iStock/Thinkstock(NAPLES, Fla.) -- Tampa Bay resident Jessica Brightman decided to join her parents in Naples to ride out Hurricane Irma, expecting the storm to largely wreak havoc on the state's east coast.



But on Saturday, a hitch in her plan emerged: Naples was projected to be in Irma's path.



Still, her parents' home is ready for Irma: The windows are boarded up, and the cupboards are stocked with food, bottled water and other supplies.



Brightman, who works at the University of South Florida in Tampa, is documenting her stay for ABC News.



Saturday, early afternoon



Even with all the hurricane monitoring, storms can still be very unpredictable, and getting in the car just driving from place to place trying to avoid the storm only causes more chaos. Naples is an evacuation zone, but at this point it's better to stay and shelter in place rather than driving around to different emergency shelters that are all at capacity. Some parts of Collier County are even going to be under a tornado watch as well, so you're either combating the wind or the water or both.



It has definitely been a long week, with a high-anxiety weekend ahead. And it does not help to have friends and family who live in a different state calling you to give "shoulda-coulda-woulda" advice. There are numerous factors that must be taken into consideration when preparing for a hurricane and/or evacuating, and that extra stress is the last thing Floridians need at the moment.



At this point, it's just a long waiting game for Irma to show up and pass through the state.



Saturday, late afternoon



Everyone in Naples has either gone off the roads and evacuated, or sheltered in place. And it's all just a waiting game now.



In Naples, we are shuttered up and just waiting for the storm to come through and ride it out and see how it goes. A lot of the neighborhood has left. It's pretty empty and quiet down here, but we're just waiting for Irma.



Saturday, 6 p.m.



The rain starts.



Saturday 6pm Naples (credit Jessica Brightman) pic.twitter.com/amac6ulUmM  Emily Shapiro (@EmilyShapiroABC) September 10, 2017

Because of the threat of the storm surge, my mom was getting too nervous, so she had us go to a shelter. It's definitely an odd feeling knowing that only your most important valuables/possessions -- aside from family -- are with you in a backpack because of the unknown of what's to come. Here's to a long 24-36 hours ahead! I wonder how many books I'll get through.Copyright  2017, ABC Radio. All rights reserved.
Opinion / Columnist

Towering music star Jah Prayzah has joined the list of artistes whose music has been dragged into politics by Zimbabweans yearning for a new leader to take over from President Robert Mugabe who has been in power since 1980.The Uzumba-born artiste's forthcoming studio album titled Kutonga Kwaro, to be released on October 13 this year, has already been unofficially and controversially renamed Kutonga Kwaro Garwe by some mischievous music fans.Garwe is Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa's nickname.Jah Prayzah recently insisted that his forthcoming album has no political connotations. He has, however, been quick to point out that he could not prescribe how his music should be interpreted."Art is out there to inspire people to talk. What we do as artistes is interpreted in different ways by different people. It only means you are still creative if people come up with various meanings to what you give them. It should never be too obvious," the musician told the Daily News on Sunday.This is the second successive time Jah Prayzah's music has been dragged into Zanu PF's raging succession battle. Last year, some Mnangagwa supporters audaciously claimed that the Uzumba-born artiste's song Mudhara Achauya was a prophetic track about Mnangagwa's ascension to power.The song praises a powerful father figure  Shumba inoruma (a vicious lion). Interestingly, Mnangagwa is of the Shumba totem.The Zanu PF youth league has also adopted the same song Mudhara Achauya as the "theme song" at Mugabe's on-going presidential youth interface rallies currently taking place across the country.Mudhara Achauya is played as the 93-year-old leader makes his way to the podium. The league's leader, Kudzanai Chipanga, has ordered DJs engaged at the on-going rallies to only play that song for Mugabe and no one else.Jah Prayzah is not the only artiste whose songs have been dragged into politics by Zimbabweans hungry for a change in leadership.In 2001, Oliver Mtukudzi's song Wasakara, off his studio album Bvuma/Tolerance, was widely interpreted as an indirect attack on the aging leader Mugabe.In her book Oliver Mtukudzi: Living Tuku Music in Zimbabwe, Jennifer Kyker states that the song was adopted as a de facto political anthem by members of the opposition MDC party."As one of Mtukudzi's band members told me, The opposition basically took it, and said to the president of Zimbabwe, You must accept that you are old.'' During live performances of the song, MDC members began engaging in overtly political gestures, flashing red cards to signify dissatisfaction with Zanu PF and waving their open palms in the air in a symbol of support for the MDC...," Kyker wrote.She added that a sound engineer called Steven Schadendorff landed in trouble during a live show at the Harare International Conference Centre (HICC) when he shone a beam on the portrait of Mugabe during Tuku's performance of the song which forced the crowd to sing along.Mugabe's official portrait is hung on the wall in all government departments' offices and buildings. It is also hung in the HICC.As the crowd sang along "Bvuma, Bvuma Chete, Bvuma Wasakara, Bvuma Waunyana (Accept, accept that you are on the wane, accept you now have wrinkles on your skin)," Schadendorff continuously shone the beam on the long-serving Zimbabwe leader's portrait.Academic Fred Zindi claimed last year that Wasakara was the major reason why the University of Zimbabwe denied the most internationally-acclaimed Zimbabwean musician an honorary degree.Then there is the late dendera star Simon Chimbetu's song titled Simba Nederere, off the blockbuster Survival (1997) album. It triggered a cocktail of interpretations with some people claiming that it was targeted at Mugabe because he had reneged on his promise to prioritise the welfare of war veterans of Zimbabwe's long-drawn-out liberation struggle.Another song which some Zimbabweans alleged was dripping with political intrigue was the late sungura star Leonard Dembo's Musha Rudziiko? The song continues to generate debate with some sections of the society claiming the song was meant to highlight the political and economic challenges that Zimbabwe has faced since the turn of the millennium.In the song Dembo asks: "Musha rudziiko usingafare pwere? (What kind of a home is this where children are always sad?)". Some politically-inclined music fans claim that Dembo was asking why innocent Zimbabweans were being denied their happiness.
All eyes are on the humanitarian crisis, but what impact will the Rohingya exodus have on the region as a whole?

Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya have been forced to flee Myanmar and their numbers are rapidly declining in the country. All eyes are understandably on the humanitarian crisis, but what effect will the exodus have not only on Myanmars stability, but on the region as a whole?

Images of burning villages and large parts of a population displaced are all too familiar in Southeast Asia.





After a vote for independence in 1999, hundreds of thousands of East Timorese had to escape military violence. Indonesian soldiers with the help of local militia destroyed and burned villages in a territory that had been under Indonesian rule for 24 years.

Of course, the struggle of the East Timorese who wanted independence was very different from the desire of Myanmars majority-Muslim Rohingya minority to obtain citizenship of the country they have lived in for centuries.

But there are striking similarities between the military backlashes in the two countries going through a difficult process of democratisation and reluctantly accepted civilian leadership amid strong ethnic and religious divisions.

Violence by the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) has given the Tatmadaw, as Myanmars military is called, an excuse to unleash a violent crackdown against the Rohingya minority as a whole.

At the same time, it shows people in and outside of Myanmar that the military is the only institution that can protect the countrys stability.

READ MORE: Who are the Rohingya?

This makes Nobel Peace laureate and state counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi not more than a symbol used by the army as the democratic face they need to rid themselves of international condemnation and sanctions.

Looking at how Aung San Suu Kyi endorsed the military crackdown and accused humanitarian organisations of aiding ARSA, it seems a role she is happy to play.

Many in Myanmar gave her the benefit of the doubt when she formed this alliance with the military. Their hope for a real democracy has now become increasingly slim.

Other ethnic groups with ongoing conflicts with the military are warned.

Region looks on

While most Muslim communities in Southeast Asia stayed quiet during last years military operation in Rakhine State, this time thousands have taken to the streets in Indonesia and Malaysia, many of them carrying anti-Buddhist banners.

Fearing religious tensions and increasing pressure on his own government, Indonesias President Joko Widodo immediately sent Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi to Myanmar and Bangladesh.

Pressure on ASEAN, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, and especially on Indonesia, to intervene is increasing.

READ MORE: Critics circle Aung San Suu Kyi over Rohingya crisis

Religious tensions between Buddhists and Muslims and a radicalised Rohingya community is something many in the region want to prevent.

But Indonesias quiet diplomacy has yet to bear results  even though Myanmar can learn a lot from Indonesias history.

During the military violence in 1999, Indonesia did accept international peacekeepers to restore security in East Timor and international investigators who could document atrocities committed.

Although the military commanders have never been jailed, Indonesia has learned from this dark chapter in its history and grew to become a democracy ever since.

An example Aung San Suu Kyi and the Tatmadaw have yet to follow.
A sons journey into his fathers dark past to find out why he had to flee Chile during the military dictatorship.

I wont tell in this letter what happened to me during the training sessions, what they did to me, or what they made me watch.

What I can say is that the human being is a beast. The training led to the systematic removal of all human functions of an individual and the destruction of their personality.

I witnessed terrible cruelties. I got to know hidden prisons, prisoners in a state of madness, including ex-military staff. My life became a hell.

Jorge Lubbert was only 22 years old when he wrote these words. He had fled from his native Chile to Germany months before in September 1978 and he was asking the German secretary of Amnesty International, Helmut Frenz, for help  the Chilean secret services had found him in Berlin and he was no longer safe.

What happened in the months before Lubberts escape from Chile had traumatised him. Not long after reaching out to Frenz he found himself in the care of Jorge Barudy, a psychotherapist based in Leuven, Belgium. Barudy was part of a collective that helped refugees from Latin America who had been subjected to torture.





Doctor Barudy believed that people who are traumatised have to vomit their trauma out in a way, explains Andres Lubbert, 32, Jorges son. They have to get it all out in order to move on.

Throughout his therapy sessions, Lubbert systematically told his story, which was recorded on audio tapes. Jorges brother, Orlando  also in exile  typed the testimony out on 40 pages.

Jorge, who is now 61 years old, stuck around in Leuven. He married a Belgian woman and had two sons with her. Filmmaker Andres is the youngest.

The relationship between him and his father was strained. Jorge became a cameraman who often travelled to conflict zones, leaving his family behind for extended periods of time. He suffered from insomnia and, at times, struggled with addiction.

Andres never knew what had scarred his father. At age 19, he set out to investigate Jorges history, travelling to Chile at least 20 times and documenting his findings in a series of films over the course of more than 10 years. Initially, his father wouldnt talk. Then, on a visit to Chile, Orlando gave a copy of Jorges testimony to Andres.

Up until then, I thought his experience was similar to that of other Chilean exiles, that he had been part of the resistance, a revolutionary, someone who was politically engaged and had to flee because of that, Andres told Al Jazeera.

Reading [the testimony] was shocking, there are so many horrific things in there. Its a miracle he survived. I dont think many people would be able to live with a trauma like that.

Enlistment

From the testimony of Jorge Lubbert: He presented me to a Mr Cano, a tall, burly guy. This person took me directly to the boss, called Jaime Letelier  We need you to work for us. OK, I said. Fine. As a draftsman, no problem. He threatened me, using my father, my brother, who was abroad.

He told me that if I didnt sign, there would be no way out. That if I left then, I would not be safe anymore. Anything can happen to you. I said no. No, I insisted, and he carried on in an aggressive, abrupt tone, insulting me.

He grabbed me by my jacket, shook me a bit and said, Sign! They told me, You have all the skills we need and we will have them. They told me not to resist, I had to sign. I had no way out and eventually, they made me give in, the pressure was too great. I signed the paper, the contents of which were covered up.

Augusto Pinochet came to power in Chile after he overthrew the incumbent Salvador Allende in a military coup on September 11, 1973. His 17-year rule was characterised by forceful repression of any opposition to his right-wing agenda. Around 3,200 people were executed or disappeared and about 28,000 people were tortured.

Many of the human rights violations that were committed during the dictatorship were perpetrated by the secret police, the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA) which in 1977 was replaced by the National Information Centre (CNI).

Jorge Lubbert had just started working at the Chilean Telephone Company when he was introduced to Jaime Letelier and made to sign a document that enlisted him in a CNI training designed to turn him into a state agent. It was the start of a four-month long horrific ordeal.

Learn more about the torture methods used against political prisoners in Chile during the Pinochet regime.

Kidnapped

From the testimony of Jorge Lubbert: One Thursday, I arrived at my house, it was late. There was a vehicle, a new Chevy Nova, two guys quickly got out, grabbed me violently and tried to get me into the car. F**k, I thought. They were abducting me.

I screamed, I kicked, I kicked furiously. They got me into the vehicle. I didnt understand what was happening, then something unusual occurred. Behind the wheel was a person I knew, he was the brother of a friend of mine. Hes called Jose Pavez, and I knew him as a tank lieutenant stationed in Antofagasta.

I have Jose Pavezs military record here, Andres tells his father. Its December 2015 and the two are standing in the hallway of a building in Barrio Olimpico, Santiago de Chile, the neighbourhood where Jose Pavez lived back in the 1970s.

Where did you get it from? Jorge responds. He reaches out to the blue folder and nervously pulls it from Andress hands. If he finds out were investigating him and his accomplices from the secret service Im sure he still has contacts, he can find me in five minutes. Me, you, my brother Orlando  all of us, Jorge says.

Throughout his four months of training by the CNI, Jorge Lubbert would routinely get abducted, blindfolded and taken to secret locations. He lived in constant paranoia that they could take him at any moment, Andres tells Al Jazeera.

Jorges fear persisted in Belgium, and even today. Andres remembers how his father would hide in the toilet when someone knocked on the door. He still doesnt open letters.

Like most of the people Jorge identifies in his testimony, Jose Pavez Ahumada was never charged with violating human rights during Chiles military dictatorship. Only one of the men mentioned by Jorge, Rosauro Martinez Labbe, is currently under investigation for his alleged responsibility in the killing of a group of leftist activists in 1981.

More than 27 years after Pinochets rule came to an end on March 11, 1990, the process of bringing human rights abusers to justice is still ongoing. Between 1998 and 2015, 344 former agents of the state were sentenced for human rights violations, with another 1,048 under investigation as of December 2015. On June 2, 2017, 106 former DINA agents received prison sentences in the biggest mass sentence to date for human rights abuses committed under Pinochet.

Find out more about ex-Chile spy chief, Manuel Contreras, reviled for his role in kidnapping and killing thousands during General Pinochets rule, who died while serving 500-year sentence

Tortured

From the testimony of Jorge Lubbert: A very tall guy came, a commando with a rubber apron and rubber gloves. He made us enter a large room with tiles and a rather unpleasant chemical odour.

There were three corpses. Without warning, the guy with the scalpel took hold of the corpses testicles and cut them off. My stomach started churning, I went very pale. The guy approached me and gave me a piece. He put the jaw into my hands and I just fainted.

When he woke me up he said I needed to get used to being around death. You have to know about these things. He furiously grabbed a piece of flesh and rubbed it in my face. He went wild, he was mad at me.

What did this have to do with me? Jorge Lubbert asks himself. He is standing in front of what is now an amphitheatre in the Legal Medical Institute of Santiago de Chile. Nowadays, medical students study corpses here. Back in the late 1970s, the venue was controlled by the CNI.

It was to dehumanise you, to rid you of all emotion regarding the human body. So you saw no difference between dead and alive, Jorge continues. When you get used to seeing a corpse, its like seeing an animal. This is actually very much like a slaughter house.

It is still unclear why the CNI singled Jorge out for their experiment to turn a 21-year-old youth into an instrument of the secret police  someone who could kill for them.

He had technical skills, was easy to like and had a leftist group of friends without being politically engaged himself, says Andres. But well never know for sure why he was chosen  the people who participated are now part of silence pacts. As far as Andres knows, his fathers case is the only one of its kind that has been recorded.

Despite the unspeakable cruelties which have come to light since the end of the military dictatorship, like the ones inflicted on Jorge Lubbert, the Pinochet era is still a cause of division in Chilean society.

A study conducted by CeRC-Mori in July 2015 found that 15 percent of Chileans still view Pinochet as one of the best rulers Chile has had, while slightly over a fifth of those polled said the military coup was justified.

There are two levels of support for Pinochet, says Javier Rebolledo, a journalist who specialises in investigating human rights violations perpetrated by the military government. The people who would jump up and shout for Pinochet, give thanks to their general  there are very few of them left, at least those who dare to show themselves that way, he tells Al Jazeera.

But theres another group of people who are still Pinochetistas, but in a hidden way. They know its politically incorrect to support Pinochet but they do, in silence. For them, there is almost a separation between what he did for the country economically and in terms of human rights violations.

Read this related article to find out more about how Pinochet-era crimes still haunt Chile

Escape

From the testimony of Jorge Lubbert: I realised I was slowly being drawn deeper into it. Sometimes, I felt like one of them. I could not accept that. I couldnt imagine working with someone who Id see kill another person.

I felt guilty. I felt like an accomplice for being there. What saved me is that I never lost touch with my family.

On September 2, 1978, Jorge Lubbert escaped to Germany with the help of his father, before the CNIs training was completed.

What saved my father was his upbringing. He was raised with a lot of love. He was his mothers favourite. He could never betray his family and be transformed in what the secret police wanted him to become, says Andres.

Throughout Andress investigation into his fathers past, talking about what had happened was difficult for Jorge  and he has now reverted to not broaching the topic at all. He recently told me this is now over for him, Andres says.

Still, he hopes that his most recent film about his fathers story, The Colour of the Chameleon, will encourage a transgenerational debate in Chilean society.

What Ive learned is that when traumas are ignored, they are passed on from generation to generation, he says. Parents try to protect their sons and daughters from trauma by not discussing it, but that only makes the problem bigger and deeper. The only way to heal a society is by starting a dialogue.

Watch more from Andres and Jorge Lubberts journey into Chiles dark past in The Colour of the Chameleon on Witness.
Opinion / Columnist

Zimbabwe experienced another sad day on 8 September 2017 as the President of Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe and his wife Grace sunk to new lows at a so-called youth interface rally in Bindura, a town just north of the capital city, Harare.This was the eighth of the ten rallies the President must address across the country. Going by the heralded headlines for the rally, I personally expected to hear the President talk about the acute joblessness amongst the youth, corruption, social inequalities and how he intended to address these issues.What came out however, is the intention by Mugabe and his wife to get the Vice President, Emmerson Mnangagwa. If one listens carefully to Mugabe when he speaks, he sounds like he is talking of a dead Mnangagwa. It sounds like Mnangagwa was supposed to be gone by now and the speech was already in place. The Mugabes have seriously exposed themselves.First, it is now obvious that Mugabe-Youth alliance was meant to advance Mugabe's wishes. This is something Mugabe has done throughout his political life; there was the Mugabe-Army alliance that sidelined the Central Committee, the Mugabe-War Veterans alliance that pushed the white commercial farmers out, Mugabe-Women's league alliance that propelled Joice Mujuru to be a Vice President, and now Mugabe-Youth alliance. Why the Youth Alliance now?There are several things going on at the same time. Mugabe wants to push his wife to be the next President of Zimbabwe, and the interface rallies provide a huge opportunity for the Gushungo business and that of their immediate families.To achieve the first goal, Grace realizes that the Mugabe-Army alliance reached during the war of liberation stands in her way. Now she is out to dismantle that alliance under the guise of the youth interface rallies. Her focus is Chiwenga.Think about it, the Vice President who is sick and is reported not to be able to stand for 15 minutes but is frog marched to a rally to chant dictated slogans. On the other hand, Grace is given unlimited time to address the rally. She proclaims to abide by party rules then declares what the party will do in the same sentence. In Bindura, she said the passing of no confidence on Kasukuwere was null and void. The party decided and was overruled by Grace, you go figure who is in charge.On the second goal; Grace announced before that her son, Russell provided the goods that were dished at the rallies. Russell is a nice guy but he is not charitable; ZANU PF is his biggest customer and Grace understands this very well, Mnangagwa understands this very well, Chiwengwa understands this very well and something is going on here. Did someone complain?In addition, Bona found herself heading a censorship board. On what qualification or merit? Did Mnangagwa or Chiwengwa say something about it that irritated the first family. As Mugabe said, Moyo-Mnangagwa tiff is personal, can the Mugabe - Mnangagwa tiff ironically be personal?Remember there are tenders going on in the country. One very lucrative being Masvingo Road dualization project. The Masvingo rumor mill has it that the tender went to Robert Junior. This is public information so those who care to know can find out. That makes me wonder, what other tenders went to the Mugabes?And where do we find our youth again? At the useless youth interface rallies, being used like used condoms. How stupid can our youth be? Why not ask for a stake in the Masvingo road dualization instead of going to giggle at the despot's shrills and sinking so low with attacks on Mnangagwa's person?What about the army? For how long is the army going to stand by when the country is abused by one family? And the media, why not expose these tender gates?
Benjamin Netanyahu and his wife are both facing potential charges, raising questions about the prime ministers future.

The threat of criminal indictment that has hung for months over Benjamin Netanyahu, Israels prime minister, loomed much larger this weekend as it was announced that his wife, Sara, faced potential criminal charges.

Israels attorney general, Avichai Mandelblit, said on Friday that he intended to indict Sara Netanyahu with fraudulently diverting some $100,000 from public funds. The charges carry a maximum sentence of five years in jail.

The case, one of a number of corruption investigations the couple face either jointly or separately, concerns allegations that the prime ministers wife billed the state for excessive sums in running his official residence.

Mandelblit has taken the unusual step of allowing Sara Netanyahu a hearing to present her side of events before indictment  a concession normally reserved for public officials. Many observers assume she will ultimately get a plea deal to avoid jail time.

Benjamin Netanyahu quickly took to Facebook to call the draft indictment absurd and baseless, adding that his wife was a brave and honest woman and has never done anything wrong  She spends a lot of time helping children with cancer, Holocaust survivors and lone soldiers.

The charges are likely to strengthen suspicions against the Israeli prime minister as he tries to stave off four other corruption investigations.

Michel Warschawski, an Israeli political analyst, said that Sara Netanyahus indictment would seal the prime ministers fate. This will serve as an aperitif before the main meal, he told Al Jazeera. Far too much evidence has mounted up against Netanyahu. The police and justice system can only drag their feet for so long.

READ MORE: Netanyahus media scandal  Who bribed whom?

According to reports in Israeli media, police sources believe the way the Netanyahus ran their official residence reflected a pattern of behaviour.

In one of the other corruption scandals, the pair are suspected of receiving gifts from wealthy businessmen worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, including jewellery, pink champagne and luxury cigars.

Police reportedly believe they can show that the gifts were accepted as bribes  in return for the Israeli prime minister peddling influence on the tycoons behalf.

Last week, unnamed law enforcement officials told Israeli media that they would recommend Netanyahus indictment before the years end in this and another investigation, regarding backroom deals to influence media coverage.

The ultimate decision to charge the prime minister, however, rests with the attorney general, who was appointed by Netanyahu. He has been widely accused of drawing out the investigations.

The inquiry into Sara Netanyahu began two years ago, following a report by Joseph Shapira, an official watchdog known as the state comptroller, into management of the prime ministers official residence in Jerusalem.

Shapira discovered massively inflated spending. He accused the Netanyahus of using public money to furnish and improve their private home in Caesarea and to pay for the care of Saras elderly father. Sara was also suspected of pocketing thousands of dollars in refunds from bottle returns, and exaggerating dinner party numbers to justify hiring private chefs.

The report contributed to an image of Sara Netanyahu as Israels Marie Antoinette.





Mandelblit, however, failed to include most of these allegations in his draft indictment. The charges relate only to excessive spending on catering. Amir Oren, a senior columnist with Haaretz, accused the attorney general on Saturday of doing only half the job.

The Netanyahus have blamed their former chief caretaker, Meni Naftali, for running up the huge bills.

Naftali won damages against Sara Netanyahu last year for abusing him and other members of the household staff. He has accused her of temper tantrums and drinking up to three bottles of champagne a day.

Netanyahu himself was not investigated in what is being called the meals-ordering affair, after the couple claimed he took no part in managing the official residence.

Given the number of unresolved scandals engulfing the Netanyahus, the response from fellow politicians has so far remained muted, noted Warschawski.

Tzipi Livni, a former justice minister, limited her criticism to the prime ministers Facebook posts. What hasnt been heard is an appropriate response from a decent prime minister, she said on Twitter.

That may in part be explained, said Warschawski, by the fact that the investigations are having little impact on many of Netanyahus traditional core supporters. Instead, the prime minister has presented himself as a victim of persecution by the police, justice system and media.

By contrast, opposition demonstrators have accused the attorney general of procrastinating. Naftali, the Netanyahus former caretaker, is among the leaders of a large weekly protest rally outside Mandelblits home.

Yossi Alpher, who once served as an aide to former Prime Minister Ehud Barak, said Netanyahu would be more worried about the scandals cumulative effect on the rights wider base of support.

READ MORE: Israels Netanyahu suspected of criminal conduct

The impression is gaining ground that the Netanyahu family interpreted the premiership as a licence to live like kings, he told Al Jazeera.

One cannot ignore the politics of this, either. The allegations will eventually encourage rivals of the Netanyahus on the right to rear their heads and challenge him.

Police sources have told the Israeli media that they are making strong headway in the investigations.

Netanyahu is in big trouble, said Warschawski. Many members of his inner circle are either under arrest or about to be. They are turning state witness. The trail of suspicion will keep leading to him.

A significant development is expected on September 17, when a gag order is due to be lifted on the testimony of Netanyahus former chief of staff, Ari Harow, who turned state witness last month. His statements are reported to provide damaging information in the two main corruption investigations faced by the prime minister.

In the first  dubbed Case 1,000  the Netanyahus have admitted to receiving lavish gifts worth hundreds of thousands of dollars from a wide range of businessmen.

According to law enforcement sources, new testimony from one, Arnon Milchan, a Hollywood mogul and former Mossad agent, has served to strengthen suspicions that Netanyahu accepted the gifts as bribes.

Milchan, who was questioned last week for the first time as a criminal suspect, reportedly said he had approached Netanyahu both for help in lobbying US authorities for a 10-year visa and for assistance with selling shares in Israels troubled Channel 10 TV station.

The Netanyahus eldest son, Yair, is also implicated, after receiving free flights and hotel rooms from Milchans friend, the Australian tycoon James Packer. Packer sought help with gaining residency and preferential tax status in Israel.

A second investigation  Case 2,000  is also advanced. Taped conversations between Netanyahu and Arnon Mozes, a media publishing magnate, suggest the prime minister tried to cut a secret deal for with Mozes for more positive coverage from his titles.

READ MORE: Netanyahus wife probed over alleged state funds misuse

Netanyahu indicated to Mozes that, in return for his Yedioth Ahronoth groups support, he would pass a law imposing a cover charge on Israel Hayom, a free newspaper known for cheerleading the prime minister. The move would have weakened the circulation of Yedioth Ahronoths main rival.

Phone logs released last week embarrassed Netanyahu by appearing to contradict his claims that he had no influence over Israel Hayoms coverage. They show that he was in regular contact with the papers editor.

Israel Hayom is owned by US casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, a strong Netanyahu supporter and a major donor to the US Republican party.

In the background are two additional corruption scandals that risk engulfing Netanyahu.

Case 3,000, the most serious of all the investigations, involves allegations of bribery and corruption among Netanyahus inner circle over a $2bn deal to buy German-made missile boats and submarines. The case has yet to implicate Netanyahu directly, but investigators have homed in on officials close to the prime minister.

David Sharan, a former key adviser to Netanyahu, was arrested this month on suspicion of accepting bribes in the affair, as was Eliezer Sandberg, a former government minister and ally of Netanyahus. Other figures close to the prime minister under investigation include Harow; David Shimron, Netanyahus lawyer and cousin; and Avriel Bar-Yosef, appointed by Netanyahu to the National Security Council.

Germany has threatened to cancel delivery if corruption is confirmed. The three Dolphin subs are due to join an existing fleet capable of carrying nuclear warheads.

Netanyahus former defence minister, Moshe Yaalon, told CNN in July that he was absolutely sure Netanyahu would be indicted over the submarine affair. He accused the prime minister of interfering to advance the purchase of the submarines against the advice of defence officials.





Netanyahu, however, has claimed he knew nothing about the contract, even though Shimron, his lawyer, was also representing ThyssenKrupp, the German shipbuilder responsible for the submarines manufacture.

But, as Israeli analyst Ben Caspit has observed, Netanyahus denials may not wash with the public. If he really did not know of Shimrons involvement in the submarine deal, it could cause a lot of people to wonder if such a person is sufficiently competent to lead the country.

The subs are seen as a vital national security issue and one that Netanyahu should have been closely supervising.

A fourth investigation, Case 4,000, was opened in July after the State Comptroller reported on dealings between the communications ministry, until recently a portfolio held by Netanyahu, and Bezeq, Israels telecoms giant.

Netanyahu fired Avi Berger as director of the ministry, ending the latters efforts to advance broadband reforms that would have harmed Bezeq. Netanyahu replaced Berger with Shlomo Filber, a former aide, who is alleged to have provided Bezeq with confidential documents.

Another Haaretz analyst, Amos Harel, wondered last week what it said about Netanyahu that he had managed to surround himself with so many people suspected of crimes or disciplinary violations.

Warschawski warned that a cornered Netanyahu could prove dangerous. He desperately needs distractions from these scandals, he said. A ready-made target is always Gaza. The danger is that he tries to heat up things there and starts a war.
We are citizens of Myanmar, if they were to declare us citizens, we would be very happy. This is what we want.

A previous version of this story said that Jashim was interviewed at Unchi Prank camp. He was interviewed at Kutupalong new shelter camp near Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh.

Jashim, 12, comes from Rakhine State, Myanmar, which he fled 13 days ago.

My names is Jashim and I am 12 years old. Before the crisis, I was at school studying. My favourite subject was English because I thought that if I knew how to speak English then I could communicate with many people across the world and express my opinion to them. I hope I can continue studying soon because I want to become a teacher.

When the military came into our village we had to run away and hide. I saw lots of soldiers, maybe 100 or 200. They were shooting at us and burning down our houses  I was very afraid.

We hid in the jungle and then started walking to Bangladesh. It took 13 days so sometimes we had to stop in the jungle and make ourselves shelters out of the forest.

It was a difficult journey, we crossed big hills and some small rivers. While we were walking, I was always afraid that the military would be around the corner, and just before we reached Bangladesh, we had to be careful because the military had planted little bombs under the ground that would explode if we walked on them.

Im very upset about my village because its not there any more. We did not bring anything, so it is all lost. I came with my mother but my father is still in Rakhine State. He told us to save ourselves and that he would join us at a later date, but we dont know where he is and we have not heard from him.

Im worried the military found him or he stepped on a small bomb. Im glad that we are safe, but it is difficult here because there are no houses to live in and we have to sleep on the wet ground.

My message to the world is that we are citizens of Myanmar, if they were to declare us citizens, we would be very happy. This is what we want.

As told to Katie Arnold in Kutupalong new shelter camp near Coxs Bazar, Bangladesh.

This interview has been edited for clarity.

The plight of Myanmars Rohingya

An estimated more than 270,000, mainly women and children, have fled to Bangladesh in the last two weeks as a result of indiscriminate violence against civilian populations carried out by the Myanmar army.

The UN and other human rights organisations have warned that the mass exodus following killings, rapes, and burned villages are signs of ethnic cleansing, pleading for the international community to pressure Aung San Suu Kyi and her government to end the violence.

Read more to find out who are Myanmars Rohingya
DACA recipient Hugo Diaz was 10 years old when his parents decided to move to the US.

For the most part, I like to keep my personal life private but on Tuesday, September 5, I learned about a decision which could have drastic effects on my life, both personal and professional.

I am a Dreamer. What does that mean? For some, it could mean dreaming about winning the lottery and retiring on a beach. My dream is more simple.

When I was 10 years old, my parents brought me and my then 12-year-old brother Aldo to the US from Mexico on tourist visas that we overstayed. My parents made this decision after a series of unfortunate events stripped our family of our financial resources.

In the 1980s and early 1990s, my dad was a successful restauranteur. He owned several restaurants which allowed us to live a pretty comfortable lifestyle in Aguascalientes city in central Mexico.

In the early 1990s, my dad took out a loan to remodel the restaurants and promote future business. But a couple of years later, the Mexican Peso Crisis of 1994 struck. My dads business was hit hard and he was unable to pay back the loan. We lost absolutely everything. Our house, our cars and even my moms book collection, which she cherished and loved.

My parents decided to return to Oaxaca, my dads home state, to join the family farming business. With the very little money they had left, and the help of family members, they were able to invest in and plant 5,000 lime trees. My dad also had farm animals which provided some additional income through cheese making and meat sales.

It was a humble living, but I had an amazing childhood. We lived in a small town called Jamiltepec. Every day, we would go home for lunch from our nearby school, excited to see what my mom had made. On weekends, we hiked up the mountains and swam in the river. Wed spend time on the family ranch and ride horses, play with the goats, and milk the cows.





My mom was a human rights activist for the local indigenous community. I attended seminars and meetings with her, witnessing dedicated people willing to fight for the rights of others.

We had found a semblance of stability. But our lives were again uprooted when in 1997, Hurricane Pauline roared towards the Pacific coast of Mexico. When it made landfall, Pauline had been elevated to Category 4, making it one of the deadliest hurricanes to hit Mexico.

Less than 30 percent of our lime trees survived the storm.

After the hurricane, my parents tried everything to make do and provide for us. When my two older siblings, Julio and Tamy, went to college, my dad sold our few remaining cows to pay for their tuition. My parents realised then that by the time Aldo and I were ready for college, they would have nothing left to sell to help us.

Thats when they started thinking about moving to the US.

My parents are not college educated and they had done their best to provide us with a life better than their own, but felt they were running out of options. My dad was reluctant to leave his life behind and all his dreams, but he sacrificed all this to provide his kids with the opportunity for an education and a better life.

Moving to the US

Back in the 1980s, some of my dads family members had immigrated to the US and some had successfully opened their own cleaning businesses. They convinced my parents that we would be better off in the US.

So, in 2002, we got our tourist visas and travelled to Dallas, Texas to stay. Although this was not legal, my parents felt this was our only option. The option of coming to the US legally wasnt available for people without a college degree and struggling to support a family.

The transition to the US was very difficult for my family. We had no identification documents and were left outside legal structures. We were separated from our loved ones and the developments in their lives. My older brother and sister had stayed behind; we didnt know when we would see them again. My brother graduated from university, my sister had a baby, and we could not be there to share these moments with them.

The adjustment was difficult for me at school as well. It was hard walking into the 6th grade in a different country and culture, and not understand the language. I had always liked school, so much so that mom arranged for me to start 1st grade at five years old instead of at seven.

I remember walking into my new school, and for the first time ever, being scared and intimidated to go in. I felt lost. I remember the kindness of my teacher who noticed I looked confused. Realising what was happening, she asked one of the other students to translate.

I am ... grateful to the United States for being a country where a janitor can be anything he or she wants, with just a little bit of work and dedication. by Hugo Diaz, Dreamer

But, it was frustrating having to depend on other students to get my work done. In Mexico, I had always been in first place at school, always very independent.

Even lunchtime at school was difficult. I was used to going home for lunch when we lived in Mexico, where my mom would prepare the meals and the utensils were always very clean. The kids at my new school picked on me for being too proper.

It was hard on my parents too, who both worked two full-time jobs, six or seven days a week, cleaning houses and buildings.

But, we quickly became financially stable again and my mom made our one bedroom apartment feel like home. My parents were able to pay off the university fees for my older siblings and we could afford things we would have never been able to in Mexico. We bought our first computer, my mom got her own car, we were able to buy new clothes and shoes for school.

Six years after we arrived, my brother, Aldo, graduated from high school and decided to return to Mexico to study at university there. When I graduated the following year, I was planning to do the same, but was accepted with a scholarship to the University of North Texas, so I decided to stay. My parents remained in the US until I graduated from college, and in 2014, they too returned to Mexico to finally live their lives and enjoy their grandkids, family, and everything else they had left behind 12 years ago.

My parents had paid the college tuition for their four children with the money they earned in the US.

We all graduated with no student loan debts because my parents worked so hard  with no sick days, vacations, or benefits. And yes, my parents paid taxes, although we lived pay cheque to pay cheque.

Learn more about how scrapping DACA leaves Dreamers vulnerable

DACA and the life of a Dreamer

I had lived as a second-class citizen for such a long time, but, I finally felt human again when, in June 2012, Obama passed the DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals; DACA recipients are also known as Dreamers). It may sound dramatic, but when you live in fear of getting pulled over because you dont have a drivers licence, or when your professional growth is limited because you dont have a social security number, you start to realise how frustrating things can truly be. So, I became a Dreamer.

I liked maths and sustainability so I studied mechanical and energy engineering, with a minor in Spanish and mathematics.

When I was in college, in the evenings, I worked with my parents cleaning buildings. On my way home from work, I would always see a sign on a building that said Jordan and Skala Engineers. I was curious if this was a place within my grasp. I made contact with the company and a month before graduation, I was invited to apply for a position opening for recent graduates. After three interviews, I got the job as a sustainability consultant.

Ive been with the company for three years now and I am currently studying to take the test to become a professional engineer in the State of Texas.

After graduating from college, I also became a yoga teacher and also work as a part-time yoga instructor.

Since my parents left for Mexico, I am the only one of my immediate family who still lives in the US. I speak to my family daily and we share photos, plans and news with each other.

I will be forever grateful for the sacrifices my family made in order for all of us to live a better life. I am also grateful to the United States for being a country where a janitor can be anything he or she wants, with just a little bit of work and dedication.

It hurts me that the Trump Administration ended DACA, not because of me, but for the younger people who dream of a better future. Ive gained my confidence by working hard to obtain a great career and am lucky enough to quickly adapt to change so Im not scared, but I know thats not the case for everyone.

There could be millions of reasons why an immigrant ended up in America, but in the end, we are all just human beings trying to do what we can for a better life.

I hope that ending DACA is a way for Trump to put pressure on Congress to find a permanent solution to the immigration crisis in the US.

I hope that Republicans and Democrats can work together and come up with the solution to this problem.

I hope we can all work together and show compassion and understanding for the choices people make, and ask ourselves: what would you do for your loved ones?

A version of this essay first appeared on the authors Facebook page. The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeeras editorial policy.
Tensions between the Sudanese regime and militia commander Sheikh Musa Hilal has reached a tipping point in recent weeks.

On July 20, Sudanese Vice President Hassabo Abdel Rahman announced the launch of a disarmament campaign to confiscate weapons and unlicensed vehicles across Darfur. In response, Hilal made a number of inflammatory statements, saying that the disarmament campaign aimed to eliminate him and threatened military action against it. As the commander of the Border Guards militia, he currently has around 3,000 men based in an enclave under his control in North Darfur.

The situation could easily escalate and trigger a new phase of war and chaos in Darfur and threaten the capital Khartoum. Controlling Hilal would be difficult and Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir does not have many options to do so.

Who is Musa Hilal?

Musa Hilal was involved in the founding of the notorious Janjaweed, a loose group of armed militias which have fought since 2003 alongside the Sudanese government in its brutal war in Darfur. He is also the sheikh (tribal leader) of the Mahamid clan of the Rizeigat Arab tribe of northern Darfur.

Hilal was recruited by Bashirs regime to organise and lead the Janjaweed to fight against the Darfuri armed groups of the black African tribes of Darfur. Land, money and power were the incentives that Bashir offered the commander and his militiamen to fight on his side. Throughout the 14 years of conflict, Hilal was insisting that he was defending his people and the country against the armed movements.





The Janjaweed and its sub-group, the Border Guards militia, committed heinous crimes against the black African tribes of Darfur, for which the UN Security Council imposed sanctions on Hilal in April 2006. According to Human Rights Watch, Hilal and his men played an integral role in the two-year campaign of ethnic cleansing by the Sudanese army and the Janjaweed militia.

In July 2004, the Security Council adopted Resolution 1556 demanding that the Sudanese government disarm and disband the Janjaweed and bring their leaders to justice. Defying the United Nations, Bashir not only did not disband the militias but also in 2013 ended up incorporating the fighters into the Central Reserve Police, Border Guards and the newly created Rapid Support Forces (RSF). Thus, the Borders Guards and the RSF are just different names for the Janjaweed.

Hilal was also a member of Bashirs ruling National Congress Party and held a seat in the Sudanese parliament. In 2008, Bashir appointed him special adviser for the ministry of federal governance.

In 2016, a confidential UN report surfaced in the media revealing that Hilal was making $54m a year exploiting unregulated gold mines in Jebel Amer in North Darfur. The Sudanese army had effectively given away the area to his forces by withdrawing in 2013 to avoid clashes.

The rift

The rift started in mid-2013, when Hilal left Khartoum angry that the regime was ignoring his political demands. He returned to his hometown of Mustariaha in North Darfur. The situation deteriorated further when Bashir appointed the second most prominent Border Guard commander, Hamdan Hemeti, field commander of the RSF, which is attached directly to the presidency.

In 2014, Hilal withdrew from the ruling party and established the Awakening (El Sahaw) Revolutionary Council to serve as a political body representing his interests. The council also has an administrative and judicial role in the areas controlled by Hilal in Darfur.

Since his relations with the ruling regime soured, Hilal has accused the Sudanese security agencies of attempting to assassinate him several times. He has also repeatedly said that Bashir did not treat him fairly and did not reward him for the sacrifices that he made when he fought with the government against the armed rebellion in Darfur.

Hilal crossed the regime's redlines by establishing contact with the Libyan General Khalifa Haftar. by

In recent weeks, Hilal has escalated his war of words against some of the governments officials, accusing them of corruption, conspiracy and betrayal. He has mainly attacked Vice President Abdel Rahman and General Hemeti. In a widely circulated video, Hilal accused the two men of stealing millions of dollars that Saudi Arabia and the UAE offered the Sudanese government for its participation in the war in Yemen.

Hilal has opposed the deployment of the RSF militia in Yemen and has been openly calling on his fellow tribesmen not to go and fight there. Most importantly, Hilal crossed the regimes redlines by establishing contact with the Libyan General Khalifa Haftar. The Sudanese government considers Haftar an enemy and has accused him of supporting armed groups to destabilise Darfur. For his part, General Haftar has repeatedly accused the Sudanese government of supporting his opponents in Libya. Last month, the government arrested many of Hilals militiamen, including his personal guard, as they were entering Darfur from Libya.

A military threat

It is evident that Hilal has become a real problem for Bashir and his inner circle, posing a real military and political threat. He is also a judicial and legal liability for Bashir, as he possesses a lot of important information and evidence about the early stages of the Darfur conflict.

Nevertheless, the regime is not in a good position to confront Hilal militarily, as its armed forces and militias are over-stretched. These forces are currently deployed around the capital city Khartoum to defend it against any potential rebel attack and in Yemen as part of the Saudi-led coalition against the Houthi rebel group.

Furthermore, the government fears that any confrontation with Hilal might trigger massive defections from the RSF. Many reliable sources confirm that General Hemeti is reluctant to implement the governments disarmament plan in Darfur and is avoiding any military confrontation with Hilal.

Some elements within Hilals group are urging him to confront the government militarily, but he is also wary of starting an outright rebellion. He knows that his stronghold in Mastarhia in North Darfur is surrounded by many government military bases and that the government enjoys air force supremacy. Therefore, Hilal would not confront the government willingly unless he secures the full support of President Idriss Deby of Chad (the husband of Hilals daughter) and the Libyan General Haftar.

Bashirs options

It is obvious that Hilal is an angry man; he has repeatedly expressed his bitterness and dissatisfaction with Bashir for not rewarding him properly. Thus, the current tensions are essentially about power and money and do not reflect a genuine change of heart for Hilal or his total break with his criminal past. He never apologised for his crimes and it is unlikely that he all of a sudden started feeling remorse.

That is why Hilal chooses his words carefully; he has never openly attacked Bashir or the Sudanese army. On the contrary, he keeps repeating that his Border Guards militia is still a part of the Sudanese armed forces.





It is, therefore, likely that Bashir will eventually try to contain Hilal by offering him concessions in terms of power and resources as he has done many times in the past. It is possible that he is considering removing Vice President Abdel Rahman to defuse tensions and offering Hilal a say over certain political appointments at the state and federal levels of government. He might also be granted full access to the Jebel Amer area to continue extracting gold undisturbed.

Bashir may also just let Hilals Border Guards and Hemetis RSF fight it out and weaken each other. As the Darfuri armed rebellion diminished in recent years and the services of the pro-government Janjaweed militias (like Hilals) are no longer needed, they logically pose a security threat for Bashirs regime. Infighting is the perfect solution to the problem, from the regimes perspective.

But as Bashir tries to reign in the very militiamen he empowered 14 years ago, some two million internally displaced persons are still languishing in camps, living in dire conditions. The cholera epidemic, which the government has not publicly acknowledged, has affected thousands and claimed hundreds of lives.

Shifting regional dynamics, including the Gulf crisis, General Haftars growing strength in Libya and Chads decision to break off relations with Qatar, could spill over to Darfur and worsen the crisis. Sudan urgently needs a comprehensive peace plan and a well-managed political transition to democratic government. This is the only way to avert the risk of renewed conflict or disintegration, which could have disastrous consequences for regional and international peace and security.

Ahmed H Adam is a Research Associate at SOAS School of Law, University of London.

The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeeras editorial policy.
World leaders, NGOs and fellow peace prize winners speak out over Aung San Suu Kyis response to the Rohingya crisis.

Myanmars Nobel Peace Prize winning Aung San Suu Kyi is facing intense scrutiny over her response to the plight of her nations Rohingya population.

Almost 300,000 Rohingya have fled into neighbouring Bangladesh, according to the UN, since renewed violence between state security forces and the minority group began more than two weeks ago.

The disruption started on August 25 after Rohingya fighters attacked police posts in Rakhine State, on Myanmars (formerly Burma) western coast, triggering a military crackdown.

Aung San Suu Kyi, the nations state counsellor and de facto leader, claimed this week that the situation is being twisted by a huge iceberg of misinformation.

We make sure that all the people in our country are entitled to protection of their rights as well as, the right to, not just political but social and humanitarian defence, she reportedly told Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan during a phone call on September 5.

The Rohingya, frequently described as the worlds most persecuted minority, are a mostly Muslim ethnic group, who have lived in majority-Buddhist Myanmar for centuries.

There are currently around 1.1 million residents in the Southeast Asian nation, which is home to more than 100 ethnic groups and approximately 55 million people.

A number of high-profile individuals have publicly criticised Aung San Suu Kyi, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991 for her campaign supporting democracy in Myanmar, in light of the crisis.

READ MORE: Myanmar  Who are the Rohingya?

However, not all world leaders have been united in condemning Aung San Suu Kyi.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, for example, has refused to speak out and has instead offered his support to her.

We share your concerns about extremist violence in Rakhine State and especially the violence against security forces, he said during a state visit to Myanmar on September 6.

More than 400,000 people have signed an online petition calling for Aung San Suu Kyi to be stripped of her accolade, accusing her of doing virtually nothing to stop this crime against humanity in her country.

The [prize is] only to be given to people who have given their utmost to international brotherhood and sisterhood. These peaceful values need to be nurtured by the laureates of the Nobel Peace Prize, including Aung San Suu Kyi, until their last days, the change.org petition reads.

When a laureate cannot maintain peace, then for the sake of peace itself the prize needs to be returned or confiscated by the Nobel Peace Prize Committee.

Malala Yousafzai

Malala Yousafzai, a Pakistani Nobel Peace laureate, has condemned Aung San Suu Kyis apparent inaction in response to the emerging crisis in Myanmar.

Every time I see the news, my heart breaks at the suffering of the Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, Yousafzai, who famously survived being shot in the head by the Taliban, tweeted on September 3.

Yousafzai, 20, called on the international community to provide sanctuary for those fleeing the violence.

Other countries, including my own country Pakistan, should follow Bangladeshs example and give food, shelter and access to education to Rohingya families fleeing violence and terror, she wrote.

Over the last several years I have repeatedly condemned this tragic and shameful treatment. I am still waiting for my fellow Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi to do the same.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the 1984 recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize for his role in ending South Africas policy of apartheid, has also called on Aung San Suu Kyi to end the Rohingyas suffering.

Denouncing the unfolding horror, the 85-year-old implored his dearly beloved younger sister to intervene in the crisis and guide your people back towards the path of righteousness again, in an open letter published on September 7.

If the political price of your ascension to the highest office in Myanmar is your silence, the price is surely too steep, he wrote.

A country that is not at peace with itself, that fails to acknowledge and protect the dignity and worth of all its people, is not a free country. It is incongruous for a symbol of righteousness to lead such a country; it is adding to our pain.





Shirin Ebadi

Shirin Ebadi, a prominent human rights activist and 2003 winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, has accused Aung San Suu Kyi of having turned her back on democracy once she came to power.

Though stopping short of calling for the prize to be stripped, Ebadi said Aung San Suu Kyi has failed to live up to the prizes ideals.

Aung San Suu Kyi received this prize for her peaceful resistance in the face of oppression. She deserved to win it, she told Deutsche Welle. How the Nobel peace laureates behave after taking the prize has nothing to do with the Nobel committee. It is up to the laureates to honour the award. Aung San Suu Kyi fails to do.

Antonio Guterres

Antonio Guterres, the UN secretary-general, has appealed to Myanmars officials in a bid to end the ongoing crisis.

Guterres expressed concern that continued disruption could descend into a humanitarian catastrophe with implications for peace and security that could continue to expand beyond Myanmars borders in a letter sent to the UN Security Council.

Although he has not directly criticised Aung San Suu Kyi, the secretary-general condemned Myanmars leaders.

I appeal to all, all authorities in Myanmar, civilian authorities and military authorities, to indeed put an end to this violence that, in my opinion, is creating a situation that can destabilise the region, he told reporters on September 5.

The grievances and unresolved plight of the Rohingya have festered for far too long.

READ MORE: Message to the world from Jashim, a Rohingya

Recep Tayyip Erdogan

Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkeys president, has claimed he will press world leaders to help Myanmars Rohingya who he said are facing a genocide.

Turkey will raise the issue at the UN General Assembly meeting in New York this month  which will run from September 12 to September 25  according to Erdogan.

You watched the situation that Myanmar and Muslims are in  You saw how villages have been burnt  Humanity remained silent to the massacre in Myanmar, he said on September 4.

Erdogan refrained from openly criticising Aung San Suu Kyi directly, but reportedly told her in a September 5 phone call that the violence perpetrated against Myanmars Rohingya population was a violation of human rights.

During the discussion, he made clear that the Muslim world was deeply concerned about the situation, according to the Reuters news agency.

Turkey has agreed with Myanmar the right to provide aid to the countrys northwestern region, where the Rohingya crisis is most acute.

Approximately 1,000 tonnes of food, clothes and medicine were delivered to Rakhine State on September 6.

Peter Popham

Peter Popham, biographer of two books about the life and work of Kyi, has called on Aung San Suu Kyi to resign.

Citing her decision in December 2011 to abide by Myanmars constitution, which provides the army with a right to take over all powers of government whenever they feel its necessary, Popham labelled her situation desperate in an opinion piece published by The Independent on September 8.

Instead of challenging the military, she is now its poodle, its patsy, its flak-catcher in chief. Senior General Min Aung Hlaing  responsible for operations against the Rohingya  is off the hook, he wrote.

As Burmas de facto ruler, Suu Kyi bears ultimate responsibility for this grotesque over-reaction. As the most admired and famous Burmese person in the world, she owed the world an explanation for it. But her response has been lamentable  [giving] No indication at all that she shares in or even understands the outside worlds indignation.

She has only one possible recourse: accept that in December 2011 she made a fatal error, and call it a day. The world would understand.

READ MORE: Myanmar faces international condemnation over Rohingya

Boris Johnson

Boris Johnson, the UKs foreign secretary, has decried Myanmars treatment of its Rohingya population, claiming it is besmirching the reputation of Burma.

The UK hopes Kyi will now use her remarkable qualities to end the crisis, Johnson said in a statement on September 2.

Aung San Suu Kyi is rightly regarded as one of the most inspiring figures of our age, he said. I hope she can now use all her remarkable qualities to unite her country, to stop the violence and to end the prejudice that afflicts both Muslims and other communities.

Tirana Hassan

Tirana Hassan, Amnesty Internationals crisis response director, has been a vocal critic of Myanmars actions near the nations border with Bangladesh.

Though not explicitly referencing Aung San Suu Kyi, Hassan has called on the nations leaders to end the suffering, and expressed the importance of a swift resolution to the situation.

Rakhine State is on the precipice of a humanitarian disaster. Nothing can justify denying life-saving aid to desperate people, she said on September 4.

By blocking access for humanitarian organisations, Myanmars authorities have put tens of thousands of people at risk and shown a callous disregard for human life.

Hassan has also openly lamented the reported use of antipersonnel landmines on the nations border with Bangladesh, which Amnesty International claims are being used by Myanmars security forces to target those escaping the country.

Authorities must immediately end this abhorrent practice against people who are already fleeing persecution, she said.
At least 90 people killed across the country as emergency workers still look for victims under the rubble.

Anguished mourners filled the streets of the southern Mexican city Juchitan, which was devastated by the most powerful earthquake to strike in 85 years, as officials put the death toll across the country at 90.

Emergency services in the southern state of Oaxaca said on Sunday there had been 71 confirmed fatalities in the state alone from Thursday nights 8.1 magnitude quake that struck off the coast of Chiapas.

The quake was stronger than a devastating 1985 temblor that flattened swathes of Mexico City and killed thousands.

Its 71 (dead). Just for Oaxaca, said Jesus Gonzalez, a spokesperson for the state civil protection authority.

There were so many deaths that slow-moving funeral processions caused temporary gridlock at intersections as they converged on cemeteries in Juchitan.

At least 15 people died in the neighbouring state of Chiapas, according to local authorities, while another four deaths have also been confirmed in the state of Tabasco to the north.

More than 5,000 homes were destroyed and many more left without running water or electricity in Juchitan.

They pulled my father out from underneath the rubble. His house collapsed on top of him. It was difficult for them to find him as it was dark  the middle of the night, Maria Angela Molina, a Juchitan resident, told Al Jazeera.

Relief efforts in the south continued through Saturday, with many of the people worst affected still wary of returning indoors to weakened buildings, fearing they could be brought down by ongoing aftershocks.

Our main needs are basic supplies, medicines, and help with removing the rubble all over the city, Oscar Cruz Lopez, Juchitans municipal secretary, told Al Jazeera.

We need to prevent an epidemic and send people enough water and food, because there are places with no water supply, he added.

Government cargo planes delivered much-needed supplies and the military began distributing boxes of food, though many residents of this city in a region of Oaxaca state, known as the Isthmus, complained that progress was slow and they had not yet received assistance.

President Enrique Pena Nieto made a brief appearance on Friday afternoon in Juchitans devastated downtown.

The long, juddering tremor was felt some 800km away in Mexico City and as far south as Honduras. The Mexican Seismological Service reported 721 aftershocks.

Mexico sits atop five tectonic plates, making it prone to earthquakes, and has two long coastlines that are frequently battered by hurricanes.








Questions answered on the Category 4 storm that ploughed into the southwest of Florida on Sunday morning.

Hurricane Irma slammed into Florida early on Sunday, belting the southern US state with wind gusts of up to 240km per hour while threatening massive tidal surges.

Here are some fast facts on the most powerful storm to hit Florida in decades.

Where has it been so far?

Hurricane Irma began life as a tropical wave near the Cape Verde Islands on August 30. It then made its way across the Atlantic and caused catastrophic damage in the northern Leeward Islands before heading for the far north of Cuba.

How dangerous is this storm?

At its peak, its winds were around 298km per hour. It is the strongest hurricane ever recorded in the Atlantic basin outside the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico. Irma was the first Category 5 storm to affect the northern Leewards.





After dropping to a Category 3 storm on Sunday as it passed along Cubas northern archipelago, the storm has since risen to Category 4 again as it crossed warm waters between Cuba and the Florida Keys.

Irma is packing winds of up to 215km/h and gusting up to 240km/h. It is moving northwest at only 9km/h. That is no more than a gentle jogging pace.

Is it good news that the storm has slowed down?

No, not really. The large storm surge, which will be three to four metres high, and the accompanying heavy rain will be there for longer and will exacerbate the life-threatening floods. Some parts could receive as much as 500mm-600mm of rain over the next few days.

Where is it going?

Current forecasts are now taking the storm along the western coast of Florida. Initial runs of the computer model expected Irma to pass over the eastern side of the state. Subsequent runs have shifted further west, primarily because it stayed south and it clung onto the Cuban islands for longer.

Is it good news that it stayed to the south?

It was certainly good news for the Bahamas. It has also taken the sting out of the storm as far as passing over eastern Florida is concerned. However, that is the dirty side of the storm where the strongest winds will still affect the large conurbations of Miami and Orlando.

The storm surge of 3-4 metres is now forecast to pass up the western side of the state with big waves on top of that.

When will the storm clear Florida?

The eye wall is currently hitting the Florida Keys as a Category 4 storm. Irma is expected to pass close to, if not make landfall, near Fort Myres at about 00:00 GMT on Monday.

This is a massive storm with hurricane force winds extending about 130km from the centre of the storm. Tropical storm force winds are currently spread around 350km from the eye. Irma is staggering along so slowly that it may take two days to clear into Alabama still as a Category 1 hurricane.
Residents hunker in shelters amid power cuts and waves of rain, as hurricane strengthens to Category 4.

Hurricane Irma began pummeling Florida late on Saturday, threatening almost the entire southeastern US state after cutting a deadly path of destruction through the Caribbean.

Tens of thousands of Floridians were hunkering down in shelters for a direct hit from the monster storm, after more than 6.3 million  nearly a third of the states population  were ordered to evacuate.

For those still at home, it was already too late to escape the wrath of what could be the worst hurricane in storm-prone Florida.

More than 170,000 homes and businesses in Florida have lost power and the centre of Irma is about 140km southeast of Key West.

Florida Power & Light said on its website that more than half of those outages were in the Miami-Dade area, where about 600,000 people have been ordered to evacuate.

If you have been ordered to evacuate anywhere in the state, you need to leave right now. Not tonight. Not in an hour. Now. You are running out of time to make a decision, Governor Rick Scott said hours before wind gusts began to lash the island chain known as the Florida Keys.

At North Collier Regional Park, a designated shelter just outside the city of Naples, anxious evacuees prayed they and their loved ones would remain safe when the storm made landfall.

All we wanted to make sure is to feel safe and whatever happens we just have to start I guess from the beginning, Viviana Sierra said.

MacDill Air Force Base, the military installation home to US Central Command, issued mandatory evacuation orders with the eye of the storm expected to pass over its home city of Tampa early Monday. The Kennedy Space Center was also closed.

The White House said President Donald Trump, Vice President Mike Pence and their cabinet were briefed on Hurricanes Irma and Jose, with Trump warning on Twitter that this is a storm of enormous destructive power.

After blasting through the nearby Cuban coastline, Irma weakened from a maximum-strength Category 5 to a Category 3 storm, but then strengthened again to a Category 4, with 210km/h winds, as it approached south Florida.

With near-hurricane force winds lashing the Florida Keys starting around 8:00pm (01:00GMT), the Miami-based National Hurricane Center (NHC) warned that Irma is forecast to re-strengthen as it approaches mainland Florida.

There was a serious threat of flooding from storm surges of up to 4.5 metres along Floridas west coast  enough to cover a house.

At least 25 people have been killed since Irma began its devastating march through the Caribbean earlier this week.

Terrified Cubans who rode out Irma in coastal towns after the storm made landfall on Friday on the Camaguey archipelago reported deafening winds, uprooted trees and power lines, and blown rooftops.

There were no immediate reports of casualties, but officials reported significant damage. A total of 1.5 million people were evacuated.

When Irma eventually hits land it might be a Category 3, which is significantly less than what was predicted, said Al Jazeeras Alan Fisher, reporting from Miami.

But that is still a major storm and still could cause significant destruction across Florida.

While Miami would likely escape the worst, Key West is going to be hammered, Fisher said.

This was a city that was prepared for the worst and has been preparing since Monday to what might come their way, Fisher said.

Michael Hernandez, adviser to Miamis mayor, told Al Jazeera: Weve taken unprecedented measures to protect our residents.

We feel that we have done all that we can  whether this storm hits us as a Category 5, 4, or what theyre saying since its moved away  a Category 1 or 2. It doesnt matter. We made the right call.

Mass exodus

In Florida, cities on both the east and west coasts took on the appearance of ghost towns, as nervous residents heeded insistent evacuation orders.

The storm was expected to move along or near Floridas southwest Gulf coast by Sunday afternoon.

But Irma is so wide that authorities were bracing for destructive storm surges on both coasts and the Keys, the chain of low-lying islands that stretch south of Miami towards Cuba.

WATCH: Whats behind worlds recent extreme weather events? (25:15)

And hurricane-force winds are expected to lash the peninsula as it rolls north towards Georgia.

A tornado funnel cloud has already formed off the coast of Fort Lauderdale, with the NHC warning that a few more were possible in south and central Florida.

On Interstate 75, a major highway along the western coast of Florida, a steady stream of cars pressed northward as thousands fled at the last minute from the fast-approaching killer hurricane.

Bumper-to-bumper traffic snaked north out of the state, with mattresses, petrol cans and kayaks strapped to car roofs.

Strip malls, fast food restaurants and retail giants were all closed for business.

In Key West, police opened a shelter of last resort for those who had ignored mandatory evacuation orders.

Scott Abraham, who lives on the fifth floor of a beachfront apartment building in Miami Beach, is planning to ignore evacuation orders and ride the storm out with his wife and two kids.

If I lived in a house, I would have left, but if it gets flooded here its going to take a week at least to come back. I dont want that, he said.

Warning that Irma would be worse than Hurricane Andrew  which killed 65 people in 1992  Scott, Floridas governor, said all 20.6 million Floridians should prepare to flee.

Path of destruction

The storm smashed through a string of Caribbean islands, beginning with tiny Barbuda on Wednesday, followed by the holiday islands of Saint Barthelemy and Saint Martin.

Also affected were the US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, Haiti and the Turks and Caicos. The Bahamas were spared Irmas worst.

Houses are smashed, the airport is out of action, Saint Barthelemy resident Olivier Toussaint said.

Upside-down cars are in the cemeteries. Boats are sunk in the marina, shops are destroyed.

Another powerful storm, Category 4 Hurricane Jose, was heading towards the same string of Caribbean islands Irma has pummeled in recent days, though it was now forecast to be weaker than initially expected.

The deteriorating weather grounded aircraft and prevented boats from bringing relief supplies to hard-hit islands.

The US military was mobilising thousands of troops and deploying several large ships to aid with evacuations and humanitarian relief, as the Air Force removed scores of planes from the southern United States.
Sixteen years after Sept 11 attacks and the US has not convicted anybody for the tower-felling spectacle of terror.

New York City  Time moves slowly for the five men accused of the 9/11 attacks.

Sixteen years after the World Trade Center was toppled, the case against the alleged mastermind and his co-plotters looks set to drag on for years, if not decades, defence lawyers told Al Jazeera.

Apart from Hurricane Irmas 250kph winds, little moves fast at Guantanamo Bay, the US Navy base in southeast Cuba where the men are detained. Their proceedings have not picked up pace since Donald Trump became president of the United States in January.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, or KSM, has been dubbed the architect of 9/11. He and his four alleged co-conspirators all face the death penalty in a case that is still crawling through the pretrial stages of a military commission.

It perplexes me that this isnt a cause for more outrage back in the US, Shayana Kadidal, a lawyer on several post-9/11 cases for the Center for Constitutional Rights legal action group, told Al Jazeera.

According to the government, you have the person by far most responsible for planning 9/11 and a couple of people just below him responsible for executing the plot. Theyve been sitting in detention for the most part of 14 years, without trial, and, by all appearances, any trial is years and years off.

READ MORE: How will Guantanamo be remembered?

At a hearing in August, prosecutors mooted an early 2019 trial start date, saying it would take between six and eight weeks to lay out evidence that the men planned and aided the hijacking of four passenger jets on September 11, 2001.





They would be tried on the 117-square-kilometre base, popularly known as Gitmo, on charges of terrorism and some 3,000 counts of murder in violation of the law of war. They could face execution if convicted by a jury of military officers.

They were arraigned in 2012, but the case has become bogged down in pretrial motions as defence lawyers claimed they were bugged and spied on and requested classified evidence of torture-like treatment in CIA custody.

Therere so many obstacles to trial that Im not sure theyll ever get there, Nancy Hollander, a lawyer in a separate Guantanamo case, told Al Jazeera.

Should the men ultimately be convicted, appeals would likely drag on for years longer before reaching the US Supreme Court, she said.

Lets say by some miracle theyre found not guilty, theyre not going home, added Hollander. These are show trials and bad show trials at that.

READ MORE: Guantanamos Child  Omar Khadr

KSM allegedly hatched the 9/11 plot, secured al-Qaeda boss Osama bin Ladens support, and oversaw operations and trained hijackers in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The other men  Walid bin Attash, Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Ammar al-Baluchi and Mustafa al-Hawsawi  allegedly trained hijackers, arranged travel and flight school courses or wired money to fund the attacks on New York and Washington, DC.





The evidence against KSM is strong, said Kadidal, not least because he bragged to Al Jazeera journalist Yosri Fouda about his involvement in 2002  before he was arrested by Pakistani authorities in Rawalpindi in March 2003.

But prosecutors have problems too. KSM was waterboarded 183 times in a single month and endured sleep deprivation and rectal rehydration, according to a Senate report on CIA torture techniques. This provides ammunition for his defence team.

The accused men were originally arraigned in 2008, but those charges were suspended when former President Barack Obama, a Democrat, opted for civilian trials in New York. That plan was blocked by legislators amid outrage from victims families.

Many people say justice is taking too long. Joel Shapiro, whose wife died in the attacks, has called for dropping the death penalty and cutting plea deals with the accused. Terry Strada, who lost her husband and runs a group for 9/11 families, disagrees.

I know its been a very long time and some family members are upset, Strada told Al Jazeera. Theyre doing everything in their power to ensure that no mistakes are made, and theres no opportunity for them to have a mistrial and elude the guilty verdicts they deserve.

On Monday, Strada will attend a private service at the start of a day of vigils across the US, as well as the televised reading of victims names at a four-hour ceremony in lower Manhattan where the Twin Towers once stood.

READ MORE: The 9/11 decade  global reflections

Opened in 2002 as a makeshift camp to hold men captured in the early fight against al-Qaeda, Guantanamo became a symbol of Washingtons heavy-handed response to 9/11. It held some 680 men at its peak in July 2003, falling to nearly 240 when Obama took office in 2009.

Obama never made good on campaign pledges to shutter Guantanamo, but a flurry of transfer deals with Saudi Arabia, Oman, and other countries at the end of his presidency brought the detainee population down to 41.





Advocates say it keeps killers behind bars. Critics say it violates rights by holding men indefinitely without charge, that it feeds anti-US sentiment abroad, and that detainees could be held more cheaply in jails on the US mainland.

During the campaign, Trump, a Republican, promised to load it up with more bad dudes. An executive order, drafted in February but not issued, called for Guantanamo to house captured fighters from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant group (ISIL).

Trump may have the popular mood: a CNN/ORC poll last year found that 56 percent of Americans wanted Guantanamo kept open. Last month, secretary of state Rex Tillerson announced plans to remove the envoy responsible for shuttering it.

White House Chief of Staff General John Kelly, whose son was killed fighting in Afghanistan, has argued to keep it open. Attorney General Jeff Sessions called it a very fine place to interrogate and prosecute terrorism suspects.

READ MORE: Saudi embassy may have funded 9/11 dry run  report

However, after al-Qaeda suspect Ali Charaf Damache was extradited to the US from Spain in July, he was sent for trial at a Philadelphia federal court rather than Guantanamo. This was likely a condition of the Spanish courts, said Hollander.

Karen Greenberg, who runs Fordham Universitys Center on National Security, said the Trump administrations signals suggest the future of anybody whos at Guantanamo Bay is as much in limbo as its ever been.

Besides KSM and his co-accused, two other men face military commissions. The inmates also include five men who have been cleared for release and 26 so-called forever prisoners who are held indefinitely without charge.

The American public has forgotten about Guantanamo. History in this country is short, said Hollander.

Do most Americans care about Guantanamo? No. But they never did. And they never understood Guantanamo.

Follow James Reinl on Twitter: @jamesreinl
Russian foreign minister meets Saudi counterpart in Jeddah and calls on Gulf countries to resolve differences.

Arab countries involved in a diplomatic dispute with Qatar should enter into direct talks with Doha to solve the crisis, Russias foreign minister said on a trip to Saudi Arabia.

Speaking through an interpreter at a news conference on Sunday, Sergey Lavrov also called for the unity of the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC).

Its for the benefit of everyone to bring back the unity of the GCC, Lavrov told reporters in Jeddah. This is important in sorting out the regions problems.

He added that Russia supported mediation efforts by Kuwait and attempts by the United States to resolve the crisis.





We need to bring stability in the Middle East and North Africa, Lavrov said. We are keen to sort out this problem, and we need to support mediation efforts. We need to maintain the unity of the GCC.

Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt severed ties with Qatar on June 5, accusing it of supporting terrorist groups  a charge it denies.

Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir told the news conference that Qatar needed to show seriousness in finding a solution to the crisis.

Qatar knows what Qatar has to do. We need things to be clarified and matters to be serious in order to find a solution, Jubeir said.

He also repeated the kingdoms demand that Qatar stops supporting terrorism and interfering in other peoples affairs.

We will continue in this direction until Qatar responds to the will of the international community and stops supporting terrorism, Jubeir said.

Qatar-Gulf crisis: All the latest updates

The press conference in Jeddah came a day after Saudi suspended plans to hold talks with Qatar.

Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman spoke by phone on Friday in the first official contact between Doha and Riyadh since the beginning of the crisis more than three months ago.

However, Saudi Press Agency later reported that Qatars state media had published a distortion of facts, and announced the suspension of the talks.

SPA did not clarify what was meant by distortion.
Opinion / Interviews

Former Finance minister Tendai Biti is one of the heavyweights that have thrown their weight behind the MDC Alliance, an opposition coalition that is rallying behind ex-prime minister Morgan Tsvangirai in his bid to topple President Robert Mugabe in next year's elections.Last month, Biti joined Tsvangirai and MDC leader Welshman Ncube at a colourful ceremony to launch the MDC Alliance at Zimbabwe Grounds, evoking memories of the formation of the original MDC in 1999.Another event to mark the establishment of the alliance was held in Bulawayo on September 2 but it was boycotted by leading opposition figures in the region from MDC-T and Biti's People's Democratic Party (PDP).The snub by leaders such as Thokozani Khupe, Lovemore Moyo and Gorden Moyo was confirmation that the formation of the alliance has divided instead of uniting them.However, Biti (TB) told reporter Obey Manayiti (OM) that the divisions would not derail the alliance, vowing that nothing will stop him from backing Tsvangirai in the 2018 polls. Below is the full interview.OM: Has there been any progress in negotiations to join the MDC Alliance since the launch in Harare in July?TB: As I said before, the issue of unity is not negotiable and so we are part of the MDC Alliance and we are committed to the MDC Alliance and we are going to make it work.Obviously and naturally, the terms of entry have to be negotiated.They are still yet to be negotiated, there are one or two challenges here or there but I hope personally that those negotiations one way or the other should be concluded on the 30th of September, that is my dream and hope as the leader of the PDP.OM: What guarantee is there that you will meet this deadline considering that you missed the previous two-week deadline that was announced at the Harare launch of the MDC Alliance?TB: There is no guarantee. This is just an indicative date but we need to make progress.OM: What challenges have the partners faced in trying to reach a deal?TB: I think for me, the biggest challenge is that this is a paradigm shift for all of us.It is a learning curve for all of us, so anything that is new is problematic but thankfully, there is sufficient consensus and sufficient gravitas to understand that this is the right thing to do and we have to do it.OM: Are you not running out of time to launch a meaningful campaign?TB: Not at all, because we are already working. I can give you an example that in 2001 Kenya formed the National Rainbow Coalition (NAC) for the 2002 election.The election was in December and NAC was only formed in August but ideally, let's conclude and let's conclude as soon as possible.OM: There are some within the PDP who are openly against your party joining the MDC Alliance. What are their grievances?TB: As I said, it is healthy to have divergent views in an organisation. What is not acceptable is for any leader to take refuge in tribalism or regionalism.That is not acceptable, but to have a healthy debate on a matter of principle is healthy but it must also be understood that the leader must have the privilege of producing the vision and carrying the vision.The leader must have that privilege and in my capacity as the leader, my vision is that there is no substitute to unity and my colleagues must respect that.OM: We have seen a trend where those against the coalition are called names. Is it correct to label those that have misgivings about the MDC Alliance tribalists or regionalists?TB: Look, the beautiful thing about the democratic movement in Zimbabwe is that when we formed and started the MDC there was no race and there was no tribe and that is why we did so well because we were representing everyone and anyone.All of us thought nationally and none of us thought regionally and that regional thinking must not start now. Tribal thinking must not start now.OM: Some senior officials in the PDP accuse you of repeating the same mistakes that led to the MDC-T split in 2014 by side-lining some members of the executive and making unilateral decisions on the alliance. Is there truth in such allegations?TB: The fact that no agreement has been signed means that I have not made any decision but the decision to unite is a collective decision, it is a founding principle of our party.You know that we went to Mandel on the 26th of April and we said we wanted to reinvigorate the Zimbabwean politics and one of the points of reinvigoration was convergence and unity.In the past four years we have spent time trying to have an alliance with MDC (led by Welshman Ncube) and Joice Mujuru and Code [Coalition for Democrats].Those questions were not asked but they are now being asked because Tsvangirai is there and so I have a problem because I know Zanu PF doesn't want Tendai Biti and Tsvangirai to collude.So I am thinking is this an accident or what and as far as I am concerned questions must not start to be raised now because we are talking to the MDC-T but when we were talking to everyone else these questions were never asked.After all, our lead negotiator is secretary general (Gorden Moyo).OM: Ahead of your executive meeting on Friday you were accused of sidelining Gorden Moyo, Lucia Matibenga, Thaba Moyo and Songezo Tshabangu. Why were they not invited to the meeting?TB: There was no executive meeting on Friday. I as president had a consultative meeting with all our provincial chairpersons and everyone was invited to that meeting, so many came.[Evelyn] Masaiti, [Jacob)]Mafume came, [Moses] Manyengavana came, the youth chairperson came, the secretary for international relations came so it was an open meeting and I even asked people to record.People shouldn't specialise on trivialities. We are facing a challenge in Zimbabwe, we have an incurable party called Zanu PF that is destroying our country. Ninety-nine percent of our people are unemployed, 82% of our people are living in extreme poverty and surviving on 35c a day.Critical questions are asked on how do we give these people hope, how do we rebuild our country, how do we build the transformative democratic developmental state.How do we build the national transitional authority and those things are not going to be resolved by disunity and division.They need a national answer so cowards shouldn't hide behind that because we have a national duty to do, which is to deliver our country.So if the idea of unity is wrong then let me be marked wrong and let my party remove me at the next congress.OM: Some are saying your party is on the verge of a split because of these problems. Can you shed some light into this?TB: That is nonsense. Unity will never split us and that is absolutely nonsense.OM: As principals in the MDC Alliance, have you started working on the message for the 2018 elections.TB: Yes, yes, yes, but I can't disclose details, you have to speak to our spokesperson Jacob Ngarivhume but there is a lot of work that is being done or that is going to be done, particularly this coming week but I can't disclose it.OM: Do you think you will match Zanu PF's campaign which has already started embarking on countrywide rallies to mobilise its supporters?TB: These are goodbye rallies. Don't be intimidated by Mugabe goodbye rallies. The Zanu PF youths are saying goodbye to an old man and don't be confused. In any event, shops are shut and people are forced to attend. We have seen this before and don't be intimidated.
As death toll climbs to 90, residents of town hit by the 8.1-temblor say authorities reacted too slowly to their plight.

Asuncion Ixtaltepec, Mexico  Public safety director Jersey Rios drove around this southern town with police officers to assess the damage caused by the deadly 8.1-magnitude quake  the most powerful to hit the country in 85 years.

Between 14,000 and 16,000 people live here, but only a team of 11 policemen can assist the town.

Nobody has come to offer us help. Its a miracle were alive, resident Julian Gomez told Al Jazeera.

Gomez was on the second floor of his house with his wife and seven-year-old daughter when the first tremors were felt just before midnight. The family was about to run down the stairs to exit the house, but his wife suddenly froze. In a split second, the house collapsed, and they landed on the first floor with no injuries  not even a scratch.

Its good that she froze otherwise  Gomez says, silencing himself. Were going to move to our father-in-laws house; we lost everything.

READ MORE: Death toll in Mexicos biggest quake continues to rise

Driving around the shattered town with Rios, it feels like a war zone with houses fully collapsed, many others about to, and those still standing showing visible structural damage. Some of the roads are blocked because of funeral processions, while residents cordon off streets to prevent further collapses from the vibration of moving vehicles.

Residents were also forced to provide relief efforts right after the quake with neighbours teaming up to help people buried under the rubble.





My husband and other neighbours had to rescue the teacher that lived there, says Jane Wong Morales, pointing at a pile of rubble in front of her house. He died trying to save his son and wife.

At least 90 people were killed by the temblor throughout Mexico, and the number continues to climb.

There is still no official death toll confirmed here, but Rios estimates that at least 10 people have died. He says the first action is to help people with funeral services since the closest funerary is in Juchitan, a city 10km away where the majority of relief efforts and political attention are concentrated.

We have been bringing coffins from Juchitan to bury the people, Rios says.

Before noon on Saturday, Alejandro Murat, governor of Oaxaca, arrived in Ixtaltepec to visit the families. Along with him came long-awaited help, almost 36 hours after the quake struck.

State police and the military arrived to implement the emergency plan DN-III involving using search and rescue dogs to locate missing people and rubbish removal efforts. Residents received them with loud complaints, having spent the first 24 hours with no shelter or immediate access to medical care.

There were dead people, and nobody came, a neighbour yelled at Rios while his team tried to unblock some of the streets for the governor and his entourage.

Adriana Cabrera, president of National System for Integral Family Development, had to improvise a shelter in a building that used to be a high school. At least 500 people were going to the shelter every day for food, which was donated by Mexicans from other areas in Oaxaca or neighbouring states since there is no running water or electricity.

We have not yet received any support from the state or federal authorities, Cabrera told Al Jazeera.

READ MORE: Magnitude-8.1 earthquake strikes off southern Mexico

The state government issued a statement right after the visit, but it omitted the death toll and affirmed it was a priority to provide immediate attention. Murat told Al Jazeera the main priority was to provide shelter and food.

The second phase carried out by the state civil protection authority will be to visit each house to assess damage. In the meantime, residents are sleeping on their patios or in the streets outside their houses, refusing to leave them since they fear looting.

Residents complained that the authorities that have visited so far only took photos and compiled information about the inhabitants of the homes.

Unlike Mexico City, where after the 1985 earthquake development has focused on earthquake-resistant buildings, Oaxaca and other coastal states in the same seismic zone have received little or no prevention efforts, even though the damage is usually more significant than in the capital because of their proximity to the epicentres.

A member of the military, who declined to give his name, said the first step was to evaluate the situation. But for residents time is crucial.

More than 700 aftershocks have been felt. On Saturday night, a 5.6-magnitude tremor shook already stressed out residents.

Despite being in an active seismic zone, nobody was prepared for this.

We are used to flooding, says Rios. That we can prevent, but this  its impossible.
An American historian who spent decades in Afghanistan working to preserve the heritage of the war-torn country has died following a long illness.

An Afghan government statement said on Sunday that Nancy Hatch Dupree, who first came to Afghanistan in 1962 and spent much of her life collecting and documenting historical artefacts, died in Kabul overnight at the age of 90.

She amassed a vast collection of books, maps, photographs and even rare recordings of folk music, all now housed at Kabul University, and wrote five guidebooks.

Many Afghans viewed Dupree as one of their own, and hundreds of people posted condolences on social media.

Nancy Dupree's extraordinary (and selfless) dedication to Afghanistan will not be forgotten. She passed away in her beloved kabul. RIP  Saad Mohseni (@saadmohseni) September 10, 2017

Born in 1927 in India to American parents, Dupree first came to Afghanistan as the wife of diplomat Louis Dupree, a renowned archaeologist and scholar of Afghan culture and history.

After the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, Dupree was forced to leave the country, but instead, she moved to a refugee camp in Peshawar in Pakistan to help Afghan refugees.

During her time in Peshawar, Dupree preserved government and non-government documents relating to Afghanistans history and culture during the Soviet invasion when many priceless books were sold to be used for fuel.

When the Taliban was overthrown in 2001, Dupree chose to stay in Peshawar as she was concerned about the safety of the document collection.

Dupree moved back to Kabul in 2003 and worked with the Afghan government to establish a home for the collection of documents that at the time numbered over 7,000 items.

Very saddened by the death of #NancyDupree. Afghans value and respect her services of decades for #Afghanistan. Nancy will be missed! RIP pic.twitter.com/QdCuujQKDa  Dr. Abdullah Abdullah (@DrabdullahCE) September 10, 2017

The collection was eventually moved to Kabul University where today it is now known as the Afghan Collection.

She also established the Louis and Nancy Hatch Dupree Foundation, which promotes the history and culture of Afghanistan. The foundation also ensures the safety of the document collection.
Jens Stoltenberg, NATO secretary-general, has demanded a strong and unified response to provocations from Pyongyang.

The head of NATO labelled North Koreas behaviour reckless on Sunday and called for a concerted international response to the isolated states recent nuclear and missile tests.

Pyongyang carried out its sixth and most powerful nuclear test to date on September 3.

The behaviour of North Korea is a global threat and requires a global response, and that of course also includes NATO, Jens Stoltenberg, the military alliances secretary-general, told the BBC.

NATO has not been directly involved in the crisis to date, but speculation has been mounting over whether the organisations Article 5  which says an attack on one member is an attack on all  would cover a North Korean offensive on the US Pacific territory of Guam.

Stoltenberg declined to clarify NATOs position on the matter, and instead stressed the need for a conflict-free resolution to the crisis on the Korean Peninsula.

We are now totally focused on how we can contribute to a peaceful solution of the conflict, he said.

North Korea: Kim Jong-un praises nuclear test

Michael Fallon, the UKs defence minister, offered his support on Sunday for Stoltenbergs position and declared that the UK would continue to support fellow NATO member the United States.

What we have to avoid at all costs is this spilling over into any kind of military conflict Its United States sovereign territory [Guam] and the US, of course, under the United Nations, has the right to ask other members of the United Nations to join in its self-defence, Fallon told the BBC.

North Korea announced last month it was carefully examining a plan to attack Guam, which is 3,430km from North Korea and home to some 7,000 US troops.

Kim Jong-un, the leader of the isolated state, ordered the army to be ready to launch a missile strike on Guam on August 16.
ISIL statement expressing support for Qatar in the Gulf crisis is apparently fake, says The New York Times.

The New York Times on Sunday debunked information spread by official Saudi media outlets a day earlier claiming that the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) expressed support for Qatar in the Gulf crisis.

The US publication said the ISIL statement aiming to link Qatar to terrorism was apparently fake.

It was not the first time Qatar has been targeted by misinformation.

Last month, Dubai TV aired a false report claiming anti-government demonstrations took place in Qatars capital, Doha, and alleged troops  including soldiers from Turkey  fired tear gas at protesters.

The media attacks come amid a dispute between Qatar and its neighbours  Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain  as well as Egypt.

READ MORE  Qatar-Gulf crisis: All the latest updates

The quartet cut diplomatic ties with Doha on June 5 and imposed an air, sea and land blockade on Qatar  accusing it of supporting Iran and extremists in the region.

Qatar strongly denies the allegations.

Marwan Kabalan, director of policy analysis at Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, told Al Jazeera that by spreading false news, Saudi Arabia might be diverting attention from a story in the US media about the Saudi embassys possible links to the September 11, 2001, attacks.

This shows that Saudis are doing their best to divert the attention from yesterdays reports by The New York Post and The Independent saying that the Saudi embassy in Washington did, in fact, have ties to some of the hijackers of the 9/11 attacks, said Kabalan.

The Gulf crisis kicked off in May following the hacking of Qatar News Agencys website, after which comments falsely attributed to Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani were broadcast by both UAE-based broadcasters Sky News Arabia and Al Arabiya.

The networks went big with the news, inviting guests to dissect and condemn the reported speech.
Raids targeted civilians fleeing violence on ferries across the Euphrates River, UK-based monitoring group alleged.

At least 34 civilians, including nine children, have been killed in a Russian air raid on Euphrates River ferries near Syrias Deir Az Zor city, according to a monitoring group.

Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said the air raids on Sunday targeted more than 40 ferries that left al-Boulil town southwest of Deir Az Zor for the eastern shore of the Euphrates.

No immediate response from Russian authorities was available.

Sundays attack came as Syrian troops pressed an offensive against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant group (ISIL) across Deir Az Zor province with Russian air cover.

According to the War Media channel operated by Syrian government ally, Hezbollah, Syrian troops seized full control of the 450km road linking the capital, Damascus, to Deir Az Zor for the first time in four years.

The Syrian army and its allies now control the entire international highway between Deir Az Zor and Damascus, through the cities of al-Sukhna and Palmyra, it said, referring to two other central Syrian cities recaptured from ISIL (also known as ISIS).

READ MORE: SDF in race with Syrian army for oil-rich Deir Az Zor

An alliance of Syrian Kurdish and Arab fighters backed by the United States was also on the move against ISIL in Deir Az Zor.

Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) on Saturday announced it had begun clearing ISIL fighters from areas east of the Euphrates, which cuts diagonally across the province.

Sweeping advance

On Sunday, the Observatory said the SDF had made a sweeping advance, capturing territory just kilometres from Deir Az Zor city.

They seized control of a hilltop seven kilometres from the eastern banks of the Euphrates, said Abdel Rahman.

He attributed the quick gains to the fact that eastern parts of Deir Az Zor are desert and not densely populated.

Oil-rich Deir Az Zor province borders Iraq and is a strategic prize for both SDF and the Syrian army.

Since 2014, ISIL has held about 60 percent of the city and much of the surrounding province.
New York Post reports FBI evidence in a lawsuit alleges Saudi Arabias US embassy may have funded test run for Sept 11.

New evidence in a 9/11 lawsuit against the government of Saudi Arabia alleges the kingdoms embassy in Washington, DC, may have funded a test run for the deadly attacks in 2001, according to a US newspaper report.

The evidence was submitted as part of a class action lawsuit against the government of Saudi Arabia, the New York Post reported on Saturday.

It alleges that the embassy paid for two Saudi nationals to fly from Phoenix to Washington two years before planes hit the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and slammed into a field in Pennsylvania as part of a dry run for the attacks.

Saudi Arabia has always denied any involvement in the September 11, 2001, attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people.

The victims lawyers, however, have said the evidence suggests a pattern of both financial and operational support for the 9/11 conspiracy from official Saudi sources, according to the Post.

READ MORE: Saudi Arabia condemns passage of US 9/11 law

The evidence could further reinforce the claim that employees and agents of Saudi Arabia directed and supported the hijackers.





Waleed Nassar, an international disputes lawyer who represents two Saudi charities that are defendants in 9/11 litigation alongside Saudi Arabia, said, the evidence, along with much of what has been submitted, is innuendo and circumstantial.

The plaintiffs burden is to show something more direct, and thats really the only hope they have to have Saudi Arabia remain in the litigation, Nassar said.

The story cites FBI documents in the complaint alleging Saudi students Mohammed al-Qudhaeein and Hamdan al-Shalawi were in fact members of the Kingdoms network of agents in the US, and participated in the conspiracy.

READ MORE: 9/11s secret 28-page history

During the flight in November 1999, the Saudis are reported to have attempted to get into the planes cockpit to test security. The pilots made an emergency landing because of the incident, and the men were interrogated by the FBI, which eventually let them go.

According to the Post story, the FBI confirmed the mens airline tickets were paid for by the Saudi embassy in Washington.

Bill Law, a journalist who specialises in Gulf affairs, told Al Jazeera that at this stage the claims are only an allegation.

He added, based on the case, that he believes there are certain pointers that would suggest that there was not, perhaps direct Saudi government involvement, but there were people who were close to, perhaps the ruling family, people who were in different government departments who may have facilitated some of the early dry runs  of what then became the horrific 9/11 attack.

9/11 law

The story follows the passage of a US law last year that allows families of the victims of the September 11 attacks to sue the Saudi government.

The law, which was originally vetoed by former President Barack Obama, allows survivors and relatives of victims to pursue cases against foreign governments in US federal court and to demand compensation if such governments are proved to bear some responsibility for attacks on American soil.

READ MORE: Obama  Congress veto override of 9/11 bill a mistake

Fifteen of the 19 men who carried out the 2001 attacks were Saudi nationals. Families of the victims spent years lobbying politicians for the right to sue the kingdom in US courts for any role elements of Saudi Arabias government may have played.

Saudi Arabia has long denied any involvement in the attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people and marked the beginning of the US war on terror.
Campaigners call on the British government to take a stronger stance against Myanmar over violence against the Rohingya.

London, UK  The lecture hall at the London Muslim Centre quickly filled up after late afternoon prayers for an urgent meeting on the crisis facing Myanmars Rohingya people.

Over the past month, reports have filtered out from survivors of mass killings, torture, and other abuses directed at the majority-Muslim Rohingya by Myanmars military.

The latest round of violence in Myanmars Rakhine State began last month when Rohingya fighters attacked about 30 police posts and army bases, prompting a military crackdown.





The violence is believed to have claimed more than 1,000 lives and catalysed a refugee crisis in neighbouring Bangladesh, where nearly 300,000 Rohingya have fled.

Buoyed by the turnout at the mosque in the East London borough of Tower Hamlets on Friday evening, organiser Abdullah Faliq issued a rallying cry to the audience, many of whom struggled to find a place to sit or stand in the hall.

How many of us here wrote to our MP? he asked, to which less than a dozen people raised their hands.

How many of us called or wrote to the Burma [Myanmar] embassy here in the UK? Faliq continued, to which even fewer hands raised.

How many of us went to a demonstration recently? he asked further, eliciting a more enthused response.

Faliq and the others addressing the crowd made no attempt to disguise their fear that the current attention to the Rohingyas plight is at the mercy of a news cycle that could easily move on to other issues, robbing the victims of violence in Myanmar of the opportunity to have their voices heard and allowing its government to get away with alleged abuses.

READ MORE: Who are the Rohingya Muslims?

Speakers at the event, titled Silent Genocide, recalled previous instances where they said the world looked away or did not act soon enough, resulting in detrimental consequences.

The examples of the genocides in Rwanda and Bosnia were brought up time and again at the event.

What we dont want is for the story and the cause to just fizzle out, said Harun Khan, the chairman of the Muslim Council of Britain, the UKs largest Muslim umbrella organisation.

[The issue] will live for a couple of days and eventually the news stories will die down, he added before imploring those present to keep the momentum going on social media.

Inexcusable

The vast majority of those at the mosque were Muslims of Bangladeshi heritage, but the campaign movements organisers say they are trying to bring together diverse strands of the Myanmar opposition movement.





They include the Burma Campaign UK and its director Mark Farmaner, once a key supporter of the campaign to free Aung San Suu Kyi, but now a critic of the Myanmar de facto leaders response to the crisis.

An activist with decades of experience on Myanmar, Farmaner described his recent conversations with the Nobel Peace Prize laureate.

Aung San Suu Kyis behaviour is inexcusable, I campaigned for more than a decade for her release from house arrest, I pressured the government, I went around the world calling for her release  and I am so disappointed with how she has behaved.

Ive spoken to this about her myself; she did not seem sympathetic  I said to her, please go and see for yourself whats going on in northern Rakhine State to the Rohingya, but she refused.

Nevertheless, Farmaner cautioned against the focus on the once dissident leader, which he said distracted from the militarys culpability for the abuses against the Rohingya.

The head of Myanmars military, Min Aung Hlaing, is responsible for military operations in Rakhine state and the armed forces of the country operate independently of its civil administration.

Britains ties

Britains ties with Myanmar are historical, as the countrys former colonial power, and have also strengthened more recently after Myanmars military rulers loosened their grip on power to allow more civilian participation in government.

The British government provides 300,000 pounds ($396,000) in direct military aid to Myanmar in addition to burgeoning trade ties since the country held its first free election in 2015.

Myanmar soldiers have also visited the UK to take part in training courses paid for by the British government.

When Al Jazeera approached the British Foreign Office for its position on the ongoing situation in Rakhine and allegations of abuse, it was directed to a statement made by International Development Secretary Priti Patel, which did not directly address the accusations levelled against Myanmars military.

READ MORE: My name is Jashim, I am Rohingya

The appalling violence in Rakhine must stop now. Britain urgently calls upon the security forces to de-escalate the situation in Rakhine and the government of Burma to allow immediate and full humanitarian access and support for the people and communities affected, Patel said.

The campaigners at the London Muslim Centre do not believe the British government has been forceful enough in its condemnation and a large number of British MPs agree.

A letter calling on Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson to take action against Myanmar was authored by opposition Labour MP Rushanara Ali and signed by 157 of her colleagues.

While there is no single measure which can persuade the military to halt its attacks, any leverage that can be used must be used, the letter reads, further calling for an end to military cooperation between the UK and Myanmar.

Thousands protest

For Rohingya advocates such as those in East London, there is a sense that the crisis is set to worsen and that campaigning is the very least they can do.

The past week has seen sporadic but nearly daily protests in London and other cities across the UK.

The largest, on Sunday, drew thousands flooding the streets outside the Myanmar embassy and attracted protesters from across the country.

IN PICTURES: Who will take us?  Myanmars fleeing Rohingya Muslims

After the protest, we aim to continue to pressurise our local MP, the government and the people that hold the power that can make the required change, said Taslim Loonat who had made his way from the Midlands town of Walsall.

We want to continue to highlight the atrocities that are being carried out to ensure this genocide does not become the norm.
Scholar taken off wanted list after international police learned alleged crimes were fabricated by Egypt, NGO says.

Interpol has removed from its online wanted list Yusuf al-Qaradawi, one of the most prominent religious leaders in the Middle East, according to the Arab Organisation for Human Rights (AOHR) in the UK.

The international police organisation, Interpol, made the move after it was discovered that the crimes Qaradawi was accused of were nothing more than a cover for the political crimes of opposing authorities in Egypt  the country that requested the scholar be put on the Interpol list in 2014, AOHR said in a statement on Sunday.

Qaradawi, an Egyptian, lives in exile in Qatar.

The decision by Interpol to remove the name of al-Qaradawi and other names can be considered a defeat to the Egyptian regime, said Mohamed Jamil, president of AOHR.

It has focused on killing Egyptians, executing wide-scale arrest operations and forced disappearances, extracting confessions using torture, which they subsequently use against the prisoners in court and to request red notices from Interpol, in what can only be termed a cheap abuse of a respected organisation with a noble cause of fighting crime worldwide.





Qaradawi, 91, chairman of the International Union of Islamic Scholars, was listed as wanted for robbery, arson and murder committed after Egypts 2013 military coup.

All the alleged crimes were later found to be fabricated as they occurred during his absence from Egypt, and could not have credibly been committed by someone of his age and reputation, AOHR said.

Many countries, including the United Arab Emirates to be specific, are behind the listing of al-Qaradawi on this wanted list, said Jamil.

When his name was published, there was a general state of euphoria in the Emirati media followed by the Egyptian media, and others who have always worked to demonise those opposed to the Egyptian regime, he added.

However, this happiness did not last long, for after a while the truth has become apparent and things will return to their rightful path.

Faulty system

Jamil also said Interpol sometimes exchanges warrants with governments directly without publishing them on its website.

This is used widely by dictatorial regimes in a blatant exploitation of this system in order to apprehend individuals wanted for opposing these regimes, he said.

Jamil called on Interpol to stop this practice and impose strict controls so governments could no longer use it to pursue political opponents that they had fabricated criminal charges against.
United States Court of Appeals, Tenth Circuit. MATTHEW MALONE, individually, and as a Personal Representative of Michael Malone, deceased, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS FOR THE COUNTY OF DONA ANA, in their official capacities; CHASE THOUVENELL, in his individual and official capacity, Defendants - Appellants, THE CITY OF LAS CRUCES, NEW MEXICO; JOHN DOES, unknown Las Cruces Police Department officers, in their individual and official capacities, Defendants. No. 16-2222 Decided: September 08, 2017

Before BRISCOE, EBEL, and MATHESON, Circuit Judges.

ORDER AND JUDGMENT*

In this interlocutory appeal, Defendant-Appellant Chase Thouvenell contends that the district court erred in denying him qualified immunity from a 42 U.S.C.  1983 claim asserted by the personal representative of the estate of Michael Malone (Malone), alleging that Deputy Thouvenell violated the Fourth Amendment when he shot and killed Malone while trying to arrest him. We conclude that Thouvenell is entitled to qualified immunity because Malone failed to show that Thouvenell violated clearly established law. Therefore, having jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C.  1291, see Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 530 (1985), we reverse.

I. BACKGROUND

The evidence, viewed in the light most favorable to Malone, the non-moving party, see White v. Pauly, 137 S. Ct. 548, 550 (2017) (per curiam), indicated the following: On July 29, 2015, Michael Malone's wife, Crystal, met with a detective from the Dona Ana County, New Mexico, Sheriff's Office, and told the detective that, five days earlier, her husband had choked and punched her, and then had pointed a revolver at the back of Crystal's head and pulled the trigger. The gun did not go off. Crystal then left the house, with Malone giving chase; during the chase, he continued to point the gun at Crystal and pull the trigger, but the gun never fired. Crystal eventually escaped to a neighbor's home, where she initially reported the attack to police.

Crystal further told the detective that Malone had called her after the attack, threatening to commit suicide. His threat included the sound of Malone rotating the cylinder on the revolver and then pulling the trigger resulting in a gun shot. (Aplt. App. 157.) Crystal also informed the detective that Malone was a convicted felon, and the detective verified that was the case. After interviewing Crystal, the detective filed a criminal complaint against Malone for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon on a household member, possession of a firearm by a felon, and battery against a household member, and obtained a warrant for Malone's arrest. (Id. 157-58 (internal quotation marks omitted).)

The Sheriff's Office decided a Special Response Team (SRT) was needed to execute the arrest warrant. An SRT is used to execute warrants under hazardous circumstances, such as when a suspect is armed and may use weapons against law enforcement officers or where the suspect's background reveals a propensity toward violence. (Id. 158-59 (quoting id. at 55).) In this situation, the SRT located Malone at a motel where they discovered he was staying with a woman in Room 103. The lead detective called Malone's cell phone, advised him that the Sheriff's Office wanted to talk to Malone about an incident involving his wife, and asked him to turn himself in. Malone refused. Several SRT members then went to Room 103, knocked, and spoke to a woman who answered the door.

Deputy Thouvenell, along with another deputy, Sanchez, positioned themselves in an alleyway on the side of the  Motel where Room 103 was located in case Malone attempted to flee the area by escaping out a back window or door. (Id. 172, 174 (internal quotation marks omitted).) Thouvenell and Sanchez suddenly heard a noise coming from the alley between the Motel and Family Dollar [store]. They looked into the alleyway as Malone, while holding a revolver, was attempting to climb a chain-link fence immediately in front of them. The Deputies repeatedly commanded Malone to drop the revolver. Instead, Malone jumped off the fence  (Id. 175.) At this point, Malone and the deputies were three to four feet apart, with only the chain-link fence separating them.

Malone jumped off the fence[,] started to back away from Sanchez and Thouvenell while still holding the revolver in his right hand[, and lowered his arms]. Both Thouvenell and Sanchez commanded Malone to drop the weapon several times yet Malone continued to back away from them with the weapon in his hand. Ultimately, Thouvenell, fearing for his, the public's and Sanchez's safety, fired three shots at Malone.

(Id. (quoting Defendants' summary-judgment motion, with alterations made by the district court).) Malone died as a result of these shots. While the evidence submitted does not indicate the precise time frame during which all of this happened, it appears to be several seconds. (Id. 263.)

Matthew Malone, the personal representative of Michael Malone's estate, initiated this litigation, asserting both federal- and state-law claims against several defendants. The only claim at issue in this interlocutory appeal is Malone's  1983 claim against Thouvenell, in his individual capacity, alleging that the deputy used excessive force when he shot and killed Michael Malone without proper cause or provocation, in violation of the Fourth Amendment (Aplt. App. 17). Thouvenell moved for summary judgment on that claim, asserting he is entitled to qualified immunity. The district court denied Thouvenell's motion, and he immediately appealed. This court has jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C.  1291 to consider Thouvenell's interlocutory appeal from the denial of qualified immunity, so long as the appeal raises only abstract legal questions. Stanley v. Gallegos, 852 F.3d 1210, 1212 (10th Cir. 2017); see also Mitchell, 472 U.S. at 530.

II. STANDARD OF REVIEW

We review the district court's summary judgment decision de novo, see Pompeo v. Bd. of Regents of the Univ. of N.M., 852 F.3d 973, 981 (10th Cir. 2017), viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to Malone, the non-moving party, see White, 137 S. Ct. at 550. The court shall grant summary judgment if the movant shows that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a).

III. DISCUSSION

In order to survive a summary-judgment motion based on qualified immunity, the burden was on Malone to show both 1) that Thouvenell's conduct violated Malone's Fourth Amendment right, and 2) that that Fourth Amendment right was clearly established at the time Thouvenell undertook the challenged conduct. See Margheim v. Buljko, 855 F.3d 1077, 1087 (10th Cir. 2017). Because we can consider these two inquiries in any order, see Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 236 (2009), we begin, and end, with the second inquiry, concluding Malone failed to establish that Thouvenell violated clearly established Fourth Amendment rights.

For the law to be clearly established, there ordinarily must be a Supreme Court or Tenth Circuit opinion on point, or the clearly established weight of authority from other circuits must point in one direction. Pompeo, 852 F.3d at 981. The Supreme Court has warned not to define a clearly established right at a high level of generality. White, 137 S. Ct. at 552 (internal quotation marks omitted). Instead, the clearly established law must be particularized to the facts of the case. Id. (internal quotation marks omitted). This is not to say that an official action is protected by qualified immunity unless the very action in question has previously been held unlawful, but it is to say that in the light of pre-existing law the unlawfulness must be apparent. Pompeo, 852 at 981 (internal quotation marks omitted); see also White, 137 S. Ct. at 551. A clearly established right is one that is sufficiently clear that every reasonable official would have understood that what he is doing violates that right. Mullenix v. Luna, 136 S. Ct. 305, 308 (2015) (internal quotation marks omitted).

Such specificity is especially important in the Fourth Amendment context, where the Court has recognized that it is sometimes difficult for an officer to determine how the relevant legal doctrine, here excessive force, will apply to the factual situation the officer confronts. Id. (internal quotation marks omitted). For example, in Mullenix, an excessive-force case, the Supreme Court rejected as too general the rule that a police officer may not use deadly force against a fleeing felon who does not pose a sufficient threat of harm to the officer or others. Id. at 308-09 (internal quotation marks omitted). Instead, the relevant inquiry into whether the law at issue there was clearly established had to incorporate the particular facts presented in that case, asking: whether it was clearly established that the use of deadly force against a reportedly intoxicated fugitive, set on avoiding capture through high-speed vehicular flight, who twice during his flight had threatened to shoot police officers, and who was moments away from encountering an officer violated the Fourth Amendment. Id. at 309.

Mullenix also cited to Brosseau v. Haugen, 543 U.S. 194, 199-200 (2004) (per curiam), in which the Supreme Court framed the question as whether it was clearly established that the Fourth Amendment prohibited the officer's conduct in the situation [she] confronted: whether to shoot a disturbed felon, set on avoiding capture through vehicular flight, when persons in the immediate area are at risk from that flight. Mullenix, 136 S. Ct. at 309 (quoting and discussing Brosseau).

Applying the Supreme Court's guidance here, the parties do not cite, nor could we find, any Supreme Court or Tenth Circuit case that is sufficiently close factually to the circumstances presented here to establish clearly the Fourth Amendment law that applies to our case. The cases Malone mentions in his brief are not sufficiently analogous. In Thomson v. Salt Lake County, this court held the use of deadly force was justified where a domestic violence suspect had just pointed a gun at his wife and then fled; threatened officers' safety over the phone; and when cornered by officers and a police dog, the suspect threatened to shoot, moved his rifle very quickly, at times pointing it at officers, and refused to drop the rifle when ordered to do so. 584 F.3d 1304, 1309-11, 1318-20 (10th Cir. 2009). And in Phillips v. James, this Court again concluded that the use of deadly force was justified where a suspect barricaded himself in his home and refused to come out, threatened to shoot officers who were surrounding the home, bragged to those officers about previously pulling a gun on a sheriff's deputy, left the house briefly to note the location of the officers surrounding the home, returned to the home, propped open a window, knocked out the window's screen and stated to the surrounding officers that he had a clean shot. 422 F.3d 1075, 1078-79, 1084 (10th Cir. 2005). These cases, in which the use of deadly force was reasonable, are not sufficiently analogous to the facts presented here to inform a reasonable officer faced with the situation in which Thouvenell found himself that the use of deadly force would, instead, violate the Fourth Amendment. See Mullenix, 136 S. Ct. at 308.

Nor do Thomson and Phillips establish, as the district court concluded, that to justify the use of deadly force, the suspect must have made some verbal threat or gesture directed at the officers. (Aplt. App. 270.) Such a per se rule contradicts the Supreme Court's mandate that a court determine the reasonableness of an officer's use of deadly force based on the totality of the circumstances. See Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386, 396 (1989) (citing Tennessee v. Garner, 471 U.S. 1, 8-9 (1985)).

IV. CONCLUSION

We REVERSE the district court's decision to deny Thouvenell qualified immunity, and REMAND this case to the district court for further proceedings consistent with our ruling.

Entered for the Court

FOOTNOTES

. In light of our resolution of Thouvenell's appeal, we lack jurisdiction over the interlocutory appeal taken by the Board of County Commissioners for Dona Ana County and, therefore, DISMISS the County's appeal on that basis. See Lynch v.Barrett, 703 F.3d 1153, 1163-64 (10th Cir. 2013).

. On appeal, Deputy Thouvenell asserts that there was no evidence to support the fact, recognized by the district court, that Malone lowered his arms once he jumped down from the fence, nor to support the inference the district court drew that Malone was in the process of complying with police commands by jumping off the fence, backing up, and lowering his arms. (Aplt. App. 264.) We have no jurisdiction, however, in this interlocutory appeal, to consider whether the district court erred in determining that an alleged fact was supported by sufficient evidence. Tenorio v. Pitzer, 802 F.3d 1160, 1161 (10th Cir. 2015) (citing cases), cert. denied, 136 S. Ct. 1657 (2016). Nor do we have jurisdiction at this stage to review  [whether] a plaintiff's evidence is sufficient to support a particular factual inference. Fancher v. Barrientos, 723 F.3d 1191, 1193, 1199 (10th Cir. 2013) (internal quotation marks omitted). We, therefore, accept the facts as set forth by the district court.

. Because of our ruling against Malone on the substance of whether there was clearly established law, we need not rule on Thouvenell's alternative argument that this was Malone's burden and procedurally he failed to advance clearly established law to support his claim.

David M. Ebel Circuit Judge
Sixteen long years have passed since the clear blue sky above New York City exploded in an inferno, with toxic smoke and the stench of burning flesh and death, on September 11, 2001. For many, the memories of the murder of nearly three thousand Americans, friends and relatives and fellow countrymen, remains as fresh as this morning's dew. Those of us, who remember all too well, have the solemn obligation and duty to ensure that America's future generations do not soon forget that Islamic jihadists struck the single deadliest attack on U.S. soil by any foe since the War of 1812.

Two thousand nine-hundred and seventy-seven Americans never could have imagined the horror they would soon face the morning of 9/11 as they headed to work at the Twin Towers. Their thoughts were filled with work, schedules, and perhaps returning home to play softball with their children or having dinner with a fiance or a husband or a wife.

It was 8:46 A.M. (EST) when nineteen Muslim terrorists flew American Airlines Flight 11 into the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Seventeen minutes later, 9:03 A.M., Muslim terrorists hit the South Tower with United Airlines Flight 175. Thirty-four minutes later, American Airlines Flight 77 flew into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C.

People jumped and fell from all four sides of both towers. There's no way of accurately telling how many people died this way, but the horror they experienced just before their deaths is unimaginable as they plummeted toward the earth.

The end to this heinous attack and the final blow arrived with the horrifying news that United Airlines Flight 93 crashed, while its passengers bravely fought the terrorists. From start to finish, nearly an hour and a half had elapsed. By 10:03 A.M., nearly 3,000 innocent Americans  loved ones, friends, and neighbors  were dead.

Set aside any emotional impulse to block 9/11 from one's mind, and embrace the gut-wrenching memory. Remember that America was attacked because of her freedom and her stand against oppression and tyranny worldwide. And there are many other things America should never forget, while we lower the flag, lay wreaths, and ring bells in memory of the dead this September 11.

Never forget that America received many warnings that a clash between Islam and the West, a clash of civilizations, was on the way, with tragedies like the bombing of the Marine barracks in Lebanon and the U.S. Embassy in Kenya and the suicide bombing attack on the USS Cole. We were even informed ahead of 9/11 that it was coming soon.

The first real warning occurred on February 26, 1993, when Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, master bomb-designer, detonated a bomb under the World Trade Center, on orders from al-Qaeda's Blind Sheikh, that carved out a stories-deep crater, injured a thousand people, and killed six. The bomb was supposed to kill thousands by releasing a cyanide cloud; however, the explosion incinerated the gas.

Never forget that since 9/11, at least thirteen Islamic-inspired terrorist attacks have been carried out across America, by Muslims following Mohammed's "perfect" example, such as we witnessed in the Boston Bombing; the D.C. sniper murders; and the shootings at the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, San Bernadino, Chattanooga, and several others. There have been numerous attacks by Muslims that the press refuses to call "terrorism," and there have been scores of terror plots and attempted terrorist acts foiled by the authorities.

Never forget that the nineteen Muslim terrorists were able to attack America on September 11, 2001 because they were trained and funded by Wahhabist imams and members of the Saudi royal family, as revealed by the 9/11 Commission Report. And recall that they also had some large degree of help from Shiite Muslims in the Islamic Republic of Iran, having spent significant time in Iran between October 2000 and February 2001.

The fires of that September morning burned for 100 days and moved America to seek an accounting from these sons of Allah in wars we are still fighting. Islam is at war with Western civilization, Europe, and America, just as Islam fought us (infidels and Westerners) under the Ottoman Empire, or a thousand years ago, now that Islam is in a new ascendancy.

America is still in an ongoing war against us, being waged by Islam, its imams and jihadi terrorists, who want to do the very same thing today that they did sixteen years ago, except on a grander scale.

The United States intelligence community acknowledges that all al-Qaeda and the Islamic State have had some recent, if limited, success in acquiring chemical weapons, like anthrax, VX nerve agents, and ricin. More troubling and dangerous, they seek nuclear weapons, as Graham Allison notes in a policy brief for Harvard's Belfer Center; and though many may see any success toward this as unlikely, it is certainly not implausible, given Iran's, Pakistan's, and Saudi Arabia's duplicitous, self-serving roles in the "war on terror."

No one ever envisioned that jet airliners would be used as Muslim terrorists' instruments of death against us. However, September 11 brought a new visual reality, as officials sworn to protect America were forced to stare into a vast, smoking pit scooped out of lower Manhattan. As then-national security adviser Condoleezza Rice repeatedly stated, "if you were in the White House that day ... every day since has been September twelfth. And your great fear is that it may be September tenth."

In his book The Field of Fight, former director of the Defense Intelligence Agency Michael Flynn wrote: "We're in a world war, but very few Americans recognize it, and fewer still have any idea how to win it."

Americans have the agonizing images of the horrible and unimaginable calamity of September 11 seared into their minds and hearts. We never forgot the lives so brutally and callously cut short, the children who lost mothers and fathers, and the sorrow that followed  and we clearly remember the depths of inhumanity to which these Islamic terrorists are willing to sink, as we ring the bells, read the names, and honor our dead. September 11, 2001 forced many Americans to the understanding that America must gather the strength and courage to stop Islam's violent ascendancy and expansion, at home and abroad, by driving their "holy warriors" into the ground, killing them, and even killing their families, until they grow weary of death and make war no more, if that is the only way to end their insanity.
On the same day that Fox News announced that it had agreed to part ways amicably with suspended conservative host Eric Bolling, Bollings son Eric, Jr. was found dead in Boulder, Colorado. The younger Bolling, known by his middle name Chase, was a 19-year old sophomore at the University of Colorado in Boulder majoring in economics. He was the only child of Eric Bolling and his wife of 20 years, Adrienne Bolling.

Eric Bolling and his son Chase (Facebook)

The elder Eric Bolling had a background as an award-winning commodities trader and financial consultant before embarking on a career in the media. He was a contributor and program host on the Fox Business Network and the Fox News Channel since 2007. On August 5, Bolling was suspended by Fox News pending the results of an internal investigation inspired by charges made in a HuffPost article published on August 4. The 900-word article, citing only anonymous sources and with no quotes, alleged that Bolling had sexted one or more photos of male genitalia to three female colleagues several years earlier. The article claimed that 14 anonymous sources at Fox had confirmed the allegations to the articles author, freelance writer Yashar Ali.

The timing of Chase Bollings passing, on the same day that his father was widely and publicly humiliated by being ousted from his prominent role at Fox News, all the while maintaining that the charges against him were false, intensified the medias interest in Bolling father and son and immediately led to speculation and anonymously sourced reports about the cause of Chase Bollings death.

Coming on the heels of hundreds, if not thousands, of articles reporting on the elder Bollings job loss on September 8, the new round of reportage less than 24 hours later featured headlines that included words like suicide and Eric Bolling Son Dies from OD. In two tweets an hour apart on Saturday afternoon, however, Eric Bolling wrote that Adrienne and I are devastated by the loss of our beloved son Eric Chase last night. Details still unclear, and Authorities have informed us there is no sign of self harm at this point. Autopsy will be next week.

It remains to be seen if a spate of early media reports suggesting that Chase Bolling was emotionally upset and extremely embarrassed about the controversy that had interrupted his fathers successful television career will hold up.

As this horrendous news is allowed to sink in and touch the heart of anyone with an ounce of compassion, it is unfortunately necessary to report some additional sad and disturbing context. First and foremost, the Bolling family appears to be very close knit. Eric Sr. obviously took great pride in his son Chase. It was just one year ago, as I recall, that Eric returned from a trip to Colorado to his co-hosting job at FNCs program The Five and proudly shared with his co-hosts and the viewing audience home videos that showed him helping to get Chase settled into his college dorm room. It is heartbreaking to recall those happy images now.

A strange anomaly in this story is that Yashar Ali, the HuffPost freelancer who wrote the August 4 article alleging that Eric Bolling was guilty of inappropriate behavior years earlier, claims to have been the first one to break the news of Chase Bollings death. For example, in a HuffPost article on September 9 time stamped 2:31 P.M. E.T., Hayley Miller writes Yashar Ali, the HuffPost freelancer behind the [August 4] story, first reported news of the younger Bollings death on Saturday. An article in Fortune noted:

The death was first publicly reported by Yashar Ali, the reporter who investigated Eric Bollings alleged misconduct for The Huffington Post. Fox News host Sean Hannity appeared to confirm the death on Twitter soon after.

In fact, a tweet by Yashar Ali time stamped 10:05 A.M. [presumably P.T.] on Saturday, notes:

As far as I can tell, I am the only reporter who has taken note, as I did here on August 7, of some interesting and overlooked, and possibly relevant, aspects of Alis background before he became an investigative journalist.

The scribe responsible for the damaging article on Bolling uses the byline Yashar Ali. According to an article in the Cleveland Plain Dealer in 2016, his full name is Yashar Ali Hedayat. After a short career doing work behind the camera in Hollywood, Ali Hedayat  reportedly from a wealthy background in Illinois, according to the Plain Dealer  started working as a Democrat political operative. According to several mainstream sources, he reportedly raised between $100,000 and $150,000 for Hillary Clintons 2008 campaign. As an individual in recent years, the Federal Election Commission reports Yashar Hedayat contributed tens of thousands of dollars to Democrat political campaigns. In 2009, he was appointed to a $131,100 a year job with San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom, but after three months he left that position for a job with Newsoms successful campaign for California Lieutenant Governor. Later, Ali Hedayet moved to the East Coast and began writing articles under the name Yashar Ali for various left of center publications.

In recent days, Ali has been tweeting and retweeting scores of times a day and he expressed condolences about the death of Chase Bolling after he reported it on September 9. On September 8, however, after the news of Bollings ouster from Fox News broke, Ali appeared to be celebrating the development and his role in it. He retweeted a tweet by HuffPost editor Lydia Polgreen that linked back to Alis article reporting that Bolling was out at Fox News. The original tweet by Polgreen, with a photo of Bolling, featured the caption Bolling in the Gutter.

Yashar Ali retweet of Lydia Polgreens tweet Sept. 8, 2017

And so it goes.

Eric Bollings friend Sean Hannity, currently a Fox News prime time host, tweeted his condolences on Saturday:

Hannity, like Eric Bolling, has been a high profile target of leftist groups dedicated to removing conservatives from the media. In fact, an organized effort is currently underway to encourage people to boycott sponsors of Hannitys Fox News program in hopes that he can be brought down. This effort has not yet succeeded.

But Eric Bolling, a clear, consistent, compelling, and very popular conservative voice  and a friend and defender of President Donald J. Trump  has been taken down.

Last May, in the wake of the successful efforts to get Bill OReilly, Fox Newss most popular program host, boycotted and fired, and the subsequent campaign to do the same thing to him, Hannity commented during his opening monologue on May 30. He began with a reference to the boycott effort:

Its also now gone to a whole other level that is very dangerous. Now my character is being assassinated. Im being lied about, smeared and slandered. And the worst part is there are many on the left that are now working hard to get me fired, get me off the air. So this voice of ours on the show  I dont force you to watch. I ask you to watch. I want you to watch  could no longer be heard. There is now a well-funded, well-orchestrated campaign against me in this particular case to silence me by attacking my advertisers. Now, this is all put together by in part a Clinton-founded, in part, Soros-funded, in part, group. Now, I want to tell you something. This is not hyperbole. What has been happening to me in the last week is a kill shot. [emphasis added.] They want this show canceled. They want me off the air. Its also an attempt to silence the FOX News Channel and talk radio.

Kill shot. Thats a term that Hannity used on more than one occasion, and it immediately stood out to me. Just over three months later now, I wonder if what Hannity was talking about has indeed now gone to a whole other level.

Peter Barry Chowka is a widely published author and journalist. He writes most frequently these days for American Thinker. His website is AltMedNews.net. Follow Peter on Twitter.
Before analyzing Kid Rock as a cultural phenomenon, we first have to spend some time with the Frankfurt School, a group of European academics who rose to prominence in the mid 20th century. No, seriously.

The word "dialectic" gets thrown around enough to warrant some clarification. Now used primarily as a pseudo-intellectual shibboleth to refer to social changes, the philosophical roots of the modern concept of dialectic are surprisingly important. Dialectic describes Hegel's idea that as society moves toward its perfected state, it must resolve internal contradictions  issues that cause social unrest and then lead to social change. According to Hegel, this process was inevitable and outside human control, and this idea, grounded in the economic sphere, would be adopted by Marx and serve as the foundation of Marxist thought.

The actual outcomes of the Marxist revolutions  despotic and impoverished regimes  were of course hardly the paradise predicted by Marxist dialectic. (If you see Marxist described as "Marxian," by the way, you know you're dealing with a Marxist.) Add to this the fact that even Marx himself was likely aware of the special economic conditions in America  a relatively large and fluid middle class  that made socialist revolution unlikely, and Marxist dialectic found itself in serious need of a revision. The supposedly inevitable "scientific" unfolding of "scientific socialism" (Marx's own term for his philosophy) insisted on not unfolding properly. What's a socialist revolutionary supposed to do in the face of a traditional society that stubbornly refuses to collapse? Well, you change the rules. Enter the Frankfurt School, and in particular Herbert Marcuse. After all, why wait for the social tensions to appear? Why not identify and magnify them?

It was Marcuse who dropped the Marxist notion (and perhaps it was always a pose, after all) of an inevitable dialectic grounded in economic movements. What Marcuse and his New Left school of thought realized was that you could identify social tensions that could change  or tear apart  a society, and even if they were not inevitable, they could be introduced or exacerbated. Like a mad scientist isolating a particularly virulent strain of smallpox, incubating it, and then releasing it into the population, the New Left takes prickly social issues, makes them into matters of life and death for which there is no middle ground, and watches as traditional society blows up. Such conflicts often go by softer names, such as "wedge" or "hot-button" issues, but whatever term is used it is fair to say that Marcuse and his New Left were the Oppenheimers of "weaponizing" dialectic. From racial divides to gender wars to every other form of identity politics, polarization into mutually exclusive sides provides the toxic conflict necessary to disrupt society, fostering resentment and eventually apathy and nihilism. Only then will a formerly free people be complacent enough to be shaped by an intellectual elite.

This isn't to say that everyone on the left side of the political aisle is a self-aware participant in such cartoonish supervillainy  but it's important to know that such a mindset (in which traditional American society, guided by the actions and desires of individuals, has to be destroyed for a new society formulated and controlled by an intellectual elite), does in fact exist. It dominates academia and elements of the administrative state, including the intelligence community  Marcuse and company were deeply influential in intelligence gathering and interpretation via the Research and Analysis Branch of the OSS, precursor of the CIA.

Who could possibly stand against such diabolical masterminds? Enter Kid Rock.

Kid Rock's foray into the political sphere coincided with the release of his video "Po-Dunk." One way to read this is that the political move is in service to selling the music, but that's a false dichotomy  "Po-Dunk" is suffused with political-social meaning.

Over the driving bass line that sounds like a threat, you can hear the menacing rattle of the Don't Tread on Me snake, and when you hear it, you know that Kid Rock is serious about music and politics. The symbols could not be any clearer: tight shots of the Bible and firearms, a direct embrace of the "God and Guns" that America "clings" to. But Kid Rock isn't even getting started.

Take the recent upheaval over Confederate symbols. Is it too cynical to say, only because it's a great way to destabilize a nation? It is certainly the modus operandi of the New Left. But Kid Rock's not having any of it. Even before "Po-Dunk," you see in Kid Rock videos the apparently contradictory blending of Southern and American symbols, the Confederate Battle Flag with the Stars and Stripes, the General Lee with biracial children. It's jarring only to those under the spell of the New Left, where the American and Confederate flags are to be seen as opposites. But they're not; one is part of the other, and Kid Rock claims them both.

And he keeps on smashing New Left social divisions. For the New Left, gun ownership should be associated with white males, tools for their continuing oppression against women and minorities. But the first gun you see in "Po-Dunk" is being cleaned by a black man, and a good part of the video dwells on women (in bikinis, no less) blasting away at watermelons. Trash another manufactured dialectical conflict.

Red state versus blue state? It was stupid to start with. Kid Rock is a walking reminder of that political maxim that Pennsylvania is Alabama in the middle. He wasn't the first to realize it; Hank Williams, Jr.'s Southern anthem "A Country Boy Can Survive" called from "North California to south Alabam," just as Kid Rock summons (in the earlier "You Never Met a M----------- Quite Like Me"):

from the depths of Dixie to my northern spots

you know its time to rock when Old Glory drops

...while Bocephus himself passes the torch, playing "Freebird" in the background, that other Southern anthem from the group with wild Gaelic echoes written into their name.

The same goes for country versus city: Kid Rock's uniform of wife-beater tee-shirt accented with a thick gold chain and occasional fur coat signals exactly what he's claiming: white trash pimp gangster with a dash of hipster in the hat.

But there is an even more subtle level at work. One of the most vital images in "Po-Dunk," the one that accompanies "Momma looking good in some jeans all ripped / Got a baby in her belly and a baby on her hip" is the young pregnant woman in a bikini, smoking a cigarette. It simultaneously destroys the false division between sex and its consequence, procreation, as well as the manufactured sin of smoking as contrary to parenting.

How about rich versus poor? Poverty for the left is a problem to be solved; poverty for Kid Rock is simply an economic situation for which no cure needs to be given, because nobody the hell asked.

These aren't even the most scandalous moments, and here we're getting close to the animus behind all the symbols. One of the opening frames in the "Po-Dunk" video is a decidedly "male gaze" upon an attractive black woman: this is a declaration that white male sexuality is no longer forbidden from finding black women desirable, a rejection of the image of the white male as the sexual transgressor who has lost all rights to desire.

That is the narrative role the left attempts to bolster with stories of historical sexual exploitation (which run a little thin when applied to young males who only very recently came into the world); the media have had to shore this up with fabricated stories such as we have seen at UVA and, before that, Duke.

Kid Rock, rightly, refuses to feel guilty about any of this. Indeed, Kid Rock represents a remarkable reversal from the left's cultural narrative, in which there is no individual, personal guilt, but only collective guilt  Kid Rock rejects all collective guilt and indeed the authority that enforces this new, collective morality. "Po-Dunk" revels in poverty, opulence, obesity, fecundity, and the right of the individual to wield violent force to protect its way of life. Kid Rock resolves in himself the contradictions of race, class, and gender without apology or remorse, a Hegelian synthesis of false dichotomies arranged by the Frankfurt School to destabilize a society disinterested in a Marxist revolution.

In other words, Kid Rock takes all the false dialectics, absorbs them, metabolizes them, and...well, if you've seen his videos, you know the rest, and it involves a roll of Radiohead toilet paper. If Trump is the clenched fist of the American people, Kid Rock is the middle finger that comes after the punch is thrown, at the very moment when the New Left expects an apology from those who dared to even challenge it.

All of this isn't about one Senate seat from Michigan, and what that might mean in terms of political calculations. It's about a movement in society. At bottom, it is guilt that is the fuel that the New Left relies on for its weaponized dialectics. And it is guilt that Kid Rock vehemently rejects, even the guilt of a straight white man.

To borrow Kid Rock's lyrics, "You never seen a m----------- quite like him." But the political stage is about to, and a lot of people are coming with him. Millions of them.

Currently a Ph.D. student in religion and politics at The Catholic University in Washington, D.C., the author has published academic articles on National Socialism as a religious movement in the Harvard University journal Cult/ure and on video games and existentialism in the book Past the Sky's Rim (Gray Matter Books). He also publishes fiction under the pen name Gibson Monk.
Critics may be forgiven for doubting the seriousness of President Trump's promise to "drain the swamp" in light of his Department of Justice's decision to give one of D.C.'s swamp things a get out of jail free and not charge former IRS official Lois Lerner in the Tea Party targeting scandal:

The Trump administration has no plans to charge former IRS official Lois Lerner over her role in the Tea Party targeting scandal, the Justice Department said Friday in response to calls by Republican lawmakers to revisit the case. In a letter to the lawmakers, the Justice Department said that "reopening the criminal investigation would not be appropriate based on the available evidence." This past April, House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady, R-Texas, and Rep. Peter Roskam, R-Ill., had asked Attorney General Jeff Sessions to take a "fresh look" at the case. Despite numerous hearings and inquiries into the tough treatment of conservative groups by the tax agency during the 2010 and 2012 elections, the Obama Justice Department had announced in 2015 that no one at the IRS would be prosecuted. They said at the time that investigators had "found no evidence that any IRS official acted based on political, discriminatory, corrupt or other inappropriate motives that would support a criminal prosecution.". The Republicans who requested a fresh look at the case were disappointed in the Trump DOJ's response. "This is a terrible decision," Brady said. "It sends the message that the same legal, ethical, and constitutional standards we all live by do not apply to Washington political appointees." ... Brady said appointees "will now have the green light to target Americans for their political beliefs and mislead investigators without ever being held accountable for their lawlessness."

Based on the available evidence, Lois Lerner should have been measured for an orange jumpsuit a long time ago. Lerner was a key participant in the scheme to turn the most feared and powerful agency of the federal government, the IRS, into a political weapon and campaign arm of the Obama administration. If nothing else, Lois Lerner should be prosecuted for contempt of Congress for her semi-testimony regarding her own missing emails and smashed hard drives.

As Investors Business Daily editorialized in April of 2015:

After pleading her innocence at that 2013 hearing, Lerner went on to invoke her Fifth Amendment right to remain silent. This raised the question of whether the Constitution let her remain silent after she was not silent and pleaded her case. The House decided that no, it doesn't. In May of last year it voted to hold her in contempt of Congress. The Ways and Means Committee went so far as to send the Justice Department a criminal referral with potential charges that could have meant 11 years in jail. Lerner waived her rights not only when she pleaded her innocence before Congress, but also when she shared with DOJ information she was withholding from Congress. Hans Von Spakovsky, senior legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation, says government officials can't pick and choose when and where they invoke their Fifth Amendment rights. They can't legally give information to the DOJ that they withhold from Congress. When Lerner gave a lengthy interview to the government, she waived the Fifth. There's no doubt about it," says Von Spakovsky. "The law is crystal clear here in the District of Columbia."

Certainly the actions Lerner was covering up with the help of others like the current head of the IRS, John Koskinen, warrant prosecution. Her deliberate and orchestrated targeting of political opponents like the Tea Party for daring to oppose the Obama administration's implementation of Obamacare is more worthy of dictatorships like Venezuela than democracies like the United States.

In defending her curious 2013 non-testimony in Politico, Lerner asked us to feel sorry for her and not her intended political victims:

As when she cooperated with the Justice Department but not Congress, Lerner's record-setting assault on the truth continued in Politico with her tale of woe. Still insisting she did nothing wrong, she feels she has to tell her side of the story. She just won't tell it to Congress and the American people under oath. Lerner fails to appreciate the irony of invoking her right against self-incrimination while trampling on the rights of others. It was her IRS that demanded to know from Tea Party members what books they read and the text of their prayers. Frankly, we are more inclined to feel sorry for the likes of Becky Gerritson of the Wetumpka, Ala., Tea Party. Along with other IRS targets, she gave Lerner and the rest of the Obama administration a well-needed civics lesson in her congressional testimony. "In Wetumpka," she said, "we are patriotic Americans; we peacefully assemble; we petition our government; we exercise our right to free speech. We don't understand why the government tried to stop us." Though she sought and received the protection of the Fifth Amendment, Lerner tried to strip from the Tea Party and other conservative groups the protection of the First Amendment. If she needs a shoulder to cry on, we might advise her to call Catherine Engelbrecht of True the Vote, an organization dedicated to clean elections without vote fraud. Engelbrecht couldn't invoke the Fifth or refuse to answer questions when Washington came down on her. ... Before July 2010, when Engelbrecht filed with Lerner's IRS seeking tax-exempt status for her group, she and her family had no contact with any government agency of any kind. But after her filing, she was buried by an alphabet soup of government harassers, from the IRS to the ATF and OSHA. "This is what the beginning of tyranny looks like," she told Breitbart.com.

Indeed, it is. Along with mystery of why Lois Lerner is not already in prison is the mystery of why IRS chief John Koskinen isn't as well for participating in the cover-up involving destruction of records and emails, conveniently destroyed hard drives, and withholding evidence from Congress. An impeachment resolution, introduced by House Oversight chairman Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), Rep. James Jordan (R-Ohio) and 18 other committee members, accuses Koskinen of making false statements under oath, failing to comply with a subpoena, and failing to notify Congress that key evidence was missing or destroyed. As they explained it to Fox News' Sean Hannity:

"The heart of this concern is that they had in their possession documents that were under subpoena and they destroyed those," Chaffetz said. "Imagine, Sean, if the IRS had asked you for those documents and you said, 'Well, I had them, but I went ahead and destroyed them.' What would happen to you?"

Likely we would be incarcerated and not just impeached. As the Washington Times notes, Koskinen is knee-deep in the IRS corruption and itse cover-up:

Among the specific charges leveled by Mr. Chaffetz and 18 of his fellow Republicans on the committee were that Mr. Koskinen, appointed by President Obama in December 2013 after the targeting scandal broke, misled Congress when he said he had turned over all of former IRS senior executive Lois G. Lerner's emails and that he oversaw destruction of evidence when his agency got rid of backup tapes that contained the emails.

Lying to Congress and destruction of evidence under subpoena are federal crimes, and that includes the arrogeant Mr. Koskinen, who is just one example of being an Obama donor can get you a good job with the administration. As

Investor's Business Daily noted:

Certainly it might be argued that Koskinen's current position is owed to four decades of being a prodigious Democratic donor. Koskinen has contributed to every Democratic presidential candidate since 1980, including $2,300 to Obama in 2008, and $5,000 to Obama in 2012.

Of course, being an Obama donor with a government job in and of itself is not a crime, but how Koskinen has used that job is positively criminal. Koskinen once confessed before Congress that obeying the law was a difficult task for him and Lerner:

"Whenever we can, we follow the law," IRS chief John Koskinen recently told the House Ways and Committee in a Freudian slip of the truth that says it all.

It is worth noting that one of the charges in the impeachment of Richard Nixon in the Watergate scandal was just considering the use of the IRS for political purposes. People went to jail in Watergate for participating in and covering up a crime. So too should John Koskinen, along with Lois Lerner.

How can you drain the swamp and let the lizards slither away?

Daniel John Sobieski is a freelance writer whose pieces have appeared in Investor's Business Daily, Human Events, Reason Magazine, and the Chicago Sun-Times among other publications.
In his unfinished book The Last Tycoon, F. Scott Fitzgerald made the acerbic remark that there are no second acts in American life. The remark was falsified by his own career, particularly after the success of The Great Gatsby. Now the pertinence of the remark can be assessed in relation to the phenomenon happening in both the United States and Russia: the destruction or maintenance of images of controversial or discredited figures in the history of the two countries. The fate of the images is an indication of real or potential changes in the political climate  second acts in the political theater of the nations.

In the U.S. in recent months, the removal or destruction of monuments and statues symbolizing controversial figures of the Confederacy has divided the country. In contrast, authorities in Russia are considering restoring the symbols of disliked figures with notorious records in the Soviet Union. Both countries are considering how best to deal with unpleasant memories of the past.

Statues and memorials are indicative of the important role individuals have played or are thought to have played, or else they illustrate past importance in the history of the country. Russia illustrated this latter concept with the erection in 2016 of a 50-foot statue in central Moscow of Vladimir the Great, the 10th- to 11th-century prince and ruler of Kiev who consolidated a considerable area of territory and brought Orthodox Christianity to it.

A better known figure for Russians and Americans is now being resurrected. On September 5, 2017, in the city of Kirov (once named Vyatka), some 500 miles east of Moscow, a large, majestic-looking statue of Felix Dzerzhinsky was unveiled. Roses were left at the foot of the statue together with a statement that he was a splendid revolutionary who neutralized the enemies of the revolution in the hard struggle that followed the 1917 revolution. Others may well disagree. There are more than 1,300 people in the Kirov area whose families were targeted in the terror of the Soviet Union that began with the man being honored.

There are, in fact, a number of monuments to Dzerzhinsky in other cities in Russia, such as the large bronze statue erected in May 2006 on the grounds of the military academy in Minsk, Belarus, his hometown area. But this one in Kirov is significant because it raises the question of whether a similar memorial to him will follow in Moscow, a reminder in the capital of the dark years of the Soviet Union.

Felix Dzerzhinsky was born in 1877 of aristocratic background in the Minsk region, now Belarus. After brief consideration of becoming a Jesuit priest, he became a revolutionary in his youth, was expelled from school, was arrested a number of times, and spent 11 years in tsarist prisons and in Siberian exile. He joined the Bolshevik wing of the Marxist organizations and endorsed Vladimir Lenin's point of view of the need for revolution. With the Bolshevik Revolution in November 1917, Dzerzhinsky at the age of 40 was put in charge of security arrangements.

He became the head of the secret police, "the lion of the revolution" for some, but for many more the most feared and hated man in the country. Virtually living in his office, which curiously had a photo of Rosa Luxemburg on the wall, he lead a Spartan life. His own motto was to have a cold head, hot heart, and clean hands. But in practice, he was ruthless and fanatical. It was he who organized the embalming of Lenin's body.

Dzerzhinsky died after a two-hour speech, in which, in characteristic fashion, he denounced major political opponents Leon Trotsky, Grigory Zinoviev, and Lev Kamenev  by coincidence, or not, all born of Jewish ancestry  to the Bolshevik Central Committee on July 20, 1926, supposedly of a heart attack, though some suggest he was murdered. His funeral was a significant event, taking on a Hollywood aspect since among the attendees were Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks, who were visiting the Soviet Union at that time. At that moment, Josef Stalin called Dzerzhinsky "a devout knight of the people," but in 1937, Stalin criticized him as a person who openly supported Trotsky against Lenin. One surprising factor is that one of the rare photos in existence of Trotsky and Stalin together is of both carrying Dzerzhinsky's coffin. Mourners lauded him for his integrity and incorruptibility.

A number of towns were named after Dzerzhinsky, as was the museum in his birthplace. Most significant was the 15-ton iron large statue, popularly known as Iron Felix, erected in 1958 in Lubyanka Square, the location of the KGB. After the attempted coup by Communist hardliners against President Mikhail Gorbachev, the statue was removed on August 22, 1991. It was not destroyed, but moved to the Muzeon (Fallen Monument) park in Moscow, the largest open-air sculpture museum in Russia, close to the new Tretyakov art gallery. The museum, which contains images of Pushkin, Lermontov, and Sakharov, asserts that the works displayed are historically and culturally significant, including those relating to the Soviet era.

The changing political climate meant revising attitudes toward former heroes. A large monument in Dzerzhinsky Square in central Warsaw was removed in 1989, and the name of the square was changed to its original, Bank Square. Ukraine removed more than 1,300 statues of Lenin and in 2015 banned all communist symbols in the country.

Like Lenin , Felix Dzerzhinshy died young, but his activity penetrated into almost all aspects of Soviet life: food, schools, military, industries, and factory organization. Above all, he was head of CHEKA (All Russian Extraordinary Commission), founded on December 19, 1917, to combat counterrevolution, sabotage, and enemy agents. It became one of the largest agencies of the state, growing and employing more than 100,000 and deploying paramilitary units of more than 20,000 men.

In 1922, CHEKA was renamed GPU (State Political Directorate), which continued the operations for the arrests, interrogations, and executions of thousands of political opponents and others, some for "economic crimes" who were shot without trial or approval of any outside authority or any kind of adherence to rule of law or to due process. It acted as judge, jury, and executioner. It was responsible by some estimates of murdering at least 150,000 and perhaps as many as 500,000 innocent people.

Notices of the arrests or executions were given to state authorities only after they happened, not before. Dzerzhinsky unabashedly explained his role: "we stand for organized terror, terror being absolutely indispensable in the current revolutionary conditions." He could not "crush counterrevolution with legal niceties." He was responsible for the creation of gulags, labor camps purportedly to re-educate people but really for use for slave profit as well as intimidation, and the use of torture and psychological torment. Though CHEKA and its successors were the "secret police," their activities were widely known. They can be see now as the model for the Gestapo and the Stasi in East Germany.

One paradox in this situation is that in October 1990, a monument was erected in "memory of the victims of the totalitarian regime." It is a large stone brought from the Solovetsky Islands in the White Sea, the area of what is said to have been the first gulag, established by Dzerzhinsky. It was erected and remains on Lubyanka Square, next to the physical headquarters of those organizations, CHEKA, the NKVD, and the KGB.

In the United States, Genreral Robert E. Lee is being erased from history. In Russia, a recent public opinion poll indicated that almost a majority favor the restoration of Dzerzhinsky to his former position in Lybanka Square. President Putin appears to be ambivalent on the issue. It is revealing that on December 25, 2014, Putin renamed the elite Moscow police unit the Dzerzhinsky Division, responsible for maintaining public order in Moscow. And in November.

In 2015, a bust of Dzerzhinsky was placed in the courtyard of the Moscow police headquarters. Putin's decision on Dzerzhinsky in Moscow will be of considerable usefulness to President Donald Trump and the White House in assessing Russian policies and intentions.
Former Breitbart editor Ben Shapiro is scheduled to speak at the University of California-Berkeley campus on September 14, But even before Shapiro utters a word, the university is offering "counseling" to students who might be offended by a speech given on campus by someone they disagree with.

Berkeley has kicked off a "Year of Free Speech" where officials want to "teach" students how to debate unpopular speakers. But even this appears to be too much for the snowflakes.

LA Times:

We are deeply concerned about the impact some speakers may have on individuals sense of safety and belonging, Alivisatos said in the memo posted on the universitys website. No one should be made to feel threatened or harassed simply because of who they are or for what they believe. The memo drew scorn from conservative websites, including the Daily Wire, where Shapiro serves as editor-in-chief. The site called the measures extreme and criticized them as a sign of the universitys intolerance.

This is fine, as far as it goes. Unfortunately, the school believes that Shapiro isn't the one being "threatened" and that it's the snowflakes who they believe are being "harassed" by Shapiro's visit.

Campus Reform:

Alivisatos email also mentions the all-too typical [some] speech this is antithetical to our values and points to a campus free speech forum which took place last evening. At that forum, Berkeley Law School Dean Erwin Chemerinsky and the Haas Institute for a Fair and Inclusive Societys john powell (yes, lower case) collided over the extent of the First Amendment. Chemerinsky (rightly) noted All ideas and views can be expressed on campus, no matter how offensive, whereas the best powell could muster was to say the US Supreme Court has been made unjust decisions in the past. [T]he Supreme Court has previously supported harmful decisions, such as allowing women to be excluded from the workplace and allowing slavery, The Daily Californian reports powell as saying. powell added he believes certain speech can directly harm people, and said dismissing its (psychological) effects uses the same rationale that upheld segregation.

Remember: Berkeley is still considered one of the finest institutions of higher education in the country. That they even had this "debate" is indicative of a moral rot and towering ignorance of why the First Amendment is important.

That even the prospect of someone speaking on campus that they can choose not to hear triggers any anxiety or fear at all is idiotic. Shapiro hasn't even opened his mouth and he's already triggering people.

Is free speech at Berkeley dead? How actively police work to protect Shapiro and anyone who wants to listen to him will tell us a lot about the state of liberty at the university. But anyone who has seen the reaction of Berkeley police to Antifa and other violent protesters recently shouldn't feel confident of a positive outcome.
If you care about the future of America, pay attention to what is happening in Chicago. Civil order, the confidence that one can go about daily life without human predators attacking at the first opportunity, is slipping away, as police find themselves unable to interdict gang activities, and in effect let them shoot each other, along with the occasional innocent bystander, often a young child. The anarchy zone is spreading out of the gang strongholds and into neighborhoods formerly regarded as safe.

Then there is the fiscal black hole represented by pension obligations that have grown to the point where they leave little tax revenue for actual services by actual city employees who have not yet retired. Taxes have skyrocketed, and will only go up  multiplying  if those obligations are to be honored.

These factors are well known to our readership, if not a top-of-mind concern of mainstream media. They are forcing businesses and residents out of Chicago, as the city shrinks in population and economic activity.

People with a large financial and personal stake in the city want things to change. But, it would seem that they are unwilling to confront the political dimensions. Consider this very serious, well-researched, and undoubtedly sincere presentation coming from the Chicago Council on Science and Technology. That group will hear a presentation from an expert on tech innovation, chronicling the sad fact that Chicago has fallen way, way, way behind in developing technology startups. Even though the city has followed the recipe that has been offered by other experts:

Since 2012, Chicago has built an estimated 1.5 million square feet of coworking spaces, and about 80 or 90 incubators and accelerators. By any reasonable measure of success, this massive effort has not translated into a competitive market for advanced industries. Chicago has not grown its share of the national venture capital market, and we have not brought more national investment into the region for the purposes of advancing technology. More significantly, Chicago has not kept pace with changes in our industrial economy. (snip) Chicago remains mired in the second-tier of venture capital deal flow, according to the National Venture Capitals Yearbook, an annual scorecard of venture capital deals that was released this month. Less than two percent of venture capital in the United States is invested in Chicago, same as its been since 2012, when we started building this Potemkin Village. By comparison, over that same time, New York has doubled its share of the American venture capital market, and now one in ten venture dollars are invested in New York. While new markets are being created in the genomic sciences, artificial intelligence, and robotic technologies in the Bay Area, New York, and Boston, Chicago seems rooted in designing new software programs that could have easily been produced at the coasts years and years ago.

Chicago is falling very far behind. Yet, the city is full of the amenities that renowned expert on urban life Richard Florida said encourage a flourishing creative class  coffee houses, art galleries, the whole trendy city life thing that is supposed to attract the precious techies that populate San Francisco, Seattle, and Austin.

Unfortunately, in the entire presentation being heard by the movers and shakers, all the fixes are technical, and the words public safety and taxes are not to be found.

I have nothing but love for Chicago and its citizens. I do not want it to follow the Detroit model of urban decline. But unless and until its civil leadership faces the real problems, it will not reverse course. And with a political power structure headed by Rahm Emanuel and still in hoc to the ethnic and labor interest groups, that is not going to happen.
For years, Cuba was not very friendly to homosexuals  i.e., concentration camps for gays and segregation of people with HIV.

About 20 years ago, Reynaldo Arenas wrote his memoirs and reminded the world that homosexuality is a crime in Cuba, and he was one of the many exhibits of that repression.

You wouldn't know it with the number of Hollywoodies who overlooked the treatment of gays to take a photo with the world's #1 anti-U.S. leader, who also allegedly offers "free health care" to his people. It's amazing what some in the left are willing to do to stand next to a guy who hates the U.S. and sings the wonders of socialized medicine.

Of course, all of us have known for a long time that Cuba is a fraud, specially the health care system.

Let me tell you now about the latest fraud, or the way anti-gay Castro Cubans are treated by Michael Moore's favorite regime.

This is from The Washington Blade:

Two gay Cuban journalists said authorities detained them on Wednesday as they covered Hurricane Irma preparations CiberCuba, a news website that operates independently of the Cuban government, reported Carlos Alejandro Rodriguez and his partner, Maykel Gonzalez, were reporting for Periodismo de Barrio, an affiliated online outlet, in the city of Sagua la Grande when the reported incident took place.

It gets more interesting:

Gonzalez has also publicly criticized President Raul Castro and his daughter, Mariela Castro, who spearheads LGBT-specific issues in Cuba as director of the countrys National Center for Sexual Education. Rodriguez on Thursdaytold the Blade authorities continue to target him and Gonzalez because of this criticism and their work as independent journalists.

So the Cuban government does not like independent journalists? In this case, it's homosexual independent journalists.

I do congratulate The Washington Blade for telling us about these two Cuban men. Of course, it would be nice if the LGBT community in the U.S. would call for a boycott of the island until its government becomes more "tolerant."

For some reason, I don't think LGBT leaders in the U.S. will do it. I could be wrong. I would actually love to be wrong.

PS: You can listen to my show (Canto Talk) and follow me on Twitter.
More posturing from Democrats who are looking to capitalize politically on Donald Trump's plan phase out DACA over 6 months.

One Democratic congressman is threatening to shut down the government unless Republicans in congress pass the DREAM Act, which would legalize most DREAMers.

The Hill:

Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.) threatened on Friday to back a government shutdown if the House failed to pass the Dream Act to protect thousands of young immigrants from being deported. "We have a Democratic caucus where I know the vast majority of the members of the Democratic caucus are ready to say If there is no pathway forward, not only for the 800,000 and for visas for all of you, but also for the rest of immigrant youth through the Dream Act, then there is no government for anyone,'" Gutierrez said at a press conference. Gutierrez's comments come after Attorney General Jeff Sessionsannounced that the Trump administration would be ending the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program with a six-month delay, sparking outrage among Democrats and civil rights groups. President Trump on Friday signed a bipartisan spending package that would provide disaster aid to victims of Hurricane Harvey, while raising the debt ceiling and funding the government for three more months. Gutierrez is hoping to pass an immigration bill by December, as the stop-gap measure is set to run out in December. The coming Christmas has to be a Christmas of joy for all of us or none of us, he said. Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.) told Mic that the vast majority of the progressive caucus and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus were backing Gutierrez's approach. There is also an effort in the Senate to push Congress to create protections for young undocumented immigrants by the end of September.

It's pretty clear that the Democrats believe they have a winning issue with DACA. But do they? While a solid majority of Americans support the DREAMers in the aspirations, how strong will that support be if Democrats shut down the government over the issue?

A government shut down - after December 15 when the continuing resolution that just passed Congress expires - could never be blamed on Republicans. Responsibility would fall on Democrats and their far left "Progressive Caucus." It would not sit well with a majority of Americans who in the past, have supported budget cuts but not at the expense of shuttering the government.

Those Democrats who consider themselves responsible legislators are fighting this effort to link the DREAM Act to keeping the government open. They know it's a losing proposition and don't want a government shutdown hanging over their party's head going into the 2018 mid terms. That's why even though a sizable number of Dems would support a shut down, the majority will see the opportunity to regain control of Congress and try to prevent it.
United States Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit. TERRENCE DEMETRIUS NESBITT, Petitioner-Appellant, v. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Respondent-Appellee. TERENCE DEMETRIUS NESBITT, Petitioner-Appellant, v. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Respondent-Appellee. No. 16-11970, No. 16-13868 Decided: September 08, 2017

Before HULL, WILSON, and ANDERSON, Circuit Judges.

Terrence Nesbitt appeals the dismissal of two pro se 28 U.S.C.  2255 motions to vacate sentences. Nesbitt argues that the district court erred by dismissing his 28 U.S.C.  2255 motions to vacate as time-barred.

We review de novo the district court's determination that a  2255 motion to vacate is time-barred. Drury v. United States, 507 F.3d 1295, 1296 (11th Cir. 2007).

There is a one-year statute of limitations for filing a  2255 motion to vacate, which begins to run following the date on which the judgment of conviction becomes final or the date on which the right asserted was initially recognized by the Supreme Court, if that right has been newly recognized by the Supreme Court and made retroactively applicable to cases on collateral review. Id.; see also 28 U.S.C.  2255(f)(1), (3). When a defendant does not appeal his conviction or sentence, the judgment of conviction becomes final when the time for seeking that review expires. Murphy v. United States, 634 F.3d 1303, 1307 (11th Cir. 2011). A defendant has 14 days to file a notice of appeal. Fed. R. App. P. 4(b)(1)(A).

In March 2017, the Supreme Court held that the advisory sentencing guidelines are not subject to a vagueness challenge under the Due Process Clause, such that the residual clause in the career-offender guideline, U.S.S.G.  4B1.2(a), is not void for vagueness. Beckles v. United States, 137 S. Ct. 886, 895 (2017). As a result, our decision in Matchett that Johnson v. United States, 135 S. Ct. 2551 (2015), does not extend to the advisory sentencing guidelines remains good law. United States v. Matchett, 802 F.3d 1185, 1193-96 (11th Cir. 2015).

The district court did not err by dismissing Nesbitt's 28 U.S.C.  2255 motions to vacate as time-barred because neither of Nesbitt's motions was filed within the one year statute of limitations. Nesbitt filed his motions more than a year after the judgments became final and the right he was asserting in his motions had not been newly recognized by the Supreme Court and made retroactively applicable to cases on collateral review. Accordingly, we affirm.

AFFIRMED.

PER CURIAM:
Lifestyles of the cossetted and illegal

Here's an unintentionally ironic one - the New Yorker has run a profile of a Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals recipient, describing the hanky-filled moment when President Trump ended the executive order-based program and passed the matter back to Congress. In the midst of this supposed purpose, the New Yorker slyly, incidentally, tried to showcase the young man as a model American, passing him off as not a product of the down-and-out culture, which is where most DREAMers emerge from, but as an overachiever more typical of the upper classes, and like the same upper classes, is now just selflessly trying to 'give back' to his community. What we're supposed to take from that is that all DREAMers are similarly overachieving. The reality about DACA recipients in the statistics tells a different story: DACA recipients in fact lag behind the general population as underachievers with higher-than-average college dropout rates (which incidentally is often a sign of non-merit-based affirmative action privileges).

The young man featured in the profile casually discloses how his illegal status as a Honduran in Tennessee had brought him a Google ambassadorship, a congressional internship, and teaching posts, plus free college tuition. In addition, he just happened to have the cash to apply to 27 colleges. Hardscrabble he was not. Never mind that the list of fancy elite opportunities he's had thrown at him came at the expense of some American citizen. Do most legal Americans get free rides through college, emerging without a dime in debt, as he did because he was illegal? Do most legal Americans have the cash to apply to 27 colleges, or have the wherewithal to get their fees waived? Do most Americans get congressional internships or Google ambassadorships? Not exactly. No, you have to be an illegal to get these things. And it's telling that his 'contributions' to society were pretty much showered honors, not the hard work of building a better mousetrap, which is something that could give him the cash to apply for legal residence as millions of law-abiding immigrants do. For him, it was much easier than that: he got his laurels by pleasing the powers that be. And that calls attention to the agenda of corporate America and the Washington swamp, to put a showcase DREAMER up on a pedestal in the hopes of portraying all DACA recipients as similarly overachieving, and thus, forcing President Trump or Congress into restoring the program. The establishment wants and needs someone exotic to honor such as this young man, much as the rich of Tom Wolfe's Radical Chic loved the exoticism of the Black Panthers and feted them at cocktail parties. From the young man's point of view, being an illegal has got to beat getting legal any day of the week.
Who would ever dream of handing political leadership to someone whose crowning career achievement was a high-paying no-show job? As its next presidential candidate, is Michelle Obama the best the Democrats can come up with? That's the view of pollster Douglas Schoen, who thinks they don't stand a chance otherwise. In a piece for The Hill, he writes:

As Ive said before, the Democrats need an alternative plan to rebuild and unite the party if they have any hope in winning back seats in Congress in the 2018 midterms, nonetheless the White House in 2020. This alternative plan requires a new, united opposition, led by a political leader with widespread popularity. The only person I can see accomplishing this would be none other than the partys most popular political figure: Michelle Obama.

He goes on to cite her high popularity numbers among Democrats and with the general public, leaving her Democratic Party potential competition in the dust.

It's well reported that President Obama stripped his party of upcoming potential leaders as he made it all about himself during his two terms. Voters liked him, personally, but not his party positions. As a result, Democrats lost 1,042 state and federal legislative offices, governorships and the presidency itself during his administration. Republicans posted gains across the board, culminating in the 2016 election of Donald Trump. Their fundraising dried up, too.

Putting Michelle Obama out there (and who knows if it will happen -- all we know is that Democrats are desperate) would be more of the same personality-based office-seeking.

Because if Barack Obama had a lightweight political record before his election, Michelle Obama has a virtually non-existent one. It was utterly substance-free. Her main point of visibility to the public was in her wearing of expensive designer gowns. Her main policy move during her White House years was in her utterly unpopular school lunch program, which one student recipient summed up as "nasty, rotty" food. It was served up with a side of corruption to boot. Prior to that, she held her no-show job in Chicago for a $316,000 salary payout. She pretty much has nothing else to speak for her other than her penchant for wearing diamonds and expensive clothes and serving in boutique ribbon-cutting roles for leftist causes, under the rubric of 'service.'

It all shows the vast desert wasteland of potential leaders the Democrats have left themselves with.

That they grasp for Michelle shows that they know their ideas are bankrupt and no longer sell with voters. That they seek to repeat the Obama act again with Michelle, suggests they are looking for an Evita, or perhaps Isabella, the two nightclub dancers who were put into place in Argentina because the locals longed for their absent strongman, Juan Peron. It was a desperate grasp for the politics of personality. Isabella's tenure as president after Peron's demise in the early 1970s was a disaster for Argentina, ushering the reactionary Dirty War which followed the leftist terrorism and disorder that emerged during her weak leadership.

Now the Democrats seem to be anxious to follow the same pattern. We've seen it elsewhere with this bunch, with the tag-team politics of Bill and Hillary Clinton, and more broadly on the left, with the Hollande-Royal partnership in socialist France, and with the Kirchner couple recently in Argentina.

Michelle Obama says she's not interested, but one wonders how long that will last, now that President Obama has begun to fundraise for Democrats once again. Whether she does or doesn't get involved, the verdict is in: The Democrats can't come up with anyone better.
As Ive said before, the Democrats need an alternative plan to rebuild and unite the party if they have any hope in winning back seats in Congress in the 2018 midterms, nonetheless the White House in 2020.

Who would ever dream of handing political leadership to someone whose crowning career achievement was a high-paying no-show job? As its next presidential candidate, is Michelle Obama the best the Democrats can come up with? That's the view of pollster Douglas Schoen, who thinks they don't stand a chance otherwise. In a piece for The Hill, he writes :

This alternative plan requires a new, united opposition, led by a political leader with widespread popularity. The only person I can see accomplishing this would be none other than the partys most popular political figure: Michelle Obama.

He goes on to cite her high popularity numbers among Democrats and with the general public, leaving her Democratic Party potential competition in the dust.

It's well reported that President Obama stripped his party of upcoming potential leaders as he made it all about himself during his two terms. Voters liked him, personally, but not his party positions. As a result, Democrats lost 1,042 state and federal legislative offices, governorships and the presidency itself during his administration. Republicans posted gains across the board, culminating in the 2016 election of Donald Trump. Their fundraising dried up, too.

Putting Michelle Obama out there (and who knows if it will happen -- all we know is that Democrats are desperate) would be more of the same personality-based office-seeking.

Because if Barack Obama had a lightweight political record before his election, Michelle Obama has a virtually non-existent one. It was utterly substance-free. Her main point of visibility to the public was in her wearing of expensive designer gowns. Her main policy move during her White House years was in her utterly unpopular school lunch program, which one student recipient summed up as "nasty, rotty" food. It was served up with a side of corruption to boot. Prior to that, she held her no-show job in Chicago for a $316,000 salary payout. She pretty much has nothing else to speak for her other than her penchant for wearing diamonds and expansive clothes and serving in boutique ribbon-cutting roles for leftist causes, under the rubric of 'service.'

It all shows the vast desert wasteland of potential leaders the Democrats have left themselves with.

That they grasp for Michelle shows that they know their ideas are bankrupt and no longer sell with voters. That they seek to repeat the Obama act again with Michelle, suggests they are looking for an Evita, or perhaps Isabella, the two nightclub dancers who were put into place in Argentina because the locals longed for their absent strongman, Juan Peron. It was a desperate grasp for the politics of personality, because there was no substance otherwise. Isabella's tenure as president after Peron's demise in the early 1970s was a disaster for Argentina, ushering the reactionary Dirty War which followed the leftist terrorism and disorder that emerged during her weak leadership.

Now the Democrats seem to be anxious to follow the same pattern. We've seen it elsewhere with this bunch, with the tag-team politics of Bill and Hillary Clinton, and more broadly on the left, with the Hollande-Royal partnership in socialist France, and with the Kirchner couple recently in Argentina.

Michelle Obama says she's not interested, but one wonders how long that will last, now that President Obama has begun to fundraise for Democrats once again. Whether she does or doesn't get involved, the verdict is in: The Democrats can't come up with anyone better.
No, this simply cant be. How could I possible agree with anything that Hillary said? Okay, maybe when she was a Goldwater girl in her youth, before corruption took over her soul. But we are talking something that she said in 2014. She was hip deep in Clinton Foundation cash from foreign governments, and plotting her return to the White House.

Yet there it is, on CNN of all places, in 2014, telling those adorable tykes, valedictorians, and heroic soldiers to get out of Dodge:

A mere three years later, Hillary is urging her supporters to protest President Trump's ending of the DACA policy by executive order.

Luckily for Hillary, the MSM will never highlight the contradiction.
According to reports in the Sunday Express and the Telegraph, British officials are convinced that the Iranians assisted North Korea in developing its nuclear arsenal.

The British government also believes that Russia gave vital assistance to North Korea in their ICBM program.

Senior Whitehall sources have told The Sunday Telegraph it is not credible that North Korean scientists alone brought about the technological advances. One Government minister reportedly said: North Korean scientists are people of some ability, but clearly theyre not doing it entirely in a vacuum. Another Foreign Office source reportedly added: For them to have done this entirely on their own stretches the bounds of credulity. Whilst Iran is reportedly top of the list of countries suspected of assisting North Korea in some form, Russia is also suspected of doing so. UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson also hinted at his departments concerns last week as he took questions from MPs about the North Korea crisis. Mr Johnson said: There is currently an investigation into exactly how the country has managed to make this leap in technological ability. We are looking at the possible role that may have been played, inadvertently or otherwise, by some current and former nuclear states. It comes amid rising fears of World War 3 after North Korea conducted its sixth and most powerful nuclear weapon test last week  describing it as an advanced hydrogen bomb for a long-range missile.

In the 1990s, the CIA pointed the finger at Pakistan and the nuclear black market network developed by "The Father of the Pakistan Bomb" A.Q. Khan as assisting both North Korea and Iran in going nuclear. In 2004, Khan confessed to selling nuclear secrets to Iran, North Korea, and Libya. He later retracted that confession, but the proof of his activities is overwhelming.

Khan's specialty was centrifuge technology, machines that are vital in enriching uranium to bomb grade levels. Iran now has advanced centrifuges that we were assured by the Obama administration were under constant surveillance and could not be used to enrich uranium beyond the 5% level (85% enrichment is the minimum necessary to construct a bomb).

But what the British government is concerned about is that centrifuge technology requires first world expertise. North Korea could not possibily have built machines that required such precise engineering so that they could spin hundreds of times a second. The comings and goings of Iranian scientists to and from North Korea has long been noted.

As for Russia, it is believed that the rocket engines used in North Korea's advanced ICBM's came from Ukraine. If any nation knew how to smuggle those rocket engines out of Ukraine, it would be Russia.

North Korea has received a lot of help in developing it's nuclear and missile programs. Those nations who assisted Kim Jong-un in this endeavor could have blood on their hands if the US finds it necessary to take these programs out.
Still bitter about her 2016 election loss, Hillary Clinton has shown what she means by 'she persists' in her continued rage at rival Bernie Sanders.

It wasn't enough that in her memoirs, titled 'What Happened,' Sanders had the temerity to oppose her in the primaries. He also copied her ideas, she whined. He wasn't a real Democrat, she added.

But now, one of her existing staffers, Adam Parkhomenko, tweeted just Friday that Sanders was colluding with the Russians.

PS...you seem to ignore the Russia support online for Bernie during the primaries. The guy is hiding something. Not sure I want to know what

 Adam Parkhomenko (@AdamParkhomenko) September 9, 2017

Now it's perfectly true that Sanders is a commie. He's a self-admitted socialist, and we all know he spent his honeymoon among the worker ants and Wendy's fashion show crowd in the romantic Soviet Union. He loved himself some communism there. But Russia isn't really communist anymore and its leader, President Vladimir Putin, whatever his faults, is no communist.

So for the Hillary crowd to persist in claiming Sanders was a Russian agent just yesterday is more than a little strange. After all, Bernie endorsed Hillary and energetically campaigned for her even after all her dirty tricks against him to steal the primaries. How's that for gratitude?

What's more up until now, Team Hillary's dirty tricks against Sanders have been of a more conventional sort. During the campaign, they rigged the primaries through the Democratic Party apparatus to favor Hillary, in the limited number of non-prime-time debates, or through insinuations that the man was an atheist, which he probably wouldn't deny, as a campaign smear, to name a couple examples.

Now they've gone back to the old Russian agent attacks. Apparently anyone who opposes Hillary must be one. Welcome to the club, Bernie.

Among Democrats, it has been a boiling theme of sorts for months.

Bernie did have a Soviet-born campaign advisor from Belarus, but the man was known for doing work on Russian opposition candidates who were against Putin. No cigar there. Bernie also had an talented campaign strategist named Tad Devine who did work with Paul Manafort on Vladimir Yanukovich of Ukraine's campaign. That latter leader, who won Ukraine's presidency, was indeed a Putin puppet who embarrassed Putin and eventually got thrown out. Kind of a maybe thing, but given the many other overseas candidates Devine's helped, many of them genuine democrats, it doesn't add up to a communist in the pay of Putin.

There was also the matter that Sanders is fairly popular abroad, including in Russia. Much of the world shares Sanders' view of socialism and that is not all that suprising. That does include Russia, so plenty of ordinary people in Russia do like Sanders and what he stands for. A reporter for RT News in Washington told me most of the reporters there were Sanders supporters, there were only about 3 in a staff of 75 who liked Trump. But even those factors don't add up to Sanders being a Russian agent, though one could see why maybe the Hillary team might imagine it from that picture.

Then there was Bernie Sanders' lonely vote against Russian sanctions, which he said he did because he wanted to preserve the Iran Deal. By themselves, Sanders was ok with sanctioning Russia. But since it was attached to the Iran Deal, he said he was against it. Now it could be argued that the Iran Deal itself is pro-Russia, given the way it weakens the United States, but it's a mighty tenuous thread to lean on, given that Bernie hasn't shown much evidence of being a Russian shill otherwise. The Nation actually debunked the claims of Russian collusion from that useless vote (accompanied only by one from Rand Paul) in this column here, and managed to trace the roots of the claims.

Sure enough, it came up with the name Peter Daou, a Media Matters-affiliated computer whiz who is now running Hillary Clinton's Verrit platform. Media Matters, according to Sharyl Attkisson in her new book, The Smear: How Shady Political Operatives and Fake News Control What You See, What You Think and How You Vote, is the prime smear and slime operation in the Washington Swamp, and closely affiliated with Hillary Clinton. Bernie, it seems has been slimed by a new Brock operation. According to The Nation:

The jumping-off point seems to have been when Peter Daou, an avowed Hillary Clinton fan and major Twitter personality, quoted-tweeted my original post. Daou spends almost as much time energetically trashing Sanders as he does attacking Trump, and many of the respondents were followers of his. He certainly did not imply Sanders was a secret KGB asset, though, writing only: Bernie Sanders and Rand Paul were the ONLY TWO VOTES **AGAINST** the Russia sanctions bill. Bernie was out of sync with every Dem senator. (It was a Russia/Iran sanctions bill, and Sanders made it clear he objected only to the Iran part, but never mind.) So how did people jump to this conclusion that Bernie Sanders, by opposing Democrats, must ipso facto be working at the behest of Russia? It wasnt entirely organic. And it points to how fake news can infect some of our brethren on the left.

Which suggests Brock and his coevals are struggling to stay relevant after 2016's election loss, up to the same old tricks, sliming Bernie Sanders after Hillary Clinton got panned for blaming her election loss in her memoirs on Bernie Sanders. And traced by The Nation, no less.

It goes to show that Hillary will stop at nothing to pin her election loss on Bernie Sanders. Instead of backing off Sanders now that everyone is laughing at her for her sour grapes, she's doubling down. She Persisted, indeed.
I really do not comprehend the need or desire for hatred. I understand the anger of righteous indignation and the revulsion against evil. But hatred steals your soul. So, when the Nazis and the KKK try to glorify racial hatred, I dont understand it. I am glad Jesus loves them, but loving them, for me, is a serious strain on my sanctification.

But I dont think America is under a serious threat from these two hate groups. Their total membership is small, and in my lifetime I have seen their influence wane severely. Much of this was accomplished by the FBI. We can continue to erode their influence by ignoring these people when they want to broadcast their views. They are guaranteed the right to speak in this country, but are not guaranteed an audience. Our news media should quit covering their events. They need to be made irrelevant.

Unfortunately, we have a new hate group that is gaining in power. This is the group that calls itself antifa. They dont proclaim racial or minority hatred, but they hate nearly everything else. They employ Brownshirt tactics of violence, intimidation, and hatred, even while shouting about the evils of fascism.

They truly hate America. They hate our Constitution and the rule of law, especially the police. They hate Christianity and traditional values. They hate capitalism, even though they enjoy the fruits of it. They hate our democratic republic and want to destroy it.

They especially hate Donald Trump and anyone in middle America who voted him into office. They are gaining in numbers and power and are using the internet and social media to organize. When they show up in large numbers toting clubs and rocks and wearing masks and hoodies, they use these tools to evade the police.

We are now discovering that Homeland Security has considered them to be domestic terrorists for more than one year. Why did Obama do nothing about them? With their arrogance at being able to stymie the police and their burgeoning hatred, I fear they may planning a large public event to punish America. I hope I am wrong.

And now for my metaphorical closure. The House of America is infested with noxious insects. The Nazis and KKK are cockroaches. We had a serious problem and had to call Orkin (the FBI). Their numbers are now small but you can still see some when you turn on the kitchen light. They are attracted to garbage and we have to remain vigilant to keep their numbers in check.

But antifa are termites. They are working largely unseen and want to destroy the House of America by eating away at the foundation. We need to stop them before our house comes tumbling down.

Roger is a practicing physician in Kankakee, Illinois. His medical degree is from the University of Chicago. He has a plethora of interests.
United States Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. ANTON LEMAR DAMES, Defendant-Appellant. No. 17-11482 Decided: September 08, 2017

Before JULIE CARNES, JILL PRYOR and ANDERSON, Circuit Judges.

Anton Dames appeals the district court's dismissal of three post-conviction motions that: (1) requested the production of Brady evidence and statements of witnesses who would not be called at trial; and (2) argued that (a) the government had not disclosed all Brady material before trial, (b) the government violated his Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendment rights by wrongfully arresting and illegally prosecuting him, (c) the government failed to call a confidential informant as a witness at his trial, in violation of the Confrontation Clause, (d) his trial attorney had conspired with law enforcement and the confidential informant to falsely arrest and convict him, and (e) his trial attorney represented the confidential informant in the state case in which the informant cooperated in an attempt to reduce his own sentence. The district court dismissed the case for lack of jurisdiction as a successive motion under 28 U.S.C.  2255.

We review questions concerning jurisdiction de novo. Williams v. Chatman, 510 F.3d 1290, 1293 (11th Cir. 2007). Appellate courts have a responsibility to examine the subject matter jurisdiction of the district courts in actions that they review. United States v. Al-Arian, 514 F.3d 1184, 1189 (11th Cir. 2008) (internal quotation omitted). The burden for establishing federal subject matter jurisdiction rests with the party bringing the claim. Sweet Pea Marine, Ltd. v. APJ Marine, Inc., 411 F.3d 1242, 1247 (11th. Cir. 2005) (citation omitted).

A prisoner in federal custody may file a motion to vacate, set aside, or correct sentence pursuant to 28 U.S.C.  2255, claiming the right to be released upon the ground that the sentence was imposed in violation of the Constitution or laws of the United States, or that the court was without jurisdiction to impose such sentence, or that the sentence was in excess of the maximum authorized by law, or is otherwise subject to collateral attack. 28 U.S.C.  2255(a). A second or successive motion must be certified as provided in 28 U.S.C.  2244 by a panel of the appropriate court of appeals. 28 U.S.C.  2255(h). This certification must be obtained before the second or successive motion is filed in the district court. 28 U.S.C.  2244(b)(3)(A). A district court does not have jurisdiction to entertain an unauthorized second or successive  2255 motion. Farris v. United States, 333 F.3d 1211, 1216 (11th Cir. 2003).

Dames has failed to identify a procedural vehicle that would allow him to raise these claims at this time. We agree with the government that the most appropriate vehicle would be a  2255 motion. See 28 U.S.C.  2255(a). However, Dames previously filed a  2255 motion in 2014. Since Dames has neither sought nor received permission of this Court to file a successive  2255 motion,  2255 is not an appropriate vehicle through which Dames can bring his claims. See 28 U.S.C.  2244(b);  2255(h).

To the extent that Dames requests the production of documents, he has provided no jurisdictional vehicle under which to make that request. To the extent he challenges his sentences, his motions are unauthorized successive  2255 motions, and the district court lacked jurisdiction to review them. Accordingly, the judgment of the district court is

AFFIRMED.

FOOTNOTES

. Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83, 83 S. Ct. 1194 (1963).

PER CURIAM:
United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit. THE ESTATE OF MAURICIO JAQUEZ, by The Public Administrator of Bronx County as administrator of the Good, Chattels and Credit of the deceased Mauricio Jaquez, ANA MARTINEZ, Plaintiffs - Appellants, v. CITY OF NEW YORK, SERGEANT WILLIAM FLORES, Shield No. 1023, Individually and in his official capacity, DETECTIVE RAYMOND MORRISSEY, Shield No. 744, Individually and in his official capacity, DETECTIVE RAYMOND FLOOD, Shield No. 744, Individually and in his official capacity, DETECTIVE RICHARD HENDERSON, Shield No. 1033, Individually and in his official capacity, DETECTIVE DAVID MCNAMEE, Shield No. 7273, Individually and in his official capacity, Defendants - Appellees, NYC Police Officers JOHN DOES, Defendants. 16-1366-cv Decided: September 08, 2017

Present: PETER W. HALL, GERARD E. LYNCH, CHRISTOPHER F. DRONEY, Circuit Judges. For Appellants: ZACHARY MARGULIS-OHNUMA, New York, NY For Appellees: SUSAN PAULSON, Assistant Corporation Counsel (Deborah A. Brenner, on the brief), for Zachary W. Carter, Corporation Counsel of the City of New York, New York, NY

UPON DUE CONSIDERATION, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED, ADJUDGED, AND DECREED that the judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED.

Plaintiffs-Appellants the Estate of Mauricio Jaquez and Ana Martinez (Appellants) appeal from the district court's orders dismissing their claims against the City of New York, and granting summary judgment in favor of Defendants-Appellees New York City police officers Flores, Morrissey, Flood, Henderson, and McNamee (Appellees) on the basis of qualified immunity for their use of non-lethal force and initial use of lethal force. Appellants also appeal from the district court's order, issued following a jury trial, granting qualified immunity to Defendant-Appellee Officer Flores with respect to his use of lethal force in firing the final shot, as well as a jury verdict in favor of Officer Flores determining that he was not liable for firing the final shot.

I. BACKGROUND

A. The Arrest

The following facts are undisputed unless otherwise noted. This appeal concerns a series of events that took place in a Bronx apartment on April 12, 2009. Appellees arrived at the residence of Mauricio Jaquez (Jaquez) in response to a 911 call reporting that Jaquez and his wife were fighting and that Jaquez was armed with a knife.

When the officers arrived, they entered the apartment and tried to persuade Jaquez to surrender. At some point, Jaquez advanced down the hallway of the apartment, and a struggle ensued as the officers attempted to arrest Jaquez. During that struggle, after Officer Henderson had deployed his Taser, Jaquez attacked Officer Flood with the knife, swinging the knife over Flood's ballistic shield, and making contact with Officer Flood in the shoulder and elbow. Officer Flores and Officer Morrissey deployed their Tasers, but that did not stop Jaquez. Because, according to the officers' testimony, Jaquez remained armed and continued to attack the officers, after yelling at Jaquez to drop the knife, Officer McNamee shot Jaquez with three to four rubber bullets from a Sage gun, which also failed to stop Jaquez. As the struggle continued, Jaquez attempted to stab Officer McNamee, Officer Henderson again deployed his Taser, and Officers Morrissey and Flores fired live ammunition. Jaquez was struck with four bullets, one of which, according to the medical examiner, ultimately proved fatal, and he fell to the ground face-down while still holding the knife. Officer Flores fired a final shot of live ammunition that struck Jaquez in the head when Flores perceived Jaquez to be pushing himself off the floor. Jaquez was placed in an ambulance and died on his way to the hospital.

B. Summary Judgment

Jaquez's estate commenced this  1983 action in the Southern District of New York. The officers moved for summary judgment based on qualified immunity. Appellants countered that proffered testimony of their proposed expert, Dr. Richard Sullivan, created a factual dispute about the officers' description of the shooting. Dr. Sullivan opined that Jaquez was in a psychotic state and that when the officers entered the apartment with weapons and body armor, this escalated Jaquez's reactions. Dr. Sullivan further opined that the trajectory of the bullets described by Dr. Kristen Landi, the assistant medical examiner who completed the autopsy report, contradicted the officers' accounts of the events. That is, Dr. Sullivan also opined that, because the autopsy report indicated that the bullets entered Jaquez's body from above, the bullets' trajectory indicated that the officers were above Jaquez when he was shot, which Appellants contend would contradict the officers' claim that Jaquez was standing and attacking them at the time they deployed live ammunition. Finally, Dr. Sullivan proposed to testify that it would have been impossible, based on the injuries suffered, for Jaquez to push himself off the floor and continue attacking the officers after the first gunshot wounds. This led Dr. Sullivan to conclude that Mr. Jaquez  was on the ground when four out of five of the shots were fired and likely already on the ground or on the way when the remaining shot  was fired, and that he posed no conceivable threat to anyone after [the fatal wound] was inflicted. Suppl. App. 920. Appellees moved to preclude Dr. Sullivan's testimony under Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharm., Inc., 509 U.S. 579 (1993).

Initially, the district court denied summary judgment, concluding that Dr. Sullivan's proffered expert testimony created a genuine issue of fact material to the officers' liability. On further consideration of the expert report, however, the district court excluded Dr. Sullivan's proposed testimony and granted the Appellees' motion for summary judgment except with respect to Officer Flores's final shot. The district court concluded that Dr. Sullivan's testimony was unreliable because his expertise was in emergency medicine, not in analyzing crime scenes, and his opinions were not based on scientific evidence, experience, or research. The district court also determined that Dr. Sullivan's testimony usurped the jury's role because he made credibility determinations regarding whether the officers' testimony was truthful. The district court, however, denied summary judgment with respect to Officer Flores's final shot, concluding that there was a triable issue of fact as to whether a reasonable officer could conclude that Jaquez posed a threat when Officer Flores fired the final shot.

C. Trial

Before trial, Appellees moved to exclude certain evidence. The district court concluded that Appellants' motorized life-sized model of Jaquez would be unduly prejudicial given other available evidence explaining the trajectory of the bullets. The district court also excluded as unduly prejudicial two photographs from before the events of April 12, 2009 that depicted Jaquez with his wife and child, and Jaquez holding an infant. The district court next denied Appellees' motion to preclude the crime scene report and allowed the report subject to redactions. With respect to the photographs attached to the crime scene report, the district court allowed eight of ninety photos showing where the final shot occurred. The court prevented Appellants from introducing into evidence some of the officers' weapons, tools, and ammunition, but did allow Appellants to introduce the Sage gun, which fires rubber bullets, a ballistic vest, and a ballistic shield.

The only issue presented to the jury was whether Officer Flores used excessive force when he fired the final shot after Jaquez was on the floor. The jury returned two verdicts with respect to the final shot. In the first verdict, the jury responded to two special interrogatories, finding that Jaquez was pushing himself up from the floor and had a knife in his hand as Officer Flores fired the final shot. In the second verdict, the jury found that Officer Flores did not use excessive force against Jaquez. On the basis of the jury's factual findings in response to the special interrogatories, the district court granted Officer Flores's motion for qualified immunity. Following the trial, Appellants moved for judgment as a matter of law, which the court denied.

II. STANDARDS OF REVIEW

We review de novo a district court's grant of summary judgment, viewing the facts in the light most favorable to the Appellants. Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a); Saleem v. Corp. Transp. Grp., Ltd., 854 F.3d 131, 138 (2d Cir. 2017). We review de novo a district court's denial of a judgment as a matter of law. Morse v. Fusto, 804 F.3d 538, 546 (2d Cir. 2015). We review the district court's evidentiary rulings for abuse of discretion. Boyce v. Soundview Tech. Grp., Inc., 464 F.3d 376, 385 (2d Cir. 2006). Finally, [a] jury instruction is erroneous if it misleads the jury as to the correct legal standard or does not adequately inform the jury on the law. Gordon v. N.Y.C. Bd. of Educ., 232 F.3d 111, 116 (2d Cir. 2000). The formulation of special verdict questions further rests in the sound discretion of the trial judge, and will warrant reversal only if the questions mislead or confuse the jury, or inaccurately frame the issues to be resolved. Cash v. Cty. of Erie, 654 F.3d 324, 340 (2d Cir. 2011) (citation omitted).

III. DISCUSSION

A. Qualified Immunity

Qualified immunity serves as a defense when an officer's conduct does not violate clearly established law or it was objectively reasonable for the officer to believe that his conduct did not violate such law. Salim v. Proulx, 93 F.3d 86, 89 (2d Cir. 1996). [W]hether an official protected by qualified immunity may be held personally liable for an allegedly unlawful official action generally turns on the objective legal reasonableness of the action, assessed in light of the legal rules that were clearly established at the time it was taken. Messerschmidt v. Millender, 565 U.S. 535, 546 (2012) (alteration in original) (internal quotation marks omitted). The objective reasonableness test is metand the defendant is entitled to immunityif officers of reasonable competence could disagree on the legality of the defendant's actions. Thomas v. Roach, 165 F.3d 137, 143 (2d Cir. 1999) (internal quotation marks omitted). The determination of reasonableness must account for the fact that police officers are often forced to make split-second judgments in circumstances that are tense, uncertain, and rapidly evolvingabout the amount of force that is necessary in a particular situation. Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386, 397 (1989). Because Jaquez cannot testify to contradict the officers' testimony, the court must also consider circumstantial evidence that, if believed, would tend to discredit the police officer's story, and consider whether this evidence could convince a rational factfinder that the officer acted unreasonably. O'Bert ex rel. Estate of O'Bert v. Vargo, 331 F.3d 29, 37 (2d Cir. 2003) (internal quotation marks omitted).

Taking the facts in the light most favorable to Appellants, there is no triable issue of fact with respect to the objective reasonableness of the officers' use of non-lethal force. See Doninger v. Niehoff, 642 F.3d 334, 349 (2d Cir. 2011). Even assuming Jaquez did not have the knife in his hand when he walked down the hallway, the officers testified that they could not see Jaquez's hand in that moment and they could not determine that he was unarmed when they deployed the Taser. Thus, in the moments that Jaquez was walking down the hallway officers of reasonable competence could disagree as to whether Jaquez was a threat because the officers knew Jaquez had easy access to a fillet knife, was acting erratically, and was refusing to obey the officers' commands. Thomas, 165 F.3d at 143; see Graham, 490 U.S. at 39697.

After the first deployment of the Taser, Jaquez moved backwards around the corner into the bathroom, out of the officers' view. The officers proceeded down the hallway towards the bathroom to arrest Jaquez. Appellants argue that there is a genuine material dispute about whether Jaquez was attacking the officers when they entered the bathroom and used non-lethal and lethal force. We disagree. Appellants did not put forth sufficient competent evidence to create a genuine dispute about whether Jaquez was attacking the officers with a knife in the bathroom. Moreover, because of Jaquez's refusal to follow commands, his close proximity to a lethal weapon, and his behavior up to that point, the arresting officers reasonably could have believed that Jaquez posed a threat. See Graham, 490 U.S. at 39697. Officers of reasonable competence, therefore, could disagree whether the officers' later use of their Tasers and, after a physical altercation between an officer and Jaquez, the officers' use of the Sage Gun were reasonable.

Appellants also contend that the district court improperly granted summary judgment on the officers' initial use of lethal force. Appellants' assertions that (1) the downward trajectory of bullets demonstrated that Jaquez was lying on the ground, (2) the trajectory of the bullets reflects that Jaquez's right arm was pulled back and not advancing at the officers, and (3) Jaquez was shorter than Officer McNamee and could not have reached his neck with the knife, do not create material disputes of fact as to whether the officers' initial decision to use deadly force was reasonable. In other words, the limited circumstantial evidence indicating the possible positions of the officers and Jaquez at the time that they initially fired live ammunition is insufficient to defeat summary judgment on qualified immunity. There is no dispute that immediately prior to the officers' use of lethal force Jaquez threatened the officers with a knifethus engaging in the use of lethal force himself. Considering the facts and circumstances of this case from the perspective of a reasonable officer on the scene and allow[ing] for the fact that police officers are often forced to make split-second judgmentsin circumstances that are tense, uncertain, and rapidly evolvingabout the amount of force that is necessary in a particular situation, a reasonable officer could believe that Jaquez's attack on Officer McNamee reasonably posed a continued threat to the safety of the officers. Graham, 490 U.S. at 39697. At bottom, therefore, reasonable officers could disagree as to whether lethal force was an appropriate response. See Thomas, 165 F.3d at 143. Absent any evidence contradicting the facts above, Appellees were entitled to summary judgment on their qualified immunity defense for their use of non-lethal and initial use of lethal force.

B. The District Court Did Not Err in Denying Appellants' Request for a Directed Verdict

[A] district court must deny a motion for judgment as a matter of law unless, viewed in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party, the evidence is such that, without weighing the credibility of the witnesses or otherwise considering the weight of the evidence, there can be but one conclusion as to the verdict that reasonable [persons] could have reached. Cobb v. Pozzi, 363 F.3d 89, 101 (2d Cir. 2004) (second alteration in original) (internal quotation marks omitted). A movant's burden under Rule 50(b) to obtain post-verdict relief is particularly heavy, and the district court may set aside the verdict only where there is such a complete absence of evidence supporting the verdict that the jury's findings could only have been the result of sheer surmise and conjecture, or  [there is] such an overwhelming amount of evidence in favor of the movant that reasonable and fair minded men could not arrive at a verdict against him. Cross v. N.Y.C. Transit Auth., 417 F.3d 241, 248 (2d Cir. 2005) (alteration in original) (internal quotation marks omitted).

Viewing the record in the light most favorable to the Appellees, at the time Officer Flores fired the final shot, the jury was able to conclude that Officer Flores reasonably perceived Jaquez as a continued threat. Officers McNamee and Morrissey testified that Jaquez was pushing himself up off the floor prior to the moment Officer Flores fired the final shot. The jury's finding was not the result of sheer surmise and conjecture, but based on the officers' testimony, the crime scene report, and other evidence in the record that the jury determined to be credible. Brady v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 531 F.3d 127, 133 (2d Cir. 2008). The district court therefore properly denied Appellants' motions for a directed verdict.

C. The District Court Did Not Abuse Its Discretion in Its Evidentiary Rulings

The district court did not exceed the bounds of its discretion by excluding Dr. Sullivan's expert testimony in which he would have opined on Jaquez's psychological state and police tactics when arresting an emotionally disturbed person. Dr. Sullivan was not shown to have expertise in psychiatric diagnosis, or on the standard police tactics in dealing with situations like that confronting the officers on the day in question. Although Dr. Sullivan's ability to opine on the immediate effects of the gunshot wounds Jaquez had already suffered on his ability to continue attacking the officers at the time of Flores's final shot is a closer question, we conclude that the district court's exclusion of that testimony was also within its discretion. Dr. Sullivan had only treated four or five gunshot wounds in his career, and it was permissible for the district court to conclude that his opinion on that subject was insufficiently reliable. (We note, moreover, that the district court invited Appellants to submit a replacement expert report before the trial on the final shot. Appellants declined to do so.).

With respect to Appellants' challenges to the district court's exclusion of a life-sized model of Jaquez, portions of the crime scene report, two photographs of Jaquez and his family, and the officers' weapons not used to fire the final shot, we conclude the district court acted within its discretion. The court weighed the probative value of this evidence against the potential for it to confuse the jury and prejudice the defense. Its conclusion that some of this evidence was cumulative of other evidence already admitted in the record was reasonable. The district court did not abuse its discretion in ruling as it did here.

Appellants also contend that the district court abused its discretion when it allowed Dr. Landi, who authored the autopsy report on Jaquez, to testify on the effect of the gunshot wounds. Specifically, Dr. Landi at several points testified that the injuries resulting from the live ammunition would not have affected Jaquez's ability to push himself up off the floor. Appellants' trial counsel did not object to that line of questioning until later, when the district court overruled an objection to a question concerning whether the injuries from the gunshot wounds would have any impact on Mr. Jaquez's ability to hold a knife inside his hand and grasp it. Suppl. App. 193637. Appellants' general objection to the question about Jaquez's ability to hold the knife was insufficient to preserve an objection to the earlier questions concerning Jaquez's ability to push himself up off the floor. Thus, we review for plain error, which we have long held should only be invoked with extreme caution in the civil context. Rasanen v. Doe, 723 F.3d 325, 333 (2d Cir. 2013). Although Dr. Landi's testimony was arguably improper, it did not so clearly contravene an established rule of law and go to the very essence of the case that we can find its admission plainly erroneous. Id.

D. The District Court Did Not Commit Error By Instructing the Jury That It Had Granted Qualified Immunity to the Other Officers or Abuse Its Discretion By Providing the Jury with Special Interrogatories

The district court's jury instructions were not erroneous as they properly informed the jury of the narrow issue before itwhether Flores's firing of the final shot was reasonable. See Graham, 490 U.S. at 39697. The district court explained at the beginning of trial that the only issue before the jury was the reasonableness of Flores's final shot. To limit the questions before the jury, and because there was testimony introduced at trial as to these officers' conduct and their use of force, the district court instructed that it had already determined that the officers acted reasonably in connection with the uses of force other than the final shot by Officer Flores. The district court also instructed the jury that none of its rulings or actions represented a determination concerning the credibility of witnesses or revealed its opinion about the appropriate verdict in this case. Nothing about these instructions could have misled the jury concerning the correct legal standard to be applied or otherwise misinformed the jury on the law. See Gordon, 232 F.3d at 116.

The district court's special interrogatories were not erroneous. See Cash, 654 F.3d at 340. Despite Appellants' argument that they were sandbagged, Appellants' Br. 59, the district court informed the parties of its intent to provide the jury with special interrogatories at a pre-trial conference, and again on the first day of trial. Much of the testimony at trial discussed the events leading up to the final shot. It was reasonable for the district court to ask the jury specific factual questions the answers to which would assist the district court in determining whether Flores was entitled to qualified immunity with respect to the final shot. Whether Jaquez was pushing himself off the floor and holding a knife at the time of the final shot were plainly relevant to the question of whether Flores acted reasonably in shooting him again. Submitting these interrogatories to the jury did not mislead the jury or inadequately inform it of the law. The district court did not exceed the bounds of its discretion in issuing these special interrogatories.

We have considered Appellants' remaining arguments and conclude that they are without merit. Accordingly, the judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED.

FOR THE COURT:

Catherine O'Hagan Wolfe, Clerk

FOOTNOTES

. Although Appellants' notice of appeal indicates their intent to appeal the June 9, 2014 order dismissing their claims against the City of New York, they have abandoned that claim by failing to brief the issue.

. In support of this view, Appellants point to deposition testimony by Detective Cannizzaro, who was operating a camera in Jaquez's apartment and relaying what he observed to the other officers. According to Cannizzaro, Jaquez appeared to have complied with the officers' orders to put the knife down before he moved down the hallway toward the officers.
United States Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. ROBERT EBEY TAYLOR, Defendant - Appellant. No. 17-6015 Decided: August 28, 2017

Before GREGORY, Chief Judge, and SHEDD and DIAZ, Circuit Judges. Robert Ebey Taylor, Appellant Pro Se. Ethan A. Ontjes, Donald Russell Pender, Assistant United States Attorneys, Raleigh, North Carolina, for Appellee.

Robert Ebey Taylor seeks to appeal the district court's order denying relief on his 28 U.S.C.  2255 (2012) motion. The order is not appealable unless a circuit justice or judge issues a certificate of appealability. 28 U.S.C.  2253(c)(1)(B) (2012). A certificate of appealability will not issue absent a substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right. 28 U.S.C.  2253(c)(2) (2012). When the district court denies relief on the merits, a prisoner satisfies this standard by demonstrating that reasonable jurists would find that the district court's assessment of the constitutional claims is debatable or wrong. Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 484 (2000); see Miller-El v. Cockrell, 537 U.S. 322, 336-38 (2003). When the district court denies relief on procedural grounds, the prisoner must demonstrate both that the dispositive procedural ruling is debatable, and that the motion states a debatable claim of the denial of a constitutional right. Slack, 529 U.S. at 484-85.

We have independently reviewed the record and conclude that Taylor has not made the requisite showing. Accordingly, although we grant Taylor's motion to amend page three of his informal brief, we deny a certificate of appealability and dismiss the appeal. We dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials before this court and argument would not aid the decisional process.

DISMISSED

PER CURIAM:
Cromer lock down: Norfolk police lies and fears of a pogrom

At 13:33 on August 19 2017, Norfolk Constabulary declared that the seaside town of Cromer was a no-go area. Hurricane? Terrorists? What happened to close a town? Deprived of a Town Crier, police reached out to the locals via Facebook, whereon the following message appeared:

We have additional resources in Cromer tonight following reports of low-level disorder earlier today. We are aware licensees of local pubs have taken the decision to close this evening and we will have additional officers on patrol to provide reassurance to the local community. We are also aware of mentions on social media relating to a stabbing in the town tonight  we can confirm no such incident has been reported to us.

Curious minds might wonder why an entire British seaside town had been closed. Are Norfolk people so fearful that one rumoured stabbing sends them scuttling for the cellars? No serious crime occurred. The police statement was clear on that.

Helping us get to the bottom of the story was the Eastern Daily Press. Published by Archant in Norwich, a mere 24 miles from the scene, the paper told readers:

Norfolk police moved to reassure residents, saying they had only been called to reports of low-level disorder on Saturday, including thefts from Morrisons and a pitch and putt course.

No big deal, then. Although the EDP did note that the decision of many businesses to shut on a what should have been a busy Saturday night..:

The move coincided with the arrival of a group of travellers who set up camp in the towns Runton Road car park With few places open in town, a large group of people were spotted walking in the middle of the road from Runton Road to Seacroft caravan and campsite in Cromer. However, police later blocked the entrance before the crowd were later seen leaving the site.

Over on the BBC, no word on the travellers. But we do hear from the police:

Supt Malcolm Cooke of Norfolk Police said: We acknowledge there have been a number of incidents in Cromer over the weekend, which will understandably cause concern. However, I can assure residents these incidents have been dealt with appropriately and are of a nature routinely dealt with in towns such as Cromer on a busy August weekend.

No-one reported what really happened. Indeed on the Norfolk police know what did not happen

Norfolk Police Deputy Chief Constable Nick Dean told media on August 21:

Cromer is a very safe town, this is an isolated incident. We cant deny a group of the travelling community were in north Norfolk at that particular time. But to put the blame completely on the travelling community as a whole, I think is totally disproportionate.

The police were on message. But they are worried that the good people of Cromer were not. Why did police send out the wrong information? Do they view the good people of Cromer as a pogrom in waiting, knuckle-heads who will turn on Travellers, blaming them all for the alleged crimes of a few? The message seems to be that you should be less on the look out for the alleged villains than you should watch yourself for signs of prejudice. Rather than policing the streets, the police were examining minds for signs of possible hate crimes.

On September 6, police issued a new statement. Chief Constable Simon Bailey explained what constitutes low-level crime:

There were a number of incidences of theft, of anti-social behaviour, of criminal damage and we misjudged our message, and Im sorry that we got that message wrong. We got it wrong, well learn the lessons. It wont happen again. Part of our review will look at our media messages. Im genuinely sorry that we created the impression that this was a low-level disorder. We had a rape which, whilst at the time we didnt connect to the group, we are now absolutely connecting. 

Alleged theft and rape are now classified as low-levelcrimes.

Hats of to the police for admitting their error. But why not just stick to the facts? Why send out a message? Theyve yet to explain why they did that.

Anorak

Posted: 10th, September 2017 | In: News Comment | TrackBack | Permalink
United States Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit. United States of America Plaintiff - Appellee v. Shawn Christopher Hatfield Defendant - Appellant No. 16-3719 Decided: September 08, 2017

Before LOKEN, GRUENDER, and SHEPHERD, Circuit Judges.

Shawn Hatfield directly appeals the sentence the district court imposed after he pled guilty to drug and money-laundering offenses, pursuant to a plea agreement that contained an appeal waiver. His counsel has moved for leave to withdraw, and has filed a brief under Anders v. California, 386 U.S. 738 (1967), essentially arguing that the district court imposed an unreasonable sentence.

Upon careful review, we conclude that the waiver is valid and enforceable. See United States v. Scott, 627 F.3d 702, 704 (8th Cir. 2010) (de novo review of validity and applicability of appeal waiver); United States v. Andis, 333 F.3d 886, 889-92 (8th Cir. 2003) (en banc) (appeal waiver will be enforced if appeal falls within scope of waiver, defendant knowingly and voluntarily entered into plea agreement and waiver, and enforcing waiver would not result in miscarriage of justice). Having independently reviewed the record pursuant to Penson v. Ohio, 488 U.S. 75 (1988), we find no nonfrivolous issues outside the scope of the appeal waiver. Accordingly, we dismiss this appeal, and we grant counsel leave to withdraw.

FOOTNOTES

. The Honorable Greg Kays, Chief Judge, United States District Court for the Western District of Missouri.

PER CURIAM.
The Harpeth Hall Honey Bears didn't have much success on the volleyball court at Baylor Saturday as they dropped a 3-1 match to GPS before Baylor won in a 3-0 sweep.

GPS improved to 20-8 overall and 3-5 in region play with the 25-22, 23-25, 26-24 and 25-20 victory in the first match of the day.

Reagan Long had 18 kills while Lilly Berger and Hannah Kincer had 14 kills apiece.

Preslee Brooksbank also had a good match with 23 digs in addition to seven kills and eight eights.

Emma Moore finished the match with 49 assists while Karly Benefield and Charlotte Vance both had 14 digs.

The Baylor girls improved to 7-0 in region play and remained unbeaten after 16 matches with the 25-17, 25-18 and 25-6 victory.

Ally Craig had 15 kills and eight digs while Denver Rogers added nine kills and seven digs.

Sarah Sumida had 38 assists in addition to three aces, two kills, a block and two digs.

BAYLOR STATS:

Sarah Barker 3 kills, 1 block

Elizabeth Case 2 aces, 9 digs

Maddy Tindall 3 aces

Sarah Sumida 3 aces, 2 kills, 1 block, 38 assists, 2 digs

Hayden Barton 2 aces, 5 digs

Zoe Ubamadu 8 kills, 2 blocks

Ally Craig 15 kills, 1 block, 8 digs

Laura Kate May 2 aces, 2 digs

Denver Rogers 9 kills, 7 digs

Lexie Laurendine 2 kills, 1 block

GPS STATS:

Preslee Brooksbank- 7 kills, 8 aces, 23 digs, 1 solo block, 1 block assist

Charlotte Vance- 1 aces, 14 digs

Karly Benefield- 14 digs,

Emma Moore- 2 kills, 49 assists, 6 digs, 3 block assists

Hannah Kincer- 14 kills, 1 block assists

Lilly Berger- 14 kills, 2 aces, 7 digs

Kendall Crum- 1 dig

Reagan Long- 18 kills, 1 ace, 3 digs, 3 solo blocks, 3 block assists

(Email John Hunt at nomarathonmoose@gmail.com)
Paul Hargave(HOUSTON) -- The body of a missing Houston real estate agent, who disappeared as Hurricane Harvey was barreling down on the area, has been found and her former husband has been charged with murder.



Authorities discovered Crystal McDowell's body in a wooded area in western Chambers County, Chambers County Sheriff's Office announced Saturday.



Her former husband, Steven McDowell, 44, has been arrested and charged with first-degree murder, police said.



"Tragedy struck into the hearts of friends and family across the nation," Crystal McDowell's boyfriend, Paul Hargrave, told ABC News in a statement. "Our worst fears became a sad, unwanted reality. Crystal has passed. However, Crystal's spirit will continue to grow and thrive through her children and those that knew her best. She will be missed deeply."



Crystal McDowell, 37 and a mother of two, was last seen on video surveillance footage walking through the living room of boyfriend Hargrave's home and then getting into her car -- a black Mercedes Benz sedan -- parked in the driveway on Aug. 25.



McDowell left his Hargraves house, got into her car and left to go pick up her two children, ages 5 and 8, from her former husband, who lived 12 minutes away, according to Hargrave.



Crystal McDowells uncle Jeff Walters told ABC News in an interview last week that he also heard from her that morning.



The next day, Aug. 26, Hurricane Harvey slammed into Houston, and three days later, on Aug. 29, McDowells Mercedes was found in the flooded parking lot of a Motel 6, 7 miles from her home. Police said the car was left unlocked and the keys were in the console. McDowell was nowhere to be found.



In June, McDowell finalized her divorce from her ex-husband, with whom she had shared custody of their children. Her uncle said McDowell never talked about their fighting, only that they had their disagreements. But McDowell and her former husband had been arguing frequently, according to Hargrave.



Before her body was found, Chambers County Sheriff Brian Hawthorne told ABC News in an interview last week that authorities believed Hurricane Harvey was "not the reason Crystal McDowell" was missing.



Copyright  2017, ABC Radio. All rights reserved.
Coming off a tough loss on Friday night, the Covenant volleyball team responded in a big way by claiming a 3-1 (25-14, 25-21, 23-25, 25-19) victory over Howard Payne in Saturday's opener at the Emory Classic in Atlanta. The Lady Scots then dropped a five-set decision (20-25, 25-20, 19-25, 25-22, 15-13) to Chapman to wrap up the day.The split puts Covenant at 3-4 overall on the year.MATCH ONE: Covenant 3, Howard Payne 1Covenant (3-3) powered its way to wins in the first two sets and would answer a Howard Payne comeback attempt with a strong fourth set to pick up the victory.Ginny Moore had a team-best 13 kills to go along with 16 digs, while Schuyler Moore totaled 36 assists and 18 digs. Olivia Becker had eight kills and Lindsey Stephens and Allie Jakes had seven apiece. Covenant accumulated 44 kills and a .143 hitting percentage as a team.Defensively, Hannah Stewart matched Schuyler Moore with 18 digs while Emily Moore and Jessica Seehorn had 11 digs each.The Lady Scots hit .333 in the opening set and never trailed in the frame to go ahead 1-0 in the match. Consecutive kills from Ginny Moore and Stephens opened up an 8-3 lead and that would grow to 21-11 later in the set after a Chloe Storm kill before a Howard Payne error ended the set giving Covenant the win.It was tight throughout the second set until Covenant went on a 9-2 run, capped by a Storm ace, to take a 21-15 lead. The Lady Scots tallied a match-high 15 kills in the set and used those to gain a 2-0 match lead.Howard Payne fought back in the third and was able to keep the match alive into the fourth. In the fourth, the Lady Scots held Howard Payne to a negative hitting percentage (-.026) and would never trail to secure the victory. Schuyler Moore had back-to-back aces early in the frame as Covenant scored the first four points. Kills from Schuyler Moore and Seehorn gave the Lady Scots the 25-19 win.Zhartezia Bradley had 11 kills for Howard Payne (2-5) and Kailey Doering had 10. Cheyenne Lovelady tallied 32 assists and 19 digs, while Jordan Livingston had a match-high 32 digs.MATCH TWO: Chapman 3, Covenant 2Covenant and Chapman went back-and-forth throughout the match, but a key run late in the fifth set was enough to propel Chapman to a five-set victory in Saturday's finale.Storm and Ginny Moore had 11 kills apiece, while Becker had 10. Covenant tallied 54 kills as a team and hit at a .150 clip. Schuyler Moore added 38 assists and 15 digs, while Ginny Moore had 32 digs and Stewart had 17. Jakes totaled 14 blocks, with 10 assisted and four solo, to go with four kills. The 10 assisted blocks for Jakes sets a five-set program record and her 14 total blocks is third-most in a single match.Covenant won the first set 25-20 after collecting 14 kills and a .262 hitting percentage in the frame. The Lady Scots broke a 20-20 tie and scored the final five points in the set, highlighted by consecutive kills from Jakes and Ginny Moore to get the set win. But Chapman responded in the second and tied the match with a 25-20 win.In the third, Covenant regained the match lead at 2-1 after tallying 15 kills for a 25-19 victory. Up 21-18, the Lady Scots put away Chapman with four of the final five points, including a pair of assisted blocks from Jakes along with Becker and Ginny Moore. Chapman would rebound again with a 25-22 set four win to tie the match again.In the fifth, Covenant took an 11-7 lead after Hannah Harris and Jakes combined for a block. Chapman once again had an answer as it went on a 5-0 run to take a 12-11 lead. Covenant would cut the margin to 14-13 on a Ginny Moore kill, but a powerful kill from Chapman's Kylie Cooke ended the match.Cook had 14 kills to lead Chapman (5-3) and Abby Smith added 10. Jessica Blum had 33 assists and Lindsey Johnson totaled 25 digs.Covenant will travel to Sewanee on Sept. 13. Match time is set for 7 p.m. EDT.
RBI was asked to give details about machines being used for counting the Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes.

The Reserve Bank said it is not using counting machines to tally total number of scrapped notes.

New Delhi: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has said counting machines are "not being used" for tallying the total number of demonetised notes of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 in any of its offices, according to an RTI reply.

The central bank also refused to give the total number of personnel deployed for counting of the scrapped notes, saying compiling the information would "disproportionately divert" its resources.

In its annual report for 2016-17 released on August 30, the RBI had said Rs 15.28 lakh crore, or 99 per cent of the demonetised 500 and 1,000 rupee notes, have returned to the banking system.

The central bank in the annual report, which was for the year ended June 30, 2017, said that only Rs 16,050 crore out of the Rs 15.44 lakh crore in the old high denomination notes have not returned.

As on November 8, 2016, when the noteban was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, there were 1,716.5 crore pieces of Rs 500 and 685.8 crore pieces of Rs 1,000 notes in circulation, totalling Rs 15.44 lakh crore, it had said.

"Counting machines are not being used for the purpose in any offices of Reserve Bank of India," the RBI said in the RTI reply dated August 10. The central bank also said no counting machines were taken on lease to reconcile the total figure of the junked notes.

It was asked to give details about machines being used for counting the Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes.

The central bank also denied sharing information on the total number of personnel deployed for counting of the old notes. "Compiling the information would disproportionately divert the resources, the information sought cannot be furnished as per Section 7 (9) of RTI Act, 2005," the RBI said in its reply to the RTI query filed by a PTI correspondent.

The Section says that information shall ordinarily be provided in the form in which it is sought unless it would disproportionately divert the resources of the public authority or would be detrimental to the safety or preservation of the record in question.

To a query seeking the dates of beginning of the counting of the demonetised notes, it said "the processing of notes is a continuous activity".

The RBI did not give any specific reply when asked about the last date of counting of the demonetised notes. "Subject to future corrections based on verification process when completed, the estimated value of specified bank notes received as on June 30, 2017, is Rs 15.28 trillion," the central bank had said in its annual report.

While the counterfeit currency notes made up for a minuscule number, the RBI post-demonetisation spent Rs 7,965 crore on printing new Rs 500 and Rs 2,000 and other denomination notes, more than double the Rs 3,421 crore spent in the previous year, it said.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had said demonetisation, which had slowed down economic activity and put common man at much inconvenience, was aimed at flushing out black money, eliminating fake currency, striking at the root of terror financing, converting non-formal economy into formal one to expand tax base and employment and giving a big boost to digitisation of payments to make India a less-cash economy.

In his reaction to the RBI report, ex-finance minister P Chidambaram had wondered whether demonetisation was "a scheme designed to convert black money into white".

"RBI 'gained' Rs 16,000 crore, but 'lost' Rs 21,000 crore in printing new notes! The economists deserve Nobel Prize. "Rs 16,000 cr out of demonetised notes of Rs 15,44,000 cr did not come back to RBI. That is 1%. Shame on RBI which 'recommended' demonetisation," Chidambaram had said in a series of tweets.
The actress is on a roll with her production ventures, lending her support to films in multiple regional languages.

Toronto: The language palette of Priyanka Chopra's Purple Pebble Pictures is all set for new additions, Assamese, Malayalam and Gujarati.

This was revealed by Madhu Chopra, the actor's mother and head of the production company, on the sidelines of the 42nd Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) on Friday.

Speaking exclusively to PTI after the world premiere at TIFF of Purple Pebble's Nepali-language, Sikkim-set film 'Pahuna: The Little Visitors', written and directed by debutante Paakhi A Tyrewala, Madhu said, "We are delighted that we will be working with veteran Assamese filmmaker Jahnu Barua next."

Having already produced films in Bhojpuri, Marathi and Punjabi, the banner is now in the process of giving finishing touches to the screenplay of its first Bengali film, 'Nalini', which tells the story of a 17-year-old Rabindranath Tagore finding his first love in Maharashtra during a stay there with his elder brother and ICS officer Satyendranath Tagore.

The banner is, at the same time, finalising plans for films in Malayalam and Gujarati as well, Madhu said.

Regarding the upcoming Barua film, the producer said, "We approached him for a collaboration with us. He asked for some time to make up his mind. He recently gave his go-ahead to the project."

Purple Pebble Pictures, which plans to bankroll at least three films a year on an average, has submitted the script for the Tagore film to the vice-chancellor of Viswa-Bharati University for final vetting.

"The film is about a towering figure and deals with sensitive aspects of his life, so we cannot afford to slip up at all," Madhu, a former Army doctor who now presides over her daughter's film production activities, said.

Tyrewala has showered lavish praise on the production company for its approach.

"I had the desire and confidence that I could direct a film, but the film wouldn't have happened had they not backed me to the hilt. They are hands-on but very non-interfering," she told this correspondent.

At the premiere of 'Pahuna', Tyrewala had divulged how a string of Mumbai producers had rejected her script.

She was a woman and a first-time director wanting to make a children's film in Sikkim. Nobody saw any potential in the project until she approached Priyanka.

"She said she would back my film for the very reasons that the others had rejected it," the director said.

'Pahuna' tells the story of three children separated from their parents as the family flees political unrest in Nepal.

They end up in Sikkim and confront their fears and uncertainties with childlike innocence, hope and tenacity.
Sanju Sahai is a 6th generation musician, now London based, and today the eldest son, so is the khalifa (titular head) of his gharana.

The craft of tabla was brought to Banaras around 200 years ago by Pandit Sanju Sahais forbear, Pandit Ram Sahai, from Lucknow. The Banaras gharana has seen such doyens as Pandit Kanthe Maharaj, Pandit Anokhe Lal, Pandit Samta Prasad, and Pandit Kishan Maharaj in the last century.

Sanju is a 6th generation musician, now London based, and today the eldest son, so is the khalifa (titular head) of his gharana. His tabla solo concerts are hugely acclaimed, as they reflect the playing of an earlier generation of what is now old fashioned Banaras baaj. He is startlingly handsome, affable, completely informal, and with the easy, natural charm of a born artist, in whose genes runs generations of trained performers.

It was easy to chat with him before his concert. I asked Pandit Sanju Sahai about his early life in Banaras, before he left for London. He acknowledged of course I grew up in India listening to some of the greats of Hindustani classical music such as Ustad Bismillah Khan Saheb, Pandit Ravi Shankar Ji, Pandit Kishen Maharaj Ji, Pandit Samta Prasad Ji and of course my father and Guru Pandit Sharda Sahai Ji. We used to look forward to attending all night concerts especially; I used to always sit behind my father on the stage, and it was a heady feeling.

Chatting about the Musical greats he had heard led to my asking him how he felt today being the Khalifa of his gharana; for him was it an advantage or a disadvantage and he replied, well, its a bit of both really. I am the eldest son, and from the time I was four I realised there were expectations of me that were not be centred around my cousin, who is elder and also a tabla player.

All us cousins grew up together in a musical environment in Banaras; one of my sisters used to play the tabla, Suman Mishra, two of my cousins also play tabla named Deepak Sahai and Shiv Sahai. For me, in my life time I dont think I can even reach 10 per cent of what my forefathers achieved; I feel I am just keeping the tradition alive. My elders in the Banaras gharana who play the tabla get my respect anyway; if they choose to acknowledge I am my fathers elder son, and thus worthy of respect, well that also happens. Its no big deal for me.

I asked how it was that there are so many different aspects to the Banaras tabla baaj to which Pandit Sanju explained, the Banaras gharana is so prolific because the founder, Pt Ram Sahai had five disciples and each one was taught differently. Thats why you see so many masters in our gharana who were each so different  Anokhe Lalji, Kanthe Maharajji, Samta Prasad ji. Pandit Sanju continued, tabla is so very important today because almost everybody has rhythm in them, even if its bad rhythm! Melody is not such an intrinsic part of ones being, for everyone.

Tabla not only connects one to the melody, its complete in itself. More and more people are taking up djembe and cajon because it is considered a cool thing today, but at the end of the day, its basically about rhythm which is so intrinsic to our lives. Today the audience chooses who they pay to hear, they dont only buy concert tickers based only on the main performer; the accompanist is as important. I was always taught from childhood onwards to perform with players who were good, masters of sur from whom I could learn. Its important who you are friends with, its as important who you interact with musically. I am a bit choosy about who I play with for this reason.

Of course living in London I dont have as many choices as I would have here, but in my way, I try. And I dont mean this arrogantly; that I choose to only play with well known masters. Thats not so. There is this German guy who has taught himself the sitar by listening extensively to Ustad Vilayat Khan; he is very sureela, and I think its my duty to accompany someone like him, so I do.

I asked him what he considered himself to be as a musician  a purist or an innovator? Pandit Sanjus reply was unequivocal, musically I am completely a traditionalist. My music belongs to my forefathers, its not mine, I am only keeping the music alive. I dont make any changes in my tabla, or the baaj. There is so much already; I have not yet felt the need to play my own thing. I asked him about his concert tours, he said I come to India around 3-4 times a year. I dont want to play 10-15 concerts in a season; if I have 1 or 2 good concerts, Im happy. At Saptak, Ahmedabad, I was given 45 minutes to play, but I ended up playing 2 hours! I feel a free flowing concert cannot stick to a strict time table; when creativity flows, you should not rein it in.

Mr Sanju continued his reminiscences Life is very busy for me in London; I have been teaching tabla at the University of London for years. After my fathers demise I am teaching more and more as well as running tabla residencies in different parts of the world, in Norway, Canada, USA. I sometimes get booked 2 years in advance. And I never let anyone down, if I have made a commitment, I stick to it. Whoever is entered in my diary first is the one I perform with! I am lucky to have played with all the greats  Ustad Amjad Ali Khan, Pandit Hari Prasad Chaurasia, Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma, my solo tabla concerts are also very appreciated.

Pandit Sanju then spoke of the new passion in his life, through Kashi Arts, a new organisation I have founded, I am trying to take the amazing artists we have here in Kashi to the West; its a sad thing but our society is very brand oriented; what is heard about, or seen as being good is what is popular.

Classical music always has had, and should have, a select audience. Its not for the masses. The interest in classical music is still there, and its is not like its there due to Western influence. On this note, we parted; Pandit Sanju Sahai headed for his concert.
The incident is of a Bhopal hospital, where the carelessness came to light when Rakhi Ganota complained about a pain in her back.

Bhopal: In a case of sheer negligence by the hospital authority, a government hospital of Bhopal allegedly left needle inside the body of a pregnant woman after giving her Spinal Anesthesia during her delivery.

The incident is of Bhopal's Sultania Zanana Hospital, where the carelessness of the doctors came to light when 23-year old, Rakhi Ganota complained about a pain in her back, after coming back from unconsciousness post surgery.

For few hours, the doctors and the family of the women didn't pay heed to her complain; it was only after 16 hours, the doctors examined the woman and found needle in her spinal cord and removed it.

"After 16 hours the needle was removed from my daughter-in-law's body. This is gross negligence by the hospital authority," said Urmila Ganota, mother-in-law of the woman.

Meanwhile, the hospital superintendent Karan Pepre accepted that it was a case of negligence and assured actions against the one responsible for the incident.
The JD(U) has 71 MLAs, the LJP has two, HAM(Secular) one and RLSP 2 in the 243-member Assembly.

New Delhi: After being allegedly ignored by the BJP in the recent Union Cabinet reshuffle, the Janata Dal (United) has again turned its focus on Bihar politics in a bid to gain a dominant position within the NDA in the state and guard against BJP eating into its core Mahadalit vote bank.

Sources said JD(U) president and chief minister Nitish Kumar is attempting to join forces with Ram Vilas Paswan-led Lok Janshakti Party (LJP), Jitan Ram Manjhi-led Hindustani Awam Morcha(Secular) and Upendra Kushwaha-led Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP) that call the shots in constituencies dominated by Mahadalits.

The JD(U) has 71 MLAs, the LJP has two, HAM(Secular) one and RLSP 2 in the 243-member Assembly.

Mr Kumar, who has assiduously nurtured the core Mahadalit vote bank over the years, and realises that the BJP, after joining his government, has started fancying its chances of winning over voters from this extremely backward class.

Within the NDA and in Bihar, Mr Kumar is now rapidly trying to form a sub-group of like-minded outfits and bring their leaders closer to him, sources said.

His move to make Mr Paswans brother Pashupati Kumar Paras a Cabinet minister and offering a berth to Mr Majhis son is being seen as attempts to win them over.

As part of his consolidation plan, Mr Kumar is also in talks with 14 Congress MLAs, out of a total of 27, for switching sides and joining the JD(U), sources said.

The BJP has 53 MLAs, RJD 80 and Congress 27 in the Assembly. After pulling out of the RJD-Congress Grand Alliance, Mr Kumar joined the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) to return as the chief minister for the sixth time in the last 12 years.

Just before the formation of government in Bihar, Mr Kumar told Mr Paswan, who was on a visit to the state, that he wanted to make the LJP leaders brother a Cabinet minister.

When Mr Paswan pointed out that Mr Paras was not an MLA, the JD(U) chief promised him that Mr Paras will be brought into the Cabinet as a member of the legislative council.

Mr Kumar has promised a Cabinet berth to Mr Manjhi as well. Incidentally, the JD(U) chief had a bitter fall out with Mr Manjhi in 2015 when the latter had refused to vacate the chief ministers chair for him.

At the core of this warmth among Mr Kumar, Mr Paswan and Mr Manjhi is the fight for the Mahadalit vote bank. Earlier, when Mr Manjhi had joined the NDA in 2015, the BJP had hoped to tap into this vote bank but he had failed to deliver, sources said.

The coming closer of these parties will give the JD(U) an upper hand in the Bihar alliance which, as of now, is seen to be tilted in favour of the BJP. Through this, Mr Kumar is also nurturing his core constituency ahead of the 2019 general elections or the next Assembly polls.
Short film "Arden's Wake" by American Eugene YK Chung won the Best Virtual Reality Award at the 74th Venice Film Festival Saturday evening.

The prize was the highest recognition for projects running in the competitive VR section devoted to VR works only, which the Venice Festival has launched for the first time ever this year.

"Arden's Wake" is a 16-minute-long animation feature telling the story of a little girl who lives with her father on the water.

All of the three prizes were delivered by the president of the VR jury, American director John Landis, at an awarding ceremony preceding the announcement of the major Golden Lion Award.

Eugene Chung thanked the festival's organizers for "taking a chance and a leap of faith on virtual reality."

"This is a new art form, and it is an incredible honor that the world's oldest film festival has embraced for the first time this art form in official competition," he said.

A Best VR Experience Award (for interactive content) went to "La camera insabbiata" by artists Laurie Anderson and Hsin-Chien Huang, a VR installation that allows viewers to lose themselves in a fully interactive, and immersive animation journey.

A Best VR Story Award (for linear content) went to "Bloodless" by South Korean filmmaker Gina Kim. Based on a true story, the 12-minute-long VR film tells of the last moments of life of a sex worker, who was brutally killed by an American soldier in a U.S. army camp-town in South Korea in the early 1990s.

Venice is the first major film festival in the world to have launched a competitive section for virtual reality works only.

With 22 titles in the competition, the VR program allowed visitors to experience the newest applications of the VR technology in three different ways: a theater where to watch screenings on rotating white chairs allowing for a 360-degree view; secondly, oculus stand ups to watch interactive works; and finally, installations.

The VR section closed on Sept. 5, registering over 3,000 visitors, according to organizers.
After raping the girl, the accused threatened her of dire consequences, police said.

The matter came to light after the girl complained of bleeding and pain in her private parts to her mother. (Representational Image)

New Delhi: A five-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a peon inside the premises of Tagore Public School on Saturday in Gandhi Nagar area of Shahdara in Delhi, police said.

The accused, identified as Vikas, 40, has been arrested, said Nupur Prasad, deputy commissioner of police, Shahdara.

The incident comes a day after a seven-year-old boy was gruesomely murdered for resisting sexual assault by a bus conductor in a Gurgaon school, which sent shock waves across the country.

Vikas had been working in the school for the last three years. Previously he worked as a security guard in the same school, the police said. He took the girl inside an empty class room around 11.45 am when he was walking on the corridors after handing over lunch boxes to teachers, the police said.

After raping the girl, he threatened her of dire consequences, they added. The matter came to light after the girl complained of bleeding and pain in her private parts to her mother. She was taken to a hospital where her medical examination confirmed sexual assault, the police said.

Traumatised by the incident, the girl was sent for counselling. According to the police, during her counselling the child said she was assaulted by a man wearing a cap and also described his physical attributes. On the basis of the description, Vikas was nabbed, the police said.
India is finding itself in a tricky situation between its two neighbours Bangladesh and Myanmar over the issue.

An exhausted Rohingya helps an elderly family member and a child as they arrive at Kutupalong refugee camp after crossing from Myanmmar to the Bangladesh side of the border. (Photo: AP)

New Delhi: After a concerned Bangladesh high commissioner in New Delhi met foreign secretary S. Jaishankar on the Rohingya crisis in Myanmars Rakhine state on Saturday, India issued a statement late in the evening saying it remains deeply concerned about the situation in Rakhine and the outflow of Rohingya refugees, adding  in a message to Myanmar without naming it  that the issue should be handled with restraint and maturity.

New Delhi also said there should be a focus on the welfare of the civilian population in Rakhine alongside those of the (Myanmar) security forces, adding that it is imperative that violence is ended and normalcy is restored expeditiously.

India is finding itself in a tricky situation between its two neighbours Bangladesh and Myanmar over the issue.

In a statement, the ministry of external affairs (MEA) sought to balance it out by saying India had earlier strongly condemned the terrorist attacks on the Myanmar security forces in Rakhine, adding that Prime Minister Narendra Modi, during his recent visit to Myanmar, expressed concern over the casualties suffered by the security forces and the loss of innocent lives. The statement also pointed out that PM Modi had urged a solution based on respect for peace, communal harmony, justice, dignity and democratic values.

In a move that could be seen as growing unease in Dhaka over the clashes between the Rohingya Muslims and the Myanmar Army, and the allegations of human rights violations by Myanmars security forces on the Rohingyas there as also the exodus to Bangladesh, Bangladesh high commissioner Syed Muazzem Ali met foreign secretary S. Jaishankar amid speculation that Bangladesh wants India to put pressure on Myanmar to resolve the situation.

New Delhi, however, has to be cautious since Prime Minister Narendra Modi has just completed what is seen as a successful visit to Myanmar during which India expressed its support to the south East Asian neighbour.

Agency reports say Bangladesh, which is facing an influx of Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar, has explained its situation to India. The Bangladesh envoy also talked about the need for the international community to pressurise Myanmar to address the exodus, sources in the Bangladesh high commission were cited by news agencies as saying.
This comes closely a month after her sister requested the Minister of External Affairs (MEA) Sushma Swaraj to bring her back.

Hyderabad: A woman hailing from Hyderabad, who allegedly faced mental and sexual harassment from her employer in Saudi Arabia's Riyadh, has been brought back home safely.

This comes closely a month after her sister requested the Minister of External Affairs (MEA) Sushma Swaraj to bring her back.

The woman, Humera Begum, while speaking about the ordeals, said that she was beaten up and tortured by her employers in Riyadh.

"I was in a lot of trouble there. I was not even given food. They tortured me and beat me up. They didn't let me talk to my sister back home. They did things like holding my hand when I served them food," she said, adding, "I want to thank the Indian Embassy, that helped me a lot and brought me here, she said.

Thanking the authorities for bringing her back, Humera also mentioned that around fifteen more women are still there in the same condition, trying to escape, but are unable to find a source to do so.

Humera Begum returned to India with the help of Minister of External Affairs Sushma Swaraj and Protector General of Emigrants MC Luther.

Earlier in August, Humera's sister sought for Swaraj's help to rescue the former.

Humera went to Riyadh on July 23, believing the fake promises of an agent, named Sayeed, who said that she would get an opportunity to do 'UMRAH,' there.

On that note, 'Umrah' is an Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca, Hijaz, Saudi Arabia, performed by Muslims that can be undertaken at any time of the year, in contrast to the Hajj, which has specific dates according to the Islamic lunar calendar. In Arabic, 'Umrah' means 'to visit a populated place.'

Humera was told by the agent that she would also have to work as a caretaker of a small family, on a monthly salary of Rs. 25,000 per month.
Sources said Jayanthi Natarajan, who quit the Congress in 2015, is abroad and will return very shortly.

New Delhi/Chennai: The CBI on Saturday conducted searches at the residence of former environment minister Jayanthi Natarajan after registering a case of corruption against her.

Ms Natarajan has been accused of abuse of power and conspiracy for approving diversion of forest land for a mining project in Jharkhand in 2012 as minister of state for environment and forests.

The CBI has registered an FIR against Ms Natarajan for the alleged violation of the Forest (Conservation) Act. Umang Kejriwal, the then managing director of the Sundergarh, Odisha, based mining firm Electrosteel Casting Limited (ECL), the company and some unidentified persons have also been named in the FIR.

Ms Natarajan (63) was environment minister between 2011 and 2013 in the Manmohan Singh government when she sanctioned the project for mining of iron and manganese inside the core zone of Singhbum Elephant Reserve.

Sources said Ms Natarajan, who quit the Congress in 2015, is abroad and will return very shortly.

She is not with any political party at the moment. The agency sleuths conducted searches at five places, including the premises of the former minister in Chennai, Delhi, Kolkata and the companys office in Sundergarh.

Jayanthi Natarajan, the then minister of state for environment and forests accorded the approval for diversion of 55.79 hectares of forest land for non-forestry use to ECL, though the same had been rejected by the earlier minister of state, the CBI alleged in its FIR.

It said this approval had been accorded without adhering to the advice of director general forests and directions of Supreme Court in this regard.

Jairam Ramesh was her predecessor and had firmly rejected the mining proposal and even cancelled the earlier mining approvals falling within the elephant reserve.

The CBI recovered several incriminating documents during its searches, sources said, adding that after scrutiny of the seized documents, the CBI will issue summons to the accused for questioning.

The agency will also seek clarifications from Jharkhand government in connection with the case, sources said.
The police said that the policemen were out on routine duty when the militants fired indiscriminately, injuring Imtiyaz Ahmed and Shakeel Ahmed.

Srinagar: A Jammu and Kashmir policeman was killed and another critically injured when militants targeted them at a bus stand in southern Anantnag town, 55-km from here, on Saturday.

The terror attack took place while visiting home minister Rajnath Singh had begun holding meetings with government functionaries, security forces officials and various stakeholders on the prevailing situation in the restive state.

The police said that the policemen were out on routine duty when the militants fired indiscriminately, injuring Imtiyaz Ahmed and Shakeel Ahmed.

They were rushed to a nearby hospital where the former was declared dead on arrival. Earlier, a Hizb-ul-Mujahideen commander was killed in an encounter with the security forces in Reban village outside the town of Sopore.

Slain militant Shahid Ahmed Sheikh alias Shabir was the district (Baramulla) commander of the Hizb.

A fire fight between militants and forces was also raging in Burbugh village of Imam Sahib area in southern Shopian district. So far, one militant has been killed and a local girl was injured in the clash.

He added that the J&K polices counterinsurgency Special Operations Group (SOG) along with the Armys 22 Rashtriya Rifles and jawans of the CRPFs 92 and 179 battalions laid siege to Dangarpora, Reban village of Sopore to launch a cordon-and-search operation. During the search operation, terrorist hiding in the area fired upon the joint search party. The fire was retaliated ensuing an encounter, he said adding that the slain man who was earlier affiliated with Jaish-e-Muhammad was involved in many anti-social, anti-national and criminal activities. One AK 47 rifle with two magazines and 23 rounds of live ammunition, one grenade and pouch were found on the slain militant, he said.
A section of Congress leaders are concerned about Gandhis frequent foreign visits when the focus should be on the crucial Assembly elections.

New Delhi: As the Congress struggles to keep itself relevant in the national political scenario, party vice-president Rahul Gandhi continues with his foreign trips. After Oslo, where Mr Gandhi had gone to discuss clean energy and climate change, he will now be flying to New York to address the Overseas Congress.

In three months this would be his third visit abroad. At a time when the Congress stares at a tough fight on the domestic front, with the BJP rapidly gaining in election-bound states like Himachal Pradesh and Gujarat, Mr Gandhi will be wooing the Indian diaspora in New York.

The Indian National Overseas Congress, headed by technocrat Sam Pitroda, is part of the Indian National Congress. Its agenda is to propagate views of the party amongst the Indian diaspora. A gala reception has been organised for Mr Gandhi at the Marquis Marriott Hotel in Times Square.

A section of Congress leaders are concerned about Mr Gandhis frequent foreign visits when the focus should be on the crucial Assembly elections.

It may be recalled that when the farmer agitation was going on in Mandsaur, Madhya Pradesh, Mr Gandhi visited the region for a day and then took off to spend his birthday with his ailing grandmother in Europe. He was also missing in action and reportedly spending time in Europe when the exercise to field candidates for presidential and vice presidential elections was on. It was left to his mother and Congress president Sonia Gandhi to hold parleys with the Opposition for consensus candidates, sources said.

A Congress leader not willing to be named said, There is no issue if a leader takes breaks, but Mr Gandhis timings to take off do create a poor image among the party cadres.

Meanwhile, as part of the ongoing organisational reshuffle, Congress on Saturday appointed Sushmita Dev, Lok Sabha MP from Silchar, Assam, as Mahila Congress chief.

Ms Dev, a first-time Lok Sabha MP, has become a face of the Congress in the Lower House. Daughter of former Union minister Santosh Mohan Dev, Ms Dev is also part of the media strategy group. She is considered close to the Congress vice-president. Recently Ms Dev had started a campaign called Tax Free Wings  a petition to the finance minister to remove GST on sanitary napkins.

In a bid to make the party battle ready in Madhya Pradesh, the Congress has also replaced the general secretary in-charge of Madhya Pradesh, Mohan Prakash, with Gujarat Congress leader Deepak Babaria. The party also appointed two AICC secretaries in-charge, Zubair Khan and Sanjay Kapoor, to assist him in handling party affairs in MP.

Mr Prakash is also expected to be dropped as the general secretary in-charge of Maharashtra. Congress sources said that there have been complaints against Mr Prakash from leaders in Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra. Gurudas Kamat, former Union minister and ex-MP from Mumbai, had openly said that he and Mr Prakash were not on talking terms.

Changes are also expected in the Madhya Pradesh state unit next week. Presently former Union minister Arun Yadav is the state chief. He is expected to be replaced by the Lok Sabha MP and senior leader Kamal Nath. The name of Mr Kamal Nath has been in the pipeline for long but insiders now claim that the official announcement can be made any day.
Odisha was one of the few states where the BJP failed to make an impact in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections.

New Delhi: BJP president Amit Shahs aggressive poll strategy in Naveen Patnaik-ruled Odisha has set the states politics abuzz with speculation about the ruling Biju Janata Dal forced to open back-channel talks with the Congress to formulate a strategy to check the BJPs unabated growth in the state, which the BJD has ruled nearly two decades.

Odisha is one of the key states on Mr Shahs radar where the saffron party has never had its own government. Mr Shah was in Odisha for three days earlier this week to review tasks given to party leaders during his last visit in July. Mr Shah will visit Odisha again in November.

Odisha was one of the few states where the BJP failed to make an impact in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. Mr Shah, now on a nationwide tour to the partys state units ahead of the crucial 2019 Lok Sabha polls, will be on a three-day visit from Monday to West Bengal, another state where the BJP has been desperately trying to gain ground.

Speculation in rife in Odishas political circles that the BJD is holding talks with the Congress, which is the states principal Opposition party, on how to check the BJPs significantly rising political graph. Grappling with factionalism, the Congress is also facing problems like a leadership crisis and internal rift. The state Congress unit could also see a major reshuffle amid growing demands from its workers.

The state Congress, it is learnt, is also worried about losing its support base to the BJP, which was evident during the local bodies elections held earlier this year. The BJP gained significantly in these polls. Since 2014, several BJD and Congress leaders and supporters have joined the BJP.

Upbeat over the local bodies poll verdict, the saffron cadre in the state has been charged up due to the party central leaderships aggressive Mission 120 strategy. There are 147 Assembly constituencies in the state and the state elections are due in 2019.

Ahead of that, Mr Shah has set tasks, including Mera booth sabse majboot (My booth the strongest), for state leaders. Mr Shahs electoral buleprint includes making the party stronger at all the 36,000 booths spread across the state. Saffron leaders and cadres have been asked to compile a detailed data of voters, including their address, phone numbers and which party they prefer, and why.

Categories also include voters who can influence; major social and religious groups in the state and activists of other parties.

The state leadershp has been asked to invlove over 90 vistaraks, who will assist the central leadership in each district of the state.

Mr Shah has also asked the state leadership to ensure that each and every department/committee formed up to the district level should become functional and be given tasks, which he would review during his next visit to the state. In all, Mr Shah held 27 meetings with party leaders, workers and supporters during his three-day stay in Odisha.
Siddaramaiah rushed to assuage tempers asserting the culprits would be arrested as fast as possible.

Mysuru: With foreheads getting creased over the delay in nabbing the assailant of senior journalist Gauri Lankesh, who was gunned down at her Bengaluru residence five days ago triggering nationwide outrage, chief minister Siddaramaiah rushed to assuage tempers asserting the culprits would be arrested as fast as possible.

It has to happen quickly. I am serious about it, he said while speaking to mediapersons on his arrival at Mysuru airport on Sunday. The slain writer was known for her anti-right wing views and her espousal of the cause of Naxalites who wanted to return to the mainstream, with sources claiming that right-wing fundamentalists could be behind the murder though this has not been proved yet.

The CM also spoke on the need to provide protection to progressive thinkers who might be under threat and said, They have not sought protection, but I decided that such writers and those leading progressive movements need to be protected. Gauri never sought any protection. A Central government minister (Ravi Shankar Prasad) made an irresponsible statement that she (Gauri) had sought protection and the state did not provide it. Its not true. We will give protection to anyone. She met me last week along with a fellow activist, Ms Vimala and MLC Mohan Kumar Kondajji. She told me that she was coming up with a Diwali special edition and wanted government advertisements but she did not speak about any threat she faced. She did not have enemies. She spoke to even her opponents; she was a very good human being. We have certain leads on her murder but we cannot divulge any information now, he said.

Asked how he planned to instil a sense of security among progressive thinkers and journalists when even the assailants of writer M.M. Kalburgi had not been traced yet, Mr Siddaramaiah replied, Maharashtra police is investigating the murder of Govind Pansare, the CBI, the murder of Narendra Dabholkar in Maharashtra and the CID in Karnataka is investigating Kalburgis murder. The Gauri case is being investigated in co-ordination with officers probing these cases. There is some progress in the Kalburgi case, its not that nothing has happened. But they have not got evidence to the extent that they can nab the culprits, he said.
A strike called by an alliance of key separatist leaders against the ministers visit disrupted normal life in the Valley.

Union home minister Rajnath Singh salutes the guard of honour during his visit to Jammu and Kashmir Police Lines in Anantnag on Sunday. Deputy chief minister of J&K Nirmal Kumar Singh and DGP S.P. Vaid are also seen. (Photo: PTI)

Srinagar: Union home minister Rajnath Singh on Sunday pledged the Centres full support to the Jammu and Kashmir police and Central Reserve Police Force, that have suffered significant casualties from rising terror attacks in recent weeks, as well as administrative and logistics assistance they need. I dont have words to praise your bravery. Even the Prime Minister has praised your courage, he said at a meeting with J&K policemen at the district police lines in southern Anantnag on Sunday, the second day of his J&K visit.

Later, interacting with their counterparts from the CRPF at its 90 Battalion headquarters in the town, the home minister said the country was equally proud of the paramilitary personnel. In a tweet, he reiterated it by saying: We are proud of our CRPF personnel. Courage cannot be purchased from any market. You are born with unassailable & unmatched courage.

Acknowledging that the J&K police personnel were working in difficult and life-threatening situations, the home minister said orders were issued for bulletproof vehicles at all police stations in the state and jawans too would be provided with bulletproof jackets. You are working in extremely challenging conditions, he said, saying funds for purchasing bulletproof jackets and vehicles, and for setting up a trauma centre for J&K police personnel had been released.

During a series of meetings with the states political leaders, Mr Rajnath Singh reiterated that he was willing to hold discussions with anyone with an open heart to bring peace to Kashmir. He also appealed to people to come forward for discussion if they have any complaints or qualms. He said: I appeal to everyone to come forward to have a discussion. If you have any complaints or qualms, I am ready to have talks with an open heart.

Anantnag, with three other south Kashmir districts  Kulgam, Shopian and Pulwama  have seen the most number of militancy-related incidents and violence compared to the rest of the Valley in the past couple of years. Both the J&K police and the CRPF have been at the receiving end, and it was for that reason that the home minister, now on a four-day visit to Kashmir, chose to reach out their officers and jawans in Anantnag.

On Saturday itself, soon after the home ministers arrival in Srinagar, a J&K policeman, Imtiyaz Ahmed, was killed and his colleague Shakeel Ahmed critically injured in a militant attack at Anantnags bus terminus.

A strike called by an alliance of key separatist leaders against the ministers visit disrupted normal life in the Valley. In Srinagar, the J&K police and paramilitary forces continued to enforce a security lockdown in six police station areas. An official spokesman said that restrictions under Section 144 CrPC remained in force in Nowhatta, Maharaj Gunj, Rainawari, Khanyar, Safakadal, and Maisuma areas as a precautionary measure to avoid any untoward incident.

However, the home minister, at his interaction with the J&K police and the CRPF, hoped Kashmir will be free from terror ... and no force in the world will be able to stop it from becoming a heaven again.

On the occasion, he remembered ASI Abdur Rasheed and Imtiyaz Ahmed, saying their supreme sacrifices were made for J&K. He said: Ive seen the picture of martyred ASI Abdul Rashids daughter. I saw her face drenched with tears. It is difficult to forget that picture.

Speaking at the Sainik Sammelan at the CRPF base, the minister said its men were born with unassailable and unmatched courage. He said it was his aim to provide, at least, `1 crore to the family of a martyr from the Central paramilitary forces.

The home minister also had meeting with leaders and representatives of various political, social and trade organisations to know their views on the issues confronting the state. An official release said the delegations which called on him to apprise him of the prevailing situation in the state and the way forward included those of coalition partners PDP and BJP, the National Conference, Congress, the Peoples Conference headed by Sajjad Gani Lone, who is also a minister in the state government, the Peoples Democratic From, Democratic Party (Nationalist), Awami Itehaad Party, Kashmir Society, National Panthers Party, All J&K Panchayat Association, All Party Sikh Coordination Committee and ABVP.
The CM said the alliance for the local body elections would be considered only after the announcement of civic polls.

Chenani: Chief minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami said on Saturday that his AIADMK (Amma) party would consider an alliance with the BJP when the local body elections are held. Reacting to a question, he said the local body elections had not been firmly scheduled since the state governments petition is pending in the Supreme Court.

The CM said the alliance for the local body elections would be considered only after the announcement of civic polls. Earlier, one of his ministers, K.T. Rajendra Balaji, had said that the AIADMK had aligned with the BJP in the past and it would not be wrong to form alliance with the saffron party again.

Later, speaking in the MGR centenary celebrations in Vellore, Mr Palaniswami narrated the story of a greedy tortoise which wanted to fly to the Moon and ended up losing its life and said people who are greedy for power without considering their merit would face a similar end. Speaking amid smoke following a minor fire accident on the stage due to an electrical short circuit, the CM asserted that the former chief minister J. Jayalalithaas soul would protect the party and government.

Devoting a major part of his speech to the achievements and service rendered by party founder MGR, Mr Palaniswami said MGR provided help to freedom fighters like Kakkan and Communist leaders like Jeevanandam. The CM also lauded the services of Christian Medical College, recalling its history and its founder Ida Scudder.
Airbnb users experience the natural beauty of the outdoors in London without having to step outside a home because it contains hundreds of trees and plants. [Photo/China Daily]

Airbnb Inc, a US-based home-sharing service provider, will continue to grow its presence in China, hiring local employees and working closely with the government to further tap the potential of the country's fast-growing inbound travel market.

China is one of the most important markets for Airbnb, and the company will continue to develop the nation's market, providing better services and products for Chinese consumers, as well as speeding up localization efforts here, said Chris Lehane, head of global policy and public affairs of Airbnb.

"Currently, Airbnb offers 120,000 active listings in China," Lehane said. There have been "2.5 million guest arrivals at listings within China for all time, a 287 percent year-on-year growth rate."

The home-sharing player has established an engineering base in China, its only such operation outside North America, to adapt quickly and meet Chinese customers' peculiar requirements.

In the next year, Airbnb will double its investment in China, triple the size of the local workforce, continue to hire local engineers, and strengthen cooperation with the Chinese government, according to the company.

Lehane said Airbnb supports the Chinese government's positive attitude toward the sharing economy and will respond positively.

At present, Airbnb has formed partnerships with Shanghai Pudong district, Shenzhen, Chongqing, Guangzhou, and Chengdu. By providing training programs and encouraging innovation and entrepreneurship, Airbnb helps those regions benefit from the sharing economy with local tourism development and cultural communication.

In March, it announced it would adopt a new Chinese name "Aibiying", which means "welcome each other with love," and stepped up efforts to localize its services in China. It integrates Chinese payment methods including Alipay, and offers its customers the ability to log in through WeChat.

"Our approach in China has historically been outbound travel, which means people from China travel to different parts of the world  An interesting phenomenon is that over 80 percent of Airbnb Chinese guests are millennials," he said, adding that the company will put more effort into exploring the inbound travel market.

From 2008 to date, there have been more than 5.3 million Chinese guest arrivals at Airbnb listings all over the world, and there was a 142 percent increase in outbound travel on the Airbnb platform last year. Moreover, Airbnb generated economic activity value worth 2.1 billion yuan ($325 million) for China last year.

Founded in August 2008 and based in San Francisco, Airbnb is a major player in the international sharing economy, currently offering 4 million listings across 191 countries. Since 2008, there have been more than 200 million total guest arrivals at Airbnb listings around the world.

Ma Tianjiao, an analyst with the Beijing-based internet consultancy Analysys, said nowadays, Chinese travelers are willing to try something different during a trip.

"They are not satisfied with hotels. Home-sharing platforms offer diverse living experiences."
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar had recommended a CBI probe on August 17.

Patna: RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav on Sunday lashed out at the BJP-led Centre and said that the government is trying to terrorise me and my family by using CBI. He gave the statement in Bhagalpur where he addressed a rally to expose political involvement in Srijan scam.

He said, The scam occurred when NDA was in power and I have all the relevant details to show that Nitish Kumar and Sushil Kumar Modi are involved in the scam. I will keep raising the issue till action is taken against both the leaders.

Lalu Yadav said he wants the resignation of both Nitish Kumar and Sushil Kumar Modi and a CBI probe to be monitored by the Supreme Court.

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar had recommended a CBI probe on August 17.

According to Tejashwi Yadav, the government is trying to save some senior NDA leaders who have been involved in the scam.

The CBI began the probe in the case but I dont know why no FIR was registered against Nitish Kumar, Sushil Kumar Modi and Giriraj Singh, Lalu Yadavs younger son and leader of opposition in the state assembly Tejashwi Yadav said in Bhagalpur on Sunday.

Lalu Yadav had earlier uploaded photographs of the founder of Srijan Mahila Sahyog Vikas Samiti Manorama Devi at various functions with NDA leaders including Giriraj Singh, Shahnawaz Hussain, Sushil Kumar Modi and Bihar Chief Nitish Kumar.

The RJD Chief claimed that Nitish Kumar broke the alliance with RJD and Congress because BJP was blackmailing him about his involvement in the case. Nitish Kumar succumbed to their pressure because he was scared that they might use Srijan scam to implicate him in the case.

Mr. Yadav also said that attempts were made to stop him from holding a rally in Bhagalpur, he said that I am not scared of investigating agency. I have been fighting cases for 20 years, they (BJP) used false cases against me but they couldnt stop me from exposing the Srijan scam.

Mr. Yadav, however, later told reporters in Bhagalpur that he is not scared of any kind of investigation but said that he would cooperate with the CBI and appear for questioning whenever required.

Lalu Yadav has been summoned by the CBI for questioning in connection with the land for hotel scam case. RJD sources said that Lalu Yadav through his lawyers has informed the investigating agency regarding his inability to appear for questioning due to the ongoing trial in the fodder scam case.

His son Tejashwi Yadav has also requested the CBI for exemption citing prior political commitments.
He won the Visa d'Or for News, the most prestigious award handed out at the "Visa Pour L'Image" festival.

PERPIGNAN, France: Belgian photographer Laurent Van der Stockt was honoured Saturday at photojournalism's biggest annual festival for his coverage of the battle of Mosul in Iraq for the French daily Le Monde.

Van der Stockt, 53, won the Visa d'Or for News, the most prestigious award handed out at the "Visa Pour L'Image" festival in Perpignan, southwestern France.

The reporter won the same prize in 2013 for his work covering rebels in the war in Syria, when he witnessed a chemical weapons attack by Bashar al-Assad's regime.

The 2017 award honoured his work during the battle for Mosul -- longest urban battle since Stalingrad -- which he covered from the start to the bitter end, embedded with Iraqi special forces.

The prize recognised that this proximity to the fighting, the suicide attacks, and to terrified civilians gave his coverage a singular force. After some 25 years of covering conflicts, Van der Stockt said that he had "never had access to a military operation for that long." He said the level of access he was given was "never or very, very rarely" granted to a correspondent.
The event was hosted by Yoro Railway Co Ltd and a non-governmental organization called Kitten Cafe Sanctuary.

The number of cats in Japan admitted to shelters has dropped by around 70 percent (Photo: AFP)

Ogaki, Japan: A Japanese civic group teamed up with a railway operator on Sunday to let some 30 cats roam on a local train at an event, hoping it will raise awareness of the culling of stray cats.

Passengers on a local train in Ogaki, in central Japan, were greeted by meowing companions on a moving train, where some passengers mingled with the felines while others enjoyed lunch.

I think its great more people are aware about stray kittens through events like this, said Mikiko Hayashi, a passenger from western Japan, who owns two cats that were strays. The event was hosted by Yoro Railway Co Ltd and a non-governmental organization called Kitten Cafe Sanctuary.

The number of cats in Japan admitted to shelters has dropped by around 70 percent to 72,624 in 2016 from 237,246 in 2004. That has reduced the number of cats culled from 238,929 in 2004 to 45,574 in 2016. The cat population in Japan is around 9.8 million.
Delhi Police files case against unknown accused under prevention of touting act.

New Delhi: When a German couple landed at the Indira Gandhi International (IGI) airport on September 3, they could never have imagined that they would not reach their hotel at Connaught Place and that their driver, whom they had hired, would abandon them midway.

The couple filed a police complaint against a taxi driver who allegedly misled them and did not drop them at their hotel in Connaught Place (CP). The driver told them that there was a demonstration going on in the city and that the police had blocked some streets including the one where their hotel was located. The driver dropped them midway and ran away.

On September 3, at around 11 pm, my partner and I arrived at the Delhi airport and booked a public taxi to the Metropolitan Hotel in Connaught Place area. On our way to the city, the driver told us that there were demonstrations being held in the city. The police had blocked some streets including the street to the hotel. Therefore, he could not drive us to the hotel. Instead, he took us to an alleged government tourist information center, which the driver claimed was a tour and transport development company. The driver dropped us at the office and left, said the complainant, Lemar Tokhi, a resident of Wuppertal in Germany.

Meanwhile, Delhi police filed a case on Thursday against the unknown accused under the prevention of touting and malpractice and is investigating the matter, said a police official on the condition of anonymity.

A source said that there are a number of such elements who lure foreign nationals under the pretext of offering cheap taxi fare. They not only misbehave with them, but also charge them extra. There have been a number of incidents in which app-based taxi drivers often cancelled booking on their own, denying services at odd hours.
City police chief: Conductor has confessed to his role in gruesome murder of minor at Ryan International School.

Gurgaon: Investigations into the gruesome murder of a seven-year-old boy at the Ryan International School will be concluded in seven days, the Gurgaon police said on Saturday. At a press conference, Gurgaon police commissioner Sandeep Khirwar also said that a three member committee, which is also probing whether the school followed the safety and security norms, would submit a report on Monday.

The police has already arrested school bus conductor Ashok Kumar in connection with crime, that triggered widespread furore. Mr Khirwar said that Kumar had already confessed to his role in the crime and added that it would be examined if there were others involved. We will conclude the investigation into the case in seven days, he said.

Efforts would be made that a fast track court conducts the trial and added that the intent would be to secure maximum possible punishment, he said. Police officials said that a committee comprising the district education officer, block education officer and an officer of the women and child development department would submit a report on whether the school followed security norms.

That report is expected on Monday and assured that action will be taken on its findings, Mr Khirwar said. Officials said that it will also be examined whether other schools in the district were following the security norms. Angry locals gathered outside the school premises this morning and protested for over two hours demanding a CBI probe into the murder while demanding that a CBI probe be ordered into the matter. They also demanded that the school management be booked for the murder of boy.

The Ryan International School management has suspended acting principal Neerja Batra and removed all the security staff, District Public Relation Officer R.S. Sangwan said. The boy, a Class II student, was allegedly killed by bus conductor Kumar who also allegedly tried to sexually abuse the minor, officials said. The accused was arrested hours after the gruesome murder. The post-mortem was carried out and the boys body was handed over to his father, they said.

The boys father, Varun Thakur, who works as a quality manager with a private firm in Gurgaon, had accused the school administration of negligence. After the post-mortem, the boys body was handed over to his family and his last rites was performed at the cremation ground in Bhondsi where hundreds had gathered. They raised slogans against Gurgaon MLA, Umesh Aggarwal, Sohna MLA, Tejpal, and Haryana PWD minister, Rao Narbir Singh, who had come to express condolences.

The boys father accused the school administration of negligence. Forensic expert Deepak Mathur, who conducted the post-mortem, said The deceased had two cuts on his neck. His throat was almost completely slit. Hemorrhage and excessive blood loss caused the death. Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar condemned the crime terming the incident as heinous and unfortunate. Those guilty will not be spared, he said adding that the concerned authorities were asked to file a challan within seven days. We will appeal to the court to give harsh punishment to the accused as early as possible, he said. Appreciating the district administration for acting swiftly, he said that the school bus conductor had been arrested soon after the crime.
Education minister Ram Bilas Sharma admitted that there have been lapses on part of the school administration.

Residents of Delhi-NCR take part in a candlelight march on Sunday to seek justice for the boy who was killed in Ryan International School in Gurgaon. (Photo: G.N. Jha)

Gurgaon: Hundreds of parents staged a demonstration outside Ryan International School in Gurgaon on Sunday demanding a CBI probe, even as the Haryana government said that it was not averse to ordering a CBI probe into the killing of a seven-year-old boy at the school. It has also asked the Gurgaon police to book the school owner under the Juvenile Justice Act.

The protesters set afire a liquor shop located barely 50 metres away from the school. They alleged that school drivers and conductors often consume alcohol from the liquor shop in their free time.

The police used batons to quell the protest and detained 20 protesters. Cameras of some photojournalists were also damaged during the protest.

Education minister Ram Bilas Sharma admitted that there have been lapses on part of the school administration.

We accept negligence on the part of Ryan International School, but the school cannot be derecognised as the future of 1,200 students is at stake, Mr Sharma said.

We have directed the Gurgaon police to book the owner of Ryan International School, Albert Pinto, under Section 75 of the Juvenile Justice (care and punishment act) Act, 2015, for punishment for cruelty to child meted out by the custodian in the charge sheet to be submitted in the court within 7 days, Mr Sharma said.

The education minister said that some loopholes in the security are visible in the case and the toilet window was also found broken from inside. He further added that the chargesheet in the case will be ready within a week as police was speedily conducting the probe. However, he stressed that if the parents of the child insist on a probe by the CBI or any other agency, the government will accede to their demand.

We are issuing directives in this regard to all schools, including private ones, he said.

We held a meeting in which the demand to derecognise the school came up, but we also had to take into account the fact that 1,200 students are studying there. The parents of students studying in this school were against this step and therefore we felt taking such a step will not be right, he added.
As per a Central law, doctors cannot terminate pregnancies that have crossed the 20-week mark.

Mumbai: A male gynaecologist running a private practice in Sangvi, Pune was allegedly assaulted with a sickle on Saturday night after he refused to terminate the pregnancy of a woman (20) based on a suspicion that the foetus was over 20 weeks old.

As per a Central law, doctors cannot terminate pregnancies that have crossed the 20-week mark.

The womans partner, Siddhart Suryawanshi (21), who is an auto-rickshaw driver, had allegedly assaulted the doctor  Dr Amol Bidkar  with the help of a few associates.

The police has registered a case and arrested Suryawanshi from the Kirkee area on Sunday night. DCP Ganesh Shinde said, We have nabbed the accused and he is in our custody.

Talking to The Asian Age, Dr Bikar said that when Suryawanshi and the woman, who was in the fifth month of her pregnancy, approached him to carry out the illegal procedure at his clinic, Sakhi Maternity Centre, a fortnight ago, he refused. I have sustained injuries on my left shoulder and on three fingers of my left hand, which were wounded in the attack. I managed to pushed them away and fled, he said.

The cases investigating officer, police sub-inspector Balmbhim Nanavare of Sangvi police station, said, We took note of the pseudonyms that the accused had given to Dr Bidkar. We then visited the doctor who had referred the case to Dr Bidkar.

He added, After finding to the original doctor who had examined the case, our search led us to medical stores in vicinity from where this girl use to buy medicines. We called the chemist and original doctor and, through them, we came to know the whereabouts of Suryawanshi.

Meanwhile, a few practicing medicos from the same vicinity gathered at the Sangvi police station, demanding severe punishment for the miscreant.

A complaint has been lodged against Suryawanshi under sections 324, 241, 506 and 34 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) which deal with voluntarily causing hurt by dangerous weapons or means, delivery of coin as genuine, which, when first possessed, the deliverer did not know to be counterfeit, punishment for criminal intimidation, and acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention, respectively.
Why is fighting against Afghan tribals such a fatal attraction?

Views and opinions on what to do in Afghanistan will invariably be many, and conflicted. It is preferable, therefore, bank on plain, oft-forgotten or ignored facts to visualise the future east of Suez and what magnet landlocked Afghanistan holds for America. And for that matter what that tribal society has meant for a series of empires in the past.

While apparently incomparable, the two As (America & Afghanistan) are a study in glaring contrast and visible contradiction. Taken together, theyre poles apart. No common ground on history, geography, culture, economics, religion, philosophy, anthropology, contiguity, tradition But Afghanistan continues to mesmerise the United States, even after almost 16 years of bloodshed since Sunday, October 7, 2001, when the US launched a war to evict the Taliban from Kabul in the wake of 9/11.

Afghanistan has fatally attracted many others in the past  troops came from the banks of the Thames to the Jhelum; from the Syr Darya and Amu Darya to the Volga! It never stopped. It was invaded by fighters from the Mississipi-Missouri river valley and the Danube, Murray and Darling, and missiles hurled at it from the sea and sky. The Afghan bug-afflicted US President, Donald Trump, now wants to pitch tent in Kabul. He was convinced by the Pentagon, after being shown 1972 pictures of Afghan women wearing miniskirts. Mr Trump was also convinced by his military experts that Indias proximity to Pashtuns makes it a preferred partner to tackle the situation in Pakistan-Afghan border region of Paktika, Helmand, Kandahar, Nangarhar, Nuristan, Khost and Kabul.

But the question remains: why do people from distant lands get hooked to landlocked Afghanistans 2.90 crore people  comprising 42 per cent Pashtun, 27 per cent Tajik, nine per cent Hazara, nine per cent Uzbek, four per cent Chahar Aimak, and three per cent Turkmen? With an area of 65,2864 sq km; a population density of 110.8 persons per square mile; 25 per cent urban and 75 per cent rural; sex distribution of 51 per cent male to 49 per cent female; 70 per cent of the population under 29; 99 per cent Muslim; a total fertility rate of almost six children per woman; more than 30 per cent unemployed; 43.1 per cent male and 12.6 per cent female literacy; poor communications; pathetic infrastructure and a terror-breeding terrain of multiple intra- and inter-ethnic conflict, it can easily be called a land of ceaseless violence, endless forced-migration and unending hostility. But it is also inhabited by a warm, hospitable people who welcomes guests, friends and non-interfering outsiders and tourists.

The inner voice of war-ravaged, traditional Afghans is likely to run on these lines: We are Afghans. We have our own history (turbulent most of the time), culture, tradition We love to live on our own terms, without external interference, in accordance with our wishes. We are a tribal and traditional, patriarchal, male-dominated society. That is what we are, and thats the way we have been. Leave us alone. Live and let live. Dont try fiddle with our system, or try find fault with it. We hate it. Beyond a point, we dont tolerate it, and dont hesitate to fight to kill, or get killed, for what we believe. You are welcome to enjoy our hospitality and friendship as a guest. But dont sermonise, dictate or impose your will on us We Afghans do know how to respect others. Do reciprocate, and give us respect too, and maintain a healthy distance. We appreciate, and always return, honour and respect. We love our freedom of thought, action, belief.

Given this, the US Presidents decision to deploy more troops and stay on till victory in the Fifth Afghan War (First Anglo-Afghan war 1839-1842; Second Anglo-Afghan war 1878-1880; Third Anglo-Afghan war 1919; Fourth Soviet-Afghan war 1979-1989) requires scrutiny.

The United States is indisputably the worlds only superpower today, despite troubling developments at home. With a GDP $16 trillion-plus, over 50 overseas bases, a fleet of 11 aircraft-carriers, a population of 330 million, a mega military-industrial complex and a real-time global intelligence-gathering system from space and sea, the US presence in Afghanistan is like a Gulliver in the land of little people. But the question that still needs to be asked, though no answers may be forthcoming, is this: Why is fighting against Afghan tribals such a fatal attraction? Is it owing to location or position? Untapped raw material? To nip terror havens in the bud? To keep track of Russia, China, Iran, Pakistan, India and landlocked Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan? Or to experiment new war incendiaries in a remote, barren terrain? To control the drugs of southeast Afghanistans Helmand? To teach lessons to the warlords and drug lords of Kabul?

There are no answers from Washington. But the issue has acquired some importance in India as Mr Trump wants New Delhi to play a bigger role in Kabul to help the United States. Does this imply a changed role for India internationally, or is it a restoration of the old hyphenation of Afghanistan-Pakistan-India  as done by previous US Presidents?

The issue may not be as simple as it looks. Landlocked Afghanistan is like a playing field for the Pakistan Army and the ISI  spanning polity to economics, coups to assassinations, drugging foreign soldiers from Moscow and Washington to make profit for its officers. In juxtaposition, it is the bewildering maze of Afghanistans eternal conflict situation. First, the intra-tribe individual conflict (cousin versus cousin being the most prominent). Second, intra-tribal feud between Durrani Popalzai (to which former President Hamid Karzai belongs) and Durrani Barakzai, which fought for power in the 19th century. Third, the inter-tribal fight between tribes of same ethnic group  Durrani versus Ghilzai. Fourth, inter-tribe fight involving two tribes of different ethnic groups  Hazara versus Pashtun. And fifth, the familiar Afghanistan, as seen even now  the perennial conflict between one or more tribes versus whosoever is in power in Kabul.

How can India really help beyond the significant role it is already playing in the development of Afghanistan, where its neighbours like Pakistan and increasingly China are operating more stealthily. India can certainly play a bigger part in the Afghan economy, and offer more assistance, but what it must never  ever  do is to send troops to fight on Afghan soil or to militarily support any other power that does so. Every foreigner who fights Afghans on Afghan soil becomes a permanent enemy of the Afghan people, and history has shown how hostile they can be.

In earlier centuries, they have even ruled over India. Sher Shah, the Lodhis, Nadir Shah, Ahmad Shah Abdali  all have ruled over and looted India. Both Soviet and American troops, in different decades, were drugged to decimation by cunning Sino-Pakistani shadow operators. That is why India shouldnt fall into the same trap of direct intervention. There are already too many live fronts on our borders; opening up another one is a prelude to disaster.
The government has asked for mandatory evacuation of more than 5.6 million people.

Hurricane Specialist Robbie Berg, left, and Ed Rappaport, right, the acting director of the National Hurricane Center, participate in a coordinating conference call for a Hurricane Irma forecast package Saturday. (Photo: AP)

Washington: A large number of Indian-Americans in Florida have decided to stay back despite US officials calling for a mandatory evacuation ahead of hurricane Irma's landfall on the coastal parts of the state.

As hurricane Irma barrelled towards Florida, Indian-Americans, who own a large number of hotels in Florida, have opened up their properties for people in need, so have temples and community places, with Indian non-profit organisations like Sewa preparing to provide food and necessary essentials to those effected by the storm.

"We have put the shutters, made all the precautions for any onslaught of the hurricane, because we have gone through these types of hurricanes every two years, so we know how to prepare," said Vivek Swaroop, who has his own consultancy business in Fort Lauderdale area of Florida, where a mandatory evacuation has been ordered.

According to the 2010 census, the Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West palm Beach area of Florida -- which is likely to be the worst affected part after Irma's expected landfall tomorrow morning, have an Indian American population of more than 40,000.

Swaroop said there was a lot of anxiety among Indian- Americans. "Most of the Indian Americans that I know of, have barricaded their houses with shutters and essentials. Some of them who live on the East Side, which is near the ocean, have vacated," he said.

Hotelier Danny Gaekwad said that most of the Indians are well off and live in good quality single-family homes, which can easily withstand wind speed up to 120 miles per hour. Gaekwad, who himself lives in Ocala area of Florida, was busy in evacuation of some 200 campers from his campground to a hotel of his own. Every hotel till several hundred miles out of Florida are full to their capacity, he said.

The government has asked for mandatory evacuation of more than 5.6 million people.

Gaekwad said Indian-American hoteliers have opened up their hotels for people.

Even banquet halls are being used to provide shelter to people who have left their homes.

Community leader Chandra Kant Singhania, from Miami, said that most of Indian Americans have decided to stay in their homes and are taking all precautions to stay safe. "They are not leaving the city," he said.

However, not all are staying put with a number of Indian-Americans leaving their homes for safer places, as far as Las Vegas and New York.

Many like Satya Shaw are not taking chances. "It took me 24 hours to convince my wife. Tomorrow is going to be a disaster. We are not staying here," he said, soon after he booked a 4 PM flight out of Tampa. The airport shuts down at 8 PM.

"It is dangerous to stay here," Shaw said, adding that he has offered his house for others to take shelter while he is away. However, for his friend Chandra Kant Patel, a resident of Tampa, it is too late to leave.

"Till yesterday, we were told Miami area would be the worst affected. Now we are being told the hurricane is moving towards Tampa," said Patel, who has a local manufacturing business.

Having taken all the precautions to stay safe, Patel feels that the businesses of Indian Americans like him would be worst hit as a result of hurricane Irma.

As per 2010 census, Florida has more than 128,000 Indian- Americans.

Many temples and community centres have been opened up for shelter. Some of the temples in Florida and other neighbouring states were conducting special prayers.

"Looking at the frequency of natural disasters recently hitting our American continent, where we have enjoyed overwhelming freedom to practice and pursue our respective faiths and plurality, it behooves to hold 'havans' and prayer services for the well being of our fellow citizens affected by the calamities," said Subhash Razdan of the Gandhi Foundation USA.

Irma "is a storm of absolutely historic destructive potential", Trump said in his weekly address. "I ask everyone in the storm's path to be vigilant, and to heed all recommendations from government officials and law enforcement," he said.

"Nothing is more important than the safety and security of our people. We are doing everything we can to help with disaster preparations and, when the time comes, we will restore, recover, and rebuild -- together, as Americans," he added.

Trump said in such challenging times, the "strength and the resolve of the American spirit" is demonstrated "and we see the kindness and courage of our people".
MIAMI: Three people in Florida, including a sheriff's deputy, have been killed in car crashes as Hurricane Irma closed in with high winds and lashing rain, officials said Sunday.

Deputy Julie Bridges, 42, died in a head-on collision in Hardee County, east of Sarasota, early Sunday, Sheriff Arnold Lanier told AFP.

"She had been working in a shelter all night, and ran home to get some supplies," when the crash occurred at 6:45 am (1045 GMT), he said.

The roads were "wet and windy," he added, noting that Bridges was the mother of a young son and had worked for the sheriff's department for 13 years.

The other driver, a corrections officer on his way to work in a private vehicle, was also killed, Lanier said.

The third fatality was a man who died Saturday near Key West when his truck slammed into a tree, the Monroe County Sheriff's Office said in a statement.

The truck was carrying a generator, ABC News reported. The exact cause of the crash was not immediately known.
Bangladesh has urged Myanmar to stem the exodus by providing for the displaced inside the country and provide safe zones for the Rohingya.

A Rohingya refugee carries two children in buckets as they arrive at Shah Porir Dwip in Teknaf, Bangladesh, on Saturday. Nearly 300,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled Myanmars Rakhine state into Bangladesh in the 15 days since new violence erupted, the United Nations said on Saturday. (Photo: AFP)

Yangon: Camps will be set up to provide aid for displaced Muslims inside Rakhine state, state-backed media said on Saturday, the first time in a 16-day crisis Myanmars government has offered any relief for Rohingya scattered by violence, many to Bangladesh.

Around 300,000 Rohingya have fled since August 25 when militant attacks sent unrest churning through Rakhine, arriving in Bangladesh hungry and exhausted and squashing into already overcrowded refugee camps.

Tens of thousands more are believed to be on the move inside Rakhine, fleeing burning villages, the army and ethnic Rakhine mobs  who Rohingya refugees accuse of attacking civilians  only to become stranded in hills without food, water, shelter or medical care.

Bangladesh has urged Myanmar to stem the exodus by providing for the displaced inside the country and provide safe zones for the Rohingya.

Around 27,000 Buddhists and Hindus have also been displaced following attacks by Rohingya militants and are receiving government aid in monasteries and schools.
The appeal said that NAB has a tremendous amount of documentary evidence relating to the properties and bank accounts of the accused.

Islamabad: Pakistans National Accountability Bureau (NAB) on Saturday challenged former President Asif Ali Zardaris acquittal in a case filed against him in 1998 accusing him of making and maintaining assets beyond his known sources of income.

The NAB in its appeal filed at the Lahore High Courts Rawalpindi bench against the special accountability courts August 26 verdict had stated that Mr Zardari was acquitted on the basis of technical flaws and key witnesses were ignored in the case proceedings.

The petition has demanded that the Rawalpindi accountability courts judgment acquitting Mr Zardari in the assets reference be voided and the case be referred to a trial court.

The appeal said that NAB has a tremendous amount of documentary evidence relating to the properties and bank accounts of the accused.

Mr Zardari, who left office in 2013, faced corruption allegations involving Swiss banks dating back to the 1990s. He was accused along with his late wife, former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, of laundering $ 12 million of illegal kickbacks.

The court, which has held hearings in Lahore and Rawalpindi since 1998, recorded statements from more than 40 witnesses. It has now become abundantly clear that the allegations against my client were fake and there were no solid grounds for filing a baseless case against him 19 years ago, lawyer Farooq H Naik said.

Mr Zardari has spent time behind bars on charges ranging from corruption to murder. Little-known at the time of his arranged marriage into the Bhutto dynasty in 1987, he carved out a powerful position for himself, serving as a government minister in his wifes two administrations.
From Cartagena, on the last stop of his visit to Colombia, Francis made an appeal for the rejection of all violence in political life in Venezuela. He also visited the shrine of Saint Peter Claver, the slave of the blacks forever who witnessed in a formidable way to the responsibility and care that we should have for one another.

Cartagena (AsiaNews)  Pope Francis on the last day of his visit to Colombia made an appeal for the rejection of all violence in political life in Venezuela and to work to promote the dignity of all our brothers and sisters, particularly the poor and the excluded of society, those who are abandoned, immigrants, and those who suffer violence and human trafficking.

Upon his arrival in Cartagena shortly after 10 am, local time, Francis was met with the same enthusiasm that he has encountered since he landed. As he leaned out to greet the people, the pontiff bumped his head against a vertical bar of the popemobiles roof. It was nothing serious, but he could later be seen with a small patch on his face.

In the Parish of St Francis, one of the citys poorest neighbourhoods, the pontiff blessed the first stones of two facilities for a homeless group and Talitha Kum, an international network of religious sisters who fight against human trafficking. The pope also visited the home of Mrs Lorenza (pictured), a 77-year-old woman who has worked for more than 50 years in the community kitchen.

During the visit to the parish, Francis recited a prayer: Let us pray. Blessed are you, O Lord, the God of mercy, Who in your Son You have given us an admirable example of charity and through Him you have strongly recommended to us the commandment to love; fill with your blessings these servants of yours, who wish to devote themselves generously to the help of their brothers; so that, in urgent needs, they may serve you faithfully and fully in the person of their neighbor. Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Lord teaches us through the example of the humble

The popes second stop in Cartagena was at the church that holds the relics of Saint Peter Claver, the apostle of the blacks. Before reciting the Angelus, Francis said he blessed the first stones of two institutions that will minister to the those most in need, and I visited the house of Mrs Lorenza, who daily welcomes many of our brothers and sisters, offering them food and affection. These visits have done me much good because they demonstrate how the love of God is made visible each day.

As we pray the Angelus, recalling the incarnation of the Word, we also reflect on Mary who conceived Jesus and brought him into the world. We look to her this morning under the title of Our Lady of Chiquinquira. As you well know, over a long period of time this image was abandoned, discoloured, torn and full of holes. It was treated like an old piece of cloth, shown no respect, and finally discarded.

And so, this woman became a model for all those who, in different ways, seek to restore the dignity of our brothers and sisters lost through the pain of lifes wounds, to restore the dignity of those who are excluded. She is a model for all those who make efforts to provide dignified accommodation and care to those most in need. She is, above all, a model for all those who pray perseveringly so that the men and women who are suffering may regain the splendour of the children of God which they have been robbed of.

The Lord teaches us through the example of the humble and those who are not valued. While he gave Maria Ramos, an ordinary woman, the grace to receive the image of the Blessed Virgin in its poor and torn state, he also granted to the indigenous Isabel and her son Miguel the grace of being the first to see the transformed and renewed fabric of the Blessed Virgin. They were the first to look humbly upon this completely renewed piece of fabric and recognize there the radiance of divine light which transforms and renews all things.

Saint Peter Claver, slave of the blacks forever

In this church, we will pray to Mary, who referred to herself as the handmaid of the Lord, and to Saint Peter Claver, the slave of the blacks forever, as he wanted others to know him from the day of his solemn profession. He waited for the ships from Africa to arrive at the New Worlds main centre of commerce in slavery. Given the impossibility of verbal communication due to the language difference, he often ministered to these slaves simply through evangelizing gestures. He knew that the language of charity and mercy was understood by all. Indeed, charity helps us to know the truth and truth calls for acts of kindness. Whenever he felt revulsion towards the slaves, he kissed their wounds.

Saint Peter Claver was austere and charitable to the point of heroism. After consoling hundreds of thousands of people in their loneliness, he spent the last four years of his life in sickness and confined to his cell which was in a terrible state of neglect.

In fact, Saint Peter Claver witnessed in a formidable way to the responsibility and care that we should have for one another. Furthermore, this saint was unjustly accused of being indiscreet in his zealousness and he faced strong criticism and persistent opposition from those who feared that his ministry would undermine the lucrative slave trade.

Here in Colombia and in the world millions of people are still being sold as slaves; they either beg for some expressions of humanity, moments of tenderness, or they flee by sea or land because they have lost everything, primarily their dignity and their rights.

Maria de Chiquinquira and Peter Claver invite us to work to promote the dignity of all our brothers and sisters, particularly the poor and the excluded of society, those who are abandoned, immigrants, and those who suffer violence and human trafficking. They all have human dignity because they are living images of God. We all are created in the image and likeness of God, and the Blessed Virgin holds each one of us in her arms as her beloved children.

After the Marian prayer, the pope turned his thoughts to Venezuela. From this city, known as the seat of human rights, I appeal for the rejection of all violence in political life and for a solution to the current grave crisis, which affects everyone, particularly the poorest and most disadvantaged of society. May the Most Blessed Virgin Mary intercede for all the worlds needs and for every one of her children.

I greet those who have come here from different places, as well as all those who are following my visit on the radio and television. I wish you all a blessed Sunday. And please, do not forget to pray for me.
Pope Francis met thousands of priests, men and women religious, seminarians, and their families at Medellins La Macarena event centre. Many young people discovered their vocation in a context of violence. A priest, a Carmelite nun, of a seminarian's mother bore witness to their experience. The pontiff is optimistic about young people and stressed the importance of having "communities with a contagious apostolic zeal, which inspire and attract others. He called to dwell in Christ by standing by the people in prayer, study and joy.

Medellin (AsiaNews)  Pope Francis spoke to thousands of priests, men and women religious, seminarians, and their families and told them that they are the promise of a new beginning for Colombia, that leaves behind the floods of discord and violence, a Colombia that wants to bear abundant fruits of justice and peace, of encounter and solidarity.

The pontiff made his address at Medellins La Macarena event centre yesterday afternoon; on the podium, the relics of Saint Mother Laura Montoya, a nun who was the first female Colombian Saint, canonised by the pontiff himself on 12 May 2013.

The Holy Father focused on consecrated people to rebuild the country. Colombia has 7,624 priests, 4,513 men religious, 16,083 women religious (3,897 in Medellin alone) out of a population of 48.6 million that is 71 per cent Catholic.

That is a huge number considering that people have lived in a situation of war and corruption for more than 50 years. Yet, this very situation of violence seems to have pushed many young people towards a priestly or religious vocation, as testified by those who spoke before the pope, namely a priest, Fr Juan Felipe Escobar Escobar, a cloistered Carmelite Sister Leidy de San Jose, and a mother, Maria Isabel Arboleda Perez, who has a seminarian son.

In particular, Fr Juan Felipe, who has been a priest for 12 years, said that he wanted to be a doctor, but then seeing the situation and the pain of his people wondered, "What can I do for my people? That is how my vocation was born: God called me to heal and be a shepherd of souls."

In his own reflection, Pope Francis spoke about the conditions under which vocational fruits of special consecration are born: Not only families sustained by a strong love and full of values but also those marked by suffering and bloodshed.

God manifests his closeness and his election; he changes the course of events to call men and women in the frailty of their personal and shared history. Let us not be afraid, in that complex land, for God always brings about the miracle of producing good clusters on the vine, like arepas at breakfast. May there be vocations in every community and in every family in Medellin!

The popes optimism is for young people. Many of you, young people, have discovered the living Jesus in your communities; communities with a contagious apostolic zeal, which inspire and attract others. Where there is life, zeal, the desire to take Christ to others, genuine vocations arise; the fraternal and fervent life of the community awakens the yearning to devote oneself entirely to God and to evangelization (cf. Evangelii Gaudium, 107).

Young people are naturally restless and, although there is a crisis of commitment and of communitarian relationships, many of them stand together against the evils of the world and become involved in various forms of political action and voluntary work. When they do so for Jesus, feeling that they are a part of the community, they become street preachers (callejeros de la fe), to bring Jesus Christ to every street, every town square and every corner of the earth (cf. ibid. 106).

Francis warned against living the vocation in lies. We are a people chosen for the truth [. . .] Vocations associated with special consecrations die when they love to be sustained with honours, when they are driven by a search for personal reassurance and social advancement, when the motivation is to climb the ladder, to cleave to material interests and to strive shamefully for financial gain. [. . .] You cannot serve God and mammon (Mt 6:21, 24), we cannot take advantage of our religious state and the goodness of our people in order to be served and gain material benefits.

Turning to the Gospel reading about the vine and the branches in Saint John, Francis said that to respond faithfully to the Lords call and bear much fruit, it is necessary to dwell in him, proposing three ways to make this dwelling effective.

The first one is by touching Christs humanity: With the gaze and attitude of Jesus, who contemplates reality not as a judge, but rather as a good Samaritan; who recognizes the value of the people who walk with him, as well as their wounds and sins; who discovers their silent suffering and who is moved by peoples needs, above all when they are overwhelmed by injustice, inhumane poverty, indifference or by the perverse actions of corruption and violence.

The second is by contemplating his divinity. In view of this, the pope urged the consecrated to study. Citing Saint Augustine, he said we cannot love someone we do not know. This entails the encounter with Sacred Scripture, especially the Gospel where Christ speaks to us, reveals his unconditional love for the Father, and instils the joy that comes from obedience to his will and from serving our brothers and sisters.

Studying can help us to interpret reality with the eyes of God. It encourages to pray, which frees us from the burden of worldliness and draws us out of our self-centredness, from being reclusive in an empty religious experience.

Together with praying, we must learn to adore in silence and be men and women who have been reconciled in order to reconcile, conscious that we are sinners, but also certain that He will never leave us at the side of the road. God does everything to prevent sin from defeating us and closing the doors of our lives to a future of hope and joy.

Finally, the third way requires dwelling in Christ in order to live joyfully: If we remain in him, his joy will be in us. We will not be sad disciples and bitter apostles. On the contrary, we will reflect and be heralds of true happiness, a complete joy that no one can take away. We will spread the hope of a new life that Christ has given to us. Gods call is not a heavy burden that robs us of joy. He does not want us to be immersed in a sadness and weariness that comes from activities lived poorly, but rather wants a spirituality that brings joy to our lives and even to our weariness. Our contagious joy must be our first testimony to the closeness and love of God. We are true dispensers of Gods grace when we reflect the joy that comes from encountering him.

In concluding, the pontiff noted that The Lord has cast his gaze on Colombia: you are a sign of this loving election. It is now up to us to offer all our love and service while being united to Jesus, our vine. To be the promise of a new beginning for Colombia, that leaves behind the floods of discord and violence, a Colombia that wants to bear abundant fruits of justice and peace, of encounter and solidarity.
BY THE NUMBERS

15

Number of people who have died in the Kern River this year.

4

Number who were from Bakersfield.

7

The number of victims who went into the river at the Keyesville/Sandy Flat section.

5

The number of victims who went into the Hart Park/Lake Ming area of the river.

2

The number of victims who died on the upper Kern River above Isabella Lake.
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In secret, behind locked gates, our Nation's Oldest City dumped a landfill in a lake (Old City Reservoir), while emitting sewage in our rivers and salt marsh. Organized citizens exposed and defeated pollution, racism and cronyism. We elected a new Mayor. We're transforming our City -- advanced citizenship. Ask questions. Make disclosures. Demand answers. Be involved. Expect democracy. Report and expose corruption. Smile! Help enact a St. Augustine National Park and Seashore. We shall overcome!
NCIC chairman Francis Ole Kaparo has said he will not be pushed into making arrests or prosecutions by anyone. This comes after a series of attacks from different leaders across the country for failing to arrest Gatundu Mp Moses Kuria and Kiambu Governor Ferdinand Waititu.This came in the wake of politicians and human rights activists calling for the disbandment of the 'toothless' agency. The activists called the toothless Kaparo that his work is to reap Kenyans their hard-earned money for their salaries while doing nothing at the commission.National Cohesion and Integration Commission is accused of failing to prosecute politicians for hate speech.But Kaparo on Sunday said the NCIC follows laid down procedures and cannot make arbitrary arrests or prosecutions."You cant tell me to just go and arrest so and so without knowing whether what that fellow has said is actually in breach of the law."On Friday, human rights activist Al-Amin Kimathi and Mombasa Senator Mohamed Faki said the commission should be disbanded."People are making provocative utterances but they dont take any action. It is as if they have abdicated their role," Faki said.Kimathi said: "They are deliberately moribund. They have been silenced. It should be disbanded."The leaders were talking after a blogger from Kisumu and Facebook admin was taken to court and charged. She was to be bailed out with Ksh 250000 or a year in Prison. The leaders said that the commission only deals with the poor and social media admins unlikely the Jubilee leaders who provoke and threatened people live.The two said the commission is a toothless dog whose objective of existence has been washed away by their inaction on hatemongers.But Kaparo dared the critics saying: "If they want to know we have teeth, let them do something. I am not ready to be hurried up. I am not a small car."The Kiambu Governor Ferdinand Waititu wanted the people who voted for Raila Odinga be evicted from Kiambu. It was also echoed by the Gatundu Mp Moses Kuria. The MP urged the people of Central Kenya who voted for Raila Odinga to be evicted and be punished.
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We are committed to building a lasting and meaningful relationship with you, our consumer, and we recognize that this relationship must be built on mutual trust. This privacy policy sets forth how we collect, use and safeguard information you entrust with us. Baxter of California collects data to provide you the best products, beauty experiences and personalization from our brands.

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Baxter of California collects information that you provide to us, from your engagement with our brand sites and platforms, advertising, media, and from third parties who have your consent to share it. For a list of categories of information, we collect please see How We Collect Information (USA) below.

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Everything we do, and the data we collect, is in pursuit of bringing beauty experiences to your life

We use data to communicate with you about our beauty products, services, answer questions and create better experiences. We use data for tailored advertising and communications.

We may combine information that we collect via one method (e.g., from a website, our digital advertising) with another method (e.g., an offline event). We do this to get a more complete view of your preferences for our beauty products and services, which, in turn, allows us to serve you better and with more customization and better beauty products. For a list of purposes for which we use information we collect, please see Why We Collect Data below.

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DETAILED PRIVACY POLICY

HOW WE COLLECT INFORMATION (USA)

Baxter of California collects information that you provide to us, information from your engagement with our Sites, advertising and media, and information from third parties who have gained your consent to share it. We may combine information that we collect via one method (e.g., from a website, digital advertising engagement) with another method (e.g., an offline event). We do this to get a more complete view of preferences for our beauty products and services, which, in turn, allows us to serve you better and with more customization and better beauty products.

Here are some examples of the categories of information we collect and how we may use it:

Categories of Personal Information Examples Identifiers Name

Address

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Mobile number

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Device identifiers Payment Information Credit or debit card information Legally Protected Characteristics Gender Purchasing Information Products or services purchased, obtained, or considered

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Precise information about your location if you allow us to collect it Audio Visual Information Photographs that you upload or share with us

Call center recordings Inferences drawn from any of these personal information categories Beauty and related preferences

Characteristics

Behaviors on and off site

Purchase patterns

Demographic

Household

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Personal Information You Provide

When you create an account on a Baxter of California site, make purchases with us (online or in-store), join a loyalty program, enter a contest, share photograph, video or product reviews, call our Consumer Care Center, sign up to receive offers or email, we collect the information that you provide to us. This information includes Personal Information (information that can be used to identify you as an individual) such as your name, social media handle, email, telephone number, home address, and payment information (such as account or credit card number). If you use a chat feature on our Sites, we collect the information you share during the interaction. We also collect information about your beauty preference, your use of our Sites, demographic, and interests so that we can customize your beauty experiences.

If you use one of our virtual try on features, we may collect and store your image(s), for example, if you use social sharing to send your image to a friend or post it online or if you save it to your profile.

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Information We Automatically Collect

We collect some data automatically when you use our Sites. We may obtain information by automated means such as through cookies, pixels, web server logs, web beacons, and other technologies described below. Information collected via automated means include identifiers (e.g., IP address, device ID, cookie ID, mobile advertising identifier), internet or network activity (e.g., browsing and search history, interactions with our websites or applications).

Cookies and Other Technologies: Our Sites, applications, email messages, and advertisements may use cookies and other technologies such as pixel tags and web beacons. These technologies are used help us to (1) remember your information so you do not have to re-enter it, (2) track and understand how you use and interact with our Sites, (3) tailor the Sites and our advertising around your preferences, (4) manage and measure the usability of the Sites, (5) understand the effectiveness of our content, (6) otherwise enhance the Sites and our beauty offerings, and (7) protect the security and integrity of our Sites.

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Essential Cookies. These cookies are essential for the website to function or provide access to features and functionality on the website. They are usually set in response to actions requesting services, such as setting your privacy preferences, logging in, or filling in forms. They also enable enhanced website functionality and personalization. These cookies (or similar technologies) are essential for the website to function, provide access to features and functionality on the website, and cannot be switched off. They are usually set in response to actions requesting services, such as setting your privacy preferences, logging in or filling in forms. These are also used in connection with website functionality, like web chat services, product recommendations, predictive sort, product search, and commenting and rating systems. Providers of these services may use their own analytics cookies (or similar technologies) to measure performance of our these services. You may be able to use your browser's settings to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site may not work properly. Analytics Cookies. These cookies (or similar technologies), including Google Analytics, allow us to count visits and traffic sources so we can measure and improve the performance of our site. They help us to know which pages are the most and least popular and see how visitors move around the site. We also have enabled Google Analytics Advertising Features to share information with Google about your use of this site to allow us to deliver relevant and personalized advertising or content to you on other sites. We have enabled the following Google Analytics Advertising Features: Remarketing with Google Analytics, Google Display Network Impression Reporting, Google Analytics Demographic and Interest Reporting, and integrated services that require Google Analytics to collect data for advertising purposes, including collecting data via marketing cookies and identifiers. You can learn more about how Google Analytics processes information here: Google Analytics Terms of Use and Google Privacy Policy. You can also download and install the Google Analytics browser plugin available here that allows you to disable Google Analytics across all websites. Marketing Cookies: These cookies may be set through our site by our advertising partners, who use this information to build a profile of your interests to show you relevant adverts (for us or other advertisers) on other sites or to other devices connected to you (cross-device advertising).

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Other Technologies:

Device Identifiers: We and our third party service providers automatically may collect an IP address, mobile advertising identifier, or other unique identifier information ("Device Identifier") for the computer, mobile device, technology or other device (collectively, "Device") you use to access the Sites or on third party websites that publish our advertising. A Device Identifier is a number that is automatically assigned to your Device when you access a web site or its servers, and our computers identify your Device by its Device Identifier. For mobile devices, a Device Identifier is a unique string of numbers and letters stored on your mobile device that identifies it. We may use a Device Identifier to, among other things, administer the Sites, help diagnose problems with our servers, analyze trends, track users web page movements, help identify you and your shopping cart, deliver advertising and gather broad demographic information. Most mobile devices will allow you to turn off sharing or reset a Device Identifier. Mobile Services/Apps: Certain of our mobile apps and tools offer optin, geolocation services and push notifications. Geo-location services provide locationbased content and services, such as store locators, local weather, promotional offers and other personalized content. Push notifications can include discounts, reminders or details about local events or promotions. Most mobile devices allow you to turn off location services or push notifications. If you consent to location services, we will collect information about the Wifi routers closest to you and the cell IDs of the towers closest to you to provide locationbased content and services. In-Store Analytics: We may use certain in-store wireless services (such as Wi-Fi networks and Bluetooth beacons) to automatically information about visitors to our stores. Our Wi-Fi routers capture certain data from mobile devices that interact with the router, including information about your mobile device (such as a MAC Address and signal strength data). Bluetooth beacons are small devices that broadcast a Bluetooth signal to map nearby Bluetooth-enabled mobile devices. We may use the data collected from these in-stores wireless services to provide operational insights such as foot traffic volumes and how customers move through our stores. Pixels : In some of our email messages, we use click through URLs that will bring you to content on our sites. We also use pixel tags to understand whether our emails are read or opened. We use learning from this information to improve our messages, reduce frequency of messages to you or determine interest in content we share.

Information from Third Parties: We receive information from third party partners, such as publishers that run our advertising, and retailers who feature our products. This information includes marketing and demographic data, analytics information, and offline records. We may also receive information from other companies that collect or aggregate information from publicly available databases or if you consented to allow them to use and share your information. This might be de-identified information about purchasing patterns, location of shoppers and sites that are of interest to our consumers. We also collect information about users who share common interests or attributes (e.g. color treated hair) to create user segments, which help us to better understand and market to our customers. We may use your data as part of health-related segments about non-sensitive conditions such as dry skin.

Social Platforms. You also can engage with our brands, use chat or try-it-on features, applications, log into our sites via social media platforms, such as Facebook (including Instagram) or Google. When you engage with our content on or through social media or other third party platforms, plug-ins, integrations or applications, these platforms may ask your permission to share certain information with us (e.g. name, gender, profile picture, likes, interests, demographic information). Such information is shared with us subject to platform privacy policy. You can control the information that we receive by changing your privacy settings offered by the relevant social media platform.

WHY WE COLLECT INFORMATION?

Everything we do, and the data we collect, is in pursuit of bringing beauty to your life. We use information for beauty to provide better products, services, customization and offers from Baxter of California. For example, we use information to:

provide tailored and personalized content, services, advertisements and offers

respond to questions and providing news, emails/communication from us

administer and manage your account or loyalty program membership

verify your identity and detect and prevent fraud

fulfill product purchases and processing payments

contact you, send notice of changes to a Baxter of California LLC policy

analyzing use of our products and services to improve effectiveness of our Sites, stores, customer service, and product offerings

conduct research and analytics

develop new products and services

allow log in, sharing and use of our content with a social media account

provide shipping and other rewards from your selected third party providers (such as ShopRunner)

post your content and consumer reviews on the Sites, our social media pages and related third party sites that retail or feature our brands and products

maintain the security of our products, services, and systems

enforce our terms of use and complying with applicable laws

protect our rights, property, and safety or the rights, property, and safety of others

For corporate governance, including mergers, acquisitions, and divestitures

HOW WE SHARE INFORMATION

We will not sell your Personal Information to third parties:

Third Parties Providing Services On Our Behalf: We share information with third party service providers fulfilling the above purposes on our behalf, including service providers that host or assist with technical operation of our Sites,; information technology vendors that provide information technology services; analytics, and research vendors; fraud prevention, legal, compliance, and risk management vendors; order processing fulfillment vendors who process orders, transactions and payments, provide customer service, loyalty program administration, and redemption services; marketing and advertising vendors, social media, or other third parties that participate in or administer our promotions, contests, sweepstakes, surveys or provide marketing or promotional assistance. We may also share information with third parties to help us identify your online preferences, including the ads with which you interact. This data may be matched with information that we process about you to provide a better experience using our websites and products. These third parties are not permitted to use Personal Information for their own independent marketing or business purposes. We may also share non-identifying information, such as aggregate statistics or usage information, with third parties.

Categories of Information shared include identifiers, internet or network activity, geolocation data, purchasing information, protected classifications, professional or employment-related information, audio-visual information, geolocation information, payment information, and inferences generated from the foregoing categories of information.

Your Agreement To Have Your Personal Information Shared: In connection with advertising or our Sites, you may be asked to receive information and/or marketing offers from someone else, or to otherwise consent to the sharing of your information with a third party, including social networking sites such as Facebook or Twitter. For example, we share information (via cookies) with third party marketing and advertising networks and social media to serve you tailored and personalized advertisements when you permit the use of cookies via our cookie manager. If you agree to have your Personal Information shared with a third party, it will be subject to the privacy policy and business practices of that third party.

Business Transfers: We share information with other entities and affiliates of the Ambi Enterprises Group, our parent company. As we continue to develop our business, we may sell or purchase assets. If another entity acquires us or our assets, or assets related to the Sites, Personal Information, and any other information that we have collected may be disclosed to such entity as one of the transferred assets. Also, if any bankruptcy or reorganization proceeding is brought by or against us, all such information may be considered an asset of ours and as such may be sold or transferred to third parties.

Legal Disclosure: Baxter of California may transfer and disclose information, including your Personal Information, and any other information that we have collected, to third parties to comply with a legal obligation; when we believe in good faith that the law requires it; at the request of governmental authorities conducting an investigation; to verify or enforce our Terms of Use or other applicable policies; to respond to an emergency; or otherwise to protect the rights, property, safety, or security of third parties, visitors to our Sites or the public.

YOUR PRIVACY RIGHTS, YOUR CHOICES

You may change your preferences and unsubscribe from email services from our brands by: (i) modifying your registered user information on the Sites; (ii) sending us an email to the email address listed in Contact Us located at the end of this notice; or (iii) following the unsubscribe instructions in the communication that you receive.

In accordance with our routine record keeping, we may delete certain records that contain Personal Information you have submitted through the Sites. We are under no obligation to store such Personal Information indefinitely and disclaim any liability arising out of, or related to, the destruction of such Personal Information. In addition, you should be aware that it is not always possible to completely remove or delete all of your information from our databases without some residual data because of backups and other reasons.

We will retain your Personal Information for as long as your account is active or as needed to provide you services and as necessary to comply with our legal obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce our agreements. If you wish to cancel your account or request that we no longer use your Personal Information to provide you services, contact us via one of the methods listed in Contact Us located at the end of this Privacy Notice. We do not control certain privacy settings and preferences maintained by our social media partners like Facebook and Twitter. If you wish to make changes to those settings and preferences, you may do so by visiting the settings page of the appropriate social media site.

MOBILE

You may at any time opt out from push notifications and allowing Baxter of California to access location data by adjusting the permissions in your mobile device. You can stop all further collection of information by our mobile applications by uninstalling the mobile application. Please note that if you uninstall the mobile application from your mobile device, the unique identifier associated with your mobile device will continue to be stored. If you re-install the application on the same mobile device, we will be able to re-associate this identifier to your previous transactions and activities.

COOKIES; INTEREST-BASED ADVERTISING AND ADCHOICES

If you would prefer not to accept cookies, you can manage your cookie preferences by clicking on the Cookie Settings button located on the bottom of the website homepage. You cannot disable essential cookies. We use certain analytics services, such as Google Analytics, to gather information about our site visits or mobile app usage. To learn more about Google Analytics, including opting out of Google Analytics, click here.

You can also change your browser settings to notify you when you receive a cookie, which lets you choose whether or not to accept it; or set your browser to automatically reject any cookies. However, please be aware that some features and services on our Sites may not work properly because we may not be able to recognize and associate you with your account. In addition, the offers we provide when you visit us may not be as relevant to you or tailored to your interests. To learn more about cookies, please visit http://www.allaboutcookies.org.

We use third party companies to serve advertisements, measure the performance and engagement with our ads, provide analytic, preference, and interest information. In some instances, these ad network providers, social platforms, sponsors, and/or analytics service providers may use their own tracking technology to capture information about your device, use and engagement online.

We may recognize your information across different devices that you use or log in from (i.e. computers or mobile devices.) We may recognize that one cookie ID (i.e. from a computer) may be connected to another device (i.e. smart phone) by the device ID or log in. This may result in you searching for one of our products on one device but seeing an ad later for that product on another device. By knowing what devices are being used by a person or household helps us limit the number of times you may see the same ad across different devices. We may also combine information we collect from your devices with other information we have about you, such as your account information, services, transaction history, and interaction with our sites.

You can opt out of receiving targeted advertising through the Network Advertising Initiative (NAI) OptOut Page . Options are Device-specific, so if you use multiple Devices, you should opt out on each one. You can also opt out of certain targeted advertising programs by clicking on the AdChoices icon that appears on our Site footers and may appear on our advertising. Even if you opt-out of targeted advertising, you may still see our advertisements while you are browsing, but they may not be targeted to you based on your interests.

Some social networks (i.e. Facebook), allow you to exercise ad choices, limit data collection and clear your history on that platform as well. For your convenience we have provided the links to some of the social networks:

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/ads/preferences/?entry_product=education_page

Instagram - https://www.facebook.com/ads/preferences/?entry_product=education_page

Twitter - https://help.twitter.com/en/safety-and-security/privacy-controls-for-tailored-ads

Google - https://adssettings.google.com/authenticated

TEXT/SMS MESSAGE CONSENT AND OPT-OUT

If you choose, you can provide your mobile phone number to receive text message alerts from our stores or sites to receive product and/or event information, tips or promotions. You agree that by providing your mobile phone number you expressly consent to receive automated marketing text messages from us to the mobile phone number provided. Consent is not required to purchase goods or services. Message and data rates will apply and you should check the rates of your mobile carrier. You can opt out from further text marketing communications by texting STOP to the SMS number used by Baxter of California LLC to contact you.

We may share your mobile phone number with service providers with whom we contract to assist us with the above activities, but we will not share your mobile phone number with third parties for their own marketing purposes without your consent. Text Messages are distributed via third party mobile network providers and, therefore, we cannot control certain factors relating to message delivery. Depending on the recipient's mobile carrier, it may not be possible to transmit the text message to the recipient successfully; nor is content available on all carriers. We do not claim or guarantee availability or performance of this service, including liability for transmission delays or message failures.

YOUR CALIFORNIA RIGHTS:

The California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) provides California residents with specific rights regarding their personal information. This section describes your rights and how you can submit your request to us. We do not sell personal information.

Access to Information

You have the right to request that we disclose information about our collection and use of your personal information over the past 12 months, including:

Categories of personal information we collected

Categories of sources for the personal information we collected

Our business purpose for collecting personal information

The categories of third parties with whom we share that personal information

The specific personal information we collected about you

Deletion

You have the right to request that we delete any of your personal information that we collected from you and retained, subject to certain exceptions. Once we receive and confirm your verifiable consumer request, we will delete (and direct our service providers to delete) your personal information from our records, unless an exception applies.

We may deny a deletion request where retaining the information is necessary for us or our service providers. For example, data may need to be kept to:

Complete a sales transaction for which we collected the personal information (such as the sale of our beauty products to you) Track consumer complaints or product issues Detect security incidents, protect against malicious, deceptive, fraudulent, or illegal activity Comply with a legal obligation Enable solely internal uses that are reasonably aligned with consumer expectations based on your relationship with us

Submitting a Request

Only you or a person registered with the California Secretary of State that you authorize to act on your behalf, may make a request related to your personal information. You may also make a verifiable consumer request on behalf of your minor child.

The verifiable consumer request must:

Provide sufficient information that allows us to reasonably verify you are the person about whom we collected personal information or an authorized representative of a California resident who wishes to make a request.

We may not be able to respond to your request or provide you with personal information if we cannot verify your identity or authority to make the request and confirm the personal information relates to you. Making a verifiable consumer request does not require you to create an account with us. We will ask you for the email information that you used to interact with us or sign up for a loyalty, email or to make purchases along with other information you submit (such as contact information like name, address, phone number) and the information we have in our systems, to help verify your identity or authority to make the request and confirm that your information is in our system. Information provided to submit a request will only be used for request purposes.

You may designate an agent to submit requests on your behalf. We will need the agent to provide us with your signed permission to act on your behalf. We may also require you to verify your identity with us directly and confirm that you provided the agent permission to submit the request on your behalf.

Timing

We will endeavor to respond to a verified consumer request within 45 days. If we require more time, we will inform you of the reason and extension in writing.

We do not charge a fee to process or respond to a verified consumer request unless it is excessive, repetitive, or manifestly unfounded. If we determine that the request warrants a fee, we will provide explanation and a cost estimate prior to completing the request.

You may only make a request for access or data portability twice within a 12-month period.

Non-Discrimination

We will not discriminate against you for exercising any of your CCPA rights.

Rewards Offers/Programs Calculation

We may offer incentives, such as a coupon, discount on purchase, or loyalty points, in exchange for personal information (e.g. email sign-up). We generally do not assign monetary or other value to personal information. If, however, we are required by law to assign such value, we have valued the personal information collected and used as based, in part, on the value of consumer trail of new products and sharing future offers tailored to your interest with competitive value. The value is a practical and good-faith effort often involving the (i) categories of personal information collected (e.g., names, email addresses), (ii) the transferability of such personal information for us, (iii) the discounted price offered, (iv) the volume of consumers enrolled in our programs, and (v) the product or service to which the programs, or price or service differences, applies. The disclosure of the value described herein is not intended to waive, nor should be interpreted as a waiver to, our proprietary or business confidential information, including trade secrets, and does not constitute any representation with regard to generally accepted accounting principles or financial accounting standards.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Under the laws of several states, Website and online service operators are required to disclose how they respond to web browser do not track signals. Baxter of California does not currently take actions to respond to Do Not Track signals as a uniform standard for such response has not yet been established.

Website and online service operators in several states are required to disclose whether third parties may collect personal information about their users online activities over time and across different sites when the users use the operators website or service. Third parties that have content or services on our Sites such as a social feature, analytics service, or an advertising network partner, may obtain information about your browsing or usage habits.

If you are a minor under 18 and have a profile on a Baxter of California Site, you may ask us to remove reviews or other content that you posted on the site by writing to us at the address listed at the end of this notice and providing as much detail as possible (i.e. date and caption) as to the post(s) you want removed. Please note that processing your request does not ensure complete or comprehensive removal of content that you posted.

CHILDREN: Baxter of Californias sites are not directed to children under 13. We do not knowingly collect, use or disclose personally identifiable information from anyone under 13 years of age. If we determine upon collection that a user is under this age, we will not use or maintain his/her Personal Information without the parent/guardian's consent. If we become aware that we have unknowingly collected personally identifiable information from a child under the age of 13, we will make reasonable efforts to delete such information from our records. If you believe that we might have any information from or about a child under age 13, please contact us through one of the methods listed in the Contact Us section at the end of this notice.

Parental Consent: Minors between 13 years of age and the age of majority in their state must ask their parent or guardian for permission to use any Baxter of California properties. For Baxter of California brands offering e-commerce, you may only make purchases if you are 18 years of age or older, or the age of majority in your jurisdiction of residence.

Parental participation: We strongly recommend that minors 13 years of age or older ask their parents for permission before sending any information about themselves to anyone over the Internet and we encourage parents to teach their children about safe internet use practices.

SECURITY OF YOUR INFORMATION

Baxter of California maintains reasonable safeguards to protect Personal Information against loss, unauthorized use, disclosure or destruction and when transferring information for processing and requires third parties providing services on our behalf to do the same. However, no electronic data transmission or storage of information can be guaranteed to be 100% secure. Please note that we cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information you transmit to us.

OTHER SITES

The Sites may contain links to third party sites that are not owned or operated by Baxter of California. This includes links from advertisers, sponsors and/or partners that may use our logo(s) as part of a cobranding or comarketing agreement. We do not control, recommend or endorse and are not responsible for these sites or their content, products, services or privacy policies or practices. These other sites may send their own cookies or other tracking technologies to your device, they may independently collect data or solicit Personal Information and may or may not have their own published privacy policies. You should also independently assess the authenticity of any site which appears or claims that it is one of our Sites (including those linked to through an email or social networking page). The Sites may make available chat rooms, forums, message boards, and news groups. Remember that any information that you disclose in these areas becomes public information and is not subject to the provisions of this Privacy and Cookie Notice.

CONSENT TO PROCESSING OF INFORMATION IN THE UNITED STATES AND OTHER JURISDICTIONS

The Sites are governed by and operated in, and in accordance with the laws of, the United States, and are intended for the enjoyment of residents of the United States. Country or region specific web sites are available for Baxter of California brands and products around the world. Baxter of California makes no representation that the Sites are governed by or operated in accordance with the laws of any other nation. Given that we are an international business, our use of your information necessarily involves the transmission of data on an international basis. If you are located in the European Union, Canada or elsewhere outside of the United States, please be aware that information we collect may be transferred to and processed in the United States. By using the Sites, or providing us with any information, you (a) acknowledge that the Sites are subject to the laws of the United States, (b) consent to the collection, processing, maintenance and transfer of such information in and to the United States and other applicable territories in which the privacy laws may not be as comprehensive as or equivalent to those in the country where you reside and/or are a citizen, and (c) waive any claims that may arise under those laws.

CHANGES AND POLICY UPDATES

Please note, we may change information on the Sites and/or this Privacy Policy at any time and any changes will be effective immediately upon the publication of revisions.
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New York Fashion Week never fails to try pass off terrible clothes as high fashion.

Gigi Hadid hit the runway for the Jeremy Scott show wearing a naked dress with jewels that looked as amateur as the crown Prince Akeem (Eddie Murphy) wore in "Coming to America".
To continue following the latest news and information for Bedfordshire and surrounding areas, simply enter your full postcode below
Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney has called on the UK Government to consider remaining in an extended Customs Union with the EU after Brexit.

Mr Coveney was addressing the British-Irish Association conference in Cambridge on Saturday evening.

Last month, the UK government recommended no physical changes to Irish border arrangements after Brexit.

The proposals outlined in a Whitehall position paper added some detail to Prime Minister Theresa Mays oft-repeated pledge to avoid a hardening of the border.

Resolving the challenges around the Irish border is one of three main phase one issues in the Brexit negotiations, along with citizens rights and the financial exit settlement.

Read More

"I find it difficult to accept that while the options available to the UK are now being discussed, debated and negotiated, that the potential option of staying in a customs union would be taken off the table, before negotiations on trade have even commenced with the EU," Mr Coveney told the British-Irish Association.

"There can be no hard border. Creativity and political will is needed to ensure that this does not happen," he added.

"There is an obvious solution, if we really value the peace and prosperity that has brought us this far. And that is for the UK to remain in an extended Customs Union and Single Market, or some version of that concept."

Earlier Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin said Northern Ireland and the border counties should be designated a "special economic zone" to help limit the damage of Brexit.

Mr Martin said: "Northern Ireland will not break out of a cycle of low incomes and poverty - in fact things will get worse - unless there is a move to address its structural problems.

"I believe the answer is the creation of a Special Economic Zone (SEZ) in Northern Ireland and at least the border counties in the South.

"This can be done while fully respecting the constitutional rights protected in the Good Friday Agreement and incorporated into both UK and Irish law."

Mr Martin said an SEZ could be recognised by the EU as being distinct from the rest of the UK in terms of Single Market and Customs Union access.

He pointed out that the terms of the Good Friday Agreement set Northern Ireland in an EU context.

"It should not be hard to design a mechanism for certifying that Northern Ireland businesses conform with EU standards relevant to market access.

"UK sovereignty would remain intact - in fact it is the UK government's official policy to support such zones in countries with structural development issues in defined regions," Mr Martin said.

He added: "There is a solution available to the economic threat to Northern Ireland from a Brexit vote passed solely on an English majority.

"It is a solution which has the potential to prioritise and kick-start long-delayed and urgently needed development in the most disadvantaged region of these islands."

Mr Coveney and Mr Martin also addressed the ongoing political deadlock at Stormont.

"It is imperative that an Executive in Northern Ireland is re-formed and the institutions of the Good Friday Agreement are restored. There is no more time to wait", Mr Coveney said.
Tony Blair has claimed the only way to make a success of Brexit is to turn Britain into a Singapore-style low-tax, low-regulation country competing with the European Union.

But the former prime minister warned that voters will not back such a huge restructuring of the economy and society, and so Jeremy Corbyns Labour is likely to win any post-Brexit election, creating a serious problem for the country.

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Mr Blair spoke after releasing a paper calling for tough new immigration rules which would allow Britain to exercise more control over who comes into the country, without leaving the EU.

He claimed this would fulfil the will of the people expressed in last years Brexit vote while allowing Britain to stay in the EU.

But Defence Secretary Sir Michael Fallon told him to get over it and accept that Brexit is happening.

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Mr Blair, however, pleaded with Remain-backing Tory ministers like Sir Michael and other MPs to steer the UK away from a false path with a choice between an old fashioned right-wing Brexit or unreconstructed leftism.

He told BBC Ones The Andrew Marr Show: I think the only circumstances in which Brexit works, and this is the fantasy of the real Brexiteers  they are in one sense right, that if you leave Europe Britain should become a light-touch, light-regulation  it should become marketed as not Europe.

The risk is the British people wont vote for that, they are not going to vote for the huge economic and social restructuring  to the changes to the health service and other things that that would require.

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And the risk is actually that we have a Brexit followed by, Im afraid, an unreconstructed leftist programme from Labour, and if you combine those two things together in my view we will be in a very serious situation as a country.

He went on: Yes theres a lot of anger, but give people an answer. There are answers to the anger, there are answers on tuition fees, on social injustice, on communities left behind.

Mr Blair admitted the open borders he presided over are no longer appropriate and put his name to a report calling for tighter domestic controls and the negotiation of modified free movement rules with the EU.

He has been blamed in many quarters for the rise in public concern about immigration which culminated in the Brexit vote, after failing to impose transitional controls on migrants from new EU member states in 2004.

Expand Close Mr Blair's intervention appears designed to provoke a fundamental shift in the Brexit debate (PA) PA Archive/PA Images / Facebook

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Whatsapp Mr Blair's intervention appears designed to provoke a fundamental shift in the Brexit debate (PA)

But he said the times were different as he released a Tony Blair Institute report calling for tough new measures, including forcing EU immigrants to register on arrival and restricting benefits or access to the NHS for certain groups such as non-workers.

The ex-Labour leader also argued that the UK can negotiate a change to free movement rules with Brussels that would allow an emergency brake on EU immigration if public services are overstretched.

Urging MPs to put forward a different or better way to the public, Mr Blair said: Im trying to say this  in the end Brexit is a distraction not a solution to the problems this country faces.

Unite boss Len McCluskey said Mr Blair misses the point because the only way to stop abuse of migrant workers by greedy bosses, which brings about undercutting of wages and conditions, is to properly regulate the jobs market after Brexit.

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Describing the ex-PM as yesterdays man, Mr McCluskey told Pienaars Politics on BBC Radio Five Live: Hes as out of touch now as he was in 2004.

He doesnt address the idea because what Tony Blair and the New Labour government were a part of, and certainly what the Conservatives have continued, is creating this race to the bottom culture within our society rather than a rate for the job society.
The Dalai Lama addresses a charity event during a visit to Londonderry

The Dalai Lama has said the developed world is experiencing a mental crisis.

He railed against too much war, fear, distrust and anger and called for world leaders to create a century of peace.

The Tibetan spiritual leader also said he was an admirer of the European Union and urged Russia to join the bloc.

The 82-year-old said: "Our goal should be a century of peace, a century of dialogue based on a sense of oneness of seven billion human beings."

He addressed an audience in Londonderry in Northern Ireland, a city on the UK's only land border with an EU state, the Republic of Ireland, which could be deeply affected by Brexit.

The leader in exile of the Tibetan Himalayan kingdom - which was annexed by China in 1950 - has visited Northern Ireland several times: in October 2000, November 2005 and April 2013.

The winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989 has become a symbol of peaceful resistance to oppression throughout the world.

He said thinking which led to warfare was outdated - referring to fighting in Burma, Iraq and Syria - adding: "Those developed countries are mentally in a lot of crisis.

"Unrest, too much warring, fear distrust and anger."

He is a guest of charity Children in Crossfire, which is marking 20 years of international development work.

The anti-poverty organisation was established by Richard Moore, who was blinded after he was injured during the Northern Ireland conflict.

Mr Moore was walking past an Army post when he said a soldier fired a rubber bullet from 10 feet away.

The Dalai Lama urged a greater sense of compassion and love during his speech to a sell-out crowd in the city.

He alluded to Brexit during a lengthy address.

He said: "I am an admirer of European Union", adding, "Eventually Russia should be part of the European Union."

He made a few jokes about US President Donald Trump and climate change, noting recent events (hurricanes in the Caribbean) may be teaching him something different.
Police in Armagh are investigating a petrol bomb attack on a house at Alexander Avenue in the early hours of Sunday. Photo by Freddie Parkinson / Press Eye  Sunday 10 September 2017

Three people have escaped injury after a petrol bomb attack in Armagh during the early hours of Sunday morning.

Two men and a woman were in the house at Alexander Avenue when the incident took place shortly before 1am.

A brick was used to smash the front window of the house before the petrol bomb was thrown in, starting a fire which caused scorch damage to the room.

One of the men, who was in the house at the time, managed to put the fire out.

Police say a number of men dressed in dark clothing were seen leaving the scene of the attack.

Sergeant Buchanan said: "Police received a report at around 00.45am on Sunday morning, that a brick had been thrown through the front window of the house followed by a petrol bomb, which ignited in the living room.

"A male occupant of the house was able to quickly extinguish the resulting fire which left scorch damage inside the room. There were no reports of any injuries.

"A number of men, dressed in dark clothing, were seen leaving the area on foot following the incident."

"Our enquiries are currently ongoing and I would ask anyone with any information which could assist with our investigation to contact police in Armagh on 101 quoting reference number 79 10/09/17."
Intensive talks between the DUP and Sinn Fein will resume on Monday

The UK Government says the DUP and Sinn Fein will continue intensive talks in the coming days in a bid to break the deadlock at Stormont.

A UK Government spokesperson told the Belfast Telegraph that bilateral talks between the parties will resume on Monday.

"Exchanges between the DUP and Sinn Fein have been taking place over recent days, and will continue next week, the spokesperson said.

"On Monday there will be further bilaterals involving all of the parties.

"And for the rest of the week there will be further intensive dialogue between the DUP and Sinn Fein."

"The UK government and the Irish government will continue to engage with all parties."

Its unlikely that Prime Minister Theresa May is planning to become directly involved in the talks at this time.

Last week Secretary of State James Brokenshire warned the parties that the "window of opportunity" to reach a deal to save Stormont was closing.

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Powersharing collapsed when the late Sinn Fein deputy first minister Martin McGuinness resigned in January in protest at the DUP's handling of the botched RHI scheme.

An Irish Language Act remains the major stumbling block to progress.

At the end of last week DUP leader Arlene Foster told the Belfast Telegraph: "We had useful discussions with Sinn Fein over a number of days. We will have intensive talks with all parties but ultimately we can only reach an agreement if Sinn Fein is prepared to negotiate.

Meanwhile Sinn Fein's Stormont leader Michelle O'Neill insisted that her party was committed to reaching a deal.

Speaking at the Irish Labour Awards in New York, Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams said: "I am not naive about the challenges facing all of us but I am hopeful that we can end the current crisis and restore the political institutions on the basis of equality and respect."
Police are conducting an investigation on cheque fraud in Downpatrick

Three men have been arrested in north and east Belfast as part of what police call a "complex and challenging investigation" into cheque fraud.

The men, two aged 24 and one aged 25, were detained on Friday on suspicion of a number of offences including theft, fraud and handling stolen goods.

It came after detectives from Downpatrick carried out eight searches in Belfast.

The investigation started last month after police received a report from a company based in the Sainfield area that company cheques were being used without their knowledge of approval.

Detective Sergeant James Johnston said: "An investigation was immediately started, with our enquiries leading us to eight searches being carried out and the arrest of three men in north and east Belfast on Friday 8th September. The men, two aged 24 and one aged 25, were arrested on suspicion of a number of offences including theft, fraud and handling stolen goods.

"All three men have since been released on police bail as our enquiries into the matter continue."
The mausoleum where the homeless pair were found sleeping rough

Two people have been found sleeping rough in a vault in Glasnevin Cemetery in Dublin as the Irish Republic's homelessness crisis continues to worsen.

The young man and woman were discovered as figures showed a record 1,178 families - with 2,423 children - were homeless in the Irish capital.

Wrapped in a purple sleeping bag and lying on thin mats on the stone floor, the vault is thought to be the best shelter the pair have been able to find.

The mausoleum is believed to have been broken into some time in the past.

Graffiti from many years ago can be seen in the interior.

The ornate, tiled floor indicates that the structure, which is called an oratory double vault, once contained human remains, but none remain today.

The pair's meagre belongings were stored in bags beside them as they slept and their worn shoes were left at the entrance.

A spokesman for the Glasnevin Trust, which controls the cemetery, said it assesses all issues brought to its attention and would do so in this instance.

"The Glasnevin Trust encourages all those currently homeless to engage with the homelessness services available," a spokesman for the group added.

The cemetery is the resting place of important figures including Eamon de Valera.
UK police officers are being flown out to help with the relief effort (Stefan Rousseau/PA)

British police officers will be deployed along with almost 500 troops as part of the countrys efforts to step up support to the Caribbean islands left devastated by Hurricane Irma.

Following criticism of its response to the disaster, the Government announced a 32 million aid package and pledged to double any public donations to the British Red Cross appeal for victims of Hurricane Irma, up to 3 million.

The Ministry of Defence (MoD) announced: The UK has just under 500 troops currently in the region.

This is made up of marines, engineers, and a number of medics and specialists, including Army and RAF personnel.

They have arrived on numerous flights that took off yesterday and today which have also brought aid and a Puma helicopter.

Army soldiers have deployed from RFA Mounts Bay on the British Virgin Islands and marines secured the airport to open it for military flights before a A400 flight landed on the British Virgin Islands, bringing a further 50 marines.

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Further flights are expected tonight, said an MoD spokesman on Saturday.

By the end of the evening there will be well over 100 marines and troops on the island, their priority will be establishing security and law and order before providing humanitarian assistance before the arrival of Hurricane Jose.

The National Police Chiefs Council (NPCC) announced that British police officers will provide support to the British Virgin Islands force as part of the relief effort.

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It said two members of the UK police cadre, who support the military in times of international crisis, flew out on Friday, while a further 53 British officers from 14 police forces, including the Metropolitan Police, are due to leave from RAF Brize Norton in co-operation with the MoD.

The officers will support the local police force to maintain law and order, as well as helping to find missing people, including British nationals, the NPCC explained.

The organisations lead for international policing, Chief Constable Andy Marsh, said: We received offers of support from officers across the country as soon as this crisis began.

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These officers, and the many others who volunteered, signify our commitment to help those in need and humanitarian instinct of the British police force, no matter where in the world.
A Conservative peer has implored parliamentarians who voted Remain to stay true to their convictions as thousands of anti-Brexit demonstrators marched on Westminster.

A sea of blue and yellow Remainers amassed outside the Houses of Parliament, days after politicians returned to Parliament following the summer recess.

It comes as MPs are set to vote on the repeal bill, formally known as the EU (Withdrawal) Bill, on Monday for the first time, amid concerns over the progress of Brexit negotiations.

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Addressing the crowds in Parliament Square, Tory peer Baroness Patience Wheatcroft appealed to demonstrators to keep fighting to stay in the EU, telling them: You have history on your side.

She said that whatever is negotiated will be worse for Britain and that Brexit will mean fewer jobs and a less prosperous Britain.

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Appealing to her parliamentary colleagues she said: We have to stop Brexit. Since we joined the EU weve had an unprecedented period of peace and prosperity. It must be right to try and maintain that.

Its not undemocratic to try to persuade the electorate to think again about Brexit. Thats democracy at work.

So I say to my colleagues over the road: You know in your hearts whats right. Many of you campaigned for Remain, now have the strength of your convictions. Do not be bowed down by the whips. Follow your consciences.'

Activist and musician Sir Bob Geldof, who had been expected to speak, did not address the crowd and could not be seen at the three-hour rally.

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Organisers said there were between 10-15,000 people at the start of the march through central London, estimating around 50,000 protesters at its height as people joined.

The Peoples March For Europe carries the message unite, rethink and reject Brexit and organisers said leaving the EU no longer holds credibility inside Westminster, let alone on the streets of Britain.

EU flags were out in force, as were Exit From Brexit placards, while T-shirts with the words Remoaner Till I Die and Je Suis Un Saboteur could be seen.

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Former cabinet minister Sir Ed Davey told the crowd he was embarrassed for Great Britain.

Liberal Democrat MP for Kingston and Surbiton said: Ive gone from anger to distress, from fury to despair. But since the Brexit negotiations began theres a third emotion Ive been feeling.

Embarrassment. Embarrassment at our countrys leaders. Embarrassment for Great Britain.

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After being interrupted by boos, he said he felt embarrassed that these shambolic people are supposed to be representing us. They cant even negotiate.

He personally thanked Conservative and Labour Remainers who voted for him to be their MP, so he could continue to oppose Brexit.

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The blue and yellow demonstrators observed a minutes silence in respect for the victims of the Grenfell Tower fire, breaking into applause as the 60 seconds ended.
An American historian who spent decades in Afghanistan working to preserve the heritage of the war-torn country has died at the age of 90.

An Afghan government statement said Sunday that Nancy Hatch Dupree, who first went to Afghanistan in 1962 and spent much of her life collecting and documenting historical artefacts, died in Kabul overnight.

It did not give a cause of death.

She amassed a vast collection of books, maps, photographs and even rare recordings of folk music, all now housed at Kabul University, and wrote five guidebooks.

Ms Dupree went to Afghanistan as the wife of a diplomat, but later fell in love with Louis Dupree, an archaeologist and anthropologist.

They married and lived for decades in Afghanistan, visiting historical sites across the country, retracing the footsteps of ancient explorers and documenting it all.

Together they wrote the definitive book on Afghanistan, an encyclopaedic look at the country they had adopted as their own.

Ms Dupree lamented the fact that young people in Afghanistan, many of whom had grown up as refugees in neighbouring countries during decades of unrest, knew little if anything about their history.

"So many young Afghans know more about the histories of the countries where they lived as refugees than their own country's history," she said. "It makes me sad because their own history is so rich."

She singlehandedly raised millions of pounds for the Afghan Centre at Kabul University, where she worked to create an extensive library that could be accessed electronically from universities in Herat, Kandahar, Jalalabad and Mazar-e-Sharif.

She also launched a mobile library programme that took thousands of books, including easy-to-read volumes in Pashto and Dari, to communities across the largely rural country, often on the backs of donkeys.

Many Afghans viewed Ms Dupree as one of their own, and hundreds of people posted condolences on social media. She is survived by her daughter.

AP
Pat Hickey has resigned from the IOC board

The International Olympic Committee said Ireland's Patrick Hickey has resigned from its executive board, more than a year after he was arrested at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics in a ticket touting investigation.

The IOC body announced Mr Hickey's resignation ahead of the board's two-day meeting which opens on Monday in Lima, Peru.

Mr Hickey "emphasised that he wants to protect the IOC", the Olympic body said, citing his resignation letter.

The IOC board seat representing the Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC) will be elected at a four-day annual meeting starting on Wednesday in Lima.

Mr Hickey temporarily stepped aside from Olympic work after Brazilian authorities arrested him at the IOC's hotel in Rio.

He denies wrongdoing and retains his IOC membership.

Mr Hickey returned to Ireland in December after the ANOC loaned him 326,000 in bail money.

AP
North Korea illegally exported coal, iron and other commodities worth at least 204 million to China and other countries including India, Malaysia and Sri Lanka during a six-month period, in breach of United Nations sanctions, the world body says.

In a report released on Saturday , UN experts said Kim Jong Un's government continued to flout sanctions on commodities, as well as an arms embargo and restrictions on shipping and financial activities, during the perios which ended in early August.

They said North Korea was also reportedly continuing banned nuclear activities with weapons-grade fissile material production at the Yongbyon nuclear complex, construction and maintenance at the Punggye-ri nuclear test site, and at a uranium mine in Pyongsan.

The eight-member panel of experts said it was also investigating the widespread presence of North Koreans in Africa and the Middle East, particularly in Syria, "including their involvement in prohibited activities".

The experts said one inquiry is into "reported prohibited chemical, ballistic missile and conventional arms co-operation" between Syria and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, the country's official name.

They said this included activities on Syrian Scud missile programmes and "maintenance and repair of Syrian surface-to-air missiles (SAM) air defence systems".

The panel noted that two unnamed countries reported intercepting shipments destined for Syria.

It did not identify the contents and said Syria had yet to respond to its inquiries.

The 111-page report was written before North Korea's sixth and most powerful nuclear test last Sunday and its latest launch of a powerful new intermediate-range ballistic missile over Japan.

It was made public two days before the United States has called for a vote on a new sanctions resolution.

The original US draft would impose the toughest-yet sanctions on North Korea including banning all oil and natural gas exports to the country and freezing all foreign financial assets of the government and Kim.

The experts said implementation of existing sanctions "lags far behind what is necessary to achieve the core goal of denuclearisation" of the Korean peninsula.

They blamed "lax enforcement" of sanctions coupled North Korea's "evolving evasion techniques" for undermining the achievement of this goal which would see the North abandon all weapons of mass destruction.

On the export of commodities - a key source of foreign exchange for the DPRK - the experts said that following China's suspension of coal imports from the North in February, the DPRK has been rerouting coal to other countries including Malaysia and Vietnam.

"The panel's investigations reveal that the DPRK is deliberately using indirect channels to export prohibited commodities, evading sanctions," the report said.

The panel said imports of DPRK coal, iron and iron ore violate UN sanctions unless the countries have received an exemption.

Between December 2016 and May 2017, for example, the DPRK exported more than 60 million of iron ore to China, the report said.

And between October 2016 and May 2017, it exported iron and steel products to Egypt, China, France, India, Ireland and Mexico, valued at 231,000.

There are no exemptions for importing silver, copper, zinc, nickel and gold from the DPRK. And since December 2016, the experts said China, Sri Lanka, and India imported one or more of these minerals in breach of sanctions.

As for violations of the arms embargo, the panel said it was conducting investigations in Angola, Congo, Eritrea, Mozambique, Namibia, Tanzania and Uganda as well as Syria.

In Mozambique, for example, the experts said they were looking into the reported supply of shoulder-launched surface-to-air missiles, air defence systems, other surface-to-air missiles and radar by a North Korean trading company.

They are also investigating reports that the same company is repairing and upgrading Tanzania's surface-to-air missile systems.

When it comes to financial sanctions, the panel said the DPRK continues to evade and violate them in a number of ways.

Many DPRK financial institutions maintain representatives overseas who conduct transactions that facilitate prohibited programmes; many foreign financial institutions wittingly or unwittingly provide banking services to DPRK front companies and others engaged in prohibited activities; and foreign investments in DPRK banks or joint ventures give those banks access to funding and the international financial system.

In addition, the experts said: "DPRK officials and entities have engaged in deceptive financial practices, including opening multiple bank accounts in the same country and in neighbouring countries in their own names, under family members' names, and in the names of front companies."

As for shipping, the experts said the number of foreign-flagged DPRK vessels has been "dramatically reduced" in response to UN sanctions.

But they said North Korea "continued to hone its evasion tactics" by increasing the number of DPRK-flagged ships by a corresponding number.

AP
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Win McNamee/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) -- President Donald Trump held a Cabinet meeting from Camp David on Saturday while monitoring the effects of Hurricane Irma on the U.S.

The president tweeted a video at the top of the meeting telling people to "get out of" the hurricane's way.

"Property is replaceable but lives are not, and safety has to come first," he said in the video. "Don't worry about it, get out of its way."

Trump added that he had seen images of Irma's impact on the U.S. Virgin Islands on Saturday morning.

"It's a storm of enormous destructive power and I ask everyone on the storm path to heed all instructions," the president said.

A White House official said Trump would continue to receive regular updates on Hurricanes Irma and Jose.

A statement from the White House said the president "directed Federal agencies to continue supporting State and local efforts to save lives, promote shelter efforts, and expedite requested assistance to affected areas."

The White House released official photographs from the meeting showing the president, Vice President Mike Pence, and Trump's advisors, praying before the Cabinet meeting.

Later Saturday night, a longer video was released of Trump's remarks and the president said that his Cabinet would also be discussing North Korea and tax reform.

Copyright  2017, ABC Radio. All rights reserved.
Von: Julian Ropcke

The human rights situation in Chechnya, a federal subject of the Russian Federation, is dire and got even worse after local authorities started to hunt down homosexuals earlier this year. In July, the Kremlin-approved Kadyrov government proudly presented a "reunification" campaign, forcing separated and divorced couples with common kids to come back together "for the sake of their children".

Tanya Lokshina is Russia Program Director for Human Rights Watch. BILD spoke to her about the recent developments and whether those should be seen in a wider context of Russian policy towards

BILD: Over the past two months, happy reunions were encouraged - some say forced - by the Chechen authorities, bringing together 948 formerly separated and partially divorced couples. How do you assess that measure and does it really improve living conditions for children?

Tanya Lokshina: "Were concerned that this family re-integration program by Chechen authorities could have a negative impact on the already dire situation with womens rights in Chechnya. When the local strongman, well known for running Chechnya through brutal repression, choses to prioritise family reunification and issues some guidelines in this respect  and just a few weeks later close to 1000 divorced couples get reunited, there are strong grounds to believe that some of those re-unifications were not voluntary, but rather forced, as far as relevant divorced women are concerned. It is particularly easy to put pressure on a woman by denying her access to her children, which belong with the father and his family by Chechen traditional laws, upheld by local authorities even when they run contrary to official Russian laws."

BILD: There is lot of talk about anti-LGBT violence in Chechnya for the past five months at least. According to HRW, what are the concrete numbers in terms of mistreated, jailed or even killed LGBT people in Chechnya in 2017 and how does HRW evaluate the current situation in that regard?

Lokshina: "Starting the last week and at least through the first week of April, dozens and dozens of men were rounded up by Chechen security officials on suspicion of being gay; the victims were held in unofficial detention facilities for days -- they captors humiliated, starved and tortured them. Several of them men disappeared; others were returned to their families barely alive from torture with security officials exposing their sexual orientation to their elder male relatives and encouraging the relatives to carry out honor killings.

Ramzan Kadyrov with a gun from his collection

As a result of unprecedented international pressure, the Kremlin launched a federal investigation into this organised and massive anti-gay purge, and the Chechen leadership was compelled to suspend it - but the situation of LGBT people on the ground is still extremely precarious. It fact, it is now more dire than before the purge, as numerous inflammatory statements by Chechen officials have served to further fuel the already extreme homophobia in Chechen society."

Auch interessant

BILD: In how far is violence against minorities "state"-organised by the Kadyrov regime, respectively does the regime "only" set the conditions of violence against certain groups by creating the framework on a rather general lever? And what is Moscow's role in this?

Lokshina: "The large-scale organised campaign aimed at purging Chechen society from gays is unprecedented -- and it made international headlines unlike any other story relevant to abuses in Chechnya-during this past decade. At the same time and most importantly, the toolbox, the methods used by local authorities to "cleanse" Chechnya of gay men are the very same lawless methods Chechen security officials have been using for years to cleans Chechnya from different groups of undesirables, including suspected insurgents or jihadi sympathisers, Salafi Muslims, suspected drug users, and even the mildest critics of the government.

These methods  abduction-style detentions, enforced disappearances, and torture  have been used by local authorities with practically absolute impunity and with the Kremlin's tacit blessing. Ramzan Kadyrov's rule is built on repression and if not for the lasting impunity for those long standing egregious abuses - the abuses which the international community didn't pay much attention to - the recent anti-gay purge wouldn't have been possible."

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The head of a victims support charity has called for guidelines on how the media cover the issue of rape.

Noeline Blackwell, chief executive of the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre, called for editors and journalists to collaborate with the organisation after broadcaster George Hook made controversial remarks about a trial in Britain.

The Newstalk presenter apologised after questioning "personal responsibility" when discussing the case of a 19-year-woman who alleged she was raped by a former member of the British swim team.Ms Blackwell said remarks about where blame lies could stop other victims coming forward.

She said: "What wed probably say is theres a need to build awareness of the realities of rape and sexual violence and criminality.

"Is it clearly understood that sex without consent is rape and that a sexual contact with consent is sex abuse?

"If you were at that stage as a baseline then everything else would flow from that.

"If a person has sex with someone without consent they are committing the rape. That deals with the notion that the victim has responsibility for the rape."

Ms Blackwell added: "Rape is only caused by rapists."

The Dublin Rape Crisis Centre said it had been considering calling for guidelines in the media.

It said it deals with queries from both journalists and dramatists over how a case or storyline should be covered appropriately and sensitively.

Ms Blackwell said guidelines would also be useful for defining acceptable language, reporting court cases and dealing with initial reports of investigations into rape.

She said the initiative should be done in conjunction with media rather than by trying to impose rules.

Mr Hook made his remarks during his High Noon programme last Friday. He apologised on Saturday in a statement issued by Newstalk.

The stations managing editor Patricia Monahan also issued an unreserved apology over the remarks and said they were "totally wrong and inappropriate and should never have been made".

In a statement Mr Hook said: "I wish to apologise unreservedly for comments I made about rape on my radio programme on Newstalk yesterday.

"It was unacceptable to suggest in any way that blame could be attributed to victims of rape.

"I apologise for the comments which caused hurt and offence, and for this I am truly sorry."
The Dalai Lama has told an audience in Derry City that the developed world is experiencing a mental crisis.

He railed against too much war, fear, distrust and anger and called for world leaders to create a century of peace.

The Tibetan spiritual leader also said he was an admirer of the European Union and urged Russia to join the bloc.

The 82-year-old said: "Our goal should be a century of peace, a century of dialogue based on a sense of oneness of seven billion human beings."

Speaking in Derry today the leader in exile of the Tibetan Himalayan kingdom - which was annexed by China in 1950 -revealed how he had visited Northern Ireland several times: in October 2000, November 2005 and April 2013.

The winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989 has become a symbol of peaceful resistance to oppression throughout the world.

He said thinking which led to warfare was outdated - referring to fighting in Burma, Iraq and Syria - adding: "Those developed countries are mentally in a lot of crisis.

"Unrest, too much warring, fear distrust and anger."

He is a guest of charity Children in Crossfire, which is marking 20 years of international development work.

The anti-poverty organisation was established by Richard Moore, who was blinded after he was injured during the Northern conflict.

Mr Moore was walking past an Army post when he said a soldier fired a rubber bullet from 10 feet away.

In Derry the Dalai Lama holds the hand of Richard Moore, Children in Crossfire founder who was blinded by a rubber bullet as a child pic.twitter.com/95Kz6vvAxJ  Charles McQuillan (@photomcq) September 10, 2017

The Dalai Lama urged a greater sense of compassion and love during his speech to a sell-out crowd in the city.

He alluded to Brexit during a lengthy address.

He said: "I am an admirer of European Union", adding, "Eventually Russia should be part of the European Union."

The @DalaiLama in good humour as he tugs on the Goatie of a Chorister at the @ChildreninXfire event in Derry today @PAImages pic.twitter.com/mAlFg0lUhW  Niall Carson (@niallcarsonpa) September 10, 2017

He made a few jokes about US President Donald Trump and climate change, noting recent events (hurricanes in the Caribbean) may be teaching him something different.
Gardai have issued an appeal for witnesses to a serious overnight road accident in Dublin.

The collision happened near the road works on the L3132, St. Margarets Road, Swords, Dublin at approximately 4am this morning.
Gardai have launched an investigation after an armed robbery took place at an Aldi store in Dublin yesterday.

The incident happened at around 2pm in Santry, north Dublin.
Up to 1,000 gardai could be investigated over the recent breath test controversy.

According to today's Sunday Independent, an investigation is on the cards after a report found that 1.5 million fake tests were recorded.
Children who have died suddenly or unexpectedly will be remembered as part of an event taking place at 11am in the Phoenix Park in Dublin this morning.

The "Mile in Memory" is a three-mile remembrance walk designed to help families who have lost children suddenly.
More than 1,300 foreign women and children, the families of Islamic State fighters, are being held at a camp for displaced people in northern Iraq, Iraqi officials said.

They said Sunday that the 1,333 individuals, from 14 countries, surrendered to Kurdish forces at the end of August after Iraqi forces drove the extremist group from the northern town of Tal Afar, near Mosul.

The military officials said the women and children will not be charged with crimes and will probably be repatriated to their home countries.

Most come from Central Asia, Russia and Turkey.

Tens of thousands of foreigners travelled to Iraq and Syria to live in the IS group's self-styled Islamic caliphate.

"We couldn't practise our religion in Azerbaijan. We couldn't wear the niqab because there were intelligence officers everywhere," said Feyruza, who is originally from Dagestan in Russia.

"We were told that in Iraq they had implemented Islam and we came here and it was true. We lived our lives as Muslims and we were very happy until the warplanes came and destroyed everything," she said.

She and other women said they had been living in Tal Afar since early 2015. They said they knew nothing about the group's widely publicised atrocities.

"We didn't see any killings. It didn't happen. Everything was according to the Koran and the Sunna. What we saw was the implementation of Islamic rule," said another woman named Aybenis, from Azerbaijan.

The women declined to give their last names out of security concerns.

The women said they lived well up until August, when Iraqi forces launched the operation to retake the town.

Their account of life under the militants is in sharp contrast to that offered by other residents of Tal Afar, who fled by the thousands in the months leading up to the operation because of severe shortages of food and other supplies.

The women and children are now living in tents and receiving aid from humanitarian groups.

They are among hundreds of thousands of Iraqis displaced by fighting over the past year. Iraqi forces recaptured Mosul, the country's second largest city, in July following a gruelling, nine-month campaign.

The women said they did not know the fate of their husbands, who surrendered to Kurdish forces separately.

Brigadier General Kamel Harki, a Kurdish commander, said some of the captured fighters were handed over to Iraqi authorities while others were killed after faking their surrender and then attacking their captors.

AP
A man has been arrested for allegedly captaining one of a pair of boats that took 305 Syrian refugees to the north-west coast of Cyprus.

Police spokesman Michalis Ioannou said Sunday that the 202 men, 30 women and 73 children who arrived at around midnight were thought to be the largest number of migrants to reach Cyprus in a single day.
Rohingya rebels, whose attack on Burma security forces last month triggered military reprisals, have declared a month-long truce as refugees continue to flood across the border into Bangladesh - and scant basic resources, hunger and illness.

The band of Muslim insurgents calling itself the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army issued the truce statement on its Twitter account and urged Burma's government to reciprocate in order to assist all victims regardless of their background.

The rebels, who say they are fighting to protect their minority members against government-sponsored persecution, launched their first known attacks last October and again on August 25.

According to Rohingya refugees, the military responded with indiscriminate killings, burning entire villages and forcing tens of thousands to flee.

The government said most of the 400 dead were "terrorists".

The United Nations said yesterday that an estimated 290,000 Rohingya Muslims had arrived in the border district of Cox's Bazar in just the last two weeks, joining at least 100,000 who were already there after fleeing earlier riots or persecution in Buddhist-majority Burma.

The number was expected to swell further, with thousands crossing the border each day.

Fights were erupting over food and water.

Women and children were tapping on car windows or tugging at the clothes of passing reporters while rubbing their bellies and begging for food. Health experts warned of the potential for outbreaks of disease.

"More and more people are coming," said UNHCR spokeswoman Vivian Tan.

With camps already "more than full", the new arrivals were setting up spontaneous settlements on roadsides or any available patches of land.

Within the camps "we are trying our best, but it is very difficult because every day we are seeing new arrivals" with nowhere to go, Ms Tan said.

Many of the newly arrived were initially stunned and traumatised after fleeing the violence.

They are now growing desperate in searching for food distribution points that appeared only in recent days, passing out packets of biscuits and 55lb bags of rice.

One aid worker said stocks were running out, with the refugees' needs far greater than what they had imagined.

"It is impossible to keep up," she said.

At one food distribution point, women were volunteering to help keep order by tapping people with bamboo sticks to gently urge them back in line.

Weary women carried infants in their arms while clutching other children to their sides, afraid they might be separated in the crowds.

One 40-year-old man, faint with hunger, collapsed while waiting and could not stand again on his own strength when others tried to help him up. They drizzled water between his lips in an attempt to revive him, to no avail.

At one camp, a mobile clinic set up for the first time on Saturday had already seen 600 patients by the afternoon.

Patients, mostly children, were coming in with severe diarrhoea, fungal skin infections, ear infections and high fever, said Nasima Yasmin, the director of the clinic run by a well-known Bangladesh health group.

Ms Yasmin said their work was barely sufficient given the camp's scale and requirements.

"We need deep tube wells so that there is clean water and people can clean themselves. Also toilets are needed," she said, adding that the sheer number of newcomers raised fears of a serious outbreak of disease.

Refugee camps had already been filled to capacity before the influx.

Makeshift settlements were quickly appearing and expanding along roadsides, and the city of Cox's Bazar - built to accommodate only 500,000 - was bursting at its seams.

There was an urgent need for more temporary shelters, Ms Tan said.

"We are seeing the mushrooming of these very flimsy shelters that will not be able to house people for too long," she said.

The UN has asked Bangladesh authorities to make more land available so they can build new relief camps.

The US State Department said it was "very concerned" about the situation and praised Bangladesh for its "generosity in responding to this humanitarian crisis".

It's not known how many Rohingya remain in Rakhine state.

Previously the population had been thought to be roughly one million.

Journalists in Rakhine state saw active fires in areas Rohingya had abandoned, adding to doubts over government claims that Rohingya themselves were responsible for setting them.

AP
Latest: Hurricane Irma has moved inland near Naples which is expected to take the brunt of the category three storm.

The National Hurricane Centre says it's carrying winds of up to 115 miles per hour and that catastrophic storm surges are expected.

Watch live updates here ...

The conditions have killed at least 27 people in the Caribbean and another three deaths have been confirmed in Florida.

Donald Trump says he will be travelling to the US state 'very soon but said right now lives are the priority.

"You do not want to be in that path. For the most part people have left but that is a bad path to be in."

Update 9.40pm: Hurricane Irma has been downgraded to a Category 3 storm - two down from the most severe level - as it moves north along Florida's West Coast.

But the US national hurricane centre is warning it will remain powerful.

Three people have died as winds of 130 miles per hour hit the Florida Keys earlier.

Emergency services in the area are concerned that water being drawn out from the coast due to Irma will return as a powerful storm surge later tonight and tomorrow.

Update 8pm: As Hurricane Irma heads away from Florida Keys there is growing concern that dangerous storm surges could soon hit the US state's West Coast.

So far three people have been killed in Florida with winds up to 130 miles an hour leaving more than a million homes and businesses without power.

Update 6.30pm: A British tourist caught in the path of Hurricane Irma has said he is "thankful to be here" after he was rescued by the US Air Force.

Alex Woolfall was on holiday on the Caribbean island of St Martin when the historic storm struck.

The PR consultant, from London, went on Twitter to post updates as winds battered the Westin Hotel, where he was sheltering in a concrete stairwell.

He wrote: "My God this noise! It's like standing behind a jet engine!! Constant booms & bangs. At least concrete stairwell not moving"

Mr Woolfall said he was airlifted to safety in Puerto Rico by a military plane as powerful Hurricane Jose was approaching.

"I am just tired but very thankful to be here," he told the Press Association after his rescue.

"I think probably all those on vacation would say it was a nightmare but it's over for us.

"What about the people of St Martin and the other islands? I just hope the aid and support they need comes."

Mr Woolfall described the devastation on the island after Irma hit.

"It's very badly damaged and it's heart-breaking to see people whose homes have been destroyed sitting outside in the street, especially when you see young children too."

A billboard is ripped apart by high winds along Interstate 95 Northbound as Hurricane Irma passes by, Sunday, Sept. 10, 2017, in Miami. (AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee)

Mr Woolfall said local hotel staff continued coming to work, despite the damage to their own property, while the manager worked tirelessly to arrange planes.

"I found that astonishing and very moving," he added.

Update 4.30pm: Officials in Florida think three reported deaths are due to Hurricane Irma - which has made landfall in the US State.

More than 6 million people were ordered to evacuate - with fears it could cause deadly storm surges.

Irma's already killed at least 22 people in the Caribbean.

Speaking to ABC's Good Morning America, Florida's governor Rick Scott made another appeal to residents to heed advice and prepare for a "devastating" storm surge as high as 15ft.

Update 4.10pm: As Hurricane Irma makes landfall on the US coast, police have confirmed a man's died after a pick-up truck smashed into a tree in Florida Keys.

They say it's the state's first casualty due to the Category 4 storm - which is whipping up winds of almost 210 kilometres per hour.

Six and a half million people were ordered to leave the state.

Waves crash over a seawall at the mouth of the Miami River from Biscayne Bay, Fla., as Hurricane Irma passes by, Sunday, Sept. 10, 2017, in Miami. (AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee)

Update 3.30pm: Hurricane Irma's is battering the lower Florida Keys as a powerful category four storm with reports that over one million home shave now lost all power.

Irma lashed the area with maximum sustained winds near 130 mph and the US National Hurricane Centre said it was expected to remain a powerful storm as it moved through the Florida Keys and near the state's west coast.

This morning the hurricane was centred about 20 miles east-southeast of Key West, Florida, and was moving north-northwest at 8 mph.

The Key West International Airport measured sustained winds of 50 mph with a gust of up to 70 mph, according to the hurricane centre.

The National Weather Service issued tornado warnings for a wide swathe of Monroe, Miami-Dade and Broward counties in south Florida. The band of rain and tornado-producing cells was moving quickly, officials said. There were no immediate reports of tornadoes touching down.

Tens of thousands of people huddling in shelters watched for updates.

In the Tampa Bay area, access to all of Pinellas County's barrier islands, including the popular spring break destination of Clearwater Beach, was shut off.

The leading edge of the immense storm bent palm trees and spit rain across south Florida, knocking out power to hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses, as the eye approached Key West.

PJ Pike checks on his boat, left, and his friends boat, right, which are sitting in their moorings in mud due to an unusually low tide, as the first effects of Hurricane Irmareach Fort Myers, Fla., Sunday, Sept. 10, 2017. Announcing itself with roaring 130 mph winds, Hurricane Irma plowed into the mostly emptied-out Florida Keys early Sunday. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

As the hurricane's eye approached the Florida Keys early Sunday, Carol Walterson Stroud, 60, and her family were huddled in a third floor apartment at a centre for the elderly in Key West.

"We are good so far," she said in a text message just before 5.30am. "It's blowing hard."

Mrs Stroud was with her husband, Tim Stroud, and granddaughter, Sierra Costello. Their dog Rocky was also riding out the storm.

Mrs Stroud said she planned to step outside once the eye of the hurricane passed over. She said she has stood in the eye of a hurricane before and it is "total peace and quiet".

Evacuees stand in line to enter the Germain Arena, which is being used as a fallout shelter, in advance of Hurricane Irma, in Estero, Florida.

Florida governor Rick Scott had warned residents in the state's evacuation zones on Saturday that "this is your last chance to make a good decision". About 6.4 million people were told to flee.

But because the storm is 350 to 400 miles wide, the entire Florida peninsula was exposed. Forecasters said the greater Miami area of six million people could still get life-threatening hurricane winds and storm surge of 4ft to 6ft.

Irma was at one time the most powerful hurricane ever recorded in the open Atlantic with a peak wind speed of 185 mph last week. It left more than 20 people dead across the Caribbean and as it moved north over the Gulf of Mexico's bathtub-warm water of nearly 90 degrees, it was expected to regain strength.

Meteorologists predicted Irma would plough into the Tampa Bay area Monday morning. The area has not been struck by a major hurricane since 1921, when its population was about 10,000, National Hurricane Centre spokesman Dennis Feltgen said. Now around three million people live there.

The latest course also still threatens Naples' mansion and yacht-lined canals, Sun City Centre's retirement homes, and Sanibel Island's shell-filled beaches.

Irma's course change caught many off guard and triggered a major round of last-minute evacuations in the Tampa area.

Many businesses had yet to protect windows with plywood or hurricane shutters. Some locals grumbled about the forecast, even though Florida's west coast had long been included in the zone of probability.

"For five days, we were told it was going to be on the east coast, and then 24 hours before it hits, we're now told it's coming up the west coast," said Jeff Beerbohm, 52, in St Petersburg. "As usual, the weatherman, I don't know why they're paid."

Nearly the entire Florida coastline remained under hurricane watches and warnings, and the latest projections could shift again, aiming the worst of the storm at other parts of the state.

Forecasters warned of storm surges as high as 15ft.

"This is going to sneak up on people," said Jamie Rhome, head of the hurricane centre's storm surge unit.

Given its mammoth size and strength and its course up the peninsula, it could prove one of the most devastating hurricanes ever to hit Florida, and inflict damage on a scale not seen there in 25 years.

Hurricane Andrew smashed into suburban Miami in 1992 with winds topping 165 mph, damaging or blowing apart more than 125,000 homes. At least 40 people died.

Strong waves brought by Hurricane Irma hit the Malecon seawall in Havana, Cuba, late last night.

Update 10.02am: Hurricane Irma regained strength as it closed in on the Florida Keys early today, as forecasters monitored a crucial shift in its trajectory that could keep its ferocious eye off the southwest Florida coast and over warm gulf water.

The hurricane re-strengthened to category-four status with maximum sustained winds near 130 mph.

The US National Hurricane Centre said Irma was expected to gain a little more strength as it moved through the Straits of Florida and remain a powerful hurricane as it approached Florida.

Tens of thousands of people huddling in shelters watched for updates as the storm swung to the west, now potentially sparing Tampa as well as Miami the catastrophic head-on blow forecasters had been warning about for days.

But those few miles meant St Petersburg could get a direct hit, rather than its more populous twin across Tampa Bay. Neither city has suffered a major hurricane in nearly a century.

#HurricaneIrma has definitely kicked up a notch now! pic.twitter.com/XWmg1v55IP  UK Weather Live (@UKWeatherLive) September 10, 2017

Earlier:

Hurricane Irma is closing in on the Florida Keys with top winds of 120mph as forecasters monitored a crucial shift in its trajectory that could keep its ferocious eye off the state's south-west coast and over warm gulf water.

Tens of thousands of people huddling in shelters watched for updates as the storm swung to the west, now potentially sparing Tampa as well Miami the catastrophic head-on blow forecasters had been warning about.

But those few miles meant St Petersburg could get a direct hit, rather than its more populous twin across Tampa Bay.

The leading edge of the immense storm bent palm trees and spit rain across South Florida, knocking out power to more than 170,000 homes and businesses, as the eye approached Key West.

If the centre of the storm keeps moving over warm Gulf of Mexico water, it may regain more strength before making landfall again.

JUST IN: #HurricaneIrma strengthens back to Category 4 as it approaches the Florida Keys. @adamklotzfnc has the latest. pic.twitter.com/x118y3h0B9  Fox News (@FoxNews) September 10, 2017

St Petersburg, like Tampa, has not taken a head-on blow from a major hurricane in nearly a century.

Clearwater would be next, and then the storm would finally go inland north west of Ocala.

Irma currently has top sustained winds of 120mph and is moving northwards at about 6mph.

More than 170,000 homes and businesses in Florida have lost power and Florida Power and Light said more than half of those shutdowns were in the Miami-Dade area, where about 600,000 people have been ordered to evacuate.

This video footage shot from a drone shows the devastation on the island of Tortola, British Virgin Islands, from Hurricane #Irma pic.twitter.com/nMgMbDYsoH  CNN International (@cnni) September 10, 2017

The company has said it expects millions of people to lose power, with some areas experiencing prolonged outages.

The company said it has assembled the largest pre-storm workforce in US history, with more than 16,000 people ready to respond.

AP
This star kept Kelce from retiring; have Philly fans seen last of Wentz?
James Lavere Quickel

September 04, 1927September 08, 2017

World War Two veteran Sgt. James Lavere Quickel (USMC) was relieved of duty on September 8th, 2017. He was born on September 4th, 1927 to James Monroe Quickel and Edna Marie (Cleaver) Forsythe in East Berlin, PA. James was married to Nadine R. (Sieg) Quickel until she passed away May 25th, 1988.

James is survived by three sons, Bradley J. (Melissa) Quickel, Sanford S. (Sandra) Quickel, and Anthony L. (Cynthia) Quickel. Along with his sons, he is survived by grandchildren Esther, Scott, Ben, Shaun, and Anthony, as well as great grandchildren Daniel, Ziva, Zara and Isla. Also living are Molly and Leah Snyder, who considered him Pappy Quickel.

James had a passion for mineralogy. His mineral collection, which ranks among the best in the state of Pennsylvania, is on display at Bryn Mawr College. Among his other achievements were being a champion rattlesnake competitor at such places as Morris, Sinnamahoning, and Cross Forks, PA. He was a revered homing pigeon competitor in the 1950s and 1960s, when he won many competitions. For many years, James served as a scoutmaster with Troop 85 in New Oxford, PA and was a Vigil member of the Order of the Arrow. His sons Bradley and Sanford achieved the rank of Eagle and Life scouts respectively, for which he was very proud of both. His grandson Anthony also went on to achieve the rank of Eagle.

James wore the title of United States Marine with great pride. He was a combat veteran in China in 1946-47. In addition to his service in China, he was also stationed as a radio operator in Guam. His memories of his service were happy, and he continued to be in contact with fellow servicemen until they preceded him in death.

Whether it was racing motorcycles or hunting, he was happiest sharing time with his sons Brad and Sandy. Their love of the outdoors formed a special bond over the years. He enjoyed nothing more than spending time at Sandys cabin in Cameron County or during his many trips to visit Brad in Maine. He had a great love for all three of his daughters-in-law and all of his grandchildren.

The family would like to thank the staff of the Claremont Nursing and Rehabilitation Center for the incredible job they did while James was a resident.

There will be no viewing or funeral. However, the family would like to invite friends, relatives, and nursing staff to the Carlisle VFW at 2104 W. Trindle Road, Carlisle, PA on September 16th, 2017 from 2:00-4:00pm for a few hours of food and refreshments in order to celebrate the life of THE MARINE JAMES L. QUICKEL. SEMPER FI! Visit www.Since1853.com to send condolences.
Families need help: Donate and Give a Christmas

During the holiday season, in partnership with NJ 211, we are pleased to offer the Give a Christmas program to Burlington County residents.
FANTASYLAND

How America Went Haywire: A 500-Year History

Kurt Andersen

Random House

462 pages; $30

Reading a great revisionist history of America is the bookish way to feel what its like to be born again. Suddenly past, present and future are connected by a visible thread. Stray details and aberrations start to make sense. You feel ashamed, but also enlightened, because at least you have named the sin: You belong to a nation of bloodthirsty colonizers (Howard Zinn), or anti-intellectuals (Richard Hofstadter) or, in Kurt Andersens latest opus, a people who have committed themselves over the last half century to florid, collective delusion.

If, for example, you remain confused about what happened in the last election, Andersens retelling of history will clarify things for you. As a host of public radios Studio 360, a best-selling novelist and a cultural omnivore, Andersen has been tracking and storing the data on the nations unravelling for decades. And he knew that what happened that November night, and in the subsequent months, was not just inevitable but in many ways our nations natural destiny. As he explains in what must have been an alarmingly self-confirming last chapter: Donald Trump is stupendous Exhibit A in the landscape of Fantasyland, a fitting leader for a nation that has, over the centuries, nurtured a promiscuous devotion to the untrue.

Fake news. Post-truth. Alternative facts. For Andersen, these are not momentary perversions but habits baked into our DNA, the ultimate expressions of attitudes that have made America exceptional for its entire history.

Andersens history begins at the beginning, with the first comforting lie we tell ourselves. Each year we teach our children about Pilgrims, those gentle robed creatures who landed at Plymouth Rock. But our real progenitors were the Puritans, who passed the weeks on the trans-Atlantic voyage preaching about the end times and who, when they arrived, vowed to hang any Quaker or Catholic who landed on their shores. They were zealots and also well-educated British gentlemen, which set the tone for what Andersen identifies as a distinctly American endeavour: Propping up magical thinking with elaborate scientific proof.

While Newton and Locke were ushering in an Age of Reason in Europe, over in America unreason was taking new seductive forms. A series of mystic visionaries were planting the seeds of extreme entitlement, teaching Americans that they didnt have to study any book or old English theologian to know what to think, that whatever they felt to be true was true.

What happens next in American history, according to Andersen, happens without malevolence, or even intention. Our national character gels into one thats distinctly comfortable fogging up the boundary between fantasy and reality in nearly every realm. As soon as George Washington dies fake news is born  the story about the cherry tree, or his kneeling in prayer at Valley Forge. Enterprising businessmen quickly figure out ways to make money off the Americans who gleefully embrace untruths. The 1800s see an explosion of water cures and homeopathy and something called mesmerism, which concerns electricity of the system thrown out of balance (run that one by your yoga teachers). Dr William A Rockefeller, father of John D, gets his start mass-marketing a pink elixir called Microbe Killer.

In the 1960s fantasyland goes into overdrive. Psychedelics, academic scholarship and the New Age movement conspire to make reason and reality the realms of idiots and squares. After the Kennedy assassinations, conspiracy theories become not just a fringe hobby but a permanent feature of the American mental landscape. UFO sightings explode, and the stories become ever more elaborate, involving abductions and cover-ups and frolics and secret alliances with interplanetary beings.

In the meantime, a kind of comfort with small fibs settles into the populace. When Andersen was young, he recalls, it was rare to see a woman over 50 whose hair was not grey or white. And apparently there were only eight plastic surgeons in all of Manhattan. But the market for hair colour and plastic surgery explodes, as America starts writing its national fiction of permanent youthfulness.

While the most persistent thread in Fantasyland is Christianity  the astounding number of Americans who believe in heaven and angels, which most of Europe gave up decades ago  Andersen reserves a starring role for the secular spiritualists. They were supposed to be a counterpoint to narrow-minded evangelicals, but Andersen says the New Agers committed an even greater sin than the faithful. What Anne Hutchinson started, Gestalt therapy finished off in the 60s. Fritz Perls, a psychotherapist and Gestalt founder, simply put it: I do my thing and you do your thing. I am not in this world to live up to your expectations, and you are not in this world to live up to mine. Or put more simply: You do you.

Its clear that Andersen is uncomfortable with the extreme relativism weve settled into. But he doesnt grapple with what it might mean to give that up. If theres a flaw in this book, its repetitiveness.

At the end of his book he tries to redraw a boundary that moves us a little closer to sanity. Youre entitled to your own opinions and your own fantasies, but not your own facts  especially if your fantastical facts hurt people, he says, echoing a comment by Daniel Patrick Moynihan. But the attempt is brief and feels half-hearted. By that point the pile up of detail  gun nuts, survivalists, web holes, scenes of cosplay, sci-fi shows and manufactured bubbles of hope  leaves a reader worried that a short manifesto on facts wont save us.



2017 The New York Times News Service
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A slowdown in the delivery of new aircraft has forced Indias biggest airline, IndiGo, to consider the wet-lease option to raise its passenger capacity for the upcoming winter schedule.

The airline is in talks with Lithuanian airline SmallPlanet and troubled European airlines Air Berlin and Alitalia to wet lease at least seven A320 planes, sources close to the development said. While has been dry leasing older planes since 2015, this will be the first time the airline will resort to wet lease.

Wet lease, an arrangement under which the lessor airline provides aircraft along with crew, maintenance, etc to the lessee, is costlier than dry lease and may lead to a spike in operational cost for . But if the airline does not deploy enough capacity, it fears losing market share, besides lucrative slots at airports.

The arrangement will be only for the winter season, which will end in March 2018.

If you see the capacity guidance given to the airline, it is 20 per cent increase in available seat kilometres (ASK) in FY18. In the current scenario, its not possible to maintain that without leasing planes. The airline will go for a short-term wet lease, expecting huge demand in the winter season, said a source.

Under wet lease, the induction of planes becomes faster. will only pay a fixed amount every month and the lessor will take care of operation and maintenance, the source added. IndiGo did not respond to queries.

Experts, however, said the move would push up the airlines operational cost. Lease cost ranges between 0.8 per cent and 1.2 per cent of the aircrafts cost, depending on factors like its age. Wet lease should be in the high range and dry lease in the lower range. IndiGo may go for older planes to bring down the cost, a sector analyst said.

A technical glitch in Pratt & Whitney engines has disrupted the production line of A320 neo aircraft, impacting fleet induction plans of IndiGo.

On average, IndiGo had been inducting two to three planes each month until recently, but in July it added only one A320 aircraft. Also, the carrier has been forced to ground eight Airbus A320 neo planes due to issues related to their engines.

Capacity addition by other airlines, too, is said to be limited. While the delivery of new planes has slowed down, the glitch has resulted in faster wearing out of the engines, requiring them to be replaced earlier than the normal cycle.

Due to the high replacement rate, Pratt & Whitney is struggling to provide sufficient spare engines to customer airlines, leading to grounding of planes.

IndiGo is Airbuss biggest customer globally for this aircraft with 430 A320 neo family planes on order, out of which it has received 23. Out of 430 planes, IndiGo has an agreement with Pratt & Whitney for the first 150 aircraft.
LANCASTER  There were no flowers, no words of comfort, no eulogies in honor of the deceased. There were no tears shed, no somber prayers and not a single family member standing graveside.

There was just Pauline and Noah Zimmerman, a funeral director and a couple of men who had backed a truck carrying 600 bags of cremated human remains right up to the edge of a large, freshly dug hole in the ground just outside Lancaster city.

On this July day, at Mellinger Mennonite Cemetery along Lincoln Highway, the men were performing a ritual that has become increasingly common in Lancaster County and the surrounding area: a mass interment for the "unclaimed."

"There's not usually a service. They just get placed and my husband, Noah, then fills in the grave," says Pauline Mellinger, a caretaker at the cemetery.

Indeed, on this day, the workers placed the 600 plastic bags containing the remains in the burial site, got in their truck and pulled away with the funeral director. "They must have wanted to get them off their shelves," Zimmerman says.

She and her husband are used to the indifference of those performing the task. Some time ago, a funeral director preparing to inter the cremated remains of 1,000 people made this request of Noah: "Dig the grave deep."

He knew there would be more.

And this summer there were.

Explaining the unclaimed

Until their burial, the unclaimed rest in black cardboard boxes inside a metal cabinet at the Lancaster County morgue in East Hempfield Township. Their cremated remains are organized neatly on shelves according to year of death.

The boxes serve as a reminder of the disconnectedness, and sometimes the coldness, of society. These are the people who have died alone and have no surviving family. These are the people whose relatives can't afford to claim them, or in some cases simply choose not to. These, in some cases, are victims of the opioid epidemic.

"Sometimes we can't find the next of kin, and some people honestly can't afford to pay for the burial costs of their loved ones," says Lancaster County Coroner Dr. Stephen Diamantoni. "But more sadly, some don't care enough about their family members to provide a proper burial.

"One man we contacted said, 'I never liked my dad. For all I care, you can throw him out the window,' " recalls Diamantoni. "That's sad to me that someone would have no emotional attachment, or at least no sense of responsibility. And then it's the taxpayers who have to foot the bill."

The president of the Pennsylvania State Coroners Association, Charles E. Kiessling Jr., says the number of unclaimed bodies being cremated is growing faster than coroners can figure out what to do with them.

"Almost every week I hear that someone is running out of room to store all their unclaimed bodies. It's a problem everywhere," says Kiessling, who serves as Lycoming County's coroner.

Kiessling says he spent a lot of time recently trying to find a relative of an elderly woman who had died in his county. But when he found someone, that person wasn't interested in claiming her aunt.

The relative told Kiessling: "Put a bone in her and let the dogs drag her away for all I care." Reflected the coroner: "I think the relative maybe was unhappy the elderly woman left all her possessions to her church."

Across the state, hundreds of boxes of ashes remain unclaimed. They sit in morgue storage lockers and in funeral homes awaiting interment, en masse, in a pauper's grave, without fanfare.

York County Coroner Pam Gay says the number of unclaimed bodies hit 39 last year, double the number in 2014. And that's a big problem.

"We're not like Lancaster," Gay says. "We don't have a morgue. We share eight slots, eight drawers with York Hospital in a city of 440,000 people. We're moving people in and out all the time," she says.

Because of the lack of space for unclaimed bodies in York County, the coroner's office typically cremates them in a week or less  sometimes before even a relative can be located.

"We can't wait around. There can be insect activity, which is a biohazard," she says. "Everyone who handles the body has to have personal protective gear."

The county works with several funeral homes that discount the rate of cremation for them. Even with the discount, the cost to the coroners' offices can be from several hundred dollars to $1,000 for each body.

The costs to York County of dealing with unclaimed bodies have risen from $4,300 five years ago to $12,000 in 2016, Gay says.

Dauphin County already has 16 unclaimed bodies this year, one more than in all of 2016. If the office determines the deceased is a veteran, it pays to transport that body to Indiantown Gap for a military funeral, says Jill Payne, from the Dauphin County Coroner's Office.

Coroners in Lancaster, Dauphin, Chester, Berks, Lebanon and York counties say the number of unclaimed bodies their offices have handled in the past five years has increased from 20 to 100 percent.

Diamantoni says his office has already cremated 20 bodies that were unclaimed by relatives this year  nearly as many as in all of 2015, when the office had 22 for the entire year, the most to date.

Diamantoni says he might ask the county for more money in next year's budget to cover the rising costs of handling and cremating unclaimed bodies. The taxpayer-funded office has spent $6,500 so far this year.

The coroner says that when the number of boxes in the cabinet of unclaimed remains reaches 45, he will need to find a burial site. It might be Mellinger Mennonite Cemetery. It might be a plot donated by another cemetery.

In Lebanon County, Coroner Jeffrey Yokum reports his office has gone from a low of a single unclaimed body in 2010 to seven last year.

Chester County's chief deputy coroner, David Daugherty, says his county has experienced about a 20 percent increase in the number of unclaimed bodies over the past five or six years.

The county reached an all-time high of 17 unclaimed bodies last year, Daugherty says.

"The way it's going, we will potentially go over our line item for our budget, which is $6,600. It really depends on the rest of the year," Daugherty says.

The Berks County Coroner's Office was left with 20 unclaimed bodies last year, the most ever. This year they've already had 12, at a cost of $750 each for disposal, according to Jonn M. Hollenbach, the assistant chief deputy coroner.

"It's not just the cost of cremation the coroners are dealing with," says Kiessling. "It's the man hours trying to track down relatives through data bases and social media."

Frustration among coroners

Lancaster County's chief deputy coroner, Eric Bieber, says his office uses search engines, social media and public documents to try and locate family members of the deceased.

Sometimes it succeeds. Many times it does not.

And even if coroners do manage to find a relative, that does not guarantee they will claim their relative.

And that's frustrating to some coroners, including Gay, of York.

"Just because we can't find a relative to claim them, or a relative won't claim them, they still deserve to be treated with respect at their passing."

"I can see when a young couple who have three or four kids can't take on the burial costs for estranged parents or grandparents, but sometimes we have people who are well off who just don't want to be bothered," she says.

"Sometimes we see someone who refused to claim their relative post a GoFundMe page to pay for funeral expenses," says Gay, "but they never come in to claim that person."

York County may file a lien if the person left an estate, and they can hold back the death certificate if relatives refuse to pick up a body of a family member, but that's as much leverage as they have, Gay says.

With each passing year in Lancaster County, the morgue shelves have become more loaded with urns. The shelf for 2017 is already full.

Diamantoni says the coroner's office eventually will hold a ceremony to honor the dead who have been unclaimed by their relatives.

He says they will try to make more of an effort than has been done in the past.

Maybe this time there will be a minister and the public may be invited.
Air Chief Marshal B S Dhanoa, the Chief of Air Staff, on Saturday said China maintains continuous air presence in Tibet but the airfields there lack the military infrastructure to carry out offensive operations.

Dhanoa also said India needs to concentrate and build infrastructure for operational efficiency in the northern and eastern sectors, even as the western border along Pakistan remains a challenge to internal security.

"China maintains continuous air presence in Tibet, they exercise their aircraft, the strength increases anddecreases as per the prevailing exercise," he said.

The Air chief's remarks come against the backdrop of the recent Doklam stand-off with China which ended after both the countries disengaged troops following a prolonged face-off.

He said available satellite images reveal that airfields in Tibet are notoptimised for offensive operations but more towards ensuring regional connectivity and lack military infrastructure.

"If you look atother airfields that are optimised for offensive operations, you will see that there is a difference in 'airfields in whichthey mean business' and the airfields in Tibet," he said.

Dhanoa was delivering the AirChief Marshal L M Katre memorial Lecture organised by the AirForce Association, Karnataka, in association with the HAL andthe Aeronautical Society of India.

Highlighting that the primary prerogative for India in the northern andeastern sectors is to concentrate andbuild up infrastructure, Dhanoa said, "This we have to do in order to increase our operational efficiency."



He said there is a"difference in perception" about the Line of Actual Control (LAC) along the northern borders, which sometimes results in stand-offs but gets resolved also.

Throughout the stand-offthat took place in Doklam there was no violation from either side, he said.

Dhanoa said only transport aircraft are allowed to fly up tothe LAC and added that there were no transgressions inthe air during the stand-off.

The Air Chief Marshal said during his last meeting with Chinese officials both sides shared the need to continue to "meeton the ground so as to stay away from each other in the air".

Speaking about the situation along the western border, without naming Pakistan, Dhanoa remarked: "In most countries the state has an army. There, the army has the state."



"It holds its exalted position in society to the propagation of a threat from us and if peace were to come they would lose all the privileges," he said.

Pointing to recent debates where people had questioned them (Pakistan) of their capability and performance in past confrontations with India, Dhanoa said, "So it isin their best interests to keep this threat alive and keep thepot boiling with the insurgency in Kashmir."



He said given the worldwide opinion right now, chances of a large-scale terror attack on a civilian infrastructure like 26/11 or Parliament attack was slightly remote as it would invite global condemnation.

"However, the military will continue to get targetedlike it happened during Pathankot, Uri and Nagrota. They will try and surprise us by attackingat a totally new location or by using a totally different methodof attack or time."



Suggesting that the biggest challenge is of internal security on a 24x7 basis, he said post Pathankot, IAF had carried out a series of measures to enhance the ability to detect and strengthen the base defencethrough training to neutralise 'Fidayeen' type attacks.

"I have alwaysmaintained that our training and preparedness has to be as peranadversaries' ability, the intentions can change, hence as aservice we are prepared for the conflict at a very shortnotice," he said.
Hundreds of parents on Sunday staged a protest outside the Ryan International School here for a CBI probe into the murder of a 7-year-old student, a demand which the Haryana government was inclined to accept as a government committee reported "security loopholes" in the school.

The state government directed the Gurgaon Police to book the owner of Ryan International School Albert Pinto under section 75 Juvenile Justice (care and punishment act) Act 15 for punishment for cruelty to child meted out by the custodian in the charge sheet to be submitted in the court within 7 days.

Education Minister Rambilas Sharma also said that the school has been ordered to remain closed tomorrow to "maintain peace and harmony" near it.

Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar asserted that there will be no leniency and the school management will be held accountable.

Ryan International School, meanwhile, issued a statement tonight, saying it is "cooperating to our fullest" with the police investigations and hoped that the guilty would be given the severest punishment as per the law.

Insisting that well being and safety of students is the school's priority, CEO of Ryan International Schools Group Ryan Pinto said, "We will not succumb to all the various false allegations being made nor will we fuel the various controversies being spread. We should not unjustly be blamed or branded as the perpetrators."



Earlier in the day, the angry parents protested outside the school premises and it turned violent, with a liquor shop, situated just 50 metres from the school, being set ablaze.

Some of the demonstrators threw liquor bottles inside school premises to vent their ire against the school management, police said.

The protestors alleged that school drivers and conductors often consume alcohol from the liquor shop in their free time.

The protestors were demanding that the school be shut until a CBI probe is ordered into the horrifying incident in which the Class 2 boy Praduman Thakur was found with his throat slit in a school washroom on Friday last.

The murder, in connection with which a bus conductor has been arrested, has triggered a major outrage.

Police used batons to dispers the protestors, injuring 50 people, including 9 journalists. They included PTI photojournalist Yogesh.

Cameras and vehicles of media persons were also damaged.

Khattar promised action against the erring police personnel, while describing as "unfortunate" the injuries inflicted upon the media persons.

"The Gurgaon Police had to use mild lathicharge to disperse the agitators. The police detained over 20 protestors found agitating outside the school," said Ravinder Kumar, PRO of Gurgaon Police.

Gurgaon Police Commissioner Sandeep Khirwar denied the charges of mediapersons being targeted by the cops.

"As per my knowledge, a fair warning was given to clear the place and nobody was targeted. However, if any mediaperson has been injured, then I express my regret and we will analyse the entire episode. But there was no intention to target anyone," Khirwar said.

"On behalf of police authorities, I want to request the district administration that the mediapersons should be given best medical treatment," he said.

Gurgaon Police has arrested school bus conductor Ashok Kumar in connection with the murder.

According to police, Kumar was inside the toilet, waiting for any student to come inside with the motive of alleged sexual assault. The deceased was the first student who entered the toilet, the police said.

Education minister Ram Bilas Sharma today said the charge sheet in the case will be ready within a week as he police were speedily conducting the probe.

He, however, added that if the parents of the child insist on a probe by the CBI or any other agency, the government will accede to their demand.

Sharma said the government has fixed a seven-day deadline in the case where the accused is booked under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code (for murder).

"We have directed the Gurgaon Police to book the owner of Ryan International School, Albert Pinto, under section 75 of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Punishment) Act, 2015, for cruelty to a child meted out by the custodian in the charge sheet to be submitted in the court within 7 days," he told reporters here.

"This is the minimum time in such cases," he said.

"However, if the child's parents still feel they are not satisfied, then as per their wish, we can get the case investigated by any agency including the CBI," he added.

The minister said the three-member fact-finding team set up by the government has found security loopholes inside school.

"Some loopholes in the security are visible in the case and the toilet window was also found broken from inside," he told PTI tonight.

The committee, which includes District Education Officer, will submit its detailed report tomorrow to Gurgaon Police and Deputy Commissioner Vinay Pratap Singh, Sharma said.

He said that from now on, it will be the duty and responsiblity of each and every school in Haryana to take and drop every students from school to home.

"I will give further direction in this regard to schools tomorrow," he said.

"There are many loopholes for which school management is held responsible for this negligence in connection with minor Pradhuman Thakur murder case in school premises," Sharma said.

He said committee found that there is no perfect school boundary wall of the school. "One can easily enter and go from the school. There are no separate toilets and washrooms for the staff of 40 bus drivers and conductors in the school. They use students' toilets," the minister said.

"The windows and grills of students toilet in which Pradhuman was killed was found broken. No frisking and security checking system was found in the school. No CCTV cameras were installed perfectly covering each and every corner inside school," Sharma added.

He said the liquor shop which was opened near the Ryan International School will be removed.

"All the liquor shops which comes under the radius of 400 meters under the schools in Haryana, will be shifted," the minister said.

He assured parents that the guilty would be brought to justice swiftly.

"Police will file a charge sheet in the fast-track court within a week. If parents of the murdered student are not satisfied with the police investigation, the state government will be ready to conduct a probe through any agency, including the CBI," Sharma said.

"We accept negligence on part of the Ryan International School but the school cannot be derecognised as the future of 1200 students is at stake," Sharma said.

Sharma also made it clear that the school management has to take responsibility for the safety and security of the children.

"We are issuing directives in this regard to all schools including private ones," he said.

"We held a meeting today in which the demand to derecognise the school came up, but we also had to take into account the fact that 1,200 students are studying there. The parents of the students studying in this school were against this step and, therefore, we felt taking such a step will not be right," he said.

"However, for any kind of lapse, by the management or the owner, we have initiated action," he said.

"The murder accused has already been arrested. Now, within a week, the police after collecting all necessary evidence will submit a charge sheet in court. However, still if the parents are not satisfied, then the Haryana government is ready to get the matter probed by any agency.

"We have full sympathy with the parents of the child. If there is any issue of providing financial help, the Haryana government will be willing to help," he said.
While the jury is still out on the effects of and Goods and Services Tax (GST) on the Indian economy, the two steps seem to have fostered awareness about the protection of trademark and intellectual property (IP) by businesses.
Excessive pressure by negotiating nations on securing future trade concessions provided by India in the domestic space may derail new Commerce Minister Suresh Prabhu's first trade engagement at the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) ministerial in Philipines.
India has renegotiated the pricing of liquefied natural gas (LNG) imported from Australia's Gorgon project to make the imported fuel affordable to price-sensitive domestic customers, oil minister Dharmendra Pradhan said on Saturday.

India has been trying to leverage its position as one of the biggest energy consumers to strike better bargains for its companies. In 2015 it renegotiated the LNG pricing formula with Qatar's Rasgas to buy the gas at half the original price.

"Indian customers will receive (Gorgon) LNG volumes at an amicable price soon. This is done in a similar way to what we did with LNG from Qatar," Pradhan said in a tweet.

India's top gas importer Petronet LNG signed a deal in 2009 with Exxon Mobil Corp to buy 1.5 million tonnes of LNG annually from Gorgon for 20 years. At that time Petronet agreed to buy LNG at a cost equivalent to 14.5 percent of the oil price and to pay for the shipping freight as well.

Supplies under the deal began from January 2017, with the landed price of gas costing about $11-$13 per million British thermal units (mmBtu), almost double that of Asian spot LNG prices.

The Gorgon gas prices are now linked to about 13-13.5 per cent of the global oil price on a delivered basis, two sources with knowledge of the negotiation said.

Renegotiation of the deal also shows how softening oil prices and a global supply glut are forcing LNG exporters to offer better deals to retain their share in global energy markets.

India wants to gradually move to a gas-based economy and aims to double the cleaner fuel's share in its energy mix to 15 percent in the next few years.

Petronet's managing director Prabhat Singh declined to comment and Pradhan did not specify changes in the pricing formula.

"Happy to share good that India has, yet again, been able to address the long-term price issue of LNG from Gorgon to suit Indian market," Pradhan said in a tweet.
Prime Minister Narendra Modis home state Gujaratis decking up to host Japanese PM Shinzo Abe. Ahmedabads potholed roads are getting a quick makeover while the states bureaucrats are having new visiting cards printed in Japanese.
The Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) of the Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER), MoS PMO, Personnel, Public Grievances & Pensions, Atomic Energy and Space, Dr Jitendra Singh has lauded the valuable contribution made by Space Application Center (SAC) Ahmedabad in providing original inputs for enriching the Indias Space Programme and also performing the role of value addition to several of the prestigious Space missions launched from ISRO, Sriharikota. .

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Currently on a two-day visit to Gujarat, Dr Jitendra Singh held a detailed review meeting with the scientists of Space Application Centre led by its Director, Dr Tapan Misra. .

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Dr Jitendra Singh made a special note of appreciation for some of the advanced technology developed at SAC, Ahmedabad with regard to origami lens, indigenously developed MMIC, Airborne low mass x-band Mini-SAR for strategic applications and disaster management, optical trans-receiver satellite mobile radio etc. .

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Referring to Ahmedabad Space Centre and other Space science programmes going on in the State of Gujarat, Dr Jitendra Singh said that the State was already ahead in terms of making maximum utilization of Space communication for education purposes. However, under the leadership of Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi, he said, the same applications have been effectively extended even to the peripheral areas of Northeast and hill States. In this regard, he mentioned recent MoU signed by the Department of Space, Government of India with the Department of Education, Government of Jammu & Kashmir. .

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Dr Jitendra Singh observed that India has already emerged as a world leader in the field of Space Technology. This has not only vindicated the noble initiative of the founding fathers like Dr Vikram Sarabhai and Dr Satish Dhawan, but has also set an example before other countries about how the Space Technology can be used effectively even for non Space Satellite Mission Programmes. .

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During the three years of the Union Government, Dr Jitendra Singh said, the Department of Space has entered into MoUs with a number of other Ministries. This has enabled the application of Space Technology in an effective manner for several important programmes of Government of India, including Smart City programmes, Geo-MNREGA, Tele-Education and Tele-Medicine. .

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Director SAC Ahmedabad Dr Tapan Misra along with his team of senior scientists/officials including Dr Piyush Verma, Dr D.K. Das, Shri Rajiv Jyoti, Shri Sarkar S., Shri Raj Kumar and others were present at the review meeting. .

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The Union Minister of State for AYUSH (Independent Charge), Shri Shripad Yesso Naik has said that the Government of India is doing everything possible to promote research in various departments of Homoeopathy and encourage new researchers to make India the leader in Research arena of Homoeopathy. Shri Naik was the Chief Guest at a three day International Homoeopathic Conference organized by Karnataka Qualified Homoeopathic Doctors Association (KQHDA) in Bengaluru from 8-10 September, 2017. An International Homoeopathic conference was organized for the first time in Bengaluru. .

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My Ministry lays highest importance to research in homoeopathy and have established Central Council for Research in Homeopathy, a pioneer research organization for carrying out high quality research in all aspects of Homoeopathy that includes clinical research, drug standardization and basic research. I am happy to share that this Council is also spreading its wings to collaborate with reputed international and national institutes for undertaking valuable researches in homoeopathy such as exploration of homoeopathy as most modern Nano-medicine; defining its role in emerging epidemics. We are inculcating research aptitude in students through specially designed schemes of scholarship in addition to capacity building of homoeopathic colleges", Shri Shripad Naik saif while addressing the participants yesterday. .

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The AYUSH Minister congratulated all the members of KQHDA for completing 25 years of their untiring and uninterrupted service to the Homoeopathic fraternity. .

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Dr. Praveen Kumar, Vice Chairman of the conference welcomed all the dignitaries and the delegates. Chairman of the conference Prof. Dr B D Patel expressed the need for all the diverse schools of Homoeopathy to work towards common goal, which is to serve humanity. Complimenting Prime Minister Narendra Modis statement of Sab Ka Saath Sab Ka Vikas, he gave a slogan Sab ka Swasthya, homoeopathy ke saath. .

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The conference was inaugurated by Shri K R Ramesh Kumar, Minister for Health and Family welfare, Government of Karnataka. The Minister said that the state government will be opening up AYUSH Clinics including homoeopathic centres in as many as 176 taluks. .

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Dr. Rajkumar Manchanda, Director General, Central Council of Research in Homoeopathy inaugurated the scientific session. .

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Many great contributors to the field of Homoeopathy were awarded in the conference. Dr. Rameshwar Rao aru was specially awarded in the category. .

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PM to address the students' convention, on the occasion of 125th anniversary of Swami Vivekanandas Chicago address and Pt. Deendayal Upadhyaya's centenary celebrations

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The Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi will address the students' convention on the theme of Young India, New India', on occasion of 125th anniversary of Swami Vivekanandas Chicago address and Pt. Deendayal Upadhyaya's centenary celebrations, on September 11, 2017. .

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In a series of tweets from his account, the Prime Minister said: .

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"Tomorrow I look forward to addressing a gathering of students on the theme of Young India, New India.' .

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The convention of students is being held on 11th September, the day Swami Vivekananda delivered his historic address at Chicago in 1893. .

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This year, we are marking 125th anniversary of Swami Vivekanandas Chicago address and Pt. Deendayal Upadhyaya centenary celebrations. .

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Swami Vivekananda strongly believed in the power of Yuva Shakti. He saw a vital place for youngsters in the realm of nation building. .

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Inspired by the ideals of Swami Vivekananda, we are working tirelessly towards realising the dreams and aspirations of our youth.".

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HARRISBURG  Pennsylvania House Speaker Mike Turzais plan to run for governor is gathering dust while hes embroiled in an increasingly ugly budget stalemate that shows no signs of ending.

The Allegheny County Republican told party members and leaders in May he was seriously considering running, but he has kept a low profile in recent weeks. He did not respond to requests for comment Friday through his office.

If he does not run, it would surprise few people: Turzai announced his candidacy for lieutenant governor in 2006, then dropped out. And in 2012, he told confidantes he would run for a U.S. House seat, but changed his mind.

Turzai suggested hed seek the Republican nomination to challenge Democratic Gov. Tom Wolfs bid for a second term in next years election. Labor Day, after a budget bill is settled, would be a more appropriate time to announce his candidacy, Turzai told reporters.

However, Labor Day has come and gone, and a fight over how to plug a $2.2 billion budget gap has unexpectedly dragged on more than two months past the July 1 start of the state governments fiscal year.

Turzais longtime campaign consultant, Mark Harris, had no comment about Turzais plans. Party officials, Republican activists and rival campaigns have heard little from Turzai, and are wondering what he will do.

Thats what a lot of people are waiting for, just to see what his decision is going to be, said David Dumeyer, the Lancaster County Republican chairman.

There is no sign that he is fundraising for a gubernatorial race, hiring staff or mounting a digital campaign, Republican campaign consultants say. The primary election is May 15, and the deadline to file petitions to get on the ballot is March 6, less than six months away.

Turzai, 58, joined the House in 2001 and became speaker in 2015.

Jim Roddey, a longtime friend and former chairman of the Allegheny County Republican Party, said Turzai still intended to run when he last talked to him about a month ago.

But, Roddey said, Turzai has been under a lot of pressure because of the budget stalemate, and he now suspects t Turzai is reconsidering running.

Roddey said the longer Turzai waits to formally announce his campaign the further he will drop behind other declared Republican candidates  York County state Sen. Scott Wagner and former health care systems consultant Paul Mango of suburban Pittsburgh.

Hes allowing the other candidates to get endorsements and backing, Roddey said. The longer you wait, the more difficult it is to overcome that.

Dave Majernik, the vice chairman of the Allegheny County Republican Party, said Turzai spoke to a Plum Borough GOP committee event in suburban Pittsburgh on Aug. 27.

Turzai was invited because he was viewed as a potential gubernatorial candidate, Majernik said.

Turzai spoke about the state budget situation, but did not say for certain whether he was running for governor, Majernik said.

My guess is that if he didnt intend to run, he probably would not have come, Majernik said.
PM wishes the women officers of Navika Sagar Parikrama the very best; urges people to share good wishes on the NM App .

The Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi, has conveyed his best wishes to the 6 women officers of the Navika Sagar Parikrama, who will begin their journey of circumnavigating the globe on board INSV Tarini, today. .

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The Prime Minister has also urged everyone to share their good wishes and words of encouragement for the team of Navika Sagar Parikrama, on the Narendra Modi App. .

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Today is a special day! 6 women officers of the Navy begin their journey of circumnavigating the globe on board INSV Tarini. .

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The entire nation comes together in wishing the all-women team of Navika Sagar Parikrama the very best in their remarkable endeavour. .

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Share your good wishes and words of encouragement for the team of Navika Sagar Parikrama, on the NM App", the Prime Minister said. .

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This is the first-ever Indian circumnavigation of the globe by an all-women crew. They will begin their voyage today from Goa, and expect to return to Goa in March 2018, after completing the circumnavigation. The expedition has been titled Navika Sagar Parikrama. The Parikrama will be covered in five legs, with stop-overs at 4 ports: Fremantle (Australia), Lyttleton (New Zealand), Port Stanley (Falklands), and Cape Town (South Africa). .

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As a flood of unregulated cash swirls through the Chinese economy, Beijing has been taking aim at the trust companies whose unrestrained lending practices are worrying regulators.

The trusts, at the heart of a vast shadow banking industry, are being pressured to step up compliance and background checks, and are being pushed towards greater transparency.

But the fast-growing 20 trillion yuan ($3 trillion) industry, whose lending operations are cloaked behind opaque structures, will be tough to rein in, according to employees at some trusts.

A regulatory sanction against one trust, Shanghai Trust, and a legal case against another, National Trust, offer rare insights into the industry and reveals just how hard it will be to police it.

Shanghai Trust was fined 200,000 yuan for selling a product that violated leverage rules, according to a regulator's notice in January. Regulators provided no further details about the case. Under these rules, property developers are only allowed to borrow up to three times their existing net assets.

According to two people with direct knowledge of the case, an unknown sum was loaned by China Construction Bank through Shanghai Trust to Cinda Asset Management Company. Cinda then invested the cash.

One of the sources said Cinda used the cash to acquire land, a sector rife with speculation that regulators have singled out as a "risky" destination for trust company loans. The source provided no further details.

Shanghai Trust, Cinda, CCB and the China Banking Regulatory Commission (CBRC) declined to comment for this story.

Steel Loans

The case against National Trust, which had revenue of 655 million yuan in 2016, involves wealth management products linked to the steel industry.

The trust was sued in June this year by eight investors who allege it misrepresented the risks involved in products it sold them and failed to adequately assess the guarantor's creditworthiness.

The trust skirted restrictions on loans to the steel industry by using the products to raise money to lend to a subsidiary of Bohai Steel Group, according to Tang Chunlin, a lawyer at Yingke Law Firm, who is representing the investors.

The plaintiffs invested different sums in the wealth management products, which National Trust promised would deliver an annual return of over 9 percent. National Trust lent the money collected to a Bohai subsidiary, Tianjin Iron and Steel Group Co, according to documents reviewed by Reuters.

Bohai Steel Group, which is undergoing a state-financed restructuring, has liabilities of around 192 billion yuan.

National Trust has now defaulted on the product, according to Tang and Gongyu Zhou, one of the eight investors, because Tianjin Iron and Steel is unable to pay back its loan.The products were also illegally sold via third-party non-financial institutions, Tang and Zhou said.

Zhou said he invested one million yuan in the product over two years from 2015 through 360caifu.com, an online finance platform.

Bohai Steel Group, Tianjin Iron and Steel and 360caifu.com did not respond to requests for comment. National Trust declined to comment.

Structural Concerns

One of the biggest challenges facing regulators is that many trusts employ a baffling array of structures, and funnel money through complex webs of beneficiaries, which makes untangling transactions extremely difficult.

Nine people working at trusts, including the two with knowledge of the Shanghai Trust case, said such complex structures were often deliberately used to sidestep lending restrictions on banks and borrowers.

"Really, only the project manager knows exactly how the money flows," said a senior employee at one trust firm. The source and others at the trust firms could not be named because they were not allowed to speak to the public.

Insurance Link

The practices of the trusts, and the speed at which the industry is growing, have made them a target for Beijing as it tries to keep a lid on risky lending, cool overheated markets and control corporate debt.

In April, Deng Zhiyi, head of the CBRC's trust department, warned of "severe risks" from funds flowing into the real estate, coal and steel sectors through trusts.

The industry is now roughly a tenth the size of China's commercial banking sector.

While the companies are overseen by the CBRC, they are not held to the same standards as banks. For example, they do not have to meet the same capital adequacy standards.

However, the regulator set out in detail in April certain structures that the trusts should not use, such as money-pooling schemes and structuring products to avoid restrictions on leverage.

That was "a signal for financial institutions that from a legal and enforcement perspective, we are entering a stricter period," said Armstrong Chen, financial compliance partner at King & Wood Mallesons.

Trust firms will also have to start registering the details of their products, identifying the ultimate borrower of funds, this year, said Chen, who is in regular contact with the regulators.

Chen said the requirement would improve transparency, but people at trust firms say it will still be difficult to detect the use of the under-the-table agreements typical of the industry.

The Shanghai Trust case also reflected the tougher line being taken by regulators. The fine would have been negligible for the state-owned company, one of the largest trusts with a total of 3.89 billion yuan in revenue at the end of 2016.

But according to three different sources with direct knowledge, Shanghai Trust was also barred from selling products to insurers for three years, a blow to a company that had made considerable sums selling products to the sector in recent years. One insurer invested as much as 10 billion yuan in just one of its property projects, according to one of the sources.

Compliance Efforts

Some of the trusts are already responding to the government pressure.

Anxin Trust is increasing the number of onsite visits by staff and has doubled its compliance team, said a person with direct knowledge of the company's activities. The trust is also looking at less risky deals - in healthcare, for example, rather than the more volatile property sector.

A spokesman for Anxin said managing risk was a priority for the trust.

China Industrial Trust is requiring staff to include photos of site visits to prevent them from faking trips.

Documents have to be signed by all participants face-to-face, said a person with direct knowledge of the company's operations. The company declined to comment.

Despite these changes, the government's job managing the trusts keeps growing. In the first half of this year, trust loans increased by 1.31 trillion yuan, which compared with 279.2 billion in the period last year, according to central bank figures.

That growth will be a challenge for the regulator, which is already facing staff shortages as it struggles to keep up with a broader official crackdown on financial risk.

The trusts see more boom times ahead.

"The demand for trust loans is increasing," an internal report at a large trust firm in May said. "In the past, state-owned-enterprises would not consider such loans, but are now considering them," said the report, adding that the trend started in March.

A source made the report available to Reuters on the condition the name of the company was not disclosed.
Saudi Arabian embassy in Washington may have funded a 'dry run' for the hijacking of the planes by two of Saudi employees used in the 9/11 attack, revealed the fresh evidence submitted in a major 9/11 lawsuit forwarded against the country.

This further reinforces the claim that employees and agents of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia directed and aided the 9/11 hijackers and plotters.

The amended complaint, filed on behalf of the families of some 1,400 victims who died in the terrorist attacks 16 years ago, has alleged that two years before the airliner attacks, the Saudi Embassy paid for two Saudi nationals, living undercover in the United States as students, to fly from Phoenix to Washington "in a dry run for the 9/11 attacks." the New York Post reported.

The lead attorney for the 9/11 plaintiffs, Sean Carter said, "We've long asserted that there were longstanding and close relationships between al Qaeda and the religious components of the Saudi government."

"This is further evidence of that," he added.

The lawyers for the plaintiffs said, the court filing has provided new details that shows "a pattern of both financial and operational support" for the 9/11 conspiracy from official Saudi sources.

Earlier, rejecting Trump's continuous attacks on Tehran, Iran's Foreign Minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif Khonsari said that the U.S. President should rather discussed how to prevent Saudi Arabia from carrying out another . Trump, in his address at the Riyadh Summit, repeatedly slammed Iran claiming that it funds arms, trains militias that spread destruction and chaos and pointed to Iran's support for Syria's Bashar al-Assad as he committed "unspeakable crimes."

The Iranian Foreign Minister emphasised that Trump himself had earlier suggested that Saudi Arabia was behind the 9/11 attacks. Majority of the 9/11 terrorists were Saudi citizens and speculations have suggested that members of the Saudi hierarchy were involved in the attack.

Reportedly, Gulf countries were used to receive funds from banks in Pakistan and UAE, owned by the UAE royal family, to allegedly finance terror strikes in the U.S. in 2001 and Mumbai in 2008.

The September 11 attacks (also referred to as 9/11) were a series of four coordinated terrorist attacks by the Islamic terrorist group al-Qaeda on the U.S. on the morning of Tuesday, September 11, 2001.

The attacks killed 2,997 people, injured over 6,000 others, and caused at least $10 billion in infrastructure and property damage.
Irma, which killed at least 24 people in the Caribbean, was likely to cause billions of dollars in damage to the third-most-populous US state | Photo: PTI
marked its governments 69th anniversary not with another missile test, as many had feared, but with a gala party for the scientists involved in carrying out the countrys most powerful nuclear test yet last week, the state-run news media reported on Sunday.
United States President Donald Trump's Cabinet met on Saturday at Camp David to discuss their preparations for Hurricane Irma, as the category-three storm is sweeping toward Florida.

Trump expressed his condolences for the victims of Irma and Harvey, which struck Texas and Louisiana earlier this month, the Hill reported.

According to reports, Irma has already killed at least 20 people in the Caribbean region.

"All of America continues, I must say, to pray for the families affected by Hurricane Harvey, Hurricane Irma, which looks like it's going to be a really bad one, but we're prepared. We're as prepared as you can be for such an event, that I can say," Trump said.

"All of America grieves for those who have already lost their lives," he added.

"The U.S. Coast Guard, FEMA and all Federal and State brave people are ready. Here comes Irma. God bless everyone!" Trump tweeted.

Saturday evening, Irma was 100 miles southeast of Key West, with sustained winds of 125 mph. It was moving towards the west, and is expected to turn north and head up the western coast of Florida, making landfall on Sunday.

States of emergency was declared in Florida, Georgia, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico to prepare for Irma's landfall.

The storm is currently at category 3 strength, but weather experts have warned that it could strengthen before making landfall on the mainland.

As many as 5.6 million people have been evacuated after Irma's landfall in Cuba.

"The storm is here," Governor Rick Scott said at news conference on Saturday, noting that 25,000 people had already lost power.

He said the storm surge could reach 12 feet. "This will cover your house. You will not survive this storm surge."

Earlier, Trump's homeland security adviser Tom Bossert said that he had spoken to Pentagon and State Department officials and insisted they were prepared to tackle Irma response efforts quickly.
The Haryana Government on Sunday informed that 99 percent of the search operation at Dera Sacha Sauda Headquarters in Sirsa has been completed.

Speaking to ANI, Information and Public Relations Department of Haryana Government Deputy Director Satish Mehra informed that 99 percent of sanitisation exercise has been completed.

"After the notice from the Haryana and Punjab Government, the Dera search operation is about to get over. The search was done peacefully in the Dera. The operation is 99 percent completed and but the court commissioner will visits all the sectors and will see if any investigation is left or not. He can visits anytime with deputy commissioner, IG and other officials. Every sector will be investigated according to their instructions," he said.

The search operation inside the Dera Sacha Sauda premises in Sirsa entered its third day on Sunday amidst heavy security deployed around the headquarters.

Yesterday, a skin bank running inside Dera Sacha Sauda headquarters without license was sealed.

Earlier yesterday, the search operations revealed the existence of an illegal explosives factory and firecrackers, which were promptly sealed.

On Friday, a computer, hard disks and cash were recovered.

Earlier on September 5, the Punjab and Haryana High Court gave orders to conduct a search operation in the Dera Sacha Sauda headquarter, under the supervision of a judicial officer.

This order came after the Haryana Police seized 33 licensed weapons from Dera Sacha Sauda. These weapons included 14 revolvers, nine guns, four rifles and other modified weapons.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Hailing the 'Startup India' initiative Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Sunday said that under the campaign it was made compulsory for the banks to lend money to women and people of Scheduled Tribe at lesser interest.

"Under Startup India, it was made mandatory for banks to lend money to women and people of Scheduled Tribe at lesser interest," Adityanath said here while addressing a gathering.

Startup India campaign is based on an action plan aimed at promoting bank financing for start-up ventures to boost entrepreneurship and encourage start ups with jobs creation.

The campaign was first announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his August 15 address from the Red Fort in 2015.

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Afghanistan's acting foreign minister Salahuddin Rabbani will hold talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj in New Delhi on Monday.

Rabbani is expected to renew Afghanistan's demand for greater Indian involvement in the war-ravaged nation including the 'wish-list' of defence equipment it has sought from India. Both India and Afghanistan are also expected to consider how they can jointly combat terrorism unleashed by Pakistan-based terror groups in both India and Afghanistan, Tolo News reported.

The Afghan leader will today arrive in Delhi for delegation-level talks of the "India Afghanistan Strategic Partnership Council" during which the two sides are likely to review the entire gamut of relations, including the Indian humanitarian assistance to the embattled nation.

This will be the first high-level visit to India from Afghanistan after U.S. President Donald Trump unveiled his Afghan strategy last month and appealed to India to assume a greater role in the country.

President Trump has appealed to India to play a larger role in providing economic and development assistance to the war-torn Afghanistan. President Trump described India as "a key security and economic partner of the United States," and said America would further "develop its strategic partnership with India - the world's largest democracy.

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Reacting strongly to the Amritsar Improvement Trust land scam in which the government's money was allegedly siphoned, Punjab Local Bodies Minister Navjot Singh Sidhu has demanded a third party audit in Punjab.

Speaking to ANI, Sidhu said, "We must learn lesson from this scam and regular checking of accounts and third party audit of all departments is a must."

Hitting indirectly at the opposition, Sidhu said that if third party audit of entire Punjab takes place, many skeletons will fall from the closet.

"A volcano is waiting to erupt and I am waiting to punish all those who backstabbed Punjab," he added.

Sidhu further said, "We are trying to turn the weakness of previous government into our strength. We are doing a damage control as many irregularities were done by the previous government and Punjab was left reeling under heavy debt."

About the scam, Sidhu told that FIR has been registered against 7 persons in which certain employees of the Improvement Trust embezzled Rs. 80 crores by opening various bank accounts.

Talking about the upcoming Municipal Elections in Punjab, the Minister said that the Congress party will contest the polls on development agenda and it is all likelihood that the elections take place in December.

Earlier last month, Leader of Opposition in Punjab Assembly, Sukhpal Khaira, urged Chief Minister Amarinder Singh to either quit or handover investigations of corruption cases involving Amritsar and Ludhiana improvement trusts to the CBI for trial outside the state. (ANI)

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World No. 1 Rafael Nadal will aim for his 16th Grand Slam title when he will clash with South African Kevin Anderson later tonight in the US Open final.

While 28th seed Anderson will be playing his maiden Grand Slam final, Nadal will be looking to bag his 16th major title in his 23rd summit clash appearance. Both players have met four times in the past, with the Spaniard winning all of those matches.

As Nadal vies for his third title at the Flushing Meadows, having previously lifted the trophy with victories over Novak Djokovic in both 2010 and 2013, he admits that it is his consistent play over the entire season that has enabled him to return to this elite level.

"I tell you, for me what is more important, more than winning Slams, is to be happy," said Nadal.

The 15-time Grand Slam champion has had a spectacular year, so far. He had reached the Australian Open final before winning the French Open, his first Grand Slam in three years. The Spaniard had regained the number one ranking last month.

"I am happy if I am healthy and if I feel competitive in most of the weeks that I am playing. That's what has happened this year. So I am very happy about what happened, very happy to win Monte-Carlo, Barcelona, Madrid and Roland Garros. I am very happy to be in the final here in the US Open," he said.

"Of course winning or losing this final is a big change, but I am very happy about all the things that happened to me and I am going to fight to win another title here. Still it is a great season for me. If I win, I will be more happy but it is about being healthy and feeling well and competitive. That's already happened in the whole season. So that's the most important thing for me," he added.

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Andhra Pradesh IT Minister Nara Lokesh on Sunday participated in the IIA International Innovation Fair 2017 held in Visakha.

Inaugurated the International Innovation Fair 2017. Interacted with delegates and encouraged them to invest in Andhra Pradesh. pic.twitter.com/XTs1z4nL7M Lokesh Nara (@naralokesh) September 9, 2017

Speaking at the event, Lokesh said that the change in the industrial system is rapid and added that Andhra Pradesh is always open to innovations.

He stressed on Andhra Pradesh's fast paced growth rate. He also said that the state aims to encourage development.

He added that the 4th Industrial Revolution, which is being witnessed today, is based on Internet of Things (IOT).

Citing an example of making disposable shaving brush using Banana fibre, the Minister said that the innovation in making products caters to the global interest.

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Welcoming the list of "fake babas" by the Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad, Swami Hardayal Shastri, the astrologer in Shanidhaam temple of Ayodhya, on Monday called for a social boycott of those listed.

The monk informed that a 'Parishad' had been made for the convenience of the administration and it serves as a medium through which the government provides land and other amenities to the country's ascetics.

These councils are, however, exploited by people like and Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, he further informed.

"They are not connected with these 'akharas', but through money, they exploit these akharas' to acquire lands and set up camps. This is wrong," Swami Hardayal told ANI. ALSO READ: 2 secret tunnels, skin bank, illegal firecracker factory found at Dera HQ

Besides the legal action taken on such fake saints as Ram Rahim and Asaram Bapu, the monk also called for their social boycott.

"We have the rule of social punishment in Hinduism, but no one has control over society now, and no one is in the control of society either. Hence, after legal boycott they should also be socially boycotted," opined Swami Hardayal.

On Sunday, the Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad, in its committee, issued a list of "fake babas" where the names of Asaram Bapu, Radhe Maa, recently convicted Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh and Nirmal Baba were mentioned.

The list was curated after the whole Sadhu community came together to talk about the issue of fake saints bringing disrepute to the community.khil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad, on Sunday in its committee, issued a list of "fake babas" where the names of Asaram Bapu, Radhe Maa, recently convicted Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh and Nirmal Baba have been mentioned.

In a list of 14, the Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad has asked the government to amend new laws against the "fake gurus".

President of the Parishad Narendra Giri said a total of 14 offers were presented where all the sadhus came together to talk about this issue.

"The committee was held on the topic of Arth Kumbh Mela. There are many fake babas in the society and we are upset because most of these so called babas are being defamed. They are not baba and after thinking on this, we have listed a few who should not be called one," he said addressing the media.

Following are the names in the "fake baba list":

 Asaram Bapu

 Sukhvinder Kaur aka Radhe Maa

 Sachdarangi

 Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh

 Om Baba aka Vivekanand

 Nirmal Baba

 Ichachadhari Vishwanand

 Swami Asmianand

 Om Namah Shivaay

 Narayan Sai Rampal

"I request the government to investigate on these hypocrite babas and put them in jail and we beware everyone to be safe from these babas. Their assets must also be probed," Giri said.

ALSO READ: Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh convicted: Details of the 14-yr-old rape case This has come after Dera Sacha Sauda chief, Gurmeet Ram Rahim was convicted in two rapes cases of 2002, in which he has been sentenced a cumulative jail term of 20 years.

Earlier, was arrested by the Jodhpur Police in an alleged rape case, on August 3, 2013, and since then, he has been in prison.

Asaram's son Narayan Sai, who is on the list as well, was arrested for allegedly raping a Surat-based woman disciple of his father between 2002 and 2005.
Union Minister Ramdas Athawale on Sunday condemned the attack on the media fraternity in Gurugram, and urged that laws be made for the protection of journalists in the country.

"Media protection is necessary. Journalists are very important to democracy, and thus, laws need to be made for their protection. They are risking their lives and working, and it is our responsibility to make sure that they are free from any pressure. Centre and states must be proactive in this regard," Athawale told ANI.

Extending complete support to the media, Athawale suggested that a commission be set up exclusively to look into the hardships faced by journalists.

"The attack on the media was also reported in Sirsa and Panchkula last month. I will speak to Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar about this. I would also like to appeal to all states to create laws to protect journalists. Additionally, the Centre must also look into the formation of a commission in this regard," he stated.

The media were on Sunday lathi-charged by the Haryana Police during the coverage of a protest being carried outside Ryan International School, where a seven-year-old child was murdered inside the school premises on Friday.

ANI personnel Naveen Yadav and Vinod Kumar sustained injuries during the baton charge conducted by the police on the protestors.

Angry parents and locals gathered outside the school premises since early morning to express dissatisfaction over the investigation being carried out by the Gurgaon Police.

The media was also attacked earlier in August following the conviction of Dera Sacha Sauda Chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) president Lalu Prasad Yadav on Sunday condemned attack on media persons outside Ryan International School by the Haryana police.

"These Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) people will soon start attacking all the media persons," said Yadav.

The media were on Sunday lathi-charged by the Haryana Police during the coverage of a protest being carried outside Ryan International School where angry parents and locals gathered outside the school premises since early morning to express dissatisfaction over the investigation being carried out by the Gurgaon Police.

ANI personnel Naveen Yadav and Vinod Kumar sustained injuries during the baton charge being conducted by the police on the protestors.

Seven-year-old Pradyuman, a student of Class II in Ryan, was killed by the school bus conductor, who was arrested on Friday.

Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) Simardeep Singh said the accused tried to sexual assault the boy but killed when he tried to resist.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The official sources in Pakistan have said that samples from the two bodies, found in a mountainous area of Mastung district on Thursday night, have been sent to Islamabad for a DNA test to ascertain identity of the deceased as it might be of the Chinese couple who were kidnapped in Quetta's Jinnah Town on May 24.

The bodies were beyond recognition when they were shifted to the civil hospital in Mastung, from where they were sent to the Combined Military Hospital in Quetta, the Dawn reported.

A security official said, "The bodies that have been found in Mastung were in very bad condition, they were just skeletons."

"Shoes worn by the two were also found on the bodies," the official added.

According to the sources, Chinese officials have been approached to get samples from relatives of the couple for the DNA test.

Earlier, Pakistan's Interior Ministry said that evidence regarding the murder had revealed that the couple were offered security cover, but they refused to accept it.

Security and intelligence agencies have looked into the background of the incident and reviewed the photographs of the kidnapped pair to reach their assessment.

Lee Zing Yang, 24, and Meng Li Si, 26, were abducted by armed men pretending to be policemen. The Islamic State had claimed that it had executed them.

It had also emerged during the investigation that the two Chinese nationals had been taken into police custody from Quetta's Kharotabad area some time ago and were informed about threat to their security.

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Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Sunday said that the Centre aims to provide Rs. 1 crore to the next kin of deceased Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) brave hearts who lost their lives on duty.

"It is my aim to provide at least Rs. 1 crore to the families of our martyrs from the CAPFs. We have also launched the "Bharat ke Veer" portal to support the families of our martyrs and the nation as a whole has given tremendous support to their cause," Singh said while addressing a Sainik Sammelan at the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) 90 Battalion Camp in Anantnag.

He also assured that the Centre is ready to extend more facilities to the CRPF personnel, and that the Centre will consider providing helicopter services in Jammu and Kashmir.

Singh also met with Conference delegation headed by Jammu and Kashmir's former chief minister Omar Abdullah in Srinagar on Sunday.

Singh, who is on a four-day visit to state earlier reiterated that he is willing to have discussion with anyone with an open heart to bring peace to the Valley.

He also appealed to the people to come forward to have a discussion if they have any complaints or qualms.

Delivering Prime Minister Narendra Modi's message to the security personnel, Home Minister Singh said, "I have Prime Minister Narendra Modi's message for you; he appreciated and acknowledged bravery and valour shown by you.

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Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Raman Singh on Sunday assured that the farmers will get relief and insurance amount in addition to bonus this year as special package for farmers by the government.

"We have told the farmers that they will get relief and insurance amount in addition to bonus this year as special package for farmers by the government," the Chief Minister said while addressing a gathering.

On August 31, Singh had announced that last year's bonus will be disbursed to farmers prior to Diwali in wake of drought like situation in the state.

He said the decision has been taken on the direction of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

He said a total amount of Rs. 21,000 crore would be disbursed as bonus to the farmers.

He further said that he had discussed with the Chief Secretary, Principal Secretary and Finance Secretary about the bonus disbursal.

Singh also thanked Prime Minister Modi and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Amit Shah for acknowledging farmers issues under these difficult circumstances.

BJP in-charge Anil Jain, saffron party state president Dharampal Kaushik, General Secretary Saroj Pandey was also present in the conference.

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In the wake of the alleged rape of a five-year-old girl in Delhi's Tagore Public School, the Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) has issued a notice to the school, demanding a reply within 72 hours along with the available CCTV footage.

Speaking to ANI, DCW chief Swati Maliwal, while condemning the aforementioned incident as well as the death of a seven-year old student of Gurugram's Ryan International School, said death penalty must be immediately issued to the perpetrators, as this would instill a sense of fear in them.

"It is a shame to see such incidents repeatedly. We demand that enquiry be completed at the earliest possible and death penalty be awarded to the perpetrators, so that they will understand that such cases cannot be excused. We have issued a notice to the Delhi school, to which we expect a reply within 72 hours. If any CCTV cameras are installed, a copy of the footage must also be provided .We want to know how the man had access to the girl in the first place," said Swati.

Deeming the incident to be a 'major setback' to the Centre's 'Beti Bachao Beti Padhao', Maliwal said the school needs to retrospect into the matter and state why no protocols were made in the first place, adding that it is time for the Centre to intervene in the matter.

Condemning the death of seven-year old Pradhyuman Thakur of Ryan International School, Maliwal opined that strict action needs to be taken against the management, as this is the second time such an incident is being reported.

"The Centre must intervene and make the necessary protocol. Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has also ordered magisterial inquiry. The protocol instated must be followed without fail, and any school violating the same must be penalized. How can we have Beti Bachao Beti Padhao when schools itself are not safe for these children? Parents now fear sending their children to school, as they are not sure of their children's safety," she added.

The last two days has borne witness to severe atrocities against innocent lives, as two young children fell prey to sexual predators, in two separate incidents.

Seven-year-old Pradyuman, a student of Class II in Ryan International School, was killed by the school bus conductor on Friday.

On the other hand, a five-year-old girl was allegedly raped inside the premises of Tagore Public School in Gandhi Nagar, Delhi, on Sunday.

Following this, the DCW issued a notice to the school, stating that it has taken suo-moto cognizance of a news article dated September 10 regarding the rape of a five year old girl in a school in Gandhi Nagar, East Delhi, and has instituted an enquiry into the matter.

The DCW has sought clarity on the following:

-Whether the accused person was an employee of the school. If yes, please inform the role assigned to him? When was he appointed in the school? Please provide all details of his appointment;

-Whether the school had done police verification this man? If yes, please provide relevant documents;

-Where did the incident take place? How did the accused person get the access to the girl at the place of incident?

-Whether the school was aware of the incident. If yes, inform the steps taken by the school against the accused person, whether police was informed by the school;

-Whether the complaints of abuse against the accused had been received in the past. If yes please provide copies of complaints as well as reasons for non-persecution of the accused till date.

-Detailed report of the incident including the sequence of events.

-Whether the school has planned to conduct counseling sessions of other students to interrogate the occurrence of similar offence with other children;

-List of male staff/contract workers (teaching and non-teaching) in the school along with their designation/roles, who have access to girl students;

-Steps taken by the school to ensure safety of the children in the school;

-Copy of entire CCTV footage of the day of the incident from the school;

The DCW has demanded a reply from the school 'not later than September 13, 2017 at 3 PM in a sealed cover', the notice stated.

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In yet another shocking incident, a five-year-old girl was allegedly raped inside the premises of Tagore Public School in Gandhi Nagar.

While the girl is said to be in a critical condition, the accused, who was absconding after the incident, has been arrested.

Speaking to ANI, the victim's father said, "The girl returned home in a very critical condition and told her mother about the horrific incident. The mother of the girl then informed me and we rushed her to the hospital. After the doctors observing her, they informed me to call the police and to file an FIR in this matter. I'm glad that the police have arrested the accused and would want strict action against him. The school has not yet taken any action on this matter."

The police has registered a case against under Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO Act) and is investigating the matter.
The St. Francois County Sheriffs Department will be receiving a new K-9 for their department in coming weeks, all thanks to an anonymous donor.

Board of Directors of St. Francois County Joint Communications Chairman Ron Bockenkamp presented a check to St. Francois County Sheriff Dan Bullock on behalf of the donor who wished to remain nameless.

I am presenting a check to the sheriff in the amount of $50,000, to be used to purchase and equip a K-9 for the sheriffs department, said Bockenkamp. This initial check will cover some of the initial upfront costs.

Bockenkamp explained the sheriffs department has already ordered a new car and it will be specially equipped for the police dog. It will also cover the cost of the construction of a kennel at the home of the officer.

The sheriff has already selected the officer who will be the K-9 handler and the dog is already in the country completing some training.

I have talked to the trainer who trains the dogs for the Secret Service and the FBI and he says this is the best dog he has ever seen, said Bockenkamp. The future cost for training of the dog, the cost of the dog and any other items ... there will be a second installment of money available to the sheriffs department.

Bullock said the donor has offered to cover everything for the dog, including food, vet costs and more.

We are very excited about getting our new K-9 program started and I am proud of Nathan Glore for stepping up to the plate to be a K-9 handler. I know its something he has wanted for a long time, but we hadnt been able to afford it. This is going to afford us that opportunity, otherwise we wouldnt have been able to afford this.

Bullock added it could have been several years before they could have raised enough money to get a K-9 for the department. He said they have had K-9s in the past and the dogs have done good work.

Its time to start a new program and this is going to be wonderful for us, said Bullock. Its a plus for law enforcement and the citizens of St. Francois County. Its been close to two years since the sheriffs department has had a K-9 on the force and we are looking forward to it.

Currently Desloge is the only police department in the county with a K-9. The Farmington Police Department is working to get two in the near future.

This will be good for law enforcement in general across the county, said Bullock. As always we certainly will work with the cities, state and other law enforcement in neighboring counties. We are really proud to have this opportunity and we certainly appreciate our donor who is making this possible.

Glore is excited to have the opportunity to be a K-9 officer. He said this is the reason he got into law enforcement.

I have been an officer with the sheriffs department for nearly 10 years and I am just ecstatic, said Glore. One day we were looking into doing fundraising to raise the money ourselves and the next day we were basically told not to worry about it, we have someone who is going to take care of everything and we dont have anything to worry about.

Glore said since that day everything has progressed so quickly that it is almost unbelievable. He added on the day they talked to donor, they ordered the dog.

We got on a website and picked the dog after watching videos, said Glore. They sent a money order for the dog the next day and he was on his way. There are not enough words to thank the sheriff for putting this together.

Glore stressed that this is a career goal for him and a lifelong dream. He has always wanted to be a K-9 handler and now that dream is quickly becoming reality.

I cant wait for him to get here, said Glore. His name is Teo (Tay-Oh) and he will be up there for training for a couple of weeks. I will then pick him up and we will start our training together. There are certifications you have to pass and he is going to be a dual purpose K-9.

Teo will be certified in narcotics, tracking and suspect apprehension, and evidentiary searches. Glore also has to learn a new language because Teo is trained in Czech and its easier to teach him a new language, than teach the dog a whole new language.

Hes from Czechoslovakia and has been speaking Czech all his life, so Ill have to learn a new language, said Glore. There are some things I have to go through, like being able to communicate with the dog and not only to talk to him, but read his body language and understand him.

Glore said once Teo completes his training in St. Charles he will know what he is supposed to do.

Its me they have to retrain. They will train me to know what my dog means when he is doing things, said Glore. There is an association, the National Association for Police Working Dogs, and once we are done with training, a judge will come out. You have to prove you can handle the dog and your dog is competent in what he knows how to do.

Glore said they will give him a certificate and each year after that he will have to recertify.

The sheriff's department has already received their new K-9 car and they are waiting on the equipment they ordered to outfit it for Teo.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Sunday slammed the opposition parties for politicizing the murder of seven year old Gurugram student.

BJP leader Nalin Kohli termed the brouhaha created by politicians around the murder case as unfortunate.

"Certain political leaders are politicizing the matter. These people have a lot to answer about the accusations against them. It's unfortunate that such people are trying to do politics over the death of a child," Kohli told ANI.

Kohli further condemned the murder and said that the state government is trying its best to solve the matter.

"It's an extremely unfortunate incident that a child was murdered in such a manner. The state government has immediately swung into action. The police are constantly working on the case. Justice will be served," Kolhi said.

Seven-year-old Pradyuman, a student of Class II, was killed by the school bus conductor, who was arrested on Friday.

Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) Simardeep Singh said the accused tried to sexual assault the boy but killed when he tried to resist.

Angry parents and locals gathered outside the school premises today morning to express dissatisfaction over the investigation being carried out by the Gurgaon Police.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Haryana Education Minister Ram Bilas Sharma on Sunday assured strict action against management and owner of the Ryan International School authorities, where a seven-year-old was brutally murdered.

Addressing the media, Sharma blamed the school management and said that the state government will show no leniency to those behind the murder.

"Action has been taken against the management and owner of Ryan International School. Under Section 75 Juvenile Act, action will be taken against school management. The accused will be presented before court within a week," he added.

He further said the government was open to a CBI probe in the heinous crime.

"If parents are dissatisfied with the police investigation, then Haryana government will order CBI probe," he added.

The Haryana Education Minister also informed that the future of 1200 students cannot be put at stake so the government will not de-recognise Ryan International School.

He said that the government has decided to shut down the liquor shop outside the school.

Meanwhile, the Haryana Police lathicharged protesters outside the school in which ANI crew was injured during the coverage of the protest.

Angry parents and locals gathered outside the school premises since early morning to express dissatisfaction over the investigation being carried out by the Gurgaon Police.

Seven-year-old Pradyuman, a student of Class II, was killed by the school bus conductor, who was arrested on Friday.

Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) Simardeep Singh said the accused tried to sexual assault the boy but killed when he tried to resist.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The Congress on Sunday dubbed the Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar government as arrogant.

Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala questioned the attack on media personnel and other protestors and said that the Khattar government must realise that the state police has failed.

"What were they doing? They were just protesting demanding actions against the gruesome murder of a 7-year-old child. What has turned Khattar government so arrogant that they have rejected summarily the demand of a CBI probe? Don't they realize that police machinery and political executive in Haryana have utterly failed?" said Surjewala.

"These incidents are happening under the nose of the Chief Minister and how can the killers go scot free?" he added.

Communist Party of India (CPI) echoed similar sentiments and condemned the attack on media professionals.

"When media has been covering the tragic death of a child, Haryana police should have maintained restrain instead of that they unleashed an attack on media persons," CPI leader D. Raja said.

The media were earlier in the day lathi-charged by the Haryana Police during the coverage of a protest being carried outside Ryan International School where angry parents and locals gathered outside the school premises since early morning to express dissatisfaction over the investigation being carried out by the Gurgaon Police.

ANI personnel Naveen Yadav and Vinod Kumar sustained injuries at a time baton charge was being conducted by the police.

Seven-year-old Pradyuman, a student of Class II in Ryan International School, Gurugram, was killed by the school bus conductor, who was arrested on Friday.

Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) Simardeep Singh said the accused tried to sexual assault the boy but killed when he tried to resist.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Category-4 Hurricane Irma has begun its assault on Florida, the south-easternmost U.S. state, with the storm's northern eyewall reaching the lower Florida Keys on Sunday after making landfall in Cuba.

More than 560,000 residents across 19 counties in south and central Florida are without power, according to Florida Power and Light Department.

Irma lashed the area with forceful winds near 130 miles per hour and the U.S. National Hurricane Centre said it was expected to remain a powerful storm as it moved through the Florida Keys and near the state's west coast, CNN reported.

Irma, which killed at least 22 people in the Caribbean, was considered a life-threatening danger in Florida as well, and could inflict a natural disaster causing billions of dollars in damage to the third-most-populous US state.

Rescue teams from the City of Miami Beach are unable to respond to requests due to extreme sustained winds. More than 72,000 people have moved into more than 390 shelters across the state, Florida Governor Rick Scott said.

The major concern is the storm surge, which can cause devastating flooding and could reach as high as 15 feet in some areas, officials warned.

"You can't survive these storm surges," Scott said.

Keeping an eye on Irma, South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster has issued a mandatory evacuation for some barrier islands, while Georgia Governor Nathan Deal expanded a state of emergency to include 94 counties.

As many as 5.6 million people were evacuated from Florida on Friday to deal with the life-threatening Hurricane Irma.

"The storm is here," Governor Rick Scott said at news conference on Saturday, noting that 25,000 people had already lost power.

He said the storm surge could reach 12 feet. "This will cover your house," he said. "You will not survive all this storm surge."

Hurricane Irma has left a trail of destruction and deaths across the Caribbean and prompted large scale evacuations in American history.

Forecasters said Irma, a hurricane of remarkable size and power that already has battered islands across the Caribbean, would approach South Florida by Sunday morning and is likely to slam into its southern tip before tracking north across a heavily populated area.

The National Weather Service say that damaging winds are moving into areas including Key Biscayne, Coral Gables and South Miami.

Gusts of up to 56 mph (90 kph) were reported on Virginia Key off Miami as the storm's outer bands arrived. The Hurricane is currently moving along the coast of Cuba about 215 miles away from Miami, as it makes its way towards the U.S. peninsula.

Ships, military personnel and equipment have been deployed to respond to Hurricane Irma. So far, the Pentagon has sent six ships, an aircraft carrier, numerous aircraft and thousands of gallons of fuel to the region, as well as activated thousands of National Guard troops in Florida and Puerto Rico.

The Category 4 storm, one of the strongest hurricanes ever reported in the Atlantic, made its first landfall on the island of Barbuda as a Category 5 hurricane on Wednesday and has now lashed Florida on Sunday morning.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) activated the Florida National Guard on Tuesday in anticipation of the hurricane. About 4,000 troops were activated on Friday, and Scott said he expected the entire force of more than 8,000 would eventually be called into duty.

Puerto Rico, meanwhile, activated its 5,200 National Guard troops, while the U.S. Virgin Islands activated its nearly 700-member unit for assistance , according to the Pentagon.

United States President Donald Trump's homeland security adviser Tom Bossert said Friday he had spoken to Pentagon and State Department officials and insisted they were prepared to tackle Irma response efforts quickly.

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An Iranian missile boat sent a warning signal to a U.S. Navy ship that closed on a fishing boat in the Persian Gulf.

According to a press statement by the Iranian Navy, Iranian fishing boat Shams was travelling 45 nautical miles off the Jask port in the Hormozgan province testing its engine, when it started to sink. Upon receiving a distress signal from Shams, Iranian Navy missile boat Falahen set off to rescue the sinking boat.

"It is reported that a U.S. Navy ship with the vessel number 02 approached the mentioned [fishing boat] when the missile boat 'Falahen' sent a warning signal and forced the ship to leave the area," Sputnik International quoted the statement, as saying.

The crew of the boat in distress was rescued.

The cause of the incident is still unidentified.

The incident is one of many times when US' and Iranian maritime forces have come dangerously near conflict and likely will not be the last.

In a similar incident in August, Pentagon officials had said that the Iranian speedboats had "harassed" US warships in the Strait of Hormuz.

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Former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda on Sunday termed the attack on media as an attempt by the state Former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda-led government to hide its failures.

Hooda said that media is a crucial pillar of democracy and that it shouldn't be suppressed.

"Media has its own role in democracy, shouldn't be suppressed. The attack is an attempt of the government to hide its failure," Hooda told ANI.

"Media is one of the pillars of democracy and raises concerns of the people, it should not be suppressed. Attack on media is condemnable. In a democracy, the government doesn't work with lathis and bullets," he added.

The media were on Sunday lathi-charged by the Haryana Police during the coverage of a protest being carried outside Ryan International School, where a seven-year-old child was murdered inside the school premises.

ANI personnel Naveen Yadav and Vinod Kumar sustained injuries during the baton charge being conducted by the police on the protestors.

Angry parents and locals gathered outside the school premises since early morning to express dissatisfaction over the investigation being carried out by the Gurgaon Police.

Seven-year-old Pradyuman, a student of Class II, was killed by the school bus conductor, who was arrested on Friday.

Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) Simardeep Singh said the accused tried to sexual assault the boy but killed when he tried to resist.

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The United Left (AISA - SFI - DSF) has swept the Jawaharlal Nehru University Student Union (JNUSU) Elections 2017 - 18 by winning all four central panel seats and 13 Councillor posts across School of Social Sciences (SSS), School of International Studies (SIS) and School of Languages and Culture Studies (SLL&CS).

United Left candidate Geeta Kumari won the president's post by defeating Nidhi Tripathi of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) by 464 votes.

For the vice president's post, AISA's Simone Zoya Khan got 1,876 votes out of total 4,620 votes. Khan defeated Durgesh Kumar of ABVP who got 1028 votes.

Duggirala Srikrisha (Left) won the General Secretary's post by winning 2082 votes. He was followed by ABVP's Nikunj Makwana with 975 votes.

The post of Joint Secretary has gone to Shubhanshu Singh (Left), who got 1755 votes. Pankaj Keshari of ABVP got 920 votes.

Sucheta De, the President of AISA, also stated that AISA will fight against ABVP in the upcoming Delhi University elections as well.

She added, "This verdict reasserts the inclusive, democratic and egalitarian essence of JNU in the face of multipronged assaults by the RSS backed ABVP Nexus. This election took place at a time when the government, along with its puppet JNU VC and ABVP left no stone unturned to 'Shut Down JNU' through a deliberate massive seat cut; and elimination of deprivation points and other inclusive features of JNU's admission policy, trampling upon of all decision making bodies by the VC and targeted victimization of students, JNUSU and faculty members."

She also said that AISA aims to carry forward the struggle to reverse seat cut, reclaim JNU's inclusive policies in admissions and safeguarding the sanctity of JNU's decision making bodies from partisan subversion by the VC.

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The three-year-old boy, who was kidnapped from Navi Mumbai's Vashi

Railway station on September 6, was found near Kalwa Sation by a passenger on Saturday.

The passenger took the child to the Vashi police station as she saw him on the news channels, who was later handed over to the parents.

However, the accused is not traced yet and further investigation is on.

This comes a few days after a CCTV footage revealed a man abducting the three-year-old child from the station and is

seen taking a train for Panvel from there.

The Navi Mumbai Police and the Railway Protection Force (RPF) were taking help of the Global Positioning System (GPS), so that the culprit can be nabbed and the child is rescued soon.

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Nine suspected terrorists have been killed in a shootout in Egypt's third largest city Giza, home to the legendary Great Pyramids and the Sphinx.

The police cordoned off several streets in the area and launched the counter-terrorism operation on Sunday. The security forces broke into an apartment in one of the neighborhood's residence building, where the suspects were hiding.

Five police officers were injured in the shootout that took place in the neighbourhood of Agouza, Giza governorate, during a raid on two suspected terrorist hideouts, Sputnik reported.

One of the suspects reportedly attempted to detonate a suicide belt but was killed by the police. Police found huge amount of weapons and ammunition from the two terror hideouts.

A high-ranking source in the Egyptian Internal Ministry said that police killed nine terrorists in the operation, while five police officers were wounded, the local media reported.

Egypt has been fighting a jihadist insurgency and series of terror attacks took place mainly targeting security forces since the army overthrew then-President Mohamed Morsi in 2013.

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With maximum sustained winds of 120 mph, Hurricane Irma has been downgraded to Category 3, the National Weather Service has said.

The National Weather Service further said that Naples and Marco Island are set to endure some of the strongest winds in the next few hours, adding that the "storm surges that threaten to swallow Florida's coastal cities" could be more dangerous than the winds.

"There is imminent danger of life-threatening storm surge flooding along much of the Florida west coast, including the Florida Keys, where a storm surge warning is in effect," CNN quoted the hurricane center.

"The threat of catastrophic storm surge flooding is highest along the southwest coast of Florida, where 10 to 15 feet of inundation above ground level is expected. This is a life-threatening situation."

Category-4 Hurricane Irma began its assault on Florida, the south-easternmost U.S. state earlier on Sunday, with the storm's northern eyewall reaching the lower Florida Keys on Sunday after making landfall in Cuba.

More than 560,000 residents across 19 counties in south and central Florida are without power, according to Florida Power and Light Department.

Irma lashed the area with forceful winds near 130 miles per hour and the U.S. National Hurricane Centre said it was expected to remain a powerful storm as it moved through the Florida Keys and near the state's west coast, CNN reported.

Keeping an eye on Irma, South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster has issued a mandatory evacuation for some barrier islands, while Georgia Governor Nathan Deal expanded a state of emergency to include 94 counties.

As many as 5.6 million people were evacuated from Florida on Friday to deal with the life-threatening Hurricane Irma.

A few records that Irma has broken are:

-Irma is the strongest Atlantic basin hurricane ever recorded outside the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea

-It spent three days as a Category 5 hurricane, the longest Category 5 hurricane since satellite storm-tracking began

-It prompted the largest evacuation in the history of the Bahamas

The National Weather Service say that damaging winds are moving into areas including Key Biscayne, Coral Gables and South Miami.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) activated the Florida National Guard on Tuesday in anticipation of the hurricane. About 4,000 troops were activated on Friday, and Scott said he expected the entire force of more than 8,000 would eventually be called into duty.

Puerto Rico, meanwhile, activated its 5,200 National Guard troops, while the U.S. Virgin Islands activated its nearly 700-member unit for assistance , according to the Pentagon.

United States President Donald Trump's homeland security adviser Tom Bossert said Friday he had spoken to Pentagon and State Department officials and insisted they were prepared to tackle Irma response efforts quickly.

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Pakistan is likely to turn to China to develop its military and technical cooperation after President Donald Trump administration's decision of giving access to Islamabad of USD 225 million worth of military assistance only with a condition that it takes more action against terror groups.

"No doubt, Pakistan will try to develop its military and technical cooperation with China, an issue that will certainly top the agenda of the Beijing talks. As for whether China will be able to replace the US in terms of giving military aid to Pakistan, it is a question which can be answered in the future," Sputnik quoted Russian expert Natalya Zamarayeva as saying.

Islamabad may turn to China in a bid to resolve the issue, Zamarayeva of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences commented on the U.S. State Department's decision to suspend military aid to Pakistan.

She referred to Pakistani Foreign Minister Khawaja Asif's visit to China to support her argument that followed after Trump accused Islamabad of habouring terrorists.

She pointed to the ongoing power struggle in Pakistan, saying that the transition period is likely to last until the parliamentary elections in the country, which are slated for in 2018.

According to her, Islamabad has already begun to adjust its domestic and foreign policy amid the increasing clout of the Pakistani military. She said that Islamabad is specifically focusing on issues related to its cooperation with China, India and Afghanistan.

Chinese political analyst Zhang Li who wasn't enthusiastic about Beijing quickly deciding to offer Islamabad a helping hand in terms of a military aid, said, "Despite a variety of contacts between China and Pakistan, I don't think that the US decision to suspend military aid to Pakistan can prompt China to cooperate with Islamabad on the matter."

The Trump administration notified Congress on Wednesday that it was putting $255 million in military assistance to Pakistan into the equivalent of an escrow account that Islamabad can only access if it does more to crack down on internal terror networks launching attacks on neighboring Afghanistan.

In August, Chinese Vice Premier Wang Yang met Pakistani Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and said China and Pakistan are "iron friends" and all-weather partners of strategic cooperation, who always support each other and pledged to deepen their pragmatic cooperation in various fields so as to ensure early harvests in the CPEC project.

Wang, who attended the flag hoisting ceremony and activities marking the 70th anniversary of Pakistan's independence at the invitation of the Pakistani government at Islamabad's Convention Centre, said China and Pakistan had stood by each other in difficult times and "this friendship will stand the test of time and grow with coming generations".

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Saudi Arabian embassy in Washington may have funded a 'dry run' for the hijacking of the planes by two of Saudi employees used in the 9/11 attack, revealed the fresh evidence submitted in a major 9/11 lawsuit forwarded against the country.

This further reinforces the claim that employees and agents of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia directed and aided the 9/11 hijackers and plotters.

The amended complaint, filed on behalf of the families of some 1,400 victims who died in the terrorist attacks 16 years ago, has alleged that two years before the airliner attacks, the Saudi Embassy paid for two Saudi nationals, living undercover in the United States as students, to fly from Phoenix to Washington "in a dry run for the 9/11 attacks." the New York Post reported.

The lead attorney for the 9/11 plaintiffs, Sean Carter said, "We've long asserted that there were longstanding and close relationships between al Qaeda and the religious components of the Saudi government."

"This is further evidence of that," he added.

The lawyers for the plaintiffs said, the court filing has provided new details that shows "a pattern of both financial and operational support" for the 9/11 conspiracy from official Saudi sources.

Earlier, rejecting Trump's continuous attacks on Tehran, Iran's Foreign Minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif Khonsari said that the U.S. President should rather discussed how to prevent Saudi Arabia from carrying out another 9/11 attack. Trump, in his address at the Riyadh Summit, repeatedly slammed Iran claiming that it funds arms, trains militias that spread destruction and chaos and pointed to Iran's support for Syria's Bashar al-Assad as he committed "unspeakable crimes."

The Iranian Foreign Minister emphasised that Trump himself had earlier suggested that Saudi Arabia was behind the 9/11 attacks. Majority of the 9/11 terrorists were Saudi citizens and speculations have suggested that members of the Saudi hierarchy were involved in the attack.

Reportedly, Gulf countries were used to receive funds from banks in Pakistan and UAE, owned by the UAE royal family, to allegedly finance terror strikes in the U.S. in 2001 and Mumbai in 2008.

The September 11 attacks (also referred to as 9/11) were a series of four coordinated terrorist attacks by the Islamic terrorist group al-Qaeda on the U.S. on the morning of Tuesday, September 11, 2001.

The attacks killed 2,997 people, injured over 6,000 others, and caused at least USD 10 billion in infrastructure and property damage.

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Condemning the recent atrocities against the two victims of sexual abuse-one in Ryan International School, Gurugram, and the other in Tagore Public School, Delhi, Nobel Peace laureate Kailash Satyarthi has stated that schools in India are not safe for children anymore, reiterating that security measures need more stringent review.

"I have always encouraged children to go to school, as I believe that every child should receive education. Schools were considered to be the safest place for children. However, in the light of recent atrocities, schools are unfortunately not safe anymore. We have failed in ensuring security for our children," Satyarthi told ANI in an exclusive telephonic conversation.

Satyarthi, who recently embarked on a 'Bharat Yatra' to spearhead the fight against child trafficking and child sexual abuse across the country said the recent events has instilled a sense of fear and aversion towards education in the minds of both parents and children alike, condemning this to be a 'matter of shame'

"During my yatra, I met with a young girl who was raped on her way back home. The minute I said anything to do with going to school, she began shivering and went through severe discomfort. This is the state of affairs and there are many such young children. Even parents are uncomfortable with sending their children to school," he said.

"While setting up a school, safety measures need to be on top of the priority list of the management, be it when a child is in school, outside the school or in transit to and from home. I don't see enough safety measures being deployed in school, and this is a matter of concern. It is a matter of shame to see such incidents, and I want to save the country from such atrocities through my Bharat Yatra," added Satyarthi.

Encouraging the society to move towards an India that secures one's childhood ('Surakshit Bachpan-Surakshit Bharat'), the Nobel laureate said the government too must not shy away from taking control of the situation, be it at the state or Centre.

Responding to the lathicharge against protestors in front of Ryan International School, Satyarthi urged that anger must be channelized into constructive solution, adding that parents need to constantly pressurise the school authorities to take up matters of security more seriously.

"Those dealing with children, including teachers, bus drivers and conductors, peons, and others need to go through adequate background checks before being hired. More stringent security measures need to be imposed by empowering parent-teacher associations (PTA). On the parents' part, they must be alert and pressurise the administration using PTA meetings as a platform to raise any concerns they may have," he said.

The last two days have borne witness to severe atrocities against innocent lives, as two young children fell prey to sexual predators in two separate incidents.

Seven-year-old Pradyuman, a student of Class II in Ryan International School, was killed by the school bus conductor on Friday.

In other gruesome incident, a five-year-old girl was allegedly raped inside the premises of the Tagore Public School in Gandhi Nagar, Delhi, on Sunday.

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Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi became Pakistan's first-ever Prime Minister to participate in an air force sortie.

Abbasi, yesterday visited the newly established Airpower Center of Excellence (ACE) at an operational air base of the Pakistan Air Force (PAF). He also flew an exercise training mission in an F-16 fighter aircraft, belonging to the No 9 Squadron.

Abbasi was briefed by Air Chief Sohail Aman on the ongoing exercise 'Saffron Bandit' and was informed that the first-ever multinational exercise will be held in October and would have participation from personnel from 19 air forces.

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Congress MLAs were also part of the delegation of opposition parties that met Rao in Chennai.

The DMK leader demanded an immediate floor test from the Governor.

He demanded an order for Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami, seeking a vote of confidence and resolves the political crisis in the state.

He apprised the Governor of the current tally of MLAs by his side. According to him, 119 MLAs are with him, as against the 114 with the Chief Minister, which is more than the majority which the assembly demands.

He added that they have met the Governor a number of times and if he does not respond to the request within a week then he will "have to take legal resort and mobilise people's mandate".

He also said that he will approach the people's court as well.

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Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) working president M. K. Stalin will meet Tamil Nadu governor C. Vidyasagar Rao on Sunday, in the evening, to stress on the on the need for a trial of strength in the state assembly.

Congress MLAs will also be part of the delegation, led by Stalin.

On August 31, a delegation of opposition parties, including the DMK, the Congress, the Communist Party of India (CPI) and the Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPM) met President Ram Nath Kovind, demanding a floor test in the Assembly.

The opposition parties in Tamil Nadu claimed that the government has been "reduced" to a minority with 21 MLAs owing allegiance to T.T.V. Dinakaran's AIADMK faction withdrawing their support to Chief Minister E. Palanisamy and thereby, demanded a floor test.

CPM general secretary Sitaram Yechury, who was present at the meeting, argued that a party cannot rule a state if the party doesn't command the mandate of the state and believes that a floor test is the only way to come to a solution.

"The point is that any government of a country has to enjoy the majority of legislative members that can be demonstrated only on the floor of the house. Without a floor test, any action taken by the government doesn't have the mandate of a majority," he told the media after the meeting.

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The Syrian Armed Forces have managed to break through the positions of the ISIS at the main southern entrance to the city of Deir Ez-Zor and join the troops, which were present inside the city, Sputnik International reported.

An operation to clear the area was kicked off earlier in the day.

The Syrian army launched an offensive from the north of the airbase, destroying ISIS' fortifications and equipment.

On Tuesday, the Syrian Armed Forces lifted the blockade in the west of the city paving the way for further advancement to the airbase.

The development comes after another vanguard unit of the Syrian forces with Russian air support broke the siege of the airfield, where 1,000 Syrian troops have been pinned down since January this year, on Saturday.

The Russian Defense Ministry called this breakthrough the biggest victory over the ISIS militants in Syria in three years.

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The Syrian Army captured a key oil field of Teym from the Islamic State (IS) in the countryside of Deir al-Zour province.

According to reports, the Army has progressively covered over the past 24 hours in reaching Deir al-Zour city from its main desert road.

Earlier this week, the Syrian Army and allied troops lifted the three-year-old siege by the IS of Deir al-Zour city through the Brigade 137 base in western Deir al-Zour.

This richly grown province is important for the Syrian Army due to its location near Iraq and also the energy fields around it.

Teym is one of the most important energy fields in Syria as it supports the electricity production to most Syrian cities.

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A top Pakistan Army official has termed the expanding war in Afghanistan a 'collective failure' and insisted that there is no military solution for the violence and will assist Afghanistan in reconciliation talks.

"Afghanistan's problems lie within Afghanistan and there is no military solution to the problems of Afghanistan as outside formulas are unlikely to yield any positive results. You cannot blame a country, an individual and an institution for the failures that are collective,"Khaama Press quoted Pakistan's Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee (CJCSC) General Zubair Mahmood Hayat, as saying during a gathering in United Kingdom.

This statement by General Hayat comes as the Afghan officials have long been insisting that the growing instability in the country has direct links with the Taliban and Haqqani network sanctuaries remaining intact in Pakistan.

Pakistan has been under immense pressure from U.S. to eliminate the sanctuaries of the Afghan militants in its soil, Gen. Hayat said "Pakistan has tried and will try its best to partner with all forces towards reconciliation between various factions so that there is peace and stability inside Afghanistan."

Hayat added, "Pakistan stands committed to trying to stabilise Afghanistan and we are in the process of building 900 posts alongside Afghanistan-Pakistan border, we are in the process of building a fence between Af-Pak border, we are constructing gates where there will be no entry without documents and identity will be proven either way. These steps are being taken so that no bad crossing takes place and we want others to partner with us on these accounts."

While announcing strategy for Afghanistan and South Asia, US President Donald Trump had said, "For its part, Pakistan often gives safe haven to agents of chaos, violence, and terror. The threat is worse because Pakistan and India are two nuclear-armed states whose tense relations threaten to spiral into conflict. And that could happen.

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The U.S. Navy denied any direct contact with Iranian forces, hours after the Tasnim News agency reported that an Iranian missile boat sent a warning signal to an American Navy ship that closed on a fishing boat in the Persian Gulf.

According to a press statement by the Iranian Navy, Iranian fishing boat Shams was travelling 45 nautical miles off the Jask port in the Hormozgan province testing its engine, when it started to sink. Upon receiving a distress signal from Shams, Iranian Navy missile boat Falahen set off to rescue the sinking boat.

In response to this, the U.S. Naval Forces Central Command (NAVCENT), in a statement, said the coastal patrol USS Tempest, operating in the Gulf of Oman on September 6, heard the distress call of an unidentified small boat about 75 nautical miles from the Tempest's position.

"At the same time the motor vessel Nordic Voyager, much closer to the boat in distress, offered help and had made visual contact with it. The Tempest offered to support the Nordic Voyager which declined the offer," the NAVCENT said.

"Following the radio traffic from a distance, USS Tempest heard the Nordic Voyager coordinate additional Iranian Navy help for the vessel in distress to tow it back to Iran. At no time was there any direct contact between the U.S. and Iranian maritime forces," the statement concluded.

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U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, Thomas Shannon will hold talks with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov in Helsinki, Finland on Sunday in a bid to calm down diplomatic tensions and to address areas of bilateral concerns.

"Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Thomas A. Shannon, Jr. will travel to Helsinki, Finland September 10-12 where he will meet with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov to address areas of bilateral concern and cooperation,"TASS Russian news agency quoted the U.S. Department of State statement.

This development comes at a time when diplomatic tensions are high as Moscow issued an order asking Washington to reduce the U.S. diplomatic presence in Russia by several hundred people and then Trump administration responded by ordering Russia to close its consulate in San Francisco and two annexes in Washington and New York.

Shannon "will also lead the U.S. inter-agency delegation to the U.S-Russia Strategic Stability Talks," it stated.

"Under Secretary Shannon will also meet senior Finnish officials, including President Sauli Niinist, to discuss a range of bilateral and global issues, following the Finnish President's visit to the White House on August 28," the statement added.

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson's visit to Moscow in April 2017 has led to the setting up of a channel of communication between Ryabkov and Shannon. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov later said that these contacts marked "a useful and business-like approach.

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A Bhartiya Janata Party legislator in Madhya Pradesh had his pocket picked during a welcome ceremony here for Union Minister Virendra Kumar, police said on Sunday.

Shailendra Jain, the legislator from Sagar city, was targetted during a rally and felicitation ceremony on Saturday for Virendra Kumar, who was recently inducted into the Union council of ministers. Sagar is the minister's home district.

Jain, who said he had Rs 15,000 cash, his Vidhan Sabha id card, voter id card, PAN card, Aadhaar card, debit cards and other important documents in his purse, appealed to the pickpocket to keep the money and return the documents.

Police have filed a case.

--IANS

hindi-him/vd

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Congress party in-charge of Chhattisgarh P.L. Punia on Sunday said that the BJP government in the state was "most corrupt" and his party will contest to win the 2018 assembly elections as "victory in the state is our right".

He also said that the party will keep in mind the youth, dedicated workers and women workers for the party ticket and ban liquor if it comes to power.

"Congress will fight elections in Chhattisgarh not only to win the Bastar region, but will fight to win the entire state in 2018 elections. There are no differences within the party in the state. We will contest election with full strength," Punia told reporters here.

"Congress party feels victory is their right (in the state) and we will contest the polls in an united manner. If our party comes to power, liquor will be banned in Chhattisgarh," he added.

He also said that due to the pressure from the opposition, the state government was forced to give bonus to the farmers in the state. "Our party got the tribals their rights in MNREGA and education. Chhatissgarh is the most corrupt state in India and people mock it," he added.

On journalist-activist Gauri Lankesh's death, Punia said it was very unfortunate and a serious situation.

"Under the BJP government, no one has the freedom to write or speak anything. Four such incidents have come to fore in Chhattisgarh as well.

"Every time the names of the accused related to such incidents come out in open, they are found to have links with the BJP or the RSS," he added.

--IANS

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The Congress on Sunday condemned the attack on journalists and parents by Haryana Police while demanding a CBI probe in the brutal murder of a seven-year-old student in Ryan International School.

"Condemn the brutal attack on mediapersons at Gurgaon. Second Attack by Haryana Police on in 15 days," said Congress spokesperson Randeep Singh surjewala on Twitter.

"It is shameful that Achhe Din Khattar Sarkar wants to terrorise the press and beat up parents demanding justice," he added.

He had earlier said: "Insensitive apathy and lathi charge by Khattar government on protesting parents demanding justice. Order a CBI probe and take action against school."

At least 50 people, including nine scribes and photo journalists, were injured when police baton-charged a group of people protesting the brutal murder of a seven-year-old student in Ryan International School in Gurugram and demanding the arrest of the school management.

Plice used force to disperse the protestors who were agitating outside the school in Bhondsi in the wake of the murder of class 2 student Pradhuman, who was on Friday found in the washroom with his throat slit.

--IANS

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Pressing ahead with its campaign against the K. Palaniswami government, the DMK-led Opposition on Sunday met Tamil Nadu Governor Vidyasagar Rao and demanded immediate convening of the Assembly and to direct the Chief Minister to prove his majority.

The Opposition parties also told the Governor that if he did not convene the Assembly within a week, they would approach courts and the "people's court", Leader of the Opposition and DMK Working President M.K. Stalin told the media after the meeting.

He said the AIADMK government headed by Palaniswami has lost majority in the Assembly with 119 MLAs ranged against him and only 116 supporting in a House of 233.

The Opposition has, in all, 98 MLAs (DMK 89, its allies Congress eight and Muslim League one) while those owing allegiance to T.T.V. Dinakaran faction of AIADMK are 21.

Stalin recalled that the Opposition has already demanded a floor test for the government and Dinakaran had also met the Governor earlier this week in the company of three more MLAs and conveyed to him that the Chief Minister had lost the confidence of MLAs loyal to him. He had a fortnight ago ferried 19 of his loyalist MLAs to the Governor with the message that they wanted removal of the Chief Minister. One of the 19 MLAs -- S.T.K. Jakkaiyan -- had switched sides to the Chief Minister's camp.

An opposition delegation, led by DMK Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly Duraimurugan had met the Governor a fortnight ago and conveyed to him their demand for convening the Assembly immediately for a floor test.

The DMK leader said it was established by the Supreme Court judgement in the S.R. Bommai and Arunachal Pradesh cases that the Assembly was the place where a majority has to be proved and it was the Governor's duty to convene the House for the purpose.

Asked what was the Governor's response, Stalin said Rao told the delegation that he would do his duty. "I still hope that he will perform his duty and convene the House," he added.

Stalin said if the Governor does not convene the Assembly session within a week, then they were left with no option but to approach the "courts and people's courts".

--IANS

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The Egyptian-US joint military exercise, known as "The Bright Star," kicked off on Sunday at a military base in Egypt, the Egyptian military spokesman said.

The 10-day joint maneuver activities will continue until September 20, including joint land, air and naval operations, Xinhua quoted Egyptian Military Spokesman Tamer al-Refaay as saying.

On the sidelines of the training, a research symposium will be held to exchange visions on strategic topics on the international arena and Egypt's comprehensive strategy of fighting terrorism, Refaay added.

Launched in 1981, the joint biennial training has been suspended since 2009, due to the ouster of former presidents Hosni Mubarak and Mohamed Morsi in addition to the dissatisfaction of former US President Barack Obama's administration with the Egyptian new leadership.

Obama's successor, US President Donald Trump promised to resume the exercise. Both Trump and Sisi have repeatedly exchanged remarks of praise and promised further cooperation and partnership.

"The Bright Star exercises reflect the depth of strategic cooperation between the Egyptian and the US armed forces," said the Egyptian military spokesman.

Resumption of the Bright Star comes a few weeks after Washington announced to withhold some $300 million of aid to Egypt over human rights concerns.

--IANS

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Exporters are having a tough time since the roll-out of the new indirect tax regime as the online facility to claim refunds is not yet available, with many even postponing shipments as they grapple with low funds, stakeholders and experts have said.

The worries are greater for small and medium exporters who have a turnover of less than Rs 20 crore as their cost of working capital has significantly risen with refunds not coming so far under the Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime.

"We estimate an additional working capital of Rs 1.5 to Rs 2 crore for us. At present, refunds can't be claimed as Goods and Services Tax Network (GSTN) system is not yet operational. We have to pay GST on procurement and also keep control on all vendors to ensure that they pay GST," Vilas Phule, CFO, Magna Steyr India, which exports engineering services in the automobile sector, told IANS.

The company with a monthly turnover of Rs 6 crore to Rs 8 crore, exports services worth Rs 4 crore to Rs 6 crore every month.

Certainly, this was putting exporters in a lot of working capital pressure, he added.

Jigar Doshi, Partner, SKP Business Consulting, said: "At present, exporters are unable to file refund claims online as no facility/utility is available at GSTN website and is unknown as to when it will be made available. Now, working capital blockage is proving to be big hurdle particularly for small exporters, who do not have deep pockets."

GST expert Pritam Mahure said, "In GST regime, exporters are facing challenges as the upfront exemption is not available and given this working capital of exporters is getting blocked. I hope that the government forms a high level committee to address their challenges or else the working capital blockage can derail the struggling exports scenario in India."

In the previous indirect tax regime, exporters enjoyed upfront tax exemption on goods to be exported. But under GST, exporters are procuring goods and services on payment of GST. This credit of GST, which is available with exporters is supposed to be claimed as refund.

Under GST, there is also Integrated GST applicable on the export turnover, for which there are two methods available -- one to export without payment of GST (under cover of Letter of Undertaking or Bond) and second with payment of IGST and then claim refund of it.

"In our case, we have 80 per cent export of services. Hence, GST paid on procurement of services which needs to be claimed as refunds. If exemptions, similar to the one given under previous indirect tax regime, are granted then the funds blockage can be optimised along with reduction in unnecessary administrative work for paying GST and then claiming refunds," Phule said.

The former GSTN Chairman Navin Kumar, who retired recently, said, "For exporters, it is not yet available. For exporters there is going to be a separate form where he can claim refund of IGST. Currently the online facility is not active on GST portal."

Amar Kulkarni, CFO, Hoerbiger India, which exports gas compressor valves for the petroleum industry, said, "Given the working capital pressure, many exporters are postponing the exports and are struggling for funds. This entire process of claiming refund by exporter can be eased through upfront exemption."

The exporter is required to capture details of monthly export for GST return and this is a tedious work, he said.

Another exporter Samir Oke, who exports thermocol for refrigerators admitted that his company was facing a problem of blockage of working capital with GST.

"Even, in case of procurement from unregistered vendors, the company is required to pay GST which further leads to increase in working capital requirement," Oke, CFO, K K Nag Pvt Ltd, told IANS.

"We faced numerous challenges in obtaining a Letter of Undertaking for exporting goods without IGST. The said procedure was expected to be online but practically we had to visit and follow up with the authorities for the same," he added.

Doshi said, "Prior to GST regime, there was no requirement to obtain Letter of Undertaking for exporting services, which is mandatory in GST regime and given this service exporters face numerous challenges. The government should identify key challenges faced by exporters and address the same immediately."

Further, the refund of GST can be claimed only if the vendors pay GST and this is required to be tracked by the company, which is leading to more hassles for the exporters.

"There are various requirement as far as input tax credit is concerned. It is very difficult to communicate with numerous vendors and ensure that they are paying GST. The company is required to ensure that vendors are paying and filing returns in case of a registered vendor. In case of unregistered vendor, the company not only has pay the GST but is also required to raise the tax invoice and payment voucher, which is a tedious and time consuming process," Oke said.

Hoerbiger India said, "We are being held responsible for compliance by vendor, which is unreasonable as SME exporters don't have manpower to ensure all these."

To add to the woes, recurring breakdowns of the GSTN system are making things worse for the exporters.

"GSTN system is not ready and we are facing numerous errors in the system during filing of GST returns," Magna Steyr India said.

Hoerbiger India said, "Exporters are investing a lot of time during return filing process as the GSTN system is not robust. If such problems continue then the company will have to focus only on returns on that export."

There is no surety on whether the tools or website will work on a particular day as due to traffic surge GSTN system was down multiple times, thus exporters are facing challenges in filing of GST returns, Oke protested.

Anita Rastogi, Partner, PwC - GST and Indirect Tax, said, " The largest issue being faced by an exporter is that of additional working capital requirement. There are teething problems being faced by exporters on the procedural side. It is important that the interests of exporters are safeguarded and this should be taken on priority by the government."

(Meghna Mittal can be reached at meghna.m@ians.in)

--IANS

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Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will on Tuesday visit camps for Rohingya refugees in the southeastern part of the country, an official said even as the government allotted 2,000 acres of forest land in Coxs Bazar area to accommodate the refugees fleeing violence in Myanmar.

Hasina will be visiting the Kutupalang camp in Cox's Bazar, Ashraful Alam, Deputy Press Secretary to the PM, told bdnews24.com on Sunday.

Rohingyas have arrived in Bangladesh in thousands fleeing violence in Myanmar's Rakhine state.

The Bangladesh government has also decided to prepare a biometric database of the Rohingya refugees, Dhaka Tribune reported.

"The numbers of the Rohingyas are increasing everyday and they have taken shelter in different places. So, we have allotted the land to keep them in one place," Shah Kamal, Secretary in the Disaster Management and Relief Ministry, said while visiting Rohingya camps.

The Passport Directorate has been tasked to make a list of the Rohingyas with their names, photos and finger prints, an official said.

According to UN, more than 290,000 people are believed to have crossed the border from Myanmar to Bangladesh, tripling the Rohingya population in Cox's Bazar in two weeks.

Over the last few decades, almost half a million Rohingya Muslims have been living in two registered camps and makeshift settlements bordering Cox's Bazar, fleeing persecution and communal violence.

Myanmar does not recognise the Rohingya people as its citizens, neither has it responded to Bangladesh's frequent calls to take back the refugees, bdnews24 reported.

Attacks on a police camp in October last year sparked an influx of almost 87,000 refugees into Bangladesh. Fresh violence broke out on August 25 when insurgents attacked 30 police posts and an army base.

About 300,000 Rohingyas are said to have fled Rakhine and sought shelter across the border in Bangladesh in the weeks since the fresh violence.

As many as 400 people have been reported killed in fighting that has rocked the country's northwest, according to Myanmar officials.

Bangladesh has proposed creating "safe zones" run by aid groups for the Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine to stop hundreds of thousands of refugees crossing into its territory.

Dhaka had earlier suggested a joint operation with Myanmar forces on the border to wipe out militant and extremist forces, but Naypyidaw has not responded.

In Buddhist-majority Myanmar, many consider the 1.1 million Rohingyas as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

Hasina said last week that Bangladesh was trying its best to support the refugees.

"We are also mounting pressure on Myanmar, so that their citizens can return to their homeland," she said on Thursday while addressing a meeting of the ruling Awami League's executive body.

--IANS

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A Hizbul Mujahideen militant was killed by the security forces in Jammu and Kashmir's Shopian district, police said on Sunday.

"The militant identified as Tariq was killed while another terrorist, Adil was arrested along with his weapon during the security operation in Barbugh village on Saturday night. Adil had joined the group three months ago," the police said.

On Saturday, the militants had fired at an army vehicle in Barbugh.

--IANS

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Subdued demand growth, consistent capacity additions and better networks may result in India producing surplus power in the current fiscal, although sporadic outages continue and 24 per cent households are yet to be electrified, according to the latest report by Fitch Ratings.

The American agency said in its newsletter "India Power Watch" that India could actually produce a power surplus in this fiscal, with an energy deficit of just 0.6 per cent in the first quarter ended March, which is a period of high seasonal electricity demand.

"However, in reality, sporadic outages continue to plague the country. At the same time, about 24 per cent of households are yet to be electrified in India," it said.

Fitch said the inability of hugely indebted power distribution companies (discoms) to purchase power, along with the absence of adequate transmission network coverage, exerts significant pressure on India's thermal power utilisation.

The cost-revenue gap remains at Re 0.42 per kilowatt hour (kWh) along with aggregate technical and commercial (AT&C) losses of 20.6 per cent overall.

"Improving these operational inefficiencies will drive any sustainable improvement," it said.

The report noted that electricity prices at power exchanges dropped by 11 per cent to Rs 2.4 per kWh in 2016-17.

"Tariffs are taking a hit mainly from the prevailing electricity demand-supply dynamics, lower coal costs and a decline in renewable tariffs," it said.

According to the credit rating agency, discoms are hesitating to tie-up new long-term power purchase agreements (PPAs) for both thermal and wind capacity as they await more clarity on the auction route for wind power, supported by the availability of cheaper spot electricity.

From the perspective of discoms in Delhi, for instance, the primary reason behind the national capital getting expensive power is that they are bound by long-term PPAs that run for 25-35 years, which were signed with generators well before privatisation in 2002.

From the perspective of the generators, with electricity demand growth in India not keeping pace with the excess capacity addition and with tariffs falling, producers are facing offtake issues on power that they have not already tied up for sale through long-term PPAs.

JSW Energy Chief Executive Prashant Jain told a news channel recently that while the company had tied up for the offtake of about 65 per cent of its power generation through long-term PPAs, it is facing challenges about disposal of its remaining "untied capacity".

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
India has renegotiated the price of liquefied natural gas (LNG) it imports from Gorgon project in Australia that will result in savings of more than Rs 10,000 crore, according to Petroleum Ministry sources here on Sunday.

"Happy to share good news that India has, yet again, been able to address the long-term price issue of LNG from Gorgon to suit Indian market," Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said in a tweet.

"Indian customers will receive LNG volumes at an amicable price soon. This is done in a similar way to what we did with LNG from Qatar," he said in a separate tweet.

According to the ministry source, the Gorgon project operators' consortium led by American majors Chevron and Exxon Mobil have agreed to charge 13.9 per cent of the prevailing UK Brent oil price at the port of delivery, rather than 14.5 per cent at the port of loading as was agreed earlier.

A joint venture formed by state-run oil and gas companies with Gaz de France as its strategic partner, Petronet LNG had last year sought a minimum 10 per cent reduction in price of LNG it agreed to buy from the Gorgon project.

The company had signed a 20-year agreement in 2009 to buy 1.44 million tonnes per annum of LNG at a price equivalent to 14.5 per cent of the prevailing oil rate.

Last year, India favourably re-negotiated its LNG agreement with Qatar to bring down the cost of importing natural gas to less than $5 per unit from $12.

In return for the renegotiation, Petronet signed an agreement for additional import of 1 million tonnes of LNG per year for about 12 years with effect from January 1, 2016, at the prevailing market prices. The new contract ends in 2028.

"Going by the old long-term gas contract price, we have succeeded in renegotiating a benefit of Rs 16,000 crore in this calendar year," Pradhan had said in his address here at the signing of the modification to the gas sale-purchase agreement with RasGas of Qatarlast year.

--IANS

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(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un called the sixth nuclear test carried out by his country last week a great victory and praised the officials and experts responsible for it, state news agency KCNA reported on Sunday.

On September 3, the North Korean army claimed it had successfully detonated a hydrogen bomb that was capable of being mounted on an intercontinental ballistic missile.

Celebrations were held in Pyongyang on Saturday to mark the success of the test and the 69th anniversary of the founding of North Korea where Kim Jong-Un said the nuclear test was a "great victory won by the Korean people at the cost of their blood", Efe reported.

In images released by KCNA, Kim Jong-un is seen sharing a table with North Korea's top brass, including army Vice Marshal Hwang Pyong-so, Workers' Party Vice Chairman Choe Ryong-hae and Premier Pak Pong-ju.

Kim, who was welcomed with a standing ovation, raised a toast to and praised the engineers for their contribution to a great auspicious event in the history of North Korea, in a reference to the test that had met with widespread condemnation globally and heightened tension on the Korean Peninsula.

The North Korean state media also reported on Sunday that a concert was held at the national theatre in Pyongyang, attended by the leader and his wife Ri Sol-ju, in honour of the scientists and military personnel who were involved in the nuclear test.

State television network KCTV visuals showed the audience fervently applauding Kim, who was accompanied by two prominent leaders of the regime's nuclear programme, Hong Sung-mu and Ri Man-gon.

The state media also took advantage of the anniversary celebrations of the founding of North Korea on Saturday to justify its status as an "invincible nuclear nation".

The newspaper of North Korea's ruling Workers Party, Rodong Sinmun, reported that the Kim Jong-un regime will continue to develop nuclear weapons to boost the country's security.

Meanwhile, the US called for a UN Security Council meeting on Monday to vote on a resolution on "additional sanctions" against North Korea for its latest nuclear test.

The proposal includes banning the sale of oil to North Korea, textile exports and vetoing North Korean citizens working abroad, from where the regime earns a substantial income.

--IANS

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Actor Leonardo DiCaprio and his former girlfriend Toni Garrn have reportedly reconciled as they were spotted holding hands.

The couple held hands here while leaving a nightclub together as they attempted to make a low-key exit, reports aceshowbiz.com.

As soon as DiCaprio, 42, and Garrn, 25, were spotted by shutterbugs, they quickly broke away.

DiCaprio was dressed in a casual attire in a navy shirt and jeans combination while Garrn looked chic in black pants and vest. She had her dark blazer draped over her shoulder to fend off the cold weather.

Before he was spotted with Garrn, DiCaprio was seen partying with another model named Lorena Rae.

They were first photographed together at a party in Monaco in May and have since been hanging out together on numerous occasions. However, his representative has denied the rumours.

DiCaprio and Garrn broke up in December 2014. They started dating in 2013.

--IANS

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Venezuela's President on Sunday issued a call in Kazakhstan's capital for a world without wars, terrorism and hegemonic empires.

"It's time to fight for another world. It's time to fight for a world without wars, without terrorism, without hegemonic empires," Nicolas Maduro said in his remarks at a summit of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation in Astana, reports Efe.

Maduro, who arrived on Saturday night in Kazakhstan, is participating in the OIC summit as Secretary General of the Non-Aligned Movement.

Venezuela deeply believes "it's time for dialogue, for a profound dialogue of cultures, civilizations and religions", the leftist President said.

He added that the two organisations can only "make progress toward those objectives of justice and peace if they are united".

The Venezuelan leader said both organisations shared principles such as "inclusive multi-lateralism," which he said was the "most effective tool" for addressing global challenges.

"And the rejection of the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or the political independence of states, and the rejection of the imposition of unilateral sanctions in accordance with the provisions of the United Nations charter and the norms of international law," he added.

He also stressed their common stance in support of the "peaceful resolution of disputes, democracy, the development and respect for all human rights and basic freedoms".

With respect to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he said the Non-Aligned Movement, which he will head until 2019, urgently calls for a "just, lasting, comprehensive and peaceful resolution" and "condemns the illegal practices of the occupying power".

Upon his arrival in Astana, Maduro was received by Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev. He later also met the Presidents of Turkey and Iran, Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Hassan Rouhani, respectively.

Before travelling to Kazakhstan, Maduro said that with the aim of reducing Venezuela's dependence on the United States dollar and weathering US sanctions and pressure on the Caribbean nation, Caracas will sell oil and natural gas in other currencies, including the yuan, yen, ruble and the rupee.

--IANS

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Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Sunday ordered a magisterial inquiry into the rape of a five-year-old girl inside a school here and asked for a report to be submitted by Tuesday.

He also said that a protocol will be formulated for all schools to ensure the safety of students.

"Shameful. (Such acts) Won't be tolerated. Police doing its job. Ordered magisterial enquiry. (The government) Will develop protocol for all schools to ensure children safety," Kejriwal tweeted.

The move comes a day after the crime took place in an east Delhi school and a peon was arrested in connection with it.

"The magisterial inquiry is being headed by Sub Divisional Magistrate (SDM) Vivek Vihar into the sexual assault by the school's staffer inside the school in east Delhi's Raghuwarpura near Gandhi Nagar, and its report is to be submitted within three days," a senior officer of the Delhi government said.

Expressing her concern over the incident, Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) Chairperson Swati Jaihind echoed Kejriwal's views and termed the move to chalk out protocol for schools a "very crucial step" to ensure safety of students.

Taking suo moto cognizance of the incident, the DCW Chairperson issued notice to the school and sought the list of male staff or contract workers (teaching and non-teaching) in the school, along with their designations, who have access to girl students.

The DCW in the notice also asked about the steps taken by the school to ensure safety of the children within the premises and also demanded from the school a copy of the CCTV footage of the entire day of the incident.

The incident came to light on Saturday around 3 p.m. when the child complained of pain in her abdomen. Her mother noticed bleeding in her private parts while taking her to the washroom.

"The accused, identified as Vikas, 40, who works as a peon, was arrested for sexually assaulting the five-year-old girl in an empty classroom," a senior police officer said.

"He was arrested from near his residence in Raghuwarpura after the victim gave his description to the police during a counselling session," he said.

Deputy Commissioner of Police Nupur Prasad said: "The incident occurred on Saturday around 11 a.m. at the Tagore Public School in Shahdara after school hours. The girl did not leave as she was waiting to take her half-an-hour extra class."

The accused has been working in the school for the past three years. He earlier worked in two other schools, said Prasad.

The police said a medical test confirmed sexual assault. Vikas has been booked under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act.

Meanwhile, the girl's grandfather alleged that police misbehaved with them when the minor was taken to Chacha Nehru Hospital. He also said that initially the doctors did not take this case seriously and only admitted the girl around 8.30 p.m. on Saturday.

"The child is still in trauma and terrified since the crime happened with her as Vikas threatened her with dire consequences," the girl's grandfather told IANS.

"He was inebriated at the time of committing the crime and also at the time of his arrest. The girl was later shifted to Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan Hospital from where she was discharged on Sunday morning," he added.

--IANS

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Former Prime Minister and senior Congress leader Manmohan Singh is scheduled to arrive here on Sunday, heading the party's policy planning group on Jammu and Kashmir, in an effort to bring peace in the state.

Security has been tightened in Jammu as Manmohan Singh arrives here, heading the party's policy planning group to interact with the leaders of like-minded political parties and cross sections of the local society in order to find ways and means to bring in permanent peace to the state.

Congress sources said senior party leaders including P. Chidambaram, Ghulam Nabi Azad, Ambika Soni and Karan Singh are accompanying the former Prime Minister on the two-day visit.

Party sources said the group would meet Congress legislators and other leaders at the state guest house in Jammu on Sunday.

"The group will meet 25 delegations of the civil society and mainstream opposition parties of the state," party sources said.

"Members of Jammu Bar Association, Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Kashmiri Pandit migrants and West Pakistan refugees are among the delegations scheduled to call on the group in Jammu on Sunday," party sources said.

--IANS

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The death toll from the recent magnitude-8.2 earthquake that rocked southern Mexico rose on Sunday morning from 65 to 90 after the Governor of Oaxaca said there had been 71 fatalities in his state alone.

'In an assessment meeting, Gov. Alejandro Murat revealed that the fatality figure from the earthquake had climbed to 71,' Oaxaca's Civil Protection Secretariat said on Twitter, reports Efe.

Federal Agrarian, Territorial and Urban Development Secretary Rosario Robles said in an interview with Milenio Television that on Saturday she had accompanied the Oaxaca Governor on a tour of several municipalities in the state.

Asked whether there was a confirmed number of fatalities, she put the number at 71 in that state.

On Saturday, the National Coordinator of Civil Protection, Luis Felipe Puente, said in an interview with that same media outlet that the preliminary death tally from the earthquake was 65,' of whom 15 were in Chiapas, 46 in Oaxaca and four in Tabasco.'

According to state and municipal sources, the municipality of Juchitan de Zaragoza, in Oaxaca state, was the hardest hit with around 60 deaths. But they warned that those figures remain preliminary.

The National Seismological Service said in its most recent report that as of midnight Saturday there had been 846 aftershocks of the magnitude-8.2 earthquake, which struck just off the coast of the southeastern state of Chiapas late Thursday.

President Enrique Peia Nieto said Friday that the earthquake, which was felt by around 50 million people nationwide, was the most powerful to hit Mexico in 100 years.

--IANS

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The Narendra Modi government-led central government's policy is to have very good Centre-state relations, newly sworn-in Minister of State (Independent) for Tourism, IT and Electronics K.J. Alphons said here on Sunday.

The 64-year-old forme bureaucrat and former Left supported legislator (2006-11) is just the second Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader from Kerala to get a berth in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government. O. Rajagopal was the first in 1999, in the A.B. Vajpayee-led government.

Meanwhile, in a statement on Sunday, former Chief Minister and veteran CPI-M leader V.S. Achuthanandan came down heavily on Alphons for his change of political affiliation.

"This change of position should have never happened to a fellow traveller of the Left. A fellow traveller of the Left should have never become a tool in the hands of fascists. The love of the country should have stood first and not a post. This should be a lesson when the Left selects candidates," said Achuthanandan.

Incidentally, it was during the tenure of Achuthanandan as Chief Minister (2006-11) that Alphons became a state legislator supported by the Left grouping.

"The policy of the Modi government is to have excellent Centre-state relations and I am confident that I will be able to do it as I have an excellent relation with Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan," said Alphons at Kochi airport, on his first visit to the state, a week after being sworn-in.

Alphons was received at the Kochi airport by BJP's Kerala unit President Kummanem Rajasekheran and two former state chiefs and other leaders.

Last Sunday, the day Alphons was sworn-in as a central minister, the state BJP headquarters in Thiruvananthapuram wore a deserted look.

The only celebration in the state was seen at his home, where local BJP workers watched the swearing-in ceremony with his mother.

Alphons, however, brushed aside questions of the Kerala BJP not celebrating his elevation. "The day I was sworn-in, people here were busy with Onam celebrations," said Alphons.

Another significant absentee at the airport was Tushar Vellapally, chief of Bharat Dharma Jana Sena (BJDS), the second biggest ally of the BJP-led NDA.

The BDJS, formed in 2015 by the Hindu Ezhava strongman Vellapally Natesan, father of Tushar, had secured 3.9 per cent of the votes at the 2016 assembly polls, He was hoping the national BJP leadership would give the party some significant posts in the central cabinet.

But so far, it has not got any and like the Kerala BJP leadership, the BDJS also has been cut up over the rather unexpected elevation of the former bureaucrat, who joined the BJP in 2011 and given an independent charge as the MoS.

Starting Sunday, the Kerala BJP leadership is organising a series of receptions for the new minister,the first one later in the day at Moovattupuzha. From there, when Alphons reaches his home town in Kanjirapally in Kottayam, nine road shows are planned.

On Monday, there would be a reception at Kannur when Alphons arrives for a private visit.

The next day, he will take part in a temple function at Kottayam. On September 15, a civic reception at his home town has been planned, followed by a meeting with various bishops.

On September 16, there will also be a reception in the state capital and he is scheduled to leave for Delhi later in the day.

Dismissing speculations that Alphons was given the post as he was a member of the Roman Catholic Church, Kanjirapally diocesan bishop Mar Mathew Arackal told the media on Sunday that Alphons got the post on account of his merit and need not be seen as a policy of the BJP to attract the minority communities.

"Our Church does not have any untouchability to any party and the Church always had good relations with the NDA government in the past also," said the bishop, who is based at Alphons' home town Kanjirapally.

--IANS

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Pakistan President Mamnoon Hussain and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Sunday discussed the issue of Rohingya Muslims being persecuted in Myanmar.

The two leaders met on the sidelines of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) summit on science and technology in Astana, Kazakhastan.

Both leaders discussed bilateral relations and pledged to further solidify the long-term relationship, Foreign Office Spokesperson Nafees Zakaria said.

Besides, they also spoke about regional issues including that of Afghanistan.

Lauding Islamabad's role in eliminating terror and restoration of peace in the region, Erdogan pledged his country's support to Pakistan's efforts for a peaceful resolution to the Afghan conflict, Zakaria said.

Separately, while addressing the OIC summit, President Hussain said Muslim countries around the globe should make collective efforts for the development of science and technology to meet the challenges of the new era.

Highlighting rapid changes occurring in the fields of science and technology, Hussain emphasised the need for enhanced focus of the Muslim world to improve the agricultural production and develop agricultural technology sector.

"With solid foundations of education and skilled healthy manpower, it will be possible to focus on higher education and research in emerging areas of science and technology," the President said. "Unity among the Muslim Ummah is very imperative for development, prosperity and a safe future for the new generation."

The President regretted that Muslim countries had failed to pay attention to education for the last several centuries, adding it was crucial for the Muslim nations to be self-sufficient in political and socio-economic sector "to revive the golden era of education".

--IANS

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The parents of seven-year-old Pradhuman, who was murdered in Ryan International School here, have urged the Haryana government to let the CBI investigate the brutal killing.

The child's father Varun Thakur, a senior executive in a private firm in Gurugram, on Sunday said that though police was doing its duty, the government should order a Central Bureau of Investigation probe into the case.

"What is wrong if the probe is handed over to the CBI? I believe there was a conspiracy behind the killing of my innocent son," he said.

He also urged government authorities to investigate the case as if his child was one of their's.

Pradhuman's mother Jyoti Thakur said the school management "misguided" them after the murder.

"First, we were told 'your child is injured'. When I reached the school, the Principal was speaking to someone on phone and she did not even pay attention to me and tell me about the incident."

Jyoti said when she reached the hospital, she saw her husband crying while clasping their son's body.

She said there could be a "conspiracy" behind the murder and that's why they were demanding a CBI inquiry to bring out the truth.

She said the arrested conductor, a resident of nearby Ghamroj village, had been made a scapegoat.

Pradhuman, a Class 2 student, was found dead on Friday by a school staffer in the washroom on the school campus in Bhondsi area near Gurugram city with a slit throat.

The boy's family resides in Maruti Kunj Society in the same area. Pradhuman's father is a senior executive with an export house in the Kherki Daula area. Pradhuman's sister is a Class 5 student in the same school.

Police late on Friday arrested Ashok Kumar, conductor of a school bus, for the killing but many believe he was made a scapegoat. The man's family too claimed he was falsely implicated since he was poor.

No one from the school management has so far come out with a statement on the shocking murder.

--IANS

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Young children with respiratory tract infections such as colds and pneumonia may be at an increased risk of developing asthma and weak lung function in later life, says a study.

The study of 154,492 European children found that those who had upper respiratory infections, such as colds, sinusitis, laryngitis, tonsillitis, pharyngitis and otitis, by the age of five years had a 1.5-fold increased risk of developing asthma in later life.

Children who had suffered from lower respiratory tract infections, such as bronchitis, bronchiolitis, pneumonia and general chest infections, had a two- to four-fold increased risk of developing asthma in later life and were also more likely to have worse lung function, according to the findings presented at the European Respiratory Society International Congress in Milan, Italy.

"These findings support the hypothesis that early-life respiratory tract infections may influence the development of respiratory illnesses in the longer term," said Evelien van Meel from Erasmus MC University Medical Centre, The Netherlands.

"In particular, lower respiratory tract infections in early life seem to have the greatest adverse effect on lung function and the risk of asthma," van Meel said.

The researchers analysed data from 37 groups of children from several European countries who were born between 1989 and 2013.

Children were included in this analysis if data were available on respiratory tract infections in early life (from age six months up to five years old), and childhood lung function and/or asthma.

The length of follow-up varied between groups, but ranged from birth until the age of four to 15 years.

Lung function and asthma are two different measures of respiratory health and are only partly related.

"Lung function is an objective measure of the function of the lungs and airways. Lung function could be affected without leading to symptoms, or it could lead to asthma or other complaints such as wheezing," van Meel said.

"Additionally, a child could be diagnosed with asthma but their lung function could be fairly unaffected, for example because they are taking adequate asthma medications," van Meel added.

--IANS

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Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi will on Monday address students at a US university, but will not be giving any talk on artificial intelligence.

Tweets by the Congress Vice President's office, and Sam Pitroda, chairman of Overseas Congress, said Gandhi's programme in the US included a series of events in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Washington and New York.

"Looking forward to addressing students @UCBerkeley & interacting w/Indian Overseas Congress members w/@sampitroda during my visit to the US (sic)," Rahul Gandhi's office tweeted.

Pitroda, who is involved with planning the events, told IANS in an email that Gandhi will not attend the Artificial Intelligence Conference.

"Rahul Gandhi will be travelling from September 10 to attend various events in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Washington and New York. He is not coming for the AI conference," he said.

Pitroda added that he will also meet "a few important people, listening, interacting and giving a few public speeches including one at the University of California, Berkley on September 11".

"He will be addressing a major event in New York organised by the Indian Overseas Congress on September 20," he said.

In a series of tweets, Pitroda said: "He is coming to meet with students and academicians and various thinking people in the US. He will be giving a talk at University of California, Berkley. He will be also meeting with Indian Overseas Congress members and others."

Gandhi is expected to speak on contemporary India and the path forward at Berkley. India's first Prime Minister and Gandhi's great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru had delivered a speech at Berkeley in 1949.

--IANS

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Assamese filmmaker Rima Das's "Village Rockstars" had its world premiere at the ongoing Toronto International Film Festival here amid big applause.

Set in Rima's own village Chhaygaon near Guwahati, "Village Rockstars" is the story of "poor but amazing children" who live a fun-filled life.

Introducing the film to the audience, Rima said on Saturday: "This film is about joy and happiness. It is about finding beauty in simple things. These children have very little but they are so happy.

"The story of the film is about what possibilities dreams can unleash," she added.

The film opens with the children having fun as a rock band. As the story progresses, it captures the whole gamut of fun that these rural children are having despite living a life of poverty and deprivation.

Among the band of these little boys is a girl called Dhunu aged 10. Raised by her mom after father died, Dhunu is an integral part of this fun-loving boys' gang.

Narrating how she thought about making "Village Rockstars", the filmmaker said: "I went to Mumbai to become an actor. There I was exposed to world cinema and I decided that I must make films.

"While in Mumbai, I was exposed to new things, but I was also missing something. I went back to my village and I found the little kids and their little performances. One day I told them I will make a film about them."

Rima said the children became so elated by the idea of a film on them that they started following her.

As they started pestering her too much, "I just started avoiding them", she said amid laughter.

Finally, Rima decided to make the film, chose the cast spontaneously and started shooting.

"It was all boys' cast initially. The girl (Dhunu) was added later."

Tt took Rima 150 days over three years to shoot the film as she did the shooting herself.

Rima said this film is an extension of her first film "Antardrishti".

Asked why she chose her own village as the setting for the film, Rima said: "The story is mine, but I must know the characters well. In my village, it was easy to know the characters.

"I like a layered structure of story-telling. Once you know your characters, your job as a filmmaker becomes easier. The innocence and energy of the kids was amazing."

(Gurmukh Singh can be contacted at gurmukh.s@ians.in)

--IANS

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After more than two weeks of violence in Myanmar's Rakhine state, the insurgent group Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) has declared a "temporary cessation of offensive military operations" for a one-month period to enable aid groups to respond to the "humanitarian crisis".

The ceasefire would begin on Sunday until October 9, the statement said late Saturday night.

ARSA's statement urged humanitarian aid to all victims of the crisis "irrespective of their ethnic of religious background".

It also called on the Myanmar government to cease all military offensive operations and participate in assisting the victims.

At least 290,000 ethnic Rohingyas have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh since August 25 after escaping violence in Rakhine, according to the latest UN figures.

Yanghee Lee, the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights for Myanmar, on Friday said that at least 1,000 people were killed in the violence over the past two weeks, though she said that figure is "very likely an underestimate", CNN reported.

However, the Myanmar government said that only 421 people have died.

The Rohingyas are considered to be among the world's most persecuted people. The predominantly Buddhist Myanmar considers them Bangladeshi but Bangladesh says they are from Myanmar, CNN reported.

Rohingya militants killed 12 security officers in border post attacks, according to state media.

In response, the military intensified "clearance operations", driving thousands of people from their homes.

Satellite photos released by Human Rights Watch show entire villages torched to the ground in clashes between Myanmar's armed forces and local militants.

In northern Rakhine state there are reports of at least another 30,000 Rohingyas trapped in hilly terrain without basic supplies of food, water or medicine, according to activists.

--IANS

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Saudi Arabia on Sunday said it would keep pressuring Qatar until demands by a bloc of Arab states are met, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir said.

The bloc's 13 demands include Doha ending its alleged support for Islamist extremist groups, closing a Turkish military base in the emirate and downgrading diplomatic ties with Tehran, Xinhua reported.

Qatar "must respond to these requests in order to open a new page", Jubeir said.

The Saudi move came just two days after US President Donald Trump spoke with the leaders of Saudi Arabia and Qatar in a bid to mediate.

The Saudi and Qatari rulers spoke by phone on Saturday, raising hope for talks.

But Riyadh later suspended the dialogue, accusing Doha of distorting facts by wrongly implying that Saudi Arabia had initiated the outreach.

--IANS

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Local authorities and security forces continued their search operation at the Dera Sacha Sauda headquarters near Haryana's Sirsa town for the third day on Sunday.

Curfew continued in the villages around the headquarters premises with paramilitary forces and Haryana Police keeping a strict watch.

Officials said that court commissioner A.K. Pawar, appointed by the Punjab and Haryana High Court to supervise the operation of the sprawling 700-acre Dera headquarters, is likely to hold a meeting with civil and police officers on Sunday evening to assess the progress and decide on how long it will continue.

Some former followers of the sect who had broken away from it, alleged that nothing big had been found in the search operation that began on Friday.

They alleged that the Dera management could have taken away incriminating evidence and other things.

Two secret tunnels and an illegal explosives factory were found inside the premises on Saturday.

Haryana government spokesman Satish Mishra said a case has been registered against the Dera.

Irregularities were found in the functioning of the hospital inside the Dera campus. These included a skin clinic being operated without licence, irregularities in pregnancy tests and the bodies being sent to other hospitals.

One of the tunnels was linked from the "gufa" (cave), a huge pink coloured building that was the ultra-luxury home of the rape-convicted sect chief, to the hostel for female disciples (sadhvis).

According to sources, the search teams also found hundreds of pairs of shoes, designer clothes and colourful caps of the now jailed Dera chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh.

A few computers, a luxury SUV and currency notes were seized by the authorities.

The Dera is spread over two campuses, 600 acres and over 100 acres respectively, about eight km from Sirsa and 260 km from Chandigarh. It houses a stadium, a hospital, educational institutions, luxury resort, bungalows and markets.

Ram Rahim was convicted in the 1999 rape cases by a CBI special court in Panchkula on August 25. He was later sentenced to 20 years of rigorous imprisonment and is lodged in the District Jail at Sunaria near Rohtak.

His conviction led to violence in Panchkula and Sirsa in Haryana, leaving 38 people dead and 264 injured. Isolated incidents of violence were also reported from Delhi and several other places in Punjab.

--IANS

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Authorities in Haryana conducted searches at the Dera Sacha Sauda headquarters near Sirsa town in the state for the third consecutive day on Sunday, with the whole operation finally ending in the evening, official sources said.

Security forces were present in strength at the Dera premises for the searches even as curfew imposed in villages around the premises was relaxed for a few hours on Sunday afternoon.

Officials said Court Commissioner A K Pawar  a retired District and Sessions Judge appointed by the Punjab and Haryana High Court on September 5 to supervise the search operation at the sprawling 700-acre Dera headquarters  was holding a meeting with civil and police officers to assess the progress and decide on the future course of action.

Informed sources said the Court Commissioner will submit a report to the High Court later.

The local administration had banned mobile Internet services, including SMSes, in Sirsa district till September 10.

Some former Dera followers claimed nothing worthwhile was found during the search operation that began on Friday and alleged that the Dera management could have carted away incriminating evidence and other things as the searches at the premises were delayed.

The sources said that JCBs and over 20 tractors requisitioned for the searches were not used for excavation on the premises.

Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar told media persons in Fatehabad town that there was "no delay" on part of his government in carrying out searches.

He said the government was awaiting the court orders to conduct the searches.

Two secret tunnels and an illegal factory to make explosives were unearthed on the premises on Saturday. Haryana government spokesman Satish Mishra said a case had been registered against the Dera management on this count.

Other irregularities found in the functioning of a campus hospital included the unauthorised operation of a skin bank, irregularities in the conduct of pregnancy tests and sending of bodies to other hospitals.

The sources said search teams found hundreds of pairs of shoes, designer clothes and colourful caps of the now-jailed Dera chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh.

A few computers, a luxury sport utility vehicle and currency notes were seized. The search teams also found fancy, modified and vintage cars, used by the disgraced sect chief, inside the premises.

Ram Rahim was convicted by a CBI court in Panchkula town adjoining Chandigarh on August 25 for the rape of two female disciples in 1999.

He was sentenced to 20 years of rigorous imprisonment and is lodged at the district jail at Sunaria near Rohtak.

His conviction led to violence in Panchkula and Sirsa in Haryana, leaving 38 people dead and 264 injured. Isolated incidents of violence were also reported from Delhi and several other places in Punjab.
BJP President Amit Shah on Sunday appealed to people in Gujarat not to feel the absence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi from the political scenario of the state and stated that he was better placed now to work for the development of the state than as its Chief Minister.

Amit Shah said: "There is no need to miss Narendra Modi in Gujarat. He placed Gujarat on the growth map as the Chief Minister, as the Prime Minister he is doing much for the development of the state. Who is more powerful, the Chief Minister or the Prime Minister?"

Shah was answering a question during a town hall video interaction with youth located at 100 places across the State. The event was called Adikham Gujarat (Resolute Gujarat) where the BJP chief claimed to have addressed one lakh youth by taking questions through the social media. He said, "Today I am not a politician, but a professor." He claimed 3.5 lakh questions had come and this spoke of the expectations and hopes from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Amid applause at the jam-packed Deendayal Hall, a questioner asked: "Politically we feel the absence of Narendra Modi and the scenario does not look the same after he has gone. What does the party intend to do?"

Shah grinned and said, "As the Prime Minister, he is helping in Gujarat's development by taking decisions at the snap of a finger. Within 10 days of assuming power in Delhi, the permission to increase the height of the Narmada dam came. And now he has ensured the radial gates are put at the dam."

"He travels across India with the interests of Gujarat in his mind and heart. Modi is very much here."

Another questioner praised the Narendra Modi government for demonetization as an effort to put an end to corruption in high places but wanted to know what was being done at the lower echelons of the government structure. In reply, Shah said, "We are doing a lot. An example of this is the direct benefit transfer scheme that we brought where subsidy benefits to poor are deposited directly in their bank accounts."

"This amount works out to a whopping Rs 59,000 crore. By the direct benefit transfer initiative, we have stopped corruption to the tune of Rs 59,000 crore. No media, no journalist had exposed this huge corruption because it was not visible," the BJP chief said.

The youngsters in the state were asked to send questions through Twitter, Facebook or by giving a missed call on 7878182182 and register themselves to send questions. Alternatively, they could ask questions on www.adikhamgujarat.com.

--IANS

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Two militants were killed while one surrendered as the overnight gunfight between hiding militants and security forces in Jammu and Kashmir's Shopian district ended on Sunday, officials said.

"Two terrorists were killed while the third one surrendered in an encounter with police and security forces which started last evening with police and security forces in Barbugh area of Shopian," said a police statement.

It said that acting on a specific information, Shopian police along with 44 Rashtriya Rifles launched a cordon and search operation in Barbugh area but came under fire and retaliated.

"Two terrorists were gunned down and identified as Altaf Ahmad Rather and Tariq Ahmad Bhat and the third one identified as Adil Hussain Dar surrendered," it said, adding arms and ammunition were recovered from the site.

"Both the killed terrorists were involved in attack on special police officer Khurshed Ahmad Ganaie at Bazar Imam Shahab in Shopian town.

"Bhat was also involved in attack on security force convoy and attack on sub-inspector, Gowhar Ahmad Malla. He was also involved in a bank robbery," the statement added.

The operations had started around 5.30 p.m. on Saturday.

Indian Army's Northern Command also said in a tweet that two terrorists were killed and one had surrendered. It identified Bhat as a member of the Hizbul Mujahideen.

--IANS

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President Donald Trumps admiration for Russian President Vladimer Putin has resulted in waves of wealthy Russians traveling to Trump properties to give birth.While Trump rails against U.S.-born children of undocumented immigrants, his Florida properties have become a playground for birth tourists from Russias upper crust, Katie Zavadski reported. for The Daily Beast.The Florida Trump properties are convenient options for wealthy Russians who can afford it. They are notorious for being investment properties for Russias hyper-wealthy, a safe place to store savings in U.S. dollars.And birth-tourism companies offer Trump apartments as part of packages costing upwards of $75,000.Trump does not criticize the anchor babies being born in his properties and is viewed as being welcoming  in contrast to his Border Wall posture.The presidents affection for Vladimir Putin and accommodating stance on Russia have had a trickledown effect: a Russian baby boom centered on Trumps Miami properties, Kali Holloway reported.Wealthy Russian couples not only want to give their babies the dividends that come with American citizenship, they want their birthing experience to be as luxurious as possible. Trump properties offer high-end digs, as well as a brand now recognized as extremely hospitable to all things Russian.As Trump is infamously aware due to his promotion of the birther conspiracy theory against President Obama, there are benefits to US citizenship.SVM-MED, a Miami birth-tourism company that also boasts outposts in Moscow and Kiev, offers three tiers of packages to its clients, with the top two advertising lodging in Trump Towers, The Beast reported.The most expensive package costs $84,700 for a Trump Tower II apartment with a gold-tiled bathtub and chauffeured Cadillac Escalade or Mercedes Benz.Not unlike those Trump wants to keep out with his border wall, the Russians just want a better life for their children.These families have no plans to work in the U.S. or pay U.S. taxes as their child grows. Rather, U.S. citizenship is an extra security blanket that the wealthy give themselves after months-long vacations on Miamis beaches, The Beast explained.It also gives their kids a shot at financial aid at U.S. schools and easier access to jobs in the U.S. After the child turns 21, he or she can also apply for family reunification, to get her parents and non-citizen siblings green cards to come to the U.S.And also, the name Melania has become very popular, a company owner told The Beast.
Urban floods are entirely manmade with poorly maintained drains, plastic bags, shrinking open spaces and climate change contributing to accumulation of water on roads after a heavy downpour, experts say.

They said that steps such as rainwater harvesting, ban on use of plastic bags and better use of weather forecasts will go a long way in helping tackle flooding in cities after rains.

Heavy downpours have been disrupting normal life in almost all metro cities in India, with Mumbai bearing the brunt last month which led to death of at least six persons.

Experts said a range of factors including rapid migration to urban areas and "lackadaisical attitude" of civic authorities were among the factors that contribute to cities coming to a standstill after heavy rains.

They said citizens also have to behave responsibly and ensure that plastic bags or used food plates are not thrown in the open or in the neighbourhood drains.

V.K. Sharma, Senior Professor of Disaster Management at the Indian Institute of Public Administration (IIPA), said the cities need a proper system of garbage collection and sewage disposal and regular cleaning of drains.

"It is true that poor drainage and sewage system is the real cause of urban flooding. There is also migration to cities which often leads to land encroachment and exerts pressure on the existing civic infrastructure," Sharma told IANS.

Sharma said the urban planning has to have a long-term perspective and infrastructure should keep pace with growth of population. He said rain water harvesting should be made mandatory.

"There is also the need of fixing accountability of government officials and municipal authorities if drains are not properly cleaned. Strict penalties should be imposed on people throwing garbage in the open," he said.

He said steps have been taken at some places to ban use of plastic bag but it should be enforced strictly.

"There is need to make people aware. This will also meet the larger goal of cleanliness," he said.

Sharma said that prediction of the meteorological department are fairly accurate and authorities can issue timely alerts to people in case there is prediction of very heavy rainfall.

"This will also help prevent loss of life," he said.

Santosh Kumar, a professor at the National Institute of Disaster Management with expertise in disaster risk reduction and policy planning, said climate change was also a factor in cities getting excessive rainfall.

"Urban flooding occurs when water flows into an urban region faster than it can be absorbed into the soil. Earlier, a city received such amount of rainfall in two to three weeks," Kumar said, referring to Mumbai getting 350 mm rainfall on August 29-30.

He said the cities do not have spaces to absorb the excess water or to store it.

"Rapid urbanisation, industrialisation and population growth have also contributed to drainage systems getting congested. These drains are not able to take the pressure of huge water accumulated due to heavy rain, leading to waterlogging," Kumar told IANS.

He said steps should be taken to improve garbage disposal and ensure that plastics do not find their way to drains.

"Urban ecosystems comprising marshlands, wetlands, lakes and rivers have steadily deteriorated," Kumar added.

Vinod Kumar Jain, director of NGO Tapas which works in revival of water bodies in Delhi, said "water harvesting can play a significant role in reducing the chances of flooding in urban areas."

Rainwater harvesting refers to trapping and storing rainwater so that it can be used at a later time when the need arises.

Heavy rainfall in Delhi last month had flooded roads and caused huge traffic snarls. On August 19, many parts of Chandigarh were flooded due to heavy rains. Chennai had witnessed severe flooding in 2015 while floods in Mumbai in 2005 had killed over 500 people.

(Amiya Kumar Kushwaha can be reached at amiya.k@ians.in)

--IANS

akk/ps/vm/tb

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
A day after Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan targeted Digvijaya Singh for his retweet against Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the Congress on Sunday hit back and asked why he is not ashamed of the Vyapam scam and the continuing farmers' suicides.

"Is he also ashamed of the country's biggest scam, that is, Vyapam? Is he ashamed of his forces shooting down six farmers in Mandsaur, and the continuing suicides by farmers due to his wrong policies?" Leader of Opposition in Madhya Pradesh Assembly Ajay Singh said.

On Saturday, Chouhan said that he was ashamed that Digvijaya Singh was once a Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh and belonged to his state, after the latter retweetd a meme of Modi that contained highly derogatory language in Hindi.

Ajay Singh said that Madhya Pradesh has been shamed in the entire country because of the Vyapam scam and the people who had got their education here are being seen with suspicion and over 50 people have died in the case.

"The Chief Minister claims to be the son of a farmer. Is it not shameful that his police killed six farmers in Pipliya Mandi in Mandsaur? Farmers have been dying by committing suicide and out of shock due to his wrong policies," the Congress leader said.

He said it was surprising that Chouhan could be ashamed of a retweet by Digvijaya Singh but not ashamed of all this happening under his nose.

--IANS

mak/rn

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When an election approaches, politicians make headlines for their skill with words. While the Odisha Assembly polls are still about two years away, rival parties have already started demonstrating their way with words. Bharatiya Janata Party President Amit Shah, who is visiting the state, dubbed the Naveen Patnaik-led Biju Janata Dal (BJD) government a burnt transformer and urged party workers to throw it into the sea. In response, the BJD described Shah as Blue Whale virus, who was speaking the language of a demon. The party was referring to the online game that has allegedly claimed several lives across the world. The BJD also criticised Shah for calling Odias poor people, who migrated to other states in search of livelihood.
Army Chief Gen Bipin Rawat (pictured) has sounded the possibility of a two-front war  with China on the one hand and Pakistan on the other. Pakistan has been waiting for China to take an aggressive stand against India. It was much disappointed with the India-China disengagement on the Doklam stand-off.
What sort of person applauds the murder of a fellow human being? And what sort of person follows such people on Twitter? These are not rhetorical questions. I mean them genuinely. In fact, theyre probably questions each of us should ask ourselves.
That Karnataka felt obliged to provide security cover to 18 of its intellectuals, including Girish Karnad, following the murder of firebrand journalist Gauri Lankesh is a sad reflection of our democracy. This shows that one needs state patronage to be able to exercise his or her right to freedom of expression. It is an acknowledgement of the prevailing atmosphere of fear.
The box, Manufactured history (September 9), extracted from Shyam Sarans book, How India Sees the World, states that India claimed the territory between the Karakoram and Kunlun ranges in 1958. If one reads the book, India-China Boundary Problem 18461947 by AG Noorani, it is evident that from 1840 to 1911, when the Chinese empire collapsed, the British were practically inviting them to come up to the Karakoram, being more worried about the Russians then.
Congress Vice-President will express his views on India at 70: Reflections On The Path Forward at the University of California, Berkeley, on Monday. The Institute of International Studies Berkeley Research on Contemporary India Program and the Institute for South Asia Studies are sponsoring the event.  has led the reorganisation of Indias Congress party since becoming the vice-president of the party in 2013.

At UC Berkeley, he will offer his reflections on contemporary India and the path forward for the worlds largest democracy. He follows in the footsteps of his great grandfather, Jawaharlal Nehru, Indias first prime minister, who delivered a historic speech at Berkeley in 1949, the university said on its website. A group called Sikhs For Justice has called upon the university to withdraw the invitation to Gandhi, citing the Congress alleged role in the 1984 anti-Sikh riots.

Bullet train project on track

The ground-breaking ceremony for the ambitious Mumbai-Ahmedabad high-speed rail corridor, commonly referred to as the bullet train project, will be performed in Ahmedabad on Thursday by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Japanese counterpart, Shinzo Abe. It will be held at a ground near the Sabarmati railway station.

Both leaders are expected to stay in Ahmedabad for three days, starting Wednesday. The train is expected to cover 508 km in two hours, with an operating speed of 320 kmph. It is expected to become operational by 2023. The corridor is coming up at an estimated Rs 98,000 crore, and 81 per cent of it will be in the form of a loan from Japan.

Modi will again visit his home state on September 17 to celebrate his birthday and pay a visit to the Sardar Sarovar dam to participate in the Narmada Yatra.

Odisha Assembly session ends this week

The eight-day monsoon session of the Odisha Assembly, which began on September 7, will end on September 16. The hallmark of the session was clashes between the government and the Opposition. The session had six official and two private members days.
At least 10 terrorists were killed today by the Egyptian security forces during a raid at their hideouts in a densely populated central Cairo neighbourhood, a security official said.

Five policemen, including three officers, were also injured in the shootout, he said.

Police raided two apartments in Ard Ellewa district on a tip-off that terrorists were hiding there and preparing to launch attacks, the state-run MENA agency reported.

When the police forces approached to the apartment, terrorists opened fire on them, the official said.

Ten terrorists were killed in the exchange of gunfire, he said.

A huge cache of arms and ammunition was also recovered by the police.

The militants were said to be the suspected members of a splinter faction of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood group.

Terrorist attacks, mainly targeting police and military, increased after the ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in 2013 by military following massive protests against his rule.

Hundreds of police and army personnel have been killed since then.

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Two security personnel were today injured in separate Naxal-related incidents in Chhattisgarh's Dantewada district, police said.

While one CRPF jawan was injured in an exchange of fire with Maoists, a DRG jawan sustained injuries in an improvised bomb blast, triggered by ultras, at different places, Deputy Inspector General of Police (Dantewada Range) Sundarraj P told PTI.

Both the incidents occurred in the forests of Aranpur police station limits, around 450 kms away from here.

Separate teams of Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), District Reserve Guard (DRG) and Special Task Force (STF) were out on anti-Maoist operations in the interiors of Aranpur, he said.

The DRG jawan from one of the patrolling teams came under the impact of explosion triggered by Naxals in the forest that left him injured, the DIG said.

In another incident, a gun-battle broke out between security forces and ultras leaving a paramilitary trooper injured, he added.

Reinforcement was rushed to the spots and the injured were shifted to the hospital in Aranapur, he said adding further details are awaited.

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Cyprus police arrested a 36-year-old man today for allegedly driving one of two boats that brought 305 Syrian refugees to the Mediterranean island's northwestern coast.

Another 29-year-old man was also taken into custody on suspicion of migrant trafficking.

Police spokesman Michalis Ioannou said the 202 men, 30 women and 73 children arrived about midnight in what is thought to be the largest number of migrants to reach Cyprus in a single day. He said they departed from Mersin, Turkey, yesterday.

The passengers reported paying up to USD 2,000 each to smugglers for the trip. Some with relatives in Cyprus have expressed a desire to remain, while others want to go to Germany or Scandinavia.

Among those waiting for the migrants at a reception center in the Cypriot capital of Nicosia was Ammar Hammasho.

The 35-year-old Syrian said he felt both joy and relief at seeing his four small children and wife behind the center's chain-link fence after fearing for their safety during the trip.

Hammasho came to Cyprus a year ago from the Syrian city of Idlib where he said his home was destroyed by airstrikes that killed one of his children.

"It's getting worse," Hammasho told The Associated Press.

"Everyone on either side is telling their own lies."



In Turkey, the coast guard stopped an unnamed fishing boat carrying 93 Syrians and one Afghan migrant today off the coast of Istanbul on the Black Sea. The authorities also caught an alleged Turkish smuggler.

Turkish authorities also announced late yesterday that coast guard boats had prevented two separate migrant landings in the Black Sea.

In one, 68 Syrians and two Iranians were stopped in a sailboat with an alleged Turkish smuggler east of Bulgaria.

In the other, Turkish coast guard intercepted 149 Syrian migrants and two Ukrainians thought to be smugglers in a fishing boat east of Romania.

The migrants and suspects were brought to northwestern Kirklareli province in Turkey for processing.

Turkey and the European Union signed a deal in March 2016 to curb the flow of migrants to Greek islands on the Aegean Sea.

A million people crossed the sea in the year before the agreement, with hundreds drowning along the way.

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Police have seized about



5.75 quintal ganja from a tractor in Bihar's Bhojpur district, a police official said today.

Acting on a tip-off, police intercepted a tractor on NH-30 near Ghagha village under Jagdishpur Police Station area around midnight and seized the contraband, Superintendent of Police (SP) Awakash Kumar said.

The seized consignment of ganja has been valued at around Rs two crore in the international market, Kumar said.

The driver of the tractor, however, managed to escape in the darkness, he added.

The tractor was on its way to Ara from Mohania in bordering Rohtas district.

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The Mizoram Excise and Narcotics department officials seized 236 grams of heroin from separate places in Aizawl and arrested five persons on charges of smuggling heroin, a department spokesman said today.

The persons were arrested yesterday, the spokesperson said.

They were booked under relevant sections of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985, the spokesperson said.

The seized contraband worth around Rs 11.50 lakh was reportedly smuggled from neighbouring Myanmar via Champhai district, the spokesman added.

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Punjab Local Government Minister Navjot Singh Sidhu today said that seven Amritsar Improvement Trust officials have been booked for allegedly siphoning of government funds.

The probe into the matter has been handed over to the the police after an enquiry by the Local Government Department, he told reporters here.

"Investigations started with three bank accounts. There was an inkling that the scam was around Rs two to three crore. But, after the department took the probe further, the net widened to 70 accounts and now there is a possibility that around Rs 80 crore could have been siphoned," the minister said.

The officials allegedly transferred the money from government accounts in their relatives name, and the scam remained under wraps due to want of departmental audit, Sidhu said.

On the basis of the probe, headed by the department's Chief Vigilance Officer (CVO) Sudip Singh Manak, the police have registered a case against Arvind Sharma, D C Garg, Paramjit Singh, Daman Bhalla, Tina Vohra, Sanjay Kapoor and Satnam Singh, he said.

The minister said that allegedly 49 cheques used to withdraw the money had Sharma's signature, two were signed by Garg and three by Paramjit. The officers will be suspended and charge-sheeted, he said.

Freedom has been given to the police to investigate the matter to put those guilty behind the bars, Sidhu said.

Kapoor, the CA of the department, never cared to probe the scam in spite of the fact that the government auditor raised 631 objections on the works being carried out by these people, he claimed, adding that a third party audit of all the trusts would be carried out.

"The matter pertaining to the alleged irregularities in the installation work of the highest tricolour near the Attari-Wagah border has also come to light and it was being probed," Sidhu said.

The department's CVO said that the modus-operandi of the accused was to deposit the money meant for trust's improvement in different bank accounts and then make withdrawals on the pretext of various works such as disbursal of salaries.

Besides, it has also come to the fore that these people made drafts in the names of their relatives and got them encashed, he said.

Manak said that many of the bank accounts were not even entered in the cash book of the department and more disclosures could be in the offing.

Deputy Commissioner Kamaldeep Singh Sangha and the Commissioner of Police S Srivastav were also present.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
At least eight terrorists were killed today by the Egyptian security forces who raided their hideout in the country's Ard Ellewa district, a security official said.

Five policemen, including three officers, were also injured in the shootout, the official said.

Police raided an apartment in Ard Ellewa district on a tip off that terrorists are hiding there and preparing to launch attacks, the state-run agency MENA reported.

When the police forces approached to the apartment, terrorists opened fire on them, the official added.

Terrorist attacks, mainly targeting police and military, increased after the ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in 2013 by military following massive protests against his rule.

Hundreds of police and army personnel have been killed since then.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
An Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) working in Warangal district of Telangana, who was recently diagnosed with swine flu died today at a private hospital here.

Wardhannapet ACP M Durgaiah Yadav (51), who had tested positive for swine flu last week was shifted to a hospital here from Warangal.

"The ACP who was suffering with ill health for the past few days has died today while undergoing treatment at a hospital in Hyderabad," an official release said.

Yadav had joined the police department as a sub-inspector in 1992 and had got promoted as Deputy SP this year and assumed the charge of Wardhannapet ACP on June 21, it said.

Warangal Commissioner of Police G Sudheer Babu and senior police officials have expressed their condolence to the family members of the deceased police official.

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National carrier has deferred the delivery of at least one A320 neo aircraft due to issues with CFM-manufactured engine, sources said.

The development also comes at a time when no-frills carriers -- IndiGo and GoAir -- have grounded at least 11 A320 neo aircraft due to problems in their Pratt and Whitney engines.

Airbus 320 neo -- the new engine option -- are more fuel efficient and Indian carriers have placed orders for more than 500 such planes.

The A320 neo planes of and Vistara are powered by CFM-made engines while those of IndiGo and GoAir run on P&W engines.

The sources told PTI that has deferred the delivery of at least one A320 neo plane due to problems with CFM engine -- probably the first instance of these planes facing woes on account of CFM engine.

Specific details could not be immediately ascertained.

Queries sent to Air India spokesperson on Thursday remained unanswered.

When contacted for comments about Air India deferring the delivery of aircraft on account of CFM engine issues, a spokesperson for Safran Aircraft Engines in an e-mailed statement said, "I regret to inform you that CFM does not want to comment."



CFM is an equal joint venture between US-based GE and France's Safran Aircraft Engines. It manufactures LEAP and CFM56 engines for commercial planes.

"We are working closely together with the engine makers and our customers on next deliveries, which are agreed with the customer," an Airbus spokesperson said in an e-mailed statement.

The aircraft for Air India are powered by LEAP-1A engine manufactured by CFM.

Currently, the airline has eight A320 neo planes in its fleet.

The national carrier took delivery of the first LEAP-1A- powered A320 neo aircraft earlier this year. Air India has plans to lease a total of 27 A320 aircraft, including neos.

Air India has a fleet of 112 planes.

Recently, Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju said technical snags faced by A320 neo aircraft operated by IndiGo and GoAir pose a "safety issue".

"Obviously, any failure is a safety issue. So, the operating procedure we changed... What is attractive is fuel efficiency. Fuel efficiency is one thing and risking life is another," the minister had told PTI in an interview.

His comments had come in response to a query on whether the P&W engine issues were a safety concern.

The aviation regulator DGCA has asked the American engine maker to expedite the supply of spare engines to India.

On whether there could be harsher action with respect to the engine issues, Raju had said some of the planes have been grounded because of regulations, implying that existing norms are strict.

"Why are they grounded, that is because of the regulations. You don't want to take risks with life... Everybody is working on it (addressing the engine issues). As long as glitches don't massacre human beings, it is okay. They will be addressed and sorted out," he had said.
The Congress is facing an uphill task in poll-bound Himachal Pradesh, with infighting and anti-incumbency emerging as the key challenges to its electoral prospects.

Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh has been demanding the removal of HPCC chief Sukhwinder Singh Sukhu and a worried central leadership of Congress is busy placating its old warhorse who has steered the party in the hill state for several decades.

Just when it seemed a solution was in sight, with Virbhadra getting a long-awaited audience with Congress president Sonia Gandhi last week, the AICC's general secretary for Himachal Pradesh, Sushilkumar Shinde, ruled out Sukhu's removal.

"There will be no change in party leadership," Shinde told reporters in Chamba where he is on a four-day tour to meet district level leaders.

The Himachal Pradesh Assembly polls are due later this year.

Virbhadra has maintained that he will neither contest the polls nor lead the campaign with Sukhu heading the Himachal unit.

He had earlier threatened to quit politics and told party MLAs in a recent meeting that he would not be able to work with Sukhu and withdraw from elections if the latter continues in his post.

With Shinde taking a hard public stand, it remains to be seen how the chief minister will respond.

Earlier this week, Virbhadra skipped a key meeting convened by Rahul Gandhi in the national capital after he came to know that the party vice president was not inclined to replace Sukhu.

According to sources, the Congress wanted a "compromise formula" to placate Singh and bring him on board. The leadership feels it is too late in the day to replace Sukhu.

The Himachal Pradesh chief has survived with the support of Rahul Gandhi so far, though it is learnt that Sonia is not averse to changing him.

During the last assembly elections, Singh had gotten the then HPCC chief Kaul Singh Thakur replaced. The latter had quit of his own accord in the party's interest after Virbhadra similarly threatened to quit in case Thakur continues.

This time though, Sukhu is not inclined to step down, party insiders say.

Caught in a conundrum, Congress leaders say if Virbhadra remains adamant, the party is not left with much of a choice for viable alternatives in in election-bound Himachal.

Sukhu, when asked about factionalism, said he didn't have issues with the CM and was working towards the party's interests.

"I have no issue with anyone. I have no tussle with anybody. I am a loyal party worker and am working honestly among the people for strengthening the party," he told PTI.

He said the responsibility and accountability of the organisation lies with him and he has worked towards that.

The chief minister however recently told a Congress Legislature Party meeting in Himachal Pradesh that he would not continue to be "humiliated" and go to the hustings "under" anyone's charge.

The party is looking to avoid a repeat of the situation withs its Gujarat state unit when its CLP leader Shankarsinh Vaghela quit just ahead of elections. Vaghela had been with the party for over two decades and was followed out of the exit by a few party MLAs.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Irked by recent controversies surrounding self-styled godmen, the Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad, the apex body of Hindu sadhus, today released a list of 14 "fake babas" and demanded a crackdown on "rootless cult leaders" by bringing in a legislation.

Giving out the list, which includes names like Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, Rampal, Asaram and his son Narayan Sai, the parishad's president Swami Narendra Giri said, "We appeal to even the common people to beware of such charlatans who belong to no tradition and by their questionable acts, bring disrepute to sadhus and sanyasis."



The parishad is a council of akharas, which are monastic orders drawing their spiritual lineage from 8th-century seer Adi Shankara, who is said to have established orders of martial monks with the aim of defending the Hindu Dharma.

The development comes close on the heels of a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) court in Haryana sentencing Dera Sacha Sauda chief Ram Rahim to 20 years in prison for the rape of two of his former disciples.

Large-scale violence took place in various parts of Haryana, Punjab and Rajasthan following his conviction by the court in the two cases.

Forty-one people were killed in Haryana in the clashes. However, no death was reported from Punjab and Rajasthan.

While Asaram is in jail in connection with a sexual assault case, his son Narayan Sai, also booked in a similar case, is out on bail.

Rampal is behind bars, facing trial in a number of cases relating to violence.

"We are going to send copies of this list to the Centre, the state governments as well as all the opposition parties with the demand that a strong legislation be brought to check the activities of these self-styled cult leaders," Giri told reporters here.

He also claimed that he had yesterday received a phone call from a person claiming to be a devotee of Asaram, who "threatened to kill me if a mention was made of his guru in the list of fake babas we planned to bring out today".

"An FIR has been lodged at the Daraganj police station in the city, based on a complaint of Giri. The matter is being investigated," Senior Superintendent of Police of Allahabad Anand Kulkarni said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Army Chief Gen. Bipin Rawat today unveiled a bust of 1965 Indo-Pak war hero Abdul Hamid here in Ghazipur district and felicitated the widow of the soldier who was awarded the Param Vir Chakra, the highest wartime gallantry medal.

On the occasion of the 52nd anniversary of his supreme sacrifice, Gen. Rawat and his wife Madhulika met Rasoolan Bibi, wife of Company Quartermaster Havildar Hamid and several other war widows and felicitated them.

The Army Chief also unveiled a memorial in Hamid's honour in his ancestral village of Dhamupur in Ghazipur district in Uttar Pradesh while exhorting the youth to join the armed forces.

Lauding the contribution made by people of the district to the armed forces, Gen. Rawat said a recruitment drive will be held soon in Ghazipur to encourage youthsto join the Army and contribute to the country's security.

He said Hamid destroyed several tanks of the Pakistan army during the 1965 war in the Lahore sector.

"Jahan Hindustan ki sena khadi hai, wahan khatra kisi aur se nahi (where the Indian Army is present, there is no threat from anyone)," the Army Chief said.

"Hamid was an inspiration for the youth and his extraordinary bravery made the country proud," he said.

On the Dokalam issue, Gen. Rawat said India and China have held talks and the situation there is under control.

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A tragic 2013 fire at the Albany Christian School has led to a four-year, $3 million facelift of the historic building, which has touched the lives of generations of mid-valley residents.

The Willamette Community Church has been housed in the former Albany Union High School building since 1964. The structure itself was built in 1899 and for decades served as an educational hub, including several years as a middle school.

Today, Albany Christian School is home to 280 students from preschool through eighth grades and the church serves 550 persons.

The community is invited to see these extensive renovations for themselves  including the recent completion of the gymnasium  from 1 to 4 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 23.

After the devastation

In July 2013, some 35 firefighters from Albany, Corvallis, Lebanon and Tangent battled an early morning blaze at the school. Their efforts kept the conflagration from entering a three-story atrium. Had that occurred, firefighters believed, the building may have been a total loss.

Church member Lee Eick leads the renovation team, which has included numerous volunteers.

Smoke damage was extensive throughout the building, he recalled. But the folks from Servpro did a fantastic job cleaning every single item from the basement to the attic.

Complicating both the cleanup and renovation was the fact that some ceilings within the structure were 12 feet tall.

We decided we should restore the building to its historic look, Eick said. That includes the tall ceilings and the addition of some schoolhouse-style light fixtures.

According to pastor Scott Miller, the renovation of more than 80,000 square feet has been completed in phases. A coffee bar area was completed in 2016 and features stunning stained-glass windows that date to 1907 and were moved from the First Baptist Church (Willamette Community Church's original incarnation), which once stood at Fifth Avenue and Lyon Street.

Miller has been the churchs lead pastor since 2008. He previously served as the Albany Christian Schools principal for seven years.

We took the smaller windows and added LED back-lighting, Miller said.

To enhance overall lighting throughout the building, old 300-watt incandescent bulbs were replaced with new LED bulbs. Roof leaks were fixed, as were plastered ceilings.

As the repair teams began their projects, they uncovered numerous secrets about the complex. Among them were lockers under the gym floor and a crawl space.

The gyms floor wood is amazing, Eick said. It is old, tight-grained wood.

The gymnasium and auditorium were constructed in 1938 and 1939.

In the attic, the names of numerous former students  including local Realtor and philanthropist Randy Tripp  can be found written, painted or scratched onto the walls or other wooden surfaces.

Eick said the long-term renovation project was physically exhausting, but mentally fulfilling. We have really given it a classic look. We really appreciate all of the work of our volunteers.

Eick said about 30 volunteers showed up regularly for work parties.

A long history

Mike Martins family has attended the church since the 1950s.

Everything had to come out of the building, he said of the fires aftermath. Desks, books, everything that was on the teachers desks.

Martin and his dad, Stan, both graduated from Albany Union High School.

Martin remembered helping raise what had been the shop area floor by four feet. We used to have to step down to get into the shop, he said. We built the floor up and the stage also was changed a lot from when it was the high school.

The church has a long history in Albany.

In 1867, R.C. Hill founded what was then called the Albany First Baptist Church at Second and Montgomery, later moving to Fifth and Lyon.

In 1964 the congregation purchased the current building for $59,916.16. It was remodeled and a school was founded with two full-time teachers and 57 students.

The church changed its name 10 years ago.

The younger Martin recalled how the church deacons decided on that bid of $59,916.16.

Each of the deacons wrote down their bid on a piece of paper and tossed it into a hat, he said. They added them all up and divided by the number of deacons and thats how the extra 16 cents came to be.
In a bid to find how alien observers might be able to detect Earth, scientists have found that at least nine exoplanets are ideally placed to observe the transits of our world.

Scientists from Queen's University Belfast in the UK and the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Germany turned exoplanet-hunting on its head, by looking for alien planet that can spot the Earth.

Researchers identified parts of the distant sky from where various planets in our Solar System could be seen to pass in front of the Sun.

They concluded that the planets Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars are actually much more likely to be spotted than the more distant 'Jovian' planets Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune, despite their much larger size.

"Larger planets would naturally block out more light as they pass in front of their star," said Robert Wells, a PhD student at Queen's University Belfast.

"However the more important factor is actually how close the planet is to its parent star - since the terrestrial planets are much closer to the Sun than the gas giants, they'll be more likely to be seen in transit," said Wells, lead author of the study published in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

To look for worlds where civilisations would have the best chance of spotting our Solar System, the astronomers looked for parts of the sky from which more than one planet could be seen crossing the face of the Sun.

They found that three planets at most could be observed from anywhere outside of the Solar System, and that not all combinations of three planets are possible.

"We estimate that a randomly positioned observer would have roughly a 1 in 40 chance of observing at least one planet," said Katja Poppenhaeger, from Queen's University Belfast.

"The probability of detecting at least two planets would be about ten times lower, and to detect three would be a further ten times smaller than this," said Poppenhaeger.

Of the thousands of known exoplanets, the team identified sixty-eight worlds where observers would see one or more of the planets in our Solar System transit the Sun.

Nine of these planets are ideally placed to observe transits of Earth, although none of the worlds are deemed to be habitable.

In addition, the team estimated that there should be about ten currently undiscovered worlds which are favourably located to detect the Earth and are capable of sustaining life as we know it.

To date however, no habitable planets have been discovered from which a civilisation could detect the Earth with our current level of technology.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Union minister Ramdas Athawale today asked Dalits not to support self-styled godmen like convicted Dera Sacha Sauda sect chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh and instead follow B R Ambedkar's ideology.

The minister, a prominent leader from the community, adviced political parties not to go to "bhondu babas" such as Ram Rahim after knowing the "reality".

The 50-year-old dera chief was jailed for 20 years in two rape cases by a court last month. The conviction led to widespread violence in which 41 people died.

"Ram Rahim Singh has been exposed, Dalits should not support him," Republican Party of India (A) leader Athawale told reporters here.

He appealed to Dalits to pursue the ideology of Ambedkar, one of the framers of the Constitution.

The Union Minister of State for Social Justice and Empowerment said one can have faith in somebody, but it should not be a blind one. "It is not right to support those babas who are on the wrong path," he said.

Ram Rahim, who is lodged at Rohtak's Sunaria jail, has a huge number of followers in Punjab and Haryana and other parts of the country, and many of them are Dalits.

"No political party should go to such a 'bhondu' baba (Ram Rahim). Parties after seeing the situation should properly inquire about babas before going to their places. They should never go with blind faith," Athawale said.

Dera supporters should not have resorted to violence after Ram Rahim was convicted in the rape cases on August 25, he said.

"It was not right to take the law into ones own hand for the 'characterless' baba after he was convicted," he said, lamenting the incidents of violence and damage to public and private properties.

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Filmmaker Ava DuVernay, TV host James Corden and writer Samantha Bee were among the winners at the Creative Arts Emmy Awards.

DuVernay's documentary "13th" was the biggest winner of the night, taking home four prizes for Documentary Special, Writing, Motion Design, and Original Music and Lyrics for "The Letter to the Free" by Common, Robert Glasper and Karriem Riggins.

Corden, 39, picked up the first award at the ceremony, for Variety Special thanks to his "Carpool Karaoke Primetime Special".

In addition to picking up that prize for the second year in a row, the "Late Late Show" presenter also took to the stage at the Microsoft Theatre in Los Angeles for the second time when the 2016 Tony Awards, which he fronted, was given the Special Class Programme award, reported Variety.

Picking up that accolade alongside the event's director, Glenn Weiss, Corden admitted it had always been his dream to host the Tonys, which honour excellence in theatre, and hailed the experience as "the single greatest evening of my life".

Bee picked up Best Variety Special Writing for her "Not The White House Correspondents Dinner" and credited her win to the writers she collaborates with.

"Thank you so much to Academy... To these people with me on stage tonight for making me look so good. These are the people who stand in a jet stream of daily obscenities and manage to write jokes about them," she said.

Actor Leah Remini was visibly emotional as she picked up her award for Informational Series or Special for "Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath" and dedicated the Emmy to the brave contributors who, despite ongoing risk and repercussion, spoke out and told their stories about being a part of the secretive religion.

She also joked about her own experiences, "Mom, thank you. You are officially forgiven for getting us into a cult."



Other winners at the ceremony included "Hairspray Live", "RuPaul's Drag Race" - which took three prizes, including Host for a Reality/Reality Competition Programme - and "Saturday Night Live".

The event was hosted by Bill Nye, who revealed he had stepped in to host in place of Hank Azaria, because the actor had gone to Florida to help move his mother to safety out of the path of Hurricane Irma.

The evening's awards focused on reality, documentary and animated programmes, and the second part of the prize-giving, for scripted programming, will take place tonight.

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Bihar's Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi was today briefed about the several IT initiatives taken up by the Hyderabad City Police in crime prevention, detection, public order management, traffic management among others.

Modi visited Hyderabad city today and studied the functioning of Hyderabad City Police.

The deputy CM also visited a police station here and Hyderabad Police Commissioner M Mahendar Reddy and other senior officials briefed him on the usage of IT enabled technologies by Hyderabad Police, as a force multiplier, in crime prevention, detection, public order management, traffic management, women and child safety, surveillance over criminals, work force management and so on.

"This has led to considerable reduction in serious crimes affecting public safety and security. The Hyderabad City Police has been working in partnership with the members of the public in popularising technologies in enhancing the standards of safety and security in Hyderabad City," a senior police official said.

"The Bihar Deputy CM studied the functioning of Hyderabad City Police and its IT initiatives, which will enable them to implement it in their state," he said.

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In an incident that has gone viral on the social media, BJP legislator Ameet Satam is seen physically assaulting local hawkers and verbally abusing police officials present there.

The BJP MLA from Andheri-West assembly constituency claimed that police officials failed to do their duty and demanded that their salary be paid to him as he is taking action against the hawkers.

"I have not committed any crime. A case may be registered against me if I am at fault. But, action should also be taken against police officials for allowing hawkers to operate freely," Satam said.

When asked to comment over the complaint filed by hawkers against him, Satam said allegations are made when action is taken against wrongdoers.

Condemning the incident, Shiv Sena spokesperson Neelam Gorhe questioned if this is the good governance BJP wants to implement in the state.

"If this is the style of certain BJP leaders, is this their style of good governance they want to implement? The hawkers policy has been finalised with guidance by the Court and it is the government's responsibility to implement it across the state," she said.

"By abusing the police officers, the BJP MLA has insulted the police force. It is condemnable," Gorhe added.

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State-owned Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) is betting on the national rollout of 4G VoLTE services, even as it begins preparatory work on 5G to stay future-ready, a top official has said.

"We are looking forward to pan India 4G VoLTE roll out and seeking spectrum from government," chairman and managing director Anupam Shrivastava said.

Late last year, the telco had written to the Department of Telecom (DoT) to allocate airwaves in the 700 MHz band for rolling out 4G services.

The company expects to get the government's approval soon for using airwaves in 700 MHz band for offering 4G and 5G services in the future.

would be required to match the highest bidder's price to acquire the spectrum though historically it is not required to participate in auction.

However, given the high debt burden of the telecom sector, the proposed auction of spectrum in various bands may get delayed by a year.

The telco is likely to report a revenue of Rs 28,700 crore in 2016-17, against Rs 28,400 crore the year before despite stiff price war from Reliance Jio.

Shrivastava said BSNL's balance sheet is least leveraged with just Rs 5,000 crore debt and the company is also aiming for profitability at net level in 2018-19.

He admitted that has been left behind but in the last few years, it is on a revival path as it ramps up its infrastructure backbone.

The company has finalised Rs 6,000 crore for setting up 40,000 new base stations which will be implemented by Nokia and ZTE.

Nokia will execute the work in the south and west regions while ZTE will do it in the north and east.

Telecom minister Manoj Sinha had recently said the country was switching from voice-centric to data-centric and expected that data usage in India to soon surpass China and USA.

VoLTE service allows even voice communication over data pipeline.

BSNL had introduced several competitive scheme for data but was unable to offer free unlimited voice but with VoLTE it will make such efforts possible, officials said.

Other private telecom majors like Bharti Airtel, Idea Cellular and Vodafone are also working in the VoLTE space.

Shrivastava said interaction with Nokia had already taken place on 5G for field trials and a knowledge sharing agreement has been signed with network firm Coriant.
The Centre today talked tough on alleged land encroachments in the name of tourism in Kerala, saying they could not be allowed.

"Encroachments of land in the name of tourism cannot be allowed," Union Minister of State for Tourism Alphons Kannanthanam told reporters at nearby Muvattupuzha.

He added that it was the state's responsibility to make arrangements to accommodate the large number of tourists thronging places like the scenic hill station of Munnar.

"Removing encroachments from a place like Munnar is the duty of the state government. But, one thing is for sure...Encroachments of land in the name of tourism cannot be allowed," Kannanthanam said.

He urged the Kerala government to identify land at places of tourist attraction like Munnar to help private players who are interested in developing tourism infrastructure.

The Union minister's statement assumes significance in the wake of the Kerala BJP's charges that land encroachments in Munnar were done with the support of local MLAs, MPs and politicians from both the ruling CPI(M)-led Left Democratic Front (LDF) and opposition United Democratic Front (UDF), headed by the Congress.

A BJP delegation, led by the party's Kerala unit chief, Kummanam Rajasekharan, had earlier informed Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh that the hill station "may witness an Uttarakhand-like disaster" if encroachments and illegal constructions on its fragile land were not stopped.

Earlier, Kannanthanam told reporters at the Cochin International Airport, where he was accorded a warm welcome by the state BJP leaders, that the Narendra Modi government at the Centre had vowed to work with all the state governments, including the LDF regime in Kerala, to do "big things" for the states and the country.

To a query on his statement on beef, the minister said he had already made his stand clear on the issue.

"In a democracy, people have the right to make their choices," Kannanthanam said.

On his first day in office on September 4, the minister had touched upon the contentious issue of beef, saying it would continue to be consumed in Kerala.

He claimed that the BJP had never said beef could not be eaten.

Kannanthanam, on his first visit to Kerala after becoming a Union minister, said the Modi government wanted to forge a good relation with all the states and added that he would work with all the state governments to fulfil the prime minister's dream of leading them on to the path of development.

"The Modi government wants good relations with all the states. Uplift of the poor is the prime minister's dream. All the states should join hands with the Centre to fulfil his dream," he said.

Recalling his "personal relations" with Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, Kannanthanam hoped that it would help him deliver good things for the state.

Flanked by Rajasekharan, former Kerala BJP chief V Muraleedharan andformer Union minister P C Thomas, he said, "All of us are ready to work together and do big things for the development of the country and the states."



Rajasekharan dismissed reports that Kerala BJP leaders were upset with the party's decision to offer a ministerial berth to Kannanthanam as "baseless" and said the leaders and workers of the party had, instead, welcomed the move.

"The central leadership of the party decides on such issues. All BJP workers have welcomed its decision," he added.

A bureaucrat-turned-politician, Kannanthanam, a BJP national executive member, is the first person from Kerala to become a minister in the Modi government.

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Fair trade regulator CCI plans to carry out a detailed study on pharmaceutical and healthcare segments, including differential pricing ways, as it looks to identify areas that pose competition concerns.

The proposal, mooted by the regulator, comes amid concerns over anti-competitive practices in the pharmaceutical and healthcare sectors.

Continuing with efforts to ensure healthy competition, the watchdog is mulling a situation analysis to understand the prescription and referral pattern of hospitals as well as medical practitioners.

Besides, the Competition Commission of India (CCI) instituted study would look into the tie-ups and networking amongst various stakeholders in the sectors.

An agency would be roped in for conducting the study that would focus on Delhi and three areas of the national capital region -- Gurgaon, Faridabad and Noida, as per a request for proposal document.

Exclusive tie-up through formal or informal arrangement for referrals, wherein people are required to get tests done from a particular laboratory, and bundling of various products as well as services would also be looked into.

"Price discrimination - differentiation in pricing/ packages depending upon the category of the patients- hospitals/ patients/ insurance companies/ third party administrators (TPAs)," as well as loyalty rebates would be analysed.

Further, prescription pattern in terms of branded and generic drugs apart from exclusive arrangement for procurement of medicine, implants and other consumables would be subject matter of the study.

The broader objectives of the study includes identifying areas of competition concern and measures to address them.

The prevalence of issuance of No Objection Certificates (NOCs) by trade associations and pharmacists would also be looked into. In recent times, the regulator has cracked the whip on various druggists and chemists groupings for indulging in unfair business practices.

"In the enforcement experience of the Commission, several anti-competitive practices in the Indian pharmaceutical and healthcare sector have come to the fore.

"In order to understand the nature and magnitude of such practices, the Commission has decided to conduct a study on pharmaceutical and healthcare sector in Delhi and select districts of NCR," the document said.

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China has substantially increased subsidies to the people living in the border areas along the India-China border in Tibet to motivate them to manage and control the border, a media report said today.

The subsidy for each resident above 16 years old in first-tier border towns has been increased from 1,000 yuan ($155) in 2012 to 2,700 yuan ($415) in 2017, and from 800 yuan ($123) to 2,500 yuan in second-tier towns, state- run Global Times reported.

In the past five years, the subsidies the government offered to the border residents has been rising, covering 160,000 people, Jiang Guojie, deputy head of the regional finance department, was quoted as saying by the newspaper.

The report said around 1.2 billion yuan ($185 million) was transferred to the border areas of Tibet in 2016 to increase the income of border residents, improve their living and working conditions and motivate them to manage and control the border.

Six billion yuan has been pooled to support the economic and social development of the border areas.

Tibet is the first provincial-level region in China to create a border subsidy system, the report said.
Aurangabad police today claimed to have cracked the murder case of a bank official within 24-hours by arresting four persons, including his wife in connection with the crime.

Jitendra Holkar (47) was allegedly murdered in the wee hours of Saturday in Chhatrapati Nagar locality of Satara area near the city.

Holkar was working as a branch manager with a district bank at Shekta village in Paithan tehsil of the district.

"The wife of the slain bank officer, a political party worker and two others were nabbed within 24 hours on the charge of murder," said a senior police official.

"The deceased Jitendra Holkar used to doubt his wife Bhagyashree's character and so she made a plan to eliminate him with the help of a political party activist Kiran Ganore," said Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) Rahul Shrirame.

He added, Ganore (40) took Rs 2 lakh to execute the crime and in turn employed one Tauseef Ibrahim Shaikh and Shaikh Husain Shaikh Basheer to do the job.

Tauseef and Hussain murdered Holkar by silting his throat, said the official.

DCP Dipali Dhate-Ghadge said the CCTV footage of the locality police showed Ganorkar and Tauseef moving in a suspicious manner in the locality.

Later on a tip off, that Tauseef had committed some crime, police arrested him and he spilled the beans about the act, said the official.

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BJP president Amit Shah today asked the youth of Gujarat not to fall prey to the anti-BJP propaganda being mounted by the Congress on social media.

Shah's statement came at a time when messages critical of the 'Gujarat model of development' under the BJP rule in the poll-bound state were being circulated on social media.

During his interaction with youths at 'Yuva Townhall', Shah also came down heavily on the Congress and its vice president Rahul Gandhi, who had recently visited the city and questioned the BJP over its development claims.

Replying to questions, Shah touched upon issues such as implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST), unemployment and demonetisation, and claimed that the Narendra Modi government has brought in substantial change during its three-year rule.

"I appeal to the youth not to blindly believe the anti- BJP propaganda being spread on WhatsApp and Facebook. Before making any judgement, you need to do analysis of what was Gujarat before the BJP came to power and what is the situation today," said Shah.

"This propaganda is largely spread by our opponent Congress," the BJP president claimed.

Responding to a question about the BJP government's achievements in Gujarat, Shah shared several figures about growth in agriculture sector, increase in per capita income, rise in the size of state budget, increase in the number of universities and several other parameters to prove his point that significant development took place after 1995.

The BJP first came to power in Gujarat in 1995.

"I want you to apply your mind before believing what is being circulated in WhatsApp. Just compare what kind of development took place before the BJP came to power and afterwards. These figures will clearly tell you that it was the BJP which did development," claimed Shah.

He added that these figures related to the development in Gujarat will be uploaded on the BJP's website so that youths can circulate it on social media to counter the propaganda.

"Before 1995, when the Congress was in power, curfew and communal riots were rampant. Even the 'Rath Yatra' was attacked. Power cut of 10 to 15 hours was normal in rural parts of state during the Congress rule. But today, every part of the state is getting 24-hour uninterrupted power supply," Shah said.

"Rahulbaba (Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi) recently came here and raised question about development. I want to tell him that the venue of his event, the Sabarmati Riverfront, was nothing short of a pit of dirty water when the Congress was in power. Today, it is considered as the best riverfront in the world," the BJP chief added.

"Gujarat's per capita income was just Rs 13,665 before 1995. Today, it is Rs 1.41 lakh. Is this not development Rahulbaba?" asked Shah, adding that the people of Gujarat should not get carried away by the false claims of the Congress and its leaders.

Responding to a question related to the BJP's approach towards creating more employment, Shah said the method of calculating employment in the country needed to be changed.

"I believe that employment should not be linked only with jobs. You can't give jobs to 125 crore citizens. Employment should also mean self employment, start-ups or starting a small business. Thus, the method of calculating the employment generation, which solely takes into account job creation, should undergo change," the BJP chief said.

Responding to a question on the GST and its benefits, Shah said the BJP government at the Centre was trying its best to make it more trader-friendly.

"We know that some (traders) are facing difficulties due to GST. But, the government is aware about it and understand your problem. The GST Council can always change the rules. Our aim is to make GST trader-friendly," he said.

Responding to a question on demonetisation and its success, especially when the RBI has declared that almost 99 per cent notes have came back, Shah said the exercise was aimed at pushing the country's economy forward by increasing the number of tax payers.

"The RBI has declared that around 99 per cent notes have came back. But, did anyone asked the RBI how much were there in the past? Earlier, only 80 per cent currency notes were in the system, as 20 per cent notes used to remain with corrupt people, be it politicians or officers. Now, all these notes are back in the system," said Shah.

"Prior to demonetisation, only 3.6 crore people used to pay income tax. But now, it has risen to 6.3 crore. This shows that people are becoming honest. It is very easy to criticise something. But, demonetisation was an attempt to boost the country's economy by increasing the number of tax payers," he said.

Over one lakh youths sitting in 312 different locations across Gujarat saw the event live while some of them even asked questions through video-conferencing.

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Delhi Police Commissioner Amulya Patnaik has asked district police chiefs to ensure that schools in their areas have adequate security measures in place, after a five-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a peon inside the premises of a private school in Shahdara.

The deputy commissioners of police (DCPs) of all districts have been asked to talk to school authorities and conduct regular security audits.

"The DCPs will be advising schools to hire staff from authorised agencies. The schools also should get a police verification done of the hired staff," said Dependra Pathak, chief spokesperson, Delhi Police.

Security audits would mean checking whether there is any particular time the children are left unattended, areas where the staff and children have access to and whether the teachers are handing over the students to their parents or leaving them unattended, explained the officer.

The schools will be asked to ensure that there are CCTV cameras installed inside the premises.

The 40-year-old peon of Tagore Public School has been arrested for allegedly raping the girl inside the Shahdara school yesterday.

The incident came close on the heels of the gruesome killing of a seven-year-old boy who had his throat slit for allegedly resisting sexual assault by a bus conductor of a Gurgaon school -- an incident which sent shock waves across the country.

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An exhibition on the life and times of Mimar Sinan, the chief architect of the Ottoman empire in Turkey, has opened in the city.

The exhibition, organised by the Turkish Consulate General in Mumbai and Rachana Sansad's Academy of Architecture, is the first of its kind in India, Turkish Consul General Erdal Sabri Ergen told PTI.

The exhibition opened on September 8 and will continue till September 17, he said, adding the event will help in boosting cultural ties between India and Turkey.

"It will contribute to building cultural bridges between the two countries as lasting as the bridges of architect Sinan," he added.

"Mimar Sinan had completed more than 400 projects in a career of 50 years, thereby revolutionising architectural form and space in conjunction with geometric purity of structural system, materials, natural light and seismic engineering," Ergen said.

Sinan was a contemporary of legendary architects Palladio and Michelangelo, but his works remain largely under- mentioned outside the geographical regions where his buildings are found, he said.

The exhibition, being held at the iconic public library of the Mumbai university below the Rajabai Tower in South Mumbai's Fort area, includes photographs by noted Turkish lensman Kamil Firat.

The architectural masterpieces of Sinan include the grand Suleymaniye Mosque in Istanbul, many caravansarais ( guest houses/hostels designed for merchants & their caravans), aquaducts (water supply channels) and bridges, among others, spread all over the erstwhile Ottoman Empire, he said.

The Turkish Consulate in Mumbai has brought part of a UNESCO Heritage Committee Exhibition, that took place in Istanbul in 2016, here, Ergen said.

Acting Vice-Chancellor of the University of Mumbai, Devanand Shinde, speaking at the inaugural event, dwelt on the interaction between the Ottoman Empire and India and how Yusuf, an Ottoman architect and disciple of Sinan, was involved in building the Taj Mahal.

Noted architect Hafeez Contractor recalled the time when he visited Istanbul and saw most of Sinan's masterpieces.

"Istanbul receives over one crore visitors a year mainly due to Sinan's work," he said.

Mumbai could follow in the footsteps of Istanbul in placing more of its heritage buildings in the UNESCO list and by making arrangements like better lighting and footpaths in order to make them more tourist-friendly, he said.

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A family from the south coast of England are planning to take legal action against their six- year-old son's school for allowing one of his classmates to wear a dress to school.

Nigel Rowe, 44, and Sally, 42, have withdrawn their son from the school, who will now be schooled at home with his older eight-year-old brother, who had also been removed from the same Church of England school a year ago when his classmate also started wearing dresses.

"A child aged six would sometimes come to school as a girl or sometimes come to school as a boy. Our concerns were raised when our son came back home from school saying he was confused as to why and how a boy was now a girl," Nigel Rowe told The Sunday Times.

"We believe it is wrong to encourage very young children to embrace transgenderism. Boys are boys and girls are girls. Gender dysphoria is something we as Christians need to address with love and compassion, but not in the sphere of a primary school environment," he said.

The couple argues the school has acted without due regard to the best interests of their son or other pupils; failed to consult other parents; and has not respected their rights as parents to bring up their children with biblical values.

The school, which has not been named, said that it followed Church of England guidance, and said transgender children were protected under the Equality Act 2010.

It added that the local East Sussex County Council's guidance on transgender children set out that they should not be seen as a problem, but "as an opportunity to enrich the school community and to challenge gender stereotypes and norms on a wider scale".

Lawyers for the couple are expected to say the school is wrong to rely on the Equality Act because legal recognition of gender reassignment applies only to people over 18.

They will also argue the school is discriminating against the Rowes by implying that their wish to bring up their sons with biblical beliefs is transphobic.

The family is also being supported by the Christian Legal Centre and its chief, Andrea Williams, said, "this new transgender ideology is being aggressively imposed on unsuspecting schools, parents and children. It is delusional and abusive."



"School classrooms, which should be one of the safest environments for children, are rapidly becoming dangerous battlefields in a war brought on by a radical transgender ideology. Vulnerable children are being used as pawns and will be harmed the most. We need to call it what it is.

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A 55-year-old farm labourer was electrocuted when he came in contact with a live wire at a village in Odisha's Jajpur district today.

Ananda Behera, the daily wage earner of Routarapur village located in Dharmasala police station limits, was electrocuted when he came in contact with the snapped live wire lying on the field, police said.

On being informed, the police reached the spot and sent the body for post-mortem.

A case of unnatural death has been registered and further investigation is on, the police said.

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Farmers in Sikar district have called for a blockade and 'gherao' of district collectorate on Monday after talks with the state government failed to resolve their issues even as their protest entered the tenth day today.

The farmers have been demanding the implementation of Swaminathan Commission recommendations and crop loan waiver.

To resolve the issue, Rajasthan's 'Devsthan' Minister Rajkumar Rinwa spoke to the farmers but it did not yield any positive result.

"We were given an assurance letter by the government that it wants to resolve the issues but nothing concrete came out in the meeting. We stand firm on our demands and will block roads on Monday," former MLA and leader of the Akhil Bhartiya Kisan Sabha, Amra Ram, told reporters here.

Rinwa had earlier assured farmers that the government was serious on their demands.

He said that a committee will decide on the issues.

Meanwhile, NPP MLA Kirori Lal Meena and independent MLA Hanuman Beniwal reached Sikar today to lend their support to the farmers' protest.

Talking to the reporters, Meena said that demands of the farmers were justified.

They are protesting from last 10 days and state government is neglecting their issues, he said.

Ample security arrangements were made in Sikar and nearby areas to maintain law and order situation, the police said.

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A major fire broke out today at a government building here in Pakistan, killing two persons and injuring five others, officials said.

The fire, which had reportedly been 'cleared' by the fire department initially, re-emerged this morning at the six- storey building after which Pakistan Navy and firefighters had to be called in to contain it.

The blazes at the Awami Markaz building near a five-star hotel in the Red Zone were doused by this afternoon with the help of seven fire tenders, Geo reported.

Two people were killed and at least five others injured, it said.

The two night-shift employees jumped out of the building to escape the fire but sustained grievous injuries, leading to their death, the report said.

The building houses several private and government offices.

The fire began on the ground floor near an office of the Federal Tax Ombudsman where records are also said to have been completely destroyed, officials said.

Rescue officials said that the two persons should not have jumped from the building as a fire exit was available.

Sources said the fire was triggered by a short-circuit.

A three-member committee has been formed to probe the incident.

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Police have arrested four people for snatching money and an ATM card from tourists in Udhampur district of Jammu and Kashmir.

Vinod Kumar, from Madhya Pradesh, lodged a complaint at Udhampur police station on September 7 stating that he and his family members were robbed while they were returning from a trip to Leh.

Kumar alleged that they were offered a lift to Udhampur railway station in a white Xylo by four people who said they were headed in the same direction, police said.

The complainant and his three family members accepted the offer and rode along. A little later, Kumar alleged, the four original occupants robbed them of Rs 90,000 and an ATM card, and pushed them off the vehicle before fleeing from the scene.

A case was registered at Udhampur police station and all checkpoints were alerted.

Yesterday, the vehicle was stopped at a checkpoint in Udhampur and after an inspection, its occupants were arrested.

The accused have been identified as Lal Chand from Faridabad, Mohd Irfan from New Delhi, Shri Nath of Allahabad and Asgar Ali from MP.

Police have seized the vehicle and recovered the cash and the ATM card.

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Germany would lend its weight to a diplomatic push to end North Korean nuclear weapons and missile development along the lines of a past deal with Iran, Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Sunday.

"I would say yes immediately if we were asked to join talks," Merkel told weekly newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung.

Talks between Iran and six world powers, sealed with a 2015 deal for Tehran to roll back its nuclear programme and submit to inspections in exchange for some sanctions being rolled back, were "a long but important period of diplomacy" that had achieved a "good end," she added.

"I could imagine such a format for the settlement of the North Korea conflict. Europe and especially Germany ought to be ready to make a very active contribution," Merkel said.

The chancellor said she had held telephone talks with the leaders of France, the United States, China, South Korea and Japan about the North Korea crisis over the past week, and is expected to speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Merkel's comments come as Washington has formally requested a Monday vote on tough new sanctions for Pyongyang at the UN Security Council.

US diplomats have called for an oil embargo, an assets freeze against leader Kim Jong-Un, a ban on textiles and an end to payments of North Korean guest workers in response to the nation's sixth nuclear test last week.

But the measures could founder on opposition from permanent Security Council members Russia and China.

Merkel said that she backed sanctions as a means of bringing North Korea to the negotiating table.
Godrej Appliances, the consumer durables division of the Godrej Group, is eyeing a turnover of Rs 4,000 crore this fiscal, at growth of over 20 per cent.

"We are targeting Rs 4,000 crore for the year 2017-18. April was good and after that May, June, July have got impacted because of GST. With the declaration of GST rates in May, we saw a dip in demand, largely purchases by trade partners.

"We saw a good purchase by trade partners in anticipation of festive season. We expect this momentum to continue now and at an overall level, by the end of the year, we should be able to deliver a growth of over 20 per cent," Business Head and Executive Vice President Kamal Nandi told PTI.

The company is also expecting 30 per cent growth in sales during the current festival season.

"We have plans to launch a lot of products. We have already launched front-load washing machines, now we will be launching microwaves. With all the new launches and good consumer offers, together this should help us to drive a growth of about 30 per cent during this festive season," Nandi said.

Refrigerator segment contributes around 55 per cent to the turnover, followed by air conditioners (20 per cent), washing machines (15 per cent), microwaves (3 per cent) and service revenue about 5 per cent.

Currently, metro cities account for 35 per cent of sales, while non-metros contribute the remaining 65 per cent.

"We will see good demand coming in from tier II, tier III and R1, R2 given that monsoon deficit is only 3 per cent. That should result in good agricultural output, therefore these markets should do well in festive season," he said.

The company, which spends 5 per cent of its turnover on marketing, enjoys a market share of 15 per cent in the overall Rs 12,000 crore refrigerator industry and 10 per cent share in the estimated Rs 5,000 crore washing machine market.

is betting big on the premium space.

"Premium segment is the fastest growing category, therefore the focus is more on developing premium portfolio and cover all segments in the premium category," he said.

"There are gaps in our premium portfolio and we are bridging those gaps. By 2018, all our launches will be over, which will cover the entire premium portfolio range for all categories," he added.

The company had forayed into premium home appliances segment with the launch of NXW brand two years ago.

"Currently NXW contributes to about 10 per cent of the overall business and our target is to take it to 30 per cent over three years," Nandi said.

E-commerce accounts for 7-8 per cent of the sales and the company expect it to grow in the future.

The company entered Maldives last month with a range of environment-friendly air-conditioners and is also looking at exporting them to Nepal.
The Consulate General of Nepal in Guangzhou officially opened on Sunday.

Nepal and China cherish a long history of a close and cordial relationship, said Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs of Nepal Krishna Bahadur Mahara.

"We consider that the Belt and Road Initiative promoted by President Xi (Jinping) can benefit countries like Nepal for upgrading infrastructure and improving connectivity among the participating countries and bring in lots of economic opportunities across the border," he said.

"We also want to work together with China in trade and commerce. Over 60 percent of our trade with China originates in Guangdong. The opening of the consulate general reflects the increased level of economic and commercial engagements and deepening people-to-people relations between Nepal and Guangdong province," he said.

China and Nepal are enjoying frequent high-level exchanges, deepening political trust and economic cooperation and encouraging more people-to-people exchanges, said He Ying, deputy director-general of the Department of Consular Affairs of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of China.

In May this year, the two governments signed an MOU on the Belt and Road Initiative, and the two countries are facing new momentum of practical cooperation in various fields under the framework of the Belt and Road Initiative.

"China wishes to work with Nepal, to align our development strategies, to expand win-win cooperation and to build a community with a shared future," He said.

Nepal's consulate general in Guangzhou is the second on the Chinese mainland, after the first one established in Lhasa, with its consular district including the provinces of Guangdong, Hainan and Fujian and the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region.

Direct investment from China into Nepal has reached $351.32 million, channeled into sectors including farming, construction, energy, information technology, manufacturing, mining, tourism and services. Total foreign direct investment into Nepal has come to $2.16 billion, said Ravi Bhattarai, consul general of Nepal in Guangzhou, at an investment promotion conference on Sunday.

Trade between the two countries accounts for about 13 percent of Nepal's total foreign trade.

The two countries have close social, political and economic relations. With similar culture, religion and language at border areas, the business environment stands at congenial.

Air and land transport connections between the two countries have been improving, Bhattarai said, adding Nepal enjoys cost competitiveness.

Nepal is encouraging foreign investment into several fields, including hydropower, aviation, transport infrastructure, special economic zones, petroleum pipelines, mining, financial services, power transmission lines, tourism, agriculture, dry ports, smart cities, manufacturing, health and education.

Nepal Airlines has applied for a permit for operating flights in Kathmandu-Guangzhou sector.

liwenfang@chinadaily.com.cn
As anxious Florida residents watched weather forecasts this week, it seemed clear Hurricane Irma was on track to strike Miami, Fort Lauderdale and other Atlantic coast cities, prompting a massive evacuation.

But on Saturday, all that changed when Irma's course shifted.

By Sunday morning, the Tampa-St. Petersburg area, once thought to be relatively safe from harm, suddenly found itself in the storm's crosshairs.

"We know that we are ground zero for Hurricane Irma," Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn said at a Sunday morning news conference. "We have for 90 years avoided this day, but I think our day has come."

The last time Tampa was hit by a major hurricane was in 1921.

Buckhorn quoted boxer Mike Tyson, saying, "Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face."

"Well," he added, "we're about to get punched in the face."

Forecast models had anticipated Irma turning north earlier than it did, said CNN meteorologist Judson Jones. That would have put the hurricane over the east coast of Florida.

"What happened was the storm continued -- after interacting with Cuba -- to move west-northwest," Jones said. "It took longer to make that turn to the north that we started to see more over the last 12 hours."

Jones warned that some Floridians "may not have power for a number of days, if not weeks."

Irma's threat prompted Tampa officials to order a 6 p.m. curfew for Sunday evening. Neighboring St. Petersburg announced a 5 p.m. curfew.

With about 3 million people, the Tampa Bay metropolitan area is the second-most populous in the state.

Buckhorn said areas along the Tampa Bay shoreline could expect a dangerous storm surge anywhere from 3 to 8 feet, adding that it would depend on where Irma went.

"What we really fear more than anything is that storm surge," Buckhorn told CNN's Anderson Cooper on Sunday.

Jones said the severity of the storm surge depended on which side of the storm Tampa was on.

"If Tampa stays on the east side of the eye, we expect the storm surge to be worse than if the eye moves inland and the west side of the storm hits it," he said.

That's because wind from the east side of Irma would be blowing toward Tampa, pushing water from the bay inland and raising the height of the storm surge, he said.

Mike Merrill, the Hillsborough County administrator, said 28,000 people had taken refuge in 45 county shelters.

There's room for more, he said, but conditions are so dangerous that "we're not saying get in your car and go. ...This is the time to stay where you are."

He said first responders and law enforcement officers have been pulled in until the weather lets up. St. Petersburg Fire and Rescue has also suspended emergency services due to dangerous weather conditions.

"I will tell you in no uncertain terms -- and I am not going to sugarcoat it -- this is going to be a difficult storm," Buckhorn said at the news conference. But he emphasized that Tampa is prepared.

"So look out for your neighbors, take care of each other," he said. "This is when we are Tampa strong. This is what we do."

CNN's Judson Jones contributed to this report.
Defence Minister on Sunday said that maintaining an optimum state of readiness of the armed forces on all fronts would be given top priority, comments which came amid concerns over security challenges on the countrys northern and western borders.

We should be prepared to deal with security challenges without discussing who is a stronger enemy  China or Pakistan. Our defence forces need to be completely prepared. We need to fill the gaps and the government is committed to strengthening the armed forces, she told reporters, in reply to a question.

To a query on Army chief General Bipin Rawats statement that India should be prepared for a two-front war with China and Pakistan, the defence minister evaded a direct reply and said that it would be her priority that there was no dearth in the preparedness of defence forces.

She interacted with senior officers of the Indian Air Force at the frontline Uttarlai airbase in Barmer in Rajasthan.

Sitharaman was the first defence minister to visit the sensitive airbase in 16 years, after George Fernandes in 2001.

Air Chief Marshal B S Dhanoa was also present at the base.

The defence minister was apprised of the role of the airbase and the nature of its operations, the IAF said.

Talking to mediapersons, Sitharaman said that meeting the demands of the armed forces with a view to maintaining optimum state of readiness and preparedness on all fronts would be accorded priority.

The 58-year-old defence minister said, I am obeying Prime Minister Narendra Modi's directions to meet the jawans posted on the frontiers.

I was in Goa earlier in the morning to flag off Indian Navy women crew's attempt to circumnavigate the globe and now have come to Uttarlai Air Force base in Barmer, she said.

The newly-appointed defence minister said Uttarlai airbase was important from the strategic point of view.

On the issue of terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir, she said that the government was making all efforts to counter terrorism in the state.

The Centre was closely working with the state government to counter terrorism and the local police were doing good work in the dealing with the issue.

Asked whether India would have a dialogue with Pakistan on the issue of Kashmir, she said that the external affairs ministry had clearly expressed its view on the issue.
Former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda today said a CBI probe should be ordered by the Centre into the killing of a seven-year-old student of Gurgaon's Ryan International School.

"People's anger in this case is a natural reaction. A heinous crime has been committed, an innocent child has been murdered. If parents of the child want a CBI probe into the case, the government should not hesitate," Hooda said.

Police today used batons to quell the protest outside the Ryan International School and detained 20 protestors. Cameras of some photojournalists were also damaged during the protest.

The former chief minister said, "I have come to know that even media persons on duty have been lathicharged in Gurgaon today and have sustained injuries and equipment of some of them got damaged as a result."



Upping the ante against the BJP government in Haryana, Hooda said, "This government has lost the trust and confidence of the public. By assaulting mediapersons, the government is trying to suppress voice of the people."



However, Gurgaon Police Commissioner Sandeep Khirwar denied the charges of targeting mediapersons.

"As per my knowledge, a fair warning was given to clear the place and nobody was targeted. However, if any mediaperson has been injured, then I express my regret and we will analyse the entire episode. But there was no intention to target anyone," Khirwar said.

"On behalf of police authorities, I want to request the district administration that the mediapersons should be given best medical treatment," he said.

A class II student was found murdered with his throat slit in the school washroom in Gurgaon on Friday. The school's acting principal was suspended and the security staff removed. The police claimed the student was killed by bus conductor Ashok Kumar, who tried to sexually abuse him.

The accused was arrested within hours of the murder after which a court in Gurgaon sent him to police custody for three days.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The Centre will consider operating personnel serving in Jammu and Kashmir to facilitate movement of troops.

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh, who is on a four-day visit to Jammu and Kashmir, said he was also working towards enhancing the monetary benefits to Rs one crore for families of Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) personnel killed in the line of duty.

"We are ready to give more facilities to our CAPF personnel. Government will consider in Jammu and Kashmir," he said addressing a sainik sammelan of CRPF personnel at Anantnag, 52 kilometres from here.

"It is my aim to provide at least Rs 1 crore to the families of our martyrs from CAPFs," he told the CRPF personnel.

As per present compensation norms, the family of a slain soldier of Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) like CRPF, BSF, ITBP, CISF, SSB, NSG and Assam Rifles gets about Rs 60-70 lakh.

Singh said the government has launched 'Bharat Ke Veer' programme to support the families of the martyrs.

"The nation is supporting the courage of our security forces. We are proud of our CRPF personnel.Courage cannot be purchased from any market and you are born with unassailable and unmatched courage," he added.

The Home Minister later presented a memento the CRPF team which took part in operations in Pulwama recently.
A 13-year-old boy died at a hospital in south west Kolkata today following which his family members resorted to vandalism, heckled the doctors and pelted stones at policemen, a police official said.

Four people have been detained for their alleged role in vandalism at the ESI Medical College and Hospital in Joka, a senior Kolkata Police official said.

Family members of Bibek Sarkar, a resident of Taratala area, alleged that he died this morning due negligence on part of the hospital authorities.

"The ICU has been entirely vandalised. Hospital officials, including the superintendent and doctors were beaten up and stones were pelted at policemen. Four people have been detained and we are looking into the matter," the official said.

When contacted, one of the boy's relatives claimed that the hospital authorities had for the last two days denied admission to the teenager, who was suffering from high fever and was vomiting blood.

"On both the occasions, the hospital had sent him back after just prescribing some medicines. As his condition worsened, we took him to the hospital this morning. After several requests he was admitted in the emergency ward.

"Bibek was rushed to the ICU without letting us know the reason, and within minutes they declared him dead. It is because of their negligence that he has died," the relative alleged.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Millions of people, including thousands of Indian-Americans, in Florida braced for Hurricane Irma as it regained its strength as a category 4 storm and moved towards the coastal US state with wind speed of 209 km per hours.

About 120,000 Indian-Americans live in Florida, thousands of them residing in the now-dangerous zones of Miami, Fort Laura deal and even Tampa, according to 2010 census.

Many struggled to cope with Irma, which regained strength as a Category 4 storm as it moved towards Florida.

The deadly storm is expected to hit the US mainland around 7 am (local time). Its outer rain bands lashed the Florida Keys today, the National Weather Service said. A 127 kmph gust was recorded today as Irma drew closer, CNN reported.

Miami and Tampa appeared "ghost towns" as residents left for safer places following mandatory evacuation notices.

The Indian embassy has opened a round-the-clock helpline number and was rushing senior diplomats to Atlanta to lead relief efforts for Indian-Americans stuck in the region.

The Indian Friends of Atlanta - in association with the Consulate-General of India, the Gujarat Samaj Atlanta and the Hindu Temple of Atlanta - has announced to operationalise three shelters.

They were preparing to open more shelters and provide accommodation and food as several Indian businesses started contributing to relief efforts.

Indian Ambassador to the US Navtej Sarna was closely monitoring the situation, officials said.

Sandeep Chakravorty, India's consul-general in New York, was monitoring the situation through a 24X7 control room set up in Atlanta.

US President Donald Trump reviewed preparedness with his cabinet colleagues at Camp David in Maryland. He asked federal agencies to continue supporting state and local authorities and expedite assistance to areas affected by the hurricane.

"This is a storm of enormous destructive power, and I ask everyone in the storm's path to pay heed to all instructions from government officials," Trump said.

Florida Governor Rick Scott asked people to move out of the danger zones as soon as possible. "The state has never seen anything like this. The storm's surge can kill you."



The US Army has so far deployed more than 7,400 soldiers and US Army Corps of Engineers civilians on the US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and the continental US.

The army has more than 140 aircraft, 650 trucks, 150 boats prepared, additional resources on standby, the Pentagon said.

AccuWeather warned Irma will unleash destructive winds, flooding, rain and inundating seas across Florida.

"Unfortunately, there is no way the US is going to avoid another catastrophic weather event," said Joel N Myers, founder, president and chairman of AccuWeather.

"There will be massive damage in Florida. [It will be] the worst single hurricane to hit Florida since Hurricane Andrew in 1992," Myers said.

The current track of Irma will bring severe and life- threatening impacts to all of the Florida Keys and a large portion of the Florida Peninsula, including Key West, Key Largo, Tampa, Fort Myers, Naples, Sarasota and Miami.
Hurricane Irma made landfall on Florida's southern islands today and claimed three lives as millions of people, including thousands of Indian-Americans, evacuated the state in the wake of the storm that left a trail of death and destruction across the Caribbean.

Hurling 130 mph winds, Irma struck Florida Keys as it barrelled towards the US state's west coast where millions of people have evacuated turning many places into ghost towns.

"There is imminent danger of life-threatening storm surge flooding along much of the Florida west coast, including the Florida Keys, where a storm surge warning is in effect," the hurricane center said.

"The threat of catastrophic storm surge flooding is highest along the southwest coast of Florida, where 10 to 15 feet of inundation above ground level is expected. This is a life-threatening situation," it said.

As the Category four storm bore down on Florida this morning, at least three deaths were reported in the state.

A man in Monroe County, which encompasses Key West, was killed after he lost control of a truck that carried a generator as winds whipped at tropical-storm strength, officials said.

Two other people, including a sheriff's deputy, died in a car crash in the rain in Hardee County, officials said. The sheriff's deputy, identified as Julie Bridges, was a 13-year veteran of the Hardee County force, Hardee County Sheriff Arnold Lanier was quoted as saying by ABC .

More than 6.3 million people were told to evacuate Florida, with warnings of a huge storm surge that would be "life-threatening" to anyone in its path.

Irma has already devastated parts of the Caribbean with 25 deaths. About 60 Indian nationals are being evacuated from the vacation island of St Martin in the Caribbean.

The eye of the Category 4 storm was 24 kilometres southeast of Key West.

The eye is a region of mostly calm weather at the centre of strong tropical cyclones. The eye of a storm is a roughly circular area, typically 30-65 km in diameter.

Around 120,000 Indian-Americans reside across Florida while thousands of them live in the now-dangerous zones of Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Tampa.

Indian-Americans in Atlanta and neighbouring areas today opened up their homes for their friends, families and community members from Florida, as catastrophic hurricane Irma made landfall on the state's southern islands.

Miami and Tampa appeared "ghost towns" as nervous residents, many of whom struggled to cope with abandoning their homes, moved to safer places following mandatory evacuation notices.

The National Weather Service (NWS) said Irma regained strength as a Category 4 storm - after being downgraded to Category 3 for more than 12 hours - as it moved to Florida.

The Indian Embassy in the US has opened a round-the-clock helpline number and rushed senior diplomats to Atlanta to lead relief efforts for Indian-Americans stuck in the region.

The hotline number is 202-258-8819.

Embassy officials said India's Ambassador to the US Navtej Sarna was closely monitoring the situation.

Sandeep Chakravorty, India's Consul General in New York, was in Atlanta overseeing preparation for relief efforts from a 24X7 control room.

The Indian Consulate in Atlanta tweeted helpline numbers (+14044052567 & +1678179393) for people seeking assistance.

"Atlanta is fully prepared to take care of evacuees from Florida. Some have already reached. Consulate is on call 24x7," it said in another tweet.

Almost the entire Florida was under hurricane warning.

US President Donald Trump reviewed preparedness with his cabinet colleagues at Camp David in Maryland. He asked federal and state agencies expedite assistance to affected areas.

"This is a storm of enormous destructive power, and I ask everyone in the storm's path to pay heed to all instructions from government officials," Trump said.

Florida Governor Rick Scott asked people to move out of the danger zones as soon as possible. "The state has never seen anything like this. The storm's surge can kill you."



The US Army has so far deployed more than 7,400 soldiers and US Army Corps of Engineers civilians on the US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and the continental US.

The Pentagon said the Army has over 140 aircraft, 650 trucks, 150 boats prepared along with additional resources on standby.

AccuWeather, a forecast weather agency, warned Irma will unleash destructive winds, flooding, rain and inundating seas.

"Unfortunately, there is no way the US is going to avoid another catastrophic weather event," AccuWeather president Joel N Myers said.

"[It will be] the worst single hurricane to hit Florida since Hurricane Andrew in 1992," Myers said.

External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar has also tweeted 24X7 helpline at High Commission of India, Kingston (+1876 833 4500; +1876 564 1378). He also tweeted email ids for Indians to contact in case of emergency: hc.Kingston@mea.Gov.In; hoc.Kingston@mea.Gov.In.

The Indian Friends of Atlanta -- in association with the Consulate-General of India, the Gujarat Samaj Atlanta and the Hindu Temple of Atlanta -- have operationalised three shelters.

They were preparing to open more shelters and provide food. Several Indian businesses have started contributing to relief efforts.

The Indian Embassy in Venezuela tweeted the helpline number in Aruba, a tiny Dutch Caribbean island off the coast of Venezuela, for the situation in Sint Maarten: 00297-593- 2552.

The helpline numbers in Curacao, a Dutch Caribbean island, is 005999-513-2407; 005999-690-2686.

The Indian Embassy in the Netherlands said countrymen affected by Irma can reach them on: 0031643743800.

Those affected in Cuba, Dominican Republic and Haiti can contact Indian authorities on emergency no. +5352131818 or email them at: controlroomindiairma@gmail.Com.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
India has renegotiated the pricing of liquefied natural gas (LNG) imported from Australia's Gorgon project to save more than Rs 10,000 crore over the life of the contract.

Exxon Mobil Corp has agreed to charge 13.9 per cent of the prevailing Brent oil price at the port of delivery rather than previously decided 14.5 per cent of the oil rate at the port of loading, a source privy to the development said.

"Besides changing the indexation, LNG pricing will be on DES basis rather than FOB previously decided," he added.

Delivered ex ship (DES) is a trade term requiring the seller to deliver goods to a buyer at an agreed port of arrival. Under FOB, the buyer has to make shipping arrangement.

At USD 50 per barrel oil price, Gorgon LNG, whose supplies started in January this year, would have cost USD 7.25 per million British thermal unit at the port of loading. Adding another USD 1 for transportation would have led to delivered price of USD 8.25 in the old contract.

In the new formula, Gorgon LNG delivered at Indian port will cost USD 6.95 per mmBtu.

"Happy to share good that India has, yet again, been able to address the long-term price issue of LNG from Gorgon to suit Indian market," Oil Dharmendra Pradhan said in a tweet.

India had used its status of Asia's third largest LNG buyer to renegotiate in 2015 the LNG pricing formula with Qatar's Rasgas to buy the gas at half the original price.

"Indian customers will receive (Gorgon) LNG volumes at an amicable price soon. This is done in a similar way to what we did with LNG from Qatar," Pradhan said in another tweet.

Petronet LNG Ltd, India's largest liquefied natural gas importer, had last year formally sought at least 10 per cent cut in price of LNG it plans to buy from Australia's Gorgon project.

Petronet LNG, a private firm whose chairman is the oil secretary, had in August 2009 signed a 20-year deal to buy 1.44 million tonnes per annum of LNG at a price equivalent to 14.5 per cent of the prevailing oil rates.

The indexation agreed was one of the highest in the world.

Petronet had in late 2015 renegotiated price of the long-term deal to import 7.5 million tonnes per year of LNG from Qatar, helping save Rs 8,000 crore. At that time, it had also signed a contract to buy an additional 1 million tonne per annum till 2028.

"That deal for an additional 1 million tonne was at 13.05 per cent of the ruling Brent price. So naturally, the expectation is that the Gorgon should lower the indexation to a minimum 13 per cent," the source said.

LNG in spot or current market is available at USD 5-6 per million British thermal unit where as Gorgon LNG at current formula will cost USD 7.25 per mmBtu at an oil price of USD 50 per barrel.

State-owned gas utility GAIL India, one of the four PSU promoters of Petronet, had way back in 2013 sought review of the Gorgon LNG price formula.

Its then Director (marketing) Prabhat Singh, who now is the Managing Director and CEO of Petronet LNG, had in June 2013 written a letter seeking reduction in price of Gorgon LNG.

Sources said the case of renegotiating the Gorgon deal had strengthened after Petronet last year got RasGas of Qatar to lower the rate for 7.5 million tons per annum LNG it supplies under a 25-year long term contract since 2004.

The price of imported LNG under this agreement had been linked to crude oil (Japanese Customs Cleared Crude or JCC) and had a concept of floor and ceiling indexed to last 5-year average. The rate thus arrived was higher than spot LNG.

Petronet sought renegotiation of the deal and RasGas agreed to modify the pricing formula to link it with last 3- month average rate of Brent crude oil, they said.

GAIL, Indian Oil, Bharat Petroleum and Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) hold 12.5 per cent each in Petronet. Petronet was to get Gorgon LNG by the end of 2015, but supplies have been deferred to 2017.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Several Indian-Americans and various organisations of the community are playing a key role in relief and reconstruction work as the US state of Texas crawls back to normalcy after the destruction caused by .

Nearly two weeks after Harvey made landfall in Texas, mounds of garbage, sheet-rock clusters, computer monitors and furniture still cover the sidewalks as volunteers work to clear the mess caused by the storm.

The efforts of government agencies including the federal, state, county and city, police, coast guard, armed forces, Red Cross and others have been phenomenal in saving lives and providing for the needs of those who got trapped in the hurricane.

However, the amount of destruction and devastation caused by Harvey needs a herculean effort to speed up the reconstruction work in the flooded neighbourhoods.

"Over the past two weeks, volunteers have already put in 23,100 hours of work towards various relief and rehabilitation projects and we have raised over $300,000 and the target is 1 million," Gitesh Desai, president of Sewa in Houston, said.

"We plan to support rebuilding efforts of homes that need to be fixed through a public-private partnership with US government agencies and many of the Indian American entrepreneurs in Houston," he said.

As families start to move back into the houses, more than 800 volunteers of different Indian non-profit groups coordinated by Sewa International are helping people clean up the mess that catastrophic floods have left behind.

Worst affected are the poor and less privileged communities.

One such community that Sewa International worked with today was the Cambodian Buddhist community in Houston. Volunteers helped clean up more than 200 mobile homes and trailer homes belonging to the community members.

"Indo-American organisations have been leading fundraising efforts and are planning to contribute to Mayor's Hurricane Relief and Governor's Rebuild Texas funds in addition to contribution in kind exceeding $2 million already," Jiten Agarwal, an IIT alumnus and founder of data analytics firm Expedien in Houston, said.

Indian restaurants have also opened up their kitchens to provide hot meals at various shelters.

"Houston restaurants served over 30,000 meals since the landfall," said Dinesh Purohit, owner of Cafe India, that has been serving free food and supplies.

Indo-American Chamber of Commerce of Greater Houston (IACCGH) is also reaching out to Small Business Administration (SBA) and plans to work closely with its District Director Tim Jeffcoat to organise seminars for business loans across the various areas in the region affected.
Unfazed by the recent upheavals at the board, will continue to hire about 6,000 engineers annually over next 1-2 years, same as last financial year, according to a top company official.

The country's second largest software services firm has also ramped up its hiring process in the US and European markets as it looks to tap opportunities and tide over visa- related issues.

"...We continue to recruit. This year that just concluded we had a net addition of 6,000 and we expect similar kind of additions over the next 1 or 2 years, depending on the kind of growth you see in the market," interim-CEO and MD U B Pravin Rao said at an investor meet last week.

The Bengaluru-based firm has been in the eye of a storm over the past few months, with the founders and former board members clashing over alleged corporate governance lapses and irregularities in Infosys' $200-million Panaya acquisition.

The spat, which often spilled over into the public domain, led to the then CEO Vishal Sikka as well as former Chairman R Seshasayee and three other board members quitting.

Co-founder Nandan Nilekani was named the non-executive Chairman in a move that was seen as the company bowing to the demands of co-founders and large institutional investors.

After Sikka's exit, Rao assumed the additional charge as interim CEO and MD.

Rao said over one million graduates pass out each year, which may look like a large number but only 20-30 per cent of that is quality talent.

"(This is the number that) we and our competitors focus on...It is a question of doing more with less, how can one be more productive," he said while answering a query on whether increasing automation would result in job losses.

At the end of June 2017, had a total of 1,98,553 employees on its payroll. The company does not provide country-specific headcount.

During the said quarter, Infosys hired 8,645 people at a gross level but its overall headcount was lower by 1,811 people on a net level (which factors in attrition numbers).

Earlier this year, there were reports of layoffs across the IT sector. With Infosys stating that it was stepping up hiring in international markets like the US, there were concerns that it could impact the company's recruitment plans in India.

Infosys had, at that time, stated it planned to hire 20,000 people (gross) this year.

Infosys has stated that it is in favour of a healthy mix of local and global personnel, even though hiring locals in overseas markets often pushes up operational costs for IT outsourcing .

During the investor meeting, Rao said Infosys is also looking at increasing localisation of its workforce and is recruiting about 10,000 people in the next few years and setting up development and innovation hubs in the US.

"...We have already started the process and we will only accelerate," he added.

The US, which is the largest market for Infosys, much like its peers, accounted for over 61 per cent of its topline in June 2017 quarter. Europe accounted for 22.4 per cent of the company's $2.65 billion (Rs 17,078 crore) revenue during April-June 2017 quarter.

To a query on the company's India business, Rao said Infosys continues to be selective about projects in the country.

"...We continue to be very cautious about India...There are pricing challenges, sometimes getting payment is a challenge," he said.
JSPL Chairman Naveen Jindal has said that brief discrepancy in the flow of cash last fiscal led to temporary delays in meeting some interest obligations of the company.

The debt-laden firm had defaulted in December on interest payment on non-convertible debentures.

"JSPL faced short-term cash flow mismatches during FY 2016-17, which resulted in temporary delays in meeting a few interest obligations," Jindal said in the company's Annual Report 2016-17.

For suitable solutions, he said, the company continuously engaging with its long-term banking partners.

Jindal said that he acknowledges faith and trust reposed by the banking partners in the company during the challenging times.

"Since inception, JSPL (Jindal Steel and Power Ltd) has had an impeccable track record for meeting all its financial commitments; and remains committed to honour all its current and future obligations," he said.

During the challenging times, JSPL said, it was often referred to as a debt-heavy company, with a net debt of around Rs 46,000 crore.

"In isolation, the debt levels may appear significantly high. However, when seen in the right perspective, with a diversified and prudently spread out asset base of close to Rs 75,000 crore, the same debt level would appear rational and reasonable," it said.

Of a debt of Rs 46,000 crore, he said, around Rs 25,000 crore was in domestic steel-making business, Rs 8,600 crore in power generation assets and remaining Rs 12,400 crore was in integrated steel plant in Oman, along with coal mining operations in Australia, Mozambique and South Africa.

JSPL had reported consolidated net loss of Rs 420.4 crore for the quarter ended June 30, 2017.
NY Times that Politico on the same day, "the next generation of Republican candidates are more likely to be running in the image of Trump-- substance-free, needlessly confrontational, and playing to a hardcore base. When Trump loyalists characterize House Speaker Paul Ryan as a squishy RINO, its clear that antiestablishment forces care more for revolutionary zeal than party affiliation. Its no secret why Republican leaders have been working tirelessly for years to prevent such candidates from emerging in primaries. But with a president egging on nihilistic elements, its becoming a thankless undertaking. If the pace of congressional retirements accelerates, its not just the House majority that will be at risk. Its the future of the Republican Party." Saturday we saw how Trump is fracturing the Republican Party to the point where the risk of wholesale retirements and resignations will be high from mainstream lawmakers. Ros-Lehtinen (FL), Reichert (WA) and Dent (PA) could well be just the tip of the iceberg. We'll have to see. Talk about Ryan bailing have been growing louder and louder-- although that may just be wishful thinking on the part of Republicans recognizing that the toxicity of his brand-- like Trump's-- will serve as negative coattails during the midterms. On Friday, Alexander Burns and Jonathan Martin reported for thethat Senor Trumpanzee's mercurial politics are already rattling Republicans heading into the 2018 midterm campaign, sparking Trump-like primary challenges in two high-profile Senate races and a host of lower-profile House contests, while pushing a growing number of moderate House members to the exits. And, as Josh Kraushaar noted inon the same day, "the next generation of Republican candidates are more likely to be running in the image of Trump-- substance-free, needlessly confrontational, and playing to a hardcore base. When Trump loyalists characterize House Speaker Paul Ryan as a squishy RINO, its clear that antiestablishment forces care more for revolutionary zeal than party affiliation. Its no secret why Republican leaders have been working tirelessly for years to prevent such candidates from emerging in primaries. But with a president egging on nihilistic elements, its becoming a thankless undertaking. If the pace of congressional retirements accelerates, its not just the House majority that will be at risk. Its the future of the Republican Party."

Trump-inspired candidates have emerged to challenge Senators Dean Heller of Nevada and Jeff Flake of Arizona, two Republicans who have been targets of the presidents ire, as well as House members seen as insufficiently devoted to Mr. Trump, such as Representative Mark Sanford of South Carolina.



And in a closely watched special Senate election in Alabama later this month, Mr. Trump is waffling on his commitment to the incumbent, Senator Luther Strange, buoying the hopes of Roy Moore, a former State Supreme Court justice and darling of the hard right.



Republicans fear that Mr. Trump has relinquished his role as leader of the party, instead assuming the mantle of his own political movement. And they are bracing for an election season in which their deeply unpopular president does more to undermine than aid candidates of the party he ostensibly oversees.



Its a cult of personality, said Mr. Sanford, who faces a primary challenge from a state legislator who charges that the congressman has been inadequately loyal to the president. Hes fundamentally, at the core, about Donald Trump. Hes not about ideas. And ideas are what parties are supposedly based on.



Such open divisions between a president and elected officials of the same party mark an extraordinary departure from modern political tradition. Even if they feuded at times with their president, lawmakers knew they could ultimately count on the White House to endorse and raise money for incumbents, because controlling as many seats as possible would serve both their interests.



But Mr. Trumps decision to align himself with congressional Democrats this week over federal spending and hurricane relief cemented a view that he will not operate according to any such conventions. Relations between the president and congressional Republicans have frayed over the lawmakers failure to deliver on key legislation and Mr. Trumps constant badgering and personal attacks against them.



The president has repeatedly assured Republicans that he will be an active campaigner for the party next year. But Republican leaders fret that he will gravitate toward candidates who share his distinctive political priorities and anti-Washington attitude, and that nominating some of the Trump-driven candidates could imperil their control of Congress. He will have spent as much time in his first year in office raising money for his own re-election as helping others.



Yet even Republicans who are uneasy about Mr. Trump say lawmakers need to understand the grip he holds on the conservative grass roots.





Senate Republicans are worried that Trump-backed candidates may win primaries against GOP incumbents in Nevada and Arizona and then lose the general elections to Democrats. "Hopefully the president recognizes its in his best political interest to have as many Republicans in the Senate as possible," said Senator John Cornyn of Texas, the No. 2 Republican in the Senate, adding, "I think he can count."
Four people are now known to have died when Hurricane Irma barrelled over the Dutch part of the Caribbean island of St Martin, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said today.

"Unfortunately, there were two more victims that we did not know about earlier," Rutte told reporters in The Hague.

"So the number of victims has risen to four," he said, after Irma devastated the island, shared with France, on Wednesday. The identity of the two new victims was not known.

After new crisis talks with his cabinet, Rutte said fortunately there had been "no new damage" caused by Hurricane Jose which whipped past the island known in Dutch as Sint Maarten late yesterday.

With the arrival of more Dutch troops and police "the security situation has improved but is still fragile," he added.

Today, Rutte issued a stern warning that security forces would crack down on looters.

By the end of today, a total of 392 Dutch troops were to have been deployed on the devastated tourist hotspot where 70 percent of homes have been destroyed or badly damaged.

Another 44 soldiers will arrive tomorrow, and 120 more will be deployed from The Netherlands to the stricken Caribbean island. That would bring the total number of security personnel to 550.

Two C-130 transport planes loaded with aid including food, water, tents and building materials landed in Sint Maarten today, and the Dutch Navy said mass distribution would begin tomorrow.

Once all Dutch tourists have been evacuated, Rutte said the "highest priority is to evacuate people who don't live permanently there, students and temporary workers."



Dutch King Willem-Alexander was due to land later today in Curacao from where the Dutch aid operation is being coordinated.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Millions of people, including thousands of Indian-Americans, in Florida braced for as it regained strength as a Category 4 storm and aimed towards the coastal US state with wind speed of 210 km per hours.

Around 120,000 Indian-Americans reside across Florida while thousands of them live in the now-dangerous zones of Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Tampa.

Miami and Tampa appeared "ghost towns" as nervous residents, many of whom struggled to cope with abandoning their homes, moved to safer places following mandatory evacuation notices.

The National Weather Service (NWS) said Irma regained strength as a Category 4 storm  after being downgraded to Category 3 for more than 12 hours  as it moved to Florida.

The deadly storm is expected to hit the US mainland around 7 am local time today. Its outer rain bands lashed the Florida Keys, the NWS said. A 127 kmph gust was recorded as Irma drew closer to Florida, CNN reported.

The Indian embassy in the US has opened a round-the-clock helpline number and rushed senior diplomats to Atlanta to lead relief efforts for Indian-Americans stuck in the region.

The hotline number is 202-258-8819.

Embassy officials said India's Ambassador to the US Navtej Sarna was closely monitoring the situation.

Sandeep Chakravorty, India's consul-general in New York, was in Atlanta overseeing preparation for relief efforts from a 24X7 control room.

The Indian Consulate in Atlanta tweeted helpline numbers (+14044052567 & +1678179393) for people seeking assistance.

"Atlanta is fully prepared to take care of evacuees from Florida. Some have already reached. Consulate is on call 24x7," it said in another tweet.

External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar tweeted 24X7 helpline at High Commission of India, Kingston (+1876 833 4500; +1876 564 1378). He also tweeted email ids for Indians to contact in case of emergency: hc.Kingston@mea.Gov.In; hoc.Kingston@mea.Gov.In.

The Indian Friends of Atlanta - in association with the Consulate-General of India, the Gujarat Samaj Atlanta and the Hindu Temple of Atlanta - have operationalised three shelters.

They were preparing to open more shelters and provide food. Several Indian businesses have started contributing to relief efforts.

The hurricane has almost ruined the Caribbean islands as a Category 5 storm. At least 24 people died as the storm swirled over the region and hit Cuba yesterday on its way to Florida.

The Indian embassy in Venezuela tweeted the helpline number in Aruba, a tiny Dutch Caribbean island off the coast of Venezuela, for the situation in Sint Maarten: 00297-593- 2552.

The helpline numbers in Curacao, a Dutch Caribbean island, is 005999-513-2407; 005999-690-2686.

The Indian embassy in the Netherlands said countrymen affected by Irma can reach them on: 0031643743800.

Those affected in Cuba, Dominican Republic and Haiti can contact Indian authorities on emergency no. +5352131818 or email them at: controlroomindiairma@gmail.com.

Almost entire Florida was under a hurricane warning. At least 36 million people have been affected by the hurricane.

US President Donald Trump reviewed preparedness with his cabinet colleagues at Camp David in Maryland. He asked federal and state agencies expedite assistance to affected areas.

"This is a storm of enormous destructive power, and I ask everyone in the storm's path to pay heed to all instructions from government officials," Trump said.

Florida Governor Rick Scott asked people to move out of the danger zones as soon as possible. "The state has never seen anything like this. The storm's surge can kill you."



The US Army has so far deployed more than 7,400 soldiers and US Army Corps of Engineers civilians on the US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and the continental US.

The Pentagon said the army has over 140 aircraft, 650 trucks, 150 boats prepared, additional resources on standby.

AccuWeather, a forecast weather agency, warned Irma will unleash destructive winds, flooding, rain and inundating seas.

"Unfortunately, there is no way the US is going to avoid another catastrophic weather event," AccuWeather president Joel N Myers said.

"[It will be] the worst single hurricane to hit Florida since Hurricane Andrew in 1992," Myers said.
Millions of people, including thousands of Indian-Americans, in Florida braced for "life- threatening" Hurricane Irma which hit the state's southern islands today as a category four storm after leaving a trail of destruction across the Caribbean.

It is expected to pummel the low-lying Florida Keys with winds reaching 130mph, before travelling north-west up Florida's Gulf Coast.

More than 6.3 million people were told to evacuate Florida, with warnings of a huge storm surge that would be "life-threatening" to anyone in its path.

Irma has already devastated parts of the Caribbean with at least 25 deaths. About 60 Indian nationals are being evacuated from the vacation island of St Martin in the Caribbean.

The eye of the Category 4 storm was 24 kilometers southeast of Key West.

The eye is a region of mostly calm weather at the center of strong tropical cyclones. The eye of a storm is a roughly circular area, typically 30-65 km in diameter.

Around 120,000 Indian-Americans reside across Florida while thousands of them live in the now-dangerous zones of Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Tampa.

Miami and Tampa appeared "ghost towns" as nervous residents, many of whom struggled to cope with abandoning their homes, moved to safer places following mandatory evacuation notices.

The National Weather Service (NWS) said Irma regained strength as a Category 4 storm - after being downgraded to Category 3 for more than 12 hours - as it moved to Florida.

The Indian embassy in the US has opened a round-the-clock helpline number and rushed senior diplomats to Atlanta to lead relief efforts for Indian-Americans stuck in the region.

The hotline number is 202-258-8819.

Embassy officials said India's Ambassador to the US Navtej Sarna was closely monitoring the situation.

Sandeep Chakravorty, India's consul-general in New York, was in Atlanta overseeing preparation for relief efforts from a 24X7 control room.

The Indian Consulate in Atlanta tweeted helpline numbers (+14044052567 & +1678179393) for people seeking assistance.

"Atlanta is fully prepared to take care of evacuees from Florida. Some have already reached. Consulate is on call 24x7," it said in another tweet.

External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar tweeted 24X7 helpline at High Commission of India, Kingston (+1876 833 4500; +1876 564 1378). He also tweeted email ids for Indians to contact in case of emergency: hc.Kingston@mea.Gov.In; hoc.Kingston@mea.Gov.In.

The Indian Friends of Atlanta - in association with the Consulate-General of India, the Gujarat Samaj Atlanta and the Hindu Temple of Atlanta - have operationalised three shelters.

They were preparing to open more shelters and provide food. Several Indian businesses have started contributing to relief efforts.

The Indian embassy in Venezuela tweeted the helpline number in Aruba, a tiny Dutch Caribbean island off the coast of Venezuela, for the situation in Sint Maarten: 00297-593- 2552.

The helpline numbers in Curacao, a Dutch Caribbean island, is 005999-513-2407; 005999-690-2686.

The Indian embassy in the Netherlands said countrymen affected by Irma can reach them on: 0031643743800.

Those affected in Cuba, Dominican Republic and Haiti can contact Indian authorities on emergency no. +5352131818 or email them at: controlroomindiairma@gmail.Com.

Almost entire Florida was under hurricane warning.

US President Donald Trump reviewed preparedness with his cabinet colleagues at Camp David in Maryland. He asked federal and state agencies expedite assistance to affected areas.

"This is a storm of enormous destructive power, and I ask everyone in the storm's path to pay heed to all instructions from government officials," Trump said.

Florida Governor Rick Scott asked people to move out of the danger zones as soon as possible. "The state has never seen anything like this. The storm's surge can kill you."



The US Army has so far deployed more than 7,400 soldiers and US Army Corps of Engineers civilians on the US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and the continental US.

The Pentagon said the army has over 140 aircraft, 650 trucks, 150 boats prepared, additional resources on standby.

AccuWeather, a forecast weather agency, warned Irma will unleash destructive winds, flooding, rain and inundating seas.

"Unfortunately, there is no way the US is going to avoid another catastrophic weather event," AccuWeather president Joel N Myers said.

"[It will be] the worst single hurricane to hit Florida since Hurricane Andrew in 1992," Myers said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Soon after the announcement of JNU Students Union election results early today, supporters of the victorious United Left alliance celebrated the win by taking out a procession in the varsity campus.

The procession began from the School of International Studies to the famous Ganga Dhaba.

At the forefront were newly-elected leaders, Geeta Kumari - president, Simone Zoya Khan - vice president, Duggirala Srikrishna - general secretary, and Shubhanshu Singh - joint secretary.

Kumari (24) a second year M Phil student of history from the School of Social Sciences hails from Panipat, Haryana.

An activist of AISA for five years she had been elected councillor twice and was a student representative to the GS- CASH (Gender Sensitive Committee Against Sexual Harassment) in 2015.

Kumari, who attributed her victory to students, promised to ensure justice for missing student Najeeb and raise the issue of seat cuts after taking charge.

Zoya Khan (26) born in Banda, Uttar Pradesh and brought up in Numaligarh in Assam, is a second year PhD student from Centre for Indo Pacific Studies in JNU's School of International Studies.

The AISA activist, whose mother tongue is Urdu, found moral support from her parents, particularly from her mother Nishat throughout the election process. Khan's father is a retired school teacher.

First year PhD student Duggirala Srikrishna, who campaigned on the slogan of 'Save JNU, save democracy', hails from Prakasam district, Andhra Pradesh.

An SFI leader, Srikrishna is an active student leader and draws his popularity from being successful after bringing several amenities to students of SIS, the school which he belongs to. He scored the highest number of votes - 2,082 - leaving his rivals from other parties to bite the dust.

Singh (25), doing second year PhD in 'Politics of Naming and Renaming' from School of Social Sciences in JNU is a native of Agra.

An active member of Democratic Students Federation for the past five years, he finished his under graduation from Sri Venkateshwara college, Delhi University, and masters from JNU.

He promised to take up seat cut issue immediately after taking oath as JNUSU joint secretary.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The united-Left alliance has retained all four seats in the JNU students union election, defeating the RSS-backed ABVP with considerable margins.

In a close fight, United Left candidate Geeta Kumari won the president's post by defeating Nidhi Tripathi of ABVP by 464 votes.

Shabana Ali of BAPSA (Birsa Ambedkar Phule Students' Association) polled 935 votes, election panel officials said.

Out of the total 4639 votes polled, 4620 were valid as 19 votes were discarded after voters put their slips in wrong ballots, they said.

For vice president's post, AISA's Simone Zoya Khan got 1,876 votes out of total 4,620 votes. Khan defeated Durgesh Kumar of ABVP who got 1028 votes.

Duggirala Srikrisha (Left) won on the General Secretary's post by polling 2082 votes. He was followed by ABVP's Nikunj Makwana- 975 votes.

The post of Joint Secretary has gone to Shubhanshu Singh (Left) who got 1755 votes. Pankaj Keshari of ABVP got 920 votes.

Geeta Kumari said, "The credit for mandate goes to students because people still believe that democratic spaces should be saved and right now, the only resistance is from students."



She also promised to take up Najeeb issue, JNU seat cuts, new hostels, saving the autonomy of JS-cash and deprivation points.

Duggirala said that JNU has become more democratic. "We promise to reach out to students everyday and counter the aggressive policies of ABVP".

He also vowed to defend the debate and dissent culture in JNU.

In the central panel, a total of 1512 NOTA votes were polled for all the four posts.

Total 31 councillors have been elected for various posts, the election officials said.
Innerwear brand Jockey India plans to double production capacity to 400 million pieces per annum in the next three years, according to a senior company executive.

"As the brand expands in the country, we are looking to increase production. We are looking to double our production capacity from current 200 million pieces per annum to 400 million pieces by 2020," Page Industries Managing Director Sunder Genomal told PTI here.

The brand currently has 17 production units in Karnataka.

As price-points in India are lower than its other markets and brand-awareness, aspiration and accessibility are on the rise, the potential for growth in India is huge, Genomal explained. The brand is now focusing on penetrating deep into smaller markets.

Jockey entered India through licensing partner Page Industries, which manufactures and markets Jockey products in India, the UAE and Sri Lanka.

The company is also looking to step up its exclusive stores in the country. Jockey has about 370 exclusive stores across the country, and retails out of 50,000 multi-brand outlets in 1,400 towns and cities.

"We operate on a franchise based model, and spend about Rs 80 crore annually on establishing outlets," Genomal said.

Jockey has product lines including men's inner wear, women's inner wear, athleisure, night wear, and accessories, alongside the newly-introduced boys' wear.

The company is presently organising pop-up museums showcasing Jockey's major milestones, across its key markets in the country.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
A Mumbai family that had been fighting a legal battle for 48 years to regain possession of their one-room flat they had rented out has got justice after the Bombay High Court asked the tenants to vacate the house.

City resident Navinchandra Nanji, who died while his plea was pending in court, and his legal heirs had been running from pillar to post to get relief.

Their efforts finally bore fruit when a single bench of the HC ordered last week that their tenants vacate the said premises in Sewri area, rented out in 1967, "within the next 12 weeks."



Justice G S Kulkarni, who was hearing the case, while issuing the eviction order also lamented the sluggish pace of the judicial system.

"It is quite a wrench for a conscious judicial mind to note that in this case, a suit for eviction was instituted about 48 years back. Soon the respondents would have celebrated the golden jubilee of the litigation. While the petitioners await the fruits of the litigation, the respondent tenant has been an undeserving beneficiary of the systemic delay in the judicial process."



As per the plea, Nanji first moved lower court in 1969 after his tenant of two years, Jivraj Bhanji, refused to pay heed to the eviction notice served to him on the ground that he had illegally made a permanent alteration in the said flat.

Bhanji argued before the trial court that he had merely created a "temporary loft" and the creation of any temporary structures or such alterations were "not a valid ground for eviction under the Bombay Rent Act."



A few months later, Nanji realised that Bhanji, his wife, and their five children had moved to "another accommodation in Wadala area, and that they were illegally using his Sewri flat as a mess or canteen for the workers" who were employed at Bhanji's shop.

He brought this to the trial court's notice, arguing that the "acquisition of alternate premises" was a valid ground for eviction under the Bombay Rent Act. The trial court finally agreed and passed an eviction order in 1984.

This order, however, was reversed by an appellate bench of the Mumbai Small Causes Court that Bhanji had approached in appeal.

The Small Causes Court took note of Bhanji's argument that the alternate flat in Wadala had been taken "on rent by his wife and sons" and that he was "neither the owner, nor the tenant of the Wadala flat."



Nanji produced documentary evidence in the form of an invitation card of Bhanji's eldest daughter, the ration cards and voter IDs of Bhanji and his sons to prove that all of them were residing together in the Wadala flat, but the Small Causes Court paid no heed to the same.

Then, in 1998, Nanji's sons, approached the High Court seeking relief. While the plea remained pending in the HC, Bhanji, too died, but the flat in Sewri remained under his sons' possession.

On September 4 this year, Justice Kulkarni ruled that the appellate bench of the Small Causes Court had been "in serious error in reversing" the trial court's eviction order.

"There is evidence on record to show that the suit premises (the Sewri flat) were used by him for the purpose of a mess for the employees working in the shop, and were not used for residence but for business purposes.

"The eviction should have been allowed on the ground of the defendant (Bhanji) having acquired suitable alternate accommodation as mandated by Section 13(1) (l) of the Bombay Rent Act," Justice Kulkarni noted.

"Though having succeeded before the trial court in the year 1984, the plaintiff was kept away from the decree on account of the perverse findings recorded by the appellate Bench," he said.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah today slammed Union Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad for accusing the state government of failure to give protection to slain journalist Gauri Lankesh, saying she never sought protection.

"The central minister said the government knew about the threat, and Gauri had sought security, but government did not give. All these, it is most irresponsible statement given by a central minister, who also is a law minister," he told reporters here.

Prasad on September 8 had shown copies of reports on Lankesh's brother, Indrajit, claiming that she had worked for the surrender of Naxalites and asked as to why the Siddaramaiah government had not provided her security.

Siddaramaiah said if Gauri Lankesh had sought security, the government would have given it.

"If someone asks for security, we will give it... Nobody expected it. She never ever spoke about threats and sought security," he said.

Gauri Lankesh also was "a very good human being" and did not hate anyone and even talked to her opponents, Siddaramaiah said.

Replying to a query, Siddaramiah said both Maharashtra and Karnataka police were coordinating to crack the cases related to the killings of rationalists M M Kalburgi, Narendra Dabholkar and Govind Pansare.

"It is not that no progress has been made in Kalburgi killing. Some progress has taken place, but the police is yet to gather evidence to find out assailants," he said.

Dabholkar was shot dead on August 20, 2013 in Pune while he was on a morning walk. Pansare was shot at on February 16, 2015 in Kolhapur and succumbed to his injuries on February 20 that year.

State Home Minister Ramalinga Reddy had also said a couple of days ago that Lankesh had never asked for security.

The 55-year-old Left-leaning journalist, a fierce critic of Hindutva politics, was shot dead at the doorstep of her house while she was returning from her office on September 5.

Her killing came in for condemnation from various quarters. The state government has formed a special investigation team (SIT) to probe the case.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
: Purdah, the special gown used by Muslim women around the globe, now gets a 'desi' touch in Kerala through its unique khadi version.

Seeking to tap the growing demand for the attire in and outside the country, the state Khadi and Village Industries Board has come out with purdahs in 'khadhi', the handspun, hand-woven natural fiber cloth, for the first time.

The eco-friendly purdah has takers not only among Muslim women, but also non-Muslims, working in Gulf countries like Saudi Arabia, where the special attire is a must while travelling outside, the Board sources said.

The Board, known for a series of unique products ranging from khadi dhotis and shirts to sarees, has presented the 'khadi purdah' series as a special product during the recenly concluded Onam festival season.

Unlike the glittering purdahs available abroad, the khadi purdahs of the southern state, made of special manila cotton, is notable for its minimal designs, variety of colours and suitability for all climates.

Purdahs worth Rs six lakh had been sold in 10 days during the first time sale of the product in Kannur district last month and the Board is now flooded with calls and orders from the state and overseas for it.

Board Vice Chairman M V Balakrishnan Master said they planned to expand production and sale of the product across Kerala and give training to its employees in purdah stitching.

"When I came across some purdah-clad Muslim women during a recent journey, I suddenly had a thought.... Why can't we bring out purdah in our own khadi," he told PTI.

"I shared the idea with my team members and thus we launched khadi purdahs on an experimental basis during Onam. But we never expected this kind of acceptance and success," he said.

He said they are finding it difficult to meet the demands for the 'khadi purdah', which is increasing day by day.

"Skilled tailors are needed to stitch purdahs.The Board's tailors can stitch ready-made shirts in a remarkable way. But they do not have expertise in purdah stitching. So we are planning to give them special training in it," he said.

Khadi purdahs are now available in 15 different colours including black, brown, grey, green, violet and so on.

The medium-size attire, envisaged for youngsters to elder women, is priced between Rs 1100-1600 according to the design.

"Usually women wear purdah over their usual clothes.As our purdah is made of khadi, it will resist heat and be more comfortable for them to wear compared to other purdahs,"Farooq K V, showroom manager of the Board in Kannur, told PTI.

After its launch in Kannur, the Board is getting orders from other places, mainly Malappuram, a Muslim dominated district, Kasaragod, Kozhikode and Thiruvananthapuram.

"We also get inquiries from other countries like Saudi Arabia and Dubai. There were even non-Muslim women, working in countries like Saudi Arabia, who bought 5-10 purdahs from our Kannur outlet," he said.

The Board planned to conduct a sale of 'khadi purdahs' in state capital Thiruvananthapuram later this month, he added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Actor Kristen Bell came to the rescue of her "Frozen" co-star Josh Gad's family and "literally saved" them from Hurricane Irma.

Gad, who voices Olaf the snowman, was raised in Hollywood, Florida, which is located near Miami. Hurricane Irma is projected to hit those areas soon.

"So @kristenanniebell literally saved my parents and my entire family tonight from #hurricaneirma.

"When they were stranded in Florida, she got them a hotel room at her hotel in Orlando and saved them, my brothers, my sister-in-law and niece and nephew," Gad wrote on Instagram, alongside a selfie showing Bell with his parents.

The actress is in Florida to film her new comedy movie "Like Father" and has been hunkering down at a Walt Disney World resort. The theme parks are shutting down over the next few days because of Irma.

"They don't make them like this girl. Thank you Kristin. You are truly an angel sent from above. And thank you @ewablueeyes for bother her when I asked you not to!" Gad added.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
"We can work it out", they hoped as they headed to an ashram at the dizzying height of their fame, discovering mental calm, learning meditation and writing over 40 songs on the banks of the Ganges.

They were The Beatles, the quartet that won over a million hearts and still has listeners dreaming and dancing to their songs. And now, 49 years after they went to the Maharishi Mahesh Yoga ashram, preparations are on in both Rishikesh and their hometown Liverpool to mark the golden jubilee of that visit.

Situated at Swargashram after crossing the Ram Jhoola, the Chaurasi Kutia Ashram, or The Beatles Ashram as it came to be known, is quite rundown. But it will be repaired and spruced up ahead of the celebrations next year.

The retreat captured global attention when the four members of the legendary English band -- John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr -- visited it in 1968, just two years before they disbanded.

The ashram is different from other such retreats in this Yoga capital because of the graffiti work and paintings on its walls and 84 soundproof meditation huts.

This is where they wrote 48 songs, which were included in 'White Album', 'Abbey Road' and ' Let it be', including "Dear Prudence" and "Sexy Sadie", described as a barbed tribute to the Maharishi.

The 15-acre ashram, which has a distinctive place in The Beatles' history, falls in the Rajaji Tiger reserve and had been off limits for tourists since 2001. In 2015, it opened its doors to fans after a nod from the National Tiger Conservation Authority.

For the golden jubilee celebrations, the forest department is planning to involve Mahesh Yogi's followers and local people.

"We are planning to open an information centre with a new brochure and maps as a lot of foreign tourists visit the place. We will also involve locals in the initiative as it will be a source of income generation for them," Sanatan Sonkar, director of the Rajaji National Park, told PTI.

Rishikesh hosts an international Yoga festival in March every year and many of the late Yogi's followers take part in that, he added.

"We will talk to them, too. The year-long celebrations will start around February next year," he said.

Asked about the condition of the ashram, he said major renovation work was planned in the coming months.

"Repair work of the main hall, where they composed music, and of the lecture hall will begin soon. The wall of Maharishi's then residence is also broken and sometimes elephants enter from there. We are renovating that, apart from clearing the bushes," he added.

Liverpool is getting ready as well to mark the occasion.

The Beatles Story, a museum dedicated to the band in Liverpool, will be celebrating the 50th anniversary of The Beatles in India.

"We will be opening a new exhibition dedicated to the telling story of this key period and the subsequent influences on the music of The Beatles after their visit in 1968," Diane Glover, marketing manager of The Beatles Story, told PTI from Liverpool.

Glover visited the ashram along with the customer service manager of the museum, Claire Ireland, to explore possibilities for promoting the events.

"We are currently in the process of designing a new exhibit at The Beatles Story which is due to be launched in February 2018 and we will also be hosting a launch event along with a year-long itinerary of events, Q&A sessions and Indian music and culture workshops in Liverpool to celebrate this anniversary," she said.

They have also been speaking to Paul Saltzman, the photographer who was in Rishikesh at the same time as the Fab Four, and took iconic photographs.

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A court here has acquitted an RLD candidate in the 2017 Delhi civic polls of the charge of defacing public property by pasting her campaign posters on an electric pole, as the complainant himself was the investigating officer in the case.

Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Munish Markan absolved the woman, who contested the election from Jaitpur ward on a Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) ticket, of the offence under the Delhi Prevention of Defacement of Property (DPDP) Act.

It was alleged that three posters carrying the woman's photograph and phone number appealing for votes were found pasted on an electric pole, a government property.

Acquitting the woman of the charge, the court said, "It is well-settled law that the complainant should not be the investigating officer in a case so as to rule out any ill?will or bias against the accused."



The court also noted that there was lack of evidence to show that police officials were present on the spot at the time of the commission of the alleged offence.

"Therefore, considering the totality of facts and circumstance, in my considered opinion, prosecution has failed to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt on numerous fronts, which are lack of evidence regarding the factum of witnesses 1 and 2 (police officials) being present on the spot at the alleged date and time, failure to prove the photographs, non- joining of public witnesses and the complainant himself becoming the investigating officer," the magistrate said.

According to the complaint lodged by a sub-inspector, three posters of the woman candidate from the RLD were found on an electric pole near NTPC Ground, Jaitpur on April 11 this year as an appeal for votes for the municipal corporations of Delhi (MCD) elections held on April 23.

An FIR was registered for the offence under section 3 of the DPDP Act which provides that whoever defaces a public property by writing or marking with ink, chalk, paint or any other material except for the purpose of indicating the name and address of the owner of such property, may face up to one-year jail or fine which may extend to Rs 50,000 or both.

The woman had denied the allegations and claimed she was innocent as she did not paste any poster on the pole.

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In a first, a militant today surrendered during an encounter with security forces that broke out in Shopian district of south Kashmir last evening, police said here.

They said a militant identified as Adil, who had joined militancy in May this year, surrendered after he was trapped from all sides.

Jammu and Kashmir Police officials assured him that he would not be killed after which he emerged from the debris of the house and laid down his AK-47 in front of the police officials.

This is for the first time in recent months that a militant has laid down his arms during an encounter.

Adil, a resident of Chitipora in Shopian, was immediately whisked away for questioning, they said, adding body of another militant identified as Tariq Ahmed Dar was recovered from the encounter site.

Dar was involved in many terror related incidents, they said.

Jammu and Kashmir Director General of Police S P Vaid had earlier said that boys who had taken to arms can surrender and the government would consider their cases.

Security forces had launched a cordon and search operation at Barbugh in Imam Sahib area of Shopian last evening after getting information about presence of militants there.

The militants had opened fire on the search party, triggering a gunbattle.

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Banned currency notes made their way to Mumbai's most popular Ganesh pandal - Lalbaucha Raja - this year with devotees offering over Rs one lakh in demonetised currency to the Lord.

Of the around Rs 6 crore, which the popular Lalbaucha Raja in Parel received from devotees during the just concluded Ganesh festival, there were 105 notes of the scrapped Rs 1,000 denomination in the donation box.

"Of the 105 notes, one was torn. There were also 50 notes of the scrapped Rs 500 denomination," an official from the state Charity Commissioner's office said.

"So far, the total donation received is Rs 5,93,14,800," the official said.

"We are yet to count foreign currency received in the donation box and also the new currency 'garlands' offered to the deity," the official said.

The quantum of donation this year was less compared to the around Rs 8 crore received last year. This year's collection also included gold and silver.

The official cited heavy rains, which lashed Mumbai on August 29 and led to flooding and disruption in transport services, as a key reason for the low donation amount.

Million of devotees visited the Lalbaucha Raja to seek blessings of Lord Ganesh during the festival that began on August 25 and ended on September 5.

The footfall at the pandal was less for two days when most people stayed indoors due to heavy rains, he added.

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An FIR was today registered against six people who allegedly assaulted a newly-married Muslim woman for making a painting of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, police said.

The complaint was filed by Nagma Praveen's father Shamsher Khan against six people including her husband, Pervez Khan, at Sikandarpur police station, Superintendent of Police, Anil Kumar said today.

Nagma married Pervez last year in Basarikpur village in the Sikanderpur area.

Shamsher alleged that his daughter was assaulted and thrown out of the house by her husband and five other men after she made a painting of Modi and Adityanath, Kumar told PTI.

Police said a probe is underway in the matter.

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A Muslim woman has openly announced to take "khula" (divorce) from her husband after her efforts to get it done through Islamic seminaries did not succeed.

In Islam, a man can take "talaq", while a woman can part ways with her husband through "khula".

Shajada Khatoon, married to Juber Ali, signed a letter for "khula" at a press conference here yesterday.

"I tried to take 'khula' from my husband. I had approached the Islamic seminaries, Nadwa and Firangi Mahal, but did not get any relief," she claimed.

"That is why, I am signing the 'khula' in the public and sending him (the husband) the notice. I am free from him now," she said.

Muslim Women League general secretary Naish Hasan, who helped Shajada take "khula", said the woman was fed up with her husband torturing her and had been living separately for the last 18 months.

All India Muslim Personal Law Board executive member Maulana Khalid Rashid Farangi Mahali, however, said the process followed by the woman for "khula" was not correct.

"Khula is not done in a single letter. For khula, the woman has to serve a notice on her husband and if he does not respond to three of such notices, it is deemed implemented," he said.

Asked about the cleric's stand, Hasan said if he felt that Shajada was wrong, he should approach the court.

All India Muslim Women Personal Law Board President Shaista Ambar voiced support for the woman, saying what she did was "valid".

The incident comes at a time when the country is witnessing a raging debate over the issue of triple talaq.

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Myanmar's military has been accused of planting land mines in the path of Rohingya Muslims fleeing violence in its western Rakhine state, with Amnesty International reporting two people wounded today.

Refugee accounts of the latest spasm of violence in Rakhine have typically described shootings by soldiers and arson attacks on villages.

But there are at least several cases that point to anti- personnel land mines or other explosives as the cause of injuries on the border with Bangladesh, where 300,000 Rohingya have fled in the past two weeks.

AP reporters on the Bangladesh side of the border on Monday saw an elderly woman with devastating leg wounds: one leg with the calf apparently blown off and the other also badly injured. Relatives said she had stepped on a land mine.

Myanmar has one of the few militaries, along with North Korea and Syria, that has openly used anti-personnel land mines in recent years, according to Amnesty. An international treaty in 1997 outlawed the use of the weapons.

Lt Col SM Ariful Islam, commanding officer of the Bangladesh border guard in Teknaf, said on Friday he was aware of at least three Rohingya injured in explosions.

Bangladeshi officials and Amnesty researchers believe new explosives have been recently planted, including one that the rights group said blew off a Bangladeshi farmer's leg and another that wounded a Rohingya man. Both incidents occurred today. It said at least three people including two children were injured in the past week.

"It may not be land mines, but I know there have been isolated cases of Myanmar soldiers planting explosives three to four days ago," Ariful said Friday.

Myanmar Presidential spokesman Zaw Htay did not answer phone calls seeking comment today. Military spokesman Myat Min Oo said he couldn't comment without talking to his superiors. A major at the Border Guard Police headquarters in northern Maungdaw near the Bangladesh border also refused to comment.

Amnesty said that based on interviews with eyewitnesses and analysis by its own weapons experts, it believes there is "targeted use of landlines" along a narrow stretch of the north-western border of Rakhine state that is a crossing point for fleeing Rohingya.

"All indications point to the Myanmar security forces deliberately targeting locations that Rohingya refugees use as crossing points," Amnesty official Tirana Hassan said in a statement today. "This a cruel and callous way of adding to the misery of people fleeing a systematic campaign of persecution."



The violence and exodus began on August 25 when Rohingya insurgents attacked Myanmar police and paramilitary posts in what they said was an effort to protect their ethnic minority from persecution by security forces in the majority Buddhist country.

In response, the military unleashed what it called "clearance operations" to root out the insurgents. Accounts from refugees show the Myanmar military is also targeting civilians with shootings and wholesale burning of Rohingya villages in an apparent attempt to purge Rakhine state of Muslims.

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Nepal's Foreign Minister Krishna Bahadur Mahara today called for more Chinese investments in the Himalayan nation, saying Kathmandu is focused on increasing connectivity with Beijing.

Inaugurating the newly-established office of the Consulate General of Nepal at the port city of Guangzhou in China, Mahara, who is also the deputy prime minister, said: "there are good opportunities for investments in inter-country railways, roads and transmission lines".

"Nepal is focusing on investment in infrastructure development and inter-country economic sector in order to increase connectivity between both the countries," the visiting Nepalese leader said.

He also expressed belief that the office will contribute in strengthening bilateral ties and broaden relations in the economic sector, Nepal's foreign ministry said.

Mahara said that economic and trade activities will surge with the establishment of the consulate.

He also added that the relations between people of the two countries will enhance further in the coming days.

Foreign Minister Mahara is on a six-day visit to China for talks with senior Chinese leaders on the invitation of his counterpart Wang Yi.

Nepal in May inked a deal with China to join Chinese President Xi Jinping's ambitious 'One Belt One Road' (OBOR) initiative to link Asia with Europe.

The newly-established consulate is Nepal's fourth such office in China.

There are 200 Nepalese businessmen engaged in various businesses in Guangzhou.

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An eight-feet bronze statue of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose was today unveiled at the Naval Area headquarter for West Bengal, which is named after him.

The statue was unveiled by Vice Admiral HCS Bisht, Flag Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Eastern Naval Command in the presence of Professor Krishna Bose, Netaji's niece-in-law and chairperson of Netaji Research Bureau.

Consul-General of Japan in Kolkata Masayuki Taga was among several dignitaries present on the occasion.

"Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose has a maritime connection as his journey from Germany to East Asia was by submarine and he was even transferred from one submarine to another in high seas," Bisht said describing him as a daring patriot.

During his 90-day sojourn, Netaji first travelled from Kiel in Germany in a U-Boat and then was transferred to a Japanese submarine off Mozambique in Africa in high seas.

"His vision was against alienation of the downtrodden, communalism and for opportunity to all," he said after unveiling of the statue at INS Netaji Subhas.

Speaking on the occasion, Krishna Bose said Netaji felt "a military thrust would be necessary to give impetus to the freedom movement."



Describing Netaji as the warrier statesman of India, she said "Netaji's message for unity, strength and sacrifice will continue to flow to all parts of the country from here where the statue has been unveiled.

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A new malware has been detected in India which steals money through victims' mobile phones, cyber security firm Kaspersky said in a report.

Around 40 per cent of target of the malware has been detected in India.

"Kaspersky Lab experts have uncovered a mobile malware targeting the WAP billing payment method, stealing money through victims' mobile accounts without their knowledge," the report said.

is disguised as useful apps like BatteryMaster and operates normally. The trojan secretly loads malicious code onto the device.

Once the app is activated, the Xafecopy malware clicks on web pages with Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) billing - a form of mobile payment that charges costs directly to the user's mo bile phone bill. After this the malware silently subscribes the phone to a number of services, the report said.

The process also does not require user to register a debit or credit card or set up a user-name and password.

The malware uses to bypass 'captcha' systems designed to protect users by confirming the action is being performed by a human. In the captcha system, websites show a set of some letter or numbers which are required to be manually filled by the user.

"Xafecopy hit more than 4,800 users in 47 countries within the space of a month, with 37.5 per cent of the attacks detected and blocked by Kaspersky Lab products targeting India, followed by Russia, Turkey and Mexico," the report said.

Experts at Kaspersky Lab have found traces showing that cyber criminals gang promulgating other trojans are sharing malware code among themselves.

"Our research suggests WAP billing attacks are on the rise. Xafecopy's attacks targeted countries where this payment method is popular. The malware has also been detected with different modifications, such as the ability to text messages from a mobile device to premium-rate phone numbers, and to delete incoming text messages to hide alerts from mobile network operators about stolen money," Kaspersky Lab Senior Malware Analyst Roman Unuchek said.

Kaspersky Lab, Managing Director- South Asia, Altaf Halde said that Android users need to be extremely cautious in how they download apps.

"It is best not to trust third-party apps, and whatever apps users do download should be scanned locally with the Verify Apps utility. But beyond that, Android users should be running a mobile security suite on their devices.
With floodwaters at four feet and rising, a family in Houston, Texas abandoned their possessions and scrambled to their roof during Hurricane Harvey to sit with their pets and await rescue. Unable to reach first responders through 911 and with no one visible nearby, they used their cellphones to send out a call for help through a social media application called Nextdoor.

Within an hour a neighbor arrived in an empty canoe large enough to carry the family and their pets to safety. Thanks to a collaboration with Nextdoor, we learned of this and hundreds of similar rescues across Harveys path.

This story illustrates the power of systems like Nextdoor, an app designed to make communication between neighbors easy. Survivors in Houston have been using social media platforms such as Facebook, Nextdoor and Twitter to connect to rescuers, organize food and medical supplies, and find places for people to stay.

These stories support our findings showing that social ties can save lives during disasters. They demonstrate why social media platforms should have pride of place among our preparations for and initial assessments of disaster damage.

When first responders are out of reach

Everyone knows that they should have batteries and three days of water and food on hand as extreme weather events roll through. But in our view, friends and social media platforms reachable by phone are equally important, because they could be lifesavers.

Many people assume that standard emergency services  such as the 911 system, police, firefighters and FEMA  will rescue them from disasters. While these are critical services during normal times, they can become literally and figuratively swamped during major hurricanes and floods, as we saw in Houston during Harvey. Firefighters and police officers cannot respond to every phone call. In some cases, emergency call response centers have shut down or have become unreachable because of damaged communications systems.

In past disasters around the world, our research has shown that the actual first responders in the immediate aftermath have often been neighbors, family and friends. Under such conditions, social ties  the connections to our friends, family, neighbors and acquaintances  can save our lives, mitigate the damage from storms like Irma and Harvey and fast-track recovery.

People to lean on

We know from studies of many disasters around the world that tighter connections help vulnerable people get through what can be lethal conditions. Neighbors can be a first line of defense, as we saw in Houston when neighbors formed a human chain to block floodwaters while others guided a woman in labor to the bed of a dump truck (the only vehicle available) and delivered her to a local hospital.

While we are constantly bombarded with information from television, radio and newspapers  especially when a major storm is approaching  we tend to act on information that we trust. The governor of Florida has urged residents in Irmas path to evacuate, but for many Floridians, hearing the same message from relatives or friends may be what triggers action.

After disasters end and recovery begins, social ties can help keep us anchored to a home or business. Victims may face long waits for insurance payouts, if they are lucky enough to have insurance, or have to make decisions about restoring homes and businesses in disaster areas. They also must confront the psychological challenge of returning to places associated with hurt and loss. Having a circle of friends and neighbors can make them more likely to return and mitigate some of the trauma they have experienced.

Apps prove their worth

Social media is a tremendous resource for harnessing social networks and putting them to work during and after disasters. Facebook and Nextdoor have both demonstrated their usefulness during recent catastrophes. A recent study found that following the 2014 Napa Valley earthquake, online engagement and utilization of social media platforms for good occurred in communities with higher levels of social cohesion. We believe that individuals who are socially active on the ground  volunteering, helping neighbors, giving blood  are similarly active through social media.

In Houston, members have used Nextdoor to share prayers and information on road closures, obtain medical care and protect homes from looting. Local agencies including the Harris and Houston County emergency management offices, Harris County Sheriffs Office and Houston Police Department have used Nextdoor to post mandatory evacuation orders, links to flood maps, lists of open shelters, instructions on connecting with first responders for rescues if needed and calls for volunteers with boats to help individuals who are stranded.

Now Florida residents are using Nextdoor to encourage people to reach out to neighbors, especially the elderly and infirm, discuss evacuation plans and find stores that still have supplies. Nearly 50 agencies have used Nextdoor to share information on preparing for supply shortages, rain, storm surges and high winds.

On September 6, Facebook activated its Safety Check feature for Hurricane Irma, allowing its members in her path to indicate if they need help and enabling users to check on friends and relatives status.

If youre in the path of a hurricane, of course you should move to high ground, bring batteries and hunker down in a safe location with food and water. But dont forget your phone, and consider using Nextdoor and Facebook through the storm and recovery. Even if you cant see them, youre surrounded by a community that cares.
After selling its domestic oil business to Russia's Rosneft and partners for $12.9 billion, Essar Group has no plans to sell its Stanlow refinery in the UK, a senior company official said.

(UK) Ltd Chief Executive S Thangapandian said the announcement of fresh investments of $250 million in upgrade and expansion of Stanlow shows the group's commitment to stay invested in the sector.

"The investments which are being made goes to show that the promoters want to stay invested in oil and gas sector," he said. "We are sure they will stay invested in oil and gas and Stanlow refinery."

(UK) Ltd, the firm that owns and operators the Stanlow refinery, is owned by billionaire Ruia brothers' Essar Group, which had sold to Rosneft last month.

Rosneft, the world's largest listed oil company, acquired 49 per cent stake in Essar Oil, which operates a 20 million tonnes a year Vadinar refinery in Gujarat, the adjacent port and about 3,500 petrol pumps.

Netherlands-based Trafigura Group Pte, one of the world's biggest commodity trading companies, and Russian investment fund United Capital Partners split another 49 per cent equity.

Stanlow as also the coal-bed methane (CBM) business of the company was not part of the sale.

Sited on a 770-hectare industrialised area of Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, Stanlow supplies 16 per cent of all road transport fuels in the UK, Thangapandian said.

He said the new investment would boost the crude oil throughput at Stanlow to 9.7 million tonnes by March 2018 from current 9.09 million tonnes.

Also, the company is targeting 400 petrol pumps in the UK in five years from the current 39.

The investment in the revamping of certain units of the refinery would help cut down on crude oil processing cost, improve product slate and lead to marginal increase in capacity, he said.

He said the promoters have so far invested $800 million in Stanlow since acquiring it from Royal Dutch Shell in 2011.

Essar had paid Shell $350 million to buy Stanlow, the UK's second largest refinery.

Stanlow has a capacity of 296,000 barrels per day (14.8 million tonnes per annum) but operates at much lesser capacity.
The Haryana government today said it was not averse to ordering a CBI probe into the killing of a seven-year-old boy at Ryan International School and has asked the Gurgaon Police to book the school owner under the Juvenile Justice Act.

Education minister Ram Bilas Sharma also said that there have been lapses on part of the school administration.

"We accept negligence on part of the Ryan International School but the school cannot be derecognised as the future of 1200 students is at stake," Sharma said.

"We have directed the Gurgaon Police to book the owner of Ryan International School, Albert Pinto under section 75 Juvenile Justice (care and punishment act) Act 15 for punishment for cruelty to child meted out by the custodian in the charge sheet to be submitted in the court within 7 days.

"Some loopholes in the security are visible in the case and the toilet window was also found broken from inside," Sharma told PTI.

He said the charge sheet in the case will be ready within a week as police was speedily conducting the probe, but stressed that if the parents of the child insist on a probe by the CBI or any other agency the government will accede to their demand.

Talking to reporters here, Sharma also made it clear that school management has to take responsibility for the safety and security of children.

"We are issuing directives in this regard to all schools including private ones," he said.

"We held a meeting today in which the demand to derecognise the school came up, but we also had to take into account the fact that 1200 students are studying there. The parents of students studying in this school were against this step and therefore we felt taking such a step will not be right," he said.

"However, any kind of lapse, by the management or the owner, against all of them we have initiated action," he said.

The boy was found murdered with his throat slit in the school washroom in Gurgaon on Friday. The school's acting principal was suspended and the security staff removed. The police claimed the student was killed by bus conductor Ashok Kumar, who tried to sexually abuse him.

The accused was arrested within hours of the murder after which a court in Gurgaon sent him to police custody for three days.

"The murder accused has already been arrested. Now, within a week, police after collecting all necessary evidence will submit a chargesheet in court. However, still if the parents are not satisfied, then Haryana government is ready to get the matter probed by any agency.

"I am hopeful that when we will produce the accused before court within a week with all evidences collected by the police, the parents of the child will be satisfied with the action being taken," he said.

Sharma said, "We have fixed a seven-day deadline and in case where the accused is booked under Section 302 of IPC (for murder), this is the minimum time in such cases. However, if the child's parents still feel they are not satisfied,then as per their wish we can get the case investigated by any agency including CBI".

"We have full sympathy with the parents of the child. If any issue of providing financial help the Haryana government comes up will be willing to help," he said.

The minister made it clear that the Haryana government will not show any leniency in the matter



"Whatever strict action needs to be taken as per law will be taken in this case," he asserted.

He also said a liquor vend near the school has been ordered to be shut down permanently.

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: Security forces in Arunachal Pradesh apprehended a hardcore ultra of the NSCN (R) in Changlang district during an operation carried out on Saturday night, an Army official said.

Acting on a tip-off, the Changlang battalion of Assam Rifles arrested the cadre, identified as Hunmai Taidong, from Old Changlang Village in the district, Defence Spokesman Col Dhiranjeet Konwer said today.

A pistol and ammunition were also seized from him.

On interrogation, Taidong revealed that he has been an active member of the outfit since February 2015 and had undergone training at NSCN (R) training camps.

Security forces have been carrying out operations in South Arunachal Pradesh bordering Myanmar where the North East militant groups have pitched their bases under the patronage of the NSCN (K).

Besides using Tirap, Changlang and Lonfding districts in Arunachal Pradesh as transit route to Myanmar base, the insurgent groups are also involved in criminal activities like extortions and abduction in the area.

Counter-insurgency operations launched by security forces in the past fortnight in South Arunachal Pradesh have resulted in elimination of two hardcore cadres, injury of three rebels, apprehension of two more hardcore cadres, busting of a temporary hideout and recovery of a huge cache of arms, ammunition and other warlike stores, the spokesman added.

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Opposition Members of Parliament in West Bengal have accused the ruling Trinamool Congress of "putting pressure" on the administration to stall the release of funds earmarked for them under a Central scheme for development work in constituencies.

A recent government report shows that many opposition MPs in the state are still to get funds under MPLADS (Members of Parliament Local Area Development Scheme), but money is flowing in for members of the Trinamool Congress.

The Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation's MPLADS status report for West Bengal reveals that most Trinamool Congress MPs have received money from the Central government scheme for 2017-18, while some in the opposition have not been able to utilise funds for 2014-15.

A sum of Rs 5 crore is given to each MP in two installments every year under MPLADS for development work. The funds are disbursed by nodal agencies controlled by district officials after MPs submit their project reports.

Congress MP from Baharampur Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, who is yet to get the second installment of Rs 2.5 crore for 2015 -16, claimed the state government was putting pressure on the nodal agencies to delay the release of the funds.

"Even if project reports are submitted, the district officials deliberately delay the process to tarnish the image of Congress MPs in the eyes of the common people. This is political vendetta," Chowdhury told PTI.

A Trinamool Congress MP, who did not wish to be named, shrugged off the opposition claims.

"We do not even wish to comment on this," he said.

A letter from the ministry was sent to the principal secretary of Planning, government of West Bengal, on August 21, asking it to direct all nodal agencies to furnish documents that would enable the ministry to release the pending funds for Bengal MPs.

CPI(M) MPs Mohammad Salim and Badaruddoza khan were yet to receive their first and second installments for 2016-17 and 2015-16 respectively as the nodal agencies had not sent the utilisation certificates for 2015-16 and 2014-15.

Utilisation certificates are sent by the district nodal agencies to the Centre after the fund has been utilised, stating what project the MP used it for.

Salim alleged that "clear instructions" had been given to the district administration to slow down the process of releasing funds till the Panchayat elections, which are due in 2018.

"Even if some officials are trying to do their job, the Mamata Government is bent upon transferring them," he claimed.

Central minister and BJP Lok Sabha MP from Darjeeling S S Ahluwalia too has not been able to get the first installment of funds for 2015-16 as his utilisation certificate for 2014- 15 has not been provided to the Centre by the nodal officers.

According to the status report, a few Trinamool Congress MPs' work has also been affected. MPs Kunal Ghosh and Mukul Roy, both said to have been sidelined by the party, have not yet received funds for 2014-15.

In 2015, Roy was removed as party general secretary after his name came up in the Saradha chit fund case.

Ghosh, who was arrested and jailed for three years in the case, moved the Calcutta High Court last year, seeking direction to the Kolkata Municipal Corporation on the utilisation of his MPLAD funds.

"Even if the funds are slowly being released, the backlog of three years will take a long time. I have submitted all the project documents but I am still facing total non-cooperation from nodal agencies," he told PTI.

In the ruling party, celebrity politicians have fared better than the others. The record shows that Lok Sabha MPs and filmstars Deepak Adhikari, popularly known as Dev, Moon Moon Sen and Sandhya Roy are due for the second installment of funds for 2016-17 or 2017-18.

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A top officer of Pakistan's Punjab government has been sacked for allowing the Mumbai attack mastermind Hafiz Saeed's Jamat-ud-Dawah (JuD) to collect hides of sacrificial animals despite a ban.

Deputy Commissioner Toba Tek Singh Asim Sapra has been sacked from his post after an inquiry team constituted by Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif found him guilty of issuing NoC to the JuD to collect the sacrificial hides during Eid days in the district which is 200-km from Lahore.

The Punjab Home Department had issued an order directing police to stop banned religious organizations including JuD and Falah-e-Insaniat (FIF) of Saeed and Maulana Massod Azhar's Jaish-i-Mohammad from collecting hides during Eid days early this month.

"DC Asim Sapra had allegedly issued NoC to the JuD to collect hides without observing that there had been an official ban on it (to collect hides during Eid days)," a Punjab government official told PTI today on anonymity.

He said Sapra was given a chance to defend himself before the inquiry committee but he failed to justify his act.

He said the government received a complaint against Sapra that he issued NoC to the JuD for collection of hides showing that he is a "JuD sympathizer" and facilitated it in the district which was under his control.

"Sapra told the inquiry team that he inadvertently issued the NoC to JuD as he overlooked the order of the home department in this regard," the official said, adding the chief minister has sacked Sapra in the light of the findings of the inquiry team.

Last week Lahore police had arrested over 20 activists of FIF and JeM illegally collecting hides during Eid days in the city. Police had also dismantled over 40 hide collection centres of the FIF in the city and stopped the mobile operation as well.

The hide collection is done in a very organised manner in Pakistan. Banned militant organisations fundraise millions of dollars on the occasion of Eid al-Adha by selling the hides of sacrificial animals after collecting them from individuals.

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The Palestinian Authority has released a prominent activist a week after he was arrested for writing a Facebook post criticising the government of President Mahmoud Abbas.

Issa Amro's lawyer says his client was released today on USD 1,400 bail today.

Amro was accused of breaking the law by criticising the government's detention of a journalist earlier this month. Amro's attorney, Farid Atrash, says it is "shameful" his client was arrested for exercising his right of free expression.

Rights groups had called on the Palestinian Authority to release Amro, an activist who advocates non-violence and protests against Israeli settlements in his hometown of Hebron.

Human rights organisations say there has been a notable increase recently in the number of journalists arrested by the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.

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One person was killed and 11 others were injured, four of them critically, after a portion of an under-construction flyover collapsed near Bomikhal here today.

Officials said around 15 labourers were working on the flyover when the structure collapsed this afternoon.

An injured worker, undergoing treatment at Capital Hospital, said, "A portion of the flyover collapsed when we were busy plastering its roof."



Expressing grief over the incident, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik announced Rs 5 lakh ex gratia for the next of the kin of the deceased and free treatment for the injured. He also conveyed his sympathy to the bereaved family.

The chief minister said a deputy executive engineer and an assistant engineer have been suspended following the incident.

"Exemplary action will be taken against those found guilty...No one will be spared whosoever he may be," he said.

Satya Patnaik, a 39-year-old businessman, was killed as he and his daughter Sheetal were under the flyover when it came down crashing, Revenue Divisional Commissioner (RDC), Central Division, A B Otta told reporters.

Patnaik's daughter is critically injured and admitted to the AIIMS, Bhubaneswar, Otta said.

Other injured have been admitted to the Capital Hospital and the AIIMS.

The chief minister also met injured at the two hospitals and spoke to the doctors about their treatment.

A massive search and rescue operation was launched soon after the collapse and it took about six hours to clear the debris.

Police, fire brigade, around 50 personnel of the Odisha Disaster Rapid Action Force (ODRAF) and two units of the NDRF were engaged in the search and rescue operation.

Sniffer dogs were also deployed to ascertain if anyone was trapped under the rubble, officials said.

Earth movers and heavy cranes were pressed into service to remove the debris. Extending a helping hand, the East Coast Railway (ECoR) engaged its workforce in the rescue operation.

Officials with over 10 gas cutters and seven hydraulic jacks were deployed, an ECoR official said.

A high-level inquiry has been ordered into the mishap.

Works Department Secretary N K Pradhan said, "I have already ordered an inquiry into the incident. It is certainly a major mistake on the part of the contractor. The job was assigned to Panda Infrastructure."



Stern action would be taken against those found guilty, he said, adding the project was under the Roads and Buildings (R&B) Division-4.

Director General of Police (DGP) R P Sharma, Police Commissioner Y B Khurania and other senior officials visited the spot to monitor the rescue operation.

Both the DGP and the police commissioner said the incident occurred apparently due to negligence.

Meanwhile, opposition parties blamed the BJD government for the incident.

Leader of Opposition Narasingha Mishra (Congress) said that the CM, who is in charge of the Works Department, is responsible and the issue would be raised in the Assembly.

He alleged the part of the flyover collapsed due to "poor quality" of work and contractors and engineers responsible for the "negligence" should be booked for "culpable homicide" not amounting to murder.

Odisha Congress chief Prasad Harichandan said stringent action should be taken against those responsible for the collapse.

BJP leader and Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan expressed grief over the incident and said, "Exemplary action must be taken against the guilty."



BJP's Odisha chief Basant Panda said even though the chief minister holds the Works Department, "poor quality" of work led to the collapse.

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BJP chief today said organisers of the Patel quota stir in Gujarat were leaning towards "one political party", an apparent reference to the Opposition Congress.

He said the reservation agitation was acquiring political colour as state assembly elections, slated to be held later this year, approached.

The BJP president was here to take questions from the youth at a programme called 'Adikham Gujarat' or Resolute Gujarat.

Asked by a participant how the BJP government was dealing with the Patidar agitation for reservations under the OBC category, Shah said the BJP government had asked the protesters, led by Hardik Patel, to follow the "legal process" but the "direction of the agitation changed".

"Observe the development and you will realise that slowly it has become an agitation backed by one political party. People had joined the agitation emotionally but the organisers are leaning towards one political party," he said.

Shah said his party's government in Gujarat tried to persuade the agitators to follow the legal process to achieve their goal.

"As per the main demand of the Patidar agitation, if a caste has to be included in the OBC category, that caste can submit an application to the OBC commission," he said.

Only after its recommendation can the caste get a place in that category, he added.

"But unfortunately, the direction of the agitation was changed... As the election approaches, you will see that slowly the issue will become political," he said.

Shah said under a Supreme Court ruling, reservation cannot exceed 50 per cent.

While reservation for SC and ST candidates was Constitutionally binding and no state government could change it, for a caste to find a place under the OBC category, it had to go through a procedure of submitting an application to the OBC Commission, he said.

Shah's comment comes in the backdrop of Hardik Patel recently dropping hints of supporting the Congress in the assembly elections.

Since 2015, the Patidars (Patels) have been agitating for inclusion of the community under the OBC category for reservation in government jobs and educational institutions.
Maryam Nawaz, the political heir apparent of Pakistan's ousted Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, said today that a majority of the people have "outrightly rejected" the Supreme Court's disqualification of her father in the Panama Papers case.

Maryam, 43, made the remarks while addressing a group of lawyers in Model Town here in connection with the election campaign for her mother Kulsoom Nawaz.

Kulsoom, who is currently being treated for cancer in London, will contest September 17 by-polls for National Assembly-120 seat that fell vacant after Sharif's disqualification by the Supreme Court on July 28 for concealing assets in his nomination papers for 2013 polls.

Majority of people have "outrightly rejected" the apex court's July 28 ruling against Nawaz Sharif, Maryam was quoted as saying by the Express Tribune.

Referring to the recent lawyers' convention held in Lahore, the scion of the ruling party said, "It was indeed a historic event and overwhelming presence of lawyers at the convention has sent a strong message to the entire world, particularly our rivals," the report said.

She said as scores of lawyers attended the gathering, opposition parties had no other option but to claim that the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) workers were provided with black coats for the event.

The apex court disqualified Sharif, 67, from continuing in office for dishonesty and ruled that corruption cases be filed against him and his children over the scandal.

Sharif will hold a rally in Abbotabad on September 10, to kick off the second phase of mass contact campaign and mobilise the people to support him, the PML-N said.

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SAD chief Sukhbir Singh Badal today said the study by PGIMER on drug addiction in Punjab has exposed the "conspiracy of anti-Punjab forces", which maligned the image of the state for their "petty political goals".

In a statement here, he said the comprehensive study, which was carried out in all 22 districts, had "exposed" the Congress as well as the AAP.

"The PGIMER report puts the entire number of addicts in the state at 2.70 lakh. Other reports, including that conducted by the AIIMS, have come out with even lower figures than this," Badal said.

"Both the parties should now tell Punjabis why they branded them as drug addicts and tender an unconditional apology to the people of the state," he said.

According to the Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER) study, conducted between 2015 and 2016, and released yesterday, up to 2.70 lakh people in Punjab are addicted to narcotics like opium, heroin, poppy husk and synthetic drugs.

One in six people in the state were dependent on one substance or the other and their use is more common in rural areas, it said.

The SAD chief today said the survey listing drug addiction in Punjab at less than one per cent had "nailed the lie" of Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi.

He said Gandhi had claimed in October 2012 that 70 per cent of the state's youth were drug addicts.

"This despite knowing that he was reading out a sample survey of drug addicts of which youth formed a big share," Badal said.

Hitting out at AAP national convener Arvind Kejriwal, Badal said the Delhi Chief minister and men had also claimed that 40 lakh youth of Punjab were drug addicts.

The "entire conspiracy" was hatched to counter the development narrative of the previous SAD-BJP government, he said.

"Though the Congress succeeded in its goal of forming government in Punjab, it caused incalculable damage to its people and its economy. Both the Congress and AAP played with the lives of the youth... It also dented the image of Punjab and Punjabis worldwide," Badal claimed.

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Prime Minister Narendra Modi today wished success to an all-woman team of the Indian Navy as it embarked on circumnavigation of the globe, a first of its kind from India.

The six women Naval officers had met the prime minister on August 16 and he had exhorted them to project the country's capabilities and strengths across the world.

The 'Navika Sagar Parikrama' was flagged off by Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman near the Panaji coast. The expedition being undertaken on an India-built sail boat INS Tarini is slated to conclude in Panaji in March next year.

"Today is a special day! 6 women officers of the Navy begin their journey of circumnavigating the globe on board INSV Tarini," Modi tweeted today.

"The entire nation comes together in wishing the all- women team of Navika Sagar Parikrama the very best in their remarkable endeavour," he added in another tweet.

The expedition will be covered in five legs, with stopovers at 4 ports -- Fremantle (Australia), Lyttleton (New Zealand), Port Stanley (Falklands), and Cape Town (South Africa).

INSV Tarini is a 55-foot sailing vessel, which has been built indigenously, and inducted in the Indian Navy earlier this year.

The vessel is being skippered by Lt. Commander Vartika Joshi and the crew comprises Lt. Commanders Pratibha Jamwal, P Swathi, and Lieutenants S Vijaya Devi, B Aishwarya and Payal Gupta.

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Pope Francis wrapped up his Colombia trip with a deeply personal final day today honoring St. Peter Claver, a fellow Jesuit who ministered to thousands of African slaves who passed through the port of Cartagena during Spanish colonial times.

His visit to Cartagena got off to a rocky start, however, when he banged his head on his popemobile, cutting his eyebrow and getting a swollen, black left eye.

Francis iced his cheekbone and received a butterfly patch to cover the cut, and he continued his popemobile tour without incident.

Francis was visiting the poor San Francisco neighborhood to dedicate new houses for the homeless before paying homage to Claver at the church that bears his name in the city's historic center.

Claver, the self-described "slave of the slaves forever," has been revered by Jesuits, popes and human rights campaigners for centuries for having insisted on recognizing the dignity of slaves when others treated them as mere merchandise to be bought and sold.

On the eve of his visit to Cartagena, Francis celebrated Claver's feast day by praising the 17th century Spanish missionary for having "understood, as a disciple of Jesus, that he could not remain indifferent to the suffering of the most helpless and mistreated of his time, and that he had to do something to alleviate their suffering."



History's first Latin American pope has similarly insisted on ministering to society's most marginal and making them the focus of the Catholic Church's mission.

He takes special care of the homeless who live around the Vatican, makes regular phone calls to prisoners, brought a dozen Syrian refugees home with him from a Greek refugee camp, and embraces the sick, the maimed and the deformed every chance he gets.

He is to pray at Claver's tomb today after laying the foundation for new residences for homeless people in Cartagena, the city famous for its UNESCO-awarded historic center but also home to slums and shanties.

Francis is likely to hold Claver up as a model for today's Catholic Church, someone who insisted on recognizing the inherent human rights of everyone.

It's a message he referenced in Medellin yesterday during a Mass on a rain-soaked airport tarmac that drew upward of 1 million people. Francis demanded that his church not hold fast to rigid doctrine but instead seek out the sinners and outcasts and welcome them in.

"My brothers, the church is not a customs post," Francis said. "It wants its doors to be open."



Francis returns to Rome from Cartagena tonight, ending a five-day visit highlighted by a huge prayer of reconciliation that brought together victims of Colombia's long-running conflict and demobilized guerrillas and paramilitary fighters.

While in Colombia, Francis refrained from making any public comments about the deteriorating political and humanitarian situation next door in Venezuela, though he did meet briefly with a delegation of Venezuelan bishops.

He will most certainly be asked about it during his airborne press conference en route home.

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Expressing solidarity with the Rohingya Muslims of Myanmar, several organisations today took out protest rallies in different parts of the city against what they termed as the "genocide" of Rohingya Muslims in the neighbouring country.

An all party protest meeting was also organised at Nampally here condemning the killings of Rohingya Muslims which was addressed among those by CPI general secretary S Sudhakar Reddy and senior Congress leader Mohd Ali Shabbir.

Holding placards that read "Stop killings of innocent Rohingya Muslims in Burma", "Stop genocide of Rohingyas", members of city-based organisations Majlis Bachao Tehreek (MBT) and Darsgah Jihad-O-Shahadat (DJS) and other organisations protested in different parts of the city.

They raised slogans besides burning effigies of Myanmar's state counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi.

Union Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju had recently said the Rohingyas, whether they are registered under the UNHCR or not, are "illegal immigrants in India and hence they stand to be deported".

The Rohingyas Muslim minority in the Rakhine state of Myanmar have been fleeing to Bangladesh and India amid reports of alleged ethnic purging and persecution.

According to estimates, Hyderabad is home to about 3,600 Rohingyas, taking shelter under a UNHCR programme.

"They are not willing to go back to Myanmar," a volunteer with an NGO working for them said requesting anonymity.

Sources in the Rohingya camp here say they are apprehensive about their future if they are deported and fear that they would be killed or subjected to torture back home.

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Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi will interact with global thinkers, political leaders and overseas Indians in the US this week on international economic and technology issues, an organiser of his visit said.

Gandhi, 47, begins his nearly two-week trip to the US with an address at the University of California, Berkeley, tomorrow on contemporary India and the path forward for the world's largest democracy.

His great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru, India's first prime minister, delivered a speech at Berkeley in 1949.

"The purpose of the visit is two-fold. One is to meet interesting and global thinkers, to have a conversation on what is happening world over on economy, on technology, on opportunities, and really understand different views from experts on the global scene," technocrat Sam Pitroda, who is involved with the preparations of Gandhi's visit, told PTI.

Pitroda worked with Gandhi's father and former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi for nearly a decade to transform India's telecom sector.

He said Gandhi will meet overseas Indians at an event in New York as part of an outreach by the Congress party.

The Congress vice president is scheduled to visit Washington DC. He is likely to address members of the think- tank community at an event organised by the Centre for American Progress, and interact with the corporate world at another programme organised by the US-India Business Council.

Gandhi may meet some members of the ruling Republican Party. "A lot of these meetings are going to be small and private," Pitroda said.

"He wants to understand more about what's happening globally and what's the global view of the situation is," he said.

The Congress vice president has often visited the US, but this could possibly be the first time in his political career that Gandhi would hold public meetings, meet political leaders and deliver speeches in the country.

"You know he needs to be out, he needs to express his views. You know he has been not, may be, talking publicly about his trips. But I think, it is important that he meets a large number of people this time and also overseas Congress members," Pitroda said.

"Today, the view of India is one short of protected by one group of people. We need to really talk about Indian aspirations, Indian concerns about what is going on not just in India but the world over. Rise of populism is one topic I am sure will come up in the conversation," Pitroda said.

He said Gandhi would interact with Silicon Valley people, where the technology, talent and Indian "brain power" is concentrated. "So, the idea is if you were to meet a lot of Silicon Valley people, it is better to talk about things in San Francisco."



Gandhi will also address a gathering at the Princeton University.

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The district administration today lifted the ban on mobile internet services from 50 out of 64 police stations here.

The internet services will remain suspended in 14 police stations of the city till September 11, Divisional Commissioner Rajeshwar Singh said in an official order.

The decision was taken considering the law and order situation in the city, he said.

Violence had erupted on Friday night as protesters gathered at Ramganj police station and pelted stones after a man riding a motorcycle was assaulted by a policeman during routine checking.

A mob damaged two dozen vehicles and torched four others, including an ambulance and police bus, besides setting ablaze a power sub-station. A man died while six policemen were injured in the violence.

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Welcoming the decision of the Council of reducing the rate on supply of various scrips from 12 per cent to 5 per cent, the Federation of Indian Export Organizations (FIEO) said the move will give a boost to the exports sector.

"Reduction of the rate on supply of scrips like merchandise exports from India scheme (MEIS), service exports from India scheme (SEIS), duty free import authorisation (DFIA) from 12 per cent to 5 per cent follows the fitment formula adopted by the Council," FIEO president Ganesh Kumar Gupta said in a statement issued here on Sunday.

He said the decision will give a boost to premium on scrips which plummeted with restriction on utilisation of scrips in the regime.

"Wider utilisation of scrips will also be looked by the new Committee as the government's objective is to benefit the exporters through the grant of scrips rather than the importers," Gupta said.
Actor Reese Witherspoon says her kids are her priority and she has rejected many good roles to be with them.

The "Big Little Lies" star, who has Ava, 17, and Deacon, 13, with ex-husband Ryan Phillippe and four-year-old Tennessee with spouse Jim Toth, says she "really needs to think" before signing a project, reported Contactmusic.

"Every time a movie comes up, I balance my kids' wants and needs versus my own. My job takes me far away, I have to travel to different countries and I might not see them until the weekend when I'm exhausted, so when I take a movie, I really need to think about that.

"Right now, Ava is applying for college, so I don't work on acting jobs. There have been several movies I wanted to make and didn't because of my kids and I wish I had made them," Witherspoon says.

The 41-year-old actor, however, likes to involve her family in her career and her life choices.

"They come on set sometimes and that's really special. It was harder when they were younger, because they didn't understand. Now I pitch them ideas about my movies.

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Rohingya militants in Myanmar, whose raids sparked an army crackdown that has seen nearly 3,00,000 Muslim Rohingya flee to Bangladesh, today declared a unilateral ceasefire but the government said it would not negotiate with "terrorists".

The United Nations said 2,94,000 bedraggled and exhausted Rohingya refugees have arrived in Bangladesh since the militants' attacks on Myanmar security forces in neighbouring Rakhine state on August 25 triggered a major military backlash.

Bangladesh's foreign minister said today that "genocide" was being waged in Rakhine state.

Tens of thousands of Rohingya are believed to be on the move inside Rakhine after more than a fortnight without shelter, food and water.

"The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) hereby declares a temporary cessation of offensive military operations," the militant group said in a statement on its Twitter account.

It urged "all humanitarian actors" to resume aid delivery to "all victims of humanitarian crisis irrespective of ethnic or religious background" during the one-month ceasefire until October 9.

International aid programmes in Rakhine have been severely curtailed over safety concerns due to the fighting.

In addition to Rohingya, some 27,000 ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and Hindus have also fled violence in northern Rakhine.

ARSA called on Myanmar to "reciprocate this humanitarian pause" in fighting.

Myanmar, which has previously labelled ARSA as "terrorists", appeared to reject the overture.

"We have no policy to negotiate with terrorists," Zaw Htay, a senior government spokesman, tweeted late today.

Aung San Suu Kyi's government has come in for strong international criticism over the military's treatment of the Rohingya -- including the alleged laying of mines along the border to prevent those who fled from returning.

Three Rohingya are reported to have been killed by a mine and others including children have been injured.

Rohingya refugees say army operations against ARSA led to mass killing of civilians and the burning of villages, sending them across the border.

Mainly Buddhist Myanmar does not recognise its stateless Muslim Rohingya community, labelling them "Bengalis".

Bangladesh foreign minister A.H. Mahmood Ali accused Myanmar of running a "malicious propaganda" campaign to term the Rohingya as "illegal migrants from Bangladesh" and the militants as "Bengali terrorists".

"Should all people be killed? Should all villages be burnt? It is not acceptable," he told reporters after briefing diplomats in Dhaka today.

"The international community is saying it is a genocide. We also say it is a genocide," he said.

Members of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) gathered in Kazakhstan's capital Astana today expressed "serious concern about recent systematic brutal acts committed by the armed forces" in Myanmar, calling for international monitors to be accepted into the country.

India's foreign ministry called for an immediate end to the violence, urging the situation "be handled with restraint and maturity".

Thousands are arriving in Bangladesh each day, joining overcrowded camps of Rohingya who have fled Myanmar over decades of troubles.

The UN has appealed for urgent donations of USD 77 million.

Bangladesh already hosts around 4,00,000 Rohingya from previous crises.

The Red Cross in Bangladesh welcomed the ceasefire pledge as aid agencies struggle to meet the needs of an "overwhelming crisis".

"How can you handle such a big influx of people? They want shelter, they want a safe place," Misada Saif, Prevention and Communication Coordinator of the ICRC Bangladesh delegation, told AFP.

Cradling her naked screaming infant, Rohingya refugee Zohra Begum was close to tears as several hundred people were ordered to leave a strip of forest alongside the beach near Shamlapur, where families were clearing land with hoes to build shelters.

"We went to all the camps but there was no place to stay. That's why we came here," she told AFP. "If we have to move from here, where will we go? We will die."



Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh say ethnic Rakhine Buddhists joined Myanmar's security forces in the indiscriminate killing of villagers.

But ethnic Rakhine villagers accuse militants of murdering civilians while the government says fleeing Rohingya set fire to their own homes to foment anger against the authorities.

At the makeshift camp near Shamlapur, Rohingya refugees doubted a ceasefire would allow their return.

"They (Myanmar army) are saying 'go away or we'll burn all of you'. How can we believe a ceasefire will have any effect?" Hafez Ahmed, 60, told AFP.

But Hashem Ullah, a 33-year-old farmer from a village west of Maungdaw, said he would return "if I got compensation, and they accept us as Rohingya".

"How can we live like this here?" he added, gesturing to the swampy earth.

ARSA says it is fighting to defend the Rohingya from persecution in Myanmar.

But Myanmar labels them "extremist Bengali terrorists".

The army says it has killed nearly 400 militants, while some Rohingya refugees say they were forced to fight by ARSA.

The first ARSA attacks in October last year were less ambitious, but the subsequent military response by a security force notorious for its scorched-earth response sent 90,000 Rohingya fleeing across the border.

That means over a third of the estimated 1.1 million Rohingya in Rakhine state have fled in less than a year.

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Hollywood star Ryan Reynolds took a quick break from filming "Deadpool 2" to voice his support for victims of Hurricane Irma.

Reynolds took to social media to share a photo of him wearing a t-shirt with the text, "Hope. Heal. REBUILD," on top off his "Deadpool" costume.

"Let's help those affected by Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma. Support the incredible ground efforts of Americares emergency response teams with this snazzy t-shirt," he wrote in the caption.

Reynolds joins the flock of celebrities who are supporting relief efforts as Hurricane Irma is about to rip through Florida.

Kevin Hart, Miley Cyrus, Sandra Bullock, Nick Jonas, Demi Lovato, and members of Fall Out Boy are among those donating funds to relief groups, while charity campaigns were launched by Supernatural's cast members, Houston Texans defensive end JJ Watt, Ellen DeGeneres, and more.

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The country's largest steel maker SAIL posted a 7 per cent rise in sales at 5.5 million tonnes in the first five months of the ongoing fiscal, helped by production ramp-up.

"Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) witnessed a growth of 7 per cent in total sales during the April-August 2017 period over the corresponding period last year...," according to a company spokesperson.

The sales growth was on account of ramping up of output, aggressive marketing and sale of new products, he said.

"During this period, domestic sales showed improvement in both long and flat products enabling SAIL to increase its market share to 14.6 per cent from 13.4 per cent," the spokesperson added.

As was as sales of galvanised products, PM plates, CR coils/sheets and heavy structurals from the new mills of the company is concerned there was significant improvement.

SAIL, he said, also had the best ever cash collections last month.

SAIL Chairman P K Singh said the steel major is gearing up to encash the conducive environment for demand as envisaged in the progressive policies of the government for the Indian economy, especially the infrastructure sector.

The PSU had recorded an 8 per cent growth in total sales at 13.14 MT in FY 2016-17.

The company had also recorded the best ever total sales figure for March 2017 at 1.575 MT, a rise of 21 per cent over the year ago.

On the production front, the company had recorded a growth of 12 per cent in saleable steel production for 2016-17 over the preceding fiscal.
Saudi Arabia said today it would keep pressuring Qatar until demands by a bloc of Arab states are met, dampening hopes for a US-mediated resolution to a diplomatic crisis.

"We will continue to take action and we will maintain our position until Qatar responds," Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir said, speaking alongside his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in the Saudi city of Jeddah.

The bloc's 13 demands include Doha ending its alleged support for Islamist extremist groups, closing a Turkish military base in the emirate and downgrading diplomatic ties with Tehran.

Qatar "must respond to these requests in order to open a new page," Jubeir said.

The Saudi move came just two days after US President Donald Trump spoke with the leaders of Saudi Arabia and Qatar in a bid to mediate.

Trump said he believed the dispute could be solved "fairly easily".

The Saudi and Qatari rulers spoke by phone yesterday, raising hope for talks.

But Riyadh later suspended the dialogue, accusing Doha of distorting facts by wrongly implying that Saudi Arabia had initiated the outreach.

A United Arab Emirates minister late yesterday voiced support for the Saudi decision on Twitter, accusing Qatar of "wasting an opportunity" to resolve the crisis.

"I hope that Doha will stop manoeuvring... And act transparently. There is no other way," state minister for foreign affairs Anwar Gargash said on his official Twitter account.

Saudi Arabia led the UAE, Egypt and Bahrain in cutting ties with Qatar in June, accusing it of bankrolling extremist groups and of being too close to Riyadh's regional arch-rival Tehran. Doha denies the accusations.

Qatar and Saudi Arabia are both key US allies.

Doha hosts a major US air base, home to the headquarters of Centcom -- the regional command which leads operations against the Islamic State jihadist group.

Qatar's emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamid al-Thani is set to meet German Chancellor Angela Merkel for talks on September 15, in what will be his first trip to a western capital since the crisis began.

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Hundreds of angry parents on Sunday staged a protest outside the Ryan International School here for a CBI probe into the murder of a seven-year-old school boy, a demand which the Haryana government expressed willingness to accept.

A liquor shop, situated just 50 metres from the school, was set ablaze and some of the demonstrators threw liquor bottles inside school premises to vent their ire against the school management, police said.

The protestors alleged that school drivers and conductors often consume alcohol from the liquor shop in their free time.

The protestors were demanding that the school be shut until a CBI probe is ordered into the horrifying incident in which the Class 2 boy Praduman Thakur was found with his throat slit in a school washroom on Friday last.

The murder, in connection with which a bus conductor has been arrested, has triggered a major outrage.

Police used batons to quell the protest and detained 20 protestors. Cameras of some photojournalists were also damaged during the protest.

"The Gurgaon Police had to use mild lathicharge to disperse the agitators. The police detained over 20 protestors found agitating outside the school," said Ravinder Kumar, PRO of Gurgaon Police.

Gurgaon Police Commissioner Sandeep Khirwar denied the charges of mediapersons being targeted by the cops.

"As per my knowledge, a fair warning was given to clear the place and nobody was targeted. However, if any mediaperson has been injured, then I express my regret and we will analyse the entire episode. But there was no intention to target anyone," Khirwar said.

Protesters set ablaze the liquor shop close to the Ryan International School in Gurugram on Sunday, two days after a 7-year-old class II student of the school was brutally murdered. Photo: PTI

Gurgaon Police has arrested school bus conductor Ashok Kumar in connection with the murder.

According to police, Kumar was inside the toilet, waiting for any student to come inside with the motive of alleged sexual assault. The deceased was the first student who entered the toilet, the police said.

Education minister Ram Bilas Sharma today said the charge sheet in the case will be ready within a week as he police were speedily conducting the probe.

He, however, added that if the parents of the child insist on a probe by the CBI or any other agency, the government will accede to their demand.

Sharma said the government has fixed a seven-day deadline in the case where the accused is booked under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code (for murder).

"We have directed the Gurgaon Police to book the owner of Ryan International School, Albert Pinto, under section 75 of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Punishment) Act, 2015, for cruelty to a child meted out by the custodian in the charge sheet to be submitted in the court within 7 days," he told reporters here.

"This is the minimum time in such cases," he said.

"However, if the child's parents still feel they are not satisfied, then as per their wish, we can get the case investigated by any agency including the CBI," he added.

The minister said "some loopholes in the security" were visible in the case and the toilet window was also found broken from inside.

"We accept negligence on part of the Ryan International School but the school cannot be derecognised as the future of 1,200 students is at stake," he said.

Sharma also made it clear that the school management has to take responsibility for the safety and security of the children.

"We are issuing directives in this regard to all schools including private ones," he said.

"We held a meeting today in which the demand to derecognise the school came up, but we also had to take into account the fact that 1,200 students are studying there. The parents of the students studying in this school were against this step and, therefore, we felt taking such a step will not be right," he said.

"However, for any kind of lapse, by the management or the owner, we have initiated action," he said.

The accused was arrested within hours of the murder after which a court in Gurgaon sent him to police custody for three days.

"The murder accused has already been arrested. Now, within a week, the police after collecting all necessary evidence will submit a charge sheet in court. However, still if the parents are not satisfied, then the Haryana government is ready to get the matter probed by any agency.

"I am hopeful that when we will produce the accused before court within a week with all evidence collected by the police, the parents of the child will be satisfied with the action being taken," he said.

"We have full sympathy with the parents of the child. If there is any issue of providing financial help, the Haryana government will be willing to help," he said.

The minister made it clear that the Haryana government will not show any leniency in the matter



"Whatever strict action needs to be taken as per the law will be taken in this case," he asserted.

He also said a liquor vend near the school has been ordered to be shut down permanently.

Meanwhile, former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda said a CBI probe should be ordered.

Upping the ante against the BJP government in Haryana, Hooda said, "This government has lost the trust and confidence of the public. By assaulting mediapersons, the government is trying to suppress voice of the people.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Haryana police have arrested Govind, a member of the state body of the Dera Sacha Sauda, Sirsa, for allegedly inciting violence on August 25 in Panchkula after sect chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh was convicted in rape case.

Meanwhile, efforts continued to trace the Dera chief's adopted daughter Honeypreet Insan, against whom a lookout notice was issued earlier.

Govind, a senior member of the Dera Sacha Sauda, was present at the Hafed Chowk, the epicentre of the violence in Panchkula on August 25, the police said today, adding that he has been accused of inciting violence.

"We arrested him from Zirakpur," Panchkula Police Commissioner, A S Chawla said today.

Chawla added that the police were still looking for two key Dera Sacha Sauda functionaries, Honeypreet and Aditya Insan.

"We are at the job and hopeful of nabbing them soon," he said.

The Haryana police had earlier sent a team to Lakhimpur Kheri in Uttar Pradesh bordering Nepal in search of Honeypreet, a close confidante of the self-styled godman who is serving a 20-year-old jail term for raping two disciples.

The police had on September 1 issued a lookout notice for Honeypreet and Aditya, fearing that they could flee the country.

"We are conducting raids at various places and our teams have gone to different areas to trace them," Chawla said.

Earlier, Dera Sacha Sauda management too had appealed to the two to cooperate with the police.

Sirsa-headquartered Dera chairperson Vipassana Insan had said that Honeypreet and Dera spokesperson Aditya Insan should help the investigations.

She had claimed that the Dera had no contact with them.

Chawla said the police initiated efforts to trace Honeypreet, the adopted daughter of Ram Rahim Singh, who describes herself as "Papa's angel", after it arrested and questioned another sect functionary, Surinder Dhiman Insan, in connection with an alleged conspiracy to help Ram Rahim escape after his conviction by the special CBI court in Panchkula.

Chawla said that police needs to question Honeypreet regarding the disclosures made by Surinder Dhiman and some other arrested accused.

He said that an FIR was earlier lodged at the Panchkula police station following a statement by a newspaper reporter against Aditya and Surinder Dhiman. The duo have been booked for sedition.

Violence broke out in Panchkula after the Dera chief's conviction, leaving 35 dead, while six others were killed in incidents in Sirsa.

Two key functionaries of Dera Sacha Sauda were also arrested on Friday for allegedly inciting violence in Panchkula. Chamkaur Singh, the incharge of Dera Sacha Sauda centre at Panchkula and Daan Singh, another key functionary, were nabbed by the police.

Both were arrested in connection with the violence that took place in Panchkula on August 25, the police said.

The 50-year-old Dera chief, who is lodged in the Sunaria Jail in Rohtak, had been sentenced to 20 years of imprisonment by the CBI court for the 2002 rapes of two of his disciples.

Earlier, five Haryana policemen, who were part of Ram Rahim's security when he travelled from Sirsa to the CBI court on August 25, were charged with sedition and dismissed from service over the alleged conspiracy to help him escape.

Honeypreet had accompanied Ram Rahim when he was brought to the special court for the pronouncement of the verdict in the 15-year-old rape cases.

She also travelled with him in a chopper which ferried them to Rohtak from Panchkula after the conviction.

Honeypreet acted in the film 'MSG 2 - The Messenger' and had a cameo role in 'MSG - The Warrior Lion Heart', in which the Dera chief played the lead roles.

Officials of the Uttar Pradesh police also said today that Honeypreet's photographs were pasted at police stations bordering Nepal and the law and order machinery was on an alert to ensure she does not sneak into the neighbouring country.
The situation today remained tense but under control even as curfew was extended till Monday 4 am in the areas here that were affected by violence on Friday night.

No relaxation in curfew was provided considering the law and order situation in Ramganj and its adjoining areas, a police official said.

Curfew was clamped in four police station areas of the city after one person died and seven others were injured in clashes between police and protesters.

The violence erupted on Friday night as protesters gathered at Ramganj police station and pelted stones after a man riding a motorcycle was assaulted by a policemen during routine checking.

The post mortem of 24-year-old Mohmmad Raees alias Aadil, who had died in the clashes, could not be done even today as his family members demanded compensation for the loss of his life, a Jaipur police commissionerate spokesperson said.

Series of talks with the peace committee and district administration were held today to maintain harmony in the area and convince the family members to get the post-mortem done, he added.

The mobile internet services were suspended till midnight today but the spokesperson said that this may be extended further.

Ample arrangements were made by the district administration so that services such as milk supply and health care do not suffer, officials said.

Earlier, a mob damaged two dozen vehicles and torched four others, including one ambulance and a police bus, besides setting ablaze a power sub-station. As tear gas shells and rubber bullets did not deter the mob, police said it was forced to fire in air and then at the miscreants.

Six policemen were also injured in the violence.

Curfew was imposed in four police station areas of Ramganj, Subhash Chowk, Manak Chowk and Galta Gate.

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A technical snag on Sunday forced an Air India flight carrying 220 passengers from Delhi to Paris to return to the IGI international airport here over 90 minutes after take off.

The flight resumed three-and-a-half hours later after the aircraft, a Boeing 787 Dreamliner, was replaced by another one.

"AI 143 departed from Indira Gandhi International airport at 1:58 pm but returned at 3.38 pm," said a spokesperson.

The substitute aircraft finally departed at 7.10 pm from New Delhi.
Ryan International School, where a 7-year-old boy was found murdered three days back, tonight said its management is "cooperating to our fullest" with the police investigations and hoped that the guilty would be given the severest punishment as per the law.

In a statement, Ryan Pinto, CEO of Ryan International Schools Group, said the school should not be held "culpable of a crime where it is itself a victim of unfortunate circumstances."



Insisting that well being and safety of students is the school's priority, Pinto said, "We will not succumb to all the various false allegations being made nor will we fuel the various controversies being spread. We should not unjustly be blamed or branded as the perpetrators."



He said the Ryan International Group of schools was facing "one of its saddest periods" since its inception due to the loss of life of one of its innocent students, as a result of a reprehensible crime.

"We are all in shock by the horror of this crime that occurred despite various security protocols," he said.

"We share the deep pain and grief of the bereaved parents and family in this darkest hour. On behalf of the entire school staff, students and management we want to extend our heartfelt condolences to the family," the statement said.

"It is understandable that everyone is seeking answers. So are we and We are cooperating to our fullest with the police investigations," said Pinto.

He said Ryan has four-decade-long reputation "as a credible educational institution educating lakhs of students across the nation. We would like to emphasise that Ryan School takes all efforts to ensure the security of its students."



The CEO said the the school is giving complete cooperation to the investigating authorities and "we have total faith in the law. We hope that the investigations will be concluded soon, and the guilty get the severest punishment as per the due process of law."



He went on to add, "As the investigations are ongoing, we request all parties concerned to refrain from holding Ryan School culpable of a crime where it is itself a victim of unfortunate circumstances.

"The investigation report should be out soon and all parties concerned need to wait until then. We request the public to refrain from turning violent and to let the police do their work."



While expressing confidence that "the truth will ultimately prevail", he said, "Once again, we extend our heartfelt condolences to Radioman's parents and We pray that God Almighty would bestow His everlasting peace for the departed soul.

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A man was arrested today for carrying MD tablets and powder worth Rs 4.13 lakh, the police said.

Police seized MDMA tablets and powder from possession of Pultsya alias Pintu Purohit under Panigate police station limits, Police Commissioner Manoj Shashidhar said.

The officer said Purohit used to source the contraband from the possession of a Nigerian national based in Mumbai.

Police have registered a case against Purohit and an unidentified Nigerian under provisions of Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act.

Purohit is also an accused in a murder case.

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Actor Taron Egerton is in negotiations to join Rosamund Pike's war reporter drama "A Private War".

Matthew Heineman is set to direct the long-gestating drama about the late Sunday Times war correspondent Marie Colvin, to be played by Pike, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The film is being produced by Charlize Theron and Basil Iwanyk via their respective Thunder Road Pictures and Denver & Deliah banners.

The script was adapted by Arash Amel and is based on a Vanity Fair article about Colvin's dramatic life as a war correspondent.

Colvin covered all the major conflicts of the last three decades, including the Sri Lankan civil war, where she was severely injured and lost an eye, the Arab Spring and finally the war in Syria, where she died in a rocket attack while reporting from Homs.

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Three companies -- Matrimony.Com, Capacit'e Infraprojects and ICICI Lombard -- will launch their initial share sale offers this week to raise about Rs 6,600 crore.

The initial public offer (IPO) of Matrimony.Com, which runs online match-making portals, will be open from September 11-13.

The IPO comprises fresh issue aggregating up to Rs 130 crore and an offer for sale of up to 37.67 lakh equity shares.

Matrimony.Com, which runs online match-making business under BharatMatrimony brand, among others, is expected to raise over Rs 500 crore.

The price band for the IPO has been fixed in the range of Rs 983-985 per share.

The company has raised nearly Rs 226 crore from anchor investors on Friday.

Net proceeds from the issue would be utilised towards advertising and business promotion activities, purchase of land for construction of office premises in Chennai, repayment of overdraft facilities and general corporate purposes.

Engineering firm Capacit'e Infraprojects' Rs 400 crore IPO will be launched on September 13.

The issue, with a price band of Rs 245-Rs 250 per equity share, will close on September 15.

The company plans to utilise the proceeds of the issue for funding working capital requirements, purchasing of capital assets and general corporate purposes.

Besides, ICICI Lombard General Insurance Company has set Rs 651-661 as the price band for its IPO, which will make it a Rs 5,700 crore issue.

The issue, the first by any general insurance company, will be open for subscription from September 15-19.

So far this year, 19 companies, including BSE, Avenue Supermarts and Central Depository Services (India) Limited, have hit the market with their IPOs.

Last week, Dixon Technologies and Bharat Road Network concluded their IPOs.
President Donald Trump has urged any US residents still in Hurricane Irma's path to "just get out of its way" and not worry about possessions, as he monitored the powerful storm's advance on Florida from the secluded Camp David presidential retreat.

Irma was expected to strike the Florida Keys at daybreak today.

Trump called it a "storm of enormous destructive power" and asked "everyone in the storm path to heed all instructions, get out of its way."



"Property is replaceable but lives are not and safety has to come first," Trump said at a Cabinet meeting at the Maryland retreat, where he was spending the weekend with his wife, first lady Melania Trump. "Don't worry about it. Just get out of its way." Trump shared a brief video of his remarks on Twitter.

Irma hammered Cuba yesterday with punishing winds and rain before setting her sights on Florida, where massive evacuations were being carried out.

Trump said the US was grieving for those who were killed by Irma even before she reached the US mainland. The storm left more than 20 people dead in the Caribbean. He said the administration is monitoring the situation "around the clock" and is in "constant communications" with governors and other officials from the affected areas.

"We've never seen anything like this," he said, pledging as he did after Hurricane Harvey that recovery and rebuilding will happen quickly.

Trump has been receiving regular briefings on both Irma and Jose, along with updates on recovery and relief efforts that continue in southeast Texas and Louisiana after Harvey, the White House said. Harvey brought record rainfall and severe flooding to Houston and surrounding areas of the Texas Gulf Coast in late August before it moved on to Louisiana.

Elaine Duke, the acting head of the Department of Homeland Security, was scheduled yesterday to brief Trump and the rest of the team on the storms.

In between storm updates, Trump spent part of his fourth Cabinet meeting discussing administration priorities and how to advance them during what's left of his first year in office.

Trump recently launched a public push to rewrite the tax code to make it simpler and more competitive by cutting taxes for corporations and the middle class. He said at yesterday's meeting that he would press for Congress to complete its work on a bill even sooner this year.

"I think now, with what's happened with the hurricane, I'm going to ask for a speedup. I wanted a speedup anyway, but now we need it even more so," he said in a longer video of the meeting that was released by the White House.

North Korea was also on the agenda. Trump said the Cabinet would discuss North Korea's "latest provocative and destabilizing actions" and "the steps the United States will take to keep our people safe and, frankly, to keep the people of the world safe in this case."



North Korea deepened concerns about advances in its development of nuclear weapons by conducting its strongest nuclear test explosion to date last weekend. Trump said earlier this week that military action against a nuclear-armed North Korea remained an option.

Trump sided with Democrats this week to raise the US borrowing limit and keep the government operating through early December in a bid to speed federal assistance to hurricane victims. Congress acted quickly to pass the USD 15.3 billion deal and send it to Trump, who signed it Friday after he arrived at the Maryland retreat.

The agreement allowed Trump to taste victory after months of legislative setbacks and whet his appetite for more wins. In addition to overhauling the tax code, the president also wants new spending to upgrade roads, bridges and other infrastructure.

Trump has also given Congress six months to resolve the status of individuals who were brought to the US illegally as children after he decided earlier this week to end an Obama administration program that allowed them to live, work and attend school without fear of being deported.

The president and Mrs. Trump invited members of the Cabinet and their spouses to Camp David for the weekend, the White House said. It marked Trump's fourth visit to the retreat. He met there in August with members of his national security team, but yesterday was the first time Trump had entertained the entire Cabinet there, including Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, who turned 67 on Friday.

In a bit of deja vu, Trump was at Camp David when Harvey struck Texas last month.

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Turkish government warnings to its citizens in Germany to be "cautious" and avoid political gatherings during election season are a "bad joke", Chancellor Angela Merkel's most senior aide said today.

"Turkey's travel warning against Germany is a bad joke!", Peter Altmaier, head of Merkel's chancellery office, wrote on Twitter.

"Imprisonment without charge for many Germans is unjust! Nazi comparisons offend our honour!" he added, referencing two bones of contention in a long-running Berlin-Ankara spat.

Ties have plummeted since last year's attempted overthrow of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Germany's strong criticism of an ensuing crackdown which saw more than 50,000 people arrested.

Relations further deteriorated after the detention of several German citizens including Deniz Yucel, a correspondent for the Die Welt newspaper.

In July, Germany updated foreign ministry travel advice to warn citizens that they could face arrest if they travel to Turkey, prompting an immediate angry response from Ankara.

In a tit-for-tat update to its own travel guidance, Turkey on Saturday warned citizens living in or travelling to Germany "to be cautious, taking into account the situation in Germany where they could risk xenophobic or racist treatment".

Meanwhile, Turkish politicians have not skimped on references to Germany's grim past in attacks on Berlin.

Erdogan himself decried "Nazism" last week, after an election debate in which Merkel and Social Democratic rival Martin Schulz both endorsed ending Turkey's EU accession talks.

"The government in Ankara is losing its sense of proportion," Schulz told website Spiegel Online Sunday.

"Germany is not a country that can accept every single humiliation from Turkey.

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Two bodies have been found in the mountains of Mastung district of Pakistan's restive Balochistan province, with a Pakistani official saying that they could be of the two Chinese nationals who were kidnapped from Quetta earlier this year.

The bodies were found last Thursday and have now been sent to Islamabad for a DNA test.

A senior government official said the test was being done to ascertain identity of the deceased as the bodies were in bad condition and beyond recognition.

"To be honest, they are just skeletons," the official said today.

Chinese officials have been approached to get samples from relatives of the kidnapped man and woman for the DNA test, the Dawn reported.

The abduction took place on May 24, in Quetta's Jinnah town. While one Chinese woman managed to escape when the abductors fired in the air to disperse onlookers, they managed to get hold of two others.

The kidnapping of the Chinese nationals has raised concerns in Beijing over the multi-billion dollar investment in Pakistan.

The abduction forced the Chinese embassy in Islamabad to evacuate 10 of its nationals from Quetta and send them home.

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Two men arrested over a suspected neo-Nazi terror plot involving British Army soldiers were released today without being charged, police said.

The two were among five men -- four soldiers and a civilian -- who were arrested earlier this week over a plot linked to a banned far-right group National Action.

"No further action will be taken against the two men, both aged 24, from Northampton and Ipswich," West Midlands Police said.

Detectives have been granted more time to question the remaining three who include a 22-year-old from Birmingham, a 32-year-old arrested in Powys and a 24-year-old from Northampton, the police said.

The Northampton man was arrested in Cyprus and the UK Ministry of Defence had previously confirmed that he was held at the island's British Dhekelia base before being transferred to Royal Air Force (RAF) Akrotiri for a flight back to the UK.

The men are being held on suspicion of being concerned in the commission, preparation and instigation of acts of terrorism under the Terrorism Act 2000; namely on suspicion of being members of a proscribed organisation.

Three of the servicemen are believed to be from the Royal Anglian Regiment.

"The arrests were pre-planned and intelligence-led; there was no threat to the public safety," said a West Midlands Police spokesperson.

The arrests were carried out by police on September 5 in conjunction with counter-terror units from the West Midlands, Wales and the East Midlands. Several properties are being searched in connection with the arrests.

The police have not given further details of the men's activities but the "commission, preparation and instigation" of terrorism could include directly planning an attack, joining a prohibited group or giving effect to that intention.

National Action, a British far-right group, was banned last year by UK Home Secretary Amber Rudd.

"National Action is a racist, anti-Semitic and homophobic organisation which stirs up hatred, glorifies violence and promotes a vile ideology, and I will not stand for it. It has absolutely no place in a Britain that works for everyone," the minister had said at that time.

An entry for National Action in the UK's official list of proscribed organisation says it is a "racist neo-Nazi group" established in 2013. Its branches across the UK "conduct provocative street demonstrations and stunts aimed at intimidating local communities".

Its activities and propaganda materials are particularly aimed at recruiting young people, it says.

Being a member of or inviting support for a proscribed organisation is a criminal offence carrying a sentence of up to 10 years in prison under the British laws.

National Action describes itself as a "national socialist youth organisation" and says its movement is aimed at the "broken right-wing".

It has used social media to call for a "white jihad" and "crusade" in Britain.

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US-backed fighters made a sweeping advance against jihadists today in Syria's eastern Deir Ezzor province, capturing territory just kilometres from the provincial capital, a monitor said.

Oil-rich Deir Ezzor province borders Iraq and is a strategic prize for both the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and Russian-supported government troops.

The SDF announced yesterday it had begun clearing the Islamic State group from areas east of the Euphrates River, which cuts diagonally across the province.

By today, fighters from the SDF's Deir Ezzor Military Council (DEMC) had seized much of the province's northeast, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

"They seized control of a hilltop seven kilometres (four miles) from the eastern banks of the Euphrates, across the river from Deir Ezzor city," said Rami Abdel Rahman, who heads the Britain-based monitor.

He attributed the quick gains to the fact that "eastern parts of Deir Ezzor are desert and not densely populated."



The DEMC's advance is being backed by the US-led coalition that has been bombing IS in Iraq and Syria since 2014 while the regime's push on the city is being supported by its Russian allies.

The coalition, the SDF, Syria's government and Russia have agreed on a "de-confliction line" in northeastern Syria to prevent the two assaults from clashing.

Regime forces today were locked in fierce clashes with IS southwest of the city as they prepared a push into neighbourhoods still held by the jihadists, the Observatory said.

According to the War Media channel operated by regime ally Hezbollah, Syrian troops seized full control of the 450- kilometre (280-mile) road linking the capital to Deir Ezzor for the first time in four years.

"The Syrian army and its allies now control the entire international highway between Deir Ezzor and Damascus, through the cities of Al-Sukhna and Palmyra," it said, referring to other central Syrian cities recaptured from IS.

"The international highway had been unusable in the area between Al-Sukhna and Deir Ezzor for four years."



Since 2014, IS has held about 60 per cent of the city and much of the surrounding oil-rich province, which borders Iraq.

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American historian Nancy Hatch Dupree, who dedicated most of her life to preserving Afghanistan's heritage, died in a Kabul hospital today aged 89.

Dupree first arrived in the Afghan capital in 1962 as the wife of a diplomat. In the city she met her second husband, the late American archaeologist Louis Dupree, and developed a lifelong passion for the Muslim country.

Over the next five decades she travelled throughout the country, wrote five guidebooks and documented the war-torn nation's past.

Her death was confirmed by Waheed Wafa, executive director of the Afghanistan Center at Kabul University where tens of thousands of documents preserved by the Duprees are kept.

Many Afghans took to Twitter to pay tribute to Dupree - sometimes referred to as Afghanistan's "grandmother" - who was widely respected for her efforts to safeguard the country's history and culture.

"Very saddened by the death of #NancyDupree. Afghans value and respect her services of decades for #Afghanistan. Nancy will be missed! RIP," wrote Afghanistan's Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah.

Activist Mariam Wardak posted: "You were a blessing, your work will remain a treasure, you are loved and will be missed by the people of #Afghanistan."



"The incredible Nancy Hatch Dupree has passed, 50 years dedicated to preserving Afghanistan's historical docs & artifacts #Kabul #Afghanistan," wrote actress Fereshta Kazemi.

US special charge d'affaires Hugo Llorens, America's top diplomat in Afghanistan in the absence of an ambassador, said Dupree had been a "pillar of the American community in Afghanistan" and would be "forever remembered".

Dupree and her husband lived in Afghanistan until the late 1970s when they were forced to leave by the communist government.

They spent time in the Pakistani city of Peshawar helping Afghan refugees fleeing the conflict during the Soviet occupation of 1979-89 and collecting documents relating to Afghanistan.

Dupree's husband died in 1989 and she moved back to Afghanistan after the US-led invasion that toppled the ruling Taliban in 2001.

With the help of the new government, Dupree created a centre to preserve the couple's priceless collection of records for researchers.

The Afghanistan Center houses more than 100,000 documents in the country's two official languages, Dari and Pashto, as well as English and other European languages.

The centre also provides reading materials to hundreds of libraries around the country, a reflection of Dupree's belief that knowledge was key to Afghanistan's recovery from decades of conflict.

"Afghans possess a remarkable inner strength that has carried them through two decades of war and displacement. If they are given the knowledge they need to fully participate in reconstruction efforts, their country will move forward steadily, to the benefit of all," Dupree wrote in the New York Times in 2008.

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Encouraged by the heavy influx of tourists to the picturesque Bhaderwah town this year, the Jammu and Kashmir government has announced a winter carnival and chopper services to promote the mountainous resort in Jammu region.

"The government has decided to hold winter carnival at Bhaderwah to promote it as major tourist destination of the state," Minister of State for Tourism Priya Sethi has said.

Sethi, who inaugurated the two-day tourism-cum-cultural festival in the town in Doda district yesterday, said the winter carnival would be held on the pattern of Gulmarg, Pahalgam and Patnitop resorts to boost tourist footfall.

Praising the natural beauty of Bhaderwah - popular as "mini Kashmir", the minister said a large number of tourists have been diverted this year towards this unexplored heaven due to the efforts and initiatives taken up by the government.

"It is highly encouraging to note that the area has witnessed record tourist footfall of more than four lakh - the highest ever figure and is expected to go much beyond by the end of this year," she said.

The minister asked the tourism department to give wider publicity to the area to attract the tourists from across the country.

She laid stress on better connectivity, tourism infrastructure and development of hospitality sector for boosting the tourism to benefit the local stakeholders.

"This valley varied tourism potential. There is huge scope for adventure tourism, pilgrimage tourism, winter sports.

"To explore this potential steps will be taken to divert the pilgrims visiting Mata Vaishno Devi, Amarnath and other parts of the state to this unexplored valley," she said.

Sethi also assured the people that the area will be soon provided air connectivity on the pattern of other districts as the Union Aviation ministry was providing attractive incentives for regional air connectivity all over India.

She directed the district administration to submit a comprehensive plan envisaging the requirements for starting the service.

"Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti is keen to see Bhaderwah emerging as a major tourist destination and she has directed state tourism ministry to explore all the possibilities for tapping its potential to the full.

"Mehbooba has also assured to sanction Rs 50 crore for various tourism projects to develop the Bhaderwah circuit," the minister said.

She said the government was also mulling to rope in private players through public-private partnership mode to develop and strengthen hospitality sector and tap the huge tourism potential of Chenab region.

"Special stress has been laid on promoting Chamba (Himachal Pradesh)-Bhaderwah road as an alternate connectivity to the state as it will surely increase the tourist footfall in the region," she said.

Asserting that tourism is the backbone of the state's economy, Sethi said Prime Minister Narindra Modi has sanctioned Rs 2,000 crore for boosting this lucrative industry in the state and Rs 400 crore has already been released for the purpose.

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Viking armies may have had high ranking female officers at the battlefield, say scientists who conducted a DNA analysis of the skeletal remains of a warrior and found that it was a woman.

Researchers at Uppsala University and Stockholm University in Sweden conducted a study on a mid-10th century grave in Swedish Viking town Birka, one of the most well-known graves from the Viking Age.

The burial was excavated in the 1880s, revealing remains of a warrior surrounded by weapons, including a sword, armour-piercing arrows, and two horses. There was also a full set of gaming pieces and a gaming board.

The morphology of some skeletal traits have long suggested that she was a woman, but since this grave has been the type specimen for a Viking warrior for over a century, it has always been assumed to have belonged to a male Viking.

Now, researchers have found that the DNA retrieved from the skeleton demonstrates that the individual carried two X chromosomes and no Y chromosome.

"This is the first formal and genetic confirmation of a female Viking warrior," said Professor Mattias Jakobsson at Uppsala University.

Isotope analyses confirm a travelling life style, well in tune with the martial society that dominated 8th to 10th century Northern Europe, researchers said.

"The gaming set indicates that she was an officer, someone who worked with tactics and strategy and could lead troops in battle," said Charlotte Hedenstierna-Jonson, form Stockholm University, who led the study.

"What we have studied was not a Valkyrie from the sagas but a real life military leader, that happens to have been a woman," she said.

"Written sources mention female warriors occasionally, but this is the first time that we have really found convincing archaeological evidence for their existence," said Neil Price, Professor at Uppsala University.

The finding were published in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology.

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As nations war, inequality widens and an ever-growing humanitarian challenge of a global refugee crisis threatens peaceful existence, the promise of a better future lies in the hands of the youth, a symposium here has stressed.

The call for global peace and solidarity was made at the conference centring around Soka Gakkai International (SGI) president Daisaku Ikeda's 2017 peace proposal titled "The Global Solidarity of Youth: Ushering in a New Era of Hope".

The SGI is a Buddhist NGO with branches across the world, including many in India.

Held by the Indian arm of SGI, Bharat Soka Gakkai, Friday's symposium, attended by eminent economists, classical dancers and defence and planning experts, focussed on different aspects of development through which global coexistence can be achieved.

Invoking the September 11 attacks in the US, C Uday Bhaskar, security and strategic affairs expert, said that "global peace was more elusive now than ever".

"We are just days away from Sept 11 and all of you are aware of the significance, the corrosive resonance of Sept 11. Sixteen years later, I submit it to your consideration that global peace is even more elusive this year than it was in the last," he said.

"Its desirability has been burnished by a few more notches given the kind of challenges to global peace. But nonetheless I believe the efforts now should be made with renewed vigour," Bhaskar, retired commodore in Indian Navy, said.

He noted that the younger generations require "higher levels of awareness of the problem at hand" pointing at the increasing nuclear risk ranging from Hiroshima to Fukushima.

Elaborating on the economy's part in achieving global peace mentioned in the proposal, Rajat Kathuria of the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER) said that conflict could be reduced by increasing trade between countries.

"The probability of conflict reduces considerably if two countries or a group of countries trade with each other or are economically interdependent. That's one way to approach it," Kathuria said.

To create a peaceful environment inside the country, he pointed out that more employment opportunities would reduce inequality in society and lead to a peaceful future for the coming generations.

Eminent classical dancer Prathibha Prahlad reflected upon Ikeda's words about young people's part in upholding and protecting the core values of human rights.

She also said a deep connection to culture was required.

"Education needs to be linked to culture. Culture of hearts brings people together, it teaches us to respect others and yourself. If we make an effort to understand other cultures and their traditions, and they do the same, we can all aim for a better future with respect for each other in our hearts," she said.

The 35th peace proposal by Ikeda says that the "world should go beyond looking at the problem of displaced persons in terms of numbers and build just and inclusive societies".

Ikeda has listed three priority areas crucial to a peaceful society as well as to attaining the United Nations' sustainable development goals.

In his proposal he highlighted "prohibiting and abolishing nuclear weapons, restoring hope in the hearts of refugees and building a culture of human rights" as the primary tools for a better world.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
MOSCOW (Reuters) - The chief executive of Russian oil giant Rosneft said on Sunday his company was not seeking the frozen assets of Sistema as it presses its multi-billion dollar lawsuit against the business conglomerate.

A court in the Russian region of Bashkortostan ruled last month that Sistema should pay Rosneft 136.3 billion roubles ($2.4 billion) to settle a claim that Rosneft-controlled oil producer Bashneft was stripped of assets when Sistema was the owner.

Sistema has rejected the claim as groundless and said it would appeal against the court decision. It has appealed against asset freezes imposed as part of the litigation but its latest request was turned down by a court last Tuesday.

The dispute has rekindled broader fears about investor rights in Russia and some observers have speculated about the redistribution of wealth among Russian elites.

"We in no way foresaw ... our owning these stakes," TASS agency quoted Rosneft CEO Igor Sechin as telling state Russian television, referring to the frozen assets.

"For us it's sufficient that Sistema settles our claims which the court has recognised," Sechin was quoted as saying in the interview broadcast on Sunday.

He added Rosneft was ready to help Sistema arrange credit lines with the banks to repay the damage award.

Last Tuesday Russian President Vladimir Putin said he had met Sechin as well as Vladimir Yevtushenkov, chairman and main owner of Sistema, and that an amicable agreement would benefit both companies and the Russian economy as a whole.

The court froze 185 billion roubles ($3.2 billion) worth of Sistema's assets in June, including 31.76 percent of shares in Russia's top mobile operator MTS.

If Sistema loses its appeal, it will be able to raise the money from banks and has no plans to sell its shares in MTS, Sistema CEO Mikhail Shamolin said in August.

($1 = 57.3429 roubles)

(Reporting by Maria Kiselyova; Editing by Gareth Jones)

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
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Police ask anyone who with information about this incident to contact them on 131 444 or Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000. Information can also be provided via the Crime Stoppers ACT website.
For the Anglicanism I grew up with was such high-quality mumbo-jumbo, such exquisite tripe that nothing else can compare with it and replace it. Anglican churches and cathedrals (even today I find my atheistic feet taking me to them wherever I am in the world) are so often marvels of architecture and treasure troves of history and art. The great Christian hymns, although written to glorify a God who doesn't exist and so cannot tune His or Her almighty ears to them, are often masterpieces of the finest composers and writers.
The abuse of the Rohingya should be of very great concern to Australia, not just because of the human rights abuse of a people by the military while the puppet de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi puts her head in the sand (and how long would she live if she did anything else?), but because the continued abuse of the Rohingya is fostering an environment for recruits for exportable terrorism.
"So the only way for cyber security to be achieved is for the private sector and government to operate together. It is very different from something like counter-terrorism, where government takes the lead and people expect it to."
THIS WEEK IN CAPE BRETON: Raising the peace flag, reviewing future plans for Centre 200 and more

SYDNEY  During a time of conflict around the world and with racial tensions on the rise in many parts, its clear there are those who want to find a bright, positive light wherever they can. Over the next several days, the YMCA of Cape Breton will ...
Our Promise: Welcome to Care2, the world's largest community for good. Here, you'll find over 45 million like-minded people working towards progress, kindness, and lasting impact.

Care2 Stands Against: bigots, racists, bullies, science deniers, misogynists, gun lobbyists, xenophobes, the willfully ignorant, animal abusers, frackers, and other mean people. If you find yourself aligning with any of those folks, you can move along, nothing to see here.

Care2 Stands With: humanitarians, animal lovers, feminists, rabble-rousers, nature-buffs, creatives, the naturally curious, and people who really love to do the right thing.

You are our people. You Care. We Care2.
PLEASE NOTE!

Due to the March 23, 2020 NM DOH Public Health Order, These Event Listings Are Not Accurate!

All non-essential businesses are closed, public gatherings are prohibited!

(One day some of these events will be rescheduled or will resume, but they are not happening now!)
Colour Me Canada is the theme for the 24th edition of the Lake Country Art Walk today and Sunday.

The theme was inspired by the nation's 150th birthday.

More than 3,000 works of art will be on display at the popular event that features art, music and dance.

There are also special exhibits dedicated to photography, fibre art, plein air painting and local youth.

Back this year are the Paint Off Art Competitions where three artists must complete a painting on a specific subject within 15 minutes along with the Quick Draw hour-long drawing session.

Visitors can also vote for their favourite of the 300 artists expected to attend.

Art Walk takes place at the Lake Country Community Complex, 10241 Bottom Wood Lake Rd., as well as in many of the surrounding buildings and courtyards.

A full list of events can be found online.
Colton Davies

Sounds of jazz are serenading Penticton this weekend, with the 21st Pentastic Hot Jazz Festival taking place from Friday through Sunday.

There are 11 bands performing, who are all playing between five to eight acts during the three-day event.

The festival is going on at five venues in four different locations, including the S.S. Sicamous, the Days Inn & Conference Centre, Elks Hall and the Penticton Trade and Convention Centre.

Michael Campbell, president of the festival, said he believes turnout is similar to what it was last year.

"And when you look at the smoke that has been around and the floods and all of the history that has preceded these past couple months, I'm surprised that we're doing as well as we are, quite frankly," he said.

Campbell commented on the variety of acts that can be seen and heard this weekend.

"We try to offer a mix for every taste. Everything except cool jazz; we're hot jazz which encompasses zydeco, dixieland, big band swing and gospel.

"I've had probably between 20-30 people come up to me and say this is (their) 20th year or 21st year here. So once they come, they kind of like it and come back the next year."

Performances will be going on until 2:30 p.m. on Sunday. The closing ceremonies will then take place at 3:00 p.m., on the French Quarter stage at the PTCC.

To see the full schedule, click here.
Photo: Contributed

Kamloops RCMP believe speed and alcohol were factors in a crash that involved a motorcycle and a passenger vehicle, Saturday afternoon.

The accident happened just after 4:30 p.m., on the East Trans-Canada Highway near Oriole Road.

The motorcycle reportedly skidded to a stop on the side of the road when the two vehicles collided.

The motorcyclist was taken to hospital with minor injuries, while none of the occupants of the passenger vehicle were hurt.

Both vehicles sustained minor damage from the crash.

Highway 1 was closed closed briefly where the accident occurred but has since been reopened.
Photo: Facebook The Diamond Creek wildfire has burned an estimated 8,000 hectares of B.C. land, and an estimated 39,000 hectares in Washington state.

The Diamond Creek wildfire has burned an estimated 8,000 hectares of B.C. backcountry.

The most recent size estimate of the fire was 5,500 hectares, which came on Wednesday.

Officials were unable to determine a size in recent days, due to thick smoke in the area.

The fire has also burned an estimated 39,000 hectares in Washington state, according to the BC Wildfire Service.

There are currently four firefighters, five support personnel, one helicopter and eight pieces of heavy equipment battling the blaze.

The BWFS said that crews have implemented a modified response to this fire, which is burning in a remote region with many trees that have been affected by pine beetles.

"Under certain circumstances, it's determined that allowing a wildfire to burn in an area is beneficial for an ecosystem. And that's what's happening here" said Justine Hunse, BWFS information officer.

No structures are threatened by the fire burning between Manning and Cathedral parks.

Hunse added that crews have identified trigger points if the fire were to reach certain geographic areas, which would mean approaching the management of the fire differently if the blaze reached those points.

The flames were fanned by winds blowing from the southwest on Saturday, at an estimated 15-25 kilometres per hour with gusts of up to 50 kilometres per hour.

Winds are predicted to ease off in the region by Sunday, with light winds expected next week.
Photo: Todd Jespersen

The BC Wildfire Service said on Saturday night the Finlay Creek wildfire is 50% contained, as crews have had success establishing fireguards.

The fire is estimated to be 2,200 hectares in size, compared to 2,000 hectares on Friday morning.

Heather Rice, BWFS information officer, said the size increase represents more accurate mapping as well as controlled burning.

There were 116 firefighters and 10 helicopters fighting the blaze on Saturday. Those resources, as well as pieces of heavy equipment being used, are expected to be reduced on Sunday.

Rice added that Saturday night is expected to be the final night of overnight operations.

There are no official reports of structures impacted by the blaze.
Photo: Smokejumpers Canada

A dozen parattack firefighters, also known as smokejumpers, have been deployed to help fight the K Mountain fire burning near Keremeos, which is burning on a nearly vertical slope.

The fire remains seven hectares in size and continues to show fire behaviour between rank one and two, meaning there is smouldering and some open flame.

According to Justine Hunse, BC Wildfire Service information officer, there are some areas of the fire where it was safe to deploy parattack crews, who were flown in from a fixed-wing aircraft.

She added that the 12 crew members will be staying overnight and resuming work on the blaze on Sunday morning.

Smokejumpers are based out of northern B.C., but they are a provincial resource and are occasionally are deployed to fight fires in the southern half of the province.

These crews were called in to assist with the Finlay Creek wildfire and Greyback Mountain fire last week.
Photo: The Canadian Press Speaker of the legislature Darryl Plecas delivers remarks before the speech from the throne.

British Columbia's Liberal party has kicked out one of its caucus members for taking the role of Speaker in the NDP minority government.

Darryl Plecas, MLA for Abbotsford South, took the Speaker position Friday to the surprise of his party.

By taking the role, Plecas gave the New Democrats more breathing room in the legislature where they hold a razor-thin minority, with a one-seat majority with the support of Green party member votes.

Liberal party president Sharon White said Plecas had broken his trust with constituents and the party by taking the position after having repeatedly promised that he would not do so.

"None of us are happy about these events," White said in the news release Saturday. "As BC Liberals, we pride ourselves on working hard together, sticking together when times get tough, and having respectful debates within a strong, united party."

The party said the Abbotsford South riding association requested to revoke Plecas's membership to the party hours after he was acclaimed. The executive approved the request Saturday.

White said revoking his party membership was "the strongest action available to us."

Interim Liberal Leader Rich Coleman said Friday that Plecas betrayed his own party and effectively joined the NDP by accepting the Speaker's post.

"The caucus had agreed and everyone had committed, including Mr. Plecas, to not run for Speaker, so to change your mind and not inform me when you change your mind until after the fact, I would still think that's a betrayal," Coleman said.
Photo: Flickr/BC Gov't

British Columbia's New Democrat government is expected to unveil its first budget on Monday, following last week's ambitious throne speech, but experts expect the financial update will be little more than an appetizer ahead of the main course early next year.

David Moscrop, a political scientist at Simon Fraser University, said holding back on anything but the most immediate and pressing commitments would be a smart move for the NDP's fledgling minority government, both economically and politically.

"I think most people would prefer that their government takes a little bit of time and reconciles their campaign promises with the books before they really get into spending.

"At the end of the day, they've been in office for 15 minutes. This is a little tweak."

Finance Minister Carole James downplayed the upcoming announcement, saying the update would broadly outline the New Democrats' election commitments, which were mirrored in the throne speech the government revealed Friday at the outset of the new legislative session.

"This really will be a budget update because normally, right now in September, we would be starting work we need for the February budget," said James, who is also deputy premier.

The speech referenced several immediate government actions that have economic implications, including boosting education funding to comply with classroom size and composition requirements, lifting tolls on two Lower Mainland bridges and increasing welfare and disability rates.

The agenda-setting document also referenced bigger-ticket items that would see consultation work begin in the fall, such as a universal child-care program, a poverty reduction plan, public transit investment and expanded health-care infrastructure, including hospitals and patient care centres.

"Government will be consulting families on the issues that matter to them, from the housing crisis, to childcare to environmental management," Lt.-Gov. Judith Guichon said, reading Friday's throne speech.
Photo: Phil Vallee The Ministry of Transportation says work on the Morgan Bridge should begin in early October.

It's been months but repair work on the Morgan Bridge on Heywood Armstrong Road is expected to start in early October.

The bridge which sits just outside Spallumcheen's boundary suffered a washout in early May during heavy spring flooding. A gaping hole was left behind and the bridge was closed.

"The design is completed and we have moved on to consultations, obtaining permits and arranging for materials," said Chad Marsh of the Ministry of Transportation. "At this time we are working towards beginning construction the first week of October. All efforts are being taken to expedite this repair."

Marsh thanked the public for their patience "as we ensure all the appropriate steps are taken to make Morgan bridge safe for the public and designed to better withstand potential future events."

A number of local residents have complained about the lengthy delay in fixing the bridge which, for some, means a much longer commute.
Photo: Nicholas Johansen File photo of Philpott Road fire.

The Philpott Road wildfire has been taken off the board by the BC Wildfire Service.

It is no longer a fire of note, explained Justine Hunse, fire information officer, on Sunday. We continue to demobilize equipment.

On Saturday, the fire was reported to be 85 per cent contained with a machine guard around the entire fire in the Joe Rich area.

Crews have been concentrating on putting out hot spots within 100 feet of the hottest, northern flank of the fire.

Just last week, the final evacuation orders and alerts were rescinded.

Hunse said there were no new fire starts in the Okanagan Valley overnight.
Photo: RDOS Evacuation orders for all properties south of the Finlay Creek wildfire have been lifted.

UPDATE: 11 a.m.

A total of 116 firefighters from B.C., Ontario and Quebec continued to work on the lines of the Finlay Creek wildfire on Sunday.

However, the fight from the air was down to one helicopter, according to Heather Rice of the BC Wildfire Service. As well, only 13 pieces of equipment were being used.

Rice said the size of the fire stood at 2,228 hectares due to some hand ignition being used to contain the blaze.

UPDATE: 10:26 a.m.

Residents to the south of the Finlay Creek wildfire between Peachland and Summerland can go home.

A mandatory evacuation order for 55 properties in the Meadow Valley area west of Summerland was lifted Sunday morning. As well, an evacuation order on two properties within the District of Summerland was also lifted.

"All residents removed from their homes can now go back," said Cameron Baughen of the Regional District of Okanagan Similkameen. "As the fire is contained but still burning, the Meadow Valley area remains in advisory evacuation alert. Residents in this area should remain prepared to evacuate if conditions change drastically."

Darke Lake Provincial Park will remain closed. As well the province will be maintaining restrictions to limit access to crown land in the backcountry area between Peachland and Summerland.

"This is still an active fire and could be for the next several months, it is just well contained," said Baughen who praised firefighting efforts.

Non-residents are advised to stay out of the area as firefighters will be active for potentially several months.

All other advisory evacuation alerts in the Faulder area have been lifted.

For more information on evacuation alerts please visit www.rdos.bc.ca or contact the RDOS Emergency Operations Centre during business hours at 250-490-4225.

ORIGINAL STORY: 10:08 a.m.

Some evacuation orders have been lifted by the District of Summerland where the Finlay Creek wildfire has been burning.

A release from the district on Sunday stated the evacuation order had been removed for:

35888 Garnet Valley Road

951 Meadow Valley Road

Both properties remain under evacuation alert until further notice.

On Saturday night, the BC Wildfire Service said the Finlay Creek wildfire was 50 per cent contained, with crews establishing fire guards.
Paddleboarding with a Cat Logan from J.D on Vimeo.

A Vernon area cat is becoming quite famous after his owner posted a video showing the two of them paddleboarding on Kalamalka Lake.

While most cats avoid water, owner JD Ram said Logan the cat is quite happy to jump aboard and go for a paddle on the lake.

In fact, Ram takes Logan almost everywhere.

I treat him like a dog, said Ram. I put him on a leash and he took to it. I never trained him. It's just natural.

Ram, a critical care nurse at Vernon Jubilee Hospital, is happy his cat puts a smile on people's faces during their trips to the beach and the park.

I thought it was just normal.

Logan turns one this December and is a playful puss who not only loves the water but likes to play hide and seek and pitch, according to Ram.

The video has had over 17,000 views since it was posted last week.
Four refugee and immigrant entrepreneurs shared their emotional stories with a packed house at Naperville's Highpoint Church, explaining how they escaped war or violence in their native countries to come to the United States.



They described the perseverance and determination needed to overcome obstacles to reach America  the same qualities that served them well as business owners in their new country.



"You have to have vision. I never sleep before midnight. I stay awake working on my business," said Janvier, one of four panelists who only revealed their first names at the program Thursday night presented by World Relief DuPage/Aurora. It showcased successful refugee and immigrant business owners.



"My kids already have an understanding of hard work, not just for my family, for my community. We have to reinvest in this community," said Janvier, who created the Coffee One brand of drinks from Burundi and Rwanda.



"We're super hungry to be successful and help people along the way," added Abraham, who was one of the 800,000 young people enrolled in the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program rescinded by President Trump recently.

Susan Sperry, executive director of World Relief DuPage/Aurora, welcomed the crowd to a program at Highpoint Church in Naperville Thursday evening. ( Diane Moca/Naperville Sun )

"DACA gave me a chance to have a life like everyone else, the ability to work," said 18-year-old Abraham of the former federal policy that allowed certain immigrants who entered the country illegally as children to apply for a two-year, renewable work permit and avoid deportation.



Abraham's parents left Mexico in 2003 after one of their employees was kidnapped; in 2012 they opened a fast casual Mexican restaurant in Oswego, which has since expanded to five locations. Salsa Verde was one of 22 different featured local businesses, from auto repair and home remodeling to transportation and tax services, described on panels displayed at the gathering.



The event also featured free food provided by many of those who own restaurants, grocery stores and beverage companies. Five business donated raffle prizes, such as free haircuts or oil changes, to raise money for the nonprofit organization, which assists all types of immigrants by providing English classes, legal help and other services.



Tabitha McDuffee, communications coordinator for World Relief DuPage/Aurora, said the "Spotlight on Refugee and Immigrant Entrepreneurs" program is one of many events throughout the year designed to educate the community about the contributions of immigrants.



"It dispels misconceptions centered around employment and whether or not they are working," said McDuffee, adding that "the vast majority of immigrants who come to the United States do not qualify for aid" and those who do only receive "benefits contingent on working toward employment."



"You hear about refugees and immigrants. Here's an opportunity to learn about what they're doing," said Alison Bell, senior resettlement manager for World Relief DuPage/Aurora.

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About 200 people gathered to hear stories of refugees who came to the United States and created successful businesses at a World Relief DuPage/Aurora program at Highpoint Church in Naperville Thursday evening. ( Diane Moca/Naperville Sun )

About 200 people listened intently during the 90-minute discussion featuring four people who described their journeys. Janvier said he had an import/export coffee business in Africa before opening Coffee One in Glen Ellyn and taking classes at the College of DuPage to get his business degree. Ibtisam said she had a thriving sewing business in Iraq and is now trying to duplicate that success in the Chicago suburbs. Walter said his father's business in Germany employed more than 1,000 people before he had to flee in 1937 with his Jewish family because of growing anti-Semitism there.



"The Nazis took everything. We had to start from scratch," said Walter. "What makes this country great is we have people from all over the world come here with ideas and make a business."



Abraham said he and his parents and three brothers are among 100 people who work in their family's restaurants. He said the president's termination of DACA is hitting his community hard. "A lot of people will lose their jobs," Abraham said.



The audience gave the panel a standing ovation at the conclusion of the program, and the moderator suggested attendees take action by patronizing one of the 22 businesses listed on the brochure, volunteer or donate to World Relief DuPage/Aurora, or contact Congress about DACA.



Sarah Flagel, immigrant legal supervisor for World Relief DuPage/Aurora, said the decision is spreading a new wave of fear in the immigrant community.



"There is a pretty significant impact, a sense of betrayal," said Flagel. "We've been following them for five years, as they've graduated high school, gone to college, got licenses for nursing and other fields, bought houses, got married. A lot fear what they'll lose. They wonder: What are my options? Do I have to go under the table? Do I have to leave the States? Many came at 6 months or 1 year old. Some speak very little of their native language."



"There's been a lot of confusion," added Bell, who said the World Relief DuPage/Aurora legal team has "represented over 800 DACAs." The group also is holding information sessions.

Salsa Verde was one of several refugee-owned businesses providing free food and drinks at a World Relief DuPage/Aurora program at Highpoint Church in Naperville Thursday evening. ( Diane Moca/Naperville Sun )

Posters told the stories of 22 refugees and the businesses they created after coming to the United States at a World Relief DuPage/Aurora program at Highpoint Church in Naperville Thursday evening. ( Diane Moca/Naperville Sun )

Diane Moca is a freelance reporter for the Naperville Sun.
Acclaimed Andersonville pastry shop Pasticceria Natalina will be shutting its doors May 22, after serving up four years worth of Sicilian desserts and abrasive moxie.

The store was scheduled to close in September when its lease expired. But Natalie Zarzour  the face of the pastry shop  implied that she had found a business to take over the space early.

The Tribune

Zarzour last December, describing her as Chicago's most provocative pastry chef in a profession with little provocation.

Zarzour is lauded for her uncompromising standards in the kitchen and praised by the likes of Gale Gand, Chicagos pastry chef emeritus. But those same standards have reflected in the pricing ($9 for a cannoli) and customers have responded by calling the shop a rip-off and highway robbery. She blames other bakeries for cutting corners in search of a quick buck, all at the expense of customers' health.

Zarzour and her husband Nick are also the kind of unsugarcoated free spirits who speak their minds, which some have interpreted as brusque customer service. She will fight you  how many pastry shops can you say about that?

When asked about her thoughts on closing, there was not a hint of bittersweetness in Zarzours voice.



Parties. Summer. The beach. Fun. Im so excited, Ive never been off summer my adult life.

The only plan for Zarzour and her husband is that there are no plans. Traveling, making pastries again in a shared kitchen, writing a cookbook  theyre all nuggets of ideas she hasnt fully processed as yet.

I can keep doing this work and probably better and inspired and diverse work if I allowed myself to get back out there.
Restaurateur Constantine "Gus" Alpogianis, an owner of Kappy's American Grill in Morton Grove, got his true start in the Chicago restaurant scene in 1955 when he became a co-owner of the iconic Palace Grill on West Madison Street.

"His personality was larger than life," said his cousin George Lemperis, who bought the Palace Grill in 1979 and still runs it as a full-service restaurant. "He was my biggest mentor and I'm his protege."

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"He made you feel like you were home," said Nick Gargano, who quickly became a friend after meeting Alpogianis at Kappy's. "If you needed something, Gus would get it for you, asking 'What do you need, kid?'"

Alpogianis, 85, died Aug. 30 in Swedish Covenant Hospital of complications from cancer, according to his son, Manolis. He was a longtime resident of Chicago's Budlong Woods neighborhood.

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He was born in Chicago's Wrigleyville neighborhood and graduated from Amundsen High School. Soon after, he joined the Army, fighting with the 2nd Infantry Division in North Korea during the Korean War, his son said.

He had worked with his father in a tavern and another restaurant in Chicago. After leaving the Army, he teamed up with his late father and his late brother Michael to buy the Palace Grill. It was then a 19-stool diner on a section of West Madison often called Skid Row  a place of battered lives and busted dreams.

He would go in at midnight, his son said, to prepare food for customers who might include a city official, a homeless person or a cop coming off a beat. For Alpogianis, it was a place to work hard, serve customers and prepare to move up.

In 1979, the Palace Grill was sold and Alpogianis and a couple of partners bought the 280-seat Kappy's at 7200 Dempster St. in Morton Grove.

Manolis Alpogianis said he and his brother George bought out the partners around 2000. George runs the restaurant, but other family members are involved.

"It's a family-owned business," Manolis Alpogianis said, adding that his sister Maria does all the marketing for what has become a family restaurant group.

As their business grew with new restaurants, Alpogianis was active as both an investor and partner, lending his expertise and advising on restaurant operations. He and his sons formed TAG Restaurant Group, which operates several restaurants throughout the Chicago area, including the since-closed seasonal City Porch and America's Dog and Burger at Navy Pier and other Chicago locations. America's Dog now has some franchise locations, a move Alpogianis recommended, his son said.

Alpogianis and his children would meet and discuss business briefly before regular Sunday family meals.

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Nick Gargano said at Kappy's, Alpogianis knew everybody. "He walked around and talked to everybody," Gargano said. "He made you feel better  and then he picked up the check."

Survivors also include his wife of 51 years, Evangeline; his daughter, Maria; another son, George; his sister, Evelyn Leberis; and five grandchildren. His brother Michael died in 2014.

Services were held.

Graydon Megan is a freelance reporter.
A group of friends had just finished a late-night soccer game on the Northwest Side at Grover Cleveland Elementary School when a black SUV pulled up.

Billy Chiguil, who was already in his car about 12:10 a.m. Monday, said he could tell the people in the SUV were saying something to one of his friends.

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"Next thing you know, they started shooting at us," Chiguil said.

The shooter had gotten out of the SUV and opened fire, grazing Chiguil's 23-year-old friend in the back.

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"I told my friend, the passenger, to duck," Chiguil said. "Then, I looked over the side to make sure my other friend was OK, and I saw he was on the ground."

After the SUV left, the group got in their cars and drove to a nearby shopping center where they spoke to officers about what happened.

The shooting happened in the 3100 block of West Byron Street in the Irving Park neighborhood, police said. Paramedics treated the 23-year-old man at the scene, but he declined to be taken to a hospital.

A small spot of what appeared to be blood could be seen on the back of the man's shirt as he spoke with a detective about what happened.

The back window of Chiguil's sedan was shattered by the gunshots.

The friends had previously played soccer at the school without problems. "That's the only soccer field that's close," Chiguil said.

They had decided to play late Sunday because it was when they all had time off work, but Chiguil said the friends might decide to play during a different time of day.

"I think it was just random, to be honest," he said. "Maybe some guy, just I don't know, just decided to scare off or I don't know."

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Chiguil's friend was one of six people who were shot, one fatally, in separate attacks during a 10-hour period from Sunday afternoon to early Monday.

The fatal shooting took place just after 8 p.m. Sunday in the Roseland neighborhood on the Far South Side. A 22-year-old man was shot in the head, and he was taken in critical condition to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn. He was later pronounced dead at 11:03 p.m.

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He was identified as Steven Reid, of the 100 block of East 126th Place, according to the Cook County medical examiner's office.

After being called to the 11100 block of South Michigan Avenue, police found the man outside with a gunshot wound to the head. Police did not release any additional details about the shooting. No one was in custody.

Other shootings:

-- On the West Side, a 24-year-old man was seriously wounded in a drive-by shooting about 11:40 p.m. Sunday in the 1400 block of North Kildare Avenue in the West Humboldt Park neighborhood, police said. He was getting out of a car when someone inside a passing dark-colored car opened fire. He was shot in the leg and the abdomen. He was taken in serious condition to Mount Sinai Hospital.

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-- On the Far South Side, a 21-year-old man was shot multiple times about 8:10 p.m. in the 9500 block of South Jeffery Avenue in the Jeffery Manor neighborhood, according to police. The 21-year-old man was driving a car a man on the street when someone on the street went up to the car and shot him, police said, updating information that the 21-year-old might have fired first at the person who shot him. The 21-year-old man was shot in the arm, leg and foot and was in good condition at Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn after originally being driven by a friend to Advocate Trinity Hospital. Police on Sept. 12 said that evidence indicates the man who shot the 21-year-old fired first.

-- On the West Side just after 3:35 p.m., a teenage boy and a man were shot when someone in a red Chevrolet vehicle opened fire at them while they were standing on a Lawndale corner, police said. The 16-year-old boy was shot in the left leg and left hand, and the 29-year-old man was shot twice in the buttocks in the 3400 block of West 16th Street, according to police. Police originally had given the boy's age as 15. The boy was taken via ambulance to Mount Sinai Hospital, while the man went to Mount Sinai in a private vehicle. They both were in good condition.

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A 20-year-old reputed gang member was firing shots at a vehicle last month on the Southwest Side when his shots mistakenly struck another vehicle and wounded a 13-year-old girl riding inside, Cook County prosecutors said Saturday.

The girl was in a car in the 6500 block of South Bell Avenue in the West Englewood neighborhood on Aug. 31 when a gunman on the street sprayed gunfire at a slow-moving black vehicle just ahead of the car she was in, prosecutors told a judge at the Leighton Criminal Court Building.

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When the victim's car tried to escape by driving around the black vehicle, numerous shots pelted her vehicle, striking the girl in the upper back, said Assistant State's Attorney Elizabeth Brogan. The teen was taken to Stroger Hospital, where she was treated and released, authorities said.

Despite the being hit by many shots, none of the five others riding with the girl were injured, Brogan said.

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Six days after the shooting, fugitive trackers with the Great Lakes Regional Task Force arrested Jaquel D. Rogers after a witness identified him as the gunman. Rogers, of the 6600 block of South Bell Avenue, was charged with aggravated battery and ordered held on $500,000 bail during a hearing Saturday afternoon.

Judge Laura M. Sullivan approved prosecutor's request to determine the source of any money offered for Rogers' bail after prosecutors noted that he was a member of the Gangster Disciples street gang.

He is expected to appear before a judge next week.

wlee@chicagotribune.com

Twitter @MidNoirCowboy
A Chicago police officer fatally shot a motorist early Sunday after the driver struck the officer during a traffic stop on the Northwest Side, according to police.

About 12:50 a.m., officers from the Grand Central district saw a motorist driving erratically in the 2100 block of North Laramie Avenue, said Sgt. Al Stinites, a police spokesman.

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Officers activated their emergency equipment and pulled over the vehicle, police said. When officers got out of their car, "the vehicle pinned the officer," Stinites said.

A male officer then shot the driver of the vehicle, a 19-year-old man, Stinites said. The 19-year-old driver was pronounced dead at 1:11 a.m., according to the Cook County medical examiner's office.

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The man was identified as Juan Flores, who lived in the same block where he was shot, according to the office.

The male officer was taken in serious condition to an area hospital, police said. One person was taken from the incident to Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center, according to fire officials.

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No one else was in the car with the 19-year-old man.

The officer will be placed on routine 30-day administrative duty. The Independent Police Review Authority was investigating the shooting.

The shooting took place in a residential area in the Hanson Park neighborhood. Police blocked off Laramie Avenue between Palmer Street and Grand Avenue.

Two men with an area church stood on the northern edge of the crime scene. A family in the area had called them to the scene, but they were still waiting to get details about how the family was involved.

Sunday's shooting marked the sixth police-involved shooting in the department's Grand Central district this year, according to data kept by the Tribune.

In July, police shot an 18-year-old man during a traffic stop in the 2800 block of North Mulligan Avenue in the Belmont Central neighborhood. During the traffic stop, officers saw one of the passengers had a gun and made statements that were "threatening," police said at the time.

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Chicago police interrupted an armed robbery at a Back of the Yards cellphone store Thursday and arrested a parolee suspected in three other cell store robberies last week, authorities said Saturday.

Officers arrested Derrick Rollins at a MetroPCS store in the 2000 block of West 47th Street just before 8 p.m. Thursday as he was finishing a robbery there, prosecutors said at the Leighton Criminal Court Building.

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Rollins, 30, of the 1900 block of West 59th Street, had an Aldi shopping bag containing a revolver, according to prosecutors.

Authorities quickly tied him to three previous cellphone store robberies in the McKinley Park and Gage Park neighborhoods that began Sept. 4. In those three robberies, the offender also entered the store with an Aldi bag containing revolver that he used to demand cash and cellphones from workers there, said Assistant State's Attorney Elizabeth Brogan.

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Rollins escaped two of the robberies with cellphones and cash. He also ordered employees into backrooms at gunpoint in the earlier robberies, Brogan said.

Rollins was later charged with four counts of robbery, Class X felonies punishable up to 30 years in prison for each charge if convicted. Rollins blew a kiss to a woman leaving the courtroom after Judge Laura M. Sullivan ordered him held on $350,000 bail

Rollins has been on parole from the Western Illinois Correctional Center since May for a 2013 residential burglary conviction.

He is scheduled to return to court next week.

Chicago Tribune reporter Elyssa Cherney contributed to this report.

wlee@chicagotribune.com

Twitter: @MidNoirCowboy
Tereasa Martin, mother of 19-year-old Kenneka Jenkins, talks about the circumstances surrounding her daughter's death Sept. 10, 2017. Jenkins was found dead in a walk-in freezer at a Rosemont hotel where she had gone for a party with friends and had been missing for a day, her family said. (Alyssa Pointer / Chicago Tribune) (Alyssa Pointer / Chicago Tribune/Chicago Tribune)

For the latest updates on this story, click here.

A 19-year-old West Side woman was found dead inside a walk-in freezer at a Rosemont hotel Sunday morning, about a day after she had gone missing from a party she attended with friends, police and her family said.

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Kenneka Jenkins was discovered after an hours-long search and was pronounced dead at 12:48 a.m. Sunday, according to the Cook County medical examiner's office.

Jenkins' mother, Tereasa Martin, said police told her Jenkins apparently let herself into the freezer while inebriated and died inside. An autopsy was performed Sunday but it wasn't immediately clear whether foul play was suspected, according to Becky Schlikerman, spokeswoman for the medical examiner's office.

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The cause and manner of the teen's death remained undetermined.

Speaking to reporters outside the hotel Sunday morning, Martin said she was having trouble understanding what happened.

"(I'm) horrified," she said. "It's something that no one could ever imagine. It's unbelievable."

According to Martin and police, Jenkins left her house in the 2100 block of West Warren Boulevard around 11:30 p.m. Friday to attend a party with friends in a hotel room at the Crowne Plaza Chicago O'Hare Hotel & Conference Center in Rosemont. Gary Mack, a spokesman for the village of Rosemont, said Jenkins' sister last spoke to her around 1:30 a.m. Saturday.

Mack said witnesses told police they saw Jenkins at a party on the ninth floor of the hotel.

Martin said her daughter's friends called her after 4 a.m. Saturday to say they had lost track of Jenkins in the hotel and left after they were unable to find her. The friends said they were in the car Martin had lent her daughter for the night and they had Jenkins' cellphone, Martin said.

Martin said she headed to the hotel around 5 a.m. Saturday to try to find her daughter. Hotel staff told her they needed a missing persons report from police before they could start reviewing surveillance video of the premises.

Martin said she then called the Rosemont Police Department and was told to wait a few hours before filing the report to see if Jenkins turned up.

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Jenkins' older sister, Leonore Harris, filed a missing persons report with Rosemont police later that morning, Mack said. Authorities notified the hotel about the missing teen around 1:15 p.m. Saturday. The 11-hour search for Jenkins included all public areas and the ninth floor, where she was last seen by witnesses, Mack said.

"The hotel staff and management (were) actively canvassing the area at that time," Mack said.

Martin said around 3 or 4 p.m. Saturday, police viewed some of the hotel video footage and said they did not see Jenkins pictured.

The family left and came back a third time around 6 p.m. Saturday, Martin said, at which point relatives started knocking on room doors to see if any guests knew anything. The hotel called the police to complain about the knocking, Martin said. One of those responding officers listened to the family's plight and agreed to view the video footage again, Martin said.

Around 10 p.m. Saturday, police told Jenkins' relatives they had spotted her on video from about 3:20 a.m. that day, "staggering" drunk near the front desk, according to Martin.

Martin said the family members stayed at the hotel until after 1 a.m. Sunday, when police informed them they had discovered Jenkins' body in the walk-in freezer.

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Expand Autoplay Image 1 of 34 Demonstrators rally outside the Crowne Plaza Sept. 9, 2018, the one-year anniversary of the death of Kenneka Jenkins, who was found dead inside a freezer at the hotel in Rosemont. (Armando L. Sanchez/Chicago Tribune)

It was not clear who located Jenkins' body, but Mack said the hotel was doing some construction in the area where she was found. Martin said she was told the freezer Jenkins was in was turned on and cold but was not being used to store food.

"I just happen to know there's work being done on some new facilities over there, so there is some construction activity where a new restaurant is being built, and (she was found) in that vicinity," Mack said. "This is not an area where anyone would typically be who was a guest in the hotel."

It is not clear whether the construction area was blocked off in any way.

Martin said Jenkins told her she was "going to the show and bowling" Friday. Martin said she only learned about the hotel party when Jenkins' friends called to say they couldn't find her and were heading back with the car.

The friends told her the three were getting set to leave the party but realized Jenkins had left her phone and car keys back in the room. Jenkins stayed in the hallway while the friends said they retrieved her stuff.

When they got back to the hall she was gone, Martin said they told her.

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But Martin said she questioned the friends' accounts, saying their "stories changed over and over."

Martin also said she had a hard time believing the police account that Jenkins got into the freezer on her own, saying if her daughter was drunk she would have had difficulty opening the heavy freezer doors.

Jenkins would have realized the freezer doors weren't the doors to an elevator or a hotel entrance, Martin said. "Those were double steel doors, she didn't just pop them open," she said.

Martin was angry about what she said was hotel workers' lack of urgency in the face of her pleas for help finding her daughter Saturday morning, directing her to the police rather than immediately reviewing hotel footage.

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Daniel Pena, a manager at the hotel, referred questions about the incident to Rosemont police Sunday.

"Anyone can understand how a parent can feel distraught over the loss of a child and feel the need to lash out due to the tremendous pain they're feeling, and we can certainly understand that," Mack said. "But people can rest assured Rosemont is one of the top, highest trained, most respected police departments in the state of Illinois and does a good job at what they do.

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"Every situation has a lot of variables, and certainly this one did," he said. "The hotel has probably never seen anything like this, either, I would imagine."

Martin said she thought Rosemont police also failed to heed the family's frantic attempts to figure out what happened to Jenkins.

"If they had taken me seriously and checked right away, they could have found my daughter much sooner and she might have been alive," Martin said.

jebyrne@chicagotribune.com

kdouglas@chicagotribune.com
In this Sept. 6, 2017 photo, Tori Texada, 25, Chloe, 7, in right, Maddison, 6, and Paisley, 1, pose for photo outside of the shelter at a convention center in Houston. (Brian Melley / AP)

HOUSTON  Michael Evan Hilburn says he can't wait to start kindergarten this week at a school about 20 miles from the Houston shelter where he and his father have been living since Harvey devastated the city.

The 5-year-old is a beneficiary of state and federal laws that seek to make it easier for homeless kids to go to school  a blessing, his father said, as they try to overcome the chaos of a catastrophic disaster that has disrupted life in the nation's fourth-largest city.

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"The sooner he's in school, the sooner I can start work," Michael Howard Hilburn said. "I want him to be happy, make lots of friends. He needs consistency."

The Texas Homeless Education Office estimates that about 35,000 to 40,000 students have been affected by Hurricane Harvey. On top of that, more than 200 school districts and charter schools statewide canceled or delayed classes, some indefinitely.

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Jeanne Stamp, the office's director, said some families have relocated to Dallas and San Antonio but Houston is sure to see their already large number of homeless children balloon.

Federal protections require schools to immediately enroll children who have lost their regular homes, including those affected by a natural disaster.

That federal law allows homeless children to either stay in the school they were attending or enroll in the school in the neighborhood where they are currently staying, with transportation costs divided equally between the two districts if there's a funding dispute.

Texas "Third Choice" law goes even further, allowing homeless students the choice to enroll in any school district in the state, regardless of their school of origin or the location of the place where they are staying.

But the state law doesn't require transportation to be provided, something Michael Santos, an attorney with the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty, urged schools to offer in order to comply with the over-arching federal law.

"That falls under the obligation to remove barriers for the student attending school," Santos said. "Transportation is controversial and it's expensive."

For Houston, the transportation is issue could be even more heightened as many displaced families are likely to have to commute across the sprawling metro area, between where they want to go to school and where they're stuck sleeping at night.

"Sometimes public bus passes help get kids to school. Sometimes parents have a vehicle but don't have funds for gas," Stamp said. "It is a very costly piece of the service but it's a necessarily piece of the service."

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Most of the schools in the Houston Independent School District, Texas' largest district and the nation's seventh-largest with 216,000 students, will open for class on Monday. In an average year, it has about 7,000 homeless students.

Officials tweeted this past week that they're still working to identify all students who are still in shelters, which they estimated at about 7,000. It's unknown how the district is managing those who are displaced but not in shelters. The district didn't respond to calls and emails seeking comment on their efforts.

Tori Texada, 25, said she wanted to get her kids back to their neighborhood school even while they are living in the Houston shelter, but that she hadn't reached Houston district officials.

The single-mother of five, including three who are school-aged, said she was unaware of any federal and state protections for displaced families, and didn't know that there was a school liaison to help her navigate it.

"I don't want them missing days of school," Texada said. "If we have to transfer so we can be closer, I hope they don't give me problems."

Homeless for about two years, Hilburn is now tapping into the Texas option that allows his son to go to school in any district in the state.

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He's enrolling his son to Tiger Trail School in the Spring Branch Independent School District, about 20 miles northwest of the shelter, because he said he has two friends who can help with pick up. He said the school principal has called him to offer support, including transportation.

"I think that's a good law, that we can choose," said Hilburn, who had been living with a relative in west suburban Katy before Harvey hit. "In this situation, it's a blessing."

Ho reported from Las Vegas.
North Korean defectors rest in a hotel room in Thailand. They will be sent to Seoul, where they will become South Korean citizens. (Paula Bronstein / For The Washington Post)

MEKONG RIVER BANK, Thailand  It takes one hour and 45 minutes to fly from Shenyang, a sprawling provincial capital in northeastern China not far from the border with North Korea, to Seoul, the capital of South Korea. It's the kind of flight in which passengers have to gobble down their beef and rice before the attendants come around telling them to stow their tray tables for landing.

But for the North Koreans who escape from Kim Jong Un's regime, by way of China, there is no quick flight onward.

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Instead, they embark on a grueling journey that - best-case scenario - involves traveling almost 2,700 miles on buses, motorbikes and boats, in taxis and on foot over mountains, on a roundabout route that scores of North Koreans each month are embracing as the best possible way to reach South Korea, where they will immediately become South Korean citizens.

For most, the journey will first pass through China, Vietnam and Laos, where they must be on the alert for police who might arrest them and send them back the way they came - to certain and brutal punishment in North Korea.

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Not until they cross a fourth frontier from Laos into Thailand are they are finally safe.

Kim, the young and tempestuous North Korean leader, is issuing increasingly shrill threats to the outside world, flying missiles over Japan and threatening to strike the United States.

For the people of North Korea, his threats are not just bluster. They are a very real part of daily life.

Behind the visible salvos of missiles, ordinary North Koreans are risking their lives to make this invisible journey out of Kim's clutches and to safety.

The Thai authorities do not send them back. Instead, they will slap them with a minor immigration violation and alert the South Korean Embassy in Bangkok, which will start the process of transferring them to Seoul - not far from where many started their journey. There, they will start a new life, one of constant Internet connectivity and white rice every day.

Map of Thailand in relation to North Korea (Washington Post)

"I want to learn all about computers," said a 15-year-old boy who had arrived in Thailand from Laos, just 12 days after escaping from North Korea. "I want to become a computer expert."

"I want to be good at computers, too," chimed in his 8-year-old sister, who was playing with an imitation Barbie that a humanitarian worker had given her on arrival in Thailand. It was the first doll she had ever owned.

The brother and sister were two of the 11 North Koreans who told their story to The Washington Post of their escape after arriving here, on the Thai side of the Mekong River, before turning themselves in to the police.

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The North Koreans asked to withhold their names and other identifying information to avoid putting their family members still in North Korea at risk of retribution from the Kim regime.

They were recovering from the last leg of their terrifying journey out of North Korea, which started with a dead-of-night escape across the water into China and culminated in a boat ride across a swollen Mekong, which washed them way downstream from where they were supposed to be dropped.

After they had spent hours in the rain, not knowing where they were, the activist who had helped them escape finally found them.

They slept overnight in a spartan hotel room here and ate hot food and changed into dry clothes. Then, the following morning, with an air of anticipation, they turned themselves in to the police.

They were processed, then joined about two dozen other North Koreans in holding cells.

It was a muggy day. In two of the cells, women and children - including the little sister who got the Barbie and a baby who had just started walking - fanned themselves on mats on the floor and ate sunflower seeds. The pink bars had been turned into a makeshift washing line, and the girl had hung up her doll's dress on it.

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A third cell contained a handful of men and the wannabe computer nerd.

Once there was a busload of them, as more North Koreans arrived nearly every day, they'd all be driven 12-plus hours to Bangkok.

The 11 who talked to The Post said that, throughout their perilous escape, they had been focused on this moment - on the moment they would get to the safety of this humid and smelly cell, the moment the South Korean bureaucracy would whir into action.

An 8-year-old girl combs the hair of a doll that she got as a gift after arriving in Thailand. (Paula Bronstein / For The Washington Post)

It was the experience of crossing back and forth into China, unrelentingly capitalist China, that made the fisherman decide to flee from North Korea. He was earning a good living, plying the seas as his official job and transferring money across the border as his unofficial one. But seeing how Chinese people lived and listening to South Korean news on a radio he'd bought across the border had opened his eyes.

"I realized that what we were told by our media was all lies," he said the night before they surrendered to police.

For the 50-year-old woman from the North Korean port of Nampo, it was the fear of being repatriated to North Korea again - she'd just spent 2 1/2 years in a re-education camp - that made her carry on after she made it back to China.

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For the 23-year-old school friends from the border city of Hyesan, being sold to Chinese men - knowingly or unknowingly - was the way to make money for their families. "I knew I was going to be sold, but I was prepared to go," said one, looking up from her smartphone.

Her friend, a hairdresser, had gone to China several months before. She thought she was going to work in a restaurant but instead was sold to a Chinese man for $12,000.

For all these reasons and many more, North Koreans cross the river into China.

Untold thousands risk their lives to escape each year. Some live in hiding in China, some get caught and repatriated, and some - 1,418 last year - make it out to safety in South Korea.

When Kim Jong Un came to power at the end of 2011, at the age of only 27, many North Koreans hoped he would usher in a new era of modernity and openness for the totalitarian state.

That didn't turn out to be the case.

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Kim has ordered a merciless crackdown on the long border with China, and Beijing has stepped up its own vigilance. The flow of people has dropped markedly - but not altogether.

A vast network of brokers, many of them defectors from North Korea themselves, arrange escape through a system that is now so well-oiled that, if everything goes smoothly, a North Korean can be in a Thai detention center within 10 days and in South Korea within a month.

That's if everything goes right.

A North Korean defector holds tissue as she cries and tells her story. (Paula Bronstein / For The Washington Post)

After finding a broker, North Koreans who have earned money through private trading pay up front for their escape. Others promise to pay with the settlement money they receive after arriving in South Korea. A lucky few have their escapes financed by Christian organizations.

The group containing the fisherman was rescued by Now Action and Unity for Human Rights, an organization led by Ji Seong-ho, himself a North Korean who escaped. Ji's outfit arranged to pay $2,000 to get each member of the group out. Contacting a broker directly would have cost double that, he said.

The group crossed the river into China at night to find two cars waiting to take them to two safe houses - just as their broker had said.

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"By the time we arrived at the house, it was getting light outside," said a 42-year-old housewife. "We stayed there for three days, just eating and sleeping and watching Chinese TV until it was time to go."

They were going to take a new route, through Vietnam rather than directly through Laos, because Chinese authorities had become more aggressive near the Laotian border.

"I was worried that we were being used as guinea pigs on the route. But if we were going to die, we were going to die," the fisherman said. "We had already decided to kill ourselves rather than be sent back to North Korea."

The group was then put onto the first of many buses for a 17-hour-long journey. "That was nothing - we spent more than 80 hours on buses in China," the housewife said with a laugh.

Being on a bus was dangerous. If Chinese police boarded to check their documents, the North Koreans would be busted. "We didn't sit together, and we didn't speak to each other while we were on the bus," the housewife said. "Nobody bothered us because they thought we were sleeping the whole time."

These escapes are usually coordinated by someone in Seoul managing the tricky logistics.

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"We have to know the exact locations of checkpoints. We need to be able to tell them where to wait and when to cross," said Kim Sang-hun, a Seoul-based Christian activist who helps North Koreans escape.

"They can be arrested anywhere at any time, and the situation is going to be very bad for them. So to bring them to safety, we have to know the local bureaucracy and find a way to get around it."

Yet this was the easy leg of their journey. Many North Koreans speak some Chinese, either through living in China or by trading with China, and their similar looks mean they can blend in with the local population.

Yet when they got to the bus station closest to the border with Vietnam, the atmosphere changed. Police were patrolling the border in force, so their guides told them to take cover and then be prepared to run through the dark.

Hiding between buildings, waiting for their moment to cross, the North Koreans were being as still as they could be. The guides were gesturing at them not to move. They didn't need to have a common language - their body language spoke volumes. When the moment came, they ran. And they were across.

The hardest part was still to come. After several more bus and car rides through Vietnam, the North Koreans had to hike through the mountains along the border with Laos, through torrential rain.

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"Every step of the escape is hard and dangerous - hiking mountains, changing methods of transportation and crossing borders," said Ji, the activist who now helps his compatriots escape. "Because they're so tense, some fall ill during or after the escape."

The journey is especially onerous for children, the elderly and the disabled, he said. Mothers sometimes give their children sleeping pills so they won't cry and give them up.

Two 23-year-old school friends from the border city of Hyesan, North Korea, look out at the Mekong River bordering Laos. The woman on the left had been sold to a Chinese man, a common fate for young North Korean women looking to make money for their families. (Paula Bronstein / For The Washington Post)

Three men with flashlights were waiting to lead the group over the mountain paths. It was raining hard, and they were all soaked through. The paths were slippery and treacherous. It was pitch black.

"We were told we were supposed to go over two mountains, but I think it was three," said a young mother who had left her 4-year-old daughter behind in China while she made the escape. "It was really hard, and I was so scared I thought I was going to die from fear."

The 50-year-old woman from Nampo said the border crossings were the most terrifying part. "I kept thinking: What would happen if I get caught now?" she said. "If I was repatriated again, I knew that it would be the end of my life."

They did make it into Laos, and there was another car waiting for them at the border. The driver's nerves put them on edge. He was afraid of being stopped by the police with the North Koreans in his car, and his fear was contagious.

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Most unnerving of all was the reality of being so close to safety but still not quite there. "I kept thinking: Imagine if I made it this far and then I got caught in Laos," the young mother said.

Just four hours to the Mekong River and, across it: Thailand.

Their clothes still wet from the mountain crossing, the group was dropped on the river bank in the pouring rain. There, they waited in the darkness until it was time to cross.

At 3:30 a.m., they got into one of the long boats that navigate the Mekong. The heavy rains had made the river high and fast, and they were dropped 20 miles downstream from where they were supposed to go ashore.

"There was nobody around, nobody waiting for us," the housewife said. "Up until that time, everything had worked perfectly."

But for the fisherman, it didn't matter. "I was so relieved to be in Thailand. I sat by the river and smoked some cigarettes."

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Ji, the man waiting upstream for them, started out on a frantic, hours-long search. He heard from the coordinator in Seoul that they'd crossed and realized they'd missed their drop point, but he didn't know where they were. And they, not being able to read Thai, didn't know where they were, either.

Luckily, as one of the women in the group had a Chinese cellphone, Ji eventually found them and took them to the nearby hotel, where a hot shower and dry clothes awaited them.

That Saturday night, before they turned themselves in at the police station, they had a celebration. They pushed back the beds in the hotel room, and the housewife cleaned the tiled floor. They sat crossed-legged and ate sticky rice, grilled fish, fried chicken and banana chips, all washed down with large cans of Chang, a Thai beer.

The 8-year-old played with a reporter's phone, delighting in photo filters that gave her bunny ears or a crown of flowers.

Not far to South Korea now.

Yoonjung Seo contributed to this report.
From the Thai media comes the story of a sultry young woman who, over the course of about two years, convinced at least 11 different men to marry her.

Following Thai tradition, each man gave her a generous sum of money  a dowry  at which point she disappeared, the men told police.

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From each husband, she collected between $6,000 and $30,000 before vanishing, using various excuses such as she had to return to her family's home to deal with their fruit business or her horoscope advised her that it just wasn't a good time to be married.

So prolific and convincing was this woman that she married four times in the month of August alone, police told local media. Initially, police reported that there were 12 complaining husbands, but later reduced the number to 11.

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Not until a warning about her was posted on Facebook did any of the men go to authorities. How the warning got to Facebook has not been revealed. Perhaps it was posted by one of the grooms, of whom there may be more, according to reports.

Indeed, upon seeing the Facebook post, they descended on police, according to The Bangkok Post and other Thai media, and told the stories of how they had allegedly been duped.

According to the English language paper The Nation, quoting a lawyer for the men, the method was pretty much the same in each case.

She would friend the man on Facebook, meet him, have sex with him, marry him and then take the money and run.

She is being called "the runaway bride."

Prasarn Tiamyam, 32, described his experience in a report to the police.

He got to know the woman after she friended him on Facebook in February of 2015. She used the name Jariyaporn "Nammon" Buayai. There was a seductive photo of her as identified in the media.

After nine months, she told him she was pregnant (it's not clear by whom) and he agreed to marry her.

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They went to a seaside resort in Prachuap Khiri Khan Province, the man told police, according to The Nation, where she extracted a dowry of $6,000.

The end came quickly for Prasarn. As The Nation reported:

"During their relationship, Prasarn said that Nammon refused to let him meet her parents. Only four days after their wedding, Nammon told him that she had to deal with their fruit business in Nong Khai province and left.

"Soon after, Prasarn could no longer contact her. Instead, he received a call from a woman who claimed to be Nammon's niece. She told him that Nammon lost the baby and Prasarn should not contact her again."

Pirat Puengsuk, 28, claims to have lost some $30,000, the dowry plus a Toyota pickup truck. He told police he quit his job as a transport driver and married her after a two-month whirlwind Facebook courtship, thinking he would join her and her parents in the fruit business.

"She demanded that I marry her before investing in the business together because it was her family's tradition. If we weren't married, we couldn't do business together," said Pirat, as quoted in The Nation.

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She then vanished in his pickup.

As it turned out, a warrant for fraud was already out on the woman stemming from an apparently unrelated incident. After the men went to police as a group, The Bangkok Post reported, police caught up with her in Thailand's Nakhon Pathom Province, known for its fruit orchards.

Bolting bride, real husband have long fraud records https://t.co/jFM7vBft9u pic.twitter.com/Tn0o6EHMEN  Bangkok Post (@BangkokPostNews) September 8, 2017

There, police on Thursday night arrested Jariyaporn Buayai, 32, and a man police described as her real husband. Lt. Thitirat Nonghanpitak, commissioner of the police Central Investigation Bureau, told reporters Friday that he believed there were other victims. He said she netted more than $90,000.

The woman has not been charged and the investigation is ongoing. The woman, according to the Post, said she did not intend to cheat the men, of whom, she claimed, there were only 7 rather than 11 or more. She reportedly said the men had voluntarily invested money in the family's fruit business.

Police want to interrogate her parents, The Bangkok Post reported, to determine whether they might have had a role in it. They based their theory on the fact that her parents showed up for each of the weddings. Thitirat said Friday the parents were in hiding.

The deceived gentlemen, who went to police for justice, are also hoping to protect others.

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"I'm so hurt by what happened," said Pirat Puengsuk as quoted in The Nation. "I want her to redeem herself and not do this to other people."
Irma is expected to hit the Florida Keys early Sunday, then move north up the west coast with the storm re-intensifying over the warm waters. Sustained winds look to peak at 140 mph just off the Naples coast early afternoon, with the storm center passing the Tampa area around midnight. It will eventually move north of Tallahassee into southern Georgia as a weakening minimal hurricane Monday afternoon.

Meanwhile, below normal temperatures continue here with sunny days and clear/cool nights. A prevailing easterly wind keeps daytime readings in the 60s along the lakefront, and the lower to middle 70s inland.

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The remnant of Hurricane Irma will briefly spread clouds over our area Wednesday, with a few light showers possible south of Interstate 80. Temperatures will be in the 80s for the weekend.
The Little Traveler offered an exclusive debut of several wines from South Africa during the annual Festival of the Vine over the weekend. (Linda Girardi/The Beacon-News )

Foodies and wine enthusiasts filled downtown Geneva for the 36th-annual Festival of the Vine over the weekend.

Thousands of people attending the three-day fall festival paired fine wine with delectable food from Geneva's restaurants under a big tent at Fourth and State streets.

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The Flavor Fare featured international and seasonal cuisine prepared by 16 Geneva restaurateurs, 26 varieties of wine and live music.

There were complimentary carriage and trolley rides with stops throughout the downtown, including in front of the Old Kane County Courthouse where there was a flower market and arts and craft show.

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All of the proceeds from wine tastings benefit the Geneva Community Chest.

Peter Lee and his mother Jenny, owners of the Gen-Hoe restaurant, during the 36th annual Festival of the Vine in Geneva. (Linda Girardi/The Beacon-News )

Allison Reinke of Wheaton and her mother Rita Evans of Elgin were having fried ice cream with churros from Sergio's Cantina. "We love the music, and sampling food and wines that we've never had before," Reinke said.

The family-owned Gen-Hoe restaurant, celebrating 49 years in Geneva, has participated in the Flavor Fare since the festival's inception.

Peter Lee and his mother Jenny, were serving their award-winning lemon chicken with fried rice, and signature Gen-Hoe egg rolls as well as two new samplings  gluten-free and vegetarian veggie crispy rolls made with napa cabbage and rice paper wraps, and gluten-free chicken dumplings made with chicken meat, green onions and rice paper wraps.

"We are all foodies at heart," Lee said.

Lee said theirs is one of the few restaurants that prepare their eggs rolls by hand. "It's a three-day process to make them," the owner said.

Bonnie Schambach of Sleepy Hollow samples wine at the Little Traveler during the annual Festival of the Vine in Geneva. (Linda Girardi/The Beacon-News )

Lee's late father Tony, and his grandfather started the restaurant. The restaurant sees generations of families in their dining room.

"We love Geneva. The festival is an opportunity for us to interact with people." Lee said.

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Chef and owner Jim Nicolaou combines the best of his Italian and Greek heritage into his cuisine at Riganato Old World Grille. The restaurant's specialty is a giant ricotta-stuffed meatball made with San Marzano tomatoes grown in Italy.

"People come all the way from Chicago to have our ricotta-stuffed meatballs," said Nicolaou, who opened the restaurant five and-a-half years ago with his father, Nick.

"The meatballs are wholly Italian. Our Colorado lamb chops are very Greek in its seasoning. It's hard work to be here, but we like to meet the other restaurant owners and see our customers in a different venue. It's a wonderful festival," Nicolaou said.

Geneva Mayor Kevin Burns was at the Flavor Fare as a volunteer-ambassador, distributing the food and wine menu at the entrance.

Burns said he'd spoken with people from the Geneva area and as far away as North Carolina and Montana. "There are people who come every year because it is casual and enjoyable. People are attracted to that style of celebration. It's a way to showcase Geneva," he said.

The guests were as diverse as the different food groups and varieties of wine.

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Daniella Amato and Theresa Christopher came from Bartlett. "Geneva has all the best stuff," said Christopher, who has come to the festival the last two years.

Meagan Markovich of St. Charles served the chocolates from Graham's Fine Chocolates & Ice Cream at the Flavor Fare at Fourth and State streets. The shop is celebrating 30 years in Geneva. (Linda Girardi/The Beacon-News )

"Geneva has the best restaurants and chocolate shops. There's always something to do in the downtown," Christopher said.

Graham's Chocolates & Ice Cream and 318 Coffee House are known for scoops of homemade ice cream, fruit skewers dipped in milk chocolate with a white chocolate drizzle and chocolate chip mini cookies made special for the festival.

Graham's is celebrating its 30th year in Geneva. Robin Butler, who has been helping at the Festival of the Vine at the Graham's booth for the last 10 years, said family members had the idea of having artist-made T-shirts to celebrate the shop's anniversary.

The Geneva Chamber wine bar intrigued the diverse palates of guests with wines from around the world, including a bourbon barrel-aged red wine.

"The wine is aged in bourbon barrels rather than wine barrels to open a different taste profile of the wine," said Jason Tondelli, of New York-based Constellation Brands that brought in the wines for the event.

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"Our guests experience wines from Napa Valley, New Zealand and Italy. The taste palates are all over. We have seen people looking for sparkling wines to people with very distinguished palates," he said.

The Flavor Fare attracted pleasant crowds during Geneva's Festival of the Vine over the weekend. (Linda Girardi/The Beacon-News )

Michelle and David Smith of Yorkville were on their third wine samplings. "We just returned from Napa. We enjoy wine tastings as a way to get familiar with the varietals and wineries. The atmosphere is great and there are lots of great restaurants in Geneva," Michelle Smith said.

Michelle Alexander of DeKalb and Emily Rapp of Naperville sampled the wine and had cake pops from Graham's.

Rapp, a family-law Geneva attorney, said she was impressed with the casual atmosphere. Alexander is her assistant.

"We like Geneva in general. Right now, it's easy and there are fewer lines," Rapp said.

The festival featured special wine tastings and culinary events at local shops as well.

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The Little Traveler's wine tasting on the lawn introduced guests to unusual varieties of wine, hard cider and lager beer. The Little Traveler's buyer in the gourmet department, Heidi Brothers, said they had an exclusive debut of several wines from South Africa. "They are light and refreshing wines," Brothers said.

An estimated 75,000 people were expected to attend the festival over the three days.

"When the festival began, we never envisioned it would grow to the size it has," said Mike Simon, owner of the Little Traveler. "The Geneva Chamber has done an amazing job of bringing people to the town," he said.

The wine tastings benefit Geneva, he said.

"We have a great partnership with the Geneva Community Chest. They provide volunteers and we donate all of the proceeds from the wine samplings," Simon said.

Bonnie and Dennis Schambach of Sleepy Hollow sampled around 10 wines at the Little Traveler. "We liked the Door Peninsula Blackberry Merlot. It was fruity with a nice oaky taste," Bonnie Schambach said.

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"We like the people at the festival and the bottles of wine are reasonably priced. We'll be going home with six bottles of different wines. We love Geneva," Schambach said.

Michelle Carter, of St. Charles, was born in North Africa. "I do like South African wines. You don't generally see South African wines in the United States," she said.

Linda Girardi is a freelance reporter for the Beacon-News.
A badly burned body found in the rubble of a Gurnee home that exploded Friday will be autopsied Monday before officials perform dental tests to attempt to determine its identity.

Lake County Coroner Howard Cooper said if dental testing can't help ID the victim, officials will move on to DNA forensics.

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"The problem with DNA testing is that it can take 6 to 8 months," Cooper said.

According to the Lake County Sheriff's Office, officers were dispatched at 6:05 p.m. to the 36300 block of Streamwood Court in unincorporated Gurnee, about a mile west of Gurnee Mills, in the Grandwood Park subdivision.

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When deputies arrived they found the home leveled and engulfed in flames, according to a news release.

The body was later found after a ruptured gas line was cut off and firefighters had completely put out the blaze at about 8:30 p.m.

Over the weekend, a Gurnee police officer stood guard outside fencing that surrounded the site of home to keep people away from the debris. Some of it, such as pieces of wood, aluminum siding and insulation, was still hanging from trees at the home on one side of the explosion site.

A nearby park and man-made lake were covered in white cotton batting, presumably from the home's roof.

Nancy Carlson, president of the Grandwood Park District Board of Commissioners, said she doesn't believe the cotton batting is harmful but officials will continue to follow up with the county to see what there is to do about the debris that now litters the park and lake.

A day after the explosion, Carlson said it could've been worse as there could have been more injuries or deaths.

"On a Friday night, there are kids riding their bikes up and down this neighborhood," Carlson said.

The trilevel home was part of approximately 750 homes built in the 1960s in the Grandwood Park subdivision, Carlson said.

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Judith Crockett, a neighbor who lives two doors from the destroyed home, said Saturday that she had thought it to be vacant, as she never saw any activity when she walked by.

According to the news release, six nearby homes were damaged by the debris from the explosion Friday, but Crockett's home only had a plate fall from a shelf and she said her outside windows are now speckled with that white cotton batting.

Lake County Sheriff's Office Sgt. Sara Balmes said after the blast, which neighbors described as a "sonic boom" Friday, a female occupant from one of the homes sustained a minor injury from falling debris inside her home. Balmes said the woman was treated and released at the scene.

The cause of the explosion is being investigated by the State Fire Marshall's Office.

Yadira Sanchez Olson is a freelance reporter for the News-Sun.
Little Miss Waukegan, Adamaris Sanchez, 10, poses with a bomber undercarriage during the Northern Illinois Airshow on Saturday, September 9, 2017 at Waukegan National Airport. (Mark Ukena/Lake County News-Sun) (Mark Kodiak Ukena/Lake County News-Sun)

A large crowd of people of all ages watched a sky filled with plane stunts during the Northern Illinois Airshow Saturday at the Waukegan National Airport.

The aerobatics show had planes from a historic military flight era, where tactical maneuvers made the powerful machines with wings dance with one another in the air.

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The show began with a patriotic display of a missing-man formation in honor of 9/11 victims and heroes, and a remembrance of local airshow pilot Vlado Lenoch, who in July died flying.

Prospect Heights couple Dennis and Luanne Macey said they enjoy going to airshows and Saturday was the first time they attended the annual Waukegan event.

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In retirement, Dennis said he has taken up learning about World War II history as a hobby. During the show, he enjoyed a land display of more than a dozen planes on the airport's runway, and seeing up close replicas of the ones that helped fight the war.

"You really get a sense of history," he said. "I like that we honor our pilots, who gave their lives for us."

The Maceys said out of all the stunts the planes made in the sky, the "piercing heart" was their favorite.

The crowd cheered when two planes made the shape of a heart with their engine smoke and a third plane crossed the heart like a piercing arrow.

Aside from the amazingly skilled aerobatics that had planes looping, swerving and seemingly falling from the sky, before picking up speed to lift back up again, the airshow incorporated vendors of airplane pins and patches, toys, shirts and hats for the flying aficionados.

Flying organizations, such as the EAA Young Eagles program, which began in 1992 to give kids ages 8 to 17 the opportunity to fly in a general aviation plane, were on hand providing information to inspire the next generation of aviators.

Collecting donations for the Lake County Veterans Memorial was volunteer Al Oller. On Saturday, Oller explained to the public how the Waukegan National Airport will soon have a park-like memorial near the entrance with a F-111 aircraft as its centerpiece.

The plane, which was on display at the airshow, came from the Chanute Air Museum in Rantoul.

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"It was taken apart, trucked in trailers and put back together," Oller said, adding that the aircraft had sat in the elements for so long, it needed a paint job, new tires and windows.

"It will be displayed on a somewhat landing figuration," Oller said.

Aside from a fun show, the event is an opportunity for those who admire the men and women who fly the planes to meet them.

Standing next to his TBM Avenger, pilot Tom Buck spent time taking pictures with kids and shaking hands with their parents. The replica war plane was painted sky blue on top and white like the clouds on the bottom for camouflage, Buck said.

The TBM Avenger aircraft is carrier plane that is 15 feet tall and can carry a 2,000-pound torpedo, or four 500-pound bombs, Buck said.

Gurnee mom Bianca Alderin was amazed by all of the powerful machines on the ground and in the air. It was the first time her family attended the airshow.

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"It's exciting to see all the planes," Alderin said.

Yadria Sanchez Olson is a freelance reporter for the News-Sun.
Waukegan District 60's gamble in canceling its food service contract has paid off, its attorney said.

The school board that oversees the 15,800-student district voted unanimously to cancel the final year of its food service contract with Aramark and go with another company despite Aramark being the low bidder.

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Both school district attorney Thomas Morris and Aramark spokeswoman Karen Cutler said the company would challenge the move.

But as the weeks passed after the June vote, Morris heard nothing, which surprised him.

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He said he would watch every time a delivery service showed up at the district offices, expecting perhaps a formal challenge to the vote had arrived.

And that's what Aramark had said it would do  not through a lawsuit, but through the process laid out in the district's bid process. However, last week, Aramark spokeswoman Karen Cutler said the company is "no longer pursuing a bid protest."

She did not respond when asked why.

The district's new food service provider, Preferred Meals, will cost the district nearly $6.2 million next year, about $78,000 more than Aramark's bid, according to board documents. Preferred Meals previously provided meals at the elementary schools, where meals cannot be produced in-house.

The district ruled that Aramark did not meet all of the district's criteria under the bidding process and therefore did qualify as a "responsible" bidder when determining the "lowest, responsible bidder," Morris has said.

School board members had questioned the quality of the food being served, leading to an in-house audit of the food service program. In addition, complaints filed with the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights and the Illinois State Board of Education claim Aramark treated its black employees unfairly compared to Hispanic and white employees.

A handful of Lake County offices will be up for election next year, which means those thinking about running for office can start the process now.

The open offices with primaries in March are county clerk, treasurer, sheriff, regional superintendent of schools, 14 county board seats and North Shore Water Reclamation District trustees.

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The County Board districts include Lindenhurst and Round Lake Heights's 3rd, Fox Lake's 5th, Grayslake's 6th, Waukegan's 8th and 9th, Mundelin's 10th, Highland Park's 11th, Park City's 14th, Libertyville's 15th, Island Lake's 17th, Vernon Hills' 18th, Lake Zurich and Barrington's 19th, Buffalo Grove's 20th and Lincolnshire's 21.

Precinct committeemen and Lake Forest aldermen will also have their general elections in March.

Those running as candidates for an established political party can turn in their petition papers full of signatures between Nov. 27 and Dec. 4.

Packets are now online at the County Clerk's website on lakecountyil.gov. Lake Forest petition packets are available at its City Hall.

A ward-by-ward initiative in Waukegan is aimed at cleaning up the city's streets, alleys and yards ahead of stronger code enforcement, city officials said.

Operation Clean Sweep, which started last week, followed the addition of two new code enforcement officers in a budget approved earlier this summer.

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The "tremendous effort to beautify" the city kicked off in the First Ward, recently represented by now Mayor Sam Cunningham, but will move on to each of the city's nine wards, Cunningham said.

"In the First Ward, we're going through our alleys, we're going to areas where they dump all the time (and) clean up vegetation," Cunningham said during a council meeting last week. "That simply might be a little bit different when we go to our Ninth, Seventh, Fifth and so on."

Letters, in both English and Spanish, went out to each residence and code enforcement officers are going door-to-door to let people know about the initiative, he said.

Updates will also be posted on the city's Facebook page to let residents know when the initiative will be coming to their area.

"The goal of this is to make sure that we engage everyone whose a part of making sure that our city is clean and more importantly getting our residents to understand that you now can take ownership of, not our city, but your neighborhood," Cunningham said. "I think when we show you that the city is doing it's part, I firmly believe that the residents are going to do their part."

emcoleman@tribpub.com

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Adam Frisch keeps calm waiting for all ballots to be counted in CD-3
Director Guillermo Del Toro, actresses Sally Hawkins and Octavia Spencer, actor Richard Jenkins and composer Alexandre Desplat (L-R) pose prior to the premiere of the movie "The Shape of Water" at the 74th Venice Film Festival in Venice, Italy, on Aug. 31, 2017. [PhotoXinhua]

"The Shape of Water" by Mexican filmmaker Guillermo Del Toro was awarded the Golden Lion as best film at the 74th Venice Film Festival, which closed Saturday evening.

The movie is a fantasy romance about a mute woman who falls for a mysterious, amphibious creature captured in water depths, and subjected to a secret experiment by the U.S. military.

With Sally Hawkins playing the main character, the story is set in the United States in the early 1960s, against the backdrop of the Cold War era.

"There is a moment in every storyteller's life, no matter what age you are, when you risk it all, and do something different," Del Toro said at the awarding ceremony.

Del Toro also encouraged peers from Latin America to pursue their dream.

"As Mexican, I want to dedicate this prize to every young Mexican filmmaker, or Latin American filmmaker, who is dreaming of doing something in the fantastic genre, but is told it cannot be done. It can be done," he added.

"All I know is that if you remain pure, and stay with your faith -whatever you have faith in, and in my case is monsters - eventually things will go right."

Israeli director Samuel Maoz was awarded the Silver Lion-Grand Jury Prize for "Foxtrot," the story of an Israeli couple grieving for the loss of their soldier son. Maoz won the Golden Lion here in 2009 with "Lebanon."

The Silver Lion for best director went to French Xavier Legrand with his family drama "Jusqu'a la Garde" (Custody), which also won the Luigi De Laurentiis Award for a Debut Film.

British Martin McDonagh received the Best Screenplay Award for "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri," which starred Frances McDormand playing the role of a grieving and enraged mother who loses her daughter, and resorts to drastic steps to find justice.

The Special Jury Prize went to Australian Warwick Thornton for his drama "Sweet Country" set in the Australian outback.

Charlotte Rampling in the film "Hannah" by Italian Andrea Pallaoro, and Kamel El Basha in "The Insult" by Lebanese Ziad Doueiri, won the Volpi Cups as best actress and best actor in the festival.

The festival's Horizons competition devoted to new cinema trends awarded best film to music biography "Nico, 1988" by Italian Susanna Nicchiarelli.

Finally, in the first ever competition launched for Virtual Reality works, a specific jury led by director John Landis bestowed the Best VR Award on short animation movie "Arden's Wake" by American Eugene YK Chung.

Installation "La Camera Insabbiata" by Laurie Anderson and Hsin-Chien Huang won the Best VR Experience Award, and short film "Bloodless" by South Korean filmmaker Gina Kim won the Best VR Story Award.

Overall, 21 world premieres competed for the Golden Lion this year, while 22 works run out of competition, and another 19 in the Horizons section.
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A train loaded with 88 containers of cloth, clothing, shoes, hats and Christmas items left east China's Yiwu City Sunday morning for Prague, the Czech Republic.

It will pass through Kazakhstan, Russia, Belarus, and Poland and travel about 16 days before arriving in Prague. The journey is about half the time for traditional sea voyage.

On August 4, the first train from Prague arrived at Yiwu, east China's Zhejiang province.

Before the launch of the Prague route, Yiwu, often called the "world supermarket," already boasted eight freight train routes.

According to customs statistics, imports and exports via Yiwu's Sino-Europe freight service have grown rapidly, reaching 3 billion yuan in 2016.

On May 13, a train left Yiwu to become the 1,000th freight train linking China and Europe this year. As of that time, China had 51 Sino-European freight train routes, with trains from 28 Chinese cities travelling to 29 cities in 11 European countries.
Chinese Premier Li Keqiang has stressed the importance of vocational education in boosting products made in China.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang (2nd L, front) views technological achievements during an inspection to Tianjin University of Technology and Education in Tianjin, north China, Sept. 8, 2017. Li made an inspection here on Friday and stressed the importance of vocational education in boosting products made in China. During his inspection, the premier extended festive greetings to the teachers ahead of National Teachers' Day, which falls on Sept. 10. (Xinhua/Zhang Duo)

Li made the remarks while inspecting Tianjin University of Technology and Education on Friday.

"While implementing the strategy of innovation-driven development, we need to encourage innovation on the one hand and translate good ideas into high-quality products on the other hand," he said during the inspection ahead of Teachers' Day, which falls on Sept. 10.

China needs to cultivate more professionals with higher quality, promote the spirit of the craftsman and encourage enterprises of various sizes to provide fine products amid efforts to boost the "Made in China" brand, Li said.

During his inspection, the premier extended festive greetings to the teachers.

He called for more efforts to foster a good environment of respecting teachers and valuing education and improve the quality of education to serve the country's economic and social development.
Nanjing has become China's first International City of Peace.

In the notorious Nanjing Massacre during World War II, about 300,000 Chinese people lost their lives and 20,000 women were raped, said J. Fred Arment, executive director of International Cities of Peace in a video speech.

This history makes people remember the war and makes them more aware of the significance of peace, he said.

Nanjing in east China's Jiangsu Province was an ancient capital for six of China's dynasties. The freezing winter of 1937 saw brutal killing by invading Japanese troops. One person was killed every 12 seconds.

A total of 172 cities in about 50 countries and regions are now on the International Cities of Peace list, according to its website, including Coventry in England, Bern in Switzerland, Amsterdam in the Netherlands and Berlin, Germany.

Liu Cheng, UNESCO Chair on Peace Studies and a professor at Nanjing University, said that there were certain requirements for becoming an International City of Peace.

"For instance, the city might be traumatized by war or have witnessed big peace-related events," he said. "It should also be advanced in peace studies and activities."

More than two years ago, Liu's Institute for Peace Studies, together with the Institute of Nanjing Massacre History and International Peace, submitted an application to the International Cities of Peace.

"What was left by history was not hatred, but our awareness of peace," he said.

"Nanjing is among the cities that felt the greatest pain in World War II, and the Nanjing Massacre left us indelible memories," said Zhang Jianjun, executive chairman of the Institute of Nanjing Massacre History and International Peace. "So we understand better how valuable peace is."

Peace education has always been emphasized in Nanjing. Nanjing University is the first university to conduct research on peace studies in China.

Kawasaki Akira, a representative with the Japanese NGO Peace Boat, said that the designation of Nanjing as an International City of Peace could help China cherish peace and Japan reflect on itself.

"Peace does not only mean 'no war,'" said Lee Ji Won, a professor at Daelim University of Republic of Korea. "Peace also means reducing violence, improving justice and safeguarding human rights."

"Peace is the only way out for human beings," said Cao Lubao, a publicity official with Nanjing City. "People from all countries should take lessons from history and enhance communication."
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The Syrian army captured on Saturday the key oil field of Teym as part of a progress against the Islamic State (IS) in the countryside of Deir al-Zour province in eastern Syria, state news agency SANA reported.

The new achievement comes as part of the progress the army forces have made over the past 24 hours in reaching Deir al-Zour city from its main desert road.

The Teym oil field is only a few kilometers from the graveyard area at southern entrance of the city.

Earlier this week, the Syrian army and allied troops with the backing of Russian air fire lifted the three-year-old siege by IS on Deir al-Zour city through the Brigade 137 base in western Deir al-Zour.

Now the advancing troops are fighting to break the IS siege on the air base of Deir al-Zour.

The oil-rich province is so important for the Syrian army due to its location near Iraq and also the energy fields, all of which fell to IS during the war.

Teym field produced gas and oil and is one of the most important energy fields in Syria as it supports the electricity production to most Syrian cities.

Meanwhile, a military source told Xinhua that the Syrian forces also captured surrounding areas near the oil field, proceeding toward the graveyard area where the first incursion team is advancing, coming from Brigade 123.

He said the army has taken key hilltops close to the air base of Deir al-Zour.

Both advancing troops will meet in the graveyard area, to proceed to break the IS siege on Deir al-Zour air base, where Syrian soldiers and allied fighters have been besieged for three years.

Breaking the siege of the airport will largely play in the hands of the Syrian government forces in their push to eliminate the IS presence in the city before proceeding to the countryside where IS also controls large swathes of areas near the Iraqi border.

Since entering the city, the Syrian government has sent several truckloads of food and medicine to the city, where 93,000 civilians have been besieged for years.

The Russian air force played a significant role in supporting the ground forces of the Syrian army and allied fighters of Iranian-backed troops and tribesmen fighters.

For its part, Syria's Foreign Ministry said Saturday that the end of IS near as the group is crumbling in Deir al-Zour.

The ministry urged for lifting the U.S. and European sanctions on Syria, saying that would help in the reconstruction process.
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A Chinese expert spoke out Saturday against a rumor claiming China secretly performed 100,000 organ transplants annually, equal to the whole world's total, at the 14th Congress of the International Society for Organ Donation and Procurement.

Prof. Wang Haibo said the rumor is "insulting the intelligence of transplant and medical professionals."

"I believe not one organ donation and transplant professional with a lucid mind believes this ridiculous accusation," said Wang, director of China's Organ Transplant Response System.

"We, top leading scientists in the field of organ donation, gather together every two years to discuss sophisticated scientific issues for the purpose of saving lives. But some people disguise their vain political talk in the form of academic presentation and try to gain political visibility for themselves in this biennial scientific platform," he said.

"The truth is that they don't care about organ donations nor about saving lives. They are using organ donations, the noble carrier that we have devoted our professional lives to, as a political tool for their own unspeakable agenda," he said.

Wang on Saturday told his colleagues from different countries that China's new national system for organ donation and transplantation is based on Chinese cultural and societal norms, and consistent with the World Health Organization's (WHO) guiding principle and international standard.

Speaking at the 14th Congress of the International Society for Organ Donation and Procurement held in Geneva on Sept. 6-9, Wang said that the 2007 human organ transplant regulation passed by China's State Council had set an important foundation for the development of a brand new system for organ donation and transplantation in China.

The international community and the WHO have applauded China's organ transplantation achievements, but internationally there are still rumors that China "harvests organs" from prisoners, especially those from Falun Gong practitioners.

In his speech entitled "The China Mode of Organ Donation and Transplantation," Wang elaborated how as far back as November 2005, China made changes to its organ donation system which led to efforts in the ensuing decade to completely replace the use of death row inmates' organs for transplantation with an alternative deceased organ donation system that is supported by the Chinese government and the people and fully embraced by international society.

Wang said the WHO's support has been vital in making China's law consistent with international norms.

"The ceremony for World Organ Donation Day will be held today in the headquarters of the WHO," Wang said, adding that the China Organ Transplant Development Foundation, of which he is the deputy secretary-general, has formally been given permission to hold the World Organ Donation Day 2019 in Beijing.

Dr. Campbell Fraser, a scholar from Australia's Griffith University who was also present at the Geneva conference, said, "I would like to clearly state that China does not use organs from Falun Gong practitioners, I'm absolutely convinced of that."

"The people running those campaigns are activists who have got a political view in contrary to what China is all about," he added.

"Such a claim is just nonsense, they think that it will be difficult to prove that it does not happen, but I've been to China and I know this is totally untrue," he told Xinhua.
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Four militants, including a Taliban key commander, were killed in Qala-e-Zal district of Afghanistan's northern Kunduz province on Sunday, a local official said.

"The security forces launched coordinated offensive on Taliban hideout in Ghushi village of Qala-e-Zal district early Sunday, killing four rebels including their notorious commander Mawlawi Ismael on the spot," district governor Abdul Momin told Xinhua.

Two more militants sustained injuries in the fighting, the official asserted.

Taliban militants are yet to make comment.
A Chinese Railway Express cargo train leavs for Duisburg, Germany, at Shenyang East Railway Station in Shenyang, the capital of Northeast China's Liaoning province, on Sept 9, 2017. The railway line for container trains from Shenyang to Duisburg was opened up on Saturday. [Photo/Xinhua]

SHENYANG - A freight train chugged out of a railway station in Shenyang in Northeast China's Liaoning province on Saturday, heading for Duisburg, Germany.

It marked the start of a new freight train route stretching more than 9,300 kilometers.

The train will pass through Mongolia, Russia and Poland. A single journey takes 17 days, about half the time for traditional sea voyage.

Two trains will depart both Shenyang and Duisburg each week at the beginning, and later increase to five.

The train's cargo includes industrial products from Shenyang, as well as commodities from Japan and South Korea.

The service is aimed at boosting trade between the economic hub of Shenyang in northeast China and Europe.

As of May 13 this year, when the 1,000th Sino-European freight train left China, the country had 51 Sino-European freight train routes, with trains from 28 Chinese cities travelling to 29 cities in 11 European countries.
MANILA/HONG KONG -- The 10 member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and China's Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) are to sign in November the ASEAN-Hong Kong Free Trade Agreement (AHKFTA) and the ASEAN-Hong Kong Investment Agreement (AHKIA), according to a joint statement on Saturday.

The agreements were reached during the ASEAN economic ministers-Hong Kong consultations, co-chaired by HKSAR government's Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development Edward Yau and Philippine Secretary of Trade and Industry Ramon Lopez, in Pasay City, the Philippines.

The agreements will be signed on the sidelines of the 31st ASEAN summit in the Philippines in November.

"The signing of these agreements bodes well for both regional and national business communities particularly for micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs). This will also send a positive signal to the international community of ASEAN's resolute commitment to free trade and open markets," said Philippine Trade Undersecretary Ceferino Rodolfo.

Rodolfo said the Philippines will tremendously benefit from the two agreements. "These agreements would level up our already vibrant trade and investments relations as this would mean increased market access for Filipinos exporters," Rodolfo said.

Rodolfo said the AHKFTA is the first FTA to be signed by the ASEAN over a period of about eight years. "That's why it's very significant that this happens during the 50th anniversary of the ASEAN and during the Philippine hosting."

The total merchandise trade between Hong Kong and ASEAN amounted to $106.8 billion in 2016, and total services trade between the two sides was $15.5 billion in 2015, according to statistics provided by the HKSAR government.

On investment, by end of 2015, ASEAN ranked the sixth among Hong Kong's destinations of outward direct investment, with a stock of $27.9 billion, and it ranked the sixth among Hong Kong's sources of inward direct investment, with a stock of $71.1 billion.

"ASEAN is a very important trading partner of Hong Kong. It was our second largest trading partner in merchandise trade in 2016 and the fourth largest in services trade in 2015," said Yau.

"Our economy stands to benefit from the FTA and the Investment Agreement, which will bring us more and better access to the ASEAN markets, create new business opportunities and further enhance trade and investment flows," he said.

He said the FTA will become effective after completion of the necessary procedures.

The FTA negotiations between Hong Kong and ASEAN commenced in July 2014.

According to the joint statement, the AHKFTA included a chapter on Economic and Technical Cooperation (ECOTECH), which would be implemented through an ECOTECH Work Program.

"This would provide opportunities for our MSMEs to work together through capacity building exercises, information sharing, and internship programs, among others," Rodolfo said.

The ECOTECH Work Program would be adopted when the two agreements are signed in November.
Growers wait in line to sell their hot peppers to the company in Longhui county, Shaoyang city in Central China's Hunan province, on Sept 9. [Photo by Wang Jingjing/chinadaily.com.cn]

Hot pepper, a common food in China, has helped to reduce poverty in a small county in Central China's Hunan province.

The Longhui county in southwest Hunnan was once in poverty due to its huge population and poor natural resources. Driven by China's poverty alleviation action, the local government, along with a local chilli sauce production company, pushed the local hot pepper industry to grow to help residents out of poverty.

The company, Hunan Junjie Food Company Ltd, built a pepper sauce factory in Longhui county, and gave free pepper seeds to the local people. The company then bought the maturing hot peppers from the residents.

According to the locals, they picked up the hot pepper every five days, and then sold them to the company. The selling price is two yuan per jin (500 grams).

The company also hired local residents as workers, which helped increase the incomes of locals.

Luo Jiangsheng, a hot pepper grower in Datang village, Longhui county, has a hot pepper land of two mu (1,333 square meters), and has earned more than 14,000 yuan in the past two years. In 2017, he said he wanted to expand the planting land and further increase his own income.
Shi Yigong, the Future Science Prize laureate in life science. [Photo/VCG]

The awarding ceremony of the second edition of the Future Science Prize, hailed as the "Nobel Prize of China", was held in Beijing on Saturday.

The Life Science Prize was awarded to Shi Yigong for his research on the structure of spliceosome, a substance which is crucial in gene expression.

The Physical Science Prize was then awarded to Pan Jianwei. Pan was the lead scientist of world's first quantum satellite launched by China last year, which marked a step closer to the country's goal of building an unhackable global communications network.

The Mathematics and Computer Science Prize was presented to Xu Chenyang for his contributions to birational algebraic geometry.

Each of the laureates won $1 million.

The Future Science Prize was initiated in 2016 by a group of entrepreneurs and scientists, with a view to honor outstanding scientists who research on basic science and its application.

"The founding of the awards is aimed at encouraging more young scientists to work out of their curiosity and be dedicated to fields which require long-term efforts," said Li Kai, a computer science professor from Princeton University and a member of the Future Science Prize Committee.

Li added the research of the winners, which can be from any country, must be original, have global influence and long-term significance, and be completed in Chinese mainland, Hong Kong, Macao or Taiwan.

Pan Jianwei, the Future Science Prize laureate in physical science. [Photo/VCG]
Premier Li Keqiang extended a congratulatory letter to the 82nd Thessaloniki International Fair in Greece on Saturday at local time.

China is the honored country in this year's exhibition. Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras attended the exhibition's opening ceremony and visited China's pavilions.

Premier Li said in the letter that China attended the fair in 1998 as the exhibition's first honored country, which was a new "bridge" to promote economic and trade exchanges between China and Europe.

That was not only of historic significance for the development of the expo itself, but also has elevated the development of China-EU and China-Greece relations to a new stage, he said.

Over the past 19 years, China and Greece have made great leaps in deepening political mutual trust and achieving outstanding progress in exchanges and cooperation in various fields, the premier said. For example, the Piraeus port project has made abundant achievements, he said.

The premier also said China is willing to work with Greece and other countries to better align the Belt and Road Initiative with their development strategies, which will create wider common interests, carry out mutually beneficial cooperation and help further recovery of the global economy to achieve strong, sustainable, balanced and inclusive growth.

Tsipras said during the ceremony that China's Belt and Road Initiative, proposed by President Xi Jinping, is of great importance to global development. That China is the honored country this year indicates that bilateral relations have reached a new height, which will further promote mutually beneficial cooperation, he said.

The fair is one of the most influential expos in South Europe and more than 100 Chinese companies are participating in the event this year.
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A visitor scrolls through the website of the poverty alleviation data system, Sept 10, 2017. [Photo by Wang Jingjing/chinadaily.com.cn]

With the widespread use of the internet, the use of big data is not exclusive to information technology companies now. Government bodies are also trying to use Internet Plus strategies in government affairs to make their work more transparent and convenient for the people.

The poverty alleviation department of Wugang city in Central China's Hunan province is applying the big data industry to local targeted poverty alleviation work, with a data system invented to involve all related data and information.

According to Liao Qing, a member of the poverty alleviation work group, the data system contains five aspects: information on poor families and poor villages, government information on who is responsible for helping them, the latest poverty alleviation policies and social assistance information.

Based on the targeted poverty alleviation work in Wugang, the system covers local government efforts in areas such as education, medical care, housing, reallocation and industry support.

A screenshot shows the login page of the poverty alleviation data system in Wugang city, Central Chinas Hunan province, Sept 10, 2017. [Photo/chinadaily.com.cn]

The Wugang City Poverty Alleviation Data System is almost completed, and will be launched as soon as possible, Liao said.

Users can find the latest poverty relief policies and the government work, search for the information on poor families or a person on the website. After the website's launch, it will be easier to search for information on the city's poor people, and it will help to make poverty alleviation work more transparent and more open.

Wugang city's goal is to lift 28,000 people out of poverty this year, and help all its poor group out of poverty by 2018.
Shortages pose major challenges in Africa, chief of program says

The head of the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV and AIDS has called on China to boost prevention and control in Africa by encouraging the country's drugmakers to open production hubs on the continent.

Michel Sidibe, executive director of UNAIDS, said the central government should use the China-Africa Development Fund to mobilize key pharmaceutical companies to invest in manufacturing hubs covering many African countries, which will help create a "viable and sustainable" market.

At the same time, medicines for HIV and AIDS produced in China and used by Chinese should be prequalified by the World Health Organization for use in Africa, he added. "We need to create a policy space to make sure those products can be prequalified by the WHO. That is one of the major challenges for the African countries to have easy access to these medicines," said Sidibe, who also is under-secretary-general of the United Nations.

Shortages of drugs and grassroots healthcare workers pose a major challenge for the control and prevention of HIV/AIDS in Africa, he said, while China also has experience and knowledge in the field that can be passed on.

"Ninety-seven percent of the medicine consumed in Africa is from other continents," Sidibe said. "We are happy that we have a very good relationship with the Chinese."

President Xi Jinping proposed intensifying cooperation with Africa in a number of areas, including industrial development, agriculture, finance, poverty alleviation and healthcare, at the 2015 summit of the Forum of China-Africa Cooperation in South Africa.

According to a 10-point action plan, the central government will encourage Chinese enterprises to collaborate with Africa in drug research, development and production, and encourage them to produce drugs in Africa to aid the sustainable development of the local pharmaceutical industry.

Globally, countries are making unprecedented progress in the control and prevention of HIV. For the first time, the world has more people with HIV receiving treatment than people waiting for treatment, and for the first time, HIV transmission from mother to babies is under control.

Moreover, China is committed to improving public health services, Xi said, noting that government health expenditures have increased by 80 percent over the past 10 years, and that it is helping to provide wider access to health services.
Chinese travel agencies predict that Japan is likely to become one of the hottest destinations for Chinese tourists during the Golden Week. [Photo/Xinhua]

Japans local governments and tourism industry are currently preparing for the coming Chinese Golden Week, a 7-day-long vacation that starts on Oct. 1, in a bid to attract more tourists from the worlds second largest economy.

Chinese travel agencies predict that Japan is likely to become one of the hottest destinations for Chinese tourists during the Golden Week.

According to Ctrip, a major travel service provider in China, Japan will be a top-3 destination for Chinese tourists during the vacation.

A total of 506,000 Chinese tourists visited Japan during the Golden Week last year, and Japan is expecting a new high this year.

Japans tourism industry is busy preparing for the rush days to attract more Chinese tourists.

Recently, a number of the countrys local governments have carried out promotion activities in China.

On Sept. 6, a government delegation from Fukuoka came to Shanghai to promote a shopping festival of the city. It is noteworthy that Fukuoka government has taken Oct. 1 as the first day of the month-long festival, with an obvious intention to attract Chinese tourists. Japanese merchants have also racked their brains to find ways to attract Chinese tourists.

Some cosmetic shops have started recruiting Chinese students as part-time employees and more local merchants are using Chinese e-payment systems for convenience.
Hurricane Irma is driving toward Florida passing the eastern end of Cuba in this NASA's GOES-16 satellite image taken at about 0800 EDT on September 8, 2017.[Photo/Agencies]

Hurricane Irma pounded Cuba's northern coast on Saturday and barreled toward Florida's Gulf Coast as authorities scrambled to complete an unprecedented evacuation of millions of residents hours before the storm lashes the state.

Irma, one of the fiercest Atlantic storms in a century, was expected to rip through the Florida Keys archipelago on Sunday morning. It will make landfall on the Florida peninsula somewhere west of Miami on a track that would take it up the state's west coast, including Tampa, forecasters said.

Irma, which has killed at least 22 people in the Caribbean, was likely to inflict billions of dollars in damage in one of the most populous and fastest-growing states.

It could bring winds in excess of 100 miles per hour and a storm surge up to 15 feet (4.6 meters) high along the state's west coast, which is expected to trigger flooding.

The hurricane could rival any storm in Florida's history, with the storm surge generating flooding along the entire west coast, Governor Rick Scott said.

"Think about that, 15 feet is devastating and will cover your house," he said at a Saturday morning news conference.

Irma, located 195 miles (314 km/h) south of Miami on Saturday afternoon, still ranked as a Category 5 storm when it crashed into Cuba during the morning. It gradually weakened to a Category 3 storm as it bumped along the island's northern coastline, downing power lines, bending palm trees and sending waves crashing over sea walls.

Maximum sustained winds dipped to around 125 miles per hour (201 km per hour) by 11 am (1200 GMT) on Saturday, the US National Hurricane Center (NHC) said.

But Irma is expected to regain strength as it steams over warm waters south of Florida, according to the NHC. It was unclear if it would regain Category 4 or even Category 5 status, the highest ranking possible.

On Florida's west coast, a long line of people in Estero, north of Naples, lined up to enter an arena that officials converted into an evacuation shelter, one of hundreds that have opened up across the state.

To the east, Luise Campana Read was one of those who chose to ignore warnings and stay in her home. She said by phone she planned to ride out the storm in her beachfront condo in Fort Lauderdale, with her elderly mother and other family members.

"With a 97-year-old, there was no way I was going to have her sleep on a cot or a blow-up mattress" in a shelter, she said.

Later, some communities on Florida's east coast lifted evacuation orders when Irma's projected path edged west.

In Cuba, the destruction along the Caribbean country's north central coast was similar to that seen on other Caribbean islands over the last week as Irma plowed into Ciego de Avila province around midnight.

It was the first time the eye of a Category 5 storm had made landfall since 1932, state media said, and the island's Communist government ordered the evacuation of more than 1 million people, with most sheltering with family and friends.

"We are praying to God and the Virgin of Charity that nothing grave happens to the people of Florida, and in particular Miami," said Antonia Navarro, 56, an office worker in the northern Cuban port town of Nuevitas in Camaguey. "We have to pray a lot for our relatives who live there."
Flutist Danielle Frabutt Garcia and pianist Steven Wiseman perform to raise money for the churchs youth program.

Flutist Danielle Frabutt Garcia and pianist Steven Wiseman will give a concert at St. Andrew Presbyterian Church on Sunday, September 10, at 3:00 p.m. A free will offering will be received to benefit the churchs Youth Program. The church is located at 5301 Ponderosa Avenue NE, in Albuquerque.

Danielle Frabutt Garcia has performed with the Las Cruces Symphony Orchestra, the Santa Fe Symphony, the New Mexico Philharmonic, the Santa Fe Symphony Woodwind Quintet, the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival Woodwind Quintet, the American Wind Symphony Orchestra, and other various chamber ensembles. She is a founding member of the virtuoso Woodwind Trio Altura Winds and the Desert Arts Duo. Danielle has a successful private teaching studio and also works in music administration

Steven Wiseman has performed with the New Quincy Trio and the Colorado Symphony Orchestra, and he is a founding member of the Colorado Arts Trio. In addition to performing, Steve taught at the University of Wyoming, Truman State University, and The University of Kansas. He returned to the Quincy Conservatory of Music, where he served as President and contributed to the establishment of new facilities, new educational programs, and the founding of an Opera Theatre Program. Upon moving to New Mexico, Steve became Director of Keyboard Studies at the New Mexico School of Music, where he taught and performed. He is currently staff pianist for Paradise Hills United Methodist Church.
LONDON -- Eight centuries of students submitting hand-written exam papers could soon come to an end at the world famous Cambridge University.

The university is considering axing compulsory written exams and allowing students to use laptop computers instead, reports in Britain's broadsheet newspapers reported Saturday.

The proposed move comes after Cambridge tutors complained that students' handwriting is becoming illegible.

Academics say today's students rely too heavily on laptops in lectures, and are losing the ability to write by hand.

Cambridge University, according to the reports, has launched a consultation on the topic as part of a digital education strategy.

Earlier this year Cambridge piloted an exam typing scheme in its history and classics faculties.

In an online survey, students are asked whether they would like the option to type exams, and whether this would have a "significant positive impact" on their "well-being".

Dr Sarah Pearsall, a senior lecturer at Cambridge's History Faculty who was involved with the pilot earlier this year, told the Daily Telegraph that handwriting is becoming a lost art among the current generation of students.

She said: "Fifteen or twenty years ago students routinely have written by hand several hours a day - but now they write virtually nothing by hand except exams," she told The Daily Telegraph.

"As a faculty we have been concerned for years about the declining handwriting problem. There has definitely been a downward trend. It is difficult for both the students and the examiners as it is harder and harder to read these scripts."

Pearsall added an increasing number of scripts are having to be transcribed centrally, meaning that students with illegible writing are forced to come back to their college during the summer holidays to read their answers aloud in the presence of two university administrators.

One leading academic who sees the decline in handwriting continuing, Sir Anthony Seldon, vice-chancellor of the University of Buckingham, told the Telegraph it is inevitable that universities will move to computers as handwriting deteriorates in coming years.

"Handwriting is very significantly in decline. We have to accept the reality."

A spokesperson for Cambridge University said their review of exam procedures was prompted by students raising concerns that they rarely handwrite during their studies.

"The consultation is on-going and will be used to inform future decision-making on the issue," the spokesperson added.
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Germany's Merkel offers diplomatic initiative for DPRK nuclear issue: report

Xinhua | Updated: 2017-09-10 21:22

BERLIN -- German Chancellor Angela Merkel is ready to intervene directly in a diplomatic initiative to end the nuclear and missile program of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), a German newspaper reported Sunday.



"If our participation in talks is desired, I will say yes," Merkel said in an interview with the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung.



The German Chancellor drew attention to the negotiations on the Iranian nuclear program, in which Germany had participated alongside the five veto-voters in the UN Security Council. It was a "long but important period of diplomacy", which had come to a "good end" last year.



Merkel said she could also imagine such a format for the settlement of the DPRK issue. Europe and in particular Germany should be ready to contribute a very active part.



After the DPRK announced the success of its first hydrogen bomb test earlier this month, Merkel issued a statement strongly condemning DPRK's nuclear test, calling for further and stricter sanctions against Pyongyang and seeking a peaceful solution with negotiation.



Merkel in last week had already spoken over the phone with the presidents of France, the United States, China and South Korea, as well as the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to discuss the issue. The report on Sunday said she will call Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday.
I had the privilege or reading a pre-release version of "God Shines Forth: How the Nature of God Shapes and Drives the Mission of the Church." Here are 20 quotes from the book, which you should pick up.
As the shelter population ebbs in the Houston area two weeks after Hurricane Harvey flooded thousands out of their homes, government agencies are shifting their focus to helping residents obtain federal assistance to rebuild their lives.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency announced Sunday that it will open three disaster recovery centers in the Houston area  in Greenspoint, Katy, and Baytown starting Monday, Sept. 11.
Texans-Giants updates: Houston falls to New York The Texans failed to get back in the win column against a playoff contender.

What Brittney Griner will face inside a Russian penal colony The WNBA star's transition into the Russian prison system will not be an easy one, an expert says.

Montrose's iconic nightclub is ready for its close up A new documentary explores the former epicenter of Houston's queer culture civil rights movement.
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Kingcreek Bullstangs posters and thank you letters to Summer Creek students and faculty were scattered around Summer Creek High School during its open house Saturday, Sept. 9, as Kingwood families toured the campus before the first day of school Monday, Sept. 11.

"Welcome Mustangs" signs were planted at the entrance for Kingwood families to see as they were driving into the school. Kingwood High School is out of commission after it was damaged by floodwaters, and Humble Independent School District opted to move the students to Summer Creek. Summer Creek students will attend classes a half-day in the morning, and Kingwood students will attend in the afternoon.

"When a school in our district is completely flooded, it makes sense for us to help them and take them in. I'm happy that we are able to help them and their class is able to stay together," said Olivia Campbell, Summer Creek senior class vice president.

Kingwood parents, students and curious community members filled the halls of Summer Creek High to tour the campus that will be shared by two different communities.

Kingwood High Principal Ted Landry said first learning the school won't open for the year was upsetting for a number of reasons but mostly because what that meant for the students.

But, Landry said, throughout the open house, he spoke to many optimistic parents.

"They get it," Landry said. "They get the fact that without Summer Creek, Kingwood High School would not exist this year, so there is a lot of thanks for the Summer Creek community for opening their arms to us."

While the instruction time has been cut in order to accommodate both schools, Landry said teachers will be restructuring and working within this challenge to continue to offer a rigorous education for students.

"We've seen it work. Other schools have done this in the past. It's not ideal, but it is a workable plan, and it had been implemented before. We knew we could pull it off. What we needed was a facility that could hold our size," Landry said.

Some students felt like the shortened class time provided a more flexible schedule to prepare them for what they will receive in college.

"I personally really like that because we get out of school at 11:20, and so we have the rest of the day to work on homework or go to lunch," said Madison Mayers, Summer Creek senior class publicist.

Brent McDonald, Summer Creek principal, said the students can make up instructional time through an optional Saturday tutorial that will be available in two weeks.

"Failure is not an option. That has always been our motto, but it absolutely is about the quality of instruction, not quantity of instruction. We will also have tutorials every afternoon," McDonald said.

Kathryn Cavalier is a Kingwood High parent with two daughters who will be attending Summer Creek, freshman Anna and junior Gabrielle.

"My freshman was a little nervous because it's her first year in high school altogether and now she's not even in her high school, but I'm glad she has her big sister around to kind of help guide her around," Cavalier said.

She was not pleased with the idea of 30-minute classes, one of the options Humble ISD originally considered. Cavalier said it would not have worked with teenagers, so when the alternative plan was proposed, she felt happy with the decision.

"I think it's awesome. Honestly, they didn't have to share their school with us this year. They were open to that, and they have been very welcoming," Cavalier said. "(There were) signs saying welcome Mustangs, it was really nice of them to open up their school year to us."

Annie Ortiz, senior student body president for Kingwood High, said they while the structure of their school is not there, the Kingwood aspect of everything will remain the same.

"It's been really fun. People have been curious about how everything is going to work out, but I think they are actually really excited, too. I'm really excited," Ortiz said.
Two teens are in custody and one another is still on the run after a 15-minute police chase ended in a fiery crash early Sunday morning in southwest Houston.

Houston police tried to pull over a car for a traffic violation around 1 a.m., according to Houston Police Department spokeswoman Jodi Silva.
The Coast Guard hoisted a 49-year-old man to safety after a medical episode on a research vessel at sea near Galveston.

Staff on the 340-foot Norwegian research ship Oceanic Vega called the Coast Guard around 4:15 a.m. to report a crew member having lower back pain and trouble breathing.
Steve Granitz/Getty Images

Celebrity fashion designer Kimora Lee Simmons is set to touch down in the Bayou City Sunday to hand out aid to Houstonians devastated by Hurricane Harvey.

The former model once married to hip hop great Russell Simmons will help distribute hygiene supplies and other necessities at the Aldine Family Hope Center from 12:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.
A chicken processing chain in Koyu & Unitek Co., Ltd (Source: trangtraiviet.vn)



This is an important event to Vietnams agriculture sector and the partners in the supply chain.

Japan is a very tough market, Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Nguyen Xuan Cuong said, adding that after chicken, Vietnam is determined to seek to export pork and milk to this market.

Koyu & Unitek Co., Ltd, a joint venture between Australia and Japan in southern Dong Nai province, is in charge of shipping 30 tonnes of chicken wings, thighs and breasts to Japan, which are expected to arrive in Tokyo in 10 days.

The company has signed a long-term contract with the Japanese side in which Japan will import about 300 tonnes of chicken products per month, said Director General of the firm James Hieu.

According to Hieu, Japan imports over 900,000 tonnes of poultry products annually. In fact, Koyu & Unitek falls short of its Japanese partners real demand which exceeds 2,000 tonnes per month.

The firm plans to increase capacity in the future by enhancing cooperation with farmers to raise chickens and expanding processing facilities./.
Two men were wounded Saturday after apparently stabbing each other in southwest Houston.

A 33-year-old and a 28-year-old man were fighting each other with knives around 11 a.m., though it wasn't immediately clear what started the brawl, according to Houston Police Department spokeswoman Jodi Silva.
Pearland police officers documented more than 79 abandoned, flooded vehicles on city roadways in the days following Hurricane Harvey, according to a department bulletin. That's nearly half the city's 188 cases reported for the week Aug. 28 to Sept. 3.

BURGLARY

A vehicle's driver's side window was broken Aug. 30 in the 3500 block of Broadway Street, police said.

An unknown suspect forced entry into a residence by prying a rear door lock between Aug. 28 and Aug. 29 in the 5300 block of Camden Lane, police said.

An unknown suspect caused damage to a door between Aug. 26 and Aug. 30 in the 1100 block of Merribrook Lane, police said.

A residence was burglarized Aug. 29 or Aug. 30 in the 2100 block of Frank Shore Drive, police said.

An apartment was broken into Aug. 30 or Aug. 31 in the 2400 block of Business Center Drive, police said.

Burglary of a habitation was reported Sept. 1 in the 5400 block of West Orange Street, police said.

A motor vehicle burglary was reported Sept. 1 in the 11200 block of Broadway Street, police said.

Police filed two burglary of habitation reports Sept. 2 in the 2200 block of Business Center Drive.

Burglary of a habitation occurred between Aug. 20 and Sept. 3 in the 4100 block of Seminole Drive, police said.

THEFT

Police filed a theft report Aug. 30 in the 8400 block of Broadway Street.

A vehicle stopped in traffic was later found to have been stolen, according to a police report filed Aug. 30 in the 4500 block of Broadway Street.

Motor vehicle theft was attempted Aug. 31 in the 2700 block of Veterans Drive, police said.

A vehicle was stolen Aug. 31 in the 5600 block of Apple Springs Drive, police said.

Shoplifting occurred Aug. 31 in the 11200 block of Broadway Street, police said.

Property theft occurred between Aug. 26 and Aug. 29 in the 1000 block of Bass Pro Drive, according to an Aug. 31 police report.

Identity theft was reported Aug. 31 in the 3400 block of Broadway Street, police said.

Theft was reported Sept. 2 in the 9400 block of Broadway Street, police said.

A license plate was stolen Aug. 30 in the 2800 block of Tranquility Lakes Boulevard, according to a Sept. 2 police report.

Shoplifting occurred Sept. 2 in the 2500 block of Pearland Parkway, police said.

Theft was reported Sept. 2 in the 2600 block of Pearland Parkway, police said.

ASSAULT

Police filed a family violence report Aug. 30 in the 4600 block of Orange Street.

A verbal argument escalated to physical contact between a man and a woman Aug. 30 in the 12300 block of Shadow Creek Parkway, police said.

A male victim reported his sister assaulted him Aug. 31 in the 1700 block of Sleepy Hollow Drive, police said.

Police cited a Galena Park man, 64, for assault Aug. 31 in the 3000 block of Kirby Drive.

Family violence was reported Aug. 31 in the 2700 of Janet Court, police said.

Police arrested a Pearland man, 43, for assaulting a public servant Aug. 31 in the 2800 block of Catalina Shores Drive.

A Pearland man, 18, was arrested for family violence Aug. 31 in the 2400 block of South Texas Avenue, police said.

Police investigated an assault, family violence report Sept. 1 in the 15000 block of Texas 288.

A Pearland man, 32, and woman, 31, received citations for assault Sept. 2 in the 2700 block of Old Alvin Road, police said.

Police cited a 37-year-old woman for assault, family violence Sept. 3 in the 5700 block of Tyler Street.

A Pearland man, 30, received a citation for assault Sept. 3 in the 4800 block of Elkmont Court, police said.

DISORDERLY CONDUCT

Police cited a Pearland man, 25, and a Houston man, 19, for fighting Aug. 30 in the 1900 block of Highland Glen Lane.

Police filed a disorderly conduct report Aug. 30 in the 3200 block of North Peach Hollow Circle.

CRIMINAL MISCHIEF

Police cited a Pearland woman, 37, for criminal mischief after she reportedly used a blunt object to break the front door glass of a residence Aug. 30 in the 3900 block of Greenwood Drive.

Criminal mischief occurred Aug. 28 in the 1100 block of Wentworth Drive, according to an Aug. 31 police report.

Police filed a criminal mischief report after a vehicle door handle was damaged between Aug. 19 and Sept. 1 in the 2500 block of Orchid Creek Drive.

FOUND PROPERTY

A Subway employee reportedly found a handgun in the restroom Aug. 30 in the 11000 block of Shadow Creek Parkway, police said.

TRAFFIC

A male subject reportedly jumped in front of a vehicle Aug. 30 in the 16000 block of Texas 288, police said.

NARCOTICS

Police cited a Katy man, 21, for possession of drug paraphernalia Aug. 30 in the 10000 block of Broadway Street.

Police arrested a Pearland woman, 20, for possession of drug paraphernalia Sept. 1 in the 2700 block of Old Alvin Road.

Police arrested a Pearland man, 26, for marijuana possession Sept. 1 in the 2000 block of Tall Timbers Lane.

A Manvel man, 29, received a citation for possession of drug paraphernalia Sept. 2 in the 14200 block of Texas 288, police said.

Police arrested a Houston woman, 34, for possession of a controlled substance and DWI Sept. 2 in 1500 block of Broadway Street.

A Houston man, 29, was arrested for possession of a controlled substance and unlawful carrying of a weapon Sept. 3 in the 11100 block of Shadow Creek Parkway, police said.

Police arrested a Houston man, 30, for possession of a controlled substance and DWI Sept. 3 in the 15000 block of Texas 288.

DRIVING WHILE INTOXICATED

Police arrested a Houston man, 25, for DWI Aug. 31 in the 16500 block of Texas 288.

Police arrested a Houston man, 31, for DWI with a child passenger Sept. 2 in the 2400 block of Main Street.

A Houston woman, 28, was arrested for DWI Sept. 2 in the 4600 block of Broadway Street, police said.

A Pearland woman, 24, was arrested for DWI Sept. 3 in the 2400 block of Main Street, police said.

WEAPONS

Discharge of a firearm occurred Aug. 30 in the 3600 block of Bartlett Way Drive, police said.

INTIMATE VISUAL MATTER

Police filed a report for invasive visual recording Aug. 31 in the 3300 block of Hickory Knoll Drive.

FORGERY

Police filed a forgery report Sept. 1 in the 11200 block of Broadway Street.

PUBLIC INTOXICATION

Police took a Brookside man, 25, into custody for public intoxication Sept. 2 in the 2200 block of Washington Irving Drive.

Police arrested a Houston man, 28, for public intoxication Sept. 3 in the 11200 block of Broadway Street.
A ceremony took place in Dong Thap on September 9 to celebrate the 55th anniversary of the Vietnam-Laos diplomatic ties. (Photo: VNA)



The event was held in the presence of Lao Consul General in HCM City Somxay Sanamoune, the provinces senior officials and Lao students studying at Dong Thap University.

In his remarks at the event, Sanamoune praised the long-standing relations between Vietnam and Laos, saying despite current pressing issues in the globe and region, the two countries comprehensive partnership has seen significant progress in all fields, including politics, security and defence, economics and education.

The Vietnam-Laos relations is an example of the neighbouring ties built on the will and solidarity of their people, said Vice Chairman of the Dong Thap Peoples Committee Doan Tan Buu.

He urged the provincial Vietnam-Laos Friendship Association to continue maintaining the good bilateral relationship and to bridge Dong Thap with Lao localities, paving the way for further expanding cooperation between the two sides.

The association took the occasion to launch its chapter at the Dong Thap University, aiming to increase awareness of the special Vietnam-Laos relations among young generation.

Over 14,000 Lao officials and students studied in Vietnam in the 2016-2017 academic year while about 60 Vietnamese attended courses in Laos./.
A youth exchange programme held in Ho Chi Minh City in April (Source: VNA)



Talking to representatives from the Lao Peoples Revolutionary Youth Union, Cang affirmed that Ho Chi Minh City is willing to cooperate with Lao localities, especially in sharing experience and improving the quality of young officials.

He suggested the two sides promote youth cooperation activities, including cultural exchange and voluntary activities and foster links between young entrepreneurs to contribute to the development of the two countries.

First Secretary of the Lao union Sonthanu Thammavong suggested that Ho Chi Minh City create favourable conditions for cooperation between Lao localities and the city, such as youth exchange and training of the Youth Union members.

At the meeting with the delegation from the Union of Youth Federations of Cambodia, Cang said that the city will support local youths to strengthen ties with Cambodian youths with the focus on voluntary and charitable activities and youth exchange.

President of the Cambodian union Hun Many noted that the Vietnam-Laos-Cambodia Youth Cooperation Conference 2017 is an important event to the three countries, marking the close cooperation of youths and good relations among the three countries./.
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The pilot who died in a crash at Point Reyes National Seashore last week had recently left his Houston home after Hurricane Harvey flooded his basement, his wife said Saturday.

John R. Wilson, an oil and gas industry consultant, was found dead when search crews discovered his wrecked Cessna 172 amid thick brush at the Sonoma County park. He was 58.

He had traveled all over the world for his career, spending time between Austria, Santa Barbara and Houston, where he worked as a consultant for his firm Scorpio Resources, said Christine Wilson, his wife of 14 years.

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For me its not reality yet, she said Saturday. He just received his pilot license a few weeks ago. He was a young pilot, but he loved it and he was careful.

She said her husband could not stay in their Houston home for the past three weeks after the storm took out electricity and running water when their basement flooded. He left Houston to stay at their property in Santa Barbara, while his wife was staying at their home in Austria.

Christine Wilson said her husband had carefully mapped out his flight from Santa Ynez in Santa Barbara County to Charles M. Schulz-Sonoma County Airport in Santa Rosa for an upcoming business trip in Napa.

He was really, really excited about flying. He was so excited. He had been planning this for a week, she said.

John Wilson had taken flying lessons for several years, and has flown several times successfully, including a trip from Houston to New Orleans, she said.

A multiagency search party found his plane Friday afternoon after the aircrafts emergency transmitter went off, giving them the location. The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the incident.

Wilson, originally from London, is survived by his wife, three children, three stepchildren and his brother.

His love for flying and hiking and his love for everyone, his character and integrity will be forever remembered by his family and friends, Christine Wilson wrote in an email to The Chronicle.

Jenna Lyons is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jlyons@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @JennaJourno
Like most of his F1 colleagues, Romain Grosjean is a big fan of the Singapore race weekend, but the thrill and enjoyment take nothing away from the venue's challenges.

Haas negotiated the last two races - held at low-downforce, power hungry tracks - with mixed fortunes.

While the US outfit and Grosjean were top ten finishers at Spa, the team's pace at Monza appeared to fall off from the outset.

"I think Monza was more just about the drag and the efficiency of the low downforce," says Grosjean.

"At Spa-Francorchamps, there were a few more corners where we could exploit a bit more of the potential of the car.

"So yes, we struggled a bit more in Italy. The pace looked good on Friday, but over the Grand Prix it was a bit more complicated and difficult."

Wings shall be angled once again in Singapore but will the higher-downforce Marina Bay track suit Grosjean's VF-17 better than the high-speed circuits?

"I think it will," he says. "Every time we run maximum downforce, the car seems to work better.

"Weve got a better efficiency between drag and downforce, so thats good. The key for us in Singapore will be to get into the tire window.

"If we do so, well be in a good place. But again, thats not easy to achieve."

Singapore will enjoy a decade of F1 this year and despite its young history, the event is a favourite among members of the sport's community, and Grosjean is no exception.

"I do like the Singapore Grand Prix, I do like competing in the night," he admits.

"Its pretty good fun. It makes some great footage, and clearly Singapore is one of the most beautiful races you can have by night. Its pretty awesome.

"Its actually easier at night because the lights never change. The luminosity is always the same. You stick with the same visor, and driving at those speeds in those conditions is absolutely fine.

"It provides something a bit different on the calendar. Everyone loves it, especially the VIPs, who then go partying after the race. Its a special one, for sure.

"Its a race everyone waits for. Its a tricky track, and youre racing at night downtown when its very hot and humid, so there are a lot of factors that make it exciting.

"Im very much looking forward to it and seeing what we can do there."

Gallery: The beautiful wives and girlfriends of F1

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Kingwood High and Summer Creek High are two of many Houston-area schools finally starting the school year on Monday.

In one of the more drastic measures after Hurricane Harvey, the entire Kingwood High student body and staff will move into Summer Creek High School for the year.
AUSTIN -- Texas Democrats turned to one of the party's legacy families for a confidence boost Saturday night.

And U.S. Rep. Joe Kennedy III was more than happy to oblige.

"Ladies and gentlemen there is no secret that we gather tonight in perilous times," Kennedy told hundreds of Democrats at a ballroom in downtown Austin Saturday night at the party's annual Johnson-Jordan fundraising dinner.

But Kennedy said the difficult lives many have faced during the first year of the Trump Administration have been a reminder that the powerless need a voice and that is something Democrats have always rallied around.

"The lesson we need is the lesson that we already know," Kennedy said. "Do not underestimate what it means to be able to provide for a family."

Kennedy said Democrats have always been the voice for the powerless against the powerful and should continue that quest.

"Democrats, this is our fight," said Kennedy, the grandson of Robert F. Kennedy. "This is our only fight. This is our story, our message, our electoral strategy and our moral responsibility. To rebuild a country defined by the decency it offers every proud man, woman or child who is blessed to call this nation home."

A big part of the nearly dinner was aimed at praising Texas and Democrats for rallying to help people in the wake of Hurricane Harvey. Texas Democratic Party chairman Gilberto Hinojosa specifically singled out Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner  who was not at the dinner  for his efforts to get Houston back on its feet.

"We are proud of very own Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner," Hinojosa said to applause.

The meeting was also a call to arms for Democrats who live in cities. Austin Mayor Steve Adler said the last legislative special session shows that city governments and the people who live in cities are under attack by Republicans and need to prepare for more.

Over a 30-day special session, state legislators tried to rewrite rules for annexations, tree ordinances and which bathrooms people who are transgender can use.

"The battle is now coming to our cities," Adler said. "We are under attack, but together we will prevail."
The summers final Live on the Waterfront concert was held Wednesday evening at Prince Arthurs Landing. The popular series in Thunder Bay has completed nine weekly shows that began on July 13. Wednesdays concert was unique as it was held one hour later in the evening to mesh with the 10 p.
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CLEVELAND -- I have spent more than two decades as a prosecutor battling hate crimes.

Along with the FBI, I investigated and brought hate crime cases all over the country as a prosecutor for the U.S. Department of Justice's civil rights division and as an assistant U.S. attorney. Then, as the United States Attorney in Northern Ohio, the home of the reported neo-Nazi who is accused of killing an innocent woman in Charlottesville, Virginia, I prosecuted cases including an arson at an African-American church, and a case involving the stockpiling of an arsenal by a white supremacist.

In the wake of incidents like these, I always put on my professional law enforcement hat and ask, "Who did it? How can we stop them?"

But my reaction to Charlottesville and its troubling aftermath has been more personal. Maybe it's the video of the neo-Nazi chants that hit home. Maybe it's the disturbing response from the White House. Maybe it's the fact that, at age 51, I am running for office for the first time (Ohio attorney general). But for whatever reason, I want to tell people that I am a proud American Jew.

That has always been an important part of me, but I want to talk about my Jewishness now, more than ever. I want to talk about it because the Nazis and white nationalists who marched in Charlottesville wrongly assume that if I do talk about being Jewish, it will hurt me in my election in Ohio.

But I also want to talk about it because others who are not haters seem to implicitly agree. Let me explain.

Here's one thing I have learned about running for office: A lot of people give you advice.

People whom you ask for advice, give you advice. So do people you don't ask. People whom you pay give you advice, and people give you advice for free.

And in the world of politics, people feel free to give advice that would usually be totally off limits. I get advice on my physical appearance and my clothes. And mostly I quietly listen.

People also give me advice on how to "handle" my Judaism. My name is not "obviously Jewish," they say. No need to "push that." It might make people "uncomfortable." Even though I don't agree -- because it profoundly underestimates the Ohio I know -- I have politely listened to that advice.

No more advice about how to treat my Judaism in my election. I want people to ask me about my family who died in the Holocaust. I want people to ask about how my Judaism affects me.

Being Jewish makes me an outsider at some level and helps me to understand how others on the outside can feel. It drives me to help protect people who don't have power -- people who are not part of the establishment and want to work hard but see they're not playing on a level field. I understand that sometimes people don't get a fair shake, whether it's because of their economic situation, their race, their religion or so many other things.

But that same background also helps me understand the incredible promise of this great nation. My family came here and thrived because of that incredible promise and hard work, and I want to help every single Ohioan to have a chance at that promise.

From my experience, both prosecutorial and personal, there are some specific things we can do to help fight these violent extremist groups, the same way we fight international terrorism.

First, we must recognize that Charlottesville was not an isolated incident. Anti-Semitic incidents are on the rise.

And according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, there are 35 active hate groups in Ohio alone.

State attorneys general should work with county prosecutors to form local Anti-Terrorism Advisory Councils (ATACs), as the Department of Justice has done to fight other radical groups. These ATACs bring together and train local law enforcement.

Second, we must follow the advice of groups like the Anti-Defamation League, and improve law enforcement data collection around hate crimes. Law enforcement must be aware of where hate crimes are occurring, so they may properly deploy the resources needed to root it out.

Third we must pass legislation that labels hate groups like the terrorist threat they are, and then devote greater resources to law enforcement so they can disrupt them before commit violence.

I have overseen cases against Islamic State disciples and other homegrown radicals. The parallels are striking. Both use sophisticated propaganda networks to recruit and target young men. We should use existing anti-terrorism models to fight them.

But first we must have the courage to talk. We can only come together and find solutions to these problems if we first own and understand our differences. Reach out to one person who is different from you this week, tell them about yourself, and ask them about their background. Sometimes, owning our differences means beginning an uncomfortable conversation, but we desperately need to come together.

And did I forget to mention it? I am Jewish.

Steven M. Dettelbach is former U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio and a candidate for the Democratic nomination for Ohio attorney general.

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CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Kansas City routed Minnesota, 11-3 Sunday, dropping the Cleveland Indians' magic number to clinch the American League Central Division tile to 8.

Cleveland faces Baltimore at 8 p.m. Sunday with a chance to reduce the magic number to 7 by the end of the night.

Minnesota (74-69) is off Monday before hosting a series against San Diego beginning Tuesday.

Cleveland's lead in the division over the Twins stands at 12.5 games with 20 games remaining. The Tribe is also tied Houston for the best overall record in the American League.

Any combination of Indians wins plus losses by the second-place Twins that is greater than or equal to 8 will clinch the division title for Cleveland.

To generate the magic number, take the number of games remaining for the first-place team (20 entering Sunday for the Indians), add one and then subtract the difference in losses between the first- and second-place teams. The result is 8, (21-13=8).
View the works of 39 artists at 14 locations throughout the scenic Alameda and North Valley area.

7th Annual Alameda Studio Tour: September 9 & 10, 2017

The seventh annual Alameda Studio Tour will be held Saturday, September 9 and Sunday, September 10, 2017 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. both days at artists studios located throughout the scenic Alameda and North Valley area, just north of Albuquerque. There will be 39 artists at 14 locations.The Alameda artists will donate a portion of their proceeds to Art in the School, a non-profit art education organization which benefits children.

For a printable map of the studios and more information about the participating artists, visit the website: AlamedaStudioTour.com. The brochure with map will also be available the days of the tour at 7209 4th Street NW and at each studio.

Alameda is home to many established and emerging fine artists and skilled craftspeople who welcome visitors to their studios and sell their work during the two days of the tour. The wide range of fine art and craft for sale will include paintings (oil, acrylic, watercolor, pastels, and encaustic); pottery, fused glass, stained glass, photography, mixed media, prints, fiber arts, jewelry, Ukrainian egg art, contemporary folk art dolls, wood craft and more. A llama family will be at one of the locations, where their fibers are crafted into rugs, hats and more.
Supporters of Mikheil Saakashvili, the Rukh Novykh Syl party leader and the former Odesa regional administration head, have broken through the Ukrainian law enforcers' cordon at the Shehyni checkpoint on the Ukrainian-Polish state border and have led the politician into the territory of Ukraine.

Ukrainian parliamentarian Yuriy Derevianko (Batkivshchyna faction) provided this information on air on NewsOne television.

A crowd moved toward the nonoperational checkpoint at some moment of time, he said. The people broke through a cordon placed by Ukrainian border guards and police, and then they closely surrounded Saakashvili and Ukrainian politicians and public figures accompanying him and have 'carried' them into the territory of Ukraine, he said.

Law enforcers stepped aside following the cordon's breakthrough and did not interfere into developments, the parliamentarian said.

Ukrainian State Border Service head's assistant Oleh Slobodian confirmed the report about the cordon's breakthrough and the crowd's infiltration into the checkpoint.

"The crowd has broken through the Shehyni checkpoint. A brawl started [...] Now it is difficult even to forecast consequences of this situation," he wrote on Facebook on Sunday evening.
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5 Captain Kirk Almost Fought Jesus

While Star Trek: The Motion Picture gave us our first taste of the series on the big screen, the movie probably isn't anyone's favorite Trek film. For most, it's what we suffer through in order to get to "KHAAAAAAN!" At best, it made us think a bit about the consequences of firing junk into space. But hey it could have been ... OK, not exactly better, but definitely way more odd. While what we got was a missing satellite and a bald robot in a short skirt, what we almost got was Captain Kirk fighting Alien Jesus. We'll give you a moment to develop that mental picture.

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How many hammer punches and clumsy forward rolls did you envision? Eight? Nice.

As it happens, an early version of the film pitted the crew against a shapeshifting alien that would assume the forms of various biblical figures. "In the climactic scene, Kirk had a fistfight with an alien who had assumed the image of Jesus Christ," Star Trek author and screenwriter Michael Jan Friedman said. "So Kirk was slugging it out on the bridge. With Jesus."

Now before you get all hot and bothered thinking how cool it would be to have Kirk drop-kicking Jesus aboard the Enterprise, it's our duty to remind you of Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, in which Kirk fights God. The one time the Star Trek universe dabbled in religion, we get a steaming piece of crap so fragrant that even its producer admits it "almost doomed the franchise."
Photo taken on Sept. 9, 2017 shows a Chinese Railway Express cargo train leaving for Prague, the Czech Republic, from Yiwu, east China's Zhejiang Province. The train, loaded with 88 containers of cloth, clothing, shoes, hats and Christmas items, will pass through Kazakhstan, Russia, Belarus, and Poland and travel about 16 days before arriving in Prague. The journey is about half the time for traditional sea voyage. According to customs statistics, imports and exports via Yiwu's Sino-Europe freight service have grown rapidly, reaching 3 billion yuan in 2016. (Xinhua/Lyu Bin)

A train loaded with 88 containers of cloth, clothing, shoes, hats and Christmas items left east China's Yiwu City Sunday morning for Prague, the Czech Republic.

It will pass through Kazakhstan, Russia, Belarus, and Poland and travel about 16 days before arriving in Prague. The journey is about half the time for traditional sea voyage.

On August 4, the first train from Prague arrived at Yiwu, east China's Zhejiang province.

Before the launch of the Prague route, Yiwu, often called the "world supermarket," already boasted eight freight train routes.

According to customs statistics, imports and exports via Yiwu's Sino-Europe freight service have grown rapidly, reaching 3 billion yuan in 2016.

On May 13, a train left Yiwu to become the 1,000th freight train linking China and Europe this year. As of that time, China had 51 Sino-European freight train routes, with trains from 28 Chinese cities travelling to 29 cities in 11 European countries.
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The staggering number of officers needed to police two immigration rallies held in Croydon earlier this year has been revealed.

The rallies, which took place on May 6 , initially involved around 25 members of the South East Alliance marching to Lunar House, in Wellesley Road, and then to East Croydon station to protest against immigrants coming to the UK.

Lunar House is the headquarters of the Home Office's UK Visas and Immigration division.

But a counter-rally, organised by United Against Fascism and PCS (The Public and Commercial Services Union), saw around 200 people gather outside Lunar House  with banners displaying messages such as "migrants and refugees welcome here" on show.

While the rallies were pre-planned and organised with the permission of the police, figures obtained by the Advertiser through a Freedom of Information request have revealed the immense strain it put on policing in the borough as officers had to be diverted from other areas to swell the police ranks for the safety of officers and the public.

A total of 406 officers were needed. That figure includes 328 police constables, 61 police sergeants, 12 inspectors, two chief inspectors, two superintendents and one commander.

A Met Police spokeswoman said the number of officers assigned to such an operation is measured on an event-by-event basis.

She said: "Every single operation that we run is taken on its own merits. There will be an operational plan and the Operation Commander will determine the appropriate number of police officers that are needed."

Within the same FOI request, the Advertiser asked the Met Police how much the event cost to police in total.

However, the Met Police said it does not routinely cost policing particular events or demonstrations and could not provide a figure.

The total would include the cost of salaries, vehicles, operational feeding, equipment and other miscellaneous costs.

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On the day of the rallies, on May 6, at about 2pm, members of the anti-immigration group the South East Alliance marched down Wellesley Road, with the group and those attending the counter rally being kept apart by a thick line of police officers.

The two groups were outside the Home Office headquarters until around 3.30pm  with pro-immigration protesters blaring out music which drowned out music the South East Alliance played.

One minor scuffle broke out at Lunar House where a bystander was reportedly mistaken for a right wing sympathiser.

The South East Alliance members were marched to East Croydon station at around 3.30pm and pro-immigration protesters clashed with police in Dingwall Road while this march was taking place.

After the South East Alliance marchers were out of sight, United Against Fascism and PCS members made their way to the front of the station for a public rally.

Public transport was affected throughout the day with trams being suspended between East Croydon and Reeves Corner.

To see more pictures and video of the protests click here.

The number of officers who policed the rallies has been broken down by rank in the table below.
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These dramatic photos show a serious house fire which is being tackled tonight in Shirley.

Police have confirmed that nobody was injured in the blaze in Devonshire Way, which emergency services were called to at 9.15pm on Saturday evening.

Six fire engines, paramedics and police have been seen at the scene and part of the road has been cordoned off.

The Advertiser understands that neighbours have been evacuated from their homes.

It is believed that the home's roof has been completely destroyed with firefighters using ladders to tackle the blaze, which is reported to have now been brought under control.

A resident, who did not want to be named, told the Advertiser they first noticed the fire at around 9pm this evening.

He said: "I was indoors in the front bedroom when I started to smell burning around 40 minutes ago. I looked out and saw the smoke but I just didn't want to believe it was a fire - at first I couldn't believe my eyes.

"The roof looks like it's completely destroyed but like they say it's all just bricks and mortar. I hope everyone who was in there is alright."

A London Fire Brigade spokeswoman confirmed to the Advertiser that the incident is ongoing.

"No more details can be released at this stage and a statement will be made in the early hours," she said.
The disgruntled backbencher didnt pull his punches. Its like 1997 all over again, he told me. Were sitting here with our head up our backsides hoping for a miracle. And a miracle isnt coming.

Tory MPs returned to Westminster last week to find a doom-laden new narrative being constructed.

Conservatism is facing an existential crisis unparalleled since Tony Blair smugly announced a new dawn has broken. In front of their eyes, Theresa May is morphing into Theresa Major.

Brave face: Mrs May is trying to head off another party meltdown

The doom-mongers need to get a grip. In the wake of the Election, the Tory Party remains stunned. It will take at least another year to fully sink in, one Minister admitted. But though shell-shocked, the party is not mortally wounded. And, so long as it keeps its head, it is certainly not facing the same fate that befell John Major and his infamous Cabinet of bastards.

Much of this hand-wringing is a product of Mrs Mays announcement of her intention to stay in Downing Street for the long term. If she stays, well be destroyed, one MP wailed to me, in an echo of John Redwoods no change, no chance slogan from his 1995 leadership bid.

And, yes, the Tory Party probably would be destroyed if they forced the PM into another head-on collision with the voters in 2022. But theyre not going to do it, and shes not going to let them do it.

Former Prime Minister John Major and chancellor Norman Lamont (right) outside 10 Downing Street

For all the brave talk of not being a quitter, the PM will be 67 at the time of the next Election. I dont know a single Cabinet member who seriously sees her putting herself through another campaign, let alone another five years in office post-2022  and that includes Mrs May herself.

Then there are the supposedly crippling divisions over Europe. During the summer, a sense of crisis has enveloped the Brexit negotiations. Little progress appears to have been made. Our European partners have been accused of acting like gangsters. Theyre trying to play time against money, David Davis fumed.

Yet against this backdrop, the party has remained broadly united. There was a flurry of excitement on Thursday when a letter from the Eurosceptic wing demanded Mrs May maintain a tough stance on single market and customs union withdrawal. But in the 1990s, rebels werent writing letters  they were ambushing Ministers, mounting leadership challenges and bringing the Government to its knees.

There will be plenty of opportunity for such carnage to be repeated. But one fundamental will not change. No assault on the Government can be mounted without an assault on Brexit itself. As a Minister put it: The choice facing the Eurosceptics is simple. Stick with us and you get your Brexit. It may not be perfect, but if we win in 2022, then you can spend your time building a better Brexit. Or, you can work against us, in which case you get Corbyn and Starmer, and the Brexit revolution is junked.

And there is one other crucial difference between the Conservative Party of 1997 and that of 2017. That difference is the Labour Party.

Labour in the 1990s was driven forward by a process of ideological renewal. Defeat in an Election many had expected to win, followed by the tragic death of its leader, forced the party to think the unthinkable. The decision to occupy the centre ground opened up acres of electoral space to be cultivated. Tony Blair and his colleagues found themselves flying free.

Corbyns surprisingly good result in June has had the opposite effect. Labour is now in a hard-Left straitjacket.

As this months victory rally in Brighton will demonstrate, one more Corbynite heave is the only strategy on offer, and will be pursued until 2022. Which, paradoxically, provides the Conservatives with an opportunity they did not have in 1997. They are not bound by a manifesto rejected at the ballot box by as many voters as endorsed it. If they choose, they too can fly free.

Of course, Tory MPs may choose to do the opposite. They could insist on driving Britain toward a catastrophic cliff-edge Brexit. They may well continue to try to counter Corbynism with heated-up Milibandism. Jacob Rees-Mogg might be invited to bring his unique 18th Century world view to the Cabinet table.

But it is not yet written. Immediately after the Election, I thought we had experienced another Black Wednesday moment. That day when Britain crashed out of the ERM, the Tories fate was sealed. But the opinion polls  for what theyre worth  tell a different story. Corbyn has yet to build a comparable lead.

I was working as a Labour researcher in 1997. You could see the future in the dead eyes of Ministers and Tory MPs.

Though dimmed, this morning there is still some light in the eyes. The nation is still a long way off casting its final judgment. So despite the doom-mongers, the Conservative Partys fate rests in its own hands. At least for now.
With Theresa May at the mercy of the hung Parliament, the Tories tarantula-keeping Chief Whip, Gavin Williamson, has decided to crank up the menace levels to keep his MPs in line. Cronus, the spider he keeps on his Commons desk in Bond villain fashion, is to be joined by a second  as yet unnamed  tarantula in time for this weeks crunch votes. Dog hopes the arachnids do not fall out over Brexit

With Theresa May at the mercy of the hung Parliament, the Tories tarantula-keeping Chief Whip, Gavin Williamson, has decided to crank up the menace levels to keep his MPs in line

Brussels-bashing Tory grandee Sir Bill Cash, 77, insists the big wooden stick he twirled on the backbenches during the EU Withdrawal Bill debate was not for attacking pro-Remain Conservatives. My wife Biddy bought it to help me keep upright after my hip replacement, he says.

Dogs revelation last week that Jeremy Corbyn had promoted privileged Georgie Robertson  daughter of author Kathy Lette and rich human-rights barrister Geoffrey Robertson  ruffled feathers at Labour HQ. A horny-handed party official lost his rag during a meeting, saying: Why is Georgie here? What does she do? This is ridiculous.

Yvettes long war with the Moggster

Labours Yvette Cooper was quick to put the boot into Jacob Rees-Mogg after he caused a storm by saying he disagreed with abortion, even in cases of rape. The two have history, first crossing swords at Oxford in the 1980s when the Moggster thwarted Yvettes attempt to ban public school-style student garb. Already fogeyish at just 19, JRM riposted that undergrads should wear a full morning suit and mortarboard at all times.

Labours Yvette Cooper was quick to put the boot into Jacob Rees-Mogg after he caused a storm by saying he disagreed with abortion, even in cases of rape

Eurocrat Jean-Claude Juncker suggests David Davis is unstable. But what about Daviss zealous Brexit Minister sidekick Steve Baker? When this newspaper interviewed him not long ago, St Steve nearly burst into tears when asked about his passion for leaving the EU.

Daviss no one said it would be easy warning about the EU talks prompted one Remainer to suggest science graduate DDs pop anthem must be Coldplays The Scientist. It includes the refrain nobody said it would be easy and continues: Its such a shame for us to part oh take me back to the start I was just guessing at numbers and figures, pulling the puzzles apart.

Jezzas Labour pains

Jeremy Corbyn may have to roll out the red carpet for Nigel Farage at Labours seaside conference. Nige is applying for a pass to host his radio show from the Brighton rally. He also hopes to crash the Tory get-together in Manchester.

Few Tories have more contempt for Brussels than Essex boy Bernard Jenkin. But today he will perform the EU anthem, Beethovens Ode To Joy, in public. The ex-Cambridge chorister sings in a concert at Lavenham Church, Suffolk.
Tiffany Trump only returned to college matter of weeks ago in order to start her law school studies, yet she still found the time to take a night off from the books and attend New York Fashion Week.

The 23-year-old sat front row at two shows on Saturday, kicking off her day of sartorial fun at the show for Shanghai-based label Taoray Wang, before moving on to some late-night entertainment in the form of Philipp Plein's show-turned-music concert.

The first daughter's day of fashion fun comes just months after her last visit to NYFW ended in controversy when it was reported that her front row presence at Philipp's show caused some fashion editors to move seats so as to avoid sitting next to her.

Style star: Tiffany Trump attended two shows at New York Fashion Week on Saturday, starting off at Taoray Wang

VIP: The 23-year-old sat front row at the show, to which she wore a black strapless Taoray Wang dress with a white ribbon belt at the waist

Fashion favorite: Tiffany added a pair of Christian Louboutin shoes to her ensemble, and wore her blonde hair down in a straight style around her shoulders

An evening on the town: The fashion show must have been a fun break for Tiffany, who has just started studying at Georgetown Law School

Friends: Tiffany attended the show alongside her friends, controversial socialite Peter Brandt Jr. (left) and designer Andrew Warren (right)

That rather dramatic turn of events certainly didn't stop Tiffany's favorite designers from inviting her to attend their shows this season; indeed, this is the second season in a row that the first daughter has had a front row seat both at Taoray Wang and Philipp Plein's events.

Looking resplendent in a Taoray Wang black strapless frock and white sash, which actually featured on the runway, Tiffany smiled sweetly for the cameras as she took her seat next to her close friends, controversial socialite Peter Brandt Jr. and designer Andrew Warren.

Tiffany is arguably the label's most famous US-based customer, as it seeks to make increasing inroads into the US market and has been a firm supporter of the label for a while now; she even wore a Taoray Wang outfit to her father's inauguration in January.

In fact - far from wanting to distance herself from the Trump administration, as some other brands have done - the label's Chinese designer Wang Tao actually joked about wishing her New York store had opened last season, so positive was the impact of Tiffany's front row attendance at her fall/winter collection last February.

Missing something? While her friends kept their mirrored sunglasses on throughout the show, Tiffany opted to go without the accessory

Fascinated: Throughout the show Tiffany made sure to get the best view of each of the looks

Spotted something you like? Tiffany looked thrilled to be attending the show

Pals: The first daughter has long supported the Chinese brand's designer Wang Tao and often attends her fashion week shows

'I think that really attracted lots of attention for the brand,' Wang told AFP. 'In a very good way.

'I like the woman who's independent, confident and not afraid to speak for [herself],' added Wang, who designs for the powerful, professional and modern woman - leaders in government, business, finance and law.

'Tiffany is one of my customers too.'

On the third day of fashion week, Wang fused East and West, sending down the runway a spring/summer 2018 collection that stayed true to her DNA of sharp, wearable suiting, but given a Baroque flare.

Inspired by a concert of music by 17th century composers Handel and Purcell at the Shanghai Symphony Hall, performed by a 'very fashionable' group of young Chinese musicians, Wang added Baroque flourishes to her trademark modern, minimalist, clean lines.

Twinning! The same black strapless asymmetrical Taoray Wang dress that Tiffany wore also featured in the runway show (left)

Fashionable foundation: Wang's spring/summer 2018 collection stayed true to her DNA of sharp, wearable suiting, but was given a Baroque flare

Details: Wang added stiff silk ruffle-style belts - think Baroque ruffle at the neck reimagined as a belt - and ruffle-style pleats on the shoulder

She added stiff silk ruffle-style belts - think Baroque ruffle at the neck reimagined as a belt - and ruffle-style pleats on the shoulder.

'Normally I wouldn't really be brave enough to try all this decoration but I'm quite happy with it,' she said.

Following the Taoray Wang show, Tiffany wasted no time in moving onto another of her NYFW favorites, Philipp Plein, ensuring - of course - that she had time for a quick outfit change in between.

Having put on a rather demure display at Wang's catwalk event, Tiffany opted for something slightly more edgy and daring for her second show of the day, wearing a black Philipp Plein dress, with dazzling black and silver heels, and putting her long blonde hair up in an intricate up-do.

The design featured several cut-outs on the arms, as well as some sheer panels on the front near the hemline, and Tiffany accessorized the rather daring ensemble with a choker necklace, earrings and a simple black clutch.

Up next! Later in the day, Tiffany moved on to the Philipp Plein show, another one of her New York Fashion Week favorites

Friends in fashion: She was again accompanied by her designer pal Andrew, although Peter seemed to have skipped this show

Dressed: Tiffany wore a black dress by the show's designer that featured several fun cut-outs at the arms, and also had Philipp's name printed along the hem

Another show, another outfit! She also added a different pair of shoes, this time opting for some dazzling heels, and put her hair into an up-do

Spotted! Fashion editor Rachel Tashjian tweeted this image of Tiffany enjoying a performance by Future at the show, which took place at Hammerstein Ballroom

And just like Taoray Wang's designer, it seems Philipp Plein has no reservations about openly supporting Tiffany as an ambassador of his brand, offering her a design that bore his name in glitter across the front.

Tiffany's glamorous ensemble was fitting given the concept of the show - which was more of a musical gig-turned-party than a simple catwalk event.

Guests at the fashion week show were treated to musical performances from rapper future and Nicki Minaj, as well as an energetic runway appearance from Kanye West muse Teyana Taylor who close the show with aplomb, writhing down the runway in a leotard, and even flashing a nipple pasty in the process.

Both Tiffany and Philipp will no doubt be pleased that her appearance at this season's show seems to have been much less dramatic than February's event, when it was reported that several fashion editors moved seats in order to avoid sitting next to the first daughter.

At the time, several writers claimed that Tiffany's appearance wreaked havoc on the seating assignments because no fashion editors wanted to sit next to her.

Strutting her stuff: It was a late night for Tiffany, who was escorted out of the show by secret service agents

Ready for bed? The first daughter looked a bit tired as she climbed into a waiting SUV, after leaving the show, which didn't start until after 10pm

Awkward: Last season it was reported that fashion editors switched seats at the Philipp Plein show in order to avoid sitting next to Tiffany

Controversy: Fashionista.com editor-in-chief Alyssa Vingan Klein tweeted that her presence at the show caused a fair amount of drama

Late start: Elle.com editor Nikki Ogunnaike added that the show also started an hour late, giving editors time to move away from their seats

Alyssa Vingan Klein, the editor-in-chief of Fashionista.com, wrote on Twitter that seating was a mess because Tiffany was essentially being shunned.

'Seating s***show at Philipp Plein because no editors want to sit near Tiffany Trump. SHOCKER,' she wrote.

'Tiffany Trump had a front row seat as well, which led several editors to request to be moved and, in a couple of cases, leave altogether,' Alyssa added in her write-up of the show.

Nikki Ogunnaike, a senior fashion editor at Elle.com, responded to Alyssa's tweet by revealing that she and her colleagues had moved seats.

'We moved and are down the hall. Come thru,' she wrote.

Statement: While Tiffany's ensemble was certainly more daring than her earlier look, it paled in comparison to the bondage-style outfits being showcased on the runway

Superstar: Adriana Lima appeared in the show wearing an over-sized T-shirt and a leather cage-style skirt

Something for everyone: The collection was full of urban-inspired designs, but also had a feeling of fun and whimsy thanks to sweet details like cartoon embellishments and frilly socks

Locked up: The caged skirts and bondage-style leather harnesses were one of the key features in the show

'Phillip Plein at 10PM: 1 hour late start, editors fleeing just so they don't have to sit behind Tiffany Trump,' Nikki tweeted a few minutes later.

Pictures from the show see Tiffany sandwiched between her friend Andrew and another blonde attendee, but former Wall Street Journal fashion columnist Christina Binkley shared photos of the empty seat next to her earlier in the night

'Nobody wants to sit next to Tiffany Trump at Philipp Plein, so they moved and the seats by her are empty,' she wrote.

Christina took a photo of the available seats next to Tiffany, adding: 'Empty seats next to Tiffany Trump.'

However a source who witnessed the incident insisted that the empty seats next to Tiffany were actually reserved for the fashion label's CEO's family - and were only made empty when editors who had accidentally sat in them were asked to move.

Stealing the spotlight: Kanye West muse Teyana Taylor closed the show, strutting her stuff and dancing down the runway in a risque bodysuit

Floored: At one point, the dancer and model dropped to the floor and began writhing around on the runway

Something saucy: Dita Von Teese also performed at the star-studded show

Closing it out: Future and Nicki Minaj entertained guests with an energetic musical performance on stage at the Hammerstein Ballroom

The seats next to Tiffany had been reserved for the CEOs family but were occupied by several fashion editors,' the source explained.

'The picture was taken in between the editors getting up to move and the family sitting down.

It was later reported that Tiffany had also spent much of the evening avoiding fellow guest Madonna, after the singer made several harsh comments about her father's presidency.

The New York Post claimed at the time that Tiffany was very concerned about avoiding Madonna who recently said she 'thought an awful lot about blowing up the White House' during her speech against the president at the Women's March in Washington, D.C.

The iconic singer ended up arriving over an hour late to the show, and she was seated across the room from Tiffany.
Social media has become more than just a way to share your daily adventures with friends and family - for many it can become their career.

And while it is hard to stand out in an online space of bikini snaps and brunch uploads one Sydney woman may have cracked the market wide open.

She just had to move countries to do it.

Scroll down for video

Amy Lyons, 24, was a Manly Sea Eagles cheerleader and uni student with a penchant for Mandarin when she entered the Chinese Language Competition in 2015 and started a Weibo account

'I just thought 'It's a little show, [don't] take it too seriously' ... I still have people recognising me from that show,' she told Triple J breakfast radio

Amy Lyons, 24, was a Manly Sea Eagles cheerleader and uni student with a penchant for Mandarin when she entered the Chinese Language Competition in 2015 and started a Weibo account.

The show, which is broadcast to more than 300 million people, cemented her status as a social media celebrity and she's been regularly uploading photos and well-crafted videos to the Facebook equivalent ever since.

'I just thought 'It's a little show, [don't] take it too seriously' ... I still have people recognising me from that show,' she told Triple J breakfast radio.

She ended up finishing in the top 30 on the show - much to her surprise.

She ended up finishing in the top 30 on the show - much to her surprise

With 65,000 followers and counting on Weibo the former Sydneysider now attracts lucrative marketing campaigns with companies like Westpac and Tencent

With 65,000 followers and counting on Weibo the former Sydneysider now attracts lucrative marketing campaigns with companies like Westpac and Tencent.

Tencent, one of the biggest gaming and eCommerce businesses in China, is also owned by the richest man in the country Ma Huateng aka Pony Ma who is worth $36.3 billion.

And while those marketing ventures help her earn a small fortune one of her most revered videos is actually about her 'chopstick legs' which has been watched over three million times.

'Chinese people love the idea of having very skinny legs, so I took chopsticks and exercise and put it all together in this fun little package that was received very well because of its quirky content,' Ms Lyons told the ABC's Lateline

In the two-minute exercise video Miss Lyons shimmies and shakes to Beyonce's Crazy In Love and teaches Chinese women how to get slimmer legs and a toned backside.

'Chinese people love the idea of having very skinny legs, so I took chopsticks and exercise and put it all together in this fun little package that was received very well because of its quirky content,' Ms Lyons told the ABC's Lateline.

It's an easy to follow routine and coupled with her infectious smile makes for a well-earned viral hit.

In the two minute exercise video Miss Lyons shimmys and shakes to Beyonce's Crazy In Love and teaches Chinese women how to get slimmer legs and a toned backside

But she didn't fall into this social media influencer role, known as a Wang Hong in China, by accident

But she didn't fall into this social media influencer role, known as a Wang Hong in China, by accident.

'I love performing, I love public speaking, I love interacting with Chinese people, I love Chinese culture, I love exercise, I love travel,' she told the Gold Coast Bulletin.

'I thought if I could become a Wang Hong, I could use all my passions, skills and talents and make that my career.'

She bides her time by travelling between Sydney and Shanghai, admitting 'this is still just the beginning for me.'

'I have high goals when it comes to my followings,' she said.
Animal-loving couples across Australia are going to great lengths to include their beloved pets on their wedding day.

Whether it's forking out up to $1,000 for training and a special minder on the day or purchasing couture tuxedos and mini tiaras, some couples are pulling out all the stops to ensure their pet feels as loved as they do on the big day.

Gillian Aptroot, 33, the founder of First Class Pet Wedding Assistants in Queensland, is hard at work behind the scenes to make sure her clients' and their fur babies have the perfect day.

Animal-loving couples across Australia are going to great lengths to include their beloved pets on their wedding day

And Gillian Aptroot (pictured), 33, the founder of First Class Pet Wedding Assistants in Queensland, is hard at work behind the scenes to make sure her clients' and their fur babies have the perfect day

Since starting the business, which sees her team do everything from transporting pets to and from the wedding to arranging hydrobath appointments, Gillian has been sharing snaps of the happy couples and their pets online

Since starting the business, which sees her team do everything from transporting pets to and from the wedding to arranging hydrobath appointments, Gillian has been sharing snaps of the happy couples and their pets online.

One couple, Kylie and Dan, posed with their tuxedo-clad chocolate Labrador Travis on their big day, who served as both the page boy and ring bearer.

The dashing dog donned a black and white bow tie, faux rings, a ring pouch and cuffs and took centre stage in a number of the couple's stunning wedding snaps.

One couple, Kylie and Dan, posed with their tuxedo-clad chocolate Labrador Travis on their big day, who served as both the page boy and ring bearer

The dashing dog donned a black and white bow tie, faux rings, a ring pouch and cuffs and took centre stage in a number of the couple's stunning wedding snaps

Another pair, Kat & Darren, posed alongside their dachshund Poppy who rocked a flower crown and special 'Just Married' plaque for the occasion

Another pair, Kat & Darren, posed alongside their dachshund Poppy who rocked a flower crown and special 'Just Married' plaque for the occasion.

Others included their dog in the official marriage certificate snap while some stylish brides made sure to colour coordinate their bouquet with their pups' outfit.

The adorable photos are the result of hard work behind the scenes, which sees hired staff taking care to provide resting mats for the dogs' paws so they don't dirty the dress, provide water and snacks and even take photos from the pets' perspective throughout the day.

In many cases, the pets are also transported to and from the venue on a luxury pet mattress.

Others included their dog in the official marriage certificate snap while some stylish brides made sure to colour coordinate their bouquet with their pups' outfit

The adorable photos are the result of hard work behind the scenes, which sees hired staff taking care to provide resting mats for the dogs' paws so they don't dirty the dress

In many cases, the pets are also transported to and from the venue on a luxury pet mattress

An array of adorable couture outfits and accessories for pets including tuxedos, bowties, handmade flower collars, flower girl dresses, ring pillows, faux rings, ring pockets and 'Just Married' plaques are also supplied if required.

The increasingly in-demand service costs $50 per hour for rehearsals, preparation and training and on the wedding day, costs between $300 and $1,000 depending on the dog.

Speaking to FEMAIL previously, Ms Aptroot said she started the business to 'achieve her dream of working with animals full time'.

An array of adorable couture outfits and accessories for pets including tuxedos, bowties, handmade flower collars, flower girl dresses, ring pillows, faux rings, ring pockets and 'Just Married' plaques are also supplied if required

Louis was on his best behaviour by the flower girl as he watched his 'pawrents' Darren and Jenna tie the knot

The increasingly in-demand service costs $50 per hour for rehearsals, preparation and training and on the wedding day, costs between $300 and $1,000 depending on the dog

Speaking about her most elaborate client, Ms Aptroot said the day started with an hour long walk for the lucky pup ahead of the wedding.

'We then headed off to the groomer for the royal treatment then back to the house to get into our couture wedding attire and took pre-wedding photos before safely transporting the furbabies to the ceremony,' she said.

'I arrived early and allowed the furbabies to become familiar with the environment, smells and sounds and then the furbabies walked down the red carpet as the ring bearers.

'After we travelled to various photo locations for photos we then safely returned home for dinner and a tuck into bed. I then stayed in the clients home for four nights to care for them while their parents were on their honeymoon. This service cost the clients just over $1000.'

Speaking to FEMAIL previously, Ms Aptroot said she started the business to 'achieve her dream of working with animals full time'

Speaking about her most elaborate client, Ms Aptroot said the day started with an hour long walk for the lucky pup ahead of the wedding

'We then headed off to the groomer for the royal treatment then back to the house to get into our couture wedding attire and took pre-wedding photos before safely transporting the furbabies to the ceremony,' she said

'I am hoping the future will allow for many flower-doggies and page-doggies. Having your furbaby involved is just like having a family member attend your wedding, it's a must,' she said

While it may not be for everyone, Ms Aptroot says the service is growing.

'I have been working hard at gaining exposure and increasing awareness. Many brides-to-be and grooms-to-be do not know this service even exists,' she said.

'I am hoping the future will allow for many flower-doggies and page-doggies. Having your furbaby involved is just like having a family member attend your wedding, it's a must.

'I treat my client's furbabies as if they are my own. Knowing that all the needs of their furbabies are catered for, takes away any stress the bride and groom may have once had.'
She was said to have been left 'devastated' following their breakup in March 2016, however, it seems that their are no hard feelings between Sarah Ferguson and Manuel Fernandez.

The former couple were pictured attending the 2017 Celebrity Fight Night on Friday where they appeared to be getting along famously.

The Duchess of York, 57, dazzled in a floor-length navy sequin gown as she arrived at the event benefiting the Andrea Bocelli Foundation on Friday.

Despite their reported split last year it seems that there are no hard feelings between the Duchess of York and Manuel Fernandez who attended a charity event together in Rome

Accompanying her was her former toyboy Manuel Fernandez, 51, who looked suave in a tuxedo complete with dickie bow.

The pair posed for photos upon entry before making their way into the charity event where they joined other famous faces.

Sarah, known affectionately as Fergie, could be seen rubbing shoulders with Italian actor Antonio Banderas and his girlfriend Nicole Kimpel.

The pair were spotted alongside Antonio Banderas (pictured with girlfriend Nicole Kimpel) at the 2017 Celebrity Fight Night on Friday

Fergie stunned in a floor-length blue sequin gown while Manuel looked dapper in a tuxedo

The ex-wife of Prince Andrew has been in Rome for several days where she has been spotted at several glittering events.

However, Manuel has been absent up until Friday night but looked pleased to be joining the mother-of-two in the Italian city.

Sarah and Manuel reportedly split in March 2016 after the internet entrepreneur ended it with the Duchess.

The mother of Princesses Eugenie and Beatrice was reported to have been dating the half-Irish half-Spanish businessman since being introduced by a mutual friend in early 2014 and, despite the eight-year age gap, insiders say she was 'besotted' with him.

The pair posed for photos as they arrived at the event benefiting the Andrea Bocelli Foundation

Despite their apparent break-up the pair appear to have remained friends having been spotted at several events together in the past year.

The Duchess lived at Royal Lodge in Windsor with her former husband, Prince Andrew, but finally moved out of the home in August 2015 - nearly 20 years after their divorce.

Manuel, meanwhile, has devoted his life to campaigning against domestic violence following the brutal murder of his 50-year-old sister Maria Stubbings in 2008.

The businessman is the co-founder of a lifestyle internet venture called vVoosh, which channels 10 per cent of its profits through a charitable foundation supporting causes including the Duchesss Children in Crisis charity.
Photo taken on Sept. 9, 2017 shows a Chinese Railway Express cargo train leaving for Duisburg, Germany, at Shenyang East Railway Station in Shenyang, capital of northeast China's Liaoning Province. The railway line for container trains from Shenyang to Duisburg was opened up on Saturday. (Xinhua/Li Gang)

SHENYANG, Sept. 9 -- A freight train chugged out of a railway station in Shenyang in northeast China's Liaoning province on Saturday, heading for Duisburg, Germany.

It marked the start of a new freight train route stretching more than 9,300 kilometers.

The train will pass through Mongolia, Russiaand Poland. A single journey takes 17 days, about half the time for traditional sea voyage.

Two trains will depart both Shenyang and Duisburg each week at the beginning, and later increase to five.

The train's cargo includes industrial products from Shenyang, as well as commodities from Japanand South Korea.

The service is aimed at boosting trade between the economic hub of Shenyang in northeast China and Europe.

As of May 13 this year, when the 1,000th Sino-European freight train left China, the country had 51 Sino-European freight train routes, with trains from 28 Chinese cities travelling to 29 cities in 11 European countries.
A controversial new book aims to unveil the sexual desires of Islamic women who have a 'thirst' to speak out about their sexuality.

The tome is the work of Morrocan novelist Leila Slimani, 35, who hopes to lift the lid on the sex 'obsessed' society.

Leila lives in France, a secular state, but grew up in Rabat in the heart of the deeply religious Morocco.

Morrocan novelist Leila Slimani has published a new non-fiction book, Sex and Lies where she unveils the sexual desires of Arab women

Drawing on her experience of Islam as well as the stories of other Arab women the novelist has written her new book Sex and Lies where she claims that 'millions' of Arabs are living in 'sexual misery'.

The book, which is accompanied by a graphic novel exploring an Arab woman's sexual awakening, explores her native country's ban on abortion, homosexuality and sex before marriage.

She claims that the repression of sexuality has caused women to reach such lengths as to bribe policeman after having abortions and even having reconstruction surgery on their vaginas in order to convince husbands they still have their virginity.

Her latest book gives a candid account of Arab women's approach to sex based on the accounts that Leila heard - though she says that it was not an easy topic to tease out.

Speaking to the Sunday Times the author says: 'It's very difficult, of course. Sex is a primordial taboo.

Leila says that there was no short supply of women who wanted to speak out about their own experiences of sexual repression

'You mustn't talk about it, discuss it. Sexuality is something that's either authorised or forbidden, with nothing between the two.'

However, despite the taboo nature of the subject Leila said that there was no shortage of women who were desperate to share their experiences.

She added: 'women had a great wish to speak, a thirst for words and a yearning to confide in someone'.

Leila was the 12th woman to be awarded the Prix Goncourt, France's most prestigious literary prize, in 113 years for her novel 'Chanson Douce'.

She has remained vocal about what she calls Morocco's 'medieval laws' particularly regarding sexuality.

In November last year she urged fellow Moroccans to rebel against the laws which weigh them down as she jumped to the defence of two teenage girls who were arrested after being caught kissing.

Leila Slimani lambasted her homeland's human rights record, and in particular the way women are treated.

Slimani, who raised eyebrows at home with her debut novel last year about a female nymphomaniac, said the oppression that women suffered had nothing to do with religion.

'Lots of imams and enlightened theologians will explain that to you... It is a question of human rights, sexual rights, the right to dignity and in particular the dignity of women's bodies' she said in November.

Slimani said a woman should not just be regarded as 'a mother, nor a sister, nor a wife, but as a woman, an individual with their own rights.'
Jenny Mollen is proving herself to be one professional mommy blogger as she documents her pregnancy on Instagram.

The actress, who is married to fellow star Jason Biggs, is currently expecting her second child and has shared everything from nude baby-bump photos to videos of herself suffering from morning sickness with her followers.

But in her latest Instagram story she took a more serious turn, admitting that she may be experiencing prenatal depression.

Getting real: Actress Jenny Bollen, 38, has opened up about the depression she is experiencing during her pregnancy

Putting it out there: She explained that the topic is something that people need to talk about more

Tough cookie: She also revealed that she experienced the depression in her first pregnancy

'I could already be in a depression; Im sorry, but its true,' she said in the recent video, reported by Yahoo. 'I think that its chemical. I think that people dont talk about it enough, so I guess Im preparing myself now.'

She also posted a black and white mirror selfie directing people to the story, writing in the caption: 'Prepartum Depression... it's what often happens to expectant moms who are awake in the world.'

In her story, she explains that she was in bed with a cold and was expecting to be feeling low after experiencing something similar during her previous pregnancy.

'I just want you to know whatever youre feeling right now, like, if youre waking up in the middle of the night with night terrors or dreaming about your dead dog or picturing your house on fire, that youre not alone,' she said. 'Its very normal.'

Lounging: Jenny added to followers that may have the same feelings that they are 'not alone'

Bumpin' along! She took to Instagram last month to share a before and after pic of her changing figure

#numbertwo': In April, the star and husband Jason announced they were expecting their second child

According to the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, around 14 to 23 per cent of women could experience depression during their pregnancy, caused by hormonal changes.

Jenny revealed recently that she also has placenta previa. According to The Mayo Clinic , the condition 'occurs when a baby's placenta partially or totally covers the mother's cervix; the outlet for the uterus.' It can also 'cause severe bleeding during pregnancy and delivery.

'Youll be shocked how fast you can just wake up one day and be in the darkest place and think, "Whats wrong with me? Im a new mom. I should be so happy. Everybody else is telling me how lucky and happy and amazing things are,"' she said. 'Dont buy into that s***. If you feel bad, please get help.'

Big brother: The couple of nearly 10 years are parents to son Sid, three

'I expected to have to be cut open again': In June, Jenny revealed she has placenta previa

Jenny has been regularly sharing the progress of her pregnancy on Instagram, even sharing comparison photos to show her changing figure.

Last month she posted a pair of images in matching underwear, with the mom looking to be make-up free with tousled hair.

'Can I just keep the boobs?' questioned the actress in the photo's caption.

In April, the star and husband Jason announced they were expecting their second child. They welcomed son Sid, three, in February 2014.

The couple, married since spring 2008, took to Instagram to break the news.

'This is how I told my son babies are made,' she wrote, followed by an appropriate hashtag. '#numbertwo.'
One in four hospital trusts are failing to give lifesaving sepsis drugs to half of patients in time, despite the latest NHS guidelines.

Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt said patients were still dying needlessly, but insisted the NHS had made 'significant progress'.

Fresh guidelines were recently introduced to help diagnose the killer condition, which is notoriously difficult to spot until it has spread throughout the body.

Under revised NHS rules, anyone showing signs of the illness should be assessed and treated within 60 minutes of arriving at hospital.

Yet NHS England figures, revealed on BBC's Panorama tonight, show that 24 out of 104 acute hospital trusts failed to administer intravenous antibiotics within an hour to half the patients considered to need the treatment.

Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt (pictured) admitted patients are 'still dying needlessly' from the disease, which is notoriously difficult to spot until it spreads throughout the body

The statistics also showed that 14 of the trusts failed to spot signs of suspected sepsis in half of patients.

Mr Hunt told the programme: 'I wouldn't pretend that we get this right everywhere.

'We're on a journey, we definitely need to do a lot better but I think we have made significant progress.

'There are preventable deaths happening but we're bringing them down.'

The figures, which date back to 2015, showed ten hospital trusts identified every suspected sepsis case, while six out of ten patients needing antibiotics were getting them within the first hour.

The Daily Mail launched a major End the Sepsis Scandal campaign last year to raise awareness of the devastating illness, which kills 44,000 in Britain every year.

It came after one-year-old William Mead died in December 2014 following a series of errors by doctors and staff.

Known as the 'silent killer', sepsis is the leading cause of avoidable death in the UK.

Figures revealed on BBC's Panorama programme show that 24 out of 104 acute NHS trusts failed to give patients life-saving sepsis drugs within an hour. Picture posed by model

It develops when an infection such as blood poisoning sparks a violent immune response in which the body attacks its own organs.

If it is caught early enough, antibiotics can control the infection before the body's immune response goes into overdrive.

Indicators in adults and older children include a high or low body temperature, chills and shivering, a fast heartbeat, and rapid breathing.

Parents of children under five should take them to A&E or call 999 immediately if their skin looks bluish or pale or if they are difficult to wake.

BBC reporter Alistair Jackson investigated the issue for Panorama after his mother Margaret showed signs of sepsis before her death three years ago.

Experts told the programme her chances of survival could have been improved if it had been spotted earlier and antibiotics administered.

The show also tells the story of Tom Ray, who has struggled to get any answers since he had all of his limbs and half of his face removed after falling victim to sepsis 17 years ago.

He said: 'With every minute that the sepsis went undiagnosed I was deeper into that likelihood of ending up with all four amputations'.

Panorama will be shown tonight at 8.30pm, BBC1
British businesses have coped remarkably well since last summers Brexit vote but it seems the stagnant economy is finally starting to catch up with some of them.

Scottish commercial interiors group Havelock Europa was one of those painting a grim picture this week after it told investors that full-year results will fall 'considerably below expectations'.

The firm blamed delays to key projects and lower-than-anticipated orders from the public sector for the gloomy outlook.

Fallout: British businesses have coped remarkably well since last summers Brexit vote but it seems the stagnant economy is finally starting to catch up with some of them

Havelock had already warned investors about the challenges ahead earlier in the year, after a period of 'reduced activity' was followed soon after by the loss of a major customer, thought to be Lloyds Bank.

Investors werent ignoring the latest warning though, with shares in the microcap losing half of their value to trade at 5.64p.

Also at the bottom of the pack this week was Safestyle UK, whose PVC windows are struggling to keep out biting trading headwinds.

Like Havelock, the windows and door retailer has already lowered its expectations once this year but was forced to do so again on Friday with installations and revenues both falling off sharply in recent weeks.

Safestyle had expected to broadly match the 19.3million pre-tax profit it posted in 2016 but said 'increasing consumer caution' and higher costs incurred whilst trying to boost order numbers would have a 'material impact on full-year profits'. Shares dropped by 30 per cent to 166.3p.

Fulham Shore also left investors with a sour taste in their mouths after the Franco Manca pizza chain owner became the latest restaurants group to warn on the industrys outlook.

Sour: Fulham Shore left investors with a sour taste in their mouths this week

Wildwood owner Tasty and Frankie & Bennys parent Restaurant Group have flagged tougher conditions in recent weeks, and Fulham Shore echoed those comments as it reported a slowdown in sales during July and August that will impact full-year earnings.

Weak trading in the key summer period  which is usually the time of year when people eat out more frequently  is never a good sign and the market reacted swiftly, with shares changing hands for 14.5p by the end of the week  a 23.5 per cent fall.

Unlike some of its peers though, Fulham Shore has decided to fight fire with fire and is sticking with its current expansion plans which should see the The Real Greek restaurant owner open another 15 sites over the coming six months or so.

It was far from a total bloodbath out on the junior market his week, but its had better. The AIM All Share ended the week 0.34 per cent, or 3.4 points, in the red at 1,012.20.

That was enough to get one over on the blue chips though, with the FTSE 100 falling 0.7 per cent, or 54.6 points, across the week to 7,383.9.

One of those keeping the junior market from falling too far was Empyrean Energy which has enjoyed a wave of positive news flow over the past few days.

On Thursday the explorer revealed that results from a seismic programme at its Jade and Topaz prospects offshore China had exceeded expectations - the three prospects were estimated to have the potential for almost 600million barrels of crude.

Then, on Friday, Empyrean told the market that drilling at its Dempsey 1-15 exploration well in the Sacramento basin in California is going to plan, with additional new reports of significant gas shows.

The bullish updates sent Empryean shares almost 50 per cent higher this week to trade at 17.5p.

Respiratory drug developer Synairgen was in investors good books as well after it reported significant industry interest in its new lung disease treatment ahead of the start of clinical trials.

The company confirmed it is to start a phase I safety trial of the new treatment for sufferers of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis later this year after completing pre-clinical studies.

On the lookout: Respiratory drug developer Synairgen was in investors good books after it reported significant industry interest in its new lung disease treatment

It hopes to have the results from the trial available next summer after which it will look to find a partner to license the drug, which is called PXS-5382A. Catchy. Anyway, the news sent the share price rising by 20 per cent to 10.5p.

Back office workforce optimisation specialist EG Solutions gets the final mention this week after it agreed to be taken over by US data analytics giant Verint Systems on Tuesday in a deal worth 26.3million.

The offer works out at 112.5p a share; a 53 per cent premium to the average price of 73.5p over the past six months but 11 per cent below Mondays close of 126.5p.

EG  which was founded by current CEO Elizabeth Gooch almost 30 years ago  said it had decided to recommend the offer as it was an 'attractive exit price', adding that it believes there have only been a handful of trades at or above 112.5p in the last decade.

Assuming the deal gets the go-ahead from investors  which looks very likely  the AIM market will be waving goodbye to the company in November.
Kwarteng now says that he advised Liz Truss to 'slow down' and take a 'methodical and strategic approach' to boosting growth as Prime Minister. He claims reservations about unfunded tax cuts in the mini-Budget as there were no plans to bear down on public spending. It was Truss, he claimed, who decided that things should be done fast. All of this looks rum. By tradition, it is the Chancellor who draws up the Budget and often the PM - as was the case with Tony Blair and Gordon Brown - has little opportunity for input.
Dr Nikki Stamp is in an elite group of people.

She is one of only 11 female heart surgeons in Australia. But there's far more to Dr Stamp than that to make her stand out from the crowd.

Aside from her array of colourful surgical caps that she wears to brighten her patients' days, its her grit and determination that has defined her as a doctor.

'I like to see myself as a resilient person', Dr Stamp told Daily Mail Australia.

It's a trait well needed in her profession, with punishing days beginning at 7am and finishing anywhere between 10 and 18 hours later, with most of the time spent in the operating theatre.

Dr Nikki Stamp (pictured) is one of only 11 female heart surgeons in Australia but there's far more to her that makes her stand out from the crowd

The Perth-based doctor has now taken up an offer from ABC to film an episode of their long-running show Catalyst which will document the complex world of heart surgery

'I wake up at 5am - its in my genes, then I have to check on all our patients and make sure they're fine before anything begins,'she said.

Her promise was evident early on when at the tender age of eight she was told she was reading anatomy books too advanced for her age.

'I saw Dr Victor Chang's work in a book and it caught my eye. I even wrote in my school diary that I wanted to be a heart surgeon', she laughed.

But teachers told her as a girl she would never become a doctor, and she took it to heart, opting out of 'difficult' subjects such as the sciences and maths.

'I never thought I had the aptitude to pursue a career as a doctor, I had decided on something in music instead.'

Two decades later, and after six gruelling years training to be a specialist after university, Dr Stamp is now one of Australia's leading cardiothoracic surgeons.

Despite being told by teachers at school she would never become a doctor, she is now celebrating twelve years as one, and has become one of the country's leading heart surgeons

Her line of work requires a certain level of grit and determination, as surgeons can spend anywhere between 10 and 18 hours inside the the operating theatre daily

'I didnt believe I could do it and I've proven to myself that it was possible.'

She is currently working at Fiona Stanley Hospital, after returning to her hometown of Perth last year from Sydney, where she forged a distinguished career at St Vincent's Hospital and Westmead Children's Hospital.

'I'm lucky because I've had such a broad range of cardiac experiences, dealing with a range of surgeries including replacements and children.'

She said her education has helped her deal with the huge pressures that come with the work that can involve life-or-death decisions.

'We're lucky here in Australia that we are so well trained and are left in an excellent condition after such strong training to deal with any difficult or unique situations.'

She also pays homage to the dedicated team working effortlessly with her on a daily basis.

'Right from the moment the patient sits down, the team contribution is absolutely enormous. Everyone has to bring it to the table  we're all in this together.'

But her career hasn't been full of good fortune throughout, as the strong advocate of gender equality points out the struggles of female doctors coming through in a male-dominated field.

'Over the years I've witnessed gender inequality, it's affected myself and others in a less fortunate way, but I've also seen it help others,' she revealed.

'Its not something needed in any workplace and it's something that should be eradicated, regardless of whether its gender or race.'

She currently works at Fiona Stanley Hospital after returning home to Perth last year after forging a distinguished career at Sydney's St Vincent's and Westmead Children's Hospital

'Right from the moment the patient sits down the team contribution is absolutely enormous. Everyone has to bring it to the table  we're all in this together'

She now wants to use her position as a leading surgeon to inspire the next batch of women thinking of a career in medicine.

'It's really important to have visible role models. I always wondered why people wanted to hear form me, but they just wanted to see that it's possible.'

'If you can see that someone has done it, it gives you that motivation.'

In the latest step in her career, Dr Stamp has swapped the pressures of the operating room for the bright lights of television.

Following an approach from ABC, she has become the host and focal point of the latest episode of their long-running show Catalyst.

Named Heartbeat: The Miracle Inside You, it's the first time she's appeared in front of the camera.

'Its completely different to anything Ive done before but the long hours of my work put me in good stead for the huge days filming.'

But her career hasn't been full of good fortune throughout, as the strong advocate of gender equality points out the struggles of female doctors coming through in a male-dominated field

She now wants to use her position as a leading surgeon to inspire the next batch of women thinking of a career in medicine, as well as eradicating gender inequality

The show delves into the complex world of heart surgery and the range of people from all walks of life she faces on a daily basis.

Dr Stamp takes viewers into the ever-changing world of heart surgery and the latest technological developments in the vital work she and her colleagues perform.

'The whole process has been an amazing opportunity but a steep learning curve at the same time.

'It's great being able to get information about the heart out there, educating viewers at home.

'Its something I've always been interested in as the ABC has a rich history of science and research.'

And after her first experience on television was a success, as well as writing for publications such as The Huffington Post, she now hopes she can continue contributing to the media.

'I'd love to continue in whatever way I can, whether it be writing or on TV.'

Heartbeat: The Miracle Inside You will air at 8.30pm on September 12.
Four adults were arrested in connection to the death of two children on a Norwood, Colorado farm.

Frederick Blair, 23, of Norwood, Madani Ceus, 37, of Haiti, Natahan Yah, 50, of Haiti and Ika Eden, 53, of Jamaica, now face charges of suspicion of murder and child abuse.

A fifth suspect, Nashika Bramble, is wanted for second-degree murder, criminally negligent homicide, and felony child abuse causing death, according to News 9 Colorado.

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Four adults were arrested in connection to the death of two girls, aged between five and 10, after their bodies were found on a Colorado farm. Frederick Blair (left) and Madani Ceus (right) were among those taken into custody

Nathan Yeh (left) and Ika Eden (right) were also charged in connection with the deaths of the young girls

San Miguel Sheriff's County deputies confirmed the bodies of the two children, between the ages of and 10, were discovered at the rural southwestern farm early Friday.

Sheriff's spokeswoman Susan Lilly said the group recently moved to the area.

Investigators believe the children were dead for at least two weeks before they were found.

Police are looking for Nashika Bramble, who is wanted on charges of second-degree murder, criminally negligent homicide, and felony child abuse causing death

'In my thirty-seven years as Sheriff, I have never seen anything as cruel and heartless as this,' San Miguel Sheriff Bill Masters told the local news station.

Norwood is located about 30 miles (48.2 kilometers) west of the ski resort town of Telluride.

Anyone with further clues on the matter has been asked to contact the sheriff's department at (970) 728-1911.
The modeling world is often accused of worshiping at the fountain of youth, but at the grand old age of 69, Maye Musk, mother of Elon, is having a moment.

Mother of three and grandmother of 10, the silver-haired siren with luminous skin, who frequently breaks into laughter, is walking tall alongside a bevy of younger models at New York Fashion Week.

If it helps being the mother of the most lauded inventor-entrepreneur of his generation, valued by Forbes at $20 billion, then so does social media and the industry's gradual embrace of more diverse models.

Maye Musk walks the runway for the Concept Korea show during New York Fashion Week on September 8, 2017

Maye Musk gets fitted for the Concept Korea show during New York Fashion Week on September 7, 2017 in New York City

Musk, the mother of tech billionaire Elon, has appeared on numerous billboard advertisements and magazine covers

She is determined to make the most of her moment in the sun. 'Forever -- until they stop calling!' she smiles when asked how long she plans to keep working, her 70th birthday looming next year.

Her's has been an extraordinary life. Musk has modeled since the age of 15 in South Africa where she migrated with her Canadian parents as a child. For decades she has worked as a nutritionist.

She married engineer Errol Musk and the couple had three children. Elon, 46, is the eldest, but all are remarkable. Kimbal, 44, has founded a chain of farm-to-table restaurants and daughter Tosca, 43, is a filmmaker.

She and her husband separated after nine years of marriage, and the period that followed was not always easy. After some years, she left South Africa and returned to Canada when Elon went there to study.

Model Maye Musk walks the runway at the Project Runway fashion show during New York Fashion Week September 8

Maye Musk and Elon Musk attend the 2017 Vanity Fair Oscar Party hosted by Graydon Carter (Pictured February 2017)

She likes to recall the time she had 'three teenagers in a rent-controlled apartment in Toronto,' but today she lives in California close to her children and grandchildren.

'I would color my own hair... and you don't even think of getting out for drinks or dinner with people because you can't afford it,' she tells AFP. But she always worked, she says proudly.

She's appeared on billboards in Times Square in commercials for Virgin America and Target. 'Nobody knew it was me because I did not have a name out,' she says.

Her name. The one she shares with Elon.

So did being the mother of the CEO of Tesla help her career take off?

'Appreciate every last bit'

She signed recently with IMG -- one of the most prestigious modeling agencies in the world -- has chalked up magazine appearances and been cultivated by brands known to favor celebrities, like rag and bone.

Kyeong Ji, who organized a runway show of young Korean designers in which Musk starred Friday, says 'of course it is helpful,' but neither is it the only reason she was booked.

She and Errol Musk (Pictured right) were married for nine years, having three children together

Maye Musk began modeling in South Africa at the age of 15, and later moved to Canada to be close to Elon during his studies

Musk has developed something of a following in South Korea since she graced the cover of Vogue Korea

Maye Musk gets fitted for the Concept Korea show during New York Fashion Week on September 7, 2017 in New York City

'Her beauty is different, very strong and noble. She has such an ostentatious smile, gracious, strong and a transcending beauty and intelligence... she has every single thing!' Ji said.

Musk has developed something of a following in South Korea since she graced the cover of Vogue Korea.

Maye Musk attends the ELLE, E! & IMG Host A Celebration of Personal Style NYFW Kickoff Party at 5 Doyers St on September 6, 2017

When it comes to her eldest son, she doesn't want to talk but she does confirm with a smile, that she drives a Tesla.

And she does recognize that social media, to which she contributes daily on Instagram, 'helps a lot' and that clients like booking a model 'who has a reputation and is well known.'

For more than 50 years, she says work has been steady. As she neared 60, she decided to leave her hair natural.

'I just was tired of coloring,' she explains.

When it comes to her recent success, other factors, she says are an ageing population and the fact that there is 'not much competition' when it comes to models hovering around the septuagenarian stage.

'I appreciate every last bit,' she says. 'All the people really love us,' she says, of how older models are received on the runway.

'I think designers are figuring that out... They just want to show there is diversity and that they appreciate older women and why not? Everybody has a mother and a grandmother.'
Vince Cable reclines on the green leather seat in his Commons office overlooking the Thames and talks about love, sex and marriage.

Somehow the Lib Dem leader, despite or perhaps because of his 74 years, manages to convey the wisdom of Solomon  alongside a mischievous air.

After regaining his Commons seat in June and becoming party leader, energetic Cable has published his debut novel, Open Arms.

The title reflects the two key ingredients of his thriller set in 2019 in post-Brexit Britain  Tory Ministers getting mixed up in a dodgy arms deal in India, with sex scandals thrown in.

The book carries the obligatory any similarities between the characters and real people is entirely accidental disclaimer. Some may take issue with the entirely.

Cable's first wife Olympia (left) was an Indian East African and died in 2001 after contracting cancer. They had overcome opposition to their love on cultural and racial grounds from their respective families. He married Rachel (right) in 2004

The dramatis personae include: a blonde Defence Minister who has a fling with a George Clooney lookalike Indian arms dealer  and voted Remain; a Defence Secretarys sidekick fired for dodgy dealings; a new male PM who is a repressed homosexual with a wife but prefers young men in Turkish baths; and Brexit bigots in Surrey Heights Conservative Association.

Cable admits heroic union official and rising Labour star Steve Grant is inspired by former postman and ex-Home Secretary Alan Johnson.

And years of frustration from clashes with Theresa May round the Coalition Cabinet table are vented in one short sentence: the Tories respectable woman PM had been deposed in a 2019 coup.

Its not vengeful, laughs Vince, somewhat unconvincingly, adding: The boys are back in charge. Theresa has disappeared.

Wisely, he is keeping quiet about the identities of the rest. And he denies writing a bonkbuster, saying haughtily: Im not Edwina Currie. But there is bed-hopping.

Married Defence Minister Kate Thompson preferred men to women having tried both. When she sleeps with her Indian lover a dam broke, sweeping away their pent-up emotional and physical constraints.

The book draws heavily on Cables political and personal hinterland. He was a Labour councillor in the 1970s, Shell chief economist, a Lib Dem Cabinet Minister and has negotiated trade deals.

His debut novel, Open Arms, features sex scandals and Tory Ministers who get mixed up in a dodgy arms deal in India

First wife Olympia was an Indian East African and died in 2001. He married Rachel in 2004. In 2010 he dazzled in a Celebrity Strictly Come Dancing Christmas show.

As well as using the book to expose what Cable claims will be the disastrous consequences of Brexit he also tackles social issues.

Shaida Khan, a young Asian businesswoman is under pressure from her strict Muslim family to be a traditional meek and submissive female, but revels in internet sex.

Cable says: The two most important characters in the book are women. I am trying to get under their skin. They embody a world where emancipated women are breaking away from stereotypes.

Kate complains her MoD mandarin spends his time gazing at my chest. Shaida is drawn to hunky union man Grant but fears her familys disapproval.

He writes of Kate in her 20s, she had sex in cheap and dirty hotels in India with an unkempt Aussie.

Cable travelled in India as a young man. Did he have sex in cheap and dirty hotels? I had a few adventures, a few romances, he smiles.

He admits to over-enthusiasm on the sex scenes. Everyone jumped into bed straightaway in the first draft, so I had to tone it down.

What did wife Rachel think? She is not prudish, we are very much in love so it wasnt awkward.

Cable has spoken in the past of his deep grief over the death of first wife Olympia from cancer after they overcame opposition to their love on cultural and racial grounds from their respective families.

A measure of the strength of his marriage to Rachel is a moment on election day, June 8.

While he paced around their home waiting to hear if he had won his Twickenham seat, Rachel suggested he visited Olympias grave to calm his nerves.

He says. I go quite often and just sit there. Ever since we met, Rachel has been hugely generous in spirit.

Retrospective jealousy has never been there. Shes been lovely about it and sometimes comes with me.

Cable is the oldest British party leader since Churchill and says he has not given up hope of becoming Prime Minister. Yes, I do think it is possible. Im my partys alternative PM.
Political activists who deface statues of Captain Cook face seven years in jail or an $88,000 fine under a federal government crackdown to protect Australia's heritage.

The Turnbull Government is placing statues that are more than 100 years old on the National Heritage List following a series of graffiti attacks on Sydney monuments two weeks ago.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said vandals should not be allowed to 'rewrite or tear down our history'.

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A Captain James Cook statue in Sydney's Hyde Park was defaced with: 'No Pride in Genocide'

Vandals who deface statues of Captain James Cook face seven years in jail or an $88,000 fine

'Australian history contains many painful chapters  particularly for indigenous Australians  but a free society debates its past, it does not deny it. It builds new monuments as it preserves old ones,' he told The Sunday Telegraph.

His intervention comes two weeks after a statue of Captain James Cook in Hyde Park was defaced with the phrase, 'No Pride in Genocide' to protest against a plaque which says the British naval explorer discovered the east coast of Australia in 1770.

Another statute of Governor Lachlan Macquarie was spray painted with, 'Change the Date', to protest against Australia Day being held on January 26 to mark the arrival of the First Fleet in 1788.

Graffiti vandals also sprayed the words 'Bow Down' on a statue of Queen Victoria.

A monument to Governor Lachlan Macquarie was vandalised to protest against Australia Day

The attacks were a statement about the recognition of Australia's indigenous history.

Environment Minister Josh Frydenberg will ask the Heritage Council advise the government on including other historic statutes on the National Heritage List.

The announcement comes as the government adds Captain Cook's landing site, Kamay Botany Bay National Park in Sydneys south, as the 112th site on the National Heritage List.

The graffiti attacks came after ABC indigenous affairs editor Stan Grant criticised the Captain Cook statue plaque for failing to recognise the suffering of indigenous people.

'The statue speaks still to terra nullius and the violent rupture of Aboriginal society and a legacy of pain and suffering that endures today,' he said.

The journalist condemned the graffiti attacks.

Malcolm Turnbull says defacing statues isn't the way to acknowledge indigenous suffering
After 800 years, laptops to replace handwriting in exams at Cambridge University

(Xinhua) 09:54, September 10, 2017

LONDON, Sept. 9 -- Eight centuries of students submitting hand-written exam papers could soon come to an end at the world famous Cambridge University.

The university is considering axing compulsory written exams and allowing students to use laptop computers instead, reports in Britain's broadsheet newspapers reported Saturday.

The proposed move comes after Cambridge tutors complained that students' handwriting is becoming illegible.

Academics say today's students rely too heavily on laptops in lectures, and are losing the ability to write by hand.

Cambridge University, according to the reports, has launched a consultation on the topic as part of a digital education strategy.

Earlier this year Cambridge piloted an exam typing scheme in its history and classics faculties.

In an online survey, students are asked whether they would like the option to type exams, and whether this would have a "significant positive impact" on their "well-being".

Dr Sarah Pearsall, a senior lecturer at Cambridge's History Faculty who was involved with the pilot earlier this year, told the Daily Telegraph that handwriting is becoming a lost art among the current generation of students.

She said: "Fifteen or twenty years ago students routinely have written by hand several hours a day - but now they write virtually nothing by hand except exams," she told The Daily Telegraph.

"As a faculty we have been concerned for years about the declining handwriting problem. There has definitely been a downward trend. It is difficult for both the students and the examiners as it is harder and harder to read these scripts."

Pearsall added an increasing number of scripts are having to be transcribed centrally, meaning that students with illegible writing are forced to come back to their college during the summer holidays to read their answers aloud in the presence of two university administrators.

One leading academic who sees the decline in handwriting continuing, Sir Anthony Seldon, vice-chancellor of the University of Buckingham, told the Telegraph it is inevitable that universities will move to computers as handwriting deteriorates in coming years.

"Handwriting is very significantly in decline. We have to accept the reality."

A spokesperson for Cambridge University said their review of exam procedures was prompted by students raising concerns that they rarely handwrite during their studies.

"The consultation is on-going and will be used to inform future decision-making on the issue," the spokesperson added.
Shocking pictures have emerged of Bake Off judge Paul Hollywood wearing a Nazi uniform at a party (File photo)

Great British Bake Off host Paul Hollywood is 'absolutely devastated' after a photograph of him wearing a Nazi uniform at a party emerged.

The image, which was taken 14 years ago, shows the 51-year-old TV chef smiling as he poses in the full German military outfit.

The photographs were taken at a fancy dress party at the White Stag pub in Monkton, Kent.

Hollywood rounded off his costume with a red Swastika armband, a replica Iron cross medal, an eagle badge - the emblem of the Third Reich - and a cap featuring a cross-swords motif, which was worn by officers in the German army.

He today said he is 'devastated' if the photograph 'caused offence to anyone'.

Hollywood also revealed that his grandfather fought against the Nazis during the Second World War.

He said: 'I am absolutely devastated if this caused offence to anyone, the picture was taken 14 years ago en route to a Comedy TV Shows Themed New Year's Eve Party and a group of us dressed up as characters from the classic TV show 'Allo 'Allo.

'Everyone who knows me, knows I am incredibly proud of the efforts of those, including my own grandfather, who fought against the Nazis during the war.

A source said: 'They may have been going to a fancy dress party  but what sort of person goes into a pub in German military uniform with a swastika on their sleeve?,' according toThe Sun.

The source added: 'At worst it was extremely offensive. At the very least it was stupid.'

The images show Hollywood posing for photographs in the Nazi uniform alongside his wife Alexandra, 53, and a friend.

The baker's choice of outfit is somewhat surprising considering his ancestor's links to the British military in the Second World War.

In 2015, while taking part in the BBC ancestry show Who Do You Think You Are?, it emerged that Hollywood's grandfather Norman Harman served with the 99th AA regiment Royal Artillery in Britain, in Tunisia and Italy from 1940 to 1945.

Hollywood rounded off his costume with a red Swastika armband, similar to this one (Stock image)

The photographs were taken at a fancy dress party at the White Stag pub in Monkton, Kent (pictured)

But Hollywood is not the first public figure to be involved in a Nazi uniform row.

In August, two serving policemen and a Ministry of Defence employee were pictured dressing up as Nazi soldiers for a Second World War re-enactment.

MoD staffer Aaron Buckingham, 50, assumed the character of a Nazi corporal.

While Sergeant Andy Dunlop, 48, of Devon and Cornwall Police and Hampshire Police Constable Simon Merritt, 43, took on the role of German soldiers.

His costume also featured an eagle badge - the emblem of the Third Reich (Stock image)

Hollywood's rounded off his uniform with a replica Iron cross medal (Stock image)

In 2005, Prince Harry was pictured wearing a Nazi uniform to a costume party.

Hollywood is the only remaining member of the old Bake Off team after the move to Channel 4 and it was mixed reviews for his new colleagues Noel Fielding, Sandi Toksvig and Prue Leith, who replaced the much-loved Mel Giedroyc, Sue Perkins and Marry Berry.

There is no suggestion that Paul or anyone else at the event has any sympathy with the Nazi Party.

MailOnline has contacted Paul Hollywood's representatives for comment.

Hollywood is the only remaining member of the old Bake Off team after the move to Channel 4

Stephen Silverman, Director of Investigations and Enforcement at Campaign Against Antisemitism, said: 'Following the very public disgrace of figures including Prince Harry and former-MP Aiden Burley over Nazi fancy dress, the debate on the acceptability of wearing Nazi uniform for entertainment is over.

'Whilst there are perfectly legitimate uses of such uniforms, for example in educational films or plays, it is offensive to use Nazi uniforms as party costumes. Nobody should find it funny to appear in public looking like Nazi war criminals.

'Wearing these costumes for fun is an insult to the British soldiers and civilians who died repelling Hitler's onslaught and the six million Jews and many others who were murdered.

'However we appreciate Paul Hollywood's immediate apology and note that this happened fourteen years ago.

'We do not expect any further action, however Mr Hollywood may wish to take the opportunity to educate his millions of fans about the horrors of the Holocaust.'
A teenage boy has died of appendicitis after twice being wrongly diagnosed by his doctors as suffering from a minor condition.

Luca Raso was told he had viral gastroenteritis in February this year after falling ill. He made two trips to the doctors in two days and both times was given the same answers.

Seven days after the first symptoms started, the 13-year-old was dead. His mother is now seeking a formal coronial inquest into Luca's death.

'I just kept saying "he's just got gastro, he's just got gastro". We live in Australia. People don't die from gastro,' Michelle Degenhardt told the Sydney Morning Herald.

Luca Raso (left) was told he had viral gastroenteritis in February this year after falling ill. His mother, Michelle Degenhardt (right) wants a formal coronial inquest into his death

Ms Degenhardt first noticed Luca's declining health when he threw up after dinner on Monday, February 20. Two days later his condition had not improved, so she took him to a GP in the Port Stephens region.

He was diagnosed with gastro, but over the next 24 hours Luca continued to decline, so his mother took him back to the same doctor on Thursday, February 24.

They were again told he had gastro.

'He kept saying "mummy, my tummy hurts". He looked so sick and he was very lethargic. He wasn't at all well,' Ms Degenhardt said.

Luca's condition then became so bad he was unable to stand. On Monday, February 27, his health rapidly declined.

Luca Raso died aged 13 after being wrongly diagnosed with gastro instead of appendicitis

He was vomiting a brown, syrupy liquid, his physical appearance had changed and he needed the help of his brother just to get to the bathroom.

Ms Degenhardt called a medical centre but was told they would have to wait until the afternoon to be seen. She dismissed this, told Luca to go to the toilet and they would leave immediately.

'While I was on the phone I heard him fall at the toilet and start groaning,' she said.

When he found Luca he was on the floor with his eyes rolled into the back of his head and teeth clenched. His heart had stopped.

Luca's mother and brother performed CPR on him until emergency services could arrive. He was transported to a local hospital, then moved to a larger facility as they were struggling to keep him alive.

He died in the ambulance on the way to the larger hospital.

Luca's mother and brother performed CPR on him until emergency services could arrive. He was transported to a local hospital, then moved to a larger facility as they were struggling to keep him alive. He died in the ambulance on the way to the larger hospital

The next day the family were told it wasn't gastro that Luca died from, it was a gangrenous appendix caused by appendicitis.

'It was like I was suspended in time. I could hear people speaking but I couldn't take it in. I was hysterical. A mess. I couldn't understand what was happening,' Ms Degenhardt said.

'My son died of a completely preventable condition.'

She is now seeking a formal coronial inquest into Luca's death after the case was referred to a local magistrate. She wants this to act as a warning to parents who believe their child has been wrongly diagnosed and is encouraging people to trust their instincts.

'I'm told like some neurotic mother that he has gastro. It wasn't gastro and now my boy is gone.'
Stuart Gulliver (pictured), chief executive of HSBC, was paid 5.7 million in 2016

The perks lavished on the bosses of Britains biggest companies are so extravagant that one received as much to move house as an average employee earns in a lifetime.

The Mail on Sunday today reveals the extraordinary extras enjoyed by the corporate elite, following our revelations last week that the top 20 corporate chiefs were paid 237 million between them in 2016.

The average FTSE 100 chief executive took home 4.5 million last year, with Sir Martin Sorrell of media giant WPP pocketing more than 48 million.

But scrutiny of their accounts revealed that they were also showered with perks as part of their generous packages.

Stefan Stern, director of the High Pay Centre, says: It is not just the really big pay packages that rankle.

These other perks are every bit as offensive as the cash figure.

They symbolise the reality gap between the lives and expectations of some chief executives and their employees and their customers.

Beau OSullivan, spokesman for pressure group ShareAction, added: Who is policing these egregiously hefty perks? Its down to the Citys biggest investors like pension funds to step in. Mail on Sunday readers who are outraged by these findings can put pressure on their pension providers.

An investigation has revealed the incredible perks lavished on the bosses of Britain's biggest companies. Burberry president Christopher Bailey (pictured) could have claimed a further 20,000 in clothing expenses last year

Anne Richards (left) is the boss of The Pru's fund management business and received a total of 3.9 million last year. Mike Wells (right), chief executive officer of Prudential Plc, received more than 1.6 million over two years just to help him move to London from the US

In 2014, insurance firm Prudential said it might take until the age of 56 for the earnings of an average employee to add up to 1 million.

Yet its boss, Mike Wells, received more than 1.6 million over two years just to help him move to London from the US.

That includes 514,000 to pay stamp duty, enough to buy a 5 million home, plus 400,000 to cover interest payments (28,000 a month in 2016) on his mortgage.

Because the stamp duty payment was classed as a taxable benefit, the company then gave him another 330,000 to cover his tax bill.

While Wells was waiting for the purchase to go through, he got more than 178,000 for temporary accommodation, having already been handed a 200,000 allowance for relocation and shipping.

The Pru, which declined to comment, also handed over large sums to Anne Richards, who took over as boss of its fund management business M&G in June last year.

Ivan Menezes (pictured), who earned 3.4 million last year as boss of drinks giant Diageo, receives a products allowance of 1,250 to help him buy his rounds

It shelled out nearly 45,500 to cover travel from her home in Edinburgh, part of the 3.9 million she received in total last year.

This is the kind of thing that raises eyebrows and hackles, said Mr Stern. But such relocation payments are routinely doled out to executives and their families.

John Rogers, the chief executive of Argos, who pocketed 1.6 million last year, gets a 52,147 allowance because his job moved to Milton Keynes and he wanted to keep his family home in Epsom, Surrey.

The company said the payments were business expenses, rather than perks for personal gain.

Dr Flemming Ornskov, of biotech company Shire, received more than 400,000 to pay for his family to join him in Boston after he moved to the US following his companys takeover of rival Baxalta.

Stuart Gulliver, the chief executive of HSBC, spends much of his time in Hong Kong, living in bank-owned accommodation  a perk valued at 263,000 a year.

He was paid 5.7 million in 2016.

Standard trappings include cars and chauffeurs plus medical and life insurance. But some bosses enjoyed far more unique perks.

Pete Redfern, paid 3.8 million last year as boss of house-builder Taylor Wimpey, built a 1.7 million portfolio of properties in London and Spain, using a staff discount to get five per cent off  a benefit worth 80,000.

The company says every employee can benefit from the discount on one property a year  though few will be able to afford to take the same sort of advantage as its chief executive.

As part of his 48 million package, Sir Martin Sorrell received 228,000 in benefits, including 37,000 for a car, 68,000 for healthcare and an 86,000 accommodation allowance when travelling abroad  even when he stays in his own flat in New York, a practice the company justifies as it saves on hotel bills.

He previously received 274,000 to pay for his wife, Cristiana, to accompany him on business trips around the world.

He has now decided to start paying those costs and repaid the sum in 2015.

Stuart Gulliver, the chief executive of HSBC, spends much of his time in Hong Kong (pictured), living in bank-owned accommodation  a perk valued at 263,000 a year

Peter Crook, who earned 6.3 million at lending firm Provident Financial before stepping down last month, was handed perks worth 102,000 last year, including an unspecified sum to cover the cost of splitting his working time between Bradford and London.

At G4S, Ashley Almanzas 190,000 perks in 2015 included 72,000 on a security system.

The company  criticised for a staff training fiasco at the London Olympics and which runs the crisis-hit Brook House immigration centre  said similar systems have been provided to several employees.

Royal Mails Moya Greene last year received benefits of 43,000  almost 1,000 times the average employee benefits  including flights to her native Canada.

She is also topping up the 1.9 million she earned last year by taking on a 60,000 a year part-time job as a non-executive director at easyJet.

Burberry president Christopher Bailey, who has just stepped back from his role as chief executive, receives a cash allowance of 440,000 as part of his benefits, and could have claimed a further 20,000 in clothing expenses last year.

Other board members had specific clothing allowances last year running into five figures. Bailey was paid just over 3.5 million last year.

The company declined to comment.

Ivan Menezes, who earned 3.4 million last year as boss of drinks giant Diageo, receives a products allowance of 1,250 to help him buy his rounds.

Diageo said this is not an executive perk, but a benefit for all employees.

It was part of a benefits package worth 92,000 last year.
Disgraced public relations company Bell Pottinger is set to sink into administration tomorrow, in the most spectacular fall from grace ever to hit the industry.

The collapse of the company  which was plunged into crisis after being accused of inciting racial hatred during a campaign in South Africa  will affect 270 blameless employees, as well as PR high- flyers, including:

Former chief executive James Henderson, who was forced to resign over the scandal. He said this weekend he has lost everything, as his winter wedding plans were put on hold indefinitely;

Divorcee Heather Kerzner. Hendersons fiancee is the biggest shareholder, but the stake she bought for several millions in the spring is likely to be virtually worthless;

Founder Tim Bell will lose around 1million of the severance pay he negotiated when he left the firm last year;

About 20 partners who face a collective tax bill of 700,000 that they thought had been settled by the company.

Wedding plans on hold: Boss James Henderson and his fiancee Heather Kerzner

The firms implosion has shocked both the City and London society, as Hendersons connections extend into showbiz, the aristocracy and Royalty. As well as City clients he has acted for Madonna and the Duchess of York, who introduced him to Ms Kerzner in 2015.

The firm collapsed after it orchestrated a fake news campaign on behalf of the Gupta family, one of South Africas wealthiest dynasties.

Lord Bell, who is famed for his willingness to represent dictators such as the late Chilean leader General Pinochet, admitted he was instrumental in bringing in a lucrative 100,000-a-month contract from a company called Oakbay, controlled by the Guptas.

Bell Pottinger fanned flames of outrage when it embarked upon a campaign to divert attention from the Guptas ties with South African president Jacob Zuma.

To do so, it branded the presidents opponents as the agents of white monopoly capital, despite the fact these included other big Bell Pottinger clients such as luxury goods giant Richemont.

Industry body the Public Relations and Communications Association expelled Bell Pottinger for at least five years, saying its actions were likely to inflame racial discord.

Ms Kerzner became Bell Pottingers biggest shareholder in April, believing the Oakbay debacle had been resolved. She and Henderson between them own around 40 per cent of the company.

Lord Bell, who founded the company, is famed for his willingness to represent dictators such as the late Chilean leader General Pinochet

As recently as last week, she described Henderson as amazing, claiming: I have never been more happy in my entire life. Friends say he has moved out of her Chelsea townhouse to give her space.

Ms Kerzner, who saw her investment as an act of faith in her fiance, said: Im not the first woman to back her man and I wont be the last. A new date for their wedding, which had been due to take place at Claridges in Mayfair in November, now looks unlikely, friends say.

Henderson said this weekend he plans to start again in the PR business once the dust has settled.

Lord Bell, who is accused by his enemies of conniving in the downfall of his former company, said he will not receive any more instalments on the seven-figure payment he agreed when he left the firm.

About 270 employees will lose their jobs. One consultant said: There are a lot of young people working here who are entirely blameless and now have an uncertain future. Henderson apologised to staff and clients and said he was hugely saddened by events.

Lord Bell added: Im sorry about the people who have lost their jobs but I left quite a while ago.
The BBC has ruled out plans to shake up Strictly's traditional format by introducing same-sex partners.

Reports emerged today that it was considering changing the format after an increasing number of LGBT campaigners said the show is not catering to a gay audience.

Richard Coles, who is starring on this year's series of the show which opened last night, revealed 'discussions' were being held with the BBC over the issue.

But a BBC spokeswoman told MailOnline that it has no plans to introduce same-sex couples in the foreseeable future.

Dancing queen: Susan Calman has admitted that she felt herself lusting after a man for the first time while preparing for her new stint on Strictly Come Dancing

The Church of England vicar told the Sunday Telegraph: 'We've had a discussion about it actually, and I don't know. I mean, it's in no sense that anyone resists the idea in principle, it's just a question of doing it.'

He suggested this year - which marks the 50th anniversary of the Sexual Offences Decriminalisation Act - would be a fitting time to embark on the changes.

This year's contestant Susan Calman was targeted by online for agreeing to take part in the show and dance with a male partner.

TBC: It is not yet publicly known who Susan will be teamed up with for her ballroom experience

But the regular Radio 4 panellist said: 'No one can say I haven't stood up for my community.

'I think politically there's nothing more powerful than having an openly gay woman on the biggest show on television whose wife's on the front row doing what she wants to do.

'No one is holding me hostage in this room, making me wear a dress and dance with a man. I want to learn how to dance,' she told The Sunday Telegraph.

A spokeswoman for the BBC told MailOnline: 'Strictly has chosen the traditional format of mixed-sex couples and at the moment we have no plans to introduce same-sex couples in the competition.'

Matthew Hulbert, serving police officer and chair of Leicester Police's LGBT group tweeted: 'When will there be a same-sex couple on #Strictly? Come on, producers, it's 2017.'
The Nationals have voted down a motion to ban the burqa and other facial coverings in government buildings and other public spaces.

North Queensland federal MP George Christensen, who brought the motion to the federal conference, argued it was needed for security reasons but also noted the party was 'bleeding to the right' on issues like this.

The motion was defeated 55-51 by a vote of delegates at the conference in Canberra.

The Queensland MP had claimed facial coverings raised safety concerns, citing evidence from a number of incidents overseas and in Australia.

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The Nationals have voted down a motion to ban the burqa and other facial coverings in government buildings. Pictured, Pauline Hanson wearing a burqa in the Senate

North Queensland federal MP George Christensen, who brought the motion to the federal conference, argued it was needed for security reasons

'There is also the issue of it encouraging isolationism,' Mr Christensen told reporters on Saturday.

The motion follows Pauline Hanson's stunt in parliament last month, where the One Nation senator wore a burqa in the Senate.

'The sensible thing to do is to ban the burqa and niqab in public buildings and spaces, leaving some exemptions for religious places of worship,' Mr Christensen told The Daily Telegraph earlier this week.

'It's not an attack on religion  it's an attack on a cultural garment which really is not conducive to the Australian way of life. There clearly is a threat to public safety and security and [people] should be forced to take them off if they refuse.'

The outspoken former chief whip of his party, whose seat of Dawson is under threat from One Nation, called for a burqa ban on his Facebook page on August 17 (pictured)

The outspoken former chief whip of his party, whose seat of Dawson is under threat from One Nation, called for a burqa ban on his Facebook page on August 17.

'I do believe quite strongly that full facial coverings should be banned in all government buildings and in public areas,' he wrote.

'There are safety reasons for such a ban and it also has to be noted that the cultural reasoning behind facial coverings is quite sexist.

'If you cant see someones face it immediately creates a tension [and] a discord,' he said.
Pictured: Liz Dawn played Vera Duckworth on Coronation Street for 34 years

Coronation Street legend Liz Dawn is fighting for her life after being rushed to hospital.

The actress who played Vera Duckworth for 34 years has been taken to hospital after suffering fluid on the lungs and chest pains.

The 77-year-old is a former heavy smoker who has lung condition emphysema. Last year she had a pacemaker fitted following a health scare.

She has recently been restricted to a wheelchair and has been housebound for weeks.

A family source said her usually upbeat demeanor had been affected by her ailing health.

'She's been in and out of hospital quite a few times in the last few years and normally the family are quite upbeat, but this time they seem more concerned,' they told The Sun.

'She's not in a good way and her loved ones are obviously very worried.'

Liz was on the programme 4 years before quitting the cobbles through ill-health in 2008.

In June she had surgery linked to a heart condition.

At the time she said: 'I've got no energy but once the operation is done I will be looking forward to being as back to my normal self and getting my energy back.'

In 2013 she had a pacemaker fitted after a heart attack while on holiday in Spain.

She admitted at the time: 'My health is very bad these days.'

The actress first appeared on the famous soap in 1974.

Her chemistry with on-screen husband Jack kept fans delighted for decades.

Actor Bill Tarmey who played Jack died in 2012.
Children are feeling increasingly lonely and growing numbers are self-harming because their parents are glued to their smartphones, according to a shock warning from Childline.

John Cameron, who runs the helpline, says it is receiving an average of 11 calls a day from lonely youngsters, and he claims the problem is being fuelled by the overuse of modern technology.

He said: Children say that when they are at home they are on a laptop or phone and their parents are on laptops or phones. Everyones in the same room together but glued to screens.

Children are calling Childline to report loneliness arising from family members who are glue to their smart phones

Thats quite a common experience now. Even when we are at home with our families, there is a growing sense of isolation.

Children are not speaking to their parents as much as in the past. It means children dont know who to turn to when they have problems. This escalating sense of isolation leads some children to express themselves in other ways, such as self-harming, to try to make themselves heard.

I think society needs to be more aware of the danger of us no longer speaking face to face. Too often we are glued to our phones and not speaking to children about the pressures they are under.

Mr Camerons remarks were backed by Childrens Commissioner Anne Longfield, a Government-appointed official who promotes the rights, views and interests of children.

She said: I am increasingly concerned that families do not talk about how much we are all glued to our screens. Parents need to keep a handle on this and really take the time to speak to their children, ask their kids on a regular basis about how things are, and spend quality family time together.

Childline revealed it had conducted 4,063 telephone counselling sessions with children and teenagers suffering from loneliness last year. Of these, 73 per cent were with girls, and the youngest caller was aged six.

It was the first time the charity, run by the NSPCC, had recorded loneliness statistics among callers since the helpline for children was founded in 1986 by broadcaster Esther Rantzen.

Esther Rantzen's charity has recorded loneliness statistics among callers for the first time since Childline was set up

A spokesman said this was because the charity recognised loneliness as a growing trend, adding: Childline counsellors are consistently hearing from children and teenagers that they feel like they are invisible, misunderstood and those closest to them are struggling to understand their feelings.

A recent study of 2,000 youngsters aged 11 to 18 found that more than a third had asked their parents to stop checking their smartphones and other devices. Of the pupils who had asked their parents to put down their phones, 46 per cent said they took no notice.

One in seven children said their parents were regularly online at meal times.

And an alarming survey last week revealed that 83 per cent of headteachers believe there is a rising number of four-year-olds arriving for their first day at school unable to speak properly.

Almost eight in ten British adults own a smartphone that can access the internet; 60 per cent own a laptop computer and there is a tablet device in more than half of homes, according to Ofcom.
Controversial activist Yassmin Abdel-Magied has posted a photograph of herself at Melbourne Airport as she migrates from Australia to the UK.

The engineer, author and TV presenter - who caused uproar with a post about Anzac Day earlier this year - shared the image on Twitter, saying: 'It's a beautiful day for migrating. Catch ya, Australia! Khair, inshallah.'

Ms Abdel-Magied's picture, which showed her holding a black suitcase as she smiled and waved towards the camera, was 'liked' more than 500 times.

The contentious engineer, author and presenter can be seen with a small black suitcase in hand waving at the camera, with a caption saying: 'It's a beautiful day for migrating. Catch ya, Australia! Khair, inshallah'

Despite removing the post and issuing an apology, it sparked an escalating series of events that Ms Abdel-Magied said left her feeling isolated

A woman by the name of Daisy replied to the tweet with: 'Yay! You are sooo welcome in the UK, and don't listen to any ignorant knob heads telling you otherwise!'

Miss Abdel-Magied replied: 'Thanks gurl!'

The young activist, 26, also posted a black and white portrait to Instagram signalling her departure from the country she calls home.

'So I'm sitting at the airport, looking ahead to an unknown new adventure... peering through the opaque curtain that cloaks the future, squinting.

'It's almost as if I cannot bear to think about it because the possibilities are impossible to imagine. Subhanallah. All I can have is faith, inshallah...to believe in Allah's plan, to know this is written, to trust that it all is as it should be.

The furore was sparked when she took to Facebook to post the message 'LEST. WE. FORGET. (Manus, Nauru, Syria, Palestine)'

'Australia! I'm going to miss you all... for all the drama, Australians have been good to me - you are why I am who I am today. But what's that quote about if you love something, let it go...?'

Ms Abdel-Magied caused a stir on Anzac Day when she took to Facebook to post the message 'LEST. WE. FORGET. (Manus, Nauru, Syria, Palestine)'

Despite removing the post and issuing an apology, it sparked an escalating series of events that Ms Abdel-Magied said left her feeling isolated.

The 2015 Young Queenslander of the Year revealed in a speech at the Sydney Writers Festival that she had also received harsh criticism over the post from a number of politicians

'I love Australia, I'm super patriotic. Yet I feel like I've been duped, like I've been sold this false sense of belonging,' she said at the time.

The 2015 Young Queenslander of the Year revealed in a speech at the Sydney Writers Festival that she had also received harsh criticism over the post from a number of politicians.

'I posted an apology very quickly afterwards, but one of our senior cabinet members said "Well Yassmin is un-Australian for saying this",' she said.

She also later said she had been labelled Australia's 'most publicly hated Muslim' and said she felt 'betrayed by my country' following the reaction, which included vile death threats.

'I posted an apology very quickly afterwards, but one of our senior cabinet members said 'Well Yassmin is un-Australian for saying this',' she said

The mechanical engineer's departure was announced in a press release from Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop two months ago however no reason was ever given for her swift move

George Christensen, the Member for Dawson, was among those who hit out at Ms Abdel-Magied following her post, taking to Twitter to suggest she leave the country.

'Yasmin should no longer on the public broadcaster's tax-funded payroll. Self-deportation should also be considered,' he wrote.

The mechanical engineer's departure was announced in a press release from Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop two months ago however no reason was ever given for her swift move.
Chinese tourist, 33, charged with manslaughter for the death of Ms Huang

Jean Huang suffered a cardiac arrest after allegedly having lethal dose of drugs

Just over a week since 35-year-old Sydney woman died from a botched boob job

Just over a week since 35-year-old Sydney woman died from a botched boob job

There are at least 12 Sydney beauty clinics employing them to perform surgeries

There are at least 12 Sydney beauty clinics employing them to perform surgeries

Illegal foreign beauty workers are flying into Australia every week on FIFO visas

Illegal foreign beauty workers are flying into Australia every week on FIFO visas

At least 12 beauty clinics in Sydney are employing illegal foreigners to perform cheap and dangerous cosmetic surgeries.

Foreign workers with only basic medical qualifications are masquerading as doctors and flying into the country on tourist visas every week.

Beauty clinics are hiring the illegal workers to perform fat transfer, eye lid and breast surgeries in a practice the NSW Health Care Complaints Commission said is common.

The 'Fly In, Fly Out' nationals may hold some form of nursing or beauty therapy treatment experience, The Daily Telegraph reports.

The shocking news comes just over a week since 35-year-old Sydney woman, Jean Huang, died after suffering a cardiac arrest during a botched cosmetic breast operation.

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Illegal foreign workers are flying into Sydney to perform cosmetic surgeries unlawfully (pictured: Sydney woman Jean Huang died from a botched boob job in September)

Jean Huang, a beauty clinic owner, died after suffering a cardiac arrest while undergoing a cosmetic breast surgery performed by a Chinese tourist

Ms Huang was given 10 times the amount of painkiller before her botched boob job

Ms Huang, who owned a beauty clinic in Chippendale, was allegedly given 10 times the normal dose of a painkiller before the operation.

The beauty clinic co-owner died in Royal Prince Alfred Hospital on Friday afternoon.

The Chinese tourist allegedly responsible for the botched procedure, Jie Shao, 33, is behind bars and facing 20 years' jail.

Australasian College of Cosmetic Surgery president Dr Ron Bezic told the Daily Telegraph that the illegal and dangerous operations are usually performed within certain ethnic groups.

Jie Shao, 33, the Chinese tourist allegedly responsible for the botched procedure, is behind bars and facing 20 years' jail

The beauty clinic co-owner died in Royal Prince Alfred Hospital on Friday afternoon

Jean Huang was taken to Royal Prince Alfred hospital where she died on Friday afternoon

'We have heard of these operations being done within certain ethnic groups, where overseas people come in and are essentially fly-in fly-out workers,' Dr Bezic said.

'It mainly relates to Chinese, Korean and some Arabic people. It's more common than what you realise.'

Ms Shao, who has since been charged with manslaughter following the death of Ms Huang, had no licence to practise medicine in Australia and had allegedly been in the country for just four days.

Much of the business between clinics' and the foreign workers is being conducted on Chinese-speaking messaging platforms like WeChat and Weibo, Dr Bezic said.

Sydney cosmetic surgeon Dr Zion Chan, a doctor for 17 years, said he had 'grave concerns' for the cosmetic industry.

Jean Huang died in Royal Prince Alfred Hospital on Friday after a botched breast procedure

'Cosmetic clinics are long overdue for regulation. The scope of illegal activity  and patients being treated with a prescribed medication without the appropriate medical license  will cause harm to patients and also death,' Dr Chan said.

Due to the business conducted on Chinese-speaking messaging platforms, Australian authorities struggle to police the practise of hiring illegal workers for beauty clinics.

Jie Shao was a graduate of a Canton medical university and a specialist in dermatology who had practised in China and Great Britain, the Central Local Court heard on Tuesday.

She had arrived in Australia four or five days before the alleged offences with two Chinese passports because her tourist visa - which expires in November - was attached to her old passport.

Shao will remain behind bars and is due to return to court on October 31.
(Xinhua) 13:59, September 10, 2017

GUIYANG, Sept. 10 -- Kweichow Moutai, China's national liquor, has seen overseas sales grow in the Belt and Road countries.

Overseas sales in H1 grew by 40 percent year-on-year, said Zhang Deqin, deputy general manager of the group, who is attending an international expo in southwest China's Guizhou Province.

Sales in central and eastern Europe have grown by almost 90 percent since the Belt and Road initiative was proposed in 2013, according to Zhang.

Sales in 26 countries along the Belt and Road accounted for nearly 19 percent all sales, Zhang said.

"We will explore more markets with better understanding of consumption habits, levels, economic conditions of Belt and Road countries," said Zhang, adding that the group would look for overseas franchise opportunities.

Moutai is sold in 78 countries and regions. Last year the Group earned 314 million U.S. dollars through exports of 1,721 tonnes of Kweichow Moutai and other alcoholic beverages.

Moutai, produced in Renhuai City of Guizhou Province, is often served on official occasions such as state banquets. Despite its high prices (up from 200 U.S. dollar per bottle), domestic demand for Moutai has always exceeded supply.
A Muslim woman who escaped war-torn Lebanon has possibly become Australia's first councillor to wear a hijab.

Nadia Saleh wore a light-purple head covering on Saturday night as she declared victory in the race for Canterbury-Bankstown council, in Sydney's multicultural south-west.

The mother-of-four, who runs a community centre, was one of three Muslim candidates who were elected to the Roselands ward.

Nadia Saleh declares victory in the Roselands ward as possibly the first councillor in a hijab as senior federal Labor frontbencher Tony Burke looks on (second, left)

In an historic first, all Roselands' new councillors are Muslim, including her Labor running mate Mohammad Huda and Liberal candidate Mohammad Zaman.

Another Muslim Labor candidate, Bilal El-Hayek, was also elected in the Bankstown ward.

Mrs Saleh's victory in the New South Wales local government election comes 28 years after she was almost killed fleeing Lebanon's civil war to join her husband Khodr, who had been in Sydney for three years.

After settling in Sydney's south-west, she dedicated herself to her newly adopted community, becoming a manager of the Riverwood Community Centre.

'When I first arrived at Australia, I struggled to raise my kids. I struggled to ask for support,' she told SBS program Once Upon A Time in Punchbowl in 2014, in which she did not wear a hijab.

Nadia Saleh (second right) wears a blue hijab as she hands out for the local council elections

The mother-of-four did an SBS television interview about her area in 2014, but did not wear a hijab

'This is the experience that I went through. (It) made me more determined to focus and learn more about supporting and strengthening community members.'

She is taking her local government spot from her husband, a former deputy mayor, who is retiring after 13 years on the council.

However, her election had one unkind critic in the Muslim community, with one fundamentalist man asking on Facebook how she could be a member of the Labor Party, which supports gay marriage.

'All those who legislate by other than the Koran are disbelievers,' he said.

'Not to mention that she is now part of a political team whose leader openly supports men having sex with other men.'

Nadia Saleh (left) is joined by her husband Khodr Saleh (second left), senior Labor frontbencher Tony Burke (second right) and Muslim NSW Labor MP Jihad Dib

The local identity was joined on hustings by Lebanese-born state Labor MP and former Punchbowl Boys High School principal Jihad Dib, the first Muslim elected to the lower house of the New South Wales parliament.

Mrs Saleh joins a small group of Muslim politicians in Australia, which includes federal MPs Ed Husic and Anne Aly, and NSW upper house member Shaoquett Moselmane, who also hails from Lebanon.

His Greens colleague Mehreen Faruqi comes from Pakistan.

Labor senator Sam Dastyari, who moved to Australia from Iran when he was four in 1988, is an atheist who describes himself as a 'non-practising Muslim'.

Early counting in the City of Canterbury-Bankstown council election shows Labor winning at least eight spots out of the 15 to have a majority.
Extraordinary footage from the Bahamas shows the shoreline receded much farther than normal, exposing what is usually the ocean floor.

Twitter user @Kaydi_K from Long Island, Bahamas wrote on Friday: 'I am in disbelief right now... This is Long Island, Bahamas and the ocean water is missing!!! That's as far as they see #HurricaneIrma.'

The strange video shows her walking on the exposed ocean floor which is dry and covered in large shells.

Another Twitter user tweeted a photo of the exposed beach at a different beach in the Bahamas and showed it was back to normal within less than a day.

Hurricane Irma, which hit the Bahamas on Friday, is so powerful that it has altered the shape of the ocean in Long Island, but it will likely be back to normal by Sunday afternoon.

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Before: Hurricane Irma temporarily changed the shape of the ocean after hitting the Bahamas on Friday

After: Twitter user @deejayeasya tweeted this photo on Saturday saying the shoreline where he lives in the Bahamas is back to normal 13 hours later

Pressure in a hurricane's center is low and Irma is so strong that it is pulling water into its core, sucking it away from the ocean, according to the Washington Post.

Deputy weather editor and meteorologist Angela Fritz explained that this may be the result of what she calls a hurricane 'bulge'. In the center of the storm, pressure is very low which draws water upward into itself.

She also noted the wind was blowing away from the shoreline on Saturday which is why water has not filled the void yet.

Some Twitter users were concerned since receding shoreline that exposes the ocean floor is often a sign a tsunami is approaching. However, Fritz said the water will not rush back rapidly.

The International Tsunami Information Center notes on its website, when the sea drains away to not investigate because this is a typical sign of an incoming tsunami.

I am in disbelief right now... This is Long Island, Bahamas and the ocean water is missing!!! That's as far as they see #HurricaneIrma wtf pic.twitter.com/AhPAonjO6s  #ForeverFlourish (@Kaydi_K) September 9, 2017
As Hurricane Irma barreled towards the Florida Keys today, 600 miles away in Georgia some residents under mandatory evacuation orders told DailyMail.com that they would ride out the storm in their trailers.

Georgia Governor Nathan Deal ordered the evacuation of the state's coastal areas on Thursday, including the city of Savannah, home to more than half a million people.

Forecasts show that the storm could enter the state on Monday anywhere from the Atlantic coast to the Alabama state line and cause massive storm surges. The last time Georgia was struck by a hurricane of force Category 3 or higher was in 1898.

For some permanent residents of mobile home parks in Chatham County, located inside the evacuation zone, there was no better place to go.

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Linda Rodgers, 56, who lives with her sister Jodi, said they have no place to evacuate when Hurricane Irma hits so they are staying at their home in Savannah

The sisters purchased their home in the Quacco Village three years ago and plan on protecting what they own during the storm. Linda and Jodi do not have flood insurance

The sisters have amassed a large collection of Elvis memorabilia. They plan to shelter together in the smallest bedroom if the hurricane hits

'We don't have the money to go and we don't know where would be the best place anyway,' Jodi Rogers, 50, told DailyMail.com.

Ms Rogers lives with her sister, Linda Rogers, 55, at Quacco Village Mobile Home Park in Savannah. The siblings had purchased their home three years ago.

'We finally own something,' Linda said. 'We are staying here to protect what we have. The Lord is with us.' She said that they have no flood insurance on the property.

She added: 'Any time it rains hard here, we can get flooded. You could also walk out any other day of the year and the Lord is going to call you.'

Linda, who suffers from osteoarthritis, said that her daughter, Karla, who lives nearby in a two-story brick home, would come to collect them if the storm became too bad.

The sisters had planned to grab important paperwork and family pictures along with some of their valuable Elvis memorabilia. 'I would really struggle to leave it,' Jodi said. 'I have loved Elvis since I was a little girl.'

Businesses around Savannah, Georgia have boarded up windows ahead of Hurricane Irma

On Thursday, Georgia Governor Nathan Deal ordered the evacuation of the state's coastal areas

The sisters had gathered canned food and bottled water to survive on if they lost power and the water stopped. Their trailer's windows are hurricane-proof and the sisters plan to shelter together in the smallest bedroom if the hurricane hits.

The first terrifying signs of Hurricane Irma arrived in Florida on Saturday afternoon with strong wind and rain in the most southern parts of the state.

In the largest evacuation effort in U.S. history, millions of people in the Sunshine State and in parts of Georgia have been told to leave their home before Irma strikes on Sunday afternoon.

Time is running out for anyone who is now planning to leave, with the outer bands of Irma arriving in parts of southern Florida with heavy rain and strong wind gusts which make it impossible to drive.

Irma is expected to track directly up through Florida, crossing the state line into Georgia early next week.

Down the street, Tammy Harper, 56, said that she too would be hunkering down in her trailer when the storm hit.

Tammy told DailyMail.com: 'I'm not scared, I'm not running. I survived Matthew last year and David [an Atlantic hurricane which struck in 1979]. We got a lot of wind and rain then and I was sitting on my porch. If I was really threatened and scared about bigger winds, I would have evacuated, I would have went somewhere.'

Tammy, who said she had been homeless in the past, said she dreamed of owning a trailer for her whole life. 'A few years ago, I managed to buy this place and I am so grateful to have it,' she said.

Tammy Harper, 56, said she is not leaving her trailer during Hurricane Irma. She told DailyMail.com she is not afraid of the hurricane since she has survived several others

'As long as I have my cigarettes and coffee, I'll be okay': Tammy Harper said she survived Hurricane Matthew and Hurricane David

She said that her adult children had asked her to stay with them in Rincon, a town 30 minutes north, during the storm.

'I'm not putting any burdens on them. I've got two cases of water. I'm on a fixed income but I get my Food Stamps on Monday, so I have to make it until then. As long as I have my cigarettes and coffee, I'll be okay.'

Tammy had turned over her lawn chairs and secured her bike and trash can. 'Everyone was asking me yesterday - what are you going to do when the hurricane hits on Sunday night?

'I'm going to stay in the front room while the power is still on. When the power goes off, I've got a radio to listen to. I also got one of them pocket weather radios. I bought that a while back just in case.

If we are going to get hit, it would say alert and it would let me know. But it has not gone off, it has just said wind and rains.

'Look - the devil is a liar. If you think negative in my book it's going to happen - you think positive and thank the Lord, it's not going to happen.'

Tammy, who attends Baptist Church, said: 'I don't drink, I don't drug. I've been praying and believing in the Lord and its showing on TV that the storm is moving and passing Savannah.'

Few had remained in the trailer park and young families were seen frantically packing cars and trucks full of belongings on Saturday morning. Most roads leaving the Savannah area were completely deserted but for a few cars heading inland. Tammy said she knew that some elderly neighbors nearby had no plans to leave.

One of her greatest concerns was for friends who were still living on the street. She particularly wanted to get a message to her friend, Joe, who is homeless, and offer him a place to stay with her.

Tammy said: 'He's a heavy-set white guy with greyish-blonde hair and a goatee beard. He's normally around City Market in downtown Savannah. I would love to know he is okay and tell him I have a couch and he would be welcome here. I haven't heard anything about the homeless, so it must not be a really big threat because they haven't showed the homeless on the news. So that is a good thing.'

Tim Toler, 55, and his son, Tim Toler II, 26, were preparing to see out Irma in their mobile homes on Ogeechee Road. They have lived in the area since 2000 and seen their fair share of storms.

Tim Toler Sr., 55, and son Tim Toler Jr., 26, said if the water gets too high they are planning on boarding their boat and floating away

'We will get through it. We've done it before': Tim Sr said people in the trailer park community watch out for each other

Tim Sr, an air-conditioning contractor, told DailyMail.com: 'Where are you going to run to? It's a big storm, unpredictable and it's the size of two states.

Tim Jr said: 'With Mother Nature, you never know. She's going to do what she's going to do. It's already moved further west.'

The father and son had stocked up with plenty of food and drinking water along with a back-up generator and 16 gallons of gas in case the power failed. They had also tied down everything loose in the yard which might get blown around.

Tim Jr lives in a trailer across the street from his father. He had taken his children to family in Guyton, further north and inland. 'My kids are being taken care of and I'm here to make sure they have something to come home to,' he said. 'We have no flood insurance.'

His father said that if the water surges became too high, he was ready to get valuables  family pictures, titles and his guns  packed in under 30 minutes and head to a hill nearby. He quipped: 'We've also got two boats sitting over there, so if the water comes up, we can float right out of here.'

Tim Jr also pointed to a vacant, two-story brick home standing nearby which they would go to if necessary. In their small RV park, they estimated about 50 per cent of residents remained in their homes.

'We are a tight-knit community, people look after each other,' Tim Sr said. 'We will get through it. We've done it before. My buddy Joe, he's 75, he'll be here with me [during the storm]. And Dwayne who lives nearby, he's disabled, he will be with me too.'

The father and son said that they were fully aware of the risk they were taking.

Tim Sr said: 'I understand that we've stayed and it's a mandatory evacuation, so we are on our own. But with the weather around here, it's like God's fixing to take you out every single day sometimes. We deal with flooding almost every week, we are used to this.'

Tim Jr added: 'Like the governor said, often these situations, you see the best in everybody.'
An Australian man's housekeeper in Bali has had her feet hacked off with a machete, with claims her husband attacked her because he thought she had been unfaithful.

Putu Careen was attacked on Tuesday evening as her two young children watched in horror. Her husband has been accused of mutilating her in an alcohol-fuelled rage.

Rohan Lee, who moved to Canggu from Perth two years ago, employed Mrs Careen for two years and has created aGoFundMe page to help pay for her medical bills and support her children while she recovers.

'Not only is this one of the most vile and vindictive acts of violence I've ever witnessed, the worst part is that in Indonesia there is no welfare or government assistance for medical treatment of this kind,' Mr Lee said.

An Australian man's housekeeper in Bali has had her feet hacked off with a machete, with claims her husband attacked her because he thought she had been unfaithful

Putu Careen was attacked on Tuesday evening as her two young children watched in horror

Mr Lee says the victim had both her feet 'sawn-off with a machete'. Their children, aged nine and 13, were allegedly present at the time of the incident

Mr Lee says the victim had both her feet 'sawn-off with a machete'. Their children, aged nine and 13, were allegedly present at the time of the incident.

Images of the scene show vast amounts of blood on a tiled floor inside the house, with further large stains in what appears to be a courtyard.

A large blade was found on a chair near the pools of blood.

Mrs Careen can be seen writhing in pain in a picture taken from an emergency room, with both of her legs heavily bandaged.

'If you have ever had the pleasure of meeting Putu (pictured), you would know that she is honestly one of the most genuinely kind and caring people you could ever meet,' Mr Lee said

Images of the scene show vast amounts of blood on a tiled floor inside the house, with further large stains in what appears to be a courtyard. A large blade was found on a chair near the pools of blood

Her Australian employer says she does not have the money to pay for her medical bills, to source prosthetic legs or undergo appropriate rehabilitation.

'If you have ever had the pleasure of meeting Putu, you would know that she is honestly one of the most genuinely kind and caring people you could ever meet,' Mr Lee said.

'She even came to make me her home remedies when I was sick with dengue fever. I struggle to see how anybody could do such a thing to such a loving and caring human being.'

Mr Lee says Mrs Careen is remaining positive and has been smiling and laughing from her hospital bed

He says Mrs Careen is remaining positive and has been smiling and laughing from her hospital bed despite the horrific mutilation.

'It was so remarkable to see for someone in her situation and was such a testament to the amazing woman and mother that she is.'

The page has already received over $40,000 in donations and have set a target of $100k.

You can help Putu Careen by donating to the GoFundMe page here.
The Sheriff's Office in Pasco County, Florida, has warned residents to not shoot guns at Hurricane Irma after a Facebook event went viral

Two residents of the state started the event, titled 'Shoot At Hurricane Irma', and, as of Saturday evening, more than 53,000 people said they were interested in the event and 25,000 said they were participating.

A description for the event read: 'YO SO THIS GOOFY LOOKING WINDY HEADA** NAMED IRMA SAID THEY PULLING UP ON US, LETS SHOW IRMA THAT WE SHOOT FIRST'.

The Sheriff's Office in Pasco County, Florida, has warned residents to not shoot guns at Hurricane Irma after a Facebook event went viral

Two residents of the state started the event, titled 'Shoot At Hurricane Irma', and, as of Saturday evening, more than 53,000 people said they were interested

Deputies warned, however, that shooting at a hurricane could have devastating consequences.

'To clarify, DO NOT shoot weapons @ #Irma. You won't make it turn around & it will have very dangerous side effects,' the Sheriff's office tweeted on Saturday evening.

One of the co-creators, Ryon Edwards, 22, told the BBC he created the event out of 'stress and boredom' and never expected the kind of response that came out of it.

'The response is a complete and total surprise to me,' he said.

'I never envisioned this event becoming some kind of crazy idea larger than myself. It has become something a little out of my control.'

Several other bizarre Facebook events have been created to prevent the storm from visiting the Sunshine State, including 'Spinning your arms really fast to push away Hurricane Irma' and 'Destroy Hurricane Irma By Cooling The Atlantic With Ice Cubes'.

The Category 4 storm is set to make landfall over the Florida Keys on Sunday morning with sustained winds of 120mph (Pictured, Facebook event for 'Shoot At Hurricane Irma'

The Category 4 storm is set to make landfall over the Florida Keys on Sunday morning with sustained winds of 120mph.

'This is your last chance to make a good decision,' Governor Rick Scott warned residents in Florida's evacuation zones, which encompassed a staggering 6.4 million people, or more than one in four people in the state.

Irma has already caused massive damage sweeping over the Caribbean, killing at least 23 people and destroying up to 95 percent of structures on the tiny island of Barbuda.
Navy Admiral William Moran (pictured) testified before congress over two warships accidents this year which resulted in the death of 17 sailors

A senior US Navy officer told a congressional oversight panel Thursday that the hectic pace of military operations and a constrained military budget don't excuse two warship accidents in the Pacific region that killed 17 American sailors.

The incident led the sea-going service to order a broad investigation into its performance and readiness.

'No matter how tough our operating environment, or how strained our budget, we shouldn't be and cannot be colliding with other ships and running aground,' Admiral William Moran, the vice chief of naval operations, told members of the House Armed Services Committee.

'We have allowed standards to drop as the number of certifications has grown,' he added.

'That is not about resourcing; it is about safety and it is about leadership at sea.'

Moran said the Navy is 'shocked' by the collisions involving the USS John S. McCain in August and the USS Fitzgerald in June.

He also said that they are under strain because they are deploying around 100 ships every day.

The U.S. Navy guided-missile destroyer USS John S. McCain is seen after a collision, in Singapore waters August 21, 2017

The Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Fitzgerald, damaged by colliding with a Philippine-flagged merchant vessel, June 18, 2017

But he also used the hearing to urge Congress to end the practice of providing defense budgets by way of stopgap spending measures.

The stopgap bills have been used frequently over the last eight years and lock the Pentagon's budget in at last year's level, which bars military services from starting new programs or ending old ones.

That forces the services to move money from their weapons modernization and training accounts to pay for current missions.

The shortfalls sparked a discussion about whether the Navy needs to refuse additional missions until the force is better stabilized.

Moran said the Navy, in the wake of the McCain collision, launched a wide-ranging review to examine those questions and also assess sailor training and navigational proficiency. Separate investigations are looking into the cause of the collisions.

Vice Admiral Joseph Aucoin (pictured) was relieved of his command following the USS McCain crash in August

'Our culture is we're going to get it done. That's what the Navy is all about,' he said. 'And sometimes our culture works against us.'

Ten sailors aboard the destroyer USS John S. McCain were declared missing after their ship crashed into a Liberian-flagged oil tanker in coastal waters off Singapore.

Seven sailors died when another destroyer, the USS Fitzgerald, hit a container ship off Japan.

John Pendleton of the Government Accountability Office said the Navy is 'treading water' in a push to keep up with operational demands that have put a heavy strain on the force.

Pendleton said GAO found that more than a third of the warfare certifications for cruiser and destroyer crews based in Japan, including certifications for seamanship, had expired as of June.

That represents 'a more than a fivefold increase in the percentage of expired warfare certifications for these ships' over the last two years, according to Pendleton.

Moran said the Navy is reviewing its plans to station additional ships in overseas ports after the McCain and Fitzgerald accidents. He said he'd assumed the Navy's 'forward deployed' forces in Japan were the best trained and most experienced because they were operating all the time.

Moran urged congress during his testimony to stop providing defense budgets by way of stopgap measures

A wide-ranging investigation found that more than a third of warships based in Japan had expired certifications

'It was a wrong assumption,' Moran said.

Overall, four Navy vessels have been involved in accidents this year in the Pacific.

The Navy relieved the commander of the U.S. Navy's 7th Fleet of duty shortly after the McCain crash. Adm. Scott Swift, commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, said he'd relieved Vice Adm. Joseph Aucoin, a three-star officer, 'due to a loss of confidence in his ability to command.'

A month before the Fitzgerald's accident, a South Korean fishing boat collided with the USS Lake Champlain guided-missile cruiser off the Korean Peninsula while it was operating in the western Pacific as part of the 3rd Fleet's USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier strike group. No one was injured in the May 9 mishap.

On Jan. 31, the USS Antietam guided-missile cruiser ran aground near the Yokosuka base that is the home port for the 7th Fleet, damaging its propellers and leaking about 1,100 gallons of hydraulic fuel into Tokyo Bay. The ship's commander was relieved from duty.

Although the Defense Department has a budget of just over $600 billion for the 2017 budget year, senior military officials have repeatedly argued that more money is needed to halt an erosion in the military's readiness for combat.

They've urged Congress to repeal a 2011 law that set strict limits on military spending and forced a reduction in the number of ready-to-fight combat units.

Moran said the Navy's operational demands continue to grow even though its fleet has shrunk dramatically.

'The Navy has deployed, on average, about 100 ships around the world each day, collectively steaming thousands of underway days each year, despite having the smallest battle fleet since before World War I, and significantly smaller than the Navy we had immediately after 9/11 over a decade ago,' he said.
While Florida Governor Rick Scott was telling Floridians how to prepare for Hurricane Irma, a sign language interpreter stole the show.

During Scott's remarks on Saturday, the especially expressive interpreter stuck out his tongue, grimaced and bulged his eyes to convey the severity of the situation.

The unidentified interpreter's behavior caused a stir on social media, with the majority of people on Twitter praising his dramatic American Sign Language interpretation.

As he signed for the sentence saying water 'flows in fast, very fast, and then it flows out,' the interpreter appeared to make jazz hands.

The unidentified sign language interpreter expressed the severity of Hurricane Irma by using dramatic facial expressions

The interpreter stole the show during Florida Governor Rick Scott's press conference in Sarasota on Saturday

One person tweeted: 'Is anybody else mesmerized by the sign language interpreter on CNN right now?'

Another said: 'I couldn't hear a word of what Rick Scott was saying over all the shouting from the sign-language translator.'

One Twitter user wrote: 'I don't mean to make light of #Irma but this sign language guy is getting the #Facials thing down! So get out and get away.'

He impressed Missy Elliot as well who said: 'Ok for the sign language guy,' the rapper tweeted 'I can't help but watch how he interprets this & with so much sauce.'

Using expressive facial expressions and exaggerated hand gestures can covey an emphasis on certain words in ASL

Missy Elliot was impressed by the sign language interpreter, saying he gave the statement 'so much sauce'

Similarly, the sign language interpreter for New York City Mayor Bloomberg also gained a fair amount of attention on social media in 2012.

As he gave remarks about how to prepare for Hurricane Sandy, the interpreter conveyed what he said in an animated fashion. The purpose of doing this is to emphasize important words.

Great sign language interpreters have to perform this way because facial expressions and body language convey grammar, according to The Atlantic.
The ex-husband of a realtor who went missing just before Hurricane Harvey hit Houston has been charged with her murder.

Steven McDowell, 44, was taken into custody and arraigned on homicide charges on Saturday after the body of Crystal Seratte McDowell, 37, was discovered in a wooded area in Chambers County.

Chambers County Sheriffs Office said it had nine persons of interest before finally arresting Steven McDowell over the weekend, according to local affiliate ABC NEWS 13.

Crystal McDowell was last heard from on August 25 when she left her boyfriend's home to go to collect her children from her ex-husband in Houston.

She never showed up and later missed several business appointments, prompting her uncle to report her missing on August 26.

Steven McDowell, 44, was arrested in the death of his 37-year old ex-wife, Crystal Seratte

Four days after vanishing, the woman's Mercedes was found submerged in flood water in the parking lot of a Motel 6.

It was recognized by someone who had seen her family's frantic social media appeals to find her.

Crystal McDowell's remains were discovered more than 20 miles away from her vehicle.

Two weeks after she first disappeared, Chambers County Sheriff Brian Hawthorne told ABC News that 'Hurricane Harvey is not the reason Crystal McDowell is missing.'

Crystal said she was on her way to her ex-husband Steve McDowell's home to collect their children, five and eight

Crystal McDowell, 37, went missing on August 25, a day before Hurricane Harvey hit

She was last heard from on August 25 when she left her boyfriend's home to go to collect her children from her ex-husband in Houston

Now, nearly two weeks after she first disappeared, Chambers County Sheriff Brian Hawthorne told ABC News 'Hurricane Harvey is not the reason Crystal McDowell is missing'

McDowell has two children, five and eight, with Steve.

At the time, Steve claimed she never showed up at his house to collect the children.

He also said he received a text message from her before she was due to arrive in which she described plans to take the children to Dallas to ride out the storm.

Sheriffs later found a black bag containing her business paperwork at Steve's house.

A Former FBI agent said that when dealing with this kind of case, police usually look at a few different things.

'One thing is the immediate circle of people around them, an ex husband, former employee,' he told ABC. 'Then you have to come up with a timeline.'

According to her uncle, McDowell recently started working with him in real estate, and everything was falling into place.

'She said herself she was the happiest she had ever been in her life,' Jeff Walters said, adding that he is like a second mother to the missing woman.

Her parents died when she was 11, and after that she lived with him.

Additionally, in the days before her disappearance, Crystal made teasing reference to a happy new life on social media.

On August 29, her car was found submerged in flood water at a Motel 6 in Houston but she was nowhere to be seen

She is seen leaving his house on surveillance cameras inside the home. Circled is the black bag she was carrying
A man in his 20s is in hospital with head injuries after a brawl broke out in front of a McDonald's on Sunday morning.

The eight-man brawl occurred around 2.20am outside the fast food restaurant in Drummoyne, in Sydney's inner west.

Police were called to the scene as the group were fighting in the car park.

A man in his 20s is in hospital with head injuries after a brawl broke out in front of a McDonald's

Police were called to Drummoyne McDonald's at 2.20am on Sunday morning

Two groups of men, allegedly unknown to each other, began arguing at the fast food chain on Victoria Road.

The confrontation quickly turned violent, leaving one man with serious head injuries taken to Royal Prince Alfred Hospital.

Police arrested another man at the scene, but he was later released.

Aftermath of the fight: blood and chips left in the car park

Police arrested a man at the scene but he was later released without charge

Police believe alcohol was a strong factor in the violence.

Anyone with information is urged to contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.
All four members of the well-known Polish death metal band Decapitated have been arrested on suspicion of kidnapping a woman after a US concert.

The four musicians, all Polish citizens, were arrested early Saturday while on tour in California, on accusations that they kidnapped the woman after their August 31 concert in Spokane, Washington.

Police said the woman attended that concert, at the The Pin concert venue in downtown Spokane, where the band was touring as part of their 'Double Homicide' tour of the US.

Following the concert, at around 2am on September 1, the woman contacted police saying she had been held against her will, cops said.

Decapitated (left to right): drummer Michal M. Lysejko; vocalist Rafal T. Piotrowski; guitarist Waclaw J. Kieltyka; and bassist Hubert E. Wiecek. All face a first-degree kidnapping charge

The band members were arrested after a concert in Santa Ana, California early Saturday. The charges stem from an alleged incident after a concert in Washington state on August 31

The case was referred to the Special Victims Unit for further investigation, and police believed they had the evidence to move forward with an arrest.

Spokane cops contacted their counterparts in Los Angeles County, and the band members were arrested right after a concert in Santa Ana, California at 2am Saturday.

WHAT IS DEATH METAL? Death metal is a subgenre of heavy metal music with heavily distorted guitars, low growling vocals, and machine-gun-like drumming. Lyrics of death metal often deal with mythology, the occult, and stylized violence in the vein of slasher or horror films. Death metal emerged in the 1980s and has remained an influential niche genre in the metal scene. Advertisement

Facing a charge of first degree kidnapping are: drummer Michal M. Lysejko, 27; guitarist Waclaw J. Kieltyka, 35; vocalist Rafal T. Piotrowski, 31; and bassist Hubert E. Wiecek, 30.

Cops said the musicians were taken into custody without incident.

'After they finished playing, they were kind of hanging out,' Santa Ana police Sgt. Javier Aceves told the Orange County Register on Saturday. 'There was nothing dramatic.'

They are being held in the Los Angeles County Jail and will face extradition to Spokane, Fuller said.

Steve Graham, the band's Spokane-based defense attorney, said that the band members are innocent of the accusations.

'There is another side to this,' he told the Spokesman-Review.

'We have witnesses that can testify to the fact that the accuser came to visit (the) band of her own free will and left on good terms.'

Cops said the musicians were taken into custody without incident, and their lawyer said they'd previously volunteered to surrender. Pictured: Rafal 'Rasta' Piotrowski at a 2016 concert

Decapitated, founded in Poland in 1996, has won critical acclaim for its albums among fans of death metal. The rest of the North American 'Double Homicide' tour is now cast into doubt

Graham said he told police that the band members had offered to surrender but never heard anything back.

'I made it clear that I could get the guys up here ASAP and they would cooperate,' he said.

The attorney said he fears the band members will spend weeks languishing in the Los Angeles County Jail before being returned to Spokane.

But Graham said that the four will not fight extradition and will return to Spokane willingly.

The band, founded in Poland in 1996, has won critical acclaim for its albums among fans of death metal, a subgenre of heavy metal characterized by heavily distorted guitars and low, growling vocals.

Decapitated had been scheduled to play an additional 14 concerts through the end of the month in their North American tour in support of the newly released album Anticult, but the arrest casts doubt on whether the tour will proceed.
DB Cooper, one of the 20th century's most compelling masterminds, hijacked a Boeing 727 at Seattle-Tacoma airport in 1971 and held its crew and passengers hostage, demanding $200,000 before parachuting out the plane

A new theory in the 46-year-old DB Cooper cold case says the legendary hijacker could have been a grief-stricken father out to embarrass the FBI.

Bill Rollins, a New Hampshire engineer and amateur sleuth, says he believes the unknown man who demanded a $200,000 ransom before jumping out of the back of a Northwest Boeing 727 is Joseph S Lakich, who died just last month at age 95.

Lakich was the father of a murdered woman named Susan Giffe and he wanted to make the Federal Bureau of Investigation look bad after they botched negotiations in her release.

Posing as a doctor with a patient in October 1971, George Giffe Jr dragged his screaming, young wife, Susan, aboard a private plane in Nashville.

He forced the pilot to fly to Jacksonville, then killed his wife, the pilot and himself when cornered by the FBI.

A US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the FBI negligent in the case regarding the two people that had been allowed off the plane to negotiate with agents before the shootings.

One of them, co-pilot Randall Crump, testified that FBI agents refused to speak with him when he was allowed off the plane.

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Bill Rollins, a New Hampshire engineer and amateur sleuth, says he believes the man responsible for the hijacking to be Joseph S Lakich (second from left), a father who was grieving for his daughter and who wanted to embarrass the FBI. Lakich died just last month at age 95

Susan Lakich-Giffe (pictured in crime scene photo) was shot by her estranged husband after he dragged her aboard a private plane in Nashville and hijacked it to Jacksonville. The FBI was found negligent after botching negotiations

Rollins believes that DB Cooper, who hijacked the Boeing 727 in November 1971, was not a career criminal and that he didn't even want the ransom money, but just that he was a man with a grudge (Pictured, the Northwest plane that was hijacked)

Despite, a longtime running investigation of suspects and motives, no definitive conclusions have ever been reached regarding Cooper's true identity or whereabouts.

Lakich, however, appears to have been an upright citizen, having a successful military career, including serving in World War II and retiring as a major in the 1960s.

But Rollins says he reached his conclusion by looking at the case from a different angle.

'I figured it out because I understood the emotions,' he told The Oregonian. 'No amount of science is going to get you to this man because he didn't leave enough evidence.'

Rollins believes that DB Cooper was not a career criminal and that he didn't even want the ransom money.

'All I knew is I was looking for someone who had suffered a tragedy and had a grudge,' Rollins said.

This supposition about motive came from an interview that federal agents conducted with Tina Mucklow, one of the Northwest flight attendants, who recalled asking Cooper if he had a grudge against the airline.

Cooper's response: 'I don't have a grudge against your airline. I just have a grudge.'

This supposition about motive came from an interview that federal agents conducted with Tina Mucklow (right), one of the Northwest flight attendants, who recalled asking Cooper if he had a grudge against the airline. Cooper's response: 'I don't have a grudge against your airline. I just have a grudge'

However, there are inconsistencies. Lakich lived and worked in Tennessee, more than 2,000 miles from where the plane was hijacked at Seattle-Tacoma Airport (Pictured, a Northwest Boeing 727 like the one hijacked by Cooper with an arrow showing where he parachuted from)

It's widely believed that Cooper - whose real identity remains unknown and who was never seen again after the heist - died of exposure in the woods between Oregon and Washington

From there he looked for people who might have been angry at aviation officials or federal law enforcement, potentially even the US government in general.

Rollins says Lakich's military experience means he could pull off a difficult operation such as the hijacking. Additionally, his age and appearance line up with descriptions of the hijacker.

However, there are inconsistencies. Lakich lived and worked in Tennessee, which is more than 2,000 miles from where the plane was hijacked at Seattle-Tacoma Airport. Additionally, the skyjacking happened less than two months after his daughter's death.

There is also the instance of death. Lakich died just last month and the FBI believes Cooper died from his high-risk nighttime parachute leap into rainy weather although a body has never been found.

In July 2016, the FBI said it was no longer actively pursuing its investigation into the notorious case, but continues to request that any physical evidence that might emerge related to the parachutes or the ransom money be submitted for analysis.
Italy's Carabinieri paramilitary police corps has suspended two policemen who allegedly raped two American students in Florence while on duty.

The two women, aged 19 and 21 according to reports, claim the cops attacked them inside their apartment on in the early hours of Thursday morning after they couldn't find a taxi home from Flo nightclub.

The pair, who are studying abroad, were believed to have been involved in a fight, prompted police to arrive at the venue.

The Carabinieri provincial office's command in Florence said the two officers were notified Saturday of the measure.

Defense Minister Roberta Pinotti said there is 'some basis' to the allegations, The New York Times reported.

Italian news media reported that the pair told prosecutors they were drunk and had smoked marijuana that night.

According to Corriere della Sera, one of the cops admitted to having sex with one of the women, but insists it was consensual.

Two American students, both 21, alleged that they were raped by Carabeinieri police when they escorted them home from a club in Florence, Italy on Thursday

Three police cars went to Flo nightclub to investigate a fight. Two of them stayed behind and supposedly took the girls home (file picture). None of the officers in this photo are believed to have been involved in the attack

It stressed the suspension reflects alleged conduct while on duty and is separate from Florence prosecutors' criminal investigation of the alleged rapes.

The women told authorities that the police, in uniform, drove them home from a disco early Thursday morning because they couldn't find a taxi, then raped them inside their apartment building.

Investigators are awaiting DNA test results to see if they confirm the women's account.

Besides the rape allegations, the policemen risk disciplinary charges for driving the women home without informing their superiors.

The officers, members of paramilitary police, are waiting to be questioned.

Three patrol cars went to Flo nightclub to investigate a fight, according to Italian media as reported by the New York Post.

After the issue was eased, two of the cars left while the last took the girls home and allegedly raped them.

News report stated that witnesses confirmed that they saw the two women enter the patrol car with the officers.

News report stated that witnesses confirmed that they saw the two women enter the patrol car with the officers

An official from the State Department said they were aware of the allegations and were taking the matter seriously.

The US Embassy in Rome said in an email: 'Due to the sensitive nature of this case and to protect the privacy of those involved, we have no further comment.'

According to the Italian news agency ANSA, the US consul general in Florence met with Florence's police chief Friday morning to talk about the case for about an hour.

The women had been said to be in Florence for several months studying Italian at an school in the area.

Florence has become a popular tourist destination for lots of Americans and offers plenty of study abroad opportunities for students in the States.

In January 2016, American woman Ashley Olsen was killed in her flat sparking lots of media attention.

A court in Florence convicted a Senegalese man of murdering the woman and sentenced him to 30 years in prison, later that year.

The 35-year-old had been strangled and suffered skull fractures.

Witnesses had said they'd seen the woman and her attacker meet at a Florence nightclub mere hours before she was murdered.
A controversial Islamic halal businessman says Muslim men who illegally marry underage child brides are treated worse than paedophiles.

Mohamed Elmouelhy told his Facebook followers Muslim men who break the law are often hated more than Australia's worst sex offenders.

'While two Muslim men married two young teenagers it became a big scandal, thousands of paedophiles get a slam on the hand,' he said.

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Halal businessman Mohamed Elmouelhy says Muslim men are often treated worse than paedophiles

The 74-year-old business leader says the media is even harsher on Muslim sex offenders

The 74-year-old founder of the Halal Certification Authority said his social media post was a comment about anti-Muslim sentiment in Australian society.

'So many times there is something about Muslims, the media always blow it up,' he told Daily Mail Australia on Sunday.

'I honestly do not know of anybody who has married a child or that I approve of it, or that I know any Muslim in this country who approves of it.'

The Egyptian-born businessman said he disapproved of child brides and polygamy.

'It is wrong in both cases,' he said.

Earlier this year, Melbourne Muslim man Mohammad Shakir, 34, pleaded guilty to going through with an illegal Islamic wedding ceremony to a 14-year-old girl.

Former Islamic cleric Ibrahim Omerdic, who was the imam of the Bosnian Islamic Society, avoided jail for presiding over that ceremony at Noble Park Mosque.

Mohamed Elmouelhy's July Facebook post suggested Australian men would die out in 40 years

Mr Elmouelhy, who is semi-retired, has returned to making public Facebook posts after Daily Mail Australia revealed in July his controversial post about Australian men.

His post had said Australian men are a 'dying breed' who would 'be extinct in another 40 years'.

He has since clarified that post to explain he was referring to Australian bigots and not all Australian men, following a backlash which saw Australian Conservatives senator Cory Bernardi call for him to be deported.

'You have people like Cory Bernardi, who is one way or another against Muslims,' Mr Elmouelhy said, also singling out One Nation leader Pauline Hanson and Nationals MP George Christensen.

Mr Elmouelhy, who moved to Australia in 1975 after studying in Italy and Britain, has weighed into the gay marriage debate, explaining he supported matrimony being between a man and a woman.

His Facebook suggested same-sex attracted people should have platonic friendships.

South Australian senator Cory Bernardi had called for Mohamed Elmouelhy's deportation

Mohamed Elmouelhy has weighed into the gay marriage debate, saying there are gay Muslims

'While Muslim men marry women they are required to love other Muslim men and the same for women, they are required to love other Muslim women,' he said.

'This does not mean that men should have sex with other men they love, and the same goes for women.'

However, Mr Elmouelhy said someone could still be gay and Muslim.

'There are even homosexual Muslims. Are we denying the obvious?,' he said.

'There are Muslims who commit fornication outside of marriage.

'There are criminal Muslims.'

He also acknowledged that many Muslims would vote 'yes' in the same-sex marriage postal vote.

'The sky is not going to fall regardless of what your vote is,' he said.
Police have launched a desperate search for missing teenager Lashay Linaker

Police have launched a desperate search for a 14-year-old girl who was last seen near a church in Melbourne's east.

Teenager Lashay Linaker was last seen at 11.30pm on Saturday and officers fear for her safety.

Lashay's family are worried because of her age, Victoria Police said.

The girl, who was last seen on Sladen Street in Cranbourne, is described as 160cm tall, with a slim build, and long straight light-brown hair.

She was last seen wearing a beige and maroon jacket and black ripped jeans.

Police have released an image of Lashay in the hope someone recognises her and can provide information on her current whereabouts.

Anyone who sights Lashay is urged to contact Cranbourne Police Station on 5991 0600.
As deadly Hurricane Irma swept through Cuba ripping roofs off houses, collapsing buildings and flooding hundreds of miles of coastline, residents sought refuge in underground military bunkers.

Families huddled together in dimly lit caves that were built more than 20 years ago when the Cuban regime believed the island would be attacked by America.

The Category 5 storm left Cuba and directed its destruction toward Florida with 130mph winds.

There were no immediate reports of deaths in Cuba - a country that prides itself on its disaster preparedness - but authorities were trying to restore power, clear roads and warn people to stay off the streets of Havana because flooding could continue into Monday.

As deadly Hurricane Irma swept through Cuba ripping rooves off houses, collapsing buildings and flooding hundreds of miles of coastline, residents sought refuge in underground military bunkers. Pictured are Cubans in a flooded street in Havana on Sunday

The Category 5 storm left Cuba and directed its destruction toward Florida with 130mph winds. A Cuban wades through a flooded street in Havana

There were no immediate reports of deaths in Cuba - a country that prides itself on its disaster preparedness - but authorities were trying to restore power, clear roads and warn people to stay off the streets of Havana (left and right)

Irma left a trail of destruction across the Caribbean, killing 20 people. On Sunday morning, four others were reported dead after the hurricane touched down in Florida.

Cuban authorities warned of staggering damage to keys along the northern coast studded with all-inclusive resorts and cities, as well as farmland in central Cuba.

Residents of 'the capital should know that the flooding is going to last more than 36 hours, in other words, it is going to persist,' Civil Defense Col Luis Angel Macareno said late Saturday, adding that the waters had reach at about 2,000 feet into parts of Havana.

As Irma rolled in, Cuban soldiers went through coastal towns to force residents to evacuate, taking people to shelters at government buildings and schools and the bunkers.

Video images from northern and eastern Cuba showed uprooted utility poles and signs, many downed trees and extensive damage to roofs.

Witnesses said a provincial museum near the eye of the storm was in ruins. And authorities in the city of Santa Clara said 39 buildings collapsed.

More than 5,000 tourists were evacuated from the keys off Cuba's north-central coast, where the government has built dozens of resorts in recent years.

Civil Defense official Gregorio Torres said authorities were trying to tally the extent of the damage in eastern Cuba, home to hundreds of rural communities.

In Caibarien, a small coastal city about 200 miles east of Havana, winds downed power lines and a three-block area was under water. Many residents had stayed put, hoping to ride out the storm.

Before slamming into Cuba, Irma had caused havoc in lush Caribbean resorts such as St Martin, St Barts, St Thomas, Barbuda and Anguilla, where many residents said they felt abandoned by officials.

Irma left a trail of destruction across the Caribbean (pictured is St Martin), killing 20 people. On Sunday morning, four others were reported dead after the hurricane touched down in Florida

Strong waves brought by Hurricane Irma hit the Malecon seawall in Havana, Cuba, late Saturday

Men wade through a flooded street, caused by the passing of Hurricane Irma in Havana, Cuba, early Saturday evening

The spokesman for France's government, Christope Castaner, said in an interview with Europe1-CNews-Les Echos on Sunday that he 'perfectly (understood) the anger' of people on the Caribbean islands.

But he the defended the government's response, saying emergency help was given 'first priority'.

Castaner said that many islanders were suffering from 'an impact of emotional shock, an impact that's extremely hard psychologically'.

With power out to much of the French Caribbean region, France's main electricity provider, EDF, said it has flown 140 tons of generators, pumps and other equipment to help St Martin and St Barts.

Many of Irma's victims fled their battered islands on ferries and fishing boats for fear Hurricane Jose would destroy or drench anything Irma left untouched. But that hurricane veered to the north without doing much damage.

On the Dutch side of St Martin, an island divided between French and Dutch control, an estimated 70 per cent of the homes were destroyed by Irma, according to the Dutch government.

Prime Minister William Marlin said about 1,600 tourists had been evacuated and efforts were being made to move 1,200 more.

Video images from northern and eastern Cuba showed uprooted utility poles and signs, many downed trees and extensive damage to roofs

Witnesses said a provincial museum near the eye of the storm was in ruins. And authorities in the city of Santa Clara said 39 buildings collapsed

A man holds a shoe as he walks through flooded streets in Havana

Marlin said many countries and people have offered help to St Maarten, but authorities were waiting on the weather conditions to see how it could be coordinated.

Authorities are still trying to determine the extent of damage to the island but 28 police officers lost homes during the storms.

The US State Department worked with the Defense Department to help more than 1,200 Americans fly out of the Dutch side of St Martin, starting with those in need of urgent medical care, spokeswoman Heather Nauert said.

France and the Netherlands said their islands in the Caribbean were spared major damage from Jose, which passed farther away from the islands than expected.

The US National Hurricane Center downgraded a hurricane warning for Barbuda and Anguilla. A hurricane watch also was discontinued for nearby Antigua.

In a tweet, the Dutch navy said the security situation on St Maarten, which saw widespread looting and robberies after Hurricane Irma, had improved thanks to patrols by marines and police flown to the island to help overwhelmed local law enforcement.
Floridians made light of Hurricane Irma by writing funny messages over boarded-up windows.

As the category three hurricane headed towards the US, Florida residents joked about the impending storm by spray painting message.

A Florida family showed they weren't letting a storm get in the way of their team spirit. They used their boarded-up windows to write: 'Go Bills' and 'Buffalo tough.'

This family didn't let Hurricane Irma stifle their team spirit for the Buffalo Bills who play on Sunday

This Floridian posed with his drill after boarding up his windows in preparation of Hurricane Irma

One person proved there was humor in the situation, depending on how you slice it

Some of the boarded-up businesses opted for artwork to go along with its message to Hurricane Irma

As hurricane supplies dwindled in evacuation zones, one Floridian offered alternative forms of payment

"Irma Gerd" -- someone in Port St. Lucie gets it #HurrcaneIrma pic.twitter.com/0Ya4r9YEAO  Andrew Atterbury (@AtterburyTCPalm) September 9, 2017

A business in Miami used its boards to paint an angry bird mascot with the message 'You don't scare us Irma.'

One photo shows a a boarded window where someone encouraged their fellow Floridians with the unifying message: 'Stay strong South Beach.'

A few feet down, someone else had a message for Irma, writing in block letters: 'GTFO Irma.'

One boarded-up window offered to let guests in exchange for hurricane supplies.

The sign said: 'Propane or cocaine. No one stays for free.'

A woman took a photo of a boarded-up business in Fort Lauderdale on Friday

One artist painted 'Irma' on Bart Simpson's rear end ahead of Hurricane Irma's landfall

While some signs were funny, others were inspirational and had Bible verses and motivational quotes on them

This sign made a good point to people interested in looting the business while the owners were away

Simple and to the point: A sign in Miami Beach showed what a Floridian really thought of the impending hurricane

A sea turtle rescue organization appeared to use a boarded up window in Fort Lauderdale to advertise its website by painting a turtle with a hurricane symbol on its shell.

Many signs let potential thieves know there was no point in looting the store while they were out of town. It said: 'Everything of value has been removed from the store. Please do not break the window.'

Several signs were simply painted saying 'Go away Irma,' and 'Irma sux.'

Some were inspirational with Bible verses and words of wisdom.

One sign referenced the global political landscape, saying: 'Hey Irma, North Korea is that way.'

This sign reminded Floridians of another major news story from the past month and encouraged the storm to turn elsewhere

This sign encouraged people to stay safe except for George Zimmerman who currently lived in central Florida

Another sign encouraged everyone to stay safe, with the exception of one notorious Florida resident. The message read: 'Hope everyone in Florida stays [sic] safe. Except George Zimmerman.'

People were spotted Saturday taking photos of the signs, and some were seen taking selfies with waves as the winds started making landfall.

Though there were mandatory evacuations in much of south and coastal Florida, many opted to weather the storm in opposition to advice from officials.

Forecasts predict Irma will first make landfall over Key West at about 7am on Sunday.
Recently submitted evidence in an ongoing lawsuit against Saudi Arabia claims that its embassy in Washington DC may have funded a 'dry run' using two of its employees before the events of September 11.

The revelation further stokes claims that Riyadh had a hand in the terrorist attacks that claimed the lives of more than 3,000 people 16 years ago, according to The New York Post.

A newly added complaint states that the Saudi Government paid two nationals posing as students to come to the US to fly from Phoenix to Washington 'in a dry run for the 9/11 attacks.'

The second hijacked plane is seen as it hits the second tower of the World Trade Center

The late King Abdullah Bin Abdulaziz Al Saud at the Riyad Air Base to greet French Jacques Chirac (Pictured 2006)

The complaint was filed on behalf of more that 1,400 family members who lost loved ones on 9/11.

'We've long asserted that there were longstanding and close relationships between al Qaeda and the religious components of the Saudi government,' said Sean Carter, lead attorney for the 9/11 plaintiffs.

The class action suit is arguing that a 'pattern of both financial and operational support' from the Saudi government aided the hijackers in the months and days leading up to the event.

Lawyers representing the Saudi government have filed motions to dismiss the claims.

The new allegations stem from FBI documents which claim that the two Saudi nationals, Mohammed al-Qudhaeein and Hamdan al-Shalaw, were in fact members of 'the Kingdom's network of agents in the US.'

The complaint further claims that both were participants in the 9/11 conspiracy, and had trained in Afghanistan with a number of al-Qaeda operatives that participated in the attacks.

September 11, widow Kristen Breitweiser, is one of 1,400 plaintiffs suing the Saudi government (pictured 2004)

And while living in Arizona, they were in regular contacts with a Saudi hijacker pilot and Al Qaeda leader from Saudi now incarcerated at Guantanamo Bay, the Post reported.

Just weeks before, at least one tried to re-enter the US but was turned away because he was placed on a terrorist watch list.

Qudhaeein was apparently employed at the Saudi Arabia's Ministry of Islamic Affairs, while Shalawi was 'a longtime employee of the Saudi government' in Washington DC.

In 1999, both men reportedly tried multiple times to gain access to the cockpit of an America West flight to Washington, testing flight-deck security in advance of the hijackings.

'After they boarded the plane in Phoenix, they began asking the flight attendants technical questions about the flight that the flight attendants found suspicious,' according to a summary of the FBI case files.

President George W. Bush sits and chats with Foreign Minister Saudi Al-Fail of Saudi Arabia in the Oval Office, Washington, District of Columbia, September 20, 2001

'When the plane was in flight, al-Qudhaeein asked where the bathroom was; one of the flight attendants pointed him to the back of the plane,' it added. 'Nevertheless, al-Qudhaeein went to the front of the plane and attempted on two occasions to enter the cockpit.'

Pilots were forced to make an emergency landing in Ohio, where FBI agents arrested Qudhaeein and Shalawi.

After an initial interrogation, however, they were released from FBI custody.

'The dry run reveals more of the fingerprints of the Saudi government,' said Kristen Breitweiser, whose husband was killed at the World Trade Center.

'These guys were Saudi government employees for years and were paid by the Saudi government,' she added. 'In fact, the Saudi Embassy paid for their plane tickets for the dry run.'

Carter said that the new allegation added to the lawsuit stem from 'nearly 5,000 pages of evidence submitted of record and incorporated by reference into the complaint,' along with 'every FBI report that we have been able to obtain.'

Hundreds of thousands of US documents relating to Saudi Arabia still remain secret.
A Byron Bay surfer and his mate were 'counting their blessings' as they headed up the beach holding a broken surfboard following a shark attack on Sunday.

Abe McGrath was screaming for a 3.5 metre great white shark to 'f**k off' as it snapped its jaws at him in the waters of Illuka beach, his friend Elijah 'Hobbit' Colbey told The Daily Telegraph.

He said the friends had been on their boards only 50 metres apart when Mr Colbey turned and saw his friend 'skimming across the water and splashing'.

'Then I hear f**k off, f**k off and then my nickname Hobbit being called out,' he said.

Abe McGrath (pictured) was screaming for a shark to f**k off as it attacked him at Illuka Beach on Sunday morning

The shark snapped Mr McGrath's board in two and left him with a nasty gash on his hip (pictured)

Horrific images show blood gushing from a wound on the man's hip that can be seen through his torn wetsuit, and his friends claim if he had been sitting on his board instead of lying on it, it's likely he would have lost his leg.

His friend Bryce Cameron told the Telegraph before the shock set in, Mr McGrath was just 'stoked' to have made it out of the water.

'[Abe] was stoked, he wasn't in shock yet, he was really happy to be alive and in front of his mates,' he said.

'We were all giving him big hugs and felt pretty lucky to have him there.'

Mr McGrath's board lays in tatters after being snapped in two by the powerful predator, who initially attacked from underneath.

The 35-year-old had been lying on his board at the time, and friends suggest if he had been sitting its possible he would have lost a leg

A witness suggests the shark attacked so aggressively Mr McGrath (pictured) was flung into the air

The Department of Primary Industries (DPI) confirmed the 35-year-old man from Suffolk Park was mauled at 6am before friends drove him to Ballina hospital with a gash to his right thigh.

Mooloolaba woman Amber Hopkins uploaded pictures of Mr McGrath and his broken board to social media, claiming he 'could have lost his life'.

Wow!!! This guy has some luck... 6am this morning - Iluka he was attacked by a 3 metre great white shark!!! He could have lost his life!' She wrote.

In a comment on her post, Ms Hopkins said he had been with a friend and they were the only two in the water at the time.

She told police the shark had began to circle and then turned away. He then grabbed half his surfboard and swam to shore.

In a comment on her social media post, witness Amber Hopkins said the surfer was with a friend and they were the only two in the water at the time

His board lays in tatters after being snapped in two by the powerful predator's jaws as he surfed off Iluka beach

'The great white was coming that fast at him... hit him so hard only the sharks front teeth were able to brush him because the force flew him in the air 10 metres then shark went back and bit the board in half,' she continued in another comment.

NSW Surf Life Saving said Iluka Beach was unpatrolled and considered closed, but signs warning swimmers of potential dangers were expected to be posted today, reports the ABC.

Main and Bluff beaches were closed as a result of the attack.

There are currently 35 SMART (Shark Management Alert in Real Time) drumlines being used between Evans Head and Lennox Head to mitigate shark attacks.
An award-winning artist and her two sons have been charged with the murder of the family's elderly matriarch.

Melissa Beowulf, 60, and her sons Thorsten, 31, and Bjorn, 29, were charged with the murder of Ms Beowulf's mother-in-law, Katherine Panin, after she was found dead at the bottom of a flight of stairs in her Canberra home in October, 2015.

Police initially believed Ms Panin, 81, had accidentally fallen, but a secret homicide squad was formed a month after her death to investigate whether it was suspicious, News Corp reported.

The trio have been locked up in Alexander Maconochie Centre in the nation's capital since the end of last month.

Melissa Beowulf (pictured right) and her sons Thorsten (center) and Bjorn (left with father Thor) were charged with the murder of Ms Beowulf's mother-in-law, Katherine Panin (old family photo)

Ms Beowulf (pictured) is a renowned artist, with a portrait currently hanging in the National Portrait Gallery and another piece was an Archibald Prize finalist

Thor Beowulf (right) died after a short battle with pancreatic cancer a few weeks before the death of his mother. (Pictured: Melissa Beowulf center, Thorsten center right, Bjorn second from left, Thorin second from right, Beren left) (old family photo)

Ms Beowulf is a renowned artist, with a portrait currently hanging in the National Portrait Gallery and another piece was an Archibald Prize finalist.

Ms Panin's death came just two months after her son and partner of Ms Beowulf, Thor, died after a short battle with pancreatic cancer. He was an accomplished bonsai tree artist, regarded as Australia's finest.

The Beowulf's all lived in a house together in Red Hill, Canberra. Ms Panin shared the home with her son Thor and his wife Melissa, as well as their four sons Thorsten, Bjorn, Thorin and Beren.

Mr Beowulf's former partner, Dianne McGowan, and their son, Niels Beowulf-McGowan, also lived in the same house.

Melissa Beowulf (left) smiles with late-husband Thor (right) and former Prime Minister Bob Hawke (center)

'It wasn't a polygamous situation, more a polyamorous one,' Mr Beowulf-McGowan said.

Mr Beowulf-McGowan and his mother moved out of the house shortly after the death of Ms Panin after the dispute over the will of Mr Beowulf and the family's matriarch.

A property in Sydney's affluent suburb of Woolahra, that had been purchased by Ms Panin for $700,000, was also sold for $2.7 million days after the death of Mr Beowulf and a few weeks before the alleged murder of Ms Panin.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un hosted a massive celebration to congratulate his nuclear scientists and technicians who steered the country's sixth and largest nuclear test a week ago, its official news agency said on Sunday.

Kim and his wife, Ri Sol-Ju, gathered top scientists, including Ri Hong Sop and Hong Sung Mu, to celebrate what he called a 'perfect success in the test of H-bomb'.

The blast, which came weeks after the country fired off two intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) that appeared to bring much of the mainland US into range, prompted global condemnation and calls to ramp up sanctions against the isolated nation.

The United States and its allies had been bracing for another long-range missile launch in time for the 69th anniversary of North Korea's founding on Saturday, but no fresh provocations were spotted while the North held numerous events to mark the holiday.

Kim Jong-un (center with his wife, threw a banquet to laud the nuclear scientists and other top military and party officials who contributed to the nuclear bomb test last Sunday

Photos released on Sunday by KCNA showed the young leader breaking into a broad smile at the People's Theatre with two prominent scientists: Ri Hong Sop (left), head of North Korea's Nuclear Weapons Institute, and Hong Sung Mu (behind Kim's right shoulder), deputy director of the ruling Workers' Party of Korea's munitions industry department

Ri (left) and Hong (right) have played vital roles in the North's nuclear program, appearing at close distance to Kim during field inspections and weapons tests

orth Korean leader Kim Jong-Un attending a photo session with nuclear scientists and technicians, who worked on a hydrogen bomb which the regime claimed to have successfully tested, at the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun in Pyongyang

Throughout last week, South Korean officials had warned the North could launch another intercontinental ballistic missile in defiance of UN sanctions and amid an escalating standoff with the United States.

Washington told the UN Security Council on Friday to call a meeting on Monday to vote on a draft resolution establishing additional sanctions on North Korea for its missile and nuclear program.

Japanese Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera said it was vital to put pressure on North Korea through additional sactions, including blocking or slowing its fuel supplies.

'If we put firm pressure on North Korea such that it realises it cannot develop missiles, it will accept dialogue and we can progress with diplomatic efforts,' Onodera told public broadcaster NHK on Sunday. 'Unless we firmly apply pressure, North Korea will not change its direction.'

KCNA said Kim threw a banquet to laud the nuclear scientists and other top military and party officials who contributed to the nuclear bomb test last Sunday, topped with an art performance and a photo session with the leader himself.

KCNA did not specify when the banquet had been held, but analysts said it had likely been on Saturday.

The banquet, concert and performance to celebrate the September 3 nuclear test, were held in Pyongyang.

The North's leader appeared deaf to the international outrage and hailed the 'perfect success in the test of H-bomb' at the dinner.

Kim and his wife, Ri Sol-Ju, attended an art performance as part of the ceremony. KCNA did not specify when the banquet had been held, but analysts said it had likely been on Saturday

The banquet was in celebration for their latest nuclear test, which North Korea had said was an advanced hydrogen bomb

Kim and his wife were surrounded by scientists and nuclear leaders who have played a role in the country's nuclear development

Dubbing the latest test the 'great auspicious event of the national history', he called for 'redoubled efforts' to complete the country's mission to fully become a recognised nuclear power.

Photos released on Sunday by KCNA showed the young leader breaking into a broad smile at the People's Theatre with two prominent scientists: Ri Hong Sop, head of North Korea's Nuclear Weapons Institute, and Hong Sung Mu, deputy director of the ruling Workers' Party of Korea's munitions industry department.

Ri and Hong have played vital roles in the North's nuclear program, appearing at close distance to Kim during field inspections and weapons tests, including the latest nuclear test.

Ri is a former director of Yongbyon Nuclear Research Centre, North Korea's main nuclear facility north of Pyongyang, where Hong also worked as a chief engineer.

Kim was also pictured with his wife, Ri Sol-Ju, who disappeared for an extended period last year, raising speculation that she could be pregnant.

South Korean media announced last month that Ri had given birth to the couple's third child.

North Korea had said the latest test was an advanced hydrogen bomb.

There was no independent confirmation but some Western experts said there was enough strong evidence to suggest the reclusive state has either developed a hydrogen bomb or was getting very close.

KCNA said on Sunday the scientists and technicians 'brought the great auspicious event of the national history, an extra-large event through the perfect success in the test of H-bomb'.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un waves to the crowd after a performance during the celebration for nuclear scientists and engineers that is believed to have taken place over the weekend

A general view of an event in Pyongyang to celebrate the latest nuclear test, Pyongyang, North Korea

Kim praised the developers in his own remarks as 'taking the lead' in attaining the 'final goal of completing the state nuclear force' in line with his parallel pursuit of nuclear and economic development.

'The recent test of the H-bomb is the great victory won by the Korean people at the cost of their blood while tightening their belts in the arduous period,' Kim was quoted as saying.

Ri and Hong's roles have also been noted overseas, prompting the United Nations, the United States or South Korea to blacklist them.

Aside from the elite, rank-and-file North Koreans also commemorated the anniversary on Saturday by visiting the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun, which houses the embalmed bodies of founding father Kim Il Sung and his son and successor Kim Jong Il.

KCNA said service personnel and civilians, including children, laid floral baskets and bouquets at the statues of the deceased leaders across the country, while enjoying art performances and dancing parties.

A slew of brazen tests in recent months, which contravene existing United Nations sanctions, has sparked surging tensions over the North Korean weapons program.

Pyongyang says it needs nuclear arms to protect itself, but the US has accused the isolated nation of 'begging for war'.

In an interview published on Sunday United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres said the showdown over North Korea's nuclear and missile programme was the world's worst crisis 'in years' and had left him deeply worried.

'We have to hope that the seriousness of this threat puts us on the path of reason before it is too late,' said Guterres in the French Sunday newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche.

He also called for unity in the UN Security Council, which is set to consider a new draft resolution presented by Washington in recent days that would be the toughest-ever imposed on North Korea.

The US is calling for an oil embargo on the North, an assets freeze on Kim Jong-Un, a ban on textiles and an end to payments of North Korean guest workers.

It is hoping for a Monday vote though both China and Russia are thought to have raised opposition to the measures.
Egypt's defence minister Sedky Sobhy headed to South Korea on Saturday upon an invitation from his South Korean counterpart Song Young-moo with the aim of boosting military cooperation between the two countries, Al-Ahram Arabic news website reported.

Sobhy, who is accompanied by a high-level military delegation, is set to meet with a number of top South Korean officials including high-ranking army members.

Sobhy is expected to discuss a number of issues regarding military and security cooperation between the armies of the two countries.

On March 2016, Egypt's President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi visited South Korea and met with then-president Park Geun-hye, where they signed nine memorandums of understanding in the fields of industry, education, transportation and justice.

Following El-Sisis visit, South Korea vowed to provide Egypt with a financial package worth $3 billion for export credits and to develop infrastructure in the transport, energy and water resources sectors.

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Defiant David Davis slammed 'vacuous' criticism of the EU repeal bill today ahead of a key vote - and warned that blocking the legislation would cause 'chaos'.

The Brexit Secretary said Labour's plan to oppose the EU Withdrawal Bill tomorrow amounted to an 'attempt to thwart the democratic process'.

He denied the measures were a 'power grab' - insisting they were necessary to ensure minimum disruption as we cut ties with Brussels.

The government is facing a major battle to push through the legislation - which effectively copies EU law on to the domestic statute books.

Brexit Secretary David Davis, pictured in the Commons last week, said Labour's plan to oppose the EU Withdrawal Bill tomorrow amounted to an 'attempt to thwart the democratic process'

Mr Davis (left) has been embroiled in fraught Brexit negotiations with the EU's Michel Barnier

The most controversial aspect is the so-called 'Henry VIII' powers for ministers to amend laws as they are transposed.

The Withdrawal Bill is expected to make it through the second reading stage late tomorrow night, as Tory MPs are not in a mood to rebel despite Jeremy Corbyn whipping his MPs to vote against.

Up to a dozen Labour backbenchers could also defy their leader to support the principle of Brexit,

But there is huge scope for revolt later in the process, with warnings that hundreds of amendments could be tabled by Remainers in a bid to soften the approach to Brexit.

Writing in the Sunday Telegraph, Mr Davis insisted negotiations with Brussels were 'delivering steady progress' on issues like citizens' rights and the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic.

He said it is 'not a moment to go backwards', dismissing criticism of the Government's flagship bill as 'vacuous'.

'Any broad attempt to block the Bill, without any sense of a viable alternative, is simply an attempt to thwart the democratic process,' Mr Davis wrote.

'So, as my colleagues in the House of Commons proceed through the voting lobbies tomorrow, they must remember what they are voting for.

'They are not voting on whether or not we leave the EU. That decision was made by the British people last June.

The EU Withdrawal Bill was in the Commons last week, and will have its crucial second reading vote late tomorrow night

Jeremy Corbyn is whipping his MPs to vote against the Bill at second reading, despite saying he supports Brexit

'Nor are they voting for the terms of our exit. Those will be agreed as we proceed through our negotiations with the EU.

'What they are voting on is how we leave: whether our withdrawal is smooth and orderly, or chaotic and uncertain.'

The rallying call came after Labour denounced the Great Repeal Bill as an undemocratic 'power grab' by ministers.

Accusing opposition MPs of only contributing 'moan, complaint and gripe' to the Brexit debate, Mr Davis insisted that laws contained within the mammoth bill would not allow the Government to bypass Parliament.

Meanwhile, Eurocrats have been accused of 'drip-feeding poison' to business chiefs, civil servants and friendly journalists in a bid to undermine the UK position.

Sources told the Sun on Sunday that allies of European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker's allies have formed a 'black ops' unit to attack Mr Davis.

One insider said: 'It's clear their strategy is to weaken the UK's position by making us look incompetent, weak or out of our depth.

'Hardly a single meeting has taken place without a damaging story about the British delegation appearing.

'More often than not it's an over-spun account of a private discussion. Sometimes they are just smears.'
Theresa May (pictured in Downing Street last week) is facing demands from the EU to pay a large divorce bill

MPs are threatening to block any big divorce bill Theresa May tries to agree with the EU.

The warnings underline the scale of the challenge the government faces if it signs up to paying large sums of money to Brussels.

The EU has made clear it wants up to 100billion to settle the UK's 'liabilities' when we leave the bloc.

Eurocrats have insisted the principles of the financial divorce must be agreed before they will start talking about trade talks - effectively attempting to hold the UK to ransom.

There are claims ministers might be willing to consider a figure closer to 50billion to end the stand-off- although Brexit Secretary David Davis has dismissed that as 'total rubbish'.

Even a significantly lower payment could be a serious problem for the government, with leading Eurosceptics insisting an Act of Parliament would be needed to authorise handing over the cash.

Former Cabinet minister John Redwood said he did not believe many MPs would vote in favour of such a payment.

'The only way UK Ministers could authorise a leaving payment would be to put through an Act of Parliament specifically authorising such an ex gratia payment. I can't see many Conservative MPs wanting to vote for that,' he told The Sun.

'They will also find that if they wanted to make a payment as overseas aid to the EU it would not qualify under our Aid budget criteria, as the EU as a whole is too rich.'

Labour MP Kate Hoey added: 'I suspect a lot of MPs would in principle vote against any excessive payment.

'I would vote against paying a big bill unless I could be convinced that all the money we have paid in over many years ahd been taken into account first.

'But my quick calculations suggest that the British public would be expecting to pay very very little, if anything at all.'

The EU's Michel Barnier (pictured right with David Davis in Brussels last month) has been refusing to talk about trade until after the divorce bill is agreed

Senior Tories John Redwood and Jacob Rees-Mogg made clear the government would struggle to get a bill divorce bill through parliament

Tory backbencher Jacob Rees-Mogg, the subject of unlikely speculation about becoming party leader in future, said: 'Almost certainly there will have to be a vote on any settlement bill.

'The money has to be voted through by parliament and with MPs facing the fury of voters, it cannot be too much money.

'The interesting conundrum facing the Commons is that if MPs think that we are paying too much money or for too long a transition period then it won't get through the Commons and if it's too Eurosceptic a deal, it won't get through the Commons either.'
A Vietnamese woman has been found dead in her home less than a month after first arriving from overseas and moving in.

The body of the unidentified woman was discovered inside the home on View Street, St Albans in Melbourne's west, at about 9.15am on Sunday.

It's believed the woman's body may have been in the house for multiple days, with a Victoria Police spokesperson confirming her death was 'suspicious'.

It comes as neighbours told how they heard screams early this morning and another discovered a knife dumped in her car, after it was allegedly broken into overnight.

A Vietnamese woman has been found lying dead in her home at St Albans (pictured), in Melbourne's west, in an incident police are treating as suspicious

It's believed the woman's body may have been in the house for multiple days, with a Victoria Police spokesperson saying mystery still surrounded the death

An anonymous resident of the street told the Herald Sun the woman had moved into the home three weeks ago

'I saw her arriving at 6am with her bags and everything and I would see her walking down the street for groceries 8am every day,'

'There used to be some quite rough people living there but they moved out and she moved in.

'My neighbour said they heard screams this morning but I believe that was when someone came across the body for the first time.'

The resident also claimed that up to seven people lived on the property in different flats.

Earlier, another neighbour Sharon Delmo told how she found a knife in her car, which she also alleged looked like it had been 'broken into'.

However a Victoria Police spokesperson later confirmed that the weapon was not believed to be linked to the woman's death.

Ms Delmo told Daily Mail Australia that the death of the woman had shocked the street.

The woman reportedly only moved to Australia and arrived in the street less than a month ago

It comes as a neighbour claims to have found a knife dumped in her car, which was parked on the street and allegedly broken into overnight. Police ruled out any link to the woman's death

'When the police first came around they asked if we'd seen anything suspicious,' she said.

'It's a bit rough around here, so you do get break ins and things from time to time, but we don't have murders all the time.'

Homicide detectives at the scene investigating the death have been door knocking neighbours.

Ms Delmo said police had quizzed them on whether they'd seen anything suspicious in recent weeks.

'We'd heard they (the woman) may have been there for a few days before they found her this morning,' she said.
A young British woman has been raped in the Spanish party resort of Magaluf - on the same day as two similar attacks on other victims.

The 21-year-old holidaymaker was sexually assaulted on Friday morning within an hour of a 20-year-old Swedish tourist.

The two women were attacked between the hours of 7.30am and 9am on the party isle.

A third woman, a German aged 30, was raped on the same day in the resort of El Arenal, 10 miles south east of the island's capital Palma.

The 21-year-old holidaymaker was sexually assaulted on Friday morning in Magaluf, pictured, within an hour of a 20-year-old Swedish tourist (stock photo)

Spain's National Police and the Civil Guard are investigating the three attacks, but it was not immediately clear if they were being linked.

The German woman told detectives she woke on the beach to find her dress unbuttoned and her underwear stained with blood. Her bag and purse were missing.

She said she had been in a bar talking to a man she met there, but did not remember leaving.

All three women were treated in the island's Son Espases hospital.

Last month a 19-year-old Scottish woman told police she was raped by three men on a beach near Magaluf's party strip, Punta Ballena.

A third woman, a German aged 30, was raped on the same day in the resort of El Arenal, pictured - 10 miles south east of the island's capital Palma (stock photo)

She gave officers a photograph of one of the three men. But she later said she did not want to take the matter further and did not give a formal statement.

Meanwhile police in the resort of Puerto Banus, on the Costa del Sol on the Spanish mainland, are still hunting for a taxi driver accused of raping another British holidaymaker last month.

She told police the driver forced himself on her after taking her to wasteland instead of to her hotel.
Just three months ago Leo Varadkar's ascension to Irish Taoiseach was hailed as a breakthrough moment for both the country and his party.

At 38 he is the youngest to hold the post, having already become Ireland's first openly gay minister after coming out on the radio, and the first of Indian heritage.

But Mr Varadkar is rapidly falling out of favour - characterised by the Irish press as a slick PR-man who values style over substance.

Of particular concern is his love of lycra-clad runs, taste for avocado on sourdough toast, and affection for rom-coms.

Leo Varadkar was hailed as a leap forward when he became Irish Taoiseach three months ago, but has since been characterised as a PR-man wit no substance (pictured jogging with Justin Trudeau on his visit to Canada last month)

The Irish Times have dubbed Varadkar and Trudeau, along with fellow young progressive Emmanuel Macron, as the 'avocado lads'

Trudeau pictured attending a gay pride march in Montreal alongside Varadkar and his partner, American doctor Matthew Barrett (right)

'The complaints are mostly about Leo, as hes called in Irish newspaper headlines, swanning around - a mortal sin here,' the New York Times wrote in a recent profile.

'That he has a new communications office denounced in the press as a vanity propaganda project.

'That his love of rom-coms spilled out on a visit to 10 Downing Street to see Theresa May, when he said he was reminded of that famous scene in Love Actually where Hugh Grant does his dance down the stairs."

Much has also been made of his trip to Canada last month where he spent time with fellow young progressive leader Justin Trudeau.

There the pair, sporting open-collar shirts with sleeves rolled to the elbows, attended the Montreal Gay Pride march along with Mr Varadkar's partner Matthew Barrett.

Irish radio host George Hook accused Varadkar - who he branded 'a public relations creation' - of 'swanning around' Canada while the country faces a series of crises.

'George. Not swanning around Canada. Four meetings and four public events today. Business. Tourism. Media. Irish community. Jobs. Trade,' he tweeted back.

The same trip led to Varadkar and Trudeau being dubbed the 'avocado lads' by the Irish Times, which has been one of the Prime Minister's most vocal critics.

The group also includes Emanuel Macron, the young, progressive, French President who has yet to meet with Varadkar - though the pair did speak on the phone during his first day in office.

Varadkar also confessed to a love of rom-com films while visiting Theresa May in June, another item brought up for scrutiny by the Irish press

The Taioseach said visiting Downing Street reminded him of the moment in Love Actually when Hugh Grant's character dances down the stairs

Varadkar (pictured left attending an award ceremony in 2012, and right volunteering for the coast guard while Transport Minister) has rebuffed accusations that he has been 'swanning about' since becoming Prime Minister

Varadkar is a fan of Hugh Grant, pictured at the Mens Singles Final at Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Championships on July 16, 2017 in London

Chief among complaints in the opinion pages of the Times, along with the Irish Independent, is that Varadkar has failed to outline any kind of grand vision for his Fine Gael party or their future direction.

That starts with the homeless crisis Ireland finds itself facing, with numbers of those living rough having over-doubled in the last three years.

There are currently thought to be 8,100 people on the streets in the Republic, with many of them children. The desperate situation has been brought to the fore in recent weeks after three people died on the streets.

Opposition politicians have criticised Varadkar for indulging in PR exercises over the issue and have implored him to act, the BBC reports.

On women's rights, Varadkar has called there current state of affairs in Ireland - where abortion is still illegal - 'unequal' and has pledged a referendum on the issue.

He backed Minister for Children Katherine Zappone's call for 'reproductive justice', but in speaking to the New York Times, he muddied the waters.

'While I dont accept the view that the unborn child should have equal rights to an adult woman,' he said, 'I dont share this view that the baby in the womb should have no rights at all.'

Irish feminists are also frustrated that he has not appointed more women to his cabinet, the Times reports.
On a screen in the Foreign Office Crisis Centre, Hurricanes Irma and Jose are being tracked across the Caribbean - mile by devastating mile.

Britain would help any human being caught up in these forces of nature. But we have a special responsibility today because Hurricane Irma inflicted its most powerful blows upon British Overseas Territories, inhabited by 75,000 British citizens.

First was Anguilla, where Irma knocked out the power and cast the island into darkness, then came the British Virgin Islands  which have borne the brunt of the storm  followed by the Turks and Caicos.

I watched Hurricanes Irma and Jose swirl across a screen in the Crisis Centre where staff from the Foreign Office have been working around the clock, writes BORIS JOHNSON (pictured second from right at the Crisis Centre yesterday)

I watched the two hurricanes swirl across the screen in the Crisis Centre where dedicated staff from the Foreign Office and the Department for International Development have been working around the clock since Wednesday.

They've been dispatching emergency supplies, mobilising ships and planes and trying to second guess nature by anticipating exactly what help would be needed, where and when.

Their task is complicated by the fact that they are dealing with not one storm but two. Following closely behind Irma is Hurricane Jose  the first time that two category four or above Hurricanes have struck in such quick succession since records began in 1851. To all intents and purposes, this is an unprecedented situation.

The Crisis Centre got through to Tim Foy, the Governor of Anguilla, who briefed me in calm and measured tones. The power station on his island had survived, he said, but 70 or 80 per cent of the transmission poles had been toppled, depriving everyone of electricity.

Britain has already sent one ship, RFA Mount Bay, to Anguilla (pictured), and the HMS Ocean is on its way to the Caribbean with helicopters, Marines and engineers

The UK's crisis team have been dispatching emergency supplies, mobilising ships and planes and trying to anticipate exactly what help would be needed, where and when

I thought of the 15,000 Brits living in darkness on Anguilla, with destroyed homes and schools all around them, having endured one hurricane and now in the path of another.

But the Governor was full of praise for the immediate help provided by the men and women on RFA Mounts Bay.

The Government dispatched this 16,000-ton naval supply ship to the Caribbean in July in preparation for the hurricane season. She carries her own floating dock, a Wildcat helicopter and a special disaster relief team.

And the Governor described how these skilled personnel had managed to restore power at Anguilla's hospital, rebuild the emergency operations centre and  perhaps most valuable of all  clear the runway and make the island's airport serviceable.

RFA Mounts Bay has now been repositioned to do everything possible to help the British Virgin Islands.

But we must be humble in the face of the power of nature. Whatever relief we are able to provide will not be enough for many who have lost so much  and their ordeal is not over.

There were gusty winds in Miami early on Saturday morning but they were feeble in comparison to the 130mph winds expected in regions which will be hit directly

Thousands took shelter at the Germain Arena in Estero, Florida, on Saturday night as Irma inched closer to the state

A crisis like this brings out the best in Britain's public servants. We can all take pride in people like Tim Foy and the other Governors of the stricken islands, the staff of the Foreign Office Crisis Centre, and the crew of RFA Mounts Bay. All are striving tirelessly to help those in need.

And so they must because the people of Anguilla, the British Virgin Islands and the Turks and Caicos are British. Our obligation to them does not depend on the happenstance of geography: we will help just as surely as if the hurricane had struck Inverness or Dover or St Ives.

It is precisely because of this overriding sense of obligation that the Government has ordered the flagship of the Royal Navy, HMS Ocean, to head the Caribbean. Our biggest warship in service - carrying eight helicopters including two giant Chinooks - has left its NATO tasking in the Mediterranean and begun steaming westwards with all dispatch. HMS Ocean will cross the Atlantic and reach the Caribbean in about 10 days.

RFA Mounts Bay docked in Anguilla loaded with supplies for Hurricane Irma victims

Locals watch flooded streets following the passage of Hurricane Irma in Havana on Saturday

There is, of course, a desperate need for aid in the meantime. On Friday a giant C-17 transport aircraft from the RAF took off for the Caribbean, laden with enough emergency shelters for almost 1,000 people. In total, almost 20 tonnes of aid has already been sent by air, including rations, water purification kits and emergency lighting.

Expertise matters just as much as materiel, so 250 Royal Marines have been deployed in the region, including military engineers and medics.

The Foreign Secretary this week visiting UK troops in a NATO deployment to Estonia

They will reinforce the 40 personnel of the humanitarian and disaster relief team on board RFA Mounts Bay, whose excellent work has made such a difference in Anguilla.

In a situation where roads are blocked and communications disrupted, helicopters are essential assets. So a second C-17 left the UK on Friday carrying two Puma transport helicopters. They will join the Wildcat already deployed by RFA Mounts Bay.

We can be reassured that a great deal of aid has either arrived or is en route. But heartbreaking damage has been inflicted and no-one should assume that everything will go smoothly in the crucial days that lie ahead.

We are working alongside our friends, including France and the Netherlands, whose Caribbean territories have also suffered terribly, and the United States.

And the Government has promised to match what I know will be the generous donations of the British public pound for pound.

We must now look ahead to where Irma will strike next. On Sunday the hurricane is expected to make landfall in Florida, where hundreds of thousands of Britons either live or go on holiday. Our Consul General in Miami is making every preparation.

In the coming days, our fellow Britons will be caught in the pathway of these forces of nature. We will not relent in our efforts to give them every possible help.
The risk of war with a nuclear-armed North Korea is 'extremely great' and London could end up within range of the regime's missiles, the Defence Secretary warned today.

Sir Michael Fallon raised concerns about the danger of a 'miscalculation' causing a military confrontation, saying it must be avoided 'at all costs'.

He also pointed out that our capital is closer to Pyongyang than Los Angeles and the range of its weapons is getting 'longer and long'.

The United States is seeking a vote on a United Nations resolution which would impose the toughest-ever sanctions on North Korea.

Appearing on the BBC's Andrew Marr show today, Sir Michael Fallon raised concerns about the danger of a 'miscalculation' causing a military confrontation, saying it must be avoided 'at all costs'

This image distributed on Sunday, Sept. 3, 2017, by the North Korean government, shows Kim at an undisclosed location during a test of what it claims was a hydrogen bomb that's ready to be mounted on an intercontinental ballistic missile

President Donald Trump said Thursday that war with North Korea is not 'inevitable' but it's something that 'could happen'

It comes days after the regime claimed to have exploded a hydrogen bomb capable of being delivered on an intercontinental ballistic missile.

Speaking on BBC One's The Andrew Marr Show, Sir Michael said: 'What we have to avoid at all costs is this spilling over in to any kind of military conflict.

'So we're working flat out at the United Nations to get a better resolution there to enforce the existing sanctions, we're looking at sanctions across the European Union, and of course we're trying to persuade China to keep its neighbour in check.'

Asked if the situation is close to war in the Pacific, following threats against Guam, Sir Michael replied: 'I'm very concerned about the situation in the Pacific.

'The United States is fully entitled to defend its own territory, to defend its bases and look after its people.

'But this involves us. London is closer to North Korea and its missiles than Los Angeles.'

On whether North Korea has a ballistic missile capable of hitting London, Sir Michael replied: 'Not yet, but they are clearly accelerating their missile programme.

'The range is getting longer and longer and we have to get this programme halted because the dangers now of miscalculation, of some accident triggering a response, are extremely great.

'So we've got to work at this problem and bring about a diplomatic solution that stops the development of North Korea's nuclear programme and enforces the sanctions we have at the moment.'

Sir Michael, on potential Nato involvement to defend its allies, added: 'Guam is part of the United States, it's United States sovereign territory and the United States, of course, under the United Nations, has the right to ask other members of the United Nations to join in its self-defence.

Mr Stoltenberg said terrorism, the crisis in North Korea and Russia under Vladimir Putin meant the political situation was more unpredictable than at any time in the past 30 years

'So I don't think a legal issue is nearly as important as getting now a diplomatic solution to this crisis.'

Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg earlier refused to say whether an attack on the US territory of Guam would be covered by Article five, in which an attack on one member of the alliance is considered an attack on all.

He told the same programme: 'I will not speculate about whether Article five will be applied in such a situation.

'What I will say is we are now totally focused on how can we contribute to a peaceful solution of the conflict and press North Korea to stop its nuclear missile programmes.'
The hero bus driver who saved the life of a woman shoved into his path by a jogger says the 'Putney pusher' must be prosecuted as he reveals the victim has not yet been in touch to thank him.

Oliver Salbris, 45, swerved his number 430 bus to avoid the commuter, 33, when she was pushed into the road by the runner on Putney Bridge in south west London.

Today he urged the Metropolitan Police, who have so far questioned and released two people in their ongoing inquiries, to catch the jogger - who Mr Salbris believed acted 'on purpose'.

The man was running across Putney Bridge in south west London when he shoved the woman

Mr Salbris was hailed a hero for his response to the near-miss, which was captured on shocking CCTV footage and released by the Met as part of their inquiries.

He told the Sunday Times: 'I thought I was going to touch her. If I hadn't swerved, I would have smashed her head. It was reflex.'

The double decker driver pulled over to help the victim, who escaped with minor injuries, and ask if she needed his help.

He said: 'She was just in shock. She was crying. I offered her my help. I gave her a note with the bus number, my route and my name and garage and my phone number.'

Mr Salbris is now urging police to find the man.

He told the Sunday Times: 'He looked like he was doing it on purpose. He needs to be caught and to explain himself. He needs to be prosecuted.'

Shocking CCTV revealed the moment a jogger pushed a woman in front of a bus on Putney Bridge (pictured)

Mr Salbris added that the woman has not yet thanked him for saving her life. He said: 'I would say thanks to God.'

Mr Salbris pulled over after the fall in the morning rush hour on May 5 and passengers tended to the woman - who does not wish to be named.

Bus operators Go Ahead London told 5 News: 'The driver commented that he is pleased to have been a hero, he was just doing his job.'

Police questioned and released two men including millionaire American investment banker Eric Bellquist, 41.

The 33-year-old woman was lucky to escape serious injury after a bus driver swerved to avoid her on the bridge in south west London

Mr Bellquist, who lives in Chelsea, west London, was released when he proved he was in the US at the time.

The Metropolitan police have not excluded the possibility that the jogger and his victim knew each other.

Officers said that the as yet unidentified jogger ran the other way across the bridge around 15 minutes after pushing his victim.

But when the woman attempted to speak to him 'he did not acknowledge her'.

Speaking in August, sergeant Mat Knowles said: 'After he pushed her he ran across the bridge and 15 minutes later came back.

'By this time the members of the public who had helped the woman were gone and she tried to talk to him as he ran past her but he just ignored her.'

A senior source from the bus company Go Ahead London said it was only down to the slow speed of the vehicle that the accident did not result in serious injury.

A spokesman told MailOnline today: 'Detectives continue to appeal for witnesses and information.'
Theresa May will lead the Tories through Brexit as there is no prospect of her being replaced by anybody sensible, Ken Clarke declared last night.

The former chancellor said discussions about a potential leadership challenge were a distraction from the important business of leaving the EU.

He dismissed the idea of a Strictly Come Dancing-style contest, and said MPs should be concentrating on the economy and arrangements for the future of the country.

In an interview with Sky News, Mr Clarke said Mrs May had the job of presiding over a smooth transition for at least the next two to three years as we leave the EU.

Former Cabinet minister Ken Clarke told Sky News it is 'hopeless' to expect the UK to remain in the bloc

And he dismissed the idea that she could be replaced by someone such as backbencher Jacob Rees-Mogg.

Its our children and our grandchildren we should be thinking about, not next weeks newspaper headlines and can we have fun with a Strictly Come Dancing-style contest between people who want to be PM, he said.

Theresa May is there. There is no prospect of her being replaced by anybody sensible, in any sensible process.

For the next two or three years, Theresa has got the job of presiding over a smooth transition, through a long transition period, to an arrangement that, at least, will minimise the damage in a few years time. The Conservative heavyweight said his party turned to talk about leadership elections whenever serious subjects, such as Brexit, were being discussed.

He added: Whenever the Conservative party cant think of anything to do, it tends to have a leadership crisis, when its rather puzzled by policies.

The things weve been talking about [like Brexit]... they are quite complicated. They are difficult.

Eurosceptic campaigners offered simplicity  Its all Brussels fault... leave the EU and with one bound we are free and a brave new world will emerge. Well, that is nonsense.

Mr Blair told the BBC that the British public should be given options for how the shape of our future relationship with the EU will look

Its no use diverting ourselves by saying, Would Jacob Rees-Mogg be a 21st century prime minister, which I suspect Jacob thinks is rather a silly question especially at this stage of his career.

Mr Clarke continued: Our economy is in a very worrying state. We need, as soon as possible, an assurance that in trade terms our arrangements with Europe are going to carry on for some years as they are now.

Speculation that Mr Rees-Mogg could become a contender for Tory leader was sparked by a Conservative Home poll which found he was more popular than anyone in the Cabinet.

However, his odds were slashed after he told Good Morning Britain that  as a Catholic  he did not support abortion under any circumstances.

Mr Davis (left) has been embroiled in fraught Brexit negotiations with the EU's Michel Barnier

Dominic Raab, the justice minister, was asked whether he would consider taking over from Mrs May, after he came third in the same poll.

He dismissed the idea as disrespectful to Mrs May.

He said: If I was working for a business and I was walking around the canteen with other workers, talking about who was going to be the next boss, talking about that with clients, most people think it would be rude and grossly unprofessional, which is why Im not going to give that tittle-tattle any succour at all.

Mr Clarke also said it is 'hopeless' to expect the UK to remain in the bloc.

The comments came on the eve of key votes in parliament over the EU Withdrawal Bill.

Former PM Tony Blair is also spearheading a fresh bid by Remainers to prevent Brexit - calling for curbs to immigration within the bloc.

But Mr Clarke told Sky News's Sunday with Niall Paterson: 'Tony (Blair) still thinks we can stay in the EU.

'I think the mood in the country is it's hopeless to expect that. What we now need to address is the practical consequences of what is our new relationship.'

But Mr Clarke insisted it was crucial for the country to get the best possible access to the EU market.

He said it was impossible to see a full agreement being struck by 2019, and a transition period of 'two, three, four years' will be needed.

The remarks by arch-Europhile Mr Clarke will be welcomed by ministers who fear a rebellion over the EU Withdrawal Bill.

Brexit Secretary David Davis slammed 'vacuous' criticism of the legislation today warning that blocking it would cause 'chaos'.

Mr Davis said Labour's plan to oppose the EU Withdrawal Bill tomorrow amounted to an 'attempt to thwart the democratic process'.

He denied the measures were a 'power grab' - insisting they were necessary to ensure minimum disruption as we cut ties with Brussels.

The government is facing a major battle to push through the legislation - which effectively copies EU law on to the domestic statute books.

The most controversial aspect is the so-called 'Henry VIII' powers for ministers to amend laws as they are transposed.

The Withdrawal Bill is expected to make it through the second reading stage late tomorrow night, as Tory MPs are not in a mood to rebel despite Jeremy Corbyn whipping his MPs to vote against.

Up to a dozen Labour backbenchers could also defy their leader to support the principle of Brexit,

Jeremy Corbyn is whipping his MPs to vote against the Bill at second reading, despite saying he supports Brexit

But there is huge scope for revolt later in the process, with warnings that hundreds of amendments could be tabled by Remainers in a bid to soften the approach to Brexit.

Writing in the Sunday Telegraph, Mr Davis insisted negotiations with Brussels were 'delivering steady progress' on issues like citizens' rights and the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic.

He said it is 'not a moment to go backwards', dismissing criticism of the Government's flagship bill as 'vacuous'.

'Any broad attempt to block the Bill, without any sense of a viable alternative, is simply an attempt to thwart the democratic process,' Mr Davis wrote.

'So, as my colleagues in the House of Commons proceed through the voting lobbies tomorrow, they must remember what they are voting for.

'They are not voting on whether or not we leave the EU. That decision was made by the British people last June.

'Nor are they voting for the terms of our exit. Those will be agreed as we proceed through our negotiations with the EU.

'What they are voting on is how we leave: whether our withdrawal is smooth and orderly, or chaotic and uncertain.'

Tony Blair, who oversaw a surge in arrivals from newer states in the bloc, has conceded that 'sentiment' has changed about open borders. The ex-PM is pictured on the BBC's Andrew Marr show today

The rallying call came after Labour denounced the Great Repeal Bill as an undemocratic 'power grab' by ministers.

Accusing opposition MPs of only contributing 'moan, complaint and gripe' to the Brexit debate, Mr Davis insisted that laws contained within the mammoth bill would not allow the Government to bypass Parliament.

Meanwhile, Eurocrats have been accused of 'drip-feeding poison' to business chiefs, civil servants and friendly journalists in a bid to undermine the UK position.

Sources told the Sun on Sunday that allies of European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker's allies have formed a 'black ops' unit to attack Mr Davis.

One insider said: 'It's clear their strategy is to weaken the UK's position by making us look incompetent, weak or out of our depth.

'Hardly a single meeting has taken place without a damaging story about the British delegation appearing.

'More often than not it's an over-spun account of a private discussion. Sometimes they are just smears.'
A 10-metre humpback whale remains trapped despite a rescue mission lasting more than six hours.

The whale, estimated to weigh about 30 tonnes, became trapped in lobster rope on Sunday morning just outside Fremantle Harbour.

In a natural attempt to escape, the animal breached and rolled, which tangled rope around its belly and mouth.

John Edwards, a senior marine operations officer for WA Parks and Wildlife told Daily Mail Australia the whale, whose gender is unknown, had two lines wrapped around its body.

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A 10-metre whale was caught in lobster rope just outside Fremantle Harbour on Sunday morning

The distressed whale was seen breaching and rolling through the water to try and escape

Authorities managed to attach themselves to the animal while it tired itself out, but just as they had gotten to a point where they could begin hacking at the whale's entanglements, it breached one last time.

Heartbreaking footage shows the whale in deep distress, breaching and rolling to try and wriggle out of its entanglements.

'The team that were on it did a great job, it was a very strong and aggressive animal, but we were at the stage when we could cut the rope away,' Mr Edwards said.

'But it made one last breach and roll and that's when it broke away.'

John Edwards, a senior marine operations officer for WA Parks and Wildlife said the animal was very strong, and broke away from the humans trying to save it

The massive whale is estimated to weigh about 30 tonnes, and authorities remarked on its strength and fitness

Rope was able to be removed from its tail, but not its belly or mouth.

Mr Edwards says as the whale had broken away and daylight was fading, it was unlikely they would be able to save it.

While the whale would be able to survive for the coming weeks with the rope still attached, he said it could impact the whale as it grows.

'[The whale's immediate future - its next few weeks, are not an issue, but as it continues to grow, if the rope doesn't come off it will compromise the health of the whale,' he said.
Ten militants were killed and nine policemen were injured on Sunday in a shootout in central Cairo's Agouza district as police were executing a raid, according to a statement by the Ministry of Interior.

Security forces had received information that a number of militants who escaped the restive North Sinai were hiding out in two apartments in Agouza and were planning a number of attacks in central governorates.

Police were met with gunfire when they attempted to execute an arrest warrant on the suspects at dawn, according to the ministry.

A number of weapons were found in the two apartments.

Six of the suspects have been identified, all of whom had registered addresses in the Greater Cairo area. Two of the suspects were wanted on terrorism-related charges in North Sinai.

Egypt's military and security forces have been battling various Islamist militant groups, mostly in North Sinai, though militants have carried out attacks elsewhere in the country.

Police frequently conduct raids on suspected terrorist hideouts, often resulting in deadly gun battles.

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A Sydney activist, 75, has embraced his right to call Tony Abbott a c***, appearing at a same-sex marriage rally with a profanity-laden sign about the former prime minister.

Well-known Sydney identity Danny Lim took part in a same-sex marriage rally in Sydney on Sunday with a sign depicting Mr Abbott's face with the caption 'c*** smile'.

Mr Lim was fined for using offensive language in a public place in February last year when he held a sign which said 'Tony you c***'  but the fine was overturned when a court ruled it was acceptable.

Well-known Sydney identity Danny Lim took part in a same-sex marriage rally in Sydney on Sunday with a sign depicting Mr Abbott's face with the caption 'c*** smile'

A NSW court made the decision in August this year ruling the sign was not offensive because it was 'essential political comment' and the word 'c***' was 'prevalent in everyday language'.

The word in question was presented on the sign as a depiction of the word 'can't' but the letter A was inverted.

Mr Lim's sign at the rally was just the latest in a series of controversial messages the Sydney activist has shared.

Former Prime Minister Tony Abbott has been outspoken about his support for the 'No' campaign

'This guy is hilarious... hope Tony has a sense of humour this time,' one man said in support of Mr Lim

Print outs of Mr Abbott in red swimmers spelled out the word 'YES' at the rally on Sunday

The Sydney man has also addressed signs to Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull saying 'Malcolm you c***' and 'Malcolm you c*** or can be trusted?'

His sign was well received on Sunday, with same-sex marriage supporters praising the message.

'This guy is hilarious... hope Tony has a sense of humour this time,' one man said.

'Thank you for always brightening my day Danny. You are wonderful,' another said.

Mr Abbott has been outspoken about his support for the 'No' campaign.

Mr Lim and his sign garnered a massive amount of attention, with same-sex marriage supporters posing with him in the street

The former Prime Minister revealed he would vote 'No' to same-sex marriage, and has urged Australians to do the same

The former Prime Minister revealed he would vote 'No' to same-sex marriage, and has urged Australians to do the same.

'If you're worried about religious freedom and freedom of speech, vote 'No', and if you don't like political correctness, vote 'No' because voting 'No' will help to stop political correctness in its tracks,'he said outside Parliament in August.

Mr Abbott said gay marriage was a 'war on our way of life'.

While he was an opponent of same-sex marriage, Mr Abbott said he would respect the result of the public vote.

'Peace, smile, people can change, Tony you c***, liar, heartless, cruel, peace be with you,' the sign said on the front

Mr Lim was fined $500 for using offensive language in a public place but he refused to pay and fought his case in court

Mr Lim fought his case in court last year after he was fined $500 for using offensive language in a public place.

In February 2016 a magistrate found the sign calling Mr Abbott a 'c***' was offensive but on appeal, Judge Andrew Scotting disagreed and ruled it was 'not necessarily offensive, even when used in a public place'.

'Politicians and their views are often subject to criticism in public. This is an essential and accepted part of any democracy,' Judge Scotting said on Tuesday.

'That criticism can often extend to personal denigration or perhaps even ridicule, but still maintain its essential character as political comment.'

Judge Scotting said that then Prime Minister Tony Abbott did not deserve special treatment just because he was the leader of the Federal Government.

Judge Scotting said that then Prime Minister Tony Abbott did not deserve special treatment because he was the leader of the Federal Government

The judge said the word was so 'prevalent' in Australians' language that it lost its power

He said the word was so 'prevalent' in Australians' language that it lost its power.

'The impugned word is now more prevalent in everyday language than it has previously been,' Judge Scotting said.

'The prevalence of the impugned word in Australian language is evidence that it is considered less offensive in Australia than other English speaking countries, such as the United States.'

Judge Scotting said Mr Lim's conduct was 'inappropriate and in poor taste' but said he did not consider it offensive.

He said Mr Lim did not 'unequivocally use the impugned word' because the sandwich board used the word 'can't'.

While he said the word could easily be read as 'c***', he said 'the language used was clearly a play on words'.

Mr Lim's penalty and conviction were both set aside by Judge Scotting in August.
When archaeologists lifted up a piece of concrete floor at a site near Hadrian's Wall, they never expected to discover one of the earliest Roman cavalry barracks and a treasure-trove of artefacts in a remarkable state of preservation.

A layer of black, sweet-smelling anaerobic soil led them to unearth eight rooms with stables for horses and living accommodation filled with extraordinary military and personal possessions left behind by cavalry men and their families 2,000 years ago.

Roman cavalry swords are extremely rare anywhere, but two were lying on the barrack floor.

A layer of black anaerobic soil at a site near Hadrian's Wall led archaeologists to find military and personal possessions left behind by cavalry men and their families 2,000 years ago. Pictured above, a Cavalry Junction strap found at the site

The barrack dates from AD105. It lies beneath the 4th-century stone Roman fort of Vindolanda, south of Hadrian's Wall, at Hexham, Northumberland. Archaeologists found both toy swords (left) and Roman cavalry swords (right) at the site

There are also two wooden swords  one with a gemstone decorating its pommel  which were clearly made as toys for the cavalry children

One of them is so complete that it is still with its wooden scabbard, handle, hilt and pommel.

There are also two wooden swords  one with a gemstone decorating its pommel  which were clearly made as toys for the cavalry children.

Cavalry lances, arrowheads and ballista bolts are among other lethal weapons found, along with an incredible range of personal artefacts, such as combs, bath clogs, stylus pens, bone dice, hairpins and brooches.

Leather shoes include fine officers' examples, as well as those of women and children. There are also two letters written in black ink on wooden tablets.

They have been rushed into a conservation laboratory to ensure their survival. It will take about three months to conserve them. Archaeologists can take their time reading them once they're safe.

The barrack dates from AD105. It lies beneath the 4th-century stone Roman fort of Vindolanda, south of Hadrian's Wall, at Hexham, Northumberland.

It was not until AD122 that Emperor Hadrian began constructing his 73-mile defensive barrier, to guard the northwestern frontier of the province of Britain from barbarian invaders.

One of the swords discovered is so complete that it is still with its wooden scabbard, handle, hilt and pommel. Pictured above, volunteer Sarah Baker, who discovered one of the swords

The barracks were found when archaeologists lifted up a piece of concrete floor laid by the Romans about 30 years after the barrack was abandoned, shortly before 120AD

Dr Andrew Birley, who heads the archaeological team, likens such a discovery to winning an 'archaeological lottery': 'What's exciting is this incredible range of artefacts and everyday items.

'They're just remarkably well-preserved. There's a huge range of stuff - their hair combs, their pots, their wooden spoons, their bowls, their weapons, bits of armour, their cavalry bling.

'It's just all there on the floor. You name it, it's there. There's loads of stuff coming out.'

He adds: 'Even for us, it's very unusual to get things like complete Roman swords still surviving, sitting on the ground in their scabbards with their handles and their pommels on.

'We're slightly dumbfounded by that. Then to find another complete sword in another room next door only two metres away, two wooden swords and a host of other cavalry equipment in beautiful condition is just terrific.'

The site was preserved because it has been beneath a concrete floor laid by the Romans about 30 years after the barrack was abandoned, shortly before 120AD. Successive barracks were constructed above it.

Archaeologists happened to lift up a piece of the concrete while exploring the foundations of the surviving 4th-century stone fortress (pictured above)

The items found in the barracks (a sward with complete blade pictured above) were remarkably preserved for sitting underground for 2,000 years

This is the south-eastern quadrant of the last stone fort. Material like wood, leather and textiles survived due to oxygen-free conditions created by that concrete layer. Such details would otherwise have rotted away.

Archaeologists happened to lift up a piece of the concrete while exploring the foundations of the surviving 4th-century stone fortress.

Excavating about 3.5 metres down, they found the earlier barrack's original timber walls and floors, fences, ovens and fireplaces.

They were part of a base that once housed more than 1,000 soldiers and probably many thousands more dependants, including slaves.

Birley says: 'I've been excavating for 24 years as an archaeologist and a lot of my colleagues for a lot longer than that and they would never expect to find a Roman cavalry sword in any context because it's like finding a modern-day soldier leaving his barrack and dumping his rifle on the floor. That's the equivalent. This is a very expensive thing so why leave them behind?'

A couple of feet long, they were 'super-thin', 'designed to slash somebody as you're riding past with a wickedly-sharp blade and a point'.

For a Roman to have left behind a complete sword is the ancient equivalent of a modern soldier abandoning their rifle, Birley says: 'Both blades came from separate rooms, are likely to have therefore belonged to different people.

Material like wood, leather and textiles survived due to oxygen-free conditions created by that concrete layer. Such details would otherwise have rotted away. Pictured above, a cavalry junction strap found at the site

The barracks were part of a base that once housed more than 1,000 soldiers and probably many thousands more dependants, including slaves. Pictured above, a cavalry junction strap found at the site

'This is then a pattern and mystery which defies an easy explanation or answer. One theory is that the garrison was forced to leave in a hurry, and in their haste they left not only the swords but also a great number of other perfectly serviceable items which would have had great value in their time.'

He adds: 'This is the precursor to Hadrian coming to the UK to build his wall. This is the British rebellion.

'So you can imagine a scenario where the guys and girls at Vindolanda are told "we need to leave in a hurry and just take what you can carry". If it's your sword or your child, you grab the child.'

Other finds include copper alloy cavalry and horse fitments for saddles, junction straps and harnesses that are so well preserved, they still 'shine like gold', he says.

A beautiful bowl for crushing spices has a carved inscription inside its rim. There is pottery covered in graffiti.

Such pieces will offer clues to the identities of some of the people who lived in the barrack.Other finds include a beautiful bone stirrer, for making and mixing potions.

Birley says: 'It looks like a cocktail stick you get today with a spoon and three little holes drilled into it. There are lovely things like that.'

Making such a significant discovery at Vindolanda is all the more rewarding for him because his archaeologist father, Robin, headed the excavation that discovered the famous Vindolanda writing tablets in 1973.
Two men who died in a horror crash in Sydney's Darling Harbour on Saturday morning have been named as brothers.

Jeff and Steve Nasr, aged 39 and 31, were killed along with a third unidentified female passenger, after the car they were travelling in flipped and caught fire.

A fourth occupant, father-of-four Joseph Bagala, survived the crash after he was freed from the wreck by police officers.

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Brothers Jeff and Steve Nasr (pictured), were killed along with a third unidentified female passenger in a fiery crash in Sydney's Darling Harbour Saturday morning

The brothers' mother was reportedly informed of their passing Sunday morning and was being comforted by her four other children, according to Seven News.

Andre Nasr, believed to be their cousin, was among those who paid tribute to the men online.

'Rest In Eternal Peace, Jeff and Steve Nasr. Words can't come close to the emptiness you've left behind, hearts are weeping and tears are flowing,' he wrote.

'Fly free my brothers, you've gained your wings. We may have lost our brothers but Heaven gained two angels.'

While another family member took to Facebook to state they were devastated by the loss of 'two brothers, two sons, two friends and two great humans'.

'Please say a little prayer to give all of us the strength to deal with it as humanly possible.'

Andre Nasr, believed to be a cousin of the brothers (pictured), was among those who paid tribute to the men online, saying 'words can't come close to the emptiness you've left behind'

While another family member took to Facebook to state they were devastated by the loss of 'two brothers, two sons, two friends and two great humans'

The crash is believed to have occurred when the two-door Nissan GT-R R35 struck a guard rail outside the Novotel Rockford Hotel.

The supercar can hit a top acceleration of 311km/h, with Superintendent Paul Pisanos saying speed was a factor in the crash, The Sydney Morning Herald reports.

Father-of-four Joseph Bagala (pictured) was the sole survivor of the fiery crash

'Speed - and considerable speed at that - along with a loss of control are two contributing factors,' he said.

It's believed the car flipped after hitting the railing around 3am Saturday at the intersection of Harbour and Pier streets.

Mr Bagala was freed from the car before it was engulfed in flames, with witnesses claiming the victims 'screamed for help as they burned alive'.

Mr Bagala was treated by NSW Ambulance paramedics at the scene before being taken to St Vincent's Hospital with lacerations and burns to his body.

His cousin Anthony Bagal later told Seven News the family were extremely thankful for the officers bravery to go in and pull him from the car.

'To find out that the New South Wales Police pulled him out of that car with it on fire is just amazing,' he said.

The crash is believed to have occurred when the two-door Nissan GT-R R35 struck a guard rail outside the Novotel Rockford Hotel and flipped onto its roof (pictured)

Emergency services were called to Harbour Street, in Sydney just before 3am (pictured)

The Novotel was evacuated as guests reported smelling smoke coming from the blaze on the street below.

Novotel Rockford guest Sonia Ripepi was woken up by a huge bang and saw the car flipped over on the street outside her window.

'Then a taxi driver pulled over and he jumped out trying to get the passengers out,' she told the Daily Telegraph.

'He was screaming "get out, get out". The taxi driver was really distressed, he couldn't get any closer to the car.

The supercar can hit a top acceleration of 311km/h, with Superintendent Paul Pisanos saying speed and loss of control were factors in the crash

'There were lots of screams still coming out of the car.'

Superintendent Pisanos, from Sydney City Local Area Command said that four police officers put their own welfare on the line to try to extinguish a volatile fire and save lives.

Police are still trying to identify the third victim, a woman whose age is also unknown.

The coroner is expected to prepare a report on the incident following an investigation.
A toddler was left with severe burns to his hands after he allegedly touched a washing machine which had overheated to 98 degrees Celsius.

Kelly Titmus says her son Walter is still having treatment eight months after the Beko washer burned and blistered his hands at their Cambridgeshire home.

Walter, who was just seven months old at the time, screamed in pain after grabbing hold of the washing machine to help him stand up.

'Screaming in pain': Kelly Titmus says her son Walter (both pictured) is still having treatment eight months after being burned by a Beko washer she says was 98 degrees Celsius (208F)

He was taken to hospital and his mother claims an infra-red thermometer she used to test the heat of the washing machine a few days later read 98 degrees Celsius (208.4 Fahrenheit).

Mrs Titmus, 34, and her husband Wayne, 29, are now taking legal action against the domestic appliance and electronics brand owned by the Turkish conglomerate, Koc Holding.

The 34-year-old said: 'I heard Walter scream so I quickly picked him up and when I touched the glass it was boiling hot - it burned the palm of Walter's right hand and the fingertips on his left.

'Wayne and I rushed him to A&E because Walter's skin was so raw and exposed.

'It was a horrible time for all of us, but particularly distressing for Walter who was screaming in pain.'

The Beko WM74165W washing machine was running on a baby or toddler setting at the time, which extends the washing time and uses extra rinsing steps to wash youngster's clothes.

'Distressing': Walter, who was just seven months old at the time, screamed in pain after grabbing hold of the washing machine with his hand (pictured) to help him stand up

Heat testing documents show the glass should not reach more than 78.5 degrees.

The couple said the reason they are taking action against Beko is to try to stop other children from being injured.

Mrs Titmus said: 'We would like to stress that we don't want any other toddler to become injured as a result of hot glass reaching the same temperatures.

'All parents should be aware that their Beko washing machines can reach up to 98 degrees Celsius.

'Above all, we want Beko to admit liability to a faulty washing machine, to put warnings on the doors and for no other family to go through what we did.

Walter, now 15 months old, is still undergoing treatment for the burns and it's not yet clear whether he will be left with any permanent injuries.

Mrs Titmus said: 'When I complained to Beko they said it was an "unfortunate accident" and that there was no legal requirement to put a warning on the machine stating the glass will get that hot.

'They also said the "baby clothing" setting was an uncommon wash and they don't expect toddlers to touch the washing machine.

Mrs Titmus, 34, and her husband Wayne, 29, are now taking legal action against the domestic appliance and electronics brand owned by the Turkish conglomerate, Koc Holding

'I was simply brushed off, there was no apology or offer of a replacement - they didn't even come out to test it, as is protocol with many other washing machine companies when an accident has occurred, they just said there was nothing wrong.'

Associate Solicitor at Express Solicitors, Jonathan Flattery, who is representing the family, said: 'Walter suffered serious burns to his hands after only momentarily touching the washing machine glass.

'The family have shown the glass can reach temperatures of 98 degrees Celsius, well in excess of the manufacturer's maximum. We consider the glass should not have reached such high temperatures and inadequate safety warnings were provided.

'Consequently Walter suffered serious burns and we are concerned that it could happen to other children.'

A Beko spokesman told MailOnline: 'We take customer safety very seriously and always seek to establish the facts. Unfortunately, despite our requests the familys solicitor has not allowed us access to the washing machine to enable us to carry out testing.

'They have also failed to provide any evidence to support their claim that the washing machine door reached 98 degrees Celsius, or any medical evidence of the injury to Walter. As a result, it is difficult for to move forward with the family in this matter or us to provide any further comment on this issue.'

But Mr Flattery responded to Beko's comment, and said: 'In product liability cases it is unusual for the claimant agreeing to send the product to the defendant for testing. In our experience when this has happened items have got lost or have been returned in a markedly different condition which would prevent the claimant obtaining further evidence.

'To prove the nature and extent of the injuries we will be obtaining an independent medical report following examination of the claimant. Now Beko have denied liability, we will now be obtaining this evidence.'
A police officer shot dead his wife and two young children at a French railway station today before turning his pistol on himself.

The bloodbath took place at Noyon, 70 miles north of Paris, after the unnamed man 'snapped' while standing on a platform, soon after 11am.

Virginie Girard, the local prosecutor, confirmed: 'The perpetrator of these murders is a police officer assigned to the police headquarters in Paris.

'He could not take it when his wife said she was going to leave him.'

An armed police officer stands outside Noyon train station in northern France where a police officer has shot dead his wife and two children aged between three and five

A witness has described hearing four gunshots as he made up the stairs of a platform at Noyon train station, northern France

A forensic police officer works in a cordoned-off safety perimeter set by Gendarmes as police investigate the crime scene

A cordoned-off perimeter set by Gendarmes is pictured on a platform of the railway station where the shooting took place this morning

Ms Girard confirmed there were 'four deaths - two children and their parents', who all died at the scene.

She ruled out terrorism, saying the incident was being investigated as a 'domestic drama', involving suicide.

The twin of the dead five-year-old survived the attack, along with their two other siblings, who stayed with extended family.

'There was the sound of automatic gunfire, and then the man was standing over his family,' said a source close to the case.

'He seemed to have snapped before the attack, and when it was over he shot himself so as to commit suicide.'

Another witness told local media: 'I climbed the stairs leading to the platforms when I heard shots.

'I saw four bodies on the ground. I then took a little girl with me to put her in safety.

'There was a black automatic pistol on the ground. With a passerby, we ran. I was afraid that the man on the ground would wake up and start shooting again.'

Police cordoned off Noyon train station in Oise after the policeman opened fire on his family soon after 11am today

The gunman committed suicide after killing his wife and two of his children. The other three survived the attack. Public prosecutor Virginie Girard confirmed he was an officer working in Paris

The shooting took place at Noyon train station in the northern French town of Oise

This afternoon the station had been shut down as forensics officers combed the crime scene for clues. No trains were stopping.

The couple, from the greater Paris area, had been heard arguing earlier in the morning, with gendarmes called to their home.

The wife was then seen by neighbours taking their five young children to stay with family in Guiscard, north of Noyon.

They were pursued by the policeman husband, who was trying to take the whole family back to Paris just before the shootings.

The policeman is believed to have killed his wife after she told him she was going to leave him

The unnamed man 'snapped' while standing on a platform, soon after 11am at the railway station 70 miles north of Paris

A third adult, who was standing next to the couple during the incident, was seen running away, and gendarmes were still looking for him on Sunday evening.

He is believed to have been a neighbour of the couple who had agreed to 'look after' the wife and children as they tried to escape the husband.

French police and the military regularly report suicides by officers using service weapons, and have made repeated efforts to stop such tragedies.

All those using guns are subject to regular psychological assessments, and efforts are made to stop ammunition being stored at home.

The family of four were shot dead on one of the train station's platforms, according to an eye-witness
A couple reenacted their wedding day for the bride's 'loveable' grandmother who was too sick to make it.

Newlyweds Samantha and Craig Stacey surprised Emmy Hall, 89, with a second ceremony at her hospital ward on August 14 this year.

Chairs were arranged into an aisle for the couple to walk down again and a chaplain was drafted in so Emmy could give the couple her blessings.

Great grandmother Emmy even donned the same outfit she would have worn to the wedding - a royal blue chiffon dress.

Samantha Stacey at Doncaster Royal Infirmary, South Yorkshire with grandmother Emmy Hall, 89, who was surprised with a second ceremony

Sadly, Emmy died from natural causes just a day later at Doncaster Royal Infirmary, South Yorkshire, which was described by family as a 'shocking but beautiful end'.

And Emmy's daughter Joyce Hall, Samantha's mother, is convinced the pensioner 'hung on' just in time so she could see her beloved granddaughter tie the knot.

She said: 'It was very nice and very emotional,' her daughter, and Samantha's mother.

Grandmother-of-seven Emmy was rushed to hospital after a fall and doctors said she would not be well enough to attend the church  so they brought it to her

'Mum did get to see Sam in her wedding dress.

Sam and Craig got engaged in October last year while on holiday in Cyprus after being together for five years.

They originally planned to get married in 2018 but Samantha was determined for her ageing grandmother to attend so brought the date forward to August 13.

But grandmother-of-seven Emmy was rushed to hospital after a fall 10 days before and doctors said she would not be well enough to attend the church.

'Mum started forgetting things, we noticed she was doing silly things like putting toast in the toaster and leaving it and I started looking after her as well as working a full-time job.

'It got too much so Sam stepped in, she was only 17 at the time, but it's a big thing to do for such a young person.

Joining the happy couple were five bridesmaids, the best man, Samantha's brother Peter who was the ring bearer and her mother Joyce Hall, 58

'She looked after her for 18 months but it got to the point where my mum needed to go into a home.

'Sam then decided to go into the care profession where she is now a coordinator for a local company.

The family wanted to thank the ward staff who nursed Emmy and took a collection on the night of the wedding

'When her and Craig decided to get married, he proposed last October while they were on holiday in Cyprus and they initially set a date for the wedding in 2018.

'Mum would have been 90 in November and Sam said to me that she'd like her grandmother to be at her wedding.'

Joining the happy couple were five bridesmaids, the best man, Samantha's brother Peter who was the ring bearer and her mother Joyce Hall, 58.

Family from as far as Northern Ireland travelled to South Yorkshire for the funeral, at Rose Hill Crematorium in Doncaster.

German-born Emmy had lived at the Rock House Residential Home in Tickhill for the past five years.

She said her mum, who was widowed 19 years ago, met her dad Harry in Germany during the war.

The family wanted to thank the ward staff who nursed Emmy and took a collection on the night of the wedding.

They are planning to give the cash to the hospital staff.
Experts are calling for a boom in kangaroo consumption to help encourage people to kill the native animals.

The national kangaroo population is fast-approaching 50 million according to a government report, more than twice the human population of Australia.

And while they are regarded as a pest for their negative effects on land and the other animals that call it home, there hasn't been a big uptake in commercial hunting licenses for kangaroos - making it difficult to cull the marsupials.

Andrew Wall, who runs Langadoon Station, north east of Broken Hill, told the ABC it was difficult to attract hunters to kill kangaroos because there was very little profit in it.

The kangaroo population of Australia is nearing 50 million, and experts are calling for an uptake in the consumption of the animal's meat

Culling licenses for kangaroos are available, but they are rarely applied for as there is little money in kangaroo meat

'If the [meat] prices aren't any good, the roo shooters aren't going to come out,' he said.

Last year, Mr Wall estimates only three per cent of the kangaroos that could have been culled were.

Associate Professor David Paton from the University of Adelaide told ABC if Australians ate more kangaroo, it might be easier to lower the numbers, as their carcasses would not be left to rot.

'If we're going to cull these animals we do it humanely, but we also perhaps should think about what we might use the animals that are killed for,' he said.

Professor David Lindenmayer from the Australian National University told the BBC 95 per cent of kangaroo carcasses are sent overseas, and 'it's a shame we don't eat more at home'.

He says roos produce less methane than cows, meaning they could prove to be a solid replacement for more traditional livestock if their popularity improved - and better for the environment.

There is just one issue, he said. 'In Australia, we don't like eating 'Skippy'.'

Kangaroos produce less methane than cows, and could be a viable replacement for traditional livestock if national tastes changed
A newlywed is lucky to be alive after she was bitten by a venomous spider on her honeymoon in Jamaica.

Victoria Ross, 32, was with her husband, company manager Brian, 33, when she was bit on the right leg by a 1cm-long brown recluse spider on July 4.

The account executive from Bingley, West Yorkshire, was left with an inflamed red raw leg covered in pus-filled boils and spent 13 days in hospital, where she was warned she might lose her leg.

Thankfully Ross, who could have died from the ordeal, is now in recovery but still faces further surgery on the grim injury.

Victoria Ross, of, West Yorkshire, was left with an inflamed leg covered in pus-filled boils and spent 13 days in hospital after being bit by a brown reclusive spider while on her honeymoon in Jamaica on July 4

Ross and her husband, Brian, flew to Lucea in Jamaica for their two-week stay at the luxury 250-a-night Grand Palladium Lady Hamilton Resort & Spa. On the last day, Ross was bitten by a brown recluse spider, also known as a violin spider, while she and Brian lay in bed

Ross said the holiday was 'absolutely amazing' but from now on she'll look into native spiders wherever she visits

She said: 'I am genuinely lucky to be alive after that horrific bite on my honeymoon to Jamaica. I had no idea that a tiny spider could cause so much damage.'

Ross and husband Brian got married at All Saints church, in Bingley, on June 17 in front of 125 of their closest friends and family.

Two days later the pair flew out to Lucea in Jamaica for their two-week stay at the luxury 250-a-night Grand Palladium Lady Hamilton Resort & Spa.

Ross said the holiday was 'absolutely amazing' and they went out on day trips and relaxed by the poolside or beach.

But on the last day, Ross was bitten by a brown recluse spider, also known as a violin spider, while she and Brian lay in bed.

She said: 'I woke up on the last day of our amazing honeymoon and noticed that I had a small bite on my leg.

Upon her return to the UK, Ross went straight to the doctor and was put on a four-week dose of antibiotics - but her leg only got worse

A week later, Ross was at work when she came down with cold shivers, a headache and vomiting. She was rushed to Airedale hospital A&E, in Keighley, and was told she was suffering from sepsis

Doctors feared that they would have no choice but to amputate the ghastly leg. Thankfully, she recovered and was able to keep her leg

'I thought nothing of it until I was on the plane back to the UK and was in searing agony.'

Ross went straight to the doctor and was put on a four-week dose of antibiotics.

She added: 'The wound had scabbed over, and so I didn't go back to the doctor because I thought it was healing.'

But a week later, Ross was at work when she came down with cold shivers, a headache and vomiting.

She was rushed to Airedale hospital A&E, in Keighley, and was told she was suffering from sepsis.

Ross was immediately admitted to the ward where she was treated with IV antibiotics and remained there for 13 days.

Doctors feared that they would have no choice but to amputate the ghastly leg.

Ross, who could have died from the ordeal, is now in recovery but still faces further surgery on the grim injury

When she was discharged from hospital, Ross was left wheelchair bound. It took a few more weeks before she could walk on crutches

Ross has been left unable to work while her leg heels, which is currently still red raw and bruised and may need surgery depending on how the tissue around the wound repairs

She said: 'I couldn't believe my honeymoon could have left me without a limb - or even killed me!

'My leg was vile, I could see that little blisters were forming on the surface of the skin and filling with fluid.

'One filled right up and then burst, it was absolutely disgusting. But ten hours later it filled with more puss. It looked like a zombie's leg from the Walking Dead.

'Doctors came around twice and said that they would need to amputate if I didn't improve soon. Thankfully they didn't have to and I still have my leg and my life.

'I don't know if it was more traumatic for me or Brian, but we certainly felt that our vows were being tested earlier than we expected.'

When she was discharged from hospital, Ross was left wheelchair bound. It took a few more weeks before she could walk on crutches.

Ross has been left unable to work while her leg heels, which is currently still red raw and bruised and may need surgery depending on how the tissue around the wound repairs.

Now, Ross says that if she ever travels again she'll be Googling the native spiders before she goes away.

She added: 'Next time I travel I'm not going anywhere there are poisonous spiders.'
Kellyanne Conway, current Counselor to President Donald Trump, has revealed what she told her daughters about voting for Trump, as opposed to Hillary Clinton, in the 2016 presidential election.

As part of a TIME feature called Firsts: Women Who Are Changing the World, Conway told the magazine: 'In explaining how I feel about one thing that Donald Trump said or did to my daughters, I would be remiss in not revealing the full conversation, which is also why mommy, who's a woman, did not support the first female presidential candidate of a major party.

'I would tell them that I respect very much that Secretary Clinton was running for president, and it showed that in this country, anybody can do anything if they set their mind to it.

'At the same time, I tried to explain to them that you could be excited for someone with whom you disagree and share in that moment in history as a proud American.'

Kellyanne Conway, 50, revealed to TIME what she told her daughters about supporting Donald Trump, rather than Hillary Clinton, in the 2016 presidential election

Conway, 50, is a former Republican pollster who led Donald Trump's presidential campaign and in the process became the first woman to run a successful presidential campaign.

The New Jersey native has three daughters: Claudia, Charlotte and Vanessa. She also has a son, who she told TIME has taken a keen interest in her polling career.

Conway, as a woman, has been criticized for her support of Trump, who has made derogatory comments about women.

Notably, in a 2005 Access Hollywood interview that was published by the Washington Post in October 2016, he told television host Billy Bush: 'When you're a star, they let you do it, you can do anything ... grab them by the p****.'

Conway told Fox News this July that Trump is a 'great boss for women'. She has previously elaborated on how she believes in deference to a superior. She does not, for example, refer to Trump as 'Donald'.

Conway also quoted Margaret Thatcher in considering her successful career in Washington during the TIME interview.

She said: 'My comfort level came in learning how to think like a man and to behave like a lady, and I hearken back to Margaret Thatcher where she said, "Being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to say you are, you probably are not."'

Conway ran Donald Trump's successful presidential campaign and currently serves as one of his counselors

Conway, pictured with her family at a Yankees game, told TIME: 'I respect very much that Secretary Clinton was running for president, and it showed that in this country, anybody can do anything if they set their mind to it...I tried to explain to them that you could be excited for someone with whom you disagree and share in that moment in history as a proud American'

Regarding Hillary Clinton, Conway previously told Glamour: 'I relish the idea of a female president in my lifetime. True feminism means you're strong and independent enough to stand on your own.'

She added: 'Im like many American women in that we say Hillary Clinton shares our agenda but not necessarily our life experience, our vision, or our values.'

Conway was profiled in the TIME series as 'The Adviser', and is listed as the first woman to have run a successful political campaign.

Other women profiled in the series include Hillary Clinton, 'The Nominee'; Oprah Winfrey, 'The Titan'; and Selena Gomez, 'The Tastemaker'.
Karl George (pictured) was among those stabbed

A man has been charged with attempted murder after three worshippers were hurt in church by the suspect who wielded a 'kitchen knife' in front of a horrified 150-strong Sunday service congregation.

One victim, 33, suffered a neck wound before two other members of the congregation at the New Jerusalem Apostolic Church in Aston, Birmingham, hurt their hands while restraining the attacker.

John Delahaye, 47, of Aston, has also been charged with two counts of wounding and possession of a bladed weapon, and will appear at Birmingham Magistrates' Court on Monday.

The church has named the victims as Karl George, Adam Brooks and Jorge George.

Minister Kevin Hutchinson said about 150 people were taking part in the New Jerusalem Apostolic Church's Sunday service shortly before 11am when 'a man with a knife stormed into our sanctuary'.

He said the attacker was challenged at the door by ushers and restrained.

He added: 'He drew out a large kitchen knife and was restrained by a number of members, about three. Three members were injured and were taken to hospital.

'The men in the church were able to restrain him until the police and paramedics came.'

Officers arrested a man, 46, at the New Jerusalem Apostolic Church (pictured) in Aston, Birmingham, on suspicion of attempted murder, after three of the congregation were hurt

Officers at the scene arrested a 46-year-old man on suspicion of attempted murder.

The man with the neck wound is now in a stable condition in hospital. His injuries are not thought to be life threatening.

A West Midlands Police spokesman said: 'Two people who helped restrain the offender were taken to hospital with minor hand injuries.

'Early indications suggest that the offender and victim knew each other and that this was a targeted attack.

'This is not believed to be a terrorism related incident.

A witness said: 'I was driving past because I wanted to go to the Office Warehouse opposite. I counted seven police cars and distressed worshippers.

The church has thanked its congregation (pictured in a similar service to today's stabbing on a Sunday in June) for the support it has received since the attack this morning

Minister Kevin Hutchinson (pictured giving a sermon at the church) said about 150 people were taking part in the New Jerusalem Apostolic Church's Sunday service when 'a man with a knife stormed into our sanctuary'

'First the rapid response came followed by two air ambulances. The air ambulance landed in the car park of the old Staples building. Police officers dressed in black were walking in and out of the building making sure it was secure.'

A police cordon was in place for much of the morning but has now been removed.

A statement on the church's Facebook page confirmed three worshippers had been knifed.

It said: 'Three members of our congregation were injured following a knife attack all of whom have been taken to hospital.

'The following individuals were injured - Elder Karl George, Adam Brooks and Jorge George. No injuries were life threatening.

The Birmingham-based branch of the church was set up in 2002 and is run by Bishop Melvin Brooks (pictured) and his wife Pastor Yvonne Brooks

'At this time we are restricting hospital visits to family only and we will keep you updated as regularly as possible.

'We would like to thank all of our members and friends that were with us this morning for your cooperation, bravery and support and thank everyone else for your prayers.'

The church follows the Pentecostal movement, which has a strong base in Nigerian communities.

The Birmingham-based branch was set up in 2002 and is run by Bishop Melvin Brooks and his wife Pastor Yvonne Brooks.
At least six people have died in violent rainstorms sweeping across Italy on Sunday, with the Tuscan city of Livorno taking the brunt of the flooding, fire services said.

Four people from the same family were found dead in a flooded house in the city, where 16 inches (40 centimetres) of rainfall in four hours transformed streets into rivers and washed away cars.

The dead were a four-year-old boy, his parents and his grandfather, all found in a basement apartment, local daily Il Tirreno said.

The grandfather, who lived on first floor, had managed to rescue a three-year-old girl from the basement but died when he went back to try and save a four-year-old boy, it said.

With six dead and others missing, locals are attempting to clean up in the aftermath of floods

At least six people have died in violent rainstorms sweeping across Italy on Sunday. The worst-hit region was the Tuscan city of Livorno

Buildings begin to disappear under water after rainstorms hit Livorno in Italy, causing flooding

Floods in Livorno, Italy, have left cars overturned as locals struggle with the aftermath of violent rainstorms

Four people from the same family were found dead in a flooded basement apartment in Livorno. The dead were a four-year-old boy, his parents and his grandfather

The grandfather, who lived on first floor, had managed to rescue a three-year-old girl from the basement but died when he went back to try and save a four-year-old boy. Pictured above, emergency services enter a home where bodies were found following the storm

People have died and property has been damaged after rainstorms in Italy

People salvage belongings as they empty a house in the Livorno area, flooded after heavy rain on Sunday

A fifth body was found in an area devastated by landslides, while a sixth was found in a nearby hilltop neighbourhood

A fifth body was found in an area devastated by landslides, while a sixth was found in a nearby hilltop neighbourhood.

A seventh person was killed in a road accident, though it was not yet clear whether it was due to the weather.

Two other people were still believed to be missing, the fire brigade said.

Rainstorms and flooding in Italy have left debris and damaged vehicles strewn across Livorno

The city has been described as 'on its knees' after flooding in Livorno, where locals are trying to cope with the aftermath of violent rainstorms

'The situation is very difficult, it's critical. The city is on its knees,' Livorno mayor Filippo Nogarin said.

He said the government had underestimated the danger, issuing a code orange alert for the region rather than red.

'We didn't expect this because the alert was orange. Then we woke up to this,' he said adding that the death toll 'may still rise' and could have been avoided entirely if they had known what was coming.

Rubble and household items lie strewn across the street after flooding in Livorno, Italy

Violent rainstorms have flooded the city of Livorno in Italy, where cars have been overturned and properties partly submerged

Cars are submerged in Livorno, Italy, after widespread rainstorms and flooding across the city

A seventh person was killed in a road accident, though it was not yet clear whether it was due to the weather. Two other people were still believed to be missing, the fire brigade said

Livorno mayor Filippo Nogarin said the government had underestimated the danger, issuing a code orange alert for the region rather than red

He said the government 'didn't expect' the storms to be as bad as they were, and warned that the death toll 'may still rise'

The storms come as Hurricane Irma ravages the Caribbean and Florida, and just days after Hurricane Harvey struck Texas and Louisiana. Devastating floods also struck Southeast Asia last week

Strong winds toppled trees and following the storms, many parked cars were nearly submerged by flood waters that also left streets clogged with mud

Nogarin appealed for volunteers to help the town, which has a population of about 170,000 and is a popular transit point for travelers catching ferries to the islands of Elba and Sardinia.

Italy's civil protection service said the code orange alert for Florence was still in place as the storms, which began in northern Italy overnight, swept down the country towards the south.

The central Italian city was hit by a storm during the night, leaving six dead and others missing

Over 200 millimetres of rain has fallen in Livorno, Italy, causing landslides and flooding

One family is reported to have died in the basement of a building after the flooding in Livorno

Landslides and flooding have devastated the central Italian city following violent rainfall

Underpasses were closed in parts of the capital Rome, and seven tube stations were shut due to flooding.

'What's happening in Rome right now is unheard of... with a storm unleashing chaos. Once more the city has proved itself to be completely unprepared for rain,' said Italian consumer association Codacons.

Coldiretti, Italy's main agricultural organisation, said the bad weather was aggravated by coming hard on the heels of a drought which had left the land drier than usual and unable to soak up the rains.

Nogarin appealed for volunteers to help the town, which has a population of about 170,000 and is a popular transit point for travelers catching ferries to the islands of Elba and Sardinia

Italy's civil protection service said the code orange alert for Florence was still in place as the storms, which began in northern Italy overnight, swept down the country towards the south. Pictured above, a partially submerged car in Livorno

People work to empty a home hit by floods in Livorno after heavy rain left the city ravaged with floods and landslides

A man piles wrecked furniture outside his home in the Livorno area, flooded after heavy rain on Sunday

Coldiretti, Italy's main agricultural organisation, said the bad weather was aggravated by coming hard on the heels of a drought which had left the land drier than usual and unable to soak up the rains

A police officer stands in a flooded crossing in Livorno, Italy. Six bodies have been found following the storms and two people are believed to still be missing

Rainfall in Tuscany in particular had been down 57 per cent this summer, it said.

'The tropicalisation of the climate is causing an increase in extreme weather events, with heat waves, heavy cloud bursts and violent hailstorms which are damaging the national agricultural production,' Coldiretti said.

It put the cost of the damage at over 14 billion euros ($16.8 billion) in the last ten years.

Train service was interrupted in parts of the Tuscan coastal area along the Tyrrhenian Sea.

In Rome, which until recently had suffered through 3 months of drought, the downpour quickly made streets resemble fast-moving streams and several subway stations were closed.

City Hall urged residents and visitors to go outside only for urgent reasons and to avoid parks after midmorning thunderstorms lashed Rome.

It warned that weather forecasts including the possibility of hailstorms and strong winds throughout the rest of Sunday and Monday.

In Rome, which until recently suffered through three and a half months of drought, the downpour made streets resemble fast-moving streams and several underground stations were closed. Pictured above, flooded streets in Livorno

City Hall urged residents and visitors to go outside only for urgent reasons and to avoid parks after midmorning thunderstorms lashed Rome. In Livorno (pictured above), residents are working to clean up the area

Officials warned that weather forecasts including the possibility of hailstorms and strong winds throughout the rest of Sunday and Monday

People are seen next to a damaged house, following floods in Livorno, Italy, on Saturday Rainfall in Tuscany in particular had been down 57 per cent this summer

The tropicalisation of the region has put the cost of the damage at over 14 billion euros ($16.8 billion) in the last ten years.
Donald Trump has retweeted condolences from Kellyanne Conway and Sean Hannity that lamented the death of Fox News host Eric Bolling's only son.

Eric Chase, 19, was the only child of Bolling, 54, and his wife, Adrienne. He died on Friday evening, just hours after his father had parted ways with the cable giant amid claims of sexual harassment.

Conway wrote on Saturday: 'Love and prayers for friends Adrienne & Eric Bolling. May Eric Chase know eternal peace.'

Hannity tweeted: '@ericbolling To my dear friend, please know we all love you, will be here for you and your family.'

Trump's Twitter feed has been dominated by news pertaining to Hurricane Irma as of late.

Other than the retweets, his last tweet not related to Irma was on September 7, when he tweeted about his visit to Saudi Arabia.

Donald Trump retweeted Kellyanne Conway and Sean Hannity after they expressed their condolences for Eric Bolling, who had just been fired by Fox news and whose son had just died. Trump's Twitter feed has otherwise been dominated by Hurricane Irma

Conway wrote: 'Love and prayers for friends Adrienne & Eric Bolling. May Eric Chase know eternal peace'

Hannity tweeted: '@ericbolling To my dear friend, please know we all love you, will be here for you and your family'

Bolling confirmed the tragic passing of the University of Colorado Boulder student on Saturday afternoon. In a tweet, he wrote that he and his wife were distraught.

'Adrienne and I are devastated by the loss of our beloved son Eric Chase last night. Details still unclear. Thoughts, prayers appreciated' wrote Bolling.

He also later tweeted authorities have told him that there were no signs of self-harm and that an autopsy will take place next week.

The shocking news was first reported in a tweet by journalist Yashar Ali, who also broke the story last month about alleged lewd texts sent by Bolling to female staff members at Fox News.

Bolling insists the allegations are false and has filed a $50million lawsuit against Ali.

'Very sad news, Eric Bollings son, who was only 19, died last night,' wrote Ali earlier on Saturday afternon. 'By all accounts, Eric was incredibly devoted to his son. Heartbreaking.'

Fox News released a statement on Saturday, saying: 'We are very saddened to hear of the passing of Eric Bolling's son.

'Eric Chase was a wonderful young man and our thoughts and prayers are with the entire Bolling family.'

Eric Chase (right), 19, the son of former Fox News host Eric Bolling (left), has passed away. The circumstances of his death are unclear

Confirmation: The tragic death of Eric and Adrienne Bolling's only son was confirmed by the former Fox news host in a tweet

Initial findings: Bolling later tweeted that his son's death did not appear to have been from self-harm

Eric Bolling's son Eric Chase is pictured here in 2015 before his prom. The caption from his father on the snap read 'My guy is growing up'

A source close to the Bolling family told DailyMail.com: It is believed he died Friday night. No doubt everything his father has been through lately has weighed heavily on his child

Chase (seen right with his father a November 2016 photograph) was attending school in Boulder, Colorado at the time of his death

Various journalists tweeted about the tragedy.

Don Lemon, a host on rival network CNN, tweeted: 'So awful. My heart goes out to Eric and his family.'

Andrew Kaczynski, a journalist with CNN's KFile unit, tweeted: 'This is very sad on a human level, regardless on what you thought of Eric. Thoughts for the family.'

Another former colleague of Bolling, Geraldo Rivera, tweeted: 'Gut-wrenching news about Eric Bolling's 19-year old only son Eric. Erica and I weep for the Bolling family This is horrible, our condolences.'

Katie Pavlich, a commentator who frequently appears on Fox News, tweeted: 'Overwhelmed by the news of Eric Bolling's son. How absolutely horrific and devastating.'

MSNBC host Joy Reid tweeted: 'This is incredibly sad. Just heartbreaking for this family. Deepest condolences.'

As of Saturday afternoon, there was no official confirmation as to the cause of death

Yashar Ali, a contributor to New York magazine and the Huffington Post, broke the news on Saturday that the 19-year-old son of former Fox News host Eric Bolling had died

Ali was the reporter who initially broke the story in Huffington Post last month about the alleged lewd texts sent by Bolling to colleagues at Fox News, resulting in an internal investigation

Another former colleague of Bolling, Geraldo Rivera, tweeted: 'Gut-wrenching news about Eric Bolling's 19-year old only son Eric. Erica and I weep for the Bolling family This is horrible, our condolences'

Don Lemon, a host on rival network CNN, tweeted: 'So awful. My heart goes out to Eric and his family'

Katie Pavlich, a commentator who frequently appears on Fox News, tweeted: 'Overwhelmed by the news of Eric Bolling's son. How absolutely horrific and devastating'

Andrew Kaczynski, a journalist with CNN's KFile unit, tweeted: 'This is very sad on a human level, regardless on what you thought of Eric. Thoughts for the family'

MSNBC host Joy Reid tweeted: 'This is incredibly sad. Just heartbreaking for this family. Deepest condolences'

Bolling and his wife, Adrienne (above together), have been married since 1997. They have one son together, Chase

The tragic death took place one day after it came to light that Bolling agreed to leave the network following an investigation into claims of sexual harassment.

Three of Bolling's colleagues claimed that he sent them unsolicited photos of male genitalia via text message.

The rising Fox News host was suspended during the investigation and left the network where he has anchored several different shows for the past 10 years.

'Fox News Channel is canceling The Specialists, and Eric Bolling and Fox have agreed to part ways amicably,' a network spokesperson told DailyMail.com.

'We thank Eric for his ten years of service to our loyal viewers and wish him the best of luck.'

After the allegations emerged back in August, Bolling had maintained his innocence and tweeted: 'I will continue to fight against these false smear attacks! THANK YOU FOR CONTINUED SUPPORT'.

The rising Fox News host was suspended during the investigation and will now leave the network where he has anchored several different shows for the past 10 years

After the news was announced that he was leaving Fox, Bolling tweeted: 'I will continue to fight against these false smear attacks! THANK YOU FOR CONTINUED SUPPORT'

The network began investigating Bolling, who is married, after two of the women who claimed to have received the photo worked with Bolling at Fox Business Network, while a third woman works at Fox News, Huffington Post reported.

The women all claim they did not solicit the messages and that they knew the message was from Bolling, who has been married to his wife since 1997, because they recognized the phone number from previous informal and work-related interactions.

The Huffington Post reported that the messages were sent several years ago on separate occasions.

After receiving the messages reportedly from Bolling, the women told their colleagues that they were deeply offended and upset.

One of the women replied to the 54-year-old anchor instructing him to never send her photos of male genitalia ever again; he reportedly did not respond.

A dozen sources told Huffington Post that at least two of Bolling's female colleagues at Fox Business and one at Fox News received the photos of male genitalia from Bolling.

The identities of the women have not been released to the public. Bolling had previously denied all allegations against him.

It was announced last month that Bolling is reportedly suing the Huffington Post reporter who broke the story claiming that he had sent several female co-workers lewd photos.

Ali tweeted last month that he is being personally sued by Bolling for $50 million in damages for the story which led to the Fox reporter's suspension on Saturday.

'It's important to note that Bolling's summons does not include HuffPost - he is coming after me personally. I'm a big boy...but very telling,' Ali tweeted on Wednesday.

'Not going to stop reporting on Eric Bolling or anyone else. I've had family members killed/jailed in Iran, a lawsuit isn't going to scare me,' he added, writing that he 'stand(s) by my reporting + will protect my sources.'

Bolling is represented by Michael Bowe - a lawyer from the same firm as Marc Kasowitz, President Trump's personal attorney until July.

The defamation lawsuit seeks $50 million in damages for 'the defendant's efforts to injure the plaintiff's reputation through the intentional and/or highly reckless publication of actionable false and misleading statements about the plaintiff's conduct and character.

'As a result of the defendant's actions, the plaintiff has been substantially harmed,' the summons sent to Ali stated.

Since the allegations emerged against Bolling, a Fox News guest, who claimed in the past she was sexually harassed by Bill O'Reilly, came forward to claim she was also on the receiving end of unwanted advances by Bolling.

Since the allegations emerged, Caroline Heldman (above), a Fox News guest, who says she was sexually harassed by Bill O'Reilly, came forward to claim she was also on the receiving end of unwanted advances by Bolling

Heldman claims she was the victim of unsolicited sexual advances from Bolling between 2008 and 2011 when she would regularly appear on the network. During a 2011 appearance on Bolling's show Bulls & Bears, he referred to her as 'the great Dr. McHottie' (above)

Caroline Heldman, a 44-year-old Associate Professor of Politics at Occidental College in Los Angeles, made 'hundreds' of appearances on Fox between 2008 and 2011, many of which were on Bolling's show Bulls & Bears.

Between appearances, she claimed Bolling, 54, called and texted her to invite her to New York to 'have fun'. On one occasion when she was in town, he took her into his office and told her it was his favorite place to have sex, she said.

He called her 'Dr. McHottie' on air and, she said, would sometimes call her afterwards to apologize 'and then do it again'.

Heldman made her accusations in a lengthy Facebook post on Saturday in which she also claimed that 'several other women' received similar treatment from him.

'My only surprise is that it took this long for people to come forward about Bolling's behavior, which has been wildly inappropriate for years,' she wrote.

Bolling denies ever making inappropriate and unsolicited contact with her.

Heldman made the accusations in a lengthy Facebook post after Bolling was suspended

His attorney Michael Bowe told DailyMail.com: 'Mr. Bolling never had any interactions with Ms. Heldman of a sexual nature, and any such accusation would be false and defamatory.'

The father-of-one co-hosted the Fox News show The Specialists and hosted Cashin' In.

His show The Specialist only just premiered in May. He previously served as one of five anchors on the network's show, The Five.

Prior to joining the network in 2008, Bolling worked at CNBC and was a former commodities trader.

In the past year, the network has faced numerous accusations of sexual harassment and assault by Fox Business and Fox News on-air talent and executives.

Former Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes resigned last year after ex-Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson filed a lawsuit accusing him of sexual harassment.

Numerous current and former Fox News hosts have accused Ailes of harassment since he was forced out of the company.

Twenty-First Century Fox paid out $50million to settle sexual harassment and discrimination lawsuits at Fox News in the last 12 months.

The figure was disclosed in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Royal Marines have started its aid relief operation in the Caribbean helping islanders get back on their feet after the devastating damage of Hurricane Irma.

British troops will use Barbados as their distributing hub as medical reserves, emergency shelter kits, rations and clean water are delivered to nearby countries.

Almost 300 Marines landed in Grantley Adams International Airport in the south of Barbados this morning and started unloading their supplies.

A further 200 personnel were sent out as their colleagues arrived on the island and are expected to land this evening.

A huge piece of machinery is used to drag the massive amount of supplies from the plane

A Royal Marine (pictured) hands out water to a shop owner in Tortola, British Virgin Islands. British troops have been deployed on the streets to restore order after reports of looting

Military personnel unload aid cargo and water upon their arrival at Grantley Adams International Airport, Barbados

The imposing new RAF A400M on the ground in Barbados as troops unload the cargo bound for the affected islands

Police Commissioner, Michael Matthews, briefing Alpha Coy of 40 Commando on the current situation across the islands

As the storm continued to roar north into mainland Florida, goods from UK is being flown to the areas worst affected by Irma following a 32 million pledge from the British Government.

The death toll from Irma has risen to 23 - with a further four people believed to have died on the British Virgin Islands and three in Florida.

A spokesman for the Ministry of Defence said aircraft carrying around 300 personnel, made up of engineers, marines and medical specialists, will take rations and medical supplies to places affected including Barbados and the British Virgin Islands.

Officials said it has been difficult to gauge the extent of the damage because communication lines have gone down

But the Department for International Development (Dfid) has sent advisers to the area to assess the wreckage.

More than 200 Royal Marines, along with engineers, specialists, medical supplies, and aid, including emergency shelter kits, rations and clean water, have been flown out to the region.

The Prime Minister also sought to give assurances to the British territories that the Government's support would include a focus on long-term rebuilding.

She said: 'I give them this commitment  I recognise that our immediate concern is ensuring the support is there and every effort is there as this hurricane is devastating these islands, but at the Cobra today I also ensured that a piece of work was being put in place, already started, on long-term planning.'

The huge RAF A400M sits on the tarmac at Grantley Adams International Airport in Barbados

Alpha Company being briefed in Barbados before onwards travel to the British Virgin Islands

Royal Marines pile out of the RAF A400M which landed in Barbados this morning in the wake of Hurricane Irma

Royal Marine Commandos from 40 Commando conducting patrols with the local police force in Tortola, British Virgin Islands, before hurricane Jose is due to make land fall on the islands

Commando Royal Marines on the runway in the new RAF A400M as they to fly into the British Virgin Islands

RFA Mounts Bay has helped to restore power and communications as well as clear the airport runway in Anguilla, and will next provide relief in the British Virgin Islands, Dfid said.

HMS Ocean is due to take equipment and aid supplies from Gibraltar to the Caribbean on Monday.

Members of 24 Commando Royal Engineers were pictured landing in the British Virgin Islands this morning after landing in an RAF C17 plane.

Mounts Bay's Commanding Officer Capt Stephen Norris RFA said last night: 'My people worked tirelessly throughout the day with determination and flexibility to support the Governor and the people of Anguilla.

'Although Anguilla suffered extensive damage, normal signs of life were returning - some roads open and the local population beginning a recovery and clear-up operation.'

Members of 24 Commando Royal Engineers were pictured landing in the British Virgin Islands this morning after landing in an RAF C17 plane

The Chinook helicopter was loaded with equipment ahead of its meeting with the HMS Ocean task group, which will provide aid to the Caribbean

HMS Ocean is due to take equipment and aid supplies from Gibraltar to the Caribbean on Monday. Pictured: Royal Engineers arriving with aid today

Medical supplies and other aid are being flown from the UK to the areas worst affected by Irma following a 32 million pledge from the British Government

Buckingham Palace said the Queen will be making a significant personal donation to the Hurricane Irma appeal organised by the British Red Cross.

The government of the Turks and Caicos Islands, which were 'pummelled' overnight, declared a national shutdown as the hurricane continued its destructive path towards America.

Forecasters said another storm - Hurricane Jose - could affect already-hit areas with the British Virgin Islands on tropical storm watch, and the Commonwealth islands of Barbuda and Antigua and British territory of Anguilla on hurricane watch.

The British Virgin Islands, which saw houses reduced to their foundations and many roads impassable in the wake of Irma, has already declared a state of emergency.

Buckingham Palace said even the Queen will be making a significant personal donation to the Hurricane Irma appeal organised by the British Red Cross. Pictured: Royal Engineers in the British Virgin Islands

Theresa May's spokeswoman dismissed criticism that the UK lagged behind France and the Netherlands in taking care of its territories in the path of the hurricane

Images posted on social media showed entire structures razed to the ground, with debris scattered across the streets.

There has been criticism of the Government's response to Irma, the most powerful hurricane ever to hit the Atlantic, with some saying more should have been done to prepare for the devastation.

Labour MP Virendra Sharma, who sits on the International Development Committee, said there had been a 'lack of vision and lack of proper response', despite indications the hurricane was coming.

But Theresa May's spokeswoman dismissed criticism that the UK lagged behind France and the Netherlands in taking care of its territories in the path of the hurricane.

Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has pledged to be there 'in the long term' for British people whose Caribbean homes have been devastated by Hurricane Irma.

Brushing aside critics he said there had been an unprecedented effort from the UK to meet what had been an 'unprecedented catastrophe in that part of the Caribbean'.

RAF Oldiham personnel loading equipment in the Chinook as part of Op Ruman

As the hurricane sweeps through the Caribbean, the RAF load equipment as part of an aid mission

He said, in addition to the 32 million already set aside following the disaster, the Government would be matching public donations to the Red Cross appeal.

Returning from the latest of a series of emergency Cobra meetings, the Conservative Minister said: 'This is just the beginning.

'A terrible thing has happened to British overseas territories.

'These are British people and we are here for the long term and we will come through with a recovery plan working with our partners in the region.

'We will come through with a recovery plan for those islands and make sure they get back on their feet again.'

Responding directly to criticism the UK relief effort has been insufficient he said: 'Well I would say that's completely wrong.

'RFA Mounts Bay was in the region for a specific need and.... that is exactly the right type of boat to have in the region.

'Other countries actually now been asking us for help including the French, we've got three planes going out today, it's an unprecedented effort by the UK to meet what has been an unprecedented catastrophe in that part of the Caribbean.

Aftermath: The hurricane has so far killed at least 24 people across the Caribbean and laid waste to vast areas. Pictured: The British Virgin Islands

Hurricane Irma smashed into the British Virgin Islands as a Category 5 storm before weakening to a Category 4 storm

'But I've absolutely no doubt that we can face up to the challenge, we can deliver the help that those islanders need, we are seeing some signs of improvement, things are getting better on BVI, we've now got to make sure Anguilla gets the help it needs.'

Irma has claimed at least 20 lives, including at least four in the British Virgin Islands and one each on Anguilla and Barbuda, and left thousands of people homeless when it smashed into the region on Wednesday.

Having battered the north coast of Cuba, the storm reached Florida with Britons in the historic storm's path being warned their situation may 'deteriorate significantly'.

The Government is working with the US authorities to ensure 'everything can be done' before the storm arrives, she said.

Meanwhile around 200 British police officers will be deployed as part of the efforts to step up support to the Caribbean islands left devastated by Hurricane Irma.

Almost 300 military personnel have left the UK as part of Operation Ruman to help with governance and reassurance, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) said.

The NPCC announced that British officers will provide support to the British Virgin Islands force as part of the relief effort.

Paradise lost: This car was flipped on its side in the British Virgin Islands and almost completely destroyed by the devastating winds of Hurricane Irma

It said two members of the UK police cadre, who support the military in times of international crisis, flew out yesterday, while a further 53 British officers from 14 police forces are due to leave from RAF Brize Norton in co-operation with the MoD.

The officers will support the local police force to maintain law and order, as well as helping to find missing people, including British nationals, the NPCC explained.

The organisation's lead for international policing, Chief Constable Andy Marsh, said: 'We received offers of support from officers across the country as soon as this crisis began.

'These officers, and the many others who volunteered, signify our commitment to help those in need and humanitarian instinct of the British police force, no matter where in the world.'

Wreckage: Many boats on the British Virgin Islands have been destroyed by the storm

Irma was first classified as a tropical storm on August 30 and rapidly intensified over the following days. Winds reached a peak of 130mph but soon became the strongest for more than a decade when sustained winds peaked at 185mph.

Thousands of British tourists believed to be in the Caribbean have been warned to follow evacuation orders while some have been advised to stay in their hotel rooms.

Holiday firms said they are monitoring the situation and some have cancelled flights or offered to amend bookings for those due to travel to affected areas in the coming days.

Hurricane Irma's trail of destruction

An emergency hotline for those affected by Hurricane Irma is available.



For our latest travel advice, please see: https://t.co/uIAh397pT0 pic.twitter.com/ZkWbJy0Kdg  Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (@FCDOGovUK) September 8, 2017

In Fort Lauderdale, Erik Petersen, 40, described the atmosphere as 'pretty tense'  adding that there was much more worry than last year, when the Sunshine State braced itself for Hurricane Matthew.

The dual American-British citizen told the Press Association: 'People aren't just talking about this as a hurricane, they're talking about it as the hurricane.

'I've had a few people ask if I'm considering going somewhere else in Florida, but this thing's the size of Texas. Roads are clogged, hotels are full, gas is running low. I'd rather face this thing in a house in Fort Lauderdale than in a car in a traffic jam somewhere outside Orlando.'

The Foreign Office has set up a hotline for people affected by the disaster and for people whose loved ones may be affected, on 020 7008 0000.
Marvell Parkinson, 18, (pictured) and a 17-year-old boy were arrested by Polk County Sheriff's Office for burglarizing an empty Lake Wales, Florida, home

Two teenagers were arrested for breaking into a home after its residents evacuated to escape Hurricane Irma, making for three people who have been detained for such acts in Florida so far.

Marvell Parkinson, 18, and a 17-year-old boy were arrested by Polk County Sheriff's Office for burglarizing an empty Lake Wales, Florida, home.

A witness noticed that two suspects were at the back of her neighbor's home on Friday around 1.45pm on Beverly Drive.

They ran when they noticed her but were taken into custody.

According to the deputies, the 17-year-old suspect had a window punch in his pocket.

He told them that they had walked through the neighborhood until they located a house that had not been boarded up.

Entering the home through the back door, they stole a set of keys and the younger boy opened the garage door for his accomplice.

Parkinson allegedly then tried to use the keys to steal a 2001 Dodge Intrepid but the battery was dead.

Two people were arrested for burglarizing a home after its residents evacuated ahead of Hurricane Irma, deputies said.

A witness noticed that two suspects were at the back of her neighbor's home on Friday around 1.45pm on Beverly Drive. They ran when they noticed her but were taken into custody

'We want everyone to be safe during the hurricane. And we will not tolerate thieves taking advantage of those evacuating their homes. Looters need to be prepared to go to jail if they try to take advantage of people during a state of emergency,' said Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd in a press release.

Both suspects have criminal histories, including burglary, grand theft and possession of marijuana.

They join 30-year-old Keith Adams who was caught burglarizing Atlantic Hardscapes in St. Lucie on Saturday

They face multiple charges including burglary of an occupied dwelling during a state of emergency, resisting arrest without violence and unarmed burglary of a residence.

Parkinson was additionally charged with contributing to the delinquency of a minor.

They join 30-year-old Keith Adams who was caught burglarizing Atlantic Hardscapes in St. Lucie on Saturday.

A member of the St. Lucie County Sheriff's Office was patrolling shuttered homes along North U.S. 1 when he spotted Adams.

'I have said over and over that we will not tolerate looting or price gouging,' said Sheriff Ken J. Mascara.

'We have deputies actively patrolling the county, including our beach communities, to ensure the safety and security of your homes and businesses.

'If you think you are going to take advantage of these evacuated properties, be prepared to spend the storm at the county jail.'
Eileen Hall at the Los Tayos site in Ecuador

They were an extraordinary band of explorers  on a quest that was, literally, out of this world.

In 1976, an unknown engineer from a small town in Scotland teamed up with Neil Armstrong, the astronaut whose small step just a few years earlier had first put mankind on the Moon.

Fighting through the dense jungles of South America, the unlikely pair were seeking an even more unlikely goal: a remote cave system where, legend had it, they would find a trove of ancient mystical texts written on gold  and conclusive proof that aliens had once visited the Earth.

The story of their bizarre search has remained largely untold for 40 years.

But now the daughter of Stan Hall, who led the expedition, has shone new light on what is surely one of the most unusual expeditions ever undertaken by a Scottish explorer.

Whats more, 31-year-old Eileen Hall, an architectural assistant based in Edinburgh, is now planning to retrace her fathers footsteps through the Andes aiming finally to complete the extraordinary quest he began more than four decades ago.

Speaking exclusively to The Scottish Mail on Sunday from Quito, the capital of Ecuador, she said last week: I am determined, in my lifetime, to get to the bottom of what my father and Neil Armstrong started all those years ago.

It has huge potential in so many fields and disciplines if my fathers research was correct

The expedition members found out just how far you can push yourself, physically and psychologically. They pushed themselves right to the edge.

This place is utterly fascinating for all its mystery and magic  and it still remains largely undiscovered.

Nothing in Stan Halls background hinted that he would end up leading such a strange expedition. Born and raised in Dunbar, East Lothian, he enjoyed a conventional upbringing and trained as a civil engineer. As a young man in the 1960s he had what he claimed was an out of body experience that challenged his understanding of the world.

Ms Hall explained: Nothing in his early life pointed my dad, who had a scientific, analytical mind, to esoteric adventure. But he said that when he was 26 and living in Edinburgh, he had an experience of being immersed in white light. He said he was shown infinity and the inter- connection of this dimension and others.

About 12 years later, Mr Hall read a book called The Gold of the Gods by Swiss author Erich von Daniken.

Published in 1974, it outlined a theory that extraterrestrials visited the Earth in ancient times. The book included the testimony of a Hungarian explorer called Juan Moricz who claimed to have found a mysterious metal library of mystical texts, belonging to an ancient civilisation and supposedly written on gold.

Ecuador encounter: Neil Armstrong (left) seen with Stan Hall (right), was intrigued by the search for evidence of aliens from outer space

Moricz reportedly wrote: The subterranean world exists and inside its chambers I have found objects and records of great cultural and historical importance for mankind.

Inspired to discover the truth, Mr Hall made the extraordinary decision to travel to Ecuador and follow Moriczs directions to look for the treasure.

Even more extraordinary, he persuaded Neil Armstrong to join him on the quest.

In 1969, half a billion people around the world had watched in awe as Armstrong earned his place in history by becoming the first man to set foot on the Moon and uttering the immortal words: Thats one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.

After leaving a plaque on the Moon which stated: We came in peace for all mankind, Armstrong returned to Earth and  unlike his fellow astronauts  lived quietly and did not court publicity.

More than 40 years later, Ms Hall is still amazed that Armstrong not only replied to a letter from her father but enthusiastically agreed to join him on his quest.

Ms Hall said: My father just wrote on spec to Neil Armstrong. Neil was interested in what goes on in outer space and dad had read von Danikens book, which has some fairly out there theories in it. My dad himself had links to the Armstrong clan  his mother was an Armstrong  and mentioned it to Neil in his letter.

It was a shot in the dark but my dad wrote: We are organising this expedition to Ecuador, would you like to come?

To his surprise Armstrong replied: Yes, it would be an honour to join you.

Cave of mysteries: Eileen Hall at the Los Tayos site in Ecuador

Armstrong not only became a participant but also honorary president of the expedition, which won backing from scientists around the world as well as the Ecuadorian government.

Ms Hall added: Dad had never done an expedition before. But he was a planning engineer and a project manager. Thats why he thought he could manage it. The expedition was a British/Ecuadorian scientific and military endeavour. It had a broad remit covering archaeology, biology, and geology and involved professional cavers. It was initially designed to map out the cave system and establish a scientific framework for long-term investigation of the area.

The metal library was supposed to contain books made of gold-leaf and possibly an alloy. They were said to have links to the Sumerian civilisation, the first urbanised people of Mesopotamia.

IN 1976, the group travelled to the Morona-Santiago province on the northern slopes of the Cordillera del Condor, a mountain range that runs between Ecuador and Peru.

After battling through the jungle, they arrived at the Cave of the Tayos, in the San Miguel de Conchay parish, where Armstrong was greeted as a hero by the local Shuar tribe who knew of the Moon landings.

At the entrance to the caves, the two explorers abseiled into the darkness.

Mr Hall later wrote: The Honorary President [Armstrong] was to descend a 6-inch-wide wire ladder which was free-hanging 65 metres into the dark interior and explore many kilometres of these Andean Halls of Valhalla, accompanied by birds, bats, snakes, scorpions, tarantulas and rushing underground torrents, at times up to his neck in ice-cold water.

An entourage of civil and military personnel, including local Shuar elders, who had arranged a speech of welcome, wound slowly down the now well-worn pathway to the cave mouth. Armstrong calmly moved forward.

In 1969, half a billion people around the world had watched in awe as Armstrong earned his place in history by becoming the first man to set foot on the Moon and uttering the immortal words: Thats one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind

Once safely harnessed, he stepped unhesitatingly onto the swing-wire ladder and began to descend Everyone watched him make yet another small step for man and who knows, perhaps also for mankind!

Such steps only occur on sacred ground, certainly sacred at that moment to the silent, watching Shuar.

The symbolic similarity with his ladder descent onto the Moon was self-evident.

However, the teams hopes of making a remarkable find evaporated after a month when they realised the treasure cave was not where they expected to find it.

Ms Hall explained: They found the entrance to the caves, and they mapped about 16km of the underground system.

But sadly, it was all they could do with the resources they had and they were forced to retreat before they found the treasure.

Controversial writer whose star rose with Chariots of Gods Successful Swiss author Erich Anton Paul von Daniken is famous for claiming that aliens visited Earth in ancient times. His most famous book, the Chariots of the Gods  Was God an Astronaut? was published in 1968. In it, he argues that both science and history point to extraterrestrial intervention in human civilisation. He theorised that humans were the descendants of galactic pioneers  and claimed archaeological discoveries such as an alien astronaut preserved in a pyramid proved it. His website states: Individual people were not brought to heaven but rather trained in a spaceship. His books include Gods from Outer Space; The Gods Were Astronauts; Arrival of The Gods and History Is Wrong. One, Tomy and the Planet of Lies (2012), is described as: A novel story with strongly autobiographic traits. Now 82, von Daniken still gives lectures and makes regular television appearances on shows such as Ancient Aliens: Declassified. Next Sunday, he is due to sail from New York City with other authors on a commercial cruise trip. Cabins on the Ancient Alien Cruise cost from US $1,549 (1,170) upwards and guests will be treated to a series of seminars while at sea. However, Mr von Daniken is not without his critics. Perhaps the most high profile was the world-renowned cosmologist, NASA robotics expert and Cornell University Professor of Astronomy Carl Sagan, who died in 1996. Von Danikens website complains: In chorus with some others, Dr Carl Sagan denounced my work as worthless, pseudo-scientific nonsense that no sane scientist would take seriously. Advertisement

Their bitter disappointment was offset slightly when an Ecuadorian national came forward with a claim that as a young man, he had been to the cave and seen the treasure von Daniken described.

Mr Hall interviewed him and was so convinced by his testimony that they continued to search  but it was to no avail.

Despite their disappointment, Armstrong and Halls resolve and friendship endured.

They had similar backgrounds  they were both engineers and both had this Scottish ancestry, so they had lots to talk about, said Ms Hall.

Dad told me that although Neil was very private, he had said he was always interested in what went on behind our galaxy in space.

I think Neil Armstrong was as intrigued as my father that a lost civilisation placed this treasure in the cave.

To access this mystical landscape was another frontier in scientific exploration.

For Ms Hall, her fathers quest has been a lifelong fascination. With a new documentary on the expedition set to be released early next year, she is planning to try to complete his mission.

Ms Hall said she was still curious to understand why Armstrong agreed to take part.

She said: There are a lot of unanswered questions and I would love to make contact with the remaining Armstrong family to see if they can help with my understanding of what made Neil embark on the trip.

I have the original letter my dad sent him and some contact information.

BUT she will have to carry out her own search for the elusive relics without the main protagonists from the earlier expedition by her side to give advice.

Neil Armstrong passed away in 2012, and Ms Halls father died in 2008 while still working to have the cave region recognised as a World Heritage Site.

Undeterred, Ms Hall intends to return to the remote San Miguel district next year.

Describing her recent visit to the jungle for the documentary she said: It was absolutely incredible and I will be going back next year. I can see why Neil Armstrong said the expedition was as great as the Moon.

It was really quite dangerous and scary being out there. Some of the film crew I was with recently ended up in hospital with viruses.

They pushed themselves too much. We did not sleep much. It must have been much the same for participants of my fathers trip. The guy who organised my expedition is now mapping the caves in 3D and is also trying to have them recognised as a Unesco World Heritage Site.

But what of the mystery that lies at the heart of the quest  is there really evidence of alien life in the caves?

I believe the treasure cave exists, said Ms Hall. And I intend to do all I can to realise my fathers dream of finding it.
Hillary Clinton suggested attending Donald Trump's inauguration was a surreal experience and, like former President George W. Bush, she didn't think much of the president's speech.

'And so there I was, on the platform, feeling like an out-of-body experience,' she recalled to CBS Sunday Morning host Jane Pauley. 'And then his speech, which was a cry from the white nationalist gut  what an opportunity to say, "OK, I'm proud of my supporters, but I'm the president of all Americans."'

Clinton told Pauley in her first televised interview to promote her new book that Trump had missed that opportunity to bring the country together after a rough and tumble election season.

Bush, who was standing on the podium alongside Clinton, had reportedly called the inauguration 'some weird s**t.'

The former Democratic nominee took responsibility, and pointed fingers too, over the course of the interview, but to this day believes the 'basket of deplorables' comment she made about Trump supporters wasn't so bad.

'I don't buy that, I don't buy that,' Clinton responded when Pauley pointed out that she had offended some people.

CBS This Morning host Jane Pauley (left) sat down with former Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton (right) for the ex-presidential contenders first televised interview of her book tour

Hillary Clinton said she went to President Trump's (pictured) inauguration, as part of her duty of being a former first lady, but though his speech was a 'cry from the white nationalist gut'

Hillary Clinton (right) spoke to Jane Pauley (left) about what it was like attending President Donald Trump's inauguration as a former first lady

On September 9, 2016, Clinton was speaking at the LGBT for Hillary gala in New York when she lumped Trump's supporters into two 'baskets.'

'You know, to just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trump's supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right? The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic  you name it,' Clinton had said.

The other basket was filled with 'friends' who felt the government and the economy had let them down, Clinton explained, encouraging her supporters to bring those Trump supporters over to her side.

Looking back on it, Clinton said, 'I'm sorry I gave him a political gift of any kind.'

'It was a gift,' Pauley noted.

'But I don't think it was determinative,' Clinton argued.

She said the word 'deplorable' was floating around in her head because 'Trump was behaving in a deplorable manner.'

'I thought a lot of his appeals to voters were deplorable, I thought his behavior as we saw on the Access Hollywood tape was deplorable. And there were a large number of people who didn't care. It did not matter to them,' Clinton said. 'And he turned out to be a very effective reality TV star.'

So effective that his win still seems to shock Clinton, 10 months after election night.

'I think I am good,' Clinton answered when the CBS journalist asked her how she was.

'But that doesn't mean I'm complacent or resolved about what happened,' Clinton added. 'It still is very painful. It hurts a lot.'

Clinton answered no when asked if she had any inkling that the election's outcome might not be in her favor.

'I had not drafted a concession speech,' she admitted. 'I'd been working on a victory speech.'

Afterward she and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, packed up and went home to their Chappaqua, New York estate.

'I just felt this enormous letdown, just kind of loss of feeling and direction and sadness,' she said. 'And, you know, Bill just kept saying, "Oh, you know, that was a terrific speech," tryin' to just kinda bolster me a little bit.'

'Off I went into a frenzy of closet cleaning, and long walks in the woods, playing with my dogs, and, as I write  yoga, alternate nostril breathing, which I highly recommend, tryin' to calm myself down. And  you know, my share of Chardonnay,' Clinton admitted. 'It was a very hard transition. I really struggled, I couldn't feel, I couldn't think.'

'I was godsmacked, wiped out,' she said.

As 2017 approached, she had to decide whether or not to attend Trump's inauguration  not as the vanquished 2016 Democratic nominee, but because Clinton is a former first lady.

'It's part of the demonstration of the continuity of our government,' Clinton said, explaining why she'd gone.

While the former first lady, ex-senator and ex-secretary of state will be touring the country on her Hillary Clinton Live tour, as a way to promote her new book What Happened, as far as being a candidate, she says that she's done.

'As an active politician, it's over,' she told Pauley.

'I am done with being a candidate. But I am not done with politics because I literally believe that our country's future is at stake,' Clinton added.
More than a dozen daredevils in Miami risked death as they partied on the beach while Florida residents braced for Hurricane Irma's terrifying 130mph winds.

'F**k you, Irma!' yelled some of the 20 surfers as they drank beer, white wine and champagne on Miami's South Beach on Saturday.

But by the afternoon, the surfers retired to the beach after the water started churning like a 'washing machine,' George Granizo, 51, told the New York Post.

The group said they gathered on the beach to mark the one-year anniversary of the death of one of their friends, who had died while surfing.

More than a dozen daredevils in Miami risked death as they partied on the beach while Florida residents braced for Hurricane Irma's terrifying 130mph winds. Skateboarder Adam Todd (left and right) was spotted doing a handstand on Saturday ahead of the storm

Miami-Dade and Broward counties won't get sustained hurricane winds, only dangerous gusts, which won't be nearly as bad as expected. But forecasters said tropical storm winds may extend into Sunday night. Todd is pictured skateboarding with a woman on Saturday

Annie Tworog, 38, told the Post: 'We are related by the water  that sounds so cheesy. But we're all surfers, and our good friend died a year ago today so we're celebrating him.'

Miami-Dade and Broward counties won't get sustained hurricane winds, only dangerous gusts, which won't be nearly as bad as expected.

But forecasters said tropical storm winds may extend into Sunday night.

A tornado watch is in effect until at least noon. Two tornadoes touched ground Saturday in Oakland Park and Wilton Manors, and tornado warnings were briefly in effect Saturday night and early Sunday morning in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties, according to the Miami Herald.

Storm-surging seas are also predicted to hit the Miami area. Overnight from Saturday to Sunday, some streets had already flooded in downtown Miami and Miami Beach.

The National Weather Service issued a flood warning at 4.40am.

But despite the tornado watch and storm surge, Jona Cerwinske, told the Post that he believes they 'are being spared damage and destruction from the storm'.

'He is fending off Irma from us. He left us in the ocean while surfing,' Cerwinske said, speaking of the group's friend who died while surfing.

Meanwhile, Adam Todd, 43, was spotted doing a handstand while skateboarding down Ocean Drive.

'Doesn't make a lot of sense,' Todd admitted to the Post as he laughed it off.

Todd was seen skating down Fifth Street in Miami alongside another skateboarder. He even took a photo lying underneath a tree that had fallen in the area.

'Getting a bit breezy around here,' he wrote on Facebook.

Jona Cerwinske (pictured) posted photos and recorded himself walking around outside ahead of the storm on Saturday before meeting up with the group

Todd even took a photo lying underneath a tree (pictured) that had fallen in the area. 'Getting a bit breezy around here,' he wrote on Facebook

Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine announced on Sunday morning that he is unsure when it will be safe for residents of the Miami area to come back.

'We haven't made a determination yet when we feel it will be safe to come back to Miami Beach. At this point, absolutely not. We want no one to attempt to come back to Miami Beach and no one to leave their homes,' Levine said from his office.

Hurricane Irma made landfall on Florida, Sunday morning as it slammed into Key West, bringing sustained winds of 130mph, as well as rain and threats of tornadoes in what is expected to be one of the worst storms to hit the area in living memory.

The state thought it had escaped the worst case scenario as the storm moved into land and was downgraded to Category 3 - but late Saturday night it re-energized and was upgraded back to Category 4, the second-worst level, with gusts of up to 144mph.

So far, three people have been killed because of the storm.

One man was killed after tropical-storm-strength winds caused him to lose control of the truck he was driving through Monroe County. He had been carrying a generator, local officials said.

Two others died in a car accident in Hardee County, Florida, the Florida Highway Patrol said. The area is around 60 miles inland from Sarasota.
The chief inspector of schools in England has agreed to meet with a group of Muslim women who want the hijab banned from primary schools.

Amanda Spielman, Ofsted's head of inspections, says she will hear the concerns of Muslim campaigners who branded the garment 'an affront to gender equality.'

The activists are concerned that girls as young as five are being encouraged to wear the hijab by 'extremists'. The modesty covering is typically only worn after puberty.

Amanda Spielman, Ofsted's chief inspector, has agreed to meet with Muslim campaigners amid concerns that primary school children are being forced to wear hijabs

An Ofsted spokesman told the Sunday Times that, while the inspector recognises the right of schools to decide their own uniform code, 'we are looking at whether there is evidence that schools are facing external pressure to adapt their policies.'

In advance of the meeting, the group of eight campaigners - led by former Labour parliamentary candidate Amina Lone - wrote an open letter to the Times.

They accuse Britain of having 'an abysmal record' of protecting Muslim girls 'who suffer under the pretext of protecting religious freedoms'.

'We duck from robustly challenging issues such as female genital mutilation, child sexual exploitation and forced marriages,' they write.

'By turning a blind eye when our schools are being politicised, government contradicts itself when advocating more inclusion and cohesion.'

It comes after a Times investigation found that 18 per cent of 800 primary schools surveyed include the hijab in their uniform policy.

The proportions were significantly higher in areas of the UK with a high Muslim population, such as Birmingham and Tower Hamlets, in east London.

Aisha Ali-Khan, a Muslim feminist campaigner and a teacher for 13 years, told MailOnline: 'The hijab should be banned from primary schools but local authorities are afraid of causing offence to the Muslim community and afraid of being branded as racist.

'A headscarf or hijab, is usually worn by girls who have reached puberty, to prevent unwanted sexual advances from men.

Aisha Ali-Khan, a Muslim feminist campaigner and a teacher for 13 years, told MailOnline: 'The hijab should be banned from primary schools but local authorities are afraid of causing offence to the Muslim community and afraid of being branded as racist'

'How can a four or five year old child make an informed choice? It's not allowed in Islam so why is it being allowed in schools? You should only do something if you want to and understand the concept behind it.

'But the local authorities are too scared to go back and our government has allowed this to be part of the school policy and that's wrong. They are allowing decisions to be made by schools and local authorities which is worrying and they are trying to wash their hands of all responsibility.'

Gina Khan, a children's rights campaigner in Birmingham, added: 'Schools are allowing it because they are afraid of being called Islamophobic and they have been told that this is a religious garment - but they need to support Muslim girls to have free choices, not to be set apart from other children.'

Amina Lone, a Muslim former Labour parliamentary candidate, said: 'In an Islamic context, the hijab is commonly understood as being for females after they reach the age of puberty. There are very few Muslims who would say a child should be covered.'

Shaista Gohir, of the Muslim Women's Network, has previously said making young children wear the headscarf was as bad as children having spray tans and pole dancing lessons.

Ms Gohir said the hijab was designed to discourage sexual advances from men and enforcing it on young children could 'sexualise' them.

'We challenge parents who spray tan or give pole dancing classes to seven-year-olds, so we should be challenging Muslim parents who make young children wear the hijab,' she said.
John Ibrahim partied at a $4000-a-night Thai villa while his brothers Michael and Fadi allegedly discussed smuggling drugs into Australia.

The Kings Cross identity was reportedly with his brothers Michael and Fadi at the luxurious Thai Villa Baan Santisuk in November 2016 while the pair allegedly organised multimillion-dollar drug deals.

John Ibrahim was unaware of his brothers' alleged discussions organising multi-million-dollar drug deals.

Michael, 37, and Fadi Ibrahim, 43, were arrested on August 8 for their alleged roles in an $810 million drug ring spanning across Sydney, the Netherlands and Dubai. The brothers were two of 20 people arrested as part of the international police sting.

John Ibrahim (pictured) partied at a $4000-a-night Thai villa while his brothers Michael and Fadi allegedly discussed smuggling drugs into Australia

A mystery police informant known only as Male Witness 1 (MW1) reportedly told police he was with the Ibrahim brothers at the Thai villa when the drug deals were allegedly planned, The Daily Telegraph reported.

While Michael and Fadi have both been arrested for their alleged involvement in a drug syndicate, John Ibrahim, 47, has not been arrested nor charged with anything.

John Ibrahim's former business partner Mim Salvato, a nightclub owner, was also at the Thai villa, the publication reported.

The five-star Thai holiday was paid for with profits Michael Ibrahim made from an illegal tobacco importation scheme, the police allege.

Fadi Ibrahim (pictured with his wife Shayda) was reportedly at a Thai villa with his brothers Michael and John in November last year - before he was arrested for alleged involvement in drug deals

'Michael Ibrahim (pictured) expressed his desire to conduct more transactions of smuggled tobacco in the future as he gets a thrill from the 'shifty' sales,' a police statement claimed

'Michael Ibrahim expressed his desire to conduct more transactions of smuggled tobacco in the future as he gets a thrill from the 'shifty' sales,' a police statement claimed.

John Ibrahim reportedly flew to Phuket with alleged money launderer Jaron Chester, Mim Salvato and his two brothers on November 23 last year.

Double Bay real estate agent Ryan Watsford reportedly joined the group days later.

The group flew back to Sydney on December 2.

There is no suggestion Mr Watford or Mr Salvato had any knowledge of or were a party to any wrongdoing or criminal activity.

Charlotte Dawson, John Ibrahim and Chelsea Mitchell at the Jayson Brunsdon collection show in 2010

John Ibrahim (left) is seen with brother Michael (right), and friend Margaret Staltaro (centre)

When the group returned to Sydney, Michael Ibrahim reportedly used his brother John's luxury Sydney house as a meeting place with associates.

John's Dover Heights house, in Sydney's prestigious eastern suburbs, was reportedly home to an altercation between Michael Ibrahim and Ryan Watsford in May this year after a large sum of money went missing.

While not involved in the reported altercation, John Ibrahim allegedly called Mr Watsford that day requesting he go to his house.

'Shut up, don't say nothing, he's gone, come back to mine,' John reportedly said to Mr Watsford.

John's Dover Heights house (pictured) was reportedly home to altercations between some of the alleged members
Handbag designer Elle Tyree, 32 (pictured) conned investors out of 320,000

A handbag designer whose creations featured at London Fashion Week conned investors out of 320,000.

Elle Tyree, who was behind label Sophia Beckford, used the cash to fund a lavish lifestyle, including shopping sprees and hotels abroad, an 80,000 Range Rover and a Thames-side flat overlooking Tower Hill.

But the scam was investigated by the City of London Police fraud squad and Tyree, 32, was jailed for five years.

Tyree's love of fashion came from her lavish grandmother who introduced her to a world of luxury fur coats, expensive dresses, jewellery and handbags, according to the Sophia Beckford section of the Not Just A Label website, for upcoming designers to showcase their talent.

The fashion line was founded in 2011, toting bags with classic shapes but twists on the traditional use of fabrics and textiles and vibrant, contrasting colours.

Sophia Beckford favourites included sparkly spherical shoulder bags and stripy satin clutches as well as colourful accessories.

The Not Just A Label page says: 'Designer Elle Tyree's collections are always inspired by feelings of emotion and culture, representative of her journey in life with long stints of time in New York and China.'

But Tyree posed as a millionaire and convinced two finance companies they were financing orders for designer handbags, detectives discovered.

Tyree approached the first company in December 2015, requesting help to fill several orders with major international retail stores including Barneys and Saks. Tyree supplied them with copies of the customer orders and they agreed to finance her purchase and sales transactions and share the profits.

Detectives found Tyree, whose bags featured at London Fashion Week (file pics of LFW), posed as a millionaire to convince finance companies to finance orders for designer handbags

A model shows off a handbag Taka Naka (this is unrelated to fraudster Tyree) during their catwalk show at London Fashion Week in London

In July 2016, they spoke to Tyree, stating there had been no payment from the first set of invoices and that as such, they would not be providing her with further finance. Tyree then started to work with a second company.

They entered into an agreement with her on the premise that seven invoices from six companies totalling over 1.8 million had been sold to her.

On the strength of this, they forwarded more than 187,000 to her business account.

A day later more than 25,000 had been withdrawn from this account and transferred into an account in the name Miss Elle Tyree.

The payment dates for when the invoices should have been paid passed and the second finance company became suspicious that none of the companies had made any payments.

In October, they wrote to all the 'debtors', supplying a copy of their relevant invoice which had been provided to them by Tyree and asked them to make payment of the amounts due.

Following this, three of the six companies responded to them to state that the handbag range mentioned in the invoices was not known to them and that no such orders had been made.

Tyree was instructed by the second company's solicitors to provide the Royal Courts of Justice with details of her global assets, including copies of her bank account details.

After failing to do so, their solicitors went to HSBC bank directly, who supplied six months of Tyree's bank statements to them.

Elle Tyree, who was behind label Sophia Beckford, also used the cash to fund an 80,000 Range Rover (file pic) and a Thames-side flat overlooking Tower Hill in central London

But the statements that came from HSBC showed an entirely different set of circumstances than the ones presented to them by Tyree and it was clear that the ones she had supplied were fake.

It was discovered through a court procedure that the original material used by Tyree to secure the finance was entirely fabricated, at which point the City of London Police's Fraud Squad began an investigation.

Tyree was sentenced to five years after she was found guilty for two counts of fraud by false representation at Inner London Crown Court.

Detective Constable Stewart Walker, who led the investigation, said: 'The sentencing highlights the severity of this crime and the hard work of the Fraud Squad to ensure that Tyree did not go unpunished.

'Tyree abused her position as a fashion designer to deceive the victims who lost vast amounts of money to her.

'Her sentence reflects the manipulative, premeditated and complex fraud that she has been found guilty of.

'Let this serve as a warning to those thinking about committing financial crime; however complex and devious, you will be caught.'
A judge lifted on Saturday the one-year-old preventative probationary measures on four members of the Egyptian satirical performance troupe Atfal El-Shawaree (Street Children), their lawyer Amr Mohamed told Ahram Online on Sunday.

The four defendants were arrested in May 2016 on charges of "inciting protests that aim to disrupt peace and security and provoke violent crimes against state institutions."

Mohamed said that the prosecution's investigation into the band members was suspended last year, but the case was not officially closed.

The five-member group first gained popularity in 2016 for videos they posted online that mock societal norms and government policies.

In September 2016, the prosecution released the four on preventative probationary measures pending further investigation.

The probationary measures required the four to check in at police stations twice a week for two hours each time.

Local and international rights groups had called on Egypt's government to release the members of the group and drop the case against them.

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Liberal MP Nick Wakeling has rejected the extremist views held by his brother on social media.

On his public Facebook page Tim Wakeling can be seen calling himself a 'former head gas controller' and 'crematory supervisor' at Auschwitz.

But the Member for Ferntree Gully has spoken out against the views, saying he rejects them in the 'strongest' way, according to the Herald Sun.

Liberal MP Nick Wakeling (pictured) has rejected the extremist views held by his brother Tim on social media, such as references to the Holocaust

'I firmly reject the views and comments of my brother in the strongest possible way,' he told the publication.

He added: 'Unfortunately, my brother and I have very different values and views.'

Wakeling's Facebook page also bears several other crude references, including stating he went to the 'school of Holocaust denial'.

In addition, his profile picture depicts a photo of Rudolf Hess, a German politician and former deputy to Adolf Hitler.

Tim Wakeling's Facebook page bears several other crude references to the Holocaust, including a profile picture of Rudolf Hess, a German politician and former deputy to Adolf Hitler (pictured)

The page also sees him call himself a 'former head gas controller' and 'crematory supervisor' at Auschwitz

In comments made from the Facebook account, the 'nationalist' also threatened to allegedly 'bash' his MP brother if he did not scrap the Safe Schools program.

'I threatened him a while ago if he didn't do (axe Safe Schools) it I'd bash the f*** out of him,' he said in a comment.

'It's good to have a politician as a brother I can smash him for poor policy but get away with the brotherly love excuse.'

In June, MP Wakeling vowed to cut the program, claiming it was about 'pushing one persons radical-Marxist ideology onto other peoples children'.

'The Safe Schools name is so damaged in the Victorian community that parents no longer have any faith in the program and thats why it needs to be scrapped,' he said.
President Trump referred to Hurricane Irma as 'some big monster', but said 'we may have been a little bit lucky' as he returned to the White House from Camp David on Sunday.

He told reporters he was pleased with FEMA's response, and seemed relieved that the hurricane veered from it's normal path and headed west because he believes it could be less destructive.

'I think it's been going really well,' Trump said as he walked to the White House from Marine One, first lady Melania Trump at his side. 'It's a rough hurricane, as you [know] better than anybody.'

'I'll be going to Florida very soon,' Trump added.

'We may have been a little bit lucky in that it went on the west and it may not have been quite as destructive, but we're going to see,'

President Trump signed a disaster declaration for the state of Florida early Sunday night.

On his walk into the White House the president called the Coast Guard 'amazing' and FETA 'incredible,' as he said the White House and other agencies had been working 'very well' with Florida Gov. Rick Scott and the governors from surrounding states.

President Trump spoke to reporters about Hurricane Irma upon returning to the White House Sunday from Camp David

The White House sent out photos from President Trump hearing updates on Hurricane Irma alongside the Pences and his wife

President Trump called Hurricane Irma 'some big monster,' though applauded the efforts of FEMA and the Coast Guard

President Trump (left) arrived at the White House Sunday afternoon with first lady Melania Trump (right) at his side

Speaking to reporters outside the White House, President Trump (left), accompanied by first lady Melania Trump (right) pledged to visit Florida soon

President Trump (left) is photographed talking to reporters as he exits Marine One on Sunday afternoon, alongside first lady Melania Trump (right) who accompanied him to Camp David

Sporting sunglasses and a red button-down top, Melania Trump arrived back at the White House Sunday after a weekend at Camp David

The White House sent out photos from President Trump receiving a 'comprehensive update' on Hurricane Irma surrounded by (from left to right) Karen Pence, Vice President Mike Pence and first lady Melania Trump

A number of cabinet officials joined the Trumps and Pences this weekend at Camp David as Hurricane Irma ravaged Florida

Those gathered at Camp David also spoke with officials back at the White House and at FEMA as the president was updated on Hurricane Irma

Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Brock Long is photographed during a briefing Sunday on Hurricane Irma

Brock Long (left) was joined by Homeland Security Acting Secretary Elaine Duke (center) and Energy Secretary Rick Perry (right) Sunday at FEMA in Washington, D.C.

Waves crash over a seawall from Biscayne Bay as Hurricane Irma passes through Miami, Florida on Sunday. President Trump or his chief of staff have been in touch with the governor and the senators from the state

Fort Myers is seen as surf and winds begin to kick up in advance of Hurricane Irma, in Sanibel Island

Trump had spoken with the governors of Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina and Tennessee on Sunday morning.

On Sunday the White House said Trump had received a 'comprehensive update' on Hurricane Irma from the presidential retreat, Camp David.

Throughout the day, Irma has moved from the Florida Keys up the Western coast of the state, while Miami and other east coast areas have been affected because of the storm's wide nature.

Trump, Vice President Mike Pence and several Cabinet members have participated in the briefing from Camp David  the presidential retreat where Trump has spent the weekend monitoring the storm.

The White House listed OMB Director Mick Mulvaney, White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations Joe Hagin, Labor Secretary Alexander Acosta, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin as being at Camp David.

Other administration officials, including Chief of Staff John Kelly and Homeland Security Advisor Tom Bossert, joined in from the White House or Federal Emergency Management Agency headquarters in Washington.

The first lady and second lady Karen Pence were also on hand at the Maryland camp.

Pence and several Cabinet secretaries visited FEMA headquarters Sunday as well.

The White House said Trump had spoken to Scott and Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., 'numerous times' over the last week.

On Face the Nation Sunday, Rubio told host John Dickerson that he was riding out the storm from home in west Miami.

'It is a nasty, brutal storm,' Rubio said, speaking to the host by phone.

'We are going to get the sustained tropical storm winds. We are getting the gusts from hurricanes, tornado threats,' he added. 'It is going to get exponentially worse everywhere ... up the west coast of Florida.'

'If you live in Naples, in Fort Myers, in Sarasota, in the Tampa Bay region, this storm has the potential to be the sort of worse-case scenario that meteorologists and emergency planners dread,' the Republican warned.

Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders also noted that Trump's chief of staff Kelly had been in touch with Sen. Bill Nelson, the Democratic senator from the state.

The two talked Sunday morning.

Nelson also talked glowingly of the federal response Sunday morning on Face the Nation.

'It's been very good,' he told Dickerson. 'And there is cooperation between the federal level, the state and the locals.'

'That has been seamless cooperation, unlike 25 years ago in Hurricane Andrew, when you did not have cooperation, unlike even Katrina, when you didn't have the cooperation and the communication between the Louisiana National Guard and the US military.'

'That has been taken care of now,' Nelson said.
Barry Smith, who's taking over from Louise Jackson, has been brought in to urgently sort out the school and get it back on track

Pupils are being told to be in bed by 9pm every night and up at 6.30am in a tough crackdown launched at one of the country's worst schools.

Children have also been warned they face losing their mobiles for weeks, to walk in single file in corridors and that teachers are the 'unquestioned authority' at the Norfolk school.

And they're being told that they'll be given buckets to vomit in if they feel sick in class.

Furious mothers and fathers have already set up a group on Facebook called Yarmouth High Worried Parents after being outraged by the new get-tough crusade.

The hardline regime is being imposed as troubled Great Yarmouth High School in Norfolk became a Charter Academy last month after being taken over by the Inspiration Trust.

A new principal was drafted in after the failing school got some of the worst GCSE results in England and Wales in the summer - with just 30pc of pupils achieving a pass in English and maths.

Barry Smith, who's taking over from Louise Jackson, has been brought in to urgently sort out the school and get it back on track.

He is co-founder, and former deputy principal, at the notoriously strict Michaela Community School in Wembley Park, north-west London.

It has built up a reputation for being one of the toughest schools in the country.

Mr Smith has written a no-holds-barred letter to parents setting out his high expectations and standards.

And a series of behaviour rules at the school, which has about 1,000 pupils aged from 11-16, written in an internal document has been revealed.

They include confiscating phones if they are seen or heard until the end of the next half term - or, if they are taken in the last two weeks of any term, until the following half terms.

It means, the document says: 'If we confiscated your phone in the last two weeks of summer term we will keep your phone until mid-October.

'That's almost four months. If your phone accidentally goes off or accidentally falls out of your pocket we confiscate it.'

Pupils who hesitate to hand it over will be put in isolation. It also says that pupils must walk in 'single file' between lessons, not talking to other pupils or turning around.

Mr Smith has warned that traditional black school shoes in leather or leather-look material.

Furious mothers and fathers have already set up a group on Facebook called Yarmouth High Worried Parents after being outraged by the new get-tough crusade

He says in his letter: 'Children who do not meet our expectations regarding uniform and appearance will be placed in isolation.'

Mr Smith said: 'Your children will avoid detentions, isolations, or confiscations if you are a supportive parent.

'The responsibility lies with you.'

Elsewhere, the internal school memo tells pupils they must 'only ever look at your teacher or where your teacher has directed you to look' and that they must 'never get out of [their] chair without permission at Charter'.

It also warns students to not make excuses to get out of learning.

'You never lie and make excuses like, 'I just wanted to put something in the bin'.

'We all know children say things like that to get out of work.

Mr Smith's letter sent to parents Dear families, Great Yarmouth Charter Academy opened its doors to families on Wednesday, September 6. Charter is not Great Yarmouth High School. Great Yarmouth High School was a failing school where, too often, pupil indiscipline was commonplace and many parents simply did not support the school. In 2017 Great Yarmouth High School pupils had some of the worst GCSE results in the entire country. In a typical class of 30 pupils, 21 pupils left the school without even a pass in English and maths. Charter Academy is not Great Yarmouth High School. Charter Academy is a new school with a new headmaster. Charter Academy is a new member of the Inspiration Trust and, as such, has huge resources and expertise behind it. As the Headmaster of Charter Academy I cannot, I will not, allow the indiscipline, the disrespect, the failure, the bullying, the truancy and the lack of parental support, that were all a part of daily life at the former High School, to continue. Parents let down their children when parents fail to support their education. As a Charter parent you must support the school 100%. 99% just won~t do. At times you may think our approach inflexible, over strict, or unreasonable. But I ask that you trust us, and help your children succeed in ways you might never have imagined. My job, as Headmaster of Charter Academy, is to ensure that teachers and pupils have a safe environment free from abuse, in which they can excel. Your children~s job is to attend every day on time, follow all instructions first time every time, treat everyone they meet politely, and get the top grades they possibly can in everything they do. Your job is to support their school and their education. By supporting us you support your children. This could be the beginning of a whole new life full of possibilities for your children. To make that happen we need your 100% support. Below you will find a list of the most basic expectations at Charter. This is just the beginning. A lot more detail will follow. 1. Traditional black school shoes in leather or leather look material. Children who do not meet our expectations regarding uniform and appearance will be placed in isolation. 2. No mobile phones on the school site. If a phone is seen or heard it will be confiscated. 3. Girls may wear one small plain gold stud in each earlobe only. No other piercings. No retainers. If ear rings do not conform they will be confiscated. 4. No chewing gum on site. If found with chewing gum pupils will be placed in isolation. Your children will avoid detentions, isolations, or confiscations if you are a supportive parent. The responsibility lies with you. We have a huge task ahead of us, but with your support we can offer all pupils their best possible future and the greatest choices in life. Barry Smith Headmaster Great Yarmouth Charter Academy Advertisement

'You never pretend to be ill to get out of work because we expect you to work through it. If you feel sick we will give you a bucket. If you vomit - no problem! You've got your bucket.

'That's probably all your body wanted - to vomit. If you are really ill we will make sure you get all the attention you need.'

There are also instructions for pupils out of school, including 'as soon as you finish school you go straight home', a 9pm bedtime and a 6.30am alarm.

Teachers are referred to as the 'unquestioned authority' in the classroom.

The Inspiration Trust said the school had now developed a stricter approach - but that it was needed to drive up performance.

Spokesman James Goffin said: 'This summer Great Yarmouth High returned the lowest GCSE results in the county - and for many years has underperformed compared to other schools in the borough.

'We don't believe this is good enough and we don't believe it is because our pupils are any less able.

'What they need is the right environment to learn and succeed. Children can't learn in unruly classrooms.

'Charter has a stricter approach to things like behaviour and uniform so that everyone gets the chance to learn.'

He added: 'Our teachers cannot do this alone. We need families to back the school 100pc so pupils get a consistent message at home and in school.

'Unfortunately there has been a lot of rumour and inaccurate information spread on social media that has understandably concerned some parents and pupils.

'Mr Smith has already met with several parents individually.

'The academy will be holding a meeting for all parents in the coming days so they can hear first hand what Great Yarmouth Charter Academy is really all about.'

Angry parents have now gone on to Facebook to vent their rage, creating a public group called Yarmouth High Worried Parents.

The group branded the school's new policies 'army like' - and is staging a meeting for incensed parents on Thursday (September 14).

Anthony Finch, who is stepfather of a student at the school, said: 'My stepdaughter works hard, is an excellent student and has a great deal of potential.

'I am appalled to see her afraid to attend school.'

Mother Tracy Cole said: 'Love to know why my daughter was put in isolation today and made to cry on her first day back.

'I'm fuming, thing is she doesn't even know why she was put in there.'

Kerry Herod's daughter was apparently told retractable pens were not allowed in the school as they could be clicked and become distracting.

She's now battling to get her upset daughter transferred to a different school.

But other parents are backing the changes - and highlighted the turnaround of the Michaela School as it's been hailed 'outstanding' by education watchdog Ofsted.

One parent said their son, who has behaviour issues, had come out of school happy for the first time.

Cheryl Ann Gardin said: 'No parent wants to hear bad reviews about their kids but let's face it, our children aren't little angels in the home so you can bet your bottom dollar they're even worse at school.

'That school was a joke before and I'd bet money it's about to turn around for the better.'
Vicars are turning to karaoke in an attempt to muster a choir and an organist for Sunday services.

The trusty hymn books could well become a thing of the past with British church bosses looking to ditch them for projectors and big screens in a radical shift.

A licensing company responsible for giving churches the green light to install the modern systems said tens of thousands are in the process of moving to a karaoke-type system which can cost up to 50,000.

Vicars are turning to karaoke in an attempt to muster a choir and an organist for Sunday services

David Churchyard, operations manager at Christian Copyright Licensing International, told the Sunday Telegraph it now has 24,500 sites in the UK on its books, up from 20,300 in 2014.

Mosques and other temples are said to be investing in the modern systems, though it is not all plain sailing.

Recently St Mary and St Cuthbert's, a Grade I listed 9th century church in Chesterle-Street, Durham, had planning permission turned down.

Chiefs at the church wanted four 50inch screens on pillars, but the chancellor of the dioceses said they would cause 'serious harm to the visual and aesthetic character of the building and thus to its significance as a building of both architectural and historic interest'.

Boyd Breen, owner of AV Installs, said many found it cheaper to subscribe to a licensing service than buy hymnals.

There has always been technology in churches, its just developed now from more audio to visual as well, he added.

There are lots of hymn books published all the time and some churches buy new ones every year or few months, so its cheaper to subscribe. Its basically religious karaoke.

David Tully, the rector of the church, told the Telegraph he was 'disappointed', and added: 'We use a projector screen week by week in our main service anyway; we are trying to make things more accessible to people.

'It will inhibit a little bit of what we can do but we're trying to be positive about it all. Clearly there is a tension between a historical Grade I listed building and it functioning as a lively active church.'

Back in 2013, vicars started the trend of buying karaoke-like machines to play music during their services to solve the difficulty of finding an organist.

The 'electronic hymnals' have a vast repertoire of music and can play anything from traditional Songs Of Praise to a disco version of Amazing Grace.

With the new system, church-goers who struggle to remember the words can look up at a big screen displaying the lyrics in time with the music for help - just like real karaoke.

Declining talent: Churches are purchasing hymnals because of the difficulty of finding people who can play the organ

The hymnal is controlled from a small screen in the pulpit or lectern and vicars can pre-programme their playlist to match their services.

More adventurous parishes can add their own music from their iPods or MP3 Players to the system.

It has already proved exceptionally popular with churches around the country that have struggled to find organists.

And Martin Phelps, director of the Surrey based company Hymn Technology, said that the hymnal device is already helping churches to revive flagging congregations.

Talking back in 2013, he said: 'We help churches who cannot find people to and the organ, which is becoming increasingly difficult.

'Many of them have had the same organist for the last 60 years but when they retire, they have no one waiting in the wings to take their place.

'Many don't have pianos or other musicians but they want to continue singing in their services.

'A lot have tried CDs but you can't alter the songs, speed them up, or alter verses like you can with a hymnal.

'Hymnals can mix songs together, change the tempo and store at least 3,000 as standard.

'They have a lot of music already stored on the system that is suitable for weddings, christening, funerals - any church service really.'

Between 1950 and 1980 church attendance halved, and between 1980 and 2005 it halved again  down to 6.3 per cent of the population, according to Christian Research.

But Church of England cathedrals have fared a little better than churches on the whole and have seen a steady increase in attendance of 30 per cent from the turn of millennium to 2013 - a growth of approximately 3 per cent on average each year.

Around 15,900 adults and 2,200 children and young people usually attend Sunday Services around the country, according to the 2013 figures.

Mr Phelps claims that the hymnals have helped many congregations boost attendance at their services.

The Reverend Michael Hayes says the hymnal is only used when an organist isn't available

He added the hymnals cost between 2,000 and 3,000 but have become a vital piece of equipment for many churches.

He said: 'We've sold thousands in the UK and we've now started selling to America. We've also sold some to Africa and are exporting a few to Australia soon.

'They're helping many churches to keep the tradition of singing during services that they otherwise would struggle to do.'

The 15th century St Mary the Virgin church in Mudford, near Yeovil in Somerset, was one of the first to test out the hymnal.

The parish still has several organists but uses a hymnal called Music Plus when they are unavailable.

Reverend Michael Hayes said: 'We've used Music Plus for the five and a half years I've been here. We also have a music plus at one of my other churches.

'We still have our own organists on a rota so the system is only used when they are away or unavailable.

'It seems to be very easy to work and the congregation seem perfectly happy with it.

'The quality is very good. When I first heard it, I thought that a good organist had been recorded playing, but its actually all done electronically.

'So you do think it is real organist playing when it's on.

'We only use it once a month but it makes a big difference when we do. Otherwise there would be no singing or no singing with no assistance.

'It's also portable and we've used it a few times when we've visited homeless shelters or for carol services.
The Dalai Lama said he is an 'admirer of the EU' and called for a 'century of peace' on a visit to Northern Ireland.

The Tibetan spiritual leader, 82, has travelled to Londonderry for the 20th anniversary celebrations of charity Children in Crossfire.

During a talk at the Millennium Forum in Derry, he said: 'Our goal should be a century of peace, a century of dialogue based on a sense of oneness of seven billion human beings.

The Dalai Lama (pictured) is visiting Derry, Northern Ireland to celebrate the 20th anniversary of charity Children in Crossfire

Speaking at Derry's Millenium Forum he called for a 'century of peace' and said he was 'an admirer' of the European Union

The Tibetan spiritual leader, 82, also slammed global warming as a 'major disaster'

'We have to work together.'

He also said there was 'too much war, fear, distrust and anger' and branded global warming a 'major disaster'.

When asked about the European Union, he said he was an 'admirer of the EU'.

The monk, who is a patron for Children in Crossfire, said thinking that always results in war in countries like Burma, Syria and Iraq is outdated.

Richard Moore, Children in Crossfire's director, said it was a 'great honour and privilege' to have him in Derry.

He added: 'I still have to pinch myself every time I think that he's agreed to come.'

'He would say compassion without action is no good. It's okay feeling empathy but unless you take action then compassion's not good enough'.

The Tibetan leader will be in Northern Ireland for two days, having visited several times before, most recently in April 2013, November 2005 and October 2000.

The 82-year-old is a patron for Children in Crossfire. Pictured with the charity's director Richard Moore
Masked gang members have been filmed hurling packages of drugs over the walls of Britain's most troubled prisons.

The shocking footage was captured outside HMP Birmingham just days after inmates smashed up a wing and flooded cells at the facility.

The category B and C prison has had a huge problem with drug smuggling recently despite putting up protective nets to help combat the issue.

A masked gang member throws a bag filled with drugs over the was at HMP Birmingham

Prison inspectors have said the prevalence of drugs at HMP Birmingham has contributed to an increase of violence within the facility

A source told the Star on Sunday that there were not enough police at the facility to stop the gangs.

The source said: 'The screws know it's coming over but there's nothing they can do.

'Spice, puff (cannabis), prescription pills like Subutex, booze, phones, food. Anything they want they can get. It comes over the back yard and cons go and pick it up. Simple as that.'

The footage consists of three videos, two of which were filmed during the day and one at night.

The gang members can be seen getting off their mopeds to chuck the contraband over the wall.

One of them can be heard shouting: 'Over the wall we go.'

One source said that prison officers knew the drugs were coming over the walls but that there was 'nothing they can do'

Prison inspectors have said the prevalence of drugs at HMP Birmingham has contributed to an increase of violence within the facility.

In December last year, elite prison officers were called in to deal with a 12-hour riot which saw inmates rip their cells apart.

And last weekend prisoners left taps running before throwing furniture around the building.
Todd Kohlhepp, 46, pleaded guilty earlier this month to murdering seven people in Spartanburg County, South Carolina

A serial killer has claimed that his victims were actually 'criminals' and that he was trying to 'save' the woman he held captive in a shipping container as a sex slave for two months.

Todd Kohlhepp, 46, made the outrageous claims from behind bars in a South Carolina prison, writing a letter to a New York Post reporter that emerged on Saturday.

It is the first time Kohlhepp has spoken out since he pleaded guilty in May to seven murders and the rape and kidnapping.

The killer's crimes came to light when authorities searching for missing woman Kala Brown, 30, tracked her cell phone to one of Kohlhepp's properties in November.

Cops heard Brown's screams and banging inside a heavily padlocked metal shipping container, and found her sitting inside with a chain around her neck connected to the wall.

Kohlhepp preposterously claims that victim Kala Brown was a 'criminal' who he chained in a shipping container because he was trying to rescue her 'non-violently'

Kala Brown, 30 (left), and her boyfriend, Charles Carver, 32 (right), were the last of Kohlhepp's victims. Brown survived after police rescued her but the serial killer murdered Carver

She told police that Kohlhepp had shot and buried her boyfriend Charlie Carver, 32, and raped her twice a day, every day, while holding her captive for two months.

Now, Kohlhepp preposterously claims that Brown 'wasnt raped' and that he was actually trying to help her.

'She was in [the] shipping container because I didnt want to hurt her, refused to turn her over to someone else who would and was buying time while I figured out a way to resolve this non-violently,' he claimed in the twisted jailhouse letter to Post reporter Melkorka Licea.

Kohlhepp bizarrely claimed that, far from being his victim, Brown was 'as big a criminal as I am'.

'All of my victims were criminals,' he went on. 'No one wants to really look at who they were, families, connections'

'Not that it makes it right, I was wrong to do what I did,' he then wrote, in his only hint of remorse for the vile crimes.

In addition to killing Carver, Kohlhepp has admitted to six other slayings: a quadruple homicide at a motorcycle dealership in 2003, and the murder of a husband and wife who were lured to his property very similarly to Brown and her boyfriend.

Scott Ponder and his mother Beverly Guy were fatally shot by Kohlhepp in 2003. Now the killer outrageously claims they were running a 'chop shop' and deserved their fate

Brian Lucas (left) and Chris Sherbert (right) were also killed in the motorcycle shop

Kohlhepp's letter did not specifically mention Meagan and Johnny Joe Coxie, a married couple he lured to his property and killed

Kohlhep had a veritable arsenal of guns (left), which investigators found during a search for Kala Brown, whom they found chained inside a shipping container on his property (right)

In his epistle from behind bars, Kohlhepp accused the Superbike Motorsports shop in Chesnee, South Carolina, where he shot four employees, of being a 'chop shop' with '$80,000 cash sitting in [a] safe.'

His letter made no specific mention of Johnny Joe Coxie, 29, and Meagan Leigh McCraw-Coxie, 26, the victims he shot and buried on his property in 2015.

Kohlhepp killed Coxie immediately and tried to keep McCraw-Coxie locked away, but he said he killed her after several days because she tried to burn the container after he gave her cigarettes.

In an earlier letter, Kohlhepp lashed out at prosecutors and prison officials, saying they were trying to 'hide' him from the press.

Murray Glenn, a spokesman for the Spartanburg County prosecutor, told the Post that Kohlhepp is an 'attention seeker' who 'needs to stay in prison and be forgotten.'

TEXT OF ONE TODD KOHLHEPP LETTER FROM PRISON August 28, 2017 Dear Melkorka [Licea, New York Post reporter], Thank you for writing me. I was held in a isolation lockdown cell before now for no other reason than the notoriety of the case. The state has done all it can to make it very difficult for me to communicate with anyone and has been hostile to more than a few of the media. They offered a deal at four months before any hearings in order to keep me off the stand under oath in open court, then quickly hid me inside the prison away from everyone. Most recently even though I formally rejected it in writing, they moved me into statewide protective services/custody, where I do not want to be. I understand I am placed here so people will have a unusually hard time contacting me, especially media, as once here, my name and address are removed from the state inmate locator website. So it looks like I am no longer in prison. I am sure all the conspiracy theorists are loving that. Sorry, I never worked for any super secret government agency and this is not a movie. Still here. Advertisement

Investigators discovered an arsenal of weapons inside Kohlhepp's home after his arrest, which they suspect he obtained illicitly due to a 1987 felony conviction for kidnapping in Arizona that it illegal for him to purchase or own firearms.

Photos from the sick killer's home show weapons stashed around the property in toolboxes, drawers and shelves for easy access.

Among the many weapons confiscated were a Barrett Model 83A1 semi-automatic .50 caliber rifle and a Beretta Model 92FS semi-automatic pistol with an Ultima 9mm Sound Suppressor.

'He had more ammo than some of my counterparts in other counties do in their whole departments,' Spartanburg County Sheriff Chuck Wright said.

Authorities earlier revealed Kohlhepp bragged in one video about wearing gloves when loading his gun to assure no fingerprints were on the casings.

He also told authorities he pulled the gun apart and threw the components into different trash bins, putting the barrel into a bag of used kitty litter.

Men are seen working to get inside the metal container where Brown was held after they heard a woman screaming inside

Guns were stashed throughout the property, such as this handgun sitting on a shelf

Even though it had been 13 years, Kohlhepp detailed each shot he fired at the Superbike shop in the quadruple-murder, including final shots to the forehead of 30-year-old Scott Ponder; 52-year-old Beverly Guy; 30-year-old Brian Lucas; and 26-year-old Chris Sherbert.

'That was one big building. I cleared that building in under 30 seconds,' Kohlhepp said. 'I'm sorry, but you guys would have been proud.'

The investigators asked if anyone begged for their lives or said anything to him.

'I don't remember any of that. I will tell you that once I engaged, I was engaged. It was almost like a video game. It's not a game  you've been there, sir, you know what I am talking about,' Kohlhepp said.

Kohlhepp moved to South Carolina in 2001 after 14 years in prison for a kidnapping in Arizona.

Authorities there said the then 15-year-old Kohlhepp forced a 14-year-old neighbor back to his home at gunpoint, tied her up and raped her.
Caroline Kennedy's younger daughter tied the knot on Saturday in Martha's Vineyard.

The wedding of Tatiana Schlossberg and George Moran took place at the Kennedy family's 377-acre estate Red Gate Farm according to the The New York Times, which previously employed the bride as a reporter on climate change and the environment.

The 27-year-old granddaughter of John and Jackie Kennedy met Moran when the two attended Yale University, with her husband currently in his fourth year of medical school at Columbia Univesity.

Tatiana is the second child of Caroline, the former US ambassador to Japan, and her husband Edwin Schlossberg. She has an older sister Rose, 29, and a 24-year-old brother Jack.

For her big day, Tatiana took a page from her late uncle John F. Kennedy Jr's playbook it appears, with a limited number of guests attending the nuptials.

She also chose a site that carries a great deal of emotion for the family, with John Jr. dying in a plane crash alongside his wife Carolyn and her sister Lauren Besette back in 1999 while the three were traveling to the island for his cousin Rory's wedding at the estate.

They did: Tatiana Schlossberg, 27, and George Moran, 28, were married on Saturday at the Kennedy family's 377-acre farm in Martha's Vineyard (couple above in 2014)

Black and white attire: The wedding took place on the same day that their Kennedy cousins the Shriver family held their annual Best Buddies Bike ride (Patrick Schwarzenegger above at event in California over weekend)

Exclusive club: Tatiana, her older sister Rose and her younger brother Jack are the only grandchildren of John F Kennedy

Among those who appeared to be absent were the families of Caroline's most well-known cousins: Robert F. Kennedy Jr, Maria Shriver and Kerry Kennedy.

Robert's daughter Kick was travelling in Spain just a few days before while Kerry's daughter with her ex, New York governor Andrew Cuomo, was hanging out in Italy at the Gp F1 Santander D'Italia Monza.

Maria's son Patrick Schwarzenegger did not make the trip either, choosing instead to stay back in California and participate in the Best Buddies charity bike rise that the Shriver family has held every year at this time to benefit the Special Olympics.

Heartache: The Kennedy estate is where Rory Kenendy had planned her 1999 nuptials, which were postponed when John Jr (above with Carole Radziwill in 1997) died in a crash en route to the island

Family: Tatiana and mom Caroline (left); Tatiana with her sister Rose (left) and brother Jack (center) last year

Tradition: Just last month, Meaghan Kennedy was married in Martha's Vineyard

Among those who did show up were Maria Shriver, who has always been close to Caroline.

She brought along her daughter Katherine, who on Sunday posted a video of her mom as she gushed about the recent college graduate's new children's book about her dog Maverick.

Kerry also appeared to be on the island, having posted a photo of herself with her two younger daughters Michaela and Cara in nearby Hyannisport a few days prior, where the Kennedy compound is located.

It is not clear if Robert Jr was in attendance or his son Conor, whose ex Taylor Swift was just on the island last week for her best friend's wedding.

The Kennedy estate, whose value is in the mid-nine figures, is imposisble to acess for photographers and press as there is just one road leading through the property to the main home, located on the Atlantic Ocean

Ciao cous: Kerry Kennedy's daughter with her ex, New York governor Andrew Cuomo, was hanging out in Italy at the Gp F1 Santander D'Italia Monza

Mum is the word: Kick Kennedy also appeared to still be in Spain for the ceremony

Look what she made them do: Taylor Swift, who dated Conor Kennedy, was on the island just last week for her friend Abigail Anderson's wedding (left). Conor's dad Robert meanwhile played with a bird of prey on Friday in North Carolina (right)

Tatiana made her first big appearance on the world scene back in 2013 when she was chosen to deliver remarks at her grandfather's memorial in England.

'We have come here today to honor his memory- as this monument does so well- but today is a difficult day because it is a reminder of a moment of profound sadness for my family, for America and for the world,' said Tatiana at the start of her speech.

'For me, my grandfather lives in my imagination, in his words, and in the lessons he has left with us. Throughout my life, I have been able to connect with him through the study of history, both by studying his life and by studying the eras and patterns that fascinated him.

'Of all the memorials to my grandfather, which pay tribute to his life and work all around the world, this one is very special to our family because it was during his time in England as a young man that my grandfather decided to study political leadership and pursue a life in public service.

'As a lover of history- particularly British history- I know that my grandfather would be both proud and humbled to see that his work on behalf of peace and liberty for all people is remembered in the same place where the rule of law was made manifest nearly 800 years ago.'

The last statement was a reference to the widely held belief that the Magna Carta was signed in Runnymede.
Horticulture experts are being asked to single out their favourite tree from the three billion across the UK - which include a working pulpit and an ancient parliament.

Among this year's shortlist for the Woodland Trust's Tree Of The Year are a sapling pulled from the mud of Passchendaele in the First World War, a tree which has inspired the scouting movement, and yew trees which "bleed" or have served as pulpits for preachers.

Some 28 trees have been chosen from nominations for four shortlists, 10 for England and six each for Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland, with the public urged to vote for their favourite.

This year, for the first time, one tree will be chosen by experts from the four national winners to go forward to represent the UK in the 2018 European Tree of the Year contest.

Last year, Wales' Brimmon Oak was the runner-up in the contest, which looks for the most-loved trees from countries across the continent. It was the best result so far for a UK entry.

Beccy Speight, Woodland Trust chief executive, said: 'Once again, the public have nominated many fantastic trees with truly inspirational stories, which highlight how intrinsic trees are in peoples' lives.

'It's a reminder of why we need to care for individual trees and that they still need true protection in law from development or mismanagement.'

The Woodland Trust wants to see better protection for ancient trees and woodland, including through changes to planning policy in England.

As part of the competition, the shortlisted trees are also in with a chance of winning a 1,000 care award, supported by the People's Postcode Lottery.

The care award can be used to arrange an expert health check, provide educational materials or simply hold a celebration for the tree.

Clara Govier, head of charities at People's Postcode Lottery, added: 'We are delighted that with our players' support, the Woodland Trust is able to provide this opportunity for communities all over Britain to celebrate and care for their fantastic trees.'
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Newly released aerial footage on Saturday shows the utter destruction and devastation wrought by Hurricane Irma on the British and U.S. Virgin Islands this week.

What were once homes in an idyllic Caribbean setting were reduced to roofless skeletons of structures surrounded by torn-down trees and shrubs that were at the mercy of 150-mile-per-hour winds and heavy rains.

Some of the homes seen in the town of Eustacia were not lucky enough to still be standing.

Helicopter footage also showed the hurricane's aftermath in Bitter End.

The beachside area appears to be reduced to ruins in a scene reminiscent of a nuclear explosion.

In Jost, houses that dot the coastline were also destroyed.

Aerial view of devastation following Hurricane Irma on Eustatia Island. Some islands appear to have been spared, but others suffered loss of life and damage on a near-apocalyptic scale

The outer bands of the approaching storm began to lash the islands early Wednesday afternoon. The above photo shows the devastation at Mafolie on St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands

This aerial shot shows the destruction at Bitter End in Virgin Gorda, UK Virgin Islands on Friday

In Tortola, properties overlooking the water suffered immense damage.

Boats that would normally float on the pristine waters just off the island were seen bunched together ashore as if thrown there haphazardly, the footage shows.

In Saba Rock, coastal resorts looked like bombed-out ghost towns as red-colored roofs were ripped off, revealing the remains of the buildings' skeleton.

On Beef Island, the local airport was hit hard, with the airfield being completely devastated.

Another shot of the utter ruin at Bitter End, where the earth appeared scorched and debris completely covered the landscape

Residents of the islands believe that the hurricane spawned tornadoes which then sliced through and destroyed hundreds of homes

The hurricane's aftermath is seen above at Cow Wreck beach on Anegada in the British Virgin Islands on Friday

The hurricane knocked out power lines and essentially cut off the islands to the outside world. British soldiers were reportedly working to re-establish satellite communications

Somehow the air traffic control tower was still standing when the hurricane swept away.

The U.S. Virgin Islands also absorbed the wrath of Irma, as shards of rooftops were strewn across the landscape in St. Thomas.

At least four people were reported killed on these islands, according to The Weather Channel.

In St. Thomas, power lines and towers were downed, leaves were stripped off plants and trees, and the water and sewage treatment plant was badly damaged.

The harbor lay in ruins while hundreds of homes and businesses were destroyed.

The storm plunged the British Virgin Islands, an offshore business and legal center, into turmoil.

Yachts were pilled on top of each other in harbor and many houses in the hillside capital of Road Town on the main island of Tortola were badly damaged.

Both there and in Anguilla to the east, residents complained help from the British government was too slow in coming, prompting a defensive response from London.

'We weren't late,' Defense Minister Michael Fallon told BBC television on Sunday, saying Britain had 'pre-positioned' an aid ship for the Caribbean hurricane season and that his government's response 'has been as good as anybody else's.'

British billionaire entrepreneur Richard Branson, who sought refuge in the wine cellar of his home on Necker island, called Irma the 'storm of the century' on Twitter and urged people to make donations to help rebuild the region.

The Virgin Islands are among dozens of other Caribbean locales that are picking up the pieces.

From Cuba to Antigua, Caribbean islanders began counting the cost of Hurricane Irma on Sunday after the brutal storm left a trail of death, destruction and chaos that could take the tourist-dependent region years to recover from.

The ferocious Category 5 storm, which killed at least 28 people across the region, devastated housing, power supplies and communications, leaving some small islands almost cut off from the world.

European nations sent military reinforcements to keep order amid looting while the damage was expected to total billions of dollars.

Ex-pat billionaires and poor islanders alike were forced to take cover as Irma tore roofs off buildings, flipped cars and killed livestock, raging from the Leeward Islands across Puerto Rico and Hispaniola then into Cuba before turning toward Florida.

On Beef Island, the local airport was hit hard, with the airfield being completely devastated

Somehow, the air traffic control tower (seen right) managed to stay in place, though the surrounding structures were not so lucy

The above image shows what appears to be a tourist resort on Saba Rock in the British Virgin Islands

The above image shows another view of the devastation, this time in Eustacia Island

The coastal resort looked like a bombed-out ghost town as red-colored roofs were ripped off, revealing the remains of the buildings' skeleton

Waves of up to 36 feet smashed businesses along the Cuban capital Havana's sea-side drive on Sunday morning.

Further east, high winds whipped Varadero, the island's most important tourist resort.

'It's a complete disaster and it will take a great deal of work to get Varadero back on its feet,' said Osmel de Armas, 53, an aquatic photographer who works on the beach at the battered resort.

Sea-front hotels were evacuated in Havana and relief workers spent the night rescuing people from homes in the city center as the sea penetrated to historic depths in the flood-prone area.

President Donald Trump issued on Sunday a disaster declaration for Puerto Rico, where Irma killed at least 3 people and left hundreds of thousands without power.

Trump also expanded federal funds available to the U.S. Virgin Islands, which suffered extensive damage to homes and infrastructure.

Further east in the Caribbean, battered islands such as St. Martin and Barbuda were taking stock of the damage as people began emerging from shelters to scenes of devastation.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said the death toll on the Dutch part of St. Martin had risen to four from two, and that 70 percent of homes had been damaged or destroyed.

Following reports of looting, the Netherlands said it would increase its military presence to 550 soldiers on the island by Monday, and Rutte said that to ensure order, security forces were authorized to act with a 'firm hand'.

The above image shows the scale of destruction on St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands

In St. Thomas, power lines and towers were downed, leaves were stripped off plants and trees, and the water and sewage treatment plant was badly damaged

Locals estimate that it may take years for the Caribbean island to recover from the effects of the hurricane

Boats that would normally float on the pristine waters just off the island were seen bunched together ashore as if thrown there haphazardly, the footage shows

Dutch authorities are evacuating tourists and injured people to Curacao to the south, where Dutch King Willem-Alexander and Interior Minister Ronald Plasterk are expected to arrive today.

France, which oversees neighboring Saint Barthelemy and other half of St Martin, said the police presence on the two islands had been boosted to close to 500.

The French interior ministry said 11 people suspected of 'malicious actions' had been arrested since Friday as television footage showed scenes of chaos on the islands with streets under water, boats and cars tossed into piles and torn rooftops.

Irma killed at least 10 people on the two islands, the French government said.

France's Caisse Centrale de Reassurance, a state-owned reinsurance group, estimated the cost of Irma at some $1.44 billion.

French President Emmanuel Macron was due to visit Saint Martin on Tuesday.

Barbuda, home to some 1,800 inhabitants, faces a reconstruction bill that could total hundreds of millions of dollars, state officials say, after Irma steamrolled the island and forced the local government to order a total evacuation.

The prime minister of Antigua and Barbuda, Gaston Browne, said Irma had wreaked 'absolute devastation' on Barbuda, which he said was now 'barely habitable' after 90 percent of cars and buildings had been damaged.
Representatives of the American National Council of Churches praised Egyptian efforts to combat terrorism and renew religious discourse

Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi affirmed Sunday that Egypt is constantly working to uphold the principles of citizenship and equality among all its citizens without discrimination, state-run news agency MENA reported.

El-Sisi added that Egypt is also keen on consolidating a culture of pluralism and acceptance, presidency spokesperson Alaa Youssef said in a statement.

These statements came during a meeting between El-Sisi and a delegation from the American National Council of Churches (NCC) in Cairo, attended by Egypt's foreign minister, Sameh Shoukry, and the head of Anglican Church of Egypt, Andrea Zaki.

The meeting tackled ways to combat terrorism, with the American delegation praising Egyptian efforts to fight extremist ideas and consolidate coexistence between all Egyptian citizens.

El-Sisi underlined that extremist ideas do not represent Islam, adding that Islam calls for tolerance, peace and freedom of belief.

NCC representatives also expressed their solidarity with Egypt in the fight against terrorism and appreciation for Egyptian efforts to renew religious discourse.

El-Sisi said that it is important to unify efforts to combat terrorism on all levels, including the cultural and intellectual levels, in parallel to the military and security levels.

He also asserted the importance of supporting stability and state institutions in the region, in order to block the growth of terrorism and resist the machinations of countries and groups that finance and support terrorism.

El-Sisi has also highlighted Egypt's willingness to receive delegations representing all sectors of American society, in order to "consolidate communication and build bridges of understanding between the two countries around the means to confront various challenges."

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As Hurricane Irma rips its way up Florida's Gulf coast, the state has hastily expanded its shelter system to more than 400 locations to protect vulnerable residents.

Some 127,000 people were crammed into shelters across Florida as Irma made landfall on Sunday, after officials ordered millions of residents to evacuate ahead of the storm.

All Florida's state offices, schools, colleges and universities were ordered to close from Friday until Monday to free up space for evacuation shelters and staging, with other shelters springing up in churches and community centers.

After the mad rush for shelter on Friday and Saturday, when many evacuees were forced to endure long lines and visit multiple shelters to find one with space, on Sunday there was little left to do but hunker down.

Evacuees watch the weather from inside a shelter as Hurricane Irma approaches in Naples, Florida on Sunday

Sheryl and Rick Estes (right) take shelter from Hurricane Irma inside the Germain Arena in Estero, Florida on Friday night

Mary Della Ratta, 94, sits in shelter after evacuating her home with the help of police. 'I'm afraid of what's going to happen. I don't know what I'll find when I go home,' said Della Ratta whose husband passed away ten years ago. 'I have nobody'

Some 127,000 people were crammed into shelters across Florida as Irma made landfall on Sunday. This map shows the locations of the state's more than 400 shelters and the storm track as of Sunday afternoon

Though overcrowding meant some shelters could only offer chairs overnight, rather than cots, reports from the state's shelters were mostly of cooperation and fears of what would be left when the storm clouds cleared.

In Naples, Mary Della Ratta, 94, sat in her wheelchair in a shelter on Sunday after police helped her evacuate her home on Saturday night.

'I'm afraid of what's going to happen. I don't know what I'll find when I go home,' said Della Ratta, whose husband passed away ten years ago. 'I have nobody. I'm all alone in this world.

In Collier County to the east of Naples, more than 800 evacuees packed into Pinecrest Elementary School.

Mark Tesar, 46, and his wife Hilda went to four shelters with their two kids ages 5 and 11, before finding space at Pinecrest.

'With the family, I don't ever plan to stay in the house,' Mark Tesar, who oversees an 800-acre tomato farm in Immokalee, told the Naples Daily News.

'I don't want them in harms way. Plus there's strength in numbers, with EMS and police here.'

Naples residents Carol and Ben told the newspaper that they ended up at the Pinecrest shelter after waiting until Friday afternoon to evacuate, and finding gas hard to come by. 'We knew we were late. It was our fault,' said Carol.

A Red Cross volunteer hands out room assignments to Tampa residents fleeing the evacuation zones at a shelter within the Pizzo Elementary School in Tampa

A young boy steps on his sister as he moves around the tight confines of a classroom where people are sleeping at a shelter within the Pizzo Elementary School in Tampa

A group of people form a prayer circle in a classroom at a shelter within the Pizzo Elementary School in Tampa, Florida

Gretchen Summer, 79, and her son, Dave Payson, 52, take shelter from Hurricane Irma inside the Germain Arena in Estero

People stand in line for breakfast on Sunday morning in the disaster shelter at Riverview High School in Sarasota

Martha Ferrer drops off her two Chihuahuas at the West Boynton Park and Recreation Center in preparation for Irma Thursday

On Florida's eastern coast, in Stuart, 539 people stayed at the shelter at J.D. Parker Elementary School on Saturday night.

'I had some anxieties,' mother Teresa Hopkins, who stayed at the shelter with her 8-year-old daughter Jasmine, told the Treasure Coast Palm.

'I'm not used to sleeping with a lot of people around,' Hopkins said.

On Saturday night, dinner at the Parker Elementary shelter was turkey and mashed potatoes.

'Spanish people like me, that's not something we eat a lot. But again, I'm not complaining,' Pedro Zapeta, there with his 15-year-old son and 12-year-old daughter, told the newspaper.

People take shelter at Key West High School in Key West, Florida on Saturday night as Hurricane Irma approaches

Andrew Patterson, left, sits with her dog Seamus as they ride out Hurricane Irma in a shelter in Naples, Florida on Sunday

Iris Belen, left, and Mouad El jamil watch weather updates on their phone after evacuating from their home to a Naples shelter

In a shelter in Pembroke Pines, near Miami, lifelong Floridian Jacqueline Cobb told DailyMail.com she had originally found a hotel to stay in, but that the lack of impact windows and a backup generator meant it had to shut down.

The shelter, in a school, was the only one she could find for people with special needs, like her friend Stephen Herndon who has problems with his autonomic nervous system that can cause severe nosebleeds, fainting and overheating.

Cobb and her friend are safe in her shelter, but a shocking text message left her worried about her home and neighbors.

'I received a code red tornado alert,' she said. 'I have a two-story townhouse and there is a three-and-a-half-ton air conditioner on the rooftop. I'm on a lake in the first house, so If the tornado rips that off, it will open up my house and let water into the building,' she said.

That tornado warning expired at 8am Sunday, but Cobb won't find out what's happened to her home for some time.

'We're now on lockdown and we're not clear when we might be able to leave the building,' she said.
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The death toll from the massive earthquake that struck Mexico on Thursday night has risen to at least 90 after emergency services in the southern state of Oaxaca said late on Saturday there had been 71 confirmed fatalities in the state alone.

'It's 71 (dead). Just for Oaxaca,' said Jesus Gonzalez, a spokesman for the state civil protection authority.

At least 15 people died in the neighboring state of Chiapas, according to local authorities, while another four deaths have also been confirmed in the state of Tabasco to the north.

Rescue workers marks debris in the city of Juchitan, Mexico, on Sunday, three days after an earthquake struck the southern coast

A man wades past a car parked in a flooded street in Vega de Alatorre, Mexico, on Saturday just hours after the hurricane hit

A woman stands in her home after a mudslide sparked by storm Katia killed several people in the neighborhood, in Xalapa

A shocking aerial image taken in Juchitan, state of Oaxaca, shows the damage the 8.2 magnitude earthquake inflicted on Mexico's Pacific coast

A woman awakes for the day in the back of a pickup truck where she slept with two family members, despite rains during the night

The 8.1 magnitude quake that struck off the coast of Chiapas on Thursday was stronger than a devastating 1985 temblor that flattened swathes of Mexico City and killed thousands.

Relief efforts in the south continued through Saturday, with many of the people worst affected still wary of returning indoors to weakened buildings, fearing they could be brought down by ongoing aftershocks.

Hurricane Katia pummeled the east coast on Saturday, wreaking more havoc across the country. The powerful storm even caused a mudslide in the city of Xalapa.

A local resident walks outside her destroyed home that was toppled during the earthquake

People retrieve their belongings from the ruins of their homes, knocked down by a quake, in Juchitan, Oaxaca

A member of the Mexican Navy stands next to a rescue dog that wears protective mittens to help sift through all the debris and rubble

A marine lifts his search and rescue dog into a truck in Juchitan, Mexico

Women observe the aftermath of the destruction from the earthquake and try to see if they can grab things to salvage

A hat rests over the coffin of German Torres, a victim of the powerful earthquake that hit Mexico's Pacific coast

Hardest-hit from the earthquake was Juchitan, Oaxaca, where a third of the city's homes collapsed or were uninhabitable, President Enrique Pena Nieto said late Friday in an interview with the Televisa news network.

In central Juchitan, the remains of brick walls and clay tile roofs cluttered streets as families dragged mattresses on to pavements to spend another anxious night sleeping outdoors.

Members of the 'Topos' (Moles) specialized rescue team dug through piles of debris looking for folk's loved ones and hoping to find some that were still alive.

Soldiers of the Army and Navy also joined in on the search and rescue, hoping to locate the bodies still missing in the wreckage.

Pena Nieto declared three days of national mourning when he first broke numbers on the deaths associated with the earthquake

The epicenter of the earthquake, according to Nieto was 123km southwest of the town of Pijijiapan.

A man carries a crutch as he rides a bicycle in the aftermath of the earthquake at a damaged site in Juchitan

Residents of a zone heavily affected by spend a third night sleeping outside

Mexico's government is distributing food to jittery survivors who worry about potential aftershocks

In this small plaza, a local organization supported by the government has created a small outdoor shelter, providing mattresses, roofing tarp, and bathroom access to residents afraid to sleep in damaged homes

Relatives of 38-year-old earthquake victim German Torres attend his funeral in Juchitan, Oaxaca state

An excavator moves debris at this damaged site in Juchitan. The earthquake with magnitude of 8.2 and epicenter in the state of Chiapas, hit the south of Mexico on Thursday

Rescue workers have begun to stockpile emergency supplies to give out to residents affected by the earthquake and storm

Soldiers of the Army and Navy continue with the work of people search in the rubble

Rescue workers know as Topos Azteca clear the debris of a building damaged by the earthquake

A hotel split practically in half shows the destruction caused by the earthquake

The 8.1 quake off the southern Pacific coast just before midnight Thursday toppled hundreds of buildings in several states

Hardest-hit was Juchitan, Oaxaca, where a third of the city's homes collapsed or were uninhabitable, President Enrique Pena Nieto said late Friday in an interview with the Televisa news network

The US Geological Survey said the magnitude of the earthquake late on Thursday was 8.1, but Pena Nieto said on Friday it was 8.2, making it the largest in Mexico in 100 years.

Hurricane Katia was roaring onshore north of Tecolutla in Veracruz state, pelting the region with intense rains and winds on Friday.

Katia, which brought rain to the state of Veracruz when hitting the coast late on Friday, was about 115 miles (185 km) west northwest of the Gulf Coast port of Veracruz early on Saturday morning, the NHC said.

A family grieves over the casket of a loved one who perished in the destruction of the earthquake that killed 90 people

Pena Nieto announced that the earthquake killed 45 people in Oaxaca state, 12 in Chiapas and 4 in Tabasco, and he declared three days of national mourning

In central Juchitan, the remains of brick walls and clay tile roofs cluttered streets as families dragged mattresses on to pavements to spend a second anxious night sleeping outdoors.

Katia was stalling over Mexico's Sierra Madre mountains and the maximum sustained winds were down to near 40 mph. It was expected to continue to dissipate over the course of Saturday.

Officials in Veracruz said Katia could cause landslides and flooding. They urged people living below hills and slopes to be ready to evacuate.

Gov. Miguel Angel Yunes has already said that two have died in a mudslide since the hurricane hit according to the Washington Post.

Hospital patients had to be evacuated from crumbling hospitals and laid out under the shade of trees

Those that could get to shelter struggled to find places on the hard floors to sleep but a vast amount of people were forced to sleep on mattresses outside

The epicenter of the earthquake, according to Nieto was 123km southwest of the town of Pijijiapan

He also reported that 2,866 people were evacuated from their homes.

Mexico's national emergency services said this week that Katia was worrying because it is very slow-moving and could dump a lot of rain on areas that have been saturated in recent weeks.

State energy company Pemex has installations in and around the coast of Veracruz but has not reported any disruption to its operations there.

The US Geological Survey said the magnitude of the earthquake late on Thursday was 8.1, but Pena Nieto said on Friday it was 8.2, making it the largest in Mexico in 100 years

Soldiers remove debris from a partly collapsed municipal building felled by a massive earthquake

A third of the Juchitan's homes were either collasped or made uninhabitable

Hurricane Katia was roaring onshore north of Tecolutla in Veracruz state, pelting the region with intense rains and winds on Friday

Rescuers searched for survivors Friday with sniffer dogs and used heavy machinery at the main square to pull rubble away from city hall, where a missing police officer was believed to be inside.

One rescue included pulling four people, including two children, from the collasped Hotel Del Rio alive even though one woman had died there as well.

The city's civil defence co-ordinator, Jose Antonio Marin Lopez, said similar searches had been going on all over the area since the Friday night.

Katia, which brought rain to the state of Veracruz when hitting the coast late on Friday, was about 115 miles (185 km) west northwest of the Gulf Coast port of Veracruz early on Saturday morning, the NHC said

Katia now is stalling over Mexico's Sierra Madre mountains and the maximum sustained winds are now down to near 40 mph. It was expected to continue to dissipate over the course of Saturday

Gov. Miguel Angel Yunes has already said that two have died in a mudslide since the hurricane hit according to the Washington Post

As Katia reached the Mexican Gulf Coast, Hurricane Irma, one of the most powerful Atlantic storms in a century, walloped Cuba's northern coast.

Millions of Florida residents were ordered to evacuate after the storm killed 21 people in the eastern Caribbean and left catastrophic destruction in its wake. The storm has already killed four people in Florida.

Meanwhile, Hurricane Jose passed Puerto Rico and moved out of the trajectory of the Caribbean.

He also reported that 2,866 people were evacuated from their homes

Workers worked to board up homes and hotels in the area in anticipation of the storm which has since gotten weaker

Mexico's national emergency services said this week that Katia was worrying because it is very slow-moving and could dump a lot of rain on areas that have been saturated in recent weeks
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Gibraltar no longer opposes Brexit and is 'hugely optimistic' about the prospect of a trade deal between Brussels and Britain.

Fabian Picardo, who supported Britain staying in the EU last year, admitted there was a 'change of plan' - and that MPs had claimed the Rock's chief minister admitted at a private dinner that 'maybe we got it wrong'.

He told the Sun: 'Its a change of plan  but sometimes a new plan is better even than the original plan.'

Mr Picardo also reiterated his desire to maintain close ties with Britain post-Brexit, stating he wants to 'cement the relationship with the United Kingdom' in terms of sovereignty and trade.

Fabian Picardo said retaining a close bond with the UK was vital and that he wants to 'establish that bilateral relationship of trade to continue the morning after Brexit as if the single market between Gibraltar and the UK seamlessly moved from one moment to the next'.

Mr Picardo's remarks come on the 50th anniversary of the 1967 referendum, when more than 99 per cent of Gibraltarians voted to remain a part of the UK and rejected Spanish rule.

The holiday, which has been celebrated since 1992, was attended by joyous Gibraltarians who attended the event draped in Union flags and Gibraltar flags.

Hundreds of revellers gather in Casemates square to celebrate Gibralatar National Day with Mr Picardo also attending the celebrations.

Spain has refused to relinquish its claim to the British overseas territory since ceding control to Britain in 1713 and there are fears Madrid may use Brexit as a tool to take control of the Rock.

Speaking to reporters, Mr Picardo said he hoped Madrid would respect the will of the Gibraltar's 32,000 residents and hailed the 'new realism' of Spanish foreign minister Alfonso Dastic, who became Spain's top diplomat last year.

Mr Picardo said: 'I think we have seen since the change ... a new realism emerge into the importance of Brexit for the whole European Union and for this region around Gibraltar of Spain in particular. That this is not a time to exploit opportunities to try and advance the sovereignty claim.

'I think it is a time to preserve the ability of people in Spain to come and work in Gibraltar, the ability of people who work in Gibraltar to live in Spain, and to have that neutrality of interests recognised.'

Dastic has previously claimed the UK's control of Gibraltar 'violates the territorial integrity' of Spain.

For the chief minister of Gibraltar, the British territory's post-Brexit future rests on strengthening its ties with the United Kingdom.

Hundreds of people carrying Union and Gibraltar flags gathered in Casemates square for the Gibraltar National Day celebrations

The holiday celebrates the 50th anniversary of the referendum which saw Gibraltarians overwhelmingly vote to remain a part of the UK

Gibraltar's chief minister Fabian Picardo also attended the celebrations and delivered a speech to partygoers

A British resident living in Gibraltar walks with the Union Jack flag draped around his shoulders as he crosses the tarmac at Gibraltar International Airport in front of the Rock of Gibraltar

Spain has refused to relinquish its claim to the British territory since ceding control to Britain in 1713 and there are fears it may use Brexit as a tool to try and take control of the Rock

A staggering 96 per cent of Gibraltarians voted to stay in the EU during last year's Brexit referendum

Spain's foreign minister Alfonso Dastic said the UK's control of Gibraltar 'violates the territorial integrity' of Spain

More than 99 per cent of people in the 1967 referendum voted to remain a UK overseas territory

Gibraltar's Chief Minister Fabian Picardo gestures after delivering his speech at Casemates square

Gibraltar has celebrated its referendum vote to remain a British overseas territory since 1992

One man makes it known where his allegiances lie by flying a Gibraltar and Union flag from his home

Speaking to reporters, Mr Picardo said he hoped Madrid would respect the will of the Gibraltar's 32,000 residents

Gibraltar's Chief Minister Fabian Picardo sings next to his wife, Justine Oliver, during the Gibraltar National Day celebrations

Mr Picardo said Brexit 'is not a time to exploit opportunities to try and advance the sovereignty claim'
A 19-year-old girl was found dead in a hotel freezer after she wandered away from a party.

Kenneka Jenkins' remains were found at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Rosemont, a suburb northwest of Chicago in the early hours of Sunday morning.

She left her house for the party at 11.30pm on Friday and was officially reported missing at 1.16pm Saturday.

Rosemont police say hotel staff discovered Jenkins inside the walk-in freezer by hotel staff.

It was running and cold but was not being used to store food.

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Kenneka Jenkins was found dead inside a walk-in freezer at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Rosemont on Sunday

Police have not said if foul play was expected and said she was at the hotel early Saturday morning at a party

The autopsy is expected to be performed on Sunday and it is not clear if foul play was involved at this point

Jenkins was last seen at a party at the hotel early Saturday and she was reported missing later that afternoon. A text message was sent from her phone at 1.30am Saturday.

Her friends called her family at 4.30am when they could not find her.

The woman's mother, Tereasa Martin, told the Chicago Tribune that police informed her Jenkins apparently let herself into the freezer.

But Martin questioned this saying if her daughter was drunk, she would have struggled to open the freezer door and would have realized she was not entering an elevator or the entrance of the hotel.

She said: 'Those were double steel doors, she didn't just pop them open.'

Witnesses saw Jenkins on the ninth floor of the hotel early Saturday morning.

Jenkins's friends The Crowne Plaza Chicago O'Hare Hotel and Conference Center said in a statement to ABC7 Chicago: The Crowne Plaza Chicago O'Hare Hotel and Conference Center holds the safety, security and well-being of our guests and employees as our top priority and concern.'

'We are saddened by this news, and our thoughts are with the young woman and her family during this difficult time. The hotel staff will continue to cooperate fully with local authorities. All further questions should be directed to the Rosemont Police Department.'
Attacks on Malcolm Turnbull for drinking beer while holding his baby granddaughter have been slammed as 'un-Australian.'

The prime minister faced backlash online after sharing a photo of himself kissing his granddaughter, Alice, while holding a beer during Saturday's Sydney Swans v Essendon Bombers AFL game.

Mr Turnbull joked he was 'multitasking at the footy', but many social media users accused him of being an irresponsible child-minder.

Now, prominent Australians  including Opposition Leader Bill Shorten  have called the outrage an overreaction.

'I've found something Malcolm & I can agree on. This is rubbish. Let him be a grandpa,' Mr Shorten tweeted.

Malcolm Turnbull divided his online audience on Saturday after sharing a controversial photo of himself at Saturday's AFL game against the Sydney Swans and Essendon Bombers

Entrepreneur Dick Smith said that those who can't appreciate the typically Australian moment should move.

'Australians need to get back to being Australian,' he said, according to the Courier Mail.

'People on social media can be so pathetic. This kind of outrage is so un-Australian. Go and live somewhere else if you don't like it.'

Cabinet Minister Christopher Pyne added that the outrage came from the 'kin dof person that would report Mother Teresa for jaywalking.'

Social researcher Mark McCrindle said Australia has become a 'nation of judgers.'

Bill Shorten slammed critics of Malcolm Turnbull, calling the outrage over the picture 'rubbish'

Mr Shorten (pictured at Sunday's rally in support of marriage equality) said the issue was something he and Mr Turnbull can agree on

'This is the land of fair dinkum, no worries, she'll be right and where has that sentiment gone?'

Mr Turnbull's post garnered more than a thousand comments, including some who took the opportunity to blast him for 'wasting' money on the upcoming postal plebiscite.

One took a stab at his definition of 'multitasking', opting to put their own spin on the meaning: 'Wasting 150 million dollars and watching the footy at the same time. #multitasking,' they wrote.

Another echoed similar thoughts: 'Multitasking by wasting tax payers money whilst insulting LGBT community.'

A particularly annoyed commenter implied Mr Turnbull was resting on the child's head due to his 'lack of spine'.

Another disgruntled social media user posed a controversial question about the prospect of his grandchild being homosexual.

Mr Turnbull (middle right) and wife Lucy (middle left) welcomed their newest grandchild Alice Lucinda Turnbull-Brown into the world in August last year. They are pictured with their daughter Daisy (right), James Brown (left) and grandson Jack

Someone pointed out the prospect of Mr Turnbull's grandchild being homosexual

Ouch! Social media users weren't gentle with telling the PM how they really feel

One commenter took a stab at the PM's definition of 'multitasking', opting to put their own spin on the meaning

'Well I hope the kid is not gay or he will be a second class citizen because of you!,' they wrote.

Perhaps the most hotly debated topic was the matter of him consuming alcohol while nursing a young child.

'Do you HAVE to drink alcohol whilst holding that baby? What is wrong with soft drink?,' one concerned follower wrote.

Another was particularly irritated, writing: 'Does anyone see anything irresponsible with an adult hold(ing) a baby and juggling a beer? And when was drinking while holding a child OK?'

Hot water: The PM's online audience weren't happy after he uploaded a photo from Saturday's football game holding his grandchild and a beer at the same time

The most hotly debated topic was the matter of him consuming alcohol while nursing a young child

Disgruntled followers suggested Mr Turnbull staged the photo to target as many social groups

Continuing: 'I find it disgusting to see people breathing grog all over baby's but sadly I'm not surprised by Malcolm doing it.'

Angered followers even suggested Mr Turnbull staged the photo to target as many social groups as possible in a last-ditch attempt to win over voters.

'Drinking beer, kissing babies, AND watching footy... you'd think he must be a politician.'

'Must have an election date in mind,' another added.

While the photo attracted more than 7,000 likes, the prime minister certainly divided his audience.

Though the photo's comment box was predominantly plagued with negativity, many praised the politician's work and commended him on taking time out to enjoy time with his family at the footy.
Triple murderer Joanna Dennehy is 'besotted' with a former university lecturer she met in her prison gym

Triple murderer Joanna Dennehy is 'besotted' with an ex-convict she met in her prison gym.

The killer was even handed a ring by former university lecturer Alexandra Crouzieres that led to the latter being banned from visiting Dennehy for three months.

Sources say Dennehy, 35, and 37-year-old Crouzieres, who was inside Surrey's Bronzefield womens jail for racially abusing a doctor and attacking three police officers, started an 'intense friendship' behind bars.

Dennehy murdered Lukasz Slaboszewski, 31, her landlord and lover Kevin Lee, 48, and her housemate John Chapman, 56, before dumping their bodies in ditches near Peterborough in March 2013.

However, according to Crouzieres, who has recently split from her husband, the pair are not an item.

She told the Sun: 'She's just one of many friends I made in jail. When I go there we chat about nails and shoes and clothes and celebrities.'

In reference to the ring, she added: 'She liked my rings so I said, 'Do you want one'? I gave it to her. It was only cheap.'

Dennehy became only the third woman in British legal history to be handed a whole life sentence after she confessed to triple killing, with the judge branding her 'cruel, calculating and manipulative'.

Dennehy tried to kill two more men in a random act of violence following her three murders.

She later pleaded guilty to three counts of murder and two counts of attempted murder.

Dennehy murdered Lukasz Slaboszewski, 31, her landlord and lover Kevin Lee, 48, and her housemate John Chapman, 56, before dumping their bodies in ditches near Peterborough in March 2013

After she was arrested, Dennehy told a psychiatrist she had started killing to 'see how it would feel, to see if I was as cold as I thought I was...then it just got more-ish.'

In CCTV, she's heard saying: 'Attempted murder and murder, thats nothing. Thats like going down for Sunday roast. Easy'

Later, she said: 'Attempted murder and murder, could be worse. I could be big, fat, black and ugly.'

Dennehy, was handed the 'life means life' sentence at the Old Bailey in February 2014.
Britons stranded in the Caribbean by the killer hurricane have been abandoned by the Government, their distraught families said last night.

Thousands of people are isolated on scattered islands with phone and power lines down, roads blocked, food and medicine scarce, and scenes of looting and lawlessness rife.

Their families say they have spent days in torment wondering whether their children, parents and siblings are dead or alive. And they have hit out at the Government for bringing aid relief too slowly and providing no information about their relatives.

Hurricane Irma has wreaked destruction across the Caribbean, including in the UK overseas territories of the British Virgin Islands, Anguilla, Barbuda and Turks and Caicos.

Britons stranded in the Caribbean (pictured) by Hurricane Irma have been abandoned by the Government, their distraught families have said

Caroline Whitlock-Henry (left), 50, and her husband Marcus Henry (right), 40, are stranded on Virgin Gorda. They were huddled in a concrete stairwell waiting for the eye of the storm to pass

As aid arrives on the ground and the clear-up effort begins, there are concerns the official death toll  currently at 25  could rise into the hundreds or even thousands as the true scale of the devastation emerges.

Dr Annelise Lawton, who works in a hospital on Tortola in the British Virgin Islands, said conditions were horrific. There is absolute devastation on the island, she added. People will die. Theres no communication between [people] on the island... there are little pockets of people who have survived.

She said none of the phones in the hospital was working, and that people are just sat there without the equipment and supplies they need.

She added: All the roads are blocked with debris. People on the island are struggling to access medication. All the pharmacies have been obliterated. Its just a mess.

It came as:

Irma continued on its destructive course and battered the western coast of Florida;

The streets of Miami were 5ft under water and storm surges of up to 15ft hit the popular holiday destination of Naples last night;

The Government sent 500 soldiers to the region, as well as 50 police officers to help deal with looting;

Defence Secretary Michael Fallon defended the Government against accusations it had acted too slowly and inadequately, and insisted our response has been as good as anyone elses;

The US was braced for another two or three days of damage as the storm headed north through Florida and into Georgia.

People trying to find relatives in British territories have been using Facebook and social media groups set up through patchy internet connections.

One website set up by a Facebook group, the BVI Hurricane Irma Safety Check website, allows people to check in and mark themselves as safe. Last night it had 3,036 people marked as safe, but 3,949 marked as unknown.

Survivors: Brendan (left) and wife Sasha Joyce (right) and their children Keiran (left) and Aiden (right), survived being in the eye wall of Hurricane Irma

Hurricane Irma has wreaked destruction across the Caribbean, including in the UK overseas territories of the British Virgin Islands, Anguilla, Barbuda and Turks and Caicos

On Virgin Gorda, a smaller island in the archipelago, one British hotel manager has been missing since the storm struck on Wednesday.

Amanda Whitlock, 49, said the only contact shed had from her sister Caroline Whitlock-Henry, 50, in five days had been a five-second phone call. She spoke to Mrs Whitlock-Henry when she and her husband Marcus Henry, 40, were huddled in a concrete stairwell waiting for the eye of the storm to pass.

Since then, she said we havent had any word, theres just been no news  its unbelievable.

Miss Whitlock added: It was literally the words, Hello, were okay, and that was it.

I dont even know whether she could hear us.

She said when she called the Foreign Office helpline set up on Thursday, she had to spell Virgin Gorda three times, because they didnt have a list of the islands. She added: Virgin Gorda needs to be evacuated.

People trying to find relatives in British territories have been using Facebook and social media groups set up through patchy internet connections

One website set up by a Facebook group, the BVI Hurricane Irma Safety Check website, allows people to check in and mark themselves as safe

The US was braced for another two or three days of damage as the storm headed north through Florida and into Georgia

A British family in Tortola described how they survived being in the eye of the hurricane.

Sasha Joyce and her father, her husband Brendan and their children sheltered in her fathers house as the storm tore across the island. The adults lay on top of the children, aged two and four, to protect them.

When they emerged, the other rooms had been swept away, with only the room they had sheltered in still standing.

Miss Joyces cousin, Clare Parker, who lives in London, said: When they came out, the eye of the tornado had ripped the concrete house apart.

They walked out of there alive, which is miraculous and we are so grateful for. They are feeling lucky to be alive.

Elsewhere, a British couple have been hiding in a rat-infested bathroom with no water for five days as the island they were living on  St Maarten  descended into lawlessness.

Jos Smart, 26, and his girlfriend Julia Taylor, 30, say they have been abandoned by the Government and are too afraid to leave the half-destroyed hotel that they found refuge in, amid reports of looting and violence.

Ian Smart, Joss father, said: They have not had any water for a day, they have got a bit of juice, but they are trying to keep under the radar.

They said the sounds were apocalyptic and they have likened it to a war zone. They are holed up in a half-demolished bathroom and their phone is running out of battery. They are in a bit of a state. There have been rats in their room looking for food.

Storm clouds gathered over Florida ahead of Irma's arrival. It has since killed four people and left three million people without power

He added: At night time there were people knocking on their door, and so there are 12 hours of sheer blackness to get through with the terror of who is going to knock down the door. Charlotte Grayson, whose father and siblings live on Tortola, said the Governments response was almost invisible.

Miss Grayson added: Looting has been rife.

The Government  which has a responsibility to provide military security and protection from natural disasters in its self-governing overseas territories  has sent 500 soldiers to the region, with 120 stationed in the British Virgin Islands.

Last night a further 50 police officers were sent to help deal with looting, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said, as he pledged to be there in the long-term for British residents.

The Prime Minister announced last week that a 32 million relief fund would support the humanitarian effort. The Government has also pledged to double all public donations made to the British Red Cross appeal.
A Key West woman was forced to deliver her baby while trying to flee from Hurricane Irma as it battered the Florida coast.

On Saturday, the Miami-Dade Police Department shared a photo of 'baby Nayiri Storm' - who came into the world hours before the category 3 storm made landfall, bringing 125mph winds.

'Welcome to the world baby Nayiri Storm! Glad our officers were able to assist the family safely from hospital to hotel. #PerfectName,' the department tweeted as a caption.

On Saturday, the Miami-Dade Police Department shared a photo of a baby born ahead of Hurricane Irma, captioned: 'Welcome to the world baby Nayiri Storm! Glad our officers were able to assist the family safely from hospital to hotel. #PerfectName' (above)

Cara Kesling and her husband (center) had learned that then-Category 5 Irma was heading straight to their home and fled to Miami-Dade, where the baby girl was safely delivered at Baptist Hospital in Kendall

Cara Kesling and her husband had learned that when Irma was still a Category 5 hurricane, it was heading straight to their home.

The family fled to Miami-Dade, where the baby girl was safely delivered at Baptist Hospital in Kendall.

On Saturday, the new mother was released from the hospital, and Miami-Dade police escorted the Keslings and Nayiri to a hotel, where they're waiting out the storm.

Irmas core hit the Florida Keys on Sunday morning, according to the National Weather Service.

Approximately 6.3 million people in Florida were ordered to evacuate their homes.

A trail of destruction and devastation has already been left in Irmas wake along the Caribbean.

At least 25 have died as a result from the storm and hundreds of homes and businesses have been destroyed, including up to 95 percent of structures on the tiny island of Barbuda.

On Saturday, the new mother was released from the hospital, and Miami-Dade police escorted the Keslings and Nayiri (pictured) to a hotel, where they're waiting out the storm

Irmas core hit the Florida Keys on Sunday morning, according to the National Weather Service. Approximately 6.3 million people in Florida were ordered to evacuate their homes

However, this is not the only case of a woman giving birth during the storm.

The Washington Post reports that a woman called 911 around 3.23am that she was in labor.

After emergency crews were unable to travel to get to her, she called again at 5.35am that she was about to give birth.

Paramedics, a dispatcher and a doctor from Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami, on a conference call, walked her through her childbirth, including delivering the placenta and cutting the umbilical cord.

Crews were able to respond to only four calls overnight. The call from the woman in labor was not one of them.
Militant unions yesterday threatened to break the law in order to force Theresa May out of Downing Street.

One hard-Left leader demanded that millions of workers down tools, declaring: Theyre not going to lock us all up.

The Rail, Maritime and Transport (RMT) union called for a nationwide train strike to bring the transport network to a halt.

And Unite leader Len McCluskey warned he would break strike laws to protect his members interests.

Backing: John McDonnell (left) with Unite's Len McCluskey (right) yesterday

Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell also spoke at the rally outside the Trades Union Congress (TUC) to give Labours blessing to a wave of strikes against the public-sector pay cap.

He said his MPs would be on picket lines to show solidarity with the struggle, and appeared to give support to co-ordinated action. The incendiary comments came as it emerged that:

Almost 50 union barons take home salaries topping 100,000;

Unions have given Labour 27million since Jeremy Corbyn became leader;

Allies of Mr Corbyn are set to use this months Labour conference to entrench the hard Lefts power over the party.

TUC delegates in Brighton will this week debate a series of motions calling for co-ordinated strikes over public-sector pay. Yesterday militant union barons gathered at a rally outside the TUC organised by the National Shop Stewards Network (NSSN).

The meeting was titled: Fight together to scrap the 1 per cent pay cap and get the Tories out.

Ronnie Draper, of the Bakers, Food and Allied Workers Union, called for laws against turning out to support other unions industrial action to be ignored, saying: Theyre not going to lock us all up  there arent enough jails.

We should be balloting for a general strike. We can take part in a general strike that is co-ordinated action. Theres nothing illegal about it. Nothing the Government can do about it.

We need something thats going to be a threat to government. Yes, if it needs bringing the Government down, then all the better.

Sean Hoyle, of the RMT, pledged a repeat of the first national rail strike. He said: I make this promise to the government: The RMT will have a quasi-national rail strike just like 1911 all over again.

The Shadow Chancellor was attacked by Tory MP Julian Knight, who said Mr McDonnell's stance was 'outrageous'

We will co-ordinate and we must stop the transport system in this country. Last year I stood here and said, Any trade unionist with any sense would want to bring down this working class-hating Tory government. Every union should stand side by side with the RMT union when we march and we say to the Government and the private operators: F*** you, f*** you and f*** you.

He also branded Mrs May a murderer for pushing through austerity that he said had caused the Grenfell fire tragedy. Mr McCluskey told delegates Unite was prepared to break the law to take on employers and the government.

He said: Unite is proud to be a fighting-back union, to be a union that is afraid of no one. We will stand shoulder to shoulder with any workers in struggle.

That is why we took the issue out of our rule book about always acting inside the law.

We took that out because we know that if the bosses and the privileged elite want to push us outside the law, so be it. It wont stop us standing up.

A Unite spokesman said he was referring to legal changes that mean a union ballot is valid only if turnout is higher than 50 per cent, rather than secondary picketing.

Mr McDonnell attends a protest against working conditions and the use of zero hour contracts in central London

Mr McDonnell told the rally he had toured the country to support strikes including workers from British Airways and McDonalds.

He told the NSSN that Labour would back industrial action to force the Government to overturn the pay cap, saying: Well be in Parliament supporting you and well be on the picket line supporting you as well.

And he vowed to back unions that worked together on industrial action  an apparent endorsement of co-ordinated strikes. Labour did not respond to calls asking whether the Shadow Chancellor had been supporting co-ordinated action.

Tory MP Julian Knight said: It is, frankly, outrageous that John McDonnell is encouraging trade union bosses to shut down public services with a wave of strikes.

n A total of 45 union barons are taking home six-figure salaries while the workers they represent struggle, according to an analysis. The TaxPayers Alliance found five union bosses earn more than the Prime Ministers 150,402.
Businesses are cosying up to Labour again after Jeremy Corbyns better-than-expected general election result.

The number of business delegates attending this months party conference is up 50 per cent on last year, when Labour appeared to be in crisis under the hard-Left leader.

Among the companies exhibiting at the event for the first time in two years are technology giants Microsoft and Google.

Other major firms such as train-maker Hitachi and Centrica, the owner of British Gas, are also sponsoring fringe events.

The number of business delegates attending this months party conference is up 50 per cent on last year, when Labour appeared to be in crisis under the hard-Left leader

Labour said the renewed interest from businesses showed the party is now seen as a government in waiting.

A spokesman added that tickets for Labours business forum  where firms pay to meet members of the shadow cabinet  sold out at the end of August.

Figures show that last year there were 1,832 business delegates at Labours conference. So far this year, 2,757 have signed up for the event in Brighton.

The party said that due to demand, additional stands have been added, and that 25 per cent of stands at next years conference have already been booked.

A Labour spokesman said: Many more businesses are attending party conference this year because they know that Labour is a government in waiting.

Other firms attending the conference for the first time include the hotel group Signature Living, energy firm Ecotricity, environmental company Tangent, Transport for the North and Co-operative Councils.

Corbyn's better than expected performance at the general election appears to have won over a number of business leaders

The new interest from corporations follows Mr Corbyns unexpectedly strong performance at the general election. It also reflects Labours potential to influence the Government on Brexit. Many firms oppose new limits on migration after Britain leaves the EU because they want to maintain a supply of cheap labour from overseas.

In many cases companies initially avoided engagement with Labour as it was dragged to the Left by Mr Corbyn.

The partys manifesto promised to increase corporation tax on business, as well as income tax on the rich. It pledged to bring energy, rail and water companies back into public ownership, and introduce a maximum pay ratio of 20:1 between the highest and lowest-paid staff in the public sector.

Last month a party source said there were not enough hours in the day to meet all the people who are requesting to meet Labour from the business community.

The source added: Old contacts and new are proactively contacting us to request greater engagement with Labour.

Last month a party source said there were not enough hours in the day to meet all the people who are requesting to meet Labour from the business community
The Grand Imam of Egypts Al-Azhar Ahmed El-Tayeb met on Sunday with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and gave a speech where he condemned the atrocities against Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar.

El-Tayeb gave his speech during Paths of Peace: Religions and Cultures in Dialogue conference in Germany, where he criticised the international community for failing to save the Rohingya.

El-Tayeb also stressed that the majority of Arabs and Muslims have nothing to do with terrorism.

The grand imam of Al-Azhar  which considered the worlds highest seat of Sunni Islamic learning  added that Western intervention and proxy wars have also played a major role in destabilising the region.

"The region has become a stage for arms races and regional and international conflicts," he added.

El-Tayeb and Merkel discussed cooperation between Al-Azhar and Germany as well as the Rohingya crisis.

Myanmars minority Rohingya Muslim population has long been subjected to discrimination in the mostly Buddhist country, where the government denies them citizenship and regards them as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, even if they have lived in the country for generations.

Over the last two weeks alone, some 270,000 mostly Rohingya civilians have fled to Bangladesh to escape the conflict in Myanmar, overwhelming refugee camps that were already bursting at the seams, a UN official told AFP.

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A man who thought he was on his way to a blind date with a woman he met on a dating app has been robbed and assaulted in Sydney's east.

The 23-year-old believed he was meeting the female at Wallis Parade in North Bondi shortly after midnight on Sunday morning.

But when arriving at the home he was set upon by three men, one of whom allegedly assaulted him and stole his wallet.

A man who thought he was on his way to a blind date with a woman he met on a popular dating app has been robbed and assaulted in Sydney's east (stock image)

Two men, aged 20 and 18, and a teenager, aged 17, were arrested on Wairoa Avenue at about 2.30am and taken to Waverley Police Station.

The 18-year-old man was charged with robbery and granted conditional bail to appear at Waverley Local Court on October 3.

The other man and the teenager have been released pending further inquiries.

Police believe the incident is linked to a popular dating app and have since sent out at a warning for users of apps such as Tinder to tread with caution when interacting with unknown profiles.
Australian actress Sarah Monahan has been livestreaming the devastation caused by Hurricane Irma in Florida.

Monahan, who lives in Palm Beach with her husband, kept her followers updated as the monster storm hit the state with 130mph (210km/h) winds on Sunday.

The 640km wide storm blew ashore in the morning in the mostly-evacuated Florida Keys before moving up the state's west coast.

Monahan and her husband Matt Norris shared a livestream lasting almost two hours from their houseboat showing fierce winds battering their surroundings.

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Asutralian Sarah Monahan (pictured) has been livestreaming Hurricane Irma from Florida

She then streamed live as they drove through deserted streets to shelter at a friend's house.

Around midday on Sunday local time, she shared a video update to let everyone know that the couple were alright.

'Hey everyone, the storm has now hit Key West, so we're about 100 miles north of that,' she says, but much of what follows is drowned out by the noise from the storm.

'As you can see, we're starting to get some wind and some rain. They keep giving us tornado warnings and then it back.'

She adds: 'I think we're going to be fine.'

She shared live videos from the boat where she lives with her husband as the fierce storm hit

She later shared a livestream as the couple drove through the deserted streets of Palm Beach

Monahan shared a picture from inside a friend's house, adding: 'Grateful for friends with big houses with hurricane glass!'

In her latest update, posted on Sunday evening, she wrote: 'We had a break between rain bands and checked on the marina.

'Got back right as the next one started, and this one is blowing pretty hard. Grateful for friends with big houses with hurricane glass!'

Monahan is best known as the child actress who starred in sitcom Hey Dad! in the 1980s and 1990s.

Years later, went revealed that she had been abused by Robert Hughes, who played her on-screen father,

Hughes was found guilty of 10 of 11 child sex charges in 2014 and is serving at least six years in prison.

Monahan posted a video update to let people know they were safe, but much of the sound was drowned out by the fierce winds
A pregnant 19-year-old was shot in the head just before 1pm Sunday while standing outside of her home in Brooklyn.

Tatiana Sparks is in critical condition at Brookdale University Hospital but is expected to survive. It is not clear what is the the condition of her unborn child.

The culprit shot at Sparks multiple times in broad daylight outside of her Brownsville home, witnesses told Pix 11.

Louis Leak, 64, knows the victim from the neighborhood and said he heard Sparks screaming. When he saw her, she wasn't moving or visibly breathing.

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Tatiana Sparks, 19, was shot in the head outside of her Brooklyn home on Sunday afternoon. She is seven months pregnant with her first child

He told New York Daily News: 'She was laying between two cars and she didn't look like she was alive to me. She was already bleeding out.'

It is not clear what motivated the attacker or if she was the intended target. Witnesses also said she was wearing pink slippers when she was shot. She is supposed to have the baby shower for her first child later in September.

The suspect wore a black shirt, grey sweatpants and is 5'7 and has a beard. He fled on Howard Avenue near the intersection of Dean Street.

She was taken to the hospital via ambulance. Police are still investigating the incident and there have not been any arrests as of Sunday evening.
The Last Tycoon has seen its last episode.

Amazon canceled the Old Hollywood drama that starred Lily Collins, Matt Bomer and Kelsey Grammer after nine episodes, according to a report Saturday from The Hollywood Reporter.

The show, which was based on the work of F. Scott Fitzgerald, was set in the 1930s and focused on the studio system tug-of-war between show biz execs Monroe Stahr (Bomer) and Pat Brady (Grammer), with Collins in the role of Celia Brady.

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Nixed: The Last Tycoon, starring Lily Collins (above), Matt Bomer and Kelsey Grammer, has been canceled after a nine-episode run, according to The Hollywood Reporter on Saturday

Amazon picked up the Billy Ray-created show in 2016 and started streaming it this past July. While the studio does not publicly release ratings statistics, the show received a lukewarm 53 percent review on Rotten Tomatoes.

It's the latest program to be nixed after a single season for Amazon, which has also canceled one-season shows such as Good Girls Revolt, Mad Dogs and Z: The Beginning of Everything, another show based off the work of Fitzgerald.

The latter series, which starred Christina Ricci as the author's wife Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald, was canceled earlier this week after it had initially been renewed this past April, with Amazon already having plunked down $7 million on production expenses for the second season, THR reported.

Insiders told the publication that the multiple cancellations are a part of an effort to scale back amid the search for 'big shows that can make the biggest difference around the world,' Amazon Studios chief Roy Price told Variety. The studio's head Jeff Bezos is seeking a smash hit akin to Game Of Thrones, the publication reported.

Growing pains: Grammer said the show provided insight into the Old Hollywood studio system, which wasn't always pretty

Then and now: Bomer said that the program pointed out differences in the handling of studio stars amid the 1930s

Grammer, 62, speaking with Variety at a screening of the show's debut in July, said that the show illuminated growing pains in Tinseltown's history.

'The glitz and the glamour are still attractive and alluring, but the underbelly of it all, accomplishment, has a shabby childhood usually,' the show biz veteran told the publication. 'It's something we all have to face. It doesn't mean it's wrong, it doesn't mean it's sad.

'It just means it's the way it goes.'

Strong role: The veteran screen star Grammer played studio head Pat Brady on the drama

Puttin' on the ritz: The show accurately depicted the classic style of the 1930s

Next up: The talented actress Collins has roles in two yet-to-be-released films in Tolkien and Halo of Stars, according to iMDb

Bomer, 39, told the outlet that the show illustrated the vast differences between the modern day atmosphere and the micromanaged control the old studios lorded over its performers.

'As nice as it is to have freedom from the studio system, there was something great about [it] because you were covered from all angles from the studio,' the actor said. 'They had your public image, they took care of your wardrobe, they took care of all your movies. I just dont want to do 50 movies a year.'

Ray said that he tried to created a program 'with as much beauty and glamour and drama and soap opera and danger and violence as' possible. The creator noted that the author Fitzgerald had died amid the writing of the book, which was subsequently published. He said, 'Fitzgerald unfortunately died halfway through and left a bunch of possibilities that he wasnt sure he was going to do,' adding that he hoped to tell the rest of the story with the show.
With his bald head hes virtually unrecognisable  but this is Ralph Fiennes in character for his latest film.

The heart-throb actor, who shot to fame in The English Patient, when he sported his natural lustrous locks, appears to have had his hair shaved to the scalp to play Alexander Pushkin. The ballet teacher was the mentor of Russian dancer Rudolf Nureyev.

The star was spotted on location in Croatia last week filming The White Crow, which he is also directing. With a screenplay by playwright David Hare, the film tells the story of Nureyevs sensational defection to the West from the Soviet Union in 1961.

Ralph Fiennes was spotted on set with a shaved head as he plays Alexander Pushkin, the mentor of Russian dancer Rudolf Nureyev

Ralph Fiennes sporting a full head of hair alongside Jennifer Lopez as the pair star in Maid in Manhattan

It is not the first time that Fiennes  who plays spymaster M in the James Bond films and who also starred alongside Jennifer Lopez in the 2002 romcom Maid In Manhattan  has lost his locks for a role.

When he played evil Lord Voldemort in the Harry Potter films, he appeared completely bald, donning full make-up to complete the effect.

Recent photographs of Fiennes suggest that his hairline has gradually receded in the past few years.

Last night a representative for Fiennes confirmed the hairstyle was for the part.
After more than 50 years in music, The Rolling Stones were back on tour on Saturday night, wowing a packed stadium of 82,000 fans in Hamburg, Germany.

Kicking off their STONES - NO FILTER tour Mick Jagger, 74, Keith Richards, 73, Ronnie Wood, 70, and Charlie Watts, 76, played to the Stadtpark venue and unveiled a spectacular new stage design for the first major live music event at the venue in 28 years.

To add to the joy, fans were left cheering as the boys declared they weren't ever going to stop performing.

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They're off: The Rolling Stones kicked off their No Filter tour in Hamburg... with a nod to The Beatles and a promise to fans that they're not slowing down any time soon

50 years later: The Rolling Stones were back on tour on Saturday night, wowing a packed stadium of 82,000 fans in Hamburg, Germany

Keith told fans: 'We havent finished yet. Its still too early for me to talk about the Stones legacy. Theres one thing that we havent yet achieved, and thats to really find out how long you can do this.

'Its still such a joy to play with this band that you cant really let go of it. Im more interested in learning how far this bunch can take it.'

Sir Mick added: 'Its incredible to think about working with the same band for more than 50 years.

'Of course, members have come and gone, but it is still the Rolling Stones. Inevitably it makes you think about the mortality of it. But here we are making plans.'

Kicking things off: Mick Jagger, 74, Keith Richards, 73, Ronnie Wood, 70, and Charlie Watts, 76, played to the Stadtpark venue and unveiled a spectacular new stage design for the first major live music event at the venue in 28 years

Lapping it up: To add to the joy, fans were left cheering as the boys declared they weren't ever going to stop performing

Keith told fans: 'We havent finished yet. Its still too early for me to talk about the Stones legacy. Theres one thing that we havent yet achieved, and thats to really find out how long you can do this'

Sir Mick added: 'Its incredible to think about working with the same band for more than 50 years. Of course, members have come and gone, but it is still the Rolling Stones. Inevitably it makes you think about the mortality of it. But here we are making plans'

Mick also made a nod to The Beatles, by saying: 'We were told by our friends from Liverpool that Hamburg is a good place to make a start with your career!'

The band rocked the house, treating fans to a set list full of classics from their formidable arsenal of songs including Its Only Rock And Roll, Paint It Black, Start Me Up and Brown Sugar.

They belted out hits Just Your Fool and Ride Em On Down from last years number one album Blue and Lonesome.

Chosen by the fans, the band performed Under My Thumb, and also pulled a few surprises with Play With Fire from the early days and Dancing With Mr D from Goats Head Soup.

Mick also made a nod to The Beatles, by saying: 'We were told by our friends from Liverpool that Hamburg is a good place to make a start with your career'

Rocking out: The band rocked the house, treating fans to a set list full of classics from their formidable arsenal of songs including Its Only Rock And Roll, Paint It Black, Start Me Up and Brown Sugar

Not slowing down: They belted out hits Just Your Fool and Ride Em On Down from last years number one album Blue and Lonesome

Chosen by the fans: The band performed Under My Thumb, and also pulled a few surprises with Play With Fire from the early days and Dancing With Mr D from Goats Head Soup

They brought the show to a thrilling close with Satisfaction, Gimme Shelter and Jumpin Jack Flash.

Saturday marked the first stop of this fourteen date tour visiting twelve different venues across Europe in September & October - although the UK is not on that list.

The tour will now head for Munich (Germany), Spielberg (Austria), Zurich (Switzerland), Lucca (Italy) Barcelona (Spain), Amsterdam (Holland), Copenhagen (Denmark), Dusseldorf (Germany), Stockholm (Sweden), Arnhem (Holland) and rounds up with three shows in Paris (France) at the brand new U Arena, the first concerts to be staged at this venue.

Keith also declared to the audience: 'Weve had some near disasters, but I honestly dont think weve ever played a bad show.

'Its an indescribable feeling to get out there and whack into "Jumpin Jack Flash" for starters. That rapport between the band and the fans  its like youve got these millions of friends.'

Closing the show: They brought the show to a thrilling close with Satisfaction, Gimme Shelter and Jumpin Jack Flash

On tour: Saturday marked the first stop of this fourteen date tour visiting twelve different venues across Europe in September & October - although the UK is not on that list

Keith also declared to the audience: 'Weve had some near disasters, but I honestly dont think weve ever played a bad show. That rapport between the band and the fans  its like youve got these millions of friends'

Announcing plans for the tour in May, frontman Mick said in a statement: 'I'm so excited to be touring Europe this autumn and returning to some familiar places and some we've never done before.'

Guitarist Keith - whose tour will include such cities as Zurich, Barcelona, Amsterdam and Copenhagen - added: 'Hey Guys, here we come. See you there!'

The tireless rockers recorded their comeback album, Blue And Lonesome, in just three days back in 2015.
She's hoping to win over the hearts of many as she courts the affections of men on Celebs Go Dating.

And Charlotte Dawson risked a serious wardrobe malfunction rather than her heart on a night out with close pal Sam Giffen at Rosso bar in Manchester on Saturday.

Hand-in-hand with her best friend, the reality star, 24, put her impressive cleavage on display when she went braless in a striking tailored white suit.

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Power dressing! Charlotte Dawson dared to wear a tailored suit as a dress when she enjoyed a night out with Sam Giffen at Rosso bar in Manchester on Saturday

Power dressing, the impressive jacket featured eye-catching buttons which glowed like golden coins in the glimmers of the street lamps.

The Ex On The Beach personality, who appeared on the show in 2016, dared to ditch trousers as she wore the garment as a dress, making a leggy arrival on the scene.

Injecting femininity into her ensemble, the television sensation boosted her height with pointed sky-high nude heels in the bustling northern city.

The dating hopeful courted attention as she wore dramatic eye make-up for the finishing touches and styled her glossy mane in a poker straight fashion.

She's bold: The Celebs Go Dating star put her impressive cleavage on display when she went braless in a striking tailored white suit

Feeling feminine: The television sensation boosted her height with pointed sky-high nude heels in the bustling northern city

Charlotte completed her dramatic attire with a canary yellow handbag which she toted with her free hand.

Sam, who was affectionately holding the beauty's other hand, pulled off a cool look with a leather jacket worn over a slim-fitted black tee and chinos.

The former Big Brother housemate wore his classically handsome good looks well and added sparkle to his appearance with a silver pendant.

How to accessorise: The reality star completed her power dress attire with a canary yellow handbag which she toted with her free hand

In the Celebs Go Dating sphere, Charlotte has already been making waves on the E4 dating show.

But as for romance it looks like things haven't kicked off to a good start when fans saw her dumped by a Pete Wicks lookalike.

Ahead of the mixer, she was getting in a flirty mood when downing Prosecco from a bottle in a taxi.

Pirate Pete doppelganger Jordan, from Wolverhampton, instantly caught her eye with Charlotte describing him as 'fit as f*** I just want to eat him'.

All about the theatrics: The dating hopeful courted attention as she wore dramatic eye make-up for the finishing touches and styled her glossy mane in a poker straight fashion

She confessed: 'I fancy the f*** out of him.'

But match-maker Lady Nadia Essex was fuming as Charlotte 'ignored' advice given to her by the agency, which she claims would make her 'impossible to get a date'.

In a flirty advance, Charlotte asked Jordan to meet her for a drink but it wasn't the fairytale ending she was hoping for as he rejected her move.

He told her: 'I don't know how to tell you this but I recently split up with someone and I'm trying to get her back.'

In good company: She held hands with her best friend and Big Brother contestant Sam, whom is one of her closest pals
She was spotted looking stony-faced and somewhat gaunt at Sydney airport on Wednesday.

But on Friday, Nicole Kidman, 50, appeared to be in better spirits as she stepped out at the Toronto International Film Festival for the premiere of her latest film The Upside.

For the event in Canada, the age-defying actress stunned in a off-the-shoulder black frock, which accentuated her slender figure.

Age-defying! Ageless Nicole Kidman, 50, looked happy and youthful as she flaunted her slender figure in an off-the-shoulder black dress at the Toronto International Film Festival in Canada on Friday

Nicole, who attended with her husband Keith Urban, couldn't wipe the smile off her face during the outing as she flaunted her enviable frame in the figure-hugging number.

The black gown gave a glimpse of the Australian star's decolletage with its sweetheart neckline.

It also featured elegant ruffled sleeves and a fishtail hemline, giving Nicole an air of sophistication and class.

Effortlessly elegant: The black gown gave a glimpse of the Australian star's decolletage with its sweetheart neckline

Happy days! Nicole couldn't wipe the smile off her face as she posed on the red carpet

Adding to the look, the Oscar-winning actress opted for black strappy heels and a pedicure in a matching shade.

Nicole accessorised the ensemble with a swathe of sparkling jewellery.

Adorning her body were diamond earrings, necklace and a host of rings as well as a bracelet.

Stunner! Nicole's husband Keith Urban dutifully watched on as the actress struck a pose

Joining the glamorous actress for the event was her country music star husband Keith, 46, who dutifully watched on as Nicole posed on the red carpet

The couple, who share two daughters, Sunday Rose, nine, and Faith Margaret, six, also happily cosied up to one another to have their photo taken together.

Former Voice Australia judge Keith looked dapper as he donned a slate grey suit with maroon tie for the occasion.

Couple goals: Keith matched his wife in the style stakes, looking dapper in a slate grey suit with maroon tie
It had been over two decades since they've played in New Zealand.

But iconic Australian rock band Midnight Oil returned to the stage in Auckland on Saturday night after 20 years to a very warm reception, in front of a packed out crowd at the city's Spark Arena.

The crowd welcomed the Oil's with open arms, with fans taking to Twitter to voice their thoughts on them returning to Kiwi shores.

Return: Iconic Australian rock band Midnight Oil returned to the stage in Auckland on Saturday night after 20 years to a very warm reception, in front of a packed out crowd at the city's Spark Arena

'In case you're interested, Midnight Oil were incredibly good. I'll let you know about Space Alert,' one punter said.

Another jokingly claimed: 'Midnight Oil was good. But need to go into the pit to dance, apparently. I was told to sit down, as fire risk. My dance moves are that hot.'

The band hadn't made the trip across the Tasman Sea since 1995 for the Mountain Rock festival.

Enduring years of hiatus and even a political career by front man Peter Garrett, the band withdrew from a regular touring schedule in 2002, only appearing at one-off events for charity including 2009's Sound Relief in both Melbourne and Sydney.

'In case you're interested, Midnight Oil were incredibly good. I'll let you know about Space Alert,' The crowd welcomed the Oil's with open arms, with fans taking to Twitter to voice their thoughts on them returning to Kiwi shores

'Midnight Oil was good. But need to go into the pit to dance, apparently. I was told to sit down, as fire risk. My dance moves are that hot' The band hadn't made the trip across the Tasman Sea since 1995 for the Mountain Rock festival

But in a surprising announcement via the band's Facebook in May last year, the band announced they would be 'getting back together for some gigs next year.'

Calling a press conference in February earlier this year, the musicians said they would be taking it one step further and touring from April all the way until November, and even travelling to different countries, including Europe and North America.

One of the most celebrated Australian bands in the country's history, the politically charged group have made controversial statements in the past for their supportive views on Aboriginal native land title.

Back on stage: Calling a press conference in February earlier this year, the musicians said they would be taking it one step further and touring from April all the way until November, and even travelling to different countries, including Europe and North America

In 2000 Midnight Oil appeared at the closing ceremony of the Sydney Olympic Games, and finished their performance with the world 'Sorry' emblazoned across their T-shirts.

Referencing the controversial Stolen Generation period in Australia between the 1890's and 1970's where Aboriginal children were removed from their biological families, the band has never been afraid to vocalize their political thoughts.

'The Great Circle' tour will finish its run on the 17 December in Sydney.

Getting political: One of the most celebrated Australian bands in the country's history, the politically charged group have made controversial statements in the past for their supportive views on Aboriginal native land title
He's the British comedian known for his bold fashion choices.

But with an impassioned plea to the Australian public in an interview with The Herald Sun, the 55-year-old threw his support behind the same sex marriage campaign, ahead of the postal vote later this month.

'I don't feel Australians should want to be on the side of the old imperialists, the old world, the old negative, regressive thinking,' Eddie told the publication.

'Australia, I encourage you to think positively, think of the future, think of equality and vote for it' With an impassioned plea to the Australian public in an interview with The Herald Sun on Sunday, the 55 year old threw his support behind the same sex marriage campaign, ahead of the postal vote later this month

'Australia, I encourage you to think positively, think of the future, think of equality and vote for it.'

The star of upcoming British-American biographical comedy drama Victoria and Abdul went on to say that the Australian people have the upper hand in this debate, and said that voting 'yes' for marriage equality is a big step forward for basic rights.

'What I love about Australia is its energy, its youthfulness, its forward-looking ability to say, 'Forget the old empire, let us invent a new way of doing things,' he said.

''And marriage equality is the new way of doing things.'

'Marriage equality is the new way of doing things' The colourful character came out as transgender in 1985 and has advocated for the rights of LGBTI individuals for years

The colourful character came out as transgender in 1985 and has advocated for the rights of LGBTI individuals for years.

Eddie is no stranger to cross-dressing, speaking about how 'you've got to be tough' in order to step out in women's clothes.

He has previously revealed how he has been attacked by strangers in the street for his feminine outfits.

The stand-up comic told the Radio Times back in 2014: 'I've had people attack me on the street, I've had people shout endless abuse at me.

'If you're going to be a transvestite, and you're going to be out in public, you've got to be tough enough.'
Iran says it warned off a U.S. Navy warship during a rescue of a boat in the Gulf of Oman, while American officials say there was no direct contact.

The U.S. Navy said Sunday the incident happened Wednesday and involved a small vessel some 75 nautical miles from the USS Tempest, a coastal patrol boat. The Navy says another boat much closer offered assistance, with that vessel communicating with Iranian naval forces.

Iran offered a different version of the incident. Press TV, the English-language arm of its state broadcaster, said Sunday that the Iranian navy "warned off an American warship" while rescuing the stranded dhow, a traditional ship.

The U.S. and Iran routinely have tense encounters in the Persian Gulf.

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He's the ripped Thor actor who's also a father to three young children with wife Elsa Pataky.

And Saturday, Chris Hemsworth, 34, was spotted being a doting dad to his daughter India-Rose.

Snapped arriving at LAX Airport in Los Angeles, the ruggedly handsome star held the five-year-old in his arms as they made their way out of the terminal.

Doting dad! On Saturday, Chris Hemsworth (pictured) was spotted carrying his five-year-old daughter India-Rose (pictured) out of the airport terminal in Los Angeles

Chris cut a casual figure for the arrival, wearing a grey T-shirt which he teamed with simple black shorts.

He added to the ensemble with brown shoes and shielded his face with aviator-style sunglasses and a black cap.

The former Home And Away star put his muscles to good use carrying his adorable offspring who sported an animal-print vest and jeans.

Like father, like daughter: India-Rose carried her stuffed toy while dad Chris carted two bags

In another photo, India-Rose could be seen walking alongside her father at the airport.

While she had a tight grip on a stuffed toy, dad Chris was left to cart two large suitcases as he kept an eye on his daughter.

Chris and his Spanish supermodel wife Elsa, 41, also share three-year-old twin sons: Tristan and Sasha.

Family ties: Chris and Elsa share three kids together: India-Rose and three-year-old twin sons Sasha and Tristian

Proud parents! Chris and wife Elsa Pataky (right) reside in Byron Bay

Though much of his work is in Hollywood these days, Chris resides in the Australian coastal town of Byron Bay with his Elsa and their kids.

Last Sunday, he made the trip to Australia in order to celebrate Father's Day with his family.

The low-key brood took time out at Byron Bay Markets to blend in with locals as the children delighted in a spot of face painting.
All eyes were on Brie Larson Saturday night as she stormed the red carpet in an eye-catching red dress with matching pants worn underneath it.

But just hours before her glamorous appearance at InStyle's party at the Toronto International Film Festival, Brie Larson flew out of LAX in a much more casual outfit.

The Oscar winner's airport look had a very youthful spirit, consisting of a unicorn sweater, glittery rainbow purse and fuzzy pink slippers.

Lady in red: Brie Larson stunned on the red carpet at the The Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA) and InStyle's 2017 Toronto International Film Festival party

Larson hit the airport with her fiance Alex Greenwald on Saturday morning to attend the screening of her latest film Unicorn Store, which undoubtedly explained her choice in attire.

Once on the red carpet, Brie struck a much more fashionable figure without losing her sparkle, adding a pair of very tall glittering red heels for the fashion magazine's bash.

Her long blonde bob was perfectly tousled with loose waves and her cheeks were covered in a peachy hue to add to her beachy beauty look.

Beachy waves: Her long blonde bob was perfectly tousled with loose waves and her cheeks were covered in a peachy hue to add to her beachy beauty look

Before and after: On Saturday morning Brie was seen arriving for her flight to Toronto at LAX

Fancy footwear: The Oscar winner rocked a pair of glittering red heels with her bright outfit

Unicorn Store marks Brie's directorial debut and will screen later in the Toronto Film Festival.

Speaking to Variety about the fete, she said: 'Im excited to be sharing it with the world. Im totally terrified, but Im also really excited. This film is such a weird, abstract portrait of myself.

'In a way, I feel like this is the most vulnerable Ive been with this quirky, fun, lighthearted comedy that has a metaphor underneath it  because you know I love a good metaphor  is about being yourself.'

Youthful spirit: Brie arrived at LAX Saturday morning with her musician fiance Alex Greenwald

Promotional: Her unicorn sweater is fitting as Brie is set to unveil her directorial debut Unicorn Store

InStyle and the Hollywood Foreign Press Association's bash also drew in Jessica Chastain who is in town for her movie Molly's Game.

The 40-year-old actress chose a black mini dress with sheer sleeves and a colorful pattern throughout.

Emma Roberts rocked a racy black lace mini dress that put her sensational pins on display.

Guest list: InStyle and the Hollywood Foreign Press Association's bash also drew in Jessica Chastain who is in town for her movie Molly's Game

Lacy lady: Emma Roberts rocked a racy black lace mini dress that put her sensational pins on display

The sweetest thing: Selma Blair, who will premiere her film Mom And Dad at TIFF, attended the party in a black two piece skirt set with silver pinstripe detail throughout

Selma Blair, who will premiere her film Mom And Dad at TIFF, attended the party in a black two piece skirt set with silver pinstripe detail throughout.

Elle Fanning, 19, chose a blush pink corseted gown with a pair of pink bejeweled heels.

Other stars on the guest list included Greta Gerwig, Kyle MacLachlan and Maisie Williams.

Blushing beauty: Elle Fanning, 19, chose a blush pink corseted gown with a pair of pink bejeweled heels

Other stars on the guest list included Kyle MacLachlan and Maisie Williams
She's the Australian actress who has drawn praise from colleagues for encouraging more powerful female characters to be on television.

And now The Wrong Girl star Kerry Armstrong has revealed she is delighted by the amount of women who are starting to land leading roles.

The 59-year-old said there has been a 'new beginning' for women, who are now featuring in more star roles in prime time slots, News.com.au reported.

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Australian actress Kerry Armstrong (pictured) has revealed she is delighted by the amount of women who are starting to land leading roles in prime time television slots

The 59-year-old (pictured with Mel Gibson) said there has been a 'new beginning' for women led by actors such as Helen Mirren and Susan Sarandon

'We are finally seeing a new beginning for women, led by people like Helen Mirren or Susan Sarandon  sexy, fearless and flawed women,' she told the website.

'There is now an acceptance that women are powerful. That comes from men as well as women.

'They live with these women  they are their mothers, their girlfriends, their sisters and their daughters.'

Kerry said her mother and sister were often worried about her being too outspoken, and was often thought of as 'mad rather than gifted'.

Kerry - who stars in The Wrong Girl (pictured) - said her mother and sister were often worried about her being too outspoken

Stunning: Madeleine West praise her Wrong Girl co-star Kerry (pictured), who plays Mimi Woodward

But recent praise from actors - including fellow star on The Wrong Girl Madeleine West - has left her mother feeling delighted.

'My mum was just so thrilled to see me getting some credit and support from wonderful actors like Maddie because for the longest time I was just considered difficult rather than intelligent,' Kerry said.

Madeleine, 37, heaped praise on Kerry last month before the second season of The Wrong Girl hit TV screens.

'I look at someone like Kerry and she is so beautiful and sexy,' she told The Daily Telegraph.

'She is so comfortable in her own skin. She is so present in her own body. She has such gravitas.'
He was named Male Model Of The Year at Daily Front Row's Fashion Media Awards on Saturday.

But before he suited up for the prestigious event, Jordan Barrett, 20, was spotted making his way through the streets of New York looking carefree.

Dressed in an all-white ensemble, the 'bad boy of fashion' puffed on an unhealthy cigarette as he carried a juice and shopping bag on Friday.

Not on a health kick, then? Male model Jordan Barrett (pictured) was spotted juice in hand and puffing on a cigarette as he strolled the streets of New York on Friday

Jordan's golden locks glistened in the sun as he gripped tightly to a beverage and a bag from New York clothing store The Vintage Twin.

The young model was decked out almost entirely head to toe in the light shade, wearing a pale-coloured jacket over a white Nike T-shirt which he matched with his trademark baggy white pants.

A pair of black shoes were the only item of clothing to buck the trend.

Blowing smoke! The 20-year-old took a drag from the cigarette as he donned an all-white ensemble for the outing

At least the drink is healthy! Also in Jordan's hands were some sort of juice and a shopping bag from New York clothing store The Vintage Twin

The genetically blessed star added a touch of bling as he accessorised the outfit with a number of chunky gold rings adorning his fingers.

Jordan, who shot to fame after being discovered at 14 while shoplifting, attended the Daily Front Row 's Fashion Media Awards on Saturday night.

Showing off his killer looks at the event by wearing a suit sans shirt, the Byron Bay native was awarded the coveted Male Model Of The Year title.

Soon to be winner! At Daily Front Row's Fashion Media Awards, Jordan was crowned Male Model Of The Year

Lucky break: The genetically blessed star was discovered as a 14-year-old while shoplifting

Last month, Jordan told The Daily Telegraph that he is planning to make a foray into acting.

His first project will be starring in the short film Carte Blanche from Czech director Eva Dolezalova, shot in America.

'Hopefully if all things go well, there will be something else coming up on that side in October filming in Australia,' Jordan told the publication.

Jordan added that his move into acting was a case of 'making hay while the sun shines.'
She was recently seen flipping the bird while simultaneously flaunting her bikini body in a bizarre Instagram video.

And on Sunday, Sahara Ray once again set tongues wagging while leaving very little to the imagination in a racy throwback snap.

The 24-year-old went completely braless while posing in a silver fishnet-style dress and clutching an unhealthy cigarette.

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Feeling nippy? On Sunday, Sahara Ray left very little to the imagination while going completely braless in a fishnet dress in a throwback snap shared to Instagram

Flaunting the flesh! Sahara recently stripped down to an ill-fitting bikini to flaunt her assets on Instagram in a very bizarre video

In an effort to tone down the revealing snap, Sahara scribbled over her nipple area.

The blonde beauty casually leaned up against a wall and pouted her luscious lips, while holding an unhealthy cigarette in her left hand.

Last week Sahara was sporting an ill-fitting two-piece swimsuit from her own line in a video, which showed her dancing in front of a mirror and giving the middle finger.

The stunning blonde pouted and contorted her face into strange expressions as she pranced around provocatively.

Flipping the bird: The stunning blonde pouted and contorted her face into strange expressions before giving the middle finger

Busting out! The beauty bared her assets in this beachside Instagram snap back in July

Is it really you? Sahara's fans were left shocked after she appeared at a festival in Los Angeles last month looking noticeably different

Sahara - who shot to fame after enjoying a naked romp with Justin Bieber in Hawaii - looked very different in the social media video compared to real life.

Just last month, the 24-year-old was seen looking nothing like her Instagram snaps during an appearance at the Girl Cult Festival in Los Angeles.

She also looked far different compared to photos taken from 2015 when she was still just a fresh-faced socialite and aspiring designer.

Sahara - who is the daughter of Australian surfer Tony Ray - cut a demure figure in a loose-fitting T-shirt and yellow checked pants at the festival.

The busty blonde's lips seemed plumper and she boasted a remarkably smooth complexion, with her cheekbones appearing more defined.
She's appeared on international editions of magazines all over the world.

And Andreja Pejic showed just why, as she made a bold arrival at Harper's BAZAAR ICONS celebration in New York City on Saturday.

The 25-year-old Serbian born model who was raised in Melbourne looked effortlessly beautiful as she posed candidly for cameras.

Effortlessly beautiful: Andreja Pejic showed crowds why she's appeared on international editions of magazines all over the world on Saturday, when she made a bold arrival at Harper's BAZAAR ICONS celebration in New York City

Putting on a leggy display with a revealing white dress that was cut off at her right shoulder, she looked effortlessly glamorous.

The flowing dress was rounded out with a black stripe at the top with a thin strap holding her ensemble together on her right side.

Her sculptured legs were in full view, as she lifted her left leg up to show off her pale white complexion.

She opted for a heavy makeup glow, while her hair was straightened yet curled at the bottom.

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Fierce: Putting on a leggy display with a revealing white dress that was cut off at her right shoulder, she looked fiercer than ever

Revealing: Her sculptured legs were in full view, as she lifted her left leg up to show off her pale white complexion

Candid: She appeared at the Harper's BAZAAR ICONS event where she was snapped partying with friends and enjoying the celebrations

She appeared at the Harper's BAZAAR ICONS event where she was snapped partying with friends and enjoying the celebrations.

And this isn't the first time she's shown why she's one of the most recognisable transgender models in the world.

As a runway favourite, she wowed as she arrived at the Four Seasons Downtown on Friday for The Daily Front Row 5th Annual Media Awards wearing a black satin blazer with bold shoulder pads - under which she went topless.

Passion for fashion: Andreja Pejic was among at the attendees at the Daily Front Row 5th Annual Media Awards, held at New York City's Four Seasons Downtown on Friday night

She teamed her jacket, which was cuffed at the sleeves and cinched just below her navel with a single lower button, with a pair of skintight black trousers.

Sticking to her singular colour scheme, Andreja stood tall in a pair of vertiginous black heels, while a pair of oversized gold hoop earrings served as her accessories.

With her platinum tresses falling to her shoulders in soft, bouncy waves, the striking star accentuated her looks with a smudge of bubblegum pink lipstick.
He was just named the male model of the year by the Daily Front Row.

And over the weekend, Jordan Barrett showed exactly why he's been such a hit in the industry as he bared his chest in a blazer with no shirt at The Business of Fashion 500 Gala in New York.

The 20-year-old flaunted his buff bronzed chest for onlookers as he strutted around the star-studded event like he owned the place.

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Who needs a shirt? Jordan Barrett showed exactly why he's been such a hit in the industry as he bared his chest in a blazer with no shirt at The Business of Fashion 500 Gala in New York

Jordan was noticeably without one of his signature cigarettes, which he's known for puffing on regularly.

The young star is known for going shirtless under blazers, and has rocked the unique look multiple times this year.

He's also unafraid to strip down further, and even went as far as to post a completely nude photo of himself on Instagram last week.

Work it! The 20-year-old flaunted his buff bronzed chest for onlookers as he strutted around the star-studded event like he owned the place

Signature style: The young star is known for going shirtless under blazers, and has rocked the unique look multiple times this year

Last month, Jordan told The Daily Telegraph that he is planning to make a foray into acting.

His first project will be starring in the short film Carte Blanche from Czech director Eva Dolezalova, shot in America.

'Hopefully if all things go well, there will be something else coming up on that side in October filming in Australia,' Jordan told the publication.

Oscar winner? Last month, Jordan told The Daily Telegraph that he is planning to make a foray into acting

The star added that his move into acting was a case of 'making hay while the sun shines.'

'I am just trying to do as much as I can and take advantage of the opportunities,'he said.

Jordan has previously been linked to Megan Blake Irwin, Paris Hilton, and Bella Hadid.
She is one of the best known dancers in the world.

But Julianne Hough looked much more like a glamourous Hollywood actress from the Golden Age of film on her latest outing.

The 29-year-old Dancing With The Stars pro looked fantastic in a silk Rami Al Ali design as she attended the Creative Arts Emmys in Los Angeles on Saturday night.

Newlyweds: Brooks Laich and Julianne Hough still had their honeymoon glow as they posed for photographers on the red carpet

She was not alone for the occasion as she was joined by new husband Brooks Laich at the event took place at the Microsoft Theater in downtown LA.

The pair maintained their newlywed glow after getting married in July of this year.

Julianne looked pretty as a petal in a silky pink strapless gown, paired with a very tall heel in the same color which added a boost to her 5ft3in frame.

Silky smooth: The Dancing With The Stars Judge, 29, was pretty in pink Rami Al Ali for the event, where she was on hand to present a choreography number during the show

All in the family: Brooks and Julianne made it a double date with her brother Derek and his girlfriend Hayley Erbert

The newlyweds were joined by Julianne's brother Derek and his girlfriend Hayley Erbert.

The Houghs looked thrilled to see each other at the event where he presented awards for Hairstyling, Lighting Design and Production Design with Shark Tank's Lori Grenier.

Dancing stars: The Houghs looked ready to bust a move as they joined forces on Saturday

Monochrome couple: Derek, 32, sported a velvet tux matched with black velvet smoking shoes, with his lady love rocking a lacy black number

Do the dip: Derek and Hayley, who began dating earlier this year, put on quite the display for the photographers

Derek, 32, sported a velvet tux matched with black velvet smoking shoes, with his lady love rocking a lacy black number to match his monochrome look.

The couple put on quite the display for photographers, with Derek dipping Hayley and going in for a dramatic kiss.

Jenna Dewan Tatum was also at the gathering as she strutted her stuff in a midnight blue sequined gown with sheer tulle that showed off her dancers legs.

Shining star: Jenna Dewan Tatum walked the red carpet at the Creative Arts Emmys on Saturday

Sheerly amazing: Her midnight blue featured sheer panels that showed off her dancers legs

Hard to miss: The sequined gown shined brightly as the photographers flashes hit it

The Step Up actress walked the carpet solo, without her husband Channing Tatum.

Her raven locks were worn pulled back to give full attention to the gown, despite bragging about her new short haircut the day before on Instagram.

'Shameless shot of new haircut because why not', she wrote on Friday as she attended the Cushnie Et Ochs show in New York.

Fierce: The World Of Dance host enjoyed showing off her gown from every angle on the carpet
She's the Real Housewives of Sydney star who isn't afraid to share her opinions.

And Lisa Oldfield became the latest star to showcase her support for marriage equality while attending a historic rally at Sydney's Town Hall on Sunday.

She boldly captioned a rally photo: '#loveislove.'

'Love is love' Lisa Oldfield was snapped at Sunday's Sydney marriage equality rally at Sydney's Town Hall on Sunday.

The 42-year-old appeared with friends holding signs supporting a 'Yes' vote for the national postal survey taking place later this month.

She also brought along her white schnauzer which appeared with Lisa and her friends in the crowd.

Holding signs that said 'Love is love' in multi-coloured rainbow letters, Lisa and her companions posed for cameras as they rallied together in solidarity.

In solidarity: Holding signs that said 'Love is love' in multi-coloured rainbow letters, Lisa and her companions posed for cameras as they rallied together in solidarity

Growing trend: Lisa is just the latest celebrity to throw her support behind the campaign

Lisa is just the latest celebrity to throw her support behind the campaign.

Comedian Eddie Izzard also voiced his opinion on Sunday about the hotly debated topic.

With an impassioned plea to the Australian public in an interview with The Herald Sun, the 55-year-old threw his support behind the same sex marriage campaign, ahead of the postal vote later this month.

'I don't feel Australians should want to be on the side of the old imperialists, the old world, the old negative, regressive thinking,' Eddie told the publication.

'Australia, I encourage you to think positively, think of the future, think of equality and vote for it' With an impassioned plea to the Australian public in an interview with The Herald Sun on Sunday, the 55 year old threw his support behind the same sex marriage campaign, ahead of the postal vote later this month

'Australia, I encourage you to think positively, think of the future, think of equality and vote for it.'

The star of upcoming British-American biographical comedy drama Victoria and Abdul went on to say that the Australian people have the upper hand in this debate, and said that voting 'yes' for marriage equality is a big step forward for basic rights.

'What I love about Australia is its energy, its youthfulness, its forward-looking ability to say, 'Forget the old empire, let us invent a new way of doing things,' he said.

''And marriage equality is the new way of doing things.'

'Marriage equality is the new way of doing things' The colourful character came out as transgender in 1985 and has advocated for the rights of LGBTI individuals for years

The colourful character came out as transgender in 1985 and has advocated for the rights of LGBTI individuals for years.

Eddie is no stranger to cross-dressing, speaking about how 'you've got to be tough' in order to step out in women's clothes.

He has previously revealed how he has been attacked by strangers in the street for his feminine outfits.

The stand-up comic told the Radio Times back in 2014: 'I've had people attack me on the street, I've had people shout endless abuse at me.

'If you're going to be a transvestite, and you're going to be out in public, you've got to be tough enough.'
She welcomed her first child with partner Ben Cohen last June.

And former Strictly Come Dancing pro Kristina Rihanoff, 39, has revealed motherhood to daughter Milena has 'completely changed' her priorities in life.

She told The Sun: 'The same things dont bother me like before, like how I look, what I weigh or what people say about me.'

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New beginning: former Strictly Come Dancing pro Kristina Rihanoff, 39, has revealed motherhood to daughter Milena has 'completely changed' her priorities in life

Opinion: The ballroom queen also gave her opinion of the well documented Strictly curse, which has seen the end of celebrity relationships after appearing on the show including Rachel Riley and Georgia May Foote as well as her current partner Ben Cohen (pictured above in January 2014)

Kristina said she didn't put pressure on herself to lose her baby weight fast or have the perfect figure since becoming a mother, saying her main focus was her newborn.

She said: 'I didnt want to be stressed or worried about how much I weigh because Ive never been a skinny girl. Thats never been me, so why add that pressure?'

Kristina, who estimates it took her around eight months to return to her pre-pregnancy figure, credits 200 hours training to a hot yoga teacher for her toned physique.

The ballroom queen also gave her opinion on the well documented Strictly curse, which has seen the end of celebrity relationships including Rachel Riley and Georgia May Foote.

New priorities: She told The Sun : 'The same things dont bother me like before, like how I look, what I weigh or what people say about me.

The well documented curse hit Kristina's partner Ben, who split from his wife Abby Blayney the year after he appeared on the show.

Kristina met former ruby player boyfriend Ben when they were partnered up and became a couple the following year.

The pair have always insisted they only got together after Ben split from his childhood sweetheart Abby Blayney, who he shares twin daughters with.

Abby and Ben announced their separation in September 2014, with the athlete's relationship with his Kristina becoming public in 2015.

Strictly star: Kristina said she didn't put pressure on herself to lose her baby weight fast or have the perfect figure since becoming a mother, saying her main focus was her newborn

Dance duo: Speaking of the curse she said: 'I think its partly to do with people finding themselves in a different state of mind and they want different outcomes in life Everything is magnified because you go through those emotions together' (pictured in November 2013)

Speaking about the curse, which saw last year's finalist Louise Redknapp reportedly split from husband Jamie, she said she would never judge anyone for their actions and that break-ups also occur on other reality shows.

She said: 'I think its partly to do with people finding themselves in a different state of mind and they want different outcomes in life Everything is magnified because you go through those emotions together.'

The star, who left Strictly after seven years in 2015, said she was impressed by the new line-up for the show, including former Playboy model Nadiya Bychkova and the addition of Latin dance queen Shirley Ballas as head judge, replacing Len Goodman.

Kristina said although she wouldn't rule out marriage to Ben in the future, the pair are focusing on parenthood and family life.
At least 34 civilians were killed on Sunday when Russian warplanes targeted ferries carrying them across the Euphrates River near Syria's eastern city of Deir Ezzor, a monitor said.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor initially reported 21 deaths in Russian air strikes but later raised the toll to 34, saying that "more bodies have been found in the river".

Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said nine children were among those killed fleeing fighting and that "dozens" of people were wounded in the strikes.

He said the raids targeted "more than 40 ferries" that had left Al-Boulil town southwest of Deir Ezzor city for the eastern shore of the river.

The Observatory relies on a network of sources inside Syria, and says it determines whose planes carry out raids according to type, location, flight patterns and munitions used.

Moscow intervened in Syria in September 2015 in support of its ally President Bashar al-Assad.

Sunday's reported raids came as Syrian troops pressed an offensive against Islamic State group militants across Deir Ezzor province with Russian air cover.

At the same time, an alliance of US-backed Syrian Kurdish and Arab fighters is also on the move against IS in Deir Ezzor.

The Syrian Democratic Forces on Saturday announced they had begun clearing IS jihadists from areas east of the Euphrates, which cuts diagonally across the province.

On Sunday, the Observatory said fighters from the SDF's Deir Ezzor Military Council (DEMC) had made a sweeping advance, capturing territory just kilometres (miles) from the provincial capital Deir Ezzor.

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He plays maverick genius Thomas Edison in The Current War, having previously portrayed code-breaker Alan Turing and detective Sherlock Holmes.

And as Benedict Cumberbatch hit the red carpet for the film's premiere in Toronto, the actor admitted that playing clever eccentrics 'keeps him grounded'.

He was posing for the cameras alongside his American co-star Katherine Waterston on Saturday as the duo got set to showcase their film at Toronto Film Festival.

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Dapper: Benedict Cumberbatch poses for the cameras alongside his American co-star Katherine Waterston for the premiere of The Current War

Waterston, 37, was the picture of elegance in a flowing black number speckled with red, gold and silver sequins. She paired the dress with pointed kitten heels.

The actress opted for dark red lipstick and put her raven tresses up, accentuating her delicate bone structure.

Meanwhile, Cumberbatch looked dapper in a slick navy Giorgio Armani suit, to which he added a skinny silk tie and crisp shirt.

At the premiere, the British actor spoke of his love of portraying geniuses.

Cumberbatch, 41, told the Press Association: 'One of the reasons I'm interested in playing characters with intelligence is it builds me up a little bit and keeps me grounded.

Genius: The Sherlock star looked dapper in a slick navy Giorgio Armani suit, which he complemented with a skinny silk tie and crisp shirt

Picture of elegance: Waterston sported a flowing black dress speckled with red, gold and silver sequins. She complemented the dress with pointed kitten heels

'It makes you realise how many fathom-deep distances there are between you and who you are playing.

'It's about bringing a character to life and that requires another skill-set which isn't so much about being a maverick genius.'

The new film features Nocturnal Animals actor Michael Shannon, who plays entrepreneur Westinghouse, while Nicholas Hoult portrays Nikola Tesla.

Edison and Westinghouse warred over whose favoured supply would win, with the former heralding direct current (DC) and the latter alternating current (AC).

For the fans: Cumberbatch greets fans at The Current War premiere in Toronto

Code-breaker: Benedict Cumberbatch as Alan Turing in The Imitation Game

Their competition and desire to change the world forever is not unlike those of Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg, late Apple pioneer Steve Jobs, tech pioneer Elon Musk and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, Cumberbatch said.

'It's about what people do when they're really in live-or-die competition with one another and what people are willing to do in the commercial arena to win but also what it costs,' he said.

'There's a lot of Jobs and Gates and Musk and Zuckerberg ... the extraordinary-ness of people in that world is very, very clear today.'

The Current War will be released in the UK in January
They famously dated for thirteen years, after meeting on set of a Spanish theatre production in 1987.

But Elizabeth Hurley proved she and Hugh Grant were still on the best of terms on Saturday, as she wished him a happy birthday on social media.

The model, now 52, took to Instagram to share a sweet and strikingly youthful throwback snap of the pair, and pay tribute to her 'best friend of 30 years' in the caption.

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'My best friend of 30 years': Elizabeth Hurley proved she and Hugh Grant were still on the best of terms on Saturday, as she wished him a happy birthday with a throwback snap on Instagram

The pair cut much fresher faces as they posed on the red carpet in the snap, taken during their romance which eventually ended in 2000.

Having earned status as a pin-up over the years, Liz displayed her famously radiant complexion and striking natural beauty as she beamed widely for cameras - her younger age only proven by a retro hairstyle and 90s-style strappy dress.

Meanwhile Hugh, now 57, was as handsome as ever sporting a black tuxedo and a mop of longer curls as he smiled beside the model at the glamorous event.

Heartfelt: Despite calling their relationship off almost twenty years ago, the actress revealed she and Hugh were still closer friends than ever in the caption (above)

Back in the day: The pair met and embarked on romance in 1987 when Hugh played Lord Byron in a Spanish production called Remando Al Viento

Despite calling their relationship off almost twenty years ago, the actress revealed she and Hugh were still closer friends than ever in the caption - which wished her ex and 'best friend' a happy birthday.

She wrote affectionately to fans: 'Happy Birthday to my best friend for 30 years' followed by a number of kiss emojis and the hashtag '#Montreaux'.

The pair met in 1987 when Hugh played Lord Byron in a Spanish production called Remando Al Viento, and Elizabeth was cast in a supporting role as Byron's former lover Claire Clairmont.

Close: While they 'amicably' split in 2000, the pair have remained very close over the years, with Liz telling Jonathan Ross: 'We're best friends. He lives next door to me'

While they 'amicably' split in 2000, the pair have remained great friends over the years, with Liz previously telling MailOnline that Hugh is 'family' to her.

The Notting Hill actor is godfather to Liz's son Damian, born in 2002 to entrepreneur Steve Bing and she has returned the favour, being godmother to one of Hugh's daughters, Tabitha.

Gushing of their friendship, she told Jonathan Ross: 'We're best friends. He lives next door to me and he's godfather to my son and I'm godmother to one of his children.

'We've been apart for longer than we were together. We were together for 13 years and then we've been best friends for 15.'

Independent woman: Liz is currently thought to be single, although she set tongues wagging in July when she was spotted in Italy with Canadian producer David Foster

When pushed by the television presenter on a possible romantic reunion, Liz dismissed the idea, adding: 'I don't think that's going to happen...but he's the best friend that anyone could have.'

Liz is currently thought to be single, although she set tongues wagging in July when she was spotted in Italy with Canadian producer David Foster - potentially marking her first romance since splitting from Shane Warne in 2013.

Meanwhile Hugh is currently in a relationship with his on/off Swedish girlfrined Anna Eberstein, 37.

The couple welcomed their second child together, a daughter in December 2015, to join their three-year-old son.
Their summer liaison in the midst of his split with Kourtney Kardashian has turned into something of a 'party partnership'.

And Bella Thorne, 19, reunited with former flame Scott Disick, 34, once again in the early hours of Sunday morning, as he hosted an impromptu apartment party in New York City.

It's the first time the flame-haired actress has partied with the father-of-three since claims he was put on 'psychiatric hold' in August.

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Busty: Bella Thorne, 19, was up to her usual tricks as she flashed her taut midriff in a busty bralette top arriving at an impromptu apartment party hosted by her 'former flame' Scott Disick in New York City in the early hours of Sunday morning

The actress was seen heading into his party, which appeared to be his own take on New York Fashion Week, dubbed Papi x Lord Disick show.

Party girl Bella dressed minimally in fightnets tights, a bandeau top and very skimpy denim shorts.

She elongated her slender pins with a pair of red velvet heeled boots, and shrugged a baggy denim jacket over her shoulders. She also carried a red MCM backpack.

The former Disney star was keen to shed her old squeaky-clean image as she paraded her lithe physique, and painted her visage with a full face of heavy make up to accentuate her features.

Bella gave particular prominence to her impossibly plump pout with a generous lashing of lipliner and bright pink lipstick.

Flamboyant: Scott, 34, was seen to wear a flamboyant red silk bomber jacket, and kept comfortable in a pair of trainers and baggy jeans as he strode purposefully to the apartment

Leggy lady: Bella elongated her slender pins with a pair of red velvet heeled boots, and shrugged a baggy denim jacket over her shoulders. She also carried a red MCM backpack

Dolled up: The former Disney star was keen to shed her old squeaky-clean image as she paraded her lithe physique, and painted her visage with a full face of heavy make up to accentuate her features

The Famous In Love actress styled her reddened hair in a sleek centre parting, and added pink accents to further highlight its glossiness.

Despite it being nighttime, Bella was keen to keep incognito by donning a pair of sunglasses, and played up to the cameras as she strutted to the party, pulling a variety of poses as she strutted down the street.

Scott kept comfortable in a pair of trainers and baggy jeans as he strode purposefully to the apartment.

Glossy: The Famous In Love actress styled her reddened hair in a sleek centre parting, and added pink accents to further highlight its glossiness

Wild child: Despite it being nighttime, Bella was keen to keep incognito by donning a pair of sunglasses, and played up to the cameras as she strutted to the party, pulling a variety of poses as she strutted down the street

The father-of-three reportedly held an impromptu fashion show at the venue, which was attended by many of his rumoured flames and leggy models.

Amongst the star-studded attendees were Justin Bieber's exes Ashley Moore and Chantel Jeffries, as well as his protege Madison Beer.

Anwar Hadid and Nicola Peltz attended, as well as model Neels Visser. Delilah Belle Hamlin, Lisa Rinna's daughter, also was spotted at the party.

Party time: The father-of-three reportedly held an impromptu fashion show at the venue, which was attended by many of his rumoured flames and leggy models

Dressed to impress: Songstress Chantel Jeffries flaunted her slender legs in a black slip dress

Pout it out: Chantel and her friend both sported extremely plump pouts

Scott and KUWTK star Kourtney ended their relationship back in July 2015 after three children together. They remain amicable for the sake of their sons Mason, 7; and Reign, 2; as well as daughter Penelope, 5.

Scott appeared to be in high spirits since The Blast reported that he was 'involuntarily placed on a 5150 psychiatric hold at West Hills Hospital' back on August 18.

However, the self-described 'sex addict' - who was once hospitalised for alcohol poisoning - was allegedly 'released before the usual 72-hour period for being a danger to himself or others.'

Strutting their stuff: Behind this pretty model was Scott's friend Papi

All-black everything: Papi sported a chic all-black ensemble with a skull on his shirt

Model behaviour: Anwar Hadid and his girlfriend Nicola Peltz also attended the soiree

Scott previously completed his fourth rehab stint at Cliffside Malibu in 2015 after having received treatment in the past at centres in Florida and Costa Rica.

The property heir has reportedly been spotted partying with a bevy of beauties during New York Fashion Week.

He has been romantically linked to Sofia Richie, Bella Thorne and Chloe Bartoli in the past year, although all three girls have claimed that they are simply 'friends' with the Lothario.

Flaunt it: Nicola ensured that her derriere was fully on display in her see-through dress

Glamorous: Leggy attendees flocked to the party

Suited and booted: Partygoers sported an array of figure-flaunting looks

Romance rumours about Scott and the 19-year-old daughter of Lionel Richie began last May as the pair partied aboard a luxurious yacht in the South of France during the Cannes Film Festival.

Meanwhile, Bella took to Twitter last month to again confirm that her Cannes Film Festival yacht buddy Scott Disick was just a friend.

'Like I have mentioned me and Scott and friends,' the teen tweeted. This was a message reiterated in June when she spoke to Complex.

The Famous In Love star was first seen canoodling Scott, 34, at dinner dates in Los Angeles before the twosome jetted off to the Cannes Film Festival in May.
She juggles a glittering Hollywood film career with motherhood to two adorable children.

And Charlize Theron looked truly content as she stepped out with toddler daughter August in Los Angeles on Saturday.

The 42-year-old Oscar winning actress looked casually chic for the outing, going braless in a navy halterneck dress with a racy split up one thigh which showed off her toned legs.

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Chic: Charlize Theron looked truly content as she stepped out with toddler daughter August in Los Angeles on Saturday

Cinched in at the waist with a belt, the elegant dress flaunted the star's lithe physique.

She accessorised with a slate grey panama hat and traded in the heels for comfy sandal.

Her pretty features were enhanced with a light dusting of make-up.

Sharing a special moment with August, who she adopted in July 2015, the proud mother held her little girl in the air and smiled, with August looking adorable in a red dress.

Cute: Sharing a special moment with August, who she adopted in July 2015, the proud mother, 42, held her little girl in the air and smiled, with August looking adorable in a red dress

Charlize was spotted helping with a lemonade stand which was supporting the hurricane relief fund

Clearly a devoted mother, Charlize was spotted picking August up from an LA preschool on Thursday.

The star also adopted son Jackson in March 2012.

Going home with mum!Clearly a devoted mother, Charlize was spotted picking August up from an LA preschool on Thursday

The South African beauty looked lovely in a black tank paired with a set of distressed denim.

Charlize was comfortable in a pair of Birkenstock sandals, which coordinated perfectly with her casual chic look.

The pretty blonde wore her chin-length hair down and accessorized with a set of shades and a thin bracelet.

Little August looked adorable in a print top, white shorts and sneakers.

Casually chic: The South African beauty looked lovely in a black tank paired with a set of distressed denim

Not present during her trip to the preschool was the star's eldest son, Jackson, six.

The Atomic Blonde star is a single parent to both her children, whom she adopted in 2012 and 2015.

In an April interview with Ellen, the star spoke of her kids, and credits 'the incredible village' it takes to raise them.

How does she do it? The Atomic Blonde star is a single parent to August and son Jackson, six. She is pictured with August on Thursday

'I'm a single mom and I have an incredible village that helps me raise these two beautiful kids,' she began.

'In the mornings I have them alone and they kind of work against each other sometimes. One kind of decides to freak out and then both decides to freak out, I don't know why they decide to do that. You think they'd stand there and be considerate like, "well that one is freaking out right now, I'm not gonna freak out." They don't do that.'

'I'm an only child so I didn't grow up with siblings and so I had no idea the beauty that siblings have with each other. Like it really is one of the most incredible things I've ever witnessed. To see how much they love each other and to see how much they're excited to see each other. They're so in love with each other, it's really beautiful.'

Charlize can next be seen in three films, Gringo, Flarsky and Tully, out next year.
History was made on The Block on Sunday, after contestants Jason and Sarah were given three zeros for not completing their master suite.

Host Scott Cam even went as far as to issue an ultimatum to the couple that they had to complete the master suite and the next room before next Sunday or they are 'off The Block.'

Declaring that it was the 'hardest thing' he ever had to do, host Scott Cam told the couple that their Block journey hung by a thread - a decision that was 'not negotiable.'

Block shock! History was made on The Block on Sunday, after contestants Jason and Sarah were given three zeros for not completing their master suite

'In the interest of fair play I cant let your lack of effort continue so here's how this is going to work and it's not negotiable,' Scott said to the embattled couple.

'By next Sunday I want you to have fully completed your master suite and the room we are doing next week. If you don't have them completed by tools down next Sunday, you are off The Block.'

Tensions reached boiling point during the judge's comments section of the show when a defiant Jason traded barbs with Scott.

Numbered days: Host Scott Cam even went as far as to issue an ultimatum to the couple that they had to complete the master suite and the next room before next Sunday or they are 'off The Block'

Not good enough: With the couple presenting basically an empty shell to the judges all three gave them resounding zeros and labelled their effort an 'insult'

Starting off talking to the group about their responsibilities on the show Scott said that all contestants had to 'go hard or go home'before honing in on Jason and Sarah.

'You are here on this series because you said, a number of times, "we have an attitude of never give up," and that's exactly what you did this week,' Scott said.

Giving no quarter Jason shot back: 'I'm definitely saying we didn't give up. I find it offensive that you would say that Scotty.'

after Scott accused the couple of 'giving up, Jason replied: 'I'm definitely saying we didn't give up. I find it offensive that you would say that Scotty'

'I'm sorry that you're offended, mate, but you didn't do anything on Monday, I don't think you did anything on Friday and I'm assuming you did nothing on Saturday,' Scott reoplied

Scott wasn't budging however,and reminded the couple of their lack of effort during the previous week.

'Well actually, I'm a bit offended as well, mate,' he replied. 'I'm sorry that you're offended, mate, but you didn't do anything on Monday, I don't think you did anything on Friday and I'm assuming you did nothing on Saturday.'

Admitting earlier that he and Sarah had planned to finish the room in the 'next three or four weeks' Jason remained adamant, saying: 'Yeah we didn't give up.'

With the couple presenting basically an empty shell to the judges all three gave them resounding zeros and labelled their effort an 'insult.'

In the end it was Elyse and Josh who won the day with a final score of 28.5, narrowly pipping Ronnie and Georgia who scored 28.
They are two of the most in-demand models, having posed for the likes of Burberry, Balmain, Calvin Klein and Swarovski between them.

And Winnie Harlow and Jourdan Dunn proved why they have caught such attention in the industry on Saturday, as they made a head-turning arrival at the Maybelline NYFW party.

The two beauties both displayed their incredibly long legs in thigh-skimming black mini skirts as they smouldered for cameras at the bash, held in the Big Apple.

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Pin-credible: Winnie Harlow (L) and Jourdan Dunn (R) proved why they have caught such attention as models on Saturday as they smouldered at the Maybelline NYFW bash

Winnie, who shot to fame on America's Next Top Model in 2014, first commanded attention in a striking PVC mini skirt - which cut into a saucy lace-up slit at one side to flash even more of her long and slender legs.

Cinching in at her slim waist, the 23-year-old paired the skirt with a gingham Fleur du Mal bustier top, which dipped into a sweetheart neckline to tease at her cleavage and smooth skin underneath.

Keeping trendy as well as sexy however, she draped a denim jacket over her shoulders, and tied the look together with metallic heels, which laced all the way up her calf to further elongate her statuesque frame.

Legs for days: Jourdan Dunn flaunted her equally leggy frame in another barely-there ensemble, formed of a trendy mini skirt and grungy band T-shirt

She swept her hair into a tight bun atop her head and opted for minimal make-up to leave her radiant and glowing complexion on display to all as she posed.

Accessorising with dramatic dark sunglasses, Winnie was the picture of glamour as she smouldered for cameras.

Giving her a run for her money at the bash however was Jourdan Dunn, who flaunted her equally leggy frame in another barely-there ensemble.

Red hot! Adding a splash of colour, Jourdan tied her look together with vibrant red ankle boots as she beamed posed for cameras

The British beauty slipped her unbelievably slender frame into a tiny black skirt, which was made more striking by a long ruffle strap, stretching to her left shoulder.

Balancing out the girly garment, Jourdan then layered a grungy logo T-shirt underneath, to keep all eyes on her incredibly long legs on show.

Adding a splash of colour, she tied her look together with vibrant red ankle boots as she fiercely posed for cameras.

Star-studded: The models appeared in good spirits as they arrived at the bash, and mingled with a number of other beauties, including Adriana Lima (second right)

In demand: Jourdan has enjoyed a very busy NYFW so far, having walked for both Jeremy Scott and Brandon Maxwell over the last week

The mother-of-one styled her hair into a chic curled bob, and opted for a shimmering slick of metallic eye shadow in a glamorous finishing touch.

The models appeared in good spirits as they arrived at the bash, and mingled with a number of other beauties, including Adriana Lima and Emily DiDonato.

Jourdan has enjoyed a very busy NYFW so far, having walked for both Jeremy Scott and Brandon Maxwell over the last week.

Meanwhile Winnie has been seen at a number of star-studded parties in celebration of the annual event, including the Mothership Ball and the Mert and Marcus book launch.
She's the Australian actress whose star continues to rise in Tinseltown.

And Margot Robbie dazzled on Saturday while attending the InStyle magazine party at the Toronto International Film Festival in Canada.

The Wolf of Wall Street star looked radiant in a simple black velvet frock that showed off her svelte form.

Stunning: Margot Robbie dazzled on Saturday while attending the InStyle party at the Toronto International Film Festival in Canada

The dress also featured sparkling diamante embellishments than ran along the shoulders and down the sleeves.

The 27-year-old also flaunted an ample amount of leg, with the dress finishing above the knee.

Margot matched her sparking ensemble with a pair of simple black heels and appeared to eschew any bling for the event.

Svelte: The Wolf of Wall Street star looked radiant in a simple black velvet frock that showed off her svelte form.

The former Neighbours star went for a slightly teased look for her shoulder length blonde locks.

She finished her ensemble with a light rose shade for her lip, a subtle application of blush to accentuate her cheekbones and a dark mascara around her eye for an added 'pop' of drama.

Margot has certainly come a long way since her days on Ramsay Street with plum roles in the Martin Scorcese epic Wolf Of Wall Street and as Harley Quinn in the superhero blockbuster Suicide Squad.

Sparkling: The dress also featured sparking diamante embellishments than ran along the shoulders and down the sleeves.

Margot was in Toronto to debut her new film, I Tonya, in which she plays infamous American figure skater Tonya Harding who was banned for life after she hindered the prosecution following the attack on fellow skater Nancy Kerrigan.

Speaking to Vanity Fair in Margot admitted that she initially thought Tonya was a fictional character.

'To be honest, when I read the script, I didn't know who Tonya Harding was, and I didn't realise it was a true story,' she admitted.

'I thought it was entirely fictionalised and our writer Steve was so creative to come up with the quirky characters and absurd incidents.'
She is an acclaimed Hollywood actress who picked up an Oscar for her stellar turn in 1992's Howards End.

And Emma Thompson looked every inch the A-lister as she stepped out for a press conference at the Toronto International Film Festival on Saturday.

The ageless star, 58, showed off her trim figure in a vibrant blue fitted blouse, which she teamed with high-waisted tweed trousers and metallic lace up shoes.

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Chic: Emma Thompson looked every inch the A-lister as she stepped out for a press conference at the Toronto International Film Festival on Saturday

Glamour: The ageless star, 58, showed off her trim figure in a vibrant blue fitted blouse, which she teamed with high-waisted tweed trousers and metallic lace up shoes

Showing off her youthful radiance the star oped for minimal make-up including fluttery lashes and smoky eyeshadow and a peachy lipgloss.

Her platinum crop was styled into a chic and simple side part and she accessorised with gold hoop earrings.

Later in the day the Beauty and the Beast star stepped out in a stylish tasselled dress at the premiere of her new film , The Children Act.

Cheery: Later in the day the Beauty and the Beast star stepped out in a stylish tasselled dress at the premiere of her new film , The Children Act

Co-stars: The star joined her dapper co-star Stanley Tucci, 56, who looked handsome in a navy suit jacket and shirt, teamed with slate grey trousers

Elegant: The mother-of-one looked glowing in the ebony shift dress, which featured asymmetric panels of navy tassels at the hem

Polished: She added height with heeled sandals and accesorised with drop earrings and a boxy strap bag

The mother-of-one looked glowing in the ebony shift dress, which featured asymmetric panels of navy tassels at the hem.

She added height with heeled sandals and accesorised with drop earrings and a boxy strap bag.

The star joined her dapper co-star Stanley Tucci, 56, who looked handsome in a navy suit jacket and shirt, teamed with slate grey trousers.

The Children Act sees Emma play the part of eminent High Court judge Fiona Maye.

Dramatic: The Children Act sees Emma play the part of eminent High Court judge Fiona Maye. As her marriage to Jack, played by Stanley, fails, she has to make a life-changing decision at work, whether or not she should force a teenage boy (Fionn Whitehead) to have a life-changing blood transfusion

Acclaimed: The visit to his hospital bed stirs up strong emotions in both characters and has a profound impact on Fiona It is based on the 2014 Ian McEwan novel

As her marriage to Jack, played by Stanley, fails, she has to make a life-changing decision at work, whether or not she should force a teenage boy (Fionn Whitehead) to have a life-changing blood transfusion.

The visit to his hospital bed stirs up strong emotions in both characters and has a profound impact on Fiona

It is based on the 2014 Ian McEwan novel.
They divorced in 2013, after 14 years of marriage.

And exes Wendi Deng and Rupert Murdoch reunited in New York City for a lunch date with their daughter Grace on Saturday.

The media tycoon, 86, and his businesswoman ex-wife, 48, looked to be on fantastic terms as they shared a friendly hug outside a Madison Avenue restaurant.

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Amicable: Exes Wendi Deng and Rupert Murdoch reunited in New York City for a lunch date with their daughter Grace on Saturday

Wendi looked chic in a cream jumper decorated with colourful feather print, which she layered over an ivory top.

Showing off her toned legs in skinny jeans the brunette beauty completed her outfit with strappy sandals and toted a shopping bag.

Her raven tresses were styled in soft curls and she opted for a light dusting of make-up to accentuate her pretty features.

The News Corporation founder and executive chairman, who is worth an estimated $12bn, looked dapper in a fitted white shirt, navy suit jacket and slate grey trousers.

Chic: Wendy looked elegant in a cream feather print jumper while the former couple's daughter Grace, 15, looked stylish in a crocheted cream sweater and ripped jeans

The former couple's daughter Grace, 15, looked stylish in a crocheted cream sweater and ripped jeans.

The couple married in 1999 after first meeting in 1997 when Wendi was a TV executive at the Murdoch-owned Star TV network in Hong Kong.

They welcomed daughters Grace and Chloe, 14 during their marriage.

Wendi memorably slapped a man about to throw a custard pie in Rupert's face during a parliamentary hearing with MPs over the phone hacking scandal in 2011.

Former couple: The couple married in 1999 after first meeting in 1997 when Wendi was a TV executive at the Murdoch-owned Star TV network in Hong Kong (pictured four months before their split at 2013's Oscars)

They announced their split in 2013, with a statement saying their marriage had been 'irretrievably broken down' for more than six months, amid rumours of Wendi's increasingly strong friendship with former Prime Minister Tony Blair.

Rupert has since remarried to supermodel icon Jerry Hall, 61, who he wed in March 2016.

The marriage is the fourth for Murdoch and the second for Hall, who had a long relationship with Sir Mick Jagger.

The couple, who have 10 children between them, met in Australia in August 2015, when Jerry was touring Down Under with a production of The Graduate.

While Wendi has gone on to date Hungarian toyboy and male model Bertold Zahoran, 21.
She has been engaged to musician Matthew Rutler since 2014.

And Christina Aguilera, 36, continued to enjoy her romantic Venice getaway with her beau as the pair embarked on a boat trip in the stunning city on Saturday.

The songstress looked sensational in a busty summer maxi dress, and shrugged a trendy denim jacket over her shoulders as she embarked on her trip.

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Romantic: Christina Aguilera, 36, continued to enjoy her romantic Venice getaway with Matthew Rutler as the pair embarked on a boat trip in the stunning city on Saturday

The beauty kept the sun off her face with a chic cream fedora hat, and slipped a large pair of dark sunglasses over her face.

She styled her peroxide blonde tresses into loose waves at her bust, and carried her phone in one hand as she gracefully held the skirt of her dress with the other.

Christina carried a stylish quilted Chanel rucksack, and smiled as she stepped onto the boat.

Happy: The duo got in engaged in 2014 after dating for four years

Gorgeous: The songstress looked sensational in a busty summer maxi dress, and shrugged a trendy denim jacket over her shoulders as she embarked on her trip

Stylish: The beauty kept the sun off her face with a chic cream fedora hat, and slipped a large pair of dark sunglasses over her face

Matthew donned a low-key hooded grey sweatshirt for the occasion, and paired it with some baggy denim jeans and dark sunglasses.

The pair looked closer than ever as they snuggled up in the back seat. Matthew looked dashing as the duo enjoyed their European break.

The pair met on the set of Christina's film Burlesque in 2010, and got together shortly after she split from husband Jordan Bratman, who she shares son Max, nine, with.

Low-key: Matthew donned a low-key hooded grey sweatshirt for the occasion, and paired it with some baggy denim jeans and dark sunglasses

Balancing act: She styled her peroxide blonde tresses into loose waves at her bust, and carried her phone in one hand as she gracefully held the skirt of her dress with the other

Label lover: Christina carried a stylish quilted Chanel rucksack, and smiled as she stepped onto the boat

Closer than ever: The pair looked closer than ever as they snuggled up in the back seat. Matthew looked dashing as the duo enjoyed their European break

Christina and Matthew have one daughter together, Summer Rain, three.

In 2015, she opened up about her precious daughter, the kind of mother she hopes to be and how her hectic life has put her wedding plans on hold.

She told People: 'I want her to be surrounded by love and grow up feeling safe. That's something I didn't have when I was young and something I have been very vocal about providing for my children.

The former Voice judge recently jetted in from Cyprus where she performed at a lavish 7.3m wedding, but was forced to move her planned beach performance indoors for fear of disturbing local turtles.

Love story: The pair met on the set of Christina's film Burlesque in 2010, and got together shortly after she split from husband Jordan Bratman, who she shares son Max, nine, with

Family bonding: Christina and Matthew have one daughter together, Summer Rain, three

Ambition: In 2015, she opened up about her precious daughter, the kind of mother she hopes to be and how her hectic life has put her wedding plans on hold
India has urged Myanmar to handle the situation in its Rakhine state with restraint following the exodus of hundreds of thousands of Rohingya refugees into neighboring Bangladesh.

In New Delhi, the Ministry of External Affairs has expressed India's deep concern about the situation in Rakhine, where Myanmar's security forces have launched counterinsurgency "clearance operations" that refugees say have resulted in indiscriminate killings and massive displacement.

India urged that the situation in Rakhine be handled "with restraint and maturity, focusing on the welfare of the civilian population alongside those of the security forces." It says it's "imperative that violence is ended and normalcy in the state restored expeditiously."

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Myanmar on Wednesday, when he discussed the security situation with Myanmar's leaders, including Aung San Suu Kyi.

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They're some of the most talented and smartest kids in the world.

And on Sunday night's episode of Little Big Shots Australia, four-year-old Bella left viewers in awe.

Arriving all the way from Russia, the adorable youngster revealed her ability to speak seven different languages fluently and impressed fans applauded her ability on Twitter.

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Incredible! On Sunday night's Little Big Shot's episode, viewers were delighted by four-year-old Bella who could fluently speak seven languages

'Bella is the most incredibly talented 4yr old I've EVER seen! Just amazing plus she's got such a beautiful nature as well. #littlebigshotsau,' one tweet read.

'She's so smart! I struggle with one language let alone 7 #littlebigshotsau,' another viewer wrote.

Despite her incredible ability to speak Russian, English, Arabic, Italian, Spanish, German and Chinese, it wasn't only Bella's multilingual capabilities that left fans gushing over her.

Mind blown: 'Bella is the most incredibly talented 4yr old I've EVER seen! Just amazing plus she's got such a beautiful nature as well'

Belittled? 'She's so smart! I struggle with one language let along 7'

Already a fluent reader, host Shane Jacobson was left out of a job when she started reading his teleprompter and mimicking his every word and moves.

'What's the point of me trying to do this professionally,' said Shane laughing hysterically.

He's fired! Already a fluent reader, host Shane Jacobson was left out of a job when she started reading his teleprompter and mimicking his every word and moves

Adorable: Fluent in Russian, English, Arabic, Italian, Spanish, German and Chinese, it wasn't just Bella's multi-lingual capabilities that left fans gushing over her

Round the world: Putting her talents to the test, Bella was asked to go on a set-up shopping trip and purchase a list of groceries in different languages from a range of stalls from different nations

Putting her talents to the test, Bella was asked to go on a set-up shopping trip and purchase a list of groceries in different languages from a range of stalls from different nations.

Without hesitation, the child who dreams of becoming a princess or fairy when she grows up purchased the goods with ease and even remembered her manners at each booth.

Little Big Shots returns next Sunday at 7:30pm on Network Seven.

Easy task: Without hesitation, the child who dreams of becoming a princess or fairy when she grows up purchased the goods with ease and even remembered her manners at each booth

Talent: Again blown away by her talents, another fan felt somewhat belittled by her single dialect abilities
She's wrapped up in the whirlwind of New York Fashion Week, all while launching her first beauty collaboration with Estee Lauder.

But Victoria Beckham looked decidedly perky on Sunday, as she dashed to the studio for her show - despite leaving her bra behind and ruffling a bedhead hairstyle.

Just this weekend, the busy mum-of-four gave an insight into how she juggles her working life with being 'the best wife and mum' and admitted that she expects a lot of her body during busy times.

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Dashing about: Victoria Beckham looked perky as she headed into New York on Sunday, ahead of her SS18 fashion show

Speaking to The Times' LUXX Magazine on Saturday, Victoria confessed: 'It's not easy. I'm a bit of a control freak. I love what I do, and I always want to be the best - whether that's designing an amazing collection, putting on the best fashion show, creating a make-up collection, being the best mum, the best wife.'

She admitted that she relies heavily on her assistant, with whom she insists she has 'never had words'.

Victoria shares four children - Brooklyn, Romeo, Cruz and Harper - with husband David, who is equally busy at times.

Opening up: Just this weekend, the brunette spoke about how she juggles her job with her family

'I do smile a lot': She said that even though she's stern in pictures, she has a laugh

This September, the brunette seems to have reached her peak, gearing up for a collection drop with a simultaneous beauty launch, seeing her children off for a new year at school and even sending her eldest son Brooklyn to New York to begin university life.

But to keep her going 100mph, Victoria says that she must treat her body well and definitely 'enjoys eating healthily'.

'I can afford to eat well,' she continued. 'I expect a lot from my body and I'm never sick. You have to be kind to your body if you expect a lot from it.'

Busy bee: Having forgotten her bra and her brush, the star seemed to be suffering under the early start in NYC

Busy day ahead: This year, things have reached fever pitch for the fashion designer

Sunday was just another example, when Victoria made an early start in NYC, keeping her head down as she left her hotel.

'I do smile and laugh a lot,' she said to the magazine. 'Every morning I genuinely wake up and realise how lucky and blessed I am - despite how I often look in pictures!'

Predictably, Victoria did display her signature pout as she strutted through the city in red stilettos.

Off she goes: She was seen just hours before the show (left) would go ahead in New York in coral heels but switched into lilac ones for the show (right)

She wore mom jeans pulled high of her waist with her jumper tucked in, which only served to emphasise her deliberate, braless display.

With her glasses tipped on her nose, she ran her hands through her tousled hair, which now seemed to display new honeyed highlights.

Her Ready To Wear SS18 fashion show takes place at 10am on Sunday and can this year be streamed via Facebook.

There to support: David Beckham was also there to support his wife, showing up on time for her bi-annual fashion show

Slick: He looked cool as always, carrying a casual hat that offset his suited appearance

Man in black: He paired a light jumper with a matching suit and shoes

David was seen arriving to support her that morning, as she made a quick change before things kicked off.

She swapped her coral shoes for a pair of lilac ones and switched into a plain white T-shirt, similar to the ones she's been wearing all week.

Ex-footballer David, meanwhile, kept to one colour palette in black but added a casual spin of slick tailoring with his country hat in hand.

Taking it all in: Victoria was pictured taking some snaps, no doubt for her well-followed social media accounts

New look: The brunette has been wowing in white T-shirts all week

Breaking the rules: Victoria has been sporting the same outfit, comprising a simple white T-shirt, all week

On Friday: Victoria favoured the same white top, teaming it with voluminous navy trousers and the same gladiator sandals
He's the Hawaiian musician who's been topping charts for over a decade.

And on Sunday night's episode of 60 Minutes, Jack Johnson revealed a lot of his greatest hits are inspired by his wife of 17 years Kim.

Allowing journalist Peter Stefanovic to follow him around his Oahu hometown for a day, the 42-year-old said many of his greatest love songs were written after he forgot an important anniversary.

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Avoiding the dog house! On Sunday night's episode of 60 Minutes, Jack Johnson revealed his love song hits stem from forgetting important dates like his wedding anniversary

'The love songs are all for my wife,' he said.

'If I wake up and I've forgotten it's our anniversary, I gotta write a song quick.

'That's my version of a card,' he continued with Peter replying he was putting the rest of us all to shame.

Man with a plan: 'If I wake up and I've forgotten it's our anniversary, I gotta write a song quick'

But although smooth as silk on the guitar and ukulele, Jack said his skills didn't initially help him win over his college sweetheart wife.

'I tried to impress her with knowing the guitar or something, but I don't think that's what worked,' dished Jack.

'I think it was my persistence.'

Not impressed: 'I tried to impress her with knowing the guitar or something, but I don't think that's what worked'

Hard worker: With a new album All The Light Above It Too just released, Jack will be heading to Australia to promote the record later this year

But in the end, the musician's work seemed to pay of with the couple parents to three children and stronger than ever two decades on.

And with a new album All The Light Above It Too just released, Jack will be heading to Australia to promote the record later this year.

Taking to his Instagram account last week, the worldwide phenomenon captioned; 'Jack & the band will be hitting the road and headed to Australia and New Zealand for the first time since 2013 for their 2017 Summer Tour'.
He's known for his calculating role as the ambitious hedge-fund king Bobby Axelrod on Sky Atlantic's Billions.

But Damian Lewis, 46, looked worlds away from his cutting character as he stepped out on Sunday wearing an eye-catching butterfly mask alongside his Peaky Blinders actress wife Helen McCrory, 49, while at Chessington World of Adventures.

The dynamic acting duo looked in jovial spirits as they wandered around the Surrey-based theme park wearing hilarious masks while hand-in-hand.

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Looking (butter)fly! Damian Lewis looked worlds away from his cutting character as he stepped out on Sunday wearing an eye-catching butterfly mask alongside his Peaky Blinders actress wife Helen McCrory while at Chessington World of Adventures

Casually-clad for their afternoon of fun, Helen complemented her navy joggers and red cherry-printed jumper with an attention-grabbing hot pink wig.

Wrapping up while at the adventure park, she donned a long navy duster coat over her frame, yet her multi-coloured oversized mask took centre stage.

While his long-term love went all out, Damian opted to go for a delicate pale pink mask with gold accents which offset his grey and black hued ensemble.

The pair were more than happy to pose in their rib-tickling veils, which no doubt did little to hide their identity while they visited The Gruffalo river ride and fed the park's giraffes.

Day out: The dynamic acting duo looked in jovial spirits as they wandered around the Surrey-based theme park hand-in-hand

Mane attraction: Casually-clad for their afternoon of fun, Helen complemented her navy joggers and red cherry-printed jumper with an attention-grabbing hot pink wig

Eye-catching: Wrapping up while at the adventure park, she donned a long navy duster coat over her frame, yet her multi-coloured oversized mask took centre stage

Madly in love, the lovebirds exchanged their vows ten years ago in a romantic ceremony in July 2007.

They instantly hit it off while treading the boards of Five Gold Rings at London's Almeida in 2003.

The celebrity couple now raise their two children, 10-year-old daughter Manon and nine-year-old son Gulliver, at their home in the capital.

They moved to Los Angeles in the late half of 2007 while Damian filmed NBC-TV crime drama Life but they moved back to north London in 2009.

Stepping out: While his long-term love went all out, Damian opted to go for a delicate pale pink mask with gold accents which offset his grey and black hued ensemble

All smiles: The pair appeared as though they were trying to contain their laughter as they walked around the park in their eye-catching disguises

Damian and Clare Danes got tongues wagging with the unquestionable chemistry in the drama Homeland.

But Helen undercut the rumours and revealed the secret to the success of the couple's ten-year marriage in a recent interview with The Telegraph.

Asked if she ever felt jealous, she told the publication: 'No. It's not because he hasn't worked with gorgeous people - it's because he's never given me any reason to be.

'You know...He's lovely, otherwise I wouldn't have chosen for him.'

Glittering: Helen's masks featured peacock feather print throughout and copious amounts of glitter

Picture perfect: The pair were more than happy to pose in their rib-tickling veils, which no doubt did little to hide their identity while they visited The Gruffalo river ride and fed the park's giraffes

Romance: Madly in love, the lovebirds exchanged their vows ten years ago in a romantic ceremony in July 2007

Previously, she revealed that when she met the flame-haired actor in 2003 it was love at first sight.

She told Radio Times: 'He just made me laugh a lot. And still does.

'Of course, everyone in life wants someone to love and be loved by, but I think I was always just engrossed and involved in work. And no, the timing was pure fluke, pure chance, it always is, isnt it?'

Love: They instantly hit it off while treading the boards of Five Gold Rings at London's Almeida in 2003. The celebrity couple now raise their two children, 10-year-old daughter Manon and nine-year-old son Gulliver, at their home in the capital

Homeland: They moved to Los Angeles in the late half of 2007 while Damian filmed NBC-TV crime drama Life but they moved back to north London in 2009

Strong: Damian and Clare Danes got tongues wagging with the unquestionable chemistry in the drama Homeland. But Helen undercut the rumours and revealed the secret to the success of the couple's ten-year marriage in a recent interview with The Telegraph

'Lovely': Asked if she ever felt jealous, she told the publication: 'No. It's not because he hasn't worked with gorgeous people - it's because he's never given me any reason to be. 'You know...He's lovely, otherwise I wouldn't have chosen for him'

While Damian is known to US audiences for his roles in Homeland and Billions, Helen is an established and respected actress of stage and screen

Her repertoire of roles include wily Aunt Polly in Peaky Blinders, Narcissa Malfoy in the Harry Potter films and her Olivier award nominated performance as Rosalind in As You Like It.

'Im so proud of him. As we know, just because youre talented doesnt mean youre going to be successful. So Im really, really proud of him and really pleased for him. And he wears it well.'

Humour: Previously, she revealed that when she met the flame-haired actor in 2003 it was love at first sight. She told Radio Times : 'He just made me laugh a lot. And still does'
She's been flaunting her romance with new girlfriend Coby Boatman for days.

But on Saturday, Brynne Edelsten decided to spread the love around as she passionately kissed Coby in a Melbourne nightclub while a unidentified individual had their hand firmly planted on her crotch.

On first glance, the hand in question appeared to belong to Ms Edelsten herself.

That's not a high five! A mystery hand was on Brynne Edelsten's crotch as she made out with her new girlfriend Coby Boatman - but WHOSE hand is it?

However, upon closer glance, the mystery mitt has a darker complexion to Brynne's golden brown solarium skin.

The X-rated optical illusion is actually the result of the reality star sitting in the lap of somebody, who has then wrapped their arm around her waist and placed their paw south of the border.

The identity of the touchy stranger remains unclear, but Brynne didn't seem to mind having an extra hand on deck as she kissed Coby.

Punch drunk love! The hand formed a fist shape as Brynne kissed Coby and clutched her drink

On Friday, the 34-year-old told KIIS FM's Kyle And Jackie O show that Coby is her first relationship with another woman.

Shock jock Kyle Sandilands asked if this was the first time she'd 'been' with a woman, with Brynne responding: 'No, no, but it's the first relationship I've had with a woman.'

Brynne was seen locking lips with new flame Coby at swanky Melbourne eatery Sash on Wednesday.

Who could it be? The touchy stranger's skin was a different complexion to Brynne and Coby's, meaning that it had to belong to an unidentified third party

The couple were seen to be getting very up close and personal at the Japanese pizza bar, looking smitten as they shared passionate kisses at the table.

When asked by the radio duo why she chose Coby to embark on her first lesbian relationship with, she said: 'I actually don't know, because I never would of thought that was something that I would want to do, but like it just works, I don't know.'

Brynne claimed she'd known the advertising sales executive for two years and had a 'girl crush' on her for some time.

'She was my girl crush, but more like a fantasy girl crush than anything I took serious,' the buxom beauty revealed.
They shot to fame on 2017's smash hit instalment of Love Island.

And now reuniting for a girls' night out on the town, Amber Davis, 20, looked sensational as she was joined by her ITV2 pals Montana Brown, 21, and Georgia Harrison, 22, at London's 100 Wardour Street on Saturday night.

The Welsh beauty showcased her slender pins as she donned a thigh-skimming dress for the occasion with her friends.

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Girls' night: Amber Davis, 20, looked sensational as she was joined by her ITV2 pal Montana Brown, 21, at London's 100 Wardour Street on Saturday night

The Motel Rocks ambassador continued to display her personal style as she stylish draped an embroidered leather jacket over her shoulders while her brunette locks fell down her shoulders in a straight half up 'do style.

Amber - who won this season's Love Island with beau Kem Cetinay - added inches to her diminutive height with a pair of metallic stilettos while holding onto her matching handbag.

Matching her friend's glamorous style, Montana flaunted her enviable figure in a sheer mesh midi dress that displayed her simply bodysuit and narrow waist underneath.

All smiles for their evening out, she towered over Amber as she worked a pair of studded strappy heels while Georgia stunned in a cream lace mini dress and pointed patent leather nude stilettos.

Stepping out: Georgia Harrison, 22, also joined Montana (R) and Amber for the outing

Amber shot to fame earlier this year after appearing on the hugely popular ITV2 show, which she went on to win with her partner and boyfriend Kem Cetinay.

As well as taking home half of the 50,000 jackpot, Amber has since bagged a number of high-profile gigs - including a temporary presenting spot on Good Morning Britain with her beau, 21, and a campaign with Boux Avenue.

As the lingerie giant's new face, the brunette admitted she wanted to be an advocate for body confidence in her younger female fans.

She explained: 'I get the odd negative comment on social media, but I just try not to let it get to me. I'm proud of my body and who I am, you're only young once and I want to make the most of it!'

Pin-credible: The Welsh beauty showcased her slender pins as she donned a thigh-skimming dress for the occasion with her friends

Elsewhere, Montana revealed she suffered from crippling body insecurity, insisting she shied away from showcasing her then healthy size 10 and was too embarrassed to sport a two-piece infront of anyone.

Speaking exclusively to MailOnline, the London beauty admitted that she built back her confidence when she decided to turn her fitness regime around and she started weight training in gym.

'I used to be a bit chubby actually but lost quite a bit of weight.,' she began. 'I was doing a lot of cardio at the gym, started doing weight training and honestly the weight just (fell off)... I do squats and stuff.

'I think I went from a size ten to a six to eight now. I was never big, but I have a photo on my Instagram you can see the difference. I was apple shaped and I didnt really want to go in a bikini, I would put a throw on. Now I love being in a bikini.'

Insecure: Elsewhere, Montana revealed she suffered from crippling body insecurity, insisting she shied away from showcasing her then healthy size 10 and was too embarrassed to sport a two-piece infront of anyone

Training: Speaking exclusively to MailOnline, the London beauty admitted that she built back her confidence when she decided to turn her fitness regime around and she started weight training in gym

Catching up: Montana was pictured chatting to George Lineker and a pal when she left the venue

Having made her name on 2017's instalment of the reality favourite, Montana spent the majority of her days lounging around in a number of sizzling swimwear looks alongside fellow beauties Olivia Attwood, Amber Davies and Camilla Thurlow.

Despite her incredible figure, the brunette beauty - who received a six-figure sum for her new collaboration with PrettyLittleThing - admitted that she was nervous ahead of appearing on the series in a number of bikinis.

She shared: 'Youre kind of in a lock down period and a bit scared as you have no idea what other girls will go on the show, and on the first day you go on and everybody is gorgeous.

'You have to just suck it up and get in your bikini every morning.'
They made history after being the first couple to receive three zeros from judges on Sunday's The Block.

And as their future on the reality show hangs in the balance, Jason and Sarah have revealed that they were gutted by their score.

Speaking to Confidential this week, Sarah revealed that, while they were prepared for a poor showing in the scores on Sunday, after failing to complete their master suite, they had no idea it could be so bad.

Record breakers: As their future on The Block hangs in the balance, Jason and Sarah have revealed that they were gutted after receiving the first zero score on the show's history

'We knew we were going to cop a bad report from that, but we weren't prepared for how bad it was,' she said.

Sarah added that the pair had been hampered by stress after seeing their children off on a trip to London just prior to filming the master suite reveal scenes.

'It was a pretty emotional day, and it was just another beating really.'

However, host Scott Cam was unapologetic for his strong words to the couple on the show, lambasting them for making little to no effort in the week prior to the reveal.

Hammered: Host Scott Cam was unapologetic for his strong words to the couple on the show, lambasting them for making little to no effort in the week prior to the reveal, telling the Herald Sun that 'they just couldn't be bothered.'

'I was pretty angry, I was disappointed. I was upset,' Scott told the Herald Sun.

He added: 'They say they didn't give up, but they gave up. They just couldn't be bothered.'

Scott went as far as to issue an ultimatum to the couple that they had to complete the master suite and the next room before next Sunday or they are 'off The Block.'

Declaring that it was the 'hardest thing' he ever had to do, host Scott Cam told the couple that their Block journey hung by a thread - a decision that was 'not negotiable.'

Block shock! History was made on The Block on Sunday, after contestants Jason and Sarah were given three zeros for not completing their master suite

'In the interest of fair play I cant let your lack of effort continue so here's how this is going to work and it's not negotiable,' Scott said to the embattled couple.

'By next Sunday I want you to have fully completed your master suite and the room we are doing next week. If you don't have them completed by tools down next Sunday, you are off The Block.'

Tensions reached boiling point during the judge's comments section of the show when a defiant Jason traded barbs with Scott.

Numbered days: Host Scott Cam even went as far as to issue an ultimatum to the couple that they had to complete the master suite and the next room before next Sunday or they are 'off The Block'

Not good enough: With the couple presenting basically an empty shell to the judges all three gave them resounding zeros and labelled their effort an 'insult'

Starting off talking to the group about their responsibilities on the show Scott said that all contestants had to 'go hard or go home'before honing in on Jason and Sarah.

'You are here on this series because you said, a number of times, "we have an attitude of never give up," and that's exactly what you did this week,' Scott said.

Giving no quarter Jason shot back: 'I'm definitely saying we didn't give up. I find it offensive that you would say that Scotty.'

after Scott accused the couple of 'giving up, Jason replied: 'I'm definitely saying we didn't give up. I find it offensive that you would say that Scotty'

'I'm sorry that you're offended, mate, but you didn't do anything on Monday, I don't think you did anything on Friday and I'm assuming you did nothing on Saturday,' Scott reoplied

Scott wasn't budging however,and reminded the couple of their lack of effort during the previous week.

'Well actually, I'm a bit offended as well, mate,' he replied. 'I'm sorry that you're offended, mate, but you didn't do anything on Monday, I don't think you did anything on Friday and I'm assuming you did nothing on Saturday.'

Admitting earlier that he and Sarah had planned to finish the room in the 'next three or four weeks' Jason remained adamant, saying: 'Yeah we didn't give up.'

With the couple presenting basically an empty shell to the judges all three gave them resounding zeros and labelled their effort an 'insult.'

In the end it was Elyse and Josh who won the day with a final score of 28.5, narrowly pipping Ronnie and Georgia who scored 28.
She has been gracing our televisions screens since 1988 with her other half.

And Judy Finnigan looked more loved up than ever, as she stepped out in London with her husband Richard Madeley - unveiling a newly slimline figure in the process.

The presenter, 69, looked sensational as she showcased the fruits of her labour in a pretty floral tunic top, while Madeley, 61, went super casual for the outing.

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New look! Judy Finnigan, 69, looked more loved up than ever, as she stepped out in London with her husband Richard Madeley, 61 - unveiling a newly slimline figure in the process

Previously: Judy sported a much more fuller figure in June of last year

Judy, who sported a fuller figure last year, looked sensational as she embarked on the lovely day out with Richard.

She was dressed in a striking black tunic, which featured pink and blue flower designs and skimmed her figure to perfection.

The slight plunge of the neckline complemented her dainty golden necklace and shoulder length blonde tresses.

Proving to be quite the fashionista, Judy teamed the top with a pair of navy skinny jeans and grunge boots - providing her enough comfort to casually stroll along.

Transformation! Her remarkable weight loss (L) was evident for all to see as she stepped out in London

Wow! The presenter looked sensational as she showcased the fruits of her labour in a pretty floral tunic top, while Madeley looked super casual for the outing

Sensational: She was dressed in a striking black tunic, which featured pink and blue flower designs and skimmed her figure to perfection

Stylish: The slight plunge of the neckline complemented her dainty golden necklace and shoulder length blonde tresses

Looking good! Proving to be quite the fashionista, Judy teamed the top with a pair of navy skinny jeans

Judy proved to be smitten with Richard, who she met in 1982 when they worked together at Granada Television, as she interlinked her arms with him.

Having just emerged from the supermarket Tesco for a quick food run, Richard carried the plastic shopper in his hands as he engaged Judy in chatter.

Proving to be casually clad, he donned a simple white tee and jeans and harboured all of his essentials in a trendy backpack.

MailOnline has contacted representatives for Judy for further comment.

Half the woman she used to be! Judy has come a long way with her body transformation (R-pictured 2015)

Walking along: A pair of grunge boots provided her enough comfort to casually stroll along

Smitten: Judy proved to be smitten with Richard, who she met in 1982 when they worked together at Granada Television, as she interlinked her arms with him

Lovebirds: Having just emerged from the supermarket Tesco for a quick food run, Richard carried the plastic shopper in his hands as he engaged Judy in chatter

Low-key: Proving to be casually clad, he donned a simple white tee and jeans and harboured all of his essentials in a trendy backpack

Eternal: Judy opted for a simple slick of make-up, focusing more on pink blusher

A onlooker told The Sun: Judy looked fantastic, really healthy.

'It looks as if shes lost a couple of stone and updated her wardrobe. Good for her.'

Her image overhaul is even more surprising after her fitness enthusiast daughter Chloe, 30, admitted that her mum wasn't one to hit the gym.

Speaking to New! Magazine in May of this year, the blonde revealed: 'My dad is fit and healthy, goes for walks and watches what he eats. My mum couldnt give a f**k.'

Explaining that she had tried to intervene, Chloe admitted: 'I tried to get them to stop eating mounds of white bread and it didnt go down well at all.'

A onlooker told The Sun: Judy looked fantastic, really healthy

It was continued about her new look: 'It looks as if shes lost a couple of stone and updated her wardrobe. Good for her'

No go area! Her image overhaul is even more surprising after her daughter Chloe Madeley admitted that her mum wasn't one to hit the gym

The fitness enthusiast, 30, admitted back in May: 'My dad is fit and healthy, goes for walks and watches what he eats. My mum couldnt give a f**k'

Explaining that she had tried to intervene, Chloe admitted: 'I tried to get them to stop eating mounds of white bread and it didnt go down well at all'

Wow: However, it looked like Chloe's attempt to help her mother change her lifestyle have worked as Judy happily flaunted her newly slimline frame

'They were like, "No! Dont bring that chat over here. We dont want to hear it." So I gave up then. That was years ago.'

Meanwhile, Judy looked utterly content with Richard as they enjoyed the brisk stroll in the British capital.

The couple, who married in 1986, made a name for themselves as a presenting duo and were the first hosts of This Morning in 1988.

The twosome left This Morning back in 2001 in favour of hosting early evening show Richard & Judy on Channel Four, with the programme running until 2008.

Two years ago, a defiant Judy blasted 'malicious and utterly false rumours' that the couple had any problems with alcohol.

Casual: Judy looked utterly content with Richard as they enjoyed the brisk stroll in the British capital

Broadcasters: The couple, who married in 1986, made a name for themselves as a presenting duo and were the first hosts of This Morning in 1988

Talented: The twosome left This Morning back in 2001 in favour of hosting early evening show Richard & Judy on Channel Four, with the programme running until 2008

'People can be so ridiculous and unpleasant and cruel': Two years ago, a defiant Judy blasted 'malicious and utterly false rumours' that the couple had any problems with alcohol

Casual: Richard seemed in high spirits as he carried his Tesco bag full of purchases

Trendy: The broadcaster also donned a pair of trendy shades to shield himself from the sunny rays

Jetting off: Preparing to head home with Judy, he placed all of his belongings into the boot of his white Volkswagen Beetle

Speaking to The Mirror at the time, she stated: 'People can be so ridiculous and unpleasant and cruel.

'I dont want to go into all that crap again but there was a lot of rivalry and jealousy from certain people who were trying to launch a show. It was all very poisonous.

'Our programme was very successful and there were a lot of very envious people who wanted to destabilise it.

Nowadays it's their daughter Chloe who takes most of the spotlight, having worked as a TV presenter, written magazine columns and appeared on celebrity reality shows such as Dancing On Ice.

Calling it a day: Richard looked focused as he prepared to head home

Careful! He gave Judy a thumbs up as he slowly made his way out of the parking spot

Slimmer: Judy's legs proved to be noticeably slimmer in her skin-tight trousers
She may be one of the favourites to win The Bachelor this season.

But Tara Pavlovic is still in touch with 'hot waiter' Derek Reiter, who she was seen flirting at cocktail parties over the space of two weeks during filming.

According to Woman's Day, the Sydney event manager told the publication, 'We've been in contact - I even messaged her yesterday and asked if I could take her out.'

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'Tara even slipped her number to him': The Bachelor's Tara Pavlovic was seen flirting with handsome waiter Derek Reiter at cocktail parties over the space of two weeks during filming, according to a an insider

In touch! According to Woman's Day , the Sydney event manager told the publication, 'We've been in contact - I even messaged her yesterday and asked if I could take her out.'

The 30-year-old, was let go from the series after Tara kept on referring to Matty as Derek.

Insiders exclusively told Daily Mail Australia, 'Tara continually flirted with the waiter to the point where she called Matty his name by accident at a cocktail party.'

'Tara even slipped her number to him before a cocktail party, as did Simone,' they continued.

'Two weeks after the flirting began, the waiter was fired after the girls were talking about him on camera,' they said.

It comes amid claims Tara wore the initials of her ex-boyfriend around her neck during the first portion of the competition.

Speaking to Daily Mail Australia, a well-placed insider revealed that Tara previously dating a recently-separated man named Dan who worked as a pilot for Emirates Airline.

Close to her heart? It comes amid claims Tara wore the initials of her ex-boyfriend around her neck during the first portion of the competition

'Tara wore the letter D around her neck for about four weeks on the show,' the spy divulged.

Indeed, eagle-eyed fans would notice Tara wearing a gold D-shaped pendant necklace in several early episodes this season.

The chain, which also features an engraved rectangle charm, also appears in several snaps uploaded to Tara's Instagram page in the weeks before she started filming the show.
She's a doting mother to six children and is happily focusing on building her family life out of the limelight.

And Madonna, 59, looked undeniably stylish as she was spotted eyeing up a 7 million sprawling mansion in Lisbon, Portugal.

The American superstar, who is currently residing in a hotel, proved to be sensational in a chic all-white ensemble and a funky fedora hat as she paid the lavish building a visit to see if it would fit her future needs.

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House-hunting: Madonna, 59, looked undeniably stylish as she was spotted eyeing up a 7 million sprawling mansion in Lisbon, Portugal

Eyeing it up! The American superstar, who is currently residing in a hotel, proved to be sensational in a chic all-white ensemble and a funky fedora hat as she paid the lavish building a visit to see if it would fit her future needs

Clearly with enough cash to spare, Madonna was on a mission as she headed out for her house hunt.

The Material Girl hitmaker embraced summer chic in a crotchet white top and airy wide-leg trousers.

Sprucing up her ensemble, Madonna draped a lightweight white scarf around her neck which effortlessly fell down her front.

The Michigan born star opted for a glamorous coat of make-up, consisting of blush-infused cheeks and a pink pout.

Lavish: The pricey mansion had clearly caught the attention of the superstar as she paid it a lengthy dinner

In good spirits: Clearly with enough cash to spare, Madonna was on a mission as she headed out for her house hunt

Sensational: The Material Girl hitmaker embraced summer chic in a crotchet white top and airy wide-leg trousers

Sprucing up her ensemble: Madonna draped a lightweight white scarf around her neck which effortlessly fell down her front

She shielded herself from the powerful sunny rays with a pair of chic black shades.

Her teased, shoulder-length blonde tresses were tamed in place with an incredible fedora hat.

Madonna made the most of her day off as she embarked on the house-hunting trip which saw her stop off at the sizeable property - which boasts over 21.000 square feet and it located in the historical centre of Lisbon.

The Neo-Arab property, which was built in 1865, boasts four bedrooms, seven bathrooms, four garages and a whooping twenty parking places.

It for sale for 7,500.000 euros - nearly 7 million.

Beauty: The Michigan born star opted for a glamorous coat of make-up, consisting of blush-infused cheeks and a pink pout

Summer chic: She shielded herself from the powerful sunny rays in a pair of chic black shades

Mane attraction: Her teased, shoulder-length blonde tresses were tamed in place with a incredible fedora hat

A source told The Mirror: 'Madonna has fallen in love with the city and wants to make it her home.

'This property is a perfect family home,' it was added.

Her sighting comes after she admitted that she once 'cried herself to sleep' after reading headlines accusing her of 'kidnapping' her adopted 11-year-old son David from Lilongwe orphanage, Home of Hope, back in 2008.

On the look out! Madonna made the most of her day off as she embarked on the house-hunting trip

Sprawling: The sizeable property boasts over 21.000 square feet and it located in the historical centre of Lisbon

Impressive: The Neo-Arab property, which was built in 1865, boasts four bedrooms, seven bathrooms, four garages and a whooping twenty parking places

Pocket money for Madonna! It for sale for 7,500.000 euros - nearly 7 million

'In my mind, I was thinking, "Wait a minute. I'm trying to save somebody's life. Why are you all s***ing on me right now?" I did everything by the book. That was a real low point for me,' the 59-year-old Queen of Pop lamented to People on Wednesday.

'I've had some pretty dark moments, but I'm a survivor...It's complicated, but it's so worth it.'

Little David had been battling pneumonia and malaria at the time.

The Raising Malawi founder - who's also mother to Rocco, 17; and Lourdes, 20 - encountered similar stresses adopting 11-year-old Mercy and orphaned twins Esther and Stella, 5.

A source told The Mirror: 'Madonna has fallen in love with the city and wants to make it her home'

It was added: 'This property is a perfect family home'

Confession: Her sighting comes after she admitted that she once 'cried herself to sleep' after reading headlines accusing her of 'kidnapping' her adopted 11-year-old son David from Lilongwe orphanage, Home of Hope, back in 2008

'It's complicated, but it's so worth it': The Raising Malawi founder - who's also mother to Rocco, 17; and Lourdes, 20 - encountered similar stresses adopting 11-year-old Mercy and orphaned twins Esther and Stella, 5

Due to her divorce from second husband Guy Ritchie, Madge (born Ciccone) was deemed 'not capable of raising a child' and she successfully challenged Malawi's Supreme Court.

'The way I was treated - that sexist behavior - was ridiculous,' Madonna - nicknamed 'Mambo' by her little ones - said.

'Because I'm a public figure, people don't want to be perceived as giving me any kind of special treatment, so I get the hard road.'
Egypt is considering rejecting 59,000 tonnes of French wheat purchased by state grain buyer GASC due to the presence of poppy seeds, the second cargo to come under such scrutiny and raising fresh uncertainty over the country's import policy.

The world's biggest wheat importer threw the international grains market into confusion in 2015 by rejecting a cargo that contained the common wheat fungus ergot, triggering a row over policy in Cairo that is still simmering and worrying traders.

Egypt's agricultural ministry said on Sunday its quarantine authority was examining seeds in the French cargo.

"If they prove to be poppy seeds a decision will be taken to reject the shipment and transfer the case to the general prosecutor," spokesman Hamid Abdel Dayim told Reuters.

A 63,000 tonne Romanian wheat cargo is currently being considered for final rejection and re-export at the office of the general prosecutor after the quarantine authority found it contained poppy seeds.

Cairo-based traders said poppy seeds were becoming "the new ergot."

In December 2015, the rejection of a French wheat shipment purchased by GASC for containing ergot set off a nearly year-long row over import requirements as Egypt's quarantine authority imposed a ban on any trace level of the fungus.

Trading companies said the requirement was impossible to guarantee and boycotted state tenders, effectively cutting Egypt off from global grains markets.

Egypt subsequently scrapped its zero-ergot policy and came into line with international standards to win back traders to its tenders. It also stopped sending Egyptian quarantine inspectors abroad to check on grain shipments and started using private companies instead.

But the new system was successfully challenged in court by a group of quarantine inspectors who argued it had allowed contaminants hazardous to plants and animals into the country.

The government has not implemented the court order and is appealing the decision, leaving the new system in limbo.

"The agricultural quarantine is trying to put more pressure, they want delegations to travel abroad again," one Cairo-based trader said.

Traders also said inspection companies abroad at ports of origin were being more meticulous in searching for poppy seeds to avoid problems when shipments arrive in Egyptian ports.

"There are currently two Romanian cargoes at ports of origin that have been told to change their wheat supply for the presence of poppy seeds," another trader said.

"They are nervous now with what is happening," he added.

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The Equifax data breach is not the largest on record but could be the most damaging because of the sensitive nature of the information held by the credit reporting agency

It could be the worst-ever data breach for American consumers, exposing some of the most sensitive data for a vast number of US households.

The hack disclosed this week at Equifax, one of the three major credit bureaus which collect consumer financial data, potentially affects 143 million US customers, or more than half the adult population.

While not the largest breach -- Yahoo attacks leaked data on as many as one billion accounts -- the Equifax incident could be the most damaging because of the nature of data collected: bank and social security numbers and personal information of value to hackers and others.

"This is the data that every hacker wants to steal your identity and compromise your accounts," said Darren Hayes, a Pace University professor specializing in digital forensics and cybersecurity.

"It's not like the Yahoo breach where you could reset your password. Your information is gone. There's nothing to reset."

Some reports suggested Equifax data was being sold on "dark web" marketplaces, but analysts said it was too soon to know who was behind the attack and the motivation.

"This could be a mercenary group or it could be a nation-state compiling it with other data" for espionage purposes, said James Scott, a senior fellow at the Institute for Critical Infrastructure Technology, a Washington think tank.

"This is the kind of information I would go after if I were a nation-state, to set up psychographic targeting for information and political warfare."

- National security risks -

Peter Levin, chief executive at the data security firm Amida Technology Solutions and a former federal cybersecurity official, said he is concerned over the national security impact of the breach, which follows a leak of data on millions of US government employees disclosed in 2015.

"The implications with regard to national security are very large," he said.

Because most federal employees also have credit reports, "those people have now been hacked twice," Levin said, offering potential adversaries fresh data to be used against them.

"We've just given the bad guys a lot more information," he said. "Even if they didn't perpetrate the attack, they can buy the data."

An FBI statement said the US law enforcement agency "is aware of the reporting and tracking the situation as appropriate."

The breach raised numerous questions among experts, such as why the company waited more than a month to notify consumers after learning of the attacks July 29.

Some analysts expressed concern that a company with a mission to safeguard sensitive data allowed a breach of this scope to take place.

"Equifax knew it was a prime target for cyberattacks," said Annie Anton, who chairs the Georgia Tech School of Interactive Computing and specializes in computer security research.

"It's amazing that one flaw could lead to a breach involving 140 million people. They should have safeguards in place. Even if a breach happens, it shouldn't grow to that scale."

Even more surprising, Anton said, is that Equifax still used social security numbers for verification despite the known risks from storing these key identifiers.

Anton noted that she testified before Congress in 2007 recommending that credit bureaus be required to use alternatives to social security numbers "and it still hasn't been fixed."

Some details of the attack remain unclear, including whether the data stolen was encrypted -- which would make it harder for the hackers to monetize.

At least two class-action lawsuits on behalf of consumers were filed following the disclosure claiming Equifax failed to adequately protect important data.

Equifax "should have been better prepared for any attempt to penetrate its systems," said attorney John Yanchunis, who filed one of the lawsuits.

Separate lawsuits announced Friday meanwhile said Equifax may have violated securities laws by allowing three high-ranking Equifax executives to sell shares worth almost $1.8 million in the days after the hack was discovered.

An Equifax spokesperson told AFP the executives "had no knowledge that an intrusion had occurred at the time they sold their shares."

Equifax stock fell 13.6 percent in New York trades on Friday following the disclosure.

- How to respond-

The huge Equifax breach affecting 143 million people is the latest in a spate of cyber incidents which include ransomware attacks

The potential impact of the Equifax breach prompted some experts to suggest the government revisit the idea of social security numbers issued for life.

"The government should consider changing social security numbers since there have been so many breaches," Hayes said.

Levin added that he "would be in favor of issuing new social security," even though "it's a fraught political discussion."

Others said the US could follow a European rule set to take effect in 2018 requiring companies to notify consumers within 72 hours of a data breach.

"Companies will put more into cybersecurity if there are tough penalties associated with data breaches," Hayes said.

The House Financial Services Committee will hold hearings on the breach, committee chair Jeb Hensarling said while expressing concern over a "very troubling situation."

New York state attorney general Eric Schneiderman said his office was launching a formal probe to determine if Equifax adequately notified consumers and had appropriate safeguards in place.
Members of North Korean women's union hold a dance party in Pyongyang to celebrate national day.

North Korea's state media marked the nation's founding anniversary Saturday with calls for a nuclear arms buildup, in defiance of mounting international sanctions.

South Korea's military said it was keeping close tabs on the North amid speculation it could stage a missile launch or another nuclear test to mark the 1948 establishment of the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea.

North Korea conducted its fifth nuclear test on September 9 last year, and then carried out a sixth a week ago, saying it was a hydrogen bomb that could be fitted onto a missile -- prompting global condemnation and calls for further sanctions.

In July, it tested two intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) that appeared to bring much of the mainland US into range.

"The defence sector, in step with the party's Byungjin policy (of developing the economy and nuclear weapons at the same time) must make cutting-edge Juche weapons in greater quantities," the Rodong Sinmun said in an editorial, referring to the national philosophy of "Juche" or self-reliance.

The mouthpiece of the North's ruling party called for more "miracle-like events" such as the two ICBM tests to deter the United States which it said was bent on "decapitating" the nation's leader Kim Jong-Un.

Analysts speculated that North Korea might stage more provocations to mark the anniversary

"No matter how the US and its puppets kick up a ruckus, our republic, which has a strong military and the most powerful Juche bombs and weapons, and whose territory has all turned into fortresses, and all its people armed to the teeth, will remain an eternal iron-clad citadel," it said.

In another commentary, Rodong Sinmun said the US would continue receiving "gift packages in different shapes and sizes" as long as it sticks to what it said was a hostile policy against the North.

- 'Gift packages' -

Kim himself has called the ICBM tests "gift packages" that the North was delivering to the "US bastards".

A South Korean defence ministry spokesman said there were no signs of the North preparing a missile launch or a nuclear test on Saturday.

"The military is maintaining its utmost defence posture, keeping a close watch over the North. But there is nothing out of the ordinary," he told AFP.

But he warned the North could fire ballistic missiles at any time from easily concealed mobile launchers.

South Korea's Yonhap news agency quoted an unidentified government official as saying that the North could carry out a seventh nuclear test at its Punggye-ri test site at any moment.

The official also said the North could choose the founding anniversary of the ruling Workers' Party, which falls on October 10, to hold another test.

Meanwhile, two Japanese fighters and two US bombers carried out a joint exercise over the East China Sea on Saturday, Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera said in Tokyo.

"It is important for us to display strong Japan-US relations for Japan's security," Onodera was quoted as saying by broadcaster NHK.

The United States wants the UN Security Council to vote on Monday to impose tougher sanctions against North Korea despite resistance from China and Russia.

A US-presented draft resolution calls for an oil embargo on North Korea, an assets freeze on Kim, a ban on textiles and an end to payments of North Korean guest workers.

Diplomatic sources said Russia and China opposed the measures as a whole, except for the ban of textiles, during a meeting of experts Friday.
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Hurricane Irma weakened slightly to a Category 4 storm early Saturday, according to the US National Hurricane Center, after making landfall hours earlier in Cuba with maximum-strength Category 5 winds.

The fierce storm was zeroing in on Florida, churning some 245 miles (395 kilometers) away from Miami and packing still powerful maximum sustained winds of 155 miles per hour.

"Some fluctuations in intensity are likely during the next day or two, but Irma is expected to remain a powerful hurricane as it approaches Florida," the NHC said in its latest public advisory.

Irma is expected to strike the Florida Keys late Saturday and Sunday before moving inland, and many residents have joined a mass exodus amid increasingly dire alerts to leave.

In Cuba, government officials reported "significant damage" in parts of the island's center without providing further details, but said there were not yet confirmed casualties.

More than a million people on the Caribbean's largest island have been evacuated as a precaution, authorities said.

Another Category 4 hurricane, Jose, was also swirling in the Atlantic with maximum sustained winds of 150 miles per hour and heading towards the same string of Caribbean islands Irma had pummeled in the days before.

And after striking the eastern coast of Mexico late Friday as a Category 1 hurricane, Katia was downgraded to a tropical storm and "beginning to stall" near the Sierra Madre mountains -- though heavy rainfall would still "likely cause life-threatening flash floods and mudslides, especially in areas of mountainous terrain," the NHC said.
In a historic move, the IOC has brokered an agreement that will see Paris handed the 2024 Games with Los Angeles awarded 2028

The International Olympic Committee opens a week of high-level meetings here Monday, preparing to rubber-stamp the award of the 2024 and 2028 Olympics as the movement battles a fresh wave of corruption revelations.

For the first time since the awarding of the 1984 Olympics, the usual frenzy of last-minute lobbying and politicking by rival bid cities and heads of state will be strikingly absent in Lima.

In a historic move, the IOC has brokered an agreement that will see Paris handed the 2024 Games with Los Angeles awarded 2028.

IOC members are set to greenlight the deal at a meeting on Wednesday following 25-minute presentations by Paris and Los Angeles, the last two cities left in the initial race for the 2024 Summer Olympics.

The formal ratification of the 2024-2028 deal will mark the end of a mostly good-natured bidding campaign notable for the number of cities who withdrew from the race citing waning public support and concerns over budget.

Hamburg, Rome, Budapest and Boston all fell by the wayside during the competition, reflecting the political difficulties in persuading voters that staging the Olympics is worth the multi-billion-dollar price tag.

- 'Too many losers' -

IOC President Thomas Bach first signalled publicly that the double-award of an Olympics could be on the agenda in December last year, lamenting that the bidding process produced "too many losers."

As the bidding battle for 2024 unfolded, and as the field thinned to leave Los Angeles and Paris as the last bids standing, the IOC's determination to lock in two high-quality cities for the next two summer games became apparent.

Los Angeles and Paris, who have slick bids which emphasise a high-level of venue readiness, both wowed the IOC's Evaluation Commission during back-to-back visits in May.

In July, the IOC announced it would award the staging rights for the 2024 and 2028 Olympics at the same meeting in Lima.

With Los Angeles offered financial sweeteners to step aside for Paris in 2024, the fait accompli that will be inked this week was confirmed on July 31.

Bach, who has saluted the deal as a "win-win-win" for the two cities and the Olympic movement, could not hide his delight after arriving in Lima on Thursday for what should be a drama-free meeting.

- 'Two great cities' -

"It's a very special, it can be a historic decision," Bach said.

"There are two great cities. Allocating the Olympic Games is not about quantity, it's about quality. It's finding the best possible host for the best athletes of the world."

Paris 2024 bid chief Tony Estanguet said he viewed this week's meeting in Lima as cause for celebration.

"It's been a great campaign, great project, a great team, so we're here to conclude this campaign and to celebrate with LA, because we are not competitors, we are partners now and we will work together," Estanguet told AFP.

"It's unique for the IOC, it's unique for Paris and it's unique for LA, so let's do it."

The cloud hovering over what should be a triumphant week for Bach however comes in the form of more corruption allegations which erupted last week and appeared to take the IOC by surprise.

Investigators in Brazil swooped on the country's Olympics chief Carlos Nuzman, who stands accused of plotting to bribe IOC members into awarding Rio de Janeiro the 2016 Games at a 2009 vote in Copenhagen.

Former IOC member Nuzman was taken in for questioning with his passport confiscated and a search of his house unearthing around $150,000 worth in cash in various currencies.

Brazilian police later said they are probing "an international corruption scheme" aimed at "the buying of votes for the election of (Rio) by the International Olympic Committee as the venue for the 2016 Olympics."

The charges swirling around Rio's bid revive memories of the Salt Lake City bribery scandal, which led to 20 IOC members being either kicked out of the Olympics' ruling body or pleading guilty to accepting bribes for votes.
Belgian photojournalist Laurent Van Der Stockt, 53, won the Visa d'Or for News, the most prestigious award handed out at the "Visa Pour L'Image" festival in Perpignan, southwestern France

Belgian photographer Laurent Van der Stockt was honoured Saturday at photojournalism's biggest annual festival for his coverage of the battle of Mosul in Iraq for the French daily Le Monde.

Van der Stockt, 53, won the Visa d'Or for News, the most prestigious award handed out at the "Visa Pour L'Image" festival in Perpignan, southwestern France.

The reporter won the same prize in 2013 for his work covering rebels in the war in Syria, when he witnessed a chemical weapons attack by Bashar al-Assad's regime.

The 2017 award honoured his work during the battle for Mosul -- longest urban battle since Stalingrad -- which he covered from the start to the bitter end, embedded with Iraqi special forces.

The prize recognised that this proximity to the fighting, the suicide attacks, and to terrified civilians gave his coverage a singular force.

After some 25 years of covering conflicts, Van der Stockt said that he had "never had access to a military operation for that long."

He said the level of access he was given was "never or very, very rarely" granted to a correspondent.
Long associated with the super rich and powerful, Goldman Sachs has been involved in complex and sometimes controversial transactions and dealings

A slump in Goldman Sachs's long-dominant trading business has sharpened questions about the Wall Street kingpin's strategy as technological change disrupts the finance industry.

"Goldman Sachs has run out of steam," said Richard Bove, analyst at Vertical Research.

"It needs inspiration. It needs new management, new businesses, new activities."

Goldman's travails are something of a surprise given its unparalleled prestige in American finance.

Long associated with the super rich and powerful, Goldman Sachs has been involved in complex and sometimes controversial transactions and dealings.

Its global alumni includes European Central Bank head Mario Draghi and several current White House officials, including Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and National Economic Council director Gary Cohn, who is attempting to shepherd a major tax reform bill through Washington.

Gregori Volokhine, president of Meeschaert Capital markets, said the 148-year-old firm "must be reinvented."

Goldman reported an unprecedented 40 percent plunge in revenues for trading in fixed income, commodities and currencies (FICC) in the second quarter, a performance that lagged that of rivals JPMorgan Chase and Morgan Stanley.

FICC has long been a key profit center at Goldman and helped launch the rise of top brass such as chief executive LLoyd Blankfein, president and co-chief operating officer Harvey Schwartz and chief financial officer Martin Chavez.

But since the 2008 financial crisis, the role of trading desks has eroded as powerful automated trading algorithms have gobbled up more transactions and as more investors have embraced exchange traded funds which have lower costs.

And competitors like Morgan Stanley slashed jobs in that business two years ago.

This trend also has been encouraged by tougher regulations on speculative activities, especially the Volcker rule which restricts proprietary trading.

Around 70 percent of volumes on the New York Stock Exchange now are on automated trading systems, Volokhine noted.

Analysts are eager to hear how Goldman plans to right the ship, and Schwartz is scheduled to address investors at a conference next week hosted by rival bank Barclays.

Bove wants the firm to acknowledge that many high-risk transactions that once boosted results are no longer bankable and it sees new opportunities ahead.

"Hopefully," Schwartz will say that Goldman is going to be "doing more trading with Procter & Gamble and less trading with XYZ hedge fund and that this quarter was a lousy one," Bove said.

- Surprise slump -

So far, Goldman Sachs has argued that trading remains a viable business, which will pick up in times of market volatility. The company also said business should be boosted by deregulatory moves by President Donald Trump's administration.

CEO Blankfein has spoken of opportunities to serve as a "full-service" bank, but acknowledged in an interview last month: "We underperformed. We know what we have to do it and we're doing it."

Still, he said, "we have a good reputation for resiliency and adaptation."

Bove said Goldman should shift to more conventional lending, an area it has begun to embrace with the creation of GS Bank, which has savings accounts, and Marcus, an online lending program.

And Goldman should consider acquisitions of smaller lenders.

"The place where financial companies make money is loans," Bove said.
Hurricane Irma, which has spent the past few days cutting a path of deadly destruction through the Caribbean, is expected to finally turn its wrath on the "Sunshine State" early Sunday

Keilyn Mora plans to spend the eve of the storm in quiet devotion to God as she and her family await the destructive fury of Hurricane Irma from a designated shelter in southwest Florida.

The 16-year-old girl of Costa Rican origin is taking advantage of the last moments she's permitted to be outside to catch some fresh air with her sisters, before everyone at the North Collier Regional Park is ordered indoors.

"I'm going to pray a lot," she says. "With my father, my sisters, we are going to pray and we're going to hold out here."

Hurricane Irma, which cut a path of deadly destruction through the Caribbean in recent days, is expected to finally turn its wrath on the "Sunshine State" early Sunday.

Millions have evacuated, while tens of thousands are hunkered down in shelters such as this one -- a plush recreational center located just outside the wealthy coastal city of Naples, equipped with a gym, a swimming pool with slides, a palm-tree lined walkway and manicured lawns.

Dozens of people are crammed into its windowless halls and rooms that have been secured against the expected flood waters.

- Pets welcome -

The shelter is "pet friendly" in that family animals are permitted in one room, while an adjacent one allows them to sleep with their masters

The shelter is "pet friendly." Family animals are permitted in one room, while an adjacent one allows them to sleep with their masters.

One prominent sign asks sex offenders to identify themselves to a representative of the sheriff.

The offer to house cats and dogs was deemed necessary to convince families who would otherwise have refused to abandon their animals.

Florida is a popular retirement destination for Americans thanks to its low taxes, serene beaches and beautiful weather.

But on Sunday, the peninsula, particularly in the Naples region, will be battered by winds of "enormous destructive power," in the words of President Donald Trump.

Robert Nicodemo lives on the third floor of a one-year-old apartment building, and was relatively confident about its ability to withstand the elements, unlike his family who had warned him to leave.

"I got scared, really scared, not so much from me but I got calls from my daughter, I got calls from other people," the retired 71-year-old doctor said.

"And then I got this weird call from a friend of mine that I hadn't seen for 60 years!"

It was finally enough to sway the native of the Dominican Republic who has lived in the US for four decades, who brought his wife and Yorkshire Terrier Charlie along to the center.

Viviana Sierra, another Naples resident who was accompanied by her dog, parents and brother, was sanguine about the prospect of eventually going back to find her home and belongings destroyed.

"You can replace material things but your life is very important so I think it's better that we stay here," she said.
A heavy police presence is the new normal for New York after 9/11

It's a typical late summer weekend in New York's Times Square, and tourists from around the world are snapping pictures beneath the commercial hub's iconic neon billboards -- watched closely by a heavy contingent of police.

Four cruisers are parked in the middle of the busy intersection, and pedestrian zones have been surrounded by barriers to stop cars from ramming the crowd, a mode of attack favored by violent extremists in recent years.

"I don't like to come to places like this," says Sue Garcia, a massage therapist from Brooklyn. "Or anywhere where incidents have happened repeatedly -- the fear comes to mind."

Fear of an attack. Fear of another 9/11, the deadliest terrorist assault in history, when almost 3,000 lives were extinguished, many in the rubble of the World Trade Center.

For New Yorkers who lost loved ones, narrowly survived or just witnessed the event, memories remain fresh and old wounds are re-opened on its anniversary. And a perpetual state of high alert is the new normal.

Garcia, now 33, was a high schooler when the planes slammed into the Twin Towers. She saw them burn then collapse, and walked all the way home like hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers that day after metro services were suspended.

"I was there, I saw it over and over again, I don't need to think about it," she says.

But her mind always drifts toward the horrors of that day, whenever it is mentioned on TV, or even "when I hear an airplane: it is like the trigger to the thought. It has subsided over the years but it is still there" she adds.

Or while waiting to meet her sister in Times Square, "The Crossroads of the World," that symbolizes the spirit of New York.

- Close calls -

Twice in recent years, catastrophe loomed. In May 2010, police discovered a car packed with explosives and primed for carnage.

In May, a mentally-ill ex-soldier deliberately drove his sedan into 23 pedestrians, killed a young American tourist.

The episodes of anxiety described by Garcia are a burden borne by many New Yorkers.

For those directly affected, the anniversary of the attacks are the "most dreaded date" of the year and post-traumatic stress can remain for an individual's entire life, says Charles Strozier, a psychoanalyst and author of a book that documents the experiences of survivors and witnesses.

"There was a collective trauma, the sense of having been proven to be not invulnerable," he says.

"To say that New Yorkers are still traumatized is an exaggeration. But they think about it, they are aware of it, they do have active fears just below the surface of consciousness about things like bombs in the subways," adds the professor, who watched the destruction of the World Trade Center (WTC) from his office just off Union Square.

Many are also convinced that, even though recent terror attacks have focused on Europe, it is New York, the beating heart of the Western world, that remains the prime target.

- Prime target -

For New Yorkers who lost loved ones, narrowly survived or just witnessed the 9/11 attacks, memories remain fresh and old wounds are reopened on their anniversary

"What better target, unfortunately, than NYC?" asks Tim Lambert, an IT consultant.

Then, as now, he worked on the southern tip of Manhattan near the WTC site. The city, he says, is a "magnet for people from all over the world... It symbolizes the freedoms that we have, the money that we have. What better way to make a statement?"

The 52-year-old says a heavier police presence is now a fact of life that people have come to expect.

"I am not comfortable with it, but it is the new norm. The world is changing and the terrorist threat is part of that change," he adds.

They are apprehensions shared by the city's leaders.

"Thank God this is not an act of terrorism. It is an isolated incident," Mayor Bill de Blasio said in June when a doctor went on a shooting rampage in a hospital where he used to work in Bronx, killing one and injuring six.

When the car ramming incident happened in May, police chief James O'Neill admitted "the worst went through my mind."

To protect its 8.5 million inhabitants, New York has to remain fully prepared.

- See something, say something -

A 38,000 strong police force that keeps watch over the city's public spaces, a massive network of cameras providing round-the-clock surveillance and a ubiquitous campaign to remind denizens "If you see something, say something," are all reminders of the cost of security.

Since 2001, the city has had its own anti-terrorist unit, which today has about 2,000 personnel and representatives in several foreign capitals, according to Robert Strang, president of the New York-based Investigative Management Group.

The agency has at times courted controversy, notably for its program that monitored citizens frequenting the city's mosques which was criticized for being discriminatory.

But the intelligence network is essential and overall and has been successful in preventing major new attacks, said Strang.

The US financial capital also wants to set an example when it comes to honoring the victims of terror abroad.

After recent attacks in Europe, authorities were quick to offer their condolences and assistance, and turned off the lights at the Empire State Building in a mark of solidarity.

The September 11 Memorial, with its two immense black granite craters, built on the site of the Twin Towers, has become a site of meditation and mourning not just for New York but for the entire world

And the September 11 Memorial, with its two immense black granite craters, built on the site of the Twin Towers, has become a site of meditation and mourning not just for New York but for the entire world.

It's "a memorial to all the terror victims in a way," said Monique Mol, a 52-year-old Dutch tourist.

"It is like these people will live forever -- like the pyramids and the mummified pharaohs in Egypt."
Two of fashion's most flamboyant headline grabbers went head to head Saturday, as king of cool Alexander Wang bussed some of the world's most famous models to an open-air Brooklyn runway and king of bling Philipp Plein laid on a striptease and invited Nicki Minaj.

New York Fashion Week, which kicks off the spring/summer 2018 season before the global bandwagon decamps to London, Paris and Milan, comes with designers desperately looking to create the biggest buzz.

Model Kendall Jenner walks the runway at the Alexander Wang show during New York Fashion Week on September 9, 2017 in New York City

Wang, the US wunderkid and ex-creative director of Balenciaga known as a party animal, opted for Bushwick, the traditionally working-class, Latino neighborhood now known among urban millennials for boho affordability in a financially exorbitant New York.

Cindy Crawford's 16-year-old daughter Kaia Gerber, making her fashion week debut this season, opened the show, treading effortlessly off a luxury #WangFest bus in stilettos and a little white dress.

She was joined by the most headline grabbing models of the moment: Kendall Jenner, half sister of Kim Kardashian and this week honored as fashion icon of the decade at the tender age of 21, and Bella Hadid.

Die-hard fans stood behind metal barriers shrieking when they saw their idols or Wang running along, hair flying. Some looked bemused.

His website broadcast footage from inside the buses of the models riding around New York, before finally reaching Bushwick.

Model Bella Hadid walks the runway at the Alexander Wang show during New York Fashion Week on September 9, 2017 in New York City

Wang, the superstar who defines downtown cool, stuck to his playbook of black, beige and white. It was his second consecutive show off the beaten track, last season dragging fashionistas to gentrifying Harlem.

A hundred wristbands for the show were distributed on a first-come, first-serve basis at his boutique in SoHo on Saturday morning.

It came as he launched a Swarovski crystal clutch, fashioned to look like a roll of $100 bills with an elastic band down the middle, designed in collaboration with bag designer Judith Leiber.

- Bondage bling -

Across town, within sight of the Empire State Building and down the road from homeless people, Philipp Plein threw the most extravagant of parties, laying on an orgasmic display of flesh and titillation.

Dita Von Teese performs on stage for the Philipp Plein Spring 2018 show during New York Fashion Week on September 9, 2017 in New York

Burlesque artist Dita Von Teese opened the night with a striptease, shedding her stilettos, sequined evening dress and corset down to just a thong, nipple clamps and sequined garters.

She then writhed and splashed inside a giant martini glass, sponging herself down, sloshing water everywhere, kicking her long, lean legs into the air before winking with a little toss of the head.

The clothes, overshadowed by a live performance from rapper Future, cloaked in a giant gold puffa coat, seemed an afterthought. The first model appeared only at 10:30 pm -- 90 minutes behind schedule.

Entitled "Good Gone Bad" they wore oversized Heidi-style plaits, which they switched and flicked like whips, striding out in bondage-style harness dresses, leather dog collars and flashing bare buttocks.

Teyana Taylor performs during the Philipp Plein Spring 2018 show during New York Fashion Week on September 9, 2017 in New York

Actress Teyana Taylor, modeling the skimpiest of black lace body suits, writhing on the floor. Other women wore daisy-style pacifiers.

Male models went topless. In the middle of the stage back-up dancers writhed and prostrated themselves on giant scaffolding.

Before the show hundreds of guests endured scenes of chaos outside, pushing and shoving their way to the front of slow-moving queues in a haze of expensive perfume, cigarette smoke and simmering frustration.

"I have to apologize," Plein told those who made it through.

"It became a monster, hard to control," he said of his ultra-expensive, international luxe take on hip-hop wear and street clothes, much of it monogrammed with his name.

The German-born, Swiss-based designer then invited everyone at the Hammerstein ballroom, a former opera house to the after party, where Minaj -- seated in the front row -- was expected to perform.

"We like just the right amount of wrong," he told the New York Post. "Just because fashion is a big business doesn't mean that it has to be stiff and serious."
Activist Shane van der Mescht who is part of a group called Reclaim the City

As a child in the 1970s, Charmaine Marcus was forcefully removed from her Cape Town neighbourhood when the apartheid government declared it a whites-only area.

Now, as a property boom transforms once-neglected suburbs into trendy and expensive enclaves, she faces being pushed completely out of the city she calls home.

"It seems to me they just don't want us here," says Marcus, who is fighting a pending eviction in court after a dispute with her landlord.

"But this is our city. We are this city."

South Africa's slowing economy and political uncertainty have curtailed the property market countrywide.

But Cape Town has proved to be an exception, with houses here on average 78.5 percent more expensive than they were in 2010, according to the South African FNB bank.

Property expert Toni Enderli says the boom is driven by families from across the country moving to Western Cape province, in part because the region has a reputation for good governance under the Democratic Alliance party that is in power at provincial government level.

"The population in the province has gone up 33 percent in the last 15 years," Enderli told AFP.

Ismail Sheik Rahim says he feels like an outsider in his own country

"People want to be in Cape Town, they want the lifestyle. But the supply of houses that should be developed on a yearly basis is not keeping up with that."

- Gentrification -

In the suburb of Woodstock, where Marcus has lived for 35 years, the evolution of decayed buildings into modern apartment blocks, restaurants and markets has made it a favourite among young professionals -- and doubled housing prices in just the last five years.

Marcus' home reveals a different picture. The paint peels off the living room ceiling as a wide crack traces its way down to the floor.

Upstairs, one apartment stands exposed to the elements, gutted.

Residents began withholding their rent here after a fire two years ago ripped through a section of the building, killing one of the tenants.

They blame the landlord for failing to maintain the structure. He responded to the non-payment of rent by issuing eviction notices.

Based on current trends, the building could be a prime site for redevelopment as modern, expensive flats in future.

- Relocation -

Campaign group Reclaim the City has occupied an abandoned hospital in Cape Town

If Marcus, 48, and her neighbours lose their eviction case, which, they believe, seems probable as the landlord was acting within his rights, none will be able to afford the area's new rental rates.

Instead, they will likely be relocated to an emergency resettlement camp on a farm some 30 kilometres (18 miles) away.

Wolwerivier, or Wolves River, has neither a clinic nor a school and little access to shops or affordable public transport -- which could cost Marcus her inner-city job as a cleaner at a clothing company.

Landlords in South Africa need a court order to evict tenants, but the Constitutional Court earlier this year ruled that a court cannot issue an eviction order that would leave a person homeless.

Many tenants however are backyard-dwellers and have no formal contracts.

- 'Strangers in own country' -

Activist Shane van der Mescht says Cape Town "doesn't work for you, it works against you"

"This city doesn't work for you, it works against you," says activist Shane van der Mescht, who is part of a group called Reclaim the City occupying an abandoned hospital in Woodstock where wards and offices have been turned into bedrooms and meeting spaces.

Many of the activists here were sleeping rough until a few months ago, and each has their own eviction story.

"I see them building these apartment blocks, but we can't afford it," says activist Ismail Sheik Rahim.

"We feel like outsiders, like strangers in our own country... Where am I going to get 1.4 million rand ($110,000) for a flat?"

Reclaim the City says the government should be doing more to provide affordable accommodation closer to the city centre.

Last month, the city announced plans to develop 10 sites in and around the inner city for affordable housing. Work on most of these sites is expected to ramp up in 2018.

"I understand residents' concerns about temporary or emergency housing only being available in Wolwerivier," Brett Herron, the city's head of urban development, told AFP.

"The reality is that that is the only emergency or transitional housing available.

"What we're working on now is to identify sites spread across the city so that if there is a displacement or there is an eviction, people are not required to move so far."

Sitting on her front step, Marcus says she knows she will ultimately be evicted from her building. But leaving her neighbourhood is not an option.

"If the council doesn't have alternate accommodation for us in or near the city, we're not going nowhere. We're here to stay."
A medic takes a sample from an Egyptian labourer being tested for Hepatitis C at a construction site on August 3, 2017

Like millions in Egypt, Ahmed Nada suffered silently from Hepatitis C. But the country is turning from the world's most afflicted by the disease to a global destination for those seeking a cure.

Nada, 31, only learned that he carried the virus when he tried to donate blood.

"At first I was very angry," he said. "I kept thinking whether it was from my previous work as a dentist, or from the barber or from what? I didn't know."

Previously, a Hepatitis C infection, even when diagnosed, would have gone untreated or simply been managed.

But a cheap new drug produced in Egypt since 2015 and a government programme to eliminate the condition meant Nada could be easily cured.

He registered on a government website and was directed to the nearest treatment centre.

Egyptian workers line up for a Hepatitis C test at a construction site near Cairo on August 3, 2017

Now cured along with more than 1.3 million other Egyptians, Nada says the entire process was simple "from the moment I filled in the application".

Egypt has the highest prevalence of Hepatitis C infection in the world, an epidemic that started with a government programme for mass vaccinations with unsterilised syringes in the 1950s.

Seven percent of people aged between 15 and 59 have an active infection, according to Egypt's 2015 Demographics and Health Surveys.

- 40,000 deaths a year -

The blood-borne virus can cause serious damage to the liver before being detected, and can be fatal.

About 20 percent of those who become infected get better without treatment, but the rest can remain infected for up to 30 years without showing symptoms.

"Just about every family in Egypt is touched by Hepatitis C," World Health Organization official Dr Henk Bekedam wrote in a 2014 report on the disease, which the agency said was killing about 40,000 Egyptians a year.

Since 2006, Egypt has carried out surveys to determine the epidemic's spread and negotiated cheaper drugs from abroad.

However, its first breakthrough came when the US-based Gilead Sciences pharmaceutical company developed Sovaldi, a cure approved by the US Food and Drug Administration in 2013.

Egypt negotiated a deal to reduce the price of a course of treatment from $84,000 (70,000 euros), or $1,000 a pill, to a fraction of that.

The National Committee for Control of Viral Hepatitis set up a website so sufferers could access the drug.

"The first day we had 100,000 patients, the second day 100,000 patients registered, and the following week 50,000 patients daily," said Manal Hamdy el-Sayed, a founding member of the committee running the programme.

- No more waiting lists -

"People were waiting impatiently," she said.

The next breakthrough came in 2015 when Egypt began to manufacture the drug locally, reducing the price for the full course to just $83, the committee's executive director Kadry al-Saeed said.

Waiting lists for the cure ended in July 2016, and the government is now searching for an estimated three million Egyptians who carry the virus without knowing it, Saeed said.

Now an Egyptian company has capitalised on the low cost of the cure locally to attract patients from abroad, where the drug is seen as exorbitantly priced.

Tour N' Cure treats visiting patients for about eight percent of the treatment's cost abroad.

"We treat patients in almost all countries," said Mostafa el-Sayed, the campaign's managing director.

The company says $7,000 covers flights, a week's accommodation, blood tests and treatment -- and five days of tourism in Egypt.

Patients return home with the remainder of the medicine while Egyptian doctors follow up with them.

Mirel Damboiu, 59, from Romania, heard about the treatment through his daughter and son-in-law.

"The treatment was successful from the first five days," said Damboiu.

"In Romania this treatment is not available to buy," while another treatment available there would have been "very invasive", he said.

Damboiu will have his final round of treatment in September before undergoing final tests.
This undated picture released by North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on September 10, 2017 shows North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un attending a photo session with nuclear scientists and technicians

North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un praised the "perfect success" of the country's sixth and largest nuclear test and urged further weapons development, according to state media Sunday, in the face of a US drive for tough new sanctions.

Pyongyang held a banquet, concert and performances in a weekend display of pageantry to celebrate the September 3 nuclear test, which the North said was a hydrogen bomb that could be fitted onto a rocket.

The blast, which came weeks after the country fired off two intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) that appeared to bring much of the mainland US into range, prompted global condemnation and calls to ramp up sanctions against the isolated nation.

But the North's leader appeared deaf to the international outrage and hailed the "perfect success in the test of H-bomb" at a dinner to congratulate the scientists and technicians behind the nuclear programme, the official Korean Central News Agency reported Sunday.

Dubbing the latest test the "great auspicious event of the national history", he called for "redoubled efforts" to complete the country's mission to fully become a recognised nuclear power.

A two-page spread carried by the North's official Rodong Sinmun newspaper on Sunday showed photos of Kim and his wife Ri Sol-Ju attending a special concert held for the nuclear scientists and technicians.

A slew of brazen tests in recent months, which contravene existing United Nations sanctions, has sparked surging tensions over the North Korean weapons programme.

This undated picture released by North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on September 10, 2017 shows a performance dedicated to nuclear scientists and technicians who worked on a hydrogen bomb

Pyongyang says it needs nuclear arms to protect itself, but the US has accused the isolated nation of "begging for war".

In an interview published on Sunday United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres said the showdown over North Korea's nuclear and missile programme was the world's worst crisis "in years" and had left him deeply worried.

"We have to hope that the seriousness of this threat puts us on the path of reason before it is too late," said Guterres in the French Sunday newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche.

He also called for unity in the UN Security Council, which is set to consider a new draft resolution presented by Washington in recent days that would be the toughest-ever imposed on North Korea.

The US is calling for an oil embargo on the North, an assets freeze on Kim Jong-Un, a ban on textiles and an end to payments of North Korean guest workers.

It is hoping for a Monday vote though both China and Russia are thought to have raised opposition to the measures.
Residents of the northeastern Syrian city of Deir Ezzor receive aid parcels on September 8, 2017, as the first the supplies since government troops broke a jihadists siege were delivered via a newly opened road

Haitham al-Ahmad has been busy dusting down kitchen appliances ahead of the grand reopening of his pizza place, after government troops broke a crippling jihadist siege of Syria's Deir Ezzor.

He brought down the shutters on his restaurant nearly three years ago, when Islamic State group militants cut off regime-held parts of the eastern city.

Russian-backed Syrian forces broke through on Tuesday, and food supplies have now begun entering a western enclave of the city via the newly opened road.

In his "Prince of Pizza and Pies" restaurant in Al-Qusur district, Ahmad excitedly listed the dishes that will feature on his menu.

"I'll serve meat pies, walnut and tomato paste, pizza, and mushahamiya" -- a meatloaf especially made in Deir Ezzor.

"And all kinds of pastries," he added.

"We'll get back to work, and Deir Ezzor will go back to the way it was."

The restaurateur sported a greying beard and a striped polo shirt, his arms covered in dust from cleaning out a long-disused oven.

Nearby, a young worker poured buckets of water into massive metal vats to rinse them out.

"I closed three years ago because I could no longer afford the oil, tomato paste or meat. What price would I charge customers?" said Ahmad.

- 100,000 people besieged -

Since 2014, IS has held swathes of Deir Ezzor province and about 60 percent of the provincial capital of the same name.

The remaining parts of the city, where about 100,000 people lived, were put under crippling siege.

Syrian military aircraft used to fly in some aid, and the United Nations carried out dozens of air drops to provide assistance to desperate civilians.

But now that Syrian troops have broken through, reinforcements, food, medicine and other materials are able to enter overland.

A picture taken on September 9, 2017 shows Russian military vehicles carrying humanitarian aid parcels in the northeastern Syrian city of Deir Ezzor

On Saturday, the Syrian Arab Red Crescent began distributing supplies that had been trucked in the previous day.

Hundreds of civilians massed around huge green trucks, waiting to receive white cardboard boxes packed with bags of rice, bulgur wheat, olive oil and preserves, as well as hygiene products.

"Just looking at all this is making us full," said 48-year-old Ghalia, standing near a wall featuring a painted Syrian flag.

"God willing, no one will taste what we went through."

Other residents headed for government warehouses where goods were being sold at reduced prices -- hummus, sugar and animal fat used in Middle Eastern delicacies.

- 'We're hungry!' -

"We're going to buy what we need because we were deprived of everything," said resident Heba, who was waiting her turn in line.

The 24-year-old's beaming face was framed by a bright fuchsia-coloured headscarf.

"There were children who didn't even know what some fruits and vegetables looked like," she said.

Bubbly Rama, just six years old, was ravenous.

Local residents gather to receive humanitarian aid parcels provided by the Syrian Red Crescent in the northeastern city of Deir Ezzor on September 9, 2017

"I'm going to eat chicken, fruit -- we want to eat everything, we're hungry!" she said.

"As besieged people, we had nothing to eat. The army advanced to open up a road for us," Rama exclaimed, before bursting into exhausted tears.

State media reported on Saturday that regime forces had broken the IS siege of Deir Ezzor military airport.

Also in line on Saturday, 58-year-old Umm Adel said she had long dreamt of whipping up an elaborate meal for her family.

"I've been waiting for this moment for years," she said.

"I'll be so glad to feed my children something filling for the first time in three years, without having to just eke something out."
Apple CEO Tim Cook, seen at the 2016 unveiling of the iPhone 7, is expected to announce updated versions of the smartphone at an event on September 12

With Apple set to unveil its newest iPhones, a key question for the California tech giant is whether it can recapture the magic from its first release a decade ago.

The keenly anticipated media event Tuesday will be the first in the Steve Jobs Theater at Apple's new "spaceship" campus in Silicon Valley, evoking the memory of the company's late co-founder and iconic pitchman.

Jobs introduced the first iPhone on January 9, 2007 and set the stage for mobile computing -- and an entire industry revolving around it. The first devices became an instant hit as they went on sale on June 29 of that year.

Apple as usual has revealed little about the September 12 event in Cupertino. Invitations provided the date, time, location and a message that read: "Let's meet at our place."

The timing, however, is in sync with Apple's annual unveiling of new iPhone models and comes as rivals field fresh champions powered by Google-backed Android software.

Eyes are on Apple to dazzle as the culture-changing firm seeks to retain its image as an innovation leader in a global smartphone market showing signs of slowing and as Chinese rivals close ground.

Chinese smartphone colossus Huawei passed Apple in global smartphone sales for the first time in June and July, taking second place behind South Korean giant Samsung, according to market tracker Counterpoint Research.

Samsung last month unveiled a new model of its Galaxy Note as it seeks to move past the debacle over exploding batteries in the previous generation of the device, and mount a renewed challenge to Apple's flagship devices.

Other makers are also scrambling for market share, including Google, which is expected to soon unveil a second-generation of its flagship Pixel smartphone.

- iPhone X? -

The upcoming iPhone event will be the first public event at Apple's new "spaceship" campus at its home in Cupertino, California

Some reports say Apple will introduce three new iPhone models, with unconfirmed talk that a special premium iPhone will be priced as high as $1,400.

"It will have to be magical," analyst Rob Enderle of Enderle Group said of a new iPhone with that kind of price tag.

"Even if you can't afford it, this has to be the one you lust after."

The new iPhone would also need to "set the bar" in a market with premium Android-powered handsets priced much lower, according to the analyst.

Two new iPhone models are expected to be improved versions of the prior generation, with most of the dramatic changes built into a premium handset unofficially referred to by some as "X" but pronounced "ten" in honor of the anniversary.

Loup Ventures partner Gene Munster said in a research note that the new premier iPhone "will be the biggest step forward in iPhone technology that we've seen since the original device launched 10 years ago."

Some reports say the new iPhone will include a high-quality, edge-to-edge screen with a notch in the top for an extra camera supporting 3D facial recognition.

Others speculate that the back of the new handset will be glass and will offer wireless charging.

The most dramatic changes were expected in the premium model, which could go so far as to get rid of a home button that has been a main control feature since the iPhone debut.

Flicking or swiping gestures could replace the home button function, enabling the handset face to appear almost all-screen.

RBC Capital Markets said that a recent survey of iPhone 8 users in the US indicated "sizable pent-up demand and excitement around the upcoming iPhone launch" with wireless charging generating the most interest.

- Augmenting reality -

Apple's new iPhones will be facing competition from premium-priced handsets like the Samsung Galaxy Note 8, seen at an unveiling in New York in August

In 2007, Jobs billed his smartphone approach as blending liberal arts, design and technology. Today Apple is seen as needing a fresh spark, whether from the phone itself or from services or other devices like the Apple Watch.

Apple's new iOS 11 operating system unveiled earlier this year boasts new camera features, the Siri digital assistant made smarter, and the potential for augmented reality applications.

Apple made an AR kit available to developers to create apps with the technology.

Adding 3D and computer vision hardware to an iPhone would "be a big step toward putting AR in the hands of everyday users," Munster said.

Apple has taken to spotlighting the growing stream of revenue from selling content and services to the hundreds of millions of people using its devices.

"We believe Apple's true differentiation is its unique computing ecosystem: iOS," RBC Capital Markets said, referring to the mobile software powering the company's creations.

"Simplistically, the scale of users attracts application developers, which in turn bolsters the number of users."
Writer/Director Aaron Sorkin (L) and actress Jessica Chastain attend the press conference for "Molly's Game" during the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival

Oscar-winning screenwriter Aaron Sorkin praises a convicted poker queen for taking the moral high ground in his directorial debut "Molly's Game," which premiered Saturday at the Toronto film festival.

The American crime drama stars Jessica Chastain as the former Olympic skier Molly Bloom, who went on to run one of the largest high-stakes poker games in the United States.

Her games at their peak required a $250,000 buy-in and attracted some of Hollywood and New York's elite -- as well as mobsters -- but she withheld most of their names in her memoir.

The film follows suit, though the identities of some of her regulars have emerged including several who were arrested.

"We live in a time when people sell each other out," Sorkin told journalists. "The rest of us don't seem to mind that that just happened. We're not calling the seller out."

"Molly (had) no sense at all that she was going to do something heroic, it just came naturally to her not to do the wrong thing," he said.

The film also features Kevin Costner as Molly's hardnosed father and Idris Elba as the attorney who defended her in court -- and for taking a moral stand by not informing on her clients.

The film was shot in Toronto. Molly, who is banned from Canada because she pleaded guilty to a federal crime in the United States, was granted special permission to enter the country in order to attend the film's premiere here.

- 'Shiny objects' -

"For two years Hollywood had been chasing Molly's story because there are a lot of shiny objects in there, the poker, the women, the tonnes of money, the powerful men," Sorkin commented.

His movie renounces glamour and salaciousness in favor of trying to help audiences understand this complex woman.

"I have no visual sensibility at all. I hear movies more than see them," Sorkin explained.

"There's a tremendous amount of language in these scenes," he said. "I'm always most comfortable as a writer inside four walls. I like just writing people talking in rooms."

One of the hardest challenges in making this film, he said, was trying to make poker interesting.

"I needed poker to look exciting and it's not," he said. "It's the world's worst spectator sport."

Sorkin said he was moved to make a film about Molly after meeting her in person.

He described her as a woman "in deep, deep trouble" after her arrest with no prospects at age 39, for a run-in with "an illegal poker game from a really long time and pleading guilty in federal court in a mob indictment."

"A woman who is in that kind of trouble is saying no to what I assume was a lot of money," he said, "which nowadays is even more attractive."

- The West Wing -

Sorkin is perhaps best known for his work on the hit television series "The West Wing."

Asked how he might change the show to suit the current political climate, he answered: "Not a thing."

"I would do the exact same show where we get to see and hear what it looks and sounds like when well-intentioned, thoughtful people -- with whom we may have differences of opinion, but whose intentions are unimpeachable -- are working hard and are dedicated to public service," he said.

Sorkin said the idea behind the series, which ran from 1999 to 2006, was to "show a very highly competent group of people who may slip on banana peels from time to time but who we understand are waking up every morning with our best interests in mind and who are hyper competent."

"So I would just keep doing that and once a week we'd hear what a press conference should sound like," he said, seemingly alluding to US President Donald Trump's mercurial tendencies in front of the podium.

Sorkin has been quoted in US media as describing Trump as "a thoroughly incompetent pig with dangerous ideas."
Master Kamal told AFP he saw three neighbours -- including a father and son -- butchered as he fled, making a 10-day trek across monsoon-drenched hills, rivers and fields to Bangladesh

Myanmar soldiers barred the entrance to the mosque, men arrived with machetes and petrol cans and then, according to Rohingya Muslim eyewitnesses, the killing began.

"Those that ran were hacked to death. Others that got away were shot by the army," said Master Kamal, a 53-year-old teacher, and one of the survivors of the massacre in Aung Sit Pyin in Myanmar's Rakhine state.

"They were burning houses. We fled to save our lives."

Kamal told AFP he saw three neighbours -- including a father and son -- butchered as he fled, making a 10-day trek across monsoon-drenched hills, rivers and fields to Bangladesh.

Interviews with about 10 people from the village who found refuge at Balukhali camp in Bangladesh revealed horrific details of the events in Aung Sit Pyin on August 25.

That was the day Rohingya Muslim militants attacked police posts across Rakhine, sparking a violent crackdown that has so far driven almost 300,000 of Myanmar's 1.1 million Rohingya population across the border.

The stateless Muslim minority blames Myanmar's army and Buddhist mobs for the widespread killings.

The testimony is difficult to verify because access to Rakhine is heavily restricted.

Myanmar's government has blamed Rohingya militants for the atrocities, including firebombing their own villages and killing civilians suspected of collaborating with the army.

- 'Everything was burning' -

Mohammad Amin, a 66-year-old farmer whose father was a village chief, said his family had lived in Aung Sit Pyin for three generations.

Anwara Begum said she plunged into a river with her four-year-old son, as soldiers fired at fleeing villagers

"This is the first time we have fled. I have never witnessed violence like this," said the wiry farmer, wrapped in a tattered blue sarong in a mud-splattered Balukhali shanty.

When the shooting began he ran into the jungle to hide, saying he crossed a river to avoid soldiers pursuing civilians.

Families scattered. Amin spent days searching for his seven sons and daughters in the brush, dodging military patrols.

"From the other side of the river, I could see everything burning," he said.

Myanmar's army says at least 400 people, mainly militants, have been killed in the violence.

But there are fears that figure is underestimated, with other Rakhine villages also the target of alleged massacres.

Many of the refugees from Aung Sit Pyin reported seeing people slaughtered, or passing corpses cut down or burned as they sprinted in all directions from advancing forces.

Twenty-six families who made it out are now cramped underneath a large tarpaulin sheet in a muddy field behind Balukhali. There are no toilets nor clean water.

Some said the journey took seven days. Others said they spent up to 12 days hiding from the military and tackling steep passes and rain-soaked jungle to reach Bangladesh.

Anwara Begum said she plunged into a river with her four-year-old son, as soldiers fired at fleeing villagers.

She clung to debris but lost contact with her other five children in the chaos, saying she hid terrified in the hills while helicopters buzzed overhead.

"I thought I would never see them again," the 35-year-old told AFP.

Her other five children aged 12 to 19 linked up with their father at the border and the family was reunited in Bangladesh, she said.

Jamal Hussain, a 12-year-old Rohingya refugee, said his five older brothers were cut down by machine gun fire in Aung Sit Pyin village in Myanmar as they ran and he has not seen his parents or seven sisters since

Others have been less fortunate.

Nearly 100 people have drowned trying to cross the Naf river on the border, their bodies washing up on the shore.

Others have arrived bearing injuries consistent with bullet wounds, or missing limbs from alleged landmines placed to deter evacuees from returning.

- 'I thought I would die' -

The sprawling camps inside Bangladesh have swelled with newcomers like Jamal Hussain, 12, who said his five older brothers were cut down by machine gun fire in Aung Sit Pyin as they ran. He has not seen his parents or seven sisters since.

"We were all together but suddenly they started firing. I could not look back, because I thought I would die," the softly-spoken boy said.

"When I was hiding, I remembered the whole thing. I started crying."

On his shoulder was a welt and scar the size of a small coin, evidence of the splinter of shrapnel or bullet that he said struck his back and passed through.

Jamal Hussain, a 12-year-old Rohingya refugee, bears an exit wound where a piece of shrapnel struck him as he fled an outbreak of violence in Aung Sit Pyin village in Myanmar

"At first I didn't know what happened, then people behind were saying there was blood on my back," he said.

Myanmar considers the Rohingya illegal migrants from Bangladesh and denies them citizenship, even though many have lived in Rakhine for generations.

Pressure is mounting on de-facto leader and Nobel peace laureate Aung Sung Suu Kyi to end the violence.

Impoverished Bangladesh has been overwhelmed by the influx of hundreds of thousands of Rohingya in the last two years.

For those squatting in the mud in Balukhali there is nowhere left to go.

Taking solace under a plastic sheet, mother of six Begum said she was prepared to "beg" for a living.

"If I have nothing to eat, I will eat soil, but I will never go back."
Former Philippine first lady Imelda Marcos visits the tomb of her late husband at the Heroes Cemetery in Manila on August 28, 2017

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte Sunday hailed late dictator Ferdinand Marcos as a "hero" to many Filipinos, brushing aside a history of corruption and rights abuses under the former strongman.

Duterte is stepping up efforts to rehabilitate the image of Marcos, who was ousted in an army-back popular revolt in 1986 and died in exile, as the Marcos family and their allies prepare to hold celebrations Monday marking a hundred years since his birth.

The outspoken Duterte, who has previously hailed Marcos as the country's best-ever president, has declared the anniversary a holiday in Marcos' home province of Ilocos Norte where his family still wields political power.

"He was a president. To the Ilocanos, he was the greatest president. Why do we have to debate on that?" Duterte said late Saturday.

"As far as the Ilocanos (are) concerned, Marcos is a hero," he added, calling criticisms of the former leader "hogwash" and "garbage".

Duterte, who has himself faced accusations of major human rights abuses, is a friend of the Marcos family and has played a key role in bolstering their efforts to regain the top echelons of political power.

Marcos was accused of embezzling billions of dollars from state coffers, with anti-corruption watchdog Transparency International in 2004 naming him the second most corrupt leader of all time, behind Indonesian dictator Suharto.

The dictator also oversaw widespread human rights abuses to maintain his control of the country and enable his plundering, with thousands of people killed or tortured, previous Philippine governments said.

This culminated in a popular revolt that toppled Marcos, sending him and his family fleeing into exile in Hawaii in 1986. He died in 1989.

No member of the Marcos clan has ever gone to prison and the family has made a stunning political comeback in recent years.

They have hosted various events in Ilocos in recent days showcasing the rule of their patriarch, including a Catholic mass and an event to unveil a plaque on Sunday at the family's ancestral home in the city of Batac.

Batac resident Lita Lampitoc, 72, summed up the adulation, saying: "We are Ilocanos so we are all for Marcos."

Asked about the opposition to Marcos, she said: "They do not know Marcos, we know Marcos. We don't know anything about those angry at Marcos."

Duterte stunned the nation last November by allowing Marcos to be buried at the national "Heroes' Cemetery" despite widespread outcry.
Nobel laureate Kailash Satyarthi is about to launch a new campaign

Bruised and battered from previous campaigns against child labour, India's Nobel Peace Prize winner Kailash Satyarthi hopes one million people will join his latest drive starting Monday -- against the sexual abuse and trafficking of children.

"It is a war on rapes, war on child sexual abuse and trafficking because these are not ordinary crimes and they cannot be solved through the business-as-usual approach," Satyarthi told AFP in an interview.

"Two children are sexually abused every hour. One child goes missing every eight minutes in India and they are not disappearing in thin air," said Satyarthi.

"These children are trafficked... sold and bought like animals. Sometimes at lesser prices than animals."

More than 9,000 children were trafficked in India in 2016, up nearly 25 percent from the previous year, according to the Ministry of Women and Child Development.

About 14,000 children were victims of rape and sexual harassment in 2015, data from the National Crime Records Bureau showed.

But those figures may only be the tip of the iceberg, with experts saying the government underestimates the numbers in a country where a shroud of silence surrounds such crimes.

Satyarthi hopes his "India March", which will kick off from the country's southernmost tip of Kanyakumari and finish in New Delhi on October 16 after travelling across all 29 states and seven union territories, will open people's eyes to the mounting epidemic.

"We want to awaken the whole nation, we want to raise the consciousness against child sexual abuse and trafficking because it is a hidden menace," he said.

Traffickers lure children, mostly from remote villages, with false promises of jobs before selling them off to brothels, factories or gangs which force them into begging.

The soft-spoken 63-year-old has been at the forefront of the drive against child labour in India, where over 10 million children are engaged in work, according to UNICEF.

He blames India's "failed" law enforcement, weak prosecution and low conviction rates for their plight, and founded Bachpan Bachao Andolan (Movement to Save Childhood) to rescue children working in horrifying conditions.

His teams often stage dangerous dawn raids on mills, dank mines and factories -- many manned by armed guards -- which employ children.

- 'Very dangerous' -

Satyarthi said his social conscience was awoken when he was about five years old and saw a boy his age outside a school, cleaning shoes.

In 1980 he quit his job as an electrical engineer to take up the cudgels on behalf of India's most vulnerable citizens.

The married father of two recalled his first rescue operation in 1981 -- at a time when India had no law against child labour.

After collecting money by selling his wife's jewellery, he and friends freed 36 children, women and men from a brick kiln in Punjab state where they had been enslaved for 17 years.

"When I was rescuing them, I realised that 'No, they are freeing me from inside' and that is a very, very special realisation of freedom, of liberation," he recalled.

"And since then I have never looked back and I have kept on freeing children. And on the other hand, they have freed me, giving me enormous joy and a sense of accomplishment."

In 2014 Satyarthi jointly won the Nobel Peace Prize with Pakistani child activist Malala Yousafzai.

But his efforts have come at a price. He has been beaten up and faced death threats and attempts at incarceration. Two of his colleagues were murdered.

"Of course, it was very dangerous," he said.

"I have injuries and scars all over my body. My left foot has been broken, my ribs have been broken, my shoulder is broken and I cannot raise it."

"But nothing can stop me."

He proudly says his movement has liberated 86,000 children from bonded labour across India and has activist networks in more than 140 countries.

In the 1990s he organised the Global March Against Child Labour, an international coalition of groups aiming to free millions of children from slavery worldwide.

"Earlier I fought against child slavery and child labour. Now I'm waging this war against rape and sexual abuse," he said.

"This is not some other person's problem. This is your problem. It can happen with anyone, anywhere."
Chancellor Angela Merkel says Germany will support an effort to hold talks with North Korea along the lines of the deal done with Iran

Germany would lend its weight to a diplomatic push to end North Korean nuclear weapons and missile development along the lines of a past deal with Iran, Chancellor Angela Merkel said Sunday.

"I would say yes immediately if we were asked to join talks," Merkel told weekly newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung.

Talks between Iran and six world powers, sealed with a 2015 deal for Tehran to roll back its nuclear programme and submit to inspections in exchange for some sanctions being rolled back, were "a long but important period of diplomacy" that had achieved a "good end," she added.

"I could imagine such a format for the settlement of the North Korea conflict. Europe and especially Germany ought to be ready to make a very active contribution," Merkel said.

The chancellor said she had held telephone talks with the leaders of France, the United States, China, South Korea and Japan about the North Korea crisis over the past week, and is expected to speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin Monday.

Merkel's comments come as Washington has formally requested a Monday vote on tough new sanctions for Pyongyang at the UN Security Council.

US diplomats have called for an oil embargo, an assets freeze against leader Kim Jong-Un, a ban on textiles and an end to payments of North Korean guest workers in response to the nation's sixth nuclear test last week.

But the measures could founder on opposition from permanent Security Council members Russia and China.

Merkel said that she backed sanctions as a means of bringing North Korea to the negotiating table.
Lee Ching-yu has left to attend her husband's trial in China

The wife of a Taiwanese rights activist being held in China arrived in the mainland Sunday on the eve of his trial in a case that has further soured cross-strait relations.

Lee Ching-yu, wife of NGO worker Lee Ming-cheh who has been held incommunicado in China for more than 170 days, left for Shanghai around noon to connect to a flight to the central province of Hunan where her husband's trial will be held.

"We landed and are on our way to our hotel in Yueyang city," Xiao Yimin, a Taiwanese legal activist accompanying Lee, told AFP.

"As we understand, she will be allowed in court, but we don't know if the rest of us will be able to get in," said Xiao, who is general secretary of the Judicial Reform Foundation.

Lee's trial is set to start Monday at a court in Hunan's Yueyang city, according to his wife.

The activist's mother arrived in Yueyang Sunday evening. Both women were accompanied by several officials from Taiwan's semi-official Straits Exchange Foundation, which handles relations with the mainland.

Lee went missing during a visit to the mainland in March and Chinese authorities later confirmed he was being investigated for suspected activities "endangering national security".

Lee Ching-yu made no comment at the airport but has pleaded for Taiwanese people to understand if her husband is "forced to confess" in court.

"I go to (China) not to provoke or argue. I hope to see the arrival of justice and let Lee Ming-cheh return to Taiwan safe and soon," she told reporters before leaving on Saturday.

She attempted to fly to Beijing in April to "rescue" her husband but Chinese authorities at that time revoked her travel permit.

Xiao told AFP that Lee was unavailable to speak with media Sunday night.

Their supporters shared a video on social media Sunday saying it showed workers setting up roadblocks outside the Yueyang courtroom.

- 'No evidence of wrongdoing' -

Beijing has repeatedly ignored Taipei's requests for information on Lee's whereabouts and details of the allegations against him.

Relations between the two sides have worsened since Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen took office in May last year. Since then Beijing has cut off all official communications with Taipei.

China sees self-ruled Taiwan as part of its territory waiting to be reunified. It wants Tsai to acknowledge the island is part of "One China", which she has refused to do.

Lee has long supported civil society organisations and activists in China, according to Amnesty International.

He had shared "Taiwan's democratic experiences" with his Chinese friends online for many years and often mailed books to them, said the Taiwan Association for Human Rights.

"We urge the Chinese authorities to allow Lee's wife to attend the trial tomorrow," Amnesty International China researcher Patrick Poon told AFP.

"Lee hasn't been given any access to his family and a lawyer of his choice since he was detained in March. Such practice does not meet international standards on fair trial," Poon added.

Sophie Richardson, China director of Human Rights Watch, told AFP that Beijing had provided "no evidence of actual wrongdoing" in Lee's case.

"The charges should be dropped immediately and he should be allowed to return home," Richardson said.
Indian Muslims in Kolkata rally against the Myanmar government's treatment of Rohingya

India has called for an immediate end to violence in Myanmar's western state of Rakhine, urging its ally to act with restraint as hordes of Rohingya flee to neighbouring Bangladesh.

"We would urge that the situation in Rakhine State be handled with restraint and maturity, focusing on the welfare of the civilian population alongside those of the security forces," the foreign ministry said in a statement late Saturday.

"It is imperative that violence is ended and normalcy in the State restored expeditiously," it said, adding it was concerned about the outflow of refugees.

The call came days after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a state visit to the Buddhist-majority country amid spiralling violence in Rakhine that has forced nearly 300,000 Rohingya Muslims to flee.

Modi condemned a series of coordinated attacks by Rohingya militants on Myanmar troops and police on August 25, but did not comment on the subsequent violence against the Rohingya and their mass exodus.

Fleeing Rohingya accuse the security forces of mass killings and rapes and the burning of hundreds of villages.

Myanmar does not want its 1.1 million Rohingya, who are seen as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh and are refused citizenship.

Successive regimes have historically discriminated against them even though many have lived for generations in Rakhine state.
A same-sex marriage rally in Sydney, where thousands marched ahead of a contentious postal vote on gay marriage

Thousands of Australians dressed in rainbow colours rallied Sunday in support of same-sex marriage ahead of a postal ballot, as polls showed the "yes" campaign's lead shrinking despite backing from the nation's top political leaders.

Carrying vibrant posters and calling for marriage equality, the marchers packed the streets of central Sydney and Brisbane two days before the ballot papers were set to be mailed out to some 15 millions Australians.

Marriage equality has attracted popular support in recent years, but such unions are yet to be legalised in the country amid political wrangling. In a bid to resolve the issue, the conservative government moved to hold a postal ballot after its preferred option of a national referendum was twice rejected by the upper house.

"If a majority votes yes, then we will ensure a... bill is presented to the parliament which will legalise same-sex marriage," Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull on Sunday told those conservative Liberal and National politicians who support the "yes" campaign.

"Our expectation is that should be accomplished by the end of the year -- it will sail through the parliament."

But the success of the "yes" vote is not certain, with a poll conducted for a major same-sex marriage advocacy group and shared with Fairfax Media on Saturday showing that support for the change was falling.

The poll, conducted between late August and early September, showed that 58.4 percent of those surveyed supported a "yes" vote, down six percentage points from just two weeks earlier.

Support for the "no" vote increased by two percentage points to 31.4 percent, while the "unsure" vote rose by three percentage points to 10.2 percent.

The survey also showed that turnout for the voluntary ballot could be very low, and at just 58 percent of those aged 18-34 -- the age group viewed as more receptive to gay marriage.

Labor opposition leader Bill Shorten, who supports the change, told the Sydney rally the ballot was about "our identity as a nation".

"Do we believe in equal care for all, equal rights for all?... We can win this thing. We can climb this mountain."

Turnbull, a political moderate who supports marriage equality, is opposed by some in his own Liberal-National governing coalition.

"No" campaign supporters, including hundreds who rallied in Sydney on Saturday, argue that changing marriage laws would infringe on religious freedom and children's rights.

Andrew Pasco, one of thousands of people who packed the streets of Sydney for the "yes" campaign rally on Sunday, said he was worried the polarising debate could discourage moderate Australians from voting.

"I am genuinely concerned that as the conversations get driven to extremities on both the left and right, that that will also alienate the people in the middle that aren't directly impacted to speak up and have a voice," he told AFP.

The postal vote will close on November 7, with the result known later that month.
Book lovers attend the "I'm Iraqi, I Read" book fair on September 9, 2017 in Baghdad, which this year saw some 15,000 books collected and distributed, for free, to eager readers

Sitting in the green grass under a bright Baghdad sun, Iraqi men and women bury their heads in romance novels, essay collections and volumes of poetry.

It's far from the image most have of the Iraqi capital-- but for one day this weekend on the banks of the Tigris, Iraqi readers were able to find some respite from the country's violence in the simple joy of losing themselves in a book.

Saturday's "I'm Iraqi, I Read" book fair was the fifth annual edition of the popular festival, which this year saw some 15,000 books collected and distributed, for free, to eager readers.

Around long tables covered in red cloth, volunteers lay out books of fiction, technical manuals, religious tracts and volumes of verse pulled from cardboard boxes.

Hussein Ali, a 23-year-old law student, says it is his second year in a row stocking his library at the festival in Abu Nuwas park, named after the famed eighth-century poet known for his odes to wine and urban life.

"I hope this type of cultural event will continue, especially for young people," says Ali, who like many bemoans the lack of cultural opportunities for youth in Iraq, where some 60 percent of the population is under the age of 25.

Nearby, Raghed Nassir, a 22-year-old finance student, is also enjoying the opportunity to stock up on new reading material.

"Our brains are like boxes that always need to be filled with new things," she says.

Law graduate Tuqa Mohammed, also 23, is browsing books at random, looking for the "adventure" of an unexpected read.

"It's easy to buy a book, but to take a book that you didn't choose... you see it in front of you, you take and read it, this is something nicer and more joyful."

- 'A way to change society' -

Not far away, dozens of festival-goers are writing messages in felt-tip markers on a huge signboard. One of them reads: "Read more and you will see further."

Muntazer Jawad has come some 200 kilometres (125 miles) from his home in Diwaniyah to attend the festival.

A would-be writer himself, Jawad has penned three novels but the 20-year-old with slicked black hair says that for young writers "it's very difficult to get help in being published".

Despite his passion, Jawad gave up his studies of literature to pursue a degree in management and administration "to obey my family and because of the situation in Iraq".

That "situation" -- a never-ending cycle of violence that has ravaged the country and seen Baghdad hit by near-daily attacks -- could not be entirely left behind at the fair.

Book lovers attend the "I'm Iraqi, I Read" book fair on September 9, 2017 in Baghdad, which this year saw some 15,000 books collected and distributed, for free, to eager readers

Automatic rifles slung over their shoulders, Iraqi police patrolled the park, allowing themselves glimpses of the piles of books or artists who had set up their easels in the grass.

Mohammed, wearing a dark jacket over a red-and-black checked shirt, says he's pleased to see "so many young people brought together by reading, because it's a way to change society."

Nassir, her head wrapped in a multi-coloured bandana, says this is even more important "for Iraqi women because their lives are governed by tradition."

Nearby stands a testament to the power of storytelling -- a statue of Scheherazade, the consort of Shahryar of "A Thousand and One Nights", who weaved a tale for her husband each night to escape execution.
Prominent Palestinian activist Issa Amro is welcomed by supporters after being released on bail by a Palestinian court in the West Bank city of Hebron on September 10, 2017

A Palestinian court on Sunday released on bail a prominent activist arrested after he criticised president Mahmud Abbas's administration.

Issa Amro was detained by Palestinian security forces on Monday in the southern West Bank city of Hebron on accusations including causing "strife", human rights activists said.

His lawyer, Muhannad Karaja, said he has also been accused of creating websites that "aim to undermine the state's security", in violation of a new Palestinian law on cyber crime.

Rights groups have criticised the law, saying it could be used to target critics of the Palestinian leadership.

"We asked for Issa to be released on bail," Karaja told AFP. "The prosecution and the court agreed on this in exchange for a deposit of 1,000 Jordanian dinars ($1,400, 1,200 euros)."

"Issa will appear later before the court regarding this case and all the charges against him," he said.

The hearing was held in secret, with journalists barred from the courtroom. Karaja said he did not know when the next hearing would be held.

Dozens of activists protested outside prosecutors' offices on Sunday over Amro's detention, some with tape over their mouths.

Afer his release, Amro went to the offices of his Youth Against Settlements organisation, where he was warmly greeted by fellow activists and spoke out against the law.

Supporters of Palestinian activist Issa Amro protest outside a court in the West Bank city of Hebron after it extended his detention at a previous hearing on September 7, 2017

"I hope the president of the state of Palestine will decide today to freeze this law," Amro said.

He spoke of the need for "a space for freedom of speech and freedom of criticism" and accused Palestinian security forces of verbal and "minor" physical abuse against him.

- 'Repressive campaign' -

Amro's Youth Against Settlements is a campaign group in the tense city of Hebron, where Jewish settlers live in heavily guarded enclaves in the centre.

He was detained after post a Facebook post criticising the Palestinian Authority's arrest of a journalist from Hebron.

Palestinian officials have not publicly commented on Amro's detention.

Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch both criticised his arrest.

Amnesty has called it the "latest evidence that the Palestinian authorities are determined to continue with their repressive campaign against free speech."

Separately, Amro is on trial by Israel on a range of charges dating back to 2010.

He has rejected all the charges, saying they are politically motivated and aim to prevent his peaceful resistance to Israel's occupation.

"I have been threatened a dozen times by the Israeli occupation and I have received death threats from settlers, but all of this did not and will not stop me," he said Sunday, wearing a shirt emblazoned with the logo "Palestinians Should Be Free".

Prominent Palestinian activist Issa Amro is held aloft by supporters after being released on bail by a Palestinian court in the West Bank city of Hebron on September 10, 2017

"I will continue defending my country against occupation and settlements, and defending the Palestinian national project for all the Palestinian people."
Syrian government forces flash the victory sign at a checkpoint on the outskirts of Deir Ezzor on September 10, 2017

Russian air strikes Sunday killed 34 civilians on ferries fleeing violence in Syria's eastern province of Deir Ezzor, where jihadists face separate assaults by US-backed forces and Russian-backed government troops, a monitor said.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor initially reported 21 deaths but later raised the toll to 34, saying that "more bodies have been found in the river" Euphrates.

Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said nine children were among those killed fleeing fighting and that "dozens" of people were wounded in the strikes.

He said the raids targeted "more than 40 ferries" that had left Al-Boulil town southeast of Deir Ezzor city for the eastern shore of the river.

Deir Ezzor

The Observatory relies on a network of sources inside Syria, and says it determines whose planes carry out raids according to type, location, flight patterns and munitions used.

Moscow intervened in Syria in September 2015 in support of its ally President Bashar al-Assad.

Sunday's reported raids came as Syrian troops with Russian air cover pressed an offensive against Islamic State group jihadists across Deir Ezzor province.

On Saturday, government forces broke a nearly three-year jihadist siege of a Syrian airbase on the southern edges of Deir Ezzor city, the provincial capital.

Assad's troops advanced further Sunday, capturing Mount Tharda west of the military airport from IS as well as another mountain overlooking the city, the Observatory said.

IS holdouts were still entrenched in southern parts of the city, the monitor said.

The army's advances in the oil-rich province come as US-backed forces press their own assault on IS in Deir Ezzor.

- A strategic prize -

The province borders Iraq and is a strategic prize for both the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) alliance and government troops.

The SDF announced on Saturday it had begun clearing IS from areas east of the Euphrates, which cuts diagonally across the province.

By Sunday, fighters from the SDF's Deir Ezzor Military Council (DEMC) had seized much of the province's northeast, the Observatory said.

"They seized control of a hilltop seven kilometres (four miles) from the eastern banks of the Euphrates, across the river from Deir Ezzor city," Abdel Rahman said.

He attributed the speedy gains to the fact that "eastern parts of Deir Ezzor are desert and not densely populated".

Syrian pro-government forces regroup on a main road leading to Deir Ezzor on September 10, 2017

The DEMC's advance is being backed by the US-led coalition battling IS in Iraq and Syria since 2014.

The coalition, the SDF, Syria's government and Russia have agreed on a "de-confliction line" in northeastern Syria to prevent the two offensives from clashing.

Regime forces were on Sunday also locked in fierce clashes with IS southwest of the city as they prepared a push into neighbourhoods still held by the jihadists, the Observatory said.

According to the War Media channel operated by regime ally Hezbollah, Syrian troops seized full control of the 450-kilometre (280-mile) road linking the capital to Deir Ezzor for the first time in four years.

"The Syrian army and its allies now control the entire international highway between Deir Ezzor and Damascus, through the cities of Al-Sukhna and Palmyra," it said, referring to other central Syrian cities recaptured from IS.

"The international highway had been unusable in the area between Al-Sukhna and Deir Ezzor for four years."

Since 2014, IS has held about 60 percent of the city and much of the surrounding province.

Syria's conflict erupted in 2011 with protests demanding that Assad step down, but it has since evolved into a complex, multi-front war.

More than 330,000 people have been killed and millions have fled their homes, but international attempts to reach a peace deal have faltered.
Hurricane Irma was packing dangerous winds of up to 105 miles (169 kilometers) per hour as it neared Fort Myers, a major tourist destination in southwestern Florida

Hurricane Irma, which has toppled cranes, swallowed streets and left millions without power, weakened to a Category 1 storm Monday but remained dangerous as it continued its furious climb up Florida's southwest coast.

Warnings of hazardous storm surges remained in effect through vast swaths of peninsular Florida, where more than six million people had been ordered to flee Irma's path -- one of the biggest evacuations in US history.

"As little as six inches of moving water can knock you down," tweeted the state's governor Rick Scott following the downgrade.

"Stay inside. Stay safe," he added.

Maximum sustained winds had decreased to 85 miles per hour as of 2:00 am local time (0600 GMT), with Irma projected to become a tropical storm as it moved into northern Florida or southern Georgia later Monday.

After wreaking a trail of death and destruction through the Caribbean, Irma had killed three people when it struck the southern Florida Keys island chain as a more powerful Category Four on Sunday.

In a video grab from a cell phone, a flooded street is seen as hurricane Irma moves through Miami, Florida

More than four million customers were without power throughout the state, according to Florida's Division of Emergency Management. Florida Power and Light said it had "safely shut down" one of two nuclear reactors at its Turkey Point power plant.

Handfuls of holdout residents, having defied calls to evacuate, hunkered down as Irma tore over the Keys, ripping boats from their moorings, flattening palm trees and downing power lines across the island chain popular for fishing and scuba diving.

Hours later, one of the mightiest hurricanes ever to slam the state made a second landfall on Marco Island near the beach resort of Naples.

"I am concerned about people that don't believe in the storm surge," said Virginia Defreeuw, 76, who fled her mobile home in Naples to a shelter. "You need to be afraid of the storm surge! People are not listening."

As Irma appeared to set its sights on the Tampa area -- home to three million residents, about half of whom live less than 10 feet above sea level -- some people were taken by surprise by Irma's northwest shift.

Staff and guests board up the front door of a hotel after winds from Hurricane Irma blew it open in Bonita Springs, Florida, northeast of Naples, on September 10, 2017

Facing Irma's wrath, Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn said the city did everything it could to get people out of the coastal areas.

"I am sure there are still people that are still there, thinking that they can hunker down on this storm," Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn told a press briefing Sunday, before paraphrasing a famous boxer's words.

"I never thought I would be quoting Mike Tyson, but 'Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face,'" he said.

"Well, we are about to get punched in the face."

- 'Lives, not cost' -

While southwest Florida bore the deadly brunt of Irma's wrath Sunday, the coastlines of Miami and the neighboring island of Miami Beach were heavily inundated by storm surges as hurricane winds sent two giant construction cranes crashing down.

The sea swallowed the coastal walkway of glitzy Brickell Avenue in the center of Miami, flooding the streets and leaving cars half-submerged.

"The wooden pier is basically gone," said Steven Schlacknam, a 51-year-old visual artist watching from a 37th floor apartment.

President Donald Trump, who vowed to travel to Florida "very soon," approved the state's request for emergency federal aid to help with temporary housing, home repairs, emergency work and hazard mitigation.

"Right now, we're worried about lives, not cost," Trump said.

At least 30 deaths are already attributable to the storm. The US victims included a sheriff's deputy killed in a head-on collision early Sunday as she drove home for supplies after working in a shelter all night.

Irma smacked the Keys 57 years to the day after Hurricane Donna hit the same area in 1960, destroying nearly 75 percent of the island chain's buildings.

A couple look at the receding water as they walk their dogs on Bayshore Boulevard in Tampa, Florida

A shelter of last resort set up in the Middle Keys city of Marathon was reported to be without power or running water, and surrounded by surging waters.

Irma also led to some uniquely Floridian responses, with a sheriff forced to warn residents not to shoot at the storm after an online prank promoting the idea went viral.

"To clarify, DO NOT shoot weapons @ #Irma," the office of the sheriff of Pasco County, on the state's west coast, tweeted hours before landfall.

- Miami spared worst -

In Miami, where emergency services were sheltering in place, a dispatcher talked a woman through delivering her own baby on Sunday morning, Assistant Fire Chief Eloy Garcia told the Miami Herald.

Before reaching the United States, Irma smashed through a string of Caribbean islands from tiny Barbuda on Wednesday, to the tropical paradises of Saint Barthelemy and Saint Martin, the US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, Haiti and the Turks and Caicos.

Debris lies piled in the streets of Cojimar in Havana after the passing of Hurricane Irma on September 10, 2017

Terrified Cubans who rode out Irma in coastal towns -- after it made landfall Friday on the Camaguey archipelago as a maximum-strength Category Five storm -- reported "deafening" winds, uprooted trees and power lines, and rooftops blown off.

There were no immediate reports of casualties in Cuba but it caused significant damage, and enormous waves lashed the Malecon, Havana's emblematic seafront, with seawaters penetrating deep into the capital.

Residents in the old colonial city were waist-deep in floodwaters after Irma cut power and forced the evacuation of more than a million people.

- Storm surge, tornado risk -

Irma is so wide that both coasts of Florida and the Keys faced destructive storm surges as the storm barreled north.

Businesses on both Florida coasts were shuttered while Miami airport was closed and not expected to reopen until Tuesday.

MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, the military installation home to US Central Command, issued mandatory evacuation orders ahead of the storm's passage early Monday, while the Kennedy Space Center on the east coast was also closed.
Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir (R) shakes hands with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov following a press conference at the ministry headquarters in Jeddah on September 10, 2017

Saudi Arabia said Sunday it would keep pressuring Qatar until demands by a bloc of Arab states are met, dampening hopes for a US-mediated resolution to a diplomatic crisis.

"We will continue to take action and we will maintain our position until Qatar responds," Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir said, speaking alongside his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in the Saudi city of Jeddah.

The bloc's 13 demands include Doha ending its alleged support for Islamist extremist groups, closing a Turkish military base in the emirate and downgrading diplomatic ties with Tehran.

Qatar "must respond to these requests in order to open a new page," Jubeir said.

The Saudi move came just two days after US President Donald Trump spoke with the leaders of Saudi Arabia and Qatar in a bid to mediate.

Trump said he believed the dispute could be solved "fairly easily".

The Saudi and Qatari rulers spoke by phone on Saturday, raising hope for talks.

But Riyadh later suspended the dialogue, accusing Doha of distorting facts by wrongly implying that Saudi Arabia had initiated the outreach.

A United Arab Emirates minister late Saturday voiced support for the Saudi decision on Twitter, accusing Qatar of "wasting an opportunity" to resolve the crisis.

"I hope that Doha will stop manoeuvring... and act transparently. There is no other way," state minister for foreign affairs Anwar Gargash said on his official Twitter account.

Saudi Arabia led the UAE, Egypt and Bahrain in cutting ties with Qatar in June, accusing it of bankrolling extremist groups and of being too close to Riyadh's regional arch-rival Tehran. Doha denies the accusations.

Qatar and Saudi Arabia are both key US allies.

Doha hosts a major US air base, home to the headquarters of Centcom -- the regional command which leads operations against the Islamic State jihadist group.

Qatar's emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamid al-Thani is set to meet German Chancellor Angela Merkel for talks on September 15, in what will be his first trip to a western capital since the crisis began.
Indian security personnel clashed with demonstrators outside the Ryan International School in Gurgaon, on September 10, 2017

Hundreds of protesters clashed with police and burnt down a liquor store in an Indian city on Sunday over demands to shut a school where a seven-year-old was killed for resisting a staffer's sexual attack.

Authorities said several people were injured.

Demonstrators attacked the store near the school in Gurgaon near New Delhi after riot police thwarted their attempt to storm the campus.

The boy's body was found in the Ryan International school's lavatory on Friday with his throat slit with a knife. Police said a school bus attendant, who was arrested hours after the incident, had admitted attacking the child after he resisted a sexual assault.

Angry parents had tried to storm the campus on Saturday, a day after they vandalised part of the school building to press demands for criminal charges against the school management.

"We had to use force to disperse the protesters after our warning had no effect," Gurgaon police commissioner Sandeep Khirwar told AFP.

Residents told television channels the shop was targeted because several staff members had been seen previously consuming alcohol during school hours.

Parents have demanded that the school's operating licence be cancelled. Authorities have ordered it closed until further notice to avoid violence.

The incident has caused widespread anger and sparked concern over safety standards in schools.

India's swelling middle class has fuelled the growth of private schools in a country with a crumbling public education system.

On Saturday police arrested a man after he allegedly raped a five-year-old girl inside a classroom in New Delhi.

India has a grim record of sexual assaults on minors with 20,000 cases of rape or sexual assault reported in 2015, according to government data.

A UN Committee on the Rights of the Child in 2014 said one in three rape victims in India was a minor. Almost half the abusers are known to the victims.
Newly arrived Rohingya refugees scuffle for relief supplies at Kutupalong refugee camp in Bangladesh. Nearly 300,000 Rohingya have fled violence churning through Myanmar's Rakhine state

The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) on Sunday condemned Myanmar for "systematic brutal acts" against its Muslim Rohingya minority and asked it to accept international monitors.

The United Nations says nearly 300,000 Rohingya refugees have arrived in Bangladesh since attacks by Rohingya militants on Myanmar security forces in the violence-wracked Rakhine state on August 25 sparked a major military backlash.

The 57-member OIC, meeting in Astana, expressed "serious concern about recent systematic brutal acts committed by the armed forces against the Muslim community of Rohingya in Myanmar."

It urged Myanmar to accept UN monitors to carry out "a thorough and independent investigation of all established violations of international human rights.. and bring those responsible to justice".

The current OIC chief is Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has been one of the loudest critics of Myanmar's policies against the Rohingya.

The Rohingya are reviled in Myanmar, where the roughly one million-strong community are accused of being illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and Afghan leader Ashraf Ghani were among the other heads of state who attended the summit hosted by Kazakhstan and the Central Asian country's veteran autocrat Nursultan Nazarbayev.

The plight of the Rohingya has triggered broad international condemnation of Myanmar and the country's Nobel peace prize laureate leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
Irma was packing maximum sustained winds of 130 miles (215 kilometers) per hour when it slammed into the Florida Keys

Irma, the most powerful hurricane ever recorded in the Caribbean, has made landfall in Florida, lashing the state with fearsome wind gusts and storm surges.

Below is a list of the largest storms to hit the United States in the last 25 years.

- 2017: Harvey -

Hurricane Harvey, a Category Four storm, reaches Texas on August 25, unleashing catastrophic rainfall that floods large areas and leads to the deaths of at least 33 people. Houston, America's fourth-largest city, bears the brunt of the flooding.

The estimated cost of the damage wrought by Harvey could eventually top $100 billion.

- 2012: Sandy -

Category Three Hurricane Sandy barrels into the eastern seaboard at the end of October 2012, causing at least 200 deaths in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut.

At least 40 people are killed in New York city alone in what is one of the costliest hurricanes ever witnessed in the US.

- 2011: Irene -

Irene strikes the eastern United States in late August 2011, killing 43 people across 11 states.

Vermont is among the worst affected, with Irene bringing rainfall leading to the most serious flooding there for 75 years.

- 2005: Katrina, Rita and Wilma -

Hurricane Katrina, the deadliest in US history, pounds the southern states of Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana in August 2005, leading to the deaths of around 1,800 people and inflicting more than $150 billion worth of damage.

Around 80 percent of New Orleans is submerged as the city's flood defenses give way.

A month later, with millions still unable to return to their homes, Hurricane Rita hits the Gulf Coast, killing 10 people in Texas and Mississippi.

A further 24 people die during the evacuation of more than three million people from their homes.

And in October Wilma, the most intense tropical cyclone ever recorded at the time in the Atlantic basin, kills 18 people in Florida and leaves millions more without power.

- 2004: Charley, Frances and Ivan -

Florida's coastline is ravaged by hurricanes Charley and Frances in August 2004, with more than 50 people killed and over $20 billion worth of damage.

A month later, Ivan batters the Caribbean and southeastern United States, killing at least 108 including 38 in the US.

- 2001: Allison -

Allison careers into Texas in June 2001 before passing over Louisiana, Florida and Pennsylvania, killing 35.

Record rainfall hits Houston, causing flood levels only surpassed by Harvey 16 years later.

- 1999: Floyd -

Hurricane Floyd overwhelms flood defenses on the East Coast, killing 61 people between North Carolina and New York in September 1999.

- 1996: Fran -

Fran pounds North Carolina and Virginia in September 1996 with 110 mile per hour (180 kilometer per hour) winds and torrential rain that leaves 22 dead.

- 1994: Alberto -

Flooding caused by Tropical Storm Alberto kills 31 people in Georgia and Alabama in July 1994, as well as forcing around 50,000 to flee to safety.

- 1992: Andrew -

Category Five Hurricane Andrew, the strongest storm to hit the US until Irma, barrels into Florida, Louisiana and the Bahamas, killing 65 people. Miami is particularly hard-hit, with damage costing at least $34 billion.
Close-up map of Deir Ezzor locating battle zone and areas controlled by Syrian regime forces and Islamic State group jihadists

At least 34 civilians were killed on Sunday when Russian warplanes targeted ferries carrying them across the Euphrates River near Syria's eastern city of Deir Ezzor, a monitor said.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor initially reported 21 deaths in Russian air strikes but later raised the toll to 34, saying that "more bodies have been found in the river".

Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said nine children were among those killed fleeing fighting and that "dozens" of people were wounded in the strikes.

He said the raids targeted "more than 40 ferries" that had left Al-Boulil town southwest of Deir Ezzor city for the eastern shore of the river.

The Observatory relies on a network of sources inside Syria, and says it determines whose planes carry out raids according to type, location, flight patterns and munitions used.

Moscow intervened in Syria in September 2015 in support of its ally President Bashar al-Assad.

Sunday's reported raids came as Syrian troops pressed an offensive against Islamic State group jihadists across Deir Ezzor province with Russian air cover.

At the same time, an alliance of US-backed Syrian Kurdish and Arab fighters is also on the move against IS in Deir Ezzor.

The Syrian Democratic Forces on Saturday announced they had begun clearing IS jihadists from areas east of the Euphrates, which cuts diagonally across the province.

On Sunday, the Observatory said fighters from the SDF's Deir Ezzor Military Council (DEMC) had made a sweeping advance, capturing territory just kilometres (miles) from the provincial capital Deir Ezzor.
Japanese owned horse Satono Diamond takes part in a training session at Chantilly on September 6, 2017

Japan's latest attempt to land the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe suffered a setback on Sunday when Satono Diamond was beaten in his warm-up for next month's French showpiece.

The Japanese raider could manage only fourth in the Group Two Prix Foy won impressively by last year's German Derby winner Dschingis Secret.

But jockey Christophe Lemaire suggested his mount was inconvenienced by the rain-softened ground and that he badly needed the run at Chantilly.

"Satono Diamond wasn't in his best form as he hasn't run since May. He will definitely be stronger for the Arc," said the jockey.

Satono Diamond is attempting to end years of heartbreak for Japan, with his trainer Yasutoshi Ikee twice finishing runner-up with Orfevre.

His 2017 charge is a son of Deep Impact, backed into favouritism by the legion of Japanese racegoers at Longchamp, the Arc's traditional home, only to finish third in 2006.

Dschingis Secret was shortened for the October 1 Arc to around 16-1 with the ante-post betting dominated by Enable.

John Gosden's brilliant triple Oaks winner and King George VI and Queen Elizabeth II Stakes heroine was trimmed to 4-5 from even money.

Her stablemate Cracksman claimed one of Sunday's other Arc trials, the Prix Niel, but the son of the mighty Frankel is not certain to return for the big race.

Owner Anthony Oppenheimer, who won Europe's top all-aged contest in 2015 with Golden Horn, is eyeing the long game with his Epsom Derby third.

"Whether we run him in the Arc or British Champion Stakes this year... we'd prefer to put him away this year without a hard race. We think that might just take the sting off him next year," he told The Racing Post.

The Arc is being staged at Chantilly for the second year as Longchamp undergoes an extensive makeover.
Senator John McCain, shown in this file photo from July 25, is being treated for a glioblastoma, a particularly aggressive brain tumor affecting adults

US Senator John McCain said Sunday his health prognosis was "very good" as he undergoes treatment for cancer, insisting he is strong enough to preside over defense legislation debate this week.

"I'm fine. The prognosis is very good," McCain told CNN's "State of the Union."

The 80-year-old was diagnosed with brain cancer in July after doctors discovered a brain tumor when the lawmaker underwent surgery to remove a blood clot from above his left eye.

He underwent treatment including radiation therapy while home in Arizona during the summer break.

Despite the aggressive cancer, the Republican 2008 presidential nominee said "all the results so far are excellent" and he has "more energy than ever."

McCain is chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and he aims to spend the coming week shepherding the all-important defense spending bill through the chamber.

Ever the maverick, McCain ruffled feathers within his party recently by casting one of the deciding Republican votes against repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act, the landmark 2010 health care law known as "Obamacare."

He was one of 17 Republicans who voted against a package of hurricane relief aid last week, because it was controversially attached to financial legislation that lifts the debt ceiling and funds government.

And he has come out against President Donald Trump's decision to end protections for so-called "Dreamer" immigrants who were brought to the country illegally as children.

But with cancer, the feisty legislator in the twilight of his career acknowledged he was in one of the fights of his life.

"The fact is, you know, I'm facing a challenge," he said. "I've faced other challenges. And I'm very confident about getting through this one as well."

McCain, a former US Navy pilot, was shot down over Hanoi in 1967 and spent five and a half years as a prisoner of war.

The lawmaker said he was feeling "no side effects" from his cancer treatment other than increased energy levels.

He said he expects to have an MRI scan taken on Monday.

"So far, all indications are very good."

The tumor, known as glioblastoma, is a particularly aggressive brain tumor affecting adults. It is of the same category of cancer that led to the death of another Senate icon, Ted Kennedy, who died in 2009 at age 77.
The skyline of Tampa, Florida, where residents fleeing the evacuation zones ahead of Hurricane Irma's landfall

With its white sand beaches, high-rise hotels and millions living near sea level, the metropolitan area of Tampa Bay is considered among the most likely places in the United States to be devastated by a massive hurricane.

The coastal cities of St. Petersburg and Clearwater and Tampa have avoided a major hurricane since 1921, a stretch of good luck that locals attribute to everything from an ancient Indian blessing to magical powers in the sand crystals of Siesta Key, which is ranked the top beach in America.

But with Hurricane Irma charging northward, packing Category Four winds of up to 130 miles (215 kilometers) per hour, forecasters say the region can no longer avoid disaster.

"If you live in Naples, in Fort Myers, in Sarasota, in the Tampa Bay region, this storm has the potential to be that sort-of-worst-case scenario that meteorologists and emergency planners dread," Senator Marco Rubio said on Face the Nation on Sunday.

"It's been so long since the Tampa region has had a storm that some people perhaps have no memory of what it's like to be through one of these."

- $175 billion at stake -

According to a 2015 report from the Boston-based firm Karen Clark and Co., Tampa Bay is the most vulnerable place in the nation to storm surge from a hurricane, and stands to lose $175 billion.

Part of the reason for its weakness is simple geography.

On the western edge of the Florida peninsula, St. Petersburg juts out as a peninsula of its own into the Gulf of Mexico.

Tampa Bay, nestled inside the arm of that mini peninsula, "creates a large funnel -- particularly for a hurricane with its radius of maximum winds near the mouth of the bay," said the Clark and Co. report.

"A severe storm with the right track orientation will cause an enormous buildup of water that will become trapped in the bay and inundate large areas of Tampa and St. Petersburg."

- Storm surge risk -

A couple walk their dogs on Bayshore Boulevard in Tampa, Florida, ahead of Hurricane Irma's landfall

Another factor is the sloping land off the coast, which allows water to build up during a hurricane and force deadly storm surge over land.

This wide continental shelf means Tampa would get twice as much storm surge -- the leading killer in a major hurricane -- as Miami on the east coast.

Also, many more people are now at risk. The population of the Tampa area was about 10,000 back in 1921, when a Category Three hurricane hit.

Today, Tampa Bay has three million residents, about half of whom live less than 10 feet (three meters) above sea level.

"This will go up our west coast," Florida Governor Rick Scott said Sunday, as Irma pummelled the Florida island chain known as the Keys.

The National Hurricane Center's 1500 GMT advisory predicted five to eight feet of storm surge in Tampa. But the governor warned of more.

"We're going to have 10 to 15 feet above ground level of storm surge. The west coast is very, very low."

- Climate change denial -

Governor Scott, a Republican, has banned the use of climate change in official state communications, an approach critics say has not helped prepare Tampa Bay for the big one.

A flurry of high-rise condos and hotels and even a seaside hospital have been erected along the coast in recent years, despite the threat posed by sea level rise.

A recent report by CoreLogic found that more than 450,000 homes in Tampa Bay would suffer damage from a big hurricane.

Adding to concern about Irma, many residents were taken by surprise as the track of Irma shifted to the west this week, and may not have evacuated in time.

But as Irma closed in, Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn said the city did everything it could to get people out of the coastal areas, known as Zone A.

"I am sure there are still people that are still there, thinking that they can hunker down on this storm," he told a press briefing, before paraphrasing a famous boxer's words.

"I never thought I would be quoting Mike Tyson, but 'Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face,'" he said.

"Well, we are about to get punched in the face."
Fierce winds were whipping this road in Naples, Florida on Sunday but the threat of destructive sea surges loomed even larger

Even more than the fierce winds whipping tall palm trees and threatening to rip roofs from houses, the beach resort of Naples in southwestern Florida was bracing Sunday for what could be a deadly rise in sea levels.

Authorities say powerful Hurricane Irma could send waters surging 10 to 15 feet (three to 4.5 meters) above normal levels along the shoreline, putting low-lying Naples -- one of the richest communities in the US -- at grave risk.

The scene from a storm-battered beach in Naples just hours before Irma's full-force arrival was hardly comforting. The city's natural defenses seemed almost laughable: pitifully small sand dunes planted with scrawny vegetation.

Just beyond the dunes sit big, fashionable homes with impeccably trimmed yards, all of them theoretically empty now following a mandatory evacuation order.

But areas where evacuation was merely recommended, and not required, are not far away -- and they appeared particularly vulnerable to Irma's wrath.

- Too late to leave -

The time for evacuation, in any case, was long past. Streets were strewn with palm fronds ripped from the trees. Interstate highway 75 was being swept by wind gusts powerful enough to knock a man off his feet, and visibility was extremely poor.

There were no visible signs of life at the area's big hotels, or its seaside residences or villas. Businesses had boarded over their windows. Everything was closed. The only visible light came from the forlorn blinking of traffic lights on abandoned streets.

Evacuees still in the area were hunkered down in shelters, or in hotels farther away from the coast. Everyone fears that Irma's intense winds might drive high, pounding seas up onto land, where they could wreak destructive havoc with cars, houses -- really everything.

"I am concerned about people that don't believe in the storm surge," said Virginia Defreeuw, 76, who fled from her mobile home to a shelter. "You need to be afraid of the storm surge! People are not listening."

"Some of them think, 'Oh, it's not gonna happen to me,'" she said, adding that some locals believed that having survived earlier storms they could ride out this one.

"They think they can do one more," she said, "but this is a serious one."

More than a million people live in the larger Naples area. Like other vulnerable coastal areas, its population has soared in recent years -- growing by nearly 30 percent just since 2010.

- Coastal area evacuated -

The white-sand beaches of Naples, Florida stood near-deserted as Hurricane Irma closed in

Many of the houses along the seafront are new -- often owned by retirees drawn by Florida's white-sand beaches and nearly perpetual sunshine.

Mark Thorpe, a retiree evacuated from Key West, vividly recalled the effects of Hurricane Wilma when it struck in 2005.

"It's no fun," said Thorpe, who is 69. "The water kept coming up, stair by stair. We had a buddy who had a (Ford) Bronco parked right outside the house -- he had water in his ashtrays.

"We had a big motorhome. The insurance company came by weeks later. They didn't even go on board, they just looked to the water line around the motorhome" and declared it a total loss.

With his wife Tess, Thorpe left the islands of the Florida Keys on Tuesday to take shelter on the western edge of the mainland -- since Irma was then projected to strike the east coast much harder.

But Irma changed course, and danger now looms. Still, Thorpe does not plan to leave the state, even after all the hurricanes he has lived through.

"It's something you live with," he said. Other Americans, living up north, face wintertime challenges of their own. But in Florida, Thorpe says, "We don't shovel snow."
North Korea warned on Monday it would inflict 'the greatest pain and suffering' on the United States if Washington persists in pushing for harsher UN sanctions following Pyongyang's sixth nuclear test.

The detonation last Sunday was the country's largest and prompted global outrage, with the UN Security Council set to discuss a new draft resolution presented by Washington that would be the toughest-ever imposed against the isolated regime.

The US is calling for an oil embargo on Pyongyang, an assets freeze on leader Kim Jong-Un, but also an end to textile exports and to payments made to North Korean guest workers.

North Korea warned on Monday it would inflict 'the greatest pain and suffering' on the United States if Washington persists in pushing for harsher UN sanctions. Pictured, Kim Jong-Un at an art performance dedicated to nuclear scientists at the People's Theatre in Pyongyang

Washington wants the Security Council to vote on Monday to impose the sanctions, despite resistance from Beijing and Moscow to the new measures.

In a statement published by the official KCNA news agency, North Korea's foreign ministry warned Washington that if it did 'rig up the illegal and unlawful "resolution" on harsher sanctions, the DPRK shall make absolutely sure that the U.S. pays due price'.

'The forthcoming measures to be taken by the DPRK will cause the U.S. the greatest pain and suffering it had ever gone through in its entire history,' the ministry said.

'The world will witness how the DPRK tames the U.S. gangsters by taking (a) series of action tougher than they have ever envisaged.'

The Trump administration wants the Security Council to vote on Monday to impose the sanctions, despite resistance from Beijing and Moscow to the new measures

The detonation last Sunday was the country's largest and prompted global outrage. Pictured, a North Korean intermediate-range strategic ballistic rocket on August 29 near Pyongyang

The test, which the North said was a hydrogen bomb that could be fitted onto a rocket, came weeks after Pyongyang fired two intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) that appeared to bring much of the mainland US into range.

At a dinner to celebrate Pyongyang's nuclear programme, North Korean leader Kim praised the test and urged the country's scientists to develop more weapons, KCNA reported Sunday.

The North says it needs nuclear arms to protect itself, but the US has accused the country of 'begging for war'.

North Korea's foreign ministry warned Washington that if it did 'rig up the illegal and unlawful "resolution" on harsher sanctions, the DPRK shall make absolutely sure that the U.S. pays due price.' Pictured, North Kim Jong-Un and his wife at the People's Theatre in Pyongyang

Yonhap, South Korea's official news agency, reported the quake last Sunday struck where North Korea's nuclear test site Punggyeri is located

Pyongyang's drive to stage a slew of brazen tests in recent months, which contravene existing United Nations sanctions, has sparked surging tensions over the country's weapons programme.

Beijing and Moscow have called for a resolution that focuses on a political solution and proposed a freeze-for-freeze that would halt North Korean nuclear and missile tests in exchange for the U.S. and South Korea stopping their joint military exercises. That initiative was rejected by the Trump administration.

Russia argues that sanctions aren't working and President Vladimir Putin expressed concern last week that a total oil cutoff could hurt the North Korean people.

Britain's U.N. ambassador, Matthew Rycroft, backed the tough U.S. measures and demand for a speedy vote, saying Thursday that 'maximum possible pressure' must be exerted on North Korea to change course and give diplomacy a chance to end the crisis.

North Korean television earlier released these photos appearing to show Kim Jong-Un signing the order to carry out the test

The announcement was delivered by news anchor Ri Chun-hee (pictured during the announcement Sunday) - who has been making announcements on Korean Central Television for more than 40 years

Professor Joseph DeThomas of Pennsylvania State University, a former U.S. ambassador and State Department official who dealt with North Korea, said on Friday that the U.S. demand for quick council action was 'an indicator of how the administration thinks time has run out.'

'My sense is they believe that they don't have time for a delicate diplomatic dance,' he said.

'The other possibility... is they want to see the color of China's money. They're putting down the marker here and saying, "OK, are you prepared to do what is necessary to put pressure on North Korea at a moment when we're simply out of time?"'
SEATTLE (AP) - An extensive poaching ring is responsible for slaughtering more than 100 black bears, cougars, bobcats, deer and elk in southwestern Washington state and northwestern Oregon, with many of the animals hunted with dogs and then left to rot, authorities said Friday.

"There was an absolute wanton disregard for our conservations laws," Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife Capt. Jeff Wickersham said.

Seven people - six adults, some of whom have previously been targeted in poaching investigations, and one juvenile - have been charged so far, but investigators plan to recommend charges against more people, he said. Some face upward of 60 counts related to illegal hunting and wasting animals.

The investigation was reported this week by The Chronicle newspaper of Centralia, which said it had obtained hundreds of pages of case reports from the department through a public records request.

According to the documents, the hunters often used dogs - sometimes as many as 11. The 50-plus poaching expeditions date back to 2015. The vast majority took place within the Gifford Pinchot National Forest, often in remote areas either closed to hunting or in areas where special permits are required.

The Associated Press could not immediately locate contact information for the defendants, and it was not immediately clear if any had obtained lawyers. Several were scheduled to make initial court appearances later this month.

The investigation began with Oregon State Police troopers who were looking into poaching in The Dalles, charging papers filed in Skamania County Superior Court say. Last December, the troopers contacted and interviewed two Longview, Washington, men, William Haynes and Erik Martin, who, the troopers said, confessed to illegally killing deer in Oregon and bringing their heads and antlers back to Washington.

The troopers contacted authorities in Washington, who recovered 27 deer heads and a bull elk unlawfully possessed by Haynes and a co-defendant, the charging papers say.

In executing search warrants for the suspects' cellphones, the documents say, investigators found pictures, text messages and videos linking several other people to the poaching.

In several cases, Fish and Wildlife Sgt. Brad Rhoden said, agents were able to use the location services on the phone to travel to where photos had been taken of the defendants posing with their kills. When they got there, they discovered the animals' remains, with intact skeletons.

"The bears really suffered the brunt of this," Rhoden said Friday. "They were just killed and left."

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Follow Gene Johnson at https://twitter.com/GeneAPseattle

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Information from: The Chronicle, http://www.chronline.com
WASHINGTON (AP) - U.S. and Russian envoys are to meet in Finland this coming week in a bid to calm diplomatic tensions that have risen to levels of the Cold War.

The State Department's third-ranking official, Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Thomas Shannon, will meet on Monday and Tuesday with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov. Shannon and Ryabkov have held several rounds of talks this year focused on resolving irritants in U.S.-Russian relations, such as the tit-for-tat closures of diplomatic missions and expulsion of diplomats. They're expected to address broader strategic relations and arms control as well.

On Aug. 31, in response to an order from Moscow to reduce the U.S. diplomatic presence in Russia by several hundred people, the U.S. ordered Russia to close its consulate in San Francisco and two annexes in Washington and New York. Those actions followed the U.S seizure of two Russian compounds in Maryland and New York and the expulsion of dozens of Russian diplomats in retaliation for Moscow's alleged interference in the 2016 presidential election.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who are expected to meet this month in New York on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly, charged Shannon and Ryabkov earlier this year with exploring ways to resolve bilateral disputes that are hindering broader cooperation on strategic and security issues, such as the war in Syria and the conflict in Ukraine.

Among the top complaints from Washington: the harassment of American government personnel in Russia, a Russian ban on adoptions of children by U.S. families, and Moscow's halting of plans to construct a new U.S. consulate in St. Petersburg. Russia's complaints include U.S. sanctions imposed after its annexation of Ukraine's Crimea region and the seizure of its properties.

Two earlier rounds of talks between Shannon and Ryabkov ended inconclusively.

The State Department announced the new talks Saturday and said Shannon will also meet Finnish President Sauli Niinisto and other Finnish officials while in Helsinki.
Pope Francis's trip to Colombia got off to a bit of a rocky start when he bumped his head on the popemobile.

The religious leader was travelling through the city of Cartagena when his vehicle was forced to brake sharply amid swarms of well-wishers.

Francis, 80, who only had a hip-high bar to hold onto, lost his balance and suffered a bruised, black left eye and a cut on his eyebrow that dripped blood onto his white cassock.

He was helped from the car and his cut was quickly bandaged with a butterfly patch and he carried on without incident with his program. Devotees reacted to the wound with a mix of amazement and concern.

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A bruised Pope Francis smiles during his visit to the Sanctuary of St. Peter Claver, in Cartagena

Pope Francis is shown a baby to bless during his arrival in the city. He continued to smile despite his injury

The cut was quickly bandaged with a butterfly patch and Francis carried on without incident with his program

Blood can be seen on the pope's white cassock. A Vatican spokesman said the holy leader was bruised but fine

'This holy blood is staying in Colombia,' said Ricardo Morales, a lawyer who lined up outside St. Peter Claver's church for a glimpse of the pope. 'He made a great effort to be here and from now on it's our obligation to make a similar effort to thank him for everything he has done.'

Vatican spokesman Greg Burke said that 'The pope is fine' but added that he has 'a bruise on his cheekbone and eyebrow'.

'Ice was put on it and he was treated,' he said.

Once recovered, Francis visited the St. Peter Claver church, where he praised the 17th century missionary for having recognized the inherent dignity of slaves. Francis, known for his own simple and austere style, said Claver was 'austere and charitable to the point of heroism.'

Claver, the self-described 'slave of the slaves forever,' has been revered by Jesuits, popes and human rights campaigners for centuries for having insisted on treating slaves as children of God and worthy of love when others considered them mere merchandise to be bought and sold.

In a prayer Sunday in front of Claver's church, Francis said the legacy of the Spanish priest should serve as a model for the Catholic Church today to 'promote the dignity of all our brothers and sisters, particularly the poor and the excluded of society, those who are abandoned, immigrants and those who suffer violence and human trafficking.'

'Here in Colombia and in the world, millions of people are still being sold as slaves; they either beg for some expressions of humanity, moments of tenderness, or they flee by sea or land because they have lost everything, primarily their dignity and their rights,' he said.

Pope Francis is helped by a priest after knocking his head on the popemobile in Cartagena

Francis wrapped up his Colombia trip with a deeply personal final day honoring St. Peter Claver

The Pope gets back into the popemobile amid a swarms of well-wishers

Francis was left with a black eye after the incident but he remained in good spirits

Like Claver, history's first Latin American pope has insisted on ministering to society's most marginal. He takes special care of the homeless who live around the Vatican, makes regular phone calls to prisoners, brought a dozen Syrian refugees home with him from a Greek refugee camp, and embraces the sick, the maimed and the deformed every chance he gets.

He has also strongly denounced current-day slave trade, calling human trafficking a crime against humanity and leading other faith leaders to take a united stand against it.

Francis prayed at Claver's tomb after laying the foundation for new residences for homeless people in Cartagena, the city famous for its UNESCO-awarded colonial center but also home to slums and shanties.

Pope Francis is greeted by children during a visit to the Sanctuary of St. Peter Claver

In remarks added into his Sunday prayer, Francis called for an end to political violence in Venezuela

He was to celebrate Mass in Cartagena's port Sunday before returning to Rome, ending a five-day visit highlighted by a huge prayer of reconciliation that brought together victims of Colombia's long-running conflict and demobilized guerrillas and paramilitary fighters.

Francis had refrained until Sunday from speaking out about the political and humanitarian crisis next door in Venezuela.

But in remarks added into his Sunday prayer, Francis called for an end to political violence in Venezuela and protection for the poor who have been most hurt by the crisis.

The large community of Venezuelan exiles in Colombia had been pushing Francis to make a strong statement against President Nicolas Maduro. Francis met with Venezuelan bishops in Colombia but refrained from taking the same strident tone taken by the Vatican in recent statements in which it has called on Maduro to respect human rights and withdraw plans to rewrite Venezuela's constitution.
BEIJING (AP) - China's campaign to stamp out use technology that allows web surfers to evade its internet filters is disrupting work and study for entrepreneurs, scientists and students.

The crackdown comes as the ruling Communist Party tightens political control ahead of a congress at which President Xi Jinping is due to be appointed to a second 5-year term as leader.

After Beijing began clamping down on use of VPNs in January, dozens of activists and lawyers have been detained and a cybersecurity law tightened control on online data.

FILE - In this Aug. 19, 2013 file photo, computer users sit near a monitor display with a message from the Chinese police on the proper use of the Internet at an Internet cafe in Beijing, China. China's campaign to stamp out use technology that allows web surfers to evade its internet filters is disrupting work and study for entrepreneurs, scientists and students. The crackdown comes as the ruling Communist Party tightens political control ahead of a congress at which President Xi Jinping is due to be appointed to a second 5-year term as leader. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)

How many people might be affected is unclear, but consumer research firm GlobalWebIndex says a survey of Chinese web surfers this year found 14 percent use a VPN daily. For China's online population of 731 million, it means 100 million regular users.
JERUSALEM (AP) - Israeli political leaders lashed out at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's eldest son Sunday for posting an anti-Semitic caricature aimed at his father's critics.

Yair Netanyahu's meme shows American Jewish billionaire George Soros and a figure that resembles Nazi depictions of world Jewry manipulating former Prime Minister Ehud Barak and two leaders of weekly protests calling on Netanyahu to step down over corruption allegations. The post was shared by former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke and other anti-Semites.

The opposition Labor Party's chairman Avi Gabbay told Army Radio the post "crossed every line imaginable," saying it was a "very sad" day for Israel and the Jewish people when the prime minister's son posts a cartoon that the leader of the Ku Klux Klan agrees with. Barak wondered on Twitter whether Yair Netanyahu, who enjoys a state-funded driver and bodyguard while living at the prime minister's official residence, absorbed such ideology at home.

FILE - In this Jan. 22, 2013 file photo, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, center, prays with his sons Yair, background, and Avner, right, at the Western Wall, the holiest site where Jews can pray, in Jerusalem's Old City. Israeli political leaders are lashing out at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's eldest son for posting an anti-Semitic caricature aimed at his father's critics. Labor Party chairman Avi Gabbay told Army Radio Sunday, Aug 10, 2017, that the post "crossed every line imaginable" and was a "very sad" day for Israel. (AP Photo/Uriel Sinai, Pool, File)

"What is it, genetics or a spontaneous mental illness? It doesn't matter. In any case, we ought to pay for him to have a psychiatrist, not a bodyguard and a chauffeur," Barak wrote. Yair Netanyahu responded by calling Barak a drunk who needed geriatric care.

The 26-year-old Yair Netanyahu has drawn criticism for living a life of privilege at taxpayers' expense and for his crude social media posts.

The Netanyahu family is facing a slew of corruption allegations. The prime minister has been questioned about his ties to executives in media, international business and Hollywood. His associates have been engulfed in a probe relating to a possible conflict of interest involving a $2 billion purchase of German submarines. Israel's attorney general has said he intends to indict the prime minister's wife, Sara, for fraud over her bloated household expenses.

Yair Netanyahu, who has reportedly taken a leading role in his father's aggressive social media platform, has also been drawn into the scandals. Australian billionaire James Packer has reportedly lavished Yair with gifts that included extended stays at luxury hotels in Tel Aviv, New York and Aspen, Colorado, as well as the use of his private jet and dozens of tickets for concerts by Packer's former fiancee, Mariah Carey.

Police are trying to determine whether these constitute bribes, since Packer is reportedly seeking Israeli residency status for tax purposes.

The prime minister has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing, portraying the accusations as a witch hunt against him and his family by a hostile media. He has resisted increasing calls to step down.
EDMONTON, Alberta (AP) - Brazilian brawler Amanda Nunes played a tactical game Saturday night to beat challenger Valentina Shevchenko by split decision and retain her bantamweight title at UFC 215.

"I wanted to show the world I'm here to stay," Nunes said.

The judges scored it 47-48, 48-47, 48-47 to run Nunes' record to 15-4.

Amanda Nunes, top, of Brazil, works against Valentina Shevchenko, of Kyrgyzstan, during their mixed martial arts bout at UFC 215 in Edmonton, Alberta, Saturday, Sept. 9, 2017. (Jason Franson/The Canadian Press via AP)

It was a careful fight with few extended skirmishes until Nunes took Shevchenko to the canvas in the fifth round. The fans often booed and chanted "Fight, fight, fight!"

Nunes, nicknamed the Lioness, raised her arms as the decision was announced while many of the fans booed the verdict.

She later told reporters her strategy was to go the full five rounds to wear Shevchenko down and then strike - and hush detractors who said Nunes was an early-round knockout artist and would fade in the long game.

"I know the crowd wants to see a knockout ... but tonight, this fight was for me, to go five rounds and prove I'm the best. I'm here to stay. I'm here for a reason," she said.

Shevchenko, a Kyrgyzstan fighter nicknamed 'Bullet,' is 14-3.

The 29-year-old walked to the side of the octagon, shaking her head in disbelief.

"I don't agree with the decision at all," Shevchenko said afterward, adding: "I won this fight."

She said she believed she won three rounds, and while Nunes took her down in the fifth, "I was landing more punches from being on the ground (than Nunes from above)."

It was the second time Nunes had beaten Shevchenko in 18 months. The 29-year-old Nunez took a unanimous decision over Shevchenko at UFC 196 in March 2016.

The two were set to fight in July at UFC 213, but Nunes pulled out the day of the fight with sinus issues.

Nunes has smashed her way to the top of her class over the past 14 months. She bloodied and submitted Miesha Tate in July 2016 to take the belt, and then defended it successfully in December with a 48-second dismantling of star Ronda Rousey.

Also on the main card, in a bout with a potential title shot on the line, former lightweight champion Rafael Dos Anjos submitted sixth-ranked Neil Magny with an arm-triangle choke at 3:43 of the first round of their welterweight battle. The 10th-ranked Brazilian is now 27-9-0.

No. 2-ranked flyweight Henry "The Messenger" Cejudo, looking for another title shot against Demetrious Johnson, nailed Wilson Reis of Brazil square in the jaw, dropping him to the mat, then pounded him into a knockout 25 seconds into the second round.

Swedish veteran Ilir Latifi lived up to his Sledgehammer nickname, lifting up and pile-driving Australian upstart Tyson Pedro head first to the mat in a light heavyweight tilt. Latifi won by unanimous decision.

Gilbert Melendez, dropping down to make his debut in featherweight, was cheered as he staggered up repeatedly from the canvas while taking a hellacious flurry of kicks and punches from eighth-ranked Jeremy Stephens. Stephens won by unanimous decision.

Amanda Nunes, of Brazil, celebrates after defeating Valentina Shevchenko, of Kyrgyzstan, during their mixed martial arts bout at UFC 215 in Edmonton, Alberta, Saturday, Sept. 9, 2017. (Jason Franson/The Canadian Press via AP)

Amanda Nunes, top, of Brazil, and Valentina Shevchenko, of Kyrgzystan, battle during their mixed martial arts bout at UFC 215 in Edmonton, Alberta, Saturday, Sept. 9, 2017. (Jason Franson/The Canadian Press via AP)

Amanda Nunes, right, of Brazil, right, blocks a punch from Valentina Shevchenko, of Kyrgyzstan, during their mixed martial arts bout at UFC 215 in Edmonton, Alberta, Saturday, Sept. 9, 2017. (Jason Franson/The Canadian Press via AP)

Henry Cejudo, of the United States, celebrates his win over Wilson Reis, of Brazil, during their mixed martial arts bout at UFC 215 in Edmonton, Alberta, Saturday, Sept. 9, 2017. (Jason Franson/The Canadian Press via AP)

ILir Latifi, right, of Sweden, elbows Tyson Pedro, of Australia, during their mixed martial arts bout at UFC 215 in Edmonton, Alberta, Saturday, Sept. 9, 2017. (Jason Franson/The Canadian Press via AP)
SABADELL, Spain (AP) - The challenge facing Spain as it moves to stifle the push for independence in its proud and wealthy Catalonia region goes beyond stopping plans by separatist politicians to hold a referendum on secession.

Thousands of Catalans already feel as if they live in another country in all but name.

The red and yellow Spanish flag rarely appears on balconies across the region. Instead, pro-independence flags with a white star and blue triangle and red-and yellow stripes adorn streets marked by signs printed in the distinct Catalan language that bears about as much similarity to Spanish as does Portuguese.

People walk on a street decorated with a banner calling to vote Yes in the independence referendum and "esteladas" or independence flags in Sabadell, near Barcelona, Spain, Thursday, Sept. 7, 2017. Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's office says members of his cabinet are meeting Thursday to react to plans by Catalan leaders who have scheduled a vote on the region's secession from Spain. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

"We say, 'What do they say in Spain?' It is an expression that has been said countless times," Montserrat Coca, the owner of a bodega who only will sell wines produced in Catalonia, said. "We are Catalans; it's as simple as that."

Spain's Ministry of Justice has warned that local officials who facilitate the Oct. 1 independence vote the Catalan government called last week risk criminal prosecution, yet over 600 of Catalonia's 948 municipalities say they intend to open polling stations. It remains unclear what position officials will take in Barcelona, the regional capital.

Coca, 59, did not always favor independence. Her transformation mirrors those of scores of people in her hometown of Sabadell and across Catalonia, where the central government in Madrid is often seen as a distant troublemaker that takes more in taxes than it returns in services and roads, schools and hospitals.

Sabadell's pro-secession mayor, Maties Serracant, cites as a tipping point the 2010 ruling by Spain's Constitutional Court that struck down key parts of a proposed charter that would have granted Catalonia greater autonomy and recognized it as a nation within Spain.

The court's decision, combined with an economic downturn from which Spain has only recently recovered, pushed neutral Catalans into the self-government camp previously occupied mainly by residents with generations-long roots and for whom independence is an age-old question of identity.

"For me and for many others, the move from just feeling Catalan to wanting to live in our own country has gone very, very fast," Serracant said. "It's not just economic, it's the sensation that everything that has come from Catalonia in recent years hasn't even been heard or is just ignored."

Many Catalans also have bitter memories of the prohibitions on the use of the Catalan language under the 1939-1975 dictatorship of Spain's Gen. Francisco Franco. Since the return to democracy, Catalonia has achieved important levels of self-governance. School lessons are conducted mainly in Catalan. The region has its own police force, and runs a public health service.

Catalonia has formed part of Spain since the union of the crowns of Castile and Aragon, which encompassed present-day Catalonia, in the 15th century. While Catalans share many customs with other Spaniards, stereotypes paint them as more reserved and hard-working, with a good nose for business.

The caricature is summed up in the Catalan word "seny," which can be roughly translated as the ability to exercise good judgment.

An hour's drive northwest of cosmopolitan and touristy Barcelona, Sabadell is a quiet city of 200,000 with an industrial past. People once came from all over Spain to find jobs and opportunities there, but like many towns and villages across Catalonia, it has been swept up in the secessionist fervor.

Serracant brags of his town being "at the forefront of the push for self-determination." He claims it is the biggest municipality in Catalonia with a town hall run by a majority of council members in support of an independence referendum.

"(Sabadell) is a city that does not historically have a separatist tendency, but now it is the city that is the most committed (to the cause)," said the mayor.

Serracant spent Wednesday in Catalonia's regional parliament while separatist lawmakers held a marathon session to push through laws that they claim give the regional government legal backing to hold the independence vote.

Spain's constitutional court suspended the scheduled referendum on Thursday after agreeing to review an appeal lodged by the Spanish government. The government, led by Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, has vowed to stop the vote, arguing that a referendum affecting all of Spain would have to be voted on by all Spaniards.

On the outskirts of Sabadell is La Plana del Pintor, a humble neighborhood of ramshackle houses, many of which were built by migrants from southern Spain. There are no pro-independence flags on its sun-baked streets, but even here separatism has made in-roads.

Take 54-year-old Alonso Simon, a computer technician who prefers to speak Spanish instead of Catalan, enjoys traditional Spanish flamenco music and whose parents were from Madrid and southern Spain.

Simon complains that Catalonia provides more revenue to the rest of Spain than it should. He cites regular breakdowns on the train line run by Spain's national rail service that passes through Sabadell, comparing it to the commuter train service operated by Catalonia that recently inaugurated a stop nearby.

"If they had had better infrastructure like we have now with the Catalan train, we would not have these problems," Simon said. "The money we spend should stay here."

After a surge in recent years, opinion polls show that support for breaking away from Spain among the region's 7.5 million inhabitants has plateaued at around 50 percent. A large part of the half that opposes independence feels comfortable with a dual identity that is both Spanish and Catalan.

Manuel Antunez was walking his dog in a park when he stopped to lament the political crisis in Catalonia. Now 88, Antunez came to Sabadell in 1953, going to work in building Barcelona's subway line.

"I feel bad because those who lifted Catalonia up are those who came from elsewhere," Antunez said. "I feel Spanish and Catalan. It makes me sad. I don't know how this can be fixed."

People walk along a street decorated with Catalan flags in Sabadell, near Barcelona, Spain, Thursday, Sept. 7, 2017. Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's office says members of his cabinet are meeting Thursday to react to plans by Catalan leaders who have scheduled a vote on the region's secession from Spain. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

Alberto Moix, 56, rides his motorcycle in Sabadell, near Barcelona, Spain, Thursday, Sept. 7, 2017. Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's office says members of his cabinet are meeting Thursday to react to plans by Catalan leaders who have scheduled a vote on the region's secession from Spain. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

A woman cleans a windows decorated with a banner calling to vote Yes in the independence referendum in Sabadell, near Barcelona, Spain, Thursday, Sept. 7, 2017. Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's office says members of his cabinet are meeting Thursday to react to plans by Catalan leaders who have scheduled a vote on the region's secession from Spain. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

Pro independence supporters holds the "estelada" or pro independence flags during a rally in support for the secession of the Catalonia region from Spain, in Vitoria, northern Spain, Saturday, Sept. 9, 2017. Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's office says members of his cabinet are meeting Thursday to react to plans by Catalan leaders who have scheduled a vote on the region's secession from Spain. (Alvaro Barrientos)

People walk along a street in Sabadell, near Barcelona, Spain, Thursday, Sept. 7, 2017. Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's office says members of his cabinet are meeting Thursday to react to plans by Catalan leaders who have scheduled a vote on the region's secession from Spain. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

Banners calling to vote Yes in the independence referendum hang on poles as people walk along a street in Sabadell, near Barcelona, Spain, Thursday, Sept. 7, 2017. Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's office says members of his cabinet are meeting Thursday to react to plans by Catalan leaders who have scheduled a vote on the region's secession from Spain. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

People sit in a park in Sabadell, near Barcelona, Spain, Thursday, Sept. 7, 2017. Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's office says members of his cabinet are meeting Thursday to react to plans by Catalan leaders who have scheduled a vote on the region's secession from Spain. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

Pro independence supporters wave "estelada" or pro independence flags during a rally in support for the secession of the Catalonia region from Spain, in Vitoria, northern Spain, Saturday, Sept. 9, 2017. Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's office says members of his cabinet are meeting Thursday to react to plans by Catalan leaders who have scheduled a vote on the region's secession from Spain. (Alvaro Barrientos)
Category 4 Hurricane Irma bearing down on Florida Keys

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) - Hurricane Irma regained strength as it closed in on the Florida Keys early Sunday and forecasters monitored a crucial shift in its trajectory - just a few more miles to the west - that could keep its ferocious eye off the southwest Florida coast and over warm Gulf water.

The hurricane re-strengthened to Category 4 status with maximum sustained winds near 130 mph (210 kph). The U.S. National Hurricane Center said Irma was expected to weaken but would remain a powerful storm as it moved through the Florida Keys and near the state's west coast.

As of 5 a.m. EDT Sunday, the hurricane was centered about 40 miles (65 kilometers) south-southeast of Key West, Florida, and had sped up slightly, moving northwest at 8 mph (13 kph).

Tens of thousands of people huddling in shelters watched for updates as the storm swung to the west, now potentially sparing Tampa as well Miami the catastrophic head-on blow forecasters had been warning about for days.

But those few miles meant St. Petersburg could get a direct hit, rather than its more populous twin across Tampa Bay. Neither city has suffered a major hurricane in nearly a century.

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Irma's westward shift now targets St. Pete more than Tampa

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) - Irma's leading edge brought hurricane-force winds to the Florida Keys late Saturday, bending palm trees and spitting rain as the storm swirled north with 120 mph (190 kph) winds on a projected new track that could expose St. Petersburg - not Miami or even Tampa - to a direct hit.

St. Petersburg, like Tampa, has not taken a head-on blow from a major hurricane in nearly a century.

The National Hurricane Center's latest tweak to Irma's forecasted track has the storm hugging the Florida's west coast off Fort Myers, but possibly not making landfall there before moving back to the Gulf of Mexico. By moving the likely track a few crucial miles west, the storm would be able to regain strength over water before its deadliest winds hit St. Petersburg and Clearwater, rather than the more populated Tampa.

After that, the storm is now expected to skirt the coast again a bit north of Horseshoe Beach, then finally go inland around Fish Creek, northwest of Ocala, with a hurricane-force wind field well over 100 miles wide.

Irma's forward motion slowed to 6 mph (10 kph) as the storm stuttered off the coast of Cuba. Forecasters say it could still increase in strength, but their forecast didn't show it.

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Cuba surveys toppled houses, flooded cities in wake of Irma

CAIBARIEN, Cuba (AP) - Hurricane Irma ripped roofs off houses and flooded hundreds of miles of coastline as it raked Cuba's northern coast after devastating islands the length of the Caribbean in a trail of destruction that has left 22 people dead so far.

As Irma left Cuba late Saturday and directed its 120 mph (195 kph) winds toward Florida, authorities on the island were assessing the damage and warning of staggering damage to keys off the northern coast studded with all-inclusive resorts and cities, as well as farmland in central Cuba.

There were no immediate reports of deaths in Cuba - a country that prides itself on its disaster preparedness - but authorities were trying to restore power, clear roads and warning that people should stay off the streets of Havana because flooding could continue into Monday.

Residents of "the capital should know that the flooding is going to last more than 36 hours, in other words, it is going to persist," Civil Defense Col. Luis Angel Macareno said late Saturday, adding that the waters had reach at about 2,000 feet (600 meters) into Havana.

As Irma rolled in, Cuban soldiers went through coastal towns to force residents to evacuate, taking people to shelters at government buildings and schools - and even caves.

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Storm surge warnings: Life-threatening, will cover a house

MIAMI (AP) - The storm surge is called dangerous and life-threatening, but what exactly is it?

It's not a wall of water or a tsunami. Simply put, hurricane winds push water toward shore. It can happen quickly and far from a storm's center, inundating areas that don't typically flood.

Storm surge doesn't just come from the ocean. It can come from sounds, bays and lakes, sometimes well inland.

Large hurricanes tend to create greater storm surge over a broader area, and coastal features such as bays can act like funnels and back water up into rivers and canals, said Jamie Rhome, head of the U.S. National Hurricane Center's storm surge unit.

"This is going to sneak up on people," Rhome said.

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Irma turns Caribbean island paradises into nightmares

ST. JOHN'S, Antigua (AP) - Strung like beads along the northeast edge of the Caribbean, the Leeward Islands are tiny, remote and beautiful, with azure waters and ocean breezes drawing tourists from around the world.

The wild isolation that made St. Barts, St. Martin, Anguilla and the Virgin Islands vacation paradises has turned them into cutoff, chaotic nightmares in the wake of Hurricane Irma, which left 22 people dead, mostly in the Leeward Islands. Looting and lawlessness were reported Saturday by both French and Dutch authorities, who were sending in extra troops to restore order.

The Category 5 storm snapped the islands' fragile links to the outside world with a direct hit early Wednesday, pounding their small airports, decapitating cellphone towers, filling harbors with overturned, crushed boats and leaving thousands of tourists and locals desperate to escape.

The situation worsened Saturday with the passage of Category 4 Hurricane Jose, which shuttered airports and halted emergency boat traffic through the weekend.

Looting, gunshots and a lack of clean drinking water were reported on the French Caribbean territory of St. Martin, home to five-star resorts and a multimillion estate owned by President Donald Trump.

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Recovery efforts pick up in earthquake-damaged Mexican town

JUCHITAN, Mexico (AP) - Relief supplies and cleanup crews began arriving in earnest in this city in southern Mexico, two days after a devastating earthquake killed 37 here - more than half the nationwide total.

Government cargo planes delivered much-needed supplies and the military began distributing boxes of food, though many residents of this city in a region of Oaxaca state known as the Isthmus complained that progress was slow and they hadn't yet received assistance.

Teams of soldiers and federal police armed with shovels and sledgehammers fanned out across neighborhoods to assist in demolition of damaged buildings. Dump trucks choked some narrow streets as they began hauling away the many tons of rubble.

Maria de Lourdes Quintana Lopez said she couldn't wait for the government's assistance as she oversaw the demolition of her family candy business' warehouse.

"We have to work so that we're not overcome with sadness," Quintana said. "We're not going to wait for the government to do what it has to do."

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Trump makes nice with Dems, leaving his party confused

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Donald Trump was in the mood to celebrate after cutting a big deal with opposition Democrats.

Joshing with Northeastern officials in the Cabinet Room, Trump hailed New York Democrat Andrew Cuomo as "my governor" and traded banter with Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer, another fellow New Yorker.

"If you just dropped in from outer space, you wouldn't know what the last eight months have been like," said Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., recalling the friendly exchanges between Trump and Schumer during the meeting with New York and New Jersey lawmakers.

That would be the same Schumer whom the president had previously slammed as a "clown" and "Cryin' Chuck."

And now?

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They've been warned: Some insist on riding out Irma at home

REDINGTON SHORES, Fla. (AP) - Carl Roberts has Chinese food, a case of water and a million-dollar view in his 17th floor Gulf front condo - all he needs, he says, to weather the massive storm coming straight at him.

Authorities have beseeched more than 6 million people in Florida and Georgia to evacuate before Hurricane Irma's storm surge and fierce winds make it impossible to flee or be rescued. Many are staying nevertheless, even boasting about surviving Camille, Andrew, Katrina and other storms.

"No. 1, I don't have anywhere to go," said Roberts, an attorney. "And I'm on the 17th floor. I have security shutters, so I should be quite safe here."

Mandatory evacuation orders apply to all barrier islands around South Florida, including Redington Shores, where Roberts' condo complex towers over a narrow reach of sand. The entire Florida Keys were supposed to be emptied. Firefighters went door to door in mobile home parks, urging residents to get out.

People who refused to evacuate were not being arrested, but were told they wouldn't be rescued once the storm arrives.

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Tank failures in Harvey reveal vulnerabilities in storm

More than two dozen storage tanks holding crude oil, gasoline and other contaminants ruptured or otherwise failed when Harvey slammed into the Texas coast, spilling at least 145,000 gallons (548,868 liters) of fuel and spewing toxic pollutants into the air, according to an Associated Press analysis of pollution reports submitted to state and federal regulators.

The tank failures follow years of warnings that the Houston area's petrochemical industry was ill-prepared for a major storm, with about one-third of the 4,500 storage tanks along the Houston Ship Channel located in areas susceptible to flooding, according to researchers.

More of the massive storage tanks could be put to the test in coming days as Hurricane Irma bears down on Florida. The tanks are prone to float and break during floods, and Harvey's unprecedented rainfalls revealed a new vulnerability when the roofs of some storage tanks sank under the weight of so much water.

Federal and state rules require companies to be prepared for spills, but mandate no specific measures to secure storage tanks at refineries, chemical plants and oil production sites.

Although Florida has no oil refineries, it has more than 20 petroleum product storage terminals in coastal communities and about 30 chemical companies with a presence in the state, including a significant number of facilities in the Tampa Bay area, according to the American Chemistry Council and U.S. Energy Information Administration.

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Rohingya rebels declare truce as desperation hits camps

COX'S BAZAR, Bangladesh (AP) - Rohingya insurgents, whose attack on Myanmar security forces last month triggered savage military reprisals, declared a monthlong truce Sunday as refugees continued to flood across the border into Bangladesh only to face scant basic resources, hunger and illness.

The Muslim insurgents of the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army issued the truce statement on its Twitter account and urged Myanmar's government to reciprocate in order to assist all victims regardless of their background.

The government did not comment immediately.

The rebels, who say they're fighting to protect their minority members against government-sponsored persecution, launched their first known attacks last October and again on Aug. 25. According to Rohingya refugees, the military responded with indiscriminate killings, burning entire villages and forcing tens of thousands to flee. The government said most of the 400 dead were "terrorists."

The U.N. said Saturday that an estimated 290,000 Rohingya Muslims have arrived in the border district of Cox's Bazar in just the last two weeks, joining at least 100,000 who were already there after fleeing earlier riots or persecution in Buddhist-majority Myanmar. The number was expected to swell further, with thousands crossing the border each day.
KHAZIR CAMP, Iraq (AP) - Fawaz Saleh Ahmed has been secretly sneaking into his own village in northern Iraq to visit his home.

The last time he went, he wept as he spent several hours going from room to room in the partially destroyed house, he said. When his tears dried, he made his way back to the nearby Khazir camp housing those displaced by war, where he and his family have lived for almost a year.

Frustratingly, tantalizingly, he can see his house from there, but the Kurdish forces controlling his village, called Hassan Shami, won't allow him to return to live.

In this Friday, July 21, 2017 photo, seven year-old Omar from Mosul flies a kite in the Chamakor camp for displaced people in northern Iraq. Many displaced can't return to their homes in Iraq's second largest city as their houses are destroyed by air strikes. Iraq's Sunni Arabs are at their lowest state ever after 3 years of war to free them from Islamic State group rule. Vast numbers are displaced from their homes, and the community is unsure what their place will be in the country's future while Iraq's other main powers, the Shiites and the Kurds, aim to change the demographics of some Sunni areas to impose their own control. (AP Photo/Bram Janssen)

"That is my house there on the hill, do you see it?" said Ahmed, a member of Iraq's once-dominant Sunni Arab minority. He stretched his arm to point.

The 39-year-old Ahmed's predicament is part of the wider disaster facing Iraq's Sunni Arabs. Three years of war have freed their lands from the rule of the Islamic State group but have also left the community at its lowest state ever. Sunnis are feeling lost, unsure what their place will be in the country's future and worried that the Shiite majority and the Kurds aim to change the demographics of some Sunni areas to impose their own control.

Sunnis have been barred from returning to their homes in numerous villages and towns that the Kurds seized during fighting with Islamic State militants in a belt of territory across the north stretching down to Iraq's eastern border.

Kurdish officials cite security reasons for not allowing residents back, even though IS was driven out of the area late last year. At the same time, the Kurds have repeatedly said they intend to incorporate the captured territory into their own self-rule zone - even as they plan a referendum for outright independence later this month. That raises questions over the future of Sunni Arab villages like Hassan Shami.

Further south, Iranian-backed Shiite militias that captured mainly Sunni territory have also kept Sunnis from returning to strategic areas between Baghdad and the Iranian border or other areas Shiites consider vital.

Sunni Arabs, meanwhile, are faced with the depth and magnitude of their plight. The fear among Iraqi authorities and the Sunnis themselves is that new militant groups could take root unless the community's situation is improved.

Their cities and towns lie in partial ruins from the fight that drove IS out of most of the territories it seized in 2013 and 2014, from northern Iraq through the country's center and across the Sunni heartland of the western Anbar province. Thousands of Sunnis languish in detention for alleged links to the group.

The community has suffered massive displacement. Currently, 3.2 million people are displaced, the overwhelming majority Sunni Arabs. Another more than 2 million were displaced previously but have since returned home, according to the International Organization of Migration. Together that would be a staggeringly high proportion of the country's entire Sunni Arab population, which is generally estimated to make up 15 to 20 percent of Iraq's 37 million people.

Those who have returned - mainly to Anbar - must rebuild homes and communities, so far with little help from the government. Those still displaced either scramble to find housing or jobs or languish in camps. More than 400,000 of those displaced in nearly a year of fighting to liberate Mosul, Iraq's second largest city, are housed in 19 camps around the north.

Sunni Arabs have struggled since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion, which brought down Saddam Hussein and opened the door for the Shiite majority to gain power through elections. Sunnis were relegated to second-tier status, igniting an insurgency that brought years of violence and gave rise to al-Qaida and its successor, the Islamic State group. Over those years, divided Sunni politicians were ineffectual, and many Sunni professionals and businessmen left the country.

Some Sunnis talk of trying to form their own self-rule region like Kurdistan. But many are wary, knowing the Sunni-majority areas have far fewer resources.

"We Sunni Arabs are the weakest link in Iraq today. But trust me, this country will not be stable and strong again unless we assume a leading role in how the country is run," said Adnan Abu-Zeid, a school teacher from Mosul.

But this kind of bravado masks a widespread despair.

"Back in 2003, we wanted democracy and freedoms. Look where that got us," said an embittered Ghazi Hamad, displaced from Mosul. "We have now lowered our expectations. Any government is good for us, as long as it makes us feel safe. We will happily live on the sidelines."

Hossam Ahmed, a 24-year-old student displaced from Mosul, spoke nostalgically of Saddam, though he would have only been 11 when the autocrat was ousted. "I love Saddam Hussein. When he was in power, we, the people of Mosul, enjoyed full security," he said. "Iraq was finished when he left."

In a sign of resignation and distrust of Shiites, some Sunni Arab tribal chiefs in the north are even publicly campaigning for their areas to join the Kurdish region. The Kurds are overwhelmingly Sunni, but suspicions and divisions run along ethnic lines with Sunni Arabs.

The Baghdad government routinely says it wants the displaced to return, and official media celebrate when Sunni Arabs go back to their areas. Officials cite security concerns and lack of basic services as reasons why some do not return.

But Sunnis worry over signs of forced demographic change in particular strategic areas.

For example, Sunnis have had difficulty returning to parts of Diyala province, which borders both Iran and the Iraqi Kurdish autonomy zone.

A recent IOM survey found that nearly 80 percent of Sunnis displaced from two sampled towns in Diyala had tried to return home but were prevented, whether by Kurdish forces or Shiite militiamen.

Sheikh Iyad al-Laheibi, a local Sunni tribal chief, said he believes Shiite militias are engineering demographic changes in Diyala to secure a direct route from the Iranian border to Baghdad through the province.

"Who gets to return home has become a random practice," al-Laheibi said. He also pointed to frequent kidnappings of the Sunnis who remain, believed to be aimed at intimidating them into leaving.

In neighboring Salaheddin province, nearly half of those displaced from towns around the provincial capital Tikrit - Saddam's hometown - said they had been blocked from returning by Shiite militias, according to the IOM survey.

Southwest of Baghdad, thousands of Sunni Arabs have been unable to return to Jurf al-Sakhar, a Sunni pocket in mainly Shiite Babel province that controls the gateway to the Shiite holy cities of Najaf and Karbala further south. Shiite militias drove IS militants from the area in 2014.

Sunni politicians' repeated calls for Sunni residents to be allowed back have been ignored. Last month, the Babel provincial government threatened legal proceedings against anyone demanding their return.

Infuriated Sunni lawmakers accused Babel of seeking to change the area's demographics. The U.N. said the Babel government was trying to intimidate politicians into silence.

In Khazir camp, Fawaz Ahmed, once a Health Ministry employee, spoke of his secret trips back to his home in Hassan Shami village. Kurdish fighters guarding the village don't allow visits, so Ahmed and others obtain permits to leave the camp, ostensibly to visit relatives elsewhere, and then sneak into their homes.

"My heart keeps telling me to go back and look," he said, squatting on a large rock at the edge of the camp facing his village. Below, in a ravine running parallel to the Khazir river, youths played soccer on dirt fields as the sky grew darker.

"There is only one question on my mind: Why can't I go home?" he said.

In Irbil, Naseradeen Saeed Sindi, the Kurdish official in charge of "Kurdistani areas outside the region," had no direct answer. He said security concerns prevent return for the moment. He also suggested that such captured areas would be made part of the Kurdish self-rule region.

"Turkmen, Christians and Arabs will have rights equal to those enjoyed by the Kurds under the region's law," he said.

In Khazir and other camps, residents languish, dealing with sizzling heat and long hours of boredom in tents lined up in monotonous rows. They talk longingly of "awda" - Arabic for "return."

"One's village is like his mother. You can never abandon her," said Ahmed Hassan Khalaf, another native of Hassan Shami and a father of 13 who is in his mid-70s and in poor health. "We used to grow tomatoes on the land on which this camp is built," he said, grabbing a fist full of pebbles from the ground outside his tent.

Then he murmured, barely audible in despair, "Oh God, oh God the compassionate."

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Associated Press writers Salar Salim in Irbil, Iraq and Sinan Salaheddin in Baghdad contributed to this report.

In this Friday, July 21, 2017 photo, a boy stands in front of a fence of the Chamakor camp in northern Iraq. Kurdish security forces who control the camp aren't allowing Sunni Arabs to return to their homes, which are now under Kurdish control. (AP Photo/Bram Janssen)

In this Saturday, July 22, 2017 photo, displaced Sunni Arabs play a game in the Hassan Sham camp in northern Iraq. Iraq's Sunni Arabs are at their lowest state ever after 3 years of war to free them from Islamic State group rule. Vast numbers are displaced from their homes, and the community is unsure what their place will be in the country's future while Iraq's other main powers, the Shiites and the Kurds, aim to change the demographics of some Sunni areas to impose their own control. (AP Photo/Bram Janssen)

In this Wednesday, Aug. 2, 2017 photo, a man walks with a child through the Hassan Sham camp in Northern Iraq. Iraq's Sunni Arabs are at their lowest state ever after 3 years of war to free them from Islamic State group rule. Vast numbers are displaced from their homes, and the community is unsure what their place will be in the country's future while Iraq's other main powers, the Shiites and the Kurds, aim to change the demographics of some Sunni areas to impose their own control. (AP Photo/Bram Janssen)

In this Wednesday, Aug. 2, 2017 photo, three year-old Saja Salih sleeps in her tent in the Hassan Sham camp for displaced people in Northern Iraq. Saja, her sister and both parents can't return to their home in Mosul because it's destroyed by an air strike. Iraq's Sunni Arabs are at their lowest state ever after 3 years of war to free them from Islamic State group rule. Vast numbers are displaced from their homes, and the community is unsure what their place will be in the country's future while Iraq's other main powers, the Shiites and the Kurds, aim to change the demographics of some Sunni areas to impose their own control. (AP Photo/Bram Janssen)

In this Tuesday, Aug. 1, 2017 photo, Abu Abdullah Fathi from west Mosul sits inside his tent in the Chamokor camp in northern Iraq. Abu Abdullah and his wife and five children can't return to their home in the Tanak neighborhood after it was destroyed by an air strike. (AP Photo/Bram Janssen)

In this Saturday, July 22, 2017 photo, a family gets water inside the Hassan Sham camp in northern Iraq. Iraq's Sunni Arabs are at their lowest state ever after 3 years of war to free them from Islamic State group rule. Vast numbers are displaced from their homes, and the community is unsure what their place will be in the country's future while Iraq's other main powers, the Shiites and the Kurds, aim to change the demographics of some Sunni areas to impose their own control.(AP Photo/Bram Janssen)

In this Wednesday, Aug. 2, 2017 photo, a girl enters her tent at night in the Hassan Sham camp for displaced people in northern Iraq. Iraq's Sunni Arabs are at their lowest state ever after 3 years of war to free them from Islamic State group rule. Vast numbers are displaced from their homes, and the community is unsure what their place will be in the country's future while Iraq's other main powers, the Shiites and the Kurds, aim to change the demographics of some Sunni areas to impose their own control.(AP Photo/Bram Janssen)
MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) - A Somali police officer says a suicide bomber blew himself up near a government office in a central Somali town Sunday, killing at least four people.

Col. Sabrie Ahmed said the bomber apparently intended to enter the regional administration's headquarters in Beledweyne, the provincial capital of Hiran province, but instead detonated an explosive belt strapped around his waist in a teashop outside the offices.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast. However, Somalia's Islamic extremist insurgents, al-Shabab, often carry out such attacks.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) - Iran says it warned off a U.S. Navy warship during a rescue of a boat in the Gulf of Oman, while American officials say there was no direct contact.

The U.S. Navy said Sunday the incident happened Wednesday and involved a small vessel some 75 nautical miles from the USS Tempest, a coastal patrol boat. The Navy says another boat much closer offered assistance, with that vessel communicating with Iranian naval forces.

Iran offered a different version of the incident. Press TV, the English-language arm of its state broadcaster, said Sunday that the Iranian navy "warned off an American warship" while rescuing the stranded dhow, a traditional ship.

The U.S. and Iran routinely have tense encounters in the Persian Gulf.
MONROE, Ga. (AP) - Anthony Pham immigrated to the United States in 1982 from Vietnam and became a citizen five years later, after President Ronald Reagan signed an immigration law that sped the legalization process for millions of new Americans.

Now a business owner and proud Republican in Georgia's staunchly conservative 10th Congressional District, Pham says he supports maintaining legal status for young immigrants living in the United States illegally who were brought to the country as children.

"When they come here as children, they can become American citizens if they are good, not bad people," Pham says of the 800,000 or so immigrants affected by President Donald Trump's decision to phase out the Deferred Action for Children Program (DACA) put in place during the Obama administration.

In this Sept. 6, 2017, photo, Anthony Pham, talks in his Monroe, Ga., barber shop. He became a U.S citizen in 1987, five years after he immigrated from Vietnam. Now a business owner and proud Republican in Georgia's staunchly conservative 10th Congressional District, Pham says he supports maintaining legal status for immigrants who arrived in the country illegally as children, the so-called "Dreamers" brought by adult family members. (AP Photo/Bill Barrow)

Trump says he's giving Congress six months to end the limbo status for these young immigrants. Yet Pham says that what Congress does - or doesn't do - won't change his support for the president or his congressman, outspoken conservative Jody Hice.

"I am Republican. I am with Mr. Trump," Pham says, sitting in the courthouse square barbershop he's owned in Walton County since 1993.

Pham's view echoes across Republican congressional districts like Georgia's 10th, a wide expanse of small towns between Atlanta and Augusta. And it highlights the political conundrum facing deeply divided Republicans whom Trump has called on to craft some kind of legislative solution, giving them an election-year deadline.

The conservative voters who dominate here and in many other GOP districts profess varying degrees of sympathy for the immigrants affected by Obama's program and then Trump's reversal. But these voters also are convinced that illegal immigration is a drag on Americans' economic opportunity, and they want the GOP-controlled Congress to stand with a president they see as defending U.S. workers and the rule of law.

That means members of Congress have little incentive to risk angering core supporters with any legislation that can be branded as "amnesty."

"What part of 'illegal' don't people understand?" booms Elwood Suggins, an 82-year-old Trump backer in Walton County.

Fellow Republican Troy Trantham, 77, says immigrants are "getting the mine" while American workers "are getting the shaft." That's a biting version of a common argument here that immigrants, particularly those in the country illegally, get public benefits without paying taxes.

At the least, 73-year-old Frank Young says, "they're taking American jobs."

Hice won election in 2014 in part as an immigration hard-liner appealing to voters such as Suggins, Trantham and Young, who are representative of the older, whiter electorates that dominate midterm elections, particularly in GOP-leaning districts.

Hice's aides say he's open to negotiation on the immigrant program and that he doesn't want to see a mass deportation of its beneficiaries. But his campaign website still blasts "amnesty" and argues that illegal immigration "drives up the cost of education, health care, police and judicial services and social services."

Since Trump's decision this past week to end the Obama program, Hice has signed on to two Republican immigration proposals. But those deal mostly with the process employers use to check the legal status of job applicants and do not explicitly address the plight of the young immigrants.

There are Republicans in this Georgia district favoring a legislative solution, including one who wants to challenge Hice next year.

"There needs to be a fix so these kids don't have to look around the corner for an ICE agent every time they try to contribute to society," says Joe Hunt, an executive with a restaurant franchising business in Athens.

The local economic development chief, Shane Short, said he has "no personal opinion on DACA," but he described the economy as "booming," saying he's managing proposed business deals totaling in the hundreds of millions of dollars in Walton County alone.

The total immigrant population in the district is small, with the Census Bureau measuring the foreign-born population at 5.4 percent, well below the national figure nearing 13 percent. That's even though the district's leading industry, agriculture, relies on considerable immigrant labor.

Hunt, Hice's prospective primary opponent, said those realities pale in districts such as the Georgia 10th partly because they are drawn to conservatives' advantage. So the representatives "sit around and take no action because they are afraid of getting hammered for amnesty."

Indeed, the 10th is a district weighted to conservatives.

Athens-Clarke County, home to the University of Georgia, once anchored a competitive congressional district that elected moderate Democrats. But Republicans divided Athens-Clarke into separate districts, diluting the influence of its liberal Democrats and moderate Republicans.

Trump won Hice's district with 61 percent of the vote in November, while Hice ran unopposed.

"It ought to take Congress 10 days to fix this, but this Congress couldn't do it in 10 years," Hunt said.

Hice's and Trump's most enthusiastic backers explain that they aren't opposed to all immigrants.

"It's just not an easy answer, if they came here when they were 6-years-old, or even babies," said Gene Briscoe, an 82-year-old retiree in Monroe who voted for Trump.

John Bramblett, 74, says he worked with many immigrants in the construction business and knows the local agriculture concerns depend on them as well.

And they both say they know local immigrants-turned-citizens, citing Pham and the families that run popular restaurants in town.

"They're good people," Briscoe said. After a pause, he adds, "They came legally."

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Follow Bill Barrow on Twitter at https://twitter.com/BillBarrowAP.
LIMA, Peru (AP) - The IOC says Patrick Hickey resigned from its executive board, more than one year after he was arrested at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics in a ticket scalping investigation.

The International Olympic Committee body announced Hickey's resignation ahead of the board's two-day meeting opening Monday in Lima, Peru.

Hickey "emphasized that he wants to protect the IOC," the Olympic body says citing his resignation letter.

FILE- In this Tuesday, Sept. 6, 2016 file photo, Ireland's Olympic Council President Patrick Hickey arrives to a police station in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The IOC said Sunday, Sept. 10, 2017, Patrick Hickey resigned from its executive board, more than one year after he was arrested at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics in a ticket scalping investigation. (AP Photo/Mauro Pimentel, File)

The IOC board seat representing the Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC) will be elected at a four-day annual meeting starting Wednesday in Lima.

Hickey temporarily stepped aside from Olympic work after Brazilian authorities arrested him at the IOC's hotel in Rio.

He denies wrongdoing and retains his IOC membership.

Hickey returned to Ireland in December after ANOC loaned him $430,000 in bail money.
NICOSIA, Cyprus (AP) - The Latest on Europe's response to the large numbers of refugees and migrants trying to reach the continent (all times local):

4:30 p.m.

Turkish authorities say they stopped 313 migrants on the Black Sea attempting to reach Balkan countries in the last two days, suggesting the emergence of an alternative route to Europe.

In this Friday, Sept. 8, 2017 video frame grab image, made available by Turkey's Coast Guard Saturday, Sept. 9, 2017, a Syrian migrant among others, briefly lifts a small child, on a rubber dinghy while trying to cross to Greece from Turkey's Izmir province. Authorities say 40 Syrian migrants, among them 18 children, were stopped Friday from illegally crossing to Greece. Turkey and the European Union signed a deal last year to curb the illegal flow of migrants to Greece. Turkey is host to more than 3 million Syrians who have fled the ongoing civil war in their country. (Turkish Coast Guard via AP)

Turkey's coast guard said Sunday it stopped a fishing boat carrying 93 Syrians and one Afghan off the northern coast of Istanbul. The coast guard says they were with a suspected Turkish smuggler.

The coast guard also intercepted 68 Syrians and two Iranians in a sailboat with one alleged Turkish smuggler 36 nautical miles east of Bulgaria on Saturday.

Late Friday, an official vessel stopped 149 Syrians and two Ukrainians thought to be smugglers in a fishing boat emitting a distress signal 14 nautical miles east of Romania.

The migrants and suspects were brought to northwestern Kirklareli province in Turkey for processing.

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10:30 a.m.

Cyprus police say a 36-year-old man has been arrested for allegedly driving one of a pair of boats that brought 305 Syrian refugees to the island's northwestern coast.

Police spokesman Michalis Ioannou said Sunday that the 202 men, 30 women and 73 children who arrived at around midnight are thought to be the largest number of migrants to reach Cyprus in a single day.

Ioannou says they departed from Mersin, Turkey on Saturday.

He says the passengers reported paying $2,000 (1,658 euros) each for the trip. Some with relatives in Cyprus have expressed the desire to remain there. Others said they want to go to Germany or to Scandinavian countries.

All will be taken to a reception center except for a woman and her newborn baby, who were hospitalized.
The court's verdict comes at a crucial juncture in the row between Governor Arif Mohammed Khan and the state government over a slew of issues.
KARACHI, Pakistan (AP) - Thousands of supporters of Pakistan's main Islamic Jamaat-e-Islami party have gathered in Karachi to protest Myanmar's treatment of its Rohingya Muslim minority.

The JI supporters rallied Sunday on a Karachi main street for hours chanting slogans in support of the Rohingyas. The JI leader Senator Sirajul Haq, addressing the rally by video link, urged world powers to carry out their role in immediately stopping the "planned genocide of the oppressed Rohingya Muslims"

Another Islamic party, Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, held a rally in northwestern city of Peshawar in support of the Rohingya Muslims. JUI leader Jaleel Khan condemned the "atrocities" committed against Muslims in Myanmar.

The rallies come a day after Pakistan's Foreign Ministry summoned Myanmar's ambassador to protest the violence against Rohingya Muslims.
BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) - The latest on Pope Francis' visit to Colombia (all times local):

7:55 p.m.

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos has pledged to Pope Francis that Colombia will keep its doors open to thousands of Venezuelan exiles even as it works to find a political solution to its neighbor's crisis.

People pray during Mass celebrated by Pope Francis at the seaport in Cartagena, Colombia, Sunday, Sept. 10, 2017. (AP Photo/Ricardo Mazalan)

Santos says he told the pope in their final encounter Sunday that "Colombia will always be a welcoming land."

The president says he also gave Francis a pin of a symbolic peace dove that Santos has worn since the start of negotiations with leftist rebels several years ago.

The pope headed back to Rome after a five-day visit during which Francis encouraged Colombians to reconcile under the peace deal signed last year.

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7:30 p.m.

Pope Francis has left Colombia after an emotional farewell in which he was serenaded by the lively, traditional rhythms of the country*s Carnival.

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos was on hand in Cartagena on Sunday to accompany Francis on the red carpet to the airliner that is carrying him to Rome.

Wrapping up his five-day visit, the pope made a final appeal to Colombians to reconcile under the peace deal signed last year between the government and the biggest rebel group aimed at ending to end Latin America's longest-running conflict.

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11:50 a.m.

Pope Francis is calling for an end to political violence in Venezuela and protection for the poor hurt by the nation's "grave" economic crisis.

The message of solidarity came at a visit to the St. Peter Claver church in Cartagena that was the final stop on his five-day visit to Colombia

The pope called for Venezuelans "to reject all types of political violence and to find a solution to the grave crisis that it is affecting especially the poorest and most disadvantage members of society."

The large community of Venezuelan exiles in Colombia had been pushing Francis to make a strong statement against President Nicolas Maduro.

Francis met during the visit with bishops from Venezuela who have referred to Maduro as a dictator. But he largely avoided the strong tone of recent Vatican statements that have called on Maduro to respect human rights and withdraw plans to rewrite Venezuela's constitution.

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11:45 a.m.

Pope Francis is denouncing human trafficking and the current-day slave trade as he pays his respects to a 17th century Jesuit missionary who ministered to hundreds of thousands of African slaves who arrived in the port of Cartagena to be sold during Spanish colonial times.

Francis praised St. Peter Claver as he arrived in Cartagena on the final day of his Colombia trip Sunday. He was sporting a bruised, black eye after banging his head on his popemobile when it stopped short amid swarms of well-wishers.

Carrying on with his agenda, Francis praised Claver for recognizing the inherent dignity of slaves, saying he was "austere and charitable to the point of heroism."

Francis said the legacy of the Spanish priest should serve as a model for the Catholic Church today to "promote the dignity of all our brothers and sisters, particularly the poor and the excluded of society, those who are abandoned, immigrants and those who suffer violence and human trafficking."

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11:00 a.m.

Pope Francis has suffered a bruise to his left cheek that resulted in some blood dripping onto his white cassock.

Francis apparently knocked his head as he was travelling in the popemobile upon arriving in the city of Cartagena for the last day of his Colombia trip.

Vatican spokesman Greg Burke says: "The pope is fine" but has "a bruise on his cheekbone and eyebrow."

Burke says the pope hit himself on the popemobile and is receiving ice treatment.

The pope continued greeting thousands of people along the streets of Cartagena's San Francisco neighborhood, without any problems.

Pope Francis is wrapping up his Colombia trip with a deeply personal final day honoring St. Peter Claver, a fellow Jesuit who ministered to thousands of African slaves who passed through the port of Cartagena during Spanish colonial times.

Small drops of blood stain Pope Francis' white cassock as he speaks with Cartagena's Archbishop Jorge Enrique Jimenez Carvajal after knocking his face next to his eye on the popemobile as he speaks with Cartagena's Archbishop Jorge Enrique Jimenez Carvajal in Cartagena, Colombia, Sunday, Sept. 10, 2017. Pope Francis arrived to Cartagena to honor St. Peter Claver, a 17th-century Jesuit who ministered to the tens of thousands of African slaves who arrived in the port to be sold. Francis returns to Rome on Sunday night.(AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)

A small drop of blood stains Pope Francis' white cassock as he is helped by a priest, after knocking his head on the popemobile in Cartagena, Colombia, Sunday, Sept. 10, 2017. Vatican spokesman Greg Burke said that "The pope is fine" but has "a bruise on his cheekbone and eyebrow." (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)

People waits for the arrival of Pope Francis outside the San Pedro Claver church in Cartagena, Colombia, Sunday, Sept. 10, 2017. Pope Francis arrived to Cartagena to honor St. Peter Claver, a 17th-century Jesuit who ministered to the tens of thousands of African slaves who arrived in the port to be sold. Francis returns to Rome on Sunday night.(AP Photo/Ricardo Mazalan)

Pope Francis blesses people as he leaves the Nunciature on route to the Bogota airport on his last day in Colombia, Sunday, Sept., 10, 2017. Francis is heading to Cartagena to honor St. Peter Claver, a 17th-century Jesuit who ministered to the tens of thousands of African slaves who arrived in the port to be sold. Francis returns to Rome on Sunday night. (AP Photo/Ivan Valencia)

Pope Francis waves as he departs the Nunciature in Bogota, Colombia, Sunday, Sept., 10, 2017. Francis slept four nights at the Nunciature during his visit the the South American country. (AP Photo/Fernando Vergara)

Two boys wait for the arrival of Pope Francis outside the San Pedro Claver church in Cartagena, Colombia, Sunday, Sept. 10, 2017. Pope Francis arrived to Cartagena to honor St. Peter Claver, a 17th-century Jesuit who ministered to the tens of thousands of African slaves who arrived in the port to be sold. Francis returns to Rome on Sunday night.(AP Photo/Ricardo Mazalan)
Frank de Boer spoke of his "hope for the future" at Crystal Palace despite the team's record-setting fourth straight loss to open the English Premier League season.

Whether he'll be part of that future remains to be seen.

Palace lost 1-0 at Burnley on Sunday to leave De Boer's position even more fragile at the London club.

Crystal Palace manager Frank de Boer gestures on the touchline during the English Premier League soccer match against Burnley at Turf Moor, Burnley, England, Sunday Sept. 10, 2017. (Martin Rickett/PA via AP)

"I am just focusing on what I can control and so are my staff and my players," De Boer said. "(The future) is for other people to decide but while I'm the manager of Crystal Palace, I will give 100 percent."

The statistics do not make good reading for the former Netherlands defender, who lasted only 84 days in his previous job at Inter Milan: No points, no goals and the first team since 1924 to lose its first four English top-flight games without scoring.

He already was the bookmakers' favorite to be the first Premier League manager to lose his job, with Palace struggling to adapt to a more expansive style of play demanded by De Boer after he came in as a replacement for the more pragmatic Sam Allardyce.

For this game at Turf Moor, he changed formations - ditching the three-man defense he favored in losses to Huddersfield, Liverpool and Swansea - and Palace dominated large parts of the game. However, De Boer was let down by bad errors from his players at both ends of the game.

Inside three minutes, Lee Chung-yong's back-pass from the halfway line was pounced on by Chris Wood, who curled in a first-time shot from 35 meters past stranded goalkeeper Wayne Hennessey. It was Wood's second goal in as many games since he joined from second-tier Leeds.

Then, in the 89th minute, Palace defender Scott Dann was presented with a virtual open goal but he headed wide. De Boer threw his hands into the air in disgust and slumped back into his seat in the dugout.

"I thought they were the better side," Burnley manager Sean Dyche said of Palace. "I told (De Boer) so. I don't feel sorry for anyone in the position - we all know the pitfalls."

Bournemouth and West Ham are the other teams with no points so far. West Ham hosts Huddersfield on Monday to conclude the fourth round of games.

___

SWANSEA 0, NEWCASTLE 1

Renato Sanches made his debut for Swansea following his surprise loan move from Bayern Munich and the Portugal midfielder looked off the pace in a tough start to life in English soccer.

The 20-year-old Sanches battled hard but was sloppy in possession, and had already been substituted by the time Jamaal Lascelles headed home Newcastle's winning goal from a corner in the 76th minute.

"He has come to a new club and has new teammates, a new language, new culture," Swansea manager Paul Clement said of Sanches, who was being talked up as one of Europe's brightest talents last year. "He did things today that were good and some that weren't good. He is a quality player."

The win gives something to cheer for ailing Newcastle manager Rafa Benitez, who wasn't at Liberty Stadium after having a procedure on Monday to address an infection resulting from an earlier hernia operation.

___

More AP Premier League coverage: https://apnews.com/tag/PremierLeague

___

Steve Douglas is at www.twitter.com/sdouglas80

Crystal Palace's Lee Chung-yong appears dejected during the English Premier League soccer match against Burnley at Turf Moor, Burnley, England, Sunday Sept. 10, 2017. (Martin Rickett/PA via AP)
ATLANTA (AP) - Hip-hop star Yasiin Bey performed for what appears to be the last time in his career.

But the rapper also known as Mos Def said in a backstage interview with The Associated Press on Saturday night, he'll continue creating and will return to the public spotlight in the future. He performed for more than an hour at the eighth annual ONE Musicfest in Atlanta.

Bey announced his retirement from the music and acting business after getting into a legal fight in South Africa last year. He was charged with trying to leave the country while using a passport not recognized by that country. He was ultimately allowed to leave but denied re-entry.

FILE - In this March 24, 2016 file photo, American actor and musician Yasiin Bey, also known as Mos Def, leaves the Bellville Magistrates' Court in Bellville, South Africa. Bey took the stage at the ONE Musicfest, a one-day music festival held in Atlanta, for what appeared to be the last performance of his career. (AP Photo/Schalk van Zuydam, File)

The 42-year-old rapper started his farewell concerts at New York City's Apollo Theater late last year.
BAYTOWN, Texas (AP) - The body of a Texas real estate agent was found in a marshy wooded area Saturday more than two weeks after she disappeared the day Hurricane Harvey made landfall, authorities said.

The woman's ex-husband, 44-year-old Steven McDowell, was charged with murder, and booked into Chambers County Jail, awaiting bail to be set.

Crystal McDowell, a 37-year-old real estate agent and mother of two, vanished Aug. 25, the day Harvey landed in the Gulf Coast area of southeast Texas, Chambers County Sheriff Brian Hawthorne said Sunday.

This August 2017 photo provided by Paul Hargrave shows Hargrave with girlfriend Crystal McDowell. McDowell, a 37-year-old Realtor and mother of two, went missing Aug. 25, the day Hurricane Harvey made landfall in Texas. Her ex-husband, Steven McDowell, was charged with her murder on Saturday, Sept. 9. (Paul Hargrave via AP)

She went missing after telling her boyfriend, Paul Hargrave, that she was headed to her ex-husband's house to pick up her children, ages 5 and 8.

Her uncle reported her missing the following day.

"I knew immediately she was deceased," McDowell's friend Morgan Raimondi told the Houston Chronicle.

"When Steve decided that if he couldn't have her, nobody else could, he also made the decision for her children, her family and her friends," Raimondi said of the suspected killer, even before charges were finalized.

Floodwaters and rain hampered the search, but McDowell's partially submerged car was found at a Motel 6 off an interstate highway. Authorities traced the last ping from her cellphone to a marshy area in Baytown, Texas, within a couple of days of her disappearance. By Sept. 2, the roads had cleared enough for search crews to scour parts of Baytown near the final cell phone ping, but they initially came up empty-handed.

As the investigation continued, the list of suspects grew to 9 or 10 people, including McDowell's uncle, Hargrave and her ex-husband, Hawthorne said.

The search resumed Thursday and the body was found Saturday. An inquest was ordered to determine the cause of death.

McDowell's arrest was based on circumstantial evidence, talks with friends and family, and the suspect's candid interview with police, Hawthorne said.
Downing Street has defended its response to Hurricane Irma amid criticism it did not do enough to prepare for the disaster.

A spokeswoman for the Prime Minister called the UKs response swift, after it was suggested it had lagged behind France and the Netherlands in taking care of its territories.

But Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said the Government should have acted much faster given the well-known news about the storm.

British tourists stranded in the affected regions have also hit out at the disgusting way they have been treated by tour operators.

Downing Streets comments came as Theresa May held another meeting of the Governments emergency Cobra committee on Friday to co-ordinate relief efforts for victims.

The spokeswoman told a Westminster briefing: We believe our response was swift. We had a ship pre-positioned. We are getting lifesaving aid now to those who need it.

Foreign Secretary @BorisJohnson responds to the devastation caused by Hurricane Irma and sets out the UK response pic.twitter.com/r4Oicac75l  Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (@FCDOGovUK) September 8, 2017

She said the Government was waiting for a full picture of intelligence to come through, adding: Three flights departed this morning carrying marines and engineers as part of the MoD task force.

Tomorrow, another C17 will leave carrying two Puma helicopters. And the RFA Mounts Bay ship is due to arrive in the British Virgin Islands  bringing aid and helicopters to help deliver supplies.

Downing Street said that the Department for International Developments disaster response centre was sending out supplies of aid to be loaded on to HMS Ocean, which has been diverted from the Mediterranean to head for the Caribbean.

Hurricane Irma's likely path

Labour MP Virendra Sharma said Hurricane Irma was not adequately prepared for, despite indications that it would wreak devastation.

Mr Sharma, who sits on the International Development Committee, welcomed the decision to send further resources, but said: If we had that planned well in advance, then when it actually happened we could have immediately taken steps, like France.

But International Development Secretary Priti Patel said Britain has a naval and military presence in the area, adding: I do think its not right to basically say that weve been caught out.

Hurricanes with the highest wind speed to hit the US

She told Adam Boulton on Sky News: Weve had the vessel out there, Adam, and that vessel has been equipped with the right people and the right skills and the right equipment and the reality is of course, its been a difficult environment to get into because of the scale of the hurricane and the extent to which the devastation has hit the countries as well.

We are helping on the ground now and in terms of preparedness, we have the right people on the ground, in country and actually I think this is about making sure that we channel our resources.

Tourists stranded in affected regions have also complained about a lack of information and assistance from holiday companies.

Personnel from all three services are helping in the effort to assist those affected by Hurricane #Irma https://t.co/X78Sp5K3Yf  Ministry of Defence  (@DefenceHQ) September 8, 2017

Paul Phipps, from Essex, who is on his honeymoon in the Bahamas, said he felt let down after being unable to get an earlier flight home to avoid the hurricane.

The 39-year-old, who is due to fly back on Monday, said: We are still here after being let down by Sandals UK and British Airways. Both kept advising only the other could assist with earlier flights home.

There were seats available on a BA flight last night when searching the internet but I was advised by Sandals that BA wouldnt assist as our flight on Monday night hasnt been cancelled.

Its disgusting how Brits in the Bahamas have been treated.

In a tweet to Thomas Cook, Gaz Pritchard said: The Canadians are being evacuated from our hotel in Cuba. British guests are left stranded with no information. Disgusting.

Thomas Cook said it is often safer for customers to stay in their hotels during extreme weather, as they are built to withstand hurricane-strength winds and rain.

Another tourist, Joe, who is staying at a resort in Varadero in Cuba, said his flight had been moved from Friday to Saturday with little explanation.

He wrote: A lot of British people left not knowing what is going on by Thomas Cook in Varadero.
Boris Johnson has suggested the European Union has a legal duty under Article 50 to discuss a future trading relationship with Britain at the same time as working through so-called Brexit divorce issues.

The Foreign Secretary intervened after senior European figures, including EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier, voiced scepticism that talks would move on to future trade relations by the previously planned date of October.

The UK Government has been pushing to begin trade talks, arguing they are inseparable from the withdrawal issues which are currently being pored over by negotiators.

Boris Johnson

.@SteveBakerHW wrote in @politicshome about the Repeal Bill and how we'll ensure Parliament gives it proper scrutiny https://t.co/xg00yLl5yJ pic.twitter.com/oCdjvTlN6C  Department for Exiting the EU (@DExEUgov) September 8, 2017

But the EU insists that sufficient progress must be made on the divorce issues  a financial settlement, citizens rights, and the Irish border  before trade talks can begin.

Arriving for an informal summit of EU foreign ministers in Tallinn, Estonia, Mr Johnson said Article 50, which provides the framework for the exit of a country from the bloc, states that the two sides should discuss future relations.

Article 50 makes it very clear that the discussion about the exit for a country must be taken in context with discussion of the future arrangements, and thats what we are going to do, the Foreign Secretary told reporters.

Watch David Davis speaking about the Repeal Bill, which will bring certainty, continuity and control as we leave the EU pic.twitter.com/ocnKz9Lt9p  Department for Exiting the EU (@DExEUgov) September 8, 2017

However, his comments came after Mr Barnier made clear that he was not yet in a position to declare that sufficient progress has been made on withdrawal issues to move on to future trade negotiations.

And other senior European figures expressed doubts that this stage will be reached by October, when London is hoping that leaders of the remaining 27 member states will give the green light to trade talks.

European Parliament president Antonio Tajani said he would advise the European Council to delay its assessment until December, while former Council president Herman van Rompuy said the chances of moving on to the second phase in October were in the neighbourhood of zero.

Mr Johnson said he had rock-solid confidence in the Governments ability to get a good deal as he dismissed EU concerns over Britains approach to the thorny issue of maintaining a soft Irish border after Brexit.

On Thursday, Mr Barnier fired a sharp rebuke at London as he called for a unique solution for the island of Ireland, accusing the Government of trying to get the EU to suspend its laws, customs unions and single market along the six counties of Northern Ireland.

What I see in the UKs paper on Ireland and Northern Ireland worries me, he said.

Mr Johnson responded: I think we can all work together to come up with a solution to that one.

It is not beyond the wit of man. We have had a common travel area between the north and the south of Ireland for getting on for a century and we are going to continue to make that work.
North Korea illegally exported coal, iron and other commodities worth at least 204 million to China and other countries including India, Malaysia and Sri Lanka during a six-month period, in breach of United Nations sanctions, the world body says.

In a report released on Saturday, UN experts said Kim Jong Uns government continued to flout sanctions on commodities, as well as an arms embargo and restrictions on shipping and financial activities, during the perios which ended in early August.

They said North Korea was also reportedly continuing banned nuclear activities with weapons-grade fissile material production at the Yongbyon nuclear complex, construction and maintenance at the Punggye-ri nuclear test site, and at a uranium mine in Pyongsan.

(PA graphic)

The eight-member panel of experts said it was also investigating the widespread presence of North Koreans in Africa and the Middle East, particularly in Syria, including their involvement in prohibited activities.

The experts said one inquiry is into reported prohibited chemical, ballistic missile and conventional arms co-operation between Syria and the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea, the countrys official name.

They said this included activities on Syrian Scud missile programmes and maintenance and repair of Syrian surface-to-air missiles (SAM) air defence systems.

The panel noted that two unnamed countries reported intercepting shipments destined for Syria. It did not identify the contents and said Syria had yet to respond to its inquiries.

DPR Korea: I am ready to support any efforts towards a peaceful solution of this alarming situation -@AntonioGuterres pic.twitter.com/eBF1fWfuCH  United Nations (@UN) September 5, 2017

The 111-page report was written before North Koreas sixth and most powerful nuclear test last Sunday and its latest launch of a powerful new intermediate-range ballistic missile over Japan.

It was made public two days before the United States has called for a vote on a new sanctions resolution.

The original US draft would impose the toughest-yet sanctions on North Korea including banning all oil and natural gas exports to the country and freezing all foreign financial assets of the government and Kim.

The experts said implementation of existing sanctions lags far behind what is necessary to achieve the core goal of denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula.

Once again the SC has spoken in unison--demanding N.Korea stop missile launches, abandon its nuclear weapons & implement sanctions. pic.twitter.com/S62MDo1zzU  Archive: Ambassador Nikki Haley (@AmbNikkiHaley) August 30, 2017

They blamed lax enforcement of sanctions coupled North Koreas evolving evasion techniques for undermining the achievement of this goal which would see the North abandon all weapons of mass destruction.

On the export of commodities  a key source of foreign exchange for the DPRK  the experts said that following Chinas suspension of coal imports from the North in February, the DPRK has been rerouting coal to other countries including Malaysia and Vietnam.

The panel said imports of DPRK coal, iron and iron ore violate UN sanctions unless the countries have received an exemption.

Between December 2016 and May 2017, for example, the DPRK exported more than 60 million of iron ore to China, the report said. And between October 2016 and May 2017, it exported iron and steel products to Egypt, China, France, India, Ireland and Mexico, valued at 231,000.

Many DPRK financial institutions maintain representatives overseas who conduct transactions that facilitate prohibited programmes; many foreign financial institutions wittingly or unwittingly provide banking services to DPRK front companies and others engaged in prohibited activities; and foreign investments in DPRK banks or joint ventures give those banks access to funding and the international financial system.
A man has been arrested for allegedly driving one of a pair of boats that took 305 Syrian refugees to the north-west coast of Cyprus.

Police spokesman Michalis Ioannou said Sunday that the 202 men, 30 women and 73 children who arrived at around midnight were thought to be the largest number of migrants to reach Cyprus in a single day.

Mr Ioannou said they left from Mersin, Turkey on Saturday.

Syrian migrants arrive at the refugee camp at Kokkinotrimithia (Petros Karadjias/AP)

He said the passengers reported paying 1,500 each for the trip.

Some with relatives in Cyprus have expressed the desire to remain there. Others said they want to go to Germany or to Scandinavian countries.

All will be taken to a reception centre except for a woman and her newborn baby, who were taken to hospital.
A British tourist caught in the path of Hurricane Irma has said he is thankful to be here after he was rescued by the US Air Force.

Alex Woolfall was on holiday on the Caribbean island of St Martin when the historic storm struck.

The PR consultant, from London, went on Twitter to post updates as winds battered the Westin Hotel, where he was sheltering in a concrete stairwell.

Hurricane Irma's likely path across Florida

He wrote: My God this noise! Its like standing behind a jet engine!! Constant booms & bangs. At least concrete stairwell not moving

Mr Woolfall said he was airlifted to safety in Puerto Rico by a military plane as powerful Hurricane Jose was approaching.

I am just tired but very thankful to be here, he told the Press Association after his rescue. I think probably all those on vacation would say it was a nightmare but its over for us.

What about the people of St Martin and the other islands? I just hope the aid and support they need comes.

Mr Woolfall described the devastation on the island after Irma hit.

Its very badly damaged and its heart-breaking to see people whose homes have been destroyed sitting outside in the street, especially when you see young children too.

Mr Woolfall said local hotel staff continued coming to work, despite the damage to their own property, while the manager worked tirelessly to arrange planes.

I found that astonishing and very moving, he added.
A Celtic handbell from the seventh century which holds significant sentimental value has been stolen from a church.

It is believed to have been taken from Fortingall Church, near to Aberfeldy, sometime between Sunday September 3, and Friday.

The distinctive artefact had been in the possession of the Fortingall and Glenlyon Church for about 1,200 years.

Handbell

Reverend Anne Brennan said: We are all just really upset that somebody would take something of such historical value.

Its got no monetary value, but in other ways its completely irreplaceable, not just for the church but for the whole area.

Wed just like to have it back, we would be happy to have it back however.

Anyone with information is urged to call Police Scotland on 101, quoting reference number CR/23634/17 (Andrew Milligan/PA)

The quadrangular iron bell is coated with bronze and had been encased behind a locked metal cage within a niche purposely built into the churchs wall.

This had been broken into and the priceless item removed.

The parish church is on an early Christian site, dedicated to Coeddi, bishop of Iona.

It is believed to have been founded from the Hebridean island as a daughter monastery, around 700.

Any information which may lead to the bells return is being asked by Police Scotland to call 101 quoting reference number CR/23634/17.
Gibraltars chief minister is keen to forge even stronger ties with the United Kingdom after Brexit.

Chief Minister Fabian Picardo said his goal after Britain leaves the European Union in 2019 is to cement the relationship with the United Kingdom in terms of both sovereignty and a commercial relationship.

Mr Picardo, speaking to the Associated Press, said he wants to establish that bilateral relationship of trade to continue the morning after Brexit as if the single market between Gibraltar and the UK seamlessly moved from one moment to the next.

Gibraltar, a rocky outcrop at the tip of the Iberian Peninsula with 32,000 residents and a British territory, has strong economic connections with surrounding Spanish regions.

In last years Brexit vote, 96% of Gibraltarians voted for Britain to remain in the EU.

Mr Picardo spoke on the 50th anniversary of the 1967 referendum when Gibraltars inhabitants voted to remain a part of the UK and reject Spanish sovereignty.

Spain, however, has never relinquished its claim to Gibraltar, which has a strategic position at the entrance to the Mediterranean Sea, since ceding its control over Gibraltar to Britain in 1713.

Mr Picardo said he is hopeful Spain will not use the Brexit negotiations as an opportunity to re-exert control over the territory.

He welcomed what he called the new realism of Spanish foreign minister Alfonso Dastis.

People take part in the National Day celebrations in Gibraltar (Marcos Moreno/AP)

I think we have seen since the change  a new realism emerge into the importance of Brexit for the whole European Union and for this region around Gibraltar of Spain in particular.

That this is not a time to exploit opportunities to try and advance the sovereignty claim, Mr Picardo said.

I think it is a time to preserve the ability of people in Spain to come and work in Gibraltar, the ability of people who work in Gibraltar to live in Spain, and to have that neutrality of interests recognised, he said.

Mr Dastis has said Madrids position remains that Britains control of Gibraltar violates the territorial integrity of our country.

Negotiations between the EU and the UK regarding Britains exit from the 28-country bloc are ongoing.
Britains Alfie Hewett was beaten by Stephane Houdet in the final of the wheelchair singles at the US Open.

The 19-year-old from Norfolk had hoped to add the title in New York to the maiden grand slam trophy he won at the French Open earlier this summer. But Hewett succumbed to fatigue and the experience of 46-year-old Frenchman Houdet, losing 6-2 4-6 6-3.

It has been a busy couple of days for Hewett, who edged compatriot Gordon Reid in a three-hour semi-final on Saturday before teaming up with the Scot to beat Houdet and Nicolas Peifer in the doubles final.

Alfie Hewett in action during Wimbledon

The teenager was out-manoeuvred by Houdet in the opening set and could not hide his frustration in the final game but he recovered from a break down in the second to level when the Frenchman double-faulted.

However it was Houdet, for whom this is a first slam singles title in four years, who was the stronger in the final set, Hewett failing to hold his serve once.

Hewett said: Congratulations to Steph for a great final. I just didnt have enough in the tank today after such an exhausting singles and doubles yesterday. But Im proud to be in the final, my first time here, theres a lot of positives to take and hopefully I can be back next year.
President Donald Trump said we may have been a little bit lucky after Hurricane Irma veered from its original course and headed along Floridas west coast, instead of east.

He said that path might be less destructive.

The president said Irma will cost a lot of money but that he is most concerned at this point with saving lives.

Mr Trump commented hours after the nearly 400-mile-wide storm blew ashore early on Sunday in the Florida Keys, made landfall on Marco Island on the states west coast and was barrelling toward Tampa, which has not suffered a direct hit from a major hurricane in nearly 100 years.

He also spoke before state and local officials had begun to assess the damage.

We may have been a little bit lucky in that it went on the west and it may not have been quite as destructive, but were going to see, Mr Trump said, addressing reporters after returning to the White House from Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland where he spent the weekend monitoring the storm.

Its going to play out over the next five or six hours, said Mr Trump, who was accompanied by his wife, Melania.

Today's video conference #HurricaneIrma briefing by @Fema at Camp David.

Thank you to 1st responders! Stay safe! pic.twitter.com/jLF6vSvgDO  Melania Trump 45 Archived (@FLOTUS45) September 10, 2017

Mr Trump deflected questions about the billions of dollars the government will be asked to spend to help communities in Florida and other affected states rebuild after Irma, saying right now were worried about lives, not cost.

Mr Trump on Friday signed a 15.3 billion US dollars measure to replenish accounts at the Federal Emergency Management Agency and speed federal assistance to victims of Hurricane Harvey, which struck southeast Texas and neighbouring Louisiana towns just three weeks ago.

The president made two trips to Texas after Harvey struck.

He said on Sunday that were going to Florida very soon.

.@POTUS sent me to @FEMA to tell them & the people of FL "wherever #HurricaneIrma goes, we will be there first to rescue, recover & rebuild"  Vice President Mike Pence Archived (@VP45) September 10, 2017

Mr Trump said he would be having additional meetings on Sunday about coordination for the storm response.

The White House said Mr Trump had received a comprehensive update on Irma earlier Sunday while at Camp David that included details on her status, forecasted path, evacuations and preparations for response and recovery.

He thanked Fema and the Homeland Security Department, which oversees the agency, for their efforts, and encouraged officials to also stay focused on the post-Harvey recovery.

Mr Trump also spoke with the governors of Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina and Tennessee.

Forecasters warned that after churning up Floridas west coast, a weakened Irma could push into those states.

(PA Graphics)

The National Weather Service on Sunday issued a first-ever tropical storm warning for Atlanta,

Florida governor Rick Scott said he also talked with Mr Trump on Sunday.

At the White House, Mr Trump described Irma as a rough hurricane and some big monster and said he was most concerned about its strength.

Donald Trump

He said Fema has been incredible and that the US Coast Guard deserved tremendous credit for its storm response.

If you talk about branding, no brand has improved more than the United States Coast Guard, said Mr Trump, a former businessman.
By Alex Whiting

ROME, Sept 5 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - It is possible to protect the world's poorest from the worst impacts of drought, even in Ethiopia where back-to-back droughts have left 8.5 million people in need of food aid, heads of U.N. food agencies said after a tour of the country.

But more investment is needed in long-term projects that can help prevent future droughts from developing into major food crises, they said on Tuesday.

Ethiopia's Somali Region, where rains have failed for the third consecutive year, is experiencing emergency levels of hunger - one level below famine in a five-point scale used by food agencies.

About 2 million animals have died there since the end of last year, crippling herding communities, according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

"A drought does not need to become an emergency," said Gilbert Houngbo, president of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), which provides governments with loans and technical expertise for rural development projects.

Investment in irrigation, water points, rural financial institutions, health and veterinary services helps communities to protect themselves and their livestock through even a devastating drought, he said.

"We know what works ... This is what we need to build on," Houngbo said in a statement.

Eastern and southern Africa were hit hard last year by drought exacerbated by El Nino - a warming of sea-surface temperatures in the Pacific Ocean - that wilted crops, slowed economic growth and drove food prices higher.

A strong aid response almost halved the number of Ethiopians needing food aid to 5.6 million by January. But the drought was followed by poor spring rains in the south and east of the country.

Herding communities need emergency aid to keep their remaining animals alive, as well as long-term help to improve their resilience to droughts, according to FAO.

"We've witnessed here that saving livelihoods means saving lives - it is people's best defence against drought," said Jose Graziano da Silva, FAO's director-general.

"It is essential to invest in preparedness and provide farmers and rural communities with knowledge and tools to safeguard themselves and their livelihoods," he said.

In Ethiopia's Tigray region, irrigation schemes, fruit nurseries and health centres are boosting productivity, incomes and nutrition, helping communities better withstand external shocks like droughts, the U.N. agencies said.

Models used by the U.N. agencies in Ethiopia will be replicated and scaled up around the world, said David Beasley, head of the World Food Programme, which distributes emergency food aid to 3.3 million people in Somali Region.

"We need to save lives while investing to support (a) sustainable, resilient environment for communities across the globe so they prosper and succeed," he said. (Reporting by Alex Whiting @Alexwhi, Editing by Ros Russell.; Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, climate change, resilience, women's rights, trafficking and property rights. Visit http://news.trust.org/climate)
By Rozanna Latiff and Emily Chow

KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 10 (Reuters) - In a room packed with Malaysian civil servants, foreign ministry secretary general Ramlan Ibrahim raised his right hand as he read out an anti-corruption pledge.

He was among thousands of state officials nationwide to take such an oath in the past several weeks, part of an anti-graft campaign called by Prime Minister Najib Razak.

"The citizens are becoming more informed ... they ask for public service which is more efficient, transparent and fair," Ramlan said after the event in Putrajaya, the administrative capital.

The campaign comes as Najib prepares to meet President Donald Trump in the United States this week, where the Justice Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation are pursuing investigations into 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB), a state fund the prime minister oversaw.

Najib must also call a general election by mid-2018 although some commentators have suggested he could do so this year itself.

The Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) has arrested dozens of top officials under the anti-graft campaign, including officers at national oil company Petronas and state-controlled palm oil firm Felda. More than 600 arrests were made just this year, MACC data showed.

The actions are unusual in the Southeast Asian country, where corruption is seen as widespread. Four out of five Malaysians aged 18-35 cited corruption as the most serious issue facing the country, according to a survey released last month by the Global Shapers Community, a programme under the World Economic Forum.

But critics say the campaign ignores the elephant in the room: 1MDB.

The state fund is being investigated in at least six countries for money-laundering and misappropriation of funds, including an alleged $681 million transfer into the prime minister's personal account.

Malaysia's attorney-general closed the 1MDB probe in January 2016, and cleared Najib of any wrongdoing.

The U.S. Justice Department has sought to seize about $1.7 billion in assets allegedly bought with stolen 1MDB funds. Its lawsuits say those involved included Najibs step-son Riza Aziz and his close associate Jho Low.

In court filings last Tuesday, the FBI, which is conducting a criminal investigation, alleged that potential witnesses in the case fear for their safety and need protection.

But investigations into 1MDB in Malaysia appear to have shut down. MACC had "a roomful" of files on 1MDB, a former MACC official told Reuters, but the commission could not pursue it once Malaysia's attorney-general declared the case closed.

REOPEN CASE

"In a way, this campaign is the MACC trying to show that it is doing its job. Even if they cannot secure a conviction (against their targets), the MACC can show that it has done all it could to stamp out major corruption," said the former official, who declined to be identified due to the sensitivity of the matter.

Cynthia Gabriel, director of the Kuala Lumpur-based Center to Combat Corruption and Cronyism (C4), said there was "enough substance" for MACC to reopen the case on 1MDB.

MACC declined to comment on whether the commission would reopen its 1MDB investigation.

"No comment on that, we are very fair in investigating anybody here, whoever they are," deputy chief commissioner Azam Baki told reporters in Putrajaya.

Anti-corruption campaigners say they fear Trump's invitation to Najib to visit the United States may affect the investigations in the United States.

"Territorial influence and geopolitical interests of the United States appears to have hollowed out its commitment to fight international corruption, much to the detriment of the future of Malaysia and the world," Gabriel said.

U.S.-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Trump's invitation was "particularly inappropriate", given Najib's use of repressive laws to stifle critics.

"There's little doubt that Najib will use this White House visit to burnish his credentials going into next year's election in Malaysia, and redouble his repression of critics using the stamp of approval from this visit," HRW's deputy Asia director Phil Robertson told Reuters.

Najib has said he hopes his visit will drum up more trade and investment for Malaysia.

"I would like to see this as a two way mutually beneficial partnership," he told reporters on Friday. "I hope the U.S. sees Malaysia as a reliable partner on issues such as trade and investment, security partnership, counter terrorism and I also hope that U.S. companies see us as among the best countries to invest in."

A government source said a defence agreement was also on the table, although no details were immediately available.

"STINKS TO HIGH HEAVEN"

Senior leaders of the ruling United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) are concerned the party may suffer election losses from the string of graft scandals linked to Najib, a source aware of discussions within the party said.

With Najib and the MACC's clean-up campaign, the source said, the party hopes to appease Malaysians frustrated with the corruption and draw back foreign investors who fled as the probe into 1MDB expanded.

Besides diverting attention from 1MDB, critics say Najib is also using MACC's anti-graft campaign to target political opponents such as Lim Guan Eng, an opposition leader who is the top elected official in Penang province. He has been charged with abuse of power in the purchase of a bungalow.

"You are going after all sorts of offences, but the biggest one, it stinks to high heaven," said Lim, the secretary-general of the Democratic Action Party. "Everyone can smell it, except you."

(Additional reporting by Joseph Sipalan; editing by Praveen Menon and Raju Gopalakrishnan)
By Saad Sayeed and Syed Raza Hassan

KARACHI, Sept 10 (Reuters) - For an estimated 300,000 Rohingya Muslims living in squalor in Pakistan's largest city, the news from Myanmar in the past two weeks is reviving painful memories of the violence that drove many of them here half a century ago.

Some say they have got word of relatives being killed in Myanmar's Rakhine state or are not being able to contact family members.

Karachi's Rohingya community comprises migrants from an earlier era of displacement dating back to the 1960s and '70s. Despite decades in a foreign land, they have stayed in touch with family back home, especially in recent years through mobile phones and social media.

In the past two weeks, nearly 300,000 Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh after the Myanmar military launched an offensive in response to a series of attacks by Rohingya insurgents on police posts and an army base. Hundreds of homes in Rohingya villages have been burned and about 400 people have been killed.

The older members of Karachi's Rohingya community fled from a repressive military regime that took power in 1962, escaping on foot or by boat to Bangladesh, which was then East Pakistan. Eventually, they made their way to Karachi.

Most of the people living in the slum called Arakanabad were born in Pakistan, or fled violence in their homeland decades ago. It's named for Arakan, which was what Rakhine used to be called.

Raheela Sadiq, a more recent migrant who came to Pakistan 15 years ago, said she has been unable to contact relatives in Rakhine via mobile phone for nearly two weeks.

"I have seen what is happening to people over there on the internet," she said as tears filled her eyes.

Videos and pictures depicting violence in Rakhine and shared on social media are passed around quickly in Arakanabad, adding to fears and anxiety about relatives back home.

Fisherman Noor Mohammed, 50, said three members of his family in Rakhine were killed a few days ago.

"My brother, brother-in-law, and nephew were there (in Rakhine). They are all dead now. The army over there killed them," he said, adding that he heard the news from another nephew who is still alive.

Hoor Bahar, 60, said she left Rakhine with her husband over 30 years ago when her mother and sister were killed.

"I have one sister left who went to Bangladesh seven to 10 days ago," she added. However, she said, her sister is being held on a beach by boatmen who brought her from Rakhine and are demanding $350 as payment.

NO LEGAL STATUS

Arakanabad smells of fish. The Rohingya who live here largely work on fishing boats, or clean the catch brought by fishermen who set sail from the nearby Korangi Creek.

Most of them say they are not able to obtain Pakistani identity cards, essential for opening bank accounts, enrolling children in schools, using public hospitals, and even getting a job. Fishing boats, where identity cards are not asked for, are one of the few employment options left although fishermen can sometimes be asked for identification by coast guards.

"There is no policy in Pakistan for the Rohingya," said Noor Hussain, the Pakistan head of the Rohingya Solidarity Organization, pointing out that the without state-issued identity cards the community cannot progress.

Thousands of Rohingya families are crammed into the one-room cement brick houses that line the narrow streets of Arakanabad.

Children play amidst knee-high garbage, and crowd around to share slices of jello topped with sugar, or other sweetmeats sold by hawkers.

"The community is living in extremely difficult circumstances, and our youth is being destroyed because they cannot get an education," said Hussain.

Despite the poverty, the community raised around 1.5 million rupees ($15,000) over the Eid al-Adha holidays earlier this month to help refugees fleeing Rakhine.

"Our community is not a burden on Pakistan," Hussain said.

"The government of Pakistan is making millions of dollars by exporting the fish our people catch," he said, adding that giving citizenship rights to the Rohingya would only benefit the country. (Writing by Saad Sayeed; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
By Kwiyeon Ha

OSAKA, Japan, Sept 10 (Reuters) - Ethnic Koreans living in Japan are nervously watching growing tensions over North Korea and are wary of a possible backlash against their community as Pyongyang ramps up its sabre-rattling.

While public antipathy towards Koreans does not appear to have escalated in reaction to the North's latest nuclear test and missile launches, the community has been the target of abuse by Japanese nationalists after similar incidents in the past.

The North conducted its most powerful nuclear test ever last week, and in late August fired a ballistic missile over Hokkaido in northern Japan in a new show of force.

In the western Japanese city of Osaka -- home to the country's largest population of ethnic Koreans -- few are willing to talk publicly about North Korea, and those that do have mixed views on Pyongyang's actions.

Pu Kyon Ja, owner of the store selling Korean traditional clothes and a second-generation Korean resident in Japan, said she felt the North's pursuit of nuclear weapons was a natural reaction against threats from the United States.

"I can't say this loudly but I secretly think well done" on North Korea's development of missile and nuclear capabilities, she said. North Korea is "under great pressure (from the international society), which I believe should end."

"I'm watching over the current situation with great hope," she added.

On the other hand, Chung Kap-su, another second-generation Korean in the town, said he hopes North Korea stops further provocations and pursues a peaceful path by seeking dialogue with South Korea.

"North Korea can't defeat (the United States), so I hope it changes its way."

Some 453,096 South Koreans and 32,461 North Koreans lived in Japan last year, according to government data. Many were forced to move there during Japan's occupation of the Korean peninsula before and during World War Two.

Japan passed an anti-hate law last year, which may be discouraging fresh acts of abuse against the community, but the issue still bears watching, said Moon Gyeong-su, professor of ethnic Korean studies at Ritsumeikan University in Kyoto.

"When North Korea launches missile or conducts nuclear tests, for example, Korean schools have been an easy target for bullies and accusations (in Japan)," he added. (Writing by Tetsushi Kajimoto; Editing by Kim Coghill)
BEIRUT, Sept 10 (Reuters) - Israeli jets flew low over the city of Saida in southern Lebanon on Sunday causing sonic booms that broke windows and shook buildings for the first time in years, security sources and residents said.

Israeli warplanes regularly enter Lebanese airspace, the Lebanese military says, but rarely fly so low.

The Israeli military gave no immediate comment.

The sonic booms also caused panic in Saida, residents said.

Tension has risen between Lebanon's Shi'ite group Hezbollah and Israel, which last fought a war in 2006.

Hezbollah has played down the prospects of another imminent conflict but warned it could take place on Israeli territory, and said its rockets could hit targets anywhere in Israel.

Israel's air force chief has said it would use all its strength in a future war with Hezbollah.

The 2006 war killed 1,200 Lebanese, mostly civilians, and 160 Israelis, mostly soldiers. (Reporting by John Davison and Ali Hashisho; Additional reporting by Maayan Lubell in Jerusalem; Editing by Mark Potter)
Sept 10 (Reuters) - Iran will reach an oil production rate of 4.5 million barrels per day (bpd) within five years, Ali Kardor, the managing director of the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC), said Sunday according to the oil ministry news site SHANA.

Iran has been producing around 3.8 million bpd in recent months.

Iranian gas production will reach 1.3 billion cubic meters per day and production of gas condensate will reach 864,000 bpd in the next five years, Kardor said.

The boost in oil production will come from an increase of 420,000 bpd from the West Karoun oil field and an additional 280,000 bps from oil fields in central and southern Iran as well as the Falat Ghare oil company, Kardor told SHANA.

Oil exports are expected to reach up to 2.5 million bpd within five years, Kardor added.

The increase in gas production is expected to come from South Pars, the worlds largest gas field, according to Kardor. (Reporting by Babak Dehghanpisheh; Editing by Mark Potter)
BRASILIA, Sept 10 (Reuters) - Brazil Supreme Court Justice Edson Fachin ordered on Sunday the arrest of billionaire Joesley Batista, one of the owners of the worlds largest meatpackers, JBS SA, and one of his executives, a person with knowledge of the matter said.

Fachin agreed to a request by Brazil's Prosecutor-General Rodrigo Janot, who revoked benefits granted by a plea bargain deal struck by Batista and Ricardo Saud, a former director of holding company J&F Investimentos.

Press representatives for Batista and Saud declined to comment on Sunday. The Supreme Court did not have an immediate comment.

Janot revoked the privileges granted to Batista and Saud after they appeared to have recorded themselves discussing crimes not covered in the plea bargain. The taped conversation, made public by the Supreme Court, was inadvertently submitted to prosecutors with unrelated material last week.

After the recording was made public, J&F said in a statement that Batista and Saud had simply been discussing hypotheses in the conversation, not facts.

The Supreme Court Justice denied a request for the arrest of former prosecutor Marcelo Miller, who was accused by the prosecutor-general of helping the Batistas with their plea deal before leaving the Prosecutors Office in April to a private law firm. (Reporting by Ricardo Brito; Additional reporting by Tatiana Bautzer in Sao Paulo; Editing by Gareth Jones)
By Sergei Karazy

PRZEMYSL, Poland, Sept 10 (Reuters) - A train carrying former Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili and his supporters was prevented from leaving a railway station in Poland for Ukraine on Sunday, deepening a standoff between Saakashvili and the Ukrainian authorities.

Saakashvili intended to return to Ukraine despite being stripped of Ukrainian citizenship by his one-time ally, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, and being threatened with arrest and extradition if he sets foot on Ukrainian soil.

Poroshenko invited Saakashvili to become a regional governor in Ukraine to help drive reforms after pro-democracy protests in 2014 ousted a pro-Russian president in Kiev.

But Saakashvili quit as governor of Odessa last November, accusing Poroshenko of abetting corruption.

Thousands of Saakashvili's supporters gathered on the Ukraine-Poland border on Sunday while prominent lawmakers, including former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, travelled with him from Poland.

But the train was stranded at a railway station in the Polish town of Przemysl. The woman in charge of the Ukrainian train, Inna Smirnova, said she had been ordered by the authorities - she declined to specify whether Polish or Ukrainian - to stop the train leaving until Saakashvili got off.

"Poroshenko took all passengers of this train as hostages and is telling everyone that no-one will go anywhere," Saakashvili told reporters. "There are children here, there are ordinary Ukrainian citizens who want to get home."

A spokesman for Poroshenko was not immediately available for comment. A statement by the Ukrainian national police denied it was behind the stopping of the train. The spokeswoman for the Polish border guard of the Bieszczady region, Elzbieta Pikor, said it was a Ukrainian train, not a Polish one.

"We will perform border checks once the train departs," she said.

Asked about Saakashvili, she said: "The foreigner will be subject to regulations that apply in the Schengen zone with respect to border checks," referring to the European Union's passport-free zone that includes Poland. She declined to elaborate further.

Saakashvili took power in Georgia after a peaceful pro-Western uprising, known as the Rose Revolution, in 2003. The 49-year-old is now wanted on criminal charges in Georgia, which he says were trumped up for political reasons.

Loathed by the Kremlin, Saakashvili was once a natural ally for Poroshenko after Moscow annexed Ukraine's Crimea region in 2014. But he has become one of the Ukrainian president's most vocal critics, casting doubt on the Western-backed authorities' commitment to tackle entrenched corruption. (Additional reporting by Margaryta Chornokondratenko in Krakovets, Ukraine, Pavel Polityuk in Kiev, Marcin Goettig in Warsaw; writing by Matthias Williams; Editing by Gareth Jones)
PARIS, Sept 10 (Reuters) - A French prosecutor said on Sunday that a man arrested last week after a police raid on a flat near Paris had a direct connection with Islamic State.

Police discovered a stash of explosives in the raid last Wednesday in Villejuif, south of Paris, and found TATP, a product often used by suicide bombers.

A second cache of explosive materials was discovered in a nearby town the following day.

Two men who were arrested were put into formal investigation on Sunday and placed in detention, the Paris prosecutor, Francois Molins, told a a news conference. A third suspect was released with no charges.

"Analysis from the material seized showed one of the suspects had been in direct contact in August 2016 with Rachid Kassim via Facebook," Molins said.

Kassim, believed to be a senior Islamic State militant, was targeted by the U.S. military in a strike near the city of Mosul, Iraq, earlier this year.

TATP has been used by militants in several attacks in Western Europe in recent years, including Manchester in May, Brussels in 2016 and Paris in 2015.

More than 230 people have been killed by Islamist-inspired attackers in the past three years in France, which along with the United States and other countries are bombing Islamic State bases in Iraq and Syria. (Reporting by Matthias Blamont, Cyril Camu, Emmanuel Jarry; Editing by Angus MacSwan)
By Philip Pullella and Noe Torres

CARTAGENA, Colombia, Sept 10 (Reuters) - Pope Francis, his eye bandaged after a minor accident in the popemobile, wrapped up his trip to Colombia on Sunday appealing for an end to modern forms of slavery and denouncing political violence in neighboring Venezuela.

His last day in the Andean country got off to a rocky start when he lost his balance and bumped his head while riding in the popemobile. He bruised his cheekbone and cut his left eyebrow, blood staining his white cassock.

The Vatican said he received ice treatment and was fine. A smiling pope continued the trip wearing a bandage over his cut. "I was punched. I'm fine," he joked afterwards, the bruises on his face clearly visible.

The pope flew from Bogota to Cartagena, a top tourist destination famous for its colonial walled ramparts that was home to Saint Peter Claver, a Spanish priest who ministered to slaves in Colombia in the 1600s, defying Spanish colonial masters who treated them as chattel.

The pope used the occasion to again decry modern slavery and human trafficking and defend the rights of immigrants.

Human rights groups estimate that millions of people around the world are victims of human trafficking and forms of modern slavery such as forced labor and prostitution.

"Here in Colombia and in the world millions of people are still being sold as slaves; they either beg for some expressions of humanity, moments of tenderness, or they flee by sea or land because they have lost everything, primarily their dignity and their rights," he said just before praying before Claver's relics.

Some 300 Afro-Colombians who receive assistance from the Jesuit religious order, of which the pope is a member, prayed with him in the church.

Francis visited the impoverished neighborhood of San Francisco and blessed the cornerstone of a shelter for at-risk Afro-Colombian girls vulnerable to child prostitution, drugs and violence.

VENEZUELA APPEAL

Later, the first Latin American pope said he was praying for the wellbeing of all countries on the continent but particularly Venezuela, which has been caught up in a social and economic crisis.

"I express my closeness to all the sons and daughters of that beloved nation, as well as to all those who have found a place of welcome here in Colombia," referring to the tens of thousands of Venezuelans who have crossed the border to find food and medicine.

"From this city, known as the seat of human rights, I appeal for the rejection of all violence in political life and for a solution to the current grave crisis, which affects everyone, particularly the poorest and most disadvantaged of society," he said.

National Human Rights Day is celebrated in Colombia on Sept. 8, the day Claver died in 1654.

Venezuela has been convulsed by months of near-daily protests against leftist President Nicolas Maduro, who critics say has plunged the oil-rich country into the worst economic crisis in its history and is turning it into a dictatorship.

Maduro has said that he is the victim of an "armed insurrection" and an "economic war" by U.S.-backed opponents seeking to gain control of the OPEC member's oil reserves.

World bodies and foreign governments have expressed concern about the shortage of food and medicine in Venezuela and called for political dialogue between Maduro and the opposition. Church leaders in Venezuela have made a series of highly critical speeches since late last year.

Francis used the trip to urge Colombians deeply polarized by a peace plan to shun vengeance after a bloody 50-year civil war. But he also said leaders had to enact laws to end injustice and social inequality that breeds violence.

That kind of social imbalance is evident in Cartagena.

Its narrow cobbled streets and well-preserved church squares attract millions of visitors every year, the economic fruits of which barely touch the lives of the city's poor.

Around the city of under a million people, hundreds of thousands, many displaced by Colombia's civil war, live in makeshift wooden shacks in slums with open sewers and no running water.

The walled city is now the preserve of tourists and luxury hotels, where the poor sell trinkets, coconuts and tropical fruits. (Additional reporting by Helen Murphy and Anastasia Moloney in Bogota; Editing by Helen Murphy and Mary Milliken)
By John Miller and Ben Hirschler

ZURICH/MADRID, Sept 11 (Reuters) - Swiss drugmaker Novartis notched a trial win for its drug cocktail against skin cancer on Monday, while a rival treatment from Roche with slipping sales failed in a separate study with a similar patient group.

All the medicines were tested in melanoma patients who had undergone surgery to cut out tumours and had a genetic mutation called BRAF, making them likely to respond to the targeted cancer pills. Patients with BRAF mutations constitute around half of the melanoma population.

Novartis's mix of Tafinlar and Mekinist slashed the risk of melanoma returning or death by 53 percent versus placebo in patients with stage III disease, according to data released at the European Society for Medical Oncology congress in Madrid.

"These are the best results ever shown for an adjuvant (post-surgery) treatment in stage III melanomas," said Axel Hauschild of the University of Kiel, Germany, one of the main researchers on the Novartis trial. "These are practice-changing results."

The findings by Hauschild and colleagues were also published online in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Novartis senior vice-president Jeff Legos said the company hoped to submit the combination for regulatory approval in the new adjuvant setting by the end of the year.

Roche's Zelboraf, however, did not improve the primary endpoint of disease-free survival in patients with similar disease, although it appeared to be effective in those with earlier-stage melanoma.

The findings suggest Novartis is gaining the upper hand in expanding its combination therapy's use against advanced, high-risk skin cancer for which there is a distinct risk of the potentially deadly tumours emerging elsewhere on the body.

Giving the powerful targeted medicines can have side effects and around a quarter of patients on the Novartis combination had to stop treatment due to adverse events.

Novartis is not alone with successful results in adjuvant melanoma. Bristol-Myers Squibb also reported positive data with its immunotherapy drug Opdivo, which is not restricted to use in patients with BRAF mutant tumours.

Revenue from Novartis's anti-melanoma "Taf-Mek" combination already outpaces Roche's offering.

Tafinlar and Mekinist have been on an upward trajectory, reaping $672 million in sales in 2016, compared to $453 million the previous year.

By contrast, Roche's Zelboraf sales slipped to 213 million Swiss francs ($224 million) in 2016, down around a fifth from their 2014 levels.

While Roche in 2015 began pairing Zelboraf with Cotellic against mutant melanoma to counter combinations like Novartis's that have become standard of care, their revenue combined remains less than half of Novartis's drugs.

Tafinlar and Mekinist were originally developed by GlaxoSmithKline but were acquired by Novartis as part of a complex asset swap between the two companies.

Roche, which began its trial of Zelboraf in patients who had undergone surgery before it had Cotellic approval, said it was disappointed, but said the news was not exclusively dour.

For instance, its trial's separate cohort of patients with less serious stage IIC to IIIB melanoma saw their risk of disease returning cut by 46 percent.

"To our surprise, it was less effective in the higher-risk cohort - it's something we thought would happen the other way around - and it's much more effective in the patients with lower risk," Thomas Buechele, Roche's head of global medical affairs for oncology, said in an interview.

"This is a bit sad, as a clinician, because there is certainly a clinical benefit here."

Buechele said he would discuss the mixed data with regulators. The company does not plan any more studies in the adjuvant setting with Zelboraf and Cotellic. (Editing by Dale Hudson and Mark Potter)
DUBAI, Sept 11 (Reuters) - A prominent Saudi religious leader has been arrested, according to social media postings on Sunday, in what appears to be a crackdown on Islamists seen as critics of the conservative kingdom's absolute rulers.

Sheikh Salman al-Awdah, an influential cleric who was imprisoned from 1994-99 for agitating for political change and has 14 million followers on Twitter, appears to have been detained over the weekend, the posting suggested.

In one of his last postings on Twitter, he welcomed a report on Friday suggesting that a three-month-old row between Qatar and four Arab countries led by Saudi Arabia may be resolved.

"May God harmonize between their hearts for the good of their people," Awdah said on Twitter after a report of a telephone call between Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to discuss ways to resolve the rift which began in June.

Hopes for a breakthrough were quickly dashed when Saudi Arabia suspended any dialogue with Qatar, accusing it of "distorting facts".

Saudi Arabia, along with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Egypt accuse Qatar of supporting Islamist militants, a charge Doha denies.

Awdah was the second cleric reported detained by Saudi authorities in the past week. Reports on social media said that Awad al-Qarni, another prominent cleric with 2.2 million Twitter followers, was also detained from his home in Abha in southern Saudi Arabia.

Like Awdah, Qarni had also expressed support for reconciliation between Arab countries and Qatar.

Saudi officials could not immediately be reached for a comment on the reported arrests.

The al-Saud family has always regarded Islamist groups as the biggest internal threat to its rule over a country where appeals to religious sentiment can never be lightly dismissed and where Islamist militants have previously targeted the state.

A decade ago it fought off an al Qaeda campaign of attacks targeting officials and foreigners that killed hundreds. In the 1990s, the Sahwa (Awakening) movement inspired by the Muslim Brotherhood demanded political reforms that would have weakened the ruling family.

Reports of the arrests coincided with widespread speculation, dismissed by officials, that King Salman intends to abdicate in favour of Crown Prince Mohammed.

Asked about the reasons for the arrests, a Saudi analyst speculated: "(To) crush the Muslim Brotherhood or scare others if their plan is for him (Crown Prince Mohammed) to be king."

Exiled Saudi opposition activists have called for protests on September 15 intended to galvanise opposition to the royal family. (Reporting by Sami Aboudi; Editing by William Maclean and Sandra Maler)
The war on terror that followed the September 11, 2001 Attacks in the United States has left a bloody and devastating trail of conflict ridden societies with Middle East, North Africa inheriting a decade and half of total violence and state failure leading to myriad of regional crises. Yet last few weeks in global affairs may have been a unique period in the whole 16 years since the beginning of the war on terror campaign officially launched on October 7, 2001 by the United States to uproot the Taliban from Afghanistan. Global news agencies and media reported less and less of terrorism or extremist driven violence, and instead was dominated by a new fear of all out war in Asia and possible nuclear war in the Korean peninsula whilst the shock and awe of mother nature has further distracted both nuclear and terror debates.



Yet many realities exist with new global and domestic social and political transformations that are taking place at unprecedented speeds, and the articulation of violent extremism still persists and in some context gaining momentum each day. Yet the strategic position of the key states that championed the war on terror remains constant with just tactical moderations, resulting in such states consistently losing the strategic capability to deal with violent extremism. Extremist elements have managed to survive and thrive even at great costs and military defeats.

A Syrian city reduced to rubble and debris following Syrian Army's offensive against ISIS

The US state department listed the names of 28 terror groups in 2002, by 2010 it was nearly 50 and currently stands at 61. The costs of the war are staggering; it is staggering both for the US led alliance as well as the states and people that are victims of the conflict. For the Americans the cost of the war on terror has reached an astounding 5 Trillion dollars. Yet the number of insurgents they are fighting are increasing in all theatres the war on terror is unfolding from 13 Islamist groups in 2002 by 2015 it had increased to 44 groups and from a mere 30,000 odd fighters with the recent recruitment drives of ISIS and its affiliates active fighter numbers have increased to 100,000.



The intention of this column is not to castigate the United States as the catalyst for all evil, instead critically analyse and explain when the most powerful country on earth errs and provides erroneous strategic guidance in combating a global adversary the consequences are shared by almost all, thus there is a certain responsibility for the United States for course correction and providing resources to implement necessary actions to prevent further crises.

In the last two years alone, all major cosmopolitan European cities from Paris, Brussels, to Manchester had experienced terror attacks, softer targets with hard political consequences



Yet this is complicated by a set of new factors, the primary factor is that the global position of the United States and its international standing has become precarious. It is no longer the hyper power it was at 2001, it is still the most decisive military power on earth but not the hegemony. The war on terror has come at both a global and domestic cost for the United States from economic slowdown, military overreach, massive domestic governance under- reach creating domestic political chaos and a foreign policy that lack a coherent strategy to deal with the complex global challenges of the day.

The stalling of the war machine that led the war on terror coupled with some new realities are bringing in more actors to deal with extremists, yet their intentions may be different. The best example is the Russian campaign in Syria and the only key terror related developments that took place last week was Russian military support to the Assad regime to break the 3 year old siege of the township of Deir ez-Zor by ISIS fighters, among a few of the last remaining ISIS strongholds in Syria.



The Russian military support or the Iranian involvement in Syria may have different set of strategic expectations than what the Americans perceived in creating a global alliance against terror when they initially launched the war on terror. Its primary deviance from American led efforts was that it was not using the campaign against Islamists with the intention of regime change. Regime change was a cornerstone of American foreign policy when it came to the war on terror.



Another critical factor is that the war on terror though it had many allies was purely driven by American interests primarily to prevent terrorist attacks against the United States, its citizens, its interests, and to augment that protection to US allies. Thus critical reflections by strategists and academics claim that US is still not safer from terrorism and at the same time the threat was inflated which took important focus away from other strategically important issues and actors in global politics that the United States should have focused and made policy adjustments.



US President Donald Trump made some signature election pledges, defeating radical Islamic terrorism was one of them, yet in his August 2017 review of American policy in Afghanistan he claimed that the US needs to completely defeat and be victorious against radical elements in Afghanistan. Thus it seems sadly what the current administration is not realizing is the fact that the central challenge to todays turbulent world is not a single strategic fix, especially in the context of the recession of American power and influence in global affairs.



Sixteen years on from the 9/11 attacks that created a new historical epoch in the policy and academic debates about international security there are some enduring realities. Terrorism is not the number one challenge to global stability it comes in the form of breakdown of the existing global order, emergence of multiple contending national powers for regional and global dominance, expanding nuclear rivalries such as the Korean dilemma and expanding the gulf between the privileged few and diminishing middle class.



Yet extremist ideologies seem to benefit from the above mentioned global turmoil. Thus extremism coupled with violent manifestations still has major repercussions for state stability, economic prosperity and political security. In the last two years alone, all major cosmopolitan European cities from Paris, Brussels, to Manchester had experienced terror attacks, softer targets with hard political consequences.



A greater concern that is engulfing counter terror experts is the ultimate fallout from a total defeat of ISIS. With the fall of Mosul Iraqi government broke the back of the Islamic State and with impending defeats in Syria, the fear is that ISIS will strategically reinvent itself as a fully blown insurgency group and will swarm and distribute its international fighters to a multitude of global locations. ISIS has the potential to be a terror swarm unlike any the global security community has ever experienced.

Such fully-blown insurgencies will seriously test the current, one dimensional counter terror strategies and narratives that lead states in the anti terror battle that has adopted. With a smart, agile and multifaceted adversary states are no longer confronted by fanatics that are mindless and senseless. Instead they are confronting extremists who are sophisticated, modern, tech savvy, in control of narratives, skilful recruiters and politically intelligent.



Sri Lanka Army concluded their most recent Colombo Defence Seminar few weeks ago on the theme of countering violent extremism, the writer chaired the crucial final panel which anchored the group workshops comprising of local and international military officers. The biggest take away was that the conventional wisdom was not sufficient to deal with evolving forms of violent extremist architectures. Public private partnerships, global information sharing, education, intelligent counter narratives form a critical bulwark against eternally metastasising conflicts that leave us all vulnerable and unsafe, as we have unconsciously consented to the fact of living with terror while trying to fight it, such a tragic departure from where it all started.



The writer is the Director, Bandaranaike Centre for International Studies (BCIS)
Kasun Pussawella, a journalist, who extensively covered and followed up the alleged murders of 27 prisoners at the Welikada Prison in 2012, will be launching a book titled 12-11-10 Welikada on Friday, September 15 at the Mahaweli Centre, Colombo.

The killings, which commenced following a prison riot on the November 9, 2009, and went on to the wee hours of November 10, 2009 were documented following several eye witness and other sourced accounts.

Pussawella, an award winning journalist, attached to the Ravaya Newspaper and thereafter the Irudina Mewspaper, spearheaded exposes in to the alleged murders, in both newspapers.

A public petition will be signed at the venue following the launch of the book.
At least nine persons, including three foreigners, were hospitalised after a luxury bus skidded off the road and crashed into an electric post at Agbopura on the Colombo-Trincomalee Main Road early this morning, to Police said.

The Police said the driver and the conductor of the bus were among the injured and they were admitted to the Kantale and Trincomalee Hospitals.
President Maithripala Sirisena said a Gazette notification would be issued under existing laws to give all private lands, which were not cultivated to those who were willing to cultivate them.

He said all Government lands also would be cultivated under this programme.

He said that decision would be taken under the Vaga Sangramaya Programme to be launched next month to increase the food production by bringing the drought affected lands to the normal conditions.

The President was speaking at the occasion to vest the new Pradeshiya Sabha building in Dimbulagala on Saturday.

He said the Government was taking all such decisions to save the people from poverty, strengthen the national economy and to build a prosperous country for future generations.

He said the Government was carrying out a balanced development porgramme.

The plan of the current Government includes a development which will be shared among all, he said.

I dont have a policy to inquire about the political party of the people when they seek solutions for the problems. I will provide solutions for the problems when fulfilling the peoples requirements, the President stated.

He said the people of Polonnaruwa voted for him without any division of the political parties or colours. He added he would fairly provide the opportunities of the development to all, without any political divisions.

The responsibility of the current Government is not to pay attention on the undue allegations and criticisms of the political rivals in this democracy ensured by the government, but to fulfill our responsibility, he emphasised.

The Pradeshiya Sabha building which with all amenities has been built at a cost of Rs. 7 mn.

The President who arrived in the Pradeshiya Sabha premises engaged in religious activities in the Buddha Mandiraya there.

He then unveiled the plaque and vested the building with public.

He also planted a Na sapling in the Pradeshiya Sabha premises.

Dimbulagama Aranya Senasanadhipathi Ven. Villane Siriyalankara Thera and Maha Sangha, State Minister Vasantha Aluwihare, Chief Minister of North Central Province Peshala Jayarathne, member of the North Central Provincial Council Jayantha Marasinghe, members of Provincial Council N. A. Sampath and H. M. Anzar also participated.
USS John S. McCain sailed within six nautical miles off Mischief Reef, part of the disputed Spratly Islands in the China sea

The Indian Ocean Conference (IOC) held at Temple Trees recently, organized by the India Foundation, was billed as a gathering of IOR countries and other concerned nations with a view to advancing Peace, Progress and Prosperity in the Indian Ocean. While this is no doubt a laudable goal, the absence of perspectives from regional players like China and Pakistan points to somewhat more partisan objectives than those advertised.



The delegate described as Principal, Ambassadors LLC Group, China was actually an American citizen, and while there was ambiguity as to the interests she represented it would be safe to surmise that she did not represent the Peoples Republic of China. However, the US, also an external power, was represented by its Acting Assistant Secretary of State for Central and South Asia, Alice Wells.

A post on the Conferences social media page points to objectives not revealed elsewhere. It describes the gathering as being part of Indias efforts to rejuvenate ties with IOR countries and increase its outreach in the region to counter growing Chinese influence in the region. The IOCs real purpose is candidly stated: The event can be seen as an effort to counter Chinas growing influence in the IOR.

Indias worries over Chinas growing maritime footprint are shared by the US, resulting in converging interests in the IOR



Indias worries over Chinas growing maritime footprint are shared by the US, resulting in converging interests in the IOR. Given its economic downturn, the US seeks like-minded democracies in the Indo-Pacific region to balance China says Indian Ocean researcher Lindsay Hughes. It has strong relationships with Australia, Japan and South Korea but It lacks a similar partner in the eastern Indian Ocean ... Referring to Washingtons agreement with Delhi to share military facilities and its efforts to sign an intelligence-sharing agreement as well, this analyst says that a close partnership with India suits Washingtons strategy of passing some of the responsibility for maintaining security in the Indian Ocean Region to regional partners.

In view of the USs eagerness to strengthen military ties with Sri Lanka, the question arises as to whether the US agenda of containing China has been taken on as well



Wells in her Colombo address unequivocally asserted that the United States is and would continue to be an Indo-Pacific power. It may be noticed that the terms Indo-Pacific or Indo-Asia Pacific, combining the two oceans as if they are a single entity, is increasingly used now by American officials. The terminology may be intended to make the increasing US assertiveness in the IOR seem normal although the US lacks presence in the Indian Ocean comparable to its massive build-up in the Pacific theatre. The USs deepening ties with the Sri Lanka Navy in recent times are also worth noting in this context. At the conference, Alice Wells announced the first ever US-Sri Lanka naval exercise to be carried out in October (in Trincomalee, and to be conducted by the USs Seventh Fleet according to reports).



The US has increasingly referred to Freedom of Navigation and Over flight in its rhetoric, seeking to enlist the support of partners in its enforcement. While in her speech Wells called on others to adhere to a common vision that respected international law as reflected in the Law of the Sea Convention, it is ironic that the US itself has not acceded to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). All the same the US has been in the habit of challenging other states when they act in ways that the US believes pose a threat to freedom of navigation, by sending its warships into the waters concerned. These Freedom of Navigation (FON) assertions by the US have dangerously racked up tensions with China in the South China Sea. In the latest incident reported last month, that the USS John S. McCain sailed within 12 nautical miles (the internationally recognized territorial limit) of Mischief Reef in the Spratly islands, causing Beijing to express displeasure over what it called an act of provocation. The incident took place in disputed waters where Chinas claims are contested by neighbours. The volatility of the situation is compounded by the fact that this was a time when Chinas help was being sought to defuse tensions with North Korea over its missile tests.

In an incident reported last month, USS John S. McCain sailed within 12 nautical miles (the internationally recognized territorial limit) of Mischief Reef in the Spratly islands, causing Beijing to express displeasure over what it called an act of provocation



Armitai Etzioni of The George Washington University, Washington DC says the US is acting, as it is often accused, as the worlds policeman.  .. as far as FONA (Freedom of Navigation Assertions) is concerned, the United States decides on its own which new restrictions introduced by any nation in the world are excessive, and what it considers the correct interpretation of international law and UNCLOS he said in a 2015 paper. And it unilaterally applies its military force ..... to enforce the rules. In short, in these matters the United States acts as accuser, judge, jury, and executioner. Etzioni warns that these types of actions add a security risk as they can quite readily escalate into dangerous clashes between the forces of the super powers.



It is in this context of ambiguity as to the motives of various parties, that Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe pledged at the IOC that Sri Lanka would take the lead in initiating a discussion to deliberate on a stable legal order on freedom of navigation and over flight in the Indian Ocean. In view of the USs eagerness to strengthen military ties with Sri Lanka, the question arises as to whether the US agenda of containing China has been taken on as well. The language used by Indias External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, by comparison, was more circumspect, and did not refer to freedom of navigation but rather President Modis vision of Security and Growth for All in the Region (SAGAR). Given the prevailing tensions in the IOR Sri Lanka will need to beware of being used as the cats paw of any big power in its games of brinkmanship  it does not need to become another South China Sea!



Asked to comment, Palitha Kohona, former head of the UN Treaty Section in New York expressed the view that Sri Lanka must again take a high profile position in discussions relating to the oceans and the blue economy. Dr. Kohona was also Chair of the UN Sixth Committee (Legal), Chair of the UN Committee on Biological Diversity Beyond National Jurisdiction and Chair of the Indian Ocean Committee. He made this assertion given that Sri Lanka, with its 200-mile EEZ and potentially vast continental shelf would increasingly turn to the ocean for its future prosperity (fisheries, petroleum and mineral extraction, environmental protection, including coral reefs, dolphins and whales, migratory fish species, tourism, etc). On an optimistic note he added that Sri Lankas input will be respected where the Convention on the Law of the Sea needs further elaboration or clarification, including in the formulation of codes.



Of course, like many rules of international law, the provisions of the LOSC also tend to be interpreted to suit the convenience of those relying on them. Some major powers are not parties to the LOSC but subscribe to its provisions as reflecting customary international law - the US, Turkey and Venezuela among them he said.
Unique spices, old family recipes and flavorful ingredients can offer a taste of history where written accounts fail  and they are sometimes the only link when that history has been buried beneath the shadows of oppression.

At Monticellos 11th annual Heritage Harvest Festival on Saturday, culinary historian and author Michael Twitty sat down with Corby Kummer, senior editor at The Atlantic, on Saturday to talk about his new book, The Cooking Gene, and how food transmits culture across time.

The Old South is a place where people use food to tell themselves who they are, to tell others who they are, and to tell stories about where theyve been, Twitty wrote, opening his book.

Specializing in African-American culinary history in the Old South, Twitty  self-described as Jewish, Southern, black and gay  became interested in culinary history at 10 years old. Raised in a home full of books and encouraged to pursue his interests, Twitty began learning about different cultures through the food on his friends dinner tables.

I wasnt doing normal kid stuff, Twitty said, garnering a laugh from the audience. Thats how I got here. Kooky, nerdy kids become fabulous adults.

Diving into the past, Twitty said, the places where people lived often determined the kind of food they had and how they cooked it. In Albemarle, Nelson and Orange counties, much of the food used indigenous and African ingredients, but the recipes were influenced by French and British cuisine, Twitty said.

Crops also had a direct impact on which foods people ate and when, he said. All across the South, people ate the same foods, but the spices and seasonings were different  creating unique pockets of cultures.

They had different rhythms and different seasons, Twitty said. It was like speaking a different dialect of soul food.

Often thought of in generic terms, such as Southern or African-American food, Twitty described soul food as an extension of the existence of enslaved people and the recipes they passed down through their families.

Soul food is the memory food of the great-grandchildren of the enslaved people  its them looking back, said Twitty. Some people make soul food and other people make soulless food.

Soulless food  no pepper, no hot sauce, no life or feeling; soul food is emotion, he said. Its like jazz: if you dont know what it is by feeling, I cant explain it to you.

In his work as a culinary historian and living history interpreter, Twitty often thinks about how African food combined with French and English food to create Southern cuisine. On Saturday, Twitty made okra soup to demonstrate one of the meals that might have been made at this time of year on Mulberry Row at Monticello.

This late in the summer, Twitty said, cooks would probably have had okra, tomatoes and fresh herbs (such as sage, rosemary, thyme and basil) on hand. With a limited number of utensils, an enslaved cook would have made a one-pot meal  like soup or stew  and would have to find a nearby flavor source, such as hot peppers.

While both Thomas Jeffersons family and the enslaved people at his estate would have had to use the same types of crops, their meals would have looked very different, Twitty said.

If you want a recipe for trough mush, I got you; ash cake, I got you; herring and hominy, I got you, said Twitty, describing some of the meals available during the 1700s and 1800s. Its not tasty  I know its not.

But thats the food enslaved people and poor whites, and Native folks had to eat every single day, without any sort of variance, until someone caught a rabbit or there were berries available, he said. And thats just the fact.

Southern recipes also can have different narratives passed down, Twitty said, mostly due to the politics of power inculcated in Southern food in ways that just arent in other regions of the country.

Thats what makes the story so complicated and so fuzzy and difficult, said Twitty. On the one side, nothing brings white and black Southerners together faster than having that common narrative.

But on the other side it becomes really, really weird because people will testify to me about their own growing-up experience with Southern food.

In a past demonstration, Twitty made a dish called cush, which is stale cornbread crumbled up into a hash with peppers and onions. Following his presentation, Twitty said he has had white American Southerners tell him that that same recipe was passed down through their families and made for them by a black cook.

They dont mean any harm by it; they literally mean the woman who worked for their family, Twitty said. But the fact of the matter is, it got passed to them because of a system where, for years, the only acceptable job available for black women was as domestics.

In an example that hits close to home for Monticello, Twitty said Jefferson is always credited with bringing macaroni and cheese to America. No credit is ever given to James Hemings  the enslaved cook Jefferson took to France to learn French cuisine, Twitty said.

Jefferson got all the credit, Twitty said. We dont hear about no James Hemings. It was as if this man had time to do everything: he just wrote declarations, he went down to the kitchen  and there were no women around  and he was just whipping stuff up.

Im just like, nuh uh, he said.

Both Violet King and Najwa Thomas, from Washington, D.C., attended the Heritage Festival specifically to see Twitty speak and learn more about his work.

Im a farmer, but I dont necessarily think about food the same way that he does, King said. So, its just really interesting to hear the perspective from a chef.

I think hes brilliant in using food as a connector for people because its very rare that we have these separate experiences as humans, especially in America, where we need so much understanding of each other, Thomas added. Food and eating are something we need to do  its nourishing  so to take history and connect it to that is brilliant.
Thank the creator (as Thomas Jefferson might have said) that we still have a free press. Thanks to Jefferson for insisting on a Bill of Rights, with its First Amendment. With a newly assertive press, the system is working as it should in the presence of a president with authoritarian ambitions compounded by a narcissistic personality disorder.

Writing to Edward Carrington in 1787, Jefferson linked freedom of expression with public opinion as well as happiness. The basis of our government being the opinion of the people, our very first object should be to keep that right, Jefferson told Carrington. Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate for a moment to prefer the latter.

Fake news is hardly novel. The speed, confusion, blaring cacophony and chaos of the internet simply put misinformation on steroids. Politicians have been stoking crowds with lies for a very long time. In 1800, for example, when many newspapers were sponsored by political parties, supporters of John Adams started rumors that Jefferson, his presidential rival, had died. The rumors were convincing enough to bring crowds of Adams supporters into the streets, cheering, until they realized that Jefferson was still alive.

Winston Churchill was fond of saying: A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to put its pants on. Such a prescient thought, given the vapid nature of so much Facebook and Twitter twaddle in a time when our president showcases his barely literate English nearly every day.

In Information Literacy, a course that I teach at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, we share an organization chart of Chinas government, with the chairman of the Communist Party at the top and the media along with other government agencies under him. Thank the creator that our president does not sit at the top of such a pyramid in our country, waving his Twitter finger, issuing executive orders to silence news media that hold him to account as enemies of the people, purveyors of fake news, sick, and so forth.

In Information Literacy, we also hear a lecture on Chinese censorship from Ming Xie, a special guest, who has been taking a Ph.D. in public administration at UNO. In Beijing, she has an interesting job: preparing news summaries of worldwide events for senior members of the Communist Party that most other Chinese dont see.

For our class, she describes the Chinese censorship system and how many Chinese perceive freedom of expression. Chinese publishing, like the rest of its fascinating and swiftly changing society, sometimes does not fit the boxes prescribed for it by Communist Party organization charts that subordinate editors and publishers to government agencies.

Until 1978 (and, in some quarters, still in theory), the main purpose of mass media in China was to strengthen socialist education, to promote proletarianism, and [to] wipe out capitalism, a far cry from prevailing daily practice today in a publishing industry that has exploded in number of titles, revenue and audience.

These days, journalists sometimes jump over the Chinese governments great firewall. For example, in March 2015, a documentary titled Under the Dome, made by Chai Jing, a former anchorwoman on state television, described the impact of Beijings smog on her daughter, who was born with a lung tumor. She obtained permission from censors, but after her documentary received more than 300 million views in one week, the state shut it down, a taste of reality that got astoundingly out of hand.

Thanks to our Constitution and its Bill of Rights, we still enjoy the right to speak truth to power, including  especially  executive power at the highest level. Jefferson and other founders gave us this right in perpetuity. We (and our leaders) also enjoy the precious right to make fools of ourselves. Enjoy that right, and protect it.

Bruce E. Johansen is writer is Frederick W. Kayser University Research Professor in the School of Communication at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. This commentary first appeared in the Omaha World-Herald.
At the Aug. 12 rally by the so-called alt-right, both sides had angry people who were hell-bent on violence. These expressions of anger were guttural and, in my opinion, not morally equivalent. Consider the basis  real or perceived  of the anger.

I base my conclusions largely on conversations I had with people attending the rally.

The angriest people I encountered among the counter-protestors were supporters of the group Black Lives Matter. Where does their anger originate?

I think it comes from their experiences in which they were pulled over for driving while black, asked to leave stores, or stopped and swabbed (a random collection of DNA in Charlottesville during the early 2000s). I think it comes from the ABC arrest of a dark-skinned University of Virginia student for underage drinking, when half the student body illegally drinks openly at one time or another on the Corner without incident. And I think the high-profile incidents of police shooting unarmed black people have contributed to their anger.

For the alt-right, where does their anger originate? What I heard repeatedly was a sense of loss and anger because they no longer have the status or privileges that once came with being white. They have lost something to the other: blacks, Jews, immigrants, foreigners  diverse America. And I wonder whether they ever deserved the higher status that they once had.

In the 1950s, a white person could drop out of high school and be hired into the steel mills in western Pennsylvania. A black person could do the same, but was more likely to be put in the hottest part of the mill (and consequently have a shorter career, more health problems, and a shorter lifespan).

In this us vs. them scenario, there are definite winners (white people) and losers (black people). And, I think, the owners of the companies, the billionaires like Donald Trump, benefited, as well. From slavery through Reconstruction reversals like the Ku Klux Klan era and Jim Crow to today, this has been a zero-sum situation.

Should we really go back to when America was great? We cannot, and we will not.

Mark Martin

Greene County
I have been closely following the myriad explanations for the horrific Unite the Right rally and pleas for accountability.

I know that white supremacist and former University of Virginia student Jason Kessler organized the rally to protest the citys plan to remove the statue of Gen. Robert E. Lee: a plan that attracted various battle-ready white nationalists and neo-Nazis.

I also know he accepted help from the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia and The Rutherford Institute to petition a federal court to keep the event at Emancipation Park.

I wonder whether the horrendous outcome might not have happened if these two civil-rights groups refused to assist him.

I ponder this after reading in the Aug. 23 Daily Progress these words from John Whitehead of The Rutherford Institute: The First Amendment does not provide the right to conduct a gathering at which there is a clear and present danger of riot, disorder, interference with traffic on public streets or other immediate threats to public safety (Freedom for the speech we hate: The ins and outs of the right to protest).

Florence Schmidt, Albemarle County
Kolkata: State-owned BSNL is betting on national rollout of 4G VoLTE services, even as it begins preparatory work on 5G to stay future-ready, a top official has said.

"We are looking forward to pan India 4G VoLTE roll out and seeking spectrum from government," BSNL chairman and managing director Anupam Shrivastava told PTI.

Late last year, the telco had written to the Department of Telecom (DoT) to allocate airwaves in the 700 MHz band for rolling out 4G services.

The company expects to get the governments approval soon for using airwaves in 700 MHz band for offering 4G and 5G services in the future.

BSNL would be required to match the highest bidder's price to acquire the spectrum though historically it is not required to participate in auction. However, given the high debt burden of the telecom sector, the proposed auction of spectrum in various bands may get delayed by a year.

The telco is likely to report a revenue of Rs 28,700 crore in 2016-17, against Rs 28,400 crore the year before despite stiff price war from Reliance Jio.

Shrivastava said BSNL's balance sheet is least leveraged with just Rs 5,000 crore debt and the company is also aiming for profitability at net level in 2018-19. He admitted that BSNL has been left behind but in the last few years, it is on a revival path as it ramps up its infrastructure backbone.

The company has finalised Rs 6,000 crore for setting up 40,000 new base stations which will be implemented by Nokia and ZTE.

Nokia will execute the work in the south and west regions while ZTE will do it in the north and east.

Telecom minister Manoj Sinha had recently said the country was switching from voice-centric to data-centric and expected that data usage in India to soon surpass China and USA.

VoLTE service allows even voice communication over data pipeline.

BSNL had introduced several competitive scheme for data but was unable to offer free unlimited voice but with VoLTE it will make such efforts possible, officials said.

Other private telecom majors like Bharti Airtel, Idea Cellular and Vodafone are also working in the VoLTE space.

Shrivastava said interaction with Nokia had already taken place on 5G for field trials and a knowledge sharing agreement has been signed with network firm Coriant.
PNB customers will have to shell out money beginning October if they carry out more than five transactions a month from the bank's ATMs.

New Delhi: PNB customers will have to shell out money beginning October if they carry out more than five transactions a month from the bank's ATMs.

At present, account holders of the country's second largest public sector bank can make any number of transactions in a month, financial or non-financial, at the bank's ATMs without attracting any charge.

"The number of free transactions and the charges beyond these free transactions for PNB customers on PNB ATMs have been revised.

The revised charges will be effective from October 1, 2017," Punjab National Bank (PNB) said in a notice to customers.

The bank said savings fund/current/overdraft account holders would all attract charges at Rs. 10 per transaction beyond a limit of five times a month even if the PNB card holder makes the transaction at PNB ATM only. Thus, customers will be charged beyond free limits for doing financial transaction where cash withdrawal is being made through ATM and non-financial transaction for issue of mini-statement.

However, PNB said there will not be any charge for other non-financial transactions like balance enquiry, fund transfer or green pin request where a secret pin code is sent on mobile

phone to facilitate money transactions like for an online purchase, money transfer via phone etc.

In August 2014, Reserve Bank had rationalised the number of free ATM transactions that customers could do at own and other bank ATMs.

For own bank ATM transactions, RBI had advised banks to give at least five free transactions (financial and non-financial) a month on savings accounts at all locations.

"Beyond this, banks may put in place appropriate Board approved policy relating to charges for customers for use of own bank ATMs," RBI had said.

While for other bank ATM transactions, banks were allowed to cut the number of free transactions from five to three a month in six metros-- Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata, Bengaluru and Hyderabad.

For other locations, number for free transactions were kept unchanged at five a month for other ATM withdrawals.

"Nothing, however, precludes a bank from offering more than three free transactions at other bank ATMs to its account holders if it so desires," RBI said.

The regulator has capped the maximum charge banks can levy beyond the number of free transactions to not more than Rs. 20 per transaction.

So banks have devised their own mechanisms to charge for ATM transactions beyond free within RBI limits. Country's largest lender SBI charges from Rs. 5-20 for financial and non-financial transactions beyond the stipulated free transactions a month for both own and other ATM transactions,

While private lender Yes Bank gives own ATM transactions service free to cost to its customers for any number of transactions a month.

On the other hand, country's largest private sector ICICI Bank allows five free transactions a month and thereafter levies Rs. 20 per financial transaction and Rs. 8.50 per non-financial transaction.
Like all of us, the murder of the seven-year old child at a posh school in Gurgaon has left filmmaker cum actor and activist Farhan Akhtar shell-shocked.

I am numbed. Words fail me. We speak about crime and then move on. This is the mistake that we make and this is what encourages crime. The lack of accountability and sustained protest the most frightening thing is, that the monster who did this horrific deed to the child thought he would get away after doing something so inhuman, says Farhan badly shaken by the gruesome crime.

I cant even begin to imagine what the childs parents are going through. As parents, we all have reason to feel very concerned. You say people like us are empowered and privileged and therefore relatively safe. I disagree with you. Because when children go to school their parents are not with them. They are as vulnerable as any other child from any section of the society. It is therefore the schools responsibility to ensure their safety. I think the school administration has failed not just the child but also proved how damaged our system is, says Farhan wondering how such potential criminals are employed to protect children.

I mean, we are talking about the most vulnerable section of our society, the children. Had they cross-checked this monsters credentials before employing him? wonders Farhan.

Some time ago, one of the female employees Pallavi Purkayastha from Farhans company had been violated and killed by the watchman of her building whose credentials were unverified. To save some money you employ dubious people to look after homes and schools. What could be more careless and irresponsible? We immediately need to pass stricter laws against careless employment of unverified people. Because whether they are potential criminals or not is not written on their faces. How do we know that the watchman employed to protect our homes or the bus conductor employed to drive children to school is trustworthy? asks the Rock On star.

He also feels that empowered sections of society do not exercise enough clout to stop these crimes. Dont just point fingers at actors. It could be any empowered or privileged individual or organisation. We all must join forces to make sure that no potential criminal thinks that he can get away with a crime as heinous as the one committed by that bus conductor in Gurgaon. 

As an actor Farhan feels he cant play anti-socials. Maybe some years ago when crime was not so barbaric, I could have. Now I doubt I will ever play a serial killer, rapist or a child molester just because it would challenge me as an actor. What about the much greater challenge that we face as nation to protect our vulnerable sections? We who have must think twice before using that voice.
Gautham Menon, who had visited Istanbul last year, seems to have fallen in love with the place instantly. The director has now taken his whole team of Dhruva Natchathiram to shoot some portions there.

Ritu Verma and Vikram in DN

But the crew, which left for Turkey from Georgia, were not let inside the place in spite having legit papers. Gautham took to social media seeking help. He wrote, Turkey, We are looking forward to film in your beautiful country. If anybody that matters is reading this, please HELP. Worried for my crew.(sic) And help did arrive! According to the official statement from the film crew, the Turkish Airlines came to the rescue. The statement read, The airlines immediately agreed to fly the crew in. The Indian agent Flamingo Travels and the Georgian company got together to sort this out with the help of Turkish authorities. Now the team is all set to reach Istanbul shortly.

The team is set to shoot some important segment in the country. Dhruva Natchathiram stars Vikram, Aishwarya Rajesh and Ritu Verma in pivotal roles.
KANNUR: Close on the heels of actor Sreenivasans remarks supporting Dileep in the actor abduction case, his house at Kuthuparambu witnessed a black-oil protest in the wee hours of Sunday. Unidentified miscreants poured black oil on the gate and walls of the house at Pookod along the Thalasserry-Kuthu-parambu road. No one lives in the house, Vineeth, in the name of actors son, Vineeth Sreenivasan. It was not clear what triggered the protest. Apart from defending Dileep, he had recently lashed out at the murder politics in Kannur in many venues.

Kathirur police inspected the spot and the SHO said that they did not get any complaint. Sreenivasan ridiculed the incident saying that the persons behind the act could have completely blackened the house so that he could save painting it. They can paint the house of Ganesh Kumar also who had supported Dileep, he said. The actor clarified that he had not supported Dileep, but said that as a person knowing the jailed actor for long he could not have committed the heinous crime.
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Russian artist Maltseva Evgeniya who was holding an exhibition at Russian Culture Centre here had a surprise visitor on Sunday. She was alone in the hall with her paintings, mostly sketches of life in Russia, when a grey-haired man in a crumpled white shirt ambled in. This is Sitaram Yechury, the national general secretary of CPM, the honorary Russian consul general, Ratheesh C. Nair, introduced the man. Ms Evgeniya was overwhelmed to have the biggest Marxist leader in the country at her exhibition. In her excitement, she told Mr Yechury that her maternal grandfather was a top Communist leader.

Suddenly for Yechury, it was like meeting a family member. He was accompanied by another CPM politburo member M. A. Baby and CPM leader Dr Sivadasan. The artist, who looked flattered by the august presence, took the leaders around, giving them a brief account of each of her paintings. A unique work was a sketch of Fyodor Dostoyevsky with the writer Perumbadavam Sreedharan. The sketch was done on an impulse on Sunday morning after the honorary consul told her about Perumbadavams almost telepathic connection with Dostoevsky, and how the Russian great had guided the Malayali writer to pen his classic Oru Sankeerthanam Pole.

Evgeniya was so moved by the bond that she insisted on meeting Perumbadavam right then. Mr Nair promptly arranged to bring Perumbadavam to the exhibition hall where an excited Evgeniya painted the writer, and his inspiration, live. She sketched Dostoyevsky like a divine spirit whispering secrets in the ear of Perumbadavam. Mr Yechury seemed hooked by the sketch and was heard probing about Perumbadavams experience. Crime and Punishment was a work that had mesmerised him, too. Ms Evegeniya then asked whether Mr Yechury had been to St Petersburg, Dostoyevskys place. Unfortunately no, he said, flashing his impish smile.
Two French fashion giants, LVMH and Kering, have pledged to ban size zero models as a response to industry criticism. Instances of poor working conditions and the use of underage and anorexic models have been endemic in the fashion industry for years. Following this, the luxury groups will introduce new rules ahead of Paris Fashion Week and say they'll guarantee the well-being of models. Fashion insiders have long said that clothes hang better on tall and androgynous women, but critics say the industry encourages eating disorders. Will such an initiative will help curb eating disorders among teens and young adults? Is this the way to go about it, or instead of a ban, should there simply be a greater inclusion of non-zero size model?

Beauty can't be defined by size

I am in favour of the move, as I believe this will solve unhealthy eating habits amongst models abroad. Abroad, models start at very young age and they do have to maintain a certain figure to fit into industry stereotypes for runway. In India, we dont have sickening thin models, which is great. But as an industry we all should encourage better eating habits than get them to starve just to fit into a certain size. Beauty cant be defined by a certain size even as fashion and film industry do promote such things in a way. But now things are changing for better.

Nachiket Barve, fashion designer

Our clothing looks better on women with some volume'

This is an ongoing debate, about size zero models. These fashion giants are banning size zero models to make a statement about why its not important to be size zero. Anything that comes into fashion becomes desirable and that makes a statement. I dont think size zero should be banned, but at the same time, anybody who wants to walk the runway should be embraced. This is something that I think we are already doing in India. We are bringing in models of different body types. It is not necessarily true that clothing only looks good on tall androgynous models especially in an Indian context. In fact, I have noticed that certain type of our clothing looks better on women with some volume. Its not about size zero; its more about understanding your type and choosing accordingly.

 Sreejith Jeevan, Fashion Designer

I hope that this will inspire the entire industry

The fashion industry has long been accused of promoting unhealthy body images to women and ignoring well-documented health problems experienced by models. So, its a welcome step to help in curbing eating disorders in teens. People tend to believe that models are just hangers but be it model or a non-model, a fit person looks more attractive than a starved zero size person. You wear clothes to look good and a happy and healthy person will look good in anything that they wear.

 Sucheta Sharma James, supermodel

Eating disorders are devastating to young girls

rs why their clothes dont hang well on curvy figures. They must be doing something wrong, or they are just not talented enough, thats pretty obvious.

On that note, Im so happy that change has began. Eating disorders are devastating to young girls and leads to very serious mental health issues.

In India, most women are built like beautiful temple carvings, designers should study what makes us look good instead of blindly following the West in their tired old tropes. It is extremely easy for us to look at a girl and know if shes naturally thin or if she is depriving herself. Its that simple. Dont do it. Love the skin youre in and we will see that confidence as soon as you walk in the room.

Aviva Bidapa, senior marketing manager at Prasad Bidapa Associates

The argument that clothes look better on a skinny frame is nonsense.

I strongly believe that size zero should be banned. The argument that clothes look better on a skinny frame is nonsense  it really depends on a silhouette. There are styles that are more flattering on a certain body frame and will just not work for the other. Also, the idea of beauty is evolving and is more inclusive now. There is a conscious effort by the designers to get more people of colour, ethnicities and varied body shapes on the ramp. There is a collective realisation that fashion is for real people and starved , unhealthy models are no longer an accepted fashion norm.

Amit Ranjan, supermodel

The ban for size zero models is too harsh

This ban again enforces the idea that one needs to not be in a particular way to hit the ramp. I think this move to ban size zero models is too harsh. Indians, for example, are not built very tall and many women cant enhance the beauty of ankle length dresses just with heels. So some designers may want taller women. If the designers have their own rules for their own shows, it is fine. Banning in general is forceful. Some women are built size zero and if they cant enter the industry it denies them of their career opportunities. The rules imposed in the industry need to improve the quality of the shows, not shut the doors for many.

Surya Ganapathy, Model
The matter came to light after the girl complained of bleeding and pain in her private parts to her mother. (Representational Image)

New Delhi: A five-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a peon inside the premises of Tagore Public School on Saturday in Gandhi Nagar area of Shahdara in Delhi, police said.

The accused, identified as Vikas, 40, has been arrested, said Nupur Prasad, deputy commissioner of police, Shahdara.

The incident comes a day after a seven-year-old boy was gruesomely murdered for resisting sexual assault by a bus conductor in a Gurgaon school, which sent shock waves across the country.

Vikas had been working in the school for the last three years. Previously he worked as a security guard in the same school, the police said. He took the girl inside an empty class room around 11.45 am when he was walking on the corridors after handing over lunch boxes to teachers, the police said.

After raping the girl, he threatened her of dire consequences, they added. The matter came to light after the girl complained of bleeding and pain in her private parts to her mother. She was taken to a hospital where her medical examination confirmed sexual assault, the police said.

Traumatised by the incident, the girl was sent for counselling. According to the police, during her counselling the child said she was assaulted by a man wearing a cap and also described his physical attributes. On the basis of the description, Vikas was nabbed, the police said.
Visakhapatnam: The Special Investigation Team (SIT) has identified over 300 acres of government land in parts of Vizag district which was encroached upon and over 280 acres of land which have been grabbed by tampering documents under the Provision of Transfer Act.

Though there was no clarity on the extension of the SIT, SIT officials are confident that they would restore over 1,200 acres of government land by the end of their inquiry.

The SIT, which has been probing tampering of government land documents in Vizag region, has been waiting for the governments nod for the extension of the period to complete the comprehensive inquiry into the land scams in Vizag.

The time, given by the government, ended on August 28. Head of the SIT, DIG (Greyhounds) Vineet Brijlal said that SIT had taken up a total of 330 complaints pertaining to tampering of land records and other complaints and an inquiry into around 160 complaints has already been completed.

Sources in SIT said that if no one influences their inquiry, they will restore at least 1,200 acres of government land, which includes over 700 acres of land that has been encroached upon by big sharks under the A.P. Assigned Lands (POT) Act 1977 and another 400 acres against which FIRs have been filed.

However, some leaders have been expecting that the government would not give an extension of SIT for two more months, saying that some TD leaders, who have grabbed the lands, may land in a soup. Of the 69 cases of no objection certificates (NOCs) issued to the beneficiaries who were allotted lands under freedom fighters and political victims quota, SIT has found irregularities in around 23 NOCs and inquiries have started into the controversial NOCs.

Expressing doubts over the extension of the SIT period, YSRC leaders say that SIT has slowed down its inquiry following political pressure. We are not confident that SIT may get an extension and will conduct a complete inquiry into the alleged land scam of the Andhra Pradesh Med Tech Zone.

Minister Ch. Ayyanna Patrudu said that AMTZ is spread over 270 acres of land at Nadupuru area in Vizag city. Though the land belongs to the government, a few land grabbers have got compensation by claiming that the lands belonged to them by using forged documents.
Dr Bikar said that when Suryawanshi and the woman, who was in the fifth month of her pregnancy, approached him to carry out the illegal procedure at his clinic, Sakhi Maternity Centre, a fortnight ago, he refused. (Representational image)

Mumbai: A male gynaecologist running a private practice in Sangvi, Pune was allegedly assaulted with a sickle on Saturday night after he refused to terminate the pregnancy of a woman, 20, based on a suspicion that the foetus was over 20 weeks old. As per a Central law, doctors cannot terminate pregnancies that have crossed the 20-week mark.

The womans partner, Siddhart Suryawanshi, 21, who is an auto-rickshaw driver, had allegedly assaulted the doctor  Dr Amol Bidkar  with the help of a few associates.

The police has registered a case and arrested Suryawanshi from the Kirkee area on Sunday night. DCP Ganesh Shinde said, We have nabbed the accused and he is in our custody.

Talking to DC, Dr Bikar said that when Suryawanshi and the woman, who was in the fifth month of her pregnancy, approached him to carry out the illegal procedure at his clinic, Sakhi Maternity Centre, a fortnight ago, he refused.

I have sustained injuries on my left shoulder and on three fingers of my left hand, which were wounded in the attack. I managed to pushed them away and fled, he said.
I will learn cooking and washing clothes and help mother at home, Priyanka said, according to her parents. (Representational Image)

Hyderabad: An 11-year-old girl student was made to stand in the boys washroom by non-teaching staff in Raos High School near BHEL, Ramachandrapuram, on the city outskirts as punishment for not wearing the school uniform.

Priyankas parents wrote a letter to the principal complaining of such treatment: After coming home and while going to sleep she broke into tears and begged me to stop sending her to school  in her own words she said, Dad, please dont send me to school anymore, I will learn cooking and washing clothes and help mother in her home tasks.

These words of my child could not be digested by me and I understood the situation of her mind. This act of abuse has a very bad impact on my child and has damaged the personal dignity of my child, her parents wrote.

A copy of the letter was also sent to the child rights organisation Balala Hakkula Sangham (BHS). Achyuta Rao, president of the BHS, said, (It is) heinous corporal punishment faced by the girl student, making her stand in the boys bathroom. Balala Hakkula Sangham is treating this as a severe crime against the girl child. We will lodge a police complaint and also take it to the Human Rights Comm-ission.

He added that it is such actions by the school staff that push children into mental depression and create an aversion for education, push children to take the drastic step of running away from home to avoid schooling, and more extreme actions like committing suicide. This sort of behaviour of schools towards children must be weeded out, he said.
Srinagar: Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Sunday reached out to Jammu and Kashmir police and the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) which have suffered significant casualties from escalated terror attacks in the recent weeks to assure them the countrys outright support in their endeavour. He also pledged the Centres all administrative and logistic assistance to them.

I don't have words to praise your bravery. Even the Prime Minister has praised your courage, he said during a meeting with the J&K policemen at the district police lines in southern Anantnag.

Later while interacting with their counterparts from the CRPF at its 90 battalion headquarters in the town, the Home Minister said that the country was equally proud of the force personnel. In a tweet, he reiterated it by saying We are proud of our CRPF personnel. Courage cannot be purchased from any market. You are born with unassailable & unmatched courage.

Anantnag with three others districts of south Kashmir-Kulgam, Shopian and Pulwama- has witnessed maximum number of militancy-related incidents and violence compared to rest of the Valley during past couple of years. Both the J&K police and the CRPF have been at the receiving end and it was apparently for that reason that the Home Minister who is on a 4-day visit of Jammu and Kashmir chose to reach out their officers and jawans in Anantnag.

On Saturday itself, soon after the Home Ministers arrival in summer capital Srinagar, a J&K policeman Imtiyaz Ahmed was killed and his colleague Shakeel Ahmed was critically injured in a militant attack at Anantnags main bus terminus.

A strike called by an alliance of key separatist leaders against the Home Ministers visit disrupted normal life across the Valley. In Srinagar, the J&K police and central paramilitaries continued to enforce a security lockdown in six police station areas. An official spokesman said that restrictions under Section 144 of CrPC remained in force in the areas of police stations Nowhatta, Maharaj Gunj, Rainawari, Khanyar, Safakadal, and Maisuma of the summer capital as a precautionary measure to avoid any untoward incident.

However, the Home Minister during his interaction with the J&K police and the CRPF jawans, hoped that Kashmir will be free from terror and no force in the world will be able to stop it from becoming heaven again.

Acknowledging the J&K police personnel were working in difficult and life threatening situations, the Home Minister said that orders have been issued for bullet proof vehicles at all police stations in the State and that jawans should also get bullet proof jackets. You are working in extremely challenging conditions here, he said and informed that funds for purchasing bullet proof and setting up a trauma centre for the J&K police personnel have been released.

On the occasion, he remembered ASI Abdur Rasheed and Imtiyaz Ahmed saying their supreme sacrifices have been made for Jammu and Kashmir. He said, Ive seen the picture of martyred ASI Abdul Rashids daughter. I saw her face drenched with tears. It is difficult to forget that picture.

While speaking at the Sainik Sammelan at the CRPF base, the Home Minister said that its men were born with unassailable and unmatched courage. He said it was his aim to provide, at least, Rs. 1 crore to the family of a martyr from the Central paramilitary forces. He said, We are ready to give more facilities to our CAPF personnel. The government will consider helicopter services for CRPF in J&K.

He conveyed a message from Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, to them and the J&K policemen that the government acknowledges their good work and appreciates their bravery and valour. The Home Minister asked them to share their grievances directly with him.

The Home Minister also had had meeting with the leaders and representatives of various political, social and trade organisations here to know their view on the issues confronting the State.

An official release said that the delegations which called on him to apprise him of the prevailing situation in the State and the way forward included those of the coalition partners Peoples Democratic Party and the Bharatiya Janata Party, opposition National Conference (NC), the Congress, the Peoples Conference headed by Sajjad Gani Lone who is also a minister in the State government, the Peoples Democratic From, Democratic Party (Nationalist), Awami Itehaad Party, the Kashmir Society, J&K National Panthers Party, All J&K Panchayat Association, All Party Sikh Coordination Committee and Akhil Bharatiya Vidhyarthi Parishad. Union Home Secretary, Rajiv Gauba was also present during these meetings.

Singh reiterated that he is willing to have discussion with anyone with an open heart to bring peace to Kashmir. He also appealed to the people to come forward to have a discussion if they have any complaints or qualms. He said, I appeal to everyone to come forward to have a discussion. If you have any complaints or qualms, I am ready to have talks with an open heart.
Satyarthi said child abuse survivors, their families, some of the ministers as well as religious leaders of different faiths will also participate in Bharat Yatra. (Photo: Kailash Satyarthi)

Mumbai: Come Monday, September 11, the country will start its fight against child sexual abuse, rape and human trafficking, unanimously raising their voices against atrocities meted out to children.

Bharat Yatra, the brainchild of Nobel Laureate Kailash Satyarthi will commence from the coastal city Kanyakumari in Tamil Nadu on September 11 and the 11,000 kilometre march will tour 22 states before culminating in the national capital on October 16.

Bharat Yatra will start from Kanyakumari in Tamil Nadu the 11,000 kilometre march will tour 22 states before culminating in the national capital on October 16. (Photo: Kailash Satyarthi)

Talking to Deccan Chronicle about the 35 day 'Bharat Yatra', Satyarthi said child abuse survivors, their families, some of the Union ministers, Member of Parliament, MLAs, chief ministers, Governors as well as religious leaders of different faiths will also participate in Bharat Yatra.

He said, At least one million people, mostly youth, would join the march and I hope one crore people will pledge against child sexual abuse and trafficking.

Six other marches from Ahmedabad, Bhubaneswar, Chennai, Guwahati, Kolkata, Srinagar will join with the main Bharat Yatra, according to the Nobel laureate.

Satyarthi said the theme of this march is Safe Childhood, Safe India.

Asserting that he has declared a war against rape, sexual abuse and child trafficking, Satyarthi said, It is not an ordinary crime. This epidemic is growing everywhere and haunting our nation.

He added, Our children are not safe either in homes, schools or neighbourhood or anywhere and the perpetrators roam freely."

Satyarthi went on to add that people have advised him that now that he has won a Nobel for himself, he should sit back and relax. However, Satyarthi differs in that opinion.

My war for children and making the country safe for them will not end, he said, adding that he will continue to fight for them till his last breath.

Talking about what triggered him to carry out the march in such a large scale, Satyarthi said, "For the last one year I have been meeting rape survivors and their families and every story has touched and moved my heart. I have seen that girls between the ages of 4 to 9 years have been the victim of this heinous crime. They have been brutally raped and the victims are moving like a free bird."

"The oscillating pendulum of is stuck at one place where the victims are leading a fearful life while survivors are moving fearlessly," he added.

Satyarthi said even the boys are not safe at present times.

"Boys are either raped by family member or relatives and they cannot speak about it because of fear of ostracization.

Parents just do not talk about their child being raped or sexually abused as they think it to be a taboo and the societal embarrassment.

Talking more about his meeting with rape survivors and their families, Satyarthi said, "The physical bruise of a survivor can be healed but no one can help the victim to overcome the mental trauma they had undergone."

He said the voice of survivors and families will strengthen the yatra as people will witness the trauma they had suffered.

Satyarthi went on to add that the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO) is a good law. The conviction rate is abysmally dismal and over 90 per cent cases, lodged under the Act, and are pending in the courts.

Talking about the cooperation from his family in the yatra, Satyarthi said his wife and son will be actively participating in the march while his daughter, who resides in Mumbai, will also be involved for a few days.

Satyarthi also hailed Right to Privacy verdict of the Supreme Court and said the verdict will help bring a lot change in the law for children and the atrocities they face.
Chennai: Anticipating the release of water from Kallanai dam to replenish the Cauvery river and with a prayer to rain god Varuna on their lips, organisers of the Cauvery Pushkaram 2017 have built a make-shift bathing ghat at Thula Kattam in Mayiladuthurai to enable pilgrims to at least collect water and sprinkle it on their heads. Also, the organisers anticipate five lakh pilgrims to throng the mega event from September 12- 24.

At least one lakh pilgrims are likely to visit on the first day and there is likely to be an increase of 25,000-50,000 footfalls as the festival gains momentum. We have requested the Karnataka government to release water and ensure the festival is held on a grand scale. Already the excess water from reservoirs in Karnataka is flowing into the Hogenakkal, Srirangam and Kallanai. We have also pitched our hopes on the Tamil Nadu government to release the water from the Kallanai on either the night of September 10 or the following morning, just in time for the Pushkaram, expresses Yogi Ganapathy Gajananda Saraswathi of Tiruvenkadu, coordinator of the Cauvery Pushkaram.

Karnatakas reservoirs, he claims, would breach if the excess water is not released. We hope the state government will come to our rescue and ensure plentiful supply of water otherwise the pilgrims will have to collect water in mugs and pour it on their heads, he says.

Thanks to the initiative of the Acharyas of the Kanchi Kamakoti Peetam, Sri Jayendra Saraswathi Swamy and Vijayendra Saraswathi Swamy, not only the festival arrangements but also the Varuna Japams are held at 27 locations. Varuna japam would be held on all days of the festival at 2,000 places across the state. The Maha Pushkaram celebrations are being sanctified and blessed by their Holiness the Kanchi Acharyas, Jeer Swamys, Vedic scholars and Aadheenams and several others, says V. Subramanian, of Jan Kalyan.

We hope Varuna Bhagwan will shower his mercy upon all of us till date we have managed with the funds from three MLAs and a few others in arranging the Pushkaram, says Yogi Ganapathy Gajananda Saraswathi. Interestingly, during the course of making arrangements for the event, the organisers have tumbled upon 12 among the 108 wells on the river bed. Lord Brahma created 84 lakh atmas, which emerged from water. Not only humans, plants, animals and insects all need water. We cant survive without water, so, thats why we attach importance to worshiping water or rivers, the Yogi adds.

What is special about the celebrations?
Body of another militant identified as Tariq Ahmed Dar was recovered from the encounter site. (Photo: PTI/File)

Srinagar: In a first, a militant on Sunday surrendered during an encounter with security forces that broke out in Shopian district of south Kashmir last evening, police said in Srinagar.

They said a militant identified as Adil, who had joined militancy in May this year, surrendered after he was trapped from all sides.

Jammu and Kashmir Police officials assured him that he would not be killed after which he emerged from the debris of the house and laid down his AK-47 in front of the police officials.

This is for the first time in recent months that a militant has laid down his arms during an encounter.

Adil, a resident of Chitipora in Shopian, was immediately whisked away for questioning, they said, adding body of another militant identified as Tariq Ahmed Dar was recovered from the encounter site. He was involved in many terror related incidents, police said.

Jammu and Kashmir Director General of Police SP Vaid had earlier said that boys who had taken to arms can surrender and the government would consider their cases.

Security forces had launched a cordon and search operation at Barbugh in Imam Sahib area of Shopian last evening after getting information about presence of militants there.

The militants had opened fire on the search party, triggering a gunbattle.
Works secretary Nalinikanta Pradhan said rescue teams with cranes and fire brigade persons have rushed to the spot. (Photo: DC/Akshaya Sahoo)

Bhubaneswar: At least one person was killed and a few others were feared trapped under the debris of under-construction flyover that collapsed at Bamikhal in Bhubaneswar.

The deceased man was identified as 40-year-old Satya Patnaik of Bhubaneswar.

According to eyewitnesses, the mishap occurred around 12.30 pm. At least 30 workers were engaged in the construction work.

Works secretary Nalinikanta Pradhan said rescue teams with cranes and fire brigade persons have rushed to the spot.

We have rescued six persons. More people are believed to be trapped under the rubbles, said Anil Kumar Sahoo, a local resident.

He added that the death toll was likely to increase as some of the rescued workers were critically injured.

Anil said a father and daughter-duo who was passing by the under-construction was seriously injured as a huge chunk of construction materials fell on them. They were rushed to Capital Hospital.

The condition of the father and daughter duo are said to be critical.

At least 15-20 injured workers were also rushed to Capital Hospital.

We are engaged in the cementing work when suddenly a portion of the flyover collapsed, said Amrit Kerketa, an injured worker said.

The construction work was being executed by the Division IV of the state public works department.

The BJP and Congress blamed the Naveen Patnaik for the tragedy.

We have been complaining about the sub-standard work of the flyover. Even we had submitted memorandum to the chief minister through his work secretary Nalinikanta Pradhan. The chief minister who is the works minister never took our complaint seriously. Instead, he allowed the contractor and the public works department to change the original drawing of the flyover for inflating the project cost. This is a huge scam and needs to be investigated by CBI, said BJP vice president Sameer Mohanty.

Congress leader Suresh Kumar Routray said the construction work was going on at slow pace for over 10 years and there was deliberate neglect to escalate the project cost for political funding.

Routray also sought CBI probe into the flyover collapse.
Hyderabad: Prominent Dalit thinker Professor Kancha Ilaiahs book Samajika Smugglurlu Komatollu (Vysyas are social smugglers) has landed him in a controversy.

Arya Vysya associations allege that the title of the book and some of its contents are derogatory and demeaning to their community. They took to the streets on Sunday and burnt effigies of Kancha Ilaiah in Hyderabad and other places in AP and Telangana, and have demanded the immediate withdrawal of the book.

The book says that, historically, Arya Vysyas used to eat non-vegetarian food and were agriculturalists and used to rear cattle. They turned vegetarian later.

In the book, Prof Ilaiah explains why other communities dislike the Vysyas - a trading community - as it sees them as a community engaged only in trading and business. He advises them to join the Indian Army to fight for the nation.

Jayanthi Venkateswarlu, Andhra Pradesh Arya Vysya Mahasabha president, said that the association is going to lodge a complaint with the police against Kancha Ilaiah.

In the past, too, he has made comments on certain castes. Being a professor he should be more dignified and not make abusive comments against other castes.

Arya Vysyas have been employing dalits and minorities in their establishments. Let him check any trade establishment run by Arya Vysyas and find out. It was Mahatma Gandhi, a Vysya, who led India to independence. The Arya Vysya community has contributed to the nation's exchequer by paying huge taxes. We are always ahead in charity, whether it's running an educational institution or rendering social service, Jayanthi Venkateswarlu said.

Professor Kancha Ilaiah says the book is a translation of a chapter from his book published in English titled Post Hindu India.

The book was originally published in 2009 and now a publisher has got it translated into Telugu and published a research based chapter about Vysyas as a booklet. It is a research book on several communities, including Brahmins, Kapus, Golla Kurma, Chakali, Mala and Madiga.

He said the book is written from a business and historical perspective.

The word smuggling (used in the title) is not used in the sense of goods smuggling. I havent used any derogatory word. Social Smuggling as a phrase is an economic process of exploitation, where it means earning in business and not investing back into society. Historically, in business, there is always deception in economic terms. The book speaks about how they should also accommodate dalits in jobs, the author explains.

In keeping with the present climate of intolerance, Professor Ilaiah has received threatening and abusive calls. I have got abusive SMSs on my phone. Instead of threatening why dont they write a counter book. I have not personally abused any individual or any community, the professor said firmly.
The AP Cabinet on Saturday approved a hike in liquor prices. The TS government is likely to follow suit in a week or two, and clear a 10 per cent price hike. (Representational image)

Hyderabad: The state government is under pressure from liquor manufacturers to hike prices ahead of Dasara on September 30, when sales go up by nearly 50 per cent.

Threatening to stop liquor production if the prices are not hiked, the companies said that while costs had increased the government had not revised the rates since 2011.

The AP Cabinet on Saturday approved a hike in liquor prices. The TS government is likely to follow suit in a week or two, and clear a 10 per cent price hike.

With this, the cost of a quarter bottle (180 ml) of different brands of liquor is expected to increase in the range of Rs 6 to Rs 30.

Excise officials have submitted proposals to the government and are awaiting approval.

"The file is pending with the Chief Ministers Office and the nod is expected before Dasara," said an official source in the TS Beverages Corporation Ltd.

The corporation enters into agreements with liquor manufacturers to supply over 100 alcohol brands in the state.

Earlier, fresh tenders used to be called every year for procurement of liquor. The practice was dispensed with in 2012, and the 2011 agreement is being renewed every year.

Liquor manufacturers have told the government that production cost has increased as there is shortage of molasses, which is the major liquor ingredient.
Mysuru: With foreheads getting creased over the delay in nabbing the assailant of senior journalist Gauri Lankesh, who was gunned down at her Bengaluru residence five days ago triggering nationwide outrage, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah rushed to assuage tempers asserting the culprits would be nabbed as fast as possible.

It has to happen quickly. I am serious about it, he said while speaking to mediapersons on his arrival at Mysuru airport on Sunday. The slain writer was known for her anti right wing views and her espousal of the cause of Naxalites who wanted to return to the mainstream with sources claiming that right wing fundamentalists could be behind the murder though this has not been proved yet.

The CM also spoke on the need to provide protection to progressive thinkers who might be under threat and said, "They have not sought protection, but I decided that such writers and those leading progressive movements need to be protected. Gauri never sought any protection. A Central government minister (Ravishankar Prasad) made an irresponsible statement that she (Gauri) had sought protection and the state did not provide it. It's not true. We will give protection to anyone. She met me last week along with a fellow activist, Ms Vimala and MLC Mohan Kumar Kondajji. She told me that she was coming up with a Diwali special edition and wanted government advertisements but she did not speak about any threat she faced. She did not have enemies. She spoke to even her opponents; she was a very good human being. We have certain leads on her murder but we cannot divulge any information now, he said. Asked how he planned to instil a sense of security among progressive thinkers and journalists when even the assailants of writer M.M. Kalburgi had not been traced yet, Mr Siddaramaiah replied, Maharashtra police is investigating the murder of Govind Pansare, the CBI, the murder of Narendra Dabholkar in Maharashtra and the CID in Karnataka is investigating Kalburgis murder. The Gauri case is being investigated in co-ordination with officers probing these cases. There is some progress in the Kalburgi case, its not that nothing has happened. But they have not got evidence to the extent that they can nab the culprits, he said.
The baby rolled off the bench and fell to the ground and was badly injured. (Representational image)

Khammam: Yet another example of the terrible state of government-run hospitals surfaced on Sunday when a mother lost her baby because she was forced to deliver on a bench and the baby rolled off it onto the floor.

Ms P. Nagamani, 22, came to the Khammam district headquarters hospital at 4.30 pm on Saturday, after her labour pains started. The doctor on duty informed her that her delivery date was October 26, and told her to come next month.

Ms Nagamani tried to explain that she was suffering severe pain, but, shockingly, nobody paid any heed to her. Since she couldnt stand or walk, she lay on a bench on the verandah while her relatives tried to convince the hospital staff to admit her.

She stayed that way till 12.30 am on Sunday, when the pains intensified and her husband and mother continued to plead with the staff to attend to her.

Ms Nagamani delivered a male baby half an hour later, while lying on the bench. The baby rolled off the bench and fell to the ground and was badly injured.

Even after the baby died almost certainly as a result of this negligence and the injury, the hospital staff did not give Ms Nagamani a bed, the family alleged

The child was taken to the intensive care unit in an attempt to show that the hospital had provided some treatment. Mr Nagamani was allotted a bed only after media persons arrived at the hospital. A police constable who was called in by the hospital, tried to convince Mr Nagamani and her family to leave the hospital.

The nurses claimed that the baby had not died because of the fall from the bench but because it was a premature delivery. Relatives of Ms Nagamani took the body of the baby to their village. No police case has been registered and no post-mortem was done.
Lucknow: In a bizarre development, a Muslim woman divorced her husband at a press conference in Lucknow after her plea for khula was ignored by the husband and also clerics.

Shajada Khatoon said she had decided to divorce her husband through a letterbecause her husband and clerics were avoiding her plea for 18 months.

She signed the letter at the press conference. Social activist Naish Hasan, who was present there, said that Shajada has sought the help of clerics but could not get any.

Zuber Ali made my life hell just a few days after I got married on November 14, 2005. The torture was so much that I filed a case against him. But that too did not bring relief. I wish to be free from today, she said. She has not been living with her husband since the past 18 months. She sent a letter seeking divorce on September 6 to her husband, a mechanic in a consumer goods store but got no reply.
Home Minister Rajnath Singh taking the salute of the Guard of Honour, during his visit to Jammu and Kashmir Police Lines, in Anantnag on Sunday. (Photo: PTI)

Srinagar: Union home minister Rajnath Singh on Sunday pledged the Centres full support to the Jammu and Kashmir police and Central Reserve Police Force, that have suffered significant casualties from rising terror attacks in recent weeks, as well as administrative and logistics assistance they need. I dont have words to praise your bravery. Even the Prime Minister has praised your courage, he said at a meeting with J&K policemen at the district police lines in southern Anantnag on Sunday, the second day of his J&K visit.

Later, interacting with their counterparts from the CRPF at its 90 Battalion headquarters in the town, the home minister said the country was equally proud of the paramilitary personnel.

In a tweet, he reiterated it by saying, We are proud of our CRPF personnel. Courage cannot be purchased from any market. You are born with unassailable & unmatched courage.

Acknowledging that the J&K police personnel were working in difficult and life-threatening situations, the home minister said orders were issued for bulletproof vehicles at all police stations in the state and jawans too would be provided with bulletproof jackets.

Meanwhile, a delegation of the Opposition National Conference, led by former CM Omar Abdullah, on Sunday conveyed to Mr Singh the partys concern over the Centres ambiguity in defending Jammu and Kashmirs special status under Article 35A of the Constitution.
Hyderabad: Troubles for the lake in University of Hyderabad do not end as another round of talks remained inconclusive. The high profile meeting took place between Sport Authority chairman, west zone commissioner and registrar of university. PCB officials surveyed the stadium and the university to ascertain the source of the sewage.

The GHMC west zone commissioner, who was present for talks, ordered a department level probe to find out the drains, which account for the sewage.

Students in the university were disappointed with the bureaucratic red tapism, and asked the university to block the drainage. It is alleged that the university engineer delayed it, citing legal hurdles.

The sewage in question is sneaking into the university for over 1 km up to the Peacock Lake. Since five years students and teachers have been fighting to save the lake.
With Dasara falling on the last working day, September 30, employees associations requested the government to pay salaries before Dasara to meet festival expenses. (Representational image)

Hyderabad: The state government has agreed to pay the September salary of its employees a week in advance so that they can meet Dasara expenses. Normally, employees receive their salaries in their bank accounts on the first of every month.

With Dasara falling on the last working day, September 30, employees associations requested the government to pay salaries before Dasara to meet festival expenses.

The associations met Chief Secretary S.P. Singh and submitted a representation. They said Dasara and Bathukamma are major festivals in the state, which are celebrated simultaneously and employees along with families head for their native villages.

The chief secretary referred the issue to Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao, who approved the payment of salaries by September 25.
Chennai: Restraining a sweet shop owner from making and selling adulterated sweets, the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum, Chennai (North) slapped a fine of Rs 55,000 on its owner.

In the petition, Venugopal of Choolai, submitted that he purchased a quarter kg of special badhusha for Rs 120 from M/s. Ajnabi Mithaai Ghar, Elephant Gate Street, Sowcarpet on September 15, 2016. The next day, he ate a piece and immediately, developed giddiness and vomited. It also caused him diarrhoea.

Three days later, he lodged a complaint during the Consumer Grievance Redressal Day programme organised by the Consumers Association of India.

Based on his complaint, a designated officer collected a sample from the shop and sent this along with a sample of the sweet he purchased, for analysis to the King Institute of Preventive Medicine and Research, Guindy. In its report dated October 13, 2016 the Institute stated, 'the food is unsatisfactory to consume and substandard as per section 3(1)(zx) of Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006.'

The report also stated that the sample contained tartrazine which can cause asthma, skin rashes, hyperactivity, especially among children, and migraine, he noted.

He sought a compensation of Rs 5 lakh from M/s. Ajnabi Mithaai Ghar represented by Mayur J.Sukhadia, for causing him mental agony and deficiency in service. He also sought direction to the shop not to manufacture and sell 'badusha' to the public. As Mayur J.Sukhadia did not appear before the Forum, the case was decided ex-parte.

The bench comprising president K.Jayabalan and member M.Uyirroli Kannan directed the shop owner to pay a compensation of Rs 55,000 to Venugopal and also directed the shop owner not to manufacture non-hygienic badhusha and sell them to public.
However, Cyberabad traffic officials said that constructing a flyover is not a solution for solving the traffic issues of Nizampet.

Hyderabad: Due to increased traffic from Nizampet Road to Bachupally crossroads, the residents are demanding to construct a flyover, connecting Niza-mpet Road with Nizampet village. The residents have also signed an online petition.

A flyover will save money and time, they noted. They are annoyed with the huge traffic on this 6-km stretch during peak hours. It takes around 30 minutes to 1 hour to cross this stretch. Some commuters spend around three hours to reach JNTUH junction or Kukatpally during peak hours.

Raja Shekhar Simma, a resident of Nizampet who started the online campaign for building a flyover, said, Earlier, there was an initiative of widening the road in this junction, which needs land acquisition. To avoid this, it is better to construct a flyover. So, I have started an online campaign and we will take this issue to the GHMC and the traffic department. Many schools have come up in our area due to which the traffic has increased many fold.

However, Cyberabad traffic officials said that constructing a flyover is not a solution for solving the traffic issues of Nizampet.

Pagdala Ashok, Cyberabad ACP, traffic, said, A flyover is not at all required in this area and this will not solve the problem. Developing and widening the road will help in reducing the traffic. If proper dividers are set up, we can reduce the traffic snarls.
Former prime minister and senior Congress leader Monmohan Singh waves as he arrives for a meeting with party leaders, in Jammu on Sunday. (Photo: PTI)

Srinagar: The Congress partys policy and planning group on Jammu and Kashmir headed by former Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, on Sunday began a two-day tour Jammu, the winter capital of the restive State.

The aim of the visit is to read the pulse of the people and take the time to check in with the stakeholders and find out how they are feeling about the issues confronting the State, said the J&K PCC chief Ghulam Ahmed Mir.

The other members of the group are former J&K Chief Minister and Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad, senior party leader Dr. Karan Singh, former Finance Minister P. Chidambaram and the AICC General Secretary Ambika Soni. The group has on it also some senior party functionaries including ministers representing all the three regions of the State-Jammu, the Kashmir Valley and Ladakh.

Mr. Azad said that the group wants to meet different sections of the society to know their viewpoints. Were going to talk to anybody and everybody who wishes to share his or her views on the prevailing situation in Jammu and Kashmir, he said.

However, the group will hold talks with the stakeholders in different phases. In Jammu, it will meet people at a guest house on Sunday and Monday and then return to Delhi. The group will return and meet the people in Srinagar on September 17, the party sources said. It will also go to Ladakh later.

In Jammu, it has already met or is scheduled to meet the delegations of Jammu Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Jammu High Court Bar Association, Kashmiri Pandit migrants, Pahadi community, ex-servicemen, the persons displaced by 1947-48, 1965 and 1971 India-Pakistan wars, the border residents apart from those of various political parties.
RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat presents a memento to Mr Vinay Deekshit, president of the Akhil Bharatiya Adhivakta Parishad, an organisation of lawyers, at the concluding session of its silver jubilee celebrations at the Saroornagar stadium in Hyderabad on Sunday. (Photo:DC)

Hyderabad: Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat on Sunday stressed the need for introducing legislation based on Indian values and ethics.

Mr Bhagwat was speaking at the silver jubilee celebration of the Akhil Bharatiya Adhivakta Parishad. He said nations make laws to suit their traditions and values.

He said, India had adopted many laws from Britain instead of making laws that suit Indian society, culture, traditions, and ethics, which are different from other countries.

He referred to reports about thefts taking place in cyclone hit states in the US currently and said whenever such natural calamities occur in India, people try to help the victims which is part of Indian values and systems.

Mr Bhagwat asked lawyers who attended the convention to enlighten people on these values and ethics which are the guiding force behind any legislation.
As the ruling BJP races ahead to prepare the setting for the 2019 general election, the Opposition parties are still coping with the tasks of finding an acceptable leader and combination after their major setback in the defection of Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar to the BJP. Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhis firefighting mission to Bihar to persuade his partymen to remain in the organisation despite their reservations over the leadership of the RJDs Lalu Prasad Yadav, a coalition constituent, reveals the depth of the crisis facing the Opposition. It was assumed Mr Kumar would be the man on the white charger and the Bihar grand coalition would be the foundation for a new assault on the BJP, come 2019. This dream came crashing down as Mr Kumar decided to play safe by going back to the NDA fold, rather than face defeat in the general election. Amusingly, one of his spokesmen took to writing on how to encourage tourism to India to cover up his leaders embarrassing decision. Mr Kumar lost face again by his party not featuring in the major Cabinet reshuffle at the Centre.

No amount of sophistry can alter the hopelessness of the Oppositions plight. As the party that ruled the country for the better part of its independent existence, the Congress would have been the obvious choice to lead the Opposition. But Mr Gandhi has proved incapable of providing leadership in pulling his party out of its steep decline and it would not matter even if he is given the titular presidency.

West Bengals feisty leader Mamata Banerjee has taken on the role of the Opposition cheerleader in encouraging Mr Yadav to rally the Opposition troops. But she is fighting a battle to frustrate BJP ambitions in her state and thus forced to mend her partys fences to steer her Trinamul Congress to victory again. Mr Naveen Patnaik of Odisha, a cautious politician, is again concerned with the BJPs electoral ambitions in his state, rather than give more attention to the plight of the national Opposition. In Tamil Nadu, despite the coming together of the two factions of the ruling AIADMK, the imprisoned Sasikalas nephew, T.T.V. Dhinakaran, is spoiling the party by maintaining the fiction that his aunt is still the partys supreme leader. This tragi-comedy deprives the BJP of the AIADMKs support at the Centre. BJP president Amit Shah is doing cheerleading for the party to get the northeastern states chief ministers together and broadcast his ambition to win the remaining states in the region.

This scenario leaves the Opposition parties singly and collectively at sea. Party spokesmen suggest there is still time to mend fences and form an effective coalition against the ruling party in the general election. But to outside observers this is an empty boast, with the Communist parties still confused on where to draw the line in teaming up with other parties. The basic problem is that with the splintering of political parties beginning with the mother Congress Party, self-interest rather than ideology was the main motivating factor. The Congress traditionally was a vast tent in which the official slogan of a socialist pattern of society co-existed with extreme conservative and jaundiced views. There was magic in Jawaharlal Nehrus leadership. After his death began a transition period in which his daughter Indira ultimately secured the leadership but had to fight her own battles to free herself from the grip of traditional power brokers by splitting the Congress twice. The imposition of the Emergency to save Indira Gandhis skin brought together the traditionally bickering Opposition parties but the advent of the Janata Party in the surprise election failed because there were too many contradictions among the parties, with BJP parent Jan Sangh nursing its own ambitions in protecting its ideological mentor Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. The BJPs assertion of its own identity and clever political footwork after identifying its leader in Narendra Modi won the party its first clear election victory in the 2014 general election. We are now living through its consequences, with the RSS driving the agenda of promoting Hindutva and the reincarnation of Nehrus India into a Hindu India.

As with any ideological party, the BJP has set about enforcing its writ, first with changing the leadership of officially-funded historical and research organisations, then nominating a new President and vice-president steeped in RSS lore, revising textbooks (with Maharashtra abolishing the Mughal period) and catching them young in instilling RSS myths in primary school. Jawaharlal Nehru is anathema to the Sangh Parivar because he stood for everything it hated, a cosmopolitan outlook and secularism. The BJP now prepares for the general election with the aim of capturing as many more states as possible. It has made the process of contesting elections into an art form using technological and computer science to broadcast its message far and wide and pressing into service its army of RSS volunteers and the legend of Mr Modi.

Beyond the task of facing a formidable adversary, the Opposition parties must still agree on a leader and come to accept a set of principles to lead their charge. Secularism is an easy first they can agree upon, but they need collectively to evolve a set of major policies hitting out at the stark failures of the BJP since it came to power at the Centre: total failure in creating jobs and tackling the farm crisis and ensuring security to the minorities. The BJP believes that the Oppositions emphasis on protecting Muslims would only consolidate the Hindu vote behind it. But the ruling party has no defence on its signal failure in creating jobs and is hopelessly at sea in tackling the deep agricultural crisis. Besides, its still licking its wounds in trying to explain away the sharp dip in national economic performance. But first the Opposition must come together and agree on a leader.
The Centre has made a concerted effort in recent months to arrest and investigate a large number of persons, including those closely associated with the top rung of the separatist leadership in Jammu and Kashmir, who are thought to be involved with terror funding in direct and indirect ways. This complimented the process of the security forces launching repeated raids on militant positions in south Kashmir and elsewhere. It is in this backdrop that Union home minister Rajnath Singh is undertaking his current visit to J&K. But it has not been revealed so far if the Centre has any kind of roadmap in mind. While non-BJP parties and leaders, including Chief Minster Mehbooba Mufti, whose PDP heads the state government in alliance with the BJP, have been suggesting to the Government of India that the trust of ordinary people in the Valley can be regained by engaging them in a meaningful conversation on the issue of J&Ks autonomy within the constitutional framework, the BJP showed impatience with the idea and the security situation went from bad to worse as more and more youth got sucked into the whirlpool of extremist violence abetted by Pakistan.

The saffron party firmly believes that if militancy can be firmly put down by the security forces, the idea of talks or dialogue with various political elements in the Valley would be superfluous. That proposition is on test today. Although suspected hawala operators and facilitators of terror financing are being questioned in New Delhi by the National Investigation Agency, there is not enough to suggest extremism have been curbed. The security forces were attacked in Kashmir on Saturday and Sunday during Mr Singhs visit and they are continuing their operations. During his visit, Mr Singh met the usual suspects  civil society organisations and representatives of trade and industry. It is far from certain if the home minister will learn anything new from such conversations. The key separatist leaders have been placed under house arrest as the home minister goes about his business in Srinagar.

In effect, it appears the Centre is engaged in a dialogue with itself. The home minister has held talks with the J&K government on the two-year-old PMs development package for Kashmir for Rs 80,000 crore. On paper, about Rs 22,000 crore have been delivered for various projects. An audit of these is likely to reveal that no tangible benefits have accrued. This is on account of the turbulence through which the Valley has passed. While the purpose of the home ministers visit remains unclear, it is also uncertain whether the Centre has a wider appreciation of the strategic picture.
I first met Gauri Lankesh when she invited me to speak at a students convention in Bengaluru, where student leaders from HCUs Rohith Vemula agitation and local student leaders were also present. Speaking last, I summed up the details and points of contention of the students struggles across the country. As I spoke about the Rohith Vemula movement, I noticed tears in Gauris eyes. After the programme she gifted me a skirt and a pair of trousers. She also sent a shirt for Kanhaiya, who had just been released from jail. She understood the importance of care in camaraderie, an aspect that is often overlooked in progressive movements.

Recently, a Dalit student needed some financial help. Even though demonetisation had affected the sales of her magazine badly, Gauri came forward to help, as she did during the anniversary of the Una movement, commemorating the historic resistance of Gujarats Dalits to caste oppression. She was not an armchair intellectual, who would only theorise about caste. She was connected to struggles on the ground as well as to individuals from marginalised backgrounds. This is also the reason why the news of her assassination wont sink in easily. She was not some remote icon, some distant figure, but a very cheerful and friendly comrade. Her murder hit home and it almost feels like we are next on the hit list. As John Dayal said, the bullets pumped into Gauris body were meant for all of us. They were meant as a reminder, a silencing tactic for those of us who oppose the politics of the Sangh Parivar.

The last time I called Gauri Lankesh in utter panic was when I heard the news of her conviction in a defamation case over a story published by her magazine against a BJP MP from Dharwad, Prahlad Joshi. She had been sentenced to six months in prison. I was relieved the moment she answered her phone. She had managed to get bail and did not have to do jail time. Gauri was convicted because she held on to the highest ethics of journalism and refused to compromise her sources, who were also in the BJP. She chose not to divulge details of her sources, and opted for conviction instead. On the night of September 5, when a friend called me to say that Gauri Lankesh had been murdered, I thought it was a bad joke, and went into momentary denial. I called her phone in the hope that she would answer and I could heave a sigh of relief. This time, however, no one answered.

The murder is widely being seen as one in a series of assassinations of rationalists like Prof. M M Kalaburagi, Govind Pansare and Narendra Dabholkar by right-wing outfits. The preliminary investigation has revealed that the same 7.65 mm country-made pistol that was used in the earlier murders, was also used to murder Gauri Lankesh. As pointed out by Paranjoy Guha Thakurta in a condolence meeting held at the Press Club of India, Delhi, what made these people vulnerable was the fact that they wrote in the vernacular medium. Choosing to work in the hinterlands, or away from Delhi, challenging caste and superstition at the grassroots, these writers and rationalists offer a much stronger cultural resistance to the RSS than those of us who think, read and write in English. In other words, it also means that those of us who are still alive are safe because we are not inconvenient enough to the RSS. Not yet.

Gauris sister, Kavitha, who was very close to her, said that there could only be one suspect, right-wing activists, as Gauri was a vocal critic of the RSS and BJP. Those who are celebrating the murder on social media are staunch RSS supporters and who write in their bios that they are blessed to be followed by Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi. Narendra Modi has not yet condemned the murder of Gauri Lankesh. Most interesting is a comment made by a BJP MLA from Karnataka, D N Jeevaraj, who said that Gauri Lankesh would have been alive had she not written against the RSS!

If justice is to be delivered to Gauri Amma, it cannot be done by simply finding the mercenaries, who shot her in cold blood. The deeper links behind these murders must be exposed. The armed extremist outfits that sponsor these murders must be rooted out. For the longest time in India, successive governments have cracked down on Islamic extremists, far Left outfits, Khalistanis, and so on, but have given a free hand to the Sangh Parivar to run armed outfits and terror networks. Maya Kodnani, Sadhvi Pragya and Col. Purohit are all out on bail. Swami Aseemanand has been acquitted despite having confessed to his crime, because the investigation is so shady. It wasnt very long ago that public prosecutor, Rohini Salian, revealed she was asked to go soft on Hindutva terror outfits. The present government at the Centre is cultivating lynch mobs and terror outfits by imparting them such impunity.

The Siddaramaiah government has a chance to expose these terror outfits and do real justice to Gauri Lankeshs dream of a society, where we are ruled not by hatred, but by the Constitution.
A newspaper is a strange phenomenon. It pretends to report news but what it actually instigates is a way of consuming news. Todays citizen consumes news like fodder and lives on the mulch it creates. The way he consumes news can be disconcerting. One senses this deeply in the death of Gauri Lankesh. I only met a her a few times, with U.R. Ananthamurthy, who was fond of her as he quarrelled quietly with her father. At that time, news was more like a costume ball, a role she was struggling to come to terms with. As one saw her a few years later, at the sociologist Chandan Gowdas house, one sensed a deeper confidence, a wider curiosity and control. She seemed to have transited from the ugly larva of a tabloid princess to a multi-layered activist. She conveyed the sense that she wrote news and made news. It was clear that ideas and issues mattered to her. As the cultural critic Manu Chakravarty told me, she played a brilliant role in allowing Naxalites to return to the mainstream. It was a courageous act of reconciliation which still remains woefully incomplete. Gauri was a set of unfinished projects on Dalits, on fighting communalism, on combining the vernacular and the cosmopolitan to create a new intellectual space in Bangalore, beyond the more indifferent fortresses of IT and science. She brought a vitality to news, a controversy which revealed her own dreams and foibles. In that sense, she was a contradiction, what activist Madhu Bhushan would call a dizzy mix of vulnerability and curiosity that people found intriguing.

Yet, death as reportage has been distinctly unfair to her.

She became a Rorschach for the city which played out its varieties of concern, hypochondria and hysteria with gusto. Gauri died a woman and she was transformed into a spectacle by a city that turned the truth of her struggle into a set of banalities and trivialities. It was almost as if each group wanted to capture her for their own intellectual turf, oblivious of the brutality of the crime. In fact, the trivialisation of Gauri takes place in several ways. The first of them is by the rationalists who seek to create a serial around Pansare, Kalburgi, Dhabolkar and Gauri. Gauris battle was a more multiverse one. To reduce her death to one more rationalist tragedy impoverishes her. She fought communalism, but as a heady mix other problems. Rationalists attempt to obsessively desiccate Gauris legacy instead of doing what she did by trying to create a deeper connectivity of issues. The sadder event was the way Siddaramiah turned the Gauri murder into a blatant act of vote bank politics. Following soon on the Ambedkar seminar as a public spectacle, it displayed a cynicism and a populism, a use of electoralism as a way of concern. Vote bank politics has banalised democracy and the great political struggles of our time. By providing protection to a bouquet of intellectuals, the Chief Minister added the right tenor of hysteria.

Intellectuals, instead of standing up with dignity, exuded hysteria, a sense of victimisation as importance that showed little concern for the myriads of small-town journalists murdered by the mafia and the politician. It was a VIP victimage that ignored the real dangers of everyday journalism, where hysteria substitutes for a real sense of the danger to journalists and whistle blowers today. In fact, if at one level there was hysteria as news, there was also a sense of indifference. Bangalore conversations resounded with the idea of Gauri as a radical and the radical as someone to be dispensed with. The very word sets the prospect of a future assassination. In fact, a sensitive observer of the elite told me that the technocracy is indifferent, almost emotionally dead when it comes to an event like this. Why is it that many scientists and engineers believe that Gauris world is not about them? It is something that takes place beyond the comfort zone of gated villages. Such sanitised gossip adds little to the understanding of real world politics, of which Gauri was such an integral part.

The hysterical reporting of events also reveals how the media turns the spotlight on Naxalites, mafia, rationalists, but says little about the huge growth of right- wing gangs that pervade politics today. The right has bluffed its responsibility out, trusting on the hysteria of the liberal left. What one misses is any kind of serious debate by civil society, any effort by PUCL/PUDR to investigate the events around her death. One misses an intellectual like U.R. Ananthamurthy who could differ with the Gauri effect and yet bond in a solidarity of struggle and debate, opening up conversation as a way of opening up minds. The storyteller and the social science analyst has gone underground as intellectual life becomes a mix of fear and hypochondria. It is time for a return to citizenship and its articulations. Gauri deserves that relish of debate and controversy, that sense that democratic forces rallied around her, not the factionalised gossip we are presenting as news today. It is almost as if Gauris death signals the impoverishment of democracy and debate in Bangalore. The second event would be the greatest insult to her memory and her struggles to make sense of the unruly politics of our time.

(The writer is professor, Jindal Global Law School, and director, Centre for the Study of Knowledge Systems, O.P. Jindal Global University)
It is often said that the BJP government in Gujarat is run by remote control from the Centre. Chief Ministe Vijay Rupani does not deny it. In an interview with Shashi Bhushan, Mr Rupani says that Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be the partys face in the Assembly elections. Excerpts:

Theres a general perception that thr Gujarat government is remote-controlled by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP president Amit Shah.

Its not a crime to work under Prime Minister Narendra bhai and Amit bhai for the development of the state. Narendra Bhai served that state as chief minister for 13 years and has a lot of experience as chief minister of the state. Even Amit bhai has been in the government. So I dont see anything wrong if I consult them over policy issues. Also, its not a crime to seek guidance from them over development issues. .

The elections are approaching. Will you be the face of the party?

Prime Minister Modi and Mr Shah will be the poster boys of the party during the elections. There is nothing wrong in that. All political parties engage their popular leaders and vote-catchers during elections. Modi bhai and Amit bhai are the most popular leaders in the country today.

Everyone knows Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi will lead the election campaign. Therefore, the BJP will also use its leaders who have mass appeal and can get votes.

How would you rate your performance in the last one year?

For the last 16 years the BJP government in Gujarat has been working for the all-round development of the state. The development of Gujarat started under the visionary leadership of then chief minister Narendra bhai. The Anandiben Patel government carried this forward and my government is also doing the same thing. The BJP is successful in the state only because of the strong and able leadership provided by the visionary leader Narendra bhai. Today Gujarat has been doing well in all sectors  despite being a rain-deficit state, we have performed well in the agrarian sector. Our agricultural growth is above the national average.

Despite your claims, the Congress has accused you of failing in the agriculture and social sectors.

That means they are accepting that we have done well in other sectors. But the truth is that there has been an all-round development in the state because of the strong foundation laid by Narendra. The Congress and its leaders in the state are disconnected from reality and the people of Gujarat.

The Patidar community, which is an influential section, is up in arms against you. Dont you think this could damage your prospects?

The so-called Patidar agitation will not be a factor during the polls. The sting has gone out of the agitation as we have consulted and taken into confidence the stakeholders. We have announced several schemes for them, which also include Mukh-yamantri Yuva Swalamban Yogna, to provide financial assistance to the youth of this community.

How do you see the debut of Arvind Kejriwals Aam Aadmi Party or formation of the third front in the state polls?

They are welcome to contest the poll but they will only taste defeat. The people of Gujarat have never accepted a third front in the state. The fight will be between the BJP and the Congress  the two main competitors.

You had once asked people to change their food habits and become vegetarians. Is your government planning to bring any legislation in this regard?

Yes, I had said that. Most people in the world are now becoming vegetarians. In Gujarat, a majority of people are vegetarians. I appeal to other to do the same. But I am not going to force that on anyone. I am not going to bring in any legislation in this regard.

Your state had hit the headlines for targeting dalits on the issue of cow slaughter. What steps have you taken to ban cow slaughter.

In order to protect milch animals, we have introduced strong legislation that included life imprisonment for cow slaughter in the state. We have also shut down hookah bars in the state. We have also strengthened the anti-liquor laws. Anyone found selling or manufacturing illicit liquor will be dealt with strictly. Violation of liquor prohibition will also attract imprisonment for life.

Are you confident of carrying out Mr Shahs goal for 150 of 182 Assembly seats?

The BJP is going to record a historic win. We will get over 150 seats. When Modiji was chief minister, he got 122 seats in the 2012 Assembly polls. This time we are confident of getting over 150 seats. There will be division of votes in the Muslim community because of our fight against triple talaq, and we expect Muslim women to vote for the BJP. It happened in Uttar Pradesh. When Prime Minister Narendra Bhai talks of 6.5 crore Gujaratis, it also includes Muslims.

Your have also managed break the Congress.

The Congress is in disarray. The 13 Congress MLAs who joined the BJP recently will only strengthen us. The split in the Congress has helped us. With the formidable Patel leader Raghavji Patel of Jamnagar joining the BJP, the Congress back has been broken. The BJP was somewhat weak in central Gujarat. This weakness, too, has been neutralised with the Congressmen joining us. Please note some of these Congress MLAs also have influence over the Patidar community.
Views and opinions on what to do in Afghanistan will invariably be many, and conflicted. It is preferable, therefore, bank on plain, oft-forgotten or ignored facts to visualise the future east of Suez and what magnet landlocked Afghanistan holds for America. And for that matter what that tribal society has meant for a series of empires in the past. While apparently incomparable, the two As (America & Afghanistan) are a study in glaring contrast and visible contradiction. Taken together, theyre poles apart. No common ground on history, geography, culture, economics, religion, philosophy, anthropology, contiguity, tradition But Afghanistan continues to mesmerise the United States, even after almost 16 years of bloodshed since Sunday, October 7, 2001, when the US launched a war to evict the Taliban from Kabul in the wake of 9/11. Afghanistan has fatally attracted many others in the past  troops came from the banks of the Thames to the Jhelum; from the Syr Darya and Amu Darya to the Volga! It never stopped. It was invaded by fighters from the Mississipi-Missouri river valley and the Danube, Murray and Darling, and missiles hurled at it from the sea and sky. The Afghan bug-afflicted US President, Donald Trump, now wants to pitch tent in Kabul. He was convinced by the Pentagon, after being shown 1972 pictures of Afghan women wearing miniskirts. Mr Trump was also convinced by his military experts that Indias proximity to Pashtuns makes it a preferred partner to tackle the situation in Pakistan-Afghan border region of Paktika, Helmand, Kandahar, Nangarhar, Nuristan, Khost and Kabul.

But the question remains: why do people from distant lands get hooked to landlocked Afghanistans 2.90 crore people  comprising 42 per cent Pashtun, 27 per cent Tajik, nine per cent Hazara, nine per cent Uzbek, four per cent Chahar Aimak, and three per cent Turkmen? With an area of 65,2864 sq km; a population density of 110.8 persons per square mile; 25 per cent urban and 75 per cent rural; sex distribution of 51 per cent male to 49 per cent female; 70 per cent of the population under 29; 99 per cent Muslim; a total fertility rate of almost six children per woman; more than 30 per cent unemployed; 43.1 per cent male and 12.6 per cent female literacy; poor communications; pathetic infrastructure and a terror-breeding terrain of multiple intra- and inter-ethnic conflict, it can easily be called a land of ceaseless violence, endless forced-migration and unending hostility. But it is also inhabited by a warm, hospitable people who welcomes guests, friends and non-interfering outsiders and tourists. The inner voice of war-ravaged, traditional Afghans is likely to run on these lines: We are Afghans. We have our own history (turbulent most of the time), culture, tradition We love to live on our own terms, without external interference, in accordance with our wishes. We are a tribal and traditional, patriarchal, male-dominated society. That is what we are, and thats the way we have been. Leave us alone. Live and let live. Dont try fiddle with our system, or try find fault with it. We hate it. Beyond a point, we dont tolerate it, and dont hesitate to fight to kill, or get killed, for what we believe. You are welcome to enjoy our hospitality and friendship as a guest. But dont sermonise, dictate or impose your will on us We Afghans do know how to respect others. Do reciprocate, and give us respect too, and maintain a healthy distance. We appreciate, and always return, honour and respect. We love our freedom of thought, action, belief.

Given this, the US Presidents decision to deploy more troops and stay on till victory in the Fifth Afghan War (First Anglo-Afghan war 1839-1842; Second Anglo-Afghan war 1878-1880; Third Anglo-Afghan war 1919; Fourth Soviet-Afghan war 1979-1989) requires scrutiny. The United States is indisputably the worlds only superpower today, despite troubling developments at home. With a GDP $16 trillion-plus, over 50 overseas bases, a fleet of 11 aircraft-carriers, a population of 330 million, a mega military-industrial complex and a real-time global intelligence-gathering system from space and sea, the US presence in Afghanis-tan is like a Gulliver in the land of little people. But the question that still needs to be asked, though no answers may be forthcoming, is this: Why is fighting against Afghan tribals such a fatal attraction? Is it owing to location or position? Untapped raw material? To nip terror havens in the bud? To keep track of Russia, China, Iran, Pakistan, India and landlocked Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan? Or to experiment new war incendiaries in a remote, barren terrain? To control the drugs of southeast Afghanistans Helmand? To teach lessons to the warlords and drug lords of Kabul? There are no answers from Washington. But the issue has acquired some importance in India as Mr Trump wants New Delhi to play a bigger role in Kabul to help the United States. Does this imply a changed role for India internationally, or is it a restoration of the old hyphenation of Afghanistan-Pakistan-India  as done by previous US Presidents?

The issue may not be as simple as it looks. Landlocked Afghanistan is like a playing field for the Pakistan Army and the ISI  spanning polity to economics, coups to assassinations, drugging foreign soldiers from Moscow and Washington to make profit for its officers. In juxtaposition, it is the bewildering maze of Afghanistans eternal conflict situation. First, the intra-tribe individual conflict (cousin versus cousin being the most prominent). Second, intra-tribal feud between Durrani Popalzai (to which former President Hamid Karzai belongs) and Durrani Barakzai, which fought for power in the 19th century. Third, the inter-tribal fight between tribes of same ethnic group  Durrani versus Ghilzai. Fourth, inter-tribe fight involving two tribes of different ethnic groups  Hazara versus Pashtun. And fifth, the familiar Afghanistan, as seen even now  the perennial conflict between one or more tribes versus whosoever is in power in Kabul. How can India really help beyond the significant role it is already playing in the development of Afghanistan, where its neighbours like Pakistan and increasingly China are operating more stealthily. India can certainly play a bigger part in the Afghan economy, and offer more assistance, but what it must never  ever  do is to send troops to fight on Afghan soil or to militarily support any other power that does so. Every foreigner who fights Afghans on Afghan soil becomes a permanent enemy of the Afghan people, and history has shown how hostile they can be. In earlier centuries, they have even ruled over India. Sher Shah, the Lodhis, Nadir Shah, Ahmad Shah Abdali  all have ruled over and looted India. Both Soviet and American troops, in different decades, were drugged to decimation by cunning Sino-Pakistani shadow operators. That is why India shouldnt fall into the same trap of direct intervention. There are already too many live fronts on our borders; opening up another one is a prelude to disaster.
Qualcomm and Apple are facing off in federal court over Qualcomms licensing for modem chips.

Apple 11 foreign lawsuits against Qualcomm can proceed while the companys dispute plays out in the United States, a US federal judge in San Diego ruled Sept. 7.

Qualcomm and Apple are facing off in federal court over Qualcomms licensing for modem chips, which provide mobile data connectivity to devices like the iPhone.

Because those chips have become a standard across the mobile phone industry, Qualcomm is required to license them on fair terms.

Apple has alleged that Qualcomm is charging unfair prices for the technology and is engaging in anticompetitive practices. Qualcomm, for its part, has said that it provided fair terms for the parts of technology where it is obligated to do so and that it is within its rights to determine pricing on patents that are not bound by the standards rules.

Qualcomm had sought what is known as an anti-suit injunction against Apple, seeking to temporarily halt 11 separate lawsuits against Qualcomm and its subsidiaries in the United Kingdom, Japan, China and Taiwan over many of the same pricing and practices issues as the US case.

But Judge Gonzalo Curiel ruled against Qualcomm and said Apple could proceed with those actions while the US case plays out.

Apples declarations make evident that it has sought to challenge Qualcomms patent licensing practices and anticompetitive conduct territory by territory, Curiel wrote. While Qualcomm may object to this litigation strategy as duplicative, the Court will not conclude that Apples exercise of its rights under foreign laws is vexatious.

Christine Trimble, vice president of public affairs at Qualcomm, said in a statement, While we are disappointed by todays rulings, we recognize that the motions involved high procedural hurdles.

Apple praised the ruling.

We are pleased the federal court in San Diego decided Qualcomm must establish the fair value of its technology and defend its business practices in court before forcing Apple and others to pay exorbitant and unfair rates, which amount to a tax on our own inventions, Apple spokesman Josh Rosenstock said in a statement.

Qualcomm has also brought an action against Apple before the US International Trade Commission seeking to ban imports of some iPhones. Qualcomm filed a separate civil lawsuit accusing Apple of infringing the patents at issue in that action.

Qualcomm also faces an antitrust complaint from the US Federal Trade Commission. Meantime, four of Apples contract manufacturers sued Qualcomm on antitrust allegations, and Apple joined that lawsuit.

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Cubans wade through a flooded street in Havana on Sunday. Hurricane Irma battered central Cuba on Saturday, knocking down power lines, uprooting trees and ripping the roofs off homes. (Photo: AP)

At least three people are reported to have been killed as Hurricane Irma swept into Florida, carrying 200 km per hour winds and threatening to devastate large parts of the so-called Sunshine State.

Millions of people, including thousands of Indian-Americans, in Florida braced for life- threatening Hurricane Irma which hit the states southern islands on Sunday as a Category Four storm after leaving a trail of destruction across the Caribbean.

More than 6.3 million people were told to evacuate Florida, with warnings of a huge storm surge that would be life-threatening to anyone in its path.

Irma has already devastated parts of the Caribbean with at least 25 deaths. About 60 Indian nationals are being evacuated from the vacation island of St Martin in the Caribbean. The eye of the storm was 24 km southeast of Key West.

Around 1,20,000 Indian-Americans reside across Florida while thousands of them live in the now-dangerous zones of Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Tampa.

The Indian embassy in the US has opened a round-the-clock helpline number and rushed senior diplomats to Atlanta to lead relief efforts for Indian-Americans stuck in the region. The hotline number is 202-258-8819.

The Indian Consulate in Atlanta tweeted helpline numbers (+14044052567 & +1678179393) for people seeking assistance.

External affairs ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar tweeted 24X7 helpline at High Commission of India, Kingston (+1876 833 4500; +1876 564 1378). He also tweeted email ids for Indians to contact in case of an emergency: hc.kingston@mea.gov.in; hoc.kingston@mea.gov.i.
Rohingya Muslim refugee children follow a vehicle with relief supplies near the Bangladeshi town of Teknaf on Sunday (Photo: AFP)

Rohingya militants in Myanmar, whose raids sparked an army crackdown that has seen nearly 3,00,000 Muslim Rohingya flee to Bangladesh, on Sunday declared a unilateral ceasefire but the government declared it would not negotiate with terrorists.

The UN said 2,94,000 bedraggled and exhausted Rohingya refugees have arrived in Bangladesh since the militants' attacks on Myanmar security forces in neighbouring Rakhine state on August 25 sparked a major military backlash.

Tens of thousands more are believed to be on the move inside Rakhine after more than a fortnight without shelter, food and water.

The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) hereby declares a temporary cessation of offensive military operations, the group said in a statement on its Twitter account. It urged all humanitarian actors to resume aid delivery to all victims of humanitarian crisis irrespective of ethnic or religious background during the ceasefire until October 9.
Children cannot be expected to walk three or more kilometres to attend school, the Supreme Court has said. It said to make the right of education meaningful, efforts should be made to have upper primary schools in such a manner that no children have to walk such a distance only to attend schools.



The court was dealing with a matter in which permission granted to a school to upgrade itself was opposed by a nearby school in Kerala, which has the highest literacy rate in the country.



A bench of Justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta noted that students who have passed Class IV in a junior primary school based in Parappanangadi town, have to travel a distance of 3-4 or more kilometres to attend classes.



"We cannot expect children in the age group of 10 to 14 years to walk 3 kilometres or more to attend school. The right of education up to the age of 14 years is now a fundamental right under article 21A of the Constitution and if this right is to be meaningful, then efforts must be made to open upper primary schools in such a manner that no child has to walk 3 kilometres or more only to attend school," the bench said.



The school was upgraded to the level of upper primary school and permitted to run from Class V to VIII also by the state government in June 2015. The state's order was challenged before the high court by another school which claimed that the procedure prescribed under the Kerala Education Rules, 1959 were not followed and no notice was given to schools in the vicinity to raise any objection with regard to the upgradation.



A single judge of the high court had allowed the plea filed by the school and set aside the state's order on the ground that the procedure prescribed under the Act was not followed.



It, however, had allowed the junior primary school to permit students already admitted to continue their education till the next academic year and said that it would be open for the government to take a fresh decision in the matter.



The junior primary school had challenged the order before a division bench of the high court which dismissed its plea.



The school then moved the apex court and its counsel told the bench that the government had taken a conscious decision to give relaxation in its favour and exempt it from certain provisions of the Act and it was then upgraded to an upper primary school from the academic year 2015-2016.



The apex court, while setting aside the high court's orders, said no other school was situated at a distance of less than three kilometres from the junior primary school.




Leader of Opposition in the Tamil Nadu Assembly M K Stalin has alleged that the ruling AIADMK in the state has "lost its majority" with the dissent by 21 of its MLAs and the DMK-led opposition commanding a strength of 98 in the House.



"With the DMK and its allies having a strength 98 MLAs in the Assembly and the ruling party's 21 dissenting legislators, the AIADMK government, led by K Palaniswami, has lost its majority in the House," he told a public meeting here last night.



Stalin said the DMK and its allies, the Congress and the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), would "point out this arithmetic" to Governor Ch Vidyasagar Rao later today. The opposition parties have sought an appointment with the governor to apprise him of the "prevailing issues" in the state.



Stalin warned of a "people's struggle" to unseat the AIADMK government, if no action was taken. "This is not for grabbing power, but to safeguard the self-respect of the people of Tamil Nadu," he said.



The opposition leader's comments have come at a time when Chief Minister Palaniswami is locked in a tussle for power with sidelined AIADMK deputy general secretary T T V Dhinakaran, who is seeking his ouster.



In the 234-member Tamil Nadu Assembly, which has one seat vacant (R K Nagar, represented by late J Jayalalithaa), the AIADMK has 134 MLAs, excluding the speaker. The opposition DMK has 89 legislators, its allies Congress eight and IUML one.



The Dhinakaran camp has been pressing for the ouster of Palaniswami as chief minister since the factions, led by the latter and his predecessor O Panneerselvam respectively, merged on August 21.



A group of 19 MLAs, loyal to Dhinakaran, had met the governor on August 22 and expressed lack of confidence in the chief minister, prompting the opposition parties to demand a floor test in the Assembly.



Stalin also took a dig at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying that despite claiming to be from the backward class, he was doing "injustice" to the BC community in the country.



The DMK leader said several problems, including farmer suicides and fishermen's issues, had remained unsolved under the Modi regime, adding that the National Eligibility-cum- Entrance Test (NEET) was the latest in the list.






Myanmar does not want its 1.1 million Rohingya, who are seen as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh and are refused citizenship.



Successive regimes have historically discriminated against them even though many have lived for generations in Rakhine state.





India has called for an immediate end to violence in Myanmar's western state of Myanmar, urging its ally to act with restraint as hordes of Rohingya flee to neighbouring Bangladesh."We would urge that the situation in Rakhine State be handled with restraint and maturity, focusing on the welfare of the civilian population alongside those of the security forces," the foreign ministry said in a statement late Saturday."It is imperative that violence is ended and normalcy in the State restored expeditiously," it said, adding it was concerned about the outflow of refugees.The call came days after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a state visit to the Buddhist-majority country amid spiralling violence in Rakhine that has forced nearly 300,000 Rohingya Muslims to flee.Modi condemned a series of coordinated attacks by Rohingya militants on Myanmar troops and police on August 25, but did not comment on the subsequent violence against the Rohingya and their mass exodus.Fleeing Rohingya accuse the security forces of mass killings and rapes and the burning of hundreds of villages.
Hundreds of protesters clashed with police and burnt down a liquor store in an Indian city on Sunday over demands to shut a school where a seven-year-old was killed for resisting a staffer's sexual attack.



Authorities said several people were injured.



Demonstrators attacked the store near the school in Gurgaon near New Delhi after riot police thwarted their attempt to storm the campus.



The boy's body was found in the Ryan International school's lavatory on Friday with his throat slit with a knife. Police said a school bus attendant, who was arrested hours after the incident, had admitted attacking the child after he resisted a sexual assault.



Angry parents had tried to storm the campus on Saturday, a day after they vandalised part of the school building to press demands for criminal charges against the school management.



"We had to use force to disperse the protesters after our warning had no effect," Gurgaon police commissioner Sandeep Khirwar told AFP.



Residents told television channels the shop was targeted because several staff members had been seen previously consuming alcohol during school hours.



Parents have demanded that the school's operating licence be cancelled. Authorities have ordered it closed until further notice to avoid violence.



The incident has caused widespread anger and sparked concern over safety standards in schools.



India's swelling middle class has fuelled the growth of private schools in a country with a crumbling public education system.



On Saturday police arrested a man after he allegedly raped a five-year-old girl inside a classroom in New Delhi.



India has a grim record of sexual assaults on minors with 20,000 cases of rape or sexual assault reported in 2015, according to government data.



A UN Committee on the Rights of the Child in 2014 said one in three rape victims in India was a minor. Almost half the abusers are known to the victims.
The Delhi Government has ordered a magisterial inquiry into the alleged sexual assault of a five-year-old girl in a Shahdara school, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said today.



He also said that a protocol would be chalked out for all city schools to ensure the safety of students.



The five-year-old was allegedly raped by a peon on the premises of the private school in Shahdara here yesterday. The accused, Vikas Kumar, was arrested last night.



The incident comes close on the heels of the gruesome killing of a seven-year-old boy who had his throat slit for allegedly resisting sexual assault by a bus conductor of a Gurgaon school -- an incident which sent shock waves across the country.



Kejriwal said such incidents won't be tolerated. "Shameful. Won't be tolerated. Police doing its job. Ordered magsterial enquiry. Will develop protocol 4 all schools 2 ensure children safety (sic)," he tweeted.



Delhi Revenue Minister Kailash Gahlot also tweeted about the incident and said that the inquiry report will be submitted in three days.



"Delhi Govt orders Magisterial Enquiry headed by SDM Vivek Vihar into the rape incident of 5 year old girl of a private school in east Delhi's Raghuwarpura near Gandhinagar. Report to be submitted by SDM within 3 days (sic)," Gahlot said.

The arrested man, Vikas, had been working in the school for the last three years. Previously, he worked as a security guard there.



He allegedly took the girl inside an empty classroom around noon yesterday when he was walking in the corridors after handing over lunch boxes to teachers.



The girl later complained of bleeding and pain in her private parts to her mother. She was taken to a hospital where a medical examination confirmed sexual assault.
In probably a first case of its kind, fed up by her mental harassment ,a Muslim woman divorced her husband through 'khula' (an Islamic form of divorce initiated by the wife) at a press conference here.



Shazda Khatoon, who had been married to Zubair Ali, a resident of the state capital, around 12 years back, announced sending the 'khulanama' (the divorce papers) to the hubby before the media here on Saturday.



Shazda said that her husband had been harassing her mentally for the past several years. ''I kept tolerating all atrocities in the hope that things would be alright one day...but it did not,'' she said.



'' I sought a divorce from him but he refused...he and his family only wanted to harass me,'' she said.



She said that she had also approached the 'Shariat court' (Islamic court) and sought justice from there. ''I was not allowed to give khula to my husband,'' she said.



Shazda then contacted a women's rights activist, who suggested that she should not look to the clerics and should herself give 'khula' to Zubair.



Muslim clerics differed on whether a woman could divorce her husband in such a way. ..A Muslim woman can not give khula in this way...she will have to approach the sharia court if the husband is not giving her divorce....there is a well-defined procedure after which divorce can be granted,'' said a senior Muslim cleric here on Sunday.



Women's rights activists, however, find nothing wrong with this. ''Islam allows a woman to divorce her husband if the latter refuses to give divorce to her,'' said an activist here.
Former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda today said a CBI probe should be ordered by the Centre into the killing of a seven-year-old student of Gurgaon's Ryan International School.



"People's anger in this case is a natural reaction. A heinous crime has been committed, an innocent child has been murdered. If parents of the child want a CBI probe into the case, the government should not hesitate," Hooda said.

Police today used batons to quell the protest outside the Ryan International School and detained 20 protestors. Cameras of some photojournalists were also damaged during the protest.

The former chief minister said, "I have come to know that even media persons on duty have been lathicharged in Gurgaon today and have sustained injuries and equipment of some of them got damaged as a result."



Upping the ante against the BJP government in Haryana, Hooda said, "This government has lost the trust and confidence of the public. By assaulting mediapersons, the government is trying to suppress voice of the people."

However, Gurgaon Police Commissioner Sandeep Khirwar denied the charges of targeting mediapersons.



"As per my knowledge, a fair warning was given to clear the place and nobody was targeted. However, if any mediaperson has been injured, then I express my regret and we will analyse the entire episode. But there was no intention to target anyone," Khirwar said.



"On behalf of police authorities, I want to request the district administration that the mediapersons should be given best medical treatment," he said.



A class II student was found murdered with his throat slit in the school washroom in Gurgaon on Friday. The school's acting principal was suspended and the security staff removed. The police claimed the student was killed by bus conductor Ashok Kumar, who tried to sexually abuse him.



The accused was arrested within hours of the murder after which a court in Gurgaon sent him to police custody for three days.
A portion of an under- construction flyover collapsed near Bomikhal here, killing at least one man and injuring 11 persons, official sources said.

About three-four persons were suspected to be trapped under the rubble, they added.



Around 15 labourers were working on the flyover when the structure collapsed on them in the afternoon.



Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik expressed grief at the incident and announced Rs 5 lakh ex-gratia for the next of kin of the deceased and free treatment for the injured.



"An exemplary punishment will be meted out to those found guilty," he said.



Satya Patnaik, a 39-year-old businessman, was killed as he, along with his daughter Sheetal, was under the flyover when it caved it, Revenue Divisional Commissioner (RDC), Central Division, A B Otta told reporters.



Patnaik's daughter was seriously injured and admitted to the AIIMS, Bhubaneswar, the RDC said.



The rest of the injured have been admitted to the Capital Hospital, AIIMS and various other hospitals.



Police, fire brigade and Odisha Disaster Rapid Action Force (ODRAF) personnel have been engaged to carry out the rescue operation. Earth-movers are being used for the purpose.



The chief minister said two engineers had been suspended in the aftermath of the flyover collapse.



"I have already ordered an inquiry into the matter. It is certainly a major mistake on the part of the contractor. The job was assigned to Panda Infrastructure," Works Department Secretary N K Pradhan said.



He added that strict action would be taken against those found guilty.



Pradhan said rescuing those trapped in the debris was the first priority of the state government.



The flyover project, he said, was under the Roads and Buildings (R&B) Division-4.



"A portion of the flyover caved in when we were busy plastering its roof. We had started work at around 8 am," said an injured worker, who was undergoing treatment at the Capital Hospital.



Police Commissioner Y B Khurania and senior officials are monitoring the rescue operations.


Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe will break ground on India's first bullet train project on Thursday in western Gujarat state, as the country seeks faster travel for millions.



Modi has pledged to invest billions of dollars to modernise India's creaking railway system, with the bullet train one of his key election promises ahead of his landslide victory in 2014.



The leaders will lay the foundation stone of the high-speed rail network between Ahmedabad -- the capital city of Modi's home state -- and India's financial hub of Mumbai on September 14, a statement by the Gujarat government said Saturday.



Japan is a pioneer in high-speed rail networks, and its Shinkansen bullet train is among the fastest in the world.



Japan will provide 85 percent of the total project cost of $19 billion in soft loans.



The train will reduce the travel time between the two cities from eight to three-3.5 hours, and is expected to complete by December 2023. It will have a capacity of 750 passengers.



India's traditional railway network is the world's fourth largest by distance and remains the vast country's main form of travel, with 22 million passengers commuting daily.



But passengers have to often endure chronic delays in journeys on the British-era network, where only a few trains hit 100 miles per hour, and which has been hit by series of deadly crashes in past years.



Modi recently replaced his railway minister after a series of derailments, including one last month which killed at least 23 passengers in the northern Uttar Pradesh state.



In November, 146 people died in a similar disaster in Uttar Pradesh.



Abe's two-day visit to Ahmedabad comes ahead of Modi's 67th birthday on Sunday. Modi has a history of 'birthday diplomacy' in his home state, hosting Chinese President Xi Jingpin in Gujarat on his birthday in 2014.



The two leaders are expected to sign several agreements during the visit and inaugurate a Japanese industrial park in the state that already hosts Honda and Suzuki auto plants.






A Muslim woman was thrown out of home by her in laws and hubby in Uttar Pradesh's Ballia district, about 400 kilometres from here, for allegedly making paintings of prime minister Narendra Modi and chief minister Yogi Adityanath.



According to the police sources here on Sunday, the woman Nagma had been married to one Parvez Ahmed, a resident of Basarikhpur village in the district in November last year.



The woman was fond of painting and used to draw pictures of Hindu gods and goddesses. Police officials, quoting the locals, said that there were several paintings of gods and goddesses in her house. Nagma had made a painting of Lord Ganesha, which had been put up on the walls at Sikandarpur police station, reports said.



Parvez, however, got very angry, when she made the painting of Modi and Yogi, and allegedly threw her out of the house forcing her to take shelter at her parent's house at Muturi village in the same district.



A panchayat was also held to resolve the matter but nothing came out of it, sources said.



Nagma's father Shamsher Khan lodged a complaint with the police alleging that her daughter was thrown out for making the paintings of Modi and Yogi. He also alleged that Parvez had assaulted Nagma and was also planning to marry again.



Parvez denied the allegations and said that Nagma was ''mentally retarded''. ''We fear that she may harm herself some day and we may be implicated in the same,'' he said.



Local police said a case under the dowry act lodged by the woman was pending in the district court. ''We are investigating the matter,'' said a district police official in Ballia.
Hundreds of BJP workers attacked a police station in Uttar Pradesh's Basti town, about 200 kilometres from here, thrashed the constables and forcibly got two of its leaders released from there.



Many police personnel, including the sub-inspectors, fled from the police station when the saffron party worker thrashed the constables on Saturday, according to the sources.



Five sub-inspectors were suspended for abandoning their post. Some more police personnel were likely to be acted against, sources said.



Police officials said that a leader of the Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), the students' wing of BJP, Kabir Tiwari and two others had been detained by the police on charges of assaulting the principal of a degree college and holding him hostage for several hours on Saturday.



Kabir, who was the president of the college student's union, had failed in the examination but wanted to be promoted to the next class, sources said.



Hundreds of saffron party workers stormed the Kotwali police station on getting the news of Tiwari's detention. The BJP workers ransacked the police station and got Tiwari and another leader forcibly released. Terrified police personnel fled from the post instead of confronting the trouble makers.



A case was registered against Tiwari and unidentified BJP workers.



Earlier also there have been instances, when BJP workers and leaders, including party MLAs, storming police stations and assaulting police officials in several parts of the state.
Cabinet minister Nirmala Sitharaman, who on Thursday assumed charge as the countrys first full-time woman defence minister visited airbase in Barmer district on Sunday along the side of India Pakistan border.



Sitharaman chose to start off her field work with a visit to Indias first underground airbase which also has the squadron of upgraded MiG-21 Bison. Chief of air staff air chief marshal BS Dhanoa was accompanying her during the visit to Uttarlai airbase. The air base played an important role in the Indo-Pakistan war in 1971.



After reaching Uttarlai, she first addressed air warriors and then interacted with station personnel and along side, she assessed the operational readiness of the air base in the Western Sector and review the morale of personnel. She also took the feedback from the officers.



Before leaving for Gujarat at around 7 PM, she also interacted with media persons. As per defence sources, her visit to this sensitive Air Force station is considered crucial as Uttarlai Air Force station is very near the Pakistan border and play an important role in India's defence preparedness. "This is the second time when a defence minister has visited the Uttarlai base in all these years. Earlier the former Defense Minister George Fernandez also visited during Atal Bihari Vajpayee's government" the senior defence official said.
A delegation of the opposition National Conference, led by former chief minister Omar Abdullah, today conveyed to Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh the party's concern over the Centre's ambiguity in defending Jammu and Kashmir's special status under Article 35A of the Constitution.



The delegation called on Singh, who is on a four-day visit to the state, here this afternoon.



"While highlighting the political, historical and constitutional context of the state's special status, Omar registered the party's concern and disappointment over the central government's ambiguity in defending the state's special status in the Supreme Court with respect to Article 35A," a spokesman of the National Conference said after the meeting.



Omar also highlighted the "worsened and constantly deteriorating situation" in the valley.



The delegation also sought a sustained and open-ended political engagement with stakeholders in Kashmir irrespective of their ideology, and urged New Delhi and Islamabad to make sincere and sustained efforts towards resumption of a comprehensive dialogue on all outstanding issues including that of Kashmir, the spokesman said.



He said the party delegation also reiterated its struggle for the restoration of autonomy and asked the central government to initiate a process of reversing "erosions" made to the state's autonomy that had been violated by extending various hitherto inapplicable central laws to the state, the Goods and Services Tax (GST) being the most recent example.



"The party also decried the singular focus on operational and military mechanisms in dealing with an inherently political issue and asked the central government to reach out to the alienated and isolated youth of the valley," he added.



Meanwhile, party representatives in the delegation from Leh and Kargil, Phuntsog Wangdan Shunu and Aga Syed Abbas Rizvi respectively, highlighted pressing issues in Leh and Kargil.



"The representatives raised challenges faced on the connectivity, communication and infrastructure front and sought that the central Government resolves these issues that are a cause of great misery and inconvenience to the people," the spokesman said.



Shunu said the exorbitant airfare to Leh round the year, especially during the months when the road-link is closed, is a source of great misery to the people.



He asked the central government to take all possible measures to ensure a reasonable airfare policy for such hilly areas.



He also highlighted poor and in certain places defunct quality of BSNL network connectivity, and said the corporation was solely focussed on reaping benefits of infrastructural monopoly in far-flung areas of Leh while failing to provide even basic connectivity.



They also sought measures be taken for utilisation of allocated funds for the Zojila tunnel and connectivity to the national grid.



Rizvi also reiterated the long-pending demand of a functional civil airport in Kargil and interim, adequate winter air-connectivity arrangement for Kargil that would enable the district to explore it maximum economic and tourism potential.



A PDP delegation, led by party vice president Sartaj Madni, also called on Singh and conveyed the party's views on the issues facing the state.



Delegations of state units of the BJP, Congress, People's Conference and the CPI(M) also called on the home minister.
Targeting erstwhile alliance partner and Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav today said the state government must spell out details of every penny "embezzled" by a Bhagalpur-based NGO in Srijan scam case.



"Nitish government will have to give details of every penny that was embezzled by Srijan in the state's 'maha ghotala' (mega scam)," he said.



The RJD chief exhorted the people who had gathered at a rally at Sandis compound here to register their protest over the Srijan scam by participating in "dharnas" to be held at every district headquarter town on September 12.



Lalu also wondered why FIRs were not registered against Nitish Kumar, Sushil Kumar Modi, Ashwini Choubey (Union minister) and others in the scam, which is nothing short of a 'maha ghotala'.



Mounting a scathing attack on the chief minister, the RJD supremo said Nitish Kumar was not only a "Paltu Ram" (one who switches sides), but a greedy person who wants to remain in power till his death.



"...I knew about his (Nitish's) character... He (Nitish) would not have become CM had I nursed 'putra-moh' despite having larger number of MLAs than that of JD(U)," he said.



Alleging that Nitish used to stay at the residence of one "Mishra" in Bhagalpur, Lalu questioned the credentials of the person.



He said the Srijan scam would have been buried by now, had the media not highlighted it.



The former railway minister said that they (BJP-JD(U)) failed to defeat him (lalu), so they were now targeting his son Tejashwi Prasad Yadav.



Lalu said there was a deliberate attempt to hamper the Bhagalpur rally and that is why the CBI summoned him to Delhi.



"I am not afraid of Narendra Modi's empty threats, rather I will make BJP bite the dust even if I have to be hung by the neck," Lalu said.



The RJD chief was accompanied by senior vice president Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, his two sons -- Tejashwi and Tej Pratap -- and other senior leaders of the party.



Former deputy CM Tejashwi Prasad Yadav also trained his guns at the Bihar CM for his "failure to take action against such scams from the beginning".



The CBI should conduct a fair probe and lodge FIRs against the CM, deputy CM, Union minister Giriraj Singh and Shahnawaz Hussain for hatching a conspiracy and destroying evidence, Tejashwi said.



The former deputy CM also accused Nitish of moral corruption besides indulging in political and social corruption by ditching minorities, scheduled castes and backward classes, who had given a mandate to the grand alliance.
Namma Bengaluru Foundation (NBF), a non-governmental organisation, has urged the state government to give details of land encroached upon by members of the public in the Western Ghats.



As per a report submitted to the government in 2007 by the Joint Legislature Committee, approximately 1,65,796 acres of forest land, including 1,04,497 acres in the ecologically sensitive zone of Western Ghats, has been encroached upon. These encroachments are mainly in Belagavi and Chikkamagaluru districts.



V Balasubramanian, chairman, Task Force for Recovery of Public Land and its Protection Committee, has reported that an estimated 27,336 acres of land has been illegally encroached upon in Bengaluru Urban district. The government, however, claims that it has reclaimed only 15,833 acres of land in the BBMP limits. The details of the remaining 11,503 acres are not available, Sridhar Pabbisetty, CEO, Namma Bengaluru Foundation, said and urged the government to provide the information.



The organisation claims the land reclaimed by the government will benefit the rich, not the poor. It also sought action against officials who facilitated the encroachments. The value of this land is estimated at Rs 4 lakh crore.



DH News Service


JD(S) state president H D Kumaraswamy on Sunday said that there is a demand from his party legislators and councillors that the Bengaluru mayor post should go to the JD(S).



Addressing a press conference after holding a meeting with JD(S) legislators from Bengaluru and councillors, Kumaraswamy said he was not happy with the attitude of the Congress leaders towards the JD(S). If Congress leaders are of the impression that their support to the JD(S) is inevitable for the mayoral poll, then they are wrong, he said.



The election to elect the next mayor and deputy mayor is scheduled for September 28. Although the BJP had emerged as the single largest party in the BBMP council in 2015 polls with 100 seats, the JD(S) and the Congress joined hands and managed to keep the BJP out of power . This was possible as MLAs, MLCs and MPs from Bengaluru get to vote in the mayoral poll.



My councillors tell me that funds are not released for developmental works in their wards. They are treated badly and not taken into confidence before taking any decision. The attitude of the Congress changes only when the mayoral poll nears, Kumaraswamy said.



To a query, he said no Congress leader had approached him or the JD(S) president H D Deve Gowda so far with regard to the mayoral election.



The total strength of the electoral college for the mayoral poll is 266. This includes 198 councillors, five Lok Sabha MPs, 10 Rajya Sabha MPs, 25 MLCs and 28 MLAs who are voters in the BBMP limits.



The BJP and the Congress have started working out the numbers, with 134 being the magic figure to form a simple majority. The BJP has 126 voters, the Congress 117 and JD(S) 23.


A man, who absconded for 30 years in a case pertaining to kidnapping of a minor girl for marriage, has now approached the Supreme Court for bail.



He was arrested in June this year in the case registered with Mundgod police in Uttara Kannada district in 1987.



A bench of Justices S A Bobde and L Nageswara Rao issued notice to the Karnataka government on a petition filed by Madappa alias Madu. The court sought response from the state within four weeks on his plea, challenging a high court order of July 27 that declined him the bail.



Madappa hailed from Gopinathpur of Kollegal taluk in Chamarajanagar district. He visited his relative in Uttara Kannada district in 1987. He stayed there for 10-12 days and allegedly enticed away minor daughter of a neighbour to his village at Gopinathapur. A case under Section 366A (kidnapping a minor daughter for marriage) of the Indian Penal Code was registered in the Kollegal police station.



He was apprehended and the girl was also found. As the trial began, he was released on bail. But during the trial, he jumped bail and remained untraceable for 30 years. The case was transferred from Kollegal to the Mundgod police station due to jurisdiction. The police finally in June 2017 caught him from Prakasam district in Andhra Pradesh.



In his petition, Madappa, who is now 58, claimed the reason for his non-appearance before the trial court was that he never received any summons. Among other grounds, he claimed the police have then recorded statements of witnesses, who said the girl was 18 year at the time of the incident, so no offence was made out.



The high court had, however, rejected his plea for bail, noticing that the trial has been kept pending because of his absence for a prolonged period of 30 years. It said that there is no guarantee that he would appear before the trial court if again released on bail.

DH News Service


The Bellandur police shot at two habitual offenders who attacked them and tried to flee at Chikkanayakanahalli on the citys outskirts on Sunday morning.



Muzammil (20), a resident of Anekal and Amar (25), a resident of Chandapura, had earlier killed a head constable in Tamil Nadu. They are wanted in 11 cases registered in various police stations in Karnataka.



Deputy Commissioner of Police (Whitefield) Abdul Ahad said a robbery complaint had been filed by software engineer Anand on Saturday night. The complainant said he was walking on Sarjapura Main Road at 11 pm on Saturday, when four miscreants in two bikes stopped him, attacked him and robbed him of his mobile phone. Later, four teams of Bellandur and Varthur police were formed to nab the suspects.



During patrolling on Sunday morning, the police noticed two abandoned bikes near a eucalyptus grove on Sarjapur Road. Soon, a team traced Muzammil and Amar nearby. Police asked them to surrender, but the suspects refused. The duo attacked head constable Anthony and another policeman Vinay with a knife. Bellandur inspector Victor Simon shot them in their legs and they fell down. The police shifted them to hospital for treatment. Vinay and Anthony are also undergoing treatment.


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A young Ballyshannon father of two, has been chosen to stand for the People Before Profit party at the next General Election in the Sligo/Leitrim/south Donegal Constituency.

29-year-old Cyril Brennan, a native of Lisahully was chosen at a meeting of the National Council of People Before Profit in Dublin

HSE employee, Cyril will be focusing his efforts on South Donegal and North Leitrim while Sligo based Nigel Gallagher was selected to contest the other area.

He first came to notice at a founding meeting of the party in Dorrians Hotel last May.

Cyril told the Democrat that South Donegal and North Leitrim have been forgotten by the mainstream parties and said he believed that People Before Profit was more in tune with the needs of ordinary people.

Since the change in the constituency boundaries South Donegal and North Leitrim are totally isolated.

My own town of Ballyshannon and places like Manorhamilton have become places to live in, or to retire to.

That is just not on and they are just commuter towns.

The IDA has been sold off from Ballyshannon and we badly need investment to grow employment.

That is an absolute disgrace and nothing much has improved on the jobs front since the last election.

Cyril, who is also studying for a Business Management qualification from LYIT, said that housing and especially affordable housing was a big issue on the area.

We have also been hammered by emigration and our health services are being steadily eroded.

But there is nobody to shout for us in Dail Eireann because of our geographical location on the electoral boundary map.

And people who are trying to start their own businesses from home are being hammered by terrible phone coverage and poor broadband.

We need a lot of investment in infrastructure to make this place great again and it does have some great tourist attraction and I acknowledge that great work has been done in the Abbey Centre in Ballyshannon.

But, Cyril believes that two PBP candidates standing in the constituency have a real chance of getting the necessary numbers.

We are the only genuine left anti-establishment party and we believe the people of this region have been let down by the other so-called left parties.

I know there is huge disaffection with politics in this area and we intend to address that defecit.
A lifetime of dedication to the gentle oriental art of Tai Chi has brought a Rossnowlagh resident under the guidance of the foremost master of the practice and now she is working to share the benefits of it with everyone.

Gill Keogh is one of the most established and experienced proponents of T'ai Chi Chuan, or Taijiquan, in ireland. It is a system of internal martial art that is shown to have proven health benefits for those who practice it regularly.

Based in Rossnowlagh for the last 22 years Gill began practicing Tai Chi in 1977 in her native London.

Initially, she explained, her interest was in improving her health and strength and she enjoyed attending local classes but over the years she went on to become an instructor and now has established strong links to the source of the revered art, the Chen Family who founded their unique style over 450 years ago.

I had been coming to Donegal for holidays for a couple of years, you have such freedom here and the beach so we decided to move over and try it and that was it, she said.

Speaking of her early days in Tai Chi, she like many others, simply tried it out as way of gaining strength, health and relaxation and it has added great benefits to her life since then.

I started Tai Chi back in 1977, so that is 40 years this month. I started with a master in London in an adult education class, similar to what I teach here now. I startedso I had something to do in the evenings but also I was not a very strong or healthy baby, child or teenager. I wasnt very strong physically, so I joined to really strengthen my body and get some exercise and I felt, after a couple of years, a lot stronger and much better healthwise, so I continued with it, she stated.

After a few years her instructor suggested that she should begin teaching the art to others and so began a deeper level of study that is ongoing after 40 years.

My master said if anyone wanted to learn to teach to put their name down on a piece of paper. Of course I didnt because I didnt want to teach, I just wanted to do it for myself. Then he came back to me and said If you want to learn Tai Chi you must learn to teach. So I put my name down and ended up teaching Tai Chi by default, she laughs, adding Of course he (the instructor) was quite right. Over the year I have learned and deepened my knowledge and I have been teaching now for 35 years.

She has trained with many Chinese masters of the art since.

In 1994 I was very fortunate to come across Grandmaster Chen Xiao Wang who is the heir and head of Chen style, that is the family that created Tai Chi back around 450 years ago. I was just in the right place at the right time to meet this Grandmaster. To cut a long story short I ended up training with him and then ended up bringing him over to Ireland and I became his student. In 2006 I travelled to China to get the discipleship exam in the temple and I have been with his family training and going to China topractice since 2005. Ive been to China six times now, she added.

The grandmaster's son will visit Donegal in October to carry out a seminar in Creevy.

Gill says not only has she personally enjoyed a range of health and wellbeing benefits from this gentle martial art, which are backed by the World Health Organisation (WHO), but she has also seen positive changes for others who maintain a dedicated practice of the art.

I train most days. Maybe not Christmas day (laughs) but it is about regular practice. But everybody is different. Sometimes training with the master it is a bit deeper or a bit harder and rigorous, but the one thing I love with Tai Chi is that it is suitable for anybody because you adapt it for your body. That's what I like about it, and that is true for children through to people who are 90 years old. Just adapt it for what they can do and it helps so many things.

Ive had students who have been stressed with jobs and they tell me that when they come to Tai Chi, its like a respite from life. It becomes about focusing the mind with the body and it gives them time out from their problems and relaxes them and relieves stress. It has been quite a major thing. Then I have done sessions with Arthritis Ireland and I have elderly students who have arthritis of some kind and the gentle movement helps to stimulate what we call the chi flow through body and blood circulation. That helps people with arthritis. I have worked with people who have heart disease and the Northern Ireland Chest Heart and Stroke group, people who cant do rigorous exercise in a gym but everyone can do Tai Chi. You do it to your own ability and it is a nice gentle movement for health but at the same time it is a martial art and it can be very powerful, she added.

There is lots of levels of Tai Chi and people do for what they want out of it. It could be just to relax, it could be to build their strength, help recover from an injury, strengthen any part of the body. A big thing at the minute is that it helps the elderly with fall prevention. We need to get them early. Once you are 90 and suffering falls it is a bit late but if we can get people to start in their mid-50s plus, it helps balance and co-ordination.

Gill teaches at various locations around Donega as well as Letrim and Fermanagh, and further afield in Belfast and Dublin

She also advocates the art being taught more in local schools due to the positve effects it has on helping young people.

To find out more you can visit www.chenireland.com or call Gill on 071 98 52374.
Over the last three weeks people of Donegal have shown tremendous resilience in the aftermath of the unprecedented storms and rainfall that struck the Inishowen.

Fundraisers were organised around the county, goods were delivered to many of the victims and volunteers just arrived out of nowhere. The people of Donegal people were not prepared to wait - they were dealing with the problems as they happened.

Last weekend thousands of euro were raised at the concert in the Aura Centre last weekend and just last Friday night the Donegal Association in Dublin hosted a fundraising table quiz in D2 on Harcourt Street for Inishowen Flood Relief.

Finin Mac a Bhaird was MC for the evening and kicked proceedings off shortly after 8pm. Finin spoke of how the Donegal Association were glad to be able to help and host an event for the victims of the recent floods in Donegal saying how this event brought the association back to its grassroots as it was originally founded as a result of a tragedy  The Aranmore Disaster in 1935

Donegal Person of the Year Stephen McCahill travelled from Ardara to be there on the night and spoke about the association and the importance of their work in Dublin.



Peggy Stringer , who was in Donegal the previous weekend and hails from Inishowen spoke of the devastation the recent floods have caused in local communities with peoples livelihoods being wiped out.

Siobhan Shovelintold the Democrat, The Donegal Association are extremely grateful to those who helped make this event a success. We would like to thank The McGill Family of the Harcourt Hotel for their support in the lead up to the event and on the night and also our wonderful quizmaster- Darragh Higgins, all the volunteers on the night and those who made donations and sponsored prizes. Your support is greatly appreciated. Currently the amount raised stands in the region of over 7,000 but the money is still coming in. It has been a tremendous success.
A large tree snapped and fell across a Jackson Street power line in Marianna around 9:30 a.m. Sunday morning, and the stress on that line caused the nearby transformer pole to snap.

Florida Public Utilities sent a crew on the scene to set another pole for the transformer and to restore the affected power lines. The damage put roughly eight customers out of power for a time. Officials estimated that winds of 20-30 mph swept in at that hour. The gust was believed to have come from an outer band of Hurricane Irma.

With the storm still hundreds of miles away in the Florida Keys at that point, FPU spokesman Lynwood Tanner said the incident was surprising but didnt catch the company off guard. Crews were at the scene almost immediately.

We were kind of shocked that the outer bands are affecting us this early, but we were prepared, Tanner said. Weve got every available body on ready to go where were needed.

Tanner said residents should use extreme caution. His message was simple: If you see a downed power line, get away.

Down in the Alliance community in south Jackson County, an outage around the same time was affecting customers as well. About 19 customers were out of power for about two hours after a limb came down across a primary feeder, Tanner said, but power had been restored by about noon.

The early, shearing wind was a wake-up call for many, and Jackson County residents busily made last-minute preparations Sunday as Hurricane Irma churned its way north.

The owners of two child day care facilities, for instance, were taking advantage of a large dirt pile situated at Strickland and Church streets in the Cypress area. Kristie and Michael Mulder and other family members were shoveling into it to get dirt for sandbags. They used the bags to mitigate potential flooding and erosion at the Caverns Learning Center on Caverns Road and the Kiddie Campus in Commerce Park.

In Marianna, some Florida Caverns State Park volunteer hosts who own animals decided against going to the host shelter at Marianna High School after they had to leave the park because of its closure. They decided instead to pull their camper homes into the parking lot at Rivertown Community Church and wait out the storm there. One dog is blind, and the other dogs and the cat in their group are timid, resist carriers, and might howl or bark all night in such a crowd, they said
When Rinske de Jong opened the cooler door, the sight was impressive  shelves upon shelves of cheese wheels. Shelves of Gouda, cheddar, cumin seed Gouda and pepper jack. In a smaller cooler, there are cheeses made with Dutch herbs that de Jong ordered from her native Holland.

The cheese cave  which is actually a refrigerated semi-trailer connected and sealed to a building  contains 15,000 pounds of cheese.

So, Ive made a lot of cheese, de Jong said.

Working Cows Dairy in Slocomb, owned and operated by Jan and Rinske de Jong, began selling a line of cheeses a few months ago. Cheese, Rinske said, was a way for the dairy farm to make full use of all the organic milk it produces.

We bought it a little by little, she said. We started last September and just looked for used equipment.

The de Jongs wanted to pay cash for the expansion into cheese products to keep the dairy from accruing a lot of debt  just in case the cheese venture didnt work.

If I made it and it didnt taste good or people didnt like it, whats going to happen? said Rinske, who made her first batch of cheese on Feb. 18.

Sold as Rinskes Cheese, the product has been getting a good response from people who have tried it. Its available at Corks & Cattle in downtown Enterprise as well as through the Working Cows online store (www.workingcowsdairycheese.com). De Jong said she hopes to find more locations that will sell the cheese, which retails for $10 a pound.

The Thirsty Pig in Dothan recently hosted a wine and cheese tasting featuring Rinskes Cheese, and owner Kerry Farrell said the reaction was positive.

It was amazing. She sold a lot of cheese and was very happy and everybody that bought and tasted the cheese was very happy. It was great, Farrell said. We paired it up with five different kinds of wine. Everybody loved it.

Working Cows Dairy began operation in October 1985 in Florida after Jan and Rinske de Jong left Holland for America. In 1991, the dairy relocated to Slocomb where it still operates today. For years, Working Cows operated like a traditional dairy. The dairy began the transition to organic in 2006, becoming the first certified organic dairy farm in Alabama.

Their Working Cows Dairy brand of milk is sold at the farm and a few places locally. Its sold more in stores in larger cities like Birmingham and Atlanta.

But, Rinske said, despite their best efforts, there was still some milk that was wasted.

If we have too much milk, we need to figure out a way to keep the milk, she said. We can put it in ice cream. We can put it in butter, but butter, thats going to be real expensive because youre throwing all the skim milk away. So to use all the product, you can make yogurt and buttermilk. Thats what Ive been doing  yogurt and buttermilk and sour cream and cream cheese.

Eventually, Rinske began looking at making cheese. She has never made cheese and began watching YouTube videos and doing research. She started small  making 2-pound wheels at home. She got cheese-making tips on a visit to Holland. She hired part-time employees to help her during the cheese-making process, which can be time-consuming.

But, cheese has a long shelf life. While some cheeses only age for a short period, some varieties are aged for years. And cheese uses a lot of milk. To make a pound of cheese takes about 10 pounds of milk (a gallon of milk weighs about 8.6 pounds). So, those 15,000 pounds of cheese in Rinskes cheese cave used a lot of milk  more than 17,000 gallons that would have gone down the drain if not sold.

Rinskes cheese-making day starts around 5 a.m. when she sanitizes the system. She starts pumping milk into a vat around 6 a.m., and by 8 a.m. shes ready to make cheese.

Milk is heated to 85 degrees. A starter culture is added followed by an enzyme called rennet (Rinskes Cheese is made with vegetable rennet). The rennet coagulates the milk and thickens it into a custard-like consistency. From there, its cut into curds and the whey, or liquid, is drained off. Depending on the cheese variety, there may be more heating and draining before the cheese goes into molds and allowed to dry.

Once the cheese is dried the wheels go into the cheese cave. When a cheese wheel is ready it is cut and packed in vacuum-sealed plastic before being weighed and labeled.

Looking over the wheels of cheese in the cheese cave, Rinske is proud of what shes been able to do, but shes ready to take the venture to the next level.

It feels good, but now I need to sell it, she laughed.
Up to 5 million promotional seats are up for grabs in AirAsia Groups red hot seat sale campaign.

Book seats via airasia.com or the AirAsia mobile app from 11 to 17 September 2017 for travel between 1 March to 21 November 2018 to enjoy fares from as low as P17.00* for flights from/to Manila, Clark, Cebu, Davao, Palawan, Bohol, Kalibo, Caticlan/Boracay, Tacloban and Iloilo.

Also up for grabs from as low as P1,290* are promotional flights to international destinations from the Philippines to Taipei, Kuala Lumpur, Kota Kinabalu, Incheon/Seoul, Canton/Guangzhou, Shanghai, Macau, Singapore and Hong Kong.

AirAsia Philippines CEO Captain Dexter Comendador said, Now is the perfect opportunity for our loyal guests and Filipino travellers to connect from many places conveniently as we continuously add new routes and increase frequencies into our network. Exciting red hot deals await those who would like to travel overseas to over 120 destinations across all Asean countries, Asia, Australia and beyond.

AirAsia is set to fly between Manila and Iloilo starting October 1 while direct flights between Davao and Kuala Lumpur will commence on December 21.

Promotional flights from the AirAsia groups hub in Kuala Lumpur to Australia, Japan, Maldives and other destinations are also available.

BIG Members get to enjoy priority access and will be able to make bookings on airasia.com and redeem flights starting from 0 BIG Points, exclusively via the BIG Loyalty mobile app from 10 September 2017 (0001h GMT +8). Its free to sign up as a BIG Member via airasia.com, airasiabig.com or BIG Loyalty mobile app to redeem promo flights during this promotion.

AirAsia Group Chief Commercial Officer Siegtraund Teh said, AirAsia continues to grow with more flights to even more destinations, making travel easier. We want our valued guests to be able to take full advantage of our unparalleled frequency to new, exciting places, so it is our great pleasure to offer up to five million promo seats in our biggest campaign ever to help them on their way.

For latest updates on promotions and activities, please follow AirAsia on Twitter (twitter.com/AirAsia) and Facebook (facebook.com/AirAsia).

* One-way base fare excluding taxes and fees. Terms and conditions apply

Stay gorgeous everyone!
#DP Opposition lawmaker accuses first lady of choreographing visit to sick child in Cambodia An opposition lawmaker accused first lady Kim Keon-hee on Monday of choreographing a visit to a sick child in Phnom Penh in an attempt to make herself look charitable, claiming pho...

#EXO After eventful three years, EXO's Chen wants to begin anew with 3rd EP Chen, a member of popular K-pop boy group EXO, said Monday he has experienced much change in his life in the past three years and wants to show himself as he is now through his upc...
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Circus Wonderland will be visiting Essex as part of their UK Tour this month and Essex residents cannot wait.

The UK's most magical circus is currently touring the United Kingdom and they have just five venues left - including ten days in Billericay, Essex.

It should be ideal for kids and families, so here is everything you need to know about Circus Wonderland's planned appearance in Essex this month:

When does it open?

Circus Wonderland will be performing just once on the opening night on Wednesday (September 20) evening at 7pm, before two sessions per day on Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays thereafter.

On both Thursday and Friday on both weeks, the performance times will be at 4.30pm and 7.30pm, whilst Saturday performance times at 2pm and 5pm and Sundays will be midday and 3pm.

Where exactly is Circus Wonderland taking place?

Circus Wonderland will be appearing at Sun Corner in Billericay - which is the patch of grass near the junction of the A129 London Road and the A176 Laindon Road.

How much are tickets?

All tickets for the two Wednesday dates will be priced at just 7.

As for the other dates, the prices of tickets are split into different bands dependent on where you'd like to sit.

Ringside tickets are priced at 20 (18 for children and seniors), whilst front view are 18 (16 for children and seniors) and side view will cost just 16 (14 for children and seniors).

Circus Wonderland do offer some special deals too. A family of four (two adults and two children) can sit ringside for just 40, have a front view for just 32 or a side view for a bargain 24.

The company also offer a discount voucher on their website, which can be found by clicking here.

How many years has Circus Wonderland been running?

This is Circus Wonderland's sixth year on tour. It was launched in 2012 by Kriss Freear, Paul Carpenter and Grace Arnett.

Along with being directors of the company, all three are also performers in the ring, with Kriss and Paul playing the roles of clowns Kakehole and Popol, whilst Grace performs her 'fabulous foot juggling fiesta'.

What is Circus Wonderland about?

Circus Wonderland is hosted by 'whiteface' clown Mr Popol. The authority figure of the whiteface clown in his glittering costumes and white heeled shoes was once a familiar figure on every major circus, but Mr Popol is the only remaining 'whiteface' clown.

He actually wears a sparkling coat which contains 180,000 sequins that were individually hand stitched over a period of 18 months.

Chaos ensues with the arrival of 'auguste' clown Kakehole with his more familiar attire of red nose, baggy trousers and oversized boots.

For many years, the fear of clowns (or Coulrophobia) has been on the increase, largely due to horror films such as Stephen King's 'It', but Kakehole and Mr Popol have launched a show to help stage therapy, or 'clownselling', to help people overcome this fear.

What other acts will be performing at Circus Wonderland?

Director Grace Arnett will also perform as Miss Grace Olivia, who dazzles the audience with her foot juggling or 'antipodist' skills, in which she lies back and manipulates seemingly impossible objects with her feet.

The stars of the Casablanca Troupe of Moroccan acrobats will also be in attendance and performing in the UK for the first time. Their incredible tumbling and pyramid building will leave the Essex crowds with their jaws on the grounds as they showcase traditional talent that has become a world renowned Moroccan circus specialty.

Also, Moldovan, Ruslan Arlanov, presents an unusual act where he stylishly spins around the circus ring in his revolving Cyr Wheel in an elegant encounter with equilibrium. The wheel takes its name from its inventor, Daniel Cyr, who created large aluminium rings and perfected its use as a circus art around 20 years ago.

For more information about Circus Wonderland, click here.
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Get the latest on all the biggest court and crime news in Essex direct from our expert court reporter

The most recent crime statistics have been released, showing the most violent places around Chelmsford according the number of police reports.

Figures recorded by Essex Police provide details of the crimes reported in each of the city's policing districts  including other crimes such as anti-social behaviour, robbery, drugs and possession of weapons.

The figures show the statistics for June. These are the latest such figures on the Home Office website, Police.UK .

Here, Essex Live list the number of violence and sexual offences cases reported for each of the policing areas.

1) Moulsham

In June 2017, a total of 331 crimes were reported to Essex Police, with violence and sexual offences being the biggest crime committed in this area throughout the month.

According to stats, 83 incidents of violence or sexual offences happened in a single month, with 42 of those happening around the city centre and the worst area there being around the Meadows Shopping Centre.

Other big crimes in the Moulsham district in June include 79 cases of anti-social behaviour and 40 shoplifting cases.

2) Marconi

The Marconi area ranked number two in terms of places with the most violent crimes committed, with 75 reported incidents in June.

When looking closely at the map, at least 14 of those incidents were flagged up around the Duke Street/Railway Street/Fairfield Road area.

Other big crimes in the Marconi district in June include 73 anti-social behaviour and 20 cases of criminal damage or arson.

3) Baddow and Galleywood

Next up is the Chelmsford district of Baddow and Galleywood, where Essex Police statistics show that 42 cases of violence or sexual offences were reported in June of this year.

Of those 42 cases, a sixth of them were committed just on the outskirts of both St Michael's Church of England Junior School and Galleywood Infant School - which is a worrying stat.

Other crimes in the district include 42 cases of anti-social behaviour and nine cases of vehicle crime.

4) Springfield

Fourth in the list in Chelmsford based on Essex Police's violence and sexual offences incident reports is Springfield, where 35 cases were lodged in June.

The map for Springfield shows that eight of those 35 cases were located near North Springfield, although more cases in general were reported around the Chelmer Village area in comparison.

Other crimes in Springfield in June include 21 shoplifting incidents, 17 criminal damage or arson reports and two recorded incidents of possession of weapons.

5) Chelmsford Rural South

Just 28 violence and sexual offences were reported to Essex Police in the Chelmsford Rural South district in June - with eight happening around the Rettendon/Runwell areas and another seven taking place in Danbury.

Violence and sexual offences was still the most common crime committed in the area that month though, narrowly ahead of the 25 cases of anti-social behaviour. There was 118 crimes reported in total in June.

Other crimes in the Chelmsford Rural South district included 13 vehicle crimes, 12 criminal damage and arson cases and one single theft from a person.

6) Broomfield

In June, a total of just 64 crimes were committed in total in the Broomfield district of Chelmsford, 24 of which were for violence and sexual offences- 19 less than just the violence and sexual offence cases in Moulsham.

The map clearly show that not a single crime was committed in the northern half of the district, with 15 of those crimes happening at Broomfield Hospital and 2 near Chelmer Valley High School.

Other crimes in Broomfield included 6 burglaries and 1 possession of weapons.

7) Boreham

Nearer the bottom of the list are the safer areas of Chelmsford - but sometimes also the smaller districts too. In Boreham, just 50 crimes in total were committed in June, which included 11 cases of violence or sexual offences.

Five of the 11 cases were based in the core Boreham area, along with two cases down Generals Lane and three near Great Leighs.

Other crimes in Boreham include 11 vehicle crimes and 3 public order offences.

8) Chelmsford Rural West

In the Chelmsford Rural West district of Chelmsford, there were just 10 cases of violence and sexual offences reported to Essex Police in June.

Half of those cases were near Writtle, with one case also being spotted on the map at Hylands Park.

Of all the crimes committed in Chelmsford Rural West, the most cases were burglary (11).

9) Chelmsford Town

Finally - the safest district in Chelmsford to live in based on Essex Police's crime statistics for June 2017 is Chelmsford Town.

A total of 44 crimes in total were committed in this area during that month, with just 8 of them being labelled as violence or sexual offences.
"The main driver behind the decline on Friday appeared to be concerns about North Korea ahead of the countrys foundation day this weekend."

"The cross has bounced overnight in the Asian session as tensions did not escalate further and in the near term, we still expect USD/JPY to trade within the 108-111 range."

North Korea threat more credible for a plethora of reasons

Geo-political risk is the order of the day with USD/JPY exchange rate responding accordingly to trade heavily on the week closing beneath 108 for the first time this year.

The threat posed by North Korean aggression is among the most prominent and widely held fears currently resonating throughout markets.

Although rhetoric out of Pyongyang has been fairly pugnacious for many years, a number of factors have given more credence to Kim Jong Uns bombastic threats.

Firstly there is the Trump factor. As a deeply unpredictable and rather unknown quantity as a leader, President Trump has chosen to deal with Un by threatening him back, a style which is certainly a departure from the typically diplomatic path which the US has pursued in previous administrations.

Brinkmanship is certainly not the preferred course of events for the financial world which hates uncertainty.

Another factor is that North Koreas technology appears to steadily improve. Both their missiles and warheads appear to be more advanced than anything previously witnessed.

Several successful missile launches and a powerful quake inducing blast, have caused people to pay much closer attention when Pyongyang says it can now fit a warhead onto one of its missiles.

Deutsche Bank not taking the crisis on the Korean peninsula lightly

A final issue is the recent aggressive talk has for once been backed up by some actions which could be deemed as overtly hostile.

The missile which flew over Japan was a game changer whichever way you look at it.

Even if the intent of the launch was never to strike Japan it was a fairly unique event as North Korea has usually been extremely careful to never fire a missile which flew over any of its neighbours mainland.

Couple this with the fact that they demonstrated the increasing range of their ballistics programme and JPY bulls have plenty of reason to believe in their bearish outlook on risk.

A particularly downbeat report from Taisuke Tanaka shows how much Deutsche Bank are backing off their bullish call for USD/JPY given the current risk environment,

In the near term, the USD/JPY is likely to drop below 110 if geopolitical tensions increase, and recover to the over-110 level if tensions ease. If the crisis becomes a reality, there are many different scenarios, and the three stages are intertwined. Developments will differ depending on whether Japan's financial system will function if embroiled in war, but we believe there will be expectations at least of the JPY strengthening to the low-100 level. Forecasting currency phenomena in every situation is our duty, but we do not want to consider the crisis lightly, and sincerely hope that the worst does not happen.

On the US side of things, the most pressing concern has been the ongoing Russia investigation which seems to have gone a bit quiet recently.

This has pushed it well back from the spotlight, and instead, the debt ceiling and hurricanes have taken control of events.

Some more Russian revelations are almost certainly a serious tail risk that investors should not ignore. A legitimate conversation can be had which doesnt ask whether Trump will be able to successfully implement tax reform, but rather whether he will still be in power a year from now.

One of my favourite bank reports on Friday was written by HSBC FX trader Brent Donnelly, where he has now removed his bearish call for the USD from all pairs except for USD/JPY,

The US economic data is going to be a mess for months... Another three months of noise and nonsense means the Fed cant hike in December and tax reform timing gets pushed back again. I agree with the idea that USDJPY is going lower into year end. A break of 108.00 is the key as the break should attract a whole new wave of interest and selling. For good order, my USD bear view is just in USDJPY now and I have taken profit on the AUD, CAD, NZD and EUR view.

Contrary traders might want to start backing Trump

If you believe in Trump there probably hasnt been a better time to invest in USD/JPY.

If hes going to outmanoeuvre Kim Jong, force through some meaningful tax reform and shrug off the Russian investigation unscathed most of the doom and gloom hanging over investors heads would likely clear as a good deal of risk would evaporate with it.

Unfortunately, expectations for the fledgling administration have faded to new lows and there are few bright spots to focus on.

Contrary positions are very often the most lucrative but risk reward needs to reflect a decent probability to warrant anything but a small position.
Saying he was aiming for a land speed record on recovery from Harveys devastation, Gov. Greg Abbott already has handed out more than $135 million in advances from the federal government to Harris County and the city of Houston, the first chunk of what officials hope will be a sustained, expedited response to one of the worst natural disasters the country has ever seen.

The city received $91.2 million and the county $44.6 million from the Federal Emergency Management Agency via Abbott, money they said would be critical to the gargantuan clean-up effort underway, as well as spurring their ability to address critical housing needs after 136,000 homes and other structures in Harris County were flooded during Harveys onslaught.

We have a need for speed, Abbott said at a Friday news conference at the Harris County Office of Emergency Management. We want to rebuild communities as swiftly as possible.

While the spotlight to date has been on local governments rescue and recovery efforts, as well as FEMAs aid outreach, the news conference provided a glimpse into the role the state will play in the rebuilding effort as Houston and Southeast Texas cope with the worst storm the region has seen. Harvey dropped more than 50 inches of rain on Houston, killed at least 70 people and ravaged the Gulf Coast last week.

Abbott said the funds provided to Houston and Harris were the first chunk of a new model of more quickly delivering advances from the federal government as local governments focus on the boots-on-the-ground recovery.

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said he and legislative leaders could consider, without a special session, moving funds from the 2019 budget into the current budget year to help with recovery.

Texas A&M University System Chancellor John Sharp, who is overseeing the Harvey recovery for the state, said Austins role was to clear the path for local recovery efforts by easing regulations. Abbott, he said, already has removed restrictions on bidding and contracting for mosquito control for areas affected by Harvey, which came ashore as a hurricane northeast of Corpus Christi on Aug. 25 before being downgraded to a tropical storm.

Sharp said the state was working with FEMA on a way to quickly repair flood victims homes  a program in which contractors would be sent into affected homes to conduct permanent, structural repairs so displaced residents could move back in.

He said FEMA still was working out how to suspend some of its regulations to implement such a program. He could not immediately provide a timeline for when such an initiative could be implemented.

Sharp said the first step was to set up disaster recovery centers  fixed and roving sites where FEMA and other agency representatives could help each flood victim with recovery needs. That would include the new housing repair program, Sharp said.

He said he expected recovery centers to be up by Monday evening. The centers likely will be a combination of mega centers, sites in offices or other buildings, and roving mobile centers.

Abbott said a representative from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency would be embedded with the state during recovery efforts.

As to whether the state would commit any additional funds beyond the federal advances and local expenditures, Abbott said the state has spent $220 million for emergency responders and military response, and that more spending is a matter of cash flow management.

The money given Friday was far short of what local leaders had asked for earlier this week. Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner had sent a letter to Abbott on Monday asking for state and federal resources outlining the unprecedented nature of the storm that put an extreme economic strain on the city and its residents.

Turner asked for advance funding of $300 million for debris removal and shoring up public infrastructure, and to establish at least 15 to 20 disaster recovery centers. He also asked Abbott to provide $60 million in state relief emergency funds, request FEMA to move quickly on a rehousing program and clear other regulations.

Harris County Judge Ed Emmett sent a separate letter asking for $75 million in advance funding, half of a preliminary estimate of $150 million for debris removal and emergency protective measures.

Turner said Friday further money would be needed, and that Fridays allocation was just the beginning.

Turner said getting less than asked for would not slow the citys cleanup effort.

We are pushing the pace, he said.

The funds and the state effort, Emmett said, would help the county help those most in need: Its these individuals that need to get back in their houses and getting the disaster recovery centers set up so that people who are out of their homes, away from their school districts, get back to their normal lives as soon as possible.
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Over the next three years, Alan Shaji is going to study moon dust, build robots that explore caves and learn what it takes to build a lunar base someday.

Hes 12.

Ive always loved space, said Shaji, a seventh grader at Hector Garcia Middle School. Its just cool to think of different worlds.

Shaji is part of a group of 30 San Antonio students with a love for science who kicked off a NASA-funded program Saturday that aims to teach them the fundamentals of being scientists, astronauts and space engineers.

Funded by a $1.2 million grant from NASA, the educational program is called LCATS  Lunar Caves Analog Test Sites. Caves on the surface of the moon could provide shelter for future lunar bases.

LCATS will ultimately teach 125 students over the next five years. The 30 students at Saturdays event are the first cohort, and they gathered at the Scobee Planetarium at San Antonio College where they viewed science exhibits and heard encouraging words from local officials who told them to work hard.

Its the realization of a dream, said Sam Ximenes, founder and chairman of the WEX Foundation, which secured the grant money for the program after years of effort.

The idea was, we wanted to establish a community space program in San Antonio, Ximenes said. Students from school districts across San Antonio are participating in the program, which will mimic the steps that need to be undertaken to build a lunar habitat.

NASA does not have official plans to go the moon, Ximenes said. But commercial interests do.

Theres a lot going on in the space industry, he said. Its not just NASA.

These are hands-on studies. Students will take field trips to Robber Baron Cave to learn its geology and how to take measurements. Ximenes said theyll build a zip line and construct tight-rope walking robots that can travel along it.

The parents who raised the budding space explorers arent surprised their kids want to spend every other Saturday studying the ins and outs of building a lunar base. As young children, these kids had always liked to tinker with things like Legos and then moved on to bigger, more ambitious projects.

Its gotten to the point where some parents are bewildered by the homework their middle schoolers bring home  but they love it.

I think its phenomenal, said Robert Maulden, whose 12-year-old son, Brad, has been building robots since the third grade.

At the initiation ceremony for LCATS, Mauldens son was acting like a typical kid  scarfing down cookies and joking with his friend and LCATS classmate, Katie Duran. But the young engineer quickly switched gears and talked about how he looked forward to building even better robots in LCATS.

Robotics has been a big part of our lives, said Brad Maulden. Here, we get to work with advanced robots and figure out how to actually make these things.

In a field of engineers and scientists, acronyms abounded.

The students who applied to the LCATS program were part of the University of Texas at San Antonios Prefreshman Engineering Program  SA-PREP.

Its a resource for middle school and high school students who love spending their summers learning about mathematics and how to apply it in the real world.

I think of it as fun, said Shaji.

jtedesco@express-news.net
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WASHINGTON  Emboldened by Republican control of the White House and both houses of Congress, President Donald Trump had hoped to replace Obamacare and overhaul the entire tax code by the end of the year.

With the health care repeal effort in shambles, the administrations hopes now turn to tax reform, where a prominent Texan, Kevin Brady, is taking center stage.

Standing outside former President Ronald Reagans ranch in California last month, Brady declared that 2017 is the year we make history. But with a Trump presidency increasingly embroiled in battles with the Congress, the media and even itself, some analysts have their doubts.

Facing political turbulence in Congress wrought by the GOP setback on Obamacare, and the national furor over Trumps handling of the white supremacist clash in Charlottesville, Virginia, a number of prominent Republicans are scaling back their ambition.

Among them are former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and New York U.S. Rep. Peter King, who tweeted recently that the GOP must go first with tax cuts and not get bogged down in tax reform.

Brady, one of the six top policymakers in Washington responsible for pushing the GOP tax overhaul, says he is not throwing in the towel.

I believe we can do it, and thats what were working on right now, The Woodlands Brady said in an interview.

In an effort to jump-start the process, Trump delivered a speech on Aug. 30 heavy on populist, pro-American declarations, promising a simplified plan of lower tax rates for everyone, the elimination of special interest loopholes and a heavy dose of corporate tax cuts.

Despite its surface appeal, the plan wont be an easy sell in Congress, where Democrats are decrying the proposed tax cuts as a massive giveaway to the rich, who would reap the lions share of lower rates. Getting rid of loopholes also is easier said than done.

Altogether, a complicated smorgasbord of federal tax deductions and credits is estimated to have cost the government more than $1.5 trillion in lost revenue this year, a sum that would go a long way toward reducing overall tax rates  if only those lobbyist-written tax loopholes could be drastically reduced or eliminated.

Brady and House Speaker Paul Ryan traveled around the country in August to build support for their plan, selling it as a linchpin for economic growth and a boon to middle- and lower-income Americans.

There is no perfect way to tax, but there are proven ways to grow jobs and paychecks, said Brady, who chairs the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee. Thats what were trying to stuff into this tax reform plan.

His committees website trumpets an analysis by the conservative Tax Foundation estimating that the gains in after-tax income for a median-income household in Texas would be $4,913. It also promises 140,374 more jobs in Texas.

Filing tax returns would be so simple, Brady says, the average taxpayer could do it on a postcard.

But its been more than a year since Brady rolled out the GOPs Better Way tax reform blueprint, and theres still no bill. He hasnt set a timetable for a written draft, other than to promise to get a bill on the presidents desk by the end of the year.

Given the upcoming congressional battles over raising the nations debt limit and passing spending bills to keep the government open past Sept. 30, some observers see little cause for Bradys optimism. Appropriating emergency funds for hurricane relief efforts will only make the tax bills uphill climb steeper.

I dont think its very likely, said San Antonio Democrat Lloyd Doggett, the top Democrat on Ways and Means. I certainly think theyre making every effort, but the tax bill is tied to all the distractions.

The distractions include Trumps recent attacks on top Senate Republicans, including Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, whom he has blamed for the Obamacare debacle in July.

The president didnt make the task any easier in a recent campaign rally in Phoenix, when he threatened a government shutdown if Congress doesnt pony up the money to fund a border wall.

Republican leaders in Congress have all but sworn off a government shutdown  especially in the wake of the massive Gulf storm Harvey. But even the threat of a shutdown could occupy the congressional agenda throughout the month of September, and possibly into October, leaving the tax reform agenda to the holiday season, traditionally a period where major legislation languishes.

Unified on taxes

On tax reform, however, Brady maintains that Republicans are united. My experience with the president and with (Majority) Leader McConnell on tax reform is that theyre very much on the same page, he said.

That unity, however, has come at a price. Brady was forced to drop a plan to slap a 20 percent border adjustment tax on imports, a measure that sharply divided Republicans and the business community. That concession meant the loss of some $1 trillion in projected revenue meant to help offset the proposed tax cuts.

He has yet to propose an alternative funding mechanism, though he suggests that some of the needed revenue is hidden in a labyrinth of the U.S. tax code. Were scrubbing the tax code to identify those provisions that dont create growth or dont make us more competitive, he said.

Significant procedural hurdles remain as well.

To get around a likely Democratic filibuster in the Senate  which requires 60 votes  Republicans will need to rely on a special budget reconciliation process that allows for a simple majority to pass a tax package.

But there are limits. The reconciliation rule means that any Republican tax cuts would require offsetting revenues within a 10-year budget window, making them budget neutral  meaning they couldnt increase the deficit. Most analysts say that will limit how far Republicans can go to rewrite the tax code, cut taxes or make any changes permanent.

A more immediate problem facing Brady is that the reconciliation process first requires that Congress pass a budget resolution for 2018, agreement on which has so far has eluded Republicans. The main sticking point? Top-line spending limits that some moderates think go too far and conservative members of the House Freedom Caucus say dont go far enough.

No budget, no tax reform, Brady said.

To beat a filibuster, White House officials have said they are also reaching out to Democrats, particularly fiscal conservatives who represent states Trump carried in the 2016 election. But with partisan rancor intensifying under Trump, the cooperation of any Democrats is far from assured.

The idea is not just to roll it out, but to roll over us as they did in the health care bill, Doggett said. It ought to be a lesson that locking things up from view and pushing things through in a high-handed manner wont work.

Conservative groups behind the tax reform push say they are heartened by what they see as greater Republican unity around the tax agenda than there was for repealing the Affordable Care Act.

But the issue is every bit as complicated and wonky, and the collision of divergent interests perhaps even more intense. Only two cherished write-offs seem to be off the table: the deduction for charitable giving and the popular mortgage interest deduction, though there have been calls to cap the mortgage interest write-off.

Theres a reason tax reform hasnt been done since 1986, said Tim Phillips, president of Americans for Prosperity, the influential advocacy group funded by the conservative Koch brothers. Its difficult. The most powerful and most wealthy interest groups in the United States all want to protect their carve-outs, and every individual in America has a stake too.

Corporate loopholes

Liberal groups see the entire tax reform project as a cover to reduce corporate tax rates, while at the same time preserving cherished tax breaks such as the so-called carried-interest loophole for certain fund managers, venture capitalists and private equity investors.

The issue came to a head recently when Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, the White Houses point man on tax reform, said during an appearance with McConnell in Kentucky that the president might preserve the controversial loophole in some cases, contrary to Trumps campaign promises.

Secretary Mnuchins private equity friends are rejoicing, said former BlackRock managing director Morris Pearl, chairman of Patriotic Millionaires, a group of business leaders and wealthy investors who argue that taxes from billionaires and corporations should comprise a higher proportion of federal receipts. The treasury secretary made it clear. The Trump administration stands with Wall Street.

Compounding the public relations hit was Mnuchins new wife, Louise Linton, who mocked an Oregon mothers humble circumstances after the woman criticized her for bragging on social media about her all-designer wardrobe on the trip to Kentucky. The incident became a rallying cry for critics.

Brady said no decisions have been made about the carried-interest loophole, which allows fund managers to pay income taxes at lower investment rates, rather than as wage or salary income, even though their own money is not at risk.

Democrats say theyre all in favor of ridding the tax code of special interest tax breaks, many of which, they claim, were passed by Republican majorities in Congress. The real battle may focus on corporate tax rates that, Republicans like to point out, are the highest in the world.

Democrats counter that the top statutory rate of 35 percent is misleading since a passel of business tax breaks and credits often bring the actual rates down to a fraction of that.

They also warn that even more tax breaks for the super rich, who pay the majority of all taxes, would undermine the nations commitment to infrastructure and social programs such as Social Security and Medicare.

Bradys argument is that the economic stimulus of tax relief will translate into more revenue, an argument that echoes the supply-side economics of the Reagan era. Nothing strengthens Social Security and Medicare like more Americans back at work with higher-paying jobs, he said.

But even Bradys backers say that his opportunity, which he often describes as once in a lifetime, may be short-lived.

If they go into 2018, the odds of achieving tax reform go down, Phillips said, because election-year politics make politicians even more timid.
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Thirty minutes!

The clock was ticking down inside the Culinary Arts Institute at the Pearl, as teams from six high schools across the city were chopping, sauteing and mixing their hearts out, all to showcase their respective culinary arts programs in a down-to-the-wire, Top Chef-style contest.

The teams  made up of two students, the schools culinary arts teacher and the district superintendent  had one hour to create a dish using specific ingredients that would wow the four foodie-centric judges, as well as feed a hungry horde of parents, friends and teachers who had showed up to cheer them on.

To say tension was in the air, along with the tantalizing aroma of garlic and sizzling steak, is to commit gross understatement. Demonstrating admirable sangfroid at the half-hour point, Kurtis Thompson, a 17-year old student at Wagner High School in the Judson district, sprinkled spices on skirt steak, then smushed them in with his fingers.

Salt, pepper, onion and garlic powder, he calmly told an onlooker, then turned to slice onions at the state-of-the-art kitchen station, as his culinary arts teacher, Rosie Laster, helped student Mariah Sanchez free an avocado from its peel.

Meanwhile, at the next station, Yaheidy Anaya, 16, stuck a plastic spoon in the avocado sauce she had just whipped up in a blender. Tasted. An unsatisfied look on her face. Teacher David La Boy of Harlan High School in Northside stuck in his own spoon. Needs lemon, he said.

Twenty minutes!

The contest was put on by Go Public, a nonprofit that promotes college and career readiness city-wide by helping students explore work and educational opportunities that await them after high school.

Our schools are stepping stones directly into life and career, and this particular program, especially with a resource like the Culinary Arts Institute, is just an incredible way to expose students to whats out there, said Lisa Losasso Jackson, head of Go Public.

Last month, teams were sent a list of around 40 ingredients they could use in the contest, allowing them to pre-plan and even do trial runs  the challenge was in making the dish in one hour, which would then be judged on taste, presentation and originality. The four judges circulated like sharks during the contest Saturday, making note of how well teams worked together and kept their stations clean. The contest  as well as a culinary arts education  is about more than how to slice cucumber or chop cilantro.

Culinary arts teaches about team work and a host of other skills you need in daily life, and which can transfer to other jobs, said Randy Stokes, one of the judges and owner of the Barn Door restaurant.

Before the challenge began, students and their adult cohorts stood in nervous little clumps, dressed in chefs aprons and toques, not smiling much, their high school name emblazoned on pockets. A large island held a cornucopia of vegetables, fruits, rice, spices, oils, eggs, butter, even box wine. There was also a mystery basket of flank steak and cucumber, which everyone already knew about. April Goess, managing director of CIA, told the teams where to find cooking instruments and that, when the clock ran down, everyone had to put their hands up in the air, just like on the show.

Weve got a game plan, were feeling confident said Miriam George, teacher at East Central High, as student Amberlee Gaona counted out trays and bowls.

When the contest started, all idle chatter ceased. As the minutes sped by, it was incredible to watch how mostly the same ingredients could morph into such unique entrees  feta-berry-steak pinwheels and stacked steak-and-fried-potato and steak-and-spinach.

Five minutes!

Suddenly it was all over. Hands up! Everyone got in under the wire. In a somber line, students placed their plates before the judges, who wordlessly tasted and marked and discerned. Then the big moment: The team judged Best Over All.

Judson ISD! Wagner!

The room erupted in cheers, several mothers lost their minds and teacher Laster cried stunned tears of joy. The winning dish? Pan-seared steak and roast potato medley with side salad. In addition to prizes and Whataburger for a year, the team gets to take over the Barn Door kitchen for one night and cook for friends and family.

But everyone got something. First place: East Central. Second: Harlan. Most creative: Southwest Legacy High. Best presentation: Alamo Heights. Best team work: MacArthur.

Before the contest, MacArthur student Miranda Modglin said, yes, she plans to own her own restaurant one day, a French bistro with American influence.

Im going to work for her, quipped district superintendent Brian Gottardy.
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Karina Alvarez drove to her teaching job Tuesday morning knowing the clock was running out on her work permit.

News alerts over the weekend said President Donald Trump planned to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program that provided renewable two-year work permits to hundreds of thousands of young immigrants.

The 28-year-old bilingual education teacher at Edgewood ISD said shed known from the day Trump was elected that she likely would lose the card that let her drive legally, get a job and, for the first time in her life, go north of the Border Patrol checkpoint that had kept her trapped between the Rio Grande and mile marker 27 on Interstate 35.

I knew that this day was going to come. DACA is just like a little Band-Aid on the bigger problem, Alvarez said. Thats why I said Im not going to get a new car. Im not going to get a house. Because I know that my status is not permanent. I know I might not have this career for long. So lets just rent and see what happens.

Trumps decision to phase out the program means that nearly 800,000 young undocumented immigrants in the U.S. who have been allowed to work legally after paying a registration fee and undergoing a background check will lose their jobs over the next two years unless Congress comes up with a permanent fix. The DACA protection for most of them will begin to expire in March.

More Information DACA Guidelines Created in 2012, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals was available to immigrants without legal status who: Were younger than 31 on June 15, 2012 Came to the United States before turning 16 Had lived in the U.S. since June 15, 2007 Were in the U.S. on June 15, 2012 Were in school, graduated, had a GED or been honorably discharged from the Coast Guard or armed forces Had not been convicted of a felony, significant misdemeanor or three or more other misdemeanors See More Collapse

In announcing the end to DACA, Attorney General Jeff Sessions said the initiative by former President Barack Obama was unconstitutional and denied jobs to hundreds of thousands of Americans. Ending DACA makes us safer and more secure.

In a written statement, Trump said: I do not favor punishing children, most of whom are now adults, for the actions of their parents. But we must also recognize that we are nation of opportunity because we are a nation of laws.

More than 120,000 DACA recipients live in Texas, with an estimated 13,000 eligible for the program in Bexar County.

Figures show the DACA-eligible population nationwide contributes as much as $3 billion in federal, state and local taxes annually, according to the New American Economy, a group that supports immigration reform.

Supporters of the program say DACA recipients will be forced underground, no longer contributing as much to taxes or the economy and unable to maintain medical insurance, passing on to other taxpayers the cost for care.

More broadly, the presidents critics say its inhumane to end a program that offered stability for young immigrants whove been in the U.S. most of their lives.

They point out that while critics of DACA have said it encourages illegal immigration, its being halted during a time of record-low apprehensions by Border Patrol agents.

There were a lot of really troubling remarks made in Jeff Sessions speech that seemed like a continuation of campaign rhetoric seen in the last election rather than things actually related to the DACA program, said Sally Kinoshita, deputy director at the Immigrant Legal Resource Center.

In a tweet Tuesday morning, Trump put the onus on Congress to pass a bill that would replace DACA.

Later that day, he seemed to change tack, tweeting: Congress now has 6 months to legalize DACA (something the Obama Administration was unable to do). If they can't, I will revisit this issue!

In the face of that uncertainty about their future in the U.S., many DACA recipients are planning for the worst.

Alvarez began creating what activists call a deportation defense plan a month ago. That includes gathering proof of the time spent in the U.S. and notification shes hired an attorney, which can slow the deportation process and ensure her lawyer knows where shes detained.

It also means making a contingency plan in case shes deported, including giving a friend or family member power of attorney, making copies of her car and apartment keys and important documents to leave with people she trusts, and finding someone who can take care of her 7-year-old son indefinitely.

Its really, really hard, because when I sat there and was writing my friends names, I remember my friend saying, Well, its not going to be for forever, Alvarez said. Im thinking, who can provide security for him while Im gone? I dont know how long it will be. Its just very, very hard to have those thoughts.

Carla Martinez, a 23-year-old graduate of the University of Texas at San Antonio who in June started a job at a New Braunfels engineering firm, began frantic planning not just for herself, but for two younger siblings, who also have DACA protection.

Now Playing: Carla Martinez is one of the nearly 800,000 people protected by the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. This is her story. Video: Lindsey Carnett, San Antonio Express-News

When she learned about the DACA announcement five years ago, she was working illegally in a fast food restaurant north of Austin. The news that she could go to college and work in a professional field hit Martinez so hard she sat in the bathroom and cried.

Fast forward five years and Im watching the decision  in my new, full-time job as the news is being given and how sad I feel, and just overwhelmed with sadness that this was actually happening, she said. (Im) thinking about, OK whats the next step now? I need to pass my (professional engineering) certification exam. I need to get a second job. I need to make sure my sister gets a (DACA) renewal  because both my brother and my sister, I do their new renewals  I need to get hers in. I need to get my brothers in. I need to start saving up.

Most of all, updating my supervisor and my hiring manager. So its been hard. Thinking about six months from now, what can or cannot happen. What might happen. One of these days telling my supervisor or my hiring manager I can no longer work here.

Both Martinez and Alvarez said they wanted to speak with reporters in part to dispel what they say are misconceptions about DACA recipients.

Martinez is frustrated with comments shes seen online and on TV suggesting that DACA recipients are the beneficiaries of government largess. They arent eligible for most federal benefits, and even with DACA, Martinez found it hard to obtain financial assistance.

That didnt happen because I got free tuition, free money, she said of her engineering degree. That happened because my parents paid out of pocket every penny. I worked two jobs every summer.

Another common misconception, according to supporters of the program, is that DACA recipients are choosing the two-year work permit in lieu of pursuing permanent legal status.

For many DACA applicants, the announcement of the program was the first time they learned they had a chance to work legally, and so it was the first time they consulted an immigration lawyer, Kinoshita said.

Those who do have the option to get visas are likely pursuing them, she said, but wait times can drag on for years and decades, and U.S. immigration laws severely limit who is eligible for legal status.

There are millions of people in the United States, including hundreds of thousands of DACA (recipients), for whom theres no avenue, she said.

I have nowhere to go to, said Alvarez, who left a small ranching community in the Mexican Gulf Coast state of Veracruz when she was 4 years old. The home that I once knew is not there anymore. The joy and the happiness and the memories will not be there, and that is a scary thought, because  theres drug cartels there that organize the community there, and the community knows, and so I know if I go back, it would be pretty dangerous. And especially exposing my son, who doesnt speak fluent Spanish, and hes fair skinned. Hes white complected. So that would make him a target.

Now Playing: Karina Alvarez was born in Mexico. She crossed the U.S. border when she was just 4 years old. This is her story. Video: By Lindsey Carnett, San Antonio Express-News

Out of the shadows

Alvarez said she didnt know she was undocumented until the start of her senior year of high school. She and her friends were planning activities for the year, and one rite of passage was going to school and registering for classes without her parents.

She was turned away for not having a Social Security number. Alvarez said she was upset, but the implications of her immigration status werent clear until later, when she had to decide where shed go to college.

She wanted to go to Texas A&M University, but even though she lived in the U.S., Alvarez faced a barrier getting there.

About 27 miles north of Laredo on Interstate 35 is a Border Patrol checkpoint. If she was caught at the checkpoint, Alvarez would face deportation. If she made it to College Station, it might be a long time before she could safely visit her family again.

My family had to sit me down and had to really put the cards on the table and say, If you find a way to get there, because you speak good English, you also run the risk of if they want to stop everybody and ask for identification, you might never, ever have an opportunity to adjust your status  and then also the fact that you might never see us again,  she said.

She decided to go to Texas A&M International University in Laredo, but Alvarez said she was frustrated to find an immigrant community that was scattered and afraid to organize.

DACA allowed her to work, and after graduation, she spent 21/2 years as a speech therapist in Laredo before moving to San Antonio in 2015. The Trump administration is allowing anyone whose DACA work permit expires by March 5 to renew it for two years in the next month. Alvarezs expires in September 2018.

In San Antonio, Alvarez said, shes found an active community of immigrant advocates who have helped her feel comfortable speaking out and whom shes joined in giving know-your-rights presentations and other outreach efforts. She called her activism therapeutic and she hopes to expand that work to Laredo.

Alvarez said she also tries to be a role model for her students. She doesnt ask about their status, but because theyre enrolled in her bilingual education class, she assumes many have backgrounds similar to hers. She said its important they know that like her they can go to college. She said her students marvel at her grad school textbooks and their tiny typeface.

Theyre like, Oh we cant read that yet, but we will,  Alvarez said. So most of the kids already have college in their minds as second-graders. And so you see that spark.

Becoming an engineer

Martinez said that despite being one of five children in a family that struggled to make ends meet, shes been extremely blessed. The most recent example: She received her DACA renewal in late August, meaning shell be able to work for the next two years.

She was smuggled into the U.S. on an international bridge into Texas at age 7. Her family settled in Austin, then moved to Pflugerville when she was in middle school.

Martinez said that in high school, she pushed herself, taking advanced placement classes and working as much as she could to save money for college while her parents took on multiple jobs, even though she had little hope of being able to apply her skills in the workforce.

That changed the summer before her senior year of high school, when DACA was launched. With the work permit it provided, Martinez would able to use whatever college degree she pursued.

She couldnt initially afford the $495 registration fee, but Martinez left for school at UTSA and scraped by with help from her parents until she could pay for the work permit during her sophomore year that allowed her to find better-paying jobs.

She got internships, which paid well enough that she no longer had to choose between buying groceries and buying books, and last year raised enough money to be the first DACA recipient at the university to study abroad.

She said it only recently became clear to her how unusual it is for an undocumented woman to enter the engineering field.

I felt like I took the full potential that DACA offered, she said. I was able to get a drivers license, to go to college to study abroad, to get a full-time job.

Now Martinez is trying to figure out what shell do in two years when her permit expires. So is her employer, M&S Engineering in New Braunfels. The company has floated the idea of sponsoring her for a work visa, but Martinez likely wont qualify.

Her supervisor, Brady Kosub, said he first met Martinez when she applied for an internship during college. He asked her to apply for a full-time job when she graduated.

When the company decided to hire Martinez, Kosub said, hed never heard of DACA, but she was leaps and bounds above other recent graduates. Her internships, including one at the San Antonio Water System, made her a perfect fit for the position.

If she cant remain an employee of this company, then thats going to hurt this company, Kosub said.

I worry about whats going to happen, he added. That has to speak somewhat to there being some problems with our immigration system.

Treated like hot potato

Because DACA recipients mostly are in school and arent concentrated in particular industries, unlike other immigrant groups, theyre not likely to have a serious impact on the wages of U.S. citizens, said Ike Brannon, a visiting fellow with the libertarian Cato Institute and president of the consulting firm Capital Policy Analytics.

On top of that, Brannon said, a low unemployment rate leaves him unconvinced DACA creates much of a barrier to U.S. citizens trying to find jobs.

Its kind of weird to be worried about foreigners taking our jobs when the unemployment rate is 4.3 percent, he said. Whats going to happen is these guys will end up working in the underground economy, A: earning a lot less than they would be and B: theyll end up displacing unskilled Americans. If were really worried about unskilled Americans, the last thing we want to do is take a bunch of skilled, motivated foreigners and make them work in unskilled jobs.

While Sessions in his speech focused on consequences of DACA, other Trump administration officials toed the line the president laid out in his Tuesday morning tweet.

During a conference call with reporters Tuesday, top officials said acting Homeland Security Secretary Elaine C. Duke decided to cancel the program not because of its impact on the economy or public safety, but because the Obama administration exceeded its authority in launching DACA.

The officials said the decision was made after Sessions issued an opinion that DACA likely would not survive a legal challenge threatened by the state of Texas.

By giving Congress a chance to act on this, that is our most desired outcome, said one homeland security official who insisted on anonymity. As a career law enforcement officer, Im enforcing the laws on books. Should Congress want to have some resolution to this, that is the best course of action.

Martinez said that leaves her feeling like a hot potato being tossed around.

Thats my future. 800,000 of us, thats our future, she said. Its definitely frustrating feeling that way, feeling like my life is just a puppet, and my problem has been handed off to someone else.

jbuch@express-news.net
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SPRING BRANCH  It was a laid back Thanksgiving Day 1989 in space when a loud alarm rang out, alerting astronauts John Blaha and Story Musgrave to a catastrophic event, a sudden loss of cabin pressure.

With two astronauts in sleeping bags, Musgrave worked to stop the leak while Blaha, a veteran Air Force aviator and the shuttle pilot, leafed his way through an emergency re-entry checklist that would put them on Guam within the hour.

The cabin pressure continued to fall as the crew worked, thinning the air to a point where they could have been on Pike's Peak  14,115 feet above sea level, with the air getting thinner every minute.

I dont think that thought ever occurred to me, Blaha said, when asked if he was concerned the crew was at risk of dying in space. All I did was doing what I was trying to do, doing what youre trained to do. And in my case it was to find the closest runway and do a burn and go to it  if Story  doesnt stop that leak.

How they solved the problem, rooted in a malfunctioning toilet, is one of NASAs more colorful tales. Its also a tribute to the intense nature of space agencys training and Blaha, a veteran test pilot who never broke a sweat that day. Space is where he always wanted to be since reading an equation as a college sophomore.

More Information At home in space At 77, John Blaha is a San Antonio native and retired Air Force colonel who flew 361 missions over Vietnam. After joining NASA's astronaut corps in 1980, he logged 161 days in space on five missions, including one aboard the Russian space station Mir. He spent 17 years with the space agency before retiring from NASA in 1997. Here's a look at his missions. STS-29, March 13-18, 1989: Pilot for a five-day mission aboard Discovery. The crew deployed the East Tracking and Data Relay Satellite, and performed eight scientific/medical experiments. Landed at Edwards AFB, California. STS-33, Nov. 22-27, 1989: Pilot for a Discovery mission that launched at night and carried Defense Department payloads as part of a classified flight. Landed at Edwards AFB after 79 orbits. STS-43, Aug. 2-11, 1991: Spacecraft commander for a nine-day mission aboard Atlantis that deployed the West Tracking and Data Relay Satellite and conducted 32 physical, material, and life-science experiments. Landed at Kennedy Space Center, Florida, after 142 orbits. STS-58, Oct. 18-Nov. 1, 1993: Spacecraft commander for a 14-day research mission aboard Columbia. NASA management recognized the mission as the most successful and efficient Spacelab flight the agency ever flew. Landed at Edwards AFB. MIR-22, Sept. 16, 1996-Jan. 22, 1997: Launched aboard STS-79, he joined a Russian crew aboard the Mir pace station. Blaha spent four months with the cosmonaut crew conducting material science, fluid science, and life science research. He returned home aboard STS-81. NOTE: A mission is defined as a launch into space. See More Collapse

Making rank or having a long Air Force career didnt much matter but becoming an astronaut did, and once he got there, Blaha didnt worry about the risks. His real concern was less existential after flying for the first time in March 1989.

The greatest fear you have in the astronaut office is flight assignments, he said, noting that a chief concern is not getting a mission or a new mission after coming back from space. That is your worry. You have no control over it.

John Elmer Blaha neednt have fretted. Hed fly five missions over his 17-year NASA career, twice in 1989 and once aboard the Russian space station Mir. He came to love space so much he wished it could have been a Monday through Friday job with weekends off on Earth with his wife, Brenda, saying, I would go there, and it would be like going to any job that anyone goes to in America.

I would do it as a profession forever, he said.

Brenda Blaha added, He feels really good up there, like thats where he should be.

One reason Blaha is so happy in space: No pollen allergies.

A San Antonio native, Blaha is 75 and his wife, 70. They live north of town in a single-story home where one room is dedicated to his Air Force and NASA career. That part of his life is over, but hes as enthusiastic as ever about space.

Blaha walks to a color photo on a wall in his house and points to a curving slice of blue that wraps itself around the Earth. Thats our planets atmosphere, and it rises 20 miles above the ground. Beyond it is the cold blackness of space.

Its a place he knows well after 161 days in orbit and years of intense training.

A tad nerdy, Blaha was groomed for spaceflight. He said his father, Col. Elmer Blaha, grew up poor during the Depression and, after joining the Army, heard there was a college that still paid for your bed, your food and you had heating and cooling and gave you clothes to wear.

It was West Point.

I grew up at Air Force bases. I didnt know people did anything other than become a pilot and fly an airplane or fix one, he said laughing, recalling that the elder Blaha was an aviator and squadron commander. So I always wanted to be an Air Force pilot.

Blaha graduated high in his class at Granby High School in Norfolk, Virginia, in 1960 and entered the Air Force Academy. Taking a course in orbital mechanics during his second year, he stumbled onto an equation that put him on a path toward Edwards AFBs Air Force Test Pilot School  and NASA.

The equation was based on Isaac Newtons F=ma and Johannes Keplers three laws of planetary motion. F=ma states the force (F) acting on an object is equal to the mass (m) of an object times its acceleration (a). The Smithsonian Air and Space Museum said it means the more mass an object has, the more force is needed to accelerate it.

Blaha said Keplers laws describe how the moon goes around the Earth, the Earth and other planets go around the sun and how stars near a black hole move around it, as well as the path Apollo missions took to the moon and unmanned probes to the planets  among other things.

I was enthralled by that equation, said Blaha, who earned a masters in astronautical engineering from Purdue University in 1966. I was so excited about the space program after that I thought, Man, when I stop flying jets for the Air Force, I want to go and fly a spaceship for NASA.

Fifty-five years later, hes still enthralled by the equation.

It was a Y joint in my life, he said. A fork.

Blaha earned his wings in 1967 and flew F-4, F-102, F-106, and A-37 aircraft, also making 361 combat missions in Vietnam. At Edwards Air Force Aerospace Research Pilot School, he flew the NF-104 research jet to 104,400 feet, and also was as an F-104 instructor pilot. He later served as a Royal Air Force test pilot.

That resume reflects the influence of Edwin Buzz Aldrin, who had taken command of Edwards Test Pilot School after Apollo 11. Blaha, in his final three months as a student at the school in 1971, went to Aldrin for some career advice.

So I asked him, obviously, Hey what can I do to do what you did? Blaha said. He told me to stay right there in the school and do something for him, so I did.

Soon enough, Blaha was flying the NF-104, dubbed the Rocket 104 because a rocket was built into its tail. Its the same jet legendary test pilot Chuck Yeager bailed out of eight years earlier after plummeting more than 90,000 feet on Dec. 10, 1963. He also followed Aldrins advice and flew in Britain as a test pilot.

Itll make you look different, he recalled Aldrin telling him.

He wasnt like a typical pilot, and I dont mean to speak in generic terms, who was just interested in the shuttle, said Shannon Lucid, who flew twice with Blaha and was with him in Russia as they prepared to live on the Mir space station.

They were together there for five days.

He was very interested in the payload and all the science that was going on in the Spacelab, Lucid, 74, of Houston added, and as a matter of fact he volunteered to be a subject on a lot of the experiments, which is a little atypical.

These days, a photo of the Mir is among many that line the walls of a room dedicated to his career. And Im in the space shuttle coming up to the Mir, and I took that picture, Blaha said, his voice rising in excitement.

Blaha believes Mars is the next step. He thinks back to a speech John F. Kennedy made that launched the Apollo program, and transformed the United States into a technological giant, in explaining why the first interplanetary manned spaceflight will have the same effect  spurring a new generation of young scientists and engineers, and advances in technologies that will power the economy.

The challenges of traveling to Mars, he predicted, will ensure that.

Take just two: Finding a way to shield astronauts flying a 6-month mission to Mars from radiation that would turn human blood solid  on the 150th day. Radio communications and data transmitted from Mars to Earth will lag 10 to 30 minutes.

Who solves those issues?

Students and their professors in colleges and universities around the country, said Blaha, who served on NASAs Space Shuttle Improvement Panel, helped develop the Orbiter Head Up Display system, and led changes in contingency abort procedures that improved crew survivability during shuttle launches.

Risks will be everywhere. But if thats an integral element of manned spaceflight, so, too, is the opportunity for learning and innovation, of improvements shared by engineers, scientists and astronauts as they map out interplanetary travel.

And risks are mitigated in space, its dangers routinely overcome. That long ago Thanksgiving Day is a case in point. Once the depressurization alarm went off, Blaha thumbed through the steps for a de-orbit burn. Musgrave went through a checklist of his own after freeing mission commander Fred Gregory from the malfunctioning toilet.

The pressure slowly fell as they turned the pages, sliding from 14.7 pounds per square inch to 10.2  the equivalent of being 2 miles above sea level.

Musgrave stopped the leak on the fifth step in his checklist.

Theres two parallel tasks, Blaha said. If we didnt fix the air issue, I was de-orbiting. It was not a big deal.

sigc@express-news.net

COMING MONDAY in MySA: Sam Space, a rhesus monkey, was aboard Mercury spaceship in 1959, then observed at Brooks.
WA Feral Animal Management owner Andy Lockey with his own Matlock Trapping System which has captured more than 172 pigs since February. The design can be altered in size by adding additional panels. The camera and remote sensor can be seen on the top right of the cage.
Hopefully this new focus on the Pilbara and exports from Port Hedland will be more than just a once-off and we can see export numbers increasing each year, as we were before the 2011 cattle suspension.
From British-Pakastani director Sarmad Masud comes new western-style thriller My Pure Land, shot guerrilla style on-location in Pakistan. Check out the stunning new trailer for the film below:

Having heard the real-life story of a group of young women who survived a siege on their home by relatives in rural Pakistan, which culminated in them fighting for the right to stay in their land against a militia of 200 bandits, director Masud decided to bring the thrilling tale to the big screen.

Grounded in realism with a feminist theme, the movie wasnt an easy one to make, as the crew working on it had to negotiate their way through one of the most heavily armed civilian regions on the planet, where kidnap, ransom and other terrible crimes are always a risk for foreigners coming in.

In fact, the lives of the crew were put in danger when, one day, an embittered extra returned to set with a firearm, opening fire on the production, but fortunately failing to hurt anybody.

Produced by Bill Kenwright, My Pure Land stars Suhaee Abro, Eman Malik, Syed Tanveer-Hussain, Razia Malik, Atif Akhtar Bhatti, Tayyab Azfal and Ahsen Murad.

My Pure Land hits cinemas across the UK on September 15.

by Daniel Falconer for www.femalefirst.co.uk

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James Blunt is using his tour with Ed Sheeran "as practice" for his own headline shows.

James Blunt and Ed Sheeran

The 43-year-old musician is embarking on a three and a half month tour around North America with the 'Castle on the Hill' hitmaker, and has joked that he'll be using the performances as a warm up to prepare him for his own tour of Europe in October.

Speaking to BANG Showbiz at BBC Radio 2 Hyde Park on Sunday (10.09.17), James said: "I'm on tour in America as Ed Sheeran's b***h. Opening up for him psychically and musically each night. We are on a three and a half month North American tour and basically I'm using him and the Americans as practice for Europe in October."

The 'You're Beautiful' hitmaker's comments come after he recently revealed he was excited to be a part of the "amazing experience", and will be doing his best to win over a few new fans with his set.

He said: "It's going to be an amazing experience coming to America to go on tour for three months with the biggest male solo artist in the world today. It will be a great thrill. It's his audience, and I'll try to win them over with some songs."

However, James also warned fans that his shows are very different to Ed's because he is "more inefficient" than the flame-haired musician.

He explained: "Firstly, I'm more inefficient than him and more foolish than him. He does it only with a pedal station, and I'll have a five-piece band, me and four others. Mine costs more to set up, but we have great fun. It's the same band I've had for many, many years. So you'll be able to spot that we're having lots of fun on stage."

Ed and James will begin their tour of the US on September 12 in Omaha, Nebraska.
The stage is set for the Carpet Design Awards which enter the 13th year in 2018. Designers and makers of modern hand-made carpets have until November 1 to submit their entries for the highly coveted award. The Carpet Design Awards are an international badge of distinction, given in recognition of quality and design excellence in hand-made carpets and rugs.Presented annually at DOMOTEX, next years awards will be conferred in eight categories, with the winners receiving their prizes on January 13 at the Carpet Design Awards display.

The stage is set for the Carpet Design Awards which enter the 13th year in 2018. Designers and makers of modern hand-made carpets have until November 1 to submit their entries for the highly coveted award. The Carpet Design Awards are an international badge of distinction, given in recognition of quality and design excellence in hand-made carpets and rugs.#

Applications for the awards are submitted online, and each entrant can submit up to three designs per category. Entry is restricted to designers and manufacturers who are exhibiting their exclusive carpet creations at DOMOTEX 2018. The only exception to this is the "Best Studio Artist Design" category, which is also open to designers who are not exhibiting at DOMOTEX.The Carpet Design Awards help to give expression to cutting-edge innovations and emerging trends in the carpet industry. Since the inception of the awards, the categories have therefore been refined and updated to reflect industry trends. The 2018 awards have two new categories: Best Interior (high-end customisation project or rug installation demonstrated with high quality images) and Best Communication (successful marketing or branding campaign demonstrated with high-quality images).An international jury headed by Michael Mandapati, carpet expert and president of Warp & Weft, New York, will assess the entries and shortlist for each of the eight categories. The carpets submitted will be judged in terms of design and design concept, material, execution, structure and quality, and sustainability and branding. The 24 shortlisted carpets will be displayed during DOMOTEX and in January 2018, the jury will select one winner in each category.The categories are Best Studio Artist Design, Best Modern Design Superior, Best Modern Design Deluxe, Best Transitional Design, Best Flatweave Design, Best Collection, Best Interior and Best Communication. (SV)

Fibre2Fashion News Desk  India
Werbehinweise: Die Billigung des Basisprospekts durch die BaFin ist nicht als ihre Befurwortung der angebotenen Wertpapiere zu verstehen. Wir empfehlen Interessenten und potenziellen Anlegern den Basisprospekt und die Endgultigen Bedingungen zu lesen, bevor sie eine Anlageentscheidung treffen, um sich moglichst umfassend zu informieren, insbesondere uber die potenziellen Risiken und Chancen des Wertpapiers. Sie sind im Begriff, ein Produkt zu erwerben, das nicht einfach ist und schwer zu verstehen sein kann.
Hamburg (ots) -- Querverweis: Bildmaterial ist abrufbar unter http://www.presseportal.de/bilder -Following a slightly rainy start to the event on Friday, the weather picked up on the second day of the Hamburg Cruise Days 2017 - attracting the usual number of visitors to the harbour. The highlight of the day was the Grand Hamburg Cruise Days Parade - the biggest in the history of the event, even without one of the originally planned six cruise ships ...The Hamburg Cruise Days switched into top gear on Saturday: around 250,000 visitors flocked to the event site to celebrate the highlight of the day: the Grand Hamburg Cruise Days Parade.Bathed in very welcome sunshine and the wonderful waterside ambiance of the harbour, visitors watched as the gigantic ships manoeuvred on the Elbe to get into position for the Grand Parade. Finally, at 21:15, the formation was complete and the parade started. Escorted by barges, sailing vessels and passenger ships, the AIDAprima, Norwegian Jade, EUROPA 2, EUROPA and MSC Preziosa majestically sailed down the Elbe against the backdrop of the illuminated Blue Port Hamburg. Each ship was waved off on its journey with its own firework display and rousing music.There was a minor disappointment in an otherwise magnificent display: instead of six ships, only five were able to take part. Due to a technical problem, Mein Schiff 3 was unable to sail in the parade as a rope had become entangled in the propeller as it was departing. "We are very sorry for the cruise line and all the passengers who were so looking forward to being a part of the parade", said organisers Katja Derow and Uwe Bergmann. "The parade was still magnificent. The spectators on land and at home in front of their screens were treated to a stunning display. Hamburg again revealed its most beautiful side in a thrilling experience. "MSC Preziosa returned to the port after the parade and docked at Steinwerder. Together with Silver Wind, which returns to Uberseebrucke on Sunday morning, she will be bidding farewell to Hamburg on Sunday evening. Another highlight for the last day of the event is the harbour cruise by Katharina von Bora at 16:00.The second day of the event remained peaceful and the police reported no incidents.Originaltext: Hamburg Cruise Days digital press kits: http://www.presseportal.de/nr/114213 press kits via RSS: http://www.presseportal.de/rss/pm_114213.rss2Press enquiries: Katja Derow k.derow@redroses-pr.com 0049 (0) 162 43 11 376
Opdivo (nivolumab) plus Yervoy (ipilimumab)reduced the risk of death by 37% versus standard of care, sunitinib, in intermediate- and poor-risk patients

The combination also significantly improved overall survival in all randomized patients

Opdivo plus Yervoy demonstrated a 42% objective response rate in intermediate- and poor-risk patients, 9.4% were complete responses

Grade 3/4 adverse events experienced by 46% of patients in the Opdivo 3 mg/kg plus Yervoy 1 mg/kg combination arm and 64% in the sunitinib arm

Bristol-Myers Squibb Company (NYSE:BMY) announced today results from the Phase 3 CheckMate -214 trial evaluating Opdivo (nivolumab) plus Yervoy (ipilimumab) versus sunitinib in patients with previously untreated advanced or metastatic renal cell carcinoma (RCC), including data on key subgroups. With a minimum follow-up of 17.5 months, Opdivo in combination with Yervoy reduced the risk of death 37% [HR 0.63; 99.8% CI: 0.44 to 0.89; P 0.0001] compared with sunitinib, the current standard of care, in an interim analysis of overall survival (OS) in intermediate- and poor-risk patients, the co-primary endpoint. The median OS had not yet been reached for the combination and was 26 months for sunitinib (95% CI: 22.1 to NA). Results from CheckMate -214 will be presented today during Presidential Symposium II at the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) 2017 Congress in Madrid, Spain, from 5:55-6:10 PM CEST in the Madrid Auditorium (Abstract LBA5).

The Opdivo plus Yervoy combination also improved OS in all randomized patients, a secondary endpoint. In this population, the combination reduced the risk of death 32% [HR 0.68; 99.8% CI: 0.49 to 0.95; P=0.0003] compared with sunitinib. The median OS had not yet been reached for the combination and was 32.9 months for sunitinib (95% CI: NA to NA).

Results for objective response rate (ORR) and progression-free survival (PFS) in intermediate- and poor-risk patients, the two other co-primary endpoints, were previously reported. The safety of the combination was consistent with that observed in previously reported studies of these medicines in patients with RCC.

"There is an unmet need for additional treatment options in the first line setting that may provide a meaningful survival benefit including more durable, complete responses for patients with advanced renal cell carcinoma. These results for the combination of nivolumab and ipilimumab are very encouraging in patients with first-line mRCC who have a very poor prognosis," said Bernard Escudier, M.D., former chair of the genitourinary group of the Institut Gustave Roussy in Villejuif, France.

Adverse events (AEs) leading to discontinuation were reported in 22% of patients (547) in the combination group, compared with 12% of patients in the sunitinib group (535). The most common grade 3/4 AEs in the combination group were fatigue (4%), diarrhea (4%), rash (2%), nausea (2%), and, in less than 1% each, pruritus, hypothyroidism, vomiting and hypertension. In the sunitinib group, the most common grade 3/4 AEs were hypertension (16%), fatigue (9%), Palmar-plantar erythrodysaesthesia syndrome (9%), stomatitis (3%), mucosal inflammation (3%), vomiting (2%), nausea (1%), decreased appetite (1%), hypothyroidism (<1%) and dysgeusia (<1%). There were seven treatment-related deaths in the combination group and four in the sunitinib group.

"As the pioneer in Immuno-Oncology research, we set a goal of increasing overall survival for more patients by combining agents and have now, for the second time in a phase 3 trial, demonstrated that the Opdivo plus Yervoy combination may provide a survival advantage for patients," said Vicki Goodman, M.D., head of new asset development, Bristol-Myers Squibb. "These positive data showing the Opdivo plus Yervoy combination improved survival in the first-line setting offer the potential, pending regulatory approval, to change the standard of care in the first-line treatment of advanced RCC and may represent a significant step forward for patients with this disease."

About CheckMate -214

CheckMate -214 is a phase 3, randomized, open-label study evaluating the combination of Opdivo plus Yervoy versus sunitinib in patients with previously untreated advanced or metastatic renal cell carcinoma. Patients in the combination group received Opdivo 3 mg/kg plus Yervoy 1 mg/kg every 3 weeks for 4 doses followed by Opdivo 3 mg/kg every 2 weeks. Patients in the comparator group received sunitinib 50 mg once daily for 4 weeks, followed by 2 weeks off before continuation of treatment. Patients were treated until progression or unacceptable toxic effects. The primary endpoints of the trial are progression-free survival (PFS), overall survival (OS) and objective response rate (ORR) in an intermediate to poor-risk patient population (approximately 75% of patients). The majority of alpha was allocated to overall survival. Safety is a secondary endpoint.

The company previously reported that the combination of Opdivo plus Yervoy achieved an ORR of 42% versus 27% for sunitinib in poor- and intermediate-risk patients, a co-primary endpoint. Median duration of response was not reached for the combination and was 18.2 months for sunitinib. PFS in intermediate- and poor-risk patients, a co-primary endpoint, improved 18% for those receiving the combination (HR 0.82; 99.1% CI: 0.64 to 1.05; stratified two-sided p=0.0331) but did not reach the pre-defined statistical significance threshold of 0.009 compared with sunitinib. The median PFS for the combination group was 11.6 months (95% CI: 8.7 to 15.5) versus 8.4 months (95% CI: 7.0 to 10.8) for the sunitinib group.

About Renal Cell Carcinoma

Renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is the most common type of kidney cancer in adults, accounting for more than 100,000 deaths worldwide each year. Clear-cell RCC is the most prevalent type of RCC and constitutes 80% to 90% of all patients. RCC is approximately twice as common in men as in women, with the highest rates of the disease in North America and Europe. Globally, the five-year survival rate for those diagnosed with metastatic, or advanced, kidney cancer is 12.1%.

Bristol-Myers Squibb Immuno-Oncology: Advancing Oncology Research

At Bristol-Myers Squibb, patients are at the center of everything we do. Our vision for the future of cancer care is focused on researching and developing transformational Immuno-Oncology (I-O) medicines for hard-to-treat cancers that could potentially improve outcomes for these patients.

We are leading the scientific understanding of I-O through our extensive portfolio of investigational compounds and approved agents. Our differentiated clinical development program is studying broad patient populations across more than 50 types of cancers with 14 clinical-stage molecules designed to target different immune system pathways. Our deep expertise and innovative clinical trial designs position us to advance I-O/I-O, I-O/chemotherapy, I-O/targeted therapies and I-O radiation therapies across multiple tumors and potentially deliver the next wave of therapies with a sense of urgency. We also continue to pioneer research that will help facilitate a deeper understanding of the role of immune biomarkers and how patients' tumor biology can be used as a guide for treatment decisions throughout their journey.

We understand making the promise of I-O a reality for the many patients who may benefit from these therapies requires not only innovation on our part but also close collaboration with leading experts in the field. Our partnerships with academia, government, advocacy and biotech companies support our collective goal of providing new treatment options to advance the standards of clinical practice.

About Opdivo

Opdivo is a programmed death-1 (PD-1) immune checkpoint inhibitor that is designed to uniquely harness the body's own immune system to help restore anti-tumor immune response. By harnessing the body's own immune system to fight cancer, Opdivo has become an important treatment option across multiple cancers.

Opdivo's leading global development program is based on Bristol-Myers Squibb's scientific expertise in the field of Immuno-Oncology and includes a broad range of clinical trials across all phases, including Phase 3, in a variety of tumor types. To date, the Opdivo clinical development program has enrolled more than 25,000 patients. The Opdivo trials have contributed to gaining a deeper understanding of the potential role of biomarkers in patient care, particularly regarding how patients may benefit from Opdivo across the continuum of PD-L1 expression.

In July 2014, Opdivo was the first PD-1 immune checkpoint inhibitor to receive regulatory approval anywhere in the world. Opdivo is currently approved in more than 60 countries, including the United States, the European Union and Japan. In October 2015, the company's Opdivo and Yervoy combination regimen was the first Immuno-Oncology combination to receive regulatory approval for the treatment of metastatic melanoma and is currently approved in more than 50 countries, including the United States and the European Union.

U.S. FDA-APPROVED INDICATIONS FOR OPDIVO

OPDIVO (nivolumab) as a single agent is indicated for the treatment of patients with BRAF V600 mutation-positive unresectable or metastatic melanoma. This indication is approved under accelerated approval based on progression-free survival. Continued approval for this indication may be contingent upon verification and description of clinical benefit in the confirmatory trials

OPDIVO (nivolumab) as a single agent is indicated for the treatment of patients with BRAF V600 wild-type unresectable or metastatic melanoma.

OPDIVO (nivolumab), in combination with YERVOY (ipilimumab), is indicated for the treatment of patients with unresectable or metastatic melanoma. This indication is approved under accelerated approval based on progression-free survival. Continued approval for this indication may be contingent upon verification and description of clinical benefit in the confirmatory trials.

OPDIVO (nivolumab) is indicated for the treatment of patients with metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with progression on or after platinum-based chemotherapy. Patients with EGFR or ALK genomic tumor aberrations should have disease progression on FDA-approved therapy for these aberrations prior to receiving OPDIVO.

OPDIVO (nivolumab) is indicated for the treatment of patients with advanced renal cell carcinoma (RCC) who have received prior anti-angiogenic therapy.

OPDIVO (nivolumab) is indicated for the treatment of adult patients with classical Hodgkin lymphoma (cHL) that has relapsed or progressed after autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) and brentuximab vedotin or after 3 or more lines of systemic therapy that includes autologous HSCT. This indication is approved under accelerated approval based on overall response rate. Continued approval for this indication may be contingent upon verification and description of clinical benefit in confirmatory trials.

OPDIVO (nivolumab) is indicated for the treatment of patients with recurrent or metastatic squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck (SCCHN) with disease progression on or after platinum-based therapy.

OPDIVO (nivolumab) is indicated for the treatment of patients with locally advanced or metastatic urothelial carcinoma who have disease progression during or following platinum-containing chemotherapy or have disease progression within 12 months of neoadjuvant or adjuvant treatment with platinum-containing chemotherapy. This indication is approved under accelerated approval based on tumor response rate and duration of response. Continued approval for this indication may be contingent upon verification and description of clinical benefit in confirmatory trials.

OPDIVO(nivolumab) is indicated for the treatment of adults and pediatric (12 years and older) patients with microsatellite instability high (MSI-H) or mismatch repair deficient (dMMR) metastatic colorectal cancer (CRC) that has progressed following treatment with a fluoropyrimidine, oxaliplatin, and irinotecan. This indication is approved under accelerated approval based on overall response rate and duration of response. Continued approval for this indication may be contingent upon verification and description of clinical benefit in confirmatory trials.

IMPORTANT SAFETY INFORMATION

WARNING: IMMUNE-MEDIATED ADVERSE REACTIONS

YERVOY can result in severe and fatal immune-mediated adverse reactions. These immune-mediated reactions may involve any organ system; however, the most common severe immune-mediated adverse reactions are enterocolitis, hepatitis, dermatitis (including toxic epidermal necrolysis), neuropathy, and endocrinopathy. The majority of these immune-mediated reactions initially manifested during treatment; however, a minority occurred weeks to months after discontinuation of YERVOY.

Assess patients for signs and symptoms of enterocolitis, dermatitis, neuropathy, and endocrinopathy and evaluate clinical chemistries including liver function tests (LFTs), adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) level, and thyroid function tests at baseline and before each dose.

Permanently discontinue YERVOY and initiate systemic high-dose corticosteroid therapy for severe immune-mediated reactions.

Immune-Mediated Pneumonitis

OPDIVO can cause immune-mediated pneumonitis. Fatal cases have been reported. Monitor patients for signs with radiographic imaging and for symptoms of pneumonitis. Administer corticosteroids for Grade 2 or more severe pneumonitis. Permanently discontinue for Grade 3 or 4 and withhold until resolution for Grade 2. In patients receiving OPDIVO monotherapy, fatal cases of immune-mediated pneumonitis have occurred. Immune-mediated pneumonitis occurred in 3.1% (61/1994) of patients. In patients receiving OPDIVO with YERVOY, immune-mediated pneumonitis occurred in 6% (25/407) of patients.

In Checkmate 205 and 039, pneumonitis, including interstitial lung disease, occurred in 6.0% (16/266) of patients receiving OPDIVO. Immune-mediated pneumonitis occurred in 4.9% (13/266) of patients receiving OPDIVO: Grade 3 (n=1) and Grade 2 (n=12).

Immune-Mediated Colitis

OPDIVO can cause immune-mediated colitis. Monitor patients for signs and symptoms of colitis. Administer corticosteroids for Grade 2 (of more than 5 days duration), 3, or 4 colitis. Withhold OPDIVO monotherapy for Grade 2 or 3 and permanently discontinue for Grade 4 or recurrent colitis upon re-initiation of OPDIVO. When administered with YERVOY, withhold OPDIVO and YERVOY for Grade 2 and permanently discontinue for Grade 3 or 4 or recurrent colitis. In patients receiving OPDIVO monotherapy, immune-mediated colitis occurred in 2.9% (58/1994) of patients. In patients receiving OPDIVO with YERVOY, immune-mediated colitis occurred in 26% (107/407) of patients including three fatal cases.

In a separate Phase 3 study of YERVOY 3 mg/kg, severe, life-threatening, or fatal (diarrhea of =7 stools above baseline, fever, ileus, peritoneal signs; Grade 3-5) immune-mediated enterocolitis occurred in 34 (7%) patients. Across all YERVOY-treated patients in that study (n=511), 5 (1%) developed intestinal perforation, 4 (0.8%) died as a result of complications, and 26 (5%) were hospitalized for severe enterocolitis.

Immune-Mediated Hepatitis

OPDIVO can cause immune-mediated hepatitis. Monitor patients for abnormal liver tests prior to and periodically during treatment. Administer corticosteroids for Grade 2 or greater transaminase elevations. Withhold for Grade 2 and permanently discontinue for Grade 3 or 4 immune-mediated hepatitis. In patients receiving OPDIVO monotherapy, immune-mediated hepatitis occurred in 1.8% (35/1994) of patients. In patients receiving OPDIVO with YERVOY, immune-mediated hepatitis occurred in 13% (51/407) of patients.

In a separate Phase 3 study of YERVOY 3 mg/kg, severe, life-threatening, or fatal hepatotoxicity (AST or ALT elevations >5x the ULN or total bilirubin elevations >3x the ULN; Grade 3-5) occurred in 8 (2%) patients with fatal hepatic failure in 0.2% and hospitalization in 0.4%.

Immune-Mediated Neuropathies

In a separate Phase 3 study of YERVOY 3 mg/kg, 1 case of fatal Guillain-Barre syndrome and 1 case of severe (Grade 3) peripheral motor neuropathy were reported.

Immune-Mediated Endocrinopathies

OPDIVO can cause immune-mediated hypophysitis, immune-mediated adrenal insufficiency, autoimmune thyroid disorders, and Type 1 diabetes mellitus. Monitor patients for signs and symptoms of hypophysitis, signs and symptoms of adrenal insufficiency, thyroid function prior to and periodically during treatment, and hyperglycemia. Administer hormone replacement as clinically indicated and corticosteroids for Grade 2 or greater hypophysitis. Withhold for Grade 2 or 3 and permanently discontinue for Grade 4 hypophysitis. Administer corticosteroids for Grade 3 or 4 adrenal insufficiency. Withhold for Grade 2 and permanently discontinue for Grade 3 or 4 adrenal insufficiency. Administer hormone-replacement therapy for hypothyroidism. Initiate medical management for control of hyperthyroidism. Withhold OPDIVO for Grade 3 and permanently discontinue for Grade 4 hyperglycemia.

In patients receiving OPDIVO monotherapy, hypophysitis occurred in 0.6% (12/1994) of patients. In patients receiving OPDIVO with YERVOY, hypophysitis occurred in 9% (36/407) of patients. In patients receiving OPDIVO monotherapy, adrenal insufficiency occurred in 1% (20/1994) of patients. In patients receiving OPDIVO with YERVOY, adrenal insufficiency occurred in 5% (21/407) of patients. In patients receiving OPDIVO monotherapy, hypothyroidism or thyroiditis resulting in hypothyroidism occurred in 9% (171/1994) of patients. Hyperthyroidism occurred in 2.7% (54/1994) of patients receiving OPDIVO monotherapy. In patients receiving OPDIVO with YERVOY, hypothyroidism or thyroiditis resulting in hypothyroidism occurred in 22% (89/407) of patients. Hyperthyroidism occurred in 8% (34/407) of patients receiving OPDIVO with YERVOY. In patients receiving OPDIVO monotherapy, diabetes occurred in 0.9% (17/1994) of patients. In patients receiving OPDIVO with YERVOY, diabetes occurred in 1.5% (6/407) of patients.

In a separate Phase 3 study of YERVOY 3 mg/kg, severe to life-threatening immune-mediated endocrinopathies (requiring hospitalization, urgent medical intervention, or interfering with activities of daily living; Grade 3-4) occurred in 9 (1.8%) patients. All 9 patients had hypopituitarism, and some had additional concomitant endocrinopathies such as adrenal insufficiency, hypogonadism, and hypothyroidism. 6 of the 9 patients were hospitalized for severe endocrinopathies.

Immune-Mediated Nephritis and Renal Dysfunction

OPDIVO can cause immune-mediated nephritis. Monitor patients for elevated serum creatinine prior to and periodically during treatment. Administer corticosteroids for Grades 2-4 increased serum creatinine. Withhold OPDIVO for Grade 2 or 3 and permanently discontinue for Grade 4 increased serum creatinine. In patients receiving OPDIVO monotherapy, immune-mediated nephritis and renal dysfunction occurred in 1.2% (23/1994) of patients. In patients receiving OPDIVO with YERVOY, immune-mediated nephritis and renal dysfunction occurred in 2.2% (9/407) of patients.

Immune-Mediated Skin Adverse Reactions and Dermatitis

OPDIVO can cause immune-mediated rash, including Stevens-Johnson syndrome (SJS) and toxic epidermal necrolysis (TEN), some cases with fatal outcome. Administer corticosteroids for Grade 3 or 4 rash. Withhold for Grade 3 and permanently discontinue for Grade 4 rash. For symptoms or signs of SJS or TEN, withhold OPDIVO and refer the patient for specialized care for assessment and treatment; if confirmed, permanently discontinue. In patients receiving OPDIVO monotherapy, immune-mediated rash occurred in 9% (171/1994) of patients. In patients receiving OPDIVO with YERVOY, immune-mediated rash occurred in 22.6% (92/407) of patients.

In a separate Phase 3 study of YERVOY 3 mg/kg, severe, life-threatening, or fatal immune-mediated dermatitis (eg, Stevens-Johnson syndrome, toxic epidermal necrolysis, or rash complicated by full thickness dermal ulceration, or necrotic, bullous, or hemorrhagic manifestations; Grade 3-5) occurred in 13 (2.5%) patients. 1 (0.2%) patient died as a result of toxic epidermal necrolysis. 1 additional patient required hospitalization for severe dermatitis.

Immune-Mediated Encephalitis

OPDIVO can cause immune-mediated encephalitis. Evaluation of patients with neurologic symptoms may include, but not be limited to, consultation with a neurologist, brain MRI, and lumbar puncture. Withhold OPDIVO in patients with new-onset moderate to severe neurologic signs or symptoms and evaluate to rule out other causes. If other etiologies are ruled out, administer corticosteroids and permanently discontinue OPDIVO for immune-mediated encephalitis. In patients receiving OPDIVO monotherapy, encephalitis occurred in 0.2% (3/1994) of patients. Fatal limbic encephalitis occurred in one patient after 7.2 months of exposure despite discontinuation of OPDIVO and administration of corticosteroids. Encephalitis occurred in one patient receiving OPDIVO with YERVOY (0.2%) after 1.7 months of exposure.

Other Immune-Mediated Adverse Reactions

Based on the severity of adverse reaction, permanently discontinue or withhold treatment, administer high-dose corticosteroids, and, if appropriate, initiate hormone-replacement therapy. Across clinical trials of OPDIVO the following clinically significant immune-mediated adverse reactions occurred in <1.0% of patients receiving OPDIVO: uveitis, iritis, pancreatitis, facial and abducens nerve paresis, demyelination, polymyalgia rheumatica, autoimmune neuropathy, Guillain-Barre syndrome, hypopituitarism, systemic inflammatory response syndrome, gastritis, duodenitis, sarcoidosis, histiocytic necrotizing lymphadenitis (Kikuchi lymphadenitis), myositis, myocarditis, rhabdomyolysis, motor dysfunction, vasculitis, and myasthenic syndrome.

Infusion Reactions

OPDIVO can cause severe infusion reactions, which have been reported in<1.0% of patients in clinical trials. Discontinue OPDIVO in patients with Grade 3 or 4 infusion reactions. Interrupt or slow the rate of infusion in patients with Grade 1 or 2. In patients receiving OPDIVO monotherapy, infusion-related reactions occurred in 6.4% (127/1994) of patients. In patients receiving OPDIVO with YERVOY, infusion-related reactions occurred in 2.5% (10/407) of patients.

Complications of Allogeneic HSCT after OPDIVO

Complications, including fatal events, occurred in patients who received allogeneic HSCT after OPDIVO. Outcomes were evaluated in 17 patients from Checkmate 205 and 039, who underwent allogeneic HSCT after discontinuing OPDIVO (15 with reduced-intensity conditioning, 2 with myeloablative conditioning). Thirty-five percent (6/17) of patients died from complications of allogeneic HSCT after OPDIVO. Five deaths occurred in the setting of severe or refractory GVHD. Grade 3 or higher acute GVHD was reported in 29% (5/17) of patients. Hyperacute GVHD was reported in 20% (n=2) of patients. A steroid-requiring febrile syndrome, without an identified infectious cause, was reported in 35% (n=6) of patients. Two cases of encephalitis were reported: Grade 3 (n=1) lymphocytic encephalitis without an identified infectious cause, and Grade 3 (n=1) suspected viral encephalitis. Hepatic veno-occlusive disease (VOD) occurred in one patient, who received reduced-intensity conditioned allogeneic HSCT and died of GVHD and multi-organ failure. Other cases of hepatic VOD after reduced-intensity conditioned allogeneic HSCT have also been reported in patients with lymphoma who received a PD-1 receptor blocking antibody before transplantation. Cases of fatal hyperacute GVHD have also been reported. These complications may occur despite intervening therapy between PD-1 blockade and allogeneic HSCT.

Follow patients closely for early evidence of transplant-related complications such as hyperacute GVHD, severe (Grade 3 to 4) acute GVHD, steroid-requiring febrile syndrome, hepatic VOD, and other immune-mediated adverse reactions, and intervene promptly.

Embryo-Fetal Toxicity

Based on their mechanisms of action, OPDIVO and YERVOY can cause fetal harm when administered to a pregnant woman. Advise pregnant women of the potential risk to a fetus. Advise females of reproductive potential to use effective contraception during treatment with an OPDIVO- or YERVOY- containing regimen and for at least 5 months after the last dose of OPDIVO.

Lactation

It is not known whether OPDIVO or YERVOY is present in human milk. Because many drugs, including antibodies, are excreted in human milk and because of the potential for serious adverse reactions in nursing infants from an OPDIVO-containing regimen, advise women to discontinue breastfeeding during treatment. Advise women to discontinue nursing during treatment with YERVOY and for 3 months following the final dose.

Serious Adverse Reactions

In Checkmate 037, serious adverse reactions occurred in 41% of patients receiving OPDIVO (n=268). Grade 3 and 4 adverse reactions occurred in 42% of patients receiving OPDIVO The most frequent Grade 3 and 4 adverse drug reactions reported in 2% to <5% of patients receiving OPDIVO were abdominal pain, hyponatremia, increased aspartate aminotransferase, and increased lipase. In Checkmate 066, serious adverse reactions occurred in 36% of patients receiving OPDIVO (n=206). Grade 3 and 4 adverse reactions occurred in 41% of patients receiving OPDIVO. The most frequent Grade 3 and 4 adverse reactions reported in =2% of patients receiving OPDIVO were gamma-glutamyltransferase increase (3.9%) and diarrhea (3.4%). In Checkmate 067, serious adverse reactions (73% and 37%), adverse reactions leading to permanent discontinuation (43% and 14%) or to dosing delays (55% and 28%), and Grade 3 or 4 adverse reactions (72% and 44%) all occurred more frequently in the OPDIVO plus YERVOY arm (n=313) relative to the OPDIVO arm (n=313). The most frequent (=10%) serious adverse reactions in the OPDIVO plus YERVOY arm and the OPDIVO arm, respectively, were diarrhea (13% and 2.6%), colitis (10% and 1.6%), and pyrexia (10% and 0.6%). In Checkmate 017 and 057, serious adverse reactions occurred in 46% of patients receiving OPDIVO (n=418). The most frequent serious adverse reactions reported in at least 2% of patients receiving OPDIVO were pneumonia, pulmonary embolism, dyspnea, pyrexia, pleural effusion, pneumonitis, and respiratory failure. In Checkmate 025, serious adverse reactions occurred in 47% of patients receiving OPDIVO (n=406). The most frequent serious adverse reactions reported in =2% of patients were acute kidney injury, pleural effusion, pneumonia, diarrhea, and hypercalcemia. In Checkmate 205 and 039, adverse reactions leading to discontinuation occurred in 7% and dose delays due to adverse reactions occurred in 34% of patients (n=266). Serious adverse reactions occurred in 26% of patients. The most frequent serious adverse reactions reported in =1% of patients were pneumonia, infusion-related reaction, pyrexia, colitis or diarrhea, pleural effusion, pneumonitis, and rash. Eleven patients died from causes other than disease progression: 3 from adverse reactions within 30 days of the last OPDIVO dose, 2 from infection 8 to 9 months after completing OPDIVO, and 6 from complications of allogeneic HSCT. In Checkmate 141, serious adverse reactions occurred in 49% of patients receiving OPDIVO. The most frequent serious adverse reactions reported in at least 2% of patients receiving OPDIVO were pneumonia, dyspnea, respiratory failure, respiratory tract infection, and sepsis. In Checkmate 275, serious adverse reactions occurred in 54% of patients receiving OPDIVO (n=270). The most frequent serious adverse reactions reported in at least 2% of patients receiving OPDIVO were urinary tract infection, sepsis, diarrhea, small intestine obstruction, and general physical health deterioration.

Common Adverse Reactions

In Checkmate 037, the most common adverse reaction (=20%) reported with OPDIVO (n=268) was rash (21%). In Checkmate 066, the most common adverse reactions (=20%) reported with OPDIVO (n=206) vs dacarbazine (n=205) were fatigue (49% vs 39%), musculoskeletal pain (32% vs 25%), rash (28% vs 12%), and pruritus (23% vs 12%). In Checkmate 067, the most common (=20%) adverse reactions in the OPDIVO plus YERVOY arm (n=313) were fatigue (59%), rash (53%), diarrhea (52%), nausea (40%), pyrexia (37%), vomiting (28%), and dyspnea (20%). The most common (=20%) adverse reactions in the OPDIVO (n=313) arm were fatigue (53%), rash (40%), diarrhea (31%), and nausea (28%). In Checkmate 017 and 057, the most common adverse reactions (=20%) in patients receiving OPDIVO (n=418) were fatigue, musculoskeletal pain, cough, dyspnea, and decreased appetite. In Checkmate 025, the most common adverse reactions (=20%) reported in patients receiving OPDIVO (n=406) vs everolimus (n=397) were asthenic conditions (56% vs 57%), cough (34% vs 38%), nausea (28% vs 29%), rash (28% vs 36%), dyspnea (27% vs 31%), diarrhea (25% vs 32%), constipation (23% vs 18%), decreased appetite (23% vs 30%), back pain (21% vs 16%), and arthralgia (20% vs 14%). In Checkmate 205 and 039, the most common adverse reactions (=20%) reported in patients receiving OPDIVO (n=266) were upper respiratory tract infection (44%), fatigue (39%), cough (36%), diarrhea (33%), pyrexia (29%), musculoskeletal pain (26%), rash (24%), nausea (20%) and pruritus (20%). In Checkmate 141, the most common adverse reactions (=10%) in patients receiving OPDIVO were cough and dyspnea at a higher incidence than investigator's choice. In Checkmate 275, the most common adverse reactions (= 20%) reported in patients receiving OPDIVO (n=270) were fatigue (46%), musculoskeletal pain (30%), nausea (22%), and decreased appetite (22%).. The most common adverse reactions (=20%) in patients who received OPDIVO as a single agent were fatigue, rash, musculoskeletal pain, pruritus, diarrhea, nausea, asthenia, cough, dyspnea, constipation, decreased appetite, back pain, arthralgia, upper respiratory tract infection, pyrexia.

In a separate Phase 3 study of YERVOY 3 mg/kg, the most common adverse reactions (=5%) in patients who received YERVOY at 3 mg/kg were fatigue (41%), diarrhea (32%), pruritus (31%), rash (29%), and colitis (8%).

Please see U.S. Full Prescribing Information for OPDIVO and YERVOY, including Boxed WARNING regarding immune-mediated adverse reactions for YERVOY.

Checkmate Trials and Patient Populations

Checkmate 067 - advanced melanoma alone or in combination with YERVOY; Checkmate 037 and 066 - advanced melanoma; Checkmate 017 - squamous non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC); Checkmate 057 - non-squamous NSCLC; Checkmate 025 - renal cell carcinoma; Checkmate 205/039 - classical Hodgkin lymphoma; Checkmate 141 - squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck; Checkmate 275 - urothelial carcinoma.

About the Bristol-Myers Squibb and Ono Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. Collaboration

In 2011, through a collaboration agreement with Ono Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd (Ono), Bristol-Myers Squibb expanded its territorial rights to develop and commercialize Opdivo globally except in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, where Ono had retained all rights to the compound at the time. On July 23, 2014, Bristol-Myers Squibb and Ono further expanded the companies' strategic collaboration agreement to jointly develop and commercialize multiple immunotherapies as single agents and combination regimens for patients with cancer in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan.

About Bristol-Myers Squibb

Bristol-Myers Squibb is a global biopharmaceutical company whose mission is to discover, develop and deliver innovative medicines that help patients prevail over serious diseases. For more information about Bristol-Myers Squibb, visit us at BMS.com or follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube and Facebook.

Bristol-Myers Squibb Forward-Looking Statement

This press release contains "forward-looking statements" as that term is defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 regarding the research, development and commercialization of pharmaceutical products. Such forward-looking statements are based on current expectations and involve inherent risks and uncertainties, including factors that could delay, divert or change any of them, and could cause actual outcomes and results to differ materially from current expectations. No forward-looking statement can be guaranteed. Among other risks, there can be no guarantee that the Opdivo plus Yervoy combination will receive regulatory approval for an additional indication. Forward-looking statements in this press release should be evaluated together with the many uncertainties that affect Bristol-Myers Squibb's business, particularly those identified in the cautionary factors discussion in Bristol-Myers Squibb's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2016 in our Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q and our Current Reports on Form 8-K. Bristol-Myers Squibb undertakes no obligation to publicly update any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170910005050/en/

Contacts:

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Media:

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Kannur (Kerala): Popular actor Sreenivasan's home at Kuthuparambu, near here, was smeared in black oil allegedly by miscreants early on 10 September.

While the actor lives in Kochi, the home that came under attack is located in the CPI-M stronghold area at Kuthuparambu and is locked with a watchman keeping guard.

According to the watchman, he was awake till 1 am on 10 September and when he woke up he found the gate, front courtyard and the front walls smeared with black oil.

Sreenivasan, however, dismissed the episode in characteristic humour and said he is not going to register a complaint on this.

"I only wish that the people who did this had smeared black oil all over the house then it would have saved me from painting the home. I have instructed my people there not to clean it up, and told them that if they suspect anyone to ask them to smear black oil on all the walls," Sreenivasan told the media.

The incident comes after the soft stand the actor has taken favouring superstar Dileep, currently in jail for the past two months in the abduction case of an actress.

Ever since the arrest of Dileep, Sreenivasan has always given a clean chit to him. Two days back, he said that since he knows Dileep very well, "Dileep is not a fool to do such an act".

Sreenivasan, who does comedy and character roles, also writes scripts. He is also known for the stand he has taken in several films, portraying the CPI-M and its ideology in poor light.
Eight episodes, each with a duration spanning anywhere between 20-30 minutes, and nine laughs.

I counted.

That's the amount of times I chuckled in what was supposedly comedy.

Going Viral is a newly released web series written and directed by Anuvab Pal starring Kunal Roy Kapur (of Delhi Belly and Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani fame) alongside Kubbra Sait, Aneesha Shah, Prabal Panjabi and Abhinav Chaturvedi.

The eight episode show is about a company called Going Viral Pvt. Ltd. in which Kapur, better known as @Gaurav throughout the entire series, plays the role of the company's boss while his on screen wife Natasha (Sait) is in charge of the accounts and finances. Shravika is their newest CFO (Shah) and Panjabi plays Frehan  the scapegoat of the company. Chaturvedi is Peon. Full stop.

Going Viral Pvt. Ltd. specialises in  you guessed it  making things go viral.

The show had all the ingredients that were required to make it a viewing experience that had substance. In my opinion though, all it did was fall short, on every count. With various hugely talented actors making special appearances throughout this web series, it still couldn't keep me hooked for more than three minutes at a time.

Right from episode one I felt that the comedy was forcibly pushed down the actors' throats as a script requirement for funny quota fulfillment. Kapur has on several occasions shown us just what a powerhouse of talent he is, but even he couldn't keep this already foundering ship from capsizing. Kubbra Sait did what she could, in whatever little was given to her, and little it was (sexy Satya Paul-esque saris and barely-there blouses a.k.a glamour quota requirement).

Panjabi was given a surprising amount of screen time, however there were very few occasions on which he actually delivered and did justice to the trust that the maker's of the show put in him and his acting abilities. There are only so many times that I can laugh at a man in a dress, or a man with his hairy chest out, or a man acting as the'poor play thing' of a woman who's in charge.

All peon did was bring tea, coffee, goats and dwarves into the office (amongst other bizzare props that were supposed to make me laugh, ha ha). Oh and every once in a while he screamed. If it weren't for his dreamy hazel-green eyes I would've probably not added his name to the lead cast credits (I'm betting Pal did too, for the very same reason).

I guess the biggest question in my mind after watching Anuvab Pal's one man conceptualised, created, written and directed web series is how the hell did the man manage this. We had so many expectations from this web series, especially since the news of Pal headlining the project.

The show had one outlandish plot after the other as various people came to the Going Viral office in order to become overnight internet sensations. Bad jokes ran rampant in Going Viral, and I found myself staring blankly at my screen for the most part.
Mumbai: Sanjay Dutt, who has started promoting his comeback movie Bhoomi, on 9 September, said scripting of the next Munna Bhai series is in progress but it will not be on the lines of Munna Bhai Chale America.

Dutt, who was present for the promotional interviews of Bhoomi, was asked about the teaser released years ago for Munna Bhai Chale America and if the film would be on the lines of the teaser, Sanjay said, "No, I don't think so. Since I can't get an American Visa, it's not going to happen."

On the film's (Munna Bhai) progress, Dutt said, "As far as I know from the conversations with Rajuji and Vinodji, scripting is going on right now. As soon as they finish shooting for the biopic (on Sanjay Dutt), Rajuji will start working on the script (of Munna Bhai) himself. And I am hoping by everyone's wishes and God's grace, the film will be ready by next year."

Speaking about Bhoomi and the success of its trailer and music, Dutt said, "I am not feeling nervous. The trailer has been appreciated and people have also liked the songs, but I hope people like the film, since we have all worked hard for it. It is a commercial entertainer with a message."

Bhoomi is a revenge drama that centers around the relationship between a father and a daughter.

Commenting on the comparison being made with other films like Sridevi's Mom or Dutt's own Pita, the actor said, "Every film is compared with another and I think all films have something or the other in common. The topic may be the same, but the scenes are different, characters are different and the father-daughter bonding is different. It has its own feel, its own connect and its own support system."

Bhoomi cast includes Sanjay Dutt, Aditi Rao Hydari and Sidhant Gupta. Directed by Omung Kumar and presented by T-Series and Legend Studios, the film is set to hit the screens on 22September.
New Delhi: Sunny Deol doesn't want to be a part of the race to be the No 1 star in Bollywood. The actor says he would rather show his talent as an artiste than focus on attaining stardom.

With acting in his genes, Sunny, son of veteran actor Dharmendra, entered Bollywood with Betaab in 1983. He says he was never part of the race in the industry.

"There never has been competition. We make it into a competition. It is not a sport that (we have to see) who will cross (a line) to come first and who will come second. I don't take it as a competition. I never took it as a competition. I came as an actor... as your films start getting successful you become a star. But I still prefer to be an actor (rather than a star)," Sunny told IANS over phone from Mumbai.

"When you are an actor, nothing bothers you because you are enjoying your work," he added.

After spending over three decades in the industry, Sunny says he still has miles to go.

"I never look back at the journey because it is still on. I never take a pause to look back and go down memory lane... I like to take every day as a new day and move ahead. I have done so many films. I have enjoyed all the work that I have done," the actor said.

Sunny says "as an actor you get to do something new every time" and the profession never bores you. "It is not a nine-to-five job where you are not enjoying yourself... We don't see if it is a Saturday or a Sunday or religious holiday or any public holiday. That is the kind of madness we have in our field. We love it and enjoy it," he added.

From being a lover boy, a spy, an army officer to an action hero, Sunny has done varied roles in his career and given hits like Border, Damini, Chaalbaaz, Gadar: Ek Prem Katha and Ghatak.

But he made a place for himself as an action star of Bollywood with lines like "Dhaai kilo ka haath", "Tareekh pe tareekh", the hand-pump scene being etched in the minds of one and all till date.

The actor is seen doing more of action-comedy roles like Jo Bole So Nihaal, Yamla Pagla Deewana and Poster Boys, which released on 8 September.

Poster Boys, which also stars Bobby Deol and Shreyas Talpade, is a story of three men who are shocked to find their photos being used as part of a vasectomy campaign. The film is produced by Sony Pictures Networks Productions, Sunny Sounds Pvt Ltd, actor Shreyas Talpade and his wife Deepti Talpade.

Sunny says choosing more of action-comedies is not a conscious step.

"It is what comes to you... At the end of the day, we are hunting for scripts and subjects and, so far, the ideas which have come across, which are interesting, have been these ones," he said.

The actor will be launching his son Karan with Pal Pal Dil Ke Paas. Clearly, acting runs in their family.

"When my dad came into the industry, he did various kind of films and was not too choosy... I love films, I enjoy acting... That is how even Bobby (brother) came and that is how even my son is going to enter. We basically want to enjoy rather than become stars. If your work is good, you are acknowledged for it and people love you for it."

At the moment, Sunny says he is busy with his son's film.

"That is my utmost priority and between that, as an actor, whenever I can do bits and pieces, I do. But at the moment, I am focused on that," he added.
Toronto: Assamese filmmaker Rima Das's Village Rockstars had its world premiere at the ongoing Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) in the Canadian capital amid big applause.

Set in Rima's own village Chhaygaon near Guwahati, Village Rockstars is the story of "poor but amazing children" who live a fun-filled life.

Introducing the film to the audience, Rima said on 9 September, "This film is about joy and happiness. It is about finding beauty in simple things. These children have very little but they are so happy.

"The story of the film is about what possibilities dreams can unleash," she added.

The film opens with the children having fun as a rock band. As the story progresses, it captures the whole gamut of fun that these rural children are having despite living a life of poverty and deprivation. Among the band of these little boys is a girl called Dhunu aged 10. Raised by her mom after father died, Dhunu is an integral part of this fun-loving boys' gang.

Narrating how she thought about making Village Rockstars, the filmmaker said, "I went to Mumbai to become an actor. There I was exposed to world cinema and I decided that I must make films.

"While in Mumbai, I was exposed to new things, but I was also missing something. I went back to my village and I found the little kids and their little performances. One day I told them I will make a film about them."

Rima said the children became so elated by the idea of a film on them that they started following her. As they started pestering her too much, "I just started avoiding them", she said amid laughter.

Finally, Rima decided to make the film, chose the cast spontaneously and started shooting. "It was all boys' cast initially. The girl (Dhunu) was added later."

It took Rima 150 days over three years to shoot the film as she did the shooting herself.

Rima said this film is an extension of her first film Antardrishti.

Asked why she chose her own village as the setting for the film, Rima said, "The story is mine, but I must know the characters well. In my village, it was easy to know the characters. I like a layered structure of story-telling. Once you know your characters, your job as a filmmaker becomes easier. The innocence and energy of the kids was amazing."
At 6 pm this Wednesday, Carter Road in Bandra saw nearly 200 people gather to demand justice for slain journalist Gauri Lankesh. The night before, Lankesh had been gunned down outside her home in Bengaluru. All over the country, meetings and protests were held, decrying what seemed like the death of dissent.

At the Carter Road protest, the crowd was composed of activists, mediapersons and celebrities; there were also citizens from the neighbourhood  one of the tonier suburbs of Mumbai. Many of the faces seemed familiar  theyd previously been part of the Not In My Name protests, which took place in the same location, on 28 July, in the aftermath of 15-year-old Hafeez Junaids lynching.

To see this group of people vocalising their concerns over violent fringe elements was heartening  but there was also a sense of deja vu, in encountering this same close-knit, exclusive constituency (which one could argue, isnt truly representative of the diverse demographic of Mumbai) at both protests.

Actor Nandita Das perhaps summed it up best, when she said: "Jo dost waise toh Mumbai mey nahi mil patey hai, woh yaha par ek tragic occasion par milte hai (While usually we do not meet each other in Mumbai, such protests have become places where we meet)".

***

One could dismiss Wednesdays protest as elitist outrage, but it did raise some important points.

Right-wing trolls on Twitter had rejoiced over Gauri Lankesh's cold-blooded murder, in a shameful development. Condemning these insensitive tweets, adman-turned-writer Gangadharan Menon told Firstpost, "As a journalist, Lankesh was entitled to her views just as the trolls are. However, violence is not the answer." Menon, who was also part of the 28 June protest, added, We have become very dictatorial in nature. People believe that whatever they shove down the throats of others, is right. Right wingers are not ready to listen to the voice of the people. This is not democracy but dictatorship.

The trolling in the aftermath of Lankeshs killing assumed significance as some of these Twitter handles are even followed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Cabinet ministers. For those who were looking to connect the dots in the gruesome murder, this came across as the Modi government's alleged approval to the trolls.

Activist Teesta Setalvad told Firstpost the press needed to investigate these trolls, and if they had criminal links.

Do you know that these trolls may belong to the Hindu right-wing? Do you know that the Sanathan Sanstha has openly advocated overthrowing the Indian Constitution? This hatred is being perpetuated in the name of politics, which is ruining this country," Setalvad said.

***

The Carter Road protest on Wednesday, was supposed to be apolitical.

Condemning the political mud-slinging over Gauri Lankeshs murder, actress Shabana Azmi told Firstpost: I request political parties to stop scoring brownie points over the murder. It is not about politics. We want all parties to come together to condemn these kind of acts. India is a beautiful country. Let it be so."

The slogans raised at the event, however, seemed to be influenced by the Left-liberal line of thought. For instance: Modi sarkar murdabad, Sangh Parivar se azadi, bhookmari se azadi (freedom from hunger), jatiwad se azadi (freedom from casteism)  many of these same slogans were heard during the February 2016 protests on the JNU campus.

Some of the statements made too had a decidedly political tone. The more we are attacked, the more liberals will unite. More people will come and join us. We won't bow down to these attacks," a protester thundered amid the sloganeering. Another protestor, condemning the murders of intellectuals like Govind Pansare, Narendra Dabholkar, MM Kalburgi and Gauri Lankesh, slammed the Modi government for making Anantkumar Hegde a minister.

"Those who are perpetrating the violence are occupying positions of power at the centre. Politicians feel that if we incite more violence we will also get a position in the current dispensation," the protester said.

One protester sought a complete ban on EVMs, dubbing them "Electronic Voting for Modi".

Songs that have long reverberated at Left-wing protests were heard on Wednesday as well. Ruke na jo, jhuke na jo. Hum to inqalab hai, zulm ka jawab hai," went one refrain.

While identifying with a particular end of the political spectrum isnt wrong (democracys biggest gift is that it can allow two or more differing ideologies to exist), the fear is that Lankeshs murder will end up caught in a show of one-upmanship between the Left and Right, with ordinary citizens, who are genuinely shocked by the killing, left out of the movement.

***

On Wednesday at Carter Road, as the crowds chanted the poetry of Kaifi Azmi and Faiz Ahmed Faiz, something was missing  or so I felt.

Where were the youngsters?

During the 6 September protest (as well as the 28 June one), I failed to see the youth in large numbers. This is not to say there were not any. I did manage to talk to a few and one of them told me that he had actively participated in the Delhi edition of the Not In My Name protests. But the general picture was dismal.

The trend is not new. Even during the Jan Lokpal movement in 2011, the turnout for the Bandra-Kurla Complex rally was significantly lower, as compared to Delhi.

In contrast to Delhis politically-charged environment, Mumbai does seem to lag behind. This is true of both students as well as working professional. Perhaps, in the financial capital, money and time are more precious than standing up for freedom of speech.

A friend once cheekily commented, "In Mumbai, students are more interested in collecting funds for college fests than attending rallies." This seems, sadly, a correct assessment.

The brutal murder of a free-thinker must worry every Indian, not just a select few. This is not just about defending the right to freedom of speech but also protecting the ethos of India  reasoning, debating and finding one's truth  from falling prey to the parochialism of fringe groups.
Every day, never-ending media disclosures on Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh reveal new facts about his murky deeds and luxurious and explosive possessions. Crime, fantasy, sex, and lust construct his image as a villainous, dubious baba in the Dera of Sacha Sauda.

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has recently directed search operations in the sprawling Dera premises. This recent court intervention comes in the wake of the legal and judicial language convicting and sentencing Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh of rape. The sanitisation of the dera will, to some extent, unravel the forbidden and buried histories of violence and exploitation.

Amid such revelations, it might be relevant to understand the complex strands of the narrative that shape the phenomenon of Singh and his Sacha Sauda in Sirsa. Its not a small matter that the dera of Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh enjoys an enormous appeal in Haryana and beyond, and constitutes an alternative form of religiosity and community. And, it is crucial to address the historical and contemporary appeal of such gurus in rural and urban India.

There is something alluring about such gurus and deras. They exert tremendous influence in civil society, drawing followers from the aspirational middle classes and subordinate caste groups.

The Dera of Sacha Sauda is located in Sirsa, a sleepy locality in predominantly rural Haryana. The dera eludes our secular, rational and Western modes of analysis and interpretation.

The Dera premises itself on notions of loyalty, faith, devotion, and morals. When thousands of devotees throng the portals of the dera, they repose implicit faith in the baba. What is interesting is that the baba is not just acting in the realm of religion and spirituality alone, but has entered the secular sphere of activity, ensuring jobs, food, and shelter to the followers. While the politicians, bureaucrats, land mafia and corporates have their calculated stakes in the Dera, common people have deeper urges to seek refuge in the baba. In addition, the baba titillates the popular imagination with his theatrics and winsome and flashy gestures. His performance becomes a spectacle.

Located in Haryana, Sirsa is a bordering district of Rajasthan and Punjab. Historically, the area was renowned as a Sufi centre, and an important point of caravan trade between Delhi and Multan. The landscape was dotted with heterodox, non-Brahmanical, anti-caste heroes and sants and their cults and sects, invoking both reformist and popular trends of Hinduism, Sikhism and Islam, like the Bairagis, Gosains, Faqirs, Udasi and Charandasi Sadhs. Many of them were given revenue-free grants for supporting the British during 1857, pointing to their continuing nexus with the state.

The sacred status of such sects and forms of community cannot be denied. The mystical, healing and wish-fulfilling aspects are crucial requirements of human existence. Secular thought has, at its own peril, neglected the human need for such solace. Yet, there has been an ugly rupture in the sacred phenomenon which, because it is reflective of the times that we live in, needs careful consideration.

The baba has abused his power. He has become a monster. How has he become a monster? This is a serious question, which will require sustained and objective probe. One can, at best, hazard some guesses without believing that they are definitive.

The vote-bank politics has created a matrix of networks wherein the babas continue to play a predominant role in garnering votes, ensuring political loyalties and clientele. Singh represents the pathology of the contemporary political scenario, which thrives on money, power, and patronage.

There is another reason. The babas entry into the secular realm in a big way is indicative of the States failure over the last few decades. The modern State has failed to provide employment, decent education, medical facilities, and food and shelter to the poor. The vacuum created by the State is filled by the babas. Not surprisingly, babas are today fulfilling the basic needs and aspirations of the common people. They have emerged as much more than religious figureheads, blurring the distinction between the religious and secular. The State has virtually abdicated its welfare functions, which the Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singhs have been quick to hijack. And lets be clear, it is the political dispensation, irrespective of party affiliations, which has to answer for this mess.

It is worth noting that the allure of the baba is irresistible. He is the modern guru assuming the role of a superstar. Singhs Robinhood image is particularly enchanting for the marginalised caste groups. Women are charmed by his charisma and personality. He is a sakshat bhagavan (the living god) for them. But this modern Robinhood has demonic powers to seduce, exploit, oppress, destroy, and wreck. Not surprisingly, he does not arouse his followers disgust. Why must we assume that the devotees will believe in the criminality of their benefactor and saviour?

In a way, the monstrosity of the likes of Singh is created by the deepening crisis of governance. The prevalence of mass poverty and deprivation together with new economic dislocations have heightened the common peoples anxieties. The babas alternative vision of egalitarianism and fantasy, embodied in the dera, darshan, satsang, and langar, serves a whole range of urges, expectations and wants of the followers.

Nonica Datta teaches history at the Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University.
Bhubaneswar: One person was killed and 11 others were injured, four of them critically, after a portion of an under-construction flyover collapsed near Bomikhal in Bhubaneshwar on Sunday.

Officials said around 15 labourers were working on the flyover when the structure collapsed this afternoon.

An injured worker, undergoing treatment at Capital Hospital, said, "A portion of the flyover collapsed when we were busy plastering its roof."

Expressing grief over the incident, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik announced Rs 5 lakh ex gratia for the next of the kin of the deceased and free treatment for the injured. He also conveyed his sympathy to the bereaved family.

The chief minister said a deputy executive engineer and an assistant engineer have been suspended following the incident.

"Exemplary action will be taken against those found guilty...no one will be spared whosoever he may be," he said.

Bomikhal flyover collapse: Odisha CM N Patnaik announces Rs 5 lakh ex-gratia for family of deceased person,free treatment for injured people  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

Satya Patnaik, a 39-year-old businessman, was killed as he and his daughter Sheetal were under the flyover when it came down crashing, Revenue Divisional Commissioner (RDC), Central Division, A B Otta told reporters. Patnaik's daughter is critically injured and admitted to the AIIMS, Bhubaneswar, Otta said.

Other injured have been admitted to the Capital Hospital and the AIIMS. The chief minister also met injured at the two hospitals and spoke to the doctors about their treatment.

A massive search and rescue operation was launched soon after the collapse and it took about six hours to clear the debris.

Police, fire brigade, around 50 personnel of the Odisha Disaster Rapid Action Force (ODRAF) and two units of the NDRF were engaged in the search and rescue operation.

Sniffer dogs were also deployed to ascertain if anyone was trapped under the rubble, officials said. Earth movers and heavy cranes were pressed into service to remove the debris.

Extending a helping hand, the East Coast Railway (ECoR) engaged its workforce in the rescue operation. Officials with over 10 gas cutters and seven hydraulic jacks were deployed, an ECoR official said.

A high-level inquiry has been ordered into the mishap. Works Department Secretary NK Pradhan said, "I have already ordered an inquiry into the incident. It is certainly a major mistake on the part of the contractor. The job was assigned to Panda Infrastructure."

Told farmers they'll get relief&insurance amount in addition to bonus this yr as special package for farmers by govt: Chhattisgarh CM pic.twitter.com/0C9iHrN0HC  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

Stern action would be taken against those found guilty, he said, adding the project was under the Roads and Buildings (R&B) Division-4.

Director-General of Police (DGP) RP Sharma, Police Commissioner YB Khurania and other senior officials visited the spot to monitor the rescue operation.

Rescue work almost over. Removal of debris underway.Will be shifted to other place by tomorrow morning. Culprits won't be spared: DGP Odisha pic.twitter.com/e0epHmsFjG  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

Both the DGP and the police commissioner said the incident occurred apparently due to negligence.

Meanwhile, opposition parties blamed the BJD government for the incident.

Leader of Opposition Narasingha Mishra (Congress) said that the chief minister, who is in charge of the Works Department, is responsible and the issue would be raised in the Assembly.

He alleged the part of the flyover collapsed due to "poor quality" of work and contractors and engineers responsible for the "negligence" should be booked for "culpable homicide" not amounting to murder.

Odisha Congress chief Prasad Harichandan said stringent action should be taken against those responsible for the collapse.

BJP leader and Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan expressed grief over the incident and said, "Exemplary action must be taken against the guilty."

BJP's Odisha chief Basant Panda said even though the chief minister holds the Works Department, "poor quality" of work led to the collapse.

Earlier reports had claimed that two people had died in the accident.
There is much euphoria over paragraphs 47 and 48 of the BRICS leaders declaration signed at Xiamen at conclusion of the 9th BRICS Summit 2017, that read, We strongly condemn terrorist attacks resulting in death to innocent Afghan nationals.  There is a need for immediate cessation of violence.We, in this regard, express concern on the security situation in the region and violence caused by the Taliban, ISIL/DAISH, Al-Qaida and its affiliates including Eastern Turkistan Islamic Movement, Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, the Haqqani Network, Lashkar-e-Taiba, Jaish-e-Mohammad, TTP and Hizb ut-Tahrir.

The declaration called upon all nations to adopt a comprehensive approach in combating terrorism, which should include countering radicalisation, recruitment, movement of terrorists including Foreign Terrorist Fighters ((FTF), blocking sources of financing terrorism including, for instance, through organised crime by means of money laundering, supply of weapons, drug trafficking and other criminal activities, dismantling terrorist bases, and countering misuse of the internet including social media by terrorist entities through misuse of the latest Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs).

On 31 August, China signaled it would defend Pakistan in case latters role in sheltering terrorists was brought up during the upcoming BRISC summit. Chinas foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying stated at a briefing, We notice that India, when it comes to Pakistans counter-terrorism, has some concerns. I dont think this is an appropriate topic to be discussed at BRICS Summit.

China was apparently scared after Prime Minister Narendra Modi described Pakistan as the mother ship of terrorism during the BRICS Summit held in Goa last year. This is nothing but the truth.

Besides, China has been sheltering Pakistani terrorist (even terrorist leaders at UN), assisting insurgents in Indias North East and providing sanctuary to United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) militants. Chunying would have known this and that this joke of a Chinese signal would not deter Modi. But Doka La apart, when the whole world is concerned about terrorism, why would BRICS not discuss the issue?

A lot had happened in the run up to BRICS meet at Xiamen, which meant China could not afford to obfuscate.

At a time when even the US intelligence was shying away from talking of Pakistani proxies attacking Afghanistan  other than the Haqqani Network  the report released by the UN Assistance Mission Afghanistan (UNAMA) in July 2016, recorded 5,166 people killed / maimed in Afghanistan (Jan to June 2016), total civilian casualties in Afghanistan (Jan 2009 - 30 Jun 2016) 64,000 (23000 killed, 41,000 injured) as conservative estimates.

The report stated that majority of these casualties caused by the anti-Afghan government forces: Taliban and organised armed groups including Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM), Haqqani Network, Hezb-e-Islami, Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, Islamic Jihad Union, groups identified as Daesh (Islamic State) and other militia and armed groups.

Significantly, the US Intelligence Assessment in February 2016 admitted that the Taliban had largely coalesced and will continue to test the overstretched Afghan National Security Forces, and that Khorasan branch of Islamic State (ISK) formed is an amalgamation of primarily disaffected and rebranded former Afghan Taliban and Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) members.

What was left unsaid is that the coalescing of both Taliban was anchored by Sirajuddin Haqqani, the number two in Afghan Taliban and chief of Haqqani network rooted in Pakistan for the past three plus decades. Significantly, the amalgamation rebranding Taliban into ISK was done in Peshawar region and with leadership of Pakistans Inter-Services Intelligence.

As per Voice of America, Afghanistan officially told Pakistan that Hafiz Saeed, former LeT chief is directing Islamic State operations in Afghanistan.

Then came the clear warning by President Donald Trump while unveiling the new Afghanistan-Pakistan policy. Trump said that Pakistan, which was sheltering terrorists, had to do more and that will change immediately. US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson later told reporters, We are going to attack terrorists wherever they live. If you are providing safe havens to terrorists, be forewarned.

He added that the US could consider sanctions on Pakistan or cut off its status as non-NATO ally if Islamabad does not crack down on the Taliban and other extremist groups.

The farce of Pakistan denying it was supporting the Taliban was exposed a decade ago when British Special Air Service (SAS)  that country's most renowned special forces unit  killed a Pakistani Special Service Group (SSG) officer operating as Taliban commander in Helmand, as reported by Christina Lamb in The Sunday Times on 12 October, 2008. His Pakistani military ID was recovered but the incident was kept under wraps by the British government.

Pakistan condemned the BRICS declaration, issuing a statement by Inter Services Public Relations spokesman Major General Asif Ghafoor just before Trump's speech. The statement read: There are no terrorist hideouts in Pakistan. We have operated against all terrorists, including Haqqani Network. But this lie has been Pakistan's 'official' stance from time immemorial.

Though, technically, the claim that there are no terrorist hideouts in Pakistan may be true in the sense that these hideouts or camps are in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) or Pakistan Occupied Afghanistan (PoA) since Afghanistan does not recognize the Durand Line and says Pakistan is illegally occupying Afghan territory, or in Balochistan which is forcibly occupied by Pakistan.

Pakistans foreign minister Khawaja Asif recently admitted the presence of LeT and JeM in his country. He didn't need to admit it. Every one knew it for a fact. Meanwhile, Pakistan Army chief Qamar Javed Bajwa tried to divert attention by talking of "political dialogue" in Kashmir.

This even as he knew that any dialogue backed by the threat of terror is a non-starter and that he cannot disavow terrorism as long as he sleeps with the Frankenstein's Monster that Pakistan has created.

Pakistan has suspended bilateral talks and visits with the US. Though US has linked financial assistance to Pakistan with action against Haqqani Network, this has been the case for many years. Without much success.

Saimual Haq, the ISIs protege heading the Defence of Pakistan Council (DPC) said in a press conference on 23 August that the Pakistan Army would not take any action against the Haqqani Network. He also issued a call for jihad to every section of society.

Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi said Beijing stands firmly behind its "iron clad friend". That's no surprise, considering Pakistan is vital for Chinas plans in the Indian Ocean and it is firmly constrained by its "all-weather friend's" economic straitjacket.

It should be obvious that no change will likely occur. After all, China wants US and NATO out of the region. And Pakistan continues to expand its "strategic depth" in Afghanistan. For the US, merely suspending financial aid to Pakistan and adding around 4,000 troops to Afghanistan won't bear much fruit.

If Pakistan was given F-16s and attack helicopters for counter-terrorism operations, the Afghan National Security Forces must be adequately armed to fight the Chinese-backed onslaught from Pakistan's "irregulars". Terrorist sanctuaries in PoA must also be wiped out and the genocide in Balochistan being perpetrated by Pakistan must be stopped.

The author is a retired lieutenant-general of the Indian Army
Raipur: Two security personnel were injured in separate Naxal-related incidents in Chhattisgarh's Dantewada district on Sunday, police said.

While one CRPF jawan was injured in an exchange of fire with Maoists, a DRG jawan sustained injuries in an improvised bomb blast, triggered by ultras, at different places, Deputy Inspector General of Police (Dantewada Range) Sundarraj P told PTI.

Both the incidents occurred in the forests of Aranpur police station limits, around 450 kilometres away from Raipur.

Separate teams of Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), District Reserve Guard (DRG) and Special Task Force (STF) were out on anti-Maoist operations in the interiors of Aranpur, he said.

The DRG jawan from one of the patrolling teams came under the impact of explosion triggered by Naxals in the forest that left him injured, the DIG said.

In another incident, a gun-battle broke out between security forces and ultras leaving a paramilitary trooper injured, he added.

Reinforcement was rushed to the spots and the injured were shifted to the hospital in Aranapur, he said adding further details are awaited.
Kolkata: Expelled Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM) leader Binay Tamang on Saturday said he, along with his friends, will hold a fast unto death after the 12 September all-party meeting to press the government for ending suffering of people in the north Bengal hills.

"We will hold a big public meeting. To put pressure on the government and seeing the suffering of the public, my friends and I, on any day after 12 September, will go for fast unto death for the cause of Gorkhaland, Terai, Dooars and the hills. If (GJM leaders) Roshan Giri and Bimal ji (Gurung) are committed to the cause, then they should join in. They have not committed to it yet," said Tamang, the GJM's former Assistant General Secretary.

Tamang, who was also the chief coordinator of the party, was expelled along with another party leader on 1 September on charges of conspiring with the state's Mamata Banerjee government to derail the Gorkhaland movement.

Meanwhile, a eight-member delegation of Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM) and other hill parties on Friday met Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh in New Delhi and pressed for "tripartite talks" on the Gorkhaland issue.

The delegation consisted of GJM MLAs Rohit Sharma and Sarita Rai, party's central committee members Swaraj Thapa and Ashok Lama, General Secretary Giri, Communist Party Revolutionary Marxist's Arun Ghatani, Akhil Bharatiya Gorkha League's Biplov Rai and Gorkhaland Rajya Nirman Morcha's Dawa Pakhrin.

"I was surprised to learn that Roshan Giri, who had a lookout notice on him, went beyond the law and attended the meeting in Delhi. He was there openly. Who is in collusion with the state. is it me or Roshan Giri? This is clear," said Tamang.

Meanwhile, the GJM, in a statement, after the meeting, said: "Raising the one point agenda of Gorkhaland, the delegation members requested the Union Home Minister to initiate the process of tripartite talks on statehood issue."

The GJM also informed Rajnath Singh that it would attend the bipartite meeting called by Banerjee on 12 September.
Barmer (Rajasthan): Defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Sunday dismissed as "factually wrong" a CAG report which had stated that the defence forces had ammunition that could last for 20 days in the event of a war, and asserted there was no dearth of weapons with the defence forces.

Facts were wrong and it was unnecessary to debate on the issue, she told reporters in Rajasthan.

"After taking the charge of defence ministry, I have discussed the issue with senior officers and experts. Purchasing weapons...is a continuous process," she said.

The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG), in its report tabled in Parliament recently, had stated that the defence forces had ammunition that could last for 20 days in the event of a war, instead of the minimum requirement of 40 days.

It criticised the state-run Ordnance Factory Board (OFB) for the inadequate quantity of ammunition supplied to the army since March 2013.

Sitharaman's predecessor in the defence ministry, Arun Jaitley told Parliament that the findings of the CAG report, which had talked about the shortage of ammunition, related to a particular point of time.

"Thereafter significant process has been made. It is a continuous process. Therefore, nobody should have any doubt about the availability of equipment or the preparedness of our forces," he asserted.

Sitharaman, who was appointed the defence minister in the last Cabinet reshuffle, visited the Uttarlai Air Force base here.
Two days after a seven-year-old boy's throat was slit by a bus conductor of a Gurugram school for allegedly resisting the sexual assault, another case of a five-year-old girl being raped by a peon inside the premises of a private school in Shahdara in Delhi, has sent shock waves across the country.

The rape case took place on Saturday morning, but it came to the light on Saturday evening, following which the Delhi government has announced a magisterial probe into the case.

The inquiry will be headed by SDM Vivek Vihar, Delhi revenue minister Kailash Gehlot said.

The accused, Vikas (40), was arrested on Saturday night, Deputy Commissioner of Police, Shahdara, Nupur Prasad said.

Vikas, who is from Jharkhand and has two teenage children, had been working in the school for the last three years. Previously he was a security guard there, the police said. According to them, before being employed in this school, Vikas had worked in two other schools.

The accused took the girl to an empty classroom around noon on Saturday and raped her. He also threatened her of dire consequences if she informed anyone about it, the police said. The girl later complained to her mother about bleeding and pain. She was taken to a hospital where medical examination confirmed sexual assault, they said, adding the victim has been sent for counselling.

According to the police, the girl, during counselling, said she was assaulted by "a man wearing a cap" and also described his physical attributes. On the basis of this description Vikas was nabbed, they said, adding it is being probed whether he had abused any other students in the past. So far he has got no criminal history, the police said. Following the incident, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said a protocol would be chalked out for all city schools to ensure safety of students.

Shameful. Won't be tolerated. Police doing its job. Ordered magsterial enquiry. Will develop protocol 4 all schools 2 ensure children safety https://t.co/YxycU5KTjI  Arvind Kejriwal (@ArvindKejriwal) September 10, 2017

The Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) has issued a notice to the school seeking details of Vikas' appointment and whether his police verification was carried out.

DCW chief Swati Maliwal tweeted, "1st Praduman & now dis! Wat wil parents do if horrific crime occur in schools. DCW issuing notice to this school! R team's assisting victim (sic)".

Meanwhile, the girl's uncle told PTI, "She was discharged from the hospital today. She is emotionally quite disturbed. The school administration is not taking responsibility for the act that took place inside their premises."

The girl's mother demanded that the school should be shut down and the uncle too echoed similar views, saying, "The accused has been arrested but we want the license of the school to be revoked."

"Strict action should be taken against the management of the school and a case should be registered against them for negligence," he said.

According to The Indian Express, she also said no investigation is being conducted in the case. Koi karyawahi nahi ho rahi hai. Aaj meri bachi ke saath hua hai kal kisi aur ke saath ho sakta hai, chahte hain ki school band ho, she told ANI.

The girl's father repairs sewing machines. Her elder brother studies in another school.

Recalling Saturday's incident, the victim's uncle said the girl came back from school looking scared and initially did not tell her mother anything.

Later, she went to the washroom where her mother saw bloodstains. She was taken to Chacha Nehru Hospital in Geeta Colony where it was confirmed that she had been sexually assaulted, he said.

The girl's uncle said one of the teachers from the girl's school had come to visit her, but she was not ready to accept that the incident could have happened inside the school.

"Nobody else from the school turned up to meet us since then," he said, adding they are not going to send her back to that school.

"We keep hearing slogans of 'Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao'. How can we send our girls to school when they are so unsafe?" he said.

On Friday morning, a Class II student of a private school in Gurugram was found murdered in the school premises.

The boy, Pradyumna, was a student of Ryan International School in Bhondsi. Its officiating principal Neerja Batra said the school gardener saw his body lying in a pool of blood in the washroom meant for the school's support staff at about 8:15 am. As the news of the boy's death spread, angry parents gathered at the school and asked how the murderer could not have been caught on any of the CCTV cameras. A few parents ransacked the school property and the school authorities had to call additional police force to control the parents.

Later, hundreds of people on Sunday staged a demonstration outside the Ryan International School in Gurugram demanding a CBI probe into the murder of a seven-year-old school boy and set afire a liquor shop near the school.

Police used batons to quell the protest and detained 20 protestors. Cameras of some photojournalists were also damaged during the protest.
Indian cities have changed very much over the last 30 years. This has affected police work.

I am not talking of how the cities have grown bigger and become unliveable for most people. But they have. What is being referred to is the way that they were originally designed and what they have become.

Though India is an ancient place, most Indian cities are new. Our largest cities, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai, were built by the British less than 300 years ago. Other cities, like Hyderabad, Surat and Ahmedabad, go back another 200 years or so. Even 'old' Delhi, meaning Shahjahanabad, was built only 400 years ago. Only Kashi can claim to be older. However, almost all of Kashi is actually new. The ghats are all relatively recent and of no structure can legitimately be claimed that it has been around for over 500 years.

Compare this with Rome, where the Pantheon, a large building constructed around 2,000 years ago, is still intact. In Rome, the population has always lived around monuments from ancient times. In that city, life continues with modern additions such as bicycles, motor cars and restaurants. Other than this, life seems like it is unchanged over the centuries.

In India, it is totally different. Many places become unrecognisable to locals who have been away for just a few years. I went back to Surat some time ago. I had spent most of my life in that city. I had to use GPS to find my own home.

So why do I say that the change has affected the way the police work? The traditional way in which crime has been tackled in India is through the neighbourhood thana and its list of 'history sheeters', whose photographs are pasted on police station notice boards. This is for new policemen to become acquainted with their area and their 'regulars'.

However, in Indian cities today, there is enormous churn. People change jobs, move cities, and shift from rented houses regularly. There is no permanence to the urban neighbourhood either in terms of the buildings or the people. However, the system of policing has remained the same. Some assistance has come through technology, such as CCTV cameras. However, even here, unlike in other countries, it is a hit-or-miss affair.

Thefts in middle class houses are still solved by the police rounding up the servants and thrashing them till someone confesses. There is no proper investigation of any crime, including murder. Those who were first at the site of Gauri Lankesh's murder scene noticed that the place was still open for people to casually walk in and out. No forensic evidence of value can remain in such places.

A parallel development that has affected police work has been the disappearance of the 'khabri'. The police informer can only be one who is on the periphery of crime, someone doing a little bit of illegal work, whom the police can bully or bribe into giving information. You and I cannot be khabris because we are not in contact with criminals.

After the fall of the Babri Masjid and the riots in Mumbai and Surat, and then the retaliatory attacks in the form of bomb blasts, the police lost its khabris, most of whom were Muslims. The communal divide has affected the old model of policing and almost no terror investigation is able to be concluded in India, as news reports show. Modern forensics-based investigation is absent and the old model can no longer produce results.

In 1996, as a reporter in the sessions court of Mumbai, I was approached by Shyam Keswani, the lawyer representing Iqbal Mirchi, the alleged drug dealer who India was seeking to extradite from England. The CBI had sent a team of four people to argue the matter in the Bow Street Magistrate's court.

Keswani gave me a copy of the chargesheet, which was about 200 pages. I read through it, and in the entire file there was only one mention of his client. This was on the last page where a line said, 'also wanted in the case, one Iqbal Memon alias Mirchi'. This was all the 'evidence' that the Government of India was submitting. Of course, Mirchi was not extradited and remained in England until his death in 2013.

I should say that this is not the fault of the Indian policeman, who is very hardworking. But he is still operating in a system that was instituted by the British to manage neighbourhood 'law and order' rather than solving crime through detection.

In Japan, the conviction rate is over 95 percent. This means if the police has caught someone, it is almost guaranteed that the court will find them guilty. There are critics of this system, which like India's is also dependent on confessional statements, often produced through torture. But despite having the same flaws, India's conviction rate is well below 50 percent. The majority of Indians who commit crimes, even serious crimes, get away.

For this reason, I will not be surprised if the men who murdered Gauri Lankesh, and their paymasters, will never be brought to account. The failure is systemic. For us to expect that it will work in particular instance is an unwarranted show of optimism rather than a fact-based assessment of reality.
By now, the masterminds of Gauri Lankesh's murder have surely put enough space between themselves and those who carried out the dastardly act.

Around the world, police say that if you don't get a lead in the first 48 hours of a capital crime, the trail grows cold.

According to Crime Investigation, a website dedicated to police work around the globe: In medicine, this is called the 'critical hour.' In criminal investigations, they call it 'the first 48 hours'. Ask any detective: They'll tell you that if they don't have a lead, a suspect or an arrest within 48 hours, their chances of solving the case are cut in half.

In this case, five days have passed. No clues have been uncovered. Investigative agencies are on thin ice. With every passing hour, the degrees of separation between Lankesh's assailants and investigators increase exponentially.

Usually, after a high-profile crime, there is a flurry of activity. A special squad is assembled. The police prepare to hunt the suspects down. In this case, not only is such activity absent entirely, there is hardly news of arrests or roping in those who might be able to assist the probe.

Instead of the police making a list of enemies and people who may have had a motive to target her, we get news of Lankesh's parents exhorting chief minister Siddaramaiah to find the killer and his dutiful response. Why should grieving parents be forced to undergo this torture of appealing for justice?

What is worrying is that even as the authorities get their ducks in a row  and let's be fair, they may be playing their cards close to their chest  Lankesh's reputation as a firebrand, her many rows with the rich and powerful combined with the fact that she was a thorn in the side of vested interests makes it likely that influence might be exerted on various levels to thwart the hunt for her killers.

Add to all this, the public has the memory of a goldfish. For Lankesh's killers, all these factors could combine to find a way out of this sticky mess. Today, news is like a firecracker. It explodes with a loud bang, shines briefly and then dissipates.

Does anyone remember our man in Pakistan? For those that don't, that would be naval officer Kulbhushan Jadhav.

Where is Honeypreet Insan? How has she continued to elude an international manhunt?

Who killed the 7-year-old at Ryan International School?

It isn't wrong to say that with all the unsubstantiated accusations flying about and obscuring the principal issue of who killed Lankesh, the fear is that political parties are using her death to sling mud at each other.

The fear is that some patsy, wearing a scarf around his neck and flanked by ten smug policemen, will be paraded in a few days. Case closed.

The nation will be told: It was a clear cut case of personal vendetta. It had nothing to do with conspiracies hatched in the corridors of power, be they political or economic.

Only the gullible would fall for this line, but it seems that every day, the ranks of the gullible are swelling.

Besides, no one really wants to follow the crumbs to its logical (and perhaps awkward destination).

And if as many as 40 witnesses connected to the Vyapam Scam can be eliminated in the past twenty years, then by comparison Lankesh's killing is small fry.

It is extremely unlikely that we will ever learn who ordered Lankesh's death.

That bird has already flown the coop, it seems.

Which is a real pity.
A large number of children dying in Uttar Pradesh (84 in Gorakhpur followed by 49 children dying in Farrukhabad) and another 24 dying in the Vidisha district of Madhya Pradesh has attracted plenty of media and public attention.

The state governments and the health officials have been castigated for their neglect in providing adequate medical facilities including oxygen and essential medicines.

The nation feels anguished at the loss of innocent lives, the public health experts are outraged and the politicians have jumped to doing what they do the best: Politicising the death of children.

It is a replay of a similar outrage after several children died in a government hospital in West Bengal a few years ago.

The media attention meanwhile has shifted to other headlines despite their promise to follow the story. The politicians likewise are busy scoring brownie points on TV debates, some forming new mahagathbandhans (Grand Alliances) and others consolidating the votes for 2019 elections.

India's inability to improve health outcomes is among the major reasons of not meeting the millennium goals of sustainable development despite rapid growth.

But evidence from the latest round of the National Family Health Survey (NFHS) suggests that this may be changing. The infant mortality rate (IMR) is an important measure of a countrys health.

There has been a marked improvement over the past decade with IMR declining from 57 per 1,000 live births in 2005-06 to 41 per 1,000 live births in 2015-16. The improvement over the past decade has been much faster than in the rest of the post-liberalisation era. The IMR declined at a nearly constant pace of 2.5 percent per annum between 1992-93 and 2005-06. But the pace of decline accelerated over the past 10 years, with the IMR registering an annual decline of 3.24 percent per annum.

The faster decline in India's IMR over the past decade has also been lauded by the UNICEF. However, the decline cannot be attributed merely to faster growth alone but also to greater public expenditure in health. For decades, India spent a woeful 1 percent or less of the GDP on health care. The budget allocations have improved from 1.1 to 1.35 percent of GDP with this years budget promising to raise it to 2.5 percent in the coming years. Public health experts would like to see it around 3 percent of GDP in order to make meaningful interventions in otherwise struggling government health care sector.

Amitabh Kant of NITI Aayog emphasised recently how the eastern states have been impediments to what could have been a happy story of growth and development. It is noteworthy that some states such as Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh comprise the unflattering BIMARU (sick) states and along with Odisha have lagged behind and still record high IMR of 50, 47, 56 and 51 respectively (NITI Aayog - 2013 figures). Uttar Pradesh, Indias most populous state has slid past Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh to record the countrys worst infant and under-five mortality rate, according to newly released health data.

Why Uttar Pradesh?

Although Uttar Pradeshs IMR has improved from 73 deaths per 1,000 live births to 50 over 10 years, some analysts still put it around 64 per 1000 live births, same as in strife torn countries like Burkina Faso or Afghanistan. This dismal picture indicates the failure of governance even as other BIMARU states made some serious efforts to improve the health services.

Bigger picture

Ahead of the swearing in of a new government in Uttar Pradesh, data released from the National Family Health Survey, 2015-16 (NFHS-4) show that Indias most populous state now also has Indias worst under-five mortality rate of 78 deaths per 1,000 live births. Serious analysts, therefore, need to look beyond the politics of Yogi Adityanath of BJP or Akhilesh Yadav of Samajwadi Party or the others before them.

According to World Data, infant mortality rate of India declined from 149.88 deaths per thousand live births in 1966 to 40 deaths per thousand live births in 2015. Similarly, NITI Aayog gave the figures on IMR from 2002 to 2013 as in Uttar Pradesh 50 (67), Madhya Pradesh 56 (70), Odisha 51 (69) Rajasthan 47 (64) and Bihar 46 (56) (figures in brackets are for 2002). IMR for India according to latest figures show further reduction to 37.81.

Kerala, on the other hand, remained steady at 12 for many years and is now on par with developed countries like the US recording IMR of six, (IE2017). What has been achieved in Kerala is attributed to a sound primary health care and total literacy especially of girls resulting in the true empowerment of women who demand and get good healthcare. High literacy with affordable good health care has kept the birth rate low sans coercion. This should have been the model that other states could have replicated with resultant healthy educated mothers and healthy children.

BIMARU states, in contrast, are reflective of the years of neglect that education and health care suffered since Independence under successive governments. Two major areas of neglect in independent India have been education and healthcare (Ratna Magotra, Bhavans Journal 15 August 2017). This neglect led to the burgeoning population that remained impoverished and backward.

Despite growth and improvement in economic indicators, there are just too many to share the pie; undernourished children fall prey to infections like encephalitis. The poor become a captive vote bank increasingly dependent on government schemes including health care. The mix of caste, religion and politics deprived them of all self-belief denying them an opportunity to become proud and equal citizens of the country.

Coming to the large number of children dying of encephalitis or other infections it is well known that the malnourished, anemic, low weight and most vulnerable children are admitted to government hospitals, often in critical condition. The patient overload in these referral hospitals has resources stretched even at times when there is no epidemic.

By the time they reach the hospital, they have nearly lost the battle. The hospital preparedness, medical expertise, availability of life care equipment like ventilators, monitors, essential quality medicines are indeed important to save lives but not the only thing experts and authorities need to take into account if the systems are to be overhauled.

Several well meaning individuals come forward to establish state of art facilities as has happened in Gorakhpur. Varun Gandhi, a parliamentarian, has promised to donate Rs 5 crore from his Members of Parliament Local Area Development Scheme (MPLAD) to set up a pediatric hospital in his constituency. Such gestures are worthy of appreciation but fact remains that we need to focus on the primary health care, education and reproductive health of future mothers. Also, children born to impoverished, underweight, undernourished and anemic mothers with poor antenatal and hospital care start with a great handicap. The population has to be manageable for optimal resource management.

Smaller families where young mothers can look after and provide for their children will change the picture that we see in villages or towns of Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh or Bihar. In a study from Columbia in the 80s, a very advanced neonatal care was set up in a deprived area with high neonatal and infant mortality. The neonatal intensive care was top end with trained experts and survivals of sick babies improved significantly. The hospital discharge data was promising and soon comparable to the best. Unfortunately, late survivors were few as these babies went back to their squalid homes with no proper sanitation or Clean drinking water .

Policy makers, public health experts and the governments can draw their own lessons. Primary education and primary health care need to come back on the drawing board with useful public-private partnerships where necessary. Improved, timely and structured referral system will bring sick babies to tertiary care hospitals in better condition and give them a fair chance to fight the battle.

All efforts should be on strengthening the education and reproductive health to build skills and confidence of young mothers to take care of their newborns and indeed their entire family.

The author is a Mumbai-based cardio-vascular surgeon.
Gurugram: Hundreds of people on Sunday staged a demonstration outside the Ryan International School in Gurugram demanding a CBI probe into the murder of a seven-year-old school boy and set afire a liquor shop near the school.

Police used batons to quell the protest and detained 20 protestors. Cameras of some photojournalists were also damaged during the protest.

Some of the demonstrators threw liquor bottles inside school premises to vent their ire against the school management, police said. The liquor shop is barely 50 metres away from the school.

They demanded that the school should be shut until a CBI probe is ordered into the incident.

"The Gurugram Police had to use mild lathicharge to disperse the agitators. The police detained over 20 protesters found agitating outside the school," Ravinder Kumar PRO Gurugram Police said.

The protesters alleged that school drivers and conductors often consume alcohol from the liquor shop in their free time.

The Class 2 student was found murdered with his throat slit inside the toilet of Ryan International School on Friday, triggering public outrage.

Gurugram Police arrested school bus conductor Ashok Kumar in connection with the case.

It was alleged Kumar was inside the toilet, waiting for any student to come inside with the motive of sexual assault. The deceased was the first student who entered the toilet, the police said.
Gurugram: At least 50 people, including nine scribes and photo journalists, were injured when police baton-charged a group of people protesting the brutal murder of a seven-year-old boy in Ryan International School Gurugram and demanding the arrest of the school management.

#WATCH: Media targeted by Haryana Police; ANI personnel Naveen Yadav & Vinod Kumar lathicharged during coverage of #Ryan protest in Gurugram pic.twitter.com/sbawpa42x2  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

A liquor vend near the school was also set on fire.

The police used force to disperse the protesters who were agitating outside the school in Bhondsi in the wake of the murder of the Class 2 student, who was on Friday found in the washroom with his throat slit.

"We were protesting peacefully outside the school but police suddenly baton-charged us without any provocation," said a protester.

The journalists covering the protest were also injured.

"TV journalists Sunil Yadav, Sushil Kumar, and photo journalists Yogesh Kumar and Abhishek were injured and have been admitted to the civil hospital," senior journalist Naveen Panchal told IANS.

"Yogesh Kumar suffered a fracture in his right hand while Abhishek's left hand was fractured," he said.

Senior journalist Mahavir Yadav from a national Hindi daily, and fellow journalists Pawan Sethi, Sanjay Chauhan, Lok Kumar and Dinesh Kumar were also injured.

The journalists were targetted after a senior police officer allegedly said that "all this (protest) was happening due to the media coverage".

An assistant commissioner of police and area SHO also threatened the journalists to leave the place.

Cameras were also damaged during the police action. Several Press Clubs, Press Associations and social bodies across the state have condemned the police action.

Former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda visited the hospital to meet the injured journalists.

"Attack on media was pre-planned and BJP workers and leaders were behind it. Journalists will not get proper treatment in the hospital because it is also run by the state government," he said.

Later, deputy commissioner Vinay Pratap Singh and additional deputy commissioner Pradeep Dahiya also visited the hospital.

A group of angry protestors also set fire to a liquor vend, located less than 50 metres from the school.

This came even as Haryana education minister Rambilas Sharma was announcing in a press conference that the licence of the liquor vend has been cancelled.

Meanwhile, Varun Thakur, father of the murdered student, appealed to people not to get violent during the protests.

"We must protest in a peaceful manner," he said.

Police late on Friday arrested Ashok Kumar, a conductor of a school bus, for allegedly killing the child, but many believe that he was only a scapegoat.
Haryana education minister Ram Bilas Sharma vowed that those responsible for the killing of a seven-year-old boy in a private school will be brought to book within a week.

Sharma, speaking to the press on Sunday, blamed the Ryan International School management and said that the state government will show no leniency to those behind the murder.

Undr sec 75 Juvenile Act,action will be taken against school mngmnt. Accused will be presented before Court within a week: Haryana Edu Min pic.twitter.com/9fF429sQyn  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

He added that the government will get the case investigated by any agency until the parents of the victim are satisfied.

Agar mata-pita jaanch se santusth nahi honge toh kisi bhi agency se Haryana gvt jaanch karane ko tayar hai: Haryana Education Min #Gurugram pic.twitter.com/GvrwPYtI9q  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

Meanwhile, angry parents protesting against school authorities burned down a liquor shop outside the campus, according to CNN-News18.

Police resorted to lathi charge to control the crowd, according to the report.

Police lathi charge parents protesting outside Ryan International School over the death of 7-year-old Pradyuman. #RyanMustPay pic.twitter.com/1Quc16PouE  News18 (@CNNnews18) September 10, 2017

On Saturday, with questions raised over security lapses that led to the murder, the Gurugram district administration announced a committee to find out whether there were any slip-ups and promised to conclude the probe and filing of a chargesheet within seven days.

"We have set up a committee to prepare a comprehensive report about the security lapses in the school. The report will be submitted by Monday. The further course of action would be taken on the basis of the report," Gurugram deputy commissioner Vinay Pratap Singh said.

He said the committee would also probe whether any such prior incident had occurred on the school campus.

With inputs from IANS
Chandigarh: Former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda on Sunday said a CBI probe should be ordered by the Centre into the killing of a 7-year-old student of Gurugram's Ryan International School.

"People's anger in this case is a natural reaction. A heinous crime has been committed, an innocent child has been murdered. If parents of the child want a CBI probe into the case, the government should not hesitate," Hooda said.

Police used batons on Sunday to quell the protest outside the Ryan International School and detained 20 protestors. Cameras of some photojournalists were also damaged during the protest.

The former chief minister said, "I have come to know that even media persons on duty have been lathicharged in Gurugram on Sunday and have sustained injuries and equipment of some of them got damaged as a result."

Upping the ante against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in Haryana, Hooda said, "This government has lost the trust and confidence of the public. By assaulting mediapersons, the government is trying to suppress voice of the people."

However, Gurugram Police Commissioner Sandeep Khirwar denied the charges of targeting mediapersons.

"As per my knowledge, a fair warning was given to clear the place and nobody was targeted. However, if any mediaperson has been injured, then I express my regret and we will analyse the entire episode. But there was no intention to target anyone," Khirwar said.

"On behalf of police authorities, I want to request the district administration that the mediapersons should be given best medical treatment," he said.

A class II student was found murdered with his throat slit in the school washroom in Gurugram on Friday. The school's acting principal was suspended and the security staff removed. The police claimed the student was killed by bus conductor Ashok Kumar, who tried to sexually abuse him.

The accused was arrested within hours of the murder after which a court in Gurugram sent him to police custody for three days.
Imphal: The Indian Embassy in Yangon with the help of Myanmar police has rescued eight Manipuri tribal girls who were to be taken to Thailand and Singapore by some international human traffickers, an official said.

S Suresh Babu, Additional Chief Secretary, Manipur in a statement said that the Indian government swung into action following an SOS to Manipur police from the eight girls who were lodged in a hotel near the central railway station, Yangon, before being taken away to Thailand and Singapore for flesh trade.

With this, the number of tribal girls rescued from the clutches of the sex traders in the past few weeks has increased to 15.

Some local members of the international gang, all hailing from Churachandpur district of Manipur, were arrested.

Suresh Babu said: "The eight girls from Churachandpur district were taken to Myanmar via Moreh, the border town. The girls managed to ring up the police in the district appealing to rescue them."

The Manipur government got in touch with the central government which in turn instructed the Indian Embassy to do the needful. With the help of the Myanmarese police the Embassy officials raided the hotel. The girls are now in the protective custody of police. Arrangements are being made to bring them back to Manipur.

Police in Manipur disclosed on Sunday that two persons have been arrested in connection with the trafficking of these girls.

A case has been registered in the women police station in Churachandpur district.

In a related incident, Churachandpur police laid multiple traps along the highway on September 2 night to rescue two girls and arrested three traffickers including two women.

One of the girls told IANS that her parents were paid Rs 10,000 with a vague assurance to be paid Rs 90,000 later. The traffickers had told the unlettered parents that she would be given gainful employment in foreign countries.

Five more girls were rescued on Wednesday while they were being taken to Moreh on way to Thailand.

Some years back three tribal girls from Manipur managed to return home with money donated by generous tourists. They said that many other girls are forced into immoral trafficking there. They said that first several boys and girls are taken to Chennai from where selected girls are taken to Thailand and Singapore. On the way their passports are confiscated. They were forced into drudgery as domestic servants and no money was paid to them for 10-hour work daily.

The social welfare department, Manipur issued an advisory to the people not to be duped by the traffickers who promise education and jobs to their daughters. They were advised to cross check before sending their children away to foreign countries.
Srinagar: The Centre will consider operating helicopter services for CRPF personnel serving in Jammu and Kashmir to facilitate movement of troops.

Union home minister Rajnath Singh, who is on a four-day visit to Jammu and Kashmir, said he was also working towards enhancing the monetary benefits to Rs one crore for families of Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) personnel killed in the line of duty.

"We are ready to give more facilities to our CAPF personnel. Government will consider helicopter services for CRPF in Jammu and Kashmir," he said addressing a sainik sammelan of CRPF personnel at Anantnag, 52 kilometres from Srinagar.

"It is my aim to provide at least Rs one crore to the families of our martyrs from CAPFs," he told the CRPF personnel.

As per present compensation norms, the family of a slain soldier of Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) like CRPF, BSF, ITBP, CISF, SSB, NSG and Assam Rifles gets about Rs 60-70 lakh.

Singh said the government has launched 'Bharat Ke Veer' programme to support the families of the martyrs.

"The nation is supporting the courage of our security forces. We are proud of our CRPF personnel.Courage cannot be purchased from any market and you are born with unassailable and unmatched courage," he added.

The home minister later presented a memento the CRPF team which took part in operations in Pulwama recently.
Kochi: The Narendra Modi government-led central government's policy is to have very good Centre-state relations, newly sworn-in Minister of State (Independent) for Tourism, IT and Electronics K J Alphons said on Sunday.

The 64-year-old forme bureaucrat and former Left supported legislator (2006-11) is just the second Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader from Kerala to get a berth in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government. O Rajagopal was the first in 1999, in the A B Vajpayee-led government.

Meanwhile, in a statement on Sunday, former Chief Minister and veteran CPI-M leader V.S. Achuthanandan came down heavily on Alphons for his change of political affiliation.

"This change of position should have never happened to a fellow traveller of the Left. A fellow traveller of the Left should have never become a tool in the hands of fascists. The love of the country should have stood first and not a post. This should be a lesson when the Left selects candidates," said Achuthanandan.

Incidentally, it was during the tenure of Achuthanandan as Chief Minister (2006-11) that Alphons became a state legislator supported by the Left grouping.

"The policy of the Modi government is to have excellent Centre-state relations and I am confident that I will be able to do it as I have an excellent relation with Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan," said Alphons at Kochi airport, on his first visit to the state, a week after being sworn-in.

Alphons was received at the Kochi airport by BJP's Kerala unit President Kummanem Rajasekheran and two former state chiefs and other leaders.

Last Sunday, the day Alphons was sworn-in as a central minister, the state BJP headquarters in Thiruvananthapuram wore a deserted look.

The only celebration in the state was seen at his home, where local BJP workers watched the swearing-in ceremony with his mother.

Alphons, however, brushed aside questions of the Kerala BJP not celebrating his elevation. "The day I was sworn-in, people here were busy with Onam celebrations," said Alphons.

Another significant absentee at the airport was Tushar Vellapally, chief of Bharat Dharma Jana Sena (BJDS), the second biggest ally of the BJP-led NDA.

The BDJS, formed in 2015 by the Hindu Ezhava strongman Vellapally Natesan, father of Tushar, had secured 3.9 per cent of the votes at the 2016 assembly polls, He was hoping the national BJP leadership would give the party some significant posts in the central cabinet.

But so far, it has not got any and like the Kerala BJP leadership, the BDJS also has been cut up over the rather unexpected elevation of the former bureaucrat, who joined the BJP in 2011 and given an independent charge as the MoS.

Starting Sunday, the Kerala BJP leadership is organising a series of receptions for the new minister,the first one later in the day at Moovattupuzha. From there, when Alphons reaches his home town in Kanjirapally in Kottayam, nine road shows are planned.

On Monday, there would be a reception at Kannur when Alphons arrives for a private visit.

The next day, he will take part in a temple function at Kottayam. On 15 September , a civic reception at his home town has been planned, followed by a meeting with various bishops.

On 16 September, there will also be a reception in the state capital and he is scheduled to leave for Delhi later in the day.

Dismissing speculations that Alphons was given the post as he was a member of the Roman Catholic Church, Kanjirapally diocesan bishop Mar Mathew Arackal told the media on Sunday that Alphons got the post on account of his merit and need not be seen as a policy of the BJP to attract the minority communities.

"Our Church does not have any untouchability to any party and the Church always had good relations with the NDA government in the past also," said the bishop, who is based at Alphons' home town Kanjirapally.
Lucknow: Photographs of jailed Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh's adopted daughter Honeypreet Insan have been pasted at police stations bordering Nepal and the law and order machinery is on an alert to ensure she does not sneak into the neighbouring country.

The police stations of Kapilvastu, Mohana, Shohratgarh and Debarua, whose areas border Nepal, have been alerted, superintendent of police (SP), Siddharth Nagar, Satyendra Kumar said on Sunday.

Honeypreet's photographs have been pasted at these police stations, the official said.

The intelligence mechanism has also been put into service to keep an eye on the activities of those crossing the Indian territory, he said.

The Uttar Pradesh Police is also on an alert in Maharajganj, Lakhimpur and Bahraich districts which border Nepal, another official said.

The Haryana Police had on 1 September issued a lookout notice against Honeypreet.

UP shares a 599.3 km long open border with Nepal touching seven districts  Pilibhit, Lakhimpur Kheri, Bahraich, Sravasti, Balrampur, Sidhharthnagar and Maharajganj.

Haryana Police officials had recently come to Lakhimpur Kheri looking for the whereabouts of Honeypreet, one of the closest aides of the Dera Sacha Sauda chief.

Additional Superintendent of Police (ASP), Ghanshyam Chaurasiya, confirmed the arrival of two Haryana Police personnel at Gaurifanta border in Kheri.

The Haryana Police had shared some information with the Gaurifanta Police and made inquiries about her suspected movement towards the neighbouring country through the porous India-Nepal border, the official said.

"However, when no clue about Honeypreet's departure for Nepal could be gathered, the Haryana Police personnel returned," the ASP said.

He said that an unclaimed vehicle bearing the registration number of Punjab was seized from the border and a probe was on to ascertain its ownership.

Honeypreet, who is in her thirties, is the adopted daughter of Ram Rahim Singh whose conviction in a rape case triggered mob violence that killed around 40 people across Haryana.

She had accompanied the Dera head when he was brought to the special CBI court in Panchkula for the pronouncement of the verdict in the 15-year-old rape case. She also travelled along with him in a special chopper which ferried them to Rohtak from Panchkula after the conviction.

The Haryana Police had earlier said that it was in touch with its counterparts in other states and was hopeful that Honeypreet and Aditya Insan, another key aide of the Dera head, would soon be found.

On 1 September, the Haryana Police had issued a lookout notice against the two, fearing that they could leave the country.

The police initiated efforts to trace Honeypreet, the adopted "daughter" of Gurmeet Ram Rahim, who describes herself as "Papa's angel", after it arrested and questioned another sect functionary, Surinder Dhiman Insan, in connection with an alleged conspiracy to help Ram Rahim Singh escape after his conviction by a special CBI court in Panchkula on 25 August.

Honeypreet is considered among Ram Rahim's possible successors as the head of the sect.

The 50-year-old Dera chief, who is lodged in Rohtak's Sunaria jail, has been sentenced to 20 years of imprisonment by the CBI court for raping of two of his disciples.

Honeypreet has also acted in the film 'MSG 2  The Messenger' and had a guest appearance in 'MSG  The Warrior Lion Heart', in which the Dera chief played the lead roles.
Mumbai: Banned currency notes made their way to Mumbai's most popular Ganesh pandal  Lalbaugcha Raja  this year with devotees offering over Rs one lakh in demonetised currency to the Lord.

Of the around Rs 6 crore, which the popular Lalbaugcha Raja in Parel received from devotees during the just concluded Ganesh festival, there were 105 notes of the scrapped Rs 1,000 denomination in the donation box.

"Of the 105 notes, one was torn. There were also 50 notes of the scrapped Rs 500 denomination," an official from the state Charity Commissioner's office said.

"So far, the total donation received is Rs 5,93,14,800," the official said.

"We are yet to count foreign currency received in the donation box and also the new currency 'garlands' offered to the deity," the official said.

The quantum of donation this year was less compared to the around Rs 8 crore received last year. This year's collection also included gold and silver.

The official cited heavy rains, which lashed Mumbai on 29 August and led to flooding and disruption in transport services, as a key reason for the low donation amount.

Millions of devotees visited the Lalbaugcha Raja to seek blessings of Lord Ganesh during the festival that began on 25 August and ended on 5 September.

The footfall at the pandal was less for two days when most people stayed indoors due to heavy rains, he added.
Chennai: AIADMK Amma faction leader TTV Dhinakaran on Sunday announced that a public meeting would be held in protest against the common medical entrance examination NEET in Tiruchirapalli, two days after he cancelled a protest by his faction's students wing in Chennai in view of a Supreme Court directive on the matter.

The sidelined AIADMK leader had called for the protest against the National Eligibility and Entrance Test (NEET) last week.

He had tweeted that he was calling off the protest respecting the Supreme Court's directive.

In a party statement on Sunday, Dhinakaran said the public meeting would be held in Tiruchirapalli on 16 September.

"I request party cadres, students and those interested in the welfare of the state to take part in it," he said.

On 5 September, Dhinakaran had announced that his party's students wing would hold the protest demonstration in Chennai against the all-India test.

He had alleged that the Centre was imposing NEET on the students with the "help" of the state government, thereby affecting the dreams of the students of getting admitted into medical colleges.

Protests had erupted in Tamil Nadu soon after Anitha, the daughter of a daily wage earner, allegedly hanged herself at her house in Ariyalur district on 1 September.

She was reportedly upset after reports emerged that Tamil Nadu would not be exempted from NEET.

They claimed that the new system would disadvantage students of state boards.
Srinagar: Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Saturday interacted with more than 20 delegations from different walks of life on the first day of his four-day visit to Jammu and Kashmir.

Singh, who arrived here in Srinagar on Saturday said he has come with an open mind and was willing to meet anyone who helps the government find solutions to the state's problems.

Officials said around 24 delegations of social, trade, travel and business organisations from the Kashmir Valley called on Singh, whose visit is seen as a follow-up to the prime minister's Independence Day speech in which he had reached out to the people of the region.

Representatives of travel agents, hotel and restaurant owners, and shikara and house boat associations met the minister. Singh also interacted with delegations representing different communities, including Kashmiri Pandits, Sikhs, Shias, Gujjars, Bakarwals and Paharis. Fruit growers and self-employed women also met the minister, the officials said.

The delegations apprised Singh of their problems and submitted memoranda to this effect. The meetings lasted more than three hours. He met Governor N N Vohra at the Raj Bhavan in the evening and discussed several important issues relating to the challenges being faced in the state, an official spokesman said.

Besides security-related issues, Vohra stressed on the efficient and accountable functioning of administrative machinery, eradication of corruption, protecting academic interests of youth, and early conduct of the pending elections to rural and urban local self-governing bodies, the spokesman said.

Singh also reviewed progress on the implementation of the Rs 80,000-crore Prime Minister's Development package for Jammu and Kashmir and directed officials to expedite work.

At a review meeting chaired by the minister, officials said the Centre had already sanctioned Rs 62,599 crore, about 78 per cent of the package amount, and released Rs 22,000 crore.

The meeting was attended by Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti, her deputy Nirmal Singh, state chief secretary B B Vyas and officials from the Union Home Ministry.

"The total cost of 63 projects under the PMDP is Rs 80,068 crore. The project includes assistance for rehabilitation of flood-affected people. Rs 1,200 crore was given for that purpose and the project is complete now," an official said.

The four-laning of the Chenani-Nashri section of the national highway has been completed. The project, which includes the longest road tunnel in India, cost Rs 781 crore. The PMDP, announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 7 November 2015, covers 63 projects pertaining to 15 Union ministries.

The officials said five of the 63 projects have been completed. Land acquisition for semi-ring roads in Jammu and Srinagar will be completed within two months. The four-laning of the Jammu-Udhampur section of the national highway is nearing completion while 19 road projects costing about Rs 43,000 crore are being implemented in the state, they said.

About Rs 5,810 crore is being invested in the power sector to improve the transmission and distribution network in the state.

Besides, the Central government is supporting the state with an investment of Rs 3,790 crore on the Pakaldul hydroelectric project, the officials said.

For the construction of AIIMS at Awantipora and Jammu, Rs 2,000 crore each has been made available and an amount of nearly Rs 91 crore released.

Besides, IIT Jammu and IIM Jammu have already started functioning from temporary campuses and the setting up of permanent campuses is underway. Rs 900 crore was sanctioned for completion of the ongoing health sector projects, the officials said, adding Rs 200 crore had been utilised.

The work on the comprehensive management of the Jhelum was evaluated. Singh also reviewed the rehabilitation plan for migrants of Jammu, PoK and Kashmiri Pandits.

The minister also assessed the progress made on other developmental projects related to urban development, solar energy, horticulture and tourism.

The chief minister assured the state government's full support in the implementation of the PMDP and on all other fronts, they added.

Earlier on Saturday, Singh arrived at the Srinagar airport where he was received by Deputy Chief Minister Nirmal Singh and senior officials of the state government.

The officials said the home minister is scheduled to visit Khanabal in south Kashmir's Anantnag district where he will interact with CRPF and police officials. South Kashmir has been on the boil over the past one-and- a-half-year and has witnessed several encounters between security forces and militants.

Singh will also visit Naushera in Rajouri district and Jammu district during the four-day visit
Srinagar: Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh on Sunday praised Jammu and Kashmir Police, saying he has no words to describe their bravery.

Addressing a 'Darbar' (gathering) of local policemen at the district police lines in south Kashmir Anantnag district, he said: "You are discharging your duties under extremely difficult conditions, and even the prime minister has appreciated your services and bravery.

"You are working for the safety of the people of Jammu and Kashmir, you don't have anything to do with politics.

"There are militants who only want militancy while they claim to be fighting for making Kashmir a 'Jannat' (Heaven).

"But it is the local policemen and CRPF jawans who actually want to make Kashmir a real heaven", Singh said.

He said the nation would always remember the sacrifices made by Abdul Rashid, assistant sub-inspector of police (ASI), and constable Imtiyaz Ahmad.

"I can't bear the tearful face of his daughter, Zohra.

"Yesterday, another cop Imtiyaz was killed by militants.

"JKP cops are giving sacrifice for Kashmir, for the country and for Kashmiris, but it is unfortunate that people are not ready to understand it."

ASI Rashid Ahmad was killed by militants in Anantnag town on 28 August this year while he was doing routine duties.

Constable Imtiyaz Ahmad was killed and two other policemen injured on Saturday in a hit and run attack at the Anantnag bus stand.

The home minister said it was only the local police that can help normalise the situation in Kashmir.

Reiterating that he has come to meet anyone with open mind, Singh said, "Magar Kashmir ko deshatgardi say najaat dilao (But please rid Kashmir of terrorism)."

He said he must be the only union home minister who visited Jammu and Kashmir four times every year.

"We have allotted funds for opening of a trauma centre and purchase of bullet proof vehicles for personnel of J&K police," he announced.

The minister's address was followed by a question-answer session.

He is also addressing troops of CRPF at Khanabal camp in Anantnag district.
Hyderabad: Expressing solidarity with the Rohingya Muslims of Myanmar, several organisations on Sunday took out protest rallies in different parts of the city against what they termed as the "genocide" of Rohingya Muslims in the neighbouring country.

An all party protest meeting was also organised at Nampally condemning the killings of Rohingya Muslims which was addressed among those by CPI general secretary S Sudhakar Reddy and senior Congress leader Mohd Ali Shabbir.

Holding placards that read "Stop killings of innocent Rohingya Muslims in Burma", "Stop genocide of Rohingyas", members of city-based organisations Majlis Bachao Tehreek (MBT) and Darsgah Jihad-O-Shahadat (DJS) and other organisations protested in different parts of the city.

They raised slogans beside burning effigies of Myanmars state counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi.

Union Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju had recently said the Rohingyas, whether they are registered under the UNHCR or not, are "illegal immigrants in India and hence they stand to be deported".

The Rohingyas Muslim minority in the Rakhine state of Myanmar have been fleeing to Bangladesh and India amid reports of alleged ethnic purging and persecution.

According to estimates, Hyderabad is home to about 3,600 Rohingyas, taking shelter under a UNHCR programme.

"They are not willing to go back to Myanmar," a volunteer with an NGO working for them said requesting anonymity.

Sources in the Rohingya camp say they are apprehensive about their future if they are deported and fear that they would be killed or subjected to torture back home.
Hyderabad: RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat on Sunday pitched for reforms in law as he stressed the need to develop a legal system based on the "ethos of the society".

Addressing the concluding ceremony of the silver jubilee celebrations of the Akhil Bharatiya Adhivakta (Advocates) Parishad in Hyderabad, Bhagwat said though the new Constitution was drafted after Independence, some old laws were taken from foreign sources.

"Our constitution was written based on the understanding of the 'bharatiya' ethos of our founding fathers, but many of the laws that we are still using are based on the foreign sources and that laws were made as per their thinking...seven decades have passed since our independence...this is something we must address," he said.

Bhagwat demanded that entire system should be based on the ethos of the society.

"Our legal system should also be based on such ethos. A discussion and debate should be held on this. After a comprehensive national debate, we will have to arrive at a consensus and such system should be made available to people. It should be such that it not only benefits our country but also sets an example for other countries," he said.

"...Other nations have their own jurisprudence. But does our jurisprudence reflect the moral and value systems of our society?" he asked.

The Sangh chief referred to the trial of revolutionary Birsa Munda and 400 tribals by the British for leading an armed struggle for independence.

"Unfortunately, what the tribals were saying was being misrepresented by the interpreters and there was a huge gap between what the (trial) judge was saying and what the accused were saying. This gap seems to exist even today."

"Our justice system is under the ambit of the legal framework but what is legal may not be morally right. For example, during the Emergency, police had the right to shoot anyone and one could not ask a question. Legally, the police were right but morally....?" he questioned.

Recalling his interaction with Pranab Mukherjee, Bhagwat said he asked the former president the definition of legality. "I recently asked Pranab Mukherjee about what is the definition of legality. He said morality is legality. Then I asked him is vice versa true?" he asked.

Appealing to utilise the wisdom of "our seers", Bhagwat said the "Neeti Shastra" has a lot to offer which modern day law-makers should take a leaf out of.

"The Westerners, including scientists and intellectuals, are studying/examining our 'Upanishads' which is our tradition," he said.

Underlining the importance of law and legislation in running the society, Bhagwat said a society should be built where its morality is at a level where the society in general and law are not at loggerheads with each other.

"No doubt, enforcement of law is necessary. However, it will be 100 percent effective only when the masses are educated. This education cannot be just by information but should include moral-based education. Unless we develop examples of honesty by living bharatiya values by ourselves, we will not be able to transform the society," he said.

He appealed to the members of the legal fraternity to reach out to those people who are facing injustice because of weakness and "embrace them".

"Work towards solutions that the poor and deprived are facing. Based on 'Satyamev Jayate' we have to helpful to them in sorting out their difficulties and problems that are arising out of injustice," the Sangh chief said.

Even in Mahabharata, Gandhari had blessed her sons with 'Satyamev Jayate' and not 'Vijayi Bhava', he recalled.

"The Adhivakta Parishad was formed in 1992 under the guidance of Dattopant Thengadi during a time when the Shahbano case judgement, and the discussion on Hindutva was raging.

"The nation was in the midst of a huge debate. Couple of the key functions of the ABAP was to fight many legal issues that were cropping up during that time and also to give voices to the millions of the people who could not afford legal assistance. The gap between those to whom justice is not accessible should be reduced," Bhagwat added.

In our society, 'dharma' was placed highest as it stands on the pillars of truth, "unlike in the Western society which believed that the king is supreme and could do no wrong, he said.
Gurugram: Haryana education minister Rambilas Sharma on Sunday said the management of Ryan International School, Gurugram, and owner have been booked under the Juvenile Act over the brutal murder of a seven-year-old student inside the school washroom on Friday.

Minister Sharma said that it was the responsibility of the school management to keep students safe inside the school premises, but they failed to do so.

He said the school management was responsible for the murder of the Class II student so the management and owner have been booked under Section 75 of the Juvenile Act.

Sharma said that police had already arrested a school bus conductor Ashok Kumar for brutally killing the child and the weapon (knife) used for killing was also recovered by police.

"Police will file a charge sheet in the fast-track court within a week. If parents of the killed student are not satisfied with it, the state government will be ready to conduct an investigation through any agency, including the CBI," Sharma said.

He said that the school bus transportation contract of the Bhondsi Ryan International School has been cancelled.

The minister said that there are nearly 1,200 students in the school and thus the license of the school would not be cancelled.

The minister's comments came as violent protests took place for the third day on Sunday outside Ryan International School here over the murder, with parents demanding the culprits be arrested and strict action taken against the school management.

Pradhuman, a Class II student, was found dead on Friday by a school staffer in the washroom with his throat slit. The boy had reached the school in the morning, and within an hour he was found dead.

The boy's family resides in Maruti Kunj Society in the same area. Pradhuman's father is a senior executive with an export house in the Kherki Daula area. His sister is a Class V student in the same school.
Chennai: Pressing ahead with its campaign against the K Palaniswami government, the DMK-led Opposition on Sunday met Tamil Nadu governor Vidyasagar Rao and demanded immediate convening of the Assembly and to direct the chief minister to prove his majority.

The Opposition parties also told the governor that if he did not convene the Assembly within a week, they would approach courts and the "people's court", Leader of the Opposition and DMK working president MK Stalin told the media after the meeting.

He said the AIADMK government headed by Palaniswami has lost majority in the Assembly with 119 MLAs ranged against him and only 116 supporting in a House of 233.

The Opposition has, in all, 98 MLAs (DMK 89, its allies Congress eight and Muslim League one) while those owing allegiance to TTV Dinakaran faction of AIADMK are 21.

Stalin recalled that the Opposition has already demanded a floor test for the government and Dinakaran had also met the governor earlier this week in the company of three more MLAs and conveyed to him that the chief minister had lost the confidence of MLAs loyal to him. He had a fortnight ago ferried 19 of his loyalist MLAs to the governor with the message that they wanted removal of the chief minister. One of the 19 MLAs  STK Jakkaiyan  had switched sides to the chief minister's camp.

An Opposition delegation, led by DMK deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly Duraimurugan had met the governor a fortnight ago and conveyed to him their demand for convening the Assembly immediately for a floor test.

The DMK leader said it was established by the Supreme Court judgement in the SR Bommai and Arunachal Pradesh cases that the Assembly was the place where a majority has to be proved and it was the governor's duty to convene the House for the purpose.

Asked what was the governor's response, Stalin said Rao told the delegation that he would do his duty. "I still hope that he will perform his duty and convene the House," he added.

Stalin said if the governor does not convene the Assembly session within a week, then they were left with no option but to approach the "courts and people's courts".
Ahmedabad: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) chief Amit Shah on Sunday said organisers of the Patel quota stir in Gujarat were leaning towards "one political party", an apparent reference to the Opposition Congress.

He said the reservation agitation was acquiring political colour as state assembly elections, slated to be held later this year, approached.

The BJP president was in Ahmedabad to take questions from the youth at a programme called 'Adikham Gujarat' or Resolute Gujarat.

Asked by a participant how the BJP government was dealing with the Patidar agitation for reservations under the OBC category, Shah said the BJP government had asked the protesters, led by Hardik Patel, to follow the "legal process" but the "direction of the agitation changed".

"Observe the development and you will realise that slowly it has become an agitation backed by one political party. People had joined the agitation emotionally but the organisers are leaning towards one political party," he said.

Shah said his party's government in Gujarat tried to persuade the agitators to follow the legal process to achieve their goal.

"As per the main demand of the Patidar agitation, if a caste has to be included in the OBC category, that caste can submit an application to the OBC commission," he said.

Only after its recommendation can the caste get a place in that category, he added.

"But unfortunately, the direction of the agitation was changed... As the election approaches, you will see that slowly the issue will become political," he said.

Shah said under a Supreme Court ruling, reservation cannot exceed 50 percent.

While reservation for SC and ST candidates was Constitutionally binding and no state government could change it, for a caste to find a place under the OBC category, it had to go through a procedure of submitting an application to the OBC Commission, he said.

Shah's comment comes in the backdrop of Hardik Patel recently dropping hints of supporting the Congress in the assembly elections.

Since 2015, the Patidars (Patels) have been agitating for inclusion of the community under the OBC category for reservation in government jobs and educational institutions.
Ahmedabad: BJP president Amit Shah on Sunday asked the youth of Gujarat not to fall prey to the anti-BJP propaganda being mounted by the Congress on social media.

Shah's statement came at a time when messages critical of the 'Gujarat model of development' under the BJP rule in the poll-bound state were being circulated on social media.

During his interaction with youths at 'Yuva Townhall', Shah also came down heavily on the Congress and its vice president Rahul Gandhi, who had recently visited the city and questioned the BJP over its development claims.

Replying to questions, Shah touched upon issues such as implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST), unemployment and demonetisation, and claimed that the Narendra Modi government has brought in substantial change during its three-year rule.

"I appeal to the youth not to blindly believe the anti-BJP propaganda being spread on WhatsApp and Facebook. Before making any judgement, you need to do analysis of what was Gujarat before the BJP came to power and what is the situation today," said Shah.

"This propaganda is largely spread by our opponent Congress," the BJP president claimed.

Responding to a question about the BJP government's achievements in Gujarat, Shah shared several figures about growth in agriculture sector, increase in per capita income, rise in the size of state budget, increase in the number of universities and several other parameters to prove his point that significant development took place after 1995.

The BJP first came to power in Gujarat in 1995.

"I want you to apply your mind before believing what is being circulated in WhatsApp. Just compare what kind of development took place before the BJP came to power and afterwards. These figures will clearly tell you that it was the BJP which did development," claimed Shah.

He added that these figures related to the development in Gujarat will be uploaded on the BJP's website so that youths can circulate it on social media to counter the propaganda.

"Before 1995, when the Congress was in power, curfew and communal riots were rampant. Even the 'Rath Yatra' was attacked.

Power cut of 10 to 15 hours was normal in rural parts of state during the Congress rule. But today, every part of the state is getting 24-hour uninterrupted power supply," Shah said.

"Rahulbaba (Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi) recently came here and raised question about development. I want to tell him that the venue of his event, the Sabarmati riverfront, was nothing short of a pit of dirty water when the Congress was in power. Today, it is considered as the best riverfront in the world," the BJP chief added.

"Gujarat's per capita income was just Rs 13,665 before 1995. Today, it is Rs 1.41 lakh. Is this not development Rahulbaba?"

asked Shah, adding that the people of Gujarat should not get carried away by the false claims of the Congress and its leaders.

Responding to a question related to the BJP's approach towards creating more employment, Shah said the method of calculating employment in the country needed to be changed.

"I believe that employment should not be linked only with jobs. You can't give jobs to 125 crore citizens. Employment should also mean self employment, start-ups or starting a small business. Thus, the method of calculating the employment

generation, which solely takes into account job creation, should undergo change," the BJP chief said.

Responding to a question on the GST and its benefits, Shah said the BJP government at the Centre was trying its best to make it more trader-friendly.

"We know that some (traders) are facing difficulties due to GST. But, the government is aware about it and understand your problem. The GST council can always change the rules. Our aim is to make GST trader-friendly," he said.

Responding to a question on demonetisation and its success, especially when the RBI has declared that almost 99 percent notes have came back, Shah said the exercise was aimed at pushing the country's economy forward by increasing the number of tax payers.

"The RBI has declared that around 99 percent notes have came back. But, did anyone asked the RBI how much were there in the past? Earlier, only 80 percent currency notes were in the system, as 20 percent notes used to remain with corrupt people, be it politicians or officers. Now, all these notes are back in the system," said Shah.

"Prior to demonetisation, only 3.6 crore people used to pay income tax. But now, it has risen to 6.3 crore. This shows that people are becoming honest. It is very easy to criticise something. But, demonetisation was an attempt to boost the country's economy by increasing the number of tax payers," he said.

Over one lakh youths sitting in 312 different locations across Gujarat saw the event live while some of them even asked questions through video-conferencing.
Kolkata: Against the backdrop of West Bengal's Mamata Banerjee government escalating its confrontation with the Centre and even denying use of a venue for his programme, BJP president Amit Shah will arrive in Kolkata on Monday on a three-day visit hoping to give a push to his party's big political ambitions in the state.

Shah, who begins his tour by paying tributes to Swami Vivekananda at his north Kolkata house, is slated to meet party leaders, intellectuals, victims of alleged political violence and interact with the media during his latest tryst with Bengal.

Unlike his last visit in April when he started his booth level public interaction programme from north Bengal's Naxalbarithe birthplace of the Maoist movement in the country half a century ago, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president would be limiting his engagements this time to Kolkata and its adjoining areas.

The trip takes place amid a controversy over the state government's refusal to direct the universities to view prime minister Narendra Modi's speech on the occasion of Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya's centenary celebration and the 125th anniversary of Swami Vivekananda's famous Chicago speech.

In the recent past, the Banerjee regime and the Narendra Modi-led NDA government have also crossed swords over central directives on Independence Day and Teachers Day celebrations, with the state refusing to comply with them.

Besides, the BJP has cried foul over the authorities denying use of the Netaji Indoor Stadium for Shah's programme on the plea that the facility was already booked. Shah himself threatened to move court on the issue.

Shah would attend a day long party leaders' meeting in the central government run Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) auditorium on Monday and interact with party workers from different districts, who have allegedly been victims of political violence unleashed by the state's ruling Trinamool Congress the next day, the party said.

"There would be around 30 families from different districts who have suffered the wrath of the Trinamool activists and goons solely for supporting BJP. Shah would listen to their grievances," state BJP general secretary Sayantan Basu told IANS.

The BJP chief would wrap up his programme on Tuesday with a meeting with the intellectuals at the same venue.

Basu said the denial of the indoor stadium for Shah's programme has upset his party's plans, as they could now accommodate less number of people.

On Wednesday, Shah would hold a press conference at the press club ahead of his meeting with members of the Merchants Chamber of Commerce at a five star hotel in central Kolkata.

Shah's programme is being seen as part of the BJP's efforts to strengthen the party organisation in a state where it has been traditionally weak, but has shown signs of emerging as a formidable force in the near future, with Opposition Left Front and Congress continuing to lose ground in recent electoral contests.
Delhi Universitys Student Union (DUSU) elections are scheduled for 12 September.

A poll-bound North Campus looks something like this: There are garlanded campaigners backed by a gang of loud sloganeers that go from one college to another, hundreds of the same posters are pasted on walls, behind e-rickshaws, and even on billboards.

Unimaginatively, these bear only the name and party of the candidate. Ask the student, who goes around campus with slouched backpacks, what they think of politics, and they say, Its a good launch pad for a longer career in national politics.

Some other students huddled outside chai and maggi stalls say, People enroll in law degrees to contest and stay in the university longer, there is big money in politics and easy fame.

Amidst U-Special buses are several SUVs carrying an entourage of campaigners, dressed, quite predictably, in white kurtas and jeans. Yet another student says, The candidates are mostly from the Jat and Gurjar community. In 2016-17 all four posts (president, vice president, secretary and joint secretary) were won by candidates from these communities that are, for whatever reason, infamous for rowdiness. Why cant elections be issue-based and intelligent? they ask.

This one-sidedness is lending incompleteness to this so called democratic exercise, and the absence of women and students from North East is particularly hard to ignore.

Of the 22 womens colleges in Delhi University, only five colleges participate in DUSU elections. These include Aditi Mahavidyalaya, Lakshmibai College, Bhagini Nivedita College, Miranda House and SP Mukherji College for Women. This means that a little less than 80 percent of DUs women students dont cast their vote.

Lets take the example of Gurmehar Kaur, whose social media outburst against ABVP made her famous. Today, she cant vote because shes a student of Lady Shri Ram College, which isnt a part of DUSU. Within our college premises, our voice is free. In our college union elections, theres a budgetary limit of Rs 3,000 per candidate and only one prop can be used, says Kaur, a literature student.

If womens colleges are embraced within the larger democratic machinery, they will bring in higher standards of discipline and might make the student wings of big political parties like the National Students Union of India (NSUI) and the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) more accountable towards maintaining peace.

Whats the point of being cynical and protecting the girls from dirty politics? What comes out of protectionist and patriarchal spaces is a regressive mindset because girls might not have the tools or awareness to find their own voice in an increasingly political society, It is a sort of ideological incarceration, says Sandhya D Nambiar, professor of English at Jesus and Mary College, another politically inactive college for women in DUs South Campus.

The role of women in the last six years has been limited to the positions of general secretary and joint secretary, with the exception of ABVPs Priyanka Chhawri, who served as the vice-president of the union in 2016-17.

Kawal Preet Kaur of the All India Students Association (AISA) joined the party when she was an undergrad student at Indraprastha College for Women, which isnt affiliated to DUSU. She is now pursuing a degree in law from the university.

In big parties like NSUI and ABVP, women representation is more of tokenism. DU politics is masculine in nature and it is part of AISAs agenda to push for off-campus womens colleges to join DUSU because to change a system one has to first be a part of it, explains the girl who is busy campaigning these days.

Instead of ensuring the safety of girls in a volatile environment, its easier to just keep them away from it all. This is nothing but benevolent sexism, says Itisha Nagar, professor of psychology at Kamala Nehru College, an all-girls college in South Delhi.

The lack of being able to participate can be internalised by the girls as not being capable enough, which leads to disenchantment with student issues at large. She feels that being politically in sync with the rest of the students might be helpful in an era of social movements like Pinjra Tod (break the hostel locks), a fight for secure, affordable and not gender-discriminatory accommodation for women students across Delhi.

Last year, when the Delhi University inserted the None of The Above (NOTA) button on ballot boxes, 17,712 voters opted for it and this meant a seven percent dip in student participation from the 2015. Earlier this year, St Stephens, the alma mater of politicians like Kapil Sibal and Shashi Tharoor, decided to apply for autonomy. When granted, St Stephens' will be free to take its own decisions in framing syllabus, fee structure, and starting new college branches. The institution doesnt participate in DUSU elections and isnt a member of the Delhi University Teachers Association either. The oldest college in Delhi (established in 1881) now stands amidst the DUSUs annual blitzkrieg, as though disapprovingly.

The other ignored segment of voters that is suffering from disenchantment is students from the North East. There are more than 20,000 of them, out of which less than 5,000 cast their vote, according to statistics shared by the North East Students' Society Delhi University (NESSDU), which was established in 2012.

Subrato Borah, a former chairman of the organisation, says the students are fed up of being treated like second class citizens. He raises the issue of lack of accommodation for northeastern students and asks why large empty spaces within the campus cannot be utilised to construct more hostels.

The Rajiv Gandhi Girls Hostel was built with funds from the DoNER Ministry but 1,000 out of the 2,500 seats have been given to outsiders. There are no hostels for our boys. Why would the students be interested in voting if basic needs havent been addressed in so many years? asks Borah. He adds that Kiren Rijiju, Union Minister of State for Home Affairs, is also from the North East and that students aren't seeing him take any concrete steps to make their lives simpler, which further forces them to give up on the system and recede into their cocoons.

Rijum Rijum, who is pursuing History (Honours) from Bhagat Singh college and hails from Arunachal Pradesh, points out that the students unions dont raise issues such as why Hindi is a qualifying subject when students from the North East arent familiar with it. People in North India treat us like foreigners because of the lack of awareness about our culture. There should be more about our history and culture in the curriculum, he said.

Pinky Baishy, former cultural secretary of DUSU, volunteers a little known fact: She used to conduct meetings with the Delhi Police so students in need of translators could reach out for help. Another reason for the present polling ratio is the fact that students from the North East often dont contest elections. Unless there are candidates the students can identify with, the voter turnout wont increase, says Adarsh Saharia who is from Assam and is contesting independently for the post of president from law faculty.

Professor Kamei Aphun, who teaches sociology at the Delhi School of Economics, says a Nodal Office for northeastern students may be present in every college, but claims that this person is largely inactive unless a specific complaint needs to be addressed.

Theres thus a need for a more positive outreach by these bodies so that students from the North East feel their positioning in DU is more than that of a group constantly caught up in law and order complications.

The North East is seen as one block of votes and social mixture is limited. The problem with North East cells is that only students from the seven states of the North East participate and that further pushes them into a corner, when whats actually needed is integration, said Amrapali Basumatary, who teaches English at Kirori Mal College.

The problem is that successful integration requires a nuanced analysis and strategic action and at least till now, DUSU doesnt seem to have either.



"Iss mulkh ne har shaks jo ko kaam tha saunpa, uss shaks ne uss kaam ki maachis jalakar chhod dee (Everyone in India was given a particular work to do. But they instead let it burn down to the ground)"

Piyush Mishras dialogue from the political drama film Gulaal can be used to sum-up student politics in Delhi University in one cinematic frame.

The scene on campus is akin to the scene of match sticks in the hands of some, being lit with passion and fury, only to ultimately die to the floor.

A temporary passion has become permanent at the cost of democratic reason.
New Delhi: The Congress is facing an uphill task in poll-bound Himachal Pradesh, with infighting and anti-incumbency emerging as the key challenges to its electoral prospects.

Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh has been demanding the removal of HPCC chief Sukhwinder Singh Sukhu and a worried central leadership of Congress is busy placating its old warhorse who has steered the party in the hill state for several decades.

Just when it seemed a solution was in sight, with Virbhadra getting a long-awaited audience with Congress president Sonia Gandhi last week, the AICC's general secretary for Himachal Pradesh, Sushilkumar Shinde, ruled out Sukhu's removal.

"There will be no change in party leadership," Shinde told reporters in Chamba where he is on a four-day tour to meet district level leaders.

The Himachal Pradesh Assembly polls are due later this year.

Virbhadra has maintained that he will neither contest the polls nor lead the campaign with Sukhu heading the Himachal unit.

He had earlier threatened to quit politics and told party MLAs in a recent meeting that he would not be able to work with Sukhu and withdraw from elections if the latter continues in his post.

With Shinde taking a hard public stand, it remains to be seen how the chief minister will respond.

Earlier this week, Virbhadra skipped a key meeting convened by Rahul Gandhi in the national capital after he came to know that the party vice president was not inclined to replace Sukhu.

According to sources, the Congress wanted a "compromise formula" to placate Singh and bring him on board. The leadership feels it is too late in the day to replace Sukhu.

The Himachal Pradesh chief has survived with the support of Rahul Gandhi so far, though it is learnt that Sonia is not averse to changing him.

During the last Assembly elections, Singh had gotten the then HPCC chief Kaul Singh Thakur replaced. The latter had quit of his own accord in the party's interest after Virbhadra similarly threatened to quit in case Thakur continues.

This time though, Sukhu is not inclined to step down, party insiders say.

Caught in a conundrum, Congress leaders say if Virbhadra remains adamant, the party is not left with much of a choice for viable alternatives in in election-bound Himachal.

Sukhu, when asked about factionalism, said he didn't have issues with the chief minister and was working towards the party's interests.

"I have no issue with anyone. I have no tussle with anybody. I am a loyal party worker and am working honestly among the people for strengthening the party," he told PTI.

He said the responsibility and accountability of the organisation lies with him and he has worked towards that.

The chief minister however recently told a Congress legislature party meeting in Himachal Pradesh that he would not continue to be "humiliated" and go to the hustings "under" anyone's charge.

The party is looking to avoid a repeat of the situation with its Gujarat state unit when its CLP leader Shankarsinh Vaghela quit just ahead of elections. Vaghela had been with the party for over two decades and was followed out of the exit by a few party MLAs.
Mumbai: The Maharashtra government is mulling to hold direct elections for the mayor's post in the corporations that fall under the C and D category, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis has said.

The chief minister said recently, polls to gram panchayat and municipal council were made direct, while there has been a similar demand to hold the mayoral polls.

"There is a demand for direct election (of mayors). We recently made the gram panchayat and municipal council elections direct. The problem with municipal corporations is that, 90 percent of elections are over and it will now be held only after five years," Fadnavis said.

He was speaking after inaugurating a two-day All India Mayors' Council, organised by Aurangabad municipal corporation yesterday in Aurangabad.

"We just have 2-4 municipal corporation polls pending," he said, adding, another constraint is that since cities are very big in the state, experimenting becomes difficult.

"But, we will definitely think about holding direct mayoral elections for small cities, whose civic bodies fall in the C and D category," the chief minister said.

Out of the 25 municipal corporations in Maharashtra, 21 fall under categories C and D.

Mumbai municipal corporation falls under the 'A+' category, Nagpur and Pune municipal corporations come under 'A' category.

The 'B' category comprises Thane and Pimpri-Chinchwad municipal corporations.

Municipal corporations that fall under C and D categories are - Navi Mumbai, Kalyan-Dombivali, Vasai-Virar, Mira Bhayander, Ulhasnagar, Bhiwandi-Nizampur, Solapur, Kolhapur, Sangli-Miraj-Kupwad, Amravati, Ahmednagar, Akola, Jalgaon, Nanded, Malegaon, Aurangabad, Latur, Chandrapur, Parbhani, Panvel.

In May 2016, the BJP-led state government revived a system of direct election of municipal council presidents.

Notably, it had reaped dividends in the municipal council polls held during the November-December-January period.

The government, earlier this year approved a proposal for direct election of village sarpanch, by amending the Maharashtra Gram Panchayat Act of 1958.
Bhagalpur (Bihar): Targeting erstwhile alliance partner and Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar, RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav on Sunday said the state government must spell out details of every penny "embezzled" by a Bhagalpur-based NGO in Srijan scam case.

"Nitish government will have to give details of every penny that was embezzled by Srijan in the state's 'maha ghotala' (mega scam)," he said.

The RJD chief exhorted the people who had gathered at a rally at Sandis compound here to register their protest over the Srijan scam by participating in "dharnas" to be held at every district headquarter town on 12 September.

Lalu also wondered why FIRs were not registered against Nitish Kumar, Sushil Kumar Modi, Ashwini Choubey (Union minister) and others in the scam, which is nothing short of a 'maha ghotala'.

Mounting a scathing attack on the chief minister, the RJD supremo said Nitish Kumar was not only a "Paltu Ram" (one who switches sides), but a greedy person who wants to remain in power till his death.

"...I knew about his (Nitish's) character... He (Nitish) would not have become chief minister had I nursed 'putra-moh' despite having larger number of MLAs than that of JD(U)," he said.

Alleging that Nitish used to stay at the residence of one "Mishra" in Bhagalpur, Lalu questioned the credentials of the person.

He said the Srijan scam would have been buried by now, had the media not highlighted it.

The former railway minister said that they (BJP-JD(U)) failed to defeat him (Lalu), so they were now targeting his son Tejashwi Prasad Yadav.

Lalu said there was a deliberate attempt to hamper the Bhagalpur rally and that is why the CBI summoned him to Delhi.

"I am not afraid of Narendra Modi's empty threats, rather I will make BJP bite the dust even if I have to be hung by the neck," Lalu said.

The RJD chief was accompanied by senior vice-president Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, his two sons  Tejashwi and Tej Pratap  and other senior leaders of the party.

Former deputy chief minister Tejashwi Prasad Yadav also trained his guns at the Bihar chief minister for his "failure to take action against such scams from the beginning".

The CBI should conduct a fair probe and lodge FIRs against the chief minister, deputy chief minister, Union minister Giriraj Singh and Shahnawaz Hussain for hatching a conspiracy and destroying evidence, Tejashwi said.

The former deputy chief minister also accused Nitish of moral corruption besides indulging in political and social corruption by ditching minorities, scheduled castes and backward classes, who had given a mandate to the grand alliance.
Washington: Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi will interact with global thinkers, political leaders and overseas Indians in the US this week on international economic and technology issues, an organiser of his visit said.

Gandhi, 47, begins his nearly two-week trip to the US with an address at the University of California, Berkeley, on Monday and will be speaking on contemporary India and the path forward for the world's largest democracy. His great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru, India's first prime minister, delivered a speech at Berkeley in 1949.

"The purpose of the visit is two-fold. One is to meet interesting and global thinkers, to have a conversation on what is happening world over on economy, on technology, on opportunities, and really understand different views from experts on the global scene," technocrat Sam Pitroda, who is involved with the preparations of Gandhi's visit, told PTI.

Pitroda worked with Gandhi's father and former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi for nearly a decade to transform India's telecom sector.

He said Gandhi will meet overseas Indians at an event in New York as part of an outreach by the Congress party.

The Congress vice president is scheduled to visit Washington DC. He is likely to address members of the think- tank community at an event organised by the Centre for American Progress, and interact with the corporate world at another programme organised by the US-India Business Council.

Gandhi may meet some members of the ruling Republican Party. "A lot of these meetings are going to be small and private," Pitroda said.

"He wants to understand more about what's happening globally and what's the global view of the situation is," he said.

The Congress vice president has often visited the US, but this could possibly be the first time in his political career that Gandhi would hold public meetings, meet political leaders and deliver speeches in the country.

"You know he needs to be out, he needs to express his views. You know he has been not, may be, talking publicly about his trips. But I think, it is important that he meets a large number of people this time and also overseas Congress members," Pitroda said.

"Today, the view of India is one short of protected by one group of people. We need to really talk about Indian aspirations, Indian concerns about what is going on not just in India but the world over. Rise of populism is one topic I am sure will come up in the conversation," Pitroda said.

He said Gandhi would interact with Silicon Valley people, where the technology, talent and Indian "brain power" is concentrated. "So, the idea is if you were to meet a lot of Silicon Valley people, it is better to talk about things in San Francisco."

Gandhi will also address a gathering at the Princeton University.
New Delhi: Seeking a hat-trick of election victories, Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan is confident he suffers from no anti-incumbency against his government nor are intolerance and cow vigilantism issues for him in the state that goes to polls next year.

For him, the image and performance of Prime Minister Narendra Modi are advantages which he will seek to drive home to the electorate along with his own performance in the last 12 years. "The opposition is jealous of his (Modi's) competence, talent and popularity."

Chouhan, 58, who has been declared the chief ministerial face by BJP President Amit Shah, acknowledges that Congress is the main challenger but feels it is not a force that is a threat to him.

"If you ask this question to a leader, then he will obviously say there is no anti-incumbency. But I am saying from the bottom of my heart that even after 12 years there is no unrest among people," Chouhan told IANS in an interview.

"Now we have two advantages. One is Modiji and his leadership. And the other is the achievements of the state government. Due to him, India's stature has gone up in the world. Like all Indians, every citizen of Madhya Pradesh too feels pride. Apart from this his schemes are there. The Ujjawala scheme has turned out to be a miracle. In just one district in Madhya Pradesh, we have distributed around 90,000 gas cylinders. Obviously we will reap benefits from his image of performer," he said.

Citing the resolution of the Doka La standoff with China, Chouhan said, "There is pride in every Indian heart that Modiji has 'straightened China'. This reflects in the people's mind. Through the surgical strikes the message went that 'We can set things right'. Due to Modiji, the feeling of national pride and self-pride have gone up in people's mind. Obviously, due to all these there will be no anti-incumbency. People feel there is a powerful government at the Centre."

Asked about issues like intolerance and cow vigilantism figuring in the national discourse, the Chief Minister said it was not an issue in Madhya Pradesh except that there is a ban on beef and strict action will be taken against anyone breaking law.

"One or two small incidents may have taken place but the whole state cannot be blamed for that. If something had happened, we have taken quick action. Law and order is our priority and nobody will be allowed to break it," he said.

He said the state has been "tough on Naxalites and dacoits". "The SIMI network has been finished. Madhya Pradesh is a peaceful place where people live in harmony. There is no question of discrimination. Even in the chief minister's house we celebrate all the festivals together of all the religions and communities."

Asked about support to forces of fundamentalism, Chouhan said neither the BJP nor the RSS supported such forces. "Individuals may be involved in such activities. We take action according to law."

He hit out at opposition parties for targeting the prime minister and using strong language against him. "The opposition is jealous of the competence of Modiji, his talent, his devotion towards the country and people and his overall impact. That is why they are targeting him all the time."

He recalled former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's advise that one should outshine the other by drawing a bigger line and not erasing the existing line.

"Instead of being jealous about Modi, friends in opposition should draw a bigger line. But they don't have the capability. That is why they target Modiji. And by targeting him they stoop low. They can't fight the Prime Minister on the ground. That is why they play with words and go to the extent of abusing him."

Asked about whom he saw as the opponent, Chouhan acknowledged that Congress is the main challenger. "But I don't think about them or their leadership. It is their look out. They need to create their leadership. We are banking on development and our work. The way the Congress leaders are talking and making remarks, only God can save them."
Mysuru: Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah on Sunday slammed Union law minister Ravi Shankar Prasad for accusing the state government of failure to give protection to slain journalist Gauri Lankesh, saying she never sought protection.

"The central minister said the government knew about the threat, and Gauri had sought security, but government did not give. All these, it is most irresponsible statement given by a central minister, who also is a law minister," he told reporters.

Prasad on 8 September had shown copies of news reports on Lankesh's brother, Indrajit, claiming that she had worked for the surrender of Naxalites and asked as to why the Siddaramaiah government had not provided her security.

Siddaramaiah said if Gauri Lankesh had sought security, the government would have given it.

"If someone asks for security, we will give it... Nobody expected it. She never ever spoke about threats and sought security," he said.

Gauri Lankesh also was "a very good human being" and did not hate anyone and even talked to her opponents, Siddaramaiah said.

Replying to a query, Siddaramiah said both Maharashtra and Karnataka police were coordinating to crack the cases related to the killings of rationalists MM Kalburgi, Narendra Dabholkar and Govind Pansare.

"It is not that no progress has been made in Kalburgi killing. Some progress has taken place, but the police is yet to gather evidence to find out assailants," he said.

Dabholkar was shot dead on 20 August 2013 in Pune while he was on a morning walk. Pansare was shot at on 16 February 2015 in Kolhapur and succumbed to his injuries on 20 February that year.

State home minister Ramalinga Reddy had also said a couple of days ago that Lankesh had never asked for security.

The 55-year-old Left-leaning journalist, a fierce critic of Hindutva politics, was shot dead at the doorstep of her house while she was returning from her office on 5 September.

Her killing came in for condemnation from various quarters. The state government has formed a special investigation team (SIT) to probe the case.
Patna: Bihar Leader of Opposition Tejashwi Yadav on Sunday blamed Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi for the Rs 2,000-crore Srijan scam in Bhagalpur and other districts of the state.

He also alleged the involvement of several Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders in the scam.

"Nitish Kumar and Sushil Modi are responsible for the Srijan scam. The state government led by them is busy eliminating evidence and trying to divert the issue to save their skin," Tejashwi Yadav, former deputy chief minister, said at a rally in Bhagalpur to launch the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) campaign against the Srijan scam.

"But we will not sit silent and have decided to intensify the agitation to expose their involvement in the scam before 11 crore people of Bihar," the RJD leader said.

He said Sushil Modi and his family members are involved in the Srijan scam.

Tejashwi Yadav called Nitish Kumar as a "Bhishma Pitamah" of moral corruption for breaking the grand alliance of JD(U), RJD and Congress and forming a new government with the BJP.

"Nitish Kumar's politics is full of misdeeds. He dumped the RJD in the garb of CBI case against Tejashwi Yaadav but real aim was to join hands with the BJP to sit in their lap to suppress Srijan scam."

He said Nitish Kumar has betrayed the people's mandate for personal interest and "he is the biggest socially corrupt leader in the country".

Tejashwi claimed that senior BJP leaders including Union Minister Griraj Singh, former Union Minister Shahnawaz Hussain, and party MP Nishikant Dubey were involved in the scam and they have looted government money.

"Srijan scam in Bihar is bigger than Vyapam scam in Madhya Pradesh. Both scams took place in BJP-ruled state," he said.

After the opposition RJD demanded a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the "mega scam", the Chief Minister last month recommended the same.

The CBI has already begun a probe into it.

The Srijan scam involves a Bhagalpur-based NGO, Srijan Mahila Vikas Sahyog Samiti Ltd, which used to provide vocational training to women.

The NGO allegedly pilfered funds meant for government welfare schemes from the bank accounts of the Bhagalpur district administration.

According to police, so far 20 people have been arrested and over two dozen FIRs, including 10 by CBI, have been lodged in connection with the scam.
AP

Television is one of the few screens that Apple hasn't conquered, but that may soon change. The world's richest company appears ready to aim for its own Emmy-worthy programming along the lines of HBO's Game of Thrones and Netflix's Stranger Things.

While $1 billion is a lot of money, it's a drop in the bucket for Apple and its $262 billion cash hoard. But it's still enough to vault Apple into the top tier of tech-industry outsiders producing their own slates of television shows.

History not repeating

Hollywood has long shuddered at the thought of Apple training its sights on TV the way it once did in the music business.

Almost 15 years ago, Apple's the then-CEO Steve Jobs convinced record labels to let the company sell digital music on its iTunes store for 99 cents a single, a deal the music industry was happy to take in the face of growing music piracy enabled by Napster. Over time, though, Apple's dominance in digital music chafed music executives, who saw the company siphoning off a chunk of their profits.

Movies and television have proven much harder for Apple to crack. The company's interest in transforming television has been an open secret for years, but Hollywood has so far spurned Apple's efforts to make itself an indispensable digital middleman for video.

In a way, Netflix beat Apple to the punch with its ground breaking video streaming service. Launched in 2007, that service pioneered "binge watching" of entire TV seasons on any device with an internet connection. That gave new life to existing shows such as "Breaking Bad," whose creator credits Netflix with its survival, and spawned the creation of other series tailor-made for bingeing.

Netflix also helped unleash a crescendo of creativity in Hollywood. Follow-on rivals Amazon and Hulu also boast popular video streaming services, and mainstream broadcasters such as CBS and Walt Disney Co., the owner of ABC and ESPN, among other networks, are also jumping in.

Business necessity

All of that has increased the pressure on Apple to step up its game in TV, not least because the increasing popularity of streaming is hurting its business of renting and selling video from iTunes.

Apple "doesn't want to be left behind," said Debby Ruth, senior vice president of consumer research firm Magid. "This is a way for them to put a stake in the ground."

This year, the company released its first two original series, Planet of the Apps and Carpool Karaoke, on its Apple Music service, which has 27 million subscribers. But neither show has generated much buzz or critical acclaim.

The recent hiring of Erlicht and Van Amburg signaled Apple's intent to make a bigger splash. The executives have helped orchestrate several TV hits, including AMC's Breaking Bad, and more recently branched out into video streaming with The Crown, which landed on Netflix last year and is up for 13 Emmy nominations in the 17 September ceremony.

Apple also has a not-so-secret weapon: hundreds of millions of iPhones and iPads already in the hands of faithful fans. It could easily transform those into a marketing platform to lure users to its TV service.

Making it in Hollywood

But the company has a steep hill to climb.

Netflix has more than 100 million worldwide subscribers and a video library that will add 1,000 hours of original programming this year alone. And HBO has become the Emmys' pacesetter since branching into original programming 20 years ago.

Both companies vastly outspend Apple's reported $1 billion production budget. HBO spends about $2 billion annually on its programming, which garnered 111 nominations in this year's Emmy Awards, more than any other network. Netflix, which boasts the second most Emmy nominations with 91, expects to spend $6 billion on programming this year.

Apple is still experimenting in TV, said Gene Munster, a longtime Apple watcher and managing partner with the research and venture capital firm Loup Ventures. "In five years, I bet Apple will either be investing $10 billion a year in content or zero," said Munster. "It's going to be one or the other."

Job's legacy

Jobs discussed his ambitions to shake up TV with his biographer Walter Issacson shortly before his death in 2011. "He very much wanted to do for television sets what he had done for computers, music players, and phones: make them simple and elegant," Isaacson wrote.

But no Apple television ever materialized. Instead, Apple has periodically upgraded its Apple TV, which isn't a television, just a video streaming player that connects to TVs. That device has been losing market share to other streaming players made by Roku, Amazon, and Google, according to the research firm Park Associates.

Building a successful programming line-up could give Apple more leverage to license shows from other Hollywood production houses. It might even embolden the company to finally release its own streaming TV set.

Apple will presumably also want to emulate Netflix's ability to exploit usage data to determine what it thinks audiences want to watch. Netflix's data analysis has helped it attract 25.5 million more subscribers in the U.S. alone since the February 2013 debut of its first original series, House of Cards.

But if Apple decides it needs a little more help in video streaming, Munster thinks there's in one-in-three chance that it will buy Netflix to instantly gain the cachet and expertise in TV programming that it craves.
tech2 News Staff

The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) twice successfully flight tested India's indigenously developed third generation Anti Tank Guided Missile (ATGM) 'Nag' in Rajasthan on Friday.

The missile hit both the targets under different ranges and conditions with very high accuracy as desired by the armed forces, an official statement said.

"With these two successful flight trials, and the flight test conducted earlier in June in the peak of summer, the complete functionality of Nag ATGM along with launcher system NAMICA has been established and marked the successful completion of development trials of Nag Missile," the release said.

India on 3 July successfully test-fired an indigenously developed short-range and Quick Reaction Surface to Air missile (QRSAM) from Chandipur along the Odisha coast. The missile was test-fired from Launch Complex-3 at the Integrated Test Range (ITR) around 11.30 a.m from a truck-mounted canister launcher, said official sources.

"All the technologies and subsystems incorporated in the missile have performed well, meeting all the mission requirements," an official statement said. "All the Radars, Electro Optical Systems, Telemetry Systems and other stations have tracked the Missile and monitored all the parameters. The missile test met all the objectives."

Defence Minister Arun Jaitley congratulated the DRDO (Defence Research and Development Organisation) over the successful launch. "Congratulations to DRDO for successfully test-firing Quick Reaction Surface to Air Missile. This will add to India's defence capabilities," Jaitley said in a tweet.

With inputs from IANS.
Reuters

France, Germany, Italy, and Spain want digital multinationals like Amazon and Google to be taxed in Europe based on their revenues, rather than only profits as now, their finance ministers said in a joint letter.

France is leading a push to clamp down on the taxation of such companies but has found support from other countries also frustrated at the low tax they receive under current international rules.

Currently, such companies are often taxed on profits booked by subsidiaries in low-tax countries like Ireland even though the revenue originated from other EU countries.

We should no longer accept that these companies do business in Europe while paying minimal amounts of tax to our treasuries, the four ministers wrote in a letter seen by Reuters.

The letter, signed by French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, Wolfgang Schaeuble of Germany, Pier-Carlo Padoan of Italy, and Luis de Guindos, was addressed to the EUs Estonian presidency with the blocs executive Commission in the copy.

They urged the Commission to come up with a solution creating an equalization tax on turnover that would bring taxation to the level of corporate tax in the country where the revenue was earned.

The amounts raised would aim to reflect some of what these companies should be paying in terms of corporate tax, the ministers said in the letter, first reported on by the Financial Times.

Le Maire, Schaeuble, Padoan, and de Guindos of Spain said they wanted to present the issue to other EU counterparts at a meeting from 15 September to 16 September, in Tallinn.

The EUs current Estonian presidency has scheduled a discussion at the meeting about the concept of permanent establishment, with the aim of making it possible to tax firms where they create value, not only where they have their tax residence.

France has stepped up pressure for EU tax rules after facing legal setbacks trying to obtain payments for taxes on activities in the country.
tech2 News Staff

The United Arab Emirates will be participating in the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation's first summit on science and technology here from 10 September to 11 September.

Ahmad bin Abdulla Humaid Belhoul AlFalasi, Minister of State for Higher Education, who is representing the UAE, said that Muslims have laid down a great human civilisation and during the Islamic era, the world witnessed an unprecedented prosperity in the science of medicine, pharmacy, chemistry, astronomy, philosophy, and others due to the many achievements of Islamic scholars.

During the opening session, OIC Secretary-General Yousef bin Ahmad Al-Othaimeen said that the Astana summit would witness a historic milestone, as it will evolve a unified collective position with a view to advancing the different fields of science, technology, and innovation.

AlFalasi added that the UAE believed in the importance and the role of science and knowledge, as they are the cornerstone of economic diversification, stressing that the UAE was a pioneer in many fields, as it officially entered the world race to explore outer space through its "Mars Hope" project, the first Arab mission to another planet.

Other than UAE, NASA's next Mars mission known as InSight, which is scheduled for a 2018 lift-off, is set to focus on examining the deep interior of Mars, the US space agency had announced.

With inputs from IANS
Kabul: Gunmen shot and killed at least two people in eastern Kapisa province, including the provincial chief of a religious council, a provincial official said.

Qais Qaderi, spokesman for the provincial governor, said on Monday the religious council chief, Mullah Gul Mohammad Hanafyar, was the target of the attack.

He died from his wounds on the way to a hospital. His security guard was the second victim. The attack was carried out by gunmen riding a motorcycle who shot Hanafyar as he was about to exit his vehicle near his home, said Qaderi.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, but Qaderi said that as many as eight suspects have been arrested and an investigation is underway.

Elsewhere, in western Farah province four police officers were shot and killed by insurgents, said Mohammad Naser Mehri, a spokesman for the provincial governor.

Mehri said that the attack took place Friday while all four officers were travelling from Bala Buluk district to Farah city.

No one claimed responsibility for this attack either, but Taliban insurgents are active in Bala Buluk and often attack security check points and target Afghan security forces using roadside bombs.
Students of McKinley Tech students in Washington DC were in for a big surprise on Friday as they were greeted by none other than former US president Barack Obama.

Welcoming students for their new academic year, Obama casually asked the students if they minded him crashing their class for the day.

The utter shock on students' faces can be seen in a video shared on Obama's official Instagram account as he asks, "How's it going, everybody?"

These young people that I met at McKinley Tech today are the reason I'm hopeful about the future. To all the young people headed back to school around the country: Make us proud. You're the next generation of leaders, and we need you. A post shared by Barack Obama (@barackobama) on Sep 8, 2017 at 2:26pm PDT

After the shock wore off, Obama told the class that he believed that young people held the potential to solve the world's problems.

One of the things I did throughout my presidency was Id meet with groups of young people everywhere I went, whether it was here in the United States or when I was traveling overseas...Just to kind of hear from them, find out what theyre interested in, because I do believe that most of the problems we have are going to be solved by you," he said.

Posting a photo of the interaction on Twitter, Obama also added that young minds make him hopeful about the future.

Obama's senior adviser Eric Schultz also a tweeted this photo that perfectly captures the disbelief on the faces of the student.

@BarackObama made a surprise visit to McKinley Tech HS here in DC to welcome back students as they start a new school year. pic.twitter.com/Y64tAE0KBl  Eric Schultz (@EricSchultz) September 8, 2017

Not just the students, but Obama's surprise visit thrilled the internet as the video went viral and was viewed over two million times.
Jerusalem: From an argument over dog poo to an alleged anti-Semitic caricature he posted on Facebook, Yair Netanyahu, the Israeli prime ministers 26-year-old son, is courting controversy with his social media activity.

The criticism of Netanyahu in Israel is turning into a sideshow to more weighty events: criminal investigations into corruption allegations against his father and mother.

They both deny any wrongdoing.

The young Netanyahu is widely seen in Israel as being groomed by his parents as a future political leader and the Facebook posts have attracted particular public interest.

On Saturday, he posted a cartoon using what the Anti-Defamation League, which monitors anti-Semitism worldwide, described as anti-Semitic imagery in a Facebook post mocking some of his fathers critics.

It included a depiction of United States billionaire George Soros at the top of a food chain, dangling the world in front of both a reptile and former prime minister Ehud Barak, a frequent critic of Netanyahu.

Jewish financiers controlling the world is a well-known anti-Semitic theme. Soros supports left-wing and human rights organisations that have been highly critical of Israel and its treatment of Palestinians.

The Israel office of the Anti-Defamation League denounced the cartoon on Twitter, writing: The caricature posted by Yair Netanyahu includes explicit anti-Semitic elements. One cannot belittle the danger inherent in an anti-Semitic discourse.

In further Facebook posts following criticism for posting the cartoon, Yair Netanyahu, who is a university student, condemned the Israeli left for being two-faced in trying to silence him.

A family spokesman said Yair Netanyahu would not be making any other comment. The prime minister refused to ask questions from reporters about the post on Sunday morning at the start of his weekly cabinet meeting.

In August, the son made another headline-grabbing post after a protester was killed during a white nationalist rally in the United States state of Virginia.

It appeared to suggest that hard-left organisations now pose more of a danger than neo-Nazi groups, which he wrote are a dying breed.

In July, Netanyahu junior found himself in a bizarre social media row over dog poo.

A neighbour of the family said on Facebook that Yair, who lives with his parents, responded with an obscene gesture and walked away after she had asked him to clean up the mess left by the dog he was walking in a park.

The post went viral. A family spokesman said at the time that the woman had behaved aggressively and Yair does not know if Kaiya (the dog) did defecate as (she) alleges.

Some critics in Israel suggested Netanyahus online activities were meant to deflect attention from his parents legal troubles.

On Friday, Israels attorney-general said he was considering indicting Sara Netanyahu on suspicion of using state funds for personal dining and catering services amounting to some $100,000.

Benjamin Netanyahu, who has served as prime minister for 11 years, spread over four terms, is being investigated by police in two corruption cases.
Washington: Florida governor Rick Scott on Saturday said 6.5 million people were ordered to evacuate ahead of Irma and that 70,000 people have moved into 385 shelters across the state.

"There's still room for more," CNN quoted him as saying. He said that more shelters would be opened on Saturday.

"Protecting life is our top priority. No resource or expense will be spared to protect families," Scott added.

Meanwhile, Florida Power and Light (FPL) estimated that nearly 3.4 million of its customers could be without power at some point during Hurricane Irma.

If that comes to pass, it will be the largest number of outages they have ever had to deal with, FPL spokesman Chris McGrath told CNN.

"We think this could be the most challenging restoration in the history of the US," McGrath said.

The governor said that 76,000 customers had already lost power.
Miami: Hurricane Irma began pummelling Florida, threatening almost the entire southeastern American state after cutting a deadly path of destruction through the Caribbean.

Tens of thousands of Floridians were hunkering down in shelters for a direct hit from the monster storm, after more than 6.3 million  nearly a third of the state's population  were ordered to evacuate.

For those still at home, it was already too late to escape the wrath of what could be the worst hurricane in storm-prone Florida.

"If you have been ordered to evacuate anywhere in the state, you need to leave right now. Not tonight. Not in an hour. Now. You are running out of time to make a decision," Governor Rick Scott said hours before wind gusts began to lash the island chain known as the Florida Keys.

He said some 76,000 people had already lost power, cautioning that "it's going to get worse... This is going to be massive."

At North Collier Regional Park, a designated shelter just outside the city of Naples, anxious evacuees prayed they and their loved ones would remain safe when the storm made landfall.

"All we wanted to make sure is to feel safe and whatever happens we just have to start I guess from the beginning," Viviana Sierra said.

MacDill Air Force Base, the military installation home to United States Central Command, issued mandatory evacuation orders with the eye of the storm expected to pass over its home city of Tampa early Monday. The Kennedy Space Center was also closed.

The White House said President Donald Trump, Vice-President Mike Pence and their cabinet were briefed on Hurricanes Irma and Jose, with Trump warning on Twitter that "this is a storm of enormous destructive power."

After blasting through the nearby Cuban coastline, Irma weakened from a maximum-strength Category Five to a Category Three storm, though it was still packing winds of 125 miles (200 kilometer) per hour.

With near-hurricane force winds lashing the Florida Keys starting around 8 pm (1 am GMT), the Miami-based National Hurricane Center (NHC) warned that "Irma is forecast to restrengthen" as it approaches mainland Florida.

There was a serious threat of flooding from storm surges of up to 4.5 meters along Florida's west coast  enough to cover a house.

At least 25 people have been killed since Irma began its devastating march through the Caribbean earlier this week.

Terrified Cubans who rode out Irma in coastal towns after the storm made landfall Friday on the Camaguey archipelago reported "deafening" winds, uprooted trees and power lines, and blown rooftops.

There were no immediate reports of casualties, but officials reported "significant damage." A total of 1.5 million people were evacuated.

In Florida, cities on both the east and west coasts of the peninsular state took on the appearance of ghost towns, as nervous residents heeded insistent evacuation orders.

The storm was expected to move along or near Florida's southwest Gulf coast by Sunday afternoon.

But Irma is so wide that authorities were bracing for destructive storm surges on both coasts and the Keys, the chain of low-lying islands that stretch south of Miami toward Cuba.

And hurricane-force winds are expected to lash the peninsula as it rolls north toward Georgia.

A tornado funnel cloud has already formed off the coast of Fort Lauderdale, with the NHC warning that "a few" more were possible in south and central Florida.

On highway 75 along the western coast of Florida, a steady stream of cars pressed northward as thousands fled at the last minute from the fast-approaching killer hurricane.

Bumper-to-bumper traffic snaked north out of the state, with mattresses, gas cans and kayaks strapped to car roofs.

Strip malls, fast food restaurants and retail giants were all closed for business.

In Key West, police opened a "shelter of last resort" for those who had ignored mandatory evacuation orders.

Scott Abraham, who lives on the fifth floor of a beachfront apartment building in Miami Beach, is planning to ignore evacuation orders and ride the storm out with his wife and two kids.

"If I lived in a house I would have left, but if it gets flooded here it's going to take a week at least to come back. I don't want that," he said.

Warning that Irma would be worse than Hurricane Andrew  which killed 65 people in 1992  Scott, Florida's governor, said all 20.6 million Floridians should prepare to flee.

Cuban-American Orlando Reyes, 82, was forced to leave his assisted living facility in Miami Beach.

"It is frightening," he told AFP at a shelter in Miami. "We had to leave without a cent, without taking a bath, or bringing anything."

The storm smashed through a string of Caribbean islands, beginning with tiny Barbuda on Wednesday, followed by the holiday islands of Saint Barthelemy and Saint Martin.

Also affected were the US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, Haiti and the Turks and Caicos. The Bahamas were spared Irma's worst.

"Houses are smashed, the airport is out of action," Saint Barthelemy resident Olivier Toussaint said.

"Upside-down cars are in the cemeteries. Boats are sunk in the marina, shops are destroyed."

Another powerful storm, Category Four Hurricane Jose, was heading toward the same string of Caribbean islands Irma has pummelled in recent days, though it was now forecast to be weaker than initially expected.

The deteriorating weather grounded aircraft and prevented boats from bringing relief supplies to hard-hit islands.

The United States military was mobilising thousands of troops and deploying several large ships to aid with evacuations and humanitarian relief, as the Air Force removed scores of planes from the southern United States.
Washington: Millions of people, including thousands of Indian-Americans, in Florida braced for Hurricane Irma as it regained strength as a Category 4 storm and aimed towards the coastal US state with wind speed of 210 kilometres per hour.

Around 120,000 Indian-Americans reside across Florida while thousands of them live in the now-dangerous zones of Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Tampa.

Miami and Tampa appeared "ghost towns" as nervous residents, many of whom struggled to cope with abandoning their homes, moved to safer places following mandatory evacuation notices.

The National Weather Service (NWS) said Irma regained strength as a Category 4 storm  after being downgraded to Category 3 for more than 12 hours  as it moved to Florida.

The deadly storm is expected to hit the US mainland around 7 am local time on Sunday. Its outer rain bands lashed the Florida Keys, the NWS said. A 127 kilometres per hour gust was recorded as Irma drew closer to Florida, CNN reported.

The Indian embassy in the US has opened a round-the-clock helpline number and rushed senior diplomats to Atlanta to lead relief efforts for Indian-Americans stuck in the region.

The hotline number is 202-258-8819.

Embassy officials said India's ambassador to the US Navtej Sarna was closely monitoring the situation.

Sandeep Chakravorty, India's consul-general in New York, was in Atlanta overseeing preparation for relief efforts from a 24X7 control room.

The Indian Consulate in Atlanta tweeted helpline numbers (+14044052567 & +1678179393) for people seeking assistance.

"Atlanta is fully prepared to take care of evacuees from Florida. Some have already reached. Consulate is on call 24x7," it said in another tweet.

External affairs ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar tweeted 24X7 helpline at High Commission of India, Kingston (+1876 833 4500; +1876 564 1378). He also tweeted email ids for Indians to contact in case of emergency: hc.kingston@mea.gov.in; hoc.kingston@mea.gov.in.

The Indian Friends of Atlanta  in association with the Consulate-General of India, the Gujarat Samaj Atlanta and the Hindu Temple of Atlanta  have operationalised three shelters.

They were preparing to open more shelters and provide food. Several Indian businesses have started contributing to relief efforts.

The hurricane has almost ruined the Caribbean islands as a Category 5 storm. At least 24 people died as the storm swirled over the region and hit Cuba on Saturday on its way to Florida.

The Indian embassy in Venezuela tweeted the helpline number in Aruba, a tiny Dutch Caribbean island off the coast of Venezuela, for the situation in Sint Maarten: 00297-593-2552.

The helpline numbers in Curacao, a Dutch Caribbean island, is 005999-513-2407; 005999-690-2686.

The Indian embassy in the Netherlands said countrymen affected by Irma can reach them on: 0031643743800.

Those affected in Cuba, Dominican Republic and Haiti can contact Indian authorities on emergency no. +5352131818 or email them at: controlroomindiairma@gmail.com.

Almost entire Florida was under hurricane warning. At least 36 million people have been affected by the hurricane.

US president Donald Trump reviewed preparedness with his cabinet colleagues at Camp David in Maryland. He asked federal and state agencies expedite assistance to affected areas.

"This is a storm of enormous destructive power, and I ask everyone in the storm's path to pay heed to all instructions from government officials," Trump said.

Florida governor Rick Scott asked people to move out of the danger zones as soon as possible. "The state has never seen anything like this. The storm's surge can kill you."

The US Army has so far deployed more than 7,400 soldiers and US Army Corps of Engineers civilians on the US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and the continental US.

The Pentagon said the army has over 140 aircraft, 650 trucks, 150 boats prepared, additional resources on standby.

AccuWeather, a forecast weather agency, warned Irma will unleash destructive winds, flooding, rain and inundating seas.

"Unfortunately, there is no way the US is going to avoid another catastrophic weather event," AccuWeather president Joel N Myers said.

"[It will be] the worst single hurricane to hit Florida since Hurricane Andrew in 1992," Myers said.
Dubai: Iran says it warned off a US Navy warship during a rescue of a boat in the Gulf of Oman, while American officials say there was no direct contact.

The US Navy said Sunday the incident happened Wednesday and involved a small vessel some 75 nautical miles from the USS Tempest, a coastal patrol boat. The Navy says another boat much closer offered assistance, with that vessel communicating with Iranian naval forces.

Iran offered a different version of the incident. Press TV, the English-language arm of its state broadcaster, said Sunday that the Iranian navy "warned off an American warship" while rescuing the stranded dhow, a traditional ship.

The US and Iran routinely have tense encounters in the Persian Gulf.
Islamabad: Ousted Pakistan prime minister Nawaz Sharif's daughter Maryam Nawaz on Sunday said a very large number of people have rejected the apex court's verdict that saw her father's disqualification in the Panama Papers scandal.

Maryam was addressing a group of lawyers in Model Town, Lahore, in connection with the election campaign for her mother Kulsoom Nawaz.

Kulsoom, who is currently in London being treated for cancer, was given ticket by the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) for contesting the 17 September by-poll in NA-120 for the seat that fell vacant following Sharif's disqualification by the Supreme Court on 28 July.

Referring to the recent lawyers' convention held in Lahore, the scion of the ruling party said: "It was indeed a historic event and overwhelming presence of lawyers at the convention has sent a strong message to the entire world, particularly our rivals."

Maryam went on to say that as scores of lawyers attended the gathering, Opposition parties had no option but to claim that PML-N workers were provided with black coats for the event.

Majority of people, she said, have rejected outright the apex court's 28 July ruling against Nawaz Sharif.
Moscow: Russian police detained people from a crowd of about 200 protesters Sunday in Saint Petersburg who had gathered over the crackdown on the Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar.

The square in the city centre was surrounded with police vans and policemen were leading people away into the vans, an AFP correspondent at the scene said, counting over 100 detained at the unauthorised demonstration.

"Our brothers are being detained! Why are Muslims always to blame, why are they detaining us?" one protester shouted.

"Why can't we express ourselves," complained another protester, Makhmud, 45. "We are worried about what is happening with our brothers in Myanmar."

The plight of the Rohingya minority in Myanmar, where nearly 300,000 have fled their homes from what they say are state-orchestrated mass killings into neighbouring Bangladesh, has seen Russia's Muslims stage several protests, particularly after a call by Chechen strongman Ramzan Kadyrov.

Thousands rallied in Chechnya's main city Grozny last week as Kadyrov called on Moscow to "stop this bloodshed" in a rare break from his public image as a fervent loyalist of President Vladimir Putin.

Moscow however has been mute over Myanmar. "We're against any sort of violence," Putin said Tuesday when asked about Kadyrov's position, adding that "any person has a right to his opinion regardless of his post."

Russia and Myanmar are also allies who signed a military cooperation agreement last year, with Moscow of having exported military aircraft and artillery to the country.
London: NATO secretary general Jens Stoltenberg said on Sunday that North Korea's nuclear and missile programme represented a "global threat and requires a global response".

In an interview with the BBC, he also refused to say whether an attack on the Pacific US territory of Guam would trigger the military alliance's collective defence clause.

"The reckless behaviour of North Korea is a global threat and requires a global response, and that of course also includes NATO," Stoltenberg told The Andrew Marr Show.

"We call on Korea to abandon its nuclear programmes, it's missile programmes, and to refrain from more testing, because this is a blatant violation of several UN security resolutions and it's a threat to international peace and stability."

Asked whether a strike against Guam would be covered under the clause that commits NATO members to come to the defence of each other, he said: "I will not speculate about whether Article Five will be applied in such a situation.

"What I will say is we are now totally focused on how can we contribute to a peaceful solution of the conflict," he added.
London: The UK's prestigious Cambridge University is mulling scrapping an over 800-year-old practice of handwritten exams in favour of using laptops or iPads due to the deterioration in students' handwriting.

A growing reliance on laptops has led to students writing becoming increasingly illegible, academics said.

The move would see an end to more than 800 years of tradition after students increasingly chose to use laptops to take down lecture notes.

Cambridge University has now launched a consultation on the topic as part of its "digital education strategy", having already piloted an exam typing scheme in the History and Classics faculties earlier this year, The Telegraph reported.

Dr Sarah Pearsall, a senior lecturer at Cambridge's History Faculty who was involved with the pilot earlier this year, said that handwriting is becoming a "lost art" among the current generation of students.

"Fifteen or twenty years ago students routinely have written by hand several hours a day - but now they write virtually nothing by hand except exams," she told the daily.

"As a faculty, we have been concerned for years about the declining handwriting problem. There has definitely been a downward trend. It is difficult for both the students and the examiners as it is harder and harder to read these scripts," she said.

Pearsall said that an increasing number of scripts are having to be transcribed centrally, meaning that students with illegible writing are forced to come back to their college during the summer holidays to read their answers aloud in the presence of two university administrators.

She said it is "extraordinarily commendable" that the University is considering reforms to its examination practises.

However, not everybody seems to be happy with such a move.

Some have voiced fears that the "handwritten word (could) become a matter of nostalgia".

Tracey Trussell, a handwriting expert at the British Institute of Graphologists, urged Cambridge to "make sure that students continue to write by hand, particularly in lectures".

"Certainly with social media, iPads, and all the rest of it, people do clearly use keyboards much more than they would hand write," she said.

"It's vital that people continue to write by hand," she added.

There is also concern that schools could follow Cambridges example by moving away from handwriting.

A spokesman for Cambridge University was quoted as saying that their review of exam procedures was "prompted by students raising concerns that they rarely handwrite during their studies".

"As part of this, a consultation is being conducted among students on whether computers should be allowed in exams," the spokesperson said.

"The consultation is ongoing and will be used to inform future decision-making on the issue," the spokesperson said.
Seoul: North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un praised the "perfect success" of the country's sixth and largest nuclear test and urged further weapons development, according to state media on Sunday, in the face of a US drive for tough new sanctions.

Pyongyang held a banquet, concert and performances in a weekend display of pageantry to celebrate the 3 September nuclear test, which the North said was a hydrogen bomb that could be fitted onto a rocket.

The blast, which came weeks after the country fired off two intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) that appeared to bring much of the mainland US into range, prompted global condemnation and calls to ramp up sanctions against the isolated nation.

But the North's leader appeared deaf to the international outrage and hailed the "perfect success in the test of H-bomb" at a dinner to congratulate the scientists and technicians behind the nuclear programme, the official Korean Central News Agency reported today.

Dubbing the latest test the "great auspicious event of the national history", he called for "redoubled efforts" to complete the country's mission to fully become a recognised nuclear power.

A two-page spread carried by the North's official Rodong Sinmun newspaper on Sunday showed photos of Kim and his wife Ri Sol-Ju attending a special concert held for the nuclear scientists and technicians.

A slew of brazen tests in recent months, which contravene existing United Nations sanctions, has sparked surging tensions over the North Korean weapons programme.

Pyongyang says it needs nuclear arms to protect itself, but the US has accused the isolated nation of "begging for war".

In an interview published on Sunday, United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres said the showdown over North Korea's nuclear and missile programme was the world's worst crisis "in years" and had left him deeply worried.

"We have to hope that the seriousness of this threat puts us on the path of reason before it is too late," said Guterres in the French Sunday newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche.

He also called for unity in the UN Security Council, which is set to consider a new draft resolution presented by Washington in recent days that would be the toughest-ever imposed on North Korea.

The US is calling for an oil embargo on the North, an assets freeze on Kim Jong-Un, a ban on textiles and an end to payments of North Korean guest workers.

It is hoping for vote tomorrow though both China and Russia are thought to have raised opposition to the measures.
Astana: Pakistan president Mamnoon Hussain and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Sunday discussed the issue of Rohingya Muslims being persecuted in Myanmar.

The two leaders met on the sidelines of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) summit on science and technology in Astana, Kazakhastan.

Both leaders discussed bilateral relations and pledged to further solidify the long-term relationship, Foreign Office spokesperson Nafees Zakaria said.

Besides, they also spoke about regional issues including that of Afghanistan.

Lauding Islamabad's role in eliminating terror and restoration of peace in the region, Erdogan pledged his country's support to Pakistan's efforts for a peaceful resolution to the Afghan conflict, Zakaria said.

Separately, while addressing the OIC summit, President Hussain said Muslim countries around the globe should make collective efforts for the development of science and technology to meet the challenges of the new era.

Highlighting rapid changes occurring in the fields of science and technology, Hussain emphasised the need for enhanced focus of the Muslim world to improve the agricultural production and develop agricultural technology sector.

"With solid foundations of education and skilled healthy manpower, it will be possible to focus on higher education and research in emerging areas of science and technology," the president said. "Unity among the Muslim Ummah is very imperative for development, prosperity and a safe future for the new generation."

The president regretted that Muslim countries had failed to pay attention to education for the last several centuries, adding it was crucial for the Muslim nations to be self-sufficient in political and socio-economic sector "to revive the golden era of education".
Bangladesh's foreign minister said Sunday that genocide was being waged in Myanmar's violence-racked Rakhine state, triggering an exodus of nearly 3,00,000 Muslim Rohingya to his country.

"The international community is saying it is a genocide. We also say it is a genocide," AH Mahmood Ali told reporters after briefing diplomats in Dhaka.

Ali met Western and Arab diplomats and the heads of UN agencies based in Bangladesh to seek support for a political solution and humanitarian aid for the Rohingya.

He told the diplomats that some 3,00,000 Rohingya had fled to Bangladesh in the past two weeks, taking the total number of such refugees in the country to over 7,00,000.

"It is now a national problem," Ali said.

At least two diplomats who attended the briefings said the minister told them as many as 3,000 people may have been killed in the latest round of violence.

The United Nations says 2,94,000 bedraggled and exhausted Rohingya refugees have arrived in Bangladesh since attacks by Rohingya militants on Myanmar security forces in Rakhine on 25 August sparked a major military backlash.

Tens of thousands more are believed to be on the move inside Rakhine.

Mainly Buddhist Myanmar does not recognise its stateless Muslim Rohingya community, labelling them "Bengali" illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

Ali accused Myanmar of running a "malicious propaganda" campaign to term the Rohingya as "illegal migrants from Bangladesh" and the militants as "Bengali terrorists".

He said the Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine is a "mixed group of people" with a history dating back 1,500 years and ancestors included Arab and Indian-origin people.

Ali described actions following the militant attacks on security forces on 25 August as "revenge" by Myanmar troops.

"Should all people be killed? Should all villages be burnt? It is not acceptable," he said, adding Dhaka was seeking a peaceful solution, not a "war" against Myanmar.

"We did not create the problem. Since the problem started in Myanmar, that's why they should resolve. We have said we'll help them," he said, adding that the problem took a "new turn" after the 25 August attacks.

A commission led by former UN chief Kofi Annan last month said Myanmar must scrap restrictions on movement and citizenship for its Rohingya minority if it wants to avoid fuelling extremism and bring peace to Rakhine state.

Ali called on the international community to urge the Myanmar government to immediately implement the recommendations of the commission's report "in its entirety".

On Sunday, Rohingya militants, whose 25 August raids in Myanmar's Rakhine State sparked an army crackdown that has seen nearly 3,00,000 of the Muslim minority flee to Bangladesh, declared an immediate unilateral one-month ceasefire.

The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) hereby declares a temporary cessation of offensive military operations," it said in a statement on its Twitter handle @ARSA_Official, adding it was to allow for humanitarian aid to reach the battered region.
Yangon: Rohingya militants, whose 25 August raids in Myanmar's Rakhine State sparked an army crackdown that has seen nearly 3,00,000 of the Muslim minority flee to Bangladesh, declared an immediate unilateral one-month ceasefire on Sunday.

The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) hereby declares a temporary cessation of offensive military operations," it said in a statement on its Twitter handle @ARSA_Official, adding it was to allow for humanitarian aid to reach the battered region.

IMPORTANT: PRESS RELEASE

(10th Sept, 2017)#ARSA hereby declares a ceasefire from offensive military operations for one month from today. pic.twitter.com/DHBjQqnyIo  ARSA_The Army (@ARSA_Official) September 9, 2017

The group urged "all humanitarian actors" to resume aid delivery to "all victims of humanitarian crisis irrespective of ethnic or religious background" during the ceasefire period which runs until 9 October.

It urged Myanmar to "reciprocate this humanitarian pause" in fighting, with huge numbers of displaced moving across Rakhine many believed to be in desperate need of help after over two weeks of violence.

Its Twitter page is often the first to publish ARSA statements or direct readers to videos.

Sunday's statement was signed by Ata Ullah, who purportedly commands the militants from jungle bases straddling the Bangladesh-Myanmar border.

Better-known locally as Harakah al-Yaqin (Faith Movement), ARSA launched coordinated raids using hundreds of militants on 25 August on around 30 police posts and state offices in northern Rakhine state.

The kickback by security forces prompted the Rohingya exodus.

Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh say security forces and ethnic Rakhine Buddhists killed villagers indiscriminately during their crackdown, setting fire to hundreds of villages.

In an area split by claim and counterclaim, ethnic Rakhine villagers accuse militants of murdering their civilians while the government says fleeing Rohingya set fire to their own homes to forment fear and anti-state anger.

ARSA appears to have significantly grown in the last year despite remaining hopelessly outgunned against one of Asia's largest militaries.

According to statements and photos released by Myanmar's army, the militants use primitive weapons, including gunpowder rifles, homemade guns and bombs as well as clubs and swords.

Myanmar's army says it has killed nearly 400 militants so far in its "clearance operations", while some Rohingya refugees have complained they were forced to fight by ARSA.
Riyadh: Saudi Arabia on Saturday suspended any dialogue with Qatar, accusing it of distorting facts soon after a phone call between the rulers of both countries offered hope of a breakthrough in the three-month-old Gulf crisis.

Qatar's emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani , spoke to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to express interest in talks, state media from both sides said, in the first public dialogue between the leaders after the US president offered to mediate in the crisis.

Saudi Arabia led the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Bahrain in cutting ties with Qatar in June, accusing it of bankrolling Islamist extremist groups and of being too close to regional rival Iran. Doha denies the accusations.

The crown prince "welcomed this desire," the Saudi Press Agency (SPA) initially reported, adding "details will be announced after Saudi Arabia reaches an agreement with UAE and Bahrain and Egypt".But the prospect of a thaw quickly died down after SPA subsequently accused Qatar's state media of wrongly implying that Saudi Arabia had initiated the outreach.

"What was published by Qatar News Agency is continuation of Qatari authority's distortion of facts," SPA said, adding that any dialogue was now suspended.

The development came after US President Donald Trump on Friday spoke separately with the leaders of Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE.

"The President underscored that unity among the United States' Arab partners is essential to promoting regional stability and countering the threat of Iran," the White House said.

"The President also emphasised that all countries must follow through on commitments to defeat terrorism, cut off funding for terrorist groups, and combat extremist ideology." When he offered to mediate, Trump said he believed the dispute could be solved "fairly easily".

In Washington on Thursday, Kuwaiti Emir Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad Al-Sabah, a key figure involved in mediation attempts, met Trump and gave an upbeat assessment of his efforts so far. But in a statement early yesterday, the Saudi-led bloc had showed no signs of backing down as it questioned the Kuwaiti emir's statement that Qatar would be willing to accept their 13 demands.

The demands include shutting Doha-based broadcaster Al-Jazeera, closing a Turkish military base in the emirate and downgrading Qatari diplomatic ties with Iran.

The bloc also voiced "regret" about the Kuwaiti ruler's statement "on the success of mediation in stopping military intervention".

Instead, the four Arab states stressed that "the military option has not been and will not be considered" under any circumstances. Kuwait has emerged as a key mediator in the crisis, while the United States has given mixed signals on its policy.

Riyadh and Doha are both key allies of the United States. Trump, who chose Saudi Arabia for his first overseas visit as president in May, two weeks before the crisis erupted, immediately expressed staunch support for Saudi Arabia.

Some other US officials including Secretary of State Rex Tillerson have adopted a more measured tone.

Tillerson and Sheikh Mohammed announced in July they had signed an agreement to fight terrorism, built on decisions made at a Riyadh summit in May to "wipe terrorism from the face of the Earth".

Qatar hosts a huge US air base, home to the headquarters of Centcom the regional command which leads operations against the Islamic State jihadist group.

Sheikh Tamim is set to meet German Chancellor Angela Merkel for talks on 15 September, in what will be his first trip to a western capital since the crisis began.
Evidence submitted in a major 9/11 lawsuit against the Saudi Arabian government alleges that the Saudi Arabian embassy in Washington may have funded a 'dry run' for the hijacking of planes by two of its Saudi employees. This development comes after the passage of a US law last year that allows families of the victims of the 11 September attacks to sue the Saudi government.

According to the New York Post, an amended complaint with new proof is filed on behalf of the families of over 1,400 victims, who died in the 9/11 terrorist attacks 16 years ago. The complaint says that the Saudi Embassy paid for two Saudi nationals Mohammed al-Qudhaeein and Hamdan al-Shalawi, who were living undercover in the United States as students, to fly from Phoenix to Washington in a rehearsal for the conspiracy.

The 9/11 terror attacks were a series of coordinated attacks by the Islamist terrorist group Al-Qaeda on the United States.

According to ANI, the attacks killed 2,997 people, injured over 6,000 others, and caused at least $10 billion in infrastructure and property damage. It is to be noted that fifteen of the 19 men who carried out the 2001 attacks were Saudi nationals.

The class action lawsuit says that the Saudi Arabian government may have even been involved in sponsoring the attacks from the earliest stages, including testing cockpit security. Sean Carter, the lead attorney for the 9/11 plaintiffs, said that this is proof of the "longstanding and close relationships between Al-Qaeda and the religious components of the Saudi government".

The complaint also reportedly cites FBI documents which say that the "students" were part of the "kingdoms network of agents in the US who actively participated in the strike.

The New York Post reports that the FBI also confirmed that Qudhaeeins and Shalawis airline tickets for the alleged "dry run" were paid for by the Saudi Embassy in question.

The advocates for the case argue that this court filing shows, "a pattern of both financial and operational support" for the "conspiracy from official Saudi sources".

According to Al Jazeera, Saudi Arabia has always denied any involvement whatsoever in the attack on the World Trade Center. Waleed Nassar, an international disputes attorney told Al Jazeera "the evidence, along with much of what has been submitted, is innuendo and circumstantial".

ANI adds that Gulf countries were reportedly used to receive funds from banks in Pakistan and UAE, owned by the UAE royal family, to finance terror strikes in the US in 2001 and Mumbai in 2008.

The New York Post states that the lawyers representing Saudi Arabia have filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit, which may be headed towards trial as Congress has cleared diplomatic-immunity related obstructions. The 9/11 plaintiffs have been asked to respond to the motion by November.
Dhaka: Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will on Tuesday visit camps for Rohingya refugees in the southeastern part of the country, an official said even as the government allotted 2,000 acres of forest land in Cox's Bazar area to accommodate the refugees fleeing violence in Myanmar.

Hasina will be visiting the Kutupalang camp in Cox's Bazar, Ashraful Alam, deputy press secretary to the prime minister, told bdnews24.com on Sunday.

Rohingyas have arrived in Bangladesh in thousands fleeing violence in Myanmar's Rakhine state.

The Bangladesh government has also decided to prepare a biometric database of the Rohingya refugees, Dhaka Tribune reported.

"The numbers of the Rohingyas are increasing everyday and they have taken shelter in different places. So, we have allotted the land to keep them in one place," Shah Kamal, secretary in the disaster management and relief ministry, said while visiting Rohingya camps.

The passport directorate has been tasked to make a list of the Rohingyas with their names, photos and finger prints, an official said.

According to UN, more than 290,000 people are believed to have crossed the border from Myanmar to Bangladesh, tripling the Rohingya population in Cox's Bazar in two weeks.

Over the last few decades, almost half a million Rohingya Muslims have been living in two registered camps and makeshift settlements bordering Cox's Bazar, fleeing persecution and communal violence.

Myanmar does not recognise the Rohingya people as its citizens, neither has it responded to Bangladesh's frequent calls to take back the refugees, bdnews24 reported.

Attacks on a police camp in October last year sparked an influx of almost 87,000 refugees into Bangladesh. Fresh violence broke out on 25 August when insurgents attacked 30 police posts and an army base.

About 300,000 Rohingyas are said to have fled Rakhine and sought shelter across the border in Bangladesh in the weeks since the fresh violence.

As many as 400 people have been reported killed in fighting that has rocked the country's northwest, according to Myanmar officials.

Bangladesh has proposed creating "safe zones" run by aid groups for the Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine to stop hundreds of thousands of refugees crossing into its territory.

Dhaka had earlier suggested a joint operation with Myanmar forces on the border to wipe out militant and extremist forces, but Nay Pyi Taw has not responded.

In Buddhist-majority Myanmar, many consider the 1.1 million Rohingyas as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

Hasina said last week that Bangladesh was trying its best to support the refugees.

"We are also mounting pressure on Myanmar, so that their citizens can return to their homeland," she said on Thursday while addressing a meeting of the ruling Awami League's executive body.
Kabul: As many as 35 civilians have been kidnapped by militants of the Islamic State and Taliban in northern Afghanistan's Jawzjan province, locals said on Sunday.

"Both Islamic State and the Taliban have created checkpoints along the way between Qush Tipa and Darzab districts of the province, arresting individuals on charges of having links with the other side, and recently 35 people, all civilians, have been taken hostage by the two rival groups," a local resident was quoted as saying by Xinhua.

Meanwhile, Nasratullah Jamshidi, the press officer of the 209th Shaheen Corps of the Afghan National Army, confirmed the incident, saying he had received such a report.

Fighting has escalated in Afghanistan as the Taliban insurgency spreads from its traditional strongholds in the south and east to the once peaceful region in the north, where the militants have been recruiting from among the youth.
London: Two men arrested over a suspected neo-Nazi terror plot involving British Army soldiers were released on Sunday without being charged, police said.

The two were among five men  four soldiers and a civilian  who were arrested earlier this week over a plot linked to a banned far-right group National Action.

"No further action will be taken against the two men, both aged 24, from Northampton and Ipswich," West Midlands Police said.

Detectives have been granted more time to question the remaining three who include a 22-year-old from Birmingham, a 32-year-old arrested in Powys and a 24-year-old from Northampton, the police said.

The Northampton man was arrested in Cyprus and the UK ministry of defence had previously confirmed that he was held at the island's British Dhekelia base before being transferred to Royal Air Force (RAF) Akrotiri for a flight back to the UK.

The men are being held on suspicion of being concerned in the commission, preparation and instigation of acts of terrorism under the Terrorism Act 2000; namely on suspicion of being members of a proscribed organisation.

Three of the servicemen are believed to be from the Royal Anglian Regiment.

"The arrests were pre-planned and intelligence-led; there was no threat to the public safety," said a West Midlands Police spokesperson.

The arrests were carried out by police on September 5 in conjunction with counter-terror units from the West Midlands, Wales and the East Midlands. Several properties are being searched in connection with the arrests.

The police have not given further details of the men's activities but the "commission, preparation and instigation" of terrorism could include directly planning an attack, joining a prohibited group or giving effect to that intention.

National Action, a British far-right group, was banned last year by UK home secretary Amber Rudd.

"National Action is a racist, anti-Semitic and homophobic organisation which stirs up hatred, glorifies violence and promotes a vile ideology, and I will not stand for it. It has absolutely no place in a Britain that works for everyone," the minister had said at that time.

An entry for National Action in the UK's official list of proscribed organisation says it is a "racist neo-Nazi group" established in 2013. Its branches across the UK "conduct provocative street demonstrations and stunts aimed at intimidating local communities".

Its activities and propaganda materials are particularly aimed at recruiting young people, it says.

Being a member of or inviting support for a proscribed organisation is a criminal offence carrying a sentence of up to 10 years in prison under the British laws.

National Action describes itself as a "national socialist youth organisation" and says its movement is aimed at the "broken right-wing".

It has used social media to call for a "white jihad" and "crusade" in Britain.
Altria (NYSE: MO), the largest tobacco company in America, is generally considered a solid income investment. The company has hiked its dividend every year since spinning off its international business as Philip Morris International (NYSE: PM) in 2008, and it currently pays a forward yield of 4.2%.

I once owned Altria, but eventually sold it and bought some telecom stocks instead. But I've still been watching Altria to see if it's worth buying again. The stock seems cheap at 8 times earnings, but that P/E was reduced by the one-time windfall it received from AB InBev's (NYSE: BUD) buyout of SABMiller. Its forward P/E of 18 is more in line with its industry peers.

That high yield and low valuation should certainly limit Altria's downside potential. However, I'm still not buying the stock again for a simple reason -- its business model just isn't built to last.

Why will Altria eventually burn out?

As a domestic tobacco company, Altria's growth is tethered to adult smoking rates in America. According to the CDC, that percentage plunged from 42% to 15% between 1955 and 2015. To offset those declines, Altria usually raises prices, cuts costs, and repurchases stock to protect its earnings growth -- thus ensuring that it can keep paying its dividend.

But this strategy can't last forever. The average price of a pack of cigarettes already hovers around $10 in several states due to rising excise taxes. Altria's total smokeable product (including cigar) shipments fell 2.7% annually last quarter, with its flagship Marlboro brand and other premium brands leading that decline. Its discount brands experienced the smallest decline (0.5%), indicating that higher prices were impacting consumer choices.

Moreover, multinational tobacco giant British American Tobacco (NYSE: BTI) recently acquired Altria's biggest domestic rival, Reynolds American, to become the biggest publicly traded tobacco company in the world. That merger threatens Altria, especially if British American lowers prices on top Reynolds brands like Newport, Camel, and Natural American Spirit to gain U.S. market share against Altria.

To exacerbate that pain, the FDA announced new plans to regulate tobacco products in late July. The agency wants tobacco companies to reduce nicotine levels to "non-addictive" levels, and plans to review flavored cigarettes (like menthol) and e-cigarettes more closely. Those new rules could throttle sales of stronger cigarettes Marlboro, making it even harder for Altria to grow its revenues amid declining smoking rates and rising taxes.

But Altria can still tread water...

Altria knows that its smokeable business will eventually burn out. That's why it diversified into smokeless tobacco (snuff), wine, e-cigarettes, and a stake in brewery SABMiller -- which is now a stake in AB InBev. But those businesses still generate a tiny percentage of its revenue compared to its core cigarette business.

But investors also shouldn't worry about Altria's business falling off a cliff. Analysts expect its revenue to rise 2% this year and another 2% next year as it keeps offsetting lower shipments with higher prices. Altria's earnings are expected to grow 8% this year and 9% next year as cost-cutting measures and buybacks support its bottom line growth.

Thanks to a $5.3 billion pre-tax cash windfall from the SABMiller deal, Altria still has plenty of room to raise its dividend, buy back stock, or make additional acquisitions to widen its moat. There's also the possibility that Philip Morris International will buy Altria, reuniting the two halves of Philip Morris to counter British American's purchase of Reynolds.

The key takeaway

I don't think Altria is a bad investment. Its low valuation and high yield should support its stock price, and it still has room to hike prices in most states. But it also faces tough questions about its long-term growth amid declining smoking rates, tighter FDA regulations, and tougher competition from British American Tobacco.

Therefore, I'd prefer sticking with more reliable income stocks -- like telcos or utilities -- to get a comparable yield with a lot less drama.

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Leo Sun has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Anheuser-Busch InBev NV. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
The Urban Dictionary defines "adulting" as (in part) "to do grown up things and hold responsibilities." True financial adulting goes beyond paying your bills on time. It's also about planning for the future, managing debt, and mitigating risk.

How are you doing at financially adulting? Use this quiz to find out. Determine which statement best describes your financial adulting behavior. Add the points for each question to determine whether you're a pro or if you have some changes to make to get yourself together.

The Ultimate Financial Adulting Quiz

1. I describe my budgeting behavior as:

2. I handle debt in the following way:

3. I plan for my financial future by these actions:

4. I plan for risk in my life this way:

5. I manage important paperwork in the following way:

How did you do?

How to win at financial adulting

Anyone can win at financial adulting, but it takes planning and discipline.

First, create a budget and keep track of your spending. You can track it digitally or in a written log, but it's important to know where your money is going. Review your spending against your budget and make adjustments to your budget as needed.

Be aware of how much debt you incur. If you're constantly unable to pay off credit cards in full, you are living beyond your means, and you need to earn more or curb your spending. Having too much debt can affect every aspect of your life, from your credit score to your relationships to your employment.

It's important to have an emergency fund to handle unexpected expenses. If you don't have $500 in savings, set a goal to save that much immediately. Then try to save at least enough to cover six months' worth of expenses. If you ever lose your job, you'll be glad you did.

Invest for your retirement. If your employer has any type of defined contribution plan, like a 401(k), 403(b), TSP (Thrift Savings Plan), employee stock ownership plan, or profit-sharing plan, invest in it regularly. If your company offers a match, invest at least as much as you need to get the match; otherwise, you're giving up free money. If you work part-time or your employer doesn't offer a plan (or if you don't like your employer's plan), open an IRA to save for retirement.

Mitigate your risk by being appropriately insured. Currently, the individual health-insurance mandate requires that adults have health insurance or pay a fine on their taxes. Even if your plan doesn't cover everything, it will save you from financial devastation if you have an accident or unexpected health crisis.

If you have family or a business that would suffer from losing your income due to death or disability, you must get life and disability insurance. Term life insurance is fairly inexpensive. Even though thinking about death isn't fun, if you're financially adulting, you protect those who need you.

If you had to evacuate from your home, would you be able to grab your important documents quickly? Protect your important papers from ruin or theft by keeping them secure in a safe-deposit box, or a fireproof, water-resistant safe in your home. If you need to take them out to use them for something, secure them immediately when you are finished. Also, scan your important papers and save them to the cloud. If for some reason the originals are stolen or destroyed, it will be much easier to replace them if you have access to copies.

Financial adulting isn't always fun, but neither are other aspects of adulting like doing laundry or cleaning. However, becoming a master in financial adulting is important to many aspects of your life. Besides, next time you balance your checkbook, it will be fun to post to your social-media account that you're #winning at #financialadulting.

The $16,122 Social Security bonus most retirees completely overlook If you're like most Americans, you're a few years (or more) behind on your retirement savings. But a handful of little-known "Social Security secrets" could help ensure a boost in your retirement income. For example: one easy trick could pay you as much as $16,122 more... each year! Once you learn how to maximize your Social Security benefits, we think you could retire confidently with the peace of mind we're all after. Simply click here to discover how to learn more about these strategies.

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Hurricane Irma's path of destruction up Florida's Gulf Coast on Sunday threatens to disrupt a thriving state tourism industry worth more than $100 billion annually just months ahead of the busy winter travel season.

Some of the state's biggest attractions have announced temporary closures, including amusement park giants Walt Disney Worlds Magic Kingdom, Universal Studios, Legoland and Sea World, which all planned to close through Monday.

About 20 cruise lines have Miami as a home port or a port of call, according to the PortMiami website, and many have had to move ships out of the area and revise schedules.

Carnival Cruise Lines and Royal Caribbean have canceled and revised several sailings as a result of the storm and have offered credits and waivers on trips where passengers are unable to travel.

A Carnival spokesman said the situation in Florida on Sunday was still not clear enough to fully assess how widespread the effects will be.

"We will know more in the hours ahead since the hurricane is active in Florida right now," spokesman Roger Frizzell said.

Irma made a second Florida landfall on Sunday on southwestern Marco Island as a Category 3 storm bringing winds of 115 miles per hour (185 kph) and life-threatening sea surge.

Disney canceled the Monday sailing of one of its cruise ships and said it is assessing future sailings, which stop throughout the Caribbean and in the Bahamas.

Florida is one of the world's top tourism destinations. Last year nearly 113 million people visited the state, a new record, and spent $109 billion, state officials said earlier this year. The first half of 2017 was on track to beat that record pace, officials said.

The damage Irma's winds and storm surge do to Florida's 660 miles (1,060 km) of beaches and the structures built along them during more than 30 years of explosive population growth will be critical to how quickly the state's 's No. 1 industry recovers. The Gulf beaches west of St. Petersburg and Clearwater, are squarely in the storm's path.

In 2016, more than 6.3 million people visited Pinellas County, which encompasses those cities, and generated more $9.7 billion in economic activity.

Up and down the wide, sandy beaches of Pinellas County are traditional "old Florida" waterfront hotels such as the Don Cesar, a coral pink 1920s hotel on St. Pete Beach, which was closed by the storm. There are also modern high-rises and resorts that are part of the nations biggest chains and brands including Hyatt Hotels, Marriott International, Intercontinental Hotels Group, Hilton Hotels & Resorts and Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company.

The low-lying barrier islands would be inundated if Irma's storm surge reaches forecast heights of as high as 15 feet (4.6 meters).

While some newer structures in the area are built on elevated pilings, many older homes and businesses are not. (Reporting by Alana Wise and Caroline Humer; Editing by Joseph White and Mary Milliken)
Hurricane Harvey caused catastrophic amounts of damage to Texas and Louisiana, and at the end of last week, the Department of Energy authorized an emergency release of 500,000 barrels of oil to Phillips 66's (NYSE: PSX) Lake Charles refinery.

In this week's episode of Industry Focus: Energy, Sarah Priestley and Taylor Muckerman explain what that means. Find out what the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) is and what it does, whether investors should be worried about this dip into the emergency reserves, what Phillips 66 investors should know about the 500,000-barrel loan, what the not-too-distant future could hold for the SPR, and more.

A full transcript follows the video.

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This video was recorded on Sept. 7, 2017.

Sarah Priestley: Welcome to Industry Focus, the show that dives into a different sector of the stock market every day. Today we're talking energy and industrials. It's Thursday, seventh of September, and we're going to be discussing the Strategic Petroleum Reserve after a question from one of our wonderful listeners. Joining me in the studio is Motley Fool Canada premium analyst Taylor Muckerman. Taylor, thank you very much for joining me today!

Taylor Muckerman: Absolutely.

Priestley: Are you refreshed from the long weekend?

Muckerman: My lack of labor over the weekend. [laughs]

Priestley: [laughs] It was wonderful! As I said, today we're going to be talking about the SPR. Really, the reason we're talking about that is because of the sheer extent of the damage from Hurricane Harvey. We're going to be covering the SPR and its role during these emergency situations. Harvey, thankfully, is now past, although we were just talking about this, there's another three hurricanes apparently out there getting ready. Harvey dumped about 50 inches of rain on parts of Texas and Louisiana. Sadly, it took the lives of 42 people and 40,000 homes were damaged, so there's some serious implications of this. It's been truly terrible for Texas. Just awful images in the media depicting terrible devastation. And as so often happens in these times of crisis, some really wonderful stories of some really great people.

Muckerman: Yes.

Priestley: I saw a great one about people forming a human line to save a woman who was in labor from the floodwater, which is just incredible.

Muckerman: Wow. That's a story to tell your kids in a few years.

Priestley: It's true. Babies won't wait, that's the thing. Texan residents and business owners are left to survey the damage and long-term impact. Preliminary estimates for the cost of recovery are at $190 billion. That figure would make this the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history. Taylor, part of the reason for this, I think, is the concentration of U.S. oil producing and refining industry. Five of the largest U.S. oil refineries are on the Texas and Louisiana Gulf Coast. Two of the largest refineries are near Houston. What will be the aftermath of this? What are they going to be dealing with now?

Muckerman: You have the Lake Charles area, big for refining. The Corpus Christi area, big for refining. Corpus Christi is almost back to pre-Harvey levels. They expect that a few more days, they'll be able to be quite near fully online. You look at, about 20% of the nation's refining capacity was shut down, so that's a big deal. And as a result, you've seen gas prices spike the most since Hurricane Katrina. The average price for regular unleaded, up $0.33 nationwide, up to $2.65 for the average. So people are feeling it. And that's probably going to last for several weeks, especially as you see, like you mentioned, other hurricanes potentially on the way. BP is already evacuating some of its Gulf platforms ahead of Hurricane Irma. So certainly still some risk out there for higher prices. The chemical industry is still offline as well, out of the ethylene production that they need to produce plastics. That's offline. So not only gasoline -- oil and chemicals all impacted. It's going to take a while for the supply chains for these to kick back in.

Priestley: Yeah. I read somewhere that the flooding has been the biggest issue they're about to deal with. It's kind of dangerous sometimes, especially fracking, if they get water in the wells, to start up again. And the other thing that people have got to consider is, the EPA is investigating potentially hazardous carcinogens in the area as a result of some of the explosions that we saw that took a lot of the media that may not be a huge impact on those companies, but on the people around, they definitely will. The reason that we're touching on this is, at the end of last week, the 31st of August, Energy Secretary Rick Perry announced that the Department of Energy is releasing oil from its Strategic Petroleum Reserve in an attempt to mitigate some of this disruption that we're talking about. This authorized the release of 500,000 barrels to Phillips 66's refinery in Lake Charles. This is the first emergency release from the SPR since Hurricane Isaac hit Louisiana in 2012. We got a great question from a listener on Twitter asking, "What are the implications and impact of this?" But first, I thought it might be worth touching on what exactly the SPR is. So, Taylor?

Muckerman: Basically, it's our nation's fall-back plan, if oil imports either get disrupted or we necessarily have to cut off oil imports for any diplomatic reasons. So I think we have about 140-some days of technically U.S. demand for oil, which would then probably be used for gasoline and other things to keep the nation running for almost half a year. So tap this every now and then. It hasn't been tapped in a few years. I think President Obama did it at least once during his two terms as president. I don't think it's necessarily anything to get in an uproar about. It's only 500,000 barrels in this case out of a few hundred million, 700 million, I believe, just north of that. And we're at peak capacity right now in terms of how much oil is actually in the SPR. So it's not like we're starting from a position of weakness letting this out. And in this case, Phillips 66 is a company that tapped it for 500,000 barrels, and they do have to refill it and then some once the term of the agreement -- I haven't seen exactly how long they have to replace this, but I imagine it's not immediate.

Then, for the company itself, you look at it and the refinery that they're using this oil at, it's completely online, so we already talked about high gas prices, so maybe just try to take advantage of the fact that they still can refine some oil. This is in Lake Charles. They do have other refineries that aren't completely online. So maybe just trying to take advantage of some higher margins right now.

Priestley: Interesting. You mentioned this was to protect the U.S. from international issues. I think that's how they started the SPR. They became a founding member of the International Energy Agency after the oil embargo by OPEC in the '70s. Obviously, it's a very different environment now. So that raises a lot of questions that we'll touch on later.

Muckerman: Yeah, we're producing near-record oil in the United States. We were definitely producing oil back then as well, but I think there's a much clearer path to the U.S. sustaining its own oil production if need be.

Priestley: Yeah. You touched on this, but in this instance, this is an exchange, which basically means that the borrower -- in this case, Phillips -- is loaned the barrels. They then have to return the same amount back to the reserves, the same quality of oil, plus extra as interest. So Philips must have requested this exchange, as you said, because they're probably taking advantage of the greater crack spread.

Muckerman: Yes.

Priestley: Should investors be concerned about them servicing this loan? Is it an issue to make good on that loan?

Muckerman: No, I think it's a small enough amount to where, as an investor, maybe it's encouraging to see management trying all options to keep capacity and their inputs coming in, because a lot of pipelines in that area were disrupted. So not only have we seen production be impacted, but even the production in the oil fields that are still running, it's having a hard time making it to the endpoints here and refineries along the Gulf Coast, because not only were the refineries impacted, but the feeding pipelines were as well.

Priestley: Yeah. And a lot of the ports, I can't remember the term for it, but they're essentially filled with silt now, so they have to be excavated.

Muckerman: Yeah, they have to be dredged, probably. We'll wait to see that, because the Gulf area is the hub for all the oil exports that we've seen ramp up over the last couple of years since we released that limit on U.S. oil exportations.

Priestley: Yeah, which is incredible when you think about how vulnerable that area is. I know every area has its risks.

Muckerman: As far west as this one went, it was kind of a surprise to a lot of people. Mid- to eastern region of the Gulf usually gets hit almost on a yearly basis. But as far west as Houston, kind of a shock there.

Priestley: Yeah, it's new to me. We have a lot of rain, but not hurricanes. I think, you said this already, but talking about how serious this is and what the impact is, I think it's important to remember that the reserves are tapped during natural disasters. It's very usual. And, as you said, 500,000 is nothing compared to how it has been. 2008, Hurricane Gustav and Hurricane Ike, they reduced levels by 5.4 million barrels. 2005, Hurricane Katrina, 20.8 million barrels. So there is a precedent for this. We shouldn't be too concerned.

Muckerman: Yeah. When you look at 500,000 barrels, and we're producing 9 million barrels per day as a country, not exactly something to get in a fuss about.

Priestley: Which leads on to my next question. The SPR is often in the news when natural disasters happen. But last year, it was in the news not concerning a disaster. The Energy Department released a report, and it said the SPR was increasingly ineffective due to aging infrastructure and a booming domestic oil industry. The report essentially said that the complex infrastructure was getting too old to function efficiently; they needed money from Congress to fix most of the critical infrastructure, for moving crude within the SPR had exceeded its service for life. So it didn't paint a great picture of the infrastructure there. But the thing that I think is interesting is where the large reserves are needed in the U.S. since the recent oil boom. The rules of the IEA were made when the U.S. wasn't producing as much. So what do you make of that?

Muckerman: Certainly, when you look at the inventory, we just saw crude oil inventories rise by almost 3 million barrels. So that's not necessarily 270 million barrels like we see in the SPR, but at the same time, it's nice to have. And we're not the only country that has one. China has one that I believe is much larger than ours, and as they've started to build that and maintain it, it was actually a pretty nice little driver for demand in the oil markets, because here you are, feeling these vast reserves without even using them. So it's just like a sudden increase in demand. But we've seen that taper off. Not the only country that has it. Nothing special. But I think it's just nice to have. It's kind of interesting. I didn't realize that they were worried about necessarily the quality of the crude within the salt caverns. Because you're right, it's not in its original formations. Technically, oil is several thousands of years old, so you wouldn't think that a few more years in a different area would impact it. But certainly, you could imagine that it's not in such a high-pressure environment, it's not nearly as far down into the Earth anymore, and it has been extracted, so maybe there's some changes going on there. You have to worry about the quality, which I never would have considered.

Priestley: Yeah. They're kept in salt caverns, which are probably the best way that you could keep it, because salt is impervious, it's far down, there's some pressure. But as you said, it's not in its natural state.

Muckerman: Right. And salt caverns are also where a lot of companies will store their wastewater that they inject into fracking wells, or things like that, or they'll store some spare natural gas instead of flaring it. So salt caverns are used for very many reasons.

Priestley: I think, as part of this debate over whether we should have one or not, I think it would be stupid for us to not have one as a country. And also, if you think about the economics of it, I think the per-barrel cost is $27, which even now at the depressed value is a good price.

Muckerman: Yeah, absolutely.

Priestley: And a lot of the exchanges that they do, it's a great way of getting high-quality, very well-priced oil for the U.S. citizens, essentially. And the other thing to factor in is that lawmakers are beginning to see the oil reserves as almost a piggy bank. Congress tapped the oil reserves for funds twice last year. So it may be something that we start to see happen more, but possibly not in this environment.

Muckerman: Yeah, if you think we're strong enough as a producing country now to where there's a little bit more flexibility there versus in the early 2000s, before the fracking boom really kicked in, you could see a steady decline from the 1970, 1971, to 2005 of oil production in the United States. And then, just straight up and to the right in terms of growth. Almost not even straight up to the right, almost just straight up from 2005 until the present. So assuaging a little bit of fears.

Priestley: The bottom line for this is, it sounds like a concerning issue. It sounds like a big thing.

Muckerman: Yeah, Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

Priestley: But it's really not. It's not a big deal. And I guess everybody is going to be keeping their eye on the next three hurricanes.

Muckerman: Yeah. It's interesting, I don't remember a time where a specific company was able to request some oil or make this exchange. I think the last few times was just the country releasing some oil into the general market, probably in an auction format. So kind of interesting to see maybe if that happens again in the future, where a specific company is almost loaned oil, essentially.

Priestley: Yeah. It's like you said, they're probably taking advantage of the situation. And the U.S. is taking advantage of the fact that we now have this glut in production so that we can do that to leverage our position. Which is great to see. It's a good use of that material, I think. So, Taylor, as always, thank you for being awesome and shedding light on the issue.

Muckerman: [laughs] No doubt. What's up next week?

Priestley: Next week is airlines. I don't know if anybody managed to catch the bonus episode that we did. It went out on Saturday over the holiday weekend, but we talked about how we wanted to broaden the scope of the show. So next week, we're trying to deliver on that promise, so we're going to do which of the big four U.S. national airline companies is the better buy right now.

Muckerman: Yeah, those have been some pretty good stocks over the last couple of years.

Priestley: They have. Historically, people have avoided them like the plague.

Muckerman: Yeah. Some consolidation in that area has boosted some stock prices.

Priestley: Yeah. I'm nerdy, so I think that's fascinating. But we'll see if anybody else finds it interesting.

Muckerman: Once Buffett charges in, you have to expect something.

Priestley: Yeah, not everybody wants in. Taylor, thank you very much. As always, you've been wonderfully knowledgeable. That's it from us today. If you would like to get in touch, please feel free to email us at industryfocus@fool.com, or tweet us on Twitter @MFIndustryFocus. As always, people on the program may own companies discussed on the show, and The Motley Fool may have formal recommendations for or against stocks mentioned, so don't buy or sell anything based solely on what you hear. For, Taylor, I'm Sarah Priestley. Thanks for listening, and Fool on!

Sarah Priestley has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Taylor Muckerman owns shares of Twitter. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Twitter. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
Former Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke Jr. told FOX Business Network special dispensations should be made during a state of emergency to protect personal property.

I have no sympathy whatsoever for looters. I cant think of anything more disgusting than to take advantage of people when they are in a vulnerable situation, he told Maria Bartiromo on Mornings with Maria on Friday.

Looting broke out in St. Martin after it was battered by Hurricane Irma. French and Dutch officials are sending additional law enforcement to the island to restore order, but in Clarkes opinion government, officials and citizens should also be allowed to take matters into their own hands.

You are going to need the citizens that stayed behind to help you protect some of that property. I have no problem with using deadly force against looters. Look we can sit up here and say, Its just a little property, its just a little looting, so what? Well I dont feel that way in these situations and once order is restored and the state of emergency is lifted then we go back to our normal situation, which will be that you cant use deadly force against property, but I think [in a] state of emergency, all bets are off, he said.

Meanwhile, while routine operations continue, US Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has cancelled plans to carry out large nationwide immigration raids due to the hurricanes. Clarke said its necessary for ICE to conduct these things for the good of the nation.

Im tired of the crocodile tears about illegal immigrants and illegal aliens in the country and how we need to feel sorry for them and pity them, no we need to feel bad for Americans who cant find work. We need to feel bad for Americans whose wages are depressed because of the issue of hiring illegal aliens for lower wage, he said.

Clarke, now a spokesperson for pro-Trump super PAC America First Action, also discussed his new role. He said aides outside of the White House will have a huge impact.

You have to have an inside army and you have to have an outside army. You have to have a two-front situation to deal with this resistance and when youre on the inside, this is always the discussion with me. Where could I best serve this administration and this president? On the inside or on the outside?, he said and added that he feels he can be a bigger help outside of the White House.
Former "Jackass" star Bam Margera is opening up about his struggles with an eating disorder in a recent episode of Viceland's "Epicly Later'd." The professional skateboarder appeared on the show alongside his parents, April and Phil, who weighed in on their son's difficult past.

He always wanted to have this very slim, slim look and a lot of it kind of happened when he became good friends with [HIM vocalist] Ville Valo, April said in the interview. [Ville] is the loveliest man ever, but he never ate, he just drank. I think Bam started sipping on a beer or sipping on a something because he liked the way he looked.

WATCH: Aaron Carter Tearfully Opens Up About His Eating Disorder: 'I Am Sorry For the Way I Look'

I remember when me and Ville Valo were out in London and he woke up at noon, opened up the mini bar and cracked open a beer. That was the first time I was introduced to day drinking, Margera admitted.

The "Viva la Bam" alum's mother recalled that her son's destructive behavior slowly slid into bulimic tendencies.

We would go out to dinner and then he would immediately excuse himself and go to the bathroom," April said. "I said, Are you throwing up? He says, Yeah, yeah, sometimes I throw up and that way Im not gonna get fat."

She continued, "It really hurts me when people make comments like, You look like you gained some weight there. Hey, wow, Bam youre looking like your dad. I dont respond, but I feel like saying, He was drinking alcohol and he was bulimic and thats why he was thin.

RELATED: Roger Ebert Responds to Outrage Over Comments About Ryan Dunn's Death

The 37-year-old insists that the fame and limelight got to his head, eventually contributing to drug and alcohol abuse.

I didnt officially start drinking until maybe 24 or 25, he revealed. Then the rockstar life and drinking spun out of control.

Margera now lives in Spain with his wife, Nicole Boyd, and they are expecting a baby in December.
Talk about being saved by the Bell.

Actress Kristen Bell has helped another family find shelter in the face of Hurricane Irma.

The "Frozen" star, who is waiting out the storm in Orlando, Florida while she films her upcoming movie "The Feather," helped secure shelter for fellow actress Jennifer Carpenter's grandmother and aunt.

Carpenter, best known for her role on "Dexter," tweeted a picture of her family members thanking Bell for "finding them a way out."

"Gma&aunt were ready2 wear helmets N closet under eye of #HurricanIrma til @IMKristenBell found them a way out," Carpenter shared on Twitter on Saturday.

Bell also managed to secure a hotel room for actor Josh Gad's familyafter they were "stranded in Florida."

Gad thanked Bell on Instagram for getting his parents, brothers sister-in-law and niece and nephew a room at the Orlando hotel Bell is staying at.

"So @kristenanniebell literally saved my parents and my entire family tonight from #hurricaneirma," Gad wrote on Instagram Saturday. "When they were stranded in Florida, she got them a hotel room at her hotel in Orlando and saved them...they don't make them like this girl. Thank you Kristin. You are truly an angel sent from above."

Bell told "Good Morning Sacramento" it's "sad that it takes a natural disaster to bring out the best in people" but she's thrilled to see everyone pitch in.

"People decided to bunk up together," she told the morning show which her father is the news director of. "We did a little room switching...we got, I thin, 13 [Gad] family members come here last night and I have other friends from LA that did the same thing this morning...we're all sleeping together and it's going to be a giant slumber party."

When Bell wasn't busy rescuing her friends' families, she visited an Orlando middle school which was being used as a shelter.

The 36-year-old actress shared videos of herself singing for those waiting out the storm.
Michael Jacksons free-spirited daughter, Paris,  who this year signed with IMG and landed a contract with Calvin Klein  was spotted having an intimate dinner at Stephen Starrs Morimoto with friends this past week.

A spy tells the New York Post, She was saying how she was working to get peak level of consciousness and working on having a calm and relaxed aura. Not easy to do during Fashion Week!

Jackson attended Calvin Kleins show Thursday and also Refinery 29s 29Rooms in Brooklyn.

Click here to read more in the New York Post.
Over 4,000 passengers fled from Hurricane Irma aboard a cruise ship appropriately called Escape.

The Escape, along with another Norwegian Cruise Line ship, the Norwegian Sky, were scheduled to return to their homeport in Miami on Saturday and Friday, respectively. However, due to Hurricane Irma, the ships came back earlier to avoid sailing through the path of the storm.

DELTA AIRLINES SUED FOR BREAKING WOMAN'S TOOTH

The cruise liner awarded each passenger a pro-rated refund for the leg of the trip that was missed, but the early arrival created additional problems for those with no scheduled hotels or flights out of Florida  which the ship alleviated with a generous offer.

USA Today reported that the cruise liner was allowing those who couldnt find transportation home on Thursday from Miami, or a safe place to stay, could sail back out to sea on the Escape to wait out the storm  free of charge.

A Norwegian spokeswoman, Vanessa Picariello, told USA Today that the company hopes to have the ship back in Miami by Tuesday, but it all depends on when the citys port reopens.

The spokeswoman added that it's not certain where the ship will go, but it'll be somewhere safe and away from the storm.

"At this point the plan is to go west," Picariello said to USA Today.

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Until that time, the ship will remain out at sea  but passengers dont seem to be complaining.

The Escape is one of Norwegians newest ships and boasts water slides, a relaxing spa and theater shows  as well as unlimited access to alcohol and food at the multiple restaurants and bars.

"We're making every effort to have at least one port of call, Picariello said. If not, it will be a cruise to nowhere and everyone will have a good time.
The president of the University of Notre Dame said he is deeply concerned after Sen. Dianne Feinstein questioned a colleague's religious beliefs during a Senate Judiciary Committee nomination hearing.

Click here for a free subscription to Todd's newsletter: a must-read for Conservatives!

Amy Coney Barrett, a law professor at Notre Dame, was grilled by Democrats over how her Catholic beliefs might influence her decisions from the bench. Barrett was recently nominated by President Trump for a seat on the federal court.

"When you read your speeches, the conclusion one draws is that the dogma lives loudly within you, and that's of concern when you come to big issues that large numbers of people have fought for, for years in this country," Sen. Feinstein said.

Feinstein has been widely condemned for what many are calling anti-Catholic bigotry and bullying.

"It is chilling to hear from a United States Senator that this might now disqualify someone from service as a federal judge," Notre Dame President John Jenkins wrote in a public letter to the California lawmaker.

He took great exception to her remark that the "dogma lives loudly" in the professor.

Continue reading this column at ToddStarnes.com.
Washington has a spending problem. It also has an explaining problem.

In fact, the latter may be a bigger issue. The explaining problem certainly helps illustrate last weeks Senate and House votes to prevent a government shutdown, suspend the debt ceiling and devote an immediate $15.25 billion for hurricane relief.

The Senate on Thursday approved the triplicate package 80-17.

All noes came from GOP senators, but not before a failed effort by Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., to offset the hurricane money with unspent foreign aid dollars. The Senate also neutered a plan by Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., to decouple the hurricane assistance from overall government funding and the debt-ceiling freeze.

Its easy to characterize the bill as emergency hurricane aid legislation -- which it was. But in an impassioned speech shortly before the vote, Sasse described the bill as much clunkier and much less explicable or defensible to your or my constituents.

Congress long ago designed the debt ceiling as a tool to harness spending. In other words, if you want to spend more, then lawmakers should be on record as voting to lift the debt limit.

However, that principle became a problem when entitlement programs like Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security exploded. Congress long ago authorized all of those entitlements, which consume two-thirds of all federal spending and drive up the debt.

Congress doesnt vote at regular intervals to approve money for entitlements. Yet lawmakers must regularly cast ballots to increase the debt ceiling -- a threshold challenged by the growth of entitlement programs.

Those phenomena dont jibe. So lawmakers sweat nearly every year about taking what the casual observer would interpret as a vote to spend more.

That makes lifting the debt ceiling one of the most virulent votes a lawmaker can cast. However, a failure to increase the debt ceiling could spark a stock market crash or trigger a downgrade in the governments credit rating.

Thats why presidential administrations and congressional leaders of both parties always hunt around for some method to latch a debt ceiling increase with something else. This time, convenient alibis boiled in the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic Basin. So Congress had to approve emergency spending for hurricanes Harvey and Irma.

Of course, not everyone would vote yea on such an amalgamated legislative package. But more than enough would. That perversely eases the blow of lifting the debt limit by  wait for it  spending more money.

Were going to use the hurricane as an excuse to hide from the truth, lectured Sasse on the Senate floor. We're not going to have any conversation about the fact that we constantly spend more money than we have and we have to borrow to do it.

The Senate then approved the package 80-17. Sasse and Paul were among the noes.

This is where the explaining problem comes in.

At the time, Irma was forecast to lash South Carolina with its torrents. Yet. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., voted nay.

Ive got zero problem helping people with hurricanes, he said. Ive got a real problem of legislating in a fashion that continues to put the military in a box.

Graham was referring to the interim spending part of the combo bill that funds the government through December 8. No quarter of the U.S. government bears a bigger hardship than the Pentagon when Congress only grants the services a few months of spending direction.

This just puts us right back into the cauldron here, and were going to have another crisis in 90 days, Graham said. It was more of a protest vote than anything else.

Or consider the approach taken by Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa.

Ernst Supports Relief for Hurricane Harvey Victims, Votes No on Debt Limit Increase, trumpeted a news release from her press shop.

Like Graham, Ernst voted no on the legislative trifecta. The jerry-rigged bill forced lawmakers who voted nay to concoct oratorical contortions to explain why they favored hurricane assistance yet opposed the debt ceiling.

Ernst argued she backed the Sasse plan for a standalone hurricane aid package, But note that she didnt even say she voted for Sasses effort, only supports.

Thats because there was never a straight, up-or-down vote on Sasses effort. The Senate voted only to table, or kill, Sasses motion to limit the bill to hurricane funding.

So with no direct vote, Ernst is stuck. Shes left saying she supports hurricane relief. However, the Senate did take a full-on roll call vote on the underlying legislation that funded the government, addressed the hurricanes and iced the debt ceiling. Therefore, Ernsts statement indicates she votes no on debt limit increase.

Voting no on the debt ceiling may sound great to fiscal conservatives. But others could flag Ernsts vote against the hurricane money. Lawmakers and their wordsmiths convulse when forced to draft tortured statements to explain vote nuances.

And remember that most of the reason behind lifting the debt ceiling isnt because of a vote Ernst or any other senator cast. Its mostly because entitlement programs are dialed-in on automatic pilot. The money flies out the door without a congressional check.

This sums up the quintessence of Washingtons gnarled explaining problem.

On Friday morning, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and White House Budget Director Mick Mulvaney headed to Capitol Hill to appeal to House Republicans to support the plan.

Someone from Equifax could have made a better case for their cybersecurity protocols. Many Republicans found Mulvaneys appearance particularly ironic. He formerly led the conservative House Freedom Caucus and repeatedly rejected debt limit hikes when he represented South Carolina in the House.

We should have sold admission passes for the discussion. I heard it was a sight to behold to have Mick Mulvaney coming in arguing for a debt ceiling increase, scoffed Rep. Charlie Dent, R-Pa.

Despite Mnuchin and Mulvaneys entreaty, the House voted on the Senate-approved plan 316-90. All 90 noes came from Republicans. Only 133 Republicans voted yea -- compared to 183 Democrats. Lawmakers from both parties again stated their abhorrence to lump issues together. But the defense from those who voted yes was that they had to do this.

There is a remedy, however.

Congress could really curb the fiscal trajectory and neutralize debt ceiling crises if members adopted a budget that indeed tamed Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security spending.

A congressional budget is different from appropriations bills, which were contained in the no government shutdown part of this package. Same for emergency disaster relief money. Budgets address all federal spending  including entitlements. And theyre not binding.

But heres the problem: The Budget Act of 1974 compels the president to draft a budget model and submit it to Congress. The House and Senate are supposed to approve their budgets in the spring. But as you can begin to imagine, neither has done so this year. Thus, the explaining problem raises its ugly head.

In the late winter and spring, Mulvaney crafted a budget blueprint for the Trump administration and specifically referred to it as such. Presidential budgets are aspirational. The numbers dont have to add up and rarely do. Same for those written on Capitol Hill. For years, Republicans designed budgets that purportedly steer federal spending on a path to balance over a period of years. They look great on paper.

Lawmakers who fancy themselves as fiscal hawks get the chance to explain why this is such a good idea.

Yet federal spending climbs. Rendezvous with the debt ceiling continue. Thats because Congress rarely approves a concrete budget which actually implements true spending reforms. Congress passed the Budget Control Act after an epic tussle over the debt ceiling in August, 2011.

The BCA imposed serious fiscal restraints known as sequestration -- though none of the spending strictures touched entitlements. Lawmakers could adopt a budget that if fact curbs the fiscal trajectory. To be sure, its hard. But instead, lawmakers spend time explaining the virtues of this budget or that one. But bona fide reforms rarely happen.

For the most part, budgets without teeth are nothing but distractions. They entail a lot of explaining. Of course actually cutting entitlement programs would involve a lot of explaining to voters as well.

Think they have an explaining problem now?

With the current fiscal fight off the table, lawmakers will focus on tax reform. That sounds great. But lower taxes could mean higher deficits. One of the reasons the sides arent closer on tax reform is because its unclear if the math will work.

On its face, diminished federal revenue means higher deficits. Tax reform advocates assert federal coffers will be fine thanks to economic growth spurred by lower taxes.

Talk about a lot of explaining

How about stumbling into a nuclear war on the Korean peninsula? You can forget about tax reform after that. That probably requires a hefty tax increase. And nuclear war doesnt do a lot for deficit reduction either.

The catastrophes of Harvey and Irma will likely cost hundreds of billions of dollars of unexpected emergency spending. Last weeks $15.25 billion was just a down payment. We havent even discussed the price tag of flood insurance. The current federal program is $26 billion in the red.

House Financial Services Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling, R-Texas, fretted at the flood insurance costs after hurricanes Katrina and Sandy.

I warned at the time, if we do not fix the problem, we are one major storm away from having to bail it out again, he said. And here we are.

Hensarling now worries about the flood insurance deficit after Harvey and Irma.

We are incenting, encouraging and subsidizing people to live in harms way, he said. Shame on us if all we do is help rebuild the same homes, in the same fashion, in the same place.

Yeah. But explain to home and business owners why they cant rebuild where they were before.

One day this is going to blow up on us. One day we will be judged by history, Hensarling said.

He voted against Fridays debt ceiling/government spending/hurricane bill. And some may ask if Hensarling and the other 89 GOP nays have some explaining to do.

This should have been two separate votes, Hensarling argued.

Its all complicated. Its tough to distill into 140 characters. The congressional appropriations and budget processes are monsters. The Treasury spends the money without major fiscal reforms. And that means Congress will tangle again with the debt ceiling again in a few months. Explain that.
Hillary Clinton said Sunday in her first TV interview since Election Day that she was just gobsmacked, wiped out after losing the presidential election to Donald Trump.

Clinton, who is releasing a new memoir Tuesday titled What Happened that points fingers and accepts responsibility for her defeat, also told CBS News' "Sunday Morning" host Jane Pauley that she wont ever run for office again.

I am done with being a candidate, but Im not done with politics because I believe that our country's future is at stake, Clinton said during the interview at her home in Chappaqua, New York.

Asked how she was doing, Clinton confessed that the loss still stings.

I think I am good, but that doesnt mean Im complacent or resolved about what happened, she said. Its still painful.

She said on election night she felt like she let everybody down.

I had not drafted a concession speech, Clinton said. I had been working on a victory speech.

She said post-election she went off on a frenzy of closet cleaning, drinking Chardonnay and walks in the woods. She recommends doing yoga.

I couldnt feel, I couldnt think, Clinton said. "I was just gobsmacked, wiped out.

Clinton said she never thought of not going to Trump's inauguration as a former first lady.

"And so there I was on the platform, you know, feeling like an out of body experience," she said. "And then this speech [by Trump], a cry from the white nationalist gut."

She said that during the campaign Trump was quite successful referencing a nostalgia that would give hope, comfort and settle grievances for millions of people upset about gains made by others.

Millions of white people, Pauley asked.

Yeah, millions of white people, Clinton replied.

Clinton also defended her "basket of deplorables" comment about Trump supporters in the interview.

"Well, I thought Trump was behaving in a deplorable manner," she said. "I thought a lot of his appeals to voters were deplorable. I thought his behavior as we saw on the 'Access Hollywood' tape was deplorable. And there were a large number of people who didn't care. It didn't matter to them."

Clinton said she didn't believer her deplorable comment energized Trump voters.

"They were already energized," she said.

Clinton said she practiced what she would do if Trump came up behind her during the debates and then she said when he did at the second debate in St. Louis, she became flustered.

"It was so discombobulating," she told Pauley. "And so -- while I'm answering questions, my mind is going, 'OK, do I keep my composure? Do I act like a president? Am I the person that people can trust in the end to make hard decisions?' Or do I wheel around and say, 'Get outta my space. Back up, you creep.' Well, you know, I didn't do the latter."

The interview concluded with Clinton saying the U.S. had a reality show that led to the election of a president. "He ends up in the Oval Office," she said of Trump ."He says, Boy, its so much harder than I thought it would be. This is really tough. I had no idea. Well, yeah, because its not a show. Its real. Its reality, for sure.



"What Happened" is being published by Simon & Schuster, a division of CBS.

The memoir, which dishes on Bernie Sanders, former FBI Director James Comey and Russian President Vladimir Putin, as well as Trump, has some Democratic Party wags worried.

Coming so soon after the election, it's poised to re-live the 2016 campaign drama in the media for weeks, if not months, to come  as Democrats try to prepare for the 2018 midterms while also battling the Trump agenda.

Clinton already is taking some criticism  complete with mockery from late-night television hosts  for planning book-tour stops in the Great Lakes and Midwestern states that ultimately cost her the election. But she writes that her campaign had more staff and spent more on advertising in both Michigan and Pennsylvania, two states she lost, than President Barack Obama did when he won them in 2012.

She acknowledges that "if there's one place where we were caught by surprise, it was Wisconsin," saying that polls showed her ahead until the end. But while she did not visit the state in the fall, she noted that her surrogates blanketed the state.

In Wisconsin, Democratic pollster Paul Maslin called it a "bitter irony" that Clinton is now trying to reach voters  or consumers  in states he believes her campaign mostly ignored.

But he said it's ultimately a sideshow from a has-been.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
One of the GOP's toughest budget hawks on Sunday defended President Trump for striking a funding deal with Democrats, saying Republican leaders left the commander in chief no good options.

Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, told Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace he was not a fan of the deal Trump cut last week with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. But he recognized Trump had to strike a bargain to pay for Hurricane Harvey aid and raise the federal debt limit.

Frankly, what options did the president have? asked Jordan, arguing Republican leaders of the GOP-controlled Congress didnt have a better plan.

Frankly, what options did the president have?  Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio

Jordan, a founding member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, noted GOP leaders allowed Congress to adjourn for a lengthy August recess instead of making members stay to craft plans on the debt ceiling, tax reform and dismantling ObamaCare.

We should have stayed.  When you fail to prepare, you get a bad outcome, said Jordan, who wanted to raise the debt ceiling is exchange for a measure to cap federal spending as a percentage of the countrys gross national product.

Trump agreed to raise the debt ceiling enough to fund the federal government for the next three months. Republican leaders wanted it raised sufficient for 18 months of funding, in order to avert budget wrangling before the end of the year.

Trump, knowing Huricane Harvey relief had been tied to the measure, took the Democrats' offer of a shorter funding deal.

I think the president is focused on doing what he told Americans he was going to do, Jordan said in defending Trump.

Jordan dismissed claims Trump has empowered congressional Democrats, saying the deal struck Wednesday with Schumer and Pelosi was a unique situation.

We get another bite at the apple, Jordan said. We have a chance to put together a plan [and] take that to the American people early, not like we did before.

Jordan also dismissed reports that the Freedom Caucus is trying to force out House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., like the group did in 2015 to Rep. John Boehner when the fellow Ohio Republican was House speaker and occasionally struck legislative deals with chamber Democrats.

No ones talking about changing the leadership, Jordan said Sunday. What we are talking about is just what I said -- what was the agenda the American people voted for in November. Lets get that done.
President Trump and his team on Sunday were closely monitored Hurricane Irma from Camp David and Federal Emergency Management Agency headquarters, with Vice President Pence saying the president has great concern and that wherever the storm goes, we'll be there first.

Pence spoke while he and several other Cabinet members visited FEMA headquarters in Washington, D.C., as the storm took aim at Florida.

Wherever Hurricane Irma goes, we'll be there first [with] the resources and support to save lives and to help and recover, Pence told reporters. This is a very dangerous storm, life-threatening.  Clearly, the briefing this morning caused the president to have great concern.  The people of Florida need to know that our hearts and prayers and all of our efforts will be with them until this storm passes.

Among the Cabinet members joining Pence at the headquarters were Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt.

Pence and fellow Cabinet members arrived at the headquarters after Trumps Cabinet meeting on Saturday at Camp David, where the president and his team discussed strategy to deal with the hurricane, which made landfall Sunday morning on the Florida Keys, and to talk about the administrations legislative agenda.

They were joined at the headquarters by Energy Secretary Rick Perry and acting Homeland Security Secretary Elaine Duke.

Pence also praised the efforts so far of Duke and FEMA Administrator Brock Long.

Trump and first lady Melania Trump were scheduled to return to the White House on Sunday afternoon. The president also used the presidential retreat, in western Maryland, two weekends ago to monitor Hurricane Harvey as it churned through southeastern Texas and then Louisiana.

On Sunday, Trump spoke with Florida GOP Gov. Rick Scott and with governors from Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina and Tennessee -- states potentially in the storms northward track.

The president and Chief of Staff John Kelly have also spoken frequently with Florida senators Bill Nelson, a Democrat, and Marco Rubio, a Republican, said White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders.

"The U.S. Coast Guard, FEMA and all Federal and State brave people are ready," Trump tweeted late Saturday night. "Here comes Irma. God bless everyone!"

The Cabinet meeting Saturday afternoon was the presidents fourth since taking office.

He arrived at Camp David this weekend after what was considered his first major legislative win, when Congress on Friday approved $15.3 billion in Harvey disaster-relief aid linked to an increase in the government's borrowing authority.

However, the president and Congress will likely have to approve additional emergency funding to handle the new damage.

Speaking from the White House after his Cabinet meeting Sunday, Trump said the U.S. Coast Guard and FEMA's response to Hurricane Irma have been "amazing" and "incredible," respectively. He added he'll be making a trip to Florida "very soon."
With Hurricane Irma battering the west coast of Florida, experts are explaining the science behind the deadly storm.

The hurricane, which has left a trail of devastation across the Caribbean, made landfall as a Category 4 storm in the Florida Keys Sunday morning, before setting out on a path along Floridas western coast.

Depending on where in the world they occur, hurricanes are also known as typhoons or cyclones. The scientific term for all these storms is a tropical cyclone, notes NASA. Hurricanes are tropical cyclones that form over the Atlantic Ocean and the eastern and central Pacific Ocean.

The Saffir-Simpson Hurricane scale is used to measure the storms  from Category 1 (74-95 mph) to the strongest, Category 5, with wind speeds of 157 mph and higher.

A major hurricane has maximum sustained winds of 111 mph or higher, which corresponds to a Category 3, 4, or 5, according to NOAAs National Hurricane Center.

NASA compares tropical cyclones to giant engines that use warm, moist air as fuel. That is why they form only over warm ocean waters near the equator, it explains. This warm, moist air rises and condenses to form clouds and storms.

As this warmer, moister air rises, theres less air left near the Earths surface, adds the space agency. Essentially, as this warm air rises, this causes an area of lower air pressure below.

This process starts the engine of the storm. To fill in the low pressure area, air from surrounding areas with higher air pressure pushes in. That new air near the Earths surface also gets heated by the warm ocean water so it also gets warmer and moister and then it rises, explains NASA.

With the warm air rising, the surrounding air swirls to take its place. Fed by the oceans heat and water evaporation, the maelstrom of clouds and winds spins and becomes larger.

At the center of the swiftly rotating storm system, a calmer, low air pressure eye forms.

Tropical cyclones usually weaken when they hit land, because they are no longer being fed by the energy from the warm ocean waters, notes NASA. However, when they move inland, they can drop many inches of rain causing flooding as well as wind damage before they die out completely.

Last month, for example, Hurricane Harvey dumped 50 inches of rain on parts of Texas and Louisiana.

Florida is particularly hurricane-prone as a result of its location. Hurricanes form between 5 and 30 degrees latitude north of the Equator and typically move toward the west. Additionally, Florida has been identified as a particularly storm-vulnerable area as a result of the states rapid growth in population. Florida has added 3.3 million people since the 2004 hurricane season, according to Stephen Strader, assistant professor of geography and the environment at Villanova University, in a note sent to Fox News.

The Atlantic hurricane season lasts from June 1 to November 30.

Follow James Rogers on Twitter @jamesjrogers
With Hurricane Irma making landfall in the Florida Keys Sunday, Facebook has activated its Safety Check service that lets users notify friends and family that they are safe.

The deadly storm is on a path for the west coast of Florida

Hurricane Irma, which has left a trail of devastation in the Caribbean, made landfall in the lower Florida Keys at 9.10 a.m. ET Sunday as a Category 4 storm.

A National Ocean Service station in Key West measured sustained winds of 71 mph and gusts up to 90 mph around 9 a.m. ET Sunday.

Facebook activated is Safety Check for Hurricane Irma in the Caribbean on Sept. 1.

HURRICANE IRMA MAKES LANDFALL

Designed for times of disaster or crisis, Safety Check lets users in a specific area notify friends and family that they are safe. Users can also check on others in the affected area and mark friends as safe.

People were also using the Safety Check for Hurricane Irma in Florida to request and offer help on Sunday morning.

The service, which was launched in 2014, has already been used in response to major events such as the Brussels terror attacks, the bombing in Ankara, Turkey and the attacks that rocked Paris in 2015. In June 2016, the service was activated for the first time in the U.S. following the mass shooting at Orlando's gay nightclub Pulse. Safety Check was also activated for the sniper attack on Dallas police officers and the terror attack in Nice, France. It was also used after the 2016 earthquake in Italy.

Follow James Rogers on Twitter @jamesjrogers
As Hurricane Irma makes landfall in the Florida Keys, airlines are canceling flights scheduled to and from Florida, shutting down some of the largest and busiest airports in the nation.

By 6 p.m. Saturday, at least 7,000 flights had been canceled as the devastating Category 4 hurricane neared closer to Floridas southern tip. This brings the total of canceled flights to about 10,600 since Irma first drew concern in the Caribbean, according to a report by USA Today  with possibly thousands more on the way as it continues its path up Florida and into Georgia and Alabama.

HURRICANE IRMA'S STORM PATH: WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW

Officials from the Tallahassee International Airport tweeted that the airport will stop flights after 5:40 p.m. today and will not resume flights until Tuesday. An airport in Savannah, Georgia canceled all of its flights Saturday evening in anticipation of Irmas land, and Atlanta  the busiest airport in the world  may follow suit as forecasters show Hurricane Irmas path to slam the metro area Monday or Tuesday.

As Delta meteorologists continue to track Hurricane Irma, strong winds and extended rain are expected in Atlanta starting Monday and could impact flights at the hub, Delta said in a Saturday statement.

FOLLOW US ON FACEBOOK FOR MORE FOX LIFESTYLE NEWS

Delta encouraged all flyers with itineraries involving Atlanta to change their travel plans through Deltas website.

Flight operations are likely not to resume until after Monday, at the earliest. FlightAware showed more than 1,700 flights had been grounded for Monday and another 150 for Tuesday as of Sunday morning.
Hurricane Irma is so strong, it is literally changing the coastline in some areas.

Twitter user @Kaydi_K witnessed this phenomenon firsthand, sharing on social media an extraordinary video that showed the ocean floor completely exposed on Long Island in the Bahamas.

I am in disbelief right now...This is Long Island, Bahamas and the ocean water is missing!!! she wrote on Friday.

The bizarre and somewhat eerie video is a result of the hurricanes low pressure and sheer strength, causing surrounding waters to be sucked into its core, the Washington Post reported.

It may be a case of a hurricane bulge effect, said Angela Fritz, deputy weather editor for the Post, in which very low pressure in the center of the storm acts as a sucking mechanism, drawing in air and pulling water from the surrounding area.

Although the Tsunami Information Center warns receding waters are typically a precursor to a tsunami, the Post reports that is not the case in this instance.

Instead, the Long Island shoreline that was swept away with Hurricane Irma was expected to gradually return to Long Island on Sunday afternoon, without great force.

Hurricane Irma struck the Bahamas on Friday, as it made its way toward Florida, where meteorologists predicted it would hit the Keys on Sunday morning

The storm is then predicted to hug the state's west coast, plowing into the Tampa Bay area by Monday morning.
As Hurricane Irma approached the Florida Keys late Saturday into Sunday, President Donald Trump reassured the nation that response personnel were standing by and ready to offer help during the potentially catastrophic aftermath of the storm.

The U.S. Coast Guard, FEMA and all Federal and State brave people are ready. Here comes Irma. God bless everyone! Trump tweeted shortly before 11 p.m. ET Saturday.

The president is known for his strong and candid presence on Twitter, a platform that allows him to immediately reach his 37.9 million followers with a click of the button.

Over the past few days, Trump has used social media to urge residents in Florida to heed the warnings of government officials -- and get out of the path of what he called a storm of absolutely historic destructive potential.

On Saturday, Trump told reporters that his administration and emergency responders were "as prepared as you can be for such an event," Politico reported.

This is a storm of enormous destructive power and I ask everyone in the storms path to heed all instructions, get out of its way," Trump said, during a meeting with his Cabinet at Camp David, Md.

Meanwhile, Florida Gov. Rick Scott has fully deployed Florida's 7,000 National Guard members to assist in emergency response.

Hurricane Irma showed Florida the first signs of its potentially deadly power with hurricane-force wind gusts recorded in the Keys late Saturday night.

As of 11 p.m. ET Saturday, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) placed Irma about 90 miles southeast of Key West with winds of up to 120 miles per hour. The center said the storm was moving west-northwest at 6 mph and warned of "heavy squalls with embedded tornadoes sweeping across South Florida."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Five adults are behind bars after authorities found the bodies of two children in what they are calling a shocking case of child abuse.

The girls were between the ages of 5 and 10 and they were found dead Friday on a farm in rural southwestern Colorado. Investigators say they believe the girls were killed at least two weeks ago.

In my 37 years as Sheriff, I have never seen anything as cruel and heartless as this, San Miguel County Sheriff Bill Masters said.

A tip led deputies to the farm in Norwood, population 500. The town is about 35 miles west of the ski resort town of Telluride.

This is a small, tight-knit community and understandably this kind of crime has sent shockwaves through it, Susan Lilly, a spokeswoman for Masters, told Fox News.

Nashika Bramble surrendered to cops Saturday.

Authorities arrested the other four adults Friday. They were identified as Frederick Blair, 23, of Norwood, Madani Ceus, 37, of Haiti, Ika Edne, 53, of Jamaica and Nathan Yah, 50, of Haiti.

Lilly wouldnt say if Ceus, Edne or Yah were in the country illegaly. She said they recently moved to the area, according to The Associated Press.

Bramble and the others have been charged with felony child abuse causing death.

Authorities werent saying how the girls were killed.

San Miguel County coroner Emil Sante told Fox News on Sunday that autopsy results are pending.

He said believes the girls were related and that they were related to one of the accused.

Sante said the bodies of the two girls were badly decomposed.
A test lawsuit goes to trial in Minneapolis Monday against Swiss agribusiness giant Syngenta for introducing a genetically-engineered corn variety before China approved it for imports.

The case alleges Viptera corn wrecked an important export market for U.S. corn and hurt prices. But Syngenta says the 2013 price drop resulted from larger market forces, not China's rejection of Viptera.

The trial had been set for May. It would have been the first of tens of thousands of cases to go to trial. But the Minnesota trial got delayed, so a lawsuit in Kansas went first, resulting in a $218 million award to Kansas farmers. Syngenta is appealing. In a third case, an Ohio judge backed Syngenta.

The test cases are meant to provide guidance for resolving the complex litigation.
Florida officials are warning those residents in the path of Irma to avoid boozing it up at so-called "hurricane parties."

Store owners in recent days have seen Florida residents stock up on water and fuel -- but theyve also noticed shopping carts filled with liquor and cases of beer.

Emergency management officials were aware of these parties and were warning residents against over-indulging as the storm hits, USA Today reported.

"We want everyone to be alert," Titusville Police Department Deputy Chief Todd Hutchinson said. "And that would involve restraint when it comes to alcohol."

One liquor store owner reported running out of supplies due to the storm.

"We ran out of Captain Morgan's yesterday," Tracey Ferguson, co-owner of Michael's Liquor and Tracey's Lounge in Suntree, told USA Today, referring to a popular brand of rum.

But not everyone was looking to spend the storm with a tall boy.

Brewer Anheuser-Busch announced Friday that it would supply 310,000 cans of safe, clean, emergency drinking water, FOX 13 reported.

The maker of Budweiser also supplied cans of water to parts of Texas following the destruction left by Hurricane Harvey.

We are grateful to be in a position to help communities affected by natural disasters by putting our production and logistics strengths to work, said Bill Bradley, Anheuser-Buschs vice president for community affairs.

The company also donated $1 million to the American Red Cross Annual Disaster Giving Program.
A Florida deputy who was helping at a Hurricane Irma evacuation center and a corrections officer heading to start his shift were killed in a head-on crash Sunday morning.

Hardee County Deputy Julie Bridges died during the crash in southeast Tampa, WFLA reported. The Florida Department of Corrections said Sgt. Joseph Ossman, who was heading to start his shift at the Hardee Correctional Institution, also died.

We are heartbroken by this loss, and our thoughts and prayers are with his family and fellow officers at this time, Corrections Sec. Julie Jones said in a statement to the Miami Herald.

TRUMP HUDDLES WITH CABINET OVER IRMA; PENCE VOWS 'WE'LL BE THERE'

Bridges was a 13-year veteran and was heading home to pick up more supplies for the shelter when the incident happened.

"Two officers killed in Hurricane Irma evacuation zone crash," the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office tweeted. "They were both on duty. Let's take a moment to recognize these heroes #IRMA."

The Florida Highway Patrol confirmed the deadly crash on Sunday, but did not clarify if the heavy rain and gusty winds from Hurricane Irma played a role in the crash. An investigation is being conducted.

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., tweeted Saturday afternoon that he was "saddened" by the loss of both officers, adding, "We honor those working 24/7 to keep us safe."

A deputy in Weston also shot a suspected burglar about 3 a.m. Saturday. Another teenager at the scene was arrested.

The teenager who was shot was rushed to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.

The hurricane made landfall in the Florida Keys as a Category 4 storm Sunday morning and headed up the state's southwest coast, dumping at least 12 inches of rain.

Power was knocked out for about 3.6 million customers, affecting more than 7.2 million people in Florida, according to TC Palm.

As Irma heads for Georgia and other Deep South states on Monday, the Nationaol Hurricane Center downgraded it to a tropical storm with maximum sustained winds of up to 65 mph.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Florida police made a string of arrests in Fort Lauderdale Sunday after they said several people were caught looting stores.

Local news station WPLG caught on camera a group of eight to nine people breaking into a sportswear store before moving on to other shops.

The Fort Lauderdale Police Department later tweeted that they arrested nine people in connection with the lootings.

Going to prison over a pair of sneakers is a fairly bad life choice, Chief Rick Maglione said. Stay home and look after your loved once [sic] and be thankful they are all safe.

Other Florida law enforcement departments tweeted similar sentiments. The Pembroke Pines Police Department wrote, Any looters who comes to Pembroke Pines will be greeted by our officers. Choose wisely and stay home.

The Broward County Sheriffs Office tweeted that all looting incidents would be investigated.

Meanwhile, Orlando Police tweeted that "In reponse to many inquiries: There was a burglary at a sporting goods store" in town.

The department later tweeted that two suspects from the burglary call were in custody, no officers were injured and the issue "has been peacefully resolved."
Georgia officials declared a state of emergency in all counties on Sunday in preparation for Hurricane Irma after the National Weather Service issued a tropical storm warning in Atlanta  for the first time in the citys history.

Gov. Nathan Deal declared the state of emergency in 159 counties after Irmas forecasted path threatened to unleash deadly wind gusts, heavy rain and possible flooding as early as Sunday night, Fox 5 Atlanta reported.

"I want to caution all Georgians that just because the weather appears calm now, do not take that for granted," Deal said in an earlier news conference.

The National Weather Service issued a Tropical Storm Warning in Dodge County. Wind gusts up to 60 mph with tropical storm-force winds could whip through starting Monday morning and into Tuesday, forecasters said. Peak winds were expected to reach 30 to 40 mph. Officials said Irma, a Category 3 storm as of Sunday afternoon, can damage porches, carports, sheds and unanchored mobile homes.

State government offices will be closed Monday and Tuesday along with several schools. Parts of south Georgia are under a Hurricane Warning.

Atlanta hotels and shelters filled with evacuees by Sunday morning. At the luxury Georgian Terrace Hotel, staff were flexible with rules to accommodate evacuees. Guests walked pit bulls through the lobby. Large families pulled roller bags and clutched blankets as they squeezed into small rooms without enough beds.

A block away, a church offered free hugs for evacuees.

Irma made landfall in the Florida Keys as a Category 4 hurricane just after 9 a.m. Sunday, bringing 130 mph winds and inches of rain within hours. In Miami, a crane  one of the two dozen in the city  collapsed due to gusty winds.

The storm threatens to wreak havoc in Georgia, Alabama, South Carolina and Tennessee has it heads north. President Trump spoke to the governors in the states from the Camp David presidential retreat.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Hurricane Irma appears to bringing out the best in some volunteers in southern Georgia. As many evacuees left Florida to escape the storm's damage, locals in Valdosta, Ga., were trying to make the whole experience more comfortable.

"We are having a lot of bottleneck traffic on [Interstate] 75 slowing down. People without food, people without money to buy gas. We just felt like it was our duty as Americans to come out and cook, Chad Harrison told Fox News.

Harrison and a group of volunteers gathered outside a gas station near an I-75 exit in Valdosta cooking hot dogs and waving signs that said Free food for evacuees. Harrison said many evacuees were dealing with a very stressful situation and giving them food, or money to get gas, was a way to alleviate some of their anxiety.

We have probably fed over 2,000 people on the interstate today, Harrison said. Fifteen to 20 families have been helped as far as gas, supplies that they needed, water, drinks, food, letting their dogs just get out.

"We have probably fed over 2,000 people on the interstate today."  Chad Harrison, volunteer helping Irma evacuees

Two Venezuelan natives evacuated from Miami and it was the signs about free food that drew their attention.

We were just passing here, Valdosta, and we just see that you guys were giving food for the people who were evacuating from the  so we come and grab some sandwiches, Anny Sanchez and Faith Daubeterre said. Thank you so much for giving the, I like, for helping us.

Valdosta, along with most of Georgia, is expected to feel the effects of Irma on Monday.
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As Tropical Storm Barry makes landfall on the Lousiana coast, many pet owners should consider the needs of their four-legged friends and how to keep them safe.

Here are some safety tips from the Florida Division of Emergency Management.

Safety measures

In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, Congress passed the Pets Evacuation and Transportation Standards (PETS) Act in 2006, which requires plans for the evacuation of pets, in addition to people.

Under the act, FEMAs director is required to ensure that state and local emergency preparedness operational plans address the needs of individuals with household pets and service animals prior to, during, and following a major disaster or emergency.

To get ready for a disaster, people should find out where they can bring their pets, which can be done by contacting hotels or shelters to see what their policies are, FEMA explained.

Pet owners also may wish to reach out to people they know.

Ask friends, relatives, or others outside the affected area whether they could shelter your animals, the agency says. If you have more than one pet, they may be more comfortable if kept together, but be prepared to house them separately.

Pets need their own emergency necessities, too, including food, water, bowls, leashes, carriers, cat litter, medicine and medical records.

Keep items in an accessible place and store them in sturdy containers that can be carried easily (duffle bags, covered trash containers, etc.), it advises.

On the road

If youre evacuating with your pets, dogs should be leashed and carriers should be used for cats, the agency advised.

Dont leave animals unattended anywhere they can run off, it says. The most trustworthy pets may panic, hide, try to escape, or even bite or scratch.

The agency suggests that pet owners allow their companions time to settle back into their routines upon returning home.
Winds from Hurricane Irma are so strong they sucked the water out of Tampa Bay Sunday morning.

The winds from Irma pushed the water out of the harbor, leaving a mix of sludge and puddles in its place, Fox News Jillian Mele said.

"We are about to get punched in the face by this storm."  Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn

"The worrisome part will be later when the winds start pushing the water back," Fox News senior meteorologist Janice Dean said.

Another person spotted the same eerie phenomenon in the Bahamas. Twitter user @Kaydi_K posted a video showing the ocean floor completely exposed on Long Island in the Bahamas.

Though receding waters typically indicate a coming tsunami, hurricane bulge may be responsible for these sites. The hurricane can draw water toward the center, pulling it away from its surroundings, the Washington Post reported. The center of the storm has extremely low pressure to draw water upward.

Its unclear when the water will return to Tampa Bay as Irma heads for southwest Florida coast after making landfall in the Florida Keys just after 9 a.m. Sunday.

Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn warned residents about Irma's fury, urging neighbors to help people out.

"We are about to get punched in the face by this storm. We need to be prepared," Buckhorn said.
"It also has the potential to significantly strain FEMA and other governmental resources occurring so quickly on the heels of (Hurricane) Harvey."  Evan Myers, chief operating officer of AccuWeather

A weakened but still dangerous Irma pushed inland Monday as it hammered Florida with winds and floodwaters.

Irma was downgraded Monday morning to a tropical storm. On Sunday, it made landfall in the Florida Keys as a Category 4 storm hurricane after leaving a deadly path of destruction in the Caribbean, the National Hurricane Center said.

The storm has already knocked out power to more than 6.5 million homes and businesses across Florida. More than 100,000 customers in Georgia and more than 80,000 in South Carolina were without power.

The storm killed at least 35 people in the Caribbean.



Nearly 7 million people in the Southeast were warned to leave in one of the largest U.S. evacuations, including 6.4 million in Florida alone. Officials estimated that about 25 percent of Key Wests residents stayed through the storm despite evacuation orders.

More than 120 homes were being evacuated early Monday in Orange County, the region where the city of Orlando is located, as floodwaters started to rise. Firefighters and the National Guard were going door-to-door and using boats to ferry families to safety.

Heres what you should know about Tropical Storm Irma and its trajectory.

Where is Tropical Storm Irma now?

By Monday evening, the tropical storm was continuing to push its way into Georgia.



FLORIDA KEYS AND HURRICANES, A LONG HISTORY

The tropical storm was about 55 miles southeast of Columbus, Ga., as of the National Hurricane Center's 8 p.m. ET advisory. It has maximum sustained winds of 40 mph and is moving in a north-northwest direction at 16 mph.

Over the next two days, Irma is expected to move into Alabama, Mississippi and Tennessee.

What else should I know about the storm?

"This hurricane has the potential to be a major event for the East Coast. It also has the potential to significantly strain FEMA and other governmental resources occurring so quickly on the heels of (Hurricane) Harvey," Evan Myers, chief operating officer of AccuWeather, said in a statement.

AS IRMA ARRIVES, ANIMALS ARE HAULED OFF TO JAIL  FOR PROTECTION

Georgia officials declared a state of emergency in all 159 counties on Sunday in preparation for Tropical Storm Irma after the National Weather Service issued a tropical storm warning in Atlanta  for the first time in the citys history.

South Carolina and North Carolina also declared states of emergency ahead of the storm.

Fox News' Jake Ingrassia, Kaitlyn Schallhorn, Zoe Szathmary, Nicole Darrah and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Sluggish pay raises have been an Achilles' heel for American workers since the Great Recession ended more than eight years ago  and a major headwind for faster economic growth.

As a result, many people are spending less than they otherwise would. That trend, in turn, contributes to slower overall growth in the U.S. economy, because consumers account for roughly 70 percent of economic activity.

Dan North, chief economist for Euler Hermes North America, part of the world's oldest and largest credit insurance company, spoke recently with The Associated Press about how income after taxes  what analysts call disposable personal income  isn't keeping pace with consumer spending growth.

___

Q: What are the factors driving U.S. economic growth right now?

A: We think for the entire year we're likely to see GDP growth of around 2 percent. But consumers have a few headwinds. First of all, real disposable personal income growth is increasing at just 1.3 percent. That's very slow. Consumer spending is increasing at a faster rate. If you look at personal consumption expenditures, that's rising at 2.7 percent. As a result, consumers have to dip into their flow of savings to pay for items.

Without income growth, it's hard for consumption growth to continue. The big story is we don't have enough income. Consumer confidence has soared since the election. But consumers often say one thing and do another. To spend, you need the willingness and ability. Consumers are saying they have the willingness, so it would seem. But that's not enough. You've got to have the ability to spend, too.

Q: What would unlock stronger income growth?

A: The low unemployment rate doesn't tell the whole story. Our participation rate  the share of people with jobs or looking for work  is quite low as well. We need more people at work. And we need those people to be earning higher wages.

You might think that the low unemployment rate would lead to higher wage growth, but it hasn't. One reason is that productivity has been very weak. When you have weak productivity, you have weak wage growth.

Q: What role to baby boomers and millennials play in all of this?

A: This demographics of the aging workforce is really tough. What's happening is we have baby boomers who are leaving the workforce at a rate of 10,000 every day. They probably will keep doing that for the next 12 years or so. We can't replace them fast enough, and employers can't find the right people with the right skills to fill those jobs.

One way to address that is to have more skilled legal immigration. President Trump took a step in the right way with a proposal to focus on bringing in more skilled immigrants. But then then he took a step backward by planning to cut down the number immigrants being admitted.

Q: Can businesses get enough access to credit?

A: Small and medium businesses have a desire to expand, but there is still caution on pulling the trigger. So there is a lack of loan demand. You see the numbers where the growth in commercial loans may not be strong, but you look at the banker survey and say, well, a lot of businesses aren't really interested in getting credit yet. That's kind of hampering the expansion of credit.

___

Answers are edited for length and clarity.
Iran says it warned off a U.S. Navy warship during a rescue of a boat in the Gulf of Oman, while American officials say there was no direct contact.

The U.S. Navy said Sunday the incident happened Wednesday and involved a small vessel some 75 nautical miles from the USS Tempest, a coastal patrol boat. The Navy says another boat much closer offered assistance, with that vessel communicating with Iranian naval forces.

Iran offered a different version of the incident. Press TV, the English-language arm of its state broadcaster, said Sunday that the Iranian navy "warned off an American warship" while rescuing the stranded dhow, a traditional ship.

The U.S. and Iran routinely have tense encounters in the Persian Gulf.
The ex-husband of a Texas real estate agent who has been missing since the day before Hurricane Harvey struck has been charged with her murder, according to published reports.

The news of the arrest coincided with the announcement by Texas law enforcement authorities that remains found in a wooded area are believed to be those of the Realtor, Crystal Seratte McDowell.

The mother of two was last seen Aug. 25 leaving the home of her boyfriend to head to Houston, where her ex-husband lives, to pick up the two children they share.

She was reportedly planning to go to Dallas with her children, ages 5 and 8, to ride out the storm.

Those close to her became worried when, uncharacteristically, she failed to respond to telephone calls and texts.

Her uncle, Jeff Walters, said in an interview with NBCs Dateline that he had reached out to her ex-husband, Steven McDowell, to inquire about his niece.

He said she had sent him a message saying she was coming to pick up the kids to go to Dallas, but she didnt show, the uncle told Dateline. We arent sure she sent those messages to him, though. She never told me of plans to go to Dallas for the storm.

The Chamber County Sheriff's Office said that Crystal McDowell, 37, was not a victim of the hurricane, and they are certain her death stemmed from a crime.

The real estate agent was seen on video cameras on her ex-husbands property leaving his home. Sheriffs found the bag she used to carry her business papers inside her ex-husbands house.

Surveillance cameras inside the ex-husbands home captured her leaving the property. The Chambers County Sheriffs Office had nine persons of interest, according to the local ABC affiliate, but then moved to arrest Steven McDowell on Saturday after they found the remains believed to be those of his ex-wife.

Chambers County Sheriff Brian Hawthorne told ABC News Hurricane Harvey is not the reason Crystal McDowell is missing.

Four days after her disappearance, which her uncle reported to police, her Mercedes-Benz was found in a flooded parking lot of a Motel 6.

Walters raised his niece after her parents died when she was only 11.

Walters said on his Facebook page on Saturday: "She is a light in the heavens that can never be extinguishedShe is an Angel that watches over us all with that bright smile."
President Donald Trump received a "comprehensive update" Sunday on Hurricane Irma after the storm hit the Florida Keys, the White House said, and Vice President Mike Pence urged those in the storm's path to "heed the warnings" of local officials.

Trump, Pence and several Cabinet members participated in the briefing from Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland where Trump spent the weekend monitoring Irma. Other officials dialed in from the White House or Federal Emergency Management Agency headquarters.

Pence and the Cabinet secretaries later visited FEMA headquarters.

"The people of Florida need to know that our hearts and our prayers and all of our efforts are with them and will be with them until this storm passes," the vice president said. He said Irma was dangerous and life-threatening.

"It's enormously important that every American in the path of this storm take the warnings of state and local officials to heart," Pence said.

Pence said Trump, who was returning to the White House later Sunday, has been tracking the storm "24/7."

The White House said Trump's briefing included an update on Irma's status, forecasted path, evacuations and preparations for response and recovery. He thanked FEMA and the Homeland Security Department, which oversees the agency, for their efforts.

Trump also encouraged officials to also stay focused on recovery efforts in southeast Texas following Hurricane Harvey, which caused severe flooding in Houston and surrounding areas after it made landfall in late August.

Trump also spoke with the governors of Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina and Tennessee  four states in Irma's path. The National Weather Service on Sunday issued a first-ever tropical storm warning for Atlanta,

Florida Gov. Rick Scott said he also talked with Trump on Sunday and the president "said he was saying prayers for us," Scott told CBS' "Face the Nation."

Elaine Duke, acting head of the Homeland Security Department, expressed confidence that the federal government can simultaneously manage the aftermath of Irma and Harvey.

"I know we're ready and I know we're responding to both hurricanes at the same time," Duke said at FEMA headquarters. "I don't have any doubt in my mind that we can support both governors and that as a federal government we can do this and will do this."

Duke said she and Brock Long, the FEMA administrator, spoke earlier Sunday with Trump and Pence, and that both were "absolutely pleased with the response."

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HURRICANE NEWSLETTER - Get the best of the AP's all-formats reporting on Irma and Harvey in your inbox: http://apne.ws/ahYQGtb

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Follow Darlene Superville on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/dsupervilleap
They shot him in cold blood  in front of his little daughter.

Last Thursday, Gerard Grandzol, 38, took his toddler and dog on a family outing that included playing with a Frisbee.

When he returned home in the evening, he was confronted by two men who demanded his wallet.

They also wanted to take his car but, according to police, Grandzol insisted on taking his 2-year-old daughter out of it before giving the thieves the keys.

That is when one of them shot Grandzol twice in the head as the little girl watched, according to published reports. He died later that night at Hahnemann University Hospital.

On Saturday, police arrested Maurice Roberts, 21, of Philadelphia, and his 16-year-old brother, who allegedly shot Grandzol.

They wanted the car; he wouldnt give up the car. And they shot him for it, Homicide Capt. John Ryan was quoted as saying by the CBS affiliate in Philadelphia.

The two brothers evidently were determined to rob someone, and Grandzol became their target, police said.

Ryan told reporters at a briefing that the weapon used in the murder was a 9-mm. handgun. The suspects were well-known to police because of prior arrests, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Grandzol was active in his community. His involvement included being a board member of the Francisville Neighborhood Development Corp.

Just six weeks ago, he became a father again, and reported the birth of his second daughter on social media.

'Two gunshots just destroyed my life.'  Kristin Grandzol

This is just not fair that this is how he died, the victims widow, Kristin Grandzol, told KYW Newsradio.

He was just the best father to our two girls that you could even imagine, she added. He was welcoming to everyone in the neighborhood. Everybody loved him and he was just the best.

Those two gunshots just destroyed my life and my two daughters dont have a father now. I have a 6-week-old daughter and a two-and-a-half year-old who saw the whole thing and I dont know if shell ever be right.
Before Hurricane Irma's expected landfall in Florida, a crew worked to protect the sign of the Pulse nightclub in Orlando.

Pulse was the site of the nations deadliest mass shooting in modern history after a gunman opened fire on the crowded gay club on June 12, 2016, killing 49 people and injuring dozens more.

Workers draped a tarp over Pulses sign on Saturday afternoon with jumper cables to protect it from the impending hurricane, WFTV-TV reported. After the tarp was secured, another worker painted a large white P on the protective sheet  similar to the now-covered sign.

Thank you to all who helped ensure that we are prepared for [Hurricane Irma], the nightclubs nonprofit foundation said in a tweet Saturday. We hope for the safety of all those in its path.

onePULSE Foundation, the nonprofit established after the tragic shooting, had scheduled a town hall forum last week but rescheduled it for October due to the storm.

HURRICANE IRMA MAKES LANDFALL IN FLORIDA KEYS AS CATEGORY 4 STORM

Hurricane Irma slammed into the Florida Keys Sunday morning as a Category 4 hurricane as it continued on its path to Floridas west coast. By Sunday afternoon, the storm was downgraded to a Category 3 hurricane with sustained winds of up to 120 mph.

At least 28 people have died from Hurricane Irma so far after it ravaged the Caribbean last week.
As people brace for Hurricane Irmas impact on Florida, a Facebook group has proposed an idea to stop the catastrophic storm in its tracks: Pull out a gun, and shoot at it.

Police in Florida have a different idea: Don't.

More than 20,000 people have RSVPd for the Shoot at Hurricane Irma Facebook event, scheduled to take place at 10 a.m. ET Sunday. Another 53,000 showed at least some interest in the bizarre idea as of Sunday morning.

LETS SHOW IRMA THAT WE SHOOT FIRST, reads the event description.

The post prompted the Pasco County Sheriff's Office to issue a reminder to not shoot weapons at Hurricane Irma.

Ryon Edwards, who created the event, told Newsbeat that the idea was inspired by a combination of stress and boredom, and was intended as a way to lighten the mood as the storm approached.

However, Edwards said he was surprised by the enormous interest in the event.

"I never envisioned this event becoming some kind of crazy idea larger than myself, Edwards said. It has become something a little out of my control."

Ideas for repelling Hurricane Irma dont stop with bullets. Another Facebook event, titled Flame Throwing Hurricane Irma, has also popped up, along with Spinning your arms really fast to push away Hurricane Irma.

Although the flamethrowing idea hadnt drawn much interest as of Sunday morning, the idea of spinning your arms seemed to resonate with people: Some 12,000 people have RSVPd for the event, and another 39,000 were interested in spinning their arms between 6 pm ET Friday and 9 p.m. ET Wednesday (Sept. 9-13).

We gotta do something about this weather y'all, the description reads. Time to become a hero.

Other events, including "Line up on the coast and shoot Kamehamehas at Hurricane Irma, have taken shape on Facebook as well, the Nashville Tennessean reported.
As Hurricane Irma neared Florida early Sunday, some forecasters predicted the city of St. Petersburg might take a direct hit.

That was disturbing news to the residents of the city of 261,000 people, who were previously told that Florida's east coast -- or even neighboring Tampa (population 377,000) -- would take a bigger blow.

"For five days, we were told it was going to be on the east coast, and then 24 hours before it hits, we're now told it's coming up the west coast," said Jeff Beerbohm, a 52-year-old entrepreneur in St. Petersburg. "As usual, the weatherman, I don't know why they're paid."

https://twitter.com/StPeteFL/status/906678532948086786

The course change from Florida's east coast caught many off guard and triggered Pinellas County, home to St. Petersburg, to order people to leave. Motorists heading inland from the Tampa area were allowed to drive on the shoulders.

The storm was likely to hit the Keys on Sunday morning as a Category 4 hurricane, moving up the state's west coast to Sarasota and eventually the Tampa Bay area, the Tampa Bay Times reported.

A major hurricane hasnt hit the Tampa area since 1921, the Times reported, citing information from National Hurricane Center spokesman and meteorologist Dennis Feltgen.

https://twitter.com/AP/status/906731806275379200

The biggest problem facing Tampa residents is potential for storm surges. Meteorologist are expecting that water pushed ashore to be around 5 to 9 feet starting around Sunday evening.

Strong winds could also cause tornados to form as the eye of the storm makes its way over Tampa.

On Saturday night an estimated 70,000 Floridians huddled in shelters as Irma closed in on the Keys, where the storm's center was expected to swirl over land Sunday morning.

https://twitter.com/Fox35Danielle/status/906769363260375040

The course change from Florida's east coast caught many off guard and triggered a major round of evacuations.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.
Two Italian policemen who allegedly sexually assaulted two American students in Florence while on duty were suspended Saturday on a precautionary basis, authorities said.

The 21-year-old women told authorities that the police, in uniform, drove them home from a disco early Thursday morning because they couldnt find a taxi, then sexually assaulted them inside their apartment building.

Italian media say three patrol cars went to a nightclub to investigate a fight. Two cars left after calm was restored, but the third remained. News reports described witnesses as confirming that they saw the women enter the patrol car.

Officials from Italys Carabinieri paramilitary police corps stressed the suspension reflects alleged conduct while on duty and is separate from Florence prosecutors criminal investigation of the alleged sexual assaults.

Besides the rape allegations, the policemen risk disciplinary charges for driving the women home without informing their superiors.

Authorities are awaiting DNA test results to see if they confirm the womens account.

Investigation is still underway, but there is some basis in respect to the allegations, Minister Roberta Pinotti said Friday evening at a forum about womens issues in Milan. Rape is always something grave. But its of unprecedented gravity if it is committed by Carabinieri in uniform, because citizens turns to them and to their uniform to have assurances and security.

Italy has two main police forces that patrol its streets  the paramilitary Carabinieri, which are under the defense ministry, and the state police, who report to the interior ministry.

A U.S. State Department official indicated the department was aware of the media reports that the two students were assaulted by police in Italy and that such allegations are taken seriously.

The U.S. Embassy in Rome, when asked about the investigation, sent an email saying: Due to the sensitive nature of this case and to protect the privacy of those involved, we have no further comment.

The U.S. consul general in Florence met for about an hour with Florences police chief Friday morning about the case, the Italian news agency ANSA reported.

Florence, with its many museums and churches full with Renaissance masterpieces, is a popular destination for many Americans, especially university students.

The women reportedly arrived in Florence several months ago to study Italian at a language institute.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.
Syrian activists say at least 17 civilians have been killed in a series of airstrikes on a Euphrates River crossing in eastern Syria.

Omar Abou Leila of the monitoring group DeirEzzor 24 says Russian jets struck on Sunday ferries waiting to transport passengers across the river in the Islamic State group-held town of al-Baloul, 27 kilometers (17 miles) east of the contested city of Deir el-Zour.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights puts the toll at 21 civilians killed. It says the Russian air force is responsible. It was not immediately possible to independently confirm the claim.

Russian-backed government forces and U.S.-backed non-government forces are in a race to claim the IS-held river valley, and the surrounding energy resources and nearby crossing to Iraq.
Israeli political leaders are lashing out at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's eldest son for posting an anti-Semitic caricature aimed at his father's critics.

Labor Party chairman Avi Gabbay told Army Radio Sunday the post "crossed every line imaginable" and was a "very sad" day for Israel.

Yair Netanyahu's meme shows American Jewish billionaire George Soros and a figure that resembles Nazi depictions of world Jewry manipulating former Prime Minister Ehud Barak and two leaders of weekly protests calling on Netanyahu to step down over corruption allegations.

The post was shared by former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke and other anti-Semites.

The 26-year-old Yair Netanyahu has drawn criticism for living a life of privilege at taxpayers' expense and for his crude social media posts.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel once again has stressed the 2015 Iran nuclear deal  negotiated with U.N. Security Council members and Germany  as a model for solving the North Korea crisis.

If our participation in talks is wanted, I will say yes immediately, Merkel said in an interview published Sunday in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung newspaper.

Merkel said a diplomatic solution was the only viable way to resolve the crisis  which has seen North Korea launch a series of missile tests as well as test what it said was a hydrogen bomb.

The actions by North Korea have antagonized the United States and its allies in the Asia-Pacific region. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has threatened a missile attack on the U.S. territory of Guam and even the U.S. mainland  prompting warnings of retaliation, in the form of economic sanctions and possible military action, from Trump and other U.S. officials.

The U.S. plans to seek a strong resolution Monday from the U.N. Security Council in a bid to convince North Korea to end its provocations and tone down its rhetoric.

Merkel previously raised the possibility of using the Iran deal as a model during a podcast earlier this month, Fox News reported.

The five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council and Germany conducted long-running talks with Iran that led to a 2015 deal for international sanctions to be lifted in exchange for Tehran curbing its nuclear activities.

Merkel told the newspaper: "I could also imagine such a format to settle the North Korea conflict."

The chancellor is expected to win a fourth term in office when Germany holds elections Sept. 24 vote, with polls giving her conservatives a double-digit lead over their rival Social Democrats, Reuters reported.

Merkel has spoken in recent days to Chinese President Xi Jinping and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe regarding North Korea. Sources told Reuters that she would speak by phone Monday with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
At least 90 people were killed in the historic earthquake that struck the southern coast of Mexico Thursday night, leaving cities and towns in rubble as relief supplies and cleanup crews arrive to assist devastated residents, officials confirmed on Saturday.

Oaxaca state Gov. Alejandro Murat said Sunday that 71 people have died in his state. At least 19 are reported dead in two neighboring states.

Its 71 (dead). Just for Oaxaca, said Jesus Gonzalez, a spokesman for the state civil protection authority, told Reuters.

Mexico President Enrique Pena Nieto announced on Twitter there will be three days of national mourning for those who have died. A body of a police officer was found buried under rubble in Juchitan, where a total of 37 people have died. The magnitude 8.1 earthquake struck Thursday night, the strongest Mexico has seen in a century.

"We have to work so that we're not overcome with sadness," Maria de Lourdes Quintana Lopez, whose familys candy business warehouse was destroyed, told the Associated Press. "We're not going to wait for the government to do what it has to do."

Government cargo planes arrived in Juchitan to deliver supplies while the military began distributing boxes of food to residents. More than 1,000 homes were destroyed in Chiapas and another 5,000 were damaged.

As residents attempted to dig themselves out, Hurricane Katia hit the Gulf coast state of Veracruz late Friday, triggering a mudslide that killed two people.

Nieto said authorities were working to re-establish supplies of water and food and provide medical attention to those who need it. He vowed the government would help rebuild.

Funeral processions have begun to bury the dead. The slow-moving funeral processions, however, caused a temporary gridlock at intersections in Juchitan.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Thousands of supporters of Pakistan's main Islamic Jamaat-e-Islami party have gathered in Karachi to protest Myanmar's treatment of its Rohingya Muslim minority.

The JI supporters rallied Sunday on a Karachi main street for hours chanting slogans in support of the Rohingyas. The JI leader Senator Sirajul Haq, addressing the rally by video link, urged world powers to carry out their role in immediately stopping the "planned genocide of the oppressed Rohingya Muslims"

Another Islamic party, Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, held a rally in northwestern city of Peshawar in support of the Rohingya Muslims. JUI leader Jaleel Khan condemned the "atrocities" committed against Muslims in Myanmar.

The rallies come a day after Pakistan's Foreign Ministry summoned Myanmar's ambassador to protest the violence against Rohingya Muslims.
Pope Francis wrapped up his Colombia trip with a deeply personal final day Sunday honoring St. Peter Claver, a fellow Jesuit who ministered to thousands of African slaves who passed through the port of Cartagena during Spanish colonial times.

His visit to Cartagena got off to a rocky start, however, when he banged his head on his popemobile, cutting his eyebrow and getting a swollen, black left eye. Francis iced his cheekbone and received a butterfly patch to cover the cut, and he continued his popemobile tour without incident.

Francis was visiting the poor San Francisco neighborhood to dedicate new houses for the homeless before paying homage to Claver at the church that bears his name in the city's historic center.

Claver, the self-described "slave of the slaves forever," has been revered by Jesuits, popes and human rights campaigners for centuries for having insisted on recognizing the dignity of slaves when others treated them as mere merchandise to be bought and sold.

POPE FRANCIS IN COLOMBIA VISIT URGES PRIESTS, CITIZENS TO WELCOME SINNERS

On the eve of his visit to Cartagena, Francis celebrated Claver's feast day by praising the 17th century Spanish missionary for having "understood, as a disciple of Jesus, that he could not remain indifferent to the suffering of the most helpless and mistreated of his time, and that he had to do something to alleviate their suffering."

History's first Latin American pope has similarly insisted on ministering to society's most marginal and making them the focus of the Catholic Church's mission. He takes special care of the homeless who live around the Vatican, makes regular phone calls to prisoners, brought a dozen Syrian refugees home with him from a Greek refugee camp, and embraces the sick, the maimed and the deformed every chance he gets.

He is to pray at Claver's tomb on Sunday after laying the foundation for new residences for homeless people in Cartagena, the city famous for its UNESCO-awarded historic center but also home to slums and shanties.

Francis is likely to hold Claver up as a model for today's Catholic Church, someone who insisted on recognizing the inherent human rights of everyone. It's a message he referenced in Medellin on Saturday during a Mass on a rain-soaked airport tarmac that drew upward of 1 million people. Francis demanded that his church not hold fast to rigid doctrine but instead seek out the sinners and outcasts and welcome them in.

"My brothers, the church is not a customs post," Francis said. "It wants its doors to be open."

Francis returns to Rome from Cartagena on Sunday night, ending a five-day visit highlighted by a huge prayer of reconciliation that brought together victims of Colombia's long-running conflict and demobilized guerrillas and paramilitary fighters.

While in Colombia, Francis refrained from making any public comments about the deteriorating political and humanitarian situation next door in Venezuela, though he did meet briefly with a delegation of Venezuelan bishops. He will most certainly be asked about it during his airborne press conference en route home.
For almost 40 years, Jon Malay tucked away the memories, thinking that one dayafter careers in which he studied weather for the Navy or sold satellites that recorded the swirling winds of hurricaneshe would write about being on the ship that became the last American military presence of the Vietnam War.

No matter how busy he was advising astronauts how to interpret weather phenomenon from space or working with NOAA (the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) and NASA, Malay thought about his time aboard the Navy destroyer, the USS Benjamin Stoddert.

It was actually the most memorable of my career, said the Falmouth resident.

Malay, 66, finally got the chance to dig out his notebooks and go back in time. With research from Navy archives and letters from his wife, Sharon, who was a newlywed when she saved every note he wrote during that tumultuous tour in 1975, Malay created a first-person narrative called War in Our Wake.

Its neither history book nor war account, Malay said, but a deeply personal story that Im proud to tell.

MADE THE STORY BETTER

Decades after the Stoddert tour, Malay discovered something that put the ships mission in a totally different light. Hed always been proud of an impromptu rescue the ship had performed, but didnt learn until a few years ago that his captain had disobeyed a direct order by saving lives.

I didnt know that hed risked his career to do this, Malay said recently. It just made the story that much better.

It was May 1975, days after the fall of Saigon had been chronicled in dramatic photos of helicopters retrieving people from rooftops. The North Vietnamese had taken over the Republic of Vietnam, Americas allies in the war against the spread of Communism.

The South Vietnamese who had helped the United States, as well as Americans and other internationals in Saigon, were desperate to get out of the collapsing country.

The rest of the American military had pulled out of Southeast Asia, and Malay wondered what the Stoddert was doing, still in country.

When guys on the bridge noticed a slow-moving boat on their last patrol along the Vietnam coast, they came across a rusty old fishing boat, overloaded with men, women and children fleeing the troops in their wake.

The Stoddert took all 158 refugees aboard, assuming theyd sink, starve or be executed if left behind. In the book, Malay writes with prideand amazementat the way technicians and engineers provided shelter for the families on the deck of the ship.

A talented welder even built platforms with two simple toilets for the passengers with their seat openings suspended above the water.

SOMETHING HEROIC

Malay didnt know until he looked through Navy archives that the ships captain, Pete Hekman, had radioed his superiors for guidance when the Stoddert first spotted the refugees.

The day before, the ship had rescued a gunboat crew of allies from the Republic of Vietnam Navy. The Stoddert already was running low on fuel, and its quarters were full with its own crew of 350, plus the South Vietnamese.

And, the countries accepting war refugees, including the Philippines, already had taken more than they could handle. Thats why the captain was told to provide the refugees with food and water, but was ordered not to bring them on board.

Hekman then did something that I call heroic, Malay writes in the book. Without further discussion with higher authority, the captain ordered that all of the people be brought on board. His absolutely correct judgment was that these people were likely going to die if we left them there.

A HAUNTING DISCOVERY

The Stoddert also patrolled the waters off the Vietnam coast for wreckage from a plane crash. A U.S. Air Force C-5A Galaxy, a large military transport, was being used to carry Vietnamese orphansmany who had been fathered by American service membersto safety along with nurses and other military personnel. There was an explosion on board, and 134 people, including 76 children, of the 328 passengers died.

The Stoddert crew was looking for crash carnage, expecting to find pieces of the cargo hatch to determine what had caused it to blow off.

What the sailors found was much more haunting. Crew members spotted a body adrift in the water, and Malay was one of six sent to retrieve it. They recovered the remains of a crew member who was thrown out of the plane when the hatch blew.

Malay will never forget the sights and smells that assailed him.

I can still smell it, if I think about it, these 41 years later, he wrote.

CAPTURES ITS ESSENCE

The Stodderts two rescue missions actually take up a small portion of the 254-page paperback. The rest of the book is devoted to the professional and cultural experiences Malay had. He discovered a love for kimchi, a staple in Korean cuisine, when he was part of an exchange program with a Korean vessel. His love of the vegetable dish, usually made with fermented cabbage, over sticky rice, continues to this day.

He also shares stories from Hong Kong and the Philippines, and you feel you are sitting there with the author as he recounts these stories, wrote Linda Boris, a retired Navy commander who lives in New Jersey.

Malay details research he discovered about the crash of the plane, sent to rescue the Vietnamese orphans, that Boris used in a book she wrote called, Every Sparrow That Falls.

Roger Launius, a chief historian for NASA and senior curator at the Smithsonian Institution, has known Malay for more than 20 years. In a review of the book on Amazon, he said his friend did a good job describing the exotic and picturesque land of Vietnamand the calamity that befell it.

He captures its essence, Launius wrote, and the tragedy of a war that could have both been avoided with effective diplomatic action and won, had the U.S. demonstrated the will to do so.
Teresa Jo Burchfield, the wife of a prominent GOP lawyer who has served three presidents, was arrested on Tuesday for delivering contraband items to an inmate after the two had sex in a car outside the Fauquier County, Virginia, jail, according to county records.

Detectives arrested Burchfield after discovering her and a 23-year-old inmate together in the back seat of a car parked in a lot adjacent to the jail, the sheriff's office said in a news release. The couple had been having sex, according to a criminal complaint filed at Fauquier County General District Court obtained by the Fauquier Times, which first reported the arrest.

During their parking-lot assignation, Burchfield had given the inmate - who was allowed outside because of his minimal sentence and status as a "trustee" - clothing, cigarettes and what detectives suspect are over-the-counter vitamin supplements, the sheriff's office said. The McLean woman, 53, was charged with a class 1 misdemeanor.

Her husband, Bobby Burchfield, is a veteran GOP lawyer who the Trump Organization picked as outside ethics counsel to help navigate the potential conflicts of interest between the business and the Trump administration. Bobby Burchfield also advised both Bush presidential teams and is a partner in the Washington office of law firm giant King & Spalding.

Reached at his law office, Bobby Burchfield had no comment. Efforts to reach Teresa Burchfield were not immediately successful.
Update: Fredericksburg Police Detectives took Cortez Mills into custody this evening and charged him with second degree murder. He is being held at Rappahannock Regional Jaill without bond.

Fredericksburg police officers responded to a shots fired call in Mayfield Saturday night and found a car crashed with a woman behind the wheel dead of a gunshot wound.

Police said officers went to the scene where a car had run into a utility pole in the 300 block of Palmer Street about 9:40 and found Antoinette Anne Beverly of Caroline County in the driver's seat dead of a "fatal gunshot wound."

Police are looking for a man they believe shot the 26-year-old Milford woman.

Beverly's boyfriend, Cortez Antonio Mills, 34, also of Milford, "is a person of interest at this time in the investigation," police said in a release.

Anyone with information about Mills whereabouts can contact police at 540/373-3122. To make an anonymous tip, send a text to 847-411 and text FPDtip followed by your tip.
The Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles is bringing its DMV Connect program to select branches of Central Rappahannock Regional Library.

DMV Connect was developed to serve Virginians who may not be able to travel to a DMV office. Customers can get and renew ID cards, licenses and learners permits. Customers can also take care of titles, vehicle registrations, transfers and plate returns. DMV Connect is not able to perform any testing or provide birth, death or marriage certificates.

On Friday, DMV Connect will be at Snow Branch from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. It will return to Snow Branch on Dec. 1, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

On Nov. 20, Fredericksburg Branch will host DMV Connect, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., in the Library Theater. It will be back at Fredericksburg Branch on Dec. 15 from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. in Meeting Room 1.

Appointments are not required. First come, first served.
Grace United Methodist Church at 13056 Elk Ridge Road in Hartwood invites the community to help assemble flood buckets for the people of Texas and Louisiana on Saturday from 9 a.m. to noon.

Please bring the following items, or just come to help assemble:

5-gallon bucket with re-sealable lid. Buckets from fast-food restaurants or bakeries can be used if washed and cleaned; do not use buckets that have stored chemicals such as paint or pool cleaner.

50 oz. liquid laundry detergent (one 50-oz. or two 25-oz.)

1216 oz. liquid household cleaner that can be mixed with water, no spray cleaners

1628 oz. dish soap

50 clothespins

100 ft. clothesline (one 100-ft. or two 50-ft. lines)

7 sponges (no cellulose sponges due to mold issues, remove from package)

24-roll 3345-gallon size heavy-duty trash bags, remove from package

18 cleaning wipes: Handi-wipes or reusable wipes, no terry cleaning towels, remove from package

aerosol or pump air freshener

614 oz. insect-repellent spray

2 pairs kitchen dishwashing gloves, remove from package

1 pair heavy-duty work gloves

5 scouring pads- no stainless steel, Brillo pads or SOS pads (nothing with soap built in), remove from package

scrub brush

5 dust masks

Place all liquid items in the bucket first, place remaining items around and make sure the lid is closed securely. No powders, please.

Drop-off of completed buckets or supplies for assembly may be done Monday through Thursday from 9 a.m.-1 p.m. or 5-8 p.m. and Saturday from 9 a.m. to noon.

Financial gifts may be made out to GUMC, with Flood Bucket Mission on the subject line and mailed to the church. These donations help greatly with bulk item purchases, at a discounted rate.
AS A MAN of science, which I will pretend to be for the next 600 words or so, I like to keep up with the latest scientific research, then present a slightly bent and truncated version of that research as a service to loyal readersboth of youso you can stay informed while devoting more time to important activities like dodging flying lawn furniture during hurricanes and digging backyard bunkers to survive North Korean missile strikes.

Here are few recent headlines that caught my eye, which made it red and puffythough that cleared up after a shot of Visine.

Study: Antidepressants found in fish brains in Great Lakes region.

According to a news release from researchers at the University of Buffalo, where someone in charge of the money must have said, I wonder what goes through a fishs mind? scientists determined that human antidepressants are building up in the brains of bass, walleye and several other fish common to the Great Lakes region.

It isnt that fish are depressed.

Doc, life just hasnt turned out the way I hoped. I wanted to be a sturgeon but I couldnt get into med school, I fell for the wrong girl hook, line and sinker, and my job? Well, lets not open that can of worms. Got anything that can help?

No, its that people are depressedmost likely about hurricanes and North Korean missile strikesand are taking antidepressants and eliminating antidepressants, which are finding their way downstream to fish.

These active ingredients from antidepressants, which are coming out from wastewater treatment plants, are accumulating in fish brains, explained lead scientist Diana Aga in the news release, It is a threat to biodiversity, and we should be very concerned.

The worst-case scenario, presumably, is a chain reaction that ultimately ends life on our planet as we know it, which would be depressing to anyone except medicated fish if not for the fact that

Study: Thinking about our death is healthy.

CBS Philly reported on a study conducted by the University of London that found taking some time to think about the unnerving possibilities surrounding your end can actually be a good thing.

The results were based on a survey of 356 peopleno fish participatedwho were asked questions about their own mortality.

Those who are interested in passing down their succession to future generations as a way to transcend death are also likely to take responsibility for their health and place value on their internal development, said health psychology Professor Mark McDermott, adding that legacy awareness was found to be correlated with both trying to be healthy and striving for spiritual growth (such as believing that life has purpose).

And that purpose, for many people, does not include cussing like a sailor on Facebook because

Study: Religious people are more positive, less profane on social media.

The findings published in the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science suggest nonreligious individuals swear more and use sexual words more frequently, while the language of religious individuals was more emotionally positive and socially oriented

The authors did note one limitation of the study was a majority of individuals were from the United States, where people commonly claim a Christian orientation in name only but do not practice regularly.

That last statement may result in the studys authors finding a post like this on their Facebook pages:

Are yall saying I dont practice what I preach, you pointy-headed sons of %!@? I will come down there to that fancy-pants journal of yours and beat the absolute %!@ out of every last one of you. Now, you have a blessed day.

And thats our look at the latest scientific research. Now, back to dodging and digging.
THE PUNDITS at elite East Coast media outletsThe New York Times, Washington Post, NBC, CNN and their many satelliteswasted no time in rushing to judgment.

Torrential rains were still flooding a huge area of southeast Texas when they proclaimed Hurricane Harvey a prime example of devastating climate change.

They received standing applause from Al Gore and his legion of federally funded climate alarmists across the country, but they were jarringly wrong.

Hurricane Harvey is a horrible, extreme case of the weather that typically ravages Texas Gulf Coast, but it has nothing to do with global climate change.

Some in the burgeoning climate disaster industry claim that Harvey was directly caused by man-made climate change, or, at the very least, was made significantly worse by it.

For example, Sen. Bernie Sanders, the Independent from Vermont, said, Is some of the intensity and the magnitude of this related to climate change? I think most scientists believe it is.

And hes been joined by countless others making frenzied calls for more government action and saying climate change will make extreme storms more severe.

But for some historical perspective, consider what happened in 1900, when the worst hurricane in American history roared into the port of Galveston, destroying thousands of buildings and killing an estimated 6,000 to 12,000 people.

Harvey, thus far, has accounted for fewer than 100 fatalities.

University of Washington atmospheric scientist Cliff Mass said climate change did not cause Hurricane Harvey.

You cant really pin global warming for something this extreme, Mass said.

William Happer, an emeritus professor of physics at Princeton University and a former director of energy research of the U.S. Department of Energy, is also among those highly skeptical of global warming as generally explained by mainstream media.

Climate has been changing since the Earth was formed some 4.5 billion years ago, he wrote in an op-ed earlier this year.

Climate changes on every time scalewhether decades, centuries or millennia. The climate of Greenland was warm enough for farming around the year 1100 A.D., but by 1500, the Little Ice Age drove Norse settlers out, he wrote.

There is no opportunity for a hoax, since climate change is so well documented by historical and geophysical records.

Debate between skeptical academics like Happer and his undoubting colleagues doing research with federal grants will likely continue ad infinitum.

In the meantime, tens of thousands of Texans are homeless, hungry and quite possibly shell-shocked.
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Milking equipment must be kept clean at all times  Tim Scrivener

Two Northern Irish dairy farmers have been fined 750 each, and ordered to pay an offenders levy, for failing to keep their farm and dairy clean enough.

Selwyn Ball and Martin Ball from Dromara, County Down, were issued with Remedial Action Notices (RANs) following a series of inspections by the Department of Agricultures Agri-Food Inspection Branch.

But on 7 September 2016, it was found that four RANs, issued under the Food Hygiene Regulations 2006, had been breached.

See also: 6 ways dairy producers can raise milk hygiene levels

As a consequence, the two brothers pleaded guilty at Craigavon courthouse to one charge that, on 7 September 2016:

the dairy was not kept pest-proofed and protected

the bulk tank exterior was not clean and miscellaneous items were present on the tank lid

unnecessary items were present in the dairy

collection/dispersal areas adjacent to the milking parlour were not sufficiently clean

Persistent breaches

The Food Standards Agency in Northern Ireland, which brought the case, said such instances of non-compliance were rare, but if producers persistently failed to meet hygiene standards, then they risked being fined.

A spokesman for the FSA NI said the booklet Milk Hygiene on the Dairy Farm (PDF) provided basic guidelines for operating around the farmyard and in the parlour and dairy, and the vast majority of farmers managed to adhere to this.

On the rare occasions something like this gets to court, it is either because the farmer has been particularly obstinate, or more likely because their circumstances mean they are so stretched they just cant keep on top of everything.
Right now, Diana Alvarez of Lebanon has a full-time job, a driver's license and a form of legal residency in the United States.

By this time next fall, none of those may be true.

Alvarez, 24, was born in Mexico and came to the United States with her family when she was 6 years old. She became part of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program five years ago and is now a teacher at Sprague High School in Salem, but the phaseout of that program announced last week leaves her future in limbo.

Called DACA for short, the deferred action program allows qualifying undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as children the right to avoid deportation. DACA recipients aren't considered citizens but are allowed to work.

Until now, DACA certification could be renewed every two years. In rescinding the Obama administration policy change that created the program, President Donald Trump said he'd delay the effects of his own order for six months, potentially giving Congress time to put a new policy in place.

Alvarez received her first DACA papers in November 2012, a few months after Obama's policy took effect. The current certification expires in October 2018.

After that, anything could happen  and because anything could, Alvarez isn't thinking about it right now.

"I'm not worried," she said. "I know many people are unsure about this, but worrying doesn't solve the problem."

DACA recipients are often called "dreamers," a nod to the DREAM Act, a path to permanent residency for unauthorized immigrants that Congress last failed to pass in 2011. It's thought the Obama administration signed the DACA policy as a direct response to that failure.

Roughly 800,000 people in the United States currently hold DACA certification, according to U.S. Citizen and Immigration Services. In Oregon, 11,281 people had received DACA benefits as of March 31, 2017.

As of the Sept. 5 suspension, no new DACA requests are being processed. People whose documents expire before March 5, 2018, can reapply now. Alvarez is one of 275,344 individuals nationwide whose papers expire in 2018, but because hers are good until next October, she can't reapply.

If nothing changes between now and then, her DACA certification goes away. Her driver's license expires, too. She will no longer be able to work legally in the United States. The risk of deportation looms.

Friends are concerned, she said. "There's a lot of people who now know about my status that didn't know about it when I was going through it, in high school," she said. "The people who know about this are more worried about it than I am. It's kind of cool ... that they care about this."

Alvarez was born in Guanajuato, Mexico, the oldest of five children. Her father, the oldest of 10 siblings, worked in construction and helped to support his younger brothers and sisters as well as his own family. He dreamed of giving his children an education he didn't see as possible in his own country.

He began going north to work, to the United States, where he could get better pay, Alvarez said. Hed work through the growing season, then come home, then return. When one of his employers suggested bringing his family north so he'd no longer have to travel each year, he decided he would.

Alvarez' father made the announcement to the family on April 30, 1998, El Dia de Nino, Children's Day. In a 2012 interview with the Democrat-Herald, Alvarez recounted the words he used: Im going to give you guys the biggest present."

Alvarez was 6 at the time and recalled being excited about "going north," although not really understanding why. She said "north," to Mexican children, means the United States. "The land of opportunity," she remembered.

The family's first attempt didn't succeed. With children ranging in age from 6 years to 5 months, hiking through the desert wasnt an option. So the family paid a coyote  a human smuggler  to get them across in a van.

It didnt work. The border patrol caught the family, held them in a detention center and fingerprinted everyone, including the children, before sending them back to Mexico.

They made it through undetected a second time, arriving in the mid-valley on May 10, Mothers Day.

Alvarez enrolled in first grade that fall at the former Waterloo School in Lebanon. Despite her practically nonexistent English skills, she immediately became a strong student, earning a spot in the highest reading group by the end of the year.

She would go on to achieve a 3.98 grade point average and become a 2011 salutatorian at Lebanon High School, receiving National Honor Student recognition and an award her junior year as Outstanding Junior in the Area of Foreign Language.

It was partly her own academic strength that drove Alvarez's plans to pursue a career teaching Spanish. But her immigration status made things complicated. She didn't have a Social Security card, which meant she couldn't fill out an application for federal student aid. She wasn't a resident and didn't qualify for in-state tuition, nor could she acquire a driver's license to get to school anyway.

Alvarez and her family heard about DACA program from news reports on June 15, 2012, the day President Barack Obama announced the new policy. Applying for certification was a given, even at a cost of nearly $500. She didn't know if she'd have another chance.

Alvarez had begun classes at Corban College, even though it didn't have a Spanish program, because the college helped her out financially. After her DACA certification came through, she got her license, transferred to Linn-Benton Community College and finished her transfer degree, then graduated from Western Oregon University.

"I didn't have to pay out-of-state tuition because through the DACA, we were able to apply for tuition equity which gave us the right to be charged the same as any other resident," she said.

Today, Alvarez is in her third year at Sprague High School, where she teaches five classes of Spanish I and one of Advanced Placement Spanish.

Her status is known but doesn't come up much. This past February, she quietly took a personal day to participate in "A Day Without Immigrants," an event meant to be a national strike to show the impact across the nation of immigrant labor. She plans to do so again next February, but will again take a personal day and leave plans for a substitute so her students won't be shortchanged. "I wanted to do things right," she said.

Now that DACA is all over the news, Alvarez said she plans to sit down with the principal at Sprague to discuss how she should handle the topic if a student asks.

She wishes, she said, that people could see her past her residency status to who she is as a person and what she's trying to do.

"I'm just like other teachers who are hoping to help students be successful in class, and give them the tools to be successful outside of class, too," she said.

Fellow DACA recipients are just regular people too, she added. "There are people doing awesome things out there just like any other American."

Mostly, she said, people ask why she and other DACA recipients can't also just "do things the right way" and become a citizen. Her answer: It isn't that easy.

"A co-worker asked me about it today (Tuesday, following Trump's announcement) and asked why I can't just apply for residency," she said. "I explained to her that it's not an option for DACA students."

A green card, the document that confers status as a legal immigrant, isn't a realistic option for Alvarez, either. Most green card recipients are sponsored through family members who are legal residents (not an option) or employment (the employer would have to have determined no one else could fill that position). She's not a political refugee or a victim of human trafficking, and Mexico isn't one of the countries eligible for the so-called "green card lottery."

Alvarez could go back to Mexico, a country that holds no ties and almost no memories for her, and re-establish residency to apply.

However, paperwork can take years to process. And if an applicant already has been in the United States illegally for more than a year, he or she faces a 10-year ban on re-entering. The Department of Homeland Security already knows Alvarez's status: Besides holding three rounds of DACA paperwork, the agency still has her fingerprints on file from the unsuccessful border attempt in 1998.

Given a magic wand, Alvarez would open a path to legal residency, the desire the unsuccessful DREAM Act tried to fulfill. If it existed, she said, 800,000 people like herself would jump at the chance.

"I'm sure if there was a way, we would," she said. "There isn't right now."

For five years, DACA lifted any concerns Alvarez might have had about deportation or her ability to work. But God has come through in the clutch for her and her family on many occasions. Congress hasn't acted yet. Fifteen states, including Oregon, have joined a lawsuit challenging Trump's decision. Things might change.

Alvarez keeps a notecard in her car with a quote from the Gospel of Luke, chapter 12, verse 25. "Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?" She didn't have room for the rest of the verse, but tries to live by its words, too: "Since you cannot do this very little thing, why do you worry about the rest?"

"Throughout my life, my parents have been good examples of what it means to trust in God. I think that's why that verse is significant to me and why I'm not worried like many others are," she said.

"It's a peace I can't fully explain."
kacylee at 10-09-2017 02:32 PM (5 years ago) (f)

The State Security Service (SSS), on Saturday, announced the arrest of Husseini Maitangaran, a top commander of by Islamic State of West Africa (ISWA), otherwise known as Boko Haram. He was arrested in Kano on 31 August. Maitangaran, according to a statement issued by the service, spearheaded several deadly attacks in Kano in 2012.

The State Security Service (SSS), on Saturday, announced the arrest of Husseini Maitangaran, a top commander of by Islamic State of West Africa (ISWA), otherwise known as Boko Haram. He was arrested in Kano on 31 August. Maitangaran, according to a statement issued by the service, spearheaded several deadly attacks in Kano in 2012.

The statement, signed by SSS spokesman, Tony Opuiyo, said the service arrested other top Boko Haram terrorists, who were part of a foiled plan to disrupt the last Eid-el-Kabir celebrations in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, Kano, Kaduna, Niger, Bauchi, Yobe and Borno states.

This followed the discovery of an elaborate plan by ISWA terrorists to launch attacks that would have disrupted the Eid-el-Kabir festivities that took place between 1 and 4th September.



According to the SSS, the plan entailed gun attacks and suicide bombing on selected targets in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, Kano, Kaduna, Niger, Bauchi, Yobe and Borno states. The Service identified Maitangaran as the mastermind, adding that he had been on the wanted list of the SSS and the Nigerian Army since he coordinated the armed attacks on the office of the Assistant Inspector-General of Police (AIG) Zone I on January 20, 2012, and other public places in Kano.



The suspect was also said to have been behind bomb attacks on worshippers at the Kano Central Mosque and another on a military formation in Yobe State, which killed over 100 people in 2015.

"Under the banner of ISWA, which he belongs, Maitangaran, an Improvised Explosive Devices expert, had been prepping and priming others for the perpetration of suicide bombing attacks carried out by the group in the past within the North-East region," said the SSS.

The statement, signed by SSS spokesman, Tony Opuiyo, said the service arrested other top Boko Haram terrorists, who were part of a foiled plan to disrupt the last Eid-el-Kabir celebrations in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, Kano, Kaduna, Niger, Bauchi, Yobe and Borno states.This followed the discovery of an elaborate plan by ISWA terrorists to launch attacks that would have disrupted the Eid-el-Kabir festivities that took place between 1 and 4th September.According to the SSS, the plan entailed gun attacks and suicide bombing on selected targets in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, Kano, Kaduna, Niger, Bauchi, Yobe and Borno states. The Service identified Maitangaran as the mastermind, adding that he had been on the wanted list of the SSS and the Nigerian Army since he coordinated the armed attacks on the office of the Assistant Inspector-General of Police (AIG) Zone I on January 20, 2012, and other public places in Kano.The suspect was also said to have been behind bomb attacks on worshippers at the Kano Central Mosque and another on a military formation in Yobe State, which killed over 100 people in 2015."Under the banner of ISWA, which he belongs, Maitangaran, an Improvised Explosive Devices expert, had been prepping and priming others for the perpetration of suicide bombing attacks carried out by the group in the past within the North-East region," said the SSS.

Post Reply I have been reporting for several years now and I am very interested in visual news reportage with strong inclusion of photos and video multimedia. Posted: at 10-09-2017 02:32 PM (5 years ago) | Addicted Hero
Around 100 people marched up and down Main Street in Danville on Saturday evening in support of local residents affected by the decision to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals immigration program.

Chanting and holding signs like undocumented, unafraid, unapologetic, the marchers walked through town to protest President Donald Trumps decision to end the program in six months. Trump made the decision earlier this week, which could affect roughly 800,000 people who participate in the program.

March organizer Maria Salazar Avilla, of Danville, said as a Dreamer her immigration status was in limbo, but she was still committed to fighting for her future in America.

We want to fight for our dreams, Avilla said, adding all Dreamers wanted to become contributing members of American society.

Fellow Dreamer Leslie Pineda was both the first Danville resident in the program to attend DCC as well as the first one to graduate form Radford University. While at Radford, Pineda fought and won the ability to pay in-state tuition at the college, after the General Assembly approved the motion by a single vote.

Im not going to back down, Pineda said. Im going to keep fighting.

Pineda added that her own high school counselor told her to give up on her education dreams, but that her parents and friends pushed her to keep following them.

I just want Congress to think wisely before they jeopardize everybody out there, she said.

Avilla said there were several ways people could help Dreamers remain in the country. She told people to call their local representatives in Congress and urge them to pass a permanent solution to allow childhood immigrants to remain in the country.

We really have to push for these six months, she said.

Additionally, Avilla told the public to get involved in politics and to vote in every election.

Eric Stamps, a local representative with the Indivisible Southside organization, echoed Avilles comments.

We have to be involved in every single election every year, Stamps said.

Avilla added keeping away from state and local politics was also problematic, because those entities also enact policies that affect undocumented individuals.

We have to put the pressure on our Congressmen, she said.
Maria Salazar Avilla is among dozens of young immigrants in the Dan River Region whose future now rides on shaky ground after President Donald Trump announced this week plans to dismantle a program allowing those brought to the county as children to stay in the United States without fear of deportation.

Salazar Avilla, of Danville, was 7 years old when her parents brought her and her siblings into the U.S. from Durango, Mexico.

When I was 3, my mom came here with a work permit, Salazar Avilla said. She had to leave us behind.

It was hard on everyone in the family and, eventually, her mother brought the family here, with hopes of escaping the rampant crime and to give her children a better education, Salazar Avilla said.

Shes one of the 800,000 people nationwide, commonly referred to as Dreamers, currently protected by the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

Salazar Avilla said it was easy for her in school  she was the youngest and absorbed knowledge like a sponge, including learning English.

Danville [Public Schools English as a Second Language] program is wonderful, Salazar Avilla said. They do their best to make sure you fit in.

"Dreamers" got their nickname based on the never-passed proposals in Congress, called the DREAM (Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors) Act. While those measures were never approved, former President Barack Obama launched the current Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program in 2012 based on much of the DREAM Act.

Because of the Obama-era program, she has been able to attend college, get a drivers license and work legally  things undocumented immigrants cannot do.

She attended George Washington High School, participating in the dental assistant program. During that time she met and was mentored by a local dentist who told her she would have a job if she became a dental hygienist.

Now 19, Salazar Avilla is in her second year at Danville Community College and has been accepted into the dental hygiene school. Once she completes that, she plans to continue her education, earning a bachelors degree.

I want a bachelors degree so in the future I can teach, Salazar Avilla said.

This wont happen if Congress doesnt act to replace the program in six months, when it ends.

In September 2018, Id be considered illegal again, Salazar Avilla said. I wont be able to work, wont be able to drive, wont be able to continue my education.

She would also face deportation to a place she barely remembers.

I dont know Mexico. I dont even know that National Anthem, she said. Ive been here most of my life and was hoping, as time went on, Id be able to become a citizen  I want to be the most contributing person I can be.

Salazar Avilla said she knows at least 30 people in Danville facing the same issues she does, including her brother and several cousins. An older sister did not qualify for the program because she was 16 when she arrived  too old to sign up for the program.

Tuesdays announcement pushed her to try and raise awareness of the fate. She went to the Danville Police Department that night and applied for a permit to hold a Defend DACA march on Saturday in Danville. She picked up the permit Wednesday morning and started spreading the word.

Dozens take to the streets Saturday in support of Dreamers Around 100 people marched up and down Main Street in Danville on Saturday evening in support

When I found out they were going to mess with DACA, I knew I wanted to organize a march, Salazar Avilla said. Tensions are high now, so we need to put pressure on Congress now.

What is the program?

Obama enacted the program in 2012 to help the children of undocumented immigration take advantage of certain, limited aspects of life in the U.S. for its citizens.

Basically, children who arrived in the U.S. when they were under the age of 16, and had lived here since at least June 15, 2007, could apply. They could not have been over the age of 30 when the program was enacted.

Accepted applicants to the program have the threat of deportation lifted for two years, when they renew their applications.

They have to be enrolled in school, or have completed high school or have a GED, or be honorably discharged from the military. They also had to have a clean criminal record  anything beyond a minor misdemeanor or two disqualified them from the program.

The program allows the participants to legally get a drivers license, work and enroll in college. They also pay taxes.

There were plans to expand the program to include parents and other family members so they could all eventually become legal citizens, but those efforts have not gained approval from Congress. As the program stands, even participants are not assured of any way to acquire citizenship.

Another story

Leslie Pineda was the first Danville resident in the program to attend DCC and she went on to get a degree in accounting from Radford University.

Pineda arrived at Radford for the first day of college, prepared to pay for her first semesters tuition.

But one of the glitches in the program surfaced: since she was an undocumented immigrant, she was not a legal resident of Virginia, so the college charged her as an out-of-state student.

According to Radfords website, for the 2017-18 school year, this technicality would more than double the cost of tuition.

I couldnt pay that, Pineda said.

Instead, she and some other participants headed to Richmond to talk to legislators.

We lobbied to get the in-state tuition rate, Pineda said.

Legislators voted on how students in the program should be charged for tuition.

We won by one vote, Pineda said. The next day, we drove back to Radford.

Pineda planned to return to Radford to earn a graduate degree, but now wonders if she will be allowed to finish it if the program is rescinded.

It has been a struggle, Pineda said. You just have to keep going on and fighting.

Whats next?

The Dreamers are in a kind of limbo right now  unless Congress acts to preserve the program in the next six months, they not only face loss of drivers licenses, legal jobs and college educations, they would be subject to deportation to places most dont even remember.

And its not just the Dreamers at risk  their families took risks just signing them up for the program, since it meant exposing themselves as undocumented immigrants. Out of the shadows most undocumented immigrants live in, they are all definitely on immigration officials radar.

Anthony Monioudis, of Woods Rogers Attorneys at Law, specializes in immigration law. The law firm has offices in Danville, Roanoke, Lynchburg, Richmond and Charlottesville.

On Wednesday, he said there were 12,134 participants in Virginia, according to data he had just received from the Legal Aid Justice Center. Of those, he said 1,280 were enrolled in college and 10,557 were working and paying taxes, according to data from the U.S. Citizen and Immigration Services.

Monioudis said current participants only have a 30-day window to file for a single two-year extension of the elimination of the threat of deportation through the program.

If it is rescinded, October 2019 will be the end of it, Monioudis said.

Undocumented immigrants face not only deportation, but losing everything they own here. Unless they have a trusted friend to handle taking care of their possessions or selling them, they could lose homes, vehicles and personal possessions.

Monioudis said there is legal action that can be taken to extend the amount of time they have to leave the country so they can wrap up their affairs here, but it can be costly and time consuming.

It can probably be negotiated in immigration court, Monioudis said. But Ive also knows people to be picked up and on a plane 24 hours later.

Christine Poarch, an immigration attorney in Roanoke, said immigration has been a complicated issue for a long time and reform has failed, with efforts just making it more complicated.

A lawful immigration system is becoming more broken by the minute, Poarch said.

Efforts to have cases heard in court takes more time than immigrants have to try a avoid deportation  the immigration court in Virginia is in Arlington and there is a huge case backlog, she said.

By continuing to avoid immigration reform, legislators are saying, We dont want immigrants and we dont want to fix it, Poarch said.

Currently, immigration authorities are focused on deporting criminal aliens and terrorists, which is how Obama set the priorities. Trumps action, Poarch said, would throw all immigrants into the same prioritization level.

Obama deported more people per month than Trump has to date, Poarch said.

Meet Eli Salgado

Eli Salgados family brought him to the U.S. in 1994, when he was 4 years old. Now 27, he is a program participant currently working in Martinsville and planning a return to college.

He currently lives in Martinsville, but said he grew up in several places in Southside Virginia, including Pittsylvania County.

Salgado said that even while the program has allowed him to work legally since 2014  Ive been able to do jobs I actually like, he said  attend college and drive, it does not provide any path to permanent citizenship, leaving the threat of deportation to continue to hang over the heads of all participants.

Theres just no way to become legal, Salgado said, his words tinged with frustration.

He has been active in promoting immigrant rights for several years in Martinsville-Henry County, forming MCH Dreamers in 2013.

In 2016, he was invited by the U.S. Ministry of Foreign Affairs to Washington D.C. to meet Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto at the Mexican Cultural Institute  the former Mexican Embassy in D.C.  and discuss immigration.

That invitation was the result of a trip Salgado made in 2015, visiting Mexico for the first time as part of a program hosted by the ministry and the U.S.-Mexico Foundation.

Salgado said officials in Mexico support immigration reform in the U.S.

Like other Dreamers, Salgado said he is anxious about the outcome of Trumps threat to end DACA.

He said he cant imagine being deported to Mexico.

I wouldnt be familiar with the country, the laws or the social structure, Salgado said.
Hurricane Irma's fierce wind and waves will slam the Gulf Coast of Florida between Key West and Tampa Bay on Sunday, but flooding rain and strong gusts will swirl across the entire length of the state and even into Georgia.

Irma is on track to be the first major hurricane to make a direct strike on Florida since 2005, and appears capable of a wider swath of destruction than each of the several storms that hit the state the mid-2000s.

Last October, Hurricane Matthew spared Florida from experiencing its strongest side  the right side  because its center tracked along the eastern coastline of the state.

With Irma, the forecast track along the Gulf coastline will expose more of Florida's cities to the stronger side of the storm.

On Friday night, Irma made landfall along the northern coastline of Cuba as a Category 5, and the interaction with that land weakened it to a Category 3 during the day Saturday.

It's most likely that Irma will strengthen over the warm waters of the eastern Gulf of Mexico and make landfall in Florida as a Category 4 hurricane.

Sunday

After crossing the Florida Keys at daybreak, the eye of Irma is projected to hit the mainland of Florida somewhere between Naples and Sarasota by Sunday evening.

Sustained winds will be as high as 140 mph immediately surrounding the eye, which could cross over cities like Fort Myers, Venice, Tampa and Saint Petersburg.

Tropical storm-force winds will overspread all of central Florida by the afternoon, then arrive in Jacksonville and the Florida Panhandle on Sunday evening.

Sunday night

Irma will continue moving north through Florida and into southern Georgia during the night, and sustained winds near the center will gradually diminish to 75 mph once the storm spends several hours over land.

Conditions will improve in southern Florida as the storm departs.

Monday

Most of Georgia will experience tropical-storm-force winds as the center of Irma lifts north across the state, which is likely to down trees and cause scattered power outages.

Heavy rain will overtake parts of Alabama and South Carolina, and some brief tornadoes may spin up in the rain bands on the eastern side of the storm's track.

Monday night

Irma will continue weakening into a tropical depression somewhere over northern Alabama or central Tennessee, but its swath of rain will extend from Arkansas to southwest Virginia.

Dry and calm weather will return to most of Florida by this time.

Tuesday

The greatly-weakened low pressure area will slow down and linger over Tennessee on Tuesday and Wednesday as showers continue moving north into the Ohio Valley and Mid-Atlantic.

There will no longer be any destructive wind with Irma, and the rain will become lighter and less continuous as the moisture spreads out.

Dan River Region forecast

The National Weather Service expects showers to develop in the Dan River Region by Monday afternoon and says it will turn quite breezy with wind gusts up to 30 mph.

Monday night and Tuesday look to be the best times to see the heaviest rainfall, according to the weather service.
Statues, monuments and flags are everywhere in the news and public debate today. Robert E. Lee. Stonewall Jackson. Generic Confederate soldiers. Obelisks praising the Southern soldiers who died in the Civil War.

Especially since Dylan Roof, the self-radicalized white supremacy terrorist, gunned down nine members of a Bible study group at Charleston, S.C.s Emanuel AME Church in June 2015 in hope of starting a race war, America has been forced to confront its history of racism, the legacy of slavery and the fact that much of the economic might of this country was built on the backs of Africans wrenched from their homes and sold into bondage. It has not been an easy thing for a nation to look itself in the mirror and acknowledge that past.

In the wake of the Charleston massacre, then-Gov. Nikki Haley and the South Carolina legislature ordered the Confederate flag to be removed from the grounds of the capitol, sparking similar debates in other states of the old Confederacy. (Roof had been photographed displaying a Confederate flag in a comment thread on a white supremacy website.) That debate came up in Danville when City Council voted in 2015 to remove the Confederate flag from a display on the grounds of the city-owned Sutherlin Mansion, sparking bitter reactions from so-called Southern heritage groups.

That same debate also came to a head in Charlottesville when the city assembled a blue ribbon panel to study what to do about two prominent statues of Lee and Jackson and the parks named in their honor and in which the statues sat. Council ultimately decided to remove the statues and rename the two parks.

It was a fateful decision that thrust the city onto the national stage. In July, a small group of Ku Klux Klan members from North Carolina rallied at the Lee statue and met heated opposition from local opponents of their agenda. Then came the horrific events of Aug. 11-12 and the Unite the Right rally, resulting in the death of a counter-protestor allegedly at the hands of a white supremacist who plowed his car into a crowd.

Individual localities have taken statues erected in the early 1900s honoring the Confederacys luminaries.

This, we believe, is the process by which we Southerners  we Americans  should confront the question of what to do with these monuments in midst and address the deeper social issues these hunks of marble or bronze represent. These are local matters that must be tackled locally, with rational and civil debate among neighbors.

The discussion that took place Sept. 7 at Riverviews Artspace in Lynchburg  A Difficult Discussion: A Community Dialogue on Race, History and Community  is an example of what each community should undertake to confront this most troubling topic. These monuments of stone and metal, most erected at the height of Jim Crow segregation in the early 1900s when the Lost Cause myth took hold of the minds and hearts of the South, may be innocuous to some but are hurtful reminders of centuries of oppression to many others. How we deal with them and the conflicting messages they convey to different people will say a lot about each communitys character.

There should be no state laws protecting any and all Jim Crow-era statues purportedly honoring heritage, but also no state laws demanding all such displays be torn down. Instead, each locality  each community  should come together, talk, discuss, learn from each other and develop a local consensus on the way forward. And then act decisively and boldly. The days of talk but no action are long past us as a nation.
To the editor:

Pardon me if I pine for the days of the uplifting words of Barack Obama who, in his finest hours as president, appealed to our noblest emotions and aspirations as Americans. As the child of an interracial union, raised by a single mother and grandparents, he understood the plight of others living at the margins, struggling to make a living on minimum wages, and often victims of prejudice and violence. His moving and comforting speeches following the tragic shootings at Newton, Conn., and Charleston, S.C., will long be remembered for their healing effects.

From the beginning of the 2016 presidential campaign, our society has become divided by countless cruel accusations and mean slogans, appealing to our worst emotions, our racial, ethnic and religious fears and suspicions. As a candidate for the Republican nomination, Donald Trump, more than any other aspirant for the office, used the shameless birther lie that President Obama was not born in the U.S. and was not a citizen, despite evidence to the contrary. Trump even questioned Obamas academic record at Harvard. Unlike Sen. John McCain, who cautioned an angry supporter who raised the birther issue in 2008, candidate Trump encouraged such talk.

After winning the election, Trump seemingly stunned by his achievement and Obamas friendly cooperation during the transition, expressed his gratitude and his respect for his predecessor. However, from his inaugural speech to the present, President Trump has continued his rivalry with Obama, repeatedly contrasting and comparing their popularity and achievements in their first 100 days, and their foreign policy initiatives.

Differences in foreign policy are to be expected to a degree, but Trumps domestic agenda, his executive orders and his promises to repeal the ACA and other Obama accomplishments have been more deliberately divisive than those of any former president since WWII. His order to ban Muslim immigrants from several countries, his war of words with the Gold Star Khan family, his questioning the decision of federal judge Gonzalo Curial because of his Mexican heritage, his new policy and treatment of undocumented immigrants, especially those from Mexico, while continuing to lead his supporters in their well-rehearsed chants Build That Wall and Mexico Will Pay For The Wall do little to heal the wounds and sensitivities of the election. He has threatened to end the DACA program, which would cause the deportation of 800,000 young people from Mexico and several other countries, most of whom are contributing positively to our country. It is my hope that he has a change of heart on this issue.

All new presidents can be expected to make changes in policy, but one effort common to all, is a genuine call for national unity and direct appeals to those who did not vote for them. In this regard, President Trump is sorely lacking. What he has done is to continue rubbing salt in the wounds of his opponents, sewing divisions among his cabinet and staff, waging open warfare with the media he refers to as The Fake News and interfering with the investigations of the Russian involvement in the 2016 campaign and election.

Its time for this president to begin acting presidential and cease his bullying, inflammatory statements and interference with the federal judiciary. His leadership in response to his first domestic crisis, the destructive storm Harvey, has been good. Lets hope that he continues this and extends his compassion to the rest of his fellow Americans, regardless of their political party, religion or country of origin.

GERALD N. DAVIS

Chatham
(TNS) - Hurricane Irma retained its 130 mph strength early Sunday afternoon as its eye crossed the Florida Keys and headed toward the Gulf coast, where Naples, Fort Myers and Tampa rushed preparations for the Category 4 storms arrival.The storm, already huge, grew wider overnight, with hurricane-force winds extending across 160 miles and tropical-force winds extending across 440 miles.Although the forecast for South Florida improved, the region still faced a day of hazardous weather, with the worst of it coming Sunday through late afternoon.Strong gusts uprooted trees and knocked down branches. Gusts near 90 mph were reported off Key Biscayne. More than 1.25 million South Florida customers lost power. A construction crane was blown over in downtown Miami. A 69 mph gust was recorded at Palm Beach International Airport early Sunday afternoon.Although a storm surge warning for Broward and Palm Beach counties was been canceled, heavy rain was expected, with 6 to 8 inches possible in coastal Palm Beach County and 8 to 10 inches in Broward and central Palm Beach.This is a serious, still life-threatening event, Broward County Mayor Barbara Sharief said. Our community has coastal areas and low-lying areas that are going to be subject to widespread flooding, on top of extensive wind damage.The storm landed on Cudjoe Key, about 20 miles from Key West, at 9:10 a.m. Sunday, the National Hurricane Center said. A gust of 120 mph was recorded at nearby Big Pine Key, home of the National Key Deer Refuge.Its wicked, this is unbelievable, said Vic Lamorte, bunkered in a hurricane-shuttered three-story concrete house in Tavernier in the Middle Keys, in a telephone interview. When I say whipping, I mean its whipping outside. And its howling, unbelievable howling.In South Florida Saturday night, streets glistened with rain and became free of vehicles as curfews were imposed at 4 p.m. Saturday in Broward, 3 p.m. in Palm Beach and 7 p.m. in the city of Miami.A large and dangerous tornado swept west through central Broward County toward the Everglades Saturday evening, the National Weather Service said. Other tornado reports came in, as powerful rotating thunderstorms from the hurricanes outer bands led the weather service to issue tornado warnings across Broward, Miami-Dade and Palm Beach counties.Shelters filled up across South Florida, as mandatory evacuations emptied coastal neighborhoods. In Palm Beach County, more than 16,000 people planned to sleep at the countys 15 shelters  about a third of the countys capacity. Broward opened extra shelters.As the storm moved north Sunday, it was forecast to flood coastal neighborhoods of southwest Florida with a storm surge of 10 to 15 feet.Irma is expected bring life-threatening wind and storm surge to the Florida Keys and southwestern Florida as an extremely dangerous major hurricane tonight through Sunday, the hurricane center said.Hurricane Irma could dump as much as 20 inches of rain on parts of Palm Beach County, said Bill Johnson, director of emergency management.That is a significant amount of rain for Palm Beach County, said Bill Johnson, Palm Beach Countys director of emergency management. But it wont be anything like Houston.2017 Sun Sentinel (Fort Lauderdale, Fla.)Visit the Sun Sentinel (Fort Lauderdale, Fla.) at www.sun-sentinel.comDistributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
News & Record reporter Carl Wilson interviews Yuri Yunakov this afternoon at the National Folk Festival.

The group performs at 2:45 p.m. today and noon Sunday at the Dance Pavillion and 4:30 p.m. Sunday at Citystage.

Saxophone virtuoso Yuri Yunakov is an undisputed star of Bulgarian Wedding Music, the dazzling style that emerged in the 1970s when Bulgarian Gypsy artists combined Roma (Gypsy), Balkan, and Turkish folk musics with western jazz and rock. His electrifying playing makes it seem, The New York Times has said, as if Bulgarias national drink were rocket-fuel!

From a long line of Turkish Romani musicians, Yuri Yunakov first played kaval (wooden flute), tupan (two-headed drum), and clarinet in his familys band. He took up the saxophone in his early 20s at the urging of the great bandleader Ivan Milev. In 1983, Yunakov joined forces with the legendary King of Wedding Music, Ivo Papasov; their groundbreaking band Trakija became so famous that thousands of fans crashed weddings at which they performed. Because of its Gypsy associations and foreign elements, Bulgarias socialist government banned the music. Band members served jail sentences with forced labor. Official oppression only increased Wedding Musics popularity and eventual acceptance as Bulgarias modern folk music.

In 1994 Yunakov immigrated to the U.S. and founded the Yuri Yunakov Ensemble. In 2011, he was awarded a National Heritage Fellowship, our nations highest honor for traditional artists.

News & Record reporters, editors and freelancers are doing live interviews of National Folk Festival performers today near the entrance to the Greensboro Cultural Center (at 200 N. Davie St.).

The interviews are broadcast live on the News & Record Facebook page, then posted at greensboro.com.
Achievers

William Martin, a fourth-grade student at Jesse Wharton Elementary School, sold lemonade this summer to raise money to buy school supplies for the less fortunate.

Martin used the $280 that he made to buy school supplies and book bags for students at his school who are struggling financially.

***

Brad Barlow, an assistant professor of astrophysics at High Point University, and astronomy students attended the eighth meeting on Hot Subdwarf Stars and Related Objects, an international conference in Krakow, Poland.

They joined astronomers from around the world in presenting research, debating controversies in the field and discussing priorities for the research community.

Barlow and junior Thomas Boudreaux both gave oral presentations at the conference, and senior Zack Hutchens gave a poster presentation and elevator pitch. Barlow also served as a session chair by invitation of the Scientific Organizing Committee.

***

Rebecca Ulrich, a senior biochemistry major at High Point University, conducted research at Carver College of Medicine as a participant in the Summer Undergraduate MSTP Research Program.

The program is funded by the University of Iowa and the National Institutes of Health.

During her 10 weeks of research, she worked with Dr. Lee-Ann Allen in an interdisciplinary microbiology, immunology and internal medicine lab researching human neutrophil biology. Her specific project focused on Helicobacter pylori, the microbial pathogen implicated in stomach ulcers, and how it can manipulate neutrophils and the human immune system to grow and proliferate in the stomach.

Activities

CeAnna Soper, a senior at High Point University, was one of 138 interns for the White House this summer.

Soper worked in the Office of Presidential Gift and Protocol, where she learned many of the requirements and traditions surrounding gifts to the administration.

Also, HPU senior Rebecca Colwell spent her summer organizing and preparing for new volunteers through her internship with the Ronald McDonald House New York.

Announcements

High Point University will host A Conversation with President Nido R. Qubein and Kevin Ashton from 9 to 10:30 a.m. Tuesday, Sept. 12, in the Pauline Theatre of Hayworth Fine Arts Center. Community members can reserve a seat by contacting the HPU campus concierge at 336-841-4636 or concierge @highpoint.edu.

Ashton is a visionary technologist and author. He coined the term The Internet of Things, co-founded the Auto-ID Center at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and has led three successful tech startups, including Zensi, which he co-founded and sold to Belkin in 2010.

This session will be filmed by UNC-TV and aired at a later date.

***

Greensboro Colleges Office of Admissions will offer free information sessions for prospective students Saturday, Sept. 16, and Sept. 30.

In the events, prospective students and their parents may experience Greensboro College in a small-group setting, learn more about the admissions process, and take a tour of campus with a current student.

Each event will begin at 10 a.m. in the lobby of Cowan Humanities Building.

The event is free, but advance registration is requested. Register at www.greensboro.edu/saturday-tours-form

For information, contact Allison Jobe at 336-272-7102, Ext. 5211or allison.jobe@greensboro.edu.

***

Wesleyan Christian Academy will host a Christian College Fair from 6 to 8 p.m. Sept. 26 at 922 Eastchester Drive in High Point.

The North American Coalition for Christian Admissions Professionals is sponsoring the free event.

High school students and their parents will be able to meet with nearly 40 college and university admission representatives from across the nation.

The fair also will include a free financial aid seminar from 7 to 8 p.m.

For information, call 336-884-3333 or visit www.naccap.org. Students who register online will provide contact information to college representatives without having to complete an information reply card; preregistration is not required.

***

UNC-Greensboros consumer, apparel and retail studies program kicked off its centennial year Aug. 28 with a 100th birthday party for students and a panel discussion featuring alumni who landed careers at VF Corp.

The celebration will continue Sept. 29 with a two-day research symposium at 10 a.m. in the Alumni House and a Gala Alumni Celebration at Revolution Mill Events Center in the evening.

At the symposium, a panel of invited CARS Ph.D. alumni will discuss the future of higher education in apparel and textiles, alongside 30 peer-reviewed research presentations given by students and alumni of the CARS Ph.D. program.

The gala includes dinner, silent auction and a fashion show featuring designs by current students, faculty and alumni.

For information, visit http://bryan.uncg.edu/cars/centennial.

***

The Miss North Carolina USA pageant is accepting applications for its Fantasy Camp program on Sept. 29-30 in High Point.

The program gives girls between the ages of 10 and 14 a glimpse into the makings of a beauty queen.

For information, visit www.missnorthcarolina usa.com/fantasy-camp.

Awards

The English Speaking Union Greensboro Branch presented its Shakespeare Competition Award to Roxanne Cowett, the winner of the competition held in March at UNC-Greensboro.

Cowett participated in the annual English Speaking Union National Shakespeare competition in May in New York and placed as a semi-finalist.

The competition is a school-based program designed to help students develop their speaking ability, critical thinking skills and appreciation of literature.

Honors

Justin L. Neal, a student at N.C. A&T and a member of Phi Beta Sigma fraternity, is the first inductee from the Southeastern region of the fraternity to be selected for membership into the Alain Leroy Locke Honors Chapter.

Neal is the son of Randall and Gwen Neal.

Selection is based upon a collegiate brothers academic performance and his community involvement. This past July, Neal traveled to Detroit to participate in the fraternity conclave.

Scholarships

The English Speaking Union Greensboro Branch awarded its British Universities Summer School scholarship of $3,000 to Ashley Honaker to study English literature at Exeter College, Oxford University.

The three-week program featured lectures on various topics of literature and two concentrated seminars on Jane Austen and Victorian fiction.

Honaker is a teacher at Ragsdale High School.

***

Randolph Community College student Alec Poupore of Randleman has been selected to travel to NASAs Kennedy Space Center in Florida this fall to participate in the NASA Community College Aerospace Scholars project. Poupore has been selected as one of 304 community college students from across the United States to be part of NCAS.

Poupore will be visiting Kennedy Space Center on Oct. 23-26. NASA will provide free transportation, meals and lodging.
Rural noir, or grit lit, is a genre of fiction, usually in the bucolic setting of a country or small town.

A murder or murders often figure into the equation, making books of this sort appealing to mystery and thriller readers. Characters are usually in some state of poverty, drug abuse or desperation that keeps them in their situations.

Happy endings are not a guarantee. Rural noir books often take place in the American South, but not always.

Its hard to pin the allure of this literary genre. Perhaps for some of us urban dwellers, rural noir represents something exotic and different.

I have read many books in the rural noir canon, but have barely scratched the surface. Here is a list of books and their authors that I have read and enjoyed.

Daniel Woodrell

Id strongly plug Daniel Woodrells books to anybody interested in rural noir. His novels are hard-hitting, his writing poetic. I have read Tomato Red, Winters Bone and the short story collection The Outlaw Album, and would recommend all three. They even made a decent film out of Winters Bone  its an instance where both book and movie are very good.

Winters Bone introduces us to the unforgettable character of Ree Dolly, a teenager determined to find her deadbeat dad before she and her younger siblings lose their home.

Ron Rash

North Carolinas own Ron Rash has written several books that could qualify in the rural noir category. Both The Cove and Serena have aspects that pass for rural noir, although they both strike me as period pieces of a sort. For one of his that hits closer to the mark, try The World Made Straight. The book alternates between the 1970s and Civil War times, but its main storyline, which concerns a young man making hard choices in an unforgiving situation, gives it a classic rural noir feel. Watch out for the bear traps.

Joy and Panowich

If you like Rash and want something even harder-hitting, read David Joys Where All Light Tends to Go. Joy, another North Carolinian, writes a rough and impressive tale of a meth dealers son who wishes he had more options. Unfortunately, being the whipping boy for his father isnt much of one.

While were on an Appalachian jag, cross over the border into northern Georgia and take a look at Bull Mountain by Brian Panowich. This book reads with the speed of a thriller, and it doesnt let up. Internecine family squabbles, shoot-outs, and a twist at the end  this one is a ride and a half.

Even though they fall into thriller/mystery territory, I will include Julia Kellers Bell Elkins series. Theres five all total (so far) and Keller consistently writes a good yarn. The setting of Ackers Gap in West Virginia, with its background of back-grinding living and dirty dealings, has a certain rural noir-ish tinge to it. In her books, Keller also lends an unflinching eye to the social ills of her fictional hill town, taking into account the aftermath of Big Coal, the proliferation of drug use and memories that wont die.

Not solely Southern

As I mentioned before, rural noir often takes place in the South, but not always. There are some notables from other parts of the country.

What I have read by Bonnie Jo Campbell has made me hungry for the rest and wish she would write more. Campbells fiction takes place mainly in rural Michigan. Once Upon A River is a must-read in my opinion.

Her main character, 16-year-old Margo Crane, is shy and vulnerable, yet flinty as steel, and shes a crack shot with a gun. She witnesses far more than her age should allow when she leaves home on a boat odyssey following unspeakable family tragedies.

Speaking of Michigan, another noteworthy book is Sweetgirl by Travis Mulhauser. In it we have yet another tough teenager, Percy, trying to save a baby from the fate of drug dealers and a blizzard that wont quit. Thank God she finds help from her mothers ex-boyfriend Portis, hard-drinking and irascible, but good-hearted.

Tom Bouman has two in a series: Dry Bones in the Valley and Fateful Mornings. In these, Henry Farrell is a police officer in the township of Wild Thyme in northeastern Pennsylvania, a place rooted in past rivalries and poised for a natural gas-fracking future. Consider the possibilities.

Another series of note, and one of several installments, is the Mike Bowditch series by Paul Doiron, which take place in rural Maine. I cant attest to the whole series, but did read the first (The Poachers Son). Bowditch is a rookie game warden, and the son of a miscreant whom the authorities want badly. The forested reaches of Maine become a whole hotbed of crime, with enough intrigue to earn this one some rural noir cred.

Montana is the setting for these last three:

Black River by S. M. Hulse is probably one of the best books that I have read in several years. This story of a widower, coming to terms with a stepson who hates him and the possible parole of a prisoner who tortured him in a prison riot 20 years previous, is both quietly moving and shocking. Hulse was about 30 when Black River came out a little over two years ago, and I am not expecting her to top this one. An amazing novel.

Fourth of July Creek by Smith Henderson, probably got the most literary press of the bunch. This rambling ling tale of woe and good intentions concerns Pete Snow, a harried social worker who is as much a piece of work as the misguided souls he tries to help. Throw in a feral child, fundamentalist lawbreakers and a missing teenage daughter, and you have a serious stew of a novel. I started this one with misgivings but did not want to put it down.

The Ploughmen by Kim Zupan uses a narrative approach reminiscent of Charles Frazier to examine the fraught relationship between a beat-down young police officer assigned to wheedle information from a world-weary older prisoner held for a series of killings. The two develop a friendship, albeit one that wont last.

Theres much more within the rural noir genre than the books Ive mentioned. I hope these suggestions will get you started.
GREENSBORO  Sixteen years have passed, but sculptor Jim Gallucci said he still can smell the burning fuel from the planes that struck the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001.

That smell followed him from a scrapyard in New Jersey back to Greensboro, where he brought 16 tons of steel collected from the rubble of the Twin Towers.

Last week, he installed in downtown Greensboro two of those pieces  steel beams  in a sculpture that serves as a reminder of the terrorists attacks on New York and Washington.

It still had the smell of diesel fuel and burnt things, Gallucci said. It was really scary.

Nearly 3,000 people died when 19 al-Qaeda hijackers crashed two commerical airliners into the World Trade Center, one into the Pentagon in Arlington, Va., and a fourth into an empty field in western Pennsylvania, short of its intended target.

Like the rest of the nation, Gallucci said he couldnt take his eyes off what was unfolding on television. He said he wanted to do something in response, so he created a 22-foot-tall sculpture that symbolizes the images of that day.

Last Tuesday, cranes lifted that sculpture above the parking lot where Martin Luther King Jr. Drive and Elm Street intersect.

Galluccis sculpture replaces the former statue of Martin Luther King Jr., which is being recast in bronze and moved to its original location a few blocks away, on Martin Luther King Jr. Drive near the Greenway. Gallucci said Kings monument will be featured more prominently in its new location.

But the 2-story height of Galluccis Sep. 11 sculpture has a more noticeable presence at the intersection.

The base of the statue is shaped like the Pentagon, with the two steel beams from the World Trade Center rising above and holding together a gate that pivots to different angles.

The gate, we found, is very symbolic, Gallucci said. It (Sept. 11) was a gateway moment in our country. It was a gateway moment of things that have happened with us and us as people and us in society. There were two weeks where we were one country, and nobody cared who you were. This was an offense against my neighbor, whoever my neighbor was.

Galluccis sculpture also includes a haunting visual from Sept. 11. From the top of that gate, 50 paper-shaped pieces of steel seemingly flutter to the ground.

When the buildings went down, there were thousands of pages that flew all over the place, Gallucci said.

Before the buildings collapsed in 2001, papers fluttered from the impacted office spaces to the ground below.

Gallucci said the sculpture will have another visual reminder of that day, but once lights are installed he said he wants people to write letters, poems and songs that will be transferred to bronze plates to be hung on the sculpture. Those notes are symbolic of what happened in the aftermath of the terrorists attacks.

People were posting notes with family members faces on it (in New York), just trying to find where they were, Gallucci said.

Gallucci said he received the last permit issued that allowed people to visit the scrap yards where materials from the World Trade Center were taken. He said he had to submit resumes, references and prove he planned to use the materials for the right purposes.

One of the pieces Gallucci found had WTC carved into steel. He said the carving came from a volunteer who was helping with clean up.

That carving is now incorporated into Galluccis sculpture.

Gallucci first unveiled this piece in 2002, on the first anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, at his studio in Greensboro. Since then it has traveled to two sites in New York, Elon University, Fayetteville and Dallas.

The sculpture returned to Greensboro last year, and city officials requested its permanent installation.

It has come back home in a great way, Gallucci said.
GREENSBORO  As Hurricane Irma moved north away from Florida, the Triad became an important hub not only for storm preparations, but for those seeking refuge.

On Sunday afternoon, Gov. Roy Cooper touched down by helicopter in Greensboro to meet with members of the National Guard. Nearby, American Red Cross officials set up a shelter for people trying to escape the 400-mile wide storm.

People are traveling north to escape the hurricanes path, but as they travel theyre finding all of the hotels are full, said Dan Owens, who is in charge of setting up the Greensboro shelter for the Red Cross.

Owens said its rare for a shelter to open in Greensboro. It typically happens only when the Red Cross shelter in Charlotte  the states largest city  meets 75 percent capacity.

Whats unique about Greensboros shelter is that it can hold up to 500 cots and has a second room for pets, with a door to a fenced area so they can be walked outside.

Owens said highway signs and rest areas are alerting evacuees to the shelters in five cities across North Carolina.

Meanwhile, a last-minute change in the forecast led state officials to relocate the staging areas for emergency-response teams to other parts of North Carolina.

What were doing is moving a number of our resources from the east to the west because we know western North Carolina will likely be most impacted, Cooper said.

Hurricane Irma made landfall in Florida on Sunday morning as a Category 4 storm, but weakened as it began to move up the states western coast.

Early forecasts predicted that Irma would then travel toward North Carolina. Now, radar shows the hurricane traveling farther west.

Hurricane Irma continues to track west of North Carolina so we wont be caught in the crosshairs of this storm, Cooper said. But there will still be rain and wind particularly in the west side of the state.

Meteorologists with the National Weather Service in Raleigh said that bands of moderate to heavy rain will pass through central North Carolina today and Tuesday bringing almost two inches of precipitation. The storm will also bring 15 to 20 mph winds with frequent gusts reaching 30 mph.

On Sunday afternoon, Cooper talked with members of the National Guard as they practiced water rescues with the Greensboro Fire Department.

I stopped by to tell you how grateful I am for all of you, Cooper said.

At least 315 members of the National Guard will be deployed across the state. Another 12,000 are on standby.

Sgt. Randy Ly has seen the devastation that hurricanes can cause to a community and residents.

During Hurricane Floyd in 1999, Ly said he went to an island to feed stranded people. He said he would never forget when a young boy grabbed his leg and thanked him.

He cried, saying Thank you, sir. Thank you. I havent had food in three to four days, Ly recalled. Being one of the soldiers and seeing the effect, you dont worry about yourself.

Members of the Greensboro Fire Department had similar stories to share Sunday.

Firefighter Luke Easter remembered the relief on the faces of a couple he helped during Hurricane Matthew in 2016.

We went to rescue a couple in a flooded housing development, Easter said. When we turned the boat around, I saw their faces and they knew we were it. We were their last hope.

None of the men and women training in Greensboro on Sunday know where they will be needed or what they will face in the coming week.

We hope we dont need them in North Carolina, but they may be needed in other states, Cooper said.

Still, Cooper said he knows Hurricane Irma could turn back toward North Carolina at any time.

The tracks could change and shift back to the east, Cooper said. We need to be ready.
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla.  The Latest on Hurricane Irma (all times local):

12:15 a.m.

The National Hurricane Center says the core of Irma is now nearing Tampa in an area south of Lakeland  a community inland and to the east of the heavily populated Tampa Bay region.

A hurricane center update at midnight said Irma remained a Category 2 hurricane with top sustained winds of 100 mph (155 kph) and was located about 25 miles (35 kilometers) south of Lakeland.

The storm is moving north at 14 mph (22 kph).

___

10:55 p.m.

Hurricane Irma remains a dangerous Category 2 hurricane despite weakening a bit more to 100 mph (160 kph). It's now bearing down on the Tampa-St. Petersburg region.

The National Hurricane Center said Irma's eye was about 50 miles (80 kilometers) southeast of Tampa near 11 p.m. Sunday and moving at a fast clip of 14 mph (22 kph). Still a large hurricane, its tropical storm force winds extend out 415 miles (665 kilometers).

Forecasters say they expert Irma's center to stay inland over Florida and then move into Georgia, Alabama and Tennessee.

They also expect Irma to weaken further into a tropical storm over far northern Florida or southern Georgia on Monday as it speeds up its forward motion. The hurricane center says the storm is still life-threatening with dangerous storm surge, wind and heavy rains.

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10:05 p.m.

A third construction crane has toppled in Florida in the powerful winds of Hurricane Irma.

Officials say it happened at a project on Fort Lauderdale beach during the storm Sunday.

Officials with developer The Related Group told the Sun-Sentinel the crane collapse caused no injuries and did not appear to damage anything else.

Two other cranes toppled earlier in Miami as Irma swirled up the state.

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9:25 p.m.

Miami International Airport has announced it will be closed Monday and begin only limited flights on Tuesday.

Orlando International Airport closed Saturday and won't reopen to passenger traffic until after Hurricane Irma has passed, a damage assessment has been completed, necessary recovery efforts made and the airlines are consulted to determine when best to resume operations.

Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport says on its website it has no timetable yet to reopen. Its last flights were Friday.

Tampa International Airport also is closed as Hurricane Irma moves up the Florida peninsula.

Airlines are preparing their recovery schedules, which may take several days to execute.

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9:05 p.m.

The county administrator in the Florida Keys says crews will begin house to house searches Monday morning, looking for people who need help and assessing damage from Hurricane Irma.

Monroe County Administrator Roman Gastesi says relief will arrive on a C-130 military plane Monday morning at the Key West International Airport.

Once it's light out, they'll check on survivors. They suspect they may find fatalities.

Gastesi says they are "prepared for the worst."

Hurricane Irma made landfall Sunday morning in Cudjoe Key.

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8:55 p.m.

The U.S. Departments of State and Defense are working on evacuation flights from Sint Maarten after Hurricane Irma.

Officials say U.S. citizens in need of evacuation should shelter in place until Monday, listening for radio updates, and then go to the airport by noon, bringing proof of citizenship and just one small bag.

The State Department adds that a Royal Caribbean Cruise Line ship has left the island.

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8:45 p.m.

More than 3.3 million homes and businesses  and counting  have lost power in Florida as Hurricane Irma moves up the peninsula.

The widespread outages stretch from the Florida Keys all the way into central Florida.

Florida Power & Light, the state's largest electric utility, said there were nearly 1 million customers without power in Miami-Dade County alone.

The power outages are expected to increase as the storm edges further north.

There are roughly 7 million residential customers in the state. (edited)

8:30 p.m.

Hurricane Irma's top sustained winds have dropped to 105 mph. That's still a Category 2 storm, meaning extensive damage will occur.

Masters says that if Irma's center had shifted just 20 miles to the north as it moved past Cuba, it could have hit the mainland United States as a Category 5.

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8 p.m.

Two manatees were stranded after Hurricane Irma sucked the water out of Sarasota Bay, in Florida's Manatee County.

Several people posted photos of the mammals on Facebook Sunday, hoping rescue workers or wildlife officials would respond. Michael Sechler posted that the animals were far too massive to be lifted, so they gave them water.

Marcelo Clavijo posted that a group of people eventually loaded the manatees onto tarps and dragged them to deeper water.

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7:45 p.m.

Hurricane Irma set all sorts of records for brute strength before crashing into Florida, flattening islands in the Caribbean and swamping the Florida Keys.

It finally hit the mainland as a big wide beast, but not quite as monstrous as once feared. The once-Category 5 storm lost some of its power on the northern Cuba coast.

It's still raking Florida with devastating storm surges, winds and rain. Its top sustained winds are now 110 mph (177 kph) and the center of the storm is about 15 miles (25 kilometers) inland from Fort Myers.

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7:30 p.m.

It's been difficult to determine the extent of damage Hurricane Irma caused in the Florida Keys, where communication has been difficult and authorities are warning boaters and drivers to stay away.

But The Associated Press has been texting with John Huston, who has been riding out the storm in his house on Key Largo, on the Atlantic side of the island, just south of John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park.

Every few minutes during the height of the storm, he sent another dispatch.

He described whiteout conditions, with howling winds that sucked dry the gulf side of the narrow island, where the tide is usually 8 feet deep. He kept his humor though, texting to "send cold beer" at one point. Now he sees furniture floating down the street with small boats.

He says the storm surge was at least 6 feet deep on his island, 76 miles from Irma's eye. He can see now that structures survived, but the storm left a big mess at ground level.

___

7 p.m.

The Lee County Sheriff's Office says water began leaking through the roof at the Germain Arena shelter in Estero just as the eye of Hurricane Irma drew near.

Thousands of evacuees have crowded into the minor-league hockey stadium, which seats about 8,400 people and is being used as a shelter.

The sheriff's office posted on Facebook that authorities are monitoring the problem.

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6:50 p.m.

Florida officials are urging people to stay in their homes and shelters, even if it looks like Hurricane Irma has passed.

Miami-Dade County spokesman Mike Hernandez said he's seen reports of people leaving the county's hurricane shelters. It's too early for that, he says: "Just because it seems like the weather is clearing up, that doesn't mean it's safe to get out on the roads.

Miami Dade remains under curfew, much of it without electricity, and with downed power lines, flooding and poor visibility, moving around could be deadly.

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6:45 p.m.

An airborne relief mission is bringing emergency supplies to the Florida Keys, where Hurricane Irma made landfall Sunday morning.

Monroe County spokeswoman Cammy Clark said help is coming in C-130 cargo planes and other air resources.

Monroe County Emergency Management Director Martin Senterfitt calls it a humanitarian crisis.

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6:30 p.m.

Hurricane Irma should be moving directly over the Tampa Bay area around midnight. Residents of the highly populated area are fearing the worst.

A report by CoreLogic, the global property data firm, found nearly 455,000 Tampa Bay homes could be damaged by storm surges, the most of any major US metro area other than Miami and New York. Rebuilding those homes could cost $81 billion.

The reason Tampa Bay is so vulnerable is that the bay acts as a funnel for storm surges, forcing water into narrow channels with nowhere else to go.

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6:20 p.m.

The National Hurricane Center reports water levels are rising rapidly in Naples from Hurricane Irma's storm surge. A federal tide gauge in Naples reported a 7 foot rise of water in just 90 minutes.

A wind gust of 142 mph (229 kph) was recorded at the Naples Municipal Airport as the storm kept its top sustained wind speed of 110 mph (175 kph).

Irma has picked up forward speed and is moving inland at 14 mph (22 kph) and its eye is about 25 miles (40 kilometers) south southeast of Fort Myers.

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6:10 p.m.

Lauren Durham and Michael Davis had big plans for a beach wedding this month. Hurricane Irma had bigger plans.

So instead of a poofy white dress, Durham got married in her Air National Guard fatigues, with no makeup, in a vast hangar filled with rescue vehicles in Orlando. Davis is a senior airman in the guard, like his bride, so they had called to say they'd miss their own wedding.

Then on Sunday, a friend joked that they should get married during the hurricane. Dozens of people helped out, and a fellow guard member happens to be a notary and officiated. Someone even came up with a bouquet of flowers.

The happy couple believes in service before self, and besides, they figure it'll be a great story to tell their kids one day.

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6 p.m.

President Donald Trump has declared a major disaster in the state of Florida, making federal aid available to people affected by Hurricane Irma in nine counties already hit by the storm.

The federal help includes temporary housing and home repairs, low-cost loans for uninsured property losses and other programs to help individuals and business owners recover in the counties of Charlotte, Collier, Hillsborough, Lee, Manatee, Miami-Dade, Monroe, Pinellas, and Sarasota.

Federal funding also is available to governments and non-profit organizations for emergencies in all 67 Florida counties. For the first 30 days, that money will cover 100 percent of the costs of some emergency responses.

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5:15 p.m.

President Donald Trump says the U.S. may have gotten a "little bit lucky" after Hurricane Irma veered from its original course and headed west along Florida's coast.

He says Irma may not have been quite as destructive as a result, but that things will play out over the next several hours.

Trump addressed reporters Sunday after returning to the White House from Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland where he spent the weekend monitoring the storm.

Trump says Irma will cost "a lot of money" but he isn't thinking about that right now.

He says "right now, we're worried about lives, not cost."

Trump says he'll be having additional meetings about coordination for the storm response.

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5:15 p.m.

Hurricane Irma has weakened to a Category 2 storm, technically losing its major hurricane status, after making landfall in southwestern Florida. It is over land but hugging the coast as it moves north.

The National Hurricane Center said Irma's winds were at 110 mph (177 kph), just below major hurricane status, as the center of the still dangerous and wide storm moved farther inland. It was 5 miles (8 kilometers) north of Naples late Sunday afternoon. It came ashore on Marco Island at 3:35 p.m.

The hurricane center says "although weakening is forecast, Irma is expected to remain a hurricane at least through Monday morning."

The hurricane center says the eye of Irma should hug Florida's west coast through Monday morning and then push more inland over northern Florida and southwestern Georgia on Monday afternoon. The forecast puts the storm generally over the populated Tampa-St. Petersburg region a couple hours after midnight into Monday morning.

Jeff Masters is meteorology director of the private Weather Underground. He says the fact that the storm approached the Tampa region from over land and from the south could slightly reduce the expected storm surge, although he says it will still be dangerous.

Irma is producing deluges of 2 to 4 inches (5 to 13 centimeters) of rain an hour, which can cause flash flooding.

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5:15 p.m.

The storm surge near Cudjoe Key may be flooding the nearby Florida Key Deer Refuge, home to fewer than 1,000 of the endangered Key deer.

The unique subspecies of white-tailed deer about 3 feet (1 meter) tall at the shoulder, the size of a large dog, but wildlife officials were not immediately concerned that the herd had been lost to floodwaters.

Dan Clark is refuge manager for the Florida Keys National Wildlife Refuges Complex. He says the deer are "excellent swimmers."

Clark evacuated his staff Wednesday, and he spoke with The Associated Press by phone from Pinellas County.

He says the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service staff planned to return as soon as weather permitted to begin assessing how the deer and other endangered species fared throughout the narrow, low-lying island chain.

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5:15 p.m.

Police in Florida have arrested nine people who were caught on TV cameras looting sneakers and other goods from a sporting goods store and a pawn shop during Hurricane Irma.

Fort Lauderdale Police Chief Rick Maglione said the group was arrested Sunday as the storm roared across South Florida. Maglione called the idea of stealing sneakers during a hurricane "a fairly bad life choice."

Local TV images showed the alleged looters running in and out of a store through a broken window carrying boxes of sneakers.

It wasn't immediately clear what charges those arrested would face. Their identities also were not immediately released.

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5:15 p.m.

South Florida Water Management District chief engineer John Mitnik says it will probably be 7 p.m. Sunday before the storm surge in Miami completely subsides. He said the district is prepared for the storm surge expected on the Gulf coast and will have crews out repairing canals and drainage equipment as soon as it is safe.

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5:15 p.m.

Wildlife officials say Florida residents and visitors should stay away from sea turtle nests and refrain from any attempts to save them from Hurricane Irma.

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission says in a news release that the public must not interfere with any sea turtle eggs, even if they think they're helping.

Officials say sea turtles have a nesting strategy that accommodates natural storm events, with each female depositing several nests throughout the season. No storm season is a total loss for Florida's sea turtles. Even in 2004, when Florida sustained direct hits from several hurricanes, officials say 42 percent of state's loggerhead nests hatched, well within the normal range.

Anyone who sees exposed turtle eggs or nests should contact wildlife officials.

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5:15 p.m.

Officials are warning boaters to stay away from the Florida Keys in the wake of Hurricane Irma.

Monroe County spokeswoman Cammy Clark said in an email Sunday evening that nearshore waters are filled with navigation hazards like debris, sunken boats, loose boats, buoys and markers.

Residents with boats already in the Keys should avoid driving them in the nearshore waters.

Hurricane Irma made landfall Sunday morning in Cudjoe Key.

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4:30 p.m.

The Marco Island police department is warning people who didn't evacuate to get to higher floors in their buildings.

The department issued the warning in a tweet on Sunday just as Hurricane Irma made landfall on the island.

Forecasts have called for life-threatening storm surge of up to 15 feet (4.5 meters) along the coast.

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4:30 p.m.

The University of Miami will not reopen either its main campus in Coral Gables or its Marine campus before Sept. 18 while it assesses the damage caused by Hurricane Irma.

The school says it is "proactively planning the recovery process." Numerous out-of-state students went back home last week to wait out the storm and it remains unclear when they will even be able to travel back to South Florida.

Miami's annual football rivalry game with Florida State has already been pushed back to Oct. 7. It had been scheduled for Sept. 16 in Tallahassee, the state capital that is also in Irma's projected path.

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4:30 p.m.

Electric car maker Tesla says it has temporarily increased the battery capacity of some of its cars to help drivers escaping Hurricane Irma.

The electric car maker said the battery boost was applied to Model S and X cars in the Southeast. Some drivers only buy 60 or 70 kilowatt hours of battery capacity, but a software change will give them access to 75 kilowatt hours of battery life until Saturday. Depending on the model, that could let drivers travel about 40 more miles before they would need to recharge their cars.

Tesla said it made the change after a customer asked the company for help evacuating. The company said it's possible it will make similar changes in response to similar events in the future.

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3:45 p.m.

Hurricane Irma has made landfall on Marco Island, Florida, as a Category 3 hurricane.

The National Hurricane Center in Miami said Irma's powerful eye roared ashore at Marco Island just south of Naples with 115-mph (185-kph) winds, for a second U.S. landfall at 3:35 p.m. Sunday.

Category 3 storms have winds from 111 to 129 mph, but 130-mph (21-kph) wind gust was recently reported by the Marco Island Police Department.

Irma's second U.S. landfall was tied for the 21st strongest landfall in the U.S. based on central pressure. Irma's first U.S. landfall in the Florida Keys was tied for 7th.

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3:30 p.m.

More than 2.1 million customers have lost power in Florida with Hurricane Irma striking the state.

Florida Power & Light reported the numbers Sunday afternoon. The utility, which services much of south Florida, says more than 845,000 of those customers are in Miami-Dade County.

Duke Energy, the dominant utility in the northern half of Florida, has about 13,000 outages with the outer bands of Irma sweeping across the region.

The power companies say they have extra crews on hand to try to restore power  when it becomes safe to do so.

FPL spokesman Rob Gould says an estimated 3.4 million homes and businesses will lose power once the worst of Irma reaches the Florida mainland.

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3:30 p.m.

Hurricane Irma is affecting the House of Representative's work schedule in Washington.

A notice from the House majority leader's office says the House now doesn't plan to take any votes Monday because of "the large number of absences" as a result of the storm.

The first votes of the week are expected Tuesday evening.

The House leadership will keep tabs on the situation and announce updates as necessary.

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3:15 p.m.

The eye of Hurricane Irma is nearing Naples, Florida, and continues to cause destruction over a wide swath of South Florida.

The National Hurricane Center said Irma had winds of 120 mph (195 kilometers) and was centered 20 miles (30 kilometers) south of Naples on Sunday afternoon. It was moving north at 12 mph (19 kilometers per hour). At that rate, the center of the storm should come ashore sometime between 4 and 5 p.m.

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3:30 p.m.

Hurricane Irma has pushed water out of a bay in Tampa, but forecasters are telling people not to venture out there, because it's going to return with a potentially deadly vengeance.

On Bayshore Boulevard in Tampa, approximately 100 people were walking Sunday afternoon on what was Old Tampa Bay  a body of water near downtown. Hurricane Irma's winds and low tide have pushed the water unusually far from its normal position. Some people are venturing as far as 200 yards (180 meters) out to get to the water's new edge. The water is normally about 4 to 5 feet (1 to 1.5 meters) deep and reaches a seawall.

The U.S. Hurricane Center has sent out an urgent alert warning of a "life-threatening storm surge inundation of 10 to 15 feet (3 to 5 meters) above ground level" and telling people to "MOVE AWAY FROM THE WATER!"

The waters retracted because the leading wind bands of Irma whipped the coastal water more out to sea. But once the eye passes and the wind reverses, the water will rush back in.

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3:30 p.m. Hurricane Irma is affecting the House of Representative's work schedule in Washington.

A notice from the House majority leader's office says the House now doesn't plan to take any votes Monday because of "the large number of absences" as a result of the storm.

The first votes of the week are expected Tuesday evening.

The House leadership will keep tabs on the situaton and announce updates as necessary.

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3:15 p.m.

Miami City Manager Daniel Alfonso says a second tower crane has collapsed into a building under construction in the city's downtown area. Alfonso told The Associated Press that the crane collapsed in a large development with multiple towers being built by Grand Paraiso.

Another crane collapsed earlier Sunday onto a high-rise building that's under construction in a bayfront area filled with hotels and high-rise condo and office buildings, near AmericanAirlines Arena. Officials said no one was injured as the result of either crane's collapse.

High winds are impeding Miami authorities' ability to reach the cranes, and authorities are urging people to avoid the areas.

Alfonso says the approximately two-dozen other cranes in the city are still upright and built to withstand significant wind gusts.

The tower cranes working on construction sites throughout the city were a concern ahead of Irma. Moving the massive equipment, weighing up to 30,000 pounds (13,600 kilograms), is a slow process that would have taken about two weeks, according to city officials.

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2 p.m.

The National Hurricane Center says a slightly weakened but still powerful Irma will slam the Naples and Marco Island with its strongest winds in a couple of hours.

Irma's winds dropped to 120 mph (195 kilometers per hour), down from 130 mph, and forecasters say it should weaken a bit more before landfall. But it still expected to a strong major hurricane as it rakes Florida from its western edges across to the east.

The storm is 35 miles (55 kilometers) south of Naples and has picked up speed moving north at 12 mph (19 kilometers per hour).

The now Category 3 hurricane will keep on battering all of South Florida with high wind and surge, forecasters say. The hurricane center in western Miami, across the state from the eye of the mammoth storm, recorded an 81 mph (130 kilometers per hour) wind gust.

"This is a life-threatening situation," the hurricane center posted.

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2 p.m.

An apparent tornado spun off by Hurricane Irma has destroyed six mobile homes in Florida.

Palm Bay Police Department Lt. Mike Bandish said no one was injured in Sunday's tornado, but that a 93-year-old man refused to leave his damaged home. He told Florida Today that officers tried to convince him to leave, but he wouldn't.

Palm Bay is on Florida's central Atlantic Coast near the Kennedy Space Center. The eye of Irma was hundreds of miles away when the tornado struck.

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2 p.m.

Department of Homeland Security Acting Secretary Elaine Duke says she doesn't have any doubt that the federal government can respond to Hurricane Irma and the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey simultaneously.

Duke spoke Sunday afternoon at Federal Emergency Management Agency headquarters. Talking about efforts to respond to Irma in Florida and the aftermath of Harvey in Texas she says, "I know we're ready and ... I don't have any doubt ... that as a federal government we can do this and will do this."

Duke says she and FEMA chief Brock Long spoke earlier Sunday with President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence and that they are "absolutely pleased with the response" and that they "understand that we're just getting started in many ways."

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2 p.m.

Some exterior paneling of AmericanAirlines Arena in Miami, home of the NBA's Heat, has been damaged by wind. The arena is near the downtown Miami location where a crane snapped as Irma pounded away Sunday. But a team official told The Associated Press that an initial investigation showed no structural damage. They'll investigate further once conditions make it safe for workers to be outside. The Heat do not play in the arena until their preseason opener on Oct. 1.

At Raymond James Stadium in Tampa  where the Tampa Bay Buccaneers play football  local, regional and statewide authorities are using the parking lots and surroundings as a staging area for high-water vehicles and equipment. On Saturday afternoon, several U.S. Marine amphibious vehicles were parked side by side, giant tanks that are ready to plunge into floodwater if needed.

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2 p.m.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott says members of his family who evacuated from Naples ahead of Hurricane Irma are leaving again now that it appears the killer storm will descend on the state capital.

Scott's wife, First Lady Ann Scott, as well as his daughter, his son-in-law and grandchildren left southwest Florida and came to the state capital. Scott owns a waterfront mansion in an area that is in the path of the hurricane.

But Scott said Sunday that his daughter and grandchildren will be leaving Tallahassee to go to Washington, D.C. His daughter just gave birth to twins. Scott said it would be "tough for them if we lose power."

The governor said he doesn't know what storm preparations have taken place at the governor's mansion, located a few blocks north of the Capitol. He said he "hasn't really been there" because he has been in other parts of the state or at the state emergency operations center.

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2 p.m.

Major General Michael Calhoun, the head of Florida's National Guard, says that more than 10,000 National Guard members from other states are going to be coming into the state.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott has already called up 7,000 members of the Florida National Guard to help with recovery efforts from Hurricane Irma. Those members have been dispatched to shelters around the state and will be involved in handing out supplies in storm-ravaged areas once Irma has passed through.

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2 p.m.

Georgia's governor has declared an emergency for the entire state as Hurricane Irma's approach triggers widespread severe-weather threats, including the first-ever tropical storm warning for Atlanta.

Gov. Nathan Deal's new emergency declaration came Sunday as Irma churned near Florida. The National Hurricane Center predicted the storm's center to cross Monday into southwest Georgia, where a hurricane warning was issued for communities including Albany and Valdosta.

Portions of western Alabama and coastal South Carolina were also under tropical-storm warnings.

The National Weather Service confirmed it had never before issued a tropical-storm warning for Atlanta, where wind gusts could reach 55 mph (88 kph). Meanwhile Savannah and the rest of coastal Georgia were under evacuation orders for the second time since Hurricane Matthew brushed the region last October.

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2 p.m.

More than 500 emergency responders are sleeping on cots in the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, waiting to dispatch to areas devastated by Hurricane Irma.

The convention center had planned to host an elevator-industry gathering this weekend. Instead, more than 1,000 emergency vehicles are lined up in its halls: boats, ambulances, fork lifts, buses, 18-wheelers, fire trucks, and 62 helicopters.

Rescue teams from Florida, Colorado, New York, California and Arizona were checking their gear and resting up so that they would be prepared to hit the road as soon as the storm clears. Some of those emergency workers never even made it home from responding to Hurricane Harvey before turning around and deploying to Florida.

Sean Gallagher is with the Florida Forest Service, which is coordinating the staging operation. He says the convention center's loading dock doors will close as soon as the winds in Orlando rise to hurricane levels to protect the vehicles and responders inside and won't open again until the winds die down.

Then, rapid response teams will rush into the most devastated areas to do recognizance and triage where the rescue operations are most needed.

Until then, they are crammed in the convention center's side rooms and cots. The convention center has pallets of 13,000 ready-to-eat meals.

Aaron Janssen is a helicopter mechanic with a medical aviation company. He's sleeping in a tent next to his helicopter, with his wife and 9-year-old Chihuahua named Marley. He didn't want to leave them behind at their Orlando home while he worked.

Marley spent the day chasing a pigeon around the hangar.

"She's loving it," he said. "She hadn't figured out yet that she's never going to catch that pigeon."

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2 p.m.

Miami Beach officials say emergency services have been suspended until winds drop below 40 mph (64 kph), and no one will be allowed into the city until roads have been cleared. The city would continue a mandatory 8 p.m. curfew for the next two nights.

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2 p.m.

Actor Robert De Niro says a resort development company he is involved with on Barbuda will work with local officials to help with reconstruction on the island devastated by Hurricane Irma.

De Niro says in a statement that he was "beyond saddened to learn of the devastation" in Barbuda.

The actor is a principal in the Paradise Found Nobu Resort planned for Barbuda. Construction has not yet started on the project.

He said the company will work with local officials to "to successfully rebuild what nature has taken away from us."

Antigua and Barbuda Prime Minister Gaston Browne says 90 percent of the structures and vehicles on the small island were destroyed in the storm. A 2-year-old boy was killed. About 1,400 people live on the island and most have now been evacuated to Antigua.

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2 p.m.

The State Department says it and the Defense Department are resuming their evacuation of U.S. citizens from Sint Maarten via a military flight to Puerto Rico.

State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert says the department is communicating with Americans there through social media, radio, and by phone.

The department also is coordinating with AirBnB to identify and communicate with U.S. citizens not located at hotels who may have rented residences on the island.

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2 p.m.

Vice President Mike Pence says Hurricane Irma is a "storm of historic, epic proportions."

Pence spoke Sunday afternoon while visiting the headquarters of the Federal Emergency Management Agency in Washington. He says that President Donald Trump has been monitoring the storm "24/7."

Pence says "the people of Florida need to know that our hearts and our prayers and all of our efforts are with them and will be with them until this storm passes."

Pence says Irma "continues to be a very dangerous storm" and he urged people to "heed the warnings of local officials" to either shelter in place or evacuate, depending on where they are.

He says Irma is a "very dangerous storm" and a "life-threatening storm."

Pence says "it's enormously important that every American in the path of this storm take the warnings of state and local officials to heart."

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1:30 p.m.

Florida Power & Light says it will be weeks, not days, before electricity is fully restored because of the damage being done by Hurricane Irma.

Spokesman Rob Gould said Sunday that an estimated 3.4 million homes and businesses will lose power once the worst of Irma reaches the Florida mainland. He expects thousands of miles (kilometers) of poles and lines will need to be replaced, particularly on the Gulf coast. As of Sunday afternoon, about 1.5 million customers were without power.

He said 17,000 restoration workers from as far away as California and Massachusetts are already stationed around the state, but it will take time to rebuild the system.

The utility covers much of the state, including most cities on the Atlantic coast and the Gulf coast south of Tampa. It does not cover Tampa and St. Petersburg, two major cities in Irma's forecast path.

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1:30 p.m.

At least 25 people in one Florida county have been arrested for violating a curfew imposed as Hurricane Irma approached the state.

Palm Beach County authorities say the arrests were made after a 3 p.m. Saturday curfew was imposed. The misdemeanor charge can carry a fine of up to $500 and potentially 60 days in jail.

Officials announced the curfew as a safety measure and to prevent looting and other crimes. They say some of those arrested could face other charges, such as drug possession or drunken driving.

The curfew will be lifted after a storm damage assessment is done.

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1:30 p.m.

A meteorologist calculates that Hurricane Irma will dump about 10 trillion gallons (38 trillion liters) of rain on Florida over a day-and-a-half time period. That's about 500,000 gallons (1.9 trillion liters) for every Florida resident.

Private meteorologist Ryan Maue of WeatherBell Analytics based his calculations on weather service forecasts. He also calculates it will dump 6 trillion gallons (23 trillion liters) on Georgia.

By comparison, Hurricane Harvey, which stalled over the Texas coast, dumped about 20 trillion gallons (76 trillion liters) on Texas and 7 trillion gallons (26 trillion liters) of rain on Louisiana in about five days. One place around Houston got more than 50 inches (130 centimeters) of rain. Irma is expected to crawl steadily through the Sunshine State.

The National Hurricane Center projects 15 to 20 inches (38 to 50 centimeters) of rain with spots up to 25 inches (64 centimeters) for the Florida Keys. Western Florida is forecast to get 10 to 15 inches of rain (25 to 38 centimeters), with as much as 20 inches (50 centimeters) in spots. The rest of Florida and southeastern Georgia is projected to get 8 to 12 inches (20 to 30 centimeters) of rain, with isolated outbursts up to 16 inches (40 centimeters).

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1:30 p.m.

Emergency workers in inflatable boats are navigating flooded streets along Havana's coast, where thousands of people left their homes for safer ground before Hurricane Irma hit Cuba.

Seawater has penetrated as much as 1,600 feet (500 meters) inland in parts of the city. Trees are toppled, roofs have been torn off, cement water tanks have fallen from roofs to the ground and electrical lines are down.

Elena Villar is a Havana resident whose home of 30 years filled with more than 6 feet (2 meters) of water.

She was on the edge of tears Sunday as she said: "I have lost everything."

Villar and her mother spent the night huddling in the lobby of a higher building nearby as the storm raked the city.

In her words: "I have never seen a disaster like this."

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1:30 p.m.

Thanks to Hurricane Irma, Savannah, Georgia, has been evacuated for the second time in less than a year. Atlanta, meanwhile, is under a tropical-storm warning for the first time ever.

Nearly all of Georgia was under some type of severe-weather warning Sunday as Irma churned near Florida. The National Hurricane Center predicted the storm's center to cross Monday into southwest Georgia, where a hurricane warning was issued for communities including Albany and Valdosta.

Portions of western Alabama and coastal South Carolina were also under tropical-storm warnings.

The National Weather Service confirmed it had never before issued a tropical-storm warning for Atlanta, where wind gusts could reach 55 mph (88 kph). That's nothing new to Savannah and the rest of coastal Georgia, which evacuated last October for Hurricane Matthew.

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1:10 p.m.

The White House says President Donald Trump has received a "comprehensive update" on Hurricane Irma.

Irma plowed into the Florida Keys Sunday and was forecast to march up the state's west coast.

Trump, Vice President Mike Pence and several Cabinet members participated in the briefing from Camp David  the presidential retreat where Trump has spent the weekend monitoring the storm.

Other administration officials joined in from the White House or Federal Emergency Management Agency headquarters in Washington.

Pence and several Cabinet secretaries are planning to visit FEMA headquarters later Sunday.

The White House says Trump has spoken with the governors of Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina and Tennessee. Irma could affect all four states.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott says he also spoke with Trump on Sunday.

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1:05 p.m.

Deputies shot and wounded a burglar and arrested his accomplice at a Florida home as Hurricane Irma blew in.

The Broward Sheriff's Office said in a news release Sunday that the homeowners in Weston were out of town but saw the burglars remotely inside the house through a home surveillance system.

Deputies responded shortly before 3 a.m. and one of the two juvenile males was shot outside the home. He was taken to a local hospital for treatment of non-life threatening injuries. The other person was arrested.

Their names were not immediately released.

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12:55 p.m.

High winds are impeding Miami authorities' ability to reach a construction crane toppled by Hurricane Irma.

The crane fell onto a high-rise building that's under construction. It's in a bayfront area filled with hotels and high-rise condo and office buildings, near AmericanAirlines Arena.

Miami-Dade County Director of Communications Mike Hernandez said emergency personnel couldn't immediately respond to the scene because of high winds. Authorities urged people to avoid the area after the Sunday morning collapse. It wasn't clear if there were any injuries.

Miami City Manager Daniel Alfonso said the approximately two-dozen other cranes in the city are still upright and built to withstand significant wind gusts.

The tower cranes working on construction sites throughout the city were a concern ahead of Irma. Moving the massive equipment, weighing up to 30,000 pounds, is a slow process that would have taken about two weeks, according to city officials.

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12:20 p.m.

Florida sheriff's deputies rescued a couple who tried to ride out Hurricane Irma on a small sailboat.

Christine Weiss of the Martin County Sheriff's Office said a passer-by noticed the couple was in trouble Sunday. It happened just off Jensen Beach, which is on the Atlantic Coast north of Palm Beach.

Video shows a Martin County patrol boat manned by deputies John Howell and James Holloran and Detective Mathew Fritchie pulling up next to the sailboat.

The task of helping the couple onto their boat was precarious as both boats bobbed in choppy water. Deputies then took them to shore.

The names of the couple were not released. They were not injured.

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12:10 p.m.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte says the death toll caused by Hurricane Irma on the Caribbean territory of St. Maarten has risen to four.

Rutte said Sunday, "unfortunately there are more victims to mourn" after the bodies of two people washed up on the island. He says the identities of the victims are not yet known.

One of the four people listed as victims by the Dutch authorities died of natural causes as the Category 5 hurricane lashed St. Maarten, badly damaging or destroying 70 percent of homes on the Dutch part of the Caribbean island.

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11:40 a.m.

Some Miami Police officers remembered to pack an essential in their hurricane survival pack: Cuban coffee known as cafecito.

The department tweeted a picture showing a coffee maker atop a camp stove. It read: "As our officers ride out the storm, some have brought the (hashtag) Miami essentials to help them get through the night."

The strongly caffeinated brew is a staple in Miami.

Former FEMA administrator Craig Fugate said this week he'd check Cuban coffee stands to gauge Irma's impacts on Miami.

Fugate is known for creating the so-called "Waffle House Index." Fugate used the Southern restaurant chain as a benchmark for how quickly local communities could rebound from hurricanes.

Waffle House are known for being open most of the time. Under the index, a closed Waffle House was a bad sign. There are no Waffle Houses in Miami, so Fugate suggested an alternative.

"Cuban coffee stands - if those are closed, it is bad," he told AP.

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11:25 a.m.

President Donald Trump has spoken with the governors of Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina and Tennessee as Hurricane Irma moves north.

All four states could be affected by the storm, which struck the Florida Keys on Sunday.

The White House says Trump spoke with the officials Sunday from the Camp David presidential retreat, where he was spending the weekend.

Trump has been in regular contract with Florida Gov. Rick Scott and Sen. Marco Rubio over the past week. Chief of staff John Kelly spoke Sunday with Florida Sen. Bill Nelson.

Trump and Vice President Mike Pence were scheduled to receive an updated Irma briefing on Sunday.

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11:15 a.m.

As Hurricane Irma evacuees fill up Atlanta hotels and shelters, folks are getting creative to offer them a hand.

About 100 of America's top chefs who had gathered for their annual summit changed gears. They pivoted their planned Monday agenda on "heritage grains" and "how to cut food waste." Now, instead, the chefs will prepare a gourmet feast for Irma refugees and serve it at a church.

Hotels were full Sunday morning. At the luxury Georgian Terrace Hotel, staff were flexible with rules to accommodate evacuees. Guests walked pit bulls through the lobby. Large families pulled roller bags and clutched blankets as they squeezed into small rooms without enough beds.

A block away, a church offered free hugs for evacuees.

And a chalkboard sign outside a restaurant offered a discount: "30% OFF Food with FLORIDA ID for Hurricane evacuees."

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11:05 a.m.

The National Hurricane Center says Category 4 Hurricane Irma is now "headed for the southwest Florida coast" as winds continue to pick up speed in all of South Florida.

Irma continues to be armed with 130 mph winds as its large eye passes north of the Keys.

Storm surge is forecast for 10 to 15 feet in southwestern Florida.

Hurricane-force winds are continuing throughout southern Florida, including the Keys. The hurricane center warns that winds affecting upper floors of high-rise building will be much stronger than at ground level.

The hurricane center also emphasizes that Irma will bring life-threatening wind to much of Florida regardless of the exact track of its center.

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10:55 a.m.

Puerto Rico's governor says there will be no classes on Monday because hundreds of schools still do not have power or water after the island took a hit from Hurricane Irma.

Ricardo Rossello said Sunday that more than 600 schools don't have power and more than 400 don't have water. Another nearly 400 schools don't have either, and dozens are flooded.

Nearly 600,000 people in the U.S. territory remain without power, representing 40 percent of customers of the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority.

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10:35 a.m.

The National Weather Service says that a crane has collapsed in Miami as strong wind from Hurricane Irma blows in.

It's one of two-dozen in the city.

The weather service's Miami office said in a Tweet that one of its employees witnessed the crane boom and counterweight collapse in downtown Miami. The employee captured video of the collapse.

It wasn't immediately clear if the collapse caused damage or injuries.

The cranes have been a concern.

Construction sites across Irma's potential path in Florida were locked down to remove or secure building materials, tools and debris that could be flung by Irma's winds.

But the horizontal arms of the tall tower cranes remained loose despite the potential danger of collapse. According to city officials, it would have taken about two weeks to move the cranes and there wasn't enough time.

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10:40 a.m.

Hurricane Irma's large eye is beginning to move slowly away from the Florida Keys as it continues north with 130 mph (215 kph) winds.

The U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami reported that the center of core of Irma is about 25 miles (40 km) northeast of Key West.

Irma is so wide that a gust of 93 mph (150 kph) was measured near Key Largo at the other end of the Florida Keys.

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A Florida Keys refuge for a unique subspecies of deer is in the crosshairs of Hurricane Irma.

The Florida Key Deer Refuge on Big Pine Key is about 10 miles from where the storm made landfall Sunday morning.

It's the only place in world where you find Key deer, a unique subspecies of white-tailed deer about 3 feet tall at the shoulder  the size of a large dog.

The herd faced a potential extinction event last year when the first screwworm infestation in the U.S. in 30 years. Fewer than 1,000 of the endangered deer remain, and the parasites that eat the flesh of living mammals killed 135 Key deer before state and federal agriculture authorities stopped the infestation earlier this year.

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10:30 a.m.

France's Interior Minister expressed relief that Hurricane Jose spared French Caribbean islands St. Martin and St. Barts further devastation.

Gerard Collomb, speaking at a press conference in Paris Sunday, said that Jose passed miles away.

Meanwhile, a spokesman for France's government defended its handling of the hurricane crisis in St. Martin and St. Barts amid criticism that many in the local population felt abandoned by authorities.

Christophe Castaner, speaking in an interview with Europe1-CNews-Les Echos on Sunday, said he "perfectly (understood) the anger" of residents after Hurricane Irma tore through the French Caribbean islands, killing several people, destroying houses and cutting off the water supply. Some shops were subsequently looted by locals.

But he insisted the means deployed by the government were robust  with emergency help given "first priority."

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10:25 a.m.

Florida officials say 127,000 people across the state have taken refuge in more than 500 shelters as Hurricane Irma takes aim at the state.

The state Division of Emergency Management did not specify which shelters had the most people.

Meanwhile, utility officials were warning that the storm could leave millions without power by the time it finishes moving through the state. Already, more than 1.3 million Florida customers were in the dark on Sunday morning as the hurricane made landfall in the Florida Keys.

Florida Power & Light, the state's largest utility, is reporting on Sunday that many people living in the three populous south Florida counties of Broward, Miami-Dade and Palm Beach are without power. State officials say another 64,000 customers who rely on smaller utilities have also lost electricity.

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10:10 a.m.

For the first time, a tropical storm warning has been issued for the city of Atlanta.

The National Weather Service in Peachtree City, Georgia, said Sunday it was the first time such a warning had been issued for the metro Atlanta area. High wind warnings have been issued in previous storms.

The warning means that tropical storm conditions are expected within the next 36 hours. Peak winds were expected to reach 30 to 40 mph (48 to 64 kph) with gusts of up to 55 mph (88 kph).

The weather service says storm threats include damage to porches, carports, sheds and unanchored mobile homes. Roads may become impassable due to debris. Power outages could occur.

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9:50 a.m.

Hurricane Irma became tied for the seventh strongest storm to make landfall in U.S. history by a key measurement of atmospheric pressure.

Hurricane Irma made landfall at Cudjoe Key at 9:10 a.m. with a minimum central pressure of 929 millibars. Atmospheric pressure is one of the major measurements meteorologists use to describe storms. The lower the pressure, the stronger the storm.

Only six storms on record had lower pressures when striking the United States, including Katrina. When Katrina hit in 2005, it had lower pressure but its wind speed kept it at Category 3.

The 929 pressure mark ties Irma with the deadly 1928 Lake Okeechobee hurricane.

Irma's arrival also marks another first.

Colorado State University hurricane researcher Phil Klotzbach says this is the first year on record that the United States has been hit by two storms that were Category 4 upon landfall: Harvey and Irma.

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9:45 a.m.

As Hurricane Irma threatened to wallop the St. Petersburg area, several folks got out on the beach ahead of the storm.

As they milled about Sunday morning, they looked at sailboats bobbing in the wind as the sun rose and took selfies and photos of the beach.

St. Petersburg resident John Leuders says he feels safe. With stores out of plywood, he tore down part of his fence to board up windows. He came down to the beach out of curiosity and noted the strong winds along the water.

Another resident, Sally Carlson, says she's been around for other storms and hurricanes, but this one scares her. She says she wanted to see the city one more time before any problems.

She adds: "I'm hoping it comes out unscathed, but I know better."

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9:40 a.m.

Florida utility officials say more than 1 million customers have lost power as Hurricane Irma hits the state.

Florida Power & Light Company said that nearly 1.1 million customers statewide were without power Sunday morning.

About 574,000 of those outages were in Miami-Dade County, while there were 360,000 in Broward and nearly 136,000 in Palm Beach County.

The massive storm made landfall in the Florida Keys, and its center was forecast to move up the state's Gulf Coast. But the effects are being felt far from the center because of Irma's size.

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9:25 a.m.

Hurricane Irma has made landfall in the Florida Keys.

The U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said the center of the massive hurricane made landfall on Cudjoe Key in the lower Florida Keys at 9:10 a.m.

Its top sustained winds are 130 mph (215 kph).

Forecasters say a gust of 106 mph (171 kph) was reported on Big Pine Key.

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9:00 a.m.

The Florida Highway Patrol says two people have died in a head-on crash in a county where Hurricane Irma's wind and rain have started to blow in.

Agency spokesman Greg Bueno said the crash happened Sunday morning in Hardee County, which is southeast of Tampa.

It wasn't immediately clear what role the weather may have played. He says troopers are investigating the crash and no further details were immediately available.

Bueno said in an email that the area is starting to feel the effects of Hurricane Irma.

The National Weather Service has issued a tornado warning for the county, saying a severe thunderstorm was in the area.

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8:55 a.m.

The National Hurricane Center forecasts that the core of Hurricane Irma will likely chug directly for the highly populated Tampa-St. Petersburg region after it gets through raking the Keys, but the storm is so massive all of Florida will be feeling the Category 4 hurricane's fury.

The center of the storm was just off Key West Sunday morning.

The latest forecast of Irma's eye  which still can change  keeps the nearly 400-mile wide (640-kilometer) storm in the water, barely off the coast of southwestern Florida's Fort Myers and Naples.

But that also puts that region in the strongest northeast quadrant of the storm, where storm surge, wind, rain and tornado threats are highest.

And a few miles wiggle could bring Irma's eye  which has measured 30 miles wide (48 kilometers)  inland.

The storm is moving slowly, about 8 mph (13 kilometers per hour) so its eye is likely to hit the Tampa region around 2 a.m. Monday, but damaging winds, storm, surge, rain and tornadoes will reach the area long before then.

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8:45 a.m.

Doctors were forced to talk a Florida woman through delivering her baby at home while Hurricane Irma's outer bands lashed Miami.

The City of Miami said on its Twitter account early Sunday that firefighters couldn't respond in time to the woman in the Little Haiti neighborhood. So doctors from Jackson Health System talked her through the birth of the baby girl at home.

Authorities say firefighters were able to make it to the woman Sunday morning and take her to the hospital after the girl was born.

Miami-Dade fire spokeswoman Erika Benitez said the fire department is responding to calls on a case-by-case basis as strong winds and rain lash the area. They are encouraging residents to stay inside because of downed power lines and debris.

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8:20 a.m.

Florida authorities have issued another stern warning about Hurricane Irma: Shooting bullets into the storm won't help keep you safe.

The Pasco County Sheriff's Office tweeted late Saturday: "DO NOT shoot weapons @ (hashtag) Irma. You won't make it turn around (and) it will have very dangerous side effects."

The sheriff's office, which is in the Tampa Bay-area, was responding to a Facebook event page created two Florida men inviting people to shoot at Irma.

The page reads: "YO SO THIS GOOFY ... LETS SHOW IRMA THAT WE SHOOT FIRST ..."

The invitation presumably was a joke, but 80,000 people indicated they were "going" or "interested" in the event.

In a tweet early Sunday, the Pasco County Sheriff's Office asked the thousands of people who had shared the page to also share their request for volunteers needed at hurricane shelters.

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8 a.m.

Forecasters say Hurricane Irma's center is poised to blow across the Florida Keys.

The northern eyewall of the storm reached the island chain early Sunday.

The U.S. National Hurricane Center said in a public advisory that the center of the storm remained offshore but was going to make landfall soon. The storm was centered about 20 miles east (30 km) of Key West, and it was moving north-northwest at 8 mph (13 kph)

The storm had maximum sustained winds of 130 mph (215) kph. The National Weather Service reported wind gusts of 90 mph (145 kph) near its Key West office.

After hitting the Florida Keys, Irma was forecast to move up the state's Gulf Coast later Sunday.

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7:55 a.m.

The National Weather Service in Miami has issued tornado warnings for a wide swath of Monroe, Miami-Dade and Broward counties in South Florida.

Officials say the band of rain and tornado producing cells is moving quickly.

There have been no reports of tornadoes touching down.

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7:50 a.m.

Authorities are urging people who chose to ride out Hurricane Irma in the Florida Keys to remain indoors until the storm passes.

The storm's eyewall reached the chain of islands Sunday morning. The National Weather Service reported wind gusts of 90 mph (145 kph) near its Key West office.

In a Facebook post early Sunday, Key West Police urged people who stayed for the hurricane to remain where they took shelter until the storm had passed completely. They also urged people not to go outside when the eye of the storm is over there area, a time period when conditions can seem deceptively calm.

John Huston, who is riding out the storm from his home in Key Largo in the upper Keys, says the wind gusts are strong in his area.

"Water level is higher today," he said via text message Sunday morning. "Incredible wind that won't stop."

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7:05 a.m.

Hurricane Irma's eyewall has reached the Florida Keys.

The U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami says the storm's northern eyewall reached the lower Florida Keys Sunday morning. The eyewall is a band of clouds surrounding the center of the storm that has intense winds and strong rain.

The hurricane center says Key West International Airport has measured sustained winds of 50 mph (80 kph).

7:00 a.m.

Hundreds of thousands of people are without power in Florida as Hurricane Irma's winds and rain lash the state.

Irma's center was over water off Key West early Sunday, but places including Miami were being hit with strong winds and rain.

Florida Power & Light Company said that about 430,000 customers were without power Sunday morning. Miami-Dade County had the most outages with about 250,000. Broward County had 130,000 outages. Palm Beach County had more than 40,000 outages.

The utility said that it has mobilized crews and is working to restore power as it can.

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6:30 a.m.

With Hurricane Irma closing in on Florida, the storm's winds are already lashing parts of the state.

In Key West, Carol Walterson Stroud and her family are huddled in a third floor apartment at a senior center.

Stroud said early Sunday that the wind was blowing hard, but her family was OK. In a text message to a reporter, she said: "We are good so far."

As of 6 a.m. EDT, forecasters say the Category 4 storm is centered about 30 miles (50 kilometers) south of the island.

The 60-year-old is with her husband and granddaughter and their dog. Stroud says she plans to step outside once the "eye" of the hurricane passes over later Sunday.

Meanwhile, to the north, access to all of Pinellas County's barrier islands, including the popular spring break destination of Clearwater Beach, has been shut off.

___

6:10 a.m.

The eye of Hurricane Irma is very close to the lower Florida Keys.

As of 6 a.m. EDT, the U.S. National Hurricane Center says the Category 4 storm is centered about 30 miles (50 kilometers) south-southeast of Key West, Florida, and is moving northwest at 8 mph (13 kph).

Irma's maximum sustained winds are near 130 mph (215 kph). The hurricane center says weakening is forecast but Irma is expected to remain a powerful hurricane as it moves through the Florida Keys and near Florida's west coast.

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6:10 a.m.

France and the Netherlands say their islands in the Caribbean were spared major damage from Hurricane Jose, which passed farther away from the islands than expected.

The Sunday announcements  coming from France's national weather service and the Dutch navy  were good news for islands that had already been devastated by Hurricane Irma last week.

Meteo-France said Jose's center passed overnight about 75 miles (125 kilometers) from St. Martin and 80 miles (135 kilometers) from St. Barts, though it still produced gales of up to 48 mph (80 kph) around the islands.

In a tweet Sunday, the Netherlands' navy says the situation after Jose passed north of the islands overnight is "better than expected." Scores of marines and troops will resume their efforts to restore vital infrastructure and distribute food and water on St. Maarten, Saba and St. Eustatius.

In a separate tweet, the navy said the security situation on St. Maarten, which saw widespread looting and robberies after Hurricane Irma, has improved thanks to patrols by marines and police flown to the island to help overwhelmed local law enforcement.

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5:10 a.m.

Hurricane Irma has sped up slightly and its eye is about to move across the lower Florida Keys early Sunday.

The hurricane is centered about 40 miles (65 kilometers) south-southeast of Key West, Florida, and is moving north-northwest near 8 mph (13 kph).

Irma is a Category 4 hurricane with maximum sustained winds near 130 mph (215 kph). The U.S. National Hurricane Center says weakening is forecast but Irma is expected to remain a powerful hurricane as it moves through the Florida Keys and near Florida's west coast.

Tens of thousands in Florida are huddled in shelters as the hurricane threatens to make a catastrophic hit on the state.

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5:10 a.m.

Dutch King Willem-Alexander is flying to the Caribbean to meet survivors of Hurricane Irma who were evacuated there from the hard-hit island of St. Maarten.

Meanwhile, Dutch tourists stranded for days on St. Maarten are hoping to finally get flights home.

Willem-Alexander was to fly Sunday to the island of Curacao to visit a hospital where more than 60 patients from St. Maarten who require kidney dialysis were flown for treatment over the last two days by the Dutch military.

If the weather is good enough, the monarch will later fly onward to St. Maarten and two other smaller islands hit by Irma on Wednesday to offer his support to the thousands of residents and Dutch marines helping to clear the island, where some 70 percent of homes were badly damaged or destroyed by the Category 5 storm.

The Dutch navy tweeted Sunday that it plans to evacuate tourists from the island's shattered resorts.

___

4:10 a.m.

The U.S. National Hurricane Center says Hurricane Irma is bearing down on the lower Florida Keys early Sunday.

A National Ocean Service station on a coral reef near the Keys has recorded sustained winds of 66 mph (105 kph) with a gust up to 85 mph (137 kph). Key West International Airport has measured sustained winds of 43 mph (69 kph) with a gust up to 73 mph (117 kph).

Irma is centered about 55 miles (90 kilometers) south-southeast of Key West, Florida, and is moving northwest near 6 mph (9 kph).

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3:15 a.m.

A re-strengthened Hurricane Irma is continuing to move toward the western Florida Keys early Sunday.

The hurricane has regained Category 4 status with maximum sustained winds near 130 mph (210 kph) and is centered about 65 miles (105 kilometers) southeast of Key West, Florida.

The U.S. National Hurricane Center says the Miami Executive Airport has measured a sustained wind speed of 46 mph (74 kph) with a gust of up to 61 mph (98 kph).

Tens of thousands in Florida are huddled in shelters as the hurricane threatens to make a catastrophic hit on the state.

___

2:10 a.m.

Hurricane Irma has regained Category 4 strength as it moves toward Florida, where it's feared to make a devastating hit.

Irma's maximum sustained winds increased early Sunday to near 130 mph (210 kph) and it's expected to gain a little more strength as it moves through the Straits of Florida and remain a powerful hurricane as it approaches Florida.

Irma is centered about 70 miles (115 kilometers) south-southeast of Key West, Florida, and is moving northwest near 6 mph (9 kph).

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1:40 a.m.

Hurricane Irma is closing in on the Florida Keys with top winds of 120 mph (190 kph) early Sunday as forecasters monitored a crucial shift in its trajectory that could keep its ferocious eye off the southwest Florida coast and over warm gulf water.

Tens of thousands of people huddling in shelters watched for updates as the storm swung to the west, now potentially sparing Tampa as well Miami the catastrophic head-on blow forecasters had been warning about.

But those few miles meant St. Petersburg could get a direct hit, rather than its more populous twin across Tampa Bay.

The leading edge of the immense storm bent palm trees and spit rain across South Florida, knocking out power to more than 170,000 homes and businesses, as the eye approached Key West.
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Local government impacts our lives in crucial ways. It sets the direction of municipalities through long-term planning, allocates resources for infrastructure, and delivers a broad range of services such as public health and recreational facilities, local road maintenance and public libraries, to name a few. Yet in Greensboro, voter turnout in municipal elections is historically low, measuring around 11 percent in 2015.

This years election is more important than ever since council members will now be elected to serve four years instead of two. This election also offers us a chance to counter last years federal and state elections, which further empowered those representing the interests of the elite at the expense of the common people. This November we must elect council members who stand for fairness and a just, truly democratic society, values held by a majority of Greensboros residents.

Energized citizens came together last January to form Democracy Greensboro, a community-based, citizen-led movement that has conducted meetings in public libraries, recreation centers and other venues to develop a Community Platform. Available online at democracygreensboro.org, the Community Platform addresses four categories: Economic Justice, Social Justice, Criminal and Civil Justice and Environmental Justice.

The provisions in the platform range from support for low-cost day care for families looking for work to replacing or rehabilitating deteriorating infrastructure to establishing civilian, independent oversight of the Greensboro Police Department. Some of the provisions weigh more heavily in certain electoral districts. For example, the pledge to keep the White Street Landfill closed permanently to solid waste reflects primarily the interests of those in northeast Greensboro (District 2), as does the platforms call to support cooperative and employee-owned businesses like the Renaissance Community Cooperative.

Most of the provisions of the Community Platform, however, relate to the city as a whole, such as the one calling on the council to oppose, by every means available, all attempts by the N.C. Legislature to interfere in the lawful governance of the city of Greensboro by its City Council and Mayor. It is critical for any municipality in North Carolina to resist the state legislatures unprecedented encroachments of recent years, such as HB 2, into the rights of its residents. We must have people on the Greensboro City Council who are willing to stand up for democracy and ensure that any law imposed on it is a just one.

The Community Platforms central principle is simple but profound: Instead of having politicians tell us, the voters, what they think we want to hear, we will tell them what we want and require. And we will vet their candidacy according to their commitment to the principles in the Community Platform. We will also use the Platform to hold those elected accountable once they are in office.

On Sept. 16, Democracy Greensboro is sponsoring a Candidate/Platform Conference at Ben L. Smith High School at 1 p.m. All of the candidates who filed for this years municipal elections have been invited. The event, which is not sponsored by Guilford County Schools, is the first of its kind in Greensboros history and will give candidates an opportunity to express their opinions about the Community Platform, share their vision for the future of Greensboro, and answer questions from the audience.

The Community Platform is a means for residents to shape local politics in Greensboro in a profound way for years to come. It holds the potential to make our city a model of participatory government for the nation. The election of a progressive City Council in November will mark the platforms first great achievement.
Confederate soldiers and generals, in stone and bronze, command the Southern landscape in ways their real-life counterparts never could. Those who support leaving Confederate monuments in place argue against erasing history. The North Carolina legislature recently acted to support this perspective and to protect Confederate dominance.

These acts dont preserve North Carolinas history. Instead, they preserve fundamental misrepresentations of the Civil War. Citizens have the power to reject these historical distortions.

Confederate monuments that loom over our civic spaces ignore North Carolinas robust anti-Confederate history. When South Carolina seceded in 1861, most North Carolinians refused to follow. During the war, many persevered in opposition to the Confederacy.

But you wouldnt know this history by looking at our states public monuments.

The state has few monuments celebrating white North Carolinians and even fewer commemorating black and Indian North Carolinians who, despite considerable persecution, protested slavery or secession, helped Confederate deserters and Union prisoners, and served in the Union army and navy.

These omissions were purposeful. Former Confederates after the war concealed considerable internal dissent by inventing a Lost Cause. According to this mythology, Southerners, including devoted slaves, united in defense of states rights.

Former Confederates and their descendants revived their Lost Cause at the turn of the century with a successful white supremacy campaign featuring a racial massacre in Wilmington in 1898 and the disfranchisement of black male voters in 1900. Former Confederates and their sons and daughters erected monuments across the state, most prominently on the Capitol grounds, to give physical form to the restoration of white supremacy.

An African-American Freedom Monument has the potential to resist the Confederacys mastery over North Carolinas civic spaces and counter the misrepresentation of the Civil War. Former Gov. Pat McCrory approved the monument for the Capitol grounds in 2015 as a commitment to tell the complete story of North Carolina.

The Freedom Monument could commemorate Harriet Jacobs, an enslaved woman in Edenton, who from girlhood suffered the sexual abuse of her master, which she only escaped by leaving her children and hiding in an attic for seven years. Jacobs, after her flight to the North, contributed to the anti-slavery movement by writing about the terror of enslavement.

Or the monument could celebrate Abraham Galloway, who escaped to the North and later returned to North Carolina during the Civil War. He spied for the Union army, infiltrating Confederate camps, recruiting enslaved men to the Union cause, and helping enslaved people run to Union lines. After the war, Galloway served as a state senator supporting equal rights.

Unfortunately, the legislature recently cut Gov. Roy Coopers $200,000 request for the African American Freedom Monument, stalling the effort. And the five monuments to Confederates on the Capitol grounds cant be moved. A law passed by the Republican majority in 2015 prevents removal of state-owned Confederate monuments except when necessary for conservation or construction. The law also prohibits communities from relocating Confederate monuments from sites of governmental power like courthouses to sites of education and remembrance like museums and cemeteries.

These legislative actions to preserve the status quo effectively preserve the distortion of North Carolinas history.

We must repeal the 2015 law to stop the state legislature from overriding the will of local communities.

Citizens should have the power to remove Confederate monuments in their midst. And we need to build a Freedom Monument on the Capitol grounds to remind us of the numerous North Carolinians, black, white and Indian, who risked their lives to defy the Confederacy and support the Union.

The monument would stand as a declaration that racism is no longer tolerated outside, or inside, the halls of power. And the monument would stand as a rejection of a false history created in the service of white supremacy.
One of the more curious and troubling developments in the course of the Syrian civil war has been Turkeys rapprochement with Russia and cooperation with Iran.

For centuries, Turkey and Russia were enemies, regardless of who ruled each country. To begin with, Russia considered itself (and still considers itself) the custodian of the true Eastern Orthodox Church after the fall of Byzantium to the Turks. The Ottomans regularly fought the czars, especially over Russian attempts to gain access to the Mediterranean Sea. Turkey remained neutral in World War II, which benefited Nazi Germany as much if not more than Soviet Russia. And Turkey joined NATO, giving the alliance its longest border with the Soviet Union. There was never much love between the two countries.

Turkish relations with Iran were nearly as antagonistic for some 150 years, but subsequently transformed into mutual caution and suspicion. After all, Shia Persia never came under the control of the Sunni Ottomans.

That the three countries have begun to work closely together to contain the Syrian civil war is more a function of their perceived perception of American weakness than of any upsurge in mutual love.

While the Trump administration has been more active in Syria than its predecessor, supplying weapons and support to the Syrian Kurdish Peoples Protection Units, or YPG, and responding to Syrian use of chemical weapons with the April cruise-missile attack on Syrias Shayrat airbase, the memory of the Obama red line still lingers. It is not at all clear how much further Washington is willing to get enmeshed in Syria in the short term, much less in the medium and long term.

Russia, on the other hand, has new, long-term leases for its bases in Syria. Iran has a much deeper vested interest in Syria and the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad than Washington does in the ever-weaker Syrian opposition. And Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan fears Russia far less than his Ottoman and republican predecessors did, while his relations with NATO and the EU continue to deteriorate, commensurate with the increase in Turkeys human rights violations. Erdogan has actually threatened to review Turkeys alliance with NATO, something that would have been unheard of during the Cold War.

Russian relations with Turkey have grown increasingly warmer since a Turkish F-16 shot down a Russian Su-24M all-weather attack aircraft over the Turkish border last November. Turkeys relations with Iran remain proper, if cautious. And the Astana agreement that the three countries reached in May, without active American involvement, has already resulted in three de-escalation zones in Syria.

It is certainly possible that this three-way partnership will be short-lived. The national interests of the three are not congruent. Much will depend on the United States, however. Should Washington remain active in Syria, or increase its efforts there, Turkey will be far less likely to abandon the West for other partners. If, however, the United States washes its hands of Syria, the Turkish-Russian-Iranian connection may be the start of a beautiful friendship.
GREENWICH  Shirley Rilett remembers everything from that morning.

On Sept. 11, 2001, she raced to Stamford High School. Her Italian teacher had told her that if she was tardy again, she would have to stay after school as punishment, and she was running late.

When she barged into her classroom, she got blank stares and a question: Did she have any family in New York City?

Her father worked at the airport there, she thought, but why did it matter? The Italian instructor choked on words as she tried to let out a sentence that would make everything real. Searching for an explanation, Rilett studied her teachers face  the educator's eyes were wide, her glasses doubling as magnifying lenses.

Then, someone in the hallway screamed: The North Tower had collapsed.

Everyone flooded toward the television screens to watch as terrified people threw themselves off the highest floors of a burning building, suspended in an agonized contortion while plunging down, down, down.

Those images always stuck to me, Rilett said. I still have a hard time looking at those.

Her classmates panicked. Would the terrorists attack schools, too? Were they targets?

Rilett tried to call her mother, but no luck  her cell wasnt working.

As students evacuated, rushing into the streets, she found her mom parked along the curb.

Shes crying. She says, Shirley, Shirley, theyre attacking the United States,  Rilett remembered.

Growing up in Peru, Rilett had wanted to be a police officer. But when she moved to the U.S. in 1998, she forgot her aspirations, occupied primarily by her new life and friends.

I thought I was in this magical land, for lack of better words, where nothing happens, she said. Because I came from a country where we had a curfew at one point. Seeing that, it kind of brought me back to reality. And I think it made me wake up.

After the terror attacks, Rilett promised herself she would join the military. But her mother was afraid that shed die over there, wherever over there became in the war against terrorism that would ensue.

Rilett appeased her mom until she saw what has become iconic footage of people toppling a statue in Iraq  the monument to Saddam Hussein in Baghdads Firdos Square. Then, she insisted: She was going to join the army.

The way I saw it was Im a young girl who can give her time and help this country with serving, Rilett said. It was a sense of duty that I had to do it. It was like the country was crying for help.

In June 2004, she enlisted. Near the beginning of training, her drill sergeant asked anyone who was there for patriotism to raise their hand.

I was. I was. Even though I wasnt born in this country, I was ready to give it all, she said.

No one moved an inch, except her. She tentatively lifted her arm, because it was true. She had joined up because she loved the United States.

Everyone else seemed to think the concept was laughable.

I had a sense of pride of being here, being part of this country, she said.

Rilett and her family had been well-off in Peru. She had never gone hungry, though she saw plenty of others who had. But bread on the table did not mean safety and security.

When she was 11 years old, she remembers a tank rolling through town with armed officers. She tried to slip out the front door to witness the spectacle, but her mother stopped her.

Lima was on lockdown. She could not go outside, or she would be considered a militant, which would mean a bullet to the chest.

My family was welcome here from the moment we set foot here. So that made me want to give back, Rilett said.

While she was in the army, Rilett encountered male GIs who, more akin to now-famed Navy SEAL Chris Kyle, a.k.a. the American Sniper, had joined to put terrorists in body bags.

They would say things like theyre ready for revenge, she said. They did this to us, were going to do this to them.

But killing was never her intent.

I wanted to help and not hurt anybody, she said. That was not what I was going in for.

Though Riletts unit never deployed, she had to pack her bags around Christmas every year, ready to hop a plane and fly across the world at a moments notice  until November 2007, when she retired from the service and eventually took a civilian job in Greenwich.

Her dream of being a police officer had never quite faded, and after spending time in Greenwich and getting to know the community, she decided they were the people she wanted to defend. Her mother had always told her that Greenwich police were especially tough, and she wanted to be considered a tough girl, she joked.

Rilett joined the Greenwich Police Department in 2012, after mastering her English  a second language to make sure she would prove the most qualified officer she could be.

The attacks of 9-11 were pivotal for Rilett. But they didnt fill her with hate, or a thirst for blood. Instead, they proved to her how unified America could be in the face of national tragedy and adversity.

We were united at one point. And it felt good. It was something horrible that happened, but we were united after, she said. After something bad, something good always comes.
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Sandra Berris life has been chock-full of experiences.

In college, she would sometimes listen to Bob Dylan records at the home of Karl Shapiro, a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and her professor. One evening, she attended Shapiros dinner party, where Allen Ginsberg personally recited his incendiary and then-buzzing poem, Howl.

After earning a masters in education from Stanford University, Berris took to Alamo, Calif., where she taught. On the weekends, schoolchildren would pile into her car to explore San Franciscos corners and cultures in the days before teachers needed permission slips to expose their students to the world.

Life then took her east. For more than 20 years, Berris lived in Greenwich, where she became engrossed in a community she loved, active in the Arch Street Teen Center, Greenwich Historical Society, United Way and other town institutions.

Despite moving permanently to Carmel, Calif., four years ago, she still has a membership with the Greenwich Branch of the National League of American Pen Women and will return to town for the organizations meeting this month to celebrate her first book of poetry, Ash on Wind, published in August.

But while Berris has ties on opposite ends of the country and can boast a more diverse autobiography than most, she often chooses to escape her own reality in her poetry, telling imagined stories instead.

A poem, its not a diary, its not a journal, its something thats created, Berris said in an interview with Greenwich Time. Theres a term poetic license that everyones heard.

Her new collection is divided into five sections, all of which have a thematic pull. The first part focuses on death, and later infidelity takes center stage.

While the poems often come from a seemingly personal perspective, Berris isnt always the narrator.

In Adagio Adieu, for example, she juxtaposes a violin with a piano, playing off their harmony and individuality to build an allegory for a marriage that has been disrupted. She said she thought of the poem as an orchestra performance, after listening to her friend talk about divorce for weeks.

I dont sit down and think, Im going to create a poem, Berris said. Im not someone who writes every day. A poem actually finds me.

When two threads meet  when her mind connects a moaning violin with her friends marital issues  she feels inspired to write.

As an avid reader, Berris also discovers creative motivation in literature. For example, after reading a work by Joyce Carol Oates that tried to capture what it was like to lose a child, Berris imagined how she would have felt if she had ever had a miscarriage, a project that culminated in her poem, Atonement.

Part of reading the fiction to me is empathizing, not sympathizing, she said. Empathizing. Feeling exactly how someone else would feel.

Berris writes convincingly, so much so that she said fans have expressed disappointment when learning some of her stories arent true in a literal sense. That poems are autobiographical is an assumption lovers of the art form often make.

Anthony Reed, an associate professor of English and Africa-American Studies at Yale University, said because of poetic conventions since the Romantic period, audiences tend to assume the first-person narrator of a poem is a stand-in for the author, which is often accurate. He added that confessional and feminist poets have stressed the links between the personal and political, only strengthening assumptions about the writer as subject.

But, he countered, there have flourished, alongside those trends, many schools of poetry concerned with character, with intensity of certain common emotional experiences, and other concerns, that have implicitly or explicitly rejected the idea of the poem as testimony.

In an email to Greenwich Time, Reed wrote that poets often cover sensitive material without personal experience in the matter. He referenced Gwendolyn Brooks poems that addressed abortion, though she most likely never had one herself. And he added that if Berris was able to make her readers believe in the truth of her story, it sounds like she wrote successful poetry.

Ironically, Berris best known piece, The Clock Shoe, is based on actual experience  her own struggles with her mothers descent into Alzheimers. The poem has appeared in a sermon by a Greenwich minister, on a Russian website and in a newsletter about Alzheimers, among other places.

In The Clock Shoe, Berris asks her mom to draw a clock, a preliminary test to see if she has Alzheimers. She instead doodles a shoe design. The moment is light and humorous, but with a troubling undercurrent. It is included in Ash on Wind, among an entire series about her parents and their aging process.

For Berris, publishing her first book has meant having something that, unlike an anthology or journal, is uniquely hers.

She said the best part is just holding the beautiful finished product in my hand.

Berris isnt expecting to make a killing off her work, a reality most poets must face. And despite her return trip to Greenwich, she is not planning a book tour anytime soon.

I do realize, she said with a calm confidence, Im a bubble in the ocean.
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Thousands of bikers  many with American flags flowing from their motorcycles  gathered Sunday for the 17 annual CT United Ride to pay tribute to those lost during the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Every single year, you come back, and every single year, you give back, Norwalk Mayor Harry Rilling told the estimated 2,500 riders as they assembled at Nordan Park in Norwalk for a 60-mile trip that began in the city and wove through Westport, Wilton, Redding, Bethel, Monroe, Trumbull and Fairfield before ending at Seaside Park in Bridgeport.

Fred Garrity, the executive director of the event, said the ride began after 9/11 as a way to show support for first responders and those who were affected by the tragedy and to raise funds for various charitable organizations. Registration fees for the ride are donated to two local United Way chapters and other groups that support first responders.

What we were able to do was bottle up that patriotism, that camaraderie, Garrity said.

Jim Curley, who volunteers for the event, said the first year there were only about 800 riders. Its tripled since then, he noted.

State Senate Majority Leader Bob Duff, D-Norwalk, expressed gratitude for the show of patriotism, adding: We made a promise 16 years ago that we would never forget. Duff said.

At Seaside Park in Bridgeport, where the ride concluded, a huge American flag hung in the background, held aloft by a city firetruck.

The riders enjoyed a warm sunny day with outstanding views of Long Island Sound and munched on free hot dogs and burgers. Many wandered between rows and rows of parked bikes, admiring the types and various paint jobs, and often pointing to those that caught their attention.

Its a great cause, said Eric Stephens of Bridgeport, who participated in the ride with his buddies. The ride was excellent.

Volunteering for days

Marcy Manes of Fairfield recalled how her husband, firefighter Joe Risola, traveled to New York to aid in the aftermath of 9/11.

He was down at the towers volunteering for four days, Manes said of her husband. I love being here because it makes me feel safe knowing Im surrounded by firefighters.

Rory Amaya of Norwalk remembered the first rally 17 years ago, noting it got bigger and bigger every year. I want to support everybodys family who were involved.

Miguel Perez of Bridgeport said he tries to not miss the annual ride.

Ive been doing it since 2009  never fails, Perez said. As a matter of fact, I just came in from the airport, straight from Atlanta. Havent slept.

Perez said its impressive how each town helps the ride pass through its borders by temporarily closing streets and protecting the bikers. I love driving through the towns  you hear the sirens, see supporters, the firemen are standing at attention. Its beautiful, he said.

Hero Luu, who traveled from Meriden to take part in the ride, said what happened on 9/11 is plenty of a reason to participate. But, he noted with a smile, Its also a chance to be with friends. Its bonding.

George Medrano of Norwalk brought his 14-year-old son along on the back of his bike. The two adorned their helmets with the faces of cartoon characters, which they said drew compliments and attention.

Its a great time, Medrano said. I love that after all these years people still show support and remember what its all about.

Myrna Vivo, of Bridgeport, said she has a son in the Air Force and a daughter in college who also plans to enter the Air Force.

We were all at work, Vivo said, recalling where she was when the planes hit the World Trade Centers twin towers in Manhattan.

It was devastating, she said. This is a way to participate and let them know we are there and we support them.
MIAMI - Hurricane Irma brought ripping winds, tornadoes and storm-surge flooding to much of Florida's lower half on Sunday, as its slow-moving core battered the state's west coast from Key West to Tampa.

The massive storm - which had menaced Florida for days, and triggered evacuation orders covering 5.6 million people - made two official landfalls on Sunday.

The first, at about 9:10 a.m., was over the Florida Keys, an isolated string of islands that had rarely felt more alone than on Sunday. Irma hit them as a Category 4 hurricane, with sustained winds near 130 miles per hour.

Little was heard from the islands for hours afterward because residents here had no way to connect with the outside world. Though hit with lengthy periods of hurricane conditions that led to significant flooding in well-known tourist areas, Key West was largely spared the onslaught that many feared. But the island was left with no power, water or cellphone service.

After the Keys, Irma crossed over warm waters and hit the U.S. mainland at last, about six hours later, near the beach town of Marco Island. By 5 p.m., the storm was hitting Fort Myers, moving north toward low-lying, vulnerable Tampa as a still-potent Category 2 storm.

More News Hurricane Irma is sucking the water away from shorelines

But it was misleading to speak of this storm as "hitting" one city.

On Sunday, Irma was all of Florida's storm. Irma was everywhere.

In the east, the hurricane's spiraling rainbands were so wide that they caused tornadoes and flooding in Miami, on Florida's opposite coast. In the west, winds were so powerful that they bent the Gulf of Mexico itself to Irma's shape. In Naples, and in Tampa Bay, water actually disappeared from Gulf beaches, because Irma's counterclockwise winds were pulling it out to sea.

But not for long.

"MOVE AWAY FROM THE WATER," the National Hurricane Center warned, as curious onlookers climbed out onto the mysteriously dry seabed, moving so fast that it left manatees forlornly stranded. Later, after Irma's eye had passed, the same forces drove the water back in powerful surges.

By the end of the day Sunday, Florida officials said there were shelters open in 64 of Florida's 67 counties - 573 shelters across the state, holding 155,000 people. More than 3.4 million customers, a third of the state, were without power as of 9 p.m.

Irma's arrival as a Category 4 hurricane - the second-most powerful category, with sustained winds of at least 130 miles per hour - made history. Hurricane Harvey also hit Texas as a Category 4 storm, which marked the first time on record that two storms that powerful had made landfall in the U.S. in a single year. Scientists say that climate change is now making such intense hurricanes more likely, since hurricanes draw strength from warmer ocean waters.

And Irma seems likely to make more history before she is finished.

As the storm headed for Georgia, the city of Atlanta - hundreds of miles from any coast, and more than 600 miles north of the place where Irma first hit the mainland - was placed under its first-ever tropical-storm warning. The storm is forecast to arrive there on Monday, with wind gusts predicted at up to 63 miles per hour.

"Wind speeds that high literally can lift furniture off the ground and turn it into projectiles," Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed, D, said. "We're already experiencing wind damage downtown."

Late Sunday, President Trump signed a disaster declaration that should speed federal funding to damaged areas in Florida. On the same day, a White House official - social media director Dan Scavino, Jr. - shared a photo of a flooded runway on Twitter. "Here is Miami International Airport," he wrote.

It was not. Officials at Miami International tweeted back to say that Scavino was wrong. It was unclear what airport was depicted in the video, which has circulated online for at least a few weeks.

With the storm still blasting Florida on Sunday, it was too early to count the damage fully. For those in the middle of the storm, anticipation of fear turned to fear itself.

"I'm terrified," said Darla Taliaferro, 40, who was staying at a Hampton Inn in Estero, on the Gulf Coast. As Irma hit the town, she had taken shelter at a hotel where her husband Jason, 35, is an employee. With them were their children, Ramielle, 9, and Jason Jr., 8, as well as her two parakeets, Desi and Luci.

In the middle of the storm, there was a knock on their door. They had to leave their hotel room. The winds were shifting, and that side of the hotel wasn't safe.

The instructions: leave valuables in the bathroom, and come to the lobby. Quickly.

"I want safety," Taliaferro said, noting that being asked to leave her 4th floor room frightened her a lot. "My heart went, 'Oh my God!' It's my first hurricane but I can't let the kids see how scared I am."

For residents of South Florida, Irma was a storm they'd spent the past week waiting for.

But it didn't arrive in the place they'd been waiting for it.

For days, as Irma battered Caribbean islands and fattened up on warm waters, it had seemed most likely to hit Miami and then target cities along the Atlantic Coast. Evacuations were issued there, sending people streaming north and west. Some people fled across the state, to the Tampa area.

Everyone watched the storm, and waited for the turn.

At some point, meteorologists said, prevailing winds would knock into Irma like a giant pool ball, redirecting it to the north. But where, exactly, would that turn happen?

Overnight Saturday, they finally knew.

"Irma has made its long-awaited turn," reported the National Hurricane Center in its 5 a.m. advisory. Instead of aiming the storm's eye at Miami, the turn left Irma tracking further west, on a path up the state's Gulf Coast toward cities including Naples, Fort Myers and eventually Tampa and St. Petersburg.

By that point, for people on the state's west side, the storm was practically on them. Winds were gusting up to 63 miles per hour in Naples by 9 a.m. The turn had put the state's southwest corner directly in Irma's path."People have asked what can we do, the first thing I tell them is: pray," Gov. Rick Scott, R, said in a morning interview with Fox News. "Pray for everybody in Florida."

The storm hit Cudjoe Key at about 9:10 a.m. Key West - further south, at the end of the chain - endured hours of unrelenting rain and high winds, which seemed to peak at about 7 a.m. Though the hurricane felled many trees on the small island and caused some property damage, predictions of potentially catastrophic storm surges and flooding didn't materialize.

Low-lying areas of Key West, especially in the tourist-heavy streets near the Key West Bight, flooded on Sunday, with deep standing water along Caroline and Front streets. Some areas had three feet of water and were impassable by car, but there were many areas of the island that saw no flooding at all. One apartment complex lost its roof.

Officials estimated that about 25 percent of Key West's residents stayed through the storm despite evacuation orders. Several people on the island said they felt like they got lucky because the storm wasn't as bad as expected, but they also now are in the dark: There was no power, water or cellphone service as of Sunday evening, meaning there was almost no way to communicate with the outside world.

It is unclear how long it will take for Key West to regain those essential services.

After it blasted the Keys, the storm moved into open water again, headed for Florida's mainland.

Its next target was Marco Island and Naples. Irma spent all morning and part of the afternoon getting there.Across the state, the outer bands of the storm were already hitting downtown Miami, breaking signs and sending debris soaring in the wind. Two construction cranes collapsed, and their broken pieces dangled dangerously above the street. Major streets flooded, as the storm pushed ocean water up and out of the Miami River that runs through downtown.

At the University of Miami, one isolated gust was recorded at 100 miles per hour. At least three tornadoes were confirmed in Miami-Dade County. By day's end, Miami was full of still-flooded streets downtown. Elsewhere, it was littered with downed trees, fallen power lines, busted gas-station signs and other debris, making even the un-flooded streets hazardous for drivers.

Miami-Dade Police Department director Juan Perez said his officers have yet to do damage assessments. He said he had heard no reports of looting. The big problem was the downed trees, he said. "I think it's worse than Wilma," he said, referring to the hurricane that hit South Florida in 2005.

And it rained everywhere; some areas of the state got between 10 and 14 inches of it.

Back in the hurricane's direct path, Irma was getting closer. At 3 p.m. in Naples, winds were gusting to 82 miles per hour. The water levels dropped four feet below normal. Beaches went dry. The water was out there someplace.Then: landfall again.

By 4:35 p.m. in Naples, the gusts were at 142 miles per hour. And the water was rising again: one gauge showed a five-foot rise in 40 minutes. In Estero, just up the coast from Naples, palm trees began to blow sideways.

By 6 p.m., the storm had weakened to a Category 2 hurricane, with sustained winds of 110 miles per hour. The storm itself was moving at an excruciating 14 miles per hour, up the coast toward Tampa and St. Petersburg - a metropolitan area of 3 million people that had not seen a major hurricane since the 1920s.

The Tampa area is particularly vulnerable to hurricanes, because of its flat geography - and because of sea-level rise. Tampa spent all day on Sunday waiting, unsure of what Irma would be when it arrived.

"We've asked people to get to know their neighbors, if you don't already," said Jason Penny, a spokesman for Tampa Fire Rescue. "We're trying to put out a message of community, we're all in this together. We could use help from about anyone right now."

The Tampa Bay region has dodged a direct hurricane hit for nearly a century, but Penny said "reality has settled in."

"Now we realize that it's our turn," he said.

Even before Tampa's damage was known, on Sunday evening people even further north were taking precautions against the storm. Having slammed the southern half of Florida on Sunday, it seemed Irma was determined to come for the rest.

"I'm doing what I should have done three days ago," said Mike Merrill, who lives in St. Augustine, near Florida's northeast edge. Though Irma had struck the opposite corner of the state, he expected it would bring strong winds to his home on Monday. So Merrill, who runs an animal-rescue operation, had hunkered down with a generator, some loaves of bread, cases of LaCroix fizzy water, 11 dogs, a cat, and five bags of dog biscuits.

"We have enough food to last awhile," Merrill said. If food ever ran low, he said the pecking order in the house would be: "Dogs first. Then people."

---

Sullivan reported from Estero, Fla., and Fahrenthold reported from Washington. Joel Achenbach and Perry Stein in Miami, Darryl Fears in Orlando, Lori Rozsa in Gainesville, Leonard Shapiro in Pompano Beach, Roy Furchgott in Sarasota, and Mark Berman, Wesley Lowery, Jason Samenow, Angela Fritz, Amanda McLaren and Katie Mettler in Washington contributed to this report.
IFA ended this week, bringing new smartphones, smartwatches and other consumer gadgets. Was it more exciting than previous years? Well, let's go back through the archives to see how the 2017 event stacks up.

2012

IFA used to be the home of the Galaxy Note. In 2012, Samsung brought out the Galaxy Note II as well as the Android-powered Galaxy Camera. Sony trotted out the Xperia T flagship (aka the Bond phone) and the waterproof Xperia V. Sony's camera, the NEX-5R was not Android-powered itself, but had many connectivity options to share its photos with a smartphone.



Samsung Galaxy Note II N7100  Samsung Galaxy Camera GC100  Sony Xperia T  Sony Xperia V

LG saved the flagship for later, instead showing the mid-range Optimus L9. HTC followed a similar sentiment, showing the Desire X instead of a One flagship.

If you go through our IFA 2012 recap, you'll notice several tablets. This year convertible laptops and 2-in-1s completely dominated the field while simple tablets hid in the shadows.



LG Optimus L9 P760  HTC Desire X

2013

Right on schedule, Samsung unveiled the Galaxy Note 3 but also introduced its line of smart wearables - the Tizen-powered Galaxy Gear. Sony answered with the second gen Z-series phone - the Xperia Z1 - and a new take on photography - the QX10 and QX100 lens style cameras. The Japanese giant showed a smartwatch of its own. Unlike Samsung, Sony's fascination with wearables was short-lived.



Samsung Galaxy Note 3  Samsung Galaxy Gear  Sony Xperia Z1  Sony SmartWatch 2 SW2

Acer boasted about the first phone with 4K video recording, the Liquid S2. It only managed 24fps at that resolution, but it was more exciting than the rest of the field. LG brought a tablet, as did Asus and Archos. Alcatel debuted its Idol series.



Acer Liquid S2  LG G Pad 8.3  alcatel Idol Alpha

There were yet more tablets at IFA 2013 including a questionable 20" 4K tablet from Panasonic.

2014

The clock ticks on, bringing another S Pen flagship, the Galaxy Note 4. This year it was a two for one special with the Galaxy Note Edge joining the festivities - an early look into the 2017 Samsung design.

A year after the previous IFA, Sony's Z-series had progressed two generations - check out the Xperia Z3 and Z3 Compact.



Samsung Galaxy Note 4  Samsung Galaxy Note Edge  Sony Xperia Z3  Sony Xperia Z3 Compact

Motorola (under Google) unveiled the second generation of Moto X, which received a very warm welcome with its Active screen and wooded backs. Meanwhile, Huawei promoted its Mate series to flagship status with the Mate7. This year, the company decided to wait a month after IFA to launch the new Mate10.



Motorola Moto X (2nd Gen)  Huawei Ascend Mate7

The Nokia 830 bragged about the thinnest OIS module ever, but it was a mid-range device otherwise. HTC stuck to the mid-range as well with the Desire 820.



Nokia Lumia 830  HTC Desire 820

Smartwatches had a stronger presence this year - Moto 360, LG G Watch R, Sony SmartWatch 3, Asus ZenWatch and the Samsung Gear S were all demoed.

Samsung also showed off its brand new Gear VR headset, which would grow to be a dominant player in the VR field (as PC and console headsets are fairly pricey even in 2017). Also, Motorola showed the Hint - a fully wireless, beautifully build Bluetooth earphone. Earphone, singular, but still pointing the way to Apple's AirPods.

We saw even more that the 2014 edition of IFA.

2015

This is the year that Samsung decided to split the Note events from the Berlin-based exhibition. No matter, Sony brought plenty of excitement with the first 4K mobile screen - the Xperia Z5 Premium. Sony's second 4K phone, the XZ Premium was unveiled at the MWC this year, not IFA (we got the XZ1 phones instead).

Other Z5 family members included the Xperia Z5 and Z5 Compact, though those struggled to prove they are better than their Z3 predecessors (the infamous Snapdragon 810 chipset did them no favors).



Sony Xperia Z5 Premium  Sony Xperia Z5  Sony Xperia Z5 Compact

The Mate series took an AMOLED detour with the Mate S, something to be revisited with the Mate 9 Pro.

Huawei joined the smartwatch race with the the Huawei Watch while Motorola put out the second generation Moto 360-7683.php) watch.



Huawei Mate S  Huawei Watch  Motorola Moto 360 46mm (2nd gen)

There were a few more interesting tidbits at IFA 2015, but overall it wasn't as busy as 2014.

2016

After declaring the Z-series dead, Sony brought it back via the new Xperia XZ and had a brand new compact to show, though it was called Xperia X Compact. With lack of 4K video and waterproofing, this Compact failed to wow the crowd too. Sony did get over this hump and this year's Xperia XZ1 Compact is everything we expect of a super mini.



Sony Xperia XZ  Sony Xperia X Compact

Huawei surprised us by saying "no new Mate phones", but it showed the premium mid-range nova and nova plus. At the time, there was talked that these two were initially designed to be Nexus phones. They certainly look the part, though they weren't as powerful as the Huawei-made Nexus 6p.



Huawei nova  Huawei nova plus

ZTE brought some competition to the X Compact, even if the Axon mini was not quite as awesome as its big brother. Motorola's mid-range Moto Z Play was unveiled with support for MotoMods, including the new Hasselblad True Zoom (by now, Sony had quit the lens-style camera game).



ZTE Axon mini  Motorola Moto Z Play

IFA 2016 had its share of smartwatches too, including Samsung's Gear S3 frontier and S3 classic and the Asus ZenWatch 3.



Samsung Gear S3 frontier LTE  Samsung Gear S3 classic LTE  Asus Zenwatch 3 WI503Q

If you missed it last week, you can also read the IFA 2017 recap. The overall impression is that Sony is the only one to maintain a flagship presence at IFA. Samsung bowed out, but this year LG took its place with the V30. Tablets heated up and cooled down quickly, but smartwatches remain a staple of IFA. At any rate, this year the IFA exhibition was as exciting as the high watermark of 2014.
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The European prices of the upcoming Coffee Lake processors have surfaced for the entire range of products, in this news item an overview. Of course Canadian prices already had been listed, but in the EU the pricing model differs quite a bit due to taxes and exchange rates.

Looking at the differences we see that Coffee Lake will be a bit more expensive compared to the current Core i5 and i7 lines. The Core i7 8700K with six-cores and one thread will cost 389,- the 8600K with six cores and threads 273. Below an overview of prices, cores and frequencies. The prices listed will differ here and there a bit basically due to differences of VAT per country.

Processor Cores / Threads Base Clock Turbo (6c) Turbo (1c) L3 TDP Price Core i7 8700K 6/12 3.7 GHz 4.3 GHz 4.7 GHz 12 MB 95 W  389 Core i7 8700 6/12 3.2 GHz 4.3 GHz 4.6 GHz 12 MB 65 W  327 Core i5 8600K 6/6 3.6 GHz 4.1 GHz 4.3 GHz 9 MB 95 W  273 Core i5 8400 6/6 2.8 GHz 3.8 GHz 4.0 GHz 9 MB 65 W  192 Core i3 8350K 4/4 4.0 GHz NA NA 8 MB 91 W  189 Core i3 8300 4/4 4.0 GHz NA NA 8 MB 65 W - Core i3 8100 4/4 3.6 GHz NA NA 6 MB 65 W  123






Published on 2017/09/10 | Source

Ma Kwang-soo poses at home with his books in this file photo from September 2015.

The novelist Ma Kwang-soo was found dead at his home on Tuesday. He was 66. His body was discovered by his sister at around 1:30 p.m. at his home in the affluent Ichon-dong district in central Seoul. He was found hanging on the porch of his apartment.

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A letter found at the scene asked that his body and assets be handled by his sister.

Ma married in 1985 but divorced five years later and had no children. He was recently diagnosed with severe depression and doctors recommended a hospital stay, but he refused and had been taking medication, according to police.

Ma debuted as a poet in 1977 and is famous for his sexually explicit novels, including "Happy Sara", for which he served an eight-month prison term for obscenity in the late 1990s.

He was also fired by Yonsei University, where he taught Korean Literature, but was reinstated in 1998 after a pardon from then-President Kim Dae-jung.

Ma's depression apparently worsened after he retired in August of last year, when he complained about ostracism from the academic community and anger of people who criticized him without ever reading his books, "simply because I wrote about sex".

He lamented that his "pent-up anger" caused his body to grow weary and ill but said he wished to see his country "become more honest" and continued writing. He published a book of poetry in January this year.
By Panos Kotzathanasis | Published on 2017/09/09 | Source

Lee Byung-hun's evolution as an actor has been tremendous through the years, and this low-key, kind-of-indie drama proves this fact to the point that Warner Bros decided to co-produce and distribute it.

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"A Single Rider" (Festival entry) is screening at the 8th Korean Film Festival in Australia.

Securities broker Kang Jae-hoon finds his life in shambles when his company in which he invested goes bankrupt after a stock fraud, leaving him broke and having to face the wrath of the customers he had persuaded to invest, some of which were friends and relatives. Disgraced, beaten, and broke, he decides to fly to Sydney where his wife Soo-jin and his son Jin-woo live in order for the latter to get an education there. Upon his arrival, he stumbles upon a girl, Gina, who has fallen victim to some Korean that promised her to exchange her Australian dollars with won at a better rate than the bank's. Reluctantly, he agrees to help her, but his problems are much bigger. His wife seems to have established herself quite well in Australia, having rediscovered her love for music, and seems to share a more than friendly relationship with her neighbor, Rick, a construction worker. Instead of confronting them, though, Kang decides to lurk around their neighborhood, watching them from the shadows, as he tries to decide if he has to let them go.

Lee Zoo-young, in her debut, directs and pens a subtle drama, in distinct indie fashion, despite the presence of Lee Byung-hun and the fact that the film is mostly shot in Sydney. The script revolves around loss and the way people cope with it, with Jae-hoon and Soo-jin presenting two opposite behaviors. The former cannot let go and goes to extremes as he tries to decide if he should move on, while the latter has accepted her situation and has already done just that.

Evidently, in cinematic terms, Jae-hoon's case is much more interesting, and Lee focuses much on it with Lee Byung-hun anchoring the film as Kang in impressive fashion, as a man lost after he realizes that his whole life has left him behind. The concept of the financial fraud works quite well in the beginning, providing one of the two shocking moments in an otherwise quite uneventful drama. However, it is not examined or even depicted very much, and the same applies to Gina's arc, which seems to exist just to provide some additional time and story filler.

I enjoyed the concept of the man who lurks in the shadows watching his family, which borders on the surreal sometimes, because nobody except the adorable dog seems to realize Jang's presence despite the fact that he is quite close. At moments, it reminded me of "3-Iron", although Kim Ki-duk's film went much further in this concept than this one.

Gong Hyo-jin as Lee Soo-jin is quite good in a small role that finds a number of highlights during the end, when the focus of the story turns on her. Ahn So-hee as Gina plays the damsel-in-distress, bringing a kind of cheerfulness in an otherwise morose film. Kim Il-youn does a great job in the cinematography department, highlighting the beauties of Sydney in impressive fashion, while the framing in the scenes where Kang is "stalking" his family is equally impressive. Kim Sang-beom and Kim Jae-beom's editing retains the sense of disorientation Lee Zoo-young wanted the film to have through a number of flashbacks that become clear at the end.

"A Single Rider" has some faults, but the presence of Lee Byung-hun, the cinematography and some shocking scenes make it a more than worthwhile spectacle.

Review by Panos Kotzathanasis

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"A Single Rider" is directed by Lee Zoo-young and features Lee Byung-hun, Gong Hyo-jin and Ahn So-hee.
By William Schwartz | Published on 2017/09/09

Once upon a time, in an obscure part of Seoul, there was a dog called Baek-gu. He came to the area as a medium-sized white puppy. He would just run around and do whatever, sticking around because there was an old man who gave him food. Then the old man went away, and by then Baek-gu was old. He became haggard and scrawny. This neighborhood was no longer the kind of place where people noticed or cared about stray dogs, not that it ever really was in the first place. So one day, Baek-gu finally died.

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Baek-gu may not have been a shaggy dog although the above synopsis is a pretty good example of a shaggy dog story. Which begs the question- why did director Kim Bo-ram feel the need to make this documentary in the first place? I'm far from the first one to ask it. The documentary itself contains numerous scenes where people respond to director Kim Bo-ram's queries about Baek-gu with a puzzled "why are you making a movie about that dog?" reaction.

Well, the answer to that is because the documentary really isn't actually about the dog at all. Rather, its exploration of current normal daily life in South Korea, using Baek-gu as a conversation starter. This is most obvious in the increasingly abstract and disconnected imagery throughout the second half of the film, which veers from major political protests to director Kim Bo-ram's own difficulty in finding affordable housing in the current real estate climate.

These events don't have much obvious connection with each other, let alone Baek-gu, although the key word there is obvious. Baek-gu is symbolic of how South Korean culture has gone from being something accommodating to those who live there to one that is increasingly indifferent and uncaring. Mind, it is at times difficult to tell whether this is a fair assessment, since a lot of the people interviewed pretty obviously just don't feel like talking on general principle.

Other places, namely the brief spots with kids, are more authentic. Then there's a section where Kim Bo-ram just tries to talk to random old ladies. She is at one point violently interrupted by a social worker who is quite adamant that random old ladies are not to be talked to. This is emblematic of how the logic and reasons behind rules in modern South Korea have become increasingly irrelevant. Stuff just happens, without explanation.

Which is in all fairness a perfectly reasonable critique of the documentary writ-large. The whole thing is just a giant run-on sentence. We start out, literally, with just an extended shot of the wind ruffling the trees, and director Kim Bo-ram frequently just seems interested more in general photography than she does anything resembling any kind of a relevant point. Still, as either a political piece or an experimental piece, she does get the job done, which is why the film has gotten around quite a bit on the local festival circuit. Whether anyone outside of Korea will get a chance to see this movie is a more ambiguous question.

Review by William Schwartz

"Baek-gu" is directed by Kim Bo-ram
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Published on 2017/09/10 | Source

Volunteers take an oath at a ceremony in Seoul on Wednesday before starting their undercover mission to inspect restaurants. /Newsis

The Korea Tourism Organization on Wednesday launched a team of 100 undercover inspectors who check the quality of food and service at major restaurants frequented by foreign visitors.

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They will visit 400 restaurants across the country from September to November posing as ordinary customers.

The team consists of 50 Koreans and 50 foreigners, most of them housewives or students. They are volunteers who will only have the cost of food and transport covered by the KTO.

The KTO will select five to 10 restaurants which receive high marks and pass on marketing strategies targeting foreign customers and provide subsidies.
Published on 2017/09/09 | Source

Anytime I see Yoo Seung-ho's name on a cast list, I'm immediately interested. Now he's up for the lead in "I Am Love", the story of a man with no family of love. He'd play this lonely man who was rejected all through his childhood and now lives as a priest by day and forger by night. He is a genius artist, which throws me back to Yoo Seung-ho's "Imaginary Cat" days. We have no time slot yet, but this production has my attention.

-Yours, Lisa, an unabashed Yoo Seung-ho fangirl

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"I Am Love" (2017)

Directed by Choi Won-seok

Written by

With Yoo Seung-ho,...

Synopsis

The story of a man who has no one to rely on, family or lover. He is a forger who was rejected by family and now leads a double life. He then meets a woman who might change everything.

Broadcast starting date in Korea : 2018
Rail: Heads We Win, Tails You Lose

by Tom Yamachika, President Tax Foundation Hawaii

The tax bill moving through the Rail Special Session contains one provision that, to me, sticks out above the rest as a Heads We Win, Tails You Lose proposition.

As you may remember, the Tax Foundation sued the State, contending that the 10% Skim that the State helps itself to off the top of the county surcharge collections is grossly excessive and unconstitutional. The suit is still pending in the court system.

The special session rail bill, SB 4, provides that if the Foundation wins and the State is ordered to refund money to the City, then the State will scoop the same amount of money from the Citys share of transient accommodations tax money, and keep it in the State general fund.

To understand what this is like, imagine if you were driving to work one day and a State vehicle rear-ends you. Crash! You incur $10,000 in damages, including car repair charges, medical bills, and the like. You sue the State. But before the judge can rule, the legislature passes a law that says if the court rules in your favor and you recover any money, there will be a special tax in the same amount that applies just to you, so that you must pay back every dime that the court says you are entitled to. We need to protect the States revenue, the legislators say.

Fortunately, our state constitution provides an answer: They cant do that! It says, No laws shall be passed mandating any political subdivision to pay any previously accrued claim. A lawsuit is the classic example of a previously accrued claim. Party A says the State did something bad in the past. Party A then files a claim to ask the State to make it right. The State refuses, and Party A takes the case to the court system.

The historical records say that the framers inserted this provision to curb some legislative practices found obnoxious by local units. One of these practices is compelling county government to pay accrued claims. This form of legislation it was urged, usurped the judgment of the courts and interfered unnecessarily with local affairs and finances. It was for the purpose of preventing such continued practice that the sentence, No laws shall be passed mandating any political subdivision to pay any previously accrued claim, was incorporated into the provision on local government." Proceedings of the Constitutional Convention of Hawaii, vol. I, Committee of the Whole Report No. 21 (1950).

This provision was left intact through the Constitutional Convention of 1978, and is now in Article VIII, Section 4 of our constitution.

That lawmakers have even considered heads I win, tails you lose legislation is profoundly disturbing. Even more disturbing is that they passed it and it is expected to be signed into law.

To be sure, our state is not alone. Other states have recently used their legislatures to upend the civil justice system. We previously have written about a case in the State of Washington where the legislature nullified a taxpayer victory in court by rewriting the law 27 years retroactively. Retroactive tax laws that unwound taxpayer victories were also enacted in Michigan, Gillette Commercial Operations North America v. Michigan Dept. of Treasury, 878 N.W.2d 891 (Mich. Ct. App. 2015), and New York, Caprio v. New York State Dept. of Revenue & Taxation, 25 N.Y.3d 744 (2015). The U.S. Supreme Court declined to take up these cases, but of course that doesnt mean the Court approved of them. It certainly does not make them right.
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Rachel Carson's expose shocked the world. And we're better for it

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When 12th-pass jobless Dinesh Kumar Maheshwari applied for the coveted post of information commissioner in Madhya Pradesh in January this year, he was merely 19 years old. Yet, he is confident of doing justice to the post, if he gets it.

But then he has to compete with 116 others, including judges, senior IAS and IPS officers and lawyers who have applied for the two posts of information commissioners in the state.

When asked what he knew about the job profile, Maheshwari said, It is only after I get the job that I will come to know what type of work I will be required to do. What I know is, it is related to RTI as to how information should be given under the RTI Act.

Maheshwari, who belongs to Shajapur and is staying in Bhopal pursuing a pathology test course, said there was no qualification required for the post. Only certain descriptions were required to be mentioned which I did on the form.

Another applicant Mahendra Maheshwari from Sehore is a graduate and labourer. He told HT that he chanced upon an ad for the post and applied.

On the eligibility and qualification for the job, he said, Since I am preparing for various government jobs I have good deal of knowledge on law, media, RTI, governance etc. I have good intention and wish to serve the country.

Brijesh Sen from Sehore and Vishal Gujarati from Agar Malwa are two other applicants with educational qualification of higher secondary. While Vishal has not mentioned his occupation, Brijesh is a labourer, as per information obtained by RTI activist Ajay Dubey.

The last date for submitting the application was January 10.

As per Right to Information Act, chief information commissioner and information commissioners shall be persons of eminence in public life with wide knowledge and experience in law, science and technology, social service, management, journalism, mass media or administration and governance.

As per RTI Act, a committee comprising chief minister, leader opposition and a minister nominated by the CM recommends selection of the state CIC and information commissioners. The committee is yet to meet to take its decision on the applications. Recently, leader opposition leader Ajay Singh of Congress warned that he would not take a part in the meeting if the parliamentary affairs minister Narottam Mishra is a part of the committee.

Activist Ajay Dubey said the lacunae in the RTI act should be plugged to rule out appointment of those less qualified. Unfortunately, he said, there were many applicants who didnt have much knowledge about RTI and they had hardly worked in the field of RTI.

However, information commissioner Aatmdeep said persons of eminence was enough to carry the implied meaning as to who should be appointed to the post.

The post of information commissioner is not a mundane job, he said, adding that undeserving candidates would be filtered in the process.

Aatmdeep noted that there have hardly any cases of undeserving persons being appointed as information commissioners.

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Taipei, Sept. 10 (CNA) A French Catholic priest was granted Taiwanese citizenship Sunday without having to give up citizenship in his home country and said he would like to be buried in the Hualien township of Yuli, where he has been serving for most of his 58 years in Taiwan.
The Salman Khan-starrer Dabangg (2010) turns seven today. It was undoubtedly a film that brought back single-screen audiences to the theatres in hordes. Salman was paired opposite debutante Sonakshi Sinha, for whom it was a dream launch.

Sonu played the villain Chedi Singh in Dabangg (2010), here seen with Salman Khan in a still from the film.

Actor Sonu Sood, who played the role of the antagonist Chedi Singh, reveals that he had initially rejected the film. And he only agreed to come on board after getting some changes done to the script of Dabangg  the filmmakers agreed to give a humorous twist to his earthy character; the result was a villain who was always sculpting his body and posing for photos when not plotting awful things, such as murder.

Sonu says, I suggested that we should bring a comedy element to this man, who always carries a photographer along with him, saying Bhaiyyaji, smile!

He narrates the story behind how the photographer element came into place. My character is heavily inspired by my batchmates, when I was studying engineering. (Bet you didnt know that Sonu is a graduate in electronics engineering!) I used to live in a hostel with Bihari roommates. They used to be very excited about getting their pictures clicked, and since there werent any mobile phones back then, they used to have a photographer accompany them everywhere. Thus, my characters personality and the photographer were incorporated into Dabangg.

Sonu recalls with a laugh that during the shooting of the climax scene of Dabangg, Salman accidentally used too much force, and the punch landed straight on my nose! There was so much bleeding, and I was rushed to the hospital, where there was no electricity. I finally shot for 5-6 days more with that broken nose. There was a huge debate on whether I should fly back to Mumbai and get operated upon.

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An otherwise lazy Sunday morning at Cyber Hub, Gurgaon, was made special by actors Sidharth Malhotra and Rakul Preet Singh, who were shooting for their film Aiyaary, directed by Neeraj Pandey.

Sidharth, dressed in a black shirt and jeans, and Rakul, in an orange cold-shoulder top, were totally drenched  thats because they were shooting a rain sequence. Amid tight security, fans tried their best to catch a glimpse of the actors. Storefronts, restaurant doorways, and balconies all around the shooting spot were filled with people.

The film, also starring Manoj Bajpayee, is based on real-life incidents and is the story of a mentor and his protege. Portions have also been shot in Kashmir and London. This is the teams second schedule in Delhi-NCR; the last schedule was in June, at India Gate.

In an earlier interview, when asked about Aiyaary, Sidharth was quoted as saying, ...Neerajs films have always been inspired by true events, and I have admired his films from the beginning as he is a content-driven director with an amazing storytelling ability. Aiyaary is also based on a story of true events. I am thrilled to venture into this new role of espionage and military intelligence with him.

Actor Sidharth Malhotra stands next to a pipe creating rain, as onlookers watch the shoot. (Photo: Manoj Verma/HT)

Rakul Preet Singh and Sidharth both get soaked for the scene. (Photo: Manoj Verma/HT)

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India has renegotiated the price of liquefied natural gas (LNG) it imports from Gorgon project in Australia that will result in savings of more than Rs 10,000 crore, according to petroleum ministry sources in New Delhi on Sunday.

Happy to share good news that India has, yet again, been able to address the long-term price issue of LNG from Gorgon to suit Indian market, petroleum minister Dharmendra Pradhan said in a tweet.

Indian customers will receive LNG volumes at an amicable price soon. This is done in a similar way to what we did with LNG from Qatar, he said in a separate tweet.

According to the ministry source, the Gorgon project operators consortium led by American majors Chevron and Exxon Mobil have agreed to charge 13.9% of the prevailing UK Brent oil price at the port of delivery, rather than 14.5% at the port of loading as was agreed earlier.

A joint venture formed by state-run oil and gas companies with Gaz de France as its strategic partner, Petronet LNG had last year sought a minimum 10% reduction in price of LNG it agreed to buy from the Gorgon project.

The company had signed a 20-year agreement in 2009 to buy 1.44 million tonnes per annum of LNG at a price equivalent to 14.5% of the prevailing oil rate.

Last year, India favourably re-negotiated its LNG agreement with Qatar to bring down the cost of importing natural gas to less than $5 per unit from $12.

In return for the renegotiation, Petronet signed an agreement for additional import of 1 million tonnes of LNG per year for about 12 years with effect from January 1, 2016, at the prevailing market prices. The new contract ends in 2028.

Going by the old long-term gas contract price, we have succeeded in renegotiating a benefit of Rs 16,000 crore in this calendar year, Pradhan had said in his address here at the signing of the modification to the gas sale-purchase agreement with RasGas of Qatar last year.
Haryana authorities concluded on Sunday a massive search in the sprawling 800-acre headquarters of the Dera Sacha Sauda, a quasi-religious sect whose chief is serving 20 years in prison for raping two woman disciples. (Highlights)

Curfew was clamped in Sirsa and mobile internet services were suspended when the search began on Friday with a large posse of state policemen and paramilitary troopers.

Government spokesperson Satish Mehra said internet and train services will resume from Monday.

Over the past three days, search teams recovered a luxury car, huge quantities of firecrackers, a window-shaped tunnel from the spiritual leaders home to a hostel for the sadhvis (woman devotees), plastic money, computers, hard disks and other items, he said.

Over 5,000 police, paramilitary and civil administration personnel were deployed for the operation conducted on the directions of the Punjab and Haryana high court.

Among the items of interest was the flamboyant 50-year-old Dera chiefs pink and whacky mansion that has an upright extension shaped like a standing half-doughnut.

The building is called babas gufa, or cave, and it was out of bounds for everyone except his closest aides. This is where, his victims alleged, the sexual exploits took place. The walls of the gufa are more than 30 feet tall  it has green lawn about 10 feet high from the surface. There are two paths. One goes directly to the basement and another to the guestrooms on the ground floor, said a police officer who didnt wish to be named.

Expensive material is used to decorate the guestroom. The gufa walls are strong and cannot be damaged easily.

Health officials detected irregularities in the Dera hospital such as illegally running a skin bank and allegedly conducting abortion of unwanted pregnancies.

But chief medical officer Govind Gupta refused comments on the allegations of the hospital breaching medical termination of pregnancy laws.

We cannot comment on the search operation, he said.

Other than the secret passage to the womens hostel, a second tunnel lined with fibreglass was discovered that looked like an escape route opening out about 5km away.

An empty box of AK-47 rifle cartridges, 84 cartons of firecrackers and chemicals from the illegal factory, besides hundreds of pairs of shoes, designer clothing and caps, were also found.

Ram Rahims sprawling complex has a stadium, a hospital, schools and colleges, bungalows, markets and an ostentatious 7-star MSG resort with replicas of the Eiffel Tower, Taj Mahal, Kremlin and Disney World.

Hundreds of people and sect followers permanently live and work in the mini-township.

The process is being videographed and overseen by retired district and sessions judge, AKS Pawar.

A quick-reaction team, anti-sabotage squad, bomb-disposal and forensic experts, bulldozers, tractors, locksmiths, and dog squads were called in to assist the comprehensive search.

The security measures were taken as Ram Rahims conviction in August led to large-scale violence in Panchkula and Sirsa, leaving 38 people dead and 264 wounded.

Government spokesperson Mehra said the revenue department has been asked to check the land records of the Dera Sacha Sauda in Sirsa.

There are allegations that the influential sect and its leadership had forced villagers to sell land at throwaway prices.
Usually, while choosing a school for their children, parents look at its academic record. They now need to change this criteria and look first at the schools safety record and its compliance of child safety laws and guidelines. The gruesome murder of a seven-year-old child at Ryan International School in Gurgaon on Friday underlines this.

Whats absolutely shocking in this case is the callous negligence of the school in allowing adults, including school bus drivers and conductors, to use the washroom meant for children. By doing so, the school put the safety of young children who studied there at risk. And sure enough, the young boy became a victim of a sexual predator- the bus conductor- who slit his throat when the child resisted his attempts at sodomy.

Any school with even an iota of concern for the safety of its pupils, would be aware of the risk of abuse that young children face at school and during travel to and from the school and the innumerable cases of molestation that have come to light in recent years. Even in July this year, a three-year-old girl in Bengaluru was sexually abused by the school van driver while being dropped home. In March, a 10-year-old girl was sexually assaulted by the school bus driver in Pune. In February, a playschool in Bengaluru came under fire following a shocking discovery that an office assistant was molesting tiny tots on the pretext of taking them to the washroom.

Given these incidents, it is common sense to ensure no one other than the children entered the toilet. In fact parents demonstrating outside the school on Friday told television channels that they had complained about all and sundry using the childrens washroom in parent-teacher meetings but the school paid no heed.

Even if the school was not sensitive enough to understand the risks, there were clear guidelines from the Gurgaon police on the issue, which it blatantly and contemptuously violated. The guidelines for safety of children in schools issued by Gurgaon police are one of the best on the subject and several clauses deal specifically on the issue of washroom safety. Forget allowing access to bus drivers and conductors to childrens washrooms, it even prohibits their entry in the school premises or loitering near the toilet and entrusts the job of ensuring this through various measures, including CCTVs , to the vigilance officer of the school. I wonder if the school even had a vigilance officer?

The school ignored guidelines on checking the antecedents of employees when it hired the conductor. And how did he bring the weapon into the school bathroom? The conduct of the school vis-a-vis pupil safety should be probed thoroughly and stringent action taken for violations. So long as this is not done, schools will continue to ignore child safety. The school in Ghamroj that sacked this conductor for his sexually predatory behaviour, but failed to report it to the police as required under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, should also be prosecuted.

Following the rape of a six-year old child in a private school in Bengaluru in 2014, government agencies issued child safety policies and guidelines. But schools continue to flout them. We need to have one common, comprehensive guideline for all schools in the country to follow. There should be stringent punishment , including closure of schools, for violation. It is equally important to empower and educate parents, so that they demand strict compliance . Schools that do not protect the children on their premises (or during travel to and from school) have no right to exist.

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Recently, when an attempt was made to create a controversy over the use of Hindi on a signboard at a station of the Bengaluru Metro, I was reminded of an old Hindi adage: Baasi kadhi mein ubaal (Trying to boil stale curry). Those who wanted to make political capital by stoking the fires of linguistic differences have not succeeded.

Bengaluru is a bustling metropolis. A large mass of people settled in a particular geography assume the character of a city only when there is a common feeling of co-existence. Bengaluru has always followed this principle. Even this time round, the citizens of Bengaluru have scored cent per cent as far as mutual respect for fellow citizens was concerned. The selfish tactics of politicians can affect society only when society allows itself to be influenced.

On September 14 India is preparing to celebrate Hindi Diwas. Although it is true that Hindi has the status of being Indias official language and is the common heritage of a large geography of the country, but each and every citizen of the nation is still not at ease understanding or speaking the language. Some people may term it as a failure of our national character, but by habit, if you indulge me, I would like to discuss a few positive points. The issue is not just about Hindi, but the development of all Indian languages and discovering common linkages between them.

A few years ago, my wife and I were in southern India for the winter vacation. We were headed for a picturesque village near the seashore located next to our resort in Puducherry. A girl clad in local attire came towards us and began asking my wife something in Tamil. There was a language barrier between them but if a person makes an honest effort, every hurdle can be overcome. Initially she could catch just one word: Punjabi. We didnt take long to realise that just like everybody in the north calls everybody in the south a Madrasi, similarly people in the south consider all north Indians as Punjabis. Using a mix of some Hindi, a little English and gestures, my wife conveyed to her that we had arrived from Delhi. I left them trying to strike a dialogue and moved ahead.

Later my wife told me that a group of women had joined the conversation. Despite the language barrier, they told her names of bird species and local trees. They also told her Tamil names for the articles of clothing that they were wearing. As a reciprocal gesture, they sought other information. Along with watching Tamil movies, the women said they liked to watch Hindi films on television. Bollywood movies, songs and dialogues have found a significant audience in the south. They love Hindi movie stars as much as Rajinikanth, Kamal Haasan, Mohan Babu, Rekha, Sridevi and Hema Malini are adored in the north. There was a time when Hindi-speaking people were viewed with suspicion, but those circumstances have now changed.

Another big reason behind this change is the economic liberalisation of 1991 which encouraged the corporatisation of India. The advent of technology led to the emergence of tech hubs such as Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Gurugram. Like large American and European cities, these cities are populated more by talented migrants than the native population. The task of national integration, which social reformers such as Shankaracharya carried out through religion, has been completed by economic liberalisation. Today a young person belonging to any region or speaking any language has little difficulty migrating to these cities to earn a living. Every migrant brings with him some basic elements of his culture and sows its seeds there.

If youve noticed, of late, Hindi has incorporated words from other languages. The case is similar with other Indian languages. Now we just need to catalyse the process because language has the potential to overcome all obstacles created by linguistic divisions. The long conversation between my wife and the women from rural Puducherry is an example of this.

What is perceptible here is that in recent years, technology has opened the doors to many new possibilities. Two years ago Google India said that the consumption of Hindi content was growing at the rate of 94% every year. Compared to this, the rate of growth for consumption of English content was just 19%. A Microsoft survey says those searching for information in local languages on the Internet are growing rapidly. The rise of local tongues on the Internet will clear the misconceptions that are proving to become obstacles in the course of finding common linkages between Indian languages.

Isnt this a sign of a positive change?

Shashi Shekhar is editor in chief, Hindustan

letters@hindustantimes.com
Dehradun: The snowballing clashes between the BJP workers and their own MLAs and leaders, tainting the reputation of the state organisation, will be taken up by the legislators with party president Amit Shah during his state visit on September 19.

According to sources, a section of the party MLAs has blamed the state leadership for its inability to rein in the unruly behaviour of the party workers who misbehaved with the legislators and want to raise the issue with the party president.

The MLAs are also unhappy with the recent attacks and vandalising the residence of Haridwar rural MLA Yatishwaranand by local ABVP workers on Saturday. A similar incident had taken place at Premnagar ashram of state Cabinet minister Satpal Maharaj in Haridwar when supporters of mayor Manoj Garg led by him clashed with ashram workers that went out of the hands of state BJP president Ajay Bhatt and landed up in the court of Shah.

Yatishwaranand issue is an indication that some elements in the party are having free run in the organisation. No matter what, ABVP workers vandalism at party MLAs residence cannot be tolerated. State leadership will have to nip the bud before its turns into a rot. Central leadership will be appraised about the existing situation and we will demand stringent action against such unruly behaviour, said a BJP MLA from Haridwar Lok Sabha constituency, who did not want to be named.

On the other hand, Yatishwaranand himself stated that the ABVP workers attack against him was a planned move by some people within the organisation. Attack on me was a pre-planned move by some people. We have put forth our problem before the party president but nothing has happened so far. The matter will be taken to the higher levels if needed, said Yatishwarnand.

Apart from Yatishwaranand and Satpal Maharaj ashram episodes, a block president from Haridwar was also beaten up recently by the partys own workers after an organisational meeting. The victim was picked by some BJP workers and taken away to an isolated place where he was thrashed by them. No action was taken against them despite the fact that the state BJP chief is well aware of the incident, said the MLA.

BJP spokesperson Virendra Singh Bisht said, Misbehaviour with party MLA Yateeshwaranand has to be condemned and action will be taken against those responsible for it.
The Delhi government has ordered a magisterial inquiry into the alleged sexual assault of a five-year-old girl in a Shahdara school, chief minister Arvind Kejriwal said on Sunday.

He also said that a protocol would be chalked out for all city schools to ensure the safety of students.

The five-year-old was allegedly raped by a peon on the premises of the private school in Shahdara on Saturday. The accused, Vikas Kumar, was arrested later at night.

The incident comes close on the heels of the gruesome killing of a eight-year-old boy who had his throat slit for allegedly resisting sexual assault by a bus conductor of a Gurgaon school -- an incident which sent shock waves across the country.

Kejriwal said such incidents wont be tolerated. Shameful. Wont be tolerated. Police doing its job. Ordered magsterial enquiry. Will develop protocol 4 all schools 2 ensure children safety (sic), he tweeted.

Delhi revenue minister Kailash Gahlot also tweeted about the incident and said that the inquiry report will be submitted in three days.

The arrested man, Vikas, had been working in the school for the last three years. Previously, he worked as a security guard there.

He allegedly took the girl inside an empty classroom around noon on Saturday when he was walking in the corridors after handing over lunch boxes to teachers.

The girl later complained of bleeding and pain in her private parts to her mother. She was taken to a hospital where a medical examination confirmed sexual assault.

Meanwhile speaking to ANI, victims mother said that no investigation to this matter has taken place as yet.

No investigation has been taking place. Today it happened with my daughter, tomorrow it could happen with anyone, she added.
Whats the most effective weapon to use in emergency? For regular people, especially women, who want to protect themselves from mugging  or worse  the answer that springs to mind is pepper spray. Surprisingly, if you were to ask Delhi Police commandos, the answer would be the same.

The humble pepper spray is part of the security equipment and gadgets used by Delhi Police commandos whore part of the Parakram vans. Each Delhi Police Parakram van has a five-member team: the driver; three commandos, of them two men and one woman; and an in-charge.

Commandos of Delhi Police Parakaram vans use pepper spray as it doesnt violate human rights. (Shivam Saxena/ HT Photo )

The security kit of these commandos has around 10 weapons/gadgets, including a knife, a baton, and stun gun. But the pepper spray is the most effective tool to combat any enemy, says Awatar Singh, inspector in-charge of south zone Parakram vans. With just one spray, the opponent feels very uncomfortable  the inflammation can even make a person fall unconscious for almost 30-35 minutes. The pepper sprays biggest advantage is that it doesnt lead to any human rights violations.

This baton, part of the commandos security kit, weighs less than 650gm and is expandable. The glasses are photochromatic and can resist even 12-gauge shotgun shells. (Shivam Saxena/ HT Photo )

Other gadgets used by Delhi Police commandos: Camera mounted on the body: It has a single start button, along with 150 degree rotation to capture a full round scene. Baton: Threefold stick that can be retracted by a button. Goggles: Each pair can resist even a 12-gauge shotgun shell and is photochromatic. Knife: Pocket-sized, with a 4- to 5-inch blade.

Kikim Singson, who has recently joined Delhi Police as a commando, says, Using a pepper spray is advantageous because its very light in weight, and so easy to carry. We can just keep it in our pockets. Its effective range is up to 20 feet, and we can use it without thinking twice.

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For at least two hours on Saturday, the five-year-old girl  who had been raped allegedly by a peon at her Gandhi Nagar school  refused to answer questions about the sexual assault. But once doctors and nurses at a government hospital used their years of experience and counselled her, the girl spilled out all the necessary details to nail her rapist.

By the time the girl was done describing her alleged rapist, Vikas Jaiswal, all that the police were left to do was to get his address from school authorities and nab him.

The girl almost accurately described Vikas height, his weight, his baldness and the fact that he often wore a cap, said a senior police officer. She told police that Vikas worked at the other building of the school  located across the street from where the girl studied  but would often visit her school building and occasionally her classroom.

The police then asked the school authorities about any staff who matched the descriptions provided by the girl. Since we had collected Vikas Aadhaar card and address proof, we immediately provided it to the police, the principal of the school said.

A police team then visited Vikas at his home that night, clicked his photograph and sent it to their counterparts who were with the girl. We sent multiple photos of the accused as well as other people. Each time, the girl identified the rapist among other photographs  said a senior investigator.

The victims parents, meanwhile, said they had spent more than what they could afford to get their daughter and son admitted to private schools in the neighbourhood.

I earn Rs 10,000 a month after overtime. Of that, I pay Rs 1,100 per month as fee for my daughter, said the girls father. We chose this school for my daughter as the school had a good reputation in our locality, he added.

He added that he will now pull his daughter out of the school and admit her somewhere else.

The parents of some other children too said that they were planning to do the same.

A school is a childs second home. They should feel safe there. But my daughter was raped in side her school, her mother said.

The woman said her daughter, after being assaulted, attended one more class before returning home.
NOTA (None of the above) got more votes than the National Students Union of India in the JNUSU polls. Though the Congress-backed student outfit was never a major player in JNU politics, its presidential candidate  Vrishinika got only 82 votes of the total 4,369 polled.

Compared to 728 votes, that the four candidates of NSUI bagged, NOTA was chosen by 1,512  more than double the number of students.

Candidate-wise, NSUIs presidential candidate got 82 while there were 127 NOTA. For the post of vice-president, Francis Lalremsiama got 201 compared to 495 NOTA. For general secretary, Preeti Dhruve got 223 votes while 389 students opted for NOTA and joint secretary aspirant Alimuddin got just 222 votes against NOTA tally of 501.

Just short of admitting a humiliating defeat, party insiders say JNU has been a Left bastion and the NSUI was concentrating its energies on DU students union polls, where it is a major player.

However, some feel that the national vs anti-national debate that erupted after the arrest of student leader Kanhaiya Kumar polarised the campus between Left and ABVP, and the NSUI failed to present an alternative narrative.

Ruchi Gupta, the national in-charge of NSUI, said, Though JNU has always been a Left stronghold, we could have fared better. Elections in JNU are just decided by local issues but whats happening in the country. After the Kanhaiya Kumar episode and Ramjas controversy , there has been polarisation and the anti-ABVP space was completely acquired by the united Left, she said.

The NSUI needs to be more active throughout the year and strengthen its presence in the governing of university matters to emerge as a credible alternative, she said.

Other NSUI leaders and party functionaries also said that the vote share could have been better and they were expecting that the outfit will score at least better than NOTA.

NSUI national president Fairoz Khan said, We should have worked harder by taking up the issues of the students such as water, hostel facilities, better modes of transport, etc. We certainly couldnt convince students that we are a strong alternative.

The Congress, however, said that the JNU result will have no bearing on the upcoming Delhi University elections.

Senior Delhi Congress leader Sharmistha Mukherjee said,  In 2015, AAP won 67 of the 70 seats in Delhi assembly but its students body ranked fourth in DUSU elections, so we should not assume that NSUIs non-performance in JNU will make a difference elsewhere.

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A group of farmers from Tamil Nadu, who have been protesting at Jantar Mantar for almost two months, have made a desperate attempt to draw attention of the authorities by allegedly eating their own excreta in protest.

Ten of their men, including their leader P Ayyakannu, took the drastic step on Sunday. I feel like throwing up when I even think about it, said Palanichamy, who was one of the 10 who allegedly ate their own excreta.

We collected the excreta in the morning (in plastic bags) and then ate it... By not giving us revised drought packages, compensation for crops ruined by the bad weather conditions and refusing loan waivers, the central government has forced us into a position of having to eat our own waste, said Ayyakannu, president of the national south Indian rivers linking farmers association.

The farmers said they would eat human flesh on Monday to add steam to their protest.

We had been here for 41 days earlier, and now by Tuesday it will be the 59th day since we came back. So altogether, Tuesday will mark the hundredth day of our protest, and we plan to march in the nude to the PMs office then, said Ayyakannu.

The group of farmers from Tamil Nadu had grabbed headlines earlier this year, for their unique methods of protests, including biting mice and snake bits, holding mock funerals and threatening to drink their own urine.



The farmers are demanding loan waivers, revised drought packages, a Cauvery Management Committee, and fair prices for their products, among other things.

The farmers had earlier this year been at Jantar Mantar for over 40 days and returned in July with 17 skulls and 17 pairs of femur bones allegedly of farmers who had committed suicide in the face of drought and debt.

The farmers resumed their protest after the Supreme Court stayed the Madras High Court order directing the state government to waive all agricultural loans, irrespective of how much land the farmer owned. The state government had moved the apex court, asking it to restrict the loan waivers to small or marginal farmers who owned less than five acres of land.

The Tamil Nadu government declared a drought in the state after the India Meteorological Department (IMD) stated that the northeast monsoon in 2016 was the worst in 140 years. Farmers allege that their crops were ruined in the drought and the subsequent Cyclone Vardah, and are still reeling under its adverse effects.

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A recent study has linked respiratory tract infections in young children to an increased risk of asthma and worse lung function in later life.

The research of 154,492 European children, which will be presented at the European Respiratory Society International Congress, found that those who had had upper respiratory infections, such as colds, sinusitis, laryngitis, tonsillitis, pharyngitis and otitis, by the age of five years had a 1.5-fold increased risk of developing asthma in later life.

Children who had suffered from lower respiratory tract infections, such as bronchitis, bronchiolitis, pneumonia and general chest infections, had a two- to four-fold increased risk of developing asthma in later life and were also more likely to have worse lung function.

Dr Evelien van Meel (MD), from the Erasmus MC University Medical Centre, The Netherlands, said, These findings support the hypothesis that early-life respiratory tract infections may influence the development of respiratory illnesses in the longer term. In particular, lower respiratory tract infections in early life seem to have the greatest adverse effect on lung function and the risk of asthma.

However, at this stage we cannot say for certain whether the relationship is causal. Further studies that measure lung function and wheezing from birth onwards are needed to explore whether the infections cause asthma and lower lung function, or whether wheezing and lower lung function may be predisposing these children to develop the infections. Studies that aim to prevent or treat respiratory tract infections at an early stage, perhaps by vaccination, would also help to shed light on this.

The researchers analysed data from 37 groups of children from several European countries, who were born between 1989 and 2013. Children were included in this meta-analysis if data were available on respiratory tract infections in early life (from age six months up to five years old), and childhood lung function and/or asthma. The length of follow-up varied between groups, but ranged from birth until the age of four to 15 years.

The researchers are planning further research. Specifically, we want to study the roles played by antibiotics, paracetamol and exposure to second-hand smoke in the relationships between respiratory tract infections and lung function or asthma. Also, we would like to study what percentage of the association between respiratory tract infections and asthma can be explained by changes in lung function, and whether the associations change when we take early-life wheezing into account, she said.
A three-member committee formed to probe the circumstances leading to the murder of an eight-year-old student at Ryan International School, Bhondsi, has found loopholes in the schools security system.

The committee noted that there are no separate toilets for about 40 adult school bus drivers and conductors and the facility is shared with students. The windows of the toilets are broken and no guards are deployed there.

Gurgaon deputy commissioner Vinay Pratap Singh had constituted the committee on Friday after the boy was found murdered in a school toilet in the morning.

A 42-year-old bus conductor Ashok Kumar was arrested for the crime. Kumar was in the toilet when the victim walked in. Kumar tried to sodomise the kid and killed him when he put up a resistance.

The committee comprised the district education officer, block education officer, and an official of the district Sarv Shiksha Abhiyan. The committee members refused to share details of the findings.

Haryana education minister Ram Bilas Sharma, however, said the committee had found a lot of loopholes in the safety measures at the school.

The committee found that the toilets were shared by students and the bus staff, there is no security for students inside toilets, the school boundary is porous, no checking system on entry and the reach of CCTV cameras is not comprehensive, said Sharma on Sunday.

Sharma, who visited Gurgaon on Sunday, said he received inputs from the officials and a detailed report would be submitted by Monday.

Action is being initiated against the school under section 75 of the Juvenile Justice Act. More sections may be added after the report is received. The name of the school owner and management officials may be added, he said. Sharma said the school did not check the background of the accused and it was a serious matter.

The minister said the revoking the NoC of the school was not an option as the future of about 1,200 students was involved. There is no such option so far. About 1,200 students study in the school. We will ask the school to strengthen safety measures, he said.

The state education department on Monday will release strict guidelines regarding security and safety of students in private schools . Sharma said the safety of the students would be responsibility of the schools from time of picking up and dropping them at home.

Sharma said the government was open to an inquiry into the murder by higher agencies if the family was not satisfied with the probe of the local police.

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More than 200 people came together under the Not In My Name campaign to spread the message of non-violence. Under the banner of Nafrat ke Khilaf, a stand against hatred, residents on Sunday gathered at the city at Leisure Valley Park in Sector 29 to express the need to unite and put an end to hate crimes.

This campaign was initiated to protest against alleged mob lynchings and incidents of violence across the country recently.

It was a unique concept as residents were seen registering their protest against the alleged hate crimes through art, song, music, theatre and poetry.

We are here to say that we do not support any violence and value all religions and cultures, Dr Parul Sharma, a resident who participated in the event, said.

We are a peace loving nation and we have the right to freedom of expression, he said.

Another resident, Anushree Misha, The environment is fearful as it is continuously spreading fear among people and we need to break free. Society should not be governed by caste and religion of individuals.

The participants said that the movement aims to connect people and bring them together to oppose communalism and stand together in support of each other.

We are out to express that we all are different and still we co-exist. We condemn violence in any form and want to spread the message of peace and love, said Dr Samman Adil, a participant.

On June 28, thousands of people had gathered outside Delhis Jantar Mantar to protest against the spread of hate and rise in incidents that claimed innocent lives and threatened to split people on communal lines.

Navtej Johar, a dancer who performed at the venue, said, We are here as we support the cause and we do not judge any individual. People should be able to lead a peaceful and respectful life.

Read I Gurgaon: Congress rally to protest rising crime hit by pickpockets

The protest has grown and spread to 32 cities and towns across the country. Residents from all sections of the society came to register their protest against such attacks.

The campaign speaks for citizens of India irrespective of religion, caste, gender or sexual orientation.

Among the artistes who performed at the Leisure Valley ground during the protest are Rabbi Shergill, Rashmi Agarwal, Madan Gopal Singh, Trippy Sama (music band), Navtej Johar (dancer) and Fouzia.
Schools across Gurgaon are advising parents not to let their children watch news channels as reports of the brutal murder are affecting innocent minds.

Parents of Ryan International School, Bhondsi, where an eight-year-old was murdered on Friday, are also wary of sending their wards and asked the school to announce leave till the matter is settled.

All branches of Ryan International School in Gurgaon declared a holiday on Monday and apparently sent a message to the parents. The group has three schools in Gurgaon.

The advisories were sent after parents complained that their children were questioning parents about the murder and discussing it at home and with their friends.

Parents of the Bhondsi branch said they did not receive any correspondence from the school management but they will not send wards till security and safety measures are strengthened.

Schools across the city are assuring parents that their premises are secure and safe. Salwan Public School, Sector 15 Part-2, requested parents to check updates on their mobile phones instead of televisions.

The news of the murder will affect innocent minds negatively and they may come to school frightened. I have been getting a lot of emails related to safety and security of kids on the school campus. The email is to reassure parents that all the security systems, which include CCTVs, are in place and are being reviewed again thoroughly, said Rashmi Malik, Principal of Salwan Public School in an email sent to parents on Saturday.

Emails sent by different schools said that the last few days have been harrowing for the education fraternity.

We conduct regular awareness sessions on Good Touch, Bad Touch. Simultaneously, we encourage a system where in the communication channels are vibrant and every suspicious/abnormal behaviour of a student is communicated to the respective teachers and the counsellors. For the safety of the students and staff, a CCTV system is in place at all vantage points and is regularly monitored by competent personnel, said Sudha Goyal, School director, Scottish high International School, Sector 57.

Parents are seeking mass support from the public to create pressure on the administration to enforce safety and security guidelines.

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Haryana education minister Ram Bilas Sharma on Sunday said that a three-member committee formed to probe whether any negligence or security lapses could have led to the murder of an eight-year-old student at Ryan International School, Bhondsi has found several loopholes in the schools security protocol.

Gurgaon deputy commissioner Vinay Pratap Singh had constituted the committee on Friday after the victim as found seriously injured a school toilet in the morning. He died shortly afterwards. A 42-year-old bus conductor Ashok Kumar was arrested for the crime. He was allegedly in the toilet when the victim went there and was killed.

Although the committee comprising the district education officer, block education officer, and an official of district Sarv Shiksha Abhiyan did not divulge details of its findings, the education minister said the panel found many loopholes in the schools safety measures.

The committee has found that toilets were shared by students and 40 bus drivers and conductors, no security for students near toilets, porous school boundary, no checking system on entry while the coverage of CCTV cameras is not comprehensive, Sharma said during his visit to Gurgaon on Sunday.

He said he had received inputs from the officials and a detailed report would be submitted by Monday.

Action against school is being initiated under section 75 of the Juvenile Justice Act. More sections may be added after the report is received. Name of school owner and management officials may be added, he said. Sharma said it was a serious matter that the school did not check background of the accused.

But he ruled out derecognising the school.

There is no such option so far. About 1200 students study in the school. We will ask the school to strengthen safety measures, he said.

The state education department on Monday will release strict guidelines for private schools regarding security and safety of students. Sharma said safety of the students would be responsibility of the schools from time of picking them up to dropping them home.

While the victims father has demanded a CBI probe, Sharma said the government was open for inquiry into the murder by a higher agency, if the family was not satisfied with probe by the local police.

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The Ryan International School management was charged on Sunday with cruelty to a child after the murder of an eight-year-old student, but the move didnt pacify angry parents demanding a CBI investigation.

Hundreds of parents tried to enter the private school in Bhondsi, near Gurgaon, prompting police to lathi-charge to disperse the crowd.

About a dozen people were detained for arson and rioting and many more wounded in the police action. Cameras of some photojournalists were also damaged in the clashes.

The parents want the school shut until a CBI inquiry is ordered and stricter legal provisions are slapped against the management for the murder of a Class 2 boy on Friday.

Ashok Kumar, a 42-year-old bus conductor, was arrested after publicly confessing to slitting the throat of the student who he tried to sexually abuse inside the toilet at Ryan International.

He worked for a security agency contracted by the school.

The demonstrators torched a liquor shop about 50 metres from the school and threw bottles into the school campus, police said.

The people alleged bus drivers and conductors often bought alcohol from the shop and got drunk.

Police also lathi-charged villagers at Ghamroj when they tried to block a highway demanding security to the suspected murderers family, saying he was framed.

Haryana education minister Ram Bilas Sharma ruled out closing the school as the future of 1,200 students is at stake, but promised zero leniency against the management for inadequate security measures on the campus.

There is no boundary wall of the school. No separate toilets for drivers and conductors of 40 buses of the school, and windows in the toilet meant for students were found broken, he said.

Besides, the school didnt check the background of the bus conductor.

The suspect was sacked by a private school in Ghamroj, his native village near Gurgaon, eight months ago for his sexually predatory behaviour, police investigations revealed on Saturday.

The education minister said the school is charged under Section 75 of the juvenile justice act, a provision in the law that deals with cruelty against children.

The name of the school owner and management officials may be added.

A firefighter tries to control a blaze at a liquor shop set afire by protesters on Sunday. (PTI)

Sharma promised to get the charge-sheet ready in a week and financial help to the murdered boys parents, if they seek.

If the childs parents are not satisfied we can get the case investigated by any agency, including the CBI, he said.

Police too said additional charges will be added in the FIR after a three-member committee formed by the district administration submits its report on Monday.

The boys father demanded a CBI inquiry and said police should charge the school management with death due to negligence under Section 304 of the Indian Penal Code.

The police probe is fine but what is wrong in holding a parallel CBI inquiry to find out the truth as something is missing in the case. Action should be taken against school, he said.

A relative later told ANI that the family will approach the Supreme Court on Monday.

The protests and lathi-charge took a political colour as opposition parties accused the government of using excessive force against the people.

The crowd apparently went out of control after police stopped Bihar parliamentarian Rajesh Ranjan, aka Pappu Yadav, from addressing the gathering outside the school.

Former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda visited the boys family and said: In democracy, governments dont work with lathis and bullets.

Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said the assault on protesters and reporters point to failure of the Manohar Lal Khattar government in the state.

Police resort to lathicharge as people protest near Ryan International School.

Police commissioner Sandeep Khirwar denied charges of mediapersons being targeted by the cops.

A fair warning was given to clear the place and nobody was targeted. However, if any mediaperson was injured, then I express my regret, he said.

The school management requested for restraint in a statement.

As the investigations are on, we request all parties concerned to refrain from holding Ryan school culpable of a crime where it is itself a victim of unfortunate circumstances  We should not unjustly be blamed or branded as the perpetrators.

According to the education minister, managements of all private schools in the state would be made responsible and accountable for taking the students from home to school and back home.

Guidelines would be issued to all schools on Monday, he told reporters.

Union women and child development minister Maneka Gandhi suggested that drivers, conductors and non-teaching staff in schools should be women to prevent sexual assaults on children.

Such a clause is present in the draft of the national womens policy, which was approved by a group of ministers in July and awaiting the cabinets authorisation, she said.

(with agency inputs)
Hundreds of people on Sunday staged a demonstration outside the Ryan International School in Gurgaon demanding a CBI probe into the murder of an eight-year-old school boy and set afire a liquor shop near the school.

Police used lathicharge to quell the protest and detained 20 protesters. Cameras of some photojournalists were also damaged during the protest.

Fridays murder of the second standard student of Ryan International School in Gurgaon has left parents shocked and angry over the security on campus.

The boy was found in a pool of blood in a toilet with injuries on his neck. Police said a bus conductor confessed to the crime after attempting to sexually assault the boy. He was arrested on Friday evening. The principal of the school was suspended on Saturday.

Here are the highlights:

5:20pm: Gurgaon Police have added a Section 75 of the JJ Act in the murder FIR against the Ryan International School management. Police claim more sections will be added upon receiving a report from three-member committee on Monday.

4:30pm: Parents have decided that they will not send their children to the school on Monday. They have also called for a mass protest outside the school on Monday morning.

3:40pm: It is subject of investigation, police is probing the incident, says Gurgaon deputy commissioner VP Singh on Haryana Police targeting the media.

3:30pm: Laws must be made to protect journalists, government must help them. I appeal to all states to make such laws.Will talk to chief minister Khattar, says Union minister R Athawale.

3:20pm: I demand an apology from chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar and action against police officials responsible for the attack on journalists, says Congress leader R Surjewala.

2:45pm: A candle light march has been planned from Sohna Chowk in Gurgaon from 4pm. Students parents from all the branches of Ryan International School have been asked to support the march.

2:43pm: I condemn the police attack on media. Haryana police are gaining notoriety of attacking the media, it happened even during the Dera agitation, says Communist Party of India leader D Raja.

2:42pm: School authorities, represented by acting principal Neerja Batra, assure that security measures will be reviewed immediately and all necessary improvements would be made: ANI

2:40pm: We accept negligence on part of the Ryan International School but the school cannot be derecognised as the future of 1200 students is at stake, says education minister.

2:35pm: Media is one of the pillars of democracy and raises concerns of the people, it should not be suppressed like this. The attack is an attempt by the state government to hide its own failures, says Hooda.

2:31pm:

Attack on media is condemnable. In a democracy, govts don't work with lathis &bullets: BS Hooda on Haryana Police targeting media #Gurugram pic.twitter.com/LBKYslTG6i  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

2:29pm: Hooda calls for CBI probe, condemns lathicharge on journalists.

2:25pm: If parents of the killed student are not satisfied with the investigation, the state will be ready to conduct an investigation through any agency, including the CBI, says Haryana education minister.

2:20pm: Haryana education minister Rambilas Sharma says it was the responsibility of the school management to keep students safe inside the school premises, but they failed to do so.

2:15pm: Victims father meets former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda.

2:13pm: The police are doing their job. We request a parallel CBI inquiry so that every detail related to the case is revealed, says the boys father, Varun Thakur.

2:10pm: Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan on Twitter condemns the murder of eight-year-old student.

Very disturbed at #RyanInternationalSchool incident. My deepest condolences to the bereaved parents and family of the deceased child.  ShivrajSingh Chouhan (@ChouhanShivraj) September 10, 2017

2:07pm: Father alleges that the murder was planned as his son was killed within a span of 10 minutes, calls for a detailed investigation claiming that the current probe has too many loop holes.

2:06pm: Want to request all parents who are supporting us that please do not get involved in violence, says Varun Thakur, father of the victim.

2:04pm: Former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda arrives at the victims familys residence. Father of the deceased boy starts press conference at his house.

2:03pm: Parents demanding that the school should be shut until a CBI probe is ordered into the incident.

2:00pm: The Gurgaon police had to use mild lathicharge to disperse the agitators. The police detained over 20 protesters found agitating outside the school, Ravinder Kumar PRO Gurgaon Police said.

1:58pm: Some of the demonstrators threw liquor bottles inside school premises to vent their ire against the school management, police said. The protestors allege school drivers and conductors often consumed alcohol from the nearby liquor shop in their free time.

1:55pm:

1:50pm: Local residents allege that the police officials beat them inside their houses.

1:30pm: A large contingent of police deployed at Ryan International School.

12:30pm: Under Section 75 of the Juvenile Act, action will be taken against the school management, Haryana education minister tells ANI. The accused will be presented before the court within a week, he adds.

12: 25pm: Action has been taken against management and owner of Ryan International School AF Pinto, Haryana education minister Ram Bilas Sharma tells ANI.

12:20pm: Around 10 reporters and photographers of various media organisations injured in the lathicharge. Two of them have been sent to a hospital.

12:15pm: Gurgaon police lathicharge the protesting parents outside the school campus.

12:10pm: Excise authorities say the liquor vend was located beyond 150 metres from the campus.

#WATCH Locals protesting over death of 7-year-old Pradyuman set ablaze liquor shop close to #RyanInternationalSchool in #Gurugram pic.twitter.com/2gdlPYncTz  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

12:05pm: Agitated parents set liquor shop on fire claiming it was within 100 metres of the school.

Noon: Parents gather outside Ryan International School to protest against the school management.

(With agency inputs)
The father of the eight-year-old boy who was killed in Ryan International School, Bhondsi on Friday suspects the murder was planned and there is something which the local police are missing and so the case should be investigated by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

Varun Thakur has decided that he will not send his daughter, who studies in Class 5, to the same school as she would not be comfortable to study there and the memories would haunt her.

Thakur told Hindustan Times that he suspects some past connection which led to the murder because there was no reason for the conductor to kill his son. Police needs to check the CCTV footages of past few days also, he said.

I am not unhappy with the police investigation but I want a detailed investigation as there is something which is missing in the probe. There are a lot of loopholes which need to be investigated and CBI can do in-depth investigation which will clear the motive of the murder, said the father, who works as quality control manager in a crafts company in Gurgaon.

Earlier on Sunday, Haryana education minister Ram Bilas Sharma said the government was open for inquiry into the murder by a higher agency, if the family was not satisfied with probe by the local police.

Thakur said he was not convinced with the probe so far which suggests the murder was committed on the spur of the moment. The murder took place within 10 minutes which means the conductor was already prepared to kill my son. As soon as the kid entered the toilet, the accused attacked him, he said.

Read more: Minister says wont derecognise Ryan International School, points to security loopholes after childs murder

If the conductor has no criminal history then how did he plan the murder? What instigated him to kill my son? Why did he take a knife with him only on that day? asked the mourning father.

He said the police have added section 75 of the Juvenile Justice Act against school management but he demanded that the police should also add section 304 (death by negligence) of the IPC.

No one from the school management has met the victims family so far.

The school is not coming forward and accept negligence at their part. They should accept their mistake and speak up. They should own up the blunder and take measures to ensure safety and security of other students. I have lost my son but I do not want the history to repeat, he told HT.

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Actor Kristen Bell came to the rescue of her Frozen co-star Josh Gads family and literally saved them from Hurricane Irma.

Gad, who voices Olaf the snowman, was raised in Hollywood, Florida, which is located near Miami. Hurricane Irma is projected to hit those areas soon.

So @kristenanniebell literally saved my parents and my entire family tonight from #hurricaneirma.

When they were stranded in Florida, she got them a hotel room at her hotel in Orlando and saved them, my brothers, my sister-in-law and niece and nephew, Gad wrote on Instagram, alongside a selfie showing Bell with his parents.

Kristen is in Florida to film her new comedy movie Like Father and has been hunkering down at a Walt Disney World resort. The theme parks are shutting down over the next few days because of Irma.

They dont make them like this girl. Thank you Kristin. You are truly an angel sent from above. And thank you @ewablueeyes for bother her when I asked you not to! Gad added.

Follow @htshowbiz for more
BJP national president Amit Shah on Sunday hit out at Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi for questioning the saffron partys Gujarat development model.

Calling Congress leader a shehzada (prince), Shah said Gandhi should not question the BJP-ruled states development.

The BJP chief was speaking at a youth outreach programme at Pandit Din Dayal Upadhyay auditorium in Ahmedabad.

In an interactive session with party workers last week, Gandhi had taken a dig at the BJPs claim that the western state progressed tremendously under its rule.

The very place where Rahul baba addressed the workers is a testimony of development (witnessed by the state). During the Congress rule, the venue was next to a filthy stream. Today, it is a Sabarmati Riverfront. How can he question development of Gujarat?Shah asked.

At the town hall event titled Adikham Gujarat (Strong Gujarat), the BJP chief answered questions put forward by youths from across the state.

When asked about the Patidar agitation for OBC status, Shah said the issue has now turned into a political campaign.

The matter should have been handled legally and constitutionally. But with elections approaching, you will soon see the agitation tilting towards a particular political party. They (agitators) have been exposed.

Shah was referring to the apparent growing proximity between Patidar leader Hardik Patel and the Congress ahead of the assembly elections to be held in a couple of months time.

On the flogging of Dalits in Una by a group of self-styled cow vigilantes, the newly elected Rajya Sabha MP said, If you refer to the government of India websites, you will see that Gujarat witnesses minimum cases of atrocities. The flogging incident was very unfortunate. The government has taken legal actions and I have full faith that justice will be done.

On a question on demonetisation asked by a student through video-conference, Shah said, Everybody is talking about 99 per cent currency notes coming back to banks. No one wants to know that the RBI never had more than 60 per cent of the total cash in circulation.

Now, accounts will be scrutinized for dubious transactions and most of the amount will be used for Indias development. The number of income tax payers during the Congress rule was 3.6 crore. It has now reached 6.3 crore.

Indirectly referring to popular anti-BJP campaign Vikas (development) has gone crazy, Shah appealed to the youth not to believe in social media campaigns and instead they should refer to the BJP website for official figures. He listed achievements of various sectors including education, GDP, agriculture to compare the performance of BJP and Congress governments.

During the event, the BJP connected youths from various cities. The party claimed to have received some three lakh questions through different online social platforms.

Shah answered 15 questions on the spot and assured to answer the rest on social media.

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Online crooks cloned the credit card of Sanjay Singhal and stole Rs 1.83 lakh in a matter of eight minutes in August, before he could get a grip of the 53 text messages alerting him about the transactions.

Much like the Mumbai-based former revenue officer, businesswoman Bhawana Katri of Gurgaon received five text alerts on her phone purchases worth Rs 40,000 on her credit card on May 29.

I immediately called the bank. But it was late. I lost Rs 40,000 by then, she said.

These thefts are among a spreading web of cyber frauds in the first six months of 2017, raising security fears over the governments push for a digitised cashless economy after it scrapped two high-value banknotes to curb corruption and counterfeiting last November.

Cybercrime has grown to an alarming extent since note ban, said Pawan Duggal, cyber expert and Supreme Court lawyer.

As a country we have failed to address the issue, he added.

More than 27,000 cybercrimes were reported in first half 2017, according to data released by the information and technology ministry. The figure was 50,362 for the entire 2016 .

If the 2017 data were extrapolated for a year, it would be an almost 10% increase in cybercrime, highest in recent years. The average jump in the past three years stands below 1.5%.

After demonetisation, digital transactions went up from Rs 71.27 crore in October 2016 to Rs 123.5 crore in the two subsequent months.

The government too is aware of the growing crime and had issued 21 advisories for securing platforms of digital transactions such as ATM and credit cards and remitting payments by wire transfer.

Junior electronics and IT minister PP Chaudhary informed Parliament during the July-August monsoon session about the spurt in cyber frauds. But he said it was like elsewhere in the world.

Online frauds have grown exponentially across the globe and nondescript places such as the Ramnicu Valcea, dubbed Scamville, have become capitals for cybercriminals. Policing in the hitherto unpoliced internet has increased too, but the scammers are innovating, adapting and getting sneakier.

The fraud transactions on Singhals card were recorded in France, though he was in India at the time.

He said banks should block cards when they notice a flurry of transactions happening in quick succession.

Experts called for stringent laws. The government proposes an Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre, named I4C.

Almost all financial institutions, banks and online transactions are vulnerable to cybercrime. Digital wallets such as Paytm and BHIM, which gained prominence after demonetisation, were found unsafe during research, an IIT Kanpur research says.

The fraudsters deploy various techniques and the most common is to lure gullible people into divulging personal details for online transactions. They raise false alarms about freezing bank accounts, or promise attractive earnings.

The majority of the frauds is related to phishing, wherein the caller or mailer purporting to be from a bank or a finance company seeks personal details and takes out money from the customers account with the data.

Pune and Noida reported more cyber frauds till July 2017 than the entire 2016. Complaints are high in Gurgaon and Mumbai too. These cities, packed with big private companies, are clear targets because people there make more card payments than, say, a mofussil town in Jharkhand.

But small towns are becoming Indias equivalent of Ramnicu Valcea. Young men, mostly semi-literate, are using the internet to get rich and out of the drudgery.

Places like Tikamgarh in Madhya Pradesh, Jamtara in Jharkhand and Katrisarai in Bihar have been identified as cybercrime hotspots. Conmen in Jharkhand floated a website promising quick returns and cheated people in Bengaluru.

Tikamgarh is the latest from where hundreds of fraud phone calls are coming, said Ashish Khare, additional inspector general with Madhya Pradeshs special investigation team.

(With inputs from Sohil Sehran in Noida, Abhishek Behl in Gurgaon, Punya Priya Mitra in Bhopal, Vikram Gopal in Bangaluru, Haider Naqvi in Kanpur, Avinash Kumar in Patna, Shalaka Shivaji Shinde in Pune, Presley Thomas in Mumbai and Saurav Roy in Ranchi)

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Twenty four hours into Bihars worst flood in a decade, the residences of the collector and superintendent of police were under eight feet of water. The district administration collapsed, electricity and cellphone networks were knocked out, vital road links snapped and communication with the flood control centre in Patna were severed.

People were stranded and starving, said Shiv Narain of the Jan Jagaran Shakti Sangathan. The administration did not have enough boats, private boatmen were charging to transport people and their possessions. When the waters finally receded, villagers like Bikram Singh made flimsy rafts to fish out the bloated corpses of beloved friends and family members who had drowned in the swirling waters.

I pulled out 18 bodies myself, said Singh, a resident of Jogbani, a settlement that bore the brunt of the flood. I couldnt bear to touch food with my hands for a week. Two of these bodies were Nemua Yadav, and his 13 year-old daughter Pooja.

The administration couldnt help me, said Ranju Devi, Yadavs elder daughter who survived. In such a big country, they couldnt find a boat? What kind of government is this?

Floods have claimed 6,028 lives in Bihar since 2000 - not a year has passed without casualties in some part of the state. Now, scientists say climate change is making monsoons more intense and floods harder to predict; which means state governments like Bihars are struggling to recalibrate their disaster management plans. As this largely rural state urbanises, state officials say they are revisiting major construction projects, city plans and road works to in light of their possible effect on floods. The administration had boats, just not in Jogbani.

On the morning of August 11, Araria was preparing to deal with a possible drought with a rainfall 39% below normal, said Principal Secretary Pratyaya Amrit, who oversaw flood mitigation and relief efforts, Twenty four hours later we were hit by the worst flood in a decade.

Ninety five of the 514 people who died in the 2017 floods, the worst in a decade, were from Araria. Amrit admits that the intensity of the flood in Araria caught the government unawares, but say they worked hard to restore communication and road links, position relief personnel and run community kitchens. Some experts like Dinesh Kumar Mishra, a engineer who has written extensively on the floods, believe that the crisis is partly due to past mitigation efforts - in particular the construction of over 3,000 km worth of flood embankments to contain Bihars rivers.

Bihars rivers, Mishra said, carry large amounts of sediment which is usually spread over a large area when the river floods. When contained between embankments, this sediment is deposited along the river bed.

This raises the level of the river, so you make taller embankments, which are less stable, said Mishra. In 2008 for instance, the Kosi river breached its embankment, triggering a flood that killing 489 people in two adjoining districts of Supaul and Madhepura, and 626 people across the state. This year too, the Gandak river breached its banks in eight places in north-western Bihar, where 138 people died. Its like you have a cat, then you turn it into a tiger, then you dont know how to fight the tiger, Mishra said. As Bihar urbanised, he said it was perhaps to plan cities that anticipated an annual flood, rather than attempted to prevent it. The embankments are not working, so why not draw lessons from East Asian cities where homes and essential services are built on stilts?

Amrit, the Principal Secretary, said the government was looking to make the states infrastructure flood resistant. When the rains stopped, raised highways, railway lines, and village-level check-dams meant the water had nowhere to go. The highways became sites of refuge, but they also exacerbated the flood by turning low-lying areas into vast lakes spanning hundreds of acres.

We have to ensure enough cross-drainage for all raised infrastructure like roads, and railways, Amrit said.

The government has plans to build community centres on stilts in each panchayat to provide a safe refuge in the countryside, with ramps leading up to the roof of the building for villagers to keep their cattle safe.

We are going to provide satellite phones to our collectors, he said, The most important lesson is that in a disaster, we need to maintain all lines of communication.

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A marriage between a Buddhist woman and Muslim man has stoked tensions in Jammu and Kashmirs Ladakh, with the regions apex religious body threatening communal unrest unless the woman is brought back.

The Ladakh Buddhist Association (LBA) has written to chief minister Mehbooba Mufti, asking for an annulment of the marriage between local-born 30-year-old Shifah, formerly called Stanzin Saldon, and her 32-year-old husband Murtaza Aga of Kargil. The woman converted to Islam in 2015. She married Aga, an engineer, last year.

Young girls are being lured by Muslim boys to marry and finally convert them to Muslim... we have repeatedly asked the Muslim community leaders... to sensitise their communities to stay away from such wicked and depraved act which otherwise will lead to communal unrest, and the district administration will be solely responsible, reads the letter, dated September 7.

The letter, signed by LBA president Tsewang Thinles of which HT has a copy, also urged the state government to intervene immediately and make arrangements to bring back the girl before peace, tranquillity and communal harmony takes an ugly turn. Repeated phone calls to Thinles and vice-president PT Kunzang went unanswered.

The controversy comes amid rising tensions between the Muslim-majority Kargil region and the Buddhist-dominated Leh region over the LBAs demand for UT status with legislative power to Ladakh region  an appeal opposed by Muslim leaders from Kargil. Ladakh-based groups say they have been historically discriminated against and received little funds to develop the sparsely populated region.

Shifah herself wrote to Mehbooba on Saturday, dismissing the LBAs claim and alleging that she was being unduly threatened. The statement of LBA is false and concocted, an effort to suppress and threaten the rights of individual I appeal not to let hatred and fear to win over love and compassion. She also said choosing Islam was her spiritual choice that had little to do with her marriage. A copy of this letter is with HT.

Kargil MLA Asgar Ali Karbalai alleged that the LBA was trying to disturb communal harmony. There are no issues as such but they are trying to start one by talking about this boy-girl thing. The woman in this case converted to Islam on her own and out of her own judgement and choice married the man, he said.

In a court affidavit last year in Karnataka, where Shifah was staying then, she declared that on April 22, 2015, she converted to Islam and on April 28, 2016, she changed her name to Shifah from Stanzin. I am affirming my new Islamic faith in healthy and sound mind without any threat, force or compulsion or coercion from any person or person, whatsoever, the affidavit said.

In another affidavit, Shifah said on July 7, 2016, she got married to Syed Murtaza Aga , out of her own free will and consent. She declared that she was not induced or abducted by her husband and was not under wrongful confinement.

When tensions rose, the couple approached the J&K high court and in an order dated July 28, it observed that during the case, the petitioners shall not be harassed.

The issue has garnered attention on social media too. In Ladakh-based Facebook groups, some users have sided with the LBAs objections saying that values to protect our identity and culture should be respected, while many others criticised it, arguing that a woman had every right to marry whosoever or follow whichever religion she wants.

The state womens commission has also written to the government to investigate the matter after reports that Shifah was being hounded.

I, in fact, got in touch with the girl and she told me that she had converted before her marriage out of her own free will. She said she is an adult and educated enough to take decisions for herself, said Nayeema Mehjoor, the commissions chairperson.

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A businessman taking his daughter to dance class was killed while 15 others were injured after a small portion of an under construction flyover bridge collapsed in Bhubaneswar this afternoon.

Businessman Satya Patnaik (40) taking his daughter Sheetal to dance class was killed on the spot as a portion of the under construction flyover collapsed throwing debris all around.

Officials said the centering used to support the concrete slab collapsed while the slab was being laid connecting two of the pillars on Cuttack Road in Bomikhal area of the city. While a dozen workers on the bridge fell down, those under were hurt. The collapsed portion was part of a railway overbridge.

Patnaik, who was crossing the road on a scooter with his daughter riding pillion died on the spot while his 12-year-old daughter Sheetal is being treated at AIIMS Bhubaneswar. The girl is said to be critical.

Bomikhal railway flyover collapse. pic.twitter.com/XaZHYEqILe  Debabrata Mohanty (@debabrata2008) September 10, 2017

Three to four persons are still reported to be trapped under the rubble. Chief minister Naveen Patnaik announced Rs 5 lakh ex-gratia for kin of deceased and free treatment of injured.

The under-construction flyover project was under public works department held by the chief minister himself. The work is was being executed by Panda Infra. Work on the overbridge has been going on at a snails pace. Public Works Department secretary Nalinikant Pradhan said two engineers have already been suspended.

10 fire tenders, three units of ODRAF have launched a massive search and rescue operation at the spot. Senior officials informed that cutters, cranes from Cuttack have also been sought to expedite the ongoing operations.

Bhubaneswar police commissioner YB Khurania said rescue operation are going on at full swing on the spot. The contractors will be arrested soon and held responsible for this criminal negligence.
When the flood waters were waist-high, the Ansari family formed a human chain and waded towards higher ground.

We were just outside our house when we were hit by a huge wave of water, said Mohammed Wajid, My mother, Memonisha, and my sisters  Fareeda and Gulzari  slipped. My brother, Afroz, jumped in after them but they were all washed away.

When the water receded, the four corpses were found caught in a fence less than 100 metres from the home. Memonisha, Fareeda and Gulzari were still holding hands.

In all, 16 people were washed away in six hours on August 12 in this small settlement in Araria district along eastern Bihars border with Nepal. Across the state, the raging waters claimed 514 lives in a flood that has revealed both  the decades-old tragedy of Bihars yearly inundation, and a worrying new trend in which previously safe districts like Araria and Kishenganj have been particularly hard it. Floods have claimed 215 lives in Araria over 18 years, of which 95 were lost in 2017 and 61 in 2016.

Had the flood hit more flood-prone districts, casualties would have been less as people would be ready, said principal secretary Pratyaya Amrit, who oversaw disaster mitigation and relief effort. Here, maximum casualties were in Araria, which did not have a history of floods.

The floods of 2016 and 2017, say villagers, experts and government officers, are evidence that the pattern of Bihars yearly inundation is rapidly changing  disrupting the plans of disaster management experts. In Jogbani, this meant that the waters rose, claimed lives, and receded before a relief effort could even begin. This years flood, the worst in a decade, followed the classic pattern in western Bihar where rain-swollen rivers breached their embankments in at least eight places  resulting in the death of 138 people. But in the east, the inundation was caused by a rain-triggered flash flood, even as the Kosi, a river known as the sorrow of Bihar, stayed on course.

In Araria, the flood began with incessant rain in the early hours of August 12, followed by what residents described as a wall of water from the foothills across the Nepal border. As the rain continued to pelt down, survivors said, rivulets and streams, which had been dry for decades, sprang to life. A meandering local river called the Parman became a torrential stream. The water receded from Jagboni by August 13 and inundated downstream towns of Forbesganj and the Araria district headquarters. In Ghatyari, for instance, the water reclaimed land that was last flooded two generations ago.

Our grandfather told us that this area used to be riverbed, said Amar Kumar, a resident. But this is the first time we are seeing water here.

Climate change has changed rainfall patterns, said Prof Ramakar Jha, a flood expert at the National Institute of Technology in Patna, explaining that the intensity of rains has increased even as the total amount of rainfall has not changed. So a large amount of water falls in a very short time interval, causing flash floods.

Experts point to the need to align flood-forecasting techniques to this new normal. The storm-front was visible on satellite images posted by NASA on August 11, said Himanshu Thakkar, an engineer and coordinator of the South Asia Network of Dams, Rivers and People, who raised the possibility of floods in a Facebook post that morning.

Thakkar tracked the storm from August 11 onwards as the rain-front, which began along Indias north-east corridors, moved steadily westwards along the Ganga Basin through Bengal, Nepal, and northern Bihar towards eastern Uttar Pradesh  which also experienced floods.

We must improve forecasting to minimise damage, Thakkar said.

Amrit said they had received rainfall warnings from the Indian Meteorological Department, but it is hard to pinpoint exactly where the flooding would occur.

We will incorporate this experience into our standard operating protocols, Amrit said. 2008 prepared us for embankment breaches, 2017 will prepare us for flash floods.

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Army chief General Bipin Rawat on Saturday said neither China nor Pakistan is an imminent threat to the country in a departure from his earlier statement wherein he had dubbed the two neighbours Indias northern and western adversaries respectively and that the country needed to be prepared for a two-front war.

None of the country (China or Pakistan) is a threat, he said on the sidelines of an event in Uttarakhands capital Dehradun on Saturday noon in response to a query.

What I had said... said, he went on to add when reminded of his previous remarks made a little over a week after India and China ended one of their worst military face-offs at Doklam at the India-Bhutan-China tri-junction.

China had reacted to Rawats earlier remark, saying ties between the two countries should not be derailed.

Against the backdrop of Doklam standoff, the general said, army was extra vigilant at the borders and the security forces were taking appropriate action in the sensitive areas.

On Kashmir, he said: We too want peace and tranquillity in Kashmir and we are doing everything to secure it.

But at the same breath he added, army was keeping its option open for surgical strikes.

Kashmir has been witnessing violent protests and clashes since the death of Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Wani last year in July.

General Rawat was in Dehradun to attend annual function at Cambrian Hall, his alma mater.

The army chief, who hails from Pauri, studied at Dehraduns Convent of Jesus and Mary (CJM) till Class 2. Thereafter, he studied at Cambrian Hall between 1969 till 1972 and then did his senior schooling at St. Edwards School, Shimla.

I have spent my most memorable days in this school, he said during the event, dressed in a navy-blue blazer with the school monogram engraved.

He also made special mention of his teacher Shanti Swaroop, who was school coordinator at that time.

Gen touched Swaroops feet as a mark of respect and love.

Later talking to reporters, general said the induction of 800 women in the military police, as was planned recently, would be a gradual process as the army would not get so many women immediately.

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Pressing ahead with its campaign against the K Palaniswami government, the DMK-led Opposition on Sunday met Tamil Nadu Governor Vidyasagar Rao and demanded immediate convening of the Assembly and to direct the Chief Minister to prove his majority.

The Opposition parties also told the Governor that if he did not convene the Assembly within a week, they would approach courts and the peoples court, Leader of the Opposition and DMK Working President M.K. Stalin told the media after the meeting.

He said the AIADMK government headed by Palaniswami has lost majority in the Assembly with 119 MLAs ranged against him and only 116 supporting in a House of 233.

The Opposition has, in all, 98 MLAs (DMK 89, its allies Congress eight and Muslim League one) while those owing allegiance to T.T.V. Dinakaran faction of AIADMK are 21.

Stalin recalled that the Opposition has already demanded a floor test for the government and Dinakaran had also met the Governor earlier this week in the company of three more MLAs and conveyed to him that the Chief Minister had lost the confidence of MLAs loyal to him. He had a fortnight ago ferried 19 of his loyalist MLAs to the Governor with the message that they wanted removal of the Chief Minister. One of the 19 MLAs -- S.T.K. Jakkaiyan -- had switched sides to the Chief Ministers camp.

An opposition delegation, led by DMK Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly Duraimurugan had met the Governor a fortnight ago and conveyed to him their demand for convening the Assembly immediately for a floor test.

The DMK leader said it was established by the Supreme Court judgement in the S.R. Bommai and Arunachal Pradesh cases that the Assembly was the place where a majority has to be proved and it was the Governors duty to convene the House for the purpose.

Asked what was the Governors response, Stalin said Rao told the delegation that he would do his duty. I still hope that he will perform his duty and convene the House, he added.

Stalin said if the Governor does not convene the Assembly session within a week, then they were left with no option but to approach the courts and peoples courts.
A doctors and a group of journalists in a tribal-dominated district of Odisha came to the rescue of a pregnant woman who was shunned by her family over superstitious belief that men are not supposed to come near a woman in labour.

The womans husband said he would have liked to help her, but tradition stopped him. My wife would have died had the doctors and journalists not stepped in, he said.

The woman was experiencing labour pain in Rayagada districts Singhamuhi village and was bleeding profusely on Friday night when accredited social health activist (Asha) Geetanjali Pattnaik received information. As there was no road connectivity from the village to the nearest health centre, Patnaik urged the womans family members to carry her on a sling. However, they refused, citing their belief.

As the due date of her delivery was near, I pleaded them to carry her to Kalyansinghpur community health centre. Her family members declined, saying a pregnant womans blood was impure, said Pattnaik.

With the family unmoved, the Asha worker reached out to a doctor and some journalists who lugged the woman on a stretcher through muddy roads and a river for about 4km. From there onwards, the woman was carried in a jeep in which the doctor was travelling.

A local TV reporter was among those who helped.

Laxmi Kanth Sahu, in-charge doctor of Kalyansinghpur CHC, said he was returning from Rayagada when he got to know about the incident. Along with a team of reporters we went to the village. As there was no road we had to carry her through the mud, said Sahu.

The team tried to contact a 108 ambulance, but as there was no mobile network, the service could not be availed.

As the woman was bleeding for long, she was finally referred to the district headquarters hospital. The woman had already lost much blood. We had to administer her two bottles of blood to stabilise her, said Dr SP Padhi, additional district medical officer of Rayagada.
With the southwest monsoon season about to end in less than three weeks time, the governments drought warning system predicts there could be a drought in 225 districts across 17 agriculturally important states of India, putting further strain on distressed agriculture sector.

According to the governments National Agriculture and Drought Assessment System (NADAMS) the affected districts include large agricultural areas in the states of Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Punjab. The three states had announced farm loan waivers just months ago.

These states are already struggling to pay the promised waivers and will find it harder to cope with any more distress in the farm sector, experts said.

Drought conditions also loom over the chronically distress-prone areas of Vidharba, Marathwada, Bundelkhand and Telangana raising the prospect of another miserable year for farmers in these regions.

Farmers protests erupted this year in Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and large parts of northern India despite record food grain production last year.

The number of districts with drought trigger 1 at the end of August was 225. The total amount of rainfall is good but dry spells have gone up sharply, SS Ray, director of the New Delhi-based National Crop Forecast Centre, under the ministry of agriculture which releases the monthly NADAMS report, told HT.

The NADAMS works like an early warning system for drought that alerts the states under which the affected districts lie, a scientist at NCFC explained.

Drought declaration is a three step process. Trigger 1 is the first stage but also the most crucial because it is assessed on the basis of rainfall deviations and dry spell. After this the states launch assessment based on the crop situation and hydrological parameters to declare a drought.

The report for August is expected to be released later this month. The report for July, released in August showed the possibility of drought in 104 districts.

The affected states, according to the data collected by the NCFC, include large parts of east and west UP, Punjab, Madhya Pradesh and Haryana  which are high food production areas. The other affected districts lie in Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Karnataka, Telengana, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal.

Though officials of the ministry of agriculture maintain overall food production may not see a large dip, crop sowing data released on Friday shows a marginal drop of around three per cent in areas under food grains.

Experts also contest the ministrys claim. The government can claim food security wont be hit but farmers will be affected. With India entering into an agreement for pulses with Brazil, imports will take care of food security, but famers welfare will suffer, said agriculture expert Devinder Sharma.

In a state like Punjab, drought-like conditions do not cause decrease in production but the input costs go up and that is not a good sign, Sukhpal Singh, senior economist at the Punjab Agriculture University (PAU) said.

Singh added that the states which have given out farm waivers are already under tremendous financial stress due to heavy costs involved.

Poor rainfall also affects overall yield despite normal sowing and that causes worry among farmers worried.

Good sowing is no measure of yield. If you miss the sowing window, yield drops. In Maharashtra and MP farmers faced a dry spell immediately after they finished sowing, farm activist Ramandeep Mann pointed out.

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Nearly 40,000 people in central Assams Sonitpur district were caught unawares in the early hours of Sunday when flash floods suddenly submerged their homes.

Thousands of people had to flee their homes leaving everything behind due to the sudden rise in the water level of the Jorakhar river. One person was washed away, officials said.

Many parts of Balipara town and nearly three dozen villages in Chariduar were affected and traffic movement on the national highway 15, which was inundated, remained closed for several hours.

The water level in the river, which originates in Arunachal Pradesh, started rising suddenly around 3am. Several areas in Balipara and parts of NH-15 were under waist-deep water, said Surjya Kamal Borah, circle officer of Chariduar.

Since there wasnt heavy rainfall in the area, officials attributed the flash floods to possible landslides or damage to sluice gates in Arunachal Pradesh.

The area had witnessed similar flooding in June following a few hours of heavy rainfall and rise in water levels of the Mansiri and Jorakhar.

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Kerala Hindu Aikyavedi leader K P Sasikala, notorious for her inflammatory speeches, threatened secular writers on Sunday saying the fate of murdered Kannada journalist Gauri Lankesh also awaits them.

Addressing a meeting in North Paravur in Ernakulam district, 250 km north of the state capital, she urged such writers to perform a Mruthunjaya Homam (a ritual to escape from the clutches of death) at Lord Shiva temples if they did not want to meet the fate of Lankesh who was shot dead in Bangaluru last week.

Her speech which was widely shared on social media has riled both the government and the opposition.

Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has condemned the speech and directed the police to take necessary action. The attempt to divide people on the lines of religion and caste will be viewed seriously. It is sad such utterances also reached Kerala, he said.

Opposition leader Ramesh Chennithala urged the government to book her under non-bailable provisions of IPC. Another Congress leader, V D Satheesan lodged complaint with the state police chief asking him to register a case against Sasikala immediately.

Lankeshs murder sparked off nationwide protests by journalists and the public last week.

One more has fallen, this time in Karnataka. All are chanting that if a Keechakan (demon) has died, the killer has to be RSS. There is a tendency to put all blames at the doors of the Sangh. Lankeshs murder is one such, she said while giving a clean chit to the Sangh Parivar.

Nobody can contain the growth of RSS. It did not have to commit such a murder. The Congress government has to be blamed for it. If you want to live longer I urge the so-called secular writers to visit nearest Shiva temples and perform Mruthunjaya Homam soon, she said.

When her speech snowballed into a raging controversy she launched a damage control exercise, saying she only blamed the Karnataka government that failed to provide enough security to Lankesh. In Karnataka, the Congress is on the verge of losing electoral battle. The party wants such killings. So I only said such writers need Mruthunjaya Homam, she said.

She said if the RSS has gone ahead and killed writers antagonising the organisation the country would have been wiped out of writers. RSS never needs such a label. It knows well that it turns stronger when they criticise it, she said.

Notorious for hate speeches Sasikala is facing many such cases. A couple of years back she was stopped from boarding a plane at Thiruvananthapuram airport after the UK denied her visa to visit the country following complaints against her.

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Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Sunday requested his Haryana counterpart Manohar Lal Khattar to take stern action against those involved in the killing of a 7-year-old boy in a Gurugram school.

Kumar called up Khattar and also expressed his grief over the incident.

The Bihar chief minister directed the Resident Commissioner in Delhi to immediately send officials to Gurugram to meet the grieving family to console them, an official release said.

On the CMs directive, Bihar Director General of Police P K Thakur had a telephonic conversation with his Haryana counterpart and requested him to to take strongest possible action against the culprits in the case, it said.

A clss II student of Ryan International School was found murdered with his throat slit inside a toilet of Ryan International School on Friday, triggering public outrage.

A conductor of a school bus was arrested in connection with the murder.
The Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad (ABAP), the apex body of Hindu sadhus, released on Sunday what it said was a list of fake saints even as it demanded a crackdown on rootless cult leaders.

The move by the ABAP, which is an umbrella organisation of 13 recognised akharas, or monastic orders, came against the backdrop of a series of controversies surrounding self-styled godmen, including Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh who has been convicted of rape.

Releasing the list --- which includes Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, Haryana cult leader Rampal, rape accused Asaram and his son Narayan Sai, the groups president, Swami Narendra Giri, said: We appeal to even the common people to beware of such charlatans who belong to no tradition and by their questionable acts, bring disrepute to sadhus and sanyasis.

On ABAP list 1. Asaram Bapu (Asumal Sirumalani) 2. Sukhbinder Kaur (Radhe Maa) 3. Sachchidanand Giri (Sachin Datta) 4. Gurmeet Singh of Dera Sacha Sauda 5. Om Baba (Vivekanand Jha) 6. Nirmal Baba (Nirmaljeet Singh) 7. Ichchadhari Bhimanand (Shivmurti Dwivedi) 8. Swami Asimanand 9. Om Namah Shivay Baba 10. Narayan Sai 11. Rampal 12. Acharya Kushmuni 13. Brahaspati Giri 14. Malkhan Singh

After a brief meeting attended by representatives of various akharas at Math Baghambari Gaddi in Allahabads Allahpur, Giri made the names public and said these self-proclaimed godmen were maligning the image of saints.

We are going to send copies of this list to the Centre, the state governments as well as all the opposition parties with the demand that a strong legislation be brought to check the activities of these self-styled cult leaders, Giri told reporters.

He said the ABAP will release another list of 28 fake godmen after Diwali, and appealed to boycott these so-called spiritual gurus.

A day before the release of the list, Giri had lodged an FIR claiming that he had received death threats from callers, who he said warned him of dire consequences if the group passed any resolution against Asaram.

The development came close on the heels of a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) court in Haryana sentencing the Dera Sacha Sauda chief to 20 years in prison for the rape of two of his former disciples. Large-scale violence took place in various parts of Haryana, Punjab and Rajasthan following his conviction, and 41 people were killed in Haryana in the clashes.

While Asaram is in jail in connection with a sexual assault case, his son Narayan Sai, also booked in a similar case, is out on bail.

Rampal is behind bars, facing trial in a number of cases relating to violence.

(with agency inputs)

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Two militants were killed while another surrendered following an overnight gun battle in south Kashmirs Shopian district, police said on Sunday.

Police identified the two slain militants as Altaf Ahmad Rather and Tariq Ahmad Bhat, while the surrendered one is Adil Hussain Dar.

A police spokesperson said that the killed militants were involved in attack on security forces and bank robbery.

Arms and ammunition was recovered from the encounter site, officials said.

The killing took the toll of conflict related deaths in last two days to four.

On Saturday, a policemen and a militant were killed in separate incidents in Kashmir, even as home minister Rajnath Singh started his four-day visit to the state.

Constable Imtiyaz Ahmed Mir was killed, while another policeman was injured as militants opened fire at a police post in south Kashmirs Anantnag town on Saturday evening, an official said.

Mir is survived by his parents, a sister and two brothers, one of whom is differently-abled, a police spokesperson said.

The attack came just hours after a Hizbul district commander was gunned down in north Kashmirs Sopore in an encounter with security forces on Saturday morning. The militant was identified as Shahid Ahmad Sheikh.

Sheikh, according to police, was the chief coordinator between Jaish-e-Mohammad and Hizbul Mujahideen in north Kashmir.

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About 60 Indian nationals are being evacuated from the vacation island of St Martin in the Caribbean, which has been devastated by Hurricane Irma, an extremely powerful storm that wreaked havoc in the region.

Most of the Indian nationals have a transit visa, a temporary short period visa, to the US.

For those who do not have a transit visa, Indian Embassy is working with the US state department and the department of homeland security for getting them one, so that they can take the first available flight to the US and then travel back home.

The state department on Saturday said it had evacuated some 1,200 US citizens from the Caribbean island St Martin. An estimated 5,000 Americans are still trapped on this small island that is jointly administered by France and the Netherlands.

More than 1,100 police, military officials and others were deployed to St Martin and the nearby French Caribbean territory of St Barts, where they used helicopters to identify the cars of people looting stores and homes.

Deputy Indian ambassador to US Santosh Jha said over the last 48 hours the main preoccupation has been to get in touch with Indians in all parts of southern US and in the islands in the western Atlantic.

And think we should today recognise that they are in the situation of great difficulty, he said.

We had (hurricane) Harvey just the previous month in Houston and today we are trying to cope up with the Hurricane Irma in Florida. The entire embassy since this morning has been working on that, Jha added.

India, he said, over the last few years, has mounted to evacuate Indians and people of Indian-origin from various parts of the world - Iraq, Libya, Yemen and Syria.
The authorities ordered an inquiry into the alleged negligence of the medical staff after a new-born child reportedly died after falling off a bench on which he was delivered outside the labour room of a government-run hospital in Telangana.

Hospital authorities, however, gave a different version of the incident. They said the baby was stillborn.

The incident happened at the states Khammam district on Saturday, but came to light only on Sunday when farther of the child Rajaiah, a farmer from Pallegudem village, brought the matter to the notice of the local media claiming hospital staff denied the mother a bed. Minister for roads and buildings Tummala Nageshwar Rao, who hails from the district, ordered an inquiry into the incident.

According to Rajaiah, his wife Nagamani (26) delivered the baby with the help of their relatives on the bench as she could not get a berth in the hospital even after waiting for hours. Nobody bothered to attend her. There was no nursing staff, he alleged.

After the delivery when she was trying to hold the baby, the male child accidentally slipped of her hands and fell into the floor.

It was only when we raised a hue and cry, the hospital staff came there and took the baby into the labour room. They later declared him dead, Rajaiah said.

He claimed it was only after the child died the hospital authorities hurriedly got some papers signed by him. Later, they got the infant buried with the help of the police, he added.

When contacted, Khammam Government Hospital Superintendent Madan Singh told Hindustan Times that there was no truth in the parents version of the incident.

She (the woman) was brought to the hospital in the eighth month of pregnancy and it was a premature delivery. The infant was stillborn and could have died in the womb itself due to medical complications, he said.

Singh, however, admitted there was some delay in admitting the mother into the hospital and taking her into the labour room and that they were conducting an internal inquiry.

The doctor who was to perform the delivery was busy with another operation and hence, could not attend to this woman, he said adding, It is not exactly known whether she delivered the baby on the bench or in the labour room.

Action would be take if there was any lapse on the part of the hospital staff, Singh added.

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The central government is likely to step in to protect the interest of homebuyers whose investments face uncertainty when bankruptcy proceedings are filed against builders.

The government is considering two options. First, amend the bankruptcy law so that homebuyers do not lose out to banks and financial institutions when a defaulting builders properties are liquidated and debts settled. Second, change the laws operational rules to make homebuyers trustees so that their investments are mandatorily protected.

More than 31,000 homebuyers have been affected by insolvency proceedings against some projects of Jaypee Infratech and Amrapali. Their vulnerability stems from the fact that they figure very low in the creditors order for payment of dues under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC).

IBC rules stipulate that once a defaulting builders properties are liquidated, the proceeds must first be used to recover liquidation costs, pay workmen such as security guards, settle the dues of banks and financial institutions, pay the salaries of other employees and clear government dues. Homebuyers come only towards the end of this list, which means that by the time their turn comes, there might be nothing left of the proceeds to settle their dues.

Amending Section 9 of the IBC to bring homebuyers at par with secured creditors, including banks and financial institutions, can ensure that they arent short-changed when a defaulting builders debts are settled.

Alternatively, the government can tweak IBC rules to treat homebuyers as trustees, which would mean that their investments must be protected after a company is taken over for insolvency proceedings.

Changes in section 9 of the code will require an amendment, which will take time. But elevating homebuyers to a new category of trustees could be done through a notification, said an official who is privy to the deliberations in the government. He did not wish to be named because Jaypee is in litigation with many homebuyers now.

The government is also watching proceedings in the Supreme Court, which is hearing pleas of Jaypee homebuyers who are caught in insolvency proceedings.

What makes real state in India peculiar is that the builders are allowed to take money from homebuyers and use them for construction, unlike other countries where homebuyers pay money only after the construction is complete. As a result, builders raise money from both banks and homebuyers to use for construction.

The Fight for RERA, an umbrella group of about 100 homebuyers associations and consumer groups wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi early this week, demanding amendments to the IBC to ensure that they get top priority in insolvency cases involving realty developers.

Insolvency proceedings against Jaypee was admitted by the Allahabad bench of National Company Law Tribunal on August 9 after IDBI Bank, the lead consortium of lenders to Jaypee, moved a petition that the company has defaulted on a Rs 526 crore loan.

But last month the Supreme Court put on hold the insolvency proceedings against Jaypee after homebuyers requested it to ensure their investments are protected.
Defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Sunday refused to categorise the severity of threat from China and Pakistan but insisted that Indian forces are ready for any scenario.

During a days visit to Uttarlai airbase in Rajasthans Barmer district, she said her top priority would be to maintain optimum state of preparedness of the armed forces on all fronts.

She refused to comment on army chief General Bipin Rawats recent statement that India must be prepared for two-front war.

We should be prepared to deal with security challenges without discussing who is a stronger enemy - China or Pakistan. Our defence forces need to be completely prepared, Sitharaman told reporters.

The minister also brushed aside the CAGs recent report which had stated that the defence forces have ammunition that can last for 20 days in an event of a war, instead of the minimum requirement of 40 days.

She stressed that there was no shortage of ammunition and that it was a routine process to purchase ammunition and other assets for the forces.

She said that her first and top priority is to ensure fulfilment of every requirement of the forces. She said that after taken the charge she met the Prime Minister and NSA and to discus Indias military preparedness. All the issues related to forces would be address shortly and also on priority basis, she said.

We need to fill the gaps and the government is committed to strengthening the armed forces, Sitharaman said.

Replying to a question on militancy in Jammu and Kashmir, the defence minister said that Centre was taking all possible steps in conjunction with the state government. She said that J-K police too had prevented many terrorist activities.

Asked about Indo-Pakistan dialogue, she said that the ministry of external affairs had already clarified its stand. She said that even Prime Minister too had spoke on this issue and Indias position on Kashmir is clear.

Earlier in the day, Sitharaman addressed air warriors and attended a meeting with top air force officials including Indian air force chief Air Marshal B S Dhanoa.
A woman hailing from Hyderabad, who was allegedly tortured, beaten up and sexually harassed by her employer in Saudi Arabias Riyadh, has been brought back home safely.

This comes closely a month after her sister requested external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj to bring her back.

The woman, Humera Begum, speaking about the ordeals, told ANI that she was beaten up by her employers.

I was in a lot of trouble there. I was not even given food. They tortured me and beat me up. They didnt let me talk to my sister back home. They did things like holding my hand when I served them food, she said.

I want to thank the Indian embassy that helped me a lot and brought me here, she said.

Thanking the authorities for bringing her back, Humera said around 15 more women were still there in the same condition, trying to escape, but were unable to find a source to do so.

Humera returned to India with the help of Sushma Swaraj and protector general of emigrants MC Luther.

In August, Humeras sister sought Swarajs help to rescue her.

Humera went to Riyadh on July 23, believing the promises of an agent, named Sayeed, who said she would get an opportunity to do umrah there.

Umrah is an Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca that can be undertaken any time of the year, unlike haj which has specific dates.

Humera said she was told by the agent that she would also have to work as a caretaker of a small family, on a monthly salary of Rs. 25,000.
RJD chief Lalu Prasad launched a twin attack on the Centre and the Bihar government when he compared the recent train mishaps in the country to Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumars political somersaults to stay in power.

Talking to a TV channel on board a train to Bhagalpur, Prasad said, Jaise paltu ram (political turncoat) Nitish Kumar ulatta hai, waise train bhi ulat raha hai (like Nitish Kumar, trains are also overturning).

Sympathising with train passengers, Prasad said he had boarded the locomotive to see how trains were getting derailed so frequently these days.

This year, at least eight train derailments have been reported. Prasad was the railway minister between 2004 and 2009.

The RJD leader had on Saturday boarded the Danapur-Bhagalpur Intercity Express for Bhagalpur, where he will address an anti-corruption rally on Sunday.

Prasad cautioned that the Srijan scam, in which Rs 1,300 crore was allegedly embezzled, was no ordinary one. He alleged that both Kumar and his deputy Sushil Kumar Modi were involved in it.

Prasad said the BJP always knew about it. Nitish made a somersault and ditched the Mahagathbandhan (grand alliance) to stitch an alliance with the BJP within two hours of Amit Shah (BJP president) showing him the scam papers at a farmhouse in Mehrauli (Delhi), he said.

Interestingly, even as Prasad projected himself to have taken up cudgels against corruption, his son Tejashwi Prasad Yadav and he had decided to ignore the initial CBI summons in the IRCTC hotels-for-land scam. The CBI had summoned both on September 11 and 12, respectively, but the two had cited prior political commitments and sought more time.

The RJD chief has been attacking the Nitish Kumar government on the Srijan scam as the NDA was in power for a major part of the scam period (2004-13). Sushil Modi was the finance minister of Bihar from 2005 to 2013.

Kumar has, however, distanced himself from the scam, with his party JD(U) insisting that the scam broke out (in 2004) when the RJD was in power. The CM, who recommended a CBI probe into the scam on August 17, has also reaffirmed his zero tolerance on corruption.

Lalu, however, questioned why the CBI had yet not instituted cases against Kumar and Modi in the Srijan scam.

The Srijan Mahila Vikas Sahyog Samiti, an NGO based in Bhagalpur, that provided vocational training to women, has been accused of swindling funds from the Bhagalpur district administrations account for various welfare schemes.

The scam came to light on August 4 after a government cheque of Rs 270 crore was dishonoured due to insufficient fund. The cheque was meant to be paid to farmers in lieu of their land for a power plant.

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Amidst a row over appointment of judges between the executive and judiciary, the law ministry has begun the process of putting candidates recommended for appointments as high court judges through detailed scrutiny.

The ministry wrote to the cabinet secretariat last month saying the process of detailed scrutiny of proposals received for appointment of judges from high courts has been initiated.

The move could trigger another tussle between the executive and judiciary, with the latter accusing the former of stepping into its domain.

The Supreme Court had in 2015 quashed the National Judicial Appointments Commission (NJAC) Act which sought to make the appointment of judges more transparent by involving members of judiciary, legislature and civil society in the appointments.

The SC had then asked the government to come up with a new memorandum of procedure (MOP), but this has been in a limbo since March 2016 over disagreements between the two after several exchanges.

The governments current move comes after a section of the SC raised concerns over the quality of judges recently.

In July, the Centre wrote to the apex court asking it to review the current system of judges appointing judges, citing a judgment in which two judges had called for the need to revisit the process of selection and appointment of judges.

What Will Law Ministry Do Now

As per the procedure being followed, the collegia of the 24 high courts send recommendations to the law ministry on candidates  advocates or members of lower judiciary  for appointment as high court judges.

The ministry then attaches a report from the Intelligence Bureau on the record of the prospective candidate and forwards it to the Supreme Court collegium  a body of Indias top five judges headed by the Chief Justice of India  which takes a final call on the appointments.

The HC collegia also send performance record of the candidates. For members of the bar, it is the cases they have argued and for lower court judges, it is the judgements they have issued.

Now, the in-house legal team of the law ministry will subject these records to tougher scrutiny.

In the case of advocates, their reported judgements, and in case of judicial officers, their case disposal time and number of adjournments are being evaluated by an in-house team having legal background, the ministry informed the cabinet secretariat.

Though law ministry officials maintain that the government is not entering the judiciarys domain, assessing judicial capability of candidates has been done exclusively by the HC collegiums in the past.

In the judgment in the contempt case on HC judge CS Karnan, justices Jasti Chelameswar and Ranjan Gogoi also stressed on the need for an appropriate legal regime other than impeachment to deal with errant judges.

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Former Prime Minister and senior Congress leader Manmohan Singh is scheduled to arrive in Jammu on Sunday, heading the partys policy planning group on Jammu and Kashmir, in an effort to bring peace in the state.

Security has been tightened in Jammu as Singh arrives here, heading the partys policy planning group to interact with the leaders of like-minded political parties and cross sections of the local society in order to find ways and means to bring in permanent peace to the state.

Congress sources said senior party leaders including P Chidambaram, Ghulam Nabi Azad, Ambika Soni and Karan Singh are accompanying the former Prime Minister on the two-day visit.

Party sources said the group would meet Congress legislators and other leaders at the state guest house in Jammu on Sunday.

The group will meet 25 delegations of the civil society and mainstream opposition parties of the state, party sources said.

Members of Jammu Bar Association, Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Kashmiri Pandit migrants and West Pakistan refugees are among the delegations scheduled to call on the group in Jammu on Sunday, party sources said.
Comparing the 71-year-old Naveen Patnaik to a defunct transformer and Prime Minister Narendra Modi to a powerhouse, Amit Shah during his long speech at BJP workers meeting in Bhubaneswar this week sought to portray the four-time chief minister as one bereft of ideas and short on effective implementation of developmental schemes.

The BJP presidents full-throated cry to unseat Patnaik in 2019 assembly elections has raised the temperature of politics in Odisha, but the road to his Mission 120 seats is surely rocky.

In the 2014 polls, BJPs lack of booth infrastructure stopped it from reaping the benefits of a pan-India Modi wave. Realising that, Shah has set the ball rolling in the 36,000-odd booths in the 147 assembly segments, aiming to appoint at least 70 people in each booth through Mo booth sabuthu mazboot (my booth strongest) programme.

But, Patnaik is not sitting idle too, and has offered sops after sops, besides rolling out Aama Sahara, Ama Unnati (my city, my development) programme, a booth-level exercise in wards of municipalities ahead of next years urban body polls.

The civic polls would be the real test of BJPs booth programme.

One Crore Votes, 100-Plus Seats

The saffron partys gameplan harps on getting a crore votes to go past the 100+ mark. In the 2014 election, BJD won 117 seats with 93 lakh votes. In this years panchayat polls, BJP secured around 67 lakh votes registering a nine-fold jump in the number of zilla parishad seats it won. Setting a target of 400 votes from each its 36,000 booth-level committees, it hopes to get 1.4 crore votes.

The party has also pinned its hopes on anti-incumbency wave drowning out BJD. But with little disenchantment against Patnaik, whose personal image is unsullied despite two decades in Odisha politics, it is going to be massive challenge for the BJP even to hold on to the 67 lakh votes that it secured.

While BJP aims to get more second rung leaders from BJD and Congress to join its ranks, BJD is also wooing disgruntled BJP and Congress leaders into its fold.

Incidentally, in the last panchayat polls, a large part of the votes that BJP secured came from Congress, which like other states, continues to be on a steady decline in Odisha.

However, there is no certainty that BJP can poach any more votes of Congress if the grand old party gets its act together in the next one year.

Patnaiks Image

Another challenge for Shahs Mission 120 plan would be making the people of Odisha believe that the Patnaik regime is a corrupt one. While several state and central government programmes remain mired in corruption, Patnaiks personal image largely remains untainted.

On the other hand, the CMs recent move asking the state vigilance to take stringent action against those seeking bribes for routine government schemes may have endeared him to electorate.

Social media which helped BJP win the 2014 polls is another weapon where BJP think it can upstage BJD. From creating WhatsApp groups and Facebook pages to highlighting the drawbacks of BJD government, the party has charted out elaborate plans of targeting 40 lakh smartphone users in Odisha.

BJD is also not lagging behind as Patnaik has shed his image of an unapproachable person posing for selfies in social media. The partys social media cell is quite active with its leaders busy engaging the youth.

Drawing on his famed skill of micromanaging elections, Shah has reportedly planned to get the PM more frequently to Odisha while he himself would have meetings with party workers in districts. But the biggest challenge for BJP could turn out to be taking on Patnaik without a chief ministerial candidate. Unlike other states where BJP won without having a CM face, a similar strategy may not work.

Sops and Surprises

To Shahs utter surprise, the canny Patnaik can throw a last minute surprise like he did in 2008 when he started Re 1 a kg rice scheme, ahead of 2009 assembly polls. This year, he has brought an ordinance that assures land for the urban poor. With the SC asking mining companies to pay Rs 17,000-odd crore as penalty to Odisha government, the funds may help CM declare a few more sops to woo the electorate. How much Odisha electorate would buy Shahs promise of a new Odisha in the face of BJDs chain of sops remains to be seen.

BJD leader and agriculture minister Damodar Rout is convinced that Amit Shahs rhetorics will have a negative impact.Shah has insulted Odisha chief minister during his visit. People of Odisha will answer him very soon, he said.

BJP leader Sajjan Sharma said BJD leaders are too drunk with power to see the reality on ground. They have exploited the feelings of Odia people to gain political power. People on the ground have decided for change.

While BJD and BJP slug it out among themselves, Congress does not seem to be reviving any time soon even if they get a new chief. The party which secured about 19% votes in panchayat polls, is steadily losing many of its grassroots workers to both BJD and BJP. Getting a new PCC chief may stem its rot temporarily, but the party does not seem to have any vision for growth.

Irrespective of the outcome of the 2019 assembly election, the next Assembly election in Odisha promises to be exciting.
On the second day of his four-day Jammu and Kashmir visit, Union home minister Rajnath Singh told security personnel in the state the nation was proud of them and indebted for their sacrifices.

The nation is indebted to the supreme sacrifices and no amount of money can compensate these sacrifices.We will again make J&K into a heaven on earth and no force can stop the country from achieving this goal, an official statement quoted Singh as saying in south Kashmirs Anantnag town.

Singh met state police and CRPF personnel and promised bullet-proof vests and vehicles would be sanctioned for all police stations.

His visit to Anantnag on Sunday came a day after constable Imtiyaz Ahmed was killed in a militant attack on a police post less than a km from the venue where he spoke. Singh paid tribute Ahmed and assistant sub-inspector Abdul Rasheed who was killed in Anantnag in an attack last month.

This is not an ordinary sacrifice, this is supreme sacrifice, Singh told the security personnel. I am short of words to salute your bravery in the line of duty. Even the Prime Minister has praised your courage, he said. He added that the whole country was proud of the bravery and valour of security personnel in facing the terrorism sponsored by the neighbouring country.

Singh also addressed a Sainik Sammelan at the CRPF 90 Battalion Camp in Anantnag. Courage is not something that can be bought from the market; you are born with unassailable and unmatched courage, he said. He added the government would consider providing helicopters to CRPF in the state.

He said, It is my aim to provide at least Rs 1 crore to the families of our martyrs from the CAPFs (central armed police forces).

Later, Singh met delegations from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the National Conference (NC). Former chief minister Omar Abdullah, who led the NC delegation, told reporters that issues of Jammu, Kashmir, Leh and Kargil regions were discussed.

Abdullah told mediapersons he had conveyed to Singh that people of the state were touched by PM Narendra Modis words on August 15 that Kashmirs problems would not be solved by abuse or bullets, but by embracing all Kashmiris. Abdullah added people wanted the PMs words to be brought to reality.

In a memorandum to the home minister, the NC registered its strong protest at the ambiguity that exists on behalf of the central government in defending the states special status in the Supreme Court. The memorandum urged the Centre to take steps to safeguard the special status, restore autonomy, resume Indo-Pak dialogue process, and engage with all stakeholders in the conflict and alienated youth.

Singh is scheduled to address a press conference in Srinagar on Monday.

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Newly-appointed defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman termed as historic the circumnavigation of the globe by an all-women Indian Navy team from Goa on Sunday.

This is not an occasion which can happen once in five years, once in ten years. This is a historic day for India. (It is) a historic day, which will be marked in navigation history and globally as well. Our women are going to stand out for doing something which mostly wouldnt even have been thought of, Sitharaman said, flagging off the Navika Sagar Parikrama at the INS Mandovi naval training base near Panaji.

It is for the first time that an all-women naval crew will be managing a sailing vessel which will attempt to circumnavigate the globe.

It is a great pleasure and it is an opportunity which no one can easily get, said Sitharaman, who had just days ago described her elevation from minister of state of commerce to defence minister as cosmic.

Navika Sagar Parikrama would be covered in five legs with stopovers at four ports  Fremantle (Australia), Lyttelton (New Zealand), Port Stanley (Falklands) and Cape Town (South Africa)  for replenishment of ration and repairs as necessary, before returning to Goa in April next year.

The crew has so far sailed approximately 20,000 Nm onboard INSV Mhadei and Tarini as part of training, which includes two expeditions to Mauritius (in 2016 and 2017) and a voyage from Goa to Cape Town in Dec 16.

INSV Tarini, a 55-foot sailing vessel has been built by Aquarius Shipyard, Goa, and was inducted into the Indian Navy earlier this year.

The project is considered essential towards promoting ocean sailing activities in the Navy while depicting Government of Indias thrust for Nari Shakti, a defence ministry statement said.

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Targeting erstwhile alliance partner and Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar, RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav on Saturday said the state government must spell out details of every penny embezzled by a Bhagalpur-based NGO in Srijan scam case.

Nitish government will have to give details of every penny that was embezzled by Srijan in the states maha ghotala (mega scam), he said.

The RJD chief exhorted the people who had gathered at a rally at Sandis compound here to register their protest over the Srijan scam by participating in dharnas to be held at every district headquarter town on September 12.

Lalu also wondered why FIRs were not registered against Nitish Kumar, Sushil Kumar Modi, Ashwini Choubey (Union minister) and others in the scam, which is nothing short of a maha ghotala.

Mounting a scathing attack on the chief minister, the RJD supremo said Nitish Kumar was not only a Paltu Ram (one who switches sides), but a greedy person who wants to remain in power till his death.

...I knew about his (Nitishs) character... He (Nitish) would not have become CM had I nursed putra-moh despite having larger number of MLAs than that of JD(U), he said.

Alleging that Nitish used to stay at the residence of one Mishra in Bhagalpur, Lalu questioned the credentials of the person.

He said the Srijan scam would have been buried by now, had the media not highlighted it.

The former railway minister said that they (BJP-JD(U)) failed to defeat him (lalu), so they were now targeting his son Tejashwi Prasad Yadav.

Lalu said there was a deliberate attempt to hamper the Bhagalpur rally and that is why the CBI summoned him to Delhi.

I am not afraid of Narendra Modis empty threats, rather I will make BJP bite the dust even if I have to be hung by the neck, Lalu said.

The RJD chief was accompanied by senior vice president Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, his two sons -- Tejashwi and Tej Pratap -- and other senior leaders of the party.

Former deputy CM Tejashwi Prasad Yadav also trained his guns at the Bihar CM for his failure to take action against such scams from the beginning.

The CBI should conduct a fair probe and lodge FIRs against the CM, deputy CM, Union minister Giriraj Singh and Shahnawaz Hussain for hatching a conspiracy and destroying evidence, Tejashwi said.

The former deputy CM also accused Nitish of moral corruption besides indulging in political and social corruption by ditching minorities, scheduled castes and backward classes, who had given a mandate to the grand alliance.
Overlooked for a government job, Ashish Kumar, an OBC from Uttar Pradeshs Basti was in the capital to knock on the doors of the National Commission for Backward Classes (NCBC). What Kumar was hoping for was a patient hearing and recourse, what he received was news of the NCBC being defunct.

Several hours of wait and uncertainty were followed by a quick meeting with an official, who is part of the secretariat, but had little to offer. The official, unsure of how to help Kumar, referred him to the department of personnel and training.

The file has to go to DoPT, there is no secretariat here, the official explained to Kumar, who wore his anxiety palpably and sat clutching a bunch of documents, including his marksheet.

With a degree in information and technology, Kumar claims he scored more than the candidate, who landed the teaching job. The OBC commission was his last resort, I am an OBC and a physically challenged person, and I also scored more than the person who was selected. No one in the state had any answers so I came here, he told HT.

Officials part of administrative staff said many like Kumar still turn up at the desolate Trikoot building, where the NCBC has an office; only there is no help available.

Positions of the chairperson, three members and a secretary are vacant at the NCBC, after the government dismantled the commission to bring in its place a new body with constitutional powers, similar to the commission for scheduled castes and tribes.

The Commissions role was limited to exclusion and inclusion of communities in the OBC list, even before it was dismantled we had little powers to help people, an official said on condition of anonymity.

The government for its part says it was with this intent to arm the NCBC with constitutional powers that it proposed a new commission after introducing a Bill.

Its efforts came a cropper after the Bill to set up a new commission tabled in Parliament by the ministry of social justice and empowerment failed to get the support of the Opposition.

Social justice minister Thawarchand Gehlot says his ministry is doing what it can to help people. Earlier too there wasnt really a commission. Whether it was the Mandal Commission or the Kaka Kelkar commission; they were set up based on certain issues, and wound up after giving their reports. We need a system where the OBC commission will be set up like the SC/ST commission which has constitutional powers, he said.

The Opposition, primarily the Congresss resistance to pass the Bill has given the BJP a handle to criticise the grand old party.

Bhupender Yadav, the BJPs general secretary and chairperson of the select committee of Rajya Sabha that submitted its report on NCBC to Parliament, said the demand for granting constitutional status to NCBC has been long pending, but is being obstructed by the Congress.

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Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi on Sunday left for the US, where he will interact with global thinkers, political leaders and overseas Indians on international, economic and technology issues.

Gandhi, 47, will begin his nearly two-week trip to the US with an address at the University of California, Berkeley, tomorrow on the subject India at 70 -- Reflections on the Path forward, where he will talk about contemporary India and the path forward for the worlds largest democracy.

His great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru, Indias first prime minister, delivered a speech at Berkeley in 1949.

Looking forward to addressing students of University of California, Berkeley and interacting with Indian Overseas Congress members with Sam Pitroda during my visit to the US, Gandhi said on twitter.

The Congress party also said on its twitter handle that, Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi will interact with students of UC Berkeley on Tuesday, September 12, 7 AM IST.

Gandhi, during his US visit, will meet and interact with academics, researchers and intelligentsia and discuss issues like emerging technologies, including Artificial Intelligence, nano technology and bio-technology, sources said.

A senior Congress leader had said earlier that the idea was to bring back knowledge and implement it at the policy level in the Congress partys vision documents.

The purpose of the visit is two-fold. One is to meet interesting and global thinkers, to have a conversation on what is happening world over on economy, on technology, on opportunities, and really understand different views from experts on the global scene, technocrat Sam Pitroda, who is involved with the preparations of Gandhis visit, told PTI.

Pitroda worked with Gandhis father and former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi for nearly a decade to transform Indias telecom sector.

He said Gandhi will meet overseas Indians at an event in New York as part of an outreach by the Congress party.

The Congress vice president is scheduled to visit Washington DC. He is likely to address members of the think- tank community at an event organised by the Centre for American Progress, and interact with the corporate world at another programme organised by the US-India Business Council.

Gandhi may meet some members of the ruling Republican Party as well. A lot of these meetings are going to be small and private, Pitroda said.

He wants to understand more about whats happening globally and whats the global view of the situation is, he said.

He is coming to meet with students and academicians and various thinking people in the US, Pitroda said.

The Congress vice president has often visited the US, but this could possibly be the first time in his political career that Gandhi would hold public meetings, meet political leaders and deliver speeches in the country.

You know he needs to be out, he needs to express his views. You know he has been not, may be, talking publicly about his trips. But I think, it is important that he meets a large number of people this time and also overseas Congress members, Pitroda said.

Today, the view of India is one short of protected by one group of people. We need to really talk about Indian aspirations, Indian concerns about what is going on not just in India but the world over. Rise of populism is one topic I am sure will come up in the conversation, Pitroda said.

He said Gandhi would interact with Silicon Valley people, where the technology, talent and Indian brain power is concentrated. So, the idea is if you were to meet a lot of Silicon Valley people, it is better to talk about things in San Francisco.

Gandhi will also address a gathering at the Princeton University.
Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi will on Monday address students at a US university, but will not be giving any talk on artificial intelligence.

Tweets by the Congress Vice Presidents office, and Sam Pitroda, chairman of Overseas Congress, said Gandhis programme in the US included a series of events in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Washington and New York.

Looking forward to addressing students @UCBerkeley & interacting w/Indian Overseas Congress members w/@sampitroda during my visit to the US  Office of RG (@OfficeOfRG) September 10, 2017

Pitroda, who is involved with planning the events, told IANS in an email that Gandhi will not attend the Artificial Intelligence Conference.

Rahul Gandhi will be travelling from September 10 to attend various events in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Washington and New York. He is not coming for the AI conference, he said.

Pitroda added that he will also meet a few important people, listening, interacting and giving a few public speeches including one at the University of California, Berkley on September 11.

He will be addressing a major event in New York organised by the Indian Overseas Congress on September 20, he said.

In a series of tweets, Pitroda said: He is coming to meet with students and academicians and various thinking people in the US. He will be giving a talk at University of California, Berkley. He will be also meeting with Indian Overseas Congress members and others.

Gandhi is expected to speak on contemporary India and the path forward at Berkley. Indias first Prime Minister and Gandhis great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru had delivered a speech at Berkeley in 1949.
A 58-year-old man was allegedly beaten to death by upper caste men on Saturday over a petty dispute at Kola Ki Nangal village in Sikar district.

According to family members of the deceased, identified as Bhagtaram Meena, the attack was a result of a dispute involving stray bovines entering the land of the alleged assailants.

Stray bovines had entered the field where my brother worked as a farm labourer on Saturday. He drove them away and they entered another field which is owned by Rawta Ram, said Subhash Meena, brother of the deceased.

He alleged that later during the night, Rawta Ram along with several others entered the house of Meena and started assaulting him.

They continued to beat him until he was senseless. When I tried to stop them, I was also assaulted. They accused us of purposefully letting the stray bovines into their land, said Subhash.

After the assault, Bhagtaram was taken to a nearby hospital where he was declared dead.

After the murder, the police dilly-dallied for over 13 hours before the FIR was finally lodged on Sunday morning, said activist Kailash Mina.
Former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Ghulam Nabi Azad said on Sunday Union home minister Rajanth Singh rushed to the state only after the Congress announced its schedule.

Rajanth Singh, who met chief minister Mehbooba Mufti, National Conference leader Omar Abdullah and security officials on Sunday, said he had come with an open mind and was willing to interact with anyone who wanted to help in resolving the problems facing Kashmir.

However, Azad, who is part of a Congress group led by former prime minister Manmohan Singh, said the Union home minister was not getting time to visit the state and came here only after coming to know about opposition partys schedule.

After Congress announcement, the home minister who didnt have four hours for the state has come here on a four-day visit. But, it is going to make no impact, he said.

Azad said the PDP-BJP government has brought back the situation akin to early 1990s when militancy was at its peak.

The Congress team has come to assess the ground situation and to see what the ruling coalition has achieved and what it has lost in the past nearly three years, he said.

The Congress group, which also comprises senior leaders Ambika Soni and Dr Karan Singh, will visit Kashmir and Ladakh on Monday to see the impact of Article 35 A in the three regions.

The Congress policy has been pondering over how to go about contentious Article 35-A vis-a-vis three regions of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh.

The team, which heard various delegations on Sunday and held deliberations with party leaders, tried to elicit views of the civil society on all the issues including Article 35 A confronting the state.

The Congress has so far maintained a Kashmir-centric stance over Article 35-A and special status of Jammu and Kashmir in a striking contrast to differing opinions of the people in Jammu and Ladakh regions.
RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat pitched for reforms in law on Sunday as he stressed the need to develop a legal system based on the ethos of the society.

Addressing the concluding ceremony of the silver jubilee celebrations of the Akhil Bharatiya Adhivakta (Advocates) Parishad in Hyderabad, Bhagwat said though the new Constitution was drafted after Independence, some old laws were taken from foreign sources.

Our constitution was written based on the understanding of the Bharatiya ethos of our founding fathers, but many of the laws that we are still using are based on the foreign sources and that laws were made as per their thinking...seven decades have passed since our independence...this is something we must address, he said.

Bhagwat demanded that entire system be based on the ethos of the society.

Our legal system should also be based on such ethos. A discussion and debate should be held on this. After a comprehensive national debate we will have to arrive at a consensus and such system should be made available to people. It should be such that it not only benefits our country but also sets an example for other countries, he said.

...Other nations have their own jurisprudence. But does our jurisprudence reflect the moral and value systems of our society? he asked.

The Sangh chief referred to the trial of revolutionary Birsa Munda and 400 tribals by the British for leading an armed struggle for independence.

Unfortunately, what the tribals were saying was being misrepresented by the interpreters and there was a huge gap between what the (trial) judge was saying and what the accused were saying. This gap seems to exist even today.

Our justice system is under the ambit of the legal framework but what is legal may not be morally right. For example, during the Emergency, police had the right to shoot anyone and one could not ask a question. Legally, the police were right but morally....? he questioned.

Recalling his interaction with Pranab Mukherjee, Bhagwat said he asked the former president the definition of legality. I recently asked Pranab Mukherjee about what is the definition of legality. He said morality is legality. Then I asked him is vice versa true? he asked.

Appealing to utilise the wisdom of our seers, Bhagwat said the Neeti Shastra has a lot to offer which modern day law-makers should take a leaf out of.

The Westerners, including scientists and intellectuals, are studying/examining our Upnishads which is our tradition, he said.

Underlining the importance of law and legislation in running the society, Bhagwat said a society should be built where its morality is at a level where the society in general and law are not at loggerheads with each other.

No doubt, enforcement of law is necessary. However, it will be 100 per cent effective only when the masses are educated. This education cannot be just by information, but should include moral-based education. Unless we develop examples of honesty by living Bharatiya values by ourselves, we will not be able to transform the society, he said.

He appealed to the members of the legal fraternity to reach out to those people who are facing injustice because of weakness and embrace them.

Work towards solutions that the poor and deprived are facing. Based on Satyamev Jayate we have to helpful to them in sorting out their difficulties and problems that are arising out of injustice, the Sangh chief said.

Even in Mahabharata, Gandhari had blessed her sons with Satyamev Jayate and not Vijayi Bhava, he recalled.

The Adhivakta Parishad was formed in 1992 under the guidance of Dattopant Thengadi during a time when the Shahbano case judgement, and the discussion on Hindutva was raging.

The nation was in the midst of a huge debate. Couple of the key functions of the ABAP was to fight many legal issues that were cropping up during that time and also to give voices to the millions of the people who could not afford legal assistance. The gap between those to whom justice is not accessible should be reduced, Bhagwat added.

In our society, dharma was placed highest as it stands on the pillars of truth, unlike in the Western society which believed that the king is supreme and could do no wrong, he said.
At least 10 persons were injured when police baton-charged people protesting the murder of a class 2 student outside a prominent private school in Gurgaon on Sunday.

Some protesters also set afire a liquor outlet close to the school, claiming it was within 100 metres of the campus, which is not allowed as per rules. However, excise authorities dismissed the allegation, saying the vend was more than 150 metres from the institution.

The protesters were demanding a CBI probe into the murder of the seven-year-old child. They said the school should be shut until the CBI probe is ordered.

Some of the demonstrators also threw liquor bottles inside the school premises to vent their ire against the school management, police said. More than 20 protestors were detained.

Gurgaon police had to use mild lathicharge to disperse the agitators. Police detained over 20 protesters found agitating outside the school, said Gurgaon police PRO Ravinder Kumar.

The protesters alleged that the schools drivers and conductors often consumed alcohol from the liquor shop in their free time.

Around 10 reporters and photographers of various media organisations were injured in the baton-charge. Two of them were sent to a hospital.

Parents of several students and others had gathered outside Ryan International School in Gurgaon to stage a demonstration demanding action against school officials for laxity in the murder of the student on Friday.

Police baton-charge protesters outside the school on Sunday. (HT photo)

The boy was found outside a school toilet on the ground floor, crawling and bleeding profusely before he died. A 42-year-old bus conductor, Ashok Kumar was arrested on Friday.

Police revealed that Kumar was fired from his job at a private school in his village Ghamroj because of his suspicious behaviour, but are yet to take action against the school for violating school safety guidelines.

(With inputs from PTI)
The government is moving ahead with linking Aadhaar with mobile SIM cards and all unlinked phones will be deactivated after February 2018, said sources.

The sources said Aadhaar mobile linkage was being done as per orders of the Supreme Court passed in February this year in the Lokniti Foundation case.

All SIM cards have to be verified with Aadhaar within a year from the date of judgement, with all unlinked phones to be deactivated after February next year, so criminals, fraudsters and terrorists cannot use the issued SIMs.

The sources said biometrics cannot be stored by the mobile operators nor they have access to any of the other personal data.

They said biometrics collected should be encrypted by the telecom company and sent to UIDAI at that moment itself and any storage of biometric by a service provider is a criminal offence punishable with up to three years of imprisonment under the Aadhaar Act 2016.

The government had told the Supreme Court in February that it would put in place, within a year, an effective mechanism for the verification of prepaid mobile users who constitute 90% of the total subscribers.

Asking the government to put in place the mechanism for the verification of existing prepaid mobile connection holders as early as possible, the court disposed of the petition by Lokniti Foundation seeking the scrutiny of the subscribers so that those having prepaid mobile connections on fake identities are weeded out.
Four Fabindia staff have been chargesheeted in a court of law here in connection with a 2015 case of snooping after Union Minister Smriti Irani made a complaint against it, a police officer said on Sunday.

Paresh Bhagat, Prashant Naik, Karim Lakhani, and Raju Payancha were named in the chargesheet filed a month back by the Goa Police Crime Branch under Sections 354 (criminal force with intent to outrage a womans modesty), 354C (voyeurism), 509 (intrusion of privacy) of the Indian Penal Code and 66E (violation of privacy) of the Information Technology Act, 2000, Superintendent of Police Karthik Kashyap told the media here.

He said top company officials had no role in the affair.

The accused were arrested in 2015 after Irani, the then Human Resource Development Minister and at present the Information and Broadcasting Minister, alleged that a hidden camera was installed to snoop on customers in the trial room of the Fabindia store in the tony Candolim beach village, 20 km from Panaji.
It began as a small weekly tabloid in 2005, born after a family feud over a legendary newspaper.

Over the next decade, Gauri Lankesh Patrike carved a niche for itself in Karnataka owing to its acerbic style and a wide variety of issues it wrote on, rooted in its editors Left-leaning ideology.

Gauri Lankesh, who was gunned down at her Bengaluru home on Tuesday night, started the weekly after falling out with her brother Indrajit over running their fathers legendary tabloid Lankesh Patrike.

Her weekly, which she named Gauri Lankesh Patrike, did not carry advertisements and had an average subscription of 75,000, as per the papers manager. It also differed in tone from her fathers paper, which Indrajit runs.

P Lankesh was a writer more than a journalist and hence there was a literary quality to the weekly. Gauri was a political journalist and, under her editorship, the weekly leaned towards political reportage, said her friend Chandan Gowda, a teacher at Azim Premji University.

The last issues cover story was about the violence in Panchkula after the conviction of Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh. Titled political Anatomy of Baba Dandhale (political anatomy of Babas rampage), the article targeted the Haryana and central governments. In the same issue, Lankeshs editorial column Kandahage (As witnessed) dealt with fake news.

In the issue before that, the cover story reported on the illegal denotification of land layout by BJP leader BS Yeddyurappa when he was the chief minister.

In her editorial in that issue, Lankesh wrote about two Supreme Court verdicts. On the verdict holding instant triple talaq unconstitutional, Lankesh wrote, At the time of writing this column people are celebrating the Supreme Court across the country. She, however, criticised another judgment that ordered a National Investigation Agency probe into the marriage of Hadiya, a Kerala woman who converted to Islam. She said the judgment undermined womens rights and gave life to the Hindutva construct of love jihad.

In an earlier edition, the cover story dealt with BJP chief Amit Shahs visit to Karnataka ahead of state elections. Lankeshs editorial in that issue dealt with the death of children at Baba Raghav Das Medical College in Gorakhpur, where she hinted at a conspiracy against Kafeel Khan, the head of paediatrics unit who was later suspended for negligence.

With focus on politics, Gauri Lankesh Patrike acquired a mass connect with its tone. Satish, a senior editor at the weekly, said the style of the tabloid was dictated by the niche market. There is also a change in the readers, who prefer this style now, Satish said this was also the style she preferred.

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A 56-year-old temple priest was killed by unidentified assailants near Kokrajhar railway station in lower Assam early on Sunday, prompting chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal to appeal to the people to maintain peace.

Four men wearing black clothes killed priest Nikhil Debnath at Kokrajhar Daily Bazar Shani Mandir premises, and looted Rs 2.30 lakh and two gold chains from his house located in the temple premises.

Kokrajhar superintendent of police Rajen Sing said the motive was robbery and one has been arrested.

The chief minister condemned the killing and sent Additional Director General of Police (Law & Order) Mukesh Agarwala to Kokrajhar to probe the case.

Sonowal said Assam Government has been taking strong action against all forces which are trying to disrupt peace and create law and order situation in the state.

Meanwhile, Bodoland Territorial Council chief Hagrama Mohilary and state Forest Minister Promila Rani Brahma visited the spot and appealed all to maintain peace.

The BTC Chief also declared Rs 2 Lakh to the next of kin of the slain priests family from BTC funds.
A senior Pakistani military commander said on Monday that the Army would respond aggressively to any Indian miscalculation or misadventure along the Line of Control (LoC).

Corps commander Rawalpindi Lieutenant General Nadeem Raza made the remarks while visiting the Battal and Dawarandi sectors along the LoC.

Raza reiterated the resolve to respond aggressively and effectively to any Indian miscalculation or misadventure along the LoC, Radio Pakistan reported.

His remarks came just a day after a 22-year-old civilian was injured in a ceasefire violation by the Pakistani Army along the LoC in Poonch district of Jammu and Kashmir.

Indias external affairs ministry had said last month that despite repeated calls for restraint and call to adhere to the ceasefire understanding of 2003 for maintaining peace and tranquillity, Pakistan forces have carried out 301 incidents of unprovoked ceasefire violations along the LoC this year.
Sixteen villages in Bharatpur district on Sunday enforced a self-imposed ban on consumption and sale of alcohol.

The decision was taken at a panchayat in Bayana led by activist Harigiri Baba. Nearly 1,000 villagers attended the panchayat.

The panchayat also decided to impose a penalty of 11,000 if anyone found drinking alcohol in these villages and 21,000 if anyone found selling alcohol.

Harigiri Baba is running anti-liquor campaign in many districts of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh.

Some of the villages are Mahloni, Kanwar, Umrain, Bhagoria, Naya Gaon, Tyohari, Nagla Mahloni and Nahchora.

Keshav Fauji from Tyohari said this unique initiative was adopted during a panchayat.

Chhabda Jankranti Manchs head Puja Chhabda said consumption of alcohol was ruining development of the society.

Women in large number attended the panchayat where they decided to convince their kids to consume alcohol. They also decided to start protest against liquor shops located in their villages.

The same initiative was launched in Mewat regions Kaithwada village on Saturday.

Defending the move, Kaithwada sarpanch Ishak Khan said youth have become habitual alcohol drinkers and assault their wives and kids after getting drunk.
Until two years ago, nine-year-old Kamla of a tribal village in Udaipur district did not attend a school and spent the day wandering around aimlessly after her labourer parents left for work.

With the nearest school located about 5 km away on the other side of the national highway, her parents were reluctant to send her to the school.

Like Kamla, most children in Jhada Aduwa and other nearby villages in the age group of 5 to 9 years did not attend school.

But things changed when two village youth decided to use an abandoned, dilapidated building belonging to the forest department as a makeshift school. This is where Kamla along with more than 100 other children gather every morning to study.

We make them learn alphabets and counting and tell them stories. Once they are old enough to walk to the government middle school by themselves, they get direct admission in a suitable class depending on their age, Sonu Meena, 20, told HT.

Meena and his friend Ramlal, who took the initiative to start the makeshift school, dont charge any fees.

We grew up in this village and wanted to contribute in whatever way we could. My family occupation is farming and that is enough to make ends meet, said Meena, who studied at the government middle school until class 10th and then went to Udaipur for two years to complete class 12.

The task was challenging as the set-up was informal without any government recognition.

We went door to door to convince the parents to send their children to the makeshift school where they would at least learn the basics. The building gets water logged during heavy rains but is functional for most part of the year, Meena said.

Before the makeshift school came up, teachers of government middle school in Kaya gram panchayat found it difficult to enrol the children of Jhada Aduwa and other villages that are located far away.

When we visited the village, we found children wandering about and asked their parents to enrol them in the school but they refused saying that they couldnt risk sending their little children so far away, especially on the other side of the busy highway, Ghanshyam Khatik, a physical education instructor at government middle school at Kaya, told HT.

Khatik also helped the youth set up the makeshift school by providing them with a board and chalks. Once the students are old enough, we conduct a test and get them admitted in a suitable class (at Kaya middle school) depending on their age, Khatik said.

The initiative has galvanised the public representatives in the region who are making efforts to get a proper school sanctioned. Udaipur (rural) MLA Phool Singh Meena and sarpanch Ramesh Damor are leading the effort.

Looking at the enthusiasm of the children in attending the makeshift school, we have approached authorities to start another middle school nearby. Five bhigha land has been allocated in Jhada Aduwa village and further process is underway, Damor told HT.

Once the new school becomes functional, the dilapidated building would once again be abandoned but thanks to the two enterprising youth, Kamla and her classmates are unlikely to forget it in a hurry.
An angry mob was making its way through the serpentine alleys of the Walled City, setting up vehicles ablaze while pelting stones at policemen.

What started with a minor issue of a couple being accidentally hit by a police baton on Friday night, was shaping up into something that Jaipur in general and Ramganj area in particular could do without.

Already several policemen had been injured in clashes and one person killed, allegedly in firing by the forces. But on that fateful night, a few good men stood between the mob and a potentially disastrous aftermath where many more lives could have been lost.

Several members of the peace committee in the city risked their lives to stop the violence from spilling over to other areas of the densely populated old Jaipur.

After the stone pelting started, a huge mob of over a thousand people started making its way from Ramganj to Subhash Chowk. I understood that if they were not stopped, the violence will spill into other parts of the city, said Gulam Ali Khan, a local resident and a member of the peace committee.

He along with other men stood like a wall between the protestors to prevent further violence. We tried to reason with the mob urging them to desist from damaging public property and mediated between them and the police. We knew our lives were at risk but fortunately because we were local residents, they listened to us, said Khan.

Another such person was businessman Barkat Mirza, who made sure that an injured Mohammed Raees was sent to the hospital without any hassle.

We realized that the sight of an injured person would have further infuriated the mob and thus made sure that he was sent to the SMS Hospital, said Mirza.

Raees was declared brought dead at the hospital..

We didnt want the situation to get worse. The priority was to restrain the mob, otherwise the violence could have engulfed other parts of the city, said Shakkel Khan, another member of the committee.

The police too, are thankful to these men for helping them during the crucial time.

We are very grateful to all members of the peace committee for the role that they played in quelling the violence. Many lives were saved because of the courage that they showed while calming the mob, said Rajendar Singh, station house officer, Subhash Chowk police station.

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Two teenagers drowned in a makeshift septic tank in a village in Murshidabad district of West Bengal on Saturday evening while a botched rescue attempt that severed the head of one of the victims compounded the tragedy.

The disaster also exposed yet again the risks related to open defecation.

According to police and local sources, around 6 pm on Saturday, class VI student Rejina Malitha (13), a resident of Sahajadpur village went to answer natures call at a makeshift toilet adjacent to a makeshift septic tank.

The girl was carrying a smartphone which slipped out of her hand and fell on the edge of the septic tank. She came back after about an hour to collect the phone but accidentally fell inside the septic tank.

She was drowning and started screaming for help, hearing which two women standing nearby raised an alarm. Rejinas cousin Bapan Malitha (17), who rushed to her rescue, too fell in the tank. By the time the police came in, both of them were dead, said Mafidul Islam, a neighbour.

Bapan Malitha, who worked as migrant labourer, had come from Kerala to celebrate Eid with the family.

This was not the end of the tragedy though.

While waiting for the police and fire brigade to arrive, villages attempted to rescue them by using an earth mover. In the process, they ended up severing the girls head from her body.

The bodies were finally retrieved by police are fire services personnel late in the night

My son didnt sit idle when he heard that his cousin had fallen in the septic tank. I think both died due to poisonous gas inside the chamber, Bapans father Bablu Malitha said.

After the deaths several villages expressed their anguish over the slow pace with which the government was building toilets under the Swachh Bharat Mission scheme. Most of the houses in the village do not have toilets and villagers defecate in makeshift toilets in the adjacent fields.

Senior government officials in the districts refused to comment on the incident. Sources in the district administration said Hariharpara block where the village is located is likely to be declared open defecation free by the end of October.
Recently, a 26-year-old heavily pregnant woman jumped to death in China. She begged for a C-section for hours but was refused the procedure causing her to take the extreme step. This incident has sparked a debate on everything: From birth rights of an expectant mother to high cost of health care in countries like China. While there is no clear answer for whos at fault, two lives were lost that day  the baby and the mother.

If women are adequately supported and offered the many alternative pain management options this should never occur. If women request analgesic pain management, they should be given it. A request for natural birth should be respected equally as a request for a medical birth. Her body, her right, says Ruth Malik, founder, Birth India, a nonprofit organisation helping women to choose the births they want.

For years, media has created images of an ideal birth. A pregnant woman labours for a few hours and with one final push, a beautiful baby is handed to her and shes all smiles. But the reality is very different from this.

Many women labour for hours but fail to progress, or some complications may develop during labour. During such times, a C-section is often suggested by doctors. However, these days C-section has become a common practice, even when not warranted. Preliminary studies estimate the rate of Cesarean surgery in India is around 50% in public hospitals and as high as 98% in private hospitals. A woman with a low-risk pregnancy should be allowed to birth vaginally, because all women are equipped to do so.

A C-section is a surgery that is performed when complications crop up during pregnancy that may make vaginal birth difficult, putting the mother or child at risk. Sometimes, C-sections are planned early in pregnancy but may also be performed when complications arise during labour.

Here are some reasons for a C-section delivery:

 The baby has developmental conditions that require a planned C-section.

 The babys head cannot fit through the pelvis. This condition is called True Cephalopelvic Disproportion (CPD). CPD cannot be diagnosed before labour and it is a very rare condition.

 You are giving birth to multiple children. Most doctors recommend a C-section if you are having three or more babies. If you are having twins and wish to have a vaginal birth, look for a caregiver who is experienced with vaginal twin birth.

 When your labour is taking too long. This may not always mean that you will deliver through a C-section, but it depends on how your doctor responds to the situation. If waiting for labour to start wont harm the baby and the mother, then a vaginal birth is also possible.

 When the baby is lying across the uterus, also known as transverse lie.

 Health conditions such as high blood pressure or heart disease in the mother-to-be.

 When the mother-to-be has HIV.

 Problems with the placenta like placental abruption (separation of the placenta from the uterine lining) or placenta previa (when the placenta covers the opening in the mothers cervix).

 A previous high-risk C-section delivery may be a concern as there is an already existing scar on the uterus. And there are chances of it rupturing during labour. However, with the right caregiver, a VBAC (vaginal birth after C-sec) is possible.

 Reduced oxygen supply to the baby due to issues with the umbilical cord.

 True foetal distress. The health of a baby is determined by its heart rate. This is constantly monitored during labour. Depending on the babys baseline, high heart rate or low heart rate can be determined.

Follow @htlifeandstyle for more.

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The Palghar police recently arrested a couple for confining a 21-year-old woman in a room and using her as a sex slave. The 21-year-old woman from Bangladesh was allegedly sold by her husband through a woman who also hails from the same village in Bangladesh.

According to the Palghar police, the victim was married to a farmer in Bangladesh. A Mumbai-based woman, who also hails from the same village, lured the farmer by telling him that he could earn lakhs of rupees if his wife entered prostitution.

The farmer agreed, and allowed his wife to accompany the woman to Mumbai. In Mumbai, the woman sold the victim for Rs1 lakh to two men, Deepak and Rajesh. They then sold her to Mohammed Samrat Shadat Shaikh, 28, and his wife, Dolly Shaikh, who reside in Mahavir Nagar in Palghar, said PI Kiran Kabadi of Palghar police station.

The survivor was confined in a room while Shaikh scouted for clients, but the victim refused to entertain them. A furious Shaikh, who had to refund the money taken form the clients, would threaten to inform the police that the woman was an illegal migrant from Bangladesh. He told her she could face deportation and would have to go back to her husband, who lived in penury, said PI Kabadi.

Shaikh would offer the victim drinks spiked with drugs, and would repeatedly rape her. This went on for many weeks, said the official.

On September 5, the victim managed to escape from Shaikhs flat. She sought help from an autorickshaw driver, who after hearing her story, took her straight to the police station.

A case was registered under Section 370 (a) (buying or disposing of any person as a slave), 376 (rape), 328 (causing hurt by means of poison), 341 (wrongful restraint), 323 (assault) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), and Sections 4 and 5 of the Prevention of Immoral Trafficking Act (PITA), 1956, and the couple was arrested on September 6. The three other accused, including the woman who sold the victim and the two men who bought her, are absconding, said the official. The duo was produced before the Palghar court, and has been remanded in police custody.
Gone are the days when annual college festivals were limited to dance, music and other forms of art. With different departments of colleges focussing on niche topics that attracts niche audiences, topics ranging from world war history, youth literature as well as the countrys current state of politics and economics are now being used as themes for fests by students across colleges.

Take, for example, Arthanomics, the annual fest of the Economics department of Jai Hind College in Churchgate, where the focus was on the current economic status of the country. We are talking about hundreds of economics students who are taught textbook knowledge but are not aware of whats happening in the country at present. Such festivals help give students a better understanding of economics concepts, said Ashok Wadia, principal of the college.

Conducted over the weekend, hundreds of economics majors from across the country participated in the two-day event that, for the first time, also included a panel discussion on the political and economic status of India at present. Even the other events conducted during the two-day fest go beyond just fun and games, and instead try to incorporate the basic of economics in everything. We have received a very positive response from students year after year, said Vivek Parashar, 20, chairperson of the fest.

Students of UPG College, Vile Parle, for the first time will be conducting an open-for-all literature festival at their institute this weekend. And whats new? There are no competitions, and there will be no winners. In times of festivals that only foster competitiveness, this will be a unique festival aimed at celebrating art and culturespoken as well as written, said Mayur Sarfare, professor, heading LitFest for the institute along with students. This will be the first time that a college will open its gates to outsiders to participate in a festival. The aim is to treat this fest as a platform for literature lovers across ages and professionals, he added.

While dance and music does attract a large audience, organising festivals on such a scale require large funds in the form of sponsorships, which is becoming difficult to garner off late. Instead, we are focussing on more relevant issues, and things that might be of interest to a small audience, but very effective and useful for them, said Kavish Tripathi, a student. Recently, St Xaviers College, Dhobi Talao, conducted a two day stamp collection exhibition called Deutsche Dak, where over 300 stamps chronicling the history of Germany from pre-World War I era to the 1900s was highlighted. The exhibition was curated by third-year students of the history department of the institute.

Festivals are worth the effort only when its a fun as well as a learning experience. Students themselves realise how these are not just more informative, but also enjoyable. We do our best to support students with such endeavours, said Rajpal Hande, principal of Mithibai College, Vile Parle.

STUDENTSPEAK

Vivek Parashar (20), third year student of Jai Hind College

Interacting with experts in the particular field that we are majoring in helps bring more perspective to all that is taught in class. Even though our festival is based on economics and related topics, the events are just as fun as events at other cultural festivals.

Aryan Desai (19), third year student of UPG College

This will be a one of its kind festival where theres zero competition between the participants. Instead, a series of workshops, panel discussions and seminars will be held giving space for all the creative people to interact with experts in the field of their choice.

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Residents from the western suburbs are opposing the proposed Metro 2B line between DN Nagar and Mankhurd, claiming the elevated line will pose a threat to the environment, livelihood of people in the vicinity and cause congestion on the arterial SV Road.

Authorities said it would be impossible to cede to the demand of an underground corridor for various reasons, including its cost which would be four times more.

More than 100 people took part in a meeting at Vile Parle on Sunday to spread awareness about the issues and to sketch out a 5-point plan to get the city talking about #MetroGoUnderground.

Residents and experts, who have been opposing the metro line 2B, have been demanding it to be made underground, like one planned between Colaba and Seepz.

According to them , the line has seamless connectivity, scope for future expansion and does not disturb the existing infrastructure.

Architect Zafar Jhaveri said, Many skywalks will have to be dismantled till Badnra Talao. Every metro station between on S V road will be 12,000-15,000 sq m big which will affect about 22 buildings in its vicinity.

Activist Hansel Dsouza, who is on the steering committee, said, SV road is the only arterial road connecting the western suburbs to the city. As future passengers of the metro, we demand that the state government listen to us.

According to Jhaveri, apart from blocking light and air ventilation at these locations, an elevated metro line will reduce 20-25% of the road width.

NGOs like Save Aarey, local schools, churches and members of the Bohra community pledged to support the campaign against the elevated metro corridor through Bandra. Nadeem Patel, a resident of Kamal apartment, Bandra (W), told HT, Half of our building is in the path of metro line 2B. We have been living here since 45 years.

Thousands of residents and schoolchildren had taken to streets on August 11 to protest the elevated metro.

Ashoke Pandit of Save Open Spaces said an even bigger march will be planned in South Mumbai next week.

Other steps to be taken by the committee members are filing a writ petition in the high court this week, a massive signature campaign and an appeal to the Prime Minister. A

Anandini Thakoor, trustee of H/W Federation, said, Every household on S V road is sending a letter of appeal to PM Modi. He will have to listen to us.

Cost of underground Metro line would be 4 times more

Though residents from the western suburbs have been opposing the elevated Metro corridor between DN Nagar and Mankhurd, authorities said it would be impossible to cede to the demand of an underground corridor for various reasons, including its cost which would be four times more.

The Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) officials  the nodal agency for the project  said tenders for the 2B line have been floated and that it is quite impossible to make any changes now.

A senior official said, It is difficult to redevelop buildings on top of the tunnel as it needs more clearances. The tunneling takes a long time and year-long construction works create road blocks.

However, experts said other factors like the environment, livelihood of people in the vicinity are far more important. Architect PK Das told HT, Even if the construction cost is less, other costs are far higher when it comes to elevated corridors.

Another expert, Zafar Jhaveri, suggested using the underground space to set up retail and shops for generating revenue.

According to experts, there are too many people in the western suburbs and less space, which cannot accommodate an elevated metro. About 2 lakh commuters will board and alight at each metro station on SV road every day, said architects.

Even as citizens have announced to take to streets again next week, the MMRDA will go ahead with the commissioning of the corridor in phases. Work will also start soon, said officials.

Moreover, residents in the western suburbs feel they are being discriminated at an infrastructural cost. If South Mumbai can have an underground metro line, why cant we? We want equality in services, they ask.

South Mumbai residents have complained about the incessant construction noises since the work started on Colaba-Seepz corridor. The Bombay High Court also disallowed tunneling work at night, further slowing down the process.

MLA Ameet Satam, who has been following the issue at the state-level, said, The Seepz-Bandra-Colaba line passes through suburbs and is underground. There is no issue of discrimination. The government will do what is best for its citizens.

Godfrey Pimenta, an activist city, however, agreed that structures near the metro tunnels cannot be redeveloped later on. The authority planned an underground one in South Mumbai because there are many heritage and dilapidated structures there. Problems also arise during construction of underground metro and although it would avoid congestion of roads, it is too risky to go underground in the suburbs where the population is dense, he said.
Surveillance cameras inside the womens washroom at one of the oldest churches in Mumbai has divided the citys Catholics.

After two women filed a police complaint against the management of St Michaels Church, Mahim, founded in the sixteenth century by Portuguese missionaries (the church building has been reconstructed), accusing the priests of voyeurism and stalking, other community associations have called it a campaign to defame priests.

On Saturday, groups supporting the priests walked to the Mahim police station to submit a memorandum supporting the priests. They said they will consult their lawyers on Monday to discuss legal action against those accusing the priests of crime.

The police have not yet registered a First Information Report, which is a formal acknowledgement that a criminal offence could have been committed, but have said that they are investigating the complaints.

Police said that they have spoken to the women who felt the cameras were obtrusive.

St Michaels is one of the important religious shrines in Mumbai, and the special prayers on Wednesday, a 70-year-old tradition, is attended by people from different religions.

The church said that the cameras were put up after complaints of thefts in the washrooms, but a group called the Association of Concerned Catholics (AOCC) said that the devices violate voyeurism and stalking laws.

The cameras can film women in a private affair. Applying lipstick or combing hair in front of the washroom mirror is also a private affair, said Joseph Sodder, a lawyer and member of AOCC.

Thousands of people visit the church for the daily masses (religious services) and for the Wednesday prayers. Hundreds of women use the wash room, said another member of the group. When women complained the priests said the cameras will be removed, but they have done nothing. The cameras have been there for years.

It is not clear why the issue has become news now. Both groups agree that the cameras have been there for three years. Why did the groups not protest when the cameras were installed?

One person explained that this was because the warning about that the premises was under surveillance was put up a few weeks ago.

The other side has argued that the warnings were put up when the cameras were installed.

The priests have pointed out that there are similar cameras in the mens toilets too.

The cameras in the womens loo are in the common area near the entrance, and according to some women, do not infiltrate the toilet cubicles.

The presence of similar surveillance devices in the mens toilet cannot justify the cameras in the womens washrooms, said Sodder. Basically it is what the woman thinks what is an intrusion. Voyeurism laws cannot be applied for the cameras in the mens washroom.

The AOCC has accused the other groups of trying to cover-up crimes by the clergy. They took out three protest marches when a priest at a Govandi church was accused of sodomising a child in 2015 (the accused is in custody and the case is under trial). There were allegations that other children were similarly abused. The whole issue was being covered up, said Sodder.

The groups supporting the priests do not see it as an attempt to cover-up the case.

The Catholic community wants to talk against the defamation of priests, spoiling the names of the priest by saying things that are totally untrue, said Rita DSa of the Bombay Catholic Sabha. For us it smacks of mischief because the matter never came up earlier. The images from the CCTV cameras are seen in a locked room, the priests are not watching the footage.

DSa said that a majority of those who took part in Saturdays protests were women and they agreed that the cameras were needed. We have no idea why the complaints have been filed suddenly.
A 29-year-old woman set her two children, aged nine months and two years, on fire and committed suicide by pouring kerosene on her at her home in Mumbais Kalyan neighbourhood on Saturday.

This is the second such incident in past 24 hours where a mother has killed her children before ending her life.

According to the police, Anita Ajay Kumar Kanojiya used to argue with her husband, Ajay Kumar, over poor living conditions.

She locked herself up in the house late in the afternoon, poured kerosene on nine-month-old Durgesh and two-year-old Nandin and set them on fire. Later, she used the combustible liquid to immolate herself.

The incident came to light when a neighbour knocked on the door and nobody opened it. She went to Ajays laundry stall and informed him that his wife did not open the door. Ajay opened the door and found charred bodies of his children and wife. The couple was married for four years, said B Kadam, senior inspector from Khadakpada police station.

The police have taken the statement of Ajay and registered a case against Anita under Section 302( punishment for murder) of the Indian Penal Code.

Kadam added, We are investigating with Ajay and their relatives to know more about the case.

Earlier too, a 32-year-old woman, Archana Kadam, strangled her twin sons and later committed suicide by hanging herself to the ceiling in Thanes Kalwa . In the suicide note, she wrote that she could not cope with the burden of taking care of her mentally-challenged children.

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Soon, a single emergency number  112  that will integrate services of police, fire brigade and medical help, is likely to be a reality in the state. The home department will roll out the services, which will reduce the response time and also introduce dedicated apps and SMS services.

In accordance with the central governments directive, the state cabinet approved a Rs429 crore plan a few weeks ago to roll out the service in 10 big cities and later in all the districts.

The project chalked out by the home department will have new 1,000 patrolling vans, with a global positioning system and vehicle tracking system installed in them. This will enable the police to reach out to complainants within minutes.

Currently, the response time of the police is 20 minutes. It was 12 minutes in Thane for a study conducted to prepare a detailed project report for the project by the consultant. With higher number of vehicles and system to track them as well as existing vehicles with the police, the response time is expected significantly. The new mechanism will have the caller identification system, which will help to reduce the fake calls

Control rooms across the state will be modernised with the back-up of command and control centres at Nagpur, Pune and Worli, Mumbai. The new system will have minimum manual interface by introduction of Interactive Voice Response for initial stage of the call to the control rooms. The mechanism will also have an integrated back up of the two data centres, said an official.

The official said that though the Mumbai polices control room is best in the state, the home department has also proposed to upgrade it too. Once launched, the emergency number system will integrate with 100, 101 and 108 dialed for police, fire and ambulance services respectively. There would be no problem in integration of the ambulance services with immediate effect but the fire brigades have been using decades-old technology and their upgradation is unlikely come in anytime soon, he said.

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Mumbai doctors, on Sunday, launched a free mobile application, which will direct people in emotional distress to a nearest helpline centre.

The application called emotional support helpline directory available on Playstore, was launched to mark the World Health Organisation declared World Suicide Prevention Day, which raises awareness about how suicides are preventable.

It features contact information of more than 50 suicide prevention helplines numbers operating across India and displays the closest helpline near the user.

Dr Milan Balakrishnan, psychiatrist at JUNO clinic, Khar, who conceptualised the application along a friend, said, A very basic form of this application was created a year back, but this year, we developed it properly with the help of an IT professional, he said.

He added that all the numbers put on the application were double-checked.

A person who commits suicides, often ends life with an impulse, but he or she may have thought about it a hundred times before. If you think that a friend looks worried and doesnt want to open up, you can always send them the link to see if they find an outlet, Dr Balakrishnan said.

According to WHOs first global report on suicide prevention published in 2014, more than 8,00,000 people die by suicide every year, around one person every 40 seconds. The report adds that some 75% of suicides occur in low- and middle-income countries.

The report added that India accounted for the highest estimated number of suicides globally in 2012. Pesticide poisoning, hanging and firearms are among the most common methods of suicide globally.

Dr Niti Sapru, president of Bombay Psychaitric Society, called it a great step towards generating awareness about mental health problems. Prior studies have shown that phone-based helplines are a significant intervention in preventing suicide, she said.
I was reversing the bus and heard some sound as if something got crushed under the wheels... I knew something wrong had happened, said Rajveer, the driver of the school bus under which five-year-old Saumya was crushed near her residence on September 9.

Following the incident, Rajveer remained at the spot and was arrested by the police, after passersby pulled the girl from under the vehicle and rushed her to a hospital. He was driving a bus of Silver Shine School.

As soon as I heard the sound, I turned off the ignition, went down and found Saumya under the wheels. I was shocked at the sight and could not gather the courage to pull her out. I sat down in the bylane. Locals arrived in numbers and vandalised the bus. Someone pulled Saumya out and rushed her to a hospital, Rajveer said.

Despite the development, the bus staff did not get down to see what had happened to the girl. It is the first such incident to have happened to me. I used to work with a gas agency but joined the school as a bus driver after the agency had shut. I have driven trucks and bigger vehicles but never met with a major accident, he said.

Rajveer, the father of a class 11 boy and a class 3 girl, came from Mainpuri district to Ghaziabad in search of a livelihood around 25 years ago.

Another driver called the police and they arrived in time. Otherwise, the angry mob would have lynched me, Rajveer said.

He said that before Saumya, another student was dropped in Mehrauli, adjacent to NH-24. He said that Saumyas grandmother, Dayawati, had come to pick her up. Her head was severely injured but one of the locals held it together and held it till she was transported to the hospital on a bike, Dayawati said.

Saumya was later declared dead.

Pooja Kashyap, Saumyas mother, said, He (Rajveer) usually drives the bus hastily and was always in hurry to get moving. Yesterday, he moved the bus into an adjacent lane where the incident took place. The lane is small and the bus had to be reversed to get back on the main road. It was in the lane that my daughter was killed.

Meanwhile, the police arrested Rajveer and a member of the bus staff, Manju, both of whom will be produced before the court.

The bus was seized after it was damaged by angry locals. Police had rushed in time, otherwise, the mob would have killed Rajveer. We have booked both under relevant sections of the IPC, which are bailable. However, we will produce them before the court and further action will be decided by the court, Neeraj Kumar Singh, station house officer, Kavi Nagar police station, said.

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The post-Jayalalithaa AIADMK has evidently become the BJPs Trojan horse. For all her faults, in 1988-89, the late leader kept the BJP leadership and the government on tenterhooks and even brought the BJP government down. More recently, despite all her legal difficulties she stood up to the Centre opposing many of its schemes.

Today, the AIADMK government led by Edappadi K Palaniswami (EPS) and his deputy O Panneerselvam (OPS) is on life support from the BJP. Consequently, the AIADMK has become an annex of the BJP with Prime Minister Modi meeting both faction heads. When they merged on August 21, he promptly tweeted his support for Tamil Nadu under their combined leadership  possibly because the BJPs hard work had finally borne fruit.

OPS, EPS and even Sasikala Natarajan are no Jayalalithaa. On January 3, Venkaiah Naidu, then information minister, said in a circumlocutory fashion that Jayalalithaas death had opened up possibilities for the BJP in Tamil Nadu. Of course he was talking about his party as an alternative in the Dravidian heartland. But even Naidu would have not imagined the possibilities for the BJP as they have unfolded since.

As Jayalalithaas sibling in spirit Sasikala decided to take centre stage in February, the party came apart with OPS revolt. Sasikala installed EPS as a stopgap arrangement and anointed TTV Dinakaran, her nephew, as deputy secretary general of the party even as she was sent to jail for the disproportionate assets case. EPS then won the trust vote on February 20. Sasikala had earlier safely shepherded the 122 MLAs away from any temptation to join the rebel OPS faction. In return, EPS and his ministers campaigned for Dinakaran in the RK Nagar bypoll cancelled by the election commission on account of candidates bribing...voters. This then led to IT raids at a ministers house, bringing to light a well-hatched plan to distribute cash for votes, in which allegedly even EPS had a role.

If anyone expected things to get difficult for EPS and his ministerial colleagues, they were in for a surprise: Instead Dinakaran was accused of trying to have bribed an EC official for the party symbol which had been frozen by the EC. He was arrested and spent two months in Tihar jail, at which point he announced that he was withdrawing from public life.

Meanwhile, EPS began to consolidate himself and merger talks began with the OPS faction. Though talks floundered the script was proceeding on expected lines: The two factions would isolate and remove the Sasikala clan  informally called the Mannargudi Mafia  from the party and government.

In the BJPs calculation  an AIADMK sans the Sasikala clan is a cleansed AIADMK, good for piggy backing on. But a post-Tihar Dinakaran spoilt their plans as he chose to fight back.

He termed the two factions as traitors who wanted to run away with whatever they could get. More ingeniously, he did not take on the BJP. Also, unlike the two leaders, he conjured up an impressive rally in Melur close to Madurai. But what is most impressive is that while Dinakaran wishes to curry favour with the BJP he is unwilling to yield space to the BJPs plans to remove his aunt and family from the political scene.

On August 22, 19 MLAs owing allegiance to Dinakaran met governor C Vidyasagar Rao said they were withdrawing support to EPS. Rao has rejected the DMK-led Oppositions demands to order a floor test stating beguilingly that the 19 MLAs are still with the party. The Speaker on the other hand had issued notice to the 19. On September 6, fisheries minister D Jayakumar said 109 MLAs attended a meeting chaired by the chief minister. This is eight short of the 117 MLAs needed for a majority. Unfortunately, as the tussle for power continues governance has become a casualty.

The BJP can be expected to save the EPS government as long as it can by using all the instruments under its control. But there are some imponderables: How will it help the merged factions overcome the legal and extra legal hurdles thrown up by Dinakaran, not to mention the knots that the EPS faction had tied itself into by having supported Sasikala earlier before the EC?

And assuming that Dinakaran goes down fighting or otherwise, will the AIADMK then become clean? It is clear to everyone except the BJP that OPS, EPS and Sasikala-Dinakaran are all cut from the same cloth. The greed for political gain has blinded the BJP. The AIADMK could serve as its Trojan horse but Tamil Nadu is no Troy.

R Kannan is a diplomat and biographer of Annadurai and MGR

The views expressed are personal
Pune

Finance minister Arun Jaitley, on Sunday, blamed the rich people for high non-performing assets (NPAs) in banks in the country. Speaking at the golden jubilee celebrations of the Pune District Central Cooperative (PDCC) bank at the Agricultural College grounds in the city, Jaitley said small borrowers cannot be held responsible for major NPA accounts of banks.

Its the rich people who are responsible for big NPAs. It is a challenge for banks to recover money from these rich people, said the finance minister.

Underlining steps taken by the central government to recover money under NPAs, Jaitley, while praising PDCC for having a zero NPA rate, said his government has taken some harsh steps, like treating defaulters as bankruptcy cases.

These rich people had to go bankrupt. This was happening in the country for the first time, the finance minister said, adding it is important for a bank to maintain its credibility.

According to Jaitley, banks giving loans to small borrowers have fewer NPAs. Be it small industrialists or farmers, banks giving loans to small borrowers have fewer NPAs.

Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar shared the dais with Jaitley during the function. The PDCC bank, according to Pawar, has zero NPAs despite offering loans to farmers at lower rates of interest.

Meanwhile, the bonhomie between senior BJP leader Arun Jaitley and NCP chief Sharad Pawar was once again on display on Sunday, with the former praising the latter. Jaitley, in his praise for Pawar said, Whenever the discussion is about national security or issues of national interest, Pawar forgets he belong to a particular political party. I have been observing Pawar for many years and have never heard negative comments from him, Jaitley said.

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Punjab chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh had patted his back and blamed his Haryana counterpart Manohar Lal Khattar for failing to prevent build-up of followers of Dera Sacha Sauda ahead of the special CBI court verdict that found its head Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh guilty of raping his two women followers.

But an audio conversation reveals that one of Amarinders three political secretaries was in touch with dera political wing head Ram Singh, and assured him of governments help, if needed, a few days before the August 25 verdict. The followers in Panchkula had gone on a rampage after the dera head was sent to jail, leaving 39 dead.

In the recorded conversation, one of the members of the deras political committee, Ram Karan, is heard telling a former follower of the dera that they had approached the Amarinder government for buses after the Panchkula arson and the state government had provided conveyance on their request.

We later thanked the CM and his aide for the help, Ram Karan is heard saying in the conversation. Sources in the government admitted that a backdoor channel of communication was opened with the deras political wing to assure them that the government will not allow radical Sikhs to take advantage of the situation and prevent them from causing damage in Punjab. There have been many incidents of clashes between the dera followers and radical Sikhs after Gurmeet Ram Rahim donned the robe of 10th Sikh master, Guru Gobind Singh, in 2007 and later after the highest Sikh temporal body, the Akal Takht, pardoned him.

On why did the Punjab government not stop dera followers from entering Panchkula through Zirakpur in Punjab and later provided them buses when they were fleeing Panchkula after the clashes, Amarinder had said Khattar never called him to stop them (followers) and he gave them buses to prevent them from causing more damage on their way back.

Most of Gurmeet Ram Rahims close aides, including Honeypreet and Aditya Insan, have gone underground. (HT File )

Notably, the followers damaged some of the buses and state transport director Bhupinder Singh had said they left two drivers injured.

Even as Haryana burned, Amarinder patted his governments back embarking on a tour a day after the violence with his team in two state choppers to distribute apples to security forces and policemen for keeping Punjab peaceful.

While most of Gurmeet Ram Rahims close aides have gone underground, including Honeypreet and Aditya Insan, Ram Karan, a resident of Bhawanigarh, has not even been questioned by the Sangrur police. Sangrur senior superintendent of police (SSP) Mandeep Sidhu said 14 incidents of violence were reported in Sangrur, 104 were named, of which the police arrested 76 people. The name of Ram Karan has not figured in our investigation, which is still on, Sidhu told HT.

Punjab Police are only after those who caused arson in the state, but not Punjabis who were present in Panchkula. A dera follower confirmed that Ram Karan was present in Panchkula during the mayhem. All the Punjab and Haryana police need to do is check the mobile tower location of Ram Karan and other members of the dera management and call them from questioning. But they have only issued lookout notices for Honeypreet and Aditya who were captured by the TV cameras, a dera follower said, requesting anonymity.

Roads to Sirsa dera sealed after a week

There are no shocking recoveries so far from Dera Sacha Saudas Sirsa headquarters after the Haryana government has initiated its sanitisation and search under the court scrutiny, two weeks after the August 25 violence at Panchkula.

While curfew was clamped in areas near the old and new dera headquarters in Sirsa, the access roads to the dera from the villages bordering it  Nejia, Bajekan, Ali Mohammad, Begu and Arniawala  were not sealed completely and men and vehicles were seen moving out of the area during late hours. Even a few media teams had reached the dera through the village route.

Also, the police had asked the dera to surrender arms. Sirsa superintendent of police Ashwin Shenvi had told HT that all the arms surrendered were licensed weapons and all the three gunhouses searched by the police belonged to kin of members of the dera management or followers. But the late sanitisation and sealing of the village roads have raised questions if the Khattar government too allowed the dera management time to santise itself.

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Search operations by security agencies and district authorities entered its third day on Sunday at the Dera Sacha Sauda headquarters near Haryanas Sirsa town. The media was stopped at some distance from the Dera premises. The sanitisation drive was being conducted under supervision of court commissioner AKS Pawar appointed by the Punjab and Haryana high court.

Dera chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh was found guilty of raping two female sadhvis on August 25. Special CBI court awarded the self-styled godman a 20-year jail term on August 28.

Highlights:

5: 35 pm: SMS, internet and railway services in Sirsa will resume from tomorrow. However, curfew will remain imposed till tomorrow, will be reviewed tomorrow evening. Relaxations will be given in morning and evening: Satish Mehra

5: 30 pm: Three-day long search operation at Sirsas Dera Sacha Sauda headquarters concludes: Deputy director of Haryana public relations department Satish Mehra. He said the court commissioner will submit his report to Punjab and Haryana high court.

4.45pm: During the search operations, irregularities were found in the functioning of the hospital inside the Dera campus. These included a skin clinic being operated without licence, irregularities in pregnancy tests and the bodies being sent to other hospitals.

4.40pm: Curfew continued in the villages around the headquarters premises with paramilitary forces and Haryana Police keeping a strict watch.

4: 18 pm: A secret tunnel and an illegal explosives factory were found inside the premises on Saturday.

4:08 pm: The search was done peacefully in the Dera, Satish Mehra said.

3:41 pm: Earlier on September 5, the Punjab and Haryana High Court gave orders to conduct a search operation in the Dera Sacha Sauda headquarter, under the supervision of a judicial officer.



3:29 pm: The search operation inside the Dera Sacha Sauda premises in Sirsa entered its third day on Sunday amidst heavy security deployed around the headquarters.

2: 13 pm: Over the last two days, search teams have recovered a luxury car and plastic money from the dera premises. The search and sanitation is expected to end today.

1: 09 pm: Court commissioner AKS Pawar, appointed by the Punjab and Haryana high court, is likely to visit soon to oversee the operation.

1:07 pm: Sanitisation is likely to end today.

1:05 pm: The exercise was divided into ten sectors - nine of these sectors have been sanitised, Satish Mehra said.

12:58 pm: Operation almost complete, says deputy director (information) Satish Mehra.

12:37 pm: Curfew continues in villages around the headquarters premises with paramilitary forces and Haryana Police keeping a strict watch.

11: 20 am: A luxury car, computers, hard disks and plastic currency has already been seized from the dera over the first two days.

10:55 am: On Day 2, search operations revealed the existence of an illegal explosives factory and firecrackers, which were promptly sealed.

10:03 am: On Day 2 of the search, a tunnel connecting Ram Rahims gufa to sadhvis quarters was found

9 :45 am: Heavy security deployment around Dera Sacha Sauda headquarters in Sirsa as search operation resumes on the third day.

Haryana: Security deployment in surrounding areas of #DeraSachaSauda Sirsa headquarter as search operation resumes on the third day pic.twitter.com/K1QWc6zSkw  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

(With agency inputs)
A meeting between three Panjab University professors with Congress national vice-president has given an element of strength to murmurs on Panjab University (PU) campus that authorities had a role to play in ensuring that three of four seats in the students council went to National Students Union of India (NSUI), the student wing of the Congress.

The meeting came to public knowledge after a photo of Gandhi with professor Navdeep Goyal, chairperson physics department, who is a senate and syndicate member and also former dean students welfare (DSW); Varinder Negi, professor University Institute of Legal Studies and Yograj Angrish, HOD, Punjabi department, was posted on Facebook. National NSUI president Firoz Khan and senior party leader Neeraj Kundan are also in the frame.

Photo removed after it goes viral

Minutes after Kundan updated this picture on his Facebook wall, student organisations shared it with the caption, A day after PU polls: For all those who dont believe that PU authorities interfered in council elections.

Due to their position, professors can usually influence students to vote for a particular candidate. The three professors were also part of the poll process.

When this went viral, the photograph was removed from Kundans account.

Students for Society spokesperson Harmandeep claimed, The authorities have been actively supporting NSUI. We raised issues like re-tendering of shops, co-operative messes and 24-hour entry in girl hostels. Its good that things have come out.

Met Gandhi for varsity work

The professors claim the meeting was professional and no links to the varsity polls. Professor Navdeep Goyal, said, It is a coincidence that we got to meet him the day after the poll results. There is no connection the two. We had met him regarding increase in grant.

Goyal is heading one of the groups in Panjab University Teachers Association (PUTA). The SFS candidate who lost in a close fight to NSUI for the presidential post is a student of physics department which Goyal heads.

Yograj Angrish said, It is our right to meet the political leaders. Earlier we had met Sukhbir Badal also. Student bodies have used obectionable words about our photo on Facebook. We never tried to support the NSUI. From my Punjabi department, NSUI secured only 16 votes and SFS took the lead.

Sanjay Tandon, BJP president of the Chandigarh unit, who is also a senator, said, People in high position should stay away from political activity. Their justification is not plausible.

Another senator Rabindernath Sharma said, Professors meeting Rahul Gandhi just a day after results has created doubt on NSUIs victory. Students bodies have got a chance to speak against authorities and accuse of them being a part of the NSUI campaign.

Professor Rajesh Gill, president of Panjab University Teachers Association (PUTA) refused to comment.

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Fans of superstar Mahesh Babu formed beeline outside of Chennais Kalaivanar Arangam on Saturday evening to gain access to the highly anticipated audio launch of their idols film Spyder, a Tamil-Telugu bilingual from director AR Murugadoss. It was an august gathering and the whos who of Tamil filmdom graced with their presence to welcome Mahesh Babu to Kollywood. From Kabali producer Kalaipuli Thanu to actor Vishal, all were extremely happy for Mahesh Babu and his decision to finally enter Tamil market.

Mahesh Babu will receive Rajinikanth-kind reception - SJ Suryah

Speaking on the occasion, actor SJ Suryah said he has known Mahesh for over a decade and nothing has changed about him and thats what makes him a superstar. He also said hes a star with a good heart. He went on to add that Tamil audiences will accept Mahesh Babu like how Telugu audiences accepted Rajinikanth.

Was in awe of Mahesh Babus charisma - RJ Balaji

Actor RJ Balaji plays a crucial role in Spyder. When he met Mahesh for the first time, he was in awe of his personality despite Rakul Preet Singh being around. He also said that Mahesh is a Tamil boy and watches lot of Tamil films. He further added that Mahesh has immense love for his family (fans) and never says no to a picture with them.

Listen to Spyders Tamil songs here



Extending best wishes to Mahesh for his grand Tamil debut, producer Thank said theres no doubt about the success of Spyder.

Director Vikraman said Mahesh, fondly called Prince by his fans, will earn the moniker King post the release of Spyder. He also confidently said that Tamil audiences will celebrate Mahesh Babu.

Will watch first day, first show of Spyder - Vishal

Vishal said he would watch the first day, first show of Spyder.

Vishal said he came to the event just for the sake of wholeheartedly welcoming Mahesh Babu. He said very few actors can emote in close-up shots and Mahesh is one such artist. He also heaped praise on his personality, reminding audiences that he was a very healthy kid and the way he has physically transformed himself is amazing. He said hell watch the first day, first show of the film in Telugu because itll be a festival and that makes the experience very exciting.

Spyder composer Harris Jayaraj, who had already worked with Mahesh in Sainikudu, said it wasnt his first association with the star. He had worked on Maheshs maiden film Raja Kumarudu as an assistant to composer Mani Sharma. Talking about the film, Harris said the audiences will have a blast in cinemas. He said when he watched Thuppakki even before its release, he was confident of its success. He said he felt the same about Spyder.

Mahesh Babus dedication motivated me - Rakul Preet Singh

Rakul Preet Singh said she couldnt have asked for more than working with AR Murugadoss and Mahesh Babu in the same film.

Rakul said she couldnt have asked for a better combination, and to work with AR Murugadoss and Mahesh Babu in the same film means a lot. She said she had always wanted to work with Mahesh, and his dedication in Spyder motivated her.

Waited for 10 years to work with Mahesh Babu - AR Murugadoss

AR Murugadoss said they had planned to work in the Telugu remakes of Ghajini and Thuppakki in the past.

Filmmaker Murugadoss said he had been wanting to work with Mahesh ever since he saw Pokkiri. They had planned to work earlier but things somehow didnt fall in place. He said that he had even planned to remake Ghajini in Telugu with Mahesh, and even wanted to do Thuppakki in Telugu with him. He glad they joined hands finally for Spyder. He said that Mahesh was very supportive through the course of the entire shoot. We had 80 days of night shoot. Never did he complain about anything. He was even ready to set aside more dates if needed. This film couldnt have been made as a bilingual if not for the support of Mahesh.

When it was Maheshs turn to speak, his fans chanted - Jai babu. Jai Jai Babu. Mahesh Babu. Though he started his speech in Telugu, he quickly switched to Tamil and his command over the language left everybody in shock. He even cracked jokes in Tamil.

Spyder is a film very close to heart - Mahesh Babu

Not only did Mahesh Babu speak in Tamil, he even cracked jokes in the language.

Mahesh said he was honoured to have joined hands with AR Murugadoss for Spyder. Despite being an actor for 18 years, he said he felt like a debutant talking at the audio launch of his maiden Tamil film. Spyder as a film is very close to heart. It was a new experience. Mahesh thanked his producers for investing over Rs 120 crore on the film.

It was also confirmed at the event that the trailer of Spyder will be released on September at the films pre-release event in Hyderabad.

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Actor Joanne Froggatt, who played maid Anna Bates in the popular period drama series Downton Abbey says she and her castmates are keen to reunite for the film but it would be very difficult to arrange.

Froggatt says the film making could be tricky as there are many peoples schedules which need to be considered, reports montrosepress.com.

Its been tricky. There has been a lot of goodwill from all of us, but logistically its a bit of a minefield. Its very difficult to get all 22 actors together. But if we can, everyone would like to do it, Froggatt told Radio Times magazine.

While the Liar star has been looking for work in America, she is not expecting to land a Hollywood blockbuster because she doesnt think she has the right image.

Im not a big-budget Hollywood type. They want the model type, classically beautiful and Im not, she said.

Ioan Gruffudd (left) and Joanne Froggatt participate in the Liar panel during the AMC and Sundance TV Television Critics Association Summer Press Tour at the Beverly Hilton on July 29, 2017 in Beverly Hills, California, USA. (Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP)

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Five members of the minority Shia Hazara community, including two women, were killed on Sunday in an attack by unidentified gunmen in Pakistans restive Balochistan province.

The gunmen targeted a car in Kuchluck area of Quetta while it was coming from the Chaman border crossing area, police said.

The firing took place when the travellers had stopped at a filling station to refuel their vehicle. Five people of the Shia Hazara community, including two women, died in the attack, the Express Tribune reported.

Balochistan Chief Minister Sanaullah Zehri expressed grief at the incident and strongly condemned the terrorist attack.

He directed authorities that the culprits should be arrested and brought to justice.

This is not the first time that members of the Hazara community have been targeted in Quetta and other parts of Balochistan.

Earlier this year, in July, four Hazara men were ambushed and killed in the Mastung area.

In October last year, gunmen opened fire on a bus carrying Hazara men and women in Quetta. Four women were killed in that attack.
Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will on Tuesday visit camps for Rohingya refugees in the southeastern part of the country, an official said even as the government allotted 2,000 acres of forest land in Coxs Bazar area to accommodate the refugees fleeing violence in Myanmar.

Hasina will be visiting the Kutupalang camp in Coxs Bazar, Ashraful Alam, Deputy Press Secretary to the PM, told bdnews24.com on Sunday.

Rohingyas have arrived in Bangladesh in thousands fleeing violence in Myanmars Rakhine state.

The Bangladesh government has also decided to prepare a biometric database of the Rohingya refugees, Dhaka Tribune reported.

The numbers of the Rohingyas are increasing everyday and they have taken shelter in different places. So, we have allotted the land to keep them in one place, Shah Kamal, Secretary in the Disaster Management and Relief Ministry, said while visiting Rohingya camps.

The Passport Directorate has been tasked to make a list of the Rohingyas with their names, photos and finger prints, an official said.

According to UN, more than 290,000 people are believed to have crossed the border from Myanmar to Bangladesh, tripling the Rohingya population in Coxs Bazar in two weeks.

Over the last few decades, almost half a million Rohingya Muslims have been living in two registered camps and makeshift settlements bordering Coxs Bazar, fleeing persecution and communal violence.

Myanmar does not recognise the Rohingya people as its citizens, neither has it responded to Bangladeshs frequent calls to take back the refugees, bdnews24 reported.

Attacks on a police camp in October last year sparked an influx of almost 87,000 refugees into Bangladesh. Fresh violence broke out on August 25 when insurgents attacked 30 police posts and an army base.

About 300,000 Rohingyas are said to have fled Rakhine and sought shelter across the border in Bangladesh in the weeks since the fresh violence.

A Rohingya refugee woman sits next to a newly built makeshift shelter in a camp in the Bangladeshi locality of Ukhia on September 9, 2017. (AFP Photo)

As many as 400 people have been reported killed in fighting that has rocked the countrys northwest, according to Myanmar officials.

Bangladesh has proposed creating safe zones run by aid groups for the Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine to stop hundreds of thousands of refugees crossing into its territory.

Dhaka had earlier suggested a joint operation with Myanmar forces on the border to wipe out militant and extremist forces, but Naypyidaw has not responded.

In Buddhist-majority Myanmar, many consider the 1.1 million Rohingyas as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

Hasina said last week that Bangladesh was trying its best to support the refugees.

We are also mounting pressure on Myanmar, so that their citizens can return to their homeland, she said on Thursday while addressing a meeting of the ruling Awami Leagues executive body.
Egypts security forces killed 10 suspected militants on Sunday in a shootout during a raid on two apartments in central Cairo, two security sources said.

Three policemen were injured after one suspected militant detonated an explosive device to block their entry into the building and two other policemen were injured during the exchange of fire that followed.

One source said authorities received a tip off about the hideouts of the individuals, who they suspect of being members of Hasm, a group which has claimed several attacks around the Egyptian capital targeting judges and policemen since last year.

Egypt accuses Hasm of being a militant wing of the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist group it outlawed in 2013. The Muslim Brotherhood denies this.

An Islamist insurgency in the rugged Sinai peninsula strengthened after the Egyptian military overthrew President Mohamed Mursi of the Muslim Brotherhood in mid-2013 following mass protests against his rule.

The militant group staging the insurgency pledged allegiance to Islamic State in 2014. It is blamed for the killing of hundreds of soldiers and policemen, and has started to target other areas, including Egypts Christian Copts.
A family from the south coast of England are planning to take legal action against their six- year-old sons school for allowing one of his classmates to wear a dress to school.

Nigel Rowe, 44, and Sally, 42, have withdrawn their son from the school, who will now be schooled at home with his older eight-year-old brother, who had also been removed from the same Church of England school a year ago when his classmate also started wearing dresses.

A child aged six would sometimes come to school as a girl or sometimes come to school as a boy. Our concerns were raised when our son came back home from school saying he was confused as to why and how a boy was now a girl, Nigel Rowe told The Sunday Times.

We believe it is wrong to encourage very young children to embrace transgenderism. Boys are boys and girls are girls. Gender dysphoria is something we as Christians need to address with love and compassion, but not in the sphere of a primary school environment, he said.

The couple argues the school has acted without due regard to the best interests of their son or other pupils; failed to consult other parents; and has not respected their rights as parents to bring up their children with biblical values.

The school, which has not been named, said that it followed Church of England guidance, and said transgender children were protected under the Equality Act 2010.

It added that the local East Sussex County Councils guidance on transgender children set out that they should not be seen as a problem, but as an opportunity to enrich the school community and to challenge gender stereotypes and norms on a wider scale.

Lawyers for the couple are expected to say the school is wrong to rely on the Equality Act because legal recognition of gender reassignment applies only to people over 18.

They will also argue the school is discriminating against the Rowes by implying that their wish to bring up their sons with biblical beliefs is transphobic.

The family is also being supported by the Christian Legal Centre and its chief, Andrea Williams, said, this new transgender ideology is being aggressively imposed on unsuspecting schools, parents and children. It is delusional and abusive.

School classrooms, which should be one of the safest environments for children, are rapidly becoming dangerous battlefields in a war brought on by a radical transgender ideology. Vulnerable children are being used as pawns and will be harmed the most. We need to call it what it is.
Florida residents were asked to stop evacuating and start seeking shelter as violent winds and rains from hurricane Irma has begun pounding the southern tip of the US state, the media reported.

Irmas powerful winds of 74 mph and outer rain bands lashed the Florida Keys late Saturday night as the massive storm slowly began turning from Cubas northern coast up into the Florida Strait, CNN quoted the National Hurricane Centre (NHC) as saying.

With maximum sustained winds of 120 mph, Irma is expected to strengthen once it moves away from Cuba, with the possibility of hitting the US mainland as a Category 4 hurricane.

Irmas eye is expected to cross the lower Florida Keys on Sunday morning before driving up the states west coast in the afternoon, according to the NHC.

So far, at least 36 million people were under hurricane warning Saturday night, CNN reported.

As Irma drew closer to the third most populous US state, officials warned the 6.5 million Floridians under mandatory evacuation orders that they were down to their last hours to make a decision.

If you have been ordered to evacuate, you need to leave now. This is your last chance to make a good decision, Florida Governor Rick Scott said at a news briefing on Saturday evening.

Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Brock Long told CNN: If you didnt evacuate the Keys, youre on your own until we can actually get in there and its safe.

The message has been clear: The Keys are going to be impacted. There is no safe area within the Keys. And you put your life in your own hands by not evacuating.

Since Irma made landfall early Wednesday morning in the Caribbean, at 24 people have been killed so far and has left entire islands in ruins.

The major concern for Florida was the storm surge, which is like a sustained high tide that can cause devastating flooding, warning that it could reach as high as 15 feet in some areas.

A storm surge warning is in place for the Florida Keys, Tampa Bay, and an extensive stretch of coastline wrapping most of the way around the state. At 11 p.m. on Saturday night, it was extended as far west as the Ochlockonee River.

You cant survive these storm surges...Youve got to get out. Youve got to evacuate. This storm is coming. Once the storms here, we cant evacuate anybody, Governor Scott told CNN.

After lashing the Caribbean islands and Puerto Rico, Irma hit Cubas Ciego de Avila province late Friday night as a Category 5 hurricane before it weakened.

Waves as high as 23 feet were recorded, according to Cuban authorities.
She flew in from Tampa and headed for a friends home an hour from the Atlanta airport. But it was getting late and friends suggested the Hindu Temple in Atlanta was a safe alternative, at least for the night. And they took her in.

She is a Muslim from Mumbai, and came to the United States to study at the University of South Florida. And now this, Hurricane Irma, which is expected to make landfall Sunday afternoon. She did not want to be identified.

The Hindu Temple in Atlanta is taking in people as they come in, unannounced but worried for the well-being of their families. We are taking in everyone irrespective of caste, colour or religion, Sai Ram, a trustee of the temple said over phone.

An estimated 6.3 million people in Florida have been asked to move to safer areas to escape the Hurricane, which President Donald Trump said was expected to be of enormous destructive power and urged people in its path to heed to officials.

People have the option of moving into the nearest shelters run by the government, charities, churches and organizations with access to large spaces. Some, like the university student, are crossing into the adjoining state of Georgia to the north or beyond.

From the consulate general in Atlanta, Indian officials are monitoring the situation for Indians and those of Indian descent who need help. They estimate there are about 125,000 Indians in the area, who include students, businesspeople and professionals.

The situation seems OK for this time, said Sandeep Chakraborty, the New York consul general who has moved to Atlanta to oversee Indian governments relief and rescue operations and who has been in touch with Indian American community leaders in most Florida cities.

All Indians in Puerto Rico and US Virgin Islands, which have already been hit by the hurricane, are safe, he added. There were 600 Indians in St Thomas, capital of the US Virgin Islands, for instance, and they have told officials they are all accounted for.

The consulate has set up emergency helplines that will run round the clock. The numbers are +14044052567 and +16787179393 in Atlanta, and +1202 258 8819 for the Indian embassy in Washington DC.

The consulate is working closely with the Indian American community in Atlanta, which has received hundred of families from Florida, some of whom moved into Hindu Temples, and other such large campuses.

Many others have taken shelter with families, who have opened their homes to strangers, people they have never known or met. Nagesh Doddaka, who heads the Telugu Association of Metropolitan Atlanta that is spearheading that effort, said 25 families have already moved in with their hosts, and 30 more were on their way.

Doddaka is taking in two families himself. One of them was driving from Tampa and was an hour away from his home at the time he spoke to Hindustan Times. They were to leave yesterday but kept delaying it till they could.

Florida authorities have marked out areas in the hurricanes path that are under mandatory evacuation orders. If you have been ordered to evacuate, you need to leave now, Governor Rick Scott said on Saturday. Do not wait. Evacuate. Not tonight, not in an hour. You need to go right now.
Hurricane Irmas eyewall slammed into the Florida Keys Sunday, lashing the island chain with fearsome wind gusts. As it bears down on the states west coast where a mass exodus has turned cities into ghost towns.

Irma, packing maximum sustained winds of 130 miles (215 kilometers) per hour, was upgraded overnight to a Category Four storm as it closed in on the Keys, the National Hurricane Center said. Six million people -- one third of the states population -- have been ordered to evacuate their homes ahead of the monster storm.

The eye of the hurricane was 20 miles east-southeast of Key West as of 8 am local time, threatening dangerous storm surges up to 15 feet -- enough to cover a house.

A number of webcams are showing live feeds as Hurricane Irma approaches Florida. Please note that livestreams may go down as weather conditions worsen. Heres where you can watch the storm:

1) Southernmost point buoy, Key West

EVERYONE IN THE FLORIDA KEYS... IT IS TIME TO HUNKER DOWN, the NWS warned before the hurricane rammed into the tropical islands popular as a destination for fishing, boating and scuba diving.

THE WORST WINDS ARE YET TO COME.

2) Lauderdale, Wind gusts in excess of 60 mph

For those still at home, it was too late to flee the wrath of one of the most powerful hurricanes ever to slam storm-prone Florida, after cutting a path of devastation across the Caribbean.

In Key West, police opened a shelter of last resort for those who had ignored evacuation orders.

3) Marathon Florida Cam

4) Downtown Orlando

5) Cruise ship docks in Key West

The cities of Naples, Fort Myers and the densely populated peninsulas of Tampa Bay on Floridas west coast were in the crosshairs of the historic storm, which was churning slowly northwest at eight miles per hour.

Its going to be horrible, Florida Governor Rick Scott said of Irma on NBC television Sunday morning. Now we have to hunker down and watch out for each other.

More than 430,000 homes and businesses were already without power, mainly in southern Florida, according to utility company Florida Power and Light, which said it had safely shut down one of two nuclear reactors at its Turkey Point power plant.

You can watch the livestreaming of the situation at Fort Myers here.
Israeli political leaders lashed out at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahus eldest son Sunday for posting an anti-Semitic caricature aimed at his fathers critics.

Yair Netanyahus meme shows American Jewish billionaire George Soros and a figure that resembles Nazi depictions of world Jewry manipulating former Prime Minister Ehud Barak and two leaders of weekly protests calling on Netanyahu to step down over corruption allegations. The post was shared by former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke and other anti-Semites.

The opposition Labor Partys chairman Avi Gabbay told Army Radio the post crossed every line imaginable, saying it was a very sad day for Israel and the Jewish people when the prime ministers son posts a cartoon that the leader of the Ku Klux Klan agrees with. Barak wondered on Twitter whether Yair Netanyahu, who enjoys a state-funded driver and bodyguard while living at the prime ministers official residence, absorbed such ideology at home.

What is it, genetics or a spontaneous mental illness? It doesnt matter. In any case, we ought to pay for him to have a psychiatrist, not a bodyguard and a chauffeur, Barak wrote. Yair Netanyahu responded by calling Barak a drunk who needed geriatric care.

Yair, 26, has drawn criticism for living a life of privilege at taxpayers expense and for his crude social media posts.

The Netanyahu family is facing a slew of corruption allegations. The prime minister has been questioned about his ties to executives in media, international business and Hollywood. His associates have been engulfed in a probe relating to a possible conflict of interest involving a $2 billion purchase of German submarines. Israels attorney general has said he intends to indict the prime ministers wife, Sara, for fraud over her bloated household expenses.

Yair Netanyahu, who has reportedly taken a leading role in his fathers aggressive social media platform, has also been drawn into the scandals. Australian billionaire James Packer has reportedly lavished Yair with gifts that included extended stays at luxury hotels in Tel Aviv, New York and Aspen, Colorado, as well as the use of his private jet and dozens of tickets for concerts by Packers former fiancee, Mariah Carey.

Police are trying to determine whether these constitute bribes, since Packer is reportedly seeking Israeli residency status for tax purposes.

The prime minister has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing, portraying the accusations as a witch hunt against him and his family by a hostile media. He has resisted increasing calls to step down.
Israeli political leaders lashed out at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahus eldest son Sunday for posting an anti-Semitic caricature aimed at his fathers critics.

Yair Netanyahus meme shows American Jewish billionaire George Soros and a figure that resembles Nazi depictions of world Jewry manipulating former Prime Minister Ehud Barak and two leaders of weekly protests calling on Netanyahu to step down over corruption allegations. The post was shared by former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke and other anti-Semites.

The opposition Labor Partys chairman Avi Gabbay told Army Radio the post crossed every line imaginable, saying it was a very sad day for Israel and the Jewish people when the prime ministers son posts a cartoon that the leader of the Ku Klux Klan agrees with. Barak wondered on Twitter whether Yair Netanyahu, who enjoys a state-funded driver and bodyguard while living at the prime ministers official residence, absorbed such ideology at home.

What is it, genetics or a spontaneous mental illness? It doesnt matter. In any case, we ought to pay for him to have a psychiatrist, not a bodyguard and a chauffeur, Barak wrote. Yair Netanyahu responded by calling Barak a drunk who needed geriatric care.

The 26-year-old Yair Netanyahu has drawn criticism for living a life of privilege at taxpayers expense and for his crude social media posts.

The Netanyahu family is facing a slew of corruption allegations. The prime minister has been questioned about his ties to executives in media, international business and Hollywood. His associates have been engulfed in a probe relating to a possible conflict of interest involving a $2 billion purchase of German submarines. Israels attorney general has said he intends to indict the prime ministers wife, Sara, for fraud over her bloated household expenses.

Yair Netanyahu, who has reportedly taken a leading role in his fathers aggressive social media platform, has also been drawn into the scandals. Australian billionaire James Packer has reportedly lavished Yair with gifts that included extended stays at luxury hotels in Tel Aviv, New York and Aspen, Colorado, as well as the use of his private jet and dozens of tickets for concerts by Packers former fiancee, Mariah Carey.

Police are trying to determine whether these constitute bribes, since Packer is reportedly seeking Israeli residency status for tax purposes.

The prime minister has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing, portraying the accusations as a witch hunt against him and his family by a hostile media. He has resisted increasing calls to step down.
I went fishing to one of my all-time favorite places recently, Lake Kabetogama in the Voyageurs National Park in northern Minnesota. Ive been to Kab many times in the past 15 years.

I go there for several reasons, but mostly because its a world class fishery for a variety of fish. Usually our focus is on the fishing, and on this trip we were going to take our fishing seriously, but maybe not as seriously as we usually do. Heres what I mean.

I was going to be fishing with local angler Travis Carlson. Travis moved to Kab from Iowa a number of years ago: He and his family looked all over the Midwest for a place to buy a resort and to live. They decided that they wanted to live in the Kabetogama area more than anywhere else.

Travis has a wife, a son Riley, and a daughter Jaeleigh. Travis had been working long days much of the summer, and the kids were getting ready to go back to school. Everyone decided that it would be a good idea if Riley and Jaeleigh joined Travis and me for a day of fishing. Im glad they did.

When we fish Kab, we usually target larger fish in deeper water. When youre with youngsters or anyone who hasnt been fishing very long, its important to target fish that want to get caught, and sometimes that means fishing in areas where there are more fish but maybe not the big ones.

We started on a weedline and pulled Fire-Ball jigs tipped with minnows and live-bait rigs tipped with crawlers or leeches. We got bit almost immediately, and, for the next couple of hours, frequently. A good number of perch, walleyes, and sauger were calling this area home. Everyone in the boat was having a good time.

Then the sun came out and the wind quit blowing into the area that we were fishing. The fishing action slowed considerably, so we moved to another area. When fishing slows due to bright skies or no wind, you need to move to another location.

We moved to an area that had some wind blowing into it and the catching started all over, and the walleyes were bigger. On Kab they protect the walleyes with a slot limit. There are lots of eater eyes, but also lots of big ones.

We caught a few more fish, then realized we were hungry, and we did something we rarely do. We stopped for shorelunch. Usually when were fishing eating consists of gobbling down a sandwich as we move from one spot to another.

On Kab there are lots of places that have fire pits to cook in. We found one and soon had a fire going. While the kids swam, Travis cleaned the fish and cooked them over the open fire. Then we ate walleyes that an hour ago were swimming in the lake. Theres just something about eating a shorelunch that makes the fish taste better.

After eating, we tried another spot, caught a few more fish, and called it a day. It was an outstanding day. I doubt that Ill do shorelunch again for a while, but it really was a nice change of pace from our usual fishing outings. It was also good to see kids take a sincere interest in being outside. We fished a full day and never once did I hear anyone say they wanted to go in or do something else. In my book, thats a win.
President Donald Trump has urged any US residents still in Hurricane Irmas path to just get out of its way and not worry about possessions, as he monitored the powerful storms advance on Florida from the secluded Camp David presidential retreat.

Irma was expected to strike the Florida Keys at daybreak Sunday.

Trump called it a storm of enormous destructive power and asked everyone in the storm path to heed all instructions, get out of its way.

Property is replaceable but lives are not and safety has to come first, Trump said at a Cabinet meeting at the Maryland retreat, where he was spending the weekend with his wife, first lady Melania Trump. Dont worry about it. Just get out of its way. Trump shared a brief video of his remarks on Twitter.

This is a storm of enormous destructive power, and I ask everyone in the storms path to heed ALL instructions from government officials. pic.twitter.com/nJfM2Sdme1  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 9, 2017

Irma hammered Cuba Saturday with punishing winds and rain before setting her sights on Florida, where massive evacuations were being carried out.

Trump said the US was grieving for those who were killed by Irma even before she reached the US mainland. The storm left more than 20 people dead in the Caribbean. He said the administration is monitoring the situation around the clock and is in constant communications with governors and other officials from the affected areas.

Weve never seen anything like this, he said, pledging as he did after Hurricane Harvey that recovery and rebuilding will happen quickly.

Trump has been receiving regular briefings on both Irma and Jose, along with updates on recovery and relief efforts that continue in southeast Texas and Louisiana after Harvey, the White House said. Harvey brought record rainfall and severe flooding to Houston and surrounding areas of the Texas Gulf Coast in late August before it moved on to Louisiana.

Elaine Duke, the acting head of the Department of Homeland Security, was scheduled to brief Trump and the rest of the team on the storms Saturday.

In between storm updates, Trump spent part of his fourth Cabinet meeting discussing administration priorities and how to advance them during whats left of his first year in office.

Trump recently launched a public push to rewrite the tax code to make it simpler and more competitive by cutting taxes for corporations and the middle class. He said at Saturdays meeting that he would press for Congress to complete its work on a bill even sooner this year.

I think now, with whats happened with the hurricane, Im going to ask for a speedup. I wanted a speedup anyway, but now we need it even more so, he said in a longer video of the meeting that was released by the White House.

North Korea was also on the agenda. Trump said the Cabinet would discuss North Koreas latest provocative and destabilizing actions and the steps the United States will take to keep our people safe and, frankly, to keep the people of the world safe in this case.

North Korea deepened concerns about advances in its development of nuclear weapons by conducting its strongest nuclear test explosion to date last weekend. Trump said earlier this week that military action against a nuclear-armed North Korea remained an option.

Trump sided with Democrats this week to raise the US borrowing limit and keep the government operating through early December in a bid to speed federal assistance to hurricane victims. Congress acted quickly to pass the $15.3 billion deal and send it to Trump, who signed it Friday after he arrived at the Maryland retreat.

The agreement allowed Trump to taste victory after months of legislative setbacks and whet his appetite for more wins. In addition to overhauling the tax code, the president also wants new spending to upgrade roads, bridges and other infrastructure.

Trump has also given Congress six months to resolve the status of individuals who were brought to the US illegally as children after he decided earlier this week to end an Obama administration program that allowed them to live, work and attend school without fear of being deported.

The president and Mrs. Trump invited members of the Cabinet and their spouses to Camp David for the weekend, the White House said. It marked Trumps fourth visit to the retreat. He met there in August with members of his national security team, but yesterday was the first time Trump had entertained the entire Cabinet there, including Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, who turned 67 on Friday.

In a bit of deja vu, Trump was at Camp David when Harvey struck Texas last month.
Britain on Sunday reiterated its demand that the Myanmar government act to stop violence against the Rohingya minority in the Rakhine province and allow access to aid workers, making the third such intervention on the issue this month.

Foreign secretary Boris Johnson urged state counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi to use her remarkable qualities to end violence and prejudice against the Muslim minority, and several MPs later expressed dismay in the House of Commons at the situation.

The latest voice from the British establishment is that of Priti Patel, International development secretary, who said: The appalling violence in Rakhine must stop now. Britain urgently calls upon the security forces to de-escalate the situation in Rakhine.

Patel called for immediate and full humanitarian access and support for the people and communities affected, and alleged that her department and partners were unable to get the access they needed to reach the victims.

She said: Right now, aid workers are getting British-funded humanitarian assistance to more than 80,000 people in parts of Rakhine state and this work must be allowed to continue unimpeded.

Elsewhere, DFIDs partners are ready to provide emergency food to 30,000 people and to treat more than 3,000 severely malnourished children and pregnant women, but cannot get the access they need. Things must change. The government of Burma must act now and allow this desperately needed help to get through.

Britain, Patel said, will continue to meet the humanitarian needs of vulnerable Rohingya who have fled into Bangladesh, providing over 55,000 people with food and protecting the most vulnerable, including women and girls.

But with more people fleeing for their safety, Britain is immediately releasing a further 5 million from existing funds to provide additional critical life-saving assistance - such as food, shelter, water and sanitation to those who are fleeing the violence, she added.

Patel said Britain was ready to support the recommendations of the Kofi Annan-led Rakhine Advisory Commission to assist the long-term development of all people in Rakhine state, but now the immediate action is for the security forces to end the violence and Yangon to allow humanitarian access.

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At least 34 civilians were killed on Sunday when Russian warplanes targeted ferries carrying them across the Euphrates River near Syrias eastern city of Deir Ezzor, a monitor said.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor initially reported 21 deaths in Russian air strikes but later raised the toll to 34, saying that more bodies have been found in the river.

Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said nine children were among those killed fleeing fighting and that dozens of people were wounded in the strikes.

He said the raids targeted more than 40 ferries that had left Al-Boulil town southwest of Deir Ezzor city for the eastern shore of the river.

The Observatory relies on a network of sources inside Syria, and says it determines whose planes carry out raids according to type, location, flight patterns and munitions used.

Moscow intervened in Syria in September 2015 in support of its ally President Bashar al-Assad.

Sundays reported raids came as Syrian troops pressed an offensive against Islamic State group jihadists across Deir Ezzor province with Russian air cover.

At the same time, an alliance of US-backed Syrian Kurdish and Arab fighters is also on the move against IS in Deir Ezzor.

The Syrian Democratic Forces on Saturday announced they had begun clearing IS jihadists from areas east of the Euphrates, which cuts diagonally across the province.

On Sunday, the Observatory said fighters from the SDFs Deir Ezzor Military Council (DEMC) had made a sweeping advance, capturing territory just kilometres (miles) from the provincial capital Deir Ezzor.
On Friday  the day films are traditionally released in cinemas  a young director walked on stage in a Toronto theatre to applause from the audience. What set this movie apart was that the film was in Assamese, set in a rural quarter of the North East state, and had just had its world premiere at the prestigious Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF).

Village Rockstars is director Rima Das sophomore project. But hers was not the only film on the North East that premiered at the festival  Mumbai-based Paakhi Tyrewalas Pahuna: The Little Visitors, her debut feature, is entirely set in Sikkim.

With these films, both Assam and Sikkim made their maiden entry into TIFF, and the festival offered a glimpse into the life in a region that is often overlooked in India and is barely a blip on the radar for the rest of the world.

Das was pleased at the distinction of making a bit of history for her state and the presence of the region at the festival. Thats great. Im very happy, but more than everything Im happy that were here, she said.

Her film was a journey back to her roots. Das grew up in Chhaygaon village, 58 km from Guwahati. After her debut feature  The Man with the Binoculars  and moving to Mumbai, she returned to Chhaygaon to make a film thats a tribute to the villages inhabitants, and a very personal story about the aspirations of a young girl.

Among its early fans was TIFFs artistic director Cameron Bailey, who selected it for the festival.

I just really fell in love with the film. Its such a lovely portrait of a young girl who is determined to achieve her goals and finds a way to do it in a very remote Assamese village. The filmmaking is just beautiful, he said.

A still from Pahuna: The Little Visitors. (Courtesy TIFF)

Tyrewalas movie was made by Priyanka Chopras Purple Pebble Pictures, and she made it clear that the production house plans on showcasing Indias regional diversity. The entire cast and many of the technicians are from Sikkim, making Pahuna a truly Sikkimese film. What makes this even more significant is that this is the first Sikkimese film ever. So, this bodes well, not only for us, but also towards the growth of the Sikkimese film industry. The fact that Pahuna is premiering at TIFF is also groundbreaking given how nascent the film industry is in Sikkim, she said.

The film is about three Nepalese children, displaced by violence caused by the Maoist agitation and escaping to Sikkim. Tyrewala said: Weve dealt with big issues from a childs perspective.

She did not seek to create a didactic film: I made a conscious decision not to make an intense film, she said, adding that she aimed for a message couched in a gentle, positive, fairytale frame.

A still from Assamese film Village Rockstars, that had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival. (Courtesy TIFF)

In bringing the film to TIFF, Das, a self-taught filmmaker, brought a distant corner of India to the world. That was an objective she shared with Tyrewala: I wanted to take Sikkim not only to Bollywood, I wanted to take it to the world stage. More than excited, Im actually grateful that this has happened; (its) long overdue.

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Hurricane Irma has pounded the Caribbean, leaving at least 25 people dead, destroying thousands of homes and triggering a mass evacuation in the US state of Florida.

After making landfall in Cubas Camaguey archipelago late Friday, Irma is now bearing down on Florida, where authorities have ordered 6.3 million people to evacuate.

Irma, previously a top-rated Category Five storm, weakened Saturday to Category Four and then to a Category Three, packing 125 mile-an-hour winds (205 kilometer per hour). It was expected to strengthen again before hitting the Florida Keys.

A second Category Four hurricane, Jose, is following part of Irmas track, affecting many Caribbean islands that have already suffered catastrophic damage. But it is expected to veer north and pose no threat to the United States.

Toll from Irma

The death toll stands at least 25: 12 in the French island of St Barts and the Dutch-French territory of St Martin; six in British Caribbean islands; at least four in the US Virgin Islands; at least two in Puerto Rico; and one in Barbuda.

The International Red Cross says 1.2 million people have already been affected by Irma  a number that could rise to 26 million.

The bill for loss and damage could hit $120 billion (100 billion euros) in the United States and Caribbean, according to data modelling firm Enki Research.

Barbuda

Irma hit the tiny Caribbean island of Barbuda on Wednesday with winds up to 295 kph. The island suffered absolute devastation, with up to 30 percent of properties demolished, Prime Minister Gaston Browne said.

One person is known to have died on the island of 1,600 residents, apparently a child whose family was trying to get to safer ground.

St Barts, St Martin and Anguilla

Irma then slammed into the holiday islands of St Barts and St Martin, wielding monster winds and torrential rain.

St Martin is divided between France and the Netherlands. France said 10 people had died on its side, while the Netherlands said the storm killed two on the Dutch side, called Sint Maarten.

On the Dutch side, 70% of the infrastructure has been destroyed.

Debris still clogs the streets, many homes are uninhabitable, communications are still down, tens of thousands are without food, water or power, and the authorities are struggling to prevent looting.

In the British archipelago of Anguilla, one man was crushed to death in a house collapse.

British Virgin Islands

Five people have been killed in the British Virgin Islands, according to the local government.

Just east of Puerto Rico, it is home to roughly 28,000 people and includes British billionaire Richard Bransons Necker Island.

US Virgin Islands

At least four people have been killed in the US Virgin Islands, officials told AFP.

Puerto Rico

At least two people were killed in the US territory of Puerto Rico, and more than half of its three million residents were without power after rivers broke their banks in the centre and north of the island.

Dominican Republic

Some 20,000 people were evacuated and more than 2,000 homes affected by floods in the Dominican Republic, the eastern part of the island of Hispaniola, which is also shared by Haiti.

Haiti

Irma brought flooding and caused several injuries in Haiti, but passed further north than had been forecast, sparing the impoverished island the worst. A number of roads were washed out.

Cuba

Irma made landfall on the islands Camaguey Archipelago late Friday. Close to a million people have left their homes to stay with relatives or in shelters and the electricity supply cut as a precautionary measure.

Cuba had already evacuated 10,000 foreign tourists from beach resorts and raised its disaster alert level to maximum ahead of Irmas arrival.

Irma: Where next?

Irma is expected to strike the Florida Keys early Sunday, tracking along the peninsulas western coast, which faces the Gulf of Mexico, rather than the more heavily populated Atlantic side, according to the US National Hurricane Center.

But the storm is so wide that the authorities have ordered 6.3 million people  more than quarter of Floridas population  to evacuate and many residents have joined a mass exodus.

The US military is mobilising thousands of troops and deploying several large ships to help with evacuations and humanitarian relief.

A state of emergency has been declared in Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, Virginia, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands. Georgia ordered the evacuation of the city of Savannah and other coastal areas.

Hurricanes Jose and Katia

Hurricane Jose, after strengthening to Category 4 status, was expected to pass by St Martin and St Barts late Saturday at a distance of around 100 kilometres (60 miles).

Frances meteorological agency warned of a dangerous event of exceptional intensity with 120 kph winds, waves of between six and eight metres (19-26 feet) and up to 100 millimetres (four inches) of rain.

Another hurricane, Katia, made landfall in eastern Mexico late Friday killing two people, just as the country grappled with damage inflicted by its worst earthquake in a century.
Myanmar soldiers barred the entrance to the mosque, men arrived with machetes and petrol cans and then, according to Rohingya Muslim eyewitnesses, the killing began.

Those that ran were hacked to death. Others that got away were shot by the army, said Master Kamal, a 53-year-old teacher, and one of the survivors of the massacre in Aung Sit Pyin in Myanmars Rakhine state.

They were burning houses. We fled to save our lives.

Kamal told AFP he saw three neighbours -- including a father and son -- butchered as he fled, making a 10-day trek across monsoon-drenched hills, rivers and fields to Bangladesh.

Interviews with about 10 people from the village who found refuge at Balukhali camp in Bangladesh revealed horrific details of the events in Aung Sit Pyin on August 25.

That was the day Rohingya Muslim militants attacked police posts across Rakhine, sparking a violent crackdown that has so far driven almost 300,000 of Myanmars 1.1 million Rohingya population across the border.

The stateless Muslim minority blames Myanmars army and Buddhist mobs for the widespread killings.

The testimony is difficult to verify because access to Rakhine is heavily restricted.

Myanmars government has blamed Rohingya militants for the atrocities, including firebombing their own villages and killing civilians suspected of collaborating with the army.

- Everything was burning -

Mohammad Amin, a 66-year-old farmer whose father was a village chief, said his family had lived in Aung Sit Pyin for three generations.

This is the first time we have fled. I have never witnessed violence like this, said the wiry farmer, wrapped in a tattered blue sarong in a mud-splattered Balukhali shanty.

When the shooting began he ran into the jungle to hide, saying he crossed a river to avoid soldiers pursuing civilians.

Families scattered. Amin spent days searching for his seven sons and daughters in the brush, dodging military patrols.

From the other side of the river, I could see everything burning, he said.

Myanmars army says at least 400 people, mainly militants, have been killed in the violence.

But there are fears that figure is underestimated, with other Rakhine villages also the target of alleged massacres.

Many of the refugees from Aung Sit Pyin reported seeing people slaughtered, or passing corpses cut down or burned as they sprinted in all directions from advancing forces.

Twenty-six families who made it out are now cramped underneath a large tarpaulin sheet in a muddy field behind Balukhali. There are no toilets nor clean water.

Some said the journey took seven days. Others said they spent up to 12 days hiding from the military and tackling steep passes and rain-soaked jungle to reach Bangladesh.

Anwara Begum said she plunged into a river with her four-year-old son, as soldiers fired at fleeing villagers.

She clung to debris but lost contact with her other five children in the chaos, saying she hid terrified in the hills while helicopters buzzed overhead.

I thought I would never see them again, the 35-year-old told AFP.

Her other five children aged 12 to 19 linked up with their father at the border and the family was reunited in Bangladesh, she said.

Others have been less fortunate.

Nearly 100 people have drowned trying to cross the Naf river on the border, their bodies washing up on the shore.

Others have arrived bearing injuries consistent with bullet wounds, or missing limbs from alleged landmines placed to deter evacuees from returning.

- I thought I would die -

The sprawling camps inside Bangladesh have swelled with newcomers like Jamal Hussain, 12, who said his five older brothers were cut down by machine gun fire in Aung Sit Pyin as they ran. He has not seen his parents or seven sisters since.

We were all together but suddenly they started firing. I could not look back, because I thought I would die, the softly-spoken boy said.

When I was hiding, I remembered the whole thing. I started crying.

On his shoulder was a welt and scar the size of a small coin, evidence of the splinter of shrapnel or bullet that he said struck his back and passed through.

At first I didnt know what happened, then people behind were saying there was blood on my back, he said.

Myanmar considers the Rohingya illegal migrants from Bangladesh and denies them citizenship, even though many have lived in Rakhine for generations.

Pressure is mounting on de-facto leader and Nobel peace laureate Aung Sung Suu Kyi to end the violence.

Impoverished Bangladesh has been overwhelmed by the influx of hundreds of thousands of Rohingya in the last two years.

For those squatting in the mud in Balukhali there is nowhere left to go.

Taking solace under a plastic sheet, mother of six Begum said she was prepared to beg for a living.

If I have nothing to eat, I will eat soil, but I will never go back.
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Houston's Theater District remains shut down, with properties owned by Houston First - Jones Hall, Wortham Theater Center and the Theater District Underground Parking Garages - in various stages of recovery.

The underground parking garages are devastated. More than 270 million gallons of water flooded the garages during Hurricane Harvey, submerging the three parking complexes that hold 3369 parking spaces for visitors and workers of the Theater District.

As of Wednesday, around 85 percent of that water has been pumped out.

But water removal will be far from the only part of the garage's recovery process. With mold removal, rebuilding, salvaging and cleanup work ahead, Houston First does not yet know when the garages will be reopened, but it will not be open for at least several weeks, said Director of Communications Carolyn Campbell.

Parking will be an issue for organizations that were luckier during the storm. The Houston Symphony, whose home of Jones Hall is slated to reopen by the end of the week, will have to determine if an alternative parking plan exists to accommodate its performances.

To accommodate daytime parking needs, Houston First is finding other parking spots for Houston District employees, using shuttle services to transport people to and from the temporary parking sites.

The Wortham Theater Center, home to the Houston Grand Opera and Houston Ballet, suffers from soggy carpet and drywall among other issues as a result of the Buffalo Bayou breaching its flood gates. The entire basement level was flooded during the storm, as was the stage floor of the Brown Theater. The stage door of the floor is being removed and replaced.

The building still has no power.

Events and performances at the Wortham are cancelled through Oct. 15, forcing the Houston Ballet to relocate its season opening to the Hobby Center. The Houston Grand Opera's planned season opener is "La Traviata" on Oct. 20.

Officials also are worried about the air quality inside the Wortham, and are allowing only vital personnel into the building.

Houston First released never-before-seen photographs of the interiors of its properties, painting a grim image even after days of pumping out water.

But the images are in stark contrast to the state of the garage last week, when water made of sludge and mud rose up to street level.

"This was an unprecedented storm that caused serious damage to one of our city's treasures," Dawn Ullrick, president and CEO of Houston First, said in a statement.
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Jim "Mattress Mack" McIngvale was kicking himself the morning after Hurricane Harvey made landfall for closing his furniture stores while some people could still shop.

Known to millions in Houston because he stars in his own zany television commercials, McIngvale had closed all three of his Gallery Furniture locations on Aug. 26.

"A lot of these small retailers up and down the street were open, and they were doing a lot of business," said the fast-talking entrepreneur, whose antics have included promising to refund customers' money if the Astros win this year's World Series.

Little did McIngvale know that Houston quickly would become a disaster zone - and that he, driven by his faith, would emerge as one of the battered city's most beloved heroes.

On the Sunday after the storm hit land, the 66-year-old entrepreneur rose early to attend Mass at Houston's Assumption Catholic Church.

But he couldn't get out of his driveway. The storm that would dump a record-breaking 50-plus inches of rain on the Bayou City had him blocked in. He was stuck at his house for three hours before he could leave.

The flooded cars on the freeway made him realize the extent of the disaster, as did the "hundreds of calls and emails and texts of people wanting us to rescue them" that greeted him at his original Gallery Furniture location.

When he settled into the store, McIngvale - who can display both his cantankerous and compassionate natures nearly simultaneously - pivoted from selling furniture to rescuing and housing fellow Texans trapped by floodwaters.

His faith, he said, moved him to help.

"My faith defines me. It's who I am," he said. "How am I going to let my people drown? It's as simple as that. I'm not going to let my people drown."

McIngvale dispatched Gallery Furniture trucks to pick up victims. He opened his stores as emergency shelters, offering food, mattresses and clean restrooms to hundreds of evacuees and Texas Army National Guard troops.

He turned his stores into collection sites for disaster relief items, posted a "Pray for Texas" video on his Facebook page that received nearly 3.9 million views, and garnered heartfelt thanks and lifelong customers.

"Just to open his doors and say, 'Hey, I don't care what your situation is; you've got a place to stay here,' I thought it was unbelievable," said Tim Blythe, a Houston oil company sales representative. "He is just an inspiration, and my family will buy all of our furniture from Gallery Furniture from now on. There is no doubt about it."

Fans of McIngvale launched a Change.org petition that has amassed nearly 200,000 signatures. The petition describes him as "a Houston icon that deserves to be remembered forever" and seeks to declare a "Mattress Mack Day" in Houston.

A boat from the Cajun Navy - an ad hoc search and rescue group - picked up Gwen Fay and her two dogs, Abby and Sam, as floodwaters rose in her house. As Fay began her rebuilding effort, she came to Gallery Furniture to get the receipts her insurance company needed for the dining room set, bedroom furniture and other items she purchased from McIngvale during the last 20 years.

"The spirit of Houston is embodied in him," Fay said. "He has always been very generous, just kindhearted."
MASON CITY | A man who died after fleeing law enforcement and rolling his vehicle Thursday was wanted in Cerro Gordo County for unpaid child support.

The warrant for Jerrick Rinnels was for 30 days in jail for non-payment of child support, Cerro Gordo County Sheriff Kevin Pals said Friday afternoon. Pals said he didn't know how much Rinnels allegedly owed.

Further information was not available, as the Mason City Child Support Recovery Unit had closed for the day.

Rinnels, 29, lost control of a 2005 Chrysler 300 at Third Street Northwest and North Jefferson Avenue around 12:45 p.m. He and passenger Jessica Herker, 28, died at the scene, according to law enforcement.

According to the Iowa State Patrol crash report, a Cerro Gordo County deputy initiated the pursuit of the vehicle. The crash occurred after a brief pursuit heading southbound on Jefferson, Iowa State Patrol Sgt. Dana Knutson said Thursday afternoon.

The deputy pursued Rinnels because there was a warrant for his arrest and he did not have a valid driver's license, Knutson said Friday.

The pursuit began near 12th Street Northwest and North Jefferson Avenue, Knutson said. The deputy stopped pursuing the vehicle at Sixth Street.

The time between (the chase) was about 35 seconds, Knudtson said.

Knudtson said that according to video, the vehicle was out of the deputys view at the time of the crash.

The deputy was a ways back, he said.

Knutson said the video will not be released at this time, as investigation is ongoing.

Local law enforcement asked the State Patrol to handle the investigation, Knutson said.

He estimated the full report, which involves a medical examiner's report, could take as long as three to four months.
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There's a new sheriff in town. He was elected and pinned with his badge in the shelter hosted by St. Joseph the Worker Catholic Church on Wednesday following the storm.

It was probably his organizational skills and darn cuteness that won over the votes of all of the folks staying at the shelter, but pre-schooler Ismael Colmenero actually received his badge from a member of law enforcement following a visit to the packed shelter.

Colmenero was there to volunteer along with his mom, two siblings and a cousin.

"They've been troopers working all week," she said about her other two children and her son, the sheriff.

The shelter opened shortly after the rain bands from Hurricane Harvey pounded Liberty County.

"All day Monday watching the news and seeing the devastation, we were wondering what was being done in Dayton," said parishioner Kerri Bartee.

"We couldn't find anyone doing anything at the time so I called our priest, Fr. Ryszard Zawadzki, and told him that we had to do something."

In her calling around, she told him she had discovered a number of their own parishioners who had suffered flooding damage and were needing assistance.

"Who will take care of them and run this?" he asked.

Bartee assured him that with the power of social media, she would muster enough volunteers to help run the shelter.

"We jumped in both feet. When we did, we heard others were doing something similar and we worked together to help meet the needs of the community," Bartee said.

She put the post out on Monday as many as she was already connected to: her school board buddies, her church, her catechism class and friends and by Tuesday morning, the day of her 19th wedding anniversary, she arrived at the church to find volunteers waiting to come in and assist. The doors were no sooner opened than people throughout the community started dropping off supplies, food, clothes, blankets, pillows and toiletries. Before long, they had more than they needed of everything including volunteers.

"People had been watching their tv's and wanted to do something," she said. "They couldn't fix the situation, but they could volunteer and cook meals, hand out clothes. We are so fortunate that we also had a food pantry associated with the Houston Food Bank that we could draw from too if we needed it."

At the height of the recovery, they had sheltered as many as 52 in their parish hall and adjoining education building.

"The first night, we were walking through the education building where we were housing some of our evacuees and we were told that there was a group of Cajun Navy guys sleeping in their trucks with their boats still attached," she said.

Bartee wasn't having that and they reached out to them and brought them back to the church for a more comfortable night's rest and some good 'ole Dayton hospitality.

"We've seen amazing things happen in people's lives with their stay here," she said.

Bartee said they didn't discriminate with who was able to come to the shelter, churched or unchurched.

"We had some who hadn't been in a church in years tell us how much they loved being here and appreciated us embracing them," she said. "We put aside what everyone's backgrounds were and beliefs and such just to be the hands of Jesus."

Garry Masterson, pastor at First Methodist in Dayton, worked with Bartee and combined their few shelter evacuees with hers at St. Joseph the Worker Catholic Church, but Masterson didn't abandon the relationships he and his wife Cindy had cultivated.

"He came and led prayer for us at breakfast," Bartee said, "and we had a Baptist lady working in the kitchen with us."

Masterson laughed that they had a Baptist, Catholic, and a Methodist doing morning prayers together.

"We were all working together to be the hands and feet of Jesus," she said.

Bartee said they evaluated each evacuee's needs as they came into the shelter and then took them over to the supplies to allow them to shop for food, clothes, cleaning supplies, and pull up a chair to eat.

"If they needed a place to sleep, we found them a place and a bed to sleep," she said.

Volunteers also guided those displaced by the floodwaters through the process of applying for assistance online with the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Bartee was grateful to the city for taking care of the trash that was accumulating and the school district for offering showers to the evacuees.

For every evacuee that received word they could go home, they received a thunderous applause accompanied by the well-wishes of those who remained.

She had tears in her eyes as she talked about the youth at the church and around the community who had come in to volunteer. It was overwhelming.

"Someone once said, share the gospel message, sometime use words," she said.

Sheriff Ismael Colmenero is home now directing things at his own home, but ready to return at a moment's notice to help his community out again.
PASADENA, Calif. - A billion-dollar spacecraft named Cassini is about to burn up as it plunges into the atmosphere of Saturn this month. That's the plan, exquisitely crafted. Cassini will transmit data to Earth to the very end, squeezing out the last drips of science as a valediction for one of NASA's greatest missions.

Dreamed up when Ronald Reagan was president, and launched during the tenure of Bill Clinton, Cassini arrived at Saturn in the first term of George W. Bush. So it's old, as space hardware goes. It has fulfilled its mission goals and then some. It has sent back stunning images and troves of scientific data. It has discovered moons, and geysers spewing from the weird Saturn satellite Enceladus. It landed a probe on the moon Titan.

It has also run out of gas, basically, though precisely how much fuel is left is unknown. Program manager Earl Maize says, "One of our lessons learned, and it's a lesson learned by many missions, is to attach a gas gauge."

The spacecraft is tracked in the Charles Elachi Mission Control Center of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. Mission Control is a darkened chamber with no external windows. The room (named after a retired JPL director) is dominated by glowing screens and people peering into consoles. Someone wandering into the place by accident would think: This looks like the kind of place where they fly spaceships.

On the far wall is a screen showing the operations of the three huge radio antennae - in the California desert; near Madrid; and in Canberra, Australia - that together make up NASA's Deep Space Network. As Earth turns, there's always a big dish looking out for Cassini and for JPL's other spacecraft roaming the solar system.

The navigators have a computer model that tells them where the spacecraft probably is and probably will be.

"We need to be able to point instruments to objects. Nothing is static. Everything is moving. The timing is critical," said navigation team leader Duane Roth. "We don't know exactly where Titan is at any given moment, or where Saturn is, or where Cassini is. When you want to propagate that out to some future time, all our errors grow."

But they're getting it done.

Cassini's final orbits have taken it, amazingly, inside the rings of Saturn, where the spacecraft practically skims the tops of the planet's clouds. These orbits can plausibly be compared to Luke Skywalker flying into that narrow trench on the Death Star.

The navigators here at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory do not boast of their prowess, however. For them, it's just . . . math.

"The key is to calculate this change in velocity," said navigation team member Mar Vaquero as she explained a complex set of equations on a whiteboard in her workspace at the lab. "So you use math. You have matrices. And you have partials. Those are changes in your trajectories with respect to each parameter. So you use your matrices, your vectors, position and velocity and your partials to come up with this delta V that you see here."

So they've done the calculations, and they've plotted the trajectory. If the atmosphere is thicker than expected, they might have to send a slight course correction using small hydrazine thrusters. But, really, there's not much to do other than let gravity handle everything, and watch the data come in, and clap, and maybe shed a few tears.

"We're kind of going through the mourning cycle," said Julie Webster, head of spacecraft operations.

"You form a family," said Linda Spilker, the Cassini project scientist, speaking of the team. "Your kids grow up together."

Cassini closes out an era in NASA space science. This is hardly the end of solar system exploration, but it's essentially the end of the first, heroic phase - the initial reconnaissance of the planets.

Sixty years ago, the Soviet Union put the first satellite, Sputnik, into orbit. Within a few years, there were spacecraft flying by the moon, crashing into the moon, even landing softly on the moon. More would go winging by Mars to see for the first time the craters and canyons and volcanoes of that desert planet.

Forty-one years ago, NASA soft-landed the two Viking probes on Mars and scratched the surface looking for signs of life (the results are disputed, but the smart money says the surface is sterile).

This year, NASA marked the 40th anniversary of the astonishing Voyager program - two robotic spacecraft that explored the outer solar system, the first Voyager flying by Jupiter and Saturn, the second flying by Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune - a solar system superfecta, to borrow a term from the horse track. The two Voyagers are now out in the exurbs of the solar system, far beyond the orbit of even the dwarf planet Pluto.

The colossal scale of Cassini is a legacy of the go-big mentality of the early days of space exploration. The United States put men on the moon with a jumbo rocket, and NASA for a long time skewed toward muscle-bound spacecraft even when humans weren't along for the ride.

No single event changed everything, but what happened to a spacecraft called Mars Observer in 1993 certainly had an impact. It was large and fully adorned with instruments. And then, one day shortly before it was to go into Mars orbit, it simply went silent.

Webster was part of the Mars Observer team and remembers how, for many days, JPL staffers tried to reconnect with the spacecraft. But Mars Observer was never heard from again. Webster said that the fuel tanks were being pressurized with helium in advance of the Mars orbital insertion. "Probably the pressurization system had a leak somewhere and it essentially blew up."

Space is hard. Space will break your heart.

"It's like a loss of a family member," Webster said.

By that point, Cassini had already been conceived, the instruments already coming online, and so it was essentially grandfathered in to the old-fashioned go-big protocol. NASA Administrator Dan Goldin wasn't a fan. He had a name for Cassini: "Battlestar Galactica."

Actually, it wasn't simply the "Cassini" mission. It was the "Cassini-Huygens" mission. The Europeans designed the Huygens probe, a separate vehicle that detached from Cassini when it passed close to Titan.

After Cassini, launched in 1997, arrived at Saturn in 2004, Huygens disengaged from the main spacecraft and dropped through Titan's thick clouds. It sent back details of an alien world that possesses a stew of complex organic molecules, including liquid methane. Hydrocarbons rain from the sky. There are lakes and rivers.

It's the only place in the solar system other than Earth known to have rain and open bodies of liquid on the surface.

Cassini also discovered something amazing about Saturn's moon Enceladus: It has geysers spewing from its south pole. Almost certainly it has an interior ocean, sealed beneath ice, that contains great volumes of water and possibly hydrothermal vents.

Someday NASA or some other space agency is likely to send a probe to Enceladus to sample those geysers and test them for indications of life.

"The legacy for which Cassini will be remembered will be Enceladus," said project scientist Spilker.

Exploration begets more exploration. Every mission drops a rope ladder in its wake.

Cassini has slowed down slightly in its final few orbits as it has passed through the outermost layers of Saturn's atmosphere. The drag on the spacecraft hastens the final plunge slightly.

At about 1:37 a.m. Pacific Daylight Time on Sept. 15, the spacecraft will roll into position to enable one of its instruments to sample Saturn's atmosphere as it gets closer and closer to the planet. It will stream data back to the Deep Space Network.

In the final minute of its life, Cassini will fire its thrusters in an attempt to keep its high-gain antenna pointing to Earth. But that is a battle Cassini is destined to lose.

The navigators at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory are still calculating precisely when the spacecraft will send its final signal on Sept. 15. At last report, it will be 4:55 a.m. Pacific Daylight Time, about 13 minutes earlier than the time calculated a couple of months ago.

But it will be already gone, in a sense. It will have been destroyed 83 minutes earlier. That's how long it takes at the speed of light for news to travel from Saturn to Pasadena.

Cassini won't exactly "crash" into Saturn, because it's a gaseous planet and there's no surface to hit. In the last moments, the spacecraft will go into a tumble and lose contact with Earth. Then it will burn up as it plunges through Saturn's atmosphere. It will disintegrate.

And then nothing will be left.

"It'll just be vaporized and completely disassociated," Maize said.

"It will become part of Saturn."

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Video: Stunning NASA video depicts Cassini's finale

URL: http://wapo.st/2q8Wbh1

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Video: The Post's Sarah Kaplan celebrates the accomplishments of NASA's Cassini spacecraft in a mock eulogy. (Monica Akhtar/The Washington Post)

URL: http://wapo.st/2wFcAe9

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MIAMI - The forecasters at the National Hurricane Center are the calm voices before the storm. Even off camera, they speak in a steady register, giving no indication that they are in the path of a violent tropical cyclone.

With Hurricane Irma headed toward Florida, the forecasters have been working around the clock, updating storm tracks and issuing watches and warnings - not only for this killer storm but also for two other hurricanes, Jose and Katia.

This is life-or-death stuff. People have to decide whether to evacuate. Florida has ordered evacuations for nearly 6 million people as the entire state has been imperiled.

The Coast Guard, the National Guard, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Pentagon and the White House all hang on every word and data point from the people here at the center.

And yet, acting director Ed Rappaport remains unruffled.

He says, mildly, "I'll be looking forward to a quieter period."

Irma's journey from the remote Atlantic Ocean through the Caribbean and toward Florida's southern tip has affirmed the improveding forecasting skills of the meteorological community and shown that storm prediction remains an inexact science.

The storms are much more likely to go where the experts say they'll go.

Twenty years ago, Rappaport said, the hurricane center had a "1-2-3" rule - meaning that a day out, the forecast of the storm track was likely to be, on average, incorrect by 100 miles. Two days out, it would be off by 200. Three days, 300.

Today, the two-day forecast is on average within 70 miles, Rappaport said.

"We've cut out two-thirds of the error of the track. That was science and technology," he said.

The practical consequence is that the center now issues a five-day forecast rather than merely a three-day forecast. That gives people more time to prepare.

For residents here in Miami, it also has prolonged the frantic period in advance of the storm.

People began making a run on stores and gas stations and buying up the last plane tickets out of town on Tuesday, for a storm that isn't expect to reach Florida until Sunday.

Forecasters here have repeatedly stated that people shouldn't focus heavily on the precise center of the forecast storm track. The experts have tried to normalize uncertainty, and make people comfortable with margins of error, which is why the "Cone of Uncertainty" has become a regular feature on projection maps in their advisories.

The center's website explains: "Historical data indicate that the entire 5-day path of the center of the tropical cyclone will remain within the cone about 60-70% of the time."

The National Hurricane Center remained Saturday within the Cone of Uncertainty.

The center, which is on the campus of Florida International University in west Miami-Dade County, has been bashed by a hurricane before. In 1992, the center was located in an office building on U.S. highway 1 in Coral Gables, across from the University of Miami.

Rappaport was a young forecaster at the time and remembers being so engaged with the high-pressure job of putting out the 5 a.m. forecast for Hurricane Andrew that he didn't notice that the building was swaying until a colleague pointed it out.

The storm knocked the radome, the domed structure over the radar, off the roof of the building. A wind gauge measured a gust of 164 miles per hour.

"There were cars flying through the air," Rappaport said. "I was relatively new and didn't know what to expect from a hurricane, let alone a Category-5 hurricane."

With Irma approaching, the center has remained a remarkably calm environment. The top forecasters take turns speaking to television stations and networks around the country, and they tend to speak in a neutral, just-the-facts tone.

Mark DeMaria, the center's acting deputy director, employed the same deadpan tone when asked how he feels about Irma. Betraying no emotion, he said, "I'm very concerned about this one."

DeMaria moved to South Florida three years ago and bought a house in the western suburbs, which is what you expect from someone who spends a lot of time talking about storm surge.

"I was thinking maybe it's a little bit nicer to the east, but I'd prefer to live a little further from the beach," he explained.

The hurricane center looks like a hurricane center, with three radio antennae aiming skyward on a side lawn and a forest of dishes on the roof. A stray cat name Pit patrols the exterior. The cat eats a lot, hence the name. The security guards say they're making sure there's a way to shelter Pit during the storm.

An interior hallway is lined with vintage newspaper front pages, hurricane-themed cartoons and photographs of major hurricanes from space.

Peek into an office and you'll see loaves of bread and jars of peanut butter and jelly. It's government work, and survival food is pretty basic.

The spokesman here, Dennis Feltgen, is a former TV weatherman.

"I was one of the very first TV meteorologists out there screaming in the wind," he says.

Feltgen said he sometimes asks his colleagues to be more demonstrative when they're talking to the press or recording advisories for the public - but "they're scientists" he said.

Born in 1952, Feltgen grew up in Florida back when hurricanes seemed to blow through Florida every couple of years. He said he was sound asleep when Hurricane Cleo's eye passed right over the house in 1964.

"My dad put masking tape on the plate glass windows," he says. "Yeah, dad, right."

After all these years in the hurricane business, he still has one regret: As a weatherman chasing hurricanes, he was never in the eye of the storm.

And if Irma holds its current track - with the eye heading west of Miami - he'll have to wait longer.
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Yes, government matters.

Harvey's wrath, and Houston's response to it, taught us a lot about our neighbors, our faith communities, our leaders. But it also has taught us about the importance of institutions, regulations and the need for policies crafted with forethought and courage.

What our government should do, and how much, is a constant debate that often disintegrates into partisan talking points and ideology. A historic flood makes flesh of philosophy.

We may applaud the performance of government on some levels, including the heroic response of first responders and the tough, bipartisan calls of Harris County Judge Ed Emmett and Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner to hunker down.

But let's start asking some tough questions.

What more, for instance, could Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo and his officers have done to save people if his department weren't 2,000 officers short?

What could have been done to safeguard chemical plants and avoid potential disasters such as the explosions at the Arkema plant in Crosby, which has already drawn a lawsuit by first responders who say they were overcome by fumes?

As my Houston Chronicle colleagues have reported, such plants operate under loose federal and state regulation, and after a 2013 ruling by then-Attorney General Greg Abbott, Texans don't even have a right to know what dangerous chemicals are being stored in their neighborhoods.

The Chronicle's Mark Collette and Matt Dempsey have reported that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality are all poorly equipped to inspect plants damaged during Harvey or to look for long-term problems because they are "understaffed, underfunded and don't account for scores of dangerous chemicals."

"Who is going to oversee any of this?" Jordan Barab, a former top OSHA official asked in a recent Chronicle story. "The answer is no one."

Consider this from that same report: President Donald Trump's budget cut OSHA enforcement spending - including inspections - but a House budget committee in July went even further, proposing cuts of $14.7 million, or more than 7 percent. The agency already was unable to inspect most facilities.

In Harris County, we should ask what more officials could have done to prevent flooding. More specifically, whether the devastating, sustained flooding we have seen in neighborhoods downstream from controlled reservoir releases could have been avoided. What if flood control officials had demanded protections, federal funding to pay for it, and tried to curb development in the area around Addicks and Barker?

'Chilling accuracy'

The answers seem clear after The Dallas Morning News last week cited a Harris County Flood Control District report from two decades ago, that predicted with "chilling accuracy" reality experienced by thousands of homeowners.

The report, which concluded the aging reservoir system was severely insufficient, proposed a $400 million fix that could have pushed water toward the Houston Ship Channel more quickly. It also suggested buying out properties at risk and regulating development in the area.

None of it happened. The report was mostly forgotten. Over time, land on the western fringes of the reservoirs filled with rows of brick homes.

Today, many sit mangled and destroyed - a preventable outcome that haunts Arthur Storey.

In a surprisingly candid interview with the Dallas paper, Storey, who was flood control director at the time of the 1996 report, said he regretted that he didn't do more to pressure officials to act, and that he was "not smart enough, bold enough to fight the system."

Storey didn't return my call on Friday, perhaps because he was busy tending to his home, which flooded as well. The longtime public servant, who retired from the county in 2015 at age 78, was clear in his assessment to the Dallas paper:

"This, what we have before us, is a massive engineering and governmental failure. I'm both angry about it and embarrassed about it."

Storey's honesty is commendable, and also heartbreaking.

But no one person is to blame for shortsighted policies. Forward-thinking, long-term investment requires buy-in from every level of government.

It also requires something else: Buy-in from you and me.

We, the people served, must acknowledge that, yes, government matters. Yes, there are some things government can solve or just make better.

Start at the polls

We can't keep electing people openly contemptuous of the government institution that signs their paycheck. Their obstruction is not helpful, or cost-effective. We can't keep demanding ever-lower taxes without regard to the cruel consequences.

As citizens, we have a duty to look beyond our own self-interests, to support investment that protects our neighbors, and to hold elected leaders accountable for doing what's right.

If you're looking for a place to start, here's one:

The U.S. House overwhelmingly approved on Friday $15 billion in aid for Harvey victims throughout southeast Texas. But four of our fellow Texans voted against it: U.S. Reps. Joe Barton of Ennis, Jeb Hensarling of Dallas, Sam Johnson of Richardson and Mac Thornberry of Clarendon.

They're all Republicans, but they have something else in common - none of them represent counties in the direct path of the storm.
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The two caskets lay side-by-side under a cloudless sky  hers crowned with chrysanthemums, roses and peonies, his draped with an American flag  the silence broken only by the roar of the Eastex Freeway.

Belia Rojas Saldivar, 81, and Manuel Quintanilla Saldivar, Jr., 84, were buried Saturday at Brookside Memorial Park in northwest Houston, 10 days after their bodies were found drowned in the van they were riding in to escape rising water in their north Houston neighborhood.

The couple and four of their great-grandchildren: Devorah ("Devy"), 16; Dominic, 14; Xavier, 8; and Daisy, 6; disappeared Aug. 27, when the van became overwhelmed in floodwaters near Greens Bayou. The driver, their son Sammy, managed to escape and get to higher ground, where he was found by Harris County Sheriff's deputies.

CHILDREN'S FATHER SPEAKS OUT: Released from prison in time for the funeral

It would be three days before the waters receded enough for officials to be able to see the van.

Despite the tragedy, the family remains focused on the couple's love story.

"Where one went, the other one went," their son, Ricardo Saldivar, said. "They lived together, they died together."

Belia and Manuel met in Corpus Christi. She was a carhop with a young son, Carlos. He was a young airman stationed nearby. Fifty-nine years later, they would be found in the front seat of a waterlogged van, still holding hands.

Belia developed Alzheimer's disease years before her husband. As his progressed, her health concerns, far more advanced, were always at the forefront.

"He always said, if he died first, he would be worried about grandma and who was going to take care of her," granddaughter-in-law Stephanie Maldonado said.

"With their illness getting worse, they needed to figure out if they were going to separate them, if they were going to keep them together in the same nursing home," grandson-in-law Patrick Gonzalez said.

Manuel often joked with his wife and kids, and despite his steadily advancing Alzheimer's, maintained a sense of humor, once saying that with his wife's memory fading, he could go out and "find someone else."

"She would forget sometimes that grandpa was her husband," Gonzalez said. "He would crack and make jokes about it."

Ricardo Saldivar said he often prayed his parents would die at the same time. After almost six decades of marriage, he wasn't sure that one would be able to carry on without the other.

"I'm so grateful they went together," he said.

Their youngest son painted a picture of loving parents who, despite financial hardships, worked hard to give their five boys everything they wanted, and later became the bedrock of a large, loving, welcoming family.

"They had the kind of marriage that anyone would aspire to have," Maldonado said. "Everywhere he was, she was. They were inseparable."

The Saldivar family lost six members in a storm that has killed over 70 people as of Friday. The four children will also be buried together, with adjacent plots set aside for their parents.

"It was rough hearing about the babies," said Gonzalez, whose daughter, Isabella, was a frequent playmate of Daisy's. "Grandma and grandpa lived a full, happy life. Those kids didn't get the chance to."

Virginia Saldivar, the children's grandmother, and Belia and Manuel's daughter-in-law, said Saturday that the family will work to move on slowly, and will find comfort in the good memories as they work to rebuild their lives.

"They all went together," she said. "And we all take comfort in that."
Hurricane Harvey peppered the John Biggers 1953 mural, Contribution of Negro Women to American Life and Education, with bursts of black mold.

National heritage responders - experts activated when art has been compromised by disasters - showed up Saturday to evaluate the damage on the painting that covers a wall inside the Blue Triangle Multi-Cultural Association's headquarters in Houston's Third Ward. The work featuring Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth and Phillis Wheatley was painted when the building housed the Blue Triangle YWCA.

For years, a leaky roof threatened the mural.

What was an emergency will become a catastrophe without immediate intervention.

Saving the Biggers mural will require a multi-pronged approach: A construction solution for the damaged building, which includes the roof; an art restoration fix for mold on the mural; and a hefty financial infusion to support those projects.

Caretakers went public in January 2016 to plead for contributions to repair the roof  $50,000 for a patch job and $200,000 for a complete restoration. The funding never came. Now, the resolution will cost much more.

Astonishing damage

Two weeks ago, Harvey's unrelenting rain sent water through the roof and walls of the historic building at 3005 McGowen St.

What were warped, discolored ceiling tiles have come down or are inundated with mold. Walls are damp with telltale trickle trails. There are dozens of receptacles throughout the building still catching water.

In a room off the main hallway, the Biggers mural is scarred but stable.

"I am absolutely astonished at the damage that has been done," said Charlotte Kelly Bryant, the association's founding president. She noted that the mural has been "perfectly kept" for more than six decades, including the association's 17 years of owning the building.

Members of an emergency response team from the American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works have come to Houston to assess the mural, as well as the flooded collection of props at the Alley Theatre in downtown's Theater District. Art conservators and a property damage restoration expert wore respirator masks inside the Blue Triangle building.

The mural can be saved. The preliminary diagnosis credits Biggers' use of two coats of white paint to prime the wall, which protected the colors from moisture.

"I am happy to say that, from a structural point of view, the mural looks OK. The paint is all right, and it's not flaking, which would have been a much bigger problem," said Elizabeth Mehlin, a painting conservator from the Boston area who came as part of the emergency response team. "I believe that the mural is salvageable, and now we just need the funding to go ahead and get the building squared away and the humidity levels reduced so that the mural won't be in jeopardy in the future  once we get the immediate mold issue resolved."

Asking for prayers

The mural restoration plan will involve conservation scientists sampling the mold, examining the fungus under a microscope, then applying the same solutions that would repair a similarly injured Picasso or Rembrandt.

Also on site Saturday was Steve Pine, a senior decorative arts conservator at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, who works with the Texas Cultural Emergency Response Alliance. National heritage responders traveled to New Orleans in 2005 after Hurricane Katrina. They also provided services following the 2010 Haiti earthquake and on the East Coast in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy in 2012, Pine said.

The Blue Triangle building, a state historic landmark registered with the Texas Historical Commission, includes a gymnasium, commercial kitchen, meeting rooms and indoor pool. Association supporters are working to preserve the community center, its programs and the mural.

"I ask the prayers of everybody as we beg for assistance," Bryant said.

Biggers, who founded the art department at Texas Southern University, died in 2001 at 76. His is considered one of the foremost artists whose work captured the black experience of the 20th century. Biggers also mentored several generations of Houston artists, particularly muralists.
Lost in Cypress Creek 'Dreamer' and his friends went to Houston hoping to save others

Lost in Cypress Creek 'Dreamer' and his friends went to Houston hoping to save others

Alonso Guillen navigated a small motorboat in 6 feet of choppy floodwater, steering toward an apartment complex off Interstate 45 near the overflowing Cypress Creek.

It was Alonso's first time behind the wheel of the flat-bottom johnboat, designed for hunting and fishing. He and his friends Luis Ortega and Tomas Carreon Jr. had borrowed it before leaving Lufkin, an East Texas town about 120 miles from Houston.

Cries for help buzzed on the Zello app they had downloaded to their phones as people stranded in the high waters brought by Hurricane Harvey begged for rescue.

Luis, 22, took to Facebook Live: "We are here in the Cypress area, if y'all need any help."

The boat rocked in the rough water. "Coming to the rescue!" Luis exclaimed, before the boat veered suddenly to one side. He almost fell overboard.

The group reached the apartment complex. But none of the residents wanted to leave. The trio steered toward another boat with volunteers from Georgia bobbing above a submerged street.

They needed to cross the roaring creek to make it back to their trucks. It had risen so high that there was only a 3-inch gap between the nearby bridge and the water. The bigger boat manned by Joey Leonard and the Georgia crew went first. The boat veered toward the bridge but muscled across.

The Lufkin crew struggled in the current.

"Push the gas!" Tomas yelled to Alonso.

The water shoved them sideways. They hit the bridge, and the boat flipped.

They fell into the churning, murky water. The undertow was swift and strong.

Harvey hit Houston on Aug. 26, unleashing the worst natural disaster in U.S. history and killing more than 70 people in Texas. With first responders overwhelmed, people of every skin color and creed rushed to one another's rescue in the nation's fourth-largest city.

Among them, on the boat that overturned, were three friends: Luis, an American; Tomas, a Mexican immigrant married to a U.S. citizen; and Alonso, a so-called "Dreamer," a recipient of a special temporary permit for some young immigrants.

All three of them were lost in Cypress Creek.

Jesus Guillen, center, talks with Jesse Duron about an area the group of volunteers, made up of friends and family members, had already covered during the search efforts for his son, Alonso, who went missing along with two friends after their boat hit the Interstate 45 road bridge and capsized. less Jesus Guillen, center, talks with Jesse Duron about an area the group of volunteers, made up of friends and family members, had already covered during the search efforts for his son, Alonso, who went missing ... more Photo: Godofredo A. Vasquez, Staff Photo: Godofredo A. Vasquez, Staff Image 1 of / 15 Caption Close Lost in Cypress Creek 1 / 15 Back to Gallery

'A bad feeling'

Two days after the storm hit, Luis was feeling helpless and restless. His mother was home in southwest Houston. His girlfriend was in her apartment in Spring.

Luis and Alonso, a popular DJ at the nightclub owned by Luis' father, hatched a plan and enlisted Tomas, a 25-year-old father of three. They would get a boat from a friend and head down to Houston to help.

Luis didn't tell his dad. He slipped out, knowing he would disapprove.

But Alonso, 31, went to his father, Jesus.

Don't go, he told his son. You could do more here by helping people on the radio, collecting donations, he said. Leave rescues to the professionals.

The father studied his son, outfitted in a camouflage jacket and work boots, his stubborn streak on full display.

"Wear your life jacket," the father relented.

Alonso and Tomas grew up in Piedras Negras, Mexico, but didn't meet until they were living in Lufkin, a city of about 36,000. They took the same bus to school, hung out at the same places.

Don't go, said Tomas' wife, Stefany Carreon.

"I have a bad feeling," she said.

Tomas tried to comfort his high school sweetheart, whom he married seven years ago, allowing him to apply for a green card.

"Don't worry," he said. "It's going to be OK."

Before Tomas left, he brought home a German Shepherd named Max. For months, his children had been begging for a dog. Tomas tried to give his kids everything.

"This dog is going to watch you grow up," he told them.

The three men drove off, but high water stopped them an hour south, at Livingston.

Reluctantly, they returned home. But as the calls for help from Houston became more desperate Tuesday, Aug. 29, they set out again.

'Please, God '

The crew from Georgia watched in horror.

"We've gotta get to the other side of that bridge," yelled Leonard, the 34-year-old Army veteran aboard the boat. "They definitely scooped under the bridge, dude. Definitely they went under."

The crew docked the boat, and Leonard radioed for help as he and his men ran to the other side of the freeway.

About this story Reporting for this story included video taken by rescuers, social media and dozens of interviews with family, friends and authorities.

"The three Hispanic guys," he shouted. "They smacked up against the bridge right when we hit that current. Oh my God."

They yelled into the darkness. But all they could hear was the fury of the creek.

Luis had been pulled under, and his head bashed against the bridge. Over and over he tried to come up for air only to be sucked back down.

He tried to grab the bridge. But the current pulled him away.

For a moment, Luis bobbed up long enough to see Tomas behind him.

Luis was too tired to swim. He grabbed a gas tank floating in the water and held on. He knew it would save him for only so long.

"If anything else pops up," he told himself, "I am going to have to get it."

He saw a tree up ahead and grabbed a branch, dragging himself onto it. Scanning the darkness beyond him, he saw nothing.

"Please God," he prayed. "I don't want to go out like this."

Ronald Schreiber's son heard a faint scream from the front porch of the family's single-wide trailer. A retired truck driver, Schreiber ran down the steps into the rain and hopped on his ATV. He couldn't figure out where the yelling was coming from.

He moved closer to the creek, then cut the ATV engine to see if he could hear anything. He couldn't get close enough. He needed a boat.

Luis didn't know how long he had been there when he saw the silhouette.

"I'm right here," he yelled.

The current was too fierce for Schreiber's small boat.

"We're trying to help," he shouted back.

A Blackhawk helicopter hovered overhead, and rescuers lowered a basket, but the tree was in the way.

Schreiber found a Harris County Sheriff's Office deputy with an airboat. They lifted Luis into the vessel and circled the creek. Are you the only one?

No.

Do any of you have life preservers on?

No.

They steered up and down the overflowing creek five or six times, hardly able to see, and could not find Tomas and Alonso. So they took Luis, bleeding from his forehead, to Memorial Hermann Cypress Hospital.

'Please let me know'

Stefany Carreon's phone rang at 2 a.m. that Wednesday. The man said his name was Chris. He was a friend of Tomas', he said, though she didn't know him. There had been an accident. They were searching for Tomas.

She called Tomas' parents, but they didn't pick up. She awoke her three children, carried them to her car, and headed to their house deep in the woods on Lufkin's southeastern outskirts. She banged on the door.

Tomas' sister, Claudia Vasquez, took over the phone.

"Please let me know as soon as they tell you something," she texted Chris.

He promised that he would.

At 4:19 a.m., he texted again.

"Search was called off till morning. It's too dark and too rough for them to push through. You and your family are in my prayers."

Early that morning, Alonso's older brother's cellphone also rang. Alonso was missing, his cousin said.

He scrambled out of bed, called his father and grabbed his keys. Alonso's father called his wife, who lived 400 miles away in the Mexican border town across from Eagle Pass.

We're going to look for Alonso, he said.

By 5 a.m., Tomas' father was agitated. He needed to do something to find his only son. He, his brother and son-in-law drove through the rain, in the dark, to Houston.

They didn't know exactly where the boat had disappeared but headed to the general direction that Chris had described, stopping at a sheriff's office near Interstate 45 and Cypress Creek. Deputies knew about the accident and told them where to go.

Tomas' relatives surveyed the surging creek. They couldn't find anyone to help with the search. Nearly all of the city's rescue workers were overwhelmed. For a time, sheriff's deputies showed up, then left.

The hours ticked by, frustratingly slow and maddeningly fast. The families knew that the longer they waited, the less likely it would be that they would find either of them alive.

The search heightens

As word of the missing men spread Thursday in Lufkin, volunteers converged where rescuers found Luis, wading through waist-high water.

Tomas' family bought a kayak at Academy.

Alonso's family prepared to launch a boat.

Luis checked himself out of the hospital and arrived with his girlfriend.

"I've gotta find my friends," he said.

Tomas' family called hospitals but couldn't find him.

Alonso's father set up his folding chair on a sandy berm with a view of the cottonwood branch that Luis had clung to and the water moving swiftly below.

A body found

At 1 p.m. that Friday, sheriff's deputies radioed that someone on the Interstate 45 bridge had spotted a body floating downstream on the creek.

Standing on the bank, Tomas' father saw the body below. The man who had drowned was wearing white sneakers.

That's my son, Tomas Sr. said.

Well, we don't know that yet, said Alonso's uncle, Ruben Guillen.

It's probably someone else, Ruben and others said.

No, Tomas' father said, that's my son.

He looks too big to be your son, they said.

My son is kind of big.

Well, he looks too dark, they said.

My son is kind of dark, he replied.

"What was he wearing?" the father asked his daughter on the phone. "Was he wearing white shoes?"

Yes, she whispered.

A mother stranded

At 11 a.m. the next day, Alonso's uncle Ruben leaned on his walking stick on the creek bank, his American flag polo stained with sweat. They had been up and down the banks maybe 30 times.

Everybody loves Alonso, Ruben said. He listens to any story, no matter how boring. He adopts stray dogs from shelters and hosts fundraisers for cancer patients.

"He was," Ruben started, then stopped.

"He is, a Dreamer."

"It's kind of annoying what people say about them," he said, "when they're giving their lives for this country."

Alonso was 15 and his brother, Wilfredo, 14 when they entered the U.S. with six-month tourist visas and moved in with their older brother. They picked up English quickly, made friends easily.

Their brother had married an American and received citizenship. Then he applied for residency for his parents. There was a decades-long backlog for siblings.

His father's application went through quickly, and he received his green card four years ago.

But the mother's stalled, leaving her stuck in Mexico. In 2007, Rita de Guillen told a border agent she was coming to Texas for a wedding. When the agent asked if she had relatives here, she lied.

She said she feared they would figure out her children had overstayed their visas and deport them.

"What mother wouldn't lie for her children?" she said.

In a separate interview with federal immigration officers, one of her sons told the truth. Authorities revoked her visa. She hadn't seen Alonso since.

As soon as she heard he was missing, she went to the port of entry in Eagle Pass and told an agent her son was swept away during Hurricane Harvey rescue efforts, she said. She said she begged for a humanitarian visa so she could come here for a few days. They turned her down, she said, though U.S. border officials dispute that, saying they have no record of her asking for admission.

So Rita grieved with her son Wilfredo, who had been deported because of a drug conviction and could not return to the United States, records show.

A deputy, now a volunteer

Harris County Deputy Steve Mateo pulled up to the creek just before 4 p.m. that Saturday. He and his partner had been searching for people missing in the storm but were now back to regular duties.

Mateo, 53, a father of three and grandfather of three more, was off the clock, here as a volunteer. He wiped sweat from his sunburned cheek and pulled on his backpack.

"If it was my son out here," he said. "I'd want the same thing."

The men gathered around him, offering theories of where Alonso might be.

They piled into trucks and drove past flooded-out neighborhoods to a debris field off Aldine Westfield Road that borders the creek.

It acted like a strainer for the storm. Towering trees caught chunks of roof and a dog house. Low, thorny plants snagged plastic bags and dead rodents. A canister of chlorine rested against a tree.

As they moved deeper into the swamp, men start slipping.

Mateo slid a few feet down a ridge. His pants got covered up to the thigh. He got back up. Two minutes later, he slipped again. Mud caked his class ring and his gold wedding band.

"We need to check this riverbed down here if we can," he said.

They made their way down toward the water, slowly.

No sign of Alonso.

Mateo led them back out to their trucks and paused before climbing into his patrol car.

"Guys, I'm not a professional at this," he said. "I know there's a certain pattern professionals do. Unfortunately, I'm not there."

A friend of Alonso's family, Juan Panuco Jr., shook his head.

"You've all done so much already," he said.

"No we haven't," Mateo replied. "It really kind of aggravates me."

The searchers regrouped back along the creek bed.

One of Alonso's uncles called the Harris County medical examiner. Do you have anyone by the name of Alonso Guillen?

No.

Then the uncle tried the Montgomery County medical examiner. Same answer.

Did they ask you questions? If he has tattoos or birthmarks, someone asked.

The uncle shook his head.

"They don't care," he said.

As the crowd thinned out, Alonso's father told them to have faith.

My son, he said, is a fighter.

Mother's premonition

Alonso's mother struggled to sleep that night. It was stifling hot without a whisper of wind. At 3 a.m., she bolted awake.

She swore something had moved in the room. How could it be? She was alone.

"Oh God," she thought. "My son is no longer with us."

She didn't want to accept it. So she willed herself back to sleep, chiding herself for being so superstitious.

A few hours later, the men waded deeper into the debris field. They launched another boat on the creek, heading upstream this time.

At noon, a man on an ATV stopped by, reporting he had seen two men rescued by a helicopter on Thursday afternoon. Hope rose.

At 12:20 p.m., someone started screaming on the bank on the spot where Alonso's father had sat for days.

"Come on! Vamonos!"

"The rope! The rope!"

Who can swim, a woman screamed.

Alonso's father saw the body floating face down and recognized the camouflage jacket.

"It's my son!"

Alonso's brother-in-law, Raudel Rodriguez, stripped off his jeans and boots and dove into the creek.

"Oh Christ," a woman whispered as the body kept floating downstream.

Raudel pulled himself out of the water and scrambled up the shoulder and tried to reach Alonso but couldn't stretch far enough.

He dove back in, dog paddled, grabbed Alonso's ankle, swam back up to the sandy bank.

Alonso's family circled around his father and steered him away from the water, praying. He thanked God for the time he had with his son.

"Take him to you," he sobbed.

Saying goodbye

The day Alonso was found, the Houston Chronicle published a story reporting that the last body had been recovered and that family members said he was a "Dreamer."

The story went viral.

By Monday, state and federal congressmen reached out to the family. Media descended on Lufkin. Immigration officials put out a statement saying they were working with consular officials to admit Alonso's mother to the U.S. for the funeral.

Early Tuesday, with the U.S. government's blessing, Rita arrived in Lufkin to bury her son.

Hours later, Attorney General Jeff Sessions took to the podium in Washington, D.C., to announce plans to wind down the so-called "Dreamer" program that provided some 800,000 young immigrants with temporary work permits and protection from deportation. Sessions said the program denied jobs to Americans and encouraged illegal immigration. If Congress does not act on the issue in six months, the Dreamers' permits and protection will go away.

Thousands of miles away in Lufkin, Tomas' family wasn't thinking about the politics of immigration. They gathered around his grave site, dressed in white, his favorite color, and released balloons into the sky.

Not far away, on her family's living room couch, Alonso's mother also mourned. She flipped through a coffin catalog. Alonso was her joy, she said. Fearless, like her. Selfless.

"He served God so well that He took him," she told her husband. "He lent him to us for a while so he could do something."

On Saturday, Rita rested her hand on Alonso's coffin moments before he was lowered into his grave at Whitehouse Cemetery in Lufkin.

"Thank you," she said, "for choosing me as your mother."

'Changed my life'

Leonard, the rescuer who saw the boat flip over, was back in Georgia. He and his crew had helped search for Tomas and Alonso before moving on to other rescues.

He typed a long Facebook post late Tuesday night.

"This past week has changed my life," he wrote.

"I literally saw two Mexicans die this week trying to save American people."

They work hard for what they have, he wrote, and "go through hell" to give their families a better life. They love this country.

"Don't forget how we started. Don't forget who we are," he closed. "We are all ancestors of immigrants. Whether you like it or not.

"End of rant. Carry on."

Susan Carroll is an investigative reporter for the Chronicle. Follow her on Twitter. Send her tips at susan.carroll@chron.com.

Lomi Kriel is an immigration reporter for the Chronicle. Follow her on Twitter. Send her tips at lomi.kriel@chron.com.

Dug Begley contributed to this report.
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Tens of thousands of families are beginning an uneven recovery in hotels, rentals, family members' homes and flood-damaged apartments two weeks after Hurricane Harvey unleashed the worst flooding in Houston's history.

The storm cut across economic lines, but the divides between rich and poor are only widening as communities dry out.

The day after fleeing his family's flooding home through a hole in the backyard fence, Scott Davis texted a relative: Was his patio home still available? Davis, 44, offered to pay the asking rent - more than the mortgage on his home in upscale Braes Heights - and within the week, his family was settling in.

Seventeen miles northeast in working-class Northshore, Abraham Gonzalez's family slept two nights above their flooded first floor before moving in with Gonzalez's sister across the street, 13 people in a three-bedroom apartment.

"I don't know if anybody knows how to handle this," said Anthony Gonzalez, Abraham's 23-year-old son.

Officials estimate as many as 136,000 homes and structures in Harris County flooded, but it remained unclear Friday how many were single-family houses, apartments, commercial or public buildings. Nor was it known yet how many Houston-area families Harvey displaced, but local officials agree that securing more stable housing for the region's flood victims is their top priority - and chief challenge - in the coming months.

"Housing, housing, housing," Mayor Sylvester Turner has repeated in recent days. "I can't underscore that enough."

In a break from recent disaster recovery efforts - which placed thousands of families in trailers - Texas is aiming to get residents back into partially repaired homes as quickly as possible by sending in contractors to make basic structural repairs.

"Rather than spend that amount of money on a trailer, can't we do something to actually help people get their house back quicker?" Harris County Judge Ed Emmett explained.

Texas A&M University System Chancellor John Sharp, who is leading the newly formed Commission to Rebuild Texas, said the Federal Emergency Management Agency on Friday still was working through how to suspend some of its regulations to implement such a program, which would be the first of its kind.

The first step, Sharp said, is setting up FEMA disaster recovery centers across the county so people can access in-person assistance, perhaps as early as Monday.

In the meantime, families are making do in precarious arrangements as worries mount.

More than 95,500 Harris County households had been approved for $110 million in FEMA assistance as of Friday, for such needs as rent, home repairs, transportation and medical care.

Separately, FEMA was paying for hotel rooms for upward of 9,500 families in Harris County, and roughly 8,200 people remained in Houston-area Red Cross shelters Friday. Many more may have found their way to shelters elsewhere in the state.

Locally, officials were focused on arranging temporary accommodations for those living in a downtown shelter at the George R. Brown Convention Center, set to close within the week.

Most were thought to have been homeless before the storm, or, like 24-year-old Damon Hale, displaced from unstable housing.

Hale, a former foster child, was paying $100 to $150 a month to stay at a friend's place in the East End but does not qualify for FEMA assistance because he did not have a lease in his name.

"I wish I had gotten them to sign, but I forgot," Hale said.

Warehouse shelter

For residents like Hale who fall through the cracks of other assistance programs, the city is planning to lease a warehouse in east downtown to provide longer-term shelter space for up to 300 people, while also working with the Houston Apartment Association to create a six-month voucher program for 700 families. The initiative is projected to cost nearly $10 million.

Turner's office sent a letter Thursday asking members of the local apartment association to volunteer their available apartments. By Friday afternoon, landlords had registered more than 2,500 vacant units.

"I do not want people leaving this shelter and going to the streets," Houston Housing Director Tom McCasland said. "I do not want someone leaving this shelter and going back underneath a bridge, and we will do everything we can to make sure that doesn't happen."

Among the challenges in launching the program are that Texas landlords may legally refuse to rent to applicants receiving government housing assistance, and that Houston's pre-Harvey apartment glut was concentrated in luxury buildings.

Occupancy for so-called Class A units - those in the nicest and newest buildings - was 82 percent before Harvey hit, according to Apartment Data Services; it was 91 percent in moderately priced complexes.

"It's going to be an issue," said Andy Teas, vice president for public affairs at the Houston Apartment Association. "People have been displaced from units at every conceivable price point."

Landlords on the city's more affluent west side now are benefiting from that imbalance, as wealthier flood victims seek short-term rentals, typically signing six-month leases.

As high-end occupancy ticks up, landlords have started pulling the generous rent concessions they were offering to lure tenants before the storm.

"In all this misery, that's been some good news," said Stacy Hunt, an executive director in Houston with Greystar, an apartment owner and manager based in Charleston, S.C. "There was a ready supply of new construction apartments."

Transition not easy

Middle-tier complexes are filling up, too, as people like Martin Nieto decide $1,147 a month in Timbergrove is preferable to $300 less for an Independence Heights apartment likely to flood again.

The transition will not be easy. Nieto, 53, installs doors for roughly $31,000 a year, and his wife supplements that by working weekends at Sunny Flea Market on Airline Drive

"I have very little left to live on," Nieto said in Spanish. To him, though, the choice was clear. "How can you live like this?"

For those with internet access, the Houston Association of Realtors and home-sharing company Airbnb are among the groups with programs to help evacuees find short-term housing on their websites.

Elizabeth Chaney, a 23-year-old graduate student who lives with her mother in a Kingwood house that did not flood, is hosting a young married couple flooded out of their home in Spring.

Chaney and her mother put their spare bedroom on Airbnb, offering it to an evacuee free of charge.

The couple moved in Tuesday after Labor Day and were set to leave Sunday for temporary housing provided by the husband's employer.

"I think they're definitely going to look at new locations to live because they're tired of living on a major floodplain," Chaney said.

Halfway through a survey of area complexes, Houston-based Apartment Data Services has identified at least 6,668 apartments damaged by Harvey's flooding, with Greenspoint, the Medical Center and the Energy Corridor hit hardest.

By comparison, Apartment Data Services President Bruce McClenny said about 5 percent of the apartment stock was damaged by Tropical Storm Allison, or around 20,000 units.

He also noted that before Harvey, there were more than 43,000 Class B, C and D apartments available.

An increased demand for homes that remained dry through Harvey is likely to boost rents across the city, McClenny said.

"Every time we've had a flood event, prices have increased," McClenny said, citing the Houston area's 6- to 7-percent rent increases after Tropical Storm Allison and Hurricane Ike.

That expected jump - paired with the temporary loss of thousands of low-rent and subsidized apartments - will only further strain Houston's inadequate supply of affordable housing.

"I don't know how quickly and how dramatically it's going to change, but I think affordable housing will unquestionably become more scarce," Houston Housing Authority President Tory Gunsolley said.

The housing authority alone will need to relocate more than 200 families whose public housing flooded, and another 200 to 300 families living in other types of subsidized housing the agency owns.

Meanwhile, HHA is continuing to assess the number of families with housing choice vouchers whose apartments flooded.

Gunsolley had just 11 vacant units to absorb flood victims, meaning most of the housing authority's impacted families are in the same boat as everyone else: staying with friends, family or in a hotel until the federal funding picture becomes clearer.

Daily challenges

Among them is Brandon Polson, who, after spending five nights at the convention center, took an Uber with his wife, their four kids and pet Chihuahua to a motel on Airline Drive.

The family had gotten a FEMA hotel voucher good through Sept. 25.

They stayed one night at the motel but had to leave because Polson's wife didn't have her identification. It was with a bag of documents they forgot on the truck that took them from their flooded Clayton Homes apartment to the downtown shelter just as it was opening two weeks ago.

The family retrieved the bag and now are staying at the Galaxy Motel in Humble, but Polson is not sure where they will go next.

In the meantime, the 33-year-old barber has been doing what he can to make money and set up a Go Fund Me page to collect donations.

Each day brings challenges. The kids are supposed to start school on Monday, but the motel is 12 miles from their school on Jensen Drive.

"We can't Uber them to school every day," Polson said. "It's going to be a tough road."

Mihir Zaveri contributed to this report.
BOISE, Idaho - Storms brought cooler and wetter weather into the Western and Northwestern U.S. this weekend, breaking up a temperature inversion that had blanketed much of the region with acrid smoke from dozens of wildfires.

Officials at the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise said Saturday they expected fire activity to decrease over the next several weeks. Center spokeswoman Kari Cobb says air quality should improve as the smoke-trapping inversion breaks up.

"We should see it lifting more today," she said Saturday. "It's predicted to be mostly gone by tomorrow in most of the West."

She said forecasters expect storms to bring some lightning and winds up to 30 mph, but that rain and higher humidity should decrease the chances of new fires. The center says there are 67 active large wildfires being fought.

Firefighters in drought-stricken Montana used sprinklers and hoses Saturday to try to protect strategic locations near some of the over two dozen wildfires burning in the state that have forced more people from their homes.

Montana has spent more than $50 million on fire suppression since the beginning of July, depleting its reserves account and emergency funds. It plans to cut programs and services to fill a projected $227 million budget shortfall.

A 165-square-mile wildfire burning within the Pasayten Wilderness about 12 miles north of Mazama is the largest wildfire in Washington state.

Officials say the fire is about 40 percent contained but rugged terrain is hampering firefighting efforts.

A wildfire in the Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area is holding at about 52 square miles but residents in communities in three counties remain under evacuation notices and those in other communities have been told to be ready to flee.

More than 900 firefighters are battling the blaze that is 7 percent contained and burning in timber.
BEIRUT - U.S.-backed forces in Syria announced a fresh offensive around the Islamic State's most important remaining stronghold Saturday, accelerating a global scramble for control of the country's oil-rich east.

Islamic State militants are under pressure from all sides in the border province of Deir al-Zour, facing down competing offensives involving almost all of the six-year war's major players, as the extremist group's self-declared caliphate crumbles across Syria and Iraq.

The Syrian Democratic Forces, a Kurdish-dominated militia supported by U.S.-led coalition airstrikes, said Saturday that it would clear the Islamist militants from territory east of the Euphrates River.

"We at the military council decided to start this decisive operation," said Abu Khawlah, a spokesman for the militia. Dubbed "Operation Jazeera Storm."

The offensive will take place in the Khabur River valley, the coalition said in a separate statement, adding that it planned to hand the area over to a civilian council.

"The morale of our forces is strong, and we are ready for victory," Khawlah said.

But in one of Syria's most complex battlefields, that achievement is far from assured. Government forces backed by Russian warplanes and Lebanese militia reached Deir al-Zour city this week, lifting an almost three-year Islamic State siege and boosting President Bashar Assad's argument his forces should retake the country's final Islamic State-held pockets.

According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group, pro-government troops continued their advance Saturday, shelling Islamic State positions while Russian planes launched bombing raids.

In Damascus, Syria's foreign ministry said the advance "foreshadowed the end of terrorism."

With SDF forces in control of more than 65 percent of the Islamic State's de facto Syrian capital, Raqqa, and most of the militant group's Iraqi strongholds recaptured, Deir al-Zour province has become the Islamic State's most important refuge.

Leadership figures are understood to have been sighted in its southern cities of Mayadin and Bukamal, among them the group's most senior leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

Although U.S. officials have insisted they do not anticipate clashes with the Syrian-backed force, the growing complexity of the battleground could make unintended flash points more likely.
Opinion: To change the status quo, we need the youth vote

Also: Your term describing her as an election-fraud crusader more aptly describes an honest, hard-working woman who saw a problem and had the courage to try to fix it.
Katia and Jose? Seriously?

As if it were not bad enough that Houston is still drying out from Hurricane Harvey and South Florida is hunkered down in the face of Hurricane Irma, last week found the newly formed hurricanes Katia and Jose, respectively spinning in the Gulf of Mexico and whirling west across the Atlantic. We face multiple, simultaneous, catastrophes.

But it's not just their timing that has some of us watching weather maps with fearful speculation. It's also the record-shredding ferocity of the two storms that have so far impacted the United States. They've produced superlatives like a Donald Trump press conference.

Harvey dropped more rain on the continental United States than any storm ever has. At about the size of Texas, Irma is a behemoth, not to mention one of the strongest Atlantic storms ever recorded.

And the timing of them, combined with the historic awfulness of them, feels more sinister than simple coincidence, does it not? You find yourself wondering if this might not be a consequence of that inconvenient truth Al Gore has been warning about - if, thanks to global warming, this is just a preview of our ghastly new normal - record-breaking storms lining up like cars at a toll booth to take turns smashing the American coast.

Unfortunately for those of us craving clear cause and effect, the answer from scientists is a bit more nuanced. Asking if global warming caused all this is, it turns out, like asking if old age causes arthritis and bad eyesight. It doesn't, but it does make those things more likely - and exacerbates them when they occur.

Not that everyone sees the same thing when they look at the weather map. Last year, right-wing radio host Rush Limbaugh said that hurricanes are actually part of a vast liberal plot. "It is in the interest of the left to have destructive hurricanes," he said, "because then they can blame it on climate change."

He expanded on that as Irma bore down on South Florida, opining that media and marketers were in on the conspiracy, using hurricanes to drive viewership and sales of bottled water.

"So the media benefits from the panic with increased eyeballs," he said, "and the retailers benefit from the panic with increased sales."

Limbaugh's lunacy reflects right-wing orthodoxy, which favors doing nothing in response to climate change on the theory it's all an expensive boondoggle designed to victimize innocent oil and gas companies. So you get Trump pulling the country out of the Paris climate accord and Florida Gov. Rick Scott forbidding his team to even use the term "climate change." Where the health of our planet is concerned, Republicans essentially ask us to make a wager that science is wrong.

Mind you, no one had trouble accepting science as authoritative last month when it predicted to the very minute a solar eclipse that darkened a great swath of America. But the eclipse threatened no one's money pot. Global warming does. So conservatives pretend science is somehow suspect when it says the planet is warming because of fossil fuels. And we should accept it as just - What? Coincidence? - that the fossil fuels industry donated $55.1 million to the Republicans in 2016 alone?

That money is a wager against our one and only planet. And that feels especially obscene on a day when much of Houston is navigable by boat and a monster storm is bearing down on Florida. Nothing to see here, say the climate deniers. Everything is fine.

Is that dangerous, delusional, and irresponsible? You bet your life.

No, actually, they do.

Pitts is a columnist for the Miami Herald. Readers may write him at lpiits@miamiherald.com.
NEW YORK, Sept. 10, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Wolf Haldenstein Adler Freeman & Herz LLP frees We Shall Overcome, the iconic Civil Rights song. We Shall Overcome, Americas most powerful song, now joins Happy Birthday, the worlds most popular song, in the public domain as a result of an historic ruling issued by Honorable Denise Cote, Federal District Court Judge for the Southern District of New York. After the global success of freeing Happy Birthday, Wolf Haldenstein turned its efforts towards freeing We Shall Overcome, the countrys most powerful song, according to the Library of Congress.



In We Shall Overcome Foundation v. The Richmond Organization, Inc. (TRO Inc.), et al., the plaintiff sought a declaration that The Richmond Organization and its subsidiary, Ludlow Music, Inc., do not own a copyright to We Shall Overcome. The Complaint was filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York in April 2016.

Two months after the original Complaint was filed, producers from the film The Butler joined as an additional plaintiff in an Amended Complaint. The films producers planned on using We Shall Overcome in several critical scenes, including scenes depicting the 1963 riots in Birmingham, Alabama, the 1965 riots in Selma, Alabama, the conflict later that same year at the Pettus Bridge, and the 1968 riots in Washington following the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. The producers repeatedly sought to obtain permission from the Defendants but were repeatedly stonewalled. After much initial resistance, the Defendants demanded as much as $100,000 to use the Civil Rights anthem in the film about the Civil Rights movement.

Wolf Haldenstein argued that the copyrights Ludlow registered in 1960 and 1963 to claim ownership of We Shall Overcome, a song that was in the public domain at least as early as 1948, was flawed. In a ruling issued late yesterday, Judge Cote agreed. In a thorough and well-reasoned decision, Judge Cote granted partial summary judgment for the Plaintiffs, ruling that the Plaintiffs have shown that the Defendants 1960 and 1963 applications for a copyright in the Song were significantly flawed. Judge Cote ruled that the changes to the melody and the songs main verse in the 1960 and 1963 versions, compared to the work already in the public domain, were so trivial and insignificant that they were not original and therefore are not entitled to copyright protection. Judge Cotes decision means that the melody and iconic verse are once again in the public domain and not subject to a copyright claim.

Apart from many other deficiencies in the copyright record, Judge Cote noted that Ludlow failed to identify the original work on which their derivative work was based, hiding the trivial differences in the pre-existing melody and well-known lyrics of the first verse. Ludlow also failed to list Pete Seeger, the songwriter who supposedly changed one of the words in the first verse, as an author in the 1960 copyright application. According to Judge Cote, the Defendants evidence on who actually made that trivial change was equivocal.

Wolf Haldenstein partners Randy Newman and Mark Rifkin and associate Gloria Melwani successfully argued the copyrights invalidity. Mr. Newman stated We are extremely pleased with the court's ruling today giving this iconic Civil Rights song back to the public. We were able to prove that any contribution the defendants made to the song  as to which the evidence was equivocal at best  lacked originality and was not copyrightable.

Founded in 1888, Wolf Haldenstein has extensive experience in the prosecution of complex class actions in state and federal trial and appellate courts across the country. The firms attorneys have expertise in various practice areas, including federal civil rights litigation. Wolf Haldensteins reputation and expertise in class litigation has been repeatedly recognized by the courts, which have appointed it to major positions in complex multi-district and consolidated litigations.

Contact:

Randall S. Newman

(212) 545-4640

newman@whafh.com
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Something happened this year that threw an obscure Conservative MP into the public eye. No one knows for sure, but, in the post-election chaos, someone swore they heard a voice in the background asking, "What about Jacob?" and ever since, everyone has been talking about Jacob Rees-Mogg becoming Prime Minister.

Jacob Rees-Mogg was all over the headlines last month. Like dogs with new toys, the media and the commentariat took Rees-Mogg, shook him up and down and dropped him after something else came along. But Rees-Mogg wasn't old news for long afterward.

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As the situation for the current Prime Minister becomes more and more untenable, Rees-Mogg has been asked here and there about whether he's going to step in. The beleaguered Conservative meme machine, Activate, recently engaged in Rees-Mogg-worship before its creators claimed to have fallen victim of hackers. Most recently, the Old Etonian was cornered on Good Morning Britain, where many viewers were shocked to discover that a Catholic did not approve of abortion or same-sex marriage.

Once again we ask ourselves why the man retains a cult-like following despite being so old-fashioned. Part of the appeal is the amusement to be enjoyed from his anachronistic mannerisms and lifestyle, which he makes no effort to tone down. Rees-Mogg celebrates the work of his family nanny, harks on about centuries-old parliamentary legislation and will tell you all about the perils of socialism. It's easy to sit back and treat him as a source of a good giggle.

It will be harder to laugh if he gets a promotion. Being a minister would give him something to do besides filibuster parliamentary bills and would keep him and his department in the spotlight for much longer. Moggmania will swiftly die out when exposed to regular, proper scrutiny.

But Jacob Rees-Mogg has one key advantage over his rivals. There's no beating around the bush: he's authentic. We can tell him apart from other MPs. The fondness of Latin, the accent, the dress sense that he has imparted to his children... they'e all genuine aspects of his character. What you see is what you get. (Which father would be cruel enough to name his sons Anselm and Sixtus unless he truly believed them to be good names?)

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Granted, authenticity doesn't make his views any better or worse. Just because we know for sure that he certainly does think that abortion is wrong in all circumstances doesn't mean that criticism is forbidden. But it's doing wonders to his image nonetheless. The status quo is getting tiresome and the clamour for radical change grows all the time. Voters are in the mood for something new; they want a break from political centrism, soundbites and spin. That's why more distinctive figures are gaining ground.

Authenticity won Jeremy Corbyn a lot of support. People could make a clear distinction between him and other politicians. In a time when Labour and the Conservatives were so often said to be the same party, Corbyn stood out.

Authenticity also worked for Donald Trump. Americans enjoyed how he spoke his mind and "told it how it is". They liked how he would dispense with political correctness and go straight for the jugular. He had not been carefully crafted and spoon-fed libertarian philosophy and free-market mantras by Republican strategists. When he bellowed and rambled at his rallies, voters knew that he was being himself and not what others wanted him to be.

To draw a theatre analogy: in a world where the top thespians have been reading the script verbatim, the audience is turning to the improvisers and the ad-libbers, the actors who haven't quite mastered their lines or would rather be doing another show.

(Note that I think that Trump lowers the bar for American politics and leadership almost every day. But he got elected and his authenticity contributed to his victory. Tempting as it is to condemn Trump as evil incarnate, we have to be realistic and acknowledge how setting himself aside from other Republicans and defying conventions earned him votes.)

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Back at home, the Conservatives have been thriving on maintaining an image of professionalism. The previous campaigns have been designed to compare a competent and polished Conservative party versus dangerous, untamed, out-of-control Labour spendthrifts. It could be summarised as, "We know what we're doing, they don't."

The 2017 election campaign revealed the facade. Now voters want something they can confidently call 'Conservative'. People are looking past the stale ramblings about long-term economic plans and strong-and-stable governments, written by spin doctors and PR wizards, to someone who can put opinions - good ones, bad ones - into words on his own.
Tim Fitzhigham

Imagine if you will, I'm out rowing in the middle of the English Channel. It's a lovely stretch of water. It's very difficult to row, however, and I'm rowing quite quickly, really, really quite quickly. Fast.

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It's the fastest I've ever rowed in my life. It's so fast that my lungs are beginning to die. And the reason for this incredible burst of speed - some would say legendary burst of speed - is that just behind me, bearing down on me, is an oil tanker.

It's five hundred metres long, and it is bearing down on me with incredible speed, which is why I am rowing faster than anyone has ever rowed in their life. I am desperately trying to get out of the way of that massive oil tanker.

Did I mention, by the way, that I am sitting rowing in a bathtub?

It's in moments like this that you question how these things happened. It started in a bathtub very like the one that I was rowing in, about eight months beforehand. I was lying in the bath, and I had this idea. I was thinking to myself, I wonder if anyone has ever rowed the English channel in a bathtub? And then I started looking it up, and the more I looked it up, the more it looked like no one had ever rowed the English Channel in a bathtub.

I thought, Someone should row the English Channel in a bathtub. And then the more I thought about that, the more I thought, You know what? The person that should row the English Channel in a bathtub, that should be me.

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I said this to some friends of mine. I said, "I'm going to row the English Channel in a bathtub."

And they said, "Good luck with that."

So I started to go into the preparations for this. Now the key preparation was... get a bathtub. So I phoned hundreds and hundreds of bathtub companies, and nobody would get involved in what I thought was an incredible project, until finally one of them wrote back. I got my bathroom company. And not just any bathroom company. I got the finest bathroom company in the entire world to give me a bathtub. Yes, that's right, ladies and gentlemen, I got a bath from Thomas Crapper and Company.

A third of a ton roll-top Victorian copper bathtub. The sort of thing that you see in a museum. A fantastically beautiful piece of bathroom kit. It goes up and has a fluted roll top. It's a gorgeous Victorian artifact.

And on that beautiful artifact, I screwed two outriggers from a rowing boat that would take the center of gravity slightly further out, which would help me to spread the weight over a wider area, so hopefully I'd be more balanced, and I wouldn't sink.

A problem began to arise. The English Channel turns out to be the busiest shipping lane in the world. There are more tankers, container ships, frigates, and just general traffic going up and down that tiny stretch of water than any other stretch of water in the entire world.

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Some of these tankers, as discussed, are huge. But what I didn't realise is that they also have giant stopping distances. Some of their stopping distances are twenty-five kilometres. That means that by the time they have seen you and applied the brake, they have already gone through you, and somebody is calling the undertaker.

They go north to south, these tankers and container ships and frigates. And I have to go from east to west, from England to France. So I am going to be crossing the busiest motorway in the world, at right angles to the direction of traffic, riding a concrete snail.

This is problem number one. The second problem is that half of the English Channel turns out to be owned not by Great Britain, but by the French.

Now. I wrote to the French government and said, "This is what I'm going to do. I'm going to row the English Channel in a bathtub." They were kind, and they were generous, and they were helpful. They sent me tons of stuff to read, and it was like years and years of stereotypes of the French not being helpful to the British were just blown away. And all the time they were going into the French parliament, and passing a new clause in the shipping act of France, making it illegal to row a bathtub in French water. And that, in the context of my plan, was a bit of a blow.

Now I thought to myself, This must be an initiative test, right? So I went to the Ministry of Transport, in Whitehall, and I said, "Now, this is what we're going to do, gentlemen. We are going to register my bath as a British ship."

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And to my shock, horror, and amazement, they said, "Yeah, fair enough, Tim, that's a good plan, yeah, yeah."

They put me on the captains' register. They gave me a small ships' registration certificate. They sent me a letter that genuinely said: "Dear Mr FitzHigham, Please find enclosed the paperwork for your newly registered British shipping vessel [bathtub]. Please keep it with you at all times and in all places, even on the high seas. To assist you in this aim, please find enclosed, we've had it laminated. We think the French are going to want to see this."

I don't think I have ever been prouder to be British than when I looked down and saw in my hand laminated paperwork.

There was another problem that I became aware of, and that is: I couldn't row. I also knew nothing about the sea. Nothing at all. Never been on it.

So I phoned loads of people to try to get someone to talk to me about the sea. I tried all the various organisations I could think of. Nobody had time to talk to me. I tried the Coast Guard. They seemed to be busy.

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In the end, I did what anyone would do in this situation. In total desperation, I phoned the Royal Navy, and by mistake, at the switchboard, I got put through to an admiral.

Now, the only sailor who's ever existed in my entire family is a great uncle. And he said to me, a long time ago, "Tim, if ever you're talking to a member of Her Majesty's Royal Navy, always start the conversation with the question, 'How are your futtocks, old man?'"

What the heck is a futtock? I had absolutely no idea, but I thought, Well, I'll give it a go.

So I said, "Ah, Rear Admiral, how are your futtocks, old man?"

And he replied, "At their furthest reach, dear boy. At their furthest reach."

Now I asked my great uncle about this, and he said, "Yes, Tim, that is the correct nautical response to, 'How are your futtocks, old man?'"

I said, "That's fantastic, Uncle. But what does it actually mean?"

He said, "Well, that's the thing, Tim. Nobody actually knows."

I thought there was something incredibly British about the fact we had both just had a conversation that neither of us had understood a single word of. We might as well have said, "Ah, ostrich hairy gusset strap, Rear Admiral?"

"Yes, Plantagenet blue ass cheese, dear boy."

But the both of us were just too darn British-ly polite to admit to the fact that we didn't understand.

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Now after this slightly weird beginning to the conversation, me and the Rear Admiral are getting on really rather well, and after a while I plucked up the courage to say, "You know this vessel that we're talking about taking across the busiest shipping lane in the world? You do know it's a bath?"

And then the line went dead.

And then the line crackled into life, and the voice said, "Well, same rules of navigation apply, dear boy. I'm on board."

So in one second, I suddenly had the Royal Navy backing the bath project.

Then I decided to do what any great British explorer I'd ever heard about has done in the history of Britain: I decided to write to the Queen, and tell her what I was planning to do and say, you know, "Do you mind if I have a crack at the Channel in a bathtub?" And to my shock, horror, and amazement, she wrote back.

Should we just recap on what's going on here? I've set off to row the Channel in a bath, and I now have a letter from the Queen saying, "Not only do I not mind you rowing the Channel in a bathtub, you have my heartiest support. Good luck, and let me know how you get on." So now, just to get back to where this story started, I'm in a third of a ton roll-top Victorian copper bathtub, there's a tanker bearing down on me. I'm rowing like no one's ever rowed in their entire life, desperately trying to get out of the way of this thing, because about two hours beforehand, I had taken what, as it transpired, was not a very good navigating decision. I had thought, I reckon I could probably get 'round the front of that.

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So I'm rowing in front of the tanker as fast as I possibly can, and my only thought is, I'm about to die. I'm about to get killed in the English Channel in a third of a ton roll-top copper piece of Victorian bathroom equipment. And a thought popped into my head, and that thought was, quite simply - who has right of way?

Now in my bath, I had a radio, and the sailors' almanac. And so as I was frantically trying to row with one arm, I was flipping through the sailors' almanac, desperately trying to get to the page that tells you about who has right of way in the English Channel.

I finally got to it, and it says, massive big tankers (like the one about to crash into me) have to give way to sailing ships. Sailing ships have to give way to rowing ships. Rowing ships have to give way to rowing ships of restricted maneuverability - and that's got to be me in a third of a ton roll-top Victorian copper bathtub.

So I grab the radio, and radioed up to the tanker captain and said, "I am in a bath! I am in a bath! Back down! Back down! I am in a bath! Over."

There was total silence, and then the captain responded, "Do you want me to scrub your back?"

Then the weirdest thing happened...

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The three-year relapse-free survival (RFS) rate for patients treated with the combination was 58%, compared to 39% with placebo[1]





Consistent improvement in RFS observed across all pre-specified subgroups, including patients with stage III A, B and C melanoma[1]





Study demonstrated clinically meaningful improvements in secondary endpoints, including overall survival (OS), distant metastasis-free survival (DMFS) and freedom from relapse (FFR) [1]

First adjuvant targeted therapy combination to demonstrate a clinical benefit in patients with a BRAF V600 mutation[1]





Results from COMBI-AD presented at the European Society for Medical Oncology annual congress and simultaneously published in the New England Journal of Medicine



Basel, September 11, 2017 - Novartis today announced results from a Phase III study of 870 patients with stage III BRAF V600E/K mutation-positive melanoma after complete surgical resection treated with the combination of Tafinlar (dabrafenib) + Mekinist (trametinib) [1] . Findings from the COMBI-AD study, which met its primary endpoint, found a statistically significant 53% reduction in the risk of death or recurrence in patients treated with the BRAF and MEK inhibitor combination therapy versus placebo (HR [hazard ratio]: 0.47 [95% CI (confidence interval): 0.39-0.58]; median not reached vs. 16.6 months, respectively; p<0.001), with no new safety signals reported [1]. Results of the study will be presented during the Presidential Symposium today at the European Society for Medical Oncology Congress (ESMO) in Madrid (Abstract #LBA6), and were simultaneously published in the New England Journal of Medicine[1],[2].

"The efficacy and tolerability of Tafinlar in combination with Mekinist seen in this study represent an important step forward in the treatment of stage III BRAF V600E/K mutation-positive melanoma," said lead investigator Axel Hauschild, MD, PhD, Professor of Dermatology, University Hospital Schleswig-Holstein, in Kiel, Germany. "These unprecedented results confirm a targeted therapy combination has the potential to transform the standard of care in the melanoma adjuvant setting."

"While surgery is a curative option for most patients with localized melanoma, there is a need for improved standard of care therapies for patients - especially for stage III disease, which carries a higher risk of relapse and death following resection," said Vas Narasimhan, Global Head Drug Development and Chief Medical Officer, Novartis. "The COMBI-AD data results address a significant unmet need in patients with stage III melanoma. We look forward to discussing the results with regulatory authorities worldwide."

The COMBI-AD study evaluated Tafinlar + Mekinist among patients with stage III, BRAF V600E/K-mutant melanoma without prior anticancer therapy, randomized within 12 weeks of complete surgical resection. Patients received the Tafinlar (150 mg BID) and Mekinist (2 mg QD) combination (n = 438) or matching placebos (n = 432)[1]. After a median follow-up of 2.8 years, the primary endpoint was met in that combination therapy significantly reduced the risk of disease recurrence or death by 53% vs. placebo (HR: 0.47 [95% CI: 0.39-0.58]; median not reached vs. 16.6 months, respectively; p<0.001) [1]. The relapse-free survival benefit among the combination arm was observed across all patient subgroups, including stage III A, B and C. The estimated one-year, two-year, and three-year RFS were consistently higher than placebo (one year: 88% vs. 56%; two year: 67% vs. 44%; three year: 58% vs. 39%) [1]. The combination treatment group also saw an improvement in a key secondary endpoint of OS (HR: 0.57 [95% CI: 0.42-0.79] p=0.0006, which did not cross the predefined interim analysis boundary of p=0.000019 to claim statistical significance). Other secondary endpoints where the combination demonstrated a clinically meaningful benefit include DMFS (HR: 0.51 [95% CI: 0.40-0.65]), and FFR (HR: 0.47 [95% CI: 0.39-0.57]) [1].

Adverse events (AEs) were consistent with other Tafinlar + Mekinist studies, and no new safety signals were reported [1]. Of patients treated with the combination, 97% experienced an AE; 41% had grade 3/4 AEs and 26% had AEs leading to treatment discontinuation (vs. 88%, 14% and 3%, respectively, with placebo) [1].

In a separate study, Novartis presented Phase II results from BRF113928, showing efficacy for patients with BRAF V600E-mutant metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) without prior systemic therapy for metastatic disease when treated with the combination of Tafinlar + Mekinist (Abstract #LBA51) [3]. Among the 36 treatment-naive patients receiving 150 mg of Tafinlar twice daily and 2 mg of Mekinist once daily, the overall response rate (ORR) was 64% (95% CI: 46%-79%). After a median follow-up of 15.9 months, median duration of response (DoR) was 10.4 months (95% CI: 8.3-17.9 months), and median progression-free survival (PFS) was 10.9 months (95% CI: 7.0-16.6 months) [3]. Median OS was 24.6 months (95% CI: 12.3 months-not estimable), two-year OS rate was 51% (95% CI: 33-67%)[3]. These study results were simultaneously published in The Lancet Oncology [4].

Findings from the study demonstrated clinically meaningful antitumor activity in patients who had not received prior systemic therapy and in patients who had received at least one platinum-based chemotherapy for their metastatic NSCLC, supporting recent approvals by the European Commission (EC) and US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

The most common AEs (incidence >20%) were pyrexia, fatigue, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, dry skin, decreased appetite, edema, rash, chills, hemorrhage, cough and dyspnea.

Additional poster and oral presentations related to the investigational use of Tafinlar and Mekinist in melanoma were also presented at the meeting, including:

Phase II Study of Neoadjuvant Dabrafenib + Trametinib (D+T) for Resectable Stage IIIB/C BRAF V600-Mutant Melanoma [Abstract #1220PD]

Five-year Efficacy and Safety Update From METRIC: Trametinib vs. Chemotherapy in Patients with BRAF V600E/K-Mutant Advanced or Metastatic Melanoma [Abstract #1226PD]

A Phase III Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Study Comparing the Combination of PDR001 + Dabrafenib + Trametinib vs. Placebo + Dabrafenib + Trametinib in Treatment-Naive Patients with Unresectable or Metastatic BRAF V600-Mutant Melanoma (COMBI-i) [Abstract #1259TiP]

KEYNOTE-022 Update: Phase I Study of First-Line Pembrolizumab (pembro) Plus Dabrafenib (D) and Trametinib (T) for BRAF-Mutant Advanced Melanoma [Abstract # 1216O]

A Phase II, Randomized, Open Label Study of Neoadjuvant Pembrolizumab with/without Dabrafenib and Trametinib (D+T) in BRAF V600-Mutant Resectable Stage IIIB/C/D Melanoma (NeoTrio Trial) [Abstract #1256TiP]

Dabrafenib and Trametinib Combination in Real Life Patients Including Brain Metastases: French Experience within MelBase [Abstract #1255P]

About COMBI-AD

The COMBI-AD study is a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, Phase III study and included a total of 870 patients with stage III, BRAF V600E/K-mutant melanoma who had undergone prior complete surgical resection. Patients were treated for 12 months and stratified based on BRAF mutation (V600E vs. V600K) and stage (IIIA vs. IIIB vs. IIIC).

The primary endpoint was RFS. Secondary endpoints included OS, DMFS, FFR, and safety.

About Melanoma

There are about 200,000 new cases of melanoma diagnosed worldwide each year, approximately half of which have BRAF mutations. Gene tests can determine whether a tumor has a BRAF mutation [5],[6]. Patients who receive surgical treatment for melanoma may have a high risk of recurrence because melanoma cells can remain in the body after surgery[7]. Adjuvant therapy may be recommended for patients with high-risk melanoma to help reduce the risk of melanoma returning [7].

About Tafinlar + Mekinist Combination

Combination use of Tafinlar + Mekinist in patients with unresectable or metastatic melanoma who have a BRAF V600 mutation is approved in the US, EU, Australia, Canada and other countries.

The combination of Tafinlar + Mekinist is also approved for the treatment of metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with a BRAF V600E mutation in the US and advanced NSCLC with a BRAF V600 mutation in the EU.

Tafinlar and Mekinist target different kinases within the serine/threonine kinase family - BRAF and MEK1/2, respectively - in the RAS/RAF/MEK/ERK pathway, which is implicated in NSCLC and melanoma, among other cancers. When Tafinlar is used with Mekinist, the combination has been shown to slow tumor growth more than either drug alone. The combination of Tafinlar + Mekinist is currently being investigated in an ongoing clinical trial program across a range of tumor types conducted in study centers worldwide.

The safety and efficacy profile of the Tafinlar + Mekinist combination has not yet been established outside of the approved indications.

Tafinlar and Mekinist are also indicated in more than 60 countries worldwide, including the US and EU, as single agents to treat patients with unresectable or metastatic melanoma with a BRAF V600 mutation.

Tafinlar + Mekinist Combination Important Safety Information

Tafinlar + Mekinist combination may cause serious side effects.

Tafinlar in combination with Mekinist should only be used to treat patients with a change (mutation) in the BRAF gene; therefore, doctors should test their patients before treatment, as patients without a BRAF mutation and with a RAS mutation can be at risk of increased cell proliferation in the presence of a BRAF inhibitor.

Doctors should also consider other treatment options for their patients if they had been previously treated with a BRAF inhibitor as single agent, as the limited data available have shown that the efficacy of Tafinlar + Mekinist is lower in these patients.

When Tafinlar is used in combination with Mekinist, or when Tafinlar is administered as monotherapy, it can cause new cancers (both skin cancer and non-skin cancer). Patients should be advised to contact their doctor immediately for any new lesions, changes to existing lesions on their skin, or signs and symptoms of other malignancies.

Tafinlar in combination with Mekinist, or Mekinist alone, can cause severe bleeding, and in some cases can lead to death. Patients should be advised to call their healthcare provider and get medical help right away if they have headaches, dizziness, or feel weak, cough up blood or blood clots, vomit blood or their vomit looks like "coffee grounds," have red or black stools that look like tar, or any unusual signs of bleeding.

Tafinlar in combination with Mekinist, or either drug alone, can cause severe eye problems that can lead to blindness. Patients should be advised to call their healthcare provider right away if they get these symptoms of eye problems: blurred vision, loss of vision, or other vision changes, seeing color dots, halo (seeing blurred outline around objects), eye pain, swelling, or redness.

Tafinlar in combination with Mekinist, or Tafinlar alone, can cause fever which may be serious. When taking Tafinlar in combination with Mekinist, fever may happen more often or may be more severe. In some cases, chills or shaking chills, too much fluid loss (dehydration), low blood pressure, dizziness, or kidney problems may happen with the fever. Patients should be advised to call their healthcare provider right away if they get a fever above 38.5oC (101.3oF) while taking Tafinlar.

Tafinlar in combination with Mekinist, or Mekinist alone, can affect how well the heart pumps blood. A patient's heart function should be checked before and during treatment. Patients should be advised to call their healthcare provider right away if they have any of the following signs and symptoms of a heart problem: feeling like their heart is pounding or racing, shortness of breath, swelling of their ankles and feet, or feeling lightheaded.

Tafinlar in combination with Mekinist, or Tafinlar alone, can cause abnormal kidney function or inflammation of the kidney. Abnormal kidney function may happen more often for patients with fever or too much fluid loss. Patients should be advised to call their healthcare provider right away if they have a fever above 38.5oC (101.3oF), decreased urine, fatigue, loss of appetite or discomfort in lower abdomen or back. Tafinlar has not been studied in patients with renal insufficiency (defined as creatinine > 1.5 x ULN) therefore caution should be used in this setting.

Tafinlar in combination with Mekinist, or Mekinist alone, can cause abnormal liver function. A patient may feel tired, lose appetite, yellow skin, dark urine colour, or discomfort in abdomen. The liver function abnormality needs to be assessed by laboratory test of the blood. Patients should consult their healthcare provider if they have such experience. Administration of Tafinlar or Mekinist should be done with caution in patients with moderate to severe hepatic impairment.

Elevations in blood pressure have been reported in association with Mekinist in combination with Tafinlar, or with Mekinist alone, in patients with or without pre-existing hypertension. Patients should be advised to monitor blood pressure during treatment with Mekinist and control potential hypertension by standard therapy, as appropriate.

Tafinlar in combination with Mekinist, or Mekinist alone, can cause inflammation of the lung tissue. Patients should notify their doctor if they experience any new or worsening symptoms of lung or breathing problems, including shortness of breath or cough.

Rash is a common side effect of Tafinlar in combination with Mekinist, or with Mekinist alone. Tafinlar in combination with Mekinist, or Mekinist alone, can also cause other skin reactions which can be severe, and may need to be treated in a hospital. Patients should be advised to call their healthcare provider if they get any of the following symptoms: skin rash that bothers them or does not go away, acne, redness, swelling, peeling, or tenderness of hands or feet, skin redness.

Tafinlar in combination with Mekinist, or Mekinist alone, can cause muscle breakdown, a condition called Rhabdomyolysis. Patients experiencing muscle pain, tenderness, weakness or a swelling of their muscles should contact their healthcare provide immediately.

Tafinlar in combination with Mekinist, or Tafinlar alone, can uncommonly cause an inflammation of the pancreas (pancreatitis). Patients should be promptly investigated if they experience unexplained abdominal pain and closely monitored if they re-start Tafinlar after a prior episode of pancreatitis.

Tafinlar in combination with Mekinist, or Mekinist alone, can cause blood clots in the arms or legs, which can travel to the lungs and can lead to death. Patients should be advised to get medical help right away if they have the following symptoms: chest pain, sudden shortness of breath or trouble breathing, pain in their legs with or without swelling, swelling in their arms or legs, or a cool or pale arm or leg.

Mekinist in combination with Tafinlar, or Mekinist alone, may increase the risk of developing holes in the stomach or intestine (gastrointestinal perforation). Treatment with Mekinist alone or in combination with Tafinlar should be used with caution in patients with risk factors for gastrointestinal perforation, including concomitant use of medications with a recognized risk of gastrointestinal perforation.

Tafinlar and Mekinist both can cause harm to an unborn baby when taken by a pregnant woman. Tafinlar can also render hormonal contraceptives ineffective.

The most common side effects of Tafinlar + Mekinist combination include fever, nausea, diarrhea, fatigue, chills, headache, vomiting, joint pain, high blood pressure, rash and cough. The incidence and severity of fever is increased when Mekinist is used in combination with Tafinlar.

Patients should tell their doctor of any side effect that bothers them or does not go away. These are not all of the possible side effects of Tafinlar + Mekinist combination. For more information, patients should ask their doctor or pharmacist.

Patients should take Tafinlar + Mekinist combination exactly as their health care provider tells them. Patients should not change their dose or stop taking Tafinlar + Mekinist combination unless their health care provider advises them to. Mekinist should be taken only once daily (either in the morning or evening, at the same time as Tafinlar). The first and second doses of Tafinlar should be taken approximately 12 hours apart. Patients should take Tafinlar + Mekinist at least 1 hour before or 2 hours after a meal. Do not take a missed dose of Tafinlar within 6 hours of the next dose of Tafinlar. Do not open, crush, or break Tafinlar capsules. Do not take a missed dose of Mekinist within 12 hours of the next dose of Mekinist.

Please see full Prescribing Information for Tafinlar and Mekinist.

Disclaimer

This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements can generally be identified by words such as "potential," "can," "will," "plan," "expect," "anticipate," "look forward," "believe," "committed," "investigational," "pipeline," "launch," or similar terms, or by express or implied discussions regarding potential marketing approvals, new indications or labeling for the investigational or approved products described in this press release, or regarding potential future revenues from such products. You should not place undue reliance on these statements. Such forward-looking statements are based on our current beliefs and expectations regarding future events, and are subject to significant known and unknown risks and uncertainties. Should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or should underlying assumptions prove incorrect, actual results may vary materially from those set forth in the forward-looking statements. There can be no guarantee that the investigational or approved products described in this press release will be submitted or approved for sale or for any additional indications or labeling in any market, or at any particular time. Nor can there be any guarantee that such products will be commercially successful in the future. In particular, our expectations regarding such products could be affected by, among other things, the uncertainties inherent in research and development, including clinical trial results and additional analysis of existing clinical data; regulatory actions or delays or government regulation generally; our ability to obtain or maintain proprietary intellectual property protection; the particular prescribing preferences of physicians and patients; global trends toward health care cost containment, including government, payor and general public pricing and reimbursement pressures; general economic and industry conditions, including the effects of the persistently weak economic and financial environment in many countries; safety, quality or manufacturing issues, and other risks and factors referred to in Novartis AG's current Form 20-F on file with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. Novartis is providing the information in this press release as of this date and does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements contained in this press release as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

About Novartis

Novartis provides innovative healthcare solutions that address the evolving needs of patients and societies. Headquartered in Basel, Switzerland, Novartis offers a diversified portfolio to best meet these needs: innovative medicines, cost-saving generic and biosimilar pharmaceuticals and eye care. Novartis has leading positions globally in each of these areas. In 2016, the Group achieved net sales of USD 48.5 billion, while R&D throughout the Group amounted to approximately USD 9.0 billion. Novartis Group companies employ approximately 119,000 full-time-equivalent associates. Novartis products are sold in approximately 155 countries around the world. For more information, please visit http://www.novartis.com.

Novartis is on Twitter. Sign up to follow @Novartis at http://twitter.com/novartis and @NovartisCancer at https://twitter.com/novartiscancer.

For Novartis multimedia content, please visit www.novartis.com/news/media-library

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References

[1] Hauschild A, Santinami M, Long GV, et al. COMBI-AD: Adjuvant Dabrafenib (D) Plus Trametinib (T) for Resected Stage III BRAF V600E/K-Mutant Melanoma. Abstract #LBA6. 2017 European Society of Medical Oncology (ESMO), September 8-12, 2017, Madrid, Spain.

[2] Long GV, Hauschild A, Santinami M, et al. Adjuvant Dabrafenib Plus Trametinib for Stage III BRAF V600E/K-Mutant Melanoma. New England Journal of Medicine. 2017.

[3] Planchard D, Smit EF, Groen HJM, et al. Phase 2 Trial (BRF113928) of Dabrafenib (D) Plus Trametinib (T) in Patients (pts) With Previously Untreated BRAF V600E-Mutant Metastatic Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer (NSCLC). Abstract #LBA51. 2017 European Society of Medical Oncology (ESMO), September 8-12, 2017, Madrid, Spain.

[4] Planchard D, Smit EF, Groen HJM, et al. Dabrafenib plus trametinib in patients with previously untreated BRAF V600E-mutant metastatic non-small cell lung cancer: an open-label, phase 2 trial. The Lancet Oncology. 2017.

[5] Melanoma Skin Cancer. American Cancer Society. Available at: http://www.cancer.org/acs/groups/cid/documents/webcontent/003120-pdf.pdf. Accessed May 31, 2017.

[6] Heinzerling L, Kuhnapfel S, Meckbach D. Rare BRAF mutations in melanoma patients: implications for molecular testing in clinical practice. British Journal of Cancer. 2013.

[7] Melanoma Research Alliance. Adjuvant Therapy. Available at http://www.curemelanoma.org/about-melanoma/melanoma-treatment/adjuvant-therapy/. Accessed July 7, 2017.

# # #

Novartis Media Relations

Central media line: +41 61 324 2200

E-mail: media.relations@novartis.com

Eric Althoff

Novartis Global Media Relations

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eric.althoff@novartis.com Kristen Klasey

Novartis Oncology Communications

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kristen.klasey@novartis.com

Novartis Investor Relations

Central investor relations line: +41 61 324 7944

E-mail: investor.relations@novartis.com
Bluebeards Torquay

When I wrote for HuffPost previously, I talked about the tragic loss of my friend to suicide, and how this harrowing experience led me to establish the Lions Barber Collective: a charity that works with barbers, barber shops and passionate brands to help raise awareness and offer support to the millions of men around the world that suffer with mental illness in complete silence.

Today, on World Suicide Prevention Day, I'd like to talk more about the mental health epidemic that is plaguing the minds of men, and how barber shops are leading the way in helping to break down the barriers that men have built between themselves and the acceptance that they can (and should) talk about their feelings.

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With the help of premium men's grooming brand The Bluebeards Revenge, we have commissioned an extensive survey that adds more detail to the current mental health picture. As a former Royal Marine's Commando, the brand's Managing Director, David Hildrew, comes from an environment where mental health is particularly prevalent, meaning he was only too happy to offer his support.

Our survey discovered that 58% of men in the UK have never openly discussed anything to do with their mental health with friends and family. It's a startling figure that we are looking to change with the help of our Barber Talk initiative.

Barber Talk educates barbers in how to spot the signs of depression and mental illness in clients that are willing to open up about it. Then, barbers are encouraged to make their clients feel comfortable in a non-clinical and non-judgemental way, before signposting those in need to suitable professional help, such as charities like the Samaritans.

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The research also revealed that men are more stressed today than they were 10-years ago; with a staggering 62% of those aged 35-or-over saying they feel greater pressure in 2017 than they did in 2007. We asked the men we surveyed what was causing their stress and among the top reasons were work (48%), money (27%) and even social media (35%).

Social media is a particularly interesting reason: I often speak with clients that feel they struggle with an over-exposure to networks such as Facebook and Instagram. They find themselves comparing their lives and achievements with other people's filtered internet profiles.

As a barber, I am able to have uniquely close relationships with my clients: they trust me to touch intimate areas such as their heads, ears and even their faces on a regular basis. Add to that the fact that I am often outside of their social circles and a sense of trust and confidentiality is quickly established.

Combine this trust with a surge of customers thanks to current barbering trends and it's easy to see how barber shops have become the number one hang-out spot for men in the UK. Previously it was local pubs, but our survey has proved that 69% of men now say they have a better relationship with their barber than their local landlord or lady.

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92% also declared that they visit their barber at least once a month, with 10% even visiting weekly to smarten up their style and socialise with like-minded regulars. In comparison, only 70% make a monthly trip to their local watering hole.

The only way for us to improve the current situation men face is to provide them with suitable safe havens that they feel comfortable enough to speak within, and encourage more men to open up about their feelings.
LOUISA GOULIAMAKI via Getty Images

Yasin is five years old. When I meet him he is attending a session at Baytna (meaning "Our Home" in Arabic) with his two year old brother and his mother who is pregnant. Yasin's father is missing.

At the session children play, learn and socialise. But none of these activities come easily to him. He is withdrawn, rarely communicative and clings to his mother. The Refugee Trauma Initiative therapist, who is leading the session, takes out a few small mirrors to begin mirror play for toddlers. Yasin's brother takes a mirror and starts to play. Seeing his "doubled" younger brother staring back at him, Yasin becomes animated. He squeals and shouts at the mirror. His mother, pulls him back and presses him to her chest.

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Yasin's younger brother - is one of identical twin brothers. His twin was run over by a car in front of him when the family escaped Syria. "He hasn't been the same since," his mother says recounting the story. Seeing his brother's reflection in the mirror triggers a disturbing reaction in him.

Ensuring that children like Yasin get the support they need is why I am raising money on GoFundMe. His story, though horrific, is not unique. Thousands of refugee children currently in Europe have been exposed to multiple potentially-traumatic events - from losing their home to their families. The impact of these experiences range from the observable symptoms of trauma to subtle changes in a child's behaviour.

Children who have been exposed to these events may find it difficult to regulate their emotions, reactions or behaviour. This can lead to a difficulty in calming down or to or to emotional responses which may be unpredictable or explosive. They may display high levels of anxiety that can manifest in physical pain. Their caregivers, often struggling to cope with the very same trauma themselves, find it difficult and confusing to care for their children.

There is a huge body of evidence demonstrating that the psychological impact of war, displacement, and violence can affect people for generations to come. Studies that range from Vietnam veterans to children in the Balkan conflict in the 90's, evidence the devastating impact of trauma related stress on people's health, wellbeing and capacity to rebuild their lives. Yet very little attention is paid to the psychological and emotional needs of people who are impacted by this.

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I experienced war first hand in Kabul, Afghanistan where I was born. Aged 11, I was forced to flee my home. The consequences of these experiences remain with me today. But I also know how much difference the right support can make.

That is why I co-founded Refugee Trauma Initiative - an organisation dedicated to meeting the emotional and psychological needs of refugees and supporting volunteers and aid workers to better help these communities. We need support from the public to continue this vital work and our fundraising campaign on Gofundme is one way you can help.

Our approach is simple. We create safe spaces for women, men and children to come together to support each other, emotionally and socially. To speak, work through the arts and share their concerns about the present, the past and the future. The safe spaces provide a containing environment guided by the pace of the participants. Our sessions foster hope and help refugees rebuild their emotional states so that they can more effectively address the physical and practical difficulties in their lives.

The RTI team has included, art therapists, psychologists, psychiatrists, and mindfulness practitioners, who usually speak the native languages and understand the culture of the refugees. We use the arts, mindfulness, talking and sharing as ways to help them process the difficult experiences they have gone through. Since our first session in March of 2016 in Northern Greece, we have supported hundreds of refugees in this way.

Yasin, his brother and his mother attend Baytna - our early childhood programme designed to help young children feel safe, calm and allow them to play--an essential part of childhood and learning. The programme is designed to reverse the impact of adversity in early childhood through play, learning and fostering secure attachment.

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When children like Yasin attend our sessions - they benefit from the support of a therapist who ensures that their needs are met. Often this means providing additional support to the whole family - from family visits to one to one sessions with the children.

In Northern Greece, where we work, the refugee population is stuck in limbo with little to no support. Many of the larger NGO's are ending their operations, leaving a distressed population behind. Refugee Trauma Initiative is committed to staying and supporting families like Yasin's.
Williamstown Elementary Committee Moves Regionalization Proposal Forward



School Committee members Joe Bergeron and Cathy Keating participate in Wednesday's meeting. WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass.  The Williamstown School Committee on Wednesday endorsed the continuation of a conversation in Williamstown and Lanesborough about expanding Mount Greylock Regional School District to include its "feeder" elementary schools.

In a 5-0 vote, the panel voted to signal the Mount Greylock School Committee that it wants to meet jointly with the the junior-senior high school committee at its Sept. 19 meeting and that the elementary school committee wants to continue to seek community input ahead of a hoped-for November special town meeting in each of Mount Greylock's member towns.

While declining to go so far as to make an advisory vote to town meeting about the current draft amendment to the regional agreement, the WES Committee members indicated that the funding mechanism developed this summer is an acceptable means of maintaining local control over K-6 education in each town.

"My comment would be that the objections I have heard from the community about regionalization, to my mind, all have been addressed by the proposed agreement," committee member Joe Johnson said. "I can't think of anything someone has brought up that doesn't go 'poof' with this."

One of the main sticking points raised by residents in both towns is the issue of "local control," and a fear of ceding control of the K-6 budget to a regional school district committee. The seven-member Mount Greylock School Committee includes four members who are residents of Williamstown and three who are residents of Lanesborough; all seven are elected by a majority of voters in the entire district.

After the Mount Greylock School Committee earlier this year asked the elementary school committees to take the lead on the regionalization question, the chairmen of the two town school committees, Joe Bergeron (Williamstown) and Regina DiLego (Lanesborough), working with stakeholders in both towns, crafted an amendment that would keep each town's elementary school budget independent.

Following a model used in a few other similar regional school districts, Lanesborough and Williamstown each essentially would receive an assessment from the Mount Greylock Regional School District for the operational costs of their respective elementary schools. The cost of the shared junior-senior high school would continue to be split per the existing formula, which is based on student population.

Dan Caplinger, who as a member of the Williamstown School Committee in 2013 served on Mount Greylock's ad hoc Regional District Amendment Committee, said the current proposed amendment solves an issue that prevented him from supporting a regionalization vote four years ago.

"The other aspect of it that I don't think we quite got to in 2013 was additional research in trying to find ways to apportion the elementary school budget," Caplinger said. "That fact motivated my negative vote on that [RDAC] committee. I share Joe Johnson's comments that the 2013 committee served a purpose of showing we're interested in the process, identifying some lingering issues.

"And now we've addressed those issues and come up with, in my mind, a better solution that preserves the educational gains."

Some of those gains  like aligning curricula between the feeder schools and sharing professional development programs among the staff  have been achieved under the current Tri-District arrangement under which Mount Greylock shares a central administration with the two schools, who operate together under their Superintendency Union-71 agreement.

There also have been financial advantages to both towns of sharing their superintendent, business manager and director of pupil personnel services.

All those gains would be solidified in an expanded region. As it stands now, any of the three schools could pull out of the existing shared services agreement.

And the inefficiencies of having the Tri-District office deal with three different elected school committees and three separate district reports to the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education creates an unnecessary burden that could be alleviated in a full K-12 district, regionalization advocates argue.

That is one reason the Tri-District currently has been operating under an interim superintendent since last fall. The Mount Greylock and SU71 committees decided to hold off on searching for a full-time superintendent until after the regionalization question is settled  keeping the door open for two or three separate superintendent searches if the towns decide not to fully regionalize. As far back as 2013, the first Tri-District superintendent, Rose Ellis, warned school committees that it would be difficult to attract qualified superintendent candidates to take the helm of the complicated three-district structure.

Mount Greylock back-burnered the regionalization question in 2013 after the district was invited to participate in the Massachusetts School Building Authority's program. With the renovated Mount Greylock set to open this spring, the Mount Greylock School Committee revived its RDAC earlier this year. But this summer, it put the RDAC on hiatus and asked the elementary school committees to lead the conversation in each town.

Bergeron said Wednesday that the draft amendment he circulated to the members of his committee has been vetted by the district's legal counsel and staff at the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.

"Counsel has been weighing in every step of the way so we're not spinning our wheels to develop something that counsel and DESE say no to," interim Superintendent Kimberley Grady said.

Bergeron also noted that the concept of expanding the Mount Greylock district to include the two elementary schools should not be confused or conflated with the broader question of countywide regionalization as envisioned by the Berkshire County Education Task Force.

"With no disrespect intended to the task force, there is nothing about the current regionalization topic that is truly related to the task force's input," Bergeron said. "What we're talking about in terms of our own little regionalization with Lanesborough  to me, I don't think of this as a first step. This is something that is potentially mutually beneficial for our towns separate from what happens in the county  which I do care about, but that's not what's before us now."

Caplinger, who serves on the BCETF, said a K-12 region to unite the two towns would dovetail with the kind of shared-services arrangements discussed by the task force.

"I think probably the most important point for us in the short term is that the task force encourages the efforts that districts like ours are making toward collaborations that are much smaller in scope than a single countywide district," Caplinger said. "There is nothing in the recommendation of the task force that seeks to discourage that. One thing that members of the task force have made clear is that a countywide region is an aspirational goal, and it will take bite-sized goals to make it happen."

The WES Committee on Wednesday discussed several dates when it and its colleagues from the Lanesborough and Mount Greylock committees can meet with Williamstown residents to explain the expanded region proposal and take feedback. Principal Joelle Brookner offered to put the subject on the agenda for a Sept. 20 all-staff meeting at the school. Grady said the committees could have tables at each of the Tri-District schools' regularly scheduled year-opening open houses. Bergeron asked for his colleagues' permission to update the Williamstown Board of Selectmen at its Sept. 11 meeting and floated the idea of more listening sessions for the school committee throughout October.

In the short term, the School Committee decided to post meetings for the body to coincide with the scheduled meetings of the Lanesborough committee on Sept. 14 and the Mount Greylock School Committee on Sept. 19.

Two of the Williamstown residents who serve on the Mount Greylock School Committee, Wendy Penner and Steven Miller, attended Wednesday's meeting in the audience.

Miller addressed the committee during its public comment period.

"I have not publicly supported any regionalization plan in the past, as the devil is in the details," Miller said, emphasizing that he was speaking as an individual and not a representative of the Mount Greylock School Committee. "Any proposal must be advantageous, or at least neutral, to each town. As a result of the enormous amount of hard work by many in both communities, the current document is a win-win for both our towns. I am happy to strongly endorse it and encourage others to do so as well."

Draft Mount Greylock Regional School District Agreement by iBerkshires.com on Scribd
Grace Proskin and Isabella 'Izzy' Brown have started the Shire Fire Candle Co.

Pittsfield Sisters Start Up Own Candle Company



Shire Fire Candles was started by the two girls as a family business. PITTSFIELD, Mass.  Grace Proskin and Isabella "Izzy" Brown were on a family trip to Ireland in June when they found a candle shop, seemingly out in the middle of nowhere.

Inside there were tons of candles all inspired by the Irish countryside and the shopkeeper told them all about it. When they got home, they couldn't stop talking about it.

That's when Grace came up with an idea: let's start our own candle company.

"When we came back we were like 'why can't we do this? I really want to do this, this is really interesting.' We wonder, as a family, what it feels like to be in business together, own a family business. All of the candles are touched by our family members," Grace said at her home on Friday.

Her father, Daniel Proskin, found some sample kits online for the girls to learn how to make them. They experimented with different scents and perfected the skill of making candles. Then they developed a business.

"I was not filled in on this. But they decided to start a candle company and they brought it up a few weeks later," Izzy said of the decision to actually start a business, but she said she thought it was a good idea and was all for it.

The entire family, Grace, Izzy, Dan, Alicia Stevenson, and even 3-year-old Emma Proskin, all have roles in the production and they proudly say that everyone in the family touches each and every candle before it is sold.

But Izzy and Grace know who's the boss: they are.

Nearly every day after school, Izzy and Grace start making homemade soy-based candles. And on the weekends, they ramp up production even more.

"They are inspired by scents and colors in the Berkshires," Grace said.

Dan said he and Stevenson inspect the candles and are teaching the girls about making the best product they can to sell.

"We've been working with the girls to make sure the quality of each and every candle they make comes out as good as it possibly can be. Yes, it is a company owned by an 11- and 10-year-old but at the same time, eventually, it gets to a point where if they aren't releasing a quality product, the cuteness factor kind of goes away," Dan said.

And the girl's are loving it. Stevenson said the other morning she was looking for Izzy to get her to school only to find her in the workshop gluing wicks into the jars to prepare for the evening's candle making.

They have three year-round scents right now. The first, MassMoCA, has a chocolatey mocha smell that reminds Grace of the coffee shop there. Life's Precious Moments, which is pink and smells like a rose, is a special product because a portion of each sale goes to Moment's House. And, they have Berkshire Vanilla, which Izzy said smells like an ice cream parlor while Grace feels it is more of a cozy, calm home smell.

Now that fall has arrived, they developed a seasonal line as well. Their most popular is the Apple Cider Donut, inspired by Bartlett's Apple Orchard. Bartlett's even bought 60 of them to sell at the orchard. They also have Apples of the Berkshires, which either smells like an apple shampoo or a freshly picked apple depending on which girl you ask.

And Izzy's favorite of the fall scents: It's the Great Pumpkin Izzy Brown.

"We're still working on the winter scents and the spring scents," Izzy said, as sample jars of scents are neatly organized in their workshop for them to test out and make decisions on what the next line will smell and look like.

The candles come in three different sizes: 8 ounce for $8.99 and 16 ounce for $15.99 at retailers; and a large 22 ounce jar for $22.99.

Grace worked with Proskin on creating a logo for the company, which he and Stevenson print and label the jars. Emma Proskin, at age 3, sticks the warning labels on the back of the jars. The family also created a website and Facebook to market the product.

They started selling at the Downtown Pittsfield Farmer's Market, selling 50 to 60 a weekend, and soon after Bella Sky Gifts, in Adams, reached out to them asking to carry the product in its store.

"In the first couple weeks, they sold all of the Apple Cider Donut, all gone. So we had to keep bringing it to them," Grace said.

Dan then set his daughters up with a meeting with Bartlett's and the Berkshire Museum. But, he's not doing the selling. The girls are asked to go into the stores and make the pitch.

"Other than the financial piece, I try to stay out of it. I let them go in and do the same spiel they do at the farmer's market, show the scents," Proskin said.

They are now selling in four different shops and have loaded up a slate of fairs and events to sell at. The big one coming up is the Lenox Apple Squeeze.

"I 100 percent believe we are going to sell all of our Apple Cider Donut at the Lenox Apple Squeeze and we aren't going to have any more. So we need to make extras and way more than we normally have. We need to make a bunch of candles," Grace said.

When a new cafe opens inside the Berkshire Organics building, the family is leasing space on the shelves to sell candles there  giving them their own mini candle shop. In the future, Izzy envisions an entire store with their products.

"I want to see them at a full out candle shop, one that sells candles and nothing else," Izzy said.

At age 10 and 11, there is still plenty of time to make that happen. But Proskin says the girls are already learning what it takes to grow a successful business.

"I think it is cool at such a young age to be able to teach them about profit margins and what the difference of a retail sale direct to the customer is versus a wholesale sale to a retailer, show them what the difference we make on a candle between the two," he said. "

They are also learning about marketing. They are learning about sales. They are learning about things that I didn't learn in school. It is kind of cool to see them going through this process at such a young age and get some life skills."
On Aug. 21, President Donald Trump rolled out yet another U.S. strategy to try to bring closure to the war in Afghanistan. The core of the new strategy is based on the idea that U.S. support for Afghanistan is not unlimited and that Washington should not be engaged in nation-building in the country  even though it is not opting for a rapid withdrawal. Though Trump praised the Afghan government and its security forces, his remarks indirectly made the point that outside powers cannot build nations when the domestic stakeholders are not ready to agree on a constitutional order.

We wrote in May about how the U.S. militarys continued involvement in Afghanistan only delays the inevitable . When the U.S. military invaded Afghanistan in October 2001, it hoped to lay the foundations for a democratic Afghanistan. The new government was supposed to keep Afghanistan from again becoming a launch pad for transnational jihadists. Yet today, the jihadist insurgency is gaining ground quickly. Al-Qaida has been seriously degraded in the country, but the Taliban insurgency has kept growing, and the Islamic State is now increasingly active in many parts of the country. Adding 4,000 U.S. troops to the 8,000 already there will not make a difference. Even with 100,000 troops in the country as recently as 2011, Washington couldnt quell the insurgency.

For years the U.S. searched for a strategy to justify its exit. It hoped that over time, with the support of American troops, Afghan security forces would be able to fight their way to a stalemate that would force the Taliban to the table. But Afghan security forces have never gotten over their chronic weaknesses. The blame cannot fall solely on the men and women in uniform, however; they are only as mature as the political system they are defending. Warlord Government Afghanistans more fundamental problem is that the central government has scarcely any influence over the rest of the country. Afghanistan hasnt had a real state since its Marxist regime fell in 1992, and even then it was dealing with a serious insurgency. At that point, the Islamist factions that fought the communists and their Soviet allies turned their guns on one another  a conflict that gave rise to the Taliban. After the West toppled the Taliban regime after 9/11, it brought those old, mostly Islamist warlords together to form a democratic regime.

This effort  relying on a patchwork of warlords with only local or regional influence who didnt even share ethnic and linguistic backgrounds  was never going to work. The only thing that bound the warlords together was their hatred of the Taliban. But the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan was founded anyway, and it muddled through the years of the Hamid Karzai presidency (2002-14), mostly because the U.S.-led NATO task force had a large presence in theater at the time. By 2014, with most of the Western troops gone and the shared fear of the Taliban long forgotten, internal rivalries bubbled to the surface.

The 2014 election to choose Karzais successor ended in controversy. Ashraf Ghani was declared the winner, but his victory was challenged by his rival, Abdullah Abdullah. Then-U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry pushed the two sides toward a compromise whereby Ghani would serve as president and Abdullah as chief executive. The arrangement was meant to be temporary until a more robust power-sharing mechanism through a constitutional amendment could be found. That hasnt happened, and the deal has since expired, creating more infighting.

As if that werent enough, other warlords have entered the fray. The most notable is Pashtun Islamist insurgent leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who, after years in the political wilderness, cut a deal with Kabul that allowed his movement, Hezb-e-Islami, to join the political mainstream. His return to politics hasnt exactly restored calm to the country. For example, a few days ago he criticized the fact that some 600 military generals come from the mostly Tajik province of Panjsher. The Tajiks and Pashtuns have a long-running rivalry, and comments such as this undermine what little military power Kabul has. The Tajik Islamist party Jamiat-i-Islami, Hekmatyars historical rivals, reacted sharply, saying that he was sowing ethnic and linguistic discontent in the country. Stay the Course In addition to these divisions, the Afghan armed forces suffer from another problem: too many generals. In fact, the military has more than a thousand of them. The situation arose from the fact that top figures from so many different factions have been incorporated into the security system to keep the peace. But instead of advancing the national interest and fighting the Taliban jihadists, too many of these generals are focused on advancing their own partisan interests.

And this is the core problem of Afghanistan: It lacks a social contract to tie the various factions together. The U.S. military cant hold this patchwork of a state together, and although the Trump administration has decided to stay the course, its unlikely that Washington will continue to squander resources like this for too long. A full withdrawal is not just the preferred course of action for Trump and his more ideological advisers  its also an option that is slowly gaining mainstream appeal. U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during his address to the nation from Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall in Arlington, Virginia, on Aug. 21, 2017. NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/Getty Images In a recent article in the Atlantic, noted realist scholar and MIT professor Barry Posen called for an American military withdrawal, which would force others Russia, Iran, Pakistan and others in the region to deal with the war-torn country. In such a scenario, the two countries that would play a lead role would be Pakistan and Iran. A U.S. withdrawal would lead to the collapse of a regime the West spent 15 years nurturing  hence why Trumps strategy is based on a compromise between the presidents preference for a rapid pullout and the open-ended commitment his generals sought. This doesnt mean the Taliban will soon come to power, but it does mean that Afghanistan would return to the intra-Islamist warfare that it experienced in the 1990s.

In years past, the battle lines were clear between the Taliban and the anti-Taliban factions under the old Northern Alliance umbrella. The situation today is far messier. The Taliban are internally divided and are being challenged by the Islamic State. On the other side, the factions that make up the anti-Taliban camp are at each others throats. The other governments in the region also dont have clear sides. Pakistan no longer holds the influence over the Taliban that it once held and believes the rise of the Taliban will make its own jihadist problems worse. Pakistan would also risk greater anarchy if it cracks down on the Afghan Taliban sanctuaries on its soil as Trumps new strategy demands, which means there will be a reckoning between Washington and Islamabad. Meanwhile, Iran, Russia and China have moved beyond simply siding with the enemies of the Taliban and have cultivated a significant degree of influence with the main Afghan jihadist movement.

The continued presence of American forces is delaying the tumult, but not for much longer. With the way things are going, Afghanistans dramatic unraveling will begin even with a U.S. military presence on the ground.
USS Iwo Jima, USS New York, USS San Jacinto Poised to Support Irma Relief Efforts

Norfolk, Virginia - The amphibious assault ship USS Iwo Jima (LHD 7) and the amphibious transport dock ship USS New York (LPD 21) departed Naval Station Norfolk Sept. 8 to support possible humanitarian relief operations in the wake of Hurricane Irma.

The two ships, assigned to Amphibious Squadron (PHIBRON) 4, will be joined by the guided-missile cruiser USS San Jacinto (CG 56).



Iwo Jima and New York pulled into Norfolk Sept. 7 after leaving their Mayport, Florida, homeport to embark a component of the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit, a detachment from Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron (HSC) 28, as well as members of Explosive Ordnance Disposal Group (EODGRU) 2, Tactical Air Control Squadron (TACRON) 22 and Fleet Surgical Team (FST) 8.



All units will be under the command of Carrier Strike Group (CSG) 10, Rear Adm. Samuel Paparo.



These ships and their embarked units are capable of providing medical and logistic support, medium and heavy lift air support, and bring a diverse capability for assessing damage and providing crucial aid.



This is the second time in the past year Iwo Jima has conducted this type of mission; last October, Iwo Jima provided support following the aftermath of Hurricane Matthew in Haiti.



"Many of the crew had similar experiences last year during Hurricane Matthew," said Capt. James Midkiff, commanding officer of Iwo Jima. "We will apply lessons learned from our time in Haiti to this event in order to be safer and more efficient this time around."



The Department of Defense is ready to support FEMA, the lead federal agency, and partner nations as tasked, in helping those affected by Hurricane Irma to minimize suffering and is one component of the overall whole-of-government response effort.
Bangladesh Hosting of Rohingya

Washington, DC - State Department: "We are very concerned by the United Nations announcement on September 8 that an estimated 270,000 Rohingya have arrived in Bangladesh since August 25 following allegations of serious human rights abuses in Burmas Rakhine State, including violent attacks and mass burnings of villages.

"We continue to coordinate closely with our partners, including the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, the International Committee of the Red Cross and the International Organization for Migration to provide emergency assistance to these individuals. Since October 2016, the U.S. government has provided nearly $63 million in humanitarian assistance for vulnerable communities displaced in and from Burma throughout the region. We applaud the government of Bangladeshs generosity in responding to this humanitarian crisis and appreciate their continued efforts to ensure assistance reaches the affected population."
Get our free weekly email for all the latest cinematic news from our film critic Clarisse Loughrey Get our The Life Cinematic email for free Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the

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Blake Heron  best known for leading the 1996 family film Shiloh  has died aged 35, according to Variety. The Los Angeles County Coroner, along with his manager, have confirmed the news.

The former teen-actor was found unresponsive at his home in California on Friday morning, medics pronouncing him dead at the scene. Herons body was discovered by a friend who said the actor had been sick with the flu for a couple of days.

A cause has not yet been determined.

Heron was previously open about dealing with drug abuse, recently having been in rehab. While promoting the documentary A Thousand Junkies earlier this year, Heron said: I started doing drugs when I was about 12, typical smoking weed at first and drinking and what not.

After discussing being addicted to heroin, he said: I lost everything. I lost my career, I lost all of my money, I lost possessions, and most importantly, I lost myself. I felt like I lost my soul.

Notable deaths in 2017 Show all 28 1 /28 Notable deaths in 2017 Notable deaths in 2017 Hugh Hefner, the creator of Playboy magazine, died 28 September 2017 aged 91 Central Press/Stringer - Getty Notable deaths in 2017 Liz Dawn as Vera Duckworth in Coronation Street, pictured with co-star Bill Tarmey who played her husband Jack. Dawn died 25 September 2017, aged 77 ITV Notable deaths in 2017 Walter Becker, one of the founders of the band Steely Dan, died September 3 aged 67 Rex Notable deaths in 2017 David Tang, one of Hong Kong's most famous businessman, died of liver cancer aged 63 on 29 August AFP/Getty Images Notable deaths in 2017 Linkin Park frontman Chester Bennington died July 20 Getty Images Notable deaths in 2017 Holocaust survivor and stateswoman who fought for abortion rights, Simone Veil, died July 4 Getty Notable deaths in 2017 Michael Bond, author and creator of Paddington Bear, died June 28 PA Notable deaths in 2017 TV's Batman, Adam West, died June 12 AFP/Getty Images Notable deaths in 2017 Peter Sallis, who starred in Last of the Summer Wine and voiced Wallace and Gromit, died on June 5 Rex Notable deaths in 2017 John Noakes, The action hero of Blue Peter, died May 29 Rex Notable deaths in 2017 Former MotoGP world champion, Nicky Hayden, died age 35, on May 26. He was knocked off his bicycle by a car in Italy. Getty Notable deaths in 2017 Sir Roger Moore died on May 23 Getty Images Notable deaths in 2017 Soundgarden singer, Chris Cornell, who helped define grunge music died May 17 Kevin Winter/Getty Images Notable deaths in 2017 Moors Murderer Ian Brady died May 15 Getty Images Notable deaths in 2017 Powers Boothe, star of Deadwood and Sin City, dies, aged 68 on May 15 Todd Williamson/Invision/AP Notable deaths in 2017 Robert Miles, Trance DJ behind hit track 'Children', died from cancer aged 47 on May 12 PA Notable deaths in 2017 Happy Days child star, Erin Moran, died at the age of 56 on April 24 Getty Images Notable deaths in 2017 Ex-player and Tottenham U23 coach Ugo Ehiogu died after he suffered a cardiac arrest at the training ground, aged 44 on April 21 Getty Notable deaths in 2017 British athlete Germaine Mason, silver medalist at the Beijing Olympics, died following a motorcycle crash, aged 34 on April 21 Rex Notable deaths in 2017 Actor Tim Pigott-Smith star of TV, film and theatre died on April 7 Getty Notable deaths in 2017 Rupert Cornwell an award-winning foreign correspondent who embodied the spirit of The Independent died on April 1 Notable deaths in 2017 Morse creator Colin Dexter died on March 21 PA Notable deaths in 2017 Rock and roll legend Chuck Berry died on March 18 Getty Notable deaths in 2017 Sir Howard Hodgkin, one of Britain's greatest abstract painters of the post-war period died on March 9 Rex Notable deaths in 2017 Sir Gerald Kaufman was the oldest of the longest-serving MPs and Father of the House of Commons when he died on February 27 PA Notable deaths in 2017 Joost van der Westhuizen died at the age of 45 on February 6 Getty Notable deaths in 2017 John Hurt died aged 77 on 28 January Getty Notable deaths in 2017 Lord Snowdon, husband to Princess Margaret died on January 13 Getty

At just 13-years-old, Heron appeared in the Disney film Tom and Huck, and in the TV series Reality Check. Two years later, in 1997, he starred in Shiloh, playing a teenage boy who rescues an abused hunting dog.

Following high school, Heron attempted more serious roles, starring in the HBO movie Cheaters, and starring alongside Mel Gibson in We Were Soldiers.
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Netflix will take on one of the most controversial cases to hit UK headlines in recent years.

In 2007, 3-year-old Madeleine McCann disappeared from her hotel room while on holiday in Portugal's Praia de Luz with her parents and two siblings. It sparked one of the most heavily reported missing-person cases in modern history, becoming a national obsession and still regularly hitting headlines when any new developments come to light.

Despite several potential suspects and sightings over the years, McCann's whereabouts are still unknown.

The case will now form the centre of a new as-yet-untitled, eight episode true crime series, featuring interviews with both investigators and key figures from the case.

This isn't the first time Netflix has dabbled in controversial criminal cases, releasing last year a one-part documentary on Amanda Knox, the American student who served almost four years in an Italian prison for the 2007 murder of Meredith Kercher, before being definitively acquitted.

 Amanda Knox Netflix Trailer

True crime's surge in popularity was certainly aided by Netflix's own Making a Murderer, based on Steven Avery and Brendan Dassey's conviction of Teresa Halbach.

A release date for the Madeleine McCann documentary has yet to be announced.

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Apple has accidentally confirmed the name of the new iPhone. And there's already a problem.

The three new handsets will be referred to as the iPhone 8, the iPhone 8 Plus and the iPhone X, according to secret software that appears to have been mistakenly made available to the public.

The same leak has revealed a range of other secret features of the new iPhone. Those include the fact that it will have animated emojis that track people's faces and be able to see whether people are paying attention to their phone.

Gadget and tech news: In pictures Show all 25 1 /25 Gadget and tech news: In pictures Gadget and tech news: In pictures Gun-toting humanoid robot sent into space Russia has launched a humanoid robot into space on a rocket bound for the International Space Station (ISS). The robot Fedor will spend 10 days aboard the ISS practising skills such as using tools to fix issues onboard. Russia's deputy prime minister Dmitry Rogozin has previously shared videos of Fedor handling and shooting guns at a firing range with deadly accuracy. Dmitry Rogozin/Twitter Gadget and tech news: In pictures Google turns 21 Google celebrates its 21st birthday on September 27. The The search engine was founded in September 1998 by two PhD students, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, in their dormitories at Californias Stanford University. Page and Brin chose the name google as it recalled the mathematic term 'googol', meaning 10 raised to the power of 100 Google Gadget and tech news: In pictures Hexa drone lifts off Chief engineer of LIFT aircraft Balazs Kerulo demonstrates the company's "Hexa" personal drone craft in Lago Vista, Texas on June 3 2019 Reuters Gadget and tech news: In pictures Project Scarlett to succeed Xbox One Microsoft announced Project Scarlett, the successor to the Xbox One, at E3 2019. The company said that the new console will be 4 times as powerful as the Xbox One and is slated for a release date of Christmas 2020 Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures First new iPod in four years Apple has announced the new iPod Touch, the first new iPod in four years. The device will have the option of adding more storage, up to 256GB Apple Gadget and tech news: In pictures Folding phone may flop Samsung will cancel orders of its Galaxy Fold phone at the end of May if the phone is not then ready for sale. The $2000 folding phone has been found to break easily with review copies being recalled after backlash PA Gadget and tech news: In pictures Charging mat non-starter Apple has cancelled its AirPower wireless charging mat, which was slated as a way to charge numerous apple products at once AFP/Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures "Super league" India shoots down satellite India has claimed status as part of a "super league" of nations after shooting down a live satellite in a test of new missile technology EPA Gadget and tech news: In pictures 5G incoming 5G wireless internet is expected to launch in 2019, with the potential to reach speeds of 50mb/s Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures Uber halts driverless testing after death Uber has halted testing of driverless vehicles after a woman was killed by one of their cars in Tempe, Arizona. March 19 2018 Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures A humanoid robot gestures during a demo at a stall in the Indian Machine Tools Expo, IMTEX/Tooltech 2017 held in Bangalore Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures A humanoid robot gestures during a demo at a stall in the Indian Machine Tools Expo, IMTEX/Tooltech 2017 held in Bangalore Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures Engineers test a four-metre-tall humanoid manned robot dubbed Method-2 in a lab of the Hankook Mirae Technology in Gunpo, south of Seoul, South Korea Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures Engineers test a four-metre-tall humanoid manned robot dubbed Method-2 in a lab of the Hankook Mirae Technology in Gunpo, south of Seoul, South Korea Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures The giant human-like robot bears a striking resemblance to the military robots starring in the movie 'Avatar' and is claimed as a world first by its creators from a South Korean robotic company Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures Engineers test a four-metre-tall humanoid manned robot dubbed Method-2 in a lab of the Hankook Mirae Technology in Gunpo, south of Seoul, South Korea Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures Waseda University's saxophonist robot WAS-5, developed by professor Atsuo Takanishi Rex Gadget and tech news: In pictures Waseda University's saxophonist robot WAS-5, developed by professor Atsuo Takanishi and Kaptain Rock playing one string light saber guitar perform jam session Rex Gadget and tech news: In pictures A test line of a new energy suspension railway resembling the giant panda is seen in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, China Reuters Gadget and tech news: In pictures A test line of a new energy suspension railway, resembling a giant panda, is seen in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, China Reuters Gadget and tech news: In pictures A concept car by Trumpchi from GAC Group is shown at the International Automobile Exhibition in Guangzhou, China Rex Gadget and tech news: In pictures A Mirai fuel cell vehicle by Toyota is displayed at the International Automobile Exhibition in Guangzhou, China Reuters Gadget and tech news: In pictures A visitor tries a Nissan VR experience at the International Automobile Exhibition in Guangzhou, China Reuters Gadget and tech news: In pictures A man looks at an exhibit entitled 'Mimus' a giant industrial robot which has been reprogrammed to interact with humans during a photocall at the new Design Museum in South Kensington, London Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures A new Israeli Da-Vinci unmanned aerial vehicle manufactured by Elbit Systems is displayed during the 4th International conference on Home Land Security and Cyber in the Israeli coastal city of Tel Aviv Getty

The iPhone 8 and Plus will be, as usual, an updated version of the iPhone 7  keeping its basic design while refreshing the internal components. The iPhone X will be the phone that most of the leaks so far have focused on and has thus far been referred to as the iPhone 8, which will feature an entirely new design and a range of brand new features, including the ability to unlock the phone with its owners face.

That latter name is already causing some trouble, because it's unclear whether it will be pronounced as a letter or as the number ten, which would potentially be a reference to the fact that it is the tenth anniversary of the iPhone. Apple has run into that confusion before, with it Mac OS X operating system  that was suppose to be pronounced as "ten", but was around for 15 years without any consensus or clarity appearing on the matter.

Apple retired the Mac OS X brand last year, instead swapping it for macOS, in line with the rest of its operating systems.

The name of new iPhones and other products is usually the least likely to leak, since it's only known by a small number of people within Apple and can be changed right up until the release date. For the same reason, Apple might change this branding scheme, but the names appear in the version of the software that will be shipping with new phones, and so are almost certain to be correct.

It's not the first time that Apple's own software has accidentally spilled secrets about the upcoming iPhone. Last month, the company mistakenly uploaded the software that powers its HomePod smart speaker, which contained within it many secrets about the new handset.
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In the remote desert along Omans southern coast, construction machines hired by a Chinese consortium are levelling an expanse of pale orange sand  a first step toward billions of dollars of investment.

Over the past year the Chinese have become key to Omans effort to transform Duqm, a fishing village 550km (345 miles) south of Muscat, into an industrial centre that will help the country diversify its economy beyond oil and gas exports.

In a pattern seen across much of the Middle East, the economic interests of the Omani and Chinese governments are coinciding, in ways that promise a surge of Chinese capital into the region over the next few years.

Omans state finances have been hit hard by low oil prices, so it is scrambling to attract foreign money for new industrial zones that will create jobs for Omanis whom the government can no longer afford to employ. Duqm is its biggest such project.

For China, the project is a potential success in its Belt and Road Initiative, a government-backed drive to win trade and investment deals along routes linking China to Europe.

Duqm, which lies on the Arabian Sea, is a potential operating base for Chinese businesses near export markets which they want to develop in the Gulf, the Indian subcontinent and East Africa. Duqm is also close to some of the raw materials which Chinese companies will need for that purpose: the oil and gas resources of the Gulf.

The result could be a bonanza for Duqm. Eventually, Chinese firms aim to invest up to $10.7bn (8.2bn) there, said Ali Shah, chief executive of Oman Wanfang, the Chinese consortium.

If that figure materialises  which is by no means certain, given the multi-year time frame and the many pressures on Chinese companies  it will be equivalent to over half of Omans current stock of foreign direct investment.

Duqm isnt like Jeddah or Dubai. Its still new; it needs time to develop. But we at Wanfang are thinking the future for Duqm will be better than those cities inside the Gulf, Ali Shah told Reuters.

Duqm is marketing its location as a major attraction  not only its proximity to maritime trade routes, but the fact that it lies outside the Strait of Hormuz, which could insulate it from conflict if regional tensions rise.

Chinas Middle East money

As recently as 2009, China accounted for less than 1 per cent of the stock of foreign direct investment in the Middle East, according to ChinaMed, a research operation at Italys Torino World Affairs Institute.

But partly because of Belt and Road, that is changing fast; the ratio rose above 5 per cent in 2015.

China was the top foreign investor in the Arab world in 2016, pledging $29.5bn of new money, according to Kuwaits Arab Investment and Export Credit Guarantee. The US, the second biggest investor, accounted for $7bn (5.4bn).

The zone around Duqm already features a port and a dry dock, and is to include an oil refinery (built partly with Kuwaiti money) and petrochemical plants.

Oman Wanfang plans to develop over 11 square kilometres (4 square miles), making the Chinese Duqms largest prospective foreign tenants by far. Their first facility, a $138m complex to store building materials and distribute them around the region, is to be completed within 18 months.

Plans for a further nine Chinese facilities, including a $2.8bn methanol plant, pipe factories, an $84m vehicle assembly plant and a $203m hotel, have been agreed in principle and are to be completed within five years.

Oman has been trying to attract capital for Duqm from many nations. It had been hoping in particular for investment from Iran, with which it has close diplomatic ties, but Irans economy is struggling.

In January 2016 its top car maker, Iran Khodro Industrial Group, agreed to study a proposal for a $200m car plant in Duqm, but no progress has been disclosed since then.

Business news: In pictures Show all 13 1 /13 Business news: In pictures Business news: In pictures Flybe collapses Airline Flybe has collapsed. All future flights on the Exeter-based airline have been cancelled  leaving more than 2,300 staff facing an uncertain future, and wrecking the travel plans of hundreds of thousands of passengers. The chief executive, Mark Anderson, said: Europes largest independent regional airline has been unable to overcome significant funding challenges to its business. AFP via Getty Business news: In pictures Future product placement will be 'tailored to individual viewers' Marketing executives say that product placement in films and televison shows on streaming services such as Netflix may be tailored to individuals in future. For instance, if data shows that a viewer is a fan of pepsi, a billboard in the background of a shot would host an advert for pepsi, while for a viewer known to have different tastes it could be for Coca-Cola Paramount Business news: In pictures Corbyn wishes Amazon a happy birthday In a card sent to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos on the company's 25th birthday, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn writes: "You owe the British people millions in taxes that pay for the public services that we all rely on. Please pay your fair share" Business news: In pictures No deal, no tariffs The government has announced that it would slash almost all tariffs in the event of a no-deal Brexit. Notable exceptions include cars and meat, which will see tariffs in place to protect British farmers Getty Business news: In pictures Fingerprint payment NatWest is trialling a new bank card that will allow people to touch their hand to the card when paying rather than typing in a PIN number. The card will work by recognising the user's fingerprint NatWest/PA Wire Business news: In pictures Mahabis bust High-end slipper retailer Mahabis has gone into administration. 2 Jan 2019 Mahabis Business news: In pictures Costa Cola Coca-Cola has paid 3.9bn for Costa Coffee. A cafe chain is a new venture for the global soft drinks giant PA Business news: In pictures RIP Payday Loans A funeral procession for payday loans was held in London on September 2. The future of pay day lenders is in doubt after Wonga, Britain's biggest, went into administration on August 30 PA Business news: In pictures Musk irks investors and directors Elon Musk has concluded that Tesla will remain public. Investors and company directors were angry at Musk for tweeting unexpectedly that he was considering taking Tesla private and share prices had taken a tumble in the following weeks Getty Business news: In pictures Jaguar warning Iconic British car maker Jaguar Land Rover warned on July 5, 2018 that a "bad" Brexit deal could jeopardise planned investment of more than $100 billion, upping corporate pressure as the government heads into crucial talks AFP/Getty Business news: In pictures Spotif-IPO Spotify traded publically for the first time on the New York Stock Exchange on Tuesday. However, the company isn't issuing shares, but rather, shares held by Spotify's private investors will be sold AFP/Getty Business news: In pictures French blue passports The deadline to award a contract to make blue British passports after Brexit has been extended by two weeks following a request by bidder De La Rue. The move comes after anger at the announcement British passports would be produced by Franco-Dutch firm Gemalto when De La Rues contract ends in July. The British firm said Gemalto was chosen only because it undercut the competition, but the UK company also admitted that it was not the cheapest choice in the tendering process. Business news: In pictures Beast from the east economic impact The Beast from the East wiped 4m off of Flybes revenues due to flight cancellations, airport closures and delays, according to the budget airlines estimates. Flybe said it cancelled 994 flights in the three months to 31 March, compared to 372 in the same period last year.

For now at least, that leaves the Chinese as Duqms best bet.

Oman Wanfang is a consortium of six Chinese firms, many from the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region in North-central China, an area with a large Muslim population that is active in promoting business ties with Arab nations.

Oman Wanfangs operations show how the Belt and Road scheme supports Chinese investment abroad. The consortium says its member firms are private, and has announced no direct financial aid from Beijing  but it enjoys political support.

In April, a deputy governor of Ningxia visited Duqm to lay the foundation stone for the Chinese industrial area, and to declare that Beijings powerful National Development and Reform Commission backed the project.

That seal of approval aids Oman Wanfang in negotiations with the Omani government and may help Chinese investors in Duqm obtain loans from Chinese banks, many of which are controlled by their government.

In a sign of growing financial ties between the two countries, the Omani government borrowed $3.55bn from Chinese financial institutions last month  the largest loan deal ever for a Gulf borrower in the Chinese market.

Reuters
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Grey squirrels are killing off their rare red counterparts with a deadly virus in the Lake District.

A population of 30 red squirrels living in Grasmere in the Lake District has fallen to 12 after grey squirrels managed to infiltrate their mountainous terrain.

As reported by The Sunday Times, squirrel rangers patrol the valley and shoot grey invaders.

Recommended Why red squirrels are thriving in one corner of Merseyside

Yet the Animal and Plant Health agency found a population boom meant it was impossible to control grey squirrel numbers in the isolated area.

Record numbers of grey squirrels overwhelmed control methods in the valley and then entered the Grasmere area, the report read.

Only a few months after grey squirrels entered the area, the first cases of pox virus occurred in red squirrels.

 Squirrel caught on camera stealing chocolate from a corner shop

Grey squirrels were imported from America by 19th-century landowners to "add variety" to UK wildlife, but they carry a virus which has decimated the native red squirrel population.

While there are now around 2.5 million grey squirrels, there are only a few thousands reds in England and Scotland.

Most red squirrels are contained in isolated areas like Mersea Island in Essex, the Isle of Wight, areas of Northumberland and the Lake District.

Grey squirrels also harm other species like songbirds, and in concentrated areas they can strip bark from young trees and stop their growth.
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A woman has died after colliding with a cyclist during an event in London.

The pedestrian, aged 67, died in a west London hospital on Thursday after suffering serious head injuries following the incident at RideLondon on 30 July.

The woman's next of kin have been informed and a post-mortem examination is due to take place.

Police were called to New King's Road and Guion Road in the Parson's Green area of Hammersmith and Fulham.

Detective Sergeant Alastair Middleton, from the Met Police's serious collision investigation unit, said police were appealing for more information about what happened.

In light of the sad news that the pedestrian in this collision has passed away, it is important that we understand more about the circumstances surrounding the collision from either members of the public or those working as part of the event, he said.

Please call into the incident room if you have information, footage or images that could benefit our investigation.

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of The Royal British Legion 2022 Poppy Appeal, at Hay's Galleria in central London PA UK news in pictures 26 October 2022 A meerkat explores a pumpkin in the enclosure at Wild Place, Bristol, where some of the animals are having pumpkin treats as part of their environmental enrichment PA UK news in pictures 25 October 2022 King Charles III welcomes Rishi Sunak during an audience at Buckingham Palace, where he invited the newly elected leader of the Conservative Party to become Prime Minister and form a new government PA UK news in pictures 24 October 2022 Rishi Sunak celebrates with Tory MPs outside the Conservative Campaign Headquarters after becoming the new leader of the Conservative Party Reuters UK news in pictures 23 October 2022 The Green Man at October Plenty, Borough Market's annual Autumn Harvest festival, in London, which returns for the first time post pandemic PA UK news in pictures 21 October 2022 Sculptor Peter McKenna puts the finishing touches to a pumpkin that will 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It comes after it emerged that a cyclist died at the same event, in what is believed to be a separate incident.

Maris Ozols, also aged 67, who was tackling the 46 mile route, suffered a cardiac arrest on Cromwell Road around the 13 mile mark.

Anyone with information about either incident is asked to call 0208 543 5157, or the police 101 non-emergency number.
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A former Treasury chief has launched a devastating attack on Theresa Mays handling of the Brexit process, warning the country lacks leadership.

Lord Macpherson accused the Prime Minister of failing to prepare the public for the inevitable compromises and trade-offs to follow  often described as her have cake and eat it approach.

The former permanent secretary highlighted a lack of Whitehall resources to deliver EU withdrawal, in an interview with the BBC to be broadcast later on Sunday.

Recommended Corbyn told to sack Labour MPs who refuse to vote against Brexit bill

He also warned the public sector pay cap could not be lifted without tax rises or spending cuts, while hinting the Treasury had advised against building the hugely expensive HS2 high-speed rail line.

On Brexit, Lord Macpherson said: I worry about how Whitehall resources are being harnessed and deployed in support of the Government approach.

And I feel passionately that this is an area that needs leadership. Someones got to have a grown up conversation with the British people about the compromises and trade-offs that have to be made. And sadly that simply hasnt happened.

On the one per cent pay cap  which No 10 has suggested will be eased this autumn  Lord Macpherson said: Generally pay caps arent sustainable in the long term, so the government does need to find a way of getting off this policy.

Brexit: the deciders Show all 8 1 /8 Brexit: the deciders Brexit: the deciders European Union's chief Brexit negotiator, Michel Barnier Getty Brexit: the deciders French President Emmanuel Macron Getty Brexit: the deciders German Chancellor Angela Merkel Reuters Brexit: the deciders Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker EPA Brexit: the deciders The European Parliament's chief Brexit negotiator Guy Verhofstadt Getty Brexit: the deciders Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May Getty Images Brexit: the deciders Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer, Philip Hammond PA Brexit: the deciders After the first and second appointed Brexit secretaries resigned (David Davis and Dominic Raab respectively), Stephen Barclay is currently heading up the position PA

On the other hand, it does cost money. And what I would be asking the Prime Minister and indeed asking [Chancellor Philip] Hammond is, well, if youre going to relax policy in this area, how are you going to pay for it?

What tax are you going to raise, what spending are you going to cut? Or are you just going to let the deficit remain at an unacceptably high level?

On HS2, he called for billions to be spent on improving Northern rail instead, saying: It was a political decision and I think it would be inappropriate for me to reveal the Treasury advice on the issue.

Lord Macpherson is the latest top civil servant to attack Brexit strategy. In January, Sir Ivan Rogers, Britains ambassador to the EU, resigned after warning that striking a new trade deal could take a decade.

Two ministers have quit key posts in apparent frustration at the lack of progress  Lord Bridges (Brexit department) and Lord Price (International Trade).

On The Westminster Hour programme, to be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 at 10pm, former Labour Chancellor Alistair Darling said he believed the financial crash and austerity paved the way for Brexit.

We live in a much darker world, more inclined to protectionism and nationalism, and so the political fallout has been absolutely immense, Lord Darling said.

If Britain failed to make the compromises necessary to strike an acceptable trade deal with the EU then were going to write off another decade and that would be a tragedy, he added.

The two key figures in the eye of the storm of the financial crisis were brought together to discuss the tenth anniversary of the run on Northern Rock in 2007, the first sign of the gathering disaster.

Asked if the Treasury was ill-prepared, Lord Macpherson acknowledged: I think thats a fair assessment. So I must take my share of the responsibility for that.

We had almost 15 years of unbroken growth. We had not had a major run on a bank, certainly since the war.

So it is fair to say that the Treasury, like the Bank of England, like the FSA [Financial Services Authority], didnt have the resources in the right place when the run on Northern Rock took place.
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As the worlds largest arms fair prepares to open its doors in London, campaign groups are highlighting that the UK has sold 3.6 billion worth of arms to Saudi Arabia since the devastating conflict in Yemen began.

According to the latest report from campaign group Control Arms, the UK, France and the US have been three of the biggest suppliers of arms to the Saudi regime since the war in Yemen broke out in 2015, despite the fact that thousands of civilians, including children, have been injured in the conflict.

Oxfam is calling on the UK to immediately stop the arms sales and push for a ceasefire and has accused ministers of double standards because of the Governments official endorsement of the Defence Systems and Equipment International (DSEI) arms fair, taking place at the Excel Centre this week.

Various campaign groups have accused the Government of rolling out the red carpet to invited delegates from some of the worlds most repressive governments, including Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Turkey, at DSEI.

In a new report, Control Arms concurs with other groups including Campaign Against the Arms Trade (CAAT) in finding the UK alone has agreed to 3.6 billion worth of arms sales since the Saudi backed coalition began its air strikes in Yemen, with an estimated 13,000 people having been killed in the confluct since March 2015 and creating a humanitarian disaster.

The Saudis involved themselves in the country's civil war to back President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi after Iran-allied Houthi fighters seized control of Yemens capital Sana'a

Amnesty International has accused the UK of being in breach of the UN treaty to regulate the international arms trade, effectively ignoring its obligations by continuing to supply arms even where there is a real risk they will cause a serious violation of human rights.

Oxfam is among the organisations calling on the Government to stop the lucrative sale of arms and push for international ceasefire.

The UK Governments aid budget for Yemen is set at 139 million for 2017-18, with Amnesty International calling this a shameful contradiction in comparison to the billions generated by the sale of arms to oppressive regimes.

The USA and UK are fuelling serious violations that have caused devastating civilian suffering though multibillion-dollar arms transfers to Saudi Arabia that vastly overshadow their humanitarian efforts, said Lynn Maalouf, Deputy Director for Research at Amnesty Internationals Beirut office.

Weapons supplied in the past by states such as the UK and USA have helped to precipitate a humanitarian catastrophe. These governments have continued to authorise such arms transfers at the same time as providing aid to alleviate the very crisis they have helped to create. Yemeni civilians continue to pay the price of these brazenly hypocritical arms supplies.

Saudi Arabia has repeatedly said that it does all all it can to reduce civilian casualties and upholds international law. It has launched investigations into a number of incidents where civilians have been killed, but campaigners have flagged far more alleged incidents.

Protests began outside the Excel centre in east London last week and are expected to intensify when the DSEI fair begins on Tuesday.

A judge last year acquitted eight people who had taken part in peaceful protests in 2015 of obstructing the public highway after they successfully used the unusual defence that they had been trying to prevent greater crimes from taking place when they either locked onto or laid down in front of vehicles carrying weapon including tanks into the arms fair.

District Judge Angus Hamilton said last May that Stratford Magistrates Court had been presented with clear, credible and largely unchallenged evidence that criminal wrongdoing had occurred at past DSEI exhibitions involving the sale of arms to countries which then use those arms against civilian populations, and the sale of arms that were inherently unlawful, such as cluster munitions and items designed for torture.

To the dismay of humanitarian campaigners, the UK High Court ruled in July that the UK Government can continue selling arms to Saudi Arabia after Lord Justice Burnett found it had not been established that the Saudi forces were deliberately targeting civilians.

The biennial autumn arms fair first took place in London in 2001 and opened its doors for the first time on the day of the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Centre. The event now attracts more than 35,000 visitors and exhibitors, including representatives from the worlds ten biggest arms companies.

10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses Show all 10 1 /10 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses In October 2014, three lawyers, Dr Abdulrahman al-Subaihi, Bander al-Nogaithan and Abdulrahman al-Rumaih , were sentenced to up to eight years in prison for using Twitter to criticize the Ministry of Justice. AFP/Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses In March 2015, Yemens Sunni President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi was forced into exile after a Shia-led insurgency. A Saudi Arabia-led coalition has responded with air strikes in order to reinstate Mr Hadi. It has since been accused of committing war crimes in the country. Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses Women who supported the Women2Drive campaign, launched in 2011 to challenge the ban on women driving vehicles, faced harassment and intimidation by the authorities. The government warned that women drivers would face arrest. Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses Members of the Kingdoms Shia minority, most of whom live in the oil-rich Eastern Province, continue to face discrimination that limits their access to government services and employment. Activists have received death sentences or long prison terms for their alleged participation in protests in 2011 and 2012. Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses All public gatherings are prohibited under an order issued by the Interior Ministry in 2011. Those defy the ban face arrest, prosecution and imprisonment on charges such as inciting people against the authorities. Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses In March 2014, the Interior Ministry stated that authorities had deported over 370,000 foreign migrants and that 18,000 others were in detention. Thousands of workers were returned to Somalia and other states where they were at risk of human rights abuses, with large numbers also returned to Yemen, in order to open more jobs to Saudi Arabians. Many migrants reported that prior to their deportation they had been packed into overcrowded makeshift detention facilities where they received little food and water and were abused by guards. Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses The Saudi Arabian authorities continue to deny access to independent human rights organisations like Amnesty International, and they have been known to take punitive action, including through the courts, against activists and family members of victims who contact Amnesty. Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses Raif Badawi was sentenced to 1000 lashes and 10 years in prison for using his liberal blog to criticise Saudi Arabias clerics. He has already received 50 lashes, which have reportedly left him in poor health. Carsten Koall/Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses Dawood al-Marhoon was arrested aged 17 for participating in an anti-government protest. After refusing to spy on his fellow protestors, he was tortured and forced to sign a blank document that would later contain his confession. At Dawoods trial, the prosecution requested death by crucifixion while refusing him a lawyer. Getty Images 10 examples of Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses Ali Mohammed al-Nimr was arrested in 2012 aged either 16 or 17 for participating in protests during the Arab spring. His sentence includes beheading and crucifixion. The international community has spoken out against the punishment and has called on Saudi Arabia to stop. He is the nephew of a prominent government dissident. Getty

Clarion Defence and Security, which runs DSEI, says all exhibitors are subject to the UK Export Control Act designed to ensure equipment and services on offer comply with both UK and international law. Prohibited goods, known as Category A items, include those designed for execution, torture, restraint, riot control, certain cluster munitions and land mines.

The Independent has contacted DSEI for a statement but received no reply ahead of publication. DSEI organisers have previously said they take legal compliance seriously.

Keynote speakers at this years fair will include Defence Secretary Michael Fallon, International Trade Secretary Liam Fox and the chiefs of staff of the British armed forces.

Although the UK Government has officially supported DSEI since its inception, several politicians in opposition have criticised it over the years, with Londons Labour Mayor Sadiq Khan this year calling for it to be banned, in contrast to his predecessor Boris Johnson, who supported it.

The DSEI arms fair is not an event that I support. ExCeL is a commercial space for hire. I am opposed to London being used as a market place for the trade of weapons to those countries that contribute to human rights abuses, Mr Khan said.

A motion on arms sales to Saudi Arabia has been proposed for debate at the Labour Party conference which takes place in Brighton later this month after its leader Jeremy Corbyn called for the sale of arms to regimes committing alleged war crimes to end.

The government insists that its arms export licensing systems is robust and subject to strict rules. Foreign Office minister Alan Duncan told parliament recently: The government take their export control responsibilities very seriously and operate one of the most robust defence export control regimes in the world. We rigorously examine every application case by case against consolidated EU and national arms export licensing criteria.
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Jeremy Corbyn is under pressure to sack any colleagues who refuse to vote against the EU Withdrawal Bill on Monday, or see his anti-hard Brexit stance exposed as a sham.

The Labour leader must show the same ruthlessness he displayed when sacking frontbenchers who defied his orders by trying to keep the UK in the single market, the Liberal Democrats said.

The demand comes after about 30 Labour MPs met Keir Starmer, the Shadow Brexit Secretary, to express their reluctance to oppose the withdrawal bill, as Mr Corbyn has instructed.

There were heated discussions as MPs from Leave-backing areas warned they would be tarred as trying to obstruct Brexit itself, The Independent was told.

Brexit: the deciders Show all 8 1 /8 Brexit: the deciders Brexit: the deciders European Union's chief Brexit negotiator, Michel Barnier Getty Brexit: the deciders French President Emmanuel Macron Getty Brexit: the deciders German Chancellor Angela Merkel Reuters Brexit: the deciders Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker EPA Brexit: the deciders The European Parliament's chief Brexit negotiator Guy Verhofstadt Getty Brexit: the deciders Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May Getty Images Brexit: the deciders Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer, Philip Hammond PA Brexit: the deciders After the first and second appointed Brexit secretaries resigned (David Davis and Dominic Raab respectively), Stephen Barclay is currently heading up the position PA

Some are expected to break a three-line whip by abstaining  on a key night in the Brexit drama, when Labour hopes some Conservatives will also stage a rebellion.

Mr Corbyn has been persuaded to vote against the bill on the grounds it is a Government power grab that will allow future laws to be made using Henry VIII powers, but some in Labour fear the move will backfire by making the party look anti-Brexit.

Tom Brake, the Lib Dem Brexit spokesman, pointed out three Labour shadow ministers were sacked in June after backing an amendment to the Queens Speech in favour of staying in the single market.

In February, Clive Lewis was among frontbenchers forced to leave Mr Corbyn's team after refusing to back the legislation to trigger Article 50 and start the exit process.

The chance to inflict a historic defeat against the Government's hard Brexit plans rests on whether Jeremy Corbyn can show leadership and keep his party united, Mr Brake said.

Corbyn must show the same ruthlessness towards his pro-Brexit MPs as he has to pro-European ones in the past.

Any frontbenchers who defy the party whip should be sacked, or else Labour's recent shift towards supporting a softer Brexit will be exposed as a sham.

Theresa May is in little danger of losing the most crucial vote on the second reading of the withdrawal bill, with only pro-EU veteran Ken Clarke threatening to vote against it.

However, an earlier vote on what is called the programme motion for the legislation could be closer, after criticism that the Prime Minister is refusing to allow sufficient detailed debate.

Only eight days have been set aside for line-by-line examination in committee, far fewer than when Britain joined the EU in the 1970s (22) or for the Maastricht legislation in the 1990s (23).

Yet the bill must carry out the daunting task of pasting 40 years of EU law onto the UK statute book ahead of Brexit day in 2019, before ministers propose which parts should be repealed.

It will be at that later stage that amendments  on anything from single market membership, to guaranteeing workers rights and environmental protections  will be tabled.

Recommended Jeremy Corbyn is really quite good at politics

Pro-EU Tories are pressing privately for more days in committee before deciding whether to back the programme motion in Mondays first vote, to take place no earlier than midnight.

One minister told The Independent: If we lose the programme motion it will be a nightmare, because we would then be unable to shut down debate on any evening. MPs could force us to sit all night.

A handful of Leave-supporting Labour MPs will support the second reading. One, Kate Hoey, warned that opposing it amounted to betraying the will of the British people.

Mr Brake insisted his party had no splits, saying: The Liberal Democrats will be united in opposing a Conservative extreme Brexit and seeking to give the British people the final say.
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North Koreas nuclear weapons programme must be halted before it develops a missile capable of hitting London, the Defence Secretary said.

Asked if the rogue state could strike the UK capital, Sir Michael Fallon replied: Not yet, but they are clearly accelerating the missile programme, the range is getting longer and longer.

He added: We have to get this programme halted, because the dangers now of miscalculation, or some accident triggering a response, are extremely great.

On potential Nato involvement to help defend the US if North Korea carried out is threat to attack Guam, in the Pacific, Sir Michael added: Guam is part of the United States.

Its United States sovereign territory and the United States, of course, under the United Nations, has the right to ask other members of the United Nations to join in its self-defence.

The comments appeared to toughen up Britains stance, just a few weeks after the Government insisted it was not preparing to help the US target North Koreas nuclear weapon sites.

A claim that the RAF has been asked to join a spying operation to pinpoint nuclear locations and artillery batteries was flat out wrong, sources said last month.

But, last week, North Korea conducted its sixth  and largest  nuclear test, with experts believing the state either has, or is very close to, developing a hydrogen bomb.

Amid widespread international criticism, US Defence Secretary James Mattis warned of a massive military response if there was any threat to the United States, its territories or its allies.

Asked about the escalation, on the BBCs Andrew Marr Show, Sir Michael said the UK was working closely with the White House to achieve a diplomatic solution to the crisis.

What we have to avoid at all costs is this spilling over into any kind of military conflict, so were working flat out at the UN to get a better resolution there, to enforce the existing sanctions, were looking at sanctions across the EU and of course were trying to persuade China to keep its neighbour in check, he said.

Kim Jong-un inspects weapon North Korea says is powerful hydrogen bomb Show all 6 1 /6 Kim Jong-un inspects weapon North Korea says is powerful hydrogen bomb Kim Jong-un inspects weapon North Korea says is powerful hydrogen bomb Photos released by North Korea show Kim Jong-un talking to subordinates next to a device thought to be the new thermonuclear weapon. There is no way of independently verifying the pictures STR/AFP/Getty Images Kim Jong-un inspects weapon North Korea says is powerful hydrogen bomb North Korea claims it has successfully tested an advanced hydrogen bomb which could be loaded onto an intercontinental ballistic missile AFP/Getty Kim Jong-un inspects weapon North Korea says is powerful hydrogen bomb A diagram on the wall behind Mr Kim shows a bomb mounted inside a cone STR/AFP/Getty Images Kim Jong-un inspects weapon North Korea says is powerful hydrogen bomb North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un (C) attending a photo session with participants of the fourth conference of active secretaries of primary organisations of the youth league of the Korean People's Army (KPA) in Pyongyang STR/AFP/Getty Images Kim Jong-un inspects weapon North Korea says is powerful hydrogen bomb A new stamp issued in commemoration of the successful second test launch of the "Hwasong-14" intercontinental ballistic missile KCNA via Reuters Kim Jong-un inspects weapon North Korea says is powerful hydrogen bomb A new stamp issued in commemoration of the successful second test launch of the "Hwasong-14" intercontinental ballistic missile KCNA via Reuters

The United States is seeking a vote on a United Nations resolution that would impose the toughest-ever sanctions on North Korea.

Asked if the situation is close to war in the Pacific, following the threats against Guam, Sir Michael replied: The United States is fully entitled to defend its own territory, to defend its bases and look after its people.

But this involves us. London is closer to North Korea and its missiles than Los Angeles.

Earlier, Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg refused to say whether an attack on the US territory of Guam would be covered by Article five, in which an attack on one member of the alliance is considered an attack on all.

He told the same programme: I will not speculate about whether Article five will be applied in such a situation.

What I will say is we are now totally focused on how can we contribute to a peaceful solution of the conflict and press North Korea to stop its nuclear missile programmes.
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Theresa May asked Boris Johnson if he would try to topple her before deciding to stay on at No 10 after her election debacle, a new book claims.

The beleaguered Prime Minister telephoned the man seen as the biggest danger to her survival, to force the Foreign Secretary to put his cards on the table, it reveals.

The call came early on June 9, as Ms May was reeling from the bitter realisation that her election gamble had destroyed the Conservatives majority in the Commons.

The book claims: According to one witness, May tells Johnson: It's not the result we hoped for, but I intend to form a government.

Can I count on your support or do you intend to stand against me? Johnson makes it clear that he will be staunchly loyal.

The Prime Minister also sought and received the same pledge from David Davis, the Brexit Secretary, according to the book, called Betting The House, by political journalists Tim Ross and Tom McTague.

Earlier, Mr Johnson had sent a text message, expressing his backing and sympathies, telling Ms May to keep her chin up, adding, we are with you and behind you.

The book says: She is so delighted by the text message that she holds up her phone and shows it to her advisers.

Since her June disappointment, the Prime Minister has denied the rumour that she discussed whether to resign even as the election results rolled in.

But the book claims Nick Timothy, her former chief of staff who himself resigned, believed she should consider stepping down and that even her distraught husband, Philip, wondered if she should go.

It also argues that:

Mr Davis pushed a very reluctant Ms May into staging the early election, because he was desperate to delay the following one until 2022  three years after Brexit.

The Brexit Secretary is said to have feared the EU forcing him to accept a poor Brexit deal in 2019, on the brink of an election the following year.

David wanted an election and set about getting one, says the book, adding: When a stunned [Lynton] Crosby disagreed, Davis bragged: 'I'm persuading her.'

Fiona Hill, the Prime Ministers adviser, received a leak of the astonishing exit poll, predicting a hung parliament before it was broadcast at 10pm on election night.

It is a contact from the BBC, tipping her off about the exit poll results, the book reads. Hill grabs Timothy and pulls him into a side room off the main floor.

'I've just heard the exit poll - they're predicting a hung parliament,' she says. 'Are you winding me up?' Timothy asks.

Conservative headquarters received an election-night phone call from Barack Obama, who had been told by a Labour contact that the party was going to lose 20 or 30 seats.

The book says: Obama told a Tory friend to pass on an encouraging message: Labour are expecting to lose seats, meaning the Tory majority will go up. And the disastrous Corbyn is here to stay.

Chancellor Philip Hammond was livid at being excluded from the election campaign and regarded May's manifesto as economic degeneracy.

When Ms May was told of the damning exit poll  by her husband  it took a minute for her to understand the scale of the disaster but, when she did, a devastated May broke down and wept.
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Tony Blair has urged pro-EU MPs of all parties to defy their leaders and start campaigning publicly to halt Brexit.

The former prime minister urged MPs to recognise that EU withdrawal was in a different category from the normal decision where you obey the party whip.

This is a decision that really changes the destiny of this country for generations, Mr Blair said.

At least try to explain that to the country. Find the leadership within yourself to say to people there is a different and better way.

Mr Blair said he accepted Brexit would go forward if the public did not change its mind  but insisted a rethink was possible if pro-EU politicians were brave enough to argue for it.

If we who are in politics, either in Parliament or outside of Parliament, put this case to people, maybe they will listen, he told the BBCs Andrew Marr Show.

The former Labour leader spoke out after calling for tough new rules to allow Britain to curb EU immigration without leaving the bloc.

He admitted open borders were no longer appropriate, putting his name to a report calling for tighter domestic controls and negotiated restrictions to free movement rules within the EU.

This would fulfil the will of the people expressed in last years Brexit vote while allowing Britain to stay in the EU, Mr Blair argued.

Asked whose side he was on, given his close ties to EU leaders, he replied: Im always on the side of Britain, but the question is whats in the British interest?

But veteran pro-EU Conservative Ken Clarke said it was hopeless to believe the UK could yet stay in the EU.

He told Sky Newss Sunday with Niall Paterson: Tony still thinks we can stay in the EU.

I think the mood in the country is its hopeless to expect that. What we now need to address is the practical consequences of what is our new relationship.

Mr Clarke said it was better to concentrate on securing a transition period of two, three, four years, to prevent the worst economic damage from Brexit.

And Sir Michael Fallon, the Defence Secretary, dismissed Mr Blairs comments, telling Marr: Its a bit late now, this epiphany, Im not sure where hes been  well we know where hes been, hes being travelling the world.

The country has taken its decision, were leaving the European Union now, and that means freedom of movement has to end whether we like it or not.

Sir Michael added: Tony Blair has got to get over it and weve got to get a smooth and successful exit from the union.
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Trade union leaders have accused the Government of pursuing a kamikaze Brexit amid calls for all options to remain on the table including staying in the single market.

TUC General Secretary Frances OGrady said there had been a criminal lack of preparation for the Brexit talks and ministers had given little consideration to the impact of the divorce on workers rights.

The trade union movement called for Britain to remain in the EU trade agreements during the transition period, and left the door open to staying in the single market after March 2019.

Speaking on the first day of the TUC annual congress, Ms OGrady said: Over the last year, the governments criminal lack of preparation for March 2019 has become clear.

Theyve published no proper assessment about the impact on industries.

No action plan to protect jobs and rights. And theres still no realistic negotiating strategy.

The clock is ticking towards what I can only call a kamikaze Brexit.

She urged Theresa Mays party not to box themselves in on the negotiations and to ignore the voices of Tory Eurosceptics after nearly 40 Conservatives signed a letter pushing the Government to pursue a hard Brexit.

Ms OGrady said she wanted all options on the table - including staying within the single market - for the final deal.

It comes as Labour vowed to vote against the Governments flagship Brexit legislation - sometimes known as the Repeal Bill - in the Commons on Monday after a dramatic shift in its stance towards the withdrawal from the EU.

UK news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 UK news in pictures UK news in pictures 12 November 2022 The City of London Pride Group take part in the parade during the Lord Mayor's Show PA UK news in pictures 11 November 2022 City workers attend a Remembrance Day ceremony at Lloyd's of London, in the City of London, to mark Armistice Day, the anniversary of the end of the First World War PA UK news in pictures 10 November 2022 A grey heron lands on the river Dodder in Dublin on a sunny autumn morning PA UK news in pictures 9 November 2022 Australia and Spain play during the Wheelchair Rugby League World Cup group A match at the Copper Box Arena, London PA UK news in pictures 8 November 2022 A migrant attempting to communicate with journalists is pinned against a fence by members of staff, before being taken out of view, at the Manston immigration short-term holding facility, located at the former Defence Fire Training and Development Centre in Thanet, Kent PA UK news in pictures 7 November 2022 Handout photo issued by Just Stop Oil of a protester who has climbed a gantry on the M25 between junctions six and seven in Surrey, leading to the closure of the motorway PA UK news in pictures 6 November 2022 A grey seal with its pup, at the Donna Nook National Nature Reserve in north Lincolnshire, where they come every year in late October, November and December to give birth to their pups near the sand dunes, the wildlife spectacle attracts visitors from across the UK PA UK news in pictures 5 November 2022 Demonstrators with placards calling for a General Election march near the Houses of Parliament AFP via Getty Images UK news in pictures 4 November 2022 A peacock is seen in the early winter sunshine in the Dutch Gardens in Holland Park AFP via Getty Images UK news in pictures 3 November 2022 Florence Kasumba, Letitia Wright, Tenoch Huerta and Lupita Nyongo attend the European Premiere of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever in London Getty UK news in pictures 2 November 2022 A red squirrel gathers nuts in Pitlochry, Scotland Reuters UK news in pictures 1 November 2022 Englands Tara-Jane Stanley scores their sides seventh try against Brazil during the Womens Rugby League World Cup group A match at Headingley Stadium, Leeds PA UK news in pictures 31 October 2022 GBs James Hall competes during the mens parallel bars qualification at the World Gymnastics Championships in Liverpool AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 30 October 2022 People dressed in Halloween costumes paddle board along the river Avon in Christchurch, Dorset PA UK news in pictures 29 October 2022 Members of the public take pictures as police officers remove activists from a road during a Just Stop Oil protest, in London Reuters UK news in pictures 28 October 2022 A cosplayer attends the MCM Comic Con London 2022 at the ExCel Centre in London Reuters UK news in pictures 27 October 2022 98-year-old D-Day Veteran Bernard Morgan, whose story is among those featured on the giant poppy wall, during the launch of The Royal British Legion 2022 Poppy Appeal, at Hay's Galleria in central London PA UK news in pictures 26 October 2022 A meerkat explores a pumpkin in the enclosure at Wild Place, Bristol, where some of the animals are having pumpkin treats as part of their environmental enrichment PA UK news in pictures 25 October 2022 King Charles III welcomes Rishi Sunak during an audience at Buckingham Palace, where he invited the newly elected leader of the Conservative Party to become Prime Minister and form a new government PA UK news in pictures 24 October 2022 Rishi Sunak celebrates with Tory MPs outside the Conservative Campaign Headquarters after becoming the new leader of the Conservative Party Reuters UK news in pictures 23 October 2022 The Green Man at October Plenty, Borough Market's annual Autumn Harvest festival, in London, which returns for the first time post pandemic PA UK news in pictures 21 October 2022 Sculptor Peter McKenna puts the finishing touches to a pumpkin that will form part of the Planet A Hebden Bridge Pumpkin Trail in the West Yorkshire town PA UK news in pictures 20 October 2022 Britains Prime Minister Liz Truss delivers a speech outside of 10 Downing Street in central London to announce her resignation AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 19 October 2022 Salmon leap up Stainforth Force on the River Ribble in the Yorkshire Dales as they swim upriver to their spawning grounds during the annual Salmon migration PA UK news in pictures 18 October 2022 Just Stop Oil protesters continue their protest for a second day on the Queen Elizabeth II Bridge, which links Kent and Essex and which remains closed for traffic, after it was scaled by two climbers from the group PA UK news in pictures 17 October 2022 Hundreds of students take part in the traditional Raisin Monday foam fight on St Salvator's Lower College Lawn at the University of St Andrews in Fife PA UK news in pictures 16 October 2022 A protester holds a placard during a march into central London at a demonstration by the climate change protest group Extinction Rebellion AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 15 October 2022 A member of the public drags an activist who is blocking the road during a "Just Stop Oil" protest, in London, Britain REUTERS UK news in pictures 14 October 2022 Germanys Womens double skulls during day one of the World Rowing Beach Sprint Finals at Saundersfoot beach, Pembrokeshire PA UK news in pictures 13 October 2022 Family and mourners arrive at St Michael's Church, in Creeslough, for the funeral mass of 49-year-old mother of four Martina Martin, who died following an explosion at the Applegreen service station in the village of Creeslough in Co Donegal on Friday PA UK news in pictures 12 October 2022 Motorists in Coventry pass trees showing autumnal colour PA UK news in pictures 11 October 2022 A woman and her dog in the the North Sea at Tynemouth Longsands beach before sunrise PA UK news in pictures 10 October 2022 Police officers remove a campaigner from a Just Stop Oil protest on The Mall, near Buckingham Palace, London PA UK news in pictures 9 October 2022 A drummer plays during the Diwali on the Square celebration, in Trafalgar Square, London PA UK news in pictures 8 October 2022 Timothee Chalamet attending the UK premiere of Bones and All during the BFI London Film Festival 2022 at the Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, London PA UK news in pictures 7 October 2022 Two young male fallow deer lock antlers in Dublins Phoenix park as rutting season begins PA UK news in pictures 6 October 2022 The Princess of Wales during a cocktail making competition during a visit to Trademarket, a new outdoor street-food and retail market situated in Belfast city centre, as part of the royal visit to Northern Ireland PA UK news in pictures 5 October 2022 Greenpeace protesters interrupt Prime Minister Liz Truss as she delivers her keynote speech to the Conservative Party annual conference PA UK news in pictures 4 October 2022 Prime Minister Liz Truss and Britains Chancellor of the Exchequer Kwasi Kwarteng wearing hard hats and hi-vis jackets, visit a construction site for a medical innovation campus in Birmingham AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 3 October 2022 British artist Sam Cox, aka Mr Doodle, reveals the Doodle House, a twelve-room mansion at Tenterden, in Kent, which has been covered, inside and out in the artist's trademark monochrome, cartoonish hand-drawn doodles PA UK news in pictures 2 October 2022 Erling Haaland celebrates after scoring Manchester City's second goal against Manchester United at Etihad Stadium. Haaland went on to score a hattrick, his third of the season in the Premier League. City beat United 6-3. Manchester City FC/Getty UK news in pictures 1 October 2022 Protesters hold up flags and placards at a protest in London. A variety of protest groups including Enough is Enough, Don't Pay and Just Stop Oil all demonstrated on the day AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 30 September 2022 British Prime Minister Liz Truss, who has not been seen in days, leaves the back of Downing Street after a meeting with Office For Budget Responsibility following the release of her governments mini-budget Getty UK news in pictures 29 September 2022 The Virginia creeper foliage on the Tu Hwnt i'r Bont (Beyond the Bridge) Llanwrst, Conwy North Wales, has changed colour from green to red in at the start of Autumn. The building was built in 1480 as a residential dwelling but has been a tearoom for over 50 years PA UK news in pictures 28 September 2022 Criminal barristers from the Criminal Bar Association (CBA), demonstrates outside the Royal Courts of Justice in London, as part of their ongoing pay row with the Government PA UK news in pictures 27 September 2022 David White, Garter King of Arms, poses with an envelope franked with the new cypher of King Charles III 'CIIIR', after it was printed in the Court Post Office at Buckingham Palace in central London AFP/Getty UK news in pictures 26 September 2022 A gallery staff member poses next to a painting by Lucian Freud - Self-portrait (Fragment), 1956 - on show at a photocall for the Credit Suisse exhibition - Lucian Freud: New Perspectives at the National Gallery in London PA UK news in pictures 25 September 2022 Labour leader, Sir Keir Starmer is interviewed by Laura Kuenssberg in Liverpool before the start of the Labour Party annual Conference which he opened with a tribute to Queen Elizabeth II and sang the national anthem PA UK news in pictures 24 September 2022 Handout photo issued by Buckingham Palace of the ledger stone at the King George VI Memorial Chapel, St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle PA UK news in pictures 23 September 2022 A climate change activist protests against UK private jets while lighting his right arm on fire during the Laver Cup tennis tournament at the O2 Arena in London EPA

After months of uncertainty, the party committed to pursuing membership of the single market and customs union during a transition period after the Britain leaves the EU in March 2019.

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has come under pressure to sack MPs who defy the order to vote against the EU (Withdrawal) Bill or risk defying his party's stance on a softer Brexit.
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The Saudi Arabian embassy in Washington DC may have funded a dry run of the 9/11 attacks, according to evidence submitted to an ongoing lawsuit against the Saudi government.

As reported by the New York Post, the embassy might have used two of its employees for the so-called dry run before a dozen hijackers flew two planes into the Twin Towers, killing nearly 3,000 people in 2001.

The complaint, filed on behalf of 1,400 family members of the victims, stated that the Saudi Government paid two nationals, posing as students in the US, to take a flight from Phoenix to Washington and test out flight deck security before 9/11.

Sean Carter, lead lawyer for the plaintiffs, said, "We've long asserted that there were longstanding and close relationships between al Qaeda and the religious components of the Saudi government."

The Saudi government has long denied any links to the terrorists and lawyers representing the government have filed motions to dismiss the claims. The plaintiffs must respond to the motion by November.

The case can then go to trial thanks to the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act which was voted into law by Congress last September, despite a veto from former President Barack Obama and lobbying from the Saudi government. The law allows survivors and relatives of victims to sue foreign governments in US federal courts.

According to the documents and as reported by the New York Post, the class action lawsuit argued that a pattern of both financial and operational support from the Saudi government helped the hijackers in the months before the attacks.

FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 Show all 19 1 /19 FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI FBI release unseen image of Pentagon on 9/11 FBI

FBI documents, submitted as evidence, claimed that the two Saudi nationals who came to the US, Mohammed al-Qudhaeein and Hamdan al-Shalawi, were in fact members of the Kingdom's network of agents in the country. The documents claimed the men trained in Afghanistan with a number of other al-Qaeda operatives that participated in the attacks.

Qudhaeein was allegedly employed at the Saudi Arabias Ministry of Islamic Affairs, and Shalawi was a longtime employee of the Saudi government in Washington DC.

In November 1999 they boarded an America West flight to Washington, and tried to access the cockpit several times, asking the flight attendants technical questions and making the staff suspicious.

In pictures: President Bushs immediate response to 9/11 Show all 12 1 /12 In pictures: President Bushs immediate response to 9/11 In pictures: President Bushs immediate response to 9/11 11 September 2001 President Bush was visiting Emma E Brooker Elementary School in Sarasota, Florida as news of the attack on the World Trade Center broke In pictures: President Bushs immediate response to 9/11 11 September 2001 The president and his staff, including Press Secretary Ari Fleischer (L) were then brought to a holding room at the school, where he prepared to address the nation In pictures: President Bushs immediate response to 9/11 11 September 2001 President Bush was then rushed onto Air Force One and was flown to Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana. He watched television coverage of the attacks from his office on the plane In pictures: President Bushs immediate response to 9/11 11 September 2001 President Bush talks on the telephone at the General Dougherty Conference Center at Barksdale Air Force Base In pictures: President Bushs immediate response to 9/11 11 September 2001 President Bush is seen with his senior adviser Karl Rove at Barksdale Air Force Base In pictures: President Bushs immediate response to 9/11 11 September 2001 The president with White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card at Barksdale Air Force Base. Before leaving the base, the president held a press conference at which he said, Make no mistake: The United States will hunt down and punish those responsible for these cowardly acts In pictures: President Bushs immediate response to 9/11 11 September 2001 The president was consoled by Lt Col Cindy Wright of the White House Military Office aboard Air Force One. After leaving Louisiana, the president was flown to Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska before he headed back to Washington In pictures: President Bushs immediate response to 9/11 11 September 2001 President Bush arrived at the White House Presidential Emergency Operations Center around 7 pm. Here he is shown with his wife, First Lady Laura Bush, Vice President Cheney and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice In pictures: President Bushs immediate response to 9/11 11 September 2001 At 8:30 pm, the president addressed the nation from the White House. In his speech, he set the tone for the wars to come in Afghanistan and Iraq In pictures: President Bushs immediate response to 9/11 11 September 2001 Ive directed the full resources for our intelligence and law enforcement communities to find those responsible and bring them to justice, the president said. We will make no distinction between the terrorists who committed these acts and those who harbour them In pictures: President Bushs immediate response to 9/11 11 September 2001 The presidents speech on the teleprompter In pictures: President Bushs immediate response to 9/11 11 September 2001 Immediately following the speech, the president had a national security meeting with Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Vice President Dick Cheney, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card and others

Qudhaeein reportedly asked staff where the bathroom was and was pointed in the right direction; instead he tried to enter the cockpit. The pilots made an emergency landing in Ohio and the two men were released after an initial interrogation from the FBI.

Their plane tickets were reportedly paid for by the Saudi Embassy, according to Kristen Breitweiser, whose husband was killed in 9/11.

 Macron grimaces as Donald Trump attacks Nato during 9/11 memorial speech

The two men also reportedly attended a symposium in Washington, organised by the Saudi embassy in association with the Institute for Islamic and Arabic Sciences in America, which employed late al-Qaeda cleric Anwar al-Awlaki as a lecturer. He later helped the hijackers to get housing and ID when they arrived in early 2000.

The Post reported that the Saudi nationals lived in Arizona and had frequent communication with Saudi officials.

Mr Carter said the allegations in the class action lawsuit were based on almost 5,000 pages of evidence.

A total of 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudi. Hundreds of thousands of US documents regarding Saudi Arabia remain secret.
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A Florida sheriff has pleaded with citizens not to shoot at Hurricane Irma, saying they wont turn it around.

The Pasco County Sheriff's Office warned that shooting weapons at the most dangerous Atlantic hurricane to hit the US since records began will have very dangerous side effects.

As many as 53,000 people said they were interested in a Facebook event called Shoot At Hurricane Irma, and 25,000 people said they would participate on Saturday evening.

Recommended Hurricane Irma sucks water from Bahamas beach in rare phenomenon

It was set up by 22-year-old Ryon Edwards.

A description of the event read: YO SO THIS GOOFY LOOKING WINDY HEADA** NAMED IRMA SAID THEY PULLING UP ON US, LETS SHOW IRMA THAT WE SHOOT FIRST.

The Sheriff's office tweeted on Saturday evening: "To clarify, DO NOT shoot weapons @ #Irma. You won't make it turn around & it will have very dangerous side effects."

Mr Edwards told the BBC he created the event out of boredom and stress, and was surprised by the reaction.

Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami Show all 8 1 /8 Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami Jennifer Nelson, senior keeper at Zoo Miami, leads a cheetah named Koda to a hurricane resistant structure within the zoo, Saturday, Sept. 9, 2017 in Miami. AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami Ryan Martinez, a trainer at Zoo Miami, places an Eurasion Eagle Owl into a crate AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami Flamingos at Zoo Miami, are shown in a temporary enclosure in a hurricane resistant structure within the zoo, (AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee) Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami Brown pelicans and an American white pelican take refuge in a shelter ahead of the downfall of Hurricane Irma at the zoo in Miami REUTERS/Adrees Latif Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami An African crested porcupine is moved into a shelter ahead of the downfall of Hurricane Irma at the zoo in Miami, Florida, REUTERS/Adrees Latif Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami A macaw parrot looks out of it's cage after being put into a shelter REUTERS/Adrees Latif Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami An African grey parrot is moved into a shelter ahead of the downfall of Hurricane Irma REUTERS/Adrees Latif Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami Cheetahs are photographed in a shelter ahead of the downfall of Hurricane Irma at the zoo in Miami, Florida, REUTERS/Adrees Latif

The response is a complete and total surprise to me, he said.

I never envisioned this event becoming some kind of crazy idea larger than myself. It has become something a little out of my control.

 Irma relief operation 'well under way' as nearly 500 UK troops sent to Caribbean

Graphics appeared online, suggesting how people could fire correctly at the hurricane to ensure the bullets did not come back and kill you.

Several other events quickly appeared on Facebook to combat the storm, including scaring it with flamethrowers, Spinning your arms really fast to push away Hurricane Irma and Destroy Hurricane Irma By Cooling The Atlantic With Ice Cubes.

The Category 5 storm ripped through the Caribbean, causing devastation to the islands and killing at least 24 people, before moving west to the US.

Six million people were asked to evacuate the Sunshine State.

Diagram being shared showing people how to shoot the hurricane (screen grab)

Many people said evacuation became difficult or impossible due to the high cost of flights, petrol stations running out of gas and traffic jams.
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Many people in south-east Florida were likely woken up Sunday morning by the unnerving buzz of their phones, announcing the threat of tornadoes nearby as the effects of Hurricane Irma began to be felt.

At about 7.30am in Hollywood, one of those alerts rang out, while trees bent under the strengthening winds outside. Intermittent bands of thunderstorms have rolled in from the Atlantic throughout the morning, pounding streets and making driving dangerous as large pools of water collect on the side of the road.

The winds have become strong enough here  130mph in some parts of the state, but likely closer to 70 in Hollywood  that anyone standing in them is liable to be pushed off balance. Strong bursts make it difficult to hold onto mobile phones outside, too.

Recommended Meet the Florida residents refusing to evacuate from Irma

Reports on local television say that cranes have broken on the top of skyscrapers in downtown Miami, and normally wind-resistant palm trees have been uprooted in Miami Beach.

The streets are mostly empty, however. Officials have implemented curfews in many portions of the region, hoping to keep people indoors where they are safer  and less of a liability for first responders.

Even emergency vehicles are a rare sight as Irma, after running through the vulnerable Florida Keys on Sunday morning, moves north into the western part of the state.

The strengthening winds have torn at the trees and shrubbery alongside roads. Branches and palms dot the streets, creating hazards for anyone brave enough to drive. As late as Saturday night, police could be seen stopping to remove debris, hoping to keep emergency routes clear for whatever response Irma might require.

At the Quality Inn in Hollywood, Greg Rogers pulled up next to thfetce front entrance of the hotel, using the awning there to shelter himself from the rain as he fetched some supplies from the bed of his white pickup truck. His licence plates read Texas.

Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Show all 45 1 /45 Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Recently planted palm trees lie strewn across the road as Hurricane Irma passes by in Miami Beach, Fla. 10 September 2017. AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Damage outside the Mercure hotel in Marigot, on the Bay of Nettle, on the island of Saint-Martin AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures People pick up debris in Fajardo as Hurricane Irma howled past Puerto Rico after thrashing several smaller Caribbean islands Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Large waves produced by Hurricane Irma crash into the end of Anglins Fishing Pier in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The category 4 hurricane made landfall in the United States in the Florida Keys at 9:10 a.m. after raking across the north coast of Cuba. 10 September 2017 Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A Royal Air Force Puma has been delivered to the US Virgin Islands to assist with the humanitarian efforts post Hurricane Irma. The Puma will be delivering Humanitarian Aid and Disaster Relief in support of the Department for International Development. Royal Air Force logisticians from RAF Brize Norton have assisted with the delivery of military personnel and aid cargo to the Caribbean to support disaster relief in the wake of Hurricane Irma. RAF aircraft including, C-17 A400M and Voyager are supporting a Joint Task Force of RAF, Royal Marines, Army and RN personnel who are supporting the Department for International Development as it delivers aid to stricken Caribbean Islands. MoD Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Flamingos at Zoo Miami, are shown in a temporary enclosure in a hurricane resistant structure within the zoo, Saturday, 9 September 2017 in Miami. Though most animals will reman in their secure structures, the cheetahs and some birds will ride out the storm in temporary housing. AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Boats are seen at a marina in South Beach as Hurricane Irma arrives at south Florida, in Miami Beach, Florida, U.S. 10 September 2017 Reuters Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Storm clouds are seen over Fisher Island as Hurricane Irma approaches on 9 September 2017 in Miami Beach, Florida. Florida is in the path of the Hurricane which may come ashore at category 4 Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Waves crash over a seawall at the mouth of the Miami River from Biscayne Bay, Fla., as Hurricane Irma passes by. 10 September 2017 AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Some of the damage on Saint Martin EPA/Gerben Van Es/Dutch Department of Defence Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The skyline is seen as the outerbands of Hurricane Irma start to reach Florida on 9 September 2017 in Miami, Florida. Florida is in the path of the Hurricane which may come ashore at category 4. Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A tree toped by hurricane Irma is seen on a empty street in Remedios, Cuba, 9 September 2017. Hurricane Irma reached Cuba bringing winds between 160 and 190 kilometers per hour. The hurricane has hit the north coast of the island. EPA Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures James Constantineau loads sands bags in his truck as he prepares for the approach of Hurricane Irma Saturday, 9 September 2017, in East Palatka, Fla. Gov. Rick Scott is urging anyone living in an evacuation zone in southwest Florida to leave by noon as the threat of Hurricane Irma has shifted west. AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The Fort Louis Marina in Marigot is seen on 8 September 2017 in Saint-Martin island, devastated by Hurricane Irma. AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Destruction in Orient Bay on the island of Saint-Martin AFP/Getty Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The wreckage in Orient Bay on the island of Saint-Martin AFP/Getty Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures View of the aftermath of Hurricane Irma on Saint Martin Reuters Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A mobile network tower snapped in two by the hurricane on the island of Barbuda ABS TV Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A house reduced to rubble on the island of Saint Barthelemy AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures General view of damage on Saint Martin Reuters Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A damaged Casino Royale on Saint Martin after the passage of Hurricane Irma Anna Mazur/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures An aerial photograph taken and released by the Dutch department of Defense shows the damage of Hurricane Irma in Philipsburg, Sint Maarten, the Dutch section of the Caribbean Island Gerben Van Es/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Flooded houses in Gustavia on the island of Saint-Barthelemy Kevin Barrallon/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The damage on the island of Saint-Martin, a day after Hurricane Irma hit AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A man carrying an umbrella is battered by the wind in Fajardo, Puerto Rico Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A lone police car on patrol during the passing of Hurricane Irma in Fajardo, Puerto Rico Jose Jimenez/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Haitian people walk through the wind and rain on a beach in Cap-Haitien on September 7 as Hurricane Irma approaches Hector Retamal/AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A flooded street on the island of Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A tree collapsed on a house in Saint Martin Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A hotel in Saint Martin is gutted by floodwater during the hurricane Guadeloupe 1ere Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Cars submerged in Saint Martin Rinsy Xieng Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Debris floats amongst the floodwater in Saint Martin @la1ere Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Household items float down the street in Gustavia, Saint-Barthelemy Carole Greaux Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The coast of Saint Martin is flooded as the hurricane hits the island Meteo Express Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A whole street underwater in Saint Martin @la1ere Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A car crashes into the tree amongst the chaos in Saint Martin @Bondtehond Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A building on the Saint Martin seafront, destroyed by the hurricane @Bondtehond Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A mobile home overturned at Princess Juliana International Airport in Saint Martin @Bondtehond Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Palm trees bend in the wind in San Juan, Puerto Rico as Hurricane Irma slammed across islands in the northern Caribbean Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A woman runs in the rain as Hurricane Irma slammed into San Juan, Puerto Rico Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A picture taken on September 5, 2017 shows a view of the Baie Nettle beach in Marigot, with the wind blowing ahead of the arrival of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A man rides past a boarded up house as part of preparations ahead of the arrival of Hurricane Irma on September 5, 2017, in the French overseas island of Guadeloupe Helene Valenzuela/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Employees of the Mercure Hotel fill sand bags on the Baie Nettle beach in Marigot, as part of the preparations for the arrival of Hurricane Irma Lionel Chamoiseau/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures People in line at Costco, as they find out the store has ran out of water on September 5, 2017 in North Miami Michele Eve Sandberg/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Night view of the city of Cap-Haitien, in the north of Haiti, 240 km from Port-au-Prince, on September 5, 2017 Hector Retamal/AFP

The hurricane! Mr Rogers said, when asked why he had come to Florida when a major hurricane was on the way. He meant a different storm, though: hed fled the effects of Hurricane Harvey in his Houston home to South Florida, only to be dogged by yet another major storm.

Houston was just a lot of rain, Mr Rogers said, looking out at the sharply slanting rain and wind hitting the street nearby. These winds are something, though.

While winds picked up throughout the morning, howling as they passed through creaking trees, lights in the hotel occasionally flickered out, then on and off again. Luckily, guests in the building werent among the more than one million people in southern Florida who have seen their power go out as Irma inches closer. At least, not yet.

However, other systems did fail.

While sleeping guess at the Quality Inn were startled by the harsh tones of the tornado warnings, another alarm was buzzing outside. Toward the back of the hotel is a lift pump, and the alarm meant that it wasnt working anymore.

The hotel, along with several others nearby, sits below the sewage plant that treats and processes all of the waste water from guests. The pump is crucial to ensuring that the hotel parking lot isnt flooded with sewage.

We hope it doesnt come to that, hotel manager Greg Winn said, noting that the hotel has about three days before the sewage drainage might be overrun.

Mr Winn is telling guests to conserve water as much as possible, just in case Irma leaves them stranded longer than initially expected.

Try not to run your water. Try not to use your toilet, he said. Do your best.
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As Hurricane Irma ominously makes its way to Florida, experts have warned that the governor's denial of climate change makes the state's infrastructure more vulnerable to damage.

Florida Governor Rick Scott has warned all residents to evacuate because Irma "is wider than our entire state and is expected to cause major and life-threatening impacts from coast to coast". The state is approximately 360 miles (580 km) wide.

We can rebuild your home, we cant rebuild your life, he said.

Recommended Floridians flee or hunker down as Hurricane Irma nears

In Florida, residents install storm shutters and wooden planks in an attempt to minimise inevitable damage to homes and storefronts, but the state may not have done enough to ensure public structures are equally prepared.

Mr Scott, along with Republican Senator Marco Rubio, have dodged questions on climate change over the years.

As recently as June 2017 after Donald Trumps withdrawal of the US from the global Paris Agreement on climate change, Mr Scott would not say whether he believed human action had an impact on climate despite scientific evidence.

Instead he focused on the Presidents commitment to American jobs, saying: You cannot invest in your environment without a good economy.

However, this attitude could result in preventable damage along the Florida coast and particularly for poorer communities in the state.

Julie McNamara, an energy analyst at the Union for Concerned Scientists, told The Independent that research done by the group indicated that electricity transformers in Miami-Dade county were at particular risk of flooding.

She said that these structures are "not required to build for the future" and so sea level rise and increasing intensity of storms are not taken into account.

State government regulations do not reflect that reality in Florida either.

Ms McNamara pointed out that Florida Power and Light, a large public utility company serving almost 10 million people, has "doubled down" on nuclear power and has limited the state's residents ability to have more resilient, renewable sources of power than nuclear plants that could also flood.

However, even in places like climate-progressive California that requirement on building standards is just now being implemented.

Florida has provided funding to save the Everglades, the tropical wetlands in South Florida, but Miami Beach City Engineer Bruce Mowry said the state has not funded his citys $500 million flood prevention programme.

Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures Show all 7 1 /7 Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures A roof-less house in Barbuda ABS TV Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures A mobile network tower snapped in two by the hurricane ABS TV Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures The hurricane left debris strewn across the island Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures Rubble in the aftermath of the hurricane ABS TV Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures The destruction in Barbuda, as seen from an ABS TV helicopter ABS TV Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures As well as destroying most houses, the hurricane also left plenty of flooding ABS TV Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures Barbudan residents survey the damage ABS TV

Thus far the city has spent approximately $100 million of the overall funding to install drainage pumps with plans to raise low-lying streets that experience what he called sunny day floods when high tide is enough to deluge streets, parking garages, and homes.

Mr Mowry noted that though there was a few million allocated by the state in low interest loans for seawalls, the city are surrounding areas have not received state or federal help for this type of climate resilient infrastructure.

Miami Beach had to raise the money through a combination of stormwater utility fees and sales of municipal bonds, said Mr Mowry.

The programme implementation began approximately two years ago, but Mr Mowry told The Independent: no one can do enough planning for a hurricane of the size and nature of Irma.

The design criteria we use for drainage system is not made for hurricanes said Mr Mowry, but he expects that the design and construction standards of public buildings may change depending on the damage caused by Irma.

He does expect a slight setback to the work that has already been put in installing drainage pumps underground in public areas of the city, but that the real impact will have to wait to be assessed as flooding often brings dirt and silt that have to be filtered through drainage systems in addition to floodwaters.

He said Mr Scott is in denial of the impact of climate change and it would be helpful if the state saw it as an overall comprehensive programme for the whole state rather than just benefiting wealthy areas like Miami Beach.

Mr Mowry contended that whether the US was involved in the Paris Agreement or not, sea level rise would continue and coastal residents would still bear the brunt of it.

What really needs to happen in Florida and all over the world is an overall culture change, he said.

Nicole Hernandez Hammer, Climate Science and Community Advocate at the Union of Concerned Scientists, told The Independent that what Miami Beach has done is great, but those same funds are not available in lower income areas.

People [in these neighbourhoods and cities] deal with flooding frequently because of sea level rise...on normal days, so it is frightening to think what may happen with Hurricane Irma, she said.

Ms Hammer, who lost her house in Hurricane Andrew in 1992, said she knows too well that a city can never really understand the extent of the damage until the storm has been passed.

But, she noted that though construction and building standards have improved in recent years, they are not resilient enough for increasingly stronger storms that are the result of climate change.

 Government buildings left abandoned after Hurricane Irma destruction

This is what happens when you build a major metropolitan area at sea level with a state government that is in denial...and supports polluters, Ms Hammer said.

She has first-hand experience with Mr Scotts aversion to even discussing climate change.

When she was assistant director of climate change research at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton, Florida, Ms Hammer worked on a report regarding the state transportation infrastructures resilience to rising sea levels.

When her team submitted the report to the Florida Department of Transportation, the agency called to tell the team to scrub almost all mentions of the phrase climate change, even in the summary of the report.

We cant even mention the phrase but now were all panicking, Ms Hammer noted.

Ms Hammer explained that Miami especially is full of large construction cranes as new buildings are going up on the water's edge. She worried about the damage these cranes may cause to existing buildings and homes nearby.

She was also concerned that lower income communities were in a particularly bad position as a result of evacuation infrastructure as well.

If you take a bus, how are you supposed to go get sandbags, plywood, supplies to prepare for the hurricane, Ms Hammer asked. She said there are a number of residents who do not own cars or have drivers licences either.

Affordable options like the private bus services are full, but people have been told they have to make it inland well past Orlando to be in a safe place.

People are frightened and rightfully so.

State officials have said that those who do not or cannot evacuate should not expect an answer if they call for emergency help.

In preparation for the damage, Congress has authorised $15.3 billion in relief aid for the state of Florida.

How that money is allocated for long-term climate resiliency improvements remains to be seen.
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At least three people are reported to have been killed as Hurricane Irma sweeps into Florida, carrying 130mph winds and threatening to devastate large parts of the so-called Sunshine State.

As the historic, category-4 storm made landfall and where millions have been evacuated as 130mph winds left almost 600,000 without power, reports said a man in Monroe County, which covers Key West, was killed after he lost control of a vehicle he was in as winds whipped at tropical-storm strength.

ABC News said the man was carrying a generator in anticipation of being without power for some time when the accident happened.

Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami Show all 8 1 /8 Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami Jennifer Nelson, senior keeper at Zoo Miami, leads a cheetah named Koda to a hurricane resistant structure within the zoo, Saturday, Sept. 9, 2017 in Miami. AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami Ryan Martinez, a trainer at Zoo Miami, places an Eurasion Eagle Owl into a crate AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami Flamingos at Zoo Miami, are shown in a temporary enclosure in a hurricane resistant structure within the zoo, (AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee) Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami Brown pelicans and an American white pelican take refuge in a shelter ahead of the downfall of Hurricane Irma at the zoo in Miami REUTERS/Adrees Latif Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami An African crested porcupine is moved into a shelter ahead of the downfall of Hurricane Irma at the zoo in Miami, Florida, REUTERS/Adrees Latif Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami A macaw parrot looks out of it's cage after being put into a shelter REUTERS/Adrees Latif Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami An African grey parrot is moved into a shelter ahead of the downfall of Hurricane Irma REUTERS/Adrees Latif Animals take shelter from Hurricane Irma at Zoo Miami Cheetahs are photographed in a shelter ahead of the downfall of Hurricane Irma at the zoo in Miami, Florida, REUTERS/Adrees Latif

Later, it was reported that two people had died in a head-on crash in Hardee County, southeast of the city of Tampa.

The Florida Highway Patrol spokesman Greg Bueno said the crash happened on Sunday morning, though it was not clear what role the weather may have played. He said police were investigating the crash and no further details were immediately available, according to the Associated Press.

The hurricane made landfall in the US at Cudjoe Key in the lower Florida Keys at 9.10am with top sustained winds of up to 130mph, according to the US National Hurricane Centre in Miami. A gust of 106mph was reported on Big Pine Key.

 Hurricane Irma: Storm changes path towards St Petersburg

As the storm followed forecasters predictions and shifted westwards, experts said its path posed a severe threat to the states west coast and the Florida Keys.

This is a worst case scenario for Monroe County, the Florida Keys and the west coast of Florida, Brock Long, administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), told Fox News.

Any time you're in that northeast quadrant as the storm is moving forward, thats where the maximum radius winds are that define the intensity of the storm. Thats where the storm surge is most prevalent and the inland winds are going to be tough.



The hurricane had previously killed 23 people as it devastated a series of Caribbean islands.
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As Florida's authorities rush to complete an unprecedented evacuation of millions ahead of an expected direct hit by Hurricane Irma, officials have issued their final dire warnings. Governor, Rick Scott called it a "killer storm" where people "cannot survive" the expected storm surges, urging residents that Saturday night marked the last chance to "make a good decision and evacuate".

President Donald Trump called Irma a storm of "enormous destructive potential" and urged residents to "get out of its way" adding that "property is replaceable but lives are not".

However, despite the warnings and the near-hurricane winds that began late on Saturday night - not to mention the threat from tornadoes and lightning - many residents of southern Florida are choosing to stay and wait out Irma.

Now I know my roof can handle this, Im very happy, said Elizabeth Hannan, who lives just west of Ft Lauderdale on Florida's eastern coast. She was referring to a shift in the tracking report for Hurricane Irma that showed the storm moving up Florida's western Gulf coast, rather than hitting Miami as had previously been expected.

The shift in path now sees southwestern Florida, and up the coast to Tampa shift into the crosshairs of the storm and its maximum 125mph winds - but as he has done for days, Florida's Governor Scott was at pains on Saturday to pint out that all parts of the state are in danger, whether from the winds or from the storm surges near the coast which Mr Scott sees as the biggest danger.

In a number of media appearances and press conferences Mr Scott said he needed "everyone to listen and get out:.

"The storm surge is what really scares me," he said referring to reports of 10ft to 15ft storm surges around Fort Meyers and Tampa, and up to 6ft in Miami. "You cannot survive this," he added.

Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Show all 45 1 /45 Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Recently planted palm trees lie strewn across the road as Hurricane Irma passes by in Miami Beach, Fla. 10 September 2017. AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Damage outside the Mercure hotel in Marigot, on the Bay of Nettle, on the island of Saint-Martin AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures People pick up debris in Fajardo as Hurricane Irma howled past Puerto Rico after thrashing several smaller Caribbean islands Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Large waves produced by Hurricane Irma crash into the end of Anglins Fishing Pier in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The category 4 hurricane made landfall in the United States in the Florida Keys at 9:10 a.m. after raking across the north coast of Cuba. 10 September 2017 Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A Royal Air Force Puma has been delivered to the US Virgin Islands to assist with the humanitarian efforts post Hurricane Irma. The Puma will be delivering Humanitarian Aid and Disaster Relief in support of the Department for International Development. Royal Air Force logisticians from RAF Brize Norton have assisted with the delivery of military personnel and aid cargo to the Caribbean to support disaster relief in the wake of Hurricane Irma. RAF aircraft including, C-17 A400M and Voyager are supporting a Joint Task Force of RAF, Royal Marines, Army and RN personnel who are supporting the Department for International Development as it delivers aid to stricken Caribbean Islands. MoD Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Flamingos at Zoo Miami, are shown in a temporary enclosure in a hurricane resistant structure within the zoo, Saturday, 9 September 2017 in Miami. Though most animals will reman in their secure structures, the cheetahs and some birds will ride out the storm in temporary housing. AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Boats are seen at a marina in South Beach as Hurricane Irma arrives at south Florida, in Miami Beach, Florida, U.S. 10 September 2017 Reuters Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Storm clouds are seen over Fisher Island as Hurricane Irma approaches on 9 September 2017 in Miami Beach, Florida. Florida is in the path of the Hurricane which may come ashore at category 4 Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Waves crash over a seawall at the mouth of the Miami River from Biscayne Bay, Fla., as Hurricane Irma passes by. 10 September 2017 AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Some of the damage on Saint Martin EPA/Gerben Van Es/Dutch Department of Defence Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The skyline is seen as the outerbands of Hurricane Irma start to reach Florida on 9 September 2017 in Miami, Florida. Florida is in the path of the Hurricane which may come ashore at category 4. Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A tree toped by hurricane Irma is seen on a empty street in Remedios, Cuba, 9 September 2017. Hurricane Irma reached Cuba bringing winds between 160 and 190 kilometers per hour. The hurricane has hit the north coast of the island. EPA Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures James Constantineau loads sands bags in his truck as he prepares for the approach of Hurricane Irma Saturday, 9 September 2017, in East Palatka, Fla. Gov. Rick Scott is urging anyone living in an evacuation zone in southwest Florida to leave by noon as the threat of Hurricane Irma has shifted west. AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The Fort Louis Marina in Marigot is seen on 8 September 2017 in Saint-Martin island, devastated by Hurricane Irma. AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Destruction in Orient Bay on the island of Saint-Martin AFP/Getty Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The wreckage in Orient Bay on the island of Saint-Martin AFP/Getty Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures View of the aftermath of Hurricane Irma on Saint Martin Reuters Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A mobile network tower snapped in two by the hurricane on the island of Barbuda ABS TV Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A house reduced to rubble on the island of Saint Barthelemy AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures General view of damage on Saint Martin Reuters Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A damaged Casino Royale on Saint Martin after the passage of Hurricane Irma Anna Mazur/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures An aerial photograph taken and released by the Dutch department of Defense shows the damage of Hurricane Irma in Philipsburg, Sint Maarten, the Dutch section of the Caribbean Island Gerben Van Es/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Flooded houses in Gustavia on the island of Saint-Barthelemy Kevin Barrallon/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The damage on the island of Saint-Martin, a day after Hurricane Irma hit AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A man carrying an umbrella is battered by the wind in Fajardo, Puerto Rico Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A lone police car on patrol during the passing of Hurricane Irma in Fajardo, Puerto Rico Jose Jimenez/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Haitian people walk through the wind and rain on a beach in Cap-Haitien on September 7 as Hurricane Irma approaches Hector Retamal/AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A flooded street on the island of Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A tree collapsed on a house in Saint Martin Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A hotel in Saint Martin is gutted by floodwater during the hurricane Guadeloupe 1ere Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Cars submerged in Saint Martin Rinsy Xieng Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Debris floats amongst the floodwater in Saint Martin @la1ere Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Household items float down the street in Gustavia, Saint-Barthelemy Carole Greaux Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The coast of Saint Martin is flooded as the hurricane hits the island Meteo Express Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A whole street underwater in Saint Martin @la1ere Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A car crashes into the tree amongst the chaos in Saint Martin @Bondtehond Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A building on the Saint Martin seafront, destroyed by the hurricane @Bondtehond Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A mobile home overturned at Princess Juliana International Airport in Saint Martin @Bondtehond Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Palm trees bend in the wind in San Juan, Puerto Rico as Hurricane Irma slammed across islands in the northern Caribbean Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A woman runs in the rain as Hurricane Irma slammed into San Juan, Puerto Rico Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A picture taken on September 5, 2017 shows a view of the Baie Nettle beach in Marigot, with the wind blowing ahead of the arrival of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A man rides past a boarded up house as part of preparations ahead of the arrival of Hurricane Irma on September 5, 2017, in the French overseas island of Guadeloupe Helene Valenzuela/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Employees of the Mercure Hotel fill sand bags on the Baie Nettle beach in Marigot, as part of the preparations for the arrival of Hurricane Irma Lionel Chamoiseau/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures People in line at Costco, as they find out the store has ran out of water on September 5, 2017 in North Miami Michele Eve Sandberg/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Night view of the city of Cap-Haitien, in the north of Haiti, 240 km from Port-au-Prince, on September 5, 2017 Hector Retamal/AFP

In Miami, officials had issued evacuation orders and warned that a direct hit from Irma could lead to major devastation, but many had opted to stay put either at home or in shelters.

As the winds picked up, and heavy rain fell - and tonardos were reported in a number of areas - resident Ms Hannan said that shes prepared for potential power outages.

More than six million people have been ordered to evacuate Florida - with more across other states such as Georgia - as Irma heads for the US having made its way through the Caribbean killing at least 23 people. The storm which passed over Cuba on Saturday after initially approaching the island as a rare Category 5 storm  was forecast to shift westward away from Floridas largest city.

In Miami-Dade County, and areas around it, people have rushed to pack into shelters. Many reached capacity quickly, filling up with people coming with supplies to keep themselves fed. More than 50,000 fled to shelters in the entire state of Florida this week, packing into schools and convention centres with their blow up mattresses to wait out the storm.

The Florida Keys, off the southern tip of Florida, were seen as particularly vulnerable as Irma, which left Cuba as a Category 3, but was expected to gain strength back to a category 4 and speed on its way towards America. Irma was expected to approach the Keys by early Sunday morning local time.

Mr Scott has mobilised the entire Florida National Guard to help with the storm, and law enforcement was preparing for search and rescue missions after the storm runs through Florida.

Florida is prepared. We have great first responders. We have great law enforcement. Every single Florida guardsman that can be has already been deployed, Mr Scott said.

At the Shenanigans East Side Pub, in Hollywood on the eastern coast more than two dozen people packed in Saturday night to eat pizza, drink beer, and enjoy each others company before the worst of Hurricane Irmas effects were felt in the area.

Outside, lightening lit up the sky, rain pelted rooftops and streets, and palm trees swayed in the increasingly powerful winds.

Were going to play it by ear, one employee said while locking up TVs in a covered courtyard. Well close down when the wind gets bad enough.

Inside, people discussed whether theyd leave their homes in the morning. And, if not, what else they might do with their day.

Their phones, intermittently, buzzed with warnings of tornado watches nearby. But nobody  not the police who had stopped in at one of the last few places with an open kitchen, or the regulars who knew the bartender by name  seemed too worried about the alerts.

 Irma relief operation 'well under way' as nearly 500 UK troops sent to Caribbean

Nearby, Rick Costello, a lawyer with a home right on the beach in Hollywood, said that he had considered heading inland but was going to stick out the storm in his light blue coastal homes with clay shingles.

Im more worried about people out west, Mr Costello said, watching the waves outside his home before the winds picked up. His home was equipped with metal shields for his glass deck doors facing the ocean, and hurricane-proof windows. He hoped the 10-foot elevation of his home would be enough.

Western residents faced a quick decision on Saturday. Walter Hodgdon was one resident to scrap plans to ride out Hurricane Irma on Saturday when the shifting forecast models suddenly put his home on a barrier island on Florida's Gulf Coast directly in its path.

Within hours, Mr Hodgdon and his partner had hastily boarded up their home and were driving to North Carolina.

Last night, during one of the models, they drew a line right over our house, said Mr Hodgdon, 58, who lives on Terra Ceia where Tampa Bay meets the Gulf of Mexico. We figured if we are going to leave, we are going to leave completely, he told Reuters.

Back on the eastern coast, Kelvin Morley, of Palmetto Bay, said his house is prone to flooding, and has suffered roof damage during previous, less intense storms and was one of the thousands to seek shelter in the area.

It's not safe at home, Mr Morley said, speaking outside the South Miami High School shelter. I just want everybody to be safe, and then we will rebuild.

Hurricane Irma has broken records in the Atlantic, and became just the second storm in recorded history to sustain winds of 185 mph for 24 hours straight.

Prime Minister Gaston Browne of Antigua and Barbuda said that the latter of those two islands is literally rubble after Irma hit, with as much as 95 per cent of the infrastructure there damaged by the storm earlier in the week. Reports of death and damage have also emerged from the US and British Virgin Islands, as well as French islands of St Martin and St Barthelemy.

Across a swath of Cuba, utility poles were toppled, trees uprooted and roads blocked on Saturday. Witnesses said a provincial museum near the eye of the storm was in ruins.

Hurricane Jose, which is following Irma, was expected to heap more misery on Islands like St Martin, with officials saying Jose would dump more rain on the island's buildings, many of which lost their roofs to Irma.

However, some islands received a last-minute reprieve from Jose as it passed by. The US National Hurricane Center downgraded a hurricane warning for Barbuda and Anguilla. A hurricane watch also was discontinued for nearby Antigua. By late Saturday, Jose was 85 miles (135 kilometres) northeast of the Leeward Islands, with winds of 145 mph (230 kmh) but moving away from the area.

As Floridians prepared for the storm, shortages of water and gas caused long lines of people hoping to stock up on essentials. Radio DJs allowed listeners to call in with tips on which grocery stores or services stations had finally gotten a shipment of water or gas. Lines quickly formed at those stations, with 10 or more cars at times waiting to top off their tanks.

Florida officials are hoping for the best, and preparing for the worst, Mr Scott said this week. As many as 5 million people may end up without power for, potentially, weeks at a time after Irma moves through the state. The government says that they have put resources into place in order to respond as quickly as possible to any losses of power. In the meantime, emergency responders are putting into place procedures to respond to any health-related issues that may arise from power outages in the state.
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An astronaut is sharing pictures showing the magnitude of Hurricane Irma, the fierce Atlantic storm which has devastated parts of the Caribbean and is bearing down on Florida.

Randy Bresnik has been able to track Irma's progress from the International Space Station. His pictures, posted on Twitter, show the scale of the hurricane and the impact it has already had on areas including the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.

The hurricane reached Florida on Sunday morning. State authorities urged millions to evacuate, with Governor Rick Scott calling it a "killer storm".

At least 23 people have already died in the Caribbean as a result of Irma.

Donald Trump called Irma a storm of "enormous destructive potential" and encouraged residents to leave their homes by saying "property is replaceable but lives are not".

Mr Bresnik commented on changes already visible along the path the hurricane took through the Caribbean. In his tweets he described the "churned up" sands of the Turks and Caicos Islands and said the US Virgin Islands are "reeling" in the aftermath.

He also warned that Hurricane Jose was following a similar path to Irma. "May it veer north and east away from those so affected by Irmas wrath already," he tweeted.

Mr Bresnik's current space mission began in July. On 31 August, he posted pictures of his own hometown Houston, Texas, saying it was "forever changed" by Hurricane Harvey.

Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Show all 45 1 /45 Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Recently planted palm trees lie strewn across the road as Hurricane Irma passes by in Miami Beach, Fla. 10 September 2017. AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Damage outside the Mercure hotel in Marigot, on the Bay of Nettle, on the island of Saint-Martin AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures People pick up debris in Fajardo as Hurricane Irma howled past Puerto Rico after thrashing several smaller Caribbean islands Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Large waves produced by Hurricane Irma crash into the end of Anglins Fishing Pier in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The category 4 hurricane made landfall in the United States in the Florida Keys at 9:10 a.m. after raking across the north coast of Cuba. 10 September 2017 Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A Royal Air Force Puma has been delivered to the US Virgin Islands to assist with the humanitarian efforts post Hurricane Irma. The Puma will be delivering Humanitarian Aid and Disaster Relief in support of the Department for International Development. Royal Air Force logisticians from RAF Brize Norton have assisted with the delivery of military personnel and aid cargo to the Caribbean to support disaster relief in the wake of Hurricane Irma. RAF aircraft including, C-17 A400M and Voyager are supporting a Joint Task Force of RAF, Royal Marines, Army and RN personnel who are supporting the Department for International Development as it delivers aid to stricken Caribbean Islands. MoD Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Flamingos at Zoo Miami, are shown in a temporary enclosure in a hurricane resistant structure within the zoo, Saturday, 9 September 2017 in Miami. Though most animals will reman in their secure structures, the cheetahs and some birds will ride out the storm in temporary housing. AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Boats are seen at a marina in South Beach as Hurricane Irma arrives at south Florida, in Miami Beach, Florida, U.S. 10 September 2017 Reuters Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Storm clouds are seen over Fisher Island as Hurricane Irma approaches on 9 September 2017 in Miami Beach, Florida. Florida is in the path of the Hurricane which may come ashore at category 4 Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Waves crash over a seawall at the mouth of the Miami River from Biscayne Bay, Fla., as Hurricane Irma passes by. 10 September 2017 AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Some of the damage on Saint Martin EPA/Gerben Van Es/Dutch Department of Defence Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The skyline is seen as the outerbands of Hurricane Irma start to reach Florida on 9 September 2017 in Miami, Florida. Florida is in the path of the Hurricane which may come ashore at category 4. Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A tree toped by hurricane Irma is seen on a empty street in Remedios, Cuba, 9 September 2017. Hurricane Irma reached Cuba bringing winds between 160 and 190 kilometers per hour. The hurricane has hit the north coast of the island. EPA Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures James Constantineau loads sands bags in his truck as he prepares for the approach of Hurricane Irma Saturday, 9 September 2017, in East Palatka, Fla. Gov. Rick Scott is urging anyone living in an evacuation zone in southwest Florida to leave by noon as the threat of Hurricane Irma has shifted west. AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The Fort Louis Marina in Marigot is seen on 8 September 2017 in Saint-Martin island, devastated by Hurricane Irma. AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Destruction in Orient Bay on the island of Saint-Martin AFP/Getty Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The wreckage in Orient Bay on the island of Saint-Martin AFP/Getty Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures View of the aftermath of Hurricane Irma on Saint Martin Reuters Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A mobile network tower snapped in two by the hurricane on the island of Barbuda ABS TV Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A house reduced to rubble on the island of Saint Barthelemy AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures General view of damage on Saint Martin Reuters Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A damaged Casino Royale on Saint Martin after the passage of Hurricane Irma Anna Mazur/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures An aerial photograph taken and released by the Dutch department of Defense shows the damage of Hurricane Irma in Philipsburg, Sint Maarten, the Dutch section of the Caribbean Island Gerben Van Es/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Flooded houses in Gustavia on the island of Saint-Barthelemy Kevin Barrallon/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The damage on the island of Saint-Martin, a day after Hurricane Irma hit AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A man carrying an umbrella is battered by the wind in Fajardo, Puerto Rico Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A lone police car on patrol during the passing of Hurricane Irma in Fajardo, Puerto Rico Jose Jimenez/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Haitian people walk through the wind and rain on a beach in Cap-Haitien on September 7 as Hurricane Irma approaches Hector Retamal/AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A flooded street on the island of Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A tree collapsed on a house in Saint Martin Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A hotel in Saint Martin is gutted by floodwater during the hurricane Guadeloupe 1ere Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Cars submerged in Saint Martin Rinsy Xieng Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Debris floats amongst the floodwater in Saint Martin @la1ere Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Household items float down the street in Gustavia, Saint-Barthelemy Carole Greaux Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The coast of Saint Martin is flooded as the hurricane hits the island Meteo Express Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A whole street underwater in Saint Martin @la1ere Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A car crashes into the tree amongst the chaos in Saint Martin @Bondtehond Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A building on the Saint Martin seafront, destroyed by the hurricane @Bondtehond Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A mobile home overturned at Princess Juliana International Airport in Saint Martin @Bondtehond Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Palm trees bend in the wind in San Juan, Puerto Rico as Hurricane Irma slammed across islands in the northern Caribbean Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A woman runs in the rain as Hurricane Irma slammed into San Juan, Puerto Rico Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A picture taken on September 5, 2017 shows a view of the Baie Nettle beach in Marigot, with the wind blowing ahead of the arrival of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A man rides past a boarded up house as part of preparations ahead of the arrival of Hurricane Irma on September 5, 2017, in the French overseas island of Guadeloupe Helene Valenzuela/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Employees of the Mercure Hotel fill sand bags on the Baie Nettle beach in Marigot, as part of the preparations for the arrival of Hurricane Irma Lionel Chamoiseau/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures People in line at Costco, as they find out the store has ran out of water on September 5, 2017 in North Miami Michele Eve Sandberg/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Night view of the city of Cap-Haitien, in the north of Haiti, 240 km from Port-au-Prince, on September 5, 2017 Hector Retamal/AFP

"God bless all those from Houston or elsewhere who are helping our fellow Texans in their time of need," the astronaut tweeted.
 Close Florida suffers coast-to-coast battering from 130mph Irma

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Hurricane Irma has pummeled Florida from coast-to-coast with winds up to 130mph, flooding homes and boats, knocking out power to millions of people and toppling massive construction cranes over the Miami skyline.

The 400-mile-wide (640-kilometer-wide) storm blew ashore in the mostly cleared-out Florida Keys, then marched up its western coast, its punishing winds extending clear across to Miami and West Palm Beach on the Atlantic side.

Irma, which has killed at least 28 people after pushing through the Caribbean, was considered a life-threatening danger in Florida as well, and could inflict a natural disaster causing billions of dollars in damage to the third-most-populous US state.

Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Show all 45 1 /45 Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Recently planted palm trees lie strewn across the road as Hurricane Irma passes by in Miami Beach, Fla. 10 September 2017. AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Damage outside the Mercure hotel in Marigot, on the Bay of Nettle, on the island of Saint-Martin AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures People pick up debris in Fajardo as Hurricane Irma howled past Puerto Rico after thrashing several smaller Caribbean islands Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Large waves produced by Hurricane Irma crash into the end of Anglins Fishing Pier in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The category 4 hurricane made landfall in the United States in the Florida Keys at 9:10 a.m. after raking across the north coast of Cuba. 10 September 2017 Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A Royal Air Force Puma has been delivered to the US Virgin Islands to assist with the humanitarian efforts post Hurricane Irma. The Puma will be delivering Humanitarian Aid and Disaster Relief in support of the Department for International Development. Royal Air Force logisticians from RAF Brize Norton have assisted with the delivery of military personnel and aid cargo to the Caribbean to support disaster relief in the wake of Hurricane Irma. RAF aircraft including, C-17 A400M and Voyager are supporting a Joint Task Force of RAF, Royal Marines, Army and RN personnel who are supporting the Department for International Development as it delivers aid to stricken Caribbean Islands. MoD Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Flamingos at Zoo Miami, are shown in a temporary enclosure in a hurricane resistant structure within the zoo, Saturday, 9 September 2017 in Miami. Though most animals will reman in their secure structures, the cheetahs and some birds will ride out the storm in temporary housing. AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Boats are seen at a marina in South Beach as Hurricane Irma arrives at south Florida, in Miami Beach, Florida, U.S. 10 September 2017 Reuters Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Storm clouds are seen over Fisher Island as Hurricane Irma approaches on 9 September 2017 in Miami Beach, Florida. Florida is in the path of the Hurricane which may come ashore at category 4 Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Waves crash over a seawall at the mouth of the Miami River from Biscayne Bay, Fla., as Hurricane Irma passes by. 10 September 2017 AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Some of the damage on Saint Martin EPA/Gerben Van Es/Dutch Department of Defence Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The skyline is seen as the outerbands of Hurricane Irma start to reach Florida on 9 September 2017 in Miami, Florida. Florida is in the path of the Hurricane which may come ashore at category 4. Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A tree toped by hurricane Irma is seen on a empty street in Remedios, Cuba, 9 September 2017. Hurricane Irma reached Cuba bringing winds between 160 and 190 kilometers per hour. The hurricane has hit the north coast of the island. EPA Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures James Constantineau loads sands bags in his truck as he prepares for the approach of Hurricane Irma Saturday, 9 September 2017, in East Palatka, Fla. Gov. Rick Scott is urging anyone living in an evacuation zone in southwest Florida to leave by noon as the threat of Hurricane Irma has shifted west. AP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The Fort Louis Marina in Marigot is seen on 8 September 2017 in Saint-Martin island, devastated by Hurricane Irma. AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Destruction in Orient Bay on the island of Saint-Martin AFP/Getty Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The wreckage in Orient Bay on the island of Saint-Martin AFP/Getty Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures View of the aftermath of Hurricane Irma on Saint Martin Reuters Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A mobile network tower snapped in two by the hurricane on the island of Barbuda ABS TV Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A house reduced to rubble on the island of Saint Barthelemy AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures General view of damage on Saint Martin Reuters Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A damaged Casino Royale on Saint Martin after the passage of Hurricane Irma Anna Mazur/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures An aerial photograph taken and released by the Dutch department of Defense shows the damage of Hurricane Irma in Philipsburg, Sint Maarten, the Dutch section of the Caribbean Island Gerben Van Es/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Flooded houses in Gustavia on the island of Saint-Barthelemy Kevin Barrallon/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The damage on the island of Saint-Martin, a day after Hurricane Irma hit AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A man carrying an umbrella is battered by the wind in Fajardo, Puerto Rico Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A lone police car on patrol during the passing of Hurricane Irma in Fajardo, Puerto Rico Jose Jimenez/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Haitian people walk through the wind and rain on a beach in Cap-Haitien on September 7 as Hurricane Irma approaches Hector Retamal/AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A flooded street on the island of Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A tree collapsed on a house in Saint Martin Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A hotel in Saint Martin is gutted by floodwater during the hurricane Guadeloupe 1ere Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Cars submerged in Saint Martin Rinsy Xieng Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Debris floats amongst the floodwater in Saint Martin @la1ere Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Household items float down the street in Gustavia, Saint-Barthelemy Carole Greaux Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures The coast of Saint Martin is flooded as the hurricane hits the island Meteo Express Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A whole street underwater in Saint Martin @la1ere Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A car crashes into the tree amongst the chaos in Saint Martin @Bondtehond Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A building on the Saint Martin seafront, destroyed by the hurricane @Bondtehond Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A mobile home overturned at Princess Juliana International Airport in Saint Martin @Bondtehond Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Palm trees bend in the wind in San Juan, Puerto Rico as Hurricane Irma slammed across islands in the northern Caribbean Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A woman runs in the rain as Hurricane Irma slammed into San Juan, Puerto Rico Reuters/Alvin Baez Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A picture taken on September 5, 2017 shows a view of the Baie Nettle beach in Marigot, with the wind blowing ahead of the arrival of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures A man rides past a boarded up house as part of preparations ahead of the arrival of Hurricane Irma on September 5, 2017, in the French overseas island of Guadeloupe Helene Valenzuela/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Employees of the Mercure Hotel fill sand bags on the Baie Nettle beach in Marigot, as part of the preparations for the arrival of Hurricane Irma Lionel Chamoiseau/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures People in line at Costco, as they find out the store has ran out of water on September 5, 2017 in North Miami Michele Eve Sandberg/AFP Hurricane Irma  devastation caused in pictures Night view of the city of Cap-Haitien, in the north of Haiti, 240 km from Port-au-Prince, on September 5, 2017 Hector Retamal/AFP

While Irma raked Florida's Gulf Coast, forecasters warned that the entire state was in danger because of the sheer size of the storm.

In one of the largest US evacuations, nearly seven million people in the Southeast were warned to seek shelter elsewhere, including 6.4 million in Florida alone.

Residents and holidaymakers were ordered to stay indoors until the storm had passed, with many Brits left holed up in apartments or hotel rooms.

About 30,000 people heeded orders to leave the Keys as the storm closed in, but an untold number refused, in part because, to many storm-hardened residents, staying behind in the face of danger is a point of pride.

fter leaving Florida, a weakened Irma is expected to push into Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee and beyond. A tropical storm warning was issued for the first time ever in Atlanta, some 200 miles (320 kilometers) from the sea.

President Donald Trump approved a disaster declaration for Florida, opening the way for federal aid.
We had a LONG day ahead of us the next day. I wanted to drive from Spokane, Washington all the way to my Aunt & Uncles house in Cody, Wyoming. That's over 600 miles in one day! According to Mapquest it was going to take us over 8 hours, but that didn't include the hour that we would lose because of going from Pacific Standard Time to Mountain Time.













I told the kids we were leaving at 7am. I got up at 6am and for some reason I couldn't get the water to work in the trailers shower. Thank goodness I brought dry shampoo!!! I was actually really glad it didn't work because there would have been no way we'd have been out of there by 7am! Just saying...I guess I'm high maintenance! Ella and Logan did SO great when it was time to go. I had told Ella that when we left this time she didn't need to be sad because we'd be staying at Logan's house again on our return journey. After the second time we stay at Logan's house then she could be sad! She loved repeating that to people.









Ed & Penny had told me about this cool rest area in Wallace ID. It is dedicated to the miners and has all sorts of things to look at and explore. I thought it would be a nice place to stop since it was about an hour and a half away from Spokane. Of course the kids did not think it was all that fun and they were whining and I really started to get angry. That's when I stopped myself and was reminded of a sermon our Pastor had just preached about getting hurt. We are all going to get hurt in life and the number one thing we need to do is left ourselves feel hurt and recognize that we are hurting. I was not wanting to admit that they were hurting my feeling by basically hating something that I thought would be fun. Instead I was protecting myself per se and getting angry. Once I realized that I stopped myself and told the kids that they were hurting my feelings. I was trying to give them an opportunity to run around and stretch their legs and have fun, but instead all they could do was complain and it hurt my feelings. They of course all apologized and were so sorry. It really was such a wonderful moment! We got back in the van and I started another movie and we were off again.





We stopped in Missoula at a gas station to go potty, get snacks and gas up. The next stop was in Bozeman at Wal-Mart to go potty and get MCD's. The final stop before Cody was in Laurel at a gas station to go potty.





Prior to the trip I downloaded an app that could keep track of where I was at all times. It's called Life 360. I also had Michael and my Mom download it as well. It made is so Michael would always be able to see where I was. I just felt better knowing that. I was also texting Michael and my parents every single time we stopped for any reason at all. My mom was watching my progress so she knew when I was in Cody and almost there. I had told my Aunt that we were going to get to her house around 7pm and we ended up walking in the door at 7:07pm!!! 11 hours of driving! Honestly though I love it....the driving was actually amazing. My kids travel so well. We had lots of movies to watch. I told them I would only start a new movie when we stopped to go potty or get gas. I was not going to be pulling over on the side of I-90 so they could have something to watch. They did have books to read and things to color so that helped. I also from the suggestion of my best friend Kim got some audio books. They were awesome! We got 3 Diary of a Wimpy Kid books and then one Hardy Boys book. I was amazed at how much the kids loved them. I also bought to Elevation Worship CD's for myself just in case I needed a little Jesus on the trip! :)













The day after we got to my Aunt & Uncles we went down to the senior apartment where my grandpa lives. He moved to Cody last fall to be closer to my Aunt Linda & Uncle Lee. The place where he lives is wonderful!!!













He has a studio apartment with a bathroom. It's all he really needs. They staff take care of everything...they fix all grandpa's meals and he can have a snack whenever he wants. They have events like movie nights or game nights, they do his laundry and they even have a place where Aunt Linda can come in and cut Grandpa's hair for him.

















We all piled in his room for a visit!













My cousin Melody and her 3 kiddos ended up coming up from their home in Rock Springs to spend some of the week with us. It was such a great surprise that they came! Alli and Ella had fun playing together. They had their moments for sure...they are 6 & 7 going on 13 you know! It really was so nice getting to see them!!!

















Of course the kids raided Grandpa's snacks so we ended up having to replenish them later in the week!













Also when you have 3 boys stuck in a room for too long wrestling will ensue!!!




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Florida has been pounded hard by what President Donald Trump called some big monster, as Hurricane Irma tore into the state, leaving a trail of damage and death and causing destruction that will likely take weeks or months to repair.

At least three people were killed as the category four hurricane made landfall in the Florida Keys and worked its way up the southwest coast, leaving more than three million properties and businesses without power and millions of people hunkering down in their homes or emergency shelters.

As Florida Governor Rick Scott asked everybody to pray for the state, Irma passed over several cities, striking land for a second time close to Naples and making its way towards Tampa. It weakened slightly as it moved, down to a category two hurricane with winds of at least 105mph.

The hurricane is as large as the entire state (Getty Images)

The US National Hurricane Center said the path of Irma should move over or near the western coast of Florida before moving over inland northern parts of Florida and Georgia into Monday afternoon.

Television footage from various locations across the east of the state showed palm trees bent over under the force of huge winds, driving rain and flash floods caused by the storm surge. Naples was expected to see a surge of up to 10ft and the citys airport reported a peak wind gust of 142 mph.

In Naples, Judy and Herve Ligeos said they had prepared for the potential of three to four days without access to amenities. They stocked up on propane to cook with, and on food and water.

Roughly half-an-hour before Irma passed over she told The Independent they could not see anything out their hurricane-proof windows, but were happy their cinder block home had managed to hold onto its roof. Its almost like a white out. You cant see, she said, likening her view to a heavy fog that a skier might encounter. There's so much rain that all you can see is white."

At the White House, Mr Trump was briefed about the path of the storm and the preparations that had been made by the director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

The bad news is that this is some big monster, Mr Trump told reporters. Right now, we are worried about lives, not cost.

He vowed he would soon pay a visit to Florida.

The White House said the President, who was with his cabinet at Camp David, also spoke to the governors of Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina and Tennessee, as Irma moved northwards.

 Hurricane Irma: Storm changes path towards St Petersburg

In Hollywood, on Floridas east coast, streets were largely deserted as winds picked up, bending palm trees and downing power lines, even though the city is more than 100 mph from the centre of the path of the storm. By evening, as Irma moved up the west coast and lost a little power, hurricane winds extended 80 miles from the centre and due to its size tropical storm-force winds extended up to 220 miles from the centre of the storm.

While certain cities were preparing for the full force of the storm, the size of which has not been seen by some locations close to a century, the power of Irma is likely to be felt by millions of people. Before Irma made landfall, up to seven million in the countrys southeast people received warnings to either leave.

The hurricane first made landfall at Cudjoe Key in the lower Florida Keys at 9.10am with top sustained winds of up to 130 mph. It struck land a second time at Marco Island, close to Naples, with 115 mph winds at 3.35pm.

Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures Show all 7 1 /7 Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures A roof-less house in Barbuda ABS TV Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures A mobile network tower snapped in two by the hurricane ABS TV Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures The hurricane left debris strewn across the island Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures Rubble in the aftermath of the hurricane ABS TV Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures The destruction in Barbuda, as seen from an ABS TV helicopter ABS TV Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures As well as destroying most houses, the hurricane also left plenty of flooding ABS TV Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures Barbudan residents survey the damage ABS TV

In the Florida Keys, a 120-mile string of islands that start south of Miami and run down to the fabled resort of Key West, up to 30,000 people listened to urgent requests for residents to evacuate with Irma bringing a 10ft storm surge. However, an untold number of residents declined to leave; many said they had faced and survived similar storms many times before.

John Huston, who was riding out the storm at his Key Largo home, was already seeing flooding in his yard before the arrival of high tide. Small boats floating down the street next to furniture and refrigerators. Very noisy, he told the AP by text message. Shingles are coming off.

In the centre of Miami, one of two dozen construction cranes that stand on the skyline, collapsed onto a high-rise building under the force of Irmas winds.

There was no immediate word on any damage or injuries. City officials said it would have taken about two weeks to have moved the cranes out of the course of the storm.

Once this system passes through, its going to be a race to save lives and sustain lives, Brock Long, the FEMA chief, told Fox News.

The states governor has activated all 7,000 members of the Florida National Guard, and 30,000 guardsmen from elsewhere were on standby.

A Miami woman who went into labour was guided through delivery by phone when authorities couldn't reach her in high winds and street flooding. Firefighters later took her to the hospital.

An apparent tornado spun off by Irma destroyed six mobile homes in Palm Bay, midway up the Atlantic coast. Flooding was reported along Interstate 4, which cuts across Florida's midsection.

Curfews were imposed in Miami, Tampa, Fort Lauderdale and much of the rest of South Florida, and some arrests of violators were reported. Miami Beach barred outsiders from the island.

Fort Lauderdale police arrested nine people they said were caught on TV cameras looting sneakers and other items from a sporting goods store and a pawn shop during the hurricane.

After Irma had smashed through the Caribbean as a category five storm, killing around two dozen people, more than seven million US residents were told to evacuate inland - including more than six million in Florida alone. Many will not know what they will face upon their return.

Given its sheer size and strength - and its projected course - Irma could prove one of the most devastating hurricanes ever to hit Florida and inflict damage on a scale not seen here in 25 years.

Hurricane Andrew smashed into Miami in 1992 with winds topping 165 mph damaging or blowing apart over 125,000 homes. The damage in Florida totaled $26bn, and at least 40 people died.

Hurricane Harvey - which hit Texas last month - and Hurricane Irma have both had their names retired, meaning no storm can take that moniker again. It is the first time two consecutive hurricanes have had their names retired in the region since Rita and Stan in 2005.
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Defeated Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton has described Donald Trumps inauguration speech as a cry from the white nationalist gut.

Promoting a new book that details her surprise defeat in last years presidential election, Ms Clinton said attending the inauguration ceremony of the man who defeated her was like an out-of-body experience.

But Im a former first lady, and former presidents and first ladies show up, she said. Its part of the demonstration of the continuity of our government.

Ms Clinton said she had no alternative but to attend the ceremony (Getty)

Speaking to CBS, she added: And so there I was, on the platform, you know, feeling like an out-of-body experience. And then his speech, which was a cry from the white nationalist gut.

Ms Clinton made her comments as she promotes a new memoir, What Happened, published by Simon & Schuster and in which she acknowledges her role in her defeat.

I go back over my own shortcomings and the mistakes we made, she writes, according to reports of advance copies of the book. I take responsibility for all of them. You can blame the data, blame the message, blame anything you want - but I was the candidate. It was my campaign. Those were my decisions.

After Ms Clinton lost, many were furious with her for what they deemed basic mistakes - her failure to visit the state of Wisconsin, for instance - and her failure to connect with younger voters. Many believed Bernie Sanders would have used the enthusiasm he generated among younger voters to defeat Mr Trump.

 Trump: "Ivanka wanted to make the trip... she said 'Daddy, can I go with you?' I like that"

When Mr Trump delivered his inaugural address on January 20, Ms Clinton sat on the dais behind him, with her husband, Bill Clinton, and his former presidents George W Bush and Jimmy Carter. George HW Bush sent a letter of apology as treatment for pneumonia forced him to miss the event.

In his speech, written by his pugilistic advisers Steve Bannon and Stephen Miller, Mr Trump outlined an unashamedly nationalist and populist vision for the country. This American carnage stops right here and right now, he said.

Ms Clinton said she believed Mr Trump had tapped into a nostalgia felt by his supporters.

Donald Trump's international Presidential trips Show all 22 1 /22 Donald Trump's international Presidential trips Donald Trump's international Presidential trips French President Emmanuel Macron and US President Donald Trump AFP/Getty Images Donald Trump's international Presidential trips French President Emmanuel Macron and US President Donald Trump talk as they leave the Army Museum at Les Invalides in Paris AFP/Getty Images Donald Trump's international Presidential trips German Chancellor Angela Merkel and US President Donald Trump arrive for the group photo at the G7 Taormina summit on the island of Sicily in May 2017 Getty Images Donald Trump's international Presidential trips Mr Trump was pressed on the subject at the G7 summit in Italy Getty Donald Trump's international Presidential trips US President Donald Trump gives a speeech at the Warsaw Uprising Monument on Krasinski Square Getty Donald Trump's international Presidential trips US President Donald Trump and Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May during a ceremony at the NATO headquarters before the start of a summit in Brussels, Belgium Reuters Donald Trump's international Presidential trips Montenegro's Prime Minister Dusko Markovic is seen to the right of Donald Trump at a Nato summit in Brussels REUTERS Donald Trump's international Presidential trips Pope Francis meeting with US President Donald J. Trump EPA Donald Trump's international Presidential trips Pope Francis poses with US President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump AFP/Getty Images Donald Trump's international Presidential trips US President Donald Trump arrives at Palazzo del Quirinale ahead of the meeting with Italian President Sergio Mattarella Ufficio Stampa Presidenza della via Getty Donald Trump's international Presidential trips US President Donald Trump is seen during a joint press conference with the Palestinian leader at the presidential palace in the West Bank city of Bethlehem AFP/Getty Images Donald Trump's international Presidential trips Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas meets US President Donald Trump PPO via Getty Donald Trump's international Presidential trips Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks with US President Donald Trump prior to the President's departure GPO via Getty Images Donald Trump's international Presidential trips US President Donald Trump and Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu shake hands after delivering a speech at the Israel Museum AFP/Getty Images Donald Trump's international Presidential trips US President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump lay a wreath in the Hall of Remembrance as White House senior advisor Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump watch on during a visit to the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial museum AFP/Getty Images Donald Trump's international Presidential trips US President Donald Trump visit to Yad Vashem Holocaust museum in Jerusalem accompanied by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu GPO via Getty Images Donald Trump's international Presidential trips US President Donald Trump takes his seat before his speech to the Arab Islamic American Summit in Riyadh in Saudi Arabia Reuters Donald Trump's international Presidential trips Saudi Arabia's King Salman bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, US President Donald Trump and US First Lady Melania Trump look at a display of Saudi modern art at the Saudi Royal Court in Riyadh AFP/Getty Images Donald Trump's international Presidential trips US President Donald Trump and Saudi Arabia's King Salman bin Abdulaziz al-Saud take part in a signing ceremony at the Saudi Royal Court in Riyadh AFP/Getty Images Donald Trump's international Presidential trips King Salman presents Donald Trump with The Collar of Abdulaziz al-Saud Medal at the Royal Court Palace on 20 May AP Donald Trump's international Presidential trips US President Donald Trump is welcomed by Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz al-Saud upon arrival at King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh AFP/Getty Images Donald Trump's international Presidential trips U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump walk on the South Lawn prior to their first foreign trip Getty Images

He was quite successful in referencing a nostalgia that would give hope, comfort, settle grievances for millions of people who were upset about gains that were made by others, she said.

Interviewer Jane Pauley asked her: What youre saying is millions of white people?

Ms Clinton replied: Millions of white people, yeah. Millions of white people.

She added: I understood that there were many Americans who, because of the financial crash, there was anger. And there was resentment. I knew that. But I believed that it was my responsibility to try to offer answers to it, not to fan it. I think, Jane, that it was a mistake because a lot of people didnt want to hear my plans. They wanted me to share their anger. And I shouldve done a better job of demonstrating I get it.

Asked about her basket of deplorables comment during the campaign, in which she said half of Mr Trumps supporters were irredeemable, Ms Clinton sought to repeat the view.

Trump was behaving in a deplorable manner, she said, citing the Access Hollywood tape. There were a large number of people who didnt care.

In recent weeks, Mr Trump has found himself at the centre of mounting controversy over what critics say has been his support for white supremacists and racists.

He was criticised for his response to neo-Nazi-led violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, last month in which one woman was killed. Mr Trump sought to claim there was blame on many sides and defended those who wanted to stop statues of figures from the Confederacy from being taken down.
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Joe Biden is considering running for US President at the next election, his daughter has said.

Ashley Biden, 36, said the former Vice President  who was jointly elected twice with Barack Obama  could potentially run for the Democratic nomination in 2020.

"If he is in good health, knock on wood, and seeing what the landscape is at the time, yeah I think he is considering it," Ms Biden, a fashion designer, said in an interview with Women's Wear Daily.

Mr Biden was expected to put himself forward for the Democratic nomination at the last election, but decided not to run, citing grief caused by the death of his son, Beau, from brain cancer in 2015.

Ms Biden said she hoped her father would stand for the nomination, but urged caution, since he had not yet made a decision.

Right now, his focus is on the [Biden] Foundation and Cancer Moonshot, as well as getting other Democrats elected.

"He's not there. He's taking it day by day after the loss of my dear beloved brother, she said.

Ms Biden added that her father would make the decision nearer the time, since "a lot can happen in four years".

Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years Show all 15 1 /15 Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years Joe Biden and Dr Jill Biden watch Barack Obama's farewell speech on 11 January. Obama called Biden his 'brother' Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years US President Barack Obama speaks alongside US Vice President Joe Biden about the Affordable Care Act AFP/Getty Images Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years Vice President Joe Biden and President Barack Obama Getty Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years President Obama listens to Joe Biden speak of his work on defeating cancer on 18 October in the White House Reuters Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years U.S. President Barack Obama is applauded by House Speaker Paul Ryan and Vice President Joe Biden while delivering his final State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress in Washington Reuters Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years U.S. Vice President Joe Biden interjects as President Barack Obama delivers remarks at a reception for the 25th anniversary of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanics at the White House in Washington REUTERS Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years Obama and Vice President Joe Biden react after a heckler was removed for their extended interruption (Reuters) Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years U.S. President Barack Obama shakes hands with Speaker of the House John Boehner (R) as Vice President Joe Biden looks on Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years Barack and Michelle Obama and Vice-President Joe Biden observing a moment of silence outside the White House to mark the 13th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks Getty Images Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years Barack Obama and Joe Biden putt on the White House putting green Getty Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years President Barack Obama and Joe Biden in April 2013 AFP/Getty Images Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years January 1, 2013: U.S. President Barack Obama winks as he arrives with Vice President Joe Biden (L) in the briefing room Reuters Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and others receive an update on the mission against Osama bin Laden in the Situation Room of the White House May 1, 2011 in Washington, DC Getty Images Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years Vice-President Joe Biden, right, confirmed that the US was looking at ways of taking legal action against Julian Assange - back in December 2010 GETTY IMAGES Joe Biden and Barack Obama through the years Joe Biden, left, and retired military officers watch President Barack Obama sign orders to close down the detention centre at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in January 2009 GETTY IMAGES

Explaining his decision not to run for nomination at the last election, Mr Biden said in 2016: I lost part of my soul when my boy died.

You should never, ever, ever commit to run for president unless you know you can look the people in the eye and say: 'I guarantee you, you have all of my being, all of my energy, all of my family's energy to get this done.' I wish I were a better man but I just wasn't ready to do that.

A joint poll by Morning Consult and Politico in June found that Mr Biden was a firm favourite to secure the nomination, with 74 per cent of Democrats saying they had favourable views of him.
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China is joining France and Britain in announcing plans to end sales of petrol and diesel cars.

China's industry ministry is developing a timetable to end production and sale of traditional fuel cars and will promote development of electric technology, state media on Sunday cited a Cabinet official as saying.

The reports gave no possible target date, but Beijing is stepping up pressure on automakers to accelerate development of electrics.

China is the biggest auto market by number of vehicles sold, giving any policy changes outsize importance for the global industry.

A deputy industry minister, Xin Guobin, said at an auto industry forum on Saturday his ministry has begun "research on formulating a timetable to stop production and sales of traditional energy vehicles," according to the Xinhua News Agency and the Communist Party newspaper People's Daily.

France and Britain announced in July they will stop sales of petrol and diesel automobiles by 2040 as part of efforts to reduce pollution and carbon emissions that contribute to global warming.

World news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 World news in pictures World news in pictures 30 September 2020 Pope Francis prays with priests at the end of a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 29 September 2020 A girl's silhouette is seen from behind a fabric in a tent along a beach by Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 September 2020 A Chinese woman takes a photo of herself in front of a flower display dedicated to frontline health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic in Beijing, China. China will celebrate national day marking the founding of the People's Republic of China on October 1st Getty World news in pictures 27 September 2020 The Glass Mountain Inn burns as the Glass Fire moves through the area in St. Helena, California. The fast moving Glass fire has burned over 1,000 acres and has destroyed homes Getty World news in pictures 26 September 2020 A villager along with a child offers prayers next to a carcass of a wild elephant that officials say was electrocuted in Rani Reserve Forest on the outskirts of Guwahati, India AFP via Getty World news in pictures 25 September 2020 The casket of late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is seen in Statuary Hall in the US Capitol to lie in state in Washington, DC AFP via Getty World news in pictures 24 September 2020 An anti-government protester holds up an image of a pro-democracy commemorative plaque at a rally outside Thailand's parliament in Bangkok, as activists gathered to demand a new constitution AFP via Getty World news in pictures 23 September 2020 A whale stranded on a beach in Macquarie Harbour on the rugged west coast of Tasmania, as hundreds of pilot whales have died in a mass stranding in southern Australia despite efforts to save them, with rescuers racing to free a few dozen survivors The Mercury/AFP via Getty World news in pictures 22 September 2020 State civil employee candidates wearing face masks and shields take a test in Surabaya AFP via Getty World news in pictures 21 September 2020 A man sweeps at the Taj Mahal monument on the day of its reopening after being closed for more than six months due to the coronavirus pandemic AP World news in pictures 20 September 2020 A deer looks for food in a burnt area, caused by the Bobcat fire, in Pearblossom, California EPA World news in pictures 19 September 2020 Anti-government protesters hold their mobile phones aloft as they take part in a pro-democracy rally in Bangkok. Tens of thousands of pro-democracy protesters massed close to Thailand's royal palace, in a huge rally calling for PM Prayut Chan-O-Cha to step down and demanding reforms to the monarchy AFP via Getty World news in pictures 18 September 2020 Supporters of Iraqi Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr maintain social distancing as they attend Friday prayers after the coronavirus disease restrictions were eased, in Kufa mosque, near Najaf, Iraq Reuters World news in pictures 17 September 2020 A protester climbs on The Triumph of the Republic at 'the Place de la Nation' as thousands of protesters take part in a demonstration during a national day strike called by labor unions asking for better salary and against jobs cut in Paris, France EPA World news in pictures 16 September 2020 A fire raging near the Lazzaretto of Ancona in Italy. The huge blaze broke out overnight at the port of Ancona. Firefighters have brought the fire under control but they expected to keep working through the day EPA World news in pictures 15 September 2020 Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny posing for a selfie with his family at Berlin's Charite hospital. In an Instagram post he said he could now breathe independently following his suspected poisoning last month Alexei Navalny/Instagram/AFP World news in pictures 14 September 2020 Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, former Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba and former Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida celebrate after Suga was elected as new head of the ruling party at the Liberal Democratic Party's leadership election in Tokyo Reuters World news in pictures 13 September 2020 A man stands behind a burning barricade during the fifth straight day of protests against police brutality in Bogota AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 September 2020 Police officers block and detain protesters during an opposition rally to protest the official presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus. Daily protests calling for the authoritarian president's resignation are now in their second month AP World news in pictures 11 September 2020 Members of 'Omnium Cultural' celebrate the 20th 'Festa per la llibertat' ('Fiesta for the freedom') to mark the Day of Catalonia in Barcelona. Omnion Cultural fights for the independence of Catalonia EPA World news in pictures 10 September 2020 The Moria refugee camp, two days after Greece's biggest migrant camp, was destroyed by fire. Thousands of asylum seekers on the island of Lesbos are now homeless AFP via Getty World news in pictures 9 September 2020 Pope Francis takes off his face mask as he arrives by car to hold a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 8 September 2020 A home is engulfed in flames during the "Creek Fire" in the Tollhouse area of California AFP via Getty World news in pictures 7 September 2020 A couple take photos along a sea wall of the waves brought by Typhoon Haishen in the eastern port city of Sokcho AFP via Getty World news in pictures 6 September 2020 Novak Djokovic and a tournament official tends to a linesperson who was struck with a ball by Djokovic during his match against Pablo Carreno Busta at the US Open USA Today Sports/Reuters World news in pictures 5 September 2020 Protesters confront police at the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne, Australia, during an anti-lockdown rally AFP via Getty World news in pictures 4 September 2020 A woman looks on from a rooftop as rescue workers dig through the rubble of a damaged building in Beirut. A search began for possible survivors after a scanner detected a pulse one month after the mega-blast at the adjacent port AFP via Getty World news in pictures 3 September 2020 A full moon next to the Virgen del Panecillo statue in Quito, Ecuador EPA World news in pictures 2 September 2020 A Palestinian woman reacts as Israeli forces demolish her animal shed near Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank Reuters World news in pictures 1 September 2020 Students protest against presidential elections results in Minsk TUT.BY/AFP via Getty World news in pictures 31 August 2020 The pack rides during the 3rd stage of the Tour de France between Nice and Sisteron AFP via Getty World news in pictures 30 August 2020 Law enforcement officers block a street during a rally of opposition supporters protesting against presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus Reuters World news in pictures 29 August 2020 A woman holding a placard reading "Stop Censorship - Yes to the Freedom of Expression" shouts in a megaphone during a protest against the mandatory wearing of face masks in Paris. Masks, which were already compulsory on public transport, in enclosed public spaces, and outdoors in Paris in certain high-congestion areas around tourist sites, were made mandatory outdoors citywide on August 28 to fight the rising coronavirus infections AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 August 2020 Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe bows to the national flag at the start of a press conference at the prime minister official residence in Tokyo. Abe announced he will resign over health problems, in a bombshell development that kicks off a leadership contest in the world's third-largest economy AFP via Getty World news in pictures 27 August 2020 Residents take cover behind a tree trunk from rubber bullets fired by South African Police Service (SAPS) in Eldorado Park, near Johannesburg, during a protest by community members after a 16-year old boy was reported dead AFP via Getty World news in pictures 26 August 2020 People scatter rose petals on a statue of Mother Teresa marking her 110th birth anniversary in Ahmedabad AFP via Getty World news in pictures 25 August 2020 An aerial view shows beach-goers standing on salt formations in the Dead Sea near Ein Bokeq, Israel Reuters World news in pictures 24 August 2020 Health workers use a fingertip pulse oximeter and check the body temperature of a fisherwoman inside the Dharavi slum during a door-to-door Covid-19 coronavirus screening in Mumbai AFP via Getty World news in pictures 23 August 2020 People carry an idol of the Hindu god Ganesh, the deity of prosperity, to immerse it off the coast of the Arabian sea during the Ganesh Chaturthi festival in Mumbai, India Reuters World news in pictures 22 August 2020 Firefighters watch as flames from the LNU Lightning Complex fires approach a home in Napa County, California AP World news in pictures 21 August 2020 Members of the Israeli security forces arrest a Palestinian demonstrator during a rally to protest against Israel's plan to annex parts of the occupied West Bank AFP via Getty World news in pictures 20 August 2020 A man pushes his bicycle through a deserted road after prohibitory orders were imposed by district officials for a week to contain the spread of the Covid-19 in Kathmandu AFP via Getty World news in pictures 19 August 2020 A car burns while parked at a residence in Vacaville, California. Dozens of fires are burning out of control throughout Northern California as fire resources are spread thin AFP via Getty World news in pictures 18 August 2020 Students use their mobile phones as flashlights at an anti-government rally at Mahidol University in Nakhon Pathom. Thailand has seen near-daily protests in recent weeks by students demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha AFP via Getty World news in pictures 17 August 2020 Members of the Kayapo tribe block the BR163 highway during a protest outside Novo Progresso in Para state, Brazil. Indigenous protesters blocked a major transamazonian highway to protest against the lack of governmental support during the COVID-19 novel coronavirus pandemic and illegal deforestation in and around their territories AFP via Getty World news in pictures 16 August 2020 Lightning forks over the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge as a storm passes over Oakland AP World news in pictures 15 August 2020 Belarus opposition supporters gather near the Pushkinskaya metro station where Alexander Taraikovsky, a 34-year-old protester died on August 10, during their protest rally in central Minsk AFP via Getty World news in pictures 14 August 2020 AlphaTauri's driver Daniil Kvyat takes part in the second practice session at the Circuit de Catalunya in Montmelo near Barcelona ahead of the Spanish F1 Grand Prix AFP via Getty World news in pictures 13 August 2020 Soldiers of the Brazilian Armed Forces during a disinfection of the Christ The Redeemer statue at the Corcovado mountain prior to the opening of the touristic attraction in Rio AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 August 2020 Young elephant bulls tussle playfully on World Elephant Day at the Amboseli National Park in Kenya AFP via Getty

Communist leaders also want to curb China's growing appetite for imported oil and see electric cars as a promising industry in which their country can take an early lead.

China passed the United States last year as the biggest electric car market. Sales of electrics and petrol-electric hybrids rose 50 percent over 2015 to 336,000 vehicles, or 40 percent of global demand. U.S. sales totaled 159,620.

The reports of Xin's comments in the eastern city of Tianjin gave no other details about electric car policy but cited him as saying Beijing plans to "elevate new energy vehicles to a new strategic level."

Beijing has supported electric development with billions of dollars in research subsidies and incentives to buyers, but is switching to a quota system that will shift the financial burden to automakers.

Under the proposed quotas, electric and hybrid petrol-electric vehicles would have to make up 8 percent of each automaker's output next year, 10 percent in 2019 and 12 percent in 2020. Automakers that fail to meet their target could buy credits from competitors that have a surplus.

Beijing has ordered state-owned Chinese power companies to speed up installation of charging stations to increase the appeal of electrics.

Chinese automaker BYD Auto, a unit of battery maker BYD Ltd, is the world's biggest electric vehicle maker by number of units sold. It sells pterol-electric hybrid sedans and SUVs in China and markets all-electric taxis and buses in the United States, Europe and Latin America as well as in China.

Volvo Cars, owned by China's Geely Holding Group, announced plans this year to make electric cars in China for global sale starting in 2019.

General Motors Co., Volkswagen AG and Nissan Motor Co. and others have announced they are launching or looking at joint ventures with Chinese partners to develop and manufacture electric vehicles in China.

Associated Press
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A young Bangladeshi farmer is the latest victim of land mines along the Burmese border, in what Amnesty International says is evidence of the deliberate targeting Rohingya Muslims fleeing the country.

The man, in his early 20s, had his leg blown off after stepping on a mine near the Bangladeshi village of Baish Bari.

Another man is said to have been injured after a separate blast near Amtali village in Bangladesh, another common crossing point.

Amnesty International has accused the army in Burma - also known as Myanmar - of planting the landmines, which have caused serious injuries to a least five civilians over the past week. Two of the injured were children, Amnesty said, while there are reports of the death of another man.

There is a reason why the use of antipersonnel landmines is illegal: they kill and maim indiscriminately and cant distinguish between fighters and ordinary people, said Tirana Hassan, Amnesty Internationals Crisis Response Director, who has been carrying out research on the Burma-Bangladesh border

The Myanmar army is one of only a handful of state forces worldwide, along with North Korea and Syria, to still openly use antipersonnel landmines. Authorities must immediately end this abhorrent practice against people who are already fleeing persecution."

In a separate incident on 3 September, a woman in her 50s had her leg blown off from the knee down while crossing the border from Taung Pyo Let Wal.

Kalma, a relative, told Amnesty International the woman had gone to fetch water for a shower. A few minutes later I heard a big explosion and I heard someone had stepped on a mine. It was only later I realised it was my mother-in-law.

Landmines are illegal under a 1997 international treaty. Last week, Bangladesh's foreign secretary Shahidul Haque confirmed he had lodged a formal complaint with Burma about the landmines.

Campaigners say the threat of explosives only adds to the fears felt by the hundreds of thousands of Rohingya Muslims currently fleeing Burma.

Rohingya refugees  in pictures Show all 15 1 /15 Rohingya refugees  in pictures Rohingya refugees  in pictures A young girl and a baby wade through mud after arriving in Whaikhyang, Bangladesh from Burma on 10 September Dan Kitwood/Getty Images Rohingya refugees  in pictures Rohingya refugees walk through a camp in Whaikhyang, Bangladesh after arriving from Burma Dan Kitwood/Getty Images Rohingya refugees  in pictures A young Rohingya refugee gathers firewood after arriving in Whaikhyang, Bangladesh from Burma Dan Kitwood/Getty Images Rohingya refugees  in pictures Rohingya refugees wait for sacks of rice to be distributed in Whaikhyang, Bangladesh Dan Kitwood/Getty Images Rohingya refugees  in pictures Rohingya Muslim refugees arrive on a boat in Whaikhyang, Bangladesh after crossing from Burma on 8 September Dan Kitwood/Getty Images Rohingya refugees  in pictures Rohingya Muslim refugees react after being re-united with each other after arriving in Whaikhyang, Bangladesh on a boat from Burma Getty Rohingya refugees  in pictures Rohingya Muslim refugees walk along the remains of a road after arriving in Whaikhyang, Bangladesh on a boat from Burma Dan Kitwood/Getty Images Rohingya refugees  in pictures Rohingya Muslim refugees wade through water after arriving in Whaikhyang, Bangladesh by boat from Burma Dan Kitwood/Getty Images Rohingya refugees  in pictures Rohingya Muslim refugees wade through water after arriving in Whaikhyang, Bangladesh by boat from Myanmar Dan Kitwood/Getty Images Rohingya refugees  in pictures Rohingya Muslim refugees stand in the rain after arriving in Whaikhyang, Bangladesh by boat from Burma Dan Kitwood/Getty Images Rohingya refugees  in pictures Indian children hold placards and shout slogans during a protest against the alleged persecution of the Rohingya Muslims in Burma EPA/Raminder Pal Singh Rohingya refugees  in pictures Supporters of the Difa-e-Pakistan Council (DPC), an Islamic organisation, listen to their leaders' speeches against Burma's persecution of Rohingya Muslims, during a demonstration in Karachi Reuters/Akhtar Soomro Rohingya refugees  in pictures Hundreds of Iranians take part in a protest against violence in Myanmar after weekly Friday prayers, in Tehran EPA/Abedin Taherkenareh Rohingya refugees  in pictures Indonesian Muslim activists hold placards and shout slogans during a protest against the alleged persecution of the Rohingya minority in Magelang, Central Java, Indonesia EPA/Ali Lutfi Rohingya refugees  in pictures Members of an Islamic organisation shout slogans against the Burma government during a protest in Dhaka, Bangladesh EPA

Some 290,000 Rohingya have crossed the border to Bangladesh in the past two weeks, according to the United Nations. Another 30,000 non-Muslims have been displaced inside Burma.

The latest exodus began after Rohingya insurgent attacks on 25 August resulted in a brutal army counter-offensive. Thousands of homes have been burned down, with witnesses reporting that entire villages have been set on fire.

The military admitted nearly 400 people died in clashes which happened when soldiers conducted "clearance operations". Most of the dead were insurgents, the military claimed, while also blaming insurgents for setting villages on fire.

The plight of the Rohingya is not new. The ethnic minority has repeatedly been described as one of the most persecuted groups in the world. In 2012, Human Rights Watch accused the Burmese authorities of carrying out a "campaign of ethnic cleansing" against them.

Many of those inside Burma have been confined to camps, surviving in incredibly poor living conditions. At least 100,000 Rohingya Muslims were already in Bangladesh before the latest round of violence, having fled previously.
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Conspiracy theories are not a new phenomenon in the Middle East. Many governments and influential organisations in the region  if not all of them  have long thrived on the power of disinformation and propaganda, which not only confuses enemies but keeps citizens in a state of pliant uncertainty.

The wide horizons of the internet make it easier than ever before to mask ulterior motives. That Russian stories spread by legions of Twitter bots and trolls managed to so spectacularly derail the 2016 US election has conclusively proved that we are living in a post-truth era.

The impact the new fake news ecosystem could have when the Middle Easts appetite for half-truths meets increasingly sophisticated methods of spreading political disinformation, however, are not yet known  and could have devastating consequences.

 Saudi Arabia cuts ties with Qatar over terror links

The possibility for fresh disruption in the increasingly polarised region is immense, said Dr Jean Marc Rickli, a research fellow at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy and King's College London.

The potential explosive power of fake news sites is even more important in societies that are unstable or weak or divided along sectarian lines in the first place, he said.

When fake news targets that aspect of identity it has a very strong mobilising power, he added.

In Lebanon, many are already on edge give the precarious situation in Syria and media drum-beating for another round of war between Hezbollah and Israel.

It is common for Lebanese to share news updates and other messages via WhatsApp and SMS, copying and pasting the text to others in their contact lists. Given the context, however, one fake news story which circulated recently raised more than a few eyebrows.

Urgent, read the message, which purported to be from Reuters news agency. Hezbollah kidnaps top-ranking Mossad intelligence officers in Israels elite class.

The Arabic text went on to quote an unnamed Israeli intelligence officer who said that Israel had decided to attack Hezbollah in Lebanon as a result of the Mossad kidnappings.

Debunked myths and fake news stories Show all 25 1 /25 Debunked myths and fake news stories Debunked myths and fake news stories Nasa releases statement over rumours that asteroid will destroy Earth Nasa has just debunked a recent rumour of a giant asteroid due to crash into the Earth in September. Internet conspiracy theorists have been saying that an asteroid will hit our planet sometime between September 15 and 28, destroying the American continents. Acting in its role as space-news fact-checker, Nasa has issued a statement refuting the lot of it. "Thats the rumor that has gone viral  now here are the facts," it said in a press release entitled 'NASA: There is No Asteroid Threatening Earth' Alamy Debunked myths and fake news stories Video of scorned lover who cut ex's belongings in half was actually an advert for a law firm Revenge is a dish best served cold, or viral on YouTube as seemed to be the case for one German ex-husband who uploaded a video of himself using power tools to saw his possessions in half so he could literally give his former wife half of everything owned. The video, titled For Laura, quickly went viral reaching nearly 5.8 million views with the description Thank you for 12 'beautiful' years, Laura! You've really earned half. Although the course of true love never did run smooth, it did seem that the jilted lover was taking revenge to a whole new level with the angst-ridden video. Now, however, all has been explained. The video was not created by a jealous ex, but filmed by a media-savvy legal company looking to expand its customer base Youtube Debunked myths and fake news stories McDonald's claims the 'secret menu' is fake The rebuttal comes following an amusing spoof article, published by the Lucky Peach, seemingly offering a smorgasbord of hidden options for the discerning customer. Among the delights apparently on offer are the Mommie Dearest (five burgers speared through with coat hangers) and the Burmese Python (complete with sock). Other options include the the Derrida  a postmodern confection consisting of a raw potato and the remains of a few chips and a partially eaten bun PA Debunked myths and fake news stories Dead shark pictures might be fake Photographs of an enormous Tiger shark fished off the eastern Australian coast have emerged on social media. NSW newspaper The Northern Star claims the four metre catch was made by a local fisherman known only as Matthew. The images first emerged after Byron Bay resident Geoff Brooks posted them to his Facebook timeline. However, Mr Brooks has subsequently admitted he did not take the images  but continued to claim that the photographs are real. Social media users have criticised the images, with some claiming they are fake Geoff Brooks, via Facebook Debunked myths and fake news stories A fried rat had been served in KFC Facebook went into full "wtfffffffffffff" mode after a man posted a picture of what he claims was a fried rat he had been served in KFC. As news of the supposed Kentucky Fried rat was reported and spread, the incident took a dramatic turn with Dixon sealing it in a bag and freezing it as evidence. KFC has denied it is in the business of plunging rats into boiling hot oil however, and claims the whole thing is a 'hoax'. A DNA test followed, and shows that the nugget, although distinctly rodent-shaped, was just chicken all along. Devorise Dixon/Facebook Debunked myths and fake news stories British scientists clone dinosaur An extraordinary story of the worlds first cloned dinosaur got a lot of traction on Twitter and inspired alarmist comparisons to Jurassic Park in March this year. It was also, not unexpectedly, a complete fake, including completely fabricated quotations from 'experts' and a picture that is actually of a very young kangaroo. Debunked myths and fake news stories Mohammed Islam - A boy who 'made $72m' in his lunch break A New York schoolboy who reportedly made $72 million (46 million) by trading stocks during his lunch breaks has admitted making the whole story up. Mohammed Islam, from Queens, originally told the New York Magazine he started dabbling in penny stocks aged just nine and developed a life-long passion for trading that was paying off. But in a later interview with the New York Observer, he said the whole story was fake and he had not made any money at all. Debunked myths and fake news stories Worlds oldest tree has been accidentally chopped down by loggers in Peru Several websites carried the news, seemingly without realising the entire story appears to be a hoax. It first appeared on the World News Daily Report  a fake news website carrying articles including Isis launches satellite and Pterodactyl sighting in New Guinea terrorises villagers. Debunked myths and fake news stories Alex from Target has teenage girls swooning Alex from Target went from being a cute, Bieber-esque cashier to an Internet sensation in less than 24 hours with a little help from social media. The internet memes featuring the Texas teenager in his Target uniform flooded Twitter and the hashtag #AlexFromTarget, a reference to his employee tag, began trending as teen girls swooned over the 16-year old. The "cute checkout guy" photograph earned him 500,000 new Twitter followers and landed him an interview with the popular talk show host Ellen DeGeneres. Alex from Target, his full name is actually Alex Laboeuf, said he was overwhelmed and was surprised by his new found fame. But a Los Angeles start-up known as Breakr has claimed responsibility for the Alex from Target phenomenon that has taken the internet by storm - insisting it was part of an intricate marketing experiment. Debunked myths and fake news stories Ryan Gosling adopted a baby A Father's Day Facebook post from "Ryan Gosling" detailing how he adopted an orphaned baby for a year attracted Likes from almost one million users. This was despite it having all the hallmarks of a hoax, including a link for users to "save thousands of children and meet me while doing it" actually redirecting to the purchase page for a Gosling t-shirt. Facebook Debunked myths and fake news stories Macaulay Culkin dead hoax How to reassure the world youre still alive after the internet reports that youre dead? Fake your own murder on Instagram, like Macaulay Culkin. The actor posted the above image via his band Pizza Undergrounds account yesterday, following several false rumours that hed passed away. One particularly misleading story, originally posted on MSNBC.website (not to be confused with the real MSNBC), read: Sources are reporting that Macaulay Culkin, best known for his role as Kevin McCallister in Home Alone and sequel Home Alone 2: Lost in New York, has been found dead at the age of 34. Debunked myths and fake news stories 'Crabzilla' - A fifty-foot crab dwelling somewhere off the English coast A satellite picture of the so-called crab, aptly dubbed Crabzilla, has gone viral after first surfacing on Weird Whitstable, a website for the supernatural curated by illustrator Quinton Winter, which deals in phantoms, mysteries, tall tales, and artefacts. The shadowy figure of a colossal crustacean, apparently spotted in the murky waters of Whistable, in Kent, dwarfs boats and cars on the pier it lurks besides. The invertebrate expert Paul Clark at the Natural History Museum in London has branded the photo a hoax. Photo courtesy of Weird Whitstable http://www.weirdwhitstable.co.uk Debunked myths and fake news stories Ebola 'risen from the dead' zombie story The story of dead Ebola victims rising from the dead, with the first "picture" of one of the zombies that has gone viral, (if it weren't glaringly obvious) is a hoax. The image on the article, while impressive, is in fact doctored picture of a zombie from the film World War Z. It appears to have taken an image of one of the films lab-zombies, and merged it with this picture of a realistic movie sculpture from Schell Studios, which the messageboard 8chan pointed out. 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We will not be responsible for the results because of the Lebanese peoples embrace of the Hezbollah terrorist, the falsified quote read.

While the language of the supposed news alert  not wholly written in a dry news tone, and missing several elements of a typical news story  was an obvious fake to anyone with media literacy, the content is worrying.

Its not clear how many people received it, whether theres an identifying strand between the recipients of occupation, class, geography  and perhaps most alarmingly, where it came from.

It could be the work of a prankster who got hold of a subscription list, or bigger actors, with more ambitious motives, could be involved. Without knowing the intended audience, it is impossible to identify the sender.

The Israeli intelligence services are far too sophisticated to ever fall for a fake news story such as the Mossad kidnap text, said Ben Nimmo, an information defence Fellow with the Atlantic Councils Digital Forensic Research Lab.

But Hezbollahs secretive intel agency is unlikely to be as well resourced or staffed  and the text has similarities with pinpoint propaganda, which Mr Nimmos research has found in Ukraine to be information warfare akin to a high-tech version of dropping leaflets onto enemy battlefields.

 Edward Snowden addresses Facebook fake news claims

In the Dombas, threatening SMS messages are periodically sent to the phones of Ukrainian Armed Forces soldiers, in the hopes they will be intimated into deserting their positions. While the source is without a shadow of a doubt Russia, the texts originate from traceless cell site simulators, which impersonate local mobile telephone signal masts.

There is no incentive for a new Hezbollah-Israel war on either side  both the Lebanese militant group and the Jewish state are deeply preoccupied with the war in bordering Syria  but all it might take is the wrong official or unit stationed on the border to receive, and believe, a similar message for all hell to break loose.

After all, its anchored in a realistic  and therefore believable  context: the necessary conditions for the 2006 war were fanned by a number of unsuccessful Hezbollah attempts to kidnap Israeli soldiers in 2005.

The most powerful [fake news reports] are those that rely on something existing and then diverge from the truth, Dr Rickli said.

It is the same mechanism as lies  the most powerful ones are those that are building on something real.

There are several conflicts in the Middle East which already run hot. But what we may be seeing, given recent events, is the emergence of fake news tactics which are not just aimed at sowing confusion and distrust among populations, but influencing events on a state level.

The current diplomatic crisis in the Gulf is a case in point: the three-month-old standoff sprung, in part, from the publication of a false news story planted by hackers on a Qatari news agency.

At the time, Qatar said that how quickly its neighbours picked up on the fake comments about Iran and Israel from Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani  and the fact several regional outlets kept running the false remarks even after Qatar had issued a statement explaining the hack  showed that something was amiss.

Recently divulged US intelligence appears to back up Qatars allegation the story was planted by its regional rivals: officials believe that senior members of the UAEs government discussed the planned hacks on 23 May, the day before they occurred, and either carried out the cyber attack themselves or used a third party.

An earlier FBI investigation found that the hack was the work of Russian hackers  whether they were from the government, or freelancers hired by a third party, is unknown.

The Gulf dispute is ongoing, and its huge geopolitical implications are yet to be fully understood.

If the US intel is correct, this is an instance of fake news being used to directly influence events in the Middle East.

[Creating] alternative realities is the ultimate goal of post-truth politics, Dr Rickli said.

These Cold War-style tactics utilising the force of politics rather than the politics of force could be used to great effect in the region.
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British Airways has updated its plans for re-starting operations to Florida and the Caribbean after Hurricane Irma.

The airline says the storm has caused severe damage to parts of the Caribbean and Florida.

All BA flights to or from the four Florida airports it serves  Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Tampa and Orlando  are cancelled on Monday 11 September.

The airline is allowing any passengers booked to fly to or from any of those airports up to and including Sunday 17 September to reschedule to the same destination as originally booked up to and including 14 October  or use the value of their ticket towards an alternative BA destination

The airline has flown a Boeing 777 to Bermuda, where it is currently waiting on the ground.

As soon as it is safe to do so, we will be positioning it in to Florida, to help bring as many customers home as possible, says BA.

We also have aircraft ready in the Caribbean when airports re-open, to help get customers to airports with connecting flights to London."

Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures Show all 7 1 /7 Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures A roof-less house in Barbuda ABS TV Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures A mobile network tower snapped in two by the hurricane ABS TV Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures The hurricane left debris strewn across the island Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures Rubble in the aftermath of the hurricane ABS TV Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures The destruction in Barbuda, as seen from an ABS TV helicopter ABS TV Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures As well as destroying most houses, the hurricane also left plenty of flooding ABS TV Barbuda, Hurricane Irma  in pictures Barbudan residents survey the damage ABS TV

From Providenciales in the Turks and Caicos, the airline is making arrangements to have relief aircraft ready to fly customers from Providenciales back to London as soon as it is safe to do so.

Flights from Heathrow to Nassau and Grand Cayman, which had been disrupted, will be back to normal from Monday onwards. Services to and from Antigua and Punta Cana are operating as normal.

But anyone booked to fly with the airline to/from Antigua, Grand Cayman, Nassau, St Kitts, Punta Cana, Tobago or Providenciales before 14 September can can choose to travel to an alternative Caribbean destination or delay the flight to another date before the end of September.

It is also allowing passengers booked to or from Atlanta on Monday or Tuesday to reschedule to Wednesday or Thursday.

Virgin Atlantic has a wider "travel waiver", allowing anyone booked to Florida, Georgia, Havana, the Bahamas or Antigua up to Sunday 17 September. They can switch dates or destinations so long as they complete their journey on or before 14 October.
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When it launched in 1996, the label "Al Jazeera" meant nothing more than a little new player in the Gulf media market to the local Lebanese journalist I was at that time. However, the network rapidly became breath of fresh air: Arab voices reporting on Arab crises? It was unprecedented.

Also unprecedented were the undisciplined and disrespectful tones and content adopted by the TV channel when it came to reporting on the untouchable: the strict red lines journalists in the region had had to previously abide by. In most Arab countries, the list of matters journalists are required to respect, as dictated by various legislations, is practically unlimited: heads of the state, national interests and security, diplomatic relations, cultural and historical values and religious values, along with many, many others.

The list is as long as it is vague in its wording and scope, allowing its misuse to quell critical voices. Dissent is not something autocratic leaders want to hear, and they have developed sufficient means to deter any attempts to express it.

Journalists of the state-owned media could not conceive of a role for themselves beyond regimes guards. By a large majority, they were not making any serious attempt to break with the uniform and censored narratives they were required to disseminate daily on behalf of the government.

As the former editor in chief of the state-owned Egyptian newspaper al-Ahram Osama Saraya told me when I met him in a coffee shop in Cairo, the main function of state media was to embellish the face of the regime, not to monitor it. It was impossible to imagine another role for it.

 Syrian opposition coordinator: 'US policy is weak' - Talk to Al Jazeera

The introduction of privately owned media could not genuinely defy this model; bound by partisanship and business interests to regimes, these new ventures pushed the ceiling of the allowed depending on the degree of tolerance or rigidity of regimes, but they never pushed beyond the established taboos that remained sacred (I listed some of these above).

Journalists learned to enjoy the margin of manoeuvre allowed by the private sectors narrow window of dissent and to work within this space. This space opens and closes depending on regimes tactics to assert legitimacy in the face of public crises, and the international criticism of their human rights record when these crises occur.

Yet this sector rapidly became a new, more efficient tool in polishing the public image of autocratic regimes by allowing a narrowly controlled space to vent frustration.

Autocratic leaders could finally praise their own so-called openness and goodwill by claiming they were being held accountable by their own media. However, taking this narrow window as a genuine attempt to open up media narratives to dissent amounts to gambling.

The former editor-in-chief of the critical Moroccan magazine Tel Quel, Abdallah al Turabi, told me about the many risks that come with embracing the regimes game of sporadically opening and closing the narrow window of tolerated dissent, including the sharing of information considered sensitive: There is definitely more information in the press today about the palace. But it all depends on the decision to open or to close this window. The day they decide they want to go after a journalist or a media institution, they will not be short of means to do so.

 Al Jazeera investigation reveals corruption links to Maldives president

Caution remains the golden rule. Journalists must know when to show their cards and when to fold.

The Al Jazeera pan-Arab network found its raison detre by spearheading a new model of disrespectful reporting, braving taboos by opening the airwaves to dissent. But this model did not really break with that of private news providers flirting with the ceiling of the allowed when it comes to reporting on Qatari policies.

It is fair to say that the network extended this space tremendously, although they did not truly rebel against the strict red lines drawn by their funders. Bold, independent journalism was introduced as a value in the newsroom culture, but it has to co-exist with a clear editorial line, mainly expressed through emotionally driven narratives carrying within them factual information and extensive field coverage. The public needs emotions to swallow information.

The extensive coverage by the network of the Arab uprisings provided these movements with a regional and international visibility. While the role of social media in empowering these movements was praised as crucial, it is difficult to imagine the success of these protest movements without the extensive and positive coverage by pan-Arab satellite channels, led by Al Jazeera.

However, the quest for independent and bold reporting on the Arab world is growing more and more challenging, with the growing link between Al Jazeera and the diplomatic agenda and interests of the Qatari ruling family.

For instance, reports in late 2007 alleged a deal had been struck to narrow the scope of criticism by the network when tackling Saudi affairs, as part of a rapprochement between the two Gulf regimes in the face of Iran's growing influence in the region.

According to the New York Times, the deal included not airing radical dissenting voices against the Saudi regime. The shifting perception of the network  from an independent news broker championing dissent to a powerful diplomatic platform for expanding Qatari role in the region post-uprisings  contributed to a growing mistrust within the public.

 Detained Al-Jazeera journalist protests on social media against arrest

The extensive friendly coverage by Al Jazeera of mainstream political Islam parties  Ennahda in Tunisia and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt  exacerbated this mistrust; the channel is perceived more and more as a full political player in shaping the outcomes of these uprisings. The demise of the Brotherhood in Egypt, accompanied as it was by unprecedented repression of the group, did not serve the channels editorial prerogative of providing a platform for the oppressed. Yet the sympathy expressed by Al Jazeera towards the group was also perceived as a political move.

It is not an exaggeration to say that the region is currently witnessing one of its darkest phases of repression against freedom of expression and civil liberties in general. Recently, the United Arab Emirates has banned expressions of sympathy towards Qatar to the extent of threatening potential offenders with a jail term of up to 15 years.

Pressure against independent journalism is widespread. To provide just one particularly egregious example, the Egyptian government has recently blocked access to at least 21 critical news sites including Al Jazeera, Al-Araby Al-Jadeed (The New Arab), HuffPost Arabi (the Arabic language site of The Huffington Post) and the independent Egyptian news site Mada Masr, one of very few that still provide critical coverage of the aftermath of the coup amid a tough clampdown on all forms of dissent. Reporters Without Borders labelled Egypt one of the biggest prison-states for journalists, with a record number of journalists behind bars, estimated between 26 (according to international organizations) to around 60 (according to local NGOs, including media staff).

The window on Arab media platforms is narrower than ever. It is crucial that critical voices continue to find a platform on Al Jazeera, but also through other spaces of contention in Arab traditional and social media.

It is equally crucial for Al Jazeera, amid this crisis, to question its style, narratives, and especially the collusion between its conflicting professional and ideological identities. The survival of the once-cherished channel as a champion of audacity in face of obedience is paramount  and has further-reaching consequences beyond the struggle of the channels funders with their powerful neighbors.

Fatima el Issawi is a senior lecturer in journalism at the University of Essex
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Hurricane Irma was still several days away from South Florida when officials in Miami-Dade began telling about 650,000 people to leave their homes. If you do it later, you may be caught in a flood of traffic trying to leave the area, Mayor Carlos A Gimenez said on Wednesday night. You may find yourself in a car during a hurricane, which is not the best place to be. Tens of thousands are expected to remain, though, either because they dont have the resources or they think they can weather the storm. In storm after storm, people either cant or dont follow evacuation orders.

Florida is no stranger to hurricanes. But Irma is the first major one to strike the state directly in more than a decade. We study communication about storms and other disasters. Unfortunately, the best way to tell the public how to stay safe in a storm is not always clear  each disaster is different, forcing different tactics for different circumstances. That means theres no playbook for emergency managers to follow, and that leaves them with constant decisions to make as a storm approaches.

World news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 World news in pictures World news in pictures 30 September 2020 Pope Francis prays with priests at the end of a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 29 September 2020 A girl's silhouette is seen from behind a fabric in a tent along a beach by Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 September 2020 A Chinese woman takes a photo of herself in front of a flower display dedicated to frontline health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic in Beijing, China. China will celebrate national day marking the founding of the People's Republic of China on October 1st Getty World news in pictures 27 September 2020 The Glass Mountain Inn burns as the Glass Fire moves through the area in St. Helena, California. The fast moving Glass fire has burned over 1,000 acres and has destroyed homes Getty World news in pictures 26 September 2020 A villager along with a child offers prayers next to a carcass of a wild elephant that officials say was electrocuted in Rani Reserve Forest on the outskirts of Guwahati, India AFP via Getty World news in pictures 25 September 2020 The casket of late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is seen in Statuary Hall in the US Capitol to lie in state in Washington, DC AFP via Getty World news in pictures 24 September 2020 An anti-government protester holds up an image of a pro-democracy commemorative plaque at a rally outside Thailand's parliament in Bangkok, as activists gathered to demand a new constitution AFP via Getty World news in pictures 23 September 2020 A whale stranded on a beach in Macquarie Harbour on the rugged west coast of Tasmania, as hundreds of pilot whales have died in a mass stranding in southern Australia despite efforts to save them, with rescuers racing to free a few dozen survivors The Mercury/AFP via Getty World news in pictures 22 September 2020 State civil employee candidates wearing face masks and shields take a test in Surabaya AFP via Getty World news in pictures 21 September 2020 A man sweeps at the Taj Mahal monument on the day of its reopening after being closed for more than six months due to the coronavirus pandemic AP World news in pictures 20 September 2020 A deer looks for food in a burnt area, caused by the Bobcat fire, in Pearblossom, California EPA World news in pictures 19 September 2020 Anti-government protesters hold their mobile phones aloft as they take part in a pro-democracy rally in Bangkok. Tens of thousands of pro-democracy protesters massed close to Thailand's royal palace, in a huge rally calling for PM Prayut Chan-O-Cha to step down and demanding reforms to the monarchy AFP via Getty World news in pictures 18 September 2020 Supporters of Iraqi Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr maintain social distancing as they attend Friday prayers after the coronavirus disease restrictions were eased, in Kufa mosque, near Najaf, Iraq Reuters World news in pictures 17 September 2020 A protester climbs on The Triumph of the Republic at 'the Place de la Nation' as thousands of protesters take part in a demonstration during a national day strike called by labor unions asking for better salary and against jobs cut in Paris, France EPA World news in pictures 16 September 2020 A fire raging near the Lazzaretto of Ancona in Italy. The huge blaze broke out overnight at the port of Ancona. Firefighters have brought the fire under control but they expected to keep working through the day EPA World news in pictures 15 September 2020 Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny posing for a selfie with his family at Berlin's Charite hospital. In an Instagram post he said he could now breathe independently following his suspected poisoning last month Alexei Navalny/Instagram/AFP World news in pictures 14 September 2020 Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, former Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba and former Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida celebrate after Suga was elected as new head of the ruling party at the Liberal Democratic Party's leadership election in Tokyo Reuters World news in pictures 13 September 2020 A man stands behind a burning barricade during the fifth straight day of protests against police brutality in Bogota AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 September 2020 Police officers block and detain protesters during an opposition rally to protest the official presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus. Daily protests calling for the authoritarian president's resignation are now in their second month AP World news in pictures 11 September 2020 Members of 'Omnium Cultural' celebrate the 20th 'Festa per la llibertat' ('Fiesta for the freedom') to mark the Day of Catalonia in Barcelona. Omnion Cultural fights for the independence of Catalonia EPA World news in pictures 10 September 2020 The Moria refugee camp, two days after Greece's biggest migrant camp, was destroyed by fire. Thousands of asylum seekers on the island of Lesbos are now homeless AFP via Getty World news in pictures 9 September 2020 Pope Francis takes off his face mask as he arrives by car to hold a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 8 September 2020 A home is engulfed in flames during the "Creek Fire" in the Tollhouse area of California AFP via Getty World news in pictures 7 September 2020 A couple take photos along a sea wall of the waves brought by Typhoon Haishen in the eastern port city of Sokcho AFP via Getty World news in pictures 6 September 2020 Novak Djokovic and a tournament official tends to a linesperson who was struck with a ball by Djokovic during his match against Pablo Carreno Busta at the US Open USA Today Sports/Reuters World news in pictures 5 September 2020 Protesters confront police at the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne, Australia, during an anti-lockdown rally AFP via Getty World news in pictures 4 September 2020 A woman looks on from a rooftop as rescue workers dig through the rubble of a damaged building in Beirut. A search began for possible survivors after a scanner detected a pulse one month after the mega-blast at the adjacent port AFP via Getty World news in pictures 3 September 2020 A full moon next to the Virgen del Panecillo statue in Quito, Ecuador EPA World news in pictures 2 September 2020 A Palestinian woman reacts as Israeli forces demolish her animal shed near Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank Reuters World news in pictures 1 September 2020 Students protest against presidential elections results in Minsk TUT.BY/AFP via Getty World news in pictures 31 August 2020 The pack rides during the 3rd stage of the Tour de France between Nice and Sisteron AFP via Getty World news in pictures 30 August 2020 Law enforcement officers block a street during a rally of opposition supporters protesting against presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus Reuters World news in pictures 29 August 2020 A woman holding a placard reading "Stop Censorship - Yes to the Freedom of Expression" shouts in a megaphone during a protest against the mandatory wearing of face masks in Paris. Masks, which were already compulsory on public transport, in enclosed public spaces, and outdoors in Paris in certain high-congestion areas around tourist sites, were made mandatory outdoors citywide on August 28 to fight the rising coronavirus infections AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 August 2020 Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe bows to the national flag at the start of a press conference at the prime minister official residence in Tokyo. Abe announced he will resign over health problems, in a bombshell development that kicks off a leadership contest in the world's third-largest economy AFP via Getty World news in pictures 27 August 2020 Residents take cover behind a tree trunk from rubber bullets fired by South African Police Service (SAPS) in Eldorado Park, near Johannesburg, during a protest by community members after a 16-year old boy was reported dead AFP via Getty World news in pictures 26 August 2020 People scatter rose petals on a statue of Mother Teresa marking her 110th birth anniversary in Ahmedabad AFP via Getty World news in pictures 25 August 2020 An aerial view shows beach-goers standing on salt formations in the Dead Sea near Ein Bokeq, Israel Reuters World news in pictures 24 August 2020 Health workers use a fingertip pulse oximeter and check the body temperature of a fisherwoman inside the Dharavi slum during a door-to-door Covid-19 coronavirus screening in Mumbai AFP via Getty World news in pictures 23 August 2020 People carry an idol of the Hindu god Ganesh, the deity of prosperity, to immerse it off the coast of the Arabian sea during the Ganesh Chaturthi festival in Mumbai, India Reuters World news in pictures 22 August 2020 Firefighters watch as flames from the LNU Lightning Complex fires approach a home in Napa County, California AP World news in pictures 21 August 2020 Members of the Israeli security forces arrest a Palestinian demonstrator during a rally to protest against Israel's plan to annex parts of the occupied West Bank AFP via Getty World news in pictures 20 August 2020 A man pushes his bicycle through a deserted road after prohibitory orders were imposed by district officials for a week to contain the spread of the Covid-19 in Kathmandu AFP via Getty World news in pictures 19 August 2020 A car burns while parked at a residence in Vacaville, California. Dozens of fires are burning out of control throughout Northern California as fire resources are spread thin AFP via Getty World news in pictures 18 August 2020 Students use their mobile phones as flashlights at an anti-government rally at Mahidol University in Nakhon Pathom. Thailand has seen near-daily protests in recent weeks by students demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha AFP via Getty World news in pictures 17 August 2020 Members of the Kayapo tribe block the BR163 highway during a protest outside Novo Progresso in Para state, Brazil. Indigenous protesters blocked a major transamazonian highway to protest against the lack of governmental support during the COVID-19 novel coronavirus pandemic and illegal deforestation in and around their territories AFP via Getty World news in pictures 16 August 2020 Lightning forks over the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge as a storm passes over Oakland AP World news in pictures 15 August 2020 Belarus opposition supporters gather near the Pushkinskaya metro station where Alexander Taraikovsky, a 34-year-old protester died on August 10, during their protest rally in central Minsk AFP via Getty World news in pictures 14 August 2020 AlphaTauri's driver Daniil Kvyat takes part in the second practice session at the Circuit de Catalunya in Montmelo near Barcelona ahead of the Spanish F1 Grand Prix AFP via Getty World news in pictures 13 August 2020 Soldiers of the Brazilian Armed Forces during a disinfection of the Christ The Redeemer statue at the Corcovado mountain prior to the opening of the touristic attraction in Rio AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 August 2020 Young elephant bulls tussle playfully on World Elephant Day at the Amboseli National Park in Kenya AFP via Getty

But there are a few things that we know: appeals to fear can work, and authorities often use them ahead of severe storms, but they can backfire if the risks seem overhyped. Evacuation orders that identify a geographic location, such as flood zones, can help target messages to those facing the greatest peril. Specific risks must be communicated clearly, but ultimately, its how individual residents and their households perceive the danger that largely determines whether they evacuate.

One of the tenets of good risk communication  that authorities should speak with one voice  was notably missing before Harvey, when Texas Governor Greg Abbott told Houstonians to evacuate while Mayor Sylvester Turner was simultaneously telling them to shelter in place. Warnings about Irma went more smoothly. Monroe County, Florida, which includes the Florida Keys and Miami-Dade County, began ordering mandatory evacuations on Wednesday based on forecasts of Irmas track. Making an evacuation mandatory can help convince more people to evacuate overall.

But our experimental survey research conducted after Hurricane Sandy has found that mandatory evacuations may also lead more people outside the intended evacuation zone to flee, with the potential to create additional traffic and fill up beds in shelters unnecessarily. On a peninsula such as Florida, where a large population may need to evacuate in the same direction, this is especially dangerous. Even worse is when people must leave through other at-risk areas, as in Florida  where the storm is likely to traverse the entire state.

Graphic shows Hurricane Irma heading for Miami

In the same study, we also found that messages that identify certain geographic areas, such as flood zones or evacuation zones, can help encourage residents to leave those areas while reducing evacuation among those who live outside those areas. This depends, however, on whether people think they live in a flood or evacuation zone  and sometimes, people are wrong. To be effective, messages must use wording that helps people recognise whether the message applies to them. (One example is the mandatory evacuation of zones A and B in Miami-Dade County that was issued on Thursday.) Research shows that many people pay attention to evacuation orders. But first they have to know that they live in areas at risk.

Another approach to motivating evacuation is to use fear appeal messages, such as the National Weather Services warnings that people who stayed behind during Hurricanes Katrina and Ike would face certain death. As Hurricane Harvey approached Texas last month, meteorologists and the news media warned of catastrophic and life-threatening flooding, and similar messages have been used about Irma. Ill do anything in my power to convince them this is a very serious storm, Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine said on Thursday, after learning that some residents were planning to ignore evacuation orders. This is a nuclear hurricane. They should leave the beach, they must leave the beach.

Our survey research finds that such warnings may help motivate evacuation, but if they are too strong, some people think the message is overblown and thus does not need to be heeded. People who think hurricanes are less risky and whose worldviews favour personal autonomy are more likely to reject fear-based messages, as are people who dont think they can protect themselves against the threat. So messages that describe the storms potential effects without being so overwhelming that they threaten peoples sense of autonomy can be more effective. Messages are often more persuasive when they include concrete, specific information to help people understand what they can do to protect themselves.

 Irma and Jose become first Atlantic hurricanes to be so intense at same time since records began

How to determine the best communication is not easy. We can look to the language and methods used before prior hurricanes to learn about which messages do and dont work with various audiences. But each hurricane is unique  with different tracks, different wind and flood hazards, and a different evolution of forecasts  and the messages vary as a result. People access messages from many sources (public officials, meteorologists, friends and family members) over multiple channels (social media, the internet, television news), and these messages evolve with the forecast. This makes it difficult for researchers like us to isolate which features of a message work best. To offset some of these variables, we often conduct experiments where we ask people to imagine hypothetical storms, but those have limitations as well.

Of course, what people hear from authorities isnt the only factor that affects whether they leave storm zones. When deciding whether, when and how to evacuate, people ask if they have a place to stay with relatives or friends outside of the evacuation zone. Can they afford a hotel? Do they have a car, and money for gas and food? Are they more worried about evacuation traffic or staying to protect their property? Do they have a disability that might make it difficult to move to a different location or stay in a shelter? In the past, having a pet was a major barrier to evacuating for some; after Hurricane Katrina, Congress passed a law requiring states to factor animals into their emergency plans and allow the Federal Emergency Management Agency to shelter them, which has made it much easier to evacuate with pets. Peoples decisions are also strongly influenced by what they hear from other people and see others doing  including family members, friends, neighbours and often even friends of friends or new connections they make online.

 Plane captures aerial view of Hurricane Irma as it heads towards the United States

Another influence: How recent was the last big storm, what were its effects and were they happy with their decision to evacuate or not? We know that people interpret forecast and warning information through the lens of their experience; sometimes, how people feel about their hurricane experiences is more powerful than any message. Good or bad examples of sheltering in place or evacuating can affect how people respond to future storms. The emotions from hurricanes linger. If people stayed at home and were terrified, theyre more likely to leave next time; if they were stuck in traffic or miserable in a shelter, theyre more likely to stay. As one emergency manager told us, No matter what people did during [Hurricane] Sandy, whether they stayed or they evacuated, they told us, Im never going to do that again.

When it comes time to decide whether to stay or go, the most important consideration is whether people think that evacuating will help protect them and their families from harm. If they think theyre safe in their homes, or just as safe as they would be with their other options, then they dont have a reason to evacuate. As Harvey clearly showed, evaluating who is safe and who isnt is complicated by the multiple hazards that hurricanes present  including strong winds, flooding and the risk of tornadoes. Each of these hazards raises its own prediction challenges, and each can have various effects on people in different types of homes in different areas. What is most important ahead of storms such as Harvey and Irma is that forecasters, emergency managers, the media and coastal residents work together to help people understand which risks they face from that specific storm and how they can best protect themselves.

Cara Cuite is an assistant extension specialist at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, who studies coastal storm risk communication and public perceptions of novel food technologies. Rebecca Morss is a senior scientist at the National Centre for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, who studies meteorological and societal aspects of extreme weather, including hurricanes. This article originally appeared on the Washington Post
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The Blair government's choice not to invoke transitional arrangements when Eastern Europe joined the EU in 2004 was taken with no prior public discussion.

By contrast, months of debate in Austria, France, Germany and Italy led to the imposition of seven-year controls - the maximum possible - largely because of pressure from trades unions and left-wing parties.

Britain's decision was greeted with astonishment in central Europe, and elsewhere.

John Doherty

Vienna, Austria

The problem with Jacob Rees-Mogg isn't his faith

Janet Street-Porter, in her column of 9 September, castigates critics of Jacob Rees-Mogg for considering him unfit for high office because of his strict Catholicism, comparing his situation to Tim Farron. Most of us would take a slightly wider view, and take into account his support of zero-hours contracts and blanket privatisation, and his disdain for green energy and foreign aid, among other issues.

Such views, taken alongside those on abortion and equal marriage (not to mention his parenting skills), suggest that Rees-Mogg is not a suitable leader for any political party in the 21st century.

Martin Heaton

Cheshire

Please can I record my dismay concerning the way that some journalists have jumped on the opportunity to beat up Catholics by using Jacob Rees-Mogg as a shining example of the faith? He is not.

All faiths have their extremists and fundamentalists, and observers are all too quick to equate their actions and attitudes with the mainstream. As a practising Catholic myself, I can assure your readers that Rees-Mogg's views do not reflect the views of the overwhelming majority of our faith. Indeed, I would argue that his views do not reflect those of Jesus as expressed in the gospels.

There is also a prevalent attitude amongst the chattering classes that it is not possible to express a Christian faith in public without being derided. This is nonsense. People respect expressions of faith, and probably wish they could share them. The example of Tim Farron being forced to resign as Liberal Democrat leader does not hold water. Farron was simply not up to the job. Nothing to do with his Christianity.

Bernard Cudd

Morpeth

Nobody could call Brexit fully democratic

I have always believed that Members of Parliament were representatives of their constituents and not delegates. That seems to suggest that they should be more inclined to vote in accordance with their convictions and beliefs rather than blindly follow the "will" of their constituents. MPs who supported Remain presumably believed that was in the best interests of the country. It seems a mystery therefore that many of them can now vote to leave the EU.

As an elected councillor at all three levels  parish, district and county  in the 1990s I twice had to support projects, in due course successfully delivered, against the claimed "will of the people", expressed in private polling, then supported by parish councils. However, both polls were deeply flawed. In one case only those areas most likely to be disadvantaged by the project were polled. A second poll, covering the whole community, showed a majority in favour.

In the second case, the poll was so blatantly biased in its wording that it would have been difficult to vote in favour of the project without seeming to want disaster to strike.

The referendum poll was not flawed in the same sense, but it was deeply flawed in that the question put was too simple. It was like deciding whether to put your money in bank A or B without first finding out the quality of their respective services.

We are now steadily finding out the qualities of the two options on offer. I would challenge MPs now to evaluate these options honestly and vote with their genuine convictions.

David Buckton

Cambridge

The 560 MPs who voted for a referendum on Europe thereby abandoned parliamentary democracy in favour of government by plebiscite. Consequently debate on the Great Withdrawal Bill is just rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic.

Roger Cook

Salisbury

The well-informed MPs who represent us in our democratically elected Parliament are capitulating to Brexit even though the majority of 480 MPs (versus 159) voted for the UK to remain in a united Europe.

Our elected MPs are submitting to the demands of 17 million ill-informed and deceived people. They are allowing 65 million people to be stripped of their European citizenship.

This capitulation by our Government and Parliament will be recorded as the greatest mistake in the history of the United Kingdom.

It seems that democracy ended on the day of the Brexit referendum  we are told that it cannot be challenged.

The Government is adding to this loss of democracy by denying parliamentary challenge and debate.

Our MPs have relinquished responsibility and our democracy has been dismantled by a few fanatical nationalists.

Is this the sovereignty we wished to regain?

We are about to lose cooperations, collaborations, freedoms, protections and rights that took 60 years to build.

Martin Deighton

Address supplied

Kenneth Clarke has been reported as saying he could not vote for the Brexit bill without further assurances. Even if he gets them, are they worth the air they are breathed with? Governments have a poor history of honouring assurances given when legislating  think how terrorism laws have been abused by the authorities. Even less will a future government of a different colour respect such assurances.

If assurances are needed they must be written into the legislation itself. Nothing else works.

David Watson

South Oxfordshire

The latest school uniform row feels Islamophobic

The recent concern expressed by Ofsted and Muslim campaign groups that the inclusion of hijabs in primary school uniform lists may represent external pressure on schools to change their policies is of concern.

The wearing of the hijab generally starts once girls have reached adolescence. However, the reality is that girls mature at different ages, with some beginning menarche at primary school. Therefore a uniform ban would actually affect such girls rights to practise their faith.

More importantly, wearing the hijab is a matter for Muslim parents and their daughters to decide and not Ofsted or Muslim campaigners to get involved with. One could equally argue that school uniforms that do not allow boys to wear dresses are just as sexualising!

I fear that once again this is just another attempt to attack Islam.

Sarah Waseem

Kingston Upon Thames

The wine-tasting minefield

Kashmira Ganders article about wine-tasting this week was full of interesting information about choosing and enjoying wine, but it did a disservice to those who are clueless about plonk by giving the impression that when the wine waiter asks you if you would like to taste the wine, he is expecting you to give a learned commentary about it or say whether you like it.

In fact all he wants to know is whether its corked or tastes unpleasant in some way. This is normally quite straightforward, because it seldom does.

Some bravery is required, however, if you think the wine is corked. This happened to me once in a smart hotel restaurant where we were entertaining a couple of friends. I thought the white wine was corked, took a deep breath and said somewhat hesitantly that I thought it was corked. The sommelier poured a little into his spoon, tasted it and agreed, much to my relief!

If the wine is in a screw-cap bottle, as is increasingly the case nowadays, you can earn some points by saying you dont need to taste it because it is in a screw-cap bottle (and therefore cant be corked). It is just possible, but very unlikely, that it will be spoilt in some other way, but worth the risk.

Bernard Theobald

Nottingham
There may well have been awkward scenes in Brussels on Thursday when the monthly fire alarm test at the EU Commission building disrupted the press conference of the EU's chief Brexit negotiator and French politician Michel Barnier.

But the only alarm bells voiced by the former EU Commissioner in his speech - which coincided with the publication of new EU papers setting out its negotiating stance on the future of the Irish Border, customs, etc - were his worries about Britain's take on its future border with Ireland.

"What I see in the UK's paper on Ireland and Northern Ireland worries me," Barnier told the conference, highlighting that a solution on the Irish Border had to be "unique".

"The UK wants the EU to suspend the application of its laws, its customs union and its single market at what will be a new external border for the EU, and the UK wants to use Ireland as a kind of test case for the future EU-UK customs relations. This will not happen," he added, stating that finding solutions would require flexibility on both sides.

It was as if the mood music had changed and the statement mirrored the more hardened stance taken recently by the Irish Government against Britain's seemingly chaotic approach to Brexit.

This was the straight-talking Alpine Barnier (66), the politician who declared himself as a "man of the mountain" when he brought the Winter Olympics to his hometown of Albertville, in the French region of Savoie back in 1992.

"Barnier has his eye on the prize and the clock, as he has reminded us in the past. He can see the big picture too - he has done the local, national and European when it comes to politics," said one Brussel-based EU source who knows him.

"He wants to reach a deal, as it wanted by the other 27 member states. Ultimately he is a deal-maker.

"Airy-fairy aspirational language is well and good as we saw in the UK's position papers, but he sees the importance for Ireland and the EU to have a concrete agreement," the source said.

He added that Barnier also has great insight into this country's situation going back to the role he played in the peace process, but he always sees the bigger picture. Barnier was regional commissioner in charge of the peace programme and recently told members of the Dail and Seanad that he was personally invested in the process that led to the Good Friday Agreement, which was signed almost 20 years ago.

One senior Northern Ireland politician who worked with him at the time found Barnier to be a keen negotiator who is tough but fair.

"He is a man of particularisms and is clear about his requirements but he is consistent in those.

"He has no problem explaining his position but that doesn't mean he is inflexible. He and his officials were very clear about the requirements and standards they wanted in the peace II programme and the various other European funding programmes," he said.

"While they would have been quite clear about targets and indicators, they were tolerant to the fact that these needed to be agreed and have a sense of local ownership. They also made their own contacts on the ground and were comfortable dealing with people."

Fast forward to the case of Brexit, the Single Market is sacrosanct - Barnier has made this clear and he has also said the three key issues of the Border, the exit bill and citizens' rights are the three key planks that the EU wants to see progress on before discussions can move to the next stage.

But even if the tone of the Brexit talks has become a little sharper in recent times, probably reflecting frustration on the EU side, those who know Barnier say this won't prompt a breakdown in relations or talks which are set to continue for quite some time ahead of the UK exit scheduled for 2019.

He is patient and won't be needled by individuals either, the Northern Ireland source said.

"His tolerance levels didn't allow him to be needled by (David) Trimble's slights of the EU," he added.

Trimble, who is keenly pro-Brexit, is a former Northern Ireland first minister.

He headed up the Ulster Unionists during the peace talks that paved the way to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998 as well as the creation of a power-sharing executive at Stormont.

But Barnier already has a good relationship with UK Brexit secretary David Davis despite their being on different sides of this Brexit divide.

"They were both Ministers for European Affairs in the mid-1990s and worked on the Amsterdam Treaty together and have a very cordial approach to each other," the EU source added.

"Anyway, you know the saying, the door is always open? Well, in his case it is."

Another senior political source in Brussel described Barnier as "affable, personable and political and he is also a good friend of Ireland in these talks. He knows his stuff".

Barnier also has a sense of humour. When he and Davis first met for Brexit talks earlier this summer, they exchanged gifts.

Davis presented Barnier with a rare book on mountaineering - a French-language version of Regards vers l'Annapurna. They are both keen hikers.

Barnier gave Davis a traditional carved walking stick from his home area of Savoie.

But he also bought himself one which he keeps in his office - a cautionary reminder of the uphill Brexit talks ahead of the scheduled British exit date of March 2019.

And while those on the UK negotiation side speak of the "respect" they have for Barnier, he has his detractors too. His calls for more financial regulation as EU commissioner for internal markets and services from 2010 and 2014 infuriated British ministers and many in the City of London.

To the Paris elite, his crime is not to have attended the prestigious Ecole nationale d'administration.

He has also been labelled a federalist, and some in the UK press have pilloried him as the man out to punish Britain for Brexit. But so far it would appear that he has proved himself a deal-maker determined to avoid the so-called 'train crash' Brexit that some business leaders have warned about.

The ultimate prize for him could be presidency of the European Commission depending on how the Brexit talks go - something he failed to achieve in 2014.

And at the risk of sounding somewhat parochial, having a character onside with his honed negotiating skills and unique understanding of this country should only be a boon for Ireland, especially if the talks end up in the bear pit.
'The entity is seeking to build 459 houses and 67 apartments at the site, according to An Bord Pleanala's website.' (stock picture)

Nama is teaming up with Pat Doherty's Harcourt Developments for a major house building project in south-west Dublin.

The state agency and Doherty's group have applied for planning permission for more than 500 units at a site in Saggart, via an entity called Greenacre.

The entity is seeking to build 459 houses and 67 apartments at the site, according to An Bord Pleanala's website.

The application - filed on August 30 - is being made via the recently introduced fast track system. This enables applications to be made directly to An Bord Pleanala, which holds consultations with the developers and the local authorities before coming to its conclusion.

The systems aims to see decisions made within 25 weeks.

The project is one of Nama's largest joint ventures to date, and is located near the Cuil Duin housing estate brought to market by Harcourt last year.

Harcourt is perhaps best known for the Titanic Quarter refurbishment project in Belfast and the Park West project in Dublin.

Andrew Parker Bowles, the former husband of Prince Charles's wife Camilla Parker Bowles, is Harcourt's chairman.

A loan portfolio connected to Harcourt, known as Project Abbey, was put on the market by Nama last year, with US investment fund Apollo selected as the preferred bidder.

The portfolio had a face value of around 700m and was sold for around 300m, according to a report by property industry trade publication CoStar News, which said Oaktree Capital was the underbidder.

At the end of 2015, Nama announced plans for a major residential funding programme.

"In an effort to de-risk these programmes and to maximise the contribution of the alternative funding, development and construction sectors, Nama will look for JV partners interested in the co-funding and construction of projects," Nama said.

"The agency will explore appropriate financing options for each site to establish the best financing mechanism specific to each.

"These options include Nama funding all of the construction work required; co-funding with other lenders; or establishing project-specific joint ventures with major investment or construction groups.

"Nama will also work with non-Nama building platforms," he added.
I am very excited at the prospect that we are, hopefully, going to plant some forestry.

We've often talked about it and finally it looks like its going to happen.

When our forebears arrived here 9,000 years ago, broadleaf forest dominated. Coverage declined initially due to the change from hunter-gathering to agriculture. But the process accelerated rapidly from the 1600s onwards, due to exports to England for shipbuilding, etc.

At the turn of the 20th century, just 2pc of Ireland's land area was covered by forests. This has now risen to 11pc, with three-quarters of this being classified as predominantly conifer.

The target nationally is to bring the afforested area to 18pc by the middle of the century, and that ambition is attracting increased impetus in the context of our climate change strategy.

However, this year is actually seeing a contraction in planting, due to well-publicised reasons, while increased non-farmer activity in the sector is also raising some hackles.

Unlike other countries where farmers routinely plant trees to satisfy their own firewood requirements, I wonder why many Irish farmers see planting trees as only something for the old, infirm or those whose ambition has plateaued.

Perhaps part of the reason is that up to relatively recently, enough firewood was readily available through fallen trees and natural regeneration?

There are attractive (if reduced) grants available for planting and in 15-year annual premia. Moreover, grants, premia and timber sales are exempt from income tax and claiming them does not affect entitlement to the Basic Payment, subject to criteria. Profits from forestry are exempt from income tax.

A 2014 study into farmers' attitudes towards forestry found that, while financial considerations were important, so were other factors.

These include continuing a family farm tradition, the preference for a farming lifestyle and, especially, that "good" land should not be planted even if it returns a higher income.

Farmers just don't see forestry as an enterprise like others.

What farmers do see is themselves is as temporary caretakers whose job is to hand on the land in at least as good a condition as they get it.

So the requirement that planted land must remain in forestry in perpetuity is off-putting.

If there is one single change that would stir new interest, it seems that this would be it. If forestry is as good a gig as is being made out, such compulsion shouldn't be necessary.

Another issue is the length of time it takes for the crop to mature.

There is a saying that the best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago; the next best time is today. However, this does provide flexibility around harvesting. A temporary dip in prices can be ridden out and the crop continues to appreciate in the meantime.

Back to ourselves, we have enlisted the help of a forester called Gerry Blake, who has paid us a couple of visits and is now helping to complete the rather onerous application form.

We are hoping to plant about 10 acres, in two lots. It's all marginal land which has been reseeded on a number of occasions, but rushes quickly reappear.

We are hoping that the smaller piece will be suitable for native woodland, as we are keen to enhance the ecological value of the farm.

I also love the idea of strolling through our own patch of deciduous forest. If we don't get to do it, someone else will.

As for the larger area, the current thinking is that Norway Spruce, with 10pc broadleaves, may be the most practical.

We are currently buzzing with enthusiasm. Hopefully, we still will be by the time the application process is complete.
'The commission said that although its consultations were public and open to all stakeholders, "some groups of passengers have not been well-represented in this process". ' Stock image

Airlines at Dublin Airport are reluctant to see ordinary passengers consulted and given a bigger say about issues that impact their journeys, according to the aviation regulator.

The Commission for Aviation Regulation said in a new report that it had decided to consult on "possible ways that we can increase our focus on the needs of passengers when we make regulatory decisions about Dublin Airport".

The commission said that although its consultations were public and open to all stakeholders, "some groups of passengers have not been well-represented in this process". The commission sets the maximum price the airport can charge per passenger based on an assessment of, among other issues, what infrastructure spend is needed at the airport.

"In general, the airlines' view was that there is no need to establish additional approaches to improve the level of consumer engagement, because they (the airlines) already fulfil the role of representing all consumers during the price determination process," it said.

Airlines regularly voice concerns that charges are set too high, while the airport authority seeks higher charges to allow it to fund expansion. Ultimately, passenger charges are paid for by ordinary travellers, as airlines pass them on, adding to the cost of travel.

With passenger numbers rising dramatically at Dublin since the economy improved, a range of infrastructure pinch-points are emerging, from baggage and security hold-ups to the need for a new runway and possibly a new terminal, both of which would ultimately be paid for through airline fares.

"Some airlines are of the view that they best represent the views of passengers, and therefore there is no need for the commission to do more in this area," said the report.

"While in some instances this may be true, there may be certain passenger groups who only make small contributions to airlines' profitability. It is not always clear that airlines will take sufficient account of these groups when making submissions to the commission.

"In short, while airlines have an important role in representing the interests of passengers, it is not clear that they represent the needs of all passengers all of the time."

The commission's paper said that although airlines could be effective at representing their passenger base in general when dealing with the airport on operational issues, "they may be less effective at representing specific groups of passengers or reflecting interests of future passengers in relation to long-term capital infrastructure projects".

"Passenger interests are diverse and airlines might not convey the complexity of these interests in their consultation submissions, or may be reluctant to share the full extent of information available to them," said the regulator. "The question is, do these shortcomings have a negative impact on our decisions by leading the commission to allow some expenditures which should not have taken place or disallow other expenditures which should have?"
On September 21, procurement specialists from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) will travel from its headquarters in the Philippines to Dublin for an Enterprise Ireland seminar to highlight tendering opportunities for Irish companies.

Those likely to be of most interest include contracts in the infrastructure, engineering, energy/environment, water, urban development, healthcare, education and policy and development areas.

Founded in 1966 and headquartered in Manila, the Asian Development Bank is a regional development bank, serving the developing countries of Asia.

Like the World Bank, it is a non-profit operation, aimed at reducing poverty in the region through development. The objectives of the Asian Development Fund (ADF) - the 'soft arm' of the ADB - include gender equality, food security, private sector development, governance, and preparedness and response to cross-border health issues and climate change and disasters.

The ADB's primary raison d'etre is to provide loans. But the bank also finances some activities with grants and 'technical assistance'. Last year, the bank disbursed almost $16.4bn in loans, $169m in technical assistance and $526.75m in grant-funded projects to client countries.

Only companies and individuals from the countries that have joined the bank can tender for, or provide consultancy services around, the multibillion euro infrastructure and development projects supported each year. Ireland is one of the most recent countries to have joined the ADB, signing up just over a decade ago as its 66th member.

The specific opportunities for investor countries fall into two categories. First, there is the supply of goods and works. However, the second, broader opportunity area - the provision of consultancy services - is seen as more relevant to Irish companies.

For example, the ADB uses consultants for technical assistance work, sector studies and economic research studies, as well as for training. In addition, client countries use consultants on loan projects.

Some 70 consultancy-type contracts, worth $11.06m, have been awarded to Irish companies since 2006. For example, ESB International, the PM Group and Energy Services, have won contracts in the energy area, while SRI Executive has provided recruitment services for the bank itself.

Separate to this, the ADB hires consultants on short-term contracts - typically anything from 10 to 60 days - to work within the bank.

These secondments provide a great opportunity to get an insider view of the ADB's workings.

Winning an ADB contract can offer Irish companies a means of entering the Asian market. The bank operates a defined and transparent procurement process and allows contractors to bid and be paid in the currency of their choice. Moreover, all tendering is through English.

With billions being disbursed every year on projects spanning the Asia-Pacific region, Irish companies are best advised to hone their ADB efforts by focusing on one or a group of countries and familiarising themselves with the relevant 'Country Strategy and Programme' document - essentially the ADB's 'business plan' for that country.

The objective should be to drill down through the projects to see what is relevant for your company.

It is also a good idea to talk to the sectoral and country specialists within the ADB. Attending the event in Dublin could be a valuable first step in making initial contacts.

As well as highlighting opportunities, the workshop will provide an update on the ADB's new procurement policy and an opportunity to meet with ADB experts in one-to-one meetings.

Tonia Spollen-Behrens is a senior market adviser on international financial institutions (IFI) tender opportunities with Enterprise Ireland.
What's the biggest turn-off about Ireland as a place in which to work and live? Property prices? Patchy public transport? High taxation? None of the above: think weather. For anyone trying to tempt City workers here, or interested in leaving Ireland to work abroad, the latest Expat Insider survey by InterNations is interesting reading.

InterNations was co-founded by globe-trotting German journalist Malte Zeeck a decade ago. "I used to work as a television reporter - I was living, for instance, in New Delhi - and every time I moved abroad I found it a little bit challenging to start from scratch, especially in a place like India. It was different culture, a different language. I felt a little lost and lonely." The organisation aims to bring expats together in cities, and provide advice and information on local life. Speaking to the Sunday Independent, Zeeck added: "Today we have about 2.7 million members on our platform in our community, organised in 390 cities around the world. We have now 6,000 events taking place every month giving members a chance to meet up."

With a huge database of members, mainly American, British and German, with "close to 200 Irish people", it set up its first survey of their experiences in 2014, and has just published the latest update, based on the responses of 13,000.

So where's the best place to live as an expat? Interestingly, it's Bahrain - which has shot up from 19th place last year. Foreign workers rated it for the friendliness of the locals and the ease of doing business where English is widely spoken.

So how about our Brexit jobs-hunting nation? "Ireland is doing quite good," said Zeeck.

"A huge topic which seems that most expats worry about is the weather - 'rain, rain and more rain', as one expat put it." He added that "only 15pc rated Irish weather positively, it is seen as the biggest potential drawback". But there are pluses: "82pc of expats rate the quality of their environment in Ireland positively. One expat told me, 'I love that simply with a short trip by car, bus or train you can get away from the hustle and bustle. You can find greenery and nature to let go and rest your mind'. Bad weather but great nature."

But financial issues are a major turn-off, too, he said, adding: "Some 69pc rate the affordability of housing in Ireland negatively and that's probably connected to the fact that housing prices rose by 11pc in 2016." The price of healthcare was also a bugbear. Still, Ireland ranks among the top 20 expat destinations in terms of settling in, and is seen as a safe environment, but overall ranks a below-average 45th place, way behind Taiwan, New Zealand, Malta, Colombia, Singapore and Spain.

Our near neighbour has plunged in popularity this year. "We see a strong decline when it comes to the state of the economy in the UK because of the Brexit  and also the political stability has dropped dramatically," said Zeeck. "Last year 77pc rated the political stability positively; this year it's only 47pc. That's a massive dip." Across the Atlantic, it's a similar picture. "Almost half of the participants judged the political instability negatively in the US - last year it was a lot better and that's definitely due to the Trump effect."

But spare a thought for a downtrodden EU neighbour: "In the last position we have Greece. Though it's a great place to go on a tourist trip it's very different if you move abroad. The Greek economy is still a major concern - 53pc say it's very bad." Surprisingly, Zeeck said the survey found that Denmark is the most difficult place for settling in, followed by Austria, Kuwait and China. "The Scandinavian countries, also Germany, Switzerland, Austria, the people are not perceived as being friends in general, and especially towards foreigners." And at the top? "Bahrain, Mexico, Costa Rica and Portugal. Very easy to make friends."

If Michael O'Leary ever considered a change of career, he'd be a credit to the priesthood. The Ryanair chief executive's eulogy at the memorial for former Ryanair board member, and friend, the late James Osborne, was a heartfelt mix of respect, emotion and showed a new side to the ceo.

Lines like: "James is the kind of man who would be easy to dislike... the brains, the talent, the easy raffish charm. If Carlsberg made 68-year-old grandfathers" Or this: "He didn't have those skills necessary to be a good solicitor - after all James had personality. James had common sense. James was good with people."

O'Leary told the Dublin funeral congregation James managed to escape the "dark side" of the legal world "into the sunshine of business". "In 1996 he agreed to join the board - 21 years ago, no one wanted to join the board. We had no money, we were being beaten out by Aer Lingus and we were struggling to survive. Much of that growth would not have taken place without James's leadership."

O'Leary added: "James was no workaholic", he lived for a time in France, "where James knew he was the only one in the entire country doing any work". But as he finished the eulogy - made longer by constant laughter of an entranced crowd - the emotion showed as he spoke of his own six-year-old child and a poem that summed up the mood. A fitting, and funny, send-off for an old friend.
San Leon energy boss Oisin Fanning's pay package was valued at five times the company's turnover last year, according to its newly released-annual report. The report also shows that San Leon's auditors have cast doubt on the oil and gas explorer's future.

Fanning's remuneration package for last year was valued at 1.7m, including salary, bonus and share awards, with the company posting revenue of 342,000.

Last year, his package outstripped that of Dalata chief Pat McCann and would have put him among the top 10 earners if the company were part of the ISEQ20.

The company's 2016 accounts were published later than stock market rules in London allowed, resulting in a suspension of trading.

In this year's annual report, auditors KPMG stated that San Leon's directors had acknowledged the company would need further funding in the next 12 months.

It is awaiting payments from its stake in a Nigerian oil field - a deal made last year, which was described by the company as transformational. The project operator has run into difficulties making the payments.

KPMG said there were "material uncertainties, which may cast doubt" over San Leon's ability to continue as a going concern.
'The case arose from an incident in 2006 after the Finglas-based company imported a quantity of wine that was then lodged in a bonded warehouse. ' Stock photo

Proceedings taken against Revenue over its seizure of a bonded warehouse full of French wine a decade ago have been struck out by the High Court.

Mr Justice Seamus Noonan ruled against a claim made by Arnaud Gaultier, a former director of Irish-registered Loire Valley Ltd, an importer of French wine into Ireland. Gaultier had pursued the case on his own behalf, even after Loire Valley went out of business five years ago.

Revenue had brought a motion seeking an order to strike out the proceedings on the grounds they were "frivolous and vexatious and bound to fail".

The case arose from an incident in 2006 after the Finglas-based company imported a quantity of wine that was then lodged in a bonded warehouse. But a dispute arose between Loire Valley and Revenue arising from the closure of the warehouse, resulting in Revenue detaining the wine and issuing a seizure notice.

The company claimed the detention and seizure of the wine was effected unlawfully and entered into discussions with Revenue, according to the ruling.

This resulted in a payment of 25,000 by Revenue to the company. After further discussions, a further sum of 80,000 was paid to the company by cheque, but this was never cashed.

"The action of detaining and seizing the wine was taken with the bona fide intent of protecting revenue that was perceived to be at risk," Revenue subsequently wrote in a letter to Loire Valley, stating the money was paid as recompense to the company. But in 2012, the company was struck off the Register of Companies for failing to file annual returns, according to the High Court judgment.

Arising from this, Gaultier brought judicial review proceedings in the High Court against the Registrar of Companies "alleging misfeasance, malfeasance and breach of duty against the Registrar in relation to the manner in which the company was dissolved", said the judgment.

"In particular, the plaintiff alleged that because the effect of the dissolution was that the property of the company vested in the Minister for Finance, the Registrar had colluded with the minister to bring about this result," it said.

In her judgment dismissing that application in March 2013, former High Court judge Ms Justice Elizabeth Dunne, who has since been elevated to the Supreme Court, described this allegation as "one which was unsupported by any evidence and was disgraceful and scurrilous".

Following the dissolution of the wine import company, Gaultier commenced proceedings on his own behalf, preparing a plenary summons that listed Revenue, the Minister for Finance, Ireland and the Attorney General as defendants, later adding the Courts Service and the Minister for Justice.

He later served a statement of claim on Revenue, but not on any other defendant, said the judgment. This claim, said the ruling, was based on the fact that Gaultier owned the company "and wrongs done to the company are wrongs done to him".

"The claim being maintained by the plaintiff in these proceedings is clearly a claim that could only have been maintained by the company if it existed, but of course it had ceased to exist before these proceedings were ever instituted, as the plaintiff must have known," wrote Mr Justice Noonan's ruling.

"It is, of course, settled law since the middle of the 19th century that a member or director of a company cannot maintain a claim on behalf of the company," it said.

The court ruled that the rationale for the rule was straightforward: "A party cannot bring proceedings in respect of a wrong suffered by another party."

Mr Justice Noonan said that "the court is required to strike the proceedings out, since to do otherwise would be to impose a considerable injustice on the defendants who have, to date, had to expend considerable time, effort and money on defending vexatious claims by the plaintiff now some 11 years after the events complained of".

He was also critical of what he said was a lengthy submission by Gaultier "concerning the impartiality of the Irish judiciary towards litigants in person in general and towards him in particular".

Gaultier had been warned that he would be held in contempt of court, said the ruling, because of suggestions in his written submission that "were in my view scandalous, gratuitously offensive to the judiciary of the State and constituted a contempt of court", said the court ruling.

"It became necessary during the course of the plaintiff's submissions for me to warn him that his behaviour was contemptuous and I would have to hold him in contempt if he did not desist. Only then did the plaintiff cease this behaviour and because he offered an apology to the court, I determined to take no further action."
The dolce vita on the Amalfi coast  but the Celtic Tiger burst along with the Prosecco bubbles

Everyone has a moment when they realised, or suspected, that the Celtic Tiger madness might not last. I had two such apparitions. The first was in the summer of 2006 sipping Prosecco on the terrace of a hotel perched on vertical cliffs overlooking the sea at Amalfi.

I was in Italy with friends who occasionally convene as a string quartet to play at the weddings of family and friends. I think I played at 13 Irish weddings that summer, at least three of which were overseas - I shudder when I hear the strains of Panis Angelicus now.

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As we sipped our Prosecco and took in the awesome views, the girls and I wondered: Could this paradise last?

The second harbinger, a year later, was a more sobering one.

Agonising, as many did in 2007, over the crazy house-buying spree, a wise barrister who had earned his stripes in previous recessions told me to throw my head into the weekly High Court repossessions list before deciding if I wanted to join the stampede for 450,000 two-bed apartments.

Week after week I sat quietly at the back of that courtroom, nursing my angst about not getting on the property ladder. The numbers were initially small, but the level of mortgage defaults quietly building up in the system in the autumn of 2007 made me stop and think twice about scaling the property ladder.

I don't know about you, but of late it's beginning to feel a little bit like 2006 all over again - and I'm not sure I like it.

There's the "miraculous" recovery. There are people sleeping overnight in their cars to body-slam estate agents to secure deposits on as yet unbuilt apartments and homes, there's runaway house prices and waiting lists in Brown Thomas for certain luxury buys.

Don't get me wrong, it's great to see confidence return after the collapse in all but name of our banking system, a plain vanilla property bust aggravated by the now 10-year-old global financial crisis (GFC).

But is there such thing as too much confidence? When does over confidence become a strategic risk? And although we have an instinctive bias towards popular, confident types, are these the main traits we want to see in the leaders of our banks and businesses?

The 'confidence paradox' was the subject of a lively debate I chaired last week at the new Executive Development Centre at the UCD Smurfit School.

The new 5m centre, which has positioned itself as a key part of Ireland's offering to the multinational and indigenous sectors - and a key asset for FDI agencies in seeking inward investment - is shaping the next generation of Irish chief executives and leaders.

One person who is concerned that we could slip back into ceo hubris is Professor Niamh Brennan, Michael MacCormac Professor of Management and academic director of the Centre for Corporate Governance at UCD.

Brennan is the co-author of a fascinating academic paper which adapted the 14 clinical symptoms of hubris from clinical psychology to the analysis of narratives in a bank ceo's letters to shareholders in annual reports to reveal signs of ceo hubris.

Analysing the ceo letters to shareholders of a single bank over 10 years for evidence of personality traits, including narcissism, the results pointed to evidence of narcissism and hubris in the personality of the bank's boss.

The paper found that over half the sentences analysed were found to contain "narcissistic speak". In 45pc of narcissistic-speak sentences, there were three of more symptoms of hubris, otherwise known as extreme hubristic behaviour.

In relation to ceo overconfidence, only seven sentences (2 pc) contained bad news. More than half of the good news was attributed to the ceo and all the bad news was attributed externally.

"We were looking for symptoms of hubris, which we found, I can tell you, in spades," Brennan told a rapt audience at the stunning new executive development facility in Blackrock in Dublin.

Yes, once narcisstic ceo does not an entire hubristic culture make.

But for Brennan, boards need to be "very careful", when interviewing candidates, of the kind of personality traits that make it appear as if that person would be a good ceo.

Confidence, ego, the kind of things that in an interview might persuade a board to appoint a chief executive, said Brennan, are the kind of personality traits that may in fact fuel risks.

"An overconfident ceo is a big risk for a business," said Brennan, who said that things have changed in the wake of the GFC in terms of Irish corporate governance - but not necessarily in a good way. Selecting leaders generates any number of paradoxes, according to Karan Sonpar, a talent management guru and cognitive bias expert who once served as a captain in the Indian military.

"The very things that bring you up can bring you down," says Sonpar, Professor of organisational behaviour and academic director of MBA Programmes at UCD.

"Confidence is good, excessive confidence is bad. Humility is good. Excessive humility, not taking a chance, is bad.

"So paradoxes, and recognising paradoxes, make us uncomfortable.

"I would argue probably the most compelling framework of leadership is the incomplete leader, there is no one type of leader, there is no one person who has all the attributes."

So, it's a bit like Goldilocks and the Three Bears. Boards need to select chief executives that aren't too confident and not too humble - executives who take risks but get it just right.
Ireland is on track to miss its 2020 renewables targets with claims the only way of meeting them would be to have 1,000 MWs of offshore wind energy

Offshore wind farms finally look set to become a reality in Irish waters. News this week that ESB plans a major investment in offshore wind projects must reflect a change in government thinking on the subject of offshore wind power.

ESB would not make a commitment like this unless it knew something was happening.

The fact that ESB is planning a major move into this area, on both sides of the Irish Sea, could also spell good news for one or more of the five projects in various states of gestation in Irish waters, some of them for several years. ESB may choose to develop its own projects completely from scratch, but surely it would be quicker to invest in or buy out some of the projects that have been in the planning for over a decade in some cases.

These include Oriel Windfarm, a proposed major wind farm off the coast near Dundalk Bay. It has described itself as "shovel ready". Backers of this project include Gaelectric and Glen Dimplex founder Martin Naughton.

Another potential beneficiary is Codling Wind, a planned 220-turbine farm proposed for 13km off the Wicklow coast between Greystones and Wicklow town. This one is backed by Norwegian renewable mogul Fred Olsen and members of the family of property developer Johnny Ronan.

The Ronan family owns 50pc of the joint venture which has seen its shareholders pump close to 10m into the project only to have it stalled. Johnny Ronan is very much back in business himself and while he only owns a tiny percentage of the venture, he returned to the board of Hazel Shore Ltd in June of this year, having stepped down a few years ago. This is the Ronan family company that owns half of the Codling venture.

Hazel Shore wrote down the value of its 50pc shareholding in Codling to zero back in 2015 as it ceased development of the project. Perhaps that looks set to change.

Codling received a 99-year foreshore lease back in 2005. However, prohibitive costs and a government desire to focus on onshore wind farms stalled all of these projects.

Ireland is on track to miss its 2020 renewables targets and one offshore industry estimate suggested the only way of meeting them would be to have 1,000 MWs of offshore wind energy in place. Hazel Shore 's directors include former civil servant Paddy Teahon, who received almost 200,000 in consultancy fees in 2014 and 2015. The cost of producing offshore wind energy has fallen dramatically in recent years, which would reduce the level of subsidy required by the state to make these projects commercially viable.

ESB has obviously done its sums on this one. Offshore turbines are bigger than onshore equipment and the Codling project estimated that with a second phase of a further 200 turbines it would generate enough electricity for 600,000 homes.

On the British side of the Irish Sea offshore farms are pressing ahead. Danish wind farm giant Dong is developing major projects which include its Walney project off the coast of Cumbria. Walney generated its first power this week, having installed the first 87 turbines. When completed it will be the largest offshore wind farm in the world.

The wind has changed somewhat in relation to onshore wind farms in Ireland with many communities saying they have enough and strict new guidelines due to come into force on proposed new projects. ESB's foray into offshore is significant but the planning and public consultation process involved in any Irish offshore wind operation could be tricky. The Department of Energy's guidelines run to 111 pages but clearly there is a greater urgency to deliver on renewables other than just more wind farms, and the technology is making them more commercially viable. One industry source suggested the largest offshore turbines can generate 9MWs - three times more than just two to three years ago.

The Vestas V164 turbine holds the world record for the most electricity produced by one turbine in a 24-hour period. It generated enough in one day to provide 15 years of electricity for one typical Irish household.

No easy solutions to problem of deciding future of bank branches

Bank of Ireland's incoming chief executive is developing her own answers to a conundrum facing most banks around the world. What do we do with bank branches?

Francesca McDonagh is set take over in a few weeks but the bank is reported to be working on a rather complicated three-tier bank branch structure. Having announced the end of cash services at 100 branches during the summer, the new plan is trying to take account of the best advice on the future of branch banking.

Bank of Ireland is looking at retaining all services at a top tier of around 50 branches. Then it will have a middle-tier with some services withdrawn and a bottom tier with only minimal levels of service.

Branches are expensive to maintain and as more people use online banking, the need for them appears less. However, it isn't as simple as that. One global study of 55,000 bank customers by EY found that customers who are more digitally savvy are not necessarily financially savvy. They want things explained to them when it comes to purchasing financial products.

Equally, some of the more financially savvy are not the most digitally savvy, and studies have found that millennials (perhaps the most digitally savvy) are often the ones who most want a personal touch by having things explained to them in branches.

Hence bankers find the need to retain bank branches but have them do different things. There has been a big cull of branches in the UK, not least by HSBC under Ms McDonagh's watch.

However, closing branches is quite politically sensitive in Ireland especially where small rural communities are involved.

The theory might be to have staff in a branch sell and explain financial products to a savvy tech generation who go online for other bank services. But what if there aren't many tech savvy young middle class professionals knocking around small Irish towns, because they have either emigrated or moved to Dublin? Bank of Ireland is planning a massive IT investment programme which will cost 900m to 1bn and forms the backdrop for branch changes. They have to find the money somewhere.

Drinks chiefs won't toast tax cut

There is an annual pre-Budget ritual between the drinks industry and Department of Finance. The booze business looks for a cut in excise duty in the budget because, well something is about to go wrong somewhere.

In reality, they know they haven't a hope of getting a cut so they are really just asking for it in the hope the rate won't be put up.

This week the Irish Wine Association was looking for an excise reduction having just had a record-equalling nine million cases sold last year. The pick-up in sales was linked to higher disposable income, consumer confidence, shifting preferences and more value for money plonk on the shelves.

However, the IWA warned that the relatively high level of excise duty on wine and a possible fall-off in UK tourist numbers due to Brexit posed a risk to sales for the sector.

In 2013, wine sales in Ireland hit a post-crash low of 8.2 million cases. So they are up 800,000 cases despite the higher excise.

But trouble is brewing with Brexit. Lower sterling will definitely bring more people across the Border this winter and the possibility of duty-free drink for passengers travelling from the UK to Ireland, would be a double whammy. Still, I wouldn't bet on an excise reduction in the budget.
'According to Revenue, in the period from January to May 25, 73 applicant companies were processed, of which 18 were rejected and 55 were accepted.' Stock image

The Revenue has told tax advisers that it will try to speed up the processing of the Employment and Incentive Investment Scheme (EIIS), which has been bogged down in delays this year.

Concerns have been raised about the future of the scheme, which is a vital source of funding for the Irish business sector. It has been beset by problems this year after changes were made to EIIS in late 2015 in order to comply with European State Aid rules.

The scheme used to guarantee a 30-day approval turnaround but has been subject to delays of up to 130 days in some cases, according to senior accounting sources. In some cases, schemes that had been approved in the past have been rejected - meaning that money is being returned to investors willing to back Irish firms in exchange for tax breaks.

It is understand that Revenue has told accountants that it will bring in further resources to deal with delays. The coming weeks are a crunch time for the scheme as the pay and file tax deadline of October 31 approaches.

Investors availing of tax incentives will need certainty on the status of their EIIS commitments ahead of that date.

In recent weeks Revenue has also circulated draft guidelines on the changes made as a result of State Aid Rules. Sources said that Revenue's interpretation was "conservative". However, the top priority is to get clarity on the changes to the schemes, they said.

According to Revenue, in the period from January to May 25, 73 applicant companies were processed, of which 18 were rejected and 55 were accepted.

Last year, 261 companies were the recipients of investments and there were 1,768 investors.

There was a 46pc increase in investments made through EIIS last year, with a record 108m put into Irish firms, compared with 74.1m in 2015.

For example, Goodbody Stockbrokers raised 10m from private clients for a new SME-focused fund to invest in businesses under EIIS.

Among the individual companies that secured funds last year was the Great Northern Distillery in Dundalk, Co Louth, backed by John Teeling, which secured an additional 5m.

The scheme provides relief from income tax to individuals who invest long-term risk capital in unquoted Irish companies.

Participation in the fund had improved significantly on the back of a number of changes to the scheme to make it more attractive to investors.

In 2013, the first full year of operation of the scheme, 42.4m was invested in 190 companies. One of the reasons why investment was lower was because high-net-worth individuals were believed to be more risk averse after the crash. Shares must be invested for a minimum of four years and a limit of 150,000 applies per person.
The Government has been given the green light to use controversial compulsory purchase order powers to force the owners of more than 180,000 vacant homes to sell or rent their properties, the Sunday Independent can reveal.

Attorney General Seamus Woulfe told the Government he sees "no impediment" to using existing laws to allow local authorities to move on owners of vacant properties as part of a new strategy to resolve the housing crisis.

"He has indicated there shouldn't be any obstacle to increasing the use of CPOs (compulsory purchase orders)," a senior Government source said.

The radical new plan will see legislation generally used to build roads and public transport systems used to force property owners to put houses back into the housing market if they are vacant for more than 12 months.

The Government feared using CPO laws on vacant homes would be a breach of constitutional personal property rights but the Sunday Independent has learned the Attorney General has cleared the path for the controversial strategy.

The move is sure to cause huge concern among thousands of property owners who will now be forced to sell or rent their houses if their houses are vacant for more than a year.

However, the Government hopes the threat of the compulsory order powers will be enough to incentivise property owners to put vacant houses or apartments back into the housing supply.

"We don't want to take properties off them, we want to put them back into use," a senior Government source said. "It's like water charges, we don't want to charge you for excessive usage, we just don't want you to excessively use," the source added.

A recent pilot project by Dublin City Council saw the local authority issue compulsory purchase orders on 21 vacant properties.

A source familiar with the project said, after the threat was made by the council, 14 properties were rented privately and seven were leased to the council.

If a compulsory order is made against a property, the owner is entitled to be paid the market value of the house or apartment and the proprietor should not lose out financially from the sale.

Local authorities can currently make orders against derelict or dangerous properties if there are public safety concerns over the building. Compulsory purchase orders can also be served for the "common good" under existing legislation and the Government will argue this clause can be used due to the housing crisis.

Last Friday, Minister for Housing Eoghan Murphy announced a dramatic shift in the Government's housing strategy, which will see the State move from buying homes to building houses to alleviate the homelessness crisis.

Mr Murphy pledged to increase the number of houses built by the State next year by 800 to a total of 3,800. However, this is far short of the 30,000 new homes needed per year to resolve the housing shortage.

It is understood the move from "buy to build" stemmed from growing fears within the heart of Government that its house purchasing strategy would overheat the Dublin housing market by as early as next summer.

Mr Murphy and Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe agreed to stop buying houses in the capital as they were warned it could exacerbate the housing crisis by inflating house prices further.

Mr Donohoe is expected to announce soon a 4bn four-year capital spending project which will include housing projects.

However, Mr Murphy will have to battle against Minster for Health Simon Harris, who is seeking money for new hospitals, and Minister for Education Richard Bruton, who wants to build more schools.

Mr Murphy already has some 5.3bn at his disposal to invest in housing and homelessness projects between now and 2021. However, it is understood he will receive additional funding from the capital spending review when it is announced.

The housing and homelessness crisis have spiralled out of control since Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has taken office.

There are currently more than 8,000 people living without homes in the country and this includes almost 3,000 children.

The figures do not include an average of around 200 people who sleep rough in Dublin city centre. The homelessness crisis was heightened in the past two weeks following the deaths of four homeless people.

As part of the solution to the crisis, Mr Murphy plans to clamp down on people on the housing list who turn down offers of social housing.

Applicants for social housing will now be able to turn down only one offer of a house before being put to the back of the list.

It was previously reported that more than 3,000 offers of houses have been turned down by people on the social housing list.

The information on refusals is not collated centrally but Mr Murphy will begin collecting the data from local authorities in the coming weeks.

At last Friday's Housing Summit in Dublin, the minister also announced he would offer to move homeless families in the cities to accommodation in rural counties.

Meanwhile, a cross-party group of councillors on Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council has come together to develop a massive 540-home affordable and social housing development in South County Dublin.

The group, led by Fine Gael councillor John Bailey, has proposed a public private partnership which would result in the development of 200 social housing units, 200 affordable homes and 140 "rent to buy" houses.

Mr Bailey said he hoped the proposal will be used as a template by other local authorities seeking to find solutions to the housing crisis.

"We put our political differences aside and sought to assist the council's executive in its endeavours to meet the council's obligations as a housing authority and committed ourselves to finding a deliverable solution to the current crisis in housing supply and homelessness," he said.
'Returned emigrants - who have amassed significant savings - are proving to be another factor in pushing up prices, especially in a bidding war for a particular property' Stock photo: Dave Thompson/PA Wire

More than 400 of Ireland's 'Lost Generation', many with significant cash savings for a down-payment on a new house, are returning home each week.

And these returnees are another "pressure point" pushing up property prices to Celtic Tiger levels.

More than 300,000 emigrated in the years following the economic crash.

But the total number of people now coming into the country has increased by almost 15pc in a year, from 69,300 to 79,300.

The figure is currently estimated at 1,525 per week.

Latest data from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) reveals the number of returning Irish people jumped from 12,100 to 21,100 in the year to April 2016. This is an unprecedented surge of more than 74pc.

Marginally more males than females have returned home. According to the CSO, almost 11,000 were men and 10,200 women.

It comes as the total number of emigrants declined over the same period, from 80,900 to 76,200.

Property experts say the numbers now returning to Ireland will put increased strain on an already dysfunctional house buying and rental market. Returned emigrants - who have amassed significant savings - are proving to be another factor in pushing up prices, especially in a bidding war for a particular property.

The UK was the most popular country of origin for returning Irish, followed by Australia and the US.

The remainder came mainly from Canada, New Zealand, Spain, France, and the United Arab Emirates.

Pat Davitt, CEO of the Institute of Professional Auctioneers and Valuers (IPAV), confirmed the numbers coming back to live here is another "pressure point" in an already erratic housing market.

He said: "Everywhere you go there are Irish people back home from Australia, America or wherever. There's no doubt there'll be more people returning, because there are more jobs available.

"When they're coming home to live in Dublin, where there's a shortage of supply, it's going to be a pressure point.

"Obviously people coming back to the city, where houses are scarce at the moment, is making a difference."

He said those aged between 35 and 50 are part of a sizeable cohort with significant savings to buy a home.

"Many of them have cash to help buy a property. Their aim was to leave Ireland, come back and buy a house."

However, he warned a significant number of returned emigrants will face a massive struggle to find a home, given the chronic shortage of supply.

"Down the country it's probably a bit better, but at the same time, there aren't many new houses being built.

"And they won't be built until such time as the price gets to a particular figure acceptable to builders."

Mr Davitt added that Ireland's economic recovery, coupled with employment growth, is likely to entice more of those who left Ireland to put down roots here.

He said if a construction programme suggested by the Government goes ahead, and as many as 35,000 houses are built, it could create between 70,000 and 75,000 jobs.

"That would also result in a considerable flow of people into the country," he added.

Reports suggest returning emigrants face various other obstacles apart from buying a home, such as finding a suitable job and schooling for their children.

They have also experienced difficulties with issues such as securing a no-claims bonus for car insurance or having their credit history recognised.

According to a recent study of Irish people who have recently returned from abroad, a desire to be closer to family is the most common reason given for moving back home, with 83pc saying that was a key motivation.

Also high on the priority list is the desire to bring up children in Ireland, along with homesickness.

The survey, conducted by Crosscare Migrant Project, a Government-funded service supporting intending and returning emigrants, found one in five expressed upset over leaving friends behind overseas.

One in four said they had only planned to live abroad temporarily, and this was their reason for returning.

A CSO spokesperson said the data currently available is preliminary and may be subject to change at the end of the month.
Ireland has a great reputation for the quality and friendliness of our hotels and none more so than the iconic Fitzpatrick Castle Hotel located in Killiney, in South Dublin. Sitting on a hill overlooking the picturesque heritage village of Dalkey, it is a wonderful example of traditional Irish hospitality mixed with all the charm of an original castle setting.

The hotel is owned and run by Eithne Scott Lennon. Like every other independent hotel owner in the country, she has had to fight hard to stay in business over recent years but now - employing 144 staff and with annual revenues of 7.5m - her hard work is finally paying off.

"We describe ourselves as a castle hotel with a family feel and where the personal touch is our key focus," says Eithne. "Our main business comes from the corporate sector and includes all manner of conferences and events as well as providing accommodation to travelling executives visiting companies in the greater Dublin area.

"We also have a strong wedding business as well as many leisure tourists who stay with us throughout the year," she adds.

Eithne has seen a sharp increase in the number of US visitors in recent months, up 17.4pc on the same period last year. Visitors from other developing markets such as Australia and New Zealand are also up - all of which signals better times ahead from the hotelier. Hospitality is certainly in Eithne's blood. Her late father and mother, Paddy and Eithne Fitzpatrick, bought the castle in 1970 and converted it into a hotel. Paddy originally trained in the Gresham Hotel before moving to the Talbot Hotel in Wexford where he built such a reputation as a manager that he was later invited to become general manager of the PV Doyle Group of hotels.

"My father actually grew up on Vico Road in Dalkey and used to tell us about how, when he was a child, he played cowboys and Indians in the grounds of the castle. So when the place came on the market in 1970, he jumped at the chance to buy it," says Eithne.

As a teenager, Eithne got exposed to every part of the business, from washing glasses in the bar to clearing tables in the restaurant.

"If you didn't work, you didn't get any pocket money. That was my father's way of helping to instil a sense of work ethic in us," she adds.

And it obviously worked. Her brother John owns Fitzpatrick in New York. Her brother Paul went on to launch the Morgan and Beacon hotels in Dublin while her other brothers, Paddy and Tony, went into property development.

After school, Eithne worked for a time in Lausanne in Switzerland where she got the opportunity to broaden her experience. There, she realised her real passion lay in the sales and marketing side of the business and so, on the advice of her father, she headed next to the US, where she worked in banqueting and conference sales, first in Minneapolis and then, Kansas.

Having returned to Ireland, she set up a new sales and marketing division in the family business which had by then, expanded to include the Shannon Shamrock hotel in Bunratty.

They would later add the Silver Springs hotel in Cork city and Fitzpatrick in Manhattan to the group.

After her father's death in 2002, Eithne decided to buy out her siblings' share in the hotel.

"I managed to raise the money from a bank but then the recession hit," says Eithne. "Revenues tanked overnight and it felt as if someone just turned the tap off." Instead of offering support, her bank wanted its money back. But with business down, she simply couldn't afford to pay it back at the time.

"They just abandoned us," she says. "It was the worst time ever - hell, in fact. It was nothing short of pure determination that got us through in the end," she says.

At the time she drew on advice she had once received from her late father.

"When I was a child, we found a rat in my grandparents' home. Seeing how frightened I was, my father explained that a rat would only ever attack if it was cornered. He then took me aside and told that if I ever found myself cornered that, I too should fight for my life, just like a rat," she recalls.

And fight she did, even slashing staff numbers to as low as 42 in order to survive.

Eventually, she was able to raise short-term finance to pay back the bank and as revenues improved, she was able to secure support from another bank.

With the economy now on the up, corporates spending again and tourism numbers increasing steadily, Eithne has once again begun investing in the hotel's facilities with more than 1.5m earmarked for projects over the next 36 months.

With four sons, two of which are in the hotel business, including Mark who is the hotel's general manager, she now finds herself at a point where she has to consider if she will expand further or consolidate the current business. For now though, it's business as usual at Fitzpatrick Castle hotel.

Related: Use our calculator to estimate your small business loan repayments

Meeting Eithne Scott Lennon, you cannot but be impressed by her incredible commitment to her staff, her guests and to the business itself.

The personification of everything you might expect an entrepreneur to be, I leave with a feeling that customers and banks alike could benefit from having an understanding of just how much blood, sweat and tears go into running any business - especially a hotel.

www.fitzpatrickcastle.com
More than half of Apples revenue now comes from the iPhone

What can we expect from the new iPhone? Will it really cost 1,000? Even if it does, is it worth getting one?

It's that time of year again. This Tuesday, Apple will unveil the company's latest iPhone. It's a bigger deal than usual, because it's the gadget's 10-year anniversary. It's also the first event scheduled for the Steve Jobs theatre, located in the futuristic new 1bn Apple campus.

Because of the 10-year milestone, Apple is expected to throw the kitchen sink at this handset. Due to supply chain leaks, we already have a good idea of what it might look like.

It will have a bigger screen, but not a bigger frame. This is because it will expand the display out to the edges of the handset in a similar way to handsets such as Samsung's S8.

That screen may be made of plastic rather than glass, allowing it to be thinner and have a longer-lasting battery life.

It's also expected to do away with the home button, possibly replacing it with gesture control. This could be a pretty big change to the way we use our iPhones, with the Home button relied on for functions that range from resetting to screenshots to mobile payments.

The cameras will again be improved, with stabilisation included in both dual cameras on the rear of the phone.

But it may not be the actual hardware that people end up talking about most.

Apple is said to be adding some new 3D-sensing functionality to its cameras, which could help kick-start 'augmented reality' features and apps.

While this sounds nerdy, it could be a big deal for apps and everyday activity. You might be able to use your phone to measure anything just by pointing at it. Companies such as Ikea are already redesigning their apps to take advantage of this. The new iPhone should allow you to virtually place any furniture you are thinking of buying into one of your rooms to see what it would look like.

Maps is another obvious beneficiary. Imagine if your phone literally showed you where to turn on the street, as opposed to on a drawn map of the street. Or how about holding it up and it point an arrow directly at the building you wanted to get to?

Both scenarios have been demonstrated already as contenders for Apple Maps using its ARKit platform.

Then there are games. While Pokemon remains the biggest example yet of augmented reality appealing to people, it has been held back by so-so cameras and phone computing power. The iPhone 8 could establish a baseline for both, making the tech work a lot better.

Look, too, for a rush of marketers trying to take advantage of the new tech with location-based competitions, celebrity geo-location or virtual installations.

Will this be enough to keep Apple close to the top? Last week, Huawei announced that it had overtaken Apple in sales over the past two months, making it the world's second-biggest phone manufacturer. It has achieved this largely by its strong performance in the Asian market and rising fortunes in Europe.

However, nothing gives Apple sales a boost like a new iPhone. If the supply chain leaks are to be believed, there may be three new models: upgrades to the existing iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus versions (although with proportionately larger screens, as mentioned above) and a new premium model.

If this is the case, it should give an even bigger kick to iPhone sales with six clear models on offer (Apple keeps the last-generation versions on sale and also has the small iPhone SE).

All of this comes against the background of phones utterly taking over from other types of computers. When is the last time you used a home PC for anything other than work or specialist purposes? Laptops remain fairly well used in the home, but an increasing portion of that is simply to get to Netflix or a video player on a larger screen. The idea of defaulting toward laptops to send emails or look up information is long gone.

As for public spaces, phones are now used more than umbrellas. Look at the seats in any train station, airport or fast food restaurant. Look down a public pavement. If people aren't gazing into their phones, they're holding them in one hand while they come up for air.

Recent international research claims that Irish phones are the most used for mobile video. Looking around, that seems about right. Buses are full of people watching videos on Facebook, YouTube, Snapchat, Instagram and TV streaming apps.

Screens are getting larger, as are monthly data caps. In cities and towns, mobile speeds of over 20Mbs (and up to 100Mbs in areas such as Dublin) are now common.

Nevertheless, Apple is depending on the iPhone pretty heavily. Over half of the company's revenue now comes from this one device. And in a smartphone market that is showing stagnant growth levels, it now needs to grab market share from someone else.

That said, the company has not received enough credit for the other product lines it has grown. The smartwatch market is a good example. Sometimes dismissed as a fad, it's now a 9bn global industry, with Apple hoovering up well over half of the revenue. There are few companies that will ever have a single product line garnering 5bn. Yet when Apple does it, it is dismissed, simply because it's not the next iPhone.

The tech giant is also lining itself up to enter the TV production business in a significant way. Reports claim that it is earmarking up to 1bn on original content, which would place it, at a stroke, in the spending arena with powerhouses such as HBO or Amazon (Netflix has an annual budget of up to 5bn).

Apple's shares frequently slide a little when a new iPhone doesn't have headline-grabbing new features. But even if whatever Apple releases doesn't immediately wow the tech press, there is still a huge, loyal iPhone user base that will reliably upgrade to the new handset.

In short, don't believe any reports you read that suggest Apple is doomed.
Dublin-based digital startup Parkpnp has launched a 3m fundraising round to pay for its planned expansion into Europe.

The company, which has developed an application that allows users access to a so-called "parking spot marketplace", has topped more than 10,000 customers per month in Ireland and has just signed its first licence in the Netherlands.

Users can rent car parking spots across a wide range of locations, from private driveways to unused parking spots in commercial premises, such as hotels.

App users can also list for free, advertise and then generate income from their unused or under-utilised parking spaces, allowing drivers to find guaranteed parking on their PC or phones before reaching their destination.

The 3m funding round is expected to attract investment from a mix of property management companies, private investors and venture capital companies based in Ireland, the UK and the US, it is understood. Sean Melly, of Powerscourt Capital, is leading the raise, which follows an initial 500,000 investment by Enterprise Ireland.

"The company was born out of my frustration searching for parking across Dublin," said Parkpnp chief executive Garret Flower, who co-founded the firm in 2016 with Daniel Paul. "Investigation shows this is a shared global problem. As populations grow, car numbers are rising, while demand for space is greater than ever. It's time to enter an era where people can park smarter.

"People can list their parking spot per hour, per day, per week, whatever. When Dublin Airport was packed in July, people were renting out their driveways close by. Some of them were then even dropping people up to the airport, so it became like a cross between Airbnb and Uber." Parkpnp aims to cut out all the inefficiencies of parking, said Flower, who also runs successful bakery distribution business Krust.

"Our management solutions combine our cutting-edge hardware and software options to seamlessly work with all space-owners, empowering them to manage their parking real-estate more efficiently," he said, claiming that Parkpnp was leading "the growing global necessity" to rapidly modernise the 100bn parking industry.

"Each and every one of more than a billion cars in the world needs to be parked somewhere. With rapid urbanisation, it's more important than ever to maximise real estate and ensure these cars are parked as effectively as possible," he said.

Parkpnp has over 3,000 spaces at more than 1,000 locations listed across the country and now manages one of the largest portfolios of parking real estate in Ireland, said Flower. It currently has 15 employees and expects to double that number as it opens offices in three European locations following the fundraising round.

Alongside its residential portfolio, Parkpnp also works with larger car park operators such as Euro Car Parks and the Dalata Hotel Group to help them maximise revenue from their spaces.
Instinctively, the English pull the curtains, dim the lights and lower their voices lest the sight of the dead or the dying obtrude into the world of the living. Unless they are medical professionals, the vast, vast majority of the English will never see, never mind touch, a dead body in their entire lives.

In a world where everyone dies, the dead have been banished.

Death has a louder voice in Ireland, but even here, in the last bastion of the ancient rite of the wake, the blinding of what could be termed the Western Death Machine grows by the hour to diminish the ancient bond between the living and the dead.

Fewer and fewer of our dead repose at their residence in an old-fashioned wake but are instead are carried to the grave on a far narrower road. 'House Private', two-hour visitation slots in the local funeral home, 'family flowers only please' and 'donations to', once the sole constipated prerogative of the Daily Telegraph's death notices, are all now recognisable marks within the modern Irish funeral tradition.

Waking the dead was still common in all European cultures until 200 years ago, but died away as the power of the Western Death Machine grew through hospitals, industrialisation and urbanisation to separate the dying from the living. For some reason, the power of the wake has always remained stronger, more embedded, amongst the Celts.

The wake is more than an Irish cultural icon. It is an ancient way of dealing with our mortality, a wisdom that we lose at our peril, and one of the oldest rites of humanity dating back long before the fall of Troy in the 8th Century BC.

At its heart are the oldest teachings of humanity; how to be brave in irreversible sorrow, how to share this mortal life with the dying, the dead, the bereaved; how to face your own death; and how to teach your children to face their deaths.

When I was seven, my mother, on the island of our forebears in Mayo, took me to my first wake to see the sight of the dead and, with her encouragement, touch the dead man's flesh.

I still remember that first, visceral, ice-cube-in-a-rubber-glove jolt touch of the stone-like corpse. Today, most modern Irish parents would be horrified at the thought of taking their own children on a similar death-training expedition. But my mother, Mary Gallagher, was enacting a rite from within the wake, drawing on its far older wisdom of taming death in a communal embrace.

My mother's aim, as unconsciously passed down to her through the island generations, was not to frighten me but to unfrighten me by showing me the very ordinariness of the dead. The old dead man in the box was nothing to be afraid of.

Waking the dead was first mentioned in Western literature in Homer's 8th-century BC war poem 'The Iliad', about the battles between the Greeks and the Trojans over the city of Troy.

After the Trojan king Priam recovers the body of his dead son Hector from his enemy Achilles, he returns to the city only to find the way blocked by the Trojan women who wail and keen in the streets all around the chariot of the fallen Trojan prince. Priam orders the women aside, saying "they will have their fill of wailing" after he has taken Hector home and cleansed his body in preparation for the funeral. Hector is waked for nine nights. The Trojans feast and hold funeral games and then ritually burn his corpse on the 10th day. And their war starts again the next day.

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Aside from Hector's cremation, the same elements are integral - and still recognisable - within the Irish wake tradition; open public sorrow, feasting and all-night vigils.

As late as the 1950s, the mna caointe, hired-in professional female mourners like the Trojan women, were common in country funerals in rural Ireland. Nor has keening entirely died out, merely taken a new form.

It is not a coincidence that at a traditional wake, the chief mourners are generally dominated by women who gather close to the corpse and unleash their emotion in tears as the men of the family gather at the back and awkwardly look on.

The same scene was painted in 2500 BC by a Greek artist Gela the Painter on terracotta tiles in Sicily. Nothing has really changed at the core of the wake for the last 3,000 years.

When my own father, Sonny, died on the island, his sisters, daughters and nieces enacted the same ancient roles, a chorus that was the focus of our grieving but also a promise of a future, a fertility rite. From amongst these women, newborn sons and daughters would in time overcome the wound of this particular death.

My father's wake, like every wake, was not just about him. A wake is a communal rite that binds the living, the bereaved and the dead together in a set of prescribed rituals aimed at restoring order between the natural and supernatural world. Dating long before Christianity, the wake's pagan origins are designed to bring closure by laying the dead to rest where they can no longer disturb the living. When the body leaves the house, it is common in Mayo to briefly rest the coffin on two household chairs, say a few prayers, splash Holy Water against the side of the house and then lift the coffin into the hearse. The chairs are then kicked over.

I have yet to meet a mourner who can explain the purpose of the chair kicking. But if you asked an anthropologist, they would tell you that what you are seeing is known as a rite of reversal. The Holy Water and the chair overturnings are the creation of supernatural barriers to prevent the dead from ever returning to disturb the living within the house. For the bereaved, the wake can be exhausting and yet also therapeutic.

Although it can feel cliched, the repeated handshake grip and 'Sorry for your trouble' mantra is a physical, psychological and communal declaration that you've lost someone important and that they are never coming back.

This aspect of the wake is the greatest antidote to what the American writer Joan Didion describes as that form of 'magical thinking', false belief, that your dead husband/wife is somehow coming back from the grave, and death is reversible.

To be truly human is to bear the burden of our own mortality and to strive, in grace, to help others carry theirs: sometimes lightly and sometimes courageously.

Rather than blinding ourselves by denying death's existence, a wake, the public display of a corpse, and the support of your community, remains the last best hope, and faith of humanity, that together we can overcome the wound, and joy, of being mortal.

My Father's Wake: How the Irish Teach Us to Live, Love and Die by Kevin Toolis, published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson, is out now
Elle Fanning says the overlooked struggle of 19th-century Frankenstein author Mary Shelley is still relevant to women today.

The actress, 19, who plays the ground-breaking British novelist in an eponymous film made by Saudi Arabias first female director, says Shelley should be greater revered as a feminist icon.

Fanning celebrated the very inspiring woman, who penned the novel aged 18, at the movies world premiere at Toronto International Film Festival.

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Not many people know it. I remember it was taught in school to me but they never explained what shed gone through and why she wrote the book, the American actress told the Press Association.

Its not just a Gothic novel, its not a monster story, Frankenstein isnt, its very personal and it correlates so much with her life.

Also the story is very modern in whats going on with women today as well. It needs to be told  shes a very inspiring woman.

The movie, which focuses on the authors relationship with poet Percy Shelley, played by Douglas Booth, is directed by Haifaa Al-Mansour.

She made her first film Wadjda from the back of a van, communicating with actors via walkie-talkie, because she could not mix with the male crew in public for fear of retribution.

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Wadjda went on to win an Oscar nomination and now Al-Mansour has made her first English-language film.

Fanning compared Al-Mansours struggle to that of Shelleys.

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Al-Mansour said: Mary Shelley is a very modern woman. Shes one of the writers who stepped out of line and wrote something that is very masculine. She did not write about social issues like marriage and jealousy.

We need women like that who are willing to challenge every moral society wants to put on women  and coming from Saudi Arabia it means a lot to me to see women who are willing to do that.

:: Mary Shelley is out in the UK in July.
Sterling is currently weak against the Euro (stock photo)

A 'Gathering No 2' targeting the Irish diaspora has been put on hold due to currency complications caused by Brexit, the Sunday Independent has learned.

One of the main problems is the weakness of sterling against the euro.

It comes as recent figures show the Brexit fallout is proving a growing challenge in the battle to lure UK visitors to this country.

Numbers are down 6pc for the first half of the year.

A serious shortage of hotel beds in Dublin has also forced a major rethink on another 'themed year'.

When the Gathering promotion was held in 2013, it provided a 170m windfall - with an impressive 275,000 additional visitors lured to Ireland.

However, the Department of Tourism has indicated a 'Gathering No 2' is now on the back-burner. A spokesperson said while the idea was "under consideration", uncertainty over Brexit means making a final decision on the matter difficult.

Sources stress currency fluctuations, coupled with other uncertainties in the medium to longer term, are dramatically changing the tourism landscape.

If another Gathering-style initiative does get the green light, it will be timed to make use of 'spare capacity' in hotel accommodation.

Optimum access to Ireland through air and sea ports will also be a deciding factor.

Both 2015 and 2016 were record years for the tourist industry here - and overall visitor numbers are up again in 2017.

However, figures this week show the Brexit fallout is beginning to have potentially serious consequences for the number of British tourists coming here.

Between January and July this year, the number dropped to 2m, down from 2.2m in the same period last year, a 6.2pc decrease.

The decline is mainly due to currency fluctuations which have seen the sterling drop in value compared with the euro.

This has resulted in a weaker exchange rate for UK travellers, making Ireland an increasingly expensive place to visit from Britain. Latest exchange rates show sterling at 0.91 against the euro.

Industry experts say the areas most affected by the Brexit fallout are Dublin, the border regions and the south-east.

A department spokesperson confirmed it was currently closely monitoring trends in the tourism sector.

It is also examining "wider developments" which will feed into the "consideration of the timing of a themed year".

"The performance of the British market is a concern," added the spokesperson.

"The tourism agencies are working to help minimise losses from this important market, whilst at the same time encouraging and facilitating visitors from other sources."

The spokesperson added that Tourism Ireland was currently working on a specific publicity initiative in Britain.

Meanwhile, the Irish Tourist Industry Confederation is predicting that Brexit will cost the Irish tourism industry 100m this year.
Tweets from the official account owned by Dalata - the company who owns the Clayton Hotel - confirmed that the group will end its contract with Newstalk following comments made by George Hook on his radio programme.

Dalata tweeted that it will be "engaging with Newstalk as soon as possible to terminate our commercial relationship," as a result of comments made by Mr Hook on his High Noon show.

Mr Hook has apologised for the comments he made in which he questioned the "responsibility of women" when discussing the case of a 19-year-old woman in the UK who alleges she was raped by a member of the British swimteam when she had gone back to a hotel room with his friend.

The young woman alleges that she was raped by the swimmer when he entered her room after she had consensual sex with his friend.

1/2 @Dalatahotels cannot support any radio station that allows inappropriate & hurtful comments to be made.  Dalata Hotel Group (@Dalatahotels) September 10, 2017

2/2 We will be engaging with Newstalk as soon as possible to terminate our commercial relationship.  Dalata Hotel Group (@Dalatahotels) September 10, 2017

Dalata said it "cannot support any radio station that allows inappropriate [and] hurtful comments to be made," in a tweet sent from its official account.

Pat McCann, Chief Executive of Dalata, hit out at the High Noon host yesterday.

Speaking to the Sunday Business Post, he said: "George Hook is fundamentally out of touch with reality. I am the father of two daughters and I find those types of comments totally unacceptable.

This contract is up for renewal in October and this will bring into focus whether we will continue to sponsor the programme.

Director of the National Womens Council, Orla OConnor urged Newstalk to take action following the scandal.

Hook yesterday apologised for the comments made on Friday, saying he wanted to apologise unreservedly."

Mr Hook's comments on Friday attracted a major backlash.

When discussing the rape case, he said: "She was passed around went the story apparently. She went to bed with one guy and he went out and another guy comes in. She doesn't want to have relations with the second guy but he forced himself upon her. Awful," he said.

"But when you then look deeper into the story you have to ask certain questions. Why does a girl who just meets a fella in a bar go back to a hotel room? She's only just barely met him. She has no idea of his health conditions, she has no idea who he is, no idea what dangers he might pose.

But is there no blame now to the person who puts themselves in danger? You then of course read that she passed out on the toilet and when she woke up the guy was trying to rape her. There is personal responsibility because it's your daughter and my daughter.

Rape victim, Fiona Doyle, told Independent.ie on Friday that Mr Hook's comments were "outrageous" and "offensive".

Fiona's father Patrick O'Brien (79) was sentenced to 12 years in prison with three suspended in 2013 for the systematic rape and sexual abuse of his daughter at their home in Dun Laoghaire from 1973 to 1982.

"Victim blaming is all too familiar to women in Ireland. George is giving the message that men can do what they want and it is the drunken woman who is to blame.

"Women have the right to be drunk. They have the right to say no. They have the right to walk down the street naked if they wish. Men have no right to rape a women and people like George Hook need to stop circulating the message that women are to blame.

"What George said is that a man can't help himself if he comes across a drunk woman. It takes the responsibility off men. Men should know not to touch a woman."

Fiona said that the comments broadcast earlier today were "old fashioned" and that it brings women back centuries.

"George Hook needs to get off his dinosaur backside and see the impact of what he is saying on young women."

She added that campaigners, gardai and the rape crisis centres have been working with women to get them to come forward after a rape.

"We're working so hard to get women to stand up and come forward without thinking they are responsible.

"It's a big thing for women to blame themselves after a rape happens. It's very hard for women to get over something like that and to tell women that it's their fault is outrageous."

Fiona said that George Hook's comments will "pull out that stigma that women are responsible".

"No man has a right to touch a women. It's that simple."

A spokesperson for Dalata told Independent.ie that the company did not have any further comment to make post their twitter comment.

If you have been affected by this issue you can contact the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre on 1800 778 888
Tools seized by gardai in the last five months (left) and a van which was damaged by thieves (right) Photos: An Garda Siochana and Locktec Locksmiths

Tools worth thousands of euro are being stolen on a "daily basis" and tradesmen are having to heavily invest in security to try and protect their property.

Independent.ie spoke to electricians, carpenters and roofers who have had their tools stolen in a number of Dublin areas over the past year.

Jack O'Brien, director of Town & Country Builders, said these "organised" thefts are also having a serious impact on the construction industry.

"Tools are being stolen to order and tradespeople cannot claim on their insurance for fear that their premiums will rise sharply," he told Independent.ie.

One self-employed roofer, based in Ballymun, told how equipment worth over 4,000 was taken from his van while he worked. He received a tip-off that the tools would be on sale at a car boot sale in the north Dublin area and bought them back for 1,500 the following weekend.

"I would have had to pay 4,000 to replace them anyway, so I just bought them back. It's ridiculous what is going on and there's not much we can do as these people know where you live. It's not worth the risk to do or say anything," he told Independent.ie.

Gavin Skelly works as a carpenter and had around 2,000 worth of equipment stolen from his van which was parked outside his Tallaght home.

The incident happened on July 25 and was reported to gardai, but the tools haven't been located. A garda spokesman said the investigation is ongoing.

"I was asleep in the front room of my house and me and my wife didn't hear a thing. I got a call from one of the neighbours and came out and all my tools were gone," Gavin told Independent.ie.

"These gangsters are targeting hard-working people and ruining livelihoods. Its the kind of thing where people just replace them and get on with it as they're too scared to do anything. I got all the locks upgraded on my van and I got an alarm in. You pay for a top of the range van and then the locks are made of chocolate...These people are highly organised and know what they're doing when they're breaking in."

Expand Close Tradesmen regularly use Facebook to try and recover their stolen tools / Facebook

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Whatsapp Tradesmen regularly use Facebook to try and recover their stolen tools

Another man, who asked to remain anonymous, said a group of thieves stole tools worth around 3,000 from his car and also took a Manchester United jersey he bought for his son.

"I rang the shop to see if anyone tried to exchange it and within an hour four lads were in trying to exchange the jersey," he said.

"The tools [and jersey] were stolen at the beginning of June. They took a cordless drill, a grinder and a big bag of mixed tools. My neighbour has CCTV footage that shows three men breaking into the car. They were my boss' tools and I haven't been back to work since."

Michael Hunt, owner of Locktec Locksmiths in Westpoint Business Park, said he has created three full-time positions this year due to the "amount of tools being stolen."

"On average, we are fitting anything from 40 to 50 vans a week," he said.

"It is absolutely rampant. Just this morning I had four lads come into me who had their tools taken. It has always happened but lately it's just gotten crazy. More people are back working and these people are back robbing tools worse than ever."

He said the damage done to the vehicles is often so minimal that people don't know their tools are taken until they actually get into the van.

"We install safer locks but there's not much you can do if they come along and cut a hole in the side of your van," he said.

"The people who are buying these tools at car boot sales or whatever, and who aren't even questioning where they came from, are just as bad if you ask me."

Expand Close A van after tools were stolen from inside. However, locksmiths say damage is usually 'minimal' as 'these people know what they're doing' Photo: Locktec Locksmiths / Facebook

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Whatsapp A van after tools were stolen from inside. However, locksmiths say damage is usually 'minimal' as 'these people know what they're doing' Photo: Locktec Locksmiths

Organised

A number of major tool seizures have been made by gardai in the past five months.

Tools worth around 26,000 were found during a checkpoint on Stockhole Lane, Cloughran, Co Dublin in May.

It is believed that some of the tools may have been taken in the UK and the North.

"The gangs in the UK are a different breed, but I think we're seeing gangs here getting far more brazen. These thefts are organised and planned and often they target one particular area each night," a senior source said.

Expand Close Some of the tools seized by gardai at the checkpoint in Cloughran. Gardai in Ballymun are appealing for the owners to get in touch / Facebook

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Whatsapp Some of the tools seized by gardai at the checkpoint in Cloughran. Gardai in Ballymun are appealing for the owners to get in touch

Industrial power tools worth an estimated 50,000 were seized at Dublin Port in April. The tools were allegedly stolen in the UK and destined to be sold on the black market here.

"A number of separate injured parties have been identified for a substantial quantity of the tools seized," a garda spokeswoman said.

Investigations are ongoing in conjunction with the UK authorities to identify all the owners of the property seized.

Expand Close Stolen industrial power tools and gardening machinery were seized estimated at upward of 50,000. Photograph: An Garda Siochana / Facebook

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Whatsapp Stolen industrial power tools and gardening machinery were seized estimated at upward of 50,000. Photograph: An Garda Siochana

Increase in thefts

While data on the amount of tools reported stolen in recent years is not available, security experts say there has been a "definite increase" in burglaries and thefts.

John Kinsella, managing director of Accura Security Products Limited, said Ireland is suffering a "crimewave of epidemic proportions."

"You just have to look at Facebook or LinkedIn on a daily basis and you will see that theft of tools from vehicles and on sites is a really serious matter and its happening constantly," he told Independent.ie.

"Most trades people need to have branded vehicles which look great and really enhance their brand, however this is also a double edged sword. Whilst showing people what you do sometimes you are showing the criminal what you have."

Mr Kinsella offered the following security advice:

Avoid vehicles with glass at the back doors and ensure that your vehicle has a fixed metal partition between the driver and cargo area.

If you are attending a site or premises to carry out work be mindful to check on the vehicle on a regular but not routine basis.

Install a vehicle CCTV system/alarm internally which can report intrusion directly to your smartphone.

When on Facebook stop telling everyone where you are if you are a target, think practical.

When your commercial vehicle is parked at home etc. ensure that rear and side doors are visible to you from within the house.

In the event of an intrusion/ attempt on your vehicle DO NOT attempt to tackle the criminals, call the Gardai and make plenty of noise and turn on lights and set off your intruder alarm.

Consider a monitored solution, whilst expensive please note that monitoring stations never sleep.

Photograph and mark all tools with your own particular codes and keep a note of this for future reference or for Gardai.

If you have had your tools stolen and want to share your story, get in touch contact@independent.ie
Garda Commissioner Noirin O'Sullivan has announced today that she is retiring from An Garda Siochana.

The announcement comes as a surprise despite mounting pressure on the Commissioner to resign amid the recent garda scandals, including falsified alcohol breath tests, wrongful motoring convictions, financial irregularities at the Garda Training College, and the ill treatment of garda whistleblowers.

In a statement released today, Ms O'Sullivan said she was stepping down because the "unending cycle" of investigations and inquiries has made it difficult to "implement the deep cultural and structural reform necessary to modernise" An Gardai Siochana.

Ms O'Sullivan said: "It has become clear, over the last year, that the core of my job is now about responding to an unending cycle of requests, questions, instructions and public hearings involving various agencies including the Public Accounts Committee, the Justice and Equality Committee, the Policing Authority, and various other inquiries, and dealing with inaccurate commentary surrounding all of these matters.

"They are all part of a new  and necessary  system of public accountability. But when a Commissioner is trying  as Ive been trying  to implement the deep cultural and structural reform that is necessary to modernise and reform an organisation of 16,000 people and rectify the failures and mistakes of the past but the difficulty is that the vast majority of her time goes, not to implementing the necessary reforms and meeting the obvious policing and security challenges, but to dealing with this unending cycle.

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The Commissioner confirmed that she is not resigning in order to take up another job, despite saying that international colleagues had encouraged her to apply for the top job in Europol this summer. Ms O'Sullivan said that her focus is now on her family.

Ms O'Sullivan said that being "being a Guard is the best job in the world".

"Youre encountering people at the lowest points in their lives. You can make a difference. As long as you avoid cynicism, you can make a profound difference  for the better  in other peoples lives," she said.

Ms O'Sullivan, the first female commissioner in the history of the garda, said after 36 years of "privileged, enjoyable and proud service", saying she notified Taoiseach Leo Varadkar and Justice Minister Charlie Flanagan of her intention to resign on Sunday afternoon.

The Commissioner thanked them for their "continued support" but stressed that retiring is the "right thing to do" after deliberating for much of the summer break.

Speaking about Ms O'Sullivan's announcement, Mr Flanagan said: "Since the establishment of An Garda Siochana, the role of commissioner has been a hugely demanding one but I want to acknowledge that, during Commissioner O'Sullivan's tenure, she was faced with particularly significant difficulties, many of which had built up over several decades.

"Commissioner O'Sullivan showed enormous resilience, determination and integrity in addressing those challenges and, in particular, in instituting a radical reform programme to modernise our policing service with the aim of providing the people of Ireland with world-class policing."

Mr Flanagan said he will continue with the necessary reform programme.

"I have no doubt that the men and women of An Garda Siochana who serve Ireland in the front line of policing have the appetite to embrace and drive that change."

The sudden resignation will at one level ease some political pressure on Mr Flanagan, and Mr Varadkar.

But it also comes at a political price because Fine Gael, traditionally the party of law and order, has been mired in problems about policing for the past four years, and has been damaged by the loss a number of key personnel.

The OSullivan resignation means the loss of a second consecutive Garda Commissioner, following the enforced early retirement of Martin Callinan in March 2014.

The most senior official in the Justice Department, secretary general Brian Purcell, stood down weeks after Commissioner Callinan stood down. The Justice Minister and Fine Gael TD, Alan Shatter, was then forced to resign in May 2014.

All of the Government had invested a great deal of their political credibility in Noirin O'Sullivan continuing as Garda Commissioner. This was despite the large volume of controversy which engulfed her, and loud calls across all opposition parties for her to be removed from office.

Mr Flanagan, has said steps will be taken to appoint a successor as quickly as is possible. But her departure now means he must face the brunt of fallout from the garda controversies.

Ms OSullivans snap resignation does not banish any of those critical policing problems.
Retired Garda Commissioner Noirin O'Sullivan has told of how years of controversies have "personally" impacted on her.

In a message to garda members, which has been seen by Independent.ie, Ms O'Sullivan said she was "doing a job I love" but acknowledged there had been "low points".

"Today, after 36 years proud service, I leave An Garda Siochana. I have been privileged to meet incredible people inside and outside the organisation," she said.

"During my service I have seen radical changes in Ireland, our economy and the society in which we live and work.

"The types of threats, concerns and issues have changed radically over that time but I am proud that our organisation has changed and adapted to respond to the community. I had many moments along the way where I realised, even at the time, that I was fortunate to be doing a job I love; and like any life lived there have been some low points as well.

"The last number of years have impacted on all of us personally and on the organisation, but we used those times to identity what we needed to do for the future," she added.

She thanked her colleagues for their "courage, hard work, dedication and commitment" and wished them success in their future careers.

"Over the last three years we have worked to rebuild and restructure the organisation to meet the unprecedented policing and security challenges we face," she said.

"It hasn't been easy, we can't fix everything overnight, but, we have made significant progress, some of which we are only beginning to see.

"i want to thank you for your courage, hard work, dedication and commitment in meeting these challenges. Despite the controversies and crisis our work has seen public trust and confidence remain high. We should never take this for granted.

"Each of you has a role to play in ensuring that public support continues and grows, through your attitude, behaviours, action and professionalism, regardless of the position you hold within the organisation. Always remember you can make a difference not just in perceptions but in other people's lives.

"As I leave today, I wish all of you success in your chosen career path and ambitions and continued success in your collective efforts to keeping our communities safe," she added.
The Chief Executive of the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre has called on the media to rethink how it reports and comments on rape.

Following the controversial comments George Hook made on his Newstalk radio show on Friday about an ongoing rape case in the UK, Noeline Blackwell said the media should introduce guidelines on the topic of rape.

Speaking on RTE's This Week, Ms Blackwell said Mr Hook had to be "called out" on the comments he made because "people are outraged and we in the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre are outraged."

Mr Hook has apologised for the comments he made in which he questioned the "responsibility of women" when discussing the case of a 19-year-old woman in the UK who alleges she was raped by a member of the British swimteam when she had gone back to a hotel room with his friend.

The young woman alleges that she was raped by the swimmer when he entered her room after she had consensual sex with his friend.

Ms Blackwell said that Mr Hook's comments are damaging and could deter rape victims from reporting the crime or from seeking help.

"A lot of times we would have people coming to us saying it has taken us days, weeks, months to say it," she said.

"In a case where somebody might be questioned about why it happened to them, that they might be blamed for being part of the crime rather than the victim of the crime, in those cases it might restrict some people in coming forward."

Ms Blackwell said she wanted to remind people "that it is not your fault".

"Rape doesn't happen because of what you're wearing, because of the amount of you've had to drink - rape happens because somebody has sex with you without your consent.

"Rape is only caused by rapists carrying out these offences and these criminal acts," she said.

Ms Blackwell called for a sensitive, standard media protocol around the discussion of rape.

On Saturday, Mr Hook issued a statement saying he wanted to "apologise unreservedly for comments" he made about rape.

"It was unacceptable to suggest in any way that blame could be attributed to victims of rape. I apologise for the comments which caused hurt and offence, and for this I am truly sorry."

Newstalk's Managing Editor, Patricia Monahan said that comments made were "totally wrong and inappropriate and should never have been made."

If you have been affected by this issue you can contact the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre on 1800 778 888
Opposition politicians have welcomed Garda Commissioner, Noirin O'Sullivan's decision to quit, while Leo Varadkar praised her 36 years of service.

The Garda Commissioner announced today that she would be standing down.

After an extended summer break, Ms O'Sullivan said she believed that resigning was the "right thing to do" and will now look to focusing on her family.

She expressed her frustration at the "unending cycle" of inquiries that made it difficult to focus on reform within An Garda Siochana.

She said: "It has become clear, over the last year, that the core of my job is now about responding to an unending cycle of requests, questions, instructions and public hearings involving various agencies including the Public Accounts Committee, the Justice and Equality Committee, the Policing Authority, and various other inquiries, and dealing with inaccurate commentary surrounding all of these matters.

"They are all part of a new  and necessary  system of public accountability. But when a Commissioner is trying  as Ive been trying  to implement the deep cultural and structural reform that is necessary to modernise and reform an organisation of 16,000 people and rectify the failures and mistakes of the past, the difficulty is that the vast majority of [my] time goes, not to implementing the necessary reforms and meeting the obvious policing and security challenges, but to dealing with this unending cycle.

On Sunday afternoon, she notified Mr Varadkar and Justice Minister Charlie Flanagan of her intention to retire.

Mr Varadkar praised Ms O'Sullivan for her "many years of dedicated service to the State".

"I want to thank her for that on behalf of the Government and the Irish people," the Taoiseach said in a statement.

"She has overseen many significant developments in often challenging circumstances, and in recent years took on the challenge of reforming the Gardai.

"As she said in her statement, her decision to retire is made in the best interests of An Garda Siochana and ensuring that it can focus on the extensive programme of reform that is now underway.

"I wish Noirin every success in whatever she does in the years ahead."

Mr Varadklar said the Government will now consider how best to accelerate the programme of reform.

There had been calls for Ms O'Sullivan to stand down following recent garda controversies including false breath tests, wrongful motoring convictions, financial irregularities at Templemore and questions about the treatment of whistleblowers.

Sinn Fein's Mary Lou McDonald welcomed Ms O'Sullivan's decision to quit and said it's been "very clear for a very long time" that her position is no longer tenable.

"She has finally done the right thing," Ms McDonald told RTE News.

Independents 4 Change TD, Clare Daly, also welcomed the news and told RTE that the next commissioner "must be brought from outside the existing garda hierarchy".

Fianna Fail justice spokesperson Jim O'Callaghan said Ms O'Sullivan's departure paves the way for a new chapter for An Garda Siochana.

"I would like to thank Noirin O'Sullivan for her many years of public service and wish her well in her retirement. Her resignation means there has been some accountability within An Garda Siochana for the 1.5 million false breath tests recorded on the Garda Pulse system," said Mr O'Callaghan.

Today, Ms O'Sullivan became the second garda commissioner to retire in the last three years, following the enforced early retirement of Martin Callinan in March 2014.

Labour leader Brendan Howlin also reacted positively to the news and called for urgent reform.

Mr Howlin said: "While I recognise the decades of service that Commissioner O'Sullivan has given the State it is clearly in the interests of policing and the urgently required reform of An Garda Siochana that we have new leadership in the force.

"The new Garda Commissioner will be the first to be appointed by Government on the recommendation of the Policing Authority.

"There clearly must be an international competition with clear criteria set out by the Authority to fulfil the reform agenda.

"I have confidence that the Policing Authority will successfully achieve that task," Mr Howlin said.

Justice Minister, Charlie Flanagan said: "Since the establishment of An Garda Siochana, the role of commissioner has been a hugely demanding one but I want to acknowledge that, during Commissioner O'Sullivan's tenure, she was faced with particularly significant difficulties, many of which had built up over several decades.

"Commissioner O'Sullivan showed enormous resilience, determination and integrity in addressing those challenges and, in particular, in instituting a radical reform programme to modernise our policing service with the aim of providing the people of Ireland with world-class policing."

Mr Flanagan said he will continue with the necessary reform programme.

From midnight tonight, Deputy Commissioner, Donall O Cualain, will step in as Acting Commissioner.
Names and faces

Connie Welsh is the newest agent to the Jacoby & Dee Insurance team. A Montana native, she has more than 25 years of experience in health care including serving as both the administrator for the state of Montana and director of the Montana University System Employee Health Plans. She brings to Jacoby & Dee a wealth of knowledge in the insurance field.

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Chris Riccardo has been hired as the Holter Museum of Art's executive director.

Riccardo has served as interim director of the museum for the last two years. He relocated to Montana permanently in 2014 to assist in the build-out of Studio 740, located on Front Street in the Great Northern Town Center. In fall of 2016, Riccardo accepted a long-term fellowship position at the Archie Bray Foundation.

He received his BFA from Boston University in 1990 and served as the sculpture department chair and foundry director at the Armory Art Center in Florida from 1998 to 2014 before relocating to Montana.

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Ashley Blanton has joined the team at Hair Hair Salon and Spa as a stylist and is also offering pedicures, nails, waxing and facials. Blanton has been in the industry for seven years and attended the Salon Professional Academy in Great Falls. She was trained in Redken Color and Principle Base Design. Blanton worked previously in Helena before relocating to Wyoming. She has returned home to Helena and welcomes new and former clients. Call 443-0055 or visit www.hairhairsalonandspa.com.

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Katie Bevan has been hired as an asthma home-visiting nurse at Lewis and Clark Public Health. She has a 2011 bachelor's degree in nursing with a minor in psychology from Loyola University Chicago. In 2013, she became an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant, which has prepared her to provide breastfeeding support. Bevan has six years of experience in neonatal intensive care, pediatric nursing, and women's health nursing. She previously served with the U.S. Navy and the Montana Medicaid Program.

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U.S. Bank in Great Falls has named Denise Burk as payment solutions market manager for the Montana Region.

As payment solutions market manager, Burk will work with local businesses to identify and meet payment processing needs. She will be located at the U.S. Bank office at 900 3rd St. NW.

Burke has been with U.S. bank for five years, most recently as a banker with the Great Falls branch.

News and notes

Eaton Turner Jewelry attends buying show

Corey Johnson and Katrina Johnson from Eaton Turner Jewelry Inc. and other top jewelers from around the nation recently attended the 2017 Retail Jewelers Organization (RJO) Summer Buying Show in Denver.

The semi-annual, three-day event, provides jewelers a chance to network with other professional jewelers and purchase jewelry at pre-negotiated prices, including exclusive jewelry products only available to RJO members. This years show, themed Mile High Style, also gave jewelers the opportunity to learn about new industry trends and attend educational sessions.

The Johnsons got to view the Imperial Tiara. Made with 171 natural South Sea pearls, the Imperial Tiara is set in pure platinum and features a fortune of diamonds. The center pearl resting on the peak of the tiara was coined the Star of the Celebes. Celebes is an island in Indonesia that is more recently known as Sulawesi. This particular pearl weighs in at 56 grains.

For more information about Eaton Turner Jewelry Inc., visit at 1735 N. Montana Ave. in Helena or online at www.eatonturnerjewelry.com.

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Guidelines

The IR welcomes reports of hiring, promotions, awards, recognition, learning opportunities and other news from local companies and nonprofits. We accept press releases and photos (digital images at 300 dpi or more are preferred). Email your information to irstaff@helenair.com.

There is no charge for items appearing in the Business Briefcase. Items are run on a space-available basis, and we reserve the right to edit and use information as we see fit.

The deadline is Tuesday at noon to be considered for publication the following Sunday.
A sex offender who was found to have been grooming more than 100 girls over the internet had at least four Irish victims, it has been revealed.

Blake Robert Johnson, from Martinez California was sentenced to 30 years in prison earlier this year on charges of traveling across state lines with the intent of engaging in sex with a minor, as well as a host of child pornography charges.

In a report by RTE Radio One show, This Week, journalist John Burke discussed Johnsons history of sex offence and his link to Irish children

Prior to that time he (Johnson) wasnt really known to police in the United States, but then a 14-year-old girl in Oregon went missing. The girls mother handed her phone over to police. She was concerned that they use it in any way to find where her daughter went to.

Police downloaded all manner of messages and images and so forth from the phone, and they found a pattern of messages with an unidentified phone number. They traced that number to this man, Blake Robert Johnson and within 24 hours they found the girl, they found her at his home.

Johnson was charged for sex offences relating to that incident, but when police searched his property they discovered a large amount of disturbing materials on his computers.

So the material that they found was actually in 500 separate folders, each with an individual childs name and all previously unidentified children to law enforcement figures, meaning that they suspected that Johnson had actually targeted all of these children individually himself, Mr Burke explained on-air.

This lead to an investigation that spread across multiple jurisdictions, including Ireland and it was led by the US Homelands Security Investigation Agency.

Johnson was found to have been in contact with children in 32 US states and more than six jurisdictions.

He used a number of apps, including Ovoo, Kik and Omegle to contact his victims and, according to documents from the trial, would target emotionally vulnerable young girls.

Johnson was the father of a teenage girl himself and was described as being sophisticated at engaging young girls over the internet to engage in illicit sexually explicit conduct.

He targeted vulnerable young girls and requested that they perform sexual acts, while also directing them to send the resulting photographs. It was also found that Johnson distributed a portion of his child pornography collection to other paedophiles.

To date, the US Government has identified 94 victims between the ages of 12 and 18, but expect to identify significantly more as their investigation progresses.

Of these victims, Burke reported that at least four victims are from Ireland, with one identified as being from Dublin, one from Meath, one who has yet to be confirmed and one who has moved between jurisdictions.

As the process of identifying victims is ongoing, however, it is possible that there are more.

Its only when all the victims are identified that well have a full picture here of the potential number of victims in this jurisdiction, Burke said.
Former Olympic chief Pat Hickey has formally resigned from the International Olympic Committees executive board.

Mr Hickey (72) was arrested on August 17 last year and held for almost five months in Brazil after becoming embroiled in a ticket-selling controversy at last year's Rio Games

In a statement issued yesterday by the IOC to their Twitter account, they confirm that Mr Hickey will resign with immediate effect.

"Patrick Hickey has informed the IOC of his resignation as a member of the IOC Executive Board with immediate effect.

"In his resignation letter, Mr Hickey emphasised that he wants to protect the IOC and to ensure that the interests of the National Olympic Committees are represented on the Executive Board.

"He also reiterated his innocence in respect of all charges and confirmed that he hopes to exercise his functions as an IOC member in the future."

The IOC confirmed that Mr Hickeys successor will be appointed during the forthcoming IOC Session in Lima.

They stated that while Mr Hickeys self-suspension from all other IOC functions will remain, the IOC reiterates that the presumption of innocence prevails.

Mr Hickey is due to go on trial in Rio de Janeiro this November.

He has maintained he is innocent of all charges.
Flanagan: 'I'm not ruling in or out any measure... I will take appropriate action' Photo: Mark Condren

Charlie Flanagan has been Minister for Justice for the past three months. He has spent that time reading into his brief and meeting with officials and agencies who underpin the country's justice system. During that time, he has kept his counsel on the mounting security and policing issues which have sparked concern in the minds of the public.

But now, in an exclusive interview with the Sunday Independent, Flanagan has decided to break his silence on the controversies facing the country's police force and the justice system at large.

Sitting in his ministerial office overlooking St Stephen's Green in Dublin city centre, Flanagan reflects on what he describes as a "very dark chapter in the long and distinguished history of An Garda Siochana".

He was speaking after the publication of an extremely damning internal Garda report which revealed gardai routinely falsified millions of roadside breathalyser tests, while a second report found a Garda blunder resulted in 14,700 motorists wrongly receiving court convictions and penalty points.

The Policing Authority will soon publish the findings of a review into the breathalyser controversy and both the Government and Garda management are bracing themselves for further backlash.

Last week, Flanagan hauled senior gardai into his office to dress them down after the details of the internal investigation became public. Garda Commissioner Noirin O'Sullivan was not in attendance as she was out of the country on business.

"The practices contained in the reports are wholly unacceptable," Flanagan says.

"I have conveyed my annoyance to the top ranks of An Garda Siochana. These acts are unacceptable and it is essential, not only that these practices never reoccur, but that trust and confidence in An Garda Siochana is fully restored," he added.

The minister wants to see those responsible for what he calls the "misdemeanours" and "negligence" outlined in the reports punished for bringing the force into disrepute.

However, he refuses to acknowledge the behaviour which emerged in the internal investigation is tantamount to corruption.

"I am eager to ensure that there is zero tolerance for unacceptable practices in An Garda Siochana.

"I am not ruling in or out any measure, other than to say I will take appropriate action on receipt of the Police Authority report which I expect in the next couple of weeks," he said.

There has been speculation that gardai will be at the very least disciplined if not sacked over the controversy. Flanagan insists that due process will be followed as part of the effort to establish who is culpable for the failings.

The minister said a superintendent will be appointed over every Garda district who will be tasked with dealing with the fallout and Assistant Commissioner Michael Finn will ultimately be responsible for implementing the reports recommendations.

n on Garda Commissioner noirin o'sullivan

The latest Garda controversy has naturally put renewed focus on Garda Commissioner Noirin O'Sullivan's future as head of the force. She has just returned from a five-week holiday, during which it emerged she had applied but failed to get a senior role with European policing agency Europol.

Does the minister understand why political parties and large swathes of the public do not believe O'Sullivan is the right person for the job?

"I think these issues are bigger than any one person. There has been a lot of critical and adverse comment of Garda management. In relation to the Commissioner, many of these pre-dated her appointment as Garda Commissioner," he said.

While the minister expressed confidence in the Commissioner, his responses to other questions throughout the interview will be less reassuring to O'Sullivan.

Does the minister think O'Sullivan will be Garda Commissioner this time next year?

"I have confidence in the Garda Commissioner. My government colleagues have confidence in the Garda Commissioner," he said.

Asked again, will she be Garda Commissioner this time next year?

"Of course, the Garda Commissioner has an important role to play in the reform programme and I expect that of her," he said.

For a third time, will Noirin O'Sullivan still be Garda Commissioner next year in your opinion?

"I deal with the here and now and the Garda Commissioner is at her desk and I expect her to play a leading role in the reform process," he said.

And a fourth time, will she be Garda Commissioner next year?

"I'm not speculating on who'll be in any position next year. Will I be at this seat this time next year? I expect to be; as regards anybody else, I don't know," he said.

But you don't think the Government is going to run out of patience with the Commissioner?

"We have experienced a very bleak and dark chapter in the history of An Garda Siochana. My job is to ensure we move from that to a better place. That will involve pain, it will involve patience, and it will involve reform of an unprecedented degree."

There is understood to be a growing frustration in the Policing Authority with Garda management and the lack of reform despite numerous reports and commissions of investigation outlining a path of change. It is unclear what the soon-to-be-published Policing Authority report will say but it is expected to raise concerns about the senior management levels of the force.

If the Policing Authority says the current Garda management structures are not fit for purpose will the minister take action?

"I have a duty to act on the recommendations of the many agencies that are in place. It is my intention to have a very close, hands-on relationship with these agencies," he said.

Was the minister disappointed that O'Sullivan went for a job with Europol?

"The Garda Commissioner and any senior ranking officer can decide to seek such a position at any time. That's a matter entirely for themselves," he said.

But some might say it shows they are not interested in the current job they have?

"Not necessarily. The Garda Commissioner is now back at her desk. There are issues that need to be dealt with from her perspective and I look forward to working closely with her on the reform agenda."

The minister said he "doesn't have any evidence" to suggest the Commissioner is unhappy with her current job.

"Should she decide to seek a career change, which she clearly did, that's a matter entirely for herself," he added.

Did she tell the minister before she applied for the role?

"I discussed the issue with her. She informed me as a courtesy. I accepted that," he said.

But was he informed before she applied for the job? "I was informed that she was in the course of applying for a job."

Asked a third and final time if he was disappointed that she applied for the job, the minister said: "That's a matter entirely for herself."

n on terrorism

For the first time, the minister acknowledged there is a growing number of jihadi terrorism sympathisers in Ireland. It was recently reported in the Irish Independent that the number of jihadi supporters under surveillance in Ireland has doubled to around 70 in the last year.

"I acknowledge the figures are real. I acknowledge the figures are more than they were this time last year and that's why I am very keen to oversee our preparedness," he said.

"I have no direct evidence of any specific threat to Ireland or its people. Ireland is not immune to terror. We don't have an exemption. We are not in any unique or exceptionable position," he added

The minister believes "multiculturalism" policies have failed across Europe and the integration of people from different cultures into Irish society is the only way to avoid creating a breeding ground for fundamentalism.

"The Irish policy of integration is absolutely essential and we will pursue that, unlike many of our EU colleagues who pursue a policy of multiculturalism which has resulted in difficulties and I refer specifically to France and Belgium," he said.

n on northern ireland

However, Flanagan said Garda intelligence shows that the "greatest threat" faced by Ireland is from dissident republican terror groups rather than jihadi fundamentalists.

"Garda intelligence tell me that in the city of Dublin and along the border areas the greatest threat to the national security of our State is from dissident republicans and that will be a priority under my stewardship," he said.

The minister said the view of gardai and the PSNI is that the threat from dissident republicans in the North is "severe", meaning an attack is "highly likely". The former Minister for Foreign Affairs is "frustrated" by the lack of progress in restoring the powersharing Executive in the North as it means he does not have a counterpart across the border with whom he can discuss this growing threat.

Asked if he thinks his successor in Foreign Affairs is taking a softer approach to Sinn Fein during the Stormont talks, Flanagan said: "Simon has his style and his ways of dealing with these issues."

"Different ministers have different styles," he added.

"I am not going to apportion blame between Sinn Fein and the DUP, I haven't been at recent talks but I want all of the parties to work with Simon Coveney and James Brokenshire with a view to establishing the Executive and the Institutions," he said.

n on TOm Oliver's Murder

On the brutal IRA murder of Louth farmer Tom Oliver, the minister said he does not believe Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams has no information on the tragic case.

"Gerry Adams is president of Sinn Fein, he knows everything about Sinn Fein. He knows much from the IRA. There is evidence to suggest that Sinn Fein headquarters in Belfast knew much of the circumstances of the brutal killing of Tom Oliver.

"I find it hard to believe Gerry Adams doesn't know anything about it," he said.

"I call on Gerry Adams to make known to the authorities what he knows about the abduction, torture and murder of an innocent, decent farmer in Co Louth."

n 'I have confidence in Garda Commissioner' n 'MULTICULTURALISM HAS BROUGHT DIFFICULTIES' n 'DISSIDENT REPUBLICANS POSE GREATEST THREAT'
Refunding water charges should be delayed so the money can be invested in our health system, Brendan Howlin has said.

The Labour Party leader also said that he feels tax tax cuts should be avoided in the next budget so the Government can effectively tackle the housing crisis.

Speaking at his party's think-in in Athy, Co Kildare today, Mr Howlin said the money designated for water charge refunds could be better used helping up the HSE's 300 million overspend.

He said: "Those repayments have to be made, but I don't think anybody would object to them being repayed next year rather than this year if that money is required to sustain our health services through November and December."

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Mr Howlin also said he feels that slashing taxes next year isn't a good idea and he said that Labour will propose an alternative Budget 2017.

He said: "Our priority is to improve public services, I dont think there is space for tax reductions.

"Income tax reductions are so expensive that the impact on the individual is tiny.

"So the notion of giving individuals the equivalent amount of a cup of coffee a week, rather than investing in housing or in health or in infrastructure, would be a very big mistake.

"Whatever resources we have, we will devote entirely to improvement s in public services and rebuilding our infrastructure."
Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin said the decision to remove Charlie Flanagan as Foreign Affairs Minister remains "unexplained and unjustified" in a speech in which he also accused the Government of being unimaginative and complacent in its response to Brexit challenges.

Mr Martin also called for the establishment of a special economic zone in Northern Ireland and border counties in the Republic, similar to the Shannon Free Zone where businesses previously enjoyed tax incentives, and a new bilateral treaty to prevent future economic issues. He added Irish and British governments must also prioritise relationships between Dublin and London.

"In Dublin there was an explicit stepping back from the idea that we had an ongoing role in ensuring the effective working of Northern institutions. An exception to this was during Charlie Flanagan's period in Iveagh House - and his removal from that post after such a brief and positive period remains unexplained and unjustified," Mr Martin told the British-Irish Association in Cambridge.

Foreign Affair Minister Simon Coveney responded in a speech at the same event last night, saying the Government would test Mr Martin's proposals "in a non-party partisan way". He added: "I also want to recognise the work of my predecessor, Charlie Flanagan, who continues to play a key role now as Justice Minister on issues relating to North-South relations, particularly on introducing legislation relating to the legacy issues of a painful past."

Northern Ireland Secretary James Brokenshire also paid tribute to Mr Flanagan.
Disaffected Sinn Fein supporters helped by the mother of a Hollywood actor plan to organise forums across Ireland to highlight allegations of mistreatment and bullying within the party ahead of the Ard Fheis in November.

Tara O'Grady, a human rights campaigner whose son Jack Reynor starred in Transformers, confirmed that she would be involved in organising the meetings, after a wave of resignations and expulsions in Sinn Fein.

"There will be meetings. There will be many of them and I will be involved. It will be to help them to build their networks, to build their capacity and to move forward as a community. They need to do it," she said.

"Sinn Fein is going to do everything it can to stifle this outcry. There will definitely be meetings and forums between now and the time of the Ard Fheis, and we also have a general election coming up."

Sinn Fein has been plagued by claims of unfair treatment from members and former members, most recently a 23-year-old councillor in Limerick who last week announced that she was quitting the party because of alleged bullying and intimidation.

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Lisa Marie Sheehy, who now intends to serve as an independent, accused members of plotting against her and pushing her out of the party.

Ms O'Grady said she had been contacted by concerned Sinn Fein members from across the country "They are really in their hundreds. There are whole communities of people who are feeling disenfranchised by the party," she said.

She said they needed to "air their concerns" and to "do it collectively", adding: "A lot of Sinn Fein members who were brought into the party in recent years have been left exposed and isolated, and were not given the fundamental support needed to enhance their political skills and thrive in their own communities.

"Now many people are feeling very distressed and definitely bullied."

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Ms O'Grady, whose human rights work is mostly in the Middle East, was herself thrown out of Sinn Fein earlier this year, after she acted as a witness for three councillors in Wicklow in an internal party inquiry.

Other disaffected Sinn Fein councillors include Seamus Morris, in Tipperary, who last week alleged that he was the victim of a campaign of harassment and slander after the party sought to remove him.

In July, Paul Hogan, a Sinn Fein councillor in Westmeath, claimed he was bullied by party members after the break-up of a relationship.

Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams has denied there is a culture of bullying in the party.

In a statement, Sinn Fein said yesterday that it was unaware of the planned forums. It said there was no place for bullying the party and that it was not always possible to resolve "local disputes".
Poor latch, mastitis, blisters, blocked ducts... If you're a breastfeeding mother, or if you have been, the chances are you'll have heard of these.

Tongue tie is another problem encountered by breastfeeding mothers. Once lampooned as a trendy fad, tongue tie is now being diagnosed more in babies, and the HSE now has a national clinical policy on it.

It occurs in babies when a piece of tissue attached to the baby's tongue is tight and/or unusually short, holding their tongue down and stopping it from moving freely.

It affects how the baby feeds and can cause physical problems for both mother and baby.

Desperate with lack of sleep, first time mothers often feel they have nowhere to turn, and they often don't know that tongue tie is a fixable problem.

"As there are more babies breastfeeding now, there are now more tongue ties being detected," Dr Alan O'Reilly, a GP and certified lactation consultant, who specialises in tongue tie, advises.

"There are a growing number of pediatricians and GPs that are developing an interest in breastfeeding and tongue tie as the public's concern and interest have risen."

"Most children with tongue tie will breastfeed successfully with expert lactation support and without any surgical intervention (to have the tongue tie cut)."

More mothers are breastfeeding their babies today in Ireland than they were forty years ago.

Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, the majority of babies in Ireland were fed formula. In 1974, for example, the breastfeeding initiation rate in the Rotunda hospital was 11pc.

Fast forward to earlier this year, when it was found that some 55.4pc of babies were being breastfed at the time of the public health nurse's first visit.

Breastfeeding rates in Ireland are climbing (albeit that Ireland still has the lowest rate for breastfeeding in Europe.) And as the rates increase, the challenges that can come with breastfeeding, are being talked about more.

In 2014 the journal Maternal and Child Health published a study looking at breastfeeding and maternal depression. It found that mothers who planned to breastfeed and went on to do so were around 50pc less likely to become depressed than mothers who had not planned to, and who did not, breastfeed.

"When people choose to come in to get a frenotomy (have the tongue tie cut) done for their baby, it's a decision that they don't make lightly. They're doing it because they're passionate about breastfeeding," Dr O'Reilly said.

"The babies that I see at my frenotomy clinic would continue to have breastfeeding difficulties despite maximum lactation support."

Breastfeeding your baby can offer protection against gastrointestinal infections and diarrhea, middle-ear infections, Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes, lymphoma, leukaemia, and Hodgkin's disease. It also reduces the likelihood of childhood obesity.

Mothers who are struggling with breastfeeding challenges can often continue to breastfeed successfully if they are given the right help.

"It is vital that mothers and babies are assessed by healthcare professionals with experience in breastfeeding and tongue tie. In Ireland this expertise usually lies with lactation consultants and public health nurses. Doctors in general have very limited teaching and training in breastfeeding," Dr O'Reilly said.

"With tongue tie, it's important that people get assessed by people qualified in the area and that they get the maximum amount of lactation support without jumping straight to a frenotomy (where the tongue tie is cut)."

"Bottle-fed babies with tongue tie generally do not have a problem with feeding. The peristaltic wave-like motion that is required for efficient breastfeeding is not required for bottle-feeding."

Dr OReilly cautions that tongue tie could be over-diagnosed, though.

"It is true that the growing awareness of tongue tie has brought its own problems. There is a growing over-diagnosis of tongue tie in babies with completely normal tongue anatomy and function. It is important that mothers and babies see healthcare professionals with adequate experience and training."

"Parents are now more informed about breastfeeding as people research their symptoms online and they discuss their symptoms with other mothers and health professionals on online forums."

"Mothers of children with restrictive tongue ties and breastfeeding problems are sharing their positive and sometimes negative experiences with each other."

Often the mother will be advised to push through the challenges and continue breastfeeding because babies will only become established at breastfeeding after the first two or three weeks.

"It is important that babies get the chance to establish breastfeeding on their own and with lactation support if required before considering tongue tie release. There are very restrictive tongues which may not allow a baby to form a sustainable latch from birth. I feel that these babies should be seen as soon as possible by a lactation expert with experience in diagnosing tongue tie. There are also mild tongue ties that will allow for established, sustainable and pain free breastfeeding after lactation support for 2-4 weeks, Dr O'Reilly said.

"It is vital that all babies with difficulty breastfeeding are also assessed by a doctor to exclude medical conditions such as infection, neurological disorders and congenital abnormalities that may be associated with breastfeeding problems for baby."

Dermot Murnane is an oral surgeon who releases tongue and lip ties in infants, children and adult.

"Tongue tie runs in families. It's a family trait. If you find one baby has it, a cousin has had it, for example, he said.

"It's a simple one-minute procedure and the result is instant. If the baby feeds straight away, it will feel different to mum straight away. The baby might be sore for a day or two, but after day three there's generally a turn around, and the baby has a firmer latch and more rhythm to their feeding. Much happier baby, baby goes to sleep, and much happier mum then.

Dr Murnane says the amount of frenotomies hes performing has increased in the last few years.

The lack of provision of services is amazing. It's mind boggling how difficult it is to get such a procedure done. Maternity hospitals don't even check if there is a tongue tie. It's poo-pooed as a non-event. A lot of it is changing but people thought that was just quackery and they'd discourage you from having it released."

"It's a very small tiny little procedure, and there's practically noone in the country doing it. People have to travel horrendous distances to have it done It's a 30 second procedure.

"It should be a standard procedure provided in any maternity hospital. Legend has it that midwives would keep one sharp finger nail and they would do it. That of course has changed now," he said.
Barry Cowen is sitting in the calm of his office amid the national storm he has created over his proposals to reduce building industry VAT rates.

"My detractors and opponents have jumped on the bandwagon to say 'oh we are back to the Galway tent', 'we are back to people propping up big developers'. They are using all of this emotive language that plays on people's minds. The odd councillor has even rang me and said 'oh, this is a PR disaster!'"

He asked the councillors the same question he is asking anyone else who has written off the proposals as something that would lead to the mistakes of the past: "Did you read it? Did you see exactly what I said? Did you see the depth of what I was saying? Or the broad nature of many of the proposals I put forward?"

The Fianna Fail housing spokesperson wants to stress that the proposal to cut VAT from 13.5pc to 9pc is specifically targeting the provision of affordable housing and for only three years - although, he says, "a complete VAT holiday in the UK and the North has worked tremendously well".

He added: "My critics want people to believe it's a VAT holiday across the sector. It is not. The cost they quoted, 240m, applies across the sector. It wouldn't be as high as that."

The Offaly TD explains how his proposals have a role to play in getting all areas of the construction sector going again.

Expand Close Fianna Fail TD Barry Cowen said he expects the company will announce around 150 redundancies at the semistate peat board next year. Photo: Tom Burke / Facebook

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Whatsapp Fianna Fail TD Barry Cowen said he expects the company will announce around 150 redundancies at the semistate peat board next year. Photo: Tom Burke

"When are we going to realise, if you are going to build a house you need a builder? And the builders need block layers, carpenters, electricians, plasterers and plumbers and they need provision of windows and they need roofers and they need slates and tiles and that sector needs help and assistance, too, and it is a great driver of the economy and it can be again.

"People talk about the trade and investment by the State in apprenticeships - well look at the help and assistance that would give in those areas, while at the same time helping to address the bloody mess we are in."

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On the opposition he has faced, he says: "It doesn't detract me from the need to have this done," and he believes people are pussy-footing around the issue because "they are afraid to overhaul, afraid to overturn and afraid to take bold chances and I am not of that mind".

Still, he is no stranger to standing his ground.

His brother, former Taoiseach Brian Cowen, was at one time the most vilified man in Ireland due to his handling of the financial crash.

I am told this is one issue the Offaly man will not talk about - even to his closest friends. But today he is open, frank and relaxed when discussing some of the more human aspects of the fallout from that time and the effect it has had on his family.

One moment in particular affected him. A video, which went viral, showed Brian being followed down the street by a group of protesters. The protesters confront him, shouting: "Three cheers for the sell-out," before calling him a "scumbag" and "traitor" and telling him to be ashamed of himself. When Brian gets to his car it is has been defaced. He calmly takes the mess from the windscreen and doors and drives away without saying a word.

Expand Close TD Barry Cowen with his children Barry, Gemma, Lorcan, his niece Meadhbh, sister in law Mary, wife Mary and daughter Aoibhe Photo: Doug O'Connor / Facebook

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Whatsapp TD Barry Cowen with his children Barry, Gemma, Lorcan, his niece Meadhbh, sister in law Mary, wife Mary and daughter Aoibhe Photo: Doug O'Connor

Barry watched the footage afterwards: "I thought he did fierce well to keep his cool - it wouldn't have been me," he says. "But that's the age we are in now, unfortunately. That's one of the unfortunate aspects of social media that has been exploited by these extremists or whatever you want to call them. But, it's a democracy."

On his advice to Brian at the time he said: "I would always say to him 'if you believe you are doing the right thing and if you have the ideological will to do it because you believe it's the right thing and in the best interest of the country - then do it'."

During the hardest time, their mother, now in her 80s, stood at the head of the family already "battle hardened" from her marriage to a life-long politician.

Barry says it upset her at times. "He [Brian] had a wife and children, which is often forgotten. But she was more than capable of dealing with it - as difficult as it was. You have to take the rough with the smooth."

On the advice she gave her sons during that time, he says: "She would always say 'you are elected by the people, you are elected by your constituents, you work for your constituents and hard work will be rewarded. And if you take your eye off the ball, if you neglect your work, if you leave yourself vulnerable and open, you lose your job'."

But he says: "She understands you're only as good as your last election. It could be around the corner at any time, on any day, and that comes from a woman who was married to a person who, in the eighties, did three elections in 18 months, and the difficulties that brings."

One particular form of abuse that upset the family was the use of the term BIFFO [Big Ignorant F*cker From Offaly] to refer to Brian.

Barry explains: "It is a very derogatory acronym. It's the perception that you are rural and you are not Dublin-centric and we don't take kindly to that, and county people don't either."

He is staunchly loyal to his brother and rejects any accusation that the former Taoiseach had a problem with alcohol while on the job.

"I refute it out of hand. But the more you talk about it, the more accusations arise out of it. It is not true. It holds no water. It is completely unfair and inappropriate and it never affected his job."

On the origin of the rumours, he says: "You mightn't have to go too far to realise where it came from but as the Yanks say 'throw the dirt and watch [us] take it off'."

Expand Close Former Taoiseach Brian Cowen. Photo: PA / Facebook

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Whatsapp Former Taoiseach Brian Cowen. Photo: PA

He believes certain sections of the media had a role to play in the tarring of Brian's name and describes how photos were set up to frame his brother in an unflattering light. "A photographer told me they were detailed by their bosses to photograph him at length in the effort to get him with his eyes closed," he says.

"It was almost to give this impression that he was half-jarred - do you know the way you take a photo when someone closes their eyes? You just continue to take [a large number of photos until you get the desired shot]," he explains. "It made me feel disgusted. Absolutely disgusted. The same photographer said to me that they were ashamed they had done it afterwards."

On the topic of alcohol, I ask if the rivalry between the Cowen and Coveney dynasties go back to an infamous tweet by Simon Coveney that the former Taoiseach sounded "halfway between drunk and hungover" while making an appearance on Morning Ireland. It is an accusation that the former presenter, Cathal Mac Coille, has since rubbished.

"I have heard over the years that people said I had a disdain for Coveney because of the famous tweet but that never formed the basis of my relationship with him. We always respected each other and the positions we were in," said Barry.

On the tweet itself, he says: "I didn't think much of it. We all make mistakes. Whether he accepts that's a mistake or not, I don't know, but it wasn't appropriate or right or proper." But he adds: "I don't hold it against him. I am big enough and bold enough to know if you hold grudges you don't get much work done."

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In fact, he is quite complimentary of Coveney, especially when comparing him to Taoiseach Leo Varadkar. "To be fair to Coveney, you could fight and argue with him and ultimately do a deal with him. But I don't know if you can do that with Varadkar. It remains to be seen. With Leo, I don't know if he is on the same wavelength or watching the same channel at all."

I ask him to expand: "He seems distant and not thoroughly engaged," he says.

"It almost appears as though he comes with a pre-conceived decision and goes through the motions. He doesn't appear to be as natural as other leaders in the past with regards to his ability to connect and converse and communicate with people in the way that Kenny, or Cowen, or Ahern could. It's all very stage-managed and I am sure it will be well honed eventually but whether it will be natural or not I don't know.

"His expert communications unit is teaching him something that came natural to many before him."

On the Taoiseach's PR team, he says: "[Leo] is obsessed with his image and maybe when we get back into the Dail term and under more scrutiny, he might improve [on] the substance.

"Spin got him where he is and maybe he thinks spin can keep him where he is."

He highlights the contrast between this and what he sees as one of Brian Cowen's most admirable qualities: a man who waited years through much criticism to speak in the relevant forum rather than "looking for a slant or a direction to be taken at his behest" by the media.

Despite his loyalty to his brother, I wonder how Barry would respond to people who say his family name has stifled his political career?

"I want to prove that perception wrong," he said. "If that were the case I wouldn't be re-elected. The public are very discerning here in Offaly and throughout the country. They respect and appreciate the effort and commitment that one makes and reward it thereafter, and they are not prepared - as some are - to be rigid [in their views] and 'guilty by association'? I would hope to prove that wrong to the very few who make that charge. It's a very lazy attitude. Who are they? Or what are they? And what have they ever done or proven to anyone?"

Expand Close Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney has held talks on the North. Photo: Gareth Chaney/Collins Photo Agency / Facebook

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Whatsapp Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney has held talks on the North. Photo: Gareth Chaney/Collins Photo Agency

Not only does Barry not see the Cowen name as a hindrance to his career, but he says he owes his career to his brother. "I wouldn't have been elected if it wasn't for him - irrespective of if I had never been in the council for the last 20 years - and I appreciate that. It is no obstacle to me anyway. And it hasn't been. And my colleagues would echo that. And most of the public would echo that, too, especially here in Offaly and it remains to be seen."

I ask him about the tribal mentality in his home town.

"You won't get abused around here. If you want to get away from it all, you go home. That's the case with family life, too. You know the sense of place in Ireland associated with your parish, your club, your county and that's as strong here as it ever was."

It ties in with the biggest lesson he learned from his brother's time in politics: "Don't forget your own - stay true to your own."

The family had spent years battening down the hatches against the nationwide criticism of its most prominent member but more recently their attentions turned to another son. After returning home from a holiday in France Barry got an ongoing health ailment checked out and was sent straight to hospital for life-saving treatment.

"I spent four weeks in hospital and was out for a long time," he says. On the diagnosis he says: "It would teach you the value of life."

He turned 50 last week (his father died at 51) and says "of course you get a scare. But you'd nearly say in hindsight isn't it great to get a fright like that? That you can recover from it and get a different perspective. You hear of some people who never get a second chance."
Montana Rail Link, which employs almost 100 people in the Helena area, is celebrating its 30th anniversary with train trips across Montana for current and former employees.

The trips will run in and around Missoula, Helena, Livingston, Billings and Laurel, according to a letter from MRL president Tom Walsh. Nearly 2,800 current and past employees are expected to take train rides with their families.

It promises to be a wonderful time to reflect with friends, co-workers and retired co-workers on MRLs achievements and operations over the past 30 years, Walsh said.

More than 500 employees from over 30 different railroads launched MRL on Oct. 31, 1987. Montana Rail Link is a Class II regional railroad that employs nearly 1,200 people and operates more than 900 route miles of track in Montana and Idaho, on line owned by partner BNSF Railway, one of seven Class I railroads in North America.

BNSF traces its roots back to the Northern Pacific, which completed a transcontinental railroad across Montana in 1883. Much of MRLs line follows the original NP route.

In Helena, MRL has been a steady place of employment with nearly 100 employees who make an average annual salary of more than $70,000. The company purchased $11 million in construction materials, fuel, hotels and transportation and mechanical services from Helena area businesses each year. A total of $85 million in Montana goods and services are purchased each year to domestic and international markets.

MRL paid $550,000 in property taxes to Lewis and Clark County last year and approximately $10 million statewide.

Last year, MRL shipped 62,000 carloads for all Montana shippers. Of all shipments company-wide, 32 percent contained grain, 24 percent coal, 29 percent industrial material, 11 percent vehicles, 2 percent intermodal and 2 percent crude traffic.

Using trains to move freight is on average more efficient than using trucks. According to information provided by MRL, a ton of freight can be moved 457 miles on one gallon of fuel. A freight train can take the load of 350 trucks, which reduces the use of roads and the cost to maintain them.

The Missoulian contributed to this report.
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Ian O'Doherty Opinion For once, the UN is right  were standing on the edge of a deadly nuclear precipice

For those of us of a certain age, the last few months have felt as if we have somehow time-warped back to the 1980s. Stranger Things, which is set in that decade, has been the biggest show on TV. Kate Bush  thanks, incidentally, to Stranger Things  is now regularly played on the radio and she has reached number one in 2022 with the re-release of her 1985 hit, Running Up That Hill.
The murder of Detective Sergeant Denis O'Brien, near his Dublin home on September 9, 1942 had severe repercussions, leading to the execution of Charlie Kerins, the young leader of the IRA. It might also have had further horrific consequences, were it not for the intervention of one those wanted for the murder.

Kerins, who was born in Tralee on January 23, 1918, joined the IRA in 1940. He rose precipitately within its ranks, largely due to the efficiency of the security forces.

After Eamon de Valera came to power in 1932, Ned Broy was appointed Garda Commissioner and given the task of recruiting some former Republicans to combat the danger of a Blueshirt coup d'etat. These recruits - dubbed 'Broy Harriers' -later turned their attention to the IRA when it sought to collude with Nazi Germany during World War II.

Those Broy Harriers who had fought on the Republican side during the Civil War, were easily able to get inside information on the IRA. Denis O'Brien had fought in 1916 and was one of the Republicans occupying the Four Courts at the start of the Civil War. He remained active in the IRA until 1933, when he joined the Broy Harriers and became the bane of active Republicans.

Around 10am on September 9, 1942, O'Brien was driving from his home in Ballyboden, Co Dublin, when a bullet shattered his windscreen. The attack was witnessed by a 12-year-old neighbour - Justin Keating, who later served as a cabinet minister in the 1973-77 coalition government.

"I was less than 20 yards away and frozen by surprise and fear," Keating recalled in his book Nothing is Written in Stone. O'Brien jumped from his car and prepared to shoot at his assailants. "Behind his back and in my full sight, a man stood up with what I now know was a sub-machine gun," Keating added. "I could see the bullets hitting my friend. I could see him fall." He was killed by a shot in the head. Keating was the only witness.

Gardai circulated details of eight Republicans they wished to question - Kerry men - Michael Quille, of Listowel, and Charlie Kerins and Tadhg Drummond, both from Tralee.

The IRA was in turmoil at the time. Six different Chiefs of Staff were jailed between June 1941 and October 1942. A month after the O'Brien murder, Kerins was appointed Chief of Staff. He had been in the IRA less than two years.

Michael Quille was arrested in Belfast and handed over to gardai at the Border. He was charged with O'Brien's murder before the Special Criminal Court in January 1943. Sean MacBride, supported by Noel Hartnett and Con Lehane, defended Quille and secured his acquittal.

Kerins remained at large until the early hours of June 17, 1944. He was arrested by Detective Sergeant Pat O'Connell while asleep in an upstairs room of the home of Dr Kathleen Farrell, at 50 Upper Rathmines Road. Guns and ammunition were found under his bed.

Kerins went on trial before the Special Criminal Court on October 2, 1944. He refused to recognise the court, or to be legally represented.

He was given time to consider whether he wished to obtain legal representation. "You could have adjourned for six years as far as I am concerned," he told the court in rejecting the offer. He was duly found guilty and sentenced to death.

It was only then that he accepted legal representation from those who had successfully defended Quille. They might well have been able to undermine the prosecution case at the original trial, but now it was too late for Kerins.

"Having contemptuously refused assistance, he could not now rely on the fact he had not been represented," Mr Justice O'Byrne ruled, and the Court of Criminal Appeal rejected his appeal on November 15, 1944.

Permission to appeal to the Supreme Court was refused. The Taoiseach was determined to make an example of Kerins by executing him as a criminal, rather than shot as a soldier by a firing squad- like the five other IRA men executed during the years of World War II.

Tom Pierrepoint, the elderly British hangman, was brought over from England to hang Kerins in Mountjoy jail on December 1, 1944. It was the last of his 25 Irish hangings.

Young Keating was very upset by the execution. "I loathe the death penalty," he later explained but added, rather pointedly, "I do believe the verdict was correct."

The IRA decided to retaliate by killing Detective Sergeant O'Connell for arresting Kerins. Tadhg Drummond, who had been third on the wanted list for the O'Brien murder, quietly warned Con Kennedy, the Town Clerk in Tralee, that the IRA planned to murder him in his home at 28 Sandford Avenue, off the South Circular Road, a few weeks later on Christmas Eve.

Kennedy's wife had been reared in the same house as her aunt, Drummond's mother. They were more like sisters, hence, the warning.

O'Connell was given the information on the understanding he would use it only to protect himself and his family. He sent his family to Tralee for Christmas, while he moved into Dublin Castle. His next-door neighbour reported that a group of men had called to his house at 10pm on Christmas Eve. O'Connell and his family lived within Dublin Castle until he retired in the 1960s.

Drummond had provided a service to both human decency and his IRA colleagues.
Last week, Starbucks enraged us all by confirming they're opening another one of their identikit shops in Dublin city centre. The small independent cafes of the capital hit back against the aggressive banality of the American chain by handing out free coffees last Tuesday, a plaintive cry into the corporate abyss of the high street, a reminder they existed.

The announcement came at a good time for the caffeine Goliath - it was the same week they released their annual 'Pumpkin Spice Latte' to shrieks of girly joy the world over. The PSL is a milky coffee with cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and cloves - or thereabouts. And lots and lots of sugar. There's not actually any pumpkin involved.

The Americans, of course, have decided it's the quintessential taste of autumn - I suppose it's better than the bittersweet cocktail of resignation and relief that we have traditionally associated with the end of the summer holidays. It's Starbucks which has bamboozled an entire generation into believing that a cup of this truly ghastly stuff is as integral to September as new school shoes and the cuts they leave on your ankles.

Starbucks has stolen autumn, and made a fetish of it for the Instagram generation. Not since Coca-Cola has a corporation so successfully rebranded a season of the year. It's bold. It's almost unbelievable. It's genius.

As surely as the leaves will turn, as the wind will become cold and the days short, so Starbucks will unleash the PSL. A combination of canny advertising and social media culture have made the drink the chicest autumn accessory.

But who drinks it? This is what Dublin couldn't figure out. We were all aghast at the chain coming and further trampling our national colour and businesses. It's not even nice, we cried; it's overpriced!

So how, then, is it even possible that they're able to open another shop? It's because Starbucks, unlike the rest of us, has not forgotten the awesome power of that most maligned and sneered at of all demographics: the teenage girl. There's a reason you don't get groups of 16-year-old girls in groovy independent roasteries. It's because they'd be looked at. Not so in a Starbucks, which welcomes all of human life.

I don't like Starbucks. I find it's expensive, its drinks underwhelming and its decor grim. But I get it. Starbucks is a place of no judgement: no one will look at you askance if you order something with more sugar than coffee.

If girls are made of sugar and spice and all things nice, so are Starbucks drinks. And the two are made for each other. Starbucks doesn't tell you what to like. It's a safe place.

Once, in my local bougie artisanal coffee shop, I was shouted at by a man in a burlap apron for asking for my cappuccino a bit hotter than 60 degrees. He told me I had an underdeveloped palate. In the end, I apologised and sipped my tepid coffee like a penance. This would never happen in Starbucks. In Starbucks you could order a grande babyccino with six pumps of vanilla syrup and they wouldn't bat an eyelid. And yes, you can get a horrid Pumpkin Spice Latte and that will be normal.

If you look up the PSL hashtag on Instagram you will find hundreds of thousands of over-exposed photos of cups grasped by disembodied, perfectly manicured hands. The hashtag #PSL will usually nestle beside #fall and, perhaps curiously, #basic.

The organiser of the free coffee initiative, Ciaran Hogan of the The Clockwork Door on Wellington Quay, was railing against the 'blandness' of Starbucks. But what he doesn't seem to understand is that Starbucks thrives precisely because of its blandness, not in spite of it. It is bland, it is boring, it is basic.

Starbucks is a nude lip. Starbucks is Niall Horan's new solo work. Starbucks is jeans and a nice top; it's Prosecco with the girls; it's instagramming your brunch. Starbucks is Taylor Swift and hating Taylor Swift. It's having your first sip of tea in the morning and saying 'ahh, the first sip of tea'. Starbucks is refusing to wear a coat heading off on a night out. It's watching Friends reruns. Starbucks is the smell of a baby's head.

If Starbucks is basic, it's just the tip of the iceberg.

'Basic' was initially a disparaging term for (usually) a girl who liked Ugg boots and gilets, ombre hair and yes, Pumpkin Spice Lattes. Because we all know that anything teenage girls like must be silly. Bland. Now, however, an entire generation know that their greatest passions make them 'basic', and they seem to be reclaiming it. Whereas their parents may have striven towards difference, uniqueness, this Instagram generation gets off on being just like all their friends. It's not that they don't see their matching haircuts and make-up and identical leggings and runners. They see it, they like it. That's the whole point.

But it's not just confined to Instagram. We are living through the basicification of culture as a whole. At one point recently, Ed Sheeran occupied every slot in the top 10. The hottest designers in high fashion magazines do streetwear. Child millionaire Kylie Jenner has fundamentally changed the make-up industry; every long-established brand is scrambling desperately to catch up with her. When we look at the biggest cultural shifts that are happening now in fashion, music, media and the internet, the main drivers are teenage girls. We may not like it, but we're living in a teen girl's world. Handing out free hand-roasted locally ground flat whites to tourists isn't going to slow the inevitable march of Starbucks. We know Starbucks doesn't have the nicest coffee. The free nice stuff is well-intentioned but misguided. They'd be better off paying attention to our teens and their awesome consumer force. They are buying, spending, consuming media, trendspotting and trendsetting in a unique way.

But where does this leave us? I don't want to admit defeat and spend the rest of my days sipping unicorn frappuccinos. I rail against the homogenisation of high streets as much as any right-minded person. I don't have the answer. But I know who might - and we ignore them at our peril.
A big cheer for Leo Varadkar. The Taoiseach has reached his 100th day as Fine Gael leader today (he has to wait another couple of weeks to celebrate his 100th day as Taoiseach).

I'm sure you will join me in offering a warm congratulations to the leader of our small island country.

After performing an impromptu standing ovation with your family on learning the good news you can return to your seated position.

Now, while sitting at the breakfast table and sipping your morning cup of tea you will be forgiven for thinking "what in the name of God has the man being doing for those 100 days?"

If you are a Fine Gael member you are undoubtedly still beside yourself over the coverage the Taoiseach and his novelty socks have received since taking office.

It's all Leo's going to do this, Leo's going to do that and Leo feels this way about this thing. It is a great time to be a Blueshirt. Especially if you're one of those more liberal Fine Gaelers who want an abortion referendum. The majority of conservative Catholic Fine Gael voters, who some would say are the party's core support base, are happy with their new leader.

Expand Close Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (R) walks with his Irish counterpart Taoiseach Leo Varadkar (L) during the Montreal Pride parade in Montreal, Canada August 20, 2017. REUTERS/Christinne Muschi / Facebook

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Whatsapp Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (R) walks with his Irish counterpart Taoiseach Leo Varadkar (L) during the Montreal Pride parade in Montreal, Canada August 20, 2017. REUTERS/Christinne Muschi

But there are grumblings from some Blueshirt voters, especially those of an older demographic based along the not-so-Wild Atlantic Way, about the Taoiseach attending various Pride festivals.

However, these people are living in the past and the Taoiseach should be praised for what he has done for gay and lesbian rights in this State and other countries.

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The Fine Gael faithful aside, many of the other right- thinking citizens of this country are beginning to wonder how they will benefit in the post-Enda Kenny era.

The first three months of Varadkar's stewardship have been mostly a brand-building exercise. The main focus has been on the Taoiseach himself - a young and fit statesman who represents people who work for a living and those who aspire to work for living.

The Taoiseach's personal promotional efforts have been overt but there is also behind-the-scenes' work on repositioning Fine Gael ahead of a general election.

Expand Close Taoiseach Leo Varadkar on the front of 'Time' magazine / Facebook

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Take last Tuesday, when Varadkar held the second meeting of his monthly Fine Gael war council.

The ministers-only meeting was held in what was described as "the attic" of Government Buildings and those who gathered dined on chicken curry while listening to presentations from the Taoiseach, Minister for Health Simon Harris and Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe about party messaging. The top brass from Fine Gael headquarters and key advisers were also in attendance.

The meeting went on for more than three hours and reaction was mixed to say the least. "It was a load of s***e," one Cabinet minister said. Others were more enthusiastic. For his part, the Taoiseach gave ministers a sneak preview of what he is expected to say in his speech at Fine Gael's annual parliamentary party gathering this week.

Essentially he expanded on what he means by a 'Republic of Opportunity' which you will remember was the slogan Varadkar rolled out after defeating Simon Coveney in the Fine Gael leadership contest. And it looks like we are going to be hearing a lot about his Republic of Opportunity in the coming weeks and months. But what does it mean?

Well, according to briefing documents given to ministers, which the Sunday Independent got its hands on, Leo's Republic of Opportunity will be one where "everyone has an equal opportunity to be the best person they can be, where everyone gets a fair go and every child has the chance to be the best person they can be".

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It will also be a republic where "every part of the country has the opportunity to share in our recovery and prosperity" and there will be "second chances for those who need them". Sounds like a great place doesn't? The Taoiseach also gave examples of this political utopia in action. This included increasing employment, allowing lone parents keep more money, budgeting for more special needs assistants and a 10-year capital plan which would see high-speed broadband rolled out nationwide.

But surely this new Republic of Opportunity would need a tag line generated by a team of public relations gurus, you say? And you're right it does.

Ireland is no longer "the best small country in the world to do business". Ireland is now, drum roll.. "an island in the centre of the world, at the heart of the common European home we helped to build". I'm sure there was lots of back slapping the night they dreamt that one up.

Other "key messages" from the Taoiseach included that Fine Gael was a party for people who not only get up early in the morning but also for those who work late.

So if you've just finished your 24-hour, or longer, shift in a hospital rest assured the Taoiseach has a political messaging he hopes will appeal to you. The Taoiseach also plans to reward you with minimum wage increases, reduced incomes taxes and more benefits in return for paying PRSI.

Varadkar also told the room "Fine Gael is making life easier for families" by introducing childcare tax reductions and subsidies. Most of you would correctly note that these childcare reforms were introduced while the previous Taoiseach was in office and have just been relaunched several times since Varadkar took over.

Paschal Donohoe spoke on Fine Gael's Budget messaging ahead of the big day in October. The Finance Minister said he would balance the books to "keep Ireland secure in a risky world". He also promised to make "steady and affordable" progress in reducing high rates of tax for low and middle income earners.

But he warned: "That means avoiding unsustainable tax giveaways, and instead reforming our tax system to further reward work and create jobs." So don't go booking that two-week Caribbean holiday just yet and you should probably hold off replacing the family car in the new year.

The purposes of these monthly meetings is to ensure the Fine Gael ethos is borne out in policy decisions taken by ministers - the Finance Minister used some of these exact lines in his speech at the Kennedy Summer School last Friday.

Over in Fine Gael headquarters on Lower Mount Street, meetings are also taking place away from public view. Last Wednesday, the party's national executive gathered to discuss an upcoming spate of selection conventions they hope will be completed before the year ends.

The central issue discussed was the need to change the party's rules around selection conventions so as to avoid another expensive legal case such as the one taken by former minister John Perry before the last general election.

It would be unfair to say the Taoiseach has spent the last 100 days entirely focused on himself and his party, but the evidence does suggest he has put a big emphasis on the next election and the public relations side of politics.

Understandably, he wants to rebuild his party's brand after last year's election and believes the best strategy is to base the repositioning of Fine Gael around himself. But he should avoid creating a Republic of Opportunities for public relations companies who can deftly create Fine Gael messaging.

The summer is over and perhaps it's time to hang up the Lycra. People want to know what's in it for them, and polished messaging and spin will only get him so far until frustration builds. For now, it's best we hold off on the celebration plans for his 200th day in office until we see some nationally focused progress.
Jonathan Rhys Meyers' wife Mara Lane has shared the heartbreaking reason behind her husband's "intoxicated" appearance at Dublin Airport.

The Cork native was seen "staggering" around Dublin Airport and being cared for by airport police this week, according to The Mirror.

In a post on Instagram on Sunday, Mara shared that the couple had lost their second child and Jonathan (40) turned to alcohol to cope with the news.

"With much sadness, we open our hearts to share that J and I lost our second child, who was baking in the oven. Child was very very much wanted (right now especially by J, so he took the news particularly not so well) and we are still working with coping skills over here... when life throws us curve balls such as these," she wrote.

Expand Close Jonathan Rhys Meyers and fiancee Mara Lane. Picture: Instagram / Facebook

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"Depression is a real concern from past abuse as well as alcoholism which he was born with. He has been able to turn any ugliness and hurt in his life into art and is the strongest person I know. I do not know anyone who has been through what he has been through and reached his level of successes. It does seem though that every time we seem to be making so much progress... sometimes it's like two steps forward, one step back."

In the lengthy post, Mara discussed her husband's battle with alcoholism and depression and shared that he was denied hospital help twice in Ireland.

"Thank you family and friends and all of you lovely kind beautiful people who send us good energy and thoughts and support. It is so appreciated. I have so much love for you. To some others, my husband is an Irishman who battles alcoholism and depression and drank between jobs to try to cope with the sadness of this news.

"He is safe and with his sober living companion and bodyguard to get into a detox closer to home since he was denied hospital help twice in Ireland because of an already two month wait period. Life is life. Life is beautiful. Life is tough sometimes though so let's try not looking down at someone unless we intend on helping them up. Sending love to those in... Texas, Florida, India and Mexico with all the natural disasters going on. We are both so sensitive and the past couple of weeks have been so ouch in our hearts for all humans and animals affected. With Love, M&J."

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The couple, who secretly tied the knot last year, welcomed their first child Wolf in December 2016.
Prince George and Princess Charlotte walk with their parents, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, as they visit Airbus in Hamburg, Germany.Photo credit: Dominic Lipinski/PA Wire

Kate Middleton and Prince William present Princess Charlotte to the world on the steps of the Lindo Wing at St Mary's hospital in London

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge with Prince George and Princess Charlotte leave Warsaw, Poland, as they head to Germany

Prince George and his father the Duke of Cambridge on his first day at school at Thomas's Battersea (Richard Pohle/The Times/PA)

The Duchess of Cambridge arrives to visit the Gdansk Shakespeare Theatre on the second day of a three-day tour of Poland with her husband the Duke of Cambridge

Kate Middleton is reportedly planning on having a home birth for her third child.

The Duchess of Cambridge is said to be keen on the idea following the "problem free" births of Prince George and Princess Charlotte, reports The Mail on Sunday.

"The Duchess knew it wasnt possible for her first baby to be born at home, but she asked for a home birth for the second.

"Officials and doctors thought it was too risky. There was concern and in the end she decided against it," said a source.

Expand Close The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge arrive at Warsaw's Chopin Airport with Prince George and Princess Charlotte for the start of their five-day tour of Poland and Germany. Photo credit : Dominic Lipinski/PA Wire / Facebook

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Whatsapp The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge arrive at Warsaw's Chopin Airport with Prince George and Princess Charlotte for the start of their five-day tour of Poland and Germany. Photo credit : Dominic Lipinski/PA Wire

Welcoming the new arrival at Kensington Palace would allow Kate (35) to avoid greeting the paparazzi directly after the birth, which was the case with both George and Charlotte at St Mary's Hospital in London.

The Duchess, who is said to be less than 12 weeks pregnant, is suffering from hyperemesis gravidarum, a severe form of morning sickness, as she did with her two other pregnancies, and missed George's first day of school last week as a result.

The new baby will become the fifth in line to the throne behind George and Charlotte, pushing Prince Harry into sixth place.
Waves crash against the Southernmost Point in Key West, Florida (The Key West Citizen/AP)

President Donald Trump said "we may have been a little bit lucky" after Hurricane Irma veered from its original course and headed along Florida's west coast, instead of east.

He said that path might be less destructive.

The president said Irma will "cost a lot of money" but that he is most concerned at this point with saving lives.

Mr Trump commented hours after the nearly 400-mile-wide storm blew ashore early on Sunday in the Florida Keys, made landfall on Marco Island on the state's west coast and was barrelling toward Tampa, which has not suffered a direct hit from a major hurricane in nearly 100 years.

He also spoke before state and local officials had begun to assess the damage.

"We may have been a little bit lucky in that it went on the west and it may not have been quite as destructive, but we're going to see," Mr Trump said, addressing reporters after returning to the White House from Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland where he spent the weekend monitoring the storm.

"It's going to play out over the next five or six hours," said Mr Trump, who was accompanied by his wife, Melania.

Mr Trump deflected questions about the billions of dollars the government will be asked to spend to help communities in Florida and other affected states rebuild after Irma, saying "right now we're worried about lives, not cost".

Mr Trump on Friday signed a 15.3 billion US dollars measure to replenish accounts at the Federal Emergency Management Agency and speed federal assistance to victims of Hurricane Harvey, which struck southeast Texas and neighbouring Louisiana towns just three weeks ago.

The president made two trips to Texas after Harvey struck.

He said on Sunday that "we're going to Florida very soon".

Mr Trump said he would be having additional meetings on Sunday about coordination for the storm response.

The White House said Mr Trump had received a "comprehensive update" on Irma earlier Sunday while at Camp David that included details on her status, forecasted path, evacuations and preparations for response and recovery.

He thanked Fema and the Homeland Security Department, which oversees the agency, for their efforts, and encouraged officials to also stay focused on the post-Harvey recovery.

Mr Trump also spoke with the governors of Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina and Tennessee.

Forecasters warned that after churning up Florida's west coast, a weakened Irma could push into those states.

The National Weather Service on Sunday issued a first-ever tropical storm warning for Atlanta,

Florida governor Rick Scott said he also talked with Mr Trump on Sunday.

Vice President Mike Pence and several Cabinet secretaries who were at Camp David for Mr Trump's storm briefing later visited Fema headquarters.

"The people of Florida need to know that our hearts and our prayers and all of our efforts are with them and will be with them until this storm passes," the vice president said.

He said Irma was dangerous and life-threatening, and pleaded with people in the storm's path to "heed the warnings" of local officials.

"It's enormously important that every American in the path of this storm take the warnings of state and local officials to heart," Mr Pence said.

At the White House, Mr Trump described Irma as a "rough hurricane" and "some big monster" and said he was most concerned about its strength.

He said Fema has been "incredible" and that the US Coast Guard deserved "tremendous credit" for its storm response.

"If you talk about branding, no brand has improved more than the United States Coast Guard," said Mr Trump, a former businessman.

AP
Hundreds of children are believed to be buried in a mass grave at a former Catholic care home in Scotland, new reports reveal.

At least 400 children are believed to be buried in a section of St Marys Cemetery, in Lanarkshire, southern Scotland. It's understood that they were residents of a care home run by Catholic nuns.

The investigation, launched by BBC News in conjunction with the Sunday Post newspaper, focused on Smyllum Park Orphanage in Lanark.

They reported that the home cared for 11,600 children between 1864 and its closure in 198, namely orphans or children from broken homes.

The burial plot was discovered by former residents of the Smyllum Park in 2003. Frank Docherty and Jim Kane made the discovery while trying to prove the presence of institutional abuse in the home.

The Daughters of Charity of St Vincent de Paul, which ran the home, refused to comment on the findings reported today by the BBC and Sunday Post. They responded to the mens findings in 2003 by stating that children had been buried in 158 compartments in the graveyard.

Mr Docherty and Mr Kane, both of whom died earlier this year, believed the number was significantly higher.

The investigation by File on 4, a BBC radio show, and the Sunday Post confirms their theory and indicates that at least 400 children are buried in the plot.

It revealed that a third of those buried were aged five-years-old and under, with most deaths occurring between 1870 and 1930.

Several allegations of abuse at the care home were also uncovered, including beatings, punches, public humiliations and psychological abuse.

The revelations are similar to those of the Tuam mother and baby home, where it is thought nearly 800 babies and young children died and were buried in unmarked graves between the 1920s and 1960s.
Gibraltar's chief minister is keen to forge even stronger ties with the United Kingdom after Brexit.

Chief Minister Fabian Picardo said his goal after Britain leaves the European Union in 2019 is to "cement the relationship with the United Kingdom" in terms of both sovereignty and a commercial relationship.

Mr Picardo, speaking to the Associated Press, said he wants to "establish that bilateral relationship of trade to continue the morning after Brexit as if the single market between Gibraltar and the UK seamlessly moved from one moment to the next".

Gibraltar, a rocky outcrop at the tip of the Iberian Peninsula with 32,000 residents and a British territory, has strong economic connections with surrounding Spanish regions.

In last year's Brexit vote, 96% of Gibraltarians voted for Britain to remain in the EU.

Mr Picardo spoke on the 50th anniversary of the 1967 referendum when Gibraltar's inhabitants voted to remain a part of the UK and reject Spanish sovereignty.

Spain, however, has never relinquished its claim to Gibraltar, which has a strategic position at the entrance to the Mediterranean Sea, since ceding its control over Gibraltar to Britain in 1713.

Mr Picardo said he is hopeful Spain will not use the Brexit negotiations as an opportunity to re-exert control over the territory.

He welcomed what he called the "new realism" of Spanish foreign minister Alfonso Dastis.

"I think we have seen since the change ... a new realism emerge into the importance of Brexit for the whole European Union and for this region around Gibraltar of Spain in particular.

"That this is not a time to exploit opportunities to try and advance the sovereignty claim," Mr Picardo said.

"I think it is a time to preserve the ability of people in Spain to come and work in Gibraltar, the ability of people who work in Gibraltar to live in Spain, and to have that neutrality of interests recognised," he said.

Mr Dastis has said Madrid's position remains that Britain's control of Gibraltar "violates the territorial integrity of our country".

Negotiations between the EU and the UK regarding Britain's exit from the 28-country bloc are ongoing.

AP
Married in 1947, 94-year-old Helena residents Edward C. and Margaret R. Miller celebrated their 70th wedding anniversary Aug. 31, 2017, with a special dinner surrounded by family. Edward was born in Butte and grew up in Bozeman. Margaret was born in Columbus and spent her childhood years in the Columbus area by the Stillwater River. Both served in World War II; Edward in the Armys 69th Infantry in England, France, and Germany and Margaret in the Navy Waves on home soil.

After the war, both attended college at Montana State University. They met when seated next to one another in class. After that first shared class was over, Ed worked his charm, asked her to join him for a Coke and the rest is history. They made Helena their home in 1950 and raised their three children Deborah, Thomas and James in the house they built in the 50s and continue to live in to this day on Helenas west side.
So hungry: A Rohingya refugee stretches his arms out for food at Kutupalong, Bangladesh (AP)

Rohingya rebels, whose attack on Burma security forces last month triggered savage military reprisals, have declared a month-long truce as refugees continue to flood across the border into Bangladesh - and scant basic resources, hunger and illness.

The ragtag band of Muslim insurgents calling itself the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army issued the truce statement on its Twitter account and urged Burma's government to reciprocate in order to assist all victims regardless of their background.

The rebels, who say they are fighting to protect their minority members against government-sponsored persecution, launched their first known attacks last October and again on August 25.

According to Rohingya refugees, the military responded with indiscriminate killings, burning entire villages and forcing tens of thousands to flee.

The government said most of the 400 dead were "terrorists".

The United Nations said on Saturday that an estimated 290,000 Rohingya Muslims had arrived in the border district of Cox's Bazar in just the last two weeks, joining at least 100,000 who were already there after fleeing earlier riots or persecution in Buddhist-majority Burma.

The number was expected to swell further, with thousands crossing the border each day.

Fights were erupting over food and water.

Women and children were tapping on car windows or tugging at the clothes of passing reporters while rubbing their bellies and begging for food. Health experts warned of the potential for outbreaks of disease.

"More and more people are coming," said UNHCR spokeswoman Vivian Tan.

With camps already "more than full", the new arrivals were setting up spontaneous settlements on roadsides or any available patches of land.

Within the camps "we are trying our best, but it is very difficult because every day we are seeing new arrivals" with nowhere to go, Ms Tan said.

Many of the newly arrived were initially stunned and traumatised after fleeing the violence.

They are now growing desperate in searching for food distribution points that appeared only in recent days, passing out packets of biscuits and 55lb bags of rice.

One aid worker said stocks were running out, with the refugees' needs far greater than what they had imagined.

"It is impossible to keep up," she said.

At one food distribution point, women were volunteering to help keep order by tapping people with bamboo sticks to gently urge them back in line.

Weary women carried infants in their arms while clutching other children to their sides, afraid they might be separated in the crowds.

One 40-year-old man, faint with hunger, collapsed while waiting and could not stand again on his own strength when others tried to help him up. They drizzled water between his lips in an attempt to revive him, to no avail.

At one camp, a mobile clinic set up for the first time on Saturday had already seen 600 patients by the afternoon.

Patients, mostly children, were coming in with severe diarrhoea, fungal skin infections, ear infections and high fever, said Nasima Yasmin, the director of the clinic run by a well-known Bangladesh health group.

Ms Yasmin said their work was barely sufficient given the camp's scale and requirements.

"We need deep tube wells so that there is clean water and people can clean themselves. Also toilets are needed," she said, adding that the sheer number of newcomers raised fears of a serious outbreak of disease.

Refugee camps had already been filled to capacity before the influx.

Makeshift settlements were quickly appearing and expanding along roadsides, and the city of Cox's Bazar - built to accommodate only 500,000 - was bursting at its seams.

There was an urgent need for more temporary shelters, Ms Tan said.

"We are seeing the mushrooming of these very flimsy shelters that will not be able to house people for too long," she said.

The UN has asked Bangladesh authorities to make more land available so they can build new relief camps.

The US State Department said it was "very concerned" about the situation and praised Bangladesh for its "generosity in responding to this humanitarian crisis".

It's not known how many Rohingya remain in Rakhine state.

Previously the population had been thought to be roughly one million.

Journalists in Rakhine state saw active fires in areas Rohingya had abandoned, adding to doubts over government claims that Rohingya themselves were responsible for setting them.

AP
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BOZEMAN  Along the northeast edge of this college town, hidden in a hollow below the well-known M hiking trail on Mount Baldy, is a place with a fascinating history that is now making history.

The Bozeman Fish Technology Center was established in 1892, the same year that Thomas Edison received a patent for a two-way telegraph. Built atop a cold and hot spring, the facility was first conceived as a fish hatchery, a name old-timers still attach to the property.

At one time we had a lot of quarters out here because workers didnt want to drive five miles to Bozeman because the roads were so bad, said Bob Muth, director of the center.

Fish production began in 1897, with the resulting hatchlings noted as the first rainbow trout released in Yellowstone National Park. The hatchery was so unusual in this part of the country that Buffalo Bill Cody requested trout and arctic grayling for his Wyoming ranchs waters.

Native focus

From an initial $10,000 investment by Congress that purchased 50 acres and all water rights to the springs, the federal facility along the banks of Bridger Creek has expanded across 150 acres, employing about 40 people on an annual budget of about $1 million under the umbrella of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Were totally research now, since 1983, Muth said, Were one of seven across the country. All have a scientific mission.

The centers switch to research began in 1966, when trout production for stocking stopped and the facility was designated a Fish Cultural Development Center.

As it transitioned to strictly a technology center, the Bozeman facility initially focused on pallid sturgeon research, an endangered species that lives in the lower Missouri and Yellowstone rivers of Montana. To better understand the species, the centers scientists looked at its physiology, reproduction, behavior and stressors, led by researcher Molly Webb.

Were native species focused, Muth said.

From sturgeon the center has moved on to study other endangered and sensitive native species like westslope cutthroat trout, arctic grayling, razorback suckers, woundfin and the tailed frog tadpole. Current research is helping states like Utah with the recovery of endangered woundfin in the Virgin River and endangered June sucker by identifying optimal temperatures for spawning suckers and increasing production of woundfin for stocking.

In Montana the center has studied the inflow to Fort Peck Reservoir and how managing reservoir levels might help upstream populations of sturgeon survive. Research using large sewage mixing motors to create artificial current could help answer questions about how to build fish passage around dams on rivers like the Yellowstone that could someday allow pallid sturgeon to move upstream to spawn.

Variety

Although located across town, the Fish Health Center is a part of the tech center. It was the Fish Health Centers scientists who last year conducted lab work for Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks to help diagnose what was killing mountain whitefish in the Yellowstone River, an outbreak of proliferative kidney disease.

We get to dabble in a lot of different critters in a lot of different areas, Muth said.

In addition, the tech center has a lab for producing and studying hatchery fish foods made out of everything from soybeans to insects. Some of the staff pre-tests drugs prior to FDA approval. One student from Montana State University is studying how to improve fish passage for arctic grayling when streams get low in late summer.

Ive been doing it every day for a month now, said student Tyler Blue of his fish passage study. Im living and breathing it, even dreaming about it.

Mixed use

The grounds are also the home of the Montana Outdoor Science School, or MOSS, which conducts about 20 summer science programs for youngsters. So the fish ponds, lawn and nearby creek are often swarming with excited children playing in the water, feeding fish and learning lessons next to a teepee erected alongside the historic 1896 superintendents residence, which is still in use as office space.

Steel fish statues line the fish pond, and one smaller concrete pond next to Muths office contains fat trout that he joked are his pets. The green, shady grounds combined with the adjacent creek and ponds gives the area a relaxed park-like feel, despite the stringent scientific endeavors taking place just inside.

On some days the research does declare itself, like when the fish food production facility  overseen by the nationally known husband and wife team of Wendy Sealey and Gibson Gaylord  produces a strong stench reminiscent of low tide accompanied by a rotting fish carcass.

This is a noisy place when it gets cranked up, Muth said.

With the nearby M and Drinking Horse public trails so close, Muth said about 80,000 to 90,000 people a year are recreating in the area.

Center technology

Although the technology center is fairly compact, it costs about $160,000 a year just to pay the electric bill, Muth said, a fee that astounded him at first. That money mainly goes to power a series of water pumps. Since the springs flow can get fairly low in the summer, water is recycled several times through the facility.

Given that the building housing different fish sits on the banks of a free-flowing creek, strict controls are placed on purifying water that leaves the facility, as well as making sure that no fish can escape. Two quarantine rooms house any fish species that may be worrisome. The pipe that moves water back to the creek features a sink-like garbage disposal. Should any fish pass by all of the other control measures it would be ground into mush.

Nothing gets out alive, Muth said.

Because the water comes from a spring, the facility doesnt have to worry about diseases or impurities in the water it uses to raise or keep fish in, providing a healthier resource.

Progress

Inside the main laboratory the center has machines that allow it to track stress responses in the blood of fish, as well as to test a fishs sex and when it may be close to spawning.

All of the blood chemistry work we can do right here, its like a hospital, Muth said.

A hospital for fish, a laboratory for fish studies and a learning center for students of all ages: The surveyor who was paid $1,000 to locate a site in the West for the federal hatchery that would become the Bozeman Fish Technology Center couldnt possibly have imagined where knowledge and skill would take fisheries science 125 years later.

I love it here, Muth said. Its a lot of fun. There is a lot of stuff going on.
These kind of things don't happen in India. This is not my India. I want India to be progressive and kind, Rahman had said about the murder of Senior journalist Gauri Lankesh who was shot dead while she was entering home.

After the grieving incident took place, the entire nation was agitated and it still is, for such a harrowing incident took place. Question on the safety of the people in the country were raised for a woman was murdered to simply curb her voice down apparently.

dropr.com

Among others, who condemned the shocking incident was legendary musician AR Rahman, who said, "I am so sad about this. These kind of things don't happen in India. This is not my India. I want India to be progressive and kind.

His comments didnt go down well many people as they trolled him and criticised him for making such a statement. Some of the Twitter users even asked him to go to Pakistan.

tere gaane acche lagte the.. par theek hai pakistan chale jaa..  Rajesh Pantula (@pantularajesh) September 8, 2017

Then go to your Country!!  Shriram Kumar (@Kumar_Shri_Ram_) September 8, 2017

Till yesterday it was ur India which gave u fame and https://t.co/QPaOio8DLi one murder and its not ur India.cheapster.dats ur true color.  Bhanu Prakash Poddar (@bhanu_P_Poddar) September 8, 2017

I always think why there is no outrage, condensation from these bollywood stars when leftists , naxal sympathetic abuses india,hindus,PM  Avinash Singh (@avinashsingh81) September 9, 2017
After the tragic incident at Gorakhpur, more incidents of children dying in hospitals across the country are making headlines. In a similar incident, 55 children have been reported dead in the Nashik Civil Hospital in the month of August. Questions have been raised on the infrastructure in place to treat them.

The government officials have informed that the average mortality rate in the state of Maharashtra stands around 7% but the neonatal death rate is much higher. Activists have alleged between April and August this year, 187 children have died at the hospital. It has being claimed that most of the deaths took place because of absence of medical instruments, like ventilators, in the hospital.

representational image

The Deputy Director of the Directorate of Health Services, Dr Archana Patil, said: We are planning to expand the neonatal services in Nashik.

According to her, the hospital received critical newborn cases from nearby tribal and rural hamlets and has lower-than-required capacity. An official from the health department said that the babies are referred to low birth weight and lung infection in advanced stages.

There is no other neonatal intensive facility in Nashik forcing all corporation and sub-district hospitals to refer patients to the hospital. Patil added that 30-40 per cent of the neonatal deaths are due to low birth weight. Recently a meeting was held at Mantralaya to look into the matter at Nashik Civil Hospital. Nashik MLC Jayant Jadhav and Maharashtra Health Minister Dr Deepak Sawant were at the meeting, along with senior health department officials. Sawant is scheduled to visit the hospital on Monday.
A five-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a peon inside the premises of a private school in Shahdara in national capital, the police said.

The accused, identified as Vikas (40), has been arrested, said Nupur Prasad, Deputy Commissioner of Police, Shahdara.

Representational Image

The incident came a day after a seven-year-old boy had his throat slit for allegedly resisting sexual assault by a bus conductor of a Gurgaon school -- an incident which sent shock waves across the country.

Vikas had been working in the school for the last three years. Previously he worked as a security guard there, the police said.

He took the girl inside an empty classroom around noon yesterday when he was walking on the corridors after handing over lunch boxes to teachers, the police said.

After raping the girl, he threatened her of dire consequences, they added.

PTI/Representational Image

The girl later complained of bleeding and pain in her private parts to her mother. She was taken to a hospital where her medical examination confirmed sexual assault, the police said.

Traumatised by the incident, the 5-year-old was sent for counselling.

According to the police, the child said during counselling that she was assaulted by "a man wearing a cap" and also described his physical attributes.

It was on the basis of this description that Vikas was nabbed, the police said.
Gurugram police have arrested a bus conductor for murdering a 7-year-old student of Ryan International School hours after his body was found in a pool of blood with throat slashed. Police said the accused, identified as Ashok Kumar has admitted of the murder of Pradyuman Thakur after a sexual assault attempt.

According to police, the 42-year-old school bus conductor was stimulating himself inside the washroom when the boy walked in. Police suspect Kumar tried to disrobe the boy and force himself on him and struck him with the knife when the boy resisted.

Kumar had brought the knife from the bus's toolkit to clean it.

So vicious was the knife attack that it split open the left side of the boy's face from the ear to the throat. According to police the toilet when the Class II student was found dead was shared by students as well as bus drivers, conductors, and class 4 employees of the school.

Kumar was arrested after he was questioned based on CCTV visuals from the campus. Pradyuman's family is yet to come into terms with the tragic incident.

PTI

He waved at me and I waved back, Pradyuman's father Varun who dropped his son to school on Friday recalled.

Varun -a quality-control executive with a garment export company -had just reached home, walking distance from the school campus, when his wife received a call at 8.10am from school that Pradhyumn had been found injured.

PTI

"I had walked my daughter and Pradhyumn to the school gate, as I do every day. When I returned home, my wife got the phone call from Dudeja, from the school's landline number. We rushed out and, on our way, got a call from Dudeja again to say my son was in Artemis hospital. When we reached the hospital, he had died. Someone had killed my son,"Varun told the police.

As the news of the murder spread, panicked parents rushed to the school and protested demanding security for their children.

BCCL

This is not the first time Ryan International has been in the spotlight for student deaths. In February 2016 a six-year-old student, Devansh Kakrora, of Ryan International School, Vasant Kunj died after he allegedly fell into a water tank.
In a move that signals a new era of women's empowerment for the armed forces, newly-appointment Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Sunday flagged off an all-women Navy team in Panaji attempting to circumnavigate the globe.

For the first time ever, an all-women crew 'Navika Sagar Parikrama of the Indian Navy will embark on a global journey on an Indian sailing vessel INSV Tarini.

The crew would sail over many oceans to complete the mission. The entire distance will be covered in five legs and the team will stop at four ports for replenishment of ration and repairs, as necessary, a naval spokesperson said. The crew will have stop overs at various ports like: Fremantle (Australia), Lyttelton (New Zealand), Port Stanley (Falklands) and Cape Town (South Africa), the spokesperson said.

PTI

The circumnavigation is likely to be completed around March 2018.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi also wished luck to the ladies for the historic journey.

Share your good wishes & words of encouragement for the team of Navika Sagar Parikrama, on the NM App. https://t.co/c7sLBPuzYd  Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) 10 September 2017

The entire nation comes together in wishing the all-women team of Navika Sagar Parikrama the very best in their remarkable endeavour.  Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) 10 September 2017

Nirmala Sitharaman took charge of the defence ministry on September 7, becoming the first full-time woman Defence Minister of the country.

She took charge in the presence of her predecessor Arun Jaitley who was given the additional charge of the key ministry in March after Manohar Parrikar quit the union cabinet to become the chief minister of Goa.

Sitharaman was elevated to the cabinet rank on Sunday and given the defence portfolio.

A priest held prayers in the defence minister's chamber before she assumed charge.

PTI

Senior officials of the ministry were present and she briefly interacted with them after taking over as the minister.

She became the first full-time woman defence minister and the second woman to take charge of the key portfolio. Indira Gandhi, as then Prime Minister, had also held the portfolio in the seventies.

As the Defence Minister, Sitharaman will be a member of the crucial Cabinet Committee on Security whose members include the Prime Minister, the Home Minister, the External Affairs Minister and the Finance Minister.
When Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg lost her husband in 2015, CEO Mark Zuckerberg told her to take as much time off as she needed to cope with the loss. In doing so, he set off a new trend in HR policies  bereavement leave.

ihoosh.ir/Representational Image

Earlier this year, Sandberg, on her FB page, admitted how difficult it had been for her to join work immediately after the loss, and how much the leave had helped her cope. She then announced a 20-day bereavement leave for Facebook employees, the maximum any company offers as grief leave.

The Sandberg incident has had a ripple effect around the globe, including India. Now, several companies here offer anything from a day to five days off to mourn the passing of loved ones. These include majors such as Tata Consultancy Services, Infosys, Cipla and Hilton India. Earlier, an employee was expected to apply for privilege leave.

Thomas Kuruvilla, managing partner in Arthur D Little, a consultancy firm that offers three days of bereavement leave, says it was introduced to ensure that employees spend at least a few days with their families in their hour of crisis. "We consider the immediate family a part of our group," he said.

In most cases, bereavement leave covers only immediate family members (spouse, children, parents, siblings, grandparents, grandkids) and not extended relatives. In select cases, it includes pets too. "They are as much an immediate family," said Ahmed Aftab Naqvi, co-founder and CEO of Gozoop, a digital marketing company which offers pet bereavement leave.

Representational Image

While there is no law mandating bereavement leave as in the case of maternity leave, companies believe going the extra mile in such trying circumstances will help increase engagement with employees.

"A study conducted in 2017 has shown how organisations are increasing their overall benefit offerings to attract and retain top talent. And they are making compassionate leave part of paid time-off benefits," said Prabir Jha, global chief people officer of Cipla.

Along with providing time off, companies provide support to employees through counselling, if required, for their emotional well-being.

At Carlson Rezidor Hotel Group, the bereavement leave policy is also applicable to people who are on probation, said its CEO Raj Rana. The chain, which owns Radisson and Park Plaza brands, offers four days of paid grief leave in case of the death of an immediate family member or distant relative.

Representational Image

Some companies also consider flexi-timings or work-from-home options for bereaved employees. "We are sensitive to such requests during personal exigencies," said B Venkataramana, group president, human resources, Landmark Group, which runs the Lifestyle chain.

Nijo Simon, a 33-year-old manager with Lifestyle International who availed bereavement leave after the death of his father, found it really helpful. "It shows the organisation is sympathetic towards our needs," he said.
The school management of Ryan International School where seven-year-old Pradyumna Thakur was murdered on Friday was suspended its principal Neerja Batra. The police has nabbed the bus conductor who has confessed to his crime, but parents of the murdered child are demanding a school to be shut and its director Ryan Pinto to spend life behind bars.

Ryan school must be shut and Director Ryan Pinto must spend life behind bars. The school should be taught a lesson so that no one dares to play with a childs life again, victims mother Jyoti Thakur said.

The parents and the locals also threatened to burn down the school, if it opened on Monday. Unless there is action against the school authorities, we wont allow the institute to function, said Pramod, one of the protesting parents.

The murder which has sparked massive outrage from parents of the children and locals has turned into a big issue for police and school authorities with protesters threatening to burn down the school unless action is taken against the school authorities.

The school authorities too continue to remain unmoved by the colossal loss to the parents as none from the school attended the cremation of the murdered child.

Also, the preliminary postmortem report submitted to the police did not mention sexual assault, while reporting two injuries on the neck.

Gurugram Police Commissioner Sandeep Khirwar, who resumed the work after a 24-day leave, said a charge-sheet will be filed within seven days. Accused Ashok Kumar, 42, a school bus conductor has been sent into three-day police custody. The previous records of the accused are being scanned. He has confessed to have killed the child. He was inside the washroom when the child entered.

PTI

When the victim resisted his advances, Kumar slit his throat. He then washed his hands, cleaned the knife, threw it inside the washroom, and left. We have requested for a trial in a fast-track court, Khirwar said.

Meanwhile, HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar expressed concern over the death of the child.The incident is a warning to schools and the people. Justice will be served, he said.
After marching to 'Auld Lang Syne' at Chennai's Officers' Training Academy, 332 candidates broke ranks and hugged to celebrate becoming officers of the Indian Army. Among them were Swati Mahadik, wife of Colonel Santosh Mahadik who died fighting terrorists in Kupwara district of Jammu & Kashmir in November 2015, and Nidhi Misra, the widow of a Naik who died in 2009. Both were commissioned as lieutenants in the Ordnance Corps.

PTI

After her husband died, Swati would look at his uniform hanging in the wardrobe. "That inspired me to join the Army," she said. "I trained on a par with gentlemen cadets. Everything was the same. So I am waiting for the Army to allow us to take up combat roles," added Swati. Read More

1. After 7 YO Boy Murdered In Gurgaon School, 5-Yr-Old Girl Raped By Peon In Delhi School.

Representational Image

A five-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a peon inside the premises of a private school in Shahdara in national capital, the police said.

The accused, identified as Vikas (40), has been arrested, said Nupur Prasad, Deputy Commissioner of Police, Shahdara. The incident came a day after a seven-year-old boy had his throat slit for allegedly resisting sexual assault by a bus conductor of a Gurgaon school -- an incident which sent shock waves across the country.

Vikas had been working in the school for the last three years. Previously he worked as a security guard there, the police said. He took the girl inside an empty classroom around noon yesterday when he was walking on the corridors after handing over lunch boxes to teachers, the police said.

After raping the girl, he threatened her of dire consequences, they added. Read More

2. Police Arrest Bus Conductor Who Slit 7-Year-Old's Throat, Parents Want School Shut For Good

The school management of Ryan International School where seven-year-old Pradyumna Thakur was murdered on Friday was suspended its principal Neerja Batra. The police has nabbed the bus conductor who has confessed to his crime, but parents of the murdered child are demanding a school to be shut and its director Ryan Pinto to spend life behind bars.

Ryan school must be shut and Director Ryan Pinto must spend life behind bars. The school should be taught a lesson so that no one dares to play with a childs life again, victims mother Jyoti Thakur said.

The parents and the locals also threatened to burn down the school, if it opened on Monday. Unless there is action against the school authorities, we wont allow the institute to function, said Pramod, one of the protesting parents. Read More

3. DRDO's Third-Gen Anti-Tank Missile 'Nag' Completes Successful Tests At Pokhran Range

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Another home made missile has completed a successful test. This time it's the Nag anti-tank missile.

India's indigenously developed third generation anti-tank guided missile (ATGM) Nag has been successfully flight tested by premier defence research organisation DRDO in deserts of Rajasthan, marking completion of development trials. The defence ministry said Nag has been successfully flight tested twice by the DRDO against two different targets yesterday in Rajasthan. The missile can hit a target up to seven km.

"The ATGM Nag missile has successfully hit both the targets under different ranges and conditions with very high accuracy as desired by the armed forces," the ministry said. Read More



4. 18 Heartbreaking Images Show Horror Of Rohingya Crisis And How 150,000 Fled Myanmar In 2 Weeks

Reuters





In what is one of the biggest exodus of people in recent times, nearly 1.5 lakh Rohingya muslims have fled Myanmar to save themselves from the violence they face in the country. Most of them are ending up in neighbouring Bangladesh. Here's a look in pictures of what has the makings of the next big international humanitarian crisis. Read More

5. Chief Of Indian Air Force Calls China's Bluff, Says Airfields In Tibet Not Fit For Operations

PTI

China's posturing had always been a part of its psychological warfare against the neighbours. But the Chief of Air Staff, Air Chief Marshal B S Dhanoa has outed China.

Air Chief Marshal B S Dhanoa, said China maintains continuous air presence in Tibet but the airfields there lack requisite military infrastructure to carry out offensive operations.

Dhanoa also said India needs to concentrate and build infrastructure for operational efficiency in the northern and eastern sectors, even as the western border along Pakistan remains a challenge to internal security.

"China maintains continuous air presence in Tibet, they exercise their aircraft, the strength increases and decreases as per the prevailing exercise," he said. Read More
Maverick North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is celebrating the success of nuclear test carried out last week. He hosted big celebration to mark the success and also congratulated country's nuclear scientists, official news agency said on Sunday.

The United States and its allies had been bracing for another long-range missile launch in time for the 69th anniversary of North Koreas founding on Saturday, but no fresh provocations were spotted while the North held numerous events to mark the holiday.

Reuters

ALSO READ: After Hydrogen Bomb Test, Bolder North Korea Prepares To Launch Another Major Missile Strike

Throughout last week, South Korean officials had warned the North could launch another intercontinental ballistic missile in defiance of U.N. sanctions and amid an escalating standoff with the United States.

Washington told the U.N. Security Council on Friday to call a meeting on Monday to vote on a draft resolution establishing additional sanctions on North Korea for its missile and nuclear program.

Japanese Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera said it was vital to put pressure on North Korea through additional sanctions, including blocking or slowing its fuel supplies.

If we put firm pressure on North Korea such that it realizes it cannot develop missiles, it will accept dialogue and we can progress with diplomatic efforts, Onodera told public broadcaster NHK on Sunday. Unless we firmly apply pressure, North Korea will not change its direction.

Reuters

KCNA said Kim threw a banquet to laud the nuclear scientists and other top military and party officials who contributed to the nuclear bomb test last Sunday, topped with an art performance and a photo session with the leader himself.

KCNA did not specify when the banquet had been held, but analysts said it had likely been on Saturday.

Photos released on Sunday by KCNA showed the young leader breaking into a broad smile at the Peoples Theater with two prominent scientists: Ri Hong Sop, head of North Koreas Nuclear Weapons Institute, and Hong Sung Mu, deputy director of the ruling Workers Party of Koreas munitions industry department.

Ri and Hong have played vital roles in the Norths nuclear program, appearing at close distance to Kim during field inspections and weapons tests, including the latest nuclear test. Ri is a former director of Yongbyon Nuclear Research Center, North Koreas main nuclear facility north of Pyongyang, where Hong also worked as a chief engineer.

Reuters

North Korea had said the latest test was an advanced hydrogen bomb. There was no independent confirmation but some Western experts said there was enough strong evidence to suggest the reclusive state has either developed a hydrogen bomb or was getting very close.

Photos released on Sunday by KCNA showed the young leader breaking into a broad smile at the Peoples Theater with two prominent scientists: Ri Hong Sop, head of North Koreas Nuclear Weapons Institute, and Hong Sung Mu, deputy director of the ruling Workers Party of Koreas munitions industry department.

Ri and Hong have played vital roles in the Norths nuclear program, appearing at close distance to Kim during field inspections and weapons tests, including the latest nuclear test. Ri is a former director of Yongbyon Nuclear Research Center, North Koreas main nuclear facility north of Pyongyang, where Hong also worked as a chief engineer.

North Korea had said the latest test was an advanced hydrogen bomb. There was no independent confirmation but some Western experts said there was enough strong evidence to suggest the reclusive state has either developed a hydrogen bomb or was getting very close.

Reuters

Ri and Hongs roles have also been noted overseas, prompting the United Nations, the United States or South Korea to blacklist them.

Aside from the elite, rank-and-file North Koreans also commemorated the anniversary on Saturday by visiting the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun, which houses the embalmed bodies of founding father Kim Il Sung and his son and successor Kim Jong Il.

KCNA said service personnel and civilians, including children, laid floral baskets and bouquets at the statues of the deceased leaders across the country, while enjoying art performances and dancing parties.

(Inputs have been taken from Reuters)
A mans body was found in the Bitterroot River near Lolo Saturday morning, according to the Missoula County Sheriffs Office.

Sheriffs were dispatched to a report of a body in the river at 10:30 a.m., MCSO spokesperson Brenda Bassett said.

The county coroner is not releasing the name of the 65-year-old man recovered from the river near Riverside Park until the family is notified.

The coroner said in a statement the death does not appear suspicious, but an autopsy will be performed at the Montana State Crime Lab.
Pollution is a pressing issue across the globe. As we stand at the edge of a situation that's pushing us into deep predicaments related to climatic change and global warming, there's no shame in accepting that various forms of pollution have contributed to it in million ways.

TOI

Nicola Sturgeon, the current First Minister of Scotland and leader of the Scottish National Party has outlined a plan for Scotland where petrol and diesel cars won't be there in 2032.

Really exciting to hear @NicolaSturgeon announce plans to phase out new petrol and diesel cars in 15 years. #oorfuture  WWF Scotland (@WWFScotland) September 5, 2017

As promising as it may seem, if this plan comes to execution then Scotland will undergo a massive revamping to expand electric charging points and programs for people to uptake electric vehicles.

"Our aim is for new petrol and diesel cars and vans to be phased out in Scotland by 2032," Sturgeon said.

Earlier in July, the British government also announced that they will stop the production of petrol and diesel cars by 2040.

"Poor air quality is the biggest environmental risk to public health in the UK and this government is determined to take strong action in the shortest time possible," said a government spokesman at the time.

Scotland Daily

"That is why we're providing councils with new funding to accelerate development of local plans, as part of an ambitious 3 billion ($3.9bn) programme to clean up the dirty air around our roads." he further added. Scotland has been facing a serious case of deaths due to indoor and outdoor pollution and the pollution emitted by diesel and petrol cars partly to blame. Scotland accounts for less than 10 percent of the British car market.

Prior to the UK, France has already banned sales of petrol and diesel cars by 2040. With so many countries already planning ahead of India, where do you see yourself in the next 3 decades? Will India pursue the same strategy? Will India mull over the situation that's causing several premature deaths? Will India curb pollution by banning the production?

Let's wait and see!
Politician, acclaimed writer of 16 best-selling books, brilliant orator and the god of witty wordplay, Shashi Tharoor is back with his badassery.

Youtube

This time again, the full-time MP from Keralas Thiruvananthapuram, slayed it with his crisp facts on how Britains drained India's wealth.

Tharoor, who was part of Australian channel ABC News Q&A, was asked about where a man from the audience asked him if Indians should be thankful to the British for imparting knowledge in the field of engineering, infrastructure and education.

In his 2015 speech at Oxford, Tharoor explained the sschematics of the economic toll that British rule took on India and he did it yet again.

In response to the question about engineering developments India has seen, Tharoor said, "All the Indian Institutes of Technology, the engineering achievements you're talking about were established after independence by the Government of India."

Over 200 years of exploitation, depredation, loot and destruction, reduced it to a poster child for third-world poverty, just over three percent of global GDP, 90% of the population living below the poverty line when the British left in 1947, Tharoor responded, while talking about how the British plundered India.

He went to say that education was the last thing on the British colonialists minds and that they left India with nothing at all.

Catch the entire part conversation after 44:55 in the video.
Governor of Ogun State, Ibikunle Amosun, has described the Minister for Women Affairs and Social Development, Aisha Alhassans open declaration for the political aspiration of former Vice President Atiku Abubakar as a disappointment.

Speaking to journalists in Abeokuta on Saturday, Mr. Amosun, while saluting Mrs. Alhassans courage, said it was misplaced.

Though she is entitled to her own opinion at any point in time, she should have just resigned her appointment because her loyalty cannot be in two places. Her falling short of resigning, takes everything away from what she said and it is clear that she will no longer be contributing to the development of the present administration, he added.

Speaking on whether or not the president would run for 2019 Presidential election, the governor said, the only thing that can prevent President Muhammadu Buhari from contesting is if his health cannot take it.

If not for this present administration, only God knows where Nigeria would have been. When the government came on board, it was like jumping into the pool at the deep end, the governor said.

He scored the federal government high in its fight against insurgency, insecurity, corruption as well as efforts at economic recovery through serious diversification drive.

The federal cabinet member, popularly called Mama Taraba, had during the week stirred the hornets nest when she said she would support the bid of the former vice president for the presidency in 2019 even if Mr. Buhari decides to recontest.

Her comments had subsequently drawn flak from two prominent members of her party, the All Progressive Congress, APC: the Kaduna State Governor, Nasir El-Rufai and the North-west chairman of the party, Inuwa Abdulkadir, who said she had never been a Buhari supporter.

Source: ( Premium Times )
Nigerians have began to react to the statement made by the Minister of Women Affairs, Aisha Alhassan, to support former vice president, Atiku Abubakar, in 2019 Presidential elections, the latest to react to the statement is the leader of the All Progressives Congress, APC.

The official also criticised Mr. Abubakar, who recently said that he had been sidelined in party affairs.

The APC National Vice Chairman, North-west, Inuwa Abdulkadir, in a statement said he was not surprised by the statement noting that Mrs. Alhassan had never been a supporter of the president.

Mr. Abdulkadirs statement aligns with that of the Governor of Kaduna State, Nasir El-Rufai, who also said yesterday that Mrs. Alhassan had never supported the Buhari ideology.

Mr. Abdulkadir also warned leaders of the party, particularly, the former vice president to stop misleading statements aimed at causing division within the party.

Source: ( Premium Times )
Six herdsmen abducted by Boko Haram insurgents at Kamuya community of Yobe State have been rescued by the Nigerian Army on Saturday.

This was confirmed in a statement signed by Brig. Gen. Sani Kukasheka, he said that the rescued herdsmen were re-united with their families.

Kukasheka said that the troops had killed two insurgents and recovered ammunition after a gun duel with the insurgents.

On Friday 8th September 2017, at about 7.30 a.m. troops of Defence Company, 27 Brigade Nigerian Army, on Operation LAFIYA DOLE deployed at Kamuya, Yobe State, received report from some herdsmen that suspected Boko Haram terrorists abducted six persons from their village.

The troops in conjunction with local vigilante familiar with the area trailed the terrorists up to Mangari village about 20 kilometres away from Kamuya.

The troops exchanged fire with the insurgents, neutralized two of them and rescued the abducted persons. The troops also recovered two AK-47 rifles. The rescued persons have been reunited with their family, Kukasheka said.

Source: ( PM News )
The Peoples Democratic Party has told Nigerians that President Buhari will have nothing to show to Nigerians as his achievement in 2019.

It, however, welcomed his reported decision to re-contest, saying the President and his party would be defeated at the poll.

National Publicity Secretary of the National Caretaker Committee of the party, Prince Dayo Adeyeye, stated this in an interview with SUNDAY PUNCH.

He said, We will defeat him because he has nothing to show. PDP will challenge him and his party in the election and the PDP will win on the account that he has not performed.

The records are there for all to see. What would they use to campaign to Nigerians? Where are the projects? Nothing.

The PDP also said the comment by Alhassan that she would abandon Buhari for Atiku in 2019 was an indication that the President had been adjudged to be incompetent.

It said if the minister who has been working with the President for the past two years could make such a pronouncement, then Nigerians should know that they have a president that doesnt deserve a second term.

Source:( Punch Newspaper )
The Coalition of Niger Delta Agitators have said it will turn its back on President Buhari if he decides to run for a second term in office.

This was disclosed by the leader of the coalition, John Duku, he said rather than support Buhari, it would back any candidate that would address issues affecting the development of the Niger Delta region.

The militant leader recalled that some of the agitators expressed their support for Buhari during the 2015 election, but added that the challenges of the oil-rich region had not been addressed.

He said, We will not give him support (for a second term). Even if we have given a group the mandate to discuss on our behalf, we will not support his second term bid and that is the truth.

We will support a candidate that will promote Niger Delta issues, a candidate that has the same understanding and feeling like the late Umaru YarAdua had for the Niger Delta region. He (Yaradua) worked with us.

But we dont think the President is interested in a second term because there are a lot of lapses in his first term. We cannot score him (President Buhari) up to 40 per cent in terms of performance.

There are a lot of issues that his government has not addressed. He is not strong enough to run for a second term; that is how we see it. I dont think he will declare for a second term, Duku said.

Source: ( Punch Newspaper )
The Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB ) has decided not to support President Muhammadu Buhari saying he doesnt deserve a second term.

According to MASSOB National Director of Information, Samuel Edeson, who spoke to SUNDAY PUNCH on Saturday, said Buharis administration brought hardship to the people.

Edeson said, We Biafra agitators dont believe in Nigerian politics, we want our own country, but nevertheless, President, Buhari, does not deserve a second term.

His government has made life difficult for the people  the masses are suffering, people are complaining of hardship and nothing has been done to make things better for the common man.

During the administration of Goodluck Jonathan, a bag of rice sold for N8,000 but today a bag of foreign rice is N28,000, the pump price of fuel has risen to N145, and it is like that in any other sectors of the economy.

Things are hard for the people and we believe the policies of the Federal Government contributed to the hardship.

No reasonable person will support Buhari for a second term; anybody that supports his second term bid is an enemy of the people.

Source: ( Punch Newspaper )
Operatives of the Police have been arrested a man in Abuja for setting a nine-room apartment on fire after his brother committed suicide.

Babatunde Bello, a 31-year old generator repairer, set the building on fire at about 8.40 a.m on Saturday at the Bakery area of Kurudu, a satellite village in the Federal Capital Territory.

According to Simeone Chijoke, one of the tenants in the apartment, eight families apart from Mr. Bello lost all their properties as the fire spread swiftly and completely razed down the building.

The tragedy began on Wednesday evening when Babatundes brother, Ismaila, took seriously ill and started vomiting. He later confessed to have ingested rat poison because he was tired of life.

Ayobami Oni, a tenant in the neighbourhood who was an acquaintance of the Bello brothers, said co-tenants quickly gave Ismaila palm oil to drink as a heavy downpour at the time made it impossible to take him to an hospital for emergency medical care.

He said they, however, took him to the Karshi General Hospital early Thursday morning where he died at about 9 a.m.

The co-tenants said Babatunde was living alone in one of the rooms in the apartment until late 2015 when Ismaila, 33, arrived from Ibadan and the two brothers started living together.

At a point this year, the brothers quarreled and Ismaila, who was unemployed, had to temporary move out of the room.

According to Mr. Oni, one of the tenants, Mr. Chijoke, later introduced Ismaila to an hotel (Zuma Hotel) in Mararaba where he was engaged in the laundry section.

After the hotel did not pay him for three months, he quit the job and I had to introduce him to a newspaper distributor who engaged him as a vendor, said Mr. Chijoke.

After Ismaila confessed to have taken rat poison on Wednesday, his brother refused to take part in our efforts tosave his life, said Mr. Chijoke, who also runs a small provision shop attached to the razed building.

He said Ismaila had decided to commit suicide because he had used N7,000 he realized from newspaper sales to playNaijabet and had no way of paying back the money to the newspaper distributor. He said we should leave Ismaila to die since that was what he had decided to do.

However, after we returned from the hospital on Thursday and told him that Ismaila had died, Babatunde started crying,saying he felt responsibility for his elder brothers suicide.

When they took Ismailas remains for burial later on Thursday, Babatunde did not follow them.

At about 8.40 a.m. however on Saturday, we suddenly noticed heavy smoke emitting from Babatundes room. We immediately saw tongues of fire and heard him shouting that we should remove our children from the house, narrated Mr. Chijoke.

Babatunde had doused his room in petrol and set fire to it. Everyone in the building scampered out because thicksmoke and fire quickly took over the whole house.

I couldnt even remove a pin from my room. I dont have anything apart from this sport pant and singlet I am wearing,Mr. Chijoke said.

Babajide Coker, the pastor of a church three houses from the apartment, said he was meeting with members of his church when he heard a commotion and all of them rushed towards the source.

Two families who are members of my church live in the building. When I got there, the fire was all over the building and I saw some people trying to restrain Babatunde from running into the burning compound.

We dragged him to the church but he was all the while trying to break loose. We took him into the childrens room, but when he grabbed the DVD Player and slammed it on his own head, shouting that he had to kill himself, we knew we had to quickly call in the police, Mr. Coker said.

A police officer living close by called his office on phone and we had to pin Babatunde down until officers arrived to take him away.

He was later taken away to the Jikwoyi Police Station about two kilometres away from the scene of the incident.

Source: ( Premium Times )
Northern governors who are members of the All Progressives Congress on Saturday have given President Muhammadu Buhari full support for contesting the 2019 election.

They spoke just as the Special Adviser to the President on Social Media, Lauretta Onochie, said on Twitter on Saturday that, Were working on Buharis return to power in 2019.

The development came barely 48 hours after the Minister of Women Affairs, Aisha Alhassan, vowed to ensure the realisation of the presidential ambition of a former vice president, Atiku Abubakar, instead of Buhari in 2019.

She had said, If am to choose between Atiku and Buhari if both contest the forthcoming 2019 presidential election, I will support Atiku.

Her declaration made the Kaduna State Governor, Nasir El-Rufai, to declare in an interview with State House correspondents that APC governors and ministers would support Buharis re-election in 2019.

El-Rufai said Alhassan did not believe in President Buharis political ideology and that she voted against the President during the APC presidential primary.

Source: ( Punch Newspaper )
Governor of Kaduna State ,Nasir el-Rufai, on Saturday in Ibadan, Oyo State capital, has said Nigeria needs to policed adequately.

He said the development posed a serious concern to the nations central policing policy.

El-Rufai spoke at the 2017 Founders Day Celebration in memory of Prof. Ojetunji Aboyade, which was organised by the Development Policy Centre.

At the event were the Chairman of the occasion, Prof. Oladipo Akinkugbe; the first female Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Folake Solanke; the host, Prof. Bimpe Aboyade; and lead speaker, Prof. Sam Olofin.

The theme of this years event was titled, Achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

The governor said Nigeria lacked sustainable national planning policy capable of helping its development

He added that it was important to ensure that the Federal Character policy did not become an enemy of merit in Nigeria.

El-Rufai said, It is obvious that Nigeria is severely under-policed, and will require more personnel, intelligence assets, better training, technology and equipment for its security agencies for the country to be a credible guarantor of security.

Even if these were to be available, it is also debatable whether a single centralised policing system, structure and staffing for 200 million citizens is viable in a diverse, multi-lingual, multicultural and multiethnic nation like Nigeria.

To complement the pursuit of the Sustainable Development Goals, we must have discourse about the imperative of a project dedicated to enabling equal opportunity so that the circumstances of a citizens birth dont determine his or her ceiling in life.

How can we promote a national subscription to meritocracy? How can we ensure that the imperative of reflecting Federal Character does not become the enemy of merit and quality in appointments? We dont have a national plan and if we dont plan, we are planning to fail.

The governor added that because the country got easy money from oil, it had lost initiative on how to develop other sources of revenue and diversify the economy.

Having suffered brain drain, how do we bring back Nigerians in the Diaspora?

These are the questions a distributive mentality around easy oil revenues is dodging. The earlier the oil dries up the better for our national ability to think, be innovative and respect intellect and academic achievement.

We get easy money. We do not collect taxes and our taxes are six per cent of Gross Domestic Product; that is an average of 21 per cent. We have stopped respecting the intellectuals in our universities, he said.

In her address, Solanke called on the Federal Government to deliberate on a policy that will deliver Nigeria from the free oil money syndrome.

She hinted that the coming of electric cars would drastically reduce the use of fuel to power vehicles and other auto systems.

Source: ( Punch Newspaper )
A Northern elder, Junaid Mohammed has given his support to the minister of women affairs, Senator Aisha Alhassan popularly knows as Mama Taraba, for her comments endorsing Atiku for the 2019 election.

The northern elder stated that there is nothing wrong with the ministers comment, even as he alleged that there are many ministers in the Federal Executive Council who share the same view with Taraba-born Alhassan. What the minister has said is nothing new but the truth.

Others in the cabinet of Buhari have been making such statements but in hushed tones. It is only that Alhassan had the courage and boldness to speak out and people should not chastise her because she has nothing to lose by staying or leaving Buharis cabinet, Mohammed told Vanguard.

He went on to say the ministers comment was a demonstration of her frustration with the Buhari government, adding that many people from her home state of Taraba, who worked with her to install the Buhari government, have not been given any serious attention by the government. His words: It is clear that like Senator Alhassan, most of those from the Taraba axis who worked to bring about the administration of Buhari are disappointed and they can only voice out their frustration through the minister, who has nothing to lose either by staying or leaving the government. He however stated that the minster should have resigned before openly expressing support for Atiku who he advised to try and add more integrity to his political menu before seeking to rule Nigeria. Mohammed went on to say Atiku needs to prove to Nigerians that he has as much integrity as President Muhammadu Buhari before Nigerians particularly, those from the North, would vote for him in any election. According to him, the former vice president does not command the respect President Buhari has in the north, adding that in spite of Atikus financial resources, he could not match the president politically. Abdulkadir, while speaking to journalists at the APC national secretariat on Friday, September 8 also said that Mama Taraba was trying to blackmail the president with her recent statement endorsing the vice president for the 2019 election.

Source:( Naij.com )
The Benue State Police Command have arrested a 49-year-old Nigerian man identified as Clement Silver has been arrested for faking his own kidnap in a bid to fraudulently obtain one million naira from his wife.

This plan was set in motion to swindle his wife, Silver who lives at Odozi Street in Agbor despite being from Benue was arrested by some members of the Agbor Gha-Ihun security at the spot where he was hiding with his accomplice, Sunday Kibechukwu. Both men were picked up beside CamelitePaint in Agbor, Delta state.

The 49-year-old man confessed to the crime stating his intention was to make his wife pay the ransom as this would him fuel his betting activities with Bet Naija. Silver worked as a security officer with UBA in Agbor before he was retrenched last year. Since then, he has been actively involved in the lottery and betting business. His wife reportedly runs a poultry business.

He also confessed to working with Kibechukwu to plan the kidnap as he had the intention of paying his wife back. He said he was assured that she would not give him the money. This made him stage his own kidnap and make her pay it nevertheless.

His accomplice on the other hand said Silver lured him into the deal stating he assured him he would return the money to her afterwards. The man who hails from Aniocha north local government area of Delta said Silver also promised to give him N10,000 to treat an injury he sustained while working at a bakery in Boji-Boji Owa.

The kidnap was done with Silvers wife contacted; they demanded for a ransom of N1m which was to be dropped along Benin/Asaba expressway in Umunede.
The Nigerian army on Sunday allegedly invaded the home of the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Nnamdi Kanu, barely 24 hours after it announced the start of its second phase of Operation Python Dance II in the South-Eastern states.

DAILY POST, however, gathered that the military personnel, who stormed Kanus home with an armoured vehicle were resisted by some members of the pro-Biafra group.

Some IPOB were reportedly shot in the process.

According to the spokesman of IPOB, Emma Powerful, about five youths were killed and about 30 were injured.

The Hausa Fulani soldiers and Police Nigerian uniforms came to kill our leader Mazi Nnamdi Kanu in his compound at Afaraukwu Umuahia and started shooting sporadically and killed five people and up to thirty people with bullets wounds, after attacking our people they went off, they came with 5 hilux vans, he said.

Every effort made to obtain reaction from the Nigerian Army failed as the Deputy Director, Army Public Relations, 82 Division, Enugu, Colonel Sagir Musa did not pick all the calls put across to his mobile line.

Earlier, the Igbo National Council (INC) gave the Chief of Army staff, Lieutenant General Tukur Burutai, a 21-day ultimatum to end the recently launched Operation Python Dance II and withdraw his men from the Southeast region.

If this is not adhered to within twenty one days (21) the Igbo National Council, INC, will petition and also sue the Nigeria Army and the Federal government, to International Criminal Court, ICC, for genocide against the armless people of the southeast Nigeria, INC said.

See video below

Source  (Dailypost)
The Federal High Court in Lagos southwest Nigeria has received an application from the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) seeking the permanent forfeiture of the sums of N664,475,246.6, $137,680.11 and property it recovered from the Permanent Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Labour and Productivity, Dr Clement Illoh Onubuogo, to the Federal Government.

The anti-graft agency had on August 17, secured an order of temporary forfeiture of the money, a property described as Clement Illohs Mansion located at Ikom Quarters, Issala-Azegba in Delta State and a hotel at No. 19, Madue Nwafor Street, off Achala Ibuzo Road, Asaba, Delta State, to the Federal Government.

In making the order, the then vacation Justice Abdul-Azeez Anka, directed the EFCC to notify the permanent secretary, in whose possession the property were found, to appear before the court and show cause within two weeks why they should not be permanently forfeited to the Federal Government.

The judge equally ordered the commission to publicize the interim orders in any national daily to allow any interested party appear before him to show cause within two weeks why the order should not be made permanent.

However, at the resumed hearing of the matter before another vacation judge, Justice Chuka Obiozor, on Friday ,EFCCs lawyer, Rotimi Oyedepo, disclosed that a motion seeking the final forfeiture of the money and property to the Federal Government has been filed.

He further disclosed that the motion brought pursuant to Section 17 (4) of the Advance Fee Fraud and Other Fraud Related offences Act has been served on the permanent secretary, who he said is yet to file a counter-affidavit.

He had earlier told the court that, as directed by Justice Anka, the EFCC had published the interim order on August 23.

In his response, Clements lawyer, T. S. Awhana, while acknowledging the receipt of the motion for final forfeiture, said he had already filed a counter-affidavit against it.

The lawyer added that he had equally filed a notice of preliminary objection challenging the courts jurisdiction to make the interim order.

According to him, it was improper for the commission to come before the Lagos court when all transactions leading to the suit were conducted in Abuja.

Awhana also informed the court of the pendency of another application seeking to discharge the interim order which he claimed was fraudulently obtained by the EFCC.

He claimed that an attempt by a courts bailiff to serve the processes on the EFCC was unsuccessful as an official of the commission he met at its official refused to accept the court papers.

The matter was consequently adjourned to September 22, to allow for exchange of processes between parties.

The anti-graft agency had on August 17, secured an order of temporary forfeiture of N664,475,246.60 and $137,680.11 found in account belonging to the serving Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Labour and Employment, Clement Illoh Onubuogo and 15 other persons suspected to be proceeds of unlawful activity.

The court also ordered that two properties in Delta state alleged to have been acquired and developed with proceeds of unlawful activity to wit :stealing should also in the interim be forfeited to the Federal Government of Nigeria.

The order of the court was sequel to an action in rem with affidavit of urgency in support of the motion ex -parte filed and argued before the court by Economic and Financial Crimes Commissions counsel Mr Rotimi Oyedepo Iseoluwa.

In an affidavit in support of the motion ex -parte sworn to by an operative of the EFCC Huleji Abraham Tukura, the deponent averred that the special task force of the anti graft agency received an intelligence report against Clement Illoh Onubuogo that funds meant for various SURE-P programs under the Federal ministry of Labour and Employment were stolen, diverted and converted to personal use.

The said intelligence report was analyzed and found worthy of investigation, the investigation of the commission revealed that Clement Illoh was a serving Permanent Secretary, Federal ministry of Labour and Employment who was saddled with the responsibility of the supervision of SURE-P Viz SURE-P Technical and Vocational Educational Training and Community Service Women and youth empowerment programs among others under his ministry.

T

The Federal Government of Nigeria released over N10b which he superintendent. Out of this amount, the commission traced total sum of N876,981,225.05 to him which he converted to his personal use, from the fictitious and fraudulent contract to his company Clement & Bob Associate which he used to fraudulently enrich himself to the tune of N94,829,845.60 ,funds which were meant for the SURE-P programme. He also used his position to receive kick back /gratification from various contracts under the SURE -P program using his staff and front companies.

From kickbacks received he made cash payment into Clement & Bob Associate account number 1013449507 using fictitious names to the tune of N81,110,250.00.,while he received the total sum of $600,000 USD proceed of unlawful activity which he converted to N103,200,000.00 and paid into the Same company account.

Mr Takura averred further that, Clement Illoh awarded a contract to one of his companies Ojeagu Farms Limited where he is a Director and sole signatory account of the company, in respect of this company, he converted the sum of N90million to his personal gain and made further cash deposits totaling N9,968,000.00 into the account using fictitious names.

He received another sum of N37,802,000.00 which was diverted through Agoha Joseph Emeka a staff of Federal ministry of Labour and Employment for his personal gain.

Through Ojeagu Global service, a company owned by his family converted the sum of N159,770,383.45.and,through undeclared Access bank and undisclosed accounts fraudulently concealed the sum of N123,000,000.00.

S
Two suspected money ritualists have been apprehended by men of the Nigeria police in Oyo state with human flesh.

Luck has ran out on two suspected money ritualists after they were caught with human flesh in Oyo state by the police. The two suspected ritualists were identified as Murtala Aliyu (30) and Saheed Raji (40).

The state police commissioner, Mr Abiodun Odude said the Federal Highway Patrol team on a stop and search along Ogbomoso-Ilorin Highway, first arrested Aliyu in a commercial vehicle around 6:20p.m. on August 9, with a piece of flesh suspected to be human part.

Aliyu, an Arabic teacher, later confessed he was given the flesh by Raji for money rituals; the second suspect was subsequently arrested at Idumota in Lagos State, Odude said.

In his confessional statement, Raji, a herbs seller in Idumota, said he contracted the Arabic teacher (Aliyu) to help him make charms that would make him record faster sales.

Also, a fake UCH medical doctor was apprehended by men of the police in the state. Parading the suspects, Odude promised that policemen would continue to work towards ensuring peace and tranquility in the state.

Speaking during the parade of the suspected criminals at the state police headquarters, Eleyele, Ibadan, Mr Odude said the 40-year-old fake medical doctor, Orimisan, had been parading himself as a staff of the University College Hospital (UCH), Ibadan.

The suspect, who claimed to be knowledgeable in curing some ailments through herbs, had been obtaining money from owners of chemist shops in Ibadan under the guise of checking for fake drugs.

The suspect had gone to a drug store at Abanla village in Idi-Ayunre, in Oluyole Local Government Area of the state and fraudulently collected some drugs and money.

A report was thereafter made to the Idi-Ayunre Police Division, which eventually led to his arrest.

Further investigation carried out by detectives attached to the Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department (CIID) revealed that the suspect was expelled from the Delta State University College of Medicine due to his poor academic performance.

Items recovered from him included a fake Nigeria Medical Association (NMA) identity card, a stethoscope, a pair of white overall and some certificates suspected to have been forged or stolen, the police commissioner said.

However, while speaking, the suspect-Orimisan, said he was invited to Abanla village to treat a lady, and after he was done, he saw a patent medicine store owner and went there, introducing himself as a staff of UCH, and that he had been sent to check the validity of their drugs.

The lady then invited the police, and that was how I was arrested, Orimisan said.

On the certificates found with him, the suspect said they belonged to some of his friends, who were searching for jobs at the UCH, and that was how he had possession of the certificates.

According to Tribune , the suspect admitted that after he left the Delta State University College of Medicine, he travelled to Kumasi, Ghana, to learn herbal medicine for two years, and he became a specialist in treating fibroid, arthritis, hernia, among other illnesses.

He said it was the devil who made him approach the medicine store owner on the day he was arrested, claiming he was a medical doctor. The police commissioner said that all the suspects would be charged to court upon completion of investigation into their cases.
St-Eustache, QC, Sunday (September 10, 2017): The twelfth round of the 2017 NASCAR Pintys Series took place last evening at Autodrome St. Eustache just outside of Montreal. Donald Theetge brought the Circuit Acura/ Le Soliet/LAntidote Dodge across the line in second while Alex Tagliani in the #18 EpiPen/Lowes Dodge managed a tenth place finish.

During the practice session, early in the day the team found out Tagliani was suffering from a back problem. He managed to get in the car and while in considerable pain he was relatively happy with the set up of the car. Theetge was able to find some speed in his #22 entry and was third quickest. They followed this up with qualifying later in the afternoon with Theetge third and Tagliani ninth fastest.

At the drop of the green flag for the Lucas Oil 250 Theetge settled into the top three quickly while Tagliani continued to maintain a top ten position. The first caution of the race took place at lap 49 and Crew Chief Tyler Case brought Tagliani to pit road for fuel. Crew Chief Randy Steckly elected to leave his driver Theetge on the track a move that gave him the lead spot. There was another caution immediately following then the remaining 174 laps were run under green. The teams fully expected additional caution periods so they could bolt on some new tires for their drivers, but the race went the green for the remaining distance. When the checkered flag waved Alex Labbe had lapped the entire field except for second place finisher Donald Theetge who posted his second podium finish of the year.

Tagliani struggled during the event and posted a 10th place finish.

We had a good day today and we set up the car for the race knowing it would get colder and that paid off for us today, said Theetge. We changed a lot of things before the feature and that was good as well. I think we lost a lot of time behind the #74 but that was the plan, being patient and without caution I was afraid I would run out of gas. But Randy said to go ahead and try to pass Lacroix but then with 50 laps to go he asked me to save fuel. The team did a great job and I am happy with second place. I think we will have a shot at the win in two weeks at Jukasa.

The Lucas Oil 250 presented by Bumper to Bumper and Coors Light will air on TSN on Saturday, Sept. 16 at 2 p.m., and on RDS on Saturday, Oct. 7 at 3 p.m.

The final race of the 2017 NASCAR Pintys series season will take place on Saturday Sept. 23 at Jukasa Motor Speedway (formerly Cayuga). For tickets and schedule information please visit www.jukasamotorspeedway.com

Follow the 22 Racing Team on social media for behind the scenes updates on; Twitter @22RacingTeam & @ScottSteckly22, Facebook Fan Page 22racingteam and Instagram 22racingteam

About 22 Racing:

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The British government has been accused of a "criminal" lack of preparation for Brexit amid increasing calls for workers rights to be protected as the UK leaves the EU.

The countrys TUC general secretary Frances OGrady said the clock was ticking towards a "kamikaze" Brexit, with no proper assessment yet carried out about the impact on industries.

Speaking on the opening day of the TUC Congress in Brighton, she said the government had no action plan to protect jobs and employment rights.

Ms OGrady told a news conference: "Over the last year the Governments criminal lack of preparation for March 2019 has become clear.

"The Prime Minister needs to break free from the hardliners in her party who want a cliff edge Brexit."

The TUC is calling to stay in the single market and customs union during the transition https://t.co/SCH97Dm2CB #TUC17 @LeftFootFwd pic.twitter.com/6vDKM9ZCC1  Trades Union Congress (@The_TUC) September 10, 2017

Ms OGrady also warned against the danger of a "sweatshop" Brexit, with UK workers falling behind the rights that other Europeans enjoy.

She said: "Its galling to see a Government that promised to protect workers rights put forward a Bill on EU withdrawal thats full of loopholes on workers rights.

"It will give ministers the power to water them down and let any future government attack them."

The TUC is calling for the UK to stay in the single market and customs unions during a transition period.

A statement issued by the TUC general council before the start of the conference said the UK needed a tariff-free, frictionless trade in goods and services with the rest of Europe.

The statement said the TUC was "alarmed " that industrial investment has declined sharply this year.

The trade deficit has widened, economic growth has slowed and wages have "stagnated", it added.
Update 9pm: An Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, has paid tribute to the "many years of dedicated service to the State" by retiring Garda commisisoner, Noirin O'Sullivan.

Mr Varadkar said he wanted thank her on behalf of the Government and the Irish people.

"She has overseen many significant developments in often challenging circumstances, and in recent years took on the challenge of reforming the Gardai," he said.

"As she said in her statement, her decision to retire is made in the best interests of An Garda Siochana and ensuring that it can focus on the extensive programme of reform that is now underway.

I wish Noirin every success in whatever she does in the years ahead."

The Taoiseach said the government would now consider how best to accelerate the crucial and essential Garda reform programme in the months and years ahead.

"The Cabinet will discuss how best to proceed at its regular meeting on Wednesday," he concluded.

Meanwhile, the outgoing Garda Commissioner has told of how years of controversies have "personally" impacted on her.

In a message to garda members Ms O'Sullivan said tonight she was "doing a job I love" but acknowledged there had been "low points".

"Today, after 36 years proud service, I leave An Garda Siochana. I have been privileged to meet incredible people inside and outside the organisation," she said.

"During my service I have seen radical changes in Ireland, our economy and the society in which we live and work.

"The types of threats, concerns and issues have changed radically over that time but I am proud that our organisation has changed and adapted to respond to the community. I had many moments along the way where I realised, even at the time, that I was fortunate to be doing a job I love; and like any life lived there have been some low points as well.

"The last number of years have impacted on all of us personally and on the organisation, but we used those times to identity what we needed to do for the future," she added.

She thanked her colleagues for their "courage, hard work, dedication and commitment" and wished them success in their future careers.

"Over the last three years we have worked to rebuild and restructure the organisation to meet the unprecedented policing and security challenges we face," she said.

"It hasn't been easy, we can't fix everything overnight, but, we have made significant progress, some of which we are only beginning to see.

"I want to thank you for your courage, hard work, dedication and commitment in meeting these challenges. Despite the controversies and crisis our work has seen public trust and confidence remain high. We should never take this for granted.

"Each of you has a role to play in ensuring that public support continues and grows, through your attitude, behaviours, action and professionalism, regardless of the position you hold within the organisation. Always remember you can make a difference not just in perceptions but in other people's lives.

"As I leave today, I wish all of you success in your chosen career path and ambitions and continued success in your collective efforts to keeping our communities safe," she added.

Update 6.10pm: Reacting this evening to the retirement of Garda Commissioner Noirin OSullivan the Minister for Justice, Charlie Flanagan, has expressed his gratitude to Ms OSullivan for her public service to the State.

In a statement Mr Flanagan said that Ms O'Sullivan had distinguished herself over the course of an accomplished 36 year career in a variety of roles which ranged from under-cover detective work in Dublins inner city in the 1980s to being appointed to the most senior position in the service in March 2014.

Minister Flanagan said that in accordance with the provisions of section 32 of the Garda Siochana Act

2005 he would appoint Deputy Commissioner Donall O Cualain as Acting Commissioner with full powers with effect from midnight tonight.

Minister for Justice and Equality, Charles Flanagan TD

He went on: "In the coming weeks I will consult with the chair of the Policing Authority about a process to identify and appoint a permanent Commissioner to An Garda Siochana. I will brief the Government at the next Cabinet meeting."

The Minister for Justice and Equality said that since the establishment of An Garda Siochana, the role of Commissioner has been a hugely demanding and acknowledged that, during Commissioner OSullivans tenure, she was faced with particularly significant difficulties, many of which had built up over several decades.

"Commissioner OSullivan showed enormous resilience, determination and integrity in addressing those challenges and, in particular, in instituting a radical reform programme to modernise our policing service with the aim of providing the people of Ireland with world-class policing.

"As Minister for Justice and Equality, I will continue to press ahead with that necessary reform programme, informed by the work of the Commission on the Future of Policing in Ireland and supported by the Policing Authority and the Garda Inspectorate.

Minister Flangan went on: "I have no doubt that the men and women of An Garda Siochana who serve Ireland in the front line of policing have the appetite to embrace and drive that change.

"I wish Commissioner OSullivan and her family well in her retirement," he concluded.

Earlier: Garda Commissioner Noirin OSullivan has announced that she is retiring from An Garda Siochana.

In a statement tonight Ms OSullivan said she was retiring after 36 years of privileged, enjoyable and proud service.

Ms. OSullivan notified Taoiseach Leo Varadkar and Justice Minister Charlie Flanagan this afternoon, thanking them for their continued confidence in her. She also thanked former Taoiseach Enda Kenny and former Tanaiste and Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald.

"The support for me to continue in the role is evident, the Commissioner said today.

"However, I devoted much of my summer break to considering if continuing would be the right thing to do. It has become clear, over the last year, that the core of my job is now about responding to an unending cycle of requests, questions, instructions and public hearings involving various agencies including the Public Accounts Committee, the Justice and Equality Committee, the Policing Authority, and various other inquiries, and dealing with inaccurate commentary surrounding all of these matters.

"They are all part of a new  and necessary  system of public accountability. But when a Commissioner is trying  as Ive been trying  to implement the deep cultural and structural reform that is necessary to modernise and reform an organisation of 16,000 people and rectify the failures and mistakes of the past, the difficulty is that the vast majority of her time goes, not to implementing the necessary reforms and meeting the obvious policing and security challenges, but to dealing with this unending cycle.

The Commissioner expressed the hope that her successor would be given the space and necessary supports in which to do the job, build on the platform that has been developed over the last three years, and move forward the Garda Modernisation and Renewal Programme, which will see An Garda Siochana become a beacon of 21st century policing.

She also said that she was not leaving her role to take up another job. In early summer, international colleagues, she said, had encouraged her to apply for the top job in Europol. Because it would have been a prestigious appointment for an Irish citizen, she agreed to consider it, but did not proceed with the application.

"I may decide to take on some other interesting and exciting challenge down the line, she said, but for now her intention is to retire and take some time with her family and adapt to the new phase of her life.

Simultaneous with the press release announcing her retirement, the Commissioner placed on the Gardas internal portal a message to all staff which pointed out that despite the controversies of the past few years, the general public still registers a high degree of confidence in An Garda Siochana.

The Commissioner thanked staff for their hard work and commitment in protecting and serving our communities during what has been an unprecedented and difficult time for policing.

The Commissioner said that despite the unprecedented challenges, controversies and criticisms of the last few years, she looks back on her 36 years in the service with enormous pride.

"Being a Guard is the best job in the world. Youre committed to the public good. Youre encountering people at the lowest points in their lives. You can make a difference. As long as you avoid cynicism, you can make a profound difference  for the better  in other peoples lives
Addressing the Agricultural Science Association (ASA) conference in Killashee House Hotel in Naas, Co Kildare, Ms Vetter said Irish agri-food stakeholders have done well to meet their UK counterparts to commit to maintaining future trade ties post-Brexit.

In sharp contrast, the US has disrupted its trade links with its neighbours in heated North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta) talks.

On day three of the Trump administration, the US left the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) talks, destabilising its trade with Japan.

US grain exporters have gone to meet their trade partners in Mexico to make it clear that, regardless of what might happen at the Nafta negotiating table, they promised to remain long- term trading partners, said Ms Vetter.

She said that the industry leaders attending the ASA conference had all made similar overtures to their existing trading partners. In light of the uncertainty surrounding the EU-UK Brexit talks, she said these commitments were in everyones shared interests.

There seems to be a lot of commercial sector engagement between the UK and Ireland, people talking about ongoing trade regardless of the outcomes of the Brexit talks. Thats really smart, she said.

There is a sense that global engagement is very important to the EU member states, who want to maintain global supply chains, which is also very much in the EU interests. The US reductionist view of trade talks is proving very divisive. Theyre looking at trade in terms of winning and losing. If I buy more commodities from Mexico, and use those items to make goods which I then export, Im not losing.

There has been a kickback in the US against the Trump administration, whose protectionist approach is not serving US interests.

Ms Vetter said the US administrations decision to exit the TTIP talks left the door ajar for the EU to enhance its trade links with Japan. She said the EU is taking a sensible approach to its trade talks, working towards maintaining global trade channels.

Meanwhile, a survey conducted by ASA showed 51% of professionals working with the agri-food industry believe Brexit could be positive for Ireland; this figure rose from 28% in 2016.

More than 400 delegates attended the ASA conference. Headline speakers included Phil Hogan, European Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development; Prof Nicola Shadbolt, director of Fonterra Co-op; Jeroen Elfers, director of Corporate Affairs, Friesland Campina; and Aidan ODriscoll, secretary general at the Department of Agriculture Food and the Marine.
You have one channel, we have 39 channels. If you curse me, you will receive bad merit. Those who [previously] cursed me already disappeared from the world.

THIS was Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sens response to a fairly anodyne question at a press conference in 2008.

Just the usual sabre-rattling bluster by the Southeast Asian strongman at the time, but this week the threat became reality as one of the last bulwarks of the free press in Cambodia was wiped out for good.

All the news without fear or favour, was the Cambodia Dailys ambitious tagline in the 24 years since it spluttered into existence in a country still reeling from 30 years of civil war, genocide, and foreign occupation.

The newspaper was envisioned by its eccentric proprietor, former Newsweek correspondent turned philanthropist Bernie Krisher, as an outlet for independent and accurate news reporting, as well as an incubator for a new generation of journalists in a country which had little tradition of either.

From 1993 to this Tuesday, they never missed an issue. Even in July 1997, when factional fighting on the streets meant there was no way to get to the printers, an office Xerox copier was utilised and a few hundred copies were distributed.

All that time, The Daily set a standard for the rigour, quality and fearlessness of its journalism.

It had a relatively small print run, but a big reputation for breaking sensitive stories about topics like corruption, environmental issues and land rights.

It survived, prospered even, amid the almost weekly denouncements, threats and the other assorted slings and arrows that are thrown at independent voices in countries like Cambodia, where principles like free press and the rule of law are poorly established.

In the past the Cambodian regime has reached for the grenade and the AK47 to deal with troublesome individuals or organisations.

But this time it was literally death by taxes. From out of nowhere, a $6.3 million dollar tax bill was produced without audit or appeal process.

Given a few weeks to pay a sum which it could not possibly afford, a fatigued and demoralised management gave in.

I was fortunate enough to have worked at the Daily in the noughties under the brilliant editorship of Dubliner Kevin Doyle.

I happily dived into the peculiarly fecund atmosphere you get in a newsroom which combined ambitious, hungry but green young journalists from the US and Europe and a much more experienced local staff who were utterly convinced of their journalistic mission.

Those local staff good humouredly put up with the wannabe Michael Herrs or Sean Flynns in their midst, who wanted a taste of journalism on the edge.

They were glad of the help and the layer of protection that they believed foreigners afforded them as they poked and prodded at those in power.

The paper itself was defiantly odd at times, with its wilfully old-fashioned format and resistance to technological change.

The same theme emerged from conversations this week with Daily alumni, many of whom went onto careers with the likes of Reuters, The Associated Press and the New York Times.

A profoundly-felt well of respect for the Cambodian colleagues who did their job day in day out, with much greater chance of punishment than we did and much less chance of a significant reward.

Those Khmer reporters truly, madly, utterly believed that telling the truth and shining a light on corruption would inevitably change their corner of the world for the better.

For the westerners in particular, it distilled a sense that, whatever else you might be in the news business for, you were privileged to have the freedom to be able to do it at all.

So what finished the Daily in the end?

What upset the precarious balance of diplomacy and powerplay, and convinced Hun Sen that the risk of international communitys ire was worth the opportunity to mortally wound dissenters and consolidate the power he has held for 30 years now?

Even the best of politicians tend to only believe in free press up to the point that they themselves truly feel threatened by it.

In an election year in which a resurgent opposition are mounting a genuine challenge to the regime, Hun Sen finally reached for the pest spray.

The same weekend the Daily ran out of road, opposition leader Kem Sokha was arrested and charged with treason.

In doing so, the always canny Hun Sen would have calculated that international opprobrium for his actions would have even less bite than usual.

As Western donors withdraw from Southeast Asia, China has stepped up with money for favours, but with no free press and democracy strings attached.

In such a delicately poised moment, the bellicosity of US President Donald Trump was akin to an elephant jumping into a swimming pool.

Within weeks of Trump declaring his war on fake news and hugely respected organisations like the BBC and the New York Times for reporting things he didnt like, Hun Sen had followed suit, condemning in March human rights organisations and journalists as anarchic groups.

When the citadels of free expression come under siege, the outliers are easy pickings.

Which is why what is happening in Cambodia should be heeded by everyone who assumes that attacks on free expression in the west are just passing storms in teacups.

The Cambodia Daily was just one newspaper on the other side of the world, but it is also another canary in the mine.

A signifier of what can happen when those who are supposed to defend of concepts like freedom of speech, are either asleep at the wheel or wilfully and quite deliberately attack it.

Because freedom of expression is a delicate, and fragile thing.

When the outliers are gone, the centre comes under even more pressure.

And In an environment where all media organisations are tarred as compromised and biased, and journalists derided as mere fake news peddlers, a few good puffs, and the whole house of cards can come down very quickly.

* Fergal Quinn is a lecturer in journalism in University of Limerick.
"Congress has been dropping in relative power along a

descending curve of 60 years' duration, with the rate of

fall markedly increased since 1933. ... The fall of the

American Congress seems to be correlated with a more

general historical transformation toward political and

social forms within which the representative assembly --

the major political organism of post-Renaissance Western

civilization -- does not have a primary political function."

-- James Burnham, "Congress and the American Tradition" (1959)

WASHINGTON -- Today, worse is better. The president's manifest and manifold inadequacies might awaken a slumbering Congress to the existence of its Article I powers and responsibilities.

As a candidate, Donald Trump vowed devotion to all 12 of the Constitution's seven articles. As president, Barack Obama, discerning a defect in the work of the 1787 Constitutional Convention, supplied Article VIII, which has expired. It stipulated: "Between Jan. 20, 2009, and Jan. 20, 2017, the president shall have the power to do whatever Congress declines to do." So, when Congress did not confer legal status on "Dreamers" (immigrants brought to America illegally as children), he did it. He conferred such status and attendant benefits on a large category of people and called this patently legislative act a routine exercise of law enforcement discretion.

As a candidate, Trump's policy regarding Dreamers made up in concision what it lacked in reflection: "They have to go." As a president whose incoherence has a kind of majesty, he says he has "a love for these people" who are "incredible" when they are not engaged in rampant criminality. When he is not pardoning Arizona's scofflaw sheriff Joe Arpaio for his anti-immigrant criminality, Trump casts immigration as a law-and-order issue.

So does Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who preaches fire-and-brimstone law and order when he is not encouraging legalized theft under "civil forfeiture," whereby government enriches itself by seizing the property of persons not convicted of crimes. Sessions, whose canine loyalty to Trump is not scrupulously reciprocated, seemed to relish the privilege of announcing Trump's policy that, absent action from a Congress that is especially loath to act on immigration, could punish 800,000 children for what their parents did long ago.

Trump's policy now is to state that Obama's policy will expire in six months unless Congress chooses to "legalize" -- Trump's word -- it. If Congress does not, Trump will do ... something: "I will revisit this issue!" Perhaps his exclamatory punctuation foreshadows something as forceful, meaning as unilateral, as what Obama did.

What Obama did was popular and unconstitutional. The latter attribute probably does not interest Obama's successor, but the former attribute evidently does. Hence Trump has sent this hot-potato issue where it belongs, to Congress, which now faces the unaccustomed agony of actually setting national policy.

The day that Trump and Sessions disturbed Congress' serenity, Nikki Haley did likewise. The U.S ambassador to the U.N. and a former executive (as South Carolina's governor) intimated that the 2015 nuclear agreement with Iran might yet wind up where, constitutionally, it should have started -- in the national legislature. An international pact of this complexity and gravity should have been a treaty, submitted to the Senate for committee hearings, floor debate, and ratification by a two-thirds supermajority. Instead, as a redundant expression of Obama's disdain for Congress and the separation of powers, it was submitted to the U.N., and then to Congress. The House voted disapproval and the Senate attempted the same, although the margins were too small to override an Obama veto in any case.

Haley suggested that Trump might declare that Iran is not in compliance with the agreement, thereby initiating a 60-day congressional review, potentially culminating in the administration leaving Congress to decide for or against U.S. withdrawal from the agreement. Just as many Republicans, after years of denouncing Obamacare, flinched from repealing it, many critics of the Iran agreement might flinch. Haley said, "I get that Congress doesn't want this." Which is a reason -- exercising atrophied institutional sinews -- for hoping it happens.

In 1959, before the exhilarating experience of Ronald Reagan's presidency, congressional supremacy was still a tenet of conservatism. Then James Burnham, a founding editor of the then 4-year-old National Review, wondered whether Congress could "survive as an autonomous, active political entity with some measure of real power, not merely as a rubber stamp, a name and a ritual, or an echo of powers lodged elsewhere." The slope of the long descending curve might be changing.

George F. Will is a columnist for The Washington Post.
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Where is the Forest Service? I mean the Forest Service that I knew during the 34 years that I was employed by the agency across the western U.S., from Alaska to California.

I dont ever recall a District Ranger being removed because some local politician, or any politician for that matter, was unhappy with an action taken by that employee. During my career, if a line officer, such as a District Ranger, was challenged, he or she was defended by every level of the Forest Service all the way to Washington D.C.

But now we have a District Ranger being removed before he was ever found guilty of any wrongdoing.

We have been told that District Ranger Alex Sienkiewicz was removed because he maintained a Forest Service Trail that has been used by the public to enter the Gallatin National Forest for over 50 years. Like many others, this trail crossed a small section of private land before entering the National Forest.

Local landowners contacted Senator Daines for help and he brought the new Secretary of Agriculture into the battle. You see, these landowners have their own private hunting ground back there on our public land. Several are also involved in selling public bull elk harvested on this National Forest Land.

Evidence shows that the Ranger was following established policy when he maintained this trail. In fact, I have a note from a retired District Ranger stating that he had done exactly what Alex did many times during his career in order to protect public access.

Remember, the politicians that triggered the Rangers removal represent a political party that has for years advocated transfer of National Forest land in Montana to state ownership. In fact, a plank in their state platform says as much. The same national Party Platform has a plank, requiring the federal government to convey certain federally controlled public lands to states.

There is an irony with the timing of this demand: Had all that 16 million acres of National Forest land been transferred to state ownership before this fire season, we would soon be seeing a bargain basement sale of what was once was National Forest land to private parties in order to pay a multi-million dollar firefighting bill. Just imagine who would be the successful bidder on your favorite mountain meadow.

John Gibson

Billings
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Hundreds of families celebrated West Monts 25th annual Harvest Days Family Fun Day on Saturday.

West Mont provides services for people with disabilities in Helena, including 13 group homes and four vocational facilities. Jean Morgan, vice president of programs at West Mont, said the event started to raise community awareness about people with disabilities. All of the proceeds from Harvest Days will support West Mont programs.

Morgan said she thinks Harvest Days are popular since the activities for kids dont involve anything with a screen.

Its good, old-fashioned fun, she said.

Kids could get their faces painted, go on wagon rides, pet the goats and sheep living on the farm, pick a pumpkin from West Monts patch and play games. Home Depot sent volunteers, tools and donated kits to build a birdhouse. Kids also had a chance to decorate an ornament for the White House holiday tree, which will come from Montana this year. The ornaments will go with the tree to Washington, D.C.

Law enforcement included US Marshals, the FBI, Montana Highway Patrol and Search and Rescue. The agencies brought canines, a state trooper helicopter, firetrucks and an ambulance to provide safety information, tours and demonstrations.

Morgan said kids who attended Harvest Days when they were little are now old enough to give back and volunteer for the day.

Its been fun to watch, she said. The event is more popular each year.

West Mont is hosting a luncheon at the Great Northern Hotel on Sept. 15. The organization will be asking for donations at the event. People interested in attending should call West Mont at 447-3100 to reserve a spot.
DECATUR  Some 200 volunteers Saturday afternoon spent hours adorning the path for Logan S. Palmer's Monday funeral procession, with some 2,400 American flags spread across the 7 miles between Life Foursquare Church to Harristown Cemetery.

The Boy Scouts and Cub Scouts organized the effort, alongside Larry Eckhardt, the "flag man," who criss-crosses the nation for similar processions of fallen servicemen and women.

Palmer, a Harristown native and 2012 Sangamon Valley High School graduate, was killed when the Navy destroyer USS John S. McCain collided with an oil tanker Aug. 21 near Singapore. He was an interior communications electrician third class and promoted posthumously to second class.

"To me, it's amazing. I mean all the people showing up to honor this young man. It's emotional," said Susie Wayne of Decatur.

Wayne said yesterday's escort of Palmer's body into Decatur went by her home.

"That was one of the most emotional things I've ever witnessed. It really made me want to come out and help if I could today," Wayne said.

Jim Hopkins of Harristown said the day brought back painful memories from 14 years ago, when his son-in-law Marine Pvt. Jonathan Gifford was killed on the third day of the U.S invasion of Iraq.

"I didn't even know (Palmer); he's just a kid. It's great that we've got kids like that today. You've got to support his family," said Hopkins, himself an Air Force veteran.

Over the course of several hours, an army of pickup trucks and SUVs carrying a load of flags in the back, rolled along the route, then stopped as volunteers used sledgehammers to drive flag posts into the ground.

A visitation of Palmer's body will be held at Life Foursquare Church today between 4 and 8 p.m.

Bill Jones, a ride captain of the Illinois Patriot Guard Riders, which has participated in Palmer's return home, said those helping with coordinating Palmer's funeral expect 1,500 visitors.

The path of Monday's procession to Harristown Cemetery will follow from Life Foursquare going west on Illinois 121, south on Wyckles Road, then take U.S. 36 and Old Route 36 to Harristown Cemetery. Monday's funeral service will start at 10 a.m.

Austen Deverell, a 17-year-old Eagle Scout with Mount Zion Troop 43, the same one Palmer belonged to as a teenager, said it's been hard to watch members of the local Boy Scouts grieve a comrade they knew well.

"I felt really bad for them, and so having to support them through it all the way, it feels like you have to do it," Deverell said.

"Being here and helping their family and helping everybody here just makes me happy, because I feel like people will remember this day," Deverell added.
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The name of the play, Steel Magnolias, says it all.

Robert Harlings 1987 play about the hidden strength of women opened Friday at the Little Theatre of Winston-Salem.

Set in small-town Louisiana and based on Harlings experience of losing his sister, Susan, to Type 1 diabetes, Harling uses nonstop zingers and zany one-liners to unveil a serious message about life-and-death choices and the deep love that can grow among women.

Absurd behavior by off-screen husbands and the charming eccentricities of the six women who gather daily in Truvys beauty parlor for female bonding makes the more serious side of the story palatable. A little bit of sugar  or, in this case, a cup of sugar, flour and fruit cocktail  makes the medicine go down.

Marcia James as Clairee, Sarah Jenkins as Annelle, Sheri Masters as MLynn, Mandi McCraw as Truvy, Carol McConnell as Ouiser and Kady Ann Tilley as Shelby appear to be having the time of their lives.

And you know how that works: If the actors are having fun, the audience will most likely have fun, too.

Clairee, the mayors widow, is gleefully looking for new ways to spend her money. James plays her with gusto and great comic timing.

McConnell as Ousier has a terrific, resonant contralto and gets to deliver one of the plays best lines: Im not crazy. Ive just been in a bad mood for the last 40 years.

The shows heart is revealed in the mother-daughter duo of Shelby and MLynn. Tilley, who plays the apparent weakest of the women, does a fine job of asserting her true power. Masters, who has one of the hardest scenes, is convincing as the loving but long-suffering mother.

On opening night, some of the rapid repartee could have been a little more rapid. While all the actors are quite good, they sometimes swallowed their best lines.

Director Steffanie Vaughan has cast the play brilliantly and gotten some terrific performances from her actors.

They just might have you laughing through your tears.
A 14-year-old boy who was shot multiple times Friday night is in recovery at the hospital after surgeries, police said.

The victim, whose name hasnt been released, was taken to Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center Friday around 6:30 p.m. after the incident at the intersection of Waughtown Street and South Martin Luther King Jr. Drive.

Police could not disclose how many times the victim was shot.

The only thing definitive is that hes in recovery, Lt. R. Melly of the Winston-Salem Police Department said.

He is in stable but non-life threatening condition, Melly said.

Police said the shooting was not considered a random act of violence. Both the victim and the shooter were on foot at the time of the shooting.

Police are looking for a suspect who is a Hispanic male, approximately 20 years old, 6-feet tall with a thin build and wearing a gray shirt and blue jeans.

No one has been arrested in the case, which is considered an assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill, police said.

Six police cars and a forensics van were visible at the scene Friday night.

The shooting occurred about a quarter-mile from where 17-year-old Eduardo Barrientos was found dead in a wooded area in late August.

Anyone with information on Fridays shooting can call the Winston-Salem Police Department at (336) 773-7700 or CrimeStoppers at (336)727-2800.
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla.  A massive but weakened Hurricane Irma zeroed in on the Tampa Bay region early Monday after hammering much of Florida with roof-ripping winds, gushing floodwaters and widespread power outages.

Irma continued its slog north along Florida's western coast having blazed a path of unknown destruction. With communication cut to some of the Florida Keys, where Irma made landfall Sunday, and rough conditions persisting across the peninsula, many held their breath for what daylight might reveal.

The monster storm measured more than 400 miles (640 kilometers) wide, and its winds of up to 130 mph (210 kph) sucked the ocean water out of bays, swamped much of downtown Miami and toppled at least three constructions cranes  two over downtown Miami and one in Fort Lauderdale.

More than 3.3 million homes and businesses across the state lost power, and utility officials said it will take weeks to restore electricity to everyone.

Irma's center was about 25 miles (40 kilometers) northeast of the heavily populated Tampa-St. Petersburg area early Monday, though in a much-weakened state. While it arrived in Florida a Category 4 hurricane, it was down to a Category 1 with winds of 85 mph (135 kph). Meanwhile, more than 160,000 people waited in shelters statewide.

There were no immediate reports of deaths in Florida. In the Caribbean, at least 24 were people were killed during Irma's destructive trek across exclusive islands known as the vacation playground for the rich. In Cuba, the storm swamped Havana's iconic seawall, pushing water nearly a third of a mile (half a kilometer) inland.

In one of the largest U.S. evacuations, nearly 7 million people in the Southeast were warned to seek shelter elsewhere, including 6.4 million in Florida alone. Upon leaving Florida, a weakened Irma is expected to push into Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee and beyond. A tropical storm warning was issued for the first time ever in Atlanta, where many schools canceled classes because of the storm.

Bryan Koon, Florida's emergency management director, said late Sunday that authorities had only scattered information about the storm's toll.

"I've not heard of catastrophic damage. It doesn't mean it doesn't exist. It means it hasn't gotten to us yet," Koon said.

In the low-lying Keys, where a storm surge of over 10 feet (3 meters) was recorded, appliances and furniture were seen floating away, and Monroe County spokeswoman Cammy Clark said the ocean waters were filled with navigation hazards, including sunken boats.

The county administrator, Roman Gastesi, said crews would begin house-to-house searches Monday morning to check on survivors. And an airborne relief mission, led by C-130 military cargo planes, was gearing up to bring emergency supplies to the Keys.

Storm surge and tornadoes were two big concerns. The National Hurricane Center said a federal tide gauge in Naples reported a 7-foot (more than 2-meter) rise in water levels in just 90 minutes late Sunday. And an apparent tornado spun off by Irma destroyed six mobile homes in Palm Bay, midway up the Atlantic coast. Flooding was reported along Interstate 4, which cuts across Florida's midsection.

In Miami, a woman who went into labor and was guided through delivery by phone when authorities couldn't reach her because of high winds and street flooding. Emergency crews later took her to the hospital.

Curfews were imposed overnight in Miami, Tampa, Fort Lauderdale and much of the rest of South Florida, and some arrests of violators were reported. Miami Beach barred outsiders from the island.

Fort Lauderdale police arrested nine people they said were caught on TV cameras looting sneakers and other items from a sporting goods store and a pawn shop during the hurricane.

About 30,000 people heeded orders to leave the Keys as the storm closed in, but an untold number refused, in part because, to many storm-hardened residents, staying behind in the face of danger is a point of pride.

John Huston, who stayed in his Key Largo home, watched his yard flood even before the arrival of high tide.

"Small boats floating down the street next to furniture and refrigerators. Very noisy," he said by text message. "Shingles are coming off."

Irma made landfall just after 9 a.m. Sunday at Cudjoe Key, about 20 miles (32 kilometers) outside Key West. On Sunday afternoon, it rounded Florida's southwestern corner and hugged the coast closely as it pushed toward Naples, Sanibel, Fort Myers and, beyond that, Sarasota.

Gretchen Blee, who moved with her husband to Naples from Long Island, New York, after Superstorm Sandy in 2012 heavily damaged their beach home, took cover in a hotel room as Irma raged.

"I said, 'Let's go and live the good life in paradise'," she said. "And here we are."

Some 400 miles (640 kilometers) north of the Keys, people in the Tampa-St. Petersburg area feared a first direct hit from a major hurricane since 1921. But the storm weakened to a Category 2 approaching that area.

"I've been here with other storms, other hurricanes. But this one scares me," Sally Carlson said as she snapped photos of the waves crashing against boats in St. Petersburg. "Let's just say a prayer we hope we make it through."

Along the Gulf Coast, two manatees became stranded after Irma sucked water out of Sarasota Bay, in Florida's Manatee County. Several people posted photos of the mammals on Facebook amid reports rescuers later dragged them to deeper water.

President Donald Trump approved a disaster declaration for Florida, opening the way for federal aid. And Florida's governor activated all 7,000 members of the Florida National Guard, and 10,000 guardsmen from elsewhere were being deployed.

Irma once was the most powerful hurricane ever recorded in the open Atlantic, a Category 5 with a peak wind speed of 185 mph (300 kph). For days, forecasters had warned Irma was taking dead aim at the Miami area and the rest of Florida's Atlantic coast. But then Irma made a westward shift and lost some of its punch while crossing Cuba's northern coast  just before a crucial turn into Florida's Gulf Coast.
Millennial Moms Review: 2022 Acura MDX is pretty close to the perfect family car

I dont know if perfect is attainable, especially considering weve got the world of options when it comes to modern vehicles. Were spoiled and, as such, we have very specific needs and wants. Driving-wise, the 2022 Acura MDX is one of my favourite ...
UPDATE: On September 8, 2017, at approximately 11:30 p.m. Bryan Police arrested a 16-year-old male in connection with the shooting. At this time no further details will be released as the case is still under investigation.

EARLIER:

Bryan police say Johnathon Albert Cordell Munoz, 19, is the victim who was shot and killed just before noon Friday at Williamson Park.

Police responded to the shooting in the 2400 block of Rountree and

attempted to perform CPR on Munoz. He was pronounced dead at the park by authorities.

At this time, no arrests have been made and no motive for the murder has been announced.

The Criminal Investigation Division and Crime Scene Unit are interviewing potential witnesses.

Anyone with information about this offense is urged to contact the Bryan Police Department at 979-209-5300 or Crime Stoppers at 979-775-TIPS.
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Domains purchased with payment plans are not eligible to transfer until all payments have been made. Please remember that our 30-day money back guarantee is void once a domain has been transferred.

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Ontario deputy NDP leader Jagmeet Singh launches his bid for the federal NDP leadership in Brampton, Ont., on Monday, May 15, 2017. A political science professor says a racist heckler that interrupted a campaign rally for NDP leadership hopeful Jagmeet Singh is an example of the discrimination that deters minorities from politics. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette
Pope Francis smiles at his driver as he arrives to the Nunciature at the end of his day of activities in Villavicencio, Colombia, Friday, Sept. 8, 2017. (AP Photo/Ivan Valencia)
Wilman Hernandez and his wife Brenda Ramirez, check their phones for the location of shelters and their capacity while waiting for a bus in Miami Beach, Fla., Friday, Sept. 9, 2017. The main hub leading Floridians out of Hurricane Irma's path is bumper to bumper with those who can afford to escape. As Hurricane Irma threatened South's Beach's elite, some booked pricey airline seats, chartered private planes and found fancy hotels like a forced vacation. But many, including the low-wage workers in Florida's tourism industry, couldn't afford to stock up on supplies and struggled to find their way to shelters. (AP Photo/Marta Lavandier)
Ammar Hammasho, migrant from Edlib in Syria who lives in Cyprus, kisses one of his four children after they arrived with their mother to a refugee camp in Kokkinotrimithia, outside of the capital Nicosia, in the eastern Mediterranean island of Cyprus, on Sunday, Sept. 10, 2017. Cyprus police say a 36-year-old man was arrested Sunday for allegedly driving one of a pair of boats that brought 305 Syrian refugees to the island's northwestern coast. (AP Photo/Petros Karadjias)
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Which arrow causes you more pain, the first or the second?

Fellow blogger Michelle at The Green Study recently posted a piece in which she distinguished between pain and suffering. It reminded me of a Buddhist teaching that inspires and humbles me. Blogger and curator extraordinaire

Maria Popova quotes it in an article she wrote last year on a book by Tara Brach:

The Buddha once asked a student, If a person is struck by an arrow, is it painful? The student replied, It is. The Buddha then asked, If the person is struck by a second arrow, is that even more painful? The student replied again, It is. The Buddha then explained, In life, we cannot always control the first arrow. However, the second arrow is our reaction to the first. And with this second arrow comes the possibility of choice.

The first step to suffering less is cultivating awareness of the second arrow. This takes practice, and we must resist the self-judgment that comes the moment we realize we have not only shot ourselves again but have been twisting that second arrow deeper and deeper. This shame and self-revulsion is, after all, another drop of poison on the second arrows tip. Instead, I like to apply Ben Zanders acclamation when he finds himself or his students doing something wrong: How fascinating! Look what I did! No judgment, just lighthearted observation.

The second step to suffering less is, of course, to remove the second arrow. Once we notice, learn how to remove it and tend the wound. Breathe deeply. Identify the sources of anger, fear, resentment, blame, contempt, shame, despair, anxiety, bitterness, envy. Breathe again. Loosen our desperate grip on these feelings. Hold them more loosely, ever more loosely. Breathe. Breathe. Hold also the space, emotional, cognitive, and temporal, for them the move through us.

Eventually, breathing, we can let go the negativity, pull the arrow out. Breathe. When assailed by another first arrow, see the second arrow coming and sidestep. Breathe. Keep breathing. Practice self-compassion and forgiveness.

Life will continue hurling arrows at us. Some will miss, others will land in our most vulnerable spots. Mindfulness practice, centered in attention to the breath, helps us evade the wounds and anguish from our own second arrows. The data, accumulated over the past four decades, is all but irrefutable for benefits of mindfulness for depression, anxiety, chronic pain, burnout and overall well-being. Prolonged practice even changes the physical structure of the brain, and its never too late to learn.

If youd like to learn more, I have included a few more links below. You may find it worthwhile to invest in the practice. Be patient with yourself. And let me know how it goes.

The Arrow

Dont Shoot the Second Arrow!

Avoiding the Second Arrow

Catherine Cheng is an internal medicine physician who blogs at Healing Through Connection.

Image credit: Shutterstock.com
National will make it easier for first home buyers to get a deposit by doubling the financial support available when buying an existing house, and increasing it for new builds.

A Labour-led government would ban foreign purchases of New Zealand property by Christmas.

We have a comprehensive plan to tackle climate change including replacing the Emissions Trading Scheme with a Kiwi Climate Fund.

Labours 100-day priorities.

Maori Television-Reid Research

Hauraki-Waikato seat: Labours Nanaia Mahuta 78%, Maori Partys Rahui Papa 22%. Waiariki seat:, Maori Partys Te Ururoa Flavell 60.1%, LaboursTamati Coffey 39.9%.

As at 9am 5 September (next update due tomorrow): Nats: $7.62b Lab: $22.82b NZFirst: $25.97b Greens: $9.94b Maori: $12.17b ACT: $-2.43b TOP: $10.69b (all figures limited to costs within next Parliamentary term). Full details here.

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To watch Thai ice cream rolls being made is a little show, conducted on a metal surface called an "anti-griddle" kept at temperatures below zero.
Brendan Moyle at Sciblogs looks at the freshwater policies of the parties. First he notes:

Initially though, there are some aspects about freshwater management in New Zealand that need to be understood. The first is that the statutory responsibility for managing freshwater in NZ lies with regional authorities. Central government doesnt give say, sawmills discharge rights into rivers or farmers irrigation rights to water. Thats what councils/regional authorities do. The second is we do have a framework for national water standards. This process was started by the previous Labour government and developed and made operational by the current National (in 2014). These require certain standards to be reached nationally, and (with some exceptions), be met by 2025.

He comments on Nationals policy:

The swimmable goal described above address the E. coli issue (but not others). E. coli is a common bacterium found in the guts of humans, livestock and birds. High E. coli counts make water unswimmable by causing illness in some swimmers. What is not made clear is that these swimmable standards dont apply to freshwater that is too small or shallow to swim in, in the first place. These will still have to meet the recreational standard however. The current and planned expenditures on clean-ups at least, addresses some of the other non-specified pollutants.  Again, most of this is about controlling E. coli levels. The new proposed rules on sewage discharge recognises that urban areas are a major source of E. coli pollution, and have been somewhat neglected with the focus on rural sources. There are no new initiatives to control other pollutants, such as nitrates. This is still up to councils and regional authorities to manage.

Then he looks at Labour:

Since a tax on water-use was first mooted by Labour, there has been high interest in their freshwater management policy. Details have been sparse. It appears at least, Labour intends continuing with the NPS-FM framework for water improvement. The response above however, is woefully short of detail and costings. Many associated issues in this brief response are poorly explained. For instance, what does truly swimmable mean? Does this mean using other metrics than the E. coli count? David Parker was suggesting Periphyton earlier this year. Is this going to be included? A generation is roughly 25 years. Is that stricter than the current goal of 90% by 2040? If say shallow urban streams and ponds have high E. coli counts because of the bird life inhabiting them, is it really Labours goal to get the E. coli count down to a swimmable level of a median of 130? What exactly is the point of getting water bodies that cant be swum in, down to a swimmable standard? What is this water royalty? We dont know what level it is going to be set at (reported numbers are between 1c and 2c per 1000l). We dont know how it is going to be collected. And it has little relationship to freshwater degradation. Dairy farming is associated with rises in nitrate levels in fresh water. Other forms of farming, such as viticulture arent linked to such rises. Viticulture also uses a lot of water. A royalty based on water use, isnt a polluter-pays tax. If your concern is nitrate pollution, you would tax nitrate fertilisers. Or youd tax cows. From a policy perspective, taxing water use makes little sense. It isnt targeting polluters or (directly) the problem of water degradation. In short, based on the above response, we dont know what Labour is going to do, how much theyre budgeting to spend, and how much theyre planning to collect by way of water royalties.

No doubt they will form a working group. As always, Labours policies are light on details and dont give you any idea what they will actually do.

He summarises:

Essentially, most of the parties either explicitly or tacitly accept that the NPS-FM 2014 is the vehicle for reaching improved water quality. Given the intensity of the water debate Im surprised the party policies outlined above showed so few points of difference. Theres a strong emphasis on E. coli and swimmable standards, but little on other pollutants. None of the parties identified aquatic life (say, fish and invertebrates) as a target or metric for their policies. Some of the differences are difficult to pin down. A National policy of 90% swimmable by 2040, versus a Labour policy of an unspecified (all?) swimmable over approximately 25 years, versus a Green of all water bodies safe to swim in (no date given) does not generate many degrees of separation.

So National is the only party with a specific timeframe and standard.

One major point of difference is water royalties or levies. The case for charging water royalties, or fees, or taxes, isnt convincing. Its not a Polluters Pay tax. The impact of it on water degradation is thus very fuzzy. If it was about pollution youd be charging a levy on nitrate fertiliser or the like. Its just the wrong thing to be taxing. And we return to that pesky problem that our water pollution has a big contribution from non-point sources. Its really hard to implement polluter-pays when we dont know who the polluters are, how much pollution they generate, and when they generated it.

Thats never stopped Labour taxing something though!

One of the major sources of freshwater pollution is emissions from urban households. Rather than such households responsible for, or funding water improvements, we see proposals to fund these from rural sources (e.g. the water royalty). This subsidies some polluting households (i.e. urban) to stop degrading water, by taxing other households (i.e. rural). Its a mess.

Yep Labour is going to tax generally lower income rural households to subsidise urban polluters!

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Shenandoah, IA (51601)

Today

Cloudy. High 43F. Winds SSW at 5 to 10 mph..

Tonight

Variably cloudy with snow showers. Low around 25F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of snow 60%. Snow accumulations less than one inch.
The new day resource center for the homeless, called the Beacon, is located at 615 E. Washington Ave.
By Yun Suh-young





Pianist Sohn Jeung-beum / Courtesy of Keumho Asiana Cultural Foundation

A 26-year-old Korean pianist won first prize at the respected German classical music competition, ARD Music Competition, Friday (local time).

Sohn Jeung-beum is the first Korean to win in the piano category in the history of the competition which began in 1952 in Munich, Germany. The ARD is the largest classical music competition in Germany and had its 66th anniversary this year. Sohn won in the final round of the three-round competition with Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 1. He will be awarded 10,000 euros.

South Korean Culture Minister Do Jong-whan sent a congratulatory message Saturday to Sohn for the win and in appreciation for promoting Korea's classical excellence and artistry.

"Sohn's winning of the prize helped publicize Korean musicians' outstanding artistry to the world," Do said.

"I hope the event will be a stepping stone in expanding the reach of classical music. I wish Sohn will be remembered as the world's greatest pianist in the minds of the people."

Sohn was among 34 finalists who competed in the piano category, nine of whom were Koreans. In the final round, three prize winners were announced including Germany's Fabian Muller in second place and Japan's Wataru Hisasue in third. The competition was held from Aug. 29 through Sept. 8. Sohn will be performing on stage with the other two prize winners from Sept. 13 through 15 with Munchner Symphoniker, Munich Chamber Orchestra and Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks.

Previous Korean winners of the competition include Park Hye-yoon who won first prize in violin in 2009 and Lee Yu-ra who won first prize in viola in 2013. Renowned conductor Chung Myung-whun was among the first Koreans to receive a prize at the competition with the second prize in piano in 1973.

This year's competition categories were limited to violin, piano, oboe, and guitar while next year's competition will be limited to voice, viola, trumpet and piano trio.

Sohn graduated from Seoul Arts High School and Korea National University of the Arts. He received a master's degree at Germany's national music school, Hochschule fur Musik und Theater Munchen. Sohn debuted in 1999 at the Keumho Talent Concert at age eight. He has won numerous prizes at international competitions such as second prize (with no first) at George Enescu International Competition in 2011, the Paul Streit award at the Geneva International Music Competition in 2012, second place at the Val Tidone International Competition in 2013 and third place at the Isang Yun International Competition in Korea the same year.
By Nam Hyun-woo



The National Pension Service (NPS) is struggling to bolster its sagging investment arm, hit hard by the corruption scandal involving former President Park Geun-hye and her confidant Choi Soon-sil.



NPS Investment Management' s relocation from Seoul to Jeonju, North Jeolla Province, has led to a massive worker exodus and made it difficult to recruit qualified fund managers.



According to government officials Sunday, the Ministry of Health and Welfare, which oversees NPS operations, is considering turning the pension management committee into a standing committee so it can review agendas more thoroughly.



The committee has been in charge of about 600 trillion won ($530.5 billion) of pension subscribers' money, but was strongly criticized for having a "rubber-stamp committee" after its controversial approval of the Samsung C&T and Cheil Industries merger.



Through the deal, Samsung Electronics Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong was able to increase his control of Samsung group. Lee had three private meetings with the ex-president from 2014 to 2016, at which he is suspected of having sought NPS approval for the deal.



Choi also allegedly exerted undue influence over the pension fund to back the merger.



The committee also played a key role in saving ailing shipbuilder Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering (DSME), by agreeing to debt rescheduling, which also caused a huge controversy, with many believing the government salvaged the company even though its viability was in doubt.



So far, the committee has been holding four to six three-hour meetings a year. Experts believe this is not enough time and too infrequent for members to review the agenda thoroughly.



Also, the rule allowing only the committee chairman, the Minister of Health and Welfare, to set the meeting agenda has been criticized because it heavily depends on the government's intentions.



"The committee is designed to depend too heavily on the health minister, therefore issues like DSME bonds and others could not be discussed at the meeting," said Won Jong-wook of the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs.



The government will put together a detailed plan on revamping the NPS's investment function by the end of this year, according to government officials.



"Such an improvement is one of the pledges of President Moon Jae-in and the government will pursue ways to improve the NPS investment management's independence and expertise," a senior government official told The Korea Times.



President Moon Jae-in promised to improve the expertise and independence of NPS investment management governance so the pension operator can regain public trust.



The pledge included enhancing the committee's authority and improving the transparency of decision-making and investment management.



"The ministry is reviewing possible options, but it is yet to have a fixed plan," a health ministry official said.




By Park Hyong-ki, Kim Jae-kyoung



President Moon Jae-in and his U.S. counterpart Donald Trump face a number of critical geopolitical and economic issues on which the two do not seem to see eye to eye.



Trump is apparently unhappy with the Moon administration's "soft" approach toward the unruly Kim Jong-un regime.



Dissatisfied with the terms of the free trade agreement (FTA) with Seoul, the Trump administration is calling for South Korea to revise the terms of the deal and open its doors wider to agriculture and fisheries goods.



Trump is also demanding South Korea buy more weapons from the U.S. and take up a greater share of the costs to operate U.S. forces here.



He even threatened a possible U.S. withdrawal from the bilateral free trade deal, unnecessarily undermining relations between the two allies in the face of North Korea's growing hostility.



These intertwined happenings in the chain of events are not only raising concerns over their strategic partnership, but also the possibility of stoking anti-U.S. sentiment here, observers say.



"These interlinked issues are raising concerns over a number of things, including possible anti-American sentiment, which can definitely affect Korea's relations with others, and the local market," said Chung Un-chan, former prime minister and honorary professor at Seoul National University.



"The latest geopolitical power play is teaching us a valuable lesson that we need to start building our strength to steer and seal our own fate. Otherwise, Korea will continue to be swayed by others."



James Rooney, vice chairman of the Seoul Financial Forum, said the Moon administration should not dance to Trump's reckless rhetoric, referring to Trump's recent remarks about canceling the Korea-U.S. free trade agreement.



Rooney, a professor of international finance at Sogang University in Seoul, is also a member of the board of directors of the Korean-American Association.



"If Trump chooses to destroy the KORUS FTA, then ignore it. If he is just making a big noise for the purposes of negotiation, then be gracious and polite and make the small concessions that do not matter much to you," he said.



He criticized Trump for being ignorant of the true cause of the U.S. trade deficit, noting that the trade deficit Trump complains about is actually caused by a failure of the competitiveness of U.S. companies and products in other countries.



"Successful businesses do not win or lose because of tariffs or FTAs  instead the successful ones are winners because they have great products that people want and will go out of their way to buy, as long as the company makes the effort to bring themselves to the customer's market intelligently and with proper and thorough local understanding."



For its part, the American Chamber of Commerce in Korea (AMCHAM Korea) also recently opposed termination of the trade deal, saying it would hurt both economies.



"We are also concerned about a deterioration of the relationship between the U.S. and Korea, leading to anti-American sentiment," it said in a statement.



"The growth of American businesses operating in Korea will be negatively influenced."



Farmers here are expected to be in a rage should Korean negotiators concede to the U.S. demand to eliminate tariffs on American agricultural goods. More Koreans will most likely take to the streets when the details of the FTA renegotiations unfold.



They also said escalating Chinese retaliatory steps against Korean companies following the deployment of a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missile battery here remains a seed of conflict.



The Trump administration should consider the economic losses South Korea should sustain from the THAAD placement before seeking to induce more concessions from Seoul involving the free trade deal and defense costs.




By Chyung Eun-ju, Park Si-soo

The British government suspects North Korea could develop nuclear weapons rapidly with clandestine technological help from Iran and Russia.

The Telegraph newspaper, citing Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) officials, said the FCO was looking into whether "current and former nuclear states" helped North Korea leader Kim Jong-un to develop nuclear warheads.

Iran is believed to be the biggest contributor and Russia the next, according to the newspaper. It did not elaborate.

"North Korean scientists are people of some ability, but clearly they're not doing it entirely in a vacuum," a FCO official was quoted as saying.












Will punishment be harsh enough for North Korea this time?

By Jun Ji-hye

North Korea faces deepening diplomatic isolation and harsher sanctions including an oil embargo and assets freeze as the U.N. Security Council (UNSC) plans to vote on a draft resolution Monday.

To exert the maximum pressure on the North, the United States wants the UNSC to impose an oil embargo, ban textile exports from the North and the hiring of North Korean laborers abroad, and freeze assets of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, according to the draft resolution circulated by the U.S.

Among others, cutting off the oil supply would bring a maximum level of sanctions against the Kim regime as it is regarded as a "lifeline" for Pyongyang.

However, China and Russia oppose it.

"A senior U.S. official on Friday night expressed skepticism that either nation would accept anything more stringent than a ban on imports of North Korean textiles," Reuters reported.

China, the North's last major ally and a major source of crude oil, has reportedly expressed concerns about the massive instability an oil embargo would bring about in the North.

The Donald Trump administration has warned it would take unilateral actions including military ones should China and Russia not cooperate in the vote. NBC News reported the military options would include "cyberattacks, increased surveillance and intelligence operations."

U.S. officials have also told China that if Beijing doesn't take stronger steps against the North, such as cutting off its oil supply, Seoul and Tokyo are likely to pursue their own nuclear weapons programs and Washington will not stop them, NBC News said.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, second from right, applauds with his wife Ri Sol-ju, third from right, and other high-ranking officials and scientists at a feast celebrating a hydrogen bomb test, at Mokran House in Pyongyang, in this photo released by the Korean Central News Agency, Sunday. / Yonhap



By Kim Rahn

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has hailed the recent test of a hydrogen bomb, calling it a "great victory," the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported Sunday.

Kim took part in a feast at Mokran House in Pyongyang to celebrate the allegedly successful test of the nuclear weapon and praised the scientists and technicians for their development of the bomb, it said.

On Sept. 3, Pyongyang exploded an H-bomb which it claims can fit inside an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).

The news agency did not say when the feast was held, but analysts presume it was on Saturday, Sept. 9, North Korea's Foundation Day, as the agency said the North presented the H-bomb's explosion as a song of triumph in September on the anniversary of when the country was established.

"The Central Committee and the Central Military Commission of the Workers' Party of Korea hosted a feast for scientists and technicians who worked for the nuclear development," the KCNA said. "Those who contributed to the successful testing of the H-bomb for an ICBM were invited."

Kim said the nuclear test was "a great victory of the Korean people which they achieved at the cost of their blood by tightening their belts in hard times." He also said North Korea "will surely win the ultimate victory because it has a strong independent economic basis, a large force of clever scientists, and its Army equipped with revolutionary spirit," according to the KCNA.

The news agency said Kim urged the attendees to work harder to achieve stronger nuclear power for self-protection. Kim stressed the "nuclear combatants" will give even more efforts for greater victory although they achieved "total success" with the H-bomb test.

Many high-ranking officials from the government, the party and the Army took part in the feast, including the Korean People's Army Vice Marshal Hwang Pyong-so, Premier Pak Pong-ju and Workers' Party Vice Chairman Choe Ryong-hae.

The North also held a separate art performance in celebration, which was attended by Kim and his wife, Ri Sol-ju.
By Park Si-soo



The U.S. government is considering moving some of its powerful tactical nuclear weapons to South Korea to counter the North's increasing military threat, the NBC reports, citing senior White House and Pentagon officials

The U.S. broadcaster said it was one of many options U.S. President Donald Trump discussed with his top national security advisers shortly after North Korea's sixth nuclear test on Sept. 3.

NBC reported that Seoul's request would be a prerequisite for the deployment. It added that many of Trump's advisers considered the move a "non-starter" because the deployment would break with nearly three decades of U.S. policy of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula.

Other options under Trump's consideration include cyber-attacks on Pyongyang, increased surveillance, intelligence operations and sanctions on Chinese banks doing business with Pyongyang, and upgrading missile defense systems in Southeast Asia.
By Lee Kyung-min



Parents of children with disabilities and residents in Gangseo-gu, western Seoul, are engaged in an escalating conflict over the construction of a special needs school there.



Parents say setting up a school designed to take care of children with chronic medical conditions is the only way to educate them because most schools refuse to accept them, saying they "disturb regular classes and other students find them bothersome."



They also point out a lack of such schools, leading some to spend up to three hours commuting every day.



However, residents say such a school will decrease house and land prices. They instead prefer the construction of a traditional Korean medicine hospital, as proposed by Rep. Kim Sung-tae of the main opposition Liberty Korea Party (LKP).



The conflict came under the public spotlight after a video clip went viral that showed about 50 parents and 10 residents facing each other for hours kneeling at a public hearing at the Topsan Elementary School last Tuesday. They met to discuss setting up a school on land formerly occupied by Kongjin Elementary School.



More than 400 people attended the hearing including civic groups representing the disabled, parents with disabled children, Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education (SMOE) Superintendent Cho Hee-yeon and Rep. Kim who won the district after promising to build a traditional Korean medicine hospital ahead of the April general election last year.



In the clip, the two sides began kneeling after one of the parents, surnamed Jang, first knelt in mid-discussion, sobbing, "I'm a sinner for having a child with a disability."



Jang, 47, with a teenage child diagnosed with intellectual disability, said she would take any insult for her child to attend school.



"I can take it if you beat me or insult me. You are all parents just as I am. Please let my child go to school near home," she said.



Soon joining Jang was another mother, surnamed Kim, who has a child she said was practically forced out of an elementary school.



Kim burst into tears while explaining how she had to take her child to a school so far away from home, it required up to three hours of commuting.



However, their emotional pleading was met only with derision from the residents who shouted "Do not attempt to put on a show."



Their children are among 645 requiring special needs education in the district. In Gangseo-gu, there is only one such school which can only accept up to 100 children.



According to SMOE, out of 12,804 children with disabilities, only about a third or 4,457 go to one of 30 special needs schools in 25 districts in Seoul. No special needs public school has been built since 2002 when Seoul Gyeongun School was built in Jongno-gu.



After the video clip went viral, almost 100 people signed a petition on a Cheong Wa Dae website supporting building the school in the district.



The Ministry of Health and Welfare said it has no plans to build a hospital in the district.



The ministry said the SMOE-owned land, the use of which is limited to only educational purposes, does not have approval for building any medical institutions.



The ministry said it was notified by SMOE about its plan to build a special needs school on the land in March, and no other discussions followed to reverse that decision.




By Jung Min-ho

A festival for better understanding between Koreans and migrants will begin this month in Changwon, South Gyeongsang Province.

The Migrant Arirang Multicultural Festival, an annual fall event, will be held from Sept. 29 to Oct. 1 for participants from 13 countries to share their cultures and differences.

Every year, the festival highlights one nation as the guest of honor. Bangladesh will play the role this year with special cultural performances.

Performers from other countries, including Indonesia, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Mongolia and the Philippines, are also scheduled to show their talents.

Interesting exhibitions and games are expected to excite and inspire visitors. On the last day, participants will dress in traditional clothing and parade through the city, which will be the highlight of the festival.

The inaugural event was held in Seoul in 2005 and has been held in Changwon since 2010.

Organizers said they are expecting more than 200,000 visitors this year after attracting about 153,000 people last year.
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Chairman of the main opposition Liberty Korea Party (LKP) Hong Joon-pyo, second from right, holds a sign criticizing the Moon Jae-in administration's security policy, during a protest in southern Seoul, Saturday, as part of the party's boycott of the National Assembly. / Yonhap



By Kim Hyo-jin

The main opposition Liberty Korea Party (LKP) has decided to end its week-long boycott of the National Assembly's regular session as they made no political gains from the boycott but only got negative responses from the public.



Party spokesman Khang Hyo-shang told reporters Saturday the party's Supreme Council decided to return to the Assembly, and the party will hold a general meeting Monday morning to decide when to officially return.



It is likely to return immediately after the meeting and participate in the interpellation session slated for that afternoon.



The decision came as the boycott was losing ground, seeing no fruitful outcome.



The LKP started the boycott Sept. 2, a day after a local court issued an emergency warrant to detain MBC President Kim Jang-gyeom for his alleged unfair labor practices.



Kim was accused of meddling in news production in favor of the previous Park Geun-hye government and abusing his authority in personnel matters by disadvantaging employees who refused to follow his directions. The warrant was issued as Kim had refused to answer four summonses by the Seoul regional labor office.



The party, however, defended Kim, claiming the Moon Jae-in administration was attempting to control the media.



But its boycott failed to gain public attention and support due to North Korea's sixth nuclear test Sunday.



The political cycle moved fast, without the LKP: the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) adopted a resolution to denounce the North's nuclear test along with the minor opposition People's Party and the Bareun Party Monday.



Kim's voluntary appearance at the labor office for investigation Tuesday also left the party little justification for its protest.



The boycott rather highlighted the main opposition party's weak presence in legislative negotiations, analysts say.



LKP floor leader Chung Woo-taik demanded the government officially announce it has no intention to control the media, but to no avail.



The public also gave the party the cold shoulder, criticizing it for neglecting legislative activity amid growing security concerns.



According to a Korean Society Opinion Institute (KSOI) poll conducted with 1,014 respondents between Friday and Saturday, 69 percent viewed the LKP's boycott unfavorably. Even conservative citizens did not support the boycott, with 53.8 percent of conservative respondents criticizing it.



Under such circumstances, the party decided to return to the Assembly in order to "seek a legislative probe" into what it calls the ruling party's attempt to control the media.



Khang refrained from mentioning what the party achieved from the boycott, virtually admitting it was of no avail.



Other parties all welcomed the LKP's withdrawal of its boycott.



"The LKP must have realized how cold the public sentiment was about the boycott that ignored the livelihood of the people and was conducted amid a security crisis," DPK spokesman Rep. Kang Hoon-sik said. "We hope the party stops this political offensive and cooperates in boosting a productive Assembly."



The People's Party also said, "It is a relief the Assembly's regular session can be normalized now."








By Walt Gardner





When universities in Korea increased tuition fees by 8 percent for international students, the decision was immediately attacked as discriminatory. In quick succession, the hike was defended as necessary to pay for the additional cost of support services and scholarships.

A similar controversy arose in the U.S. when the University of California system charged out-of-state students close to $30,000 more for their education each year than state residents. The move was a transparent attempt to boost revenue because non-resident students need no more services.

What's the truth? In both cases, the larger question is whether admitting higher-paying students is fair. Why should students who are in a position to pay more be able to buy themselves a place? Enrollment is not supposed to be for sale to the highest bidder.

There is much truth to this claim. In a pure meritocracy, admission should be based strictly on academic qualifications. But universities are increasingly being run like businesses. That means by limiting the number of international or out-of-state students, respectively, universities run the risk of a shortfall in their operating budgets.

Despite the financial argument, the University of California finally yielded to pressure and placed a 20 percent systemwide limit on nonresident undergraduates. This cap followed in the wake of a threat by California lawmakers to hold back $18.5 million.

A more positive way of addressing the problem in Korea is to amend the Higher Education Act that limits tuition increases to 1.5 percent to apply to all students, regardless of their origin. At present, the law exempts international students.

A more dramatic strategy would be to make tuition free for all students in public colleges and universities. New York State rolled out a plan last spring that has been heralded as a model for other states. Under the Excelsior Scholarship, the cost of a degree from a four-year state college or university would be cut by about $26,000 for an eligible family. (The current cost is about $83,000 for tuition, fees, and room and board.)

Korea could modify this plan to meet its unique needs by establishing certain terms and conditions. For example, students must come from families earning less than a stipulated amount and must attend school full-time and graduate on time. Students who don't complete 30 credits over two semesters would lose their grant award for the second semester and be responsible for taking out loans to pay back what they owe.

International students, in particular, would have to commit to living and working in Korea after they graduate for as many years as they receive the scholarship. If they leave before then, the grant would turn into a loan. After all, they've been the beneficiary of a solid Korean education, for which they owe something in return.

There is never going to be a solution that will please everyone. But Korea can profit from the talent of international students while defending itself against charges of discrimination by instituting reasonable changes. The key is to balance the benefits to the country with the needs of students.





Walt Gardner writes the Reality Check blog for Education Week in the U.S. Write to walt.gard376@gmail.com.
By Ruti Teitel





NEW YORK  Joe Arpaio, the former sheriff of Maricopa County, Arizona, who was convicted of contempt of court for defying a federal judge's order to stop racially profiling and arbitrarily detaining Latinos in the name of catching illegal immigrants, is no stranger to controversy. But it is US President Donald Trump's recent pardon of Arpaio that currently is spurring heated debate, as it raises fundamental questions about the presidential pardon power that has been a part of US policymaking from the country's birth.

In a monarchy, a king may have the power to forgive citizens' crimes virtually without limit. In the US Constitution  Article II, Section 2  America's founders gave a similar power to the president, but with two key limitations. One is rooted in separation of powers: it could not be used in cases of impeachment, an issue that is handled by Congress. The other is rooted in federalism: it could be used only for crimes "against the United States," or federal crimes, not crimes prosecuted by one of the 50 US states.

The granting of the pardon power reflected concerns among the US Constitution's framers that the criminal code would be applied in a draconian manner, producing a surfeit of punishment. As Alexander Hamilton put it in Federalist 74, "The criminal code of every country partakes so much of necessary severity, that without an easy access to exceptions in favor of unfortunate guilt, justice would wear a countenance too sanguinary and cruel."

The power to pardon, Hamilton continued, ought to be exercised by one person, because a single person "would be most ready to attend to the force of those motives which might plead for the mitigation of the rigor of the law." What the founders do not address is what happens when that one person has something other than justice on his mind.

During Arpaio's 24 years as the sheriff of a jurisdiction that includes the rapidly growing city of Phoenix, he built his reputation on his department's aggressive efforts to track down undocumented immigrants  and on the brutal conditions he established in the facilities where they were held. Arpaio was directly responsible for detaining thousands of people without any reasonable suspicion that they had violated immigration law. It was enough that they looked Latino. That behavior made Arpaio the subject of lawsuits that, from 1993 to 2015, cost $142 million to settle.

Trump and Arpaio are longtime allies. During Barack Obama's presidency, both were prominent figures in the racist "birther" movement that insisted Obama was born outside the US, and therefore was not entitled to be president. During Trump's presidential campaign, Arpaio was a poster child of the divisive immigration debate and a vocal supporter of the candidate's extreme promises, including the construction of a wall on the border with Mexico.

Against this background, Trump's pardon of Arpaio looks like sheer political opportunism. It certainly was not a moral act of clemency. After all, Arpaio's conduct hardly qualifies as "unfortunate guilt." He reveled in his law-breaking, has shown no remorse for it, has never signaled an understanding of the grace of mercy. And, given that he was not to be sentenced until October, one cannot argue that he faced draconian punishment (a key concern for America's founders).

The US Constitution's framers envisioned another key purpose for the pardon power: to help end conflicts and reconcile with political foes. In Hamilton's words, "there are often critical moments when a well-timed offer of pardon to the insurgents or rebels may restore the tranquility of the commonwealth."

In 1863, Abraham Lincoln issued full pardons for Confederates  with the exception of their leaders and subject to conditions "he may deem expedient for the public welfare"  in order to help reunite the country after the Civil War. Even Gerald Ford's 1974 pardon of Richard Nixon, who had resigned from the presidency over the Watergate scandal, was couched in terms of national healing.

Recalling the ways in which the pardon power has been used in the past highlights the perversity of the Arpaio affair and its singular reactionary purpose: to denigrate and, where possible, reverse Obama's achievements and, indeed, his values. In Trump's hands, a constitutional power intended to mitigate the "necessary severity" of criminal justice was deployed to sanction cruelty by a sworn officer of the law.

Unsurprisingly, given its purely ideological basis, Arpaio's pardon was not reviewed in advance by the US Department of Justice, as has become customary over the years. Indeed, the DOJ rushed to distance itself from the decision, highlighting how easily Trump can use (or not use) the pardon power to settle his many scores: it is virtually the only power within the criminal justice system that the president can exercise unilaterally.

To be sure, Trump's pardon of Arpaio has not created a legal basis for impunity; the pardon power's constitutional limitations prevent that. But a serious problem will arise if Trump attempts to use it to protect his family  not a farfetched scenario, given pending FBI investigations into his inner circle's dealings with Russia. Such a move would be met with a potential legal challenge, based on the impeachment clause or other constitutional limits.

The pardon power is like a loaded gun. In the hands of a leader who possesses wisdom and good character, it can strengthen the rule of law. But, in the hands of an unstable, vengeful narcissist, it can cause profound damage.





Ruti Teitel is professor of comparative law at New York Law School and the author of a forthcoming book about President Barack Obama's legacy for global transitional justice.

Copyright belongs to Project Syndicate.
Olympics can serve as impetus to overcome tourism slump



Recently, there has been discouraging news about Korea's tourism. A Bank of Korea report showed the nation's travel deficit in July rose 39.8 percent from a year ago to $1.79 billion.



The record-low figure is due to a decline in foreign tourists and rise in the number of Koreans traveling abroad.



In particular, there was a noticeable drop in the number of Chinese travelers to Korea, decreasing by 69.3 percent to 281,000. Beijing banned travel agencies from sending group tours to Korea earlier this year as a retaliatory measure against Korea's deployment of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system. The number of tourists from Japan and Europe has also been declining.



The geopolitical tension caused by Pyongyang's increasing provocations is also impacting Korea's appeal as a tourism hub among foreign travelers.



On the other hand, the number of Koreans traveling abroad hit a record high of 2.39 million in July, rising 14.5 percent from a year ago.



Korea should use its position as an Olympic host to lift up the tourism industry. Aside from being the world's biggest sporting event, the Olympics are a great opportunity to promote the host country's tourism, cultural and history assets.



President Moon Jae-in, who was appointed honorary ambassador for the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games, spent a part of his summer vacation in PyeongChang to promote the alpine city as a tourist destination. He has also been introducing the city to fellow world leaders. But still, PyeongChang is unknown to the outside world. With just a few months left until the Olympics, Korea's diplomatic missions and cultural centers should spread tourist attractions from all over Korea in their host countries.



The relevant ministries and the Korea Tourism Organization should also work together on diversifying Korea's tourism and reducing its heavy dependence on Chinese tourists. The government recently announced marketing plans to attract more tourists from Taiwan and Vietnam.



It is important to increase domestic travel by Koreans. Many Koreans choose to travel to nearby countries like Japan, Taiwan and Hong Kong instead of going to popular local destinations like Jeju Island because of high prices in Korea nowadays.



Koreans also need more leisure time. A recent report showed nearly a quarter of salaried workers did not take summer vacations. If Koreans had more free time, they would consider taking long weekends and traveling to nearby destinations as well as faraway regions. Reducing the notoriously long work hours and giving workers the liberty to take all of their annual vacation days could be effective for promoting interest in domestic travel.




The Chinese edition of the Global Times, the sister paper of China's state-controlled People's Daily, has, as we know, given the media a bad name _ acting as attack dog at its government's bidding, throwing away any pretensions of neutrality and making the media there a collective lout. Being sly is also a major characteristic.



At issue is its editorial on Sept. 7, entitled "Korea won't be safe with THAAD deployment." THAAD is a U.S. anti-missile Terminal High Altitude Area Defense battery now in place in the South against the growing North Korean missile threat. China has opposed its deployment, citing absurd claims its radar is intrusive enough to spy on China's interior when it already has radar systems that are much more intrusive in nature.



The paper said, "Korean conservatives have become stupid after eating too much kimchi." It also said Korea would find itself to be a helpless victim in the U.S.-China confrontation, while giving unsolicited advice to Korean churchgoers and Buddhists to pray.



The paper parroted the government's provocative and uncalled-for line and ignored the North's threat that led to the deployment.



These arguments warrant a reply, so we ask:



( 1) Is eating too much pork and drinking too much tea making the Global Times editorial board stupid enough to see only one side of a story?



(2) Is the one-man dictatorship turning China into a monster that the international community will shun?



(3) Should Taoists pray and Falun Gong march to Tiananmen Square?



The Global Times, as observers point out, is currying favor with its owner, the Communist Party, to get more subsidies, being an ugly duckling compared with the party's flagship, the People's Daily. If the Chinese mass media sucks up to the state with the zeal of red guards protecting Mao Tse-tung, it can only help lead to unhappy episodes like the Cultural Revolution.



Finally, the paper tried to hoodwink readers when, in the face of protests from Seoul, it switched the headline to "2 questions Korea should answer" and reposted the contents with no changes. This shows that as well as being a state mouthpiece, the paper is deceitful as well.




New developments catch Seoul off guard



South Korea finds itself in the role of bystander in the North Korean nuclear and missile crisis, although it is the party most affected by the outcome. The North's tactic of alienating it is one reason, while the international nature of the crisis is another. But it is imperative Seoul keep finding ways of staying involved, have its say and determine the outcome that serves its interests.



For that to happen, it is pivotal for the government to have plans to counter a variety of contingencies. The lack of such plans has caught the Moon government flat-footed when the North pressed ahead with its nuclear and missile tests and the U.S. is zigzagging from hard-line to soft-pedaling without bothering to consult Seoul.



In this political melee, the government has lost its political compass and given up its pursuit of reconciliation with the North to follow the U.S. lead and acquiesce to the rising conservative domestic demand for inter-Korean confrontation. This change of stance has come without a fallback plan and will likely make it harder to seek dialogue again later.



There are now two big contingencies. The first is related to what to do in the lead-up to the international recognition, unofficial most likely, or denial of the North's possession of nuclear weapons. The second is about the aftermath.



It is widely agreed that the North is close to developing an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) tipped with a sizable nuclear warhead, capable of striking key U.S. population centers.



There could be more crises in the coming months, with experts believing the North needs about a year or so to complete its ICBM capability. The biggest crisis is about a U.S. temptation to launch a pre-emptive strike at the risk of triggering a second Korean War. What would Seoul have to prevent it? The second biggest would be about the North's provocations that would crest as the U.S. urges China and Russia to cut off oil supplies to the North, a move which is happening now in the United Nations. Seoul appears to be a reluctant rider on the runaway U.S. sanctions train and there will be a time for it to try to slow the train down. The plan should cover how it should do that.



In case the North's nuclear status is somehow accepted, the North is likely to try to cut a deal about a moratorium on tests or freeze its nuclear and missile programs. By its current and past behavior, the North will definitely try to sideline the South to deal directly with Washington. The U.S. may be drawn to Pyongyang's proposal that it withdraw from the Korean Peninsula. Already, some Americans have argued for the U.S. pullout.



Our plan should deal with preventing the U.S. pullout, setting in place self-preservation measures in case that happens, or, more broadly, ways of achieving a balance of power with a nuclear-armed North Korea. Then, there should be our winning strategy of outlasting the North. Better to be prepared than sorry. Besides, while preparing, chances are we will find new strengths we did not know we had.




By Tong Kim





Amid renewed tensions with North Korea, U.S. President Donald Trump told reporters at the White House on Sept. 7 that the military option is still on the table, but it is not "inevitable."

He also warned that if the U.S. has to use force, "it would be a very sad day for North Korea." "I would prefer not going the route of the military, but it's something, certainly, that could happen. Our military has never been stronger."

After his call to the Chinese president a day earlier, Trump said the military option was "not his first choice," adding that "President Xi Jinping would like to do something. We will see whether or not he can do it."

Trump appears willing to wait to see if non-military means could work out. Some members of Congress, who recently were briefed by Trump's security advisers including the secretaries of defense and state, said the tone of the briefing was on the side of diplomacy rather than on military plans.

Trump's improvised tweets and unscripted comments have often created confusion and concerns over U.S. policy. For example, his tweets that read "dialogue is not the answer" were understandable in the face of mounting tensions from North Korean provocation. But his scolding of the Moon government, "South Korea is finding as I told them, that their talk of appeasement with North Korea will not work, they only understand one thing!" was undiplomatic and unnecessary, as many critics pointed out.

His threat to terminate the U.S.-ROK free trade agreement was inappropriate at a time when a stronger alliance was needed to meet the challenges of the North Korean threat. The White House backed down after there was a torrent of criticism from American industries and Congress. South Korea will be spending billions of dollars to buy U.S. military hardware and that alone will help reduce U.S. trade deficits.

Pyongyang's successful nuclear test on Sept. 3 triggered concerns and condemnation from all over the world, including the European Union (EU). The North's sixth test came only a week after it launched an intermediate-range ballistic missile that flew over Japan and landed in the North Pacific.

Pyongyang claimed it conducted "an ICBM-ready H-bomb test," demonstrating "super-powerful EMP (electromagnetic pulse) capacity" to paralyze power grids and electronic systems. The test result was between 50 and 160 kilotons, or five to 10 times stronger than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima at the end of World War II.

Washington believes that North Korea has an ICBM capable of reaching the United States and that it has miniaturized a nuclear warhead to mount on it, but it is yet to prove its re-entry technology. However, some experts believe the North has already resolved the re-entry hurdle.

If the North has completed its capacity to strike the U.S. with a nuclear-tipped missile, this may rule out U.S. military action. There is no guarantee that a U.S. strike will take out all North Korea's nuclear weapons. The North could strike back against the continental U.S. with its surviving weapons. One comfort: Kim Jong-un is not insane and he is not "begging for war." He is seeking for recognition.

At the United Nations Security Council, the U.S. and its allies are pressing hard for the toughest sanctions ever against the DPRK, which reportedly would include imposing an oil embargo, barring North Korean laborers from working overseas, stopping agricultural exports from the North, freezing Kim Jong-un's financial assets and prohibiting him from traveling.

However, Russian President Vladimir Putin told South Korean President Moon Jae-in in Vladivostok that Russia will not support a total cut-off of oil supplies to the North. Putin says sanctions and pressure alone will not work on the North. Like China, Russia condemns North Korea's weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs, but insists on dialogue as the only solution.

Despite China's seeming willingness to take further steps to punish the North, it is unlikely to agree to suspend all its oil provision to the North, which could lead to the regime's collapse. China is reacting bitterly against last week's completion of the THAAD missile battery deployment in Korea, not an encouraging sign for China's cooperation on Pyongyang.

The Moon government shifted its emphasis from dialogue to "maximum pressure possible" to deal with North Korean provocations. It will require a constructive change in North Korean behavior to defuse the powder keg that Pyongyang has brought to the Korean Peninsula. What's your take?





Tong Kim is a Washington correspondent and columnist for The Korea Times. He is also a fellow at the Institute of Korean-American Studies. He can be contacted at tong.kim8@yahoo.com.
By Lee Min-hyung



Naver has joined with a group of leading auto parts makers to create a $65 million (73.2 billion won) fund for an Israeli startup that manufactures sensors for autonomous vehicles, the internet company said Friday.



The partnership with Innoviz Technologies will serve as a building block for Naver to raise its global profile as a driverless vehicle industry player, the Korean company said.



The nation's top portal operator did not reveal its stake in the fund, citing contract terms. Other investors include Delphi Automotive and Magma International.



Innoviz is renowned for developing the light detection and ranging (LIDAR) sensor that is often cited as the eyes of self-driving vehicles.



The LIDAR sensor comes with one noteworthy difference from conventional radars, Naver said. By using a powerfully pulsed laser light, LIDAR can measure distances of neighboring objects in much more detail than other sensors.



Engineers from Israel's defense ministry established the company in 2016, focusing on developing deep learning-driven algorithms for autonomous vehicles.



Innoviz Technologies plans to launch InnovizPro LiDAR in the first quarter next year and supply the sensor to major carmakers here and abroad.



"The latest partnership will help us enhance the competitiveness of our ongoing cognitive research for autonomous vehicles," a Naver official said.



"Other benefits the strategic alliance will bring include potential synergy with Naver Labs Europe's AI research facility in France."



In February, Naver was the nation's first IT firm to win a license for autonomous vehicle road tests.



This came as part of the company's efforts to find its next revenue generator after a group of leading IT titans  such as Google and Samsung Electronics  tapped into the autonomous vehicle industry.



According to Strategy Analytics, the global LIDAR market will grow to 3.69 trillion won in 2021, with an annual growth rate of 61 percent. This is because more tech companies are jumping on the auto parts bandwagon.



Samsung Electronics acquired Harman International last year for 8 trillion won, seeking to tap deeper into the connected car industry.



"The world's leading carmakers and IT players are joining forces to secure key technologies to embrace the autonomous vehicle era," Naver chief technology officer Song Chang-hyun said.



"Naver will continue to enhance research on ways to combine its deep learning-based technologies into cars. Toward that end, we are going to further expand our partnerships with tech players in the self-driving car industry."




By Lee Min-hyung





LG V30

Sales of LG Electronics' latest smartphone, the V30, is expected to top its predecessor, the V20, as the flagship device is drawing decent market responses for its organic light-emitting diode (OLED) high-end display and enhanced design, according to analysts.

LG expects the device to give new momentum to the firm's ailing mobile unit, even if the V30 alone is insufficient to help the division post a noteworthy turnaround in a few quarters.

"An estimated sales figure for the device will be around 1.3 to 1.5 million this year, up from that of its predecessor's 1.1 million last year," Dongbu Securities analyst Kwon Sung-ryul said. "The V30 will not be able to become a game changer, but at least, the device is expected to energize the stagnant mobile unit."

This is because LG has jumped on the global smartphone display bandwagon by equipping the device with its much-hyped six-inch, 18:9 ratio FullVision OLED display, according to the analyst.

"In particular, the V30 gave customers the perception that the company can manufacture quality smartphones despite its quarters-long deficit," he said. "The device has also been praised by many customers for its improved design from its predecessor."

LG unveiled the device at this year's IFA tradeshow in Germany late last month. The smartphone will be available for sale on Sept. 21 here, with the device set to make its debut in other major overseas markets soon after. The V30 is priced at 949,300 won ($839.35) here for the 64-GB internal storage model. The 128-GB phone will sell for 998,800 won.

The V30 comes at a time when the premium smartphone industry is reaching saturation, due to lack of innovations and intensifying rivalry with the rise of Chinese cost-effective vendors.

IHS analyst Ian Fogg said LG is on track to establish its differentiated smartphone brand identity with the V30's OLED panels.

"LG is able to take advantage of its display panel business to deliver a high quality, high dynamic range (HDR) and super wide aspect ratio OLED display on the V30," said the analyst. "This is highly differentiated from Chinese brands which have struggled to secure OLED panels." LG has a stable source of OLED panels from LG Display, while Chinese handset makers still adopt liquid crystal diode (LCD) displays that are not compatible with quality HDR video content, according to him.

The analyst said the key to the device's sales success depends on its possibly wider availability in more countries than its predecessor.

"The V20 was not sold in Europe," he said. "If the V30 has wider international availability, this will increase the volume modestly."

But he also concurred that the V30 will not be powerful enough to help the mobile unit achieve a short-term rebound.

"The V30 is not sufficiently unique enough to turn around LG's fortunes in the super-competitive smartphone market."
Delafield businessman Kevin Nicholson and state Sen. Leah Vukmir, R-Brookfield, are competing for the chance to challenge Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin. At a recent debate, they agreed on almost everything. So which one do voters choose?
Samantha Stam was going to school and working three jobs as a waitress when a customer offered her a job out of the blue.

Stam, 25, recognized local grocery store owner Brett Rechek's name when he paid his bill and made a joke about not realizing she was serving royalty. Rechek's Food Pride is a well-known family-owned business in Beaver Dam.

Rechek was so impressed with Stam's customer service skills that he handed her his business card and told her to call him about a job.

Rechek said it's a new strategy he's tried within the past year as he has contended with a growing worker shortage. He has handed out his business card at drive-through windows even when he doesn't have an opening, because he knows once he does how hard it will be to fill it.

"If I get a good application I hire them, I fit them in, because you don't get that many great ones any more," Rechek said. "It's getting that hard to find people."

Stam started working part-time at Rechek's service desk for $9 an hour. At one point Rechek's wife commented on her work ethic and Rechek asked how he could get her to work full-time. She asked for $15, but it was more than what most cashiers made. She ended up getting a raise to $12.50 an hour full-time.

Stam grew up in Milwaukee and Cedarburg where her friends were getting ready to go to college while she started waiting tables. Her mother worked through night school to become a union electrician when Stam was 6 years old.

"I guess just seeing her doing that, I don't have an excuse to be lazy," Stam said.

She plans to finish classes at Moraine Park Technical College with two two-year degrees in legal administrative professional and administrative professional services. Her dream is to one day have her own desk neatly stacked with papers.

Stam had a number of bad experiences with other employers, but what she appreciated about Rechek was his willingness to reward hard work.
John Rossant is founder and chairman of the nonprofit NewCities foundation and creator of LA CoMotion, a big urban mobility conference and festival thats attracting an international crowd to the Arts District Nov. 15-19.

A former journalist who has organized and produced conferences around the world, including the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Rossant, 62, intends to make LA CoMotion a world-scale annual event. He recently moved with his family from New York to Los Angeles.

More success stories from How I Made It 

Family influence

I grew up in Manhattan. My father was a journalist at the New York Times. We would religiously read the New York Times at the breakfast table. It was a very bookish household. My outlook on life was formed by early reading.

When I was 17, I applied to the University of Wisconsin, where my girlfriend was going. I fell in with students from completely different backgrounds than my own. I think people who grow up in New York often forget how insular New York is to the rest of the country and the rest of the world.

After my freshman year, my dad ended financial support following a big disagreement  and I probably deserved the punishment. I had to drop out for a year, lived in a cold water flat in New York. I worked as a messenger on Wall Street and cleaned mouse cages at a lab. I was on my own financially. Not fun, but it taught me how to survive on my own.

The Cairo spark

When I returned to college, I saw signs for an Arabic course. The calligraphy was beguiling and I said, why not. When I graduated, I won a U.S. State Department fellowship for intensive training in classical Arabic in Cairo. I found myself in this huge, very foreign, exotic, wonderful city. This was clearly the spark that ignited my fascination with cities and how cities are organized.

If the ultimate iconic car culture city could change, any city in the world could change.  John Rossant on Los Angeles

My first job was in Saudi Arabia, at the English-language Arab News. It was a truly alien place for a journalist back then: an absolute monarchy, a tribal system. Nobody quite understood what a Western journalist did, and I think most people thought I was a CIA operative.

Copines Francaises

Back in New York after a year and a half in the Arabian desert, BusinessWeek called me up one day and said they were opening a Paris office. Would I be interested? I said, ummm  yes 

The editor asked me if I spoke French. I told him yes, of course. He said OK, youre heading to Paris next week. Let's just say my French was pretty basic so I had to learn on the fly. I had French girlfriends and I forced myself to go to lots of French movies. That worked.

Later BusinessWeek moved me to Rome to cover Italy and the Middle East. I had to learn Italian, of course, and that's where I was lucky enough to meet my wife. In 1991, I covered the first Gulf War.

After that I was back in Paris as Europe editor. I was at a working lunch in Paris with Maurice Levy, the legendary CEO of Publicis, the big French advertising and public relations firm. He invited me to his office. We had a long discussion of French history and American relations.

Levy was clearly looking for someone who could speak French, who knew about communicating with the Anglophone world. The digital onslaught was just beginning and I didnt see a bright future for print so I made the decision to leave BusinessWeek. I was made head of communications and public affairs at Publicis.

Digital tsunami

The very week I joined Publicis, Rupert Murdoch made a prescient speech in Washington where he told assembled newspaper and magazine editors: Youre all going to be out of a job. Theres a digital tsunami coming.

I immediately recommended that Publicis launch a high-level conference on the future of media. I cut a deal with Prince Albert of Monaco to create the Monaco Media Forum. I developed a real passion for bringing smart people around a table to talk about issues.

For several years I was in charge of producing the famous World Economic Forum in Davos  and I started to gain a reputation as someone who could put together these kind of events.

At the same time, I was more and more fascinated and preoccupied by cities, the development of cities. A majority of the human population was moving to cities. At the same time, the digital revolution and the Internet held out the promise of radically reorganizing cities. For the better.

L.A.: Where its at

I created a nonprofit foundation, the NewCities Foundation. Our big annual meeting has now been held in Paris, Sao Paulo, Dallas, Jakarta, Montreal and Songdo, a very successful new city near Seoul, [South] Korea.

More and more, though, I saw that the huge disruption sweeping over the mobility and transportation sector would impact cities everywhere, and I saw a need for a global gathering on urban transportation.

I read Mayor Eric Garcetti s Mobility 2035 transportation plan and was impressed. If the ultimate iconic car culture city could change, any city in the world could change. So why not anchor a global mobility conference in Los Angeles? L.A. in particular and California in general are emerging as the center of smart thinking about mobility.

Take a leap

When I look back, its important to trust your instincts and leap into the unknown. You have to kind of just take risks with things. Its a lesson thats hard to impart to your children, because risks sometimes dont turn out so well.

russ.mitchell@latimes.com
HBOs Entourage followed a glitzy group of childhood friends as they pursued their dreams of fame and fortune in Hollywood.

The shows creator, Doug Ellin, is now selling his Beverly Hills mansion for $9.995 million, and the luxurious pad looks like it couldve been featured as a set piece on the series.

Situated behind hedges and gates, the traditional home is entered via a horseshoe-shaped driveway and opens to a formal, two-story foyer.

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A vaulted ceiling overlooks the dark hardwood floors of the living room and dining area. The highlight of the spacious living room is a step-down rotunda bar that opens to the backyard.

French doors, three ovens and an island populate the chefs kitchen, which opens to the patio area. Flagstone terracing teams with trees and shrubs to give privacy to the pool and spa, while a barbecue area sits adjacent.

Six bedrooms are spread across the homes 5,780 square feet of living space. The master suite provides plenty of room to relax, with a fireplace, huge walk-in closet and a steam shower. Two other suites downstairs have been converted to a library and an office.

The two-story home last changed hands in 2008 for $5.93 million, according to public records.

Ginger Glass of Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage holds the listing.

Ellin, 49, created and produced Entourage, which ran for eight seasons. He also has enjoyed success as a director and screenwriter and has been nominated for three Emmys and four Writers Guild of America awards.

jack.flemming@latimes.com

Twitter: @jflem94
This is a terrific article [Harvey Refocuses National Media, Aug. 30]. TV critic Lorraine Alis perception of the current opinion versus news is so obvious its breaking news that no one else seems to report on it. I suggest she email/tweet a copy of this article to champions of spinning opinion such as Sean Hannity, Eric Bolling, Anderson Cooper, Don Lemon, Rachel Maddow, Chris Matthews and Lawrence ODonnell. Retitle the piece as News Alert to get their attention.

Blair Tuckerman

Upland

::

A wonderful article. My dad, grandfather and great uncle, who were true newspapermen of the highest degree, would have been very proud. My father worked all levels for journalism, but the one thing he left me with was that news that was not verified was not news at all. He would have choked on the reporting of today.

Thank you for speaking clearly about the honorable professionalism of journalists who honor the news and not themselves.

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Jim Power

Kingwood, Texas

::

I must respectfully disagree with you here. The nonstop coverage of President Trump by CNN and MSNBC is some of the best actual journalism Ive seen. It is very repetitive, I will admit, but absolutely necessary because this country has never in the history of its existence had such an inept leader. With his presidency, this country has entered a dark and perilous time that is unprecedented. That absolutely deserves nonstop coverage.

Elliot Hill

Koreatown

::

Genuine congratulations for this article. It takes some courage to point out, even indirectly, what a bad job your employer has been doing over the last two years. Lets hope The Times takes a leadership role in this refocus.

David G. Miller

Rancho Palos Verdes

::

I dont usually send a thank you for good writing, but Ali deserves one for her article on the media rediscovering the power of breaking news. It was not a good week for our friends in Houston, but it was a good week for real news.

Russ Brumbach

Hidden Hills

::

Great article. It almost sounded like you could be a Republican, but I know that cant be, since you work for The Times.

Margie Perenchio

Los Angeles

::

Trump has got to be the most covered person in the history of mankind, and he aint that interesting.

James A. Mitchell

Northridge

He captured her spirit perfectly

I want to express my appreciation to Marcus Lam for his beautiful photo of Bedouine [A Wandering Spirit, Aug. 29].

Karen Robinson Stark

Pasadena

99-seat theaters? Heres another

I enjoyed the article on 99-seat theaters [The 99-Seat Beat, Sept. 1], but one of my favorite venues wasnt included: Ensemble Studio Theatre in Atwater Village. Im writing because I was so moved by its latest production: Wet: A DACAmented Journey, an amazing one-man show.

With the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program in the sights of the Trump administration, this is a powerful piece of theater based on the true-life experiences of the multitalented writer, poet and actor Alex Alpharaoh.

Bonnie Voland

Los Angeles

Local boy makes good at L.A. Phil

Your review of the L.A. Philharmonic [Like a Bowl Night of Days Gone By, Aug. 31] mentioned Matthew Howard, who is the orchestras new principal percussionist. Everyone should know that Howard is a Los Angeles native who went to LAUSD schools and graduated from the Academy of Music and Performing Arts at Hamilton High School. Lets celebrate a local boy when we can.

Vance Miller

Los Angeles

Well, thats two views on Tulip

Kimber Myers hit the nail on the head with her review of Tulip Fever [Clipped Tulip Wilts Fast, Sept. 2].

I sat in the theater groaning. I was alone, or I would have broken a cardinal rule about not making negative remarks during a movie.

Carol Clark

Los Feliz

::

I have been waiting several years to see Judi Dench in Tulip Fever. How can you possibly review this film without even mentioning that she is in it, much less if she is any good? I intend to see Dench in this film, no matter what.

Connie Elliot

Studio City

calendar.letters@latimes.com
From James Franco to Alexander Payne: Directors who surprised, and disappointed, at the Toronto Film Festival

Perhaps the most useful and instructive function of film festivals, especially in light of the Star Wars affair, is that they offer an arena where filmmakers are allowed to fail  and, just as importantly, where filmmakers who have failed before are given a second, third or fourth chance.

One of the most thunderously applauded entries in Toronto this year was itself a fascinating film about failure: The Disaster Artist, which revisits the making of that 2003 bad-movie classic, The Room, is a triumph for its prolific director and star, James Franco, best known of late for clogging the festival circuit with wan adaptations of In Dubious Battle and The Sound and the Fury. Who knew that Faulkner would prove a less fruitful source of inspiration than Tommy Wiseau?

Not every director operating outside his or her usual parameters did grade-A work. I wasnt taken with Downsizing, an incredible-shrinking-man comedy that allows the writer-director Alexander Payne to look down on his characters in a more literal sense than usual. The Third Murder, a rare foray into police-procedural territory from the great Japanese director Hirokazu Kore-eda, struck me as an equally rare disappointment, measured and meditative to a fault.

And Im decisively in the critical minority on The Death of Stalin, Armando Iannuccis audacious but airless attempt to transfer the madcap style of his great political comedies (Veep, In the Loop) to the moment of the Soviet dictators sudden demise. Its an ingenious premise that Iannucci and his fine cast (including Steve Buscemi, Jeffrey Tambor and the great Simon Russell Beale) seek to render in shades both hilarious and disturbing, to increasingly strained effect.

By contrast, Dan Gilroys Roman J. Israel, Esq., which many dismissed as a failure across the board, struck me as one of the festivals most compelling oddities  a moody, intoxicating vision of Los Angeles that I ultimately preferred to Gilroys previous one, Nightcrawler. Denzel Washington burrows deep into the title role of a brilliant activist lawyer with savant-like tendencies who winds up skittering down a legal and moral rabbit-hole of his own making. The result is a bit of a narrative muddle, but the kind that makes tidier movies look overly timid by comparison.

Read More
Hello! Im Mark Olsen, welcome to another edition of your regular field guide to a world of Only Good Movies.

This week were writing from Toronto, where the Toronto International Film Festival is in full swing. Just last week we published our fall movie preview, and now with the onslaught of films from festivals in Venice, Telluride and Toronto, it is really all happening.

From Telluride, Josh Rottenberg spoke to Greta Gerwig about her Lady Bird and Guillermo Del Toro about The Shape of Water, two of the most anticipated and most talked-about films form the fall circuit so far. He also put together a wrapup in which Angelina Jolie confides, You think its a festival and its going to just feel like a festival but it doesnt.

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Separate from festival madness, Trevell Anderson took a look at the recent controversy around movies such as Gone With the Wind, which do not match up with contemporary social attitudes.

You cant sweep history under the rug, said Todd Boyd, a professor of cinema and media studies at USC. A lot of it is not pretty and it may contradict the ways some people see things in contemporary society.  But its important to have context whenever youre viewing material of this kind. Otherwise, people can embrace and celebrate it without dealing with the whole truth.

Angelica Jade Bastien wrote a dynamic essay exploring these same issues for Vulture.

We also are hard at work on lining up some screenings for the fall prestige season. To find out more and for updates on future events, go to events.latimes.com.

From left, Shoniqua Shandai, Kid Twist, Rory Uphold, Calum Worthy, director Joseph Kahn, Jackie Long, Dumbfounded and Dizaster from the film Bodied at the Toronto International Film Festival. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times)

Toronto International Film Festival

In his opening preview of the Toronto International Film Festival, Steven Zeitchik noted that the gathering will provide an artistic response and even collective therapy to the roil emanating from Washington, D.C.  all while offering a glimpse at how the country might debate issues and seek solace at movie theaters in the months to come.

In the first of his ongoing dispatches from the festival, Justin Chang noted, Oscar buzz has become a necessary evil at Toronto. On one hand it ensures the packed houses, bustling red carpets and gobs of press coverage that keep this festival running year after year. But it also inevitably overshadows the many, many worthy films that arrive here with no media profile or awards prospects of which to speak.

Justin in turn spotlighted Frederick Wisemans Ex Libris, which focuses on 11 of the New York Public Librarys 92 branches. He also wrote about the festivals official opening night film, Borg/McEnroe, declaring, There have been far better and far worse TIFF opening-night movies than Borg/McEnroe, which is fast-paced, inoffensive and about as emotionally resonant as your next poutine. But few have been more emblematic of the reality that film festivals have become their own competitive sport  a kind of cinephile Grand Slam.

Jen Yamato wrote about the opening night title of the festivals beloved Midnight Madness program, Korean American filmmaker Joseph Kahns Bodied. Set amid the world of underground battle rap, the film is purposefully designed to skirt the edges of being offensive to a wide array of people, grappling with stereotypes, constructions of race and the difficulties of honestly interrogates your own prejudices, privileges and blind-spots

Im not trying to give you any answers, said Kahn. The world today is race-obsessed and conflicted; race is probably the biggest problem in America right now, its literally fracturing everything. And Im in the thick of it.

Amy Kaufman was at the premiere of the new documentary on Lady Gaga, titled Gaga: Five Foot Two and directed by Chris Moukarbel. She posted the five most revealing moments from the film. One of them is actual nudity.

I spoke to filmmaker Angela Robinson about Professor Marston and the Wonder Women, about the unusual love story behind the origins of the character of Wonder Woman.

Wonder Woman is the only superhero whose ideas are founded on love.  And I think that is so valuable and poignant and necessary. And thats why I think shes hit such a chord. Literally her message is powerful.

And Ill also have a story posting soon about Brie Larsons feature directing debut, Unicorn Store, in which she also stars as a young woman convinced she is about to receive a unicorn.

This film is like an abstract self-portrait, Larson said in an interview before the festival. Its totally a metaphorical journey of not only my experience of being an actor and learning how to be true to myself in the face of people telling me no or that I was wrong or telling me to change, but it was also directly my experience directing this film.

Writer-director Hallie Meyers-Shyer makes her feature debut with the new romantic comedy Home Again. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)

Home Again

Its no secret we are huge fans around here of filmmaker Nancy Meyers. So you know we were very excited about the prospects of Home Again, the feature debut of Nancys daughter Hallie Meyers-Sheyer. The movie stars Reese Witherspoon as a woman trying to start the next chapter in her life after separating from her husband.

In her review for The Times, Katie Walsh said, Call it nepotism, call it a legacy or simply call it the family business. It inspires a sense of trustworthiness, quality and consistency.  Thank goodness the Meyers mantle has been passed on to the next generation. Meyers-Shyer may have gotten it from her mama, but the point of view is all hers.

Amy Kaufman spoke to Meyers-Shyer about making a film that would inevitably be compared to the work of her mother.

A lot of people have asked me, Why didnt you want to do your own thing  like something in horror? said Meyers-Shyer. But thats not me. I just wanted to be true to myself, and my moms films are the kind of movies that I love. I dont have a big ego in that way, where I feel like I have to be different.

Email me if you have questions, comments or suggestions, and follow me on Twitter @IndieFocus

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At a moment when her acting career is in full bloom  with her Academy Award-, Golden Globe- and Spirit Award-winning performance in Room, a starring role in this years Kong: Skull Island and an upcoming turn as the title character in anticipated superhero adaptation Captain Marvel  Brie Larson presumably has other things to do than think about rainbows covered in craft-store tinsel.

Yet by making her feature directing debut with the aggressively whimsical Unicorn Store, in which she also stars, Larson has again shown herself to be an unpredictable, unconventional talent. The movie has its world premiere on Monday as part of the Toronto International Film Festival, and, as she explained, making Unicorn Store took on a therapeutic aspect, plugging her back into her own creativity.

I feel like this film is like an abstract self-portrait of myself, Larson said in an interview before the festival. Its totally a metaphorical journey of not only my experience of being an actor and learning how to be true to myself in the face of people telling me no or that I was wrong or telling me to change, but it was also directly my experience directing this film.

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FULL COVERAGE: Toronto International Film Festival 2017 

She added, And so I think part of making this movie was the joy and feeling the magic of creativity, but also having these crippling moments of Is it OK to have my voice? Am I allowed to speak up for what I believe in, or am I going to get completely demolished and shattered to pieces? 

Written by Samantha McIntyre, the film has a cast that also includes Samuel L. Jackson, Joan Cusack, Bradley Whitford, Hamish Linklater, Martha MacIsaac and Mamoudou Athie. The movie features score and songs by Larsons fiance, musician Alex Greenwald.

This film is like an abstract self-portrait of myself.  Brie Larson on Unicorn Store

In the film, Larson plays Kit, a young woman who has washed out of art school and is back living at home with her parents (Cusack and Whitford), who run a self-help outdoors camp. Depressed and unsure of what to do next, Kit becomes glued to the couch watching infomercials. She signs up with a temp agency and is placed into a sterile office environment that she struggles to make the best of under the watchful eye of her new boss (Linklater).

A series of playfully cryptic invitations beckons her to a seemingly magical place overseen by a salesman (Jackson) who informs her she will soon receive a unicorn of her very own if she follows his instructions. This leads her to enlist a disaffected hardware store employee named Virgil (Athie) to help her prepare for her unicorns arrival.

Larson actually auditioned for the movie as an actress about five years ago. She didnt get the part, and the project never came together. Having already made two short films  The Arm and Weighting  she had been casually looking for a feature project to direct when Unicorn Store came back around.

At a time when her acting career had reached a new height, Larson could have simply enjoyed her newly minted status of movie star rather than taking on the added responsibilities of directing, in particular to make a movie as boldly earnest and willfully eccentric as Unicorn Store.

Im really not good at being comfy, said Larson. I really want to keep being in this state of being a little bit off-balance and a little bit scared and ready to be surprised.

Theres this kid in me that doesnt have a voice, theres this innocence inside of me, and this dreamer and this hope and this optimism that reside inside of me that was dying, she said. Kind of everything I was doing was about digging into the darkness and revealing the darker parts of our world. Which we need to see. But I also think, at least for myself, that I need to remember the other side of it too and that they work together. And to not feel repulsed by innocence or by happiness.

Larson had at first wanted to find an unknown actress for the lead part of Kit. Once she decided to play the role herself, she became even more determined to give the kind of opportunity to an up-and-comer she felt other directors had previously extended to her. To that end, she cast Athie as the male lead.

Originally from Mauritania and raised mostly in Maryland, the 28-year-old Athie attended the Yale School of Drama before landing roles in projects such as Baz Luhrmanns The Get Down and the recent Patti Cakes. He was also named a recipient of TIFFs Rising Star award as part of this years festival. In Larsons words, Hes a movie star.

Once I got his audition tape, it was very striking to me. He just has a different way of being a man on screen, Larson said of Athies unassuming yet charismatic screen presence. I felt like Kit was a new way of perceiving a young woman on screen, and I wanted somebody who was excited about breaking new ground and showing a new way of being a young man on screen.

Yet Athie said he felt he had learned a lot about acting for the camera from watching Larson as a fellow performer in their scenes together and also in how, as a director, she established the tone for the set. Athie would even come to hang out on days he didnt have scenes to shoot.

It was a really fun set to be on. It was a special, welcoming, well-run machine, Athie said. And I was learning a lot from Brie. I was learning a lot from watching Bradley Whitford and Joan Cusack  Id admired them for years. And of course, Sam Jackson. So it seemed like it would be kind of a waste to be hanging out in my room if I could be on set.

I feel like every time I do an interview I sound like Im about to break into song. Its so corny, but I really mean it, he added. I had never felt a stronger connection to a character.

In her directors note for Unicorn Store, Larson ties the act of making movies into her own sense of personal activism and the elevated platform she has via social media and her profile as a celebrity. The intense attention given to her has only risen following her Academy Award win and the anticipation for the upcoming Captain Marvel.

Part of that activism is creating empathy for characters you wouldnt normally empathize with, finding ways to connect with people that are living in darker corners of the world that youre not thinking about, she said.

In working on this film, I was able to recognize that theres still a lot of magic and a lot of beauty in this world, she said, and the way that Im personally going to be able to keep going as an activist is through having opportunities for play and for lightness. It doesnt always have to be about seriousness and this hard form of work. It can also be done in a song and a dance, through community and through innocence.

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Mark.Olsen@latimes.com

Follow on Twitter: @IndieFocus

ALSO

Angela Robinson on a superheros hidden message of love in Professor Marston and the Wonder Women

From The Big Sick to Brigsby Bear, what does box office mean for indie movies these days?

Ben Stiller draws from his experiences as both a father and a son in two new character-driven films
The debate over state incentives to land the Foxconn Technology Group in Wisconsin will likely wrap up soon, with the state Legislature expected to vote by mid-September.

Here are some of the questions being asked as a decision nears:

Q. The state incentive package would be $3 billion over 15 years. What guarantees will be put into place to ensure Foxconn invests the $10 billion and creates the 13,000 jobs it has planned?

A. Unlike some states that rely more on clawbacks after they have spent taxpayer dollars, Wisconsin takes a pay-as-you-grow approach to economic incentive packages. If Foxconn spends $3 billion and creates 3,000 jobs, the amount of state tax credits would be commensurate  and retroactive. Foxconn must part with money to get some of it back in the form of tax credits, which are based on economic activity that otherwise wouldnt happen.

Clawbacks are still important, however. How would they be initiated and enforced?

A clawback is a provision in an economic development agreement that requires a company to repay any financial benefit gained for which it did not meet certain performance thresholds, such as job targets or capital investment levels. These provisions are most often included in contracts negotiated between governments and companies. Concurrent to the legislative debate, the Wisconsin Economic Development Corp. is drafting a contract that is expected to be completed by Sept. 30.

OK, but who watches the contract writers and makes sure that document is being enforced?

An amendment to the Foxconn package by the state Senate would give the Legislative Audit Bureau, an arm of the Legislature, the ability to audit contract compliance each year. The Senate has also included language that would more strongly tie Foxconns projected capital investments to job creation estimates.

This deal seems to have been, in no small part, a product of the evolving friendship between Gov. Scott Walker and Foxconn founder and chairman Terry Gou. What happens if one or the other of those leaders ride into the sunset?

State negotiators are keenly aware that Gou turns 67 in early October and wont work forever. However, the depth of the Foxconn management team engaged in the Wisconsin project  combined with investments already made or poised to happen  make a reversal highly unlikely. Foxconn wants to build North Americas first liquid crystal display plant in Wisconsin, a decision driven from the board of directors level on down. As for Walker, hes all but certain to run for re-election in 2018 and wont turn his back on a deal he started. His opponents will make doubly sure of that. Walkers chief deputies on this deal, Administration Secretary Scott Neitzel and WEDC Secretary Mark Hogan, also remain in place.

Im uneasy with the notion that governments compete for industry, foreign or domestic. Is Wisconsin getting on a treadmill it cant stop?

Economic competition among nations, states and communities is nothing new. Whats new is that Wisconsin is finally getting better at it after years of not showing up on the radar screens of site selectors. The Foxconn deal is one of several national competitions under way right now, with Amazon announcing it will build a second headquarters and Toyota-Mazda looking to open a new U.S. assembly plant.

Why is it that so many Democrats seem opposed to the Foxconn deal and most Republicans are supportive? Isnt job creation a bipartisan goal?

Some Democratic lawmakers would doubt Walker if he said the sun rises in the east, and it didnt help their mood that President Donald Trump took credit for the deal. However, the 2016 Democratic Party platform called for fostering a manufacturing renaissance, pursuing an innovation agenda and creating jobs for young people. A Foxconn presence in Wisconsin, with an entirely new industry and a statewide supply chain, could help meet all three goals.
We cant give the people what they want at the beginning, Kermit the Frog instructed early on Fridays Muppets invasion at the Hollywood Bowl. We have to make them want you.

He was advising Miss Piggy, his demanding diva of an ex who, not surprisingly, clamored for the spotlight from the get-go in The Muppets Take the Bowl, the first of three weekend two-hour extravaganzas at the venue.

Yet Kermit may as well have been addressing the audience that packed the historic bowl. Being a Muppets fan in 2017 is often an emotionally up-and-down affair.

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The colorful critters were evicted from their 3-D theater at Anaheims Disneyland Resort in 2014. Although a pair of charmingly nostalgic films in 2011 and 2014 appeared to revive the characters for a new generation, a prime-time 2015 ABC sitcom derailed any major Muppets comeback; the show misread the brand and often confused the difference between adult themes and immature content.

And while many a Muppets die-hard is now fully grown  and the Hollywood Bowl wasnt exactly overrun with little ones on Friday  the Muppets work best when theyre still relatively young at heart. Puns and innuendos? Bring em on. Depressed Muppets with a bounty of relationship issues? Hard pass.

So no doubt fans on opening night were plenty hungry for some ol-fashioned zaniness, and what a joy of a show they received. The revue tapped all that made the Muppets special  a wide-eyed earnestness when it comes to discovering music, goofy multi-layered comedy routines that emphasized merriment over snark, and the staunch belief that happiness, jubilance and pure show-biz liveliness transcend any generational trend.

Its a shame only that its run was limited and this show isnt embarking on a national tour. The Muppets Take the Bowl was a celebratory affair that actually felt relatively essential. For this was a show in which a shrimp could command control of an orchestra and remix Beethovens Fifth Symphony into a fiery Latin dance number, a female pig could lead a spaceship and a blue-furred creature with a crooked nose could offer a brief lesson in individuality.

If the production was not exactly a study in diversity, it certainly was a testament to the power of inclusivity. For all of the Muppets reinventions and misadventures over the decades, one constant has generally held true. While Kermit may struggle to keep this easily-distracted crew on-message, the Muppets exist to embrace  to absorb, often with wonderment, everything from bad jokes to magic routines to popular music.

The troupe was accompanied by the always-versatile Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, led by the never-not-affable Thomas Wilkins, and the stage was dressed like an old-fashioned theater. Projection effects puts us in outer space, or on a road trip, and though puppeteers were always visible contorting themselves like acrobats, Muppet personalities are outsized ones, and the hands beneath the fleece soon became essentially invisible.

The show, credited to writers Jim Lewis, Andrew Williams, Kirk Thatcher and Matthew Barnette, brought back some fan-favorite sketches  there was a Pigs in Space bit, in which a 2001 monolith essentially became a chatty Amazon Alexa-like device, and a Muppet Labs routine showed us the troll-like Muppets lurking in the dark corners of the Internet. Music, as always, was a focal point.

No doubt the The Muppet Show throughout its run in the late 70s served as a sort of musical discovery engine, one where the likes of Paul Simon, Alice Cooper or Johnny Cash were likely to pop in. And while cynics may write off Muppet takes on well-known songs as novelty numbers, house band Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem always approached its renditions with pure adoration.

That was true Friday, when the band brought a summer-of-love spirit to Edwarde Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros Home, a take that played up the tunes hokey sentimentality. Heres hoping all of us, if only for one brief moment in our lives, can experience the love apparent between band members Floyd Pepper and Janice.

The band  and yes, the band was made up of puppets, but the Bowl did a rather fine job of creating the illusion of realness  segued effortlessly into David Bowies Suffragette City. If it caught some by surprise that the Muppets didnt edit out the songs shouts of wham-bam-thank-you-maam, the Muppets have long been family-friendly without pandering, and its also indicative of how much those behind the Muppets love their music. Everyone, after all, knows you dont mess with Bowie.

Miss Piggy had her way with Adeles Hello, until the songs outrageously cartoonish show-tune-like rendition had its way with her, and no Muppets gig would be complete without the communal sway of the Kermit-led Rainbow Connection. Here, the frog was joined by Paul Williams (who, along with Kenneth Ascher, wrote the song) and comedian Bobby Moynihan, who served as an unobtrusive host who largely set the Muppets up for their own gags.

There were non-musical highlights as well  parodies such as Keeping Up With the Crustaceans and The Walking Bread. These brief diversions went beyond their potential one-joke gags, as the latter showed us the Swedish Chef caught in a nightmare scenario where zombie bread (read: moldy bread) caused a personal meltdown.

Even a simple farce can turn into a character study in the right hands. And thus, if there was any connecting thread throughout this variety show, it was this: embrace your eccentricities. As Gonzo said at one point, It is not OK to be a weirdo. It is amazing!

         

The Muppets Take the Bowl

Where: Hollywood Bowl, 2301 N. Highland Ave., Los Angeles

When: 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, 7:30 p.m. Sunday

Tickets: $38-$166

Information: (323) 850-2000, www.hollywoodbowl.com

Todd.Martens@latimes.com

Follow me on Twitter: @toddmartens
Youre nobodys first choice for this job, says the stern admiral of a vague intergalactic concern called the Union to Capt. Ed Mercer (Seth MacFarlane), commander of a spacecraft named The Orville, which is also the title of Foxs new quasi-comedy premiering Sunday.

And though MacFarlanes own wish-fulfillment is clearly at work as his character says this job is something hes dreamed of ever since I was a kid, its hard not to approach this muddled sci-fi series without sharing the misgivings of the Union admiral.

Best known for the defiantly crude animated shows Family Guy and American Dad! as well as the tonally similar Ted, A Million Ways to Die in the West and, most divisively, a 2013 stint hosting the Oscars, MacFarlane isnt an obvious choice for an hourlong, series-length homage to Star Trek, something obviously close to his heart. That inability to balance his rapid-fire comic wheelhouse with the demands of dramatic storytelling keeps The Orville earthbound.

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MacFarlanes Mercer is a wise-cracking, determinedly glib variation of roughly every character hes played  which is to say, himself. He gets to say captain-like things (Take us out, engaging quantum drive) and answers the age-old question of whether crew members have to use the bathroom in space. Actors in colorful latex masks playing aliens and the Orvilles bright, familiarly flimsy-looking interiors testify to MacFarlanes loving eye for detail.

Among those boldly going along for the ride are Klyden (Chad L. Coleman), an analytical alien in a metal helmet who is a spiritual cross between Vulcan and android; Lt. Cmdr. Bortus (Peter Macon), a Klingon-esque crewman of few words; Alara Kitan (Halston Sage), an improbably young security officer with superhuman strength; and, oh yeah, the first officer, Capt. Kelly Grayson (Adrianne Palicki of Friday Night Lights), who happens to be Mercers ex-wife.

How exes wind up crew-mates is a dramatic contrivance with Grayson offering her service as penance for her infidelity, which is mostly handled with the grounded sensitivity youd expect given MacFarlanes track record. (Though Palicki capably riffs along with him here and there, in space everyone can hear bickering couples scream  and its no more fun than on Earth.)

But more problematic are tonal shifts that come with filling an hour with the sort of drama that should support an orchestrally scored Star Trek homage while also accommodating MacFarlanes typically skewed, bro-friendly search for laughs.

A scientists distant distress call is sideswiped by a dog licking its privates in the background  a gag that might have landed if MacFarlane could resist having two crewmen point it out afterward. The requisite space battle climax grinds to a halt when Mercer asks the threatening alien to center himself on the ships screen. Theyre decent jokes if, like Airplane! or TBS Angie Tribeca, that was the shows only mission. Here, the action is undercut, and if the characters dont care about their situations, why should we?

The second episode finds a better balance by playing it more straight with an intergalactic zoo storyline, which builds to an effective closing gag. But if youre looking for a sci-fi show, there are more reliable sources out there  like, say, Star Trek: Discovery. The third episodes attempt to be topical with jokes around Bortus having a female child in his all-male species is awkward at best, and theres an inescapable feeling that MacFarlane couldnt decide if his show is a spoof or an homage. It unsuccessfully tries to straddle both lines.

This is frustrating because MacFarlane can deliver sharp comic surprises, and 1999s Galaxy Quest  now in development for an Amazon series, by the way  showed that Star Trek can be mined into a brilliant spoof. There may be a goofy half-hour comedy buried inside MacFarlanes tribute, but The Orville feels suited only for his already dedicated fans  though they also may not recognize what they discover here.

The Orville

Where: Fox

When: 5 and 8 p.m. Sunday

Rating: TV-14-DLSV (may be unsuitable for children under the age of 14, with advisories for suggestive dialogue, coarse language, sexual content and violence)

See the most-read stories in Entertainment this hour 

chris.barton@latimes.com

Follow me over here @chrisbarton.

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Hundreds of activists rallied in MacArthur Park on Sunday to protest efforts by the Trump administration to phase out protections from deportation for roughly 800,000 young immigrants brought into the country illegally by their parents.

The loud but mostly peaceful group of demonstrators swarmed the park west of downtown L.A. about 3 p.m., chanting, No Trump, no KKK, no racist USA, and No hate, No fear, immigrants are welcomed here. Some held up posters that said, Protect Dreamers, deport racists, and others waved Mexican flags.

Im angry; I feel upset. So many people are being affected by this, said Andrea Beltrami, 19, a demonstrator who drove to the rally from Huntington Beach with her mom and friends. Theyre not just kids  they have families depending on them in other countries.

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About a dozen pro-Trump demonstrators gathered on the corner across the street from the park at Alvarado and 6th streets. One man with a bullhorn yelled at demonstrators to turn themselves into a local police station for deportation.

Do the right thing, he said. Get out of here.

Police officers patrolled the area on foot, keeping the sidewalk clear and standing in between the two groups. But there were no clashes between rival groups.

Demonstrator Esau Andrade, 22, said he was a beneficiary of former President Obamas Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA. Known as Dreamers, young people like him were given a reprieve from deportation and access to work permits if they arrived in the U.S. before age 16 and stayed in school and out of trouble.

Andrade said he received his DACA status about a year after graduating from high school in 2013. He said when he enrolled in the program, he was told that his personal information would not be used against him.

But now hes worried that it could be.

You put all of your might into a country that you feel at home in and truly have respect for, to  from one day to another  be thrown out and be told youre not worth it, he said.

Andrade said his family brought him to the U.S. at age 3 with a temporary visa, which he overstayed. The Rancho Cucamonga resident said he works as a receptionist at a hair salon, which he couldnt do without his DACA status.

On Sunday, he showed up at MacArthur Park with a small orange sign that said, Here to stay.

El Segundo resident Fred Macintosh, 55, had a different view on the immigration issue. He was among the dozen or so pro-Trump counter-protesters who also turned out at the park Sunday.

He said a friend in the Philippines has been trying for two years to immigrate to the U.S. legally with three kids. People here illegally need to wait in line, Macintosh said. Its not fair to them that theyre not able to get in.

After the rally and speeches by activists, the immigrants rights demonstrators marched to Echo Park. They blocked traffic as they passed through residential neighborhoods, where onlookers crowded onto their balconies and outside their homes, taking photos and recording videos. Drivers honked in support of the demonstration, some pumping their fists, others offering a thumbs up.

Following a short break, organizers said, participants were then planning to continue on to Placita Olvera in downtown Los Angeles, across from Union Station.

The primary focus of the march was to defend participants in the DACA program. But organizers of Sundays march said the demonstration was also intended to protest Trumps plans to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Speakers at the MacArthur Park rally included Alma de Jesus Ramirez and Ludi Valdez Word, both Dreamers. Jim Lafferty of the National Lawyers Guild was also lined up to speak.

Last Tuesday, Trump took action to strip away protections for Dreamers. He gave the Republican-majority Congress six months to write a law to resolve their plight.

Later that day, Trump seemed to accept the prospect that Congress might not be able to agree on legislation. If they cant, he tweeted, I will revisit this issue! It was unclear what he meant by revisit.

The legislative uncertainty created by the presidents action translated to even greater personal uncertainty for the many people affected. Protests were immediate in cities nationwide.

alene.tchekmedyian@latimes.com

ALSO

Anaheim considers declaring local emergency as homeless population continues to grow along Santa Ana River trail

Chance of thundershowers in some burn areas, including La Tuna Canyon, forecasters say

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UPDATES:

6:55 p.m.: This article was updated to include another comment from a demonstrator and more details from the march.

5:45 p.m.: This article was updated to include a comment from a counter protester.

5:00: p.m.: This article was updated with new comments from demonstrators.

4:25 p.m.: This article was updated with additional comments from demonstrators.

4:00 p.m.: This article was updated with comments from demonstrators.

This article was originally posted at 8:40 a.m.
Members of the Polish death metal band Decapitated were arrested by Los Angeles County Sheriffs deputies on suspicion of kidnapping a woman, authorities said Sunday.

The four men are being held in an L.A. County jail pending extradition to Spokane, Wash., where they allegedly kidnapped the woman after an Aug. 31 concert in that city, authorities said.

The men were arrested early Saturday in Santa Ana after a performance at the Observatory venue, where they were scheduled to play with other bands, including the Australian deathcore group Thy Art Is Murder. The two bands have been touring North America in a series of shows headlined Double Homicide.

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The arrested band members are Waclaw Jan Kieltyka, Rafal Tomasz Piotrowski, Hubert Edward Wiecek and Michal Mikolaj Lysejko.

The band members lawyer Stephen Graham told a Times reporter that there was another side to the story and alleged that the woman came to visit the band on her own free will.

He said the band members had offered to surrender to authorities days earlier, but that Spokane police never responded to their offer.

Adam.Elmahrek@latimes.com

@adamelmahrek
Parts of Southern California experienced a lightning show Saturday night as thunderstorms moved through.

The National Weather Service issued a severe thunderstorm warning for parts of northern Los Angeles County, saying hail and damaging 60 mph wind gusts were possible.

Officials also said localized flooding was possible in northern areas including Palmdale and Lancaster.

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Thunderstorms were also possible Sunday and Monday, the NWS said, due to a low-pressure system.

Here are some videos of the lightning:

lightning or aliens pic.twitter.com/OKVz6pws2l  Ryan Beatty (@TheRyanBeatty) September 10, 2017

Weird. One cloud here in LA having its own little lightning storm inside pic.twitter.com/XB3hkUwmQg  Jeffrey Kafer  (@JeffreyKafer) September 10, 2017

ALSO

Hundreds expected to march through the streets of Los Angeles on Sunday for immigrants rights

Anaheim considers declaring local emergency as homeless population continues to grow along Santa Ana River trail

Chance of thundershowers in some burn areas, including La Tuna Canyon, forecasters say
She is only 23, but Breana Rynns teary eyes speak of defeat.

Recently, someone stole nearly all of Rynns belongings, crammed into a makeshift space along the dusty, needle-littered Santa Ana River trail where she lives along with hundreds of others of Orange Countys homeless.



For the record: A previous version of this article misspelled police spokeswoman Kristina Hamms last name as Ham.

Rynns bedding, her dishes, her cold-weather gear, a few items of personal hygiene  are all gone.

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The Connecticut high school graduate who once dreamed of joining the Marines  but now lives outdoors in the shadows of Angel Stadium in Anaheim  couldnt stop crying.

What little we have, what are we to do? she asked a visitor. Then, in a whisper, she inquired, Do you have a blanket?

There are dozens of youths, middle-aged and elderly people living in the stench along the encampment, and every day brings more hunger, more pain. Some say city officials and residents do not understand their plight and instead are focused on finding ways to get rid of them since they took over a designated National Recreation Trail.

Hikers and enthusiasts who use the trail for biking, jogging and horseback riding say it is full of drug users and violent transients.

Tensions have boiled over as more than 11,000 people have signed a petition aimed at reclaiming the trail. They are urging officials to enforce anti-camping ordinances in the area and to crack down on crime.

The City Council plans to meet Tuesday to consider declaring a local emergency at the trail site. Officials said they want to link forces with county, state and federal agencies, as well as with faith groups and nonprofits to help relocate the homeless and to discourage others from settling in the riverbed area.

We can no longer tolerate the way things are, said Anaheim resident George Gonzales, 45, who lives near the Honda Center and whose family uses the recreational path on weekends to stay fit.

We dont want to join a gym because we prefer the outdoors, he said. But if the outdoors means running into addicts and thieves, how can we enjoy it?

Anaheim police said officers have been vigilant in monitoring the site.

We have had very few crimes that have occurred in our city limits at the riverbed encampment, said Kristina Hamm, a Police Department spokeswoman. We will respond to any crime in progress or threat to public safety within our city limits and determine the jurisdiction later.

Tammy Schuler, 41, who shares her cluttered tarp-covered plot on the trail with her boyfriend and younger brother, said she and her homeless neighbors make do with this way of life. We trade and try to help each other. We have no choice. If we did, we would be safer.

The former eyeglass technician, who grew up in California, staked a spot next to her mother and her dog, named after the character Smeagol in Lord of the Rings, one of five chihuahuas that the family owns.

Im grateful to see folks coming to visit this site to figure out what to do, said Schuler, who has lost a tent and more valuables to strangers. Many times, things appear hopeless because we have nothing  not even restrooms.

Last May, members of the Orange County Poverty Alleviation Coalition placed three portable toilets on the trail for the homeless. But within days, Anaheim officials removed the outhouses, citing potential health hazards, leaving Schuler and others continuing to use buckets and bushes. Some of the homeless walk to the fast-food restaurants on Chapman Avenue to use their facilities, she said.

Homeless advocates have pushed city and county officials for a year to bring portable toilets to the riverbed or open up park bathrooms at night. They say its inhumane to leave the population stranded without options.

Since Aug. 7, Orange County officials have extended the hours of operation at a recreational area along the flood control channel near Katella Avenue, providing security guards and around-the-clock bathrooms for the homeless, said county spokeswoman Carrie Braun.

A recent survey conducted by City Net, a nonprofit organization that works with the homeless, found 422 adults living along the trail from Chapman Avenue to Ball Road, Braun said.

In July, county supervisors approved a $720,000 contract with City Net to work to significantly reduce the population along the trail, guiding the homeless to temporary housing.

This area is not intended for human habitation. We are trying to assess what needs are out there, Braun said, adding that county staff is in regularly in touch with officials from Anaheim, Fountain Valley, Orange and Santa Ana  the cities most affected by the trail  because its imperative that we work together to solve the problem.

Rynn, who camps out with a girlfriend along the trail, said the pair must try to relocate to a different spot along the riverbed where it might be a tiny bit more stable.

Jodi Samhat, 34, has lived along the trail for the last 10 months.

Theres usually a code of behavior for people to respect each others stuff, Samhat said. Born in Orange, Samhat said she took classes to become a medical assistant and worked in a doctors office before becoming homeless.

Were trying to live a quiet life, keep to ourselves, she said. We appreciate any help, such as having a place to wash or shower.

Brenda Jean, a grandmother who patched together a tent to shelter herself under a bridge, said she was among the first people who chose the riverbed as a home seven years ago. She estimates that nearly 80% of the current population showed up in the last two years.

Ive learned to leave the area as I find it, keep my things tidy as best as I can, said Jean, 61, sitting next to a can of Spaghetti-Os. There are troubles, but Im not taking part in it.

anh.do@latimes.com

Twitter: @newsterrier
In a calamitous northward sweep from the Everglades to the Florida Panhandle, a weakening but still monstrously powerful Hurricane Irma battered a string of cities on the states palm-fringed west coast Sunday before advancing toward Georgia and the Carolinas.

Irma, downgraded early Monday to a Category 1 storm and expected to lose its hurricane status later in the day, yielded watery misery and hours of scouring winds even in areas that avoided a direct hit, like Miami, and flattened buildings in the Florida Keys, where it first made landfall.

So broad and punishing was the storms reach that no corner of Florida, the countrys fourth most-populous state, was unaffected.

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Live updates: Hurricane Irma surging up from Florida Keys 

And Irma was an avatar of night terrors: As darkness fell Sunday, the storm was bearing down on the populous Tampa Bay region, rendered especially vulnerable to deadly storm surges by the bays funnel shape.

But as the storm moved over land, losing punch but gaining speed, a slight tack to the northeast appeared to spare Tampa the worst of its furies and instead imperiled the theme-park destination of Orlando, and the center of the state saw repeated Irma-spawned tornadoes.

There were at least four deaths. A man in the Florida Keys drove his car into a light pole, and a woman driving on a toll road in central Florida ran into a rail. In a rural area southeast of Tampa, two law-enforcement officers died after their vehicles crashed head-on. None of the incidents was linked conclusively to the storm.

With more than 4 million homes and businesses without power and a vast reckoning of the destruction still at hand, President Trump moved to free up funds for a huge rebuilding effort.

Right now were worried about lives, not cost, he told reporters as he returned to the White House from a weekend at the presidential retreat of Camp David.

Sundays dizzying sequence of stormy weather saw dual landfalls by the hurricane over a span of little more than six hours. After striking the Keys in midmorning, the eye of the storm moved over Marco Island, south of Naples. And soon after came the floodwaters, with water levels in Naples increasing 7 feet in just 90 minutes.

As the storms trajectory took it north, water was sucked from part of Tampa Bay, exposing a muddy expanse that would normally be underwater  a frightening portent of flooding to come when that water, and more, comes rushing back.

MOVE AWAY FROM THE WATER! appealed the National Hurricane Center after photos on social media showed people and dogs frolicking on the bays exposed sand.

The cities bracketing Tampa Bay  Tampa and St. Petersburg, with a population of some 3 million people between them  were forecast to be clobbered later Sunday by sustained hurricane-force winds. A direct hit on the area would be the first in nearly a century.

We are about to get punched in the face by this storm, Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn declared.

The storms passage by no means marks the end of the danger. Once this system passes through, its going to be a race to save lives and sustain lives, William B. Brock Long, the Federal Emergency Management Agency administrator, said on Fox News Sunday.

With the storm on a havoc-filled trajectory, much of Florida was a jumbled tableau of overflowing shelters, boarded-up buildings and deserted streets in normally bustling urban centers. Palm trees blew sideways, with fronds snapping under the assault; tree branches flew like missiles.

In Pinellas County, which encompasses St. Petersburg, officials announced a curfew, and sheriffs deputies hurried to relocate 1,000 inmates from the Pinellas County Jail.

An overnight curfew was also announced in Miami, where almost horizontal sheets of rain whipped through downtown all day long, and the wind seemed to come simultaneously from all directions. Whitecaps were visible on Brickell Avenue, a main north-south waterfront artery, and other major streets flooded as well.

Video: Times coverage of Hurricane Irma

The wind made weapons of debris and even coconuts from palm trees, and powerful gusts threatened some two dozen construction cranes dotting Miami. At least two collapsed in Sundays winds.

By nighttime in Miami, the winds, while still fierce, had diminished to the point where it was possible to stand outside without tumbling over, and the rain had given way to clearing skies. A few people ventured outside, some walking their cooped-up dogs.

For those sheltering in hotels, board games and boredom  a contrast to the angry panorama outside  carried the day. Its fine; at least its safer than the house, said Chris McShane, who was staying at a Homewood Suites in the Brickell area in downtown Miami with his wife, Jennifer, and their children, Ashley, 1 and Riley, 2, after the family fled their home in the citys north.

Amid the storms ravages came small points of light. A woman in Miamis Little Haiti neighborhood went into labor and emergency responders were unable to reach her, so doctors coached her through the birth by phone, the city of Miami reported on Twitter. Sunday morning, mother and baby  a girl  were safely transported to Jackson Hospital by fire crews, the city reported.

In Florida alone, more than 6.5 million people were told to flee in advance of the storm, leading to days of jampacked highways and frantic searches for gasoline amid one of the nations largest emergency evacuations ever. More than half a million others were ordered to evacuate in Georgia.

1 / 79 Trailer homes at the Sea Breeze trailer park in the Florida Keys town of Islamorada were destroyed by Irma. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 79 Tom Ross inspects the damage to his three-story condominium building in Islamorada. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 79 The remains of a boat in Islamorada. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 79 Brooke Gilbert, 15, and her father, Mike Gilbert, look at the ruins of her grandparents condominium building in Islamorada. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 79 Laura Gilbert retrieves the mailbox from her fathers condominium in Islamorada after it was swept away during the storm. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 79 Sand and debris block access to trailer homes in Islamorada. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 79 Greg Garner embraces neighbor Linda Nettles in front of his longtime family home that lost part of its roof after Tropical Storm Irma hit Sullivans Island, S.C. (Mic Smith / Associated Press) 8 / 79 Israel Alvarado, 25, tries to open a gate blocked by fallen tree branches to retrieve a generator in Bonita Springs. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 79 Rescue workers help a couple evacuate their flooded home in Jacksonville. (John Raoux / Associated Press) 10 / 79 Charlotte Glaze, left gives Donna Lamb a hug as she floats out some of her belongings in floodwaters in Jacksonville,. (Dede Smith / Associated Press) 11 / 79 Ron Colby, 70, leaves his flooded Bonita Springs home after staying during Hurricane Irma. He said he was OK with the wind but that at 3:30 in the morning the water started to rise. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 12 / 79 A dresser floats by Gilberto Diaz in his Bonita Springs neighborhood. Originally from Guatemala, Diaz has lived in Florida since 1994. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 79 In Bonita Springs, floodwaters reached waist deep in some areas on Monday, flooding homes and cars. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 79 A block from the ocean in Naples, the water was still a foot deep from storm surge. Homeowner Terry Clontz put up a no wake sign because people were driving by too fast, pushing water farther onto his property. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 79 Floodwaters surround a marina in Key Largo on Monday following Hurricane Irma. (Wilfredo Lee / Associated Press) 16 / 79 Mobile homes in Key Largo, Fla., lie in ruins on Monday after Hurricane Irma. (Wilfredo Lee / Associated Press) 17 / 79 Floodwaters surround Gilberts Resort in Key Largo on Monday. (Wilfredo Lee / Associated Press) 18 / 79 Kelly McClenthen returns to see the flood damage to her home with her boyfriend, Daniel Harrison, in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in Bonita Springs, Fla. (Gerald Herbert / Associated Press) 19 / 79 Terry Thompson is relieved. He rode out the storm in his home in Riverwood Estates in Naples. Although the Naples area of Florida was hit hard by Hurricane Irma, damage wasnt nearly as bad as anticipated. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 20 / 79 A woman leaves her flooded home the morning after Hurricane Irma swept through the area in Fort Myers, Florida. (Spencer Platt / Getty Images) 21 / 79 People tend to a car that flipped over on Cape Coral Parkway during Hurricane Irma, in Cape Coral. (Gerald Herbert / AP) 22 / 79 A man clears the drain next to his house in Estero, Fla., during the lull in winds as the eye of the hurricane passes over. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 23 / 79 Evacuees use flashlights so others can maneuver around the stairway at Hampton Inn and Suites in Estero, Fla. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 24 / 79 Guests gather in the lobby of Hampton Inn and Suites in Estero, Fla., to watch the hurricane gusts. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 25 / 79 Darla Talia Ferro, 40, and her two parakeets ride out Hurricane Irma in the lobby of Hampton Inn and Suites in Estero, Fla. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 26 / 79 John Krowzow, 74, wades in floodwater to check out his homes in Corkscrew Woodlands, a park with 640 senior mobile home units in Estero, Fla. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 27 / 79 Peter Moodley wades through floodwater in downtown Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 28 / 79 Two men walk through a downed tree as Hurricane Irmas full force strikes Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 29 / 79 A woman films the damage from a house whose roof was blown off near downtown Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 30 / 79 A vehicle drives through debris caused by Hurricane Irma, in Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 31 / 79 Weather reporters in downtown Miami jump and cling on to illustrate the force of the winds caused by Hurricane Irma. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 32 / 79 Weather reporters do a stand-up as the force of the winds caused by Hurricane Irma hit Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 33 / 79 A cargo truck is tipped over by the wind caused by Hurricane Irma in Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 34 / 79 Storm surge floods the Brickell neighborhood of Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 35 / 79 Streets are empty in downtown Miami as the wind picks up speed during Hurricane Irmas approach. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 36 / 79 Maria Koenig, 63, of Estero, Fla., and her dog, Baeley, sit by the window at their Estero hotel so Maria can keep an eye on the storm on Sunday. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 37 / 79 Glen Sinatra, 69, from Naples, says he feels lucky to be at a hotel in Estero instead of a shelter. Hes nervous about the storm and says hes trying not to worry his children about the conditions. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 38 / 79 Jimmy Alfano, of Ft. Myers, holds onto Alec Hoskins who is autistic, while watching the storm gusts through the window of their Estero hotel with Frank Pairs. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 39 / 79 A car sits abandoned in storm surge along North Fort Lauderdale Beach Boulevard as Hurricane Irma hits the southern part of the state. (Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images) 40 / 79 The metal canopy at a gasoline station is overturned by high winds brought on by Hurricane Irma. (Wilfredo Lee / Associated Press) 41 / 79 Youssef Ezzou, left, and Fadel Beznbachir roam outside to check out the conditions in Miami as Hurricane Irma nears the mainland. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 42 / 79 A construction crane whose arm broke off towers over a building as high wind blows through downtown Miami on Sunday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 43 / 79 A man and woman run to safety in Miami as winds from Hurricane Irma bear down on Sunday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 44 / 79 Storefronts in Miami are damaged as Hurricane Irmas winds hit Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 45 / 79 Dustin Terkoski, Palm Bay Police officer surveys the scene after a possible tornado touched down at Palm Pam Bay Estates. (Red Huber / Orlando Sentinel) 46 / 79 A man braces against the wind by the Miami River on Sunday as water levels surge. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 47 / 79 A man stands by the Miami River as the water level surges on Sunday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 48 / 79 The waves on the Miami River begin to surge Sunday as winds pick up speed upon Hurricane Irmas approach. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 49 / 79 Brian Williams, of Maryland, fights the winds in downtown Fort Myers. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 50 / 79 Trees fall as winds pick up speed early Sunday as Hurricane Irma approaches Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 51 / 79 A TV reporter braces against the wind as Hurricane Irma approaches Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 52 / 79 The outer bands of Hurricane Irma start to reach Florida on Saturday, with clouds over the Miami skyline. (Joe Raedle / Getty Images ) 53 / 79 People wade through a flooded street in Havana after Hurricane Irma battered central Cuba. (YAMIL LAGE / AFP/Getty Images) 54 / 79 Thousands wait Saturday to enter a storm shelter set up at Germain Arena in Estero, Fla., south of Fort Myers. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 55 / 79 Jean Turner, 79, waits to get into a shelter with a few of her belongings as rain begins to fall Saturday in Estero, Fla. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 56 / 79 Sherri Bourdo, 32, and Anthony Guidry, 40, look out over the water in Naples, Fla, in advance of the arrival of Hurricane Irma. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 57 / 79 Lisette Toroella and Tatiana Morera play on the beach as storm clouds approach in Miami Beach. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 58 / 79 Adam Todd, does a handstand while skateboarding down a virtually empty Ocean Drive in Miami Beach. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 59 / 79 Abby Jenkins walks against the wind with her luggage and umbrella to get to safety, in Miami Beach. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 60 / 79 James Sampero surfs in the churning ocean as Hurricane Irma approaches. (Joe Raedle / Getty Images) 61 / 79 Cubans wade through the rubble from a collapsed building in Havana on Saturday. (Yamil Lage / AFP/Getty Images) 62 / 79 A woman and child use a blanket as protection from wind and rain as they walk in Caibarien, Cuba. Hurricane Irma battered Cuba on Saturday with deafening winds and unremitting rain, pushing seawater inland and flooding homes before turning toward Florida. (Desmond Boylan / Associated Press) 63 / 79 Annette Davis plays with her son Darius, 3, while staying at a shelter in Miami on Saturday after evacuating from their home in Florida City ahead of Hurricane Irma. (David Goldman / Associated Press) 64 / 79 Residents walk through rain brought on by Hurricane Irma in Caibarien, Cuba. The powerful storm battered Cuba on Saturday and continued its march toward Florida. (Desmond Boylan / Associated Press) 65 / 79 Palmetto Ridge High School is a shelter for people with special needs near Naples, Fla. Many seniors plan to ride out the storm there. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 66 / 79 Francesca DeLuca, age 20, will be waiting for 10 hours for her flight back to Milan, Italy. She had been visiting a friend in Miami by herself, but the area where she was staying is under mandatory evacuation. At Miami International Airport, the last flights will be this afternoon with the airport closing tonight at 6pm. Most travelers are taking flights to anywhere they can find. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 67 / 79 Boats that cant be evacuated are tied off in canals to protect them from Hurricane Irma on in Key Largo, Florida. The entire Florida Keys are under a mandatory evacuation notice as Hurricane Irma approaches the low-lying chain of islands south of Miami. (Marc Serota / Getty Images) 68 / 79 Hundreds wait in line on Friday at Home Depot in Miami to get supplies line sheets of plywood, and anything else they can find, to board up their homes. Police were on the scene to keep things orderly. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 69 / 79 In the Little Haiti neighborhood of Miami, Fritz Drinks, whose family is from Haiti, helps load sandbags at Little Haiti Hardware and Lumber. Many people in the area are refusing to evacuate in advance of Hurricane Irma. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 70 / 79 In downtowm Miaimi, people wait to get on a bus headed to Orlando under a mandatory evacution plan. Preparations are underway for Hurricane Irma as the storm makes its way toward Florida. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 71 / 79 Stores are boarded up in Miami Beach in advance of Hurricane Irma. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 72 / 79 Preparations for Hurricane Irma are underway in Miami Beach as the storm makes its way toward Florida. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 73 / 79 Genaro Dacosta, 65, of Miami Beach loads sandbags in advance of Hurricane Irma. He says he cant evacuate the area because he has a monkey. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 74 / 79 An aerial photograph taken and released by the Dutch Department of Defense on Wednesday shows damage from Hurricane Irma in Philipsburg, St. Maarten. (Gerben van Es / AFP/Getty Images) 75 / 79 Juan Negron, third from left, prepares to start up a power generator in front of whats left of his damaged property in Culebra, Puerto Rico, after the passage of Hurricane Irma. (Carlos Giusti / Associated Press) 76 / 79 Residents come out to survey the damage caused by Hurricane Irma in Nagua, Dominican Republic. (Tatiana Fernandez / Associated Press) 77 / 79 People on Thursday look over damage from Hurricane Irma on a sand-covered street of Marigot, near the Bay of Nettle, on the island of St. Maarten. (Lionel Chamoiseau / AFP/Getty Images) 78 / 79 Inmate trustees from the Brevard County Jail fill sandbags for Meritt Island, Fla., residents in advance of Hurricane Irma. (Brian Blanco / Getty Images) 79 / 79 Motorists leave Key Largo, Fla., ahead of Hurricane Irma. (Alan Diaz / Associated Press)

In downtown Fort Myers, on Floridas southwest coast, the hurricanes leading edge was so strong that it was hard to walk a block. Ominously, the Caloosahatchee Rivers level dropped sharply, its lowered tide likely heralding a storm surge.

Some seemed ill-equipped to face an epic weather event, armed with little more than bravado.

I got rum, cheese, tortillas, announced Michael Gandy, a sunburned 77-year-old, who was keeping an eye on his boat from a marina-side apartment complex in Fort Myers.

People who had left everything they owned behind could only worry and wait as the wind and water reached a crescendo. Im worried I wont have a house to go back to, said Diana Frana, who fled her canal-side home in Cape Coral, on Fort Myers outskirts.

Floridas lifeblood is tourism, so the storm-stranded included many from out of state  and from outside the U.S. An Argentine family, the Mureoccas, spent a week at Walt Disney World, but were thwarted when they tried to fly back to Buenos Aires after visiting Miami Beach.

Its not what we planned, said Leonardo Mureocca, 44, who was stuck at a hotel near Miamis airport with his wife and two daughters, 8 and 12. This is our first hurricane  we dont have this kind of thing.

By the time the storm hit, Floridians had already had a grim preview of Irmas fury: The storm left a trail of destruction across the eastern Caribbean, barreling up through the lush Leeward Islands and killing at least two dozen people.

More than 36 hours after being pummeled by what was still then a Category 5 storm, a shaken Cuba was still assessing the damage Sunday. Initially, the storm had not been expected to make landfall there, but it passed directly over northern islands, with effects felt as far away as the capital, Havana. Passing over Cuba probably weakened the storm as it punched onward toward Florida, scientists said.

Even while the storm raged, there were sober assessments of a long and painful recovery for the storm zone on the U.S. mainland. Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), speaking on CNN, said weeks and months of disruption are to be expected.

This storm has covered the whole state of Florida, he said, predicting a slow slog back to any semblance of normalcy.

A determined few Floridians seized any opportunity  even a fleeting one like the hurricanes eye, a period of relative calm  to check on homes and property.

John Krowzow, who is 74, slipped away to check on the situation in Corkscrew Woodlands, a mobile home park for seniors in Estero, a hard-hit town near Fort Myers.

I feel good! he said after finding that his mobile home, raised on cinder blocks, was intact.

Staff writer McDonnell reported from Miami, staff writer King from Washington and staff writer Halper from Fort Myers. Staff writer John Cherwa in Orlando and special correspondent Les Neuhaus in Miami contributed to this report.

laura.king@latimes.com

@laurakingLAT

Hurricane Irma: What we know so far

Storm surge: What happens when the sea rises up during a hurricane?

The incredible stories of the die-hards who looked Irma in the face  and stayed

UPDATES:

11:20 p.m.: This article was updated with news that Irma was downgraded to a Category 1 storm.

7:20 p.m.: This article was updated throughout for context.

4:05 p.m.: This article was updated with President Trumps disaster declaration and details about more than 2 million without power, the storms approach to Fort Myers and quotes from stranded people.

2:10 p.m.: This article was updated with news that the storm has weakened to a Category 2 storm.

12:55 p.m.: This article was updated with a second landfall, comments from Tampas mayor, preparations in St. Petersburg, forecast details and overnight curfews in several cities

11:05 a.m.: This article was updated with the hurricanes latest position, descriptions and quotes from Miami and Fort Myers, and 1.5 million now without power.

9:35 a.m.: This article was updated with flooding in downtown Miami, more comment from Gov. Rick Scott and from Sen. Bill Nelson.

7:55 a.m.: This article was updated with a tropical storm warning for Atlanta, more losing power, and the birth of a baby whose stranded mother in Miami was coached by phone.

7 a.m.: This article was updated with descriptions of conditions, the storm surge danger in Fort Myers.

This article was originally published at 6:40 a.m.
Relief efforts in the Caribbean islands hard hit by Hurricane Irma continued Saturday even as Hurricane Jose, a Category 4 storm, dumped more rain on the beleaguered region.

Several nations still possess a variety of Caribbean islands or maintain close ties with former colonies, and relief efforts were coming from all over, including France, the Netherlands and the United States.

The Franco-Dutch island of St. Martin suffered significant damage when Irma slammed into it Wednesday. An estimated 70% of the houses on the Dutch side of St. Martin were badly damaged or destroyed, Dutch officials reported Saturday. The French government said 95% of the French half of the island had been destroyed.

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Irma inflicted similar damage on the island of Barbuda. Prime Minister Gaston Browne initially estimated that 95% of the properties on the island had been damaged or destroyed  then later said the losses were probably even worse. About 1,600 Barbuda residents were evacuated to Antigua.

French President Emmanuel Macron called an emergency meeting at the Elysee Palace on Saturday to set up urgent aid to the French side of St. Martin as well as the French Caribbean island of St. Barthelemy.

Four deaths were reported on the French side of St. Martin and two on the Dutch side, but the number of victims is expected to rise. On Saturday afternoon, President Trump telephoned Macron to express his condolences for the devastation and human loss. More than 1,100 French emergency services  police, civil security, soldiers and health personnel  have been dispatched to St. Martin and St. Barthelemy, where an emergency electricity network has been set up to keep hospitals working. Police forces have been kept busy trying to prevent the pillaging of shops and private properties. An overnight curfew was imposed from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. in anticipation of Jose, which was expected to pass north of the islands Saturday. Around 3,000 packs of emergency military rations have been delivered. An additional 100,000 are being sent to the two islands. Macron announced Wednesday a national reconstruction plan for Frances overseas territories. An emergency fund will be set up, he said. He told a news conference that it was too early to put an exact figure on the sum needed.

The Dutch military, meanwhile, dropped fliers on the island Saturday urging people to get to shelters as Jose approached, according to a tweet from a military commander.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said looting had broken out after the storm, but more than 200 Dutch troops and police are now patrolling the island to restore order. Rutte said told the Associated Press that the situation on the island remains grim. Dutch King Willem-Alexander will leave Sunday for another Caribbean island, Curacao, and will be briefed on relief operations around the region. The Dutch Department of Defense tweeted videos of troops delivering water to the island of Saba on Saturday. A Dutch commander also shared video of dialysis patients being transported off the island. Hurricane Irma also hit Cuba early Saturday. Cubas meteorological agency reported that Irma struck overnight north of central Camaguey province, home to the countrys third-largest city, with winds so strong they destroyed measurement instruments. Hurricane-strength winds were later recorded in the northern half of Camaguey, the agency said. Irma was the first Category 5 hurricane to hit the province in 85 years, according to the state media. Damage was reported across the province: roofs torn off, trees downed and power disconnected. Personnel at the U.S. prison in Guantanamo rode out the storm instead of evacuating. Puerto Rico dodged the brunt of Irma, but still sustained severe damage to its electrical grid. More than 1 million people have lost power because of downed lines, and it is unclear how long it will be until power is restored to the whole island. Officials have said it could take weeks or months for the cash-strapped island to restore power. Among those offering aid to the island was Connecticut, which has a large Puerto Rican population. Gov. Dannel P. Malloy said Saturday a C-130H cargo plane from the Connecticut National Guard would head to Puerto Rico to help with Hurricane Irma recovery. It was expected to arrive Saturday night. Connecticut knows all too well the damage that can result from severe storms, and we are grateful for all the help we received from others as we worked to recover from those storms, Malloy said in a statement. The state of Connecticut stands ready to provide support across the nation in the ongoing response and recovery efforts as a result [of] the damage caused by Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Jose. Puerto Rico has become a hub for relief efforts aiding other islands. The Puerto Rican Air National Guard said in a statement that more than 1,000 American citizens were evacuated from St. Martin to Puerto Rico thanks to crews from the Puerto Rico, Kentucky and New York Air National Guards. But by Saturday evening, forecasters had good news about Hurricane Jose. It appeared the northern Caribbean would avoid a direct hit from Jose, a Category 4 storm with 145 mph winds that is forecasted to move farther northwest and weaken Sunday. The government of Antigua called off a tropical storm warning for the sister islands of Antigua and Barbuda. A tropical storm warning remained in effect for St. Martin and St. Barthelemy. Swells generated by Jose will begin to hit Puerto Rico, Hispaniola, the Turks and Caicos Islands and portions of the Bahamas over the next few of days. The National Weather Service said the swells are likely to produce life-threatening surf and rip current conditions. The service said Jose will begin to gradually weaken Sunday and continue to simmer down Monday.

Special correspondent Willsher reported from Paris and Times staff writer Panzar from Los Angeles.

Staff writer Molly Hennessy-Fiske contributed reporting from Houston.

javier.panzar@latimes.com

Twitter: jpanzar

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Miles-long traffic jams as Hurricane Irma sets its sights on Florida

When Hurricane Irma veered toward Naples, Fla., it was too late to evacuate

Police removing homeless from the streets of Miami as Hurricane Irma approaches
The signature Art Deco hotels along Ocean Drive were all shuttered, a sullen sky yielded sheets of rain, and the elegant seaside palms swayed like elastic bands in the fierce wind.

Miami Beach, an iconic destination for generations of merry-makers, was a veritable ghost town Saturday in the aftermath of unprecedented evacuation orders in response to the threat from Hurricane Irma.

Although Irma appears likely to veer to the west and not hit Miami head-on, meteorologists say the area still faces potentially deadly, hurricane-force winds and storm surges of 3 to 6 feet.

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On Saturday, as the storms effects began to be felt, relatively few ventured onto a wind-whipped and mostly deserted beach, normally filled with weekend revelers in search of sun.

The jaunty town known for its vivacity took on a forsaken character. Owners worried about the fate of their properties, many protected only with plywood strips and a few sandbags.

Ive never seen anything like it, said Garrick Boyd, 26, who stood on Ocean Drive staring at the desolate tableau. Its like looking out in the country somewhere, not Miami Beach.

Roadways and freeways sit quiet as people avoid traveling near the time of curfew in Miami on Saturday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

He was among the relatively few city residents who chose to disregard an evacuation order and wait out the storm.

My apartments on the third floor, so that should be higher than any floods  at least I hope so, said Boyd, a hotel worker. And the windows are reinforced. So I think Ill be OK. And now they say Miami is not getting a direct hit?

Most of the citys homeless population appeared to have been among those evacuated to shelters. But at least one homeless man was seen trying to sleep in the doorway of an upscale restaurant as the storm worsened.

In advance of Irmas onslaught, officials in Miami-Dade County directed more than 650,000 people to leave their homes in Miami Beach and other vulnerable communities. Most decided to evacuate rather than face the wrath of Irma.

Ive been here 60 years. Ive never heard of this kind of evacuation, Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez, a former Miami fire chief, told reporters last week.

Throughout the state, authorities ordered the evacuation of more than 6 million people, more than a quarter of Floridas population.

The storms anticipated westward turn generated a hasty new series of evacuation orders in Tampa and elsewhere on the western side of the Florida peninsula.

But in Miami, despite the repeated warnings, a few people couldnt resist venturing out in the deteriorating weather. In Miami Beach, a few skateboarders daring fate had pretty much clear sailing along an Ocean Drive largely devoid of traffic.

We could use a little more wind to really get going, said Adam Todd, 43, who was shirtless and doing hand-stands on his skateboard. But it feels great.

Another shirtless man  a 30-year-old Venezuelan native who goes by the name Funky Matas  rode his skateboard while wearing pink floaties on his biceps and an inflated childrens life preserver around his waist.

But the scene was generally gloomy as the rain and wind began to take their toll. Many wondered what would become of the town in Irmas aftermath.

A plywood sheet covered the entrance to Mangos, a popular Ocean Drive night spot. Spray-painted lettering advised patrons that the place would open again once Irma went on its way.

We love Miami Beach, read the sign. Amen!

A popular Miami night spot, Mangos promises to be back after the hurricane, though one man doesnt seem too impressed by that pledge. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

Luis Torrego was among those astounded at the sight of the many deserted sites.

These places are normally so crowded you cant get in, said Torrego, 47. Its something hard to believe.

Torrego told the story of a friend who had offered to book a hotel room for him in Tampa so that he could leave the Miami area for the storm. Now, his friend is looking to get out of Tampa as Irma veers that way.

Looks like we got lucky this time in Miami, Torrego said. At least lets hope so.

At one hotel along Ocean Drive, Enrique Pupo Cabrera was resting on an exercise mat laid out atop an outdoor bar. Yellow police taping roped the grounds of the shuttered hotel, where Pupo works as a maintenance man and security chief.

Im here to take care of the place  we dont want any trouble during the storm, said Pupo, 63, a muscular man who said he was among the wave of Cuban immigrants who arrived during the so-called Mariel boatlift in 1980.

His eyes on Saturday were on the news from Cuba, where his wife, three children, nine grandchildren and other relatives were taking shelter in a home on a family farm. Irma has been battering the island before its expected northward lurch toward Florida.

But all was not all bleak on Miami Beach as Irma approached. There is also a longtime tradition of people coming to the beach in advance of hurricanes to view the power of nature.

It feels awesome just to see this, said Yvette Torroella, 39, as she and her family stood on the beach, watching the 6-foot breakers with frothy tops. Weve got everything ready at home for the hurricane. Food, whatever we need. So we wanted to come here and enjoy this sight.

Others ventured into the water. Surfers caught waves. Paragliders took advantage of the winds. Some people waded in until the increasingly strong surf knocked them over. A topless woman hopped on a boogie board in the choppy sea.

In a steady rain, Pedro Granja, 47, was walking shirtless along Ocean Drive with a big smile on his face and a towel on his shoulder. He had just come from a refreshing dip in the roiling sea.

Its always a pleasure to be in the ocean, said Granja. But to go swimming in a hurricane? That is something special.

patrick.mcdonnell@latimes.com

Twitter: @mcdneville

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Live Updates: Hurricane Irma expected to intensify on approach to Florida
While Miami was mostly evacuated by Saturday, one group still had a noticeable presence: the homeless.

Ill be all right, Terry Donald, who estimated he had been living on the streets here for two years, said as he shuffled barefoot down a deserted downtown street. I think Ill make it through.

In the hours before Hurricane Irma was expected to pummel Florida, authorities were urging homeless people to go to shelters.

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For those who refused, police were employing a controversial law known as the Baker Act, which allows officers to send anybody they believe poses a danger to themselves or others to a mental institution, where they can be held for up to 72 hours for an involuntary examination.

The 1971 law has been widely criticized by advocates for the homeless. But with Irma bearing down on Miami-Dade County, some advocates had been urging local authorities to use it.

Its a bad storm and we needed to take drastic measures, said Ron Book, chairman of the Miami-Dade County Homeless Trust, a public-private partnership that aims to end homelessness. Im not going to see our homeless population dead in the streets.

Id rather see this law used than to have them in body bags, he said.

Books group estimates about 1,130 people are homeless in Miami-Dade County. He said that on Friday law enforcement officials invoked the Baker Act to take six people off the streets.

For almost two weeks weve been telling people living on the streets this storm is headed here and its going to be bad, he said.

On Saturday afternoon, scores of homeless people were walking the streets, tucked under building awnings and sleeping on sidewalks.

A Times reporter witnessed several homeless people being loaded into a police van.

Jerry Dean, who said hed been homeless for four months in Miami, said he was happy to get the help.

Theres no way to ride this storm out  it aint going to happen, said Dean, 50, of New Jersey. This storm will kill you.

Deborah Ford, who sat in her wheelchair paralyzed from the waist down, said there wasnt much choice for her.

What am I going to do? Ford, 62, said. [The police] are just doing their job for the most part. A lot of people dont want to come off the streets.

James Bernat Sr., a senior executive assistant to the Miami police chief and the departments point person on homeless issues, said that some homeless people were being taken to shelters. Any removed from the streets under the Baker Act would be taken to Jackson Memorial Hospital for evaluation, he said.

This is to ensure their safety and the safety of the public, he said.

The use of the law to evacuate people was not universally praised by homeless advocates.

The National Coalition for the Homeless said in a statement that it rejects the misconception that all homeless folks have a mental illness or that someone who has a mental illness does not understand the danger of a storm like Irma.

People who are homeless are survivors. Anyone who has lived outdoors quickly develops techniques for surviving difficult situations, it said. We are concerned that Miamis decision to invoke the Baker Act sends the wrong message about how we respect the rights of those who do not have a home.

Neuhaus, a special correspondent, reported from Miami. Lee reported from Los Angeles.

kurtis.lee@latimes.com

Twitter: @kurtisalee

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CHICAGO  In writing The Once and Future Liberal, the historian Mark Lilla has produced a short tome that is devoid of the shrieking hysteria about partisan rivals that usually sells political books.

Indeed, Lilla has done worse  hes taken his own party to task in a scathing critique of liberalisms failure to create a common vision for our nation. His ideas are sound and logical, and he yearns for politically awakened citizens who can create lasting legislative change. The book essentially argues that the collective spirit of We the people has been replaced by me-me-me-ism at a time when we most need to hold on to our shared values.

For vast swaths of America, this isnt controversial but, predictably, these proclamations are infuriating the choir Lilla is trying to preach to. A pragmatic  and self-identified as proud  progressive, Lilla has ruffled liberal feathers. In prefacing a testy interview in which The New Yorker editor David Remnick seemed both pained and horrified at Lillas prescriptions, the author was ominously labeled a distinctly more conservative brand of liberal and Trump opponent.

Michael S. Roth, president of Wesleyan University, was similarly affronted. In the journal Inside Higher Ed, Roth wrote that Lilla condemns campus radicals for abdicating their responsibility to go beyond movement politics and build successful electoral coalitions ... [but] must be aware the old solidarity came at the expense of all too many, and that thanks to the movement politics he derides, our politics now has the potential to be more inclusive. The strong reactions are due to Lillas blunt assessment of where liberalism stands in the Trump era, which appears to be a repudiation of all progressives have fought for in the past few decades.

Liberals bring many things to electoral contests: values, commitment, policy proposals. What they dont bring is an image of what our shared way of life might be, Lilla writes. Ever since the election of Ronald Reagan, the American right has offered one. And it is this image  not money, not false advertising, not fearmongering, not racism  that has been the ultimate source of its strength. In the contest for the American imagination, liberals have abdicated.

Lillas critics have mocked him for supposed overuse of the term abdication, but he lists other liberal sins such as an overemphasis on identity politics, which he says was at first about large classes of people  African-Americans, women  seeking to redress major historical wrongs by mobilizing and then working through our political institutions to secure their rights. But by the 1980s it had given way to a pseudo-politics of self-regard and increasingly narrow and exclusionary self-definition that is now cultivated in our colleges and universities. The main result has been to turn young people back onto themselves, rather than turning them outward toward the wider world. It has left them unprepared to think about the common good and what must be done practically to secure it  especially the hard and unglamorous task of persuading people very different from themselves to join a common effort.

Again, any moderate, centrist or independent voter will find a lot of truth in that sentiment. But Lillas message is instead goading the very liberals he seeks to convince.

He argues quite convincingly that it is not individual identity, but a shared sense of citizenship, that can bring our nations diverse peoples together. I am not a black male motorist and never will be, he writes. All the more reason, then, that I need some way to identify with one if I am going to be affected by his experience. And citizenship is the only thing I know we share. The more the differences between us are emphasized, the less likely I will be to feel outrage at his mistreatment.

But Lilla makes a bitter pill of the medicine he proposes. He writes, Children do not respond well to scolding and neither do nations. It just puts their backs up. They become better only when they are told that they are already good and therefore can improve.Despite Lillas great points and examples, the overall tone of this book is that of a harsh scolding. As a result, Lillas passionate call for the lefts unity with those in the middle and on the right is diminished. His book will likely only resonate with those progressives who already believe we need fewer marchers and more mayors, governors and other legislators who can enact lasting change.
After blazing a path of destruction through the Caribbean, Hurricane Irma made landfall in Florida on Sunday, bringing chaos as it moved north through the nations third most populous state.

Heres what you need to know:

Where is Irma now? How big is the storm? And where is it going?

As of Sunday evening, Irma had been downgraded to a Category 2 hurricane with 110 mph winds, after barreling into the city of Naples on Floridas southwest coast with winds gusting up to 130 mph.

It was actually the storms second landfall in Florida.

After scraping the northern coast of Cuba on Saturday, Irma turned north toward Florida overnight. The new path put the storm on a collision course with the low-lying islands of the Florida Keys, which dangle toward Cuba from the southernmost edge of the state.

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After making landfall on the islands Sunday morning, causing heavy flooding and wind damage, the strongest part of the storm ripped north toward Floridas Gulf Coast, the western edge of the state. The cities of Naples, St. Petersburg, Tampa, Clearwater and Fort Myers were in its direct path. But the storm was so big, it was also wreaking havoc in the eastern half of the state.

Although hurricanes usually weaken after making landfall, Irma was expected to remain powerful as it rakes Floridas coast. Tallahassee, in Floridas panhandle, could be next, followed by southwestern Georgia.

1 / 79 Trailer homes at the Sea Breeze trailer park in the Florida Keys town of Islamorada were destroyed by Irma. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 79 Tom Ross inspects the damage to his three-story condominium building in Islamorada. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 79 The remains of a boat in Islamorada. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 79 Brooke Gilbert, 15, and her father, Mike Gilbert, look at the ruins of her grandparents condominium building in Islamorada. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 79 Laura Gilbert retrieves the mailbox from her fathers condominium in Islamorada after it was swept away during the storm. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 79 Sand and debris block access to trailer homes in Islamorada. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 79 Greg Garner embraces neighbor Linda Nettles in front of his longtime family home that lost part of its roof after Tropical Storm Irma hit Sullivans Island, S.C. (Mic Smith / Associated Press) 8 / 79 Israel Alvarado, 25, tries to open a gate blocked by fallen tree branches to retrieve a generator in Bonita Springs. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 79 Rescue workers help a couple evacuate their flooded home in Jacksonville. (John Raoux / Associated Press) 10 / 79 Charlotte Glaze, left gives Donna Lamb a hug as she floats out some of her belongings in floodwaters in Jacksonville,. (Dede Smith / Associated Press) 11 / 79 Ron Colby, 70, leaves his flooded Bonita Springs home after staying during Hurricane Irma. He said he was OK with the wind but that at 3:30 in the morning the water started to rise. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 12 / 79 A dresser floats by Gilberto Diaz in his Bonita Springs neighborhood. Originally from Guatemala, Diaz has lived in Florida since 1994. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 79 In Bonita Springs, floodwaters reached waist deep in some areas on Monday, flooding homes and cars. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 79 A block from the ocean in Naples, the water was still a foot deep from storm surge. Homeowner Terry Clontz put up a no wake sign because people were driving by too fast, pushing water farther onto his property. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 79 Floodwaters surround a marina in Key Largo on Monday following Hurricane Irma. (Wilfredo Lee / Associated Press) 16 / 79 Mobile homes in Key Largo, Fla., lie in ruins on Monday after Hurricane Irma. (Wilfredo Lee / Associated Press) 17 / 79 Floodwaters surround Gilberts Resort in Key Largo on Monday. (Wilfredo Lee / Associated Press) 18 / 79 Kelly McClenthen returns to see the flood damage to her home with her boyfriend, Daniel Harrison, in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in Bonita Springs, Fla. (Gerald Herbert / Associated Press) 19 / 79 Terry Thompson is relieved. He rode out the storm in his home in Riverwood Estates in Naples. Although the Naples area of Florida was hit hard by Hurricane Irma, damage wasnt nearly as bad as anticipated. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 20 / 79 A woman leaves her flooded home the morning after Hurricane Irma swept through the area in Fort Myers, Florida. (Spencer Platt / Getty Images) 21 / 79 People tend to a car that flipped over on Cape Coral Parkway during Hurricane Irma, in Cape Coral. (Gerald Herbert / AP) 22 / 79 A man clears the drain next to his house in Estero, Fla., during the lull in winds as the eye of the hurricane passes over. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 23 / 79 Evacuees use flashlights so others can maneuver around the stairway at Hampton Inn and Suites in Estero, Fla. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 24 / 79 Guests gather in the lobby of Hampton Inn and Suites in Estero, Fla., to watch the hurricane gusts. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 25 / 79 Darla Talia Ferro, 40, and her two parakeets ride out Hurricane Irma in the lobby of Hampton Inn and Suites in Estero, Fla. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 26 / 79 John Krowzow, 74, wades in floodwater to check out his homes in Corkscrew Woodlands, a park with 640 senior mobile home units in Estero, Fla. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 27 / 79 Peter Moodley wades through floodwater in downtown Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 28 / 79 Two men walk through a downed tree as Hurricane Irmas full force strikes Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 29 / 79 A woman films the damage from a house whose roof was blown off near downtown Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 30 / 79 A vehicle drives through debris caused by Hurricane Irma, in Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 31 / 79 Weather reporters in downtown Miami jump and cling on to illustrate the force of the winds caused by Hurricane Irma. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 32 / 79 Weather reporters do a stand-up as the force of the winds caused by Hurricane Irma hit Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 33 / 79 A cargo truck is tipped over by the wind caused by Hurricane Irma in Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 34 / 79 Storm surge floods the Brickell neighborhood of Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 35 / 79 Streets are empty in downtown Miami as the wind picks up speed during Hurricane Irmas approach. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 36 / 79 Maria Koenig, 63, of Estero, Fla., and her dog, Baeley, sit by the window at their Estero hotel so Maria can keep an eye on the storm on Sunday. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 37 / 79 Glen Sinatra, 69, from Naples, says he feels lucky to be at a hotel in Estero instead of a shelter. Hes nervous about the storm and says hes trying not to worry his children about the conditions. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 38 / 79 Jimmy Alfano, of Ft. Myers, holds onto Alec Hoskins who is autistic, while watching the storm gusts through the window of their Estero hotel with Frank Pairs. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 39 / 79 A car sits abandoned in storm surge along North Fort Lauderdale Beach Boulevard as Hurricane Irma hits the southern part of the state. (Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images) 40 / 79 The metal canopy at a gasoline station is overturned by high winds brought on by Hurricane Irma. (Wilfredo Lee / Associated Press) 41 / 79 Youssef Ezzou, left, and Fadel Beznbachir roam outside to check out the conditions in Miami as Hurricane Irma nears the mainland. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 42 / 79 A construction crane whose arm broke off towers over a building as high wind blows through downtown Miami on Sunday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 43 / 79 A man and woman run to safety in Miami as winds from Hurricane Irma bear down on Sunday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 44 / 79 Storefronts in Miami are damaged as Hurricane Irmas winds hit Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 45 / 79 Dustin Terkoski, Palm Bay Police officer surveys the scene after a possible tornado touched down at Palm Pam Bay Estates. (Red Huber / Orlando Sentinel) 46 / 79 A man braces against the wind by the Miami River on Sunday as water levels surge. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 47 / 79 A man stands by the Miami River as the water level surges on Sunday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 48 / 79 The waves on the Miami River begin to surge Sunday as winds pick up speed upon Hurricane Irmas approach. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 49 / 79 Brian Williams, of Maryland, fights the winds in downtown Fort Myers. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 50 / 79 Trees fall as winds pick up speed early Sunday as Hurricane Irma approaches Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 51 / 79 A TV reporter braces against the wind as Hurricane Irma approaches Miami. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 52 / 79 The outer bands of Hurricane Irma start to reach Florida on Saturday, with clouds over the Miami skyline. (Joe Raedle / Getty Images ) 53 / 79 People wade through a flooded street in Havana after Hurricane Irma battered central Cuba. (YAMIL LAGE / AFP/Getty Images) 54 / 79 Thousands wait Saturday to enter a storm shelter set up at Germain Arena in Estero, Fla., south of Fort Myers. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 55 / 79 Jean Turner, 79, waits to get into a shelter with a few of her belongings as rain begins to fall Saturday in Estero, Fla. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 56 / 79 Sherri Bourdo, 32, and Anthony Guidry, 40, look out over the water in Naples, Fla, in advance of the arrival of Hurricane Irma. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 57 / 79 Lisette Toroella and Tatiana Morera play on the beach as storm clouds approach in Miami Beach. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 58 / 79 Adam Todd, does a handstand while skateboarding down a virtually empty Ocean Drive in Miami Beach. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 59 / 79 Abby Jenkins walks against the wind with her luggage and umbrella to get to safety, in Miami Beach. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 60 / 79 James Sampero surfs in the churning ocean as Hurricane Irma approaches. (Joe Raedle / Getty Images) 61 / 79 Cubans wade through the rubble from a collapsed building in Havana on Saturday. (Yamil Lage / AFP/Getty Images) 62 / 79 A woman and child use a blanket as protection from wind and rain as they walk in Caibarien, Cuba. Hurricane Irma battered Cuba on Saturday with deafening winds and unremitting rain, pushing seawater inland and flooding homes before turning toward Florida. (Desmond Boylan / Associated Press) 63 / 79 Annette Davis plays with her son Darius, 3, while staying at a shelter in Miami on Saturday after evacuating from their home in Florida City ahead of Hurricane Irma. (David Goldman / Associated Press) 64 / 79 Residents walk through rain brought on by Hurricane Irma in Caibarien, Cuba. The powerful storm battered Cuba on Saturday and continued its march toward Florida. (Desmond Boylan / Associated Press) 65 / 79 Palmetto Ridge High School is a shelter for people with special needs near Naples, Fla. Many seniors plan to ride out the storm there. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 66 / 79 Francesca DeLuca, age 20, will be waiting for 10 hours for her flight back to Milan, Italy. She had been visiting a friend in Miami by herself, but the area where she was staying is under mandatory evacuation. At Miami International Airport, the last flights will be this afternoon with the airport closing tonight at 6pm. Most travelers are taking flights to anywhere they can find. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 67 / 79 Boats that cant be evacuated are tied off in canals to protect them from Hurricane Irma on in Key Largo, Florida. The entire Florida Keys are under a mandatory evacuation notice as Hurricane Irma approaches the low-lying chain of islands south of Miami. (Marc Serota / Getty Images) 68 / 79 Hundreds wait in line on Friday at Home Depot in Miami to get supplies line sheets of plywood, and anything else they can find, to board up their homes. Police were on the scene to keep things orderly. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 69 / 79 In the Little Haiti neighborhood of Miami, Fritz Drinks, whose family is from Haiti, helps load sandbags at Little Haiti Hardware and Lumber. Many people in the area are refusing to evacuate in advance of Hurricane Irma. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 70 / 79 In downtowm Miaimi, people wait to get on a bus headed to Orlando under a mandatory evacution plan. Preparations are underway for Hurricane Irma as the storm makes its way toward Florida. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 71 / 79 Stores are boarded up in Miami Beach in advance of Hurricane Irma. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 72 / 79 Preparations for Hurricane Irma are underway in Miami Beach as the storm makes its way toward Florida. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 73 / 79 Genaro Dacosta, 65, of Miami Beach loads sandbags in advance of Hurricane Irma. He says he cant evacuate the area because he has a monkey. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 74 / 79 An aerial photograph taken and released by the Dutch Department of Defense on Wednesday shows damage from Hurricane Irma in Philipsburg, St. Maarten. (Gerben van Es / AFP/Getty Images) 75 / 79 Juan Negron, third from left, prepares to start up a power generator in front of whats left of his damaged property in Culebra, Puerto Rico, after the passage of Hurricane Irma. (Carlos Giusti / Associated Press) 76 / 79 Residents come out to survey the damage caused by Hurricane Irma in Nagua, Dominican Republic. (Tatiana Fernandez / Associated Press) 77 / 79 People on Thursday look over damage from Hurricane Irma on a sand-covered street of Marigot, near the Bay of Nettle, on the island of St. Maarten. (Lionel Chamoiseau / AFP/Getty Images) 78 / 79 Inmate trustees from the Brevard County Jail fill sandbags for Meritt Island, Fla., residents in advance of Hurricane Irma. (Brian Blanco / Getty Images) 79 / 79 Motorists leave Key Largo, Fla., ahead of Hurricane Irma. (Alan Diaz / Associated Press)

Whats the damage like so far?

More than 100 miles of coastline in southwest Florida  from the Everglades to the barrier islands, west of Fort Myers  were expected to get flooded in 10 to 15 feet of ocean water from wind-blown storm surge. That includes the city of Naples, where Florida Gov. Rick Scott expected his waterfront mansion to be inundated.

Other parts of the state, including the Keys, were expected to get 5 to 10 feet of storm surge.

Near the storms eye, Naples has gotten hurricane-strength gusts up to 142 mph, according to the National Weather Service. But tropical-storm-strength winds were churning as far as 220 miles away from Irmas center.

Live updates: Hurricane Irma surging up from Florida Keys 

The heavy winds have snapped trees all across southern Florida and also seem to have broken two construction cranes in downtown Miami, leaving them dangling dangerously over the city below.

The Florida Keys, already drenched in storm surge, was expected to get 15 to 20 inches of rain by the time the storm is finished, with the rest of Floridas peninsula potentially seeing a foot or more of precipitation.

Floridians will also have to keep an eye out for possible tornadoes spawned by the hurricane. One twister reportedly damaged several mobile homes in the city of Palm Bay.

How are people holding up?

Large portions of Floridas coastline have been ordered evacuated in recent days. Many residents simply left the state, driving north with some of their possessions after boarding the windows of their homes.

Tens of thousands of others have filled dozens of emergency shelters  some of them schools and stadiums  to wait out the worst of the storm. More people are holed up in hotels, with many filling up their bathtubs in anticipation of losing water.

Storm surge: What happens when the sea rises up during a hurricane? 

At least 2.3 million customers have lost power, according to the Florida Power & Light Co.

A few holdouts bet they could weather the storm in boats and mobile homes, against officials wishes, and some have already had to be rescued.

A sheriffs deputy and a state prison official died southeast of Tampa on Sunday morning after their vehicles collided head-on. It wasnt immediately clear whether the crash was storm-related.

Fort Lauderdale police said they arrested nine people for looting a cash-and-pawn business in the city. But many police agencies were in the process of withdrawing officers from the streets because the storm had made it too dangerous to continue working outside.

matt.pearce@latimes.com

Matt Pearce is a national reporter for The Times. Follow him on Twitter at @mattdpearce.

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More national headlines
Commemorations for the anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks began in New York late last week as they have for multiple years, with twin beams of light piercing the night sky, a tribute to those lost in the World Trade Center that could be seen across the region.

Yet even 16 years after the 2001 attacks, the list of the fallen continues to grow as police officers, firefighters, first responders and recovery workers succumb to illnesses linked to their work in the aftermath of the attacks.

Researchers estimate that the choking dust that coated the ground zero recovery site  and persisted in the air for days afterward  contained a hazardous mix of airborne particles, including aluminum, asbestos, glass and the remnants of burned jet fuel. Similar hazards affected workers at the Pentagon and the Shanksville, Pa., crash site where the hijacked United Flight 93 was brought down.

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Scientists studying exposure to those airborne hazards have linked them to lung disease, asthma and cancer, and the federal government has taken steps in recent years to help tackle these lasting health challenges.

On Monday, a memorial on Long Island will be dedicated to both the nearly 3,000 people who lost their lives on Sept. 11, and those who died of illnesses stemming from the attacks and their aftermath.

How many people have experienced health complications due to effects from the Sept. 11 attacks?

In New York alone, an estimated 60,000 to 70,000 responders worked at ground zero, sometimes for weeks, in the aftermath of the attacks. They included police officers, firefighters, construction workers and volunteers. The numbers are less clear for responders to the attack on the Pentagon and the crash at Shanksville, although hundreds of local police and fire officials worked in the aftermath of both scenes. Additionally, thousands of people in lower Manhattan may have been exposed simply by returning to their apartments or commuting to work in the days after the attacks.

In June, the World Trade Center Health Program, the federally funded organization that helps provide medical treatment for people affected by the attacks, counted more than 67,000 responders and 12,000 attack survivors as enrollees. The program receives hundreds of new participants each month, including nearly 400 new enrollees in June alone. Since the program began in 2011, more than 1,300 members have died, although not all deaths could be directly attributed to Sept. 11-related illnesses.

What type of conditions are 9/11 responders and survivors experiencing?

The majority of enrollees in the federal program suffer from breathing-related issues, mental health complications or cancer. Yet the program covers a wide array of challenges that arise in the wake of trauma, including asthma, post-traumatic stress disorder and lower back pain.

Scientific studies continue to find a link between Sept. 11 responders and high risks of health problems. A 2012 study from the New York Department of Health found that responders to the World Trade Center attacks were at a higher risk of developing prostate and thyroid cancer, and a study in 2011 found a 19% higher rate of cancer among New York firefighters who responded to the attacks.

What help can responders and survivors receive for their ailments?

The federal government funds both a health and a compensation program for Sept. 11 assistance. While the World Trade Center Health Program provides medical treatment, the federal Victim Compensation Fund provides financial help for victims families, first responders and survivors of the attacks.

Though the compensation fund originally ran from 2001 to 2004, President Obama reactivated it in 2011 after a congressional battle over funding for the program, with fiscally conservative Republican senators filibustering the bill in 2010. Obama signed a bill in 2015 that will keep the fund operating until 2020.

By August of this year, the fund had granted eligibility to more than 17,000 claims out of more than 30,000 filed, and had paid out more than $3 billion in compensation, more than the $2.7 billion Congress originally approved in 2011. Claims covered responders at all three sites as well as people living and working in lower Manhattan at the time of the attack.

How do advocates for responders and survivors feel about the care they are receiving?

Advocates for responders and victims say that although Sept. 11 remains a defining event for the nation, the fate of the people directly affected by the attacks is sometimes forgotten.

People in America know the story of 9/11, said Ben Chevat, executive director of 9/11 Health Watch, a nonprofit watchdog group. Whats really not well known or understood are the challenges facing so many to this day.

Though Chevat and his fellow advocates are pleased that the federal government has taken responsibility for healthcare and compensation, he said, there remains a backlog of compensation cases and the need for more conditions to be covered, such as autoimmune disorders linked to the response.

John Feal, who heads the FealGood Foundation, a nonprofit that advocates for first responders, worries that there are still too many responders and survivors who arent aware of the federal programs.

The reality is that more and more people are getting sick and dying, he said. He is particularly concerned about the coming emergence of asbestos cases, which he noted can take up to 20 years to appear.

He estimates there are about 10,000 additional responders who are eligible for the program but not enrolled, and Chevat believes there may be more than 30,000 who are still eligible.

The guys in Texas, Oregon and California who went to New York for the cleanup and recovery for 10 months, its hard to reach them, Feal said.

Though the cause has high-profile backers, including comedian Jon Stewart, Feal worries the message isnt reaching people outside of the Northeast.

A year and a half ago, I traveled to 10 states in 10 months and met first responders, he said. Its an uphill battle and an obstacle every day to ensure people get enrolled in the program.

Hansen is a special correspondent.

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Sept. 11, 2017, 9:01 p.m. Irma is now a tropical depression Once a powerful hurricane, Irma is now officially a tropical depression. In what it said was its last advisory on the storm, the National Hurricane Center announced the downgrade at 11 p.m. East Coast time. The storm was centered five miles south of Columbus, Ga., with maximum sustained winds of 35 mph, and moving northwest at 15 mph. All storm surge warnings and tropical storm warnings have been discontinued, the advisory said. Even so, the storm was continuing to assert its presence, with 2 to 5 inches of rain -- and as much as 8 inches in isolated pockets -- expected through Wednesday across South Carolina and northern portions of Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi into Tennessee and North Carolina.



Full CoverageGeorgia

Sept. 11, 2017, 6:52 p.m. Irma claims a third life in Georgia Flooding on Tybee Island, Ga., from Tropical Storm Irma. (Stephen B. Morton / Associated Press) Tropical Storm Irma has claimed a third life in Georgia. The Forsyth County Sheriffs Office says on its website that a woman died from injuries she suffered when a tree fell on a vehicle in a private driveway. The Sheriffs Office says deputies and firefighters tried to rescue the woman, but she died from her injuries. The office said it was withholding the womans name until her family and friends had been notified. The storm is also being blamed for the death of a man in his 50s who was killed when a tree fell on his house just north of Atlanta and for the death of a 62-year-old man in rural southwest Georgia who had a heart attack after he climbed onto a shed during heavy winds on Monday.

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Sept. 11, 2017, 6:40 p.m. When students tried to park at Florida State University during the storm, they found the spots taken by a car dealership When students and faculty at Florida State University learned that they could leave their cars parked in the campus garage over the weekend, many breathed a sigh of relief. After all, their cars could have been severely damaged by Hurricane Irmas powerful winds and dangerous storm surge. But that relief was short-lived for some. When they tried to park Friday, they found many of the spots in the covered campus garage were filled with sparkling new cars from Napleton Infiniti, a dealership in Tallahassee. Angry students took to social media to complain. Some also went to the dealerships Yelp page, flooding it with negative comments. Shame on you Napleton Infinity of Tallahassee for taking up many FSU parking garage spots and preventing FSU students and its surrounding community from parking in one of the few options they have, one Yelp reviewer wrote. There were calls to boycott the dealership, including from people out of state who took up the students cause. Out of respect for the families who have lost everything during hurricane Irma, do NOT do business with this establishment, a Yelp reviewer from Chicago wrote. On Sunday evening, the university posted on Twitter that it had addressed the matter and that the vehicles have been removed. Napleton Infinity of Tallahassee did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Full CoverageThe Keys

Sept. 11, 2017, 5:09 p.m. Images emerge of Hurricane Irmas devastation in the Florida Keys



Full CoverageThe Keys

Sept. 11, 2017, 4:49 p.m. Hurricane Irma spares Hemingways home and its cats A six-toed cat at the Ernest Hemingway Home and Museum in Key West, Fla. (Florida Keys News Bureau) Hurricane Irma battered the Florida Keys over the weekend, but the Ernest Hemingway Home and Museum in Key West, its staffers and its 54 six-toed cats were unharmed by the storm, the Orlando Sentinel reports. Jacque Sands, general manager of the Ernest Hemingway Home and Museum, told the newspaper that the house was not severely damaged, and that the museums 10 employees and the dozens of polydactyl felines that populate the property were safe. The museums staff made headlines after announcing that it wouldnt heed orders to evacuate the Keys, thought to be particularly vulnerable to Irmas wind and rain. Mariel Hemingway, the actress and Ernest Hemingways granddaughter, had urged Sands to leave the house and seek safer shelter, the Telegraph reported. I think that youre a wonderful and admirable person for trying to stay there and save the cats, and save the house, and all that stuff, Hemingway told Sands. But ultimately, its just a house. Save the cats. Get all the cats in the car and take off. Read more



Full CoverageSouth Carolina

Sept. 11, 2017, 4:24 p.m. Authorities confirm first Irma-related death in South Carolina Pedestrians walk into huge waves crashing over the Battery park as Tropical Storm Irma hits Charleston, S.C., on Sept. 11, 2017. (Mic Smith / Associated Press) Authorities are reporting the first death in South Carolina related to Tropical Storm Irma. Abbeville County Coroner Ronnie Ashley said Charles Saxon, 57, was cleaning debris outside his home in Calhoun Falls about 3 p.m. Monday when a tree limb fell on him. Ashely said in a news release that Saxon died at the scene. An autopsy has been ordered. The National Weather Service says winds in the area were gusting to about 40 mph at the time Saxon was killed. Calhoun Falls is 60 miles south of Greenville, S.C.



Full CoverageThe Keys

Sept. 11, 2017, 3:29 p.m. Its devastation in the Florida Keys, governor says (Alan Diaz / Associated Press) Florida Gov. Rick Scott says there is devastation in the Florida Keys, but the damage from Hurricane Irma was not as extensive on the states west coast as he had feared. Scott told reporters that he flew over both areas on Monday and saw many overturned mobile homes and boats washed ashore in the Keys. My heart goes out to the people in the Keys, he said at U.S. Coast Guard Air Station Miami. Its devastation, and I just hope everybody survived. As for the west coast of Florida, Scott said, We clearly saw homes that were messed up, clearly saw roofs that were off. But I thought we would see more damage. Going forward, he said the biggest threat would be from river flooding. Parts of the state are receiving torrential rains, which combined with the storm surge has caused historic flooding along the St. Johns River.



Full CoverageJacksonville

Sept. 11, 2017, 3:11 p.m. Reporting from Orlando, Fla.

Jacksonville hit with some of its worst flooding in 100 years Rescue workers help a couple evacuate their home after it was flooded by Tropical Storm Irma in Jacksonville, Fla. (John Raoux / Associated Press) Jacksonville may have been spared the most ferocious winds of Tropical Storm Irma, but the torrential rains and storm surge have swelled the St. Johns River to historically high levels and inundated low-lying areas of the city. Tom Bossert, the White House homeland security advisor, called it some of the worst flooding to hit the city in 100 years. Get out NOW, the Jacksonville Sheriffs Office warned people in evacuation zones. It advised those who needed help escaping flooded homes to visibly display something white  a shirt or a pillowcase. Florida Gov. Rick Scott mentioned the gravity of the situation at his daily news briefing Monday. In Jacksonville, he said, the storm surge is 3 to 5 feet on top of more than a foot of rainfall, which is causing record and historical flooding along the St. Johns River. Scott said he spoke with Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry and assured him that resources were being deployed. The state has sent teams from the State Emergency Operation Center and the Fish and Wildlife Commission to aid with search and rescue operations. Curry said at least 100 people in the San Marco area had been rescued by midday. Adding to the problems is that Hurricane Jose, which is churning in the Atlantic, is pushing water toward the northern part of the state and preventing water from receding from Jacksonville. Theyre not going to recede today, Curry said. This is not a one-day event. This is probably a weeklong event. The National Weather Service called the flooding a particularly dangerous situation. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) tweeted words of encouragement to the citys emergency responders. Keep going, help is on the way, he wrote. The St. Johns River meanders through Florida for 310 miles, starting near Indian River County in the middle of the state and flowing north to Jacksonville, where it connects with the Atlantic.



CaribbeanFull Coverage

Sept. 11, 2017, 1:27 p.m. Paris

French president headed to hurricane-devastated St. Martin and St. Barts (Pascal Pavani / AFP/Getty Images) French President Emmanuel Macron will visit the Caribbean on Tuesday in an effort to persuade locals on the Hurricane Irma-devastated islands of St. Martin and St. Barts that Paris has not abandoned them. Macron, whose popularity has plummeted at home, is taking flak from political opponents and islanders on the French territories for what they consider to have been inadequate hurricane preparations and a slow response to the mass destruction of homes and infrastructure. He was traveling to St. Martin, a Franco-Dutch island, on an overnight flight aboard an Airbus carrying aid and emergency supplies. During his whistle-stop visit, he is also expected to travel to St. Barts, a French territory 20 miles to the southeast. Fourteen people were killed on St. Martin -- 10 on the French side of the island, four on the Dutch side -- after Irma struck on Wednesday. Damage to the island is estimated at more than $1.65 billion by the French state-run reinsurance body, the CCR, which specializes in natural disasters. Read more



Full CoverageGeorgiaOrlandoThe Keys

Sept. 11, 2017, 2:16 p.m. Reporting from Orlando, Fla.

Irma death toll rises by three after an electrocution in Florida, two fatalities in Georgia Downed power lines can be deadly and cause electrocution if encountered in water or on land. (Ricardo Ramirez Buxeda / Orlando Sentinel) The death toll in Florida from Hurricane Irma grew by one Monday afternoon when a 51-year-old man in Winter Park, a suburb of Orlando, was found dead in the street after being electrocuted. Officials in Georgia also confirmed two storm-related deaths, bringing the U.S. toll to at least eight, to go along with the 37 reported fatalities in the Caribbean. Such tolls are difficult to determine because it is sometimes impossible to tell whether a death was the direct result of a storm. At least four people died as a result of traffic accidents on Florida roads soaked by Irma. A sheriffs deputy and a corrections officer were killed in a two-car crash in Hardee County, southeast of Tampa, on Sunday morning. A woman was killed in Orange County when the car she was driving struck a guard rail on Sunday. And a man in Monroe County, near the Florida Keys, lost control of his truck, possibly because of high winds, and died. In Miami-Dade County, a man died of carbon monoxide poisoning from his generator. This can happen if generators are used inside without proper ventilation. Another storm-related fatality may have occurred in Shark Key, where a man was found dead in his home. But its not clear whether the death was related to first responders not being able to assist the man. The Georgia Emergency Management Agency confirmed the storm-related deaths in Sandy Springs, a city north of Atlanta, and in Worth County, about 170 miles to the south. It provided no further details. This post was updated with authorities confirming a second storm-related death in Georgia.



Full CoverageGeorgia

Sept. 11, 2017, 12:41 p.m. Tropical Storm Irma brings extensive flooding to Georgia coast Joey Spalding walks back to his truck on Tybee Island, Ga. (Stephen B. Morton / Associated Press) Communities along the Georgia coast are seeing extensive flooding from Tropical Storm Irma. Irmas storm surge pushed water ashore at the high tide Monday afternoon, and heavy rainfall made the flooding even worse. On Tybee Island, east of Savannah, Hollard Zellers saw waist-deep water in the street as he went to fetch a kayak. About 3,000 people live on Tybee Island, which is Georgias largest public beach. The city manager, Shawn Gillen, said the waters seemed to be receding quickly, but most of the island appeared to have some level of flooding, and there was water in many homes. Storm surge also sent floodwaters into downtown St. Marys, just north of the Georgia-Florida line. St. Marys Police Lt. Shannon Brock said piers and boat docks were heavily damaged, and many boats sank.



Full CoverageThe Keys

Sept. 11, 2017, 12:23 p.m. FLORIDA CITY, Fla.

Frustrated Florida Keys residents wait for permission to return to evacuated homes Warren Stincer waits at a checkpoint along Route 1, the only road going in and out of the Florida Keys on Monday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) There is no gas at the RaceTrac gas station along Route 1 here, and the mini-market is shut down. The site is like a lot of other anonymous roadway establishments, featuring some palm trees, shrubbery and patches of grass across the road from a flooded thicket. But the unremarkable petrol stop has become a terminus for stranded residents seeking to go back to their homes in the Florida Keys, as well as for dozens of journalists keen to survey the damage there in the wake of Hurricane Irma. Florida authorities on Monday were stopping all southbound traffic here, a 20-minute drive or so from Key Largo. There is no other roadway south. Frustration was mounting among those who want to go back home after obeying a mandatory evacuation order declared as Irma headed for Florida. A dozen or so inhabitants of the Keys waited at the gas station, below a sweltering Florida sun, a day after the powerful stormed moved on. Joining them were a half dozen or so TV satellite trucks and other media vehicles. Ive got a house full of food and water waiting for me back home, but they wont let me through, said Warren Stincer, a boat captain and carpenter from Key Largo who evacuated his home last week. Im sorry I ever agreed to evacuate. Now Im stuck here with no food and no water. My home is just 20 minutes down the road and I know the road is clear. Im very disappointed with our officials. He had heard that his home wasnt damaged in the storm. My house is fine, my boat is fine, the road is fine  everythings OK, said Stincer. They just wont let me back in. Joe Sanchez, spokesman for the Florida Highway Patrol, told reporters gathered here that the road would remain closed to all but emergency crews until authorities determined that it was safe. Units of the Florida National Guard and other agencies have been dispatched to the Keys for the cleanup. Pickups ferrying bulldozers and other heavy equipment were being allowed through the police checkpoint. Its a question of safety, said Sanchez, addressing a gaggle of disappointed journalists. There is debris in the roads. There is flooding. Its just not safe yet. That was no consolation for Stincer and other residents of the Keys, including Odalis Padron, who was waiting on a grassy knoll at the edge of the gas station with her pet poodle, Taini. A tree and a rain umbrella provided some shade from the sweltering sun. People tell me the road is good, I dont know why they wont let us in, said Padron, of Key West, expressing the general sense of frustration. All we want to do is go home.



Full CoverageThe Keys

Sept. 11, 2017, 11:17 a.m. Reporting from Washington

More than 10,000 U.S. service members are supporting relief efforts in Florida region The U.S. aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln in 2012, (U.S. Navy) About 10,400 U.S. service members are supporting relief operations in the Florida region. The U.S. military says it has coordinated the evacuation of 1,904 people since Friday. The Air Force is pre-positioning search and rescue units in Florida in Key West, Homestead Air Reserve Base, Patrick Air Force Base and Orlando to support state, local and national authorities. The Air Force flew in about 300 doctors, nurses and healthcare professionals over the weekend to help issue relief aid. The aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln arrived off Floridas east coast on Sunday night with 24 helicopters, and was prepared for operations in southern Florida and the Florida Keys on Monday morning. The amphibious assault ship Iwo Jima and amphibious transport dock ship New York also arrived.



Full CoverageOrlando

Sept. 11, 2017, 10:55 a.m. Reporting from Orlando, FL

Central Florida starts its cleanup after Hurricane Irma Downed trees were a common sight through much of central Florida. (John Armstrong/Orlando Sentinel) The morning after Hurricane Irma rumbled through central Florida with howling winds and torrential rain, the region was working to clean up damage that mostly amounted to downed trees and power lines and some flooding. There was hardly a neighborhood in this vast tourist corridor that did not have upended trees and no power. More than half a million people were without power. Winds blowing at 30 to 40 mph were hampering the cleanup effort, although in many neighborhoods people were out with rakes and power saws. Im so proud of the people of Orlando for taking Irma seriously, the citys mayor, Buddy Dyer, said at a news briefing. This morning I was out in many of the neighborhoods in our city and was pleased to see neighbors out helping other neighbors clean up yard debris and clear trees from yards. Overall the damage was much less than it could have been. There were one reported storm-related death, a traffic fatality on a toll road on Sunday. Seminole County, a collar county around Orlando, lifted its curfew at 11 a.m. Orange County still has a curfew in effect until 6 p.m. The major theme parks of Disney World, Universal and SeaWorld are all going to try to open on Tuesday. SeaWorld reported that all its animals and personnel were safe. Stormwaters flooded a neighborhood of 24 homes south of Pine Hills. But the National Guard, in some cases using boats because the water was too deep for their vehicles, rescued all the residents without any reported injuries. The waters were as deep as three feet, but have already started to recede, and residents are expected to return to their homes Monday to assess damage. Other areas of low-lying Orange County also reported flooding, although no injuries were reported. Some parts of central Florida had as much as 10 inches of rain. A large sinkhole was reported in east Orlando and a few small ones have also occurred, making some roads difficult to drive. Many lift stations in Seminole County were damaged, and residents were asked to limit their use of showers, laundry and flushing toilets until the stations were fixed.



Full Coverage

Sept. 11, 2017, 10:22 a.m. Reporting from BONITA SPRINGS, FL

In Bonita Springs, waist-deep polluted water flows through houses hit by Hurricane Irma (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) Some of the Floridians hardest hit by Irma live in a modest residential neighborhood near the river in Bonita Springs, where waist-deep polluted water flows through their houses. But that isnt keeping some of them from staying put. As a members of a rescue team cruise the flooded streets in a motorized raft, they say they are finding residents trapped in their homes who have no interest in leaving. The residents were determined to see the hurricane through in their homes, and now they are determined to stay in them until they are fully habitable again. Some found their way onto plastic boats. Others pushed away debris such as nearly fully submerged garbage cans bobbing along the streets. It could be a week before the massive pond of sewage-tainted storm water engulfing their properties recedes. They are happy stuck in their houses. They are saying, We have enough food and water, we are going to be fine, said Lt. Manny Hernandez of the Bonita Springs Fire Control & Rescue District. The rescuers have been knocking on every door in the neighborhood as they float by. Some residents take up the offer and leave their homes, but others say, no, thank you. Hernandez said he figured there were about a dozen people in homes inundated with waste-deep water. How many of them called for a rescue once the storm passed? Zero, he said. The neighborhood is a wreck right now, and there are others like it nearby. Yet locals are surprised to see how few communities look that way. Forecasters predicted many, many more homes would be destroyed. Even right across the beach in downtown Naples, where devastation was forecast, tony beach homes endured the storm with just a few scrapes and no serious water damage. The damage hasnt been as bad as I expected, said Hernandez as he waited for the rescue raft to get back from its rounds.

Fort Myers

Sept. 11, 2017, 9:21 a.m. reporting from Naples

Theres still flooding in Naples. But the birds are drying their feathers

Orlando

Sept. 11, 2017, 9:09 a.m. Reporting from Orlando, Fla.

Disney World may not reopen until Tuesday as Hurricane Irma damage assessment continues

Even though Hurricane Irma has passed through central Florida, Orlandos theme parks  including all four at Walt Disney World  may not reopen until Tuesday. All major attractions were closed Sunday and Monday as the storm worked its way up the length of the state. Tropical-storm-force winds are expected to linger well into the afternoon, and Orlando is under a curfew until 6 p.m. Monday. We are beginning an initial assessment of our property, a Disney World spokeswoman said Monday morning. While we experienced high winds and rain, we maintained power throughout the storm. Disney decided on Friday it would close Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Disneys Hollywood Studios and Disneys Animal Kingdom parks for two days. Its Disney Springs shopping and entertainment complex is also closed. The companys hotels stayed open to guests. Disney closures are rare. This one is the fifth since the Florida resort opened in 1971. Read more



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Sept. 11, 2017, 10:36 a.m. Reporting from Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

Hurricane Irma cuts power to more than 7 million homes and businesses Flooding on San Marco Island, Fla. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) Nearly 7.2 million homes and businesses are without power in multiple states as Tropical Storm Irma moves through the Southeast. The vast majority are in Florida. The states emergency management officials said the storm had cut power to more than 6.5 million account holders across the state as of Monday afternoon. Eric Silagy, chief executive of Florida Power & Light, said Irma caused the most widespread damage in the companys history. It affected all 35 counties in the utilitys territory, which is most of the states Atlantic coast and the Gulf coast south of Tampa. The most extensive damage was likely in the Naples area, but a full assessment was ongoing. He said 19,500 electric workers have been deployed in the restoration effort. Still, he said, it will take days for many people to be restored and, in some cases where the damage was extensive, weeks. Meanwhile, Duke Energy reported Monday morning that more than 860,000 of the homes and businesses it serves in Florida were without power. Georgia reported more than 570,000 homes and businesses without electricity, and there were 80,000 in South Carolina. This post has been updated with more than 7 million homes and businesses without power in multiple states



Sept. 11, 2017, 8:07 a.m. Reporting from Naples, Fla.

In a Naples mobile home park, neighbors count their blessings Terry Thompson, 65, near his home in Riverwood Estates in Naples, Fla. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) Terry Thompson moved into his home in the Riverwood Estates Mobile Home Park in Naples two weeks ago. Remarkably, it was still there on Monday. Theres a lot of cleanup, the 65-year-old Air Force veteran said as he assessed the situation around his home. Though it was intact, his neighbors carport had flown off and smacked into his wifes car. Siding had blown off the house. Water still covered many of the streets. Debris was everywhere. Thompson said he rode out the storm with his dog in the mobile home. It was wild. ... The house was lifting and moving and shifting. All sorts of things were going on, he said. John Jenkins, 52, also lives in a brand new mobile home in Riverwood Estates. The street in front of the house was still underwater Monday morning, but his house was standing and mostly intact  which couldnt be said for all his neighbors homes. During the storm, he said, he went our twice and had to take aluminum sheets that were prying loose from his neighbors carport and get them out of the path of his house. It was quite interesting, he said. Their carport was peeling apart and coming at our house. ... I was worried about all the debris. A friend drove by and Jenkins reached in the drivers side window and gave him a hug. I love you, he said. He asked if the friend was OK. The friend reported that his house was fine. The stakes were particularly high for Jenkins, who couldnt get the bank to fund a loan for his home. I put everything I got in the world into [buying] it, he said.
In 1927, as the muddy waters of the Mississippi River began to recede from what was then the deadliest storm-related flood in American history, blues musicians wailed their sorrow and rage. Blind Lemon Jefferson recorded his Rising High Water Blues that May:

Children stand there screamin: Mama we aint got no home

Awww, Mama we aint got no home

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Papa says to the children, Backwater left us all alone.

The gut-wrenching disaster, and others that swept through the Mississippis fast-populating basin in the early 20th century, led to more blues devoted to rain and flood than any other natural event. But Papa was wrong: It wasnt the water that left families homeless and alone.

Under pressure to allow development of the Mississippis natural floodplain that once absorbed nearly half the nations rainfall, Congress had ignored Progressive Era wisdom that flood control required a mix of reservoirs, levees and preserved wetlands and forests. Instead, lawmakers caved to a levees-only strategy that ushered in what the flood-law scholar Christine A. Klein calls a century of unnatural disaster.

By putting the evil eye on nature, we take it off the humans who have science in their hands, but hold it behind their backs.

Weve long sung our blues, conjured our demons and imagined our enemies in deluges and sky-darkening storms. Even today we imbue the atmosphere with evil intention, like how we once saw swamps as villainous forces. This way of thinking about storms leaves us feeling helpless and also off the hook: The problem is the weather, rather than human decisions that impede safety and drainage, or deny the climate science we need to better understand the atmosphere, including record-breaking tropical storms.

Hurricanes Harvey and Irma did not surprise climate scientists, who have grown hoarse warning that the warming seas and atmosphere will amplify hurricanes and other natural disasters. And yet, media and meteorologists dubbed the exceptional cyclones monsters, as if they were spun from a fairy tale rather than hotter-than-usual ocean waters. We have cried beast and zombie storm, watching Irma break global wind speed records and Harvey the U.S. record for greatest rainfall in a single storm. Fear, perhaps, returns us to the ancient superstitions that named these storms after Huracan, the Carib god of evil.

In his new film on the climate change crisis, An Inconvenient Sequel, Al Gore describes the extremes that have drowned cities from Baton Rouge to Bangladesh as rain bombs, suggesting an angry god throwing down torrential rains and ruinous floods.

Last year, when Stu Ostro, a meteorologist with the Weather Channel, saw a smiling skull in Hurricane Matthew on infrared satellite imagery, its creepy eye over Haiti, he posted the sinister-looking face to Twitter. The skull went viral. The Weather Channel, CNN and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution all assigned reporters to the story. Many TV broadcast meteorologists took precious air time to feature it.

We writers are not immune. I was taken aback by this line in a favorite reporters story: The weather appears to be on an unprecedented climate-change-induced rampage.

But weather is not sinister. It is not on a rampage. It is not the bomb.

In the history of humans and their climate, such misplaced attribution has led to our most profound mistakes. In medieval times, people became convinced during the weather extremes of the Little Ice Age that witches were conjuring the storms. As frightening weather intensified, so did witch trials, torture and executions of thousands of innocent people accused of weather magic.

Two hundred years later, British parliament quashed pioneering storm forecasts under pressure from those who thought that the ability to foretell rain was black magic  a fear flamed by ship salvagers who worried predictions would cut into shipwrecks, and their profits. The brilliant Royal Navy vice-admiral who developed the advanced warnings, Robert Fitzroy, committed suicide in the wake of the merciless doubt.

In mid-20th century America, from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta to the Everglades of Florida, federal engineers hyped up water as the fierce, uncompromising enemy. The propaganda film Waters of Destiny breathlessly describes the Army Corps of Engineers massive replumbing of the Everglades to save South Florida from devastating, ruining, havoc-wreaking rains.

In fact, it was the compulsion to vanquish an enemy rather than live in waters balance that put future generations in grave danger.

Soft rains, torrents and even hurricanes are part of that balance. Hurricanes are essentially giant engines that transfer heat from sea to atmosphere. Scientists are working hard to understand the extent to which global warming may fuel them. Yet at this most crucial time, the Trump administration has purged climate experts, research funding and even the science itself from public websites as if we were back in the witchcraft days.

Lessening the blows of both storm disasters and climate change requires us to see the cycle rather than the Cyclops. Failure to do so will cause more of the same catastrophic destruction and human suffering now occurring in Texas, the Caribbean and Florida.

We are not powerless. Unlike hapless children in a blues song or a fairy tale, there is plenty we can do. EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt has said that a hurricane emergency is not the time to talk about climate change. To the contrary, it is just the time to draw the nation to the conversation. In recovery mode, we can remake cities to better withstand storms  in ways that help us reduce the carbon emissions warming the planet. We can plan retreat from those parts of the coast becoming unsafe for people. And we can hike investment in the science of climate change so that we can understand, rather than fear.

By putting the evil eye on nature, we take it off the humans who have science in their hands, but hold it behind their backs. The rain is not the bomb. The storms are not the monsters. The weather is not on a rampage. That would be us.

Cynthia Barnett is the author of three books on water including Rain: A Natural and Cultural History. She is environmental journalist in residence at the University of Florida College of Journalism and Communications.

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President Trump has repeatedly attacked the North American Free Trade Agreement, calling it the worst trade deal ever negotiated. Angry about the U.S. trade deficit with Mexico, he warned that unless Mexico and Canada agreed to revamp NAFTA to his liking, hed tear it up.

Trump seemed to think that renegotiating NAFTA would be easy, and that hed get the talks to focus on Mexicos lower wages and labor standards  which he views as undercutting the blue-collar workers he wooed during the campaign. In recent NAFTA talks, however, Canada turned the tables by arguing that U.S. labor standards are a problem as well. According to the Globe & Mail newspaper, Canada asserted that lower standards in the United States and Mexico give those countries an unfair advantage. Canada insisted, in particular, that the U.S. end its so-called right-to-work laws.

Jerry Dias, president of Canadas largest private-sector union, told reporters, Canadas got two problems: The low wage rates in Mexico and the right-to-work states in the United States.

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Is that just bluster, or do the Canadians have a point?

Under federal law, when a majority of workers at a workplace vote to unionize, the union wins exclusive representation and bargains for all the employees there. But right-to-work laws bar any requirement that employees at unionized, private-sector workplaces pay dues to the unions that represent them.

Its hardly crazy for Canadians to argue that right-to-work laws unfairly weaken American unions and thereby give U.S. businesses an improper advantage.

Republican-dominated legislatures in Kentucky, Missouri and West Virginia have recently approved right-to-work measures, bringing the total number of states that now have such laws to 28. GOP lawmakers maintain that theyre being pro-worker by protecting employees freedom not to have to pay compulsory fees.

Unions, however, argue that right to work is unfair because it enables free riders who refuse to pay even though they receive union services. Union officials and Democrats also argue that the real reason that Republicans  immediately after winning control of a legislature  race to enact right-to-work laws is to weaken unions because Republicans see them as pillars of the Democratic Party.

Many labor leaders ask, if the Republicans who embrace right to work are such champions of workers, why do they repeatedly oppose other pro-worker measures, whether a higher minimum wage, paid sick leave or paid parental leave?

There is no denying that right-to-work laws weaken unions, often discouraging them from undertaking unionization campaigns. Russel Sobel, an economics professor at the Citadel, found that the share of free riders in right-to-work states ranged from 9% in Georgia to 39% in South Dakota. If 39% of workers refuse to pay union dues, thats a hefty hit to a unions treasury, and perhaps to its ability to mount a strike or get out the vote.

In another study, David Ellwood, a professor at Harvards Kennedy School of Government, and Glenn Fine, a former Justice Department official, found that in the first five years after states enacted right-to-work laws, the number of unionization campaigns fell by 28%, and in the following five years by an additional 12%. Unionization wins dropped by 46% in the first five years and 30% in the next five. Overall, right-to-work laws, after accounting for other factors, caused union membership to drop 5% to 10%, the study found

The Economic Policy Institute, a labor-backed research center, has also found that in right-to-work states, wages were 3.1%  or $1,558  lower per worker per year, after taking the cost of living and other factors into account.

Its hardly crazy, then, for Canadians to argue that right-to-work laws unfairly weaken American unions and thereby give U.S. businesses an improper advantage over Canadas.

Of course its highly unlikely the Canadians will get their way: The Trump administration has already told Canada that it wont agree to ending right-to-work laws. Regardless, the percentage of workers in unions will continue to fall.

The percentage of U.S. workers in private-sector unions has dropped from 35% in the 1950s, to 6.4% today  the lowest level in a century. Right to work is just one factor in that decline; other factors include imports, automation, outsourcing and corporate Americas stepped-up resistance to unions.

Paralleling their fight for right-to-work laws, conservatives are pushing to end any requirements that government employees pay union dues. According to the Guardian, a network of conservative think tanks has begun a nationwide campaign that aims to defund and defang public-sector unions, like teachers unions, as a step toward crippling progressive politics in the U.S. (which public-sector unions help to finance).

Before Justice Antonin Scalia died, it looked as if the Supreme Court, in a case brought by several California public school teachers, would rule 5 to 4 that requiring government workers to pay fees to the unions that represent them (when they might have disagreements with their union) violates the workers 1st Amendment rights. After Scalia died, the court deadlocked 4-4 in that case. But with Justice Neil Gorsuch replacing Scalia, the court is expected to rule in an Illinois case that government employees cant be forced to pay union fees. That would create a right-to-work rule for government employees nationwide.

All this comes as business increasingly swamps labor unions in spending on election campaigns. In the 2015-16 election cycle, business outspent labor 17-1 in national elections  $3.4 billion to $205 million  according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.

At least the Canadians quixotic push to end right to work reveals Trumps inaction on labor issues. During last years campaign, he complained mightily about wage stagnation under President Obama. Since his inauguration, however, Trump hasnt done a thing to lift workers wages  indeed he has hurt wages by undercutting an Obama rule to extend overtime pay to 4 million more workers.

Steven Greenhouse, a former labor and workplace reporter for the New York Times, is writing a book about the history and future of labor unions and worker advocacy in the United States.

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MONDOVI  A U.S. district court has ruled that descendants of Cherokee slaves have a constitutional right to be enrolled as full members of the Cherokee Nation.

Those descendants, known as Freedmen, have a long history with the Cherokee. During the American Revolution, the Cherokee fought alongside colonists. In exchange, they were granted greater freedoms, including the right to take African-American slaves. After emancipation, many Freedmen stayed with the tribe and journeyed with the Cherokee in the famed Trail of Tears march, a 900-plus-mile trek to present-day Oklahoma.

For generations, the Freedmen and Cherokee coexisted mostly peacefully. A number of Freedmen intermarried, had children, spoke the language and even held tribal council positions.

But in 1887, the federal government created the Dawes Act, which required tribes to identify members based on blood quantum and ancestral heritage. This left many Freedmen out in the cold.

In recent years, however, the Freedmen have begun to challenge their exclusion from membership. In 2006, the Cherokee Supreme Court ruled that the Freedmen had a constitutional right to be enrolled. Then-tribal chair, Chad Smith, organized a petition among membership to change the tribes constitution.

Fearful of sharing meager casino profits and access to medical care and education, the membership voted for the change.

In response to the Freedmen ban, the federal government imposed economic sanctions against the tribe. It refused to issue millions of needed dollars for housing and other services because of the vote.

While I disagree with any federal attempt to stomp on tribal sovereignty, I do believe the Cherokee were wrong to exclude their black brothers and sisters from membership. They should have known better than to cut out such a devoted and contributing segment of their tribe.

Even as slaves, the Freedmen worked alongside their owners, were invited to live in their homes and were granted full Cherokee membership through ceremony and culture. But the federal governments imposition of harsh enrollment rules drove a wedge between the Freedmen and the tribe. The Dawes Act, like just about every other federal policy imposed on Indian Country, created chaos and division.

Now this mistake has been undone. The Cherokee do not plan to appeal the courts decision.

The Cherokee Nation respects the rule of law, and yesterday we began accepting and processing citizenship applications from Freedmen descendants, the tribes attorney general, Todd Hembree, said in a statement. While the U.S. district court ruled against the Cherokee Nation, I do not see it as a defeat. As the attorney general, I see this as an opportunity to resolve the Freedmen citizenship issue and allow the Cherokee Nation to move beyond this dispute.
To the editor: I certainly agree with your position that a parole for convicted murderer and former Mason family member Leslie Van Houten is a complicated call. I also agree with your opposition to the death penalty and feel life sentences give society a chance to correct its mistakes. (Leslie Van Houten committed an act of terrorism. She should stay behind bars, editorial, Sept. 7)

But I think you missed one important issue.

As other inmates watch Van Houten being denied a parole despite her years as a model prisoner, they will no doubt conclude that good behavior and accomplishments while in prison will do them no good. More importantly, they will be management and safety problems for prison administrators and guards.

Paroling Van Houten will encourage other prisoners to better themselves.

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Kevin McGill, Chula Vista

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To the editor: The Times editorial is spot on, though I would go one step further.

Van Houten was engaged in an act of first-degree murder and, at the time, she was sentenced to death. The sentence was changed to life after Californias death penalty was determined to be unconstitutional in 1972.

I believe that the term life in prison means just that for those who are found guilty of premeditated homicide. As one who unalterably opposes the death penalty, I do believe that our moral compass as a society dictates that an individual forfeits her freedom once she is convicted of first-degree murder.

Van Houten should live out the rest of her life in prison.

Bob Teigan, Santa Susana

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Wendy M. Troxel and Marco Hafner skim over the real and serious reasons why the California School Boards Assn. has rightly opposed SB 328: This legislative overreach is not the small change they suggest. (If teenagers get more sleep, California could gain billions, Opinion, Sept. 7)

School start times arent the issue. Surely more sleep would be be beneficial for teenagers, which is one reason why my own district went to a later high school start time years ago. But we oppose the one size fits all approach from Sacramento.

School start times at the roughly 3,000 secondary schools in California are set for many reasons: Working and single parents in some districts may not have the ability to adjust their work schedules, transportation demands and costs must be considered, and changing end-times in turn limits students who rely on part-time work or access to local community colleges. The list of unintended consequences goes on.

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The logistical challenges that Troxel and Hafner dismiss so casually are serious matters for locally elected governing boards, which are better placed than Sacramento to know what is right for their district.

Angela Cutbill, Agoura Hills

The writer is a trustee on Las Virgenes Unified School District Board of Education.

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To the editor: As a kid, I had a bedtime that was enforced because it was good for me. That idea seems to have disappeared from the parenting landscape.

Elementary school kids are now up watching American Horror Story, playing on their electronic devices or yakking and texting on cellphones. Parents attend social events mid-week and drag their children with them. Bedtime and sleep is so old school, yet somehow my peers and I all went to bed between 8 and 10 p.m. as kids, and we were in school starting at 8 a.m. with reasonable success.

Moving back the school start time also pushes teachers and students into rush hour traffic they now can avoid. Plus, how many students wont make the bell because the bus is stuck on the freeway?

Lets not adopt a bogus fix that enables bad habits.

Mitch Paradise, Los Angeles

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No one in the countrys largest state delegation to Congress has announced plans to retire by 2018. Yet.

Democrats need to flip 24 seats to win back control of the House next year, and that will likely require winning at least a few of the nine Republican California districts Democrats have their eyes on. But it is unlikely any of the most vulnerable California Republicans will make it easier on them by retiring.

Districts with no incumbent are traditionally more likely to switch parties, and Republicans who hint at retirement can expect to get a lot of pressure from House leaders, including Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Bakersfield), to stick it out. So far, none really have.

Nonetheless, representatives sometimes see a national partisan wave coming and decide to get out so they dont have to serve in the minority party, and no amount of badgering from leadership can sway them. Others may have health or family issues drawing them home, or are facing brewing scandals.

On the Democratic side, too, few members have publicly signaled they might be ready to leave Washington.

The filing deadline isnt until March, so members will likely take their time over the next few months to decide whether to run again.

For now, this is who were keeping an eye on. The list has shifted a bit since we last looked in December.

U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) (Justin Sullivan / Getty Images) (Justin Sullivan / Getty Images)

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.)

What the senior senator decides to do will have ripple effects throughout California politics. Feinstein has held the seat for a quarter of a century, and at 84, it isnt yet clear whether the oldest member of the Senate will seek another six-year term.

She has also been under pressure from the left, with a few potential primary challengers  including state Senate leader Kevin de Leon  stoking criticism of her moderate reputation.

Feinstein has indicated that shed like to continue serving, and said in April shell announce her plans once some family health issues are resolved.

She skipped the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia last summer after her husband was diagnosed with lung cancer. She was also fitted with a pacemaker in January.

But shes definitely fundraising like someone who plans to run. She has raised $1.35 million since the beginning of the year, and has $3.57 million in the bank.

Feinstein is the highest-ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is ramping up its investigation of Russia interference in the 2016 election and the Trump campaigns potential involvement.

That could be a powerful incentive to stay another term.

Rep. Grace Napolitano (D-Calif.) (Tom Williams / CQ Roll Call) (Tom Williams / CQ Roll Call)

Rep. Grace Napolitano (D-Norwalk)

When she made a formal announcement shed seek another term in April, the 80-year-old Napolitano pointed to her seniority and experience  10 terms in Congress  as her reason.

But shes on our list because she missed several weeks of votes this summer while her husband, Frank Napolitano, underwent chemotherapy and radiation to treat esophageal cancer . Napolitano worked in the district while she was away from Washington.

The congresswoman easily beat former Democratic state Assemblyman Roger Hernandez of West Covina last November, and her staff says her husband's health hasnt changed her plan to seek an 11th term.

Napolitano raised $163,626 in the first six months of the year. Mary Ann Lutz, former mayor of Monrovia and a former Napolitano aide, has more than $100,000 in the bank, but has said she plans to run only if Napolitano retires.

Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Costa Mesa) (Alexander Zemlianichenko / Associated Press) (Alexander Zemlianichenko / AP)

Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Costa Mesa)

Rohrabacher, the longest serving Republican in the delegation, has long been the subject of retirement rumors. The 70-year-old was on our December retirement watch list, and potential candidate Orange County Republican Scott Baugh is in the wings with more than half a million dollars  more than Rohrabacher  but has not entered the 2018 race.

With the ongoing FBI and congressional investigations into Russias interference in the 2016 election, Rohrabacher has been the subject of dozens of media reports speculating about his long-known friendliness toward Russia.

How Rohrabachers higher media profile will affect a 2018 run isnt clear. Rohrabacher has said hes not too worried. He won reelection in 2016 by 16.6%

Still, his district narrowly went for Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and he has drawn a handful of well-funded Democratic opponents as well as a Republican challenger.

Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Alpine) (Bill Clark / CQ Roll Call) (Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call)

Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Alpine)

On paper, it may not look as if the 40-year-old Hunter would consider retiring. The combat veteran replaced his father in Congress in 2009. He won his last election by nearly 27 percentage points and oversees an influential military-related subcommittee.

Hes got more than half a million dollars in the bank. But last quarter, he only brought in about as much as he spent on legal fees to defend himself and others against an FBI investigation into whether he misused tens of thousands in campaign funds on things such as flying the family rabbit on a plane and payments to nail salons, his childrens private school tuition and a trip to a Phoenix resort.

More than a half-dozen people have filed to run against Hunter, including two Republicans. Many of them are using the investigation to attack Hunter.

If the FBI moves to indict, Hunter may come under pressure from the party to step aside so a reliably Republican district stays in the GOPs hands.

sarah.wire@latimes.com

Follow @sarahdwire on Twitter

Read more about the 55 members of California's delegation at latimes.com/politics

ALSO:

Jolted by Trump, Orange County Democrats see a shot at victory on GOP turf

California's House Republicans voted for the Obamacare repeal that seems dead. Here's what they're saying now

Updates on California politics
Over the past few months, immigrant advocates have rallied at sheriffs departments, marched to the state Capitol and occupied the governors office in a push for a California Senate bill that would limit law enforcement from questioning or holding people on immigration violations.

The so-called sanctuary state bill, by Senate leader Kevin de Leon (D-Los Angeles), has drawn both national praise and rebuke, touted as part of a legislative package by Democrats to shield thousands of immigrants without legal residency from President Trump s call for expanded immigration enforcement.

But Gov. Jerry Brown has been in talks with elected county sheriffs over possible changes to the bill, SB 54, after expressing reservations about signing the legislation should it come to his desk, telling NBCs Meet the Press that some people here illegally who have committed crimes have no business being in the country.

For those who remember the passage of the bills predecessor, the California Trust Act, the debate is familiar. Like de Leons legislation, the Trust Act was introduced by Democrats to blunt the impact of federal policy on immigrant communities. And it also ignited a bitter fight over who the state should protect when the federal government casts a wide deportation net that can entangle hardworking families and criminals alike.

The Trust Act, which was signed by Brown in October 2013, prohibits state and local law enforcement from holding people longer than 48 hours for federal immigration agents  unless theyve been convicted of certain crimes, most of them serious or violent.

With SB 54, de Leon seeks to further limit which inmates officials can detain for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement , and to curb state and local agencies from collecting or sharing their personal information and release dates from jail or prison with federal immigration officials.

But sheriffs argue SB 54 would hamper cooperation between law enforcement officials, allowing immigrants with violent or serious convictions to walk free. Immigrant rights advocates counter that the state needs to do more to keep people from being punished twice  once under criminal laws and again through deportation  in a time of fear for immigrant communities.

Here is how the Trust Act has shaped this years debate on SB 54:

Rebuilding trust in police

Before sheriffs lobbied against SB 54, they were among the most vocal opponents to the Trust Act. Former San Francisco Assemblyman Tom Ammiano introduced the law in 2011 in response to the Secure Communities program.

Under the 2008 Obama -era initiative, law enforcement agencies began to submit to the FBI and ICE the fingerprints of all people booked in state prisons and local jails. When someone was flagged as being in the country illegally, ICE could ask law enforcement to hold the person for eventual federal detention.

Obama administration officials said Secure Communities was intended to identify immigrants without legal status who had been convicted of serious crimes, such as murder, rape and kidnapping. But national debate raged over the number of immigrants law enforcement officials were targeting, spurring legal challenges to the constitutionality of the program and to whether cities and states could opt out of it.

In California, where then-Atty. Gen. Brown signed a memorandum to enter the state in Secure Communities, Ammiano and other Democrats argued the program was ensnaring many people who had not been convicted of any crimes or were low-level offenders.

The first version of the Trust Act would have blocked state and local law enforcement from sharing fingerprints with ICE. But Ammiano later amended the bill to narrow the list of offenders who local and state officers could legally detain for the federal agency.

The California Sheriffs Assn. warned that by barring state and local officers from complying with detainers, or official requests to hold offenders for ICE, it would prevent agencies from working together to keep many serious criminals behind bars.

Read the emails between ICE and Gov. Jerry Browns office.

Top federal immigration officials also tried to privately lobby Brown to veto the legislation after it had passed both chambers of the Legislature.

In emails obtained by the Advancing Justice-Asian Law Caucus and the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, then-ICE director John Morton and senior ICE officials proposed that Brown hold off approving the bill while the federal agency developed an alternative pilot program in California to limit which immigrants police and sheriffs could detain. They said the program would influence national policy.

A staffer with the governors office rejected ICEs proposal in a September 2012 email. Even so, Brown vetoed Ammianos bill a few days later. In his message, the governor echoed the concerns of sheriffs, saying the list of offenses for which local agencies could hold inmates for federal officials was fatally flawed because it omitted many serious crimes, including child abuse, drug trafficking and selling weapons.

I believe its unwise to interfere with a sheriffs discretion to comply with a detainer issued for people with these kinds of troubling criminal records, Brown wrote, pledging to work with legislators the following year to address the concerns.

Balancing act

A year later, Brown received national attention when he signed a new version of the Trust Act as opposition against the Secure Communities program continued to gain momentum.

Across the country, other governors, mayors and some police officials were looking for their own ways to limit their participation in the federal program. Police and immigration officials working closely together created a chilling effect, they said, making immigrant crime victims and witnesses reluctant to come forward.

Weeks of tough negotiations with police and sheriffs associations went into crafting the final bill, which prohibited California law enforcement agencies from holding immigrants for ICE unless they were charged with one of an expanded list of roughly 800 crimes. Among those barred from release were immigrants with past serious or violent felonies, registered sex and arson offenders, domestic violence abusers and those charged with certain other felonies.

Not all sides were satisfied with the compromise. Some sheriffs argued the list of offenses was still not long enough. Immigrant rights advocates were dismayed it included so many crimes, including nonviolent drug charges and wobblers, offenses that could be charged as either a felony or misdemeanor.

But the limits of the Trust Act were not fully tested when Secure Communities came to an end a few months later.

In September 2014, a federal court held an Oregon county liable for damages after officials detained an inmate past her release date in order to turn her over to ICE. The court decision prompted hundreds of cities and counties around the country to stop complying with immigration-hold requests before then-President Obama ended Secure Communities that year.

ICE officials rebooted the program as the Prioritized Enforcement Program, which allowed immigration agents to ask local law enforcement agencies for immigrant offenders release dates so ICE could detain them when or before they were set free. It also directed ICE to prioritize its requests to transfer or detain immigrants convicted of certain crimes, who posed a danger to national security or who recently entered the U.S. without permission.

Under the Trust Act, cities and counties have the discretion to further narrow the list of crimes for which their authorities can hold people for ICE, but it does not allow them to expand it.

The good thing about the Trust Act was that if localities want to, they can adopt policies that set a higher standard, more protections for immigrants, said Angela Chan, policy director at the Asian Law Caucus. That, she said, allowed for the San Franciscos and Santa Claras of the state, so-called sanctuary cities and counties where local laws limit collaboration between local authorities and federal immigration officials.

Senate leader Kevin de Leon, left, answers questions during a news conference to address the so-called sanctuary state bill while Former U.S. Atty. Gen. Eric Holder, center, and LAPD Chief Charlie Beck listen. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

A new era under Trump

In its first seven months, the Trump administration has reinstated the Secure Communities program, canceled a temporary immigration relief program for people brought into the country illegally as children and pledged to slash funding from local law enforcement agencies that refuse to collaborate with federal immigration agencies.

Advocates, social workers and pastors once more are asking the state to intervene on behalf of immigrant communities. But the debate over whether local and state officials should be able to provide information to ICE and hold more serious offenders continues.

On NBCs Meet the Press, Brown called SB 54 a balancing act, saying it needs more changes to win his approval. What those are remains uncertain, but some proposed changes that have been circulated at the state Capitol would allow federal immigration agents to continue entering state prisons and working with corrections officials.

Brown also has been in talks with Los Angeles County Sheriff Jim McDonnell and other members of the California Sheriffs Assn., who argue the bills limits on communication could hamper local and federal officers working on transnational crime and human trafficking cases.

McDonnell said that could lead to drug dealers and known gang members being released to our streets.

Immigrant rights groups counter that when victims and witnesses dont trust local police, entire neighborhoods suffer. In cities across the state, they say, some parents without legal residency are keeping their children home from school. Families have stopped seeking food assistance and other social services. Churches are offering legal aid in basements to people fearing deportation.

Ammiano said the Trust Act was sufficient for its time, when Donald Trump was not president.

Brown expounds a lot about Trump, the former assemblyman said. If anybody should understand that [SB 54] needs to be as strong as possible to address not only the time, but the future, it should be him.

To read the article in Spanish click here

ALSO

Gov. Brown wants to prevent 'abuse of federal power' on immigration, but expresses concerns about 'sanctuary state' bill

What you need to know about California's 'sanctuary state' bill and how it would work

L.A. Police Chief Charlie Beck endorses 'sanctuary state' bill that Eric Holder hails as 'constitutional'
Political activists inflated a 10-foot chicken parodying President Trump on Saturday near Rep. Dana Rohrabachers office in Huntington Beach to protest Rohrabachers unwillingness to hold town hall meetings with constituents.

The event was organized by the owner of the inflatable, Taran Singh Brar, and left-leaning activist group Indivisible OC 48.

Brar, an Orange County resident, set up a 30-foot version of Chicken Don in early August near the White House, making national headlines.

Indivisible OC 48 Chairman Aaron Craddolph said Thursday that the chicken symbolizes Rohrabacher (R-Costa Mesa) neglecting the interests of his district, plus his affinity for Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

benjamin.brazil@latimes.com

Twitter:@benbrazilpilot
AUSTRALIA

Presentation

Adrian Kalvinskas and Susan Hickman will discuss southeast Australia, including Sydney, Melbourne, the Blue Mountains and Great Ocean Road.

When, where: 7:30 p.m. Monday at Distant Lands, 20 S. Raymond Ave., Pasadena.

Admission, info: Free. RSVP to (626) 449-3220.

HIKING

Workshop

REI experts will discuss womens hiking basics such as trip planning, gear, what to bring and where to go.

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When, where: 7 p.m. Wednesday at the REI store in Woodland Hills, 6220 Topanga Canyon Blvd.

Admission, info: Free. (818) 703-5300

SANTA MONICA MOUNTAINS

Workshop

Find the best day hikes and enjoy tips, advice and stories from Doug and Caroline Chamberlin, authors of The Complete Hikers Guide to the Backbone Trail.

When, where: 6:30 p.m. Thursday at the Adventure 16 store in Tarzana, 5425 Reseda Blvd., and Friday at the Los Angeles store, 11161 W. Pico Blvd.

Admission, info: Free. (818) 345-4266 for Tarzana; (310) 473-4574 for Los Angeles.

SAN PEDRO

Coastal Cleanup

Enjoy the coast and help the environment by joining Coastal Cleanup Day, hosted by the Cabrillo Marine Aquarium and the California Coastal Commission.

When, where: 9 a.m.-noon Saturday, Cabrillo Beach

Admission, info: Free. Mandatory safety waiver required at check-in. Cabrillo Marine Aquarium, 3720 Stephen M. White Drive, San Pedro. (310) 548-7562.

Please email announcements at least three weeks before the event to travel@latimes.com.
Travel from Denmark to Greece to Japan; be a fashionista or an artist or a hiker in a dazzling national park and get ready for a busy weekend.

Newport Beach

For fashionistas, Style Week OC at Fashion Island combines fall-design for clothing, beauty and home decor with panel discussions on makeup, style, design and entertaining by influencers, including E! News Catt Sadler, personality Audrina Patridge, and local fashion bloggers.

When: Sept. 15-16

Cost, info: Free. Younger children not recommended. No dogs. (949) 721-2000, (855) 658-8527, Fashion Island

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Los Angeles

The Los Angeles Anime Festival celebrates the centennial of anime by screening Namakura Katana, one of the first Japanese animated short films, made in 1917. Also on the bill are award-winning films and the North American premiere of King of Prism, which encourages audience members to feel as though theyre at a live concert by waving glow sticks and cheering characters, kind of like The Rocky Horror Picture Show but nicer.

When: Sept. 15-17

Cost, info: Tickets for each film $8-$30. Three films are suitable for children. Only service dogs permitted. Tickets

Solvang

Hans Christian Andersen (or an actor representing him) will be part of the Danish culture celebrated at the 81st annual Solvang Danish Days. Live music, a reenactors Viking encampment and a living-history area with storytellers are all part of the fun. Craftspeople show their skills in an Old World Artisans Marketplace, and kids have an area just for them.

When: Sept. 15-17

Cost, info: Free except for food. Family-friendly. Dogs on leash OK. (877) 327-2656, Solvang

Del Mar

More than 80 musicians are scheduled at Kaaboo, including Pink, Ice Cube, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Jackson Browne, Tom Petty, Janes Addiction, Kesha, Muse, Weezer and the Tubes. Comedians include David Spade, Al Madrigal, Bridget Everett and Arsenio Hall. Installation, mural and other arts abound. Nearly 100 chefs, restaurants and purveyors of adult beverages will be represented.

When: Sept. 15-17

Cost, info: Tickets from $129 plus $18.95 fee; 10% discount for verified students and military; additional for other activities. Geared toward adults. No dogs. (855) 798-5995, Kaaboo

Twentynine Palms

Sixty-three artists display works inspired by Joshua Tree National Park at the Joshua Tree National Park Art Exposition. Inspiration is the theme, and visitors can join ranger walks and talks about the unusual nature of this stunning desert park, listen to guitar-and-mandolin and jazz duos, and express their creativity in workshops on watercolor painting, portrait and figure drawing, and Asian black-ink Sumi-e brush painting.

When: Sept. 16 and 17

Cost, info: Free. Family-friendly. Dogs on leash OK. (760) 367-3505, jtnparts.org

San Juan Capistrano

Live Greek music with traditional dancing and a bazaar take place at the lively fifth annual Greek Festival at St. Basil Greek Orthodox Church. Come for Greek cuisine, including souvlaki, gyros, spanakopita, pastitsio and Greek salads, and traditionally handmade pastries such as baklava, powdered sugar-covered kourambiethes,and honey-dipped loukoumathes (Greek doughnut holes), to be washed down with strong Greek coffee. Opa!

When: Sept. 16 and 17

Cost, info: Free. Family-friendly. Only service animals permitted. (949) 542-3445, SJCgreekfest

travel@latimes.com

travel@latimes.com

@latimestravel
Credit the Legislatures Republican-controlled budget committee for keeping two vital road projects on pace in south-central Wisconsin: the reconstruction of Highway 151 (Verona Road) south of Madisons Beltline, and the expansion of Interstate 39-90 from Madison to Beloit.

Unfortunately, top GOP lawmakers agreed to borrow more than $400 million over the next two years to help make that happen. And they cut $79 million for state highway rehabilitation while delaying some big projects in southeastern Wisconsin.

Overall, the states road system  already one of the worst in the nation  is expected to further deteriorate under this state budget, according to state Department of Transportation predictions last year that were based on status quo funding.

Gov. Scott Walker is the main impediment to better roads. He has refused to raise the state gas tax or vehicle registration fee, even though theyve been flat for the last decade. He also has ignored suggestions from his own DOT for modernizing the states revenue stream to reflect changing technology.

The closest the budget committee came last week to trying to fix an ongoing funding gap between transportation needs and stalled revenue is a $2.5 million study of open-road tolling on major highways, and higher fees on hybrid and electric vehicles.

Tolling the interstates could bring in tens of billions of dollars over time for better roads, with more money coming from Illinois tourists and over-the-road trucks.

But for the next two years, Republican lawmakers are planning  yet again, and largely at the governors direction  to punt the states transportation funding shortfall into the future.

Thats irresponsible.

Attracting lots of attention is a higher state fee on hybrid and electric vehicles. Republicans on the budget committee voted last week to double the state charge on hybrid vehicles from $75 to $150, and to increase the fee on electric vehicles from $75 to $175. The state fee for cars that run solely on gasoline would stay at $75.

The higher fees on battery-powered vehicles, which run partly or entirely on electricity, would bring in just $8.4 million over 18 months, under the budget committees plan. The new revenue would come from a few thousand electric vehicles and about 70,000 hybrids that tend to be more popular in urban counties.

Some critics say the new fee is targeted at liberal Madison and Milwaukee, where hybrid and electric vehicles are popular. But the county with the third highest concentration of such cars is conservative Waukesha County.

Moreover, the DOT projects that, over the next decade, the number of electric vehicles will increase to 200,000, while hybrids will jump to 140,000. That would bring in more than $30 million a year from the higher fees, but it also would further erode state gas tax revenue.

So overall, the Republican-run Legislature hasnt come close to fixing its chronic road funding problem. The governor has decided the political advantage of saying no to any new taxes or fees affecting most drivers is better than properly maintaining a modern road system for our economy.

Hes wrong.

The transportation budget heading to the governors desk once again dodges fiscal responsibility in favor of political expediency.
My wifes uncle was tired, and she wanted me to take over from him and drive.

Do you think you can? my wife asked.

Of course I could. Whether I should was another question.

Ordinarily, I would be glad to get behind the wheel of a car. But I was in China, where driving isnt quite what I was used to.

We were headed from the airport in Shanghai to her parents house about 325 miles away in Jiangsu province. As I moved into the drivers seat, I started getting butterflies, much as I had as a novice driver a decade earlier in the U.S.

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I reminded myself that a car in China is basically the same as a car in the U.S. All the normal components were there, including the accelerator.

Except in the U.S., you push slowly but firmly on the accelerator as you head down the highway. But in this version of driving, instead of slowly pressing down or easing off, my foot constantly switched back and forth from the accelerator to the brake to contend with cars merging unexpectedly.

I was still peering through a windshield, but my eyes also darted to the side to make sure no one was passing on the shoulders.

And, most unusual of all, although my hands were still planted at 10 and 2 oclock on the steering wheel, my left hand seemed to be drawn, as if by some mysterious gravitational force, toward the wheels center to honk the horn.

In China, the sound of car horns is just part of the music of the city. In the U.S., its  not.

In fact, I rarely honk the horn, doing so only to alert others to an impending crash. Even if a driver isnt paying attention when the light changes, I keep quiet because the beep seems unnecessarily rude and aggressive, like clearing your throat to make a point.

Not in China. The blare of the horn isnt a message about outrage. It isnt about scolding. It is simply a warning, perhaps conforming to its original intent.

So I started to sound the horn. Slowly, I started to like it.

A car came into my lane to pass a slower vehicle.

Honk!

A city bus was trying to pull in front of me after picking up its passengers.

Honk!

A pedestrian tried to step into my lane.

Honk!

China had unleashed in me some kind of repressed driving id.

And I started to enjoy the freedom.

The formal rules of driving in China may not be as entrenched or as strongly enforced as those in the U.S., but there are many unwritten rules.

After a while, they began to make sense to me. It was a lot like the old Cold War policy of Mutually Assured Destruction, or MAD, which held that no country with nuclear weapons would ever use those weapons on a country that also had them.

The same was true in China. No driver would ever assume a car would let him in, and, in turn, no driver would ever assume that any other driver wouldnt try to get in.

Unlike MAD, when no nuclear weapons were ever used, the policy here doesnt have quite the same success on Chinese roads, according to the World Health Organization.

In China, there were about 19 accidents per 100,000 people, compared with about 11 per 100,000 in the United States, a 2015 WHO report said.

Still, I never saw major accidents, just fender-benders.

By the end of my two weeks in China, I was feeling comfortable with this new driving paradigm  so much so that it was difficult to adjust back when we returned home.

Months later, I still find myself tempted to pass a slow vehicle on city streets. I still want to merge without waiting for another car to wave me in. And too often, I find my hand drawn by that same force back toward the center of the steering wheel.

Whenever I beep the horn now, Im reminded that travel broadens our horizons, reinforcing the notion that our way isnt always the right, only or even best way.

Honk!

Departure Points, a new monthly column, explores the lessons learned while traveling. You may submit a first-person essay of 700 worlds or less to travel@latimes.com with Departure Points in the subject line. Please include your first and last names.

travel@latimes.com

travel@latimes.com

@latimestravel
Regarding A Students Wallet Abroad, On the Spot, by Catharine Hamm, Aug. 27: If youre carrying cash abroad, dont keep it all in one place. Break it up in smaller amounts so that if one stash is stolen you are not without any while in transit.

Do not place any large amount in checked baggage.

I carry a Post-it notepad and place a note on the door of things to remember before leaving a room or cabin with a safe. Things to check before checking out are also listed.

Also, having a second credit card is smart. Losing one or having it stolen doesnt ground you.

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Be sure you leave copies with someone at home of both sides of your cards, passport and other important items you take with you.

If any on the list are lost or stolen, one call home gets things canceled ASAP.

Beware the debit card. Those can have nasty charges from both your bank and the one that owns the foreign ATM, as well as exchange charges.

There is little recourse as this money comes out of your account.

Paul Brown

Santa Ana

::

Before I planned my peripatetic trip through Europe, I was concerned about the various banks charges in the euros zone.

I asked my bank whether it was possible to minimize the 3% charge when using the card overseas. I received a flat no.

Typical of me (I do not accept a no for answer), I called customer service and asked for supervisor, posing the same question. She verified my account, then told me she was lowering the 3% to 1.5% for one month.

I could not resist returning to my old friends at the branch and, with gusto, rubbed some Mediterranean salt in their noses.

John Rosati

Simi Valley

I enjoyed the carless San Diego article very much [The Trolleys a Real Trip, by Jan Molen, Aug. 27]. I had not heard of the Carnitas Snack Shack, which I look forward to trying.

If you have never been to the Fish Market restaurant, which is next to the Midway, I would highly recommend it. Even for a lifelong coastal-dwelling Southern Californian, the food and view of the harbor activity are pretty special. It is great to show to visitors from elsewhere.

Paul Prendiville

La Habra

travel@latimes.com

@latimestravel
In the Eastern Sierra near Bishop is a mountain route unofficially known as the highest motorable road in California.

The dirt section at the top is maintained by the University of California scientific research facility at Barcroft Station and access is open just two days a year. (Dates for 2017 have passed, and those for 2018 havent been announced. For information, call [760] 873-4344 or check the facility website.)

Hikers can do the last piece of road on foot any time between June and October by driving within two miles of the facility. But riding up is a special treat.

To me, that was catnip. I contacted Bike-urious blogger Abhi Eswarappa, a friend who shares my taste for the offbeat, and we made a plan: Lets make a motorcycle adventure out of riding up to 12,000 feet.

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We selected Independence, Calif., for our base camp for several reasons. First, it would put us within striking distance of White Mountain Road and let us attack the mountain early, before the day got too hot.

Second, it would give us the opportunity to visit with Cris Chater, a.k.a. Strider, the charming innkeeper at the Mt. Williamson Motel and Base Camp, one of the most pleasant hostelries along the entire Eastern Sierra corridor.

We thought dual sport bikes, like the Kawasaki Versys 300 (left) and the Honda CR250L Rally (right) would be perfect for this ride. They also looked good against a backdrop of the Eastern Sierras. (Charles Fleming / Los Angeles Times)

Third, we could knock two items off our shared bucket list: I would be able to visit the memorial to the Japanese internment camp at Manzanar, and Abhi would get to fulfill his dream of riding a motorcycle into an abandoned mine.

Manzanar came first. Despite what I knew of the history of the wartime internment of Japanese Americans, I left the national historic site impressed by the displays and depressed by this shameful act of racial prejudice.

A visit to the lonely nearby Manzanar cemetery, in 100-degree heat, did nothing to lift my mood.

We continued on to Abhis bucket list item. We drove up a rugged, boulder-strewn dirt road, glad we were in a sturdy four-wheel-drive truck, until we reached the Reward gold mine, active from about 1900 to 1950 but now abandoned.

Abhi unloaded his motorcycle, strapped on his camera and rode into the 15-foot-square mine opening. I stood 10 feet deep inside the dark mine, glad of the cool silence.

Abhi Eswarappa was keen to discover how far he could ride into the abandoned Reward mine. Answer? Far enough to get spooked. (Charles Fleming / Los Angeles Times)

Ten minutes later, Abhi emerged, grinning and eager to show me photos of the mines huge interior galleries.

The next morning we rose early, ate the Mt. Williamson Motels complimentary bacon-and-eggs breakfast, and hit the road. We drove 27 miles to the turnoff for California Highway 168, unloaded the motorcycles from the truck, and started our ride.

White Mountain Road intersects the 168 and heads into the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest, part of the huge Inyo National Forest. Soon we had left the fields and farms, climbing from 4,000 to 6,000 feet along a road lined with scrubby, low-growing pines.

We stopped periodically to take pictures of the majestic Sierra, disagreeing over which peaks were Whitney and Williamson and enjoying the cool mountain air.

Though we were eager to complete our highest motorable road ride, we took a quick look at the Bristlecone Forest Visitor Center, then pressed on, leaving the paved section of White Mountain Road and hitting the dirt.

From there, the climb was sublime along a road designated a National Forest Scenic Byway. The well-maintained unpaved road was the ideal surface for the small dual-purpose motorcycles we were riding.

We didnt expect to see snow in July, even at 12,000 feet. Abhi expressed his enthusiasm by riding the Kawasaki directly into a drift, then lying down next to it. (Charles Fleming / Los Angeles Times)

We skipped over the washboard and loose gravel, passing the slow-moving SUVs and pickup trucks, quickly covering the 14 miles of rugged road from the visitor center to a gate where, ordinarily, all traffic is halted.

But today was special, one of the two days a year when the operators of White Mountain Research Center at Barcroft Station open the last two miles of road to the research center to vehicular traffic.

Past signs warning High Clearance Required, 4WD Recommended we rode, stopping only when the road ended in the centers parking lot at 12,470 feet.

Other vehicles had preceded us, most carrying ardent climbers ready to walk five more miles to summit White Mountain, one of the Sierras tallest peaks at 14,252 feet.

We declined a suggestion to join them, feeling the effects of the thin air and not dressed for the occasion.

The research center is not open to the public, but a pair of friendly workers showed us around and explained some of the science that takes place at the high-altitude facility. They also recommended some alternate routes back.

We took them up on their suggestions, first exploring the unpaved road through Wyman Canyon, then stopping for a proper visit at the Bristlecone Forest Visitor Center.

We were clumsy in our motorcycle gear  and huffing from the altitude  but managed a one-mile walk through the gnarled and twisted pines, said to be the oldest living creatures on Earth.

For the ride down, we decided to skip the pavement and test our mettle on rugged Silver Canyon Road. Out of the pines, descending steep rocky sections through sage, scattered oak trees and hairpin turns, we slowly made our way off the hill, stopping regularly to admire the staggering Sierra peaks, still snow-capped in late July.

The road eventually began to flatten, then culminated in a series of six water crossings before depositing us near Bishop  and into 105-degree heat.

After the challenging and increasingly overheated ride, it felt great to shed our protective motorcycle gear and slide into an air-conditioned truck. We were still talking about the ride when we got back to L.A. five hours later.

charles.fleming@latimes.com

If you go

The White Mountain Research Center road is open just two days a year. For information, call (760) 873-4344 or check its website. White Mountain Road, reached on U.S. 395 and California 168, is said to be the highest motorable road in California. The highest paved road, though, is nearby Rock Creek Road, which climbs to 10,320 feet.

WHERE TO STAY

Mt. Williamson Motel and Base Camp, 515 S. Edwards St., Independence, Calif.; (760) 878-2121m. Mountaineering veteran Cris Chaters camp is a waystation for backpackers on the Pacific Crest Trail or tackling Mt. Whitney through the Onion Valley portal. Its comfortable rooms, pristine bathrooms, powerful air conditioning and hearty free breakfast more than justified the $140 we each paid for our non-smoking, queen-bed rooms.

WHERE TO EAT

There are limited dining options in Independence, so we had a serviceable dinner at Amigos Mexican Restaurant (285 N. Main St., Bishop; [760] 872-2189, open 11:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily), and an acceptable lunch at Country Kitchen (181 S. Main St., Big Pine; [760] 938-2402. Open 7 a.m.-9 p.m. daily).

WHEN TO GO

The paved road to the ancient bristlecone pine forest is open year round, except when theres too much snow to plow. It would make a worthy detour on the way to or from Mammoth or Yosemite. The unpaved section on the approach to White Mountain is also open but is not recommended for two-wheel-drive vehicles or those without high ground clearance.

Silver Canyon Road is for four-wheelers and experienced off-road motorcycle riders only.

travel@latimes.com

@latimestravel
Powerful waves and a storm surge from Hurricane Irma topped Havanas iconic Malecon seawall and left thousands of homes, businesses and hotels swamped Sunday, even as the storm moved away from the island.

There were no immediate reports of fatalities in Cuba, where the government prides itself on disaster preparedness and said it had carried out evacuations totaling more than 1 million people.

Authorities warned that the floodwaters could linger for more than a day, and there was as-yet uncalculated damage to sugar cane and banana fields in central Cuba and to northern cays studded with all-inclusive resorts, potentially dealing a major blow to the countrys key tourism industry.

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The powerful storm ripped roofs off homes, collapsed buildings and caused floods along hundreds of miles of coastline after cutting a trail of destruction across the Caribbean. Irma has killed at least 24 people in the region, leaving officials scrambling to bring aid to shattered communities.

In Havana, home to 2 million people, central neighborhoods along the coast between the Almendares River and Havana harbor suffered the brunt of the flooding, with seawater penetrating as much as a third of a mile inland in places.

Waves as high as 20 feet continued to pound Havana, with the spray topping the lighthouse at the Morro fortress at the entrance to the bay, and Civil Defense Col. Luis Angel Macareno warned that the flooding would persist into Monday.

Video: Times coverage of Hurricane Irma

Emergency workers and residents boated and waded through streets littered with debris: toppled trees, downed electrical lines, roofs torn off by the winds and concrete water tanks that fell from atop homes.

Elena Villar and her mother spent the night huddling in the lobby of a building on higher ground as her home of 30 years filled with more than 6 feet of water.

I have lost everything, she said, on the edge of tears.

Floodwaters entered the high-end Melia Cohiba and Riviera hotels, where the storm damaged the buildings, landscaping and roofing.

The waters and winds also damaged the seaside U.S. Embassy, tossing around shipping containers that sit on the compound, smashing parts of its black perimeter fence, ripping exterior panels from the building and breaking windows and doors. The embassys flag was in tatters fluttering from its staff Sunday.

Hector Pulpito, 33, recounted a harrowing night at his job as night custodian of a parking lot that flooded five blocks from the sea in the Vedado neighborhood.

I felt great fear. This was the worst of the storms I have been through, and the sea rose much higher, Pulpito said. The trees were shaking. Metal roofs went flying.

State television reported severe damage to hotels on the northern cays off Ciego de Avila and Camaguey provinces.

Witnesses said a provincial museum near the eye of the storm was in ruins, and authorities in the city of Santa Clara said 39 buildings collapsed.

Communist Party newspaper Granma reported that the Jardines del Rey airport serving the northern cays was destroyed and posted photos to Twitter showing the shattered terminal hall littered with debris.

In Caibarien, a small coastal city about 200 miles east of Havana where many residents stayed put to ride out the storm, winds downed power lines and neighborhoods were under water.

Similar scenes played out across the Caribbean, where the storm devastated islands before setting its sights on Florida.

In St. Martin, formerly lush green hills were stripped to a brown stubble and the smell of rotting debris spread across the French Caribbean territory of 40,000 people. Irma passed through last week as a Category 5 storm.

A truck drove through damaged neighborhoods distributing water, and authorities expected to set up distribution points on Monday. Plans to do so were initially delayed by Hurricane Jose, which roared toward the region as a Category 4 storm on Saturday but turned north without doing much further harm.

Everything has been destroyed where I work. Theres nothing there, 27-year-old Manon Brunet-Vita said as she walked through the streets of Grand Case. When I got to this neighborhood, I cried.

More than 1,000 tons of water and 85 tons of food have been shipped to the French Caribbean territories of St. Martin and St. Barts, and additional deliveries are expected, according to government officials in the nearby island of Guadeloupe.

Authorities announced the reopening of St. Martins Marigot port and said a boat was expected to dock by Monday with a 5-ton crane capable of unloading large containers of aid.

More police and soldiers were patrolling the streets following reports of looting, and authorities set up 1,500 emergency shelters.

On the Dutch side of St. Martin, an island divided between French and Dutch control, an estimated 70% of all homes were destroyed by Irma.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said Sunday that the death toll in his countrys territory had risen to four after the bodies of two unidentified people washed up on the island.

Unfortunately, there are more victims to mourn, Rutte said.

With power out to much of the French Caribbean region, Frances main electricity provider, EDF, said it has flown 140 tons of generators, pumps and other equipment to help St. Martin and St. Barts.

In St. Thomas, the U.S. Virgin islands, a convoy of FEMA trucks carrying water rumbled past damaged homes with sirens blaring.

William Mills, a 35-year-old security worker, said he waited in a mile-long line for gas. He said many were seeking to leave St. Thomas, but thats not an option for him.

Im going to stay here and tough it out, Mills said.

UPDATES:

3:50 p.m.: This article has been updated with waves topping Havana seawall, other details.

This article was originally posted at 8:50 a.m.
. To do so, first type the original number into the text box. Then click on the "Scientific Notation" option located at the top of the floating window. Finally, click on the "Standard" button found beneath the text box to display your result. This program is useful for scientists and engineers working with decimal-based numbers. It provides easy access to those who need to convert those numbers into more compact forms without having to do heavy math calculations first.

Scientific notation is a way to express very large or very small numbers. It is used in physics, chemistry and other fields where large numbers are common. Those numbers are written as a power of 10 followed by a number with an exponent. For example, 1,000,000 (one million) is written as 1  103. The exponent shows how many zeros are after the first digit. For example, 1,000,001 is written as 1  102. Scientific notation is a useful tool for making calculations easier. You can use it to write down very big or very small numbers in one step instead of writing out both the large and small numbers separately. You can also use it to express large or small numbers in terms of other units like centimeters or millimeters.

Scientific notation solver is an online tool that can be used to convert any number into scientific notation. Simply enter any number to the left of the decimal point and it will automatically convert it into a scientific notation equivalent. This web tool can be very helpful when you need to convert a large number into scientific notation. However, please note that this online tool can only convert numbers that are in scientific format. For example, it cannot convert a non-scientific number like "1,085" into a scientific notation equivalent. It is also important to keep in mind that this web tool only works when converting numbers from one particular format to another. For example, if you want to change a non-scientific number like "1,085" into standard format, then you will have to use another online tool like NumberFormatting.com.
The Northampton County's executive may be limited to two terms in the future.

Northampton County Council introduced a measure to put a question on the May 15, 2018, primary ballot as to whether voters would like to implement term limits on the county executive.

Council is scheduled to decide at its Sept. 21 meeting whether to add the voter referendum that would alter the county's Home Rule Charter to include the limits.

If the referendum were to pass next year, the county executive's tenure would be limited to two four-year terms.

If a person serves for at least two years as county executive without being elected -- for instance, if someone were to take over for a previous county executive who resigned -- the new executive would only be eligible to be elected for one additional term.

The restriction on the head of the executive branch would become effective in January 2022.

"Historically, at many levels of government, we see limits on executive terms," Council President John Cusick said.

The limits would be consistent with the limits on the U.S. president, who is limited to two terms, and Pennsylvania's governor, who is limited to two consecutive terms, Cusick said.

Current County Executive John Brown said he does not support the term limit. Brown is serving in his first term as executive and seeking to be elected to a second term in November.

Brown said he doesn't believe Northampton County has had issues in the past with county executives serving protracted terms.

"I am not even sure why it is under consideration," Brown said.

Cusick said the term limits are not a reflection on Brown or on any particular individual.

"This is not about the person holding the office," Cusick said.

Council voted in 2015 to limit council seats to a maximum of three consecutive four-year terms.

John Best is a freelance writer. Find lehighvalleylive on Facebook.
Laois County Council Arts Office has announced a wide variety of free events open to the public to celebrate Culture Night 2017.

Taking place in various venues across Laois, there will be free events catering for people of all ages. Individual artists and arts organisations open their doors, hosting tours, talks and performances, on Friday, September 22.

The Laois Culture Night Ambassador 2017 is 17 year old Lucy Deegan from Luggacurran.

Lucy was the overall winner in this years Texaco Art Competition.

An exhibition entitled 'Time and Space'  A Celebration of Texaco Children's Art Success in Laois including works by Lucy and those by other prize winners from Laois takes place in the Laois Arthouse, Stradbally, and opens from 6pm-8pm on Culture Night.

Among the many events taking place is Anam - Siamsa Tire, a percussive dance show featuring world class step dancers and renowned Irish traditional musicians, which will be staged in the Dunamaise Arts Centre at 8pm on Culture Night.

Anam features dancers Mathew Olwell (Appalachian flat foot), Joseph Kerry (North Kerry Munnix), Nathan Pilatzke (Ottawa Valley, Canada) and John Fitzgerald (modern Irish), and musicians Fergal O Mhurchu (voice), Mikey Smith (pipes and whistle) and Joseph McNulty (bodhran and guitar)

A highlight event will be a Samba Drum Performance presented by Music Generation Laois at the Plaza, County Hall, Portlaoise starting at 5pm.

Led by Peter Crann and Eddie O Neill, a visiting Samba Band Itchy Feet Drummers from Sligo will perform alongside Samba drummers from Laois, in a high-octane show including young samba drummers from local primary schools.

In the Parish Centre Portlaoise, Portlaoise Comhaltas presents Exploring Cultural Connections  Through Music, Dance, Conversations, Displays.

This is a unique opportunity to try a traditional Irish instrument with Portlaoise Comhaltas teachers or sign up for the International Folk Orchestra. This event is from 6-8pm.

In An Sean Chistin, in Irey, Ballyfin at 8pm, enjoy an evening of traditional Irish music, sean nos poetry in English and Irish, ceili dancing and set dancing.

Mountmellick Library will host The Secrets of Painting a Landscape in Oils by Artist Tom Joyce from 7pm-9pm and also in Mountmellick Library at 4.30pm is a reading by Laois Writer Sheelagh Coyle.

For more information and for a full event listing contact The Arts Office, Laois County Council, Aras an Chontae, Portlaoise, telephone 057 8664033/13, email artsoff@laoiscoco.ie or see the National Culture Night website www.culturenight.ie.

Culture Night Laois is brought to you by the Department of Arts, Heritage, Regional, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs in partnership with Laois County Council.
An intriguing day awaits for Leitrim Ladies GAA with no clear favourite for this Sundays intriguing Senior Final between St. Josephs and Dromahair.

Both these teams have fallen in decider's in recent years to two time Connacht Senior finalists Kiltubrid and the signs are good for an entertaining match between the teams.

Dromahair and St. Josephs actually met in the Group stages with the Aughavas & Carrigallen women scoring a vital win over the north Leitrim side to book their place in the Quarter-Finals.

But it is Dromahairs performance in the semi-final that has most people pointing to them as hot favourites for the title as they dethroned the champions Kiltubrid and held Aine Tighe scoreless, the 2-18 to 2-8 scoreline a stunning performance.

St. Josephs looked to have struggled past Glencar/Manorhamilton in a low scoring battle but with Muireann Devaney leading the way for an up-and-coming Manor team that might herald an Aughawillan-like domination in the years ahead, the result was much better than the bald 0-10 to 1-6 scoreline suggests.

What we can be sure of is that this game will be full of energy and running - Dromahair have set the standards consistently for their powerful running game since they first won the Junior title before going on to win Intermediate and Senior crowns in successive years.

That hasnt changed and in Sinead Fowley, Anna Conlan and Roisin Fowley, Dromahair have three quality exponents of the craft, never lying down and never giving up.

St. Josephs too have lots of pace and big engines with the Heslin sisters huge performers for the Leitrim County side. Carmel McGovern, Clare Owens, Vanessa Gallogly, Alannah Bohan and Bronagh ORourke also give them huge power and experience.

This really is too tight to call - Dromahair have great momentum but St. Josephs are a quality side - dont rule out a draw.

The Intermediate Final sees Oughteragh Gaels, relegated last year, looking to bounce back straight away with a win over Mohill. Deirdre Ward will lead the way for Mohill who would desperately love to have Dearbhaile Beirne in their ranks but in Christine Quinn, Claire Beirne & Aileen Flynn, Mohill have a lot of talent.

They come up against an Oughteragh Gaels side who look like the team to beat and have come through a potentially tough semi-final against St. Francis with some ease.

In the ODowd sisters & Roisin McHugh, Oughteragh Gaels have two game winners and a lot of pace while there is a lot of young talent coming up through the ranks in the Gaels side. Oughteragh should come through this one.
The Minister for the Department of Rural and Community Development, Minister Ring TD, has launched the iconic Shannon Blueway Boardwalk in Drumshanbo completing a 14km off-road, waterside Blueway trail, linking Drumshanbo and Leitrim Village.

The 500,000 support from the Department's Rural Recreation Fund enabled the Shannon Blueway to be extended from its terminus at Drumhauver Bridge along an attractive new walkway 600 metres long in total.

The walkway has been constructed partly on land, with a significant section, 160metres long, floating over the water of Acres Lake.

The project involved the procurement and installation of the floating walkway, the construction of a new path linking the walkway to the services at Acres Lake, increased and improved parking provision, and a new viewing point and fishing stand.

Carried out by Waterways Ireland staff the work has been completed to a very high standard.

In the presence of Waterways Ireland Chief Executive, Dawn Livingstone and Leitrim County Council, Chief Executive Frank Curran, elected representatives and invited guests, Minister Ring said, This project represents exactly what my Department is about: supporting locally led initiatives to create jobs and infrastructure.

This boardwalk over Acres Lake will further enhance the already excellent Shannon Blueway and help attract more visitors to this area from Ireland and abroad.

This in turn will help support local people to live and work in their community. In this respect it represents an extremely sensible and worthwhile investment in this region by the Government.

The Shannon Greenway has been modelled on the Great Western Greenway in Mayo. As someone who has been involved in the Greenway from the start, I am proud and delighted to see the Shannon Blueway flourish.

The Shannon Blueway has already received two awards and brought an additional 80,000 visitors to the area annually. Eight new businesses have already established.

This innovative new boardwalk which links Drumshanbo via this off-road route with Leitrim Village is hugely significant in extending the recreational provision and tourism experience and should lead to increased visitor numbers and recreational use.

Waterways Ireland, Chief Executive Dawn Livingstone said "we are indebted to Minister Ring and his officials for recognising the potential of the Shannon Blueway to create significant change in the recreational provision and tourism experience in rural Leitrim, Roscommon, Cavan and Longford.

Drumshanbo now has the opportunity to attract some of the 80,000 extra people visiting the Shannon Blueway annually making a significant difference to the town.

I would like to commend the work of my staff, led by Regional Manager Eanna Rowe. I would also like to recognise the support of local landowners and the wider community and partnership of Leitrim County Council in this achievement.

The recent announcement of 1.1m of funding to Leitrim County Council will see the delivery of a new walkway and cycle way from Carrick-on-Shannon to Leitrim Village and from Acres Lake to the Lough Allen Hotel.

The Blueway network will then exceed 200km of quality multi-leisure activity trails across Leitrim, Roscommon, Longford and Cavan, both on and off water, offering a wider and deeper experience of the region through associated activities and attractions.

In conjunction with the accommodation and hospitality sector in the wider geographical area, activity providers are developing interesting and exciting packages for families and friends to experience.

Find them on www.bluewaysireland.org
Following the recent staging of the very successful Manorhamilton and District Historical Society SL&NCR exhibition in the Leitrim Sculpture Centre, another chance to learn more about this iconic former local railway will be provided when Charles Friel gives a talk on the Sligo Leitrim in the Glens Centre on Monday night, September 11 at 8pm.

Charles Friel says although the Sligo, Leitrim and Northern Counties Railway closed almost 60 years ago, its memory is still very much alive.

The Sligo Leitrim, as it was known to everyone, ran the 42 miles from the Great Northern Railway at Enniskillen, through counties Fermanagh, Cavan and Leitrim to meet up with the Midland Great Western (later to become Great Southern Railways and Coras Iompair Eireann) at Carrignagat Junction between Collooney and Ballysodare in County Sligo.

From that junction, the Sligo Leitrim ran its trains the remaining 5 miles to Sligo town where it also served Sligo Quay goods yard. The Sligo Leitrim had several claims to fame. It was, for instance, the last independent, standard-gauge railway in Ireland.

Because it crossed the Border, it could not be nationalised in the 1940s and 1950s when almost all the railways on the island were brought under government ownership. Thus it remained independent from its opening in 1879 until its closure on 30 September 1957.

Another curiosity of the line was that it did not number its steam locomotives, preferring instead to give them names. These were mostly named after local places such as Lurganboy, Glencar or Lough Gill though one,Sir Henry, recalled one of the lines founders, Sir Henry Tottenham.

The lines main traffic was livestock, mostly cattle, being shipped from the West of Ireland fairs through Collooney to Enniskillen to be exported via Derry or Belfast. In the days before local slaughtering and refrigeration, all cattle exports were 'on the hoof.'

Although it was a busy line, it never made much money for the shareholders and, as a result, financial stringency was always the watchword. Being independent, the Sligo Leitrim had to maintain its own permanent way, buildings and rolling stock.

The lines engineering works at Manorhamilton produced many a miracle to keep things moving. Apart from the line's steam engines, there were railbuses, a railcar, carriages and wagons to be maintained and repaired. The carriages and wagons included some unique vehicles and many of them were of great age and interest.

Although the line closed on 30 September 1957, photographs of the Sligo Leitrim are still coming to light, mainly thanks to the efforts by Headhunters Railway Museum and Barbers' shop in Darling Street, Enniskillen. The museums' curator, Selwyn Johnston, said that he never knows what to expect when visitors ask 'Would you be interested in  ?'

Charles Friel's illustrated talk will recreate a journey in pictures along the route of the SL&NCR and will draw on a vast range of pictures.
In recent years, the hottest place to be on the Saturday night of Conference is the Lib Dem Disco. This year its back for the fourth time.

This year, the organisers are being uncharacteristically cagey about their line-up, tantalising us by drip-feeding out the contestants who will be competing for the prized accolade of Best DJ. The title has been won for the last two years in fantastic style by Jo Swinson. The last time I spoke to her about it she was adamant she wasnt going to go for the hat-trick.

So far, we know that Lib Dem Newbies co-founder and force of nature Daisy Benson and Lib Dem Peer and former MEP Sarah Ludford will be taking their turns at the decks.

The first year the contest took place, I was very proud of myself when I came second only to the mighty Alistair Carmichael after a fairly loose interpretation of the term disco . We were in Glasgow, after all. That was the year the Standard referred to me as a Lib Dem MP and publicised my sons horrified reaction to hearing what I was going to do.

The event usually gets the attention of various media outlets. Buzzfeed enjoyed Paddy Ashdowns set in 2015 and The Mirror last year.

Make sure you get your ticket here.

* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings
Welcome to the Golden Dozen, and our 488th weekly round-up from the Lib Dem blogosphere  Featuring the five most popular stories beyond Lib Dem Voice according to click-throughs from the Aggregator (3-9 September, 2017), together with a hand-picked seven you might otherwise have missed.

Dont forget: you can sign up to receive the Golden Dozen direct to your email inbox  just click here  ensuring you never miss out on the best of Lib Dem blogging.

As ever, lets start with the most popular post, and work our way down:

1. Lib Dems gain council seat in Cambridgeshire by Mark Pack on Mark Pack.

Good news.

2. Statement re false allegations by Esther Baker by John Hemming on John Hemmings Weblog .

John attacks political opponents and the media for their coverage.

3. There is no natural end to this current Tory Government. The left should stop indulging in this fantasy by Nick Tyrone on NickTyrone.com.

Nick doesnt think there will be a General Election any time soon.

4. Theres a perfect, horrible storm brewing in Northern Ireland by Nick Tyrone on NickTyrone.com.

Brexit and the collapse of power-sharing  not good.

5. Vince Cable tops Tim Farrons best leadership ratings by Mark Pack on Mark Pack.

A good start.

And now to the seven blog-posts that come highly recommended, regardless of the number of Aggregator click-throughs they attracted. To nominate a Lib Dem blog article published in the past seven days  your own, or someone elses, all you have to do is drop a line to [email protected] You can also contact us via Twitter, where were @libdemvoice

6. I have received final assignments for what I will be doing at Conference for FCC by Jennie Rigg on I spend ages hanging around the Rue Morgue in a gorilla suit and what do I get?.

Someone has been cruel, giving the Glee Club host her chairing debut the morning after Glee. But shell rock it cos she is fab.

7. Is missing your childs first day of school a big deal? by Jane Chelliah on FeministMama.

More for Mum than the child.

8. What a colossal waste of time Brexit is by Louise Ankers on From one of the jilted generation.

Taking the Governments eyes from the huge problems facing us that will only be made worse by Brexit.

9. Day 6095: British democracy is a shambles by Richard Flowers on The very fluffy diary of Millennium Dome, Elephant.

Referendum and since is not exactly delivering power to the people, says Richard

10. Fame and the echo chamber by Chris Bowers on Chris Bowers .

Two books. Two good books. But do we listen more to someone because they are famous and is this harmful?

11. Post Brexit irony strikes again by Peter Black on Peter Black.

Those blue passports beloved of Brexiteers. Where do you think they will come from?

12. How to strangle the economy the Brexit way by Jonathan Wallace on Jonathan Wallace.

To the Brexiteer, keeping out foreigners is much more important than the health of the economy.

And thats it for another week. Happy blogging n reading n nominating.

Featured? Add this to your blog post!



<a href="https://www.libdemvoice.org/top-of-the-blogs-the-lib-dem-golden-dozen-488-55227.html"><img src="https://www.libdemvoice.org/images/golden-dozen.png" width="200" height="57" alt="Featured on Liberal Democrat Voice" title="Featured on Liberal Democrat Voice" /></a>

* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings
RATHKEALE has the highest number of prosecutions in the country involving non-attendance at school, the solicitor for Tusla, the child and family agency, told Newcastle West court this Tuesday.

Solicitor Derry ODonovans comments came in a case involving the parents of a 14-year-old Traveller boy who only attended school on ten days in the last school year.

It was, the court heard, one of the worst cases dealt with by Tusla and was the fourth prosecution against the same parents who failed to appear in court to answer the charges against them.

They are giving the Churchchillian two-fingers to the entire system, Mr ODonovan said. It is beyond shame.

He pointed out that Tusla had brought only one similar prosecution under the Education and Welfare Act in Abbeyfeale and none in Kilmallock or Croom. The centre of concern for this area is always Rathkeale. In statistical terms the number of prosecutions is the highest in the country, he said.

He described the case before the court as chronically bad and said the parents way of dealing with prosecutions was not to turn up unless a bench warrant was issued.

Last January, Mr ODonovan explained, the parents had been convicted and sentenced to jail in a prosecution involving the same boy but the sentence against the mother had been lifted on appeal.

There is an egregious refusal to comply with the law, Judge Mary Larkin said of the parents of the 14-year-old boy.

We all live in a country where we have the benefit of education, medical cards and childrens allowances, Judge Larkin said. But this is not an a la carte menu you can pick and choose. Your children must be taken care of, they must be educated.

I dont know if I am going to be told there is a cultural reason, the judge continued. I dont understand that you can argue on the basis of culture or ethnicity that you wouldnt avail of education which is the entitlement of every child in the country.

She issued a bench warrant against the boys parents.

In another case, the Traveller parents of a 14-year-old Rathkeale girl also failed to appear in court to answer charges of failing to send their daughter to school.

The girl, the court heard, had only attended school on a total of 11 days in the 2015/2016 school year and 35 in the past school year, She went to the school last April and told a member of staff she was going to Italy.

An education and welfare officer from Tusla had made 10 home visits, the court was told, but had never actually met the girls parents. The girl was described as very bright with a lot of potential and very well behaved when at school.

This is regarded as a very bad case, Mr ODonovan, solicitor for Tusla said.

You know my views about denying a child an education, Judge Larkin said. She intended to impose a custodial sentence, she said, and issued a bench warrant for the arrest of the girls parents.
FARMERS in county Limerick have expressed their frustration with the lack of garda resources in rural areas, following a spate of quad bike thefts this year.

It is believed that at least 40 quad bikes have been stolen from farms in County Limerick so far this year, potentially meaning that losses to local farmers could be in the hundreds of thousands of euro.

A number of farmers in the county feel as though they are being targeted by organised gangs, which appear to be prominent in rural areas of the county, particularly the west and south, and north Cork.

More than 30 farmers attended a meeting at the Rathkeale House Hotel with Mayor Stephen Keary and gardai from the Newcastle West district last Thursday, to express their frustration.

The farmers believe that the same culprits are offending repeatedly. In some cases reported to the Limerick Leader, people who have replaced stolen quad bikes in the weeks after the first attack have been targeted for a second time.

They seem to be highly organised, because they are making away with quads easily, and they are coming with vans or whatever is needed to get them out.

Someone must be noticing vans driving around at 11 or 12 at night, vans they dont recognise. But when there are so few gardai around, they are able to get away with it, said one farmer who wished to remain unnamed.

They are bold, I have been broken into in recent weeks and I have CCTV, which I gave over to the gardai, but its no good because they cover their faces and break the locks and walk right in, said another farmer.

One person said that rural farmers are living in fear.

While they are there, they often take whatever else they can get their hands on, often power tools and other equipment. But the main attraction seems to be the quads.

Cllr Adam Teskey told the Limerick Leader that he has also been victim to a break-in in recent weeks.

The main concern voiced by the farmers who spoke to the Leader is the lack of garda resources.

Many of our garda stations are open for an hour or two in the middle of the day, or they are closed altogether, said a farmer who has been the victim of a theft.

Gardai are continuing to investigate the spate of thefts.
NEW RESEARCH results  presented at Arrabawn Co-ops open day at Gurteen College last Thursday  on farm efficiencies is pointing to the bigger dairy farmer potentially having a better quality of life.

A talk, based on her research, given by Teagasc PhD candidate Justine Deming, MSc, from Connecticut in the USA, showed that labour efficient dairy farmers milking between 253 and 534 cows are finishing their days work between 3.30pm and 4pm, whereas those with between 79 and 149 cows will work up to three hours more. This is a result of larger farms having more hired employees to perform the evening milking.

Some 38 dairy farmers across the country, including in Limerick, were researched over a 12 month period between 2015 and 2016 by Ms Deming, who shared some of her findings in the afternoon session at the Arrabawn open day attended by over 800.

In addition to the talks, farmers were given demonstrations on farm skills, safety, body condition scoring and winter feeding and grassland management, while the event culminated with the annual quality milk award presentations. Among the award winners was John Dowling, of Ardagh, who received his presentation from Mick Houlihan of Bord Bia.

In her address, Ms Deming, who taught dairy science at college level in the US for two years before coming to Ireland to do her PhD, said that among the key findings of the research were that large farms tended to be more efficient, though they come with a higher need for hired labour.

As expected, the most amount of time is spent on milking, which on average accounts for 33% of farm hours, while cow-care (primarily winter feeding) comes next at 17%, grassland management at 11% and farm management 10%. Looking specifically at the two biggest contributors to farm hours, the top efficient 25% of farmers will spend up to four times less on cow-care as the bottom 25% and 40% less time on milking, these are largely due to farm facilities and management practices.

Key differentiators between the more efficient and less efficient in relation to milking include reducing the rows of cows being milked, introducing automatic backing gates and having once-a-day milking for at least four weeks in the spring. Ms Deming said: This is the first time in about ten years that a labour study this detailed has been done.
Florida authorities have issued another stern warning about Hurricane Irma: Shooting bullets into the storm won't help keep you safe.

The Pasco County Sheriff's Office tweeted late Saturday: "DO NOT shoot weapons @ (hashtag) Irma.
As Friendswood lifts the curfew designed to prevent looting in flood-affected areas at 6 a.m. Sept. 7, the city's police remind residents that the aftermath of a natural disaster and the process of rebuilding can bring new problems.

"Scams that follow a disaster like Hurricane Harvey include shady contractors looking to make fast money off rebuilding homes and the dishonest sale of flood-damaged cars," according to a department bulletin. "Keep your guard up, Friendswood. You are vulnerable, so be suspicious."

Residents can report fraud and price gouging to the Texas Attorney General's consumer protection hotline, 800-621-0508.

BURGLARY

A power saw and other tools were stolen between Aug. 28 and Aug. 30 from a residence in the 4300 block of Saffron Lane, according to an Aug. 31 police report. Authorities consider the burglary a looting incident.

A burglary was reported Sept. 1 in the 2000 block of Pine Drive following a disturbance between two brothers. One of the brothers told police he entered the home through the garage to check for flood damage and wait for his mother. He reportedly took his father's gun and walked outside. His brother then struck him with a stun gun and took the father's gun back, police said.

Residents who evacuated their home for Hurricane Harvey Aug. 24 in the 400 block of Castlelake Drive returned Aug. 31 to find the interior garage door unlocked, according to a Sept. 3 police report. Inside the home, jewelry boxes were missing from the master bedroom.

Two Yeti coolers and a pistol were stolen from an unlocked truck Sept. 1 in the 400 block of South Shadowbend Avenue, according to a Sept. 3 police report.

A smash-and-grab vehicle burglary was reported Sept. 3 at Friendship Haven, 1500 Sunset Drive, police said. A purse and jewelry were stolen.

Jewelry was stolen from a home Sept. 3 or Sept. 4 in the 16900 block of Stardale Lane, police said. The resident, who evacuated her home because of rising flood waters, told police she suspects a family member.

When a resident returned to her home in the 15500 block of Wandering Trail to check the progress of renovations, she discovered the back door had been kicked in, according to a Sept. 4 police report. Nothing was stolen from the flood-damaged home, and the residence was secured.

ASSAULT

Police investigated an alleged assault Aug. 31 in the 1300 block of Crawford Drive.

A 55-year-old female patient punched a nurse at First Choice Emergency Clinic, 225 E. Parkwood Ave., according to a Sept. 1 police report. The patient, in pain, was verbally abusive toward staff and demanded a specific opioid medication, police said. When the nurse refused, the patient attempted to leave with her IV line. She reportedly pushed and spit on the nurse. Friendswood EMS transported the patient to a local hospital.

NARCOTICS

Police charged a Pearland man, 21, with possession of a controlled substance after observing him driving erratically Sept. 4 in the 600 block of West Edgewood Avenue. A search of the vehicle yielded marijuana, cocaine and alprazolam, police said. Bond was set at $5,000.

DRIVING WHILE INTOXICATED

A Rosharon man, 28, was charged with DWI after he was seen driving dangerously Sept. 3 in the 2400 block of West Parkwood Avenue, police said. He reportedly failed a field sobriety test but agreed to provide a blood specimen.

PUBLIC INTOXICATION

An 18-year-old Pearland man was charged with purchasing alcohol for minors following a party Sept. 1 in the 900 block of Glenlea Court, police said. Officers broke up the party and reportedly observed cans and bottles of beer through the house as well as an unresponsive partygoer. Bond was set at $1,500. Three girls were released to adults and issued citations for underage drinking.

Police charged an Alvin man, 24, with public intoxication after he reportedly was found covered in vomit and sleeping in a vehicle Sept. 2 at a Citgo station in the 1500 block of FM 528.

Police charged a Friendswood man, 24, with unlawful carrying of weapons after he reportedly fell off a bicycle into traffic in the 900 block of West Parkwood Avenue. He exhibited signs of intoxication and was taken into custody, police said. An officer found a firearm in the man's backpack; he does not possess a license to carry, police said.

Police charged a Bacliff man, 41, with public intoxication and possession of drug paraphernalia after he reportedly was observed driving suspiciously through the parking lots of closed businesses Sept. 3 in the 700 block of West Parkwood Avenue. He had a meth pipe in the seat of his vehicle, police said.

THEFT

A kayak was stolen from the intersection of Bay Area Boulevard and FM 528, according to a Sept. 1 police report. The owner, reportedly assisting with water rescues during Hurricane Harvey's flooding, secured the kayak with ropes to the back of his truck. Afterward, his truck was towed, but the kayak was gone. The kayak is described as a light blue Hobie Outback with a single black seat and a black storage compartment.

TRAFFIC

Police said they intend to charge a driver with failure to stop and give information after a hit-and-run collision Aug. 31 in the 16700 block of Blackhawk Boulevard. Officers found the suspect vehicle in the 17200 block of Townes Road, and the driver reportedly admitted involvement in the crash.

The driver of a gray Ford Mustang hit a tree Sept. 2 in the 2300 block of Taylor Sky Lane and left car parts all over the yard, police said.

As Friendswood lifts the curfew designed to prevent looting in flood-affected areas at 6 a.m. Sept. 7, the city's police remind residents that the aftermath of a natural disaster and the process of rebuilding can bring new problems.

"Scams that follow a disaster like Hurricane Harvey include shady contractors looking to make fast money off rebuilding homes and the dishonest sale of flood-damaged cars," according to a department bulletin. "Keep your guard up, Friendswood. You are vulnerable, so be suspicious."

Residents can report fraud and price gouging to the Texas Attorney General's consumer protection hotline, 800-621-0508.

BURGLARY

A power saw and other tools were stolen between Aug. 28 and Aug. 30 from a residence in the 4300 block of Saffron Lane, according to an Aug. 31 police report. Authorities consider the burglary a looting incident.

A burglary was reported Sept. 1 in the 2000 block of Pine Drive following a disturbance between two brothers. One of the brothers told police he entered the home through the garage to check for flood damage and wait for his mother. He reportedly took his father's gun and walked outside. His brother then struck him with a stun gun and took the father's gun back, police said.

Residents who evacuated their home for Hurricane Harvey Aug. 24 in the 400 block of Castlelake Drive returned Aug. 31 to find the interior garage door unlocked, according to a Sept. 3 police report. Inside the home, jewelry boxes were missing from the master bedroom.

Two Yeti coolers and a pistol were stolen from an unlocked truck Sept. 1 in the 400 block of South Shadowbend Avenue, according to a Sept. 3 police report.

A smash-and-grab vehicle burglary was reported Sept. 3 at Friendship Haven, 1500 Sunset Drive, police said. A purse and jewelry were stolen.

Jewelry was stolen from a home Sept. 3 or Sept. 4 in the 16900 block of Stardale Lane, police said. The resident, who evacuated her home because of rising flood waters, told police she suspects a family member.

When a resident returned to her home in the 15500 block of Wandering Trail to check the progress of renovations, she discovered the back door had been kicked in, according to a Sept. 4 police report. Nothing was stolen from the flood-damaged home, and the residence was secured.

ASSAULT

Police investigated an alleged assault Aug. 31 in the 1300 block of Crawford Drive.

A 55-year-old female patient punched a nurse at First Choice Emergency Clinic, 225 E. Parkwood Ave., according to a Sept. 1 police report. The patient, in pain, was verbally abusive toward staff and demanded a specific opioid medication, police said. When the nurse refused, the patient attempted to leave with her IV line. She reportedly pushed and spit on the nurse. Friendswood EMS transported the patient to a local hospital.

NARCOTICS

Police charged a Pearland man, 21, with possession of a controlled substance after observing him driving erratically Sept. 4 in the 600 block of West Edgewood Avenue. A search of the vehicle yielded marijuana, cocaine and alprazolam, police said. Bond was set at $5,000.

DRIVING WHILE INTOXICATED

A Rosharon man, 28, was charged with DWI after he was seen driving dangerously Sept. 3 in the 2400 block of West Parkwood Avenue, police said. He reportedly failed a field sobriety test but agreed to provide a blood specimen.

PUBLIC INTOXICATION

An 18-year-old Pearland man was charged with purchasing alcohol for minors following a party Sept. 1 in the 900 block of Glenlea Court, police said. Officers broke up the party and reportedly observed cans and bottles of beer through the house as well as an unresponsive partygoer. Bond was set at $1,500. Three girls were released to adults and issued citations for underage drinking.

Police charged an Alvin man, 24, with public intoxication after he reportedly was found covered in vomit and sleeping in a vehicle Sept. 2 at a Citgo station in the 1500 block of FM 528.

Police charged a Friendswood man, 24, with unlawful carrying of weapons after he reportedly fell off a bicycle into traffic in the 900 block of West Parkwood Avenue. He exhibited signs of intoxication and was taken into custody, police said. An officer found a firearm in the man's backpack; he does not possess a license to carry, police said.

Police charged a Bacliff man, 41, with public intoxication and possession of drug paraphernalia after he reportedly was observed driving suspiciously through the parking lots of closed businesses Sept. 3 in the 700 block of West Parkwood Avenue. He had a meth pipe in the seat of his vehicle, police said.

THEFT

A kayak was stolen from the intersection of Bay Area Boulevard and FM 528, according to a Sept. 1 police report. The owner, reportedly assisting with water rescues during Hurricane Harvey's flooding, secured the kayak with ropes to the back of his truck. Afterward, his truck was towed, but the kayak was gone. The kayak is described as a light blue Hobie Outback with a single black seat and a black storage compartment.

TRAFFIC

Police said they intend to charge a driver with failure to stop and give information after a hit-and-run collision Aug. 31 in the 16700 block of Blackhawk Boulevard. Officers found the suspect vehicle in the 17200 block of Townes Road, and the driver reportedly admitted involvement in the crash.

The driver of a gray Ford Mustang hit a tree Sept. 2 in the 2300 block of Taylor Sky Lane and left car parts all over the yard, police said.
Hurricane Irma lingered along Cuba's north coast Friday, swamping seaside towns and shredding the island's rickety infrastructure, though there were no reports of deaths or injuries.

Cuban authorities said they had moved more than a million people out of Irma's path, sending them to an extensive network of shelters that included dozens of caves.

After Irma made landfall late Friday as a Category 5 storm - the most powerful to strike the island in nearly a century - it began to slacken. By late afternoon, it was a Category 3 system, moving westward at a plodding pace of just 9 miles per hour, meting out destruction across a huge swath of the island.

Images published by Cuban state broadcasters and on social media showed downed trees and rubble-clogged streets. Some towns reported damage to 60 percent of homes, as the storm shredded zinc roofing panels and blasted apart old Spanish tiles.

Power lines and electrical posts were strewn across roads and highways, and state media reported the collapse of a causeway linking beach hotels to the mainland. At the Cayo Coco resort, near the site where Irma roared ashore, the top of a 200-foot communication tower was doubled over like a noodle.

Forecasters at the U.S. National Hurricane Center said Irma would begin turning northward late Saturday and smash into the Florida Keys Sunday morning.

That path would be a reprieve for Cuba's capital, Havana, but police and Civil Defense officials have been evacuating the city's waterfront neighborhoods that are most at risk of major flooding if Irma brought a significant storm surge.

In areas of the island where the worst has passed, Cubans have begun venturing out to inspect the damage.

"It's a total disaster," said Dianelys Alvarez, reached by cellphone in the central plaza of Nuevitas, Camaguey province, where Alvarez said not a single tree remained standing.

"The streets are full of rubble. There are houses with their roofs ripped off. Even the oldest trees in town have been knocked down," she said.

The town has been without power for more than a day, but Alvarez said reports of damage elsewhere have been reaching her neighbors by word of mouth. She's heard the destruction is even worse in the towns and beach resorts where Irma made landfall.Cuban state media reported waves exceeding 30 feet along some parts of the north coast, bringing extensive flooding.

Despite the property and infrastructure damage, Cuba appears to have been spared the lethal devastation Irma unleashed on the Leeward Islands to its east, especially on the island of Barbuda, which was all but obliterated. Those islands got a bit of good news Saturday afternoon as Hurricane Jose turned short of them, sparing the residents another devastating blow.
Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., who said President Donald Trump's "moral authority" was "compromised" by his response to the white supremacist-fueled violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, last month, is set to meet with the president Wednesday to discuss issues of race and race relations, said two people familiar with the meeting.

Scott, who has been sharply critical of Trump and his rhetoric on issues of race, had expressed interest in meeting with the president before the Charlottesville violence, the people said, but that get-together took on newfound urgency after Charlottesville.

For Trump, the meeting with serve largely as a "listening session," one of the people added. Both spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive meeting.

Trump further plunged his young administration into crisis with his response to the white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, which left one counterprotester dead and several injured. At the time, Trump refused to immediately condemn the violence and said that "both sides" were to blame.

Speaking to VICE News, Scott - the only black Republican in the Senate - refused to defend the president, saying, "I'm not going to defend the indefensible," and added that Trump's "moral authority" had been "compromised" by his insufficient response. In the same interview, he also said that the country still had serious work to do on racial issues: "Racism is real. It is alive. It is here," Scott said.

On CBS' "Face the Nation" at the time, Scott also said he believed Trump needed to hear from people who have experienced the agony of racism firsthand. The one-on-one meeting Wednesday grew out of that appeal, one of the people familiar with it said.

"If the president wants to have a better understanding and appreciation for what he should do next, he needs to hear something from folks who have gone through this painful history," Scott said on CBS. "Without that personal connection to the painful past, it will be hard for him to regain that moral authority, from my perspective."

Scott plans to use part of his audience with the president to tell his personal story, about which he has previously spoken movingly. His grandfather dropped out of third grade, never learned to read and spent much of his life picking cotton. His mother raised him as a single parent, working long hours as a nursing assistant.

Scott and Trump are also expected to discuss other issues facing black Americans, such as poverty and historically black universities.
The woman wearing a mint-green dress with tiny pink flowers is trying not to cry.

She is explaining that she has Temporary Protected Status, which was granted to 58,000 Haitians after the 2010 earthquake that devastated the country. She had been living in the United States for more than a decade when the quake struck, but found herself a beneficiary of the program that allowed Haitians to stay.

So every 18 months, she renewed her status without much thought. Then came May, and an announcement from then-Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly. He told Haitian TPS holders that the program may soon come to an end. That they would be given a six-month extension, but they should prepare to leave the United States and return to Haiti by January 2018.

His reasoning: Things were improving in Haiti since the quake killed more than 230,000 people and did an estimated $14 billion in damage to buildings and roads.

Critics called the decision shortsighted. The effects of the earthquake are still visible. Many people still reside in tents and makeshift homes. A cholera outbreak followed in 2010, infecting at least 770,000 people and killing more than 9,200. And on Saturday, Hurricane Irma brought more heartache to the already devastated Caribbean island nation as reports of flooding began to surface.

But for the woman in the mint-green dress, struggling not to cry, her reasons for wanting to stay are much more personal.

The Washington area, where she has lived for more than two decades, is her home - and home to an estimated 800 Haitians with TPS. Her husband and 2-year-old daughter are there. Her job as a nurse is there. And her church, with its majority Haitian congregation, is there. So despite pleas from family and friends that she should follow the exodus of Haitians afraid of a return to Haiti and instead head to Canada, she will not.

"I think it's lack of faith for me to get up and leave," said the woman, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because she feared she would become an easy target for deportation. "I have two sisters and a brother in Montreal. They ask me to come every time. 'People are coming,' they say. I say, 'Is it easy to pack up and come?' It is not. I don't want to hear people tell me that kind of stuff."

- - -

An estimated 11 million people live in Haiti, the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. A Category 5 hurricane like Irma could cause flooded roads and mudslides, which could destroy houses built on hillsides - a repeat of the devastation caused by the earthquake in 2010 and when Hurricane Matthew hit the country in October 2016.

It is for that reason that many Haitians with TPS in the United States say returning to Haiti is not an option. In August, Canadian officials reported a surge in Haitians crossing the border from the United States. According to the Quebec immigration ministry, as many as 150 Haitian asylum seekers are arriving in Canada each day after making border crossingsfrom New York into Quebec. According to the Canadian Broadcasting Corp., about 700 Haitians were waiting to be processed for claims of asylum from the United States this year.

Canadian soldiers are building tent villages near U.S. borders to house Haitian asylum seekers. Olympic Stadium in Montreal is being used to house refugees, the CBC reported.

The growing panic can be seen across the country. Haitian radio stations and other media outlets talk about the issue almost nonstop. Marleine Bastien, executive director of the Haitian Women of Miami, said that more than 32,000 Haitians with temporary status live in Florida. Many have been living in the United States for up to 20 years.

"We are talking about people who have deep roots in the community," Bastien said. "These are people who own homes, who have reached the American Dream to own a home, and started business. Eighty-five percent of them are working."

"I receive calls every day," Bastien added. " 'Marleine, what should I do? Should I put my house to sale? Do I take my children to a country still reeling under remnants of an earthquake, a country where the entire south peninsula has been destroyed? Where people are dealing with food scarcity because Hurricane Matthew destroyed crops?' "

"The heart-wrenching questions the families are asking are difficult to answer," she said. "How do you tell a parent what to do with U.S.-born children? How do you answer a mom sitting in front of you with tears in their eyes?"

Jean St. Ulme, senior pastor at Eglise Baptiste Du Calvaire in Adelphi, Maryland, said he is also dealing with similar questions.

"It is a sad situation. They don't know what will happen," St. Ulme said. " They don't have anything in Haiti. They come here for a better life. They are afraid to go back."

- - -

The woman in the mint-green dress is a member of St. Ulme's congregation. She and her husband, who is also in the country on temporary status, pray every morning before the sun comes up and again at night before midnight. It is the same prayer: That the U.S. government will not return to Haiti the more than 58,000 Haitians living here.

She was 18 when she left Haiti in 1995 on a visitor's visa. "Since then, I've never been back. I have no house there," said the woman, who is now 40. "I wouldn't know how to live there. How would I survive going back there?"

She rubs her swollen belly. Her second child is due in three weeks.

Now she can no longer hold back her tears.

"My child is a U.S. citizen," she says. "Would you take my child from me? Would you send me back and take my child? What would she become? Would you break a family?"

The health-care system in Haiti is terrible, she says. Patients wait on hospital beds with no sheets, clutching brown paper bags of medicine they brought with them, hoping doctors not stopped by strikes will see them. In Haiti, she said, "You call 911, the ambulance has no gas to come help you. There is no security. There is no place to render justice."

Rony Ponthieux doesn't want to go to Canada either, but the prospect of returning to Haiti is not one he can see. He has lived in the United States since 1999, and he and his wife were granted TPS after the 2010 earthquake.

While here, he has gone to school and become a registered nurse. Since 2015, he has worked at Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami.

"I have two children born here," Ponthieux said. "The eldest son is 16, going on 17. I have a girl who . . . spoke at Washington in Congress. She was giving some speeches. She is gifted. She just turned 10. She was champion spelling bee for her school."

Moving to Canada would be a last option. "I heard the news. I see the borders. I don't think it's a good idea."

On the other hand: "If I go to Haiti, I would struggle to live. To take care of children will be hard. If I leave children here, it will be family separation. It is not good to leave children here."

But, he added, "Imagine children born here and go to a place with no pure water. No shelter. No food. No house in Haiti. It would be a bad situation."
Angelica Mendoza de Ascarza was a 54-year-old indigenous Peruvian mother of eight when, in the pitch-black early hours of July 3, 1983, the door of her tiny concrete-block home in the city of Ayacucho was kicked in by a group of men pointing assault rifles and wearing black hoods.

As she tried to fight them off with her bare hands, they sought out her 19-year-old student son Arquimedes, dragged him from his bed and bundled him, in his underwear and barefoot, to a waiting vehicle she recognized as a military armored personnel carrier.

"I clung to my son but they dragged me with him onto the street, punching me, kicking me and twisting my arm until I let go," she told the Associated Press later. "Arquimedes shouted back to me: 'Mama, don't cry. I'm a big man now. Don't worry. I haven't done anything wrong.' "

That was the last time she saw her son. He became one of Peru's "desaparecidos" (the disappeared ones), just one victim of a 20-year "dirty war" that never got as much global media coverage as those during the military governments of Argentina and Chile. More than 69,000 Peruvians were known to have died between 1980 and 2000 and 7,000 disappeared, even though the three successive Peruvian governments of the era were not military-led like those in South America's Southern Cone.

Mendoza, who died Aug. 28 at 88, personally campaigned for an independent Truth and Reconciliation Commission to investigate the disappearances, and her demand was finally met in 2001 by a caretaker government. The commission - made up mainly of academics, priests and lawyers, and before which she testified in her native Quechua language - issued its damning report in August 2003.

It said the Marxist Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) group had been responsible for more than half the deaths, massacring with machetes anyone they considered government sympathizers, including indigenous peasants.

But the report also blamed the three successive ostensibly democratic governments of the era for the rest of the killings and human rights abuses, concluding that the state had given too much power to the military, which launched a "scorched earth" policy against villagers in the Peruvian highlands. Seventy-five percent of the dead were innocent indigenous Quechua speakers caught between the military and the guerrillas.

After her son was hauled away, Mendoza waited anxiously for dawn - until the end of a 12-hour curfew during the ongoing state of emergency in which anyone venturing out risked being shot. She went to the Los Cabitos military base to ask about her son.

"No sabemos nada" (we know nothing), she was told. Same at the police station, same at the paramilitary National Guard.

But she did bump into other mothers or relatives looking for their loved ones. They later formed a group they called the National Association of Families of the Kidnapped, Detained and Disappeared of Peru, known by the Spanish acronym ANFASEP, with the motto Verdad y Justicia (Truth and Justice). She became its leader and most public face, known nationwide as Mama Angelica.

In 1985, she organized their first march, accompanied by Argentina's 1980 Nobel Peace Prize-winner Adolfo Perez Esquivel, when she and other relatives carried crosses, photos of their missing loved ones and placards saying "No matar" (Do not kill). She would participate in such marches, though increasingly frail, for the rest of her life. Her lawyer Gloria Cano confirmed her death, in Ayacucho, of complications from pneumonia.

"Mama Angelica is not only a symbol of the battle for justice in Peru, but a symbol for all the countries in the region which lived through terror situations during the same epoch," the Peruvian branch of Amnesty International said in a statement. "Women like Mama Angelica are the ones who achieved a transformation in all our countries. She was among those who showed us the way. Now we must continue to follow her example, in her memory and for all who are still in the struggle."

Mendoza never learned about her son but, through her efforts, other mothers and relatives did have their loved ones' deaths confirmed.

With her strongly Inca features and her white high-crowned peasant's hat, Mama Angelica, became a symbol of the parents or other loved ones of those who disappeared between 1980 and 2000 - her son during the presidency of Fernando Belaunde Terry, others during the term of Alan Garcia and the rest during the near-dictatorship of Alberto Fujimori, who is now in prison for human rights abuses and corruption.

Fujimori had once accused Mama Angelica of being a Shining Path "terrorist" and threatened her with jail, forcing her to go underground in Peru for two years. On coming to power in 1990, Fujimori absolved all military or state security forces of any guilt during the previous 20 years.

Belaunde had been president of Peru from 1963 to 1968 until he was deposed by a military coup. After fleeing to the United States and teaching at Harvard, Johns Hopkins and George Washington universities, he returned home and was democratically elected president in 1980.

He preached democracy but became close to the military dictators of Latin America, supporting - vocally and with naval vessels and fighter planes - the Argentine invasion of the British-governed Falkland Islands in 1982. He also became cozy with, and learned from, the Argentine and Chilean intelligence services in their efforts to get rid of leftist dissidents. Hence the detention and disappearance in 1983 of Mendoza's son Arquimedes, a student of business administration at the San Cristobal of Huamanga National University in Ayacucho, which the state security services considered a hotbed of Shining Path activity.

With her fellow parents or loved ones, Mendoza made frequent visits to garbage piles around Ayacucho, where rumor had it some of the desaparecidos had been dumped. She climbed over fly-infested mounds of mutilated, decomposing bodies, unrecognizable but which she believed were mostly students from the university, killed by soldiers seeking information about Shining Path.

She said she saw bodies with eyes gouged out, jaws broken, fingernails torn out, fingers cut off, at least 15 bodies without heads. She never found her son.

She later asserted that there had been more than 100 bodies in the dump and that the military had burned many dissidents' bodies in a large oven in Los Cabitos before disposing of their bones in among the garbage.

Just two weeks before she died, Mendoza, although ailing, traveled from her home in Ayacucho to the capital, Lima, to witness a court verdict against two former military officers - in absentia - finding them guilty of more than 50 cases of arbitrary detention, torture and disappearances of civilians. The two men are believed to be still alive and free.

Angelica Mendoza Almeida de Ascarza was born in San Gabriel de Huarcas, south of Ayacucho, on Oct. 1, 1928. Her husband, Estanislao Alcarza Barron, died in 2015. She is survived by several children.

In a statement last year, the Geneva-based International Committee of the Red Cross described Mendoza as a "tireless advocate for these women who lost their loved ones." The ICRC quoted her as saying: "We cannot forget them even as we grow old and die. How can we forget our sons, our husbands, our fathers? It's impossible. Women came to see me from the countryside, asking if I could speak on their behalf. I told them that they wouldn't kill us if we stood united. We were many and together we were strong."
Montgomery County commissioners set a plan in place regarding how the county will handle donations from individuals and businesses wanting to help with Hurricane Harvey recovery.

During a special court meeting Sept. 1, Assistant County Attorney Amy Dunham said several businesses, including Target, had expressed interest in helping victims. Hurricane Harvey slammed the Texas coast Aug. 25 dumping a historic amount of rain on the region including Montgomery County. Hundreds of homes and businesses flooded.

"They would like to make a donation to Montgomery County and have that distributed to people in need," she said. "Only the court can accept a donation on behalf of the county."

However, she said handling donations could be an issue as far as tracking those donations and handling administratively. In the past, Dunham said, if a business wanted to make a donation, the county would encourage the donation be made directly to a nonprofit.

County Judge Craig Doyal asked whether the court could accept the donations and then donate them to a nonprofit. While Dunham said the court could do that, it isn't easy.

"It depends on how (the donation) is given to us," said Dunham, noting that if the donation is given to the county and the donor wants it to be used for a specific need, the county only could use it for that need and nothing else or the donation must be returned.

Precinct 3 Commissioner James Noack suggested the county stick with asking those donors to make the donation directly to a nonprofit.

"I don't want to be in the donation business," he said.

County Auditor Phyllis Martin cautioned the court about accepting donations.

"The challenge the county has is the administration of all those dollars because they usually, not always, come with specific restrictions," said Martin, noting the process may require a "heavy administrative function." "You might very quickly have those administrative costs become very burdensome."

Precinct 1 Commissioner Mike Meador said a local company contacted him about making a "sizable" cash donation.

"I don't want to turn it down and say you can't donate to us, you have to donate to someone else," he said. "I'm not going to do that."

Precinct 2 Commissioner Charlie Riley said he won't turn away donations, either.

"When did we get so scared to take a donation," he said. "I don't understand this."

Doyal suggested the county accept large cash donations and put those in the county's fund balance. If a specific allocation request is made by the donor, the county would ask them to donate to a specific nonprofit directly.

The court agreed.

Meador said he will place the donation he mentioned on the court's Tuesday agenda. The court will meet at 9:30 a.m. on the fourth floor of the Alan B. Sadler Administration Building, 501 N. Thompson St.
WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump prepared for the pivotal meeting with congressional leaders by huddling with his senior team - his chief of staff, his legislative director and the heads of Treasury and the Office of Management and Budget - to game out various scenarios on how to fund the government, raise the debt ceiling and provide Hurricane Harvey relief.

But one option they never considered was the that one the president ultimately chose: cutting a deal with Democratic lawmakers, to the shock and ire of his own party.

In agreeing to tie Harvey aid to a three-month extension of the debt ceiling and government funding, Trump burned the people who are ostensibly his allies. The president was an unpredictable - and, some would say, untrustworthy - negotiating partner with not only congressional Republicans but also with his Cabinet members and top aides. Trump saw a deal that he thought was good for him - and he seized it.

The move should come as no surprise to students of Trump's long history of broken alliances and agreements. In business, his personal life, his campaign and now his presidency, Trump has sprung surprises on his allies with gusto. His dealings are frequently defined by freewheeling spontaneity, impulsive decisions and a desire to keep everyone guessing - especially those who assume they can control him.

He also repeatedly demonstrates that, while he demands absolute loyalty from others, he is ultimately loyal to no one but himself.

"It makes all of their normalizing and 'Trumpsplaining' look silly and hollow," said Rick Wilson, a Republican strategist sharply critical of Trump, referring to his party's congressional leaders. "Trump betrays everyone: wives, business associates, contractors, bankers and now, the leaders of the House and Senate in his own party. They can't explain this away as [a] 15-dimensional Trump chess game. It's a dishonest person behaving according to his long-established pattern."

But what many Republicans saw as betrayal was, in the view of some Trump advisers, an exciting return to his campaign promise of being a populist dealmaker able to cut through the mores of Washington to get things done.

In that Wednesday morning Oval Office meeting, Trump was impressed with the energy and vigor of Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumerm D-N.Y., and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., relative to the more subdued Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis. Far from fretting over the prospect of alienating McConnell and Ryan or members of his administration, he relished the opportunity for a bipartisan agreement and the praise he anticipated it would bring, according to people close to the president.

On Thursday morning, he called Pelosi and Schumer to crow about coverage of the deal - "The press has been incredible," he told Pelosi, according to someone familiar with the call - and point out that it had been especially positive for the Democratic leaders.

At the White House later that day, Trump asked Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., how he thought the deal was playing. "I told him I thought it was great, and a gateway project to show there could be bipartisan progress," King said. "He doesn't want to be in an ideological straitjacket."

In some ways, White House officials said, Trump is as comfortable working with Democrats to achieve policy goals - complete with the sheen of bipartisan luster - as he is with Republicans. Though he did not partner with Democrats to spite McConnell and Ryan, aides said, he has long felt frustrated with them for what he perceives as their inability to help shepherd his agenda through Congress, most notably their stalled efforts to undo former president Barack Obama's signature health-care law.

On Thursday, Trump took to Twitter to express dissatisfaction with his adopted political party, complaining about Obamacare: "Republicans, sorry, but I've been hearing about Repeal & Replace for 7 years, didn't happen!" He also bemoaned the legislative filibuster, which requires Republicans to work with Democrats to meet a 60-senator threshold for most votes, writing, "It is a Repub Death wish."

Ari Fleischer, press secretary under President George W. Bush, said that Trump deserves credit for staving off, at least in the short term, a possible default and government shutdown.

"It's going to internally hurt him that he didn't work with Republicans on this one, but by avoiding a mess, he likely saved Republicans from themselves," Fleischer said. "I consider it a small victory that congressional Republicans didn't once again trip themselves up over this issue. At least for now."

King, a moderate who represents a Long Island district that Trump carried, said: "I think this could be a new day for the Republican Party."

Trump's agreement with the Democrats is hardly the first time the president has flouted his allies, including those around the world, sending them skittering nervously in response to a threat or a sudden turnabout.

In April, Trump thrust Canada and Mexico - as well as many of his advisers and Cabinet officials - into a state of panic during a frenetic, if brief, period when he threatened to withdraw from the North American Free Trade Agreement. In May, speaking in front of NATO's sparkling new headquarters, Trump alarmed European allies when he chastised them for "not paying what they should be paying" and refused to embrace the treaty's cornerstone - that an attack on one represents an attack on all. And in September, as the crisis with North Korea escalated, Trump abruptly threatened to withdraw from a free-trade agreement with South Korea.

Foreign diplomats euphemistically describe the president as "unpredictable," and even those with good relationships with the United States say they are "cautiously optimistic" that Trump's behavior will continue to benefit their nations.

On the issue of the debt-ceiling extension and short-term government funding, a GOP aide familiar with Wednesday's meeting said many Republicans viewed Trump's decision as "a spur-of-the-moment thing" that happened because the president "just wanted a deal."

"He saw a deal and wanted the deal, and it just happened to be completely against what we were pushing for," said the aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to offer a candid assessment. "Our conclusion is there isn't much to read into other than he made that decision on the spot, and that's what he does because he's Trump, and he made an impulsive decision because he saw a deal he wanted."

From the outset, the meeting did not go as Republican leaders and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin had hoped. They began by pushing for an 18-month extension of the debt ceiling, with Mnuchin lecturing the group of longtime legislators about the importance of raising the debt ceiling, according to three people familiar with the gathering who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

"It was just odd and weird," one said. "He was very much a duck out of water."

The treasury secretary presented himself as a Wall Street insider, arguing that the stability of the markets required an 18-month extension.

At one point, Schumer intervened with a skeptical question: "So the markets dictate one month past the 2018 election?" he asked, rhetorically, according to someone with knowledge of his comment. "I doubt that."

At another, Pelosi explained that understanding Wall Street is not the same as operating in Congress. "Here the currency of the realm is the vote," she told reporters in a news conference Thursday, echoing the comments she had made privately the day before. "You have the votes, no discussion necessary. You don't have the votes, three months."

The Republican leaders and Mnuchin slowly began moderating their demands, moving from their initial pitch down to 12 months and then six months. At one point, when Mnuchin was in the middle of yet another explanation, the president cut him off, making it clear that he disagreed.

The deal would be for three months tied to Harvey funding, Trump said - just as the Democrats had wanted.

On Friday morning, at a closed-door meeting of House Republicans, numerous lawmakers vented their frustrations to Mnuchin and White House budget director Mick Mulvaney. One of them, Rep. Lee Zeldin, R-N.Y., stood up to say he thought Trump's snub of Ryan - who had publicly rejected Democrats' offer hours before Trump accepted it - was also a snub of Republicans at large.

"I support the president, I want him to be successful, I want our country to be successful," Zeldin said in an interview afterward. "But I personally believe the president had more leverage than he may have realized. He had more Democratic votes than he realized, and could have and would have certainly gotten a better deal."

Democrats remain skeptical about just how long their newfound working relationship with Trump will last. But for Republicans, the turnabout was yet another reminder of what many of them have long known but refused to openly admit: Trump is a fickle ally and partner, liable to turn on them much in the same way he has turned on his business associates and foreign allies.

"Looking to the long term, trust and reliability have been essential ingredients in productive relationships between the president and Congress," said Phil Schiliro, who served as director of legislative affairs under Obama. "Without them, trying to move a legislative agenda is like juggling on quicksand. It usually doesn't end well."

- - -

The Washington Post's Mike DeBonis contributed to this report.
The Deir Ezzor Military Council announced a new US-backed offensive against the Islamic State in eastern Syria.

The US-led coalition announced today that the Syrian Arab Coalition (SAC) has begun a new offensive against the Islamic State in the Kahbur River valley. The offensive, named Operation Jazeera Storm, aims to dislodge the so-called caliphate from its strongholds north of the city of Deir Ezzor.

The new effort means that there are now two different coalitions trying to uproot the self-declared caliphate in eastern Syria.

Bashar al Assads regime, backed by Iran and Russia, has made progress in Deir Ezzor in recent weeks. Earlier this month, the Syrian regime said that its forces and allies had broken through the Islamic States siege of its positions in and around Deir Ezzor city. Abu Bakr al Baghdadis men began the siege in 2014 and their actions have contributed to the ongoing humanitarian crisis in the area.

The Assad regime, along with Iranian-sponsored militias, Hezbollah and the Russians, began an offensive toward Deir Ezzor this past summer. The regime has taken two pathways. One is from the west, where Assads forces have seized ground from the Sunni jihadists in Homs province. The other is from the north, where the regime has established its own foothold in parts of Raqqa province. [See FDDs Long War Journal report, Analysis: The Syrian regimes offensive towards Deir Ezzor.]

The SAC is pressing into Deir Ezzor mainly from the north. The multi-ethnic SAC is a battle-tested, proven partner force in the Coalitions fight to defeat ISIS in northern Syria, Combined Joint Task Force  Operation Inherent Resolve (CJTF-OIR) said in a statement earlier today. The operation is led by the Deir Ezzor Military Coalition, which will give the effort a local face.

Once the Khabur River valley is cleared of ISIS, the SAC states the region will be turned over to representative bodies of local civilians who will then oversee security and governance as with Tabqa and Manbij, CJTF-OIR stated.

CJTF-OIRs statement was undoubtedly intended to assuage fears about Irans and the Assad regimes ability to capitalize off of the US-led coalitions gains. There is a concern, inside Syria and elsewhere, that once the SAC and its allies beat back the Islamic State north of Deir Ezzor city, they will simply allow Assads men and Iranian-backed forces to take control of the turf. The Assad regimes recent gains in Deir Ezzor only heighten this concern, although it is not clear how much authority the regime can exert over the province. CJTF-OIRs statement also emphasizes the role of the SAC, without mentioning the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which is largely comprised of Kurdish fighters.

Indeed, the offensive into Deir Ezzor province was also announced on websites affiliated with the Kurdish Peoples Defense Units (YPG) and the Womens Defense Units (YPJ). The YPG and YPJ are affiliated with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), a US-designated terrorist organization.

The YPG/YPJ are the main component of the SDF, which has led the charge on the ground against the Islamic State in Raqqa province.

A YPG website posted a message and video attributed to the Deir Ezzor Military Council, which is the same body mentioned in CJTF-OIRs statement. YPG and YPJ flags fly in the background of the video as Ahmed Abu Kholeh, the head of the Deir Ezzor Military Council, announces the new operation in eastern Syria. The military council fights under the banner of the SDF, according to Reuters.

At a time when ISIS defense lines are broken one by one, terror draws to a close in Raqqa, Syrian Democratic Forces create epics of heroism and sacrifice and 70% of Raqqa has been liberated, ISIS is trying to raise the low morale of their members by attacking the eastern areas of Shaddadi [a town in northeastern Syria] and Deir Ezzor, the message reads. That is why we as the [Deir Ezzor] Military Council launched this operation with a spirit of responsibility to support the people of eastern Syria. We also salute the SDF for their participation and support and we offer our thanks to the International Coalition forces for their aerial and ground support, the message continues.

CJTF-OIRs statement emphasizes that the US-led coalition will support the new operation in the Khabur River valley as part of their advise and assist mission, providing equipment, training, intelligence and logistics support, precision fires and battlefield advice.

The US has already been targeting key Islamic State figures and assets in Deir Ezzor province, including in Mayadin, a city on the Euphrates River that has become a hub for the so-called caliphates leadership. [See FDDs Long War Journal report, US says 2 more senior Islamic State leaders killed near Mayadin, Syria.]

Thomas Joscelyn is a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the Senior Editor for FDD's Long War Journal.

Are you a dedicated reader of FDD's Long War Journal? Has our research benefitted you or your team over the years? Support our independent reporting and analysis today by considering a one-time or monthly donation. Thanks for reading! You can make a tax-deductible donation here.
Late last month, Irans Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) publicized its drone strikes against the Islamic State near the Iraqi border in Syria. The IRGC deployed the drones as part of its revenge campaign against the Sunni jihadists, and also to show off Irans growing fleet of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs).

In early August, the Islamic State raided an IRGC position near Jamouna, about 37 miles northeast of the US base in Tanf, Syria. The self-declared caliphates offensive led to the deaths of dozens of Iraqi militiamen fighting for the Seyyed al Shuhada Brigades. Several Iranian operatives embedded in the militia were killed as well.

Abu Bakr al Baghdadis loyalists captured and beheaded an Iranian officer. Photos of the dead Iranian, portrayed as a martyr by IRGC-affiliated sites, subsequently went viral. So the IRGC and allied Shiite jihadists vowed to exact retribution.

But first, in an attempt to cover up its embarrassing loss, the IRGC peddled a conspiracy theory saying the US struck the Iranian-led forces right before the Islamic States assault. The conspiracy was entirely self-serving, as the IRGC did not want to admit that Baghdadis goons delivered a stinging blow to its forces. [See FDDs Long War Journal report, IRGC-controlled militia accuses US of strike to hide Islamic State raid near Syrian border.]

The IRGC wasnt finished, however. Later in August, IRGC-affiliated websites released footage of a drone strike by the Seyyed al Shuhada Brigades against the Islamic State in Syrias Badia desert. The footage is consistent with that of an Iranian Shahed-129 drone, according to Adam Rawnsely, an analyst who spoke with FDDs Long War Journal. The images showed the Iraqi militiamen undertaking reconnaissance and launching a drone strike against an Islamic State technical. The footage also showed more strikes, though it was not immediately clear if they were from the same operation. That attack was just the beginning of the IRGCs revenge operations against the Sunni jihadists, according to IRGC-affiliated media.

Then, on Aug. 24, Irans state media reported that the Iranian-led Afghan Fatemiyoun Division, backed by the IRGCs drone unit, repelled an Islamic State assault close to Wadi al Waer, approximately 35 miles northeast of Jamouna by the Iraqi border. Footage from the drone is also consistent with that of a Shahed-129, according to Rawnsely. An IRGC-affiliated media outlet, citing a field source, later added that other units were positioned there and participated in the assault. They included the resistance fronts missile unit, Lebanese Hezbollah, Iraqi militias from the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) and Iranian advisers. While the IRGC often claims its operatives are in Syria merely as advisers, they have played a far more active role, directly leading forces in combat.

The IRGCs drone operations against the Islamic State show how it is using multiple tactics in its irregular warfare, and directly backing its Shiite foreign legion with Iranian assets. The Islamic State demonstrated in Mosul and elsewhere that small, weaponized drones can be particularly effective in guerrilla-style warfare, even if only for a time. Irans UAV capability is more advanced, but is being deployed for similar ends.

The Iranian footage from eastern Syria highlighted several other noteworthy aspects of the IRGCs battles with the so-called caliphate. IRGC-led forces dug trenches around the perimeter of their positions in an attempt to foil the Islamic States notoriously destructive suicide vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices (SVBIEDs). The videos included scenes acquired from the cameras of Islamic State fighters. And an Iranian reporter interviewed some of the IRGC-led militiamen following the battles, with Persian voice overs inserted into the clips.

While the IRGC claims to have killed more than 190 Islamic State combatants in the operations, it has yet to provide evidence to support this claim. The footage suggests far fewer jihadists were killed and the IRGC is known to exaggerate its enemies death toll.

The IRGC-led operation by Syrias border with Iraq is part of an Iranian-Russian-Syrian offensive that aims to retake much of Deir Ezzor province. This week, pro-regime forces broke the Islamic States multi-year siege of Deir Ezzor city. Tehran supports the Assad regimes territorial conquest and also wants to secure territory on both sides of the border for its own purposes.

Tehran is showing off its drones for other reasons as well. The UAVs are intended to bolster an aging, ill-equipped, and underfunded air force, thereby providing the Islamic Republic with more offensive capabilities.

Just this week, Irans Press TV reported that the commander of the Army Khatam al Anbiya Air Defense Base had inaugurated a new UAV base. The state media report highlighted that drones have been playing a significant role against takfiri terrorists as well as monitoring US warships in the Persian Gulf.

Last month, an Iranian drone buzzed a US aircraft in the Persian Gulf. Earlier in the year, the US shot down Iranian drones flying near US forces in Tanf. Iran leaked a video of one of its drones trailing an American one. An Iranian operator boasted that he could strike the US drone, even though that was a dubious claim.

Iran will continue to invest in and deploy its drones in combat and propaganda. The UAVs are contributing notably to Irans battles against the Islamic State, but are also intended to send a message to the US as well.

Images and videos from the IRGC-led battles against the Islamic State in eastern Syria

Footage of the IRGC-controlled Seyyed al Shuhada Brigades launching a drone strike against the Islamic State:

IRGC-affiliated media disseminated video of the Iraqi Seyyed al Shuhada Brigades launching a drone strike as revenge against the Islamic State for beheading an Iranian: pic.twitter.com/Csz4HSZsh1  FDDs Iran Project (@FDD_Iran) August 23, 2017

Iranian state medias footage of an IRGC drone attack against Islamic State fighters:

Iran state media footage claims to show IRGC drones supporting the Afghan Fatemiyoun Division and repel ISIS in Sad al Waer, near Syria-Iraq border pic.twitter.com/59zZ3Xu2cb  FDDs Iran Project (@FDD_Iran) August 25, 2017

IRGC-affiliated media posted the map below showing the location of a drone strike near Wadi al Waer in August:

IRGC-led forces dug a trench that was intended to neutralize the Islamic States SVBIEDs:

Amir Toumaj is a independent analyst and contributor to FDD's Long War Journal.

Are you a dedicated reader of FDD's Long War Journal? Has our research benefitted you or your team over the years? Support our independent reporting and analysis today by considering a one-time or monthly donation. Thanks for reading! You can make a tax-deductible donation here.
Guess who is the latest one to catch the 'Jimikki Kammal' craze? It's none other Jimmy Kimmel. Last day, the popular American television host and comedian tweeted that he loves the song too.

The song from the Mohanlal movie 'Velipadinte Pusthakam', have gone viral in the social media and several spin-offs of the song even became more popular than original video.

However, the similarity of 'Jimikki Kammal' with 'Jimmy Kimmel' has not gone unnoticed and it was brought to the attention of the host of 'Jimmy Kimmel Live'. One of the twitter user shared the video and tagged the Oscar host in his tweet.

Surprisingly, he re-tweeted the dance video by saying that he'd not heard the song until now but that he loved it. Composed by Shaan Rahman the song was sung by Vineeth Sreenivasan.
Kochi: The Nedumbassery police on last day recorded the statement of the actress, who was abducted and assaulted during February this year, on her complaint that Poonjar MLA PC George defamed her through news media and channel discussions.

The statement of the actress was recorded at her residence in Thrissur. The Nedumbassery police had earlier registered a case against PC George based on the complaint lodged by the actress to the Chief Minister pointing that MLA is giving defamatory remarks consistently.

In her statement the actress said that the comments made by PC George misinformed the public and led to spreading rumours.
MARTINSVILLE  When she started college, Joli Ayn Wood couldnt create a feasible class schedule around her planned major of American History, so she took a few art classes instead.

Art wasnt a totally new concept to Wood at the time  shed taken art lessons as a wee babe, she said, and her mother created illustrations in her free time at home.

Ive been creative since I was little, Wood said.

After discussing her future with her father, it didnt take long for Wood to officially change her major to Art History and Studio, a degree she earned from Westhampton College, University of Richmond, in 1991.

My dad said, Whatever you work hard at, eventually youll make money. Just do the best you can, Wood said.

While she enjoyed creating art, painting wasnt Woods forte.

At first, I hated painting, Wood said, calling the activity too technical and precise.

Even though it wasnt something she planned to make a career out of, Wood sometimes got out a blank canvas and captured a scene. Not producing work for a class or critique, painting became more of a hobby and less of a chore  but it wasnt something she did very often.

In 2003, Wood faced some health issues.

I wasnt feeling well. My doctor told me I needed to slow down, Wood said. My husband at the time said, Why dont you get your paints out?

She did.

Wood found a medium she liked  oils  and stuck with it.

It makes you slow down and I have a hard time slowing down, Wood said.

Additionally, Wood noted the various creative directions painting with oils provided.

Theres a process to it, Wood said. You have to let it dry or else itll get all muddy. When I go back to it, I may take it in a completely different direction because I see something new.

Also, theres something special about the vivid nature of the colors she achieves with oils.

I like the buttery quality and the luminosity, Wood said.

In the studio, Woods able to devote time and attention to detail. However, thats not where shes spent the majority of her time over the past five or six years.

Ive been doing a lot of en plein air, Wood said. Its painting out of doors. Youre painting it outside in the open air.

Painting on-location takes not only skill, but also rapidity.

I try to finish in one sitting when Im outside painting on site, Wood said. It helps you get the feel of how things sit in a space. You learn to paint quickly and capture the big things quickly.

By producing plein air pieces on a regular basis, Wood noticed a difference when she entered her indoor workspace.

I can work faster in the studio, Wood said. In the studio, I can add more detail. One really helps the other.

While Woods painted all over the country  including desert scenes in Arizona  there are a couple of places that continuously draw her attention and spark her imagination.

Traveling outside of her home in Floyd once a month to paint, Wood doesnt always go far. Some of her favorite scenerys right up or down the road in any direction. The artist enjoys capturing the differing landscapes of Virginia.

I just like the abstract qualities of the hillsides, Wood said. Each county has its own signature. Rockbridge is different from Floyd and Floyd is different from Henry County, just like Henry County is different from Patrick County. I see the differences and appreciate them.

Itd be simpler for Wood to print off an image from her computer of an interesting place in Virginia and recreate the piece, but thats not what inspires the artist  its actually going, seeing and attaining her own perspective of a location.

Unless youve painted and driven those roads, you dont appreciate the topography, Wood said.

Another one of Woods favorite places to paint en plein air is approximately 900 miles north of Martinsville  Maine.

I love New England in general, Wood said. My father loved Maine and New England and I just inherited his love for Maine. I love the water and the coastline. I cant wait to go up and do more. I go up every year.

With Woods works on exhibit at Piedmont Arts Historic Little Post Office through Oct. 6, the artist said visitors could expect to see a little bit of everything.

About 85-percent of its plein air, Wood said. Its a real cornucopia. Theres new stuff, old stuff and everything in between. Theres some plein air, detailed stuff. Theres even one of Main Street in Floyd.

Some of the paintings were so new they hadnt completely dried by the time Will Gravely, postmaster, hung them.

While each work is distinctly different from the next, they all share one similar feature.

On the back of every painting, I write the name of the piece. I always put where I was, when I finished and something about the day, Wood said.

From hay bales to active brooks, Woods range of creativity is apparent in the exhibit.

I want people to see my style, Wood said.

The Little Post Office is open to the public Tuesday through Friday from 11:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. or by appointment and is located at 207 Starling Ave. Admission to the exhibits, both at the post office and the Piedmont Arts main building, is free.

To see more of Woods work or to learn about the painting lessons she offers, visit her website online at https://www.joliaynwood.com/
RIDGEWAY-George Moore was known by many in Ridgeway as someone who wanted to help his town. The 58-year-old, who passed away on June 28, was honored this past month during a celebration of life cookout, where Ridgeway Mayor Craig O'Der gave Moore's family a posthumous key to the Town of Ridgeway, as well as a Virginia State Flag that had been flown at the state capitol. It was given in honor of his decade of service on the Zoning and Planning Commission for the Town of Ridgeway. In addition, Moore was known as a home computer repair expert and worked at Nautica VF Distribution Center in Martinsville as a senior desktop support technician. He was a NHRA enthusiast, jazz lover and avid fisherman, in addition to being a graduate of Virginia's Certified Planning Commissioner's Course offered through Virginia Tech and the University of Virginia and a member of the American Association of Community Planners.
The Springfield Business Improvement District held the Springfield Jam Fest, a free outdoor concert, in downtown Springfield's Court Square on Saturday, Sept. 9.

Local artists including FAT, The Alchemystics, Trailer Trash, Conjunto Barrio, Feel Good Drift, Alex2e, Maxxtone, The Pitts Campaign Experience and more performed across two stages.

The first annual event featuring local food, beverage and retail vendors began at noon and will run until 11 p.m.

The proceeds raised by this event will go to the National Alliance of Mental Illness of Western Massachusetts, an organization dedicated to improving the lives of families and individuals affected by mental illness.

For more information on the Springfield Jam Fest, visit www.springfielddowntown.com.
Gabriel Nutter, who works for the Department of Veterans' Services in the commonwealth, was among the more than 40 vendors at State Senator Eric P. Lesser's "Thrive After 55" wellness fair June 9 at Western New England University.

Nutter works as regional team leader covering Western and Central Massachusetts for a program called Statewide Advocacy for Veterans' Empowerment (SAVE).

The program was created, in 2008, through the state's Department of Public Health, with the mission "to advocate for veterans in need of mental health or counseling services, with the primary mission being suicide prevention."

It was inspired by the advocacy of Kevin and Joyce Lucey on behalf of veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder.



The Lucey's 23-year-old son Jeffrey hanged himself in the family's Belchertown home on June 22, 2004. This was just about a year after he returned on July 3, 2003, from three months of active duty as a lance corporal, with the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve's 6th Mobile Transport Battalion out of New Haven, deployed to drive truck convoys in Iraq at the start of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Drinking and haunted by his time in a war zone that, according to a Frontline report involved the transport of prisoners, he received psychiatric treatment from the VA Medical Center in Northampton, but not for PTSD, and took his own life not long after being discharged from treatment there for substance abuse.

The family sued the VA for wrongful death, and the federal government settled for $300,000.

In 2008, a special commission was established in the commonwealth to study the "mental health effects of war upon returning Massachusetts service members" with the aim of identifying "best practices in the delivery of services to veterans."

The study was dedicated to the memory of Jeffrey Lucey and Jeff Kinlin, United States Army, 82nd Airborne, who was also said to suffer with PTSD and also took his own life.

A number of programs in the commonwealth were developed under former long-time Veterans' Services Secretary Thomas G. Kelley, a Vietnam War hero and a Medal of Honor recipient.

More recent programs, Nutter noted, specifically address post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury, and he called such programs "world class." They include Home Base, a partnership between the Red Sox Foundation and Massachusetts General Hospital, which was founded in 2009 to "help Post-9/11 service members, veterans and their families heal from the Invisible Wounds of War: TBI and PTS."

Nutter was at the wellness fair with "co-worker" Sammy, his Labrador retriever trauma dog who also serves as an "ice breaker" at such events to draw the attention of veteran attendees so Nutter can inquire if they have accessed all the services - ranging from mental health to housing to financial - for which they are eligible.

Key to the SAVE program are staff members like Nutter who know firsthand what challenges can arise in the transition from military to civilian life.

Nutter, who joined the Army in 2004, served for four years with the 1st Squadron 10th Cavalry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division at Fort Hood, in Texas, and Fort Carson in Colorado. He was an E-5 Sergeant and served as a 19D Cavalry Scout.

He was deployed in November 2005, from Fort Hood, to the southern Baghdad region of Iraq for a year of active duty.

A 1999 graduate of Maher Regional High School who grew up in Orange, Nutter said he always "wanted to join the Army." He was diagnosed with PTSD after he left the service, and sought treatment. He said he knew "nothing about suicide or mental health when I was active duty."

"I took this job with SAVE because I wanted to take the knowledge that I had accumulated on my own and share it with other veterans and their families to help make their road of transition, smoother than mine was," Nutter said.

"As Regional Team Leader with the SAVE Team, I provide training for clinicians, veterans, family members, and first responders to help them identify behaviors of veterans in crisis and to educate regarding resources that are available."

Nutter was asked further about his military service as well as his work with SAVE for which he sometimes does community outreach involving a presentation called "BATTLEMIND" to deepen understanding about veterans' issue and what type of support can help.

Q.

Last year, during a Department of Development Services event for veterans, you presented a program called "BATTLEMIND" that shared the experiences of combat veterans returning to civilian life. What does the title of the program refer to, and what did you want to make people more aware of through its presentation?

"BATTLEMIND" was created by Walter Reed Army Hospital as a tool to identify behaviors that the military of all branches teaches its members to keep them alive safe and focused in combat, but are rarely transitioned to civilian life. The behaviors that kept you alive and safe can now as a civilian hinder your transition from military service.

(In breaking down the title below, you can compare how, for example, does the need to be lethally armed in battle transition into a mindset of "locked and loaded" at home.)

B

A

T

T

L

E

M

I

N

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All members of the armed services are presented "BATTLEMIND" in their transition home but it makes its biggest impact when presented in the community and civilian setting. I present this to many law enforcement, fire department and EMS personnel to help them identify veterans in crisis and to link them to the appropriate services that they need.

Many family members who have not served in the military come away from the presentation with a new outlook and an understanding of family members who have served in the past and begin to understand why they may be behaving or acting the way that they do.

The program is a good insight to the behaviors and skills that service members have picked up during their service and it explains through relatable scenarios and situations the "battlemind" of a service member.

Q.

What do you continue to hear from veterans in terms of how their combat experiences continue to impact their daily life, their relationships and even their own sense of safety and control?

A.

Less than one percent of our population serves in the military of any capacity. When our service members come home, they have a hard time re-establishing connections and bonds that they have had in the past. There have been over 2.6 million individual deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001.

Forty percent of that 2.6 million has been our National Guard and Reserve components. I was lucky enough to be single and on active duty at Fort Hood. When I returned from the war zone, I had every resource of the Department of Defense and the Department of the Army at my finger tips. I also lived in the barracks on post and saw my chain of command and my battle buddies on a daily basis.

The guard and reserve do not have that luxury. When they return from the war zone, they complete a short debriefing period, then they are put on a plane and sent home. Once they are home, they are no longer with their units on a daily basis, and they are expected to go back to work Monday morning and fill the roles that they are supposed to fill as if nothing has happened.

They see there battle buddies and chain of command two days out of 30. There needs to be support for the service members and their families of this population. Our local Veterans' Service officers in every city and town of the commonwealth are the first line of support for these veterans as well as the SAVE Team.

SAVE has staff located throughout the Commonwealth - including at the Soldiers' Home in Holyoke - who are ready to assist veterans of any generation and their families to help them access benefits and resources that they are entitled to.

Q.

Veterans of the Vietnam era are now senior citizens. What do you hear from these veterans in terms of what they experienced in combat continuing to impact their life and relationships?

Q.

Veterans of any era or conflict suffer from the same issues when it comes to combat stress. This generation of veterans are diagnosed with PTSD, that is a new term, prior to 1980, it wasn't in the diagnostic manual.

Veterans were diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, before that it was called "battle fatigue," "shell shock," "soldier's heart," "nostalgia," among other terms.

Vietnam-era veterans came home to an unfriendly and hostile population that unleashed their anger related to the war and the government onto the service members. - Hate the war, do not hate the war fighter.

The treatment of these veterans led them to be resistant and reluctant to access benefits and services. Many of these veterans who have been home for more than 40 years are now reaching out and accessing what they have earned.

There are a wide variety of medical issues that are unique to Vietnam veterans and their exposure to Agent Orange. If someone is a Vietnam veteran, the family member of a Vietnam veteran or has any questions related to this, they should not be afraid to reach out to the SAVE Team or their local Veterans' Service Officer.

Q.

How hard is for a combat veteran to seek help with mental health issues? Have you lost veteran friends to suicide?

A.

There has always been a stigma related to mental health and suicide. People are afraid to talk about it. I have lost multiple friends and battle buddies to suicide after a deployment.

Help is out there. There is always someone available to listen. The U.S.Department of Verteran Affairs Veterans Crisis Line is manned 24/7 and can be reached at 1 (800) 273-8255 press 1 for veterans.

The more we talk about these issues, the easier it will be for us to normalize these conversations. People should never be afraid to have a dialogue regarding either one of these issues.

When I was first diagnosed with PTSD my first thought was "Oh great, they are gonna lock me up in a padded room and throw away the key." I thought it was a life sentence and i would be negatively affected for the rest of my life. I could not have been more wrong.

Q.

How were you impacted by your service and what helped you with your own adjustment to civilian life?

A.

I had always wanted to join the Army since I was a small child and when I did, it was the best thing that I had done in my life up until that time.

When I was medically separated from the Army in March of 2008 for issues unrelated to mental health, I had no idea what I was going to do next. After I was separated from the service I was diagnosed with PTSD and that was the start of another journey all together; learning the world of mental health and utilizing the programs and services that the VA, MGH Home Base program and other logical providers make available to our veterans.

Q.

How long have you had your yellow Lab Sammy and has Sammy been part of your therapy?

A.

Sammy is a trauma assistance dog from the

NEADS

Program in Princeton. I was matched with Sammy on Sept. 9, 2013. He has been one of the biggest helpers to me. He helps me identify when I am getting triggered or escalated and he can help me take steps to mitigate those actions and behaviors.

Sammy has made it possible for me to go through many therapies and treatments that I would not have done on my own. I now use him as my ice breaker working with veterans in crises. Vets may not talk to me, but the dog always gets a response.

Q.

What importance do you give to the fact that SAVE is staffed by veterans to serve veterans, and that it had its origins in the suicide of a veteran who had served during Operation Iraqi Freedom.

A.

We attempt to normalize and reduce the stigma of mental health issues. By having our staff members all be combat veterans or immediate family members of combat veterans, we bring experience to the table. When we are working with a veteran who is having difficulties transitioning, we know what they are going through, we speak their language. The peer aspect of our programs is key to the success we have seen.

The SAVE Team exists today due to a conversation that the leadership of the Department of Veterans' Services had with Jeff Lucey's family. After a long conversation, they came up with the idea of making the system fit the veteran, not the veteran fit the system. That was the SAVE Teams original mission. To link, refer, offer peer support and raise wariness regarding suicide prevention.

The direct contact line for SAVE Team for is (888) 844-2838, press 2, or visit the Mass Vets Advisor website.


Kanes and Caseys. Regans and Cavanaughs. O'Connors and Trants. Johnsons and Sheas, and Murphys and Sullivans.



The map of Ireland is woven into the rich fabric of life in the city of Westfield, Massachusetts.

Irish blood runs deep into the generations of families who helped plot the course of the Whip City's almost 350-year history.



Seventy-year-old Patrick Murphy is a relative newcomer, having settled here a mere 26 years ago. It's enough time, though, for him to have established a home away his hometown of Cork City, Ireland. Enough time to be firmly implanted among the membership of the Sons of Erin Irish club. And, enough time to make a mark on the community.

Murphy landed in Boston 50 years ago, stayed there for a time before enlisting in the U.S. Air Force. After his stint in the military, he was on his way back to Boston when he stopped in Springfield where he stayed for a few years before heading across the Connecticut River to settle in Westfield.

"I liked the country(side). Westfield is like a city in the country. I've always liked the outdoors, hunting and fishing. Westfield was just small enough for me. It's laid back, got a good Irish-American population. I fell in love with the place," he says.

A bricklayer and mason by trade, Murphy was at work in West Springfield as regional training director for the International Masonry Institute on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001 when he received a call from a friend, saying, "Have you got a TV on?"

"I brought all of my instructors and the students from the classrooms. Everyone was in complete shock," Murphy remembers. "We let everyone go, and I headed to the Sons of Erin." It was there that Murphy learned of what tragedy would rock his adopted hometown on this day that terrorists set their sights on the United States. Before day's end, Westfield would know it had lost not one, but three of its young people, all of them of Irish heritage: Tara Kathleen Shea Creamer; Brian Joseph Murphy; and Daniel Patrick Trant.

Creamer died aboard American Airlines Flight 11, the first of the jetliners to crash into the World Trade Center at 8:46 a.m., while Trant and Murphy, both of whom worked in the trade center, died as the twin towers collapsed just after 10.



Murphy counts Tara's father, James Shea, a fellow member at the Sons of Erin, among his friends. "When I heard Jim's daughter was one of the casualties, it kind of freaked me out," Murphy recalls. "I said to friends of mine, I'd like to do something for Jim and the others who died."

An acquaintance from the masonry institute, who happened to be an architect, offered to draw up a plan, and Murphy began the task of seeking an OK from each of the families of the dead.

Jim Shea remembers how respectful Murphy was in his approach. "After all of the events were held in those first weeks and things had calmed down, Patrick came to me and said they wanted to have something at the Sons (of Erin) and to build a monument. He said they would never forget Tara and Danny and Brian Murphy."

Then came the task of building the memorial and ensuring the message of "We will never forget" would remain for generations to come. The bricks were donated by the Bricklayers and Allied Craftsmen Local 1 of the Massachusetts Building Trades Council, and Murphy says he traveled to Barre, Vermont, to find granite mined at the Rock of Ages quarry perfect for the memorial. It was dedicated three years after the terror attacks on Sept. 11, 2004.

Murphy says he's built a lot of things over the course of a long career in masonry, but none compares to this monument. Part of it may be the personal connection, a trace of which you can recognize in the long pause he takes as he searches for words to express why he did it.

"It really is the nicest thing I ever built," Murphy says. "I draw the most satisfaction out of that. I've worked on jobs in Boston and New York, many in upstate New York, but none of the work compares to this. I'm so happy I did it."

Murphy organizes each year's memorial service at the Sons of Erin, an event that unites the community together with the families of those who lost loved ones. This year's ceremony begins tomorrow at 6 p.m. at the club on William Street in Westfield. He says he always tells each of the families, "Please tell me whenever you want me to stop doing this." None has.

Brian Murphy's sister, Ann, now retired as an English teacher at Southwick-Tolland Regional High School, is among those who doubt the day will ever come when her family stops appreciating all that Patrick Murphy and the Sons of Erin do to remember 9/11.

"Family members and I were extremely honored by the efforts of Patrick Murphy and the members of the Sons of Erin who worked tirelessly and quickly to establish the beautiful and elegant tribute to the lives of the three Westfield natives who perished on that fateful day," she says. "The Sons of Erin members keep the memories alive with the touching and poignant memorial service each year on the anniversary of the 9/11 tragedy. It is so reassuring to see so many community members join to honor not only those who perished but the family members who mourn their loss every day."



Sally Trant, one of Dan Trant's siblings, shares the sentiment. She and her family have no desire to visit Ground Zero in New York City where the trade center once stood and where no trace of Dan was ever found among the ruins. "It has no meaning to us," she says. "To go to the Sons of Erin, to have this monument and get together to spend time with family and friends is important to us. We will always go there as long as there is a ceremony."



Patrick Murphy says he's thankful some of the vast sea of sadness which engulfed the first years' observances has evolved into the event becoming a celebration of life for those lost. Murphy says he marvels at how his friend, Jim Shea, carries forward with a positive attitude. "I don't know how he does it. I have so much respect for that man, and that's one of the reasons I wanted to do this."

He says he's seen Shea at the monument from time to time throughout the year, saying a prayer and moving on. Shea will confide that he feels Tara's presence whenever he visits the club: "Tara's always with me when I'm there."

There are others, too, some of them people Patrick Murphy doesn't know, who spend moments of quiet, peaceful reflection at the memorial.



Ann Murphy is among those visitors for whom the memorial is not a once-a-year destination. "It is so comforting to be able to visit the memorial throughout the year and remember and honor Brian's life. When his daughters visit Westfield, it is an ideal location to celebrate Brian and recount his myriad adventures," she shares "Personally, I feel a sense of peace when I stand in front of the monument, recalling Brian and his all too short life."

Because her brother's remains, too, were never discovered in the wreckage of the trade center, Ann Murphy regards the Sons of Erin memorial as "Brian's final resting place in his hometown where he grew up with solid core values centered on family and faith."

Patrick Murphy prays he'll never have to confront a loss of the enormity any of the 9/11 families endure, but, coming from Ireland, he knows a bit about violence and the havoc it can wreak in the lives of those touched by it. He uses that analogy to share his greater hope for what the 9/11 memorial can deliver as a message: Peace.

"Coming from Ireland, where we've had our share of bombings and shootings, I'd like to see peace in the world," Murphy says. "I've got a daughter and grandkids I completely adore. If anything ever happened to them, I don't know what I would do. As Americans, we are so lucky, and I thank God for how lucky we are."



He wants to ensure generations to come never forget what happened that day 16 years ago, why it happened and, most especially, who died. "With North Korea and everything that's going on today, it's important for us to understand why did this happen and remember the innocent people who died," Murphy says. "They show us what heroism is all about."



Cynthia G. Simison is managing editor of The Republican. She may be reached by email to csimison@repub.com.
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) -- Announcing itself with roaring 130 mph winds, Hurricane Irma plowed into the mostly emptied-out Florida Keys early Sunday for the start of what could be a slow, ruinous march up the state's west coast toward the Tampa-St. Petersburg area.

With an estimated 70,000 huddling in shelters statewide, the storm lashed the low-lying string of islands with drenching rain and knocked out power to close to 400,000 customers across the state.

About 30,000 people heeded orders to evacuate the Keys as the storm closed in, but an untold number refused to leave, in part because to many storm-hardened residents, staying behind in the face of danger is a point of pride.

As of 8 a.m. EDT, the hurricane was centered about 20 miles (30 kilometers) southeast of Key West, moving northwest at 8 mph (13 kph).

While the projected track showed Irma raking the state's Gulf Coast, forecasters strongly warned that the entire Florida peninsula -- including the Miami metropolitan area of 6 million people -- was in danger from the monstrous storm, 350 to 400 miles wide.

Nearly 7 million people in the Southeast were warned to get out of the storm's path, including 6.4 million in Florida alone.

As the hurricane's eye approached the Keys early Sunday, 60-year-old Carol Walterson Stroud and her family were huddled in a third-floor apartment at a senior center in Key West.

"We are good so far," she said in a text message just before 5:30 a.m. "It's blowing hard."

Key West Police urged anyone riding out the storm in that city to "resist the urge" to go outside during the eye, the deceptive calm interlude in the middle of a hurricane. "Dangerous winds will follow quickly," police said in a Facebook post.

Irma was at one time the most powerful hurricane ever recorded in the open Atlantic, with a peak wind speed of 185 mph (300 kph) last week.

It left more than 20 people dead across the Caribbean, and as it moved north over the Gulf of Mexico's bathtub-warm water of nearly 90 degrees, regained strength.

Forecasters said Irma could hit the Tampa-St. Petersburg areas early Monday.

The Tampa Bay area has not taken a direct hit from a major hurricane since 1921, when its population was about 10,000, National Hurricane Center spokesman Dennis Feltgen said. Now around 3 million people live there.

The governor activated all 7,000 members of the Florida National Guard, and 30,000 guardsmen from elsewhere were on standby.

In the Orlando area, Walt Disney World, Universal Studios and Sea World all closed on Saturday. The Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Tampa and Orlando airports shut down.

Given its mammoth size and strength and its projected course, Irma could prove one of the most devastating hurricanes ever to hit Florida and inflict damage on a scale not seen here in 25 years.

Hurricane Andrew smashed into suburban Miami in 1992 with winds topping 165 mph (265 kph), damaging or blowing apart over 125,000 homes. The damage in Florida totaled $26 billion, and at least 40 people died.

By Tamara Lush and Jay Reeves. Associated Press writers Seth Borenstein in Washington; Terry Spencer in Palm Beach County; Gary Fineout in Tallahassee; Terrance Harris and Claire Galofaro in Orlando; and Freida Frisaro, Jason Dearen, Jennifer Kay and David Fischer in Miami contributed to this report.
BOSTON - State police have closed all southbound lanes of I-93 near Exit 12 after two people on a motorcycle were shot on Sunday evening.

Fox 25 Boston reports that the shooter fired from a vehicle that fled the scene.

Both victims were taken to Boston Medical Center with serious injuries.

Traffic is reportedly backed up for several miles as police investigate.

According to CBS Boston, Randolph police said initial reports describe the suspect vehicle as a red or orange Jeep Renegade that exited on to Route 28.

Police are asking anyone who sees the vehicle to call 911.
SPRINGFIELD - The Le Souk Hookah Lounge will soon be open to the public.

Located in downtown Springfield on Lower Worthington Street, the Lounge will offer an array of Mediterranean food, Afghani cuisine and hookah.

Kay Hussain, the owner and executive chef of Le Souk, said that she was happy to finally see the establishment opening. "This was two years of hard, hard work, and today it's finally here," she said.

The new venue held a private event Saturday to celebrate the result of that work. In attendance were Hussain's family and friends, but also an array of city officials, including Mayor Domenic Sarno, City Councilor Melvin Edwards and State Rep. Carlos Gonzalez.

"Blood, sweat, and tears, it takes a lot to open up your own business," Mayor Sarno said.

Hussain, or "Chef Kay" as she's known, said she wanted to see city residents flock to Le Souk, but also hoped people from surrounding communities would become regulars. "Downtown Springfield is a great, great place for people to come and enjoy," she said.

"It's such a wonderful thing to see a new business start," said Councilor Edwards. "We're here to support you, we wish you much success and we're looking forward to being very supportive of you in the future," he said.

Rep. Gonzalez also complimented the new establishment, calling small businesses "the heart of downtown" and expressing excitement for the future of Le Souk.

Hussain has lived in Springfield for many years but is originally from Afghanistan.

The style and design of the restaurant were inspired by a cultural fusion of Moroccan and Afghani culture, she said, expressing the hope people would get a "different feeling" when they entered Le Souk. "It feels like you're sitting somewhere in the Mediterranean," she said. "We wanted to create something where people can come in, enjoy, relax, and just feel like there's no place like it," she said.

Mayor Sarno described the interior of the Lounge as "tremendous, eclectic," complimenting Hussain on the building's design before participating in a ribbon cutting ceremony along with the new business owner. "We're so happy to have chef Kay here," he said.

The Le Souk Hookah Lounge will be celebrating its grand opening and will be open to the public on Wednesday, Sept. 13.
The 22-year-old man accused of killing four people in Groton, Massachusetts Friday graduated from a top music school in Ohio earlier this year and was called a "gentle" person by some friends.

Orion Krause is facing four counts of murder for the killings of three women and one man at 80 Commons St. on Friday. Authorities said he is expected to be arraigned in Ayer District Court Monday.

As of Sunday morning, authorities did not release the names of the victims, but previously said Krause has a "familial" relationship with the victims. All four victims were bludgeoned with a weapon, which was recovered, according to Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan.

The district attorney called the deaths a "situation of tragic family violence."

Krause's Facebook page shows he graduated from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music in Ohio this year. He also attended Camden Hills Regional High School in Rockport, Maine.

The Courier-Gazette & Camden Herald reports Krause won a maestro award for a drum solo in his senior year of high school. The newspaper reports he won honors at the high school.

The president of the Oberlin Conservatory sent a message to the Lowell Sun stating the crime is horrific. The school is offering support to students and faculty.

Louie Krauss, a Baltimore resident, told the Lowell Sun that Krause was a jazz musician who was "one of the most gentle people I've ever gotten to know." Another person who graduated with Krause said the 22-year-old "came across as a really gentle guy," according to the Lowell Sun.

The Oberlin Conservatory of Music, located on Oberlin College's campus in Ohio, said Krause had a senior degree recital in April. The recital involved musicians playing his original works.

Krause also posted on a social networking website for musicians called Fandalsim. Krause discussed his time playing in a Beatles tribute band and his musical days in Rockport, Maine. Facebook posts show Krause played drums in a band called the Michael Beling Trio.

Town officials in Groton said a vigil for the four victims is planned for Sunday evening.

Krause headed to neighboring home in Groton after the killings. He was naked and covered in mud.

"I opened the door and he said, 'I need help,'" Wagner Alcocer said. "I closed the door on him because he was naked, covered in mud and I didn't know what he had in his hands."

He opened the door again and spoke with Krause.

"He said I need help, I need help, I murdered four people," Alcocer told MassLive in an interview.
Senator Calls for Immediate Action to Protect Consumers Personal Data

After Equifax announced that 143 million of its customers had their personal information compromised, U.S. Senator Jon Tester is demanding that the companys CEO appear before his Senate Banking Committee.

In a letter to the consumer credit reporting agencys CEO Richard Smith, Tester said he has grave concerns that millions of Americans had their names, Social Security numbers, addresses, drivers licenses, and birthdates put in jeopardy after a massive data breach at the company.

"I respectfully request that you voluntarily brief or testify before the entire Senate Banking Committee, on which I serve, so we can question you about these new developments of compromised information, how you plan on compensating harmed customers, and how you plan on securing individuals personal data in the future," Tester wrote.

Tester asked Smith why it took nearly six weeks to notify customers that their personal financial information had been compromised. He also raised concerns about how this will impact peoples credit.

"As you well know, what happened to consumers in July is unacceptable and has far-reaching impacts beyond a data breach," Tester added. "I believe it is critically important that Equifax make their customers whole in a timely fashion."

Tester has a long record of protecting consumers and holding corporate executives accountable. In 2016, Tester grilled Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf https://www.tester.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=4907 after it was announced the bank illegally opened over two million deposit and credit card accounts without customers knowledge or consent.

Testers letter to CEO Smith can be found HERE. https://www.tester.senate.gov/files/Letters/2017-09-08%20Letter%20to%20Equifax%20CEO.pdf
Whats the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the words "sustainability" and "economic development" in the same sentence?

Its a common misconception that these two practices are mutually exclusive goals. However, not only are they compatible with, but essential to one anothers success in todays world.

Economic development strategies must reflect the culture and values of a community. That is why no two communities have the same priorities. One of Missoulas community values is sustainability, and the Missoula Economic Partnership tries to reflect that value through our strategies and practices.

JAMES GRUNKE

http://missoulian.com/business/james-grunke-sustainable-economic-development-in-missoula/article_602e154e-69c0-506a-8316-ab181390ae15.html
For one McDowell family, sitting around worrying about the victims of Hurricane Harvey was just something they couldnt do.

My mom woke up on Wednesday and just felt the Lord say stop worrying and go do something, Jordan Freeman told The McDowell News. So together her and I posted on Facebook, and in less than 36 hours through our church, local schools, local businesses, family and friends, we were able to fill two large trucks, a large horse trailer and a U-Haul.

Byrd and her familyDana Brewer, Todd Pool, Eva Pool and Dylan Brewerleft McDowell County on Friday Texas bound with dozens of donations given by McDowell residents. Upon arrival, they met with a local family in Texas who escorted them through neighborhoods and passed out the goods to people in need.

It was the most humbling experience I think any of us have ever had, Freeman said. We saw homes completely under water, cars completely submerged and abandoned, and entire communities with all of their contents in the front yard as they had to gut their homes.

But even in the uncertain future of many Texan residents, Freeman said people were so nice, upbeat and excited to see us.

When a man cried over a bottle of bleach, we all couldnt help but cry with him. When we went to the center to drop off the rest of our items, the people just cried and were beyond thankful that we could even consider coming to help them, Freeman said. The Lord called our family to make this journey and through the help of our community, it was made possible. The Lord stayed with us the entire time. We were gone for 72 hours and we received such a blessing by going.

The Holland family from Texas who came to the center where the family dropped many of their donations moved everyone to tears that day, and wrote about his experience on his website. Here is a portion of what he wrote:

Catherine and I have had plenty of heroes during this whole Harvey hell. Randi and a family of wonderful people from North Carolina are the latest. We saw what was going on and we started loading up donations, Dana Brewer, a North Carolina resident told me. We finally had to tell people that we had no more room in our trailer. What she didnt mention was that they also rented (with their own money) a U-Haul, all so that we could break away from our tears and try to get back to normal. I dont even know whether Dana Brewer and her family are Tarheels, Blue Devils or members of the Wolfpack. But I do know that they are angels. Strawberry Fields Forever  And North Carolina too.

Their entire trip was documented on Brewers Facebook page from beginning to end. To see a photo gallery, visit www.mcdowellnews.com.
By PTI: New Delhi, Sep 10 (PTI) Ten people were arrested in Uttar Pradesh today after Aadhaar-issuing authority UIDAI complained of misuse of operators authentication credentials.

The arrests have been made by the Uttar Pradesh Special Task Force (UPSTF) in Kanpur and adjoining districts after investigation, said the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) in a statement.

Those held were allegedly trying to dodge the UIDAI enrolment process by misusing the mandatory biometric login authentication, it added.

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"This has been a clear violation of the provisions of the Section 34 of the Aadhaar Act, which provides penalty for impersonation at the time of enrolment," said the UIDAI.

However, it added that its enrolment and authentication are "robustly secure systems" that are able to detect on its own any such fraudulent or abnormal activity by any unscrupulous element.

"On detection of such illegal activities, the UIDAI takes necessary legal action against such elements and had filed the complaint, in this case with the UPSTF to lodge an FIR, which investigated and arrested this gang of 10 persons today," it stated. PTI KRH ARD ARD

--- ENDS ---
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First author Matthew Sydes, statistician, MRC Clinical Trials Unit, University College London, UK, said: "Right now, oncologists and urologists want to know which combination is preferable, which is why we conducted this analysis."The analysis presented uses prospectively collected data from the STAMPEDE trial to directly compare patients randomised to the docetaxel and abiraterone acetate plus prednisolone (AAP) research arms while both arms of the trial were recruiting. The randomisations overlapped between November 2011 and March 2013. This comparison included 566 patients, of whom 189 were randomised to receive docetaxel and 377 were randomised to receive AAP, both on top of standard of care androgen-deprivation therapy (with radiotherapy for some patients).The estimate for the primary outcome of overall survival was a HR of 1.16, and the difference between the two treatments was not statistically significant, with confidence intervals capturing estimates favouring both AAP and docetaxel.For the early outcome measures of failure-free survival and progression-free survival, estimates of treatment effect clearly favoured AAP with HRs of 0.51 and 0.65, respectively. The estimates of treatment effect for late outcome measures of freedom from metastatic progression and freedom from symptomatic skeletal events favoured AAP but the differences between treatment groups were not statistically significant.Sydes said: "This comparison was of course underpowered, but it is the only data we have to directly compare docetaxel and abiraterone in this setting."Professor Nicholas D. James, Chief Investigator of STAMPEDE and Consultant Oncologist at University of Birmingham and Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham, UK, said: "The individual trials suggested that abiraterone may have a larger effect on survival than docetaxel, but this did not translate into a clear advantage in this study. Both drugs provide a survival advantage over standard of care alone in men with high risk prostate cancer beginning long-term hormone therapy. This study suggests that starting with either drug is acceptable and choice may depend on availability."Sydes said: "We could only make this head-to-head comparison because of the platform nature of this protocol."Commenting for ESMO, professor Cora N.Sternberg, Chief, Department of Medical Oncology, San Camillo Forlanini Hospital, Rome, Italy, said: "The STAMPEDE trial has a unique design and has prospectively studied more than 9,000 patients with high risk or metastatic hormone sensitive prostate cancer compared to the standard of care. By 2025 it will have reported the results of ten randomised clinical trials.""This comparison offers strong evidence for the combination of standard of care plus AAP versus standard of care alone in terms of failure-free survival and progression-free survival and less strong evidence in terms of metastases-free survival and skeletal related events," she continued. "There was no difference in survival with standard of care plus docetaxel, as compared to standard of care plus AAP."Sternberg pointed out that the toxicity profiles were quite different in the two trials. The AAP results are consistent with the LATITUDE trial, which also favoured AAP over standard of care in high risk patients.She said: "Both STAMPEDE randomised trials support starting hormonal therapy plus either AAP or six cycles of docetaxel. At one and two years, the percentage of patients with grade 3 or 4 (severe) toxicities was low and similar among the two groups. Toxicities associated with chemotherapy for six cycles will dominate decisions about upfront docetaxel. Toxicities associated with AAP are also likely to influence decisions. Physicians will base their choice of therapy on availability and patient characteristics and preferences."Regarding the need for further studies, Sternberg said: "Cardiovascular follow-up will be important in patients taking AAP. In the future, we will get data on whether patients could start with both docetaxel and novel hormonal therapy such as AAP. Ongoing randomised trials in metastatic hormone sensitive prostate cancer will evaluate the combination of novel hormonal therapy and chemotherapy upfront (ARASENS; NCT02799602) as will data from the PEACE 1 trial (NCT01957436) in which two-thirds of patients will receive AAP plus docetaxel chemotherapy for hormone sensitive high risk prostate cancer."Further research on abiraterone in patients with high risk prostate cancer will be presented on Friday, 8 September. STAMPEDE contributes substantially to the network meta-analysis presented on Sunday, 10 September by Dr CL Vale.Source: Eurekalert
You might criticize us for digging old graves, but we still cannot get over the fact that some people in London left music maestro AR Rahman's concert midway because he played a couple of Tamil songs. While some fail to appreciate good music, there are others who love it irrespective of the lyrics. We belong to the second category. Having said that, we don't think there's anyone who will disagree when we say that South Indian songs are one of the trippiest and peppy dance numbers, you just cannot stop yourself from grooving to it. And Jimmiki Kammal' from Mohanlal starrer Velipadinte Pusthakam' is one such number. Unless you were living under a rock, you would have definitely heard this song and slyly danced on it too. Well, you are not the only one who is tripping on it, American talk show host Jimmy Kimmel seems to love this song too. Here's the official video of the song.

While we were busy grooving to this song, there was one guy who noticed the potential of these two becoming a classic example of Homonyms, given how they sound so strikingly similar. He took this opportunity and shared a video of a group of students from Kerala dancing on this song and asked Kimmel if he has heard this or not.

As we all know the rest is history as Kimmel himself reacted to the tweet, saying he didn't know of it earlier but now loves it.

not until now, but I love it! https://t.co/6Qv9StTdpY  Jimmy Kimmel (@jimmykimmel) 8 September 2017

Soon after Kimmel tweeted about the song, Twitter went in a frenzy and their reactions are as hilarious as they can get.

Wow Jimmy Kimmel as jimmiki kammal so funny.u shd telecast dis in ur late night show. Me and wife r

ur huge fans:) Request frm ur Indian fan  Ramesh Asaithambi (@Rameshtamil) 8 September 2017

you will never forget this song once you know the meaning of the lyrics #jimmikkikammal  Vinu CT (@vinuct) 9 September 2017

South Indian Sensation making sensation world wide...!!  praveen mohan (@praveennavoday) 9 September 2017

The least did he know that he's popular coz of this song in South India?  Madhu (@pikadhu) 9 September 2017

Now that Kimmel has listened to the song and loves it too, let's hope that he plays it soon on his Jimmy Kimmel Live' show.
Racial discrimination against people of Indian origin is not new in the West. There have been numerous attacks, verbal and physical, on Indians, especially Sikhs and Muslims living abroad. This time a racist woman targeted a Sikh politician in Canada. Jagmeet Singh, who is a Sikh MPP and a politician for the New Democratic Party, was addressing audience gathered at his campaign event JagMeet and Greet' when the woman interrupted him and began hurling racists abuses.

 Youtube_The Globe and Mail

The woman asked him when his Sharia (Islamic canonical law) is going to end and said that she knows he is part of the Muslim brotherhood. Jagmeet Singh displayed exceptional calm in the situation and not for once did he lose his temper at the constant heckling by the woman.

He instead tried to dissuade her with the message of love and peace. Without malice or anger, he announces how they will not let hate ruin a good event; how hate can be overcome with a message of love. In response to her hurtful words, he said, We love you, we support you. In a heartwarming gesture, the audience joined in and began the chant of Love and courage'.

The woman had no option but to retreat. There was no way her hate was going to win over brotherhood and humanity.

Jagmeet Singh later tweeted a heartfelt letter explaining his response to the woman and why he didn't clarify to her that he wasn't Muslim.

Soon, tweets supporting him and praising his dignified reaction poured in.

The Sikh religion teaches compassion and justice. It's beautiful to see Jagmeet Singh living these values in the face of hate. ?  Simran Jeet Singh (@SikhProf) September 10, 2017

Every Canadian politician, nay EVERY Canadian should emulate @theJagmeetSingh and how he responds to hate. We would all be stronger.  Cory Papineau (@Iam_Canadian) September 10, 2017

Whether I agree with all of your political platform it irrelevant. But I believe you will debate honour with a voice & POV we need to hear.  Glenn Johnson (@Glenn_A_Johnson) September 10, 2017

I saw the video, you were so poised and calm during the entire thing. I'd vote for you if I could   Regina Marie (@regibaby67) September 10, 2017
It has not even been a year since Barack Obama stepped down as the president of the United States to make way for the next POTUS, and the world is already missing him badly. The former president of the United States was seen holidaying with wife Michelle Obama and the internet collectively sighed as it braced itself to welcome the next POTUS. Obama is perhaps one of the most loved leaders of the modern world and he's always encouraged the youth to move forward and achieve its true potential.

 Instagram/Barack Obama

Students of McKinley Tech school in Washington DC school were in for a wonderful surprise when Barack Obama walked in their classroom as their substitute teacher for the day. Who's teaching you today? The former president of the United States.

 Instagram/Barack Obama

Mr Obama non-chalantly walked in and asked if he could crash their class. Naturally, the students were over the moon and it took some time for jaws to come back to their original position. This surprise visit was part of the supporting the next generation of leaders' initiative.

These young people that I met at McKinley Tech today are the reason I'm hopeful about the future. To all the young people headed back to school around the country: Make us proud. You're the next generation of leaders, and we need you. A post shared by Barack Obama (@barackobama) on Sep 8, 2017 at 2:26pm PDT

Speaking to the class of overwhelmed students, he said, One of the things I did throughout my presidency was I'd meet with groups of young people everywhere I went, whether it was here in the United States or when I was traveling overseas. [] Just to kind of hear from them, find out what they're interested in, because I do believe that most of the problems we have are going to be solved by you.

This is not the first time Barack Obama has reached out to students. The former president and his wife Michelle Obama believe in regularly engaging with the youth and have often in the past visited schools and colleges to interact with students.
The Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) will soon run a trial of the new system at the 10 selected airports.

Passengers have often complained about the hassle of getting their hand baggage tagged. Photo for representation: Reuters.

By PTI: Ten more airports in the country, including Pune and Ranchi, will soon do away with the practice of stamping hand baggage tags of domestic passengers, a new air travel regime that began at civil airports in April this year. A total of 17 airports are currently stamp-free, with four airports joining the new protocol on Saturday.

The Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), tasked to secure 59 civil airports against terror and security threats, will soon launch a trial of the new system at Amritsar, Chandigarh, Varanasi, Udaipur, Dibrugarh, Nagpur, Mangalore, Trichy, Pune and Ranchi airports.

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"We will be conducting the trial at 10 more airports. Once the trials are successful, we would be bringing these 10 airports under the stamp-free hand baggage regime by this month end or early October," CISF Director General O P Singh told PTI.

The CISF, along with other aviation security stakeholders, stopped stamping hand baggage tags at Jaipur, Guwahati, Lucknow, Trivandrum, Patna and Chennai airports from June 1.

The practice was done away with at facilities in Delhi, Mumbai, Cochin, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Kolkata and Ahmedabad since April 1.

Sources in aviation security said two airports at Bhubaneswar and Bagdogra could also have been brought under the new regime, with the four airports of Coimbatore, Kolkata, Indore and Vadodara on Saturday, but some "infrastructural issues" delayed the move.

The trial at the 10 airports will ensure that adequate security gadgets and logistics are provided at these facilities so that tight security measures are in place once the stamping of the hand baggage tags is discontinued.

Stamped tags on the hand baggage were a way to ensure that no weapon or ammunition entered the aircraft. The procedure also placed the accountability on the CISF personnel who cleared the baggage.

With the deployment of smart cameras and re-positioning of security paraphernalia at the 10 airports after the trial period, the same objectives are being achieved.

Stamping of hand baggage has been a major irritant for flyers, with airport authorities often receiving complaints from hassled passengers.

A committee comprising officials of the CISF, the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) and airport operators was constituted early this year to ensure a smooth roll-out of this new protocol at all the 59 airports guarded by the paramilitary force.

CISF director general said the new measure will enhance "passenger experience and provide hassle-free security environment to them" while travelling through the airports.

The new protocols are only meant for domestic passengers and those travelling to international destinations will have to get their hand baggage tags stamped as usual.

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Good news: Hand baggage stamping not needed at these airports from April 1

Udan scheme: Now you can fly to these 43 cities, see the full list here

ALSO WATCH: Drama outside Jaipur airport as air hostess, pilot get into ugly spat

--- ENDS ---
By PTI: (Eds: Updating toll; adding fresh inputs)

By Youssra El-Sharkawy

Cairo, Sep 10 (PTI) At least 10 terrorists were killed today by the Egyptian security forces during a raid at their hideouts in a densely populated central Cairo neighbourhood, a security official said.

Five policemen, including three officers, were also injured in the shootout, he said.

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Police raided two apartments in Ard Ellewa district on a tip-off that terrorists were hiding there and preparing to launch attacks, the state-run MENA news agency reported.

When the police forces approached to the apartment, terrorists opened fire on them, the official said.

Ten terrorists were killed in the exchange of gunfire, he said.

A huge cache of arms and ammunition was also recovered by the police.

The militants were said to be the suspected members of a splinter faction of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood group.

Terrorist attacks, mainly targeting police and military, increased after the ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in 2013 by military following massive protests against his rule.

Hundreds of police and army personnel have been killed since then. PTI YES AMS ZH CPS

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The 21st Council meet, and the second since the implementation of GST, put its stamp on a long pending issue by raising total tax on mid-size cars from 43 to 45 %.

By Rahul Shrivastava: The GST Council, headed by finance minister Arun Jaitley, on Saturday announced that there would be no change in tax for small cars. "There will be no additional burden on those buying small cars. There will be a status quo on tax rates on 1,200 cc petrol and 1,500 cc diesel cars," he said.

But for those planning to buy a bigger car, it is not as pleasant. The 21st Council meet, and the second since the implementation of GST, put its stamp on a long pending issue by raising total tax on mid-size cars from 43 per cent to 45 per cent.

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While the mid-segment may cost less, the big car segment has seen a drop in tax from 43 per cent to 48 per cent. On the other hand, the SUV segment too has been nudged to a higher tax bracket. The total tax on SUVs would now be 50 per cent instead of the previous 43 per cent. The tax on passenger carrier vehicles and larger vehicles has been left untouched.

The automobile industry, in its representations to the government, had sought a differential hike formula which included low increase for mid-sized cars. The argument was that a hike in the segment would hit the middle class which is currently the driving force in the auto market.

After the July 1 GST rollout, the industry had slashed prices in the upper-end segment of cars like Mercedes Benz, BMW, Audi, Jaguar and Volvo to attract more buyers. Car prices had fallen by up to Rs 3 lakh as tax rates fixed under GST from July 1 was lesser than the combined central and state taxes before GST.

The GST Council had at its last meeting approved an increase in cess from 15-25 per cent as part of an amendment in the compensation law. Due to the increase in cess rate, the overall tax incidence on various cars is as follows:

Small cars, hybrid cars and 13-seater vehicles: No change

Large cars: Tax up by 5 per cent

SUVs: Tax up by 7 per cent

Mid-size cars: Tax up by 2 per cent

Total tax incidence on different segments:

Mid-size cars: 45 per cent

Large cars: 48 per cent

SUVs: 50 per cent

The overall tax incidence remains at 50 per cent and below.

For the masses, the GST Council brought more joy. Ahead of the festive season, the tax rate on clay idols, incense sticks, saree falls, walnuts and khadi sold at KVIC outlets have been exempted. The council has put broom, custard powder, idly-dosa batter, rubber bands, raincoats, corduroy fabric, computer monitors, table and kitchenware in the exempted from the levy of tax category.

In a move to streamline taxation of branded packaged food, a new framework was finalised at the meet. Jaitley, briefing the media after the meeting, said, "Food items sold in open was categorised at zero per cent tax rate while the branded ones attracted 5 per cent tax. Some businesses were deregistering their brands and selling under corporate brand names, creating inequality of trade, so we amended the rule".

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Explaining the amended list of rules for the exempt and taxable food items, the finance minister said, "If you fall in either of two categories, you will pay 5 per cent tax- one, if on May 15, 2017, you had a registered trademark. Two, if you have a mark or a name on which you are entitled to maintain actionable claim or exclusivity".

This was a ticklish issue about which the government was getting reports from the ground. To avoid 5 per cent GST on branded pulses, cereals and flours, food items were being put in unit containers bearing a registered brand name.

Also, businesses were deregistering brands post GST to avoid taxessince food items that are not branded are exempt of tax while branded and packaged food items attract 5 per cent rate.

With the amended rules even if a brand is deregistered after May 15, 2017 cut-off date it will be considered as a registered brand for the purpose of GST levy. Inhouse brands of large retailers too will fall in the 5 per cent tax slab.

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The GST Council meet also provided relief for handicraft makers. Handicraft traders who sell their produce to other states with annual turnover below Rs 20 lakh do not have to register.

"Overall GST collections have been robust with over 70 per cent of eligible taxpayers filing returns of about Rs 95,000 crore," Jaitley said during the media briefing.

ALSO READ |

What Arun Jaitley said on GST collections and rates: Everything you need to know

The Big Slide: Did both GST, demonetisation do more harm than good to economy?

ALSO WATCH | 70 years of Independence: From Nehruvian socialism to liberalisation, demonetisation and GST

--- ENDS ---
The accused took the girl inside an empty classroom and after raping her, threatened her of dire consequences.

By Press Trust of India: A five-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a peon inside the premises of a private school today in Gandhi Nagar area of Shahdara here, police said.

The accused, identified as Vikas (40), has been arrested, said Nupur Prasad, deputy commissioner of police, Shahdara.

The incident comes a day after a seven-year-old boy was murdered for resisting sexual assault by a bus conductor in a Gurgaon school, which sent shock waves across the country. Vikas had been working in the school for the last three years. Previously he worked as a security guard in the same school, the police said.

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He took the girl inside an empty classroom around 11.45 am when he was walking on the corridors after handing over lunch boxes to teachers, the police said.

After raping the girl, he threatened her of dire consequences, they added.

The matter came to light after the girl complained of bleeding and pain in her private parts to her mother. She was taken to a hospital where her medical examination confirmed sexual assault, the police said.

Traumatised by the incident, the girl was sent for counselling.

According to the police, during her conselling the child said she was assaulted by "a man wearing a cap" and also described his physical attributes.

On the basis of the description, Vikas was nabbed, the police said.

ALSO READ |

Chandigarh shocker: 12-year-old raped while returning from school after I-Day event, case filed

7-year-old Gurgaon schoolboy killed by bus conductor who tried to sexually abuse him, say police

Himachal Pradesh: Violent protests in Chamba over school girl's rape by teacher

ALSO WATCH | 7-year-old boy murdered in Gurgaon school: Bus conductor confesses to killing him

--- ENDS ---
By PTI: (Eds: Adding comments of DCW chief and girls family)

New Delhi, Sep 10 (PTI) A five-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a peon inside the premises of a private school in Shahdara here, the police said today.

The accused, Vikas (40), was arrested last night, Deputy Commissioner of Police, Shahdara, Nupur Prasad said.

The incident came a day after a seven-year-old boys throat was slit by a bus conductor of a Gurgaon school for allegedly resisting sexual assault -- an incident that sent shock waves across the country.

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Vikas, who is from Jharkhand and has two teenage children, had been working in the school for the last three years. Previously he was a security guard there, the police said.

According to them, before being employed in this school, Vikas had worked in two other schools.

The accused took the girl to an empty classroom around noon yesterday and raped her. He also threatened her of dire consequences if she informed anyone about it, the police said.

The girl later complained to her mother about bleeding and pain. She was taken to a hospital where medical examination confirmed sexual assault, they said, adding the victim has been sent for counselling.

According to the police, the girl, during counselling, said she was assaulted by "a man wearing a cap" and also described his physical attributes.

On the basis of this description Vikas was nabbed, they said, adding it is being probed whether he had abused any other students in the past.

So far he has got no criminal history, the police said.

Following the incident, the Delhi Government has ordered a magisterial inquiry into it and Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said a protocol would be chalked out for all city schools to ensure safety of students.

The Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) has issued a notice to the school seeking details of Vikas appointment and whether his police verification was carried out.

DCW chief Swati Maliwal tweeted, "1st Praduman & now dis! Wat wil parents do if horrific crime occur in schools. DCW issuing notice to this school! R teams assisting victim (sic)".

Meanwhile, the girls uncle told PTI, "She was discharged from the hospital today. She is emotionally quite disturbed. The school administration is not taking responsibility for the act that took place inside their premises."

The girls mother demanded that the school should be shut down and the uncle too echoed similar views, saying, "The accused has been arrested but we want the license of the school to be revoked."

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"Strict action should be taken against the management of the school and a case should be registered against them for negligence," he said.

The girls father repairs sewing machines. Her elder brother studies in another school.

Recalling yesterdays incident, the victims uncle said the girl came back from school looking scared and initially did not tell her mother anything.

Later, she went to the washroom where her mother saw bloodstains. She was taken to Chacha Nehru Hospital in Geeta Colony where it was confirmed that she had been sexually assaulted, he said.

The girls uncle said one of the teachers from the girls school had come to visit her, but she was not ready to accept that the incident could have happened inside the school.

"Nobody else from the school turned up to meet us since then," he said, adding they are not going to send her back to that school.

"We keep hearing slogans of Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao. How can we send our girls to school when they are so unsafe?" he said. PTI SLB NSD

--- ENDS ---
By PTI: By Shirish B Pradhan

Kathmandu, Sep 10 (PTI) The Asian Development Bank will provide a USD 152 million to Nepal for the implementation and enhancement of its power transmission and distribution, officials said here today.

The Manila-based Asian Development Bank (ADB) and Nepals Ministry of Finance signed the loan agreement in Kathmandu.

The aid will be granted to the Power Transmission and Distribution Efficiency Enhancement Project (PTDEEP) which supports expansion of the transmission lines in various areas of Nepal and enhancement of the distribution efficiency in the northern part of Kathmandu, according to a statement issued by the ministry.

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The project, having a 4 to 5-year completion period, would incorporate various components such as construction of transmission lines, upgrading sub-stations in Barhabise, Laphsiphedi, Khimti and Chapagaun areas and the rehabilitation and capacity enhancement of distribution system in Kathmandu Valley.

Similarly, ADB has also agreed to provide USD 21 million policy-based assistance to the government of Nepal.

The loan would be utilised in the implementation of South Asia Subregional Economic Cooperations (SASEC) customs reforms and modernisation for trade facilitation programme.

The assistance would be mobilised through budget mechanism, the ministry said.

The ADB had approved a USD 80 million loan in 2013 to Nepal to rehabilitate the sewerage network and build treatment plants to deal with over 90 million litres of wastewater a day in Kathmandu. PTI SBP MRJ

--- ENDS ---
By PTI: (EDS: With minor edits)

Dhamupur (UP), Sep 10 (PTI) Army Chief Gen. Bipin Rawat today unveiled a bust of 1965 Indo-Pak war hero Abdul Hamid here in Ghazipur district and felicitated the widow of the soldier who was awarded Param Vir Chakra, the highest wartime gallantry medal.

On the occasion of the 52nd anniversary of his supreme sacrifice, Gen. Rawat and his wife Madhulika met Rasoolan Bibi, wife of Company Quartermaster Havildar Hamid, and several other war widows and felicitated them.

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The Army chief also unveiled a memorial in Hamids honour in his ancestral village of Dhamupur in Ghazipur district of Uttar Pradesh while exhorting the youth to join the armed forces.

Lauding the contribution made by the people of the district to the armed forces, Gen. Rawat said a recruitment drive will be held soon in Ghazipur to encourage the youthto join the Army and contribute to the countrys security.

Hamid had destroyed several tanks of the Pakistan Army during the 1965 war in the Lahore sector.

"Jahan Hindustan ki sena khadi hai, wahan khatra kisi aur se nahi hai (where the Indian Army is present, there is no threat from anyone)," the Army Chief said.

"Hamid is an inspiration for the youth and his extraordinary bravery made the country proud," he said.

On the Dokalam issue, Gen. Rawat said India and China have held talks and the situation there is under control. PTI Corr MPB NES KUN SC

--- ENDS ---
By PTI: (EDS: With correction in headline, intro, minor edits)

Dhamupur (UP), Sep 10 (PTI) Army Chief Gen. Bipin Rawat today unveiled a memorial of 1965 Indo-Pak war hero Abdul Hamid here in Ghazipur district and felicitated the widow of the soldier who was awarded Param Vir Chakra, the highest wartime gallantry medal.

On the occasion of the 52nd anniversary of his supreme sacrifice, Gen. Rawat and his wife Madhulika met Rasoolan Bibi, wife of Company Quartermaster Havildar Hamid, and several other war widows and felicitated them.

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The Army chief also bowed down and touched the feet of the 80-year-old widow of the Param Vir Chakra recipient.

Unveiling a memorial in Hamids honour in his ancestral village, he exhorted the youth to join the armed forces.

Lauding the contribution made by the people of the district to the armed forces, Gen. Rawat said a recruitment drive will be held soon in Ghazipur to encourage the youthto join the Army and contribute to the countrys security.

Hamid had destroyed several tanks of the Pakistan Army during the 1965 war in the Lahore sector.

"Jahan Hindustan ki sena khadi hai, wahan khatra kisi aur se nahi hai (where the Indian Army is present, there is no threat from anyone)," the Army Chief said.

"Hamid is an inspiration for the youth and his extraordinary bravery made the country proud," he said.

On the Dokalam issue, Gen. Rawat said India and China have held talks and the situation there is under control. PTI Corr MPB NES KUN SC SMJ SMJ

--- ENDS ---
Islamists around the world are waging a very effective campaign against the Buddhist people of Burma.

Aung Sun Suu Kyi's government - to be more precise, Burma's military - have had enough of Islamist attacks in Burma's Rakhine province.

Islam's apologists have many excuses for the Rohingya's violence.

Theirs is a tale of British colonialism, Japanese occupation, Arab traders from the 1400s and the many monarchies that lived and died in the region through the ages.

But what can't be argued is that the most recent crackdown - however you weigh its proportionality - is in direct response to Islamist Rohingya attacks on Burma's military and police.

Rakhine province could be like the many provinces in Thailand where Muslims live relatively peacefully alongside Thailand's other citizens.

Thailand would not tolerate the level of Islamist insurgency we've seen in the Rakhine. Australia wouldn't tolerate it within our borders either.

If the Rohingya stop fighting and fulfil their responsibilities as Burmese citizens, the violence will stop.

Until then Australia has no business in underwriting their Islamist expansionism.

Thanks to a lazy media we are woefully ill-informed on this Islamic hotspot in our region.

Sky News today tells us Rohingya is a place, not a people.

Sky was reporting on Minister for Celebrity Causes Julie Bishop who has sniffed the breeze and dug out the cheque book.

The key to her announcement is in the last line - not the misleading headline.

The money is for the Rohingya themselves - not for authorities in their country Myanmar (Burma). Australia is calling on Burma to show restraint - but makes no such call or criticism of the Islamists.

Assistance for Myanmar? Bullshit.

I have lived in the region. There are many South East Asian communities where Muslims and Buddhists live together without too many problems. But where there is Islam, terror and violence is never far away.

I have never seen Buddhists trying to expand their religion or philosophy by violence or terror. Terror and violence are however central to Islamist teaching.

I would go easy on the rush to condemn Aung Sun Suu Kyi. I'd have no such hesitation in relation to Muhammad.

Here's a little background on Buddhism - from Wikipedia.

Buddhism teaches people how to end their suffering by cutting out greed, hatred and ignorance. When people do bad things, they will get bad consequences. When people do good things, they will get good consequences.

The ultimate goal of a Buddhist is to reach the state of enlightenment (Nirvana) and liberate oneself from endless reincarnation and suffering.

Buddhism was started by Gautama Buddha (563483 BC) in Lumbini, Nepal, while he was a rich prince. He gave up everything to find a way to end suffering. His teachings spread, after his death, to Central Asia, Tibet, Sri Lanka, Southeast Asia, and the East Asian countries of China, Mongolia, Korea, and Japan and have now spread to the west.

According to the Buddha, overcoming suffering allows a person to be truly happy. The Buddha taught that if people make good decisions they would be happy and have peace of mind. The Buddha taught that life is imperfect and that we will suffer. He taught that we suffer because of desire, anger and stupidity, and he showed that we could end our suffering by letting go of desires and overcoming anger and stupidity. The complete letting go of these negative influences is called Nirvana, meaning "to extinguish", like putting out the flame of a candle. The end of suffering, when one is fully awake (put an end to one's own ignorance) and has let go of all desire and anger, is also called Enlightenment. In Buddhism Enlightenment and Nirvana mean the same thing.

"To avoid all evil To do good. To purify one's mind. This is the teaching of all the Buddhas." --Dhammapada, XIV, 5 ,

So how to reconcile Burma's Buddhists rounding on the Rohingya?

Burmese Buddhist Monk Wirathu puts it this way:

"You can be full of kindness and love, but you cannot sleep next to a mad dog."

"If we are weak, our land will become Muslim."

This summary of the Rohingya and their history is taken from the Wall Street Journal.

8th Century: The Rohingya, a people of South Asian origin, dwelled in an independent kingdom in Arakan, now known as Rakhine state in modern-day Myanmar.
CASEVILLE TOWNSHIP  Monday night offers another chance to meet Huron County's reality television family.

The series premiere of "Meet the Putmans" will take place at 10 p.m., and TLC will air six episodes in coming weeks on the TLC cable network.

The family of 26  advertised as three generations under one roof  lives on Sand Point and is building a new 34,000-foot home near Caro.

"Think of the four couples that you are best friends with and enjoy spending a lot of time with," Blake Putman told the Tribune Friday. "Now, imagine living with them."

"That's how I feel about my (familily)," he said.

The family consists of Blakes's parents, Bill and Barb; brothers, Billy and Brandon, and sister, Blair  all of the sibling's spouses, Jennifer, Kacie, Megan and Jamie; as well as Bill and Barb's 16 grandchildren.

They are: Abbigail, Addison, Alena, Bella, Eli, Emma, Gabby, Gia, Isabelle, Jonah, LuLu, Mercy, Mya, Noah and Nova  and a new baby, whom viewers will meet this fall.

The pilot episode premiered in January. It showed Blair's dilemma as she contemplated leaving home because of her husband, Jamie's long commute to Saginaw.

Blake describes the show as a "dramedy," which includes both drama and comedy.

"We were happy with the pilot because we wanted the emotional attachment and humor as well ... We're real people."

"We're reincarnating the old family," Patriarch Bill says in the trailer for the series.

"You are talking to the most blessed person you will ever met," Blake said over the phone to the Tribune, as he drove to his job at Scheurer Hospital in Pigeon.

Unlike most family members, who help with the family business, Putman Development and Demolition, Blake works outside of the home.

He graduated from Central Michigan University Medical School this summer and began working as a doctor at Scheurer soon after.

He said it's interesting to see how others view Michigan's Thumb area.

He said he is amazed by "how much Huron County and Tuscola County bring to the party" in terms of scenic beauty.

Specifically, he was thinking of the production crew that documents the Putman's lives.

It was as culturally shocking to the crew to come here as it was for the family when they recently visited Los Angeles, he said.

Blake has been anticipating the series taking off since word of production began a couple years ago.

"It's like the Olympics that comes every four years," he said. "To see this on Monday come to fruition, we are excited."

"God has blessed us for an astronomical amount," Blake added. "We want to pass blessings on to everyone else. We have the same problems and issues as other families. This is how our family gets through it."

The series, he said, shows how the family deals with situations such as health scares.

He is also glad that his wife, Megan, does not have to raise their children alone while he puts in long hours.

TLC's website describes the series as follows:

"The family is coping with the harsh reality of Papa Bill's health problems, and he's not the only family member being forced to face fears. (Daughter-in-law) Kacie ... has a family history that may force her to make some tough decisions about her future ... the Putmans tackle every obstacle together in a leap to redefine the all-American family."

Blake says it's like Christmas every morning and Thanksgiving every night.

He said the family hopes to move into its new home near Caro by Easter.
Four C-17 Globemaster III aircraft flew out just before midnight on Saturday to transport approximately 300 health care personnel in preparation for Hurricane Irma disaster response operations -- even as parts of Florida were still evacuating before the Category 4 storm hit.

At the request of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the medical staff -- physicians, nurses, veterinary staff, paramedics, fatality management professionals, and experienced command and control staff -- flew from Washington Dulles International Airport to Floridas Orlando International Airport, Air Mobility Command officials said in a release.

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The doctors and staff are part of the National Disaster Medical System, which provides response capabilities to augment existing healthcare systems in affected areas, AMC spokesman Maj.Korry Leverett said in the release.

The C-17s -- from Scott Air Force Base, Illinois; Dover Air Force Base, Delaware; and March Air Reserve Base, California -- were pre-positioned by Air Mobility Command's 618th Air Operations Center at Scott. The AOC plans, tasks, and executes airlift, aerial refueling and aeromedical evacuation missions throughout the globe.

Additionally, there are about 20,000 pounds of medical equipment and supplies pre-positioned at Scott to provide assistance when called upon, AMC spokesman Col. Chris Karns told Military.com.

The service on Thursday deployed a 10-bed patient staging facility and 28 airmen from Travis Air Force Base, California, to St. Croix, to support patient movement from Schneider Regional Medical Center, St. Thomas, to Puerto Rico.

As Irma approached the Florida coast over the weekend, the Air Force said it would be using Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama, and Moody Air Force Base, Georgia, as the staging areas for roughly 800 trucks, and various support facilities to include lodging and dining facilities, airfield operations, security and latrine services.

The Air Force stands ready to provide multiple capabilities, including vertical airlift, security forces, airfield repair and medium altitude persistent airborne platforms in support of hurricane relief operations, Air Force spokeswoman Ann Stefanek said.

Aircrews and aircraft are on alert to provide search and rescue support, she said in an email.

-- Oriana Pawlyk can be reached at oriana.pawlyk@military.com. Follow her on Twitter at @Oriana0214.
Hurricane Irma's northern eyewall hit the Florida Keys at daybreak Sunday as first responders across the state hunkered down in place and the military prepared a massive rescue and relief response.

In a Facebook post, the skeleton crew of sailors who remained near Naval Air Station Key West said, "We're still safe. Conditions are rough. We have power in the main building and breakfast and as soon as there's a lull we'll congregate there." The Navy said 36 personnel from NAS Key West were at a Category 5-rated hotel near the base.

Last week, more than 5,000 personnel and their families at NAS Key West evacuated to Georgia at the direction of Rear. Adm. Bette Bolivar, commander of Navy Region Southeast. Naval Station Mayport near Jacksonville, Florida, and other military installations across the state were shut down until the storm passes.

"We're ready," said Coast Guard Rear Adm. Peter Brown, commander of the Coast Guard's 7th District that has the main responsibility for Irma response. He told CBS early Sunday that the Coast Guard "has made very operational or our service available -- even people from Alaska and Hawaii" to cope with the storm.

Related content:

The Department of Defense has named several installations as staging areas for post-Irma support operations, including Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama; Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, New Jersey; Fort A.P. Hill, Virginia; Moody Air Force Base, Georgia; Fort Bragg, North Carolina; and Robins Air Force Base, Georgia.

The 400-mile wide Category 4 Irma with sustained winds of 130 mph and gusts to 160 mph was expected to proceed on a track up the state's west coast and into Georgia, and produce storm surges of 6-15 feet and widespread flooding on Florida's Gulf and Atlantic coasts.

"It's pretty nasty here," Mayor Bill Barnett of Naples, Florida, on the Gulf Coast told MSNBC well before the brunt of the storm reached his area. Mayor Jack Seiler of Fort Lauderdale on the Atlantic coast said "the federal government seems ready, willing and able to do their job.

More than 100,000 residents of Broward County were already without power before the storm hit the area.

In advance of the storm, Gov. Rick Scott, R-Florida, activated the entire Florida Army and Air National Guard -- about 7,000 available members -- to help with planning, logistics and support. The governor said that 1,000 high water vehicles, 13 helicopters, 17 boats and more than 700 generators were on standby.

In addition, the National Guard Bureau has identified approximately 30,000 troops, 4,000 trucks, 100 helicopters and air evacuation crews that are standing by for Hurricane Irma support.

At the presidential retreat at Camp David, Maryland, on Saturday, President Donald Trump convened a Cabinet meeting ahead of the storm for briefings on the progress of Irma and the following Hurricane Jose, which the National Hurricane Center said took a turn to the north to spare many of the Caribbean islands already devastated by Irma.

Trump directed all federal agencies to back the Federal Emergency Management Agency to "continue supporting state and local efforts to save lives, promote shelter efforts, and expedite requested assistance to affected areas," the White House said.

The president also amended the disaster declaration for the U.S. Virgin Islands to increase from 75 percent to 90 percent the level of federal cost sharing for debris removal, emergency protective measures, and federal assistance, the White House said.

"Search and rescue forces, strategic and vertical lift, planning, communication and medical capabilities are on 'Prepare to Deploy Orders' to facilitate a timely post-landfall response" in Florida once the storm passes, the Pentagon said.

The Army said Saturday night that active duty, Reserve and Army National Guard personnel were either already involved in the Irma response or preparing to give support.

The land service response by Saturday included more than 7,400 soldiers and U. S. Army Corps of Engineers civilians in the U.S. Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and the continental United States, the Army statement said. More than 140 aircraft, 650 trucks, 150 boats and additional assets were on standby.

Army National Guard Soldiers from Florida, South Carolina, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands are currently on state active duty status and are either responding, or prepared to respond to each governor's priorities, the Army said.

In addition, National Guard units in Florida, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina are conducting routine inactive duty training, which they will utilize to prepare for a Hurricane Irma response, the Army said.

On Friday, the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln, the amphibious assault ship Iwo Jima and the transport dock ship New York left Norfolk, Virginia, to be in position for the Irma response effort once the storm passes. The three-ship group was to be joined by the Arleigh Burke-class destroyer Farragut.

The amphibious assault ships Wasp and Kearsarge, with Marines from the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit based at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, and the dock landing ship Oak Hill were already providing relief in the U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.

U.S. Northern Command and U.S. Transportation Command were on standby to respond to state requests for strategic lift to move responders from the Department of Health and Human Services to Florida to support aeromedical evacuation of up to 560 patients per day, the Pentagon said.

-- Richard Sisk can be reached at Richard.Sisk@Military.com,
Camp Lejeune Town Halls Aim to Help Those Exposed to Toxic Water. Heres How You Can Go.

Retired Marine Master Sgt. Jerry Ensminger made it his mission to tell the world that if they lived or served on Camp Lejeune...
The Real Reshuffle (Not)

Lost in the social media clamour over Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal's momentous cabinet reshuffle-in which he appointed himself minister for water resources, his first portfolio halfway into his five-year term-was the little-noticed ascension of Nirmala Sitharaman to the post of India's defence minister. Until wrong-footed by Kejriwal, social media was consumed by which minor AAP functionary might be appointed to which hamstrung ministry. First on Kejriwal's to-do list was to take himself off for a 10-day Vipassana retreat in Maharashtra. As for Sitharaman, it must have been hard for her to miss out on column inches because of Kejriwal's careful manipulation of the news agenda. Otherwise she might have enjoyed days of soft-focus news features, adulation on Twitter, and crowing about women's empowerment. Like how the election of Obama proved that the US was post-racial.

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Rahul Feeds the Trolls

It takes a big man to pass up an easy jibe. Unfortunately for Rahul Gandhi, Twitter is a manifestation of collective small man syndrome. So when it was announced that Rahul would be travelling to the US to lecture Silicon Valley on artificial intelligence, comedians and subeditors across India threw their arms up in exasperation and kicked their cats. What use are they if the jokes and headlines write themselves

Satire or Bigotry?

Speaking of easy jibes. A satirical website in the US published a fake news story about a mosque in Houston refusing to provide shelter to Christians and Jews made homeless by Hurricane Harvey. The story was deliberately ridden with spelling errors ('tenant' for 'tenet', 'thing' for 'think'). "Christian churches all over Texas are doing their parts to help," faux-fulminated the author. A megachurch was widely reported to have kept its doors shut during the most severe flooding. The story, featuring a photo of an imam who had never been to Houston, was shared thousands of times in earnest. But what did the author seek to prove? That only badly educated rednecks can be prejudiced? What the website lacks in satire, it doesn't make up in irony.

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KALAMAZOO, Mich. -

The Western Michigan volleyball team made quick work of Southern Illinois to win the Holiday Inn West Invitational at home at University Arena on Saturday night. The Broncos downed the Salukis 3-0 (25-15, 25-17, 25-22) on the backs of a season-high .330 hitting percentage for their third straight win.

Quinna Ware was named MVP of the tournament.





Quinna Ware led the Broncos (5-3) with 14 kills and a .423 hitting percentage, earning MVP honors of the tournament. Sydney LeMay had 11 kills and seven digs and freshman Rachel Bontrager had 10 kills. Mary Murphy had 27 assists to help the Bronco attack. Both LeMay and Murphy were named to the All-Tournament Team. Kathleen Reilly led the team with a match-high 11 digs.
YPSILANTI, MI - Eastern Michigan University will hold a Ceremony of Remembrance on Monday, Sept. 11.

The ceremony will take place at 8:40 a.m. at EMU's 9/11 Memorial, located behind Pease Auditorium, at the corner of East Cross Street and Perrin Street in memory of those lost and the first responders. The public is invited to attend.

The short ceremony will include the National Anthem, a moment of silence, taps, a prayer and words of perspective and a chance to explore the memorial, which features a large steel beam from the South Tower of the World Trade Center.

The 14-foot steel support beam weighs about 6,800 pounds, and is pockmarked with dents made from molten metal falling on the beam. Written on the side is "south," which is presumed to mean the South Tower, the second one hit but the first to collapse.

The number "74" inscribed appears to mean the 74th floor, just several floors from the 78th floor, where the second plane crashed into the tower. A side on one end of the beam is simply sheared off, testimony to the overwhelming forces at play in the collapse of the tower.

At the University of Michigan, the Young Americans for Freedom are organizing a "9/11: Never Forget Project" on campus from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. on the Diag.

Through this initiative, students will display 2,997 American flags to remember those who lost their lives on Sept. 11, 2001.
YPSILANTI, MI - Eastern Michigan University Police are seeking a suspect who fired shots from a handgun after a fight broke out on campus early Sunday, Sept. 10.

The EMU Police Department responded to the fight at approximately 1:30 a.m. in the area outside of Sellers Hall near East Circle Drive for a report of a suspect shooting a handgun into the air.

According to an alert from EMU, everyone fled the scene from the fight and no injuries were reported. EMU Spokesman Geoff Larcom indicated "several shots" were fired into the air by the suspect during the incident.

The suspect who fired the shots is described as a dark skinned African American male with longer, Afro-style hair and under the age of 18. The suspect was last seen wearing a black shirt and grey sweatpants.

The incident remains under investigation and surveillance cameras are located in the area near the incident, Larcom said. Anyone with information related to these events is asked to contact the Eastern Michigan University Police Department at 734-487-1222.
ANN ARBOR, MI - It's a helpless feeling to experience something the magnitude of Hurricane Irma from a smartphone, Khalida Cook said, as she anticipated the storm hitting her hometown of Fort Myers, Fla., on Sunday afternoon, Sept. 10.

Cook, who was born in Ann Arbor, and raised outside of Columbus, Ohio, before coming back to attend the University of Michigan, evacuated Fort Myers in Southwest Florida on Friday following a mandatory order from the city.

Her family decided to make the drive to New Orleans to seek refuge, experiencing all of the difficulties associated with traveling while keeping friends and family who opted to stay in Florida in the back of their minds at all times.

What is usually an 11-hour drive from Fort Myers to New Orleans turned out to be 18 hours. Cook estimated that only one out of every four gas stations still had fuel, while many of the rest stations weren't in service, so there were no places to go to the bathroom on the family's trip.

"It makes me want to be back there," Cook said Sunday afternoon as the nearly 400-mile-wide storm blew ashore in the morning in the mostly cleared-out Florida Keys. "When you're there, you're worried about your livelihood and your belongings, but when you're not there, you're thinking 'it's going down and I'm not there.' You're thinking about your family and friends that are still there."

The hurricane is expected to make a slow, ruinous march up the state's west coast, hitting the heavily populated Tampa-St. Petersburg area by Monday morning.

By midafternoon, Irma's winds had dropped to a still-fearsome 120 mph, according to the Associated Press.

Many streets were underwater in downtown Miami and in other cities. Roof damage and floating appliances and furniture were reported in the low-lying Keys, but the full extent of Irma's wrath was not clear.



While the projected track showed Irma raking the state's Gulf Coast, forecasters warned that the entire state - including the Miami metropolitan area of 6 million people - was in extreme peril because of the sheer size of the storm.

Nearly 7 million people in the Southeast were warned to evacuate, including 6.4 million in Florida alone, according to the AP.

Cook, who most recently lived in Dearborn while working with MLive Media Group before moving to Fort Myers in May to start her own public relations business, evacuated the area with her husband, Taylor, and children, Connor and Mackenzie. They visited an aquarium in New Orleans on Sunday to take their minds off the hurricane.

At any other moment, she said, many of those who evacuated Florida for New Orleans can be found checking their phones to look at the radar and wonder how family and friends are doing.

"You're constantly checking 'Is it a (Category) 3 or 4?'" she said. "You think 'I want the storm to hit north of me,' but I've also got family and friends in places like Tampa, so no matter what it impacts somebody. The main thing is, I just want it to slow down."

Despite the constant state of anxiety that comes with awaiting the fate of her home, neighborhood, family and friends, Cook said there have still been some moments of hope during a traumatic time.

"One thing that made me feel better was when we were traveling north and west, there were a lot of power and electric companies that were being escorted by the police to help out," she said. "It shows that they are doing a lot to prepare for it."
ADA, MI -- For longtime grocer Alan Hartline, the fun of opening of Kingma's Market second store has been working with a blank slate.

At about one-third the size of traditional grocery stores, Kingma's is as much about what is on shelves, as what isn't.

"You can't get Budweiser here. You can't get Mountain Dew. You can't get Doritos. If you want those, go to Speedway, go to a traditional grocery store," Hartline said. "You can have fun with some healthy local stuff here. That's what I think Kingma's customers are looking for."

Hartline gave MLive a sneak peek at the Ada store, at 444 Ada Drive, that opens at 7 a.m. Monday, Sept. 11.

More than half the products are grown or made in Michigan. Some of it comes just a few miles away from farms like Green Wagon in Ada. In the winter, the produce will be harvested from the CSA's greenhouses. Honeycrisp apples will be delivered this week straight from Kent County orchards.

With 4,000 more square feet than Kingma's original store, the Ada store has expanded on customers favorites such as the "wall of goodies."

This colorful display of stacks of plastic containers are filled with treats that range from healthy to indulgent. There's nuts, trail mixes, dry fruit, edible Legos, gummies and minted cookie bites.

"It's kind of just fun," Hartline said. "Really, when you walk in, it sets the tone for the store. Treasure hunting is part of the shopping experience."

In the coffee section, customers will find only Michigan made options. There's Rowster, which operates a shop in the store, along with coffee from Ferris, Schuil and Higher Grounds out of Traverse City. Schuil has created the Ada Bridge blend only available at Kingma's.

"We have such amazing relationships with these local purveyors," Hartline said. "It's so much fun and they are so very excited to be part of the store, which embodies who they are, too."

Vendors have appreciated having a store where they don't have to compete with the national brands. Many have customized their display models to fit in with Kingma's open market architecture.

The store has lots of culinary offerings with foodies in mind. There's an olive bar with a dozen different varieties along with sun dried tomatoes and marinated mushrooms. The nearby cheese section has 350 varieties from around the world.

"I think it is more of that European approach quite frankly," said Hartline, who thinks shoppers will make daily stops in the store to pick up meals and see what new items are available."

"I think that is what today's shoppers, whether it's the millennials, boomers or empty nesters, want," he adds.

The new store anchors the $13 million Ada village redevelopment, which is reorienting the business district to the Ada River instead of Fulton Street.

It's located a short walk from where upscale condos will built in the development, and across the street from Amway's headquarters where nearly 4,000 employees work.

"So if you are an Amway employee, come in in the morning, go to Rowster order a cup of coffee, come over here and grab a salad and a wrap," Hartline said. "It's made fresh every day with local ingredients."

Unlike the Plainfield location, the Ada store will sell liquor in addition to a wide selection of wine and craft beer.

A focal point of the store will be Fish Lads and Carvers Grand Rapids' Finest Meats, a business Hartline aquired part ownership. In addition to offering a selection of fresh meats and seafood, Fish Lads will have sushi and oyster bars in the store.

Kingma's will share a patio eating area with Gravel Bottom Brewery, which is slated to move in next door.

When Hartline bought Kingma's, a nearly century-old grocery store in 2015, he saw potential for adding new locations.

The business is turning into a family affair.

His oldest son, Andrew, 19, now works at the stores while attending classes at Grand Rapids Community College. He plans to earn a degree in Western Michigan University's lauded food merchandising program, and help his dad grow the Kingma's brand.
By PTI: London, Sep 10 (PTI) In a bid to find how alien observers might be able to detect Earth, scientists have found that at least nine exoplanets are ideally placed to observe the transits of our world.

Scientists from Queens University Belfast in the UK and the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Germany turned exoplanet-hunting on its head, by looking for alien planet that can spot the Earth.

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Researchers identified parts of the distant sky from where various planets in our Solar System could be seen to pass in front of the Sun.

They concluded that the planets Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars are actually much more likely to be spotted than the more distant Jovian planets Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune, despite their much larger size.

"Larger planets would naturally block out more light as they pass in front of their star," said Robert Wells, a PhD student at Queens University Belfast.

"However the more important factor is actually how close the planet is to its parent star - since the terrestrial planets are much closer to the Sun than the gas giants, theyll be more likely to be seen in transit," said Wells, lead author of the study published in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

To look for worlds where civilisations would have the best chance of spotting our Solar System, the astronomers looked for parts of the sky from which more than one planet could be seen crossing the face of the Sun.

They found that three planets at most could be observed from anywhere outside of the Solar System, and that not all combinations of three planets are possible.

"We estimate that a randomly positioned observer would have roughly a 1 in 40 chance of observing at least one planet," said Katja Poppenhaeger, from Queens University Belfast.

"The probability of detecting at least two planets would be about ten times lower, and to detect three would be a further ten times smaller than this," said Poppenhaeger.

Of the thousands of known exoplanets, the team identified sixty-eight worlds where observers would see one or more of the planets in our Solar System transit the Sun.

Nine of these planets are ideally placed to observe transits of Earth, although none of the worlds are deemed to be habitable.

In addition, the team estimated that there should be about ten currently undiscovered worlds which are favourably located to detect the Earth and are capable of sustaining life as we know it.

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To date however, no habitable planets have been discovered from which a civilisation could detect the Earth with our current level of technology. PTI MHN MHN

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India should stand by Bangladesh government over Rohingya crisis, said Awami League general secretary and Road Transport Minister Obaidul Kader at a function in Dhaka on Sunday.

By Sahidul Hasan Khokon: India should stand by Bangladesh government over Rohingya crisis, said Awami League general secretary and Road Transport Minister Obaidul Kader at a function in Dhaka on Sunday.

Ruling party general secretary Kader said, "Whole world is expressing concern over the Rohingya issue. India also expressed concerns. It is very important for us to have this concern of our neighbour India."

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He said, "India was with Bangladesh during the critical period of 1971. We hope that in this time of crisis too, India will be with us."

Kader further said, "A large number of Rohingya people are coming to Bangladesh. They are coming like a river, already three lakh have come. I do not know how long the flow of these currents can be borne. The government should cooperate with all this."

The Rohingyas, who have come as refugees are living in a stable environment, as the government has decided to provide temporary shelters to them.

Meanwhile, on Thursday, the United States had urged Myanmar's military to protect civilians. Whereas Yanghee Lee, the UN's special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, had expressed fear about the worsening situation.

ALSO READ:Thousands of Rohingya Muslims flee Myanmar to Bangladesh, toll rises to 96

Rohingyas in India and terror threat: How jihadi forces may have infiltrated persecuted Muslims of Myanmar

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Boutique resorts chain Aamod Resorts is looking to add 13 properties by the end of 2020 across the country as part of its expansion plans.

The company, which started operations in 2010, currently has 12 properties in India.

"We plan to open 13 more boutique properties by the end of 2020. They will be a mix of the company owned properties and those under management contract", Aamod Resorts Managing Director Gaurav Jain told PTI.

The new properties will be mainly in central India and south India as the company already has a strong presence in north India.

Outside India, "we are focusing on Sri Lanka as we are already present there and it has huge potential as the market is under-serviced at present. The country also has a good infrastructure", Jain said.

When asked how the company plans to fund the expansion going forward, Jain said: "As most of the properties will be under the management contract model, our investments will not be very large. Our investment will be mainly on the properties that we would own".

The company follows an asset light model as it helps in scaling up the operations, he added.

"We are planning for a fund raise by the second half of next year for developing the company owned properties", Jain said, without disclosing the amount they are planning to raise.
Representative image

India's trade deficit is expected to improve in August to about USD 10.3 billion from USD 11.5 billion in July, largely on moderation in export as well as import growth, says a Morgan Stanley report.

According to the global financial services major, the moderation, on a year-on-year basis, is likely owing to higher oil prices and unfavourable base effects.

"We estimate a moderation of export growth to 3.4 per cent year-on-year in August from 3.9 per cent in July and imports of 11.3 per cent in August from 15.4 per cent in July," Morgan Stanley said in a research note.

The report noted that gold imports are also likely to have remained strong in August at around 61 tonnes (USD 2.5 billion), though lower than the pre-GST levels of about 130 tonnes (USD 5.4 billion).

Besides, non-oil non-gold imports, which is a proxy for domestic demand, is expected to continue to post strong growth. According to official data, India's trade deficit stood at USD 11.44 billion in July from USD 7.76 billion in the year ago period.

Cumulative export during April-July of 2017-18 rose by 8.91 per cent to USD 94.75 billion while import increased by 28.30 per cent to USD 146.25 billion, leaving a trade deficit of USD 51.5 billion.

Meanwhile, the second part of the Economic Survey, which was tabled in Parliament in August, India's rising trade deficit and protectionist tendencies on the global front are areas to watch for in the short term.
Madhya Pradesh became the first state in the country to bring in a 'Bhaavantar Yojana' or 'price deficit payment' scheme for agricultural produce, making it possible for the government to bail out farmers without having to buy their produce. The scheme will also help the government avoid the goof-ups and accusations of mismanagement of procured stock as happened recently in the procurement of 8.76 lakh tonnes of onions.

Cleared by the state cabinet, the scheme will enable the government to pay the difference between the modal price and the MSP (minimum support price) of a crop in case prices fall below the MSP. The modal price will be the average price of an agricultural commodity over a two-month period in MP and two other states where it is grown. Eight crops will be covered, including soyabean, of which MP is the biggest producer.

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A brainchild of NITI Aayog member Ramesh Chand, the scheme was earlier tried out on a pilot basis in Goa and, for pulses, in MP. The scheme comes close on the heels of massive mismanagement in procurement of onions-a decision seen as a kneejerk reaction to the farmers' agitation in June. Thousands of tonnes of onion were procured by Markfed (MP State Cooperative Marketing Federation Ltd), only to be dumped and left to rot after the rains. The loss suffered by the exchequer has been estimated at nearly Rs 500 crore. The government purchased the onions at Rs 8 per kg and sold a part of it through the PDS network at Rs 2 per kg. The remainder went for as little as 10 paise a kg after the rains started. A GM of the MP state civil supplies corporation, S.K. Soni, was arrested after a sting operation by the INDIA TODAY news channel showed him fixing a deal to sell procured onions to traders at depressed rates.

Worse still, nearly 25,000 tonnes of onions are still 'missing', with Markfed extending excuses like 'moisture loss', something which even its parent body, the department of cooperation, is not buying. The losses this year were a repeat of the 2016 procurement mess by Markfed, albeit on a much bigger scale. In 2016, 72 per cent of the 1.04 lakh tonnes of onions procured were destroyed while the remaining 27,000 tonnes were sold at Rs 3 per kg. "Onion procurement was an emergency situation," says Markfed MD Gyaneshwar Patil. "It was done during the rains and Markfed has no facilities to store, nor any expertise in procurement. We can't blame anyone for the losses due to damage. However, if other anomalies are detected, action will be taken."

Sensitive to the flak, the Shivraj Singh Chouhan government rolled out the Bhaavantar Yojana. State elections are due in 2018 and the farming community has been the backbone of the CM's support base. There were already concerns after the farmers' agitation in June. The scheme still doesn't address the issue of non-remunerative prices for perishable agricultural produce, a plank of the farmers' agitation. Also, the scheme doesn't deal with inefficiencies at the mandis or cartelisation, both of which are responsible for farmers not getting their due. "We will address mandi reforms administratively in the months to come," says principal secretary, agriculture, Rajesh Rajora.

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After selling its domestic oil business to Russia's Rosneft and partners for USD 12.9 billion, Essar Group has no plans to sell its Stanlow refinery in the UK, a senior company official said.

Essar Oil (UK) Ltd Chief Executive S Thangapandian said announcement of fresh investments of USD 250 million in upgrade and expansion of Stanlow shows the group's commitment to stay invested in the sector.

"The investments which are being made goes to show that the promoters want to stay invested in oil and gas sector," he told PTI. "We are sure they will stay invested in oil and gas and Stanlow refinery."

Essar Oil (UK) Ltd, the firm that owns and operators the Stanlow refinery, is owned by billionaire Ruia brothers' Essar Group, which had sold Essar Oil to Rosneft last month.

Rosneft, the world's largest listed oil company, acquired 49 per cent stake in Essar Oil, which operates a 20 million tonnes a year Vadinar refinery in Gujarat, the adjacent port and about 3,500 petrol pumps.

Netherlands-based Trafigura Group Pte, one of the world's biggest commodity trading companies, and Russian investment fund United Capital Partners split another 49 per cent equity.

Stanlow as also the coal-bed methane (CBM) business of the company was not part of the sale.

Sited on a 770-hectare industrialised area of Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, Stanlow supplies 16 per cent of all road transport fuels in the UK, Thangapandian said.

He said the new investment would boost the crude oil throughput at Stanlow to 9.7 million tonnes by March 2018 from current 9.09 million tonnes.

Also, the company is targeting 400 petrol pumps in the UK in five years from the current 39.

The investment in the revamping of certain units of the refinery would help cut down on crude oil processing cost, improve product slate and lead to marginal increase in capacity, he said.

He said the promoters have so far invested USD 800 million in Stanlow since acquiring it from Royal Dutch Shell in 2011.

Essar had paid Shell USD 350 million to buy Stanlow, the UK's second largest refinery.

Stanlow has a capacity of 296,000 barrels per day (14.8 million tonnes per annum) but operates at much lesser capacity.
Former Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah

Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah slammed Union Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad for accusing the state government of failing to give protection to slain journalist Gauri Lankesh, saying she never sought protection.

"The central minister said the government knew about the threat, and Gauri had sought security, but the government did not give. All these, it is the most irresponsible statement given by a central minister, who also is a law minister," he told reporters.

Prasad on September 8 had shown copies of news reports on Lankesh's brother, Indrajit, claiming that she had worked for the surrender of Naxalites and asked as to why the Siddaramaiah government had not provided her security.

Siddaramaiah said if Gauri Lankesh had sought security, the government would have given it.

"If someone asks for security, we will give it... Nobody expected it. She never ever spoke about threats and sought security," he said.

Gauri Lankesh also was "a very good human being" and did not hate anyone and even talked to her opponents, Siddaramaiah said.

Replying to a query, Siddaramiah said both Maharashtra and Karnataka police were coordinating to crack the cases related to the killings of rationalists M M Kalburgi, Narendra Dabholkar, and Govind Pansare.

"It is not that no progress has been made in Kalburgi killing. Some progress has taken place, but the police are yet to gather evidence to find out assailants," he said.

Dabholkar was shot dead on August 20, 2013, in Pune while he was on a morning walk. Pansare was shot at on February 16, 2015, in Kolhapur and succumbed to his injuries on February 20 that year.

State Home Minister Ramalinga Reddy had also said a couple of days ago that Lankesh had never asked for security.

The 55-year-old Left-leaning journalist, a fierce critic of Hindutva politics, was shot dead at the doorstep of her house while she was returning from her office on September 5.

Her killing came in for condemnation from various quarters. The state government has formed a special investigation team (SIT) to probe the case.
You may not be able to use your SIM cards after February 2018, in case it is not linked to Aadhaar. The government is planning to deactivate the unlinked SIM cards from next year.

According to an IANS report published on NDTV, the move is in order to be in compliance with a Supreme Court order in the Lokniti Foundation case in February this year. All SIM cards need to be verified with Aadhaar within one year from date of the judgment. Government sources told IANS that this will ensure that criminals, fraudsters and terrorists will not be able to use the issued SIM cards.

However, the biometrics will not be stored by mobile operators. They will only collect the data and send it to UIDAI servers in encrypted form.

Watch || How Aadhaar Will Transform India In The Future

This report comes after the last date to link PAN and Aadhaar was extended till December 31.

The government has made Aadhaar compulsory for a plethora of services and financial transactions. These include opening a bank account, to get a PAN card, to file IT returns, in transactions over Rs 50,000 and to receive government subsidies on LPG, fertilisers.

Also Read: A 3-step guide on how to link Aadhaar with PAN card

The deadline to furnish Aaadhar to avail benefits of social welfare schemes was also extended till December 31.

Incidentally, a nine-judge Constitution bench of the apex court had on August 24, declared the Right to privacy as a Fundamental right saying it is protected as an intrinsic part of the right to life and personal liberty under Article 21 and as a part of the freedoms guaranteed by Part III of the Constitution.

This might affect the wide use of Aadhaar services as the Supreme Court is set to decide on its validity and security.
A policeman stands guard as a volunteer (bottom R) of the Hindu nationalist organisation Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) looks on in front of a hoarding featuring Prime Minister Narendra Modi (L) and Amit Shah, president of India's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), outside the venue of the party's national executive meeting in Allahabad, India, June 12, 2016. REUTERS/Jitendra Prakash - D1AETJMITFAB

After Nathuram Godse pulled the trigger thrice to assassinate Mahatma Gandhi on January 30, 1948, his alleged links to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) got the organisation banned.

At that point, the RSS was merely an organisation that advocated Hindu values and supremacy and did not wield much political influence. And yet somehow, nearly 70 years later, the top three constitutional posts in the country are currently occupied by products of the RSS.

How did this come to be? How did an organisation which boycotted the Quit India movement and the national flag manage to gain such a vast following in free India?

To answer these questions, we must take a look at RSS past, what gave birth to it, and how it has evolved since.

Origin and history

Inspired after reading Vinayak Damodar Savarkars Hindutva and meeting him in person while incarcerated at Ratnagiri prison, Keshav Baliram Hedgewar founded the RSS in 1925, with an aim to strengthen Hindu society.

Hedgewar believed the only reason for a few Britons managing to hold control India was the lack of unity and valour among Hindus. To remedy this, he recruited young Hindu individuals with a hunger for revolution, gave them a uniform resembling the one British policemen sported, and armed them with lathis.

However, since the RSS isolated itself from the Indian freedom movement, the ideology behind the birth of the RSS has been disputed by scholars and historians.

In fact, when MS Golwalkar became the Sarsanghchalak (supreme leader) of the RSS in 1940, he continued to strengthen this isolation from the freedom movement by saying that the RSS aim was to achieve freedom by fighting for religion and culture and not against the British.

Golwalkar went as far as to actually shut down the military department of the RSS when ordered to do so by the British during the Second World War. The British government noted the RSS was not supporting any civil unrest against them at the time, and the Bombay government acknowledged that the organisation stayed away from participating in the Quit India movement, which broke out in August 1942.

Around five years later, a few months before India gained independence, the RSS openly opposed the tricolour and did not recognise it as the national flag. The Organiser, which was the Sanghs mouthpiece then, demanded the Bhagva Dhwaj (saffron flag) be adopted as the countrys national flag.

The people who have come to power by the kick of fate may give in our hands the Tricolour but it never be respected and owned by Hindus. The word three is in itself an evil, and a flag having three colours will certainly produce a very bad psychological effect and is injurious to a country, Golwalkar wrote in an article in the Organiser.

On January 30, 1948, Nathuram Godse, a Hindu supremacist and alleged member of the RSS, walked into the compound of Birla House in New Delhi and shot Mahatma Gandhi thrice in the chest.

Gandhi shortly succumbed to his wounds and several RSS leaders were arrested in connection with the incident in the few days that followed. Five days after the assassination, on February 4, the RSS was banned.

The organisation has since been acquitted of its association with the unfortunate incident and has disowned Godse. However, in a letter to Hindu Mahasabha leader Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, then Deputy Prime Minister Vallabhbhai Patel had said the RSS and the Hindu Mahasabhas actions were responsible for creating the atmosphere that made Gandhis assassination possible.

The ban on the RSS was lifted in 1949, after the organisation vowed to stay away from politics and Golwalkar promised to mention the partys loyalty to the Constitution of India and the national flag more explicitly in the RSS' constitution.

Rise to prominence

For a long time after the ban on it was lifted, the RSS did not find any political standing in the country. It was not until 1975 when the Indira Gandhi government proclaimed emergency rule in India that the RSS rose to prominence.

Perceived as being close to leaders from the Opposition, the organisation was among a number of organisations banned by the government. However, the RSS defied the ban and thousands of Sangh members from shakhas around the country took to Satyagraha to express their discontent and protest against the violation of human rights.

When this did not result in any positive outcome as such, RSS members started forming underground movements with an aim to restore democratic governance, and started secretly publishing and distributing literature that was censored in the media.

A substantial amount of funding was raised and leaders both in and out of jail started forming networks of communication to coordinate the movement. The RSS had even said that at the time, it had only one purpose and that was bringing back democracy.

After the Emergency came to an end in 1977, the ban on the RSS was lifted and it quickly immersed itself into mainstream politics. Under the direction of Sarsanghchalak Madhukar Deoras, the RSS merged its political arm the Bharatiya Jan Sangh, created in 1951, into the larger and more diverse Janata Party.

This was the first ever instance of the RSS openly getting involved in electoral politics. The Janata Party defeated the Indian National Congress in the 1977 General Elections and became the ruling party for the next three years.

After losing the 1980 General Elections, the Janata Party split and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) emerged as the Sangh's new avatar. It adopted socialism in order to shield itself from allegations of communalism. However, the BJP won only two seats in Parliament in the 1984 General Elections amid widespread belief that the RSS had withdrawn support to the party and even voted for Congress candidates.

Later that decade, the BJP took notice of the RSS, and the Vishwa Hindu Parishads movement to build a Ram temple in Ayodhya was gathering momentum. Seeing this as an opportunity, the party openly embraced Hindutva and thrust itself to the forefront of the movement.

Between September and October 1990, the BJP, along with the RSS and VHP, organised a march called the Ram Rath Yatra. The purpose of the yatra was to support the VHP and RSS demand to build a temple to the Hindu deity Rama on the site of the demolished Babri Masjid. Incidentally, a young Narendra Modi, who was then a member of the BJPs National Election Committee, had a hand in organising the yatra that was led by LK Advani, who would eventually go on to become Deputy Prime Minister.

What followed was a period of communal divisiveness the likes of which India had not seen since Partition. In the eyes of the public, the BJP and the RSS were one and using this momentum, the party came to power in 1996, albeit for just 13 days.

But this was just the beginning. In 1998, the party formed an alliance government, which stayed in power for 13 months, during which it fought a war with Pakistan. In the general elections that followed in 1999, the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance came to power and stayed there for the next five years.

However, it was in these five years that the RSS belief that being involved in electoral politics could help build the country based on its own ideologies was put to the test. Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who was a RSS swayamsevak himself, chose to ignore the RSS demand for a Ram temple in Ayodhya and instead focused on other issues.

Coming into power

The RSS had been replacing its old guard with younger members since the late 1990s.

In 2005, when LK Advani visited Mohammad Ali Jinnahs tomb in Pakistan and praised the leaders secularist views, the RSS unified against him. Advani was asked to report to the RSS headquarters and tender his resignation from the post of BJP President with immediate effect.

However, Mohan Bhagwat, who was then the general secretary of the RSS, took a softer approach to the whole issue. He suggested that the RSS, as a major organisation of volunteers, should strive to maintain cordial relations with Indias neighbours and that the BJP should hold on to Advani and make him a mentor for the party.

When Bhagwat was appointed Sarsanghchalak of the RSS in 2009, he first focused on repairing the RSS relations with the BJP. Unlike his predecessor Sudarshan, who was against going to Advanis home and discussing the issue with him, Bhagwat believed that given Advanis age and seniority, he ought to be treated with some respect.

However, despite having gone to Advanis house and paying him due respect, Bhagwat did not back down from his argument. And therein lies the biggest reason for the RSS coming into real power in the years that followed. Bhagwat not only gained in influence within the RSS and the BJP, he also achieved the unique combination of being both authoritative and accommodative at the same time.

After BJP lost the 2009 General Elections, Bhagwat told Advani he was of the mind to send 500-700 volunteers from the Sangh to strengthen the party at various levels, but left it up to the latter to accept or reject the assistance.

Having lost two general elections in a row, the RSS and the BJP started looking for a prime ministerial candidate for the 2014 elections. Bhagwat had long had Pramod Mahajan in mind, but since Mahajan was shot dead by his brother in 2006, he threw his weight behind Narendra Modi, who had been the Chief Minister of Gujarat since 2002.

Notwithstanding his ability as an organiser and leader, many in the RSS were opposed to the idea of Modi being the BJPs primary candidate. There were question marks around the outcome of the investigation against him for his alleged involvement in the 2002 Gujarat riots.

However, a year before the election, the RSS and the BJP had to make a choice between a pro-Hindutva candidate and a secular candidate and they largely agreed to go with the former. By June 2013, Modi had already been chosen to head the BJPs national campaign committee.

The rest, as we know now, is history. Modis popularity helped BJP sweep the 2014 General Elections with a single-party majority and ensured the party steamrolled over almost every state assembly election that followed. BJP is now in power in 18 of Indias states and the RSS now has over 50,000 shakhas across the country. With more than 6 million volunteers, RSS says it is the worlds largest voluntary organisation .

A couple of months ago, former Bihar Governor Ram Nath Kovind was voted President of India, and former Union minister Venkaiah Naidu was elected Vice- President. President Kovind, Vice-President Naidu and Prime Minister Modi all trace their roots to the RSS.
gurmeet ram rahim singh

Irked by recent controversies surrounding self-styled godmen, the Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad, the apex body of Hindu sadhus, released a list of 14 "fake babas" and demanded a crackdown on "rootless cult leaders" by bringing in a legislation.

Giving out the list, which includes names like Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, Rampal, Asaram and his son Narayan Sai, the Parishad's president Swami Narendra Giri said, "We appeal to even the common people to beware of such charlatans who belong to no tradition and by their questionable acts, bring disrepute to sadhus and sanyasis."

The Parishad is a council of akharas, which are monastic orders drawing their spiritual lineage from 8th-century seer Adi Shankara, who is said to have established orders of martial monks with the aim of defending the Hindu Dharma.

The development comes close on the heels of a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) court in Haryana sentencing Dera Sacha Sauda chief Ram Rahim to 20 years in prison for the rape of two of his former disciples.

The large-scale violence took place in various parts of Haryana, Punjab and Rajasthan following his conviction by the court in the two cases.

41 people were killed in Haryana in the clashes. However, no death was reported from Punjab and Rajasthan.

While Asaram is in jail in connection with a sexual assault case, his son Narayan Sai, also booked in a similar case, is out on bail.

Rampal is behind bars, facing trial in a number of cases relating to violence.

"We are going to send copies of this list to the Centre, the state governments as well as all the opposition parties with the demand that a strong legislation is brought to check the activities of these self-styled cult leaders," Giri told reporters.

He also claimed that he had yesterday received a phone call from a person claiming to be a devotee of Asaram, who "threatened to kill me if a mention was made of his guru in the list of fake babas we planned to bring out today".

"An FIR has been lodged at the Daraganj police station in the city, based on a complaint of Giri. The matter is being investigated," Senior Superintendent of Police of Allahabad Anand Kulkarni said.
The second round of discussions between India and Pakistan on Ratle and Kishanganga hydroelectric projects, over which Islamabad has raised objections, will take place in Washington on September 14 and 15 under the aegis of the World Bank.

Union Water Resources Secretary Amarjit Singh will lead the Indian delegation comprising representatives from the Ministry of External Affairs, Power, India's Indus Water Commissioner and Central Water Commission.

"A multi-disciplinary (Indian) delegation led by our secretary (Singh) will hold second round of technical discussions on Ratle and Kishenganga hydroelectric projects with Pakistan and the World Bank on September 14 and 15," a senior official said today.

The first round of discussion had taken place in Washington on July 31 and August 1 this year, the official said.

Following the first round, the global lender had also issued a factsheet giving its stated position on the IWT under which India is allowed to construct hydroelectric facilities on the shared Indo-Pak rivers.

As per the IWT provisions, India does not require any approval or clearance from third party for constructing projects such as Kishenganga on the Western Rivers.

The World Bank had also maintained that the first round discussions were held in a spirit of "goodwill and cooperation".

Pakistan had approached the World Bank last year, raising concerns over the designs of Ratle (850 MW) and Kishenganga (330 MW) hydroelectricity projects located in Jammu and Kashmir.

It demanded that the World Bank, which is the mediator between the two countries under the 57-year-old water sharing pact, set up a court of arbitration to look into its concerns.

On the other hand, India asked for appointment of a neutral expert to look at the issues, contending the concerns Pakistan raised were "technical" ones.

Following this, the international lender had in November 2016 initiated two simultaneous processes--for appointing neutral expert and establishment of court of arbitration--to look at technical differences between the two countries in connection with the project.

The simultaneous processes, however, were halted after India objected to it.

After that, representatives of the World Bank held talks with India and Pakistan separately to find a way out. The first and the upcoming second round are being considered as part of the same effort by the World Bank.
Every three seconds, a person attempts suicide. And if you notice the red flags on time, you will be able to prevent it. Neerja Birla, Founder and Chairperson of Mpower, a firm specialising in offering care and allied services for mental health said there is still a huge gap in treatment for mental health issues in India.

September 10 is observed globally as World Suicide Prevention Day to create awareness about mental health and also help observe early signs to aid prevention. The World Health Organization estimates over 800,000 people die by suicide each year, thats one person every 40 seconds.

In India, there are 3800 psychiatrists, 898 clinical psychologists, 850 psychiatric social workers and 1500 psychiatric nurses. This is very small. This translates to 3 psychiatrists per million people and according to WHO, this is 18 times fewer than the Commonwealth norm which is 5.6 psychiatrists per 100,000 people, said Birla. She said the country is short of 6200 psychiatrists.

In March, the Mental Healthcare Bill was passed by the Parliament that decriminalises suicide and encourages coverage for mental health-related ailments. Birla said this has also also increased the funding to centres of excellence in mental health which will boost efforts to create awareness and provide support.

However, basic facilities like insurance is still being talked about. Regular medical reimbursement programmes offered by corporates also do not cover either medication or visits to the therapists for mental health issues.

If you are running a fever, you never see any stigma associated with picking up the phone and talking to a doctor. There is a certain schema there that anything to do with our mind makes us weak and vulnerable. We do not want to then admit to it, said Birla.

Mpower, which started its Mumbai centre in May 2016, is now looking to expand to other cities as well. Opening our first counselling cell at BITS Pilani, Goa for the campus. We want to take it to Pune and Bangalore and also want to target university campuses and have reached out to instituites like IIT Madras, she said.

While Mpower and other institutions like them have been reaching to educational institutes and corporates, Birla said that it is still early days. In their outreach programme, Mpower offers free workshops to schools and also encourage them to take a student-assisted programme. They will also be opening up a helpline next year.

In Mumbai, we reached out to 180 schools in Mumbai we reached out too, but only five have said yes. Why are we shirking it under the carpet and not giving it due importance? People are talking about it but when it comes into taking action, it is slow, she added.

According to research, the first one minute where a person contemplates suicide is the most crucial. Birla said that through their campaign, they have been trying to create an awareness about this and encourage individuals, especially yougsters between the age of 18-30 years to seek help and also listen to people in need of help.
I have a guy who needs convincing. Him: No, no way, nope. Me: Oh, come on. Well get up at 4 a.m., sunrise already in some parts of the world. Well throw our coats over our pajamas and take a...
By PTI: Mumbai, Sep 10 (PTI) In an incident that has gone viral on the social media, BJP legislator Ameet Satam is seen physically assaulting local hawkers and verbally abusing police officials present there.

The BJP MLA from Andheri-West assembly constituency claimed that police officials failed to do their duty and demanded that their salary be paid to him as he is taking action against the hawkers.

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"I have not committed any crime. A case may be registered against me if I am at fault. But, action should also be taken against police officials for allowing hawkers to operate freely," Satam said.

When asked to comment over the complaint filed by hawkers against him, Satam said allegations are made when action is taken against wrongdoers.

Condemning the incident, Shiv Sena spokesperson Neelam Gorhe questioned if this is the good governance BJP wants to implement in the state.

"If this is the style of certain BJP leaders, is this their style of good governance they want to implement? The hawkers policy has been finalised with guidance by the Court and it is the governments responsibility to implement it across the state," she said.

"By abusing the police officers, the BJP MLA has insulted the police force. It is condemnable," Gorhe added. PTI MM RMT

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Rabbis installation at Keneseth Israel will get a boost of student creativity
September 10, 2017

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By PTI: By Aditi Khanna

London, Sep 10 (PTI) The UKs reputable Cambridge University has advertised a new full-time post of a sexual assault and harassment adviser aimed to "bolster" advice and support available to a student.

The new position will be part of the world-famous universitys counselling service and is believed to be the first for a British university.

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The new position will be part of the world-famous universitys counselling service and aims to "bolster the advice and support available to a student", the university said in reference to the job.

According to the advert, the successful applicant will work with the police, the local sexual assault referral centre and Cambridge Rape Crisis.

It involves "individual work with students" and also "designing and running workshops for staff".

"The university is continuously and actively working to improve the prevention, response, support and investigation of all instances of harassment, hate crime and sexual misconduct," a university spokesperson told the BBC.

"This new post has been created to supplement and bolster advice and support available to students through the college tutorial system, and in particular offer a source of specialist support to students," the spokesperson said.

It is reported that the new 40,000-pounds-a-year post was created following growing complaints by female students of inappropriate physical contact, wolf whistles and jokes about rape.

Last year, Oxford University started compulsory sexual consent workshops. The sexual consent course also covers legal aspects of consent and general sex education.

According to the UKs National Union of Students, one in five studentsacross the UK experience some sort of sexual harassment in their first week of term. PTI AK MRJ MRJ

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A new child care center could be coming to Morganton, and thats no joke, despite the name Giggles N Grins.

But before it becomes official, the Morganton City Council will vote on whether or not to provide loans to the child care center and another proposed business during its next meeting Sept. 11.

The council, which will convene one week later than usual due to Labor Day, also will vote whether to purchase new city vehicles, how to resurface city streets and on rules for the new skate park, according to the agenda.

Giggles N Grins Child Care & Learning Center may be a familiar name to Burke County residents due to its other locations in Valdese and Drexel.

John Gantt and Amber Bernard-Gantt are the owners of the proposed facility, which would be located at 525 Hopewell Road in Morganton.

The Gantts are asking for $30,000 of small business loan funds for startup working capital, to purchase classroom supplies and to modify the building, the agenda says.

The new center will provide care for children between infancy and pre-school. Such a facility is needed in Morganton, according to a recent market study cited in the agenda.

The Gantts will both personally guarantee the loan, which will be for a term of nine years, the agenda says. If all payments are made on time for 4.5 years, the remaining half of the principal balance will be forgiven.

The small business loans will come from Community Development Block Grant funds. The city has set aside these funds to encourage small businesses that meet Housing and Urban Development guidelines and Morgantons 2030 goals, the agenda says.

The council also will vote on a separate loan in the amount of $5,000 to assist Corey Totten with renovating a building at 106 N. Sterling St. Totten plans to renovate the building, which was formerly Vivians Sewing Shop, into a hair salon, the agenda says.

Ben Belton, the property owner, has agreed to issue a lease to Totten for five years, which is the life of the loan, the agenda says. Totten has agreed to complete renovations and open within 60 days from the loan date.

Totten will put up her car as collateral, the agenda said.

Also on the agenda is a proposal to establish rules for the new skate park. The rules state that anyone riding a skateboard or similar device must wear a helmet, elbow pads and knee pads, the agenda says. Signs will be placed in the park to notify the public of the requirements.

By putting this ordinance in place and having proper signage, the city will be relieved of liability for personal injury or property damage to those who skate in the park, the agenda says.

A memorandum of agreement also will be voted on by the council. The MOA is for Duke Energy to fund $139,600 for the city to develop a trailered boat ramp and 10 gravel parking spaces near the Morganton Weir, the agenda says.

The council also will vote on an upgrade to the Glen Alpine Pump Station, an inspection for the Silver Creek outfall sewer line, a system for determining which streets should be resurfaced and a proposal to purchase a new dump truck and crew cab pickup truck. All of these items fall under the consent agenda.

Ryan Wilusz is a staff writer and can be reached at rwilusz@morganton.com or 828-432-8941.
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Read our editorial policy to learn more about our process.
By PTI: By Sangita Bakaya

Lucknow, Sep 10 (PTI) The Congress has launched a "vigorous" campaign to highlight the "bad shape" of medical care at government hospitals in Uttar Pradesh, days after scores of children died at hospitals in Gorakhpur and Farrukhabad.

Under the Rajiv Gandhi Swasthya Sewa campaign, teams of leaders and party workers have started touring hospitals in the state to find out the "reality" of the medical facilities and provide as much help as possible to patients.

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Congress MLC Deepak Singh, who has been leading the campaign along with MLA Aradhana Misra, told PTI that the partymen are covering three to four districts everyday meeting patients and attendants.

He claimed his partys intention was not to attack the government for political mileage but to contribute in improving the medical situation.

The teams will listen to the problems of the people, make efforts to resolve them and prepare a status report on the conditions in government hospitals. They will also take stock of pathological labs and operation theatres, Singh said.

"We have found many hospitals in remote areas where the entire medical care hinges on a single doctor on contract, whereas in hospitals or community health centres on main routes, the number of doctors posted is far above the sanctioned strength," he said.

The state of medical equipment, hygiene, medical care and the availability of medicine are very bad and patients and their attendants face immense hardships, Singh said.

He said the campaign was started under the guidance of Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee chief Raj Babbar who in turn was given instructions by party vice president Rahul Gandhi on August 20, in the wake of the Gorakhpur deaths. The campaign was intensified after 49 children died at a Farrukhabad hospital.

"It is not just Gorakhpur or Farrukhabad hospitals. There are several other district hospitals where health services are in very bad shape and our effort is also to draw governments attention to it," he said, adding that there are some other cases which have not found enough attention so far.

Singh cited the example of Bahraich district where, he claimed, 40 children died in 15 days because of "medical negligence". He added that a team will visit the district soon.

"The teams have been visiting the districts and handing over memorandums to the respective district magistrates and administration to draw their attention. But, if there is no improvement in the near future or the government does not respond to the situation we will not desist from taking the course of agitation," he warned.

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The Congress leader said the tour programme till September 25 has been finalised.

"As part of our swasthya sewa we have asked our district units to set up hoardings before all government hospitals with their phone numbers so that needy people can contact us personally and we can contribute by helping them in whichever way we can," he said.

Singh said that a state ministers statement that "August is the month of deaths in Gorakhpur", where encephalitis claims several lives every year, prompted the party to come forward and contribute in the exercise to ensure that all remain healthy.

Congress leaders were the first to visit the government- run BRD Medical College hospital in Gorakhpur soon after the death of 30 children in two days last month with central leaders Ghulam Nabi Azad and Rahul Gandhi rushing there.

Similarly, UPCC president Raj Babbar had led a delegation to Farrukhabad and had announced that party leaders will visit all government hospitals to find out the "ground reality". PTI SAB SMI TIR BSA

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Mount Pleasant, SC (29464)

Today

Sunshine and clouds mixed. High 61F. Winds NNE at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Cloudy skies early with showers later at night. Thunder possible. Low 54F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%.
The minister was presented with a Guard of Honour by the Air Warriors on her arrival at the base.

By Manjeet Negi: It's Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman's 8th day on the job today, and it seems that she is working full swing.

Sitharaman was on her maiden visit to forward air base at Uttarlai, Rajasthan on September 10. She was received by Air Chief Marshal BS Dhanoa, Senior Air Staff Officer DS Rawat, and Air Commodore Sanjay Sharma.

The minister was presented with a Guard of Honour by the Air Warriors on her arrival at the base. She was then briefed on the role of the base and nature of air operations. A glimpse of fighter strike operations were also showcased to the newly appointed defence minister during her visit to the Air Traffic Control Centre.

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The minister then addressed the Air Warriors and interacted with them. Prior to her departure, the minister interacted with mediapersons and answered their queries.

Sitharaman said, meeting the demands of the armed forces with a view to maintain optimum state of readiness and preparedness at all fronts shall be her priority.

This visit to Uttarlai has incidentally been the first by any Defence Minister after 30 December, 2001.

ALSO READ | Indian Navy goes hunting for heavyweight torpedoes for submarines, approaches global companies

ALSO READ | INS Khanderi, Indian Navy's second Scorpene-class submarine, launched in Mumbai

ALSO READ | Nirmala Sitharaman joins the league of powerful woman defence ministers in 15 other countries

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WTGS members to meet

Members of the West Texas Geological Society will meet September 12 in the Carrasco Room at Midland College beginning at 11:30 a.m.

Sandeep Mukherjee, Geology Advisor and Technical Team lead for Halliburtons Formation and Reservoir Solutions Group in Houston, will present Application of High Resolution Microresistivity Measurement in Petrophysical Characterization of Challenging Wellbores.

Cost is $25 in advance, $35 at the door. Reservations may be made by calling 683-1573 or email at wtgs@wtgs.org. Online registration is also available at www.wtgs.org and clicking on the Events tab.

GlobeLTR Energy sells well servicing division

GlobeLTR Energy Inc., a portfolio company of affiliates of Clearlake Capital Group L.P. has closed the sale of its well servicing division to Brigade Energy Services, LLC, a portfolio company of Turnbridge Capital Partners LLC and affiliates. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

We look forward to working with Brigade to ensure a smooth transition and make certain safety and quality of service remain priorities for all of our customers through the transition period, said Troy Botts and Pat Bond, Co-CEOs of GlobeLTR. This transaction represents a significant strategic initiative for our company and GlobeLTRs other operations and product lines will not be affected by this transaction, they added.

Jose E. Feliciano, chairman of GlobeLTR, and co-founder and managing partner of Clearlake, stated, This transaction facilitates GlobeLTRs increased focus on its core midstream water logistics and pre-frac solutions as well as power generation services for E&P clients operating in the Permian and other target basins.

Clearlake Capital recapitalizes Floworks

Clearlake Capital Group L.P., together with its affiliates, and FloWorks International LLC announced the successful recapitalization of FloWorks in partnership with the companys existing financial sponsors, led by TowerBrook Capital Partners L.P., the companys management team, and other stakeholders. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Headquartered in Houston, FloWorks is a specialty industrial distributor of pipe, valves, and fittings and related technical solutions to the energy and industrial sectors. FloWorks has a global platform with world-class distribution capabilities, operating 44 strategically located facilities across North America, Shanghai, China and Jubail, Saudi Arabia. FloWorks brands includes Sunbelt Supply Co. and Major Inc.; Southwest Stainless & Alloy; J&J Alloys, and J&J Bar Plus.

Core Lab names new Midland representative

Preston Haygood has been named to handle technical sales in the Midland region for Core Laboratories. He will be responsible for routine and special core analysis services, PVT fluids services and regional consortiums and strategic services.

Haygood has about 10 years technical sales and laboratory experience with Core Laboratories.
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A Hispanic-owned firm whose workers have been threatened and harassed for security projects along the Mexico border was chosen Thursday to build a prototype for President Donald Trump's long-promised border wall.

The company was among four companies selected Thursday by U.S. Customs and Border Protection to build the see-through prototypes. In addition to the Hispanic-owned KWR Construction of Sierra Vista, Arizona, the winners are: Caddell Construction of Montgomery, Alabama; ELTA North America of Annapolis Junction, Marland; and W. G. Yates & Sons Construction in Philadelphia, Mississippi.

Each of the contracts is worth between $300,000 and $500,000. Caddell and Yates & Sons also won separate contracts to build concrete prototypes, the agency announced last week.

READ ALSO: Houston firm picked to build prototype for Trump border wall

Al Anderson, the general manager of KWR Construction, which had helped build the existing border fence as well as associated roads and lighting, would not divulge design details of its prototype for the contentious border project. Under the contract terms, the firms had to use materials other than concrete.

"We want whatever jobs here along the border that we can get, and set aside our personal beliefs to support our employees," Anderson said in a previous interview with The Washington Post.

Trump this summer had repeatedly promoted a border wall made of solar panels, but the agency would not confirm Thursday whether it had selected such a design.

READ ALSO: 'Build the wall' takes back seat to rebuilding after Harvey

Construction on the prototypes is expected to begin in San Diego this fall although no money has been appropriated to pay for Trump's pet project and key campaign promise of building a wall spanning the entire 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexico border. Congress has set aside only $20 million in the current budget to build the prototypes.

On Tuesday Trump, who campaigned on border security and the deportation of illegal immigrants, canceled an Obama-era program that had allowed 800,000 undocumented immigrants who arrived in the United States as children to live and work in this country without fear of deportation.

Trump said he is phasing out the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program to allow Congress six months to come up with a legislative solution. Some Congressional Republicans are expected to use DACA as a bargaining chip to fund the border wall, which Democrats firmly oppose .

Trump's 2018 budget calls for $2.6 billion for "high-priority tactical infrastructure and border security technology." Of that amount, $1.6 billion is for "bricks and mortar construction" and $1 billion is for infrastructure and technology, such as roads needed to access construction sites and surveillance equipment.

Trump had earlier threatened to shut down the government if a budget deal this month did not include funding for his wall, but pulled back on the threat last week.

Opponents of the wall argue that it's unnecessary, given that nearly 700 miles of fencing already exists in the most critical areas of the border and the decrease in the number of border crossers.

Trump himself has acknowledged that a seamless wall would not be possible, nor practical, given natural barriers in the landscape as well as international treaty and flood-zone requirements.

The government in March asked for design submissions for two types of wall: a reinforced concrete barrier wall and one made of an alternative material with see-through capability. The wall must be insurmountable and "aesthetically pleasing in color," at least from the U.S. side, according to the design specifications. It must also withstand digging for at least six feet below the surface.

More than 200 companies responded with proposals. The contenders were winnowed down to a secret list of about 20 finalists.

Thursday's announcement follows last week's awarding of four contracts for concrete prototypes. The earlier winners were: Fisher Sand & Gravel/DBA Fisher Industries of Tempe, Arizona. and Texas Sterling Construction in Houston, along with Caddell and Yates & Sons.
By PTI: Chennai, Sep 10 (PTI) DMK leader M K Stalin today called on Tamil Nadu Governor CH Vidyasagar Rao and urged him to direct the state government to prove its majority in the assembly within a week, in view of rebellion by a section of ruling AIADMK Amma legislators.

Emerging from the meeting with Rao at the Raj Bhavan here, the DMK working president said if the governor did not act on their plea within a week, the party would take legal recourse and also approach "peoples court".

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"We are hopeful that he (governor) will convene the assembly session. If he does not take steps in a weeks time, we will approach the court and also peoples court. I have informed this to him," he told reporters here.

Stalin was accompanied by leaders of allied parties Congress and IUML.

He said as the leader of opposition in the state assembly, he had urged the governor to convene the session based on a request by MLAs loyal to sidelined AIADMK Amma Deputy General Secretary T T V Dhinakaran.

"...I have requested the governor to convene the assembly session so that the ruling AIADMK can prove its majority," he said.

Stalin had earlier written two letters to the governor on the issue after 19 pro-Dhinakaran MLAs met Rao and expressed lack of confidence in the chief minister on August 22.

The revolt by the MLAs came a day after the merger of the factions led by Palaniswami and former chief minister O Panneerselvam.

Delegations of DMK, Congress and Left parties had already called on the governor and pressed for a floor test for the Palaniswami government.

Dhinakaran had last week met Rao and sought replacement of Palaniswami, who, however, had been asserting that his government had the requisite majority and none could topple it.

Stalin claimed that the Palaniswami government was having lesser number of MLAs supporting it in the 234-member assembly with one vacancy.

"The DMK has 89 MLAs, Congress eight and IUML one in the assembly totalling 98 MLAs, plus 21 MLAs from the T T V Dhinakaran camp...the total is 119, which is higher than the 114 MLAs who support the Palaniswami government," he reasoned.

Asserting that todays meeting with the governor would be the last on the matter, Stalin said he had informed Rao that he would take legal steps if no measure was taken by him on the DMKs demand. PTI VIJ VS SRY

--- ENDS ---
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As Daytona Beach braces for Irmas arrival, many hotels shut their doors and businesses boarded up.

Tiki Hut stayed open for utility crews

Daytona Beach bracing for Hurricane Irma

But, not everyone stayed that way, especially when theres hungry utility crews with nowhere to go.

Burgeys Tiki Hut in Daytona Beach opened their doors to patrons Saturday night.

A couple came in, more saw and here we are, were open," said Brittany Burgess. Theres no where else open, why not let people come in for a beer or two?"

Burgess runs the Tiki Hut at Main Street and Atlantic Avenue alongside her brother, Adam. Back in February, their father, Tom, saw the bar for sale and scooped it up, knowing his children would be careful custodians of the acquisition.

But, months later, they were bracing for something they had never experienced before: a hurricane.

It is nerve-wracking, it would hurt to be out of business for awhile," said Adam Burgess.

So, their father decided to drive down from his hometown of Chicago to help his children prepare.

Drove our vehicle down on Wednesday, brought some generators down, the extensions cords, whatever was going to be needed to help them out," Tom Burgess said.

By Saturday afternoon, the windows were boarded, sandbags at the ready. Most of the city had done the same, leaving Daytona Beach looking like a ghost town.

But, as the family eyed the last piece of plywood destined for the door Sunday, patrons started wandering in, including utility worker Caleb Hernandez.

When you see them come and welcome you in, its a nice thing to have," he said, twisting a beer in his hand as he waited for his wings.

Hernandez made the long drive from Long Island, picking up other utility crews along the way.

It was 21 hours straight through for me," he said. I think its pretty amazing, kind of nice. Especially with an actual, proper evacuation.



Once the bottles are recapped and the plywood goes up, only then will the Tiki Hut worry.

But, for now, they remain a refuge---one of the last spots open as Irma makes her approach.
After a week long trip, Regina Glover and her three children, who were trying to fly to Chicago, are now stranded in Orlando.

Orlando International Airport shut down

Stranded passengers taken to Red Cross shelter

The airport hopes to resume operations as soon as possible

"By the time we got here, thinking that our flight was still going to be on schedule, they had already canceled it out," said Glover.

All commercial flights to and from Orlando International Airport have been stopped in preparing for Hurricane Irma.

Meanwhile, the Glover's will not be able to camp out at the airport.

Officials said OIA is not an approved or certified shelter.



Leaving the Orlando Intl. Airport, which is is closed until officials can access possibly damage after #HurricaneIrma. @MyNews13 @BN9 pic.twitter.com/lrZ3kyaQYy  John W. Davis (@johnwdavis) September 10, 2017

So stranded passengers will be taken to a nearby Red Cross shelter to ride out the storm.

What are you thinking about doing?, I asked.

"Trying to go ahead and get hotel somewhere in the Orlando area," Glovers said. "Everything seems to be really booked up, even here at the airport."



However barren the airport was, hundreds of passengers were able to snag accommodations in 445 guestrooms, at the now sold-out Hyatt Regency at the Orlando International Airport.

Bob Brown was planning to escape Hurricane Irma by visiting his sister in Philadelphia.

"So I'm staying here for a few days to hold out the storm," said Brown, who evacuated from Melbourne.

But others weren't so fortunate.



"No family, not here," Glover said. "The closest place would be like Atlanta but as you can see the storm is going up that way."

Glover said her trip to Orlando was more than a family vacation.



She was actually checking out Central Florida, because she's planning on moving here.



"Anything is better than snow and ice storms. If we get through this storm, then we'll see what happens," Glover said.

Orlando International Airport is planning to resume normal operations as quickly as possible, after accessing the impact of Hurricane Irma.
With a week to prepare for Hurricane Irma, Floridians have had time to be creative.

From sidewalk chalk to spraypaint on plywood to literal art, Florida residents have a range of messages for Irma, and a few for Floridians as well.

"You better watch out..."

Robert's Christmas Wonderland in Clearwater with a warning for Irma. (Clearwater Police)

Be gentle, Irma

Don't hurt these cute kids! (Victoria Brake, Bay News 9+ app)

Sent via News 13+ app: Dana Davis, Viewer

You don't have to go home, but we don't want you here...

Several Floridians seriously questioned Irma's sobriety.

(Bonnie Burich, Bay News 9+ app)

A business is boarded up ahead of Hurricane Irma in Brevard County. (Greg Pallone, Staff)

Silver Linings

I mean, always look on the bright side of life, right?

Sent via News 13+ app: Crystal, Viewer

Acts of Defiance

We ain't afraid of no storm!

A message for Irma in South Beach/Miami as streets are ominously quiet and shops shuttered Friday morning. (Jason Lanning, staff)

College football fans in Florida had this message for Hurricane Irma. (Tom Cunningham, Bay News 9+ app)



This resident appears to be ready for the hurricane. Bay area residents have spent the past few days preparing for Irma. (Brenda, BN9+ app)

A Tarpon Springs resident has a message for Hurricane Irma while preparing for the storm Friday. (Theresa Pressley, Bay News 9+ app)

Tara Harrison had this message for Irma. (sent in via Bay News 9+ app)

A stern warning on the plywood of a store in Melbourne.

Thoughts and Prayers

Tampa Bay area residents leave messages for Irma as they prepare for the major storm. (Lisa Stoermer, Bay News 9+ app)

Sparing a thought for Oldsmar. (Jillian Watson, Viewer)

Being hopeful: Angela & Rich, Bay News 9+ app

Ocean Drive in Miami Beach is boarded up and waiting for Irma. This is Mango's. (Jason Lanning, Staff)

Sally's Ice Cream in Flagler Beach, prepared for Hurricane Irma. (Brittany Jones, Staff)

But tell us how you really feel...

But at the end of the day, most Floridians feel about the same about Irma.

Chrissy, Bay News 9+ app

We just want Irma to go: Melody Pumphrey, Bay News 9+ app

Like... please go: Erin Stires, Bay News 9+ app

We don't like you... Sent via News 13+ app: John Dudek, Viewer

And take your crazy cone of major uncertainty with you: Mark Strong, Viewer

This is one way to keep people out of your home after the storm! Watch out for Walkers!. (Sent via our Tom Cunnigham, Bay News 9+ app)

And May the Force Be With Us...

Matthew Baranishyn in Kissimmee decided to get a little creative when he was boarding up his windows before Hurricane Irma pays a visit. Star Wars' R2D2 will protect his house from Darth Irma. (Matthew Baranishyn, viewer)
By PTI: Ahmedabad, Sep 10 (PTI) BJP president Amit Shah today asked the youth of Gujarat not to fall prey to the anti-BJP propaganda being mounted by the Congress on social media.

Shahs statement came at a time when messages critical of the Gujarat model of development under the BJP rule in the poll-bound state were being circulated on social media.

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During his interaction with youths at Yuva Townhall, Shah also came down heavily on the Congress and its vice president Rahul Gandhi, who had recently visited the city and questioned the BJP over its development claims.

Replying to questions, Shah touched upon issues such as implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST), unemployment and demonetisation, and claimed that the Narendra Modi government has brought in substantial change during its three-year rule.

"I appeal to the youth not to blindly believe the anti- BJP propaganda being spread on WhatsApp and Facebook. Before making any judgement, you need to do analysis of what was Gujarat before the BJP came to power and what is the situation today," said Shah.

"This propaganda is largely spread by our opponent Congress," the BJP president claimed.

Responding to a question about the BJP governments achievements in Gujarat, Shah shared several figures about growth in agriculture sector, increase in per capita income, rise in the size of state budget, increase in the number of universities and several other parameters to prove his point that significant development took place after 1995.

The BJP first came to power in Gujarat in 1995.

"I want you to apply your mind before believing what is being circulated in WhatsApp. Just compare what kind of development took place before the BJP came to power and afterwards. These figures will clearly tell you that it was the BJP which did development," claimed Shah.

He added that these figures related to the development in Gujarat will be uploaded on the BJPs website so that youths can circulate it on social media to counter the propaganda.

"Before 1995, when the Congress was in power, curfew and communal riots were rampant. Even the Rath Yatra was attacked. Power cut of 10 to 15 hours was normal in rural parts of state during the Congress rule. But today, every part of the state is getting 24-hour uninterrupted power supply," Shah said.

"Rahulbaba (Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi) recently came here and raised question about development. I want to tell him that the venue of his event, the Sabarmati Riverfront, was nothing short of a pit of dirty water when the Congress was in power. Today, it is considered as the best riverfront in the world," the BJP chief added.

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"Gujarats per capita income was just Rs 13,665 before 1995. Today, it is Rs 1.41 lakh. Is this not development Rahulbaba?" asked Shah, adding that the people of Gujarat should not get carried away by the false claims of the Congress and its leaders.

Responding to a question related to the BJPs approach towards creating more employment, Shah said the method of calculating employment in the country needed to be changed.

"I believe that employment should not be linked only with jobs. You cant give jobs to 125 crore citizens. Employment should also mean self employment, start-ups or starting a small business. Thus, the method of calculating the employment generation, which solely takes into account job creation, should undergo change," the BJP chief said.

Responding to a question on the GST and its benefits, Shah said the BJP government at the Centre was trying its best to make it more trader-friendly.

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"We know that some (traders) are facing difficulties due to GST. But, the government is aware about it and understand your problem. The GST Council can always change the rules. Our aim is to make GST trader-friendly," he said.

Responding to a question on demonetisation and its success, especially when the RBI has declared that almost 99 per cent notes have came back, Shah said the exercise was aimed at pushing the countrys economy forward by increasing the number of tax payers.

"The RBI has declared that around 99 per cent notes have came back. But, did anyone asked the RBI how much were there in the past? Earlier, only 80 per cent currency notes were in the system, as 20 per cent notes used to remain with corrupt people, be it politicians or officers. Now, all these notes are back in the system," said Shah.

"Prior to demonetisation, only 3.6 crore people used to pay income tax. But now, it has risen to 6.3 crore. This shows that people are becoming honest. It is very easy to criticise something. But, demonetisation was an attempt to boost the countrys economy by increasing the number of tax payers," he said.

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Over one lakh youths sitting in 312 different locations across Gujarat saw the event live while some of them even asked questions through video-conferencing. PTI PJT PD NM NRB SMN

--- ENDS ---
MIAMI (AP)  A monster Hurricane Irma roared into Florida with 130 mph winds Sunday for what could be a sustained assault on nearly the entire Sunshine State, submerging streets, knocking out power to millions and snapping massive construction cranes over the Miami skyline.



The 400-mile-wide (640-kilometer-wide) storm blew ashore in the morning in the mostly cleared-out Florida Keys and then began a slow march up the states west coast. Forecasters said it could hit the heavily populated Tampa-St. Petersburg area early Monday.



Pray, pray for everybody in Florida, Gov. Rick Scott said on Fox News Sunday as some 116,000 people statewide waited it out in shelters.



Irma struck as a Category 4 but by late afternoon had weakened to a Category 2 with 110 mph (177 kph) winds that whipped Floridas palm trees with drenching squalls. A storm surge of over 10 feet (3 meters) was recorded in the Keys, and forecasters warned some places on the mainland could get up to 15 feet of water.



There were no immediate confirmed reports of any deaths in Florida, on top of the 24 people killed during Irmas destructive trek across the Caribbean.



Many streets were flooded in downtown Miami and other cities. Appliances and furniture were seen floating away in the low-lying Keys, though the full extent of Irmas fury there was not clear.



A Miami woman who went into labor was guided through delivery by phone when authorities couldnt reach her in high winds and street flooding. Firefighters later took her to the hospital.



An apparent tornado spun off by Irma destroyed six mobile homes in Palm Bay, hundreds of miles away along the states Atlantic coast. Flooding was reported along Interstate 4, which cuts across Floridas midsection.



In downtown Miami, two of the two dozen construction cranes looming over the skyline collapsed in the wind. No injuries were reported. City officials said it would have taken about two weeks to move the massive equipment.



Curfews were imposed in Miami, Tampa, Fort Lauderdale and much of the rest of South Florida, and some arrests of violators were reported. Miami Beach barred outsiders from the island.



Fort Lauderdale police arrested nine people they said were caught on TV cameras looting sneakers and other items from a sporting goods store and a pawn shop during the hurricane.



More than 2 million homes and businesses across the state lost power, and utility officials said it will take weeks to restore electricity to everyone.



While the projected track showed Irma raking the states Gulf Coast, forecasters warned that the entire state  including the Miami metropolitan area of 6 million people  was in danger because of the sheer size of the storm.



Nearly 7 million people in the Southeast were warned to evacuate, including 6.4 million in Florida alone.



About 30,000 people heeded orders to leave the Keys as the storm closed in, but an untold number refused, in part because to many storm-hardened residents, staying behind in the face of danger is a point of pride.



John Huston, who stayed in his Key Largo home, watched his yard flood even before the arrival of high tide. Small boats floating down the street next to furniture and refrigerators. Very noisy, he said by text message. Shingles are coming off.



Irma made landfall just after 9 a.m. at Cudjoe Key, about 20 miles outside Key West, forecasters said. During the afternoon, it rounded Floridas southwestern corner and hugged the coast closely as it pushed toward Naples, Sanibel, Fort Myers and, beyond that, Sarasota, at 14 mph (23 kph).



Hurricane-force winds extended 80 miles (129 kilometers) from its center.



Meteorologist Ryan Maue of WeatherBell Analytics said the entire Florida peninsula will be raked by Irmas right front quadrant  the part of a hurricane that usually brings the strongest winds, storm surge, rain and tornadoes.



The Tampa-St. Petersburg area, with a population of about 3 million, has not taken a direct hit from a major hurricane since 1921.



The wind began picking up in St. Petersburg, some 400 miles north of the Keys, and people started bracing for the onslaught.



Ive been here with other storms, other hurricanes. But this one scares me, Sally Carlson said as she snapped photos of the waves crashing against boats. Lets just say a prayer we hope we make it through.



Forecasters said a weakened Irma could push into Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee and beyond. A tropical storm warning was issued for the first time ever in Atlanta, some 200 miles from the sea.



Once this system passes through, its going to be a race to save lives and sustain lives, Federal Emergency Management Agency chief Brock Long said on Fox News Sunday.



With FEMA still dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey in Houston, Irma could test the agencys ability to handle two disasters at the same time.



President Donald Trump approved a disaster declaration for Florida, opening the way for federal aid.



Floridas governor activated all 7,000 members of the Florida National Guard, and 10,000 guardsmen from elsewhere were being deployed.



For days, forecasters had warned that Irma was taking dead aim at the Miami metropolitan area and the rest of Floridas Atlantic coast.



But then Irma made a more pronounced westward shift  the result of what meteorologists said was an atmospheric tug-of-war between weather systems that nudged Irma and determined when it made its crucial right turn into Florida.



Irma at one time was the most powerful hurricane ever recorded in the open Atlantic, a Category 5 with a peak wind speed of 185 mph (300 kph). Given its size, strength and projected course, it could still prove one of the most devastating hurricanes ever to hit Florida.



The storm brought memories of Hurricane Charley, which blew ashore near Fort Myers in 2004 with winds near 149 mph (240 kph). It caused $15 billion in damage and was blamed for as many as 35 deaths in the U.S.










By PTI: New York, Sep 10 (PTI) A simple eye examination may help accurately diagnose a progressive neurodegenerative condition called frontotemporal degeneration, scientists have found.

Frontotemporal degeneration (FTD) is among the most common causes of midlife dementia, and is often misdiagnosed as Alzheimers - or vice versa.

Researchers at University of Pennsylvania in the US using an inexpensive, non-invasive, eye-imaging technique found that patients with FTD showed thinning of the outer retina - the layers with the photoreceptors through which we see - compared to control subjects.

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The retina is potentially affected by neurodegenerative disorders because it is a projection of the brain.

Prior studies have found a loss of optic nerve fibbers and associated thinning of the inner retina in a few other neurodegenerative disorders including Alzheimers, ALS, and Lewy-body dementia.

The new results suggest that FTD manifests in a different way in the structures of the retina, and that this difference, detectable with a retinal imaging test, might help doctors distinguish one disorder from another.

"Our finding of outer retina thinning in this carefully designed study suggests that specific brain pathologies may be mirrored by specific retinal abnormalities," said Benjamin Kim, assistant professor at University of Pennsylvania.

The study included 38 FTD patients and 44 control subjects who did not have any neurodegenerative disease. The FTD patients were carefully characterised with clinical exams, cerebrospinal fluid biomarkers to exclude Alzheimers Disease, and genetic testing.

The researchers then employed an eye-imaging technology called spectral-domain optical coherence tomography (SD-OCT), which uses a safe light beam to image tissue with micron-level resolution. SD-OCT imaging is inexpensive, non-invasive, and quick.

Measurements of the retinal layers of the participants, after adjustments for age, gender, and ethnic background, showed that the outer retinas of the FTD patients were thinner than those in the control participants, researchers said.

This relative thinning of outer retinas was caused by a thinning of two specific portions of the outer retina, the outer nuclear layer (ONL) and ellipsoid zone (EZ).

The outer nuclear layer of FTD patients was about 10 per cent thinner than controls, and this ONL thinning was the primary source of the outer retina thinning, they added.

The study was published in the journal Neurology. PTI APA MHN MHN

--- ENDS ---
By PTI: New Delhi, Sep 9 (PTI) A two-day festival to promote the art, culture, heritage, cuisine, handicrafts, business and tourism of North East India was inaugurated here today.

North East Calling, organised by the Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) under its Destination North East series, is showcasing the rich heritage of the seven sisters through their music, dance, art and craft.

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A music festival with bands playing music from the region, along with a cultural night featuring dances of the north-eastern states have been organised as part of the festival.

Jitendra Singh, who inaugurated the festival at the India Gate lawns here, appealed to the public to come and visit the festival and understand the richness of culture of North East.

"Such events will not only enrich the economy and culture of North Eastern region, but will also bring the rest of India more closer to the North East.

"These events, that too in the heart of National Capital, help the artisans and people of North East to showcase their talent," he said.

The development, upliftment and growth of North East has been on the priority of the government under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, he added.

Singh also launched North East Venture Fund, a joint initiative of Ministry of DoNER and North Eastern Development Finance Corporation Ltd, that seeks to promote entrepreneurship and start-ups in the region.

The North East Tourism Development Council to promote sustainable tourism in North East India, was also launched.

"The focus has not only been bringing North East closer to the rest of country, but also to bring rest of India closer to the North East," he said.

The festival also features a handloom demo show, exhibiting the clothes of North-East, as well as a range of food stalls serving delicacies from the seven states. PTI TRS TRS

--- ENDS ---
A 40-year-old San Jose man suspected in a fatal stabbing Friday evening and another attempted knife attack minutes earlier was arrested, police said on Saturday.

Alan Christopher Gaeta was booked into Santa Clara County Jail Saturday on suspicion of murder and attempted murder.

San Jose police officers were called to the 4200 block of Senter Road about 6:45 p.m. on Friday and found a man suffering from at least one stab wound, authorities said. The assailant had already left the scene in a car by the time officers got there, officials said.

The victim was taken to a local hospital, where he was later pronounced dead. His name was not released.

Investigators found similarities between the fatal stabbing and an attempted stabbing that occurred 5 minutes earlier on nearby Hellyer Avenue at Palisade Drive, officials said. The victim escaped unharmed and called police, officials said.

Several hours later, a Santa Clara County Sheriff's deputy spotted the car witnesses reported the suspect in the attacks was driving and pulled it over about midnight on Bentoak Lane in San Jose. Gaeta, who was in the car, was detained and later arrested.

He was being held Saturday without bail.

Anyone with more information can call Detective Sergeant Mike Montonye or Detective Jason Tanner of the San Jose Police Department's Homicide Unit at (408) 277-5283.

Jenna Lyons is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jlyons@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @JennaJourno
In a Saturday morning Facebook post that left hundreds saddened and in disbelief, Olmos Pharmacy announced it has permanently closed.

"To all of our regular customers, I greatly appreciate all your support over the years," read the note from General Manager Rod Campbell. "To all of our regular customers, I greatly appreciate all your support over the years. I'll miss the chance to visit with you over a cup of coffee or some other frosty beverage."
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Tuesday, Feb. 28, 2007 was a typical night for Army Reservist Staff Sgt. Dwayne Cole at Q-West base in Iraq. He was flipping through a magazine while others in his unit were watching "CSI" reruns on television. Staff Sgt. Thomas Prasenski was there, too. Nothing unusual.

Suddenly, Cole says, Prasenski approached him pointing a handgun in his face. Cole claims he had overheard Prasenski say he always wanted to shoot a black man.

"He said, 'You know I'm going to shoot you," Cole said. "I pushed the gun away. I told him 'stop pointing your weapon in my face. I don't like it.'"

According to Cole's statement to Army leadership, Prasenski said, "since you can dodge IEDs, let me see if you dodge this bullet." He then squeezed the trigger.

Falling off the bunk, Cole, who was 28 at the time, remembers losing feeling in his hands and legs and watching his uniform become saturated with blood.

"All I kept thinking was 'God, let me see my family again,'" Cole said. "It was my mother's birthday."

The bullet, lodged in his spine, just missed his jugular vein. Cole has been confined to a wheelchair ever since, paralyzed from the chest down, with use of only his left arm.

Prasenski, on the other hand, has gone on to lead a celebrated life. Despite a bad conduct discharge, as Army records show, he is the commander of the regional Military Order of the Purple Heart, Chapter 446, in Albany and an honored guest at many area Purple Heart ceremonies. In July, he was the first to drive into a newly designated parking spot for Purple Heart recipients in Schenectady. In August he and other veterans were honored at Purple Heart Day in Malta.

On both occasions, he stood with elected officials including Congressman Paul Tonko, state Sen. Jim Tedisco, Assembly members Angelo Santabarbara and Carrie Woerner.

At the time of the Schenectady event, Santabarbara said, "It's so important to show our veterans that their courage and sacrifice is appreciated  not just on holidays, but every day."

But after Santabarbara was alerted to Prasenski's past, he said he would not be welcoming Prasenski at future Purple Heart ceremonies.

"I'm shocked," Santabarbara said. "We ask the national headquarters to send us a representative. The last few times, they sent Tommy Prasenski. And he comes a long way, all the way from Massachusetts. Why are they sending him? We want some answers."

Prasenski isn't giving a lot of answers. In a recent telephone interview from his home near Springfield, Mass., he wouldn't talk about his motivation for the shooting, which some in the unit believe was racial. Nor would he speak about his court-martial or time served.

Records from the Department of Defense indicate that Prasenski served in the Army from February 1993 to June 2011 with two deployments to Iraq where he was a parachute rigger and a driver.

But personally, he wasn't that well liked. Cole said Prasenski "was moody and got angry over stupid things." But he still considered him a friend and never believed he would "act on his rage."

Sgt. Michael Hewitt, now a New York City police officer, remembers Prasenski as a guy who "liked to play with guns." Cole agreed, saying Prasenski often waved guns in people's faces, but not until the night of the shooting were the guns loaded.

"I think the weapon gave him some sense of power," Cole said.

Specialist Kevin Chambers remembers Prasenski as a guy who often spewed racial slurs.

"He tried to say things in a joking way, you know, just pass it off as cool," Chambers said.

According to Cole's sworn testimony, a few nights before the shooting, Prasenski ranted using racial slurs for blacks and Hispanics when Cole brought in food for other people.

Prasenski was injured in 2006 in Iraq when a roadside bomb blew up a vehicle he was driving. Cole and Hewitt were also part of the convoy.

Prasenski was sent home, but returned to Iraq about six months later after the Christmas holidays. Chambers, who is still enlisted, remembered that Prasenski came back with neck problems.

"He couldn't turn his neck so he had to stay back at the FOB (forward operating base)," Chambers said. "We were surprised he came back because he couldn't do his job. It's beyond me why he was back."

Chambers said that when he returned, Prasenski was not issued a weapon. But he managed to grab hold of his commander's 9mm the night he shot Cole.

"I was full of shrapnel and had limited rotation movement," Prasenski said during a recent interview with the Times Union. "I couldn't control my movement and the gun went off. It was an accident. It was 10 years ago. It's a dead issue."

When asked if the shooting was racially motivated, he said. "There is no black or white in combat. Everyone is green."

Cole isn't sure why Prasenski shot him. He speculates, based on what Prasenski said just before he pulled the trigger, that he might have been resentful because Cole survived two recent IED explosions and was unharmed.

"To this day, I have no idea why," he said. "But I do believe he wanted to kill me."

Prasenski was charged with maiming, assault with a deadly weapon and obstruction of justice. He was convicted at a military court-martial June 6, 2008, and sentenced to 54 months on Feb. 17, 2011. He was also demoted to a private and received a bad conduct discharge, one step above dishonorable, Army files indicate.

Pending his court-martial, NBC News photographed Prasenski in March 2008 with then presidential candidate Sen. John McCain and other veterans who were being honored in the Capitol Rotunda.

The Army has not confirmed that Prasenski spent time in military prison. A 2008 Dateline NBC story with Chris Hansen and producer Tim Sandler about the shooting claims Prasenski did spent time in a military prison. But Cole was told by the Army that Prasenski only spent 42 months in a military hospital and was released. Prasenski won't say either way. Hewitt, who traveled back and forth from Virginia, where he was stationed, to the trial in Massachusetts, gave up keeping track.

"Every time we would go to court, Prasenski wasn't there," Hewitt said. "He had high blood pressure or he was feeling faint. I just couldn't keep driving back and forth anymore."

The biggest mystery is Prasenski's Purple Heart, the reason for all the attention he receives from local politicians. The Department of Defense says there is no record of Prasenski being awarded a Purple Heart. But the National Purple Heart Hall of Honor indicates that Thomas H. Prasenski does have the medal. So too does the Military Order of the Purple Heart, which also says Prasenski had one bestowed upon him June 2, 2006, immediately following the IED explosion in Iraq.

"We looked at his DD215, which is the amended DD214 (the official paperwork of military service)," said John Bircher, the national spokesman. "I can assure you, he has one."

Even Hewitt said he was entitled to the Purple Heart.

"He was blown up on a mission," Hewitt said. "If you are wounded in action, you get the Purple Heart."

When told that many feel uncomfortable with honoring his service, Prasenski said, "That's unfortunate."

Double Purple Heart recipient David Wallingford who lives on Saratoga Lake said that Prasenski has paid his debt to society and should be able to move on.

"He does a world of good now," Wallingford said. "It was quite a few years ago. I don't think it's fair to hold it against him. It's old news and it's not something he personally needs now."

Yet, he admitted the regional Purple Heart organization could revisit Prasenski's past.

Tonko's spokesman, Matt Sonneborn, said that the congressman was unaware of Prasenski's past. Sonneborn said he found it "obviously deeply troubling."

It is especially troubling for Cole who is facing a life sentence in a wheelchair. He feels lucky though. His wife, Shontel, helps him throughout the day. He is also almost finished with his bachelor's degree in business administration with a concentration in informatics. They live in the South in a barrier-free house built and donated to him by Home for the Troops.

"I don't want anyone to know where I live," Cole said. "I don't want to cross paths with this guy again.

"Outside, I didn't really know the guy. But we were supposed to have each other's back. We were in uniform together, we were supposed to have the same intentions at heart."

Cole is happy he survived, but admits it's hard to overcome his frustrations and anger with the Army and Prasenski.

"It was a traumatic situation," Cole said. "So being here is bittersweet. There is no way this should have ever happened."
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WEST HAVEN >> Democratic voters get to choose Tuesday between a two-term mayor, Ed OBrien, who says hes finally getting West Haven to move in the right direction and a challenger, Nancy Rossi, who says OBrien has had his chance and failed.

Rossi says she can do better because she has financial experience  although OBrien says that as a City Council member until two years ago, Rossi held up progress by voting against a deficit bail-out plan.

I believe that of the two of us, Im the better candidate to lead the city of West Haven out of its current fiscal condition, said Rossi.

OBrien doesnt think so.

I think that Nancy Rossi is a huge part of why were in the financial situation that we are right now, OBrien said  although Rossi suggests that the responsibility rests squarely with the mayor. She led the charge against that and I think that hurt the city.

The story line has been unfolding for months now. But you get to write the ending.

Rossi also has qualified for the General Election ballot on the A Better Choice Party line, however. So should she lose the primary, the possibility exists for a three-way race between OBrien, Rossi and Republican City Councilman David Riccio on Nov. 7.

OBrien, in a meeting this past week with the New Haven Register editorial board, said that economic development is the cornerstone to fixing everything in West Haven.

With The Haven upscale outlet mall ready to take off, ground broken on a new West Haven High School, The Atwood mixed-use development leasing in Allingtown  with two more buildings on the way  new development along Sawmill Road and the former Acorn/Sursum Corda site off Route 34 recently sold to become a regional distribution center for Yale New Haven Health Service, OBrien said West Haven has seen more economic development than in years.

He also said crime has been reduced since he took office and he has reversed a longtime city practice of deferred maintenance, replacing a number of police cars and city snow plows that were falling apart, and upgrading several city parks, including Painter Park, Morse Park and Veterans Memorial Field.

Rossi, who has been a thorn in the side of the OBrien administration throughout OBriens four years in office, said she is running because I believe that most of West Havens problems, the majority of them, have to do with financial problems  failure to balance a budget, etc ...

I believe that the biggest problem in West Haven right now is the way that were conducting our financial matters, Rossi said. Were falling deeper and deeper in the hole.

She has blasted OBrien for essentially doubling the citys cumulative deficit, which she said was about $7.8 million when former Mayor John Picard left office and is close to $16 million now  something that resulted in Moodys Investors Service downgrading the citys bond rating last year. OBrien has accused Rossi of playing with numbers.

As a certified public accountant running on a ticket that also includes former Councilman Michael Last, chief financial officer for the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station, running for city treasurer, Rossi said her administration would take steps to stabilize West Havens fiscal ship right out of the gate.

On my first day in office, I would institute a hiring freeze for all non-essential positions as well as a freeze on all non-essential spending, said Rossi, who served 10 years on the City Council and has run unsuccessfully for mayor twice before.

Any expenditures greater than $500 would require approval from the mayors office and Rossi  and all city department heads  would present and maintain responsible and balanced budgets while aggressively tackling cumulative operating deficits and long-term bonding debt, she says in her platform.

What Im concerned with is that each and every year since the mayor has been in office, the deficits have grown larger and larger and larger, Rossi said. No matter how much economic development we produce, no matter how successful it is, if we dont get our expenses in order, were ... going to be falling into a hole.

OBrien says he has delivered on his promise to revive the city.

I think I came to office saying I would take care of economic development ... and I think were done that, OBrien said.

He pointed to expansions in the works at MacDermid Enthone, Watson Inc. and AAIS as examples that West Havens economic development does not rest its hopes just on one or two big projects.

OBrien said that in addition to an uptick in economic development, the city has seen its crime rate drop by 12 percent, according to FBI statistics.

How did that happen?

I think we did it by community meetings that we had with the residents and with police offices walking around to neighborhoods, informing residents of whats going on. A 12 percent drop is something that were very proud of, he said.

While some big projects have started to fall into place elsewhere in the city, OBrien acknowledged that Beach Street  once home to the Captains Galley Restaurant, Chicks Drive-In and The Debonair Motel  remains vacant, although he said the city has worked with property owners to try to make the vacant properties less unsightly.

The owners of the former Debonair are waiting for The Haven to start before they go ahead and Chicks is on the market after going through probate following the death of former owner Joseph E. Chick Celentano, OBrien said.

On the former Captains Galley site, owned by Jimmies owners James and Paul Gagliardi, we dont want residential there, OBrien said. We want a restaurant only.

In the meantime, the city has landed a grant that will ultimately result in raising a stretch of Beach Street by five feet and contractors hired by the city will before long be dredging Old Field Creek to improve drainage to Long Island Sound, he said.

The Haven, which recently installed fencing around the former residential neighborhood that makes up much of its future site, will be starting the demo soon, OBrien said. Leasing, they say, is going well and there are no more holdouts.

He acknowledged that one property owner, the owner of the pawn shop at Elm and Water streets, remains in court with the city, adding, but that should be wrapped-up soon.

The current estimated completion date for The Haven is the fall of 2019, OBrien said.

Meanwhile, up in Allingtown, the city is actively seeking another grocery store to replace the closed Shop Rite store that used to be alongside the Railroad Salvage store, he said.

Near the Metro-North railroad station, were working to put workforce housing over there, he said, adding that there will be no affordable or low-income housing, as Rossi has suggested. Any housing that gets built will be high-end housing or market rate housing.

Rossi has sounded alarms, however, pointing out that a consultants plans shows hundreds of multifamily housing units being built near the train station  where, she says, the city ought to be bringing in business.

OBrien said the design Rossi was referring to was a conceptual design of one of the planners there. It was the bookcover but its not a formal plan, he said.

We have a beautiful train station and I would like to see more around it, said Rossi. She specifically mentioned the former Armstrong Rubber factory and headquarters, and said, I would like to see something done there.

As far as economic development, the biggest thing that (OBrien) was supposed to have was The Haven... Rossi said. That was something that Picard had left for him ... But to this day, that has not come to fruition ... We dont know if The Haven ever is happening. But peoples homes were taken...

All I know is, he inherited a great project and nothing has ever happened... she said. To me, The Haven was the first thing out of the gate  and to me, there should be something beyond a fence being put up two weeks before the primary.

She pointed out that Bilco, Hallocks and a number of other businesses went out to make way for it.

Asked what he thought his biggest failure or disappointment has been so far, OBrien said, I think my biggest failure has been P.R. But I think on all fronts were doing a pretty good job.
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Beaumont's water was cleared to drink Saturday as Gov. Greg Abbott and other state officials promised help to rebuild from the record flood that affected about 40 percent of the population from East Texas to the Coastal Bend.

After a touch-and-go 10 days under water, the city's pump station at Lawson Crossing on the Neches River was back in operation Saturday. The system is capable of delivering 22 million gallons a day to Beaumont residents who had been boiling a tenuous supply while the city and private industry worked to revive the system.

The canceled boil-water notice eliminates the need for free water distribution for the city's 120,000 residents and the responders who have

worked without stopping since the city lost water. Almost 30 percent the city's 1,250 employees had flood damage, said City Manager Kyle Hayes and Mayor Becky Ames.

On Saturday, city officials joined with county judges, mayors and other local leaders for a nearly two-hour conference with Abbott and John Sharp, Texas A&M University chancellor and Abbott's designated chair of the Commission to Rebuild Texas.

"If you have any complaints, you have my personal contact information and it won't be a complaint for very long," Sharp said to the officials at the Beaumont Emergency Operations Center meeting.

Abbott told the elected and appointed leaders to consider the recovery commission an "extension of your staff."

This past week, Congress voted an emergency appropriation of more than $15 billion to help storm recovery, of which $7.4 billion is for community block grants, which city and county officials need only file a request to access.

On Friday, Abbott said he handed the Houston mayor a check for $90 million and the Harris County judge a check for $44 million from that fund.

Block grants can be used for a "multitude of projects," Abbott said.

"Your demands will be met," he said. "The commission will work at record speed, with maximum efficiency, ahead of schedule and under budget."

And, in a joking aside to Sharp, "with a smile on your face."

Sharp has wide experience in state government. He was a onetime representative for the Harvey-stricken Rockport area, a former state comptroller, a member of the oil and gas-regulating Railroad Commission and a Democratic candidate for governor before accepting the appointment as Texas A&M chancellor.

Abbott and other state agency heads, including education commissioner Mike Morath, assured the county judges and mayors that the state will provide "every tool and resource required to respond to this horrific storm."

"We have one goal and that is to help families rebuild as fast as possible," Abbott said after the meeting.

Taking a longer-range view, Abbott said the state Legislature likely will not need a special session to address recovery, but the next regular session in 2019 probably will have a supplemental budget to deal with bills from recovery.

Abbott said he spoke with the U.S. Small Business Administration director, and $500 million is available to help small businesses restart.

He said Harvey's impact will set back Texas in the short-term, but he noted "robust job growth" figures for the state in August before the storm.

He said the Texas Education Agency has set up a working group to ensure school districts have adequate money to deal with Harvey's impact.

"We all recognize this is an economic issue for the state and we have disaster money set aside." Abbott said.

Abbott said FEMA will reimburse 100 percent of costs to local mosquito control agencies through Sept. 22.

In other impacts from Harvey, vessel traffic on the Sabine-Neches Ship Channel is restricted to those with less than 37 feet of draft from the Sabine buoys to Texaco Island in Port Arthur, which accommodates most of the refinery, petrochemical and LNG ship traffic.

From Texaco Island to the Port of Beaumont, draft is limited to 30 feet. That affects Exxon Mobil, a large supplier of refined product to Florida's Gulf Coast, which is expected to take a direct hit from Hurricane Irma.

Florida has no refineries and relies on pipelines and U.S.-flagged vessels to deliver fuel to its Gulf and Atlantic ports.

Jefferson County Judge Jeff Branick said if the Sabine-Neches improvements had been completed, the channel would be running at full capacity. It was authorized for deepening in 2014, but Congress hasn't appropriated the money for it.

The Southeast Texas refining complex makes more than 9 billion gallons of gasoline a year, enough for 545 million cars to run. Two weeks of limited operations from Harvey cost about 23 million car tanks' worth of gas, he said.

At about $2 per gallon, it's a loss of about $1 billion in revenue, $88 million in state taxes and $172 million in federal taxes.

U.S. Rep. Brian Babin, R-Woodville, told the officials at Saturday's meeting that Congress will be there to help Texas.

"You will need that money," he said of the $15 billion already appropriated. "There will be more coming."

Babin said resources will be stretched to accommodate recovery from Harvey and Irma, but the country can handle it.

He said there is bipartisan support from across the country for the recoveries.

"We're going to survive this," he said.

Dan Wallach is a freelance writer.
As Irma churned toward the Florida coast, two Republican lawmakers from the state voted against a $15 billion hurricane relief bill, saying that although they want aid to storm victims, they have concerns about other provisions of the measure.

The relief package, which sailed through the Senate and the House and was signed by President Donald Trump on Friday, boosts funding for the Federal Emergency Management Agency. It will also raise the debt ceiling for three months and includes a short-term budget that would keep the government running until December - part of a deal struck between Trump and Democratic leaders Sen. Charles Schumer, N.Y., and Rep. Nancy Pelosi, Calif.

That latter was a problem for GOP Reps. Matt Gaetz and Ted Yoho, who stuck to their principles of fiscal conservatism despite calls from fellow Florida lawmakers to support the bill. The two, who are among the 90 House Republicans who voted against the bill, do not represent parts of the state that are likely to feel Irma's immediate impact as the massive storm makes landfall on mainland United States this weekend.

Yoho, who represents areas of northern Florida, said the disaster-relief bill should have been stand-alone legislation.

"Snaking in a debt-ceiling increase with funding for victims and communities affected is immoral and reflective of broken leadership in Washington," Yoho said in a statement after the vote Friday. "I do not think it wise to extend our borrowing limit without mandatory spending reforms . . . If this was a clean measure that focused on those affected by Hurricane Harvey, I would have proudly voted for it."

Gaetz, whose district includes coastal areas along the Gulf of Mexico, called the spending package "generational theft."

"I have a pretty strident view that I will only vote to raise the debt limit if that vote is accompanied with reductions in entitlement spending," Gaetz said, according to the Miami Herald. "If conservatives don't start voting no against debt-limit increases, all the FEMA in the world won't save us from our must unfortunate destiny."

Both lawmakers had voted for a stand-alone bill that would provide nearly $8 billion in hurricane relief for FEMA. That version passed the House on Wednesday. But they and others soured after the bill came back from the Senate with double the funding and other provisions tacked on.

"I think anytime you start dealing with disasters and tying it to must-pass bills, it's not a good thing for the American people," Yoho said on C-SPAN's "Washington Journal" before the vote Friday. "I don't want to be hypercritical, but when you make a deal with Charles Schumer and Nancy Pelosi on a spending bill, a lot of times it can't be good for the American consumer."

Yoho said he opted to stay in Washington this weekend, but he plans to fly to Florida on Monday, when Irma is expected to reach his district.

"Of course, we want the assistance there, and I can feel comfortable saying that the American people will know that the assistance will be there for FEMA," he added. "We just don't want the political antics to be tied up with it."

The bill passed 316-90, with 133 Republican votes.

Twenty-seven lawmakers, including 11 House Republicans from Florida, did not vote, as many were in their home state preparing for the hurricane. Among them are Reps. Ron DeSantis, Neal Dunn, Bill Posey and Dennis Ross - hard-liners who might have voted against the package in other circumstances.

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, another Republican who skipped the vote and whose district includes part of Miami, urged colleagues to vote in favor of the bill.

"As Hurricane Irma approaches Florida, I would ask that all my Congressional colleagues reflect on the fate of Florida's 20.61 million residents when they are asked to again vote on this vital emergency disaster funding as it comes back from the Senate," Ros-Lehtinen said in a letter to House members Thursday.

Five Florida Republicans remained in Washington for the vote. Three of them, Reps. Brian Mast, Thomas Rooney and Francis Rooney, voted for the bill, as did all six Democrats who stayed.

Four Texas Republicans, Reps. Joe Barton, Jeb Hensarling, Sam Johnson and Mac Thornberry, rejected the bill for the same reasons that Gaetz and Yoho raised.

"I am not voting against relief programs to help hurricane victims, but I am against raising the public debt ceiling without a plan to reduce deficits on the short term, and eliminate them in the long term," Barton said in a statement. "The money we vote to spend today will have to be paid back by our children and grandchildren."

Thornberry criticized advancing "another agenda" by roping it with disaster assistance.

None of those Republicans, however, represents coastal areas affected by Harvey, which barreled through Southeast Texas last week.

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, R, who skipped the Senate vote on the bill Thursday to prepare for Irma in Miami, said he would have voted for it "despite significant reservations" about the other items attached to it.

"As I have always done in the past, I support providing additional emergency resources for disaster aid and recovery. Disaster relief is an appropriate function of the federal government. And unlike some previous disaster relief legislation, these funds are to be spent immediately, and are properly targeted to assist the areas impacted by Hurricane Harvey and potentially Hurricane Irma," Rubio said in a statement Thursday. "The rest of the package, however, contains items that under normal circumstances, and considered separately, I have opposed."

The Senate passed the bill 80-17, with 33 Republican votes.

- - -

The Washington Post's Mike DeBonis contributed to this report.
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About 5:30 in the morning the day Tropical Storm Harvey hammered Southeast Texas, Drucella Wheeler woke her husband, Kallen, to tell him her contractions had started.

"I woke up listening to the news reports about Harvey, thinking, 'I hope we make it,'" Drucella said.

Hurricane Harvey dropped 27 trillion gallons of water over Texas and Louisiana, including 26 inches of rain over the Beaumont-Port Arthur area by Aug. 30. Many neighborhoods like the Wheelers' were closed off as streets flooded and roads became impassable.

"When we woke up, that's when we started to see the water coming in the house," Kallen

said. "I walked out to the road to see if we could make it to the hospital because she was going into labor. It was knee-deep out there and I knew we couldn't make it. Then we called 911 and they dispatched an emergency vehicle to come out."

Drucella was whisked off to Baptist Hospital in Beaumont. Kallen and the Wheelers' 2-year-old son, Jonas, weren't allowed to follow.

"I tried to get on and they said, 'No, this is for people with medical emergencies only,'" Kallen said. That left him and Jonas to try to brave Dowlen once the floodwaters and rain calmed down about 10:30 a.m.

Kallen said the Wheelers' SUV, a Mazda CX5, hit a deep puddle and stalled in the floodwaters on Dowlen on the way to the hospital.

"I didn't know what the heck I was going to do," Kallen said. "So I just put Jonas on my shoulders and started walking toward the hospital. One of the neighbors, a good Samaritan, wouldn't let me go. He said to get in his truck. Unfortunately, he hit the same puddle I did and lost his truck trying to help me out."

Kallen said he, Jonas and the good Samaritan were towed back to the neighbor's house, where Kallen watched the birth of his son on FaceTime.

"I saw the room, the delivery room, and then the nurse put the phone up on the window sill so I could watch the delivery," he said.

Luckily, the Wheelers didn't sustain much damage to their home, beyond having to replace some drywall and throwing out some stuff from their garage. Kallen, a dentist with Family Smiles of Beaumont, said Noah was to be named Noah J. Wheeler, but that night they decided to give him the middle name Harvey.

"It's just a reminder of what we'd been through," Drucella said. "And a reminder that we can get through hard times."

"So much has bad has come from this storm, and so many people have lost their houses, it reminds us that some good comes from the bad," Kallen said.

Drucella said Noah originally was on a short list of names for their second child before Harvey even developed in the Atlantic Ocean, but that after the flooding, she felt both "Noah" and "Harvey" were a perfect fit.

"Noah quickly jumped to the top of the list after everything that happened," she said, with a laugh.

Drucella said she hopes Noah never has to face a flood like the one Harvey brought, but if he has to, "We certainly know he can now."

TCollins@BeaumontEnterprise.comTwitter.com/tadamcollins
To Amy Owens, the State Department program that allows babysitters to come from overseas and work for little more than room and board is a working mom's lifesaver. To her 23-year-old German au pair, Ann Kathrin Lentsch, the program is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see the United States through the eyes of an American family.

Now Owens fears that both those benefits may be in jeopardy after receiving an email last week from Interexchange, the agency that sponsors her au pair, saying that the "Trump administration is planning to eliminate the Au Pair Program."

"I don't know what we would do," the mother of three from Alexandria, Virginia, said. "It's such a valuable program to us."

The State Department declined to answer questions about the future of the program but said in a statement: "We continue to implement J-1 visa programs at the same levels we have for the past few years. There has been no change in our procedures for handling applications for J-1 visas."

The White House did not respond to requests for comment.

But businesses and families who employ foreign workers on J-1 visas are convinced something is happening, in part because of a May email J-1 sponsors received from G.K. Saba, acting deputy assistant secretary for the State Department's Private Sector Exchange division. The email warned of "emerging Administration policies and themes" that would put certain J-1 visa programs under sharper scrutiny.

Advocates who have been informed about the situation said some categories of the visa program were being reviewed by a small working group under the White House's "Buy American and Hire American" executive order. Areas that could be cut include the au pair program, summer workers and camp counselors.

Critics of the J-1 visa program say itprovides an easy way for employers to choose inexpensive labor instead of hiring American workers whom they would have to pay higher wages.

In 2016, 19,233 au pairs, 101,061 summer workers and 22,994 camp counselors worked in the United States on J-1 visas, according to State Department data.

"It's been used by businesses to basically bring in cheap foreign labor to fill temporary jobs," said Chris Chmielenski, director of content and activism at NumbersUSA, which opposes J-1 visas in their current form.

Ian Band, an immigration attorney at Hunton & Williams who has seen the email fromSaba,said his clients who sponsor J-1 recipients are concerned because this is the time of year they begin to plan for next season.

"I think it's part of a broader anti-immigrant view that plays to the president's base," Band said. "It's easy to pitch it as saving U.S. jobs."

As a candidate, President Donald Trump's immigration revision plan pledged to eliminate the J-1 visa program and replace it with what his campaign website described as a "jobs program for inner city youth."

But advocates for the program say jobs that go to J-1 visa workers, particularly those employed at seasonal destinations such as beach towns, are ones that could not easily be filled by U.S. workers. They also say J-1 visa holders introduce American communities to foreign cultures and languages in a valuable and enriching way.

"For young people, it's great to get to come to a new country and learn about a different family and a different culture," said Lentsch, the au pair for Owens's family.

In Ocean City, Maryland,where the population explodes in summer months, 4,000 foreign workers are employed up and down the boardwalk, many on J-1 visas. Melanie Pursel, executive director of the Ocean City Chamber of Commerce, said there aren't enough young people in proximity to fill all the jobs needed.

Moreover, Pursel said, most U.S. workers who take these jobs are students who can't work during the "shoulder seasons," late spring and late summer, because they have to be in school. Summer tourism allows these businesses to stay afloat year-round, so having foreign workers actually protects the jobs of full-time U.S. employees, she said.

After word spread about possible cuts in the J-1 visa program, Pursel sent a survey to area businesses. Preliminary responses show that nearly 93 percent said their businesses would be negatively affected if they could not hire workers on J-1 visas,and 95 percent said they first look to employ qualified American workers.

Summer camps are also sounding the alarm. The Foundation for Jewish Camp, whose more than 300 camps employ counselors from Israel and other countries, sent a letter to Trump urging him to preserve J-1 visas.

"Any threat to these programs and their educational impact could cause ripples across our entire faith community and deeply impact the development of future Jewish faith leaders and their connection to Israel," the letter said.

The foundation wrote that there are not enough American students to fill all the jobs at summer camps, especially those in rural areas.

The J-1 visa program hasn't been studied as closely as other foreign worker programs, so data is limited, Chmielenski said.

But he noted that criticism of the program has come from different parts of the political spectrum: In 2013, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., said the program was intended to be for cultural understanding but is now "a low-wage jobs program" where companies can "replace young American workers with cheaper labor from overseas."

Still, there is bipartisan support on Capitol Hill for keeping the program intact. Lawmakers from the House and Senate wrote to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson this summer espousing the benefits of J-1 visas for diplomatic purposes.

"At a time when the values of the United States are misrepresented in many parts of the world, this program plays an ever-increasing role to correct those impressions of America, expose international students to our culture and values, and give Americans the opportunity to learn about corners of the world to which they may never travel," said the letter from 33 House members, both Democratic and Republican.

Ilir Zherka, executive director of the Alliance for International Exchange, an umbrella organization for sponsors of J-1 visa programs, said Congress has received 100,000 letters urging it to protect the program.

And it may already be working. On Thursday, the Senate Appropriations Committee added an amendment to a State Department spending bill mandating that any changes to the J-1 program must be transparent.
When Tara Trevino walked into her home in the Magnolia Bend neighborhood after Hurricane Harvey's rainstorms, all she could do was stare.

"I've been in floods before, but this is 10 times worse than I ever imagined," said Trevino, standing under the sky peeking through an open roof in her gutted out home, in the community along FM 1314 south of Conroe and along the east side of the West Fork of the San Jacinto River.

High winds, possibly a tornado, according to her insurance representative, is believed to have caused the damage to the roof. Portions of the ceiling fell as floodwaters rose, destroying her home's structure beyond repair with an estimated $240,000 in damages, according to Trevino. She said the disaster caused about another $380,000 in damages to her four rental properties in Magnolia Bend, where she said about 30-40 homes flooded.

In spring 2016, the home took on 3 feet of floodwater, but this time even her mother's home next door, which stands 12 feet off the ground and housed her family during the storm before they decided to evacuate Sunday night, had at least a foot of water upstairs.

"We flooded in 1994, and they (the San Jacinto River Authority) said that was a 100-year flood and it wouldn't happen again," Trevino said.

SJRA General Manager Jace Houston, who did not work at the authority in 1994, said it is possible to experience this type of flooding event, even in the future.

"The 1994 storm was probably more than a 100-year storm, but no one in the water business would ever tell you that would never happen again ," he said. "There's no way to know. Think about Harvey. This is more than a 100-year storm. I've had people ask me already if it could happen again, well, it could. It's unlikely, but it could."

Trevino said she monitored the weather and SJRA's release from the Lake Conroe Dam and informed people in the neighborhood, where she said there are a total of about 300 homes, to evacuate.

"No one came out to tell anybody," she said. "We had no warning this time."

The SJRA partners with the Conroe Emergency Management officials who issue evacuations. The Conroe OEM was unable to respond to Courier phone calls by press time Saturday. However, early Monday morning, on Aug. 28, the City of Conroe called for more than a dozen communities to evacuate in response to the record release of water from the Lake Conroe Dam, including a mandatory evacuation for McDade Estates and recommended evacuations for areas expected to flood neighborhoods downstream from McDade Estates, River Plantation, Woodhaven Forest, Artesian Forest, Riverbrook Drive & Sherbrook Circle (East of I-45 at 1488), and neighborhoods off of FM 2854.

The Conroe OEM is a separate operation from the Montgomery County OEM.

Down the street at the end of East Parkway Drive, volunteers in yellow shirts from the Church of Jesus Christ Latter-Day Saints helped Joseph Newman gut out his two-story home.

"This is hard for him," said Beverlee Gorewitz, who was among about 22 volunteers helping. "He lost a lot of personal belongings, the house has mold, and I'm not sure if they will be able to save it or not.  Opening the door and the smell of the house was overwhelming."

The water rose at least 10 feet with about 2 feet inside the second floor of the home where Newman, who lost his wife 17 years ago, has lived for 40 years and finished remodeling from last Spring only three weeks before Harvey hit.

"They opened up the lake and got us again almost like they do every year," said Newman, who watched the flood gage at Interstate 45. "I saw it start rising, grabbed my cat and left.  I had to start over in 1994 and here I am again 20 years later.  It was a blessing (the volunteers arrived). I didn't know what I was going to do.

"I'm just taking it one day at a time," he said holding a FEMA application.

Both residents live next to Shadow Lake and near Sandy Branch Creek. However, they blamed the extent of the flood on the SJRA's release from the Lake Conroe Dam. The SJRA has no control over tributaries that connect with the West Fork of the San Jacinto. The river runs 4,291.36 feet (1.31 km) southwest of East Parkway Drive. In the 1994 floods, the SJRA released water from the dam at a rate more than 33,000 cubic feet per second. During Harvey's storms, the maximum release rate was a record 79,000 cbs -- almost 2-1/2 times the previous record rate of release.

According to information from SJRA, Lake Conroe was receiving water at a rate of 130,000 cubic feet per second during the Harvey rainstorms.

A class-action lawsuit has been filed against the SJRA by a Houston-based law firm which estimates thousands of homeowners and business owners' properties were flooded that had previously escaped flooding from Hurricane Harvey itself. The SJRA won a similar lawsuit after the October 1994 floods.

Houston said the dam reduces downstream flooding from what would occur if the dam were not built.

"If there were no lake there today, the peak flow they would have all seen was 130,000 cubic feet per second. But because the dam exists, it was 79,000. It would have been that much worse. That's why the lawsuit in 1994 was dismissed; and most likely, that will be the same thing that happens this time."

Trevino supports the solution offered in the past lawsuit.

"In 1994, the class-action lawsuit talked about lowering the lake and dredging the river," said Tevino, noting the flood event happened on a holiday weekend. "I wholeheartedly agree."

Houston said prerelease of lake water is not recommended by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality because it would most likely make problems worse and would not reduce peak flow in an event. More information is available at sjra.net.
There are some parts of the Republican coalition who feel like they havent gotten what they expected from the presidency of Donald Trump. Those who are opposed to gay rights, however, have little to complain about. Heres the latest:

In a major upcoming Supreme Court case that weighs equal rights with religious liberty, the Trump administration on Thursday sided with a Colorado baker who refused to bake a wedding cake for a same-sex couple.

The Department of Justice on Thursday filed a brief on behalf of baker Jack Phillips, who was found to have violated the Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act by refusing to create a cake to celebrate the marriage of Charlie Craig and David Mullins in 2012. Phillips said he doesnt create wedding cakes for same-sex couples because it would violate his religious beliefs.

The government agreed with Phillips that his cakes are a form of expression, and he cannot be compelled to use his talents for something in which he does not believe.

I wont go too deeply into the legal arguments around this case, except to say that it gets to a fundamental question: Is it OK to discriminate against gay people? Colorado has an antidiscrimination law that explicitly protects citizens from discrimination in public accommodations on the basis of disability, race, creed, color, sex, sexual orientation, marital status, national origin or ancestry, and the baker clearly violated that law. He claims, however, that he should be able to discriminate because his antipathy toward gay couples is based on religious beliefs. In the case of other kinds of discrimination, we dont accept that as an excuse.

If you own a restaurant, you cant put up a Whites only sign and say that your reading of the Bible mandates that you refuse to serve black people. Even if your beliefs are sincerely held, weve decided that our societal interest in stopping discrimination outweighs your religious freedom. Although the administration takes the position that its the bakers artistic expression in making a cake that gives him greater latitude to discriminate (a somewhat different legal matter), the larger question we as a society are grappling with is whether, broadly speaking, it should be permissible to discriminate against gay people as it has been for most of history, or whether weve now moved beyond that.

The Republican Partys answer to the question of whether discrimination should be allowed is, Pretty much, yeah. But theyre fighting a rear guard action, constantly changing their position on what kinds of discrimination are acceptable as they race to catch up to a public that keeps leaving them behind.

Both parties have had to evolve in response to the rapid change in public opinion, but Democrats have had a much easier time of it. And opinion has been transformed in a very short time. For instance, in 2007, the Pew Research Center found the public opposed to same-sex marriage by a margin of 54-37. Ten years later, the public supported it by 62-32  from 17 points in opposition to 30 points in favor. Youll have a hard time finding another issue on which theres been a net swing in opinion of 47 points in just a decade.

While marriage as gotten much of the attention, the inclusion of LGBTQ Americans as people who deserve the same rights as anyone else brings with it a series of particular questions, which has led to a repeating cycle as these issues play out in our public debate. LGBTQ people demand equal treatment in some area, and conservatives say, My god, if we allow that, it will be a cataclysm!

Then the public talks and thinks about it, and comes to the collective conclusion that its really no big deal. The change comes to pass, and eventually conservatives realize that theyve lost the argument and they stop talking about it, with no more than a few exceptions. (You wont find too many Republican politicians loudly arguing that the Supreme Court should overturn Obergefell v. Hodges and allow states to ban same-sex marriage again.) They then retreat to a new, smaller hill that they say they absolutely must defend if society is to survive. Okay, they say, we can live with gay people not being banned from teaching, but if they can get married, thatll be a disaster. Then: Okay, we can live with gay people getting married, but what really matters is that bakers be allowed to discriminate.

Yet they keep getting undermined by the facts on the ground. Again and again, the massive social disruption that conservatives have predicted when gay people are granted civil rights has failed to materialize. Its been two years since the Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage everywhere, and straight couples havent rushed to get divorced and abandon their children. Its been six years since the end of Dont Ask, Dont Tell, allowing gay people to serve openly in the military, and we never saw the catastrophic breakdown in morale and unit cohesion that conservatives said would occur. It turned out that people in the military handled it just fine, just like it turns out that people handle having married gay neighbors just fine, and kids handle being told that some of their friends have two mommies or two daddies just fine.

To be clear, Im not saying that gay people dont still suffer plenty of hostility and discrimination, because they do. But once Americans get a chance to talk and think about the issue and interact with the gay people in their own lives, most of them are in favor of eliminating discrimination.

Still, that doesnt include everyone, and it doesnt include President Trumps most committed supporters, particularly the evangelical Christian conservatives who know that theyre a dwindling portion of the population and increasingly feel like the culture is rejecting their values and leaving them behind - which it is.

So they can find some solace in the fact that Donald Trump has rewarded their loyalty by waging an assault on gay rights. Heres some of what the Trump administration has done in its nearly eight months in office, even before the case of the anti-gay baker:

 Argued in court that the Civil Rights Act does not protect gay people from discrimination in the workplace.

 Moved to ban transgender Americans from serving in the armed forces.

 Revoked an Obama administration guidance to public schools instructing them to avoid discriminating against transgender students.

 Removed questions on sexual identity from Department of Health and Human Services surveys, eliminating data that could be used to identify challenges LGBTQ Americans face.

 Rescinded an executive order President Obama had signed requiring federal contractors to verify their compliance with civil rights laws.

There will no doubt be more over the next three years, and some of it will make gay peoples lives more difficult. But it wont change the direction of history.
By PTI: Islamabad, Sep 10 (PTI) A major fire broke out today at a government building here in Pakistan, killing two persons and injuring five others, officials said.

The fire at the six-storey Awami Markaz Software Technology Park in Red Zone erupted in the morning and after which Pakistan Navy and firefighters had to be called in to contain it.

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The blazes were doused by afternoon with the help of seven fire tenders.

Deputy Mayor of Islamabad, Syed Zeehsan Naqvi said two people were killed and at least five others injured in the fire.

"One person died due to suffocation while another jumped from the fourth floor and was killed," he said.

The building houses several private and government offices.

Earlier in the day, reports emerged from the local media that several records of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which were ostensibly stored there, were destroyed in the fire.

Foreign Office Spokesman Nafees Zakaria later rubbished the claims in a tweet.

"No CPEC record has been destroyed in Awami Markaz fire. There is a small research unit, record of which is in digital mode and is safe," Zakaria tweeted.

Sources said the fire was triggered by a short-circuit.

An eight-member committee has been formed to probe the incident. PTI SH CPS CHT CHT

--- ENDS ---
WASHINGTON - Former secretary of state Hillary Clinton said Sunday that racial grievances had a significant influence on the 2016 presidential election and continue to be stoked by President Donald Trump.

"He was quite successful in referencing a nostalgia that would give hope, comfort, settle grievances for millions of people who were upset about gains that were made by others," Clinton said on CBS's "Sunday Morning" ahead of the Tuesday release of her campaign memoir, "What Happened."

Host Jane Pauley replied, "What you're saying is millions of white people."

"Millions of white people, yeah," Clinton said. "Millions of white people."

Clinton also criticized Trump's address at his inauguration, which she attended in January out of what she deemed a sense of duty, as a speech that spoke to the anger of some white voters.

"I'm a former first lady, and former presidents and first ladies show up," Clinton said. "It's part of the demonstration of the continuity of our government. And so there I was, on the platform, you know, feeling like an out-of-body experience. And then his speech, which was a cry from the white-nationalist gut."

Clinton's remarks on Sunday came a little more than a year after she gave a major campaign speech in which she described the "disturbing" connection between Trump's campaign and the "alt-right," a movement associated with white nationalism.

"He is taking hate groups mainstream and helping a radical fringe take over the Republican Party," Clinton said in Reno, Nevada, last year. "His disregard for the values that make our country great is profoundly dangerous."

Trump responded at the time by saying that Clinton was using the "oldest play in the Democratic playbook."

"She paints decent Americans, you, as racists," Trump told a crowd in Manchester, New Hampshire, after her speech.
As a meteorologist, there are things you learn in textbooks that you may never see in person. You know they happen theoretically, but the chances of seeing the most extraordinary weather phenomena are slim to none.

This is one of those things - a hurricane strong enough to change the shape of an ocean.

Twitter user @Kaydi_K shared a video Saturday afternoon, and even though it looked as though it couldn't be possible, it was absolutely legit.

"I am in disbelief right now. . ." she wrote. "This is Long Island, Bahamas and the ocean water is missing!!!"

Basically, Hurricane Irma is so strong and its pressure is so low, it's sucking water from its surroundings into the core of the storm.

The wind on Long Island in the Bahamas is from the southeast to the northwest on Saturday. On the northwest side of the island, it would be blowing the water away from the shoreline.

It also may be experiencing the effects of what I call the hurricane "bulge." In the center of the storm, where there is extreme low pressure, water is drawn upward. Low pressure is basically a sucking mechanism - it sucks the air into it, and when it's really low, it can change the shape of the surface of the ocean. As the storm draws water toward the center, it gets pulled away from the surroundings.

In any case, this isn't the sign of a tsunami. The water will return to Long Island, and it probably won't rush back with any great force. It will probably be back by Sunday afternoon.
Wednesday evening found Brian Poe hunkered down in a commercial kitchen, which in some ways was not unusual, as he is a chef by trade. But this particular kitchen was nearly 2,000 miles from his home in Boston, at a resort on the island of St. Maarten.

Moreover, at that moment, the kitchen and Poe and 100-some other terrified guests were all in the eye of Hurricane Irma.

The kitchen was flooding, Poe recalled. The ballroom had already started to cave in. The resort's general manager, suddenly transformed into a shepherd of terrified souls, used the eye's brief calm to lead his flock to higher ground.

"He said, 'We have to do this,' " Poe recalled. "Don't stop moving.' "

They didn't. Poe and his wife, who had been celebrating their anniversary, scrambled up the stairs of the howling, shaking, soaking Sonesta resort. One floor, then another. On the fifth floor, they paused and held on to whatever they could, as floors six and seven went into the sky.

For the next 48 hours, they'd keep moving - from one uncertain shelter to another, across an obliterated country, and finally to a half-flattened airport where they hoped against all odds a plane might come and take them home.

Irma damaged or destroyed nearly three quarters of the homes in St. Maarten, a part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands that lies in a chain of Caribbean islands ravaged by the hurricane's march toward Florida. The airport was devastated and unreachable. St. Martin, a French territory that covers the small island's northern half, fared no better.

Such was the ruin that Poe witnessed through the fifth-story window of the resort when daylight broke on Thursday.

"There was one point I thought I was gone - me and my wife were gone," Poe told The Washington Post, his recollections occasionally interrupted by long silences when memories got the better of him.

The Poes weren't dead, but they were in trouble. Irma appeared to have wiped out the island's entire infrastructure. The State Department warned U.S. citizens trapped there that all ports were closed; there was no consulate; and anyone in trouble should simply try 911.

The prime minister of St. Maarten had last updated his website before the storm hit, and signed off: "God be with all of us."

And all the while, Hurricane Jose was rolling toward them in Irma's wake, threatening to hit the island with a second blow.

The staff at the ruined Sonesta managed to rig up a landline, which Poe used to let friends and family in Boston know they'd survived, even if he wasn't sure how he'd get back to the city and two restaurants he co-owns there.

Worried that what was left of the resort might collapse, the manager led the guests inland, to a shelter run by the Dutch military.

As darkness fell on his first night since the hurricane, Poe said, he looked out over the hills and saw flashlights signal distress.

The supply crisis became quickly apparent the next day.

"We used the last of the flour this morning to ration 120 pancakes I cooked for the shelter," Poe told the Boston Herald, using sporadic cellphone service to communicate with the newspaper through texts.

He and his wife were showering with hoses. The shelter was crowded with stranded visitors like them and locals, some of whom looked badly injured. Information passed largely by word of mouth, with report often hard to determine from rumor.

At some point on Friday, a bus arrived at the shelter. The Poes were told to board along with dozens of others.

They drove for several miles along the ravaged coastline to Princess Juliana Airport - "destroyed," Poe said, though the parking lot was nevertheless pressed with people trying to get off the island.

A plane was landing to evacuate the Americans, Poe remembered being told. And then: "We're so sorry. The plane can't get out. It's not coming."

They went back to the shelter. Tried to reclaim their beds. Then another bus trip was announced, and they returned to the airport, only to be told once again that the plane couldn't make it.

By then, Poe said, "everyone was in tears."

Likewise, people were in despair across the island. Stranded students at the Caribbean School of Medicine scavenged through the rubble for food and water, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reported.

A spokesman for the State Department told The Washington Post it helped evacuate more than 500 Americans off the island, then suspended operations until Hurricane Jose passed.

Hundreds of Americans "are knocking on every door we can find to get them off the island," a U.S.-based lawyer for the Divi Little Bay Beach Resort - a few miles from where Poe stayed - wrote to The Post.

"It's very difficult to be in an emergency situation and just feel like nothing's happening," said the lawyer, Lewis Stanford.

But help was at hand for some of those stuck on St. Maarten - even if they couldn't yet see it.

When Hurricane Harvey flooded huge swaths of the United States last month, volunteers with the New York Air National Guard flew down to join the rescue effort. Members of the 105th Airlift Wing and 106th Rescue Wing spent long days plucking trapped Texans out of the water, then flew back to New York last weekend.

Days later, they loaded up again and flew out into Irma's wake.

"We're para-rescuemen. Our business is specialized rescue. That's what we do," said Capt. Mike O'Hagan, a spokesman for the unit, speaking from its present base in Puerto Rico.

His team had flown over St. Thomas with helicopters - rescuing a pregnant woman and men in cardiac arrest from an island no less flattened and mangled as the one Poe was stuck on.

They weren't an evacuation squad. There were far too many stranded people for about 130soldiers to help.

But on Friday, as the New Yorkers were preparing to hunker down for Hurricane Jose, a late request came in from headquarters: a diabetic woman was stranded on St. Maarten.

Poe didn't know who the woman was. He had heard of her at the shelter, through the same chain of uncertain reports that were now his news source. But he and his wife had other things on their mind as they headed back from the airport for the second time since the hurricane - wondering when, how and if they'd ever get home.

Then, from behind, Poe heard someone yell: "Turn around! Turn around! We might have something for you."

So he and his wife and two dozen other Americans turned, and went back to the ruined airport a third time.

This time, they were met from half a dozen U.S. soldiers from the 105th and 106th.

They had come to the island to pick up the diabetic patient, not the stranded resort guests. But they had brought with them an HC-130 plane with plenty of seats to spare.

Poe chatted with the soldiers - mostly young men from New York, who had already been flying missions over a hurricane zone for hours.

The chef now speaks of those he met in St. Maarten in terms that transcend their professions. The resort manager who led him out of the hurricane's eye is a "hero." The soldiers who escorted him and his wife to safety are saviors.

But as he spoke to the soldiers that night on an isolated runway in the Carribean, before finally leaving the island, they described their own work in the modest terms.

"They said, 'We heard a bunch of guys were down here,' " Poe said.

And then the back of the plane opened up, and Poe and his wife strapped in, and hours later called The Washington Post from an airport in Puerto Rico - homeward bound.

"Some of the best airline service I've ever had in my entire life," Poe said.
Extremely dangerous Hurricane Irma first crashed into the Florida Keys on Sunday morning and then made a second landfall on Marco Island on Florida's west coast Sunday afternoon, unleashing violent wind gusts up to 142 mph and storm-surge flooding. The storm was plowing up Florida's west coast Sunday night and, once it's over, forecasters feared that this storm will go down as one of the worst in the state's history.

At 11 p.m., the storm was centered 50 miles southeast of Tampa. Its eyewall - containing the storm's most violent winds - had passed northeast of Sarasota. The storm center was plowing north at 14 mph into the area between Tampa and Orlando. Through around 2 a.m. Monday, wind gusts of 75 to 100 mph were possible in both cities, where winds had already gusted that high.

Hurricane-force wind gusts were also quite possible on the east coast of central Florida into early Monday, the Hurricane Center said, thanks to Irma's large wind field.

Around Tampa, once the storm center passes early Monday morning, a storm surge is possible of several feet above normally dry land, potentially inundating low-lying coastal areas.

Irma's peak winds of 100 mph, with higher gusts, had dropped 30 mph from the morning, making it a Category 2 hurricane (down from a Category 4). Even with slow weakening likely to continue as the storm passes over land, Irma remains very serious and life-threatening. The National Hurricane Center said it is expected to remain a hurricane through Monday morning.

Coastal waters could rise well above normally dry land along Florida's central Gulf Coast, inundating homes, businesses and roads.

Because of the storm's magnitude, the entire state of Florida is being severely affected by damaging winds, torrential rains and, in many areas, the risk of tornadoes. Tropical storm and hurricane conditions were also predicted to spread into the Florida Panhandle, eastern Alabama, much of Georgia and southern South Carolina by Monday.

This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate 3 1 of 3 Paul Chiasson/AP Show More Show Less 2 of 3 Bob Self/AP Show More Show Less 3 of 3





Central Florida

Irma's eyewall passed on the east side of Sarasota around 10 p.m. and should pass between Tampa and Orlando through around 1 or 2 a.m., from south to north, producing wind gusts between 75 and 100 mph throughout the region. Both cities had already clocked gusts to near 80 mph.

Once Irma's center passes north of Tampa early Monday morning, the seas will rise likely resulting in areas of coastal inundation.

Even on Central Florida's east coast, tropical-storm force winds and hurricane-force gusts were fairly widespread Sunday evening. At St. Lucie, a gust reached 99 mph and Cape Canaveral gusted to 79 mph.

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Southwest Florida

The worst winds had passed this region just prior to 9:30 p.m. but gusty showers continued on the storm's backside.

Irma's eyewall passed through Fort Myers and Cape Coral just before 7 p.m., producing wind gusts of 88 and 101 mph and then passed on the west side of Port Charlotte between 8 and 9 p.m.

As the eyewall moved over Naples late Sunday afternoon, it reported sustained winds of 93 mph and a gust to 142 mph - the strongest recorded from this storm in the U.S.

Josh Morgerman, a hurricane chaser positioned in Naples, described the scene: "Went thru violent, destructive winds. Screaming, whiteout, wreckage blowing by in fog." Then the calm eye moved overhead.

Before the arrival of the storm center, water was actually retreating from Naples to Tampa due to offshore winds from the east pulling the sea back. But forecasters warned residents that shortly after the storm's center passed to the north and winds blew back onshore, waters would rush back in rapidly causing severe inundation.

In Naples, as of 7 p.m., water levels were about four feet above normally dry land but the level was starting to stabilize around 8 p.m. Amazingly, it set its second lowest water level and highest water level all in the course of 8 hours.

In Ft. Myers, waters levels were rising through 10 p.m., but not as dramatically as they had in Naples.

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Southeast Florida

In Southeast Florida, spiral bands continued to unleash tropical-storm-force winds. Even into the evening, winds were gusting up to 60 to 75 mph around Miami and West Palm Beach (7 p.m. gust of 75 mph), but they weren't as strong as earlier.

In the afternoon, sustained winds in Miami and Fort Lauderdale reached 50-60 mph through the early afternoon, gusting as high as 80 to 100 mph. Miami International Airport clocked a gust to 94 mph and an isolated gust hit 100 mph at the University of Miami.

Also during the afternoon the seas had risen several feet above normally dry land. Social media photos and videos showed water pouring through Miami's streets, in between high-rises, amid sideways sheets of rains.

Late Sunday afternoon, waters were finally starting to slowly recede around Miami.

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The Keys

While the core of the storm and worst winds passed the Keys early Sunday morning, the Weather Service warned storm surge flooding was ongoing as winds on the storm's backside shoved water over the islands. Gusts still reached 50 to 60 mph as of 7:45 p.m.

Early Sunday afternoon, the maximum surge at Cudjoe Key was estimated at 10 feet.

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Statewide

About 3 million customers were without power.

Particularly in South and Central Florida, torrential rain was falling, with widespread totals of 6 to 10 inches and pockets up to 10 to 14 inches. Numerous flash flood warnings had been issued.

As the storm's spiral bands walloped Central and Northern Florida, the potential for tornadoes arose in the swirling air, and the Weather Service issued watches and scores of warnings.

Storm warnings in effect and predicted surge height and winds

Hurricane warnings cover all of Florida except the western Panhandle, where a tropical storm warning was in effect.

A storm-surge warning was also issued for much of the Florida Peninsula (except for a small section from North Miami Beach to Jupiter Inlet), and even extended up the Georgia coast into southern South Carolina. The Hurricane Center said that this would bring the risk of "dangerous" and "life-threatening" inundation.

Because of the shift in the most likely storm track to the west, Miami and Southeast Florida were most likely to miss the storm's intensely destructive core, known as the eyewall, where winds are strongest. Even so, because of Irma's enormous size, the entire Florida Peninsula and even the Panhandle were likely to witness damaging winds. The National Hurricane Center warned that the storm would bring "life-threatening wind impacts to much of the state."

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Conditions will continue to deteriorate Sunday night over Florida in the central and north part of the state as Irma chugs up the coast. Conditions will slowly improve to the south.

Through around very early Monday morning, the corridor between Tampa and Orlando would face the storm's brunt.

Here's a guide to what is most likely and where . . .

--Key West/Key Largo

Time frame for worst conditions: Through Sunday afternoon.

Hazard threats: Wind, storm surge and rain.

Wind gusts of up to 50 to 70 mph should continue into the evening.

A catastrophic storm surge of 5 to 10 feet or more is expected to inundate much of the island chain. Heavy rain will add to the water issues, as anywhere from 5 to 10 inches of additional rain will fall before the worst of the storm is over. Unfortunately, the damage potential on the Keys could be landscape-altering after taking a direct hit from this storm.

--Miami/Fort Lauderdale/West Palm Beach

Time frame for worst conditions: Through Sunday night.

Hazard threats: Strong winds, tornadoes, heavy rain.

Sustained winds of 45 to 70 mph with gusts of 80-plus mph will last well into Sunday evening.

Swirling winds at all levels of the atmosphere have also increased the chances of tornadoes developing at any point on Sunday, especially in locations right along the water. Rainfall totals of four to eight inches or more are expected on Sunday alone, which may exacerbate localized flooding. With Irma's last-minute track shift to the west, the storm surge won't be as big of a concern here as it is elsewhere, with a two- to four-foot surge expected along much of Florida's east coast.

--Naples/Fort Myers/Tampa Bay/St. Petersburg

Time frame for worst conditions: Through Monday morning.

Hazard threats: Storm surge and wind.

Irma's ultimate destination will be along the west coast of Florida. This means the conditions will deteriorate rapidly from Naples to Tampa Bay throughout Sunday afternoon. However, Irma's path will take it parallel to the west coast of Florida, keeping the entire region engulfed in the dangerous northeast quadrant of the storm, where winds are strongest. Sustained hurricane force winds and gusts over 100 mph should arrive in Naples Sunday afternoon and up to 75-100 mph in St. Petersburg/Tampa Bay between 10 p.m. and midnight or so.

The most dangerous hazard for this region will be the extreme storm surge. Nowhere in the entire state will the storm-surge levels be higher than along the gulf-facing coast, with storm surge totals of eight to 12 feet and locally up to 15 feet forecast. Any coastal city from Tampa Bay south to Naples is at risk, with historic flooding (the likes of which haven't been seen in this area since Hurricane Donna in 1960) threatening thousands of people and structures.

--Orlando/Central Florida

Time frame for worst conditions: Sunday night through Monday morning.

Hazard threats: Wind, rain, and tornadoes.

Inland areas won't escape the effects of Irma. The storm is extremely large in size, with tropical-storm-force winds extending outward over 200 miles from the center. The wind speeds in central Florida and the Orlando area will start to pick up by late Sunday afternoon, with sustained winds of 40 to 60 mph and gusts of 70-plus mph lasting from late Sunday night through Monday morning.

Heavy rain will also cause problems, with a general six to 12-plus inches of rain expected by the time the storm is over. The threat of tornadoes will increase by Sunday night, as well, as the storm's center tracks north along the west coast of Florida.

--Jacksonville/Daytona Beach

Time frame for worst conditions: Sunday evening through Monday afternoon.

Hazard threats: Rain, tornadoes, wind.

The northeast portion of Florida will be spared the worst of Irma but won't escape unscathed. Sustained tropical-force winds of 40 to 55 mph will overspread the area from Daytona Beach to Jacksonville by Sunday evening, with the worst winds (gusts up to 70 mph) occurring overnight. Heavy rain will be a story line here as six to 10-plus inches of rain is expected to fall in a relatively short period.

As with other parts of the state, the tornado threat will peak overnight on Sunday as Irma's storm center tracks northward.

Storm-surge values will be elevated (two to four feet) but should result in only minor to moderate coastal flooding.

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Potential effects on Georgia and the southeastern United States

--Georgia/Atlanta/South Carolina

Time frame for worst conditions: Monday morning through Tuesday morning.

Hazard threats: Wind, rain and, at the coast, storm surge

Hurricane warnings extend well into Georgia, covering over half of the state. Parts of southern South Carolina also are under a hurricane warning, with Irma poised to maintain its hurricane-force strength for several hours after landfall.

Sustained tropical force winds of 25 to 45 mph will spread over Georgia from south to north starting late Sunday night. The strongest sustained winds (40 to 50 mph) with gusts of 60-plus mph will move in on early Monday morning, lasting through Monday evening. This includes Atlanta, which is under a tropical-storm warning, where sustained winds of 25 to 40 mph with gusts up to 60 mph will occur from about 10 p.m. Sunday night to about 5 p.m. Monday afternoon. This could lead to downed trees and outages.

Heavy rain is also expected, with storm totals of six to 10 inches forecast, the bulk of which should fall Monday.

Storm surge along the Georgia/South Carolina coast will be a hazard, as well, with the Hurricane Center predicting a surge of four to six feet. Of particular concern is the duration of the storm surge. Persistent onshore winds will extend the surge component here, with elevated water levels potentially lasting up to 36 hours.

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Irma's path so far

At 3:35 p.m. Sunday, Irma had made its second U.S. landfall of the day over Marco Island, where a wind gust of 130 mph was reported.

Earlier, the storm officially made its initial U.S. landfall at Cudjoe Key at 9:10 a.m. as a Category 4 hurricane. Winds over the Keys raged, gusting to at least 94 mph in Key West (before the wind instrument failed) and up to 120 mph in Big Pine Key. Witness video showed the rising storm surge flooding Key West streets.

Before its encounter with the Keys, Irma made landfall on the north coast of Cuba as a Category 5 hurricane just after 9 p.m. Friday, with maximum sustained winds of 160 mph. It became that country's first Category 5 hurricane since 1924. Fueled by the extremely warm ocean temperatures, Irma reintensified to the maximum hurricane classification level after weakening slightly on Friday afternoon.

As it scraped Cuba's north coast early Saturday, it produced a sustained wind gust of 118 mph, and a gust to 159 mph was reported at Falla, Cuba, in the eyewall of the hurricane.

On Friday, before making landfall along Cuba's north-central coast, Irma passed north of Haiti and then between Cuba's northeast coast and the Central Bahamas.

Thursday evening, the center of the storm passed very close to the Turks and Caicos, producing potentially catastrophic Category 5 winds. The storm surge was of particular concern, as the water had the potential to rise 16 to 20 feet above normally dry land in coastal sections north of the storm center, causing extreme inundation.

A devastating storm surge and destructive winds had also probably battered the southeastern Bahamas, near Great Inagua Island.

Through early Thursday, the storm had battered islands from Puerto Rico to the northern Lesser Antilles.

While the center of Irma passed just north of Puerto Rico late Wednesday, a wind gust of 63 mph was clocked in San Juan early Wednesday evening, and more than 900,000 people were reported to be without power. In Culebra, Puerto Rico, a small island 17 miles east of the main island, a wind gust registered 111 mph in the afternoon.

On Wednesday afternoon, the storm's eye had moved over Virgin Gorda in the British Virgin Islands, and its southern eyewall raked St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

Early Wednesday afternoon, a wind gust to 131 mph was clocked on Buck Island and 87 mph on St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

On Tuesday night and Wednesday morning, the hurricane passed directly over Barbuda and St. Martin in the northern Leeward Islands, the strongest hurricane recorded in that region and tied with the 1935 Florida Keys hurricane as the strongest Atlantic storm to strike land.

As Barbuda took a direct hit, the weather station there clocked a wind gust to 155 mph before it went offline.

The storm also passed directly over Anguilla and St. Martin early Wednesday, causing severe damage.

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Irma's place in history

Irma's peak intensity (185 mph) ranks among the strongest in recorded history, exceeding the likes of Katrina, Andrew and Camille - whose winds peaked at 175 mph.

Among the most intense storms on record, it trails only Hurricane Allen in 1980, which had winds of 190 mph. It is tied for second-most intense with Hurricane Wilma in 2005, Hurricane Gilbert in 1988 and the 1935 Florida Keys hurricane.

The storm maintained maximum wind speeds of at least 180 mph for 37 hours, longer than any storm on Earth on record, passing Super Typhoon Haiyan, the previous record-holder (24 hours).

Late Tuesday, its pressure dropped to 914 millibars (the lower the pressure, the stronger the storm), ranking as the lowest of any storm on record outside the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico in the Atlantic basin.

The storm has generated the most "accumulated cyclone energy," a measure of a storm's duration and intensity, of any hurricane on record.

Irma's landfall pressure of 929 millibars in the Florida Keys was the lowest for any U.S. landfalling hurricane since Katrina (920 millibars) and for a Florida landfall since Andrew (922 millibars). It ranks as the seventh-lowest pressure of any U.S. landfalling storm.

When Irma crashed into the Keys early Sunday as a Category 4, following Hurricane Harvey's assault in Texas, it marked the first time on record that two Category 4 storms had made landfall in the United States in the same year.

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Capital Weather Gang hurricane expert Brian McNoldy contributed to this report. Credit to tropical-weather expert and occasional Post contributor Phil Klotzbach for some statistics.

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VIDEO:

https://youtu.be/5gFntKt8ABI
One of four suspects in a 2016 jewelry store heist that turned fatal will face a jury in October.

A Montgomery County grand jury re-indicted Sedrick Townsend, 36, on a first-degree felony aggravated robbery charge for his alleged role in attempting to rob Jeff's Jewelry Oct. 3. Townsend was arrested days after the robbery along with Kadarius Royston, 23, Coredarian Bailey, 21, and Santo Stephens, 20.

One robber, 21-year-old Javian Jackson, died on scene after exchanging gunfire with store owner Jeffrey Turner Jr. The owner was not injured in the incident and has not been charged in Jackson's death.

The new indictment, handed down Tuesday, corrects the spelling of Turner's name as a victim and also lists Townsend's previous felony aggravated assault conviction in Harris County from 2005. He probably will face a jury Oct. 23 in Judge Patty Maginnis' 435th state District Court.

He is facing up to life in prison if convicted.

The Heist

The five men met at Jackson's mother's apartment in Houston on the morning of the robbery before departing to Conroe in two vehicles, according to court documents. After meeting up again at a Conroe gas station, the five allegedly discussed the robbery.

Jackson, Stephens and Royston reportedly got into a white Dodge Charger and headed to the Conroe West strip center in the 4800 block of Texas 105 West, which is where Jeff's Jewelry is located. Court records show Townsend stayed behind as the four headed to the store.

Early that Monday afternoon, police allege, Jackson, Stephens and Royston entered the jewelry store as Bailey held open the door. Jackson, armed with a gun, went straight to the register and demanded the cashier fill a duffle bag with cash.

As an employee fired shots at the robbers, police say Bailey, Stephens and Royston fled to the Charger parked out front, but Jackson stayed behind waiting for the duffle bag to be filled with cash. Once the bag was full, court records show, Jackson started firing at Turner, who returned fire with his AK-47 rifle.

Jackson died on scene.

Bailey, Stephens and Royston met up with Townsend at the Walgreens at the corner of FM 3083 and Texas 105 immediately after the robbery, according to court records. The four drove around, and as Townsend learned they did not get the money, he left them on the side of the freeway, detectives said.

Townsend made his way back to the crime scene, parking his car at the same Walgreens and walking the roughly 400 feet along Texas 105 to Jeff's Jewelry, according to law enforcement. Conroe police questioned Townsend, who said he knew Jackson was dead before police had identified him.

He reportedly told police a friend in Houston called him and told him of Jackson's death, but was not able to substantiate that claim, court records show. The next day, he reportedly told police he was in Houston at that friend's house buying drugs when he heard of Jackson's death and drove straight to the crime scene.

Police say witnesses told them they saw Townsend at the Walgreens prior to him arriving at the crime scene.

Townsend was arrested Oct. 10. Royston was arrested two days later, and Bailey turned himself into authorities Oct. 14.

Montgomery County grand jury indictments for Sept. 5:

Jeremy Joseph Duncan, aggravated robbery

Thomas Lyn Barringer, unauthorized use of motor vehicle and burglary of habitation

Omar Kroscotti Caldera, aggravated sexual assault of a child (x2) and assault public servant

Dillon Ray Mayes, possession with intent to deliver/manufacture controlled substance and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon

Reese Edwin Mack, assault family strangulation

Jason Thomas Davey, aggravated assault and assault family strangulation

Travis Jermain Harrell, assault family strangulation and unlawful possession of firearm by felon

Christopher Matthew Light, assault causing bodily injury family enhanced

Russell Lee Midkiff, assault family strangulation and DWI  third or more

Jamie Todd Cassard, assault family strangulation

Kevin Lane Fields, intoxication assault

Manuel Rodriguez, DWI  third or more

John Khanon Lucy, possession of controlled substance

Edward T. Miller, DWI  third or more

Terry Power, possession with intent to deliver/manufacture controlled substance

Jonathon Richard McNew, evading arrest detention with vehicle

Odis Charles Oliver III, theft

Muhummad Faheem Sheik-Hyath, aggravated assault causing serious bodily injury family enhanced with a weapon

Dwight Blane Delozier, DWI  third or more

Agustin Rodriguez, possession of controlled substance

Luis Antonio Martinez-Caudillo, cruelty to non-livestock animals

Deaundric Jaquay Dorsey, unlawful possession of firearm by felon

Ricky Lynn Gainer, possession of controlled substance

Larry Daniel Arredondo, possession with intent to deliver/manufacture controlled substance

April Green Anderson, possession of controlled substance

Veronica Alejandra Escoto, unauthorized use of motor vehicle

Michael Floyd Wyatt, possession of controlled substance

Eric Colin Pfeiffer, DWI  third or more

Jeremy William Jasek, assault family strangulation

Pascual Cordova Muniz, assault causing bodily injury family enhanced twice within 12 months

Anthony Ray Odell, unlawful possession of firearm by felon

Jason Clark Lara, possession with intent to deliver/manufacture controlled substance

Terrence Trevor Allison, possession with intent to deliver/manufacture controlled substance

Larhonda M. Biggles, theft

Terry Jarome Simmons III, theft

Heather Dean Hewitt, DWI  third or more

Julian Alexander Arguellas, indecency with a child (x2)
When Carlos E. Moore became a part-time municipal judge in Clarksdale, Mississippi, his first order of business was to remove the state flag from his courtroom.

The banner, adopted in 1894 and retained by Mississippi voters in a 2001 referendum, features the Confederate battle flag in its upper left corner and has been a continuing source of controversy, especially for African-Americans such as Moore.

"That flag - I do not believe it stands for justice," the 40-year-old lawyer said in an interview last week. "I did not want it standing behind me as I tried to administer justice."

In fact, Moore would like to eliminate the flag all together. He has ignored death threats and asked the Supreme Court to intervene in what so far has been an unsuccessful federal lawsuit claiming the flag promotes white supremacy and violates the equal-protection rights of black Mississippians.

It seems it would be a substantial lift to ask the Supreme Court to tell a state it cannot fly the flag it favors. Even Moore's lawyer, Philadelphia attorney Michael T. Scott, acknowledges there is no reason to think the court is particularly anxious to join the national debate over what should be done about the nation's lingering memorials to the Confederate States of America.

The state of Mississippi did not bother to file a response to Moore's Supreme Court petition. But the court last month told the state it wanted to know more, and to file a brief.

"So at least somebody at the Supreme Court does not think it is frivolous," Moore said.

Moore's petition to the court says that the "message in Mississippi's flag has always been one of racial hostility and insult." It encourages violence, Moore alleges, and sends a "message to African-American citizens of Mississippi that they are second-class citizens."

It seemed he had caught a break when his lawsuit was randomly assigned to U.S. District Judge Carlton Reeves.

Reeves, nominated by President Barack Obama, is only the second African-American federal judge in Mississippi and already has made a name for himself.

He struck down the state's law forbidding same-sex couples to marry, one of several rulings around the country that preceded the Supreme Court's decision in 2015 that such prohibitions violate the Constitution.

And Reeves became something of an internet sensation in 2015 when he delivered an eloquent speech on racial animosity and his state's tragic past when sentencing three young white men who had killed an African-American.

"The simple fact is that what turned these children into criminal defendants was their joint decision to act on racial hatred," he said, in a long speech whose transcript went viral.

In Moore's case, Reeves resurrected some of those themes.

He devoted about half of his 32-page decision to what he called "historical context" and dismissed the idea that the Confederate battle flag celebrates heritage, not hate, as supporters often declare.

"It should go without saying that the emblem has been used time and time again in the Deep South, especially in Mississippi, to express opposition to racial equality," Reeves wrote. "Persons who have engaged in racial oppression have draped themselves in that banner while carrying out their mission to intimidate or do harm."

He added, "It is difficult to imagine how a symbol borne of the South's intention to maintain slavery can unite Mississippians in the 21st century."

Still, Reeves wrote, Moore must lose.

To bring a federal lawsuit, a plaintiff must show an actual or imminent injury, specific and concrete to that person.

"Moore needs to identify that part of the Constitution which guarantees a legal right to be free from anxiety at state displays of historical racism," Reeves wrote. "There is none."

Scott, a corporate lawyer who normally represents pharmaceutical companies but had been looking to be involved in a case involving government endorsement of the Confederate flag, offered Moore help at the appellate level. Moore's case next moved to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit, considered one of the nation's most conservative.

But again, Moore seemed to luck out. His randomly assigned three-judge panel comprised a George H.W. Bush nominee and two judges nominated to the court by Obama, one of them African-American.

"I've got to admit, when I saw that panel, I wasn't unhappy," said Scott. "When I saw the opinion, I was."

The judges were unanimous in affirming Reeves's ruling. The Equal Protection Clause demanded a showing of government action that hurts an individual, Judge Stephen A. Higginson wrote.

"The gravamen of an equal protection claim is differential governmental treatment, not differential governmental messaging," he wrote.

Scott's petition to the Supreme Court asks the justices to look at it this way: If the Constitution's Establishment Clause means that a state may not favor one religion over another, its Equal Protection Clause should be read to prohibit a state "from expressing the view that one race is superior to, or preferred over, another."

Under the 5th Circuit's decision, Scott tells the court: "A city could adopt 'White Supremacy Forever' as its official motto ... or a state could incorporate a Nazi swastika, as an endorsement of Aryan/white supremacy, in its state flag. So long as the government's race-based message was 'limited' to speech, without further proof of a more tangible denial of 'equal treatment,' it would be immune from attack under the Equal Protection Clause."

Moore acknowledges that the best way to accomplish his goal would be for Mississippi's elected officials to change the flag. After white supremacist Dylann Roof killed nine people in the Charleston, South Carolina, church massacre, Confederate flags came down across the South.

But Mississippi remains the only state to incorporate the battle flag in its official emblem, and Moore said legislative efforts to change it have foundered. He sees no reason to believe that will change.

The final straw that led to his suit, he said, came in February 2016, a month traditionally celebrated as African-American History Month. It was then that Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant, R, announced that April would be Confederate Heritage Month.
People, hunkered down in Florida, tuned in to the local news, are seeing variations of the same theme: Exhausted but well-coiffed TV weather people describing the varied ways Hurricane Irma is pummeling their communities.

But for a moment early Sunday, the devastation seemed to break through one broadcaster's professional demeanor as she reacted to predictions about the destructive - and likely deadly - storm surge.

Dani Beckstrom is a recent transplant from Idaho who's been with Fox 4 News in Fort Myers since May 2016. As Irma's eye approached Southwest Florida, detailed radar images were coming in, allowing Beckstrom and other forecasters to bring into sharp focus the hurricane's effects.

To aid viewers, the station had put together a color-coded map depicting the anticipated storm surge - the wall of ocean water that would push into Florida's coastal communities. Blue signified a foot of water; red signified more than nine feet, enough to submerge a single-story home.

U.S. LANDFALL: Hurricane Irma reaches Florida Keys

Beckstrom was looking at a screen full of red.

"This is unbelievable," she said. "As I'm saying this, I'm realizing what it means. Think of how many homes are south of Veterans Parkway in Cape Coral. So, so many."

She pivoted to another area of the map.

"Those who live in the northwest cape, which there are a lot of developments in the northwest cape a lot of new homes ... we're going to see that 6-to-9-foot storm surge in the general area in the northwest cape, which is - gut-wrenching at this point."

Now Playing: Watch Hurricane Irma coverage Video: San Antonio Express-News

Beckstrom couldn't be reached for comment on Sunday. Her news director, Eric Waze, said she was "in the middle of a 12-hour wall-to-wall coverage shift."

But as she was working, her earlier words about Irma were zipping across the nation.

HURRICANE IRMA: Florida residents warned not to shoot guns at monster storm

"It just breaks my heart," she said in the broadcast, pointing to another all-red section of the map. "But we are looking at Sanibel being completely underwater as the storm surge moves ... it's going to push that wall of water over the entire island."

She then offered simple advice for anyone trying to ride out the storm on the island: Seek high ground.

"If you in a one-story home on Sanibel, you're still there, go to your neighbor's house - quickly, I'm talking within the next hour - if they have a two-story home. Because we're looking at nine feet, which would fill up the first floor of your home. You would no longer be safe."
Ta-Nehisi Coates' powerful new essay, "The First White President," offers up an indictment of white America - and white punditry - that is more sweeping than it first appears. Coates' argument is not just that Donald Trump's ascent was fueled by the racism of much of his white electorate. It's also that Trump's candidacy, election and presidency, coming in the first election following two terms of the nation's first black president, represent nothing less than an effort to eradicate the very fact that America elected a black president in the first place.

Coates argues that we must forthrightly confront the wretched reality that Trump won because he framed his candidacy, overtly, as a "negation" of the first black presidency - as a promise to cancel it as a kind of historical accident. Trump launched his rise with the "birther" charge that Barack Obama's presidency was illegitimate. and vowed to erase the Obama legacy, i.e., to obliterate all historical evidence of the first black president's successes. Thus, Coates argues, Trump's ascension constitutes at its core a reassertion of white supremacy as the rightful American order.

There is another claim embedded in that one that I want to try to say something about. Coates extensively challenges a noxious strain of punditry about Trump's victory, and about how we should respond to it. And he deals it devastating blow.

However, there is an incompleteness to Coates' treatment of that topic in particular that, I believe, risks working against our ability to make sense of the present moment, and creates an opening for a series of other bad arguments to take hold.

The pundit narrative Coates targets holds that Trump's election was not driven by his white electorate's racism. Instead, it was fueled by cultural and economic grievance - by a backlash against liberal elites who sneer at working class whites' vanishing way of life, mock their anxieties about demographically evolving America as rank bigotry, and don't sufficiently empathize with (or are actively helping bring about) their diminished opportunities in the globalizing economy. As a symptom of this, the Democratic agenda was overtaken by "identity politics," in which Democrats advocated for the narrow interests of various minority groups, while dismissing the moral legitimacy of working class white cultural and economic angst.

This analysis is fundamentally fraudulent, as Coates demonstrates. It reduces Trump's support to a class based phenomenon, when in fact white support for Trump extended far beyond the working class, and indeed transcended class. It submerges Trump's use of white identity politics, thus whitewashing (as it were) away the culpability of white racism and white tribalism in Trump's victory. It downplays the significance of the preferences of working class minorities. It dodges on the core question of whether various groups of minorities, facing deeply rooted discrimination of varying circumstances, actually do have a legitimate claim to particularized redress, in service of the very same ideal of equality that these pundits themselves insist is being violated by the "identity politics" game. (Also see Jacob Levy's strong statement of this argument.)

As Coates neatly summarizes, for these pundits, "the white working class functions rhetorically" as a "tool to quiet the demands of those who want a more inclusive America."

However, Coates' analysis goes one important step further. Coates argues that pundits trafficking in this narrative aren't simply wrongheaded; they did so because they, too, were, and remain, caught up in white tribalism. This is impeding a reckoning with what Trump's rise says about racism's continued centrality to American political life. As Coates puts it, "those charged with analyzing him cannot name his essential nature, because they too are implicated in it."

It is here where the incompleteness of the analysis demands attention, I believe. Many white pundits and writers throughout the campaign and since Trump's election have in fact pushed back hard against the fraudulent narrative that Coates dismantles. Josh Marshall has already done the work of making this case, so I won't recapitulate it here. As Marshall says, there is a class of white pundits and writers who "sees Trumpism as a broad, white backlash against the rising assertion of non-white or multi-racial America - a broad demographic and cultural tide that both made Barack Obama possible and which he in turn symbolized. In other words, they see Trump as primarily about racial backlash."

Coates is also too dismissive of some on the left, such as Bernie Sanders, who also criticized Hillary Clinton for playing identity politics. But, while one can quibble with that language, the Sanders/left critique was more that rhetorically attacking Trump's racism was insufficient - that a substantially more robust social democratic economic agenda also must underpin any serious rebuttal of Trump, and any serious policy response to the systemic racism that Trump promised to further entrench. Regardless, the upshot of all this, as Marshall concludes of Coates, is that "there are a lot of voices - hardly little heard or without megaphones - he's simply not hearing."

But here something more must be said. The issue is not that these voices aren't getting recognition for calling out Trump's ascent for what it is. Rather, it's that this omission has intellectual consequences that could complicate our ability to make sense of the response to Trump we are currently witnessing.

As Coates says, Hillary Clinton " acknowledged the existence of systemic racism more explicitly than any of her modern Democratic predecessors." But Clinton then won the national popular vote by nearly three million. This also came after she aggressively attacked Trump's racism and (whatever the previous sins of the Clintons) defended the minority groups that Trump had openly vowed to persecute. Trump almost certainly would not have won if not for a perfect storm of Hillary Clinton mistakes and weaknesses and other external and structural factors, such as James Comey's intervention, time-for-a-change sentiment, and increasing partisanship and polarization.

Meanwhile, since the election, polls have showed broad majority condemnation of Trump's mass deportations; his rescinding of protections for the "dreamers"; his Mexican wall; his pardoning of Joe Arpaio; his thinly-veiled Muslim ban; and his lending of succor to white supremacists responsible for racist violence and murder in Charlottesville, Virginia. If anything, popular revulsion at the core elements of Trumpism has only grown. The pushback from civil society and from the chorus of voices (that Coates didn't acknowledge) has intensified.

Coates would likely dismiss the deeper significance of these factors - and understandably so. Indeed, none of this is to absolve America - or white America - of its sin in electing Trump. The very fact that it was close enough for the electoral college to swing the election itself confirms the horror of Coates' core indictment - that Trump's bigotry and centrality of his vow to negate the first black presidency should have been dealbreakers , but weren't. A racist and white nationalist is sitting in the White House. The deportations continue apace. The Muslim ban may survive. Jeff Sessions is gutting civil rights protections. A national crackdown on voting rights looms. The force and value of Coates' broader case is undeniable.

Still, in accounting for what is happening in American politics right now, we should all say more about what the deep resistance to all of this means. Not to do so creates an opening for variations on the bad arguments that Coates destroyed to reenter through the back door.

An argument circulating among some centrist pundits - one related to the "identity politics" claim that Coates demolished - holds that liberal Democrats have moved too far to the left on immigration and race. Intoxicated by their moral superiority and overconfidence that the culture is moving their way, liberal Dems have not reckoned with the latent desire of many Americans to organize solidarity around something other than a commitment to ideals of equality and inclusive liberal democracy. This helped create an opening for Trumpism to fill the void, goes this argument.

There is a serious component to this claim. It is true that we should redouble our efforts to make the case for these ideals. It is also true that we still do not acknowledge the degree to which those ideals have lost out to inegalitarian, ascriptive, racially hierarchical ideologies throughout U.S. history, or the pull they still exert today. Indeed, part of Coates' great achievement is to demonstrate with great persuasive power that the election of Trump emerged directly from those traditions.

But the broad popular rejection of Trump's presidency also matters. If we don't accord it a place in the story, we risk conceding too much ground to those who want to blame Trump's ascent on allegedly excessive moralizing on behalf of inclusive liberal democracy.

Yes, Trump won, and that speaks for itself in all its barbarity. But here's something else that's also true. If Trump is our first white president, by virtue of his determined effort to erase the historical fact of the first black presidency and the advances it wrought, then a great swath of America is responding: Whose white president? Not mine.
President Donald Trump's decision to wipe out deportation reprieves for young undocumented immigrants has unleashed a frenzied rush to renew 154,000 permits before an Oct. 5 deadline, a process advocacy groups say will cost millions of dollars in fees and stretch their resources to the limit.

In hurricane-ravaged Houston, lawyers are clearing their calendars to help immigrants fill out the forms. In Maryland and Virginia, advocates are holding emergency meetings and recruiting volunteers. Nationwide, immigrants and nonprofits are raising money online to help cover the $495 renewal fees.

"It's definitely one disaster after another: one of natural causes and one man-made," said Maria Rodriguez, executive director of the Florida Immigrant Coalition, based in Miami, which was preparing for Hurricane Irma on Friday. "It's heartbreaking."

The Trump administration announced Tuesday that it will eliminate Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, an Obama-era executive action that protected hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as children. Nearly 700,000 people have that protection now, government officials said last week. Critics say then-President Barack Obama did not have the authority to create the program when he set it up in 2012, and they say DACA beneficiaries take jobs and other benefits that should go to legal residents.

Those whose deferred-action status is expiring between Sept. 5 and March 5, 2018, have a month to apply to renew their work permits. A successful application would be only a reprieve, valid for two years.

"It fell on people like a bag of bricks . . . and it's only starting to sink in," said Joshua Hoyt, executive director of the National Partnership for New Americans, a coalition of organizations providing legal services to immigrants. "It's 5,133 [renewal applications] every day, including today. That's 214 per hour, if we work all night long."

Advocates are urging Trump to extend the Oct. 5 deadline to give immigrants a chance to raise money to pay the renewal fees - which could surpass a total of $76 million if all those who are eligible apply. They also say that immigrants in Texas and Florida, which have large undocumented populations, could miss the deadline because of the extreme disruption caused by Hurricane Harvey.

"There are whole neighborhoods that are still flooded," said Leslie Crow, a lawyer with BakerRipley, a Texas nonprofit organization helping immigrants apply for work permit renewals. "People have lost their cars. People have lost all of their belongings. . . . I have heard from a few parents: 'I have no idea how I'm going to be able to make that payment now.' "

In Virginia and Maryland, advocates are mobilizing volunteers to quickly review renewal applications, tapping into a network of lawyers that formed after Trump's January executive order banning entry to the United States by citizens of certain majority-Muslim countries. The stakes, the advocates say, are high.

"A small clerical error might get their application kicked back, and then they won't meet the deadline," said Sirine Shebaya, a lawyer who volunteers with the Dulles Justice Coalition. "It's an all-hands-on situation."

Barring action from Congress, thousands of DACA recipients will begin losing their legal status in March. About 200,000 will be phased out of the program in 2018, followed by 320,000 in 2019. The program would cease to exist by 2020, federal officials said Friday.

DACA beneficiaries are bracing for a return to being undocumented, unable to work legally for the first time in five years. Many would lose health insurance, driver's licenses and other benefits. And they would be at risk of deportation under an administration that is aggressively enforcing immigration laws.

"This is my home. Thinking about not being protected in your own home is very scary," said Vishal Disawar, a 22-year-old fellow at a tech incubator in Chicago and a citizen of India. His parents brought the family to the United States in 2001, when he was 6, so that his younger sister could undergo heart surgery. Both he and his sister have deferred action; his expires first, sometime next year.

Disawar graduated last year from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign after majoring in computer science and political science. He said he feels encouraged that Microsoft and other tech giants are vowing to defend DACA beneficiaries who lose their status, and hopes more people in the program will come forward to share their stories and push for a new reprieve.

DACA beneficiaries and their advocates are fighting battles on multiple fronts: in Congress, the courts, and at the state level, where some are renewing efforts to secure in-state tuition and driver's licenses for undocumented immigrants, even if they do not have DACA status.

Deferred-action beneficiaries can get driver's licenses in all 50 states, but only 12 states and the District of Columbia issue licenses to other undocumented immigrants, according to the National Immigration Law Center. In Texas, for instance, DACA beneficiaries would be unable to renew their driver's licenses if their status expires, a Department of Public Safety spokesman said.

The most urgent battle is in Congress, where multiple bills are pending to address the situation of young immigrants.

Many advocates are throwing their weight behind the bipartisan Dream Act, which would make 1.8 million immigrants - including those in DACA - eligible for conditional residency, according to the Migration Policy Institute. Those who met additional requirements, such as completing their education, could apply for permanent residency and get on a path to U.S. citizenship.

In exchange for a bill to protect young immigrants, Republican lawmakers are likely to push for concessions that would put at greater risk of deportation the rest of the nation's estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants, including the parents of DACA beneficiaries. Trump, meanwhile, has called for funding to expand the wall on the border with Mexico and to hire thousands of additional border patrol agents and personnel to handle deportations.

Advocates for immigrants say they would settle for nothing less than a "clean" Dream Act that would not be tied to immigration enforcement. But critics of illegal immigration - and some lawmakers - have called that position unreasonable.

"I know they don't want that, but the whole rationale for DACA was that they didn't have any choice in the matter," said Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, which favors tougher enforcement. "The parents did not grow up here and did have a choice."

Trump has sent mixed signals on the deferred-action beneficiaries. During the presidential campaign, he vowed to end the program immediately on taking office. But he acted only months after entering the White House, after Texas and several other states threatened to sue the administration to take action on DACA.

After Tuesday's announcement, Trump reassured young immigrants on Twitter that they would be safe from deportation during the next six months and urged Congress to pass a law to permanently resolve their status. Otherwise, he said he would "revisit" the issue.

On Friday, Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., said he was hopeful that Congress would pass the Dream Act, which has not cleared both houses since it was introduced 16 years ago. He acknowledged that a law that would protect only young immigrants brought here as children would be difficult for DACA beneficiaries to swallow, since their parents would remain at risk of deportation.

But he said they should take one battle at a time.

"You are the most beloved, the most cared for, the most recognized of our immigrants," he said Friday. "What chance do I have for your mom and dad if I lose you?"
By PTI: (Eds: With additional inputs)

Barmer (Rajasthan), Sep 10 (PTI) Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman today said that maintaining optimum state of readiness of the armed forces on "all fronts" would be given top priority, comments which came amid concerns over security challenges on the countrys northern and western borders.

"We should be prepared to deal with security challenges without discussing who is a stronger enemy -? China or Pakistan. Our defence forces need to be completely prepared. We need to fill the gaps and the government is committed to strengthening the armed forces," she told reporters, in reply to a question.

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To a question on Army chief General Bipin Rawats statement that India should be prepared for a two-front war with China and Pakistan, the defence minister evaded a direct reply and said that it would be her priority that there was no dearth in preparedness of defence forces.

She interacted with senior officers of the Indian Air Force at the frontline Uttarlai airbase in Barmer in Rajasthan.

Sitharaman was the first defence minister to visit the sensitive airbase in 16 years, after George Fernandes in 2001.

Air Chief Marshal B S Dhanoa was also present at the base.

The defence minister was apprised of the role of the airbase and the nature of its operations, the IAF said.

Talking to mediapersons, Sitharaman said that meeting the demands of the armed forces with a view to maintaining optimum state of readiness and preparedness on all fronts would be accorded priority.

The 58-year-old defence minister said, "I am obeying Prime Minister Narendra Modis directions to meet the jawans posted on the frontiers."

"I was in Goa earlier in the morning to flag off Indian Navy women crews attempt to circumnavigate the globe and now have come to Uttarlai Air Force base in Barmer," she said.

The newly-appointed defence minister said that Uttarlai airbase was important from the strategic point of view.

On the issue of terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir, she said that the government was making all efforts to counter terrorism in the state.

The Union government was closely working with the state government to counter terrorism and the local police were doing good work in the dealing with the issue.

Asked whether India would have a dialogue with Pakistan on the issue of Kashmir, she said that the external affairs ministry had clearly expressed its view on the issue. PTI CORR AG MPB SMN

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A Bexar County jury will hear closing arguments Monday to decide whether a San Antonio stepgrandmother shares guilt in a child injury case that resulted in the death of a 5-year-old boy in 2012.

Gloria R. Proo was 48 when she was arrested along with her daughter and son-in law, all accused of injury to a child/severe bodily injury by omission in the death of Josiah Williams, Proos stepgrandson.

RELATED: San Antonio EMT testifies that starved, beaten child 'severely emaciated'

The child had been dead long enough for his emaciated, bruised body to begin stiffening when emergency responders found him Dec. 27, 2012, in the kitchen of the home his parents rented in the 3900 block of Gayle on the Southeast Side. He weighed 38 pounds.

Proo, now 52, is the second of three adults to go on trial. Her daughter, Crystal Williams, who was Josiah's stepmother, pleaded guilty to injury to a child in June and was sentenced to 99 years in prison. Charleston Williams, the child's father, is awaiting trial.

The trial began Tuesday. Proo's attorney Ernest Acevedo III told the jury Proo did not live with the Williams family, is not a blood relative of Josiah's and did not have legal responsibility for him.

Acevedo said Proo had very little contact with the boy because her father was terminally ill in December 2012.

RELATED: Jurors cry at images of emaciated, battered child

Witnesses testified that Proo was known to stay with her daughter and watch the children. Acevedo said "she wasn't in the picture" because of her father's illness, except for watching Josiah on Dec. 23 when his parents took his stepbrother and half-sister to see Santa at Fiesta Texas. He said Josiah was not feeling well and that Proo watched him that day only.

Prosecutor Stephanie Boyd contends Proo lived at the home and that the children were left in her care.

Witnesses testified that Josiah had lost weight, his skin had turned yellow and that he was depressed. Two family friends testified that when they went to a barbecue before Thanksgiving 2012, Josiah was not allowed to sit and eat with everyone else and was only allowed to eat once everyone had eaten.

A medical examiner testified that Josiah died of dehydration and malnutrition and from the injuries suffered from battering.

RELATED: Parents now behind bars in death of 5-year-old boy

The case is being heard in the 379th state District Court, presided by Judge Ron Rangel.

Injury to a child/severe bodily injury is a first-degree felony. If convicted Proo faces up to life in prison. Online court records indicate that Proo has applied for probation.

ezavala@express-news.net

Twitter: @elizabeth2863
Funding for a massive border wall will be debated again as negotiations over the administrations budget request for the new fiscal year get under way. As divisive as the border has been for groups concerned with national security and immigrant issues, there is another constituency whose needs should be part of the conversation: wildlife.

The border region is one of the most biodiverse areas in the United States and an intersection for many carnivores. In 2011, I worked with colleagues in state and federal agencies to identify 14 potential corridors connecting core habitat for bears, wolves and other large carnivores in the Sky Island Region on the border. These animals have been traveling these pathways for centuries to maintain their populations and gain access to food, mates and water.

For several years, the U.S. and Mexican governments have been working to define critical habitat and reduce threats such as roads and enhance species protection for carnivores and other species. Together, we have worked to restore populations of species such as the Mexican wolf, the smallest and rarest wolf in North America, on either side of the border. Meanwhile, yet another jaguar tripped a camera trap this winter in Arizona 60 miles north of Mexico.

The Mexican wolf historically ranged across New Mexico, Arizona, West Texas, and northern Mexico, although predator removal programs driven by conflicts with livestock led to their local extirpation. Successfully restoring these and other carnivores requires that conservationists listen to and work with diverse, local communities as they adapt to living with these creatures on a daily basis.

The best argument for ensuring that wild carnivores have access to cross-border habitat comes from science. Our research found that bears in the southern United States and northern Mexico are closely related and depend upon movements through pathways across the border. Such corridors for movement are likewise important in maintaining populations of other rare species in the region like bison and Sonoran pronghorn.

Decision makers from the Department of Homeland Security, Customs and Border Patrol, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, state and federal wildlife and land management agencies, and all the equivalent agencies in Mexico must consider this type of information and incorporate the needs of wildlife into border plans.

The hundreds of miles of barriers already constructed along the border provide a model to achieve the right balance. In urban areas such as San Diego with large human populations and more remote locations known as high crossing areas, one commonly finds pedestrian fencing  typically a solid barrier several meters high. This barrier, effective against people, blocks the passage of all terrestrial wildlife.

More porous vehicle fencing is found in other areas largely inaccessible to people, but not to wildlife. Conservationists have information that can tell decision makers which areas along the border might be considered for wildlife-friendly fencing and how these various wall designs may influence different species.

Some proponents of strong border security measures will argue that we cannot spend hundreds of millions of dollars to build a wall only to have it be passable for wildlife in certain areas. This assumes that the security and conservation communities dont have the creativity and ingenuity to find solutions.

Before new negotiations over the federal budget get underway and any decisions are made to construct a border wall, now is the time to ensure an informed conversation about how it would impact wildlife were it to be constructed.

Can we maintain important linkages for wildlife in a transboundary region in the context of a border fence without compromising immigration and national security goals? I think the answer is yes if we plan using the best available science and factor the needs of transboundary wildlife into the plans.

Jon P. Beckmann is a conservation scientist with the Americas program at WCS (Wildlife Conservation Society).
The agitation outside Ryan International School turned violent after protesters set fire to a liquor shop near the school.

By India Today Web Desk: Two days after a seven-year-old was found murdered with his throat slit at the Ryan International School in Gurgaon, fresh protests have erupted outside the school premises today.

While a school bus conductor Ashok Kumar has confessed to killing the seven-year-old boy when the latter tried to resist an attempt of sexual assault, some parents today alleged he was being framed.

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Agitated parents today gathered outside the Ryan International School to protest against the murder of the seven-year-old and express their dissatisfaction with the ongoing investigation in the case.

The agitation turned violent with the police restoring to lathicharge in which some mediapersons sustained injuries.

In another development, Haryana education minister Ram Bilas Sharma today said that a case has been registered against the management and owners of Ryan International School under provisions of the Juvenile Justice Act.

HERE ARE THE LIVE UPDATES ON THE GURGAON MURDER CASE:

The SIT that has been constituted to investigate the murder has called in three teachers for questioning.

Media is one of the pillars of democracy and raises concerns of the people, it should not be suppressed like that, says Bhupinder Singh Hooda.

Attack on media is condemnable; in a democracy, governments don't work with lathis and bullets, says Bhupinder Singh Hooda.

Former Haryana chief minister and Congress leader Bhupinder Singh Hooda condemns the attack on mediapersons during the lathicharge outside Ryan International School.

Police is doing its job, request a parallel CBI inquiry so that every detail related to the case is revealed, says Varun Thakur, father of the seven-year-old victim.

Seven-year-old victim's father says, "Want to request all parents who are supporting us that please do not get involved in violence".

Delhi government has called a meeting of top private schools in the city on Monday, which will be chaired by Manish Sisodia. The Delhi government plans to constitute a committee to chalk out safety measures for children in schools.

In the wake of the Ryan school murder, Delhi deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia says that the government will look into the complaints of irregularities against Ryan International.

Fire tenders rushed to douse the fire at the liquor shop near Ryan International School. Security in and around Ryan International School has been beefed up.

Police lathicharge protesters outside Ryan International School. A few mediapersons were injured in the police lathicharge.

School authorities will have to take responsibility of schoolchildren once they step out of their homes, says Haryana education minister Ram Bilas Sharma.

We have decided to shut down the liquor shop outside the Ryan International School, says Haryana education minister Ram Bilas Sharma.

If parents of the seven-year-old are not satisfied with the investigation, Haryana government is ready to order a probe by another investigative agency, says Ram Bilas Sharma

We will complete the probe into the Ryan school murder in a week and submit the evidence in court, says Haryana education minister Ram Bilas Sharma.

A case has been registered against the management and owners of Ryan International School under Section 75 of the Juvenile Justice Act, says Haryana education minister Ram Bilas Sharma. Haryana government will not de-recognise Ryan International School as it will affect the future of 1200 children, the minister says.

Won't spare the guilty, investigation has been initiated on the lapses by the school management, says Haryana education minister Ram Bilas Sharma.

Haryana government condemns the murder of the seven-year-old child, our condolences to his family, says Haryana education minister Ram Bilas Sharma.

Parents protesting against the death of the seven-year-old victim set ablaze a liquor shop close to Ryan International School. Parents want the Ryan school to be shut.

We demand a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) into the case, we want justice for him, says a parent whose child studies at Ryan International School

Not satisfied with the ongoing investigation in the case; bus conductor is being framed, says Jyoti, another parent. School management must take responsibility of students' safety, she says.

Haryana education minister Ram Bilas Sharma reaches divisional commissioner's office for a meeting on Ryan school murder case.

Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar says that a CBI probe into the Ryan school murder will be ordered if Haryana Police cannot successfully investigate it.

ALSO READ:

Gurgaon murder: Ryan International School bus conductor confesses to killing child, says he refused sex

Gurgaon school murder: Accused conductor's village wants him punished for the crime

Gurgaon murder: Ryan International School flouted every High Court, police guideline

ALSO WATCH: Ryan International School murder: Protesters burn liquor shop near school

--- ENDS ---
On Sept. 12, 2001, I was revising a middle-school textbook I had co-authored with another historian when I received a call from my editor. You know what happened yesterday, he declared.

Of course I did. Like many Americans, I had watched the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on television. You have to write something for the latest edition, he said.

I had already been wondering how I would address the events still so raw for eighth-graders. That afternoon I took a stab at it.

The words came quickly, if not easily: two planes transformed by terrorists into guided missiles slamming into the twin towers and setting them aflame; people leaping to their deaths from the buildings to avoid being burned alive; two more planes suddenly becoming weapons of war, one hitting the Pentagon, the other crashing to the ground as doomed passengers stormed the cockpit to prevent another attack.

When my editor received the draft, he called again. All wrong! he barked. Well be selling this book to New York City schoolchildren. Some of them have lost parents, relatives and friends of their families. Theyre only 12 or 13, and what youve written is too hot for some of them to handle.

In the end, we settled on a less explosive rendering of events and stressed the unifying effects of the attacks in their immediate aftermath. I focused on the candlelit vigils all over the country and members of Congress, Republicans and Democrats alike, singing God Bless America on the steps of the Capitol.

What my editor wanted was closer attention to context. Historians examine context all the time as we try to understand the complexities of the past. But in this case, I had ignored the most important context: the present in which our young readers lived.

The events were still too fresh for them. A good text demanded sensitivity missing from that first draft. As important, we knew little about what had occurred, little about who did it or why or even the number of people who perished, let alone what that terrible day meant.

Today, we know much more. And we face the opposite problem. The students who read our textbooks and whom we teach in class are far removed from 9/11. They have no memory of that day.

They also confront a sharply different context. In the fight against terror, Afghanistan has become Americas longest war, and the Islamic State group has replaced al-Qaida as the most daunting threat. What once united us now often divides us as we battle over the legacy of the Patriot Act, the meaning of immigration and the mounting refugee crisis.

Today, we need to teach 9/11 with the perspective that comes from distance, much as the way we teach about the Civil War or the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, however painful they were to those who experienced them.

We must examine 9/11 through the hard lens of history. That demands a dispassionate accounting of causes and consequences and an appreciation of the increasingly tangled circumstances we have faced since that day.

We need to do a better job exploring the complex set of causes that produced 9/11, among them the rise of Islamic fundamentalism and post-colonial nationalism as well as the spread of globalism and regional conflicts.

And we can look at the consequences even as they are still unfolding, not just in the Middle East, but also in other things such as airport security lines and heavily armed police in cities across the globe.

To those we add the creation of new intelligence bureaucracies, the economic and political costs of security, the rise of anti-Muslim nativism and the lessons learned about how to protect ourselves.

Taken together, we can see 9/11 as a hinge of history, no longer just the horrific shock we felt in the present of 2001, but the first stroke in what has become a larger threat looming across multiple fronts.

Michael B. Stoff is an associate professor of history and a University Distinguished Teaching Professor at the University of Texas at Austin.
Re: Venezuelans could be voting democracy out (Nation & World, July 30 ); Venezuelan body takes over (Nation & World, Aug. 9):

These items report that the Supreme Court of Venezuela, which is composed of judges who are loyalists of the president, invalidated laws that the president opposed; the president has created a constituent assembly with the power to rewrite the nations constitution and either restructure or abolish any branch of government that is disloyal to the president; voters did not have the option to reject the assembly, and were permitted only to select the delegates from a list of the presidents supporters; and the assembly has declared itself superior to all other branches of government.

Venezuelas current convulsion demonstrates the Founders wisdom in structuring our government on the principle of separation of powers. This principle separates the executive, legislative and judicial branches from each other, delegates to each specified exclusive functions, and vests each with only the power necessary to perform those functions.

In the Federalist No. 47, James Madison explained the rationale of the principle as follows: The accumulation of all powers legislative, executive and judiciary in the same hands, whether of one, a few or many, and whether hereditary, self appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny  (W)here the whole power of one department (branch) is exercised by the same hands, which possess the whole power of another department (branch), the fundamental principles of a free constitution are subverted.

To further restrict the exercise of power by each branch, the framework of our government supplements separation of powers with the principle of checks and balances. This principle enables each branch, by performing its specified functions, to restrain the exercise of power by the other two, and unites and balances the functions of all three.

Madison explained this principle in The Federalist No. 48 by writing, (U)nless these departments (branches) be so far connected and blended, as to give to each a constitutional control over the others, the degree of separation which the maxim requires as essential to a free government, can never in practice, be duly maintained.

By being structured on the principles of separation of powers and checks and balances, our government is designed to preserve liberty under law. The government of Venezuela was not and is not established on these principles, and, as a result, Venezuelans are losing their freedom and descending into dictatorship.

Robert R. Barton is a senior district judge.
It didnt have to be this way, San Antonio. We didnt have to nearly run out of gas over Labor Day weekend.

Long lines could have been avoided. The focus could have remained fully on the toll Harvey took on Houston and the Texas coast, and not a self-created crisis about where to find one last drop of gas. One derived from hoarding and panic, which then rippled into real problems for people approaching empty or those who drive for a living.

There was never a gas shortage until we chose to make one. Numerous officials said this. Mayor Ron Nirenberg begged San Antonio residents to stop hoarding, noting gas consumption during the panic was 2.5 times the normal amounts.

Likewise, Railroad Commissioner Ryan Sitton repeatedly offered assurances that there was no shortage and implored people to simply use normal amounts of fuel.

As disappointing as this moment was, it highlighted a glaring lack of transit options. While officials encouraged people to drive less, the reality is its difficult not to drive in San Antonio.

As we all know, there is no rail in San Antonio. We are only now on the cusp of carpool lanes on our interstates. The Howard Peak Greenway Trails system is wonderful for recreation, but is still far from being completed and lacks the kind of connections that would make it a biking commuter option  especially to downtown and the Medical Center.

And while VIA Metropolitan Transit commendably offered free bus rides for a day, it is underfunded. VIA receives significantly less sales tax revenue than its counterparts in other major Texas cities. But VIA still covers more than 1,200 square miles. This means slower service, which matters to commuters. Why spend 50 minutes on the bus, if you can drive in 20?

The lessons here are clear. First, when panic strikes, stay calm. If a supply shortage is a concern  and refinery production did drop after Harvey  hoarding is a great way to make that shortage a reality.

Second, we are far too reliant on driving, and therefore vulnerable to supply disruptions. That means the city desperately needs better transit options. Not only would this improve traffic congestion by taking vehicles off the road, but it would help ensure the city keeps moving during a fuel shortage or crisis.
NEW HAVEN >> Fifteen seismographs placed in forests, farms and backyards across northern Connecticut picked up the vibrations of a 7.9-magnitude earthquake in Papua New Guinea on Jan. 22.

That information arrived from 200 kilometers  124 miles  under the Earths surface, deep within the planets upper mantle, below its crust. It will help geologists at Yale University and elsewhere better understand what lies underneath Connecticut. It will also help explain why the supercontinent Pangea split about 200 million years ago, forming the Atlantic Ocean and creating the continents of North American, South America and Africa.

The data might also help explain why the Atlantic basin is opening and getting bigger and the Pacific Ocean basin is getting smaller and why the continents rimming the Pacific are likely to bash into each other and form a new supercontinent hundreds of millions of years from now, according to Maureen Long, a Yale professor of geology and geophysics who is overseeing the Seismic Experiment for Imaging Structure beneath Connecticut, or SEISConn.

That opening and closing of the ocean basins is known as the Wilson cycle.

Listening to Earth

The 15th station was installed about a month ago and started recording data, and now Long and John Aragon, a 2017 Yale graduate and SEISConn project manager, can focus on analyzing the information recorded on the seismographs and start turning those wiggles into insight [about] how the Earth works beneath Connecticut, Long said.

We want to know whats down there now, what does the structure of the crust and mantle look like beneath Connecticut today and then what does it tell us about how these plate tectonic processes have operated in the past, Long said.

The Earth is sending signals all the time with big earthquakes, but you need the instruments to receive the signals that are going on naturally, said Aragon, who also goes by Juan. Long compared the process to a CT scan of the body; the vibrations deep within the Earth are like the radiation that maps the bodys internal organs.

The seismographs are just like shining a little flashlight down into the Earth, Aragon said. Its a flashlight with a long beam. He compared the depth at which the seismographs can register vibrations to the Kola Superdeep Borehole in Russia, which at 12.26 kilometers (7.6 miles) is the deepest point on the Earth.

We can pick up waves in many cases that have passed through the Earths core, Long said. While most waves the seismographs pick up are from earthquakes, Long said, I do expect that we probably recorded the North Korean nuclear test.

Seismic history

The breakup of Pangea was a really important process in plate tectonic theory, Long said, but geologists dont have a good understanding of how the Earths plates move, creating earthquakes along the fault lines between them.

We really dont understand very well exactly how this process works, Long said. Its a pretty fundamentally unsolved problem in plate tectonics.  What makes a supercontinent break up? Presumably something is happening in the deep Earth to generate the forces that would rip apart a continent.

When thinking about earthquakes, Connecticut does not spring immediately to mind, but, Long said, Connecticut has amazing geology. Up in the northwest part of the state, these rocks are about a billion years old. In the southeast part of the state is another chunk of pretty old rock, about 700 million years old, she said. This is a bit of continent that was probably formed either as part of Africa or just short of offshore of it. All these pieces of the Earths crust kind of got glommed onto North America, like a 10-car pileup, she said.

About 300 million years ago, when the Appalachian Mountains were formed, that southeastern part of the state got slammed into what is now Connecticut and when Pangea broke up it basically got left behind.

Connecticut has just this super-complicated and rich geologic and tectonic history, Long said. What makes Connecticut especially interesting is its central spine, called the Hartford Rift Basin. These are basically volcanic rocks that were formed 200 million years ago as Pangea was breaking apart, Long said. The aftereffects can be seen as West Rock and East Rock in New Haven, Sleeping Giant in Hamden and the Hanging Hills in Meriden.

This is a region where the supercontinent started to break apart and then it failed and then instead the supercontinent broke apart somewhere to the east, Long said. The Hartford basin is almost like a snapshot of that rifting process, she said. Beneath the Hartford basin is a perfect opportunity to study that process, which she said is vital to plate tectonic theory.

The Hartford Rift Basin is frozen in time, Aragon said. Its a rift basin that failed so its sort of frozen in that immature state.

Aragon noted that evidence of the Earths tectonic plates can be seen from space or even on the Google Earth website, but it doesnt tell you whats happening in the Earths mantle, which is the layer below the crust, he said.

Change takes time

The movement of the vast tectonic plates is an exceedingly slow but dynamic process. Pangea is the most recent supercontinent, but if you go back even further into Earths geologic history there is increasing good evidence thats there have been several older supercontinents, Long said. A billion years ago, there was a supercontinent known as Rodinia. Now, the Atlantic basin is opening and getting bigger and the Pacific Ocean basin is getting smaller, she said.

But a new supercontinent wont form for hundreds of millions of years into the future, she said.

The 15 stations are installed in a line across northern Connecticut, where there is less surface noise, from the YMCA in the Lakeville section of Salisbury to one in Rhode Island at the Chepachet Farms and Carriage Works. Theres one in the Yale Camp in the Great Mountain Forest in Canaans Falls Village  the camp is maintained by the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies  another in Winsted and one in the Yale Myers Forest in Eastford.

Sometimes we just knock on doors to find places to stick these things, Aragon said.

The stations, which consist of a seismometer buried in a 33-gallon drum, powered by solar panels, will collect data for two years. We do expect to have some preliminary measurements and conclusions within the next six months or so, so in that sense its kind of an exciting time in the project, Long said. The data will be stored on memory cards, which will have to be collected about every six months. Despite its high-tech aspect, the project is off the grid.

Thirteen high school teachers have helped set up the stations through the weeklong Field Experiences for Science Teachers program, Long said. They helped dig the holes, pour concrete and set up the solar arrays, as well as collect initial data. They also jumped up and down near the seismographs to assure they were working properly.

Megan Weingart, who teaches Earth science and related subjects at Cheshire High School, was one of those who appreciated the experience of actually doing science again.  These seismographs are just so sensitive that they are able to pick up the [ocean] waves hitting the continent, which come through as background noise, she said.

Weingart has had Long speak to her class and has told them of her own experience, but is looking forward to be able to use the collected data in her teaching. Just knowing in general whats directly below the crust of the Earth in Connecticut, it brings it home to the students and makes it more pertinent and interesting, Weingart said.

Until now, seismologists have not collected a data set that is this detailed or that will allow us to do detailed imagery beneath Connecticut, Long said. This is going to be a pretty big leap forward to understand the deep parts of the crust and mantle of where we live.

Call Ed Stannard at 203-680-9382.
The villagers are of the opinion that Kumar has committed the crime. India Today spoke to few villagers who said that they are standing in support of the family, but want Kumar to be punished for the horrendous crime he has committed.

By India Today Web Desk: Gurgaon's Ryan International School bus conductor Ashok Kumar, accused of attempting to sexually assault a 7-year-old and killing him, was on Friday sent to three-day custody.

Back in the village, Ashok Kumar's family is facing the repercussions of his actions.

Bus conductor Ashok Kumar is a resident of Gamroz village in Bhonsi, Gurgaon.

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The villagers are of the opinion that Kumar has committed the crime. India Today spoke to few villagers who said that they are standing in support of the family, but want Kumar to be punished for the horrendous crime he has committed.

Kumar's family alleged that he is being framed. "My son is innocent, he is just being framed; all this because of the school," Kumar's father told news agency ANI.

His sister alleged that the school principal bribed the police. "My brother has been beaten up and put under pressure to give wrong statements. School principal has bribed the police," she said.

Kumar is married and has two children.

THE INCIDENT

The class 2 student, was found dead on Friday by a school staffer in the washroom with his throat slit. A knife, presumably the murder weapon, was found near the body.

Police late on Friday arrested Ashok Kumar, a conductor of one of the school's buses.

Local residents, including parents of children studying in the school, assembled outside the school on Saturday morning and held protests, demanding strict action against the school management.

Singh said the services of a private security agency hired by the school had been suspended and a security audit will be done of all schools in Gurugram.

(With inputs from Chirag Gothi)

Also read

Gurgaon murder: Ryan International School flouted every High Court, police guideline

Delhi horror: Shahdara school peon arrested for raping 5-year-old girl in empty classroom

--- ENDS ---
Government will soon unveil higher denominations of money to bring convenience to the transacting public but has to do so with caution to avoid inflationary pressures, Secretary for Finance and Economic Development, Mr George Guvamatanga has said.

He said some coins and bond notes will gradually be withdrawn from circulation when Government ultimately introduce higher denominations.

Mr Guvamatanga said this today while responding to questions from journalists during a media briefing in Harare that was organised by Finance and Economic Development Minister Professor Mthuli Ncube.

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Brigadier General Charles Kaneta has died.

He was 64.

He collapsed and died while at his farm in Nyanga yesterday.

Brig Gen Kaneta was the Director General Logistics at the Zimbabwe Defence Forces Headquarters.

In a statement last night, Brigadier General Augustine Chipwere, the Director General Policy, Public Relations and International Affairs at Zimbabwe Defence Forces Headquarters, said: The Zimbabwe Defence Forces would like to announce the untimely death of Brigadier General Charles Kaneta who was the Director General Logistics at the Zimbabwe Defence Forces Headquarters.

General Kaneta, 64, collapsed at his farm in Nyanga and was ferried to Hauna District Hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival at around 12 noon on 10 September 2022.

Mourners are gathered at Number 7 Married Quarters Cranborne West, Harare.

 Herald

Breaking News via Email
In light of Berkeley becoming a hotbed of political violence, police are asking city leaders to reverse a 20-year-old policy that limits officers' use of pepper spray.



As things stand, officers are prohibited from using pepper spray as a way to control crowds, Police Chief Andrew Greenwood wrote in a memo to the City Council. However, it can be a mode of effective intervention in violent crowd control situations involving direct coordinated attacks on police lines, he continued.

Greenwood stressed the Berkeley Police Departments commitment to upholding peoples First Amendment rights  no matter where on the political spectrum they may fall.

In 2017, however, Berkeley has been the focus of an unprecedented effort to be made a battleground for extremist groups, Greenwood wrote.

The city has experienced a spike in violence and criminal behavior by these clusters of people who have launched brutal and determined attacks against officers and people whom they have determined should not be allowed to speak or publicly assemble, he added.

Greenwood listed chaotic and bloody riots that broke out at March 4 Trump and Patriots Day rallies. In both cases, hundreds of protesters descended on Berkeley, fights broke out, some people were injured and others were arrested, and property was destroyed. On Aug. 28 again, more than 100 black-clad Antifa members pushed their way past police barricades, and attacked right-wing protesters.

Protesters were armed with shields, which rendered most of the polices non-lethal weapons useless, Greenwood said.

Pepper spray is markedly more effective against those using shields, as shields do not give full protection against the effects of directed, focused applications of chemical irritant, Greenwood explained.

Berkeley police officers are permitted to use batons, projectiles and tear gas. However, tear gas emits a cloud of chemical irritant that has the potential to impact even peaceful demonstrators or witnesses, he wrote. Batons pose "an inherent risk of injury to both suspects and officers," he added.

By contrast, pepper spray makes it possible to repel specific attackers, Greenwood said.

The availability of pepper spray as a force option to use against specific violent offenders in a crowd situation would allow for more safety for officers and the public, and increase the likelihood of apprehension and criminal prosecution of suspects, while reducing the potential for injuries to suspects and officers, according to Greenwood.

Nearly all police departments across the United States use pepper spray as an intermediary form of force as an alternative to tear gas and batons, Greenwood wrote.

It is widely recognized that pepper sprays benefits include cessation of attack and creation of space between police and violent individuals and their targets, and opportunities to carry out focused arrest efforts on violent offenders, he wrote.

The lack of that option means unchecked violence can escalate, creating a need for more significant use of force, Greenwood said.

If Greenwoods proposal is approved, police officers will submit Use of Pepper Spray reports to the City Council. It will also not be used against peaceful demonstrators or observers, and officers will make a concerted attempt to limit collateral exposure to non-involved parties.

Further, Greenwood wrote, Where there is probable cause to arrest for a crime, officers shall prioritize where practical the arrest of individuals upon whom pepper spray has been deployed.

The City Council has called for a special meeting at 3 p.m. Tuesday to mull the issue and decide whether or not to greenlight Greenwoods request.

The timing has been determined by the fact that the University of California, Berkeley is preparing to host controversial speaker and former Breitbart News editor, Ben Shapiro, on Thursday.

The city and campus reportedly amassed roughly $600,000 worth of damage in February when Milo Yiannopoulos, an alt-right speaker, who also worked at Breitbart News, was scheduled to speak on campus. Thousands rioted, starting at UC Berkeley and ending up in the streets of the city. Yiannopoulos speech was canceled, but that didnt stop protesters from setting trash on fire, lighting fireworks, vandalizing businesses, and starting fights.

Berkeley Mayor Jesse Arreguin has called on UC Berkeley leaders to nix Shapiros speech. However, the university has demurred because registered student groups are permitted to invite speakers of their choice to campus, according to spokesman Dan Mogulof.

Thursdays event will unfold on campus, but Berkeley police officers could be asked for assistance, officials say.

Below is Chief Andrew Greenwood's entire report to the Berkeley City Council:
Scores of Bay Area urban search and rescue personnel in Florida are gearing up for days packed with relief missions as Hurricane Irma lashes the state with powerful storm surge, winds in excess of 100 mph and constant downpours.

Hundreds of members representing California Task Force 3, California Task Force 4 and the California Air National Guard from the 129th Rescue Wing were either in Florida or on their way to the region by the time the Category 4 storm made landfall in Florida Keys Sunday morning, inundating neighborhoods with water and toppling trees.

The 80-member California Task Force 4 worked 14-hour days in Texas to ease some of the misery from Hurricane Harvey, and helped rescue not only people, but also cattle, horses, dogs, cats and birds. Shifting their attention to Irma, the members of California Task Force 4 are equipped with four rescue boats, tool for breaching and shoring up collapsed structures, audio and visual aid for finding trapped survivors, and four K-9 teams.

About 82 members from California Task Force 3 were still en route to Florida as of Sunday morning, according to officials. Days before, a caravan of emergency vehicles belonging to the outfit arrived in Menlo Park after a physically and emotionally exhausting mission in Texas.

Approximately 100 members of the California National Guard departed from Moffett Field in Mountain View on Friday to fly toward Irma's projected path.

The highly-trained search and rescue unit is expected to fly helicopters into flooded neighborhoods and pull people to safety. The team completed more than 100 successful rescue operations in Texas neighborhoods pummeled by Harvey.
A sea of people on Saturday flocked to Oakland to march in protest of the Trump administration's decision to rescind a program that protects young undocumented immigrants in the United States from deportation.

The dismantling of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA, was announced by Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Tuesday. President Donald Trump has since given Congress six months to draft new legislation to address the status of children belonging to undocumented immigrants in the states.

An estimated 700 people peacefully gathered and marched in Oakland on Saturday, many choosing to condemn the administration's decision. Signs hoisted into the air read "No Human is Illegal," "Defend DACA!" or "Dreamers are part of MLK's Dream."

"Dreamers" is a common term used to describe DACA recipients.



Lucy Siale, 16, helped organize the event after posting details on social media.

"Being a first generation American student and being a daughter of immigrants, I felt like it was necessary to make the voices of the unheard be heard," she said.

Amping up those in attendance, Siale shouted, "We are showing up for the 800,000 folks who have been targeted this past week."

Marlene Gutierrez, a DACA recipient, also took the microphone to share her story. She attended Merritt College and hopes to be an educator one day.

"I won't apologize for breaking the law when I got here," she told the crowd.

Marchers temporarily blocked access to some city streets, according to police, but the city's department did not receive any reports of serious incidents.

Across the country in New York City, hundreds of people rallied outside the Trump International Hotel and Tower to protest the DACA decision.
The wife of a pilot killed in a crash in Marin County said her husband had recently fled his home in Houston after it was damaged by Hurricane Harvey.

The San Francisco Chronicle reports a search crew found 58-year-old John R. Wilson Friday in his wrecked Cessna 172 at Point Reyes National Seashore. The oil and gas industry consultant was flying from Santa Barbara County to Santa Rosa for a business trip, and he was reported overdue Thursday afternoon.

Wilson's wife, Christine, said her husband splits his time between Austria, Santa Barbara and Houston. She said he left Houston to stay at the couple's property in Santa Barbara after the hurricane flooded their basement.

She said he received his pilot license a few weeks ago.
Its almost as if Jeff Paganini was born and raised on the back of a fire engine. At the age of 58 hes spent more than 40 of them putting out fires and saving lives with the Sonoma Fire Department.

So now that hes retiring from the profession hes known since he was 17 years old, firefighters around the Bay Area are paying tribute to a firemans fireman who left his mark on generations of firefighters.

I think hes pretty much responsible for thousands of peoples lives being saved, said Lieutenant Jonathan Baxter, a San Francisco firefighter who worked under Paganini in the Sonoma Fire Department.

Joe Rosato Jr./NBC Bay Area

Paganini was 17 when his mother signed a permission slip allowing him to become a volunteer firefighter. He served with Cal Fire for a time. But he spent the majority of his career with the Sonoma Fire Department, the city where he grew up  taking inspiration from a neighborhood full of volunteer firefighters.

He recalled the chief who hired him giving him an edict: Promise me one thing, Paganini remembered him saying. All I ask is you leave this place a little better than when you got here.

And in retirement Paganini is leaving plenty. He founded the Sonoma County Fire Department museum, designed the departments training tower and founded a local chapter of the Every 15 Minutes campaign focused on deterring high school students from drinking and driving.

Is that part of his job description? No. He saw a need and he filled it, said fellow Sonoma Firefighter Jim Cominsky. And since it was accepted and took on we have not had a fatality vehicle accident involving alcohol in high school kids.

Joe Rosato Jr./NBC Bay Area

Paganini said the founding of the fire departments history museum sits at the top of his list of proudest accomplishments. Inside a former store room, fire engines from the early days of the department are flanked by displays of old badges and uniforms. He showed off the citys 1889 water tender which holds the distinction of being the only fire apparatus anyone knows of that actually pumped wine on a fire.

It ended up putting the fire out and saving the plaza, Paganini said with a chuckle.

Paganini paced through the museum, eyeing the vintage vehicles  some of which were still in use when he joined the department. He said once word of the new museum began to spread, people started turning-up with vintage department treasures. The Benicia Fire Department discovered a box of original Sonoma Fire Department uniforms in a storage room. Paganini lit up as the museum filled with the past.

His passion was creating something, a historical thing said his son Nick Paganini, now a San Francisco Firefighter, to not lose memory of how it started.

Joe Rosato Jr./NBC Bay Area

The elder Paganini said young firefighters entering the department should know its long history  the sense of where it came from and how things came to be before trucks were outfitted with GPS and computers.

When I came to work we used pencils and paper to write a reports, and use a map book, he said. And now theres computers in the engine and everything."

But retirement wont come easy for a man used to slipping into his fire fighting gear in under a minute, or riding down the street with sirens wailing. Even now, the sound of a radio call to his unit stops him mid-sentence. And the wail of a siren gives him an adrenalin rush.

Its tough because I live a few blocks away, Paganini said, and I hear the siren and the engine leaving the station.

But the veteran firefighter wont be slipping into the easy-chair just yet. Even after retiring hes re-enlisted as a volunteer, with the intention of easing out of the business gently.

I just dont see me sitting in a chair in front of the TV, he said, pulling down the museum door.
Five people were killed and at least 33 more were wounded in shootings across Chicago over the weekend, bringing the city close to yet another bloody milestone.

The weekend's first fatality happened early Saturday morning, when a 22-year-old man was shot in the 5300 block of South Seeley. He was later pronounced dead at Holy Cross Hospital.



Hours later, three people were fatally shot on the city's South Side, police said. A 36-year-old man, 26-year-old woman and 30-year-old woman were standing behind a parked vehicle on South Yale Avenue, according to preliminary information from police, when two men emerged from a nearby alley and fired multiple rounds, fatally injuring all three.

On Sunday night, a 22-year-old man was shot in the head in the 11100 block of South Michigan Avenue. He was being treated at Christ Hospital and was later pronounced dead.

By early Sunday morning, at least 33 people were wounded in Chicago violence since Friday evening.

The weekend's shooting bring the city to at least 2,651 people shot and 485 people killed so far this year, according to the Chicago Tribune.

The numbers remain below the historic numbers that were seen at this time year, when more than 3,000 were shot and more than 520 people had been killed.

Here's a look at the weekend:

Friday:

A 29-year-old man was shot in the 6400 block of S. Honore at approximately 4:34 p.m. He was transported to Holy Cross Hospital in good condition after he was shot while standing in a group of people.

A 30-year-old person got into a physical altercation with two other people and was shot in the 1600 block of W. Lake St. at approximately 7:20 p.m. The victim was shot in the shoulder and was taken to Stroger Hospital in serious condition. The two people involved in the altercation are currently being questioned.

A 23-year-old man was shot in the abdomen and was taken to Christ Hospital in critical condition at approximately 7:45 p.m. The incident occurred in the 8800 block of S. Eggleston.

A 21-year-old man was standing in an alley when a person in a dark colored sedan fired shots at him in the 1200 block of S. Avers at approximately 9 p.m. The man was taken to Mt. Sinai Hospital in good condition after being shot in the buttocks.

Saturday:

At approximately 2:01 a.m. in the 8600 block of S. Kingston, a 41-year-old woman was shot in the shoulder while she was sitting outside. She was taken to Trinity Hospital in good condition.

A 21-year-old man was shot in the thumb at approximately 3:31 a.m. in the 2200 block of W. 21 st St. He was walking down the street when he heard gunshots. He was taken to Stroger in good condition.

St. He was walking down the street when he heard gunshots. He was taken to Stroger in good condition. A 23-year-old man was shot after attempting to rob a woman in the 8000 block of S. Ashland at approximately 6:15 a.m. As he pulled a gun on the woman, she wrestled it away from him and shot him in the hand. He was taken to Christ Hospital in good condition after being apprehended by police officers.

A 27-year-old woman was shot by a man after refusing to talk to him in the 2900 block of S. Dearborn Ave at approximately 9:25 a.m. She was taken to Stroger Hospital in stable condition after being shot in the shoulder and the left hip, and the man was taken into custody a short time later.

While walking to his car, a 67-year-old man was shot in the hip and abdomen by a person in the 800 block of E. 46 th St. at approximately 1:43 p.m. He was taken to the hospital in stable condition.

St. at approximately 1:43 p.m. He was taken to the hospital in stable condition. Three men were shot in the 300 block of S. Campbell at approximately 1:54 p.m. The men were walking when a silver vehicle passed by and an occupant opened fire. A 23-year-old man was shot in the hand and foot, a 28-year-old man was shot in the leg, and another 23-year-old man was shot in the leg. All three were taken to Stroger Hospital in stable condition.

A 16-year-old was walking in the 5000 block of W. Harrison when a man approached him and opened fire at approximately 3:55 p.m. The boy suffered a graze wound to his arm and was taken to Stroger Hospital in good condition.

Two men were shot in the 100 block of E. 105 th St. at approximately 5:12 p.m. They were standing near a car when a blue sedan pulled up and one of the occupants opened fire. A 40-year-old man was shot in the chest and leg and was taken to Christ Hospital in serious condition. A 39-year-old man was taken to Roseland in stable condition with a gunshot wound to his back.





St. at approximately 5:12 p.m. They were standing near a car when a blue sedan pulled up and one of the occupants opened fire. A 40-year-old man was shot in the chest and leg and was taken to Christ Hospital in serious condition. A 39-year-old man was taken to Roseland in stable condition with a gunshot wound to his back. Three men were shot at about 1:54 p.m. in the 300 block of South Campbell, police said. A 23-year-old man was shot in the hand and foot, a 28-year-old man was shot in the leg, and another 23-year-old man was shot in the leg. All three were transported to a local hospital in stable condition.



According to preliminary information, the men were walking outside when a vehicle approached and someone inside fired shots. No one was in custody.

A 27-year-old woman was shot in the arm at about 10:10 p.m. in the 4000 block of West Van Buren. Police said the woman was standing in a back yard when a sedan drove past and an occupant fired shots in her direction. No one was in custody.





Three people were fatally shot at about 11:40 p.m. in the 1100 block of South Yale, police said. A 36-year-old man, 26-year-old woman and 30-year-old woman were killed, police said. According to preliminary information, they were standing behind a parked vehicle when two men emerged from a nearby alley and fired multiple rounds, fatally injuring all three.

Sunday:




A 19-year-old Chicago woman was found dead in a freezer at a hotel in suburban Rosemont early Sunday, hours after she was reported missing.

Kenneka Jenkins was pronounced dead at 12:48 a.m. at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, located at 5440 N. River Rd., according to the Cook County Medical Examiners office.

Jenkins, of the 2100 block of West Warren Boulevard, was last seen leaving her home on Chicagos West Side at around 11:30 p.m. Friday night, the Rosemont Public Safety Department said in a release.

She was headed to the hotel for a party, Jenkins sister Leonore Harris told authorities while filing a missing person complaint Saturday afternoon.



Harris said the two last spoke via text message around 1:30 a.m. early Saturday, according to police, who said she filed the official report about 12 hours later.

Witnesses told authorities that Jenkins was seen at a party on the hotels ninth floor that evening into early Saturday.



Jenkins' mother Teresa Martin said she was told her daughter was missing around 4:30 a.m. Saturday morning. Her family went to the hotel several times trying to look for her, Martin said, and called police for help.

"These are all precious hours, especially when I went between 4 and 5 ish," she said. "Within that time, maybe we could have saved my child's life." [[238427591, C]]

After she was reported missing, Crowne Plaza Hotel staff and management canvassed and searched the area, authorities said. Harris said investigators allowed her to watch surveillance video, which showed the teen entering, but never leaving, the hotel.

"'We do see your daughter again on this camera,'" Martin said police told her. "'At this point, she can barely hold herself up. She's like holding onto the rail, walking along the wall.'"

While searching the hotel, staff located Jenkins in a freezer at around 12:24 a.m. early Sunday. She was "beyond resuscitation," according to officials, and was pronounced dead at the scene.

Investigators told the family they believed the 19-year-old stumbled into an employee lounge and got into the freezer that was on, but unused.

Jenkins' family said they have their doubts about what happened, and that they're most upset because they tried to find her shortly after she disappeared - but were unable to until it was too late.

"If it weren't for us studying, pushing to find out what happened, my sister's life would still be in that freezer right now," Harris said.

"I had all the hope in the world that she would just come back," she added. "Maybe there was something wrong, but I asked God, not death. He let me down. He let me down."

An autopsy conducted Sunday ruled that Jenkins' cause of death was pending further study, according to the medical examiners office, and an investigation into Jenkins death remained ongoing. Police have not said whether they have ruled out foul play in the case.
Angry relatives asked why education minister Ram Bilas Sharma, the local MP and union state minister Rao Inderjeet Singh had not reached out to the victim's family yet.

By Ajay Kumar: Slogans were raised against PWD minister Rao Narbir Singh, Sohna MLA Tejpal Tanwar and Gurugram MLA Umesh Agrawal when they reached the cremation ground to pay condolences to the Ryan International student.

The boy's body was handed over to his family on Saturday after postmortem and his last rites was performed at the cremation ground in Bhondsi where hundreds had gathered.

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Angry relatives asked why education minister Ram Bilas Sharma, the local MP and union state minister Rao Inderjeet Singh had not reached out to the victim's family yet. "The callous attitude and insensitivity of the public representatives indicates that Haryana government is defending the top brass of Ryan International. The government forced the school management to suspend its acting principal and this step is good enough. The principal and other school officials should face criminal charges," said Anil Bedi, a resident of Bhondsi village.

People were so agitated that Narbir Singh and Tanwar had to leave the cremation ground. Agrawal stayed till the last ritual. "I have no authority to comment on the police investigation at present, but I can ensure the family members of the deceased and others that the decision about a CBI probe into the murder will be taken within 24 hours. I will talk to the chief minister in this matter so that justice will be delivered in the fastest way possible," Agrawal said.

Police commissioner Sandeep Khirwar said: "We have asked the deputy commissioner of Gurugram and district attorney general to provide a prosecution lawyer who can guide us about collecting evidences."

ALSO READ |

7-year-old Gurgaon schoolboy killed by bus conductor who tried to sexually abuse him, say police

Gurgaon murder: Ryan International School bus conductor confesses to killing child, says he refused sex

ALSO WATCH | We will complete the probe within 7 days: Gurugram police chief on Ryan International School murder

--- ENDS ---
Hurricane Irma gave Florida a coast-to-coast pummeling with winds up to 130 mph Sunday, swamping homes and boats, knocking out power to millions and toppling massive construction cranes over the Miami skyline.

The 400-mile-wide (640-kilometer-wide) storm blew ashore in the mostly cleared-out Florida Keys, then marched up its western coast, its punishing winds extending clear across to Miami and West Palm Beach on the Atlantic side.

While Irma arrived in Florida as a Category 4 hurricane, by nightfall it was down to a Category 2 with winds of 100 mph (160 kph). As of 2 a.m. EDT Monday, the storm further weakened to a Category 1 storm and was centered about 25 miles (40 kilometers) northeast of Tampa, moving north-northwest near 15 mph (24 kph). Its maximum sustained winds weakened to 85 mph (135 kph) with additional weakening expected.

Meanwhile, more than 160,000 people waited in shelters statewide as Irma headed up the coast.

There were no immediate reports of deaths in Florida. In the Caribbean, at least 24 were people were killed during Irma's destructive trek.

Bryan Koon, Florida's emergency management director, said late Sunday that authorities had only scattered information about the storm's toll, but he remained hopeful.

"I've not heard of catastrophic damage. It doesn't mean it doesn't exist. It means it hasn't gotten to us yet," Koon said.

In the low-lying Keys, where a storm surge of over 10 feet (3 meters) was recorded, appliances and furniture were seen floating away, and Monroe County spokeswoman Cammy Clark said the ocean waters were filled with navigation hazards, including sunken boats. But the full extent of Irma's wrath there was not clear.

The county administrator, Roman Gastesi, said crews would begin house-to-house searches Monday to check on survivors. And an airborne relief mission, led by C-130 military cargo planes, was gearing up to bring emergency supplies to the Keys.

Storm surge was a big concern. The National Hurricane Center said a federal tide gauge in Naples reported a 7-foot (more than 2-meter) rise in water levels in just 90 minutes late Sunday.

Many streets were flooded in downtown Miami and other cities.

In downtown Miami, two of the two dozen construction cranes looming over the skyline collapsed in the wind. A third crane was reported down in Fort Lauderdale. No injuries were reported.

A Miami woman who went into labor was guided through delivery by phone when authorities couldn't reach her because of high winds and street flooding. Firefighters later took her to the hospital.

An apparent tornado spun off by Irma destroyed six mobile homes in Palm Bay, midway up the Atlantic coast. Flooding was reported along Interstate 4, which cuts across Florida's midsection.

Curfews were imposed in Miami, Tampa, Fort Lauderdale and much of the rest of South Florida, and some arrests of violators were reported. Miami Beach barred outsiders from the island.

Fort Lauderdale police arrested nine people they said were caught on TV cameras looting sneakers and other items from a sporting goods store and a pawn shop during the hurricane.

More than 3.3 million homes and businesses across the state lost power, and utility officials said it will take weeks to restore electricity to everyone.

While Irma raked Florida's Gulf Coast, forecasters warned that the entire state was in danger because of the sheer size of the storm.

In one of the largest U.S. evacuations, nearly 7 million people in the Southeast were warned to seek shelter elsewhere, including 6.4 million in Florida alone.

About 30,000 people heeded orders to leave the Keys as the storm closed in, but an untold number refused, in part because, to many storm-hardened residents, staying behind in the face of danger is a point of pride.

John Huston, who stayed in his Key Largo home, watched his yard flood even before the arrival of high tide.

"Small boats floating down the street next to furniture and refrigerators. Very noisy," he said by text message. "Shingles are coming off."

Irma made landfall just after 9 a.m. at Cudjoe Key, about 20 miles (32 kilometers) outside Key West. During the afternoon, it rounded Florida's southwestern corner and hugged the coast closely as it pushed toward Naples, Sanibel, Fort Myers and, beyond that, Sarasota, at 14 mph (23 kph).

Forecasters warned some places could see a storm surge of up to 15 feet (5 meters) of water.

Gretchen Blee, who moved with her husband to Naples from Long Island, New York, after Superstorm Sandy in 2012 heavily damaged their beach home, took cover in a hotel room as Irma raged.

"I said, 'Let's go and live the good life in paradise'," she said. "And here we are."

Some 400 miles (640 kilometers) north of the Keys, people in the Tampa-St. Petersburg area started bracing for the onslaught. The Tampa Bay area, with a population of about 3 million, has not taken a direct hit from a major hurricane since 1921.

"I've been here with other storms, other hurricanes. But this one scares me," Sally Carlson said as she snapped photos of the waves crashing against boats in St. Petersburg. "Let's just say a prayer we hope we make it through."

Along the Gulf Coast, two manatees became stranded after Hurricane Irma sucked the water out of Sarasota Bay, in Florida's Manatee County. Several people posted photos of the mammals on Facebook amid reports rescuers were able to later drag them to deeper water.

After leaving Florida, a weakened Irma is expected to push into Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee and beyond. A tropical storm warning was issued for the first time ever in Atlanta, some 200 miles (320 kilometers) from the sea.

President Donald Trump approved a disaster declaration for Florida, opening the way for federal aid.

"Once this system passes through, it's going to be a race to save lives and sustain lives," Federal Emergency Management Agency chief Brock Long said on "Fox News Sunday."

Florida's governor activated all 7,000 members of the Florida National Guard, and 10,000 guardsmen from elsewhere were being deployed.

Irma at one time was the most powerful hurricane ever recorded in the open Atlantic, a Category 5 with a peak wind speed of 185 mph (300 kph), and its approach set off alarm in Florida.

For days, forecasters had warned Irma was taking dead aim at the Miami area and the rest of the state's Atlantic coast. But then Irma made a more pronounced westward shift  the result of what meteorologists said was an atmospheric tug-of-war between weather systems that nudged Irma's crucial right turn into Florida's Gulf Coast.
Connecticut has deployed 22 more National Guardsman from the state to help with the Hurricane Irma relief efforts.

Fourteen Connecticut Army National Guard soldiers assigned to the 1st Battalion, 169th General Support Aviation Battalion left Sunday with two CH-47RF Chinook helicopters, according to Gov. Dannel Malloy.

The National Guardsman include rotary wing pilots, helicopter crew members and maintenance personnel and will stage just north of Florida to provide a quick response, Malloy said.

A crew of eight Airmen in a C-130 Hercules was sent to Joint Base Andrews where it will stand by for upcoming support missions, according to Malloy.

"Connecticut stands ready to assist our friends and neighbors in the Sunshine State in the days, weeks and months to come," Malloy said in a statement.

In all, the state has 31 Connecticut National Guardsman supporting hurricane relief efforts, including a crew of eight deployed to Puerto Rico on Saturday.
Hurricane Irma ravaged the French and Dutch Caribbean island of St. Martin.

Nine people were killed, almost every structure was destroyed and communication was knocked out.

That left a North Texas mother worried sick about her daughter.

Worried, until she found out the good deeds the medical student has been taking on in the dangerous conditions.

I just want my baby home, said Neeta Shah of Plano.

Since Monday, Shah has been holding on to her cell phones and her faith.

In my bed, just sitting like this. No TV, nothing. Just sitting like this and just praying, she said. Crying and praying. Crying and praying.

Shes been waiting for word on her daughter.

Tina Sharma is a medical student at the American University of the Caribbean School of Medicine in St. Martin.

Shah has had little to no communication with her daughter since Monday.

My heart was just pounding, she said. Until I heard from her, a very short mom, Im ok. Im alive.

The Plano mother would soon find out through others that not only was her 23-year-old daughter alive, she was doing something.

Were you able to get in touch with Tina, read a message to Shah. Shes safe and making us all proud by setting up a rescue mission off campus.

Sharma has been helping those injured during the storm, working non-stop for three days.

God placed her there so she could be of help to save lives and that made me feel a little more comfortable, said Shah.

On Saturday, the U.S. military evacuated Sharma and other students from St. Martin to Puerto Rico.

In a video message provided to NBC 5, Sharma said: Im so glad and honored and truly humbled to be a leader of a medical team handling all of the patients not only at AUC, but all of the island of St. Martin.

Thats my daughter, said Shah. Thats my hero.

Work and dedication that is making all of the uncertainty and time apart worth it in the end.

She will turn into the best doctor I know, said Shah. And to know that she is our very own, from Plano, Plano senior, raised in Texas. I think she is making all of us very proud.

Sharma said she and her classmates will be flown to the U.S. on chartered flights on Sunday.

As for St. Martin, the island was spared a direct hit by Hurricane Jose on Saturday.

The State Department issued travel advisories for U.S. citizens on the island of St. Martin on Saturday. Residents have been urged to shelter in place and not to travel to the airport unless they have departure plans.

Hundreds of additional soldiers were deployed to the French territory of St. Martin. The islands jail was also reportedly destroyed and its 250 inmates remained at large.
Florida police warned people to not shoot weapons at Hurricane Irma in response to a social media event encouraging people to do just that.

OK, it was a semi-serious warning.

"To clarify, DO NOT shoot weapons @ #Irma. You wont make it turn around & it will have very dangerous side effects," the Pasco Sheriff's office tweeted late Saturday.

The tweet was published along with a Yahoo article containing a graphic of a hurricane system, showing its swirling motion with the words "bullets come back don't shoot."

To clarify, DO NOT shoot weapons @ #Irma. You won't make it turn around & it will have very dangerous side effectshttps://t.co/CV4Y9OJknv  Pasco Sheriff (@PascoSheriff) September 10, 2017

The facetious tweet from the Sheriff's office was prompted by a Facebook event titled "Shoot at Hurricane Irma," that over 25,000 people RSVP'd to.

"Lets show Irma that we shoot first," the event description says.

The tweet received positive feedback in the midst of an otherwise grim situation, with many thanking the Pasco Sheriffs office for bringing a glimmer of humor as Irma heads toward South Florida. One Twitter user even offered a counter event: singing Smash Mouth's hit "All Star" to hopefully turn the storm away.

SOMEBODY ONCE TOLD ME...  Pasco Sheriff (@PascoSheriff) September 10, 2017

Building off the tongue-and-cheek of their "don't shoot" tweet, the Pasco Sheriff's office took a more serious tone on urging Twitter users to instead volunteer their time at evacuation shelters.

They responded to tweets baffled by their humor saying the account reached over 1 million people yesterday, likely due to their attention-grabbing tweets. The accound has been retweeted by Seth Rogen, William Shatner, Jake Tapper and Sen. Ted Cruz.

Hey everyone here for shooting guns at hurricanes...how about you RT this, too, and get some volunteers for our shelters? pic.twitter.com/Bn9wL0U8xM  Pasco Sheriff (@PascoSheriff) September 10, 2017

Irma changed paths Saturday night, heading on a new track that could expose St. Petersburg to a direct hit, instead of Miami or Tampa. In one of the biggest evacuations ever ordered in the U.S., about 6.4 million people in Florida were warned to leave.

[NATL] Hurricane Irma Lashes Through the Caribbean
As several thousand customers remain without power Saturday after Hurricane Irma lashed Florida, officials say those in South Florida could remain on that list into the week.

As of 10:15 a.m. Monday, Florida Power & Light said just under 53,000 of those customers are in Miami-Dade County. Just under 13,000 customers were affected in Broward County.

Florida Power & Light expects those living in southeastern Miami-Dade County to have their power restored by Tuesday night, and customers in Broward County by Monday.

Officials at a press conference Tuesday said the plan is to have the East Coast back up and running by the weekend, with an exception for areas hit by tornadoes, flooding and severe damage. Officials said they're working to restore power in the eastern part of the state first before working their way west.

Updated Sept. 11 at 4 p.m.

Crews have been staying for days at the BB&T Center in Sunrise, where about 800 utility trucks and cars were parked before being sent out.

"Our ownership was very very emphatic that we do anything to help the community to help out FPL," said Matthew Caldwell, president and CEO of the Florida Panthers. "We spoke on Monday and told them we'd open up the arena for them. Starting on Thursday night we had hundreds of workers being staged here. We got hundreds of cots for everyone to sleep on and it was great. Final count, we had over two thousand workers."



The company said they have assembled the largest pre-storm restoration workforce in U.S. history, more than 17,000 workers, to deal with the aftermath of Irma.

"The storm here is much larger than Wilma. This is the first time in our company's history that we've had all 35 counties, 27,000 square miles of our service territory hit," FPL president and CEO Eric Silagy said.



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Spokesman Rob Gould said thousands of miles of poles and lines will need to be replaced, particularly on the Gulf coast.

FPL also warned customers of impersonators, advising residents to take the proper steps in identifying FPL workers. FPL said customers should ask workers for their FPL photo ID badge and make sure they are in marked trucks. Also, FPL workers never need to enter your home.



The power companies said they have extra crews on hand to try to restore power  once it's safe to do so. Gould said workers from as far away as California and Massachusetts are already stationed around the state, but it will take time to rebuild the system.

NBC 6 investigator Dan Krauth is in Midtown Miami, speaking with residents about how theyre coping with no electricity.

The utility covers much of the state, including most cities on the Atlantic coast and the Gulf coast south of Tampa. It does not cover Tampa and St. Petersburg, two major cities in Irma's forecast path.

Strong winds and heavy rains were causing flooding and downed trees throughout the state. The eye of the hurricane made landfall at 9:10 a.m. at Cudjoe Key.

In Miramar, people and their pets were holed up in a Hilton Garden Inn, a makeshift shelter which lost power amid heavy wind and horizontal rain.

"When you live on A/C all the time, its a bummer, a woman taking shelter at the hotel told NBC 6. Having no power sucks, but it could be worse, so just waiting it out."

The hotel was handing out free ice cream before it melts.

A Hollywood family was among those without power in Broward County Sunday after a power line to their home snapped and fell into their backyard pool.

Fernando Gimenez called NBC 6 to report what happened at his home on North 66th Avenue near Johnson Street.

Gimenez, who said he's a licensed electrician, said he was concerned because the power lines were still energized. He said the firefighters that arrived told him they didn't have the equipment needed to cut the power and that FPL needed to respond.

Gimenez reported smoke coming from the electric panel inside his home also and worried about his home catching on fire.

"The pool right now is hot...inside the house we had smoke coming in through the panel," Gimenez said. "We don't have power inside the house.

"We have a 92-year-old person inside the room, and we dont know what to do. They told us to go sit in the cars, turn the cars on, but thats dangerous, too."

NBC 6s Melissa Adan shows how employees from FPL and companies across the country are heading out through the area in an effort to get power restored.

The National Weather Service reports the storm had maximum sustained winds of 130 mph when it made landfall Sunday morning. A gust to 106 mph was reported at the National Key Deer Refuge in Big Pine Key.

After hitting the Florida Keys, Irma continued up the state's Gulf Coast later Sunday, making landfall again in Naples.

At least seven power lines were reported down at Broward's Emergency Operations Center.

"We expect that we will see more power lines downed, that's just the nature of the beast, unfortunately," said Julie Roulhet, FPL spokesperson. "We can't fight Mother Nature, but we are ready to fight what she does after the storm."

NBC 6s Chris Hush spoke with one store owner in Hialeah Gardens who is dealing with rising water after the bands of the hurricane dropped plenty of rain this weekend.

Key Energy Services, which serves the Lower Keys, said nearly all of its customers were out of power, some 28,567 people. The Keys Electric Cooperative Association that serves the Upper and Middle Keys reported 21,387 of 33,000 accounts don't have power.

Hundreds of thousands waited out the brunt of the storm in darkness, as heavy winds ripped down power lines.

The heavy rains also led to some street flooding. Areas affected include Biscayne Boulevard near southeast First Street in Downtown Miami. Floodwaters were seven inches deep along Northwest 192nd Street in Northwest Miami-Dade.

A man riding out a storm in his mobile park home in Florida City in Miami-Dade County told NBC 6 the weather "got ugly" around 5 a.m., bringing 120 mph winds which knocked down power lines and brought down tree limbs. He said his home lost power but it came back soon after.

He said he chose to ride out the storm in his mobile home because "people are quick to rob those places."

Street flooding was also reported along Northeast 29th Terrace in Miami. Water from Biscayne Bay sprayed over the seawall with heavy winds and rain rolling through the area contributed to the flooding.

Miami Beach is also seeing street flooding including 31st Street and Collins Avenue.

Boats docked at Dinner Key Marina in Coconut Grove were rocking in the water due to whipping winds from Irma early Sunday morning. There was also some storm surges at the marina.

Fifty-year-old Dan Rodriguez was hunkered down with his parents in Tamiami Lakes and by Sunday they also had no electricity.

"40 to 60 mph gusts with nonstop rain and loss of power," he texted. Still happy no direct hit."

Rodriguez, who splits his time between his parents home and Brickell, the citys financial center where there was a mandatory evacuation order, remembered the devastation of Hurricane Andrew in 1992 and worried about staying.

"Evacuation wasnt a choice for me," he said before the storm hit Florida. My two parents are still alive.

His mother is 83, his father, 81, and they did not want to chance running out of gas or not finding a place to stay, he said.

Trees have toppled from the strong winds including a Lauderhill tree that once stood at least 30 feet tall. The root network was so large, it took part of the ground with it when it came down.

Strong winds split a large mahogany tree in half on NE 24 Avenue a few blocks from Ives Dairy. The tree blocks the entire road.

Downed powerlines were also reported at U.S. 27 and Stirling Road in Weston - while in other areas, including on Southwest 104th Street in Pinecrest, trees were reported down.

On Northwest 198th Terrace in northwest Miami-Dade, a large tree appeared to have fallen on a home.

In Coconut Grove, firefighters responded after a tree fell on to a power line.

An FPL spokesperson told NBC News that the nuclear power plants located at Turkey Point in Miami-Dade County and one in St. Lucie will remain open at this time, and a decision will be made at a later point based on weather conditions.
Subway tokens were done away with 14 years ago. And the ubiquitous MetroCard, modern when swipes started in 1993, is on its way out.



The MTA says a replacement to the MetroCard will hopefully be in use next year and fully implemented by 2022.

The transit agency announced last year that it was planning to replace the MetroCard with contactless media used in London and other cities. This week, the agency said it hopes to start implementing the system soon, a move that comes as it looks to modernize its aging trains and stations.

Matthew Hudson of Transport for London told an NYU transit summit this week that using bank cards or smartphones is the fastest way to get through a turnstile.

If you do get it right, its amazing what other good things also come your way, Hudson said.

The major benefit is customers love it. They make their journeys easy, he told NBC 4 New York.

This past summer, Mark Wild, executive director of the London Underground, told NBC 4 that London probably [has] the most advanced contactless system in the world.

Metro-North and LIRR already use electronic smartphone tickets, but replacing the MetroCard will cost hundreds of millions of dollars and take years.

The MTA estimates that while it will implement the new fare payment system soon and start using it next year, it wont eliminate MetroCards for another five years. (It took eight years to phase out the old token system.)

In a statement on Friday, MTA spokesman Shams Tarek said: "The MTA is moving aggressively to develop and implement a new contactless fare payment system with an experienced provider that will incorporate best practices from across the world and the newest state-of-the-art technology to deliver a first-rate system for our customers.

NYU professor Mitchell Moss, who advises MTAs leadership as it undergoes Chairman Joseph Lhota's newly unveiled NYC Subway Action Plan, said implementing a contactless system will be worth the wait.

Anytime youre making a decision for a system that has six million riders a day, you want to take time, you want to do it right, Moss said.
A former drifter charged with killing six people in Connecticut in 2003 and disposing of the bodies behind a New Britain strip mall pleaded guilty Friday to killing five women and one man.

William Devin Howell, a 47-year-old native of Hampton, Virginia, was already serving a 15-year prison sentence for manslaughter in the killing of a seventh victim, 33-year-old Nilsa Arizmendi of Wethersfield.

Howell will be sentenced on Nov. 17. He is expected to be sentenced to 360 years in prison, or six consecutive life sentences, according to the state Division of Criminal Justice. Of that time, 150 years is mandatory for state law.

Arizmendi and the six other victims were found buried behind a strip mall.

The other victims were identified as: Joyvaline Martinez, 24, of East Hartford; Diane Cusack, 53, of New Britain; Mary Jane Menard, 40, of New Britain; Melanie Ruth Camilini, 29, of Seymour; Marilyn Gonzalez, 26, of Waterbury; and Danny Lee Whistnant, 44, of New Britain.

Howell sexually assaulted three of the women and kept one of the bodies in his van for two weeks, sleeping next to the body and calling the victim his "baby," according to an arrest warrant affidavit. Howell also told a cellmate "there was a monster inside of him that just came out" and described himself as a "sick ripper," according to the warrant.

Howell was working odd jobs and cuts grass at homes and businesses in Wethersfield, Hartford, New Britain and West Hartford at the time of the killings.

"By pleading guilty today, William Howell wanted to spare the victims families further emotional pain through a lengthy and drawn out trial that would have taken several weeks, if not months. Avoiding a trial also saves the taxpayers of the state nearly $1,000,000," Howell's attorneys, Jeffrey C. Kestenband and William H. Paetzold, said in a statement on Friday.


It started out cold as ice, and then turned warm and friendly. Now the tortured relationship between President Donald Trump and House Speaker Paul Ryan has gone cool again, with the Republican president making clear he has no qualms about bucking the GOP leader to cut deals with his Democratic foes.

The two men dined at the White House Thursday night and discussed legislative challenges ahead for the fall, a get-together that was scheduled over Congress' August recess, long before the head-spinning events of this week. In a moment that stunned Washington, Trump cut a debt and disaster aid deal Wednesday with Congress' Democratic leaders as Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell watched on helplessly, after lobbying unsuccessfully for much different terms.

The moment distilled the inherent tensions between Trump, 71, a former Democrat and ideologically flexible deal-maker, and Ryan, 47, a loyal Republican whose discomfort with Trump led him to withhold his endorsement for weeks last year.

After Trump was elected the two papered over their differences and even developed a rapport, talking frequently during health care negotiations earlier this year, as each understood they needed the other to advance individual and shared goals. But their phone calls have tapered off of late and Trump has expressed his frustration with GOP leaders on multiple fronts, culminating in the president's decision to ditch them and join hands with the Democrats instead.

Trump exulted in his newly bipartisan approach Thursday, declaring it "a great thing for our country," while Ryan mostly grinned and bore it.

At the Capitol on Wednesday, Ryan had deemed a three-month debt ceiling increase as "unworkable" and "ridiculous." Yet an hour later, Trump overruled his strong objections to side with the Democrats.

The president's rebuff on the debt came just days after Trump ignored Ryan's pleas not to end the program to aid immigrants brought to the country as children and living here illegally. Instead, Trump ended the program and tossed the issue to Congress to resolve in six months.

A spokeswoman for Ryan, AshLee Strong, said Friday that the speaker and Trump "have a good relationship and are in frequent communication as the two work to advance the legislative priorities Republicans promised, including tax reform. In fact, they talked five times this week," including the dinner.

The House on Friday passed the $15 billion in disaster aid and a three-month government funding extension, sending it to Trump.

Indeed for Ryan, GOP reactions to the deal exposed some lurking threats to his perch atop a conference where unrest brews nearly ceaselessly among conservatives, and there have been recent rumblings of a possible coup.

Trump remains highly popular in the conservative districts occupied by many House Republicans, much more so than Ryan himself, who is scorned by many in the GOP base as an establishment sell-out. In a whipsawed moment, some House Republicans defended Trump's handling of a deal they don't like, while simultaneously criticizing Ryan, who had been overruled by the president. It also underscored the political pressure on Ryan to try to remain in the president's good graces even when Trump is flirting with Democrats.

Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, said the message in his conservative district is that "congressional Republicans need to get behind the president."

That sentiment "makes him weaker," King said of Ryan.

Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona described Ryan as "very unpopular" in his district, while regard for Trump is "pretty high."

As far as his constituents are concerned, Gosar said, they'd be happy if Ryan got the boot and Trump stayed. "That's kind of the mantra in my district," he said.

For his part, Trump has soured on the Republican congressional leadership in recent months, fuming to associates that they led him astray on their health care strategy, among other complaints.

The president has told those close to him that he regrets choosing to tackle the repeal and replace of Barack Obama's health care law as his first legislative push. He has singled out Ryan for blame, saying the speaker assured him it would pass and instead handed him an early, humiliating failure, before ultimate House passage of a revived bill, according to three White House and outside advisers familiar with the conversations but not authorized to speak about them publicly.

GOP health care efforts collapsed in the Senate in July.

Trump has spoken to Ryan less frequently in recent weeks, particularly after the departure of his first chief of staff, Reince Priebus, who has deep Wisconsin ties to the speaker. Priebus would sometimes broker the calls and stress to each man their importance, according to two people familiar with the conversations. Those calls have occurred less often since John Kelly took over as chief of staff.

Though Trump has expressed particular anger at McConnell for the failed Senate health care vote and for not protecting him from the Russia investigation, he grudgingly has told associates that he is aware of the Senate leader's grip on power. He has spoken less glowingly about Ryan's own ability to lead due to the shorter House terms and the growing insurgency within the conservative Freedom Caucus.

Ryan's position is seen as secure for now, if only because it is widely accepted that no other House Republican could garner the support needed to replace him. But even allies believe his tenure in the job could be finite, and might depend in part on the whims of a president with whom he has no real deep ties.

"I think any speaker is going to have a very difficult time in this environment," said Rep. Tom Reed, R-N.Y. "The nature of that job, I think, over time, they don't last."

Lemire reported from New York.
A team of San Diego-based firefighters, search and rescue specialists and doctors deployed to Florida Saturday to help with whatever is necessary for the aftermath of Hurricane Irma.

FEMA Urban Search and Rescue California Task Force 8 is an 81-member team comprised of firefighters, doctors, paramedics, structure specialists, search and rescue specialists, Hazmat experts and other first-responders often sent to disaster-stricken zones.

The team recently spent 12 days deployed in Texas, in areas ravaged by Hurricane Harvey.

On Saturday, the team began their next journey, this time to Florida, to prepare for the relief efforts that will be needed after Hurricane Irma hits.

Fifty-seven members from Task Force 8 headed to Florida, including firefighters with the San Diego Fire-Rescue Department (SDFD).

SDFD Capt. John Wood said Task Force 8 will set up at Eglin Air Force Base. From there, they will divide into smaller teams and help in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma.

Well be ready to go and work right away, said Wood. This is what we want to do; this is what were built to do. Well get our sleep when we can. Were there to help.

SDFD Capt. Brent Brainard, whos also a K-9 specialist, is part of Task Force 8. He and his K-9, Decker, aided victims of Hurricane Harvey, and now theyre going to do the same for those impacted by Hurricane Irma.

Its something we train for, Brainard told NBC 7.

When Irma hits, he and Decker will be paired up with another K-9 team to look for victims in the rubble.

And then once were able to confirm, Hey, theres a victim in this area, then we can bring in more technical search specialists or the rescue squads that come behind us., he explained.

Brainard said leaving his family for these types of missions is always difficult but having Decker by his side really helps.

Hes my best friend, he said.

Brainard said Decker not only helps civilians in the field of these disasters but also acts as a therapy dog for other first responders missing home or for civilians who just need a little reassurance.

He plays multiple roles, he said, of his K-9 companion.

In addition to Decker, Task Force 8 also includes three other search and rescue K-9s and their handlers.
The self-styled godman reportedly complained of uneasiness and restlessness to the team of doctors who examined him at the Rohtak jail.

By Manjeet Sehgal: A fortnight since Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh has been lodged in the Rohtak jail after being convicted of raping two female followers in a 15-year-old case, jail authorities on Saturday called a team of doctors, including a psychiatrist, to conduct a health check-up.

The self-styled godman reportedly complained of uneasiness and restlessness to the team of doctors who examined him at the Rohtak jail.

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According to sources, the Dera chief is believed to have told the doctors that the health issues are a physical manifestation of some withdrawal symptoms he is suffering from.

"The baba is, in fact, a sex addict. He has no access to physical pleasures in the jail which is the cause for his restlessness. He can be treated. However, if the treatment is delayed, it can lead to a bigger problem," said a doctor who was part of the team that examined Ram Rahim in the jail.

ALSO READ: What is sex addiction? How does one get addicted to sex?

It, however, remains unclear if Gurmeet Ram Rahim was addicted to drugs as well. Some reports suggest that the Dera chief consumed alcohol till 1988. "He may not be drinking liquor now, but he regularly consumed energy drinks and sex tonics that were specially imported from Australia and other countries," claimed Gurdas Singh Toor, a former Dera member.

#ITQuickie Doctors who examined the Rockstar Baba at the Rohtak jail, believe he is a "sex addict." Take a look at what the doctors said... pic.twitter.com/R88ggR53le- India Today (@IndiaToday) September 11, 2017

RAM RAHIM TOLD COURT THAT HE IS IMPOTENT

Notably, Gurmeet Singh, who did not leave any stone unturned to prove himself innocent, told the special CBI court that he was impotent.

After taking over as the Dera chief in 1990, Ram Rahim publicly renounced his family and worldly desires.

When an anonymous letter accusing Ram Rahim of rape, written by one of the victims, surfaced, he told people that the girls were under pressure to give false statements. He alleged that his opponents had bribed the victims.

"He is a liar as he was never impotent. His son was a few months old when he became a Dera chief in 1990. He is accused of raping his disciples. When people demanded for his potency test, he retracted his 1990 statement and said he had physical relations with only his wife. He wanted to mislead the court. Why nobody has got his potency test done so far is another loophole," Gurdas Singh Toor, who appeared as a witness for the CBI, told India Today.

Was the demand to allow Honeypreet to stay with him in jail meant to satiate physical needs?

Gurmeet Ram Rahim had requested the jail authorities to allow Honeypreet, his closest aide, to stay with him in the jail. He had reportedly threatened the jail staff when Honeypreet was asked to leave the jail complex. The Dera chief told the jail authorities that Honeypreet was his physiotherapist.

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Interestingly, Gurmeet Ram Rahim did not demand the presence of either a male attendant, his biological daughters, or even his wife. His only demand was that Honeypreet be allowed to stay with him as his attendant.

When he failed to meet Honeypreet in the jail, Ram Rahim requested authorities to let him speak to her over phone. However, Ram Rahim's hopes were dashed when Honeypreet, slapped with a sedition case, went underground.

ALSO READ:

Gurmeet Ram Rahim's adopted daughter Honeypreet facing death threats, say intelligence reports

Dera search ends: What tumbled out of Gurmeet Ram Rahim's Sirsa ashram

Gurmeet Ram Rahim, Asaram Bapu, Sant Rampal find place on list of 'fake babas' released by apex body of Hindu sadhus

Gurmeet Ram Rahim had built a secret tunnel connecting his gufa to room of sadhvis

ALSO WATCH: Ram Rahim is a sex addict, claims doctor who examined him

--- ENDS ---
A man has been charged with attempted murder after police say he set his pregnant girlfriend on fire, causing her to have critical burns on nearly her entire body and forcing her to deliver her baby early.

Prince George's County police officers and firefighters found Andrea Grinage with critical burns on a large part of her body while responding to a fire about 11:45 a.m. Friday at 1405 Elkwood Lane, police said.

On Saturday, police identified the suspect as 34-year-old Laquinn Phillips, of Southeast D.C. Phillips has been charged with attempted first- and second-degree murder, arson, assault and several related charges, police said.

Grinage told police Phillips doused her with a flammable liquid inside her apartment and set her on fire. She also told police he may be on his way to D.C. to possibly harm one of her relatives, Prince George's County police spokeswoman Jennifer Donelan said at a news conference Friday afternoon.

"She was very brave. We want her family to know how brave she was, suffering as badly as she was -- critically burned, worried about her unborn child, dealing with those injuries and was able to share that information with us so that we could get moving with our investigation and locate this person," Donelan said.



Medics took Grinage to a hospital, where she delivered the baby. Police said she and the baby are alive.

On Saturday, Grinage and the baby were in critical condition, according to police.

These are not the circumstances under which this baby was to be born, Donelan said Friday.

Grinage's father, Arthur Grinage, said the baby, a girl, was born seven weeks premature and is doing OK. The baby was named Journey Aaliyah Grinage.

"She's hanging in there. She's doing fine. She's beautiful," he said.



Police said Phillips turned himself in to police in Washington, D.C. He remains in police custody in D.C., police said Saturday.

"He's a coward. He's less than a man. Walk away if you don't want the responsibility. Walk away," the victim's father said of Phillips.



Neighbors said they heard Phillips and Grinage arguing Thursday night.
A teenager was arrested on multiple weapons and drug charges in Pepperell, Massachusetts on Saturday.

According to Pepperell police chief David Scott, 19-year-old Pepperell man Francis Banister's first interaction with police was around 3:00 a.m. after he was found with a gunshot wound in his leg.

Banister, who was treated at a local hospital, initially told police that he was walking down Leighton Street when a white vehicle drove by him and opened fire.

Upon investigating and discovering that a bullet had been fired through a resident's wall in an apartment complex on Leighton Street, police concluded that Banister's wound was actually obtained while visiting a friend's apartment.

Police said that Banister's injury was self-inflicted, and they seized firearms and parts from his friend's residence. They also searched Banister's home, where they seized more gun paraphernalia as well as multiple illegal drugs.

This is a prime example of why firearms should never be in the hands of unlicensed individuals, said Scott. Im thankful that nobody else was injured.

Banister eventually turned himself in and is being held without bail pending a Monday arraignment in Ayer District Court.
By Reuters

NEW DELHI: India has renegotiated the pricing of liquefied natural gas (LNG) imported from Australias Gorgon project to make the imported fuel affordable to price-sensitive domestic customers, oil minister Dharmendra Pradhan said on Saturday.

India has been trying to leverage its position as one of the biggest energy consumers to strike better bargains for its companies. In 2015 it renegotiated the LNG pricing formula with Qatars Rasgas to buy the gas at half the original price.

"Indian customers will receive (Gorgon) LNG volumes at an amicable price soon. This is done in a similar way to what we did with LNG from Qatar," Pradhan said in a tweet.

India's top gas importer Petronet LNG signed a deal in 2009 with Exxon Mobil Corp to buy 1.5 million tonnes of LNG annually from Gorgon for 20 years. At that time Petronet agreed to buy LNG at a cost equivalent to 14.5 percent of the oil price and to pay for the shipping freight as well.

Supplies under the deal began from January 2017, with the landed price of gas costing about $11-$13 per million British thermal units (mmBtu), almost double that of Asian spot LNG prices.

The Gorgon gas prices are now linked to about 13-13.5 percent of the global oil price on a delivered basis, two sources with knowledge of the negotiation said.

Renegotiation of the deal also shows how softening oil prices and a global supply glut are forcing LNG exporters to offer better deals to retain their share in global energy markets.

India wants to gradually move to a gas-based economy and aims to double the cleaner fuels share in its energy mix to 15 percent in the next few years.

Petronets managing director Prabhat Singh declined comment and Pradhan did not specify changes in the pricing formula.

"Happy to share good news that India has, yet again, been able to address the long-term price issue of LNG from Gorgon to suit Indian market," Pradhan said in a tweet.

NEW DELHI: India has renegotiated the pricing of liquefied natural gas (LNG) imported from Australias Gorgon project to make the imported fuel affordable to price-sensitive domestic customers, oil minister Dharmendra Pradhan said on Saturday. India has been trying to leverage its position as one of the biggest energy consumers to strike better bargains for its companies. In 2015 it renegotiated the LNG pricing formula with Qatars Rasgas to buy the gas at half the original price. "Indian customers will receive (Gorgon) LNG volumes at an amicable price soon. This is done in a similar way to what we did with LNG from Qatar," Pradhan said in a tweet. India's top gas importer Petronet LNG signed a deal in 2009 with Exxon Mobil Corp to buy 1.5 million tonnes of LNG annually from Gorgon for 20 years. At that time Petronet agreed to buy LNG at a cost equivalent to 14.5 percent of the oil price and to pay for the shipping freight as well. Supplies under the deal began from January 2017, with the landed price of gas costing about $11-$13 per million British thermal units (mmBtu), almost double that of Asian spot LNG prices. The Gorgon gas prices are now linked to about 13-13.5 percent of the global oil price on a delivered basis, two sources with knowledge of the negotiation said. Renegotiation of the deal also shows how softening oil prices and a global supply glut are forcing LNG exporters to offer better deals to retain their share in global energy markets. India wants to gradually move to a gas-based economy and aims to double the cleaner fuels share in its energy mix to 15 percent in the next few years. Petronets managing director Prabhat Singh declined comment and Pradhan did not specify changes in the pricing formula. "Happy to share good news that India has, yet again, been able to address the long-term price issue of LNG from Gorgon to suit Indian market," Pradhan said in a tweet.
By Express News Service

CHENNAI: Clearing the air around the hike in cess on mid-size cars, SUVs and luxury cars, the GST Council raised the cess on large luxury cars to 20 percent, SUVs to 22 percent and mid-size sedans to 17 percent from 15 percent for each of these categories, raising prospects of some types of premium vehicles getting dearer ahead of the festive season. The Council, which met in Hyderabad on Saturday, has however maintained the status quo on the categories like small cars, 13-seater, and hybrid vehicles, that means the effective tax remains the same.

Reacting to the increase in cess, luxury automobile makers have expressed disappointment, saying that the council has completely overlooked their contribution to the industry and the economy. Even if the rumored cess hike of 10 per cent was not concluded, the prices will go up again, which is disappointing. We will need to study the impact of this hike on the buyer sentiment, Audi India Head Rahil Ansari said.

Expressing similar views, Mercedes-Benz India MD & CEO, Roland Folger said, the decision to increase cess totally overlooks the contribution we make to the industry and to the economy. Though luxury car contribution to the industry volume-wise is very low, the value-wise contribution is much higher and has immense potential to grow, even more, had there been fair taxation, Folger added.

He also pointed out that by continuous taxation of the segment, the overall revenue generation is going to be hurt, as the increase in price is going to hurt demand. Folger went on to add that now, prices are bound to leap back to the pre-GST regime. Meanwhile, Jaguar Land Rover India president and managing director Rohit Suri said, while the increase in cess will impact consumer demand, investment, and job creation, we are glad that the government and GST Council took note of our concerns and somewhat moderated the increase in cess.

Protests mar council meeting as glitches vex industry

The GST Council meeting witnessed protests from several sections of the industry, who made use of the occasion to highlight their disappointment on the new tax structure. The Federation of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh Chambers of Commerce (FTAPCCI), Agriculture Machines Manufacturers Association, granites manufacturers and others arrived at the GST Council meeting venue on Saturday to highlight the problems being faced by them post GST and tried to get an appointment with Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, even as workers from Left Parties staged protest outside venue.

Traders are ready to pay the tax amount, but are facing severe problems while filing the returns. Government should immediately address the difficulties being faced because of GSTN. Government has put the lakh of businesses and traders into difficulties with half cooked system, said Gowra Srinivas, president of Federation of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh Chambers of Commerce. The GSTN portal is the IT backbone of the new tax system, and glitches experienced by taxpayers while filing returns has resulted in a lot of inconvenience, according to industry players, due to the inability of the portal to sustain heavy traffic.

CHENNAI: Clearing the air around the hike in cess on mid-size cars, SUVs and luxury cars, the GST Council raised the cess on large luxury cars to 20 percent, SUVs to 22 percent and mid-size sedans to 17 percent from 15 percent for each of these categories, raising prospects of some types of premium vehicles getting dearer ahead of the festive season. The Council, which met in Hyderabad on Saturday, has however maintained the status quo on the categories like small cars, 13-seater, and hybrid vehicles, that means the effective tax remains the same. Reacting to the increase in cess, luxury automobile makers have expressed disappointment, saying that the council has completely overlooked their contribution to the industry and the economy. Even if the rumored cess hike of 10 per cent was not concluded, the prices will go up again, which is disappointing. We will need to study the impact of this hike on the buyer sentiment, Audi India Head Rahil Ansari said. Expressing similar views, Mercedes-Benz India MD & CEO, Roland Folger said, the decision to increase cess totally overlooks the contribution we make to the industry and to the economy. Though luxury car contribution to the industry volume-wise is very low, the value-wise contribution is much higher and has immense potential to grow, even more, had there been fair taxation, Folger added. He also pointed out that by continuous taxation of the segment, the overall revenue generation is going to be hurt, as the increase in price is going to hurt demand. Folger went on to add that now, prices are bound to leap back to the pre-GST regime. Meanwhile, Jaguar Land Rover India president and managing director Rohit Suri said, while the increase in cess will impact consumer demand, investment, and job creation, we are glad that the government and GST Council took note of our concerns and somewhat moderated the increase in cess. Protests mar council meeting as glitches vex industry The GST Council meeting witnessed protests from several sections of the industry, who made use of the occasion to highlight their disappointment on the new tax structure. The Federation of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh Chambers of Commerce (FTAPCCI), Agriculture Machines Manufacturers Association, granites manufacturers and others arrived at the GST Council meeting venue on Saturday to highlight the problems being faced by them post GST and tried to get an appointment with Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, even as workers from Left Parties staged protest outside venue. Traders are ready to pay the tax amount, but are facing severe problems while filing the returns. Government should immediately address the difficulties being faced because of GSTN. Government has put the lakh of businesses and traders into difficulties with half cooked system, said Gowra Srinivas, president of Federation of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh Chambers of Commerce. The GSTN portal is the IT backbone of the new tax system, and glitches experienced by taxpayers while filing returns has resulted in a lot of inconvenience, according to industry players, due to the inability of the portal to sustain heavy traffic.
By Express News Service

BENGALURU: Two police officers and two others accused of theft were injured in a shootout at Sarjapur Road in Bengaluru on Sunday morning. The condition of all four injured is said to be stable.

According to the Bellandur police, Amar (25), a resident of Anekal, and Muzammil (20), a resident of Chandapura, allegedly snatched a phone from a software engineer at Sarjapur Road at around 11.30 pm Saturday night. A complaint was registered the same night. On Sunday morning, about eight personnel of the Bellandur police station spotted the two accused on a two-wheeler and identified the vehicle by the description they had received from the phone's owner.

As soon as they spotted the policemen, the two accused started to run away, and police personnel chased them. The duo then allegedly attacked the two police personnel with knives. Police officials Anthony and Vijay were stabbed in their stomach and shoulder. In response, another official, Victor Simon, fired at the two accused, who sustained bullet injuries in their legs.

The two policemen are undergoing treatment at Levin Hospital at Sarjapur, while the two accused were taken to Bowring Hospital. The condition of all four injured persons is said to be stable. Bellandur police have registered a case against the accused.

BENGALURU: Two police officers and two others accused of theft were injured in a shootout at Sarjapur Road in Bengaluru on Sunday morning. The condition of all four injured is said to be stable. According to the Bellandur police, Amar (25), a resident of Anekal, and Muzammil (20), a resident of Chandapura, allegedly snatched a phone from a software engineer at Sarjapur Road at around 11.30 pm Saturday night. A complaint was registered the same night. On Sunday morning, about eight personnel of the Bellandur police station spotted the two accused on a two-wheeler and identified the vehicle by the description they had received from the phone's owner. As soon as they spotted the policemen, the two accused started to run away, and police personnel chased them. The duo then allegedly attacked the two police personnel with knives. Police officials Anthony and Vijay were stabbed in their stomach and shoulder. In response, another official, Victor Simon, fired at the two accused, who sustained bullet injuries in their legs. The two policemen are undergoing treatment at Levin Hospital at Sarjapur, while the two accused were taken to Bowring Hospital. The condition of all four injured persons is said to be stable. Bellandur police have registered a case against the accused.
By Express News Service

HYDERABAD: A Bangladeshi national, who was allegedly in possession of an Indian passport, along with his two sons was picked up by the intelligence officials here on Friday night.

On Friday, the Intelligence Bureau officials and the Counter Intelligence Cell sleuths of Telangana assisted by the Cyberabad police picked up Abdul Qayyum and his sons Hafiz Faizullah (18) and a minor boy (17) from his home at Sun City in Rajendranagar police station limits. However, his wife and daughter were not detained.



Speaking to the Express, Cyberabad police commissioner Sandeep Shandilya said We received inputs that a foreign national who has acquired Indian passport using forged documents was living here and was picked up. Responding to a query, the commissioner said We are just his antecedents since 2009 and questioning is on about how he possessed a passport. We did not find any links so far with any terrorist organisation and further investigation is on. The 60-year-old Abdul Qayyum has reportedly come to India in 2009, with his family and lived in Uttar Pradesh for sometime before settling in Hyderabad. He has been into the business of making POP (Plaster of Paris) material used for interior designing works and managed to get a voter id card, Aadhar card and an Indian passport subsequently using false documents.



Panicked about the drama staged by the police at their home, Qayyums wife and daughter approached some advocates requesting help. Later in the day, the officials made Qayyum speak to his wife over phone and assured releasing him and her sons soon. While reports emerged about his alleged links to a terror accused recently arrested by Uttar Pradesh Anti-Terrorist Squad, the same was denied by UP ATS officials.



Qayyum has come to the city from Dubai 10 days ago. A Few days later, some police officials went to his house and checked the passport and had reportedly told him that everything was clear, but they detained the trio, said advocate Khalid Saifullah quoting Qayyums family members. It is also learnt that Qayyum has obtained huge amount of money and purchased a house worth `50 lakh in Sun City area.

HYDERABAD: A Bangladeshi national, who was allegedly in possession of an Indian passport, along with his two sons was picked up by the intelligence officials here on Friday night. On Friday, the Intelligence Bureau officials and the Counter Intelligence Cell sleuths of Telangana assisted by the Cyberabad police picked up Abdul Qayyum and his sons Hafiz Faizullah (18) and a minor boy (17) from his home at Sun City in Rajendranagar police station limits. However, his wife and daughter were not detained. Speaking to the Express, Cyberabad police commissioner Sandeep Shandilya said We received inputs that a foreign national who has acquired Indian passport using forged documents was living here and was picked up. Responding to a query, the commissioner said We are just his antecedents since 2009 and questioning is on about how he possessed a passport. We did not find any links so far with any terrorist organisation and further investigation is on. The 60-year-old Abdul Qayyum has reportedly come to India in 2009, with his family and lived in Uttar Pradesh for sometime before settling in Hyderabad. He has been into the business of making POP (Plaster of Paris) material used for interior designing works and managed to get a voter id card, Aadhar card and an Indian passport subsequently using false documents. Panicked about the drama staged by the police at their home, Qayyums wife and daughter approached some advocates requesting help. Later in the day, the officials made Qayyum speak to his wife over phone and assured releasing him and her sons soon. While reports emerged about his alleged links to a terror accused recently arrested by Uttar Pradesh Anti-Terrorist Squad, the same was denied by UP ATS officials. Qayyum has come to the city from Dubai 10 days ago. A Few days later, some police officials went to his house and checked the passport and had reportedly told him that everything was clear, but they detained the trio, said advocate Khalid Saifullah quoting Qayyums family members. It is also learnt that Qayyum has obtained huge amount of money and purchased a house worth `50 lakh in Sun City area.
Zumbish By

Express News Service

HYDERABAD: Two migrant labourers, who were compelled to return home after their employer had shut down the firm in Oman five months ago, returned here on Saturday. Bingi Ravi of Karimnagar district and Ganga Reddy of Jagtial district landed at the Rajiv Gandhi international airport. Though returning home was a great relief to the duo, they said they had a bleak future staring them in their face.

As many as 900 employees of Petron Gulf LLC, a construction and engineering firm, are learnt to have been rendered jobless. Five more persons hailing from Telangana, who lost their jobs with the firm, are likely to be repatriated on Monday.



According to Ravi (50), the Indian embassy in Oman had been financing their groceries and rent for the last few months. Ravi, who is the only breadwinner for his family, said that the employees of his firm had approached a labour court in Muscat following the firms closure. He said he had given the power of attorney to the Indian embassy to pursue the case. They cannot play with our future. I wish the case reaches its logical conclusion and will get justice, he said.



We are thankful that the Indian embassy funded our return and provided us relief but there is no hope of alternative employment. As a construction material supervisor I was earning an amount equal to D40,000 a month. Now, I am clueless about how I will take care of my family, he said. Ganga Reddy (47), narrated the same plight and said he saw no hope for a steady income job in a place like Jagtial. Lack of savings during his employment in Oman is worrying him now. Forget savings, I cant even afford the tickets for the bus which is taking me to Jagtial. Even for that I am depending on the Telangana government, said Reddy who is worried about the future of his children, wife and parents.

HYDERABAD: Two migrant labourers, who were compelled to return home after their employer had shut down the firm in Oman five months ago, returned here on Saturday. Bingi Ravi of Karimnagar district and Ganga Reddy of Jagtial district landed at the Rajiv Gandhi international airport. Though returning home was a great relief to the duo, they said they had a bleak future staring them in their face. As many as 900 employees of Petron Gulf LLC, a construction and engineering firm, are learnt to have been rendered jobless. Five more persons hailing from Telangana, who lost their jobs with the firm, are likely to be repatriated on Monday. According to Ravi (50), the Indian embassy in Oman had been financing their groceries and rent for the last few months. Ravi, who is the only breadwinner for his family, said that the employees of his firm had approached a labour court in Muscat following the firms closure. He said he had given the power of attorney to the Indian embassy to pursue the case. They cannot play with our future. I wish the case reaches its logical conclusion and will get justice, he said. We are thankful that the Indian embassy funded our return and provided us relief but there is no hope of alternative employment. As a construction material supervisor I was earning an amount equal to D40,000 a month. Now, I am clueless about how I will take care of my family, he said. Ganga Reddy (47), narrated the same plight and said he saw no hope for a steady income job in a place like Jagtial. Lack of savings during his employment in Oman is worrying him now. Forget savings, I cant even afford the tickets for the bus which is taking me to Jagtial. Even for that I am depending on the Telangana government, said Reddy who is worried about the future of his children, wife and parents.
By ANI

NEW DELHI: Afghanistan Foreign Minister Salahuddin Rabbani will visit India next week.

During his visit, he will call on Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and will also hold bilateral talks with External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj.

The visit comes weeks after US President Donald Trump announced a new policy on Afghanistan and sought more help from India in Afghanistan.

Speaking from the Fort Myer military base in Arlington Trump had said, "We will develop a deeper strategic partnership with India, but we want them to help us more in Afghanistan."

"Another part of South Asia strategy for America to further develop its strategic partnership with India, the world's largest democracy and key security and economic partner of US. We appreciate India's important contribution to bring stability in Afghanistan. But, India makes billions of dollars in trade with the United States and we want them to help us more with Afghanistan especially in the area of economic consistence and development," Trump said.

Afghanistan's Ambassador to India Shaida Mohammad Abdali hailed the United States President Donald Trump's new policy for Afghanistan and urged Pakistan to join the fight against terrorism sincerely to sustain peace in the region.

"President Trump's remarks were very clear. It has still open the window for cooperation and partnership, but clearly the lack of that...he also hinted at a strong action. I think this is an opportunity for everyone, including Pakistan to adhere to the principles of state government, to fight terrorism sincerely, for the sake of everyone in the region," Ambassador Abdali told ANI.

"If there is genuine fight against terrorism for peace and stability, there is still an opportunity for partnership, but if that's not there, the words were clear and we hope that words are also transferred into action, and if there is lack of sincerity in the fight against terrorism, action will be as it was spoken in his (Donald Trump) remarks," he added.

Describing Trump's policy as a very comprehensive strategy, the envoy said it focused more on terrorism and it is very multifaceted.

Emphasising that India has been a genuine partner, the envoy said New Delhi has been standing alongside Afghanistan, especially after fall of Taliban.

"India's assistance is in multifaceted ways. You can see India's assistance in development of peace, security, economic, culture and education in many fields, there is always room for more ....and we hope India will do more," he said.

Speaking about Trump asking India's help in Afghanistan, the envoy said, "I am glad, I wish this had been the case long time back, that India to be partnered with on peace and stability in Afghanistan and the wider region. I am glad right now, the U.S. in this current strategy has focussed more and we look forward to a strong India-U.S. partnership with Afghanistan."

India has also welcomed Donald Trump's new policy on Afghanistan and said that New Delhi shares the concerns and objectives as entailed by the former in his recent address.

"We welcome President Trump's determination to enhance efforts to overcome the challenges facing Afghanistan and confronting issues of safe havens and other forms of cross-border support enjoyed by terrorists. India shares these concerns and objectives," India's External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said, in a press statement.

"We are committed to supporting the Government and the people of Afghanistan in their efforts to bring peace, security, stability and prosperity in their country. We have been steadfast in extending reconstruction and development assistance to Afghanistan in keeping with our traditional friendship with its people. We will continue these efforts, including in partnership with other countries," the statement added.

NEW DELHI: Afghanistan Foreign Minister Salahuddin Rabbani will visit India next week. During his visit, he will call on Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and will also hold bilateral talks with External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj. The visit comes weeks after US President Donald Trump announced a new policy on Afghanistan and sought more help from India in Afghanistan. Speaking from the Fort Myer military base in Arlington Trump had said, "We will develop a deeper strategic partnership with India, but we want them to help us more in Afghanistan." "Another part of South Asia strategy for America to further develop its strategic partnership with India, the world's largest democracy and key security and economic partner of US. We appreciate India's important contribution to bring stability in Afghanistan. But, India makes billions of dollars in trade with the United States and we want them to help us more with Afghanistan especially in the area of economic consistence and development," Trump said. Afghanistan's Ambassador to India Shaida Mohammad Abdali hailed the United States President Donald Trump's new policy for Afghanistan and urged Pakistan to join the fight against terrorism sincerely to sustain peace in the region. "President Trump's remarks were very clear. It has still open the window for cooperation and partnership, but clearly the lack of that...he also hinted at a strong action. I think this is an opportunity for everyone, including Pakistan to adhere to the principles of state government, to fight terrorism sincerely, for the sake of everyone in the region," Ambassador Abdali told ANI. "If there is genuine fight against terrorism for peace and stability, there is still an opportunity for partnership, but if that's not there, the words were clear and we hope that words are also transferred into action, and if there is lack of sincerity in the fight against terrorism, action will be as it was spoken in his (Donald Trump) remarks," he added. Describing Trump's policy as a very comprehensive strategy, the envoy said it focused more on terrorism and it is very multifaceted. Emphasising that India has been a genuine partner, the envoy said New Delhi has been standing alongside Afghanistan, especially after fall of Taliban. "India's assistance is in multifaceted ways. You can see India's assistance in development of peace, security, economic, culture and education in many fields, there is always room for more ....and we hope India will do more," he said. Speaking about Trump asking India's help in Afghanistan, the envoy said, "I am glad, I wish this had been the case long time back, that India to be partnered with on peace and stability in Afghanistan and the wider region. I am glad right now, the U.S. in this current strategy has focussed more and we look forward to a strong India-U.S. partnership with Afghanistan." India has also welcomed Donald Trump's new policy on Afghanistan and said that New Delhi shares the concerns and objectives as entailed by the former in his recent address. "We welcome President Trump's determination to enhance efforts to overcome the challenges facing Afghanistan and confronting issues of safe havens and other forms of cross-border support enjoyed by terrorists. India shares these concerns and objectives," India's External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said, in a press statement. "We are committed to supporting the Government and the people of Afghanistan in their efforts to bring peace, security, stability and prosperity in their country. We have been steadfast in extending reconstruction and development assistance to Afghanistan in keeping with our traditional friendship with its people. We will continue these efforts, including in partnership with other countries," the statement added.
All of southern Florida was feeling the effects of the storm creeping towards the shore, with at least one man killed, a woman forced to deliver her own baby, apartment towers swaying in high winds and trees uprooted.

A partially submerged car is seen at a flooded area in Coconut Grove as Hurricane Irma arrives in Miami, Florida. (Photo: Reuters)

By Reuters: A weakening but still potent Hurricane Irma lashed Florida's Gulf Coast on Sunday with tree-bending winds, pounding rain and surging surf, leaving more than 2.6 million homes and businesses without power statewide while flooding streets and swaying skyscrapers in Miami.

Forecasters warned that Irma remained extremely dangerous as the monster storm toppled trees and power lines, peeled tiles off roofs and threatened coastal areas with storm surges of up to 15 feet (4.6 m). Tornadoes were also spotted through the southern part of the state.

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Hours after barreling across the resort archipelago of the Florida Keys, the storm crept up the western shore of the Florida Peninsula to make a second landfall at Marco Island around 3.35 pm (1935 GMT), about a dozen miles (19 km) south of the upscale beach town of Naples on the Gulf of Mexico.

Irma's center came ashore not long after it was downgraded to a Category 3 storm from a Category 4 on the five-point Saffir-Simpson hurricane scale, with maximum sustained winds of 120 miles per hour (195 kph).

From my brother's Univision colleagues in downtown Miami pic.twitter.com/ADJlO5R6tR&; Paul Adams (@BBCPaulAdams) September 10, 2017

A few hours later, it was downgraded again to Category 2, with maximum sustained wind gusts of 110 mph (175 kph), the National Hurricane Center reported in Miami.

Some 6.5 million people, about a third of the state's population, had been ordered to evacuate southern Florida as the storm approached. An estimated 170,000 people were lodged in some 650 emergency shelters as of early evening, according to the Florida Division of Emergency Management.

"This is a life-threatening situation," Governor Rick Scott told a news conference. Curfews were declared on Sunday evening for the Gulf Coast cities of Tampa and St Petersburg as several Florida counties reported arrests of looters taking advantage of homes left vacant by evacuations.

The storm killed at least 28 people as it raged through the Caribbean en route to Florida. On Sunday, Irma claimed its first US fatality - a man found dead in a pickup truck that had crashed into a tree in high winds in the town of Marathon, in the Keys.

The storm's westward tilt as it advanced on Florida put a string of Gulf Coast cities at greatest risk and spared the densely populated Miami area the full force of its wrath. The state's biggest city, situated about 100 miles (160 km) east of Irma's core, was anything but unscathed.

Miami apartment towers swayed in the high winds, two construction cranes were toppled, and small white-capped waves could be seen in flooded streets between Miami office towers.

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Last week, Irma ranked as one of the most powerful hurricanes ever documented in the Atlantic, one of only a handful of Category 5 storms known to have packed sustained winds at 185 mph (297 kph)or more.

Before turning on Florida, the storm pummeled Cuba with 36-foot-tall (11-m) waves after ravaging several smaller Caribbean islands.

Its core was about 5 miles (8 km) north of Naples by 5 p.m. (2100 GMT) and was expected to move along or over Florida's western coast through evening.

Irma is expected to cause billions of dollars in damage to the third-most-populous US state, a major tourism hub with an economy that generates about 5 percent of US gross domestic product.

At least 2.6 million Florida homes and businesses had lost power, according to Florida Power & Light and other utilities.

MIAMI BUILDINGS SWAY, STREETS FLOODED

Waves poured over a Miami seawall, flooding streets waist-deep in places around Brickell Avenue, which runs a couple of blocks from the waterfront through the financial district and past consulates. High-rise apartment buildings were left standing like islands in the flood.

One woman in Miami's Little Haiti neighborhood delivered her own baby because emergency responders were unable to reach her, the city of Miami said on Twitter. Mother and infant were later taken to a hospital, it said.

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Deme Lomas, who owns Miami restaurant Niu Kitchen, said he saw a crane torn apart by winds and dangling from the top of a building.

"We feel the building swaying all the time," Lomas said in a phone interview from his 35th-floor apartment. "It's like being on a ship."

One hour of 30-second #GOES16 vis imagery as Hurricane #Irma made landfall in the Florida Keys as a cat 4 with sustained winds of 130 MPH. pic.twitter.com/SWIMtbIqAP- NASA SPoRT (@NASA_SPoRT) September 10, 2017

On Marco Island, home to about 17,000 residents, 67-year-old Kathleen Turner and her husband rode out the storm on the second floor of a friend's condominium after failing to find a flight out. She feared for her canal-facing home.

"I'm feeling better than being in my house, but I'm worried about my home, about what's going to happen," Turner said.

"I am prepared to say goodbye to my things, and that is hard," Allison McCarthy Cruse, 42, said as she huddled with seven other adults, three children and seven dogs in the home of a neighbor just blocks from the water in St Petersburg. She said she feared the roof on her own house might not survive.

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Irma comes just days after Hurricane Harvey dumped record-breaking rain in Texas, causing unprecedented flooding, killing at least 60 people and an estimated $180 billion in property damage. Almost three months remain in the Atlantic hurricane season, which runs through November.

US President Donald Trump, acting at the governor's request, approved a major disaster declaration for Florida on Sunday, freeing up emergency federal aid in response to Irma, which he called "some big monster."

Earlier, Trump issued a disaster declaration for the US territory of Puerto Rico, which was hit by the storm last week, the White House said.

WATCH | Hurrican Irma seen from space earlier this week (Video: YouTube/Associated Press)

ALSO READ |

Hurricane Irma barrels towards Florida after it ripped through Cuba

Preparing for Irma: Indian Florida resident's first-person account of facing a deadly hurricane

Hurricane Irma: Most powerful Atlantic hurricane ever hits Caribbean

--- ENDS ---
By PTI

GURGAON: The Haryana government today said it was not averse to ordering a CBI probe into the killing of a seven-year-old boy at Ryan International School and has asked the Gurgaon Police to book the school owner under the Juvenile Justice Act.

Education minister Ram Bilas Sharma also said that there have been lapses on part of the school administration.

"We accept negligence on part of the Ryan International School but the school cannot be derecognised as the future of 1200 students is at stake," Sharma said.

"We have directed the Gurgaon Police to book the owner of Ryan International School, Albert Pinto under section 75 Juvenile Justice (care and punishment act) Act 15 for punishment for cruelty to child meted out by the custodian in the charge sheet to be submitted in the court within 7 days.

"Some loopholes in the security are visible in the case and the toilet window was also found broken from inside," Sharma told PTI.

He said the charge sheet in the case will be ready within a week as police was speedily conducting the probe, but stressed that if the parents of the child insist on a probe by the CBI or any other agency the government will accede to their demand.

Talking to reporters here, Sharma also made it clear that school management has to take responsibility for the safety and security of children.

"We are issuing directives in this regard to all schools including private ones," he said.

"We held a meeting today in which the demand to derecognise the school came up, but we also had to take into account the fact that 1200 students are studying there. The parents of students studying in this school were against this step and therefore we felt taking such a step will not be right," he said.

"However, any kind of lapse, by the management or the owner, against all of them we have initiated action," he said.

The boy was found murdered with his throat slit in the school washroom in Gurgaon on Friday. The school's acting principal was suspended and the security staff removed. The police claimed the student was killed by bus conductor Ashok Kumar, who tried to sexually abuse him.

The accused was arrested within hours of the murder after which a court in Gurgaon sent him to police custody for three days.

"The murder accused has already been arrested. Now, within a week, police after collecting all necessary evidence will submit a chargesheet in court. However, still if the parents are not satisfied, then Haryana government is ready to get the matter probed by any agency.

"I am hopeful that when we will produce the accused before court within a week with all evidences collected by the police, the parents of the child will be satisfied with the action being taken," he said.

Sharma said, "We have fixed a seven-day deadline and in case where the accused is booked under Section 302 of IPC (for murder), this is the minimum time in such cases. However, if the child's parents still feel they are not satisfied,then as per their wish we can get the case investigated by any agency including CBI".

"We have full sympathy with the parents of the child. If any issue of providing financial help the Haryana government comes up will be willing to help," he said.

The minister made it clear that the Haryana government will not show any leniency in the matter

"Whatever strict action needs to be taken as per law will be taken in this case," he asserted.

He also said a liquor vend near the school has been ordered to be shut down permanently.

GURGAON: The Haryana government today said it was not averse to ordering a CBI probe into the killing of a seven-year-old boy at Ryan International School and has asked the Gurgaon Police to book the school owner under the Juvenile Justice Act. Education minister Ram Bilas Sharma also said that there have been lapses on part of the school administration. "We accept negligence on part of the Ryan International School but the school cannot be derecognised as the future of 1200 students is at stake," Sharma said. "We have directed the Gurgaon Police to book the owner of Ryan International School, Albert Pinto under section 75 Juvenile Justice (care and punishment act) Act 15 for punishment for cruelty to child meted out by the custodian in the charge sheet to be submitted in the court within 7 days. "Some loopholes in the security are visible in the case and the toilet window was also found broken from inside," Sharma told PTI. He said the charge sheet in the case will be ready within a week as police was speedily conducting the probe, but stressed that if the parents of the child insist on a probe by the CBI or any other agency the government will accede to their demand. Talking to reporters here, Sharma also made it clear that school management has to take responsibility for the safety and security of children. "We are issuing directives in this regard to all schools including private ones," he said. "We held a meeting today in which the demand to derecognise the school came up, but we also had to take into account the fact that 1200 students are studying there. The parents of students studying in this school were against this step and therefore we felt taking such a step will not be right," he said. "However, any kind of lapse, by the management or the owner, against all of them we have initiated action," he said. The boy was found murdered with his throat slit in the school washroom in Gurgaon on Friday. The school's acting principal was suspended and the security staff removed. The police claimed the student was killed by bus conductor Ashok Kumar, who tried to sexually abuse him. The accused was arrested within hours of the murder after which a court in Gurgaon sent him to police custody for three days. "The murder accused has already been arrested. Now, within a week, police after collecting all necessary evidence will submit a chargesheet in court. However, still if the parents are not satisfied, then Haryana government is ready to get the matter probed by any agency. "I am hopeful that when we will produce the accused before court within a week with all evidences collected by the police, the parents of the child will be satisfied with the action being taken," he said. Sharma said, "We have fixed a seven-day deadline and in case where the accused is booked under Section 302 of IPC (for murder), this is the minimum time in such cases. However, if the child's parents still feel they are not satisfied,then as per their wish we can get the case investigated by any agency including CBI". "We have full sympathy with the parents of the child. If any issue of providing financial help the Haryana government comes up will be willing to help," he said. The minister made it clear that the Haryana government will not show any leniency in the matter "Whatever strict action needs to be taken as per law will be taken in this case," he asserted. He also said a liquor vend near the school has been ordered to be shut down permanently.
By PTI

LUCKNOW: Photographs of jailed Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh's adopted daughter Honeypreet Insan have been pasted at police stations bordering Nepal and the law and order machinery is on an alert to ensure she does not sneak into the neighbouring country.

The police stations of Kapilvastu, Mohana, Shohratgarh and Debarua, whose areas border Nepal, have been alerted, Superintendent of Police (SP), Siddharth Nagar, Satyendra Kumar said today.

Honeypreet's photographs have been pasted at these police stations, the official said.

The intelligence mechanism has also been put into service to keep an eye on the activities of those crossing the Indian territory, he said.

The Uttar Pradesh police is also on an alert in Maharajganj, Lakhimpur and Bahraich districts which border Nepal, another official said.

The Haryana police had on September 1 issued a lookout notice against Honeypreet.

UP shares a 599.3 km long open border with Nepal touching seven districts - Pilibhit, Lakhimpur Kheri, Bahraich, Sravasti, Balrampur, Sidhharthnagar and Maharajganj.

Haryana police officials had recently come to Lakhimpur Kheri looking for the whereabouts of Honeypreet, one of the closest aides of the Dera Sacha Sauda chief.

Additional Superintendent of Police (ASP), Ghanshyam Chaurasiya, confirmed the arrival of two Haryana police personnel at Gaurifanta border in Kheri.

The Haryana police had shared some information with the Gaurifanta police and made inquiries about her suspected movement towards the neighbouring country through the porous India-Nepal border, the official said.

"However, when no clue about Honeypreet's departure for Nepal could be gathered, the Haryana police personnel returned," the ASP said.

He said that an unclaimed vehicle bearing the registration number of Punjab was seized from the border and a probe was on to ascertain its ownership.

Honeypreet, who is in her thirties, is the adopted daughter of Ram Rahim Singh whose conviction in a rape case triggered mob violence that killed around 40 people across Haryana.

She had accompanied the Dera head when he was brought to the special CBI court in Panchkula for the pronouncement of the verdict in the 15-year-old rape case. She also travelled along with him in a special chopper which ferried them to Rohtak from Panchkula after the conviction.

The Haryana police had earlier said that it was in touch with its counterparts in other states and was hopeful that Honeypreet and Aditya Insan, another key aide of the Dera head, would soon be found.

On September 1, the Haryana Police had issued a lookout notice against the two, fearing that they could leave the country.

The police initiated efforts to trace Honeypreet, the adopted "daughter" of Gurmeet Ram Rahim, who describes herself as "Papa's angel", after it arrested and questioned another sect functionary, Surinder Dhiman Insan, in connection with an alleged conspiracy to help Ram Rahim Singh escape after his conviction by a special CBI court in Panchkula on August 25.

Honeypreet is considered among Ram Rahim's possible successors as the head of the sect.

The 50-year-old Dera chief, who is lodged in Rohtak's Sunaria jail, has been sentenced to 20 years of imprisonment by the CBI court for raping of two of his disciples.

Honeypreet has also acted in the film 'MSG 2 - The Messenger' and had a guest appearance in 'MSG - The Warrior Lion Heart', in which the Dera chief played the lead roles.

LUCKNOW: Photographs of jailed Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh's adopted daughter Honeypreet Insan have been pasted at police stations bordering Nepal and the law and order machinery is on an alert to ensure she does not sneak into the neighbouring country. The police stations of Kapilvastu, Mohana, Shohratgarh and Debarua, whose areas border Nepal, have been alerted, Superintendent of Police (SP), Siddharth Nagar, Satyendra Kumar said today. Honeypreet's photographs have been pasted at these police stations, the official said. The intelligence mechanism has also been put into service to keep an eye on the activities of those crossing the Indian territory, he said. The Uttar Pradesh police is also on an alert in Maharajganj, Lakhimpur and Bahraich districts which border Nepal, another official said. The Haryana police had on September 1 issued a lookout notice against Honeypreet. UP shares a 599.3 km long open border with Nepal touching seven districts - Pilibhit, Lakhimpur Kheri, Bahraich, Sravasti, Balrampur, Sidhharthnagar and Maharajganj. Haryana police officials had recently come to Lakhimpur Kheri looking for the whereabouts of Honeypreet, one of the closest aides of the Dera Sacha Sauda chief. Additional Superintendent of Police (ASP), Ghanshyam Chaurasiya, confirmed the arrival of two Haryana police personnel at Gaurifanta border in Kheri. The Haryana police had shared some information with the Gaurifanta police and made inquiries about her suspected movement towards the neighbouring country through the porous India-Nepal border, the official said. "However, when no clue about Honeypreet's departure for Nepal could be gathered, the Haryana police personnel returned," the ASP said. He said that an unclaimed vehicle bearing the registration number of Punjab was seized from the border and a probe was on to ascertain its ownership. Honeypreet, who is in her thirties, is the adopted daughter of Ram Rahim Singh whose conviction in a rape case triggered mob violence that killed around 40 people across Haryana. She had accompanied the Dera head when he was brought to the special CBI court in Panchkula for the pronouncement of the verdict in the 15-year-old rape case. She also travelled along with him in a special chopper which ferried them to Rohtak from Panchkula after the conviction. The Haryana police had earlier said that it was in touch with its counterparts in other states and was hopeful that Honeypreet and Aditya Insan, another key aide of the Dera head, would soon be found. On September 1, the Haryana Police had issued a lookout notice against the two, fearing that they could leave the country. The police initiated efforts to trace Honeypreet, the adopted "daughter" of Gurmeet Ram Rahim, who describes herself as "Papa's angel", after it arrested and questioned another sect functionary, Surinder Dhiman Insan, in connection with an alleged conspiracy to help Ram Rahim Singh escape after his conviction by a special CBI court in Panchkula on August 25. Honeypreet is considered among Ram Rahim's possible successors as the head of the sect. The 50-year-old Dera chief, who is lodged in Rohtak's Sunaria jail, has been sentenced to 20 years of imprisonment by the CBI court for raping of two of his disciples. Honeypreet has also acted in the film 'MSG 2 - The Messenger' and had a guest appearance in 'MSG - The Warrior Lion Heart', in which the Dera chief played the lead roles.
Gustavo De Aristegui By

Gustavo de aristegui Former Spanish ambassador to India

I returned to Lebanon after many years of absence to attend my brothers wedding. I lived there as a student when my father was the Spanish Ambassador from 1984 to 1989. My father was murdered for defending Lebanons independence and territorial integrity in April 1989. Among my many emotional and touching memories were my trip to repatriate my fathers remains after the attack, and the visit of the Spanish troops in south Lebanon under United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon next to the Indian Base over there when I was a Spanish member of Parliament. I didnt come to a different country, it seemed to be a different planet.



Lebanon was torn by cruel Civil War since 1974, that exhausted all the possible combinations of confrontation among the different communities of the country, not only Muslim-Christian; Christian against Christians; intra-Muslim rife; inter-Chia war after the birth of Hezbollah. Finally, two broad coalitions of heterogeneous Lebanese parties clashed for years until the situation was unblocked and General Michel Aoun was elected as President and Saad Hariri Prime Minister. Lebanons war was much more a war by proxy than a real civil war.

Hatred was fuelled by external powers and their interests used the Lebanese as pawns of a much larger conflict, one beyond the Cold War that caused over three lakh causalities of a population of under four millions. Every Lebanese family has suffered tragedy and loss, my own family was struck by the horror of war. My father was killed alongside his Lebanese father-in-law and sister-in-law in a deliberate shelling of the Embassy compound by Syrian Armys 240mm shells.



This land of contrast, history, traditions, modernity, glamour and fashion, is also the land of war, violence, revenge. Here, sworn enemies can become strong allies after years of battles and deaths. Beirut boasts some of the most beautiful, modern and avant-garde architecture, with the coolest bars and clubs, luxurious hotels and trendy restaurants, pretty much at the best level of the hottest places on earth. Everything about Beirut is tantalising and bewitching, a near-perfect mix of tradition and modernity all wrapped in charm and bustle.



Just a couple of kilometres away there is a different world, not just a different neighbourhood, in the traditional Chia districts such as Bourj al-Barajneh with no alcohol, bars and packed with chadors and pictures of their leaders all over the place. Walking those streets we could be in Teheran in Iran or Karbala in Iraq. In fact some of these places were called Little Teheran during the war. And just 50 km away from Beirut, the Lebanese Army was fighting Daech terrorists that had occupied 120 km of Lebanese territory on the border with Syria during my recent stay.



The Lebanese people are resilientgoing from near extinction as a nation, as they were all but annexed by Syria, to becoming an apparent oasis of prosperity and stability. Apparent because there are still underlying tensions that need to be intelligently managed to prevent Lebanons very short fuse from creating an explosive chain-reaction taking the country back into chaos. The Lebanese know how to enjoy life because they know how fast and dramatically things can change from peace to war, from normality and stability to mayhem.



Lebanons treasure is its people, not only those that live in the country, but its huge diaspora of well over 18 million that is as dynamic and hard working as the most. They have contributed to strengthen the identity of the country, help their brothers back home, send back money, investment and ideas that they invented or learnt abroad. Its like a limitless bank of human talent. After decades of deeply-rooted hatred, fuelled by regional and world powers, the moment of true independence and peace has come. The only way to make this happen is by not forgetting the tragedies, the pain, the suffering of the past. If all of this is ignored, history could repeat itself.

gmdea1967@gmail.com

Gustavo de aristegui Former Spanish ambassador to India I returned to Lebanon after many years of absence to attend my brothers wedding. I lived there as a student when my father was the Spanish Ambassador from 1984 to 1989. My father was murdered for defending Lebanons independence and territorial integrity in April 1989. Among my many emotional and touching memories were my trip to repatriate my fathers remains after the attack, and the visit of the Spanish troops in south Lebanon under United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon next to the Indian Base over there when I was a Spanish member of Parliament. I didnt come to a different country, it seemed to be a different planet. Lebanon was torn by cruel Civil War since 1974, that exhausted all the possible combinations of confrontation among the different communities of the country, not only Muslim-Christian; Christian against Christians; intra-Muslim rife; inter-Chia war after the birth of Hezbollah. Finally, two broad coalitions of heterogeneous Lebanese parties clashed for years until the situation was unblocked and General Michel Aoun was elected as President and Saad Hariri Prime Minister. Lebanons war was much more a war by proxy than a real civil war. Hatred was fuelled by external powers and their interests used the Lebanese as pawns of a much larger conflict, one beyond the Cold War that caused over three lakh causalities of a population of under four millions. Every Lebanese family has suffered tragedy and loss, my own family was struck by the horror of war. My father was killed alongside his Lebanese father-in-law and sister-in-law in a deliberate shelling of the Embassy compound by Syrian Armys 240mm shells. This land of contrast, history, traditions, modernity, glamour and fashion, is also the land of war, violence, revenge. Here, sworn enemies can become strong allies after years of battles and deaths. Beirut boasts some of the most beautiful, modern and avant-garde architecture, with the coolest bars and clubs, luxurious hotels and trendy restaurants, pretty much at the best level of the hottest places on earth. Everything about Beirut is tantalising and bewitching, a near-perfect mix of tradition and modernity all wrapped in charm and bustle. Just a couple of kilometres away there is a different world, not just a different neighbourhood, in the traditional Chia districts such as Bourj al-Barajneh with no alcohol, bars and packed with chadors and pictures of their leaders all over the place. Walking those streets we could be in Teheran in Iran or Karbala in Iraq. In fact some of these places were called Little Teheran during the war. And just 50 km away from Beirut, the Lebanese Army was fighting Daech terrorists that had occupied 120 km of Lebanese territory on the border with Syria during my recent stay. The Lebanese people are resilientgoing from near extinction as a nation, as they were all but annexed by Syria, to becoming an apparent oasis of prosperity and stability. Apparent because there are still underlying tensions that need to be intelligently managed to prevent Lebanons very short fuse from creating an explosive chain-reaction taking the country back into chaos. The Lebanese know how to enjoy life because they know how fast and dramatically things can change from peace to war, from normality and stability to mayhem. Lebanons treasure is its people, not only those that live in the country, but its huge diaspora of well over 18 million that is as dynamic and hard working as the most. They have contributed to strengthen the identity of the country, help their brothers back home, send back money, investment and ideas that they invented or learnt abroad. Its like a limitless bank of human talent. After decades of deeply-rooted hatred, fuelled by regional and world powers, the moment of true independence and peace has come. The only way to make this happen is by not forgetting the tragedies, the pain, the suffering of the past. If all of this is ignored, history could repeat itself. gmdea1967@gmail.com
Ravi Shankar By

We live in the Age of the Refugee. Political strife and sectarian violence have displaced millions of people, rendering them practically stateless. As of mid-2016, their number was 16.5 million, living in makeshift camps in horrendous conditions on the kindness of strangers. As India draws up plans to deport over 14,000 registered Rohingyas (the unofficial count is higher), a vast humanitarian crisis is in the making.

America prospered on the back of refugees and immigrants.

However, today, the civilised world faces a savage threat from refugees and immigrants who drive trucks into innocent crowds, rake nightclubs with automatic fire and stab shoppers. The Islamist narrative has polarised the world as terrorists create havoc in countries that welcomed them with dole and free housing at taxpayers expense, and ignoring the savage laws they brought from home in the name of cultural sensitivity. This weakness of conscience is what the IS exploited, by inflitrating the Syrian refugee wave with suicide bombers and killers who want nothing more than to destroy the very societies that welcomed them with open arms.

The Rohingyas are the refugees of the subcontinental moment. After a border attack by Rohingya terror group (the Harakah al-Yaqin), Nobel Peace Prize Winner Aung San Suu Kyi spoke out against their involvement with Islamic militants. The trend of radicalisation among young Rohingyas is realRohingya terror group Aqa Mul Mujahideen (AMM) is operating in Kashmir with Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed. Agencies found that AMM fighters had received training in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Securitymen recently killed a Hafiz Saeed-sponsored Rohingya terrorist in the Valley. The war against Islamic militancy is being fought between religion and nationalism. Fundamentalists believe only in faith, not national or cultural identity.

India is home to millions of illegal immigrants. Like Bangladeshis, they are spread across the country. Decades of minority vote pandering has changed the demographic balance in many states. Once, anti-refugee feeling had economic reasons; today, its driven mostly by fear of an alien religion interfering in domestic culture and way of life.

The current global refugee crisis has been created by Islam's internal war. It is responsible for the agony of millions of Muslims who have been killed, maimed and orphaned. The International Crisis Group, which works to resolve deadly conflicts, has identified links between Rohingyas and the Saudi-Pakistan terror nexus. It is true that only a few suicide bombers and terrorists have risen from refugee camps. But it is no longer a credible excuse to absolve the collective innocence of the Rohingyas, Syrians and Palestinians of the blood of innocents that stains the hands of their murderous children. The onus of preventing mass murder lies on the community as a whole.

Instead of expecting the world to open its heart and soul to the unfortunate Rohingyas, it is now time for wealthy Saudi Arabia to offer them residence and citizenship. Instead of being the founder-in-chief and main propagator of Wahhabi terror, Saudi Arabia has a chance to become the shining beacon of humane Islam, thus integrating religion and race to create a brotherhood of faith in all its mercy.

Ravi Shankar

ravi@newindianexpress.com

We live in the Age of the Refugee. Political strife and sectarian violence have displaced millions of people, rendering them practically stateless. As of mid-2016, their number was 16.5 million, living in makeshift camps in horrendous conditions on the kindness of strangers. As India draws up plans to deport over 14,000 registered Rohingyas (the unofficial count is higher), a vast humanitarian crisis is in the making. America prospered on the back of refugees and immigrants. However, today, the civilised world faces a savage threat from refugees and immigrants who drive trucks into innocent crowds, rake nightclubs with automatic fire and stab shoppers. The Islamist narrative has polarised the world as terrorists create havoc in countries that welcomed them with dole and free housing at taxpayers expense, and ignoring the savage laws they brought from home in the name of cultural sensitivity. This weakness of conscience is what the IS exploited, by inflitrating the Syrian refugee wave with suicide bombers and killers who want nothing more than to destroy the very societies that welcomed them with open arms. The Rohingyas are the refugees of the subcontinental moment. After a border attack by Rohingya terror group (the Harakah al-Yaqin), Nobel Peace Prize Winner Aung San Suu Kyi spoke out against their involvement with Islamic militants. The trend of radicalisation among young Rohingyas is realRohingya terror group Aqa Mul Mujahideen (AMM) is operating in Kashmir with Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed. Agencies found that AMM fighters had received training in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Securitymen recently killed a Hafiz Saeed-sponsored Rohingya terrorist in the Valley. The war against Islamic militancy is being fought between religion and nationalism. Fundamentalists believe only in faith, not national or cultural identity. India is home to millions of illegal immigrants. Like Bangladeshis, they are spread across the country. Decades of minority vote pandering has changed the demographic balance in many states. Once, anti-refugee feeling had economic reasons; today, its driven mostly by fear of an alien religion interfering in domestic culture and way of life. The current global refugee crisis has been created by Islam's internal war. It is responsible for the agony of millions of Muslims who have been killed, maimed and orphaned. The International Crisis Group, which works to resolve deadly conflicts, has identified links between Rohingyas and the Saudi-Pakistan terror nexus. It is true that only a few suicide bombers and terrorists have risen from refugee camps. But it is no longer a credible excuse to absolve the collective innocence of the Rohingyas, Syrians and Palestinians of the blood of innocents that stains the hands of their murderous children. The onus of preventing mass murder lies on the community as a whole. Instead of expecting the world to open its heart and soul to the unfortunate Rohingyas, it is now time for wealthy Saudi Arabia to offer them residence and citizenship. Instead of being the founder-in-chief and main propagator of Wahhabi terror, Saudi Arabia has a chance to become the shining beacon of humane Islam, thus integrating religion and race to create a brotherhood of faith in all its mercy. Ravi Shankar ravi@newindianexpress.com
Scientists see the end of humanity looming in the distance. Googles chief of engineering Ray Kurzweil says humanity will end in 2045, and robots will take over. Stephen Hawking, playing theoretical physicist-turned-soothsayer, gives man a little more time. The professor thinks the humanity will be obliterated in a 100 years by climate change, asteroid strikes, epidemics and population growth. Personally, I wonder if humanity is not dead already, and not for the reasons cited above. Im going by the hatred that is all-pervasive in India today.

In Bangalore, feisty journalist Gauri Lankesh, who openly spoke and wrote against the rise of communalism and rightwing politics and supported the causes of Dalits and women, was killed on her doorstep last week by a man wearing a helmet. Most people were stunned, as much by the murder as by the way it was done. Our home is our haven; we do not expect to be followed and gunned down there. Not when we are not in the business of killing others.

After minutes of stunned silence, the public came out to grieve and protest, personally and virtually. So far, so normal (whatever normal means these days). But then other voices piped up, singing a different tune. These voices of supposedly normal, everyday people took to social media to exult in Lankeshs death. She got what she deserved, they said; karma, they called it, and asked for other women who speak in a similar voice to be dealt the same fate. Their harsh words, the sinister tone almost rivaled the crime in brutality. Lankesh was a political being with a strong voice.

Its only natural that many would disagree with her views strongly, even completely. But ideological disagreements are a part of life; they cant be the cause of death or the rejoicing over it. Every society understands the sanctity of life and forbids murder. We used to, too. But in the last few years, not only have we taken to killing those who worship a different God or eat different foods, we are even celebrating the murder of those we are not in sync with. Is it that we no longer believe that human life is inherently valuable? As fellow beings, the news of anyones untimely passing is supposed to trigger feelings of sadness.

After all, were wired to show empathy to other beings. Or is that a thing of the past? Have we reached that tipping point as a society where we can only live with carbon copies? Much has been made of the fact that the main gent exulting in the death of Lankesh is followed by Narendra Modi on Twitter. His apparatchik has countered the criticism with the assertion that the Prime Minister cannot be expected to keep track of everyone he follows. That is a fact.

Modi must have had his reasons for following Lankeshs key detractor on Twitter. Why he did it is not important. What is important is that, despite the mans despicable talk, he has not unfollowed him. Gauri Lankesh is not the fi rst person to be killed for the ideas she held. Most likely, she wont be the last. But perhaps her vilest detractor could be the last troller that the leader of the nation supports. If only to assure the nation that he believes that all lives are sacred.

Shampa Dhar-Kamath

shampa@newindianexpress.com

Scientists see the end of humanity looming in the distance. Googles chief of engineering Ray Kurzweil says humanity will end in 2045, and robots will take over. Stephen Hawking, playing theoretical physicist-turned-soothsayer, gives man a little more time. The professor thinks the humanity will be obliterated in a 100 years by climate change, asteroid strikes, epidemics and population growth. Personally, I wonder if humanity is not dead already, and not for the reasons cited above. Im going by the hatred that is all-pervasive in India today. In Bangalore, feisty journalist Gauri Lankesh, who openly spoke and wrote against the rise of communalism and rightwing politics and supported the causes of Dalits and women, was killed on her doorstep last week by a man wearing a helmet. Most people were stunned, as much by the murder as by the way it was done. Our home is our haven; we do not expect to be followed and gunned down there. Not when we are not in the business of killing others. After minutes of stunned silence, the public came out to grieve and protest, personally and virtually. So far, so normal (whatever normal means these days). But then other voices piped up, singing a different tune. These voices of supposedly normal, everyday people took to social media to exult in Lankeshs death. She got what she deserved, they said; karma, they called it, and asked for other women who speak in a similar voice to be dealt the same fate. Their harsh words, the sinister tone almost rivaled the crime in brutality. Lankesh was a political being with a strong voice. Its only natural that many would disagree with her views strongly, even completely. But ideological disagreements are a part of life; they cant be the cause of death or the rejoicing over it. Every society understands the sanctity of life and forbids murder. We used to, too. But in the last few years, not only have we taken to killing those who worship a different God or eat different foods, we are even celebrating the murder of those we are not in sync with. Is it that we no longer believe that human life is inherently valuable? As fellow beings, the news of anyones untimely passing is supposed to trigger feelings of sadness. After all, were wired to show empathy to other beings. Or is that a thing of the past? Have we reached that tipping point as a society where we can only live with carbon copies? Much has been made of the fact that the main gent exulting in the death of Lankesh is followed by Narendra Modi on Twitter. His apparatchik has countered the criticism with the assertion that the Prime Minister cannot be expected to keep track of everyone he follows. That is a fact. Modi must have had his reasons for following Lankeshs key detractor on Twitter. Why he did it is not important. What is important is that, despite the mans despicable talk, he has not unfollowed him. Gauri Lankesh is not the fi rst person to be killed for the ideas she held. Most likely, she wont be the last. But perhaps her vilest detractor could be the last troller that the leader of the nation supports. If only to assure the nation that he believes that all lives are sacred. Shampa Dhar-Kamath shampa@newindianexpress.com
T J S George By

In the days of Nathuram Godse, things were straightforward and honest. When he shot Mahatma Gandhi there was no attempt to hide his identity. The courage of his conviction emboldened him to say bluntly, I did fire the shots... I do not desire any mercy to be shown to me. His final statement before the court was an eloquent defence of the Hindutva view of history.

Courage of conviction similar to Godses was seen again in 1984 when Beant Singh and Satwant Singh shot Indira Gandhi dead. They were her bodyguards, professionally committed to protect her. But their ideological commitment proved stronger. Again, there was no attempt to escape from responsibility. In fact, according to some reports, they shouted Sikh slogans as they fired their weapons. When Rajiv Gandhi was blown up by a bomb in 1991, it was known that the LTTE was behind it; soon after the horror they informally admitted it, too.

Times have changed and ideologically motivated killings are done these days in cowardly fashion. Godse and others were proud of their ideologies and therefore had no problem coming clean on their killings. Todays ideologues are different. They are ready to use the violence demanded of them, but they lack the conviction to own it up. They kill in clandestine operations, then run away into the safety of darkness. In that darkness, obviously, hide protectors powerful enough to protect them. The protectors also are cowards who hide themselves.

Thus, the killers of Narendra Dabholkar in Pune have remained untraced since the murder in 2013. Three years after the event, CBI arrested ENT doctor Virendrasinh Tawade who is still in jail. But CBI suspects that the killers are Vinay Pawar and Sarang Akolkar. There is no trial yet and no answer to the question: Who killed Dabholkar?

Govind Pansare was shot in 2015 in Kolhapur and died four days later. Sameer Gaikwad was arrested seven months later. In June this year, he got bail. A Special Investigation Team took into custody Virendrasinh Tawade already in jail in the Dabholkar case. Vinay Pawar and Sarang Akolkar are also wanted in the Pansare murder case. Nearly three years after the event the question remains: Who killed Pansare?

Six months after Pansare was silenced, ideology-driven murderers turned their attention to Karnataka. They killed M M Kalburgi in Dharwad. That was on August 30, 2015. To this day neither Karnataka police nor CBI have been able to make a single arrest. The states authorities, evidently more incompetent than their counterparts in Maharashtra, cannot answer the question: Who killed Kalburgi?

Interestingly, though, there are some strange parallelisms among these unsolved murders.

All three victims were free thinkers and rationalists, opposed to conventional beliefs including religious. Dabholkar campaigned against superstitions. Pansare, a communist, carried on a war against caste. Kalburgi fought idol worship. On the other side, Tawade and Sameer Gaikwad were members of the Hindu right wing Sanatan Sanstha. Vinay Pawar was a friend of Gaikwad. Add to these interconnections the fact that all three killings were carried out by motorcycle riders. Two motorcyclists shot Dabholkar on a public road, two motorcyclists shot Pansare and his wife in their house, two motorcyclists entered Kalburgis house posing as students and shot him.

Two (or three) motorcyclists entered Gauri Lankeshs compound and shot her. She, too, was a rationalist. She, too, opposed superstitions and conventional religious beliefs. As a journalist, she also had clear political views; she fought the very concept of Hindutva. This and the similarities with the earlier killings of rationalists have spread the impression that Gauri too was felled by Hindutva forces. Trollers strengthened the impression by suggesting that she deserved death for her anti-Hindu views.

Partisans turned the whole thing into a vicious political war on social media, indicating the depths to which bigotry has dragged the country. What is certain as of now is that India has become a dangerous place for independent thinkers. Even the barbarous practice of lynchings is condoned. Gauri was not as powerful an opinion maker as Kalburgi or Dabholkar. Even then she would not be allowed to live. Intolerance has reached levels that threaten Indias basic values. The outpouring of protests across the nation, sensational in itself, is reflective of a fear complex that has seized the people. Are we losing the dream? If Gauris killers are not punished, there will be more Gauris because assassins will feel safe in our system. Gauri herself will remain an exemplara journalist who was killed for her journalism.

In the days of Nathuram Godse, things were straightforward and honest. When he shot Mahatma Gandhi there was no attempt to hide his identity. The courage of his conviction emboldened him to say bluntly, I did fire the shots... I do not desire any mercy to be shown to me. His final statement before the court was an eloquent defence of the Hindutva view of history. Courage of conviction similar to Godses was seen again in 1984 when Beant Singh and Satwant Singh shot Indira Gandhi dead. They were her bodyguards, professionally committed to protect her. But their ideological commitment proved stronger. Again, there was no attempt to escape from responsibility. In fact, according to some reports, they shouted Sikh slogans as they fired their weapons. When Rajiv Gandhi was blown up by a bomb in 1991, it was known that the LTTE was behind it; soon after the horror they informally admitted it, too. Times have changed and ideologically motivated killings are done these days in cowardly fashion. Godse and others were proud of their ideologies and therefore had no problem coming clean on their killings. Todays ideologues are different. They are ready to use the violence demanded of them, but they lack the conviction to own it up. They kill in clandestine operations, then run away into the safety of darkness. In that darkness, obviously, hide protectors powerful enough to protect them. The protectors also are cowards who hide themselves. Thus, the killers of Narendra Dabholkar in Pune have remained untraced since the murder in 2013. Three years after the event, CBI arrested ENT doctor Virendrasinh Tawade who is still in jail. But CBI suspects that the killers are Vinay Pawar and Sarang Akolkar. There is no trial yet and no answer to the question: Who killed Dabholkar? Govind Pansare was shot in 2015 in Kolhapur and died four days later. Sameer Gaikwad was arrested seven months later. In June this year, he got bail. A Special Investigation Team took into custody Virendrasinh Tawade already in jail in the Dabholkar case. Vinay Pawar and Sarang Akolkar are also wanted in the Pansare murder case. Nearly three years after the event the question remains: Who killed Pansare? Six months after Pansare was silenced, ideology-driven murderers turned their attention to Karnataka. They killed M M Kalburgi in Dharwad. That was on August 30, 2015. To this day neither Karnataka police nor CBI have been able to make a single arrest. The states authorities, evidently more incompetent than their counterparts in Maharashtra, cannot answer the question: Who killed Kalburgi? Interestingly, though, there are some strange parallelisms among these unsolved murders. All three victims were free thinkers and rationalists, opposed to conventional beliefs including religious. Dabholkar campaigned against superstitions. Pansare, a communist, carried on a war against caste. Kalburgi fought idol worship. On the other side, Tawade and Sameer Gaikwad were members of the Hindu right wing Sanatan Sanstha. Vinay Pawar was a friend of Gaikwad. Add to these interconnections the fact that all three killings were carried out by motorcycle riders. Two motorcyclists shot Dabholkar on a public road, two motorcyclists shot Pansare and his wife in their house, two motorcyclists entered Kalburgis house posing as students and shot him. Two (or three) motorcyclists entered Gauri Lankeshs compound and shot her. She, too, was a rationalist. She, too, opposed superstitions and conventional religious beliefs. As a journalist, she also had clear political views; she fought the very concept of Hindutva. This and the similarities with the earlier killings of rationalists have spread the impression that Gauri too was felled by Hindutva forces. Trollers strengthened the impression by suggesting that she deserved death for her anti-Hindu views. Partisans turned the whole thing into a vicious political war on social media, indicating the depths to which bigotry has dragged the country. What is certain as of now is that India has become a dangerous place for independent thinkers. Even the barbarous practice of lynchings is condoned. Gauri was not as powerful an opinion maker as Kalburgi or Dabholkar. Even then she would not be allowed to live. Intolerance has reached levels that threaten Indias basic values. The outpouring of protests across the nation, sensational in itself, is reflective of a fear complex that has seized the people. Are we losing the dream? If Gauris killers are not punished, there will be more Gauris because assassins will feel safe in our system. Gauri herself will remain an exemplara journalist who was killed for her journalism.
Prabhu Chawla By

Express News Service

Journalism will kill you, but it will keep you alive while youre at it.

Horace Greeley

A monsoon of blood has arrived in Indian journalism where bylines have become epitaphs. Gauri Lankesh, the feisty 55-year-old editor of her family-owned news weekly, Lankesh Patrike, has become the new martyr of vocal journalism. Her passion for the truth in both language and tone was driven by conviction and not convenience. Unlike most other scribes, she carried her ideology on her sleeve. She spoke with substance and wrote with authority.

When her voice could not be stilled, her unidentified adversaries used bullets to silence her forever. Her murder has raised questions about the idea and idiom of Indian journalism. She was a journalist first, anything else later, period. Then why is her death being exploited by admirers to score political points? Why has her murder been turned into a confrontation of belief systems? Nobody knows yet who killed her and why. But both her friends and foes claim it were her ideological convictions that finished her in the end; not a genuine commitment to reporting the truth.

Karnataka is ruled by a liberal, secular party. Its chief minister has never been part of a communal dispensation. He swiftly appointed a SIT to probe the Lankesh murder. He also ordered senior police officials to nab the killers and expose any possible ideological conspiracy to obliterate Lankesh from the platform of journalism. Lankesh Patrike, with its insignificant circulation, hardly posed a threat to any institution, ideology or individual. However, Lankeshs towering reputation and credible voice had the power to influence movers and shakers in the society.

She was an avowed liberal, opposed to anything and everything saffron. But her rebuttals relied on logic, though varnished with her own ideological gloss. She rarely used language calculated to attract violent retribution. Unfortunately, the fiery debate over her death has converted journalism into a season of conflict between political parties, liberals and nationalists. Journalism is meant to disseminate the truth and unite everyone everywhere against its suppressors. Of late, sadly, it has acquired avoidable acronyms such as presstitutes, fake news, paid news, anti-national media, Bhakta media and what not.

Lankeshs death is not the first time a journalist has met with a brutal end for doing his or her job. According to a study by The Hoot, a media portal, about 25 journalists were threatened and 54 attacked in various parts of the country in the past 18 months. As of last week, eight journalists have been killed. Globally, 122 journalists were murdered in 2016. Lives of journalists have never been in greater danger in India than in any other part of the world. Though there are no definite conclusions to the motives behind the murders, journalists were eliminated to stop them from exposing corporate corruption, a deviant cult leader or a dodgy political party.

In India, over 90 journalists were killed between 1992 and 2017. Barring sporadic condemnations, not one of these deaths made prime time news or was a front-page story of a national daily. The journalist who first exposed Ram Rahims sexual peccadillos was gunned down years ago, but became news only after the godman was convicted. Over half a dozen local journalists have been murdered in Kashmir over the past 25 years, but the national media has never bothered to investigate the motives, money and mercenaries behind their deaths. Not one of the dozen-odd journalists who fell to bullets in the Northeast and Bihar were officially mourned or given a gun salute by the state governments.

Nothing is more demeaning for a journalist for his or her death to be milked for vote bank purposes. While liberal and elitist journalists justifiably protested against Lankeshs death, their silence on the murders of small town, regional journos raise doubts about the efficacy of a joint struggle against the slaying of free and fair journalism.

Lankeshs admirers have done her great injustice by allowing various political parties to indulge in blame games rather than banding together to punish the perpetrators of her heinous killing. The National Herald, a Congress-owned publication, blamed the BJP by writing since the saffron forces do not have recourse to the administrative and police machinery in states not ruled by the BJP, they have to kill to silence opposing voices. The Sangh Parivar held the Congress state government responsible and hinted at Naxal involvement in Lankeshs death.

A senior Vishwa Hindu Parishad functionary told a newspaper: Killings have so far in India been a festival for the left over which they have celebrated their politics. They jump at killings and jump at conclusions and their associates, like organised mafia, exploit it. Either Gauris murder or that of another scribe in Bihar, no one should be killed; it is regrettable. But playing politics over this is all the more regrettable. Gauri was working recently on cases of corruption and scams by Congress leaders in the state. She was having an ideological clash with Naxalites. In the last one year 22 scribes have been killed. Who did they raise their voice at?

Millions of Internet warriors and social media soldiers converted Twitter, Facebook and numerous websites into abusive online battlefields instead of suggesting an effective mechanism to curb the foes of freedom. Lankesh could never have imagined that her life, spent in protecting the rights of the masses, would in death ignite a turf war between classes.

It seems cynically evident that the freedom of the press is endangered only when a scribe from a cosmopolitan city, with known political moorings and formidable backers, is put to unacceptable harm. The media is regularly mauled and maimed in many of Indias small towns and tehsils by mafia of all colours and calculations. Small and local news organisations there kill or dilute umpteen stories of rape, corruption, unnatural deaths, breakdown of civic infrastructure, unholy links between the bureaucracy and contractors to avoid physical harm to journalists.

The vertical divide among the Media Megaphones clearly indicates that the threat to press freedom comes from the media itself. India needs to protect the Institution of Media and not the rhetoric of a few individuals whose identity as media mavens is questionable. The Indian press needs to prove CNNs former president Jim Waltons claim wrong that at CNN, our view is that good journalism equals good business. For Lankesh, fearless journalism turned out to be a bloody business, while for the Indian media it was business as usual with ideological fulminations and conspiracy theories.

Prabhu Chawla

prabhuchawla@ newindianexpress.com

Follow him on Twitter @PrabhuChawla

Journalism will kill you, but it will keep you alive while youre at it. Horace Greeley A monsoon of blood has arrived in Indian journalism where bylines have become epitaphs. Gauri Lankesh, the feisty 55-year-old editor of her family-owned news weekly, Lankesh Patrike, has become the new martyr of vocal journalism. Her passion for the truth in both language and tone was driven by conviction and not convenience. Unlike most other scribes, she carried her ideology on her sleeve. She spoke with substance and wrote with authority. When her voice could not be stilled, her unidentified adversaries used bullets to silence her forever. Her murder has raised questions about the idea and idiom of Indian journalism. She was a journalist first, anything else later, period. Then why is her death being exploited by admirers to score political points? Why has her murder been turned into a confrontation of belief systems? Nobody knows yet who killed her and why. But both her friends and foes claim it were her ideological convictions that finished her in the end; not a genuine commitment to reporting the truth. Karnataka is ruled by a liberal, secular party. Its chief minister has never been part of a communal dispensation. He swiftly appointed a SIT to probe the Lankesh murder. He also ordered senior police officials to nab the killers and expose any possible ideological conspiracy to obliterate Lankesh from the platform of journalism. Lankesh Patrike, with its insignificant circulation, hardly posed a threat to any institution, ideology or individual. However, Lankeshs towering reputation and credible voice had the power to influence movers and shakers in the society. She was an avowed liberal, opposed to anything and everything saffron. But her rebuttals relied on logic, though varnished with her own ideological gloss. She rarely used language calculated to attract violent retribution. Unfortunately, the fiery debate over her death has converted journalism into a season of conflict between political parties, liberals and nationalists. Journalism is meant to disseminate the truth and unite everyone everywhere against its suppressors. Of late, sadly, it has acquired avoidable acronyms such as presstitutes, fake news, paid news, anti-national media, Bhakta media and what not. Lankeshs death is not the first time a journalist has met with a brutal end for doing his or her job. According to a study by The Hoot, a media portal, about 25 journalists were threatened and 54 attacked in various parts of the country in the past 18 months. As of last week, eight journalists have been killed. Globally, 122 journalists were murdered in 2016. Lives of journalists have never been in greater danger in India than in any other part of the world. Though there are no definite conclusions to the motives behind the murders, journalists were eliminated to stop them from exposing corporate corruption, a deviant cult leader or a dodgy political party. In India, over 90 journalists were killed between 1992 and 2017. Barring sporadic condemnations, not one of these deaths made prime time news or was a front-page story of a national daily. The journalist who first exposed Ram Rahims sexual peccadillos was gunned down years ago, but became news only after the godman was convicted. Over half a dozen local journalists have been murdered in Kashmir over the past 25 years, but the national media has never bothered to investigate the motives, money and mercenaries behind their deaths. Not one of the dozen-odd journalists who fell to bullets in the Northeast and Bihar were officially mourned or given a gun salute by the state governments. Nothing is more demeaning for a journalist for his or her death to be milked for vote bank purposes. While liberal and elitist journalists justifiably protested against Lankeshs death, their silence on the murders of small town, regional journos raise doubts about the efficacy of a joint struggle against the slaying of free and fair journalism. Lankeshs admirers have done her great injustice by allowing various political parties to indulge in blame games rather than banding together to punish the perpetrators of her heinous killing. The National Herald, a Congress-owned publication, blamed the BJP by writing since the saffron forces do not have recourse to the administrative and police machinery in states not ruled by the BJP, they have to kill to silence opposing voices. The Sangh Parivar held the Congress state government responsible and hinted at Naxal involvement in Lankeshs death. A senior Vishwa Hindu Parishad functionary told a newspaper: Killings have so far in India been a festival for the left over which they have celebrated their politics. They jump at killings and jump at conclusions and their associates, like organised mafia, exploit it. Either Gauris murder or that of another scribe in Bihar, no one should be killed; it is regrettable. But playing politics over this is all the more regrettable. Gauri was working recently on cases of corruption and scams by Congress leaders in the state. She was having an ideological clash with Naxalites. In the last one year 22 scribes have been killed. Who did they raise their voice at? Millions of Internet warriors and social media soldiers converted Twitter, Facebook and numerous websites into abusive online battlefields instead of suggesting an effective mechanism to curb the foes of freedom. Lankesh could never have imagined that her life, spent in protecting the rights of the masses, would in death ignite a turf war between classes. It seems cynically evident that the freedom of the press is endangered only when a scribe from a cosmopolitan city, with known political moorings and formidable backers, is put to unacceptable harm. The media is regularly mauled and maimed in many of Indias small towns and tehsils by mafia of all colours and calculations. Small and local news organisations there kill or dilute umpteen stories of rape, corruption, unnatural deaths, breakdown of civic infrastructure, unholy links between the bureaucracy and contractors to avoid physical harm to journalists. The vertical divide among the Media Megaphones clearly indicates that the threat to press freedom comes from the media itself. India needs to protect the Institution of Media and not the rhetoric of a few individuals whose identity as media mavens is questionable. The Indian press needs to prove CNNs former president Jim Waltons claim wrong that at CNN, our view is that good journalism equals good business. For Lankesh, fearless journalism turned out to be a bloody business, while for the Indian media it was business as usual with ideological fulminations and conspiracy theories. Prabhu Chawla prabhuchawla@ newindianexpress.com Follow him on Twitter @PrabhuChawla
By Express News Service

VISAKHAPATNAM: It was a jamboree of innovation and creativity at the inaugural of the three-day International Innovation Fair which was inaugurated by Alireza Rastegar, president of the International Federation of Inventors Associations (IFIA), here on Saturday. Apart from local scientists and innovators, representatives from 30 countries displayed technically advanced models in various trades. As many as 600 delegates from across the world participated in the event. After bifurcation, it was for the first time such programme was organised in Andhra Pradesh, said representative of the AP Innovation Society.



A multi-purpose drum seeder designed by a young farmer scientist D Babu Rao from Vizianagaram district attracted many eyeballs on the first day. A special footwear for climbing electrical poles and trees by toddy-tappers designed by another young innovator D Tirupathi Rao from Prakasam district also attracted many visitors, so did the model for the preservation of onions and other innovative ones displayed by the foreign innovators. Young innovators should use this platform to showcase their best works. More youth innovators should come forward to utilise the opportunity, said Alireza Rastegar in his inaugural address.



AS Rao, president of the Indian Innovators Association, said that the youngsters should utilise modern technology and work on some innovative models which will be useful to the society. The fair will offer great opportunity to local companies and start-ups to access international technologies. With the new IT inventions, entrepreneurship will develop which in turn increases job opportunities to the youth, he said.

Only 60 innovative ideas and models are on display of the nearly 600 plus models as there is a space constraint, he said.



V Valli Kumari, chief executive officer (CEO) of AP Innovation Society, said, There will be a seminar on technology transfer on Sunday in which IT minister N Lokesh will participate and on the concluding day on Monday, three prizes would be presented by Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu. An MoU would also be signed with the National Research Development Corporation (NRDC) to help out students and start-ups of the State.

VISAKHAPATNAM: It was a jamboree of innovation and creativity at the inaugural of the three-day International Innovation Fair which was inaugurated by Alireza Rastegar, president of the International Federation of Inventors Associations (IFIA), here on Saturday. Apart from local scientists and innovators, representatives from 30 countries displayed technically advanced models in various trades. As many as 600 delegates from across the world participated in the event. After bifurcation, it was for the first time such programme was organised in Andhra Pradesh, said representative of the AP Innovation Society. A multi-purpose drum seeder designed by a young farmer scientist D Babu Rao from Vizianagaram district attracted many eyeballs on the first day. A special footwear for climbing electrical poles and trees by toddy-tappers designed by another young innovator D Tirupathi Rao from Prakasam district also attracted many visitors, so did the model for the preservation of onions and other innovative ones displayed by the foreign innovators. Young innovators should use this platform to showcase their best works. More youth innovators should come forward to utilise the opportunity, said Alireza Rastegar in his inaugural address. AS Rao, president of the Indian Innovators Association, said that the youngsters should utilise modern technology and work on some innovative models which will be useful to the society. The fair will offer great opportunity to local companies and start-ups to access international technologies. With the new IT inventions, entrepreneurship will develop which in turn increases job opportunities to the youth, he said. Only 60 innovative ideas and models are on display of the nearly 600 plus models as there is a space constraint, he said. V Valli Kumari, chief executive officer (CEO) of AP Innovation Society, said, There will be a seminar on technology transfer on Sunday in which IT minister N Lokesh will participate and on the concluding day on Monday, three prizes would be presented by Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu. An MoU would also be signed with the National Research Development Corporation (NRDC) to help out students and start-ups of the State.
By Express News Service

CUTTACK: Cracking down on illegal sand transportation by mafias, Cuttack district administration on Friday night seized as many as 59 wagon-loads of sand from goods train of East Cost Railway (ECoR) at Nirgundi station. The sands lifted from Balighat of Kathajodi river at CDA Sector-11 were being transported to Uttar Pradesh illegally without permission. Acting on a tip-off, Tangi-Choudwar Tehsildar Dr Abinash Rout conducted a raid at Nirgundi station and found loading of sand in 59 wagons at the goods yard. On being informed, Collector Nirmal Chandra Mishra and ADM (Revenue) Raghuram R Iyer also rushed to the spot and took stock of the situation.



While the transporters failed to produce the transit order for transportation of sand to outside the State, the administration seized all the 59 wagons having around 3,800 tonnes of sand. The party showed transit pass having permission for transportation of sand from the source point to Nirgundi only. There was no permission to transport sand to outside State, said the ADM. The seized sands, which have been handed over to Nirgundi Station Superintendent, will be auctioned as per the government guideline, he informed.

The revenue officials managed to corner Sanjay Prasanna of Begusarai in Bihar and his manager Akhay Kumar Sahoo of Bhubana in Dhenkanal, who were involved in the illegal transportation at the spot. Another Manjit Chawala, who is said to be the mastermind of the racket, is at large. Both Sanjay and Akhay were handed over to Cuttack GRP police.



On Saturday, Rout filed an FIR at Cuttack GRP police station. A show cause notice has also been served to Nirgundi station manager to file counter reply on which ground they had given permission for transportation of sand to other state, Rout informed.

CUTTACK: Cracking down on illegal sand transportation by mafias, Cuttack district administration on Friday night seized as many as 59 wagon-loads of sand from goods train of East Cost Railway (ECoR) at Nirgundi station. The sands lifted from Balighat of Kathajodi river at CDA Sector-11 were being transported to Uttar Pradesh illegally without permission. Acting on a tip-off, Tangi-Choudwar Tehsildar Dr Abinash Rout conducted a raid at Nirgundi station and found loading of sand in 59 wagons at the goods yard. On being informed, Collector Nirmal Chandra Mishra and ADM (Revenue) Raghuram R Iyer also rushed to the spot and took stock of the situation. While the transporters failed to produce the transit order for transportation of sand to outside the State, the administration seized all the 59 wagons having around 3,800 tonnes of sand. The party showed transit pass having permission for transportation of sand from the source point to Nirgundi only. There was no permission to transport sand to outside State, said the ADM. The seized sands, which have been handed over to Nirgundi Station Superintendent, will be auctioned as per the government guideline, he informed. The revenue officials managed to corner Sanjay Prasanna of Begusarai in Bihar and his manager Akhay Kumar Sahoo of Bhubana in Dhenkanal, who were involved in the illegal transportation at the spot. Another Manjit Chawala, who is said to be the mastermind of the racket, is at large. Both Sanjay and Akhay were handed over to Cuttack GRP police. On Saturday, Rout filed an FIR at Cuttack GRP police station. A show cause notice has also been served to Nirgundi station manager to file counter reply on which ground they had given permission for transportation of sand to other state, Rout informed.
By Express News Service

BHUBANESWAR: One person was killed and 12 others were injured when a portion of the under-construction flyover in Bhubaneswar collapsed on Sunday.

The accident occurred when the centering support for laying a span plunged several feet into the ground. The workers on the bridge came hurtling down while a passerby Satyajit Patnaik, who was driving home with his daughter Sheetal on a two-wheeler, was killed.

The 12 injured people, including Sheetal, were rescued from the debris and rushed to Capital Hospital. Sheetal was later shifted to AIIMS in a serious condition.

Onlookers said about 20 people were engaged in work when the mishap occurred while Satyajit was taking his daughter back home after a dance class. The 45-year-old man was received dead at Capital Hospital. Sources at the hospital said most of the injured had reported multiple fractures.

WATCH VIDEO: One killed when under-construction bridge collapsed in Bhubaneswar, Odisha

The National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), Odisha Disaster Rapid Action Force (ODRAF) and fire fighters equipped with gas cutters, three cranes and earth movers are busy removing the debris where some workers are feared to have been trapped. Four ambulances have been pressed into the rescue work.

The railway flyover connects Sahid Nagar to Cuttack Road where a major portion of the bridge is under construction. The workers were laying a span between two slabs when the centering support caved in a little after noon.

IN PICTURES | Under-construction bridge collapses, one killed

Even as works secretary Nalini Kanta Pradhan rushed to the spot, chief minister Naveen Patnaik ordered the suspension of two engineers while directing a high-level inquiry into the mishap. The probe would be headed by chief engineer, designs and chief engineer, roads.

The chief ministers office said exemplary punishment will be taken against those found guilty.

Work of the flyover which has been hanging fire for last three years had resumed recently. The construction work had started in 2012 and was supposed to complete in 2014 but delay in land acquisition pushed the schedule.

The Works Department secretary said the bridge was targeted to be completed by December. It was being executed by Roads and Building Division 4 and construction work was assigned to Panda Infrastructure Ltd, a local firm.

There was chaos in the site as a huge crowd gathered at the spot with the Twin City Commissionerate Police unable to clear the area. Initially, the fire fighters did not have the required equipment to clear the debris. When NDRF and ODRF teams joined in, debris removal work picked up.

BHUBANESWAR: One person was killed and 12 others were injured when a portion of the under-construction flyover in Bhubaneswar collapsed on Sunday. The accident occurred when the centering support for laying a span plunged several feet into the ground. The workers on the bridge came hurtling down while a passerby Satyajit Patnaik, who was driving home with his daughter Sheetal on a two-wheeler, was killed. The 12 injured people, including Sheetal, were rescued from the debris and rushed to Capital Hospital. Sheetal was later shifted to AIIMS in a serious condition. Onlookers said about 20 people were engaged in work when the mishap occurred while Satyajit was taking his daughter back home after a dance class. The 45-year-old man was received dead at Capital Hospital. Sources at the hospital said most of the injured had reported multiple fractures. WATCH VIDEO: One killed when under-construction bridge collapsed in Bhubaneswar, Odisha The National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), Odisha Disaster Rapid Action Force (ODRAF) and fire fighters equipped with gas cutters, three cranes and earth movers are busy removing the debris where some workers are feared to have been trapped. Four ambulances have been pressed into the rescue work. The railway flyover connects Sahid Nagar to Cuttack Road where a major portion of the bridge is under construction. The workers were laying a span between two slabs when the centering support caved in a little after noon. IN PICTURES | Under-construction bridge collapses, one killed Even as works secretary Nalini Kanta Pradhan rushed to the spot, chief minister Naveen Patnaik ordered the suspension of two engineers while directing a high-level inquiry into the mishap. The probe would be headed by chief engineer, designs and chief engineer, roads. The chief ministers office said exemplary punishment will be taken against those found guilty. Work of the flyover which has been hanging fire for last three years had resumed recently. The construction work had started in 2012 and was supposed to complete in 2014 but delay in land acquisition pushed the schedule. The Works Department secretary said the bridge was targeted to be completed by December. It was being executed by Roads and Building Division 4 and construction work was assigned to Panda Infrastructure Ltd, a local firm. There was chaos in the site as a huge crowd gathered at the spot with the Twin City Commissionerate Police unable to clear the area. Initially, the fire fighters did not have the required equipment to clear the debris. When NDRF and ODRF teams joined in, debris removal work picked up.
By PTI: (EDS: Updating with fresh inputs)

By Lalit K Jha

Washington, Sep 10 (PTI) Hurricane Irma made landfall on Floridas southern islands today and claimed three lives as millions of people, including thousands of Indian-Americans, evacuated the state in the wake of the storm that left a trail of death and destruction across the Caribbean.

Hurling 210 kilometres per hour winds, Irma struck Florida Keys as it barrelled towards the US states west coast where millions of people have evacuated turning many places into ghost towns.

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Irma later weakened slightly to a Category Three storm from Category Four as it moved past the Keys, packing maximum winds of up to 195 kilometres per hour.

"There is imminent danger of life-threatening storm surge flooding along much of the Florida west coast, including the Florida Keys, where a storm surge warning is in effect," the hurricane center said.

"The threat of catastrophic storm surge flooding is highest along the southwest coast of Florida, where 10 to 15 feet of inundation above ground level is expected. This is a life-threatening situation," it said.

As the Category four storm bore down on Florida this morning, at least three deaths were reported in the state.

A man in Monroe County, which encompasses Key West, was killed after he lost control of a truck that carried a generator as winds whipped at tropical-storm strength, officials said.

Two other people, including a sheriffs deputy, died in a car crash in the rain in Hardee County, officials said. The sheriffs deputy, identified as Julie Bridges, was a 13-year veteran of the Hardee County force, Hardee County Sheriff Arnold Lanier was quoted as saying by ABC News.

More than 6.3 million people were told to evacuate Florida, with warnings of a huge storm surge that would be "life-threatening" to anyone in its path.

Irma has already devastated parts of the Caribbean with over 25 deaths. About 60 Indian nationals are being evacuated from the vacation island of St Martin in the Caribbean.

The eye of the Category 4 storm was 24 kilometres southeast of Key West.

The eye is a region of mostly calm weather at the centre of strong tropical cyclones. The eye of a storm is a roughly circular area, typically 30?65 km in diameter.

Around 120,000 Indian-Americans reside across Florida while thousands of them live in the now-dangerous zones of Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Tampa.

Indian-Americans in Atlanta and neighbouring areas today opened up their homes for their friends, families and community members from Florida, as catastrophic hurricane Irma made landfall on the states southern islands.

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Miami and Tampa appeared "ghost towns" as nervous residents, many of whom struggled to cope with abandoning their homes, moved to safer places following mandatory evacuation notices.

The National Weather Service (NWS) said Irma regained strength as a Category 4 storm - after being downgraded to Category 3 for more than 12 hours - as it moved to Florida.

The Indian Embassy in the US has opened a round-the-clock helpline number and rushed senior diplomats to Atlanta to lead relief efforts for Indian-Americans stuck in the region.

The hotline number is 202-258-8819.

Embassy officials said Indias Ambassador to the US Navtej Sarna was closely monitoring the situation.

Sandeep Chakravorty, Indias Consul General in New York, was in Atlanta overseeing preparation for relief efforts from a 24X7 control room.

The Indian Consulate in Atlanta tweeted helpline numbers (+14044052567 & +1678179393) for people seeking assistance.

"Atlanta is fully prepared to take care of evacuees from Florida. Some have already reached. Consulate is on call 24x7," it said in another tweet.

Almost the entire Florida was under hurricane warning.

US President Donald Trump reviewed preparedness with his cabinet colleagues at Camp David in Maryland. He asked federal and state agencies expedite assistance to affected areas.

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"This is a storm of enormous destructive power, and I ask everyone in the storms path to pay heed to all instructions from government officials," Trump said.

Florida Governor Rick Scott asked people to move out of the danger zones as soon as possible. "The state has never seen anything like this. The storms surge can kill you."

The US Army has so far deployed more than 7,400 soldiers and US Army Corps of Engineers civilians on the US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and the continental US.

The Pentagon said the Army has over 140 aircraft, 650 trucks, 150 boats prepared along with additional resources on standby.

AccuWeather, a forecast weather agency, warned Irma will unleash destructive winds, flooding, rain and inundating seas.

"Unfortunately, there is no way the US is going to avoid another catastrophic weather event," AccuWeather president Joel N Myers said.

"[It will be] the worst single hurricane to hit Florida since Hurricane Andrew in 1992," Myers said.

External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar has also tweeted 24X7 helpline at High Commission of India, Kingston (+1876 833 4500; +1876 564 1378). He also tweeted email ids for Indians to contact in case of emergency: hc.kingston@mea.gov.in; hoc.kingston@mea.gov.in.

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The Indian Friends of Atlanta -- in association with the Consulate-General of India, the Gujarat Samaj Atlanta and the Hindu Temple of Atlanta -- have operationalised three shelters.

They were preparing to open more shelters and provide food. Several Indian businesses have started contributing to relief efforts.

The Indian Embassy in Venezuela tweeted the helpline number in Aruba, a tiny Dutch Caribbean island off the coast of Venezuela, for the situation in Sint Maarten: 00297-593- 2552.

The helpline numbers in Curacao, a Dutch Caribbean island, is 005999-513-2407; 005999-690-2686.

The Indian Embassy in the Netherlands said countrymen affected by Irma can reach them on: 0031643743800.

Those affected in Cuba, Dominican Republic and Haiti can contact Indian authorities on emergency no. +5352131818 or email them at: controlroomindiairma@gmail.com. PTI LKJ UZM ABH NSA ASK ASK

--- ENDS ---
By IANS

CHENNAI: Pressing ahead with its campaign against the K Palaniswami government, the DMK-led Opposition on Sunday met Tamil Nadu Governor Vidyasagar Rao and demanded immediate convening of the Assembly and to direct the Chief Minister to prove his majority.

The Opposition parties also told the Governor that if he did not convene the Assembly within a week, they would approach courts and the "people's court", Leader of the Opposition and DMK Working President M.K. Stalin told the media after the meeting.

He said the AIADMK government headed by Palaniswami has lost majority in the Assembly with 119 MLAs ranged against him and only 116 supporting in a House of 233.

The Opposition has, in all, 98 MLAs (DMK 89, its allies Congress eight and Muslim League one) while those owing allegiance to T.T.V. Dinakaran faction of AIADMK are 21.

Apprised Guv of tally - 89 DMK MLAs,8 Cong MLAs,1 IUML MLA which comes to 98,also Rebel AIADMK MLAs are 21,making it 119 in total: MK Stalin pic.twitter.com/vS1y4dW7SM  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

Stalin recalled that the Opposition has already demanded a floor test for the government and Dinakaran had also met the Governor earlier this week in the company of three more MLAs and conveyed to him that the Chief Minister had lost the confidence of MLAs loyal to him. He had a fortnight ago ferried 19 of his loyalist MLAs to the Governor with the message that they wanted removal of the Chief Minister. One of the 19 MLAs -- S.T.K. Jakkaiyan -- had switched sides to the Chief Minister's camp.

An opposition delegation, led by DMK Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly Duraimurugan had met the Governor a fortnight ago and conveyed to him their demand for convening the Assembly immediately for a floor test.

The DMK leader said it was established by the Supreme Court judgement in the S.R. Bommai and Arunachal Pradesh cases that the Assembly was the place where a majority has to be proved and it was the Governor's duty to convene the House for the purpose.

Asked what was the Governor's response, Stalin said Rao told the delegation that he would do his duty. "I still hope that he will perform his duty and convene the House," he added.

Stalin said if the Governor does not convene the Assembly session within a week, then they were left with no option but to approach the "courts and people's courts".



CHENNAI: Pressing ahead with its campaign against the K Palaniswami government, the DMK-led Opposition on Sunday met Tamil Nadu Governor Vidyasagar Rao and demanded immediate convening of the Assembly and to direct the Chief Minister to prove his majority. The Opposition parties also told the Governor that if he did not convene the Assembly within a week, they would approach courts and the "people's court", Leader of the Opposition and DMK Working President M.K. Stalin told the media after the meeting. He said the AIADMK government headed by Palaniswami has lost majority in the Assembly with 119 MLAs ranged against him and only 116 supporting in a House of 233. The Opposition has, in all, 98 MLAs (DMK 89, its allies Congress eight and Muslim League one) while those owing allegiance to T.T.V. Dinakaran faction of AIADMK are 21. Apprised Guv of tally - 89 DMK MLAs,8 Cong MLAs,1 IUML MLA which comes to 98,also Rebel AIADMK MLAs are 21,making it 119 in total: MK Stalin pic.twitter.com/vS1y4dW7SM  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017 Stalin recalled that the Opposition has already demanded a floor test for the government and Dinakaran had also met the Governor earlier this week in the company of three more MLAs and conveyed to him that the Chief Minister had lost the confidence of MLAs loyal to him. He had a fortnight ago ferried 19 of his loyalist MLAs to the Governor with the message that they wanted removal of the Chief Minister. One of the 19 MLAs -- S.T.K. Jakkaiyan -- had switched sides to the Chief Minister's camp. An opposition delegation, led by DMK Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly Duraimurugan had met the Governor a fortnight ago and conveyed to him their demand for convening the Assembly immediately for a floor test. The DMK leader said it was established by the Supreme Court judgement in the S.R. Bommai and Arunachal Pradesh cases that the Assembly was the place where a majority has to be proved and it was the Governor's duty to convene the House for the purpose. Asked what was the Governor's response, Stalin said Rao told the delegation that he would do his duty. "I still hope that he will perform his duty and convene the House," he added. Stalin said if the Governor does not convene the Assembly session within a week, then they were left with no option but to approach the "courts and people's courts".
By Express News Service

MANCHERIAL :Two Class 8 students of the state government-run Gurukul school at Luxettipet in Mancherial district allegedly attempted suicide on Saturday morning. According to the father of one of the girls, the attempt was triggered by ragging from seniors.

The two girls of the Social Welfare Residential School for Girls in Luxettipet reportedly consumed acid at the school. School authorities rushed them to the local government hospital. They were then shifted to the MGM Hospital in Warangal, before being finally taken to Nizams Institute Of Medical Sciences in Hyderabad for better treatment. One of the girls is from Ellaram village, and the other from Nirmal in the district.

Though doctors at MGM Hospital said the condition of the girls was stable, their parents told media that they had been told the girls were critical. Sources said the girls were being ragged by students in Class 9 and 10 for past three months. On Saturday, during breakfast a war of words reportedly broke out between the girls and the senior students. However, Luxettipet SI B Sammiah said there was no ragging involved in the case.

MANCHERIAL :Two Class 8 students of the state government-run Gurukul school at Luxettipet in Mancherial district allegedly attempted suicide on Saturday morning. According to the father of one of the girls, the attempt was triggered by ragging from seniors. The two girls of the Social Welfare Residential School for Girls in Luxettipet reportedly consumed acid at the school. School authorities rushed them to the local government hospital. They were then shifted to the MGM Hospital in Warangal, before being finally taken to Nizams Institute Of Medical Sciences in Hyderabad for better treatment. One of the girls is from Ellaram village, and the other from Nirmal in the district. Though doctors at MGM Hospital said the condition of the girls was stable, their parents told media that they had been told the girls were critical. Sources said the girls were being ragged by students in Class 9 and 10 for past three months. On Saturday, during breakfast a war of words reportedly broke out between the girls and the senior students. However, Luxettipet SI B Sammiah said there was no ragging involved in the case.
By Express News Service

HYDERABAD: The Hyderabad High Court has directed Special CBI Court to release the helicopter of Bell-407 belonging to mining baron Gali Janardhan Reddy, which was earlied seized by investigation agency, only on furnishing bank guarantee for `6.62 crore by the latters Obulapuram Mining Company (OMC).Justice M Satyanarayana Murthy was passing this order recently in a petition by Obulapuram Mining Company questioning the order of the Special CBI Court which had imposed certain conditions for release of the said helicopter.



CBI, which is probing the illegal mining case involving OMC, had seized the helicopter and Reddys cars as part of investigation in 2012.In March this year, the trial court while dealing with petition filed by OMC managing director BV Srinivasa Reddy, had directed him for executing a personal bond for `6.62 crore with one third party surety offering the security of immovable property for the said amount in favour of the court. But the petitioner furnished the documents in the name of the company.

The trial court did not accept the surety furnished by the company. Aggrieved with the same, the OMC approached HC for relief.The petitioners counsel submitted that the company was willing to furnish bank guarantee in place of the personal bond for `6.62 crore.While disposing of the case, the judge directed the lower court to release helicopter on furnishing bank guarantee.

HYDERABAD: The Hyderabad High Court has directed Special CBI Court to release the helicopter of Bell-407 belonging to mining baron Gali Janardhan Reddy, which was earlied seized by investigation agency, only on furnishing bank guarantee for `6.62 crore by the latters Obulapuram Mining Company (OMC).Justice M Satyanarayana Murthy was passing this order recently in a petition by Obulapuram Mining Company questioning the order of the Special CBI Court which had imposed certain conditions for release of the said helicopter. CBI, which is probing the illegal mining case involving OMC, had seized the helicopter and Reddys cars as part of investigation in 2012.In March this year, the trial court while dealing with petition filed by OMC managing director BV Srinivasa Reddy, had directed him for executing a personal bond for `6.62 crore with one third party surety offering the security of immovable property for the said amount in favour of the court. But the petitioner furnished the documents in the name of the company. The trial court did not accept the surety furnished by the company. Aggrieved with the same, the OMC approached HC for relief.The petitioners counsel submitted that the company was willing to furnish bank guarantee in place of the personal bond for `6.62 crore.While disposing of the case, the judge directed the lower court to release helicopter on furnishing bank guarantee.
By Express News Service

HYDERABAD: With high number of Swine Flu cases recorded in Maharashtra, orders were passed to take up surveillance in Telangana districts which border with the neighbouring state. As part of surveillance, district surveillance officers (DSO) will check if anyone suffering from Swine Flu symptoms has not opted for treatment, or if anyone who had symptoms has died. The situation will be scrutinised at Adilabad,Nizamabad, Kamareddy, Nirmal,Komaram Bheem districts.



This year, as per latest statistics available with the State Health department, out of 929 deaths in India, 404 were recorded in Maharashtra, 190 in Gujarat. In Telangana, 18 deaths were reported. A total of 22 positive cases were recorded in the Telugu State on Saturday On Friday, a review meeting was held in Hyderabad between national and State health officials where incidence of Swine Flu in Maharashtra and number of cases in bordering districts were discussed. From January 1 to September 6, 11 positive flu cases were recorded in Adilabad, 19 in Nizamabad. While 800 cases were diagnosed in Hyderabad.

HYDERABAD: With high number of Swine Flu cases recorded in Maharashtra, orders were passed to take up surveillance in Telangana districts which border with the neighbouring state. As part of surveillance, district surveillance officers (DSO) will check if anyone suffering from Swine Flu symptoms has not opted for treatment, or if anyone who had symptoms has died. The situation will be scrutinised at Adilabad,Nizamabad, Kamareddy, Nirmal,Komaram Bheem districts. This year, as per latest statistics available with the State Health department, out of 929 deaths in India, 404 were recorded in Maharashtra, 190 in Gujarat. In Telangana, 18 deaths were reported. A total of 22 positive cases were recorded in the Telugu State on Saturday On Friday, a review meeting was held in Hyderabad between national and State health officials where incidence of Swine Flu in Maharashtra and number of cases in bordering districts were discussed. From January 1 to September 6, 11 positive flu cases were recorded in Adilabad, 19 in Nizamabad. While 800 cases were diagnosed in Hyderabad.
Amit Agnihotri By

NEW DELHI: Rahul Gandhi may have to wait further. The Congress vice-presidents much-awaited elevation scheduled for October as the party boss may take another step. For, the party is apprehensive over his image of a part-time politician coupled with a poor track-record of winning elections.

As a face saver, the party strategists have now come up with a Plan B under which the Gandhi family scion will be made working president with Sonia Gandhi continuing to head the 132-year-old organisation, a senior leader considered close to the family said.

The plan B has been discussed among the Gandhi family members and a few close advisers like Sonias political secretary Ahmed Patel and her latest trouble-shooter Ghulam Nabi Azad, the sources said.

Rahul Gandhi has faced criticism for being a casual leader. His notable abstentions at crucial momentsincluding the 53-day sabbatical during land ordinance protests in 2015, the recent visit to Italy to meet his grandmother in June ahead of presidential polls, and his foreign trips in August and September when strategies for poll-bound Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh needed to be firmed uphave often been cited by his critics who brand him as a 9 to 5 politician.

The fact that Rahul cant be credited with any major electoral win since taking over as the party vice-president in 2013 also goes against the young leader given he has to fight 24x7 leaders such as Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.

His performance as a parliamentarian shows him in poor light. In 2014, he refused to head the Congress in the Lok Sabha and instead fielded veteran Mallikarjun Kharge to counter the Modi government.

These facts cant be overlooked, said a senior AICC functionary, who is jittery about the change in top leadership. Party insiders said reasons for letting Sonia at the helm of affairs are many. She commands respect among the rank and file, and leaders of opposition parties such as NCPs Sharad Pawar, JD(U) rebel Sharad Yadav, TMC chief Mamata Banerjee, SPs Mulayam Singh Yadav and BSP chief Mayawati find it easier to relate with Sonia than Rahul. She has also led the party from the front during grave political challenges.

The Congress internal polls will conclude in October when Rahul is expected to participate in the election for the post of party president. Sonia has held the post since 1998. Sources said if Rahul becomes working president, four vice presidents may be appointed to assist him.

Sonia, 70, has not been keeping good health over the past year. The leadership mantle was to pass to Rahul, 47. However, given his style of functioning and his uneasy equations with veterans, the Congress vice-presidents promotion has been a concern within the party.

NEW DELHI: Rahul Gandhi may have to wait further. The Congress vice-presidents much-awaited elevation scheduled for October as the party boss may take another step. For, the party is apprehensive over his image of a part-time politician coupled with a poor track-record of winning elections. As a face saver, the party strategists have now come up with a Plan B under which the Gandhi family scion will be made working president with Sonia Gandhi continuing to head the 132-year-old organisation, a senior leader considered close to the family said. The plan B has been discussed among the Gandhi family members and a few close advisers like Sonias political secretary Ahmed Patel and her latest trouble-shooter Ghulam Nabi Azad, the sources said. Rahul Gandhi has faced criticism for being a casual leader. His notable abstentions at crucial momentsincluding the 53-day sabbatical during land ordinance protests in 2015, the recent visit to Italy to meet his grandmother in June ahead of presidential polls, and his foreign trips in August and September when strategies for poll-bound Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh needed to be firmed uphave often been cited by his critics who brand him as a 9 to 5 politician. The fact that Rahul cant be credited with any major electoral win since taking over as the party vice-president in 2013 also goes against the young leader given he has to fight 24x7 leaders such as Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. His performance as a parliamentarian shows him in poor light. In 2014, he refused to head the Congress in the Lok Sabha and instead fielded veteran Mallikarjun Kharge to counter the Modi government. These facts cant be overlooked, said a senior AICC functionary, who is jittery about the change in top leadership. Party insiders said reasons for letting Sonia at the helm of affairs are many. She commands respect among the rank and file, and leaders of opposition parties such as NCPs Sharad Pawar, JD(U) rebel Sharad Yadav, TMC chief Mamata Banerjee, SPs Mulayam Singh Yadav and BSP chief Mayawati find it easier to relate with Sonia than Rahul. She has also led the party from the front during grave political challenges. The Congress internal polls will conclude in October when Rahul is expected to participate in the election for the post of party president. Sonia has held the post since 1998. Sources said if Rahul becomes working president, four vice presidents may be appointed to assist him. Sonia, 70, has not been keeping good health over the past year. The leadership mantle was to pass to Rahul, 47. However, given his style of functioning and his uneasy equations with veterans, the Congress vice-presidents promotion has been a concern within the party.
Yatish Yadav By

When India was awakened at the stroke of the midnight hour, a majority of her population was lost in dreams. They were transported to a so-called paradise where peopleHindus, Muslims, Sikhs and Christianswere supposed to shift their individual identity into factions: left, right, liberal, socialist, etc. During the evolution of a free Indian society, a few found themselves in the state of homelessness as more divisions were created on the basis of caste.

And the irony is politicians of fledgeling democracy that gave the right to the public to choose between them to govern this country were busy distributing masks of different ideologies, which was glorified to such an extent that the real face of humanityone that was born nakedwas quietly crucified. The brutal murder of journalist Gauri Lankesh is a clear example of a sick society where individual identity has either been lost or slaughtered by masked men.

While the cold-blooded murder of Lankesh is a matter of investigation and justice, what followed on social media shows that the ideological difference in society has poisoned hearts and minds. Some social media users posted the data of journalists killed in India since 1992 when Ram Singh, a reporter with a Jalandhar-based newspaper, was murdered. Lankesh and others have been silenced because of exercising their freedom of expression.

This only shows we have been sick for a very long time. The vitriolic debate next day took another ugly turn. Different masks came out with diverse voices blaming each others regime and issued customised condemnation and condolence. Statements and commentaries from left, right, liberal, secular and other political shades appeared as beautiful fiction. And the followers, always blinded because of the mask, roared again because profound truths and real intent of electoral harvesting remains a secret. People dont know because of political crops they are being crushed between the ideologies, which have the potential to turn this already ill society into a war field.

A dream is very feeble, but the political class over time watered ideological reverie to grow it into a reality. People have become so possessed that they are ready to sacrifice anything. A cursory glance at social media platforms in the last one week shows we are perhaps sitting on a volcano, which can erupt any moment. Mahavir Tyagi, a freedom fighter and parliamentarian, had told the Constitution makers that professional politicians would kill democracy.

He had warned on November 25, 1949, All democracies are run by professional politicians and I am afraid that is the main cause of their failures, because such people begin to live on democracies. It becomes with them a profession, the statecraft, and it becomes their only source of living.

That is the bane of democracy and I want to make the future generations aware of this. If this democracy is also to be run by such persons who will have nothing else to fall back upon, and who live on ministries or on the memberships of the Parliament, then this democracy is doomed, I am sure. Sixty-eight years have passed since Tyagis comment, but the greed to attain power for living by dividing the society remains a reality. It has to be understood that politicians have created the ideological veil that clouds our hearts and minds. Besides, they have only created the divisions.

It doesnt matter whether you are right, left or liberal; whether you are a BJP follower, a Congress supporter, or a Leftist. What matters is that are you able to acknowledge that the mask given to you by politicians is a complete lie. If you can, then sow the seeds of compassion, not ideology, to cure this society for the new generation and a vibrant democracy.

When India was awakened at the stroke of the midnight hour, a majority of her population was lost in dreams. They were transported to a so-called paradise where peopleHindus, Muslims, Sikhs and Christianswere supposed to shift their individual identity into factions: left, right, liberal, socialist, etc. During the evolution of a free Indian society, a few found themselves in the state of homelessness as more divisions were created on the basis of caste. And the irony is politicians of fledgeling democracy that gave the right to the public to choose between them to govern this country were busy distributing masks of different ideologies, which was glorified to such an extent that the real face of humanityone that was born nakedwas quietly crucified. The brutal murder of journalist Gauri Lankesh is a clear example of a sick society where individual identity has either been lost or slaughtered by masked men. While the cold-blooded murder of Lankesh is a matter of investigation and justice, what followed on social media shows that the ideological difference in society has poisoned hearts and minds. Some social media users posted the data of journalists killed in India since 1992 when Ram Singh, a reporter with a Jalandhar-based newspaper, was murdered. Lankesh and others have been silenced because of exercising their freedom of expression. This only shows we have been sick for a very long time. The vitriolic debate next day took another ugly turn. Different masks came out with diverse voices blaming each others regime and issued customised condemnation and condolence. Statements and commentaries from left, right, liberal, secular and other political shades appeared as beautiful fiction. And the followers, always blinded because of the mask, roared again because profound truths and real intent of electoral harvesting remains a secret. People dont know because of political crops they are being crushed between the ideologies, which have the potential to turn this already ill society into a war field. A dream is very feeble, but the political class over time watered ideological reverie to grow it into a reality. People have become so possessed that they are ready to sacrifice anything. A cursory glance at social media platforms in the last one week shows we are perhaps sitting on a volcano, which can erupt any moment. Mahavir Tyagi, a freedom fighter and parliamentarian, had told the Constitution makers that professional politicians would kill democracy. He had warned on November 25, 1949, All democracies are run by professional politicians and I am afraid that is the main cause of their failures, because such people begin to live on democracies. It becomes with them a profession, the statecraft, and it becomes their only source of living. That is the bane of democracy and I want to make the future generations aware of this. If this democracy is also to be run by such persons who will have nothing else to fall back upon, and who live on ministries or on the memberships of the Parliament, then this democracy is doomed, I am sure. Sixty-eight years have passed since Tyagis comment, but the greed to attain power for living by dividing the society remains a reality. It has to be understood that politicians have created the ideological veil that clouds our hearts and minds. Besides, they have only created the divisions. It doesnt matter whether you are right, left or liberal; whether you are a BJP follower, a Congress supporter, or a Leftist. What matters is that are you able to acknowledge that the mask given to you by politicians is a complete lie. If you can, then sow the seeds of compassion, not ideology, to cure this society for the new generation and a vibrant democracy.
Gayathri Mani By

NEW DELHI: The High Courts decision of reinstating the National Students Union of Indias (NSUI) presidential candidate Rocky Tuseed for DU student body polls, on Friday, shattered the hopes of the dumped candidate Alka Sehrawata blood cancer patient. Bhagat Singh College student Sehrawat, who was fielded as the presidential candidate after Tuseeds nomination was cancelled by the varsity election commission, has now decided to fight as an independent candidate.

The party used me for their purpose. I was fighting as an independent candidate but they requested me to contest for their party. When I opposed their decision of reinstating Tuseed, they tried to shut my mouth by promising money for my treatment and a foreign trip. They tried to bribe me by saying that I will be made the national coordinator, said Sehrawat.

She was not even given the ballot number and letter after filing of nominations.

She said, They forced me to withdraw but I will fight as an independent candidate and my whole college will support me. Both ABVP and NSUI are male-dominated parties.

All parties in Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) had fielded female candidates for the post of president, elections for which were held on Friday. But in DU, only All India Students Union (AISA) has fielded a female candidate for the post. Election in DU will be held on September 12.

NEW DELHI: The High Courts decision of reinstating the National Students Union of Indias (NSUI) presidential candidate Rocky Tuseed for DU student body polls, on Friday, shattered the hopes of the dumped candidate Alka Sehrawata blood cancer patient. Bhagat Singh College student Sehrawat, who was fielded as the presidential candidate after Tuseeds nomination was cancelled by the varsity election commission, has now decided to fight as an independent candidate. The party used me for their purpose. I was fighting as an independent candidate but they requested me to contest for their party. When I opposed their decision of reinstating Tuseed, they tried to shut my mouth by promising money for my treatment and a foreign trip. They tried to bribe me by saying that I will be made the national coordinator, said Sehrawat. She was not even given the ballot number and letter after filing of nominations. She said, They forced me to withdraw but I will fight as an independent candidate and my whole college will support me. Both ABVP and NSUI are male-dominated parties. All parties in Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) had fielded female candidates for the post of president, elections for which were held on Friday. But in DU, only All India Students Union (AISA) has fielded a female candidate for the post. Election in DU will be held on September 12.
Yatish Yadav By

Documents reveal that the Congress presidents son-in-law bought land through his bodyguard and his driver, by wiring money into their bank accounts. CBI and ED investigators believe this is just a small part of the big picture.

BIKANER/NEW DELHI: After registering an FIR to probe Robert Vadras alleged tainted land deals in Rajasthan, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is now focusing on the use of proxies such as his former police bodyguard and his driver to purchase and sell four chunks of land spread over 275 bighas in Kolayat Tehsil in Bikaner district of Rajasthan at a net profit of about Rs 4.5 crore. Former bodyguard Mahesh Nagar was with the Delhi Police. His driver Ashok Kumar is currently missing.

A review of documentsaccording to CBI officials, the most crucial pieces of papers in Vadras shady land dealsreveals startling facts on alleged forgery of documents, land pieces passing through multiple hands, and use of ghosts and proxies to extract maximum profit in real estate business.

The first land deal under the scanner is two portions of land75 bigha and 50 bigha in Gajner, Bikaner. The pieces of earth were first registered in revenue records on September 14, 1992, as government-owned land. It was later allotted to Natharam, son of Kishnaram Jat, and Hari Ram, son of Lunaramboth residents of Jagatsinghpura villagein connivance with the district revenue officials, who forged the documents to sell the land.

Its registration number was 75 and put in official records on October 16, 2007. Natharam was allocated 50 bigha while Hari Ram got 75 bigha of land. And, the Khasra Number was 710/499 in the revenue record of the district. Interestingly, the mediator in this entire forged land deal was shown as someone called Guganagar, a resident of Churu district of Rajasthan. A month later on November 19, 2007, the land was sold to Rajendra Kumar, a resident of Khajuwala village for Rs 2 lakh. The registration number has been shown as No.120 in the land records in this case.

On January 4, 2010, Sky Light Hospitality Pvt Ltd, owned by Vadra, bought the land for Rs 30 lakh. The money to purchase the land was transferred to Ashok Kumar, whom Vadra gave power of attorney by Vadra. In the land record, the property was registered as No. 238. Kumar, 54, of Bhuapur Village of Faridabad, had signed the deal. On February 21, 2012, the land was sold to Allegeny Finlease Pvt Ltd for Rs 2.34 crore. The registration was shown as No. 387/21.02.12 and the company is registered at R-67, Basement, Greater Kailash-I, New Delhi.

Similarly, 150 bighas of land in Goyalari Village, Bikaner, was registered on September 16, 1992. The government land was transferred to Bhaira Ram of Rampura village, and Jora Ram of Jagatsinghpura village, allegedly on the basis of forged documents. Bhaira was allotted 65 bighas while Jora got 85 bighas. The same mysterious Guganagar of Churu was the mediator in the deal that was registered as No. 319/237 in the land records on February 1, 2007. On March 21, 2007, it was sold to Yogesh Agarwal of Saadulganj, Bikaner, for Rs 6.5 lakh. On August 20, 2007, it was sold to Satish Kumar Goyal of Bikaner; Baburam Goyal of Guhana in Haryana; Ghanshyam Bansal of Panipat, Haryana; Rajendra Prasad of Panipat; and Kailash Agarwal of Rohini, New Delhi. Record 118/20.08.2007 show the land was sold for Rs 8.25 lakh.

Sky Light Hospitality Pvt Ltd bought both the portion of land through its proxy Mahesh Nagar, a Delhi Police constable who was Vadras bodyguard but later resigned from the service. Officials said Nagar continued to work for Vadra. Government record number 188 shows the land was bought for Rs 42 lakh on January 4, 2010, and was sold to Allegeny Finlease Pvt Ltd for Rs 2.81 crore on February 27, 2012. Allegeny issued power of attorney to Rishal Khan of Palwal in Haryana. It was registered in the land record as No. 249/27/02/12.

What is perplexing is Vadras use Ashok Kumar, Nagars driver to ink the land deals. CBI sources said Kumars bank accounts were under the scanner as they was used to funnel money to purchase land on behalf of Vadra. CBI officials said though Rajasthan Police sent a team to serve notice on Congress President Sonia Gandhis son-in-law in Delhi, they were unable to question him.

We will grill him (Vadra) after collecting all the evidences, said the CBI sources. Heads of Rajasthan bureaucrats are likely to roll once the CBI probe gathers steam. The CBI is going through Rajasthan Police case files to build its investigation to find out whether the suspected bureaucrat-Vadra connivance had the blessings of the top brass of the previous Congress government in the state.

Investigators are hunting for Kumar, who went underground in February. He was questioned once by Bikaner Police. He had admitted that money was wired through his account to buy land. Nagar was recently confronted by police but refused to divulge any details. Police said Kumar and Nagar were involved in spreading propaganda about the government planning to establish industries in villages where Vadra had purchased these lands.

Ten other persons role has been proved beyond doubt by investigatorsJai Prakash, son of Har Dayal, Arjansar, Bikaner; Uma Charan, son of Hari Ram, 5-D-10, HUDCO quarters, Bikaner; Deeparam, son of Udaram, Mithadiya, Bikaner; Rajendra Kumar Shandilya, son of Nand Lal, 3/503, Mukta Prasad Colony, Bikaner; Fakir Mohammad, son of Hafiz Mohammad, Subhashpura, Bikaner; Mahavir, son of Bihari Lal, Vaidya Magharam Colony, Bikaner; Ranjit Singh, son of Ram Singh, Subhashpura village, Bikaner; Kishore Singh, son of Ram Singh, Subhashpura village, Bikaner; Guganagar, son of Guman Giri, Doodhgiri village, Churu district; Madan Gopal, Vishwakarma Colony, Bikaner.

FROM the CBI FILES

The Central Government had acquired land of 34 villages in Bikaner district to establish Mahajan Field Firing Range for the Army. The government paid compensation to displaced persons and the state government proposed their rehabilitation by providing land equivalent to their acquired land in Bikaner district itself at a minimum price. For this, they had to fill the Khasra number and name of village in the application form. Thereafter, the Colonisation Department was to examine these applications and after deposit of the price of the land through challan, it allot land to them.

The allottee was to move an application along with the allotment letter and other original documents pertaining to the allotment in the Tehsil Office. After verifying the documents and their genuineness, the allotted land would be transferred to the allottee. The land mafia conspired with government servants like Patwaris and Naib Tehsildars, and forged allotment letters. They marked vacant government land in revenue villages of Goyalari, Madh, Indoka Bala and Gajner of Kolayat tehsil in collusion with government officials Uma Charan, Mahavir, Deeparam, Rajendra Kumar Shandilya, Madan Gopal and Fakir Mohammed, and obtained Khasra numbers of vacant government land.

Government officials prepared forged allotment letters of vacant land, in the name of such persons, who were neither resident of the villages the lands of which were acquired for Mahajan Field Firing Range nor their names were in the list of displaced persons. Even the forged allotment letters were prepared in the name of non-existent persons, CBI papers said.

Two FIRs were filed at Kolayat Police Station and 16 at Gajner Police station in Bikaner, Rajasthan, on August 28, 2014, by Gajendra Singh, Revenue Tehsildar of Kolayat. Singh told investigators that government officials in league with land mafia prepared forged documents and then illegally acquired and sold large tracts of land, causing huge loss to the government exchequer.

Enough Evidence for Prosecution in Vadra Land Deal: Enforcement Directorate

The ED, which is probing the money-laundering angle in the scam, said funds derived out of the land deals may have been diverted for other purposes and may have been projected as untainted money.

All the persons, who directly or indirectly indulged in the commission of offence, enjoyed the proceeds of the crime, including acquisition and possession of the properties wrongfully gained by them. These persons have caused wrongful loss to the government and their act comes within the definition of offence of money laundering and there is sufficient evidence on record to prove them guilty of the offence of money laundering, the ED note said.

Documents reveal that the Congress presidents son-in-law bought land through his bodyguard and his driver, by wiring money into their bank accounts. CBI and ED investigators believe this is just a small part of the big picture. BIKANER/NEW DELHI: After registering an FIR to probe Robert Vadras alleged tainted land deals in Rajasthan, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is now focusing on the use of proxies such as his former police bodyguard and his driver to purchase and sell four chunks of land spread over 275 bighas in Kolayat Tehsil in Bikaner district of Rajasthan at a net profit of about Rs 4.5 crore. Former bodyguard Mahesh Nagar was with the Delhi Police. His driver Ashok Kumar is currently missing. A review of documentsaccording to CBI officials, the most crucial pieces of papers in Vadras shady land dealsreveals startling facts on alleged forgery of documents, land pieces passing through multiple hands, and use of ghosts and proxies to extract maximum profit in real estate business. The first land deal under the scanner is two portions of land75 bigha and 50 bigha in Gajner, Bikaner. The pieces of earth were first registered in revenue records on September 14, 1992, as government-owned land. It was later allotted to Natharam, son of Kishnaram Jat, and Hari Ram, son of Lunaramboth residents of Jagatsinghpura villagein connivance with the district revenue officials, who forged the documents to sell the land. Its registration number was 75 and put in official records on October 16, 2007. Natharam was allocated 50 bigha while Hari Ram got 75 bigha of land. And, the Khasra Number was 710/499 in the revenue record of the district. Interestingly, the mediator in this entire forged land deal was shown as someone called Guganagar, a resident of Churu district of Rajasthan. A month later on November 19, 2007, the land was sold to Rajendra Kumar, a resident of Khajuwala village for Rs 2 lakh. The registration number has been shown as No.120 in the land records in this case. On January 4, 2010, Sky Light Hospitality Pvt Ltd, owned by Vadra, bought the land for Rs 30 lakh. The money to purchase the land was transferred to Ashok Kumar, whom Vadra gave power of attorney by Vadra. In the land record, the property was registered as No. 238. Kumar, 54, of Bhuapur Village of Faridabad, had signed the deal. On February 21, 2012, the land was sold to Allegeny Finlease Pvt Ltd for Rs 2.34 crore. The registration was shown as No. 387/21.02.12 and the company is registered at R-67, Basement, Greater Kailash-I, New Delhi. Similarly, 150 bighas of land in Goyalari Village, Bikaner, was registered on September 16, 1992. The government land was transferred to Bhaira Ram of Rampura village, and Jora Ram of Jagatsinghpura village, allegedly on the basis of forged documents. Bhaira was allotted 65 bighas while Jora got 85 bighas. The same mysterious Guganagar of Churu was the mediator in the deal that was registered as No. 319/237 in the land records on February 1, 2007. On March 21, 2007, it was sold to Yogesh Agarwal of Saadulganj, Bikaner, for Rs 6.5 lakh. On August 20, 2007, it was sold to Satish Kumar Goyal of Bikaner; Baburam Goyal of Guhana in Haryana; Ghanshyam Bansal of Panipat, Haryana; Rajendra Prasad of Panipat; and Kailash Agarwal of Rohini, New Delhi. Record 118/20.08.2007 show the land was sold for Rs 8.25 lakh. Sky Light Hospitality Pvt Ltd bought both the portion of land through its proxy Mahesh Nagar, a Delhi Police constable who was Vadras bodyguard but later resigned from the service. Officials said Nagar continued to work for Vadra. Government record number 188 shows the land was bought for Rs 42 lakh on January 4, 2010, and was sold to Allegeny Finlease Pvt Ltd for Rs 2.81 crore on February 27, 2012. Allegeny issued power of attorney to Rishal Khan of Palwal in Haryana. It was registered in the land record as No. 249/27/02/12. What is perplexing is Vadras use Ashok Kumar, Nagars driver to ink the land deals. CBI sources said Kumars bank accounts were under the scanner as they was used to funnel money to purchase land on behalf of Vadra. CBI officials said though Rajasthan Police sent a team to serve notice on Congress President Sonia Gandhis son-in-law in Delhi, they were unable to question him. We will grill him (Vadra) after collecting all the evidences, said the CBI sources. Heads of Rajasthan bureaucrats are likely to roll once the CBI probe gathers steam. The CBI is going through Rajasthan Police case files to build its investigation to find out whether the suspected bureaucrat-Vadra connivance had the blessings of the top brass of the previous Congress government in the state. Investigators are hunting for Kumar, who went underground in February. He was questioned once by Bikaner Police. He had admitted that money was wired through his account to buy land. Nagar was recently confronted by police but refused to divulge any details. Police said Kumar and Nagar were involved in spreading propaganda about the government planning to establish industries in villages where Vadra had purchased these lands. Ten other persons role has been proved beyond doubt by investigatorsJai Prakash, son of Har Dayal, Arjansar, Bikaner; Uma Charan, son of Hari Ram, 5-D-10, HUDCO quarters, Bikaner; Deeparam, son of Udaram, Mithadiya, Bikaner; Rajendra Kumar Shandilya, son of Nand Lal, 3/503, Mukta Prasad Colony, Bikaner; Fakir Mohammad, son of Hafiz Mohammad, Subhashpura, Bikaner; Mahavir, son of Bihari Lal, Vaidya Magharam Colony, Bikaner; Ranjit Singh, son of Ram Singh, Subhashpura village, Bikaner; Kishore Singh, son of Ram Singh, Subhashpura village, Bikaner; Guganagar, son of Guman Giri, Doodhgiri village, Churu district; Madan Gopal, Vishwakarma Colony, Bikaner. FROM the CBI FILES The Central Government had acquired land of 34 villages in Bikaner district to establish Mahajan Field Firing Range for the Army. The government paid compensation to displaced persons and the state government proposed their rehabilitation by providing land equivalent to their acquired land in Bikaner district itself at a minimum price. For this, they had to fill the Khasra number and name of village in the application form. Thereafter, the Colonisation Department was to examine these applications and after deposit of the price of the land through challan, it allot land to them. The allottee was to move an application along with the allotment letter and other original documents pertaining to the allotment in the Tehsil Office. After verifying the documents and their genuineness, the allotted land would be transferred to the allottee. The land mafia conspired with government servants like Patwaris and Naib Tehsildars, and forged allotment letters. They marked vacant government land in revenue villages of Goyalari, Madh, Indoka Bala and Gajner of Kolayat tehsil in collusion with government officials Uma Charan, Mahavir, Deeparam, Rajendra Kumar Shandilya, Madan Gopal and Fakir Mohammed, and obtained Khasra numbers of vacant government land. Government officials prepared forged allotment letters of vacant land, in the name of such persons, who were neither resident of the villages the lands of which were acquired for Mahajan Field Firing Range nor their names were in the list of displaced persons. Even the forged allotment letters were prepared in the name of non-existent persons, CBI papers said. Two FIRs were filed at Kolayat Police Station and 16 at Gajner Police station in Bikaner, Rajasthan, on August 28, 2014, by Gajendra Singh, Revenue Tehsildar of Kolayat. Singh told investigators that government officials in league with land mafia prepared forged documents and then illegally acquired and sold large tracts of land, causing huge loss to the government exchequer. Enough Evidence for Prosecution in Vadra Land Deal: Enforcement Directorate The ED, which is probing the money-laundering angle in the scam, said funds derived out of the land deals may have been diverted for other purposes and may have been projected as untainted money. All the persons, who directly or indirectly indulged in the commission of offence, enjoyed the proceeds of the crime, including acquisition and possession of the properties wrongfully gained by them. These persons have caused wrongful loss to the government and their act comes within the definition of offence of money laundering and there is sufficient evidence on record to prove them guilty of the offence of money laundering, the ED note said.
Ankur Sharma and Siddhanta Mishra By

NEW DELHI: Bus conductor Ashok Kumar stands accused of killing seven-year-old Pradyuman by slashing his throat, but the police are fingering Ryan International School, Gurgaon, for the culprit.

They accuse the school management of multiple lapses in student security like flouting regulations in hiring school buses, employing staff without police verification, allowing unauthorised persons unrestricted access to the school and omitting to repair broken-down CCTVs.

According to the sources, the school buses were leased not by the school, but through a third party supplier without the necessary documentation as prescribed by CBSE for its affiliated schools.

lax management

Officially, conductors, drivers and other outsiders are not allowed to use the toilets on the school premises but the accused managed to get in.

School buses plied without sufficient school staff on board to monitor the behaviour of the bus drivers and conductors. Cops claim that Ryan International did not get Ashok Kumars police verification done even though he had been in his job for seven months.

School authorities had no personal details of the accused like his address and place of birth in their possession.

The school had no proper security personnel in place either, to frisk and check staff and outsiders at the gatethe reason why the killer could enter the school with a knife. Cops have discovered that CCTVs installed in the area where the murder occurred were not working properly.

Hence, they are struggling to obtain the technological evidence needed to get a conviction. The two-member team constituted by the Haryana government to probe lapses of the school management will submit its report on Monday.

The police said that Kumar admitted that he and other members of the school bus staff were prohibited from using the school washrooms; however, the absence of security personnel and teachers made it easy for them to use the facilities.

I have been using the toilet since last 7-8 months, the accused said in his statement.

The school did not carry out proper documentation procedures while hiring buses and their staff. Kumars police verification was not done since the school had hired a third party, which used to supply buses and staff. There are no proper verification papers or identity cards for them, a Gurgaon Police official investigating the case said.

CBSE has a prescribed procedure in place regarding bus safety and hiring norms. CBSE had also sent a circular on the issue last October, mandating that a lady attendant should be available on each school bus to help the kids board and de-board with the help of the conductor. responsibility missing

Since a schoolboy drowned in a water tank of Ryan International School, Vasant Kunj, last year, a circular was issued by the school administration to define the responsibilities of staff overlooking various aspects such as security and cleaning.

According to the circular, the principal was the overall in-charge. This circular had helped the Delhi Police to fix the responsibility on the school management for the drowning.

The principal and some teachers of the school were arrested for negligence by the school administration. However, in Pradyumans case, the Gurgaon Police found the responsibility chart missing. Attempts to reach out to the official spokesperson of Ryan International School, Neeti Srinivasan, yielded no results.

Negligent School

The school had no equipment or procedures to frisk and check outsiders and staff entering the school, which helped Ashok to carry his knife in.

CCTVs installed in the toilet area were not working properly.

Bus staff were hired without proper documentation as no police verification of the accused were found

Security staff deployed outside the toilet was missing.

CBSE Guidelines for Safety And Manpower in the Bus.

Each school should designate a Transport Manager. The name and contact details of the person should be prominently displayed at the school.

Provision must be made by the school for at least one well-trained lady attendant in each school bus to help school children.

While hiring buses, school authorities shall enter into a valid agreement with the owner/transporter. The driver must carry the copy of the agreement in the bus.

NEW DELHI: Bus conductor Ashok Kumar stands accused of killing seven-year-old Pradyuman by slashing his throat, but the police are fingering Ryan International School, Gurgaon, for the culprit. They accuse the school management of multiple lapses in student security like flouting regulations in hiring school buses, employing staff without police verification, allowing unauthorised persons unrestricted access to the school and omitting to repair broken-down CCTVs. According to the sources, the school buses were leased not by the school, but through a third party supplier without the necessary documentation as prescribed by CBSE for its affiliated schools. lax management Officially, conductors, drivers and other outsiders are not allowed to use the toilets on the school premises but the accused managed to get in. School buses plied without sufficient school staff on board to monitor the behaviour of the bus drivers and conductors. Cops claim that Ryan International did not get Ashok Kumars police verification done even though he had been in his job for seven months. School authorities had no personal details of the accused like his address and place of birth in their possession. The school had no proper security personnel in place either, to frisk and check staff and outsiders at the gatethe reason why the killer could enter the school with a knife. Cops have discovered that CCTVs installed in the area where the murder occurred were not working properly. Hence, they are struggling to obtain the technological evidence needed to get a conviction. The two-member team constituted by the Haryana government to probe lapses of the school management will submit its report on Monday. The police said that Kumar admitted that he and other members of the school bus staff were prohibited from using the school washrooms; however, the absence of security personnel and teachers made it easy for them to use the facilities. I have been using the toilet since last 7-8 months, the accused said in his statement. The school did not carry out proper documentation procedures while hiring buses and their staff. Kumars police verification was not done since the school had hired a third party, which used to supply buses and staff. There are no proper verification papers or identity cards for them, a Gurgaon Police official investigating the case said. CBSE has a prescribed procedure in place regarding bus safety and hiring norms. CBSE had also sent a circular on the issue last October, mandating that a lady attendant should be available on each school bus to help the kids board and de-board with the help of the conductor. responsibility missing Since a schoolboy drowned in a water tank of Ryan International School, Vasant Kunj, last year, a circular was issued by the school administration to define the responsibilities of staff overlooking various aspects such as security and cleaning. According to the circular, the principal was the overall in-charge. This circular had helped the Delhi Police to fix the responsibility on the school management for the drowning. The principal and some teachers of the school were arrested for negligence by the school administration. However, in Pradyumans case, the Gurgaon Police found the responsibility chart missing. Attempts to reach out to the official spokesperson of Ryan International School, Neeti Srinivasan, yielded no results. Negligent School The school had no equipment or procedures to frisk and check outsiders and staff entering the school, which helped Ashok to carry his knife in. CCTVs installed in the toilet area were not working properly. Bus staff were hired without proper documentation as no police verification of the accused were found Security staff deployed outside the toilet was missing. CBSE Guidelines for Safety And Manpower in the Bus. Each school should designate a Transport Manager. The name and contact details of the person should be prominently displayed at the school. Provision must be made by the school for at least one well-trained lady attendant in each school bus to help school children. While hiring buses, school authorities shall enter into a valid agreement with the owner/transporter. The driver must carry the copy of the agreement in the bus.
By Pradip R Sagar By

NEW DELHI: Simmering discontent in the Army is now turning into a legal battle. Over 100 serving officers have moved the Supreme Court against the Army Headquarters deploying them in operations but denying them benefits. These officers have been named non-combatants in the Armys order.Army Headquarters in its submission before the apex court last year had called the services cadrewhich comprises over 20 per cent of the Armynon-operational.

Miffed over the stand, several service cadre officers had expressed their reluctance to go on operational postings, including forward and counter-insurgency areas. The cadre has nearly 10,000 officers in its strength of 2.6 lakh personnel. Army Service Corps (ASC) is an arm of the Indian Army that handles its logistic support function.

Now over 100 servicing officers between the rank of Captain and Brigadiers, including some gallantry awardees have filed a petition by stating that they have been falsely declared non-operational.

Petitioners stated that legally they are not supposed to wield arms as non-combatants, yet they are being used in operations. The Army or the government has no power to declare any part of regular army non-operational, since the officers of the regular army are operational by statute, read the petition.

The petition further stated, The officers belonging to the service cadre do not hold any immunity under the Geneva Convention, as applicable to combatants and if caught on foreign soil, shall be tried not as soldiers but under the criminal law of the country.

Different streams

Indian Army comprises 11 streams Infantry, Armoured Corps, Mechanised Infantry, Artillery, Air Defense, Engineers, Signals, Army Service Corps, Army Ordinance, Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, and Other Corps including Intelligence, Aviation and other Minor Corps.

Case History

Major Satish Dahiya, an officer from Army Service Corps was killed in an operation, in a non-combatant status. He died during operations against terrorists in Kashmir while posted with 30 Rashtriya Rifles unit. Major Dahiya received the Shaurya Chakra, the third highest gallantry award.

Bitter Truth

The officer mortality rate of Army Service Corps in the most recent war fought at Kargil has been 1.77 per thousand which is more than any other component of the regular army.

These very combat services officers were denied vacancies that were churned out of the Kargil experience.

It all started when the Armys 2009 promotion policy, which was based on the recommendation of former defence secretary Ajai Vikram Singh Committee, was challenged in the Armed Forces Tribunal (AFT).

The combat services officers are a part of the Regular Indian Army which in itself is operational by the enactment.

NEW DELHI: Simmering discontent in the Army is now turning into a legal battle. Over 100 serving officers have moved the Supreme Court against the Army Headquarters deploying them in operations but denying them benefits. These officers have been named non-combatants in the Armys order.Army Headquarters in its submission before the apex court last year had called the services cadrewhich comprises over 20 per cent of the Armynon-operational. Miffed over the stand, several service cadre officers had expressed their reluctance to go on operational postings, including forward and counter-insurgency areas. The cadre has nearly 10,000 officers in its strength of 2.6 lakh personnel. Army Service Corps (ASC) is an arm of the Indian Army that handles its logistic support function. Now over 100 servicing officers between the rank of Captain and Brigadiers, including some gallantry awardees have filed a petition by stating that they have been falsely declared non-operational. Petitioners stated that legally they are not supposed to wield arms as non-combatants, yet they are being used in operations. The Army or the government has no power to declare any part of regular army non-operational, since the officers of the regular army are operational by statute, read the petition. The petition further stated, The officers belonging to the service cadre do not hold any immunity under the Geneva Convention, as applicable to combatants and if caught on foreign soil, shall be tried not as soldiers but under the criminal law of the country. Different streams Indian Army comprises 11 streams Infantry, Armoured Corps, Mechanised Infantry, Artillery, Air Defense, Engineers, Signals, Army Service Corps, Army Ordinance, Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, and Other Corps including Intelligence, Aviation and other Minor Corps. Case History Major Satish Dahiya, an officer from Army Service Corps was killed in an operation, in a non-combatant status. He died during operations against terrorists in Kashmir while posted with 30 Rashtriya Rifles unit. Major Dahiya received the Shaurya Chakra, the third highest gallantry award. Bitter Truth The officer mortality rate of Army Service Corps in the most recent war fought at Kargil has been 1.77 per thousand which is more than any other component of the regular army. These very combat services officers were denied vacancies that were churned out of the Kargil experience. It all started when the Armys 2009 promotion policy, which was based on the recommendation of former defence secretary Ajai Vikram Singh Committee, was challenged in the Armed Forces Tribunal (AFT). The combat services officers are a part of the Regular Indian Army which in itself is operational by the enactment.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's visit to New Delhi comes at a time of immense geopolitical churn. India and China have just withdrawn after a 70-day faceoff over a disputed plateau in Doklam, Bhutan. The climbdown was preceded by some of the shrillest war rhetoric from Beijing in nearly three decades and some of the most level-headed diplomatic manoeuvring by New Delhi with tacit Japanese support. Tokyo didn't exactly disguise where its sympathies lay-an August 17 statement by the Japanese envoy to New Delhi, Kenji Hiramatsu, urging "all parties not to resort to unilateral attempts to change the status quo by force", drew a sharp rebuke from Beijing.

Prime minister Abe, of course, faces infinitely greater security threats. North Korea first lobbed a nuclear-capable missile over northern Japan on August 29 and on September 3, tested a hydrogen bomb with a yield over five times that of the weapon dropped over Nagasaki in 1945. North Korea's new capability dramatically imperils the security of non-nuclear East Asian states like Japan and South Korea. "We would like to change North Korea's policies in close cooperation with India," Abe was quoted by Japanese media as saying during a September 5 meeting with Union minister Arun Jaitley in Tokyo. Jaitley noted with concern the proliferation of nuclear weapons and missiles through Asia.

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Nuclear weapons and missiles are common to the convergence of a two-front security threat that India and Japan are seeing through the Pyongyang-Beijing-Islamabad axis. While India faces a two-front situation with Pakistan and China, Japan has an unpredictable North Korea and China. If Japanese diplomats are studying New Delhi's responses to Doklam, it is because in recent years, China has become increasingly assertive in territorial disputes, such as over Senkaku Islands in East China Sea, and conti-nues to test Japan's defences. Japanese fighter jets scrambled over 800 times to intercept Chinese fighter aircraft intruding its airspace over the past year. An increasingly insular United States, under President Donald Trump, has heightened Japanese insecurity.

Japan has for long been a latent nuclear power, not exercising the option because of its deep pacifism. G. Parthasarathy, former Indian ambassador to Pakistan, says India should fully back Japan's attempt to develop nuclear weapons as it would check China's belligerence. "One of the reasons for China's arrogance is that it feels India has nuclear weapon states both to its east and west," he says. "We would have a more realistic behaviour from them if they face a similar situation on their borders."

In November last year, PMs Modi and Abe announced the Asia-Africa Growth Corridor (AAGC). It is widely seen as an attempt to provide an alternative to Beijing's Belt and Road initiative, which New Delhi has boycotted. AAGC calls for the two countries to develop quality infrastructure in Africa and digital connectivity to link the two continents. It is primarily a maritime route linking Jamnagar with Djibouti, Madurai with Zanzibar and Kolkata with Sittwe. Worried over China's widening global footprint, especially through Asia and Africa, Japan and India have common security interests. Both countries have a robust institutional dialogue mechanism, an annual bilateral summit between the two PMs and defence ministers, besides the annual Indo-US Malabar exercises that were expanded in 2015 to include the Japanese navy. "Japan has always been concerned about the security of their sea lanes of communication," says Admiral Arun Prakash, former chief of the naval staff. "With China bearing down on them and the United States ambivalent, their best bet on the maritime front at least is to team up with India."

In April 2014, the Abe government allowed its industries to export arms. It triggered off optimism in New Delhi, which looked to Japan not only for defence hardware but also high technology inputs into stalled programmes like an indigenous fighter jet engine. "Japan had a lot of defence technologies and India, of course, has great use for these technologies because we are attempting to have local manufacturing," Jaitley said during a visit to Tokyo in May this year. That optimism hasn't been backed by any sales of military hardware, technology or joint ventures. A 2013 offer from Japan to sell a dozen US-2I amphibious aircraft for the Indian navy has figured in joint statements. But defence ministry officials are believed to have raised objections over price-$2.8 billion or Rs 16,800 crore-and the limited indigenous options under Make in India.

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Japan's Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, which makes the Soryu-class submarines, was one of six global firms the Indian navy sought proposals from to build a new line of Project 75I diesel-electric submarines. The nearly $8.3 billion project will be executed by an Indian private sector shipyard under the defence ministry's strategic partnerships programme. Mitsubishi has not tied up with any Indian defence firm, one of the prerequisites for strategic partnerships, so it's unclear if they would be in the reckoning for the contract. Only a government-to-government deal bypassing India's lengthy defence acquisition norms could ensure India buys any defence hardware from Japan.

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PM Abe's visit signals a sense of urgency to the security relationship because of domestic and external factors, says Rupakjyoti Borah, visiting fellow at the National University of Singapore. "Both Modi and Abe face elections in 2018 and 2019 respectively. Externally, they face a deteriorating security environment," says Borah. Another set of two-front challenges that would hopefully propel them to take the security relationship forward.

--- ENDS ---
By AFP

FRANKFURT AM MAIN: Germany would lend its weight to a diplomatic push to end North Korean nuclear weapons and missile development along the lines of a past deal with Iran, Chancellor Angela Merkel said today.

"I would say yes immediately if we were asked to join talks," Merkel told weekly newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung.

Talks between Iran and six world powers, sealed with a 2015 deal for Tehran to roll back its nuclear programme and submit to inspections in exchange for some sanctions being rolled back, were "a long but important period of diplomacy" that had achieved a "good end," she added.

"I could imagine such a format for the settlement of the North Korea conflict. Europe and especially Germany ought to be ready to make a very active contribution," Merkel said.

The chancellor said she had held telephone talks with the leaders of France, the United States, China, South Korea and Japan about the North Korea crisis over the past week, and is expected to speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Merkel's comments come as Washington has formally requested a Monday vote on tough new sanctions for Pyongyang at the UN Security Council.

US diplomats have called for an oil embargo, an assets freeze against leader Kim Jong-Un, a ban on textiles and an end to payments of North Korean guest workers in response to the nation's sixth nuclear test last week.

But the measures could founder on opposition from permanent Security Council members Russia and China.

Merkel said that she backed sanctions as a means of bringing North Korea to the negotiating table.

FRANKFURT AM MAIN: Germany would lend its weight to a diplomatic push to end North Korean nuclear weapons and missile development along the lines of a past deal with Iran, Chancellor Angela Merkel said today. "I would say yes immediately if we were asked to join talks," Merkel told weekly newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung. Talks between Iran and six world powers, sealed with a 2015 deal for Tehran to roll back its nuclear programme and submit to inspections in exchange for some sanctions being rolled back, were "a long but important period of diplomacy" that had achieved a "good end," she added. "I could imagine such a format for the settlement of the North Korea conflict. Europe and especially Germany ought to be ready to make a very active contribution," Merkel said. The chancellor said she had held telephone talks with the leaders of France, the United States, China, South Korea and Japan about the North Korea crisis over the past week, and is expected to speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Merkel's comments come as Washington has formally requested a Monday vote on tough new sanctions for Pyongyang at the UN Security Council. US diplomats have called for an oil embargo, an assets freeze against leader Kim Jong-Un, a ban on textiles and an end to payments of North Korean guest workers in response to the nation's sixth nuclear test last week. But the measures could founder on opposition from permanent Security Council members Russia and China. Merkel said that she backed sanctions as a means of bringing North Korea to the negotiating table.
By AFP

MOSCOW: Russian police detained people from a crowd of about 200 protesters Sunday in Saint Petersburg who had gathered over the crackdown on the Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar.

The square in the city centre was surrounded with police vans and policemen were leading people away into the vans, an AFP correspondent at the scene said, counting over 100 detained at the unauthorised demonstration.

"Our brothers are being detained! Why are Muslims always to blame, why are they detaining us?" one protester shouted.

"Why can't we express ourselves," complained another protester, Makhmud, 45. "We are worried about what is happening with our brothers in Myanmar."

The plight of the Rohingya minority in Myanmar, where nearly 300,000 have fled their homes from what they say are state-orchestrated mass killings into neighbouring Bangladesh, has seen Russia's Muslims stage several protests, particularly after a call by Chechen strongman Ramzan Kadyrov.

Thousands rallied in Chechnya's main city Grozny last week as Kadyrov called on Moscow to "stop this bloodshed" in a rare break from his public image as a fervent loyalist of President Vladimir Putin.

Moscow however has been mute over Myanmar. "We're against any sort of violence," Putin said Tuesday when asked about Kadyrov's position, adding that "any person has a right to his opinion regardless of his post."

Russia and Myanmar are also allies who signed a military cooperation agreement last year, with Moscow of having exported military aircraft and artillery to the country. Russian police detained people from a crowd of about 200 protesters Sunday in Saint Petersburg who had gathered over the crackdown on the Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar.

The square in the city centre was surrounded with police vans and policemen were leading people away into the vans, an AFP correspondent at the scene said, counting over 100 detained at the unauthorised demonstration.

"Our brothers are being detained! Why are Muslims always to blame, why are they detaining us?" one protester shouted.

"Why can't we express ourselves," complained another protester, Makhmud, 45. "We are worried about what is happening with our brothers in Myanmar."

The plight of the Rohingya minority in Myanmar, where nearly 300,000 have fled their homes from what they say are state-orchestrated mass killings into neighbouring Bangladesh, has seen Russia's Muslims stage several protests, particularly after a call by Chechen strongman Ramzan Kadyrov.

Thousands rallied in Chechnya's main city Grozny last week as Kadyrov called on Moscow to "stop this bloodshed" in a rare break from his public image as a fervent loyalist of President Vladimir Putin.

Moscow, however, has been mute over Myanmar. "We're against any sort of violence," Putin said Tuesday when asked about Kadyrov's position, adding that "any person has a right to his opinion regardless of his post."

Russia and Myanmar are also allies who signed a military cooperation agreement last year, with Moscow of having exported military aircraft and artillery to the country.

MOSCOW: Russian police detained people from a crowd of about 200 protesters Sunday in Saint Petersburg who had gathered over the crackdown on the Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar. The square in the city centre was surrounded with police vans and policemen were leading people away into the vans, an AFP correspondent at the scene said, counting over 100 detained at the unauthorised demonstration. "Our brothers are being detained! Why are Muslims always to blame, why are they detaining us?" one protester shouted. "Why can't we express ourselves," complained another protester, Makhmud, 45. "We are worried about what is happening with our brothers in Myanmar." The plight of the Rohingya minority in Myanmar, where nearly 300,000 have fled their homes from what they say are state-orchestrated mass killings into neighbouring Bangladesh, has seen Russia's Muslims stage several protests, particularly after a call by Chechen strongman Ramzan Kadyrov. Thousands rallied in Chechnya's main city Grozny last week as Kadyrov called on Moscow to "stop this bloodshed" in a rare break from his public image as a fervent loyalist of President Vladimir Putin. Moscow however has been mute over Myanmar. "We're against any sort of violence," Putin said Tuesday when asked about Kadyrov's position, adding that "any person has a right to his opinion regardless of his post." Russia and Myanmar are also allies who signed a military cooperation agreement last year, with Moscow of having exported military aircraft and artillery to the country. Russian police detained people from a crowd of about 200 protesters Sunday in Saint Petersburg who had gathered over the crackdown on the Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar. The square in the city centre was surrounded with police vans and policemen were leading people away into the vans, an AFP correspondent at the scene said, counting over 100 detained at the unauthorised demonstration. "Our brothers are being detained! Why are Muslims always to blame, why are they detaining us?" one protester shouted. "Why can't we express ourselves," complained another protester, Makhmud, 45. "We are worried about what is happening with our brothers in Myanmar." The plight of the Rohingya minority in Myanmar, where nearly 300,000 have fled their homes from what they say are state-orchestrated mass killings into neighbouring Bangladesh, has seen Russia's Muslims stage several protests, particularly after a call by Chechen strongman Ramzan Kadyrov. Thousands rallied in Chechnya's main city Grozny last week as Kadyrov called on Moscow to "stop this bloodshed" in a rare break from his public image as a fervent loyalist of President Vladimir Putin. Moscow, however, has been mute over Myanmar. "We're against any sort of violence," Putin said Tuesday when asked about Kadyrov's position, adding that "any person has a right to his opinion regardless of his post." Russia and Myanmar are also allies who signed a military cooperation agreement last year, with Moscow of having exported military aircraft and artillery to the country.
By IANS

KABUL: As many as 35 civilians have been kidnapped by militants of the Islamic State and Taliban in northern Afghanistan's Jawzjan province, locals said on Sunday.

"Both IS and the Taliban have created checkpoints along the way between Qush Tipa and Darzab districts of the province, arresting individuals on charges of having links with the other side, and recently 35 people, all civilians, have been taken hostage by the two rival groups," a local resident was quoted as saying by Xinhua.

Meanwhile, Nasratullah Jamshidi, the press officer of the 209th Shaheen Corps of the Afghan National Army, confirmed the incident, saying he had received such a report.

Fighting has escalated in Afghanistan as the Taliban insurgency spreads from its traditional strongholds in the south and east to the once peaceful region in the north, where the militants have been recruiting from among the youth.

KABUL: As many as 35 civilians have been kidnapped by militants of the Islamic State and Taliban in northern Afghanistan's Jawzjan province, locals said on Sunday. "Both IS and the Taliban have created checkpoints along the way between Qush Tipa and Darzab districts of the province, arresting individuals on charges of having links with the other side, and recently 35 people, all civilians, have been taken hostage by the two rival groups," a local resident was quoted as saying by Xinhua. Meanwhile, Nasratullah Jamshidi, the press officer of the 209th Shaheen Corps of the Afghan National Army, confirmed the incident, saying he had received such a report. Fighting has escalated in Afghanistan as the Taliban insurgency spreads from its traditional strongholds in the south and east to the once peaceful region in the north, where the militants have been recruiting from among the youth.
By Associated Press

LONDON: Thousands marched Saturday to Parliament in central London to protest Britain's plan to withdraw from the European Union.

Organizers of the "People's March for Europe" said the goal was to "unite, rethink and reject" the Conservative government's plan to implement Brexit by 2019. Some protesters carried the EU flag while others carried an "Exit from Brexit" banner.

Ed Davey, a Liberal Democrat legislator, told the crowd he is "embarrassed" by Britain's negotiating stance.

"I've gone from anger to distress, from fury to despair. But since the Brexit negotiations begun there's a third emotion I've been feeling: Embarrassment. Embarrassment at our country's leaders. Embarrassment for Great Britain," he said.

Other speakers demanded that Britons be given a chance to vote on the Brexit decisions once negotiations are concluded.

Britain voted in June 2016 to withdraw from the 28-nation EU bloc but negotiations with the EU are moving extremely slowly. The talks have been stalled because of disputes over how much Britain will have to pay the EU because of their joint obligations. The two sides have not yet started to discuss future trade relations.

Parliament is expected to vote Monday on a repeal bill designed to eventually incorporate many EU laws into British law once the separation becomes final.

LONDON: Thousands marched Saturday to Parliament in central London to protest Britain's plan to withdraw from the European Union. Organizers of the "People's March for Europe" said the goal was to "unite, rethink and reject" the Conservative government's plan to implement Brexit by 2019. Some protesters carried the EU flag while others carried an "Exit from Brexit" banner. Ed Davey, a Liberal Democrat legislator, told the crowd he is "embarrassed" by Britain's negotiating stance. "I've gone from anger to distress, from fury to despair. But since the Brexit negotiations begun there's a third emotion I've been feeling: Embarrassment. Embarrassment at our country's leaders. Embarrassment for Great Britain," he said. Other speakers demanded that Britons be given a chance to vote on the Brexit decisions once negotiations are concluded. Britain voted in June 2016 to withdraw from the 28-nation EU bloc but negotiations with the EU are moving extremely slowly. The talks have been stalled because of disputes over how much Britain will have to pay the EU because of their joint obligations. The two sides have not yet started to discuss future trade relations. Parliament is expected to vote Monday on a repeal bill designed to eventually incorporate many EU laws into British law once the separation becomes final.
By PTI

KARACHI: Five members of the minority Shia Hazara community, including two women, were killed on Sunday in an attack by unidentified gunmen in Pakistan's restive Balochistan province.

The gunmen targeted a car in Kuchluck area of Quetta while it was coming from the Chaman border crossing area, police said. The firing took place when the travellers had stopped at a filling station to refuel their vehicle. Five people of the Shia Hazara community, including two women, died in the attack, the Express Tribune reported.

Balochistan Chief Minister Sanaullah Zehri expressed grief at the incident and strongly condemned the terrorist attack. He directed authorities that the culprits should be arrested and brought to justice.

This is not the first time that members of the Hazara community have been targeted in Quetta and other parts of Balochistan. Earlier this year, in July, four Hazara men were ambushed and killed in the Mastung area.

In October last year, gunmen opened fire on a bus carrying Hazara men and women in Quetta. Four women were killed in that attack.

KARACHI: Five members of the minority Shia Hazara community, including two women, were killed on Sunday in an attack by unidentified gunmen in Pakistan's restive Balochistan province. The gunmen targeted a car in Kuchluck area of Quetta while it was coming from the Chaman border crossing area, police said. The firing took place when the travellers had stopped at a filling station to refuel their vehicle. Five people of the Shia Hazara community, including two women, died in the attack, the Express Tribune reported. Balochistan Chief Minister Sanaullah Zehri expressed grief at the incident and strongly condemned the terrorist attack. He directed authorities that the culprits should be arrested and brought to justice. This is not the first time that members of the Hazara community have been targeted in Quetta and other parts of Balochistan. Earlier this year, in July, four Hazara men were ambushed and killed in the Mastung area. In October last year, gunmen opened fire on a bus carrying Hazara men and women in Quetta. Four women were killed in that attack.
By PTI

KARACHI: Two bodies have been found in the mountains of Mastung district of Pakistan's restive Balochistan province, with a Pakistani official saying that they could be of the two Chinese nationals who were kidnapped from Quetta earlier this year.

The bodies were found last Thursday and have now been sent to Islamabad for a DNA test.

A senior government official said the test was being done to ascertain identity of the deceased as the bodies were in bad condition and beyond recognition.

"To be honest, they are just skeletons," the official said today.

Chinese officials have been approached to get samples from relatives of the kidnapped man and woman for the DNA test, the Dawn reported. The abduction took place on May 24, in Quetta's Jinnah town. While one Chinese woman managed to escape when the abductors fired in the air to disperse onlookers, they managed to get hold of two others.

The kidnapping of the Chinese nationals has raised concerns in Beijing over the multi-billion dollar investment in Pakistan. The abduction forced the Chinese embassy in Islamabad to evacuate 10 of its nationals from Quetta and send them home.

KARACHI: Two bodies have been found in the mountains of Mastung district of Pakistan's restive Balochistan province, with a Pakistani official saying that they could be of the two Chinese nationals who were kidnapped from Quetta earlier this year. The bodies were found last Thursday and have now been sent to Islamabad for a DNA test. A senior government official said the test was being done to ascertain identity of the deceased as the bodies were in bad condition and beyond recognition. "To be honest, they are just skeletons," the official said today. Chinese officials have been approached to get samples from relatives of the kidnapped man and woman for the DNA test, the Dawn reported. The abduction took place on May 24, in Quetta's Jinnah town. While one Chinese woman managed to escape when the abductors fired in the air to disperse onlookers, they managed to get hold of two others. The kidnapping of the Chinese nationals has raised concerns in Beijing over the multi-billion dollar investment in Pakistan. The abduction forced the Chinese embassy in Islamabad to evacuate 10 of its nationals from Quetta and send them home.
Japan is determined to provide everything for its success: finance, state-of-the-art technology, construction of train manufacturing factories and training facilities in India, and know how to run the system.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's upcoming state visit to India is unconventional as he will be spending little time in Delhi. By this unusual gesture to visit only Gujarat, the front-runner of reforms in India, he pays the highest tribute to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Their chemistry fits remarkably. Both are expected to officially launch the high-speed rail project between Mumbai and Ahmedabad, which adopts the well-known disaster-proof Shinkansen system of Japan. This exceptional infrastructure project follows excellent Japan-India cooperation on a series of projects, such as the Delhi Metro and similar initiatives in major cities, industrial corridor projects between Delhi and Mumbai as well as Chennai and Bengaluru, and the Delhi-Mumbai rail freight corridor project. The Shinkansen project is a precursor to the one between Chennai and Bengaluru and, perhaps, other high-speed train systems in the future.

Hiroshi Hirabayashi

Japan is determined to provide everything for its success: finance, state-of-the-art technology, construction of train manufacturing factories and training facilities in India, and know how to run the system.

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The two PMs will also bless the new Suzuki automobile factory in Gujarat-the third complex after Gurgaon and Manesar in Haryana. Since the early 1980s, Suzuki's engagement with India's automotive industry has successfully brought a manufacturing 'revolution' to India. The rail project and Suzuki's new venture symbolise the commitment of the two governments and business communities towards PM Modi's bold initiatives-Make in India and Skill India.

The 'Special, Strategic and Global Partnership' between the two nations increasingly gives priority to security cooperation. PM Abe's 'Free and Open Indo-Pacific Strategy' and PM Modi's 'Act East' policy promote security cooperation bilaterally and trilaterally, by engaging common friend US. This reflects in China's geopolitical advances. Beijing's 'One Belt, One Road' strategy aims to expand economic interests and politico-military influence along the ancient Silk Road and the sea lanes, from South China Sea to Europe through the Indian Ocean. Chinese harassment over territorial issues extends from India's Himalayan borders to the South China Sea and East China Sea.

India might question the validity of its own policy of strategic autonomy in the light of the new dimension of the Indo-US security relationship. The Malabar joint maritime exercises by the US and Indian navies have become a routine feature. In fact, US's Seventh Fleet covers both the Pacific and Indian Oceans. In Japan, the long-established 'three principles of export of weaponry' have been eased to promote security cooperation with friendly countries, in view of the gradually deteriorating security environment in East Asia. Some equipment, including Japanese coast guard ships if not ships of the Self-Defense Forces, has been provided to ASEAN countries threatened by Chinese expansion in South China Sea. Japan should ask itself if the above principles be eased further for security cooperation with India.

The visit by both PMs to Mahatma Gandhi's ashram in Ahmedabad will be an opportunity to make a renewed appeal that Gandhi's philosophy still holds true. They are expected to renew the commitment to promote democracy and the rule of law in the Indo-Pacific region.

Recently, I launched the book The Last Superpower India, published by Nikkei BP. I believe in some decades, India, with its size (land mass and population expanding quantitatively and improving qualitatively), growing economic and military might and increasing international influence, will acquire superpower status. No other country will emerge as a superpower after India. Currently, the United States is categorised as a superpower. China and Russia may be termed superpowers, but with suspect political systems and their sympathy toward dubious regimes, they are not respected powers. It is my hope that India would become a great peace-loving and democratic power worthy of the title 'super' in the true sense of the term.

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The author is president of the Japan-India Association and Japan's former ambassador to India

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By PTI: New Delhi, Sep 10 (PTI) India has renegotiated the pricing of liquefied natural gas (LNG) imported from Australias Gorgon project to save more than Rs 10,000 crore over the life of the contract.

Exxon Mobil Corp has agreed to charge 13.9 per cent of the prevailing Brent oil price at the port of delivery rather than previously decided 14.5 per cent of the oil rate at the port of loading, a source privy to the development said.

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"Besides changing the indexation, LNG pricing will be on DES basis rather than FOB previously decided," he added.

Delivered ex ship (DES) is a trade term requiring the seller to deliver goods to a buyer at an agreed port of arrival. Under FOB, the buyer has to make shipping arrangement.

At USD 50 per barrel oil price, Gorgon LNG, whose supplies started in January this year, would have cost USD 7.25 per million British thermal unit at the port of loading. Adding another USD 1 for transportation would have led to delivered price of USD 8.25 in the old contract.

In the new formula, Gorgon LNG delivered at Indian port will cost USD 6.95 per mmBtu.

"Happy to share good news that India has, yet again, been able to address the long-term price issue of LNG from Gorgon to suit Indian market," Oil Dharmendra Pradhan said in a tweet.

India had used its status of Asias third largest LNG buyer to renegotiate in 2015 the LNG pricing formula with Qatars Rasgas to buy the gas at half the original price.

"Indian customers will receive (Gorgon) LNG volumes at an amicable price soon. This is done in a similar way to what we did with LNG from Qatar," Pradhan said in another tweet.

Petronet LNG Ltd, Indias largest liquefied natural gas importer, had last year formally sought at least 10 per cent cut in price of LNG it plans to buy from Australias Gorgon project.

Petronet LNG, a private firm whose chairman is the oil secretary, had in August 2009 signed a 20-year deal to buy 1.44 million tonnes per annum of LNG at a price equivalent to 14.5 per cent of the prevailing oil rates.

The indexation agreed was one of the highest in the world.

Petronet had in late 2015 renegotiated price of the long-term deal to import 7.5 million tonnes per year of LNG from Qatar, helping save Rs 8,000 crore. At that time, it had also signed a contract to buy an additional 1 million tonne per annum till 2028.

"That deal for an additional 1 million tonne was at 13.05 per cent of the ruling Brent price. So naturally, the expectation is that the Gorgon should lower the indexation to a minimum 13 per cent," the source said.

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LNG in spot or current market is available at USD 5-6 per million British thermal unit where as Gorgon LNG at current formula will cost USD 7.25 per mmBtu at an oil price of USD 50 per barrel.

State-owned gas utility GAIL India, one of the four PSU promoters of Petronet, had way back in 2013 sought review of the Gorgon LNG price formula.

Its then Director (marketing) Prabhat Singh, who now is the Managing Director and CEO of Petronet LNG, had in June 2013 written a letter seeking reduction in price of Gorgon LNG.

Sources said the case of renegotiating the Gorgon deal had strengthened after Petronet last year got RasGas of Qatar to lower the rate for 7.5 million tons per annum LNG it supplies under a 25-year long term contract since 2004.

The price of imported LNG under this agreement had been linked to crude oil (Japanese Customs Cleared Crude or JCC) and had a concept of floor and ceiling indexed to last 5-year average. The rate thus arrived was higher than spot LNG.

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Petronet sought renegotiation of the deal and RasGas agreed to modify the pricing formula to link it with last 3- month average rate of Brent crude oil, they said.

GAIL, Indian Oil, Bharat Petroleum and Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) hold 12.5 per cent each in Petronet. Petronet was to get Gorgon LNG by the end of 2015, but supplies have been deferred to 2017. PTI ANZ ABM

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Champaign, IL (61820)

Today

Generally sunny despite a few afternoon clouds. High 43F. Winds ESE at 5 to 10 mph..

Tonight

Cloudy. Snow showers developing after midnight. Low near 30F. Winds ENE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of snow 60%. Snow accumulations less than one inch.
Both Army widows, Swati Mahadik and Nidhi Mishra Dubey are now Lieutenants in the Indian Army. A proud moment for them, and for all Indians.

Newly commissioned as a Lieutenant in the Indian Army, Swati Mahadik stands straight in her olive green uniform. She looks proudly at it and says, "This is my husband's dream. I had other dreams - like being with my children - but I took up his dream."

Colonel Santosh Mahadik was killed while battling terrorists in Kashmir's Kupwara in 2015. Besides his distraught wife, he was survived by their two children, Karthikee and Swaraj.

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When Swati decided to join the Army last year, she was 37. It wasn't an easy decision.

"My husband liked being in the Army. He fought against terrorism, so after he died, I decided to wear this olive green uniform," she says.

She is now a graduate of Chennai's Officers' Training Academy, and wants to follow in Col Mahadik's footsteps. If her children want to, so can they, she says.

Lt Swati Mahadik (Photo: @IRavindraShinde/Twitter)

Lt Mahadik says she owes everything to her husband, who "liberated" a spouse who was told growing up that she had to be home by 7 pm.

"He was everything to me and my children. Since his death, this training and my children have filled every day. But his void can't be filled," she recalls. Her expression evinces strength.

And just how would he feel now, seeing her in this uniform?

Lt Mahadik smiles. "My husband loves dancing. He would have danced seeing me graduate today. I know we would all be dancing."

LT. NIDHI DUBEY

Nidhi Mishra Dubey was pregnant when her husband died of a cardiac arrest. Mukesh Dubey was a Naik in the Mahar regiment.

Nidhi wanted to wear the uniform to show her son Suyash what it meant to be in the Army.

It wasn't a cakewalk - her first five attempts to pass the exam ended in failure. But that's in the past now.

"Now I am ready to serve the nation," she says.

Lt Dubey says she missed her son during training, but also that her family has been "a pillar of support."

She now wants her son to join the Army too.

Lt Nidhi Dubey (Photo: ANI)

ON INDIA'S NEW DEFENCE MINISTER

Last week, at Finance Minister Arun Jaitley's 2 Krishna Menon Marg residence in New Delhi, another woman learned she'd achieved a rather special feat.

Shortly after she was bestowed a Cabinet rank, Nirmala Sitharaman was told she could take charge of India's defence ministry that very evening, or wait till Jaitley - the interim minister - returned from Japan.

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News of Sitharaman's appointment as India's first full woman defence minister - Indira Gandhi once held the portfolio when she was PM - was widely welcomed as a milestone.

And how does Lt Swati Mahadik feel about it?

Pat comes the reply. "We all are serving the nation. No distinction between women and men."

As for Lt Dubey, she says she's happy to graduate at a time "when a woman is the defence minister."

On Saturday, both women packed their bags and said goodbye to their fellow cadets, ready to begin a role they they never dreamed they would be in as young girls.

And they walked away briskly with their children towards their new future.

ALSO READ

Indian Army to deploy women in combat role on frontlines soon?

The rise and rise of Nirmala Sitharaman: JNU alumnus, BJP leader from family of Congress supporters

FROM THE MAGAZINE | THE BIG STORY | Challenges that await Sitharaman in the mammoth ministry called Defence

WATCH VIDEO

From Army widows to lieutenants: The inspiring tale of Lt Swati and Lt Nidhi

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New Delhi: Unfazed by the recent upheavals at the board, Infosys will continue to hire about 6,000 engineers annually over next 1-2 years, same as last fiscal, according to a top company official.



The country's second largest software services firm has also ramped up its hiring process in the US and European markets as it looks to tap opportunities and tide over visa-related issues.



"...we continue to recruit. This year that just concluded we had a net addition of 6,000 and we expect similar kind of additions over the next 1 or 2 years, depending on the kind of growth you see in the market," Infosys interim-CEO and MD U B Pravin Rao said at an investor meet last week.



The Bengaluru-based firm has been in the eye of a storm over the past few months, with the founders and former board members clashing over alleged corporate governance lapses and irregularities in Infosys' USD 200-million Panaya acquisition.



The spat, which often spilled over into the public domain, led to the then CEO Vishal Sikka as well as former Chairman R Seshasayee and three other board members quitting. Co-founder Nandan Nilekani was named the non-executive Chairman in a move that was seen as the company bowing to the demands of co-founders and large institutional investors.



After Sikka's exit, Rao assumed the additional charge as interim CEO and MD. Rao said over one million graduates pass out each year, which may look like a large number but only 20-30 per cent of that is quality talent.



"(This is the number that) we and our competitors focus on...It is a question of doing more with less, how can one be more productive," he said while answering a query on whether increasing automation would result in job losses. At the end of June 2017, Infosys had a total of 1,98,553 employees on its payroll. The company does not provide country-specific headcount.



During the said quarter, Infosys hired 8,645 people at a gross level but its overall headcount was lower by 1,811 people on a net level (which factors in attrition numbers). Earlier this year, there were reports of layoffs across the IT sector. With Infosys stating that it was stepping up hiring in international markets like the US, there were concerns that it could impact the company's recruitment plans in India.



Infosys had, at that time, stated it planned to hire 20,000 people (gross) this year. Infosys has stated that it is in favour of a healthy mix of local and global personnel, even though hiring locals in overseas markets often pushes up operational costs for IT outsourcing companies.



During the investor meeting, Rao said Infosys is also looking at increasing localisation of its workforce and is recruiting about 10,000 people in the next few years and setting up development and innovation hubs in the US.



"...we have already started the process and we will only accelerate," he added.



The US, which is the largest market for Infosys, much like its peers, accounted for over 61 per cent of its topline in June 2017 quarter. Europe accounted for 22.4 per cent of the company's USD 2.65 billion (Rs 17,078 crore) revenue during April-June 2017 quarter.



To a query on the company's India business, Rao said Infosys continues to be selective about projects in the country. "...we continue to be very cautious about India...there are pricing challenges, sometimes getting payment is a challenge," he said.
Bhopal: The All India Muslim Personal Law Board has said it considers triple talaq to be absolutely valid despite the Supreme Court verdict, adding it cannot and shall not tolerate such attacks on personal law of Muslim community.



The board held its executive meet on Sunday that was attended by 50 of its members. It passed a resolution to form a committee that will advise on the method and process for undertaking a large-scale community reform within the boundaries of Islamic Sharia.



The committee will also examine the SC verdict and see if there are any inconsistencies with the Shariat. It will comprise legal experts and religious scholars and is expected to submit its report within 10 days.



AIMPLB also declared that all four Sunni schools believe that triple talaq pronounced in one sitting has its basis in the religious texts, and therefore, Talaq-e-Biddat is sinful but valid.



Kamaal Farooqui, a former Samajwadi Party leader and member of AIMPLB, said the board respects the apex court verdict, but the sanctity of belief and practices in personal or matrimonial relationship in Islamic law cannot be treated differently from the belief and practices in personal or matrimonial relationship by other citizens of India who follow their own custom and practice and have this protection.



According to executive board members, the discussion in the SC was confined to only Talaq-e-Biddat or instant talaq and the court considered only four schools of Sunni Islam - Hanafi, Maliki, Hambali and Shafai.



The board, however, completely sidelined the Shia school of Muslims. Their observation also goes against the concerns voiced by former Chief Justice of India, JS Khehar, who had questioned the counsels regarding the meaning of triple talaq for the Shias.



The majority verdict by the SC had primarily ruled instant talaq to be unconstitutional because it had no religious sanction in the Quran and found its mention only in hadiths, which were dated after Caliph Umar. The court gave weightage to the holy book over other religious scriptures.



However, the board strongly protested such a view and stated that "Islam or Shariat is based on Quran, Hadith, Ijma and Qiyas. Maulana Syed Arshad Madani, president of Jamiat Ulema I Hind, told News18, Hadith is as valid as Quran and is its soul.



The poor uneducated people often do not know that Hadith is as important as Quran and cannot be ignored. Hadith is Quran's interpretation and if you don't study Hadith, then ones knowledge of the holy book will be zero. We are asked to offer namaz in Quran but the procedure has been elaborated in Hadith, he said.



Can you ever ignore it? Hence, I do not think this verdict will be able to stop talaqs at all, said the senior Madani, an expert in Islamic law.



The board has also decided to conduct programmes and events to spread awareness on the correct procedure of talaq.



Talking about the role of the expert committee, advocate Yusuf Hatim Muchhala told News18 that its prime duty will also be to implement social reform through the principles of Islam. Its duty will be to draft a plan to implement the real Shariat by the people, he said.



The board also voiced its displeasure on the NDA governments stand that all forms of triple talaq should be abolished. In May this year, then attorney general Mukul Rohatgi had said the Centre was planning a legislation to see triple talaq is banned.



"We record our displeasure with regard to this and consider it as an attack on Muslim Personal Law. The stand of the present government regarding this is contrary to the protection guaranteed by the Constitution of India, said Kamal Farooqui, while stating the stand of the board. Assaduddin Owaisi, President of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen and Zafaryab Jilani, AIMPLB Counsel, were by his side.



The executive board meeting also had Dr Asma Zehra, one of the few woman members present their view. Speaking to News18, she said the expert committee was needed as the verdict had two parts and was conflicting.



In one part the court accords protection to Muslim personal law and in another part it invalidates triple talaq. Hence the expert committee will iron this conflict. But I don't understand why the government is after us? They want to abolish all kinds of talaq. We will not let this happen, she said.



On Bhartiya Muslim Mahila Andolans proposed Muslim Family Law, 2017, she said that such laws are being made by people who are not aware of the basics of Muslim Personal law. Anyone can draft such laws but nothing can happen unless religious experts deliberate on such an issue. But the Parliament can always legislate and we cannot stop them, she said.
Bhopal: The All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) on Sunday decided to constitute a committee that will study the Supreme Court verdict on triple talaq in detail and find a solution to the conflict between the judgment and Shariat.



Zafaryab Jilani, a member of AIMPLB and counsel for the board, told News18 that the idea was floated in board's first round of meeting today, and the committee will have lawyers and religious scholars, who will scrutinize the verdict from the legal as well as Islamic perspective. All 45 members attending the meeting agreed to the formation of this panel, he added.



The committee will submit its detailed report to the board in ten days' time based on which the board will take the future course of action, Maulana Wali Rahmani told News18.



Earlier in the day, Syed Qasim Rasool Ilyas, AIMPLB member and member of Jamaat Ulma said, We are considering filing a review petition against the verdict. We need to check the points the judges have made in our favour and what is held against us and then accordingly approach the apex court with a review petition.



During a precursory meeting on Saturday, AIMPLB refuted the observation made by the Supreme Court that since triple talaq is sinful, it cant be lawful. The personal law board further claimed that they will continue to practise Shariat, which provides for instant triple talaq.



Supreme Court judge, Justice Kurian Joseph, while penning down the triple talaq verdict had unequivocally stated that "the practice of instantaneous triple talaq was something which did not have an Islamic sanction and since it was a sinful practice, it could not be valid in the eyes of law."



Just minutes before the meeting began on Sunday, Qazi Azmat Shah Makki, General Secretary, Minority United Organisation, told News18 that an important point for consideration before the board was the six month stay put in place by SC in triple talaq and how the board would find its way around it.



They have put a stay of 6 months on instant talaq which is of no use. Now if someone gives triple talaq they will have a case against them but in Shariat there is no punishment. We are going to decide what to do in this 6 months' stay and are not concerned with this prohibition on instant talaq. Even the government has ruled out that there will be no new law on this, then what is this six months for?" said Makki.



Drawing a comparison with adultery and robbery, Maulana Wali Rahmani, General Secretary of the AIMPLB, expressed surprise that "how educated people draw such conclusions".



"Nullification of triple talaq is a very small part of the verdict. We follow Shariat and Shariat provides for instant triple talaq. We believe in triple talaq and it must and will go on. The fact remains that whoever still practices triple talaq will still continue to severe ties with his wife and it will not change. How to implement it, is a headache of the court and government," said Rahmani on Saturday.



Jilani had earlier said: The verdict by the three judges who overruled triple talalq stated that this mode of instant divorce is arbitrary. It did not speak of any constitutional article. We are now deliberating upon this point of it being arbitrary.



AIMPLB member Khalid Rashid Firangi Maili told News18.com, We are now jotting down the various interpretations of the constitutional articles involved in the verdict. We have also decided that the struggle we have been waging since the last several decades to discourage the practice of instant talaq will continue no matter what. The ratio of talaq since 1972 is 0.05% among Muslims and this has been going on since the inception of the board. Three crore women have told us that we do not want any interference in our personal laws. Political parties are trying to cash on this, but we have to protect our religion and this freedom has been guaranteed by our Constitution and it will remain forever.



Syed Jalaluddin Umri, secretary of the AIMPLB, said: In a democracy, we cannot oppose the verdict of the court, but we cannot welcome it. We have to safeguard our personal laws. The court thinks by this verdict they will save women. I am yet to understand how it will happen.



The board also cited crime records on domestic violence and stated that the communities which do not have the quick form of divorce often witness a higher number of suicide and domestic violence cases.
Srinagar: Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh visited Anantnag on Sunday and paid respects to a policeman who was martyred in a terror attack in the south Kashmir town the previous day.



Rajnath, who is on a four-day visit to Jammu and Kashmir, said: "It is unfortunate that people still don't understand the value of your (security forces) martyrdom. It's not ordinary but supreme sacrifice.



Addressing personnel from J&K police at the Anantnag Police Lines, Rajnath said this was his fourth visit to the Valley, more than that of any of his predecessors.



"I am in Kashmir not just on my own, but with a message from my PM, the Wazir-e-Azam. We are all proud of you and are confident that you will succeed in your efforts to bring peace to Kashmir and make it a jannat once again."



Rajnath Singh's visit comes in the backdrop of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Red Fort speech where he had said neither bullets nor abuse can solve the Kashmir problem.



The Union Home Minister assured the security brass that issues like allowance parity are being actively considered and funds for more bullet proofs vehicles and jackets have been released.



South Kashmir, where Anantnag is located, has seen more than 100 home grown terrorists in the past one year and has become the most terror attack prone area in recent times.



On June 16, six police personnel, including SHO Feroz Ahmad, were killed in an attack in Achabal area. The slain SHO had requisitioned a bullet-proof vehicle in view of the danger posed by militants in south Kashmir, but was not provided one.



During his visit, Rajnath Singh also announced that the Centre has allocated funds for the purchase of bullet-proof vehicles for Jammu and Kashmir Police personnel. We have allocated funds for purchase of bullet-proof vehicles for Jammu and Kashmir police," Singh said.



The Home Minister said he had come with an open mind and was willing to interact with anyone who wanted to help in resolving the problems facing Kashmir.



Singh will interact with CRPF personnel in Anantnag and is scheduled to chair a security review meeting here later in the day.



(With PTI inputs)
Srinagar: In a first, a militant surrendered early on Sunday during an encounter with security forces which broke out in Shopian district of south Kashmir the previous evening.



Police said a militant identified as Adil, who had joined militancy in May this year, surrendered after he was trapped from all sides.



Jammu and Kashmir Police officials assured him that he would not be killed after which he emerged from the debris of the house and laid down his AK-47 in front of the police officials, PTI reported.



This is for the first time in recent months that a militant has laid down his arms during an encounter, PTI reported.



Adil, a resident of Chitipora in Shopian, was immediately whisked away for questioning, they said, adding that body of another militant identified as Tariq Ahmed Dar was recovered from the encounter site. Dar was involved in many terror related incidents, they said.



Jammu and Kashmir Director General of Police SP Vaid had earlier said that boys who had taken to arms can surrender and the government would consider their cases.



Security forces had launched a cordon and search operation at Barbugh in Imam Sahib area of Shopian on Saturday evening after getting information about presence of militants there. The militants had opened fire on the search party, triggering a gunbattle.



(With PTI inputs)






Food & supplies !

Here's what it's like on board INSV Tarini 36 hours before the global sailing expedition begins. #NavikaSagarParikrama pic.twitter.com/R8CPX4WSeg  Livefist (@livefist) September 8, 2017

A team of six naval officers are starting a historic and gruelling around-the-world mission on Sunday  the first circumnavigation of the globe by an Indian all-female crew.Lieutenant Commander Vartika Joshi, who is leading the voyage which will begin in the western state of Goa, said the project was "revolutionary" in bringing women to the helm and would inspire others in the country.In recent years, the Indian Navy has sought to open its doors to women to take on more challenging roles, with the latest project winning the backing of Prime Minister Narendra Modi who urged the crew to "project India's capabilities and strengths across the world".The navy commissioned a 17-metre (56-foot) yacht "Tarini" in February for the mission, with the crew kicking off preparations for the voyage in 2014."For me, it's a matter of conquering a feat that has been achieved by a chosen few," Lieutenant Commander Pratibha Jamwal told AFP."It's not been an easy journey in terms of preparation but as they say 'the more you sweat in peace, the less you bleed in war'," she added.Retired naval officer Captain Dilip Dhonde, who undertook India's first solo around-the-world expedition in 2009-10, mentored the crew.The team sailed twice to Mauritius and once to Cape Town in preparation."It is going to boost the spirits of everybody across the country. Not just women but it can also be an inspiration for the male counterparts. Our aim is to rekindle the spirit of adventure," Joshi said.Their journey will feature stops in Australia, New Zealand, the Falkland islands and South Africa. They are expected to return to Goa in March next year.
Management of Ryan International School in Gurugram has been booked over the murder of a Class 2 student on school premises on September 8. The boys father has demanded a CBI probe, alleging a bigger conspiracy by school authorities. Meanwhile, protests by angry parents outside the school have taken a violent turn with demonstrators being lathicharged by police after they set fire to a liquor shop nearby. Some of the protesters allege that a conductor who is in police custody is being framed by school authorities.

Stay tuned for live updates:

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Bhopal/New Delhi: First it was the Indian Christian Marriage Act 1872, then came the Parsi Marriage and Divorce Act 1936, followed by the Hindu Marriage Act 1955 and the Hindu Succession Act 1956. India, a secular democratic republic, has codified family laws for all major religions, except Islam. And while the idea of Uniform Civil Code (UCC) is still at a nascent stage, buoyed by the recent Supreme Court verdict declaring instant triple talaq unconstitutional, groups of Muslim women have proposed a law governing Muslim family norms to ensure gender justice and do away with adhocism.



Interestingly, much like legal fight against instant triple talaq, these Muslims women are not only getting support from women across communities but also from sections of the Sangh parivar, making it appear like a possibility in near future.



Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan, an advocacy group, has proposed a draft for Muslim Family Law 2017, which it claims is a result of nine years efforts by Muslim women from 15 states. BMMA activists say they are reaching out to women MPs across parties to ensure that Parliament takes up the issue in the next session to ensure that not only triple talaq is prohibited but other brutal and inhuman practices like polygamy and nikah halala are also ended. There should also be a common procedure, according to Islam, with regard to marriage and divorce.



Zakia Soman, co-founder of BMMA said the proposal is as good as a draft law and looks beyond the issues of triple talaq and marriage, taking into account inheritance and adoption, which are totally skewed in the favour of men due to misogynistic stand of All India Muslim Personal Law Board.



News18 has accessed a copy of the proposal, which is being sent to the Ministry of Women and Child Development and the National Commission for Women.



The proposal  draft Muslim Family Law 2017  not only seeks total ban on instant triple talaq but also prescribes the procedure of divorce, giving women an equal say.



During the arguments in the triple talaq case in the Supreme Court in May, senior advocate Indira Jaising, arguing for Bebaak Collective, one of the petitioners, had stated that While divorce in Islam was judicial (resort to courts) for a wife, it was extra-judicial (at the comfort of home and his own will) for a husband.



This argument seems to have formed the backbone of the draft proposal. According to the draft, whoever wants divorce, regardless of gender, the method has to be Talaq-E-Ehsan, which mandates a compulsory period of gaps between the three utterances of divorce coupled with efforts of arbitration and mediation. The one who seeks divorce will have to file an application with Qazi, Darul Qaza or a court. Then an arbitrator will call the other party for mediation and there will have to be a three-month gap before the marriage comes to an end.



Noorjehan Niaz, another co-founder of BMMA said, "Khula (divorce sought by woman) will no more be dependent on the consent of a man. It will no more be extra judicial for the man and judicial for the woman. Our draft seeks to make both judicial."



Further, the proposed draft makes it difficult for either of the spouses to not cooperate in the divorce proceedings. It states that if a spouse refuses to cooperate in the reconciliation or dissolution of marriage proceedings initiated at the behest of the other spouse, it may amount to misconduct and may be a ground for approaching the court for dissolution of marriage.



The draft also seeks an explicit end to the practice of polygamy, nikah halala and muta (temporary) marriage. The aspect of penalty has been left for the parlimentarians to debate and decide.



It also seeks that marriage should only take place when the Muslim woman is of 18 years and the Muslim man is of 21 years. With regard to Mehr, which forms a compulsory payment by the groom to the bride on the occasion of the marriage, it seeks that Mehr cannot be less than what the groom earns annually.



It states that every marriage needs to be registered after it's enactment and the clerics who conduct the marriage should be made accountable to such a law.



This comes at a time when the AIMPLB executive board is meeting in Bhopal. Earlier, Maulana Wali Rahmani had told News18 that the Supreme Court verdict on triple talaq ensures protection for personal law and Uniform Civil Code is impossible in India.



Soman, however, said the proposed draft seeks "to achieve harmony between the tenets of the Quran and the Constitution".



"It is possible to achieve this because both of them speak of Justice. The only problem is the AIMPLB, which tries to bring out rules that suit its own patriarchal worldview. If all communities' personal laws have been codified, then why exclude only the Muslims?" asked Soman.



The draft also speaks elaborately on the aspect of inheritance and bats for equal rights for sons and daughters. The daughters' share will be equal to that of the sons' by even the way of Hiba or gift in Islam. It also states that both father and mother will be the natural guardian of the child.



Draft proposal of Muslim Family Law 2017 also takes into account the case of adoption, but hasn't gone in detail to formulate a process as Islam prohibits adoption. "In case a Muslim couple wishes to adopt, then they are free to do so under The Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection) Act of 2000, which after the 2006 amendment, allows any Indian citizen to adopt a child who is legally free for adoption," Niaz told News18.



When asked, Muslim Rashtriya Manch leader Indresh Kumar said since the demand is coming from the Muslim society it must be looked into. "Nowhere in the world there is a Muslim Personal Law Board. It is only here and has no constitutional, Islamic or social validity. We asked Muslims about the personal laws -- there are different sects and practices within them, but over the period of time some socially regressive practices creeped in the religion like polygamy and halala. These have no backing from the Quran or the Constitution," he said.



"When the triple talaq verdict came out, Muslim women got justice... their religion also commands watan parasti and obedience to the rule of the land," he added.
Six female Indian Navy officers today began a circumnavigation attempt, sailing from Goa on board the INSV Tarini. This is the first all-woman crew in Indian history to attempt circumnavigation.

By India Today Web Desk: Six female officers of the Indian Navy today began a historic journey that will test their combined endurance and sailing skills. The six women left aboard the Indian Naval Sailing Vessel Tarini on a circumnavigation effort that will see the officers spend more than 200 days at sea.

This is the first time in India's history that an all-woman crew is attempting to circumnavigate the globe. Previous notable attempts to circle the world include Captain (retd.) Dilip Donde's solo circumnavigation and Cdr Abhilash Tomy's non-stop circumnavigation of the globe.

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Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman today flagged off 55-foot INSV Tarini from the INS Mandovi naval training base in Goa, bidding adieu to Tarini's skipper, Lt. Commander Vartika Joshi, and crew, Lt. Commanders Pratibha Jamwal, P Swathi, and Lieutenants S Vijaya Devi, B Aishwarya and Payal Gupta.

Click here to Enlarge The six-member all-woman crew of INSV Tarini during today's flagging-off ceremony (Photo: Twitter/DefMinIndia)

"This is not an occasion which can happen once in five years, once in ten years. This is a historic day for India. A historic day, which will be marked in navigation history and globally," Sitharaman said, after flagging off 'Navika Sagar Parikrama', the official name of the circumnavigation effort.

"Our women are going to stand out for doing something which mostly wouldn't even have been thought of," Sitharaman, India's first full-time female defence minister, said at the event, which was attended by former defence minister and current Goa Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar.

Several sailing enthusiasts bid Tarini bon voyage as the naval ship headed out of the Goa harbour. Here's a video of the event, shared by the Indian Navy on Twitter:

Top Navy brass - including Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral Sunil Lanba, and Flag Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Southern Naval Command, Vice Admiral AR Karve, attended the flagging off ceremony.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who met the six women last month, sent out his wishes to INSV Tarini's crew earlier in the day.

"Today is a special day! 6 women officers of the Navy begin their journey of circumnavigating the globe on board INSV Tarini," PM Modi tweeted. "The entire nation comes together in wishing the all-women team of Navika Sagar Parikrama the very best in their remarkable endeavour."

Click here to Enlarge The six female Indian Navy officers who today began a circumnavigation effort met Prime Minister Narendra Modi alongwith Admiral Sunil Lamba on August 16 (Photo: Twitter/Indian Navy)

SEVEN-MONTH JOURNEY

INSV Tarini and its six-member all-woman crew is expected to anchor back in Goa sometime in April, 2018. The 55-foot sailing vessel was indigenously built and was inducted into Navy earlier this year.

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During their circumnavigation journey the crew will make four stopover - Fremantle (Australia), Lyttleton (New Zealand), Port Stanley (Falklands), and Cape Town (South Africa). The first leg of the journey will see the women sail from Goa to Australia.

The journey will see the officers sail through three oceans - Indian, Pacific and Atlantic. During the voyage, the crew will monitor and report marine pollution on the high seas, and collate and update meteorological, ocean and wave data in order to help the India Meteorological Department (IMD) better forecast the weather. The data will also be used to for research and development by various Indian organisations.

The crew is also expected to meet with Persons of Indian Origin during their port-calls in Australia, New Zealand, Falklands and South Africa.

Click here to Enlarge INSV Tarini will make five stops during its circumnavigation bid (Photo: Twitter/Indian Navy)

(With inputs from agencies)

ALSO READ | Indian Navy goes hunting for heavyweight torpedoes for submarines, approaches global companies

ALSO READ | INS Khanderi, Indian Navy's second Scorpene-class submarine, launched in Mumbai

ALSO READ | Nirmala Sitharaman joins the league of powerful woman defence ministers in 15 other countries

--- ENDS ---

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Gurugram: The Haryana government on Sunday said it was not averse to ordering a CBI probe into the killing of a seven-year-old boy at Ryan International School and has asked the Gurgaon Police to book the school owner under the Juvenile Justice Act.



Education minister Ram Bilas Sharma also said that there have been lapses on part of the school administration.



"We accept negligence on part of the Ryan International School but the school cannot be derecognised as the future of 1200 students is at stake," Sharma said.



"We have directed the Gurgaon Police to book the owner of Ryan International School, Albert Pinto under section 75 Juvenile Justice (care and punishment act) Act 15 for punishment for cruelty to child meted out by the custodian in the charge sheet to be submitted in the court within 7 days.



"Some loopholes in the security are visible in the case and the toilet window was also found broken from inside," Sharma told PTI.



He said the charge sheet in the case will be ready within a week as police was speedily conducting the probe, but stressed that if the parents of the child insist on a probe by the CBI or any other agency the government will accede to their demand.



Talking to reporters here, Sharma also made it clear that school management has to take responsibility for the safety and security of children.



"We are issuing directives in this regard to all schools including private ones," he said.



"We held a meeting today in which the demand to derecognise the school came up, but we also had to take into account the fact that 1200 students are studying there. The parents of students studying in this school were against this step and therefore we felt taking such a step will not be right," he said.



"However, any kind of lapse, by the management or the owner, against all of them we have initiated action," he said.



The boy was found murdered with his throat slit in the school washroom in Gurgaon on Friday. The school's acting principal was suspended and the security staff removed. The police claimed the student was killed by bus conductor Ashok Kumar, who tried to sexually abuse him.



The accused was arrested within hours of the murder after which a court in Gurgaon sent him to police custody for three days.



"The murder accused has already been arrested. Now, within a week, police after collecting all necessary evidence will submit a chargesheet in court. However, still if the parents are not satisfied, then Haryana government is ready to get the matter probed by any agency.



"I am hopeful that when we will produce the accused before court within a week with all evidences collected by the police, the parents of the child will be satisfied with the action being taken," he said.



Sharma said, "We have fixed a seven-day deadline and in case where the accused is booked under Section 302 of IPC (for murder), this is the minimum time in such cases. However, if the child's parents still feel they are not satisfied,then as per their wish we can get the case investigated by any agency including CBI".



"We have full sympathy with the parents of the child. If any issue of providing financial help the Haryana government comes up will be willing to help," he said.



The minister made it clear that the Haryana government will not show any leniency in the matter."Whatever strict action needs to be taken as per law will be taken in this case," he asserted.



He also said a liquor vend near the school has been ordered to be shut down permanently.


New Delhi: The murder of a seven-year-old student in Ryan International School in Gurugram snowballed into a big controversy on Sunday after police lathicharged protesters demanding the arrest of the school management.



According to reports, at least 50 people were injured in the lathicharge, including some journalists, after a liquor shop was allegedly set on fire. Cameras of some photojournalists were also damaged during the protest.



Some of the demonstrators even threw liquor bottles inside school premises, police told PTI. The liquor shop is barely 50 m from the school.



"The Gurugram Police had to use mild lathicharge to disperse the agitators. The police detained over 20 protesters found agitating outside the school," Ravinder Kumar, PRO Gurugram Police, told PTI.



Gurugram Police Commissioner Sandeep Khirwar denied the charges of targeting media persons.



The protesters deny the police version that the protest had turned violent which necessitated the lathicharge. "We were protesting peacefully outside the school but police suddenly baton-charged us without any provocation," a protestor told IANS.



The protesters were demanding that the school should be shut until a CBI probe is ordered into the incident. They also alleged that school drivers and conductors often consume alcohol from the liquor shop in their free time.



A panel constituted to look into shortcomings of the school has submitted their report to the Gurugram police. The report, accessed by CNN-News18, has highlighted the poor security at the school, particularly the lack of separate toilets for male and female students.



Based on the report, Gurugram Deputy Commissioner of Police has recommended strict action against the school.



Meanwhile, Haryana Education Minister Rambilas Sharma said that the management of Ryan International School, Gurugram, and owner will be booked under the Juvenile Act.



Sharma said the Haryana government was not averse to recommending a CBI probe. He also alleged that there have been lapses on part of the school administration.



"We accept negligence on part of the Ryan International School but the school cannot be derecognised as the future of 1,200 students is at stake," he told PTI.



"We have directed the Gurgaon Police to book the owner of Ryan International School, Albert Pinto, under section 75 of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Punishment) Act, 2015, for cruelty to a child meted out by the custodian in the charge sheet to be submitted in the court within 7 days. Some loopholes in the security are visible in the case and the toilet window was also found broken from inside," he added.



The body of Pradyuman Thakur whose body was found around 8 am on Friday by another student in the schools washroom. His throat had been slit and a knife was found next to the body.



The school's acting principal was suspended and the security staff removed. The police claimed the student was killed by school bus conductor Ashok Kumar, who tried to sexually abuse him.



The case has acquired political overtones with opposition condemning the lathicharge on protesters.



Former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda told PTI, "People's anger in this case is a natural reaction. A heinous crime has been committed, an innocent child has been murdered. If parents of the child want a CBI probe into the case, the government should not hesitate."



On the lathicharge he said, I have come to know that even media persons on duty have been lathicharged in Gurgaon today and have sustained injuries and equipment of some of them got damaged as a result.



"This government has lost the trust and confidence of the public. By assaulting mediapersons, the government is trying to suppress voice of the people," he added.



Ryan International Schools CEO, meanwhile, has responded to the accusations against the school saying that the intvestgation so far does not hold Ryan responsible for the crime.The school won't succumb to "false allegations", he added.



(With Agency inputs)
Washington: Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi will interact with global thinkers, political leaders and overseas Indians in the US this week on international economic and technology issues, an organiser of his visit said.



Gandhi, 47, begins his nearly two-week trip to the US with an address at the University of California, Berkeley, tomorrow (Monday) on contemporary India and the path forward for the world's largest democracy.



His great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru, India's first prime minister, delivered a speech at Berkeley in 1949. "The purpose of the visit is two-fold. One is to meet interesting and global thinkers, to have a conversation on what is happening world over on economy, on technology, on opportunities, and really understand different views from experts on the global scene," technocrat Sam Pitroda, who is involved with the preparations of Gandhi's visit, told PTI.



Pitroda worked with Gandhi's father and former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi for nearly a decade to transform India's telecom sector.



He said Gandhi will meet overseas Indians at an event in New York as part of an outreach by the Congress party.



The Congress vice president is scheduled to visit Washington DC. He is likely to address members of the think-tank community at an event organised by the Centre for American Progress, and interact with the corporate world at another programme organised by the US-India Business Council.



Gandhi may meet some members of the ruling Republican Party. "A lot of these meetings are going to be small and private," Pitroda said.



"He wants to understand more about what's happening globally and what's the global view of the situation is," he said.



The Congress vice president has often visited the US, but this could possibly be the first time in his political career that Gandhi would hold public meetings, meet political leaders and deliver speeches in the country.



"You know he needs to be out, he needs to express his views. You know he has been not, may be, talking publicly about his trips. But I think, it is important that he meets a large number of people this time and also overseas Congress members," Pitroda said.



"Today, the view of India is one short of protected by one group of people. We need to really talk about Indian aspirations, Indian concerns about what is going on not just in India but the world over. Rise of populism is one topic I am sure will come up in the conversation," Pitroda said.



He said Gandhi would interact with Silicon Valley people, where the technology, talent and Indian "brain power" is concentrated. "So, the idea is if you were to meet a lot of Silicon Valley people, it is better to talk about things in San Francisco."



Gandhi will also address a gathering at the Princeton University.


New Delhi: The surgical strikes across the Line of Control were precise and conducted at a frenetic pace but the Major, who led the daredevil mission, says the return was the most difficult part and bullets fired by the enemy soldiers were so close that they were whistling past their ears.



The Army Major speaks about the stunning mission in a new book being brought out on the first anniversary of the surgical strikes in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.



The officer is referred to as Major Mike Tango in the book, titled India's Most Fearless: True Stories of Modern Military Heroes.



The Army had decided to use soldiers from the units that had suffered losses in the Uri attack for the elaborate revenge mission.



A Ghatak platoon was formed and soldiers from the two units that had lost men were roped in to man border posts and provide crucial terrain intelligence and support to the mission that lay ahead.



"Tactically, this was a smart move  few knew the lay of the frontier land better than they did. But there was another astute reason.



"Involving them in the mission would at least begin to lay the ghosts of Uri to rest," says the book.



About the details of the planning, it says, "The target list was scrutinised along a top-secret chain of command that numbered barely a handful of people, with 'need to know' rules applicable throughout.



"The options were vetted by designated officers from the Intelligence Bureau and the Research and Analysis Wing, before a final recommended brief was presented to the government."



Maj. Tango was entrusted with the job of leading the operation to carry out the strikes.



"As team Leader, Maj. Tango had chosen every man himself, including the officers and men who would play a supporting role. He was also acutely aware of the fact that the lives of 19 men were, quite literally, in his hands," the book says.



Though Maj. Tango chose the best men for the job, one thing was bothering him  the de-induction or the return. "That's where I knew I could lose guys," the book quotes him as recalling.



"Even the actual attack was not something that flustered the commandos. It was the return, an uphill trek to the LoC that was the truly daunting part.



"Their backs would be facing a blaze of fire from Pakistan Army posts, belatedly roused from their slumber. And the dominant position held by the posts would make the escaping warriors easy targets to spot and kill," the book says.



A total of four terror launch pads operated by Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and protected by the Pakistan Army were selected.



"Through a series of masked communications over mobile, Maj. Tango's men contacted four 'assets'- two local villagers in PoK and two Pakistani nationals operating in the area  both moles in the dreaded Jaish-e-Mohammed terror group, men who had been turned by Indian agencies a few years before.



"All the four assets separately confirmed the target information that was placed before them. In terms of intelligence, there was nothing further for the team to do on this side of the LoC," the book says.



The book, written by Shiv Aroor and Rahul Singh and published by Penguin India, tells 14 true stories of extraordinary courage and fearlessness, providing a glimpse into the kind of heroism India's soldiers display in unthinkably hostile conditions and under grave provocation.



The mission was brief  the soldiers were expected to reach their targets, study the latest intelligence they could possibly access with their satellite devices and then proceed to wipe out every man they saw there, the book says.



The weapons and equipment were then finalised. "Maj. Tango would be armed with his M4A1 5.56-mm carbine, the rest of the assault team with a mix of M4A1s and standard-issue Israeli Tavor TAR-21 assault rifles, Instalaza C90 disposable grenade launchers and Galil sniper rifles. Batteries on night-vision equipment were checked and other devices were charged too," the book says.



Two of the terror launch pads identified as targets for Maj. Tango's team were well inside PoK and roughly 500 metres away from each other, it says.



"Each launch pad is really a transit staging area for terrorist infiltrators before they are sent across the LoC. Both launch pads were close to Pakistan Army posts for logistical and administrative purposes. ISI handlers would often visit these launch pads before infiltration attempts," according the book.



"From the moment the firefight began until the last bullet was fired, it had been just over an hour. The frenetic pace of the assault meant the teams, now united after the split attack on two launch pads, would prepare to leave with only a very rough estimate of the number of terrorists they had managed to kill: 20. The figure would be corroborated days later by India's external intelligence.



"A total of 38-40 terrorists and two Pakistan Army personnel were killed at the four targets. The three separate teams had simultaneously struck 4 launch pads across the LoC. Their entry into PoK had been coordinated and precisely timed," it says.



As for the return, the major decided to take not the route used to enter PoK but a different path that was longer and more circuitous, but comparatively safe. But while the Indian soldiers were returning, the Pakistan Army posts opened fire with everything they had  enraged by the cross-border strike.



"At one point, the bullets were so close, they were whistling past our ears. There's a familiar put-put sound when rounds fly very close to your head," Maj. Tango recalls. "If I were a foot taller, I would have been hit many times over."



During the circuitous escape, the men were frequently flat on the ground as trees in their path were shredded to bits by hails of ammunition, the book says.



"A particularly vulnerable 60-metre patch in the de-induction route gave the commandos their closest call. Still flat on their bellies, but with no natural feature hiding them, they needed to slither the full distance without being hit. Crossing in pairs as ammunition hit the ground inches from them, Maj. Tango's team made it to the LoC before the sun was up, finally crossing it at 0430 hours."
Swati,wife of Col Santosh Mahadik(who lost his life fighting terrorists in J&K in 2015) commissioned as Army Officer pic.twitter.com/mAXCTwRPe8  ANI (@ANI) September 9, 2017

In an inspiring example of grit and courage, the wife of Colonel Santosh Mahadik, who was killed fighting terrorists in Jammu and Kashmir nearly two years back, on Saturday joined the army as an officer after 11 months of gruelling training.38-year-old Swati Mahadik, a mother of two, was commissioned in the Army in the rank of Lieutenant and will be posted with the Army Ordnance Corps in Pune. Her husband Col Mahadik, a recipient of the Sena medal for gallantry, was killed in an anti-terror operation in Kupwara in north Kashmir in November 2015."I wanted to be close to him by joining the Army. Uniform was his first love and that is why I have decided to join the army so that I can wear the uniform. I want to give a way of life to my children which he would have given to them," Swati told PTI.Mahadik, 39, was an officer from the Army's elite 21 Para Special forces and according to his colleagues, he was known for always leading from the front.Following her husband's footstep, Swati had joined joined the Army's Officers Training Academy (OTA) in October last year.Swati's children -- 12-year-old daughter Kartikee and 7-year-old son Swaraj -- were present at the ceremony where she was commissioned into the army."Swati Mahadik was today commissioned as an officer after she completed her training at the OTA in Chennai," said a senior Army officer.He said Swati will join the Army Ordnance Corps in Pune. Col Mahadik was critically injured during the operation in the Haji Naka forest area of Kupwara and later succumbed to his injuries at a hospital. He was awarded the Sena Medal for gallantry during Operation Rhino in the North-East in 2003.Another woman -- Nidhi Dubey -- was also commissioned as an officer today. Nidhi had also lost her husband who was a Naik in the Army. Like Swati, Nidhi was also commissioned as Lieutenant.
New Delhi: A five-year-old girl was raped in the classroom of Tagore Public School in east Delhis Shahdara allegedly by the school peon, highlighting the sorry state of child safety conditions in educational institutions.



Police said the accused, who has been working in the school for three years, took the girl inside an empty classroom around 11.45 am when he was roaming the corridors after handing over lunchboxes to the teachers. He also allegedly threatened the girl of dire consequences.



The crime came to light when the child complained of bleeding and pain in her private parts to her mother. She was taken to a hospital where a medical examination confirmed sexual assault, the police said.



The girl was sent for counselling during which she revealed that she was assaulted by "a man wearing a cap" and also described his physical attributes.



Based on the description, the police arrested the 40-year-old peon who previously worked as a security guard at the same school.



The Delhi government has ordered a magisterial probe into the case. The probe team will be headed by the Sub-Divisional Magistrate of Vivek Vihar and the team will submit its report within three days.



Speaking to CNN-News18, the childs uncle alleged the school had employed the accused without proper verification. Why did the school employ him without verification? The Delhi Police are yet to take action against the school. We want strict action against the school and those in-charge at the time, he said.



The case further raises questions on the issue of child safety in schools, coming two days after a Class 2 boy was murdered in Gurugrams Ryan International School. Gurugram police said a bus conductor arrested the same day confessed to killing the boy after a failed sexual assault attempt. Parents protesting outside the school on Sunday have alleged a bigger cover-up by the school.




Mother Urges 9-Year-Old Daughter To Undergo Surgery To Look Prettier, What She Said
Bhopal (Khanugaon): The All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) on Saturday refuted the observation made by the Supreme Court that since triple talaq is sinful, it cant be lawful. The personal law board further claimed that they will continue to practise Shariat, which provides for instant triple talaq.



The board said that it is a misconception and triple talaq can still be valid in law and never be disregarded, even if its sinful. During Sundays executive meeting, the board will be looking at finding legal solutions to the clash between Shariat and the Supreme Court ruling.



Supreme Court judge, Justice Kurian Joseph, while penning down the triple talaq verdict had unequivocally stated that "the practice of instantaneous triple talaq was something which did not have an Islamic sanction and since it was a sinful practice, it could not be valid in the eyes of law."



Drawing a comparison with adultery and robbery, Maulana Wali Rahmani, General Secretary of the AIMPLB, expressed surprise that "how educated people draw such conclusions".



"Yes, we had stated that instant talaq was a sinful practice, but how does it mean that what is sinful in the eyes of God cannot be valid in law. I don't know how educated people say that if something is sinful, can't be a part of the law. Suppose a robbery takes place, can you still say that since it's a sinful act, it did not happen. If a spouse commits adultery, will you say it did not happen because it is sinful?" said Rahmani.



Key members of the AIMPLB had gathered on Saturday at Khanugaon in Bhopal to address a gathering of Muslims just before the scheduled executive board meeting on Sunday to clear out certain confusions and make sure there is complete support to implement the decisions that will be taken on Sunday.



Though the SC verdict on triple talaq ran into hundreds of pages in which the court discussed the validity of the practice of instant talaq, Rahmani termed the discussion, a miniscule part of the verdict, with the larger picture being the insulation given to personal laws.



"Nullification of triple talaq is a very small part of the verdict. We follow Shariat and Shariat provides for instant triple talaq. We believe in triple talaq and it must and will go on. The fact remains that whoever still practices triple talaq will still continue to severe ties with his wife and it will not change. How to implement this is headache of court and government," said Rahmani to the gathering which was by now nodding their heads in agreement.



Later, Rahmani told News18 that while the SC verdict looks at the aspect of triple talaq in Muslim Personal Law, it clashes with the Shariat. "This conflict will be reduced on legal grounds in Sundays meeting," said the General Secretary.



The board members did not hesitate to elaborate on why women were not given equal rights to divorce in Islam and attributed it to their "frivolous temperament" and "unwise decision making".



Maulana Mohammad Umrain Mahfooz Rahmani, Secretary of AIMPLB said that if a woman was given the rights to divorce equally, then "most of the families would have been broken by now with unhappy marriages".



"The woman have not been given the right because they get angry very soon and have no control over their temper. It would have destroyed a lot of families by now. Hence, this law is justice not only for men but also for women. It is the beauty of Islam that women have been given rights but within its boundaries," said Rahmani.



In Islamic law, although all options of divorce have been given to men, Khula as an option can be exercised by a woman to seek divorce on her own but with the consent of the husband.



Rahmani, however, buttressed his point that "talaq is not the problem but a solution to the problem" and that "a negative image about the community was being created".



"People are trying to tamper with the Shariat. The law of Allah cannot be wrong. Talaq is not a mode of injustice or oppression and the Prophet, in his last sermon called for respecting woman," the secretary said.



Rahmani went on to compare the women who were given talaq, with the ones who were abandoned in other religious communities. AIMPLB stated that talaq "was an easy way out rather than dragging it for saat janam (seven lives).



"There are men who have abandoned their wives and have not seen them for years. The prime example of this is our Wazir-e-Azam, Prime Minister Modi. His poor wife is still waiting for her husband, but he never cares to visit her. Look at the widows of Vrindavan and what they go through," said Rahmani.



The board also cited crime records on domestic violence and stated that the communities which do not have the quick form of divorce often witness a higher number of suicide and domestic violence cases.



With the tussle of Shariat and Constitution flaring up after the Supreme Court verdict, AIMPLB is seeking options from legal experts to construe a harmonious way out.



Khalid Rashid Firangi Mahli, a member of AIMPLB told News18, "We are going to consult a host of legal experts on Sunday to suggest us how can we avoid Shariats clash with the SC verdict."
A few days back, Kareena Kapoor Khan and Saif Ali Khans little munchkin Taimur was seen having a meltdown at the Airport as mommy Kareena tried her best to cheer him up. Taimur Ali Khan Pataudi is back in town after spending some time in Delhi with mommy Kareena Kapoor Khan for Veere Di Weddings first schedule. His new pictures with mommy Kareena are here. Needless to say, he looks adorable and youd once again call Taimur the cutest celebrity kid on the block.The little nawab looked smart and dapper in a checked blue shirt with denims and striped sneakers. Taimur looked super happy to be back to home. If Taimurs adorable face was not enough, Kareena Kapoor Khan walked the airport as if she's walking a runway. She turned true to her image of being the 'boss mommy' as she slayed in a formal attire. Kareena looked super hot at the airport smiling and posing for the shutterbugs holding little Taimur in her arms. She was spotted wearing black trousers with a white shirt and blazer. Sexy shades and grey heels completed her look.It felt that the little one was comfortable around paparazzi as he smiled and looked at peace around shutterbugs.The actress was in Delhi to begin the shooting schedule for Veerey Di Weddin co-starring Sonam Kapoor, Swara Bhaskar and Shikha Talsania and the little munchkin will keep his mother company on the film sets.
Mumbai: Sanjay Dutt, who has started promoting his comeback movie Bhoomi, on Saturday said scripting of the next Munna Bhai series is in progress but it will not be on the lines of Munna Bhai Chale America.



Dutt, who was present for the promotional interviews of Bhoomi, was asked about the teaser released years ago for Munna Bhai Chale America and if the film would be on the lines of the teaser, Sanjay said: "No, I don't think so. Since I can't get an American Visa, it's not going to happen."



On the film's (Munna Bhai) progress, Dutt said: "As far as I know from the conversations with Rajuji and Vinodji, scripting is going on right now. As soon as they finish shooting for the biopic (on Sanjay Dutt), Rajuji will start working on the script (of Munna Bhai) himself. And I am hoping by everyone's wishes and God's grace, the film will be ready by next year."



Speaking about Bhoomi and the success of its trailer and music, Dutt said: "I am not feeling nervous. The trailer has been appreciated and people have also liked the songs, but I hope people like the film, since we have all worked hard for it. It is a commercial entertainer with a message."



Bhoomi is a revenge drama that centers around the relationship between a father and a daughter.



Commenting on the comparison being made with other films like Sridevi's Mom or Dutt's own Pita, the actor said: "Every film is compared with another and I think all films have something or the other in common.



"The topic may be the same, but the scenes are different, characters are different and the father-daughter bonding is different. It has its own feel, its own connect and its own support system."



The film cast includes Sanjay Dutt, Aditi Rao Hydari and Sidhant Gupta.



Directed by Omung Kumar and presented by T-Series and Legend Studios, the film is set to hit the screens on September 22.
By PTI: (EDS: Updating with fresh inputs)

By Lalit K Jha

Washington, Sep 10 (PTI) Millions of people, including thousands of Indian-Americans, in Florida braced for "life- threatening" Hurricane Irma which hit the states southern islands today as a category four storm after leaving a trail of destruction across the Caribbean.

It is expected to pummel the low-lying Florida Keys with winds reaching 130mph, before travelling north-west up Floridas Gulf Coast.

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More than 6.3 million people were told to evacuate Florida, with warnings of a huge storm surge that would be "life-threatening" to anyone in its path.

Irma has already devastated parts of the Caribbean with at least 25 deaths. About 60 Indian nationals are being evacuated from the vacation island of St Martin in the Caribbean.

The eye of the Category 4 storm was 24 kilometers southeast of Key West.

The eye is a region of mostly calm weather at the center of strong tropical cyclones. The eye of a storm is a roughly circular area, typically 30?65 km in diameter.

Around 120,000 Indian-Americans reside across Florida while thousands of them live in the now-dangerous zones of Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Tampa.

Miami and Tampa appeared "ghost towns" as nervous residents, many of whom struggled to cope with abandoning their homes, moved to safer places following mandatory evacuation notices.

The National Weather Service (NWS) said Irma regained strength as a Category 4 storm - after being downgraded to Category 3 for more than 12 hours - as it moved to Florida.

The Indian embassy in the US has opened a round-the-clock helpline number and rushed senior diplomats to Atlanta to lead relief efforts for Indian-Americans stuck in the region.

The hotline number is 202-258-8819.

Embassy officials said Indias Ambassador to the US Navtej Sarna was closely monitoring the situation.

Sandeep Chakravorty, Indias consul-general in New York, was in Atlanta overseeing preparation for relief efforts from a 24X7 control room.

The Indian Consulate in Atlanta tweeted helpline numbers (+14044052567 & +1678179393) for people seeking assistance.

"Atlanta is fully prepared to take care of evacuees from Florida. Some have already reached. Consulate is on call 24x7," it said in another tweet.

External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar tweeted 24X7 helpline at High Commission of India, Kingston (+1876 833 4500; +1876 564 1378). He also tweeted email ids for Indians to contact in case of emergency: hc.kingston@mea.gov.in; hoc.kingston@mea.gov.in.

The Indian Friends of Atlanta - in association with the Consulate-General of India, the Gujarat Samaj Atlanta and the Hindu Temple of Atlanta - have operationalised three shelters.

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They were preparing to open more shelters and provide food. Several Indian businesses have started contributing to relief efforts.

The Indian embassy in Venezuela tweeted the helpline number in Aruba, a tiny Dutch Caribbean island off the coast of Venezuela, for the situation in Sint Maarten: 00297-593- 2552.

The helpline numbers in Curacao, a Dutch Caribbean island, is 005999-513-2407; 005999-690-2686.

The Indian embassy in the Netherlands said countrymen affected by Irma can reach them on: 0031643743800.

Those affected in Cuba, Dominican Republic and Haiti can contact Indian authorities on emergency no. +5352131818 or email them at: controlroomindiairma@gmail.com.

Almost entire Florida was under hurricane warning.

US President Donald Trump reviewed preparedness with his cabinet colleagues at Camp David in Maryland. He asked federal and state agencies expedite assistance to affected areas.

"This is a storm of enormous destructive power, and I ask everyone in the storms path to pay heed to all instructions from government officials," Trump said.

Florida Governor Rick Scott asked people to move out of the danger zones as soon as possible. "The state has never seen anything like this. The storms surge can kill you."

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The US Army has so far deployed more than 7,400 soldiers and US Army Corps of Engineers civilians on the US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and the continental US.

The Pentagon said the army has over 140 aircraft, 650 trucks, 150 boats prepared, additional resources on standby.

AccuWeather, a forecast weather agency, warned Irma will unleash destructive winds, flooding, rain and inundating seas.

"Unfortunately, there is no way the US is going to avoid another catastrophic weather event," AccuWeather president Joel N Myers said.

"[It will be] the worst single hurricane to hit Florida since Hurricane Andrew in 1992," Myers said. PTI LKJ UZM ABH NSA

--- ENDS ---
Image: Youtube/ A still from The Shape Of Water

Image: Youtube/ A still from Foxtrot

It was clear that the Annette Bening jury at the just-ended 74th Venice Film Festival favoured fantasy to fact when it celebrated Guillermo de Toro's fairytale, The Shape of Water, with the top Golden Lion for Best Picture. The movie was one among the 20 others  like George Clooney's Suburbicon and Javier Bardem-Penelope Cruz-starrer Loving Pablo  that had punters putting their pounds on.But yes, The Shape of Water from Mexico was an alluring piece of fiction, narrated with a touch of finesse. A parable set in the Cold War era, starring Sally Hawkins, Richard Jenkins, Octavia Spencer and Michael Shannon, the film was a sad, sweet and sexy love story of the most unusual kind. The girl, Elisa (Hawkins), cannot speak, and her boyfriend lives in water. He has fins and gills, and The Shape of Water is a mermaid story with a difference.The Grand Jury Prize, the Silver Lion, went to Samuel Maozs Foxtrot, about an Israeli familys grief over their soldier son. It was a frightening case of how mistaken identity could cause havoc in people's lives. Imagine when the ageing parents are told that their soldier son is dead  only to be informed hours later that there had been a horrendous mistake!Maoz won the Golden Lion for his 2009 Lebanon  a uniquely experimental Israeli war movie which is narrated from the inside of an army tank! The film also won the 14th Annual Satyajit Ray Award.The Silver Lion for the Best Director went to Xavier Legrand for his dramatic Custody  where a child finds himself as a victim torn between his parents squabbling for his custody. Eventually, when the court rules in favour of joint custody, the child is dragged deeper into a torturous pit.I saw something similar at the Cannes Film Festival in May. An unforgiving image of Russia - Andrey Zvyagintsevs Loveless - deals with parental selfishness and how it shatters, even destroys, the lives of their children. This is a story that an increasingly self-centered Indian community can easily identify with, given the shooting number of marital rifts and divorces, Loveless is a powerful indictment of an unfeeling society from a helmer who earlier gave us a masterly Leviathan.The British playwright, Martin McDonagh, won the Best Screenplay Award for Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, a poignantly powerful look at the rape and murder of a teenage girl whose mother (Frances McDormand) takes it upon herself to find the culprit when the police fail. And what a novel way she choses to hit back at the uniformed men. Why by ridiculing the force. She puts up three billboards screaming about the lack of initiative by the cops, and has them placed strategically outside the police station.As far as performance went, Charlotte Rampling (I still remember her riveting piece of acting in Francois Ozon's gripping drama, Swimming Pool, where she plays a woman with a writer's block, a work that was slaughtered out of shape in India) walked away with the Best Actress Prize in Andrea Pallaora's Hanah  where she portrays the angst of one swinging between delusion and reality after her husband's imprisonment.Kamel El Basha was adjudged the Best Actor for his role as a Palestinian foreman in The Insult  a work that talks about how the quarrel of two men, a Christian and a Muslim, over a trivial issue sparks riots in Beirut.Golden Lion For Best FilmThe Shape Of Water (USA), Guillermo del ToroSilver Lion  Grand Jury PrizeFoxtrot (Israel-Germany-France-Switzerland), Samuel MaozSilver Lion - Award For Best DirectorXavier Legrand, Custody (France)Coppa Volpi for Best ActressCharlotte Rampling, Hannah (Italy-Belgium-France)Coppa Volpi for Best ActorKamel El Basha, The Insult (Lebanon-France)Award For Best ScreenplayMartin McDonaghm Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (UK)Special Jury PrizeSweet Country (Australia), Warwick ThorntonMarcello Mastroianni Award for Best Young Actor or ActressCharlie Plummer, Lean On Pete(UK)Lion Of The Future Luigi De Laurentiis Venice Award For A Debut FilmCustody, Xavier Legrand(Gautaman Bhaskaran is an author, commentator and movie critic who covered the just ended Venice Film Festival)
Ahmedabad: After Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi's 'Samvaad' with party workers under the 'Navsarjan Gujarat' (New Creation) slogan, BJP President Amit Shah interacted with thousands of young BJP supporters on Sunday under the 'Adikham Gujarat' (Resolute) banner.



Clearly, both political parties are making an all-out effort to woo young and first-time voters in the state which goes to polls later this year.



The BJP said that Amit Shah's Youth Town Hall program received 10000 questions on Facebook, 12000 questions on the BJP website, and over 6000 questions on Twitter. The town hall was attended by over a lakh BJP workers at around 250 locations across the country.



Learning a lesson or two from the experience of Chief Minister Vijay Rupani's Town Hall programme a few months ago, the BJP got Amit Shah not just to respond to questions that had already been received but also take questions live from at least 8 different locations.



The BJP President took questions on some contentious issues such as the Patidar reservation agitation, the Una Dalit atrocity case, slow down in the economy post demonetization, the GST issue and the recent floods that ravaged parts of Saurashtra and North Gujarat.



In reply to a question with regard to the Patidar reservation agitation, Amit Shah said: "This is a constitutional issue. The Supreme Court has capped reservation at 50%. Moreover, this is not the first time that a reservation agitation has taken place. The past experience shows that what begins as a reservation agitation for a particular community, ends up being a political movement. And those who lead the agitation on behalf of a community, actually behave like leaders of a particular political party."



Responding to a question on the Una incident in which a group of Dalits was flogged, the BJP President said, "As compared to other states in the country, the atrocities against Dalits are among the lowest in Gujarat. This is because the state government here has been strictly implementing laws to ensure such incidents do not recur."



On the sticky GST issue, Amit Shah said that GST is a modern and efficient tax system, but certain difficulties will be faced as part of the transition. He added that the council meeting is being held every month so that grievances can be addressed and necessary modifications can be made.



Shah singled out Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi, saying that the Congress leader had been asking several questions of the Government of late, but successive Congress government had failed to deliver on any of their promises.



"Rahul Gandhi had asked several questions about development and growth, from the Sabarmati river-front last week. It is ironic that the very spot, from where he was speaking, was once a rivulet full of garbage and dirt. Today, the riverfront is a model that is being studied by various countries."



Amit Shah also singled out the Congress over the Narmada issue, saying that the Congress had deliberately tried to stall the progress of the Sardar Sarovar Dam project. "Ask the Congress why attempts were made to stall the progress of a Narmada Dam project under Congress rule. Whenever BJP governments or non-Congress governments were in power, the project moved swiftly," he told the young attendees.



Answering a question on the pathetic state of roads across the state because of the monsoon, the BJP President said that the state government in association with various civic bodies will carry out a drive from September 15 to October 22, and all damaged roads in the state will be resurfaced.


Thiruvananthapuram: Kerala Hindu Aikyavedi state president K P Sasikala on Sunday accused the ruling Congress in Karnataka of orchestrating journalist-activist Gauri Lankesh's murder for electoral gains.



She said that the party knew it was going to fare badly in the upcoming elections, and hence, the murder



Urging secular writers to perform "mruthonjaya home" (a ritual to guard oneself against death), Sasikala said that Congress party needed Gauri's murder and the same fate might await others, too. "Go to one of the Lord Shaiva temples, or else, you will also meet the same fate," she said.



The RSS keeps growing even as rivals oppose it. It did not have to commit such a murder. Hence I tell the secular writers."



The leader, famous for her inflammatory speeches, also said that others (writers etc.) should be careful because nobody knows what level somebody might stoop to for votes.



Congress leader V D Satheeshan filed a complaint against the organization's leader with the state DGP, stating that Sasikala's speech was provocative and aimed at creating disturbance among people. The Congress leader also named another leader R S Babu who, Satheeshan claimed, threatened him that he will perform his 16-day puja in a speech.



The leader of Opposition in the state Assembly Ramesh Chennithala urged the government to book Sasikala for her controversial speech under non-bailable sections of IPC.
Ahmedabad: BJP chief Amit Shah on Sunday said organisers of the Patel quota stir in Gujarat were leaning towards "one political party", an apparent reference to the Opposition Congress.



He said the reservation agitation was acquiring political colour as state assembly elections, slated to be held later this year, approached.



The BJP president was here to take questions from the youth at a programme called 'Adikham Gujarat' or Resolute Gujarat.



Asked by a participant how the BJP government was dealing with the Patidar agitation for reservations under the OBC category, Shah said the BJP government had asked the protesters, led by Hardik Patel, to follow the "legal process" but the "direction of the agitation changed".



"Observe the development and you will realise that slowly it has become an agitation backed by one political party.



People had joined the agitation emotionally but the organisers are leaning towards one political party," he said.



Shah said his party's government in Gujarat tried to persuade the agitators to follow the legal process to achieve their goal.



"As per the main demand of the Patidar agitation, if a caste has to be included in the OBC category, that caste can submit an application to the OBC commission," he said.



Only after its recommendation can the caste get a place in that category, he added.



"But unfortunately, the direction of the agitation was changed... As the election approaches, you will see that slowly the issue will become political," he said.



Shah said under a Supreme Court ruling, reservation cannot exceed 50 per cent.



While reservation for SC and ST candidates was Constitutionally binding and no state government could change it, for a caste to find a place under the OBC category, it had to go through a procedure of submitting an application to the OBC Commission, he said.



Shah's comment comes in the backdrop of Hardik Patel recently dropping hints of supporting the Congress in the assembly elections.



Since 2015, the Patidars (Patels) have been agitating for inclusion of the community under the OBC category for reservation in government jobs and educational institutions.
Washington: President Donald Trump urged any US residents still in Hurricane Irma's path Saturday to "just get out of its way" and not worry about possessions, as he monitored the powerful storm's advance on Florida from the secluded Camp David presidential retreat.



Irma was expected to strike the Florida Keys at daybreak Sunday.



Trump called it a "storm of enormous destructive power" and asked "everyone in the storm path to heed all instructions, get out of its way."



"Property is replaceable but lives are not and safety has to come first," Trump said at a Cabinet meeting at the Maryland retreat, where he was spending the weekend with his wife, first lady Melania Trump. "Don't worry about it. Just get out of its way." Trump shared a brief video of his remarks on Twitter.



Irma hammered Cuba on Saturday with punishing winds and rain before setting her sights on Florida, where massive evacuations were being carried out.



Trump said the US was grieving for those who were killed by Irma even before she reached the US mainland. The storm left more than 20 people dead in the Caribbean. He said the administration is monitoring the situation "around the clock" and is in "constant communications" with governors and other officials from the affected areas.



"We've never seen anything like this," he said, pledging  as he did after Hurricane Harvey  that recovery and rebuilding will happen quickly.



Trump has been receiving regular briefings on both Irma and Jose, along with updates on recovery and relief efforts that continue in southeast Texas and Louisiana after Harvey, the White House said. Harvey brought record rainfall and severe flooding to Houston and surrounding areas of the Texas Gulf Coast in late August before it moved on to Louisiana.



Elaine Duke, the acting head of the Department of Homeland Security, was scheduled Saturday to brief Trump and the rest of the team on the storms.



In between storm updates, Trump spent part of his fourth Cabinet meeting discussing administration priorities and how to advance them during what's left of his first year in office.



Trump recently launched a public push to rewrite the tax code to make it simpler and more competitive by cutting taxes for corporations and the middle class. He said at Saturday's meeting that he would press for Congress to complete its work on a bill even sooner this year.



"I think now, with what's happened with the hurricane, I'm going to ask for a speedup. I wanted a speedup anyway, but now we need it even more so," he said in a longer video of the meeting that was released by the White House.



North Korea was also on the agenda. Trump said the Cabinet would discuss North Korea's "latest provocative and destabilizing actions" and "the steps the United States will take to keep our people safe and, frankly, to keep the people of the world safe in this case."



North Korea deepened concerns about advances in its development of nuclear weapons by conducting its strongest nuclear test explosion to date last weekend. Trump said earlier this week that military action against a nuclear-armed North Korea remained an option.



Trump sided with Democrats this week to raise the US borrowing limit and keep the government operating through early December in a bid to speed federal assistance to hurricane victims. Congress acted quickly to pass the $15.3 billion deal and send it to Trump, who signed it Friday after he arrived at the Maryland retreat.



The agreement allowed Trump to taste victory after months of legislative setbacks and whet his appetite for more wins.



In addition to overhauling the tax code, the president also wants new spending to upgrade roads, bridges and other infrastructure. Trump has also given Congress six months to resolve the status of individuals who were brought to the US illegally as children after he decided earlier this week to end an Obama administration program that allowed them to live, work and attend school without fear of being deported.



The president and Mrs. Trump invited members of the Cabinet and their spouses to Camp David for the weekend, the White House said. It marked Trump's fourth visit to the retreat. He met there in August with members of his national security team, but Saturday was the first time Trump had entertained the entire Cabinet there, including Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, who turned 67 on Friday.



In a bit of deja vu, Trump was at Camp David when Harvey struck Texas last month.
Fort Myers: Hurricane Irma's northern edge crashed into the Florida Keys on Sunday, bringing a double barrel threat of destructive winds and life-threatening storm surges that sparked one of the largest evacuations in US history.



The storm, which hammered Cuba's northern coast a day earlier, was a Category 4 hurricane about 15 miles (25 km) south-southeast of Key West, Florida, as of 7 am EDT (16:30 IST) with maximum sustained winds of 130 mph (210 kph), the National Hurricane Center said.



It was on a path that would take it along the state's Gulf of Mexico coast near population centers including Tampa and St. Petersburg, the NHC said. Hundreds of thousands of people spent the night in emergency shelters.



Storm surges pushed by a high tide were forecast to be as high as 15 feet (4.6 meters) for low-lying area along the state's southwest coast on Sunday, which could produce catastrophic flooding for thousands of homes.



Take action now to protect your life, the National Weather Service in Key West advised. "This is an extremely dangerous and life-threatening situation."



Officials in Florida have ordered a total of 6.3 million people, or about a third of the state's population, to evacuate, creating massive traffic jams on highways and overcrowding shelters.



Irma, which killed at least 22 people in the Caribbean, was likely to cause billions of dollars in damage to the third-most-populous US state.



Wind gusts near hurricane force began to batter the Florida Keys late on Saturday, the NHC said, with Key West seeing gusts of more than 80 mph on Sunday morning and water levels about 2 feet (61 cms) above normal.



SEEKING SHELTER



The NHC has put out a hurricane warning and a tropical storm warning stretching through almost all of Florida into Georgia and South Carolina - an area where more than 20 million people live.



Florida Power & Light said more than 430,000 customers in Florida were without power as of Sunday morning.



Irma comes just days after Hurricane Harvey dumped record-setting rain in Texas, causing unprecedented flooding, killing at least 60 people and leaving an estimated $180 billion in property damage in its wake. Almost three months remain in the Atlantic hurricane season, which runs through November.



Tracking models showed Irma would make landfall on the Keys and head along Florida's west coast, slamming the state that is a major tourism hub, with an economy comprising about 5 percent of U.S. gross domestic product.



Amid urgent warnings from state officials to evacuate before it was too late, downtown Miami was all but abandoned on Saturday.



On Florida's west coast, resident Charley Ball said he expected a storm surge to completely engulf the island of Sanibel where he lives.



"Just left the island and said goodbye to everything I own," said Ball, 62.



In Cuba, the destruction along the north central coast was similar to that suffered by other Caribbean islands over the last week as Irma plowed into Ciego de Avila province.



It was the first time the eye of a Category 5 storm had made landfall in Cuba since 1932, state media said, and the island's Communist government ordered the evacuation of more than a million people from its path.
Kabul: American historian Nancy Hatch Dupree, who dedicated most of her life to preserving Afghanistan's heritage, died in a Kabul hospital on Sunday aged 89.



Dupree first arrived in the Afghan capital in 1962 as the wife of a diplomat. In the city she met her second husband, the late American archaeologist Louis Dupree, and developed a lifelong passion for the Muslim country.



Over the next five decades she travelled throughout the country, wrote five guidebooks and documented the war-torn nation's past.



Her death was confirmed by Waheed Wafa, executive director of the Afghanistan Center at Kabul University where tens of thousands of documents preserved by the Duprees are kept.



Many Afghans took to Twitter to pay tribute to Dupree -- sometimes referred to as Afghanistan's "grandmother" -- who was widely respected for her efforts to safeguard the country's history and culture.



"Very saddened by the death of #NancyDupree. Afghans value and respect her services of decades for #Afghanistan. Nancy will be missed! RIP," wrote Afghanistan's Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah.



Activist Mariam Wardak posted: "You were a blessing, your work will remain a treasure, you are loved and will be missed by the people of #Afghanistan."



"The incredible Nancy Hatch Dupree has passed, 50 years dedicated to preserving Afghanistan's historical docs & artifacts #Kabul #Afghanistan," wrote actress Fereshta Kazemi.



US special charge d'affaires Hugo Llorens, America's top diplomat in Afghanistan in the absence of an ambassador, said Dupree had been a "pillar of the American community in Afghanistan" and would be "forever remembered".



Dupree and her husband lived in Afghanistan until the late 1970s when they were forced to leave by the communist government.



They spent time in the Pakistani city of Peshawar helping Afghan refugees fleeing the conflict during the Soviet occupation of 1979-89 and collecting documents relating to Afghanistan.



Dupree's husband died in 1989 and she moved back to Afghanistan after the US-led invasion that toppled the ruling Taliban in 2001.



With the help of the new government, Dupree created a centre to preserve the couple's priceless collection of records for researchers.



The Afghanistan Center houses more than 100,000 documents in the country's two official languages, Dari and Pashto, as well as English and other European languages.



The centre also provides reading materials to hundreds of libraries around the country, a reflection of Dupree's belief that knowledge was key to Afghanistan's recovery from decades of conflict.



"Afghans possess a remarkable inner strength that has carried them through two decades of war and displacement. If they are given the knowledge they need to fully participate in reconstruction efforts, their country will move forward steadily, to the benefit of all," Dupree wrote in the New York Times in 2008.




As progress continues on the development of the proposed Atlantic Coast Pipeline, opponents have offered a new challenge in hopes of stopping the project, while developers are asking the agency reviewing it for federal approval this month.

In a letter filed Thursday, Dominion Energy and Atlantic Coast Pipeline partners Southern Company Gas and Duke Energy asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and its commissioners Neil Chatterjee, Cheryl A. LaFleur and Robert F. Powelson to approve the 600-mile, three-state project at the earliest possible time.

The letter asks commissioners to issue a certificate of public convenience and necessity in September, so that initial construction activities and tree clearing can begin in November and conclude in early 2018.

The Commissions timely issuance of the order for the ACP project  is essential to meeting our contract obligations, ensuring customers realize the energy savings, providing manufacturing access to needed supplies of natural gas, and offering enhanced energy security and reliability to the region, the letter reads.

In an interview last week, Dominion spokesman Aaron Ruby explained the letter was issued in response to the recent restoration of a quorum at FERC.

Until a month ago, when Chatterjee and Powelson were confirmed by the U.S. Senate, the commission could not vote on pending projects.

While Dominion officials previously have said they expect to receive a certificate in the fall following the issuance of a final environmental impact statement in July, FERC spokeswoman Tamara Young-Allen said in an interview last week the commission, can make a ruling at any time.

Young-Allen added ACPs request is not unique, explaining other developers recently have submitted similar letters following Chatterjee and Powelsons confirmation.

A number of companies have asked us to get rolling on their applications, she said.

Opponents, however, view the letter as a move to speed up the regulatory process.

For three years Dominion has been bullying its way through this process, throwing its enormous weight at landowners, politicians and ratepayers, said Ernie Reed, president of anti-pipeline group Friends of Nelson, in a statement. Nothing is more dangerous than a desperate bully. This action also clearly demonstrates Dominions vulnerability and how much it fears getting its comeuppance.

Ruby said in an interview Dominion is not asking for an expedited approval process.

As ACP developers hope to stay on schedule with the project, opponents have moved to slow and stop the development process with the filing of a federal lawsuit last week.

The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, poses dozens of landowners, Friends of Nelson and Bold Alliance  a national organization that fights big corporations and pipelines it believes threaten our land and water  against FERC, its commissioners, the ACP and the proposed Mountain Valley Pipeline that would run through western and Southside Virginia.

More than a dozen landowners in Nelson County, through which about 27 miles of the ACP will run, are named as plaintiffs in the suit.

The suit asks the court to prevent FERC from issuing a certificate on the grounds the Natural Gas Act provisions as implemented by FERC violate the due process and public use clauses of the Fifth Amendment.

While the lawsuit concedes FERCs granting of a certificate for ACP is virtually certain and imminent, plaintiffs say in the suit ACP has failed to demonstrate public need for the project.

They may desire it, said Richard Averitt, one of the Nelson landowners named as a plaintiff in the suit, in an interview last week, but that doesnt mean there is a need for it or that its a good idea.

In a statement issued in response to the lawsuit, Ruby said the ACP is necessary and will serve a critical public need.

It will provide cleaner electricity and home heating for millions of Virginians and North Carolinians, and it will power local businesses across the two states, he said in the statement. Our regions existing pipelines are fully tapped and are unable to meet the growing energy needs of public utilities and the economy. The FERC will thoroughly evaluate public need in its final order.

Averitt and the suit also contend FERCs policies create an incentive for ACP to strong-arm landowners to acquire properties by any means necessary as early as possible.

I believe 100 percent that Dominion has used eminent domain from the outset. They stepped up to the plate and they cocked the gun and they said, Now, would you like to deal with us? Averitt said in an interview.

According to Ruby, ACP has reached mutual easement agreements with more than 70 percent of landowners on the route, all of whom signed the agreements voluntarily. Ruby said landowners signed the agreement after mutual negotiation and concessions on both sides.

We do not have eminent domain authority, and we have not suggested that we do, Ruby said in the statement.

Averitt said based on his knowledge of FERCs approval rate of other natural gas pipelines, he thinks the ACP will receive a certificate, but hes hopeful about the effect of the lawsuit on the projects progress.

I do believe and I have long believed that FERC will approve the pipeline, which will give Dominion  the power of eminent domain, Averitt said, but I do not believe that they will be successful in building the pipeline.

I think this lawsuit is going to stop them in their tracks. And there are a dozen more lawsuits prepped and ready to go the minute the certificate is issued. This is just the start.

Reached by phone last week, Young-Allen said FERC does not comment on court cases or on pending matters before the commission.
By PTI: New Delhi, Sep 10 (PTI) Soon after the announcement of JNU Students Union election results early today, supporters of the victorious United Left alliance celebrated the win by taking out a procession in the varsity campus.

The procession began from the School of International Studies to the famous Ganga Dhaba.

At the forefront were newly-elected leaders, Geeta Kumari - president, Simone Zoya Khan - vice president, Duggirala Srikrishna - general secretary, and Shubhanshu Singh - joint secretary.

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Kumari (24) a second year M Phil student of history from the School of Social Sciences hails from Panipat, Haryana.

An activist of AISA for five years she had been elected councillor twice and was a student representative to the GS- CASH (Gender Sensitive Committee Against Sexual Harassment) in 2015.

Kumari, who attributed her victory to students, promised to ensure justice for missing student Najeeb and raise the issue of seat cuts after taking charge.

Zoya Khan (26) born in Banda, Uttar Pradesh and brought up in Numaligarh in Assam, is a second year PhD student from Centre for Indo Pacific Studies in JNUs School of International Studies.

The AISA activist, whose mother tongue is Urdu, found moral support from her parents, particularly from her mother Nishat throughout the election process. Khans father is a retired school teacher.

First year PhD student Duggirala Srikrishna, who campaigned on the slogan of Save JNU, save democracy, hails from Prakasam district, Andhra Pradesh.

An SFI leader, Srikrishna is an active student leader and draws his popularity from being successful after bringing several amenities to students of SIS, the school which he belongs to. He scored the highest number of votes - 2,082 - leaving his rivals from other parties to bite the dust.

Singh (25), doing second year PhD in Politics of Naming and Renaming from School of Social Sciences in JNU is a native of Agra.

An active member of Democratic Students Federation for the past five years, he finished his under graduation from Sri Venkateshwara college, Delhi University, and masters from JNU.

He promised to take up seat cut issue immediately after taking oath as JNUSU joint secretary. PTI CPB KUN

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Statues, monuments and flags are everywhere in the news and public debate today. Robert E. Lee. Stonewall Jackson. Generic Confederate soldiers. Obelisks praising the Southern soldiers who died in the Civil War.

Especially since Dylan Roof, the self-radicalized white supremacy terrorist, gunned down nine members of a Bible study group at Charleston, S.C.s Emanuel AME Church in June 2015 in hope of starting a race war, America has been forced to confront its history of racism, the legacy of slavery and the fact that much of the economic might of this country was built on the backs of Africans wrenched from their homes and sold into bondage. It has not been an easy thing for a nation to look itself in the mirror and acknowledge that past.

In the wake of the Charleston massacre, then-Gov. Nikki Haley and the South Carolina legislature ordered the Confederate flag to be removed from the grounds of the Capitol, sparking similar debates in other states of the old Confederacy. (Roof had been photographed displaying a Confederate flag in a comment thread on a white supremacy website.) That debate came up in Danville when City Council voted in 2015 to remove the Confederate flag from a display on the grounds of the city-owned Sutherlin Mansion, sparking bitter reactions from so-called Southern heritage groups.

That same debate came to a head in Charlottesville when the city assembled a blue ribbon panel to study what to do about two prominent statues of Lee and Jackson and the parks named in their honor and in which the statues sat. Council ultimately decided to remove the statues and rename the two parks.

It was a fateful decision that thrust the city onto the national stage. In July, a small group of Ku Klux Klan members from North Carolina rallied at the Lee statue and met heated opposition from local opponents of their agenda. Then came the horrific events of Aug. 11-12 and the Unite the Right rally, resulting in the death of a counter-protestor allegedly at the hands of a white supremacist who plowed his car into a crowd.

Politicians from the president on down have weighed in on the debate, with opinions running the gamut from removing such monuments to leaving them in place. Since the Charlottesville rally, cities such as Baltimore, New Orleans and Nashville have removed statues erected in the early 1900s honoring Confederate luminaries.

It is at the local level, we believe, where we Southerners  we Americans  should confront the question of what to do with these monuments in our cities, towns and counties and address the deeper issues these hunks of marble or bronze represent. Ultimately, these are local matters that must be tackled locally, with rational and civil debate among neighbors and with a municipalitys elected leaders.

The discussion that took place Sept. 7 at Riverviews Artspace in Lynchburg  A Difficult Discussion: A Community Dialogue on Race, History and Community  is an example of what each community should undertake to confront this most troubling topic. These monuments of stone and metal, most erected at the height of Jim Crow segregation in the early 1900s when the Lost Cause myth took hold of the minds and hearts of the South, may be innocuous to some but are hurtful reminders of centuries of oppression to many others. How we deal with them and the conflicting messages they convey to different people will say a lot about each communitys character.

There should be no state laws protecting any and all Jim Crow-era statues purportedly honoring heritage, but also no state laws demanding all such displays be torn down. Instead, each locality  each community  should come together, talk, discuss, learn from each other and a develop a local consensus on the way forward. And then act decisively and boldly. The days of talk but no action are long past us as a nation.
Perspectives on hospital readmissions

The Sept. 3 edition of The News & Advance featured the article Centra hospitals face penalties over Medicare patients readmission. The article was written about the government program, CMS (Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services) and how they penalize hospitals for 30-day readmissions under Medicare. Since CMS initiative of this program six years ago, hospital systems across the country, including Centra, have worked diligently to reduce 30-day readmissions. The article went on to say that 68 of 74 Virginia hospitals and 2,573 across the country are facing readmission penalties, some worse than others. The article noted that Centra has greatly improved under this measure, moving from a penalty of almost $2 million in 2017 to $942,000 for 2018.

What was not covered by the article is that there are actually three variables in the CMS initiative that determine gains or penalties for hospital systems. They are:

 Readmissions: These penalize hospitals if patients with certain conditions return to any hospital for any reason within 30 days of their discharge. For example, if a patient has a total knee or hip replacement and returns to any hospital with a heart condition within 30 days of being discharged, it counts against the first hospitalization.

 Value-based purchasing: This program incentivizes hospitals for clinical quality, service and efficiency of care provided for a hospital stay. A hospital can earn or lose revenue from CMS based on these factors.

 Hospital-acquired conditions: This program identifies conditions that are acquired by patients during a hospital stay, which may be the result of their care. If a hospital has a higher than expected rate of this condition, the hospital may be penalized.

One could say that these incentives have done a great deal to improve care across the country. The challenge for readmissions, however, is that it appears a floor has been reached nationally on this metric, with few hospitals making further inroads. Some readmissions will always occur.

For Centra, instead of a penalty, the net of all three measures combined shows a gain in 2018. CMS will pay Centra a bonus in 2018. Readmissions will remain a tough nut requiring constant effort, but we are trending in the right direction. This overall change from negative to positive is a credit to a very focused efforts of Centra employees, management and independent doctors.

In addition to our progress under the CMS formula, we are gratified to see our quality recognized by CMS in their star quality rating system for hospitals. Lynchburg and Southside were awarded 4 out of 5 stars, while Bedford received 3. These awards put us in very elite company in Virginia.

U.S. News and World Report has a ranking system for Virginia hospital systems, and Centra is proud this year to be ranked No. 5, up four spots from No. 9 in 2016. Two of the systems ranked ahead of us, the University of Virginia and Virginia Commonwealth University, have nationally recognized programs that essentially move them to a different tier. Again, elite company.

One of the best things that a community can claim is excellent health care. Centra is without question an excellent system, measured by any metric. It is the firm goal of the Centra employees, management and the board of directors to not only preserve but continue to improve our health care. After all, this is where we live.

WALKER SYDNOR

Lynchburg

Editors note: The writer is chairman of the Centra Health board of directors.

Come together

With the national tragedy in Texas, I regret The News & Advance published another letter from Bill Blackwell, America at a breaking point on Sept. 1, in which he quotes The New Yorker magazines describing our president in the most dreadful way to put it mildly. America is at a very bad point with both political parties forgetting our proud past and letting leftist anarchists tear us apart over statues and monuments, rewriting our history.

This is a time when we must all come together as our president has said, proclaiming Sept. 3 a national day of prayer, calling on Rev Robert Jeffresss prayer to a group in the Oval Office with our president and some cabinet members and the personal donation of $1 million to the flood victims.

All these acts seem to me to refute the awful things stated in the letter I referred to above.

NANCY HUNTER

Lynchburg
Several high-profile cases of rape or attempted rape have been in the news recently. Yesterday, a school peon was arrested in Delhi's Shahdara for allegedly raping a 5-year-old girl.

By India Today Web Desk: Police have arrested a man who allegedly raped a two-and-a-half-year-old girl in Karnataka's Belagavi district, and then tried to bury her alive, ANI reported.

The news agency did not mention the man's name or age.

If a study conducted by World Vision India is anything to go by, child sexual abuse is rampant.

After surveying more than 45,000 children (ages 12-18) across the nation, the organisation found that one in every two children has been sexually abused, IANS reported.

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Several high-profile cases of rape or attempted rape have been in the news recently.

Yesterday, a school peon was arrested in Delhi's Shahdara for allegedly raping a 5-year-old girl.

Meanwhile, parents of students enrolled at Gurgaon's Ryan International School are protesting after a 7-year-old boy was allegedly murdered by a bus conductor, who said he killed him after attempting to sexually assault him. But some parents think the man, Ashok Kumar, is being framed.

And earlier this week, the Supreme Court allowed a 13-year-old rape victim to terminate her pregnancy, weeks after it refused to let a 10-year-old rape survivor do the same.

ALSO READ

Sex with minor wife not a crime, Centre tells Supreme Court

Delhi horror: Shahdara school peon arrested for raping 5-year-old girl in empty classroom

FROM THE MAGAZINE | UPFRONT | Let's talk about rape

FROM THE MAGAZINE | UPFRONT | Why it's time to amend the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act of 1971

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5 ways friends and family can help a sexual assault survivor heal

--- ENDS ---
Alexandrov: TT must find new pathologist

Alexandrov submitted his resignation one month in advance to allow the Ministry of National Security adequate time to find a new pathologist. However, in an interview on Friday, Alexandrov revealed the centre has yet to find a permanent replacement and was in the process of organising a roster for the remaining forensic pathologists to cope with a backlog of autopsies. The pathologists are Dr Eslyn Burris and Dr Hughvon des Vignes.

Last week, the previous week was supposed to be my last week but the situation as it is now is very unstable, with Dr Eslyn Burris. She applied for a parttime position. She was applying for two days a week. There were three of us working week after week, so ultimately the number of days for each of us was eight days a week. If she is taking two days each week, its the same monthly workload, if its every other week, who will be covering the workload now that I am gone? Alexandrov explained while Friday was his last day conducting autopsies, he would remain at the centre until he has completed all reports on autopsies under his charge.

So I have to finish all my reports, I cannot leave the country.

There is no standard of time pertaining to how long to do an autopsy report, because I need to do a make a detailed description of all tattoos or markings on the body as well as a description of the injuries. Alexandrov added that the centre did not adhere to the international standard which prevented individual pathologists from conducting more than 250 autopsies per year, disclosing he has performed 800 since 2016.

The United Nations Forensic Pathology Commission are saying that any forensic pathologist is not allowed to do more than 250 autopsies for the year, 275 for the most and that is under special circumstances. If any pathologist is found to perform more than 300, they are stripped of accreditation, which means that the court can consider me an unreliable witness on the basis that performing so many autopsies, I become exhausted mentally and physically or prone to make major mistakes in the administration of justice. Asked the reason for the backlog of autopsies and immense workload, Alexandrov said that short staff and too many holidays are responsible for the current state of the centre.

In the UK or Canada there is only one day when the forensic centre is closed and that is Christmas. Everyday is work as usual, however here in Trinidad there are 146 days off including weekends. Also asked what autopsy stood out to him the most, Alexandrov said he remembers the autopsy of Japanese pannist and masquerader Asami Nagakiya in 2015 because of difficulties in transporting the body for an autopsy.

That was a case that really left a mark on me. I remember that they found her body less than half a mile from the centre and still it took a long time to reach for me to do the autopsy and I dont understand why.
Participate seeks TT teachers to work in US

The private organisation, which works under the US State Department, allows for teachers to go to the US and experience teaching particularly in North and South Carolina, and Virginia.

Jeff Seaby, international education advisor with Participate, told Sunday Newsday the aim was to promote cultural exchange for teachers and schools.

Their curriculum does not necessarily give them a window to the world so having a teacher from another country can provide them with all kinds of experiences that would open their minds to the global perspective, Seaby said.

Over the past 30 years, the programme has had teachers from over 50 countries including Jamaica, England, South Africa, Bahamas, Canada, Ireland, China, The Philippines, France and countries in Central and South America.

He said, while the programme had international teachers in middle and junior high schools (Forms 1 to 3) as well as high schools (Form 4 to Upper 6), the bulk of the teachers were situated in elementary school (primary school) because they feel younger children were more greatly impacted, especially with learning languages.

He said teachers would teach the standard curriculum but teachers were asked to add to it and integrate something about their country in the lessons.

The goal is culture, not filling positions, Seaby said. The schools we work with and the principals have seen the impact on the students when you bring in a global teacher. They have basically made spots for these teachers.

They have worked it into the system. Seaby said the programme started in North Carolina so most of the organisations connections were in that state. As it became popular and successful, it spread to neighbouring states of South Carolina and Virginia.

At times we have been in other states  Florida, Kansas, California, Arizona  but we felt we wanted to bring it back near to our headquarters in North Carolina, so that we can make sure we are able to visit all our teachers easily, and that they have a good social network and offer support to each other. Since it is a non-immigrant programme, teachers would return to their home countries having learned and grown from their experience, and bringing some of their knowledge.

Seaby said he came to TT in 2005 to find out about the country and eventually recruited one teacher who spent three years at a US school.

The reason we looked at Trinidad and Tobago was because it has such a unique and rich culture, Seaby said.

Its got African and Indian cultures, it invented the steel drums, and calypso, limbo is from Trinidad, youve got Carnival, roti...

Theres so much that is unique to Trinidad and Tobago that it would be interesting and something I think people should know about that we thought it would be great to have some representatives from the country. However, he said soon after that local teachers stay, the global recession hit and school budgets in the US had some cut backs. Therefore, Participate put a hold on expanding beyond its usual countries at a time American teachers may have been struggling for work. After more than a decade later, Participate decided to resume its expansion, hence its request for local teachers to register on their website. Seaby said for the August 2018 school year, Participate was expecting 300 international teachers to be placed in US schools. However, they were only asking for five primary school teachers from TT to teach kindergarten to Grade Five at elementary schools.

The reason, he said, was because the country was relatively small and the programme did not want to be a drain on the education system.

Yet, if TT teachers became popular with the schools, they might increase the number to ten in the future.

Teachers of the Participate programme are usually well taken care of. Some of the benefits include a full-time teaching position; visa sponsorship for the teacher and their family; salary, vacation and holidays that is the same as US-based teachers; airfare to the US; subsidised health insurance and free life insurance.

The J1 visa, a non-immigrant visa, allows a legal spouse to reside in the US where they could apply for any job. Dependents under the age of 21 are covered under the visa, and dependents who are five and older would qualify for public education.

In addition to these benefits, Participate provides a lot of practical support for its teachers.

According to Seaby, when they arrive there is an orientation where they meet teachers from around the world. Local advisors, who live in the school district the new teacher would soon work in, would help them set up bank accounts and phones, help them find a place to live, show them around the area and more. The advisors also organise social events, check up on the new teachers, and try to help those struggling with adjustment.

Seaby said, Everyone goes through a period of cultural adaptation, even people who visited the US before and think they would be fine.

We are there to assist them during that phase through teacher workshops and more. Participate also has an open-source online learning centre for its teachers and any teacher who wishes to sign up to share resources and ideas on how to infuse culture into every-day lessons.
Jagessar: Indian mas in good hands

The future of Indian mas is in good hands with this programme, Jagessar said. I am so glad the Government could give us this opportunity to keep the mas alive. The programme was great and it was a pleasure to do it.

Jagessar, band leader of San Fernando-based Lionel Jagessar and Associates, was one of five masters for the programme, a project of the National Registry of the Artists and Cultural Workers. The initiative was developed five years ago, under the Community Development Culture and Arts Ministry, in commemoration of this countrys 50 years of Independence.

Apart from the field of fancy Indian mas, for this year, masters mentored participants in childrens mas, aspects of music production and the business of music, Orisha traditions and professional development in broadcasting.

Yesterday, the ministry hosted the fancy mas exhibition at the Southern Academy for the Performing Arts at San Fernando. Jagessar reiterated that Indian mas was not just a traditional- type mas but one capable of winning prestigious titles such as Band of the Year, and King and Queen of the Bands.

During the programme, Jagessar taught the participants bead-working techniques, arrangements of features and other techniques.

His son Lionel Jagessar Junior was also one of the participants.

In delivering remarks at the exhibition, Permanent Secretary Angela Edwards told the gathering that it was of utmost importance for the ministry to thank and show tangible appreciations to this countrys cultural icons.

Edwards publicly thanked the Jagessar family, more so the illustrious icon and his wife Rosemary Jagessar, for their contributions to Carnival. Rosemary and her son, Junior, are the reigning South King and Queen of Carnival.
Police need internal affairs unit

Their position stems from agreement with the Police Complaints Authoritys (PCA) recommendations for structural changes in the Police Service, as well as criminal charges against officers for their conduct in the 2015 Day of Total Policing.

The action, carried out on March 23, 2015, created a traffic nightmare for commuters as police officers held road blocks and search exercises throughout the country. It was believed the action was taken as a result of stalled salary negotiations.

The David West-led PCA, which investigated the exercise, released its findings on Friday, recommending, among other things, that criminal charges be brought against some police officers.

It also recommended the restructuring of the Special Branch and the countrys intelligence-gathering capabilities as well as a strengthening of the management/supervisory infrastructure with the TTPS.

Former national security minister Gary Griffith and PSC member, attorney Martin George, yesterday told Sunday Newsday the recommendations were a step in the right direction.

These are the things that are required to ensure accountability and it shows that we have a shortcoming in the measurement of performance of the few rogue officers in the Trinidad and Tobago Police Service, said Griffith.

George agreed. It is excellent that the PCA has bitten the bullet and stepped forward and made some tough and stern recommendations because one of the biggest problems plaguing the TT Police Service is the fact that the does not appear to be enough robust and rigorous internal discipline and policing of the police themselves and that is what the nation has been calling for for years, he said.

Although the Professional Standards Bureau exists, both men felt an internal affairs unit, similar to what obtains in North America and other jurisdictions, to monitor the conduct of officers, should be established.

In our Police Service, there is no one guarding the guards. So, it cannot be himself unto himself and therein lies the problem, where a senior police officer might not want to discipline other police officers because they all in the same uniform, said Griffith.

But you must have an internal affairs unit that has the authority to investigate police officers, get findings and it gives them the authority for disciplinary action to be taken in the absence of the Commissioner of Police not doing what is required.

We do not have that. George said the TTPS executive needs to be more serious and proactive in terms of its internal disciplinary procedures.

Until we do that, we will never fix the problem. We will only be reactive instead of being proactive.

You need to be proactive and have officers all the time observing things and nipping it in the bud.

The hierarchy of the Police Service has not demonstrated that level of seriousness about dealing with rogue officers and we need to be more diligent in terms of policing the police, he said.

Acting Police Commissioner Stephen Williams received strong criticism from Griffith for not investigating what occurred.

What I thought was alarming was that the Commissioner of Police, whether you are acting or not, you are given the same authority and responsibility to hire, fire as you see fit and he has never lifted a finger. Therein lies the problem. Leadership has obviously been lacking and the ball has been dropped. Recalling an incident some years ago when several officers had walked off their posts whilst securing a prime minister, Griffith said: This is why it is important that some level of disciplinary action must be taken when incidents like this take place. They all claimed they were sick at the same time but nothing was done.

All of those officers should have been fired. Those are the things that are required to ensure that all police officers understand the responsibility they have and it will root out the rogue elements. Despite its findings, Griffith regarded the PCA as a toothless bulldog making recommendations that might not very well be adhered to and implemented.
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For those in wheelchairs or with other mobility issues, funerals can be tricky to navigate. And in Japan, where 1.43 million people are expected to die annually by 2020, the need for a solution is pressing, reports the Japan Times. Enter Kankon Sousai Aichi Group, based in central Nagano Prefecture. It plans to open a drive-thru service in December, allowing funeral attendees to pull up to a window, sign their name on a tablet, hand over condolence cash customary in Japan, and use an electronic incense-burning device. It's expected to cut attendance time by 25%.

In Nagano Prefecture in particular, one in three people are now over the age of 65. "I've been in this business for a while and have seen how burdensome attending funerals can be for old folks in wheelchairs," the company head says. "Those who would otherwise stay home [can] go out and bid farewell to friends and family." The New York Post notes that the idea sounds similar to drive-thru services offered at funeral homes in California, Arkansas, Michigan, and the cities of Chicago and Memphis. (Japan is now asking its over-worked population to take Friday afternoons to chill.)
Irma is getting closer to Florida: As of about 11pm Eastern, the hurricane was roughly 90 miles southeast of Key West, per the AP. More than 170,000 homes and businesses in Florida already have lost power, and more than half of those outages were in the Miami-Dade area, where about 600,000 people have been ordered to evacuate. Florida Power and Light has said it expects millions of people to lose power. Irma is currently a Category 3 hurricane with winds of 120mph, and the first hurricane-force gale of 74mph has been registered in the Florida Keys.

The National Hurricane Center says the storm's forward motion fell to 6mph as the storm stuttered off the coast of Cuba. Forecasters say it could still increase in strength, but their forecast didn't show it. The latest forecast calls for Irma to make landfall Sunday morning in the Florida Keys, then hit southwestern Florida before moving up the coast to the Tampa area, reports USA Today. "THIS IS AS REAL AS IT GETS," tweeted the National Weather Service. "NOWHERE IN THE FLORIDA KEYS WILL BE SAFE. (Read more Hurricane Irma stories.)
The members of a Polish death metal band who were scheduled to play a show in Mesa, Ariz., last night instead found themselves in a Los Angeles County Jail cell. All four members of Decapitated were arrested early Saturday morning after their Friday night concert in Santa Ana, Calif., on suspicion of kidnapping a woman following their Aug. 31 show in Spokane, Wash., the Spokesman-Review reports. The woman told police the four men kidnapped her after she attended their show at the Pit concert hall in downtown Spokane as part of their "Double Homicide" tour. The four men, all Polish nationals, are now awaiting extradition back to Spokane.

But a Spokane-based defense attorney hired by the band says there is "another side" to the story. "We have witnesses that can testify to the fact that the accuser came to visit the band of her own free will and left on good terms," says Steve Graham. He also says the members of Decapitated have offered to surrender to Spokane authorities but have yet to hear back. The band's accuser has not been identified, and the police have not said where she was taken during the alleged kidnapping, the New York Daily News reports. According to the band's Web site, Decapitated was scheduled to perform in El Paso, Texas, tonight and Albuquerque, NM, tomorrow. (Read more heavy metal stories.)
More than two dozen legislators have told the Congress Vice President to focus on building the party in Bihar rather than playing second fiddle to RJD Chief Lalu Prasad.

By Rohit Kumar Singh: There is massive resentment brewing within the Bihar Congress with several legislators who recently met Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi suggesting him to snap alliance with the RJD immediately.

More than two dozen legislators have told the Congress Vice President to focus on building the party in Bihar rather than playing second fiddle to RJD Chief Lalu Prasad.

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Speaking Exclusively to India Today, Congress legislator from Bhagalpur, Ajit Sharma said that ever since JDU has walked out of the grand alliance, there was no truce with RJD.

"We should not have alliance with RJD, I have told this to Rahul Gandhi. If need be, we can have alliance with RJD again ahead of 2019 but not now", said Ajit Sharma.

'IT HAS ONLY WEAKENED US'

Sharma said that alliance with Lalu's party for last couple of decades have only weakened the Congress in Bihar. He said despite Congress being a national party, Lalu has always ignored the party's existence in the state. He added that in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the Congress should fight maximum number of seats in Bihar.

Congress legislator from Bhagalpur, Ajit Sharma Congress legislator from Bhagalpur, Ajit Sharma

"Lalu has always given us less number of seats to fight. Congress should fight the maximum possible number of seats in Bihar 2019. Lalu always give Congress seats which they can't win. He gives urban seats to Congress which is stronghold of BJP. Congress has always remained at a loss after allying with Lalu", alleged Ajit Sharma.

Sharma also lashed out at senior leaders from his party alleging that had they intervened during the political crisis in Bihar when Nitish walked out of grand alliance over corruption charges on then deputy CM, Tejaswi Yadav, the Mahagathbandhan would have survived. He said that every legislator in the Congress then had wanted Tejaswi to quit but to no avail.

"Tejaswi should have resigned over corruption charges. I asked central leaders of Congress to intervene and ask Tejaswi to resign but no central Congress leader came and therefore alliance broke", said the Congress MLA.

Also read

BJP trying to scare me through CBI probe: RJD Chief Lalu Prasad

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As Floridians fled the wrath of Hurricane Irma, scores left behind man's best friendsome of them tied up, in pens, or in fenced yards, reports the Sun Sentinel. Authorities in Palm Beach County found 49 dogs in such circumstances, while shelters took in an influx of animals surrendered by their owners. Those owners who surrendered nearly 60 dogs and cats shouldn't show up looking to get them back after the storm passes, says the director of Palm Beach County Animal Care and Control. "We are pretty clear when you surrender your animal you give up your rights," she says. The county is running a storm shelter that allows pets that still had 45 vacancies Saturday night. Those who left animals trapped or stranded outside face felony animal cruelty, and animal control officers were searching out such pets until winds hit 35mph. (Read more Hurricane Irma stories.)
Hurricane Irma regained strength as it closed in on the Florida Keys early Sunday and forecasters monitored a crucial shift in its trajectoryjust a few miles to the westthat could keep its ferocious eye off the southwest Florida coast and over warm Gulf water. The hurricane re-strengthened to Category 4 with maximum sustained winds near 130mph, reports the AP. The National Hurricane Center said Irma was expected to weaken but would remain a powerful storm as it moved through the Florida Keys and near the state's west coast. As of 5am EDT Sunday, the hurricane was centered about 40 miles south-southeast of Key West, and had sped up slightly, moving northwest at 8mph. Tens of thousands huddling in shelters watched for updates as the storm swung west, now potentially sparing Tampa as well Miami the catastrophic head-on blow forecasters had warned of for days.

But those few miles meant St. Petersburg could get a direct hit, rather than its more populous twin across Tampa Bay. Neither city has suffered a major hurricane in nearly a century. The leading edge of the storm bent palm trees and spit rain across South Florida, knocking out power to more than 170,000 homes and businesses, as the eye approached Key West. Florida Gov. Rick Scott warned residents in evacuation zones Saturday that "this is your last chance to make a good decision." About 6.4 million were told to flee. Forecasters said the greater Miami area of 6 million people could still get life-threatening hurricane winds and storm surge of 4 to 6 feet. Irma's course change caught many off guard and triggered a major round of last-minute evacuations in the Tampa area. Many businesses had yet to protect windows with plywood or hurricane shutters. (Read more Hurricane Irma stories.)
China is joining France and Britain in announcing plans to end sales of gasoline and diesel cars, AP reports. China's industry ministry is developing a timetable to end production and sale of traditional fuel cars and will promote development of electric technology, state media on Sunday cited a Cabinet official as saying. The reports gave no possible target date, but Beijing is stepping up pressure on automakers to accelerate development of electrics. China is the biggest auto market by number of vehicles sold, giving any policy changes outsize importance for the global industry. France and Britain announced in July they will stop sales of gasoline and diesel automobiles by 2040 as part of efforts to reduce pollution and carbon emissions that contribute to global warming.

China passed the United States last year as the biggest electric car market. Sales of electrics and gasoline-electric hybrids rose 50 percent over 2015 to 336,000 vehicles, or 40 percent of global demand. US sales totaled 159,620. Beijing has supported electric development with billions of dollars in research subsidies and incentives to buyers, but is switching to a quota system that will shift the financial burden to automakers. Under the proposed quotas, electric and hybrid gasoline-electric vehicles would have to make up 8 percent of each automaker's output next year, 10 percent in 2019, and 12 percent in 2020. Automakers that fail to meet their target could buy credits from competitors that have a surplus. (Read more China stories.)
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Generation Ex

That the BJP's Margdarshak Mandal was created in August 2014 as a parking slot for senior leaders L.K. Advani, M.M. Joshi and A.B. Vajpayee was no secret. It fulfilled a symbolic role over the past three years, with BJP ministers visiting Advani and Joshi to seek their blessings before taking oath. But as the September 3 reshuffle showed, even that function has now ceased. In a break from tradition, none of the new BJP ministers visited the party patriarchs. As a newly promoted minister put it, "If word gets around we met the veterans, we would be the next entrants into the mandal."

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Didi's New Tune

Mamata's debut as a lyricist and music composer in her recently launched music album, Matri Ma, is all set to hit a new record. Within a week, it was set to join the gold disc club. Many of those who were at the launch and had the opportunity to hear some of the songs expressed surprise. To the detractors, the Bengal CM's fans had just one thing to say: that the number of Didi's supporters is not small. It's one more feather in Mamata's multi-tasking cap.

Return of Varun

Now this is one battle-hardened man. Undeterred at being sidelined in the BJP after the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections, Sultanpur MP Varun Gandhi is going it alone, in a manner of speaking, at least. He has been addressing a string of non-political seminars organised by different youth organisations, the latest one being in Kanpur on September 2. With seminars lined up in Patna, Jaipur, Jodhpur, Chennai and Srinagar, Varun's strategy is to present himself as an effective youth leader before the 2019 elections. A precursor to parting ways with the BJP?

Praise Be

Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis gladdened their hearts when he called Thane municipal commissioner Sanjeev Jaiswal and police commissioner Param Bir Singh the "Jai and Veeru of Sholay" on August 30. Singh, who had arrested Lt Col. Prasad Purohit for the Malegaon mayhem in 2008, is eyeing the Mumbai police commissioner post. Demolition man Jaiswal could be a BJP candidate in the 2019 assembly elections.

Son Flowers

If Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan is smelling of roses these days, it's because elder son Kartikeya has opened up a flower shop-Sunder Florica-named after his grandmother. The flowers come from Chouhan's farm in Vidisha district and Kartikeya and his mother Sadhana drop by to track sales. With agricultural growth rates averaging 20 per cent in the past five years, Chouhan has publicly appealed to MP farmers to add value to their produce to keep the growth momentum going. His son, at least, seems to have heeded his advice

Dogged Pursuit

Who better than canine sleuths to sniff out mischief? Unable to get the better of bootleggers in Bihar, who've been using ingenious means, from brick kilns to school bags, to hide and deliver liquor, the state police is bringing in 20 sniffer dogs.

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Fairbanks, AK (99707)

Today

Cloudy skies with late-night snow showers. Low 22F. Winds light and variable. Chance of snow 60%. Snow accumulations less than one inch..

Tonight

Cloudy skies with late-night snow showers. Low 22F. Winds light and variable. Chance of snow 60%. Snow accumulations less than one inch.
New Delhi:

According to a top Infosys official, unfazed by the recent upheavals at the board, the company will continue to hire about 6,000 engineers annually over next 1-2 years, same as last fiscal.



The hiring process has been ramped up by Infosys in the US and European markets as it looks to tap opportunities and tide over visa-related issues. While speaking at an investor meet last week, Infosys interim-CEO and MD U B Pravin Rao said We continue to recruit. This year that just concluded we had a net addition of 6,000 and we expect similar kind of additions over the next 1 or 2 years, depending on the kind of growth you see in the market."



The Bengaluru-based firm has been in the eye of a storm over the past few months, with the founders and former board members clashing over alleged corporate governance lapses and irregularities in Infosys USD 200-million Panaya acquisition.



The spat, which often spilled over into the public domain, led to the then CEO Vishal Sikka as well as former Chairman R Seshasayee and three other board members quitting. Co-founder Nandan Nilekani was named the non-executive Chairman in a move that was seen as the company bowing to the demands of co-founders and large institutional investors.



After Sikkas exit, Rao assumed the additional charge as interim CEO and MD. Rao said over one million graduates pass out each year, which may look like a large number but only 20-30 per cent of that is quality talent. (This is the number that) we and our competitors focus on...It is a question of doing more with less, how can one be more productive, he said while answering a query on whether increasing automation would result in job losses.

ALSO READ | Infosys crisis: Nilekani promises to bring stability and unity in IT major



At the end of June 2017, Infosys had a total of 1,98,553 employees on its payroll. The company does not provide country-specific headcount. During the said quarter, Infosys hired 8,645 people at a gross level but its overall headcount was lower by 1,811 people on a net level (which factors in attrition numbers).



Earlier this year, there were reports of layoffs across the IT sector. With Infosys stating that it was stepping up hiring in international markets like the US, there were concerns that it could impact the companys recruitment plans in India. Infosys had, at that time, stated it planned to hire 20,000 people (gross) this year.



Infosys has stated that it is in favour of a healthy mix of local and global personnel, even though hiring locals in overseas markets often pushes up operational costs for IT outsourcing companies.

During the investor meeting, Rao said Infosys is also looking at increasing localisation of its workforce and is recruiting about 10,000 people in the next few years and setting up development and innovation hubs in the US. We have already started the process and we will only accelerate, he added.



The US, which is the largest market for Infosys, much like its peers, accounted for over 61 per cent of its topline in June 2017 quarter. Europe accounted for 22.4 per cent of the companys USD 2.65 billion (Rs 17,078 crore) revenue during April-June 2017 quarter.



To a query on the companys India business, Rao said Infosys continues to be selective about projects in the country. We continue to be very cautious about India...there are pricing challenges, sometimes getting payment is a challenge, he said.

ALSO READ: Infosys puts Sikka's resignation behind, approves Rs 13,000 crore share buyback to keep shareholders interest intact

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When a local pointed out the traffic violation, the cop allegedly slapped him.

By PTI: A Chandigarh policeman was suspended for allegedly slapping a man who filmed him talking on the phone while riding a bike.

A video of head constable Surinder Singh slapping the local went viral on social media.

-@IG_CHANDIGARH -DGP Chandigarh Tejinder LUTHRA ji if video in this tweet is true plz suspend this police official for assaulting a Citizen pic.twitter.com/39F5T0n3vY- Manish Tewari (@ManishTewari) September 9, 2017

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He was allegedly not even wearing his helmet properly.

When the local pointed out the traffic violation, the cop allegedly slapped him. The incident took place on Saturday at the Sector 36/37 dividing road in Chandigarh.

Former union minister and Congress leader Manish Tewari sought action against the policeman while uploading the video on his twitter handle.

"-@IG_CHANDIGARH -DGP Chandigarh Tejinder LUTHRA ji if video in this tweet is true plz suspend this police official for assaulting a Citizen,"(sic) Tiwari wrote.

Chandigarh police SSP Traffic Shashank Anand said the head constable has been suspended for misconduct and violating traffic norms.

He was also challaned for not wearing his helmet properly and speaking on the phone while driving, the SSP said.

The driving license of the cop has been seized and it will be sent to the transport and licensing authority for suspension for three months, he said.

The head constable was posted in the security wing of the Chandigarh police.

Also Read

UP woman cop who stood up to bullying by BJP workers transferred

Karnataka High Court asks police why order on moving out cows illegally confined in mosque was not followed

--- ENDS ---
New Delhi:

At least two people were killed and five others were trapped under the under debris after an under-construction flyover collapsed in Bhubaneswar's Bomikhal area on Sunday afternoon.



One of the deceased has been reportedly identified as Satya Patnaik (40) of Jharpada. His daughter, Sheetal, who was also injured has been shifted to AIIMS.



According to reports, rescue teams with cranes and fire brigades were rushed to the spot. It quoted eyewitnesses as saying that around 30 labourers were working when the flyover collapsed at around 12.45 pm.



aTwo senior engineers have been asked to visit the spot and conduct a detailed inquiry into the incident. Action will be taken against those who found guilty,a Works Secretary Nalinikant Pradhan told Kalinga TV.



The sudden collapse is being blamed on poor construction while political leaders are pointing fingers at Odisha chief minister Naveen Patnaik to take responsibility for the situation.



Congress leader Suresh Kumar Routray also alleged a deliberate negligence in order to "escalate the project cost for political funding".

Bhubaneswar: 2 people dead, 10 injured, 5 other trapped under debris after portion of a flyover collapsed in Bomikhal; rescue operation on pic.twitter.com/jijle1Hwdd a ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

1 dead, 4 injured after portion of under-construction flyover collapsed in Bomikhal; rescue ops on, confirms Bhubaneswar Police Commissioner pic.twitter.com/7ljvwTMHI2 a ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017
New Delhi:

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has ordered a magisterial inquiry into the gruesome incident of rape of a five-year-old girl in a Gandhinagar private school.

Kejriwal termed the incident as a Shameful act and said such incident will not be tolerated. He said the state govt will develop a protocol for all private schools to ensure children's safety.

Shameful. Won't be tolerated. Police doing its job. Ordered magisterial enquiry. Will develop a protocol for all schools to ensure children's safety, CM Kejriwal tweeted.

The magisterial inquiry will be headed by SDM Vivek Vihar who will submit a report within three-days.

Also Read | Ryan school murder: Police lathi charge parents demanding CBI probe, govt accepts negligence on schools part

The class one student of a private school in east Delhis Raghubarpura near Gandhinagar was raped inside an empty classroom allegedly by a peon on Saturday.

The girl came home in a critical condition and told her mother about the horrific tale. The parents of the victim took her to a hospital where medical examination confirmed the sexual assault.

Vikas, the accused peon has been arrested by the Delhi police hours after the incident. He has been working there for past three years.
New Delhi:

Following the recent incidents of murder and rape in schools of the national capital and surrounding Gurugram, Amulya Patnaik, Commissioner of Police, Delhi has directed district DCPs to ensure the security of children in the schools of their respective areas.

The Commissioner has asked DSPs to contact school authorities and ask them to get security audit of their premises done and follow the advice for the safety of children.

The CP has released safety and security guidelines for schools which include installing CCTV Cameras at all the vulnerable areas in the school premises.

Also Read | 5-year-old raped inside classroom by peon, Delhi CM Kejriwal orders magisterial inquiry

These guidelines say that all the schools must get the police verification done for the all the employees, especially the bus drivers, conductors, peon and other support staff.

Commissioner Patnaik also advised school to hire supporting staff from authorised agencies and keep proper records.

The guidelines of Delhi police came a day after a 5-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a peon inside the premises of a school in Gandhinagar area o the national capital.

Earlier on September 8, a 7-year-old second grader was brutally murdered inside the premises of Gurugrams Ryan International School allegedly by the school bus conductor.
New Delhi:

In a shocking incident, Karan Joseph, a 29-year-old Mumbai based musician allegedly committed suicide by jumping from the 12th floor of a building on Saturday morning.

Famous as 'Madfingers' among his peers, Joseph was a pianist and had moved to Mumbai recently, to make his career in the music industry. He was staying at the home of a friend for past month in Bandras Concord Apartments.

The reason behind the musician's suicide is still ambiguous and no suicide note has been recovered.

Read more: In Pics | When PM Modi met Adnan Sami and family

According to an officer at Bandra police station, "The deceased was staring out of the window. Suddenly, he got up and jumped out of it. There was no grill outside the window".

He was rushed to the nearby Bhabha Hospital, where doctors declared him dead on arrival.

A case of accidental death has been registered at the Bandra police station.

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New Delhi:

BJP President Amit Shah has arrived on a three-day visit of West Bengal as part of his 110-day long nationwide tour to strengthen the organization. Shah will meet party leaders, MLAs and other functionaries of the BJP during the tour and will chalk out strategies to further bolster the partys base in the state, a party statement said.

He will also meet people drawn from various sections of the society, it said.West Bengal is among the states high on Shahs scheme of things for 2019 Lok Sabha polls.

It is among the five states Shah will visit twice as part of his ongoing nation-wide tour. Earlier, he was in the state between April 25 and 27.West Bengal Chief Minister and TMC chief Mamata Banerjee has emerged as a key opposition figure against the saffron party and the BJP is pulling out all stops to politically corner her.

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New Delhi:

An encounter broke out between security forces and terrorists in Barbug village of Shopian district in Jammu and Kashmir on Sunday morning. One terroristA was killed in the encounter.

Another terrorist was arrested with weapons. Search operations are presently going on.

Terrorist killed in Shopian encounter identified as Tariq Ah Bhat of Hizbul Mujahideen.

Earlier on Saturday, a policeman was killed and two others injured when militants opened fire on a police party in south Kashmir's Anantnag district on Saturday.

Militants attacked the police team near Anantnag bus station. They fired indiscriminately on them, killing a policeman, a police official said.

J&K:HM terrorist Tariq Bhat killed in Shopian,LeT's Adil Dar surrendered. Mohd Altar Rather surrounded by security forces (Visuals deferred) pic.twitter.com/SMAV0K8KlQ a ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

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New Delhi:

A deeply concerned India on Saturday asked Myanmar to handle the situation in the Rakhine state with maturity and restraint while focusing on the welfare of the civilian population along with that of the security forces and asserted that it was imperative that violence ends there.



The Indian statement came in the backdrop of the continuous exodus of Rohingya Muslims from the Buddhist-majority country in the wake of violence against them.

In a statement, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said that India remains deeply concerned about the situation in the Rakhine state and the outflow of refugees from that region.



We would urge that the situation in Rakhine state be handled with restraint and maturity, focusing on the welfare of the civilian population alongside those of security forces. It is imperative that violence is ended and normalcy in the state restored expeditiously, the statement said.

Read | PM Modi shares Myanmar's concerns about extremist violence in Rakhine



The statement also referred to Indias strong condemnation of the terrorist attacks on Myanmar security forces in the Rakhine state.



The two countries have since affirmed their shared determination to combat terrorism and not allow its justification under any pretext, it said.



The Indian statement came even as Bangladesh High Commissioner Syed Muazzem Ali called on Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar to discuss the issue.



Nearly 300,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled to Bangladesh from Myanmars Rakhine state since August 25 when the fresh wave of violence erupted.



However, the MEA statement made no mention of the meeting.

Read | Suu Kyi on Rohingya Muslims: Need to differentiate between terrorists and innocents



During prime ministers recent visit to Myanmar this week, he had expressed his concern at the casualties of security forces as well as other innocent lives, the MEA statement said.



He had also urged a solution based on respect for peace, communal harmony, justice, dignity and democratic values, it added.



The statement also noted that during the prime ministers Myanmar visit it was agreed that India would provide assistance under the Rakhine State Development Programme in conjunction with the Myanmarese government.



India had refused to be a part of a declaration adopted at an international conference recently in Indonesia as it carried inappropriate reference to violence in Rakhine state.



An Indian parliamentary delegation, led by Speaker Lok Sabha Sumitra Mahajan, dissociated itself from the Bali Declaration adopted at the World Parliamentary Forum on Sustainable Development held in Indonesia.



According to media reports, the violence began when Rohingya militants attacked police posts in Myanmars northern Rakhine state.



Rohingya residentsa stateless mostly Muslim minority allege that the military and Rakhine Buddhists responded with a brutal campaign against them, according to the reports.

India remains deeply concerned about situation in Rakhine State in Myanmar and outflow of refugees from that region. Our full statement: pic.twitter.com/XYVdNfiK03  Raveesh Kumar (@MEAIndia) September 9, 2017

Read | Rohingya genocide in Myanmar: Does India have responsibility towards refugees?





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New Delhi:

A Railway Protection Force (RPF) officer on Friday saved a 55-year-old woman from becoming another train victim at Nalasopara station in Mumbai. In order to board the train in hurry, she lost control and slipped.

PSI Gopal Krushna Rao saw Lata Maheshwari was being dragged and without giving it a second thought, he ran towards her and managed to save her. The womans leg had come between the train and platform but he pulled her back right on time and avoided a mishap.

Rao was having a discussion with his team at the station when the incident took place around 9:30 pm.

Today RPF,Sub-Inspector Gopal krishna Rai frm Virar saved life of lady passenger who tried boarding running train and fallen down @rpfwrbct pic.twitter.com/NrjfuLjO9w  rpfvirar (@rpfvirar) September 8, 2017

ALSO READ: Haryana woman falls off train, dies fighting robber on running train in Delhi

Rao explained the entire incident and said, "I was with my team when I heard a woman shouting. When I looked up, I saw a woman running along with the train and people urging her to let go of the rod. I ran towards her and pulled her away from the train."

The woman, who is a resident of Jaipur, had come to visit her daughter Priti Lath. She sustained minor injuries. When she along with her daughter arrived at the station, they saw the train departing from the station.

"While Priti managed to get onto the train, when Lata tried to get in, the train had started moving. Lata fell and was dragged along with the train," a police officer said.

Her daughter also issued a statement and said "I tried to pull my mother into the train, but could not as the train was moving. We are grateful to the police officer who helped her."

ALSO READ: Suresh Prabhu says number of train accidents gone down during his tenure

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New Delhi:

Former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda on Sunday slammed ML Khattar government over attack on media during protest at Ryan International School in Gurugram.

He said attack on media is condemnable and in a democracy, governments do not work with lathis and bullets.

Hooda said media is one of the pillars of democracy and raised concerns of the people. He said it should not be suppressed.

CPI leader D Raja also condemned the police attack on media. He said Haryana police is gaining notoriety of attacking media as it was happened during Dera agitation too.

ANI personnel attacked by Haryana police, lathi-charged during coverage of #RyanInternationalSchool protest in Gurugram pic.twitter.com/pBEap0WZyh a ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

An ANI journalist sustained injuries during police lathicharge when parents were staging protest.

Attack on media is condemnable. In a democracy, govts don't work with lathis &bullets: BS Hooda on Haryana Police targeting media #Gurugram pic.twitter.com/LBKYslTG6i a ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

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New Delhi:

The meeting of executive committee of All India Muslim Personal Law Board on Sunday kicked off over Supreme Court's verdict on TripleTalaq in Bhopal.

Last month, the Boardas working committee member Zafaryab Jilani had said that the meetingas agenda was issued and they would take up it in September 10 meeting.

aThe working committee meeting in Bhopal on September 10 will take a decision on the future course of action on Supreme Court verdict after studying it in detail,a he had said.

Besides, other issues will also be taken up in the meeting with the verdict being the most prominent one, A Jilani had said.

Madhya Pradesh: Meeting of executive committee of All India Personal Law Board over Supreme Court's verdict on #TripleTalaq begins in Bhopal pic.twitter.com/tmSteb5EQf a ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

He had said that the hearing on the Babri mosque case is also on the agenda of the meeting.

Madhya Pradesh: Meeting of executive committee of All India Personal Law Board over Supreme Court's verdict on #TripleTalaq to begin shortly pic.twitter.com/YWzzVzvaYf a ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

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DMK working president MK Stalin seems to have lost his trust with the Governor Vidyasagar Rao as he alleges that no decision was made from his earlier meeting with him.

By Pramod Madhav: DMK working president MK Stalin seems to have lost his trust with the Governor Vidyasagar Rao as he alleges that no decision was made from his earlier meeting with him.

In a marriage function in Chennai, Stalin expressed his anguish with much criticism against the Governor.

"I don't want this government to be toppled, but I want them to prove their majority," he said.

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Taking DMK as an example, he said that back in 2006 to 2011, DMK had 96 MLAs with Congress and PMK as our allies, but Kalaignar conducted the government without any problem.

He then broke down the Assembly number at present explaining that after Jayalalithaa's death, the number of MLAs in the assembly is 233 and to prove a majority one should need 116.

"DMK has 89 seats and along with its allies the number comes to 98. Now 21 MLAs are against CM EPS, which means the Opposition for the government has increased to 119," he explained.

Stalin then raised the allegation that the state government is running all because of BJP's support even after losing majority.

"Of the 233 MLAs, we have 119 and the ruling government has only 114 while the majority should be 116. Don't the Governor know this math? Do we need a Governor who doesn't even know this count?" he questioned rhetorically.

He then went ahead and claimed that the ruling Government has lost its self respect to the Centre and that DMK will never attempt to form the government through any 'back door' tactics.

MK Stalin stated that he will meet the Governor again and make his points perfectly clear to him.

ALSO READ:

AIADMK has lost its majority in TN: Stalin

Amid EPS-OPS merger news, Stalin threatens to topple government

--- ENDS ---
New Delhi:

Just imagine the excruciating pain one would experience while passing urine and even otherwise if there is even a small stone in the bladder! But what if the stone measures up to be the size of an egg of an ostrich? This is exactly what happened in a California hospital where the doctors got the shock of their lives.



A 64-year-old man was admitted to the hospital complaining of immense pain on the side and difficulty while using the toilet. Doctors advised a CT scan which uncovered the source of the anomaly  a stone the size of an Ostrich egg weighing almost 770 grams.



The stone measuring 4.7 inches by 3.7 inches by 3 inches is a massive and rare one. The largest ever bladder stone was reported from Brazil which measured 7 inches by 5 inches by 3.7 inches as reported by Deccan Chronicle.



Doctors stated that the man had an invasive bladder cancer over a decade ago and was given laser treatment to break down another smaller stone in addition to the surgery for removing the big stone.



Mayo Clinic says that bladder stones show up in people's bodies when they can't empty their bladders, forming hard masses of minerals and symptoms could include severe abdominal pain or blood in the urine, though people don't always show symptoms.
New York:

German dictator Adolf Hitlers monogrammed pair of boxer shorts is all set to be auctioned in the US. It is estimated that the boxers may fetch up to USD 5,000.

The white striped linen under shorts are surprisingly large, 19 inches long, with a waist of about 39 inches and bear Hitlers monogram: A.H. just to the right of the top of the fly, according to Alexander Historical Auctions in the US.

The boxers were left behind by him, in the Parkhotel Graz Hotel in Austria, where he stayed in 1938.

A notarised letter by the consignor explains that he is the grandson of the previous owners of the Parkhotel Graz where Hitler stayed April 3-4, 1938 while travelling through the country, and that these items were left behind in his suite, the auction house said.

ALSO READ: Adolf Hitlers personal telephone sells for more than 240,000 dollars

A very rare signed copy of Hitlers autobiography Mein Kampf will also be up for auction.

Other items in the auction include one of Hitlers white monogrammed dress shirt and his globe, which was taken as a souvenir by US soldier from his home in Bavaria, Germany, both estimated to fetch USD 7,000 and USD 100,000 respectively.

The online auction starts on September 13.

ALSO READ: Hitler's 'Mein Kampf' becomes bestseller in Germany

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New Delhi:

Hurricane Irma, the most powerful category 4 storm barreled towards the Florida and set off a 11th-hour scramble for safety on Saturday after completing a devastating march along Cuba's northern coast.



It was expected to pass through Florida's southern archipelago on . Till Now, Irma has killed at least 22 people in the Caribbean, was considered a life-threatening danger to Florida as well.



It will likely inflict billions of dollars in damage in the third-most-populous U.S. state.



When Irma crashed into the Cuba it was Category 5 storm, but it was gradually weakened to a Category 3 storm as it rammed along the island's northern coastline.

According to the US National Hurricane Centre (NHC), maximum sustained winds stayed around 125 mph (201Kph).But it is expected to regain strength as it streams over warm waters south of Florida, NHC added.

The National Weather Service predicted a high rain of up to 25 cm to 51 cm over Florida and southeast Georgia through It is just a fraction of what Hurricane Harvey dropped on Texas and Louisiana two weeks ago which almost killed 60 people and caused property damage of an estimated US$ 180 billion.

Destruction in Cuba



As Irma barreled towards the Cuba, the destruction along the north central coast was almost on similar lines that saw on other Carribean islands over the last week.



High winds of Irma has toppled trees and utility polls or ripped apart roofs. Cubans passed through ankle deep water in Caibarien, a fishing town where streets were flooded and covered in seaweed.



Since 1932 this was the first storm which had made landfall in Cuba.



Irma has forced to evacuate nearly 6.3 millions people which are nearly about a third of the state's population. It also caused massive traffic jams on highways and overcrowding shelters.



This was the strongest storm Caibarien ever had. It will take a while to recover from this, at least a few years, said Risle Echemendia, 28.

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New Delhi:

Rohingya militants, the world's most persecuted minority, have declared an immediate unilateral one-month ceasefire. Faced with the barbarity, about 10,000 Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar have rushed into Bangladesh for refuge.

Through twitter handle, the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) has announced a temporary cessation of offensive military operations to allow humanitarian aid to reach the battered region.

In order to provide aid delivery to all victims of humanitarian crisis irrespective of ethnic or religious background, the group urged "all humanitarian actors" to resume the aid process.

It recommended Myanmar to "reciprocate humanitarian pause" in fighting, with huge numbers of displaced moving across Rakhine many believed to be in desperate need of help after over two weeks of violence.

Also Read| Rohingya Violence: Thousands of Rohingya refugees celebrate Eid in Bangladesh

Its Twitter page is often the first to publish ARSA statements or direct readers to videos.

Recent statement was signed by Ata Ullah, who purportedly commands the militants from jungle bases straddling the Bangladesh-Myanmar border.

On 25 August, ARSA has launched coordinated raids using hundreds of militants on around 30 police posts and state forces in northern Rakhine state. The kickback by security forces incited the Rohingya exodus.

Also Read| Suu Kyi on Rohingya Muslims: Need to differentiate between terrorists and innocents

The violence in Myanmar started on Aug. 25, when insurgents attacked Myanmar police and paramilitary posts in what they said was an effort to protect minority Rohingya. In response, the military started what it called "clearance operations" to wipe out the insurgents.

Recently United Nations (UN) has released data on Rohingya Muslims, according to that around nearly 60,000 Rohingyas have arrived in Bangladesh since the violence erupted on August 25.

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Seoul:

North Korea warned on Sunday that it would inflict "the greatest pain and suffering" on the United States if Washington persists in pushing for harsher UN sanctions following Pyongyang's sixth nuclear test.

The September 3 detonation was the country's largest and prompted global outrage, with the UN Security Council set to discuss a new draft resolution presented by Washington that would be the toughest-ever imposed against the isolated regime.

The US is calling for an oil embargo on Pyongyang, an assets freeze on leader Kim Jong-Un, but also an end to textile exports and to payments made to North Korean guest workers.

Washington wants the Security Council to vote on Monday to impose the sanctions, despite resistance from Beijing and Moscow to the new measures.

In a statement published by the official KCNA news agency, North Korea's foreign ministry warned Washington that if it did "rig up the illegal and unlawful 'resolution' on harsher sanctions, the DPRK shall make absolutely sure that the US pays the due price".

Read more: North Korea exported USD 270 million illegally recently: UN experts

"The forthcoming measures to be taken by the DPRK will cause the US the greatest pain and suffering it had ever gone through in its entire history", the ministry said, using the abbreviation for North Korea's formal name.

"The world will witness how the DPRK tames the US gangsters by taking (a) series of action tougher than they have ever envisaged."

The test, which the North said was a hydrogen bomb that could be fitted onto a rocket, came weeks after Pyongyang fired two intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) that appeared to bring much of the mainland US into range.

At a dinner to celebrate Pyongyang's nuclear programme, North Korean leader Kim praised the test and urged the country's scientists to develop more weapons, KCNA reported on Sunday.

The North says it needs nuclear arms to protect itself, but the US has accused the country of "begging for war".

Pyongyang's drive to stage a slew of brazen tests in recent months, which contravene existing United Nations sanctions, has sparked surging tensions over the country's weapons programme.

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The Modern Sub Machine Carbine (MSMC) is possibly the only weapon designed, developed and manufactured in India with a cult following among gamers across the world. The futuristic looking carbine-a compact weapon that fires smaller calibre rounds than an assault rifle-clearly caught the attention of the designers of Call of Duty. Since 2012, players of the franchise's Black Ops II have had the DRDO-designed MSMC as one among five carbine options.

No one is quite sure how the virtual version of the weapon showed up in American-produced pop culture. The actual weapon's history, however, is somewhat chequered. It was developed by DRDO's Pune-based Armaments Research and Development Establishment after the Army announced a contest in 2006 to replace all of its obsolete World War II era 9 mm carbines. The 5.56 mm MSMC has a 30-round magazine and can fire upto 900 rounds per minute. An indigenously-made holographic sight with an inbuilt red-dot laser pointer allows for accurate aiming up to the weapon's 200 metre effective range, making it ideal for use in confined urban spaces. The weapon is produced by state-owned ordnance factories and is close to meeting the army's rigorous testing standards.

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As the DRDO-OFB combine wait for the Army order, they have decided to offer the carbine to the police and paramilitary forces. Their optimism is not unfounded. Police forces are looking to modernise WWII era weapon inventories. Imports are not just expensive, but also subject to controls by host nations- German manufacturer Heckler and Koch has repeatedly cited human rights violations by Indian security forces as reason to deny exports.

The Chhattisgarh police became the first to order the weapon this year-640 of them-with similar orders expected from the Madhya Pradesh, Delhi and Meghalaya police. India's paramilitary forces are another potential buyer. Its designers estimate the firearm has the potential to replace nearly 400,000 obsolete weapons, an order worth over Rs 45,000 crore (including ammunition).

"We have the production capacity to make around 35,000 such carbines each year," says H.R. Dixit, general manager, Small Arms Factory (SAF), Kanpur. This Indian carbine's transition from virtual to real could prove to be a potential game changer.

--- ENDS ---
Japan's Daichi Nakamura won the first prize in the violin category at the International Johannes Brahms Competition in Poertschach, southern Austria, on Friday.

"I am relieved now," Nakamura, 27, who is originally from Kitakyushu in the southwestern Japan prefecture of Fukuoka and currently lives in the Austrian capital of Vienna, told the press.

He added that he wants to perform in a manner that would reflect the intentions of composers as much as possible.

Nakamura has performed with numerous orchestras both inside and outside of Japan, including the Kyushu Symphony Orchestra, based in the city of Fukuoka, when he was nine years old.
The National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT) has released a video of auroras that are believed to have appeared due to a solar flare - an explosion on the sun's surface - that occurred on Wednesday.

The video was captured on Friday at Showa Station, Japan's research base in Antarctica.

In addition to a green aurora captured in the video, the NICT said a purple aurora was also observed.

"We believe the auroras' colors were affected by strong solar flares," said Mamoru Ishii, director at the NICT's Space Environment Laboratory.

Auroras are seen when charged particles emitted from the sun hit particles in the Earth's atmosphere and produce light in the air.

Sep 10 (Kyodo) - aeeeaacsaccceaaaaaaiaccYaaiaaacaca aaaacaaeaaaYaaaaaYaaaacaaaeYaaaaaaaaaaaaaeaaaYa
Tokyo Metropolitan Police have busted a mail order service based in a Nerima Ward that sold about 1 million illegal pornographic DVDs each year since 2012. The operation is believed to have funded organized crime, reports TV Asahi.

Earlier this month, police raided the headquarters of the operation and found Yoshikazu Egawa, the 45-year-old leader, and a male Korean national, also 45, to be in possession of 23,000 DVDs, whose content is deemed to be waisetsu, or obscene, with the intent to sell.

Under Japanese law, all exposed genitalia appearing in films must be obscured. Four other persons have been arrested in the case.

Telephone and direct mail

According to police, the residence was used to manufacture the DVDs. In order to evade a bust, customers were not solicited via the internet; instead, the telephone and direct mail were used for the placement of orders.

The operation sold about 5 million DVDs with revenue totaling 1.5 billion yen since 2012, police said.

Police are investigating whether funds from the operation were used to fund a criminal syndicate.

Sep 10 (ANNnewsCH) - aaceaaaeaaaaaDVDaeaaaccsaaaaaYaaaaaaeaaaaaaaaaaacaa6aaeaaaaaYa
The opportunity to see wild brown bears in their natural environment has made a national park in Hokkaido a popular hiking destination.

The hiking route in Daisetsuzan National Park is open for about a three-month period from late June to early October. It is closed when the park's information center judges conditions too dangerous.

Hikers are allowed to walk along the trail without a guide, but only after attending a lecture about brown bears, including prohibited behaviors such as cooking in the forest, eating at certain locations and leaving waste behind.

The 7-km-long route takes visitors through a mountainous area dotted with ponds in Kamikawa, affording them a good chance of spotting bears from a distance. Since the opening of a supervisory office in 1994, there have been no reported incidents between people and bears.

"If we keep an adequate distance, we can coexist," the center says.

The writers of Lonely Planet included the hiking route, called Daisetsu Kogen Onsen Spa Numameguri, in one of its travel guidebooks, and through this more foreign tourists have visited the national park in recent years.

One early morning in August a couple from Germany were excited to see an adult brown bear with a cub grazing on grass about 200 meters away. Using telescopes, the couple took a closer look at them, which stood at about 1 to 1.5 meters tall.

"Many of the bears here are gentle in nature and quickly run away when approached," said Hitoshi Yanagisawa, 43, an official at the brown bear information center.

Because of the area's lush, rich vegetation, close to 30 bears are spotted at the popular feeding spot every summer.

Hikers can access the route from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. during the open period. Information center officials patrol the route every day and post information on a notice board in the center on locations of recent bear sightings or where footprints have been found.

According to the Hokkaido Prefectural Government, 14 incidents involving brown bears were reported throughout the prefecture in the five years to March 2016. In some cases, people were attacked when they entered the forest to gather wild plants to eat.
Reflecting the recent rise of alpine accidents amid the trekking boom in Japan, experts advise hikers to get insurance covering search and rescue expenses, which can be hugely expensive.

There were 2,495 mountaineering accidents across Japan in 2016, the second highest figure since data became available in 1961, according to the National Police Agency. A total of 319 people died or went missing while 1,133 were injured. Nearly 60 percent of the victims were in their 50s or older, according to the NPA.

If police or other public organizations are mobilized in a mountaineering accident, the taxpayer gets the bill for search and rescue operations. But if private rescue teams are called in, the victim must pay the additional costs, which run very high.

A person familiar with private rescue services said, "Deploying a helicopter can cost up to 10,000 yen per minute and daily payments to a rescuer working on a volunteer basis could come to several tens of thousands yen."

A Japan Mountaineering and Sport Climbing Association official said, "Hikers should be fully prepared before going on a trek. On top of that, we strongly suggest that they get insurance coverage."

The association provides a reasonable insurance service that covers rescue costs incurred during trekking and other outdoor activities. The underwriter is Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Co.

If the insurance policy is bought on a group basis, the insured needs to pay an annual subscription fee of 1,000 yen. The premium is about half the sum needed for an individual contract.
As even his closest confidants will tell you, it's never easy reading Prime Minister Narendra Modi's mind. This was proved once again last week with the cabinet reshuffle-as many as nine new faces from the BJP were inducted, six ministers were dropped and a major reshuffle of portfolios was effected. The bag of surprises included a major bump up for Nirmala Sitharaman to the post of Union defence minister and nixing of rumours that the JD(U) or AIADMK may make it into the cabinet.

By and large, the political message was clear: perform or perish. Good performers were rewarded and poor ones downsized or dropped. While MoS for skill development Rajiv Pratap Rudy clearly paid the price for not doing enough to realise the PM's dream in the area, three key ministers of state were promoted-Piyush Goyal, Dharmendra Pradhan and Sitharaman.

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Goyal moved to railways in place of Suresh Prabhu who moved to industry and commerce. Former Union home secretary and new inductee, the BJP MP R.K. Singh, took over the power and new and renewable energy portfolios from Goyal (which came as a bit of a surprise considering how the latter had dramatically improved the power situation in the country).

But Modi's biggest political surprise was in anointing Sitharaman defence minister, the first woman to hold the critical portfolio full-time (Indira Gandhi too handled defence in 1975 and 1980-82 but she was also prime minister then). It's clearly a gamble, driven less by performance-related math than by Modi's tendency to spring a surprise in every exercise he carries out. Sources say Sitharaman got defence only because of Modi's insistence, her diligence, integrity and a marked habit of not exceeding her brief weighing in her favour.

Her critics in the party, though, say she has been found wanting at times when it comes to taking bold decisions. The Indian export scenario remained weak during her tenure as commerce minister, though the shortfall is attributed less to her than the global situation (it picked up in the later stages). In the industry portfolio, she did quite well in niche areas. It's significant to note here that the prime minister's surprise moves have had a mixed response in the past. Smriti Irani was inducted into HRD in almost a similar manner in 2014 but had to be moved to another ministry in the last reshuffle. However, a source close to the prime minister who's also worked with Sitharaman says "she's a fast learner... she will pass the test".

Some were also surprised at the induction of the outspoken R.K. Singh who had criticised the BJP ticket distribution during the Bihar elections, and even accused a section of the state party leadership of taking money. However, few know that he also played a key role, along with Arun Jaitley, in getting Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar to cross over to the NDA. Singh will be closely watched, there are many who are sceptical on whether a "standard bureaucrat" can run the power ministry with the same efficiency as the innovative Goyal.

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Meanwhile, Prabhu's demotion wasn't just because of the series of railway accidents. Top BJP sources say he was seen as not delivering enough on core areas like increase in freight and passenger traffic while there was an overemphasis on service areas like cleanliness and food.

Modi's focus on performance was best illustrated by the induction of two experts who are not even MPs-Hardeep Puri, IFS officer and former India representative to the United Nations, as well as ex-IAS officer from Kerala, Alphons Kannanthanam. But even here there are contradictions. Alphons, a known administrator who earned the label of demolition man when he was Delhi's municipal commissioner, has been given tourism (independent charge) and MoS for electronics and IT. Meanwhile, Puri, who has never worked in urban development, has been given housing and urban affairs. The latter has a tough job on his hands as the Centre's urban housing programme for the poor is not doing well.

Dharmendra Pradhan got a major thumbs up with elevation to full cabinet rank and being given additional responsibility of the skill development ministry (apart from petroleum, oil and gas which he already held). It was reward for his successful implementation of the Ujjwala cooking gas cylinder scheme for the poor which has worked wonders for the party's image. Of the 50 million BPL connections to be distributed by 2019, Pradhan has already covered 28 million. He has also brought transparency to the tainted oil and gas sector. If Pradhan can turn around the skill development ministry, his stock will go up further.

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Among the new discoveries in the expansion is Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, the MP from Jodhpur. Shekhawat was picked up as MoS for agriculture on the basis of the work he has done to solve governance-related problems in areas like agriculture, solar power generation and direct benefit transfer (DBT) in welfare schemes and a knack for using social media forums effectively. Indeed, Shekhawat has a big following on Quora because of this. Sources say Modi was so impressed with Shekhawat's work that he was asked to give a presentation to BJP MPs in the last parliamentary session.

The focus on performance is by now obvious. It was common knowledge that the PM was less than happy with the work in the Ganga rejuvenation ministry under Uma Bharti. So the portfolio was transferred to the ever-efficient Nitin Gadkari who has already announced a ministerial task force to suggest ways to speed up the work. MoS for culture and tourism Mahesh Sharma, a medical doctor and a favourite of RSS leaders (more for his medical connections than his work as a minister) stands divested of tourism.

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But the minister facing the toughest challenge is Piyush Goyal-reforming the railways and privatising Coal India Ltd (he retains coal) which he has been unable to do due to various factors, including pressure from the trade unions. He will face the same trials with railways where the unions are very strong. One reason for the poor safety infrastructure in the railways has been the large number of vacant posts. Some 121,000 such posts are lying vacant right now, kept so with a view to saving money. Also, the modernisation process has been slow. Speeding it up could mean cutting more jobs, where again the unions will come into play.

Significantly, party seniority and loyalty have also been rewarded. Of the new ministers, Virendra Kumar is a six-term MP while the controversial Anant Kumar Hegde has five terms under his belt. Shiv Pratap Shukla, a four-time MLA from UP and a state cabinet minister for eight years, is an old party warhorse. All three are from Sangh backgrounds so the RSS's concerns have been addressed.

Inside the party, there is a buzz that Jaitley has become very strong with all his nominees-Goyal, Pradhan, Sitharaman and minority affairs minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi-being promoted and rewarded. But sources close to Modi say the only consideration was performance. BJP president Amit Shah told india today: "Four words define the reshuffle and expansion-proficiency, professional and political acumen and passion for achieving progress. And, of course, keeping to the priorities of the party and the government." Clearly, the ruling BJP was of the view that the government machinery had to be revved up as the race towards the 2019 polls approaches.

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MoneyTips

National Be A Millionaire Day is celebrated every year on May 20th. The trick to becoming a 401(k) millionaire is to start young and allow your money to go to work for you. It may be difficult for someone who is just starting out in life to be disciplined enough to max-out his/her 401(k) fund contributions, but I'd definitely suggest setting up a budget. Find out what it's going to take just to pay your bills  not all of your wants and desires and the unnecessary things in life, just your bills  what it takes to merely exist. If you don't have money left over, it might be time to cut expenses, seek a higher-paying career or further your education.

Once you have an idea of what you can save, START saving! If your company matches your contributions, then most definitely contribute the maximum to take advantage of the free money they're giving you. If there's an option for a Roth 401(k) and you plan to work there for at least five years, choose the Roth. You'll contribute after-tax dollars, so your contribution, along with all of your gains over time, will be tax-free for life (and there are no required minimum distributions after age 70); the company's match contributions will sit in a traditional 401(k). Always set it up to auto-contribute! Out of sight is out of mind, and one day, you'll look at it and say, "I had no idea I had that much!"

However, don't just blindly contribute. Look at the choices available for you to allocate your money within the plan. Seek the help of a professional! Don't do what most people do and get what I call "water cooler advice" from your friends and coworkers. If you're young, be more aggressive; if you're closer to retirement and don't have an appetite for risk, be more conservative.

Should you find yourself in a hardship situation, look at other options instead of borrowing from your 401(k). Even if you can prove your hardship and can avoid the 10% IRS penalty for withdrawing from the account prior to age 59 , remember that this is your primary source of retirement funding and should never be touched, under most circumstances, if at all possible. I have seen way too many 30-50-year-olds decimate their retirement by making this mistake, only to realize what a poor decision they made when it was too late to rebound from the effects of early withdrawals. Money is relatively cheap right now, so a bank loan or line of credit may be a better solution.

The simple answer is to seek the help of a professional, start contributing as soon as possible, max out your contributions to the best of your financial ability, and let the time value of money work for you. After all, informed decision-making is always the best solution.

People with better credit can save more for retirement because they pay less in interest. You can check your credit score and read your credit report for free within minutes by joining MoneyTips.

Photo iStockphoto.com/JacobWackerhausen

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Originally Posted at: https://www.moneytips.com/how-to-become-a-401k-millionaire

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DANBURY  A Danbury man was arrested Sunday after police said he broke into a multifamily home and hit the homeowner.

Police said the owner of a Beaver Brook Road home heard someone on his basement stairs around 2 a.m. Sunday. The resident told police he opened the door to his basement and asked the suspect what he was doing. The suspect, 24-year-old Elias Madrid-Suchite, of Danbury, lied and then threatened to beat up the resident, police said.
/ Contributed

BROOKFIELD  A Yonkers man was indicted on murder charges this week for purportedly stabbing his wife  a former Brookfield High School graduate  to death during an argument in the spring.

Joseph Abraham, 54, was indicted on several charges including murder and two counts of weapon possession in connection to the death of his wife Amanda Trenck, 25, who was found by dead by police in May in the apartment the couple shared in Yonkers, N.Y.
Several F-15E military fighter jets flew over the region Sunday afternoon in formation and then individually, raising peoples eyes to the sky, and concerns.

It turns out the flyover was for the U.S. Open in Queens, according to the New York City Office of Emergency Management.

Planned Flyover: five F-15E Strike Eagle aircraft will fly over the Hudson River, over Manhattan, & to the US Open (QN) on 9/10 btwn 3PM-4PM, a Twitter post by the agency said.

In Norwalk, local officials didnt know why the jets were flying over. It was too late for the Sept. 11 CT United ride, and it wasnt arranged for the Oyster Festival.

State Sen. Bob Duff said he was arriving in Hartford shortly after 3 p.m. when he got barraged by inquiries on social media. He passed on information as it came. He noted that no such jets are based in Connecticut.

So... it was a little hard to tell through the trees but what looked like 2 sets of four F-15's just flew over... Did Trump piss off another country and should I get a helmet? Jeff Santo of Norwalk posted on Facebook shortly after 3 p.m.

The jets, which were very loud, passed over Norwalk several times in the span of an hour.

Residents of other towns and cities saw and heard the jets as well. That includes Fairfield, where the towns police chief Gary MacNamara tweeted: In case anyone asks. The jets over fairfield are part of a Flyover for the US Open in Flushing Queens.
By India Today Web Desk: 21st GST Council meet: Daily use items to be cheaper, big cars to cost more

The 21st Council meet, and the second since the implementation of GST, put its stamp on a long pending issue by raising total tax on mid-size cars from 43 to 45 %.Mexico mourns 66 dead after twin punch of earthquake, hurricane

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Hardest hit was Juchitan, a Oaxaca state city where 36 people died when the magnitude 8.1 quake toppled buildings.

US Open: Sloane Stephens thumps Madison Keys in final for maiden Grand Slam title

Sloane Stephens beat fellow American Madison Keys 6-3, 6-0 in women's singles final to win her maiden Grand Slam title.

Shraddha to play a dual role in Prabhas's Saaho?

Reports are doing the rounds that Shraddha Kapoor will be seen in a dual role in Tollywood star Prabhas's Saaho.

--- ENDS ---
Hal Brodsky says it has taken him almost 90 years to grow up, to be himself, to be free and to fully express his experiences in the Depression and World War II as well as the people he has met.

Now, finally, here is what he calls the story of my life in paintings and drawings on exhibit at the Woodbridge Town Library. The exhibition opened this past week and can be seen through the end of the month.

Im coming to the end of my life now, Brodsky told me last Wednesday as we sat in the exhibition room at the library, surrounded by his colorful work. I wanted to make a statement. I lived through the Depression. I lived through World War II.

He has never made a living as an artist and only once before, about 50 years ago in Stony Creek, was he invited to exhibit his work.

Brodsky paid his bills for most of his life by selling insurance, usually working door-to-door in Branford. But at home he kept painting and drawing.

Brodsky always knew he wanted to do this. When he was a young man in Brooklyn, living in a poor family with his immigrant parents, he told them he wanted to go to art school. But they had been through the deprivations of the Depression in the 1930s and didnt want him to pursue such an impractical career.

Halting his narrative, Brodsky got up from his chair and showed me his painting of a youngster roasting a potato in the street. When I was a kid in Brooklyn, we didnt have much food.

Eventually, he overcame his parents objection and made it to art school, funded by the G.I. Bill. I wanted it very badly.

Next to the potato-roasting remembrance are two brightly-colored paintings: Hiroshima and Contemplation.

Hiroshima, painted only within the past year, features a big red-and-yellow slash above a group of black buildings. Brodsky pointed to the green, blue and white stripes on the side of the painting: Thats life against death.

Then, pointing to Contemplation, he said, Thats me, watching Hiroshima happen. A mans figure stands in the foreground of the red-and-yellow fireball.

When that U.S. plane dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima in August 1945 (followed three days later by a second one on Nagasaki), Brodsky was serving in the U.S. Army in a division led by General George Patton. Like most of the American soldiers, he applauded the bombings, as they quickly led to Japans surrender and the end of the war.

When it happened, I was happy, he said of the Hiroshima bombing. I didnt realize that 145,000 Japanese civilians died who had nothing to do with it.

Brodsky said when he learned of this, I became a pacifist.

The biggest lesson Ive learned is that your enemy today could be your friend tomorrow, he said. The people you hated could be the nicest people in the world.

Brodskys haunting World War II memories include seeing the German concentration camps and the people in them. Brodsky and his fellow soldiers were assigned to re-locate the Jews who had survived that ordeal.

Brodskys war experience turned him into an atheist as well as a pacifist. The war, that ended any kind of a sense of religion for me.

He asked the question: Where was God? He is still asking that question today.

Brodsky has included in the exhibition at least one other painting with a political message: Stinker  Fake News. It depicts a familiar-looking man seated on a toilet.

Its a parody of (President Donald) Trump, Brodsky said. The three men in the foreground are wearing red, white and blue hats; thats America. And theyre looking at this guy.

On the table in the center of the exhibition room rested a drawing of a smiling woman that had not yet found its place on the walls. This is Brodskys wife of 31 years, Cecile Brodsky.

We havent been able to fit it in yet, Brodsky told me. Were gonna fit it in, believe me!

Shes a wonderful part of my life, he said.

Brodskys first marriage is not such a romantic story.

I knew two weeks after I got married that I had made a mistake, he recalled. I told my brother: I made a mistake! I want to get a divorce. He said, We dont get divorced. Do you want to kill your mother?

I stayed, Brodsky noted. I was unhappy. When our daughter was born with cystic fibrosis, I didnt leave. I waited until she grew up. Then I asked for a divorce, after 25 years.

Brodsky moved to New Haven in the 1950s and he got that life insurance job. I was frustrated, very unhappy. I went to the VA and asked for help with my emotional problem. They gave me a girl with a tiny voice. She got me in a room and asked: How can I help you?

I told her, Im here to find out who I am. I dont know who I am. She grabbed my arm and said, No. You know who you are. You dont like who you are. She was 100 percent correct.

It all led back to my childhood, Brodsky told me. When you grow up in an immigrant family from Europe, it was a very controlling family. You did whatever they told you to do. I was the youngest and thought I could make everybody happy  but not myself.

It took me all those years to come to the realization that I had to be who I am, not what everybody wants me to be. And now Im enjoying every friggin minute of it! My wife has supported me. It took me 90 years to grow up. Its the truth and Im not afraid to tell anybody.

As he moved around the room, telling me about the 40 or so pieces on the wall, Brodsky occasionally relied on his cane. I had a stroke 2 1/2 years ago. Two strokes, two heart attacks at the same time. And Ive got emphysema and asthma. Other than that, Im in good shape!

Brodsky said all of this has not hampered his ability to draw or paint. It did affect my hand. I have to hold my hand while I paint.

He knows hes lucky to still be around, having seen so many others die. The thing I miss terribly is that all my friends are dead. I get lonely.

But he and his wife like their home on Mansfield Street in New Haven. I love that street, he said. We have a three-family house; we rent some of it to Yale students. They keep me young. Were going to live there until we die  or she throws me out! At our age, all you can do now is be active. Everything is the people in my life.

When I reached Cecile Brodsky on the phone, she said of the exhibition, I really wanted him to do this a long time ago. I love his art. Its different, thats what I love about it. Its all varied.

She said the public might get a chance next year to see Brodskys work exhibited at the New Haven Lawn Club.

Brodsky said he entitled his exhibition Vignettes because these are vignettes of my life, little spots of people that were part of my life and influenced me.

And he said putting it together invigorated me. The process of doing it made me feel like I was re-born. Im a free man, thats the only way I can express it. Im glad I had this opportunity. This is a nice culmination; Im turning 90 on Sept. 17 and were having a reception at the library on the 16th (1-3 p.m.). I wasnt sure I was going to live long enough to see it.

Contact Randall Beach at rbeach@nhregister.com or 203-680-9345.
As he wrapped up a meeting with the Hearst Connecticut Media editorial board on Thursday, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy casually uttered a wish for a bipartisan budget to end the ugly stalemate that is holding Connecticuts reputation hostage.

But Im not going to hold my breath on that one, he said of the likelihood of Democrats and Republicans playing nice together deep into extra innings after a long season of verbal squabbling.

Were not holding our breath either, but a bipartisan pact is exactly what should happen before the 2017 calendar flips to Oct. 1  a full three months after Malloy was forced to start running the state freestyle  and the state adds even more to its epic $1.6 billion debt. Benjamin Barnes, the secretary of the Office of Policy and Management, estimates that the lack of a budget is costing the state about a million dollars a day.

Malloy, the top dog among state Democrats, likes to bark that the minority Republicans never sign off on his budgets. This time, virtually every member of the General Assembly seems paralyzed in the face of tough decisions that require bringing bad news back to constituents.

From a political perspective, its hard to blame Republicans for taking a let it burn approach. It improves their odds of reclaiming the governors office in 2018 and tilting the House and Senate see-saw in their direction.

We dont care about the politics. Connecticut needed a budget months ago, but even Malloy wasnt surprised the regular session ended without one. That the fuse has burned this long should be jarring to anyone. The only other state that has yet to sign off on a budget is Wisconsin, and its spending plan is nearing final approval.

Malloy is no diplomat. Hes not the ideal person to negotiate a truce that will produce a bipartisan budget. Were not even sure how that politician could survive in the current political climate in America. Its up to party leaders to lead.

The governors new two-year, $39.7 billion budget seeks to raise cigarette and restaurant taxes, hike the sales tax from 6.35 percent to 6.5 percent and eliminate a slew of property-tax credits. It also takes a more empathetic approach to the states vital nonprofits.

Malloy has blinked  twice  by trimming his request for municipalities to cover one-third of teacher pensions, but remains clear-eyed that Connecticut start following a practice that is typical across the rest of the country. We cant argue with that concept, and prefer the idea of starting slow.

His budget is not perfect  theres no magic pot of money to fill our canyon of debt  but it should be enough to motivate lawmakers to finally produce a budget during this weeks special session.

We implore Democrats and Republicans to collaborate on the hard work. That doesnt just mean the Republicans swallowing another plan thats hard for them to digest. Democrats must stop being intractable about good ideas that come from across the aisle.

So, go ahead, give us a bipartisan plan. Theres still time to take our breath away.
WASHINGTON  Connecticut Democrats in Washington are cautiously optimistic that a deal with President Donald Trump to raise the debt ceiling and fund the government might lead to cooperation in other areas, but theyre not holding their collective breath.

My suspicion is this was likely dictated by Trumps mood on one particular day, and its not a strategic shift, said Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., who in the past accused Trump of actively sabotaging health care and giving Russia free rein around the world.

But its not out of the realm of possibility it could happen again, Murphy added.

Trump as Democrat-flagellator-in-chief turned into Trump the bipartisan deal-maker Wednesday. He went around GOP leadership and did a deal with Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., to up the debt ceiling and keep the government operating for three months.

House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., had called the Democrats temporary fix ridiculous and disgraceful, but later soft-pedaled the Trump-Dem deal as a bipartisan moment aimed at reassuring the nation during a particularly harsh hurricane season.

I regard it as a positive step and an act of statesmanship, said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., who has been the target of Trump insults on Twitter. If it leads to bipartisan compromises, it will be highly significant. Well see what the next step is.

Many bridges to cross

Asked by reporters at the White House if the budget-debt deal signals more bipartisanship, Trump responded: I hope so.

Cooperation between the parties is a great thing for our country, he said. Thats what the people of the United States want to see.

The agreement with Democrats was incorporated into a hurricane-relief emergency funding bill that passed the Senate on Thursday and the House on Friday.

But reaching accord on the debt ceiling and keeping the government open may prove much easier than hatching a comparable deal on immigration reform, health care or infrastructure.

Although Trump put temporary legal status for youthful immigrant dreamers on a six-month timer on Tuesday, he and Democrats (and many Republicans) agree this population  more than 8,000 in Connecticut  should not be put back in the shadows, subject to deportation.

But the two sides differ on the broader issues of immigration, with Democrats supporting wider legal status and a path to citizenship while Trump still wants to build a wall across the entire U.S.-Mexico border.

Being the boss

Connecticut Democrats see Trumps erratic behavior and lack political consistency as limiting future cooperation.

It is impossible to predict anything with President Trump in the White House, said Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., a liberal firebrand who is among Pelosis closest allies. I sincerely hope this bipartisanship spirit persists so we can tackle the big issues people are facing every day  jobs that do not pay people enough to live on, lowering the cost of health care, and making sure their children get a good education.

Trump may well be using his embrace of Democrats as a wedge to keep Republicans in line.

Its a signal to Republicans that they kowtow to the president or else hell go an alternate route, said Gary Rose, political science chairman at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield. Hes a maverick who does maverick things.

Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., were under no legal obligation to follow Trumps lead on the deal and could have scuttled it, Murphy said.

But in allowing the deal to prevail in House and Senate, the two deflected some of the inevitable heat emanating from more conservative lawmakers who have long opposed raising the debt ceiling unless it was accompanied by deep cuts in federal spending.

They could say the president made me do it, but thats not how the Constitution works, Murphy said.

As far as future cooperation goes, Trump may have found new allies, but he hasnt stopped being his cantankerous self.

I think theres the potential this could happen again, but its more likely hell go back to calling Schumer and Pelosi names, Murphy said.

dan@hearstdc.com
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NEW HAVEN >> Luisa DeLauro, a fiery advocate for her city and the mother of U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro, died Saturday at the age of 103.

The longest-serving alder in New Haven, whose family has deep roots in the Wooster Square neighborhood, was remembered Sunday as someone who never backed down from a fight and who acclimated generations of residents to New Haven Democratic politics.

Born Dec. 24, 1913, Luisa was the third of six children born to Cesare and Luisa Canestri.

My mother was no stranger to hard work, DeLauro said in a statement. When I was growing up, she worked in a sweatshop, sewing shirt collars for pennies. Every day after school, she would make me come by to see the horrible, cramped conditions. It is something I will never forget. The lesson she passed on was clear: work hard. Make something of yourself. Get a good education.

My mother has always been my greatest inspiration and I will miss her greatly. She taught me the most valuable of lessons of my life, continued DeLauro. She understood that politics was an avenue for changea way to help people who were struggling. It is truly the blessing of a lifetime to have been able to follow in her footsteps, to serve the people of New Haven and Connecticut. All of my actions are guided by her love, encouragement and dedication.

The Iovane Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements which are not yet complete.

The most persistent image of Luisa DeLauro presented by her friends was of someone sitting at her kitchen table welcoming visitors, most of them unannounced, with Luisa making cream puffs on the spur of the moment.

Nick Balletto, the former head of the Democratic Party in New Haven and now the state party leader, said Luisa paved the way for many of us. We all lived a glorious life here because of her.

She was the strongist-willed fighter I have ever met, Balletto said

The congresswoman, an only child, almost always refers to her family at political, and often policy, events, and has said on many occasions how her mother made sure that other women in the party had their voices heard and were not secondary to the male leaders.

Rosa DeLauro recounted that story in a statement about her mother. The congresswoman said Luisa penned an article in the 10th Democratic Wards letter in 1933.

It is not my intention to be critical, rather my motive in writing this article is to encourage the female members of this organization to take a more active part in its affairs. We are not living in the middle ages when a womens part in life was merely to serve her master in her home, but we have gradually taken our place in every phase of human endeavor, and even in the here-to-for stronghold of the male sex: politics. Come on girls, lets make ourselves heard, Luisa wrote.

Joseph Carbone, who was the chief of staff to former Mayor Biagio DiLieto, said his family was close to the DeLauros and while his mother was wary of politicians when she was left a young widow with twin 13-year-old boys, she implicitly trusted Luisa.

Carbone said as a young teen he got his first job with Luisa DeLauros help. He said she practiced, throughout her career, retail politics, something that has long been lost.

If anyone had a problem, no matter what party you belonged to, you didnt need an appointment, you would just knock on her door at 538 Chapel St., Carbone said, and she would listen and help.

The system has been coopted by technology, Carbone said of a lack of personal attention today. She made friends that persisted a lifetime,

He said it was not just politics he would discuss with Luisa.

Carbone said he can remember as a young adult, if he had failed to impress some young woman he liked, Luisa, over a cup of coffee and a pastry, would put it in perspective and make him feel better.

Carbone, who heads The Workforce Place, and his brother, Bill Carbone, who had a top position in the states criminal justice system, said he credits her with guiding them to the successful careers they both enjoyed.

Luisa DeLauro lived in the Wooster Street neighborhood all her life until she moved into her daughters house in the East Rock neighborhood and later had an apartment downtown in the same building as the congresswoman.

The family ran Canestris Pastry Shop on Wooster Street, a building that now houses Consiglios restaurant.

Tomas Reyes, chief of staff to Mayor Toni Harp, said he became a voter in the Democratic Party after Luisa and Rosa knocked on his door and registered him in the party.

That is how far back we go, said Reyes, who was also a long-term president of the Board of Alders.

As she was very close with DiLieto, Reyes remembered a fight the alders had with the mayor who had cut out all funding for neighborhood agencies in the Community Development Block Grant.

While it was hard for her to buck DiLieto, he said, in the end she did it, saying it was the boards job to represent their constituents, and this lack of funds wasnt cutting it.

Mayor Toni Harp said Luisa DeLauro was characterized by family and public service.

She mentored countless women throughout her career  I served with her on the Board of Aldermen in the 1980s  and the entire city will miss her indefatigable, pioneering spirit, Harp said in a statement.

Andrew Consiglio, who retired as a police captain in New Haven, grew up about two blocks from the DeLauros.

He said he remembers it as a very poor area with a lot of residents who didnt know how to go about getting help.

They (Luisa and her husband, Ted) gave assistance to everyone. They made sure they were taken care of, Consiglio said. This in turn, gave them the power to influence political decisions in Wooster Square.

Luisa DeLauro helped get those cherry trees planted in Wooster Square and set the Cherry Blossom Festival in motion. While serving as vice-chairman of the New Haven Historic District Study Commission, she was instrumental in designating Wooster Square as New Havens first Historic District.

The corner of Academy and Chapel streets is named for her and the more controversial granite DeLauro Family Table in Wooster Square, is dedicated to her and her husbands open house for those in need.

The table, which was privately funded, did meet with resistance from more than 100 residents who objected to its design and a perceived lack of neighborhood inclusion in the plans.

Like Carbone, Bill Iovane Jr., who runs the Iovane Funeral Home, said he got his first job through Luisa, with CETA (Comprehensive Employment and Training Act,) funds, where he worked in the summer maintaining a local school property.

He said Luisa was a a mentor to me. I learned an awful lot about Wooster Square. She took the time to introduce me to a lot of people.

He said the DeLauros fought hard to minimize the damage Interstate 95 did to the neighborhood, as well as other Redevelopment Agency decisions.

It is now a crown jewel of the city, Iovane said this section of the city.

Carbone said the DeLauros had a lot of influence in finding homeowners who used the tax credits and renovation grants to fix up neglected properties in that area, which are now some of the most desirable in the city.

He said she remained a renter all her life and never took advantage of those funds. She never advanced herself in a financial way, Carbone said.

Former Mayor John DeStefano Jr., who served for two decades, knew Luisa DeLauro his whole political life.

Two things about Luisas politics. They were fierce and they were personal, he said.

DeStefano said they had to be fierce because, as a woman, she was traveling a road that few women had traveled. If she was not fierce, she would not have been heard.

As for the personal, if you were a constituent and needed something, she was not going to take no for an answer. If you were hers, that was enough.

DeStefano said he remembers when he first went out campaigning with her.

I was following those three-inch heels up some tenement stairs and she didnt knock. She just walked in. Everyone knew her. That was Luisa. She was indefatigable.

Michael Morand, a former alder and now the spokesman for the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University, remembers serving with her on the board, where she remained for 35 years and served under six mayors.

Luisa DeLauro was a blessing to New Haven. Her fierceness inspired many generations and I think her career and her life are a witness in that she worked with people across neighborhoods, races and ethnicities, while rooted proudly in her own tradition, Morand said..

When her husband, Ted DeLauro, left the Wooster Square aldermanic seat to work for the Redevelopment Agency, Luisa DeLauro didnt have to follow him into electoral politics, Morand said.

It is no surprise, he said, that Rosa DeLauro is such a fighter. It is what she learned from her mothers example from childhood on. It is also remarkable that Luisa has been a presence, including her past 100th birthday, at civic events and in Wooster Square.
GREENWICH >> As Connecticut struggles with a budget stalemate and the departure of major companies, one of its wealthiest communities wants to make it known to the wider world that all is well in Greenwich.

A team from a public relations firm visited the town last week to begin work on a campaign to promote Greenwich, the town of 60,000 people on the New York state line known in the publics imagination as home of the polo and country club set.

The town narrowly approved $30,000 in taxpayer money for the campaign by New York City-based Lou Hammond Group. Organizers also have raised $90,000 in private donations.

Once we get this PR campaign going, the stories that come out will show a very diverse, very engaged, more current and modern community than perhaps has been thought of in the past, said Robin Kencel, co-leader of the Experience Greenwich public-private partnership.

Organizers also see value in burnishing Greenwichs own brand at a time when headlines out of Hartford have been telling of struggles to close a budget shortfall and woe over the departure of companies like Aetna and General Electric.

We are proud to be part of Connecticut obviously, Kencel said, but taking this point in time, our response could be to just sort of fall under whats going on statewide or we could make sure people know we are extraordinarily business friendly.

Skeptics have pushed back against the idea of using town money for the campaign.

Our town cant correct the problems created by Hartford, Karen Fassuliotis, a member of the Representative Town Meeting, said at a public hearing in the spring.

Kencel, who is also a real estate broker in Greenwich, said the campaign will encourage people to work, shop and play in town.
Satam alleged that cops have failed to do their duty and their salary should be paid to him, as he is taking action against the hawkers.

By Saurabh Vaktania: A video has gone viral on social media where BJP MLA from Andheri-West Assembly Constituency, Ameet Satam, is scene abusing police officials and local hawkers. The MLA does not stop here and even physically assaulted the hawkers.

Satam alleged that cops have failed to do their duty and their salary should be paid to him, as he is taking action against the hawkers.

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In his defence Satam said, "I haven't committed any crime. Case can be registered against me, if I am at fault. Action should also be taken against senior police inspector and DCP of the zone for they allowed hawkers to operate freely."

When asked about complaint filed by the hawkers, Satam said, "People make such allegations when you try to take action against them."

DCP Paramjit Dahiya said, "We have received a written complaint in the matter. We are investigating, and if we find anything against Satam, we will book him."

Also Read:

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Caught on tape: Arni BJP MLA Raju Todsam demanding money from contractor

Also Watch: Mumbai: BJP MLA Ameet Satam assaulting policemen, hawkers; incident caught on camera

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GUILFORD >> The memories of those African Americans who were enslaved in Guilford will be preserved in granite and brass markers around town as the result of the Witness Stones Project.

A panel discussion about the project will be held from 6:30 to 8 p.m. Sept. 13 at the Guilford Free Library, 67 Park St.

Dennis Culliton, chairman of the Witness Stones Committee, said the purpose of the project is the idea of remembering. Were restoring the history and then honoring the slaves, honoring their humanity. They had lives and they had skills and crafts and professions and they contributed to civic life in Guilford.

Culliton said the idea originated with Doug Nygren, who saw the Stolpersteine in Germany (translated as stumbling blocks), which memorialize Jews killed in the Holocaust and are placed where the Jews lived. Similarly, the Witness Stones will be placed outside the enslaved persons onetime residences, Culliton said.

A lot of ministers owned slaves and lot of merchants and  sea captains, Culliton said.

The committees hope is to place three stones per year over the next seven to 10 years. The idea is a pretty powerful idea and were hoping that if we find success in Guilford that we can partner with other communities, he said.

Culliton, an eighth-grade history and language arts teacher at Adams Middle School, is using the project as a lesson, in which students will write the story of a slave.

The installation of the first three stones  for Moses, his mother Phillis and Candace  is scheduled for Nov. 2, Culliton said. Theyll be placed outside the slaves residences so youll realize that the black slaves didnt live on the outskirts of town. They lived in these big houses, Culliton said.

A model stone has been made by Paul Growald of the Stopping Stones Project in Vermont for Darb, who was a fiddler, but the committee has not yet determined where he lived.

The panel will include Nygren, a retired social worker; Hazel Carby, professor of African-American studies at Yale University; the Rev. Ginger Brasher-Cunningham, pastor of the First Congregational Church; and Marji Lipshez-Shapiro, senior associate director of the Anti-Defamation League of Connecticut.

For more information, go to WitnessStones.org. Registration is not required but attendees can sign up at www.guilfordfreelibrary.org, under the Events tab. The project is a committee of the Guilford Preservation Alliance and sponsored by the Guilford Foundation Youth Advisory Group and the Guilford Fund for Education.

Call Ed Stannard at 203-680-9382.
Kano State Governor, Abdullahi Ganduje, has endorsed President Muhammadu Buhari for second term.The State Commissioner for Information and Culture, Mr. Muhammed Garba in a statement, Saturday, quoted Ganduje as saying that the foundation laid by the current administration would be consolidated and improved upon should the President decide to offer his services to the nation again in 2019.He said, The Buhari brand is a unifying factor because Nigerians across ethno-religious divides have come to see him as a man who walks the talk.For us in Kano for example, our support for him is 100 per cent. We know him as an honest Nigerian who thinks Nigeria first before anything else.His performance over the last two years  especially in the war against corruption, insecurity and terrorism  has been exemplary.Should he decide to hear our cry to seek re-election, we will not only support him but also do everything humanly and legally possible to ensure his victory.For those who have the privilege of travelling outside Nigeria, it is common knowledge that we are now respected because of the value the Buhari administration has brought to governance.In the same vein, Governor Amosun of Osun State, who spoke to journalists on Saturday in Abeokuta, Ogun State, at a book launch, said the President had the right to a second term.He said, The only thing that can prevent President Buhari from contesting is if his health cannot take it.If not for this present administration, only God knows where Nigeria would have been. When the government came on board, it was like jumping into the pool at the deep end.He scored the Federal Government high in its fight against insurgency, insecurity, corruption as well as efforts geared at economic recovery through serious diversification drive.
By PTI: (Eds: Repeating after correcting word Lalbaugcha)

Mumbai, Sep 10 (PTI) Banned currency notes made their way to Mumbais most popular Ganesh pandal - Lalbaugcha Raja - this year with devotees offering over Rs one lakh in demonetised currency to the Lord.

Of the around Rs 6 crore, which the popular Lalbaugcha Raja in Parel received from devotees during the just concluded Ganesh festival, there were 105 notes of the scrapped Rs 1,000 denomination in the donation box.

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"Of the 105 notes, one was torn. There were also 50 notes of the scrapped Rs 500 denomination," an official from the state Charity Commissioners office said.

"So far, the total donation received is Rs 5,93,14,800," the official said.

"We are yet to count foreign currency received in the donation box and also the new currency garlands offered to the deity," the official said.

The quantum of donation this year was less compared to the around Rs 8 crore received last year. This years collection also included gold and silver.

The official cited heavy rains, which lashed Mumbai on August 29 and led to flooding and disruption in transport services, as a key reason for the low donation amount.

Million of devotees visited the Lalbaugcha Raja to seek blessings of Lord Ganesh during the festival that began on August 25 and ended on September 5.

The footfall at the pandal was less for two days when most people stayed indoors due to heavy rains, he added. PTI VT RSY DV ARS IKA

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The Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, has alleged that President Muhammadu Buhari has ordered the Nigerian army to wipe out Igbos from the country.IPOB said it was shameful that Buhari has ordered the Chief of Army Staff, Tukur Buratai to kill anyone supporting the Biafran cause instead of focusing on the Boko Haram insurgents, which had take over the northern region.The group in a statement on Sunday by its spokesman, Emma Powerful said Buhari had sworn to wipe out Biafra citizens from the face of the earth.The statement reads in full.We wish to alert humanity about the wickedly undemocratic silent Jihadi war unleashed on peaceful Biafran populations, in order to complete the extermination of the Igbo race under the pretext of military exercise in a peaceful civilian environment. This act of primitive criminal intimidation and provocation by Fulani Islamic fundamentalists in the Buhari regime, must not go unchallenged by men and women of good conscience.Major General Muhammadu Buhari was supposedly elected to preside over a transparent civilian democratic government. However, what we have today is an administration of Fulani ethnic jingoists and unprecedented levels of religious bigotry never before witnessed in Nigeria. This Buhari administration is the very worst kind of elected dictatorship. This latest attempt to use military show of force in Biafraland to deal with legitimate peaceful agitation for self determination vindicates IPOB position that Nigeria is irredeemably primitive and incapable of human development.Where on earth is it heard that combat ready troops are deployed within the borders of a country to deal with a non-violent civil matter; only in Nigeria. It makes a mockery of the role of the military and a nonsense of the constitution that soldiers can be ordered by one army officer, without the permission of the Senate, to kill civilian populations in an area devoid of any conflict. This is one of the many reasons we IPOB cannot share the same geo-political space with people that can hardly reason like humans.These clueless and uninformed members of APC Party in Aso Rock under the supervision of Major General Muhammadu Buhari have once again proven their undemocratic and savage nature. For Fulani Caliphate to think they can intimidate Biafrans the same way they intimidated and conquered Hausa people along with other indigenous ethnic minorities of the North, proves they are not good students of history. Previous Fulani Jihadi campaigns to conquer and subjugate Biafraland have always ended in failure, that is why Biafra has remained till date untainted by virulent Jihadi Islam unlike other coastal regions of West Africa.Major General Muhammadu Buhari and his core Arewa North are misguided into thinking this present generation can be subdued with threats of war as they did to our fathers. Arewa North falsely boasted that they won the 1967-70 War. But as serving officers, which some of them were during that time, they knew fully well that Biafra was defeated by Britain and her fellow conspirators not Nigeria. History is replete with events and instances where British support for Nigeria, especially regarding the secret sale of weapons to Gowon, proved decisive in ending the war in favour of Nigeria.The fact remains that Nigeria as a country has never won any war on its own, they always need outside help to succeed. The limited gains made against Boko Haram in 2015 was as a result of the coalition put together by President Jonathan, comprising of troops from Chad, Niger and Cameroon. Nigeria cannot point to any theatre of war comprising exclusively of Nigerian troops with exception of the Congo expedition led by Gen. JT Aguiyi-Ironsi, where they recorded any victory against an armed opposition. Cameroon took Bakassi Peninsula from Nigeria after series of skirmishes between them that ended in defeat for Nigeria both on the battle field and in court.Nigerian Army are only strong when it comes to killing unarmed peaceful civilians. In battlefield against a formidable adversary, they are cowards. Whenever they come into contact with any battle ready formation they crumble and flee. We IPOB advice Buratai not to march his Islamic army into Biafraland under the cover of Operation Python Dance because IPOB is agitating for self determination in a peaceful manner. We have no arms and will never resort to bearing arms. Buhari and Buratai should rather focus their attention on the Boko Haram ravaged areas of Bornu, Yobe, and Adamawa. Boko Haram is a well armed army, they are the ones Buratai should be facing not market women in Aba and traders at Onitsha. We are peaceful people by nature but will not tolerate any molestation or intimidation on our soil.The few crazy people cheering Buratai on with this ill advised military exercise were the same people that called for the execution of Mohammed Yusuf, the peaceful Boko Haram leader. His death gave Nigerians Abubakar Shekau and the deadly insurgency ravaging the North today. Successive Nigerian governments are good at creating problems out of nothing. Had the Nigerian Government not executed Mohammed Yusuf in cold blood, there wouldnt have been any Boko Haram as we know it today.Had Ken Saro Wiwa not been executed by the Nigerian state, there would be no militancy in the Niger Delta. Those Hausa Fulani people benefiting from defence contracts and wanting to expand the frontiers of Islam into Biafraland must know that any conflict they ignite will consume them because Britain will no longer support them openly should they provoke another bloody conflict in Biafra. We advice Buratai to take back his armoured tanks to the war front in the North where its needed as we are not fighting any war in the East.We ask every Biafran to remain calm and continue to be law abiding in our peaceful agitation to restore Biafra. Let nobody entertain any fear because the world knows we are IPOB and as such, we are without fear before our enemies. IPOB Family under the command and leadership of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu are in the mighty hands of the Lord the Most High Creator of Heaven and Earth.
The Department of State Service (DSS) said yesterday it arrested a wanted terrorism suspect and member of the Islamic State of West Africa (ISWA), Husseini Mai-Tangaran.

A statement by a DSS official, Tony Opuiyo, said the Service uncovered and foiled plans by the ISWA terrorists to cause mayhem that would have disrupted the Eid-Kabir Sallah festivities.

He said the plan was to conduct gun attacks and suicide bombing on selected targets in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja, Kano, Kaduna, Niger, Bauchi, Yobe and Borno states.

He said Mai-Tangaran was the brain behind major terror attacks in parts of the country, especially the one of January 20, 2012 in Kano

The mastermind of the operation is Husseini Mai-Tangaran, a well known senior ISWA commander, who has been on the Service and Nigeria Army radar since 2012, when he spearheaded armed attacks on the office of the Assistant Inspector General of Police (AIG), Zone I, on January 20, 2012, as well as other public places in Kano, he added.

The DSS said Mai-Tangaran was also responsible for the deadly attacks on worshippers at the Kano Central Mosque, as well as an attack on a military formation in Yobe State in 2015, which claimed hundreds of lives.

Opuiyo explained that under the banner of the ISWA, which he belongs, Mai-Tangaran, an IED expert, had been prepping and priming others for the perpetration of suicide bombing attacks carried out by the group in the past within the North-East region.

He also said Mai-Tangaran was arrested in Kano on August 31, 2017, and that further exploitation led to the arrest of one Abdulkadir Umar Mohammed by the Service on September 2, 2017, at Kantin Kwari Market in Fagge Local Government Area of Kano.

Mohammed was a fighter of the sect who left the conclave of the group in the Sambisa forest to join ranks with Ismaila towards carrying out attacks being planned by the group.

Also, another accomplice in the plot, one Muhammad Ali, was arrested on September 3, 2017, at Sheka area in Kumbotso Local Government Area of the state. Prior to his arrest, Ali was the financial courier of the group in Kano.

He was one of the conduits through which funds and other material logistics were channelled to the group from foreign extremist elements/sponsors. Like Abdulkadir Umar Mohammed, Ali was involved in the plot to perpetrate the planned attacks in Kano and other states in the North during the just concluded Eid-Kabir celebration, the DSS stated.

Opuiyo also said that in a related tactical operation on September 3, 2017, the Service apprehended Yahaya Mohammed Abatcha and Yusuf Mohammed along Top Medical Road, close to Mobile Quarters in Tunga area of Minna, Niger State.

He added that Abatcha and Mohammed were both fighters of the Habib Al-Barnawi-led Islamic State of West Africa (ISWA) and leading elements of a cell of the extremist group and have been hibernating and furthering the doctrines of the group in the city.

He said they were also to be responsible for operations in the FCT, Kaduna and Niger States.

He added that in Borno, Bauchi, Yobe and Gombe axis, based on credible intelligence, the Service, in concert with sister security agencies, conducted a counter-terrorism operation on August 29, 2017.

This resulted in the apprehension of one Abdulkarim Mohammed, also known as Baba Maigiwa, at Ajilani area of Jere Local Government Area of Borno State, Opuiyo said.

He explained that Baba Maigiwa was apprehended based on intelligence, which indicates his status as a spy/ double agent to the Boko Haram group in the North-East region.

He added that the suspect had been spying on targets in Maiduguri, particularly troops deployments/positioning and subsequently passing same to elements of the group in Sambisa forest, while also pretending to be working for the security forces.

He added that in a follow-up operation after the arrest of Baba Maigiwa, the Service further arrested the three individuals who are currently cooperating in providing useful information on the plans of the group.

He also said that in a bid to stem the flow of arms and ammunition in the ongoing criminality and gangsterism in Benue State being perpetrated by Gana Akwaza-led gang, the Service arrested Moses Peverga in Abuja.

He said, Subject, who is based in Lokoja, was trailed and apprehended after investigations revealed him to be a major source of arms supply to the Gana group and other criminal groups to perpetrate violence in Benue and other adjoining states of Kogi and Nasarawa.

He said the Service was pursuing other leaders and individuals who are believed to be involved in these plans.
Governor of Kaduna State, Nasir El-Rufai, has said he is praying for Nigerias oil to dry up.He said the wealth accruing from it was a major hindrance to innovation.El-Rufai stated this while speaking in Ibadan on Saturday, at the 2017 Town Hall Meeting/Founders Day celebration, in memory of renowned economist, Professior Ojetunji Aboyade.The Governor explained that when the oil wells dry up, the government and people will become serious about developing the country.Because Nigeria gets easy money from oil, the nation has lost its thinking initiative on how to develop other sources of revenue and diversify the economy.We get easy money, we do not collect taxes and our taxes are six per cent of Gross Domestic Product; that is an average of 21per cent. We stop respecting the intellectuals that we have in our universities because we get easy money.This is very sad, I wish the oil will dry up so that we can begin to use our brains because we have stopped using our brains and we have stopped respecting intellects because of easy money, El-Rufai said.On policing, he said: It is obvious that Nigeria is severely under-policed, and will require more personnel, intelligence assets, better training, technology and equipment for its security agencies for the country to be a credible guarantor of security.Even if these were to be available, it is also debatable whether a single centralised policing system, structure and staffing for 200 million citizens is viable in a diverse, multi-lingual, multi-cultural and multi-ethnic nation like Nigeria.
In spite campaign against same-sex marriage in some countries of the world, Australian political leaders, including Prime Minister Malco...

In spite campaign against same-sex marriage in some countries of the world, Australian political leaders, including Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, have come out in support of a campaign.More than 20,000 people gathered in Sydney to campaign ahead of a non-binding postal vote on changing Australias marriage act.Mr Turnbull made a surprise appearance and speech at the launch of the New South Wales Yes campaign.Opposition leader Bill Shorten then addressed the crowd at the main rally.The non-binding vote to gauge support for changing Australias Marriage Act will be sent out from 12 September, with a result expected in November.The survey will not have the power to legalise same-sex marriage but it could lead to a vote in parliament if the majority of Australians support the change.The postal plebiscite has been criticised by opponents as an unnecessary delay in resolving the debate, which they say could be settled immediately in parliament.The Prime Minister previously said he would personally be voting in favour of same-sex marriage, but has not publicly campaigned prior to the surprise speech on Sunday.Throughout my public life Ive sought to ensure same-sex couples are not discriminated against and their entitlements, be it in respect of medical benefits, taxation, superannuation or employment, are no different to those afforded to heterosexual couples. Why then shouldnt those same rights now be extended to marriage?Mr Turnbull pointed out that 23 other countries had already legalised same-sex marriage.In any one of those nations, has the sky fallen in? Has life as we know it come to a halt? Has traditional marriage as we know it been undermined? The answer is no, he said.Meanwhile, Mr Shorten, who is the leader of the Australian Labor Party, told campaigners he anticipated the yes vote to win in the postal survey.Weve got one last mountain to climb before we make marriage equality a reality. Lets climb it together, today, he said.His party have been opposed to the plebiscite vote launched by Mr Turnbulls government, criticising its A$122m (75m; $97m) cost, its non-binding nature, and arguing it could prompt hate-filled campaigns.The High Court of Australia last week dismissed two separate objections to the poll by same-sex marriage advocates.Source: BBC
In the last one week, many public hospitals have been a shadow of themselves because of the ongoing strike by the National Association o...

In the last one week, many public hospitals have been a shadow of themselves because of the ongoing strike by the National Association of Resident Doctors (NARD).They called out their members on what they called an indefinite and total strike following their rejection of the governments terms of settlement.At the Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH), Idi-Araba, Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH), Ikeja and National Orthopaedic Hospital, Igbobi, among others, the strike affected services. Only consultants and other medical staff attended to patients.There was low turnout of patients at the National Orthopaedic, Igbobi. A doctor who spoke off camera said the hospital is on partial strike. We only attend to critical cases and not minor cases, she said. Mr. Jude Aholor who brought his son to the hospital for regular clinic, said that government should address the demands of the doctors in the interest of the deprived patients. While expressing disappointment with the doctors action, Aholor enjoined government to make the doctors welfare a priority to avoid incessant strikes.Another patient, Mr Igbagboyemi Alao, commended the hospital management and other doctors on ground for their abilities to manage the patients in spite of the resident doctors strike. We dont even expect to get this attention, though, it is a bit slow, as you can see, and we are still being attended to accordingly, he said.On a tour round the different sections of LASUTH, apart from the medical emergency unit where doctors and other medical staff were seen attending to patients, nurses were the major officials attending to patients. In one of the sections, the security officers were seen asking the patients to leave as there are no doctors to attend to them. In high hope, some patients refused to leave, claiming they were given an appointment that day.At the Department of Family Medicine, a lot of patients came for treatment, but few hands were available to attend to them. One of the patients lamented that we were told to sit down since morning, only to be told now that we should leave as doctors are on strike. Some of the patients who were frustrated already, decided to leave the waiting point into the building in order to know what was going on, but they were appeased and addressed by the hospitals security officers and nurses. Another patient there told The Nation that I have been here for over five hours and no response. One of them (hospital staff) came to pacify us. They said the consultants will attend to us but they are not on seat. We were told they are in a meeting. Only two people are attending to us. He added go to private hospitals, you will give them your card and immediately, you will be attended to. Here, theres always delay. I dont have choice but to wait for them.Dr. Adeola Badmus, President, Association of Resident Doctors-LASUTH said the doctors demands were not new. According to him, the problem is that the demands are old demands, they are the same old demands weve been asking for over the years. On how effective the strike has been in LASUTH, he said, well, you might see skeletal work around, because the consultants are working as they are not part of the strike. They are still seeing their patients to their own capacity, but the bulk of the work being done in the hospital is done by resident doctors. The resident doctors are always the first contact for the patients.Also, at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH), Idi-Araba, there was low turnout of patients, as fewer patients were seen at the major department and clinics. A visit to the Accident and Emergency Unit, which was always busy on normal day, was scanty as well as other units including the Gynaecology and Paediatric Units. Meanwhile in the Out Patient Department Unit, Consultants, Corps members who are doctors and other medical personnel were seen attending to patients.Speaking with the (NARD) President, in LUTH, Dr Sekumade Adebayo, on why doctors embarked on the strike, he said it wasnt a spontaneous action; the association he said have been engaging government officials for several months. There was a warning strike in January and this is September that is 9 months down the line. We have met severally and signed agreements that were not implemented, he said.On whether the strike would soon be called off, Sekumade explained that due to the level of coverage the strike has been getting and the willingness of the government officials to come to the negotiating table, one can be hopeful that the strike can be brought to an end speedily, he concludedIn Gbagada General Hospital, normal activities was going on there, doctors were on hand to attend to patients. In an interview with one of the patients, Mrs. Anna Boripe who wanted to see the doctor, she said she was not aware of the strike action. According to her, I have been seen the doctors moving around in their robes and some attending to us. I dont know that there is an ongoing strike in Gbagada, she said.A boost for private hospitalsThe ongoing strikes in government hospitals nationwide is no doubt a boost for most of the private hospitals as most people are left with little or no choice but to go to private hospitals.A visit to R-Jolad Hospital in Gbagada revealed most people are either on referrals from government hospitals or are there as a result of lack of bed space in government hospitals. The Assistant Head Records Division, at the hospital, Mr. Oluwatokunbo Adeoye, confirmed that the hospital does have referrals from various hospitals. Yes we do have referrals from government hospitals as well as from tertiary hospitals and it has become high due to the strikes action embarked upon by the resident doctors nationwide. They come here sometimes for admission or to see our specialist and even to access medicare. Most times the patients come here when there are no bed space in government hospitals. Once they come here we do attend to them but you know it is not free.Many private hospitals are witnessing a surge in patronage due to the strike.FMC Abeokuta unaffectedAt the Federal Medical Centre, Abeokuta, Ogun State, healthcare delivery services to both in and out  patients are n top gear despite the on  going industrial action by NARD.Members of NARD FMC Abeokuta joined their colleagues across the country to withdraw their services in compliance with the indefinite strike directive given by its national body.When newsmen visited the hospital, patients were being attended to by consultants and graduate doctors who are members of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC).It was observed further that patients also received special service such as surgery while the accident and emergency cases were also attended to.The Chief Medical Director (CMD), Prof. Adewale Musa, said that there was no gap at the facility because of the industrial action of resident doctors, saying other medical personnel have been mobilised to duty to ensure that patients were attended to.He said the hospital is coping favourably well with NARDs strike, explaining that there are 140 doctors  comprising 70 consultants, 60 doctors and 10 National Youth Service Corps doctors, on ground attending to patients needs.The CMD however appealed to the striking doctors to return to duty in the interest of patients and the country.Musa said: the resident doctors absent are being felt, we are missing them and they are quite important because of the quantum of work they do.The President of FMC chapter of NARD, Dr. Taiwo Babajide, said his colleagues would follow the directive from its national body faithfully.Full blown strike in Enugu Teaching HospitalAlthough the resident doctors strike is full blown at the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital (UNTH), Enugu, no serious case of stranded patients has been reported.The hospital premises which used to be a beehive was as at Wednesday empty as patients stayed home or look for alternative private hospitals.Those on admission were, however, still in the wards. According to a nurse who refused to disclose her name, the nurses and other para-medicals were able to manage some of them.She also hinted that some patients with long leg made arrangements whereby some doctors unofficially come to attend to them.But those billed for surgery were all discharged and asked to await the end of the strike. In some cases, the doctors make brisk business by referring them to their private hospitals for surgeries. That is those who can afford it.A pathetic case in point is the one of a woman who was brought all the way from Ugbokolo in Benue State for a booked surgery. She arrived last Tuesday for her Thursday appointment for surgery. But as at the time of filing this report, the woman could not see her doctor.The daughter, Iwongo lamented, My mother was booked for this operation last month. And we arrived two days ago, only to be told that the operation cannot be performed because of the doctors strike. The doctor that has been seeing us cannot be reached.Dr. Chibuzo Ndiokwelu, chairman of the UNTH NARD who spoke to our reporter said the strike was total and would only resume when the national body calls it off.A the Enugu State University Teaching Hospital, the strike was not total as the management of the hospital mobilized Youth Corps doctors to attend to patients. Even at that the consultants were seen attending to very serious cases.But the chairman of the resident doctors of the hospital, Dr. Nebo insisted that the strike was total and effective.Significant drop in activities in Calabar Teaching HospitalActivities at the University of Calabar Teaching Hospital (UCTH) have dropped significantly since the strike action began.President of the UCTH branch of NARD, Dr Akanimo Ekereuke, said resident doctors in the hospital were 100 per cent compliant with the strike from the national body.He said those found on duty were not resident doctors.Akanimo, who is also the Senior Registrar in the Department of Family Medicine said, The strike is total and we are not going back for now. The resident doctors are 100 per cent compliant with the strike. The consultants are working. They are not part of resident doctors. There also principal medical officers. Those ones are not resident doctors, so they can also work. All the resident doctors are on strike including house officers and medical officers below the rank of Principal Medical Officers.The hospital was still admitting patients, but with the warning that they may not get a doctors attention immediately, as only very few consultant doctors were available. Many of the operations to be carried out in the operating theatres were also postponed as the doctors handling most are residents. The most critical ones were taken over by consultants who could work on them, while others were left stranded.A patient, Edet, who was to undergo an appendicitis operation, who was left stranded, said he was at a loss of what to do.Right now the doctor who was to attend to me has left me hanging and I am confused as it is. They have asked me to queue because very few consultants are available and that I may have to wait a long time. The other alternative I have is to go somewhere else, likely a private hospital but that is more expensive and I dont have that kind of money. Right now the economy is not favourable and with this situation, I dont know if they want to kill us in this country. Something must be done urgently.When contacted the Chief Medical Director of UCTH, Dr Thomas Agan, said We are still in negotiations. We are in Abuja. It is the weekend that I would be in a better position to say something.Consultants, nurses to the rescue in KadunaIn Kaduna State, the strike has been very effective, from Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital (ABUTH) to National Eye Centre and National Ear Care Centre (NECC). However, consultants and nurses have taken over the services.It was gathered that activities at both sites of Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital (ABUTH), Shika and Tudun-Wada, Zaria have remained paralysed.Patients to the hospital with various ailments were seen being turned back, while those who had been on admission before the commencement of the strike were being attended to by few consultants and nurses on duty.A disappointed patient, Hajia Rabi Usman said, she was highly disturbed on reaching the hospital to discover that doctors are on strike and nobody to attend to them.According to her, I have been down with Malaria for the past two weeks now. I have been to a private hospital in my neighbourhood, but the symptoms refused to go. So, the only alternative I thought I had for a comprehensive treatment is a teaching hospital, but here we are, doctors are on strike. So, we are now at the mercy of private hospitals, which are not as competent and equipped as the government hospitals.Similarly, at the National Eye Centre Kaduna, consultants, nurses, laboratory scientists, pharmacists and some other health workers were seen going about their duties.Only few patients were seen in the various wards and waiting rooms compared to the heavy influx of patients across the country to the specialist hospital.However, the Chief Medical Director (CMD), ABUTH, Prof. Lawal Khalid told journalists that, the problem was not peculiar to the hospital as it was a nationwide strike.Patients are now trooping into major private hospitals like, St. Gerards Catholic Hospital and others to seek alternative medical care.However, while the strike lasts, the minister of health Prof. Isaac Adewole, has directed heads of federal government hospitals to ensure that all other medical doctors in the other strata are available to fill the vacuum.
With his homemade rifle resting on the sandbags of the checkpoint, Mustapha Musa scans the red-mud road and the lush green fields surrou...

With his homemade rifle resting on the sandbags of the checkpoint, Mustapha Musa scans the red-mud road and the lush green fields surrounding his small village of Molai Kiliyari on the outskirts of the north-eastern city of Maiduguri.For now, the only sound is bird-song. But Mr Musa, 24, and three other vigilantes on duty are tense  they know danger is just down the road. This is a place where strangers are treated with suspicion for good reason.A few weeks ago, in the dead of night, several suicide bombers blew up their explosives bringing carnage to the village. Eight vigilantes were killed. We dont know when theyll come and whether theyll come with guns or bombs, says Mr Musa, his trigger-finger resting on the wooden barrel of his rifle. But Im not scared of anything. There are soldiers nearby if we needed reinforcements.The only problem we face is that the enemy is well-armed  and my gun only fires one round. The young men are among the estimated 26,000 members of vigilante groups defending their communities from attacks by militants from the Boko Haram Islamist group. The eight-year insurgency has devastated north-eastern Nigeria and spilled over into neighbouring Chad, Niger and Cameroon. The vigilantes first came to prominence in Maiduguri in 2013. With the Nigerian army in disarray, there were fears that the city would fall. Initially, the youth in Maiduguri were caught up between the brutality of Boko Haram and the harsh reprisals of the Nigerian military, says Nnamdi Obasi, one of the authors of a recent International Crisis Group report on vigilante groups in the region.They formed vigilante groups so they could isolate and eliminate Boko Haram members and also demonstrate they were not complicit in the groups attacks and atrocities. The overstretched Nigerian military quickly realised the value of extra manpower and the local knowledge the vigilantes possessed. It joined up with them in order to flush out the insurgents. Unofficially, the vigilantes are now called the Civilian Joint Task Force (JTF), working alongside and liaising with the military. More than 650 have been killed in the violence.Most are volunteers  petty traders, civil servants, and unemployed youth  and are not paid for their work. But around 2,000 vigilantes received some military training and are now on the governments payroll. Often they man checkpoints, spotting potential suicide bombers. But they also operate alongside the army in the bush where Boko Haram militants take shelter. Its like rich people that go hunting, one vigilante told me. When the army says theres an operation we all want to go. The vigilantes are normally armed only with wooden clubs, machetes and homemade weapons. The authorities are cautious given that heavy-duty weapons could fall into the wrong hands or be turned against them.While many Nigerians view the vigilantes as heroes in the fight against Boko Haram, they have been accused of human rights abuses from rape to extortion  and extra-judicial killings of suspected militants. Now, after years of fighting, there is a growing concern that battle-hardened vigilantes could turn into a militia that the authorities are not able to control. There is a strong sense of entitlement among the vigilantes, says Mr Obasi. They believe they not only saved Maiduguri but have fought an insurgency on behalf of the Nigerian government.He says that most wish to be formally absorbed into the military and security forces or at least be recognised, and paid, by the government, while others expect scholarships, skills training or grants to set up small businesses. The fear is that unless these expectations are addressed, the authorities could have a big problem on their hands. At an abandoned office building used by the vigilantes as a make-shift headquarters, scrawled on the wall in chalk is the message: Forgiving a terrorist is left to god. But fixing their appointment with god is our responsibility.It is here that I meet Lawan Jaafar, 39, the chairman of the Civilian JTF. He still works as a leather merchant and cattle trader when not leading the organisation. Hes a man of quiet intensity and purpose  he commands the respect of the thousands of vigilantes he heads. Earlier this year, he was detained by the Nigerian security forces on suspicion of selling cattle to Boko Haram militants. He was later released without being charged.But it shows how Mr Jaafar is now a powerful player in this part of the country  and some other actors want to clip his wings. He carefully weighs his words: Im appealing to the government to provide jobs to the vigilantes and to take care of the poor families of those who lost their lives for the cause. He has this warning if nothing happens: Were going to have problems with armed robbery and kidnapping  because if a man has no job, he will do anything to survive.No-one in north-east Nigeria doubts the bravery of the vigilantes. They have helped immensely in putting Boko Haram on the back foot. But unless their sacrifices are recognised, they could end up presenting a new security threat. * Source: BBC
The Nigerian Army, on Saturday, expressed misgivings over attempts by those it referred to as Boko Haram sympathizers to denigrate its...

The Nigerian Army, on Saturday, expressed misgivings over attempts by those it referred to as Boko Haram sympathizers to denigrate its patriotic efforts at decimating the terrorists, checkmating their murderous exploits and clearing them out of the North East. The Army said, the Islamic Movement of Nigeria (Shiites Islamic Group) wrote to the United States Government, criticizing it for planning to sell Super Tucano Aircraft to Nigerian Airforce, saying the US should rescind the decision as the military would use them to perpetrate atrocities against the innocent.In another instance, the Army said it was unreasonable for people to call for the resignation of its Chief of Staff, Lt. General Tukur Yusuf Buratai, over failure of Operation Lafiya Dole to arrest Boko Haram Leader, Abubakar Shekau, after a 40-day ultimatum he gave to the troops. A statement signed by its Director of Public Relations, Brigadier General Sani Usman, partly reads:The Nigerian Army wishes to note with great concern the recent spate of negative, unguarded comments and derogative publications both on mainstream and on online media, denigrating the Armed Forces of Nigeria particularly, the Nigerian Army and the Nigerian Air Force, by some unidentified, unscrupulous and unpatriotic individuals and groups. This worrisome trend is observed mostly whenever we record successes in our military operations against Boko Haram terrorists and other laudable military endeavours such as when the United States Government decided to sell Tucano aircrafts to Nigeria.First there was a letter written by some self-appointed leaders of Islamic Movement of Nigeria on 17th August 2017 to United States of American government exhorting it to rescind its decision to sell Tucano aircraft, weapons and military hardware to Nigeria citing baseless reasons.This was followed by another round of cacophony of lies and unfounded allegations through media interviews by some individuals and bloggers and on Facebook and other Social media platforms, and followed by concocted statistics by a well-known Non-Governmental Organization alleging that there was resurgence of Boko Haram terrorists activities even when the facts on the ground speaks otherwise.This is in addition to other writings by hosts of self-acclaimed champions of the masses that go by various appellations on the Social Media making spurious and unfounded allegations against the military. The most unfortunate of these campaigns of calumny was a recent publication titled Nigerians blame the NAF for failures in war against insurgents on some online publication news outlet.The Services in conjunction with other security agencies have been doing the nation proud, sometimes at the expense of our dear lives. We will remain focused and resolute in serving our country. It is imperative to note that the Nigerian Air Force is the backbone of the fight against terrorism and insurgency in Nigeria.The Nigerian Air Force has also been lifting logistics for the Nigerian Army and also supported in casualty evacuation and guiding troops during operations in addition to the provision of Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) and humanitarian activities, amongst others. It is therefore most unkind and uncharitable for anybody to accuse any Service of any perceived or imagined lapses and attributing same to causing failure in the war against terrorists. Such unguarded utterances and malicious allegations by individuals and reports by Non-Governmental Organizations are false, ill-timed and deplorable.Troops of the Nigerian Armed Forces should rather be commended for their selfless service which includes paying the supreme price. The Nigerian Army fully appreciates the significant roles of the Nigerian Air Force in the North East and elsewhere across our country.
The Catholic Archdiocese of Lagos, on Saturday, condemned the shooting of the Parish Priest of St. Thomas Catholic Church, Onilekere, Ik...

The Catholic Archdiocese of Lagos, on Saturday, condemned the shooting of the Parish Priest of St. Thomas Catholic Church, Onilekere, Ikeja, Lagos, Daniel Nwankwo.The gunmen reportedly posed as parishioners to attend the morning mass on Friday before carrying out the shooting.The Director of Social Communications, Catholic Archdiocese of Lagos, Monsignor Gabriel Osu, revealed that the church had resorted to prayers for protection since the incident was reported.He said, The government must wake up to its responsibility and give us protection. The police should be on its toes in averting crime and ensuring justice.The government should provide employment because an idle mind is the devils workshop. Most of the criminals dont work so they resort to robbery and other crimes. The government should step up its security system too. The surest way is to provide jobs. If people are busy, they wont take to crime.We have been advised to step up our security too as a church. But we cannot begin a routine search of people to gain entrance into churches. If people will be searched, its no longer a church. God protects. But the task of securing our environment is a collective responsibility. We hope the government would do something tangible.The Catholic priest said it was unfortunate that the perpetrators of the shootings had not been arrested.Osu noted that the Federal Government had not lived up to the promise it made to secure religious places in the country after the Ozubulu church attack.He called on the new Commissioner of Police in Lagos, Edgar Imohimi, to arrest those responsible for the Lagos shooting.He said, God is the ultimate one who can protect human beings. We try as much as we can. I doubt if the Federal Government can deploy soldiers or police in churches. We are praying that God should expose the evil doers.The police should swing into action. Life has become so cheap in Nigeria and it is disturbing. If our security is good enough, the criminals should have been fished out by now. They must be people from that neighbourhood, people will know them. We hope they get arrested. When they are fished out, they must face the wrath of the law.
ORADELL -- Congressman Josh Gottheimer on Saturday announced that he will introduce a bill on Tuesday that will allow law enforcement to freeze the financial assets of suspected terrorists.

Gottheimer (D-5th District) said the bipartisan bill, co-sponsored by republicans Brian Fitzpatrick (PA-8) and Tom Reed (NY-23), dubbed the FASTER Act (Freezing Assess of Suspected Terrorists and Enemy Recruits) will fill a gap in preventing domestic terrorism.

"There's legislation on the books to stop foreign terrorists and freeze their assets to prevent further funding of terroristic activity but there was no resources to actually stop and prevent homegrown, lone wolf, ISIS-inspired terrorists from committing further crimes using resources," he said.

The announcement was made Saturday afternoon in front of the 9/11 memorial beside the Oradell Firehouse on Kinderkamack Road, just days before the 16th anniversary of the worst terror attack on U.S. soil.

The bill is meant to target terrorists who sit home and watch YouTube videos in their living rooms and get trained, he said.

It would require the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network to notify financial institutions when terrorism suspect is arrested and immediately freeze their assets.

The bill also establishes a National Homegrown Terrorism Incident Clearinghouse to collect and share information on incidents of lone wolf terrorism and violent extremism. It applies to those who provide material support to terrorist groups including ISIS and Al Qaeda, as well as individuals suspected of domestic terrorism. It also requires government officials to provide written notice to suspects within 60 days and grant them their days in court.

There were 22 domestic terror attacks and 17 plots, threats of violence, and instances of weapons stockpiling in New Jersey in 2016, according to the New Jersey Office of Homeland Security and Preparedness.

Among, them, was Ahmad Khan Rahimi, of Elizabeth, who was arrested after a shootout with Linden Police last September following a bomb he was suspected of planting in Elizabeth the night before. He is also suspected of planting a pipe-bomb style device that detonated near a military charity run in Seaside Park and detonating pressure-cooker bombs in Manhattan's Chelsea neighborhood.

"That would've been a case where this act would've enabled us to possibly cut that off ahead of time, if we had known that, or after the fact of once having a suspect in custody, being able to seize all of those funds that enabled him to conduct this heinous act," said Hackensack Police Officer Tim Sroka, who attended the announcement Saturday on behalf of the Bergen County Police Benevolence Association Conference.

"Once those funds are taken away, it eliminates the possibility of it going further," he said.

Allison Pries may be reached at apries@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @AllisonPries. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
David "D.J." Creato Jr. looks around the courtroom during his trial in May. After a hung jury, he pleaded guilty to aggravated manslaughter and admitted killing his 3-year-old son Brendan. (Tim Hawk | For NJ.com)

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By Amanda Hoover | For NJ.com

CAMDEN -- Aside from a pair of clean socks, the case against David "D.J." Creato, who last month admitted he killed his toddler son and dumped his body in a nearby creek, was nearly absent physical evidence.

The 24-year-old father argued that his son, 3-year-old Brendan Creato, had wandered from their home overnight in October 2015 and walked to a creek nearly a mile away, where his body was later found. Prosecutors alleged that Creato, the only person with access to the boy that night, killed him, yet there was no physical evidence to illuminate exactly how, where or when the boy died.

Creato pleaded guilty to aggravated manslaughter in the death of his son last month. The plea came just weeks before a second trial charging the Haddon Township man with murder was slated to begin, after the first ended with hung jury in May.

In exchange for his plea, Creato will be sentenced to 10 years in prison later this month.

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Photo provided

That plea deal frustrated many, who found both a lack of other suspects in the killing and circumstantial evidence pinning Creato to the crime compelling. But it was a lack of physical evidence that left a first jury split on convicting Creato, and some worried the same could happen in a second set of legal proceedings, potentially allowing Creato to walk.

Instead, it was the digital evidence, and Cornerstone Discovery, a Philadelphia-based litigation support firm that utilizes digital forensics, that helped to build the case against Creato. Sifting through thousands of text messages between Creato and his then-17-year-old girlfriend Julia Stensky and examining data embedded in cell phone photos, forensic examiners Louis Cinquanto and Brian Stofik helped the prosecution to construct a motive, and to put Creato at the crime scene days before Brendan was killed.

But before they, and prosecutors, knew all of that, they had just one thing: Creato's cell phone.

"We approached it as not having made up on our mind about anything," Cinquanto said. "Even going in, unbiased, we felt it was pretty convincing from forensic evidence. We felt as though it was compelling and useful to the prosecution."

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Clues hidden in a photo

Above, Assistant Prosecutor Kevin Moran shows a photo from David "D.J." Creato Jr.'s cell phone during the ninth day of trial. (Tim Hawk | For NJ.com)

To start, Cinquanto and Stofik took a photo of a wooded area from Creato's phone and examined it's EXIF data, which holds information regarding the time and place the image was captured. With that, they pegged down within three meters of accuracy where the photo was taken, and were able to determine that the photo was snapped just feet from where Brendan's body was recovered.

Before the digital era, such a photograph may have been an unidentifiable snapshot of trees, with no concrete evidence linking it to the scene, and it would have been harder to argue that Creato took the image.

There was no evidence at the scene to suggest a child or adult had walked there, but a pair of clean socks on Brendan's feet led investigators to believe he had not walked there himself.

"There was no direct physical evidence," Cinquanto said. "You take the picture into account with the other circumstantial evidence, it becomes a pretty compelling argument."

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Thousands and thousands of text messages

The two also poured over thousands of messages, from texts to iMessages, between Stensky and Creato. With the password to Creato's phone available, they were able to recover both active and deleted messages, and tracked the percentage of messages deleted.

In October, when officials first examined the phone, Creato had erased a small portion of the messages. But by the time examiners got their hands on the phone in January, the percentage had grown, leading Cinquanto and Stofik to determine that Creato had gone back to erase a larger chunk of his correspondence, a move that raises a red flag, suggesting Creato could be hiding something.

And with the date and time of messages sent, they could create timelines of the couple's relationship, and various disputes regarding Brendan.

Those retrieved messages helped the prosecution to construct a narrative suggesting that Brendan was a source of strife between the long-distance couple, and that Creato could have killed the boy to make himself more available to Stensky.

It was something Creato said to investigators shortly after Brendan's death, and something authorities could then back up with messages in both Stensky and Creato's words.

And a final piece to the puzzle, they said, was seeing how Creato had logged into Stensky's social media accounts at 1:30 a.m. the night before he reported Brendan missing.

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Digital data continues to grow

While the high-profile Creato case brought was noteworthy for the depth of correspondence available, Cinquanto and Stofik said, it was hardly revolutionary in terms of using digital records to make a case. Their firm utilizes such records to assist officials in both civil and criminal cases.

"Cell phones are providing an invaluable source for all types of cases," said Cinquanto. "But with criminal specifically, a wealth of information is available."

And that information is growing. When cell phones first began making their way into court courtrooms bearing evidence, call logs and the location of cell towers pinged were used to either provide alibis or cases against defendants.

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Above, Louis Cinquanto, a senior forensic specialist for Cornerstone Discovery, testifies about SnapChat usage. (Tim Hawk | For NJ.com)

But now, the amount of information forensic experts can mine from phones has more than doubled, and smashing a phone isn't a sufficient way to erase the data. With location services enabled on a number of apps and phones providing nearly constant backups to cloud-based storage services, much of that information remains available to investigators who know how to track it down.

Messaging services that use end-to-end encryption, such as Snapchat, are still difficult for investigators to parse, and phones with passwords remain protected, if the owner isn't available to supply them.

Despite some remaining limitations, Cinquanto and Stofik say cell phones will remain a key piece of the investigative puzzle.

"This is it. Back before the proliferation of cell phones, the government would often say, where you have drugs, you have guns, and when you have guns, you have drugs," Cinquanto said. "Now, they've changed it to where you have drug and guns, you have cell phones."

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Defense attorney Richard Fuschino Jr. holds up his phone as he questions Special Agent Bill Shute during the ninth day of trial for David "D.J." Creato Jr. (Tim Hawk | For NJ.com)

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MORE ON DJ CREATO

Did toddler walk to where he was found dead? Here's the route (VIDEO)

Teen girlfriend wanted toddler's dad to give up custody, she says at murder trial

Dad accused of killing son to please girlfriend spied on her online, jury hears

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Amanda Hoover can be reached at ahoover@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @amahoover. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
By Bibek Debroy: "THERE used to be a widelytraded joke about the verification culture at The Hindu: before a report or an advertisement of a natural death was published, a staff member would be dispatched to the house of the departed to make sure that he or she was not of this world."

"The 2010 expose by Open magazine and Outlook of an unsavoury nexus between politicians, corporates, and journalists, based on the leaked Nira Radia 'tapes', actually 140 digital audio recordings of telephone conversations secretly done by the income tax department in 2008-09, showed for the first time in India what digital platforms could do for the presentation of a mass of evidence turned up by journalistic enterprise."

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These two quotes are from journalist N Ram's new book, Why Scams Are Here To Stay. The subtitle reads, "Understanding Political Corruption in India". In the Introduction, the author explains he didn't want the catchy title. That was the publisher's suggestion, presumably because the book would sell. So far as Ram is concerned, the book is about the sub-title, political corruption. There are three sections: the story of corruption and scams in India; history, definitions and theory; and two case studies (Bofors and Tamil Nadu). In addition, there is a conclusion about what can be done.

Also Read: This book is changing the way people look at Muslim women

In general, the author is in favour of extending definitions of corruption to include private sector too. Countervailing pressure by civil society, not just media, has made governments more accountable. If transparency and notions of corruption are to be extended everywhere, why should media be excluded? How transparent is media? What does media do about publishing false news? What has media done about journalists culpable under Nira Radia tapes? If the moving finger writes, it should write everywhere.

Why Scams Are Here To Stay, N Ram, Aleph; Rs 399. Photo: Mail Today

Let's now turn to the three sections. The first two have little to offer. Nevertheless, three points can be made. First, the standard difference between "big ticket"; and "petty" corruption is a useful one, much more than the chapter the author devotes to a "Marxist lens";. Second, since the author himself quotes CMS (Centre for Media Studies), I am sure he knows about the 2017 CMS corruption study. This shows a decline in "petty" corruption, defined as public services CMS gauges. Why not quote that inconvenient fact? Is this because Ram wants to build up a case of corruption increasing? Third, Transparency International (TI) is quoted often. Corruption is legislation specific and crime cannot be defined independent of legislation. That's the problem with cross-country studies, especially based on surveys. Many activities are legitimate under the law in the US, but would be morally regarded as corruption in India. One can quote TI, and others, all one wants, but not without caveats.

Also Read: Ravi Subramanian's new book is about a temple, curse and folklore

That being said, what's the book's value addition? Only in the two case studies. Of these, Bofors is well-known. Therefore, read the book only for the chapter on "Tamil Nadu's scientific system of political corruption". There is some new information there.

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Corruption concerns all of us and books on corruption interest us. In recent years (2013), one of the best books I have read is one edited by the late Samuel Paul. Ram doesn't seem to be aware this book, along with several others, exists. He prefers to quote Prakash Karat.

The reviewer is member, Niti Aayog.

--- ENDS ---
NEWARK -- The man killed in an early Sunday shooting in Newark was identified as a 29-year-old from the city.

Police responded to a shooting in progress around 2:40 a.m. in the 100 block of North 5th Street, where they found Denzel Uwubiti "unresponsive" in a vehicle that was in the middle of the street, according to the Essex County Prosecutor's Office.

Uwubiti was rushed to University Hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 3:11 a.m., according to Chief Assistant Prosecutor Thomas Fennelly, of the homicide unit.

Detectives with the prosecutor's office Major Crimes Task Force, which includes city police, were investigating the slaying. Authorities did not immediately report any arrests or comment on a possible motive for the attack.

Anyone with information was urged to call the prosecutor's tip line (877) 847-7432.

Records show the state's largest city has logged at least 47 murders this year compared to 68 killings in the same period the prior year.

Noah Cohen may be reached at ncohen@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @noahyc. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

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NEWARK -- Essex County College has met a crucial deadline with its accrediting agency as it strives to stabilize from a rocky year of high-profile firings and financial investigations.

The college submitted its monitoring report due to the Middle States Commission on Higher Education, the nonprofit that issues and monitors accreditation to area colleges, on Sept. 1. The report focused on three areas Middle States flagged for deficiencies: resources, leadership and governance, and student admissions.

The college was warned late last year that its accreditation was in jeopardy.

On Oct. 5-6 representatives from Middle States will visit the college and conduct interviews to verify what's in the report, the college said. Those findings will be reported back to the Middle States Commission and a recommendation on the college's status will be made at the Nov. 16 meeting, an agency representative said.

While it's rare for a large public institution to be stripped of its accreditation, should Essex County College lose it, students would no longer be eligible for federal student aid. And, without enough students able to afford tuition, Essex County College would be forced to close.

The college enrolls about 15,000 students and in 2014-15, more than 8,000 federal Pell grants -- for low-income students -- were awarded to Essex County College students, about 10 percent of all those given in New Jersey, state data show.

"Serving as the College's president since only June 1, Dr. Anthony E. Munroe has worked tirelessly on the crucial Middle States situation," the college said in a press release announcing its status with Middle States. "Under his guidance and direction, Essex has quickly instituted a corrective action plan to ensure compliance and timely submission of financial audits as has historically been done in the past."

Munroe is the college's third leader in seven years and was unanimously appointed by the Board of Trustees. The college's former president, Gale Gibson, was fired and is suing the institution claiming she was wrongfully terminated for investigating financial improprieties.

In the last few weeks, a group of clergy has expressed their support for Munroe and blamed political interference for stopping his efforts to fix the institution.

During a press conference last month, faith leaders demanded the entire Board of Trustees at the college -- most of whom were appointed by Essex County Executive Joseph DiVincenzo Jr. -- resign. They also called upon the state Attorney General's Office and the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate the institution's finances.

Karen Yi may be reached at kyi@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter at @karen_yi or on Facebook.
BAYONNE -- The city's high school students may notice some differences this year as they get settled into their school schedules and back into their routine.

They may have, for instance, seen slightly fewer teachers than last year.

The Board of Education -- after finding a multi-million structural deficit at the end of 2016, and then having their proposed budget for this school year rejected by the state in April -- opted to temporarily lay off 287 teachers and other employees, causing widespread community outrage and even student protests.

Roughly 60 of the teachers and various employees who were originally fired have not returned to the district.

And approximately 28 of those are teachers who have yet to find employment elsewhere, according to BOE President Joseph Broderick.

But some students haven't seen a difference; in fact quite the opposite.

"I actually feel like there's more teachers this year," said one student who declined to be named.

Meanwhile, a major change in the district's academy may cause some students to see faces they may not have recognized in previous years.

The board during a July meeting, under the new leadership of interim Superintendent Dr. Michael Wanko, moved to decentralize the high school's Academy of Fine Arts & Academics.

Established in August 2013, the academy provides students who are academically qualified with specialized tracks, including the performing arts, STEM and other disciplines.

The students were originally housed in a centralized location within the Bayonne High School complex.

The board's vote decentralized the academy by keeping students enrolled in their specific tracks, but spreading the academy classes out across the high school complex.

Students enrolled in the academy will now have classes such as physical education and their lunch period with the rest of the high school, but will remain in classes specifically tailored for their track.

"You're getting the same courses you had before. It's just that we put everyone into the same bucket so that we can lower the cost by having more students in the class," Wanko said during the July meeting.

In addition to the academy's decentralization, each grade starting this year will now have a dean of students and a vice principal assigned to the classes, who will move up with them until they graduate.

The vice principals will act in a "role where they will be doing more observations of instruction to raise the rigor in every place, not just honors classes or AP classes," Wanko said at a July meeting.

The four deans, who will act as supervisors or guidance counselors, were assigned to their roles at the August board meeting. Bayonne High School teachers Frank Blunda, John Calcatera, Lyndia Hayes-Santiago and Edith Westpy will assume the new positions.

Students started their new school year this past Wednesday.
SECAUCUS - About two dozen runners participated in a 5k at Harmon Plaza Sunday morning to raise money for wounded veterans and their families.

The seventh annual race benefits Hope for the Warriors.

Runners began their race at about 9 a.m., with all 27 participants completing their run around the shopping and business plaza in under an hour.

The nonprofit assists service men and woman who were deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan transition back to civilian life and "celebrates their strength and resolve."

Sunday's event was expected to raise about $10,000. Races across the country are collectively expected to raise roughly $200,000.

Check out photos from the event in the gallery above.
Joseph Cardinal Bernardin was archbishop of Cincinnati from 1972 to 1982 and archbishop of Chicago from 1982 until his death in 1996. (AP file photo)

Last May, Joseph Cardinal Tobin, archbishop of Newark, greeted some 200 LGBT pilgrims and their families at Sacred Heart Cathedral in Newark by saying, "I am Joseph, your brother." This phrase reminded me of another famous cardinal named Joseph, Bernardin, who months after his appointment as archbishop of Chicago met with Jewish leaders and uttered those same words.

Nearly 35 years ago, building bridges between Jews and Catholics was essential to bring healing after centuries of animosity.

Today, Tobin's historic gesture toward the LGBT community, despite pushback from some Catholics and even hierarchs, is just as needed. In many ways, Tobin and Bernardin are so much alike it's as if Tobin continues the legacy of the other Joseph at a time in our church and country when consensus and compassion are most needed.

On Thursday, the Archdiocese of Newark will celebrate Tobin's reception of the pallium by Pope Francis last June. Archbishops receive from the pope a narrow, circular band of wool placed around the shoulders with short lappets hanging from front and back. It symbolizes the chief role of an archbishop as a shepherd.

And that's how we remember Joseph Bernardin, perhaps the most influential American Catholic churchman in the 20th century. He was the youngest bishop in the U.S. in 1966 when he became auxiliary bishop of Atlanta. He became the archbishop of Chicago in 1982 and a cardinal the next year. As head of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, he fostered extensive dialogue and consultation that produced two landmark pastoral letters on war and peace and the economy. He coined the phrase "seamless garment," threading together all the life issues worthy of protection.

An interesting connection between Bernardin and Tobin was John Cardinal Dearden, the archbishop of Detroit, where Tobin grew up. Dearden attended the Second Vatican Council and was an ardent supporter of church reforms. He tutored Bernardin when he was the USCB general secretary.

Tobin grew up under Dearden's leadership, though Tobin entered the Redemptorists, a religious order, and eventually became their Superior General and lived in Rome starting in 1991. In 2005, he participated in a Spanish language group with then Jorge Cardinal Bergoglio, now Pope Francis, who was obviously impressed with Tobin, who speaks five languages. Francis made him a cardinal in 2016 and moved him to Newark.

Already, Tobin has taken some strong stands in support of undocumented immigrants and called Trump's ending of DACA "malicious.''

"Today,'' he said, "the Administration not only has closed borders; it also has closed minds and hearts."

He also issued a statement on the racist aftermath of Charlottesville: "Dark words and deeds must be met with light and love."

Back in Indiana, Tobin was known to consult widely and was universally loved before he left for New Jersey.

He is currently revamping the priests' council in Newark and plans for an archdiocesan pastoral council. At the June meeting of the U.S. bishops, his strong, yet gentle, style won over many other bishops and the press.

In the National Catholic Reporter, Michael Sean Winters wrote: "This year, a star rose in the East, as Cardinal Joseph Tobin of Newark emerged as the prophetic voice of the conference. 'He is genuinely free, profound and holy,' one bishop told me. His interventions were 'unassailable.'''

A towering figure who can bench press a LeBron James, Tobin is not easily moved.

Like Bernardin, Tobin lost his father at an early age. Bernardin had one sister; Tobin had eight sisters and four brothers so he knows how to negotiate. His presence has a healing quality, which has reverberated in the archdiocese since his arrival in January.

Someday, people will talk about what Tobin did for the U.S. church in the 21st century like Bernardin in the 20th -- as our brother!

EDITOR'S NOTE: The Rev. Alexander Santora is the pastor of Our Lady of Grace and St. Joseph, 400 Willow Ave., Hoboken, 07030. Fax: 201-659-5833; email: padrealex@yahoo.com; Twitter: @padrehoboken.

To learn more:

"Bernardin: A public television documentary on the life and legacy of Cardinal Joseph Bernardin," produced by Journey/Frost Productions and Family Theater Productions; 1998; 57 minutes; DVD.

"The Works of Mercy," Pope Francis; Orbis Press, 2017; $16.
MOUNT OLIVE -- One of the two brothers accused in the shooting death of a beloved Philadelphia dad was tracked down at a local hotel and taken into custody Saturday by U.S. marshals, according to a report in Philly.com.

Maurice Roberts, 21, of Philadelphia, and his 16-year-old brother are facing murder and other charges after Gerard Grandzol, 38, was fatally shot outside his vehicle during an apparent carjacking in front of his Philadelphia home, with his 2-year-old daughter inside the car, the website reported.

29yr veteran officer said after watching murder of surveil, "It's worst thing I've seen in my 29 years."Grandzol didn't resist @FOX29philly pic.twitter.com/62MGkKJh3u  Steve Keeley (@KeeleyFox29) September 9, 2017

The older brother was arrested without incident at about 6:15 p.m. Saturday at an Extended Stay America motel in Mount Olive by the U.S. Marshals Service and the Philadelphia police department's fugitive unit, Philly.com reported.

Police said the younger brother, whose name was not released by authorities, is the accused shooter and was taken into custody earlier Saturday in Philadelphia, Philly.com reported.

The two-year-old was unhurt.

Grandzol, a father of two, was described as a well-known activist and volunteer in his Philadelphia neighborhood.

A memorial fund for his family had raised $118,067 as of 2:50 p.m. Sunday.

His funeral will be Wednesday in Philadelphia.

Rob Jennings may be reached at rjennings@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @RobJenningsNJ. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
LINDEN -- A Linden woman was finally able breath easier Saturday afternoon, after an "excruciating" several days without any word from her family on the Caribbean island of St. Maarten, where they were on vacation when Hurricane Irma devastated the region.

"They were stranded from Irma," Gabrielle Yanuzzelli, 32, told NJ Advance Media. "I think they were actually rescued by the (U.S.) military."

Yanuzzelli said she spoke to her father on Tuesday, a day before the record storm slammed into the island's French side -- where the spelling is St. Martin -- and then had no more contact with the family at all until Saturday, and even then only indirectly, through social media.

Yanuzzelli's father, Thomas Conshay, was vacationing on St. Maarten with her two sisters, Jessica and Adrianne Conshay, and Jessica's boyfriend, Steve Schelhorn.

Yanuzzelli said having no word from her family between Tuesday and Saturday was "excruciating," and even after learning they had survived Irma's impact -- the island's Dutch side did not bear the storm's full force -- she was alarmed by word of looting and overall chaos on the island.

In fact, the Associated Press reported late Friday afternoon that Prime Minister Edouard Philippe announced that France was sending Foreign Legion troops, paratroopers and other reinforcements to St. Martin starting Sunday.

Yanuzzelli was somewhat encouraged earlier on Saturday by reports that Americans were being evacuated from the island. Her worries were far from over, however, with news that Hurricane Jose was bearing down on the region.

Relief finally came at 2:30 p.m., in a text from Adrienne.

"Hi. We just landed in Puerto Rico. We are fine," the text read.

Yanuzzelli said she still does not know when the family will be able to fly home, or exactly where they will fly to.

And while St. Maarten had long been a favorite vacation spot, she's not sure they'll be returning to the island anytime soon.

"They love it there," she said. "But now I don't know what's left for them to go back to."

Steve Strunsky may be reached at sstrunsky@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @SteveStrunsky. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
Photo by John Munson | NJ Advance Media

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By Steve Strunsky | NJ Advance Media

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The 10 highest salaries list at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey includes several changes in 2017, including a new executive director of the bi-state agency and raises for all but one of the seven holdovers from the 2016 top 10 list. Only one person remains in the same spot, at the same salary.

The list does not necessarily include the 10 highest paid Port Authority employees for 2017, because the executives who earn the highest salaries at the agency are not eligible for overtime pay, added compensation that in a some cases allows Port Authority police officers or other agency employees to increase their pay significantly, sometimes even doubling or tripling it.

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Port Authority of NY & NJ

As director of port commerce, Molly Campbell is in charge or the original function of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, to facilitate the import and export of goods at the collection of shipping terminals that make up the busiest port on the East Coast. Campbell debuts on the list at number 10.

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Port Authority of NY&NJ

Robert Galvin, the Port Authority's chief technology officer, returns to the top 10 from the 2016 list at number 9, with a salary $4,888 higher than last year's.

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Port Authority of NY & NJ

With a pay bump of $7,254, Director of World Trade Center Construction Alan Reiss moves up one place in the top 10, from 9th to 8th.

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Port Authority of NY & NJ

Michael Massiah, the agency's director of capital planning, returns to the list in 2017, and once again in a tie, this time for 6th place, with Chief Engineer James Starace. Last year Massiah was in a 3-way tie for 5th with Aviation Director Thomas Bosco and Chief Security Officer Thomas Belfiore, at $246,922. Both those men have left the agency.

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Port Authority of NY & NJ

James Starace, the chief engineer at an agency that has long prided itself on its momentous works of civil engineering, moves up several notches on the top 10 list, from 10th last year to tie for 6th with Director of Capital Planning Michael Massiah in 2017, after a salary boost of $12,142.

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Port Authority of NY & NJ

Steve Strunsky | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

Huntley Lawrence is the third newcomer to the top 10, after replacing Thomas Bosco as director of aviation. The job puts Lawrence in charge of the Port Authority's three major airports, Newark Liberty, John F. Kennedy International and LaGuardia, as well as Atlantic City International, Teterboro and Stewart airports.

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Port Authority of NY & NJ

Executive Director Richard Cotton enters the top 10 in the number 4 spot, with a starting salary of $275,000, after he was named to the position this year by Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York. Cotton was named to replace Patrick Foye, now at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, who was number 2 on last year's list, at $289,667. Under a post-Bridgegate leadership reform plan intended to depoliticize and unite the bi-state agency, a chief executive officer was to be hired by the Port Authority Board of Commissioners, rather than being appointed by the governor, as the unwritten custom has been for two decades. The plan was not realized.

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Port Authority of NY & NJ

Steve Plate, director of major capital projects, moved up one rung on the top 10 ladder, from the number 4 spot to number 3, with a pay increase of $8,090.

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Chief Financial Officer Elizabeth McCarthy remained the second highest-salaried employee at the Port Authority in 2017, at $282,178, a pay increase of $8,216 over last year.

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Port Authority of NY & NJ

Since joining the agency last year, General Counsel Michael Farbiarz has been paid the highest salary at the Port Authority. With his 2017 salary remaining at $295,022, Farbiarz is the only holdover from the 2016 list whose pay has not increased.

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Read more

Here's the new top 10 Port Authority salary list, shaped by Bridgegate scandal

These 26 Port Authority Employees each earned more than $125,000 in overtime

Hudson County's top 10 public salaries: a clean sweep for men

Big leadership shake-up rocks Port Authority

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Steve Strunsky may be reached at sstrunsky@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @SteveStrunsky. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

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BRICK -- A liquor store employee was beaten over the head with a large stick during a robbery Friday night, police said.

Michael Martinez, 20, of Princeton Junction, was arrested and charged with robbery, theft and weapons offenses after a K-9 with the Ocean County Sherriff's Office found him hiding in the woods, said Sgt. Neal Pedersen, a spokesman for the Brick Police Department.

Michael Martinez, 20, of Princeton Junction. (Courtesy of the Ocean County Jail)

Pedersen said police arrived at the Wine World on Route 88 in Brick shortly after 10 p.m. and found an employee in the rear parking lot with a head injury.

The employee told officers he was hit several times over the head with a large stick, causing him to fall to the ground, Pedersen said. The employee then took out the cash from that night's deposit and gave it to Martinez, according to Pedersen. The employee was treated at the scene for his injuries but declined additional medical attention.

A fellow employee overheard the commotion and chased after Martinez in the direction of Coolidge Drive, where the employee eventually lost sight of Martinez, Pedersen said.

Officers fanned out to find Martinez and were assisted by the Ocean County Sheriff's Office and its K-9, Jax.

Jax tracked Martinez's scent to the woods at Roosevelt and Coolidge drives, where he was found hiding in thick brush, Pedersen said. He was in possession of the stolen cash and the weapon used in the robbery, according to Pedersen.

Martinez was taken to the Ocean County Jail.

Alex Napoliello may be reached at anapoliello@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @alexnapoNJ. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
According to all the reports I've been reading here at NJ.com, Senator Bob Menendez has procured the services of a high powered, high price (presumably) defense attorney by the name of Abbe Lowell. Mr. Lowell and his phalanx of assistants have wracked their collective brains to craft a cynical defense that might be most accurately paraphrased as "It only looks illegal". It'll probably work, too.

To recap: The senator is accused of trading favors for lavish gifts from the world's richest eye doctor/medicare cheat Salomon Melgin. The senator enjoyed luxurious weekend in Europe and the Caribbean, free travel on Dr. Melgin's private jet (how does an eye doctor get a freaking private jet?) and hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions. In return, the prosecution alleges that Menendez served as Melgin's personal legislator.He made phone calls and leaned on federal agencies to clear the way for some of the mysterious Dr.Melgin's pet projects.

The facts of the case are not particularly in dispute. Menendez admits doing favors and accepting gifts from Melgin not because he was bribed, but because the were friends. I have never give my friend a $300,000 campaign contribution or the keys to my villa in the Dominican Republic. Seems a little excessive. Every year my friends and I do a secret Santa. We set a $20 dollar limit to avoid federal prosecution.

The defense admits it looks gross, but despite the appearances the prosecution still has an uphill battle. The way the corruption laws are crafted the prosecution must show that a specific gift was exchanged for a specific action. Slathering a U.S. Senator with trips and cash is certainly unsavory but it's not illegal unless you can prove the quid pro quo.
By PTI: Srinagar, Sep 10 (PTI) A delegation of the opposition National Conference, led by former chief minister Omar Abdullah, today conveyed to Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh the partys concern over the Centres ambiguity in defending Jammu and Kashmirs special status under Article 35A of the Constitution.

The delegation called on Singh, who is on a four-day visit to the state, here this afternoon.

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"While highlighting the political, historical and constitutional context of the states special status, Omar registered the partys concern and disappointment over the central governments ambiguity in defending the states special status in the Supreme Court with respect to Article 35A," a spokesman of the National Conference said after the meeting.

Omar also highlighted the "worsened and constantly deteriorating situation" in the valley.

The delegation also sought a sustained and open-ended political engagement with stakeholders in Kashmir irrespective of their ideology, and urged New Delhi and Islamabad to make sincere and sustained efforts towards resumption of a comprehensive dialogue on all outstanding issues including that of Kashmir, the spokesman said.

He said the party delegation also reiterated its struggle for the restoration of autonomy and asked the central government to initiate a process of reversing "erosions" made to the states autonomy that had been violated by extending various hitherto inapplicable central laws to the state, the Goods and Services Tax (GST) being the most recent example.

"The party also decried the singular focus on operational and military mechanisms in dealing with an inherently political issue and asked the central government to reach out to the alienated and isolated youth of the valley," he added.

Meanwhile, party representatives in the delegation from Leh and Kargil, Phuntsog Wangdan Shunu and Aga Syed Abbas Rizvi respectively, highlighted pressing issues in Leh and Kargil.

"The representatives raised challenges faced on the connectivity, communication and infrastructure front and sought that the central Government resolves these issues that are a cause of great misery and inconvenience to the people," the spokesman said.

Shunu said the exorbitant airfare to Leh round the year, especially during the months when the road-link is closed, is a source of great misery to the people.

He asked the central government to take all possible measures to ensure a reasonable airfare policy for such hilly areas.

He also highlighted poor and in certain places defunct quality of BSNL network connectivity, and said the corporation was solely focussed on reaping benefits of infrastructural monopoly in far-flung areas of Leh while failing to provide even basic connectivity.

They also sought measures be taken for utilisation of allocated funds for the Zojila tunnel and connectivity to the national grid.

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Rizvi also reiterated the long-pending demand of a functional civil airport in Kargil and interim, adequate winter air-connectivity arrangement for Kargil that would enable the district to explore it maximum economic and tourism potential.

A PDP delegation, led by party vice president Sartaj Madni, also called on Singh and conveyed the partys views on the issues facing the state.

Delegations of state units of the BJP, Congress, Peoples Conference and the CPI(M) also called on the home minister. PTI MIJ SMN

--- ENDS ---
WASHINGTON -- U.S. Sen. Cory Booker picked up support in both houses of Congress as he introduced legislation to remove statues of Confederate leaders from the U.S. Capitol.

Booker introduced his bill with four Senate sponsors, while a similar version in the House was backed by 46 representatives, including Rep. Frank Pallone Jr., D-6th Dist.

"Those who committed treason against the United States of America and led our nation into its most painful and bloody war are not patriots and should not be afforded such a rare honor in this sacred space," said Booker, D-N.J.

The measure was a response to last month's white supremacist march in Charlottesville, Va., where a counter-demonstrator was killed when a Nazi sympathizer drove his car into a crowd.

"The unfathomable white supremacist demonstrations and deadly violence that occurred in Charlottesville recently are antithetical to American values, and pose a serious threat to our society," Pallone said. "It is yet another reminder of the deep racial issues in American history."

The legislation would set a 120-day deadline for removing statues of those who voluntarily joined the Confederate States of America. They would be offered back to their states or donated to the Smithsonian Museum.

Each of the 50 states has placed two statues at the Capitol to recognize notable historic figures in their history.

Of the 22 statues from the 11 states that seceded and fought a Civil War against the United States in order to preserve slavery, nine salute men with Confederate ties.

They include Gen. Robert E. Lee of Virginia, Confederacy President Jefferson Davis of Mississippi and Vice President Alexander Hamilton Stephens of Georgia.

Booker said millions of Americans consider the Confederate statues "painful, injurious symbols of bigotry and hate, celebrating individuals who sought to break our nation asunder and preserve the vile institution of slavery."

President Donald Trump was criticized last month for saying there was "blame on both sides" for Charlottesville and that "some very fine people" could be found among the white supremacists, neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klan members who marched.

Booker said at the time that the president's comments left him "outraged and disgusted."

Jonathan D. Salant may be reached at jsalant@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @JDSalant or on Facebook. Find NJ.com Politics on Facebook.
By Jonathan D. Salant | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

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U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez's political career hangs in the balance as he is on trial facing charges that he intervened with federal regulators on behalf of a friend and campaign donor, Dr. Salomon Melgen, in exchange for trips and political contributions.

If he is found guilty, Menendez, D-N.J., will face pressure to resign. The Republican National Committee already is pushing Senate Democrats to demand that Menendez quit immediately upon conviction, without waiting for him to appeal a verdict.

Menendez doesn't automatically forfeit his seat if he is found guilty. The Senate would have to vote to expel him, and that takes a two-thirds majority.

The last New Jersey senator convicted of criminal charges, U.S. Sen. Harrison Williams, D-N.J., resigned his seat in 1982 after the Senate Ethics Committee recommended expulsion. That was 10 months after Williams was convicted in the Abscam scandal.

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Should Menendez leave office before his term expires in January 2019, then the next New Jersey governor likely will have the chance to fill the vacancy. If it's former U.S. Ambassador Phil Murphy, the seat will remain in Democratic hands.

If Menendez is acquitted, he could decide not seek re-election as he could still face a Senate Ethics Committee investigation. An open Senate seat would be very attractive to a number of New Jersey Democrats.

Or Menendez's ethical problems could entice another Democrat to challenge him for the Democratic nomination.

Here are seven Democrats who could wind up representing New Jersey in the U.S. Senate.

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1. Donald Norcross

Rep. Donald Norcross, D-1st Dist., is the brother of South Jersey Democratic powerbroker George Norcross and as a former union official commands the loyalty of organized labor.

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Jim Johnson waits for the beginning of a Democratic gubernatorial debate in May. (John O'Boyle)

2. Jim Johnson

A former federal prosecutor and U.S. Treasury official, Jim Johnson came up short in the Democratic primary in his bid to become New Jersey's first black governor.

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3. Frank Pallone Jr.

Rep. Frank Pallone Jr., D-6th Dist., ran in the Democratic primary for the Senate seat that Cory Booker now holds, so he has shown an interest in statewide office. But if the Democrats should win control of the House next year, Pallone would be one of the most powerful members of the chamber as chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

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Former Sen. Robert Torricelli is in his office in this 2001 photo. (Carl Bower)

4. Robert Torricelli

Democrat Robert Torricelli used to be a U.S. senator, occupying the seat now held by Booker. "The Torch" succeeded fellow Democrat Bill Bradley in 1997, but withdrew from his re-election race just two months before Election Day due to ethical concerns. The Senate Ethics Committee "severely admonished" Torricelli for accepting gifts from David Chang while intervening with federal agencies on his behalf.

Democrats were able to get former U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., on the ballot to replace Torricelli and won the 2002 race.

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Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop speaks to the media following a meeting in Newark to discuss the potential impact of President Donald Trump's immigration executive orders. (Andre Malok | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com)

5. Steve Fulop

Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop considered a run for governor before deferring to former U.S. Ambassador Phil Murphy, so he clearly is interested in statewide office.

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Assemblywoman Shavonda Sumter, D-Passaic.

6. Shavonda Sumter

The goddaughter of state Democratic Chairman John Currie, Assemblywoman Shavonda Sumter of Passaic considered running for governor but passed. Her next chance at statewide office could be an open U.S. Senate seat.

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U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez arrives at the federal courthouse in Newark. (Patti Sapone | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com)

7. Robert Menendez

If Menendez is cleared of criminal charges, don't count him out. While the Senate Ethics Committee could recommend censuring or reprimanding him, such a rebuke is not a death sentence.

A case in point: U.S. Sen John McCain (R-Ariz.) has remained a respected member of the chamber and was the 2008 Republican presidential nominee despite being reprimanded by the ethics panel in the Keating Five scandal, where he and four other senators intervened with federal regulators on behalf of Charles Keating, whose savings and loan collapsed in the 1980s.

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Former U.S. Sen. Harrison Williams and his wife Jeanette at the White House. (Mark Abraham | The Star-Ledger)

New Jersey's been down this road before

A former occupant of the Senate seat Menendez now holds, Democrat Harrison Williams, was convicted of bribery, conspiracy and other charges in the Abscam scandal in 1981, which involved the FBI impersonating an Arab sheik seeking favors from lawmakers in exchange for money.

The Senate Ethics Committee recomended expulsion, calling his conduct "ethically repugnant."

Williams resigned his seat in March 1982, allowing Republican Gov. Tom Kean to appoint a fellow Republican to the post, Nicholas Brady. In the fall election, Democrat Lautenberg won the seat when Brady did not seek re-election.

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More about the Menendez trial

Forget 'tabloid' details: Judge tells lawyers in Menendez trial

The investigation explained

Menendez trial begins: We take you inside the courtroom as it happens

Here's who is likely to pick Menendez replacement if he leaves Senate

7 Republicans who could take over Menendez's Senate seat

U.S. Supreme Court won't throw out Menendez corruption case

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Jonathan D. Salant may be reached at jsalant@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @JDSalant or on Facebook. Find NJ.com Politics on Facebook.
MANNINGTON TWP. -- Salem County residents will gather Monday evening to mark the 16th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on America.

The ceremony, beginning at 7 p.m., will be held at the Park of Remembrance, 135 Cemetery Rd., near the county 911 Call Center, officials said.

Officials from Cpl. Joseph C. Toulson Veterans of Foreign Wars Post No. 253 of Elsinboro will lead this year's observance.

The first local service to honor the victims of the attack was held along the riverfront in Penns Grove in September 2001.

Each year since, an annual observance has been held in the county.

This year's event will include music and participation from several groups and individuals, including the Salem County Vocational-Technical School Junior ROTC and fire and rescue personnel from throughout the county.

VFW Post No. 253 Commander Patrick Hassler will be the master of ceremonies.

This year's scheduled guest speaker will be U.S. Army veteran Michael Smith, currently a patrolman with the Winslow Township Police Department, according to event organizers.

Others scheduled to take part in the ceremony are Joe Grasso, Pastor Tim Hunt, Evelyn Shuman and Jack Ayars and Matthew Jordan.

As in past ceremonies two fire ladder trucks will be raised during the ceremony to symbolize the twin towers of the World Trade Center in Manhattan. The ladders will "fall" as the ceremony closes.

Also scheduled to take place near the close of the ceremony is the unveiling of the Flight 93 Memorial.

All county residents are invited to attend.

Bill Gallo Jr. may be reached at bgallo@njadvancemedia.com. Follow Bill Gallo Jr. on Twitter @bgallojr. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
FORT MYERS, Fla. (AP)  Survivors of Hurricane Ian face a long emotional road to recover from one of the most damaging storms to hit the U.S. mainland. For those who lost everything to disaster, the anguish can be crushing to return home to find so much gone. Grief can run the gamut from frequent tears to utter despair. The Lee County medical examiner says two men in their 70s even took their own lives a day apart after viewing their losses. Experts say suicides climb after disasters and more funding for mental health should be provided as climate change makes storms and fires more frequent and devastating.
By PTI: (Eds: Updating toll; adding fresh inputs)

By Youssra El-Sharkawy

Cairo, Sep 10 (PTI) At least nine terrorists were killed today by the Egyptian security forces in a densely populated central Cairo neighbourhood, a security official said.

Five policemen, including three officers, were also injured in the shootout, he said.

Police raided two apartments in Ard Ellewa district on a tip-off that terrorists were hiding there and preparing to launch attacks, the state-run MENA news agency reported.

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When the police forces approached to the apartment, terrorists opened fire on them, the official said.

Nine terrorists were killed in the exchange of gunfire, he said.

A huge cache of arms and ammunition was also recovered by the police.

Terrorist attacks, mainly targeting police and military, increased after the ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in 2013 by military following massive protests against his rule.

Hundreds of police and army personnel have been killed since then. PTI YES AMS ZH CPS

--- ENDS ---
A story on Lawson Garic's plan to open a "poor man's bakery" from the Dec. 27, 1917, New Orleans States.
SIOUX CITY  Dolf Ivener wants to help the planet and revolutionize the way farmers power their farms.

The Sioux City businessman and fifth-generation farmer, who oversees operations outside of Hinton and Whiting, recently launched Hog Power Energy.

The new company aims to help pork producers reduce electricity costs in confinements through the use of renewable energy created via a self-contained solar generator system developed and tested by Ivener.

Essentially, it gives producers a chance to implement a microgrid system to a confinement that would lessen but not completely eliminate their dependence on utilities and offset their electricity costs by $300-$500 a month, according to Iveners estimates.

The all-in-one solar-powered system comes packed inside a 20-foot shipping container. Contents of the container include an 11-kilowatt solar panel system that features 40 panels, a battery management system, a 20-kilowatt battery to store excess energy and provide 30 hours of backup power and a 15-kilowatt inverter that directs the collected energy.

Although the system is suited for any type of ag building, Ivener is specifically targeting hog confinements for now due to how the needs of those structures align with solars capabilities.

You see whats running on this hog confinement? Fans, Ivener told The Sioux City Journal. At night when its really cool, the fans dont run and you dont need as much electricity. Winter time, none of the fans run  like one fan  so it works perfectly with solar production because its when their energy consumption is at its most.

While the figure varies by type of building, materials inside of it, its size and its purpose  for example, a finishing barn versus a gestation barn  a typical 1,000-head swine facility uses about 2,000 kilowatt hours a month, according to Jay Harmon, an Iowa State University professor and livestock production specialist for the colleges extension program.

Harmon came about that number after he and other researchers associated with the college surveyed a number of producers to try and determine the average electrical use for operating a hog confinement.

Thats ball park anyway, Harmon said.

Determining an average rate is a bit more challenging. Rates vary depending on if a confinement receives service through a private utility, a municipal-owned utility or rural cooperative and the category it is billed under.

However, another study by the University of Minnesotas extension office estimated that energy costs, including gas usage, represent anywhere from 2 to 5 percent of the out-of-pocket costs of raising a pig.

Even though that figure isnt a substantial expense, it is one that can be trimmed, which is where Ivener sees his opportunity.

Advances in battery technology are what have allowed Ivener, a 43-year-old champion of renewables, to create the Hog Power system.

Theres a saying, You strike when the iron is hot. Ivener said. And the iron is hot because the technology is getting cheap enough and the utilities dont understand that they might actually have to charge you less money for electricity; theyve never done that in the history of electricity.

According to a new report by Morgan Stanley, Iveners assessment of the markets potential is spot on. The global investment banking firm predicts that the energy storage market is expected to grow from less than $300 million to $4 billion in the next two to three years.

The report goes on to say that, ultimately theres about a $30 billion market for storage units, with capacity for around 85 gigawatt-hours of power storage. Thats enough electricity to light up most of the New York City metro area for a year.

In the past, one of the biggest criticisms against renewable energy sources was the lack of reliable storage. And for solar in particular, that its peak collection times occur opposite of peak electrical usage times, something Ivener has worked to correct.

Through an automated process, a Hog Power unit uses power collected through the solar panels to power whatever structure it is wired into. If the device overproduces, the excess power is shifted to the battery unit, which can also power the building when the sun isnt visible and the panels arent collecting.

Ivener even developed an accompanying all-inclusive Hog Power Energy mobile application that allows users to track their billing, energy usage, how much energy has been stored and other features.

It does everything ... all on your phone, he said.

Ivener has been tinkering with the Hog Power Energy concept for more than a year. He settled on a shipping container since it was cheaper than most battery cases, portable and large enough to host the entire system.

His jury-rigged prototype Hog Power unit features a desktop computer and batteries he recovered from a wrecked Nissan Leaf  an all-electric vehicle  and is far less sophisticated than the consumer version.

When asked if he thinks a service like Hog Power Energy could have a major impact on the agriculture industry, Harmon noted he needed more information on the product, but from what he heard of it he thought it was a possibility.

It could be. I dont know what it costs up front or maintenance costs and there are some other things to think about, but it certainly could impact production, he said. It might be that you could be operating more remotely.

Ivener is confident in his product and allows producers to extensively test out a Hog Power Energy unit before they commit to it.

Basically, we show up in one day and set the whole system up, he said. Thats them kicking the tires. Theyre going to get the app on their phone, theyll look at the power theyre going to consume and produce. Then at the end of six weeks, you can either buy it, lease it or we come back, unhook, take the panels off and throw em back in the shipping container and drive to (another) confinement and see if I can sell it to him.

Aware there may be skepticism about his system and his intent, Ivener compared the situation to the first time someone bought a refrigerator and he thinks microgrid systems like his will soon become more common.

The part about spinning the tires in 10 years will be irrelevant because people will be so comfortable it that (it will) be like buying a refrigerator, he said. This will get us over the leap.
SHELBY  Dallas McDowell and Hagen Sorensen put in some work this weekend.

The fourth graders from Harlan picked potatoes at Carstens 1880 Farmstead during the organizations Farm Days kids program on Friday, getting their hands dirty while plucking spuds.

Another bucket! McDowell said triumphantly as the pair turned in another full haul.

The Harlan pair was among more than 400 students from more than 10 schools that descended on the farm near Shelby as part of the 35th annual Farm Days weekend. And on Saturday and continuing today, the event is open to the public.

Students learned about 18th and 19th century farm practices, including how to make rope, thresh corn and keep bees, along with using a wash basin to do laundry.

There was a wagon tour, antique tractors and a blacksmith. And while a corn maze might not be olde tyme, it still provided a lot of enjoyment for the youngsters.

Its fun because were doing it like they used to do back in the day, Sorensen said.

After picking potatoes, students were able to enjoy the fruit of their labor when volunteers cleaned, sliced and fried em up. Served with catsup.

Everything, said Lauren Schmitz of Harlan when asked what she enjoyed about Farm Days. Shed just finished up enthusiastically picking potatoes.

I like that theres a ton of potatoes and it really helps my eyesight, she said, though she noted she didnt like potatoes and wouldnt have a plate of chips. Lauren shouldve given them a chance; they were delicious.

The potatoes were sliced by Lanny Newland of Persia, one of the many volunteers working to provide the experience to the students. Newland said hes been a part of the Farm Days since the beginning.

You get a job here, you dont get rid of it, he said with a smile, saying two words when asked about his favorite part: The kids.

As they finished up washing and hanging clothes out to dry, a group of Underwood students talked about another skill theyd enjoyed learning about  rope-making with Bernie Schroder.

We got to make four pieces of rope, said fourth-grader Kayle Bristol. It was a lot of fun.

Schroder explained his machine was built in 1901. He learned the craft from his grandfather.

He didnt think we were paying attention, he said of those lessons. But I was.

The annual Farm Days offer both students and the general public a chance to learn about farm practices of yesteryear while also exploring the Carstens Farmstead, a gem of land located south of Interstate 80 near Shelby.

This is one of the best, most satisfying days at the farm, Mel Hursey, president of Carstens board, said on Friday before noting he looked forward to a great three days of showcasing the farm.

The Farm Days weekend wraps up today, with the public invited to participate in many of the activities the youngsters enjoyed on Friday. An antique farm equipment and classic car parade will roll through the farm grounds at 2 p.m. today. Admission to the event is $5 per day for attendees 9 years old and older.

We do it because this is our roots, we want to help people better understand pioneer life in western Iowa, said Terry Torneten, an event organizer who works as regional director for Iowa State University Extension and Outreach.
It may seem like school just started, but it will soon be time for high school seniors to think about college.

Thats because the FAFSA  the form state, federal and a lot of private financial aid is based on  can be filed beginning in October, and some colleges give priority to students whose forms reach them in November or December, said Steve Irvin, student success advisor for the Iowa College Access Network based at Iowa Western Community College.

The University of Iowa urges people to file it by Nov. 15, he said.

Once they are processed by the government, results are sent to colleges indicated by the student, said Brittania Morey, director of communications for ICAN.

The FAFSA is the first step, she said.

In October and November, ICAN advisors will be busy meeting with students and parents to complete FAFSA forms and answer questions about the college financial aid system, Irvin said. Many colleges will hold FAFSA events where families can go to get information and assistance.

Riverside High School will hold a FAFSA day for Pottawattamie Promise students on Oct. 16, and Irvin will be there to meet with them, said Chris Conover, guidance counselor at Riverside. Another FAFSA event will be held later in the month for other seniors.

Both of these days end up getting filled up real fast, he said. We do have a good relationship with Steve Irvin with ICAN, and I send a lot of parents his way.

The whole financial aid process has been moved up because, in 2016, the government started accepting tax returns that are a year older, Morey said. It used to be families couldnt submit the forms until the spring before the student was to attend college, because they had to have tax returns from the previous year.

Families are taking advantage of the change and submitting forms earlier, Conover said.

I think that extra time makes a difference, he said.

Because of ICANs FAFSA READY IOWA campaign and school guidance counselors, the percentage of high school seniors in the state who file a FAFSA form has been increasing, Morey said. Applications for aid in the 2017-18 school year were up an estimated 8.5 percent from those for the 2016-17 school year, she said. Numbers for FAFSA completion in Pottawattamie County showed a steady completion rate of 73 percent over the last two academic years.

Riverside High School and St. Albert High School had substantial increases in the past year, with Riversides completion rate jumping from 80 percent to 98 percent and St. Alberts rising from 32 percent to 50 percent, according to the Iowa College Student Aid Commissions figures before the July 1 federal deadline, Morey said.

Among other Pottawattamie County schools, Abraham Lincoln High Schools rate rose from 63 percent to 66 percent, Thomas Jeffersons fell from 58 to 55 percent, Lewis Centrals dropped from 73 percent to 68 percent, Underwoods went from 97 percent to 100 percent, Tri-Centers plunged from 96 percent to 84 percent and AHSTWs held steady at 69 percent.

Theres a running total at https://fafsa.iowa.gov/. However, the parameters of the statistics have been changed, so percentages will not be comparable to those of past years. Students are always applying, so the rates are always changing. For more information, see ICANsucceed.org. To make an appointment with Steve Irvin, call 515-402-4209.
School elections are coming up across southwest Iowa this Tuesday, with competitive races in Council Bluffs, Treynor, Underwood and other surrounding communities.

Lewis Central doesnt have competitive races this cycle, but one seat for Iowa Western Community College  the District 7 contest between challenger Bryan Jack Holder and incumbent Kirk Madsen  will be decided by voters.

Five candidates are seeking three seats for the Council Bluffs school board: challengers Richard Dallinger, Kyle McGlade and John Minshall are facing off against incumbents Jill Ogg-Gress and Susan Riley.

Inside todays Nonpareil are articles on competitive races in AHSTW, East Mills and South Page. Find those on Page 6A.

The Nonpareil has published candidate profiles for the Council Bluffs and Iowa Western races, as well as articles on Treynor, Underwood, Clarinda, Logan-Magnolia, Shenandoah, Sidney and Woodbine. Additional competitive races are taking place in Boyer Valley and Griswold.

Find a collection of The Nonpareils coverage on our website, nonpareilonline.com. A list of all area candidates, including noncompetitive races, can be found on the website as well.

Look for local results online Tuesday night and in Wednesdays Nonpareil, with full area results in Thursdays edition.
By PTI: New Delhi, Sep 10 (PTI) After selling its domestic oil business to Russias Rosneft and partners for USD 12.9 billion, Essar Group has no plans to sell its Stanlow refinery in the UK, a senior company official said.

Essar Oil (UK) Ltd Chief Executive S Thangapandian said announcement of fresh investments of USD 250 million in upgrade and expansion of Stanlow shows the groups commitment to stay invested in the sector.

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"The investments which are being made goes to show that the promoters want to stay invested in oil and gas sector," he told PTI. "We are sure they will stay invested in oil and gas and Stanlow refinery."

Essar Oil (UK) Ltd, the firm that owns and operators the Stanlow refinery, is owned by billionaire Ruia brothers Essar Group, which had sold Essar Oil to Rosneft last month.

Rosneft, the worlds largest listed oil company, acquired 49 per cent stake in Essar Oil, which operates a 20 million tonnes a year Vadinar refinery in Gujarat, the adjacent port and about 3,500 petrol pumps.

Netherlands-based Trafigura Group Pte, one of the worlds biggest commodity trading companies, and Russian investment fund United Capital Partners split another 49 per cent equity.

Stanlow as also the coal-bed methane (CBM) business of the company was not part of the sale.

Sited on a 770-hectare industrialised area of Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, Stanlow supplies 16 per cent of all road transport fuels in the UK, Thangapandian said.

He said the new investment would boost the crude oil throughput at Stanlow to 9.7 million tonnes by March 2018 from current 9.09 million tonnes.

Also, the company is targeting 400 petrol pumps in the UK in five years from the current 39.

The investment in the revamping of certain units of the refinery would help cut down on crude oil processing cost, improve product slate and lead to marginal increase in capacity, he said.

He said the promoters have so far invested USD 800 million in Stanlow since acquiring it from Royal Dutch Shell in 2011.

Essar had paid Shell USD 350 million to buy Stanlow, the UKs second largest refinery.

Stanlow has a capacity of 296,000 barrels per day (14.8 million tonnes per annum) but operates at much lesser capacity. PTI ANZ ABM

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I am hating war and the conditions which make it possible more as each day goes by, and I hated it strongly before I even left America.

Cedar Rapids Gazette Editor Verne Marshall was writing from the front lines of France, where he drove an ambulance for the American Ambulance Field Service in 1916. It was a long way from Iowa, and it started with lunch with an old friend.

In February, Marshall joined a friend from Marion for lunch. The event was supposed to be a farewell for the friend, who was leaving to drive an ambulance in France during the days of World War I before the United States joined the conflict.

Before the meeting was over, Marshall had decided to join his friend in the adventure. Within a week, he had his passport, had passed the drivers exam and was sailing from New York on the Lafayette.

Eight days later, he had arrived at Bordeaux and boarded a train to Paris. He hoped to spend a little time in the city in order to learn a little of the French language. Marshall knew not a word of French but found himself almost immediately on his way to the front with a French guide who knew no English.

It was his job to drive an ambulance from a base hospital several miles to the front, where he picked up wounded and delivered them to the hospital. He drove only at night with no lights on roads that were constantly shelled by the Germans. Marshall said it was an experience hed never forget.

At the Battle of Verdun, he served three months, transporting the wounded from Dead Mans Hill to the base hospital. His ambulance was one of 20 cars that made the journey every night. Marshall wrote about seeing more than 3,000 wounded assembled at one base hospital, waiting to be distributed to other nearby hospitals.

The dead were transported in American-made Packard trucks. They were buried side-by-side, shoulder-to-shoulder wrapped only in bits of canvas, Marshall reported.

He wrote that, in June, he witnessed a cemetery where three trenches held 60 bodies each. Ten weeks later the same cemetery held 80 trenches with 60 bodies in each.

Marshall described meeting a wounded French soldier on his way back from the front. He asked Marshall for some bread and described how he had survived. He had lain beneath four dead men as protection for four days and five nights, using a knotted torn sleeve to staunch the flow of blood from his wound.

And there was the wounded 19-year-old French soldier who said he had just received a letter from his mother.

She told him of the death of his brother, who had been killed in battle. She was heartbroken and terrified that her only surviving child would meet the same fate. As he was lifted from the ambulance, he cried, Mere, mere! Mother, Mother! Those were his final words.

I used to think there was nothing worse than hell; now I am not sure, Marshall wrote. At least I know that hell can be no worse than this war.
Sunshine, music and dancing were on display at Bayliss Park during the fourth annual Council Bluffs Latino Festival.

Kids were able to get their faces painted or meet Colors da Clown, while bounce houses offered a chance for fun. Music filled the air throughout the day, with a rotation of live bands, dancers and a DJ. Food trucks and other vendors offered a bite to eat. A number of organizations, services and businesses set up booths at the event.

Roger Garcia, executive director of Centro Latino, said the festival was a chance for people to come together.

It serves a dual purpose, Garcia said of the festival. We wanted to help unite the Latino community, and we also want to reach out to the community at large. Its a chance to learn about each other and enjoy a beautiful day together.

Centro Latino teamed with the Strength and Unity Committee of Council Bluffs to organize the event.

Council Bluffs Police Department Lt. Dan Flores, on duty at the festival as an officer and also a Centro Latino board member, said he was happy to see the booths.

This is a great chance for the Latino community to learn about whats available, he said of the organization and services booths. Its also a chance for people to get to know the Latino community and vice versa.

Maria Valdez of Council Bluffs brought her children, Alex, 10, and Julissa, 5. Maria Valdez said she came to check out the event and learn about some of the services in the community. Her kids said they enjoyed the activities.

I like the trampolines, Alex said of the bounce house, noting he might get his face painted.

Cintya Piedra and her daughter Gabriela Vogel, both of Council Bluffs, stopped by to meet people, try some Venezuelan food and have fun.

Its a good way to get to know people in the community, Vogel said. A good time to get in contact with people. Weve enjoyed it a lot.

Added her madre: Same.

Tanner Gordon and his wife Maricela Valdez said they heard about the event on Facebook and wanted to check it out. Gordon mentioned their support for the Latino community, saying the decision by the Justice Department to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program was horrible.

Everyones entitled to the American dream, he said. We shouldnt deny that to them, especially when theyre doing the right things to stay and not breaking laws.

Laura Ayers and Trixie Fisher stopped by to check things out, according to Ayers.

And the food, Fisher added.

They enjoyed their tacos.

Its a good thing to have this, its something different to do, Ayers said.

Fisher said she enjoyed learning about Latino culture at the event.

They support us, we should support them, Fisher said.

Ayers added: As it should be.
Education minister Ram Bilas Sharma alleged that there have been lapses on part of the school administration.

By PTI: The Haryana government today said it was not averse to recommending a CBI probe into the killing of a seven-year-old boy at Ryan International School and asked the Gurgaon Police to book the school owner under the juvenile justice law.

Education minister Ram Bilas Sharma alleged that there have been lapses on part of the school administration.

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"We accept negligence on part of the Ryan International School but the school cannot be derecognised as the future of 1,200 students is at stake," he said.

"We have directed the Gurgaon Police to book the owner of Ryan International School, Albert Pinto, under section 75 of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Punishment) Act, 2015, for cruelty to a child meted out by the custodian in the charge sheet to be submitted in the court within 7 days.

"Some loopholes in the security are visible in the case and the toilet window was also found broken from inside," Sharma told reporters here.

He said the charge sheet in the case will be ready within a week as the police were speedily conducting the probe, but stressed that if the parents of the child insist on a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) or any other agency the government will accede to their demand.

Sharma also made it clear that the school management has to take responsibility for the safety and security of the children.

"We are issuing directives in this regard to all schools including private ones," he said.

"We held a meeting today in which the demand to derecognise the school came up, but we also had to take into account the fact that 1,200 students are studying there. The parents of the students studying in this school were against this step and, therefore, we felt taking such a step will not be right," he said.

"However, for any kind of lapse, by the management or the owner, we have initiated action," he said.

WHAT HAPPENED AT RYAN INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL

The boy was found murdered with his throat slit in the school washroom in Gurgaon on Friday. The schools acting principal was suspended and the security staff removed. The police claimed the student was killed by school bus conductor Ashok Kumar, who tried to sexually abuse him.

The accused was arrested within hours of the murder after which a court in Gurgaon sent him to police custody for three days.

"The murder accused has already been arrested. Now, within a week, the police after collecting all necessary evidence will submit a charge sheet in court. However, still if the parents are not satisfied, then the Haryana government is ready to get the matter probed by any agency.

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"I am hopeful that when we will produce the accused before court within a week with all evidence collected by the police, the parents of the child will be satisfied with the action being taken," he said.

Sharma said, "We have fixed a seven-day deadline in the case where the accused is booked under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code (for murder). This is the minimum time in such cases. However, if the childs parents still feel they are not satisfied, then as per their wish we can get the case investigated by any agency including the CBI."

"We have full sympathy with the parents of the child. If there is any issue of providing financial help, the Haryana government will be willing to help," he said. The minister made it clear that the Haryana government will not show any leniency in the matter

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"Whatever strict action needs to be taken as per the law will be taken in this case," he asserted.

He also said a liquor vend near the school has been ordered to be shut down permanently.

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By PTI: Mumbai, Sep 10 (PTI) Parents across the globe, including in India, have not severed the financial umbilical cord, with 50 per cent with children over 18 years still providing them regular support, finds out a study.

The study has revealed that parents in the Middle East and Asia are generally far more likely to be financially supporting children into adulthood than those in Europe and the Americas, according to HSBCs study Facing the future.

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The UAE (79 per cent) is where the highest proportion of parents still support grown-up children, followed by Indonesia (77 per cent), Mexico (59 per cent), Malaysia (57 per cent), China (55 per cent) and India (55 per cent), it said.

In the UK and the US, it is much below with 30 per cent and 26 per cent, respectively, findings of the study showed.

This study represents views of 13,122 people across 13 countries and territories, including Argentina, China, France, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mexico, Singapore, Taiwan, UAE, the UK and the US.

It is found very common for parents to be supporting children well into adulthood.

Almost half (48 per cent) of those supporting an adult child have been doing so for over 12 years, with that child now aged over 30, the analysis said.

This is despite most parents (61 per cent), who support the grown-up children, believing they should stand on their own feet financially when they grow up, it added.

Education is where most parents (59 per cent) are providing the key financial support while almost half (49 per cent) are helping with costs like utility bills, groceries and home repairs.

"Parents are also helping with medical and dental care (33 per cent) and rent costs (27 per cent). Over one in four (27 per cent) are even helping to pay for holidays," it added.

Most parents supporting grown-up children feel good about helping their family, with 61 per cent feeling appreciated for the support they give others and 70 per cent feeling they are a good provider for their family, it said.

However, there can be significant knock-on effects to parents long-term financial planning, it stated.

Nearly 68 per cent parents supporting adult children would prioritise paying for their childs university or higher education over their own retirement fund, and 26 per cent had to withdraw from their own savings and investments while 12 per cent have incurred more debt. PTI SM RSY ARD SDM

--- ENDS ---

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For the eighth year, North Platte-area firefighters and law enforcement will team up with Huskeradio and the American Red Cross to help save lives during the Battle of the Badges Blood Drive. The friendly competition is from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Monday at the Quality Inn & Suites, 2102 S. Jeffers St.

Police officers are all too aware of the importance of having donated blood available, said North Platte Police Chief Michael Swain, whose police department leads the competition four to three. We see the impact in the eyes of the victims, their families and friends. That is why each year we partner with our fire department in a battle of the badges to see who can get the most donated blood.

By rolling up a sleeve during this special event, blood donors have the chance to show their support for the North Platte Fire Department, North Platte Police Department, Lincoln County Sheriffs Office or Nebraska State Patrol. While the side with the most donors gets bragging rights, everyone walks away a winner, especially the patients who benefit from blood donation.

Our jobs are to protect the public, and this friendly competition is a way for us to know that we are doing something now that will help save lives in the future, Swain said. It is also a way for you to have our back. Show your support and donate blood during this years Battle of the Badges.

Make an appointment to give blood by using the free Red Cross Blood Donor App, visiting redcrossblood.org or calling 800-RED CROSS and using sponsor code NPbattleofbadges.

Blood products can help many different kinds of patients including accident and burn victims, heart surgery patients, organ transplant patients and those receiving treatment for leukemia, cancer and sickle cell disease. This drive comes at the end of the summer season, which can be a difficult time for the Red Cross to collect enough blood to meet patient needs. Donating at this drive helps ensure blood remains available for hospitals.

All blood types are needed to ensure a reliable supply for patients. A blood donor card or drivers license or two other forms of identification are required at check-in. Individuals who are 17 years of age in most states (16 with parental consent where allowed by state law), weigh at least 110 pounds and are in generally good health may be eligible to donate blood. High school students and other donors 18 years of age and younger also have to meet certain height and weight requirements.

Blood donors can now save time at their next donation by using RapidPass to complete their pre-donation reading and health history questionnaire online, on the day of their donation, prior to arriving at the blood drive. To get started and learn more, visit redcrossblood.org/RapidPass and follow the instructions on the site.
As classic cars lined downtown North Platte on Saturday, two looked as though they came right out of an old cop movie.

Not quite. A 1950 Ford coupe was an actual patrol car, with one red light on top and a flashing sign that reads STOP on the side.

It wasnt a Nebraska patrol car, said Nebraska State Trooper J.J. Connelly. It was actually an Iowa patrol car.

The car was on display at Col. Codys Cruise Show and Shine, an annual antique car show that features restored and original vehicles of many types. The show also raffled a 1965 Chevrolet Impala, restored by North Platte Community College students. Linda Ridenour of Johnson Lake won the raffle.

The 1950 patrol car was restored by a couple in Holdrege. The couple, Larry and Connie Jacobson, donated the car to the Nebraska State Patrol in 1997. It now stays in Lincoln, and the State Patrol brings it to shows and parades on request, Connelly said.

While the car has a time-period phone built inside it, Connelly said troopers in the past didnt have such amenities. While in their patrol areas, troopers had to stop at a designated gas station and other places that had a telephone to communicate with those back at their headquarters about what was going on.

Right beside the coupe sat a 1993 Mustang, although the 24-year-old car has a brand-new radio.

We could actually work with this one if we want to, Connelly said.

The State Patrol often used Mustangs and Chevrolet Camaros in the 1990s and early 2000s, and Connelly remembers his own patrol Camaro from the early millennium.

This thing was great, Connelly said. Really fast.

Those companies no longer make police models, and Connelly now uses a 2015 Dodge Challenger. Troopers no longer have to worry about finding a gas station telephone. Along with modern-day dispatch, Connelly has a built-in dash camera and can print speeding tickets from his center console, often sending them to county attorneys offices.

Law enforcement is coming out with new technology and programs all the time, Connelly said, but the models from 1950 and 1993 are still important to him.

The patrol has a lot of history, he said. And weve got to remember where we came from.
A Lincoln County feedlot lost hundreds of bales Saturday after a bolt of lightning created daylong flames.

Just before 7:20 a.m., North Platte firefighters were called to Olson Feedlot, 12428 U.S. Highway 30, where a morning thunderstorm caused a fire, said Battalion Chief David Heitman. Firefighters from Sutherland and Hershey departments also responded.

The fire burned 200 big, round bales of corn stocks, Heitman said. He did not know the estimated cost of damage to the bales.

Firefighters stayed on scene throughout the day Saturday.

Its going to burn for a while, Heitman said.

The storm was one of two systems that moved into Lincoln County on Saturday morning, bringing about  of an inch of rain, loud booms and plenty of lightning. The first storm moved into North Platte between 7 and 7:30 a.m., with another following about 9:30 a.m., said Kenny Roberg, a meteorologist at North Plattes National Weather Service office.

The disturbance came from South Dakota, first mostly affecting western Lincoln County before moving all across the county, Roberg said. The storms then continued east.

Roberg said the area can expect dry conditions throughout the rest of the weekend and into next week.
Commissioners will receive comments on proposed budget

The Lincoln County Commissioners will open a public hearing at 10 a.m. on Monday to receive comments on the proposed 2017-18 fiscal year budget for the county.

Following the public hearing, the board will then consider a resolution to adopt the budget.

At 10:15 a.m., a public hearing to receive comments relating to setting the final tax request at a different amount than the prior years tax request.

The regular meeting of the commissioners begins at 9 a.m. in the Commissioners Room at the Lincoln County Courthouse.

School board hearing to be on property tax request

The public will have a chance to share their comments on the North Platte Public School Districts property tax request on Monday.

A hearing will take place at 5:30 p.m. at McKinley Education Center, to discuss the request which totals $27.98 million. Of that, $23.97 million goes to the general fund, $2.48 goes toward bond funds, $864,399 goes to the Qualified Capital Purpose Undertaking Fund and $660,384 goes to the special building fund.

The regular school board meeting will immediately follow the hearing. During the meeting, the board will vote on whether or not to accept the property tax as well as whether or not to approve the proposed $57 million budget.

The same budget amount was approved for the 2016-17 fiscal year.

2 hospitalized after motorcycle crash on I-80

A man and woman from Iowa were taken to the hospital Saturday after their motorcycle crashed.

Just before 3:15 p.m., Nebraska State Patrol Troop D began receiving multiple calls about the crash, located just east of Brady on Interstate 80 East, said Amy Roskilly, a communications specialist for the patrol.

An eastbound motorcycle with a travel trailer blew a rear tire, and the motorcycle overturned, Roskilly said.

Both the driver and passenger sustained non-life threatening injuries and were taken by ambulance to Gothenburg Health.

The occupants were a man and woman, believed to either be related or married, Roskilly said.
The NRL has confirmed the times and venues for Weeks Two and Three of the NRL Telstra Premiership Finals Series.

Week Two of the Finals Series will begin with the match between Brisbane Broncos and Penrith Panthers at Suncorp Stadium on Friday night.

It will continue on Saturday night with a clash between Parramatta Eels and North Queensland Cowboys at ANZ Stadium.

Minor premiers the Melbourne Storm and Sydney Roosters will host preliminary finals matches in Week Three.

NRL Telstra Premiership Finals Series  Week 2

Semi Final: Friday, September 15, 7.55pm, Suncorp Stadium

NRL: Brisbane Broncos v Penrith Panthers

Holden Cup: Penrith Panthers v Brisbane Broncos; 5.15pm

Semi Final: Saturday, September 16, 7.40pm, ANZ Stadium

NRL: Parramatta Eels v North Queensland Cowboys

Holden Cup: Cronulla-Sutherland Sharks v Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles; 5.00pm

NRL Telstra Premiership Finals Series  Week 3

Preliminary Final: Friday, September 22, 7.55pm, AAMI Park

NRL: Melbourne Storm v Winner of Broncos/Panthers

Holden Cup: To Be Confirmed

Preliminary Final: Saturday, September 23, 7.40pm, Allianz Stadium

NRL: Sydney Roosters v Winner of Eels/Cowboys

Holden Cup: To Be Confirmed

Ticketed members prices start from $50 for families and $20 for Adults at every venue for the NRL Telstra Premiership Finals Series.

General Public tickets start from $65 for families and $25 for Adults at Sydney games.

Tickets for Week Two matches will be on sale to Ticketed Club Members at 10am on Monday (September 11), while tickets for non-ticketed members will be on sale at 1pm and for nrl.com members at 4pm on Monday.

Week Two Finals Series tickets will be on sale to the general public at 10am on Tuesday (September 12) at www.nrl.com/tickets.

All tickets for ANZ Stadium matches include return transport on Sydney trains.

Fans are also reminded that tickets for the NRL Telstra Premiership Grand Final, on October 1, are on sale at www.nrl.com/tickets.
By PTI: injured

(Eds: Updating)

Bhubaneswar, Sep 10 (PTI) One person was killed and 11 others were injured, four of them critically, after a portion of an under-construction flyover collapsed near Bomikhal here today.

Officials said around 15 labourers were working on the flyover when the structure collapsed this afternoon.

An injured worker, undergoing treatment at Capital Hospital, said, "A portion of the flyover collapsed when we were busy plastering its roof."

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Expressing grief over the incident, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik announced Rs 5 lakh ex gratia for the next of the kin of the deceased and free treatment for the injured. He also conveyed his sympathy to the bereaved family.

The chief minister said a deputy executive engineer and an assistant engineer have been suspended following the incident.

"Exemplary action will be taken against those found guilty...no one will be spared whosoever he may be," he said.

Satya Patnaik, a 39-year-old businessman, was killed as he and his daughter Sheetal were under the flyover when it came down crashing, Revenue Divisional Commissioner (RDC), Central Division, A B Otta told reporters.

Patnaiks daughter is critically injured and admitted to the AIIMS, Bhubaneswar, Otta said.

Other injured have been admitted to the Capital Hospital and the AIIMS.

The chief minister also met injured at the two hospitals and spoke to the doctors about their treatment.

A massive search and rescue operation was launched soon after the collapse and it took about six hours to clear the debris.

Police, fire brigade, around 50 personnel of the Odisha Disaster Rapid Action Force (ODRAF) and two units of the NDRF were engaged in the search and rescue operation.

Sniffer dogs were also deployed to ascertain if anyone was trapped under the rubble, officials said.

Earth movers and heavy cranes were pressed into service to remove the debris. Extending a helping hand, the East Coast Railway (ECoR) engaged its workforce in the rescue operation.

Officials with over 10 gas cutters and seven hydraulic jacks were deployed, an ECoR official said.

A high-level inquiry has been ordered into the mishap.

Works Department Secretary N K Pradhan said, "I have already ordered an inquiry into the incident. It is certainly a major mistake on the part of the contractor. The job was assigned to Panda Infrastructure."

Stern action would be taken against those found guilty, he said, adding the project was under the Roads and Buildings (R&B) Division-4.

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Director General of Police (DGP) R P Sharma, Police Commissioner Y B Khurania and other senior officials visited the spot to monitor the rescue operation.

Both the DGP and the police commissioner said the incident occurred apparently due to negligence.

Meanwhile, opposition parties blamed the BJD government for the incident.

Leader of Opposition Narasingha Mishra (Congress) said that the CM, who is in charge of the Works Department, is responsible and the issue would be raised in the Assembly.

He alleged the part of the flyover collapsed due to "poor quality" of work and contractors and engineers responsible for the "negligence" should be booked for "culpable homicide" not amounting to murder.

Odisha Congress chief Prasad Harichandan said stringent action should be taken against those responsible for the collapse.

BJP leader and Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan expressed grief over the incident and said, "Exemplary action must be taken against the guilty."

BJPs Odisha chief Basant Panda said even though the chief minister holds the Works Department, "poor quality" of work led to the collapse. PTI AAM SKN JM NSD TIR

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I recently saw a meme on Facebook featuring the face of a shocked man that read, "That moment you realize all your vegan friends live in your computer."

I found it funny because there is some truth to it.

While I do know of a few other vegans outside of Facebook, there is a stronger sense of community and commitment to the cause among those I meet on social media. I guess that is because the ones who do speak out, and are active, are using Facebook and other forms of social media as one, or even their preferred platforms.

When I first gave up meat in the mid 1980s, I would have to travel to Chicago to meet up with other vegetarians to demonstrate, speak out and find community. Today, I just sign on to Facebook.

Social media provides me with an easy way to stay on top of all that is vegan, which is no easy feat considering how quickly the movement is growing. Food, clothing and other types of manufacturers are releasing new vegan products all the time and many of them pop up on my Facebook timeline with reviews by fellow vegans.

Before going down to Noblesville, Indiana, last weekend for a concert, I posted a request on the Indianapolis Vegetarian and Vegan group for restaurant ideas. The responses began arriving immediately and before long I had a long list of vegan-friendly eateries from which to choose.

There are a few downsides to social media, including the common squabbles among users, especially when a Facebook Troll chimes in with the intention of disrupting a conversation or seeking attention.

There are also the graphic images and videos of animal abuse (much of it perfectly legal and quite common), which never fails to shock me and get my blood boiling. I quickly scroll by most of those images, wholeheartedly buying into the belief that going vegan absolves one from having to continue witnessing those horrors.

When the realities of all sorts of animal abuse and every day life get too much, I need only check in on Facebook with Esther the Wonder Pig for some much-needed relief. I highly recommend "liking" that page.

I encourage anyone considering going vegan or already vegan to join in the online communities and conversations. Your friends may be on the computer, but they are still friends.
In a competitive grocery marketplace, Jewel-Osco's top executive believes fast and friendly service and offering shoppers diverse choices in fresh foods are effective strategies to stand out.

While the approach may seem old-fashioned in an age where more consumers are turning to online shopping and spending less time in brick and mortar stores, Jewel-Osco President Doug Cygan says, "what's old is new again."

"It's interesting, we're 118 years strong and when you look at our history, (Jewel) started out as a delivery business, now we're going to be doing that again," Cygan said during his address to members of the Grocery Merchandising Association of Chicagoland Aug. 31 at Drury Lane in Oakbrook Terrace, Illinois.

Itasca, Illinois-based Jewel-Osco, which operates 187 Chicagoland stores, including four locations in Northwest Indiana, in keeping pace with its competitors also is launching its own online grocery buying and delivery service in the Chicago area.

According to figures shared by Cygan, Jewel-Osco controls about 22.6 percent of the Chicago area's grocery market share. The other major players included Walmart, 19.2 percent; Target, 13.2 percent; Mariano's, 7.6 percent; and Meijer, 5.8 percent.

Cygan said Jewel's strategy to protect its position in the marketplace includes providing fast and effective service to customers as well as giving shoppers the largest varieties of fresh food including produce, fruits and other freshly prepared items.

"How do you differentiate yourself from Amazon," he asked the crowd. "Shoppers still like to see and feel their fresh foods, they want clean stores and fast service and that means giving people the right training."

Jewel has devoted resources to employer training and has been actively recruiting young people through internships so it can secure and train future company leaders and executives.

Cygan said Jewel also will be stepping up its advertising and promotions, showcasing its community involvement and historic presence in the Chicago area and Northwest Indiana.

"We want to be visible in the community," he said. "Jewel has 31,000 employees who help us do what we do and it's our people who helped build the company, and it's what they do that gives me the opportunity to be here today."

Addressing internet giant Amazon's acquisition of Whole Foods Market, Cygan believes Jewel-Osco is well positioned.

"When you look at it, Amazon doesn't make money on delivery. For us, we have to focus on our delivery service and focus on what we offer through our stores," he said. "What we offer is service and best in fresh in order to compete."

Cygan said Cook County's recently implemented sweetened beverage tax, which places a one-cent tax on every ounce of sweetened beverage sold in that county, has affected sales of sweetened drinks at Jewel-Osco's Cook County locations but didn't offer specifics.

"We've seen a drop in Cook County sales but we've also seen sales pick up in Lake County (Illinois)," he said. "Time will tell how that will play out."
When thoughts turn to surfing, the general public easily envisions the rolling and thunderous waves of Hawaii and California.

But the exciting water sport actually has a strong culture in the Region and throughout Chicagoland.

Filmmaker Pat Noyes is intent on letting people know that the surf is definitely up in Northwest Indiana.

Noyes is the man behind the documentary film "Southend: The Place Where I Go Surfing," which sheds light on the surfing scene throughout the Southern Lake Michigan area.

The film was originally screened at the Wilmette Theatre in July and this month Region residents will have the opportunity to see it in Hammond and Michigan City.

"Southend: The Place Where I Go Surfing" will be screened Sept. 14 at The Towle Theater in Hammond and on Sept. 22 at Fire and Water At Washington Park in Michigan City.

"I feel really good about the fact the movie will be shown in Northwest Indiana,"said Noyes. "I hope people will find a way to connect with it somehow and I hope it will make them happy about where they're from," he said. The filmmaker also wants to bring awareness to the fact that the surfing culture surely exists in the area.

During a reception and short program at the Wilmette screening, Noyes told audience members about his passion for the surfing sport and also introduced many members of the regional surfing community who appeared in the film.

"Basically, (my love) of surfing inspired me to do the film," he said, adding getting to know the fellow surfers and about their lives, through the years, was also a great inspiration.

Noyes, who has been surfing for a decade, said he was attracted to the excitement of the sport as well as the overall lifestyle of surfers.

He originally learned to surf in Hawaii while taking lessons during a trip to the islands. A college friend, who was from Holland, Michigan, later told him there was a surfing culture in the Southend and Noyes began to explore it.

"The first time I came to the Region to surf, I went to Hammond," he said, adding he surfed at The Shoe, which is near the Horseshoe Casino. Other popular areas in NWI where surfers take to the waves include Whihala Beach in Whiting; Michigan City Pier; The Whiting Public Park; Portage Lakefront and River Walk; and Michigan City Breakwall.

Film viewers meet a variety of surfers or what Noyes calls the "hearty souls" who are part of the local surf scene, in his movie.

At the Indiana showings of the film, audience members will also have the opportunity to meet the filmmaker as well as others who are featured in the movie. During the July screening, a number of surfers attended including Steve Arnam, Tommy Shimenetto, Jack Flynn, Bernie Konrady, Terry Richardson and others.

Konrady, a surfer for 20 years, said there's a "core" group of dedicated surfers in Northwest Indiana. "I'm honored to be a participant in this film," Konrady said, during a past interview.

Dave Benjamin of the Great Lakes Surf Rescue Project offered some advice and tips during his portion of the program which focused on avoiding accidents and incidents while surfing Lake Michigan. Benjamin, a surfer who had an accident which almost cost him his life, is now dedicated to delivering much needed information about safety in surfing. At the Indiana film showings, The Great Lakes Surf Rescue Project will also have a presence.

An art exhibit inspired by surfing will accompany the film screenings as it did at The Wilmette Theatre. The exhibit, curated by Younsoo Flynn, in July, featured works by Mike Killion, Jack Flynn, Jason Lukas and Frank Dudley. Some of those artists and additional ones are expected to be a part of the Northwest Indiana events.

FYI: Screenings of "Southend: The Place Where I Go Surfing" will be Sept. 14 at The Towle Theater, 5205 Hohman Ave., Hammond and Sept. 22 at Fire and Water at Washington Park in Michigan City. A reception starts at 5:30 both days with film at 6 p.m. and a Q & A at 7:10 p.m. For more information on the event and to make a reservation (reservations are free) call the One Region office at 219-933-3300.
CROWN POINT  Democratic Party leaders decide Saturday whether an insider or an outsider can restore the Lake County Sheriff's Department to good repute.

Six active and retired law enforcement officials and two civilians seek command of a law enforcement agency with the responsibility to protect all of the county's 485,000 residents, supervise 475 county police, corrections officers and civilian employees, the county jail and a $32 million-a-year budget.

A U.S. District Court jury convicted and removed former Sheriff John Buncich Aug. 24 on bribery and wire fraud charges that he took illegal kickbacks from towing firms seeking more lucrative work.

The next election for sheriff doesn't take place until 2018.

State law gives Buncich's political party the authority to name his replacement until then. More than 500 precinct committee members are to gather Saturday in Crown Point to choose a new sheriff from among their ranks.

Those who had filed since Friday are:

Schererville Police Chief David Dowling

Retired federal law enforcement agent Richard Ligon

Lake County Police Sgt. Oscar Martinez

Lake County Deputy Police Chief Daniel Murchek

Gary landlord Jim Nowacki

Retired San Diego Harbor police Lt. Todd Rakos of Munster

Former Lake County Commissioner Gerry Scheub

Lake County sheriff's Cpl. Maria Trajkovich

Dowling said, "I'm neither an insider nor an outsider. I'm an independent voice for officers and the community. The next sheriff needs to be a law enforcement official. I consider myself first and foremost to be a cop who serves the public and an administrator who demands performance." He said he would work to have the Sheriff's Department nationally accredited.

Dowling started with the Schererville Police Department in 1984. He rose to serve as Schererville police chief from 2005 to 2008. He returned in 2012 and currently commands 65 employees.

Ligon said, "I am an outsider. My purpose is to bring integrity back." He said he will employ a department veteran as his chief of police.

Ligon has 36 years of military service, and was a federal law enforcement agent for 23 years. He also has served as a Gary police commissioner, an Indiana parole agent and a juvenile probation officer and supervisor.

Martinez, a county policeman since 1993, writes in a Times guest editorial that he sympathizes with his fellow officers over a department, which is "at one of its lowest points because the hardworking men and women of the force have had to do their jobs with one eye on the street, and the other eye over their shoulders."

He made headlines working in the department's drug interdiction program by seizing large amounts of narcotics and illicit profits from drug runners using the county's interstate highways.

Murchek is in his 23rd year as a county police officer and has been third in command of the department since 2011. He said, "As an insider, I will be able to hit the ground running with my operational experience in the department. I will bring in an outside police chief."

Murchek served nine years on the Dyer Police Department and worked as a sheriff's detective, gang crimes unit investigator and a canine officer.

Nowacki said he is running for sheriff because the department has been under the control of Democratic Party insiders for too long.

"Voters are unaware that this small group of insiders, as apologists for Lake County's corrupt reputation, receive benefits and special treatment while leaving voters on a political plantation," he wrote in a Times guest editorial.

Rakos, a 1982 Munster High School graduate, said he would bring 25 years of progressive, contemporary law enforcement and supervisory experience, from California's San Diego Harbor Police Department.

"There is probably no more agency in need of an 'outsider' to come in and take over the leadership position than the Lake County Sheriff's Department. This agency has in essence been run by insiders for the last 20-plus years and during that time they have gone from a federal consent decree overseeing the jail, to an illegal sale of automatic weapon scandal, to the top officers either being found guilty or pleading guilty to bribery and corruption," Rakos said.

Scheub, who served 20 years as St. John Township trustee and 20 years as a county commissioner, said he would only complete Buncich's unexpired term and won't run for sheriff next year so he can concentrate his administrative talents on healing the department.

"I will work on day one to do everything possible to honorably and effectively support the men and women who wear the uniform and risk their lives protecting and serving Lake County," he writes in a Times guest editorial.

Maria D. Trajkovich is a corporal with the Lake County Sheriff's Department. She has been on the force since 1997.

"I feel that being an insider makes me a better candidate, as I know where our strengths and weaknesses are. I have an established working relationship with officers from each division," she said.

Other Democrats can file as sheriff candidates until early Wednesday.
INDIANAPOLIS  Supporters and opponents of eliminating Indiana's license requirement to carry a handgun in public appear to have had little impact on the members of a legislative study committee examining the controversial issue.

For nearly 10 hours over two meetings, a variety of studies, statistics, reports and anecdotes were presented to lawmakers in an effort to persuade them of the benefits of permitless carry or the perils of removing state oversight of who can have a loaded weapon on the streets. The first meeting was held Aug. 22 and the second Thursday.

In the end, seemingly no research result remained uncontested or undisputed as pro- and anti-gun groups continuously directed state representatives and senators to competing data that reinforced their already existing policy preferences.

On one side were constitutional absolutists, including state Rep. Jim Lucas, R-Seymour, who believe that since the Indiana Constitution proscribes, "The people shall have a right to bear arms for the defense of themselves and the state," then any limitation of that right is inherently unconstitutional.

"I don't see why we're forcing innocent Hoosiers to get fingerprinted, pay the state a fee and jump through hoops to get a little pink card," Lucas said, referring to the state police license allowing adult Hoosiers to carry a handgun, openly or concealed, in most public places.

Under state law, Hoosiers are not required to obtain a permit to purchase a gun or ammunition, carry a rifle or shotgun in public or possess a handgun in their home or on property that they own.

Those favoring retention of the existing system, including Democratic Marion County Prosecutor Terry Curry, said Indiana already is plagued by gun crime and putting more handguns on the street with no oversight will endanger police and other public safety officials.

"In terms of the permit requirement it is simply not a burdensome requirement," Curry said. "It is a reasonable requirement that takes virtually no time to complete."

State police data show 134,290 carry permits were issued in 2016, including 7,534 new permits in Lake County, 2,902 in Porter County, 2,150 in LaPorte County, 294 in Newton County and 752 in Jasper County.

Altogether, there are 46,220 carry permit holders living in Lake County, 18,750 in Porter County, 12,054 in LaPorte County, 2,033 in Newton County and 4,337 in Jasper County, according to state police records.

A total of 4,802 carry permit applications were rejected by state police in 2016 for reasons including prior felony convictions, domestic violence convictions, known mental health issues or recent arrests for gun-related felonies.

Across the country, 13 states allow their residents and visitors to carry handguns in public without any kind of license or permit.

Lucas' proposal that Indiana do the same, House Bill 1159, did not receive a committee vote this year in the Republican-controlled House, in part to avoid becoming a distraction during a budget session and Republican Gov. Eric Holcomb's first year in office.

The study committee review that Lucas won instead is due to recommend on Oct. 12 whether the 2018 General Assembly should approve permitless carry for Indiana.

So far, the panel only tangentially has looked at how eliminating carry permits would affect other parts of the state's criminal code, such as how to charge a convicted felon banned from owning a handgun who nevertheless is found carrying one in public.

It also has not determined how the state will replace approximately $5 million in annual revenue generated by carry permit application fees, or whether the 800,000 past purchasers of lifetime carry permits would be entitled to a partial refund.

State Rep. Charlie Brown, D-Gary, doubts such practical questions will deter the Republican-dominated study committee from endorsing permitless carry if the chairman, state Sen. Rod Bray, R-Martinsville, allows a vote on a policy recommendation.

"This is really a waste of time because if there is a vote it's going to pass out of here," Brown said.

He suggested the Republican legislative supermajorities then would be under significant pressure, in an election year, from the National Rifle Association and other pro-gun groups to follow through and enact permitless carry, even if most Hoosiers don't necessarily want it.

"I appreciate some of my colleagues being rabid about the ability to carry a weapon," Brown said, "but there are many that feel just the opposite  they are, I think, the silent majority."
EAST CHICAGO  Hispanic Heritage Month is a time to recognize the contributions made and the important presence of Hispanic and Latino Americans to the United States. In honor of Hispanic Heritage Month, the East Chicago Public Library will be celebrating Hispanic culture and tradition with a variety of programs and events for adults, teens and kids.

The highlights include:

 Loteria (Mexican Bingo) - Come for a game of Loteria Mexicana! Everyone is welcome, event will be done mostly in Spanish. There will be prizes and refreshments. This game will be held at 9:30 a.m. Sept. 11 and Sept. 25 at the Main Library, 2401 E. Columbus Drive and at 10 a.m. Oct. 4 at Pastrick branch, 1008 W. Chicago Ave.

 Golden Era Mexican Matinee - Movies from the Golden Era of Mexicos cinema will be shown at two library locations. Coffee, hot chocolate and pastries will be offered after the film. The event will be held at 9:30 a.m. Sept. 15, 19 and 22 at the Main Library and 10 a.m. Oct. 3 and 10 at the Pastrick branch.

 Folkloric Dancing - Ballet Folkorico Yolotzin. Enjoy traditional dances from Mexico presented in all their passionate glory to celebrate Mexican independence for all ages. This event will be held at 6 p.m. Sept. 27 at Main Library.

 Latin Style Exercise  Zumba/salsa for everyone. Have fun while doing exercise Latin style at 5 p.m Sept.28 at the Main Library and at 6 p.m. Oct. 5 at Pastrick branch.

 Bien Sabrosas! Learn to make tortillas de harina (flour tortillas) from scratch from 3 to 4:30 p.m. Sept. 29 at Main Library.

The finale will begin at 5 p.m. Oct. 11 at 2401 E. Columbus Drive.

Friday, September 29, 3-4:30 p.m.  Main Library. This event will include a performance by Africaribe of Chicago. The performance will highlight the African influence in Puerto Rico and other Caribbean lands through various styles of song, dance, drumming and more. The closing celebration will also feature Ada Lopez, author of "Asi Somos/Who We Are", a collection of vibrant color photos that highlight the richness and diversity of Puerto Rican people throughout the United States and Puerto Rico. Refreshments will be served before the performances begin.

All events are free and open to the public.
Helping after Hurricane Harvey

CEDAR LAKE  Hanover Community School Corp. is helping with Hurricane Harvey aid through Principals Helping Principals, a grassroots social media effort started by a Houston educator. Both Jane Ball and Lincoln Elementary schools have been assigned a school in the area. And Hanover Central Middle School will also be adopting a school through the Principals Helping Principals project. The Middle School Student Council and National Junior Honor Society at HCMS will be taking the lead on fundraising efforts. Hanover Central High School will be collecting money for the American Red Cross to aid in relief efforts. Contributions to the ARC can be dropped off in the main office or sent with students. The Hanover Central Middle School Builders Club and Hanover Central High School Key Club are collecting supplies, gift cards and asking for monetary donations to offset the cost of shipping supplies. Collection boxes will be at both schools.

Foundation ensures possibilities

CHESTERTON  The Duneland Education Foundation (DEF) presented a $5,000 check to Westchester Intermediate School for a MakerSpace room (potentially two) where students will be able to engage in hands-on STEM/STEAM/STREAM learning. The space will be used to create/engineer products; use the scientific method for experiments; share creations and learning through class presentations and learn from their peers. MakerSpaces will provide teachers with a suitable space for extended projects, storage for science materials and student work, as well as provide a place to display student work.

Classroom celebrates corn

VALPARAISO  In conjunction with the Valparaiso Popcorn Festival, first-graders at Immanuel Lutheran School celebrated all things corn. Students learned about Orville Redenbacher and taste tested and voted on their favorite corn products including cornbread, sweet corn, canned corn and popcorn. Students also learned about chemical reactions while watching their teacher Mrs. Bouman mix baking soda, vinegar, water and popcorn kernels. Gas bubbles formed and stuck to the kernels causing them to rise to the top. Once the bubbles burst, the kernels sank to the bottom.
MERRILLVILLE  The Northwest Indiana Breast Care Center at Methodist Hospitals will be holding a Pink Party on Oct. 7 celebrating their five-year anniversary in honor of breast cancer awareness month in October. This event will be kicked off with a Strive for Five free fun 5K Walk/Run at 9:30 a.m. Registration for the walk/run and Pink Party is recommended.

The following will be offered at this event beginning at 8 a.m. for free: gifts for attendees, chair massages and express manicures, blood pressure and bone density screenings, lipology consultations, bra fittings and continental breakfast.

Free Go Pink bracelet will be given to attendees who schedule their mammograms before event and receive it at the Pink Party. Limited spots are available and must be registered by calling 1-888-909-3627. The event will be held at Methodist Hospitals Southlake, Pavilion A, 101 E. 87th. Ave.
By PTI: New Delhi, Sep 10 (PTI) Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address a students convention tomorrow to mark the 125th anniversary of Swami Vivekanandas Chicago address and BJP ideologue Deendayal Upadhyayas centenary celebrations.

The theme of the convention is Young India, New India.

"Tomorrow I look forward to addressing a gathering of students on the theme of ?Young India, New India," Modi tweeted.

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The convention of students is being held on a day Vivekananda delivered his historic address at Chicago in 1893, he noted.

"This year, we are marking 125th anniversary of Swami Vivekananda?s Chicago address and Pt. Deendayal Upadhyaya centenary celebrations," the prime minister said in another tweet.

He said Vivekananda strongly believed in the power of "Yuva Shakti (youth power) and saw a vital place for youngsters in the realm of nation-building.

"Inspired by the ideals of Swami Vivekananda, we are working tirelessly towards realising the dreams and aspirations of our youth," the prime minister said. PTI AKK AKK

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The Indiana University Northwest Alumni board and Student Alumni Association members (SAA) invite the community to give blood and/or join the national bone marrow registry from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Thursday in the Moraine Student Center, on the IU Northwest campus in Gary.

The blood drive and bone marrow registry celebrates the 400-plus emergency workers who, on Sept. 11, 2001, lost their lives while saving others. Donating blood on this day will help the American Red Cross meet its national goal of collecting 10,000 units of blood.

At the event, individuals can also join the Be the Match National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP) with a simple mouth swab to collect cheek cells and an application process to determine eligibility. Those accepted for the registry can potentially save the life of someone with blood cancers or other life-threatening diseases if found to be a genetic match.

About one in 540 members of the bone marrow registry will go on to donate, the NMDP reports, either by donating bone marrow or peripheral blood stem cells (PBSC).

Walk-ins will be accepted, but those interested in scheduling an appointment to donate blood can visit http://www.redcrossblood.org/make-donation-sponsor, and enter iun as the sponsor code. First-time donors will need to create a profile. Returning donors can log-in by entering their e-mail address and date of birth as the default password.

For more information, contact the Office of Alumni Relations at 219-980-6769.
GARY  Indiana University Northwest welcomed its newest group of scholars just embarking on their educational journeys in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields.

Thanks to a National Science Foundation grant, 13 students are named NSF-AIMS Scholars for the 2017-18 academic year from the Advancing Indiana Math and Science (AIMS) initiative. The scholarships provide up to $10,000 per year to academically talented undergraduate students with financial need pursuing degrees in actuarial science, biology, chemistry, computer information systems, geology, informatics and mathematics at IU Northwest.

NSF-AIMS Scholars for 2017-18 include: John Banaag, Jeff Dykstra, Abdul Enayeh, Neal Govani, Haroon Mohiuddin, Nick Olchawa, Samantha Ostrom, Gabriella Richey, Sabrina Rizo, Kyla Roney, Steffan Santiago, Rasha Siddiqui and Karl Wehner.

IU Northwest combined its STEM Summer Bridge Program for incoming freshmen with the activities of the NSF-AIMS Scholars, including student presentations, and a field trip to the Indiana Dunes. Student projects in both programs focused on water quality in our Region.

In addition to the NSF-AIMS Scholars, presenters from the incoming freshmen STEM Summer Bridge Program included: Tristen Allen, Joshua Drosos, Shelley Gurevitz, Sean Lopez and Josh Marciniak.

Each group collected water samples from some sites at the Little Calumet River and Lake Michigan. Their presentations explored a myriad of topics regarding water quality, such as measuring the levels of E. coli, alkalinity, plankton and nitrates in the water. The students discussed their process for determining water quality, reported results to a panel of faculty and fielded their tough questions.

This program is one of many planned throughout the year for NSF-AIMS Scholars. More than just a scholarship, the program promotes student success in science, technology and math disciplines by providing academic and peer support.

NSF-AIMS Scholars are linked academically and socially through shared experiences. Academic and peer support is intertwined through placement seminars, peer-led instruction, field trips, a first-year STEM seminar, and cohort classes. NSF-AIMS scholars have opportunities to become instructional leaders, participate in faculty-mentored research, internships and to take advantage of job placement services.

The scholarships are awarded to incoming freshmen and community college graduates, enabling them to attend college full-time without supplemental employment. They are renewable each year, up to three years for entering freshmen and one year for community college graduates.
My name is Todd Rakos, and I am a candidate for Lake County Sheriff.

Since I am new to the Lake County political scene, I should start with my background. I was born in Hammond, one of six children to working-class parents.

My father was a Hammond police officer for almost 40 years. My mother worked as an administrative assistant. Later, my family moved to Munster where I graduated from Munster High School in 1982.

After graduation, with the darkening Region economy, I moved west seeking employment, ultimately ending up in the San Diego area. After several years of construction jobs, I ended up following the family calling and was hired by the Port of San Diego as a harbor police officer in 1991.

By any measure, I had a very successful and rewarding law enforcement career. Like most officers, I started working as a patrol officer but eventually moved into other areas of law enforcement. I spent time as a detective, and shortly after 9/11, I was assigned to a joint federal counterterrorism task force. In that role, I was responsible for several terrorism-related arrests.

The most prominent arrest was a group of terrorists who had been responsible for a series of bombings in San Diego, which included setting a bomb off at the federal courthouse.

After this assignment, I was promoted to sergeant and was in charge of putting together the department's Community Policing Division, developed to increase community outreach. I ended my 25-year career after being promoted to lieutenant and being part of a police management team, which was accountable for a large police agency with almost 200 employees and a $37 million budget.

Even while living in San Diego, I still kept up with Lake County news through family members residing here and through the online newspaper. After I retired, I moved back to the Region with my family and closely followed the criminal case involving former Sheriff John Buncich.

Having a passion for progressive, contemporary law enforcement, I realized the Lake County Sheriffs Department needs a true outsider with proven experience and training to revitalize the agency. I have experience working for a multi-jurisdictional agency similar to the Lake County Sheriffs Department. My prior agency had a jurisdiction overlapping five cities in addition to the San Diego International Airport.

I have a deep empathy for the professional men and women who currently work for the Lake County Sheriffs Department. Having been a police officer for 25 years and supervising for almost 20 years, I know law enforcement officers can be a resilient bunch.

The poor decisions and actions of some members of the law enforcement profession have resulted in all officers being painted with the same broad brush. This, along with the double hit of having the sheriff generating negative publicity for the agency, cannot be good for these employees' morale.

I truly believe as a law enforcement officer if you do your job properly, there is nothing nobler you can do with your life. As the sheriff, I will commit to having the proper people and processes in place that will allow us to move forward as a focused team, and I will never make a decision in a way that seeks to benefit me directly.

I also believe transparency is the key to building trust, and trust is a fundamental leadership principle.
There was a time when Labor Day was about as good as it could get for organized labor and the Democratic Party in Northwest Indiana.

Thousands of organized labor members filled much of the Lake County Fairgrounds to celebrate Labor Day. It was a heck of a party.

And Democratic political candidates made their way through the crowds of union workers hoping to secure votes in the upcoming elections. If you were a candidate and didnt have union support, you didnt have much of a chance.

Unions were a brotherhood back then. Elected officials took notice and acted accordingly.

For a variety of reasons, things began to change following the recession of 1980 and a downturn in the steel industry.

The meaning of union strong no longer had the clout it once did. The building trades in Northwest Indiana  once more than 25,000 strong  lost membership and was no longer its former self.

And the Steelworkers, who once had a regional membership of 75,000, lost two-thirds of its members as the steel industry found it could make steel more economically.

All the while, some unions lost the solidarity that made them strong and produced results.

Some union members fell away from the Democratic Party and started voting for the God, guns and gay issues promoted or opposed by Republicans.

Organized labor then started to pay the ultimate price in the loss of clout.

The Republican-controlled Legislature decimated teacher unions by stripping them of power.

And they did much the same to building trades when it eliminated the prevailing wage law.

The next attack upon unions was the adoption of the right-to-work law that essentially is the right-to-work-for-less law.

And all the while, some union members continued to help elect more Republicans.

Its difficult to determine if organized labor in Northwest Indiana can make a comeback.

But it is clear they have a pretty good leader in U.S. Rep. Pete Visclosky, D-Ind., who has been fighting for unions on the federal stage for almost 34 years.

But he cant do it alone.
A teenager was arrested Saturday night in connection with a home invasion that police say led to a Brooklyn woman's death in December.

Nia Williams, 18, faces second-degree murder and burglary charges.



Police said she and two men broke into the apartment of Brenda Ramos, 68, on Kings Highway near 95th St. in East Flatbush.

Police said the suspects attacked Ramos's roommate with a hammer and stole some valuables.

When authorities arrived, according to officials, they found Ramos unconscious, with no sign of trauma, and rushed her to a local hospital, where she died.



The city's medical examiner said Ramos died from a heart attack combined with the presence of cocaine in her system. Officials ruled her death a homicide in April because it occurred during a home invasion.

It is unclear if Williams knew Ramos or her roommate.

Police are still looking for the two men they say helped Williams.
By PTI: Bengaluru/Amaravati, Sep 9 (PTI) Violent protests broke out atHubballi in north Karnataka against candidates from other states appearing for a bank examination today.

Hundreds of students from Karnataka boycotted the Institute of Banking Personnel Selection-Regional Rural Bank (IBPS RRB) exam and prevented candidates from other states from taking it.

A banking aspirant from Hubballi allegedly attempted suicide by slitting his wrist with a blade, police said.

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As the situation spun out of control, police said they resorted to a mild lathicharge to disperse the agitating mob.

A protester said the "outsiders" were taking away opportunities from the Kannadigas, while state-level leaders were tight-lipped over the issue.

She alleged "outsiders" in Grameen Banks not only ignore Kannada, but also impose their language on the Kannada speaking people.

A local activist of Karnataka Rakshana Vedike, a pro-Kannada outfit, alleged the exam had become a platform to demean the local talent and encourage outsiders.

Similar agitations were reported in some other parts of the state too.

Meanwhile, Andhra Pradesh chief secretary Dinesh Kumar discussed the issue with his Karnataka counterpart and requested that necessary arrangements be made to ensure safety of Telugu candidates.

Speaking to TV channels in Hubballi, the aggrieved Telugu candidates alleged the locals did not let them write the exam and attacked them.

AP CM N Chandrababu Naidu and his deputy N China Rajappa reviewed the situation in the afternoon.

Rajappa in a statement said "the attack on Telugu candidates was unfortunate".

"We are taking up the issue with the Karnataka and central governments to ensure such attacks do not recur. We will also request the Centre to open examination centres in Visakhapatnam and Vijayawada," he said.

Pradesh Congress Committee president N Raghuveera Reddy also condemned the alleged attack and said he spoke with Karnataka minister Ramalinga Reddy on the issue.

"I asked the Karnataka minister to provide security for Telugu candidates and he assured me that required steps are being taken to prevent such incidents," Raghuveera said in a statement. PTI GMS RA DBV NRB APR GVS

--- ENDS ---
UPDATED 3 P.M. TUESDAY:

The Opelika City Schools and Auburn City Schools announced today that each will resume regular classes on Wednesday. All schools will be open during normal operating hours, and buses are expected to run on a normal schedule.

*****

UPDATED 10:45 A.M. TUESDAY:

Many local city programs and offices are resuming normal activities today.

Among the Tuesday morning notes:

Auburn University resumes classes at noon.

Auburn city parks and recreation facilities, programs, classes and events will resume normal schedules today.

The Opelika City Schools budget hearing originally scheduled for today has been rescheduled to Thursday

The Auburn Public Library announced that it is waiving non-resident library card fees for evacuees.

The high temperature for today is forecast at 67. By Friday, it will climb to 85. We have a 30 percent chance of rain today before 1 p.m., with skies expected to begin clearing late today and giving away to sunshine on Wednesday.

*****

UPDATED 8:45 A.M. TUESDAY:

Alabama Power Company and Opelika Power Services continue to work on outages this morning caused by Tropical Storm Irma.

OPS crews resumed work early this morning. Almost 500 OPS customers remained without power late Monday.

Alabama Power early today reported there are still 20,000 outages statewide with its customers.

Most are in southeast Alabama, with 12,000 in the Phenix City/Eufaula area, 3,300 in the Anniston area, and 2,900 around Auburn.

There are no weather advisories in effect today for east-central Alabama.

The National Weather Service lifted its tropical storm warning on Monday night, but later issued a wind advisory from about midnight until 4 a.m. That, too, has since been lifted.

Today's forecast calls for a 30 percent chance of rain, and cooler temperatures, with a high of 67 and a low tonight of 57.

Then on Wednesday, temperatures start to climb again, reaching into the upper 80s by Thursday.

Homeowners, road and city crews throughout the area are working on clean-up. Motorists are reminded to drive with caution and continue to be alert to fallen debris.

*****

UPDATED 11:15 P.M. MONDAY:

More than 23,000 Alabama Power Company customers remained without power at 11 p.m. Monday, with many of them concentrated in three areas.

Alabama Power: "Irma update: 23,000 power outages as of 11pm. Main areas: Phenix City/Eufaula (11,000); Anniston/Pell City (4100) & Auburn/Dadeville (3300).

"Our crews will work through the night to continue restoration work where it is safe to do so."

*****

UPDATED 10:45 P.M. MONDAY:

Although the tropical storm warning is cancelled, our area remains under a wind advisory until 4 a.m., with strong winds expected throughout the night.

*****

UPDATED 10 P.M. MONDAY:

The National Weather Service has cancelled its tropical storm warnings associated with Irma for east-central Alabama.

Meanwhile, Alabama Power Company reported that approximately 13,000 outages exist in Eufaula/Phenix City; 4,200 in Auburn/Dadeville and 4,100 in the Anniston/Pell City area.

Alabama Power crews planned to work throughout the night to restore service.

The following bulletin was posted by the National Weather Service shortly before 10 p.m. Monday, including tips/warnings regarding recovery and clean-up efforts:

**Irma Weakens to a Tropical Depression** NEW INFORMATION --------------- * CHANGES TO WATCHES AND WARNINGS: - All watches and warnings have been canceled * CURRENT WATCHES AND WARNINGS: - None * STORM INFORMATION: - About 130 miles southeast of Birmingham AL or about 80 miles east of Montgomery AL - 32.4N 84.9W - Storm Intensity 35 mph - Movement Northwest or 320 degrees at 15 mph SITUATION OVERVIEW ------------------ Irma has weakened to a tropical depression. All tropical storm warnings have been cancelled that were previously included for Central Alabama. POTENTIAL IMPACTS ----------------- * WIND: Little to no additional impacts are anticipated at this time across CENTRAL ALABAMA. PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS ---------------------------------- * OTHER PREPAREDNESS INFORMATION: When inspecting damage, use flashlights rather than candles or flamed lighting. Be aware of sparks that can ignite leaking gas or other flammables. When clearing out fallen trees, be careful with chain saws and axes. Always wear protective gear and keep others at a safe distance. Use these tools according to operating manuals and safety instruction. Leaning trees and those which have fallen on roof tops can be especially challenging. If you are not in good health or unsure about what you are doing, have someone else with tree cutting experience do the job. Never cut trees without a partner. If using a generator, avoid carbon monoxide poisoning by following instructions by the manufacturer. Make sure that the generator is run in a well ventilated space. * ADDITIONAL SOURCES OF INFORMATION: - For information on appropriate preparations see ready.gov - For information on creating an emergency plan see getagameplan.org - For additional disaster preparedness information see redcross.org

*****

UPDATED 7:15 P.M. MONDAY:

More than 500 Opelika Power Services customers remain without power, and OPS plans to discontinue repair service soon until in the morning because of safety concerns.

The following press statement was released shortly after 6 p.m. by the city of Opelika:

"Opelika Power Services Update:

"We have 507 customers without power at this time. We are working on restoring about half of those before we stop working for the night. Winds are forecasted to get higher again after dark making it unsafe to continue to work. We will resume at 6:00 a.m. tomorrow restoring power. If you do not have power in the near future, please make plans accordingly. You will most likely be out until sometime tomorrow. Thank you for your patience and understanding."

Meanwhile, Alabama Power Company reports 42,000 outages, with most being in east Alabama.

Alabama Power: 8,260 customers in central Alabama are without power -- the majority of whom are in Auburn and Opelika (3,800).

The area remains under a tropical storm warning, with continued gusts of wind and sporadic heavy showers.

*****

UPDATED 5:30 P.M. MONDAY:

The National Weather Service is warning residents in east-central Alabama that the possibility for severe weather remains.

Meanwhile, power outages continue, and debris cleanup has begun over a widespread area.

There are numerous reports of large trees down in yards and on homes.

The latest NWS bulletin:

**Tropical Storm Warning continues for the eastern half of Central Alabama** NEW INFORMATION --------------- * CHANGES TO WATCHES AND WARNINGS: - None * CURRENT WATCHES AND WARNINGS: - A Tropical Storm Warning is in effect for Barbour, Blount, Bullock, Calhoun, Chambers, Cherokee, Clay, Cleburne, Coosa, Elmore, Etowah, Lee, Macon, Montgomery, Pike, Randolph, Russell, St. Clair, Talladega, and Tallapoosa * STORM INFORMATION: - About 210 miles southeast of Birmingham AL or about 150 miles east-southeast of Montgomery AL - 31.5N 84.0W - Storm Intensity 50 mph - Movement North-northwest or 340 degrees at 17 mph SITUATION OVERVIEW ------------------ Irma will continue to have impacts across the eastern half of Central Alabama through this evening. Wind gusts of 30 to 45 mph are possible across far southeast Central Alabama at this time. Conditions could still worsen through the evening as strong winds spread northward with gusts possibly reaching 55 mph. Scattered tree and power line damage is possible along with power outages. Some minor structural damage is also possible. The greatest wind gusts and impacts are expected to be generally along and east of a line from Oneonta to Sylacauga to Montgomery to Troy. Conditions will gradually improve in the late night and early morning hours on Tuesday as Irma continues to move northwestward into Western Tennessee. POTENTIAL IMPACTS ----------------- * WIND: Protect against hazardous wind having possible limited impacts across the eastern half of Central Alabama. Potential impacts include: - Damage to porches, awnings, carports, sheds, and unanchored mobile homes. Unsecured lightweight objects blown about. - Many large tree limbs broken off. A few trees snapped or uprooted, but with greater numbers in places where trees are shallow rooted. Some fences and roadway signs blown over. - A few roads impassable from debris, particularly within urban or heavily wooded places. Hazardous driving conditions on bridges and other elevated roadways. - Scattered power and communications outages. * FLOODING RAIN: Protect against life-threatening rainfall flooding having possible extensive impacts across east central counties in Central Alabama. Potential impacts include: - Major rainfall flooding may prompt many evacuations and rescues. - Rivers and tributaries may rapidly overflow their banks in multiple places. Small streams, creeks, canals, arroyos, and ditches may become dangerous rivers. In mountain areas, destructive runoff may run quickly down valleys while increasing susceptibility to rock slides and mudslides. Flood control systems and barriers may become stressed. - Flood waters can enter many structures within multiple communities, some structures becoming uninhabitable or washed away. Many places where flood waters may cover escape routes. Streets and parking lots become rivers of moving water with underpasses submerged. Driving conditions become dangerous. Many road and bridge closures with some weakened or washed out. Protect against dangerous rainfall flooding having possible limited to significant impacts across most of the eastern half of Central Alabama. * TORNADOES: Little to no impacts are anticipated at this time across CENTRAL ALABAMA.

*****

UPDATED 4 P.M. MONDAY:

Alabama Power: 45,000 outages statewide, mostly concentrated in the eastern part of our state. This includes 23,000 in Eufaula area, 13,900 in Auburn area.

High winds and steady rain have slowed but not stopped over much of the Auburn-Opelika area. The tropical storm warning remains in effect, and road debris continues to be a hazard.

Utility crews are working in numerous locations to restore power as soon as possible. Law enforcement officers continue to help guide traffic at some intersections where power to signal lights remain out.

For live-feed photos, bulletins, updates, see LIVE UPDATES on oanow.com.

*****

UPDATED 3:30 P.M. MONDAY:

Alabama Power: About 13,900 customers in central Alabama are without power, mostly from Auburn, Opelika and Notasulga (about 9,600).

Weather conditions are expected to improve Monday evening, but road debris and other hazardous conditions remain.

*****

UPDATED 2:30 P.M. MONDAY:

The Lee County Sheriff's Office has suspended all non-emergency response/operations until conditions improve.

Lee County EMA PIO Rita Smith said there are 3,200 Opelika residents and 1,500 Auburn residents without power.

Alabama Power: About 10,000 Alabama Power customers are without power in central Alabama - most from Auburn, Opelika and Notasulga (7,970).

Road debris, tress and tree limbs are reported down on numerous roads. Standing water from heavy rain also is creating hazards.

Power outages have caused signal lights to go out at several local intersections, including earlier on Gateway Drive near Tiger Town in Opelika.

A tropical storm warning remains in effect for most of east-central Alabama until early Tuesday. However, local conditions should begin to improve Monday evening as Irma moves northward.

For live, real-time updates, see the live feed on oanow.com.

*****

UPDATED 11:30 A.M. MONDAY

Heavy rains and wind gusts arrived in the Auburn-Opelika area as expected this morning, with early power outages reported in both cities. Road debris and water collection on highways also is occurring on many roads.

Avoid travel if possible, but those who do should watch for falling limbs, water collection and other hazards, including sudden wind gusts.

The area remains under a tropical storm warning, and winds at 35-55 mph are occurring in southeast Alabama, with the worst impact on the Lee County area expected to arrive early afternoon and continue into the night.

Here is the latest update from the National Weather Service:

...TROPICAL STORM WARNING REMAINS IN EFFECT... * LOCATIONS AFFECTED - Auburn - Opelika * WIND - LATEST LOCAL FORECAST: Equivalent Tropical Storm force wind - Peak Wind Forecast: 30-40 mph with gusts to 55 mph - Window for Tropical Storm force winds: until early Tuesday morning - CURRENT THREAT TO LIFE AND PROPERTY: Moderate - The wind threat has remained nearly steady from the previous assessment. - Remain braced against the reasonable threat for strong tropical storm force wind of 58 to 73 mph. - To be safe, efforts should fully focus on protecting life. Properties remain subject to significant wind impacts. - Now is the time to hide from the wind. Failure to adequately shelter may result in injury. Remain sheltered until the hazardous wind subsides. - POTENTIAL IMPACTS: Unfolding - Potential impacts from the main wind event are unfolding. * FLOODING RAIN - LATEST LOCAL FORECAST: - Peak Rainfall Amounts: Additional 3-5 inches, with locally higher amounts - CURRENT THREAT TO LIFE AND PROPERTY: Elevated - The flooding rain threat has remained nearly steady from the previous assessment. - Emergency considerations should include a threat of flooding. - Be safe and remain ready to protect against flooding rain impacts. - If flood related watches and warnings are in effect, heed recommended actions. - POTENTIAL IMPACTS: Limited - Localized rainfall flooding may prompt a few evacuations. - Rivers and tributaries may quickly rise with swifter currents. Small streams, creeks, canals, arroyos, and ditches may become swollen and overflow in spots. - Flood waters can enter a few structures, especially in usually vulnerable spots. A few places where rapid ponding of water occurs at underpasses, low-lying spots, and poor drainage areas. Several storm drains and retention ponds become near-full and begin to overflow. Some brief road and bridge closures. * TORNADO - LATEST LOCAL FORECAST: - Situation is unfavorable for tornadoes

*****

UPDATED 7:30 A.M. MONDAY

The Auburn-Opelika area remains under a tropical storm warning, with winds expected at 30-40 mph and gusts above 50 mph; some estimates report peak gusts could be 60 mph.

Also, at least 3-5 inches of rain is expected.

The worst conditions likely will arrive here early this afternoon and continue overnight into early Tuesday morning.

The tropical storm warning has extended in range for east-central Alabama to include most counties east of Interstate 65.

Local schools are closed today and most of them on Tuesday, although Auburn University already has announced that it will reopen to employees at 7:45 a.m. Tuesday and resume classes at noon Tuesday.

Opelika city offices are open this morning and normal trash pick-up is planned unless further noted, the city reported Sunday night.

The following is the latest emergency bulletin for the Auburn-Opelika area, released around 5 a.m.:

...TROPICAL STORM WARNING REMAINS IN EFFECT... * LOCATIONS AFFECTED - Auburn - Opelika * WIND - LATEST LOCAL FORECAST: Equivalent Tropical Storm force wind - Peak Wind Forecast: 30-40 mph with gusts to 50 mph - Window for Tropical Storm force winds: early this afternoon until early Tuesday morning - CURRENT THREAT TO LIFE AND PROPERTY: Elevated - The wind threat has decreased from the previous assessment. - Emergency plans should include a reasonable threat for tropical storm force wind of 39 to 57 mph. - To be safe, prepare for the potential of limited wind impacts. Remaining efforts to secure properties should now be brought to completion. - Hazardous wind is possible. Failure to adequately shelter may result in serious injury. Move to safe shelter before the wind becomes hazardous. - POTENTIAL IMPACTS: Limited - Damage to porches, awnings, carports, sheds, and unanchored mobile homes. Unsecured lightweight objects blown about. - Many large tree limbs broken off. A few trees snapped or uprooted, but with greater numbers in places where trees are shallow rooted. Some fences and roadway signs blown over. - A few roads impassable from debris, particularly within urban or heavily wooded places. Hazardous driving conditions on bridges and other elevated roadways. - Scattered power and communications outages. * FLOODING RAIN - LATEST LOCAL FORECAST: - Peak Rainfall Amounts: Additional 3-5 inches, with locally higher amounts - CURRENT THREAT TO LIFE AND PROPERTY: Elevated - The flooding rain threat has remained nearly steady from the previous assessment. - Emergency plans should include a reasonable threat for minor flooding where peak rainfall totals are near amounts conducive for localized flash flooding and rapid inundation. - To be safe, prepare for the potential of limited flooding rain impacts. - Localized flooding is possible. If flood related watches and warnings are issued, heed recommended actions. - POTENTIAL IMPACTS: Limited - Localized rainfall flooding may prompt a few evacuations. - Rivers and tributaries may quickly rise with swifter currents. Small streams, creeks, canals, arroyos, and ditches may become swollen and overflow in spots. - Flood waters can enter a few structures, especially in usually vulnerable spots. A few places where rapid ponding of water occurs at underpasses, low-lying spots, and poor drainage areas. Several storm drains and retention ponds become near-full and begin to overflow. Some brief road and bridge closures.

*****

UPDATED 11 P.M. SUNDAY

No changes to the forecast, as the local area remains under a tropical storm warning.

The city of Opelika announced on Sunday night that its offices will be open on Monday as normal, but officials will re-evaluate during the day if necessary.

Opelika planned normal trash pick-up on Monday morning until otherwise noted.

*****

UPDATED 5 P.M. SUNDAY

The latest forecast continues to have east-central Alabama under a tropical storm warning, with peak winds expected to come in gusts up to 55 mph.

Monday afternoon into early Tuesday morning is expected to be the time-frame for the worst conditions in our area.

Also of note, almost all local school systems are closed Monday, and most on Tuesday.

Many government offices in Lee County also will be closed Monday.

The following is a weather update released Sunday evening by the National Weather Service:.

- LATEST LOCAL FORECAST: Equivalent Tropical Storm force wind - Peak Wind Forecast: 30-40 mph with gusts to 55 mph - Window for Tropical Storm force winds: Monday afternoon until early Tuesday morning - CURRENT THREAT TO LIFE AND PROPERTY: Moderate - The wind threat has remained nearly steady from the previous assessment. - Emergency plans should include a reasonable threat for strong tropical storm force wind of 58 to 73 mph. - To be safe, earnestly prepare for the potential of significant wind impacts. Remaining efforts to secure properties should now be brought to completion. - Dangerous wind is possible. Failure to adequately shelter may result in injury. Move to safe shelter before the wind becomes hazardous. - POTENTIAL IMPACTS: Significant - Some damage to roofing and siding materials, along with damage to porches, awnings, carports, and sheds. A few buildings experiencing window, door, and garage door failures. Mobile homes damaged, especially if unanchored. Unsecured lightweight objects become dangerous projectiles. - Several large trees snapped or uprooted, but with greater numbers in places where trees are shallow rooted. Several fences and roadway signs blown over. - Some roads impassable from large debris, and more within urban or heavily wooded places. A few bridges, causeways, and access routes impassable. - Scattered power and communications outages, but more prevalent in areas with above ground lines.

****

The National Weather Service has upgraded the local area from a tropical storm watch to warning. Here is the latest bulletin from the NWS regarding our area:

Irma is expected to have noticable impacts across the eastern half of Central Alabama on Monday into Monday night. Winds of at least 35 mph may begin as early as the pre dawn hours Monday in the southeast counties. Conditions will worsen during the afternoon and evening on Monday as strong winds spread northward with gusts possibly reaching 50 to 70 mph. Scattered tree and power line damage is possible along with power outages. Some structural damage is also possible. The greatest wind gusts and impacts are expected to be generally along and east of a line from Blountsville to Sylacauga to Montgomery to Troy. Conditions will gradually improve on Tuesday as Irma continues to weaken and move to the north. POTENTIAL IMPACTS ----------------- * WIND: Prepare for dangerous wind having possible significant impacts mainly east of a line from Blountsville to Sylacauga to Montgomery to Troy. Potential impacts in this area include: - Some damage to roofing and siding materials, along with damage to porches, awnings, carports, and sheds. A few buildings experiencing window, door, and garage door failures. Mobile homes damaged, especially if unanchored. Unsecured lightweight objects become dangerous projectiles. - Several large trees snapped or uprooted, but with greater numbers in places where trees are shallow rooted. Several fences and roadway signs blown over. - Some roads impassable from large debris, and more within urban or heavily wooded places. A few bridges, causeways, and access routes impassable. - Scattered power and communications outages, but more prevalent in areas with above ground lines. * FLOODING RAIN: Prepare for locally hazardous rainfall flooding having possible limited impacts across CENTRAL ALABAMA. Potential impacts include: - Localized rainfall flooding may prompt a few evacuations. - Rivers and tributaries may quickly rise with swifter currents. Small streams, creeks, canals, arroyos, and ditches may become swollen and overflow in spots. - Flood waters can enter a few structures, especially in usually vulnerable spots. A few places where rapid ponding of water occurs at underpasses, low-lying spots, and poor drainage areas. Several storm drains and retention ponds become near-full and begin to overflow. Some brief road and bridge closures.

*****

Auburn and Opelika city school systems, Lee and Tallapoosa County schools, announced that all classes and activities are cancelled for Monday and Tuesday.

School officials will evaluate conditions on Tuesday afternoon to decide if any further action is required beyond Tuesday.

Other local school systems are beginning to announce Monday closures, including Lee-Scott Academy.

*****

ORIGINAL STORY filed Saturday night:

Monday looks to be the day Hurricane Irma most makes her presence known in east-central Alabama, prompting Auburn University to cancel all classes and other school systems to consider making the same decision.

Local school systems are expected to make their announcements sometime Sunday regarding their Monday schedules.

The National Weather Service issued a tropical storm watch Saturday night for Lee, Macon and Russell counties:

Irma is expected to have noticeable impacts across the southeast counties of Central Alabama along a line generally east of Milstead-to-Troy and south along a Milstead-to-Auburn line.

Scattered tree and power line damage, some structure and road damage with power outages are possible.

Winds of at least 35 mph may begin as early as the pre-dawn hours Monday, but the worst conditions will be during the day and evening on Monday with wind gusts well above tropical storm force possible.

Such winds could bring down large tree limbs, trees and power lines, leading to power outages and possibly impassable roads. The strongest winds are likely to be east of an Auburn-to-Clayton line. Conditions will gradually improve on Tuesday as Irma continues to weaken and move to the north.

Tuesday looks to be cooler, with a high near 67 and a 30 percent chance of rain, according to the National Weather Service.

Hotels stay full

Local hotels continued to see a brisk business, with most showing a no vacancy post Saturday on internet travel sites. Some had cancellations, but most empty rooms quickly were rebooked, and at what appeared to be normal prices.

Early Saturday, a search online revealed only one local hotel with vacancies, and the asking price was $999 for a room for two.

A call to that hotel, however, resulted in the manager saying it was an online mistake, and the only room available could be booked for $79. It soon was taken.

Alabama State Parks throughout the state remained open for evacuees to use campsites and cabins at normal rates. The parks service sent media an email late Friday to help spread the word.

OPS ready to go

The city of Opelika dispatched a press release Saturday morning pronouncing its crews ready and on standby.

Late Friday night, various weather services were reporting that the Auburn-Opelika area was in a zone that could see possible power outages, with about a 20 percent chance for an outage.

Opelikas utility responded by saying it was prepared to act quickly should local service be interrupted, and if no disruptions here, its crews would go to help neighboring communities that needed assistance.

Opelika Power Services is actively following Hurricane Irma and planning for any required event response. OPS line crews spent part of Friday afternoon preparing trucks, resources and outage-response equipment in preparation for any loss of service that may occur because of Hurricane Irma, the city reported.

Our staff is in contact with local, state and regional mutual aid partners and will continue to communicate and coordinate our efforts and response throughout the event. If Opelika doesnt require a sustained power outage response and recovery effort following the weather event, OPS will work in partnership with other utilities to provide assistance to other damaged systems.

Customers should contact OPS at 334-705-5170 Option 1 to report a loss of service.

During a major outage, OPS crews may work around the clock until all power is restored. If you lose power following a major storm, please be patient, it said.

Auburn postpones lecture

Travel complications connected to the arrival of Hurricane Irma have forced the postponement of an open campus lecture at Auburn University by retired four-star Army Gen. Barry McCaffrey scheduled for Monday, Auburn University reported in a Saturday statement.

McCaffrey, a former White House cabinet member, had been scheduled to discuss leadership of complex organizations at a 3:15 p.m. event hosted by the Raymond J. Harbert College of Business. The college is working to secure an alternate date for the event.
Lee County residents are reaching out to help four-legged storm victims as Hurricane Irma approaches the coasts of Florida and Georgia, and Texas reels from the devastation caused by Hurricane Harvey,

Haden Cannon and her husband Matt are just one couple who are volunteering their land in Opelika as a place where evacuees can house their large animals while they await Irmas landfall.

We have horses, goats, dogs and cats  just a little farm of our own, she said. I cant imagine being in that position myself, if we lived in an area where we had to evacuate.

Cannon, who formerly was employed by Auburn Universitys veterinary school, saw a Facebook post by a current employee, saying the school was receiving calls from evacuees wanting to know where they could take their animals.

It tugged at my heart a little bit, Cannon said. We wanted to do something when Harvey hit Texas. But we have small children, so we were not able to leave and physically go down there to help with relief. So when we saw that Irma would be affecting Florida and Georgia, we wanted to do what we can. I want to help in some way, so maybe we can help someone save their animals.

People can board dogs and cats at a veterinary office or take them with them to stay in hotels or with friends, she said, but there are not as many options for people moving livestock.

"If we can save a couple of horses or a few goats, it's better than sitting around, doing nothing," Cannon said. "It's something small, but it's something."

Boarding during Irma

Holly Brown, owner of Statford Equestrian Farm in Waverly, already has one horse from a friend in Florida staying with her.

A friend and I met her over in Georgia and were able to pick up the horse to board here, Brown said. So right now, we have one. And I was just contacted about another horse.

Brown opened her farm just over one year ago, so this is the first time she has had the opportunity to extend her facility to those in need.

Were a small community, and I think we need to do whatever we can to help, she said. Every little bit matters.

On Thursday, a handful of evacuees from Florida had taken their dogs to Opelika Animal Hospital to board during the storm.

Im expecting well have an influx tomorrow, Dr. Gary Hunt told his staff at the veterinary clinic.

Recovering from Harvey

At the same time Opelika Animal Hospital is helping those in Irmas path, it is collecting donations to share with a veterinary clinic in Cypress, Texas, which is still feeling the effects of Harvey.

A storage pod is parked in front of the veterinary clinic on 2nd Avenue, and until Sept. 22, staff is inviting members of the community to drop off pet food, leashes, blankets, collars, kennels or any other pet supplies.

Supplies will be given to Cy-Fair Animal Hospital in Texas, where its staff will distribute to families as needed.

The vets who work there went to Tuskegees veterinary school and were classmates with one of our vets, Dr. Lybbi Epperson. She has been in direct contact with them since Harvey hit, said Judy Colley. Colley is married to Dr. Jere Colley, one of the veterinarians on staff in Opelika. She and Epperson, along with the Colleys daughter, Tipi Colley Miller, organized the donation drive. We know the people receiving it will hand it out as needed. We felt it was better to donate directly to a veterinary clinic, rather than to a big organization.

Anyone who wishes to donate pet supplies can do so during Opelika Animal Hospitals business hours, from 7:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday, and 8 a.m. to noon Saturday.

Colley said that while all pet-related items are accepted, food is probably the main need.

There are so many pets who have been abandoned, or who were rescued and the people fostering them were not prepared to feed them, she said. As soon as the pod was delivered (Thursday) morning, people pulled up and started putting dog food in it.

It seemed like a God thing, Colley added. With Dr. Epperson knowing the doctors at the vet clinic in Texas, and with donations from the generous people in our area, it was a perfect match.
A group of Offaly tourists have been evacuated from their Florida holiday home as Hurricane Irma bears down on the State at Category 4 force.

The historic hurricane is expected to make landfall in the Sunshine State in the early hours of Sunday morning having already ravaged the Carribean islands.

A group of seven tourists from Edenderry and Daingean made their way to a holiday home on the island of Anna Maria on the west coast of Florida last week for a dream end of summer trip.

Natalie Seery, Andrea Quinn, Riona Byrne, Shauna Maguire, Ross Mangan, Stephen Coffey and Ciaran McEvoy have now been evacuated and placed into a hurricane shelter for the weekend.

Natalie Seery explained to the Offaly Express how they were informed of the incoming weather system and the steps they needed to take to stay safe.

"On Friday evening we received a mandatory evacuation order from the governor, so we left this morning and headed for a hurricane shelter on the mainland," she said. "The emergency services then rang the house and just told us to go and that shelters would be open from 4pm on Friday."

"We are in Manatee County in a shelter at a High School," Natalie explained. Authorities in Manatee County have issued a voluntary evacuation order of Level B hurricane level. 22 schools across the county have been converted into makeshift shelters.

"It's absolutely terrifying here," Natalie told us. "The weather isn't bad at the moment but we reckon we will be locked in this high school until Monday as the storm is expected to hit us here tomorrow evening."

Up to 20 inches of rain could hit Florida in the coming days as winds up to 160mph rage through the area. Hurricane Irma is actually wider than the entire state of Florida, the largest hurricane ever recorded in the Atlantic Ocean.

It is larger than the devastating Hurricane Andrew that hit the state, killing 60 people and destroying 125,000 homes, in 1992.

Natalie explained that the group didn't try to get flights out because "there was no point." "The roads were all bumper to bumper with traffic so we wouldn't have made it to the airport and would have got stuck on the highway." A petrol shortage also halted any chance of driving away from danger.

"We were updated that the hurricane is expected to pick up more speed before it hits us because of the warm waters. We are not receiving much information, to be honest," Natalie said.

"We are all very nervous as we do not know what to expect," she concluded.
Amid demands to remove Confederate statues across the country, cries have grown louder to dismantle monuments to J. Marion Sims, the "father of gynecology," a white 19th-century doctor who performed surgical experiments on enslaved black women without anesthesia.

Late last month, a Sims statue in New York City, where he established the first hospital for women in 1855, was vandalized. "RACIST" was spray-painted on the Central Park monument, and splotches of red paint were used to deface the statue's eyes and neck.

The city is considering whether to remove the statue, the site of an Aug. 19 protest, as part of a 90-day review of "symbols of hate" on city property, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said. The memorial was denounced by New York City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito, who described Sims's work as "repugnant and reprehensible" and a "stain on our nation's history." The New York Academy of Medicine reissued its statement calling for the statue's removal.

Sims, who practiced medicine in Alabama from 1835 to 1849 before moving to New York, invented the speculum and other instruments still in use today. He pioneered surgery for fistula, a condition that left women incontinent after giving birth; historians say the treatment revolutionized the field of gynecology. He also performed the first successful gallbladder surgery and the first successful artificial insemination.

But to make those advances, Sims performed experimental surgeries on enslaved women, raising disturbing ethical questions. His legacy has long been questioned by those who believe he used black women as medical guinea pigs without their consent.

Protesters have demanded removal of a monument to Sims in Columbia, South Carolina, the state where Sims was born. Columbia Mayor Steve Benjamin, the city's first African-American leader, said in an interview on MSNBC that he is more offended by the statue of Sims on the capitol grounds than any Confederate memorial. The state health department building is also named in his honor.

A statue of Sims also stands on the capitol grounds in Montgomery, Alabama. In 2005, a painting entitled "Medical Giants of Alabama" that depicted Sims and other white men standing over a partially clothed black patient was removed from the University of Alabama at Birmingham's Center for Advanced Medical Studies because of complaints from people offended by it.

According to a 2006 Washington Post article: "Anarcha Wescott, Sims's patient in the painting, endured 30 surgeries as Sims worked to perfect the technique. She was among about a dozen slaves on whom Sims operated repeatedly without anesthesia, which was just being developed and not widely used at the time. Some scholars have questioned whether the slaves gave or were capable of giving informed consent to the surgery, despite Sims's claim they eagerly sought his cures."

Sims, who was born in 1813 in Lancaster County, South Carolina, graduated in 1835 from Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, according to the Encyclopedia of Alabama. Sims opened a medical practice in Lancaster, but his practice "failed within the year after two infants under his treatment died." Sims moved to Alabama and settled in Macon County, where he began working as a doctor treating enslaved people on local plantations.

He built a hospital, Sims wrote in his autobiography, "The Story of My Life," in the corner of his yard where he saw black patients.

The hospital, he wrote, had beds for 12 patients. He began trying to treat fistula, a catastrophic injury from childbirth that at the time was considered incurable.

According to the National Library of Medicine, "First reports of successful repairs emerged in the literature around the mid-19th century when James Marion Sims described his technique of a transvaginal approach with the use of silver sutures and bladder drainage postoperatively."

In his autobiography, Sims described surgeries performed on enslaved patients, including women named Anarcha, Lucy and Betsey.

Sims wrote that he made a proposal to the slave owners: "If you will give me Anarcha and Betsey for experiment, I agree to perform no experiment or operation on either of them to endanger their lives and will not charge a cent for keeping them, but you must pay their taxes and clothe them. I will keep them at my own expense."

He wrote that he "was very enthusiastic" and expected to cure them within six months. Anarcha was described as "a mulatto girl" about 14 years old. Lucy, described as about 18, had given birth to a child "two months ago, and that since that time she had been unable to hold any water."

Lucy's bladder was destroyed, "leaving an opening between the vagina and the bladder, at least two inches in diameter or more," Sims wrote.

"That was before the days of anaesthetics, and the poor girl, on her knees, bore the operations with great heroism and bravery. I had about a dozen doctors there to witness the series of experiments that I expected to perform. All the doctors had seen my notes often and examined them, and agreed that I was on the eve of a great discovery, and every one of them was interested in seeing me operate."

Sims wrote that the operations were tedious and difficult. It took Lucy two or three months to recover. Soon after, Sims operated on Betsey. "I repeated the operation in the same way and manner as performed on Lucy with the exception of placing in the bladder a self-retaining catheter instead of the sponge. I started out very hopefully and of course, I waited anxiously for the result of the operation."

The Sims monument in New York, on Fifth Avenue at 103rd Street, was sculpted by Ferdinand von Miller II and dedicated on Oct. 29, 1894, according to the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation.

The Black Youth Project 100, a group of social justice activists, staged the protest at the statute. The activists wore hospital gowns splashed with red paint dripping down their legs.

In a Facebook post, they explained that Sims had "purchased Black women slaves and used them as guinea pigs for his untested surgical experiments. He repeatedly performed genital surgery on Black women WITHOUT ANESTHESIA because according to him, 'Black women don't feel pain.' Despite his inhumane tests on Black women, Sims was named 'the father of modern gynecology', and his statue currently stands right outside of the New York Academy of Medicine. #FightSupremacy."
A Mumbai court has rejected Radhe Maa's plea to drop her name as an accused from a dowry harassment case.

By India Today Web Desk: A Mumbai court has rejected the application by self-styled godwoman Radhe Maa seeking dropping her name from a dowry harassment case. Radhe Maa has been named as an accused in the case with Borivali police.

The dowry harassment case was filed last year by a Mumbai resident Niki Gupta, who alleged that Radhe Maa instigated her in-laws for domestic violence. Niki Gupta filed complaint accusing Radhe Maa of telling her in-laws to raise dowry related demands from her.

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The case went on without making much noise as police did not, alleges Niki Gupta, investigate the case properly. Later, Borivali police dropped Radhe Maa's name from the list of accused citing lack of evidence.

Niki Gupta, on April 28 this year, approached the Bombay High Court against dropping of Radhe Maa's name from the FIR by the police. Niki told the Bombay High Court that police dropped the name of Radhe Maa without informing her and without recording her statement.

Hearing her plea, the high court ordered the Mumbai police to proceed in the case. Justice Sadhana Jadhav directed the police to record her statement and allowed Niki Gupta to assist the police in conducting further probe. The court directed the police to take further action as per law.

ANOTHER CASE AGAINST RADHE MAA

Radhe Maa is facing some other charges also. The Punjab and Haryana High Court directed the Punjab police on September 5 to file an FIR against Radhe Maa on plea of a Phagwara resident, Surender Mittal, a former Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) member.

Two years ago, Mittal had sought an FIR against Radhe Maa but receiving no response to his complaint from Punjab Police, Mittal had moved the Punjab and Haryana High Court this year.

Originally, a Punjab resident, Sukhwinder Kaur later changed her name to Radhe Maa and moved to Mumbai. She hosts regular religious events at her Radhe Maa Bhawan located in Borivali now.

After Dera Sacha Sauda Chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, Radhe maa has become the next spiritual leader to come under the scanner.

(With ANI inputs)

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Radhe Maa seduction case: After Gurmeet Ram Rahim, is it time for Sukhwinder Kaur to pack up?

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An Elkhorn-area man died late Saturday when the pickup truck he was driving crashed into a utility pole near 60th and Leavenworth Streets in Omaha, police said.

Chase D. Kruse, 22, was pronounced dead at the scene about 10:45 p.m., according to an Omaha Police Department statement. Investigators determined that Kruse was speeding and was not using a seat belt, police said.

The investigation found that Kruse was alone in a 2007 Ford F-150 pickup westbound on Leavenworth Street. The pickup turned onto Elmwood Park Drive and left the roadway, hitting a metal utility pole.
The card appears to have faded with time since being issued in Brazil nearly a half century ago. But theres no question as to the identity of the American citizen who in December 1968 was registering with the Brazilian government as a resident alien. The name is typed on the document in all capital letters: WILLIAM LESLIE ARNOLD.

Fifty years after he escaped from the Nebraska State Penitentiary, a piece of the mystery of Leslie Arnold has now been solved.

A Brazilian immigration document that surfaced last week represents proof that the Omaha boy given a life sentence for killing his parents fled to Brazil within 17 months of his 1967 prison escape.

I cant believe what youre telling me, said Geoff Britton, a former investigator with the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services who spent years tracking Arnold.

Brazil was exactly where Britton and other investigators who have probed Arnolds disappearance over the years had surmised he fled, primarily based on the account of the fellow inmate he escaped with. Now theres no question thats just what Arnold did.

The card, written in Portuguese and until recently buried in a government archive in Sao Paulo, in itself doesnt get anyone much closer to knowing whether Arnold is still in that country 49 years later or is still alive today at age 75. And in some ways, it raises new questions.

A typed notation on the back of the card suggests Interpol, the international police agency, noted this new immigrant was wanted by the FBI, requesting more information on him. A subsequent entry, depending on how its read, could mean Brazilian authorities tried to capture Arnold but failed, did not want him captured initially, or perhaps didnt want him caught at all.

Its unknown whether the FBI was made aware of Arnolds international flight. FBI officials in Washington said Friday a search of headquarters files found no reference to the Arnold case at all. The local Omaha office of the FBI did not immediately respond to a request seeking information.

Whether Arnold ultimately left Brazil, blended in under a new identity or found some other way to avoid capture over the years also remains a mystery.

The World-Herald last week published a three-part series on The Mystery of Leslie Arnold, detailing the saga of the troubled 16-year-old Omaha boy who in 1958 killed both of his parents. The boy subsequently spent nine years behind bars before working with another inmate to saw through bars, go over the penitentiary fence and flee to Chicago. Arnold was never seen again.

The story had concluded that Arnold likely fled to Brazil. Jim Harding, the inmate who escaped with Arnold and was recaptured within a year, said Arnold had told him that he believed if he fathered a child in Brazil he would never be extradited back to the States.

Britton had uncovered his own evidence leading him to believe Arnold fled to South America. At one point someone in South America looked up Arnold on the Corrections Departments website, not by his name, but by his inmate number  something few people besides Arnold would have known.

The World-Herald series generated tremendous reader response and interest. Among those piqued was David Finney, an Omaha genealogy buff. As Finney searched for Arnold on the genealogy website FamilySearch last week, the immigration card popped up on his screen.

According to FamilySearch, the immigration cards in its database were issued by the Office of Public Safety to foreign citizens given permanent residency. The records were housed for decades in a public archives building in Sao Paulo before FamilySearch in recent years digitized them and put them online to assist in family history research.

Whats most striking about the card, issued on Dec. 7, 1968, is that Arnold used his real name, birth date and even place of birth: Omaha, Nebraska.

Its unclear what type of documentation Arnold would have needed to provide at the time to gain entry into the country. Its also possible Arnold believed he was more likely to be extradited if he entered his new home under false pretenses.

While the card doesnt say how and where Arnold entered Brazil, its storage in Sao Paulo suggests he likely arrived in that city. Sao Paulo is the largest city in South America  even bigger than New York City  and is a major landing spot for travelers coming by both air and sea.

Providing further intrigue are the two typed messages on the back of the card.

The first, which appears to be dated 1968, suggests Arnolds entry was immediately flagged by Interpol, which asked for more information on him. It said the FBI was looking for the man who, it noted, may also go by the name Les Arnold.

The second entry, which appears to be dated 1971, is more difficult to decipher, featuring bureaucratic language and several abbreviations. But it ends with the phrase without capture. That reference could be interpreted several ways: that Brazilian authorities tried to capture him and failed, that they wanted him located but not immediately captured, or that they didnt want him captured at all.

Theres no question that Brazil has a historical reputation for being reluctant to extradite its citizens.

However, the protections against extradition that the Brazilian constitution provides the countrys natural-born citizens today do not apply to naturalized citizens who committed their crimes before becoming citizens. Its unclear what the state of extradition law was at the time Arnold entered in 1968. Even if he ultimately gained Brazilian citizenship, its possible Interpols inquiry put Arnold in jeopardy of capture.

How hard the government worked to find Arnold is also unknown. At the time, the country was ruled by a strict military dictatorship that had seized power after a 1964 coup.

Calls to the Brazilian Embassy in Washington and the U.S. Embassy in Brazil seeking more information also werent immediately returned.

Once in Brazil, its conceivable Arnold at some point changed his name to better blend into the vast country, which geographically is larger than the continental United States and today boasts a population of more than 200 million.

A cursory check last week of the countrys taxpayer database found no one by the name William Arnold or Leslie Arnold. Britton, whose search for Arnold ended when he left the Corrections Department in 2013, said he doubts the fugitive could have kept his real name all these years without becoming known.

One of the biggest questions remains what the FBI knew about Arnolds flight to Brazil. Neither Britton nor other Nebraska law enforcement officers who have been quoted on the Arnold case over the years ever mentioned being told by the FBI he landed in Brazil.

Jim Arnold, Leslies younger brother, said the FBI has never said anything to him about it.

Jim Arnolds first reaction to learning that Leslie fled to Brazil reflected the bitterness he still feels for his brothers crimes, which left him orphaned at age 13: If thats what he wanted to do, fine. As long as he stays away from me.

A cousin of Arnolds had a different reaction.

Paul Wisner of Kansas City, Missouri, said he believes Arnolds crimes were rooted in a troubled relationship with his mother. If Arnold fled to Brazil and kept his nose clean all these years, Wisner hopes his cousin wont ever be captured.

I think everyone would be better off if hes not found, he said. Id like to think he had gone beyond what he was at the time, didnt hurt anyone else or didnt do anything he shouldnt have. Id like to know he has done OK by the world.
A Papillion woman accused of stealing more than $18,000 from the Nebraska Wind Symphony is being held for trial on $25,000 bail.

Kelli J. Lockwood, the former treasurer of the symphony, appeared in Douglas County Court and was charged with felony theft by deception. She must pay 10 percent of the bail amount  $2,500  to be released.

Lockwood, 43, is alleged to have taken $18,181 between Sept. 1, 2015, and Aug. 8 of this year, according to the criminal complaint filed by the Douglas County Attorneys Office. She faces up to four years in prison if convicted.

The suspect had admitted at a meeting with symphony officials to embezzling a lot of money, according to an Omaha Police Department report filed Aug. 16 by the nonprofit group's attorney. Lisa Line told police that Lockwood stole cash and misused a symphony debit card.

A symphony official has said the alleged theft would not impede the coming symphony dates. The Nebraska Wind Symphony will open its 41st season Oct. 29 at Millard North High School with a program titled Celebrate Nebraska.
The Nebraska National Guard rushed to the rescue two weeks ago after Hurricane Harvey dumped a record-setting deluge on southeast Texas.

Now its time to come home.

By today, all 76 of the deployed Guard members were expected to be back in Nebraska. Members of two helicopter units got back to Lincoln and Grand Island on Friday, and a 44-member medical team arrived home in a convoy Saturday.

The first of seven Nebraska National Guard helicopters arrived in Texas the weekend of Aug. 26-27 as the rain was still falling and the floodwaters still rising.

We were the first ones in, and the last ones out, said Maj. Mitch Tessendorf, leader of the 37-member Nebraska Aviation Task Force.

For most of their stay the Task Force was headquartered in Sugar Land, Texas, just southwest of Houston.

During nearly two weeks of around-the-clock effort, the Cornhusker crews rescued 290 people  eight of them with the use of a hoist  and 44 pets, Tessendorf said. Twenty of the rescuees were medical evacuation patients.

The crews also hauled 142,000 pounds of cargo, 6,000 pounds of bottled water, 3,000 pounds of food, and 1,000 pounds of medical supplies.

During the second week, Tessendorf said, few people needed rescuing. The Nebraska Guard helicopters worked more to move people  particularly military personnel  around the vast damage zone, which stretched 300 miles from Corpus Christi in the mid-Gulf Coast to Port Arthur near the Louisiana border.

We kind of got to see where the true effects of Hurricane Harvey hit, Tessendorf said. Some areas are complete annihilation.

The second major Nebraska Guard contingent included a 45-member medical team from the Lincoln-based 155th Medical Group of the Air National Guard. The doctors, nurses, emergency medical technicians and other medical professionals set up a mobile clinic in Beaumont on Sept. 3, outside a hospital that had lost power, said Lt. Col. Scott Shaddy, the teams commander.

He said the team treated patients overnight while a Texas Guard team staffed the day shift, handling mostly cuts and scrapes, giving tetanus shots and dispensing medicines to people who had been without them for days.

We get them to more definitive care if they need it, Shaddy said.

Within a day, the hospital regained power. The unit ended up moving to Vidor, just east of Beaumont, where they set up outside a high school. Between their two locations, they treated about 150 patients.

Shaddy said the team, one of several across the country created a decade ago under a mandate from the Department of Homeland Security, received its first test in a real disaster.

Weve been training this way twice a year for 10 years, Shaddy said. To come out here in a live activation and see it work, its really fulfilling.

Their last exercise took place only a few days before they deployed to Texas.

He said the communities that were aided embraced them. All week, local churches pitched in and cooked their meals. The militarys prepackaged meals ready to eat mostly stayed packed up.

Ive only had to eat one of those, Shaddy said.

After weeks of wearing their uniforms and pitching in, the Nebraska Guard members are now home with their families and their civilian jobs. But with monstrous Hurricane Irma bearing down on Florida, they are ready to go again if needed.

We stand ready at all times, Tessendorf said. If Florida calls and they need us, our soldiers are willing to go.
The Amethi MP is scheduled to deliver a lecture titled, 'India at 70: The Path Forward for the World's Largest Democracy,' at the University of California at Berkeley.

By Supriya Bhardwaj: Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi will begin a two-week long tour of the US tonight. He'll take part in a series of events organised by Overseas Congress, and meet students, NRIs, global thinkers, political leaders and corporate honchos.

The highlight of the tour? Rahul's meetings with members of the Republican Party in Washington, according to organisers.

The Amethi MP is scheduled to deliver a lecture titled, 'India at 70: The Path Forward for the World's Largest Democracy,' at the University of California at Berkeley on Monday. His great-grandfather, Jawaharlal Nehru, spoke at the varsity in 1949.

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In Washington, Rahul will address a gathering of members of the Centre for American Progress, and of the think-tank community.

At another program, organised by the US-India Business Council, he'll talk to business leaders about the current global economic situations, technological issues, and their impact on India.

The Congress has also organised an outreach program on September 20 at New York's Times Square, where Rahul will interact with NRIs.

Contrary to what some news reports have said, he won't give a lecture on artificial intelligence during this trip.

I have seen news in media that Rahul Gandhi is coming to the US to give a talk on Artificial Intelligence. This is FALSE information.- Sam Pitroda (@sampitroda) September 10, 2017

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--- ENDS ---
Strong winds brought by Hurricane Irma, a massive and powerful storm making its way to the Florida Keys, had become too dangerous for paramedics and fire crews to respond to dozens of emergency calls, Assistant Fire Chief Pete Gomez said. Crews were able to respond to only four overnight. The call from a woman in labor was not one of them.
The writer, who served in the U.S. Army from 1965 to 1968, is a senior scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center. He wrote this for the Los Angeles Times.

There are two Vietnam wars, and the second is still going, 40 years after the first ended. The United States fought the first one from 1959 to 1975 in the jungles, villages and airspace of Indochina. The second is the war over how that war, the first lost war in Americas national history, is remembered.

This month, as Ken Burns 10-part Vietnam documentary is aired on PBS, the second conflict is sure to heat up again with renewed intensity.

The positions will be fiercely argued. What was the war good for? Absolutely nothing, as the 1970 song put it? Or was it a heroic cause?

The most important  and poignant  group who will offer answers to these questions is Vietnam veterans themselves. They see themselves reflected, against the roll of the dead, on the black granite walls of Maya Lins Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington or in the faces of Frederick Harts evocative sculpture of three soldiers nearby.

Many who served came home and got on with their lives, whatever the wounds and scars of war. A more visible subset of aging warriors sits astride motorcycles in Veterans Day parades or stands in the median strips of our streets holding cardboard placards. They live their lives as war survivors. They ponder what might have been.

Often, no matter how their lives have unfolded, Vietnam vets have a chip on their shoulder. They wish that their patriotism, their service, be better recognized: They stepped forward, regardless of the flawed rationale and conduct of the war, when hordes of other young men, especially the so-called best and brightest, avoided the unpleasantness altogether.

For those who avoided the draft and the danger, there is often a quiet guilt  I have witnessed it many times. They dodge the inevitable question: How did you manage to get out of it? Hasty marriage? Graduate school? A trick knee?

Of those who served, 2.1 million were deployed to Vietnam. More than 58,000 died, 300,000 were wounded and 245,000 have filed for injuries incurred by exposure to the defoliant weapon Agent Orange.

More than 50,000 draft-age men fled to Canada and Sweden. There are no statistics on those who suffer from permanent psychological wounds.

The men who actively protested against the war may feel best about themselves. They were engaged in the struggle of their generation, and they deserve the lions share of credit for stopping the war.

Their resistance, especially from 1967 to 1969, when U.S. casualties were the highest, forced the hand of Americas leaders. They have a better argument for serenity in their old age than those who merely avoided service and stood smugly on the sidelines.

Then there are the politicians. The rationale for American involvement  the phony Tonkin Gulf resolution and the discredited domino theory  forced the moral dilemma on the Vietnam generation.

It is with bitter irony that the Vietnam generation has witnessed the friendly visits of Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush (both of whom avoided fighting in the war) to Hanoi, or the jovial Oval Office interchange between President Donald Trump (deferred because of bone spurs) and Nguyen Xuan Phuc, the prime minister of our new ally and bulwark against China, the Peoples Republic of Vietnam.

They must cope with the recent revelations that Richard Nixon scuttled a Lyndon Johnson peace deal during the 1968 election for political reasons, a deal that might have saved the 20,000 U.S. soldiers who died during Nixons subsequent six-year presidency.

Reconciliation after divisive wars, especially a lost war, is a tricky business. Those who served in Vietnam or resisted may never be considered members of a Greatest Generation, like World War II veterans. Nevertheless, their experiences are authentically American, deeply revealing of divisions and ideals that haunt us still.

In the early 1980s, the design for the now-celebrated Vietnam memorial wall  a site that has evolved into a place of contemplation for the pacifist as well as the warrior  attracted advocates and enemies who saw it as yet another opportunity to re-fight the war. An editorial in the Boston Globe summarized what would become a five-year art battle this way: Commemorating the war in Vietnam is likely to prove no simpler than fighting it.

The Burns documentary airs in a week. Get ready for another round.
Members of Nebraska Task Force One and other rescue teams in Florida are preparing for a different type of destruction from what they saw in Houston after Hurricane Harvey, a leader of the task force said Saturday.

Harvey stalled over Houston, dumping more than 50 inches of rain and endangering lives with flooding, said Battalion Chief Brad Thavenet of Lincoln Fire and Rescue and a task force leader.

Hurricane Irma, on the other hand, is packing devastating winds, which would require more dryland rescue operations similar to those after a tornado, Thavenet said in a Saturday phone call with reporters.

The Nebraska team of first responders could end up with plenty of experience in both types of rescues after being deployed first to Texas and now to Florida.

And they should be rested and ready to help with Irma after spending Friday night at a hotel in Tupelo, Mississippi, before moving on to Elgin Air Force Base near Pensacola, Florida.

The task force is made up of firefighters from Lincoln, Omaha and Papillion area fire departments, as well as doctors, structural engineers, heavy-rigging specialists and canine search specialists with four search dogs. The 80-member task force specializes in urban search and rescue.

The group is under the direction of the Federal Emergency Management Agency and is coordinated by Lincoln Fire and Rescue.

The task force members likely will stay hunkered down in safe quarters until after the storm passes and they can safely be transported to where they are needed, Thavenet said.

The Lincoln fire official has been in Florida since Wednesday and is helping to plan and coordinate the efforts of numerous agencies.
19 companies under CBI scanner for sending Rs 400 crore abroad

India

oi-Vicky

By Vicky

19 companies have come under the scanner of the Central Bureau of Investigation for having sent Rs 424 crore in foreign remittances through about 700 transactions.

It is alleged that during the year 2015, unidentified officials of Punjab National Bank (PNB), Mint Street branch, Chennai, entered into a criminal conspiracy with the 19 accused companies which were account holders in the branch.

"In furtherance of the conspiracy, the above said companies were sending foreign exchange to Hong Kong without any genuine business transactions," the FIR, registered last evening, alleged.

It said the accounts thus opened were used for the purpose of sending advance foreign remittances.

"The modus operandi was that the customers got remittances from various other banks to their accounts by way of RTGS (real time gross settlement). The customer presented their request with a quotation issued by foreign suppliers for 100 per cent advance remittances," it said.

The customer made request for remittance to foreign supplier based on the quotation, it alleged.

"The remittance amount was kept in such a way that it would not exceed the threshold limit of US$ 1 lakh for each remittance in order to circumvent the regulatory requirements and applicability of the RBI," it said.

The CBI said there were 700 advance remittances made for imports through various current accounts opened during the period from January 2015 to May 2015 totalling to Rs 424.58 crore.

"All the advance remittances were routed through NOSTRO (account held by PNB with a foreign bank in a foreign currency) account maintained with HSBC, New York," it said.

The bank had found that none of units were functioning at the available address. The RTGS credits emanated mostly from some credit cooperative societies, at Mumbai and other places.

The RTGS transactions were made by the remitter through fictitious persons in whose names accounts could have opened in the co-operative societies in Mumbai.

The remittances were sent in the name of foreign suppliers who had opened accounts in various banks in the UAE, Hong Kong and Taiwan. The remittances were routed through HSBC, New York to these banks, the CBI alleged.

"It is clear that this is a case of money laundering through shell companies and there has been loss of foreign exchange to the tune of Rs 421.58 crore to the country," it was further alleged.

OneIndia News

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Story first published: Sunday, September 10, 2017, 5:45 [IST]
By PTI: overseas Indians

New Delhi/Washington, Sep 10 (PTI) Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi tonight left for the US, where he will interact with global thinkers, political leaders and overseas Indians on international, economic and technology issues.

Gandhi, 47, will begin his nearly two-week trip to the US with an address at the University of California, Berkeley, tomorrow on the subject India at 70 -- Reflections on the Path forward, where he will talk about contemporary India and the path forward for the worlds largest democracy.

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His great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru, Indias first prime minister, delivered a speech at Berkeley in 1949.

"Looking forward to addressing students of University of California, Berkeley and interacting with Indian Overseas Congress members with Sam Pitroda during my visit to the US," Gandhi said on twitter.

The Congress party also said on its twitter handle that, Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi will interact with students of UC Berkeley on Tuesday, September 12, 7 AM IST."

"The purpose of the visit is two-fold. One is to meet interesting and global thinkers, to have a conversation on what is happening world over on economy, on technology, on opportunities, and really understand different views from experts on the global scene," technocrat Sam Pitroda, who is involved with the preparations of Gandhis visit, told PTI.

Pitroda worked with Gandhis father and former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi for nearly a decade to transform Indias telecom sector.

He said Gandhi will meet overseas Indians at an event in New York as part of an outreach by the Congress party.

The Congress vice president is scheduled to visit Washington DC. He is likely to address members of the think- tank community at an event organised by the Centre for American Progress, and interact with the corporate world at another programme organised by the US-India Business Council.

Gandhi may meet some members of the ruling Republican Party as well. "A lot of these meetings are going to be small and private," Pitroda said.

"He wants to understand more about whats happening globally and whats the global view of the situation is," he said.

"He is coming to meet with students and academicians and various thinking people in the US," Pitroda said.

The Congress vice president has often visited the US, but this could possibly be the first time in his political career that Gandhi would hold public meetings, meet political leaders and deliver speeches in the country.

"You know he needs to be out, he needs to express his views. You know he has been not, may be, talking publicly about his trips. But I think, it is important that he meets a large number of people this time and also overseas Congress members," Pitroda said.

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"Today, the view of India is one short of protected by one group of people. We need to really talk about Indian aspirations, Indian concerns about what is going on not just in India but the world over. Rise of populism is one topic I am sure will come up in the conversation," Pitroda said.

He said Gandhi would interact with Silicon Valley people, where the technology, talent and Indian "brain power" is concentrated. "So, the idea is if you were to meet a lot of Silicon Valley people, it is better to talk about things in San Francisco."

Gandhi will also address a gathering at the Princeton University. PTI LKJ/SKC ASK ASK

--- ENDS ---
Delhi: School peon arrested for raping a 5-year-old

India

pti-PTI

New Delhi, Sep 10: In a heinous incident, a five-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a peon inside the premises of a private school in Shahdara in East Delhi.

The accused, identified as Vikas (40), has been arrested, said Nupur Prasad, Deputy Commissioner of Police, Shahdara.

The incident came a day after a seven-year-old boy had his throat slit for allegedly resisting sexual assault by a bus conductor of a Gurgaon school -- an incident which sent shock waves across the country.

Vikas had been working in the school for the last three years. Previously he worked as a security guard there, the police said.

He took the girl inside an empty classroom around noon on Saturday when he was walking on the corridors after handing over lunch boxes to teachers, the police said. After raping the girl, he threatened her of dire consequences, they added.

The girl later complained of bleeding and pain in her private parts to her mother. She was taken to a hospital where her medical examination confirmed sexual assault, the police said.

Traumatised by the incident, the 5-year-old was sent for counselling. According to the police, the child said during counselling that she was assaulted by "a man wearing a cap" and also described his physical attributes. It was on the basis of this description that Vikas was nabbed, the police said.

PTI
AIADMK crisis: TN opposition parties meet Governor, seek floor test

India

oi-Anusha

By Anusha Ravi

Opposition parties in Tamil Nadu led by DMK's M K Stalin met in charge Governor Vidhyasagar Rao over the prevailing political crisis. The parties, once again, sought the Governor's intervention to seek a floor test in the Tamil Nadu assembly.

"This is the last time we are meeting the Governor. If he does not seek a floor test from Edappadi Palanisamy, we will go to the court," M K Stalin said after meeting the Governor. Opposition party legislators including 89 from DMK, 8 from Congress, one from IUML make up to 98 in a house of 238 legislators in Tamil Nadu. M K Stalin claimed that 21 MLAs of the AIADMK were with TTV Dinakaran and had refused to support Edappadi Palanisamy. "This means that the Chief Minister is running a minority government with just 114 MLAs supporting him," Stalin added.

M K Stalin led a delegation of DMK and Congress MLAs and urged that the Governor direct Chief Minister Edappadi Palanisamy to prove his majority in the house. The opposition had launched a united attack on the minority government split by factions within the AIADMK. Close to 21 MLAs, including one independent MLA have chosen to support TTV Dinakaran and have withdrawn support to Edappadi Palanisamy as the Chief Minister.

Meanwhile, MLAs supporting TTV Dinakaran have been lodged at an unknown resort. In a bid to stop poaching, Dinakaran has refused to reveal details of the legislators' whereabouts. Earlier in the day, M K Stalin while addressing a gathering, said that the DMK was sure to come to power in Tamil Nadu. He also criticised the Governor for refusing to take action over MLAs withdrawing support to Edappadi Palanisamy.

"The DMK will surely come to power in Tamil Nadu and will remain in power for at least 25 years. Many people in Tamil Nadu are wondering if the Governor is unable to determine what majority means," M K Stalin mocked.

Congress and DMK have, in the past, taken separate delegations to the Governor seeking a floor test. Vidyasagar Rao has, however, refused to interfere in the matter so far.

OneIndia News
Don't fall prey to social media propaganda, says Amit Shah to youths

India

pti-PTI

Ahmedabad, Sep 10: BJP president Amit Shah asked the youth of Gujarat not to fall prey to the anti-BJP propaganda being mounted by the Congress on social media. Shah's statement came at a time when messages critical of the 'Gujarat model of development' under the BJP rule in the poll-bound state were being circulated on social media.

During his interaction with youths at 'Yuva Townhall', Shah also came down heavily on the Congress and its vice president Rahul Gandhi, who had recently visited the city and questioned the BJP over its development claims.

Replying to questions, Shah touched upon issues such as implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST), unemployment and demonetisation, and claimed that the Narendra Modi government has brought in substantial change during its three-year rule. "I appeal to the youth not to blindly believe the anti- BJP propaganda being spread on WhatsApp and Facebook. Before making any judgement, you need to do analysis of what was Gujarat before the BJP came to power and what is the situation today," said Shah. "This propaganda is largely spread by our opponent Congress," the BJP president claimed.

Responding to a question about the BJP government's achievements in Gujarat, Shah shared several figures about growth in agriculture sector, increase in per capita income, rise in the size of state budget, increase in the number of universities and several other parameters to prove his point that significant development took place after 1995. The BJP first came to power in Gujarat in 1995. "I want you to apply your mind before believing what is being circulated in WhatsApp. Just compare what kind of development took place before the BJP came to power and afterwards. These figures will clearly tell you that it was the BJP which did development," claimed Shah. He added that these figures related to the development in Gujarat will be uploaded on the BJP's website so that youths can circulate it on social media to counter the propaganda.

"Before 1995, when the Congress was in power, curfew and communal riots were rampant. Even the 'Rath Yatra' was attacked. Power cut of 10 to 15 hours was normal in rural parts of state during the Congress rule. But today, every part of the state is getting 24-hour uninterrupted power supply," Shah said. "Rahulbaba (Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi) recently came here and raised question about development. I want to tell him that the venue of his event, the Sabarmati Riverfront, was nothing short of a pit of dirty water when the Congress was in power. Today, it is considered as the best riverfront in the world," the BJP chief added. "Gujarat's per capita income was just Rs 13,665 before 1995. Today, it is Rs 1.41 lakh. Is this not development Rahulbaba?" asked Shah, adding that the people of Gujarat should not get carried away by the false claims of the Congress and its leaders.

Responding to a question related to the BJP's approach towards creating more employment, Shah said the method of calculating employment in the country needed to be changed. "I believe that employment should not be linked only with jobs. You can't give jobs to 125 crore citizens. Employment should also mean self employment, start-ups or starting a small business. Thus, the method of calculating the employment generation, which solely takes into account job creation, should undergo change," the BJP chief said.

Responding to a question on the GST and its benefits, Shah said the BJP government at the Centre was trying its best to make it more trader-friendly. "We know that some (traders) are facing difficulties due to GST. But, the government is aware about it and understand your problem.

The GST Council can always change the rules. Our aim is to make GST trader-friendly," he said. Responding to a question on demonetisation and its success, especially when the RBI has declared that almost 99 per cent notes have came back, Shah said the exercise was aimed at pushing the country's economy forward by increasing the number of tax payers.

"The RBI has declared that around 99 per cent notes have came back. But, did anyone asked the RBI how much were there in the past? Earlier, only 80 per cent currency notes were in the system, as 20 per cent notes used to remain with corrupt people, be it politicians or officers. Now, all these notes are back in the system," said Shah.

"Prior to demonetisation, only 3.6 crore people used to pay income tax. But now, it has risen to 6.3 crore. This shows that people are becoming honest. It is very easy to criticise something. But, demonetisation was an attempt to boost the country's economy by increasing the number of tax payers," he said. Over one lakh youths sitting in 312 different locations across Gujarat saw the event live while some of them even asked questions through video-conferencing.

PTI
Naxalism is down, but it is still Indias greatest challenge: Rajnath Singh

FIR against Shah mockery of democracy, says HM, accuses Mamata govt of misusing state machinery

No documents will be asked or biometric taken for NPR: Home Ministry

Wonder why home minister chose not to go to AIIMS but to private hospital: Shashi Tharoor

Kashmir will be freed from menace of terrorism: Rajnath Singh

India

oi-Vikas

By Vikas

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh, who is on a four-day visit to Jammu and Kashmir, on Sunday, said all the police stations in the state will get bullet proof vehicles.

Addressing the state police personnel at the district police lines in Anantnag, the Home Minister said funds have been released for bullet proof jackets for jawans.

"Orders issued for bullet proof vehicles at all police stations in Jammu and Kashmir...Our jawans should also get bullet proof jackets and fund for this has been released," he said.

On behalf of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Rajnath Singh lauded the bravery of police personnel serving in the valley.

"I have PM Narendra Modi's message for you, he appreciated & acknowledged bravery and valour shown by you," he added.

Asserting that he had come with an open mind, Singh said that if anyone has an issue then they should directly talk to the government. He also assured that Kashmir will be freed from the menace of terrorism

Sabse appeal karunga kisi ko agar koi shikwa, shikayat hai to seedha hum se baatcheet karein, mai khule dil se baat karne ko tayyar hoon: HM pic.twitter.com/nRhflCF95u  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

Iss dehshatgardi se Kashmir ko nijaat mil ke rahegi aur phir se humara Kashmir jannat ban ke rahega, duniya ki koi taaqat nahi rok sakti: HM pic.twitter.com/LoXcD3Utwf  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

Singh, later in the day, will also interact with the personnel of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) who have been in the forefront of the anti-terrorist operations in Anantnag.

The Home Minister, who arrived in Srinagar on Saturday, met with Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti.

During the four-day visit, the longest by a home minister in years, Rajnath Singh will travel to Jammu and Rajouri as well as Anantnag in south Kashmir and meet civil society members, leaders of political and social outfits and business leaders.

OneIndia News
Gurgaon school murder: Angry parents stage protest outside school, torch nearby liquor store

India

oi-Vikas

By Vikas

Shaken by the murder of an eight-year-old class 2 student in school, the parents of the students of Gurgaon's Ryan International School staged a protest outside the school and expressed dissatisfaction over the probe.

The agitated parents gathered outside the school and raised slogans against the management. Reports say that some window panes of the school were also damaged.

"Not satisfied with the ongoing investigation, bus conductor being framed. School Management must take responsibility of students' safety," news agency ANI quoted one of the parents, Jyoti, as saying.

"We demand CBI investigation, we want justice for Pradyuman," said another parent.

There have been reports that the staff of the school bus used to consume liquor as there is a liquor shop close to the school. The angry parents set the liquor store ablaze.

#WATCH Locals protesting over death of 7-year-old Pradyuman set ablaze liquor shop close to #RyanInternationalSchool in #Gurugram pic.twitter.com/2gdlPYncTz  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

42-year-old bus conductor Ashok Kumar has been suspected of killing 8-year-old Pradyuman. The cops zeroed in on Ashok after collecting CCTV footage and matching the sequence of the entry and exit of people in the toilet with their statements.

Ashok had been sacked a few months back from a different school for his sexually predatory behaviour. He was a driver with a private school in Ghamroj, his native village near Gurgaon, but was fired from the job after some students complained about his behaviour. The school, about 5-km from Ryan International, did not file a complaint with the police.

Kumar publicly confessed to slitting the throat and killing a Class II student who he tried to sexually abuse inside the toilet at Ryan International in Bhondsi.

On Saturday, the school suspended acting principal Neerja Batra and set up a three-member panel to look into security lapses that led to the young student's murder, which sparked angry protests by parents.

OneIndia News
Gurgaon school murder: Police lathicharge to disperse agitating parents

India

oi-Vikas

By Vikas

As the intensity of protest by parents of students of Gurgaon's Ryan International School grew, the police on Sunday resorted to baton charge to disperse them.

The parents were protesting against the school management over the murder of an 8-year-old class 2 student in school's toilet. The 8-year-old Pradyuman was allegedly murdered by a 42-year-old bus conductor, Ashok Kumar.

Earlier, the angry parents raised slogans against the school management and even damaged some window panes of the school. Some even demanded the closure of the school.

They also set ablaze a nearby liquor store after it was reported in some sections of the media that the school bus staff used to consume liquor while on duty. An India Today report claimed that some empty liquor bottles were also found in the area where school buses are parked.

The parents also demanded a CBI probe into the matter.

Meanwhile, Haryana Health Minister Ram Bilas Sharma said that action will be taken against the management and the owner of Ryan International School in Bhondsi.

"Under section 75 of the Juvenile Act, action will be taken against school mngmnt. Accused will be presented before Court within a week," he said.

"Agar mata-pita jaanch se santusth nahi honge toh kisi bhi agency se Haryana gvt jaanch karane ko tayar hai (If the parents are not satisfied with the probe then we will get the case investigated by any agency)," he added.

On Saturday, the school suspended acting principal Neerja Batra and set up a three-member panel to look into security lapses that led to the young student's murder, which sparked angry protests by parents.

Ashok Kumar has been suspected of killing 8-year-old Pradyuman. The cops zeroed in on Ashok after collecting CCTV footage and matching the sequence of the entry and exit of people in the toilet with their statements.

Ashok had been sacked a few months back from a different school for his sexually predatory behaviour. He was a driver with a private school in Ghamroj, his native village near Gurgaon, but was fired from the job after some students complained about his behaviour. The school, about 5-km from Ryan International, did not file a complaint with the police.

Kumar publicly confessed to slitting the throat and killing a Class II student who he tried to sexually abuse inside the toilet at Ryan International in Bhondsi.

OneIndia News
Nitish Kumar has been affected by his age: Prashant Kishor

Could not care less: Nitish on Amit Shahs jibe

Prashant Kishor claims Nitish Kumar in touch with BJP says don't be surprised if he joins hands with it again

Gurgaon schoolboy murder: Nitish urges Khattar to take strict actions against culprits

India

pti-PTI

Patna, Sep 10: Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar requested his Haryana counterpart Manohar Lal Khattar to take strict actions against culprits of 7-year-old's murder in Gurugram school.

Kumar called up Khattar and also expressed his grief over the incident. The Bihar chief minister directed the Resident Commissioner in Delhi to immediately send officials to Gurugram to meet the grieving family to console them, an official release said.

On the CM's directive, Bihar Director General of Police P K Thakur had a telephonic conversation with his Haryana counterpart and requested him to to take strongest possible action against the culprits in the case, it said.

A clss II student of Ryan International School was found murdered with his throat slit inside a toilet of Ryan International School on Friday, triggering public outrage. A conductor of a school bus was arrested in connection with the murder.

PTI
Gurgaon student murder: Will national registry on sexual offenders help?

India

oi-Anusha

The clamour for a national registry of sexual offenders has resurfaced after the brutal sexual killing of a student in a Gurgaon school. The Union government had assured to maintain a registry in 2016 but nothing ever came out of the same. Given the number of sexual assault cases, will such a registry help? Activists, law enforcement officers are divided over the same.

An online petition by a Gurgaon resident, Jaya Roy on Change.org demands the creation of a National Sex Offender List. " We have no system of recording the serial offenders which can be made available for the public to view and check. This makes them even more fearless. The schools and other commercial institutes have no way of knowing that they are hiring a serial sex offender. The present system of submitting the employee details in the nearest police station has been a failure as there are no checks in terms of a national database," reads the petition addressed to Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh.

petition link: https://www.change.org/p/shri-rajnath-singh-home-minister-government-of-india-create-national-sex-offender-list?recruiter=51158853&utm_source=share_petition&utm_campaign=share_facebook_responsive&utm_medium=whatsapp&utm_content=nafta_whatsapp_sharetext_en_2:real_control

Activists believe that such a registry will help keep offenders away from vulnerable individuals. "Registry will help greatly since there will be a repository of information categorized as central, state and regional-wise. We have to take a cue from other countries. If there is a repository, institutions appointing such persons will be held accountable. It is unfortunate that such a registry has not been mandated. The institutions must be held responsible for the appointments they make and with a registry such as this, they will know who they are hiring," said Brinda Adige, a rights activist based in Bengaluru.

Practical difficulties in maintaining such registry

In other countries where the registry is in practice, it has helped investigators keep track of a repeat offender, flag off alerts, demarcate boundaries where his or her movement can be restricted etc. In India, however, the challenges are different, officials say. "Accused in many cases, including those under POCSO, are first time offenders. The registry only works when someone is a repeat offender. It has to be a case-wise consideration. In the case of repeat offenders, we would even suggest tagging and not just maintain a registry," said Alok Kumar, senior IPS officer who is currently posted in Karnataka.

Practical difficulties also include the possibility of a person's acquittal by court due to lack of evidence. Should a person continue to be on the list of offenders despite not being convicted? Police officers also state instances of where a victim, especially in the case of minors between the age of 3 and 5 years of age, is unable to identify the culprit but 'someone who looks like the predator'. "Should such sensitive information be made public? It should again be a case by case consideration. What if the victim is unable to identify the predator or the accused is a family member? Moreover, in the case of regionality, the place where a sexual predator resides must be made public to ensure safety of those around but think about the challenges that come with it," said another IPS officer.

Proposal in cold storage

The demands for a offenders' registry is not new and the union government, in 2016, had told the Lok Sabha that a proposal to set up Sex Offenders Registry in India was being prepared. A statement from the Ministry of Home Affairs dated May 10, 2016, says that Draft guidelines on the proposal to set up Sex Offenders Registry in India were under preparation in consultation with relevant Ministries and organizations. The same was to be put out for wider consultation with the State Governments and the public.

More than a year later, the proposal is yet to come through. The initial consultation draft was to include the registration of individuals convicted for offenses like rape, voyeurism, stalking and aggravated sexual assault and possibility of registration of offenders below and above 18 years. More than a year later, nothing has come about.

OneIndia News

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Story first published: Sunday, September 10, 2017, 11:02 [IST]
FM Nirmala Sitharaman hints at possibility of Centre considering restoration of state status to J&K

In J&K, 14,000 dropouts find their way back to schools

One Jaish-e-Mohammad terrorist gunned down in Jammu and Kashmir

J&K: Two terrorists killed, another surrenders in a gun battle in Shopian

India

oi-Vikas

By Vikas

Two terrorists were killed by the security forces while another surrendered on Saturday evening in Jammu and Kashmir's Shopian district.

During the overnight gun battle, a terrorist who has been identified as Adil, surrendered along with his AK 47 rifle. Another terrorist was killed in the exchange of fire.

Adil, a resident of Chitipora in Shopian, was immediately whisked away for questioning.

The body of another terrorist identified as Tariq Ahmed Dar was recovered from the encounter site. Dar was involved in many terror related incidents. The terrorists reportedly belonged to Hizbul Mujahideen group.

Police said a joint operation was launched in Barbugh village in Shopian by security forces on Saturday evening after they received a tip-off about the presence of three terrorists.

Earlier on Saturday, a group of heavily armed militants attacked a police party in Jammu and Kashmir's Anantnag district in which one policeman was killed and two others seriously injured. The incident took place barely 500 yards from the venue of Home Minister Rajnath Singh's scheduled meeting on Sunday.

OneIndia News
Jamia student's Rs 35 cr compensation claim rejected by HC

India

pti-PTI

New Delhi, Sep 10: A Jamia Millia Islamia University student's plea claiming a compensation of Rs 35 crore on various grounds has been rejected by the Delhi High Court.

One of the reasons that the student had cited was that the re-evaluation result for an exam, in which he had failed, was not declared on time.

A bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Navin Chawla upheld the single judge's order observing that the "claim for damages on this account is clearly unsustainable and ill-founded".

"As per the result declared in April-May, 2013, the appellant had failed. It was for the appellant to prepare himself for re-examination to be held in January 2014, even if he had applied for re-evaluation. The appellant could not have assumed that he would clear the first year examination held in January 2013 solely because he had applied for re-evaluation. Attending the second year classes would not confer any right to be promoted to the second year," the bench said.

It observed that the student has not questioned that he had failed in the first year annual examination held in January 2013 and January 2014.

"After re-evaluation also, the appellant had been declared as failed. These results are not challenged. In these circumstances, we do not think the plaint, as framed, discloses any cause of action for a suit for damages of Rs 35 crores, which is rather fanciful," the bench added.

It said that to claim damages, loss caused has to be shown along with the causal connection linking the loss with the negligence and errors by the defendants.

"As the appellant had failed, the alleged lapses in the factual matrix would not confer any cause of action in the absence of link and causal connection of the act of negligence with the loss," the bench said.

The student, who had taken admission in the Bachelor of Engineering course, could not pass the re-examination as well. He had contended that he was unable to pass the re- examination due to lack of preparation time as the re- evaluation result, which also declared that he had failed, was delayed.

He had claimed that if he had been informed earlier about his failure in the initial examination through the re- evaluation result, he would have begun preparations for the re-examination sooner. He had also argued that there were some errors in the mark sheets issued to him. A single judge had earlier dismissed the plaint by the student after which he preferred an appeal before the division bench.

PTI
Last year, 13 people died after falling into spaces between trains and platforms in Mumbai, a news report said. Lata Maheshwari was one of the lucky ones.

By India Today Web Desk: A Railway Police Force (RPF) officer saved a senior citizen from falling in the crevice between a moving train and a platform at Nalasopara railway station, news reports said.

The officer rushed to the rescue of Lata Maheshwari, who lost her balance while trying to get into a train headed for Churchgate in Mumbai, the Times of India reported.

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It could have all gone so terribly wrong. The TOI report said that before the RPF officer came to Maheshwari's aid, the "lower part of her body was hanging between the train and platform gap," and that she was "dragged around 20 feet."

In the end, she only suffered "minor bruises," the report said.

A man who tried to board a train at Mumbai's Borivali station in very similar circumstances just weeks ago, wasn't quite so lucky.

The 40-year-old fell between the platform and the Ahmedabad-bound Gujarat Mail, and was killed, the Mumbai Mirror reported.

Last year, as many as 13 people died after falling into spaces between trains and platforms in Mumbai, the Hindustan Times reported citing data obtained by Sameer Jhaveri, an activist.

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Mumbai rains: Pregnant journalist braves 12-hour train journey amid utter chaos

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Torrential rains in Mumbai paralyse rail, road transport services; high tide alert issued

--- ENDS ---
Man booked for rape of 12-year-old after video of injured girl surfaces on internet

Man rapes 8-year-old to use her blood for removing obstacles to his marriage

Magisterial inquiry ordered into rape of 5-year-old girl in Delhi school

India

oi-Vikas

By Vikas

The Delhi Government on Sunday ordered a magisterial inquiry into the alleged rape of a five-year-old-girl in a school in the national capital's Shahdara area.

The government has sought a report from the SDM within three-days.

Delhi Revenue Minister Kailash Gahlot took to Twitter to inform this.

In a heinous crime, a five-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a peon inside the premises of a private school in Shahdara in East Delhi.

The accused, identified as Vikas, has been arrested, said Nupur Prasad, Deputy Commissioner of Police, Shahdara.

Vikas had been working in the school for the last three years. Previously he worked as a security guard there, the police said. He took the girl inside an empty classroom around noon on Saturday when he was walking on the corridors after handing over lunch boxes to teachers, the police said.

After raping the girl, he threatened her of dire consequences, they added. The girl later complained of bleeding and pain in her private parts to her mother. She was taken to a hospital where her medical examination confirmed sexual assault, the police said. Traumatised by the incident, the 5-year-old was sent for counselling.

According to the police, the child said during counselling that she was assaulted by "a man wearing a cap" and also described his physical attributes. It was on the basis of this description that Vikas was nabbed, the police said

OneIndia News with PTI inputs

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Story first published: Sunday, September 10, 2017, 15:01 [IST]
Ryan school protest: Opposition slams Haryana government over attack on media

India

oi-Vikas

By Vikas

The Haryana Government drew major flak from the opposition parties after police resorted to baton charge to disperse the protesters outside Gurgaon's Ryan International School, in which some media persons were injured.

The parents of students of Ryan International School were protesting over the murder of an 8-year-old student at the school. The angry protestors torched a nearby liquor store and damaged a few window panes of the school.

Police resorted to lathicharge to disperse the agitators in which some media persons of news agency ANI were also injured.

The father of Pradyuman, a class 2 student who was murdered in the school toilet, appealed to the agitators to not get involved in violence.

"Want to request all parents who are supporting us that please do not get involved in violence....Police is doing its job, request a parallel CBI inquiry so that every detail related to the case is revealed," Pradyuman's father Varun Thakur said.

Political parties lashed out at the Haryana Government over the attack on media.

"Attack on media is condemnable. In a democracy, governments do not work with lathis and bullets...Media is one of the pillars of democracy and raises concerns of the people, it should not be suppressed like that," former Haryana Chief Minister and Congress leader Bhupinder Singh Hooda said.

[Gurgaon school murder: Police lathicharge to disperse agitating parents]

CPI's D Raja also condemned the attack and said, "Haryana police gaining notoriety of attacking the media, it happened even during Dera agitation."

Congress leader Randeep Surjewala demanded an apology from Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar.

"We demand apology from CM Khattar and action against policemen responsible for the attack," he told ANI.

OneIndia News
Senior Dera Sacha Sauda functionary held, search on for Honeypreet continues

India

pti-PTI

Chandigarh, Sep 10: Haryana police have arrested Govind, a member of the state body of the Dera Sacha Sauda, Sirsa, for allegedly inciting violence on August 25 in Panchkula after sect chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh was convicted in rape case.

Meanwhile, efforts continued to trace the Dera chief's adopted daughter Honeypreet Insan, against whom a lookout notice was issued earlier. Govind, a senior member of the Dera Sacha Sauda, was present at the Hafed Chowk, the epicentre of the violence in Panchkula on August 25, the police said today, adding that he has been accused of inciting violence.

"We arrested him from Zirakpur," Panchkula Police Commissioner, A S Chawla said today. Chawla added that the police were still looking for two key Dera Sacha Sauda functionaries, Honeypreet and Aditya Insan. "We are at the job and hopeful of nabbing them soon," he said. The Haryana police had earlier sent a team to Lakhimpur Kheri in Uttar Pradesh bordering Nepal in search of Honeypreet, a close confidante of the self-styled godman who is serving a 20-year-old jail term for raping two disciples. The police had on September 1 issued a lookout notice for Honeypreet and Aditya, fearing that they could flee the country.

"We are conducting raids at various places and our teams have gone to different areas to trace them," Chawla said. Earlier, Dera Sacha Sauda management too had appealed to the two to cooperate with the police. Sirsa-headquartered Dera chairperson Vipassana Insan had said that Honeypreet and Dera spokesperson Aditya Insan should help the investigations.

She had claimed that the Dera had no contact with them. Chawla said the police initiated efforts to trace Honeypreet, the adopted daughter of Ram Rahim Singh, who describes herself as "Papa's angel", after it arrested and questioned another sect functionary, Surinder Dhiman Insan, in connection with an alleged conspiracy to help Ram Rahim escape after his conviction by the special CBI court in Panchkula.

Chawla said that police needs to question Honeypreet regarding the disclosures made by Surinder Dhiman and some other arrested accused. He said that an FIR was earlier lodged at the Panchkula police station following a statement by a newspaper reporter against Aditya and Surinder Dhiman.

The duo have been booked for sedition. Violence broke out in Panchkula after the Dera chief's conviction, leaving 35 dead, while six others were killed in incidents in Sirsa.

Two key functionaries of Dera Sacha Sauda were also arrested on Friday for allegedly inciting violence in Panchkula. Chamkaur Singh, the incharge of Dera Sacha Sauda centre at Panchkula and Daan Singh, another key functionary, were nabbed by the police. Both were arrested in connection with the violence that took place in Panchkula on August 25, the police said.

The 50-year-old Dera chief, who is lodged in the Sunaria Jail in Rohtak, had been sentenced to 20 years of imprisonment by the CBI court for the 2002 rapes of two of his disciples.

Earlier, five Haryana policemen, who were part of Ram Rahim's security when he travelled from Sirsa to the CBI court on August 25, were charged with sedition and dismissed from service over the alleged conspiracy to help him escape.

Honeypreet had accompanied Ram Rahim when he was brought to the special court for the pronouncement of the verdict in the 15-year-old rape cases. She also travelled with him in a chopper which ferried them to Rohtak from Panchkula after the conviction.

Honeypreet acted in the film 'MSG 2 - The Messenger' and had a cameo role in 'MSG - The Warrior Lion Heart', in which the Dera chief played the lead roles. Officials of the Uttar Pradesh police also said today that Honeypreet's photographs were pasted at police stations bordering Nepal and the law and order machinery was on an alert to ensure she does not sneak into the neighbouring country.

PTI
Siddaganga mutt seer backs separate religious tag for Lingayats

India

oi-Anusha

The pontiff of the largest and the most influential Lingayat mutt in Karnataka, Sri Sri Sri Sivakumara Swamiji, has backed the community's fight for a separate religious tag. Karnataka Water Resources Minister M B Patil on Sunday claimed that the 110-year-old seer had 'blessed the movement'.

"I met the seer of Siddaganga mutt and informed him of the fight for a separate religious tag. He said that Lingayatism should be a separate religion and gave his consent to the movement. He, in clear terms, has said that Veerashaiva and Lingayats are different," M B Patil claimed. Patil is one of the prominent promoters of the movement to seek religious status for Lingayats and differentiate it from Veerashaivas.

Lingayats are long since believed to be the largest community in Karnataka, are BJP state chief B S Yeddyurappa's primary vote bank. Leaked statistics from the caste census says that Lingayat population is below 10 per cent, Vokkaliga around 8 per cent in the state. Nearly 55 per cent of Karnataka's population is from the backward classes. Lingayats are hoping to receive a separate religious status with backward class categorization.

Sivakumara Swamiji's consent is bound to have political ramifications, analysts say. Congress leaders like Patil have been taking the movement forward while the BJP chose to "let the community decide". Analysts believe that the development will dent the BJP's chances in next years polls.

"The Congress never intended to distance itself from the movement and now they have what they wanted. They wanted to break the BJP's massive vote share from the community in North Karnataka and Sunday's development will pave the way for the same. Siddaramaiah has hit two birds with a single stone," said Harish Ramaswamy, political analyst, and professor with Karnatak University.

He added that Siddaramaiah does not, at least for now, have to bother about another BJP leader claiming the support of entire communities, at least the large ones.

OneIndia News
40 down and counting: Forces on the verge of wiping out Pakistani terrorists in Valley

Mubin did it in Coimbatore: Why do Islamist terrorists shave their body before a suicide mission

Terrorists may smuggle toxic gases into planes, trains, warns IB

India

oi-Vicky

By Vicky

A high alert has been sounded following an Intelligence Bureau alert that suggests attacks on aircrafts. The alert states that terror groups will try to release toxic gases on airlines following which a high alert was issued.

The alert has been sounded in the cases of trains and buses as well. Following the alert the Ministry for Home Affairs issued a directive to all states to up security at airports, bus stands and railway stations. In its advisory, the MHA has said that central agencies had intimated that terrorists were looking to carry out strikes against commercial aviation targets.

The MHA also said that terrorists could use toxic gases to carry out the attack. Terrorists may look to smuggle in the toxic gases disguised as medication and hence security should be increased, the MHA also said.

OneIndia News
Odisha: Two killed as truck hits motorbike in Bhadrak

Biryani feast during Solar Eclipse: Rationalist leader served legal notice, another gets threat call

Govt offices, schools and colleges in Bhubaneswar to remain shut after 1pm tomorrow for Prez visit

Bhubaneswar Flyover collapse: 1 killed; 2 engineers suspended

India

oi-Vikas

By Vikas

One person was killed and 11 injured after a portion of an under construction flyover collapsed in Odisha's capital Bhubaneswar on Sunday. The mishap took place

Five people are believed to be trapped under the debris. Rescue efforts are underway to rescue them.

The mishap occurred around 12.30 pm and many of the injured people are workers who were involved in the construction of the flyover. The injured were rushed to Capital Hospital in Bhubaneswar.

One of the deceased has been identified as one 40-year-old Satya Patnaik from Bhubaneswar. His daughter is also said to injured in the incident.

10 fire tenders, three units of ODRAF have launched a massive search and rescue operation at the spot, said reports.

Meanwhile, Odisha CM N Patnaik announced Rs 5 lakh ex-gratia for family of deceased person, free treatment for injured people.

Patnaik further said that two engineers have been suspended, high-level inquiry ordered.

OneIndia News
Myanmar: Rohingya rebels declares one-month ceasefire as exodus

International

pti-PTI

Sep 10: Myanmar on Sunday rebuffed a ceasefire declared by Muslim Rohingya insurgents to enable the delivery of aid to thousands of displaced people in the violence-racked state of Rakhine, declaring simply that it did not negotiate with terrorists.

The United Nations said 2,94,000 bedraggled and exhausted Rohingya refugees have arrived in Bangladesh since the militants' attacks on Myanmar security forces in neighbouring Rakhine state on August 25 triggered a major military backlash. Bangladesh's foreign minister said today that "genocide" was being waged in Rakhine state.

Tens of thousands of Rohingya are believed to be on the move inside Rakhine after more than a fortnight without shelter, food and water. "The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) hereby declares a temporary cessation of offensive military operations," the militant group said in a statement on its Twitter account. It urged "all humanitarian actors" to resume aid delivery to "all victims of humanitarian crisis irrespective of ethnic or religious background" during the one-month ceasefire until October 9.

International aid programmes in Rakhine have been severely curtailed over safety concerns due to the fighting. In addition to Rohingya, some 27,000 ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and Hindus have also fled violence in northern Rakhine. ARSA called on Myanmar to "reciprocate this humanitarian pause" in fighting.

Myanmar, which has previously labelled ARSA as "terrorists", appeared to reject the overture. "We have no policy to negotiate with terrorists," Zaw Htay, a senior government spokesman, tweeted late today. Aung San Suu Kyi's government has come in for strong international criticism over the military's treatment of the Rohingya -- including the alleged laying of mines along the border to prevent those who fled from returning. Three Rohingya are reported to have been killed by a mine and others including children have been injured. Rohingya refugees say army operations against ARSA led to mass killing of civilians and the burning of villages, sending them across the border. Mainly Buddhist Myanmar does not recognise its stateless Muslim Rohingya community, labelling them "Bengalis".

Bangladesh foreign minister A.H. Mahmood Ali accused Myanmar of running a "malicious propaganda" campaign to term the Rohingya as "illegal migrants from Bangladesh" and the militants as "Bengali terrorists". "Should all people be killed? Should all villages be burnt? It is not acceptable," he told reporters after briefing diplomats in Dhaka today.

"The international community is saying it is a genocide. We also say it is a genocide," he said. Members of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) gathered in Kazakhstan's capital Astana today expressed "serious concern about recent systematic brutal acts committed by the armed forces" in Myanmar, calling for international monitors to be accepted into the country. India's foreign ministry called for an immediate end to the violence, urging the situation "be handled with restraint and maturity".

Thousands are arriving in Bangladesh each day, joining overcrowded camps of Rohingya who have fled Myanmar over decades of troubles. The UN has appealed for urgent donations of USD 77 million. Bangladesh already hosts around 4,00,000 Rohingya from previous crises. The Red Cross in Bangladesh welcomed the ceasefire pledge as aid agencies struggle to meet the needs of an "overwhelming crisis".

"How can you handle such a big influx of people? They want shelter, they want a safe place," Misada Saif, Prevention and Communication Coordinator of the ICRC Bangladesh delegation, told AFP. Cradling her naked screaming infant, Rohingya refugee Zohra Begum was close to tears as several hundred people were ordered to leave a strip of forest alongside the beach near Shamlapur, where families were clearing land with hoes to build shelters. "We went to all the camps but there was no place to stay. That's why we came here," she told AFP.

"If we have to move from here, where will we go? We will die." Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh say ethnic Rakhine Buddhists joined Myanmar's security forces in the indiscriminate killing of villagers. But ethnic Rakhine villagers accuse militants of murdering civilians while the government says fleeing Rohingya set fire to their own homes to foment anger against the authorities. At the makeshift camp near Shamlapur, Rohingya refugees doubted a ceasefire would allow their return.

"They (Myanmar army) are saying 'go away or we'll burn all of you'. How can we believe a ceasefire will have any effect?" Hafez Ahmed, 60, told AFP. But Hashem Ullah, a 33-year-old farmer from a village west of Maungdaw, said he would return "if I got compensation, and they accept us as Rohingya". "How can we live like this here?" he added, gesturing to the swampy earth. ARSA says it is fighting to defend the Rohingya from persecution in Myanmar. But Myanmar labels them "extremist Bengali terrorists".

The army says it has killed nearly 400 militants, while some Rohingya refugees say they were forced to fight by ARSA. The first ARSA attacks in October last year were less ambitious, but the subsequent military response by a security force notorious for its scorched-earth response sent 90,000 Rohingya fleeing across the border. That means over a third of the estimated 1.1 million Rohingya in Rakhine state have fled in less than a year.

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Officials today finished searching and sanitizing the mammoth Dera Sacha Sauda headquarters in Sirsa. A number of recoveries, including those of human skeletons and an illegal explosives factory, have been made.

By India Today Web Desk: The mammoth task of sanitising the Dera Sacha Sauda headquarters in Sirsa came to an end today evening. Internet and mobile services in Sirsa, which had been suspended during the operation, will resume from Monday, and a curfew that was earlier in place was relaxed Sunday evening.

Authorities will now turn their focus to taking stock of the recoveries made from Gurmeet Ram Rahim's controversial ashram in order to submit a report to the court.

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The search was being conducted under the supervision of AKS Pawar appointed by the Punjab and Haryana High Court. Forty-one paramilitary companies, four Army columns, cops from as many districts, a SWAT team, and a dog squad have been deployed for the search of the Dera headquarters.

Meanwhile, Gurmeet Ram Rahim's adopted daughter Honeypreet Insan, against whom a lookout notice has been issued, is still missing.

ALL THAT THE POLICE RECOVERED FROM THE DERA HQ

HUMAN SKELETONS

A day before the massive search and evacuation operation was to commence at the Dera den in Sirsa, the Dera mouthpiece- Sach Kahoon published a report on 'body donation'. It read how Gurmeet Ram Rahim asked followers to donate dead bodies, so as to avoid their cremation or immersion in Ganga, for environment conservation.

Haryana Police did dig up some skeletons and soon clamour followed over the bodies being those of 'dissenters', who were mercilessly killed by Ram Rahim's followers.

According to another report, the devotees were made to take the 'body donation pledge' which meant that there body could be used for medical research.

ILLEGAL EXPLOSIVES FACTORY

An illegal explosives factory was found operating inside the Dera headquarters, that was sealed and tonnes of crackers seized alongwith.

SECRET TUNNEL

A window-like tunnel connecting Ram Rahim's room (Dera Awas) to the room of Sadhvis (female devotees). Another fiber tunnel was also found inside Ram Rahim's room. On the second floor of the same room, the search team found an AK-47 magazine cover.

DERA CURRENCY

The self-appointed Godman, was also an acting RBI in himself, with a separate currency being used inside the headquarters to purchase and avail goods and services.

So far, two such coins have been found to be in vogue in the Dera campus. With denominations of Re 1 and Rs 10, the currency comes in two eye-catching colours - blue and orange.

One side of the coin carries symbols of all the four major religions in India - Hinduism, Islam, Christianity and Sikhism.

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The words 'Dhan Dhan Satguru Tera Hi Aasra, Dera Sacha Sauda Sirsa' are inscribed on them.

LUXURY CAR

A luxurious Lexus car without a number plate and an OB (Outside Broadcasting) van was found as well, that has been sent to police headquarters for investigation.

READYMADE GARMENTS FACTORY

Ram Rahim's adopted daughter Honeypreet Insan was running a ready-made garments factory under the name- MSG Fashion Mart (Messenger of God Fashion Mart). 1500 pairs of shoes and innumerable designer apparel has been seized in addition.

UNLABELLED MEDICINES, OLD CURRENCY

A huge amount of medicines without labels or brands have been found in addition to some old currency notes and hard drives.

Also read: After investments in Dera Sacha Sauda sect crashes down, follower commits suicide

Also read: Dera ashram search an eyewash? Weapons already moved out: Witnesses

Also read: Gurmeet Ram Rahim to run Dera Sacha Sauda from jail, Honeypreet has no role

Also Watch: Search operation ends in Dera HQ, court commissioner to submit report in HC soon

--- ENDS ---
Mediaite 28 Sep 2022

Twenty Cuban migrants are missing after their vessel sank Wednesday as they attempted to reach the U.S. during Hurricane Ian,..
The father of a seven-year-old boy murdered at the Ryan International School claimed that the investigation into the killing was being influenced and that the school was attempting to hide something. The family of the murdered boy plans to approach the Supreme Court in order to request a CBI probe.

Protests at the Ryan International School in Gurgaon over the murder of a 7-year-old boy turned violent today with police having to resort to lathi-charge (PTI photo)

By India Today Web Desk: In a dramatic late-night development, the father of a seven-year-old boy found murdered at the Ryan International School in Gurgaon, claimed that the institution was trying to hide something and that police investigation into the killing was being influenced at the behest of "someone who does not want the trust to come out."

The boy's family said they plan to approach the Supreme Court demanding a Central Bureau of Investigation probe into the boy's murder, for which Gurgaon Police has arrested a school bus conductor. The conductor, Ashok Kumar, confessed to killing the seven-year-old boy when the latter tried to resist an attempt of sexual assault, police said on Friday after announcing the arrest.

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Meanwhile, the CEO of Ryan International Group, Ryan Pinto, broke his silence on the matter, saying, in a statement, that the "reprehensible crime" was shocking and that the group takes all efforts to ensure the security of its students.

RYAN SCHOOLBOY MURDER: TOP DEVELOPMENTS

We are going to Supreme Court tomorrow and have prepared our petition: Sushil Tekriwal, Relative #RyanInternationalSchool pic.twitter.com/hEbTAvMmV5- ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017 The father of the 7-year-old murdered boy Sunday night alleged that Ryan International School was hiding something and that the investigation was being influenced. "I don't think it is that simple and easy to murder a kid in a school washroom," Varun Thakur, the father said. "I want [a] CBI inquiry... [the] school is trying to hide something...," Thakur said. "I think investigation is being influenced by someone who does not want the truth to come out." Haryana Education Minister Ram Bilas Sharma had earlier indicated that his government was not averse to ordering a CBI probe into the murder. The father of the 7-year-old murdered boy Sunday night alleged that Ryan International School was hiding something and that the investigation was being influenced. "I don't think it is that simple and easy to murder a kid in a school washroom," Varun Thakur, the father said. "I want [a] CBI inquiry... [the] school is trying to hide something...," Thakur said. "I think investigation is being influenced by someone who does not want the truth to come out." Haryana Education Minister Ram Bilas Sharma had earlier indicated that his government was not averse to ordering a CBI probe into the murder. Late Sunday night, Ryan Pinto, the CEO of Ryan International Group of Institution, broke his silence on the issue, saying in a statement, "Ryan International school is facing one of its saddest periods since its inception. Due to the loss of life of one of innocent students as a result of reprehensible crime we are all in shock by the horror of this crime that occurred despite various security protocols. On behalf of entire school students, staff and the management we want to extend our heart-felt condolences to the family... We are cooperating to our fullest with the police investigations... We want to reassure all our parents across the nation that the well-being and safety of our students is our priority." Click here to Enlarge Strong police presence was seen at Gurgaon's Ryan International School where protests over a 7-year-old boy's murder turned violent today (PTI photo) Sunday evening, Gurgaon Deputy Commissioner Vinay Pratap Singh recommended action against Ryan International School on the basis of a report submitted by a three-member panel that found security lapses on part of the school. The report found deficiencies in the installation of CCTV cameras and found that the school lacked separate toilets for staff like drivers and conductors. The three-member panel, on visiting the Gurgaon school, also found it had a broken boundary wall and expired fire extinguishers. Crucially, the panel found that Ryan International School had failed to carry out a police verification of its employees. Earlier in the day, Haryana education minister Ram Bilas Sharma said that a case has been registered against the management and owners of Ryan International School under provisions of the Juvenile Justice Act. Sharma said that it was the responsibility of the school management to keep students safe inside the school premises, but they failed to do so. Meanwhile, protests at the Ryan School International today turned violent, with Gurgaon Police having to resort to lathi-charge to control angry parents. The protestors alleged that school drivers and conductors often consume alcohol from the liquor shop in their free time. A liquor shop, situated just 50 metres from the school, was set ablaze and some of the demonstrators threw liquor bottles inside school premises to vent their ire against the school management, police said. Click here to Enlarge Angry protestors set ablaze a liquor shop located near the Ryan International School in Gurgaon, where a 7-year-old boy was murdered last week (PTI photo) Police used batons to quell the protest and detained 20 protestors. Cameras of some photojournalists were also damaged during the protest. "The Gurgaon Police had to use mild lathicharge to disperse the agitators. The police detained over 20 protestors found agitating outside the school," said Ravinder Kumar, PRO of Gurgaon Police. Gurgaon Police Commissioner Sandeep Khirwar, however, denied the charges of mediapersons being targeted by the cops, according to news agency PTI. However, Chief Minister Manohal Lal Khattar seemingly accepted that the media may have been attacked during the police action against protestors. "It [the attack on media] is unfortunate, shouldn't have happened. Directing action against policemen responsible for it," CM Khattar told news agency ANI. "Have always been a supporter of media's freedom of speech. Medical treat will be given to injured journalists and losses will be compensated," Khattar added. #WATCH Locals protesting over death of 7-year-old Pradyuman set ablaze liquor shop close to #RyanInternationalSchool in #Gurugram pic.twitter.com/2gdlPYncTz- ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017 One of the chief demands of the protestors was that the school be shut down until a CBI probe is ordered into the seven-year-old boy's murder. There were also demands from some quarter that Ryan International School be entirely derecognised, a request that Education Minister Ram Bilas Sharma said was impractical. "We held a meeting today in which the demand to derecognise the school came up, but we also had to take into account the fact that 1,200 students are studying there. The parents of the students studying in this school were against this step and, therefore, we felt taking such a step will not be right," Sharma said. One of the chief demands of the protestors was that the school be shut down until a CBI probe is ordered into the seven-year-old boy's murder. There were also demands from some quarter that Ryan International School be entirely derecognised, a request that Education Minister Ram Bilas Sharma said was impractical. "We held a meeting today in which the demand to derecognise the school came up, but we also had to take into account the fact that 1,200 students are studying there. The parents of the students studying in this school were against this step and, therefore, we felt taking such a step will not be right," Sharma said. In a related development, the family of Ashok Kumar, the arrested bus conductor, said that he was being framed and has been "pressurized to give wrong statements." "School principal has bribed the police," his sister told news agency ANI, while Kumar's father said, "My son is innocent, he is just being framed; all this because of the school." A similar sentiment was expressed by at least one parent, identified as Jyoti, who told ANI, "Not satisfied with the ongoing investigation, the bus conductor is being framed. School management must take responsibility of students' safety." Click here to Enlarge Policemen look inside the washroom where a 7-year-old boy was found murdered on Friday (PTI photo) The seven-year-old boy was found with his throat slit in a washroom inside Ryan International School Friday morning. The child was rushed to a hospital where he was declared brought dead. Later in the day, Gurgaon Police said they arrested Ashok Kumar, a bus conductor employed by the school, for the boy's murder. The conductor confessed to killing to boy after attempting to sexually assault him, police said.

ALSO READ | Ryan murder case: 5 unanswered questions after 3 days of police probe

ALSO READ | Beyond Ryan International School murder: How safe are children in India

ALSO WATCH | Ryan murder: Haryana education minister assures speedy justice

--- ENDS ---
As Miss America contestants perfect their walk and talk, some have been voicing their views about President Donald Trump's recent move to rescind the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

The program, which President Barack Obama instituted by executive order in 2012, prevented the deportation of undocumented children and adults who were brought to the United States before June 15, 2007, before they turned 16. Under the Trump administration, the program is set to come to an end in March.

"I was a little bit upset when I heard that it was going to go to Congress and have a six-month delay," Miss New Jersey, Kaitlyn Schoeffel, tells NJ Advance Media.

"I truly believe that we should keep the executive order that President Obama instated because I think that those 800,000 children, students and workers, because of their circumstance, should not be punished because their parents came here illegally," says Schoeffel, 24, a dancer, magician's assistant and graduate of Montclair State University from Egg Harbor Township. "They had nothing to do with that, so we shouldn't punish them. However I definitely, definitely believe that there needs to be reform in the immigration system so that those children don't have to stay here illegally and we can easily help them find a way to ensure their security here in this country so the next presidential election, they don't have to be afraid to have someone take away those rights."

Miss Oregon, Harley Emery, says she knows people who are in the U.S. under the DACA program and says she considers it "devastating" that they would be kicked out of the country.

"Ending DACA is just heartbreaking," says Emery, 20, of Springfield, Oregon, an aspiring diplomat. "Because the people who are affected by it are primarily youth and college-age people who are coming here and being educated and contributing to society and I think that these aren't the kind of people who we want to kick out of our country. These are the kind of people who are going to be the next Bill Gates, the next, you know, founders of large corporations and they're contributing so much."

Emery, whose pageant platform is "Intercultural Community Building," which encourages a welcoming attitude towards immigrants, majors in international studies and journalism at the University of Oregon, with minors in Arabic, political science and geography. She grew up in Washington D.C. and interned with the U.S. State Department's Virtual Student Federal Service program, through which she co-founded a branch of No Lost Generation, a student advocacy group at the University of Oregon that focuses on spreading awareness of the refugee crisis and educational opportunities for young refugees.

Miss Wisconsin, McKenna Collins, also has some experience with government, having interned for House Speaker Paul Ryan. The former dancer with the Madison Ballet says she'll speak with Ryan this month about her pageant platform, "Table Talk: Promoting Civil Discourse," which encourages Americans to "reach across the aisle." (She prides herself on being a member of both the College Republicans and College Democrats.)

"It's disheartening and it's disappointing to think that hundreds of thousands of innocent children who didn't break the law are going to be deprived of chance and opportunity in America," says Collins, 21, of Waunakee, Wisconsin, a political science and communications major at the University of Wisconsin who aspires to earn a law degree and work in congressional policy on Capitol Hill.

"Going forward, I would like to see Congress, the legislature, work on creating a safe, legal path to immigration," she says.

Amy Kuperinsky may be reached at akuperinsky@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @AmyKup or on Facebook.
By Barbara Marquand, NerdWallet

Thanks to advances in screening and treatment, life insurance is available more quickly and at better rates for breast cancer survivors than ever before.

If you've come out the other side of this harrowing disease, you have a good chance of qualifying for coverage.

"Many breast cancer survivors will qualify for coverage, some immediately after treatment, and others after a few years," says Dr. Valerie Kaufman, vice president and chief medical director at MassMutual.

What has changed?

Life insurers have offered coverage to breast cancer survivors for many years. MassMutual has done so since 1964. But now many more survivors can qualify today than even just a decade ago.

"At a time when treatment has improved, better screening and earlier detection of breast cancer has increased the number of individuals whose cancer is found when treatment is more likely to be successful," Kaufman says.

In addition, she says, medical advances have enabled life insurance companies to gauge risk in a more comprehensive way for different breast cancer scenarios. That's resulted in more rating categories as well as shorter waiting periods and lower premiums in many cases.

Whether you qualify for coverage immediately and how much you pay for life insurance depend on a variety of factors, and each person's situation is unique.

"It's not a one-size-fits-all deal," says Jeff Root, founder of independent life insurance agency Rootfin based in Austin, Texas.

Root, who specializes in helping people with health issues find coverage, says the most important factors life insurers consider for breast cancer are:

The type of breast cancer

The stage and grade of the cancer

When the cancer was diagnosed and when treatment ended

How the cancer was treated, such as lumpectomy, mastectomy, chemotherapy, radiation or other methods

Whether there was any metastasis or any lymph node involvement

The lower the stage, the lower the grade, the longer amount of time since treatment ended, the better chance you have at qualifying for coverage at lower rates, Root says.

Preferred rates  the best possible for life insurance  are available in some instances. At MassMutual, Kaufman says, customers with noninvasive cancer (stage 0), "favorable risk markers" and appropriate treatment may qualify for preferred rates.

Others may qualify for preferred rates several to 20 years after completion of successful treatment, she says, and those who may not qualify for the best rates may qualify for standard  the usual  rates.

Root says that in some cases, life insurers attach a temporary extra charge to standard rates for a certain number of years. This is called a "flat extra." You might qualify for standard rates plus a $5 flat extra per $1,000 of coverage for five years. On a $100,000 life insurance policy, you would pay $500 a year on top of the standard rate for the first five years of the policy.

Preparing to buy

Don't despair if you get turned down for coverage by one company. The underwriting process varies among insurers, which is why it's so important to get quotes from different carriers.

Root suggests working with an independent life insurance agent who has experience working with clients in your situation. An impaired risk specialist is an insurance professional who focuses on helping people with health conditions or risky hobbies or livelihoods buy coverage.

"There are so many variables with breast cancer," he says. "A lot of agents don't know what to ask."

When you apply for coverage, be prepared to list all your doctors and their contact information, Root says. This will help the process move more quickly, so the insurance company won't have to come back and ask for more information. A copy of your pathology report will help the agent gather prequalified quotes on your behalf. These are quotes based on your information without your name attached. The quotes insurance companies provide are binding if you decide to buy, unless other information comes to light.

Fear not

Finally, don't be afraid to apply for life insurance.

"The most important thing that we cannot stress enough is that in dition to taking every precaution to protect your health, do the same to protect your financial health for yourself and your loved ones," Kaufman says. "Do not put off your mammogram, and do not put off your financial planning and preparedness for life's curveballs."

Barbara Marquand is a staff writer at NerdWallet, a personal finance website.
By Jenn Director Knudsen, Special to The Oregonian/Oregonlive

Breast cancer can be a difficult topic to talk about, but one Portland-area program is using the pews to get the word to African American women about diagnosis and prevention.

Cancer is the No. 1 killer of African Americans in this country. Among African-American women, breast cancer is the most common cancer diagnosed and is the second most common cause of cancer death (exceeded only by lung cancer). Breast cancer deaths are more than 40 percent higher in black women than in their white counterparts.

"African American women tend to be diagnosed at an earlier age and with a more aggressive form of breast cancer (known as triple-negative), and they are more likely to die from the disease than white women," said Cindy Fletcher, director of programs at Susan G. Komen Oregon and SW Washington.

Several years ago, Komen Oregon and SW Washington transformed its Pink Sunday initiative into greater Portland's own Worship in Pink. The program, which is open to all congregations and faiths, continues to expand its programming and reach, including into barber shops and salons.

Worship in Pink has nine pilot churches in the African American community and counts 24 partner churches in Multnomah, Washington, Clackamas, and Clark counties. Education programs, activities, and health fairs occur throughout October.

"Churches are where people congregate," said Dr. Nathalie Johnson, the medical director of Legacy Cancer Institute. She is also a breast-cancer survivor and active member of Mt. Olivet Baptist Church in North Portland.

"It's been so moving to watch Worship in Pink function in the community," said Johnson, who helped launch the outreach program here in 2011, when she was on the local Komen affiliate's board. Komen Atlanta held the first Worship in Pink event in 2004.

As in many communities, barriers remain for women, as well as men, seeking information about breast health. Trained educators in the African American churches, called Ambassadors, say there's an ongoing lack of trust in health-care institutions and a culture of keeping health talk and concerns to oneself.

Oct. 7 event

Worship in Pink is hosting a free event on Oct. 7, at Maranatha Church, 4222 N.E. 12th Ave., Portland. The Tuality Healthcare mobile mammography van will be onsite from 8:45 a.m. to 3 p.m. Pre-registration is required for mammograms by Oct. 2: komenoregon.org or 503-552-9160. The event, Health Matters, will provide health screenings and information at the church from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.

"Culturally, black people in the church and in community did not talk about health issues or family history," said Kathy Kendrix, business owner and Worship in Pink project manager. She has been instrumental in expanding Worship in Pink and training its growing number of Ambassadors.



"In families, people would just say, 'Oh, she passed. Of what?' We never knew," Kendrix said. "Families didn't talk about it."



But thanks to Worship in Pink, this long-held cultural tradition is changing, Kendrix and others say.



Ida Shepherd, a great-grandmother and member of North Portland-based St. Paul Missionary Baptist Church, says breast health never was a conversation topic in her family.



Her friend, fellow congregant, and Worship in Pink Ambassador, Cynthia Monk, spent years encouraging Shepherd to get screened for breast cancer. She finally went last year, at age 87, and confesses the exam wasn't as bad as she thought it would be.



"I kept dragging my feet," she said, but was so relieved to learn she did not have breast cancer. Now she's become an informal ambassador, cajoling fellow churchgoers, "Don't be like me and wait so long."



Monk, a nurse, counts her passion and enthusiasm for women's health generally, and breast wellness specifically, as among the gifts she gives to her church community. She adds that supportive clergy, such as St. Paul's pastor, Craig Brown, and his wife, Angela Brown, are key to Worship in Pink success.



"One of the first things we have to do as pastors is help (church members) with their health," said Brown. He says he urges his congregants to take excellent care of one another and themselves.



"Life is short," he said. "We're not going to live forever, but that doesn't mean we have to go out in suffering."
BY STEVE SCHELL

Nearly 300,000 vehicles cross the Columbia River in a day. A little less than half cross on Interstate 5. Recently, commute times have soared and rush hour speeds have dropped dramatically.

A C-Tran bus used to be able to travel from Fisher's Landing on the Washington side to downtown Portland in 26 minutes. It now takes 40. Drivers on State Route 500 in Vancouver headed to Jantzen Beach could make the trip in about six minutes. It now takes 20. Many commuters find themselves stuck in traffic for an hour or more in either direction.

Almost every hour that people are parked or delayed on a freeway because they can't cross the bridge is an hour lost from the work force or their families.

The economic argument is clear. As the 25th largest area by population in the United States, the Portland-Vancouver area is in competition with similar regions -- both domestically and internationally -- for effective production and distribution of goods and services. Having a large portion of our work force doing nothing but waiting and having freight movement paralyzed because of F-level congestion, affects our advantage by making goods and services more expensive.

Those lost hours in traffic mean missing out on children's or grandchildren's events as well as just spending time together with families. If the family remains the cornerstone of our culture, ignoring the congestion problem is a public sin resting on the shoulders of our current legislators in both states.

In 2014, three Senators in the Washington Legislature killed the Columbia River Crossing project, as well as the $2 billion federal commitment and the $200 million in planning that went into it. Oregon's state politicians are miffed at that and say that revisiting the issue is a long way off. Yet the waste and public sin continue.

Two of those Washington Senators are now gone. In its 2017 session, the Washington Legislature adopted an olive branch proposal for a joint, bipartisan committee composed of eight lawmakers from each state. The group would assess the past planning, evaluate all available mass transit options and find a way forward. To form the committee, lawmakers must hold a first meeting by Dec. 15.

Research into the new tolling requirements, which Oregon adopted last session, for the Interstate 5 and Interstate 205 bridges will help assess the extent of the need to ease congestion. Oregon's new joint Transportation Committee should get authority to accept this olive branch and restart the effort to restore to the public loss of those frozen freeway hours. It's time.

Steve Schell is a Portland lawyer. He served as president of the Sensible Transportation Options for People nonprofit, chaired Portland's advisory committee on the Mt. Hood Freeway, served on JPACT, and was a member of the Oregon Land Conservation and Development Commission which adopted its first transportation-land use goal.
Oregonians increasingly seek outdoor adventure and renewal on public land--and trails provide ready access. Trails are the passport to beautiful vistas, streams and lakes, hiking, fishing, hunting, mountain biking and so much more.

Trail-based recreation creates jobs and is an economic boon to towns that serve as gateways to public land. Trails also enhance our health and quality of life. Yet Congress continues to cut funding for trails maintained by the U.S. Forest Service and other agencies. In the Pacific Northwest, trails can grow over or be blocked by downed timber. Wildfires obliterate them. Access to public land becomes diminished or lost. Profits from recreation-based tourism go unrealized.

We represent nonprofit organizations with robust volunteer trail maintenance programs that partner with federal agencies to ensure safe and well maintained trails. Yet volunteers alone should not be expected to shoulder the workload when Congress cuts agency budgets. Agency expertise is essential to quality management and healthy partnerships. Volunteers become stretched thin. Then what?

The U.S. House of Representatives recently passed a 2018 budget that again cuts the Forest Service's trails program. This trend needs to be reversed. It's fiscally irresponsible not to maintain beloved trails built over decades through taxpayer and volunteer support.

U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley understands this. He is on the Senate Appropriations Committee that negotiates federal agency budgets. We are optimistic that he will carry the message that the 2018 budget should support our land managers and respect the benefits that safe and well-maintained trails provide.

Randy P. Rasmussen and Mark Larabee

Rasmussen is director of Public Lands & Recreation, Back Country Horsemen of America and Larabee is associate director of communications for the Pacific Crest Trail Association
NEWPORT -- In the last 10 years, Laura Todd has helped rescue 45 sea turtles and was part of the successful rehabilitation of seven. She's driven them out of state when the Oregon Coast Aquarium was full and even chaperoned a pair on a flight to Southern California aboard a C-130.

And yet Todd has never seen a turtle released. That's about to change.

On Monday, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife field supervisor in Newport will be part of a team that will release three sea turtles in the Pacific Ocean off San Diego.

"After seeing them looking dead, with sunken eyes and very dark skin, then transform to very colorful and active ... I can't wait to see it," she said. "Everybody has a reaction to turtles. People are just amazed by how gentle and large and ancient they are. It's just amazing to see a turtle in their natural environment."

Two of the three turtles being released landed at the Newport aquarium before being sent to SeaWorld in San Diego for further rehabilitation: Solstice was rescued Dec. 22, 2014, in Long Beach, Wash. Lightning washed ashore near Pacific City during an unusual series of winter thunderstorms on Dec. 10, 2015.

Tucker was found near Cannon Beach that same month, but because the Oregon Coast Aquarium was already nursing the other sea turtles and didn't have the space for a third, he went to the Seattle Aquarium and later to SeaWorld.

"Solstice was pretty sick," Todd said. "She had buoyancy problems and we almost didn't consider her releasable. Lightning was pretty beaten up. Her pelvic girdle, pectoral girdle, the base of her skull and one of her fins were broken. She also had buoyancy problems. Tucker was really sick. He is a really odd white color. By the time I dropped him off, I thought he was dead.

"Tucker went through quite an experience. He was intubated and they breathed for him manually for two days," Todd recalled. "His buoyancy was really severe. He was sitting way up high in the water and could not dive at all. They tried a hyperbaric chamber at Virginia Mason Institute in Seattle, and he got much better."

Sea turtles become stranded when they become ill or get stuck in cold water. Scientists aren't sure which comes first. Local rescuers see five to 10 strandings a year  more frequent than 10 years ago, Todd said.

"They could end up chasing food in warm pockets of water that then get mixed into cold water," Todd said. "As those pockets disappear with the storms, they get stuck in cold water. Or they could become incapacitated by illness, and then stuck in the cold water."

The three about to be released  all olive ridley turtles  are the rare survival stories. Two turtles died after washing ashore in the days after Lightning.

Olive ridley turtles, listed as endangered, are the smallest sea turtle in the Pacific Ocean at 22 to 31 inches when fully grown and a maximum weight of about 100 pounds, according to the Oregon Coast Aquarium. They are the most frequently stranded sea turtle in the Northwest.

Follow the turtles

-- The Oregon Coast Aquarium will also

about the sea turtles.

-- Learn more about sea turtle rehabilitation, check out

If you find a stranded turtle:

The Oregon Coast Aquarium recommends calling local authorities. Among resources:

Oregon State Police Wildlife Division:

1-800-452-7888.

Marine Mammal Stranding Network in Oregon, Washington and California:

1-866-767-6114

What to note

: The exact location of the turtle, whether it appears alive or dead, estimated weight and length of its shell. If possible stay near the turtle to help direct rescuers to it and protect it from scavengers.

They are among many species of Pacific turtles, which typically live in tropical and subtropical areas. They usually venture no further north than Southern California, but occasionally travel to Oregon and Washington waters. When they show up on beaches, they're sick or injured.

Jim Burke, director of animal husbandry at the Oregon Coast Aquarium, believes turtle recovery is so difficult because the cold-blooded reptiles often have turned hypothermic long before they're rescued  sometimes for more than 30 days.

"What happens is they slow down so much that they are unable to make progress in any one direction," Burke said. "They are too weak to swim south or farther west, and they're not able to find the resources they need to survive, which are warmer weather and a food source."

LIVE IN SAN DIEGO: Getting rescued sea turtles ready for return to the ocean by placing satellite transmitters on their shells to monitor their movement at sea. Posted by SeaWorld on Friday, September 8, 2017

In California, Todd and staff from SeaWorld will board a rescue boat and ferry the three, all fitted with transmitters, to an undisclosed location about 50 miles offshore where the water is warm and conditions conducive to survival.

Once they set the turtles free, they'll monitor their movements until the end of the transmitter period, about six months.

"This is the peak temperature off San Diego," Burke said. "We are hoping they can get out there and feed and forage and stay where they need to stay, which is ideally not heading back up here. They have a chance of surviving, but it is still a bit of a battle."

The satellite tags will help answer questions to shape future release decisions, he said: Will the turtles become stranded again? Will predators get to them?

In other tagged turtle cases that Todd has been involved in, one turtle swam north and ended up off the Oregon coast far out to sea, another went down to Mexico and another one that had been stranded in Canada returned to Canada after his release southwest of San Diego. All showed normal turtle behavior, she said.

Todd is optimistic that Solstice, Lightning and Tucker will do well, too.

"They've managed to make it two to three years since they first stranded," she said. "The conditions are good offshore. I think they are going to be good."

-- Lori Tobias

Special to The Oregonian/OregonLive
U.S. Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., joined a small group of congressional Republicans who voted last week against blocking some federal funds from states and cities that don't cooperate with immigration enforcement agents.

Oregon is a so-called sanctuary state by law, and governments of several Oregon cities, including Portland's, have symbolically designated themselves as sanctuary cities. In practice, Oregon's immigration enforcement statute bars state and local law enforcement from cooperating with immigration agents if a detainee's only apparent offense is being in the country illegally.

Walden has generally voted in favor of conservative immigration policies. The congressman "leans toward less immigration, less population growth, less foreign labor," according to his voting scorecard at NumbersUSA, a group that lobbies for less immigration.

He voted to build a fence along the U.S.-Mexico border in 2006. He's co-sponsored legislation several times that would deny automatic citizenship to U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants.

Following the Trump administration's decision last week to end DACA, which grants deportation reprieves to children of illegal immigrants, Walden expressed sympathy for young adults who may face deportation. He said Congress should find a "permanent solution" to fix the nation's immigration system.

Walden was one of eight Republicans to vote against the funds-blocking amendment Wednesday, which was sponsored by U.S. Rep. Jason Smith, R-Mo. It passed, 225-195.

In a speech from the House floor, Smith described his amendment as "very straightforward" and ensures that funds "only go to cities and states that uphold federal law."

All of Oregon's congressional Democrats -- Earl Blumenauer, Suzanne Bonamici, Peter DeFazio and Kurt Schrader -- voted against the amendment. Washington Republicans Jaime Herrera Beutler, Kathy McMorris Rodgers and Dan Newhouse voted for the amendment but Dave Reichert joined that state's Democrats in voting against it.

The bill containing the amendment funds the U.S. Department of the Interior, Environmental Protection Agency, the Forest Service, the Indian Health Service and other agencies. The full bill has yet to pass the House.

-- Gordon R. Friedman

503-221-8209; @GordonRFriedman
5:24 p.m.: No crowds remain in downtown Vancouver. Much of the police presence has dispersed. This story will be updated if the situation changes.

5 p.m.: The crowd is breaking up in downtown Vancouver, with about 30 to 40 people still milling about in the streets.

4:48 p.m.: This Facebook video from Maggie Vespa KGW shows the truck racing down the street and the arrest of the man driving.

SCARY! Driver in black truck sped off, narrowly missing several counter protesters. Happened twice before police pulled him over and detained him. They now say he was driven away in cuffs, then released without charges. ORIGINAL POST: Counter protesters following Patriot Prayer members through Vancouver. Posted by Maggie Vespa KGW on Sunday, September 10, 2017

4:34 p.m.: Observers say a large pickup truck drove into a crowd of counterprotesters, some of whom had to scramble to get away. People threw rocks and bottles at the truck, and several protesters described the truck and pointed police in its direction. Police then located the truck, pulled it over and cuffed the man, observers say.

Update on the truck: https://t.co/nKABnZwIER  Bethany Barnes (@BetsBarnes) September 10, 2017

4:31 p.m.: Joey Gibson and counterprotesters engage.

#pdxprotests: Counter protesters confront Joey Gibson on associations w white supremacists. Gibson responds. pic.twitter.com/dAzkumNJBl  Beth Nakamura (@bethnakamura) September 10, 2017

4:27 p.m.: The crowd has left the parking lot and is marching into downtown Vancouver. Groups are antagonizing each other.

Large vehicle with flags challenging counter protesters in the street pic.twitter.com/Ubj3zh2Lv4  Bethany Barnes (@BetsBarnes) September 10, 2017

4:18 p.m.: Police have made people move off the waterfront and told them they were subject to arrest otherwise. The crowd has mostly moved from the amphitheater to a parking lot.

3:57 p.m.: The gathering in Vancouver appears to be winding down.

Patriot Prayer rally in Vancouver ends with Gibson leading a large group prayer in the amphitheater. #pdxprotests pic.twitter.com/Lbh0uwBTab  Shane D. Kavanaugh (@shanedkavanaugh) September 10, 2017

3:38 p.m.: Three vehicles just arrived carrying dozens of riot police, who are now entering the scene of the counterprotest.

3:29 p.m.: Police numbers slightly increase at the scene in Vancouver, with officers being added to the perimeter keeping the groups apart. Police have essentially divided the Vancouver waterfront by political beliefs. A Gibson supporter tried to stand with counterprotesters but had to move. Patriot Prayer speeches continue.

3:16 p.m.: Portland police say seven people were taken into custody during downtown Portland protests. They also say officers stopped a vehicle whose occupant reportedly flashed a gun at protesters. Police are investigating.

3:09 p.m.: A group or Patriot Prayer supporters arrives at the Vancouver amphitheater, and counterprotesters chant at them.

3:03 p.m.: The crowd at Schrunk plaza in downtown Portland is largely dispersing.

2:53 p.m.: Patriot Prayer speeches continue on the waterfront in Vancouver.

Tiny Toese, who Gibson calls his spiritual protector, speaking now in Vancouver. #pdxprotests pic.twitter.com/yg3uS2xPFV  Shane D. Kavanaugh (@shanedkavanaugh) September 10, 2017

2:45 p.m.: In Vancouver, police are moving counterprotesters back, pushing a couple to get them to move. Things are tense but mostly tame, Oregonian/OregonLive reporter Bethany Barnes says.

Counter protesters being moved back. Some police are pushing a couple of antifa protesters so they move pic.twitter.com/iOzBRx6Xjh  Bethany Barnes (@BetsBarnes) September 10, 2017

2:42 p.m.: A large crowd of counterprotesters remains at Schrunk plaza, where speeches, cheers and applause are center stage. Few Patriot Prayer members have been seen in the area.

2:36 p.m.: Silly string assaults cross the Columbia.

Silly string deployed on new arrivals here for Gibson's group pic.twitter.com/fUsj8vrcce  Bethany Barnes (@BetsBarnes) September 10, 2017

2:24 p.m.: At least one counterprotester is detained at Vancouver Landing Amphitheater, where Patriot Prayer is gathered.

2:16 p.m.: Joey Gibson begins addressing the crowd gathered in Vancouver along the Columbia River.

Gibson speaking now, says he wanted an intimate setting. Says counter protesters are misguided. pic.twitter.com/XnOyEnpx9V  Bethany Barnes (@BetsBarnes) September 10, 2017

2:13 p.m.: A confrontation leads to a silly string and glitter attack.

Guy with a press pass for org I couldn't make out got into it with some counterprotesters, got silly stringed and glitter bombed pic.twitter.com/MzB0pH1was  Dave Killen (@killendave) September 10, 2017

2:06 p.m.:

Joey Gibson, the leader of the Patriot Prayer group, arrives at the Vancouver Landing Amphitheater. Rose City Antifa announces their members are heading to Vancouver to confront Gibson.

Police making counter protesters move farther back from Gibson's group pic.twitter.com/RwAybFvNSq  Bethany Barnes (@BetsBarnes) September 10, 2017

2:04 p.m.: Police say a second officer has been injured when struck in the face with a projectile. They say three people have been taken into custody so far.

2:02 p.m.: The group of counterprotesters has returned to Terry Schrunk Plaza, where speeches are beginning.

March is filing in to Terry Schrunk Plaza pic.twitter.com/37YoDffNkl  Dave Killen (@killendave) September 10, 2017

1:59 p.m.: Portland police say protesters are loading slingshots. One officer has been injured and fire medics are responding. Police also are reporting that photographers are being attacked by protesters.

1:51 p.m.: Portland police announce the "crowd has become violent in nature" and warn of use of riot-control agents and impact weapons if people don't disperse.

1:48 p.m.: The crowd at Esther Short Park in Vancouver has moved to the Vancouver Landing Amphitheater along the Columbia River. The Patriot Prayer group is anticipated to arrive there to hold a rally at 2 p.m.

1:41 p.m.: At least one person has been detained at Southwest Third Avenue and Salmon Street. Police have used a flashbang to control the crowd. Police announce that because of violence, peaceful protesters "should disperse immediately for their own safety."

1:33 p.m.: Much of the crowd is leaving the waterfront and heading up Southwest Taylor Street to Second Avenue.

1:30 p.m.: Some altercations are occurring between police and counterprotesters. Police have deployed pepper balls and pepper spray; some in crowd have used smoke bombs. Police are telling people to leave the area or be subject to arrest. "If you are a peaceful protester, leave the area now," they said over a loudspeaker.

1:22 p.m.: A small group of antifascist protesters has gathered at Esther Short Park in downtown Vancouver.

1:18 p.m.: Portland police are between the protest groups and are keeping them separated. But police report projectiles and smoke bombs have been thrown at officers.

1:02 p.m.: A group of marchers that appears to be aligned with the Patriot Prayer group has arrived at the waterfront. Some are carrying American flags, and others are carrying Trump banners. The counterprotesters greeted them with chants of "Nazis, go home."

12:52 p.m.: A few hundred people have gathered at Terry Schrunk Plaza near City Hall in downtown Portland. A large group has also gathered at the Salmon Street Fountain at Waterfront Park. Both groups appear to be counterprotesters.

* * *

Hundreds are expected to descend Sunday afternoon on downtown Portland and Vancouver as opposing demonstrators square off once again in public.

Portland police are preparing for a potentially violent showdown between the dueling demonstrators, with a ramped-up presence and vows to crack down on clashes and criminal acts.

Portland Stands United Against Hate, a coalition of more than 80 social activist organizations, and Rose City Antifa, a prominent antifascist group, have planned to protest a march and rally organized by Joey Gibson and his Patriot Prayer movement.

Gibson originally had planned his march for 2 p.m. at Salmon Street Fountain in Waterfront Park. But on Saturday, Gibson announced he would move his event to the Vancouver Landing Amphitheater.

Organizers for the counter-demonstrations said they would still hold their events, which are likely to draw more than 1,000 people. The counterprotest was to begin at Terry Schrunk Plaza about 12:30 p.m. and also include the Salmon Street fountain.

Portland police shortly after noon Sunday released the following statement about the Portland protest:

The Police Bureau has established two separate demonstration areas for those gathering at Waterfront Park today. Participants in the Patriot Prayer Free Speech Rally should gather in Waterfront Park between Southwest Taylor Street and Southwest Salmon Street. Those who are counter-protesting, should gather in Waterfront Park in the area north of Southwest Taylor Street and south of Southwest Yamhill Street. Officers will be available to assist participants in finding the appropriate location.

Also, the Oregon Department of Transportation said the sidewalks on both spans of the Interstate Bridge will be closed until 5 p.m. because of the expected protests.

The Oregonian/OregonLive will provide live updates from all locations.

Follow this Twitter list of Oregonian/OregonLive reporters and photographers covering the protests:

-- The Oregonian/OregonLive
Sunday -- Nora's last day with her public in Oregon -- was a classic pre-fall Portland day: blue sky dotted with feathery clouds, a welcome chill creeping in under the late summer warmth.

Nora seemed to appreciate the good weather, plunging into her pool and playing with the plentiful toys at her disposal, including a box with the words "PDX to SLC Sept. 2017" printed on it, which she gleefully tore into.

Sometime this month, Portland's furry, nearly 2-year-old polar bear cub will travel, first by van and then plane, to her new home at Utah's Hogle Zoo in Salt Lake City. There, after a time in quarantine, she will meet her aunt Hope, a cub like Nora, around 2 years old.

For the first time in her life, Nora will hopefully be fully integrated with another bear, who will be able to teach her things her human companions have been unable to.

On Sunday morning, Pacific Shores, the Oregon Zoo's polar bear exhibit, was full as soon as the zoo opened at 9:30 a.m., reverberating with screams and shrieks of laughter. The throng of people didn't let up for hours.

Waves of strollers and humans rolled through the various chambers of the exhibit, everyone hoping to get one more glimpse of the zoo's popular polar bear cub as she swam in her pool, gnawing on a red floating mat, then a log and then burrowing in the piles of snow in her enclosure.

At the Oregon Zoo for Nora the polar bear's last day with the public. Posted by The Oregonian on Sunday, September 10, 2017

Nora will be the last bear in this iteration of the zoo's polar bear exhibit, which will close when the cub leaves. The zoo plans to open a new exhibit called Polar Passage, sometime in 2019, which will offer future bears more space to roam and will help the Oregon Zoo continue its mission of researching the massive bears that roam the Arctic and are some of the earliest victims of climate change.

Nora's fans were sad to see her go, but as a chubby, playful ambassador for her struggling species, she has already left her mark on the younger generation.

Two-year-old Knox Godesa of Beaverton said he was there to see "Nora Bear" and characterized the situation as a "bummer."

Four-year-old Mia Cunningham of Portland said polar bears are her favorite animal and that she always tells her mom to turn off the lights, to help the polar bears. Her mother, Samantha Cunningham, confirmed this.

"We love the polar bears," the older Cunningham said, adding her daughter is always saying, "Turn off the lights, Mommy! The polar bears!"

Megan Freedman, a 14-year-old from Vancouver, said she has been volunteering this summer with Zoo Quest, where she helps younger children play games and learn about animals and conservation. She said she tries to see Nora after every volunteer shift.

"I used to want to be a vet," Freedman said, but then she changed her mind. "I couldn't see animals sick -- it makes me too sad."

Now Freedman wants to be a chef, where she can continue to work on one of her other interests that she thinks will help animals without forcing her to see them sick: eliminating food waste.

Nora has been charming humans since her birth in Ohio, at the Columbus Zoo in November 2015. When she was less than a week old, her mother abandoned her and zookeepers did their best to raise her without bear help.

When she was less than 1, she came to Portland, where she was set to be mentored by Tasul, the Oregon Zoo'a beloved elder bear. Sadly, not long after Nora was introduced to Tasul, it was discovered that the 31-year-old bear had ovarian cancer and the zoo decided to euthanize her.

The move to Utah will hopefully result in a more stable situation for the young bear.

Alexis Blauvelt-Rowlett of Longview, who was visiting the zoo for her seventh birthday, has also moved twice, and had some advice for young Nora, who she figured might be nervous about making another move.

"You shouldn't be scared," Blauvelt-Rowlett said. "You should just try and make it work out."

-- Lizzy Acker

503-221-8052

lacker@oregonian.com, @lizzzyacker
MEXICO CITY -- The magnitude 8.1 quake that hit Mexico overnight occurred within a seismic hotspot in the Pacific where one tectonic plate dives under another. These so-called subduction zones are responsible for producing some of the biggest quakes in history, including the 2011 Fukushima disaster and the 2004 Sumatra quake that spawned a deadly tsunami.

A tsunami warning was put in place after the earthquake hit Mexico's southern coast, near the Guatemala border. Tsunami waves have been measured off Mexico's Pacific coast after a major earthquake.

The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center says waves of 3.3 feet above the tide level were measured off Salina Cruz. Smaller tsunami waves were observed on the coast or measured by ocean gauges in several other places.

No threat was posed to the Pacific coasts for Hawaii and the western United States.

While 2.3 feet doesn't sound like much, it can travel very far inland and do a lot of damage. Fortunately there is no tsunami expected here. https://t.co/93MPrNXdnC  NWS Portland (@NWSPortland) September 8, 2017

Scientists are studying how this latest quake happened. But a preliminary analysis indicates the quake was triggered by the sudden breaking or bending of the Cocos plate, which dives beneath Mexico. This type of process doesn't happen often in subduction zones; usually, big quakes in subduction zones occur along the boundary between the sinking slab and the overriding crust.

Seismologist Susan Hough of the U.S. Geological Survey says, "It's unusual, but it's not unheard of." She adds that "you get stresses on the seafloor and we know that can produce big earthquakes."



The death toll from Mexico's huge earthquake has risen to 32.

Oaxaca state Gov. Alejandro Murat told local news media Friday that at least 23 people in his state died after the magnitude 8.1 quake that hit just before midnight.

Civil defense officials say at least seven people died in the state of Chiapas, which borders Guatemala. Two others died in the Gulf coast state of Tabasco.



The quake that struck Mexico overnight matches the force of a magnitude 8.1 quake that hit the country on June 3, 1932, roughly 300 miles west of Mexico City.

Both the Mexican and U.S. services say Friday's quake matches the magnitude of the 1932 temblor. The U.S. Geological Survey puts both at 8.1 while, though the Mexican seismologists calculate them at 8.2. It's common for different agencies to arrive at slightly different calculations of quake magnitude.

Authorities in Mexico say that a hotel in Oaxaca has collapsed in the major earthquake that hit the country, but no one has been reported dead.

Civil Defense photos showed the crumbling facade of the Anel hotel in Matias Romero and split in half. President Enrique Pena Nieto said no one was reported dead at the hotel.

Earlier, Oaxaca Gov. Alejandro Murat said that some people were able to escape from the hotel and authorities were working to determine if they were any casualties or missing people.

Pena Nieto says that the magnitude of the earthquake that hit the country is 8.2, the biggest the country has seen in a century.

-- The Associated Press
The National Policy for Children, 1974 declared children a "supreme national asset." But, the last survey by the government on child abuse revealed that nearly 70 per cent children faced physical abuse and about 50 per cent were sexually abused.

By Prabhash K Dutta: There is outrage over safety of children in schools following the gruesome murder of a 7-year-old boy in the Ryan International School , Gurgaon. The Ryan International School was founded by Dr AF Pinto and managed by his wife Grace Pinto - both are said to be politically well connected with the BJP and Congress leadership.

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The group that manages Ryan International has more than 300 schools across 18 states in the country and abroad. The attempted sexual assault and murder of the class II boy at Gurgaon is the second shocking crime reported from the Ryan International school premises in Delhi-NCR. Last year, another child (6-year-old) died of drowning in the Ryan International School's water tank at its Vasant Kunj campus in Delhi.

There have been several reports of child abuse in schools from all over the country. However, there is no specific law passed by Parliament to deal with the crimes against children in schools.

CHILDREN ARE VULNERABLE

Children are among the most vulnerable groups in the country and around the world. A survey conducted by humanitarian aid organisation, World Vision India revealed in May this year that one in every two children is a victim of sexual abuse.

The survey was conducted across 26 states of the country and covered 12-18 years age-group. It is estimated that children below 12 may have higher abuse rate as they are more vulnerable.

In July 2015, a UNICEF report highlighted four major areas of concern about the safety of children in India. It said that majority of abuses of children was reported for the age group of 5 to 11 years.

Secondly, more than 48 per cent girls wished they were boys so that they could escape abuse. But, the study also found that boys (over 54 per cent) were at equal risk of abuse as girls. And, fourth, persons in trust and authority, including parents, were major child abusers.

NCRB DATA ON CHILD ABUSE

According to NCRB records, total 89,423 cases of crime against children were reported in 2014. The number increased to 94,172 in 2015 and 1,05,785 in 2016. Uttar Pradesh reported the maximum number of crimes against children in 2016 - overtaking Maharashtra.

Between 2014 and 2016, the number of crimes against children under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSOA) went up from 8,904 to 35,980 - a four-fold increase in just two years.

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On the other hand, the disposal of POCSO cases by the investigation agencies and courts is dismal. According to an estimate, it will take 12 years in Delhi to adjudicate all the pending cases of child sexual abuse under POCSO Act.

Maharashtra is likely to take more than 20 years to clear all the pending cases of sexual abuse of children while Gujarat may take 40 years in bringing all the existing child abusers to justice.

NOTHING CHANGED IN 10 YEARS

The Union Ministry of Women and Child Development conducted a study in 2007 to gauge the ground reality of child abuse in the country. Titled, Study on Child Abuse in India, the report revealed that 68.99 per cent of more than 12,000 children interviewed had suffered physical abuse.

About 53 per cent children said they had encountered one or more forms of sexual abuse. Over 20 per cent children reported severe sexual abuse which included assault and being forced to fondle private parts of adults.

According to the WCD report of 2007 - no other study has been conducted the Ministry since then - about 53 per cent children not going to school reported having been sexually abused in their family environment.

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In the same survey, nearly 50 per cent of over 12,000 children said they were sexually abused at their schools. Ryan International School incident confirms that nothing has changed in 10 years with regard to safety of children in schools.

Ironically, the National Policy for Children was announced in 1974. It declared children a "supreme national asset." However, decades later, about 70 per cent of children reported physical abuse and 50 per cent said they were sexually abused.

ALSO READ |

Gurgaon murder LIVE: Case filed against Ryan school management, owner; Haryana govt says guilty will not be spared

Gurgaon murder: Ryan International School bus conductor confesses to killing child, says he refused sex

Gurgaon Ryan International murder: Every third child feels unsafe in school, said a recent report

ALSO WATCH: Ryan International School murder: Protesters burn liquor shop near school

--- ENDS ---
A 28-year-old Hillsboro mom spent the night in jail Saturday after police arrested her under accusations of dropping her young children off at a park, then heading to a local business to get a tattoo.

Ana Lisa Lara left her kids -- ages 3 and 8 -- unattended for about an hour, according to investigators with the Washington County Sheriff's Office.

Deputies were called at 5:36 p.m. to Harleman Park in the city of Cornelius after strangers found the two children in a public restroom at the park, the sheriff's office said. The children had become frightened when it began to rain and sought shelter in the restroom, the sheriff's office said.

Harleman Park in Cornelius. (Thomas Boyd/The Oregonian)

The strangers -- who were a family that had gone into the restroom to use it -- didn't know the children. They called 911.

Twenty-four minutes later, Lara returned to the park to pick up her kids, the sheriff's office said.

Deputies placed Lara under arrest under accusations of first-degree criminal mistreatment, recklessly endangering another person and second-degree child neglect.

Under Oregon law, that last crime is defined as leaving a child under 10 years old unattended, in a situation that might likely endanger the child's health or welfare.

Lara is being held in lieu of $10,000 bail. Washington County Jail records show her still in jail Sunday morning.

Authorities sent Lara's children to stay with a family member.

-- Aimee Green
UPDATED 4 p.m.: The Coast Guard announced Sunday afternoon that it will suspend the Columbia River safety zone at 6 p.m. Sunday. The river will be open to all vessel traffic.

* * *

Fire officials said they will need to wait until at least Tuesday to see how the wind and burnout efforts affect the Eagle Creek fire before making a decision on whether to lift evacuation orders for hundreds of people displaced by the fire.

By the end of the day Tuesday, a much clearer picture should emerge of whether it's safe to let people return to their homes in east Multnomah County and Hood River County, said Jim Whittington, a spokesman for the Southwest Incident Management Team, on Sunday.

"We're very aware of the anxiety we've caused," said Whittington, of ordering people out of the area.

Whittington said some of the burned areas near homes are still very hot. Firefighters want to be sure the area is cleared of dry brush and other fuel that could ignite in pockets near the homes, Whittington said.

He said officials also want to be sure electricity and other utilities are all in working order before lifting evacuation orders.

Whittington added that the decision will be a "tough call."

Four homes have burned since the Eagle Creek fire began eight days ago, on Sept. 2. Police have made no arrests, but have said a 15-year-old Vancouver boy is suspected of starting the blaze by playing with fireworks along the Eagle Creek Trail in the Columbia River Gorge.

The following are updates, offered by officials during a press briefing Sunday:

Police are guarding homes:

Jason Gates, chief deputy with the Multnomah County Sheriff's Office, said residents of the evacuated areas can rest assured that deputies are protecting their homes from criminals.

Contrary to some social media rumors, "there is no looting going on in Corbett," Gates said.

Gates said there was one "opportunist" who was caught in an evacuation area and arrested before he could make off with anyone's belongings. Gates didn't have the man's name immediately available, but officials later confirmed the man was Cody Cunningham, 23.

Sheriff's officials say Cunningham pretended to be a firefighter, picked up firefighter's clothing and was caught in an evacuation area.

Gates said law enforcement are patrolling evacuated neighborhoods around the clock - and that means if an officer takes a break, another officer fills in so there's no gap in patrols.

"I want a police car in those neighborhoods in those neighbors 24/7 - all of the time," Gates said.

Fire's footprint hasn't changed much:

Fire officials say they haven't been able to use an infared camera for the past few days to measure the fire, but they flew over it Saturday night and believe it's size has held steady at about 33,000 acres.

The fire remains 7 percent contained - mostly along the far western and southwestern edges of the fire.

That's great news for the nearby communities of Corbett and Troutdale in east Multnomah County.

"There's not much activity, much smoke," Whittington said, referring to that area. "It's looking pretty cool."

The 10 helicopters working the fire zone will continue to drop water in the western and southwestern areas - as well as the northeastern corner.

Firefighters working that corner are trying to stop the fire from jumping across Herman Creek, which is 10 to 15 feet wide. That area is just southeast of Cascade Locks.

In all, nearly 1,000 firefighters have been working the fire.

Steep terrain has inhibited the fire:

Whittington said the fire has failed to grow much in the past few days because in many places, it has burned up to ridgelines in the gorge, and it's difficult for fire to advance back downhill.

"Hot air rises," Whittington said. "Fire wants to reach up."

At the same time, officials said they've kept firefighters out of those steep areas.

"Our firefighters are in really good shape but they're not in mountain-goat shape," Whittington said.

Morale boost:

Rich Tyler, a spokesman from the Oregon State Fire Marshal's office, said he felt good about the view as he was driving along the Columbia River Sunday morning.

"The smoke was lifted," Tyler said. "It was clear. And I got to see our gorge."

Tyler continued: "We're getting back to normal. A lot of devastation has occurred. It's going to take some time."

Old growth not so easy to burn:

Officials said the fire spread so rapidly on the third and fourth days because it was traveling across lower elevations.

The forests there aren't as thick and as dense as the older growth the fire's edge is encountering now - much of it in the Mark O. Hatfield Wilderness, Whittington said.

Whittington said because there's more cover from the tree canopy, the ground is moister -- and that's caused the fire to slow. Also, bigger trees don't catch fire as easily, he said.

Rain:

An end to hot, dry weather will help firefighters in their efforts. But some mist that saturated the air Saturday actually ended up inhibiting firefighter efforts, because it made it more difficult to burn containment lines and clear other pockets of fuel.

But firefighters are encouraged by the weather outlook: September should continue to bring cooler days and possibly some rain that could help dampen the fire itself.

-- Aimee Green
In the wake of the Eagle Creek fire's ravenous consumption of more than 33,000 acres of the Columbia River Gorge, concerned Oregonians have been clamoring to help rehabilitation efforts.

As Facebook events pop up rallying would-be conservationists to aid in re-planting throughout the region, U.S. Forest Service personnel say it's best to wait.

"In order for that to really make a difference, let's get the fire out first," Jim Pena, regional forester for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, said.

After all, he said, it's not like any old trees will do in rehabilitating the acres upon acres of greenery. The Forest Service does extensive studies to determine how best to re-populate those areas in the wake of wildfires.

Having hikers and self-motivated conservationists go rogue in planting their own trees may end up doing more harm than good.

"We want to make sure we're planting the right kinds of things," Pena said.

Still, the regional forester considers the outpouring of concern a positive thing.

"I think it's well-intentioned," he said. "And I think it's right to put that good intention to use."

Pena said Oregonians interested in helping rehabilitate the area should trust the Forest Service and state and regional agencies to tackle rehabilitation efforts when the time comes. Organizations such as the Friends of the Columbia Gorge also regularly host conservation and educational events.

There may also be relief coming from Washington, D.C.

U.S. Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., introduced a bill that would expedite reforestation efforts in the Columbia River Gorge, as well as in southern Oregon and other areas of the state devastated by wildfires.

"It breaks your heart to see that great part of our state burning," Walden said during a media briefing in Troutdale Saturday.

Although there's not much average Oregonians can do to help rehabilitate the wildlife areas in the gorge, organizations aiding evacuees and first responders are still accepting donations.

All they ask is that contributions come in the form of cash for relief agencies rather than bottles of water, Gatorade and granola bars.

Yo, STOP SENDING WATER. They are bussing it out now.  #EagleCreekFire pic.twitter.com/oTY6qi4ucM  Ryan Haas (@ryanjhaas) September 6, 2017

--Eder Campuzano | 503.221.4344

@edercampuzano

ecampuzano@oregonian.com
Managers overseeing the Eagle Creek fire have crafted a strategy they hope will guide the fire eastward to a slope in the Columbia River Gorge and further containment, an official said Saturday.

"Crews are looking at opportunities to utilize roads and natural barriers to use as containment lines," U.S. Forest Service spokesman Paul Cerda said in a Saturday afternoon briefing about the fire.

In describing the strategy, Cerda also acknowledged the size of the fire could double from its current 33,000 acres before it is fully contained, perhaps by the end of September. The acreage count reflects the estimated total acres consumed and what is still burning.

Also Saturday, U.S. Forest Service chief Tony Tooke toured the burned area along Interstate 84 with elected Oregon leaders, using the experience as an opportunity to point to the need for a reliable source of money for fighting forest fires.

"We desperately need a fire funding fix," said Tooke, who recently began work in his new role. "Large emergency fires are natural disasters and they need to be funded like natural disasters."

Too often, such as this year, the Forest Service has eaten through its firefighting budget and has been forced to seek emergency backfilling from Congress, Tooke said in a media briefing held at the Troutdale Policing Community Center.

Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., appearing with Tooke, said he has co-sponsored a bill with Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., to fund wildfires separately from the Forest Service operating budget.

Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue supports the approach, said Wyden, one of the elected officials to appear with Tooke. Others included: Gov. Kate Brown, Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., and Washington Public Lands Commissioner Hilary Franz.

Forest Service spokesman Cerda said light winds from the west on Friday and Saturday helped nearly 1,000 firefighters contain the Eagle Creek blaze.

The fire is 7 percent contained, a number that has not changed since Friday. Containment reflects the percentage of an estimated perimeter that no longer poses a fire threat. Cerda said that fire activity in the Bull Run Watershed, which supplies drinking water nearly 1 million residents in the Portland area, has been minimal.

Cerda said managers have targeted an area around Mitchell Point - which rises to 1,178 feet near Exit 58 on Interstate 84 - as one of the few places at a Gorge ridgetop where firefighting crews can prepare fire lines and help bring the fire under control. Firefighters have mostly been limited to battling the fire in flat, lowland areas, relying on helicopter water drops to thwart flames in the steeper slopes.

Cerda said bulldozers began plowing fire lanes near Mitchell Point on Friday, and the work is expected to continue at least the next few days.

Firefighters completed a "burnout operation" Friday south of Cascade Locks, reducing the danger of Eagle Creek fire progressing toward the city near the Bridge of the Gods, officials said. Also, firefighters burned vegetation around a communications tower south of Cascade Locks.

Fire managers also offered a glimpse at "the mosaic," as a statement issued Saturday called it, of burned and living trees.

"Some areas contain trees with brown needles or portions of slopes where crown fires consumed most of the foliage and branches from the trees," the statement says. "Other areas within the fire perimeter have green trees. While some of these may die later from damage to their roots, many of these trees should survive, keeping the gorge green."

The Coast Guard on Saturday updated a Columbia River vessels-restricting safety zone, to extend from river mile 126 to 185 (east of Reed Island to the vicinity of The Dalles).

Watercraft are allowed in parts of the restricted area, but are required to stay 500 yards away from aircraft engaged in water removal operations, and the river is restricted to all watercraft between miles 154 and 158 (Anderson Point in Hood River County to Collins Point in Skamania County, Washington). Also, vessels traveling between miles 154 and 158 must obtain Coast Guard authorization.

Command of the Eagle Creek blaze, the nation's highest priority fire, transitioned Saturday to a Type I incident management team, the nation's highest-level team for fighting a wildfire.

Multnomah County Sheriff Mike Reese, who spoke at the Troutdale news conference, said officials are not yet ready to allow people who live in areas under a Level 3 (go) evacuation, to return to their homes.

Reese acknowledged that fire crews have completed digging fire lines near the community of Cascade Locks, for example, but "these lines have not been tested... we need to know these lines will hold and keep these communities safe."

Meanwhile, the Hood River County Sheriff's Office announced late Friday that it had added some communities west of Hood River to a Level 1 (be ready) evacuation. The sheriff's office made the change based on information gathered from a flight over the Eagle Creek fire area Friday morning that showed the fire further east than previously observed.

The Hood River County Sheriff's Office also said the Level 2 evacuation east of Cascade Locks was extended to include Wyeth.

The city of Hood River is not affected by the Level 1 evacuation notice, but that designation still has caused anxiety in the Gorge community, said Hood River Mayor Paul Blackburn.

"There has been a lot of stress in the (Hood River) Valley for the first time," said Blackburn, one of the elected officials who toured the Gorge along Interstate 84 on Saturday. "It (the fire) feels very close all of a sudden."

--Allan Brettman

503-294-5900

@
A Boeing 747 specially outfitted to drop up to 20,000 gallons of water or retardant on Oregon's wildfires is standing by, ready to travel over two of the nation's most urgent firefighting priorities.

But Gov. Kate Brown and the U.S. Forest Service aren't calling on the SuperTanker to aid in battling the Eagle Creek or Chetco Bar fires. And all of it has to do with the aircraft's limited effectiveness in both the Columbia River Gorge and the mountainous reaches of southern Oregon, officials say.

"If we need to use it, we'll just order it up," Doug Grafe, fire protection chief for the Oregon Department of Forestry. "But the broken terrain won't allow it."

Strong and unpredictable winds, abetted by the heat of the fires burning in both ends of the state, also make maneuvering the 747 through the mountainous regions difficult enough.

"You need to fly this thing low and slow," Grafe said. "It works really well in open range country. But we just don't have much of that with Chetco or Eagle Creek."

The SuperTanker is also meant to act much like a tank, barreling ahead of an infantry of firefighters and dropping retardant or water so that men and women on the ground can tackle the blaze once it's somewhat suppressed. Rocky terrain in both the Eagle Creek wilderness and where the Chetco Bar blaze burns makes it all but impossible to send scores of people in after the aircraft.

"If you can't get people in there, you can't accomplish its mission," Grafe said.

Brown also said that heavy smoke and smog from both blazes made it difficult to asses just where the SuperTanker could target the fires burning beneath. Visibility is so bad that infrared is one of the only reliable ways to track what's burning.

The aircraft also requires immense effort to prepare and refuel, as KOIN reported earlier this week. KATU reports it also costs $120,000 per day to operate.

But the price and logistics aren't what's stopping state and federal officials from contracting the SuperTanker. Oregon State Forester Peter Daugherty said Brown has told him to disregard costs when considering how to tackle either of the state's large blazes.

"It's up to the incident management teams to ask for the resources they need to control the fire," he said.

--Eder Campuzano | 503.221.4344

@edercampuzano

ecampuzano@oregonian.com
Following the brutal murder of a seven-year-old student of Ryan International School, the Delhi Police has chalked out a plan of action to look into the issue of security of children in schools.

Guidelines will be issued to schools to increase children's security. Photo for representation: PTI.

By Chirag Gothi: Meetings between school administration and police authorities to discuss security of children are a routine in Delhi.

However, in the wake of the the brutal murder of a seven-year-old student of Ryan International School allegedly by a bus conductor, the Delhi Police has chalked out a plan of action to look into the issue of security of children in schools.

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HERE IS ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT DELHI POLICE's PLAN OF ACTION:

1) A meeting of Station House Officers (SHOs) will be called and officers will be directed to keep a watch on security of children in schools.

2) A set of guidelines will be issued for schools across Delhi.

3) Schools will be asked to increase the number of CCTVs installed in the premises.

4) Keeping in mind the security of children, schools will be asked to increase the number of security guards.

5) Directions will also be issued to ensure police verification is done for school drivers, cleaners and other staff. The movement of school staff will be monitored as well.

ALSO READ:

Gurgaon murder: Ryan International School flouted every High Court, police guideline

Gurgaon school murder: Accused conductor's village wants him punished for the crime

Delhi horror: Shahdara school peon arrested for raping 5-year-old girl in empty classroom

ALSO WATCH: Inside Ryan International School, the scene of the murder of a 7-year-old boy

--- ENDS ---
Police said force was the only option, as the mob had become violent and had set the liquor shop ablaze.

By Abhishek Anand: Two days after a 7-year-old boy was murdered at Gurgaon's Ryan International School, angry parents and locals torched a liquor shop located barely 50 metres away from the school premises.

Police then lathi-charged the parents, and detained more than a dozen protesters. They also attacked several media professionals. Around a dozen people were injured.

"We have been protesting peacefully for the last two days. Some people torched the liquor shop, it wasn't us. However, the police hounded us with lathis and beat up many of the parents demanding justice" for the victim, said Mukesh Jha, a local whose child is enrolled at Ryan International School.

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However, the police maintained that force was the only option, as the mob had become violent and had set the liquor shop ablaze.

"We had repeatedly requested the protestors to leave the area as they had torched the liquor shop. We had no option left but to use force to disperse the crowd to prevent any further damages to public or private property," said a senior police official who is camping in the school premises.

CASE REGISTERED UNDER JUVENILE ACT

Meanwhile, a case has been registered against Ryan International School's administration under the Juvenile Act.

The victim, a Class 2 student, was found murdered in a washroom with his throat slit. The police has arrested a bus conductor, Ashok Kumar, in the case.

The boy's father, Varun Thakur, said he wants a thorough enquiry.

"The senior police officials have assured me of not letting any culprit get away. I have faith in the police. All I want is a thorough enquiry so that such incidents shall not take place in future. Also, accountability of every person should be fixed," he said.

ALSO READ

Beyond Ryan International School murder: How safe are children in India

Gurgaon school murder: Accused conductor's village wants him punished for the crime

ALSO WATCH

Ryan International School murder: Protesters burn liquor shop near school

--- ENDS ---
Paducah, KY (42003)

Today

Except for a few afternoon clouds, mainly sunny. High 48F. Winds light and variable..

Tonight

Cloudy with occasional rain showers. Low 37F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%.
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BLOOMINGTON  St. Mary's Parish's 150-year outreach to the community may be illustrated with two recent developments that began badly.

The first was the probable closure of Loaves and Fishes soup kitchen  a hot lunch for an average of 60 people in need served every Tuesday and Thursday at St. Mary's Church, 527 W. Jackson St.

When Clare House closed in November 2015, that threatened to end Loaves and Fishes, a service of Clare House. Instead, St. Mary's and five other Bloomington-Normal area Catholic parishes took over sponsorship of the soup kitchen, which continues to thrive.

The second was the vandalism of St. Mary's School, 603 W. Jackson St., by four juveniles in July 2016. While the extent of the vandalism nearly delayed the start of school the following month, St. Mary's allowed the juveniles to do their community service sentence at the school, where they help with maintenance work.

While the juveniles need to be trained and overseen, "the relationships that have developed in that community service atmosphere have gone beyond serving time," said Father Greg Nelson, pastor of St. Mary's Parish, which includes the church and school.

"Everyone involved has grown to care for each other," he said.

Those examples of community outreach are why St. Mary's Parish, on Bloomington's west side, continues to thrive after 150 years. St. Mary's celebrates its sesquicentennial today with a Mass by Bishop Daniel Jenky at Central Catholic High School and with other events later this fall.

"We try to establish a safe and welcoming place for parishioners and non-parishioners alike  where people can grow in their faith" and where their other needs, such as for food and clothing, can be met as well, Nelson said.

"That's the reputation of St. Mary's," he said. "People know that anyone can come here to get support, spiritually and otherwise. That attracts parishioners. They see it as fulfilling not just for them but for the neighborhood and the larger community."

Another service of St. Mary's is its long-standing "back door ministry" for the poor, Nelson said.

"Every day, people come to our back door needing help spiritually and materially," Nelson said.

"Our role is to support the community in being a helpful, giving, loving and accepting community," said Jamie Hartrich, principal of St. Mary's School, which has 139 students.

When Lynda Rettick first entered St. Mary's 17 years ago "we felt welcomed. People talked to us. It's very friendly."

Rettick joined the parish, served as a member of the parish council, school office manager and advancement director, and is a communion minister and chairwoman of the sesquicentennial committee.

"We enjoy being together. It's happiness," said Carol Burroughs, parishioner and communion minister who is a secular Franciscan, meaning she tries to live a life of peace, service and prayer.

"I like the back-door ministry and Loaves and Fishes," Rettick said. "Ministry at St. Mary's is done in a down-to-earth way. St. Mary's doesn't do things and say 'Hey, look at us.' It just fills a need."

One is addressing spiritual and social needs of the community's Hispanic population. A parish that was established in 1867 largely to serve German-American Catholic families now has a Hispanic membership that accounts for 25 percent of the parish's 1,103 households, Nelson said.

St. Mary's supports Hispanic families with a Mass in Spanish at 1 p.m. each Sunday and a Hispanic Advisory Committee, which has existed since 1983 to assist Spanish speakers, said Jose R. Montenegro, a parishioner since 1972 who was ordained a permanent deacon in 2007.

"It's a small parish but hard-working and everyone is welcome," Montenegro said.

"The parish has thrived because the parishioners are so active in the ministries of outreach and are generous with their time and money," Nelson said.

"We have amazing, giving parishioners who create that family feeling every Sunday, which allows the parish to flourish," Hartrich said.

The parish also has an active adult education program. "We have several faith and scripture study groups happening at any one time," Nelson said. "That interest in study is an important part of life here."

There was concern among some parishioners when Franciscan friars, who had been staffing the parish since 1881, pulled out last year with the retirement of popular longtime pastor, Father Ric Schneider, as well as Father Neri Greskoviak and Brother Kevin Duckson. There were no Franciscans available to replace them so the Diocese of Peoria assigned Nelson and another diocesan priest, Father Joe Baker.

"The secular Franciscans remain a vital part of the parish life and our arms and hearts remain open to those who are in need spiritually and materially," Nelson said. "Those are not just Franciscan missions but missions of the larger Church."

"The Franciscan roots are deep here," Burroughs said. "We are so blessed with the priests assigned here. They have Franciscan hearts."

"We miss the friars, of course," Hartrich said. "But Father Greg and Father Joe are amazing and allow us to continue our Franciscan heritage."

Nelson is at the school frequently and joined fourth-graders  including Hailey Chapman, 9, of Gridley, and Zarai Salinas, 9, of Bloomington  for lunch on Aug. 29.

What would they tell someone who was thinking about coming to St. Mary's Church?

"I would tell them they would make a lot of friends and it would be a perfect idea," Hailey said.

"St. Mary's is a young parish," Montenegro said. "We have a lot of young families coming in. That's what attracts a lot of people here."
BLOOMINGTON  The remnants of Hurricane Irma will move slowly toward Illinois, but forecasters with the National Weather Service say the storm is not likely to produce any significant rainfall in Central Illinois.

The hurricane made its first U.S. landfall in Florida just northeast of Key West at Cudjoe Key at 8:10 a.m. Sunday. The system will gradually weaken as it moves northeast, said Chris Geelhart, a meteorologist with the Lincoln-based NWS.

We have a chance of showers Tuesday night into Wednesday, but as of right now, it doesnt look like its going to quite reach the Bloomington-Normal area, he said. We will have some clouds this week, but not much rain.

The high temperature will hit 77 degrees both Monday and Tuesday, and temperatures will be around 80 degrees until the weekend when it warms up slightly. Fridays high is expected to be around 82 degrees. It could hit 84 degrees on Saturday.

Still, the hurricane will have an impact in Central Illinois.

Crews from Ameren Illinois are traveling to help with widespread damage and power outages in Florida. Ameren has dispatched about 500 workers, including linemen, tree trimmers and substation electricians to aid in restoring power.

"We have extensive experience in restoration efforts in Illinois," Richard Mark, Ameren Illinois chairman and president, said in a statement Sunday. "Safety during this restoration effort will be paramount as we will be working in unfamiliar surroundings. As we do before any job here in Illinois, our on-site job and safety briefings will be critical before we perform any restoration task."

Country Financial and State Farm also are sending people to the region. Country moved its Loss Reporting Unit and First Contact Team into place to handle initial contacts with customers, said John Butkus, director of property claims.

Meanwhile, flights in and out of Central Illinois Regional Airport in Bloomington to Florida could be affected this week. Flights to and from Orlando were cancelled Sunday.

So far, three departures and three arrivals have been affected at the Central Illinois Regional Airport for Monday. Delta Flight 5459 from Bloomington to Atlanta, scheduled to leave at 11:42 a.m. has been cancelled, as has Flight 3751 to Atlanta, scheduled to leave at 5:10 p.m. Allegiant Air Flight 879 from Bloomington to St. Petersburg, scheduled for 3:05 p.m., has also been cancelled.

Delta Flight 5459, scheduled to land at 11:07 a.m., and Delta Flight 3751, scheduled to land at 4:35 p.m., has been cancelled. Also Allegiant Air 878 from St. Petersburg, scheduled to land at 2:20 p.m., has been cancelled.

As of Monday morning, Delta Flight 5460, arriving from Atlanta at 10:34 p.m., is still scheduled.

Motorists, said officials at GasBuddy, are still seeing the effects from Hurricane Harvey and have not yet seen the effects from Hurricane Irma show up at the gas pump.

Because Harvey shut "down an extensive amount of refining capacity, the national average gasoline price saw its largest weekly jump since Katrina hit the Gulf Coast in 2005 when the national average jumped 49 cents in a week, said Patrick DeHaan, senior petroleum analyst for GasBuddy.

Its been one of the most challenging weeks faced in years. Until Texas can recover from Harvey, gasoline prices will likely continue to remain elevated. The situation is beginning to look up, with many refineries either back online or in the process, and gasoline production is ramping back up.

In Bloomington-Normal, prices ranged from $2.37 to $2.70 per gallon of unleaded gasoline on Sunday.

Additionally, Secretary of State Jesse White is warning consumers about flood-damaged cars on the market. With all the flooding from the hurricanes, White cautioned Illinois residents to be wary when buying vehicles from those areas and said his staff will be keeping an eye out for cars from states where flooding was extensive. Applicants will have to submit a hurricane disclosure statement in order to obtain a clean title in Illinois.
BLOOMINGTON  Humans arent the only ones escaping devastation caused by Hurricane Harvey.

Through volunteers with PAWS animal transport, 110 dogs were rescued from Houston shelters and are being given a better chance of adoption in the Midwest.

These dogs are from rural Houston. They were going to euthanize existing dogs in shelters because of the influx of displaced pets from Hurricane Harvey, said Laura Frazier of Bloomington.

Frazier drove to Springfield on Saturday with a caravan of volunteers to pick up a number of the dogs from Texas. From there, they met a second group on Bloomingtons west side to disperse the dogs to other areas.

The spay and neuter laws arent as strict in the southern states and theyre more prone to euthanization, said Frazier, who organized the Bloomington stop.

Sally Brusveen of Taylorville was waiting at the Bloomington stop to load up her car with pups.

There are too many puppy mills in the South, but up north there are so many people that would love to adopt. Its disproportionate. We get them sent on to places where they have a better chance of getting adopted, and they do, said Brusveen.

Jean Ann Hert, owner of Rubys Rescue and Retreat in rural McLean, took in five dogs to nurture for adoption. She had help from her boyfriend, Tim Christensen of McLean.

This is my passion. We heard there was a big need for these dogs, so we thought we could squeeze in a few more, said Hert.

Christensen said the rescue work is rewarding, but can be overwhelming.

But just at the moment where I think Im fed up, a family comes in to adopt a dog and they fall in love and its all worth it, he said.

Angie Atkins of Bloomington stopped by the transfer location on Bloomington's west side to help stretch the dogs legs and give them water.

The dogs tugged on their leashes and were eager to make friends. One dog gave birth to a litter during the trip.

I have always been an animal person and I really like helping dogs. Its important to help them when they cant help themselves, said Atkins.

Participants said there is a growing need for volunteers to transport dogs out of kill-shelters. Some trips are less than an hour and others can stretch over days. Transport mileage is tax deductible.

"Since I'm retired, I have the time to make a difference for animals that people don't care about. Every dog deserves a chance," said volunteer Debi Sherwood of Taylorville.

To learn how to help locally, visit PAWS (Pushin Another Waggin to Safety), Kindred Hearts Transport Connection or Bootheel Paws Express, all on Facebook.
Consider all that is going on here and in the world right now.

The never-ending debate over immigration is ignited again after the Trump administration decided to force Congress' hand on the controversial DACA issue.

Another fight over the debt limit is underway after Trump and Democratic leaders agreed to a deal not supported by the president's own party.

Hurricane Irma could rival what Harvey did to Texas.

And there is North Korea, a nation so irrational and unpredictable that no one seems to know what to do.

That's just in the past week.

It seems there is a crisis of varying degrees and lasting varying lengths of time about every other day.

Maybe that is just the world we live in now. A constant emphasis and focus on "today" and what is immediately in front of us.

But we should never forget the past  as this weekend illustrates more than at any other time in our recent history.

Monday marks 16 years since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in New York City, at the Pentagon outside Washington, D.C., and in a field in Pennsylvania that literally changed the world we live in  and will continue to do so for decades to come.

For this generation, it was the Pearl Harbor of its day, a tragedy so immense and unthinkable that it is still hard to imagine it happened at all.

But it did.

In all, 2,996 people were killed and more than 6,000 were wounded in the attacks  statistics as jarring today as they were when we learned of the totality of the tragedy 16 years ago.

There were a lot of anniversary events to commemorate that day in the immediate years after 9/11. But they began to recede from the headlines as we moved onto other concerns and the inevitable march of time allowed us to think about other matters.

Certainly, the families of the victims have not forgotten and the day has been marked every year with a ceremony at Ground Zero in New York, where all the names of those who died are solemnly read aloud.

A lot of us pause that day, too. We might say a prayer or close our eyes for a moment. But then we go about our day and confront the good and bad that happen in our own lives.

Time, it is said, heals all wounds. Perhaps, but not this one. And it never should.

There are people, including our presidents who have served since then, who most assuredly lie awake at night thinking, "Can it happen again?"

There have been terrorist attacks in the succeeding years, with radical extremists killing innocent people. But what was done to our country on that day, on 9/11, cannot happen again.

This, despite all our differences. Despite all the political discord. Despite the growing perception among many that the world seems to be on the brink.

As a nation, we cannot allow it. Back then, there was naturally a lot of talk about this being the "united" states of America.

We can't forget that, either.
By PTI: Houston, Sep 10 (PTI) South Asians with a family history of coronary heart disease are at higher risk of suffering from heart attacks, say scientists including those of Indian origin.

Calcium accumulates in the arteries of the heart after plaque builds up and calcifies over time.

Researchers at University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in the US found that South Asians with a family history of heart disease were three times more likely to have calcium levels above 300 in the hearts arteries.

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This level is likely to increase the risk of a serious coronary event to 10 per cent, 15 per cent, or more, they said.

Researchers, including Jaideep Patel, suggest family history may be a more important predictor for South Asians than for other ethnic groups.

"A CT scan to check for coronary artery calcium may be an important test for South Asians whose parents, siblings, or children have coronary artery disease," said Parag Joshi,a preventive cardiologist at UT Southwestern.

"The main take-home lesson here is that family history is a meaningful and inexpensive diagnostic indicator for assessing cardiovascular disease risk in South Asians," he added.

The study was published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology: Cardiovascular Imaging. PTI APA MHN MHN

--- ENDS ---
A 65-foot-mural of a baby has been put up over the U.S. Mexico border, so that the young child is looking down over the wall into the United States. The cut-out's placement is on the border near Tecate, Mexico, and depicts a one-year-old who lives in the town.

French artist "JR" created and put up the work, which will stay up for a month as the debate over immigration rages on in America. "As an artist, I try to bring back perspective," JR told the New York Times. "For this little kid, there are no walls and borders."

He added, "The artwork comes at a time when dialogue surrounding immigration is fierce: Trump intends to pull the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Program, and his administration has accepted more proposals for building the 2,000 mile-long border wall."

Meet Kikito, he turned 1 year old last April. The piece is visible close to the Tecate border for a month pic.twitter.com/xfDBzQ1DYV

 JR (@JRart) September 7, 2017





JR told the Guardian, "Now as an artist I think that it's amazing that the piece arrived at a moment when it creates more dialogue. Because the idea itself is to raise more questions."

The artist has also created large scale projects in buildings in Rio de Janeiro and poor neighborhoods in Paris, as well as giant photobooths in Israel and Palestine.

[h/t Dazed]

Image via Twitter
Makeup artist Isamaya Ffrench got her start the way that many rising sensations in all fields do in this day and age  via Instagram. Fast forward a couple years to today and Ffrench is a certified beauty expert, with her stunning, often paint-inspired, makeup looks gracing videos like Fergie's "M.I.L.F.$" and the pages of Vogue and PAPER. Now, the Creative Artist Consultant for Tom Ford Beauty is taking her art to other mediums by collaborating with Hunter for a sleek collection of hand-drawn backpacks that perfectly balance her colorful artwork with Hunter's signature durability. We talked to Isamaya about the chic range of bags and what she's most excited to do during New York Fashion Week.

What inspired the collaboration with Hunter? What did you want to bring to the brand to change it up/take it to a new level?

I like working with brands that have a recognisable and functional aesthetic. Hunter has a strong heritage and I value their use of innovative materials and their love of the outdoors! To me, Hunter is a luxury brand and I felt it would be good to incorporate a naive and hand-drawn element to the bags and make them all feel personalized.

What are you most excited for this fashion week?

I'm excited for my friend Christian Cowan's show! He's a new young designer I'm working with and I love his hyperreal, fun and sexy clothes. Paris Hilton opened the show last season.

What's the most fun part of fashion week? What's the least fun part?

Parties!..... and hangovers!

Who are your must-see shows?

Christian Cowan, Dion Lee, DVF and Seis Marjan  also Mert & Marcus' book launch.





The collection is available now at Dover Street Market New York and up for pre-order at hunterboots.com. View the entire collection below.

Photo via BFA
Alexis Blair Penney sent me this piece from Religion Dispatches titled Magic in the Air: How Intellectuals Invented the Myth of a Mythless Society. Its an interview with Jason Josephson-Storm, author of the recently released book The Myth of Disenchantment: Magic, Modernity, and the Birth of the Human Sciences. The interview was enough to get me to order the book  Ill have more to say on the topic once I have a chance to read it. In this post, I want to talk more about myths.

Myths are stories to live by. They tell us who we are, where we came from, and where we belong. They tell whats important in life  they communicate values and virtues. The idea that we have no myths is itself a myth  a story that says while stories may be entertaining and even inspiring, they contain no truth. It tells us there is nothing beyond the material world. It tells us to put our faith in Science not just for the things that science is good at  something I strongly support  but for everything.

This myth exists primarily as a reaction to the weaknesses and excesses of another myth  the myth that the Christian church has all the answers, or at least, all the answers that matter. That myth led to the burning of heretics and supposed witches, and the forced or coerced conversion of indigenous peoples. Its still in the news with last weeks Nashville Statement of cold-hearted and regressive views on sexuality. Compared to this, the myth-of-no-myths is a decided improvement.

But it is still a myth that fails to live up to its promise. And its not the only one.

Here are three other harmful myths in our wider society, and three better alternatives.

The Myth of Progress

The Myth of Progress says that things have been getting better and will continue to get better in the future. It says history is linear and only points up. Its Star Trek  onward and upward, our future is in the stars.

Its easy to see how this myth came about. For the West, the last 300 years have been more or less continual progress. Knowledge, technology, and medicine have seen great improvements and theres still no end in sight. And while weve still got a long way to go, there is truth in the quote from Theodore Parker made famous by Martin Luther King, Jr.: the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.

But were finally starting to understand that progress carries costs: the fossil fuels that power our society are polluting the air and water and changing the climate  and theyre running out. The cheap consumer goods that fill our homes are made with sweatshop labor, and they do not satisfy our souls.

They Myth of Progress is disproved by history  every civilization and every empire that has ever existed has eventually fallen. Babylon, Egypt, Rome, Britain now the United States is clearly in imperial decline, and no amount of red MAGA caps can stop the slide.

Instead: The Myth of Cycles

Nature teaches that life is not linear, it is cyclical. Pagans celebrate the Wheel of the Year, not the inclined plane of the year. The moon waxes and wanes and then waxes again. What goes up must come down unless it reaches escape velocity, demonstrating that theres an exception to every rule.

I think its likely theres a floor under Western civilization  nothing short of global nuclear war would sent us back to medieval times. But except for the very rich, the current generation of Westerners has or will have a lower standard of living than their parents, and that trend is likely to continue for several generations  maybe several centuries.

Until it in turn bottoms out, and things start moving upwards again. Endless progress is not possible, much less inevitable. Neither is endless decline.

Learn to spot where you are on a given cycle  set your expectations and make your plans accordingly.

The Myth of Materialism

Materialism is the doctrine that nothing exists except matter and its movements and modifications. It says there is no such thing as a soul and the mind is merely the interactions of brain chemistry. If something cannot be explained by rational science then it cannot exist. But as Gordon White of Rune Soup likes to say, materialism is an assumption of science, not a finding. Evidence that does not fit into the prescribed boundaries is simply ignored.

As with the myth-of-no-myths, the Myth of Materialism exists because it has been helpful in countering harmful myths about religion and the bloody impact of religious prejudice. But it has thrown the baby of spiritual connections and experiences out with the dirty bathwater of fundamentalism.

Instead: The Myth of Experience

What do we do when we experience something materialism says isnt possible? If we want to avoid ridicule from those who know better, we rationalize it away or we keep it to ourselves. And yet when I wrote about seeing something that materialism says cannot be, I got comment after comment from people who had similar experiences.

What are we to do with thousands of reports of near death experiences and past life memories? What are we to do with magic that works so many times we cant not believe its real? What are we to do with first-hand experiences of Gods, ancestors, and other spirits?

The Myth of Experience says that if you experience it, its real. We can debate what causes these experiences and what they mean, but that they happen is undeniably true.

Materialists ask who ya gonna believe, me or your lying eyes? I suggest you believe yourself.

The Myth of the Golden Age

The Golden Age Myth is Eden or Atlantis. Its the peaceful matriarchal hunter-gatherer society or the proud independent pre-Christian European tribe. Its a time in the past when everything was right, and then Something Went Wrong. Now things are inferior, but if we could just get back to the way things used to be, if we were just pure and pious, all would be right with the world.

Except there never was a Golden Age. Oh, there were times when things were better than they are now  see the Myth of Cycles. But things were better for some people, in some ways  memories are selective. The folks wearing those red MAGA caps are yearning for a time when things were great for straight white men and not so great for everyone else.

Even if we could restore the best parts of a past age, it wouldnt be golden because the context would be radically different. While Im interested in learning as much as I can about the original Druids, Im not interested in trying to recreate iron age Druidry. I dont live in pre-Roman Britain, I live in 21st century America. Our religions  and the rest of our culture  need to speak to our circumstances and our needs here and now.

Instead: The Myth of Context and Adaptation

I started to call this the Myth of Evolution, but there are still those who deny the science of biological evolution, so Context and Adaptation seems like a better choice.

The Myth of Context and Adaptation says that while values and virtues are timeless, their expression is not. A practice that was helpful and maybe even essential in a tribal desert society may be irrelevant or even harmful in the interconnected world of today. So rather than mindlessly copying what our ancestors did, or what we think they probably did, or what some ancient text tells us they did, we examine the context of our society and circumstances and we adapt our cultural and religious practices for the world in which we actually live.

Reciprocity and hospitality, sovereignty and autonomy, truth and honor, compassion and love: these are timeless. How we embody them and express them must be tailored to the world we live in here and now.

Examine your myths

Unexamined myths lead to bad assumptions, and bad assumptions lead to weak and harmful religion. We all have myths  stories that we live by. What are your myths? Do they help you live the kind of life you want to live? Or have they set you up for failure?

The good news is that if you find yourself clinging to a harmful myth, theres a better alternative available.
U.S. Navy Denies Iran's Claim Says It Warned Off Warship In Gulf Of Oman

09/10/17

Source: RFE/RL

Iran says it has warned off an American warship during the rescue of a boat in the Gulf of Oman, while the U.S. Navy denied any direct contact with Iranian forces. The hard-line Tasnim news agency reported on September 10 that the U.S. vessel turned away after the warning from a rocket-bearing Iranian military ship.

The Iranian vessel then towed the fishing boat, which had sent out a distress signal after taking on water, back to shore, it said.



The agency did not specify when the incident, close to the strategic Strait of Hormuz in the Persian Gulf, occurred.



The United States offered a different version of the events, which it said happened on September 6.



The U.S. Navy said the coastal patrol ship USS Tempest heard the distress call of an unidentified small boat about 75 nautical miles, or 140 kilometers, from the Tempest's position.



It said another ship much closer to the boat in distress offered assistance, with that vessel communicating with Iranian naval forces.



"At no time was there any direct contact between the U.S. and Iranian maritime forces," U.S. Naval Forces Central Command (NAVCENT) said.



The Iranian and U.S. navies routinely have tense encounters in the Persian Gulf and its environs.



In August, an unarmed Iranian drone came close to a U.S. Navy warplane as it prepared to land on an aircraft carrier in the Gulf, U.S. officials said at the time.



And in July, the U.S. Navy said that one of its helicopters fired warning flares at Iranian vessels approaching American ships in the Gulf.



Based on reporting by AP and Reuters

Copyright (c) 2017 RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. www.rferl.org
Yemen: Hiding Behind Coalition's Unlawful Attacks

09/10/17

Source: Human Rights Watch

Lack of Transparency Underscores Need for International Inquiry

Members of the Saudi-led coalition have sought to avoid international legal liability by refusing to provide information on their role in alleged unlawful airstrikes in Yemen, Human Rights Watch said today. In 2017, Human Rights Watch wrote to the coalition and its current and former members urging them to release information on their investigations and findings of laws-of-war violations as required by international law. None have replied.

The coalition's unwillingness to conduct serious investigations into alleged violations of the laws of war was evident in its response to airstrikes on apartment buildings in Sanaa, the capital, on August 25 that killed or wounded more than two dozen civilians.

"No coalition member can claim clean hands in Yemen until all its members explain their role in scores of documented unlawful attacks," said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. "It borders on the absurd for the coalition to claim its own investigations are credible when it refuses to release even basic information like which countries participated in an attack and whether anyone has been held accountable."

Two family members of victims of the August 25 attack reported that coalition aircraft struck three apartment buildings in Faj Attan, a densely populated neighborhood of the capital, killing at least 16 civilians and wounding 17. After an international outcry, the coalition admitted carrying out the attack, but, as in previous apparently unlawful airstrikes, did not provide details on the coalition members joining the attack or the countries undertaking any investigation.

At about 2 a.m. on August 25, Muhammad Mea'sar, in his thirties, went up to the roof of his home in Sanaa after hearing an airstrike. He said there were four airstrikes, each about two to three minutes apart. The first three hit the Faj Attan mountains on the outskirts of Sanaa, where there are stockpiles of Yemeni army weapons under the control of the opposing Houthi-Saleh forces, who control the area. The coalition has hit the mountains repeatedly during the two-and-a-half-year conflict.

The fourth strike hit the neighborhood below, Mea'sar said: "People live there, people from Sanaa, and a lot of displaced people from different governorates. I saw the smoke coming from the middle of the houses." Mea'sar later learned that the coalition had hit a three-story building he owned, and two four-story buildings his aunts owned. He said his aunt's buildings "were gone." The buildings "became only rubble, dust, and casualties."

Ali al-Raymi, a 32-year-old Ministry of Oil and Minerals employee, was messaging his younger brother as the August 25 attacks began. Six months earlier, his brother, with his wife and six children, had moved to a cheaper apartment in the neighborhood below the mountains. His brother texted him that the sounds of the first attacks terrified his children.

Ali al-Raymi said that when his brother stopped messaging him: "I took my mom's phone and started calling my brother. He was not answering. I called him many times, but the phone was ringing and there was no answer... I felt very nervous. I felt something bad may have happened."

Al-Raymi called a friend in the area and "heard the noise of ambulances and people saying take him out! ... Take him out! ... Help this one ... Help that one." Al-Raymi immediately walked to the area and "found destruction." He said the area was so chaotic and the devastation so complete that he could not tell which home was his brother's. Another brother guided him over the phone to the spot where the house should be. "It was rubble," al-Raymi said. "I told him not to call our mother."

The airstrike killed al-Raymi's brother, his sister-in-law, five of their six children, ages 2 through 10, and his sister-in-law's brother. Only the family's 6-year-old daughter survived. Al-Raymi stayed to help with the rescue effort. The rescuers found his brother last, at about 5 p.m., after more than 14 or 15 hours of continuous searching.

Mea'sar compiled for Human Rights Watch a list of the names, ages, genders, and hospitals where people were taken: 16 people were killed in the attack, including 7 children ranging in age from 2 to 13, and 17 wounded, including 8 children. Two of Mea'sar's cousins, ages 3 and 12, were among those killed.

The coalition said that it carried out the attack, but asserted that the civilian casualties were the result of a technical error and that it had targeted a "legitimate military objective" - a command-and-control center that Houthi-Saleh forces built "with the sole purpose of using the surrounding areas as well as its civilians as shields to protect it." The coalition spokesperson said it had referred the case to the Joint Incidents Assessment Team (JIAT), the coalition's investigative mechanism, which has, to date, largely absolved the coalition of wrongdoing. The coalition spokesperson did not provide any details regarding which countries' forces may have participated in the attack. The International Committee of the Red Cross called the attack "outrageous," and said there was no apparent military target in the area.

The coalition currently consists of Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates (UAE), Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, and Sudan; Qatar withdrew in June. The coalition has conducted thousands of airstrikes in Yemen since March 2015, including scores that appear to violate the laws of war, some of which may be war crimes, yet JIAT and coalition members have provided no or insufficient information about the role that particular countries' forces are playing in alleged unlawful attacks.

While Saudi Arabia leads the coalition, available information shows that other countries have participated in the military campaign to varying degrees. In March 2015, the Emirati State news agency reported that Saudi Arabia had deployed 100 aircraft to take part in coalition operations, the UAE had deployed 30, Kuwait 15, Bahrain 15, and Qatar 10. Media and policy reports have provided some detail on specific incidents in which coalition members have played a role in the air campaign: In May 2015, a Moroccan F-16 aircraft crashed while on a mission in Yemen. In December 2015, both a Bahraini F-1 jet and a Jordanian pilot flying an F-16 carrying out coalition operations crashed. In 2015, Egypt conducted airstrikes on Yemen's western coast. In March 2017, after a helicopter attacked a boat carrying Somali migrants and refugees off the coast of Hodeida, killing and wounding dozens, a member of the UAE armed forces said the UAE was operating in the area but denied the UAE carried out the attack.

In July, the United Nations Panel of Experts on Yemen, established by the Security Council, expressed concern that coalition members "seek to hide behind 'the entity' of the Coalition to shield themselves from state responsibility for violations committed by their forces. ... Attempts to 'divert' responsibility in this manner from individual States to the Saudi-Arabia led coalition may contribute to further violations occurring with impunity." A month later, Foreign Policy reported that US officials had said that instead of looking at the whole coalition as a single entity, the UN should identify the individual countries directly responsible for atrocities in its annual "list of shame" of violations against children. A US official denied the account.

The failure of the coalition or any coalition member to credibly investigate violations by their own forces for more than two years of armed conflict underscores the need for an independent international investigation into alleged violations of international human rights and humanitarian law by all parties to the conflict, Human Rights Watch said.

"Yemeni civilians who are paying the price of this war deserve far more than blanket denials or generic expressions of sympathy," Whitson said. "UN member countries should make crystal clear to coalition members that they are failing to meet even basic standards for transparency, and that - as none of the warring parties seem willing to do so - the Human Rights Council will step in and make sure these violations are investigated."
The biggest mistake in creation was making it possible for highly intelligent crooks to go to school and wear three-piece suit.



By the fortuitous courtesy of the faceless Anas Aremeyaw Anas of Tiger Eye fame, Joy FMs Manneseh Azure Awuni, the EOCOs, the BNIs and the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament, we have a mirror placed before us by which the truth about ourselves stares us in the face week after week; and the truth is that we are a nation of five per cent highly intelligent, classroom educated crooks taking advantage of the majority merely on account of our illiteracy. They have access to the power and wealth of Ghana and they are enriching themselves beyond the dreams of greed.



In 2012 , the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) decided that it needed a self- service point which allows contributors and pensioners to print statement of accounts and update personal information with the help of a smart card.



Not only was the project outrageously expensive; also, as has now been revealed, the $34million technology was only good enough for the management of provident fund, not pensions. It has been upgraded six times between 2012 and 2016 with the cost rising from $34million to $72million but the system is still not fully functional.



One person at SSNIT could have prevented this from happening - the Director of Management Information Systems. As is now known, however, this director did (does) not possess a doctorate; no, not a masters; worse not even a first degree. So who constituted the interview panel that ticked him off as the best candidate for the job?



And, having hired him, how did the man rise through the ranks to head this unit without once occurring to anybody to question his competence?

Dear reader, did you hear how SSNIT and the State Insurance Company (SIC) were outsmarted in the Merchant Bank-UMB saga?

A Citi news report says that prior to the troubles of the hitherto wholly state owned Merchant Bank, SSNIT controlled an 89.6 per cent stake with the remaining 10.4 per cent belonging to SIC Life.



SSNIT and SIC Life sold 90 per cent of the bank to Fortiz, a private equity fund. After an initial payment of GH10 million to UMB as equity capital, however, Fortiz took a loan from the bank (UMB) and used it to invest an additional GH40 million into the same bank (UMB). Soon after it was concluded, the loan was converted into equity, reducing the shares of SSNIT and SIC Life to five per cent.



Finally, we turn to the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development. Thanks to Joy News investigative journalist, Mannaseh Azure Awuni, it has been revealed that the ministry procured one million waste bins which were not needed.



I am not interested, at least, for now in the truth or otherwise of how the waste bin contract was inflated. I am interested in how the contract could have been awarded on a Certificate of Urgency - to justify the resort to single source procurement method - when the rains were not expected till May/June 2017. Also, how come only companies from one group were single sourced?



The question I am begging every Ghanaian to ask is why the ministry placed an order for one million bins in 2016 when it had not been able to distribute 54,500 out of an earlier consignment of 155,000 bins it imported in November 2014. Indeed, it is said that the distribution centres at the assemblies were choked with bins.



An aspect of the Joy News investigation which may not have hit Ghanaians yet is the reason given by the assemblies for failing to distribute the bins. The ministrys own investigations have revealed that the citizens for whom the bins were bought at such colossal cost did not need them and that many people were using them to store water.



Everybody says politicians are crooks. I think a greater threat to our existence as a people is the corps of unscrupulous civil/public servants.

I have, on some of my trips, met Ghanaian (and other African) public officials in three-piece suit at duty-free shops of airports around the world. You will stand agape at the show of opulence. They shop like lords. At the expense of the tax payer, they fly Royal Class, lodging at multi-star hotels - the successful men and women in the land.



All these we do not begrudge them. Yet, all the book-knowledge, all the three-piece suit, all the air-conditioned chauffeured SUVs are good only for plotting the nations rape.



No wonder that in Ghana, luxury residential apartments are mushrooming everywhere whose rents are calculated per square metre and quoted in dollars. No wonder that a plot of land goes for over GH 1 million.



All it takes to be successful in Ghana is looking the other way when a bus branding contract is placed before you whose sum has been inflated by several millions of Ghana cedis  and you know it. Folks, I am getting convinced that the saga of SADA, GYEEDA etc did not happen by accident.



We need to save Ghana from rapists for whom riches are better than a good name. We need a civic education programme (as properly thought-through as One-District One-Factory, One-village one-dam and Free SHS) to restore us to our pristine morality. Our children should grow up preferring a good name to riches.

Source: Enimil Ashon/D. Graphic









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Featured Video
Of all the Floridians in the path of Hurricane Irma, Pam Brekke's father is one of the most vulnerable.

The Korean War vet has congestive heart failure and a pacemaker helps keep him alive. To take the strain off the damaged organ, every night Brekke turns on a machine that pumps oxygen to him.

If Irma knocks out power to her neighborhood near Orlando's airport, it could mean difficult days for her father - or worse.

So when Brekke heard on the radio that a local Lowe's home improvement store had just gotten a surprise shipment of generators, she dropped her work at a furniture reupholstery and dashed 30 miles to the store.

"I was getting really nervous about the storm," she recounted to The Washington Post on Saturday morning, taking a break from boarding up windows at her home. "We still didn't know what it was going to do. It was just a stressful moment."

The stress was compounded by what she found at the store: Dozens already in line, anxiously waiting to take a generator back to their own families.

One by one, the generators were snapped up.

The last box went to the person in front of Brekke.

Overwhelmed, she leaned against a display of stoves, buried her head in her arms and cried.

A man nearby noticed. He didn't speak English that well, but he asked her what was wrong.

"I told him 'I'm just scared this storm's coming and my father's on oxygen. I'm just scared,'" Brekke recounted. "And I said, 'That's all right, God will provide.' And then I turned to walk away.

"Then he stopped me. And he said 'Ma'am, this generator's for you. . . . You take it. You need it more than I do.' "

As Irma's path through Florida becomes clearer, thousands of Floridians are deciding whether to stay or go. For Brekke and the other people who are staying, coming out unscathed on the other side of Irma can depend on acquiring increasingly scarce supplies: plywood to board up windows, nonperishable food, a gas-powered generator.

The competition for dwindling resources has brought out the worst in some people. A man waiting in line at a Miami gas station was shown on video pulling a gun on another motorist. The Florida State Attorney General says she's gotten more than 7,000 complaints of people hiking up prices on fuel, hotels and water.

But Brekke said she believes there are also small acts of kindness in these anxious days before the hurricane: People sharing fuel and water. Neighbors helping neighbors board up windows. Or, in her case, a man she'd never met placing a generator into her cart.

Brekke's moment happened to be captured by a news crew that had staked out the Lowe's to capture moments of chaos and desperation as Irma loomed.

They captured the embrace by the two strangers.

He can be heard softly consoling her: "Everything is okay. Everything is fine."

She touched his face, then turned to the camera and said: "That's a beautiful man right there."

And then they went their separate ways.

Brekke said she didn't even know the man's name until she saw it on news reports.

It is Ramon Santiago. He lives near the store. His act of kindness has gone viral. And, most importantly, his family won't have to go through Irma without a generator.

When a new generator became available later that day, the store manager told WFTV that she immediately thought of Santiago.

On Friday, Santiago returned to Lowe's with WFTV to get his own generator from the store - free of charge.

"I wanted to make sure he received it because he definitely deserved it," manager Melissa Rodriguez told WFTV. "He's the hero of the day."

Brekke told The Washington Post that's her favorite part of the story.

And it's been a bright spot as she agonizes over her own final preparations for the storm.

Winds for her area are forecast at 70 to 85 mph, she said. Her home will be boarded up by then, and if the power goes, her generator will be standing by, thanks to a man she referred to as "my angel."

"It really is an awesome thing," she told The Post. "I know there's a lot of people out there doing the same thing - helping people in the same kind of need that I'm in."

(c) 2017, The Washington Post * Story by Cleve R. Wootson Jr.
The Latino Hispanic American Community Center put on the 8th annual Hispanic Heritage Festival along Derry Street, which was closed between 13th and 14th streets on Saturday.

Sponsors, vendors and volunteers enjoyed live music, Spanish food and face painting, among other things.
A few bad fishes are spoiling the entire pond, the Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad, the apex body of Hindu sadhus, essentially said as it released a list of 14 'fake babas' and announced plans to bring in a mechanism to award the title of 'sant'.

By India Today Web Desk: The Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad, the apex body of Hindu sadhus today, released a list of 'fake babas' in the country. The move seems to be in response to recent controversies that have surrounded some self-styled godmen.

The list includes 14 names, including Asaram Bapu, Sant Rampal and Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh. The latter has been surrounded in never-ending controversy since his conviction for raping two female followers of his Dera Sacha Sauda.

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Such controversies have, seemingly, displeased the Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad. "Such hypocrite babas should be put in jails, also their assets must be probed," Akhada Parishad National President, Mahant Narendra Giri said.

"We appeal to even the common people to beware of such charlatans who belong to no tradition and by their questionable acts, bring disrepute to sadhus and sanyasis," Giri said while announcing the list.

There is a very strong feeling among saints that because of misdeeds of just one or two religious leaders, the entire community was being shown in a bad light, Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) Joint General Secretary Surendra Jain said.

The parishad is a council of akharas, which are monastic orders drawing their spiritual lineage from 8th-century seer Adi Shankara, who is said to have established orders of martial monks with the aim of defending the Hindu Dharma.

The move by the top body of Hindu religious leaders came close on the heels of the recent rape conviction and jailing of Gurmeet Singh Ram Rahim, the head of Dera Sacha Sauda in Sirsa, Haryana, and the violence that followed his conviction.

Click here to Enlarge (Clockwise from top left) Asaram Bapu, Swami Aseemanand, Icchadhari Bhimanand, Narayan Sai, Sant Rampal, Radhe Ma, Swami Om and Nirmal Baba are all on the list of 14 'fake babs' (Photos: Agencies/File/Facebook)

MECHANISM FOR AWARDING 'SANT' TITLE

Along with releasing the list of 'fake babas', the Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad, has also decided to put in place a mechanism to award the title of 'sant' in order to people like Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh misusing the title.

"The Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad feels that the title of 'sant' is being misused so it has decided to put in place a mechanism to award this title," Jain said.

The title will be given after evaluating and examining an individual. "The Akhara Parishad will also observe lifestyle of individuals before conferring this title on them," Jain added.

A senior functionary of the Akhara Parishad said that they had also decided that a saint cannot hold cash or have any assets in his name.

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"All such things -- assets and cash -- should belong to a trust and should be utilised for the welfare of the people at large," the functionary said.

Jain said that the people should also "cross-check" an individual's credentials before becoming their disciples.

The Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad is the united body of 14 akharas, including the Nirmohi Akhara which is the face of the Ram Janmabhoomi movement in Ayodhya.

HERE'S THE LIST OF FAKE BABAS

Asaram Bapu

Radhe Maa

Sachinand Giri alias Sachin Datta

Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh

Icchadhari Bhimanand

Malkhan Singh

Narayan Sai

Rampal

Acharya Kushmuni

Swami Aseemanand

Brihaspati Giri

Om Namah Shivay Baba

Nirmal Baba

Om Baba

(With inputs from PTI)

Also Read

Radhe Maa in dowry harassment case: Mumbai court rejects plea to drop her name as accused

Gurmeet Ram Rahim had built a secret tunnel connecting his gufa to room of sadhvis

Radhe Maa seduction case: After Gurmeet Ram Rahim, is it time for Sukhwinder Kaur to pack up?

ALSO WATCH | The political baba: The proximity of babas to the powers that be

--- ENDS ---
Donald Trump in the last six months has proven himself to be filled with surprises - but breaking the nation's promise to 800,000 proud, would-be American citizens was not one of them.

Tony May (PennLive file)

More often than not, our nation has honored treaties and agreements with indigenous Americans and other nations as long as it has been convenient - and then brushed them aside when they become an impediment to American goals.

For a starter, you can go all the way back to the Treaty of Fort Pitt, notable because it was the first treaty of any kind between the new nation and American Indians that was committed to writing (signed 239 years ago on Sept. 17, 1778).

For the most part, it was an agreement with the Delaware tribes to allow U.S. troops safe passage through Delaware country while pursuing their enemies.

In return, the Delaware were to receive "articles of clothing, food and utensils of war." When it became apparent to the Delaware that the Continental Congress thought the agreement also required the Delaware to attack other native Americans, the treaty collapsed within a year.

By some counts, the U.S. has abrogated more than 500 treaties over its nearly two and a half centuries of existence.

Under DACA, the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, foreign-born residents who were brought to the U.S. as minor children by their parents were guaranteed safe harbor against deportation for a two-year, renewable period and provided with a green card allowing them to work or pursue education.

The program was created in 2012 through an executive order by then-President Barack Obama after Congress failed to address the issue of childhood arrivals through legislation.

Trump has been, as usual, sending mixed signals about DACA card holders. He had Attorney General Jeff Sessions announce his intent to abolish the program if Congress did not pass comprehensive immigration legislation --- including funding to start the Mexican border wall - and the followed up by professing his love for DACA participants.

What is clear is that Trump sees 800,000 human beings as bargaining chips in his efforts to secure funding for the wall, an issue that cannot independently secure the support of a majority of members of Congress.

In fact, 800,000 is a low number because - in signing up for DACA, participants had to disclose the existence and location of parents and siblings in the U.S. This, in effect, could serve as a target list for deportation by the Customs and Immigration Service (CIS) should the DACA shutdown be put into effect.

Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro has joined more than a dozen other state attorneys general in challenging Sessions' pronouncement in federal court.

Pennsylvania, according to the Center for American Progress, is home to an estimated 5,300 DACA participants of whom 4,600 are working and the remaining pursuing higher education.

CAP estimates abandoning DACA would have a negative impact of more than $320 million a year on the state's Gross Domestic Product.

What is also clear is that Trump's waffling on the DACA shutdown order shows that he overplayed his hand on the immigration question. Most people appear to think that there is some level of "good" immigration and that this includes kids who find themselves residents of the U.S.A. through the decision of parents and other adults and who are willing to jump through all kinds of hoops to earn citizenship.

Trump's actions call to mind the time in 1973 when National Lampoon Magazine outraged most American's by publishing a cover photo of a dog with a revolver pointed at his head. The headline read: "If you don't buy this magazine, we'll kill this dog."

Too far.

Tony May is a partner in Triad Strategies, a Harrisburg lobbying and public relations firm. His "Donkeys & Elephants" column appears weekly opposite conservative commentator Charlie Gerow.
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The Top 5 Letters to the Editor of the week.

As you might imagine, we get more letters to the editor here at PennLive Opinion than we could ever hope to run. Some are turned down because they're too long. Some don't make the cut because they just don't have that something that makes them worthy of publication.

None of these have run on PennLive before. It's a nice way to clear the decks on a Sunday morning before another busy week of news devours our collective attention.

Ready? Here we go.

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5. If Obamacare fails, Trump and the Republicans own it

If we see a destabilization of America's mighty healthcare system, President Trump will certainty "own it." According to the CBO and PolitiFact, the ACA is strong and nowhere close to a "death spiral." But Trump has been working to sabotage the ACA since January.

Earlier this year his administration made it more difficult for consumers to enroll in ACA marketplace insurances, by announcing they were slashing the sign-up period from three months to only 45 days. In August, Trump first lied about the funds that help poor Americans afford healthcare by calling them "bailouts for insurance companies," before threatening to terminate them. And just last week, his administration announced that funds to publicize the ACA enrollment period would be gutted by 90 percent, and 41 percent of the funds allocated to assist Americans in enrollment would be eliminated.

If the ACA fails, we will blame the Trump administration, not President Obama.

Tarik S. Khan, Philadelphia, Pa.

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Andrea Murray-Seaboyer | National Desk

4. Sessions and PennLive were wrong about sanctuary cities

On Sunday, Sept. 3, The Patriot-News ran an editorial "Sessions right to punish sanctuary cities."

The editorial is nonsense as is the attorney general's policy. The mayors of at least nine American cities have declared that their cities are "sanctuary cities." No proof is provided of what actions the police departments of each of these cities are taking or not taking to enforce federal immigration laws.

The police departments of many American cities are taking varied actions in response to requests from federal immigration officials for assistance.

The attorney general has threatened to withhold federal funds from any city which says it is a "sanctuary city," no matter what actions the city is taking or not taking to enforce federal immigration laws. That of course makes no sense.

Also, courts have held consistently that officials from the executive branch of government (the Department of Justice) cannot legally decide to cut funds allocated by the legislative branch of government (Congress). It is embarrassing that the attorney general is not aware of the law.

Michael A. Sand, Susquehanna Township

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File photo

3. Protect all who protect the public - that includes our Corrections officers

Law enforcement officers on all levels are facing ambushes, assaults, and murders by criminal elements in record numbers across the nation. As state corrections officers, we are part of that law enforcement community, especially in the eyes of the public. We wear uniforms almost identical to many police departments; and to most criminals, a correctional officer is "just another cop." Not only are we grouped with most other law enforcement officers, we are most vulnerable when unarmed.

Across America, police and many corrections officers can carry their off-duty weapon to and from work. Those who work behind the walls in Pennsylvania are not afforded that protection. Unfortunately, we have to face a harsh truth that we are defenseless. There have been documented cases of former inmates/associates following officers from their place of employment and assaulting them.

PA DOC employees are citizens of the Commonwealth and should be permitted to exercise the rights afforded to them by the Second Amendment, as well as the Pennsylvania Constitution, Article I, Section 21. Employees who are otherwise licensed to carry a firearm as a citizen while off-duty should not have that right stripped simply because they are commuting to and from work.

In Congress, legislation is pending to allow federal prison officers the right to carry firearms to and from their work location by providing on-site storage and/or allowing secure vehicle-mounted storage. It's time we afford that same protection to our state corrections officers.

Rich Fowler, Shamokin, Northumberland County

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AP Photo/Gerald Herbert

2. Harvey relief efforts showed Americans at their best

Houstonians and people from all across America are banding together with love, work and unity to fight the floods and devastation of Hurricane Harvey.

This is America at its best and needs to grow into a nationwide movement to put America back on the right track.

Stop the blame game, name calling, division and political and ideological correctness. We can and must work together to solve our core problems - national defense, infra-structure, health care, global warming, deficit, tax reform and a growing economy, good jobs and equitable pay.

John Currie, Lower Allen Township

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1. Donald Trump is the most un-Christian president ever.

President Trump has ended the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program  also called DACA. Under the DACA program, the Justice Department deferred prosecution against certain undocumented persons who had entered the U.S. as children. It was far from an amnesty program.

Let's call this action what it is, a cynical attempt to build up Trump's support with the narrow 25 percent or so who elected him, and to divert attention from his administration's failure to repeal Obamacare as well as other failures. Let's also call this what it is not, an action with any trace of Christianity. Rather than me telling you why this is so, why not read these passages from Jesus's Gospel - Luke 10:25-37, Matthew 25:40.

This President, who got so many votes from alleged Christians, is proving to be perhaps the most un-Christian ever!

Jim Foster, Hampden Township
By Shamaine Daniels

President Donald Trump is right - DACA is a failure and Congress needs to step up and do its job.

Shamaine Daniels (PennLive file)

That is as much as I will agree with the president Trump on immigration matters. Shortly after pardoning Sherriff Arpaio who is reputed for engaging in human Trafficking and proudly flouted the laws of the United States, Trump rescinded Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, also known as DACA; beneficiaries are often referred to as Dreamers.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions explained that the decision was made to honor the rule of law, which for some reason does not apply to Arpaio. Ignoring the obvious hypocrisy, Trump dared Congress to do something about his immigration decision within the next six months.

DACA was a tiny band-aid to a very broken immigration system. Under the program, over 800,000-- or less than ten percent of undocumented immigrants--were allowed the opportunity to stay in the U.S. with work authorization until Congress were to decide to show up to work. While DACA allowed mainstream America to peek into the world of the undocumented community, it solved very little.

Trump's behavior is repugnant, but I can't say that I will miss DACA. Its existence was proof of the moral failure of the U.S. Congress in standing up for American values enshrined in our constitution, in addressing the needs of the United States, and a troubling comfort of the American people with a sort of second-class citizenship.

You could argue that prior to DACA people justified the exploitation of the undocumented community because they were outside the folds of our legal system while being keystone to our economic one.

DACA, on the other hand, was an explicit statement that Americans will tolerate people who stay in the U.S. as long as they don't participate in our political systems, don't rely on our economic safety nets and accept that they will never be called Americans. The founding parents had an objection to taxation without representation, but we have grown accustomed to it; and given the mismanagement of Social Security funds, depend on it.

I could argue the numbers, the income we lose by not providing a path to citizenship to all of the undocumented immigrants in Pennsylvania, the increase in blight in a community after an immigration raid, the jobs a region loses every-time an immigrant-owned business closes.

I could speculate about what rescue efforts in the South and in the West would look like without the help of undocumented immigrants, I could even point out how much political clout Pennsylvania has lost due to its anti-immigrant policies or how much more we will lose in Congress after the next Census.

There is no point though, the numbers are out there and have been out there. Our legislators are simply too lazy to do the work and lack the spine to explain to their constituents that the future of the United States and the future of the undocumented community are tightly intertwined. Their success is ours and ours is theirs.

I am with Trump on this: DACA needs to be eliminated as we cannot sit comfortably with second-class citizenship, it is un-American. Congress needs to grow a pair of ovaries and adopt a bill that gives a path to citizenship to the approximately twelve million undocumented immigrants in the United States this year.

They need to stand up for the very fundamental aspirational premise of this country, that everyone is created equal and deserves equal treatment under the laws. It needs to show that as an institution, it is still capable of doing its job.

The alternative will continue to morally and economically devastate Pennsylvania and the United States.

Shamaine Daniels is vice-president of Harrisburg City Council. She writes from Harrisburg.
Men board up a door in preparation for Hurricane Irma in Caibarien, Cuba, Friday, Sept. 8, 2017. Cuba evacuated tourists from beachside resorts after Hurricane Irma left thousands homeless on a devastated string of Caribbean islands and spun toward Florida for what could be a catastrophic blow this weekend. (AP Photo/Desmond Boylan)
By PTI: to have CBI probe

(Eds: Combining the related stories)

Gurgaon, Sep 10 (PTI) Hundreds of angry parents today staged a protest outside the Ryan International School here for a CBI probe into the murder of a seven-year-old school boy, a demand which the Haryana government expressed willingness to accept.

A liquor shop, situated just 50 metres from the school, was set ablaze and some of the demonstrators threw liquor bottles inside school premises to vent their ire against the school management, police said.

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The protestors alleged that school drivers and conductors often consume alcohol from the liquor shop in their free time.

The protestors were demanding that the school be shut until a CBI probe is ordered into the horrifying incident in which the Class 2 boy Praduman Thakur was found with his throat slit in a school washroom on Friday last.

The murder, in connection with which a bus conductor has been arrested, has triggered a major outrage.

Police used batons to quell the protest and detained 20 protestors. Cameras of some photojournalists were also damaged during the protest.

"The Gurgaon Police had to use mild lathicharge to disperse the agitators. The police detained over 20 protestors found agitating outside the school," said Ravinder Kumar, PRO of Gurgaon Police.

Gurgaon Police Commissioner Sandeep Khirwar denied the charges of mediapersons being targeted by the cops.

"As per my knowledge, a fair warning was given to clear the place and nobody was targeted. However, if any mediaperson has been injured, then I express my regret and we will analyse the entire episode. But there was no intention to target anyone," Khirwar said.

"On behalf of police authorities, I want to request the district administration that the mediapersons should be given best medical treatment," he said.

Gurgaon Police has arrested school bus conductor Ashok Kumar in connection with the murder.

According to police, Kumar was inside the toilet, waiting for any student to come inside with the motive of alleged sexual assault. The deceased was the first student who entered the toilet, the police said.

Education minister Ram Bilas Sharma today said the charge sheet in the case will be ready within a week as he police were speedily conducting the probe.

He, however, added that if the parents of the child insist on a probe by the CBI or any other agency, the government will accede to their demand.

Sharma said the government has fixed a seven-day deadline in the case where the accused is booked under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code (for murder).

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"We have directed the Gurgaon Police to book the owner of Ryan International School, Albert Pinto, under section 75 of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Punishment) Act, 2015, for cruelty to a child meted out by the custodian in the charge sheet to be submitted in the court within 7 days," he told reporters here.

"This is the minimum time in such cases," he said.

"However, if the childs parents still feel they are not satisfied, then as per their wish, we can get the case investigated by any agency including the CBI," he added.

The minister said "some loopholes in the security" were visible in the case and the toilet window was also found broken from inside.

"We accept negligence on part of the Ryan International School but the school cannot be derecognised as the future of 1,200 students is at stake," he said.

Sharma also made it clear that the school management has to take responsibility for the safety and security of the children.

"We are issuing directives in this regard to all schools including private ones," he said.

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"We held a meeting today in which the demand to derecognise the school came up, but we also had to take into account the fact that 1,200 students are studying there. The parents of the students studying in this school were against this step and, therefore, we felt taking such a step will not be right," he said.

"However, for any kind of lapse, by the management or the owner, we have initiated action," he said.

The accused was arrested within hours of the murder after which a court in Gurgaon sent him to police custody for three days.

"The murder accused has already been arrested. Now, within a week, the police after collecting all necessary evidence will submit a charge sheet in court. However, still if the parents are not satisfied, then the Haryana government is ready to get the matter probed by any agency.

"I am hopeful that when we will produce the accused before court within a week with all evidence collected by the police, the parents of the child will be satisfied with the action being taken," he said.

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"We have full sympathy with the parents of the child. If there is any issue of providing financial help, the Haryana government will be willing to help," he said. The minister made it clear that the Haryana government will not show any leniency in the matter

"Whatever strict action needs to be taken as per the law will be taken in this case," he asserted.

He also said a liquor vend near the school has been ordered to be shut down permanently.

Meanwhile, former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda said a CBI probe should be ordered.

Upping the ante against the BJP government in Haryana, Hooda said, "This government has lost the trust and confidence of the public. By assaulting mediapersons, the government is trying to suppress voice of the people." PTI CORR/SUN VSD DV ANB SC AKK AKK

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Meet Gavin and Macey Bebble, cousins and fellow St. Mary's stars

Two fellow Class of 2023 members, Gavin and Macey Bebble share a bond as cousins, friends and leading members of multiple talented St. Mary's teams.
By PTI: Chandigarh, Sep 10 (PTI) Haryana police have arrested Govind, a member of the state body of the Dera Sacha Sauda, Sirsa, for allegedly inciting violence on August 25 in Panchkula after sect chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh was convicted in rape case.

Meanwhile, efforts continued to trace the Dera chiefs adopted daughter Honeypreet Insan, against whom a lookout notice was issued earlier.

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Govind, a senior member of the Dera Sacha Sauda, was present at the Hafed Chowk, the epicentre of the violence in Panchkula on August 25, the police said today, adding that he has been accused of inciting violence.

"We arrested him from Zirakpur," Panchkula Police Commissioner, A S Chawla said today. Chawla added that the police were still looking for two key Dera Sacha Sauda functionaries, Honeypreet and Aditya Insan.

"We are at the job and hopeful of nabbing them soon," he said.

The Haryana police had earlier sent a team to Lakhimpur Kheri in Uttar Pradesh bordering Nepal in search of Honeypreet, a close confidante of the self-styled godman who is serving a 20-year-old jail term for raping two disciples.

The police had on September 1 issued a lookout notice for Honeypreet and Aditya, fearing that they could flee the country.

"We are conducting raids at various places and our teams have gone to different areas to trace them," Chawla said.

Earlier, Dera Sacha Sauda management too had appealed to the two to cooperate with the police. Sirsa-headquartered Dera chairperson Vipassana Insan had said that Honeypreet and Dera spokesperson Aditya Insan should help the investigations.

She had claimed that the Dera had no contact with them.

Chawla said the police initiated efforts to trace Honeypreet, the adopted daughter of Ram Rahim Singh, who describes herself as "Papas angel", after it arrested and questioned another sect functionary, Surinder Dhiman Insan, in connection with an alleged conspiracy to help Ram Rahim escape after his conviction by the special CBI court in Panchkula.

Chawla said that police needs to question Honeypreet regarding the disclosures made by Surinder Dhiman and some other arrested accused.

He said that an FIR was earlier lodged at the Panchkula police station following a statement by a newspaper reporter against Aditya and Surinder Dhiman. The duo have been booked for sedition.

Violence broke out in Panchkula after the Dera chiefs conviction, leaving 35 dead, while six others were killed in incidents in Sirsa.

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Two key functionaries of Dera Sacha Sauda were also arrested on Friday for allegedly inciting violence in Panchkula. Chamkaur Singh, the incharge of Dera Sacha Sauda centre at Panchkula and Daan Singh, another key functionary, were nabbed by the police.

Both were arrested in connection with the violence that took place in Panchkula on August 25, the police said.

The 50-year-old Dera chief, who is lodged in the Sunaria Jail in Rohtak, had been sentenced to 20 years of imprisonment by the CBI court for the 2002 rapes of two of his disciples.

Earlier, five Haryana policemen, who were part of Ram Rahims security when he travelled from Sirsa to the CBI court on August 25, were charged with sedition and dismissed from service over the alleged conspiracy to help him escape.

Honeypreet had accompanied Ram Rahim when he was brought to the special court for the pronouncement of the verdict in the 15-year-old rape cases.

She also travelled with him in a chopper which ferried them to Rohtak from Panchkula after the conviction.

Honeypreet acted in the film MSG 2 - The Messenger and had a cameo role in MSG - The Warrior Lion Heart, in which the Dera chief played the lead roles.

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Officials of the Uttar Pradesh police also said today that Honeypreets photographs were pasted at police stations bordering Nepal and the law and order machinery was on an alert to ensure she does not sneak into the neighbouring country. PTI SUN VSD ADS

--- ENDS ---
Of all the Floridians in the path of Hurricane Irma, Pam Brekke's father is one of the most vulnerable.

The Korean War vet has congestive heart failure, and a pacemaker helps keep him alive. To take the strain off the damaged organ, every night Brekke turns on a machine that pumps oxygen to him.

If Irma knocks out power to her neighborhood near Orlando's airport, it could mean difficult days for her father  or worse.

So when Brekke heard on the radio that a local Lowe's home improvement store had just gotten a surprise shipment of generators, she dropped her work at a furniture reupholstery shop and dashed 30 miles to the store.

"I was getting really nervous about the storm," she recounted to the Washington Post on Saturday morning, taking a break from boarding up windows at her home. "We still didn't know what it was going to do. It was just a stressful moment."

The stress was compounded by what she found at the store: Dozens already in line, anxiously waiting to take a generator back to their own families.

One by one, the generators were snapped up.

The last box went to the person in front of Brekke.

Overwhelmed, she leaned against a display of stoves, buried her head in her arms and cried.

A man nearby noticed. He didn't speak English that well, but he asked her what was wrong.

"I told him, 'I'm just scared this storm's coming and my father's on oxygen. I'm just scared,'" Brekke recounted. "And I said, 'That's all right, God will provide.' And then I turned to walk away.

"Then he stopped me. And he said 'Ma'am, this generator's for you.  You take it. You need it more than I do.' "

As Irma's path through Florida becomes clearer, thousands of Floridians are deciding whether to stay or go. For Brekke and the other people who are staying, coming out unscathed on the other side of Irma can depend on acquiring increasingly scarce supplies: plywood to board up windows, nonperishable food, a gas-powered generator.

The competition for dwindling resources has brought out the worst in some people. A man waiting in line at a Miami gas station was shown on video pulling a gun on another motorist. The Florida attorney general says she's gotten more than 7,000 complaints of people hiking up prices on fuel, hotels and water.

But Brekke said she believes there are also small acts of kindness in these anxious days before the hurricane: people sharing fuel and water. Neighbors helping neighbors board up windows. Or in her case, a man she'd never met placing a generator into her cart.

Brekke's moment happened to be captured by a news crew that had staked out the Lowe's to capture moments of chaos and desperation as Irma loomed.

They captured the embrace by the two strangers.

He can be heard softly consoling her: "Everything is OK. Everything is fine."

She touched his face, then turned to the camera and said: "That's a beautiful man right there."

And then they went their separate ways.

Brekke said she didn't even know the man's name until she saw it on news reports.

It is Ramon Santiago. He lives near the store. His act of kindness has gone viral. And most importantly, his family won't have to go through Irma without a generator.

When a new generator became available later that day, the store manager told WFTV that she immediately thought of Santiago.

On Friday, Santiago returned to Lowe's with WFTV to get his own generator from the store  free of charge.

"I wanted to make sure he received it because he definitely deserved it," manager Melissa Rodriguez told WFTV. "He's the hero of the day."

Brekke told the Post that's her favorite part of the story.

And it's been a bright spot as she agonizes over her own final preparations for the storm.

Winds for her area are forecast at 70 to 85 mph, she said. Her home will be boarded up by then, and if the power goes, her generator will be standing by, thanks to a man she referred to as "my angel."

"It really is an awesome thing," she told the Post. "I know there's a lot of people out there doing the same thing  helping people in the same kind of need that I'm in."
JERUSALEM  Israeli leaders and political commentators reacted with anger and bewilderment Sunday after Yair Netanyahu, son of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, posted a classic anti-Semitic meme on his Facebook page.

Neo-Nazi groups in the United States and Holocaust denier David Duke, a former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, liked the post, however.

"Yair Netanyahu is a total bro," wrote Andrew Anglin in the neo-Nazi Daily Stormer. "Next he's going to call for gassings."

Duke tweeted about it: "Welcome to the club, Yair  absolutely amazing, wow, just wow."  David Duke

The image posted over the weekend by the younger Netanyahu, who goes by the name "Yair Hun" on Facebook, appears to be a local take on a classic anti-Semitic meme suggesting that Jews control the United States. It has appeared widely on extreme alt-right websites.

In this instance, it depicts his father's perceived foes: American Jewish billionaire philanthropist and investor George Soros, outspoken former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak, activist Eldad Yaniv, and Meni Naftali, a former housekeeper for the Netanyahus who successfully sued them for mistreatment.

Netanyahu captioned the meme "the food chain."

It is not clear who created the caricature, but many in Israel condemned it and expressed shock that the prime minister's son would share such an image.

Barak suggested he should see a psychiatrist.

"Is this what the kid hears at home?" he wrote on Twitter. "Is it genetics, or a spontaneous mental illness? It doesn't matter. In any case, we should fund his psychiatrist instead of security guards and a driver."

Netanyahu responded to Barak by telling him to get a geriatric nurse: "I hope Ehud Barach [a play on words meaning 'Ehud ran away'] didn't tweet about me from his seat in Boston (between one shady deal or another) while drunk on whiskey (as I well recall). Time to get a geriatric nurse, Ehud."

He also responded to an article about his post in the left-leaning newspaper Haaretz, calling the publication anti-Semitic.

"It's a particularly sad day for Israel when a caricature endorsed by the head of the KKK emerges from the home of the prime minister of the Jewish state," wrote recently elected Labor leader Avi Gabbay on Twitter.

"Every Jew should feel a sense of shame that a Der Sturmer-style cartoon has come out of the Israeli Prime Minister's residence and was embraced by one of the great anti-Semites. Erase, apologize and condemn!" wrote Opposition Chairman Isaac Herzog on Twitter.

"This post was not put up by mistake, this is in keeping with the views of his father," activist Eldad Yaniv told The Washington Post. "He wants to set Israeli society on fire, pitching people against each other, so he can hide the suspicions that are against him."

On Twitter, Yaniv shared the image posted by Yair Netanyahu together with the original, which he called the inspiration behind a post from "the son of the prime minister of the Jewish people."

Yaniv, together with former housekeeper Naftali, have been leading weekly protests against the prime minister and the attorney general over what they see as a failure to issue indictments against Netanyahu in at least two cases of alleged corruption.

Three weeks ago, the two men were violently arrested and held overnight by police for Facebook posts calling on the public to join them. Last week, in a speech to his supporters, Netanyahu publically attacked the two men, calling them anarchists and criminals.

On Friday, Netanyahu's wife, Sara, was informed by the attorney general that she will likely face charges for excessive spending, ordering  against protocol  ready-made food and hiring private chefs to the prime minister's residence in Jerusalem.

Writing in the daily Yediot Aharonot, commentator Ben Dror Yemini said this post indicated the prime minister and his family were panicking.

"If that wasn't clear then along came this cartoon to demonstrate that something bad, very bad, is happening in the [prime minister's] residence on Balfour Street. When an anti-Semitic cartoon gets posted there, that is no longer just the problem of the people who reside in the residence. It is the State of Israel's problem," he wrote.

Last month, at the time of the neo Nazi march in Charlottesville, Yair Netanyahu also caused controversy by equating neo-Nazis with activists from far-left anti-fascist groups known as "antifa."

"I'm a Jew, I'm an Israeli, the neo nazi scums in Virginia hate me and my country. But they belong to the past. Their breed is dying out," the 26-year-old wrote on Facebook. "However the thugs of Antifa and BLM who hate my country (and America too in my view) just as much are getting stronger and stronger and becoming super dominant in American universities and public life."
As Irma churned toward the Florida coast, two Republican lawmakers from the state voted against a $15 billion hurricane relief bill, saying that although they want aid to storm victims, they have concerns about other provisions of the measure.

The relief package, which sailed through the Senate and the House and was signed by President Donald Trump on Friday, boosts funding for the Federal Emergency Management Agency. It will also raise the debt ceiling for three months and includes a short-term budget that would keep the government running until December  part of a deal struck between Trump and Democratic leaders Sen. Charles Schumer of New York and Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California.

That latter was a problem for GOP Reps. Matt Gaetz and Ted Yoho, who stuck to their principles of fiscal conservatism despite calls from fellow Florida lawmakers to support the bill. The two, who are among the 90 House Republicans who voted against the bill, do not represent parts of the state that are likely to feel Irma's immediate impact as the massive storm makes landfall on mainland United States this weekend.

Yoho, who represents areas of northern Florida, said the disaster-relief bill should have been stand-alone legislation.

"Snaking in a debt-ceiling increase with funding for victims and communities affected is immoral and reflective of broken leadership in Washington," Yoho said in a statement after the vote Friday. "I do not think it wise to extend our borrowing limit without mandatory spending reforms . . . If this was a clean measure that focused on those affected by Hurricane Harvey, I would have proudly voted for it."

Gaetz, whose district includes coastal areas along the Gulf of Mexico, called the spending package "generational theft."

"I have a pretty strident view that I will only vote to raise the debt limit if that vote is accompanied with reductions in entitlement spending," Gaetz said, according to the Miami Herald. "If conservatives don't start voting no against debt-limit increases, all the FEMA in the world won't save us from our must unfortunate destiny."

Both lawmakers had voted for a stand-alone bill that would provide nearly $8 billion in hurricane relief for FEMA. That version passed the House on Wednesday. But they and others soured after the bill came back from the Senate with double the funding and other provisions tacked on.

"I think anytime you start dealing with disasters and tying it to must-pass bills, it's not a good thing for the American people," Yoho said on C-SPAN's "Washington Journal" before the vote Friday. "I don't want to be hypercritical, but when you make a deal with Charles Schumer and Nancy Pelosi on a spending bill, a lot of times it can't be good for the American consumer."

Yoho said he opted to stay in Washington this weekend, but he plans to fly to Florida on Monday, when Irma is expected to reach his district.

"Of course, we want the assistance there, and I can feel comfortable saying that the American people will know that the assistance will be there for FEMA," he added. "We just don't want the political antics to be tied up with it."

The bill passed 316-90, with 133 Republican votes.

Twenty-seven lawmakers, including 11 House Republicans from Florida, did not vote, as many were in their home state preparing for the hurricane. Among them are Reps. Ron DeSantis, Neal Dunn, Bill Posey and Dennis Ross  hard-liners who might have voted against the package in other circumstances.

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, another Republican who skipped the vote and whose district includes part of Miami, urged colleagues to vote in favor of the bill.

"As Hurricane Irma approaches Florida, I would ask that all my Congressional colleagues reflect on the fate of Florida's 20.61 million residents when they are asked to again vote on this vital emergency disaster funding as it comes back from the Senate," Ros-Lehtinen said in a letter to House members Thursday.

Five Florida Republicans remained in Washington for the vote. Three of them, Reps. Brian Mast, Thomas Rooney and Francis Rooney, voted for the bill, as did all six Democrats who stayed.

Four Texas Republicans, Reps. Joe Barton, Jeb Hensarling, Sam Johnson and Mac Thornberry, rejected the bill for the same reasons that Gaetz and Yoho raised.

"I am not voting against relief programs to help hurricane victims, but I am against raising the public debt ceiling without a plan to reduce deficits on the short term, and eliminate them in the long term," Barton said in a statement. "The money we vote to spend today will have to be paid back by our children and grandchildren."

Thornberry criticized advancing "another agenda" by roping it with disaster assistance.

None of those Republicans, however, represents coastal areas affected by Harvey, which barreled through Southeast Texas last week.

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, who skipped the Senate vote on the bill Thursday to prepare for Irma in Miami, said he would have voted for it "despite significant reservations" about the other items attached to it.

"As I have always done in the past, I support providing additional emergency resources for disaster aid and recovery. Disaster relief is an appropriate function of the federal government. And unlike some previous disaster relief legislation, these funds are to be spent immediately, and are properly targeted to assist the areas impacted by Hurricane Harvey and potentially Hurricane Irma," Rubio said in a statement Thursday. "The rest of the package, however, contains items that under normal circumstances, and considered separately, I have opposed."

The Senate passed the bill 80-17, with 33 Republican votes.

The Washington Post's Mike DeBonis contributed to this report.
WASHINGTON  President Trump prepared for the pivotal meeting with congressional leaders by huddling with his senior team  his chief of staff, his legislative director and the heads of Treasury and the Office of Management and Budget  to game out various scenarios on how to fund the government, raise the debt ceiling and provide Hurricane Harvey relief.

But one option they never considered was the that one the president ultimately chose: cutting a deal with Democratic lawmakers, to the shock and ire of his own party.

In agreeing to tie Harvey aid to a three-month extension of the debt ceiling and government funding, Trump burned the people who are ostensibly his allies. The president was an unpredictable  and, some would say, untrustworthy  negotiating partner with not only congressional Republicans but also with his Cabinet members and top aides. Trump saw a deal that he thought was good for him  and he seized it.

The move should come as no surprise to students of Trump's long history of broken alliances and agreements. In business, his personal life, his campaign and now his presidency, Trump has sprung surprises on his allies with gusto. His dealings are frequently defined by freewheeling spontaneity, impulsive decisions and a desire to keep everyone guessing  especially those who assume they can control him.

He also repeatedly demonstrates that, while he demands absolute loyalty from others, he is ultimately loyal to no one but himself.

"It makes all of their normalizing and 'Trumpsplaining' look silly and hollow," said Rick Wilson, a Republican strategist sharply critical of Trump, referring to his party's congressional leaders. "Trump betrays everyone: wives, business associates, contractors, bankers and now, the leaders of the House and Senate in his own party. They can't explain this away as [a] 15-dimensional Trump chess game. It's a dishonest person behaving according to his long-established pattern."

But what many Republicans saw as betrayal was, in the view of some Trump advisers, an exciting return to his campaign promise of being a populist dealmaker able to cut through the mores of Washington to get things done.

In that Wednesday morning Oval Office meeting, Trump was impressed with the energy and vigor of Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D., N.Y.) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.), relative to the more subdued Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) and House Speaker Paul Ryan (R., Wis). Far from fretting over the prospect of alienating McConnell and Ryan or members of his administration, he relished the opportunity for a bipartisan agreement and the praise he anticipated it would bring, according to people close to the president.

On Thursday morning, he called Pelosi and Schumer to crow about coverage of the deal  "The press has been incredible," he told Pelosi, according to someone familiar with the call  and point out that it had been especially positive for the Democratic leaders.

At the White House later that day, Trump asked Rep. Peter King (R., N.Y.) how he thought the deal was playing. "I told him I thought it was great, and a gateway project to show there could be bipartisan progress," King said. "He doesn't want to be in an ideological straitjacket."

In some ways, White House officials said, Trump is as comfortable working with Democrats to achieve policy goals  complete with the sheen of bipartisan luster  as he is with Republicans. Though he did not partner with Democrats to spite McConnell and Ryan, aides said, he has long felt frustrated with them for what he perceives as their inability to help shepherd his agenda through Congress, most notably their stalled efforts to undo former president Barack Obama's signature health-care law.

On Thursday, Trump took to Twitter to express dissatisfaction with his adopted political party, complaining about Obamacare: "Republicans, sorry, but I've been hearing about Repeal & Replace for 7 years, didn't happen!" He also bemoaned the legislative filibuster, which requires Republicans to work with Democrats to meet a 60-senator threshold for most votes, writing, "It is a Repub Death wish."

Ari Fleischer, press secretary under President George W. Bush, said that Trump deserves credit for staving off, at least in the short term, a possible default and government shutdown.

"It's going to internally hurt him that he didn't work with Republicans on this one, but by avoiding a mess, he likely saved Republicans from themselves," Fleischer said. "I consider it a small victory that congressional Republicans didn't once again trip themselves up over this issue. At least for now."

King, a moderate who represents a Long Island district that Trump carried, said: "I think this could be a new day for the Republican Party."

Trump's agreement with the Democrats is hardly the first time the president has flouted his allies, including those around the world, sending them skittering nervously in response to a threat or a sudden turnabout.

In April, Trump thrust Canada and Mexico  as well as many of his advisers and cabinet officials  into a state of panic during a frenetic, if brief, period when he threatened to withdraw from the North American Free Trade Agreement. In May, speaking in front of NATO's sparkling new headquarters, Trump alarmed European allies when he chastised them for "not paying what they should be paying" and refused to embrace the treaty's cornerstone  that an attack on one represents an attack on all. And in September, as the crisis with North Korea escalated, Trump abruptly threatened to withdraw from a free-trade agreement with South Korea.

Foreign diplomats euphemistically describe the president as "unpredictable," and even those with good relationships with the United States say they are "cautiously optimistic" that Trump's behavior will continue to benefit their nations.

On the issue of the debt-ceiling extension and short-term government funding, a GOP aide familiar with Wednesday's meeting said many Republicans viewed Trump's decision as "a spur-of-the-moment thing" that happened because the president "just wanted a deal."

"He saw a deal and wanted the deal, and it just happened to be completely against what we were pushing for," said the aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to offer a candid assessment. "Our conclusion is there isn't much to read into other than he made that decision on the spot, and that's what he does because he's Trump, and he made an impulsive decision because he saw a deal he wanted."

From the outset, the meeting did not go as Republican leaders and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin had hoped. They began by pushing for an 18-month extension of the debt ceiling, with Mnuchin lecturing the group of longtime legislators about the importance of raising the debt ceiling, according to three people familiar with the gathering who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

"It was just odd and weird," one said. "He was very much a duck out of water."

The treasury secretary presented himself as a Wall Street insider, arguing that the stability of the markets required an 18-month extension.

At one point, Schumer intervened with a skeptical question: "So the markets dictate one month past the 2018 election?" he asked, rhetorically, according to someone with knowledge of his comment. "I doubt that."

At another, Pelosi explained that understanding Wall Street is not the same as operating in Congress. "Here the currency of the realm is the vote," she told reporters in a news conference Thursday, echoing the comments she had made privately the day before. "You have the votes, no discussion necessary. You don't have the votes, three months."

The Republican leaders and Mnuchin slowly began moderating their demands, moving from their initial pitch down to 12 months and then six months. At one point, when Mnuchin was in the middle of yet another explanation, the president cut him off, making it clear that he disagreed.

The deal would be for three months tied to Harvey funding, Trump said  just as the Democrats had wanted.

On Friday morning, at a closed-door meeting of House Republicans, numerous lawmakers vented their frustrations to Mnuchin and White House budget director Mick Mulvaney. One of them, Rep. Lee Zeldin (R., N.Y.) stood up to say he thought Trump's snub of Ryan  who had publicly rejected Democrats' offer hours before Trump accepted it  was also a snub of Republicans at large.

"I support the president, I want him to be successful, I want our country to be successful," Zeldin said in an interview afterward. "But I personally believe the president had more leverage than he may have realized. He had more Democratic votes than he realized, and could have and would have certainly gotten a better deal."

Democrats remain skeptical about just how long their newfound working relationship with Trump will last. But for Republicans, the turnabout was yet another reminder of what many of them have long known but refused to openly admit: Trump is a fickle ally and partner, liable to turn on them much in the same way he has turned on his business associates and foreign allies.

"Looking to the long term, trust and reliability have been essential ingredients in productive relationships between the president and Congress," said Phil Schiliro, who served as director of legislative affairs under Obama. "Without them, trying to move a legislative agenda is like juggling on quicksand. It usually doesn't end well."

The Washington Post's Mike DeBonis contributed to this report.
For Philadelphia's Walter Rich, wine and food were the only teachers, guides through which he saw the world and learned to enjoy its many pleasures.

After escaping a Nazi concentration camp at age 12, Mr. Rich resolved to spend every day as if it were his last  a promise his friends and loved ones said transformed him into a larger-than-life character who ate, drank, loved, and lived with abandon.

Mr. Rich, 89, a longtime resident of Center City, was in his favorite hotel in Biarritz, France, when he died Aug. 29 after injuring himself in a fall. He died without suffering, said his longtime partner, Ellen Steiner. Mr. Rich had been vacationing there with friends, as he did each year.

Many knew Mr. Rich as the neighborhood's bon vivant, a charming, eccentric raconteur who spent decades honing his knowledge of wine, particularly Bordeaux, and imparting that wisdom to others. An exuberant, jovial figure who always spoke his mind, Mr. Rich relished fine food and traveled to Europe several times a year with Steiner, his partner of 40 years.

He never allowed his traumatic early years, in which his father was murdered by Nazis and Mr. Rich fled a work camp, to poison his rose-colored outlook, Steiner said.

"For him it became a motivating factor," said Steiner, a longtime Center City real estate broker. "He always said living well is the best revenge. He'd survived an attempt to kill him, and after that he didn't focus on slights or resentments."

Born in 1928 in western Germany, Mr. Rich was 5 years old when the Nazis rose to power. Jewish children were forbidden to attend public school, and so Mr. Rich was tutored and home-schooled, said Michael Bloom, a Philadelphia attorney and Mr. Rich's friend for almost 30 years. Mr. Rich's father, a successful manufacturer, gradually lost everything: the family's home, their wealth, and eventually their freedom.

Mr. Rich and his parents were taken to a detention camp in France, where he mounted an astonishing escape by sea, using a canoe he built and rowing his way to Lyon, Bloom said. After that, Mr. Rich loved all things French, and renounced all aspects of German culture.

His mother eventually was granted release from the camp, and the two traveled to Philadelphia with help from relatives who had settled there. Mr. Rich's father was killed at Auschwitz, Bloom said.

In America, Mr. Rich learned English and worked whatever odd jobs he could find. As a young man, he was hired by an advertising agency that allowed him to design cover art for albums, including some by Chubby Checker. As soon as he began to make a living wage, he devoted his extra pennies to weekend train rides to New York, where he would enjoy lunch at a French restaurant with a bottle of wine.

"He wasn't thinking about saving his money for the future," Steiner said. "He wanted to have foie gras!"

Mr. Rich dabbled in a number of occupations over the years, and even tried his hand at inventing. He was proudest of designing a plastic hook used for selling socks, Steiner said. He started a milling company that built the interiors of retail stores around the country, which he eventually sold.

Mr. Rich was separated from his second wife when he met Steiner, who was divorced. The two were seated next to each other at a wine dinner, and the attraction was immediate.

"We had a passion for food and wine that became a mainstay of our relationship," she said. "It was a big part of our life together."

They embarked on a romance that would take them all over Europe many times over in search of the greatest meals and bottles, often eating, drinking, driving, and napping their way through France. By the time of Mr. Rich's death, they had settled into a routine that took them to Biarritz every August.

Mr. Rich took pride in saying that he had no formal education. He was a voracious reader who did the New York Times crossword puzzle up until his death  in ink. In 2013, he self-published 500 copies of an encyclopedic volume about first-growth Bordeaux wine, including original labels and tasting notes. He initially priced it at $475  a joke, Bloom said, meant to compare the book to the cost of one such bottle.

In Philadelphia, one of his favorite restaurants was Parc, which reminded him of his beloved France, and where he would often hold court at his usual table.

"He would rest his cane on the railing and sit facing the incoming crowd," wrote his friend Peter Tarantino. "Of course he knew them all  or at least the ones who were interesting."

He was also fond of Vernick. Steiner ventured there with friends in recent days but found she wasn't ready yet.

"It felt sad," she said. "Clearly he was missing."

Mr. Rich's remains have already been cremated, Steiner said, as per his wishes. But she said she hoped to plan an event in his honor for his friends at some future date.

"It's going to be a party, something very festive," she said. "I know what he would want. He wants people to have a good time."
By PTI: Chennai, Sep 10 (PTI) Ace filmmaker AR Murugadoss said shooting his upcoming bilingual project "Spyder", featuring Telugu superstar Mahesh Babu, was extremely challenging.

The director said making a film was a tough task as they had to shoot simultaneously in Tamil and Telegu.

"While shooting bilinguals, filmmakers usually shoot the close-up sequences alone twice. But, we have walked the extra mile in Spyder.

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"We had even filmed some silence sequences twice to ensure authenticity in details for both Tamil and Telugu. It was a taxing experience. Its definitely not an easy task to make an authentic bilingual," AR Murugadoss told reporters at the audio launch of the movie here.

The 42-year-old filmmaker said he wanted to make "Ghajini" and "Thuppakki" in Telugu with Mahesh Babu, but things did not work out.

"Since Ghajini was dubbed in Telugu, I later wanted to remake Thuppakki in Telugu with Mahesh. But, it also didnt happen. When I had an exciting line for a spy thriller and approached him for a straight bilingual in Tamil and Telugu, he gave his nod immediately."

Appreciating the actors commitment and dedication, Murugadoss said, "When we had to shoot continuously during the night for more than two months, he gave us full support without making any qualms. He was also keen to extend the call sheet if there was a need.

"Last I witnessed such commitment from an actor was when I made "Ghajini" with Aamir Khan."

Mahesh Babu said "Spyder" is an intense film with great action sequences.

"The action sequences in the movie were physically demanding. Stunt master Peter Hein has given his best effort for the film. I had a great experience working on a bilingual project for the first time."

The actor said making a foray into Tamil industry was never planned.

"Even after 18 years in the industry, I still feel like a debutante. By Gods grace, I have a huge market in Andhra Pradesh. The immense love of my fans is enough for this lifetime. Since the movie is made on a huge budget it always helps to have an additional market. But Im glad that Im making my Tamil debut with a film like Spyder," he said.

The movie features Rakul Preet as the female lead and actor-director SJ Suryah plays the antagonist.

Harris Jayaraj has composed the music for the film.

Produced by NVR Cinema and Tagore Madhu, "Spyder" will release worldwide on September 27. PTI CORR SHD

--- ENDS ---
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Hillary Clinton is making sure that America doesnt forget Trumps bragging about sexual assault while calling him, a very effective reality TV star.

Video:

"I thought Trump was behaving in a deplorable manner. I thought a lot of his appeals to voters were deplorable."  @HillaryClinton pic.twitter.com/1kvHPv34gd  CBS Sunday Morning (@CBSSunday) September 10, 2017

Clinton was asked about her basket of deplorables comment, and she answered, I thought Trump was behaving in a deplorable manner. I thought a lot of his appeals to voters were deplorable. I thought his behavior as we saw on the Access Hollywood tape was deplorable, and there were a large number of people who didnt care. It did not matter to them, and he turned out to be a very effective reality TV star.

Jane Pauley brought up the argument that Clinton energized Trump supporters with her deplorables comment. She rebutted, No, but they were already energized. Clinton added that the Trump supporters were already energized.

Trump desperately wants to be taken seriously as a president, and Hillary Clintons little jab struck the President square in the ego. In the rest of the interview, Clinton took responsibility for the loss and admitted how painful the defeat has been for her.

It is important that Clinton brought up the Access Hollywood tape because America cant be allowed to normalize and forget about the fact that the man who is occupying the Oval Office bragged about sexually assaulting women.

Donald Trump will never be taken seriously as a president. For the majority of Americans, he will be the bigoted, sexually assaulting, reality television star who only won the presidency with help from Putin and the Russians.

Hillary Clinton speaks for more voters than Trump, and Presidents fragile ego just got a reminder of why so many Americans are rejecting his presidency.
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By Scott DiSavino

(Reuters)  Hurricane Irma knocked out power to about 2 million homes and businesses in Florida on Sunday and threatened millions more as it crept up the states west coast, the states electric utilities said on Sunday, and full restoration of service will take weeks.

Much of the state has yet to feel the full brunt of the storm as Irma barreled across the Florida Keys on Sunday morning and rolled up the states southwest coast with maximum sustained winds of 120 miles (195 kilometers) per hour, making it a Category 3 storm, the third worst on the Saffir-Simpson scale.

So far, the brunt of the storm has affected Florida Power & Lights (FPL) customers in the southern and eastern sections of the state.

FPL, the biggest power company in Florida, said over 1.9 million of its customers were without power at around 3 p.m. EDT (1900 GMT), mostly in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties. More than 200,000 had electricity restored mostly by automated devices.

We will have to rebuild part of our system, particularly in the western part of the state. That restoration process will be measured in weeks, not days, said FPL spokesman Rob Gould at a news conference on Sunday.

Large utilities that serve other parts of the state, including units of Duke Energy Corp <DUK.N>, Southern Co <SO.N> and Emera Inc <EMA.TO> have had scattered outages. FPL is a unit of Florida energy company NextEra Energy Inc <NEE.N>.

Duke warned its 1.8 million customers in northern and central Florida that outages could exceed 1 million. Emeras Tampa Electric utility said the storm could affect up to 500,000 of the 730,000 homes and businesses it serves.

The utilities had thousands of workers  some from as far away as California  ready to help restore power once Irmas high winds pass their service areas. About 17,000 were helping FPL, nearly 8,000 at Duke and more than 1,300 at Emera.

FPL said on Friday that Irma could affect around 4.1 million customers, but that was before the storm track shifted away from the eastern side of the state. Its customers are concentrated in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties.

Last October, Hurricane Matthew knocked out 1.2 million FPL customers as it skirted Floridas east coast without making landfall. Matthew did not come on shore and damage infrastructure, and it took the utility about two days to restore power.

FPL has warned customers to prepare for outages that could last weeks if Irma requires the utility to rebuild parts of its service territory.

FPL decided to shut only one of the two reactors at its Turkey Point nuclear plant on Saturday because the storm track shifted, and plans to leave both reactors at the St. Lucie plant in service because hurricane force winds are no longer expected to hit the sites. On Sunday, Gould said its nuclear plants were safe.

FPL had planned to shut both units at Turkey Point sometime on Saturday about 24 hours before hurricane force winds reached the plant.

St. Lucie is located on a barrier island on the states east coast, about 120 miles (193 km) north of Miami, while Turkey Point is about 30 miles south of Miami.

There is also spent nuclear fuel at Dukes Crystal River plant, about 90 miles north of Tampa. The plant, on Irmas current forecast track, stopped operating in 2009 and was retired in 2013. In a worst case scenario, the spent fuel in the pool could release radiation if exposed to the air, but a federal nuclear official said that was extremely unlikely.

There is nothing to indicate there is any concern for the spent fuel stored at Crystal River. That fuel is so cold, relatively speaking, it would take weeks before there would be any concern, said Scott Burnell at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

Duke was transferring the spent fuel in the pool at Crystal River to dry cask storage as part of the work to decommission the plant, but temporarily suspended the effort ahead of Irma.

(Reporting by Scott DiSavino in New York; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)
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The White Houses big solution to Trumps racism is to have him talk to African-American Republican Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina about racial issues.

Axios reported:

President Trumps botched Charlottesville response was the low point of his presidency for some of his key aides. Now, he has a chance for a reset, at the same time that hes reveling in the adulation for his surprise deal with Democrats. Trump meets one-on-one Wednesday with Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, the only Republican senator who is African-American, who told Vice after Charlottesville that the presidents moral authority is compromised.

..

Aides say Trump is most likely to take in information if theres a personal story attached to it. The session with Scott provides exactly such an opportunity. The moment could be fleeting or consequential, depending on whether Trump realizes that, at 71, he has a lot of catching up to do.

The White Houses big plan to teach Trump to stop being racist is to have him talk to the only Republican African-American Senator about race. The fact that the White House feels the need to hold a racial intervention for the President Of The United States is the problem. America should not have a president that needs to educated about racism. The president is looked to provide moral leadership to the nation, but Donald Trump needs Tim Scott to explain racism to him.

Lets call this what it really is. Trump is trying to create some good publicity for himself by taking a meeting and listening to Sen. Scotts personal story, but the President Of The United States should need to be sat down and spoken to like he is a child.

Sen. Scott requested the meeting with Trump before his Charlottesville comments. The White House didnt set up the meeting until after Trump started openly sympathizing with neo-Nazis and white supremacists, which suggests that the real motive of this meeting has nothing to do with racism. For Trump, it is all about political optics and coverage on cable news.
Charleston, SC (29403)

Today

Except for a few afternoon clouds, mainly sunny. High 61F. Winds NNE at 10 to 15 mph..

Tonight

Cloudy skies early with showers later at night. Thunder possible. Low 53F. Winds NE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 50%.
In an encounter that began late last evening in Shopian, a Hizbul Mujahideen terrorist has been caught alive and another neutralised by the security forces.

By Ashraf Wani: In a first in recent years, a terrorist has been arrested alive after an encounter broke out in south Kashmir's Shopian district on Saturday.

In an encounter that began late last evening an army vehicle was attacked by three terrorists. Out of the three, one identified as Tariq Bhat was gunned down by the security forces in retaliation on Saturday and another was arrested today morning. The third terrorist was killed today afternoon.

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The terrorist caught alive, reportedly surrendered at gunpoint. He has been identified as Adil Dar (17) who joined the Hizbul Mujahideen only three months back.

Security forces believe there were three terrorists, but they have not found the body of the third terrorist yet.

The encounter has now ended.

Also Read

J-K: Terrorists attack army vehicle in Shopian, one shot dead by security forces

Caught on Camera: How Pakistan funds Kashmiri separatists to burn the Valley - India Today Exclusive

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Mahesh Babu was in Chennai on Saturday for the audio launch of his upcoming film Spyder.

By India Today Web Desk: After much delay, superstar Mahesh Babu is gearing up for the release of the spy-thriller Spyder. On Saturday, the makers hosted a grand audio launch in Chennai, where several eminent personalities from the industry graced the event. Mahesh Babu was received by hordes of fans, who were constantly chanting "Star...Star...Superstar".

Mahesh began his speech in Tamil, which was received with thunderous hooting and cheering by the audience. He thanked filmmaker AR Murugadoss, producer Madhu and his co-stars Rakul Preet Singh and SJ Suryah for Spyder.

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When asked about his favourite dialogue from Ilayathalapathy Vijay's films, Mahesh said, "I liked 'I'm waiting' from Thuppakki." The Nenokkadine star also revealed that he really wished he had starred in Thuppaki.

And signed off thanking fans in Hyderabad for their unconditional love and support. AR Murugadoss said that the much-awaited Spyder trailer will be out on September 15.

It must be noted that Vijay has remade several Mahesh Babu's films in Tamil. Earlier to this, Mahesh Babu once told that he planned to work with Vijay in a Telugu-Tamil bilingual. The highlight of the event was Mahesh's eloquent Tamil. Interesting trivia is that Mahesh grew up in Chennai before becoming a superstar in Andhra Pradesh.

Directed by AR Murugadoss, Spyder will see Mahesh Babu as a stylish police officer, while SJ Suryah will play the prime antagonist. Ever since its inception, fans have been madly waiting for the film as it marks Mahesh's first film with Murugadoss.

Made on a lavish budget of Rs 120 crore, Spyder is expected to have a massive opening in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. The film has already raked in Rs 150 crore through its satellite and distribution rights.

Spyder will hit the screens on September 27 worldwide.

ALSO READ: Mahesh Babu's Spyder footage leaked? Makers rubbish rumours

ALSO READ: Spyder's Aali Aali song out | Mahesh Babu gets a peppy romantic number

SEE PIC: Mahesh Babu looks dapper on the sets of Spyder

WATCH HERE: Spyder Teaser

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The Rochester City Council will get an early look at preliminary budget numbers Monday.

Interim City Administrator Gary Neumann said he will provide a glimpse at next year's budget during the committee of the whole meeting at 3:30 p.m. Monday in room 104 of City Hall, 201 Fourth St. SE.

"It's going to be very high-picture, big-category numbers," he said, noting many details of individual department requests still are being gathered.

The numbers presented Monday will include wage increases associated with employee contracts, expected health care costs and known utility expenses, so council members can start discussion for setting a cap on next year's tax levy.

Minnesota cities are required to set a preliminary levy in September, which becomes the maximum allowed for property-tax collection the following year. It means the budget process for 2018 will not be able to raise the amount once it's set.

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The Rochester City Council could set the preliminary levy as early as Sept. 18 during its regular council meeting. If it's not set on that date, Neumann said, the council likely will hold a special meeting Sept. 25 to set the levy cap.

"It must be done by Sept. 25," he said.

Based on early numbers, which still are being collected, Neumann said the council likely will have limited flexibility if it keeps property tax revenue close to the $62.5 million in taxes collected last year. This year's overall city budget is $238 million.

The tax levy for 2017 was a 9.2 percent increase over 2016's levy. The increase reflects the total amount collected, not the impact on individual tax bills, because factors such as increased property values and the number of taxable properties can offset levy increases.

Last year's budget included the addition of two police officers, two firefighters and an arborist, as well as funds to fight the invasive emerald ash borer in the city.
In an interview that will air tomorrow, Steve Bannon tells Charlie Rose that the Republican establishment is trying to nullify the 2016 election. Theres a lot I respect about Bannon, but this claim strikes me as false.

The obvious problem with it is that every Republican member of the House was elected in 2016 or later. Indeed, since its impossible to win a House seat with fewer votes than ones opponent, we can say that every member of the House was more popular with his or her constituents when elected than President Trump was with his. Thus, even if the House is blocking Trumps economic nationalist agenda, as Bannon claims, it is not nullifying the 2016 election.

But is the House, or Congress generally, blocking that agenda? According to reports of Bannons interview with Rose, the former White House strategist complained that during one of the Team Trumps first meetings with McConnell, the Senate Majority Leader said, I dont wanna hear any more of this drain the swamp talk.

This sentiment (or slogan, to be more precise) is mainly a matter of rhetoric, not substance. One can work to pass economic nationalist legislation without wanting to hear swamp rhetoric. And given that Trump seems to consider the Senate part of the swamp, its normal for the Senate Majority Leader not to want to hear such talk.

The real question is whether McConnell and Speaker Ryan have obstructed Trumps economic nationalist legislative agenda. The answer, it seems to me, is that they havent.

What legislation have they blocked? Obamacare repeal and replace legislation made it through the House. In the Senate, it failed by one vote because three Republicans voted against even skinny repeal. That wasnt Mitch McConnells fault or the fault of the Republican establishment. It was the handiwork of two centrists (Sens. Collins and Murkowski) and a maverick who cant stand Trump (Sen. McCain).

If Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, and the Republican establishment generally are trying to nullify Trumps agenda, they havent done so through the legislative process.

Trump complains that McConnell and other GOP establishment members in the Senate havent abolished the legislative filibuster. This was the excuse he used in one of his tweets explaining why he collaborated with Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi, neither of whom can pass for an economic nationalist.

The filibuster did not cause the failure to pass Obamacare repeal legislation. There werent even 50 votes for that.

But thats not really the point. The point is that abolishing the legislative filibuster is a bad idea.

It has a surface appeal when the GOP holds a Senate majority. But if it loses the majority, as is inevitable, the Democrats will be able to pass all sorts of left-wing legislation  single-payer, pro-illegal immigrant, pro-union, you name it. And if the House and the presidency are controlled by Democrats as well, that legislation will become law.

Moreover, abolishing the legislative filibuster could turn the U.S. into something of a banana republic. The law on all sorts of key matters would swing wildly back and forth with fluctuations in the parties electoral fortunes. No one could confidently predict what the law will be for more than the short term.

None of this matters to Trump because these ill effects wouldnt occur while hes president. But McConnell and the GOP establishment are right to take a more far-sighted view.

It can be argued that the Democrats will abolish the legislative filibuster as soon as they gain control of the three branches, so why not stick it to them now. I wouldnt put this past the Democrats, but its worth noting that they did not abolish the legislative filibuster eight years ago when they were in a position to do so. Its not a foregone conclusion that they will do so the next time.

Steve Bannons claim that the GOP establishment is trying to negate the 2016 election should be viewed for what it is, a rallying cry, not an accurate description of reality.
Stephen Montemayor covers the courts for the Star Tribune. If youve been following the saga of the Minnesota men  young Minnesota Somali Muslims who have conspired to lend a hand to ISIS over the past several years  you will want to take a look at Montemayors Star Tribune story on six open cases involving support for ISIS in Minnesota.

St. Louis Park is the Minneapolis suburb that was the home of such famous native Minnesotans as Pulitizer Prize-winning New York Times columnist Tom Friedman, Academy Award-award-winning filmmakers Joel and Ethan Coen and former humorist Al Franken. In the words of the Bob Dylan song, however, things have changed.

In his story today Montemayor focuses on one case in particular. As Montemayor tells it, its an interesting case involving a St. Louis Park family whose son left them in Morocco to join ISIS. At the time of his disappearance in 2015 he was a student at Normandale Community College in Bloomington, Minnesota. According to Montemayor, the sons motivation remains a mystery. That is actually what he says.

The sons name is Abdelhamid Al-Madioum. He left to join ISIS while on a family trip to visit relatives in Morocco. The reader is left to draw the inference that Al-Madioum is  how to put it?  Muslim, a word which appears nowhere within the four corners of Montemayors article. Conspicuous by their absence from Montemayors article are the words Muslim or Islam. I could say that their disappearance remains a mystery, but their disappearance is about as mysterious as Al-Madioums.

UPDATE: After writing this post I tweeted Steve. He took the trouble to respond. I appreciate his willingness to engage.
And what a shape it is. The Washington Post helpfully handicaps the top 15 Democratic presidential prospects for 2020, but from surveying the list one wonders whether the Post confused the office of President of the United States with president of the AARP.

There are a few younger candidates from the margins of the long shots, like Mark Zuckerberg (39 in 2020), or Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti (49 in 2020), but the real frontrunners are all well past any normal political sell-by date. Elizabeth Warren will be 71; Joe Biden will be 77; Bernie Sanders will be 78. And people say the Republican electorate is getting old.

And then theres one really old fossil the Post includes on its list of 15 prospects: California Gov. Jerry Brown, who will be 82 in 2020. Seriously? Yes: given than Brown is addicted to running for office, it wouldnt surprise me if he thinks about it and starts visiting New Hampshire after his term ends next year.

I say we should keep our eye on Hillary. She may say shes not going to run again, but does anyone really believe that she doesnt have Gollum-like insatiable hunger for her precious Oval Office?
The Alliance Defending Freedom is a Christian legal rights group devoted to the cause of religious freedom. My friend Jordan Lorence is one of the many fine ADF attorneys representing clients in important cases around the country.

To take one outstanding example, ADF attorneys represented the Missouri church with a preschool and daycare center that was excluded from a state program providing grants to purchase rubberized surface material for childrens playgrounds. Although the state highly ranked the center as qualified for the program, it denied the centers application solely because a church ran the daycare. This past June 26 the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the church under the First Amendments free exercise clause. The vote in favor of the church was 7-2. The Supreme Court opinions in the case are posted here.

To take another outstanding example, ADF attorneys represent Jack Phillips and Masterpiece Cakeshop in the case to be decided by the Supreme Court this Term. ADF attorneys have just filed their opening brief in the Supreme Court. ADF writes about the case here. The opening ADF brief in the case is posted online here.

The wealthy hate cult that calls itself the Southern Poverty Law Center has designated ADF a hate group. According to the SPLC the ADF is an anti-LGBT hate group.

In the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing last Wednesday on the confirmation of Notre Dame Law Professor Amy Coney Barrett to the Seventh Circuit, Minnesota Senator Al Franken used the SPLC designation to berate Professor Barrett (video below). Barrett, you see, had once given a speech to the ADF. Let me emphasize that ADF itself is innocent of any wrongdoing, but Franken used McCarthyite tactics to smear Professor Barrett by association with ADF.

At PJ Media Tyler ONeil has an excellent post documenting the proceedings and collecting relevant information. At Bloomberg View Megan McArdle has a good column on the creative stylings of the SPLC in the business of its hate group designations.

Taking Frankens shenanigans at face value, ADF president, CEO and general counsel Michael Farris issued this statement last week in response to Franken:

It is deeply regrettable that Sen. Franken is misinformed about our work on behalf of religious freedom, something so extreme that even seven justices of the U.S. Supreme Court agreed with our position three months ago in Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia v. Comer. There is a real danger of conflating genuine hate groups, like the Ku Klux Klan, with mainstream religious beliefs that are shared by millions of Americans and people from all walks of life across the world. As a member of Congress, Sen. Franken needs to fact-check before parroting discredited attacks by the Southern Poverty Law Center, a once-proud civil rights organization that is now a left-wing smear machine known to incite violence. Alliance Defending Freedom is the largest religious liberty legal advocacy organization in the world and advocates for the freedom of all peopleincluding Sen. Frankens constituentsto peacefully live, speak, and work consistently with their convictions without fear of government punishment.

I have followed Frankens career for a long time. A little over forty years ago I went to see him try out new SNL material with Tom Davis at the Dudley Riggs ETC Theater on the West Bank in Minneapolis. In his new career as a senatorial paladin of the left Franken has proved himself a joke in many respects, but in one respect he is perfectly representative. He represents the descent of the left into left-wing fascism in the name of the higher wisdom.
The trigger was an order dated July 25, 2016 when the SC allowed a rape survivor to terminate her 24-week-old 'abnormal' foetus after a medical board certified that it would endanger her life.

The Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act of 1971 bars abortion if the foetus has crossed the 20-week mark. A possible amendment could extend that to 24 or 28 weeks.

By Harish V Nair: The Supreme Court is at present witnessing a unique kind of case pile-up. Petitions are streaming in from across the country seeking permission for termination of pregnancy, thanks to an archaic law, Medical Termination of Pregnancy (MTP) Act 1971, in force which bars abortion after 20 weeks of conception.

Shockingly, those in the nervous queue are not just women with severe foetal abnormalities faced with the prospect of giving birth to children with major deformities, but full-blown pregnant school kids too!

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The trigger was an order dated July 25, 2016 when the SC allowed a rape survivor to terminate her 24-week-old 'abnormal' foetus after a medical board certified that it would endanger her life. At least 17 cases have landed in SC after that. Much can also be attributed to the delay in passing of the Medical Termination of Pregnancy (MTP) (Amendment) Bill, which contemplates the extension of the legal limit for abortion from the present 20 weeks to 24 or 28, which is pending since June 2014 owing to differences between the government and bodies representing doctors.

Two instances in the last one month, wherein a 10-year-old girl (a class 5 student) from Chandigarh and another aged 13 (class 7 student) from Mumbai, both rape survivors in advanced stage of pregnancy, moved court seeking to abort their 32 week old foetus had made international headlines.

While the 13-year-old was at least in some way lucky with judges allowing her to abort, the girl aged 10 is now a reluctant mother after the court refused her permission citing grave threat to her life.

She may have lost the battle but significantly became a catalyst in court issuing a landmark order beneficial for minor petitioners like her but also for lakhs of women forced to give birth to abnormal or still-born babies every year.

Rejecting her plea for abortion on July 28, something sensational happened as then Chief Justice JS Khehar threw up his hands expressing concern that abortion pleas were piling up before the court. But all for good.

Noting that abortion pleas keep pending in courts during which the petitioner woman or minor girl loses crucial time resulting in further advancement of the pregnancy and aggravation of complications, the CJI asked Centre to set up permanent medical boards across all states to deal with such cases as a substitute for the courts.

The CJI said the alternative mechanism should be in place till the bill for extending the legal limit of abortion is pending.

Following this, the Centre has written to all states to set up the boards as early as possible.

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"Such cases come before us when time is too short for us to decide. Crucial time is lost. Let states examine complaints and also to ensure that women, especially child rape victims, could receive expedient access to medical care", the Chief Justice told Solicitor General of India Ranjit Kumar.

The Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act of 1971 bars abortion if the foetus has crossed the 20-week mark. An exception to the law is made if a registered medical practitioner certifies to a court that the continued pregnancy is lifethreatening for either the mother or the baby.

Presently, women are forced to undertake the cumbersome process of approaching different courts, from district courts to high courts and finally the Supreme Court, for permission to medically terminate their pregnancies which are over 20 weeks. It is to be noted that by the time two rape victims - the 10 and 13 year old - exhausted the judicial hierarchy, their foetus had turned 32-weeks-old, that is one month short of delivery date.

A petition filed by two women victims of the law and doctor Nikhil Datar in 2008, terming the 20 week limit imposed by the MTP Act as "irrational, outdated, unconstitutional and a violation of women's rights to equality, health, and life", is still pending in the supreme court.

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The National Commission for Women, the Federation of Obstetricians and Gynecologists of India (FOGSI), the international community, and several other women's groups back the PIL, saying the Act violates women's rights to physical integrity.

Armed with views of several doctors of reputed hospitals, they argue that now with advanced technology available to conduct a safe abortion at any stage without any harm to the health of the mother, the rules need to be drafted in a way to suit changing times.

ALSO READ |

Supreme Court turns down request to abort 26-week-old foetus with Down syndrome

New hope for women forced to give birth to stillborn babies

Supreme Court allows 13-year-old Mumbai rape survivor to terminate 31-week-old pregnancy

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Reactions have continued to trail the revocation of concession rights earlier given by the federal government to Aulic Group for the management of the Lagos Trade Fair Complex.

PREMIUM TIMES paid a visit to the popular market located around Lagos/Badagry expressway, situated on a large expanse of land in the area. It is meant to be a massive commercial hub in the country and also geared towards raking in revenue.

Aulic was granted the concession rights in 2008 after an intense bidding process. The right has since been revoked since September 4, 2017, at a National Council on Privatisation, NCP meeting chaired by Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo.

In 2015, the Bureau of Public Enterprises reportedly made a move to start the revocation process over allegations that Aulic was not paying its prescribed yearly fees; although the recommendation of the BPE was not implemented then.

Since the official revocation, there have been diverse reactions from Nigerians with many praising the move to take the rights away.

At the complex, an official of Aulic group who spoke with PREMIUM TIMES under condition of anonymity because the matter was in court said the firm was not fairly treated.

We believe so much that the federal government is not aware of some issues happening in the market. After we won the concession rights, we have not been paid one naira as lease rent by the traders. But we believe that the government has the power to do what is right, especially with the knowledge of Vice President Yemi Osinbajo who is a lawyer and understands the law, the official said.

The official said the firm would wait for the outcome of the court case before taking the next step.

The matter is in court. We have sunk a lot of money into the complex without getting anything in return and you just come one day to say it would be taken over?

The official who said it was not the right time for the press to be involved said the firm had invested a lot in the complex but had not realised anything in return.

Meanwhile, some traders who spoke with the reporter welcomed the development.

A trader who identified herself as Blessing, a trader in the centre said Aulic had not acted in best interests of traders before now.

I heard about the takeover early this morning. I must say that really the market has not been in a good state. Look at the buildings, they are beginning to rot and no one is saying anything, she said.

Another trader, who deals in cosmetics and identified himself as Ojukwu, said he was pleased with the takeover but expressed joy that he would not be directly affected since his section of the market belongs to Balogun Traders Association and not Aulic.

Traders have lost confidence in Aulic. Here belongs to Balogun Traders Association. The road has become so bad. There was even a time that we said we should contribute money to repair the roads but Aulic said no. Look at the buildings, people are only managing. They (Aulic) are not doing a good job, he said.

Also, Uju Alli, another trader said things are not easy in the market as customers are beginning to desert the complex.

We pay N120,000 here in my line of shop and sales are not coming. It has not been so encouraging, she said.

PREMIUM TIMES also gathered from some traders reportedly paid between N7000 and N15, 000 monthly as fees, a situation they were unhappy with.

The traders also decried the situation at the market where customers who had already paid for their goods would be compelled to pay fees at the gate again before being allowed to exit.

A customer, who identified herself as Modupe, said she doesnt come to the market regularly again due to the fees she is compelled to pay at the gate whenever she patronises the market

PREMIUM TIMES learnt that customers pay fees ranging from N100 and above depending on the number of goods bought at the complex.

In 2013, a group known as Association of Progressive Traders faulted the takeover of the complex by Aulic describing it as unfair especially in the light of their investment in the complex.

In the same year, former President Goodluck Jonathan during the 27th Lagos International Trade Fair had hinted that the federal government will take over the complex as a way to resolving the persistent disputes on ownership.

Meanwhile, in the latest move, the federal government has not stated whether it would take over the complex fully, lease it to another private company, or hand it over to the Lagos State government which has asked for it.

It would be recalled that the NCP had not only approved the revocation of the concession of the complex at its last meeting but ordered a fresh privatisation process for the Yola Electricity Distribution Company.

It also approved the privatisation of Afam Power plants 1-5 which is aimed at injecting additional power into the national grid and improving electricity supply.

The council equally approved the pursuit of an out-of-court settlement of the dispute over the privatisation of Aluminium Smelter Company of Nigeria, ALSCON.

Among other decisions, the council also reviewed the proposals presented by its Secretariat, the Bureau of Public Enterprises, BPE for the reform and restructuring of various sectors of the economy.

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The Nigerian Army on Sunday said its personnel fired warning shots to disperse hoodlums who lobbed stones and broken bottles against them during a procession in Umuahia, the Abia State capital.



The Army was countering the account of Mr. Kanu, which had said soldiers stormed his residence in the Abia State capital, killing and injuring occupants in a bid to attack the separatist activist.



The attention of 14 Brigade Nigerian Army has been drawn to fictitious news going round especially on the social media that troops have invaded the home of Nnamdi Kanu and killed three persons.

This is far from the truth. Rather, it was a group of suspected IPOB militants that blocked the road against troops of 145 Battalion while on show of force along FMC-Word Bank Road in Umuahia town, Abia State at about 6.00-6.30pm, today. They insisted that the military vehicles would not pass and started pelting the soldiers with stones and broken bottles to the point of injuring an innocent female passerby and a soldier, Corporal Kolawole Mathew.

The troops fired warning shots in the air and the hoodlums dispersed. No life was lost, the Army said in a statement signed by Oyegoke Gbadamosi, a major and assistant deputy spokesperson of the 14 Brigade.



The Armys account corroborated polices statement on the incident.



There was no attack on the home of Nnamdi Kanu, Abia police commissioner, Leye Oyebade, told PREMIUM TIMES by telephone Sunday evening.



What happened was that the military was parading a new armoured carrier and passed through Nnamdi Kanus residence.



It was while they were passing that some people threw stones and other things at them, Mr. Oyebade explained.



The police chief said normalcy has been restored and no life was lost during the minor skirmish. He said Mr. Kanu was neither targeted nor arrested.



But Mr. Kanus lawyer, Ifeanyi Ejiofor, had painted a different account of what transpired at the home of the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, saying there was a siege.



In a statement, Mr. Ejiofor accused the Buhari administration of attempting to take his clients life.

Just to alert the world that the Nigeria military personnel under the command of Chief of Army Staff is presently laying a siege on my client (Nnamdi Kanu) country home in umuahia.



They had continued to shot sporadically into the air through which assault, about five of his family members were brutally wounded and some unfortunately killed. There is no doubt that the present deployment of troops to the South East is to haunt for my client and possibly eliminate him, the statement said.



Mr. Ejiofor added that if something goes wrong with his clients life, the international would hold the countrys president responsible.



The Army urged the public to disregard reports or videos purporting serious injuries or casualties during the skirmish, warning mischief makers of grave consequences.

We would like to use this opportunity to warn mischief makers threatening the peace and security of the country through falsehood such as above, Mr. Gbadamosi said.



The Nigerian government is currently pursuing revocation of Mr. Kanus bail, after the IPOB leader allegedly breached the conditions of his bail which was granted to him by the Abuja Division of the Federal High Court, where he faces treason charges.



The revocation motion, which was filed by the Attorney-General Abubakar Malami, is expected to be heard in October.

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Stalin took a dig at the governor stating that why he is not taking action when the opposition MLAs are in higher number than the ruling government.

DMK working president and opposition leader of Tamil Nadu, MK Stalin, has set a deadline for Tamil Nadu governor Vidyasagar Rao to convene the assembly within a week.

After meeting the governor in Chennai, on Sunday evening, along with the allies Congress and IUML MLAs, Stalin said, "We have met governor many times. This will be the last time we should be meeting him. He should convene the Assembly. If he doesn't take action in one week, we will approach the court. He has promised to take action. We have confidence that he will do something."

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Stalin further took a dig at the governor stating that why he is not taking action when the opposition MLAs are in higher number than the ruling government.

"After Jayalalithaa passed away, strength of the assembly came down to 233 from 234. There are 114 MLAs supporting Edappadi Palanisamy, as per media reports on how many attended his meeting. Those who are opposing including us and TTV Dhinakaran MLAs are 119. We pointed this to the governor," he said.

The representation given by the DMK points out SC order on SR Bommai case, "In all cases where the support of the ministry is claimed to have been lost support, the proper course for testing the strength of the minister is holding the test on the floor of the house."

The DMK representation to the governor pointed this and asked for the convening of assembly. Meanwhile, Dhinakaran faction MLAs are camping in a resort in Coorg, Karnataka. Three of them are likely to meet Sasikala in prison on Monday ahead of the AIADMK General Council meet called by Edappadi Palanisamy.

Also Read:

Tamil Nadu political crisis: Do we need a Governor who can't count, questions MK Stalin

Jayanthi Natarajan booked in a corrupton case, her premises raided by CBI

Also Watch:

Former Union minister Jayanthi Natarajan booked in corruption case, premises raided by CBI

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Kiku Sharda was taken into custody last year for taking a dig at Dera chief and rape convict Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh.

By Indo-Asian News Service: Comedian Kiku Sharda says instead of taking the path of violence or bullying, one should be more subtle to express humour and anger.

Kiku, who was seen in the The Kapil Sharma Show, was taken into custody in January 2016 after he took a dig at rape convict and Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh.

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The comedian took to Twitter to share his happiness on the imprisonment of Singh.

Asked about his first reaction to the verdict, Kiku told IANS: "I got calls from many media houses but I did not comment on that, I just expressed my happiness with my style of joke, on Twitter. We can use social media or our form of art, which is, I feel strong."

He added: "I think humour and protest can be subtle. We saw what happened, once the verdict came out, so sad that was."

Many celebrities have been a victim to social media trolls and negative criticism, but can Kiku take jokes being cracked on him?

"There is a difference between trolling, bullying and joking. I as an individual can always take a joke on me, big time, there's no doubt about that. But then it is about, coming from people of a similar sensibility. If you are cracking a joke on me and in counter, cannot take a joke when I am cracking on you, then, you stay away from me."

The comedian strongly feels that an "intention of a joke should be having fun, not to hurt anyone."

Kiku is quite excited about his upcoming film 2016 The End featuring Divyendu Sharma, Rahul Roy, Priya Banerjee and Narendra Jha.

He says being a comic actor on the small screen he would only get comic roles.

"But as an artist I wanted to do something different," he added.

2016 The End will be releasing on November 5.

Also read: Comedian Kiku Sharda takes another dig at Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh

Also read: After The Kapil Sharma Show, Kiku Sharda is doing this new show

--- ENDS ---
A Linwood man seriously injured in an arrest outside the Tropicana Atlantic City in 2013, requiring hundreds of stitches to repair bites by a police dog, has settled an excessive-force lawsuit against Atlantic City for $3 million, his attorney confirmed Sunday.

David Connor Castellani, 20 at the time of the incident, is now in law school, said his attorney Jennifer Bonjean.

Its over to the extent it can be over in the system, said Bonjean, adding the settlement has been approved by the city, the state and an insurance adjuster. But its not as if Connor doesnt have lasting impacts from it in his personal life to deal with.

Castellani was indicted in 2015 for allegedly threatening and using force against Officer Darrin Lorady and resisting arrest by several officers outside Tropicana Atlantic City in 2013.

A videotape taken by security cameras at the casino showed Castellani arguing with officers around 3 a.m. June 15, 2013. He walked away from the officers and across the street, where he continued to yell at them. He then walked back toward the officers yelling and pointing, and then was taken down by Lorady, with other officers quickly running toward the scene. K-9 Officer Sterling Wheaten then pulled up and released his police dog.

After the incident, a grand jury cleared the officers of wrongdoing and charged Castellani, who required more than 200 stitches from the police dogs bites, with aggravated assault on a police officer and resisting arrest. He also was indicted on a lesser charge of inflicting harm on a law enforcement animal.

After pleading not guilty, Castellani applied for pretrial intervention, or PTI, which allows defendants without a criminal record to avoid prosecution.

The PTI coordinator accepted him into the program, but the Atlantic County Prosecutors Office would not sign off on it.

Superior Court Judge Michael Donio disagreed with the prosecutors decision and allowed Castellani to enter the program anyway.

The Prosecutors Office then appealed to the state Appellate Division and ultimately the New Jersey Supreme Court. Last year, the state Supreme Court denied the prosecutors request, and Castellani remained in the program.

If Castellani completes the PTI program he will be cleared of all charges against him, according to his attorney.

Castellanis attorney in that case, Steve Scheffler, has said his participation in the program is not an admission of guilt.

There is absolutely no admission of guilt because (Connor) did nothing wrong, he has said.

Bonjean said two other cases she has filed against Atlantic City for excessive use of force by police have also ended, with one settling for $370,000 and one going to trial and the plaintiff receiving $500,000.

All three involve Wheaten, Bonjean said.

This officer has cost the city a lot of money, she said. The city has failed to do its function of policing its own police and disciplining offenders.

She said she hopes the city looks at the conduct of its Internal Affairs department and does what is needed to hold officers responsible.

What is it teaching them if nothing comes out of their pockets, they are not disciplined and there is no impact on them? Bonjean asked.

Bonjean has filed a total of six excessive force lawsuits against the city, she said.

At least eight civil lawsuits filed in the last three years allege Wheaten has abused his power during the course of arrests. Internal affairs documents obtained by an attorney in one of those cases show 21 complaints against Wheaten between 2008 and 2011. None of them was sustained by police after investigations.
With massive upheavals, reforms and health care policy changes still on the table in Congress, there is a debate in New Jersey over a long since proposed health care system known as single payer.

In the face of heavy opposition, several federal lawmakers, including Sens. Cory Booker, D-N.J., Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., have expressed their desire to reform the way Americans are covered for health care services and the governments role in that delivery.

I think a state-level approach only works if you have at least a minimum federal commitment (for support). If thats a hostile situation, it becomes a tough sell, said Michael Gusmano, associate professor at Rutgers University School of Public Health.

A single-payer health system, dubbed Medicare for all, is one in which a single government insurer provides coverage for basic health care costs for everyone, regardless of income, age or employment status, and is financed by taxes.

Hospitals, health care providers and doctors could remain private, and residents still could choose where they go for health care.

It may sound familiar  and thats because the United States already has a single-payer model in Medicare. Legislators have said they would use those policies as a foundation and create a nationwide system for everyone, not just those 65 and older.

Sanders reportedly will introduce a single-payer health care bill to Congress this week.

Gusmano said if individual states or the country as a whole were to adopt a proven system, it would most likely resemble the health care systems of several European countries, such as France, where government funds universal health care and most doctors remain in private practice.

It you look at the U.S. as a whole, uninsured people or people on Medicaid dont have as much access, he said. If you go to a system like in France, Germany, Canada or South Korea, youll find people have tremendous access. They may have some other limitations, more so than in the U.S., but not severe.

Though nice in theory, opponents of a single-payer plan argue it would be too expensive. Insurance companies, for-profit hospitals, pharmaceutical companies and large nonprofit hospitals that rely heavily on private insurance could stand to lose the most, experts say.

Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, the Republican candidate for governor, has said she opposes government-run health care because it would be too expensive for taxpayers and the state. Other experts agree it would be a heavy lift in New Jersey and elsewhere.

I think there is a lot of misunderstanding about the ability to save money under single payer  like that you could eliminate insurance companies and the allegedly unnecessary things they do. But someone needs to contract with providers and manage claims or else there is no way to control costs, said Katherine Hempstead, senior adviser at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in Princeton.

Hempstead also said many people with employer-based health insurance are unwilling to consider a single-payer system on the chance coverage would not be as good as their current plans.

Most recently, California lawmakers tried to pass a single-payer bill for state residents, but the motion was shelved.

Anthony Rendon, that states Assembly speaker, said in July that plans contained too many issues, including financing, delivery of care, cost controls and the realities of support from the federal government under President Donald Trump.

Despite general criticism and skepticism from many, Ron Caplan, a Stockton University associate professor of public health, said consideration of single payer is much more serious today than several decades ago, when the late Sen. Ted Kennedy promoted the model.

Caplan said it would cost more up front to reform the U.S. health care system, but it would be more beneficial in the long run and save people money, as the government would be able to better spend heath care dollars.

I really think this might be the time for single payer to emerge, he said.
In 1996, a local car club held a show and crafts sale on a Saturday around Halloween at Flemings Auto Parts, a vehicle junkyard on Zion Road in Egg Harbor Township. It was an instant hit, drawing 35 classic cars and a crowd its first year.

The next year the Pumpkin Run Car Show was already being televised on the local channel of Suburban Cable, and served as the kickoff for the Marine Corps Toys for Tots program in Atlantic County  a new toy required for each car entered.

For two decades it grew, adding food, flea markets, tractor pulls, even cannons  drawing more than 2,000 people annually and greatly exceeding the sites parking capability.

The neighborhood grew in that time, too, adding nearby housing developments and traffic to roads built for rural use. The gridlock on show day got so bad that local residents were pinned down and outsiders tried to avoid the Bargaintown area.

Township police asked owner Harry Fleming to come up with a parking and traffic plan to fix these problems, a challenge for sure. In June, he must have figured it couldnt be done this year, and he announced there would be no Pumpkin Run Car Show.

That didnt sit well, probably with hundreds of people, maybe thousands. We got a letter from a woman in Tennessee urging the township to do whatever was necessary to allow the show to go on.

Turned out there was a township willing to make it happen this year, just across the Egg Harbor River to the south.

Upper Township Committee members heard about the Pumpkin Runs plight and realized they could help the show and themselves by hosting it at the township Amandas Field in the Petersburg section. A petition to gauge the interest in hosting the show garnered 1,026 signatures.

They reached out to Fleming, talked it over and last month approved it as a township event.

Committeeman Hobart Hobie Young figures the event could bring several thousand people to the township and maybe raise some funds for something such as Fourth of July fireworks.

The Upper Township FallFest & Pumpkin Run Car Show, hosted by Flemings Pumpkin Run, will be held from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 4, at Amandas Field, 10 Sunset Drive off Route 50. About 1,100 people online have already expressed interest in attending, and 372 have said theyre coming, so it looks like a lot of the loyal crowd will give the new location a try.

Fleming would still like to figure out a way to host the event at his Egg Harbor Township property, but the continued success of the show and difficulties of the old site might change his mind.

Upper Township officials say the show could open their eyes to the possibility of hosting their own event if it does go back to Bargaintown.

So far, so good. Maybe the added space and facilities in Petersburg will let the show get bigger and better. Or maybe an essential part of its appeal was the junkyard setting, keeping it informal and authentic.

Whatever, were happy to see solutions proposed and tried anytime they make it possible for people to keep having a good time.
By India Today Web Desk: Pahuna - The Little Visitors directed by Paakhi A Tyrewala has received a standing ovation at Toronto International Film Festival 2017. The film is produced by Priyanka Chopra's home productions Purple Pebble Pictures.

Speaking about the film, Priyanka told IANS, "This (north-east) is a part of India which does not get seen too much, does not get too many people coming and visiting. But it is a little piece of heaven.. the stories, these kids and the perspectives that you saw when it comes to conversions, when it comes to religion, when it comes to kids being replaced and not knowing their parents and where they are going...it is such a special and important story and I think Paaki told it very well.

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Touted to be India's first film in Sikkimese language, Pahuna opens with insurgent violence forcing people in a Nepalese village to flee to Sikkim. It's the story of three children facing extraordinary circumstances. Pahuna marks the first feature film of Paakhi after her short film Kajaal.

On the work front, Priyanka Chopra is gearing up for the release of her Hollywood projects, A Kid Like Jake and Isn't It Romantic?

ALSO READ: Priyanka has no time to do Hindi film, says mother Madhu Chopra ALSO READ: Priyanka finally breaks her silence on PM Narendra Modi and the dress controversy

ALSO READ: Priyanka was asked a dirty question about her Baywatch guys and she handled it like a boss

PHOTOS: Priyanka goes into Baywatch mode, burns up the beach in a bikini ALSO WATCH: I wanted to be seen as a modern actor, says Priyanka

--- ENDS ---
(Photo: http://mma.prnewswire.com/media/554000/Hamburg_Cruise_Days.jpg )



The Hamburg Cruise Days switched into top gear on Saturday: around 250,000 visitors flocked to the event site to celebrate the highlight of the day: the Grand Hamburg Cruise Days Parade.

Bathed in very welcome sunshine and the wonderful waterside ambiance of the harbour, visitors watched as the gigantic ships manoeuvred on the Elbe to get into position for the Grand Parade. Finally, at 21:15, the formation was complete and the parade started. Escorted by barges, sailing vessels and passenger ships, the AIDAprima, Norwegian Jade, EUROPA 2, EUROPA and MSC Preziosa majestically sailed down the Elbe against the backdrop of the illuminated Blue Port Hamburg. Each ship was waved off on its journey with its own firework display and rousing music.

There was a minor disappointment in an otherwise magnificent display: instead of six ships, only five were able to take part. Due to a technical problem, Mein Schiff 3 was unable to sail in the parade as a rope had become entangled in the propeller as it was departing. "We are very sorry for the cruise line and all the passengers who were so looking forward to being a part of the parade," said organisers Katja Derow and Uwe Bergmann. "The parade was still magnificent. The spectators on land and at home in front of their screens were treated to a stunning display. Hamburg again revealed its most beautiful side in a thrilling experience."

MSC Preziosa returned to the port after the parade and docked at Steinwerder. Together with Silver Wind, which returns to Uberseebrucke on Sunday morning, she will be bidding farewell to Hamburg on Sunday evening. Another highlight for the last day of the event is the harbour cruise by Katharina von Bora at 16:00.

The second day of the event remained peaceful and the police reported no incidents.

Press enquiries:

Katja Derow

k.derow@redroses-pr.com

0049 (0) 162 43 11 376



SOURCE Hamburg Cruise Days
With her announcement, President Michelle Bachelet fulfilled a 2015 commitment to conserve the waters of Rapa Nui. The MPA, one of the largest in the world, will protect an area about 740,000 square kilometers (285,716 square miles), roughly the size of Chile's land area. Announced at the close of the Fourth International Marine Protected Areas Congress (IMPAC4) in Chile, the MPA will protect Easter Island from industrial fishing, mining, and other extractive activities within the Chilean exclusive economic zone that surrounds the island. The Rapa Nui's artisanal fishing practicesfishing from small open boats using hand lines and rocks as weightswill be grandfathered into the management plans for the MPA. Residents of Easter Island endorsed the designation by a wide margin in a referendum just before the start of IMPAC4, with 73 percent supporting an MPA that includes artisanal Rapa Nui fishing practices. Their leaders had made the initial MPA proposal to the Chilean government in 2015.

"The government of Chile believes that public participation leads to better policy with a deeper connection to those who are affected, and we were committed to consultation with the Rapa Nui," said Marcelo Mena, Chile's minister of the environment. "That resulted in a vote to approve this marine protected area, limiting extractive techniques to those that are traditional to the Rapa Nui people."

"This marine protected area," he said, "adds to the legacy of President Bachelet and the 1.5 million square kilometers of protected areas created by this government."

Easter Island, which sits 4,000 kilometers (2,485 miles) west of mainland Chile, is a UNESCO World Heritage site that is world famous for its Moai statues. The efforts by the Rapa Nui to create the MPAhome to at least 142 species found nowhere else, including 27 that are threatened or endangeredwill ensure that the residents are known as global leaders in marine stewardship. In addition to hosting numerous endemic species, Easter Island's waters are important spawning grounds for many migratory species, such as tuna, marlins, and swordfish.

Matt Rand, director of the Pew Bertarelli Ocean Legacy Project, said, "The Rapa Nui understand that a healthy marine environment is directly tied to their traditions and way of life. A thriving environment can help maintain a society's culture and traditions."

"This designation begins a new chapter in the island's history and serves as a lesson to other nations and communities that marine protected areas can strengthen ocean resilience," Rand added.

"We are delighted that President Bachelet has designated the Rapa Nui Rahui MPA, which protects one of the last true ocean wildernesses on the planet," said Dona Bertarelli, co-president of the Bertarelli Foundation.

She added: "The Rapa Nui's heritage is inextricably tied to the sea, and we are proud to have supported them on this journey to conserve their ocean habitat for future generations."

The Pew Charitable Trusts and the Bertarelli Foundation have supported the Rapa Nui's efforts to protect Easter Island's waters since 2012. The partnership between Ocean Legacy and the Rapa Nui led to the most comprehensive scientific assessment of the island's marine environment ever completed, as well as an analysis of the potential economic impact of the proposed MPA. Ocean Legacy worked with Rapa Nui leaders on education and training for the local population, facilitated cultural exchanges with other Pacific Islanders, and planned how to effectively monitor for illegal fishing. A 2013 test of new technologies supported by Pew and Bertarelli used satellites to detect illicit activities in Easter Island's waters.

"The Rahui MPA is a recognition of the community process that has gone on the last five years," said Sebastian Yankovic Pakarati of the Mesa del Mar, a coalition of more than 20 local organizations on Rapa Nui. "It will safeguard our waters from industrial fishing, give us control over our own waters and resources, protect our way of life, and strengthen the Pacific Ocean and its growing network of protected areas."

Before the start of IMPAC4, only about 3 percent of the world's oceans had any protections, while just 1.6 percent were strongly protected. The Easter Island Marine Protected Area and other national efforts announced at the congress will help boost the amount of protected waters worldwide.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature has adopted scientists' recommendation that world leaders should conserve at least 30 percent of the ocean by 2030 to maintain biodiversity, boost fisheries productivity, and safeguard the myriad economic, cultural, and life-supporting benefits of the seas. The Pew Bertarelli Ocean Legacy Project remains committed to collaborating with local communities, governments, scientists, and stakeholders around the world to reach this ambitious target.

About the Pew Bertarelli Ocean Legacy Project

The Pew Charitable Trusts and the Bertarelli Foundation joined forces in 2017 to create the Pew Bertarelli Ocean Legacy Project. This effort builds on a decade of work by Pew's Global Ocean Legacy initiative, which helped to obtain commitments to safeguard more than 2.4 million square miles (6.3 million square kilometers) of ocean by working with philanthropic partners, indigenous groups, community leaders, government officials, and scientists.

Kevin Connor, +1 202-253-5493, kconnor@pewtrusts.org

Photo - http://mma.prnewswire.com/media/553888/Pew_Betarelli_Ocean_Legacy_Campaign_Butterfly_Fish.jpg

Video - http://mma.prnewswire.com/media/553887/Pew_Betarelli_Ocean_Legacy_Campaign_Easter_Island.mp4

Photo - http://mma.prnewswire.com/media/553886/Pew_Betarelli_Ocean_Legacy_Campaign_Rapa_Nui_Boats.jpg

SOURCE Pew Bertarelli Ocean Legacy Campaign of The Pew Charitable Trusts
LONDON, September 10, 2017 /PRNewswire/ --

Calvin Ayre, a citizen and long term resident of Antigua & Barbuda, is calling on the online gambling industry and the Bitcoin community to dig deep to help the people of the island of Barbuda, which was flattened by Hurricane Irma this week.

Barbuda was directly in Irma's path, and its Category 5 mix of 300km/hour winds and heavy rain left a trail of devastation in its wake. Gaston Browne, Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda, said 90% of the island's structures have been destroyed and at least one person has been killed, although that latter figure may rise.

It's hard to imagine, but the worst may be yet to come. A new hurricane, Jose, is forming in the Atlantic and has already attained Category 5 status.

Help is urgently needed and Calvin Ayre - a citizen and longtime resident of Antigua - is calling on the global online gambling industry to offer its assistance. The Calvin Ayre Foundation is currently working with the local government to coordinate relief efforts, including bringing in desperately needed tents and other emergency supplies.

Similar to its campaign during the Typhoon Haiyan relief effort in the Philippines, the Calvin Ayre Foundation has pledged to match all donations by the global online gambling industry and the Bitcoin community to Barbuda's relief effort, up to $1m. This is separate from the personal contribution that Calvin will be making to aid his adopted home.

HOW TO DONATE

Cash donations can be sent to the Barbuda Relief & Rebuilding Fund via government accounts set up at the following banks:

Antigua Commercial Bank: Barbuda Relief & Rebuilding Fund account #100004771

Caribbean Union Bank: Barbuda Relief & Rebuilding Fund account #10001372.

Donations can also be made to the Red Cross relief effort by downloading the TickeTingEvents app from either the iOS App Store or Google Play.

Wherever you choose to donate, send [email protected] a copy of your receipt and the Calvin Ayre Foundation will add an equal amount to the money they've already committed. If you donate $100, it will in effect be equivalent to $200 directly helping the Island of Barbuda.

SOURCE Calvin Ayre Foundation
BOULDER, Colo., Sept. 10, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- OQUS, which rhymes with focus, is poised to be the successor to the now ubiquitous fidget spinner. Unlike the traditional spinner, OQUS is a fidget ring whose patent pending design allows users to custom-configure their toy with 12 different inserts and 6 rollers. The brainchild of Michael Schumacher, a UC Boulder student who watched his classmates struggle to stay focused during classes, the toy went from concept to working prototype in just 14 months.

OQUS, which rhymes with focus, is poised to be the successor to the now ubiquitous fidget spinner. Unlike the traditional spinner, OQUS is a fidget ring whose patent pending design allows users to custom-configure their toy with 12 different inserts and 6 rollers.

"I started Laughable Toys, OQUS' parent company, with the goal of sharing OQUS with the world. Over the last 14 months I have brought OQUS from a concept to a trademarked, patent-pending product, and now I'm raising funds for manufacturing on Kickstarter," said founder Michael "Mikey" Schumacher. "I got off to a great start but really need help to bring the idea to market."

With so many potential configurations, sharing different setups is not only possible it's highly encouraged. "We want OQUS to be an open community where people can share with each other, and with us," said Mikey. "We're all about giving our community members a voice in what we release next, which will always keep OQUS interesting and evolving. It'll never get old."

With only a short time left on Kickstarter, Mr. Schumacher is hoping to rally support for his idea. Nobody who has had an OQUS in their hands wants to put it down, much less give it back  something that's hard to really appreciate when you're just looking at it on screen. With pledges starting at just $1.00, getting in early on what could be the next big craze is affordable for everybody.

"I was born and raised here in Colorado. I went to school in Boulder before leaving to pursue OQUS full time. My life is here and this is where I want to start my company. So I'm hoping people will take a look at my Kickstarter page and support the idea if they see some potential it."

To learn more about OQUS visit Mike's Kickstart page at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1498424793/oqus-the-configurable-fidget-toy/description

About Laughable Toys

Laughable Toys is the OQUS' parent company. Its goal is to create a community in which people around the world can have fun posting videos and photos of themselves playing with OQUS, participate in forums, enter contests, contribute ideas, and create a creative, vibrant community. To learn more about Laughable Toys, visit http://oqus.com/

Agency Contact - Anna Covert - 808-351-3629 - [email protected]

Related Images

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OQUS: The Configurable Fidget Toy

image2.png

Introducing OQUS

image3.jpg

Take It Everywhere

image4.png

About Us

Related Links

Support Us On Kickstarter

Oqus.com

Related Video

https://vimeo.com/233054778

SOURCE Laughable Toys

Related Links

http://oqus.com


ATLANTA, Sept. 10, 2017 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Four organizations will serve as keystone partners of Habitat for Humanity's response to Hurricanes Harvey and Irma, each making contributions of $1 million or more to support the Habitat Hammers Back initiative. The gifts from the Dow Chemical Company, General Motors, Thrivent Financial and a group of American wind energy companies will support on-the-ground responses to the hurricanes in Texas, Florida and other affected areas.

"These generous partners share our commitment to helping families recover from Hurricanes Harvey and Irma," said Habitat for Humanity International CEO Jonathan Reckford. "Dow, GM and Thrivent share a long history of supporting our work, and we are pleased to welcome the support of representatives from the wind industry. Their contributions allow us to be on the ground to respond to the storms without delay."

As Hurricane Irma begins to hit Florida, Habitat for Humanityalready at work in storm-ravaged southeast Texasis expanding its hurricane recovery response. Through the Habitat Hammers Back initiative, Habitat for Humanity is working with its local offices along Irma's path to respond to the storm with pre-positioned response equipment.

"Harvey and Irma have wrought unprecedented levels of damage, particularly to peoples' homes," Reckford added. "We need additional support to match this enormous challenge. We ask for anyone who can to join Habitat Hammers Back by visiting habitat.org/hurricanes today."

As part of Thrivent's mission to help Christians be wise with money and live generously, the organization has committed monetary and hands-on support in the aftermath of Hurricane Harveyallowing neighbors to help neighbors and communities to help communities. Building on a more than 10-year partnership with Habitat, Thrivent is making an initial $1 million contribution and committing an additional $2 million to support Thrivent members and others to travel to Harvey and Irma affected areas and volunteer with Habitat for Humanity alongside families who need assistance. Thrivent is also offering to match up to $3 million in personal donations made through their website to Habitat for Humanity.

At the intersection of sustainability, innovation and citizenship, Dow's support of Habitat Hammers Back builds on a more than 35-year partnership between the organizations. Focused on the long-term recovery of the region and communities where the company has operations, Dow's $1 million of support includes a financial commitment, a broad range of technology-based products and solutions for home construction and repairs, and employee volunteerism.

General Motors' $1 million cash contribution to support Harvey and Irma is in addition to past post-disaster support that in the wake of Superstorm Sandy included the contribution of vehicles to Habitat that serve as Mobile Response Units for disaster responders. These vehicles are also being deployed to support Habitat's response to the recent hurricanes.

Representatives of America's wind energy industry are making a financial commitment of $1 million to Habitat Hammers Back as well as a commitment of volunteers to help with the rebuilding effort. Texas has the largest installed base of wind power in the nation, and the industry nationally employs over 100,000 workers. A number of wind energy families were directly impacted by Hurricane Harvey.

Working through its local offices as well as by deploying trained Disaster Corps volunteers, Habitat conducts rapid assessments of storm damage and helps clean out homes damaged by winds and flood waters. Habitat's long-term post-disaster recovery efforts include repair of damaged homes and construction of new affordable homes. Construction plans are determined after evaluations and are dependent on the level of support received from donors, volunteers, corporate partners and other community organizations.

Habitat has been responding to disasters since 1997 and to date has helped more than 230,000 families in 52 countries through its disaster response work. Following Hurricane Katrina, Habitat organizations along the Gulf Coast built more than 6,000 homes and removed debris and cleaned more than 2,500 homes in preparation for rehabilitation. Habitat also mounted responses to Superstorm Sandy, tornadoes through the South and Midwest, and earthquakes and typhoons overseas.

More information on Habitat for Humanity's response to Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma can be found at habitat.org/hurricanes.

About Habitat for Humanity

Driven by the vision that everyone needs a decent place to live, Habitat for Humanity began in 1976 as a grassroots effort on a community farm in southern Georgia. The Christian housing organization has since grown to become a leading global nonprofit working in more than 1,300 communities throughout the U.S. and in more than 70 countries. Families and individuals in need of a hand up partner with Habitat for Humanity to build or improve a place they can call home. Habitat homeowners help build their own homes alongside volunteers and pay an affordable mortgage. Through financial support, volunteering or adding a voice to support affordable housing, everyone can help families achieve the strength, stability and self-reliance they need to build better lives for themselves. Through shelter, we empower. To learn more, visit habitat.org.

SOURCE Habitat for Humanity International

Related Links

http://www.habitat.org


SHANKSVILLE, Pa., Sept. 10, 2017 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- In partnership with the Families and Friends of Flight 93 and the National Park Foundation, Flight 93 National Memorial will break ground (and sound) today on a visual and audible reminder of the courageous actions of the 40 passengers and crew of United Flight 93. This feature marks the final phase of major construction of the memorial's original design and will be named the Tower of Voices (TOV). It will stand 93 feet tall and contain 40 wind chimes that will serve as an enduring memory of the voices of the passengers and crew. Construction of the tower will begin in late September with anticipated completion and a dedication ceremony in September 2018.

"There are no other chime structures like this in the world," said Flight 93 National Memorial Superintendent Steve Clark. "This unique structure will complete all of the major components of our permanent memorial in a most beautiful way. Not only will it be the first thing visitors see and hear when they arrive at the memorial, it will provide an opportunity for reflection as they depart."

The "soundbreaking" ceremony will take place on Sunday, September 10, at 3:30 p.m. EDT in a field near the entrance of the memorial. After brief remarks and a ceremonial ground turning, visitors will hear an airing of a chimes simulation and view an early prototype of one of the 40 future chimes. To listen to the audio simulation of the chimes and view illustrations of the tower's design, please visit www.nps.gov/flni/getinvolved/tower-of-voices.htm.

Gordon Felt, President, Families of Flight 93 said, "As we enter into the construction phase of the Tower of Voices, the Families of Flight 93 feel a sense of relief that our heroes' Memorial is nearing completion. We are grateful to our partners at the National Park Service, National Park Foundation and the Friends of Flight 93 National Memorial for the opportunity to work hand in hand from the very beginning in order to create what we feel is an extraordinary memorial to the 40 heroes of Flight 93."

The design and construction of the TOV  totaling nearly $6 million  is being funded by a grant from the National Park Foundation. This contribution is in addition to the more than $40 million the Foundation raised through its Flight 93 National Memorial Capital Campaign to fund reforestation of the park's landscape and design and construct the park's Memorial Plaza, Wall of Names, 40 Memorial Groves, and Field of Honor.

"This park is a shining example of the powerful impact that private philanthropy can have in our national parks," said National Park Foundation President Will Shafroth. "Thanks to contributions from more than 110,000 individuals, foundations and corporations, we're able to help ensure that the heroes of Flight 93 will be remembered and honored into perpetuity."

The TOV itself is a musical instrument. The shape and orientation of the tower are designed to optimize air flow through the tower walls to reach the interior chamber. Each of the 40 wind-activated chimes in the tower interior will produce a musical note, that sounds in harmony with surrounding chimes.

"The intent is to create a set of forty tones, or voices, that can express through consonance the serenity and nobility of the site while also through dissonance recalling the event that consecrated the site," said Architect Paul Murdoch. "The National Park Service, with the help of the design team, has engineered an audio simulation of what these chimes may sound like when they are fully installed next year."

The chimes will be constructed of polished aluminum tubes measuring eight inches in diameter and approximately five to 10 feet in length. The size of each chime is dependent on the musical note and associated frequency it is intended to produce.

"To our knowledge, tuned chimes of this size and an arrangement in this magnitude are unique in the world," Murdoch said.

The National Park Service is partnering with EarthCam to provide a live stream of the TOV's soundbreaking ceremony and construction over the coming year. To view the live stream, visit www.flight93friends.org/plan-your-visit/webcams.

The Flight 93 National Memorial's annual Luminaria and September 11 Observance will take place on the evening of September 10, and morning of September 11, respectively. The public is encouraged to attend these events and the tower's "soundbreaking" ceremony. More information is available at nps.gov/flni.

------------

About Flight 93 National Memorial

On September 24, 2002, Congress passed the Flight 93 National Memorial Act. The Act created a new national park unit to commemorate the passengers and crew of Flight 93 who, on September 11, 2001, courageously gave their lives thereby thwarting a planned attack on our nation's capital. The memorial is outside Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where Flight 93 crashed with the loss of its 40 passengers and crew. For more information about the Flight 93 National Memorial, please visit www.nps.gov/flni.

About the National Park Foundation

The National Park Foundation is the official charity of America's national parks and nonprofit partner to the National Park Service. Chartered by Congress in 1967, the National Park Foundation raises private funds to help PROTECT more than 84 million acres of national parks through critical conservation and preservation efforts, CONNECT all Americans with their incomparable natural landscapes, vibrant culture and rich history, and INSPIRE the next generation of park stewards. In 2016, commemorating the National Park Service's 100th anniversary, the Foundation launched The Centennial Campaign for America's National Parks, a comprehensive fundraising campaign to strengthen and enhance the future of these national treasures for the next hundred years. Find out more and become a part of the national park community at www.nationalparks.org.

Contact: Stephanie Loeb, National Park Service, [email protected], 215-268-2614

Alanna Sobel, National Park Foundation, [email protected], 202-796-2538

SOURCE National Park Foundation

Related Links

http://www.nationalparks.org


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Hong Kong, Sep 5 : Authorities in Hong Kong on Tuesday replaced a 24-hours BBC World Service radio channel, that has been running for 39 years, with China National Radio's Mandarin-language broadcast.

An online petition against the move initiated by Alex Hofford, a Hong Kong-based British activist, has already garnered around 1,000 signatures and warns that the move will make Hong Kong, which touts itself as an international city, appear "more parochial and inward-looking", reports Efe news.

"We are not against the service provided by China National News. We just don't want Radio Television Hong Kong (RTHK) to broadcast China National News at the expense of the BBC programming which many Hong Kong people rely on for news from far flung places," the petition said.

The restructuring of Hong Kong's public network include pushing off-air six low-popularity channels and reducing the airtime of BBC World Service -- that has been broadcasting in the city since 1978 -- by 12 hours and moving it down to a night slot from Tuesday onward.

The scrapping of the BBC world service broadcast, which provides global news and informative analyses, is being seen as an effort to curtail press freedom in Hong Kong and an indication of the gradual penetration of Chinese state media into the former British colony, where the dominant language, Cantonese, is being replaced gradually by Mandarin, the official language of China.
Cairo, Sep 6 : Egypt will host the joint Egyptian-US military exercise known as "The Bright Star" from September 10 to 20 at a military base in the Arab country, a Egyptian military spokesman said in a statement.

"The Bright Star is considered one of the most important joint exercises for both the Egyptian and the American armed forces, which reflects the depth of relations and the level of military cooperation between the two sides," said Egyptian military spokesman Tamer al-Refaay in the statement on Tuesday.

Launched in 1981, the joint biennial training has been suspended since 2009, due to the ouster of former presidents Hosni Mubarak and Mohamed Morsi following mass protests in 2011 and 2013 respectively, Xinhua news agency reported.

Later dissatisfaction of former US President Barack Obama's administration with the Egyptian new leadership led to suspension of the Bright Star as well as halting annual US military aid to Egypt of $1.3 billion.

Assuming the Oval Office in January, new US President Donald Trump promised to resume both the exercise and the aid to Egypt under President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi. Both Trump and Sisi have repeatedly exchanged remarks of praise and promised further cooperation and partnership.

The Egyptian military spokesman noted that the training will focus on the fields of security cooperation and counterterrorism amid the ongoing unconventional anti-terror war.

Earlier in April, the Egyptian and the US navies launched on a joint exercise in the waters of the Red Sea, dubbed "Eagle Salute 2017," where Italy, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Kuwait and Pakistan participated as monitors.

The Bright Star resumption comes a couple of weeks after Washington said it would withhold some $300 million in aid to Egypt over human rights concerns.

Egypt receives annually about $1.5 billion in US military and economic aid since it signed the 1979 US-sponsored peace treaty with Israel.
By PTI: couple: Pak officials

Karachi, Sep 10 (PTI) Two bodies have been found in the mountains of Mastung district of Pakistans restive Balochistan province, with a Pakistani official saying that they could be of the two Chinese nationals who were kidnapped from Quetta earlier this year.

The bodies were found last Thursday and have now been sent to Islamabad for a DNA test.

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A senior government official said the test was being done to ascertain identity of the deceased as the bodies were in bad condition and beyond recognition.

"To be honest, they are just skeletons," the official said today.

Chinese officials have been approached to get samples from relatives of the kidnapped man and woman for the DNA test, the Dawn reported.

The abduction took place on May 24, in Quettas Jinnah town. While one Chinese woman managed to escape when the abductors fired in the air to disperse onlookers, they managed to get hold of two others.

The kidnapping of the Chinese nationals has raised concerns in Beijing over the multi-billion dollar investment in Pakistan.

The abduction forced the Chinese embassy in Islamabad to evacuate 10 of its nationals from Quetta and send them home. PTI CORR CHT ASK CHT

--- ENDS ---
Kabul, Sep 6 : At least six militants, including a key Taliban commander, were killed in Afghanistan on Wednesday in a drone attack, an army official said.

The unmanned plane targeted a militant hideout in Nadir Shah Kot district of Khost province, Army spokesman Captain Abdullah said.

"Acting upon intelligence inputs the security forces conducted the early morning strike on a Taliban hideout in Zinokhil, killing six rebels including commander Jehad Shad and injuring another," Abdullah told Xinhua news agency.

Eyewitnesses, however, said that the drone targeted a car killing all those travelling in it.

The Taliban has not yet commented on the strike.
Washington, Sep 8 : US President Donald Trump said that while a military response remains a possibility as the US develops a response to North Korea's detonation of what Pyongyang claims was a hydrogen bomb, it would not be his first choice.

"Military action would certainly be an option. Is it inevitable? Nothing is inevitable," he said on Thursday when a reporter raised the issue during the President's joint press conference with the visiting Emir of Kuwait.

"I would prefer not going the route of the military," Trump said.

"I can tell you that North Korea is behaving badly and it's got to stop," he said, alluding to the nuclear detonation and a series of ballistic missile launches.

China wants to restrain the government in Pyongyang, Trump said on Wednesday after a telephone conversation with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

"President Xi would like to do something ... we'll see whether or not he can do it. But we will not be putting up with what's happening in North Korea," the US President said of the conversation.

Following last weekend's nuclear test, Trump said he was considering cutting off US trade links with any country that does business with North Korea, whose main economic partner is China.

Last Sunday, Defense Secretary James Mattis said North Korea would face "a massive military response" if it were to pose any threat against the US or its allies.

"Our commitment among the allies are ironclad," Mattis said. "Any threat to the United States or its territories, including Guam, or our allies will be met with a massive military response, a response both effective and overwhelming."

The North Korean government has spoken about plans for an attack on US military facilities in Guam.
Washington, Sep 9 : Hurricane Irma smashed into Cuba and the Bahamas as it drove towards Florida on Saturday after hitting the eastern Caribbean with its devastatingly high winds, killing at least 24 people and leaving catastrophic destruction in its wake. At least five million people were told to evacuate from Florida.

It made landfall on Cuba late on Friday night, regaining its maximum intensity as a Category 5 storm, striking the Camaguey Archipelago with 160 mph winds, the US media reported.

A hurricane warning was in effect in Cuban provinces of Camaguey, Ciego de Avila, Sancti Spiritus, Villa Clara and Matanzas, while floods have been reported in the northeast.

Hurricane Irma is due to hit Florida Keys on Sunday morning, crossing over the entire state over a 30 hour period.

As many as 5.6 million people were told to evacuate from Florida -- more than a quarter of the state's population. At least 540,000 people in parts of Georgia were also told to flee as the storm headed towards the American mainland.

"This is a storm that will kill you if you don't get out of the way," said National Hurricane Centre meteorologist and spokesman Dennis Feltgen.

Feltgen said the storm has a really wide eye, with hurricane-force winds that cover the entire Florida peninsula and potentially deadly storm surges on both coasts.

Tom Bossert, US Homeland Security Adviser, said: "Please listen to your local authorities. You need to evacuate from south to north - that is a staggered and carefully thought-out process."

In West Palm Beach police were going door to door, urging people to obey the mandatory evacuation order.

Rick Scott, the Governor of Florida, said they were working to ensure that fuel was available for cars to get to shelters. He told people they should not wait, and should leave now.

Irma claimed its first victim in Florida, even before making landfall, when a 57-year-old man fell from a ladder while fitting storm shutters at his home, reports said.

Irma is now tracking a path down the coast of Cuba towards the Bahamas, where it is due to reach early on Saturday, before hitting southern Florida early on Sunday.

Florida's major theme parks, including Walt Disney World, Universal and SeaWorld, will remain closed throughout the weekend.

The US military was on Friday night mobilising thousands of troops and deploying several large ships to aid with evacuations and humanitarian relief, as the air force removed scores of planes from the region.

The Red Cross said an estimated 1.2 million people have already been affected by Irma and that figure could rise sharply to 26 million.

US President Donald Trump said in a videotaped statement that Irma was "a storm of absolutely historic destructive potential" and called on people to heed recommendations from government officials and law enforcement.
Srinagar, Sep 9 : Two militants were killed and a girl injured on Saturday in a gunfight broke out in Jammu and Kashmir's Shopian district after militants fired on a military vehicle. police said. The exchange of fire was still on.

Police said hiding militants fired at the army vehicle in an area between Imam Sahib and Barbugh village of Shopian in the evening and troops returned the fire, killing two militants.

"A local girl identified as Nusrat has sustained bullet injury in the cross fire and has been taken to the hospital for treatment," a police officer said.

"The operation in the area is still going on and police reinforcements have been rushed to the spot," police said.

Earlier reports had said the security forces had surrounded Barbugh village on information that militants had been hiding there.
London, Sep 10 : Actress Joanne Froggatt, who played maid Anna Bates in the popular period drama series "Downton Abbey" says she and her castmates are keen to reunite for the film but it would be very difficult to arrange.

Froggatt says the film making could be tricky as there are many people's schedules which need to be considered, reports montrosepress.com.

"It's been tricky. There has been a lot of goodwill from all of us, but logistically it's a bit of a minefield. It's very difficult to get all 22 actors together. But if we can, everyone would like to do it,"Froggatt told Radio Times magazine.

While the "Liar" star has been looking for work in America, she is not expecting to land a Hollywood blockbuster because she doesn't think she has the right image.

"I'm not a big-budget Hollywood type. They want the model type, classically beautiful and I'm not," she said.
Toronto, Sep 10 : Assamese filmmaker Rima Das's "Village Rockstars" had its world premiere at the ongoing Toronto International Film Festival here amid big applause.

Set in Rima's own village Chhaygaon near Guwahati, "Village Rockstars" is the story of "poor but amazing children" who live a fun-filled life.

Introducing the film to the audience, Rima said on Saturday: "This film is about joy and happiness. It is about finding beauty in simple things. These children have very little but they are so happy.

"The story of the film is about what possibilities dreams can unleash," she added.

The film opens with the children having fun as a rock band. As the story progresses, it captures the whole gamut of fun that these rural children are having despite living a life of poverty and deprivation.

Among the band of these little boys is a girl called Dhunu aged 10. Raised by her mom after father died, Dhunu is an integral part of this fun-loving boys' gang.

Narrating how she thought about making "Village Rockstars", the filmmaker said: "I went to Mumbai to become an actor. There I was exposed to world cinema and I decided that I must make films.

"While in Mumbai, I was exposed to new things, but I was also missing something. I went back to my village and I found the little kids and their little performances. One day I told them I will make a film about them."

Rima said the children became so elated by the idea of a film on them that they started following her.

As they started pestering her too much, "I just started avoiding them", she said amid laughter.

Finally, Rima decided to make the film, chose the cast spontaneously and started shooting.

"It was all boys' cast initially. The girl (Dhunu) was added later."

Tt took Rima 150 days over three years to shoot the film as she did the shooting herself.

Rima said this film is an extension of her first film "Antardrishti".

Asked why she chose her own village as the setting for the film, Rima said: "The story is mine, but I must know the characters well. In my village, it was easy to know the characters.

"I like a layered structure of story-telling. Once you know your characters, your job as a filmmaker becomes easier. The innocence and energy of the kids was amazing."

(Gurmukh Singh can be contacted at gurmukh.s@ians.in)
Srinagar, Sep 10 : Restrictions were imposed in some parts of Srinagar city on Sunday to prevent separatist-called protests against Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh's visit to Jammu and Kashmir, police said.

The minister is scheduled to address a gathering of police personnel and Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) troopers at Khanabal in Anantnag district later in the day.

Restrictions were imposed by the Srinagar District Magistrate in Maisuma, Safa Kadal, M.R. Gunj, Nowhatta, Khanyar and Rainawari, the police said.

Senior separatist leaders, Syed Ali Geelani and Mirwaiz Umer Farooq were placed under house arrest while Muhammad Yasin Malik has been lodged in the city's Central Jail.

Railway authorities also suspended train services between north Kashmir's Baramulla and Jammu's Bannihal towns.

Heavy security was deployed in the areas under restriction.

A day before the Home Minister's visit to Anantnag district, militants killed a police constable and injured two others in Anantnag town in a hit and run attack.

Security forces killed one militant and arrested another terrorist on Saturday night following an attack on an army vehicle in Barbugh village of Shopian district.
Kabul, Sep 10 : Four militants, including a key Taliban commander, were killed and two others injured on Sunday during a security offensive in Afghanistan's Kunduz province, a senior official said.

"The security forces launched the offensive on a Taliban hideout in Qala-e-Zal district, killing four militants, including the notorious commander Mawlawi Ismael, on the spot," the official told Xinhua news agency.
Srinagar, Sep 10 : Two terrorists were killed and one was apprehended in Shopian district of Jammu and Kashmir, the Army said.

The operations took place in Barbugh village of Shopian on Saturday night. The terrorists had holed up inside a house there.

Army officials identified the apprehended terrorist as 17-year-old Adil Hussein Dar, a resident of village Chatarpura of Shopian. According to sources, Dar surrendered.

The operations had started around 5.30 p.m. on Saturday.

Northern Command of Indian Army said in a Tweet: "Two terrorists killed and one terrorist surrendered in Shopian. Weapons and Ammunition recovered."

One of the killed terrorists has been identified as Tariq Bhat of Barabug, Shopian. He belonged to the Hizbul Mujahideen.
Chennai, Sep 10 : The Indian Plumbing Association (IPA) will soon approach the central government to star rate consumer durables like washing machines, dish washers and bath fixtures for water efficiency, a top official said here.

"We will soon approach the Ministry of Water Resources to star rate products like washing machines, dish washers, taps, showers, shower heads, flush, low flow urinals for their water usage efficiency. Water is a precious commodity that is becoming scarce," Gurmit Singh Arora, National President, IPA, told the media late Saturday.

According to Arora, the Bureau of Energy Efficiency star rates electrical goods and there was an increasing need for rating water related products.

"Star rating of consumer durables has caught on as power cost is high whereas the cost of water is very cheap and hence people are not largely concerned about water wastage," Arora said.

Queried about the premium shower heads and their water efficiency, C.S. Gupta, Honorary General Secretary, IPA, said the modern shower heads are water efficient although it seem they discharge more water.

Arora also said the upcoming Indian Plumbing Conference here will focus on the disconnect between the architects and the plumbing experts of high rise buildings.

"The architect drawings of high rise buildings do not take into account the plumbing needs."

"The plumbing consultant is called in later and not in the building's design stage. This results in overflowing sewage, inadequate planning of water needs and its disposal," Arora said.

The 23rd Indian Plumbing Conference (IPC) will be held at the Chennai Trade Centre from September 22 to 23.

The theme of the conference is "Intricacies in Plumbing Design for High Rise Buildings".

According to Arora, around 700 delegates are expected to attend the conference. There will be delegates from 10 foreign countries as well.

An exhibition will also be held to display and demonstrate products and technologies by domestic and international players.
By PTI: New Delhi, Sep 10 (PTI) Some refugees of West Pakistan, who had migrated to India during the 1947 partition, have moved the Supreme Court challenging Article 35A of the Constitution relating to special rights and privileges of permanent residents of Jammu and Kashmir.

The petition said there were around 3 lakh refugees from West Pakistan but those settled in Jammu and Kashmir have been denied the rights gauranteed under Article 35A which are given to the original residents of the state.

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A bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justices A M Khanwilkar and D Y Chandrachud tagged the plea of the refugees, who are settled in the Kathua district of Jammu and Kashmir, with the similar matters pending before it.

The apex court had, on the request of Jammu and Kashmir government, posted the matters challenging Article 35A for hearing after Diwali holidays.

Article 35A, which was added to the Constitution by a Presidenial Order in 1954, accords special rights and privileges to citizens of Jammu and Kashmir.

It also empowers the states legislature to frame any law without attracting a challenge on grounds of violating the Right to Equality of people from other states or any other right under the Indian Constitution.

Earlier, a Kashmiri Pandit woman, Dr Charu Wali Khanna, had approached the apex court challenging the provision.

Petitioners Kali Das, his son Sanjay Kumar and one other in their plea have said that they were raising issues seeking conferment of basic natural and human rights which at present were denied to them.

"The petitioners are persons who migrated from Pakistan to India in 1947. They were assured by the government that they should stay in the state of Jammu and Kashmir on the assurance that they would be granted Permanent Resident Certificates (PRC), which would permit them to purchase properties and own a house, opportunity to get a government job and reservation benefits, since most of them belong to SC/ST/OBC category and a right to vote in state and municipal elections," the plea said.

The petition claimed that since 1947, the refugees have been given repeated assurances by successive governments but never given PRC, thereby keeping them as refugees for over 65 years.

"Petitioners are filing the instant writ petition for conferring the status of permanent resident on around 3,00,000 West Pakistan refugees, who have been denied basic rights like the right to employment, education, ownership of property and political participation," the petition said.

It said denial of any of these necessary, natural and basic human rights result in "denial of basic civilisational recognition to a set of humanity which defies basic human values and civilsational ethos".

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"Certain group of citizens of India for whose rights this petition is being moved are subjected to extreme cruelty and bonded labour treatment. The state government granted permanent resident status to some of the West Pakistan refugees subject to exception that they could be employed only as sweepers," the petition submitted.

The plea claimed that the refugees and their children are not allowed to hold any position higher than sweeper and the children are not entitled to gain education in government universities or avail any scholarship to gain education.

"Theoretically, employment of these people is permissible and their appearances in All India Services in UPSC is permissible, where they can become chief secretary of J&K, the DGP of J&K but cannot hold any position higher than a sweeper, like a clerk or a constable in the state," it submitted.

The plea said if a person is permitted to occupy the position of Chief Secretary or DGP of the state in law, no logical or legal impediments remains for him to occupy the post of a clerk or a constable. PTI MNL ABA SJK RKS ARC DV

--- ENDS ---

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New Delhi, Sep 10 : Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi will on Monday address students at a US university, but will not be giving any talk on artificial intelligence.

Tweets by the Congress Vice President's office, and Sam Pitroda, chairman of Overseas Congress, said Gandhi's programme in the US included a series of events in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Washington and New York.

"Looking forward to addressing students @UCBerkeley & interacting w/Indian Overseas Congress members w/@sampitroda during my visit to the US (sic)," Rahul Gandhi's office tweeted.

Pitroda, who is involved with planning the events, told IANS in an email that Gandhi will not attend the Artificial Intelligence Conference.

"Rahul Gandhi will be travelling from September 10 to attend various events in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Washington and New York. He is not coming for the AI conference," he said.

Pitroda added that he will also meet "a few important people, listening, interacting and giving a few public speeches including one at the University of California, Berkley on September 11".

"He will be addressing a major event in New York organised by the Indian Overseas Congress on September 20," he said.

In a series of tweets, Pitroda said: "He is coming to meet with students and academicians and various thinking people in the US. He will be giving a talk at University of California, Berkley. He will be also meeting with Indian Overseas Congress members and others."

Gandhi is expected to speak on contemporary India and the path forward at Berkley. India's first Prime Minister and Gandhi's great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru had delivered a speech at Berkeley in 1949.
New Delhi, Sep 10 : Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Sunday ordered a magisterial inquiry into the rape of a five-year-old girl inside a school here and asked for a report to be submitted by Tuesday.

He also said that a protocol will be formulated for all schools to ensure the safety of students.

"Shameful. (Such acts) Won't be tolerated. Police doing its job. Ordered magisterial enquiry. (The government) Will develop protocol for all schools to ensure children safety," Kejriwal tweeted.

The move comes a day after the crime took place in an east Delhi school and a peon was arrested in connection with it.

"The magisterial inquiry is being headed by Sub Divisional Magistrate (SDM) Vivek Vihar into the sexual assault by the school's staffer inside the school in east Delhi's Raghuwarpura near Gandhi Nagar, and its report is to be submitted within three days," a senior officer of the Delhi government said.

Expressing her concern over the incident, Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) Chairperson Swati Jaihind echoed Kejriwal's views and termed the move to chalk out protocol for schools a "very crucial step" to ensure safety of students.

Taking suo moto cognizance of the incident, the DCW Chairperson issued notice to the school and sought the list of male staff or contract workers (teaching and non-teaching) in the school, along with their designations, who have access to girl students.

The DCW in the notice also asked about the steps taken by the school to ensure safety of the children within the premises and also demanded from the school a copy of the CCTV footage of the entire day of the incident.

The incident came to light on Saturday around 3 p.m. when the child complained of pain in her abdomen. Her mother noticed bleeding in her private parts while taking her to the washroom.

"The accused, identified as Vikas, 40, who works as a peon, was arrested for sexually assaulting the five-year-old girl in an empty classroom," a senior police officer said.

"He was arrested from near his residence in Raghuwarpura after the victim gave his description to the police during a counselling session," he said.

Deputy Commissioner of Police Nupur Prasad said: "The incident occurred on Saturday around 11 a.m. at the Tagore Public School in Shahdara after school hours. The girl did not leave as she was waiting to take her half-an-hour extra class."

The accused has been working in the school for the past three years. He earlier worked in two other schools, said Prasad.

The police said a medical test confirmed sexual assault. Vikas has been booked under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act.

Meanwhile, the girl's grandfather alleged that police misbehaved with them when the minor was taken to Chacha Nehru Hospital. He also said that initially the doctors did not take this case seriously and only admitted the girl around 8.30 p.m. on Saturday.

"The child is still in trauma and terrified since the crime happened with her as Vikas threatened her with dire consequences," the girl's grandfather told IANS.

"He was inebriated at the time of committing the crime and also at the time of his arrest. The girl was later shifted to Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan Hospital from where she was discharged on Sunday morning," he added.
New Delhi, Sep 10 : India has renegotiated the price of liquefied natural gas (LNG) it imports from Gorgon project in Australia that will result in savings of more than Rs 10,000 crore, according to Petroleum Ministry sources here on Sunday.

"Happy to share good news that India has, yet again, been able to address the long-term price issue of LNG from Gorgon to suit Indian market," Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said in a tweet.

"Indian customers will receive LNG volumes at an amicable price soon. This is done in a similar way to what we did with LNG from Qatar," he said in a separate tweet.

According to the ministry source, the Gorgon project operators' consortium led by American majors Chevron and Exxon Mobil have agreed to charge 13.9 per cent of the prevailing UK Brent oil price at the port of delivery, rather than 14.5 per cent at the port of loading as was agreed earlier.

A joint venture formed by state-run oil and gas companies with Gaz de France as its strategic partner, Petronet LNG had last year sought a minimum 10 per cent reduction in price of LNG it agreed to buy from the Gorgon project.

The company had signed a 20-year agreement in 2009 to buy 1.44 million tonnes per annum of LNG at a price equivalent to 14.5 per cent of the prevailing oil rate.

Last year, India favourably re-negotiated its LNG agreement with Qatar to bring down the cost of importing natural gas to less than $5 per unit from $12.

In return for the renegotiation, Petronet signed an agreement for additional import of 1 million tonnes of LNG per year for about 12 years with effect from January 1, 2016, at the prevailing market prices. The new contract ends in 2028.

"Going by the old long-term gas contract price, we have succeeded in renegotiating a benefit of Rs 16,000 crore in this calendar year," Pradhan had said in his address here at the signing of the modification to the gas sale-purchase agreement with RasGas of Qatarlast year.
Kolkata, Sep 10 : Against the backdrop of West Bengal's Mamata Banerjee government escalating its confrontation with the centre and even denying use of a venue for his programme, BJP President Amit Shah arrives here on Monday on a three-day visit hoping to give a push to his party's big political ambitions in the state.

Shah, who begins his tour by paying tributes to Swami Vivekananda at his north Kolkata house, is slated to meet party leaders, intellectuals, victims of alleged political violence and interact with the media during his latest tryst with Bengal.

Unlike his last visit in April when he started his booth level public interaction programme from north Bengal's Naxalbari - the birthplace of the Maoist movement in the country half a century ago, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President would be limiting his engagements this time to Kolkata and its adjoining areas.

The trip takes place amid a controversy over the state government's refusal to direct the universities to view Prime Minister Narendra Modi's speech on the occasion of Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya's centenary celebration and the 125th anniversary of Swami Vivekananda's famous Chicago speech.

In the recent past, the Banerjee regime and the Narendra Modi-led NDA government have also crossed swords over central directives on Independence Day and Teachers Day celebrations, with the state refusing to comply with them.

Besides, the BJP has cried fowl over the authorities denying use of the Netaji Indoor Stadium for Shah's programme on the plea that the facility was already booked. Shah himself threatened to move court on the issue.

Shah would attend a day long party leaders' meeting in the central government run Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) auditorium on Monday and interact with party workers from different districts, who have allegedly been victims of political violence unleashed by the state's ruling Trinamool Congress the next day, the party said.

"There would be around 30 families from different districts who have suffered the wrath of the Trinamool activists and goons solely for supporting BJP. Shah would listen to their grievances," state BJP general secretary Sayantan Basu told IANS.

The BJP chief would wrap up his programme on Tuesday with a meeting with the intellectuals at the same venue.

Basu said the denial of the indoor stadium for Shah's programme has upset his party's plans, as they could now accommodate less number of people.

On Wednesday, Shah would hold a press conference at the Press Club ahead of his meeting with members of the Merchants Chamber of Commerce at a five star hotel in central Kolkata.

Shah's programme is being seen as part of the BJP's efforts to strengthen the party organisation in a state where it has been traditionally weak, but has shown signs of emerging as a formidable force in the near future, with opposition Left Front and Congress continuing to lose ground in recent electoral contests.
Ahmedabad, Sep 10 : Union Minister Jitendra Singh on Sunday lauded the contribution of Space Application Centre (SAC) here in India's space programme, saying it gave valuable inputs and thus made value additions to several prestigious space missions.

Currently on a two-day visit to Gujarat, the Minister of State for Atomic Energy and Space held a detailed review meeting with SAC scientists here.

Jitendra Singh appreciated advanced technology developed at SAC with regard to origami lens, indigenously developed Monolithic Microwave Integrated Circuit, and airborne low mass x-band Miniature Synthetic Aperture Radar for strategic applications as well as disaster management and optical trans-receiver satellite mobile radio among others.

The Minister said India has emerged as a world leader in space technology.

This has not only vindicated the noble initiative of Indian space programme's founding fathers like Vikram Sarabhai and Satish Dhawan, but also set example for other countries about how the space technology can be used effectively even for non-satellite mission programmes.

He said under the Modi government, the Department of Space has entered into memorandums of understanding with other ministries to enable space technology application in several important government programmes like Smart City, tele-education and telemedicine.
Cairo, Sep 10 : Egyptian police on Sunday killed nine suspected militants in a shootout near Cairo, the state-run Middle East News Agency reported.

Five police officers were injured in the shootout that took place in the neighbourhood of Agouza, Giza governorate, during a raid on two suspected terrorist hideouts, MENA added.

On August 15, two alleged militants were killed in a shootout with Egyptian security forces in the village of al-Khosous, in al-Qaliubiya governorate.

Egypt has seen a series of terror attacks, mainly targeting security forces, since the ousting of Islamist President Mohamed Morsi in 2013.
Kabul, Sep 10 : As many as 35 civilians have been kidnapped by militants of the Islamic State and Taliban in northern Afghanistan's Jawzjan province, locals said on Sunday.

"Both IS and the Taliban have created checkpoints along the way between Qush Tipa and Darzab districts of the province, arresting individuals on charges of having links with the other side, and recently 35 people, all civilians, have been taken hostage by the two rival groups," a local resident was quoted as saying by Xinhua.

Meanwhile, Nasratullah Jamshidi, the press officer of the 209th Shaheen Corps of the Afghan National Army, confirmed the incident, saying he had received such a report.

Fighting has escalated in Afghanistan as the Taliban insurgency spreads from its traditional strongholds in the south and east to the once peaceful region in the north, where the militants have been recruiting from among the youth.
Patna, Sep 10 : Bihar Leader of Opposition Tejashwi Yadav on Sunday blamed Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi for the Rs 2,000-crore Srijan scam in Bhagalpur and other districts of the state.

He also alleged the involvement of several Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders in the scam.

"Nitish Kumar and Sushil Modi are responsible for the Srijan scam. The state government led by them is busy eliminating evidence and trying to divert the issue to save their skin," Tejashwi Yadav, former Deputy Chief Minister, said at a rally in Bhagalpur to launch the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) campaign against the Srijan scam.

"But we will not sit silent and have decided to intensify the agitation to expose their involvement in the scam before 11 crore people of Bihar," the RJD leader said.

He said Sushil Modi and his family members are involved in the Srijan scam.

Tejashwi Yadav called Nitish Kumar as a "Bhishma Pitamah" of moral corruption for breaking the Grand Alliance of JD-U, RJD and Congress and forming a new government with the BJP.

"Nitish Kumar's politics is full of misdeeds. He dumped the RJD in the garb of CBI case against Tejashwi Yaadav but real aim was to join hands with the BJP to sit in their lap to suppress Srijan scam."

He said Nitish Kumar has betrayed the people's mandate for personal interest and "he is the biggest socially corrupt leader in the country".

Tejashwi claimed that senior BJP leaders including Union Minister Griraj Singh, former Union Minister Shahnawaz Hussain, and party MP Nishikant Dubey were involved in the scam and they have looted government money.

"Srijan scam in Bihar is bigger than Vyapam scam in Madhya Pradesh. Both scams took place in BJP-ruled state," he said.

After the opposition RJD demanded a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the "mega scam", the Chief Minister last month recommended the same.

The CBI has already began the probe into it.

The Srijan scam involves a Bhagalpur-based NGO, Srijan Mahila Vikas Sahyog Samiti Ltd, which used to provide vocational training to women.

The NGO allegedly pilfered funds meant for government welfare schemes from the bank accounts of the Bhagalpur district administration.

According to police, so far 20 people have been arrested and over two dozen FIRs, including 10 by CBI, have been lodged in connection with the scam.
Chennai, Sep 10 : Leaders of opposition parties led by DMK Working President M.K. Stalin on Sunday met Tamil Nadu Governor C. Vidyasagar Rao an urged him to convene the state assembly within a week so that the K. Palaniswami government can prove its majority.

Speaking to reporters after the meeting, Stalin said: "We urged the Governor to convene the assembly within a week. If it is not done then we will approach the court and also the people's court."

Stalin said the delegation also told Rao that they hoped this will be the last time they will be meeting him on the subject.

According to him, the DMK with 89 legislators, along with its allies - Congress eight, IUML one -- total 98 legislators.

Stalin said 21 legislators belonging to AIADMK Deputy General Secretary T.T.V. Dinakaran are opposed to Chief Minister K. Palaniswami.

In the 235-member Assembly there are now 234 members including one nominated member without voting right.

One seat remains vacant following the death of Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa last year.

Effectively the number of legislators with voting rights in the assembly is 233.

The number of legislators who are opposed to the government is 119 -- DMK and allies 98, Dinakaran faction 18.

"The ruling party has the support of only 114 legislators," Stalin said.

"Only a democratically elected government, which has the support of majority of elected representatives, is mandated by the Constitution of India and this is recognised as a basic feature of our Parliamentary democracy," Stalin told Rao.

In his letter to Rao, the DMK leader said it is mandatory on the part of the Governor to hold the floor test immediately and without any further delay.

"If the present minority Government is allowed by your good self to continue any further, it goes against the very basic constitutional tenets of Parliamentary Democracy and against the Constitutional Principles laid down by the Supreme Court," Stalin told Rao.

In his letter, Stalin said any delay in directing an immediate floor test will only encourage horse-trading and foster unsavoury political manipulations in Tamil Nadu.

"The omission, so far, on the part of your good self in not directing a floor test is breeding a grave suspicion as to the impartiality of your functioning. Your good self may note that the Indian Constitution contemplates a government of the people, by the people and for the people," Stalin told Rao.

On Saturday, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Palaniswami claimed that with 134 legislators the AIADMK commands majority in the assembly.
Gurugram, Sep 10 : At least 50 people, including nine scribes and photo journalists, were injured when police baton-charged a group of people protesting the brutal murder of a seven-year-old student in Ryan International School here and demanding the arrest of the school management.

A liquor vend near the school was also set on fire.

The police used force to disperse the protestors who were agitating outside the school in Bhondsi in the wake of the murder of class 2 student Pradhuman, who was on Friday found in the washroom with his throat slit.

"We were protesting peacefully outside the school but police suddenly baton-charged us without any provocation," said a protestor.

The journalists covering the protest were also injured.

"TV journalists Sunil Yadav, Sushil Kumar, and photo journalists Yogesh Kumar and Abhishek were injured and have been admitted to the civil hospital," senior journalist Naveen Panchal told IANS.

"Yogesh Kumar suffered a fracture in his right hand while Abhishek's left hand was fractured," he said.

Senior journalist Mahavir Yadav from a national Hindi daily, and fellow journalists Pawan Sethi, Sanjay Chauhan, Lok Kumar and Dinesh Kumar were also injured.

The journalists were targetted after a senior police officer allegedly said that "all this (protest) was happening due to the media coverage".

An Assistant Commissioner of Police and area SHO also threatened the journalists to leave the place.

Cameras were also damaged during the police action. Several Press Clubs, Press Associations and social bodies across the state have condemned the police action.

Former Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda visited the hospital to meet the injured journalists.

"Attack on media was pre-planned and BJP workers and leaders were behind it. Journalists will not get proper treatment in the hospital because it is also run by the state government," he said.

Later, Deputy Commissioner Vinay Pratap Singh and Additional Deputy Commissioner Pradeep Dahiya also visited the hospital.

A group of angry protestors also set fire to a liquor vend, located less than 50 metres from the school.

This came even as Haryana Education Minister Rambilas Sharma was announcing in a press conference that the licence of the liquor vend has been cancelled.

Meanwhile, Varun Thakur, father of the murdered student, appealed to people not to get violent during the protests.

"We must protest in a peaceful manner," he said.

Police late on Friday arrested Ashok Kumar, a conductor of a school bus, for allegedly killing the child, but many believe that he was only a scapegoat.
By PTI: London, Sep 10 (PTI) Viking armies may have had high ranking female officers at the battlefield, say scientists who conducted a DNA analysis of the skeletal remains of a warrior and found that it was a woman.

Researchers at Uppsala University and Stockholm University in Sweden conducted a study on a mid-10th century grave in Swedish Viking town Birka, one of the most well-known graves from the Viking Age.

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The burial was excavated in the 1880s, revealing remains of a warrior surrounded by weapons, including a sword, armour-piercing arrows, and two horses. There was also a full set of gaming pieces and a gaming board.

The morphology of some skeletal traits have long suggested that she was a woman, but since this grave has been the type specimen for a Viking warrior for over a century, it has always been assumed to have belonged to a male Viking.

Now, researchers have found that the DNA retrieved from the skeleton demonstrates that the individual carried two X chromosomes and no Y chromosome.

"This is the first formal and genetic confirmation of a female Viking warrior," said Professor Mattias Jakobsson at Uppsala University.

Isotope analyses confirm a travelling life style, well in tune with the martial society that dominated 8th to 10th century Northern Europe, researchers said.

"The gaming set indicates that she was an officer, someone who worked with tactics and strategy and could lead troops in battle," said Charlotte Hedenstierna-Jonson, form Stockholm University, who led the study.

"What we have studied was not a Valkyrie from the sagas but a real life military leader, that happens to have been a woman," she said.

"Written sources mention female warriors occasionally, but this is the first time that we have really found convincing archaeological evidence for their existence," said Neil Price, Professor at Uppsala University.

The finding were published in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology. PTI APA MHN MHN

--- ENDS ---
Astana, Sep 10 : Pakistan President Mamnoon Hussain and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Sunday discussed the issue of Rohingya Muslims being persecuted in Myanmar.

The two leaders met on the sidelines of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) summit on science and technology in Astana, Kazakhastan.

Both leaders discussed bilateral relations and pledged to further solidify the long-term relationship, Foreign Office Spokesperson Nafees Zakaria said.

Besides, they also spoke about regional issues including that of Afghanistan.

Lauding Islamabad's role in eliminating terror and restoration of peace in the region, Erdogan pledged his country's support to Pakistan's efforts for a peaceful resolution to the Afghan conflict, Zakaria said.

Separately, while addressing the OIC summit, President Hussain said Muslim countries around the globe should make collective efforts for the development of science and technology to meet the challenges of the new era.

Highlighting rapid changes occurring in the fields of science and technology, Hussain emphasised the need for enhanced focus of the Muslim world to improve the agricultural production and develop agricultural technology sector.

"With solid foundations of education and skilled healthy manpower, it will be possible to focus on higher education and research in emerging areas of science and technology," the President said. "Unity among the Muslim Ummah is very imperative for development, prosperity and a safe future for the new generation."

The President regretted that Muslim countries had failed to pay attention to education for the last several centuries, adding it was crucial for the Muslim nations to be self-sufficient in political and socio-economic sector "to revive the golden era of education".
Kolkata, Sep 10 : Fake Indian Currency Notes of the Rs 2000 denomination with the face value of Rs 6.9 lakh have been seized from West Bengal's Malda district, a BSF official said on Sunday.

Acting on a tip off, Border Security Force (BSF) troopers in Malda's Churiantpur ran a special operation at three places in the area on Saturday night and challenged a group of people near the Indo-Bangladesh Border Fence (IBBF) when they were trying to collect the fake notes thrown from the Bangladesh side.

"The troopers recovered 345 fake Rs 2000 notes of the face value of Rs 6,90,000, wrapped in plastic packets after searching the area. However, the smugglers managed to flee taking advantage of the darkness," R.P.S. Jaswal, Deputy Inspector General of BSF's South Bengal Frontier zone said in a press release.

"Three mobile phones were also recovered from the place. The seized notes and the mobile phones were handed over to Kaliachawk police station for further legal action," he added.
Astana, Sep 10 : Venezuela's President on Sunday issued a call in Kazakhstan's capital for a world without wars, terrorism and hegemonic empires.

"It's time to fight for another world. It's time to fight for a world without wars, without terrorism, without hegemonic empires," Nicolas Maduro said in his remarks at a summit of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation in Astana, reports Efe.

Maduro, who arrived on Saturday night in Kazakhstan, is participating in the OIC summit as Secretary General of the Non-Aligned Movement.

Venezuela deeply believes "it's time for dialogue, for a profound dialogue of cultures, civilizations and religions", the leftist President said.

He added that the two organisations can only "make progress toward those objectives of justice and peace if they are united".

The Venezuelan leader said both organisations shared principles such as "inclusive multi-lateralism," which he said was the "most effective tool" for addressing global challenges.

"And the rejection of the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or the political independence of states, and the rejection of the imposition of unilateral sanctions in accordance with the provisions of the United Nations charter and the norms of international law," he added.

He also stressed their common stance in support of the "peaceful resolution of disputes, democracy, the development and respect for all human rights and basic freedoms".

With respect to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he said the Non-Aligned Movement, which he will head until 2019, urgently calls for a "just, lasting, comprehensive and peaceful resolution" and "condemns the illegal practices of the occupying power".

Upon his arrival in Astana, Maduro was received by Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev. He later also met the Presidents of Turkey and Iran, Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Hassan Rouhani, respectively.

Before travelling to Kazakhstan, Maduro said that with the aim of reducing Venezuela's dependence on the United States dollar and weathering US sanctions and pressure on the Caribbean nation, Caracas will sell oil and natural gas in other currencies, including the yuan, yen, ruble and the rupee.
Kolkata, Sep 10 : A private hospital was vandalised and its doctors heckled following a teenage boy's death on Sunday, forcing police to baton charge the agitators to keep the situation under control.

The incident happened in ESI Medical College and Hospital in Joka in city's south-western fringes.

Four family members of the deceased have been detained on charges of vandalism and provocation, police said.

Alleging negligence in treatment, the family members of the deceased Bibek Sarkar, 13, ran amok in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) and the emergency ward of the hospital, damaging equipment and pelting stones at the police when they tried to intervene.

Sarkar's parents alleged that their son was left unattended by the hospital authorities even after repeated requests.

"My son was constantly complaining of uneasiness and respiratory problem. But the doctors did not attend him for a long time and the staff deliberately delayed the admission process. Had they been a little proactive, our son would not have died," his mother lamted.

Sarkar was rushed to the ICU after admission where the doctor declared him dead.

The hospital superintendent tried to pacify the patient party but was attacked by the agitators. He rebuffed the allegation of negligence and said all possible measures were taken to treat the teenager.

"We followed the medical procedure and took all possible measure for his treatment but unfortunately could not save the patient," he said.

The situation became tense in the hospital premises as the agitators shattered critical care equipments like ventilators, and cardiac monitor in the ICU following the boy's death. The air conditioning system was also impacted.

Police initially tried to pacify the crowd but later resorted to baton charge to take control of the situation.

"Four people have been detained for vandalism so far. We are looking for the others," said a officer from Thakurpukur police station.
Colonial Chevrolet Acton Massachusetts Our sites converted more traffic to leads and experienced great time on site, which we attribute in part to our dynamic virtual test-drives from the Dealer Video Showroom!

The Dealer Video Showroom is an interactive video enhancement to CDKs state-of-the-art next gen websites that lets car shoppers enjoy a personalized virtual test drive. The DVS was created by WheelsTV, which is now partnering with CDK on the DVSs distribution to CDKs 9,000 dealership websites.

The Dealer Video Showrooms exclusive library of over 5,000 virtual test drives brings to life every new and pre-owned car on each dealers lots. Car shoppers go from taking virtual test-drives on dealers inventory pages to taking actual test-drives at the dealerships. Over the Labor Day weekend, Chevy dealerships busy websites became self-contained e-dealerships open around the clock. Car shoppers enjoyed exploring each vehicles most important attributes, from interior features, fuel economy, power, safety and warranty to exterior design and whats new for the model year.

Visitors to 515 participating Chevrolet e-dealerships took 14,668 virtual test drives over the three day weekend. The busiest times were mornings and early afternoons. The most popular virtual test-drives were of the 2017 Chevrolet Silverado 1500 and the most popular chapter was Interior.

Car shoppers averaged 5 minutes and 46 seconds while taking virtual test drives, indicating that they took at least two virtual test drives before setting out to the dealerships for actual test drives.

Helping dealers and consumers do business more quickly and easily is what the Dealer Video Showroom is all about, says WheelsTV President Lehel Reeves. By providing this next gen interactive video experience, WheelsTV and CDK accelerate the consumers research and decision making process. When Chevy dealers help consumers to enjoy their research, they are helping themselves to move new and used cars off their lots and into the arms of happy motorists.

WheelsTV and CDK offer the Dealer Video Showroom as a free, no-obligation trial similar in nature to how consumers can sample Sirius/XM satellite radio. Once the trial ends, the dealer can choose whether or not to keep this highly effective marketing and sales feature. Judging by the success that Colonial West Chevrolet and Colonial Chevrolet of Acton have experienced with the Dealer Video Showroom, thats an easy call to make!

Both Colonial West Chevrolet and Colonial Chevrolet Acton had great August and Labor Day weekend sales this year. Our sites converted more traffic to leads and experienced great time on site, which we attribute in part to our dynamic virtual test-drives from the Dealer Video Showroom! states Daniel Fontaine, E-Commerce Director, Colonial Automotive Group at http://www.colonialchevy.com

To learn more about The Dealer Video Showroom contact Lehel Reeves at lreeves(at)wheelstv.net or call 978-264-4333.

About WheelsTV

Automotive Networks Corporation d/b/a WheelsTV, is an industry-leading video technology company that creates and distributes cutting-edge interactive video platforms and original automotive content for all screens. Patent-pending products include the Digital Video Showroom and iDrive Interactive Video Player. Exclusive content includes over 5,500 original virtual test drive brochures covering every popular light vehicle from 2008 to present. WheelsTV has received recognition for excellence in product innovation and automotive programming through multiple awards including Telly Awards, Communicator Awards and W3 Awards.

Visit http://dealervideoshowroom.com/
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Speaking at the event, held at the Swiss Spirit Alisa Hotel, the companys Head of Business, Mr Rowland Odolokor, praised the resilience and perseverance of many of the partners who have been with the company for some time. He also commended those who have recently joined the company for believing in Glo. He promised that the company would continue to cherish such exemplary display of business trust.

Glo Mobile used the event also to share its plans for the foreseeable future while also showing a baggage of mouth-watering incentives for the business partners to encourage them and boost their performances.

Said Mr Odolokor at the event: We are currently engaged in market development, introducing new products and fine-tuning existing ones to take care of the needs and yearning of the subscribers. Just last week, we introduced four new products, namely the Glo Ay d kk Recharge bonus, the Welcome Back Offer, the e-Top-Up 15% Recharge Bonus and the Glo Cafe.

He promised that Glo was doing everything to ensure that network availability, stability and quality is augmented so that the subscriber experience on the network can improve and impact positively on purchases of airtime, thus delivering value to Glo and to you, our partners. He called on the dealers to strengthen the partnership for the mutual benefit of both parties.

The Regional Chief Marketing Officer, Mr Ashok Israni took time to break to the partners details of the recently introduced products by Glo, while Mr Sanjib Roy, the Director Technical, Globacom, explained ongoing network stability, expansion works and plans for the future.

Some of the business partners were later presented gifts by officials of the company in recognition of their growing business patronage.

Responding on behalf of the partners, the chief executive of Airtymn Solutions, Mr Edward Mills Banson, commended the company for its focus and expressed optimism that with the renewed efforts being made by the company, Glo was set to soar in Ghanas telecom market. He commended the owner of Glo, Dr Mike Adenuga for his pan Africa focus and urged him not to waiver.

His investment in Ghana alone is commendable and worthy of plaudits. We can only wish him the very best in his unalloyed passion to grow an indigenous black African telecoms brand that Africans can all be proud of he added.
He accused Dr Owusu Afriyie Akoto of lying to parliament when he told MPs that the fall armyworms have been defeated.

READ MORE: PFAG calls on government to declare state of emergency

He according, the armyworms are alive and well in his constituency and suggested that the minister was in contempt of parliament.

He told Accra-based Joy: The fact that the statement he made on the floor of parliament has been proven to be false based on actual and practical evidence indicate that he is even in contempt of parliament and paddled falsehood to the good people of this country.

I think that he has lost credibility. The armyworm is alive and well and since I have provided uncontroversial evidence to indicate the worm is alive and alive in my constituency, the honorable thing the agric minister can do is to resign.

In July, Dr Akoto told parliament that the fall army worm has been defeated.

Dr. Akoto said the pest is not causing as much harm as it did when they invaded hectares of farms across the country.

He stated that when the pest became an issue, the Ministry deployed chemicals to various farms and so far the problem is under control.
"If John Mahama is saying there is a lack of patriotism among the citizenry, I agree with him but he himself may have contributed to the problem. How did he demonstrate to the ordinary people that he is willing to die for Ghana? Im not sure. says Prof. Ransford Gyampo, a political science lecturer at the University of Ghana.

He added: If you have a country where there is serious deficit in terms of civic education; where political leaders have not demonstrated essential leadership; where they have not demonstrated that they are prepared to die a little for Ghana.

"If you live in a country where leaders are always milking the nation dry and they are always thinking about taking their own pound of flesh and not wanting to die a little for the nation then the citizenry do not also become patriotic because they learn from the leaders

"The political leaders themselves know what they have to dothe political leaders we have seen in Ghana demonstrate to us that they are selfish, self-seeking, self-perpetuating and self-aggrandisingif you have leaders who have these features, it becomes difficult to instil patriotism.

Speaking at a ceremony to mark the enrollment of the first batch of students at the NDCs ideological school in Accra, he said patriotism has become very deficient.

He said: "Nationalism and patriotism have become very deficient today. Absolutely nobody thinks about the country first.
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"I assure all of you of my prayers for each of the countries of Latin America, and in a special way for neighboring Venezuela," Francis said.

"I appeal for the rejection of all violence in political life and for a solution to the current grave crisis, which affects everyone, particularly the poorest and most disadvantaged of society."

'Pope should intervene'

Venezuela's crisis has caused food and medicine shortages and calls for President Nicolas Maduro to quit.

Clashes with security forces at anti-government protests left 125 people dead from April to July.

The Vatican tried to mediate in negotiations last year between Venezuela's government and opposition.

The talks broke down with the sides accusing each other of bad faith.

Thousands of Venezuelans have fled to Colombia to escape the crisis.

"We could ask the pope to intervene directly for dialogue," said Venezuelan housewife Nancy Pugliese, 35, who attended Francis's visit in Cartagena.

"We need all the spiritual support we can get to free Venezuela... The pope should tell President Maduro directly to listen to the people."

Venezuelans vote

On Sunday, Venezuela's center right-led opposition was holding a vote to choose candidates for regional governorship elections scheduled for October.

The opposition MUD coalition and international powers have accused Maduro of stifling democracy by taking over power from state institutions.

Francis met in Bogota on Thursday with Venezuelan bishops, who warned him that priests and nuns had faced threats in their country.

They said in a statement that they "informed him about the worsening of the crisis and the radicalization of the government's stance."

The statement said Francis "expressed his concern for the worsening of the humanitarian crisis."

Praying for the poor

Francis was due to fly back to Rome on Sunday evening after a four-city tour of Colombia.

During his visit, he pleaded for lasting peace in Colombia as it moves toward the end of a half-century civil war.

In Cartagena, he visited the impoverished district of San Francisco, where he blessed the foundations of a new homeless shelter.

"We have a lot of faith in Francis's visit to this forgotten district," said Willy Martinez, a 43-year-old bricklayer.

"Here, there are lots of people who only eat once a day. The worst thing is the corruption -- that is worse than the bullets of the guerrillas or the paramilitaries."

Francis prayed in the name of local holy figures, including Saint Peter Claver, the patron saint of slaves, who lived in this colonial port city during the slave trade.

They "invite us to work to promote the dignity of all our brothers and sisters, particularly the poor and the excluded of society," he said.

"Those who are abandoned, immigrants and those who suffer violence and human trafficking."

Pope gets 'bashed'

jpegMpeg4-1280x720Earlier, Francis got a cut on his brow and blood on his white cape when he bumped into the window of his Popemobile.

He was standing up in the specially designed vehicle, waving to admirers, when it braked sharply and he collided with the glass.

He was seen later with a bruise on his cheek and a small dressing on his brow, but still smiling.
Hung's the CEO of Axovant, a company that has a shot tolaunch the first new Alzheimer's drug in 15 years. Before joining the company in April, Hung founded Medivation, a cancer drugmaker based San Francisco that Pfizer bought for $14 billion inAugust 2016.

But selling Medivation wasn't initially part of the plan. And now he's trying to make sure it doesn't happen again.

"We never looked to get acquired," Hung said. "We were on a great trajectory, we had created a drug that was the biggest selling prostate cancer drug in the world ,we'd crossed $2 billion in revenue."

The company was growing, and its pipeline looked solid as well. "Our intention was to be a fully integrated large pharmaceutical company," Hung said.

In the end, that didn't happen.

Because Medivation was publicly traded, it was hard to turn down a $14 billion offer from Pfizer, a 118% premium over its stock price at the time. But now he thinks he can grow an even bigger company.

That's in part because Medivation shared the sales of its leading prostate cancer drug, Xtandi, with Astellas. That's not the case with Axovant, which entirely owns intepirdine, the drug Axovant's developing to treat Alzheimer's.

"Medivation was $14.3 billion, but we had less than half of Xtandi," Hung said. "Had we owned all of Xtandi, Medivation should have been a $30 billion company."

Axovant, incorporated in Switzerland, also benefits from a lower tax rate than Medivation, which was incorporated in the US. The combination of owning all of intepirdine, the tax rate, and the number of patients who could potentially benefit from the drug has Hung convinced that if the trial is positive, Axovant could become even bigger than Medivation was. Axovant's current market cap is $2.5 billion.
The announcement which was made at the event yesterday, Saturday, September 9, 2017, was the first time anyone would win the accolade which was only introduced this year.

Channel 24 reported that it was the first time the award would offer nomination opportunities to comedians in the following countries, Nigeria, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Angola and Lesotho.

Dillon Khan, the Vice-President of Comedy Central Africa presented Basketmouth with his trophy which gave him a feeling of pleasure as observed from his delighted expression while walking towards the stage.

He went on to social media, precisely his Instagram to express feelings of appreciation to the organizers when he wrote, "Thank you @comicschoice I truly appreciate this."

It was truly a deserving recognition for the jokester whose reputation reaches beyond the shores of Africa.

ALSO READ: Comedian clears air over alleged viral picture of his childhood

The planners of the award agree with this based on their congratulatory message to him via Instagram yesterday.

"Africa!! Your Pan African Comedian of the year is @Basketmouth #SavannaCCA Naija Stand Up!!! Congrats," the post reads.
Amosun said the minister should have resigned before pledging allegiance to Atiku, adding that she cannot be loyal to two masters.

The Governor stated this while speaking to newsmen in Abeokuta, the state capital, on Saturday, September 9.

Amosun said given where Alhassan's loyalty lies, she cannot make any meaningful contribution to the Muhammadu Buhari administration.

He said: "Though she is entitled to her own opinion at any point in time, she should have just resigned her appointment because her loyalty cannot be in two places.

"Her falling short of resigning, takes everything away from what she said and it is clear that she will no longer be contributing to the development of the present administration."

According to him, the only thing that can stop Buhari from running for a second term in office would be ill-health.

"The only thing that can prevent President Muhammadu Buhari from contesting is if his health cannot take it," he said.

ALSO READ: Why I visited Atiku - Mama Taraba

The Governor said the economic challenges Nigeria is facing would have been worse if Buhari was not in power.
A copy of the suit which was filed on September 6 by Arik Airs counsel, Mr Babajide Koku (SAN), Mr Chukwuemeka Nwigwe and Mrs Ezinne Emedom, was obtained by NAN on Sunday, September 10.

In its statement of claim supported by a 20-paragraph affidavit deposed to by Mr Chris Ndulue, a Director with Arik Air, the plaintiff asked the court to restrain the first and second defendants from further negotiations on its takeover.

The plaintiff noted that the Asset Management Company of Nigeria (AMCON) had taken over the airline on February 8, which was challenged by its management via two suits already pending before the Federal High Court, Lagos.

ALSO READ: FG takes over Arik Air, appoints new management

According to the plaintiff, the suits numbers are FHC/L/CS/827/17 and FHC/L/CS/826/17, adding that the negotiations by the defendants will render the outcome of the suits worthless.

The statement said: "The plaintiff avers that the agreement of the second defendant with the first defendant will be wide ranging and intricately affect every aspect of the plaintiff herein, including but not limited to the day to day running technical as well as financial management which will affect the plaintiff as being the largest domestic and regional airline in Nigeria.
He said the huge revenue generated from oil is the reason successive governments in the country were not innovative.

He stated this in Ibadan on Saturday, September 9, while speaking at the 2017 Town Hall Meeting/Founders Day celebration, in memory of renowned economist, Professor Ojetunji Aboyade.

The Governor said when the oil wells dry up, the government and Nigerians will become serious about developing the country.

He said: "Because Nigeria gets easy money from oil, the nation has lost its thinking initiative on how to develop other sources of revenue and diversify the economy.

"We get easy money, we do not collect taxes and our taxes are six per cent of Gross Domestic Product; that is an average of 21per cent. We stop respecting the intellectuals that we have in our universities because we get easy money.

"This is very sad, I wish the oil will dry up so that we can begin to use our brains because we have stopped using our brains and we have stopped respecting intellects because of easy money."

ALSO READ:

El-rufai also described security in the country as inadequate, giving credence to a general opinion that Nigeria is under-policed.

He added: "It is obvious that Nigeria is severely under-policed, and will require more personnel, intelligence assets, better training, technology and equipment for its security agencies for the country to be a credible guarantor of security.
The DSS said the plot was masterminded by the Islamic State of West Africa (ISWA) terrorists.

The spokesperson for the security agency, Mr. Tony Opuiyo, disclosed this in a statement on Saturday, September 9.

Opuiyo listed the targeted states as Kano, Kaduna, Niger, Bauchi, Yobe and Borno.

He named the mastermind of the plan as Husseini Mai-Tangaran.

Mai-Tangaran is said to be a well known senior ISWA commander, who has been on the DSS and Army watchlist since 2012.

The suspect terrorist is believed to have led armed attacks on the office of the Assistant Inspector General of Police Zone I and other places in Kano.

He was also said to be responsible for the deadly explosive attacks against worshippers at the Kano Central Mosque as well as an attack on a military formation in Yobe State in 2015, which claimed many of lives.

ALSO READ: Senate 'critically' investigates DSS lopsided recruitment

Opuiyo said that the suspect was arrested in Kano on August 31, adding that one Abdulkadir Mohammed was also arrested on September 2, at Kantin Kwari Market, Fagge, Kano.

Opuiyo said, "Mohammed was a fighter of the sect who left the conclave of the group in the Sambisa forest, to join ranks with Ismaila towards carrying out the attacks being planned by the group.

"Also, another accomplice in the plot, one Muhammad Ali was arrested on September 3, at Sheka area in Kumbotso area of the state.

"Prior to his arrest, Ali was the financial courier of the group in Kano. He was one of the conduits through which funds and other material logistics were channeled to the group from foreign extremist elements/sponsors.
According to a video circulating on social media, the soldiers invaded Kanu's home at Ibeku, Umuahia, in armoured tanks and patrol vans.

They allegedly opened fire on IPOB members guarding the house.

One of the Biafra agitators, who is believed to have recorded the video said some of his comrades were killed while many were wounded.

But the video only captured one IPOB member being rushed to the hospital - he was allegedly shot by the soldiers.

This is coming barely 24 hours after the Nigerian army said it would begin its second phase of Operation Python Dance II in the South Eastern states.
The party's Caretaker committee chairman, Ahmed Makarfi, who spoke authoritatively about PDP returning to power in 2019, said Nigerians would see the flaws of the President Muhammadu Buhari administration 'when' the APC-led government loses the next election.

Makarfi stated this in Kaduna on Friday, September 8, while speaking to newsmen.

He said: "On the issue of corruption, we will be able to assess the APC government when they leave office. By 2019, when we take over, we are not going to be vindictive. But the truth will prevail.

"Who told you there are no series of petitions against them as they are in office right now? When they leave office, we will see what will come up. We will know whether corruption is something limited to one political party. We are not doing justice to the fight against corruption when we try to politicise it."

He noted that corruption is not limited to politicians, saying it is a Nigerian problem.

"Take a look at the private sector, those the EFCC has charged to court, no politician has been tried or taken to court for anything near that. If you try to just narrow corruption to only politicians from the opposition parties, we are undermining the fight against corruption. We should look at it holistically together as Nigerians.

"I am also referring you to an official government report from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) which pointed out leading agencies or institutions on the corruption index, and they are all public institutions manned by public servants and not politicians," he said.

The PDP regained relevance in Nigeria's political sphere after the Supreme Court sacked Ali Modu Sheriff, who refused to step down as the party's Chairman.
Talks between Iran and six world powers, sealed with a 2015 deal for Tehran to roll back its nuclear programme and submit to inspections in exchange for some sanctions being rolled back, were "a long but important period of diplomacy" that had achieved a "good end," she added.

"I could imagine such a format for the settlement of the North Korea conflict. Europe and especially Germany ought to be ready to make a very active contribution," Merkel said.

The chancellor said she had held telephone talks with the leaders of France, the United States, China, South Korea and Japan about the North Korea crisis over the past week, and is expected to speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin Monday.

Merkel's comments come as Washington has formally requested a Monday vote on tough new sanctions for Pyongyang at the UN Security Council.

US diplomats have called for an oil embargo, an assets freeze against leader Kim Jong-Un, a ban on textiles and an end to payments of North Korean guest workers in response to the nation's sixth nuclear test last week.

But the measures could founder on opposition from permanent Security Council members Russia and China.
The 305 migrants, who included 30 women and 73 children, said they had set off from the Turkish port of Mersin and paid up to $2,000 (1,600 euros) each for the crossing.

Police arrested a 36-year-old man on suspicion of piloting one of the boats. He was expected to appear before a court in the resort town of Paphos later on Sunday.

Police said the migrants were in good health and would be transported to a reception centre outside the capital Nicosia. A woman and her 10-month-old baby were taken to hospital as a precaution.

Cyprus, an EU member state located 160 kilometres (100 miles) from Syrias Mediterranean coast, has not seen the massive inflow of migrants experienced by Turkey and Greece.

Since September 2014, however, more than a dozen migrant boats have reached the island, bringing in nearly 1,500 migrants including the latest arrivals.
"President Trump emphasized the common commitment of the United States and Turkey to work together to increase regional stability," a White House statement said.

The phone call came amid a backdrop of deteriorating relations between Washington and Ankara, NATO allies whose relations have soured over the US decision to arm Kurds in Syria to fight Islamic State. Turkey regards the Kurdish militias as "terrorists."

Turkey has also repeatedly demanded, without success, that the United States extradite Fethullah Gulen, a Turkish preacher who lives in Pennsylvania and is accused by Ankara of being behind a failed coup against Erdogan in July 2016.

US authorities have also charged several Turks with violating financial sanctions against Iran, including former economy minister Zafer Caglayan.

Erdogan denounced the charges as a politically-motivated decision against Turkey.
"It is a war on rapes, war on child sexual abuse and trafficking because these are not ordinary crimes and they cannot be solved through the business-as-usual approach," Satyarthi told AFP in an interview.

"Two children are sexually abused every hour. One child goes missing every eight minutes in India and they are not disappearing in thin air," said Satyarthi.

"These children are trafficked... sold and bought like animals. Sometimes at lesser prices than animals."

More than 9,000 children were trafficked in India in 2016, up nearly 25 percent from the previous year, according to the Ministry of Women and Child Development.

About 14,000 children were victims of rape and sexual harassment in 2015, data from the National Crime Records Bureau showed.

But those figures may only be the tip of the iceberg, with experts saying the government underestimates the numbers in a country where a shroud of silence surrounds such crimes.

Satyarthi hopes his "India March", which will kick off from the country's southernmost tip of Kanyakumari and finish in New Delhi on October 16 after travelling across all 29 states and seven union territories, will open people's eyes to the mounting epidemic.

"We want to awaken the whole nation, we want to raise the consciousness against child sexual abuse and trafficking because it is a hidden menace," he said.

Traffickers lure children, mostly from remote villages, with false promises of jobs before selling them off to brothels, factories or gangs which force them into begging.

The soft-spoken 63-year-old has been at the forefront of the drive against child labour in India, where over 10 million children are engaged in work, according to UNICEF.

He blames India's "failed" law enforcement, weak prosecution and low conviction rates for their plight, and founded Bachpan Bachao Andolan (Movement to Save Childhood) to rescue children working in horrifying conditions.

His teams often stage dangerous dawn raids on mills, dank mines and factories -- many manned by armed guards -- which employ children.

'Very dangerous'

Satyarthi said his social conscience was awoken when he was about five years old and saw a boy his age outside a school, cleaning shoes.

In 1980 he quit his job as an electrical engineer to take up the cudgels on behalf of India's most vulnerable citizens.

The married father of two recalled his first rescue operation in 1981 -- at a time when India had no law against child labour.

After collecting money by selling his wife's jewellery, he and friends freed 36 children, women and men from a brick kiln in Punjab state where they had been enslaved for 17 years.

"When I was rescuing them, I realised that 'No, they are freeing me from inside' and that is a very, very special realisation of freedom, of liberation," he recalled.

"And since then I have never looked back and I have kept on freeing children. And on the other hand, they have freed me, giving me enormous joy and a sense of accomplishment."

In 2014 Satyarthi jointly won the Nobel Peace Prize with Pakistani child activist Malala Yousafzai.

But his efforts have come at a price. He has been beaten up and faced death threats and attempts at incarceration. Two of his colleagues were murdered.

"Of course, it was very dangerous," he said.

"I have injuries and scars all over my body. My left foot has been broken, my ribs have been broken, my shoulder is broken and I cannot raise it."

"But nothing can stop me."

He proudly says his movement has liberated 86,000 children from bonded labour across India and has activist networks in more than 140 countries.

In the 1990s he organised the Global March Against Child Labour, an international coalition of groups aiming to free millions of children from slavery worldwide.

"Earlier I fought against child slavery and child labour. Now I'm waging this war against rape and sexual abuse," he said.
"This morning, he showed signs of the beginning of tachycardia, and the decision was made to take him immediately to intensive care,"Alejandro Aguinaga told AFP.

"He is now in stable condition and has been doing a series of tests."

Aguinaga noted that Fujimori, who led Peru from 1990-2000, experienced an "onset of supraventricular tachycardia," which is a sign of a heart problem, and the second such event for his patient in just 11 days.

The 79-year-old last went to hospital on August 29, for a six-day stay before returning to prison. In May, he also experienced arrhythmia. His doctor says he also suffers from hypertension.

He was convicted in 2007 for his role in killings by a death squad targeting supposed guerrillas when he was in power from 1990-2000.

Fujimori has since been in and out of hospital with heart, back and stomach trouble and growths on his tongue, which has been operated on several times for cancer.
A judge accused JBS meatpacking executive Joesley Batista of hiding evidence in a probe of allegations that Temer approved the payment of hush money to a corrupt politician.

Judge Edinson Fachin said in a written ruling there was evidence that Batista and another suspect "omitted... information that they were obliged to provide" as part of a plea bargain.

The JBS affair rocked Temer's government this year just as it was pushing reforms to try to drag Latin America's biggest economy out of its worst ever recession.

Fachin's ruling suspended the suspects' provisional release under the plea bargain and ordered them to be detained for five days.
CHICAGO (AP)  Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner has departed an eight-day visit to Japan and China for his administration's first international trade mission.

In a statement, Rauner's office says the first-term Republican governor left from Chicago's O'Hare International Airport on Saturday. The delegation includes several business and local leaders.

Rauner says he plans to work on attracting foreign job creators to the state and to help Illinois businesses enhance competitiveness.

He is scheduled to attend the Midwest-USA Japan Conference. Then he's scheduled to continue to China, where he will have meetings with government officials.

Rauner's trip will last until Sept. 17.
CHICAGO (AP)  As the school year begins, districts across Illinois will face a new requirement to aid breast-feeding students.

The law signed by Gov. Bruce Rauner last month takes effect Jan. 1, the Chicago Tribune reported. It requires public schools to provide a room, other than a bathroom, with an electrical outlet for nursing mothers.

Students must also have access to a refrigerator to store their milk and can't be penalized for time away from academics because they were pumping.

Some school district officials say they're already making accommodations for nursing mothers but that they'll solidify policies to comply with the law.

The statute doesn't specify whether teachers or staff can use the room.

Advocates for pregnant and parenting teens support the law, but say breast-feeding is just one of many obstacles teen mothers face when trying to finish their education.

Illinois data show that breast-feeding remains an unpopular choice among young mothers compared with women who have children well after high school. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends breast-feeding exclusively for the first six months and continuing to do so with the introduction of solid foods until at least a year.

An annual survey conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Illinois Department of Public Health shows that most teenage mothers try breast-feeding but switch to formula in the first few weeks more often than older mothers do.

"We just want to make sure we have healthy babies and a supportive environment for young mothers," said Rep. Sonya Harper, a Chicago Democrat who proposed the law. "They have so much to worry about already."
COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP)  Denmark's minority center-right government doesn't want to accept any refugees this year that come in under a U.N. quota system, an official said Saturday.

The U.N. refugee agency has made deals with countries, including Denmark, to take in a number of refugees each year. Since 1989, Denmark has accepted about 500 such refugees every year.

But now Denmark "doesn't want to commit ourselves," said Integration Minister Inger Stoejberg, considered an immigration hardliner. "I don't believe we have room for quota refugees this year."

Stoejberg said Denmark had received about 56,000 asylum-seekers since 2012 and many of them are expected to try to bring relatives in. She said those already in Denmark should be integrated first.

The anti-immigration Danish People's Party, which backs the government, supports the proposal.

Holger K. Nielsen, a senior member of the small opposition Socialist People's Party, said it was "totally wrong of Stoejberg to close the door to quota refugees," saying she was letting down "the weakest refugees in the world."

No date for a vote in the 179-seat Parliament was set.

Denmark has received about 20,000 asylum-seekers in 2015, a small number compared with its Swedish and German neighbors.

Last year, Stoejberg said the reception of refugees through the UNHCR program had been postponed, saying Danish municipalities should have "a little breathing room to better take care of those who have already arrived."

In other migrant developments:

 Coast guard forces from Romania and Bulgaria intercepted 217 migrants in the Black Sea who are suspected of trying to illegally enter Romania. Romanian border police said Saturday they spotted a tourist ship carrying 97 migrants from Iran and Iraq sailing close to Romanian waters late Friday and sent it to the port of Mangalia. Separately, a joint Romanian-Bulgarian effort blocked a fishing vessel carrying 120 migrants in the Black Sea near the northern Bulgarian town of Shabla. The ship and its passengers were handed over to Turkey.

 Germany's interior minister called Saturday for benefits for asylum-seekers to be standardized across the European Union, reducing his country's attractiveness for would-be migrants. Thomas de Maiziere also urged that legal procedures surrounding asylum and deportation to be standardized. More than 1 million people came to Germany as asylum-seekers in 2015 and 2016.

Turkish authorities said 40 Syrian migrants were stopped Friday from illegally crossing to Greece from the western province of Izmir. In footage filmed from a coast guard boat, the group is seen in a rubber dinghy. As the coast guard vessel approaches, one man lifts and then briefly lowers a small child toward the sea, while another man raises his arms in prayer. The coast guard then pulls in the dinghy and transfers the migrants to its boat.

Turkey and the European Union signed a deal last year to curb the illegal flow of migrants to Greece. Turkey is hosting more than 3 million Syrians who have fled the war in their country.

___

Zeynep Bilginsoy in Istanbul contributed to this report.
BEIRUT (AP)  U.S.-backed Syrian fighters launched an offensive against the Islamic State group in eastern Syria along the border with Iraq on Saturday, bringing them into a race with government forces marching in the same direction against the extremists in their last major holdout in the war-torn country.

The dueling battles for Deir el-Zour highlight the importance of the oil-rich eastern province, which has become the latest focus of the international war against the Islamic State group, raising concerns of an eventual clash between the two sides.

The U.S.-trained Deir el-Zour Military Council said it was calling its operation Jazeera Storm, after the familiar name for northeast Syria. The Military Council is a part of the predominantly-Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces, which enjoys broad U.S. military support. The SDF are the U.S.'s primary ally in the fight against IS in Syria.

The race to reach the Iraqi border will shape future regional dynamics, determining whether the United States or Russia and Iran will have more influence in the strategic area once the extremist group is defeated.

Iran has been one of President Bashar Assad's strongest backers since the crisis began in March 2011 and has sent thousands of Iranian-backed fighters and advisers to fight against insurgent groups trying to remove him from power.

The U.S.-backed fighters are up against a huge challenge to reach Deir el-Zour, especially while they are still fighting to liberate Raqqa from IS. Three months into the battle, they have liberated around 60 percent of the city, and much more difficult urban fighting still lies ahead.

This week, Syrian troops and their Iranian-backed allies reached Deir el-Zour, breaking a nearly three-year-old IS siege on government-held parts of the city in a major breakthrough in their offensive against IS. In a victory statement, the Syrian military said Deir el-Zour will be used as a launching pad to liberate the remaining IS-held areas along the border with Iraq.

Pro-government forces broke the siege of the city's airport on Saturday, state media reported.

The troops' arrival to Deir el-Zour city brings Syrian forces and their allies a step closer to controlling the oil-rich eastern province and its capital bordering Iraq, a major boost for Tehran's growing influence in the area. The region has some of Syria's largest oil fields, whose revenue is vital to the state's dried coffers.

Syria's military command announced Saturday they had captured the province's Taym oil field from IS militants on Saturday.

Washington has been determined to block the formation of an "Iranian corridor"  of Shiite-controlled land stretching from Tehran to Damascus  and for months has been eyeing the area southeast of Raqqa near the Iraqi border.

U.S.-backed Syrian rebels had been gathering in Tanf in southeastern Syria to march toward Deir el-Zour, but their plans were disrupted in June when Syrian troops reached the border with Iraq, obstructing their path. The only way left for the SDF to enter the eastern province appears to be from the northeastern province of Hassakeh, where Syrian activists say the U.S.-backed fighters have been gathering and stepping up preparations for an attack.

SDF officials say the timing of Operation Jazeera Storm is not related to government forces reaching the Deir el-Zour earlier this week, and was planned months in advance.

"Deir el-Zour is a main connection point and a very important geographic area," said Syrian Kurdish official Nawaf Khalil, who is in Germany but frequently visits northern Syria. He said the battle for Raqqa requires fewer fighters now than it did in its earlier stages.

The U.S.-led coalition fighting IS said in an email to The Associated Press that the SDF "will decide when the conditions are right for an offensive."

Asked about concerns of a possible clash between the SDF and Syrian troops, the coalition said: "We urge all forces to concentrate their efforts on our common enemy (IS)."

Washington has welcomed Syrian troops' fight against IS. Both the U.S. and Russia have an interest in avoiding a clash between the SDF and Syrian forces and may devise a strategy that will allow both sides to share control of the vast province.

U.S. officials have suggested they are not seeking a confrontation with Assad's forces.

"We are in the killing-ISIS business. That is what we want to do, and if the Syrian regime wants to do that ... and show that they are doing just that in Abu Kamal or Deir el-Zour or elsewhere, that means that we don't have to do that in those places," said coalition spokesman Col. Ryan Dillon in June referring to a town on the Iraqi border, and using a different acronym for IS.

U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said last month during a visit to the Middle East that the Middle Euphrates River Valley will soon be liberated, as IS takes hits from both sides of the valley that bisects Iraq and Syria.

"You see, ISIS is now caught in between converging forces," Mattis said.

Ahmed Abu Khawla, the commander of the Deir el-Zour Military Council, says he commands a force of 4,000 fighters, mostly from Deir el-Zour province.

"We are an organized army. We are not militias or separate brigades. We have a unified military leadership and an operations room to coordinate," he told the AP.

"The plans for the Deir el-Zour campaign have been in the works for over a year and half but Raqqa took precedence because of international considerations," said Abu Khawla.

Abu Khawla said his group has already liberated 93 villages in northwestern rural Deir el-Zour including, more recently, the village of Abou Khashab. Asked about potential confrontations with government troops, he said: "If the regime wants a confrontation or directs one bullet at us we will respond."

He also said that the SDF is already forming a local civilian council to administer the area after the military operations.

Ahmad al-Ahmad, who heads the opposition's Syria Press center, said the SDF does not have the manpower to control Deir el-Zour, adding that government forces have brought in lots of troops and Iranian-backed gunmen for the battle.

"The regime wants to reach the border with Iraq to open a land line to Iran through Baghdad," al-Ahmad said, adding that they are capable of doing that.

____

Associated Press writers Sarah El Deeb and Philip Issa in Beirut and Albert Aji in Damascus, Syria contributed to this report.
Property details:

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Price: $ 105 Seller State of Residence: California State/Province: New Mexico Type: Recreational, Acreage Zip/Postal Code: 81020 City: Deming Location: 900**, Los Angeles, California

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This is a sale of a Placer Gold Mining Claim on BLM land in Elmore County Idaho. The nearest town is Featherville, 7 miles away on a BLM road. Pike is 6 miles farther down the road. Both towns have food stores, cafe, bar, motel, gas station and cabins for rent. The 20 acre claim has all fee's and documents required by the BLM and state filed for this assessment year. You will need to file the next annual maintenance fee by September 1, 2018. The maintenance fee is due each year by September 1. I...

Price: $ 850 Seller State of Residence: Oklahoma Property Address: Trinity Creek State/Province: Idaho City: Featherville Type: Placer Gold Claim Location: 746**, Fairfax, Oklahoma

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The corner of Washington Street in Downtown Athens was filled with people of all ages, some with pets, friends, family or significant other celebrating and showing their support for the LGBTQ community on Sunday, Sept. 10.
It is no coincidence that the White House released the DACA decision right after Hurricane Harveys initial impact and right before the three other hurricanes made landfall.
PNB officials entered into a criminal conspiracy with 19 accused companies, the FIR alleges.

T E Narasimhan reports from Chennai.

The Central Bureau of Investigation has registered a case against 19 companies which have sent over Rs 424 crore (Rs 4.24 billion) in foreign remittances through about 700 transactions, suspecting it to be a case of money laundering through shell companies.

It is alleged that during the year 2015, unidentified officials of the Punjab National Bank, Mint Street branch, Chennai, entered into a criminal conspiracy with 19 accused companies which were account holders in the branch.

'...In furtherance of the conspiracy, the above said companies were sending foreign exchange to Hong Kong without any genuine business transactions,' the first information report, registered on Saturday evening, alleged.

It said the accounts thus opened were used for the purpose of sending advance foreign remittances.

'The modus operandi was that the customers got remittances from various other banks to their accounts by way of RTGS (real time gross settlement). The customer presented their request with a quotation issued by foreign suppliers for 100 per cent advance remittances,' it said.

The customer made request for remittance to foreign supplier based on the quotation, it alleged.

'The remittance amount was kept in such a way that it would not exceed the threshold limit of $1 lakh for each remittance in order to circumvent the regulatory requirements and applicability of the RBI,' the FIR said.

The CBI said 700 advance remittances were made for imports through various current accounts opened during the period from January 2015 to May 2015 totalling to Rs 424.58 crore.

'All the advance remittances were routed through NOSTRO (account held by PNB with a foreign bank in a foreign currency) account maintained with HSBC, New York,' it said.

The bank had found that none of units were functioning at the available address.

The RTGS credits emanated mostly from some credit cooperative societies, at Mumbai and other places.

The RTGS transactions were made by the remitter through fictitious persons in whose names accounts could have opened in the co-operative societies in Mumbai.

The remittances were sent in the name of foreign suppliers who had opened accounts in various banks in the United Arab Emirates, Hong Kong and Taiwan.

The remittances were routed through HSBC, New York to these banks, the CBI alleged.

'It is clear that this is a case of money laundering through shell companies and there has been loss of foreign exchange to the tune of Rs 421.58 crore to the country,' it alleged.

With PTI inputs
Take part in the growth story, Amit A Shah advises Corporate India.

Subhayan Chakraborty reports.

Barely two weeks after India's dismal economic growth figures for the first quarter of 2017-2018 were released, Bharatiya Janata Party President Amit A Shah told industry captains to stop complaining about reforms and take part in the growth story.

Speaking at a Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry event on Saturday, September 9, Shah said greater tolerance was required for reforms.

"FICCI's job is not only to bring forward complaints, but also to make suggestions about how to augment India's brand value," Shah said.

Industry should introspect on how to improve on research and development, and start manufacturing items such as solar cell phones, for which India was heavily reliant on imports, he added.

FICCI President Pankaj Patel said industry bodies needed to work more closely with the government for better implementation of economic and social programmes.

"We are currently transforming the way we interact with various stakeholders as part of the FICCI 3.0 plan," he said.

In the first quarter (April-June) of FY18, gross domestic product growth fell to 5.7 per cent -- the lowest level since the Narendra D Modi-led government came to power in 2014.

Experts have claimed this was largely a fallout of the scrapping of old Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes in November 2016, which had led to a massive fall in demand.

Shah, however, focussed on the benefits of the note ban. "We believe demonetisation has made the formal economy much larger," he said.

The BJP president also spoke about the government's development agenda.

Direct transfer of benefits to the accounts of beneficiaries had brought transparency to the process, Shah said.

Since 2014, the number of bank accounts brought into the ambit of this scheme had increased from 85 million to 360 million.

"This has saved Rs 59,000 crore (Rs 590 billion) that was being transferred as government benefits," he said.

On the goods and services tax, Shah said industries complaining about a higher tax burden did not take into account that input tax credit had been made available for all categories.

"Earlier, there were 17 different taxes, not all of which allowed input tax credit," he said.

Shah also spoke on other achievements of his party's government.

He said the government had doubled the taxpayer base from 37 million to 63 million individuals in the past three years.

In the infrastructure space, rural roads were now being constructed at a pace of 133 km per day from 69 km earlier.

The BJP president said the critical mass reached by the stock exchanges, along with the strength of the currency, was reason enough for Indian firms to start seeking investment opportunities in smaller nations.
Eight months after he filed for bankruptcy, it's business as usual for the Indian designer who dressed Michelle Obama.

Bibhu Mohapatra (left) helps a model prepare for his Spring/Summer 2018 fashion show at the New York Fashion Week on September 8.

Photograph: Andrew Toth/Getty Images.

It's been eight months since Bibhu Mohapatra, best known in India as the designer from Odisha who dressed then American First Lady Michelle Obama, filed for bankruptcy protection.

'This was a planned decision,' he had told the Economic Times. 'My business is doing really well actually. People file for chapter 11 if they are struggling and they want to scale it [operations] down. People also do it because they want to restructure the organisation, reduce debt and then bring in more money... Brands like Michael Kors and Dior have done it in the past.'

He had added to The Wall Street Journal, 'It is business as usual while this process proceeds. This brief period of restructuring will allow us to emerge stronger than ever and more able to deliver the finest products and experience that I take so much pride and joy in bringing to our customers around the world.'

Eight months on, it's business as usual for the designer.

Scroll down for a front-row view of his Spring/Summer 2018 Collection, which was showcased at New York Fashion Week.

For his spring inspiration, this time Bibhu Mohapatra's creative leap took him to early 20th century Japan.

Photograph: Frazer Harrison/Getty Images.

According to Vogue, 'Instead of the kimono, he reinterpreted the underpinnings that traditionally stayed hidden beneath it.'

Photograph: Photograph: Amr Alfiky/Reuters.

Though there were 'nods to kimono shapes with wrapped fronts and dramatic off-the-shoulder pieces,' the fashion magazine pointed out.

Photograph: Frazer Harrison/Getty Images.

In other nods to Japan, there were clear origami inspirations, and the line remained rather modest with hints of sexiness.

Photograph: Frazer Harrison/Getty Images.

As always, the Bibhu Mohpatra killed it with his glamorous evening wear.

Photograph: Frazer Harrison/Getty Images.

Bibhu Mohapatra summed up his muse as ' an intrepid spirit that craved for cultural knowledge and courageous adventure that transcended continents.'

Photograph: Amr Alfiky/Reuters.

The designer (right) and his team make the walk.

Photograph: Frazer Harrison/Getty Images.
Irked by recent controversies surrounding self-styled godmen, the Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad, the apex body of Hindu sadhus, on Sunday released a list of 14 'fake babas' and demanded a crackdown on 'rootless cult leaders' by bringing in a legislation.

List of 'fake' babas - Asaram Bapu - Nirmal Baba - Sukhvinder Kaur aka Radhe Maa - Sachdarangi - Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh - Om baba aka Vivekanand - Ichachadhari Vishwanand - Swami Asmianand - Om Namah Shivaay - Narayan Sai - Rampal - Acharya Kushmuni - Brihaspati Giri - Malkhan Singh

Giving out the list, which includes names like Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, Rampal, Asaram and his son Narayan Sai, the parishad's president Swami Narendra Giri said, "We appeal to even the common people to beware of such charlatans who belong to no tradition and by their questionable acts, bring disrepute to sadhus and sanyasis."

The parishad is a council of akharas, which are monastic orders drawing their spiritual lineage from 8th-century seer Adi Shankara, who is said to have established orders of martial monks with the aim of defending the Hindu Dharma.

The development comes close on the heels of a Central Bureau of Investigation court in Haryana sentencing Dera Sacha Sauda chief Ram Rahim to 20 years in prison for the rape of two of his former disciples.

Large-scale violence took place in various parts of Haryana, Punjab and Rajasthan following his conviction by the court in the two cases. Forty-one people were killed in Haryana in the clashes.

However, no death was reported from Punjab and Rajasthan.

While Asaram is in jail in connection with a sexual assault case, his son Narayan Sai, also booked in a similar case, is out on bail. Rampal is behind bars, facing trial in a number of cases relating to violence.

"We are going to send copies of this list to the Centre, the state governments as well as all the opposition parties with the demand that a strong legislation be brought to check the activities of these self-styled cult leaders," Giri told reporters in Allahabad.

He also claimed that he had on Saturday received a phone call from a person claiming to be a devotee of Asaram, who 'threatened to kill me if a mention was made of his guru in the list of fake babas we planned to bring out today (Sunday)'.

"An FIR has been lodged at the Daraganj police station in the city, based on a complaint of Giri. The matter is being investigated," Senior Superintendent of Police of Allahabad Anand Kulkarni said.
Security forces on Sunday killed two local Hizbul Mujahideen terrorists in an overnight encounter in Kashmir while the third surrendered, making it the first case of arrest during a gunfight in several years.

The encounter had started on Saturday evening in Barbugh area of Shopian district after specific information about some terrorists hiding in the area, police said.

During searches, the hiding terrorists opened fire at the security forces who retaliated, leading to a gunfight which continued till this morning, a police spokesman said.

"Two terrorists were gunned down in this encounter who were identified as Altaf Ahmad Rather and Tariq Ahmad Bhat. One terrorist identified as Adil Hussain Dar surrendered before the security forces," he said.

Dar, who became first terrorist to be apprehended alive during an encounter in several years, had reportedly joined Hizbul Mujahideen just about four months back.

The gunned down terrorists were involved in attack on SPO Khursheed Ahmad Ganaie, the spokesman said.

Tariq was involved in the attack on security forces' convoy at Chakoora in Shopian, the spokesman said.

Tariq was also involved in attack on SI Gowhar Ahmad Malla at Barbugh and in the bank robbery at Turq Wangam.
The United Left alliance has retained all the four seats in the JNU students union election, defeating the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad with considerable margins.

In a close fight, United Left candidate Geeta Kumari won the president's post by defeating Nidhi Tripathi of ABVP by 464 votes. Shabana Ali of BAPSA (Birsa Ambedkar Phule Students' Association) polled 935 votes, election panel officials said.

Out of the total 4639 votes polled, 4620 were valid, and 19 votes were discarded after voters put their slips in the wrong ballot boxes, they said.

For the vice president's post, AISA's Simone Zoya Khan got 1,876 votes out of a total 4,620 votes, defeating Durgesh Kumar of the ABVP who got 1028 votes.

Duggirala Srikrisha (Left) won the general secretary's post by polling 2082 votes. He was followed by the ABVP's Nikunj Makwana with 975 votes.

The post of joint secretary has gone to Shubhanshu Singh (Left) who got 1755 votes, while Pankaj Keshari of the ABVP got 920 votes.

Geeta Kumari said, "The credit for the mandate goes to the students because people still believe that democratic spaces should be saved and right now, the only resistance is from students."

She also promised to take up the Najeeb issue, JNU seat cuts, new hostels, and others.

Duggirala said JNU has become more democratic. "We promise to reach out to students everyday and counter the aggressive policies of ABVP." He also vowed to defend the debate and dissent culture in JNU.

In the central panel, a total of 1512 NOTA votes were polled for all the four posts. In all, 31 councillors have been elected for various posts, the election officials said.

IMAGE: Students and teachers of Delhi University, JNU and Jamia stage a protest march against ABVP at in New Delhi on February 28, 2017. Photograph: Shahbaz Khan/PTI Photo
A portion of an under-construction flyover collapsed near Bomikhal in Bhubaneswar, killing at least one man and injuring 11 persons, official sources said.

About three-four persons were suspected to be trapped under the rubble, they added.

Around 15 labourers were working on the flyover when the structure collapsed on them in the afternoon.

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik expressed grief at the incident and announced Rs 5 lakh ex gratia for the next of kin of the deceased and free treatment for the injured.

"An exemplary punishment will be meted out to those found guilty," he said.

Satya Patnaik, a 39-year-old businessman, was killed as he, along with his daughter Sheetal, was under the flyover when it caved it, Revenue Divisional Commissioner (RDC), Central Division, A B Otta told reporters.

Satya's daughter was seriously injured and admitted to the AIIMS, Bhubaneswar, the RDC said.

The rest of the injured have been admitted to the Capital Hospital, AIIMS and various other hospitals.

Police, fire brigade and Odisha Disaster Rapid Action Force (ODRAF) personnel have been engaged to carry out the rescue operation. Earth-movers are being used for the purpose.

The chief minister said two engineers had been suspended in the aftermath of the flyover collapse.

"I have already ordered an inquiry into the matter. It is certainly a major mistake on the part of the contractor. The job was assigned to Panda Infrastructure," Works Department Secretary N K Pradhan said.

He added that strict action would be taken against those found guilty.

Pradhan said rescuing those trapped in the debris was the first priority of the state government.

The flyover project, he said, was under the Roads and Buildings (R&B) Division-4.

"A portion of the flyover caved in when we were busy plastering its roof. We had started work at around 8 am," said an injured worker, who was undergoing treatment at the Capital Hospital.

Police Commissioner Y B Khurania and senior officials are monitoring the rescue operations.

IMAGE: NDRF, ODRAF and Police carrying out rescue works after a portion of an under-construction Railway overbridge collapsed in Bhubaneswar on Sunday. Photograph: PTI Photo
Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi will interact with global thinkers, political leaders and overseas Indians in the US this week on international economic and technology issues, an organiser of his visit said.

Gandhi, 47, begins his nearly two-week trip to the US with an address at the University of California, Berkeley, tomorrow on contemporary India and the path forward for the world's largest democracy.

His great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru, India's first prime minister, delivered a speech at Berkeley in 1949.

"The purpose of the visit is two-fold. One is to meet interesting and global thinkers, to have a conversation on what is happening world over on economy, on technology, on opportunities, and really understand different views from experts on the global scene," technocrat Sam Pitroda, who isinvolved with the preparations of Gandhi's visit, told PTI.

Pitroda worked with Gandhi's father and former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi for nearly a decade to transform India's telecom sector.

He said Rahul Gandhi will meet overseas Indians at an event in New York as part of an outreach by the Congress party.

The Congress vice president is also scheduled to visit Washington, DC, and is likely to address members of the think-tank community at an event organised by the Centre for American Progress, and interact with the corporate world at another programme organised by the US-India Business Council.

Gandhi may meet some members of the ruling Republican Party. "A lot of these meetings are going to be small and private," Pitroda said.

"He wants to understand more about what's happening globally and what's the global view of the situation is," he said.

The Congress vice president has often visited the US, but this could possibly be the first time in his political career that he would hold public meetings, meet political leaders and deliver speeches in the country.

"You know he needs to be out, he needs to express his views. You know he has been not, may be, talking publicly about his trips. But I think, it is important that he meets a large number of people this time and also overseas Congress members," Pitroda said.

"Today, the view of India is one short of protected by one group of people. We need to really talk about Indian aspirations, Indian concerns about what is going on not just in India but the world over. Rise of populism is one topic I am sure will come up in the conversation," Pitroda said.

He said Gandhi would interact with Silicon Valley folk, where the technology, talent and Indian "brain power" is concentrated. "So, the idea is if you were to meet a lot of Silicon Valley people, it is better to talk about things in San Francisco."

Gandhi will also address a gathering at Princeton University.
Cambodian National Election Committee (NEC) officers pull a bag of used ballots from a truck at the NEC office in Phnom Penh, Aug. 3, 2013.

UPDATED at 9:30 A.M. EST on 2017-05-17

More than 300,000 Cambodians may not be able to vote in next months commune elections because they do not possess identification cards required for casting a ballot under a new legal procedure put in place by the countrys election committee, election observers and analysts said on Thursday.

A new and complicated procedure of the National Election Committee (NEC), the agency that supervises the countrys national elections, are causing difficulties for voters who must scramble to obtain forms confirming their identities, and jeopardizing their right to vote granted by the countrys constitution, they said.

The legal procedure, adopted by the NEC on March 10 and publicly disseminated in April, requires citizens whose names appear on voter lists, but who do not have an official identification card, to apply for a certificate confirming their identity to vote in commune elections on June 4.

To get a certificate, they must prove their identities, submit three photos of themselves, and have two witnesses appear before officials at commune/sangkat (administrative subdivision) election commission offices between May 4 and June 2.

Observers said some Cambodians who already have registered their names on voter lists believe that they have sufficient documents in order to cast ballots. Others have applied for official IDs but have not yet received them from the Ministry of Interior. They also said Cambodian migrant workers in neighboring countries are the most at risk of losing their right to vote.

The new legal procedure could disenfranchise more than 300,000 people, or roughly 4 percent of the nearly 7.9 million Cambodians who have registered their names to vote, analysts said.

Independent analyst Lao Mong Hay noted that many other democratic countries have far less complicated procedures in place so their citizens can vote for their leaders.

Cambodia, however, is not among them because the country has some legal procedures, such as the new NEC requirement, that prevent its citizens from exercising their right to vote, he said.

The state is obliged to ensure that citizens can vote easily with minimal expense, he told RFAs Khmer Service.

NEC deputy secretary-general Som Sorida has called on the media to help spread the news about the new procedure to those without ID cards so they can go to administrative offices and complete the paperwork for their certificates.

If they dont possess documents confirming their identities for voting, even though they have their names registered on the voter list, they still cannot cast their votes, he said. All people must clearly understand this point."

There are two kinds of documents that people can use to be able to cast their voteseither a Khmer national identification card or a certificate confirming a person's identity for voting, he said.

Too much, too late

Lao Mong Hay, however, questioned why the NEC did not announce the new procedure when citizens first registered their names to vote.

He pointed to the new voting registration system that requires people to have their thumbprints scanned and possess documents that confirm their identity for voter registration in accordance with the election law.

Because such people already have been issued official confirmations that they are eligible to vote, Lao Mong Hay said the NECs further legal procedure requiring prospective voters to apply for a certificate confirming their identity should not be necessary.

Such legal procedures should have been done as part of a package by the time people went to register their names to vote, he said. And the NEC should have let the people know in advance and told the authorities responsible for issuing the identification cards to be well prepared.

Cambodians in some provinces such as Poipet, Banteay Meanchey, and Kratie have complained about difficulties with applying for certificates confirming their identities.

They said commune authorities are putting up obstacles to the issuance of the certificates and expressed concern that they will lose their right to vote in the June 4 elections even though they have already registered.

Election observers said the NEC should remove the new legal procedure so that citizens who have their names on the voter lists and have received official voter name registration receipts can cast ballots.

Korn Savan, an investigation coordinator for the Committee for Free and Fair Elections in Cambodia (Comfrel), said few people are aware of the requirement for a certificate confirming their identities in order to vote because of the limited dissemination of information and bad timing as election day approaches.

Nheb Bunchin, spokesman for the royalist political party Funcinpec, agreed that the NECs new legal procedure has caused problems for voters, even though the agency, political parties, and other election stakeholders have all urged people to cast ballots.

The NECs legal procedures and formalities are too burdensome, he told RFA. People may not go to cast their votes after seeing the procedure, so we are evaluating whether we can create any shortcuts in the procedure and will submit a request to the NEC.

We are not sure that they will listen to us, he said. Nevertheless, we have to reduce the procedures.

CNRP weighs in

Cambodias main opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP) also raised concerns over the issue that citizens whose names already appear on voter lists may face disenfranchisement.

It has requested that the NEC simplify the new requirement to ensure all citizens can vote.

They [voters] are facing difficulties, said Meng Sopheary, the CNRPs head of the Election Affairs and Legislation Department. First, the legal procedure is a bit complicated. Second, they have to spend time [getting the necessary documents]. Third, they have to spend money on transportation [to get to local election commission offices] because some of them work far away, or have migrated to neighboring countries to work, and they have to return.

Such expenses, including their time, are reasons they cannot get certificates confirming their identities for voting, she said. This will affect the elections because they will not be able to cast their votes.

In response to the CNRPs request, the NEC said it only can request that all microfinance institutions return IDs to citizens who have put up the cards as collateral for loans, so that they can use them to vote in the upcoming elections.

Reported by Zakariya Tin for RFAs Khmer Service. Translated by Sovannarith Keo. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.
The head of Cambodias opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP) on Wednesday called on his partys candidates to remain above the fray amid a slew of threats from Prime Minister Hun Sens ruling Cambodian Peoples Party (CPP) in the lead up to local elections set for next month.



Speaking in the capital Phnom Penh ahead of a 12-day campaign period beginning on May 20, CNRP president Kem Sokha told a gathering of 103 top ranked female candidates that the party must adhere to nonviolence and avoid trading insults with the CPP ahead of the countrys June 4 commune elections.



We are not cowards, brothers and sisters, but we are well aware that we are marching towards our goal, he said.



Let me give you the example of a race: If we want to overtake our challengers and they turn to block us with their legs, should we bother ourselves with attacking them back? Do not engage, just continue on, brothers and sisters!



Kem Sokha made specific reference to a warning by defense minister Tea Banh on Sunday that the army will smash the teeth of anyone protesting an election win by the ruling party and quickly suppress any demonstrations by CNRP members like those that followed the oppositions loss in national elections in 2013.



Let the people make a judgment in regard to those who want to smash our teeth or whatever they plan, he said.



We really do want their votes, but the people can make their own decisions. If they prefer those who want to smash our teeth, they should vote for them. But if they prefer gentle people, such as those in the CNRP, please vote for the CNRP.



Kem Sokha suggested that the people of Cambodia will eventually elect peace lovers to lead the country, adding that the CNRP will opt for a nonviolent approach in both words and deeds during the upcoming campaign.



Tea Banhs remarks came less than a week after Cambodias prime minister Hun Sen warned of civil war if the public does not support his CPP in local elections on June 4.



Hun Sen, who has already ruled Cambodia for three decades, has made similar threats in recent months, with CPP-controlled media regularly alluding to violence if the party loses.



In response to Kem Sokhas speech, CPP lawmaker and spokesperson Sok Ey San said Wednesday that the people of Cambodia are already well aware of which party can maintain peace in the country and which one will be stirring up trouble after next months polls.



The people dont need  a party that only knows how to speak lies and cheat them from one issue to another, he said.



The people need a constructive party that protects peace for the sake of bringing progress and prosperity to their livelihoods.



From left to right, Kem Sokha, Pol Ham, Mu Sochua, and Eng Chhay Eang at an extraordinary congress in Phnom Penh, March 2, 2017. Credit: RFA Deputies elected



Also on Wednesday, the CNRP held an extraordinary congress to elect Mu Sochua, Pol Hom and Eng Chhai Eang as the partys vice presidents after amending a crucial bylaw in a bid to placate the Ministry of Interior, which rejected its previous method of selecting the same leaders in March.



At the conclusion of the extraordinary congress, CNRP spokesperson Yim Sovann announced in a press briefing that the three lawmakers had been named vice presidents and said the party will forward official documentation detailing its hierarchy and leadership profiles to the ministry.



Last month, the CNRP amended Article 47 of its internal regulations a second time, after an initial change at another congress in March, to state that if there is no vice president, the steering committee must choose new ones from its members by an absolute majority of votes, which it did Wednesday.



The clash between the CNRP and ministry over the oppositions leadership selection process began in March after former party president Sam Rainsy resigned.



On March 31, the CNRP notified the Ministry of Interior of amendments to its party bylaws after the ministry had declared the oppositions appointment of Kem Sokha as president and the three lawmakers as vice presidents illegitimate, throwing its participation in the upcoming elections into question.



The ministry had claimed that the appointments during a March 2 extraordinary congress ran afoul of the CNRPs statute, based on documentation the party filed in 2013, requiring a moratorium on electing a new president for 18 months after the post was vacated.



The CNRP had amended the statute at the congress before appointing new leadership.



On Wednesday, Ministry of Interior spokesperson Khieu Sopheak said the ministry had yet to receive an official letter from the CNRP concerning the election of the oppositions vice presidents and declined to say whether the new appointments were done in accordance with the partys bylaws.



I dont dare comment on anything yet, he said. We will have to wait for the letter before we can make a determination.



Observers say the CNRPone of 12 political parties competing for 1,646 commune council seatscould give the CPP a run for its money in the June polls, foreshadowing a possible CNRP win in national elections scheduled for 2018.



Reported by Neang Ieng and Vandeth Van for RFAs Khmer Service. Translated by Sovannarith Keo. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.
A company owned by business magnate Kith Meng is using its license to clear a reservoir for the Lower Sesan 2 hydropower dam in Cambodias Stung Treng province as a cover to launder illegally logged timber, according to a report by the countrys police force.



Ang & Associates Lawyers, a subsidiary of Kith Mengs Royal Group, has been logging timber from areas outside the 36,000-hectare (89,000-acre) area earmarked for the 400-megawatt dams reservoir and selling it to buyers across the border in Vietnam, said the report, posted to the website of the National Police on Tuesday.



Royal Group is constructing the dam in Stung Trengs Sesan district along with Chinese partners and provided Ang & Associates with a contract to begin clearing the reservoir in 2012.



Forest destruction activities in Sesan district and timber smuggling for sale in Vietnam is ongoing in the name of the company clearing the Lower Sesan 2 reservoir, owned by business tycoon Kith Meng, but the relevant authorities have ignored it and failed to prevent it, the report said.



A ban on timber exports from Cambodia to Vietnam has been in effect since January 2016.



An Ang & Associates manager named Seng colludes with and recruits local residents to log outside the reservoir area, collects the timber, and puts the logs at the bottom of the reservoir to make the illegal timber seem legal, it added.



The report cited unnamed sources as saying that Kith Mengan Australian citizenhad handed the logging operation over to another businessman, who in turn passed it on to two men named Tim Bunlin and San Choy. They are purchasing timber from area communes and laundering it in the reservoir, it said.



Local communities have expressed concerns over the loss of natural resources in the area and warned of an environmental crisis if the practice is not ended, according to the report, which makes no mention of whether authorities plan to investigate.



Massive destruction



On Wednesday, villagers from Sre Kor commune told RFAs Khmer Service that several groups of people have destroyed forest in Sesan districts Phnom Krala Pos mountain area and a conservation area in Siem Pang district, using tractors and logging trucks to transport the timber to the Lower Sesan 2 reservoir.



A villager named Puth Khoeun said a logging trail was cut through the forest last year to transport the timber, some of which originates from an area in between the Sesan and Sre Pok rivers near the border with Laos, known as the Koh (Island) area.



Smaller logging trucks transport during the daytime and larger ones for transporting both inside and outside of the country usually do so at 6:00 p.m. or later, he said.



This is a truly massive kind of destruction.



According to Sre Kor commune chief Siek Mekong, the deforestation is being carried out in various regions by various groups, including residents and timber traders from elsewhere in the country.



He said that due to the vast size of the reservoir, it is impossible for commune authorities to know how much of the timber had been harvested from other areas and deposited there.



Besides looking at the size of the reservoir area, we cant truly know because we dont have concrete data, he said.



Ouch Leng, chairman of the Cambodia Human Rights Task Force, told RFA that logging activities outside the reservoir area have been occurring for several years, and called on relevant ministries to carry out a full investigation of the issue.



Kith Meng has no knowledge of thisits his subordinates who seek timber from outside to store at the reservoir before supplying it to saw mills owned by the Vietnamese and Chinese, he said, without providing details.



They are the ones who order such timber and process it for export, the construction of homes, or sale at various depots throughout Cambodia.



Company response



Responding to the allegations, Ang & Associates representative Um Reth denied that the company had transported timber for laundering, saying it had yet to finish clearing timber from the 36,000-hectare reservoir area.



He added that the harvested timber is used to supply the domestic market only after strict inspection by officials from the Stung Treng provincial Department of Agriculture or the Forestry Administration.



Without such examination by expert officials, the timber could not be transported out of the reservoir, he said.



All timber loads must be accompanied by authorization letters  and expert officials conduct examinations and measurements prior to issuing any authorization letter for transport.



Um Reths denial was echoed by Lean Seng, director of Stung Treng provinces Department of Agriculture, who the Cambodia Daily quoted as saying it doesnt happen  officials from the Agriculture Ministry have come to inspect.



The Daily was also able to reach Kith Meng by telephone, but he told the paper he was in a meeting in Beijing and hung up.



EIA report



Attempts by RFA to contact Ministry of Environment spokesperson Sao Sopheap about logging in Sesan district went unanswered Wednesday, though he has previously said the ministry is looking into the findings of a May 8 report by U.K.-based watchdog Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA), which documented timber smuggling from Cambodia to Vietnam.



In that report, entitled Repeat Offender: Vietnams persistent trade in illegal timber, the EIA said some 300,000 cubic meters of timber has been smuggled out of Cambodia and legitimized in Vietnam  [through] kickbacks [that] are likely to have amounted to more than U.S. $13 million since the beginning of November 2016.



Not only are Vietnamese officials corruptly profiting, but so too is the Vietnamese state, formally taxing the illegal traffic of logs and so effectively taking a cut of the illegal businesses it has sanctioned, the report said.



At the time the report was published, Cambodias Ministry of Environment acknowledged that illegal deforestation is occurring in the country and said it would investigate the EIAs claims.



Reported by Chanthy Men for RFAs Khmer Service. Translated by Sovannarith Keo. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.
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The average new house in western Henrico County is 3,300 square feet, or at least those built by HHHunt Homes, one of the leading builders in the Richmond area.

It has four bedrooms, 2 baths and sits on a quarter-acre. The average price is $600,000.

HHHunt Homes is building for the first time a house that is cheaper, smaller and more efficient.

A courtyard house, as these are called, sits on 1/8th of an acre. It starts in the $390,000s and ranges from 2,100 square feet to 3,000 square feet.

A striking feature is the garage is attached on the front of the house, not incorporated into the main part of the house  where it would take up 400 square feet in the main structure  like they do in most new suburban homes.

HHHunt and other builders in the Richmond area are keying off a trend of declining new home sizes as the industry prepares for first-time homebuyers to take the plunge into homeownership.

Larger homes are still in demand, said Thomas R. Tyler, director of housing markets for Integra Realty Resources  Richmond, a real estate consulting and valuation firm in Henrico.

However, as the market has recovered, home builders and developers have diversified housing product in the local market, including smaller homes that are offered at lower price points, Tyler said.

More product is being built for young families as well as the empty-nester demographic. This may be a reflection that demand for this product was relatively low during the Great Recession and now that conditions have improved, buyers have returned to the market.

HHHunt Homes is building 81 courtyard houses in Holloway at Wyndham Forest, a neighborhood planned with a total 217 single-family homes and 102 town houses off Nuckols Road in western Henrico. The builder currently is only doing these smaller houses in this neighborhood.

Eleven have sold to date. The first was finished in April.

The houses would be roughly $50,000 less if they were built in areas where land prices are not as high as they are here, said Pat McCarthy, division manager for HHHunt Homes in Richmond. In this corridor, where land is so expensive, this is some of the more affordable new construction, even starting in the $390,000s.

Situated in a good school district  Rivers Edge Elementary School, Holman Middle School and Deep Run High School  the smaller houses are appealing for the most part to young families, McCarthy said.

As land prices go up, were trying to build on smaller lots, McCarthy said. Were also seeing a trend where millennials dont necessarily want to do the yard work that their parents did.

The town houses are even cheaper and smaller with low maintenance. They start at $302,000 and range from 1,600 to 2,200 square feet in this subdivision. HHHunt Homes expects to start construction on the town houses in October and finish the first ones in early spring.

Last year marked the end of an era that began in 2009, when new houses got bigger with more amenities coming out of the real estate recession, according to the National Association of Home Builders.

In 2015, the average size of a new house nationwide was 2,689 square feet, according to the national association. In 2016, it fell to 2,634 square feet, marking the first drop since 2009.

Builders shaved off a few more feet in the second quarter this year to an average 2,616 square feet, figures show.

Danna Markland, CEO of the Home Building Association of Richmond, said she expects to see the trend continue.

As the residential construction industry continues to recover from the recession  right now in our region were seeing about half the new home closings compared with 2008  and as more entry-level homeowners look to build, there is a gradual trend to smaller square footage, Markland said.
Hurricane Irma is displacing millions of people, and some of them are ending up in the Richmond area.

Floridians Elizabeth Harris and her mother, Philippa Millard, drove 16 hours in traffic from St. Augustine, Fla., to escape the storm bearing down on their home state.

We arrived (Friday) afternoon. It took us about 16 hours to go what normally takes nine hours, said Harris, who was safely out of the storms path Saturday and staying at the home of her sister, Trish Poupore, in Richmond.

It was horrible, but people were very kind and compassionate the whole way. We had four dogs, one of which weighs about 90 pounds. It was horrible, she said.

St. Augustine was under a mandatory evacuation as of Saturday, Harris said.

We knew we had to get ahead of the traffic  along with millions of other people, said Harris, who added that shes grateful to be in Richmond but worried about family left there who plan to wait out the storm.

A sister-in-law who is a nurse planned to stay and work around-the-clock shifts, Harris said. Its not the first storm they have been through, either. Hurricane Matthew ripped through St. Augustine last October.

My house was flooded. My brothers house was flooded. ... People are still fixing the housing from that, Harris said.

Flights arriving in Richmond from Charlotte and Atlanta on Saturday included passengers whose trips originated in Florida.

Lynda Sandora said there were yelps of joy from passengers when the Delta flight she was on took off from Daytona Beach, Fla., at about 7:15 a.m. Saturday.

Once we got on the plane and took off we were Yeah,  Sandora said. Her flight touched down at Richmond International Airport shortly after 11 a.m. after a stop in Atlanta.

Sandora and her partner, Alan T. Yokota, live in Hawaii and had traveled to Daytona Beach last week on a pre-planned trip to pick up her mother, Jewell Sandora, from a nursing home and bring her to Richmond to visit family in the area. Sandora grew up in Midlothian.

With the uncertainty of the storm, the couple initially tried to change their flights before leaving Hawaii but were unable to, Sandora said. When they arrived in Daytona Beach on Thursday, they again tried to cut short their Florida stay and leave Friday instead of Saturday.

Everything was booked, totally booked, Yokota said as he waited at the luggage carousel at Richmond International Airport on Saturday.

Sandora, her arm linked with her mothers, said they were lucky. Volusia County, where Daytona Beach is located, ordered mandatory evacuations Saturday afternoon.

They were supposed to close the highways at 2 p.m. down there, Sandora said.

Waiting outside the Richmond airport terminal, Sharon Batson of Niceville, Fla., said her thoughts were on family down in Florida.

She and partner Al Adams arrived in Richmond on Saturday morning for a prearranged trip to attend the NASCAR races at the Richmond Raceway in Henrico County.

I am 58 years old. I have never been through a hurricane before, she said. The storms shift westward put it on track that had her worrying about family.

My daughter lives in Ocala. Where my daughter lives and where the rest of my family are, they just told them to get out. I have two brothers and a sister and their families are there. I dont know what they are going to do, said Batson, who was keeping in touch with her daughter through text messages.

Richmond-area hotels and campgrounds said they were renting rooms to people displaced by the storm. At the Candlewood Suites at 4301 Commerce Road, a clerk Saturday afternoon said about 18 hotel guests had indicated they had left Florida to get out of the path of the storm.

At Americamps RV Resort campgrounds just off Interstate 95 in Hanover County, manager Terrie Jones said there were some storm-waylaid travelers.

We are actually having quite an interesting weekend, Jones said. This is NASCAR race weekend. We are seeing people from the north coming down, and they are supposed to be going on vacation in Myrtle Beach and Orlando or different places south, so they are holing up here. Then we have also people from the South who are making their way on up here to get away from South Carolina and Florida.  So far, whoever has called in, we have been able to find a spot for them, Jones said.

Jonathan McNamara, spokesman for the Virginia region of the American Red Cross, said agency volunteers are on standby to respond.

First and foremost for any potential impact on Virginia. But as soon as we are clear here, we will be sending volunteers down to support operations in areas that are impacted by the storm. Were actively preparing for that, McNamara said.

With the devastation caused by Hurricane Harvey in Houston, the agency has been dealing with back-to-back major storms.

We need volunteers. And we are going to be doing rolling training across the state of Virginia, McNamara said.
People across the Richmond area with ties to the Korean Peninsula, like much of the rest of the world, are worried about growing tensions created by North Koreas threats of nuclear war.

The isolated nations testing of nuclear weapons has put people on edge around the world.

President Donald Trump has publicly denounced North Koreas programs with fierce language about retaliation, adding uncertainty about Washingtons approach. Trump has said he opposes talks with North Korea even as people in his administration work for a diplomatic solution.

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said last week that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is begging for war.

On Thursday, a panel of people with personal ties to the area will offer their perspectives on the Korean crisis from noon to 1:30 p.m. at the Richmond Times-Dispatch for the newspapers 72nd Public Square.

Dr. John Kim, 55, is a dentist who lives in Midlothian and also serves as president of the Korean-American Society of Greater Richmond.

He said he personally feels the best way to contain the situation in North Korea is with diplomacy, economic sanctions and by keeping China engaged. But he also doesnt think of himself as some kind of spokesperson on Korean affairs.

The Korean-American Society of Greater Richmond focuses on promoting Korean culture and history along with racial harmony.

Kim arrived in the U.S. from South Korea when he was 10. A registered Republican, he has gone back to visit South Korea multiple times and describes himself as a typical American.

Kim said the Korean-American community votes as conservatives and as liberals. He said he dealt with overt racism when he arrived to the U.S. but things have improved even as racial tensions have risen as of late.

Kim said many members of the Korean community are appreciative of veterans efforts in the Korean War, the first military clash of the Cold War.

James Chase, 87, was drafted in the Army in 1951 while doing electrical work for a Virginia power company. In the Korean War he installed cable lines to help with communication among soldiers.

It takes nine men to keep one man on the frontline, Chase said. I was one of those nine.

Chase said the situation with North Korea today is worrisome and that Trump is trying hard to solve the problem without losing face.

Graham Nelms, 91, served in the Navy in World War II and Korea as a motor machinist mate. Nelms ship in Korea shelled the coastline and rescued troops off a beach.

More than 60 years later, the nature of war has changed dramatically, said Nelms, a Chester resident.

Im hoping the world is going to be calm about this whole thing, Nelms said. Its scary.

John Clatterbaugh, 87, served in the infantry between 1951 and 1952 in Korea and Japan. He strung telephone wire and operated the radio in combat on one tour. On another tour, he was a squad leader manning outposts and running ambush patrols.

Clatterbaugh had friends and family members who served in WWII, but their war stories couldnt really prepare him for what he called the horrors of war.

It was a real shock to me, Clatterbaugh said.

Clatterbaugh said its hard to determine what should be done about North Korea.

Monti Datta, a University of Richmond political science professor, spent two years in South Korea, where he taught English, and has followed the region over the years. A few years ago, he traveled with the University of Richmonds Office of the Chaplaincy to Gwangju in South Korea.

Datta has plans to teach a course that will involve students simulating U.S. foreign policy to North Korea.

Datta said in the real-world situation, he expects more saber rattling and inflammatory rhetoric between the U.S. and North Korea. He thought someone like former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson or former President Jimmy Carter will have to intervene. Datta didnt think there would be a war.

I personally want to see a united Korea, Datta said.
Race is a constant in Virginia gubernatorial politics, though not always a conspicuous one. After all, the grandees might intone, that would be un-Vuhginyun.

Following the deadly violence in Charlottesville last month, the debate over Confederate monuments flared with angry urgency, erecting for the candidates perceived absolutes: Arguing for the preservation of the statuary somehow translates as an appeal to racial intolerance. Arguing for its removal, as an affirmation of racial tolerance.

Theres little interest in nuance; that, for instance, taking down rebel statues would be rewriting history, just as putting them up was.

Ditto: the intersection of law and order and illegal immigration; that concern for brown- and yellow-skinned newcomers to Virginia somehow translates to coddling felonious non-English-speaking strangers who shouldnt be here in the first place.

The subtleties of these issues can be an inconvenience. They make it more difficult to stir passions. After all, to get your vote, Republican Ed Gillespie and Democrat Ralph Northam have to arouse your pulse.

In Virginia, particularly since World War II, race has been  and remains  a potent political stimulant, often for ill, occasionally for good.

In the immediate post-war years, race was an issue with which an increasingly creaky oligarchy  white, male and conservative  perpetuated its authority, even as the state began shedding its rural past for its suburban future, becoming less Southern and more national.

In 1945, Virginians elected as their governor Bill Tuck, a colorful, bourbon-swilling segregationist from the red-clay Southside. His victory was a formality, testimony to the absolute power of the courthouse-to-statehouse machine of U.S. Sen. Harry F. Byrd Sr., D-Va., that would produce 11 governors between 1925 and 1965. The organization kept the electorate small, malleable and white through a poll tax, in place since 1902, that eliminated African-Americans as a political force.

The tax would be outlawed in federal elections in 1964 and in state elections two years later, harnessing anew a black vote that, in Virginia, has been unwaveringly Democratic, even lifting to the governorship in the mid-1960s a school-closing segregationist, Mills Godwin, who had repackaged himself as an school-opening progressive.

Tucks term loosened regional fears and frustrations tamped down by global war. Among them: the consequences  social and economic  of making permanent modest civil rights protections in the workplace that the federal government put in place. They assured a measure of equality for African-Americans and women.

So infuriated was Tuck by Washington meddling that threatened white supremacy, he and a usually pliant legislature attempted an elaborate scheme under which Virginia could deny its votes in the 1948 Electoral College to President Harry Truman, whom they branded a scalawag for advocating on behalf of blacks.

In 1949, another Byrd stalwart, John Battle, achieved the governorship but not before fending off a primary challenge by a moderate, Francis Pickens Miller, whose candidacy fully exposed fissures within a Democratic Party in which bigots and blue-collar workers, plutocrats and pensioners had not so peacefully co-existed.

Battle believed post-war Virginia required stronger schools. He spent more on education through a plan that featured unrestricted state grants that, he believed, could help preserve a segregated public school system that would be overturned in 1954 by the U.S. Supreme Court, ruling in a challenge initiated in five states, including Virginia.

That decision came four months into the term of Battles successor, Tom Stanley, and led to the nasty spasm of defiance known as Massive Resistance. Virginia would craft a lattice of laws and rules under which public schools that the courts declared should be open to whites and blacks would, instead, be closed.

Virginias hostility to desegregation boiled over, fortuitously  in the Byrd organizations view  when federal troops were dispatched to Little Rock, Ark., to ensure the enrollment of black students in a high school. The episode was used to whip up the segregationist fervor that guaranteed Lindsay Almonds election in 1957.

Almond seemed the fiery absolutist on segregation, but after the state and federal courts threw out the Massive Resistance laws  the final blow came on Jan. 19, 1959, the anniversary of Robert E. Lees birth  the governor folded, decrying integration as wrong but saying that Virginia was powerless to fight on.

Still, Almond consented to only modest steps toward desegregation. By the close of his administration in 1962, less than 1 percent of African-American students attended schools with whites. This guaranteed race would remain a volatile issue in succeeding years, fueling white flight from the cities to suburbs; in the process, fattening the Republican vote.

But in 1969, it would be Linwood Holton, a Republican governor  Virginias first of the 20th century  who saw race not as a source of division but as an opportunity for progress in a Virginia that was becoming more cosmopolitan. He would enroll his children in desegregated schools and use his appointive powers to begin diversifying the bureaucracy.

These were powerful symbolic gestures, briefly signaling a new Virginia, but they could not fully blunt black-white wariness that had built up over centuries. And by the 1970s, a more conservative Republican Party  fortified by the wizened remnants of the Byrd apparatus  found new ways to harness white resentment.

Some were understated but all were obvious: Imposing desegregation through court-ordered busing; complaints that the U.S. Voting Rights and Civil Rights acts overprotected African-Americans at the expense of whites, and the possibility of statehood for Washington, D.C., magnifying the political influence of a then-majority-black city.

A changing audience  most evident in the Washington suburbs  began to recoil at such appeals.

In 1981, Godwin, by then a Republican, invoked renewal of federal voting protections and support for D.C. statehood as two reasons Virginia should elect Marshall Coleman as the states fourth consecutive GOP governor. Anger over the racially tinged appeal overshadowed what was supposed to be the headline: Ronald Reagans endorsement of Coleman.

Four years later, Democrat Doug Wilder, who campaigned not as a black politician but as a politician who happened to be black, won for lieutenant governor. In 1989, he would become the nations first elective black governor, narrowly lifted to office on the hopes of voters eager for Virginia to present a fresh image.

But race would rise again, if only as a sub-theme, in the 1993 election that Republican George Allen won in a landslide on a tough law-and-order message: scrapping parole for mandatory fixed sentences, a system that would swell a prison population already heavily black.

Twenty-four years later, Gillespie  struggling to appear minority-friendly while appealing to Trump conservatives  proposes easing felony-theft thresholds and marijuana-possession laws, while depicting Northam as soft on sanctuary cities where illegal immigrants, many Spanish-speaking, could be shielded from possible deportation.

And Northam, the Eastern Shore from-here reaching for the votes of Northern Virginia come-heres, forsakes his slave-owning, Confederate forebears by suggesting that all those statues of Dixie deities belong on historys scrap heap.

These are messages, rich in code, that  for certain voters  require little elaboration.

Too much would be un-Vuhginyun.
RADFORD  Radford University on Friday unveiled a new cybersecurity program designed to boost enrollment and build partnerships with an array of companies and municipalities across the commonwealth.

The move comes in response to Gov. Terry McAuliffes push to bulk up cybersecurity in the face of increasing cybercrime.

As part of a daylong tour through Southwest Virginia, McAuliffe joined RU President Brian Hemphill on campus as he and other administrators detailed the new program  Innovative Mobile Personalized Accelerated Competency Training, or IMPACT.

This is part of our new Virginia economy, McAuliffe said. Cyberattacks are the largest threat we face in our commonwealth today. We have the jobs. We need to fill them.

Approximately 71 million such attacks were launched against companies or local governments within the commonwealth last year, according to state data. In 200 of those cases, a data breach was reported.

Elected officials and business leaders are struggling to field an army to defend their proprietary information. An estimated 36,000 jobs are open in cybersecurity across 650 companies within the state.

In February, McAuliffe said workers in those jobs are needed.

We took that very seriously, said Matt Dunleavy, executive director of Radfords IMPACT program. We realized we already have a nationally recognized program here, so we wanted to identify how we could serve the commonwealth.

The program will be modeled on competency-based education, a booming teaching method that has gained popularity nationwide as access and affordability to traditional models of higher education have dwindled quickly enough to price a growing number of prospective students out of the market.

CBE is a training approach that focuses on teaching specific job-related skills needed to perform a critical task within a workplace context. CBE decouples learning from traditional time-based models and course formats.

Applied to cybersecurity, Radfords program will have two primary missions.

First, were going to help rapidly develop the commonwealths workforce in cybersecurity, Dunleavy said. Were then going to use that same model to address other high-demand areas that we know are going to be in the future.

The announcement marks another instance of a public university pivoting to a more skills-based and certification-earning training model that has traditionally been provided through community colleges.

Hemphill said the school wanted to leverage our background in cybersecurity and experience but deliver it in platform that would really target that working adult that is already out there.

Im not aware of any community colleges that are delivering in this context, he added.

Radfords traditional classroom-based cybersecurity program has a well-documented history of turning out productive graduates.

Prem Uppuluri is a professor of computer science who leads RUs classroom-based cybersecurity program. Each year, his students compete and place near the top in the Mid Atlantic Cyber College Defense Competition.

The U.S. Department of Defense and National Security Administration have recognized RU as a center for academic excellence in recent years.

Our students are defending and attacking real systems, Uppuluri said. We have an external computer network that is separate from the campus network. Its fully managed by me and my students. Its a lab. You take a physical hardware server and run multiple operating systems.

Instead of a traditional credit-based business model, the IMPACT program will provide a 12-month license to use all content at a cost of $6,000. That fee includes certification training in cybersecurity, geospatial intelligence and any other future IMPACT programing.
Dominion moves to study new hydroelectric facility

RICHMOND  Dominion Energy Virginia is moving forward with work to study the feasibility of building a pumped hydroelectric storage facility in the coalfields region.

The company announced Thursday that it is considering two possible locations for the renewable energy system. One is a 4,100-acre site in Tazewell County, and the other is an abandoned mine in Wise County.

The systems use huge amounts of water pumped between reservoirs to generate power.

Republican lawmakers passed legislation earlier this year encouraging utilities to establish sites in abandoned coal mines. Advocates said it would help the economically depressed region.

Dominion has filed a preliminary permit with federal regulators for the Tazewell location, which will allow the company to proceed with studies. It has contracted with Virginia Tech to study the second site.

Fewer hunters get permits for Great Dismal Swamp

SUFFOLK  Fewer hunters are interested in shooting bears and deer this fall at the Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge.

Thats what officials from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said in a statement on Wednesday. Officials said hunter numbers are down nationwide.

Refuge manager Chris Lowie said the swamp typically receives several hundred permit requests by this time of the year. He said hunters typically report a favorable experience. Harvests are considered average at the swamp in Suffolk.

Hunts for deer are scheduled throughout October and November. Bear hunting is slated for November.

The 113,000-acre refuge has allowed deer hunting since 1979 and bear hunting since 2006. Applications for hunting permits are available online.

Albemarle shelter takes in homeless Houston animals

CHARLOTTESVILLE  An Albemarle County animal shelter has taken in 70 homeless animals from Houston.

Staff members with the Charlottesville-Albemarle Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals drove down to Houston to pick up homeless cats and dogs to help relieve overcrowded shelters after Hurricane Harvey flooded vast swaths of the city.

The shelter sent their Care-A-Van and a second van to Houstons municipal animal shelter and transported them safely back to Virginia.

Some of the animals will be available for adoption as soon as Monday.

Navy prepares four ships to assist with hurricane relief

NORFOLK  The U.S. Navy says four ships are ready to assist with Hurricane Irma relief.

The U.S. Navy Fleet Forces Command said in a statement Friday that Adm. Phil Davidson ordered the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, the transport dock ship USS New York and the assault ship USS Iwo Jima to be in position to provide humanitarian relief if requested.

The statement says the destroyer USS Farragut is already conducting local operations and has been ordered to join the group.

The ships are capable of providing medical support, maritime security, logistical support and other tasks.

The center of Irma cleared the Cuban coast and entered the Florida Straits on Saturday. The hurricanes core should hit Florida early Sunday.
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Hurricane Irma has weakened into Tropical Storm Irma as it moves north and away from Florida, but the threat of heavy rainfall and strong gusts will continue across Georgia, South Carolina and Alabama.

The eye of Category 3 Hurricane Irma crossed into mainland Florida near Naples on Sunday afternoon after striking the Florida Keys at Category 4 strength on Sunday morning.

According to the National Hurricane Center, Irma made landfall on Cudjoe Key east of Key West at 9:10 a.m., and the second landfall took place at 3:35 p.m. on Marco Island, south of Naples.

Bands of torrential rain containing 96 mph gusts lashed the Miami metro area and a tornado spun up near Fort Lauderdale International Airport.

On Sunday afternoon, Florida Power and Light reported that nearly 75 percent of customers were without power in Miami-Dade County.

Irma hit 57 years to the day since Hurricane Donna in 1960, which was the last time a Category 4 hurricane devastated the Florida Keys.

Irma is the first major hurricane to make a direct strike on Florida since Hurricane Wilma in 2005, and appears capable of a wider swath of destruction than each of the several storms that hit the state the mid-2000s.

Last October, Hurricane Matthew spared Florida from experiencing its strongest side  the right side  because its center tracked along the eastern coastline of the state.

With Irma, the forecast track along the Gulf coastline will expose more of Floridas cities to the stronger side of the storm.

This story was updated on Monday at 11:00 a.m.

Monday

Most of Georgia will experience tropical storm-force winds as the center of Irma lifts north across the state, which is likely to experience downed trees and scattered power outages as far north as Atlanta.

Heavy rain will overtake parts of Alabama, and more tornadoes could strike eastern Georgia and coastal South Carolina.

Monday night

Irma will continue weakening into a tropical depression somewhere over northern Alabama or central Tennessee, but its swath of rain will extend from Arkansas to southwest Virginia.

Dry and calm weather will return to most of Florida by this time.

Tuesday

The greatly weakened low pressure area will slow down and linger over Tennessee on Tuesday and Wednesday as showers continue moving north into the Ohio Valley and Mid-Atlantic.

There will no longer be any destructive wind with Irma, and the rain will become lighter and less continuous as the moisture spreads out.

Richmond-area forecast

Irmas remnants will bring occasional rain to central Virginia on Tuesday and Wednesday, but no extreme or destructive weather.

The high pressure that brought fall-like weather to the state over the weekend will still keep things dry here on Monday, but clouds will gradually move in from the south.

Showers from the remnants of Irma will start to replace the dry air during the day on Tuesday, but the rain will be on and off instead of lasting all day.

The best chance may be late Tuesday afternoon or evening, but the scattered nature of the rain will keep totals below 1 inch in most local backyards. After Irma disintegrates, a seasonably warm but humid air mass will linger over Virginia for several days.

There will still be a chance for a passing shower on Wednesday, then a few thunderstorms are possible from Thursday into next weekend.

Expect highs in the lower 80s starting Wednesday and mild lows in the upper 60s. After Monday morning, there wont be another night with crisp lows in the 50s for at least a week.
A Place for All Conservatives to Speak Their Mind.
CHRISTIANSBURG  A suggestion to teach Chinese in high schools is resonating with some members of the Montgomery County School Board.

The request was made at a meeting last week during which a small group of speakers commented to the board about the growing demand to learn the language.

One way to strengthen our diversity is to offer a Chinese speaking class in the school district, said Kang Xia, one of the speakers and a Virginia Tech environmental chemistry professor.

Xia spoke about Virginia Techs growing study abroad programs that send students to China. She said more widely introducing the language in high school would better prepare those students to take part in those kinds of programs in college.

I think we need to explore that, board member Penny Franklin said later during the more than three-hour meeting.

Board member Connie Froggatt said its a shame some high schools only teach a single foreign language.

Chinese is already available to high school students in Montgomery County  but not in the classroom. Courses in the language are taught through a statewide online platform called Virtual Virginia. The courses through Virtual Virginia are run by certified instructors.

Tech horticulture professor Greg Welbaum also addressed the board during the meeting. He said hes aware of Virtual Virginia, but he added that Chinese is better taught in the classroom because of the languages level of difficulty.

There are a lot of Caucasian, European ancestry people like me who want their kid to learn Chinese, he said.

In Montgomery Countys school district, a total of four students  two at Blacksburg High School, one at Auburn High School and another at Christiansburg High School  are taking Chinese through Virtual Virginia, according to district figures.

Chinese is not taught directly in the classrooms in the Roanoke city or Roanoke County school districts. Salem, however, has offered Chinese to its middle and high school students since the 2015-2016 school year.

During that same school year, the Salem school district was among 20 school divisions in the country to secure a grant to have a Chinese teacher on staff for the entire year.

Between Roanoke and Roanoke County, only one student at Northside High School took the language through Virtual Virginia in 2014-2015, the latest school year available for Virginia Department of Education enrollment data on Chinese language courses.

About 3,700 students in 47 school districts across the Commonwealth took Chinese during that school year. A VDOE spokesman provided a chart of all the schools where students took Chinese, but the document itself doesnt specify if the course was taught in the classroom or through Virtual Virginia.

Where you see only a handful of students in a school, those students are likely taking the language through our Virtual Virginia program, VDOE spokesman Charles Pyle wrote in an email.

Elsewhere in the New River Valley, one student at Pulaski County Senior High and another at Giles High School took Chinese, according to VDOE.

Enrollment in Chinese is most prevalent in the states major population centers. Single courses with more than 10 students each are not uncommon at numerous schools across Northern Virginia, the Richmond area and Hampton Roads.

Chinese has also received relatively high interest in Charlottesville and Carroll County.

A total of 51 students at Carroll County High School took Chinese in 2014-2015 and another eight took the language at Carroll County Middle School. A total of 74 students were enrolled in four different levels of Chinese at Charlottesville High School during that school year.

By far the highest concentration of enrollment in Chinese occurred in Chesterfield County near Richmond where more than 1,700 students at two elementary schools took a course in the language.

Chinese was in 2012-13 the second most prevalent language spoken in dual-language programs across the U.S., according to a report from the U.S. Department of Education. The agency generally describes dual-language education as when English and another language are used for teaching.

The DOE states that Chinese was used in dual-language programs in 14 states. The most prevalent dual-language partner language is Spanish, which was used in programs in 35 states.

Although language courses are available through Virtual Virginia, there is greater value in teaching them in the classroom, Froggatt, the Montgomery County school board member, said Thursday.

Having a physical teacher is exponentially better than listening to someone online, she said before referring to her daughter whos currently studying French at Virginia Tech. For her, theres nothing like immersion.

Being able to spend 45 minutes to an hour every day with a person speaking to you. Having a conversation with the person speaking the language is so much better.

Froggatt said she finds learning Chinese itself important due to the growing global market and described the language as a key asset on anyones resume.

Board member Jamie Bond said on Tuesday there are still some challenges to bringing Chinese to the classroom.

She pointed to interest among students in the county and efforts to make new language courses equally available in all high schools. Bond suggested some schools could ease the introduction of Chinese by initially offering it through their club functions.

Superintendent Mark Miear followed Bonds comments by saying the district would need to find money for teachers and the ability to offer the course for multiple years.

Montgomery County schools spokeswoman Brenda Drake said other challenges include buying course material such as textbooks and providing space in the buildings.

As a result of budget cuts, our smallest high schools only offer one language, CHS offers two and BHS offers four, Drake wrote in an email. To offer an additional language, the board would need to prioritize where the funds would be spent and how to balance the inequity that currently exists.

Spanish, French, German and American sign language are the languages taught in Montgomery County school classrooms. Blacksburg High offers all four; Christiansburg High offers Spanish and French; and Auburn and Eastern Montgomery County high schools each only offer Spanish.
PULASKI  Sprinkled throughout the county seat are reminders of its history. Local staples like the Dalton Building, Old County Courthouse and duck-laden Peak Creek combine to form the towns unique character.

Yet atop one of the many hills on which this town of less than 10,000 people is built sits a more nugatory relic.

Here, an aging middle school inspires little nostalgia. Instead, its physical state brings to the surface the reality of financial hardships the local government and school system here have never been able to fully navigate.

Located in the center of town, Pulaski Middle School is nearly a century old; conditions inside get worse each year.

When school begins, the hot and sticky August air is easily trapped inside. The motors of pedestal fans blare through the halls as daylight slips through cracks in window panes where duct tape has yet to be placed.

The walls smell of dust and grime. Outside, the sidewalks and driveways are fractured and dotted with overgrown weeds.

The classrooms have no air conditioning. The chipping paint carries dangerous lead. Even minor repairs require expensive asbestos abatement.

Dilapidated facilities have become essentially normal for hundreds of Pulaski County children  a demographic now at the center of a debate on the fate of the school districts two middle schools.

Its outdated, said Pulaski Middle School Principal Bill Atwood. We are constantly frustrated with outdated wiring, technology and safety.

On a daily basis, students and teachers at Pulaski and Dublin middle schools are reminded of how the putting off of facility upgrades can lead to an uncomfortable learning environment and few cost-effective options for improvement.

After months of internal debate, the district is now asking, hoping voters will approve a ballot measure that would spur the largest local property tax increase in the countys history and fund a $45 million combined middle school project.

We need this, said Superintendent Kevin Siers. We can no longer maintain a suitable learning environment in this facility given the current conditions.

A costly investment

Currently, Pulaski County residents are taxed 64 cents per $100 of taxable value on their homes. If the bond issuance is accepted by voters, the rate would raise by between nine and 13 cents.

It was so good to see our board approve to put this project on a referendum for the people to decide, said County Administrator Jonathan Sweet. We have a very informed, astute citizenry that are going to understand the dynamics of the project and what this community needs. Theyll make the right decision.

Plans to either repair or replace the two buildings have been percolating for years.

In November of last year, the district began interviewing potential architects for a new consolidated middle school. In March, RRMM Architects in Roanoke were selected and a joint building committee was formed by the district.

That committee reviewed 13 potential sites for a new school before settling on a plot of land directly across from the Cougar Express on U.S. 11. The land, which includes 55 acres and is valued at $550,000, is owned currently by Shelor Motor Mile executive and land developer David Hagan under the name Pulaski Farm Property LLC. Hagan, regarded as one of the more influential businessmen in the New River Valley, has offered to sell the property to the district for $220,000 and pay to improve the nearby sewage pump station that would serve the school at an additional cost of $35,000.

Siers called Hagan an extremely strong supporter of public schools in the New River Valley.

In June, an initial design was presented to the public and the school board passed a resolution asking the county to place a bond referendum on the Nov. 7 ballot. The board of supervisors has approved putting the measure on the ballot.

The ask comes as a last-ditch effort for school officials who say the potential burden to county residents is a necessary one.

The bottom line is this: My windows have got to be replaced, my classrooms have to be able to use more than one outlet, said Dublin Principal Adam Joyce. The building has served the purpose it was put here for.

Dublin Middle School was constructed in 1968. The building itself, brick and sprawling across a large campus, is sturdy.

But the paint inside is rotting and the old-style windows do not allow air conditioner installment.

This is the hottest room in the county, Joyce said opening the door to a Spanish classroom that faces the south and takes a beating from the sun every day. The school closed early three days last year because it was simply too hot to hold classes, he said.

John Earls is a janitor at Dublin Middle School. When he cleans up at the end of each school day, he knows what to expect.

The dust collects real quick, Earls said. And let me tell ya, it gets hot in here. The kids, they notice it. It just makes it difficult, Id say.

On and off the backburner

During the summer of 2012, the district commissioned a study that estimated a $21.2 million price tag for improving Dublin Elementary School and $60 million cost to build a new middle school.

In 2013, a series of public meetings were held to inform county voters of the conditions at the school. Two years later, the school board approved a $2.8 million renovation to Dublin.

The district later decided to use those funds to make renovations to and build a new wing on Dublin Elementary.

It just didnt make any sense to put that kind of money into a (middle school) building that old, school board Chair Tim Hurst said. The goal from the beginning has been to consolidate.

Pulaski Middle is in considerably worse shape than Dublin, but to school administrators the clear best solution is to close both and combine into one.

Like all of Southwest Virginia we are losing enrollment every year, Siers said. Those who live on the outskirts of the county can just as easily go somewhere else if the parents have the means to get them there. It is our hope that (if a new school is built) the people who leave to go to other schools would keep them here.

But county and town officials argue their constituents are already cash-strapped and underwriting a massive building project independent of taxpayer support is out of the question.

I know the county budget has been tight and we certainly arent in a position to provide any significant financial resources at this point, said Pulaski Town Manager Shawn Utt. But anything we can do with our staff or anything else, we will support whatever happens.

A turning point

School employees and community members and local leaders concede they have a common goal.

This would be an investment in the children, Atwood said. I can tell you that I work with people in this building every day who do everything they can to make the situation as positive as they can.

Whether it is now or later, Sweet said it is clear something must be done to improve the conditions of the two aging schools.

Ive toured those facilities, Sweet said. We need to find a solution to our deficiencies. Its unfortunate that weve spent the last six months talking so negatively about our schools.

For school officials a no vote would come as a significant blow to future plans for consolidation.

There is no Plan B at this point, Siers said. We can have those conversations if we get there. All we can do is reiterate why this would be a good thing not just for our students but for the county. This is critical.
After standing for more than a million years against the forces of nature, a 215-foot-tall stone arch in Rockbridge County seems to be holding up just as well to the strain of vehicular traffic that runs across its top.

Thats what the Virginia Department of Transportation has long said about Natural Bridge, which also serves as a highway bridge for U.S. 11.

But as questions are raised about whether the weight and vibrations of traffic could be causing long-term damage to the unique geological formation, theres increased talk within the agency about finding a way to preserve it.

I fully support finding an alternative that would close natural bridge to vehicular traffic soon, VDOTs chief engineer, Garrett Moore, wrote in a July 5 email to the commissioner of the transportation department and three colleagues.

Moore was responding to an internal email that summarized a meeting the previous week of a committee that is developing a master plan for Natural Bridge and its surrounding 1,500 acres, which last year became part of a state park.

Now that the property is under the management of the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation, the committee has suggested that the bridge be closed to U.S. 11 traffic, which would be bypassed to the north.

Lets use this opportunity now that the park is in place to work with them towards a solution, Moore wrote in his email, which did not explain in detail why he favors closing the bridge to traffic.

The email, and others among nearly 200 obtained by The Roanoke Times through the Virginia Freedom of Information Act, reflects a growing interest in the structural stability of Natural Bridge  which as a natural formation is not inspected regularly by VDOT the way a constructed bridge would be.

Since the message was sent, VDOT has announced that it will conduct a series of tests to determine whether the 2,000-some cars and trucks that pass across the bridge daily pose a threat to its structural integrity.

So far, weve seen nothing in the data that tells us the structure is unsafe, VDOT spokeswoman Sandy Myers said last week.

The opinion that Moore expressed in his email was not a data-based decision, Myers said. Instead, it reflected his view that now is a good time to study the effect of traffic on the bridge, with its inclusion in a state park leading to a higher emphasis on conservation.

VDOT still has no official position on whether traffic from U.S. 11 should be routed off the bridge  a question that wont be addressed until the results of ongoing studies are available.

Its very early in the process, and were just trying to look at the structure and get a picture of its health, Myers said.

The last known study of the bridges stability was conducted in late 1999 and early 2000, after a rock fell and killed a tourist who was standing on the walkway that follows Cedar Creek as it passes under the arch.

Two seismic studies were conducted, one for the bridges private owner at the time and the other for VDOT.

Both studies detected vibrations adjacent to the roadway; however, the magnitudes and actual effects possible from those vibrations could be the subject of much debate, a final report stated.

VDOTs report concluded that traffic had no effect on the bridges structural integrity.

But Radford University geology professor Skip Watts, who co-authored the report commissioned by the property owners, said at the time that he believed the long-term effects of traffic vibrations were not well understood and needed more study.

Nearly two decades later, another round of testing is underway. VDOT officials say they plan to convene a panel of prominent geologists from the United States and Canada to review the results and issue a report.

Although Moore wrote in his email that he would like to see the bridge closed to traffic soon, that seems unlikely.

The Department of Conservation and Recreation is just beginning to discuss the option as part of its master plan for the park.

DCRs planning horizon for alternative routes is 30 years plus, Randy Kiser, the administrator for VDOTs Staunton District, wrote in a July 5 email to Moore and Charlie Kilpatrick, the commissioner of the transportation agency.

The email provided a summary of a June 29 meeting of an advisory committee that is developing the master plan. At the meeting, a consensus was reached to support a plan to close the bridge to all traffic and build a U.S. 11 bypass that would veer north of the bridge and traverse the parks boundary before reconnecting with the highway.

Two other options were also discussed: Making U.S. 11 and nearby Virginia 130 accessible only to state park traffic, and closing U.S. 11 to trucks while allowing all other types of vehicles.

No feasibility studies have been conducted for the alternative routes. Possible complications include historic properties that lie in the bypass potential path and very challenging roadway geometrics to overcome, Kiser wrote.

Funding could be another potential roadblock.

Officials from DCR, Rockbridge County and the Central Shenandoah Planning District Commission are discussing a feasibility study that would be a prelude to an application for funding under VDOTs SMART Scale method of scoring transportation projects, Kiser wrote in his July 5 email.

After Moore responded, saying he supported closing the bridge to all traffic, Kiser sent out a follow-up message to nearly a dozen VDOT staffers.

Please note the chief engineers comments below, he wrote in calling for a meeting to discuss the risks of the current location of Route 11 on Natural Bridge and costs of moving it to another location.

At a meeting the next day, three short-term options were discussed: Conducting tests to measure the vibrations from traffic on the highway, repaving U.S. 11 where it crosses the bridge and adding an impervious geotextile between the road and the rock formation to curb the flow of stormwater, and continuing to maintain a concrete ditch along the side of the road to divert water from the arch.

As for longer-term options, one idea was to construct a 150-foot long truss bridge that would span the Natural Bridge  taking traffic off the formation but likely making it visible from the bottom of the gorge, where cars and trucks passing overheard are currently not visible.

While the bridge over a bridge option is not being seriously considered, other plans to keep traffic off the formation pose their own difficulties in terms of where and how the bridge can be bypassed.

You cant just close a road and not put it somewhere, and that involves a great deal of study, Myers said.
WASHINGTON  The U.S. Air Force sniffer plane was collecting air samples off Russias Kamchatka Peninsula on Sept. 3, 1949, when it gathered evidence of radioactivity, confirming that the war-shattered Soviet Union had tested a nuclear device. The Soviets Aug. 29, 1949, test had come faster than expected.

Dating from the detonation at Alamogordo, New Mexico, on July 16, 1945, the basic science of nuclear explosions is more than 72 years old  three years older than the North Korean nation. Ballistic missile technology is more than 60 years old. The problems of miniaturizing warheads for mounting on missiles, and of ensuring the warheads survival en route to targets, are not sufficient to stymie a nation  consider Pakistan, whose annual per capita income is less than $2,000  that is determined to have a nuclear arsenal.

North Korea has one and is developing ICBMs faster than expected and with ostentatious indifference to U.S. proclamations. On Jan. 2, President-elect Donald Trump scampered up the rhetorical escalation ladder, unlimbering his heavy artillery  an exclamation point  to tweet about North Koreas promised ICBM test: It wont happen! It did. North Koreas most audacious act, firing a missile over Japan, came seven days after Secretary of State Rex Tillerson praised North Koreas restraint.

Pyongyangs signaling does not involve abstruse semiotics: It wants a nuclear arsenal, and as The Economist magazine says, the worlds unpalatable options are the improbable (productive negotiations), the feeble (more sanctions) and the terrifying (military pre-emption).

Concerning the latter, there is no bright line, but there is a distinction to be drawn, however imprecisely, between pre-emptive war and preventive war. The former constitutes self-defense in response to a clear and present danger  repelling an act of aggression presumed with reasonable certainty to be imminent. The latter is an act of anticipation  and, to be candid, of aggression  to forestall the emergence of a clear and present danger.

When Trump threatened North Korea with fire and fury like the world has never seen, was he threatening to cross the nuclear weapons threshold? This has been contemplated before regarding North Korea. Former Gen. Douglas MacArthur, who had been fired by President Harry Truman for insubordination, handed President-elect Dwight Eisenhower a memorandum on how to clear North Korea of enemy forces: This could be accomplished through the atomic bombing of enemy military concentrations and installations in North Korea and the sowing of fields of suitable radio-active materials, the by-product of atomic manufacture, to close major lines of enemy supply and communication. ... 

MacArthur badly misjudged Eisenhower, whose biographer Jean Edward Smith says that during the Potsdam Conference (July 17-Aug. 2, 1945), when Eisenhower was told of the Alamogordo test  his first knowledge of the new weapon  he was appalled and was the only one at Potsdam who opposed using the bomb. Smith says:

As president, Eisenhower would twice be presented with recommendations from his National Security Council and the Joint Chiefs of Staff that the bomb be used; first, in Vietnam to protect the French at Dien Bien Phu, then against China at the time of the Formosa Strait crisis. Both times Eisenhower rejected the recommendations. As a former supreme commander, Eisenhower had the confidence to do so, where other presidents might not have. And by rejecting the use of the bomb, there is no question that Eisenhower raised the threshold at which atomic weaponry could be employed  a legacy we continue to enjoy.

But for how long? The non-proliferation regime has been remarkably successful. During the 1960 presidential campaign, John Kennedy cited indications that by 1964 there would be 10, 15 or 20 nuclear powers. As president, he said that by 1975 there might be 20. Now, however, North Korea, the ninth, might be joined by Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, among others, unless U.S. leadership produces, regarding North Korea, conspicuously credible deterrence. The reservoir of presidential credibility is not brimful.

On Aug. 1, Sen. Lindsey Graham said that Trump had told him that there will be a war with North Korea if it continues to develop ICBMs capable of reaching the United States. Well see, said Trump on Sunday, responding to this shouted question: Will you attack North Korea?

You?

Are Congress constitutional powers regarding war so atrophied that it supinely hopes for mere post facto notification? Ten months after Nov. 8, that days costs, until now largely aesthetic, are suddenly, although not altogether unpredictably, more serious than were perhaps contemplated by his 62,984,825 voters.

Will is a columnist for The Washington Post Writers Group.
About two years ago, some important members of Virginias business community persuaded the governor and the General Assembly that the state government wasnt doing enough to promote enough growth. The business community wanted its turn.

The result was the GO Virginia initiative  a state-appointed council of business leaders and nine regional sub-councils, each charged with drawing up a growth and diversification plan for their region.

The premise was sound: There is no single state economy but rather a collection of regional economies, each with their own needs. There also was concern that this was much ado about nothing: The amount of money that GO Virginia has to spend is really quite small in the great scheme of things, so could it really make a difference?

Those nine regional plans have now been drawn and we must admit that were impressed. Its still unclear whether anything will come of them, but at the very least they represent honest appraisals of Virginias regional economies that state and local leaders ought to take to heart. Some observations:

n The reports are often brutally frank. Thats especially true for the two on the states poorest regions. The Southwest report says too many potential workers have drug problems to make the region attractive to potential employers. The Southside report is unsparing about how regions opposition to integration in the 50s continues to hurt it today: There are vestiges of Massive Resistance and other racially divisive actions are still evident, particularly as seen in lack of support for public schools.

Even the report for the Richmond area says that the citys Civil War history is an impediment to recruiting talent: Human resource directors felt that they had to overcome a sense from people outside the area that Richmond was still the Capital of the Confederacy and not the ideal place for professionals who wanted to live in a vibrant, culturally diverse location.

Keep in mind that these reports dont come from political activists angling to tear down statues; they come from clear-eyed business leaders who generally fall right of center. That lack of a political agenda is what makes these reports so powerful. When even business leaders from Southwest Virginia state matter-of-factly that coal is dead and the region should embrace alternative energy as a growth industry, perhaps its time certain politicians should stop trying to perpetuate the fantasy that coal is coming back.

n Everybody gets blamed for slow economic growth  politicians, businesses and, yes, even ordinary people. The reports for Southside and Southwest Virginia unearth some pretty unsparing complaints about local government leaders who, they say, simply dont understand the modern economy and are resistant to change. Local elected bodies (boards of supervisors, city councils, town councils) are not open to new ideas, the Southside report says.

Some in the business community come in for their share of the blame, too. The Southside report says resistance is still seen by business leaders who do not want the region to recruit or support the expansion of new businesses whose wage rates may be higher. This report from the business community sounds positively pro-labor: The region needs to continuously message its employers that it is important to pay well for talent, the Southside report says.

Actually, no one is spared from criticism. That same report cites a lack of parental expectations that education is important, which results in challenges to create competitive schools. That ultimately results a lack of skilled workers. Speaking of which . . .

n For all their differences, every region says the same thing: They dont have enough skilled workers. Each report documents a growing skills gap between the workers available and the jobs available. Thats an especially acute problem in rural areas, but even Northern Virginia laments that it faces critical shortages in certain technical fields  and that those shortages are slowing economic growth even for the states golden goose.

This skills gap plays out two places. Every region needs more college-educated workers, particularly in certain fields. However, every region also needs more skilled workers in the so-called middle skills jobs that require more than a high school diploma but less than a college degree. Taken together, these nine reports blast out a clarion call for support for the states community college system  and scholarship programs to get more students into their credentials programs.

n Public school systems are faulted. Some are called weak, especially in Southside. Others are blamed for being too disconnected from the local job market, and for pushing kids to four-year colleges when maybe theyd be better off somewhere else. The report for the Charlottesville area says that one stakeholder noted that up until the last year and a half, it was taboo to even discuss community colleges in the high school.

n State colleges are blamed, too. Each of the reports wishes colleges were working more closely with the local business community. The colleges and universities are not contributing significantly to the startup community, says the Shenandoah Valley report. The University of Virginia . . . has continued to push forward with their own initiatives rather than collaborating with other initiatives across the region, complains the Charlottesville report.

n Every region with rural areas says the lack of broadband internet is a big problem. A significant barrier is how the report for the Fredericksburg area describes it, a sentiment consistently echoed elsewhere.

n Roanoke comes off looking pretty good. Roanoke is cited as a good example in both the Southside and Shenandoah Valley reports. Southside favorably mentions the CoLab on Grandin Avenue as a way to grow entrepreneurs; the Shenandoah Valley report says that region should copy how Roanoke has promoted an outdoors culture as a way to attract millennials.

So now what? The state GO Virginia council will review all these plans on Tuesday. Thats great. But it might be better if every citizen read them, and then asked their local officials what theyre doing about them.

You can find them here: http://tinyurl.com/y73qpned.
Few people have an art museum gallery named after them, much less two.

Carl Ky Rohman, however, has just that with the Rohman Family Gallery at the Sheldon Museum of Art and a gallery at the Museum of Nebraska Art in Kearney.

Those galleries recognize the contributions Rohman, a longtime member of the Sheldon Advisory Board and co-founder and former board president of MONA, made to the museums.

But Rohman, who died on Aug. 30 at age 97, was also a strong supporter of music, most notably opera, serving as chairman of the Nebraska District of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. And he played a key role in the development of the historic village of Brownville.

"For more than 40 years, the Rohman family has been a leader in the arts in Nebraska," former University of Nebraska-Lincoln Chancellor Harvey Perlman said in 2005. "It is hard to find an art initiative in Nebraska that doesn't involve Ky and Jane Rohman. Ky's gentle and often humorous prodding and counsel have been of enormous help to me in trying to advance the Sheldon and the other art activities of the university.

More than that, the Rohman family has donated more than 100 pieces of art to Sheldon over 50 years.

Many of those gifts were of 19th century landscapes and impressionism that considerably strengthened Sheldons collection in those areas.

But their contributions cover the history of American art from Gilbert Stuarts 1805-1810 Portrait of Alexander Walker" to a 1969 screen print of Andy Warhols Vegetarian Vegetable (The Alphabet Soup).

Together with his first wife, Lorraine, who died in 1988, Ky donated paintings by 19th-century American painters Ralph Albert Blakelock and Emil Carlsen, and gifts in Lorraines honor include a Martin Johnson Heade still life and Augustus Vincent Tacks 1930 (Untitled) Abstraction.

Carl and Jane Rohmans gifts included the Robert Rauschenberg 1972 sculpture,Tampa Clay Piece 3, (now on view in the museums permanent collection galleries) and a Hugo Robus painting.

Rohman family support contributed to the 1970 acquisition of Alexander Calders 1948 Red Disk, Black Lace kinetic sculpture, the 1991 acquisition of a 1978 floor piece by Carl Andre and Torn Notebook, the monumental 1996 sculpture by Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen at 12th and Q streets that has, in the past two decades, become a Lincoln landmark.

Works purchased by the Beatrice Rohman Fund, named for Kys mother, include Lilian Westcott Hales 1906 impressionist painting The Convalescent (Zeffy in Bed), a favorite painting of Sheldon visitors.

Other Rohman gifts to Sheldon include works by Milton Avery, William Baziotes, Edwin Dickinson, Walt Disney Productions, Howard Finster, George Inness, Wolf Kahn, Kenneth Noland, Nathan Oliveira, Guy Pene du Bois, Theodore Rozak and Augustus Saint-Gaudens.

The collection that bears their name is a testament to their astute eye and discriminating tastes, as well as to their generous philanthropy, reads a 2015 Sheldon statement.

The Rohmans, however, didnt just support Sheldon. Rohman played a key role in establishing the Museum of Nebraska Art in Kearney, serving as board president and also making contributions to its collection of art from the state.

Even as he served on the boards and made significant contributions, Rohman largely stayed in the background. I dont recall ever speaking with him when he took individual credit for any of the accomplishments at Sheldon or MONA, save, of course, for the exhibition of Rohman family gifts that accompanied the naming of the Sheldon gallery 12 years ago.

Deservedly, Rohman received every arts honor Nebraska can bestow: the Governors Arts Award, the (Lincoln) Mayors Arts Award, the Spirit of Museum of Nebraska Art, the 2007 Distinguished NEBRASKAlanders Award and, most recently, the 2015 Sheldon Award.

I last saw Rohman in April at the Jayne Snyder Trail Center in Union Plaza, where wed both come to see Ben Victor working on the clay version of his monumental sculpture of Standing Bear.

An arts supporter to the end, Rohman will be missed by Nebraskas arts community. But through the gifts and his work in developing museums and organizations, his influence on the arts will be continual.
Cindy Lange-Kubick Columnist Cindy Lange-Kubick has loved writing columns about life in her hometown since 1994. She had hoped to become a people person by now, nonetheless she would love to hear your tales of fascinating neighbors and interesting places. Follow Cindy Lange-Kubick Close Get email notifications on {{subject}} daily! Your notification has been saved. There was a problem saving your notification. {{description}} Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items. Save Manage followed notifications Close Followed notifications Please log in to use this feature Log In Don't have an account? Sign Up Today

The man from Iraq called his American friend on a Sunday.

He was going to Houston, Zeyad Eesa told Sara Sawatzki.

Sara grew up in Lincoln, moved away when she was in middle school and came back in 2008. Shes the corporate photographer for Olsson Associates.

He grew up in Northern Iraq and came to Lincoln as a refugee more than two years ago. The Yazidi man had built his parents home in Shingal and lived nearby with his wife and two little boys.

He was on vacation in Turkey on Aug. 3, 2014, when his phone rang in the middle of the night. His father was crying. The town had been attacked, people were being massacred, their house was gone.

Sara has seen the photos, a beautiful home destroyed at the hands of ISIS.

Last week, she was in Denver working when Zeyad called with his plan to drive to Texas and help people whod lost their homes.

He said, is that dumb? Sara said Thursday. And I just told him, if its in his heart, he should go.

And he did.

Sara was still in Denver when Zeyad called again to tell her hed started out for Houston but his car had broken down in the middle of Kansas. Hed paid $700 to have it towed back to Lincoln.

Zeyad isnt a rich man. He works as a security guard, sometimes six nights a week.

When he got back to Lincoln, out of cash and with a car repair bill looming, he couldnt sleep.

I was up at night, smoking, smoking, smoking, the 29-year-old said.

It wasnt the money.

It was the images from the news  all those desperate people with flooded homes, their possessions ruined.

Honestly, I saw the same thing as when our people lost their houses, Zeyad said. People with no food, no drink, no anything.

He had to get to Houston.

What about Sara?

She was in.

* * *

Zeyad had many jobs back home  cook, gas station owner, house flipper, photographer.

He was an interpreter for U.S. troops, too. Kurdish was his first language, but hed learned English from Facebook videos and lots of practice.

His military ties helped him land in America after ISIS began attacking the Yazidis, a long-persecuted religious minority in Iraq.

When theyd invaded his town three years ago, they ordered the Christian Yazidis to convert to Islam or be killed. Thousands were murdered, women were raped, many fled into the mountains. His 5-year-old nephew was killed. Neighbors died.

My dad tell me what is going on then, Zeyad said. He made me promise never to come back.

Sara met Zeyad this summer at a gathering commemorating the attack of Aug. 3. He asked her to take his photo after the ceremony and, a few days later, he sent her a friend request on Facebook.

Hes the type of person who knows no strangers, Sara said. Hes just amazing.

Sara already knew about the plight of refugees. In the spring of 2016, the 33-year-old spent a month on the Greek island of Lesvos, where rafts floated in filled with desperate families whod lost everything.

She and a coworker helped furnish an apartment for a Yazidi family who was resettled here by Lutheran Family Services in December.

She gets a lot of friend requests from refugees on Facebook.

People want to practice English, or have an American friend to talk to.

Shed just started a Facebook page, Refugees of Lincoln, to share stories and photos of the newcomers to her community.

Zeyad was her first profile.

They met at Oak Lake and sat on a bench near the water. He told her hed become an interpreter for the U.S. military at 16.

Zeyad fought and bled with our soldiers, Sara wrote. They were brothers.

He showed her the two scars on his shin  where one bullet went in, where another came out. He showed her another on his back, the shrapnel scars on his head and hands.

He told her about his parents, stranded in Iraq, their last interview at the U.S. embassy canceled when President Trumps travel ban went into effect.

Its really dangerous for family members of interpreters to be there, Sara said. He misses them so much.

He calls them daily. He stays busy, trying to do good.

He would give someone the shirt off his back, Sara said. And I would be genuinely shocked if he hadnt actually done that.

So when Zeyad asked her to head to Houston, she couldnt say no. Amel Hskan, the oldest daughter from the family shed helped in December  like a little sister to Sara  wanted to go, too.

They left at 3 a.m. the Saturday of Labor Day weekend, with names in their pockets of people who might need their help.

Before they crammed into Saras Honda Fit, Zeyad had a favor to ask.

He wanted us all to have Husker shirts.

* * *

For two days, Zeyad sweated in his red Husker shirt alongside Sara and Amel, sweeping floors made filthy from flood water, tearing out molding drywall for a grateful couple in Humble, and moving ruined furniture to the curb for a single mom of two in Spring.

I felt blessed to have him show up at my doorstep, said Randi Kalich, a nurse whose home took on nearly 2 feet of water.

A friend of a friend of a friend pointed Zeyad in her direction, and when the trio from Lincoln were done helping, Randi called her aunt and uncle.

I told them, I know you all need help. Im sending Nebraska.

The Honda Fit and its occupants showed up as the immediate outpouring was winding down, Randi said.

The new reality was sad and depressing, so to have Zeyad come, it was, Oh my god, I do need help. Ill be forever grateful to them.

Zeyad came home happy. He has new friends in Texas. We were so lucky we meet these people, he says.

His car is fixed, his paycheck $31 a month smaller until he pays off the repairs.

Its just money.

He and his wife are expecting their third baby, another boy.

He misses Iraq and his family, but he feels safe here, free to practice his religion surrounded by good and helpful people.

I didnt know a lot about America when I moved here, he said. Im so proud to call Nebraska my second house.
By Abraham Dayan

Just a month after the terrible disaster at ALROSA's Mir mine in Yakutia where eight miners lost their lives following a sudden flooding at the underground operation, attention turns to the safety record of the diamond mining industry. It might appear to be too soon to talk about the subject with the memory of the catastrophe still fresh in the mind and with families and friends of the eight miners still grieving terribly, but the accident nonetheless leads our attention to focus on the safety precautions and standards that are in place.

Firstly, however, the Russian authorities must be praised for immediately setting about the rescue operation which extracted 143 miners. More than 300 rescue workers fought continuously for over three weeks to find the eight missing men in conditions that are too awful for most people to possibly imagine, with a reported 40,000 tons of water above where the miners were located. That enormous mass of water, together with tons of rock and suffocating mud, could have broken through at any moment, and it was with an understandably heavy heart that the rescue operation was ended.

As WFDB President Ernie Blom said in a media release: "I would like to praise the speedy response by ALROSA which allowed 143 miners to be rescued quickly, and the way in which it rapidly put the rescue operation into place. Rescuers worked around the clock for more than three weeks facing incredible dangers and operating in conditions that are impossible for outsiders to comprehend. Unfortunately, a point was reached where it was simply not possible to continue. With great sadness, we had to accept that the trapped miners are unlikely to still be alive without food and water, in appallingly high levels of humidity and with a high content of hydrogen sulfide and salts in the mudflow."

Hope inevitably was in the hearts of all involved in the rescue operation  and in those of the many outsiders looking in. Their belief that the miners could be rescued may have been sustained by recorded accidents where miners were trapped underground for long periods but who survived. Among the best known examples is one that had billions of people around the world glued to their TV sets in 2010 when a mining accident in Chile saw a cave-in at the San Jose copper-gold mine. Incredibly, after 69 days the 33 workers trapped 700 meters underground were rescued.

If there is one thing that stands out about the terrible accident, it is actually to show how rare such occurrences are in the diamond mining industry. Periodically, there are incidents around the world where miners become trapped and rescued, as mentioned above, and unfortunately not a few instances of deaths.

These have typically happened in coal mining operations. In Pakistan earlier this month, five coal miners were killed. In Iran in May, 21 coal miners were killed trying to rescue trapped colleagues, while China has also experienced accidents resulting in the deaths of scores of miners. Even the United States has recorded fatalities among coal miners, almost a dozen killed in the first half of this year  which is more than in all of 2016.

The fact is that the diamond mining industry has an excellent safety record. The last such incident was when a father-of-three was killed driving inside the pit at the enormous Jwaneng mine in Botswana in July 2012.

As the rescue efforts in Russia testified, excellent safety records are only possible when mining companies insist on stringent safety procedures. In the nature of work that has a potential for danger, there will always be incidents caused by unforeseen events. This does not detract, however, from the work of all the diamond mining firms and their procedures and policies insisting that employees follow very strict guidelines in order to slash the risk of an accident down to extremely low levels.




OOO Proex Service, which is searching for diamonds in the Arkhangelsk Region of Russia, discovered seven kimberlite pipes in the Kozolsky license area having spent 15 months for the find. One of the pipes is very similar to the highly diamondiferous Grib diamond pipe by its petrochemical characteristics and a set of indicator minerals pointing to kimberlites. Vladimir Shchukin, the head of Proex Service, is confident that diamondiferous kimberlites will be discovered in other licensed areas explored by this junior company, whose operations he described in an interview given to Rough & Polished.

Could you say a few words about your companys business for the sake of our readers?

The main task of Proex Service is to search for diamond deposits. To solve this task, we have to make some prognostic plotting, that is to select areas for prospecting works and in fact to start geological exploration to identify projected deposits. The importance of choosing the right areas for prospecting is obvious, so we attach special importance to this kind of work. The employees of our company created an automated system for comprehensive analysis of geological and geophysical materials with a view to forecasting mineral deposits. This system is constantly being improved, new programs and subprograms are being created, its databases are being replenished. Therefore, the development of new software products for our system is one of the important aspects of our activity.

How difficult is it for you to obtain prospecting licenses and what are the operational terms within them?

Obtaining licenses in our environment is a long and difficult process. My personal experience: we sought our first licenses for more than two years and spent more than three years to get the currently valid licenses. The situation has improved slightly after the introduction of the application principle, but in this case the time from filing an application to obtaining a license is about 6 months. Another problem is connected with compiling an application package of documents.

The subsoil user is obliged to include a contract with a bank, fund or large company to finance the project in the package of application documents (this is about 100 pages of text). As a rule, banks do not give and do not promise money to finance an idea, while private funds are rarely able to agree, and not all juniors have the opportunity to even talk to them, so only large, often inaccessible companies remain. This makes potential juniors having good ideas stay idle, without work.

How successful is Proex Services business? What kimberlites have you discovered and what is their potential?

In the licensed areas, we have obtained conclusive evidence of diamondiferous kimberlites, so the probability of finding an economically important deposit is very high. We have discovered seven kimberlite pipes in the Kozolsky Block in the course of 15 months of our operations there. The KL1 pipe is currently the most explored area, while the rest are tapped by 1 or 2 wells. On the KL1 pipe spreading across almost 7 hectares, we intersected xeno-tuff breccias of kimberlites. By its petrochemical characteristics and a set of kimberlitic indicator minerals, this pipe is analogous to the highly diamond-bearing Grib Pipe. We plan to evaluate the identified kimberlites in the winter season of 2017-2018. This is a very good result. We are sure that diamondiferous kimberlites will be discovered in other licensed areas.

How do you manage to finance geological exploration for diamond deposits?

After obtaining licenses, we prepare exploration programs and present them to potential investors. We offer up to 50% of the companys shares to investors for the full financing of the project's search and evaluation program. The investor is guaranteed to return the spent sums primarily from the company's profits when the discovered deposit will be developed or sold. Of course, the risk exists, but if a diamond deposit is discovered, the costs of geological exploration will be paid off many times over. It is this aspect that attracts investors. In the previous project, we managed to attract a foreign investor, but the financial crisis of 2008 destroyed the project. We have not yet found an investor to finance the entire program of work within the current project, so we are going to do it.

What are the prospects for your company in case you will discover a large primary diamond deposit?

It is the business of large mining companies to develop primary diamond deposits, as it is difficult for juniors to attract the necessary technology and funds. Therefore, we have either to sell an explored deposit or to assign a significant stake in the company. It is quite possible that there will be other opportunities.

How much are you interested in attracting investments in your project? In what way may it arouse interest on the part of investors?

Our project is one of the largest diamond exploration projects in Russia and therefore we are interested in attracting funds for its full implementation. We have carried out the major part of exploration work, which is the riskiest part. Now it is necessary to proceed with the planned discovery of new kimberlite pipes and their evaluation. The possibility of discovering a new diamond field is very high, and in our opinion, this should attract investors.

The Ministry of Economic Development, while offering its development concept for junior exploration companies in Russia, focused on attracting private capital to geological exploration. What is your take on this matter?

In my opinion, the development of junior exploration companies can be carried out only by attracting private capital. But this requires a new Law on Subsoil.

Do you think that state participation in junior exploration companies can bring more benefit or harm?

From my point of view, the state participation in junior companies will lead to complete elimination of this movement in Russia. As a rule, junior companies are established by high-level professionals, who are well acquainted with the area, in which they are going to work, and the type of mineral. The relative freedom in decision-making in terms of exploration direction, selection of contractors, acquisition of equipment, etc., will be lost in case of state participation, whereas mobility is the main advantage of junior companies. The state should legislatively provide an opportunity for juniors to access archival geological materials and the prospective plots allocated to them. For this, it is necessary to change the Law on Subsoil replacing it with a new one, and not just to make regular changes and amendments.

Tell us about the development of your software for geological exploration. How much does the market demand such products?

The employees of our company have developed the "Proex-geology" software package, which is a target-oriented automated system for comprehensive processing of geological and geophysical data needed to forecast and search for mineral deposits (Certificate No. 2004610060 issued by Russias Federal Agency for Intellectual Property, Rospatent).

The Proex-geology automated system includes a database and five blocks for processing geological and geophysical information. The architecture of the system is constructed in such a way that both additional blocks and individual programs can be included in it. Such a configuration allows us to continuously improve the system and, if necessary, align it to any type of mineral.

The search for mineral deposits is an elaborate and expensive process, especially in areas with a complex geological structure. In such areas, the geologist has to solve a multifaceted task with a huge amount of initial data, the qualitative processing of which is impossible without modern technologies. With the intensification of geological exploration in Russia, such software products will be in demand on the market.

What will be your contribution to the 11th International Kimberlite Conference in Botswana?

The International Kimberlite Conferences (IKC) are held every four years, and they are attended by geologists and diamond miners from all the world, who are bringing their news, ideas and reports. This is a great opportunity to talk with colleagues, exchange opinions and get first-hand information. In general, we are going for new knowledge. I am going to present a report at this conference (using a stand), which is "Diamond bearing capacity of the North European part of Russia and prospects for discovering new diamond deposits." I hope the report will be of interest to my colleagues.

Vladimir Malakhov, Rough&Polished
Nornickel introduces automated remote-controlled drilling at Norilsk mines The automated drilling technology significantly enhances performance, improves safety, and ensures a stable workflow and delivery against the targets.



Iamgold revises 2022 production guidance upwards Dual-listed Iamgold produced 184 000 ounces (oz) in the third quarter from three of its operations compared to 153 000 oz, a year earlier. Of the three operations, its 90%-owned Essakane Mine in Burkina Faso delivered strong results and achieved...

Mandatory labeling of jewelry in Russia to begin in 2024 The deadline for mandatory application of physical marking on jewelry made of precious metals and precious stones in Russia has been postponed from March 2023 to March 2024. That resolution was signed by the Government of the Russian Federation. It is...

Northam Platinum mulls acquisition of remaining RBPlat shares Northam Platinum is planning to acquire all remaining shares in Royal Bafokeng Platinum (RBPlat) at R172.70 a share. It currently controls a 34.52% stake in RBPlat and, together with call options and a right of first refusal secured with...
The city and county will likely be stepping in with financial help to make sure the nonprofit Bridge is able to operate its detoxification unit for the next year.

The Bridge, formerly Cornhusker Place, has been losing around $4,800 a month since January on Medicaid-eligible patients after state leaders determined the Bridges civil protective custody services dont qualify for Medicaid reimbursement.

Lincoln Police Chief Jeff Bliemeister plans to use $50,000 of his budget to help offset the Medicaid losses for this fiscal year, and Lancaster County commissioners also agreed last week to step in with short-term funding.

Todd Wiltgen, County Board chairman, said he is hoping for a solution to the Medicaid issue and a continuation of Medicaid dollars from the state and federal government.

The Bridge is also expecting some help from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, whose students and fans are often Bridge clients on days of Husker games, according to Phil Tegeler, Bridge executive director.

The Bridge has been operating its civil protective custody program for more than 30 years, providing up to 24 hours of detoxification care for people who are publicly intoxicated, arrested on drunk driving charges, or arrested on other misdemeanor charges and are drunk or high on drugs.

If the civil protective custody program is reduced, because of funding problems, more people will end up in the county jail, which is funded with county tax dollars, commissioners were told during a meeting last week.

* Many drunk drivers -- 200 arrested by sheriff's deputies and around 1,200 by city police annually -- would end up in jail.

Taking the people arrested for driving under the influence to jail would cost the county around $140,000 a year, said Roma Amundson, county commissioner.

* Currently, police also take people who are so intoxicated they are a danger to themselves or others to the Bridges civil protective custody unit. If there were no Bridge services, police would likely charge many of them with a misdemeanor and house them in jail, police said.

Even now the Bridge's civil protective custody unit cant always handle all the intoxicated people brought in by police on a Husker home game weekend.

Last Saturday night, the Bridge was at its 20-bed capacity for several hours, forcing police to try to find a relative willing to take the person in or wait for a detox bed to open up.

Police have come to rely on the Bridges' civil protective custody service. "Its a resource we have relied on for 34 years. If we lose that civil protective custody component, that would be devastating," said Lancaster County Sheriff Terry Wagner during the County Board discussion.

"I dont think the county jail is a proper place for someone who is highly intoxicated," Wiltgen said.

The Bridge has depended on the Medicaid reimbursement for decades to help supplement city and state funding for this program.

In January, state Medicaid staff determined the civil protective custody services have no Medicaid definition and are therefore not eligible for reimbursement. Medicaid would pay for a hospital stay or emergency room visit for these same people.

The Bridge and Medicaid staff are working to come up with a service definition to resolve the Medicaid roadblock, Tegeler said.

The Medicaid definition issue is also linked to another $100,000 in funding that comes through Region V Systems to the Bridge, Tegeler noted.

That funding is expected to continue unless Bridge and Medicaid staff cannot find a solution, he said.
(Agencia CMA Latam) - Former Brazilian minister Geddel Vieira Lima was arrested Friday morning in Salvador city by the Federal Police after investigators have found his fingerprints in the apartment where he allegedly stored R$ 51 million (US$ 16.38 million) in cash.

According to a statement from the Federal Public Prosecutor's Office (MPF),the federal judge Vallisney de Souza Oliveira issued two arrest warrants and three search and seizure orders to be carried out in Salvador, the capital of Bahia state, to avoid destroying evidence.

On Tuesday, the Brazilian Federal Police has found the money stored in the apartment, located in an upscale neighborhood in Salvador. The place was opened under judicial order by the federal police after collecting information related to Operation Cui Bono, which investigates a fraud scheme within a public bank, Caixa Economica.

Geddel, who was a vice-president at Caixa Economica from 2011 to 2013, and former House of Representatives speaker Eduardo Cunha, are singled out as the primary articulators of the scheme.

Geddel was a minister under Michel Temer and Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. Before that, he was a federal representative for the PMDB, Temer's party.

by Agencia CMA Latam

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Japan will on Monday release July figures for core machine orders, highlighting a modest day for Asia-Pacific economic activity.

Machine orders are expected to rise 4.1 percent on month and fall 7.8 percent on year after sliding 1.9 percent on month and 5.2 percent on year in June.

Japan also will see July numbers for its tertiary industry index, as well as August data for money stock and machine tool orders.

The tertiary industry index is expected to add 0.1 percent following the flat reading in June, while machine tool orders surged 28.0 percent on year in July.

The M2 money stock is tipped to rise 4.1 percent on year after gaining 4.0 percent in July, while the M3 is called steady at 3.4 percent.

New Zealand will provide August figures for credit card spending. Overall card spending is expected to add 0.2 percent on month after falling 0.7 percent in July. Retail spending is called higher by 0.5 percent after losing 0.5 percent in the previous month.

Malaysia will see July numbers for industrial and manufacturing production. Industrial production is expected to rise 5.5 percent on year after gaining 4.0 percent in June. Manufacturing production is called higher by 4.9 percent, up from 4.7 percent in the previous month.

The Philippines will provide July figures for imports, exports and trade balance. In June, imports were worth $7.06 billion and exports were at $4.91 billion for a trade deficit of $2.15 billion.

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(Agencia CMA Latam) - U.S. President Donald Trump signed a US$ 15.25 billion relief package to victims of the Hurricane Harvey, which includes raising the government debt ceiling, according to the White House.

The aid package was approved this morning by 316-90 in the House of Representatives and is expected to pass in the Senate. "It is possible that President Trump signs the bill today," counselor Tom Bossert told a news conference.

The measure's progress in Congress comes after a deal reached on Wednesday between Trump and Democratic opposition leaders. "Thanks to the bipartisan agreement, it was possible to move forward on debt and funding," said White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders.

The package ensures government funding through December 8, allowing the Treasury Department to meet its obligations beyond the deadline of September 29.

by Agencia CMA Latam

For comments and feedback: editorial@rttnews.com

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As students at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln settle in for another semester, many will be looking to jump-start their post-collegiate careers through internships.

And being well dressed before going into a interview is key for landing those internships and boosting students' confidence, said Bill Watts, director of UNL's Career Services, a university career center that helps students find employment.

The center is teaming up with J.C. Penney at Lincoln's Gateway Mall for Sunday's Suit-Up event, where UNL students can buy professional attire at a discounted price.

"Students are at a point in their lives where they need to transition into a professional wardrobe, but where there might not be that fiscal opportunity to do so," Watts said.

The J.C. Penney at Gateway Mall near 66th and O streets, which is typically open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Sundays, will open from 6:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. for students to shop.

Pre-ordered professional attire  suits, dresses, pants, socks, belts, shirts and more  will be sold at a 40 percent discount with a valid student ID, on top of regular sale prices, said the store's general manager Brian Tadlock.

"It's important to not only have that professional attire, but it also makes you feel good about going into an interview, not having to worry about how I'm going to look," said Tadlock, who expects anywhere from 400 to 700 students to show up.

Faculty, staff and alumni from UNL, along with J.C. Penney employees, will be available to help students with sizing and selection.

This is the first year the store is holding the Suit-Up event. It's a concept that has worked at other schools around the country, Tadlock said. Two Big Ten schools, the University of Iowa and Ohio State University, will also hold Suit-Up events at J.C. Penney stores this fall.

J.C. Penney also awarded UNL's Career Services a $1,000 grant, which will be used for gift cards for students, Watts said.

Sunday's event comes weeks before UNL's Career Services will host its fall career fairs around campus, where students can network and meet with prospective employers.

A business and liberal arts career fair will be held at Pinnacle Bank Arena on Sept. 25, followed by a science, technology, engineering and math fair at the arena on Sept. 26.

Fairs for students studying actuarial science, education and agricultural science will be held in October.

Store general manger Tadlock said his store is planning on holding a Suit-Up event in the spring, in conjunction with additional career fairs.
Last week was definitely a memorable time for us all.

It was when we played host to the 48th Pacific Islands Forum Leaders Meeting right here in Apia, where as the Forums Chairman, Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi, was without a doubt the man of the moment.

Indeed, there is no denying that his very presence had ensured the convention would become uniquely successful, as itd turned out to be. Whats more, there was infectious peace too with happy, smiling faces everywhere.

When he launched that World Bank report aimed at accelerating economic growth in the Pacific region, Tuilaepa announced the idea was geared towards increasing both jobs and incomes around the region.

He said the report hopes to create more than 500,000 new jobs, and increase incomes by more than 40 percent, for people in most Pacific Island countries by 2040.

He then pointed out that the report was being launched jointly with World Bank Vice President for East Asia and Pacific, Victoria Kwakwa.

He said: Pacific Possible is not just another report, but an analytical piece of work that governments, like ours, will use as a platform for policy discussions and reforms, that will deliver real outcomes for our people.

He also said: We are working hard to take the tourism sector in Samoa to the next level -- the analysis in Pacific Possible is something we can draw on -- in our discussions to help make this possibility a reality.

Now the question is: What is he talking about here?

When he said: We are working hard to take the tourism sector in Samoa to the next level, can we ask: What level is he talking about now?

Indeed, how many levels is Tuilaepas government planning to raise Samoas tourism sector to, in order for it to be in a position to create more than 500,000 new jobs, and increase their incomes by more than 40 percent by 2040?

It would be good to know.

All were being told is that so far, according to Pacific Possible, which is a Pacific Island organization that has taken nearly three years in the making, is staffed by non-governmental organizations, academics and individuals across the region, and their final, complete report identifies four significant transformative opportunities, for increased prosperity for Pacific countries, together with a set of recommendations for minimizing the economic impact of the biggest challenges, facing the Pacific Islands over the next 25 years.

Now please dont get me wrong!

My question is: Who is the genius whod put together this conglomeration of words and quite meaningless ideas, knowing well that no one with a sane mind would be able to make any sense out of them all?

Still, what are these biggest challenges, anyway?

According to Tuilaepa, they include new source markets in tourism; greater labour mobility between Pacific countries, Australia and New Zealand; improved information communications and technology affordability and access, and higher incomes from more sustainable use of fisheries.

And then there is climate change and natural disasters, as well as non-communicable diseases, which have been highlighted somewhere as the two greatest threats.

Still, there is hope.

Said Ms. Victoria Kwakwa: Tourism, ICT, labour mobility, and sustainable fisheries, are the key sectors analyzed in Pacific Possible, that represent the greatest opportunities for governments, to turn possibility into reality.

She also said: By focusing policy reforms and investments in these key areas, they can deliver the greatest benefit for most people.

Now is that so? Indeed, what is she talking about here?

Still, once again, with its meager resources and quite fickle economy, how can Samoa possibly cope?

Indeed, now that the United States of America, has assured Pacific leaders that it will maintain its leadership in the fight against climate change, well then, that is definitely news we should be thankful for.

According to the U.S. Acting Assistant Secretary of State for the East Asian and Pacific Affairs, Susan Thornton, who attended the Pacific Forum last week, her country had not withdrawn from the Paris climate accord, (not) just yet (anyway).

She also said the US government is still working through the details, with regards to their status on the Paris Agreement.

And then in 2015 America signed the Paris Agreement under President Barack Obama.

However, earlier this year, U.S. President Trump announced that the United States will withdraw.

In order to fulfill my solemn duty to protect America and its citizens, the United States will withdraw from the Paris climate accord, Trump said at the time.

Now Ms Thorton said: The announcement angered the Pacific nations, who are at the forefront of the impact of climate change.

During last weeks meeting though, Ms Thorton offered a different view.

She said: I think what the President has said was that the U.S. is going to maintain its Paris Agreement.

The President also said: We are going to maintain our leadership on the reduction of green house gas emissions, and other environmental and climate related efforts.

He went on to say: We have a lot to be very proud of in the United States, and we have managed to show that you can reduce your green gas emissions, and still keep the economy going. We have reduced emissions considerably over the last ten years.

Now Ms Thorton pointed out: So I dont see a contradiction between maintaining our engagement in the Pacific.

Of course, the Pacific Islands have expressed concerns about climate change, and the effects of climate change on them, which were very sensitive to.

Ms Thorton then assured of the USs commitment to the Pacific region, saying: Weve heard a lot of comments, but I think the United States is going to remain engaged on the issue of climate change, as we have programmes in the region that are bilateral.

We also have a seat on the board of the Green Climate Fund and have contributed a billion dollars to the fund.

Were going to remain active, while we continue to look at the effects and implications of the agreement, and what were going to do about our status in the agreement.

And lastly, lets talk briefly about the story titled Pacific leaders asked to stop assault on media at Forum, that was published in the Weekend Observer, on 9 September 2017.

The story said that during the traditional welcoming ceremony, attended by Pacific island leaders, a journalist was trying to take a photo of the ceremony when she was manhandled by a policeman, Monica Miller, the Chair of the Rarotongan-based Pacific Freedom Forum, wrote.

She went on to say: It was upsetting to hear that a colleague, trying to capture Samoas traditional welcoming of Pacific island leaders, was manhandled by a policeman.

She then revealed that as local and overseas journalists were edging up to the back corner of a tent where some delegates were seated - to get out of the rain - a police officer grabbed the journalist by the arm and tried to pull her out of the shelter.

And then questioning the officers action, Miller wrote: Why the need for force? A camera woman being manhandled by a plain clothed policeman amounts to assault.

She then called for the incident to be investigated, and for the officer to be disciplined.

She said: P.F.F is concerned that it seems every year, forum organizers treat members of the news media with disdain, and even hostility.

As it turned out, the journalist is question is Heidi Yieng Kow; she is from French Polynesia.

Ms Miller said the police assault on Heidi Yieng Kow, took place against a background of decades of complaints, about the mistreatment journalists at the forum.

She also said an assault on a journalist by a police officer is a new low, adding that the officer in this case could have politely asked the camerawoman to move along.

Ms Miller said: We are the Fourth Estate, the eyes and ears of more than 30 million people, across the worlds largest region.

She also said: Pacific leaders have long called for media to do better than parachute journalism - to move beyond coups and cyclones  and yet when foreign and local media turn up to cover the regions top meeting, they are often treated poorly.

Yieng Kow first started working in Tahiti media in 1999, her LinkedIn profile says.Before that, she worked in France and later in the La Reunion islands, before returning to French Polynesia, in 2002.

Since then she has been writing and filming stories for 15 years.

Asked for a comment, Yieng Kow was polite.

She told Ms Miller: Im sure I came across an exception! Most people are super nice.

She has class, Yieng Kow.

Have a peaceful Sunday Samoa, God bless!
The Ministry of Revenue has confiscated a container allegedly smuggled into the country using falsified documents.

This was confirmed by the Minister of Revenue, Tialavea Tionisio Hunt.

Responding to questions from the Sunday Samoan, he also confirmed that an internal investigation has been launched to determine what happened and how it happened.

The incident occurred last week. The Minister and his Associate Minister, Sooalo Mene, were present when the discovery was made.

According to the Minister, the container belongs to a businessman running a furniture store. He was not at liberty to divulge the identity of the man.

The red flag arose with the increasing number of containers that had been imported, he said. Usually this company brings in two containers but this time it had increased to five.

The manifest indicated the items in the container were furniture but we found out they were not. All five containers were released under the Customs Green Lane List.

When the Ministry became suspicious, they demanded further information.

They were never provided by the local business and then we had to step in and to confiscate the containers.

By the time we got to the containers there was only one left and we took 2,300 soda cases. We confiscated the shipment from a Chinese Store.

I dont know what is the connection between the Chinese store and the business man, but we will find out as the Customs are doing and investigation.

According to Tialavea, the internal investigation will determine if there was collusion in the matter. He said the government has zero tolerance for this type of activity.

One of the containers should have been opened, he said. I am not saying we are at fault but the Customs Officers should have opened at least one.

I dont understand why that was not done, but I am certain that we will get to the bottom of this.

We have a huge role to play in terms of revenue collection and if there was any collusion or bypassing tax obligations then someone will lose their job.

I will not stop there, that person(s) will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

The Minister also pointed out the matter is clear breach of trust between the business and the Ministry.

And this business man has abused the system that was created for the releasing of operation to run smoothly.

I know we will be highly criticized by this incident for our Green Lane list, but this does not mean we will suspend this system.

Its working as the businesses prepay their shipment and the companies get their containers right away.

This practice is the result of our mutual working relationship with the private sector and this system had been in place long before and we will not change it, due to actions by one business.

This means the Customs Officers need to more vigilant and more judgmental and they will now conduct more spot checks.

One things for sure is that this company will be taken off the list and their shipments will be checked all the time.
American Samoas hopes of becoming a full member of the Pacific Islands Forum have been dealt a major blow.

In Apia for the Forum Meeting, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific, Matt J. Matthews, said the possibility of it happening is very slim.

He said the legal opinion and a long standing policy by the United States Department of State prohibits U.S territories from becoming members of an international organization.

Prior to this week, American Samoa Government Chief of Staff, Fiu Johnny Saleua, told the Samoa Observer they want to become a full member of the Forum. He said they would be asking the U.S. Department of State and was confident their request to Washington D.C. would be granted.

He said the proposal was prepared by the Governors Legal Counsel, Alema Leota and Attorney General Taleuega Eleasalo Ale.

Heading the delegation at the P.I.F.s, Fiu told the Samoa Observer that once they return to American Samoa, they will finalise the lengthy proposal and with the approval by Governor Lolo Matalasi Moliga, it will then be sent off for approval.

But based on Mr. Matthews statement, it may not be as simple as that.

The general legal opinion of the treaties and law department of the Department of State for territories of the United States for which the U.S. provides security and foreign policies is that they cannot be full members of International Organization. They are in fact territories of the United States and so they will probably continue on as observers.

In response to the Samoa Observer questions, Mr. Leota said that if their proposal is denied, that is something they have to work on.

I know there are different channels, he said.

We have a lot of issues that we can control ourselves like immigration, taxes, trade goods with other countries.

There are areas which we have authority alone. In this case, we need to speak and work with State Department and they have been a great partner and they have been helping us with these big conferences.
The New Zealand General Election takes place later this month on 23 September 2017 and Agnes Loheni, one of the sisters from the local Samoan fashion brand MENA is stepping into the political ring as the National Party Candidate for Mangere.

Agnes, the eldest daughter of Fepuleai Pelasio Loheni, of Siumu, Lefagaoalii Siumu, and Filomena Matautia Loheni, of Amaile, Lalomanu, Saleaaumua, Asau, Safotu, is delighted to be selected by the National Party in April this year.

Shes been humbled by the support of friends, family and complete strangers who have jumped onto her campaign team.

Agnes is standing against incumbent and long standing Labour Party M.P. for Mangere Aupito Sua William Sio.

She made her choice to stand with National because she believes that Nationals values are more aligned to the values that have shaped not only the achievements in her life but also her attitude to challenges.

Ive seen my parents and work hard all their lives to keep my sisters and I housed, clothed, fed and educated, she said.

Theyve supported and served our extended aiga and Ive seen them uphold our values around of faith, service and pride in our cultural heritage.

Even though there was not a lot of money growing up, we were rich in the currency of love, faith, the strength of our families and a belief that we could achieve the future we wanted with education and hard work.

Although Mangere is a strongly held Labour seat, Agnes is standing to give the people of Mangere a more aspirational choice because she believes that prosperity cannot be handed to you through a welfare benefit.

Agnes journey of building a successful business, raising five children, and attaining a degree in Chemical Engineering wasnt easy but working hard, resilience, her faith and persevering when times get tough are all qualities that she thinks will put her in a strong place to serve the people of Mangere and all New Zealanders as a Member of Parliament.

Agnes has been busy campaigning since April.

Door-knocking, visiting schools, community groups, public meetings and candidate debates are part and parcel of election campaigning. Agnes is delighted to have been able to host the N.Z. Prime Minister Leuluaialiiotumua Bill English in the Mangere electorate on a number of occasions.

I feel extremely fortunate to have a Party Leader like Bill English who speaks often about his faith, the strength of his large family and his vision to make sure New Zealand continues to both prosper and care for those on our community who need it.

Agnes encourages all those living in Samoa who are NZ Citizens or Permanent Residents to vote in this years election.

They can do that by taking their ID to the NZ High Commission Office in Apia.

The deadline for overseas voting papers to be returned to the NZ High Commission is 4pm Friday 22nd September.
Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull might have been the last leader to arrive for the 48th Pacific Islands Forum Meeting in Apia but once he touched down, it was business right away.

Mr. Turnbull held bilateral talks with the Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi and later announced a number of initiatives by Australia to help the Pacific region.

Among them was a hi-tech fixed-wing aircraft to patrol the Pacific oceans and the offer that 2000 Pacific Islanders will be able to get a three-year visa to work in rural and regional communities in Australia.

The Prime Minister said Australia hopes the aerial surveillance mission across the waters will help detect and disrupt illegal fishing.

This surveillance will be operationally controlled by the P.I.Fs Forum Fisheries Agency in Honiara. Flights are expected to commence before the end of the year and will also be able to assist in addressing issues such as transnational crime and people smuggling.

The following is a media statement issued by Turnbull about his trip to Samoa:

The Pacific Islands Forum (P.I.F) brings together leaders of all Pacific nations to drive stronger regional cooperation and advance our collective security and prosperity.

At last years P.I.F in Pohnpei, I committed to step up Australias engagement in the Pacific. Today, I am delivering on that promise. Australia is introducing a series of practical initiatives that will bolster regional cooperation on common security challenges and integrate Pacific Island economies more closely with our own.

SECURITY COLLABORATION

This years PIF follows the successful conclusion in 2017 of the RAMSI operation in Solomon Islands. RAMSI demonstrated what can be achieved when Australia and our Pacific partners work together to manage common security challenges.

I was pleased that Pacific leaders agreed today to commence work on a new regional security declaration to strengthen cooperation between our countries. This will position the region better to address threats such as people smuggling, transnational organised crime, cyber attacks and major disease outbreaks.

The protection of the oceans and their resources is a vital national interest for all PIF countries. Thats why Australia will also fund a new aerial surveillance mission across the waters of PIF members to help detect and disrupt illegal fishing. This surveillance will be operationally controlled by the PIFs Forum Fisheries Agency in Honiara. Flights are expected to commence before the end of the year and will also be able to assist in addressing issues such as transnational crime and people smuggling. This new program complements our existing support to regional security efforts through Patrol Boats. The first keel of the new Pacific Patrol Boats was recently laid down in Western Australia - the first of these will be delivered to Papua New Guinea in late 2018.

Australia will also expand its national security training and assistance in the Pacific to support the development of tailored responses to national security challenges.

Today, I signed new umbrella security arrangements with Tuvalu and Nauru which will provide a framework for new engagement on identity, border and health security. I will also sign agreements with Nauru, Tuvalu and Tonga to bolster health security by providing support through the Therapeutic Goods Administration for medicine quality and safety testing of drugs in these three countries. This will reduce costs and increase assurances about the safety and efficacy of drugs.

ECONOMIC INTEGRATION

A new Pacific Labour Scheme in 2018 will give Pacific Island citizens opportunities to work in rural and regional Australia for up to three years, and help plug labour shortages in our towns and on our farms. Kiribati, Nauru and Tuvalu will have first access to the scheme, with an initial intake of up to 2,000 workers. Australia will also establish a new Pacific Labour Facility to support the scheme  helping connect Australian employers with workers and monitoring its social and economic impacts.

This initiative builds on the very successful and longstanding Seasonal Worker Program, which itself will be streamlined to support Australian employers and Pacific Island workers to access the program more effectively. My Government is also working with the Australian financial sector, the International Monetary Fund and the New Zealand Government to reduce the cost of remittances so that workers can more easily send home a portion of their income to support their communities.

The PACER Plus trade agreement is central to achieving better integration of economies in the Pacific. Negotiations for the agreement were concluded in Brisbane this year. Economic prosperity and security in the Pacific is good for all Australians, so I was pleased that Vanuatu joined the agreement as its 11th signatory yesterday.

CLOSER GOVERNMENTS AND COMMUNITIES

My Government will continue to build strong relationships between governments, communities and businesses in the Pacific through a new $2.2 million, two-year Pacific Connect pilot program. This program will bring together Pacific and Australian leaders across the public and private sectors to learn from each other; the first years focus will be on Bringing the Digital Revolution to the Pacific.

All these initiatives reflect the deep commitment of Australia and its PIF partners to strengthen our practical partnerships, embrace opportunities and manage the shared challenges we face in a changing world.
The new Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, Lopaoo Natanielu Mua, has called for better teamwork from his staff to improve the development of the sector in Samoa.

The Minister made the call during a ceremony on Friday where he was officially welcomed at the Tooa Salamasina Hall.

Lopaoo has replaced former Minister, Laaulialemalietoa Polataivao Schmidt, who has resigned following a criminal charge filed against him.

Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi had kept Lopaoos appointment a top secret until the day of the announcement.

Now a week into his new role, Lopaoo is a man on a mission.

Our contribution to G.D.P is a little over 7 percent and that reflects the work that we do, he said.

My message to you this morning is to make it a 100 percent effort, because your family, church, village and country depend on it.

The question is can we do it? The answer is yes we can make it a 100.

The Minister wants the A.C.E.Os, Principal Officers and everyone to work with the C.E.O.

Let us work together, I will not do your job for you or anyone else.

You have already been appointed to do your work. My job as the Minister is to look after the policies and the deliverable implementation, he said.

I need us to work together. There are so many promises made and for me I am not going to make you any promises but I just want to ask you to make it a 100 percent effort. This time, this year and that is all I ask.

Ladies and gentlemen the task that was given to us is to help improve the lives of our people through agriculture.

When it comes to agriculture, they can do without the money and so many things but they cannot do without food.

The Minister said he will be calling a monthly meeting with all staff members to update them on developments.

We will be having a meeting every month and if you dont attend the meeting you will know whats going to happen.

You need to conduct inspections for each of your divisions whether everything is running well and if there is anything you need help with.

The new Minister also encouraged his staff members to be honest.

Rev. Aisoli Tapa Iuli of the Methodist Church blessed the beginning of the Ministers tenure.
Life is very challenging.

Aitupe Aitupe of Fasitoo-uta knows this about life in Samoa today.

We are living at an age where life has so much to offer, the good, the bad, she said.

The most interesting challenge is the cost of living. It is such a hassle and its becoming very tiring as well.

People give their best to provide for families with the limited resources they have.

Aitupe does the best she can with what she has.

For me, I sell vegetables and that is our main source of income. It may not be enough but its the least I can do to support my family, she said.

In my family, our vegetables like pumpkin, cabbages, and tomatoes are what we rely on heavily.

We earn up to a $100 a day then we spend on buying what is needed for everyday necessities. Its not much but I am happy that I am able to provide for my family.

Aitupe also has advice for those struggling to seek employment to go back to the plantation.

Go back to the land, I know it will take time to get a farm going but believe me once you get it going and you see the fruits of your labor you will be happy, just like me.

One of the issues nowadays is that people want more, we need to differentiate and draw the line as to what are needs and what are wants.

Stop wanting to be like someone else and trying to purchase what you cannot afford because that is why we get poor, being greedy will only make things worse.

My advice, work hard and live within your own means stop comparing yourself to other people they are what they are.

If you were born an average person, then work on becoming a better person, we are all poor but the work we do determines our lives in this world, said Aitupe.

This life was given to us by God, our family needs us and so as our children does something good about it and live it in any way we can.
One hundred Nebraska Army National Guard soldiers and four UH-72 Lakota helicopters will be deployed to Florida for Hurricane Irma relief.

Just as we did in Texas, members of the Nebraska National Guard stand ready and able to do what we have always done, support our fellow Americans during times of natural disaster," Maj. Gen. Daryl Bohac, Nebraska adjutant general, said in a release Sunday.

The Category 4 storm touched ground Sunday morning in the Florida Keys after devastating several Caribbean islands. By evening, the eye was passing over Naples in southwest Florida.

Floridians will also receive relief efforts from Nebraska Task Force 1, who arrived in northern Florida Saturday after a 22-hour drive.

The 80-person team pulled into Eglin Air Force Base, near Pensacola, around 4 p.m. Saturday, where they await

The team doesn't know exactly where or when they will begin rescue work, Task Force leader Dave Kluthe said Sunday.

Recently deployed to assist in west Texas after Hurricane Harvey, the team is in good spirits, Kluthe said.

"We're getting ready to go to work."
Service is the pathway to success. That is the guiding beacon for 20 year old Viliamu Tito, of Leauvaa Uta. An untitled man or taulealea Viliamu believes in the true meaning of that Samoan quote.

Viliamus duties and responsibilities within his family are to do the daily chores.

To me personally, there is nothing wrong or hard about staying home and serving the family in that manner.

If you do it wholeheartedly you will be rewarded and mind you, there is nothing that comes easy, it is expected that if you to be successful, you must work towards it.

Samoan men are taught that when you become a Chief you have to make certain sacrifices for the families that you have pledged to serve.

Viliamu said the eagerness to serve his family came from observing his father, uncles and untitled men.

They work hard in everything they do, whether its chores in the family, village affairs, the men in my family put effort in what they do.

Viliamu emphasized that honesty must be the core foundation of what you do in life and in anything you do.

The young man also sends out a strong encouraging message to the youth who have failed in being upstanding citizens.

In this life we are given many chances to make amends and rebuild ourselves become better person that you were yesterday.

Viliamu also spoke about the untitled men who dont want to participate in village affairs.

I dont know why is it is so hard for them, if you have pride in your family and village this is the actions you take. You become active and should be a part of the village police.

I take pride in being an untitled man, because the time will come when I will get my reward for my service to my family and village.

As a taulealea I will do my work and serve my villages and families, said Viliamu.
When her mother developed Alzheimers disease, Susan Taylor thought she knew what to expect.

The reality was worse.

I was not prepared for the agitation that she had, the frustration that she had, the anger that she had, the former NBC San Diego news anchor said Saturday.

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Also unexpected: After her father died, she learned to routinely lie to her mother.

Every time I would tell her that dad had passed away, she would relive the pain of that, said Taylor, now with Scripps Health. And then two minutes later she would forget. So when she kept asking for him I finally just said, Dads sleeping.

1 / 10 The more than 1,400 participants in the Walk to End Alzheimers, San Diego, that began and ended in Crown Point Park, walk along Bayside Walk. (Howard Lipin / San Diego Union-Tribune) 2 / 10 David Dubnicka holds up a flower wind spinner during the Walk to End Alzheimers, San Diego, that began and ended in Crown Point Park. Each person received a different colored spinner based on whether the person they were walking for has passed away from the disease, they have disease, care for an Alzheimers patient, or support the cause. (Howard Lipin / San Diego Union-Tribune) 3 / 10 During the Walk to End Alzheimers, San Diego, that began and ended in Crown Point Park, Dale Pettit has a family photo attached to the back of his shirt that includes his mom, Ellen Pettit, who has the disease. (Howard Lipin / San Diego Union-Tribune) 4 / 10 Alyssia Claiborne walked for her mom, Rita, during the Walk to End Alzheimers, San Diego, that began and ended in Crown Point Park. (Howard Lipin / San Diego Union-Tribune) 5 / 10 The more than 1,400 participants in the Walk to End Alzheimers, San Diego, that began and ended in Crown Point Park, walk along Bayside Walk. (Howard Lipin / San Diego Union-Tribune) 6 / 10 Beatriz Lopez walked for her dad who died of Alzheimers, and her brother who has it, during the Walk to End Alzheimers, San Diego, that began and ended in Crown Point Park. (Howard Lipin / San Diego Union-Tribune) 7 / 10 The more than 1,400 participants in the Walk to End Alzheimers, San Diego, that began and ended in Crown Point Park, hold up different colored flower wind spinners they received, which represents whether the person they were walking for has passed away from the disease, they have disease, care for an Alzheimers patient, or support the cause. (Howard Lipin / San Diego Union-Tribune) 8 / 10 The more than 1,400 participants in the Walk to End Alzheimers, San Diego, that began and ended in Crown Point Park, hold up different colored flower wind spinners they received, which represents whether the person they were walking for has passed away from the disease, they have disease, care for an Alzheimers patient, or support the cause. (Howard Lipin / San Diego Union-Tribune) 9 / 10 Monica Serrano held a sign supporting her grandmother who has Alzheimers, while she walked in the Walk to End Alzheimers, San Diego, that began and ended in Crown Point Park. (Howard Lipin / San Diego Union-Tribune) 10 / 10 Wendy Hooks Kramer participated in the Walk to End Alzheimers, San Diego, that began and ended in Crown Point Park. She walked to support her grandfathers side of her family, which has been affected by the disease. (Howard Lipin / San Diego Union-Tribune)

As a caregiver, you end up making up this web of lies and deceit, in order to lessen the pain, and in order to keep the person with Alzheimers not agitated.

Taylor moderated a panel discussion at Date With A Cure, Alzheimers San Diegos annual presentation at the University of San Diego.

In a separate effort to raise awareness Saturday, more than 1,400 participants fund-raised for Alzheimers care and research at the 2017 Walk to End Alzheimers  San Diego.

Held at Crown Point by a different organization, the local chapter of the Alzheimers Association, the event raised nearly $153,000 as of Saturday afternoon, surpassing its goal of $150,000. Donations are still being accepted.

Back at the Alzheimers San Diego USD panel, researchers and doctors said the good news is that what Alzheimers does to the brain, and what needs to be done to stop it, is known.

Alzheimers is physically characterized by toxic protein deposits in the brain, known as beta amyloid, and protein tangles known as tau. Both can now be noninvasively detected in living people, and the sequences of pathological events is also known; first amyloid then tau.

Moreover, drugs now in development inhibit or remove these abnormal proteins, said Dr. Paul Aisen, director of the San Diego-based Alzheimers Therapeutic Research Unit, part of the University of Southern California. However, Aisen said extensive testing is needed to identify which of the drugs under development are the right ones, what doses need to be given, and when.

Aisen and other panelists distinguished between Alzheimers disease, the pathological changes to the brain that destroy cognition, and the actual symptoms themselves. These changes begin many years before symptoms emerge.

People with Alzheimers may die with their minds intact, the panelists said, because disease progression to symptoms is delayed. The theory is that something about these people, either their genetic characteristics or their environment, protects against the full onslaught of Alzheimers.

Some things help with maintaining brain acuity, such as exercise. This helps keep a good supply of blood flowing to the brain, as well as to the heart. Mental exercises and an active social life are also believed to be beneficial.

Find a cure cant happen without the publics help, the researchers said. Money is useful, but also the participation of people, both healthy and sick, is needed for clinical trials of these drugs. The faster people can be screened and signed up, the sooner these trials can begin.

And those in clinical trials can make a contribution even after death, by donating their bodies to be studied.

Dr. Jim Brewer, director of the Shiley-Marcos Alzheimers Disease Research Center at UC San Diego, said 93 percent of the centers clinical trial participants agree to donate their bodies once the importance is explained to them.

Alzheimers San Diego provides comprehensive information on clinical trials being conducted in San Diego County at j.mp/asdtrials.

Along with supporting research, Alzheimers San Diego offers services to those now struggling with the disease, and those close to them who bear the brunt of dealing with the consequences.

The nonprofit can give caregivers a break with free weekly respite care. Caregivers can learn more about the program online at j.mp/alzresp or by calling (858) 492-4400.

Science Playlist  On Now In a first, scientists rid human embryos of a potentially fatal gene mutation by editing their DNA On Now Space station flyovers visible from San Diego this week 0:55 On Now UCSD's 'ghost drivers' begin testing people's reaction seemingly empty cars 1:29 On Now 10 interesting facts about Mars On Now Kids can add years to your life On Now LA 90: SpaceX launches recycled rocket On Now Big passions, big giving: Malin Burnham 2:30 On Now Big passions, big giving: Darlene Shiley 2:40 On Now Big passions, big giving: Joan and Irwin Jacobs 2:45 On Now Ocean temperatures warming at rapid rate, study finds

bradley.fikes@sduniontribune.com

(619) 293-1020
While wildfires rage throughout the northern part of California and elsewhere in the West, locally firefighters await the coming fall, when traditionally the worst blazes hit the Southern California region.

Wildfire conditions in San Diego County presently are decent, firefighters say. The moisture levels of the live brush in the mountains and valleys of the backcountry are a bit higher than normal because of the big winter rains and some monsoonal downpours that have been drenching parts of the area every few weeks this summer.

Still, it will all depend on the weather, specifically the Santa Ana winds which in past Octobers have turned small fires into huge conflagrations that in 2003 and 2007 destroyed thousands of homes and killed dozens.

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Its not doom and gloom, said Cleveland National Forest Fire Chief Brian Rhodes. But its an interesting time.

One concern is that all of the active fires up north, where many firefighters normally assigned to San Diego fire stations are now helping battle flames, will keep burning into this regions most dangerous period.

Rhodes said usually weather patterns shift in mid-to-late September in the Pacific Northwest and the northern Rockies, bringing moisture from the coast and diminishing fire activity. But should the summer-like conditions persist, they will still need a lot of firefighters, fire trucks and aircraft to combat those blazes.

It could put us in a bad position down here because well be competing for resources, Rhodes said.

He also worries about fatigue.

We have a lot of resources gone helping out in Oregon, Montana and the fires in Northern California. Whether its the Forest Service or Cal Fire, weve been going after this quite hard for a while now. Its a big concern. We need to give people the rest they need.

So far the fire season in San Diego County has been pretty tame. Like every year, hundreds of small fires have broken out, but theyve been quickly contained and kept small.

We have not had any big, destructive fires, said Cal Fire Capt. Issac Sanchez. There are fires that happen every week that simply dont garner any media attention because they are put out almost immediately. No agency can keep every fire small, but this year in San Diego County weve done a pretty good job of it.

A few blazes this year have threatened homes and the largest consumed about 2,000 acres of wilderness near the Mexican border in May.

There are particular parts of the county at greater risk than others  areas that havent burned in a long time.

In North County, the Palomar Mountain range and the Agua Tibia Wilderness area to its northwest is especially vulnerable. Also at risk is the Laguna Mountain range, where its been a long time since the 1970 Laguna fire burned from the edge of the desert into populated parts of East County. After that, it was 33 years before another massive firestorm hit the county in 2003. Then just four years later it happened again.

Whether that can be attributed to climate change is unknown, but officials fear the dynamic has changed.

Theres a consensus that we are experiencing larger, more destructive fires in the last 10 to 15 years, Sanchez said. Thats the new normal. Thats the level of fires that were seeing now that historically hadnt really appeared.

Rhodes and Sanchez said fire season is pretty much year-round now and that any part of the county can burn whether or not it has seen recent fire activity recently.

But the areas that havent burned in the past 15 to 20 years, those fires have the potential to burn for a very long time because theres a lot of heavier fuels available, Rhodes said.

The effects of the recent drought and tree die-off has caused a great deal of dead, flammable, brush to accumulate in the forest.

Once its dead its dead, Rhodes said. It doesnt matter what the weather is. If the fuel is dead it will burn. It will burn when its raining because its dead.

Other parts of the county of great concern are the Sweetwater drainage area east of Alpine and the forest east of Pine Valley bisected by Interstate 8 where fire has not burned since the 1950s, Rhodes said.

Of special concern in that area are vehicle fires along the freeway that could start a blaze. Under the worst weather conditions a fire in that area could grow quickly and head west toward populated areas pushed by Santa Ana winds.

Since the huge firestorms of the last decade, the county has invested millions of dollars to strengthen firefighting capabilities and SDG&E has hardened and improved much of its electrical system in hopes of avoiding the 2007 scenarios where sparks from their equipment, caused by massive Santa Ana winds, began several major fires.

Communications also have greatly improved in the past decade, with numerous tools now available to people to keep track of imminent fire danger and websites and apps to help protect families and their property.

Cal Fire has launched a Ready for Wildfire app, available for download via the App Store or Google Play Store by searching for Cal Fire. It provides critical wildfire alerts and puts a whole library of step-by-step checklists in the palm of the users hand concerning such things as creating defensible space around their homes, assembling an emergency supply kit and creating a family communication and evacuation plan.

The county, too, has several tools available all easily accessible by visiting readysandiego.org on the web.

jharry.jones@sduniontribune.com; 760/529-4931; Twitter: @jharryjones
CITY COUNCILS

DEL MAR

The Del Mar City Council met in closed session Tuesday to discuss litigation, property negotiation and personnel. In regular session, the council heard nearly two hours of public comment on the recent decision to terminate Del Mar lifeguard Pat Vergne. Longtime resident and community figure Tensia Trejo was honored with a proclamation. The council held a hearing and approved an ordinance on the permit process for electric vehicle charging stations. The council discussed the Coast to Crest Trail, which ends before reaching the beach, and does not allow horses to reach the beach. A suggestion on how to accommodate passage to the beach and also to allow horses at certain times was approved to send to the Lagoon Committee. A Deemed Approved ordinance to control late-night bar-related nuisances was discussed, and staff was directed to research the cost of hiring additional patrols. A public hearing for a setback seawall permit at 2938 Sandy Lane was continued to Oct. 2.

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ENCINITAS

The Encinitas City Council met Wednesday to hold a public hearing on the upcoming move to by-district elections instead of at-large elections. The council discussed the number of districts and approved a communications plan with modifications to inform the public on the process.

OCEANSIDE

The Oceanside City Council met in closed session Wednesday to discuss labor negotiations, litigation and property negotiations. In regular session, the council discussed and approved its Library Strategic Plan Update 2016-2020. Councilmember Esther Sanchez and the Oceanside Noche Mexicana Committee invited the community to the 13th annual Noche Mexicana from 1-7 p.m. today at Civic Center Plaza.

POWAY

The Poway City Council met Tuesday to hold a hearing and approve the first reading of an ordinance prohibiting marijuana dispensaries and marijuana cultivation and delivery. The council also approved starting eminent domain proceedings to acquire the final easements for the Espola Road Safety Project.

SCHOOL DISTRICTS

ESCONDIDO

The Escondido Union High School District board met Tuesday in closed session to discuss student discipline and waivers. In regular session, the board adopted changes in regulations dealing with suicide prevention training and education. The board also received a contract proposal from the California School Employees Association, Chapter 219, and offered the districts proposal to the CSEA. New student board members Carolina Flores and Jasmine Colak were sworn in.

FALLBROOK

The Fallbrook Union Elementary School District board met in closed session Tuesday to discuss litigation and labor negotiations. In regular session, the board heard initial contract proposals from the Fallbrook Elementary Teachers Association and the California School Employees Association, Chapter 307; and approved the California State Preschool Program Quality Block Grant Services agreement.

SOLANA BEACH

The Solana Beach School District board met in special closed session Thursday to discuss contract negotiations.

laura.groch@sduniontribune.com
For the third year in a row, North Coast Repertory Theatre is going back to the well  producing a play by Neil Simon, the New York playwright whose work launched the Solana Beach theater back in 1982.

Some of Simons plays have worn well with age. Others havent. This years offering, the 1969 comedy The Last of the Red Hot Lovers, is a bit creaky, with some awkwardly dated dialogue. But the play, which opened Saturday night, also has a superb cast led by Phil Johnson, who has a long track record as San Diegos funniest actor.

Johnson is gifted at playing everyman (and everywoman) characters who may put up a front of confidence, ease and panache, but their fear, inexperience and ordinariness eventually poke holes in their veneer.

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So, director Christopher Williams couldnt have chosen a better actor to play Barney Cashman, a nice and decent long-married New Yorker in his mid-40s whos determined to have an extramarital affair before the free love era ends. Barney may try desperately to play the hip, suave swinger, but Johnsons hesitant gestures, carefully averted eyes and painfully grimacing smile betray the characters conflicting emotions.

The two-hour, 30-minute play has three scenes, each involving Barneys attempted seductions of different women in his mothers empty apartment, which has been elegantly designed by Marty Burnett and tastefully decorated with grandmotherly doilies and family photos.

Barneys first tryst attempt is with sex-hungry housewife Elaine, who shows little patience for Barneys conversational foreplay and casual flirtation. As Elaine, Katie Karel plays the hard-boiled, hard-drinking serial adulterer with bold, liberated fearlessness.

Next comes Bobbi, a cheerful 20something actress from California who seems at first charmingly naive before revealing herself as a serious nutjob. Noelle Marion makes a hilarious North Coast Rep debut in the role, continuously delivering unexpected twists and turns with her catlike physicality and quicksilver emotions.

Finally we meet Jeanette, a repressed and clinically depressed housewife who calculates shes enjoyed just 8.2 percent of her life. Sandy Campbells honest, naturalistic portrayal of this sad, soul-searching character ultimately brings out Barney underlying humanity.

Simons script is talky, particularly in the repetitive final scene, but Williams production is packed with situational and visual humor to keep the laughs flowing. Johnsons detail-rich improvisational skills also help, especially on opening night when he (and later Marion) turned a broken prop into a running gag.

Matt Novotny designed lighting, Aaron Rumley designed sound and Elisa Benzoni designed the period costumes which ideally suit the personalities of each character. Thanks to the consistency of its design and performances, Red Hot Lovers is a picture-perfect snapshot of middle-class life in late 60s America. But that comes with its own baggage. There are uncomfortable comments about blacks, Mexicans and gay people and an over-the-top pot-smoking scene that reflect the attitudes of the times.

North Coast Rep audiences love to laugh and they love Simons plays, so Last of the Red Hot Lovers has already been extended by a week. It now runs through Oct. 8.

The Last of the Red Hot Lovers

When: 7 p.m. Wednesdays and Sundays. 8 p.m. Thursdays-Saturdays. 2 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays. Extended through Oct. 8.

Where: North Coast Repertory Theatre, 987D Lomas Santa Fe Drive, Solana Beach.

Tickets: $44-$53

Phone: (858) 481-1055

Online: northcoastrep.org

pam.kragen@sduniontribune.com. Twitter: @pamkragen
They are native sons and daughters who left Mexico at a young age, grew up in the United States, and now face the possibility of a forced return to a country most can barelyif at allremember.

Hundreds of thousands of these young and undocumented Mexican immigrants are now struggling with an uncertain future. Questions about their fate have also loomed large in Mexico in recent days, forcing a forcing a closer look at how the country receives U.S. deportees.

The wake-up call came Tuesday, with the Trump administrations announcement that it is canceling the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. While neither a path to U.S. citizenship nor to permanent resident status, the DACA program since 2012 has allowed participants to study, work and live in the United States without fear of deportation. With that protection being lifted, Congress has been given six months to find a solution.

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Across Mexico, the news of DACAs cancellation for many has cut to the quick. President Enrique Pena Nieto tweeted that Mexico will receive these young people who return with open arms, while the Foreign Ministry issued a statement expressing profound regret at DACAs cancellation.

Critics say Mexico is far from prepared to receive any deported dreamersand has had a poor track record with deportees in general. Mexico continues to be not ready, said Nancy Landa, a deportee based in Tijuana whose firm, Mundo Translated, conducts research on immigration issues. You still see that theres not enough help, not enough resources, not enough support in the whole return process.

One of the main repatriation points on the U.S. border, Tijuana has been receiving an average of 85 deportees a day through July of this yearcompared an average of 106 a day last year, according to Mexican government figures. On the heels of DACAs cancellation, Tijuanas Coalition For the Defense of Migrants has raised some pointed questions about the ability of local, state and federal authorities in Mexico to assist these new arrivals.

Are you ready to provide the necessary support? the group asked in a written statement. What support programs are you contemplating? Is there a plan? Is there a public policy in this regard?

One Tijuana deportee group, Dreamers Moms, has few resources but is prepared to share shelter and orientation with any DACA recipients forced to return to Mexico.

We are ready to receive them, although we hope that none of them has to leave, said Yolanda Varona, the groups leader, whose daughter, daughter-in-law, and niece are DACA recipients. Definitely, their future would be better in the United States.

The private university, CETYS, issued a statement expressing solidarity with the dreamers, and announced that it is analyzing possible financial aid for those who quality.

The U.S. dreamers are getting a response that I havent seen in Mexico for many decades, said Rafael Fernandez de Castro, director of the Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies at University of California San Diego. The feeling in Mexico is that this is sad, it is against the U.S. soul, the U.S. has been very welcoming of immigrants.

But Fernandez also cautioned against raising excessive expectations of assistance in Mexicoand not coming through. The government should not promise what it cannot accomplish, he said. They have promised a lot to Mexican-Americans, to Mexicans here, and often they dont deliver.

Any move to deport the 800,000 young undocumented immigrants who have benefited from DACA would be overwhelming for Mexico. Close to 618,000 of these beneficiaries are Mexican-born, and many deportees who are already in Mexico say it has not been an easy experience.

Its more than a struggle, its a complete change of life, said Robert Vivar, 61, a longtime resident of Riverside County who now lives near the U.S. border fence in Playas de Tijuana, separated from his two children and six grandchildren. Vivar was brought to the United States at age six, and deported 4  years ago. He supports himself working at a call center with many fellow deportees, and volunteers with a group that orients deported veterans.

For younger deportees trying to continue their schooling in Mexico, its not impossible, but its obstacle after obstacle. Vivar said. Getting Mexican institutions to recognize U.S. educational credentials has been a difficult hurdle, he said. While some improvements have been made, we know kids who go to apply who get met with all kinds of obstacles, Vivar said.

The day after the announcement of DACAs cancellation, the Mexican government announced the creation of a special job bank geared to deported Dreamers. It promised to streamline the process of transferring U.S. university credits to Mexican higher education institutions.

But Luis Videgaray, the countrys foreign minister, said the most important objective will be diplomatic efforts to reach out to members of U.S. Congress who are now weighing the future of these dreamers. Videgaray said that the aim is to give legal certainty to these young people that would allow them to study and work in the United States.

At consulates across the United States, the Mexican government has been stepping up efforts to protect its citizens in the United States from deportation since Trumps election last year. We are tripling our efforts, said Marcela Celorio, the Mexican consul general in San Diego, home to some 38,000 DACA recipients.

sandra.dibble@sduniontribune.com

@sandradibble
Like many residents of Rosarito Beach, Victor Loza Bazan was a transplant. But he adopted this small oceanside city as his own, promoting Baja Sand, an annual sand sculpture festival that last month drew some 20,000 people.

A well-know figure in the citys tourism and real estate communities, Loza was found dead in a hotel room in Ensenada on Wednesday, according to the Baja California Attorney Generals Office. He had been stabbed repeatedly and wrapped in a blanket.

No suspects had been arrested as of Saturday, and authorities did not state a motive for the crime.

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Lozas death has caused shock and dismay in Rosarito Beach, where he had lived for more than a decade and had a broad network of connections that extended to government officials, journalists and members of the citys large expatriate community.

Rosarito has lost an icon, and we have lost a dear friend, said Judy Westphal, president of the United Society of Baja California, a organization spearheaded by U.S. expats and a hub for nonprofit groups in the area.

A certified public accountant in the United States, Loza lived in California for many years. After moving to Rosarito Beach, he turned to selling real estate. An advocate for professionalizing the industry, he promoted legal reforms requiring certification for anyone selling real estate, said Gustavo Torres, president of the Rosarito branch of the Mexican Association of Realtors.

He was very honest, very hard-working, very direct, Torres said. He put a lot of energy into promoting tourism and real estate in Rosarito.

sandra.dibble@sduniontribune.com

@sandradibble
Whenever Heidi Lynch thinks about priests molesting children, she shudders with memories of her own abuse and worries whether the Catholic Church is doing all it can to protect potential victims.

Are they really taking care of the children? asked Lynch, a 60-year-old San Carlos resident, who between the ages of 8 and 11 was repeatedly raped by a priest. Are they really taking care of the abusers? Are they still hiding this?

Ten years ago this week, the Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego agreed to pay $198.1 million to settle the lawsuits filed by Lynch and 143 other adults. As children, each had been sexually assaulted by a priest or, in one case, a layman supervising altar boys.

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This was a landmark moment in one of the largest scandals in the churchs 2,000-year-old history. From Dublin to Manila, Boston to Portland, Ore., Catholic officials were hauled into court and forced to account for shielding predatory clerics, often for decades.

The San Diego settlement was the nations second largest, trailing only the Los Angeles dioceses $660 million.

Absorbing these damages led the San Diego diocese to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. In the end, insurance paid $76 million and the Diocese of San Bernardino, which had part of this diocese, contributed almost $15 million.

Selling properties and tapping its bank accounts, San Diego paid the remaining $107 million. Seven months after going to bankruptcy court, the dioceses case was dismissed.

The scandal was a grave wrong and sin on the part of the church, Bishop Robert McElroy said.

Since assuming leadership of the diocese in 2015, McElroy has enacted reforms to reduce the chances of clergy preying on children. Every employee, from vicars to janitors to visiting clerics, undergo background checks. Catholic school pupils and their parents are taught to recognize inappropriate behavior and warning signs of predators.

Still, the bishop warns the problem hasnt vanished.

It will never go away, it is part of human nature  sadly, he said. We have to maintain vigilance  we cant become complacent.

If the diocese is determined to remember, some victims struggle to forget.

Asked how her life has changed in the last decade, Lynch opens a shoe box she keeps on the kitchen table in her ranch-style San Carlos house. The box is packed with prescription drugs to treat ulcers, colitis, anxiety, insomnia, depression.

When this happens to you as a child, she said, you think you must be the most horrible person in the world.

Like many Catholic children enrolled in public school, Heidi attended weekly catechism classes at her local parish, St. Ritas. While learning church teachings and preparing to receive the sacraments, she descended into a nightmare.

At age 8, Heidi and her classmates first received the sacrament of reconciliation. Also known as confession, this became a regular part of the childrens routine. As students queued outside the confessional, Heidi was directed to the end of the line.

I was always the last, Lynch said. Once, we had a new nun and she started wondering why I was always the last one. She asked questions -- and then she disappeared.

Heidi was always last because the priest would usher her into his part of the confessional booth, close the door and sexually assault her.

After the scandal erupted, the diocese made some personnel changes. The victims assistance coordinator, Msgr. Steve Callahan, was replaced by a lay person, Lisa Petronis, a licensed clinical psychologist.

And the Diocesan Review Board  a panel that reviews allegations of child sexual abuse by church employees  received a new member: an adult survivor of this crime.

We thought that was an important perspective to have, McElroy said.

Today, the bishop said, every allegation of sexual abuse of a minor is referred to either the police or child protective services. It depends on whether the minor is still at risk, he said.

At the same time, allegations are forwarded to a private investigator who has a contract with the diocese. This investigators report goes to the authorities and the aforementioned Diocesan Review Board.

We act as the finder of fact for the diocese, said Chris Hulburt, a career defense lawyer who chairs the board.

Meeting quarterly, the board includes a prosecutor of sex crimes; a retired judge; a marriage and family therapist; a school nurse; a pastor; and the sexual abuse survivor. McElroy is present when the board hears evidence, including the investigators report. Then he leaves the chamber so the board can discuss whether an instance of abuse occurred and, if so, what should be done.

The latter is a recommendation. Its McElroys decision whether to take any action.

We are an advisory group, Hulburt said.

In Hulburts five years on the board, hes heard five allegations of new cases and another five that allegedly occurred decades ago. None of the former led to the removal of a priest. One allegation was retracted. Another involved a priest from the Los Angeles diocese. A third stemmed from a priests questionable communications, but no physical contact, with a minor.

The five older allegations, all leveled against priests who are now dead, were judged more serious. In several cases, the board recommended the diocese pay for the victims counseling. At least once, the board recommended  and the bishop approved  payment to a victim.

While board members include several legal professionals, this is not a legal proceeding. In fact, the board may deliberate while the legal system  including the churchs lawyers  come to grips with civil or criminal cases prompted by the allegation.

Were not involved in the churchs legal strategy at all, Hulburt said. We are concerned about people  concerned about the people that may have been harmed and the people that are being accused.

Ideally, Hulburt said, these private hearings can heal wounds. Thats not what happened during the negotiations that led to the massive 2007 settlement. Victims and family members are bruised from the adversarial experience, saying the diocese stonewalled, destroyed documents, hid assets and acted in bad faith.

The settlement, large as it was, has done little to heal this rift for victims such as Heidi Lynch.

peter.rowe@sduniontribune.com
Ignacio Hernandez has been Googling DACA every day since the November election.

On Sunday, at a family party, Hernandez, 21, checked his phone and saw an article that said Trump would end DACA on Tuesday. Hoping that there was still time for the president to change his mind, when Hernandez woke up Tuesday morning, he Googled again.

It was there, he said. My sister asked me what was wrong. I dont know how she noticed.

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I didnt know how to feel, he added. A few months after the election, I saw what I feared.

Hernandez, a fourth-year student in film and accounting at San Diego City College, where he is president of the student government and student trustee, was brought to the U.S. from Tijuana when he was six years old.

He has five jobs and even more goals for his future. He wants to be a film producer, a professor, an accountant and, if given the opportunity for U.S. citizenship, a senator.

I started thinking about dropping out of college and getting another job to save up money, he said.

He hasnt done that. He has started to think about shifting his plans, what alternative life paths might look like. He has thought about what would happen if he gets deported.

I know if I go back, I will have the same dreams and hopes, but I will not have the possibility to reach them, Hernandez said.

Hernandez got DACA his senior year of high school. His mother was going through a divorce, he said, and he was considering dropping out of school to work and help her.

With DACA, he was able to get jobs that allowed him to stay in school.

His permit expires in January, so he will be able to reapply one more time before the program goes away.

If his plans work out the way he wants them to, by the time that renewal expires, he will be in his last semester of a bachelors degree after transferring to a university.

He hopes Congress will pass legislation before then so that he will be able to graduate.

Hernandez used to be scared that people would learn about his immigration status.

About a year ago, that changed when learning about Cesar Chavez, Martin Luther King Jr. and Eva Peron inspired him to share his story with others. Other DACA students look to him for guidance, he said.

Im really confused, the same way as them, Hernandez said. That puts a bigger load on me. I have to be strong for myself and also for others.

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Irving Hernandez De La Torres graduation cap references poet Dylan Thomas  Do not go gentle into that good night.

Hernandez has lived that quote since the Trump administration announced the end of the DACA program. He rallied more than 1,000 people on Tuesday at a downtown San Diego protest, encouraging them to fight to stay in the U.S. despite their immigration status.

We love this country, and today was a betrayal of what we hold dear, he said.

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Hernandez is an aerospace engineer. His diploma is displayed prominently in the living room of his familys home.

He is also a dreamer, both in the sense that he was brought to the U.S. without permission when he was six years old, and in the sense that he has big plans for his future.

I came here on the dream of my parents wanting to get out of poverty, he said. Look at where I arrived based on their dreams.

Hearing that the program that protects him from deportation and allows him to work would end in six months was painful, he said, but it wasnt as bad as watching the election results in November while studying for an exam during his final year at San Diego State University.

Ive never felt more pain than this spring semester when Donald Trump came into power and started enacting anti-immigrant measures, Hernandez said. Theres no logic in these outdated laws that are based on xenophobia and false patriotism.

Since then, he has known that DACA would end. He sat down with his family to talk for the first time about what to do if they get deported. If that happens, he said, he wont come back.

Thats the worst betrayal I could ever experience, he said. Ive come to terms with it, but Im not giving up.

Hernandez has an internship with an aircraft composites company that will end soon. Hes been applying for other jobs, but even with DACA, hes limited in the work he can do in his field because of his immigration status. Many positions require security clearances that are not given to unauthorized immigrants.

His goal, he said, is to work for the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, and he knows he most likely needs a masters degree to do that.

Knowing that he might be forced to leave the U.S. before he has the chance to go to graduate school, he applied for the job anyway.

He realized the weight of his status in high school, when, for the first time, he tried to tell someone about it.

I told him, Im... and I hesitated, Hernandez said. When I finally said it, I realized I was in tears.

His status has meant frustration and pain, he said.

Knowing that my potential and my parents potential, with very little weve been given, weve accomplished a lot, Hernandez said. Its that frustration of never being let free to accomplish more.

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Levi Wertzs first float tank experience began how many did in Lincoln in the early 2010s  in an industrial-looking steel box in Jeremy Warners basement.

Wertz had been listening to comedian and podcaster Joe Rogan tout the thought-clearing (and thought-forming) virtues of floating in a sensory deprivation tank  for the uninitiated, a sound-proof, light-proof chamber filled with a small pool of extra-buoyant salt water, heated the temperature of a human body, all meant to give the floater an out-of-body experience, or at least a healing one.

Wertz, 36, wanted to have one of those experiences, and began Googling to see if there was one in Lincoln he could rent some time in to space out. He found a phone number for a massage studio that used to have one, and was directed to the man whod built it.

Warner, whose Escape Pods are built in Lincoln and have been shipped to float studios and homes all over the place, invited Wertz over for a basement float, as hes done for several curious people in the area (including this writer, in 2013).

The first 30 or 40 minutes, Wertz said, he felt like he spent just trying to float, even though the heaps of Epsom salt dissolved in the warm water were providing all the buoyancy he needed.

I had just never been in an environment like that, he said. All of a sudden  I just stopped, and next thing I know, I was experiencing things Id heard about. It was like a conduit into my consciousness.

Its hard to describe the experience in words, said Wertz, who has since opened Lincoln's first float center and his first business, Lost in Float, 8244 Northern Lights Drive.

The experience is why he leaves out a set of markers and chalk, along with pens and journals, for clients to write, doodle or draw with once theyve concluded 60- or 90-minute sessions in one of the four Escape Pods.

Wertz said he used to pore over the entries after each client finished writing or drawing. Now, he peruses them every couple days. Still, the contributions can wow him, like one that Jennifer Barnason left after her fourth float.

Barnason, 32, of Lincoln, said shed been periodically looking for a float center in Nebraska after reading about the emerging relaxation technique. Her first float, she will admit, she splashed around in it like it was a kiddie pool. After she got used to the water, she said, it felt like she was floating in space.

The feeling is sort of a precious one, she said.

When shed get home, Barnason tended to draw or paint something post-float. Rather than wait, before her fourth float, she decided to bring in some watercolors, a hobby of hers. After her session concluded, she began to paint.

I think it was mostly just wanting to see where it goes, just wanting to see what came out on the paper, Barnason said. I wanted to make something that related to the feeling that the tank catalyzed.

It was a scribble session a few minutes long, she said, but Wertz was blown away by the painting, a silhouette of a figure floating in the tank, surrounded by black and blue water. The figures head and hands were painted a metallic gold, Barnason said, in an effort to represent the feeling she had of conquering a lousy day.

It kind of made me feel like youve got this, Barnason said.

Her experience made Wertz feel like a project Lost in Float had created could yield some exciting results. This month, the business is providing three free floats for a collection of artists who submitted portfolios in August.

Its a substantial investment for the startup business  an introductory deal on three floats costs $99, though the business offers pricing plans for entire companies, as well as memberships. Those chosen for the artist program are expected to create a piece that will be displayed at the float center within a month of their final floats.

Wertz said it was inspired by a project done at Float On, a Portland, Oregon, float center where he and his wife, Gina, apprenticed once she too became convinced that Lincoln needed a float center of its own. (Lost in Float also offers cryotherapy.) Float On published a book in 2011 titled, Artwork from the Void: 150 Pieces Inspired by Sensory Deprivation, which collected submissions from Portland-area artists.

There is a level of creation that comes with the tank, Levi Wertz said.

Trent Grooms, one of the artists chosen for the project, has perused a copy of that book at Lost in Float often during the 30 or so minutes he said he spends in the center after his floats. You can tell the submissions were from people whod just experienced substantial sensory deprivation, Grooms said. After five floats, he said, he got to the point where it feels like youre basically just a thought floating in space.

He recognized that experience in Artwork from the Void pieces, he said. The colors tend to be on the dark side. There are often visual representations of the actual tank. That might be the way he goes with his submission. It might not. Grooms, who has been adding to a chalk drawing he made of a skeleton with one eyeball flashing a peace sign beneath a multicolored star over the course of his Lost in Float visits, said he currently has three blank pages framed and laid out.

I want to try to get three pieces done, he said. I know theyre not expecting three.

Levi Wertz said he has no particular expectation.

I might look at that and go, 'What does it have to do with floating? he said.

But the agreement doesnt involve artistic representations of floating. The goal, he said, is to use the time in the tank to create visual expressions of the minds journey to the void and back.

However you produce that, I dont really care, he said.
Iveth Estrada found out about her immigration status in high school when she tried to convince her mother that she should get a part-time job to help the family.

Her mother told her that she couldnt, that she didnt have a social security number.

Estrada was angry at her mother for a long time after that, she said.

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Why didnt she bring me to the U.S. when I was in her stomach still? Estrada said. It wouldve changed everything.

Estrada, 20, a third-year sociology student at Cuyamaca College, came with her family to the U.S. without authorization when she was one year old. Except for a few years that she spent in Tennessee living with her father, all of her memories are in San Diego County.

She doesnt blame her mother anymore, she said. She knows now that her mother wanted a better future for her.

She will be among the first dreamers whose authorization to work and protection from deportation expires when the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program ends in six months.

When she first signed up, she was attending community college, which was already farther than she thought shed be able to go in higher education after she learned about her status. After DACA, she began to plan transferring to a university and eventually getting a doctorate.

When I got DACA, it made a big difference in my life, she said. I felt like I belonged more because I had something on paper that made me not illegal completely.

Shes applying this semester to transfer next year to either UC Los Angeles or US Santa Barbara.

Right before I transfer, my DACA will expire, Estrada said. Im not sure how thats going to work.

She was counting on income from jobs shes allowed to have with DACA to pay for the more expensive schools.

I was scared. I still am scared, she said. Im thinking, How am I going to afford my education now? Thats a very emotional thing for me to not be able to pursue my education.

She would like to visit Mexico one day, she said, to understand where she came from, but she doesnt want to live there.

I feel like this is my home, she said. San Diego is my home. California is my home. This is where I go to school. This is where I work. I wouldnt want to live anywhere else.

She hopes Congress will act before DACA ends in March.

If nothing happens, Im going to have to stop working and find another way to move forward here, Estrada said. Its going to be tough, but if my mom can do it, we can do it.

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San Diego County government and its largest labor union have reached a tentative deal on a new contract, avoiding a strike planned for later this week.

After months of little progress at the bargaining table, the county and Service Employees International Local 221 settled on a proposed pact that gives some 10,000 employees base raises of about 13 percent over five years.

The Board of Supervisors still needs to approve the countys side of the deal, and its not clear if they will consider the contract at its meeting on Tuesday. The union will present the deal to its members to vote on from Tuesday through Thursday.

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Regardless of the outcome to those two processes, the tentative agreement has staved off a strike planned for Tuesday and Wednesday, the first time since the mid-1990s that Local 221s county workers would have stopped work.

Like agreements reached earlier this year with other unions that represent county employees, the proposed contract includes 13 percent across-the-board-raises for Local 221 members spread over five years. But the agreement reached late Friday includes one-time increases in base salary for registered nurses that translate into 16 percent raises  both the county and the union wanted to increase retention  and 14 percent raises for social services and social welfare workers. Psychiatrists will receive a 17 percent raise, but 5 percent of the pay hike is to correct an issue with a previous contract.

Similar to agreements with other unions, SEIU-represented members will also receive 7 percent more in county health care funding annually to offset rising costs, as well as $5,250 in cash bonuses spread over five years. The tentative agreement is expected to cost the government about $495 million, pretty much the price tag of early proposals.

The unions president, David Garcias, said that the county finally blinked.

We now have an agreement that helps to close the wage gap for critical public servants like nurses and social workers which is an essential step in alleviating chronic staff turnover and significant short staffing of services to vulnerable residents of San Diego, he said.

But on SEIUs Facebook page, some members said the tentative agreement seems to be nearly identical to offers the county made when negotiations began early this year. They said it doesnt pay San Diego Countys employees on par with other counties workers, that it was a five-year deal rather than three, and that it fell short of expectations Local 221 had built through the lengthy negotiations. The deal also lacked a $500 signing bonus that was included in earlier offers.

The county did not immediately comment on the tentative agreement.

SEIUs leadership had been under increasing pressure from some of its own members to allow a vote on the countys offer. At least three different bargaining units within Local 221 have taken early steps to leave SEIU and represent themselves or join another parent union. About 1,200 of the 10,000 county workers represented by Local 221 would leave if the process is completed.

The tentative deal came after both sides accused the other of unfair labor practices, accusations both the county and union denied.

The union said that the county, at times, refused to negotiate and that its series of proposed contracts grew increasingly unacceptable.

The county said that the union violated agreements when it brought several groups into bargaining sessions, including the American Civil Liberties Union, the Community Advocacy Network and others. It also accused some of the unions senior members of prematurely campaigning for a strike.

SEIU has attempted to short-circuit bargaining, by exerting unlawful economic pressure on the County by threatening and preparing for a pre-impasse strike in violation of labor relations laws, the county said in unfair labor practice charge.

Union members voted for a strike in July, and in late August announced that they would not work on this Tuesday and Wednesday. The timing was to coincide with the supervisors first board meetings after their summer recess.

Twitter: @jptstewart

joshua.stewart@sduniontribune.com

(619) 293-1841
Former San Diego County District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis relationship with convicted Mexican businessman Jose Susumo Azano Matsura may cause her political problems. But theres another case that may be tougher for her to explain on the campaign trail.

Azano has been convicted on about three dozen federal charges, almost all related to his efforts to funnel hundreds of thousands of dollars into campaigns to help San Diego politicians, including Dumanis when she ran for mayor in 2012.

Her political opponents started making hay about that even before she announced her candidacy for county supervisor last week.

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Dumanis once said she could barely recall who Azano was; the record eventually showed she met with him several times, including at his Coronado home.

But at least nobody got killed.

Then theres Armando Gabriel Perez. He was the estranged husband of 19-year-old Diana Gonzalez, who was found dead in a City College restroom in 2010 after being stabbed repeatedly.

Perez pleaded guilty during his arraignment but his eventual conviction was overturned. The appellate court said he shouldnt have been able to make a guilty plea without a lawyer representing him, which is required when the charges carry a possible sentence of life without parole.

In writing about Perezs retrial recently, the Union-Tribunes Lyndsay Winkley noted the case raised important questions about how the county handles particularly dangerous domestic violence cases.

Police arrested Perez, now 44, after Gonzalez told them that her husband had kidnapped and raped her and held her captive for days in a motel room.

Gonzalez and her family begged for Perez to be prosecuted, certain he would do more harm if he was let go.

 the District Attorneys Office declined to file charges, Winkley wrote. Then-District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis said her office lacked proof beyond a reasonable doubt.

Gonzalez obtained a restraining order, but she and her 10-month-old child were compelled to seek a safe harbor with her parents, who escorted her almost everywhere  including to City College where, like so many other students, she was trying to improve her life.

Her parents were waiting for her in a campus parking lot the night she was murdered.

Some time after Gonzalezs death, Dumanis helped establish the Domestic Violence High Risk Response Team, which seeks to intervene in cases where extreme violence or death are most likely.

In October 2010, Diana Gonzalezs mother, Concepcion Gonzalez, spoke about reaching out to law enforcement agencies with hopes they could protect her daughter.

We did so much and nothing happened, she said.

They just kept saying, Im sorry. Im sorry, Gonzalez recalled. I said, Are we supposed to wait for him to kill her?

To each, a corrupt political partner?

Guilt by association, fair or not, is a staple of politics. Dumanis and her chief opponent, former Assemblyman Nathan Fletcher, are certain to be paired up with undesirables by the opposition.

Democrats already have Azano on Team Dumanis, and, for all we know, may add Perez.

Fletcher, well likely be reminded, once worked for Randy Duke Cunningham, the former Republican congressman who was sent to federal prison after multiple convictions in one of the biggest bribery scandals in Congress, ever.

He also probably said some nice things about Cunningham, and if theres a record of it, you can bet well see it during the campaign.

But then, a lot of people praised Cunningham at the time. Remember, before there was a whiff of scandal, Duke was a Vietnam War ace Navy pilot and a highly popular congressman.

Not with Democrats, though.

Fletchers Cunningham connection has the added benefit for the pro-Dumanis crowd of reminding voters that the Democrat used to be a Republican  and an independent in between. Not that his critics have been shy about bringing that up ever since he bolted the GOP while running for mayor in 2012.

But engaging in the partisan game  for a technically non-partisan office  could be a high-wire act for Dumanis et al. She is a Republican, after all, running in a central San Diego County supervisorial district where Democrats have a 2-to-1 voter registration advantage over Republicans.

Dumanis, speaking for herself apparently and not her surrogates, says she rises above political party  but others dont.

Ive never been in a partisan position, she told the Union-Tribunes Joshua Stewart after she made her announcement Thursday. I am probably the only nonpartisan in the group.

Well, maybe she hasnt appeared on a stage with President Donald Trump, but whatever Republican credentials she has  and the endorsements shes made  will be on full display, courtesy of the pro-Fletcher crowd, perhaps with wee bit of hype.

It would be tough for Fletcher to duck the partisan label  not that it would necessarily hurt him in such a district  given that he didnt exactly jump into the Democratic Party in a nominal way. He proudly became a nominating delegate for Hillary Clinton at last years Democratic National Convention.

To what extent his past Republicanism becomes an issue for voters remains to be seen. Theres a lot of independent voters in the district. And termed-out incumbent Ron Roberts, a moderate Republican, has with rare exception won his elections in a walk despite the Democratic registration advantage. But he was first elected more than two decades ago when the political demographics were considerably different.

Painting Dumanis and Fletcher as evil partisans of one stripe or another and tying them to corrupt individuals  this is low-hanging fruit.

Opposition researchers can be a creative and talented bunch. So get ready for when they really ramp it up.

Tweet of the Week

Goes to Greg Moran (@gregmoran) of the Union-Tribune about the surprise introduction of candidate Judge Bonnie Dumanis.

No one has called her judge for 15 years.
Three robbers pistol-whipped a marijuana dispensary employee during a delivery in the College Area Saturday, San Diego police said.

Two men working for the unidentified dispensary met the trio on Cresita Drive off College Avenue about 3:50 p.m. One of the employees got into the groups car to sell them the marijuana, police Officer Robert Heims said.

Thats when the victim was pistol-whipped in the head and robbed. It is unclear if the thieves took money, marijuana or both from the victim.

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When his co-worker went over to help, two of the robbers ran away.

Officers arrived and arrested a 20-year-old man who did not flee.

The victim suffered a cut to his head and was taken to a hospital.

One of the outstanding thieves was described as black, in his early 20s, 5 feet 10 inches tall, 140 to 160 pounds, with brown hair and wearing jeans and a burgundy shirt. The other was said to be black, 22 years old, 5 feet 9 inches, 150 pounds, wearing dark clothing.

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Email: david.hernandez@sduniontribune.com

Phone: (619) 293-1876

Twitter: @D4VIDHernandez
In 2010, a superior court judge in Los Angeles ordered the Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego to release its files on priests accused of sexually abusing minors.

The documents, now curated on the bishop-accountability.org site, make grim reading. A sampling:

Rev. Robert Nikliborc

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A Chicago native, Nikliborc was ordained in San Diego in 1955. A year later, he underwent counseling at a church treatment center in New Mexico, following two allegations of sexually assaulting children. In 1957, he was sent to St. Boniface School in Banning. There, he was a accused of sexually molesting a boy from 1963 through 65. Johnny G., the victim, sued in 2003.

In 1969, while financial director of a Banning orphanage, Nikliborc was convicted on income tax evasion charges. After serving a prison sentence, he began a 30-year tenure as pastor of St. Annes Parish in San Diego (1971-2001).

Early in his pastorship, Nikliborc was ordered by Bishop Maher to end a relationship with a church secretary. The scandal is not only among the parishioners who are complaining, Maher wrote on April 12, 1976, but among our clergy. The question is what hold does this woman have on you?

Nikliborc retired from the priesthood in 2001.

Rev. Franz Robier

An Austrian citizen, Robier worked in the Diocese of San Diego from 1955 until 1982. He died in 1994 at the age of 82.

Robier has been accused or raping or sexually assaulting at least 24 girls in the 1950s and 60s. Several victims were members of the childrens choir at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in San Diegos Oak Park. Hed have me sit on his lap, said one of the victims, Jane Doe Number 5. The other girls, he took places.

Rev. Edward Rodrigue

A San Diego native, Rodrigue was ordained in 1962. In 1979, he was sentenced to a years probation for sexually abusing a boy. In 1992, he was removed from the priesthood.

Records show that he was a serial abuser. In 1998, he was sentenced to 10 years in prison for abusing a youth. In 2003, civil suits accused him of abusing at least 19 children. He admitted to molesting four or five boys every year over a 22-year period.

Released from prison in 2006, Rodrigue died in 2009.

Rev. Paul Shanley

A Massachusetts native who preyed on minors while a priest in Boston, Shanley was a subject of the Boston Globe Spotlight teams investigation.

In 1993, Shanley was transfered to the Diocese of San Bernardino. During his time there, he assisted at parishes in Scripps Ranch and La Jolla.

A June 19, 2002, letter from Bostons Cardinal Bernard Law to Bishop Gerald Barnes of San Bernardino apologized that a priest of this Archdiocese has been the cause of bewilderment, scandal and anger among the faithful of San Bernardino.

In 2005, Shanley was convicted of raping a boy. He served 12 years in a Massachusetts prison. Released on July 28, Shanley will be on probation until 2027.
2002

January: The Boston Globe launches an investigative series into allegations of Catholic priests sexually abusing minors and archdiocesan cover-ups. The cases go back decades.

June: U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops issues Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People, declaring a zero tolerance policy for sexual abuse. The Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego reveals allegations made against 23 priests  18 in San Diego County and five in Imperial County  since Bishop Robert Broms arrival in 1990.

August: Brom reveals that retired Monsignor Rudolph Galindo admitted sexually abusing three boys and urges victims to speak up. Two lawsuits are filed in San Diego Superior Court on behalf of two men who say they were sexually abused by priests when they were minors.

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2003

January: California lifts the statute of limitations on civil cases for one year, allowing sexual abuse victims to sue, regardless of when incidents occurred. By the Dec. 31 deadline, the Diocese of San Diego had been named in 99 such lawsuits involving more than 140 victims.

September: The Archdiocese of Boston agrees to pay $85 million to more than 500 people.

2004

February: In a letter to San Diego priests, Brom says that accusations by 128 people against 42 priests in the diocese since 1950 were substantiated or are credible. The diocese found 18 priests were either falsely accused or claims against them could not be substantiated.

February: A church-appointed national review board rebukes U.S. bishops for shameful failure to stop widespread clerical sex abuse over the past half-century. The tally shows 10,667 abuse claims involving minors lodged against 4 percent of the clergy (about 3 percent in San Diego).

February: The John Jay College of Criminal Justice releases a study sponsored by the U.S. bishops, The Nature and Scope of Sexual Abuse of Minors by Catholic Priests and Deacons, 1950-2002.

July: The Archdiocese of Portland, Ore., becomes the first Catholic diocese to seek bankruptcy protection in the face of sexual abuse claims.

December: The Diocese of Orange in California agrees to pay $100 million to about 90 victims, with payouts ranging from $50,000 to nearly $4 million.

2006

May: A Los Angeles judge coordinating nearly 600 sexual-abuse lawsuits filed in Los Angeles and San Diego says five cases in each city can go forward.

2007

February: The Diocese of San Diego files for bankruptcy protection the day before the first trial is to begin. It is the nations fifth diocese to seek Chapter 11 reorganization, and the largest.

March: The Diocese of San Diego releases the names of 38 priests with credible allegations of sexually abusing minors, along with their church service records dating to 1928.

July: The Archdiocese of Los Angeles agrees to pay $660 million to 508 victims. It is the largest settlement of its kind in the Catholic Church.

September: The Diocese of San Diego reaches a $198.1 million agreement with 144 victims. The diocese also promises to release church documents about abusers histories.

2008

March: The Diocese of San Diego pays its share of the settlement; insurance and other religious orders are also involved. The average payout: $1.3 million per plaintiff; after lawyers fees are subtracted, .

2009

February: Lawyers for the victims in San Diego begin to gain access to files about priests accused of molesting parishioners.

2010

October: A retired San Diego Superior Court judge orders the Diocese of San Diego to make public 10,000 pages of previously confidential personnel files of 48 priests who were accused of sexual abuse or had credible allegations lodged against them.

2011

May: John Jay College releases an updated report, The Causes and Context of Sexual Abuse of Minors by Catholic Priests in the United States, 1950-2010.

2012

April: Rev. Jose Alexis Davila, a priest at St. Judes Shrine of the West in Southcrest, pleads guilty to a misdemeanor battery charge for groping a woman at his home. Hes sentenced to three years probation.

2013

September: Cirilo Flores formally is installed as bishop for the Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego, succeeding retired Bishop Robert Brom. After 11 months in office, Flores succumbed to cancer.

2014

July: Pope Francis meets with sex abuse victims.

2015

April: Robert W. McElroy is installed as the Diocese of San Diegos bishop.

June: Pope Francis announces he will create a tribunal to punish bishops who cover up instances of sex abuse.

December: Rev. Davila is assigned to four Oklahoma congregations, despite his 2012 battery conviction in San Diego.

2016

April: Rev. Davila is removed from his priestly duties. Oklahoma City Archbishop Paul Coakley said new information regarding the allegations against Rev. Alexis Davila made the move necessary.

October: Rev. Jacob Betrand, a San Diego priest, charged with criminal sexual conduct in Minnesota. Hes accused of having sexual contact with a woman in 2010 while providing spiritual guidance. A jury trial is set for January 2018.
For this weeks Back Story, reporter Peter Rowe discusses his front page story about a painful anniversary. Thursday marked 10 years since the Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego settled the sex abuse claims of victims of predatory priests.

Q. Whats changed over the past decade?

A. That depends on who you interview. Diocesan officials, including Bishop Robert McElroy, point to a range of new policies designed to reduce the chances of this happening again. These included a new curriculum for Catholic schools, meant to help students and their parents identify  and stop  suspicious behavior. There are new background checks for every employee, religious or lay. Even visiting missionaries and substitute teachers have to undergo this step.

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McElroy says all allegations are now reported to the appropriate civil authorities. The Diocesan Review Board, which existed 10 years ago, has subtly changed. The panel has always reviewed allegations, but the chair says it now takes a more active role in determining the facts of a case. And McElroy added a new member to the panel, a survivor of childhood sexual abuse.

Q. You interviewed several victims of the abuse. What was the overriding feeling you got from talking to people who went through this incredible trauma?

A. Anxiety. Any new reports of sexual abuse by clergy  and there have been numerous in the last 10 years, in San Diego, the U.S. and abroad  revives their fears.

The victims won in court, receiving damages many would consider life-changing  the average payment was $825,000. Yet when you talk to them, they dont sound triumphant. They remain saddened and scarred by their childhood experience.

Q. Do you get the feeling the church has acknowledged its culpability in this tragedy beyond making settlements for all these victims?

A. Thats difficult to say. I cant assess the state of the church writ large, especially one as large as the Catholic Church.

In fact, the San Diego diocese is also vast, embracing two counties (San Diego and Imperial), 99 parishes and more than 1 million believers. The congregations are incredibly diverse, including military families, immigrants and refugees, seniors, members of the LGBT community. Within this group, theres no one view of what the church should done, or should do.

So I found a range of reactions from people within the diocese. Theres tremendous shame, even among model priests who did nothing wrong yet felt humiliated by their colleagues. It was a tough time to wear a collar, one told me.

Some are hopeful that the diocese is on the right track, becoming more transparent and responsive to parishioners and law enforcement. Yet theres also some defensiveness. American history has seen periodic bursts of anti-Catholicism  the Know Nothing Party, the whispers about JFK taking orders from the pope.

Still, McElroy ended one of our conversations by noting that we will all die and face judgment. Im afraid the church will have a lot to answer for, he said.

Q. Were you surprised by anything you learned in reporting this story?

A. Reading over personnel documents for the perpetrators, I was surprised at how many were praised for their compassion and wisdom. Most of these men were outwardly charismatic, although their inner lives were dark and sad.

Also, I was stunned when the bishop said he does not expect that the crime  the sin, if you will  of child sexual abuse will ever be wiped out. This is a sad fact of human nature, McElroy insisted, and how it can be warped.

Perfection is impossible in this life, and we all fall short in ways small and large. I suppose this true, but its a sobering thought.
More American high schoolers are graduating than ever, with this years graduation rate reaching a record 81 percent.

But the journey from kindergarten to commencement is inflicting collateral damage on kids. More than eight in 10 students report experiencing moderate to extreme stress. Childhood depression and anxiety rates have skyrocketed. Teen suicide rates are three times what they were 50 years ago.

Schools have a responsibility to cultivate not just their students intellect but their physical and mental well-being, too. They can do so by taking a page from the medical profession  and first do no harm. Then they must devote more energy to teaching kids the social and emotional skills they need to become healthy, successful adults.

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Students mental health takes a hit the moment they wake up. The majority of secondary schools start at 8 a.m. or earlier. Yet studies have shown thats too early for adolescent brains and bodies.

According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, teens need 8.5 to 9.5 hours of sleep nightly. And they are biologically, not just socially, wired to stay up late. But 59 percent of middle school students and 87 percent of high school students get less than this recommended amount of sleep on school nights. Even worse, 58 percent of 15- to 17-year-olds regularly sleep fewer than seven hours a night.

The consequences of this are serious. Sleep-deprived kids exhibit diminished attention spans and concentration  and have higher rates of depression, suicidal ideation and obesity.

The pediatricians propose a radical solution to this problem: Start school later.

Even an extra half-hour of sleep would do a world of good. The Academy of Pediatrics study sampled 9,000 students from schools that started at 8:30 a.m. or later. It found that late starts improved students standardized test scores and reduced car accidents involving students by as much as 70 percent.

Schools can also reduce the harm they do by assigning less homework. Seriously.

Schools are piling increasingly large loads of homework on their students. A recent Stanford study found that high school students had, on average, more than three hours of homework a night.

Yet research shows that excessive amounts of homework have little or limited learning value.

This is not surprising. After all, students generally must complete their homework in distracting locations  their homes  away from the people best able to answer their questions, their teachers. And they must do so after expending all their energy to get through the long school day.

Homework has been linked to stress and academic disengagement among both young children and teens. In many households, its the major cause of kids stress  and stress between kids and parents.

All of this exacerbates teenage anxiety and depression, both of which are reaching epidemic levels.

According to the National Institute of Mental Health, about 8 percent of teens have an anxiety disorder, and 9 percent succumb to a major depressive episode each year.

A recent poll asked the 2015 state teachers of the year what they believed were the biggest challenges to student achievement. Topping the list were stress, poverty and psychological problems.

With the seeds sown during secondary school, mental health illness continue to be a significant risk for students in college. According to a 2014 national survey by the American College Health Association, 14 percent of college students had been diagnosed or treated for anxiety and 12 percent for depression within the previous 12 months.

So the American educational status quo is graduating evermore students but breaking their psyches in the process.

There are better, less destructive ways to educate kids.

Paramount among them is social-emotional learning. This approach blends traditional academic curricula with integrated methods for understanding and honing self-awareness, self-regulation, social awareness, relationship-building, and effective decision-making.

According to the Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Leaning, students who follow a social-emotional learning track display a greater desire and capacity to learn  and reduced levels of anxiety and stress  than those who dont. They also score better on academic achievement tests.

Our nations schools must do more than just turn out a new crop of graduates each year. They must prepare the children in their charge to lead happy, productive, healthy lives long after theyve received their diplomas.

Americas schools are not adequately performing those crucial tasks. We shouldnt celebrate surging graduation rates until they are.
Regarding Trump orders end to dreamer plan, (Sept. 6): What a bunch of ideological hypocrites that have spawned in this era. We have all known for years that DACA was illegal and needed action from Congress. President Obama knew it when he signed the executive order. Senator Chuck Schumer and Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi had majorities in Congress and didnt do anything to legalize and formalize it. And the last time I looked Senators Dick Durbin and Lindsey Graham have been in Congress for many years with ample opportunities to do something from either side and didnt. Now everyone is wringing their hands and crying about how unfair this is.

Get the representatives to pass a law and uphold it and there can be no equivocating. Agree or disagree is yours and my prerogative but demonstrations that support an illegal situation is not what my family came to America to live with. Get voting and make change, otherwise follow/enforce the law.

Tony Tartaro

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Hillcrest

Nation is stronger with the dreamers here

Thank you for your editorial, Its time for Congress to rescue dreamers (Sept. 5). As a teacher who has worked with DACA students, it would be a mistake to send them back to a country few of them know.

For them, the United States is their country and the majority are productive members of society who have a lot to contribute.

Mimi Pollack

La Mesa

Letters and commentary policy

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Obama foes must exit their echo chambers

Lynn Louder states in her letter that Trump is still better than Obama was after 8 years of lies and corruption (Sept. 7).

She didnt list the lies and corruption. It seems to be typical of many Trump supporters. They voice vague generalities about how bad Obama was, but rarely any specific things. Also, when they boast about how great Trump is, they rarely can state any specific things that Trump has accomplished. It appears that Trump supporters live in a bubble where facts become fake news and immoral, questionable behavior becomes acceptable.

They seem to accept Trumps lies and actions against their core beliefs, including religion, morals, conservatism, national debt, compassion, etc. It seems obvious that Trump is concerned only about himself, his image and how to increase his wealth.

Tom Wilmot

La Mesa
At President Trumps rallies, hes usually flanked by a pair of big blue placards displaying his administrations proudest boast. Promises Made, reads one. Promises Kept, reads the other.

On the surface, keeping his promise to rescind the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA, which suspended deportation of young immigrants who were brought into the country illegally, should have been simple. Deporting Dreamers was part of Trumps tough immigration platform. They have to go, he said in 2015.

But somewhere along the line, the president seems to have had second thoughts. Maybe it was the well-scrubbed group of Dreamers who visited him at Trump Tower last year or a plea from his daughter Ivanka. We love the Dreamers, he said only last week. They should rest easy, he said in April.

So when the moment of decision arrived this week, a president who likes to portray himself as decisive tried to have it both ways. To use one of Trumps favorite words, he choked.

His words, aimed at immigration hawks in his base, were still tough. Lax immigration policies have produced lower wages and higher unemployment for American workers, he charged, yet few in Washington expressed any compassion for the millions of Americans victimized by this unfair system.

But his real decision was to pass the buck. Trump dumped the problem in Congress lap and told lawmakers to fix it. Lest there be any confusion about whose responsibility the program now was, Trump tweeted, Congress, get ready to do your job -- DACA!

To give Congress time to act, he deferred implementation of his order for six months. That, apparently, was the humane dimension his aides had promised: The roughly 800,000 young people currently covered by DACA have a shot -- if the bureaucracy works properly -- at keeping their protected status for up to two additional years.

But, after that, an administration official told reporters, theyll be just as deportable as their parents. And no new applications will be considered; toddlers whose papers havent been filed are out of luck. Thats more humane than scrapping the program, but not by much.

Trump wasnt very humane toward Republicans in Congress, either. DACA is their problem now. And its part of the larger immigration issue that has divided their party bitterly for most of a decade. Immigration may be the hottest of the hot-button issues that pit GOP populists like former Trump aide Stephen Bannon against establishment figures like House Speaker Paul Ryan.

One official compared Trumps decision to rolling a grenade into the Capitol. If Ryan tries to bring a DACA bill to the floor, hell face an instant revolt from the conservative House Freedom Caucus. Trumps six-month deadline comes up next March -- when Republican primaries will be heating up. That will make it even harder for GOP moderates to risk looking soft on immigration.

The irony is that theres probably a bipartisan majority in both houses for turning some form of DACA into law -- in principle, anyway. Democrats want to do it. So does a minority on the Republican side, not only mavericks like John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, but also a few rock-ribbed conservatives like James Lankford of Oklahoma and Jerry Moran of Kansas, judging by recent statements.

But its a polarizing issue thats guaranteed to divide the Republican majority. To pass a bill, theyd need support and political cover from their president. Its not clear that theyd get it.

On Monday, Trumps attorney general, Jeff Sessions, came down hard on the other side, against a renewal of DACA. The program, he charged, has denied jobs to hundreds of thousands of Americans by giving Dreamers work permits. That wasnt an endorsement.

Besides, Congress has an impossibly long to-do list already: It needs to act on the debt ceiling, government funding, a budget, hurricane relief, tax reform and healthcare. It will be much easier not to act on DACA. (Congress is good at that.) And if Congress doesnt act, DACA expires.

Here, in a final irony, is what happens if Congress falls short. Trump will blame the legislators, just as he did when they failed to repeal Obamacare. Then, as DACAs expiration date approaches six months from now, the problem will head back to the White House -- straight for the presidents desk.

If Congress cant fix DACA by March 5, theres no legal reason Trump couldnt extend the program again. Hell face the same decision he tried to duck this week. By then, it will be a congressional election year, and the voices on both sides will only be louder.

So the president has escaped his DACA dilemma, but its only a temporary respite. As often happens when an executive ducks a tough decision, Trump hasnt really solved his problem -- or his partys. Hell simply have to face it again, all too soon.
WASHINGTON -- Chuck and Nancy and Donald and Ivanka seemed to thoroughly enjoy their meeting at the White House the other day. Mitch and Paul, not so much.

Does it really surprise anyone that President Trump betrayed the Republican leaders who have been trying their best to carry water for him on Capitol Hill -- Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Paul Ryan -- and is playing footsie with their Democratic rivals? It shouldn't.

One thing that should be blindingly obvious by now is that political loyalty, for the president, is a one-way street.

Yes, McConnell and Ryan embarrassed themselves and squandered precious political capital in a long, fruitless attempt to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. Yes, the Republican leaders have held their tongues time and again when Trump has manifested his unfitness for office. Yes, they have pretended not to notice the glaring conflicts of interest between Trump's private business affairs and his public responsibilities.

Still, there was something brazen about the way events unfolded Wednesday. First, Ryan tells reporters that a short-term, three-month extension on the debt ceiling, tied to relief funds for Hurricane Harvey -- an idea supported by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi -- was "ridiculous and disgraceful."

Then, in the Oval Office meeting, Trump stuns everyone by endorsing the Schumer-Pelosi plan -- and agrees to work with the Democrats on repealing the debt ceiling altogether, according to The Washington Post. Later, on Air Force One, Trump goes on about what a productive meeting he had with "Chuck and Nancy," not bothering to mention the GOP congressional leaders by name. Ouch.

Some shell-shocked attendees said they believed the meeting went off the rails when the president's daughter Ivanka, who has an office in the West Wing, cheerily dropped in and disrupted the conversation's focus. But this sounds to me like nothing more than a search for a scapegoat. Ryan and McConnell have no one to blame but themselves.

Trump is many things, but he is not, nor has he ever been, a committed Republican. He seized control of the party in a hostile takeover. His campaign positions on trade, health care, entitlements and other issues bore no resemblance to GOP orthodoxy. He has instincts -- some of them odious, from what we can intuit about his views on race and culture -- but his worldview is transactional and situational, not ideological.

McConnell, Ryan and many of their Republican colleagues in Congress convinced themselves that Trump could be a useful instrument -- that he would sign whatever legislation they sent him, and therefore they would be able to enact a conventional GOP agenda of tax and entitlement cuts.

Trump might have gone along with this scenario, at least for a while. But Ryan and McConnell utterly failed to hold up their end of the bargain.

Look at the health care fiasco from Trump's point of view. His campaign position was that Obamacare had to be repealed, but that the replacement should be a system offering health care for "everyone." What Ryan and the House delivered, however, was a plan that would make 23 million people lose health insurance and cut nearly $800 billion from Medicaid.

Trump called that legislation "mean" but was so desperate for a big win that he backed it anyway. In the Senate, however, McConnell wasn't able to deliver anything at all -- not even a stripped-down measure to repeal the ACA now and replace it later. Trump was humiliated and angry. "Mitch M" and "Paul R" became frequent targets of his barbed tweets.

So, on Wednesday, Trump dished out a little humiliation of his own. At the White House meeting, the president reportedly cut off Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin -- who supported the Ryan-McConnell approach to raising the debt ceiling -- in mid-sentence to announce that he was siding with Schumer and Pelosi.

The stunning slapdown almost overshadowed another surprise that Trump had delivered Tuesday evening: After sending Attorney General Jeff Sessions out to announce the end of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, Trump tweeted that if Congress did not act within six months, he would "revisit" the question.

What Trump clearly has already revisited is his belief in the ability of the conservative GOP congressional majorities to get anything meaningful done. He seems to be at least flirting with the idea of working instead with Democrats and GOP moderates -- working not with but around the House and Senate leadership.

I just hope Schumer and Pelosi know not to trust him the way McConnell and Ryan did.
Quite beyond being morally repugnant and an offense to human decency, the Trump White House's announcement Tuesday that it's rescinding the "Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals," or DACA, is the ultimate exercise in political cynicism.

By punting the fate of 800,000 young people who entered the country illegally as children into the hands of a Republican-controlled Congress that can't even reach agreement on the things it agrees upon, President Donald Trump is using the so-called "Dreamers" as human shields in his ongoing push for a border wall with Mexico.

During a briefing with reporters, White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Trump is looking for "overall immigration reform that is responsible and lawful."

That includes the wall that remains the White Whale of Trump's presidency.

"I don't think the president has been shy about the fact that he wants a wall," Huckabee Sanders said, "and thinks it is an important part of a responsible immigration package."

Trump had to have known the impossibility of the challenge he posed to Congress when he trotted out Attorney General Jeff Sessions to make the announcement that most of official Washington had known was coming for days.

Sessions, who was one of the Senate's most avid immigration hawks, let loose with a barrage of factually dubious claims and downright libels, as he announced that Congress had six months to come up with a legal alternative to the Obama-era program.

That Trump hid behind Sessions, only hours after announcing that he has "a love for these people [the Dreamers]," was a cowardly abdication of leadership that was compounded by his decision to leave it to Congress to come up with a legislative fix to the mess his own White House had made.

Keep in mind, this is a president who campaigned on the claim that "he alone" could fix what ails the country.

But in every major legislative test, from the Obamacare repeal to tax reform, Trump has been content to skate along the surface of the issues, leaving the intellectual heavy lifting to the legislative branch.

The buck does not stop with Trump; it merely flies by him.

So it's now up to Republican members of Congress, including U.S. Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Marco Rubio, R-Fla., who each tweeted their indignation with Trump, to move beyond mere rhetoric and pass legislation in the coming months that will protect the Dreamers -- who are from all over the world, and who, in the vast majority of cases, have known no other home than the United States.

Rubio turned to a Bible verse to make his argument against the White House's action:

"For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me," Rubio wrote, quoting from the Gospel of Matthew.

While acknowledging that the federal government has a responsibility to guarantee border security, McCain also noted that the U.S. has to do it in a way that "upholds all that is decent and exceptional about our nation."

And most voters agree with McCain -- and on the need for a comprehensive immigration reform package that has dodged a solution for at least seven years.

Nearly three-quarters of respondents (72 percent) to a Pew poll last year said it was either "very" or "somewhat" important to allow illegal immigrants who entered the U.S. as children to remain in the United States. Conversely, nearly six in 10 respondents (59 percent) said Trump's much vaunted border wall was not a priority for them.

To borrow from McCain, Trump's push for the wall is neither decent nor exceptional.

Rather it's a direct appeal to his ever-dwindling base as he moves into the ninth month of an administration that has done everything except make America great again.

Trump's claim that the DACA program is unconstitutional isn't even supported by his own actions. If it's unconstitutional, the White House should have rescinded it immediately.

That it didn't speaks volumes not only about its true motives, but about the moral cowardice behind its action. We've been told more than once not to judge Trump by what he says, but by what he does.

There is no clearer evidence than now of his lack of fitness to lead.
DARLINGTON, S.C.  A toddler was killed Saturday in an automobile collision in Darlington County, according to Darlington County coroner Todd Hardee.

The incident occurred at approximately 4 p.m. at the intersection of Potato House Road and High Hill Road, south of Darlington.

The child was pronounced dead at the scene by Hardee.

The name of the child will not be released.

The South Carolina Highway Patrol is assisting with the investigation.
WILMINGTON, N.C.  Wind, rain and minor flooding are all forecast for the Pee Dee on Monday as Hurricane Irma moves through Florida and Georgia on the way to west Tennessee.

A wind advisory through 2 a.m. Tuesday has been posted for all of northeastern South Carolina along with five counties in southeastern North Carolina.

The storm, big enough that radar images show its reach from the Florida Keys to the Virginia/West Virginia border, is forecast to spin off 2 inches of rain into Florence and Marion counties through Wednesday along with more than three inches into Johnsonville and Kingstree and approximately two inches into Hartsville, Bennettsville and Dillon, according to a Sunday afternoon bulletin issued by the National Weather Service office in Wilmington, North Carolina.

The rains come with maximum forecast wind speeds of low- to mid-30 miles per hour with gusts into the low- to mid-40 mph range, according to the bulletin.

"The wind will continue to increase during the day as high pressure interacts with the peripheral circulation of Irma," Reid Hawkins, science and operations officer for the weather service office, wrote in the bulletin. The highest winds are expected along coastal South Carolina.

"The wind is expected to peak Monday from the late morning into the evening, then gradually diminish early Tuesday morning. These winds could easily topple weak or poorly rooted trees. Widely scattered power outages are possible."

There also is an increased possibility of severe thunderstorms and tornadoes associated with the storm.

"The tornado risk is not expected to develop until after 8 a.m. Monday and it will persist through Monday afternoon/evening and into Tuesday morning," Hawkins wrote in the bulletin.

The worst impacts from the storm might be along the coast.

"Onshore winds with high pressure to the north and Irma moving northwards across western Florida will push water into our coast resulting in some coastal flooding with each high tide," according to the bulletin.

"Coastal inundation of 1-3 feet is possible, especially with each high tide during Monday when the onshore winds will be strongest. Coastal flooding is likely to cause impacts at vulnerable low-lying areas of downtown Wilmington as well."

Minor overwash is forecast for Sunday evening with coastal flooding with high tides at noon Monday and midnight Tuesday and coastal flooding possible with the Tuesday noon high tide. Minor overwash is possible with the midnight high tide Wednesday, according to the bulletin.

A gale warning has been posted for coastal waters from the South Santee River in South Carolina to Surf City North Carolina.
With what appears to be unanimous support, the Lincoln City Council is almost certain to approve a resolution supporting tolerance and condemning bigotry at tomorrows meeting.

The document states Lincoln will proactively work to promote diversity and inclusion and encourages all city departments and employees and all who live, work, or visit in Lincoln to speak out against acts of bullying, discrimination, and hate violence and to stand up for those who are targeted for such acts.

This measure reaffirms the tenets of human decency and deserves passage. People of all nationalities, races, religions, political beliefs and other identifiers must continue to be welcome in Lincoln.

The mere fact that the political climate is toxic enough to merit such a resolution is necessary in 2017, however, is troubling. When did America, the land of opportunity and home to the largest melting pot in the world, get to the point where it became necessary to support basic dignity to our fellow humans?

In this, the land of the free and home of the brave, the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism reports a 20 percent increase in hate crimes in 2016  a trend PBS Newshour reports, sadly, has risen in 2017.

Councilman Carl Eskridge told the Journal Star that he introduced his resolution in light of the rallies in Charlottesville, Virginia, organized by white supremacists and neo-Nazis, that turned violent and left a young woman dead.

Three-quarters of a century after World War II  which killed an estimated 60 million people, or about 3 percent of the worlds population  the despicable ideals of hatred for religious and ethnic minorities that sparked the conflict persist. Any action short of complete repudiation and condemnation is insufficient to quell the sickening ideals these bigots embody.

The support from the City Councils Democrats and Republicans for this largely symbolic vote underscores the simple fact that tolerance is not a partisan issue, even as some frame it as such.

After a pair of similar resolutions in the Nebraska Legislature this spring failed to garner a majority, we wrote: Supporting fellow humans trumps any and all party lines. Measures supporting undocumented Latino immigrants brought to the U.S. as children and supporting refugees passed without support of more than half of Nebraskas 49 state senators.

Eskridge noted his resolution also coincides with Nebraskas sesquicentennial. Communities across the state owe their existence to hardy immigrants who battled tornadoes, blizzards, droughts and other natural disasters to flourish, setting the stage for the Good Life we cherish today.

From the pioneers and Germans from Russia who came to Lincoln in its earliest days, this city has always welcomed those from different backgrounds. Lincoln must remain tolerant  and vigilant in guarding against the discrimination and evil that will continue rearing its ugly head.
When I read the headline of Joanne Youngs story (A dream deferred," Sept. 7), the title brought me to Langston Hughes' original powerful poem:

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a sore and then run?

It reminded me of how the slave traders captured and stole African families and brought them to our country illegally to work in the southern cotton fields. Their descendants are now American citizens who didnt have a visa or legal papers.

Why is it that the DACA children arent given the same consideration? President Obama issued an executive order for these young dreamers" to stay in America because its the right thing to do. Repealing DACA is not only unfair; its un-American!

Leta Powell Drake, Lincoln
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POE LEADS INQUIRY ON MISSING, EXPIRING PREPAID LOAD

Consumer complaints on the "vanishing prepaid cellphone load" and related issues have prompted Sen. Grace Poe to conduct a Senate inquiry.

Poe, chairperson of the Senate committee on public services, will conduct a hearing on Wednesday, Sep. 13, on Senate Bill No. 848 or the proposed Prepaid Load Protection Act, which prohibits telecommunication companies from imposing an expiration period on the validity of prepaid and the forfeiture of load credits.

The hearing will be held at 11 a.m. at Tanada Room, Senate of the Philippines.

"Matagal nang reklamo ng ating mga kababayan ang naglalahong load kahit hindi naman nila ginagamit," Poe said.

"Kailangang mabigyan sila ng proteksyon dahil hindi biro ang perang pinambibili nila ng load para makausap ang kanilang mga mahal sa buhay," she added.

Representatives from the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC), telcos Globe and Smart and various consumer groups will be invited to the public hearing.

The measure, authored by Senate President Pro-Tempore Ralph Recto, imposes penalties against telcos that include a fine of up to P1 million, and revocation of license, among others, if they commit any of the following:

-Impose an expiration period on the validity of unused prepaid call and text cards;

-Forfeit load credits stored on an active prepaid phone account via prepaid call and text card or electronic transfer; and

-Refuse to give a refund to any prepaid subscriber whose load credits were forfeited without any valid cause.

Poe said the proposed legislation should deter telcos from unduly imposing additional burden on their subscribers.

She said the NTC should also broaden and strengthen their regulatory authority and oversight powers on telcos to protect Filipinos and improve telcos' services.

The senator has received a barrage of complaints about poor telco service and predatory pricing of services on her official social media accounts, and vowed to take action on these.
Press Release

September 10, 2017 Gov't to spend P35 B for 100,000 new teachers, cops, firemen Government will be hiring at least 100,000 new personnel next year, bulk of them frontline workers such as teachers, policemen and firemen, at a cost of almost P35 billion in first year salaries alone, Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph Recto said. Recto said his count refers to new positions created and does not include recruitment to replace separated, resigned, dismissed or deceased personnel. Recto said topping the list of agencies that will go on a recruitment-spree next is bureaucracy's biggest, the Department of Education which will open up 81,100 teaching slots beginning January next year. These are for 43,732 kindergarten and elementary, 1,944 special education teachers, 35,192 junior high school, and 232 for senior high school teachers. The second biggest recruiter will be the Philippine National Police which will be authorized to create 10,000 entry-level Police Officers 1 positions. Once hired, they will raise PNP's uniformed personnel strength to 194,410, resulting in a 1:511 policeman to population ratio. Also included in the 2018 national budget are funds to hire 1,000 Jail Officers 1 to allow the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology to cope with a projected 76,276 spike in inmate population next year. Another DILG agency, the Bureau of Fire Protection, will also be authorized to sign up 2,000 Fire Officers 1 which, Recto pointed out, hardly makes a dent on its need for about 25,000 additional firemen. Recto said the hiring of policemen and teachers are "linked to population growth". "There is a cop-to-citizen ratio that must be maintained. And 40 more students enrolled in public schools would require the hiring of one teacher. Forty is the number of babies born every 10 minutes in this country," Recto said. With the addition of kindergarten and two more grades in the basic education curriculum, DepEd needs more teachers, "in fact, even if all the 2018 new slots will be hired, it will be needing 87,432 more," Recto said. For 2018, DepED is set to receive P16.7 billion to fill vacant positions and P28.17 billion for new positions to be created. Bureaucracy-wide, some P34.9 billion is allotted for the pay of new civil service entrants. Recto said although other agencies will not create job items, they will be hiring to fill existing but vacant positions. "Those involved in infrastructure, like the Department of Transportation and the DPWH, will have no choice but to boost their technical staff to end talent shortage and project delays. Recto said the DPWH has 1,777 vacancies in its approved plantilla of 19,501 personnel, while the DOTr's mother agency, the Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC), had 1,297 reported vacancies last year. The judiciary, Recto said, is also grappling with lack of judges and support personnel to dispose of heavy caseloads. The Supreme Court and lower courts have total plantilla positions of 37,230 but only 25,154 are filled, leaving 12,076 vacancies. "Ganun din ang Commission on Audit. Ang authorized positions ay 14,102 positions pero 8,175 lang ang may tao; ang 5,927 ay bakante," Recto said. "Public spending next year will be more than P4 trillion na, kasama ang GOCC and local governments. How can COA's 6,733 auditors go over the books of 19,081 agencies?" Recto said. He said revenue agencies are expected to bolster the number of its workforce. It can be recalled that President Duterte has asked Congress to authorize the filling of 3,233 Customs bureau vacancies at a cost of P4.2 billion in initial year pay. In all, the national government will have 1,460,733 authorized positions next year but only 1,214,137 are projected to be filled, resulting in 246,596 vacancies "on paper." Recto conceded that some of the vacancies will have to be scrapped if they are redundant, "but crucial items like those in the PNP, medical personnel of the DOH, to name just a few, these should be filled in the name of public service." "Tulad nung sa pulis, kahit ma-hire mo yung 10,000 next year, meron pa ring matitirang bakante na 14,500 slots. Sa dami ng riding-in-tandem at akyat-bahay, at kasama sa Grab business o yung nag-gra-grab ng bag, kwintas at cellphone, dapat talaga punuan ang mga posisyon na yan," Recto said.
This list is not comprehensive. Municipalities are listed as they appear on the criminal complaint. Suspects are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. To see mugshots of the accused, visit www.journaltimes.com/gallery. Additional information about the complaints can be found at: journaltimes.com/news/local/crime-and-courts.

Shavonta R. Booker, 960 block of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Drive, Racine, felony bail jumping, hit run: attended vehicle, resisting an office causing substantial bodily harm to officer.

Brandy N. Clincy, 2500 block of North 24th Place, Milwaukee, attempting to flee or elude a traffic officer.

Robert J. Gaston, 400 block of 3 Mile Road, Caledonia, physical abuse of a child:intentionally cause bodily harm.

Charles M. King, 5900 block of Middle Road, Caledonia, operating a motor vehicle while intoxicated: fourth offense, operating motor vehicle while revoked.

Victor J. Morales, 5300 block of West 23rd Place, Cicero, Illinois, possession with intent to deliver or manufacture THC.

Jeremy S. Smith, 1800 block of Superior Street, Racine, felony bail jumping, misdemeanor retail theft, possession of a controlled substance.

Derek W. Shaw, 200 block of Echo Lane, Racine, possession of cocaine: second or subsequent offence, as a party to a crime, misdemeanor bail jumping.

Alexander J. Vanwhe, 30000 block of Durand Avenue, second degree sexual assault of a child under 16 years of age, felony bail jumping.

Christian Paul Wade, 1900 block of Wisconsin Avenue, possession with intent to deliver or manufacture THC, operating a motor vehicle while intoxicated: second offense, obstructing an officer, possession of drug paraphernalia.

Warren James Brazeau, 900 block of Marquette Street, knowingly violating a domestic abuse injunction, repeater.

Daniel S. Braznell, 500 block of 3 Mile Road, Caledonia, disorderly conduct.

Grant L. Ellis, 1200 block of Acewood Boulevard, Madison, possession of cocaine, possession of a controlled substance, possession of drug paraphrenalia.

Angela Grecian, 1500 of College Avenue, possession of drug paraphernalia.

Joseph W. King, 1400 block of College Avenue, obstructing an officer.

Alice M. Lecus, 9600 block of Dunkelow Road, Caledonia, disorderly conduct, misdemeanor bail jumping.

Jaimeer C. Lminggio, 3600 block of Spring Street, Racine, obstructing an officer, misdemeanor bail jumping.

Ricardo S. Mora, 2600 block of Gideon Street, Zion, Illinois, retail theft: intentionally concealing.

James Rayos, 1600 block of Western Avenue, Green Bay, violation of injunction: harassment, knowingly violating a harassment restraining order.

Cornell D. Rice, 2300 block of West Marquette Road, Chicago, Illinois, obstructing an officer, resisting an officer, disorderly conduct, misdemeanor bail jumping.

Brian A. Wegner, 5700 block of Seventh Avenue, Kenosha, obstructing an officer: repeater, criminal trespass:repeater, disorderly conduct: repeater.

John D. Barranco, 1200 block of Oregon Street, Racine, operating a motor vehicle while intoxicated: fourth offense, general alcohol concentration enhancer.

Marciella H. Chairez, 1300 Grand Avenue, Racine, disorderly conduct, assault by prisoners.

Jameel Ardell Cunningham, 1600 block of Edgewood Avenue, Racine, manufacture/deliver THC: second and subsequent offense.

Savannah M. Hernandez, 1500 block of Flett Avenue, Racine, possession of drug paraphernalia, possession with intent to deliver or manufacture THC: as a party to a crime.

Javonte R. Hunter, 100 block of Ohio Street, felony bail jumping, misdemeanor theft, misdemeanor batter: domestic abuse assessments, criminal damage to property: domestic abuse assessments.

Jeffrey Scott Langdon, 1000 of Parker Avenue, Racine, possession of drug paraphernalia, operating a motor vehicle while intoxicated: third offense, with a minor child in vehicle.

Collin R. Walter, 3500 Harrison Street, Dover, possession of narcotic drugs.

Mia L. White, 1900 of Taylor Avenue, Racine, substantial battery: domestic abuse assessments: repeater, disorderly conduct: domestic abuse assessments, repeater.

Dawn M. Gajewski, 200 block of South Seventh Street, Waterford, misdemeanor theft.

Cierra A. Jeter, 4600 block of South 49th Street, Greenfield, misdemeanor bail jumping, possession of cocaine.

Lupe Martinez, 1100 block of Perry Avenue, Racine, resisting an officer.

Amanda Northrop, 600 block of Winson Drive, Waterford, misdemeanor bail jumping.

Xhejlane Rahmani, 1600 Menomonee Avenue, South Milwaukee, obstructing an officer.

Hiram Wilson, 4800 block of North 39th Street, Milwaukee, misdemeanor batter: domestic abuse assessments, disorderly conduct, domestic abuse assessments.

Christopher L. Anderson, 1300 block of Grand Avenue, Racine, first degree recklessly endangering safety: as a party to a crime.

Timothy A. Debartelo, 4200 block of 22nd Avenue, Kenosha, attempting to flee or elude traffic officer, misdemeanor theft: as a party to a crime, obstructing an officer.

Daniel A. Kirk, 4700 Indian Hills Drive, Mount Pleasant, strangulation and suffocation: domestic abuse assessments, misdemeanor battery: domestic abuse assessments, disorderly conduct: domestic abuse assessments, misdemeanor bail jumping: domestic abuse assessments.

Joseph P. Maziarka, 200 block of Madison Street, Burlington, criminal damage to ATM/other machines, attempted entry into a locked coin box.

Lashaun McBride, 6100 block of Maiden Lane, Spring Grove, Illinois, possession with intent to deliver or manufacture THC.

Henry Peace, 1800 block of Mead Street, Racine, criminal damage to property: repeater, felony bail jumping: repeater.

Erik M. Pelt, 6600 block of 62nd Avenue, Kenosha, misdemeanor theft: as a party to a crime, possession of drug paraphernalia, felony bail jumping.

Richard L. Roberts, 5400 block of 18th Street, Kenosha, felony retail theft: intentionally taking more between $500-$5,000 as a party to a crime.

Wayne E. Sura Jr., 1600 block of Rapids Drive, Racine, manufacture/deliver heroin: second or subsequent offense.

Dennis W. Taylor, 5100 block of Wright Avenue, Racine, first degree sexual assault of a children under age 12.

Suzanne R. Baker, 300 block of East Market Street, Burlington, disorderly conduct, misdemeanor bail jumping.

Joshua L. Christianson, 1400 block of 11th Avenue, Union Grove, possession of THC, misdemeanor bail jumping.

Jeremy D.Debartelo, 4200 block of 22nd Avenue, Kenosha, misdemeanor theft: as a party to a crime, misdemeanor bail jumping.

Samantha L. Eisensee, 2800 block of Vermillion Street, Lake Station, Indiana, obstructing an officer, failture to obey traffic officers/signal.

Tony Charles Mow, 400 block of 3 Mile Road, Caledonia, posses/illegally obtained prescription, misdemeanor bail jumping, operating a motor vehicle while revoked.

Masharaya L. Bostick, 3200 block of Wheelock Drive, Racine, possession with intent to deliver cocaine: between 5-15 grams, as a party to a crime, possession with intent to deliver schedule IV drugs: as a party to a crime, possession of drug paraphernalia.

Dale Arthur Deavers, 22800 block of 8 Mile Road, Muskego, mental harm to a child, false imprisonment, manufacture/deliver THC: between 200-1,000 grams, maintaining a drug trafficking place.

Thomas P. Hartnell, 2900 block of 21st Street, Racine, operating a motor vehicle while intoxicated: fourth offense, attempting to flee or elude a traffic officer.

Gail D. Lalonde, 22800 block of 8 Mile Road, Muskego, mental harm to a child, false imprisonment, manufacture/deliver THC between 200-1,000 grams, maintaining a drug trafficking place.

Leroy John Payne Jr., 1900 block of Racine Street, Racine, possession with intent to deliver cocaine: between 5-15 grams, as a party to a crime, possession with intent to deliver schedule IV drugs: as a party to a crime, possession of drug paraphernalia: as a party to a crime.

Matthew E. Roslof, 5400 block of Kenosha Drive, Elkhorn, first degree sexual assault ofa child under age 12: repeater.

Kendrick D. Smith, 2200 block of Center Street, Racine, manufacture/deliver cocaine: less than 1 gram, second and subsequent offense.

Nicholas J. Slaasted, 3500 block of Rio Vista Road, Caledonia, felony bail jumping, resisting an officer, disorderly conduct.

Cecil Watkins, 12700 block of Germane Avenue, Apple Valley, Minnesota, attempted first degree intentional homicide: use of a dangerous weapon, first degree reckless endangering safety: use of a dangerous weapon.

Brian T. Hawkins, 100 block of Steeplechase Drive, Racine, disorderly conduct: domestic abuse assessments, use of a dangerous weapon.

Melissa L. Miller, 500 block of East Evandale Drive, Oak Creek, possession of drug paraphernalia.

Ashley L. Petersen, 1600 block of Charles Street, Racine, obstructing an officer.
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As civilians ran away from New York Citys burning twin towers nearly 16 years ago, first responders rushed toward the buildings, scaling the steps of the 110-floor skyscrapers to rescue anyone they could.

Bay Area first responders climbed the stairs of San Franciscos Bank of America building Saturday to pay homage to the heroic feats that occurred on Sept. 11, 2001  one that cost 412 emergency workers, including 343 firefighters, their lives.

At the inaugural San Francisco Stair Climb, officials raised money to combat and bring light to the less evident emotional toll of their work.

The event raised more than $140,000 to support post-traumatic stress injuries that first responders in police, fire and emergency services face throughout their careers.

The event, organized by San Francisco firefighter Greg Collaco and Fire Commissioner Joe Alioto Veronese, drew a few hundred climbers and raised contributions from around 1,500 donors.

Theyre there for us on our worst day, Alioto Veronese said of first responders. We want to be there for them on theirs.

Firefighters  some wearing their full fire gear  civilians, and various emergency services personnel climbed the 52-story building at 555 California St.  now the third-tallest skyscraper in the city behind the Transamerica Pyramid and the new Salesforce Tower.

Tom OConnor, president of San Francisco Firefighters Union Local 798, emerged from the building in a white T-shirt and workout shorts, catching his breath after climbing up and down the building in about 20 minutes.

I did it without my gear on. Thats why I sprinted past the young people, OConnor said.

He saw the climb as one of many ways to eliminate the stigma surrounding mental health issues confronting first responders.

Its a good cause, OConnor said. Were trying to say its OK to ask for help.

San Francisco Fire Chief Joanne Hayes-White and Police Chief Bill Scott joined participants in the plaza outside the skyscraper to show their support for the event.

For Scott, looking at the building was a reminder of the physical and emotional sacrifices responders made on 9/11  and continue to make now.

I go back to Sept. 11, 2001, and the courage of all these first responders going up those towers. Thats the essence of what this is all about, he said.

Ive always drawn inspiration from that.

But, he added, a lot of people dont realize theres an aftermath you have to deal with psychologically.

Hayes-White said that in her 27 years with the Fire Department shes seen change for the better when it comes to addressing mental health. As runners scaled the 1,197 steps up the skyscraper, they took even more strides toward addressing and treating the trauma first responders face firsthand.

We have a lot of rewarding days. Theres a lot of days that can be difficult, Hayes-White said. We want to make sure everyones well and healthy when they come to work.

Jenna Lyons is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jlyons@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @JennaJourno
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Politically charged rallies and protests in Berkeley this year have cost East Bay police departments more than $1.5 million to keep the peace, according to law enforcement data reviewed by The Chronicle.

The expenses will climb as UC Berkeley girds itself for a talk Thursday by conservative commentator Ben Shapiro, a Free Speech Week at the end of the month that is expected to feature author Milo Yiannopoulos, and protests that the events may draw. Outside campus, another right-wing gathering is planned for a downtown park Sept. 24.

The Chronicle reviewed expense data connected to the rallies, protests or demonstrations that have occurred in Berkeley this year. There were five:

 Feb. 1: A fiery protest at UC Berkeley prompted campus police to cancel a scheduled speech by Yiannopoulos. Protesters included black-clad anarchists and others who objected to Yiannopoulos as a promoter of a white nationalist-linked movement and for his ties to Steve Bannon, then a senior adviser to President Trump. They smashed windows, started fires and threw bricks and fireworks as they infiltrated the building where he was to speak. One person was arrested.

 March 4: Ten people were arrested and several were wounded after bloody fistfights broke out between supporters and opponents of President Trump. The violence unfolded in Martin Luther King Jr. Civic Center Park, where a rally was organized by Trump supporters.

 April 15: A pro-Trump rally turned violent when supporters and opponents of the president again fought at Civic Center Park. Twenty people were arrested and 11 were injured.

 April 27: Conservative commentator Ann Coulters expected appearance at UC Berkeley prompted dozens of her and President Trumps supporters, many in makeshift suits of armor, to gather at Civic Center Park. About 100 counterprotesters showed up, but there was no fighting  and there were no black-clad anarchists, either.

 Aug. 27: Thousands marched through downtown to protest what was billed as a right-wing No to Marxism in Berkeley rally. A crowd of self-style antifascists chased the rally-goers away, sometimes with beatings, from Civic Center Park. Berkeley police requested help from agencies across the East Bay. Seven people, including a police officer, were injured and 13 people were arrested.

Seven police departments and the Alameda County Sheriffs Office provided data to The Chronicle about their expenses related to the events. The police departments were from UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Oakland, Hayward, Newark, San Leandro and Union City. Four agencies that also dispatched officers did not provide requested data: the California Highway Patrol and Emeryville, Alameda and Fremont police.

A review of data showed that the April 27 event  which saw the least violence  cost the most. UC Berkeley shelled out nearly $700,000 for expenses including the assistance of East Bay police departments as well as the lodging, meals and equipment of officers from other UC campuses, including Irvine, Los Angeles, Riverside and Santa Barbara.

The review also found that the bulk of spending went to overtime pay. Other costs included equipment, paramedics, building repair and public works installments such as fences.

Lt. Paul Liskey, emergency manager for the Sheriffs Office, said the Berkeley protests have been unpredictable and costly, but the expenses are impossible to mitigate.

Its volatile. Its mobile, said Liskey, who coordinates mutual aid, or interagency law enforcement agreements, for the region. Traditionally, youd have a protest, theyd make a statement, the peaceful people would go home and the troublemakers would stay and cause destruction. Now, these two groups show up to fight each other, and were like the referees. Its very hard to control that situation. Its a crazy phenomenon.

Gabrielle Lurie/The Chronicle

Because each police department absorbs the costs of crime-fighting in other cities  unlike firefighting across jurisdictions, the expenses for which the state reimburses  the protests have made a huge difference on everyones budget, Liskey said.

Liskey said that while well never say no because lives are on the line, there are few incentives for cities to send their police officers to help Berkeley. On top of paying for overtime, the agencies become exposed to the possibility of equipment destruction or lawsuits stemming from use of force, he said.

When it comes to budgeting, though, the demonstrations on the UC Berkeley campus have proved to be an exception.

Since mutual aid is an emergency mechanism triggered when the resources of more than half a police department are exhausted, there can be a significant lag time before backup officers arrive, said Sgt. Sabrina Reich, spokeswoman for the campus police department. In the wake of the Feb. 1 violence outside the building where Yiannopoulos was supposed to speak, the campus began hammering out contracts with other police agencies ahead of time.

Thats why the university police ran up the big bill on April 27.

The nonevent that day cost the campus roughly $415,000 in outside law enforcement  though invoicing hasnt been completed  plus $70,000 for other UC campus police and $96,000 for their equipment and lodging. Private security cost $4,000, and UC Berkeleys own police required $65,000 in overtime. Building cleanup, staff overtime and paramedics services cost another $14,800.

Matthai Chakko, a spokesman for the city, said the protests have made an impact on the citys budget, but how allocations will be adjusted is not yet clear.

Its a significant cost, he said. This is money that could be spent on things residents really want. Wed rather not be going through this, but we have a duty to protect people.

In a letter to the UC Berkeley campus, Provost Paul Alivisatos said there will again be an increased and highly visible police presence Thursday during Shapiros talk. Six campus buildings will be closed so that police can establish a perimeter around the hall where he is set to speak, Alivisatos said.

Campus and police officials declined to discuss preparations or costs associated with future events, citing security threats.

Ed Obayashi, a Plumas County deputy sheriff and lawyer who has trained Alameda County law enforcement on the use of force, said that deploying large numbers of police officers is as much about psychology as it is practical public safety.

When protesters see a show of overwhelming force  a sea of blue or green or black, especially in military gear  theres a certain deterrent factor. It means, We mean business, Obayashi said. Psychologically, canines are a huge deterrent, too. The mere presence of a canine is worth about a dozen officers. No one wants to get bit by a German shepherd.

The purpose of a big law enforcement presence  and the costs associated with it  is about preparing for the worst possibilities, Liskey said.

We are just one incident away from having a catastrophic event, he said. Whether its a vehicle into a crowd, whether its a shooting, were at that threshold where if this goes bad, itll go really bad. And you cant prevent it, but you can react to it and react quickly with force.

Kimberly Veklerov is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: kveklerov@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @kveklerov
The pilot who died in a crash at Point Reyes National Seashore last week had recently left his Houston home after Hurricane Harvey flooded his basement, his wife said Saturday.

John R. Wilson, an oil and gas industry consultant, was found dead when search crews discovered his wrecked Cessna 172 amid thick brush at the Marin County park. He was 58.

He had traveled all over the world for his career, spending time between Austria, Santa Barbara and Houston, where he worked as a consultant for his firm Scorpio Resources, said Christine Wilson, his wife of 14 years.

For me its not reality yet, she said Saturday. He just received his pilot license a few weeks ago. He was a young pilot, but he loved it and he was careful.

She said her husband could not stay in their Houston home for the past three weeks after the storm took out electricity and running water when their basement flooded. He left Houston to stay at their property in Santa Barbara, while his wife was staying at their home in Austria.

Christine Wilson said her husband had carefully mapped out his flight from Santa Ynez in Santa Barbara County to Charles M. Schulz-Sonoma County Airport in Santa Rosa for an upcoming business trip in Napa.

He was really, really excited about flying. He was so excited. He had been planning this for a week, she said.

John Wilson had taken flying lessons for several years, and has flown several times successfully, including a trip from Houston to New Orleans, she said.

A multiagency search party found his plane Friday afternoon after the aircrafts emergency transmitter went off, giving them the location. The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the incident.

Wilson, originally from London, is survived by his wife, three children, three stepchildren and his brother.

His love for flying and hiking and his love for everyone, his character and integrity will be forever remembered by his family and friends, Christine Wilson wrote in an email to The Chronicle.

Jenna Lyons is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jlyons@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @JennaJourno
Erika Almanza picked up her 11-year-old son from school in San Jose one afternoon shortly after President Trump was elected and began to ask him about his day, but first the boy needed his own questions answered.

Mommy, are you illegal? he said. Are you going to get deported?

She assured him she would not, because she is a Dreamer  one of the more than 200,000 people in California protected from deportation by the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, known as DACA.

Now Almanza doesnt know what to tell her son and his 7-year-old sister after the Trump administration announced Tuesday it is phasing out DACA. She is facing not only the prospect of being deported to Mexico in a couple of years, but the realization that she would probably choose to leave behind her children, who are U.S. citizens by birth.

Their life is here. They only know here. The same way my life is here, said Almanza, a 27-year-old small-business owner, who was brought to the U.S. from Mexico at age 4. Her partner, the childrens father, is undocumented.

While attention on the DACA program has long focused on college students, surveys suggest that up to a quarter of the nearly 700,000 recipients are believed to be parents of citizens. These relationships add a powerful dimension to the debate as Trump, who professed love for Dreamers even as he rescinded DACA, asks Congress to come up with a solution.

The young parents are worried not only about their own fate, but also their childrens futures, if the end of DACA leads to deportations. They are weighing a variety of fraught factors, including the quality of education available in their native countries, their kids ages, and the availability of an American relative or other guardian who would step in.

Pratheepan Gulasekaram, a professor at Santa Clara University School of Law who has been critical of the Trump administrations tightening of immigration, said Dreamers who lose protection would not, by virtue of having a child who is a citizen, have a clear path to gaining a visa.

The fact that our draconian immigration laws wouldnt allow a former DACA-recipient parent with U.S.-citizen children a reasonable path to regular status in this country showcases just how harsh and ridiculous our system is, he said. No one benefits.

Unless Congress takes action, the phaseout of DACA will take a few years, because recipients will remain protected through their current term. But new applications are no longer accepted, and those whose protection is set to expire in the next six months must renew their two-year status by Oct. 5. Starting March 6, tens of thousands of recipients will begin to see their status expire, and could be deported.

Almanza, who is seeking to renew her DACA protection through January 2020, is one of many people already looking ahead to worst-case scenarios.

Mason Trinca / Special to The Chronicle

Family members, including her mother, oppose her tentative plan to leave behind her son and daughter if she is ordered to leave the country, telling her that a mother should always remain with her kids. She said she knows they are right  and feels it  but has to think about a bigger picture.

There is no future over there with my kids. I want to do it for my kids future, she said. I cry because its overwhelming what could happen next. Im really scared. Ive never been more scared.

Launched in 2012 by former President Barack Obama, DACA offered renewable, two-year work permits to applicants who were younger than 31 on June 15, 2012, had come to the U.S. before they were 16 and had lived here since June 2007. The program prompted many to establish stronger roots in America  going to school, developing a career or starting a family.

More than half of recipients surveyed this year by UC San Diego Professor Tom Wong said they got a job with better pay, got their first credit card and bought their first car after acceptance into the program. According to the same study, which was done for the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank, 25.7 percent of recipients said they had a child with U.S. citizenship, while 59 percent said they had an American sibling.

More than 70 percent said DACA had allowed them to earn more money and help their family financially. Wages went up from an average of about $20,000 to more than $36,000, the survey found.

DACA has impacted family stability and building of communities. Its allowed parents to work legally in the U.S. and earn an income in order to provide for their families, which include their own parents, their children and extended family members like their siblings, said Marissa Montes, co-director of the Loyola Law Schools Immigrant Justice Clinic in Los Angeles.

She cited the case of one of her clients, a mother of five who got married at a young age to an abusive husband. Because of DACA, she was able to leave the relationship, obtain a stable job and support her children.

On Tuesday, the client called Montes in a panic, saying, Whats going to happen to me? Whats going to happen to my children, because my children depend solely on me?

Other clients, she said, have voiced similar fears in recent days. Im getting a sense of desperation, Montes said.

At a news conference in Washington, D.C., Attorney General Jeff Sessions said the administration had no choice but to shut down the program because it was an unconstitutional exercise of authority by the executive branch. Several states had threatened to sue if Trump had not eliminated the program. Sessions also said DACA was a form of amnesty and, without offering evidence, said it had denied jobs to hundreds of thousands of Americans.

On Thursday, at the urging of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, Trump sought to reassure Dreamers. Referring to the fact that no one can be deported until March, he said on Twitter, For all of those (DACA) that are concerned about your status during the 6 month period, you have nothing to worry about  No action!

Those assurances, and the possibility that Congress will step in, are little comfort to Jennifer Sotz, a 23-year-old legal counselor in the Bay Area, who gave birth to a baby girl just a few weeks ago. Her DACA protection expires in February, though she has applied for a renewal.

The program has allowed her to hold a stable job and save for motherhood. She was, for the first time, able to get health insurance through her work.

All of a sudden, though, Sotz is confronted with the possibility that she will be deported to Honduras, a poverty-stricken country with one of the highest homicide rates in the world, according to the U.S. State Department. She left when she was 10.

Hours after Sessions announced the rollback of the program, Sotz, whose husband is undocumented, called her mother to relay her fears  that the government possessed all of her information through her DACA application, and that she would be deported with her daughter to a country she hardly knew. She has no future in Honduras, she said.

Lets wait, pray and hope that they can do something about it, her mother told her.

Im hopeful, Sotz said she responded, but its hard not knowing. Its like our future is up in the air.

Hamed Aleaziz is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: haleaziz@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @haleaziz
No one, least of all Republicans, should be surprised by President Trumps decision to dance with the Democrats.

Donald Trump has never been about ideology. Hes about making deals. He makes absolutely no secret of that. During the Obamacare debate, it was plain to see he was ignorant of the details of the various Republican repeal-and-replace proposals  he just wanted a deal.

And that experience was instructive, because the Republicans couldnt get him a deal. So now, he looks at the looming debate over the federal debt ceiling, and what does he see? A hard-line GOP willingness to default on our obligations, become a deadbeat superpower and throw the worlds financial markets into turmoil, all to score a few budget points.

That horse falls out of the gate dead. Even Trump can see that. So he comes to the obvious conclusion:

The sane Republicans in Congress are going to need the Democrats on this one. Why should I wait for Mitch McConnell to figure that out? Ill cut the deal with Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi myself.

So suddenly, there he is with Chuck and Nancy, his new best buddies. Then he doubles down with the Dems by tweeting out, at Pelosis request, reassurance to the Dreamers that there will be no immediate crackdown on them, even though Trump wants to roll back Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA.

People on both sides of the aisle tied themselves into pretzels trying to figure out what Trump was up to. Its not so hard  just look at what Trump himself said to Pelosi in a phone call, as reported by the New York Times:

The press has been incredible.

And thats not just boasting. It was also a message to the battered Democrats that they can score some points if they find their way to the table.

Unlike the Bernie Sanderses of the world, who come into a meeting with a laundry list of goals and conditions that must be met or no deal, Trump comes in with one idea: Come out a winner.

Truth be told, Trump is a lot closer in spirit to Schumer than to the courtly, reserved McConnell or Boy Scout Paul Ryan.

Trump and Schumer are both from New York. Theyve traveled in the same circles for years; they speak the same language.

When you saw Trump and Schumer laughing together last week, rest assured, it was not the first time.

Think big: The time has come for us to stop thinking of the Bay Area as a place with nine counties, and instead realize that were residents of a 20-county super region extending well into Northern and Central California.

That was the message delivered by SPUR leader Gabriel Metcalf and futurist Paul Saffo at the Battery club the other night.

Their point: Were more and more connected to the Central Valley, in transportation, housing, education and jobs. BART and the rest of the Bay Areas public transportation systems arent big enough to handle it all.

And there are major changes coming, they predict. Between the migration of everything online and the impending arrival of self-driving cars, shopping malls and sprawling parking lots and big garages will soon hit the endangered species list. Even with the demand for new housing, that will be a lot of dead space to fill.

These guys have important thoughts about whats coming, and every politician should be listening.

Crowded field: Quite a turnout by the local Greek community at the home of Victor Makras for Eleni Kounalakis, who is running for lieutenant governor. Shes a former U.S. ambassador to Hungary and was a big fundraiser for Hillary Clinton.

Theres no shortage of promising candidates for the states second-banana job in 2018. Besides Kounalakis, theres state Sen. Ed Hernandez, D-West Covina (Los Angeles County), former Richmond Mayor Gayle McLaughlin, Los Angeles physician Asif Mahmood (another big Clinton fundraiser), and Bay Area attorney Jeff Bleich, a former U.S. ambassador to Australia and special counsel to President Barack Obama.

During the event, a woman came up and asked if I had seen any of the TV reports about the flooding in Houston.

Did you notice? she asked. Usually with hurricanes and floods, the victims we see on TV are the poor. In Houston, it was everyone.

Movie time: I Do ... Until I Dont: No sense in mincing words. This film about three couples sharing their marital experiences, or lack of them, for reality TV is a flop.

Nothing works. The casting is bad. The plot is worse, and even the Florida setting feels off. Lake Bell, Ed Helms, Mary Steenburgen and company should have stayed home. Inexpensively produced and poorly shot to boot.

The Big Sick. A bad title for a fabulously entertaining movie. The story centers on a Pakistani who is being Americanized in a way that even President Trump would find entertaining. Add in a poorly paid standup comic who is not very funny, and a delightful mom and dad, and you have a fun night at the movies.

Crown Heights. The unexciting story of an innocent man jailed for 21 years for a murder he didnt commit. The painful pace of justice is matched only by the painful pace of the movie itself.

Sporting scene: The As are bad, and the Giants, remarkably, are worse. The South Bay 49ers start their latest exercise in futility Sunday. The Raiders are heading to the front desk with the key in their hand, ready to check out.

But its all going to be OK. The Warriors first exhibition game is less than three weeks away.

Want to sound off? Email wbrown@sfchronicle.com
The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program gave unauthorized immigrants who were brought to the United States before age 16 temporary work authorization and relief from deportation. It indirectly made them eligible for certain benefits they couldnt get before, though not as many as citizens and permanent residents get.

On Tuesday, the Department of Homeland Security said it had begun an orderly wind-down of the program after Attorney General Jeff Sessions said he believes that President Barack Obamas order creating the program in 2012 was an unconstitutional exercise of authority by the executive branch.

In a tweet Tuesday, President Trump said, Congress now has 6 months to legalize DACA.  If they cant, I will revisit this issue! But the next day he tweeted, For all of those (DACA) that are concerned about your status during the 6 month period, you have nothing to worry about  No action.

Heres a look at what the Dreamers stand to lose if DACA dies, what they could keep and what they never had.

A job: DACA recipients can work legally in the United States for two years. In the past, they could renew their work authorization every two years.

People who already have work authorization through DACA can retain it until its term expires. People whose authorization expires on or before March 5 can renew it for two more years, but only if they file a renewal no later than Oct. 5, the department said.

If your DACA expires March 6, 2018, or later, you will not be able to apply for renewal, the National Immigration Law Center says on its website.

The department will still consider first-time DACA requests filed on or before Tuesday, but none later.

U.S. employers are required to ask all new employees for documents establishing their identity and authorization to work. If their work authorization is temporary, employers cannot ask them to reverify it before it expires, although they can remind them that the expiration date is coming up, said Angelo Paparelli, an immigration lawyer with Seyfarth Shaw.

When an employees work authorization document expires, employers are required to reverify that the employee is still legally authorized to work. An employee who cant provide a currently valid work authorization document cannot be legally employed and must be dismissed, said Felicia Reid, an employment lawyer with Hirschfeld Kraemer.

Social Security numbers: Along with work authorization, a DACA recipient can apply for a Social Security number. This number has a number of different functions. One is for tax purposes, one is for eligibility for certain benefits, a third for employment purposes and a fourth is for identification, said Jackie Vimo, a policy analyst with the National Immigration Law Center. At some point, the work authorization may expire, but that Social Security number may remain valid for other purposes.

One is for tax filing. Social Security numbers dont expire, said Alison Flores, principal tax research analyst at the Tax Institute at H&R Block. Once a person gets a Social Security number, they must always use that number to file taxes even if they lose work authorization.

People who are required to file a U.S. tax return but dont qualify for a Social Security number can get an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number. But once people get a Social Security number, they cant go back to using their old taxpayer identification number.

Social Security benefits: Any worker who pays Social Security and Medicare taxes, including DACA recipients, can accrue credits that eventually could entitle them to benefits under those programs.

To collect Social Security retirement benefits, a worker generally needs to have paid Social Security taxes for at least 40 quarters, or the equivalent of 10 years, and must be at least 62. Thats a long way off for DACA recipients, most of whom are in their 20s.

To get Social Security Disability Income, workers generally must have paid Social Security taxes for at least five of the past 10 years, or four of the past eight years if they were younger than 30 when they became disabled. Some early DACA recipients who become disabled could be eligible for these benefits, although qualifying is no easy task.

If DACA recipients lose their work authorization, they would keep any credits they earned while working and paying taxes, Vimo said.

Tax credits: Low-income workers who have a Social Security number valid for employment are eligible to claim the Earned Income Tax credit, which is a form of welfare for the working poor, especially those with children. People who lose DACA could no longer claim this credit, because their Social Security number would not be valid for employment.

Two federal tax credits for low-income people with children  the Child Tax Credit and the Additional Child Tax Credit  do not require work authorization. They can be claimed with a Social Security number or an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number.

Health care: DACA recipients can get health coverage through their employers plan. If they lose their job, they could stay in the plan temporarily under the federal law known as Cobra. However, they would have to pay the full cost of coverage themselves, which could be prohibitively expensive. If they had health insurance through a spouses or partners employer, they could remain in the plan because there are no immigration requirements for such coverage, the immigration law center says.

DACA recipients who purchase their own insurance never qualified for premium subsidies under the Affordable Care Act. In fact, they cannot purchase health insurance through a state exchange such as Covered California, even if they pay the full cost themselves. On the bright side, they are not required to pay a tax penalty if they lack health insurance.

DACA recipients also do not qualify for Medicaid (other than emergency services) except in New York, California, Massachusetts, Minnesota and the District of Columbia, which are covering income-eligible adults with their own (not federal) funds, Vimo said.

In California, DACA recipients are given Medi-Cal eligibility under a broader immigration category that includes a number of categories of noncitizens who are eligible for full scope Medi-Cal coverage, the Department of Health Care Services said on its website. If DACA is rescinded, There will be no changes to the Medi-Cal coverage for DACA recipients (adults or children) in California.

Higher education benefits: DACA recipients are not eligible for federal financial aid, including grants, loans and work study. Nor are they automatically eligible for in-state tuition at public colleges. It is up to each state whether to give them in-state tuition and state financial aid, Vimo said.

In California, unauthorized immigrants who have spent at least three years at a California high school are generally eligible for in-state tuition and state financial aid  whether or not they are DACA-eligible. That wont change if DACA dies.

On Friday, the University of California sued the Trump administration, saying its order to end DACA violated the rights of students and the university system. A group of 15 state attorneys general have also filed a suit, saying the order discriminates against Mexicans, who make up the majority of the approximately 800,000 DACA recipients.

Kathleen Pender is a San Francisco Chronicle columnist. Email: kpender@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @kathpender
RACINE  Grace Verhaeghe began seeing the world through an artists eyes at a very young age. Her first paintings were created when she was about 12 years old and enrolled at a one-room schoolhouse near her hometown of Union Grove.

Her teacher  who taught all eight grades  encouraged Grace to create a series of pictures of various birds and enter them in the Racine County Fair. The young artist did so, and, while her entries didnt earn any ribbons, that experience inspired her to continue painting.

More than 80 years later, some of the many paintings Verhaeghe, now 98, created in the years since that County Fair are being shown in a retrospective exhibition at the Racine Arts Councils ArtSpace gallery, 409 Sixth St.

It is the artists first solo show and is comprised of untitled landscapes, still-lifes, portraits and abstracts that were discovered in her Northwestern Avenue home after she moved out and was selling the house.

While she had studied painting at Racines Wustum Museum of Fine Arts and the University of Wisconsin-Parkside  and estimates she had close to 100 paintings stored in her attic alone  Verhaeghe said she had never shown her artwork before because I didnt think they were good enough.

Artistic connections

Painting is something Verhaeghe did for her own pleasure and challenge, mostly after raising her five children. The basic skills came naturally to her and she enjoyed learning from teachers such as John Goray, who she said taught her to be more free and colorful in her work.

Verhaeghe has many fond memories of working with Goray and Ruth Kjaer, another artist she met at Wustum. The three became friends, she said, and would often gather socially in her home near the museum.

Wed light the fireplace and theyd sit at the piano and play and sing, she said.

Fellow artists are some of the many interesting people Verhaeghe said shes met through her artwork, and some of their portraits can be seen in the show. Gallery visitors can also see her view of the many places she traveled with her husband, George, and other family members, from Fairbanks, Alaska, to Toledo, Spain, as well as locations closer to home.

Verhaeghes retrospective exhibition  which was organized by Nicholas Ravnikar, Dan Gobis and Verhaeghes daughter, Sue Henderson  also includes a few paintings that the artist isnt sure are hers. Back in her days taking classes, she explained, she would sometimes take her classmates paintings home with her, if they didnt want them. And, as the years have passed, she said she cant be certain that all of the portraits found in her attic are hers.

I dont want anyone to think that Im claiming their work for my own, she said.

Creative gifts

No matter where she went in life, Verhaeghe always seemed to discover things she wanted to paint  from a towering, gold-dredging machine in Alaska to Milwaukees Three Brothers Restaurant. She was often sketching and most of what she painted was done from memory. But, she also filled requests for paintings, including those for a life-sized portrait of a pirate and a treasured family farm, and often gave away her work as gifts.

The artist was also very generous in sharing her time and talents with her grandchildren, Henderson said. At some point in their young lives, Verhaeghe took care of all seven of her grandchildren and, when she did, she would bring out all kinds of art supplies and encourage them to express themselves, passing on her passion for creativity.

Her retrospective exhibit, Ravnikar said, is meant to draw attention to the artistic contributions and legacy of Verhaeghe, an otherwise little-known painter.

For Verhaeghe, whose adventurous spirit is still evident today, it is an opportunity to not only revisit her many years of creating art, but also the people, places and memories each piece holds.

The show is also an opportunity for the public to help support a couple local causes. Many of the paintings exhibited are available for sale through a silent auction, with proceeds going to the Veterans Outreach Center, in memory of Verhaeghes son, Michael, and to RACs Main Gallery program. Bids can be placed in person at the ArtSpace Gallery through Oct. 21. Gallery hours are noon to 5 p.m. Thursday through Saturday.

Auction winners can pick up their paintings at the exhibits closing reception, which will be held from 5 to 7 p.m. Oct. 21. The reception will feature a brief gallery talk by the curator and a chance to meet the artist, as well as refreshments. For more information, go to www.racineartscouncil.org.
Rising young movie star Dylan OBrien was shooting The Death Cure, the final installment in the Maze Runner movie series, when everything changed.

He was performing a stunt on a moving vehicle, harnessed for safety, when he was suddenly jerked into the air unexpectedly. The teen actor flew into another vehicle ... face first.

I had a severe concussion and brain trauma, says OBrien, calmly, though hints of something jagged poke through his polite tone. I basically broke this whole side of my face, he says, indicating the right side of his face.

I had to have facial reconstructive surgery. Got plates in there now. I thought that was just it, that my face was never gonna look the same again.

But it did. The surgeons did a remarkable job. In addition to the ragged start of a beard and the muscle he put on for his new film, American Assassin, the only obvious difference now is that his face looks fuller, more grown up.

I now look at the experience as having gotten away really luckily, he says. A, just walking away from it. And B, getting this great doctor who took care of me and really fixed me up.

Following that experience, OBrien, who lists among his credits Teen Wolf and Deepwater Horizon, decided to take on the most physical role of his life: CIA black ops man Mitch Rapp in American Assassin. To play the character from the best-selling Vince Flynn books, he would have to train his body and learn to fight like never before. At least, unlike the badly damaged Rapp, he wouldnt have to kill people to get his catharsis.

This was definitely tackling it head-on, he says of putting himself through the physical rigors of the role. I also felt more connected to the character in a way, and more informed than I ever could have been  at the same time, I was terrified to do it.

OBrien says he learned from the films CIA advisers of personal traumas that set them  like Rapp, and now, like OBrien  on their paths.

That strength comes, in a way, from having survived these traumatic incidents. Obviously, its not every one of those guys, but I felt really connected to that.

As Rapp, OBrien is a cold-eyed killer who doesnt even react when a noncombatant woman is killed right in front of him.

I always wanted to try to implement these signs of pain and damage in ways like that, he says of Rapps apparent detachment, but its really important that Mitch accept that what happened to him is always going to be with him, and no amount of revenge will ever heal that.

Playing a killer he couldnt previously have imagined hed understand this way, as well as finally getting back to the set of Death Cure, have all been part of a year of healing.

I would have good days and bad days, he says of preparing for Assassin. Some days, I would show up to the gym, and my trainer would sense I was  in this place, you know? Not a good one. I would randomly have very doubtful days and panicky moments of just wanting to bow out. I had to constantly push through them. Even when I was leaving for the film.

I had a pretty severe panic episode an hour before my flight  to the point where I didnt even know if theyd let me on the plane. But I always had a lot of support. ... My dad came with me on that flight. I dont think I would have been able to do it; he actually came out with me and was my rock.

OBrien is clearly proud to have overcome those doubts to complete both films. Even after Assassin, just returning to Death Cure almost proved to be too much.

Inside, youre wanting to run away  you dont want to do it, you know? he says. It ended up being one of the best experiences of my life. Im really glad I was able to finish it. I thought I felt relief after Assassin; this was the ultimate kind of weightless. ... It had been over a year at that point since the accident, and I felt more free and like myself once I accomplished that than I had the whole year.

Michael Ordona is a Los Angeles-based freelance writer. Twitter: @michaelordona.

American Assassin: Opens Friday, Sept. 15, at Bay Area theaters. (R)
JERUSALEM - Yair Netanyahu, the son of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, removed an anti-Semitic meme from his Facebook page on Sunday after an outcry from Israeli politicians and Jewish community leaders in the United States.

The image, posted by Netanyahu on Friday, appeared to be a local take on a classic anti-Semitic cartoon suggesting that Jews control the United States. It has appeared widely on extreme alt-right websites.

In this instance, it depicted his father's perceived foes: American Jewish billionaire philanthropist and investor George Soros, outspoken former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak, activist Eldad Yaniv and Meni Naftali, a former housekeeper for the Netanyahus who successfully sued them for mistreatment.

Netanyahu, who goes by the name "Yair Hun" on Facebook, had captioned the meme "the food chain."

Over the weekend, Netanyahu's actions drew praise from Neo-Nazi groups in the United States, as well as from Holocaust denier David Duke, a former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan.

"Yair Netanyahu is a total bro," wrote Andrew Anglin in the neo-Nazi Daily Stormer. "Next he's going to call for gassings."

Duke tweeted about it:

"Welcome to the club, Yair - absolutely amazing, wow, just wow." - David Duke

But many in Israel and the U.S. condemned it, expressing shock that the prime minister's son would share such an image.

The Israeli office of the Anti-Defamation League tweeted in Hebrew that "the cartoon posted by Yair Netanyahu blatantly contains anti-Semitic elements."

Former prime minister Barak suggested the younger Netanyahu see a psychiatrist.

"Is this what the kid hears at home?" he wrote on Twitter. "Is it genetics, or a spontaneous mental illness? It doesn't matter. In any case, we should fund his psychiatrist instead of security guards and a driver."

Netanyahu responded to Barak by telling him to get a geriatric nurse: "I hope Ehud Barach (a play on words meaning "Ehud ran away") didn't tweet about me from his seat in Boston (between one shady deal or another) while drunk on whiskey (as I well recall). Time to get a geriatric nurse, Ehud."

He also responded to an article about his post in the left-leaning newspaper Haaretz, calling the publication anti-Semitic.

"It's a particularly sad day for Israel when a caricature endorsed by the head of the KKK emerges from the home of the prime minister of the Jewish state," wrote recently elected Labor leader Avi Gabbay on Twitter.

"Every Jew should feel a sense of shame that a Der Sturmer-style cartoon has come out of the Israeli Prime Minister's residence and was embraced by one of the great anti-Semites. Erase, apologize and condemn!" wrote Opposition Chairman Isaac Herzog on Twitter.

"This post was not put up by mistake, this is in keeping with the views of his father," activist Eldad Yaniv told The Washington Post. "He wants to set Israeli society on fire, pitching people against each other, so he can hide the suspicions that are against him.

On Twitter, Yaniv shared the image posted by Yair Netanyahu together with the original, which he called the inspiration behind a post from "the son of the prime minister of the Jewish people."

Yaniv, together with former housekeeper Naftali, have been leading weekly protests against the prime minister and the attorney general over what they see as a failure to issue indictments against Netanyahu in at least two cases of alleged corruption.

Three weeks ago, the two men were violently arrested and held overnight by police for Facebook posts calling on the public to join them. Last week, in a speech to his supporters, Netanyahu publically attacked the two men, calling them anarchists and criminals.

On Friday, Netanyahu's wife, Sara, was informed by the attorney general that she will likely face charges for excessive spending, ordering - against protocol -- ready-made food and hiring private chefs to the prime minister's residence in Jerusalem.

Writing in the daily Yediot Aharonot, commentator Ben Dror Yemini said this post indicated the prime minister and his family were panicking.

"If that wasn't clear then along came this cartoon to demonstrate that something bad, very bad, is happening in the (prime minister's) residence on Balfour Street. When an anti-Semitic cartoon gets posted there, that is no longer just the problem of the people who reside in the residence. It is the State of Israel's problem," he wrote.

Last month, at the time of the neo Nazi march in Charlottesville, Yair Netanyahu also caused controversy by equating neo-Nazis with activists from far-left anti-fascist groups kn known as "antifa."

"I'm a Jew, I'm an Israeli, the neo nazi scums in Virginia hate me and my country. But they belong to the past. Their breed is dying out," the 26-year-old wrote on Facebook. "However the thugs of Antifa and BLM who hate my country (and America too in my view) just as much are getting stronger and stronger and becoming super dominant in American universities and public life."
Googles search engine runs about two-thirds of all searches in the United States and 90 percent in Europe. Platform monopolies like this can squelch innovation. Google could favor its own services, such as Google Maps and Google Shopping, for example.

This is one reason that the European Commission hit Google with a fine of $2.7 billion in June.

Why hasnt Google run into similar problems with antitrust authorities in the United States?

It almost did in 2012. The Federal Trade Commissions Bureau of Competition recommended that the FTC sue Google for conduct that has resulted  and will result  in real harm to consumers and to innovation in the online search and advertising markets.

But the commissioners didnt pursue the case, which is unusual when the staff recommends action. They gave no explanation for this, but it may have had to do with Googles political clout.

Google is among the largest corporate lobbyists in the United States and a major campaign donor. We now know that Google also has enough financial power to stifle criticism coming from independent researchers.

Last week, the New York Times reported that the New America Foundation, an influential center-left think tank, fired Barry Lynn, a sharp critic of platform monopolies. Lynn had posted a congratulatory note to European officials about their Google decision, and called for American antitrust officials to follow suit.

Since its founding in 1999, the New America Foundation has received more than $21 million from Google (and its parent company, Alphabet), and from the family foundation of Eric Schmidt, the executive chairman of Alphabet who previously served as chairman of New Americas board.

According to the Times, Schmidt didnt like Lynns comments and communicated his displeasure to the president of the New America Foundation, who then accused Lynn of imperiling the institution as a whole, and fired him and his staff.

Few powerful institutions or people like to be criticized. But its never smart to use power to try to stop critics.

Consider Donald J. Trump. It may seem odd to mention Trump at the same time Im talking about Google. Googles executives tend to be on the left. Schmidt was a major backer of Hillary Clinton.

But power is power, and Trump has demonstrated a similar tendency to throw his ever-expanding weight around. Like Google, he doesnt particularly like being criticized.

Trump also has a record of paying off politicians. During the 2016 Republican primaries, when attacked by his GOP rivals for having once donated money to Hillary Clinton, Trump explained that as a businessman and a very substantial donor to very important people, when you give, they do whatever the hell you want them to do.

After Trumps charitable foundation made a $25,000 contribution to a campaign organization linked to Floridas attorney general, she decided not to open a fraud investigation of Trump University that her office had been considering.

To support his ambitions, Trump has also paid for, shall we say, fake news. Apparently his campaign financed a lot of fictionalized dirt on Hillary.

Google doesnt pay for fake news, but it does pay academics to do research that sways the public and policymakers in its direction.

The Wall Street Journal recently reported that Google has financed hundreds of professors, including some at Harvard and Berkeley, to write research papers that help Google defend itself against regulatory challenges of its market dominance. Googles payments range from $5,000 to $400,000. This research has been used by Google in courtrooms, regulatory hearings and congressional hearings.

Some professors have even allowed Google to see the papers before theyre published, enabling Google to give them suggestions, according to emails obtained by the Journal.

The professors dont reveal in their published research that Google solicited the work, nor do they necessarily disclose that Google paid for it.

Im not suggesting the research has been faked. But Googles financial connection to it and the failure to fully disclose that connection raise questions about its objectivity.

Google and Trump are wildly different, of course, but theyve been playing the same game. Theyve used their clout to stifle criticism, theyve paid public officials to pull their punches, and theyve bought fake (or at least questionable) facts to support their public policy goals.

Whether its a giant left-leaning corporation or an unhinged alt-right president, the underlying problem is the same.

The use of power in these ways imperils our democratic system. Its morally wrong.

 2017 Robert Reich

Robert Reich, a former U.S. secretary of labor, is professor of public policy at UC Berkeley. He blogs daily at www.facebook.com/rbreich. To comment, submit your letter to the editor at SFChronicle.com/letters.
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A retro commotion is echoing throughout Berkeley Rep Theatres rehearsal space. But dont call it a resurrection.

On a recent Wednesday afternoon, the cast of Aint Too Proud: The Life and Times of the Temptations, are running through the first act of the upcoming musical about the iconic Motown group. Opening Sept. 14 and running through Oct. 8 at Berkeley Rep, the musical observes the rise, beginning in the 1960s, of the original five members of the Temptations into one of the most renowned soul acts ever.

Its a look back, but not exactly a revival  if anything the Temptations, who still tour regularly with founding member Otis Williams, have only survived.

There have been 24 Temptations, says director Des McAnuff, the Tony Award-winning director behind such Broadway shows as The Whos Tommy and Jersey Boys. Theyve spanned decades, and theyve survived all kinds of hardships  going through the South, segregated audiences, obviously the turmoil of the 60s, death, drug addiction, suicide.

The Temptations tale  their longevity, the inner conflicts, their ascension into superstardom as a black group from Detroit in a deeply racist era  is why McAnuff, and playwright Dominique Morisseau, might recoil at the jukebox musical label conveniently slapped onto productions such as these. The Temptations hits are there, but the production is no revue or glorified soundtrack.

The production might be seen as a play within a musical, especially with its script coming from playwright and Detroit native Morisseau.

Its a look at how they try to figure out who they are in the middle of representing their community and what they come from, says Morisseau. Theyre kind of rising in a way that their community isnt. Theyre getting a taste of privilege in a way, while the world is unraveling.

More was at stake here than the frictions of budding stars, and the story examines the price they paid for their rise, Morisseau says. But that fevered history on stage is ever-present. Riots, racial violence and tension, the question of identity amid constant social unrest  hysteria then is so now.

Williams (Derrick Baskins), the last living member of the classic five ensemble who has been involved with the production (and tapped McAnuff for the directing role), guides the production through the turbulence. Based in part on his book, Temptations, Williams anchors the musical with narrations of the groups story, prompting quick transitions across time and space.

Stage and music If you like the Temptations, here are some other Motown...

The use of large turntables and a treadmill of sorts allow for scenes to move quickly through smoothly roving sets. Almost everything you see floats, glides, McAnuff says. Like its a memory play. Like its a dream.

As the first act moves along in rehearsal, Baskins is performing bits from Runaway Child, Running Wild, before jumping in and out of imaginary locations surrounded by the black and brown characters of the budding Motown label. This in itself  such a palette of faces in the fore of musical theater  can appear as a dream indeed.

Its really important that this cast has essentially five leading black men, Baskin says, especially complicated ones where dimension takes shape. A lot of times with black characters in theater, musical theater especially, black guys  were the sidekick, were the villain. But our characters are very rarely fleshed out like this.

It helps, of course, that the rare opportunity is met with supreme skill, along with a palpable sense of camaraderie among the cast.

In the room, on the final callback, I was so humbled by their talent, and I told them   choreographer Sergio Trujillo says before cutting himself off. Wait, theyre so loud! Outside, the cast is whooping and hollering through a friendly volleyball game during a rehearsal break, before Trujillo steps out with a playful rage, calling for quiet.

The cast is populated by Broadway veterans such as Baskins and, among others, rising star Ephraim Sykes (playing David Ruffin) who was part of the original cast of Hamilton.

There is a perhaps purposefully muted, but not entirely quiet, notion that this group can eventually bring the production to Broadway. McAnuff would know, with his recent music group-bio production, Jersey Boys, the 2005 Tony Award best musical that had one of the most successful runs in Broadway history.

Im not sure that will ever happen to either of us again, McAnuff says, turning to look at Trujillo, who choreographed Jersey Boys. But wed sure like it to. I think this is a very exciting piece of theater. And my expectations for it are really high.

Jinxing might be the fear, but within music history, the Temptations, more than most, warrant a space on the biggest stages. Decades later, modern music still bears their fingerprints, whether in the moves (from the Jackson 5 to Bruno Mars, says Trujillo) or in the tunes (see Adele or Leon Bridges, says musical director Kenny Seymour).

But for now, the focus is on the Berkeley stage.

Its so exciting, you kind of want to just say, You know what, lets just take it one day at a time. Lets get the show here, Baskins says. Were still in tech, so lets just hope we make it through opening night.

Brandon Yu is a Bay Area freelance writer.

Aint Too Proud: The Life and Times of the Temptations: Written by Dominique Morisseau. Directed by Des McAnuff. Opens Thursday, Sept. 14. Through Sunday, Oct. 8. $40-$125. Berkeley Rep Theatre, 2025 Addison St, S.F. (510) 647-2900 www.berkeleyrep.org

To view a video of Morisseau and her husband J Keys dancing at their wedding, go to https://youtu.be/Txa1wtSaAZM

Aint Too Proud: The Life and Times of the Temptations: Written by Dominique Morisseau. Directed by Des McAnuff. Opens Thursday, Sept. 14. Through Sunday, Oct. 8. $40-$125. Berkeley Rep Theatre, 2025 Addison St, Berkeley. (510) 647-2900 www.berkeleyrep.org

To view a video of Morisseau and her husband J Keys dancing at their wedding, go to https://youtu.be/Txa1wtSaAZM
RACINE  All six candidates to be the next mayor of Racine appeared in public together for the first time Saturday afternoon, and the struggles facing Racine Unified School District were on their minds.

The candidates were asked about economic growth, bringing a community health center to the city and building trust with Racines immigrant community at the forum, hosted by the Racine Branch of the NAACP at the Bray Center YMCA, 924 Center St. However, the only topic that comprised two separate questions was the recent troubles facing Racine Unified.

The citys banner economic development project, the proposed Downtown event center and hotel, was not the subject of any of the predetermined questions; there was no opportunity for attendees to ask the candidates questions. The center was only mentioned in passing by Alderman Sandy Weidner and Green Party leader Fabi Maldonado, both vocal opponents of the plan, when discussing overspending on failed development projects.

None of the candidates have publicly come out in support of the event center. That didnt change Friday, when state Rep. Cory Mason, D-Racine, released a video on Facebook announcing his opposition to the plan.

I support economic development projects, I want to rebuild the city, but we need to do things that will work in the real world, he said in the video. We need to do things that are financially sustainable and we need to do them well.

Unified split causes concern

The crowd of about 200 at the Bray Center remained fairly composed throughout the 2-hour forum, but when the candidates addressed the issue of possible suburban secession from Racine Unified School District, the room grew raucous.

The loudest reaction of the entire forum came after Mason questioned the consistency of his colleagues in the state Legislature regarding their respective stances on Unified and Foxconn, the Taiwanese company to which the state is preparing to offer a $3 billion incentive package.

How do you say on one day, Hey, City of Racine, we could really use some water for a big economic development project, and then the next day say, By the way, youre on your own with the schools,  Mason said.

Masons fellow candidates reiterated their stances against the potential Unified split.

The fate of Unified is also the fate of the City of Racine, Weidner said. If Unified goes, the city will not be far behind, in large part because the success of the city depends on the success of Unified.

Local business owner Austin Rodriguez said that ensuring Unified is not taken over by Racine County is the biggest challenge we have to face right now.

Community organizer Wally Rendon agreed, and again said as mayor he would hire a city liaison to monitor Unifieds progress.

The school district is ours, Rendon said. It belongs to the taxpayers of the city. The last thing we need to do is have the state come in and tell us how to run our school district.

Maldonado said the goal of the Legislatures attitude toward Unified is to pit people against each other.

Its going to be segregated, he said. Its going to be Brown vs. The Board of Education all over again. Its going to be the county versus the city and that is not the way we should be going about this.

Pastor Melvin Hargrove, a former president of the Racine Unified School Board, acknowledged that suburban secession would have massive results to the negative for the city. However, he used most of his time on both questions to address the importance of aligning the RUSD handbook with state law.

Whether we like it or not, Act 10 was the law and still is the law, he said. If we break the law, we have to face the consequences. I know you dont want to hear that, but at the end of the day, the consequences have to be paid for breaking the law.

Foxconn, immigrant concerns

While Unified drew the most animated responses from the crowd and candidates alike, it was far from the only issue discussed Saturday. To begin the forum, the candidates were asked an open-ended question about their economic development ideas, which led some of the candidates to discuss Foxconn.

Mason brought up the importance of preparing Racinians for jobs with companies like Foxconn through local training programs.

Weve got to be ready for that, like yesterday, Mason said. Theres a lot of jobs that are going to come available, but those jobs might as well be 100 miles away if we dont get our workforce ready.

Hargrove said that hes glad that Foxconn is coming, before emphasizing the economic effect that improving housing could have on the city.

As the community rises, then what? The tax base rises, he said. We have to look at how we use housing as a way to continue economic development.

Maldonado reiterated his stance as firmly anti-Foxconn.

Were essentially selling out our environment, Maldonado said. I dont think its a good idea that we have to give up $3 billion to Foxconn ... to me, thats a bad deal.

The candidates also were asked about how they would build trust between City Hall and Racines immigrant population, an issue that has taken national prominence lately in light of President Donald Trumps proposed rollback of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals.

One of the ways we build trust, it doesnt matter what immigrant population youre from, we have to understand their culture, Rendon said. The only thing un-American about a DACA kid is he was brought in or she was brought in as an infant.

Rodriguez said its important to get local immigrants documented into our payroll system and acknowledged their importance to the local workforce.

Thats where we fail to realize that they do play a big role in our economy with the money that they do make, he said.

Weidner said that she would go about building trust with immigrants one person at a time and said she would fight against deporting someone from the City of Racine.

I think an administration, a City Hall, and a police department and all of our social service agencies (should) make it clear to our immigrant population that they are not only welcome here, but we want them to stay, Weidner said. These are my neighbors were talking about.
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The Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit system temporarily ground to a halt Saturday after a Santa Rosa motorist suspected of driving under the influence veered off the road and onto the SMART train tracks north of Rohnert Park Expressway, officials said.

According to Rohnert Park Police, 23-year-old Tyra Ingalls said she was driving west on Rohnert Park Expressway when another unidentified vehicle began swerving, causing her to leave the roadway.
The centuries roll by, and human nature doesnt change all that much, and so we keep telling ourselves the same stories over and over in different guises  tales of love and betrayal, of heroic deeds and toxic families and the impact of it all. Sometimes we tell those stories with enough verve and timelessness that they become art.

The extraordinary production of Richard Strauss Elektra that opened Saturday night at the San Francisco Opera  a tour de force of musical bravura and theatrical inventiveness  both explores and exemplifies that little homily. It ostensibly treats the plots ancient Greek roots at a certain remove, by viewing the travails of the House of Atreus through the eyes of an anonymous contemporary woman who finds there an echo of her own familial trauma.

Yet the opening performance at the War Memorial Opera House was delivered with such fiery intensity by a basically flawless troupe of singing actors and orchestral musicians  led by soprano Christine Goerke in the title role, and guided from the pit by conductor Henrik Nanasi in an unforgettable company debut  that Elektras fears and grievances seemed to become ones own.

Your head may have been busy parsing the narrative framework, and musing on the durability of myth. But your heart was, at every moment, engrossed by the psychological plight of these characters.

The premise of director Keith Warners production, which premiered last year in Prague and is staged here by Anja Kuhnhold, seems too high-concept at first blush to be quite plausible, yet it soon pays off with dramatic riches. As the audience files in, the curtain is already up to reveal a modern-day museum, where an exhibition on the Elektra story is in place.

There are glass display cases holding elaborate costumes and Mycenaean bronzes, and monitors playing video loops that seem to be drawn from some early Expressionist film versions. A handful of patrons  including a few who may look familiar from the artists pages of the program book  circulate under the eyes of watchful guards. Then a closing announcement is made, and everyone is ushered out  except for our protagonist, who is so moved by what shes seen that she lingers behind for a night in the museum.

What follows in the ensuing nearly two intermissionless hours is a performance of Strauss taut masterpiece as conceived and executed by the main characters trauma-scarred consciousness. The parallels seem unavoidable to her: She is Elektra, her dead father might as well be the heroic Agamemnon, and the faithless, murderous Klytemnestra is for damn sure her own mother  the source, whether literally or not, of everything thats gone wrong in her life. (In one of the most viscerally telling moments, the protagonist pulls the Klytemnestra waxwork out of its case and strips it of its ancient robe and crown, to press it into service in her private drama.)

Warner uses this schema to allow for a freewheeling approach to the episodic dramaturgy of Strauss opera, which is built around a series of discrete encounters between Elektra and members of her family. The various display cases in Boris Kudlickas elegantly gleaming set fly in and out of focus at the protagonists behest, and flashbacks appear and disappear with theatrical virtuosity.

Even a merely passable musical account of Strauss score would, I suspect, have made for a potent account under these circumstances. Instead, the San Francisco Opera has assembled a cast for the ages.

Goerke was, of course, the focus and main conduit for the evenings brilliance. Elektra is onstage through the entire opera, and a performance of the work stands or falls on the contributions of its leading lady.

Yet to try to catalog the virtues of Goerkes magnificent star turn feels like a poor substitute for merely pointing in dumbstruck awe. She unleashed volleys of voluminous and perfectly tuned sound capable of riding easily atop the crashes of Strauss mammoth orchestra, then turned around to deliver soft-hued phrases of impeccable intimacy.

She caressed the twists and turns of Hugo von Hofmannsthals libretto, from the machine-gun bursts of verbiage  sardonic, wheedling, fiercely accusatory  with which Elektra confronts her interlocutors to the almost wordless howls of despair that overcome her in her darkest moments. And her performance was so expressively transparent that the productions theatrical premise registered with crystal clarity (although, fair warning, a little advance familiarity with the plot is not unhelpful in this case).

The rest of the cast surrounded Goerke like so many gleaming planets around a fiery sun. Soprano Adrianne Pieczonka gave an exquisite performance  bright-toned, ardent, poignant  as Elektras sister Crysothemis, who wants nothing more than to be free of the family turmoil so she can find a man and start popping out babies.

Michaela Martens Klytemnestra  a figure of needy menace, swaggering around with a whiskey bottle clutched in her claw  showed a masterful ability to sustain the musical and dramatic tension of a moment through an attenuated, almost inaudible thread of sound, only to follow up with a finely crafted blast of malignancy.

Alfred Walker, his singing as ominous and sepulchral as his presence, made a formidable company debut as Orest, the late-arriving agent of vengeance (staged here in exuberant horror-flick style), and Robert Brubaker oozed arrogant smarm as the usurping Aegisth.

Through it all was the crashing, insinuating work of the Opera Orchestra, tackling Strauss opulent score with a degree of precision and fluency that were a delight to hear. Nanasi, a young Hungarian conductor with a rare combination of interpretive insight and technical command, made the most of every moment.

May he come back again, and soon. May Goerke continue to scale the artistic heights she has undertaken in this production. May the San Francisco Opera, and its patrons, continue to look on this Elektra as a benchmark to aspire to.

Joshua Kosman is The San Francisco Chronicles music critic. Email: jkosman@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @JoshuaKosman

San Francisco Opera: Elektra: Through Sept. 27. $26-$397. War Memorial Opera House, 301 Van Ness Ave., S.F. (415) 864-3330, www.sfopera.com
President Trumps decision to wipe out deportation reprieves for young undocumented immigrants has unleashed a frenzied rush to renew 154,000 permits before an Oct. 5 deadline, a process advocacy groups say will cost millions of dollars in fees and stretch their resources to the limit.

In hurricane-ravaged Houston, lawyers are clearing their calendars to help immigrants fill out the forms. Nationwide, immigrants and nonprofits are raising money online to help cover the $495 renewal fees.

Its definitely one disaster after another: one of natural causes and one man-made, said Maria Rodriguez, executive director of the Florida Immigrant Coalition in Miami, which is coping with Hurricane Irma. Its heartbreaking.

The Trump administration announced Tuesday that it will eliminate Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, an Obama-era executive action that protected hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as children. Almost 700,000 people  who have come to be known as Dreamers  have that protection now, government officials said last week. Critics say then-President Barack Obama did not have the authority to create the program when he set it up in 2012, and they say DACA beneficiaries take jobs and other benefits that should go to legal residents.

Those whose deferred-action status is expiring between Sept. 5 and March 5, 2018, have a month to apply to renew their work permits. A successful application would be only a reprieve, valid for two years.

It fell on people like a bag of bricks ... and its only starting to sink in, said Joshua Hoyt, executive director of the National Partnership for New Americans, a coalition of organizations providing legal services to immigrants. Its 5,133 (renewal applications) every day, including today. Thats 214 per hour, if we work all night long.

Advocates are urging Trump to extend the Oct. 5 deadline to give immigrants a chance to raise money to pay the renewal fees. They also say immigrants in Texas and Florida, which have large undocumented populations, could miss the deadline because of the extreme disruption caused by Hurricanes Harvey and Irma.

Barring action from Congress, thousands of DACA recipients will begin losing their legal status in March. About 200,000 will be phased out of the program in 2018, followed by 320,000 in 2019. The program would cease to exist by 2020, federal officials said Friday. Multiple bills are pending in Congress to address the situation of young immigrants.

Maria Sacchetti is a Washington Post writer.
SEATTLE  An extensive poaching ring is responsible for slaughtering more than 100 black bears, cougars, bobcats, deer and elk in southwestern Washington state and northwestern Oregon, with many of the animals hunted with dogs and then left to rot, authorities said.

There was an absolute wanton disregard for our conservations laws, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife Capt. Jeff Wickersham said.

Seven people  six adults, some of whom have previously been targeted in poaching investigations, and one juvenile  have been charged so far, but investigators plan to recommend charges against more people, he said. Some face upward of 60 counts related to illegal hunting and wasting animals.

The investigation was reported last week by the Chronicle newspaper of Centralia, which said it had obtained hundreds of pages of case reports from the department through a public records request.

According to the documents, the hunters often used dogs  sometimes as many as 11. The 50-plus poaching expeditions date back to 2015. The vast majority took place within the Gifford Pinchot National Forest, often in remote areas either closed to hunting or in areas where special permits are required.

The Associated Press could not locate contact information for the defendants, and it was not immediately clear if any had obtained lawyers. Several are scheduled to make initial court appearances later this month.

The investigation began with Oregon State Police troopers who were looking into poaching in The Dalles, charging papers filed in Skamania County Superior Court say. In December, the troopers contacted and interviewed two Longview, Wash., men, William Haynes and Erik Martin, who, the troopers said, confessed to illegally killing deer in Oregon and bringing their heads and antlers back to Washington.

The troopers contacted authorities in Washington, who recovered 27 deer heads and a bull elk unlawfully possessed by Haynes and a co-defendant, the charging papers say.

In executing search warrants for the suspects cell phones, the documents say, investigators found pictures, text messages and videos linking several other people to the poaching.

Gene Johnson is an Associated Press writer.
Google / /

A 61-year-old Petaluma resident was busted following a drunken driving rampage Saturday night that left a person injured in the path of destruction in the citys downtown, police said.

The driver, identified by authorities as Kenneth McConnell, was arrested on suspicion of felony hit-and-run and driving under the influence after a bystander intervened and held him for police, officials said.
Getty Images / /

Police are hunting for a suspect who killed one person and wounded another in a double stabbing along a pedestrian walkway in downtown Petaluma early Sunday.

The attack happened around 1:45 a.m. near the 100 block of Kentucky Street as last call approached and local bars and nightclubs were letting out, Petaluma police Lt. Tim Lyons said.
117 workers make formal Fulbari exit

Hundred and seventeen workers of the Fulbari Resort and Spa, a Pokhara-based five-star hotel, on Saturday made a formal exit under the voluntary retirement scheme launched by the resort.
This is a legal proposal, so lets start with a stipulation.

You are monsters.

You are rapidly deporting undocumented Californians, many of whom are crucial members of our communities, workplaces and families. In removing parents, you routinely orphan children who are U.S. citizens, and in the next breath say you are for America First. Your next targets for removal are the 800,000 young people known as Dreamers, people who were brought to the United States as children by their undocumented immigrant parents.

Tragically, my people cant stop you, because immigration enforcement is the province of the federal government. But we are slowing you down. While we provide everything from legal aid to drivers licenses for undocumented immigrants, we deluge you with litigation, target you with protests and work politically with like-minded people in other states to undermine the very legitimacy of your government.

This ever-escalating conflict is dangerous  which may be what you want. The presidents political adviser Roger Stone has called for a new Civil War, and, as the Charlottesville aftermath made clear, President Trump is keen on refighting the last one.

But if civil war is not your intention, lets make a deal that would protect Californians and perhaps de-escalate the conflict, at least over immigration.

Under this deal, Congress and your administration would grant me, California, an exemption from federal immigration law, just as the U.S. government has granted me exemptions to fight air pollution.

In effect, I would win the power to designate certain people  undocumented folks who meet standards that my elected officials determine  as California residents who would have a legal right to live and work here even if they are not U.S. citizens or legal residents of the United States.

The federal government could still deport people, but with a couple of conditions. If a California resident were detained for immigration enforcement in another part of the country, then he or she would have to be deported not overseas but back to California. And if the federal government decided to go ahead and deport a California resident out of the country, it would  under the contract Im proposing  pay all the costs of that deportation.

In my view, you, the federal government, should cover the legal expenses of any California resident that you deport, and the costs of providing care, income and schooling for children and other family members that deported people leave behind.

To do this, California would need to create standards and a process for granting residency. Dave Marin, research and policy director for the California Freedom Coalition, which works for greater California autonomy, points out that state legislation appropriating money for legal aid to the undocumented already offers a list of people that Californians consider to be our own. These include: undocumented people with family members who are U.S. citizens or legal permanent residents, military veterans and their spouses, asylum seekers, Dreamers, and just about anyone else without a violent felony conviction.

Such a concept of California residency is not new. In 2002, the states reform body, the Little Hoover Commission, suggested creating a Golden State Residency Program to accelerate the integration of immigrants, including the undocumented, into California society. Little Hoover said that anyone participating in his or her local community should be considered a resident, with the rights and responsibilities that entails.

Residency is not ideal; it still leaves a subclass of people who have full rights only in California. But its the best that can be done until a federal administration fully legalizes undocumented people. And residency is principled: Californians should decide who lives and works in our state  not a faraway federal administration that routinely slanders us.

Will you, the Trump administration, do this deal? I suspect not. You prefer to lie and scapegoat diverse California  you think it fires up your racist base  rather than learn from our long experience with immigration.

One great American tradition is our federalist system  letting states choose their own paths and seeing how things work out. California is confident that being a haven that integrates immigrants will produce far more greatness than your approach of removing millions of people and breaking up families.

So what will it be? Make a deal that respects Californias sovereignty? Or continue waging war against your countrys largest state?

Joe Mathews writes the Connecting California column for Zocalo Public Square To comment, submit your letter to the editor at SFChronicle.com/letters.

MEMO

To: Acting U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Elaine Duke and Attorney General Jeff Sessions

From: The Golden State

Re: An alternative to mass deportation of Californians
68,000 personnel on the ground for security

The Home Ministry has decided to deploy around 68,000 police personnel in Province 2 in view of the third phase of local level elections taking place on September 18.
Accused arrested seven years after murder

A person charged of murdering an elderly woman seven years ago has been arrested and made public by Makwanpur police on Sunday.
Acting CoAS, Defence secy inspect Rajbiraj-Kunauli road construction works

Acting Chief of Army Staff Baldev Raj Mahat along with Secretary at the Defence Ministry Shreedhar Sapkota inspected the under-construction Rajbiraj-Kunauli road section in Saptari district on Sunday.
Caty Davis, Miss Tennessee 2017, has been competing in pageants for seven years.

Her platform -- Miss America-speak for a cause, or the theme of a contestant's volunteerism and advocacy -- was initially devoted to education.

But three years ago, her father, who had long struggled with opioid and alcohol addiction, having gone through rehab four times, committed suicide.

"That was a huge wakeup call for me," she says.

But that wasn't the first time Davis, 22, lost a loved one to addiction. Her half brother, who had his own addiction problems, had already committed suicide two years before that. Her grandfather, an alcoholic, died in a car accident when her father was just 14.

"It's just run rampant in my family," Davis says. The Miss America competitor, who has been in Atlantic City signing, strutting and fielding questions from judges ahead of the televised pageant on Sunday, says 12 members of her family have struggled with substance abuse.

Miss Tennessee 2017, Caty Davis, performs Whitney Houston's 'I Have Nothing' in the talent portion of Miss America preliminaries at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City. Her pageant platform, which deals with addiction, draws from personal experience. (Tim Hawk | For NJ.com)

"For so long, I was either ashamed or embarrassed to even speak about it or didn't know that other people around me were dealing with the same family struggles that I was," she says, calling the opioid crisis a "huge national emergency."

Davis, who has spoken to local students about addiction and partnered with Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam and the commissioner of the state's Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse, says she's raised more than $40,000 for substance abuse prevention and recovery efforts and babies born dependent on drugs. Her pageant platform is "Attacking Addiction: Prevention, Recovery, and Restoring Families."

The advocate credits her mother, who divorced her father when she was 4 years old, with creating stability in her life.

"Unfortunately, addiction does not discriminate," she says. "It is no longer the homeless man on the street. It is your next-door neighbor, your dad, your brother. I mean, it's so, so unfortunate. But we need to be talking about it or people aren't going to get help. And right now only one out of 10 people are getting the recovery process and treatment that they need."

Davis is a graduate of the University of Tennessee, where she studied psychology. Her goal is to study for a master's degree in child studies at Vanderbilt University and become a clinical child psychologist at an addiction treatment center.

"Addiction, I have learned over and over again, is a disease," she says. "It is a brain disease and it is not a choice or a moral failing."

The 2018 Miss America pageant airs 9 p.m. Eastern Sunday, Sept. 10, on ABC.

Amy Kuperinsky may be reached at akuperinsky@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @AmyKup or on Facebook.
Eric Bolling

In this July 22, 2015, file photo, co-host Eric Bolling appears on "The Five" television program, on the Fox News Channel, in New York. Bolling has left the network, which is canceling his news program, "The Specialists." The network suspended Bolling in August as it investigated a report of allegations that he sent lewd photos to co-workers. (AP Photo/Richard Drew, File)

BOULDER, Colo. (AP) -- The son of former Fox News host Eric Bolling has died, just hours after the network announced that Bolling was leaving the network.

Bolling said in a tweet on Saturday that he and his wife, Adrienne, were devastated by the loss of their son, Eric Chase Bolling. A freshman at the University of Colorado in Boulder, Eric Chase Bolling died Friday night.

Adrienne and I are devastated by the loss of our beloved son Eric Chase last night. Details still unclear. Thoughts, prayers appreciated.  Eric Bolling (@ericbolling) September 9, 2017

Eric Bolling says the cause is under investigation but that authorities say there was "no sign of self harm." An autopsy was pending.

Boulder police say they are investigating a death near the university but did not provide details.

Authorities have informed us there is no sign of self harm at this point. Autopsy will be next week. Please respect our grieving period.  Eric Bolling (@ericbolling) September 9, 2017

Fox News Channel said Friday it had parted ways with Eric Bolling, who had been suspended in August following allegations that he sent lewd photos to female co-workers.
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- While most New Yorkers have watched as candidates from both major parties have gone after Mayor Bill de Blasio in an effort to unseat the first-term mayor, Staten Islanders have been tuned in to the only other competitive race in the borough: the North Shore City Council seat.

Councilwoman Debi Rose is a two-term lawmaker, seeking a third and final term, and running against her in the Democratic primary is Kamillah Hanks, a civic activist.

De Blasio and Rose endorsed each other on Friday, and Assemblymen Michael Cusick and Matthew Titone endorsed Rose earlier in the week.

Hanks got the endorsement of the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association as well as the Uniformed Firefighters Association and the Uniformed Fire Officers Association.

The two candidates have a lot in common: both are female, both are black (Rose is the island's first black elected official), both are mothers, both are/were involved in civic life before running for political office, both are lifelong Staten Islanders who grew up on the North Shore.

But neither see it that way, of course.

Rose's biggest criticism of Hanks is that her opponent doesn't stand for anything other than disparaging the councilwoman's record.

Hanks paints Rose as an ineffective representative for the district, one who doesn't appear often in the community or speak with constituents.

KAMILLAH HANKS

Hanks often mentions her time spent knocking on voters' doors -- not all voters, registered Democrats who are likely to vote in Tuesday's primary.

"I'm extremely proud of myself," Hanks said Friday. "This was something, that no matter what, I learned so much about the people of this district."

But she wasn't exactly a foreigner to many on the North Shore.

Hanks runs B.U.I.L.D. Staten Island, an affiliate of Youth Build USA, an alternative school in Stapleton that teaches young adults ages 18 to 24 life skills, leadership and workplace preparedness.

She is the founder and president of Historic Tappen Park Community Partnership, boosting cultural and economic development in the area.

She is a former president of the Van Duzer Street Civic Association in Stapleton and remains active in the background.

She is the former executive director of the Downtown Staten Island Council and served on the City Council Districting Commission in 2012.

Hanks previously served on the NYC Panel for Educational Policy.

She has worked in public relations at the Staten Island Museum, the Staten Island Economic Development Corporation and Stanton Crenshaw Communications.

Hanks said she learned that despite people on social media focusing on the ins-and-outs of politics, what regular people want is something different.

Hanks often took one or both of her daughters, Olivia, 21, and Nadia, 19, with her when knocking on doors, she said, and that helped her start conversations with strangers.

"It's nerve-wracking," she recalled. "You don't know how you're going to be received.

"I met people who did not like me, agree with me or know me, but they appreciated that I showed up."

That leads to her criticism of her opponent.

She saw a lot of "dissatisfaction" from constituents, Hanks said. "Everywhere I go," people say of Rose, "they've never seen her."

Hanks said she learned how important it is to visit people, especially in neighborhoods she was previously unfamiliar with.

"Communities are like sovereign nations and their issues are really different," she said.

One thing she heard a lot, though, was the prevalence of "zombie" houses, vacant and abandoned houses that attract illegal and unsightly activity, as the house and property decay.

She said if she's elected, one of the first bills she would sponsor is one to "add teeth" to the existing state law that requires banks to maintain the properties. Her bill, she said, would require banks to have management companies oversee the properties' maintenance.

While Rose has criticized Hanks as having no platform, Hanks said, "You can't have a platform unless you talk to people."

Having done that, she advocates for responsible development that preserves neighborhoods, increasing transportation options, allocating resources to fighting gun violence and opioid addiction, promoting employment and vocational training and ending overcrowding in schools.

But Hanks says it's the conversation with people that was so important.

"It's about connections and relationships because they know you're not going to build a school in a day or save the world ... the things that make the difference are the things that you can't do in government: engage, empower, elevate."

DEBI ROSE

The councilwoman is feeling optimistic about Tuesday's election.

"We're ready to go," she said Friday. "I'm absolutely confident that we're going to win this primary."

Her campaign has notified voters by mail, calls and home visits.

"We're confident that they know that I'm a proven element, that I have a record of accomplishments," Rose said. "That we have run a campaign that talked about accomplishments and vision and what we're going to do on the North Shore based on what we've already done."

That includes getting people into good-paying, full-time jobs both in the construction of the New York Wheel and the Empire Outlets and in their daily operations when they open.

Rose advocated for and got 100 percent union labor for the projects.

"The jobs are there, people are working," she said. "After construction will be almost 1,300 jobs where Staten Islanders will have priority."

Beyond the St. George waterfront developments, Rose takes credit for a waterfront plaza at Van Name/Van Pelt Avenues, Heritage Park, a waterfront space at Urby and Mariner's Marsh.

She touts getting funding for the recent Curtis High School renovations, the new PS 59 Harborview School in 2013, the new Gifted and Talent program at PS 45.

She helped get city funding to expand the Richmond University Medical Center ER.

That's unlike her opponent, she says.

"She needs to recognize that she needs to have substance, she needs to have a plan and vision," Rose said. "The constituents in this district deserve the best and they need someone who doesn't talk about what they would do ... they need someone who's going to be able to deliver what needs to be."

The councilwoman said in speaking to constituents they're most concerned with education, transportation, jobs and housing.

Responding to Hanks' criticism that Rose doesn't appear enough in her district, the councilwoman said, "She needs to be out in the community talking to people because she's unknown. I am a known and proven entity, they know me, they know what I stand for."

"But I am present, that's another one of her campaign lies."

Rose called Hanks' operation a "campaign of desperation and lack of substance," pointing to her affiliation with attorney Richard Luthmann, who is accused of having created Facebook pages to disparage elected officials and candidates, one of which is Rose.

Luthmann's Facebook account was broken into, and messages were sent to NY1 and the New York Times, showing his conversations about social media posts and the campaigns.

While Rose and others have tried to tie Hanks to Luthmann's Facebook antics, nothing specific has been presented to show that Hanks had any involvement in or knowledge of the pages.

"I think that Ms. Hanks should repudiate Richard Luthmann because she clearly has some involvement in the nastiness ... and she needs to give back the money that she took from him," Rose said.

The Advance pointed out that Rose too received money from Luthmann, in her case, it went to her criminal defense fund set up to pay legal fees for campaign staff involved in a Working Families Party case, but Rose said she returned it.

Hanks responded, "There is nothing nasty in educating voters of the truth. There is nothing open to interpretation when we know that Rose missed 782 votes. She cannot change the fact that she is a leader in the city council in absenteeism."

"If Debi Rose wants to talk about returning money, she should return the thousands of anonymous donations that she has taken from online donors for her legal defense fund - which is in direct violation of Campaign Finance Board regulations. We call on Debi Rose to disclose her full list of donors."

Rose said that while Hanks claims she has been getting support from voters who are dissatisfied with the councilwoman, that's not how she sees it.

"The impression that's out there ... that there's a lack of support, it's just not true," noting her campaign raised far more than Hanks did. "We did what we needed to do: reach our constituents and to reinforce our strength."
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- "U.S. Under Attack" -- that was the headline on the front page of the Advance on Sept. 11, 2001.

Because of the Advance's publication time back then, it was the only paper on the East Coast to carry same-day coverage of the attacks.

The next day, the Advance carried a photo of Ground Zero with people covered in ash and soot. The Associated Press photographer chose to capture the moment in black and white.

The headline beneath the photo read: "America trembles and seethes after terror attacks in New York and D.C.

This was the text.

"There could be thousands dead. Hundreds could be Staten Islanders. Today, a day after the most egregious terror attack on the United States, no one knows. We do know that the incomprehensible devastation has deeply touched our community. The Staten Island Fire Department's elite Rescue 5 unit raced into the firestorm yesterday morning. The 11-member team has not yet returned to Staten Island. Fire Battalion Chief Charles Kasper is listed officially as missing. Families from St. George to Tottenville were wracked with pain, and then overjoyed, as they received telephone calls from loved ones with a simple message, "I'm OK." Others were not as fortunate and still wait. The stories that will unfold will forever change our lives and the world in which we live. Today, the Advance begins its attempt to tell those stories. What you will read and see today will make your heart ache. It is the first day that Staten Island and America try to overcome the numbness that engulfed us yesterday while trying to understand how it all happened. And why?"

As the years passed, our front pages and those inside the Advance continued to tell the stories of the memorials, the stories of the men and women who went to war, and the stories of a borough forever changed.
ADB to provide 152 million US dollars for various projects

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has agreed to provide 152 million US dollars for the implementation of Power Transmission and Distribution Efficiency Enhancement Project.
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Staten Island attorney Richard Luthmann exchanged messages with Assemblyman Ron Castorina Jr. about a plan to use a "super-soaker" to spray Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis with water at a fund-raising picnic last year, according to a new report from NY1.

The messages were taken without permission from Luthmann's Facebook page, and he is suing the people he says illegally accessed his account and took his private information.

Castorina, now the Staten Island GOP chairman, is shown responding to Luthmann after the attorney messaged him about Malliotakis.

Each year, the South Beach Civic Association holds a fundraising picnic, and last year, Malliotakis, who is now running for mayor, attended. Witnesses told NY1 that Luthmann sprayed the assemblywoman, and he appeared to aim for her breasts.

The night before the event, according to NY1, Luthmann told Castorina in a Facebook conversation this is what he would do.

Luthmann messaged Castorina a lewd photoshopped image of Malliotakis.

Castorina, then, as now, Malliotakis' colleague in the Assembly, replied:

"You are one seriously sick 'expletive' I almost crashed my car looking at that 'expletive' meme while driving LOL."

According to NY1, Luthmann then wrote: "I'm bringing a super-soaker to the South Beach Civic Association Picnic tomorrow. Wet tees! Nicole will not be happy!"

Castorina reportedly replied, "Where do you come up with this 'expletive' 'expletive' hysterical."

When NY1 asked Malliotakis to comment on the incident, she refused.

According to a report from the New York Times, published on Thursday, Luthmann exchanged offensive messages and sexually explicit photos with Castorina about the lawmaker's opponent last year, Janine Materna.

Luthmann has told the Advance he "didn't create anything," referring to the sexually explicit photos.

He is alleged to have created a fake Facebook account posing as Materna. In August, NY1 reported that it obtained screen shots of private Facebook messages between Castorina and Luthmann, discussing the existence of an unauthorized Materna Facebook page, which allegedly resulted in death threats against her.

Luthmann also is alleged to have created a fake Facebook page posing as Councilwoman Debi Rose. While Luthmann has had some duties for Kamillah Hanks in her Democratic primary bid against Rose, there's no evidence that Hanks had a role in creating the page or any knowledge that Luthmann was allegedly behind it.

Castorina has told the Advance he never initiated conversation with Luthmann about attacking Materna on social media, and only replied to placate him and prevent the litigious man from aiming his legal guns at Castorina.

Materna has been calling for Castorina to resign from his Assembly seat and as chairman of the party since the story broke a few weeks ago.

"It is time for Mr. Castorina to take accountability for his actions. He must resign," Materna said in a statement Friday. "Ron Castorina does not have the moral compass needed to serve the Republican Party or his constituents. In light of the recent discoveries reported by the New York Times, how can Ron Castorina lead the Staten Island Republican Party or his constituents?"

Castorina remains firm on his previous statements that he will not leave either position.
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Among the most recent were a brazen early morning holdup at a Bay Street deli and a cellphone heist later the same day.

A man was handcuffed by police a short time after the holdup at Bay Street and New Lane just a few blocks from the scene.

And an arrest was also made in the armed robbery of the phone at Bard and Henderson Aves.

Just a couple of days earlier, there were another two on the same day.

One of the victims of the gunpoint robbery at a T-Mobile store in Charleston told the Advance she felt lucky to be alive after she was forced to the floor with a gun to her head during the terrifying ordeal on Sept. 4.

The 28-year-old employee said she was alone on the sales floor when two men entered, one wearing a ski mask and a camouflage snowsuit. She dropped to the floor and reached for an emergency alarm, but one of the men got to her first, she said.

"He [cocked] the gun, and then he was like, 'Oh, no no no. Let's go,'" said the single mother.

Thankfully no one was hurt.

The same day an armed robber took about $1,200 in cash and a cell phone from a store in Rosebank.

The masked suspect entered the Lucky Deli & Grocery at 1200 Bay St., at the busy corner of Hylan Boulevard, at about 10:14 p.m.

The robber threatened the 30-year-old male employee who was behind the counter with a black handgun before taking the loot.

And chances are good there have been others, some successful and some not.

But the question is: With all the talk about dropping crime statistics, what's driving this spate of quick, hit-and-run armed holdups in various communities across the Island.

We're not talking about intricate and well-planned burglaries or big-money bank robberies.

These four are just recent examples and they have all the signs of a desperate need for some quick cash.

Doesn't matter what time of day or the location -- and a few hundred or a cell phone will do.

That's just what an addict -- out of drugs and out of money -- will do to avoid the excruciating withdrawal that can come within hours after the last fix.

While it's probably not the case in every instance, chances are good that it's behind a significant portion of holdups like these.

THE D.A. TAKES ACTION

Our District Attorney Michael McMahon has made it clear that the borough's drug crisis continues at an alarming rate.

We've reported that the borough is on track to have as many, if not more, overdose fatalities than 2016's frighteningly high number of 116.

McMahon's office is now investigating 67 overdose deaths through the office's Overdose Response Initiative, his spokesman told the Advance on Wednesday, Sept 6.

The actual number is likely much higher because many are not reported to law enforcement.

The D.A.'s Overdose Response Initiative has resulted is a number of significant drug takedowns, including one that was directly linked a fatal OD.

We praised the D.A. for taking a bold step as a result. That bust resulted in the first manslaughter charge for an alleged drug dealer who, authorities say, delivered a lethal dose of fentanyl, a painkiller much more powerful than heroin.

The 67 deaths are heartbreaking and disturbing.

This number is just as troubling. The OD-reversal medication naloxone has been used to save 132 individuals since January 1, the D.A.'s office reported. That's more than five times as many by the this point in 2016.

We've repeatedly commended McMahon for launching a series of promising initiatives.

The most recent is the website SIHope.org that helps Staten Islanders get quick, easy access to information on where to find help for addiction or how to aid the cause.

"This is a one stop shop for those battling addiction, know somebody who is or those who want to help," McMahon said. "It's not a silver bullet, but it will go a long way in getting people help."

Borough President James Oddo lauded McMahon's "creativity and out-of-the-box thinking" in his office's approach to the drug crisis.

"Mike realizes that things have to be done differently," Oddo said.

We could not have said it better.

Imagine how many more families would be mourning the loss of a loved one if naloxone was not as readily available as it is and these initiatives had not been put in place.

Now, as summer comes to a close and schools are open, we can't lose sight of the need to keep this crisis on the front burner -- through education, awareness, law enforcement and treatment.

If we keep our foot on the gas, will these quick-hit holdups vanish?

Of course not.

Will they subside?

Hopefully.
Banke Muslims take out protest rally demanding end to Rohingya crisis

Muslims of Banke district have sought Nepal government to pile pressure on Myanmar to stop the discrimination against the Muslim minority group.
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Bhairawaha-businessman shooting suspect made public

Police on Sunday have made public the suspect involved in shooting Bhairawaha-based businessman and Vice Chairman of Federation of Siddhartha Industry and Commerce Kul Prasad Neupane.
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Television personality Lisa Wilkinson has led celebrity tributes to Love Your Sister founder and cancer crusader Connie Johnson, who died on Friday.

Online tributes to mother-of-two have celebrated her advocacy and success in raising millions for research - coming as she battled breast cancer and received treatment in a palliative care unit after the illness spread to her lungs, liver, pelvis, spine and knee.

Her brother, Gold Logie-winning actor Samuel Johnson, announced the 40-year-old's death in a Facebook post on Friday night.

Details of her funeral are yet to be released.
Good morning, Canberra. Welcome to another working week.

The capital is in for some great weather in the next few days. On Monday, we'll have a top of 19 with partly cloudy conditions after an overnight low of minus 1.

Tuesday is going to be the best day of the week, with a top of 23.

Here's the news you need to start the day:

Panel to consider bid for a Victoria Cross
The federal government is keeping the pressure on AGL to extend the life of its Liddell coal-fired power station.

Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg and Treasurer Scott Morrison separately reiterated on Sunday the importance of the Liddell plant continuing to operate past 2022, when the Sydney-based company has said it will close. The government is scheduled to meet AGL Chief Executive Officer Andy Vesey on Monday to discuss options.

"We have five years to continue the life of that station or ensure there is no supply shortage  that is what we are going to investigate tomorrow," Frydenberg told Sky News Australia. "AGL needs to act in the public interest and that is ensuring there is no shortfall when Liddell closes."

The government is responding to reports that called for states to have in place reliable thermal electricity generation to provide security of supply if weather-dependent hydro plants or wind farms are unable to meet demand. Frydenberg says coal-fired stations provide base-load power and would help avoid power blackouts that have blighted states like South Australia when thermal plants have been shuttered.
"Resources outperformed the market through August by 5.2 per cent, helped by resilient Chinese and global growth momentum, a plateau (above consensus forecasts) in the commodity price deck, and generally positive results augmented by strong cash generation and an increased focus on shareholder returns," he said. "Among the miners, Rio and S32 delivered strong results, while BHP was forgiven for an EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) miss given its strong FCF [free-cash-flow] yield and intention to divest its US onshore petroleum business," he said. In an interview with Fairfax Media Mr Nicol said miners offered leverage to strong global growth, better commodity prices, and better cash flows, which ultimately resulted in higher returns to shareholders. "Mining stocks have rallied pretty hard since the middle of July," he said.

"We saw some weakness in the stocks in the early part of the year, as we saw the iron ore price, in particular, retracing. The big difference in the second half of the year is that we've got stability in the commodity deck, and what that allows you to do is take a much firmer view on valuation and also possibly more importantly at this point, a much firmer view on cash generation, and free cash flow yield," he said. "The commodity prices are supportive, and even at spot prices today there's valuation upside for most of the stocks," he said. "You're entitled I think as a shareholder of these stocks, to expect and probably receive better dividends and better cash flows, and not over-spending on capital expenditure for things that don't generate returns," he said. The substantial cash returns unveiled by mining companies last month, and in prospect over the next year or so, are undoubtedly contributing to investor demand. Over the next few weeks miners will pay billions in dividends to investors. In addition, South32 and Rio unveiled major increases in share buybacks. Even bigger returns are possible in the future, given the emphasis the miners placed on shareholder returns as they reported buoyant commodity prices and some high-profile asset sales.

Rio Tinto had a giant payday on September 1, when it received $US2.45 billion in cash for the sale of Coal and Allied to Yancoal. More cash will flow Rio's way under the deal in royalty payments, including an extra $100 million in 2017. In a research report released last week UBS analyst Glyn Lawcock said miners were poised to deliver substantial cash returns to shareholders. "Investors have historically bought mining companies for growth not yield, given the finite nature of their assets, which requires the miners to continually invest in new mines to sustain operations. So while miners may not have the stable cash flow stream of an industrial company, and thus may not be able to sustain high pay-out ratios, we do see the potential for the miners to provide high returns for investors over the next 18 months, perhaps longer. "Inevitably we believe the call to invest or acquire will become too strong and the industry will follow the path of prior cycles, but until that happens we believe the sector is poised to return a substantial amount of cash to shareholders given prices and margins are driven by supply restraint and not demand," he said. The outlook for gold miners also seems buoyant, as investors around the world react to the global uncertainty arising from the aggressive behaviour of North Korea, and invest in gold and gold miners.
In recent weeks the Federal Government's attacks on Bill Shorten solidified around the epic theme of Crimes Against History.

The Opposition leader, according to a battery of Coalition MPs, is a would-be statue-demolishing Stalinist and "socialist revisionist", who, in this centenary year of the Russian Revolution, banks on young people's ignorance of history to push his new red agenda.

Illustration: Jim Pavlidis.

Even in the amped-up rhetorical climate we've come to regard as normal, such assaults amount to unleashing the heavy artillery. Hard not to worry that the Government's losing the plot  especially when the attacks can be read as psychological projection. I use "projection" in the loose, popular way, what Urban Dictionary calls, "an unconscious self-defence mechanism characterised by a person"  or in this case, political collective, "unconsciously attributing their own issues onto someone or something else as a form of delusion and denial."

For while Shorten's policy prescriptions and contributions to the public conversation are eminently debatable, he's not the one trashing history. When last week Shorten agreed that a new plaque be added to the statue of Captain James Cook in Sydney's Hyde Park, Malcolm Turnbull lambasted the suggestion as "thoroughly Stalinist". Shorten was "rewarding" the spray-painting vandals. "This proposition that you start revising, re-editing your history is thoroughly Stalinist," the Prime Minister said.
This improvement has largely come about because the NSW Government now requires students to have met a minimum standard of literacy and numeracy in order to receive a HSC from 2020.

This year's NAPLAN results have seen the biggest ever improvement in Year 9 results for NSW students. NSW now leads the nation in Year 9 numeracy and we are second in Year 9 reading. Results in some schools have seen the number of students achieving three band 8s in year 9 increase by 400 per cent.

As I prepare to leave NSW Parliament, I look back proudly on the efforts the NSW Government has made to increase education standards in this state. So, I was stunned by the protest in Macquarie Street last week organised to oppose one of those new standards. I was stunned because the reform has seen a 50 per cent increase in the number of year 9 students achieving three band 8s or higher in NAPLAN compared to last year. I can only presume the chant that day was: "What do we want? Worse results! When do we want them? Now!"

If students achieve Band 8 or above in the Numeracy, Reading and Writing NAPLAN tests, they have demonstrated the standard. If a student has not achieved a Band 8 or above, then they can sit the new online tests up to six times before they do their HSC exams. Once a student has passed the standard in one area, they can bank that result and focus on the remaining areas they need to meet the standard.

The bottom line is that too many students leave school in this state with insufficient literacy and numeracy skills. We have a major problem in NSW when we see a dip in students' results from year 7 through to year 10 before their performance starts to pick up as they start to think about the HSC.

Everyone rightly argues that quality teaching is critical. However, a child's attitude to their learning matters just as much and a student's attitude to learning is strongly shaped by the expectations set for them  by their teachers, by their parents and the expectations they set for themselves. This new standard raises those expectations and I have every confidence that students will meet and exceed them.

Western Australia has had a similar standard in place for several years and they have seen their results improve. The province of Ontario in Canada, a very high-performing system, requires students to pass a literacy and numeracy test in year 10 in order to qualify for their HSC equivalent in year 12.

We introduced this reform to identify students who need extra support to develop their literacy and numeracy skills. This should happen in primary school before students fall behind, and in early high school where the need for literacy and numeracy increases dramatically. Yes, it means a higher expectation in year 9 to get the basics under your belt early. Ignoring early high school means the pressure in senior high school is magnified because of a lack of preparation.
Biotechnological innovation

As an economist by profession, understanding the complex world of agricultural sciences involves a learning curve.
The same-sex marriage campaign makes me wonder when my fellow Australian lesbians lost their political backbone? Where's the sparky radicalism of the gay and lesbian community? When did chasing after marriage become our life's work? Or for that matter any feminists' work?

Our heterosexual sisters must be wondering why we're so keen to dignify an institution  which for so many women has led to violence from their partners and drudgery for themselves. They surely notice the hypocrisy; lesbians becoming cheerleaders for an institution which has caused so many so much pain.

We get the "gold rings and honeymoon" appeal of marriage; but I feel embarrassed for our collective selves that the public now sees us as grovelling for the chance to wear white wedding dresses. How are women going to recognise lesbianism as an alternative to heterosexuality, if they don't see us protesting against institutions that have been harmful to us: like marriage, prostitution and the nuclear family?

The "yes" campaign's slogan "love is love" equates marriage with love when many married women experience it as anything but love. The slogan trivialises the heroic efforts of some who have had to escape the institution. Some like Sri Lankan-born doctor Chamari Liyanage who was sentenced for killing her abusive husband by beating him with a heavy metal mallet. A husband that a judge described as a "manipulative and merciless offender".
Writing to Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Immigration Minister Peter Dutton at the weekend, Senator Di Natale said the state-led persecution of Rohingya people in Myanmar's Rakhine state was escalating, with entire villages being destroyed.

Greens leader Richard Di Natale says Australia should organise an emergency intake similar to the Syria program launched two years ago.

The Greens are calling on the Turnbull government to take in 20,000 of the Rohingya refugees who have fled rapidly worsening bloodshed in Myanmar.

Aid organisations are warning of a looming humanitarian crisis, with flood-ravaged neighbouring Bangladesh currently bearing much of the Rohingya refugee burden. The United Nations says nearly 300,000 people have fled Myanmar to Bangladesh in recent weeks.

An injured Rohingya child Nur Sadika, 5, receives treatment after crossing over from Myanmar into Bangladesh. Credit:AP

"We write to you with deep concern about the crisis in Myanmar and the unprecedented levels of forcible displacement we are seeing," Senator Di Natale and his immigration spokesman Nick McKim said in the letter to Mr Turnbull and Mr Dutton.

"We call on you to immediately commit a further 20,000 permanent humanitarian visas for Rohingya refugees this year. This is not without precedent, with conflicts in Syria previously triggering this kind of emergency intake by Australia in 2015."

The Greens were among the first to call for the Syrian intake in 2015, with the Abbott government later announcing 12,000 extra places. The last of those refugees arrived in Australia last month.
The Nationals have rejected renegade MP George Christensen's motion to ban the burqa - but only by a few votes.

Mr Christensen says he will continue to push for the Turnbull government to adopt the policy of banning the face covering from government buildings and public spaces despite his own party's decision.

George Christensen's motion to adopt a policy of banning the burqa was defeated 55-51. Credit:Andrew Meares

The urgent motion came to a vote at the Nationals federal conference on Sunday and was defeated 55 to 51.

Mr Christensen said the ban was needed for security reasons but also noted the party was "bleeding to the right" on such issues. The motion comes just weeks after One Nation leader Pauline Hanson caused a firestorm by wearing a burqa to Senate question time as part of her bid to ban it.
Doctors battling melanoma  the deadliest form of skin cancer  may soon get new weapons, which researchers say can stop the disease from spreading and killing their patients.

In a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, researchers at the Melanoma Institute Australia announced they had successfully trialled a combination of new treatments to prevent melanoma from spreading and metastasising to distant organs.

"Our ultimate goal of making melanoma a chronic rather than a terminal illness is now so much closer to being achieved," Georgina Long, the institute's conjoint medical director, said.

About 14,000 people in Australia will be diagnosed with melanoma this year and about 1800 are expected to die from it.
Gayle King spends the same on preschool for her three-year-old son Harry as she does on her mortgage, but she said she sees it as an important investment in his education.

"One salary goes to paying for childcare, it costs us $130 a day," said Mrs King, 36, who works as an accountant.

Charlie Ferrarin, Ollie Wei, and Harry King at Gowrie NSW Early Education and Care centre in Erskineville. Credit:Janie Barrett

However, she and her husband have been paying for preschool since Harry was one, and Mrs King said she has seen major improvements in his language, maths and social skills in the past two years.

Mrs King said she has noticed a big difference between Harry's development and that of friends' children who don't attend preschool.
Just how Ian Reid wasn't killed in a paddy field in Vietnam, no one can agree.

The 20-year-old Army recruit found himself in the middle of a sustained firefight on the night of April 30, 1970, when he saw another Australian soldier shot in the throat near enemy lines.

Ian Reid will give evidence to the Defence Honours and Awards Appeals Tribunal this week. Credit:Dion Georgopoulos

A rifleman and medic with the 7th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, Private Reid went to the aid of Newcastle-born Noel William Cooper to stem the bleeding from his jugular vein.

Known as "Flappers" because of his prominent ears, he held Private Cooper upright for at least 39 minutes, likely saving his life while waiting in the dark for a helicopter rescue.
As counting continues to expose the scope of voters desertion of the government in Saturday's council elections, the Labor party has claimed the ballots as a verdict against not just forced council mergers but what it describes as an "overdevelopment agenda" the government must drop.

Preference flows continue to be allocated for the more than 45 councils that took more than one-third of NSW voters to the polls on Saturday, but they are progressively revealing voters are moving away from the Liberal party, especially in key parts of its heartland.

Ryde Labor councillor Jerome Laxale with NSW opposition leader Luke Foley and candidate Peter Kim on Sunday.

"What we saw yesterday across NSW was the Liberals receive a hiding," a triumphant opposition leader, Luke Foley, said on Sunday in Ryde, an area where the party achieved a close to 15 per cent swing in a council the Liberals controlled outright following the last election. "They forced mergers, they rigged boundaries and people across NSW punished them."

Fresh results on Sunday morning reveal further Liberal losses in Waverley Council, where the party lost its majority on the council, reduced from seven seats to five.
After staking so much political capital merging NSW councils, the Liberal party risks walking away from Saturday's elections without controlling any newly merged Sydney council as opponents claimed voters abandoned the party driving Sydney's "overdevelopment".

As counting continued on Sunday across 46 council districts, including 22 Sydney councils, early results showed voters had punished the Liberal party across the board, but surprisingly including deep into its Sydney heartland.

Of council elections, Premier Gladys Berejiklian said she was "pleased with the outcome across the board because the community has had its say". Credit:Brook Mitchell

"In the councils between Newcastle and Shellharbour the average swing to Labor currently stands at about 5.5 per cent," said psephologist Ben Raue, who said the swing was tempered by inconsistencies in comparing merged and unmerged councils.

But swings to the opposition in Ryde, a council the Liberals had previously held in its own right, reached close to 15 per cent. That follows a turbulent term in which a sitting Liberal councillor was convicted for tax offences and others left the party to run as independents.
NSW health authorities reported on Sunday that potentially combustible cladding was installed at the Queanbeyan Hospital when it was built.

An independent consultant who inspected the hospital for any non-compliant cladding panels delivered the verbal advice to health authorities on Friday.

The consultant said the cladding may be Alucobond PE, a potentially combustible form of aluminium cladding.

Combustible panels have been blamed for fires that enveloped the Grenfell Tower in London, killing more than 80 people, that raced up the Lacrosse building in Melbourne and that have twice struck The Torch in Dubai.
A surfer has been bitten by a shark while surfing at Iluka, near Yamba, on the NSW north coast.

Abe McGrath, a 35-year-old Byron Bay man, was surfing with friends at Main Beach early on Sunday morning.

A man has been bitten by a shark while surfing at Iluka in northern NSW. Credit:Bryce Cameron

About 6.30am, Mr McGrath's board was hit from underneath by a shark.

He told police the impact caused him to fly into the air before landing back in the water.
Communication academy soon, says minister

Minister for Information and Communications Mohan Bahadur Basnet has said the National Mass Communication Training Academy would be finalised by mid-September.
Former Queanbeyan mayor Tim Overall's ticket is on track to win four of the 11 places on the new Queanbeyan-Palerang council.

As counting continued on Sunday, eight seats on the new council were all but locked up, with the remaining three to be decided on preferences later this week.

The Queanbeyan-Palerang election. Queanbeyan-Palerang Regional Council administrator Tim Overall. Credit:Jamila Toderas

NSW council elections were held on Saturday, with the Queanbeyan-Palerang council among them.

After the forced amalgamation of the two councils in May 2016, it will be the first time democratically elected representatives take a seat for the combined regions.
Police have charged a man after he allegedly pointed a laser at a police helicopter patrolling Loganlea on Saturday night.

Police helicopter Polair 1 had been tasked to the area on Saturday following complaints from commercial airlines of lasers being pointed at them.

It is alleged about 9.40pm, a man pointed a laser at the helicopter while it was patrolling.

Footage captured from Polair 1 show a red laser being pointed at the helicopter from a man on the ground.
Andrew Thompson sits on his single bed in the front of a factory in Melbourne's outer southeast.

The cavernous unheated space, with its makeshift kitchen and bathroom, is home for the father and taxi licence owner  at least for now.

Cab driver Andrew Thompson lost his house after the value of his taxi licences collapsed. Credit:Chris Hopkins

Mr Thompson's real home is long gone, sold in a forced auction when he couldn't meet the repayments. A $670,000 debt hangs around his neck like "a noose".
Police are searching for a man after a woman was hospitalised after an assault in the Ballarat suburb of Alfredton on Saturday.

An Ambulance Victoria spokesperson said she had injuries to the upper body, but was in a stable condition.

Police are searching for a man after a woman was hospitalised during an assault in Ballarat. Credit:The Courier

A property on Vale Street was cordoned off as police investigators searched the home.

Anyone with information can call Ballarat police on 5336 6000 or Crime Stoppers anonymously on 1800 333 000.
Eagles match winning hero Luke Shuey has described having a little laugh to himself just moments before he kicked the winning goal after the siren to clinch victory against Port Adelaide on Saturday night.

Shuey kept an ice cool head to clinch the winning goal in the most thrilling of circumstances.

Cool hand Luke: Shuey sends it forward for the Eagles. Credit:Tony McDonough

With 22 seconds remaining in extra time, Shuey was tackled high 30 metres from the Eagles' goal and awarded a free kick.

Shuey slotted the ball through for a goal after the siren had sounded, giving West Coast a remarkable two point win and in the process, broke the hearts of the 41,000 strong Adelaide crowd.
Jerusalem: Yair Netanyahu, the son of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, removed an anti-Semitic meme from his Facebook page on Sunday after an outcry from Israeli politicians and Jewish community leaders in the United States.

The image, posted by Netanyahu on Friday, appeared to be a local take on a classic anti-Semitic cartoon suggesting that Jews control the United States. It has appeared widely on extreme alt-right websites.

In this instance, it depicted his father's perceived foes: American Jewish billionaire philanthropist and investor George Soros, outspoken former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak, activist Eldad Yaniv and Meni Naftali, a former housekeeper for the Netanyahus who successfully sued them for mistreatment.

Netanyahu, who goes by the name "Yair Hun" on Facebook, had captioned the meme "the food chain."
As she barrelled in from the Caribbean, after wreaking havoc in a string of vulnerable island nations, they're as ready as they can be in Florida as Hurricane Irma hits, despite a last minute curve ball for emergency planners.

Instead of tracking northward on the state's Atlantic east coast, the storm shifted westward, and picked up again to Category 4, menacing dozens of communities that previously believed they would be spared.

In Miami, streetlights were being lowered from their standards in a bid to preserve them. And at Happy Wine restaurant the windows were boarded up, parking was at a premium and there was a 45-minute wait for tables. By early evening the bar staff reportedly had opened more than 150 bottles of wine.
Hurricane Irma is continuing to move through Florida and currently sits north of Tampa.

Irma has been downgraded to a Category One hurricane after spending three days as a Category Five hurricane, the longest Category Five ever recorded.

The death toll in the US stands at five with all the deaths coming from Florida, including one person reported dead in the Florida Keys.

Aid has already started arriving in affected areas with 300 doctors, nurses and paramedics flown in to Orlando, Florida to assist those on the ground.

A spokesperson for DFAT said anyone looking to get in contact with loved ones should attempt to contact them directly before calling DFAT.
Seoul: North Korean leader Kim Jong-un hosted a massive celebration to congratulate his nuclear scientists and technicians who steered the country's sixth and largest nuclear test a week ago, its official news agency said on Sunday.

South Korea had been bracing for another long-range missile launch in time for the 69th anniversary of North Korea's founding on Saturday, but no fresh provocations were spotted, while the North held numerous events to mark the holiday.

Throughout last week, South Korean officials had warned the North could launch another intercontinental ballistic missile in defiance of UN sanctions and amid an escalating standoff with the United States.

Washington told the UN Security Council on Friday to meet on Monday to vote on a draft resolution establishing additional sanctions on North Korea for its missile and nuclear program.
Vatican City: Pope Francis, who has used his absolute authority in the Vatican to decentralise power from Rome, has made a widespread change to the ways, and words, in which Roman Catholics worship.

The change was achieved by amending Vatican law to give national bishop conferences greater authority in translating liturgical language  the words in which parishioners will pray and worship.

Pope Francis poses for a selfie with a couple attending his weekly general audience last month Credit:AP

"It's hugely important," said Rita Ferrone, a specialist in Catholic liturgy who writes for Commonweal, a liberal Catholic magazine.

By loosening Rome's grip on the language of prayers, Francis had restored the intention of the reforms of the Second Vatican Council and erased some of the roll-backs of his predecessor, Benedict XVI, she said.
DPM inaugurates Nepal's Consulate General Office in Guangzhou

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs, Krishna Bahadur Mahara inaugurated Nepal's Consulate General Office at Guangzhou in China on Sunday.
BRIDGETOWN, Barbados:--- Assessments are still coming in from the impact of Hurricane Irma on a number of Caribbean countries in the northern Leeward Islands and the northern Caribbean with warnings and watches still in place for a few countries in Irmas path.

Additionally, due to the projected path of Hurricane Jose, a category 4 storm, tropical storm and hurricane watches and warnings have been issued for some countries in the northern Leeward Islands.

Following is an update regarding Irmas impact as well as steps being taken by countries still in Irmas path. Reports from CHTA-member hotels have been included where available and details regarding Joses projected track are listed.

Antigua and Barbuda

Antigua was not impacted by Hurricane Irma with electricity being resort to the Capital St. Johns and most parts of the island. The V.C. Bird International Airport opened for all flights on Thursday, 7 September.

On the other hand, Barbuda with its approximately 1,800 residents was severely impacted by the hurricane which passed directly over the small island, resulting in one fatality. The prime minister, Gaston Browne said 90 per cent of homes were destroyed. Barbudas hotel infrastructure was also damaged, but with less than 100 hotel rooms the overall effect on tourism as a whole is minimal.

With Hurricane Jose threatening, the prime minister issued a mandatory evacuation order for Barbuda on Friday 8 September, the very day the first of three Amerijet cargo planes, with over 120, 000 pounds of hurricane relief for the island arrived on Antigua.

The Government of Venezuela has also made two aircraft available to transport goods for Barbuda as well as a medical team of 20 doctors and nurses experienced in disasters.

N.B. In the most recent update on Hurricane Jose issued at 11a.m. Eastern Caribbean Time (15:00 GMT) by the National Hurricane Centre in the US, the tropical storm watch for Antigua, the British Virgin Islands, St. Thomas and St. John had been discontinued. A hurricane warning remained in effect for Sint Maarten, St. Martin and St. Barthelemy, and a tropical storm warning remained in effect for Anguilla, Barbuda, Saba and St. Eustatius.

Updates from individual hotels on Antigua are as follows:

Curtain Bluff: Property emerged from the tail of the storm without any damage. Most importantly, all staff and their families are unharmed. The clean up of the property has begun and communications will soon be restored.

Property emerged from the tail of the storm without any damage. Most importantly, all staff and their families are unharmed. The clean up of the property has begun and communications will soon be restored. Cocos Hotel: No long term damages

No long term damages Galley Bay: Guests are doing just fine and are safe. Operational updates will be available in the coming days

Guests are doing just fine and are safe. Operational updates will be available in the coming days Hermitage Bay: A little waterlogged from the swells which came up but other than that all is well.

A little waterlogged from the swells which came up but other than that all is well. Jumby Bay Island: Members of the Jumby Bay Island team have assessed the island discovered no structural damage to any of the resort or homes. A landscaping clean-up will be needed, however. Jumby Bay Island is currently closed as part of its annual maintenance programme and therefore no guests were on the island when Hurricane Irma passed. Jumby Bay Island did have a skeleton team of facility and security staff present throughout the storm. The reopening remains on schedule for 9 October, 2017.

Members of the Jumby Bay Island team have assessed the island discovered no structural damage to any of the resort or homes. A landscaping clean-up will be needed, however. Jumby Bay Island is currently closed as part of its annual maintenance programme and therefore no guests were on the island when Hurricane Irma passed. Jumby Bay Island did have a skeleton team of facility and security staff present throughout the storm. The reopening remains on schedule for 9 October, 2017. Keyonna Beach Resort: No long term damage.

No long term damage. Pineapple Beach Club: Guests are safe. Operational updates in the coming days.

Guests are safe. Operational updates in the coming days. St. James Club: Guests are safe. Operational updates in the coming days.

Guests are safe. Operational updates in the coming days. Verandah: Guests are safe. Operational updates in the coming days

Anguilla

The Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency is reporting the airport runway and most roads leading to the airport have been cleared of debris. The agency is also reporting that 90 per cent of government buildings and business structures were damaged as well as 90 per cent of the electricity infrastructure. There is also significant damage to the main water supply.

The British government has deployed three humanitarian aid experts from the UK to assist with needs assessments and coordination.

The British naval ship Royal Fleet Auxiliary Mounts Bay has arrived in the territory, with 40 Royal Marines and Army engineers on board. The ship carries a range of equipment to support humanitarian responses including vehicles, tents and facilities to purify water.hundreds of troops and the Royal Navy flagship HMS Ocean to its overseas islands.

Quintessence Hotel which had been expected to reopen 1 November suffered damage during Hurricane Irma, so those plans have been delayed.

The Islands of The Bahamas

The all clear has been given for Nassau, New Providence the most populous island, and popular destination within the country. The all clear for the central and southeastern Bahamas was issued earlier today.

At this time only Grand Bahama, Bimini, and Andros remain under a hurricane warning as Hurricane Irma moves away from the islands-nation.

The Lynden Pindling International Airport in Nassau sustained no damage from Hurricane Irma and will resume operations tomorrow Sunday, 10 September at 5:00 a.m.

The traveling public is encouraged to contact their respective airlines for flight information using the listing of all airlines and their contacts found on LPIAs website at www.nassaulpia.com.

All other airports throughout The Islands of The Bahamas remain closed, but operations will resume as soon as the National Emergency Management Agency gives the all clear and the airports have been assessed and cleared for opening.

Cruise ports of entry throughout The Bahamas will also be assessed for clearance to re-open. Cruise reservation holders should check directly with their cruise providers for updates on departures and itineraries.

The British Virgin Islands

The destruction caused by Hurricane Irma in the British Virgin Islands has been devastating, according to a statement from Sharon Flax-Brutus, the director of tourism. With cell phone towers down and power outages, communication to, from and within, the territory has been difficult, impacting the ability to fully assess the damage. The destination has lost entire structures and many homes are without roofs, or have been diminished to merely foundations.

The Government has begun to coordinate humanitarian relief efforts and an initial clean-up operation. The UK government is sending Royal Navy flagship HMS Ocean to offer relief and support.

Updates from individual hotels in the British Virgin Islands are as follows:

Bitter End Yacht Club: the hotel was on its annual closure during the storm. The crew on the ground is safe.

the hotel was on its annual closure during the storm. The crew on the ground is safe. Peter Island Resort & Spa: Guests and on-island staff are safe.

Guests and on-island staff are safe. Rosewood Little Dix Bay: Rosewood Little Dix Bay is currently closed for renovation and therefore no guests were present at the resort and the management team was relocated prior to the storm.

Rosewood Little Dix Bay is currently closed for renovation and therefore no guests were present at the resort and the management team was relocated prior to the storm. Scrub Island: All guests and associates are safe.

Cuba

Hurricane Irma is passing along the northern coast of Cuba, where thousands of tourists were evacuated from low-lying cays off the coast.

Dominican Republic

Punta Cana International Airport has resumed normal operations following the passage of Hurricane Irma after the storm passed off Punta Canas coast. The areas hotel sector is reporting no major damage. Damaged homes and flooded streets in Cabarete and Sosua have been reported.

Haiti

Reports indicate that damage and flooding is minor in Haiti but warnings for possible flooding are still in effect.

Puerto Rico

The Puerto Rico Tourism Company (PRTC) is reporting that major tourism infrastructure and attractions are operational and the island can continue to welcome new visitors. The PRTC said while there have been power outages, many hotels, as well as essential services such as hospitals, have generators and are operational. The majority of hotels throughout mainland Puerto Rico are ready to welcome new guests. Attractions such as parks and beaches are currently being assessed to ensure a committed focus on quick clean up in the coming days.

Flights to and from Luis Munoz Marin International Airport have resumed. Puerto Ricos port is operational and should be receiving cruises by September 9.

Updates from individual hotels in Puerto Rico are as follows:

Condado Plaza Hilton: Minor damage

Minor damage El Conquistador Resort: Operational and working on getting all amenities back to normal. The clean-up of the areas in under way and some minor damage is being attended to. Las Casitas Village will reopen when electricity is restored.

Operational and working on getting all amenities back to normal. The clean-up of the areas in under way and some minor damage is being attended to. Las Casitas Village will reopen when electricity is restored. El San Juan Hotel: The team and property are safe. The hotel has received minimal damage and all efforts are being made to re-open as soon as the power is restored.

The team and property are safe. The hotel has received minimal damage and all efforts are being made to re-open as soon as the power is restored. Hotel El Convento: All guests, associates and clients are safe. There was no significant damage to the hotel and operations are resuming, including Patio del Nispero & Alegria Patio Bar.

All guests, associates and clients are safe. There was no significant damage to the hotel and operations are resuming, including Patio del Nispero & Alegria Patio Bar. InterContinental San Juan: Business as usual.

Business as usual. Rincon Beach: Open for business

Open for business San Juan Water Beach Club Hotel: The hotel sustained no damage, have full power, and is open for business.

St. Kitts and Nevis

St. Kitts & Nevis sustained minimal damage overall and both St. Kitts Robert L. Bradshaw International Airport and Nevis Vance W. Amory International Airport have reopened.

Hotels in St. Kitts reported no structural damage while Nevis hotel updates include:

Four Seasons Resort Nevis is reporting the resort is in fine shape and all areas are generally dry

is reporting the resort is in fine shape and all areas are generally dry Hermitage Inn reported general debris and no structural damage

reported general debris and no structural damage The Great House and Cottages at Nisbett Plantation Beach Club are in excellent condition. However, there was damage to the Sea Breeze Beach Bar, the decking and the beach.

St. Barthelemy

It has been reported that St. Barths was heavily impacted by Hurricane Irma which destroyed government buildings and badly damaged private homes and resorts including the Eden Rock Hotel. There is flooding throughout the destination. The French government is sending people and supplies to the country to assist with recovery efforts.

St. Maarten (Dutch) / St. Martin (French)

The recovery effort continues. Director of tourism for Dutch St. Maarten Rolando Brison is reporting that Sun Wing has evacuated some visitors to Montreal, Canada, while other guests have also been evacuated. The Princess Juliana International Airport has been receiving flights that are bringing in relief supplies, and evacuating guests. No passengers, including media, are being allowed in at the moment due to a shortage of staff to man the airport.

However, the airport has been closed, pending the passage of Hurricane Jose, which is now projected to pass away from the Franco-Dutch island. In a best case scenario, he said, the airport can reopen on Sunday 10 September for the resumption of relief flights.

Updates from St. Maarten / St. Martin hotels are as follows:

Beach Plaza: Badly damaged

Badly damaged Hotel Mercure: Damaged

Damaged Oyster Bay Beach Resort: Significant damage

Significant damage Riu Palace St. Martin: The infrastructure is severely affected, but hotel has confirmed that all the guests and employees are fine and there is sufficient water and food for all guests and employees.

The infrastructure is severely affected, but hotel has confirmed that all the guests and employees are fine and there is sufficient water and food for all guests and employees. Sonesta: All guests and staff of Sonesta Maho Beach Resort Casino & Spa, Sonesta Ocean Point Resort and Sonesta Great Bay Beach Resort & Casino are safe and unharmed. Resort damage is severe. Guests are currently in on-property safe areas at the resorts. All further reservations from now through the end of 2017 have been cancelled. Guests are in comfortable conditions and are provided with security, food, and water.

All guests and staff of Sonesta Maho Beach Resort Casino & Spa, Sonesta Ocean Point Resort and Sonesta Great Bay Beach Resort & Casino are safe and unharmed. Resort damage is severe. Guests are currently in on-property safe areas at the resorts. All further reservations from now through the end of 2017 have been cancelled. Guests are in comfortable conditions and are provided with security, food, and water. Sonesta Sint Maarten resorts can confirm that Jonathan Falwell, who was an in-house guest of Sonesta Ocean Point Resort contacted Samaritans Purse, a nondenominational evangelical United States-based Christian organization providing spiritual and physical aid to hurting people around the world, to provide a DC-8 with supplies and a Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART) on Friday, 8 September 2017. Twenty-seven guests, of Sonesta Sint Maarten Resorts, including the elderly, anyone with a medical condition, women and children, were evacuated on that aircraft. In addition, 25 guests of Sonesta Great Bay Beach Resort were evacuated on a United States C130 military aircraft on Friday, 8 September at sundown.

Further evacuations of guests of Sonesta Great Bay and Sonesta Maho Beach Resort are being planned for today, Saturday, 9 September via a commercial aircraft. This plane is expected to depart for Punta Cana, Dominican Republic. A vessel from the Dutch marines has also docked in St. Maarten to facilitate the arrival of flights in from Curacao, meaning there are more troops and supplies on the ground in Sint Maarten.

Westin Dawn Beach: Suffered significant damage.

Both the French and Dutch governments are sending people to the country along with supplies and vital aid.

St. Eustatius

A few roofs lost, some downed trees, but the island suffered minimal damage by Hurricane Irma. The airport and seaport are both operational, and telephone, internet, electricity are water are also back up.

Turks and Caicos Islands

Governor Dr. John Freeman and Premier Sharlene Cartwright-Robinson given the all-clear. They have said in a joint statement that assessment of the damage is continuing.

The director of Tourism Ramon Andrews reported that Turks and Caicos Islands experienced flooding, some structural damage, roofs that have been blown off, downed trees, no loss of life and all visitors are safe.

Many roads have been flooded and power lines and transformers are down, according to the emergency management agency.

Providenciales International Airport (PLS) is currently closed.

Updates from individual properties in the Turks & Caicos Islands are as follows:

Alexandra Resort, Blue Haven Resort and Beach House: All guests and staff of the three resorts are reported safe and unharmed, and are remaining on property pending further instructions from the authorities on the conditions of roads, electricity and the status of the airport. The resorts have sufficient supplies, food and water to care for all guests in the interim. The resorts sustained some wind and water damage due to the storm, and will be closed for arrivals for 30 days through 8 October.

Resort All guests and staff of the three resorts are reported safe and unharmed, and are remaining on property pending further instructions from the authorities on the conditions of roads, electricity and the status of the airport. The resorts have sufficient supplies, food and water to care for all guests in the interim. The resorts sustained some wind and water damage due to the storm, and will be closed for arrivals for 30 days through 8 October. Beaches Turks & Caicos Resort Villages & Spa: All guests are safe - no power or water yet

All guests are safe - no power or water yet Gansevoort Turks & Caicos, A Wymara Resort: All guests are safe, power off and water is temporarily off, phones are out but cell and internet are working

All guests are safe, power off and water is temporarily off, phones are out but cell and internet are working La Vista Azul: All guests are safe - no power or water yet

All guests are safe - no power or water yet Ocean Club Resorts: All guests are safe - no power or water yet

All guests are safe - no power or water yet Ports of Call Resort: All guests are safe - no power or water yet

All guests are safe - no power or water yet The Regent Grand: All staff and guests are safe

All staff and guests are safe Sands at Grace Bay: All is well

All is well Seven Stars Resort: All guests are safe - no power or water yet

All guests are safe - no power or water yet The Shore Club: All staff and guests are safe

All staff and guests are safe Villa Del Mar: All guests are safe, power & water off

United States Virgin Islands (St. Croix, St. John and St. Thomas)

The U.S. Virgin Islands Department of Tourism has advised that full assessment on the impact of Hurricane Irma is under way and while St. Croix is getting back to business, visitors are being encouraged not to visit St. Thomas and St. John.

According to commissioner of tourism Beverly Nicholson-Doty, The island of St. Croix did not receive the full brunt of the storm, and St. Croixs Henry E. Rohlsen Airport received its first commercial flight a JetBlue flight from San Juan, Puerto Rico on Friday 8 September.

She reported that communication is still limited, there is significant damage to infrastructure in St. Thomas and St. John, and the Cyril E. King Airport on St. Thomas will not be open for commercial traffic before Jose passes the area this weekend.

To ensure everyone's safety, the postponement of all scheduled visits to St. Thomas and St. John is being recommended.

The storm has resulted in four casualties to date on the island of St. Thomas.

The following updates have been shared by individual properties in the U.S. Virgin Islands:

The Buccaneer (St. Croix): Open for business. Facilities are in good shape, but there may be some limitation of services over the next few days.

Open for business. Facilities are in good shape, but there may be some limitation of services over the next few days. Caneel Bay (St. John): Complete power outage at the resort.

Complete power outage at the resort. Westin St. John Resort Villas (St. John): All associates, owners and guests are safe. The resort and the surrounding areas experienced some damage and overall impact is being assessed.

All associates, owners and guests are safe. The resort and the surrounding areas experienced some damage and overall impact is being assessed. Bluebeards Castle Resort (St. Thomas): Everyone who was onsite is safe. The property has sustained major damage, which is currently being assessed.

Everyone who was onsite is safe. The property has sustained major damage, which is currently being assessed. Point Pleasant Resort (St. Thomas): Everyone at the resort is safe, but without power and cell phone service. The team is currently assessing damage, and will share new information when available.

Everyone at the resort is safe, but without power and cell phone service. The team is currently assessing damage, and will share new information when available. Secret Harbour Beach Resort (St. Thomas): All guests and staff are safe. There is no major structural damage to the buildings. The generator is still working.

All guests and staff are safe. There is no major structural damage to the buildings. The generator is still working. Sugar Bay Resort & Spa (St. Thomas): All guests and team members are safe. The damage is being assessed and updated information will be provided when available.

All guests and team members are safe. The damage is being assessed and updated information will be provided when available. Windward Passage (St. Thomas): Will be closed for six months.

The CTO and CHTA will continue to share updates from member countries in the CTO Storm Watch Centre on http://www.onecaribbean.org/cto-storm-watch-centre/ as well as on CHTAs website http://www.caribbeanhotelandtourism.com/knowledge-center/hurricane-center/.

CTO has activated its CTO Relief Fund through GoFundMe to help families and countries rebuild after hurricanes, with monies raided being sent directly to CTO-member destinations affected by the catastrophic storm. For more information on CTOs Relief Fund or to make a donation, visit www.gofundme.com/hurricane-relief-fund-cto.

Donations through CHTAs Caribbean Tourism Recovery Fund can be made via http://www.tourismcares.org/caribbean.

CTO Press Release
James Krauseneck maintained his innocence at the sentencing Monday and was supported by his daughter, Sarah, who was 3 at the time and saw her deceased mother, Cathleen Cathy Krausneck, 29, a Macomb County native.
Notre Dame beats Youngstown State in men's basketball

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HARTFORD  Gov. Dannel P. Malloy on Sunday said the state sent an additional 22 Connecticut National Guardsmen to Florida to provide support for Hurricane Irma relief efforts.

Officials are preparing to assist Floridians who may need a great deal of help during the immediate response and recovery from this storm, Malloy siad. Connecticut stands ready to assist our friends and neighbors in the Sunshine State in the days, weeks and months to come. The men and women of the Connecticut National Guard are an invaluable resource during severe storms and we are grateful for service.
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STAMFORD  Ed Marini is hoping to brighten a persons day in court.

Marini, who has run concession stands at West and Cummings beaches and Cove Island Park since 2016, has taken over the Stamford courthouses second-floor restaurant.

The Rolling Dough Express has replaced Law and Order Cafe, which had been run by the state Bureau of Education Services for the Blind since 2002 until it closed last year.

Marini, whose family has owned and operated Marinellos Pizzeria and Deli on Strawberry Hill Avenue in Norwalk for more than 40 years, says he knows how to convert people into repeat customers.

If I give them good food, they are going to come back. If I dont give them good food, they wont be back, he said as he sat at one of the tables inside the cafe last week.

One challenge to the restaurant is not having a grill. Marini has worked around that by installing a steam box and purchasing a hot dog roller. He offers a limited amount of $4 breakfast sandwiches, which he prepares in the morning at his Norwalk deli, as well as jumbo doughnuts ($1.75), danishes ($2.50), muffins ($3.50), salads ($5.50 to $7) and lunch sandwiches ($5.50 to $6.50)

My concept is to make the food basic and easy, Marini said.

According to Kathleen Sullivan, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Rehabilitative Services, the Committee of Blind Vendors decided last September to give up its locations at the Stamford courthouse and New Britain Department of Motor Vehicles because of the limited amount of customers.

A 1945 state law gives the organization the first choice to operate food services in public buildings.

The state Judicial Branch said Marini is paying a pro-rated $3,160 per year to occupy the 600-square-foot cafe.

Bondsman Freddy Fodiman said the cafe is needed in the courthouse.

Its set up with more simplicity and everything looks clean. Its a nicer environment, he said while eating a danish with milk. People come to court and they are in a hurry and they miss breakfast. If you need a little food, you can come up here.

Ann-Margaret Archer, chief clerk for the Stamford Norwalk Judicial District, said the cafe has received positive reviews by courthouse employees.

I am not sure how much business they are doing, but every staff person I have talked to thinks the food is delicious, she said.

jnickerson@stamfordadvocate.com
As parents of Stamford Public School current students and recent graduates, we were extremely disturbed by Republican mayoral candidate Barry Michelsons characterization of the quality of our schools in his op-ed on Sept. 6 (Attacks dont heal a community).

The SPS provided our sons and daughters every opportunity to succeed, as evidenced by their attendance at schools such as University of Michigan, University of Connecticut, University of Notre Dame, Boston College, University of Virginia, University of Maryland, Emory University, George Washington, Princeton, Duke, Stanford, Cornell, New York University, University of North Carolina, Purdue, Drexel, Tufts, Northeastern, Rochester Institute of Technology, Ohio State, University of Pennsylvania, Yale, Quinnipiac, Eastern Connecticut State University, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, University of Colorado Boulder, as well as many other fine institutions.
Electronic cardholders can now make online purchases

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For the common good

Germany underwent a radical transformation in a number of areas after the Second World War, and the field of mass media was no exception.
LINCOLN  President Donald Trump announced Friday, Sept. 1, his plans to nominate Nebraska Department of Agriculture Director Greg Ibach as the USDA under-secretary for marketing and regulatory programs.

I am honored to be nominated by the President, and I so appreciate the support and encouragement from Secretary Perdue, Ibach said in a statement. I look forward to serving, if confirmed.

USDAs under-secretary for marketing and regulatory programs includes the Agricultural Marketing Service, the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, and the Grain Inspection Packers and Stockyards Administration. Ibach, a lifelong rancher and farmer, has also been active in the National Association of State Departments of Agriculture since his appointment as NDAs director in 2005 serving as chair of the marketing and international trade committee, animal and plant health committee, and, most recently, as president. Ibach earned his Bachelor of Science degree in agriculture from the University of Nebraska with majors in animal science and agricultural economics.

Mr. Ibach has been a visionary leader for Nebraskas agriculture effectively supervising departmental staff and programs, with the ability to analyze issues, develop strategies, and create solutions for domestic and global initiatives, a statement from the White House announcing his appointment said. Ibach has oversight of Nebraskas plant and animal heath regulatory functions. He has been actively involved in foreign and domestic marketing and development activities.

Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts released a statement congratulating Ibach on the appointment. Ricketts noted that Ibach will bring broad experience to this new role from his work with Nebraskas animal and plant health programs as well as the livestock disease tractability program.

During his 12 years as director of the Nebraska Department of Agriculture, Greg helped grow Nebraska by building the Nebraska brand and Nebraskas international trade relationships, Ricketts said. Greg brings outstanding experience to this role. While we will miss Gregs day-to-day presence here in Nebraska, he will continue to be a resource for Nebraska as we partner with him in his new role as well as a tremendous asset to the USDA and President Trumps administration. I urge the president to send his nomination to the U.S. Senate, and urge senators to take up his confirmation in a timely manner.

A spokesperson for Ricketts said the states trade mission to Japan, scheduled to start on Sept. 10, is continuing as scheduled. Mat Habrock and Stan Garbacz will represent the NDA on the trade mission, and until Ibach is confirmed by the U.S. Senate, there is no vacancy for his position. Ibach continues to serve as the NDA director.

U.S. Sens. Deb Fischer and Ben Sasse also issued statements regarding Ibachs appointment.

Bruce (Fischers husband) and I extend our congratulations to Greg Ibach on his nomination for the marketing and regulatory programs under secretary position at the Department of Agriculture, Fischer said. I have known and worked with Greg for many years. He is an agriculture expert who has extensive knowledge of the industry and its numerous contributions to Nebraska, our country and the world. Im pleased the president accepted my recommendation of such an impressive Nebraskan. Once hes confirmed, I look forward to working with Greg to ensure Nebraskas producers have the tools necessary to continue feeding the world.

A Nebraskan through and through, Greg has served our state well, and I have full faith that he will serve America with the same skill and hard work, Sasse said. Nebraskas farmers and ranchers congratulate Greg and his family on the presidents decision to invite him to this new calling.

Steve Nelson, president of the Nebraska Farm Bureau, touted Ibachs tremendous track record of serving Nebraska agriculture.

(Ibachs) years of service in leading the Nebraska Department of Agriculture make him an outstanding choice for the position of USDA under secretary for marketing and regulatory programs, Nelson said. We wish him the best as he proceeds in the nomination process.

Ibach has been inducted into the Nebraska Hall of Agricultural Achievement and honored with the Service to Agriculture Recognition from the University of NebraskaLincoln, College of Agriculture Science and Natural Resources, among other honors. Ibach is also the immediate past president of the National Association of State Departments of Agriculture. He and his wife, Teresa, have three grown children and live on their farm and ranch in Sumner.
GERING  There will be potatoes galore at the Legacy of the Plains Museum on Saturday, Sept. 16, and Sunday, Sept. 17, at the annual Harvest Festival.

Visitors to this years Harvest Festival will have the opportunity to pick their own potatoes and watch demonstrations of vintage hand, horse and tractor equipment used in the planting, harvesting and processing of potatoes in the valley.

Each afternoon during the festival there will be a parade. Children will have the opportunity to play in a hay bale fort and ride on a pedal tractor course. There will also be wagon and barrel train rides.

The Wiedeman farmstead will be open and farm animals will be on display.

Interim Director Amanda Gibbs said shes looking forward to the event.

People absolutely love to come out digging for potatoes, she said. And theyre all grown here on site.

There will be potato field demonstrations, horse-drawn and tractor-powered potato equipment and labor practices. Visitors will learn about cutting, planting, cultivating, harvesting, sorting and sacking potatoes.

Its neat to see the old machinery up and running, Gibbs said. Its also good to see how your parents and grandparents would have harvested potatoes.

This year, in celebration of the Lockwood Grader Company, there will be a company reunion on Friday, Sept. 15. The Harvest Festival cycles through different crops each year and this year happened to be potatoes. Realizing 2017 was also the 60th anniversary of founder T.J. Lockwoods death, a reunion to honor the man, the company and its employees was organized. Lockwood invented the potato harvester. Visitors will get to see films, which were recently cleaned and digitized of the Lockwood Company as well as other media related to the potato industry.

He was a man with a vision who wanted to help local farmers, Gibbs said. His inventions grew exponentially.

Lockwood began his company in Kimball before moving to a building in Gering, now known as Cozad signs.

Volunteers will be on site to explain how the machines work, how the restoration process works and provide general education on the history of agriculture in the valley.

Early risers on Saturday can attend the Kiwanis pancake breakfast at 7 a.m. On Sunday, a church service will be held at 9 a.m.

Fridays events take place from 1-5 p.m. The Harvest Festival runs Saturday, Sept. 16, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday, Sept. 17, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Admission is $5. Members, exhibitors and children under 10 are free. Museum admission will be discounted to $8 for the weekend.

For more information, contact the Legacy of the Plains Museum at 308-436-1989.

BREAKOUT BOX or BOXES

Lockwood Grader Company Reunion

Friday, Sept. 15

Legacy of the Plains Museum

Harvest Festival

Saturday, Sept. 16 and Sunday, Sept. 17

Legacy of the Plains Museum
For news junkies like me, this past week was consumed by the devastation Hurricane Harvey left in Texas and Louisiana and the doom Hurricane Irma is casting on Florida and the Caribbean. The destruction and human tragedy is incomprehensible. Toss in the always stormy Washington D.C. atmosphere and you have the perfect storm.

It is times like these that test the ability of a nation, and from my perspective, we passed the test in flying colors. FEMAs first response has been dramatic, timely and effective, after learning the lessons taught by Hurricane Katrina. Part two of the exam will be if we have the staying power to continue the efforts in Florida and the ongoing efforts to help rebuild, which will take years.

Just eight months into his presidency, President Trump is equally being tested. On top of the natural disasters he chose to take on the DACA illegal immigration issue and was forced to deal with a country that is out of money as we once again bumped into the debt ceiling which requires Congress to act so the country can borrow even more, adding to the $20 trillion we have already borrowed and have no plan in place to pay back. So how did Trump do this week?

Trump had a remarkable week. His newly formed administration was ahead of the Texas disaster and from all aspects, the federal response has been commendable. His leading efforts to craft a quick solution to fund the recovery efforts by working with the Democrats to get a $15 billion dollar extension of the debt limit, and to keep the government open through December was brilliant. Even though the Republicans hated the idea, because they wanted an 18-month deal that would take them past next years election, they had to vote for it. The last thing speaker Paul Ryan wanted to face was another vote to extend the debt limit before the election, especially when they have clearly stated in their platform they intend to put a cap on that very same debt limit. But President Trump did exactly what he needed to do; getting the hurricane relief money and putting the pressure of actually managing the debt squarely back where it belongs, in the Halls of Congress.

Well see what they do in December, after decades of promising us a smaller more effective government, reducing the debt and balancing the budget. You already know exactly what they will do. They will cave because 2018 is an election year and like always, they will put getting re-elected ahead of their campaign rhetoric and make even more promises to those of us who once believed they actually planned to do what they say.

But today, even I, who constantly berates Congress for not doing the work of the people, have to applaud their efforts in the face of tragedy, even though it was a relatively simple vote considering the $15 billion, which is a lot of money, but is only about the amount we borrow every two weeks.

In the midst of all the natural disasters looms the dilemma of what to do about illegal immigration. This is not a new problem and exists today because Congress has failed to address the issue since Ronald Reagan issued amnesty for three million illegal immigrants in 1986 in exchange for border security. How has that worked out?

President Obama established the DREAM Act (DACA) which deferred deportation to nearly 800,000 illegal immigrants brought to this country as children, even though for years leading up to his decision he told us he couldnt do it because t was unconstitutional because that responsibility belongs to Congress. But because of Congress inability to pass meaningful immigration policy, he acted. These people were brought to America, educated by Americans, hired by Americans and if they have no significant criminal records, Obama said they could stay on a temporary basis.

So what did President Trump do this past week? He said he will end the DACA program in six months, unless Congress steps up to the plate and finally does what we hired them to do. If Congress passes immigration law allowing these young folks to stay in America, and they should, then all this talk of discrimination is for naught. If Congress puts it off, which historically is what they have shown us to be their answer to most major problems like immigration, the debt and affordable health care, then the program will end and these people who grew up in America may face deportation.

In the span of just one week, President Trump directly called out Congress and essentially ordered them to do what they should have been doing for years, instead of playing power partisan politics, governing by election cycles so they can either gain or regain power, governing by fear of alienating voters or governing to keep the ineptitude of their K Street lobbyist infected status quo.

So Trump, like him or not, in spite of his endless and ridiculous daily Tweets, his obvious struggles with the office, his overblown ego and unscripted comments, did what he had to in the face of four crises, two caused by nature, the other two by Congress.

My two cents, whats yours? Let me know at greg.awtry@starherald.com.
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Hetauda industrial area starts recovering unused land

Industrial District Management Limited of Hetauda has launched a drive to recover land from manufacturing units that have terminated operation. These manufacturing units have been issued 35-day notice to vacate the space.
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Chairman of the People's Movement Party (PMP) Traian Basescu said on Saturday that he hadn't been curious to read the report of the parliamentary inquiry committee tasked with investigating the 2009 presidential election because he knows for sure the ballot was not rigged in his favour.

"I think they reached such levels of ridiculousness with these conclusions that they are unworthy of a response on my side; however, I'll reflect on whether to react or not. I haven't had the curiosity to read the report because I know perfectly well that the elections haven't been manipulated in my favour. Proof for this is the fact that whereas our party - PDL at that time - had just one representative in each polling station, they had six parties backing my opponent Geoana. How could that one man possibly manipulate the ballot papers? (...) These are just poor quality speculations," Basescu told the PMP youth Summer School in Neptun on Saturday.

In the report on the 2009 presidential election, the inquiry committee states having found that the presidential institution represented by Traian Basescu and the government headed by Emil Boc had taken concrete actions to manipulate the election result to the benefit of candidate Traian Basescu.

According to the report, "these actions by the two institutions were perfectly timed, thus proving that they were part of a broad, minutely conceived plan, and that the actions had been premeditated."

"Having in view that the difference between the two candidates was of just 70,321 votes, representing approximately 0.68 percent of the valid votes, as well as the actions to manipulate the election in Traian Basescu's favor, we conclude that the amplitude of these actions was such as to change the election's outcome," the report reads.

Chairperson of the parliamentary inquiry committee Oana Florea said that the report is only partial, as it fell short of one of its goals, specifically they couldn't find evidence for the involvement of the Romanian Intelligence Service - SRI and the anticorruption agency DNA in the manipulation of the election. Florea said that copies of the committee's report will be sent to the General Prosecution, the Superior Council of Magistrates and the Presidential Administration, all of which have the legal competence to take action on their own motion against the persons and potential electoral offences found by the inquiry committee.
No budget allocation for local polls in Province 2

The allocated election budget may not be enough to hold two major pollsprovincial and federalas some of the amount earmarked for these events is being used for the third phase of local vote in Province 2.
After eight months in office, much of it consumed with a busy legislative session, the economic development priorities of Missouris new self-styled outsider governor, Eric Greitens, are coming into focus.

Some of the new administrations policy preferences arent surprises from a Republican administration, such as longer-term efforts to reduce income tax rates. Another, reforming Missouris huge tax credit programs, is a mainstay of Missouri politics that has been attempted by both Democrats and Republicans in the governors mansion and Legislature.

But two other efforts appear to have risen to the top of Greitens economic development agenda. He brought them into focus at the annual Governors Conference on Economic Development, which drew hundreds of local and state officials from around Missouri to St. Louis last week.

Speaking at the Hilton at the Ballpark downtown Thursday, Greitens announced the launching of a new program, Skilled Workforce Missouri, to make it easier for businesses to use Missouris workforce training programs. Finding workers with the necessary skills is almost always among the top concerns of business leaders, Greitens told conference attendees.

We also have Missourians who need jobs, but theres been for a long time in Missouri a skills gap, he said.

Through better branding, the state wants to make its workforce development programs more visible to businesses inside and outside of Missouri. And it wants to streamline the programs into a more navigable system.

Theres going to be a single point of access, a single point of entry, Greitens said.

The second big push emerged during a whirlwind week where the governor crisscrossed the state to promote businesses planning to tap state incentives that help them add jobs. On Wednesday, a task force Greitens formed in June released its report on how best to help entrepreneurs.

Among dozens of policy proposals in the Innovation Task Force report, Greitens drew attention to one in particular: the creation of a Missouri innovation fund.

Missouri Chief Operating Officer Drew Erdmann, in an interview, described it as the evolution of the Missouri Technology Corp.

MTC, which invests in startups alongside private capital and provides grant funding for organizations such as Arch Grants and ITEN, had garnered bipartisan support in recent years and is touted by business leaders for helping to seed the startup communities within the states cities.

Greitens faced some criticism over his budget proposal earlier this year to slash MTC funding from almost $23 million to $5 million. In its final budget, the Legislature cut MTC funding even more than that, to $2.5 million.

Now, Greitens administration is pushing a plan to sell bonds to refill the MTC fund. Using similar appropriations to make bond payments, Erdmann said bonding authority could provide over $100 million for the innovation fund.

In addition, Greitens administration wants to solicit private firms to manage the fund. Private investors, too, would be invited to pool their capital in the fund.

What the Innovation Task Force brought to us was an idea so we could take what we were already investing, form a new public-private innovation fund managed by private sector leaders, run like a business, not a bureaucracy, to make strategic investments that would help us to launch new startups all over the state, Greitens said Thursday.

Workforce revamp

While that idea would need approval from legislators, the other big push, to revamp the states workforce development programs, is administrative.

Greitens in June tapped Rob Dixon to lead the states Department of Economic Development, which oversees the states worker training programs. Dixon is familiar with that world. He most recently led the Missouri Community College Association, representing the institutions that often administer job training programs for the states businesses.

Greitens touted Dixons work in workforce development when he appointed him, saying he successfully coordinated major policy changes on behalf of Missouris 12 community colleges.

If Missouri wants to serve companies in the state looking to expand we have to start moving forward in a different direction, Dixon said at the conference last week.

In an interview, he described the push as an effort to make the state into a concierge service for businesses, helping them to navigate the various training programs instead of handing them applications and telling them go figure it out.

We are not asking for more money, more people, Dixon said. We are looking at using what we have more efficiently.

The other major component is better branding of the workforce training program, with a new website and marketing for the Skilled Workforce Missouri initiative. Other states have successfully branded their programs to appeal directly to businesses considering expansion or evaluating sites across the country, he said.

The state would help participating businesses design pre-employment training, screen job applicants and coordinate with community colleges that perform job training.

The push would help companies from outside Missouri or in areas without a strong community college or other job training institution better find the resources available. Dixon said businesses that have existing relationships with community colleges, many of which already work with DEDs workforce training offices, wont have to change anything. He pointed to the successful partnership between Boeing and St. Louis Community College for worker training as a model the state wants to help facilitate elsewhere.

Theres a lot of opportunity to do very similar programs like that all over the state, Dixon said.
Executives from a Los Angeles-based tech company said they are weighing whether to fight a judge's order to provide Washington, D.C. prosecutors with email addresses and other information from people who visited an anti-Donald Trump website in the months leading to Inauguration Day.

The company, DreamHost, filed a motion with D.C. Superior Court Judge Robert E. Morin last weekrequesting that he put his order on hold while they consider whether to appeal.

But prosecutors, concerned that such a delay could hinder their cases against dozens charged in Inauguration Day riots, have asked the judge to force DreamHost to immediately turn over the data.

In a year where DreamHost was looking forward to celebrating its 20th anniversary, the company instead has been propelled into a high-profile privacy rights case as a result of managing the server for a website that authorities say facilitated Inauguration Day rioting.

In an interview, DreamHost's co-founder and chief executive Dallas Kashuba said the potential implications go beyond this case. He said there is concern among tech companies that Internet users could become fearful of visiting websites if they know government authorities can monitor such information.

"This is a fundamental issue of online privacy and how the internet works. If this goes the wrong way, it could detrimentally impact the internet itself," Kashuba said. "If people become afraid to access websites because they may be found out," he said, "it could chill the online communication."

Prosecutors from the U.S. Attorney's Office in the District of Columbia have filed felony rioting charges against some 200 people who they say participated in the riots.

In court, they said they obtained the subpoenas seeking emails, email addresses and IP addresses of anyone who might have engaged with the alleged rioters through the website Disruptj20.org, the site hosted by DreamHost.

Orin Kerr, a computer crime law professor at George Washington University, said the case has caught national attention as observers watch how prosecutors handle concerns over constitutional rights prohibiting unreasonable searches and seizures.

"This is testing the limits of the Fourth Amendment," Kerr said. "It's an important question of the government trying to get records that they haven't obtained in the past."

DreamHost is not the first internet company to challenge the government in its quest to prosecute individuals associated with the riots.

On Thursday, attorneys for Facebook are scheduled to argue in front of the D.C. Court of Appeals over a court order that blocks the social media giant from letting users know when law enforcement investigators ask to search their online information, particularly their political affiliations and comments.

The Inauguration Day riots left six police officers injured and caused tens of thousands of dollars in damage when downtown D.C. businesses were vandalized just blocks from where President Donald Trump and his family paraded following the swearing-in ceremony.

Prosecutors initially reached out to DreamHost on Jan. 27, just seven days after the inauguration. At that time, prosecutors made a preservation request, asking DreamHost to save a snapshot of its data on its servers. DreamHost rebuffed the government's initial request. Then on Feb. 8, prosecutors obtained their first court subpoena for the information they wanted, forcing DreamHost to comply.

On July 17, prosecutors filed a subpoena which the company said would have required it to turn over the IP addresses of about 1.3 million users of its site.

DreamHost objected to such a sweeping petition and requested a hearing in front of the judge. But days before the hearing, prosecutors scaled back their request to include email addresses from just those people who engaged with the website by, for instance, providing their email addresses or signing up to receive information.

Prosecutors argued that their request had to be somewhat broad because they have no idea which site users may be associated with the rioting until they review the data.

Judge Morin ordered DreamHost to turn over user information from the site's inception through Inauguration Day. DreamHost said the current request involves information regarding people associated with about 10,000 email addresses.

Kashuba said he believes prosecutors are trying to charge more people in the case and are trying to use data from his company as evidence to bolster those charges.

"They are trying to figure out every person who they believe may be associated with this group and may have supported them in some way. That would go beyond the 200 people who are already charged," Kashuba said. "They are trying to leverage us and the information we have to assist in their investigation."

Kashuba said DreamHost  which employs about 200 people and has revenue of about $50 million last year  has already spent about $25,000 in legal fees fighting with prosecutors over the subpoenas. To file an appeal, would cost another $150,000.

"It does make me wonder how far they're allowed to go," Kashuba said. "How much of our time should be put into aiding their investigation?"
At age 33 and in only his first year of doing music full time, Jonny P is something of a late bloomer. But judging from his midafternoon set o
NRA asks NTs position on Dharahara construction

The National Reconstruction Authority (NRA) has asked Nepal Telecom (NT) to make its position clear on the construction of Dharahara within a week.
CLAYTON  As shoppers browsed his booth at the St. Louis Art Fair on Saturday afternoon, artistic woodturner John Mascoll was on the phone discussing last-minute storm preparations with his son at home in Safety Harbor, on Floridas west coast.

Like a handful of others showing at the tony fair, Mascoll left home days ago thinking Hurricane Irma was heading up one coast, only to learn that the whims of wind and weather were sending it up the other.

Leaving the Sunshine State, Mascoll said he followed lines all the way from Florida to Chattanooga.

The artists shared the road with storm refugees, on drives that took hours longer than usual.

They passed packed rest stops and gas stations that had run out of toilet paper. Some saw exhausted travelers sleeping in their vehicles.

Youd see 40 dogs on leashes, said sculptor Scott Causey of Sarasota, Fla.

Causey also took a call during an interview with a reporter, talking his 20-year-old son Chase through storm preparations of their own.

Causey and his wife, Jodi, left for Clayton on Wednesday morning. When the massive storm took a turn Friday, they talked about whether he should fly home.

He decided not to, but he said that there has been a lot of second-guessing about preparations.

Artists at the fair are identified by their hometowns, and Jodi Causey said many fairgoers want to talk about whats happening in Florida.

A surprising number, she said, also have homes in the state.

Jodi Causey said the couple are not the only ones who struggled with decisions forced by the storm. Her sister-in-law was pregnant with her first child. Doctors didnt want to induce labor, as they were busy with other procedures.

She thought of driving north, but stayed and had her first child, a son, by C-section Friday at a riverfront hospital in Bradenton that has since been evacuated.

Mother and son were taken by ambulance to a hospital farther inland in Manatee County, she said.

Ceramic artist William Kidd, a veteran of Hurricane Andrew from Miramar, Fla., drove his wife and their dogs to a rented cabin in the mountains of North Carolina before coming to Clayton.

During the 1992 hurricane, the family spent an hour huddled in a bathroom under a mattress as what sounded like a freight train roared outside.

Were he still home in Homestead, Fla., painter Rey Alfonso said that he would have stayed. His house, he said, is cast concrete, with steel roll-up doors. And as a Cuban, he is a veteran of the storms that lash the island, and the accompanying hurricane parties.

The Cubans dont ever leave, he said.

Mascolls home is 8 miles from the Gulf of Mexico. He said hes not worrying about water, but about wind, and the neighbors old oak tree.

All were attracted to Clayton by the fairs reputation. The fair features 180 independent artists selected by a jury, as well as live music and food and drinks from a dozen area restaurants.

The event continues until 10 p.m. Saturday and from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday.

The weather forecast here for Sunday is sunny, with a high around 80.
As Hurricane Irma chews up Florida and the southeast, a dozen C-17 military troop transport planes from South Carolina are waiting out the storm in the safety of the Metro East's Scott Air Force Base.

The massive planes were brought in last week from their Charleston, S.C., base in anticipation of the storm. After the hurricane passes, the planes are expected to return to the affected areas as part of the rescue and recovery efforts.

Scott, near Belleville, has been promoting the operation on social media.

Florida is expected to bear the brunt of the storm as it approached land Saturday night. Officials have directed 6.5 million Florida residents to leave in one of the largest emergency evacuations in U.S. history. The hurricane was moving northwest from Cuba and was expected to reach the Florida keys by Sunday morning.
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti  The storm-stricken Caribbean took on the feel of a sprawling disaster zone Sunday, with Cuban first responders using inflatable rafts to navigate flooded streets as panicked families sent up social-media pleas in search of loved ones on hard-hit islands further east.

In St. John in the U.S. Virgin Islands, "people there are roaming like zombies," said Stacey Alvarado, a bar owner who managed to leave for the mainland. Her husband, who is still there, told her Sunday that residents and tourists are in shock. "They don't know what to do. The island was wiped out. It's like the walking dead down there."

In Cuba, where the government said it had evacuated 1 million residents, Hurricane Irma's driving winds and pelting rains sent roofs flying, knocked over trees, wrecked building and caused large-scale flooding along the northern coast. Officials in Havana warned of flooding that would last through Monday. In the city of Santa Clara, the Associated Press reported that 39 buildings had collapsed.

As streets turned into rivers, authorities took to inflatable rafts to access coastal neighborhoods. Some Cubans had even sought shelter in caves. The brutal storm struck Cuba along a coast studded with resorts that are among the pillars of the island's economy. Authorities warned of heavy damage from the storm, which has so far killed at least 25 people across the Caribbean.

"The hardest-hit provinces are Camaguey, Villa Clara, Sancti Spiritus and to some extent Matanzas, the resort area of Varadero, which was directly in the path of the hurricanes and where all the tourists were evacuated," Richard Paterson, the CARE organization's representative in Cuba, said by phone from Havana.

"Power has been turned off throughout the city, in fact, throughout the country," he said. "The electricity infrastructure received extensive serious damage."

European governments came under fire as critics accused them of being slow to respond to crises in their overseas Caribbean territories, where massive damage left thousands homeless as looting broke out in the streets.

On Sunday, the French government announced that President Emmanuel Macron would travel to the Saint Martin, an island split between France and the Netherlands, on Tuesday. The French have already deployed more than 1,000 personnel to the Caribbean region in an aid-and-relief effort.

The evacuation of U.S. citizens from the Dutch side of St. Martin resumed Sunday, according to State Department spokesperson Heather Nauert, after being suspended in anticipation of Hurricane Jose, which later veered off to the north. Priority is being given to those needing urgent medical care, she said.

Residents in the devastated British Virgin Islands used Facebook in frantic calls for help.

One user, Lanein Blanchette, echoed many others still looking for word from relatives and friends whom they had not heard from since Irma began belting the region last week.

"There is absolutely no news about East End on any of these pages," she wrote. "I've posted over ten times asking for assistance as to whether anyone has seen my uncle Kingston 'Iman' Eddy and not one person has replied. I am lost for words at this point. I honestly don't know what else to do."

At the same time, dramatic tales of escape began to emerge.

Lauren Boquette, a 48-year-old restaurant manager on St. John, said his family had barricaded themselves in the bathroom of their home. When they emerged, he said, they saw a scene of total destruction.

"It was beyond rough times, it was end-of-the-world times. Everything normal to us has been destroyed," he said.

Authorities in the devastated island nation of Antigua and Barbuda faced a historic effort ahead to rebuild. The island of Barbuda suffered damage to almost 100 percent of its structures.

"In Barbuda, where they evacuated everybody, now they have to figure out where to start, how to construct basic need services, how to figure out what to do with families that lost their homes," said Jan Gelfland of the International Federation of the Red Cross.
Netflix expected to withdraw from Russia

Middlesex, UK( )

Netflix and Amazon Prime Video will boost the Eastern European SVOD sector considerably. The Eastern Europe OTT TV & Video Forecasts report estimates that Netflix will have 3.43 million subscribers by 2022, nearly triple its 2016 result. Amazon Prime Videos achievements will be less impressive, but will still have 1.12 million subscribers by 2022.

Simon Murray, Principal Analyst at Digital TV Research, said: These numbers may seem modest, but they will be accomplished without any subscribers in Russia. The Russian regulator has recently introduced a 20% foreign ownership equity limit on OTT platforms [with more than 100,000 subscribers]. We believe that this will force Netflix and Amazon Prime Video to abandon their standalone platforms. This is a major blow to their global ambitions.

Instead, they are likely to license their original content to a local platform. Amediateka already brands itself home of HBO, so deals with other platforms are possible. Netflix has already done something similar in China with IQiyi.

Excluding Russias 6.80 million SVOD subscribers by 2022, Netflix will control 35% of SVOD subscribers in the remaining 21 countries. Amazon Prime Video will contribute a further 12%.

Digital TV Research forecasts 16.5 million SVOD [subscription video on demand] subscribers across 22 Eastern European countries by 2022; quadruple the 4.0 million recorded by end-2016.

SVOD will become the regions largest OTT revenue source in 2017. SVOD revenues will total $1,300 million by 2022 (57% of total OTT revenues)  up from $190 million in 2016 (34% of total OTT revenues).

OTT TV episode and movie revenues for 22 Eastern European countries will reach $2.23 billion in 2022; quadruple the $552 million recorded in 2016. Russia will account for 46% of the regions OTT revenues by 2022, with Poland generating a further 19%.
Financial Plan: NTB proposes record Rs1.35b budget for 2017-18

The Nepal Tourism Board (NTB) has proposed a record Rs1.35 billion budget for the fiscal year 2017-18 to rev up advertising and promotional activities to boost tourist arrivals. The budget is expected to be approved in a couple of weeks, the board said.
Chaudhry Nisar has said on Saturday that the army was in no way related to the Panama case and no role was played either.

The former interior minister said that he saw Nawaz Sharif disappointed multiple times after 2013. No political gains can be achieved by taking up a front against the apex court, he said.

Nisar said that he has terms with former army chief Pervez Musharraf ever since he was a serving colonel.

The ex-minister was interviewed by a private television channel and he through the course of it he talked about various issues. He said that had his entire conversation with the ousted premier during a cabinet meeting was leaked, it would have led to his personality building.

He said that he used to bring all kinds of issues to Nawaz Sharifs notice in one-on-one meetings. His relationship with PML-Ns former president has seen ups and down since 1985 to 2013 but there was never any falling out.

He said that he takes pride in the fact that he hails from a military family that has been serving in the military for past generations.
PAC to question PM about ministers skipping meeting

The parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has decided to seek clarification from Tourism Minister Jitendra Dev and Physical Planning and Transport Minister Bir Bahadur Balayar for their absence from a meeting convened to discuss the construction delays of the Gautam Buddha Airport in Bhairahawa.
Separated by violence and tested by time, Rohingya in Nepal ache for home

Sayed ul-Haq, a Rohingya man in his 20s, looks at his mobile phone every now and then. What he wants is updates on the situation in Myanmar from where, according to various humanitarian agencies including the United Nations,
Taking responsibility

Impacts of global warming on a poor country like Nepal are manifold. The obvious impact of global warming is the diminution of snow fall in the Himalayas.
First-home buyers will be able to cobble together a larger deposit if National is re-elected to government.

The changes announced today mean a couple will be eligible for an extra $10,000 of Government HomeStart Grants, taking the grants to $20,000 for an existing home or $30,000 for a new build.

The additional grants mean there is funding to help a further 80,000 people into their first home over the next four years, on top of the 31,000 people the scheme has already helped.

Building and Construction spokesperson Dr Nick Smith says HomeStart Grants complement other government measures to support first home buyers, including Welcome Home Loans, which allow first home buyers to access government-backed mortgages with a 10 per cent deposit, and KiwiSaver FirstHome Withdrawals, which allow New Zealanders to access all of their KiwiSaver funds to put towards a deposit.

Take a couple on the average wage in Auckland who have been in KiwiSaver for five years and are looking to buy their first home, says Nick.

Between the $20,000 HomeStart Grant and their KiwiSaver withdrawal, they will have around $60,000 for a deposit for an existing home.

Add in a government-backed Welcome Home Loan, which means they only need a 10 per cent deposit, and they have enough for a house worth up to $600,000  the Auckland HomeStart cap for existing homes - without needing other savings.

Thats significant support for those New Zealanders, particularly given 18 per cent of home sales in Auckland in the past year were below $600,000.

If that couple lived in Palmerston North, they would have enough for a 20 per cent deposit on a $300,000 house, without the need for a Welcome Home Loan.

Housing New Zealand spokesperson Amy Adams says National will also combine HomeStart Grants and Welcome Home Loans into one HomeStart product, so first home buyers can get all the support available to them from one place.

We will simplify the application process for Welcome Home Loans to allow accredited banks to approve these 10 per cent deposit, government-backed loans on the spot  rather than going through an often time-consuming process with Housing New Zealand.

Nick says Nationals policies are helping 200,000 new houses be built over the next six years  the equivalent of four extra Dunedins.

We are increasing our support for first home buyers, and making it easier to access, to further help young New Zealanders achieve their dream of owning their first home.

The changes will come into force on January 1, 2018. They are expected to cost $74 million per year, to be met from the 2018 Budget allowance. Costs in 2017/18 will be met from the between budget contingency.
UML can change the face of province 2 in five years: MK Nepal

CPN-UML senior leader Madhav Kumar Nepal has remarked the issue of constitution amendment is the interest of few leaders and not of Madhesi people.
Wythe Countys longest tenured employee retires next week after 45 years on the job. Not only has Debbie Repass worked for the county the entire time, she has worked in same department, the treasurers office, for all 45 years.

I dont know what to say about it, she said. Ive been here forever. Thats all I can tell you.

Repass began working in the treasurers office part time after she graduated from George Wythe High School in 1969.

That summer, I typed tax tickets, she said. Every one was typed by hand. It took all summer.

Repass continued to work part-time for the county as she pursued a secretarial science degree and a one-year degree in business management from Wytheville Community College.

Three years later, in the summer of 1972, she married magistrate Jimmy Repass and took a full-time job in November paying $3,000 a year.

And Ive been here ever since, she said, adding that she has worked under four treasurers: T. Barclay Allison, Shirley G. Sutherland, Sam Crockett and the current treasurer, Lori Guynn.

Repass started out as a clerk and then moved up to bookkeeper and then to her current position as chief deputy treasurer.

One of the most challenging times in her career came when Crockett introduced computers to the department years ago.

Of course, we were all scared to death and hated them, Repass said. Now, we cant do without them.

Without a doubt, her favorite part of her job has been the people. She used to work in the front of the office, where she could say hello to everyone who walked in the office or by the door. Eventually, she moved into a nearby office, but she can still see the office door and wave to people as they enter.

Debbies a people person, said her boss, Guynn. She enjoys seeing people and talking with them.

Shes also the office party planner. Any time theres a special occasion, Repass gets busy planning who will bring the chips, dips and sweets. As for her retirement party Friday, Sept. 15, her co-workers have kept her out of the arrangements; its one party they dont want her to plan.

Guynn said Repass is a very special lady not only to her co-workers, but to others as well.

Debbie enjoys life to the fullest, she said. She is always a happy person, and she definitely brightens up the day. We will miss her very much. There will many tears shed on Friday as we celebrate Debbie and her 45 years of service to the office and citizens of Wythe County.

Guynn said Repass has dedicated her life to the treasurers office and the people she has worked with over the years, both in the treasurers office and other departments.

She remains close with many of them, Guynn said. I have thoroughly enjoyed working with Debbie since becoming treasurer. I felt like I already knew the ladies here when I took office because I had heard Sam Crockett speak of them, and I knew they had a close relationship with him. I was the new person coming in, and she welcomed me wholeheartedly. I have asked her to come back and help us out with taxes in December when the lines are long, but so far she has declined the offer in usual Debbie fashion with a smile and a chuckle.

As for the future, Repass, whose husband died in a car accident 20 years ago, plans to look after her 89-year-old mother, Lola Chapman.

She can still get around, so hopefully we can do some short traveling, she said.

Her father, Raymond Albert Chinkeye Chapman, was a Wytheville police officer killed Aug. 25, 1963, along with a fellow officer in an accident on Main Street.

Repass was 12 years old.

He was killed at the Greyhound Bus station (located at the former R.P Johnson site), she said. A truck jackknifed and killed him and Claudius Irving.

Repass said she will miss coming to work every day.
SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- A local television and radio news host died suddenly Friday in his native Northern New York, according to an obituary posted on the Watertown Daily Times.

Kevin Schenk, 54, had been in the news business for more than three decades, most recently working for NewsRadio 570 WSYR, according to the Syracuse Press Club.

"The Club extends its deepest sympathies to his family; including his widow Lori, his two sons, Michael and Christopher, along with his many friends and colleagues," the organization stated.

The Sackets Harbor resident died at the Samaritan Medical Center in Watertown after suffering a ruptured aortic aneurysm earlier Friday morning.

Schenk began his journalism career at age 18 at a Watertown radio station. He gained local traction in the mid-1990s when he began working as a producer for CNYCentral.com and WSTM-TV Action News, according to the press club.

Schenk was later heard on "The Daily Wrap with Joe Galuski and Kevin Schenk" on WSYR radio, but would eventually return to WSTM to anchor the weekend newscasts, the organization stated.

Calling hours are 2 to 4 p.m. and 7 to 9 p.m. Monday at the Reed & Benoit Funeral Home. Condolences can also be left online.
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BY OPIO SAM CALEB:

FDC has warned Ugandans to stand up against the land and age limit bill saying they are both ploys which they should reject both.

Delivering Kiiza Besigyes condolence message at the burial of FDC Elders league chairman and father to Prosy Naikoba at Kisozi Kamuli September 8, FDC Vice President Alice Alaso and FDC Minister for the presidency Wafula Ogutu stalwarts said the constitution has all the provisions for the two amendments touted by the regime and are a timebomb.

Todays politics of land and age is the same and one thing options- the same sides of the coin- so choosing one means you have the coin so reject both, Alaso rallied amidst applause

Alaso challenged the regime to promote unity in diversity, manage the country with peaceful co-existence in practice between the regime and opposition since Uganda is now a multiparty democratic government

Chief mourner Isaac Musumba called for calm over the land bill saying the President himself has come out to clarify and detonate the opposition propaganda against the land bill and will soon be on air in Busogas Baba FM radio.

On behalf of the family Prossy Naikoba said her father was a democrat in practice supporting each person for what he deemed good for the people.
After helping rescue Texas residents affected by Hurricane Harvey, Louisiana's Cajun Navy is ready, and waiting, to assist Florida as Hurricane Irma prepares to make landfall over the weekend.

+2 3 Cajun Navy members rescue, resuscitate woman found drowning in Houston flooding Three men from St. Tammany Parish had just arrived in Houston when they spotted an elderly w

A report from the Miami Herald says Cajun Navy member and Baton Rouge native Rob Gaudet spoke with Florida Sen. Marco Rubio Thursday to figure out the best way for the volunteer organization to be most helpful. Gaudet said boaters are on their way to Florida now or already there.

Rubio suggested the Cajun Navy consider navigating narrow canals in South and Central Florida to reach possibly stranded Floridians if Irma's storm surge leaves wide areas unreachable by car or deeper-water vessels, the Herald said.

Read the Miami Herald's full report here.

Can't see the video below? Click here.
A St. Amant woman who was awarded $50,000 after being sexually assaulted in the office of then-Sorrento Police Chief Earl Theriot Jr. is not entitled to more money for alleged false imprisonment or emotional distress, a federal appellate court has decided.

The woman was drunk at the time of the November 2013 incident, and Theriot was on duty. He resigned and pleaded guilty in February 2014 to lying to the FBI about the sexual encounter, and was put on probation for two years.

U.S. District Judge Shelly Dick ruled last year that Theriot violated the woman's constitutional rights, and the judge found Theriot and the town of Sorrento liable for sexual assault and sexual battery. Dick said Theriot and the town owe the woman $50,000.

The judge, however, said the former police chief and town were not liable to the woman for false imprisonment or intentional infliction of emotional distress.

The woman appealed, and a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans affirmed the judge's ruling Thursday.

"We are disappointed with the ruling as the court chose to place an impossible burden on the plaintiff, effectively permitting Theriot to escape liability for additional damages under IIED and false arrest," the woman's attorney, Tregg Wilson, said Friday. IIED stands for intentional infliction of emotional distress.

Theriot's attorney, Sally Fleming, said the federal appeals court  "under the facts presented here"  was correct in agreeing with Dick.

Scott Thomas, who represents the town of Sorrento, said he could not comment on the ruling.

The woman testified at the trial of her lawsuit against the town and Theriot that the chief forced her to perform sexual acts in his office after finding her drunk outside a Sorrento antique shop. His attorneys claimed she initiated the "unconsummated" sexual encounter to avoid jail.

Dick, though, ruled the woman at that time was legally incapable of consenting to sex, given her "extreme intoxication."

The woman said Theriot groped her in his police car while taking her back to his office. Theriot admitted at his guilty plea that he engaged in "inappropriate sexual contact" with her in his office.

Although she sat outside the back door of Theriot's office to smoke a cigarette, and used his telephone to call her boyfriend several times when Theriot left the office, the woman testified she believed she could not leave because of an implied threat of being sent to jail if she failed to cooperate with his demands, the 5th Circuit panel noted in its ruling.

In rejecting her false imprisonment claim, Dick cited the woman's testimony that she was not locked in Theriot's office and placed several phone calls to her boyfriend. The woman also testified Theriot used her belt to tie her wrists, but Dick said she failed to mention that in her FBI interview.

Earlier this year, Dick awarded nearly $40,000 in fees to the woman's attorneys.
A 22-year-old local rapper was shot to death early Sunday on Dallas Drive, Baton Rouge police said.

Garrett Burton, known as "Gee Money" or "Da Real Gee Money," was found about 1:30 a.m. in a parking lot in the 1900 block of Dallas Drive, police spokesman Sgt. Don Coppola said. Burton, of 3336 Laurel St., died at the scene.

No suspect or motive has been identified, Coppola said.

Baton Rouge activist Arthur "Silky Slim" Reed said he had met Burton a few times, calling him a very dedicated musician.

"Rapping was his heart," Reed said Sunday. "Rapping was definitely his love."

Reed worried how young people will be affected by Burton's violent death because so many teens looked up to the rapper as a local leader.

+6 NBA YoungBoy associate arrested in 2017 death of Gee Money as police focus on Baton Rouge rap beefs Music insiders have long speculated about the widespread impacts of an ongoing feud between two Baton Rouge rappers and their associates.

"It's sad to see such a young, vibrant individual's (life) cut so short," Reed said. "I'm just praying for his family, and, that his life will save someone else's life that's on the same track."

Reed said he hopes people will learn to think twice about dialogue that normalizes violence, a topic that he said he heart often in Burton's music.

"We have to watch what we speak into existence," Reed said.

New Orleans-raised rapper Dee-1, who attended LSU and worked in Baton Rouge, posted Sunday about Burton's death on Instagram.

+3 In rapper Blvd Quick's homicide, police investigating Baton Rouge 'rap beef' as possible motive Authorities are investigating whether the recent shooting death of Baton Rouge rapper Blvd Quick is the result of ongoing beef between two loc

"I'm heartbroken," Dee-1 wrote. "i just Facetimed you two days ago  You said you wanted to come by me and get away. From the pressure. The beef. The negativity."

"i have so much to say but I don't know what to say," the post continues. "i'm just tired  i'm tired. Of people getting murdered. Especially people i know. My friends. Other rappers. All of it. Garrett i love you man. And i promise to show my love for you by using the rest of my life to be part of the solution."

Anyone with information about the shooting is asked to contact the Violent Crimes Unit at (225) 389-4869 or Crimestoppers at (225) 344-7867.
Louisiana is about to launch a new bid to elevate one of the hottest fields in education, and improve on the dismal number of women in science, technology, engineering and math.

The targeted careers  known as STEM  will be the topic of an influential panel authorized by the Legislature earlier this year, and set to hold its first meeting on Wednesday at 10 a.m.

The goal is to boost student interest in science, technology, engineering and math; align those skills with fast-growing workforce needs and increase the number of women with STEM degrees.

Women make up only 16 percent, 12 percent and 23 percent of engineering, physics and computer science graduates respectively, according to state Sen. Sharon Hewitt, R-Slidell and the prime mover behind the push.

"Women are very underrepresented in these fields," said Hewitt, a mechanical engineering graduate herself.

The 29-member panel is called the Louisiana Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics Advisory Council.

The group, which is chaired by Commissioner of Higher Education Joseph Rallo, includes LSU President F. King Alexander; state Superintendent of Education John White and officials of a wide range of public school groups. Others include officials of The Boeing Company, Century Link, the state Department of Economic Development and representatives of colleges and universities.

Hewitt, who sponsored the bill that set up the council, said a high school survey showed that while 52 percent of high school students have an interest in STEM fields, only 14 percent are considered STEM-ready based on test results.

"We know that part of the problem is we can't just start at the high school level," she said. "You really have to start at the elementary level in creating an interest and building the skills."

"The only way we are going to get there and make major changes is by having a game plan," she said. "That is what the advisory council is going to do."

Louisiana has pockets where interest in STEM fields is flourishing, including industry partnerships with colleges and high schools.

However, no statewide plan exists.

The council is supposed to craft just such an outline.

It will spell out objectives in STEM education and career opportunities, and align elementary, secondary and postsecondary curricula and programs.

The aim is to "create a new STEM culture and promote activities that raise awareness of STEM education and STEM career opportunities," according to the legislation.

One of the goals is to set up a competitive grants program to fund robotics contests, which enhance soft skills, project management, and teamwork.

Another is to get dollars into the newly-created STEM Education Fund, a lofty goal amid state budget problems.

The state Board of Regents, which will oversee the effort, will serve as a clearinghouse on resources for both public schools and college and universities.

Tougher TOPS requirements shelved by state Board of Regents; here's why With little discussion, the state Board of Regents voted Friday to shelve a proposal to toug

Also, the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education is supposed to come up with requirements for a high school diploma endorsement for students who show superior skills in STEM fields.

Studies show that, in the next 10 years, workforce demand in Louisiana for STEM talent is expected to grow by 18 percent. But not enough students are in the pipeline now to fill those needs.

"We want to make sure our students, both K-12 and university, are on pathways to aspire to those jobs," Rallo said.

Stephen Waguespack, president of the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry, said the panel will tackle a key need for the state. "We are drastically low in computing degrees, especially if you look at female graduates," he said.

Waguespack noted that plans by Amazon to build a second headquarters, which will be highly sought by cities and states, points up the issue.

"We know one thing, they need is STEM-related jobs," he said.

LABI's slot on the council will be filled by Mike Gaudet, who has a bachelor's degree in chemical engineering and is a member of the East Baton Rouge Parish school board.

Hewitt said the best way for Louisiana to solve its recurring budget problems is to create high-paying jobs.

"That was the backbone of the whole thing," she said. "My vision is for Louisiana to be the go-to state for STEM talent."
In 1983 a book titled A Nation at Risk was published about a study that showed U.S. graduates were falling behind the rest of the world, which began the push for education to send more children to college.

After 30 years of changes to the education system, especially under the Bush administration with the No Child Left Behind Act, districts like Black River Falls are building on their tradition of career and technical education curriculum to develop individualized paths for students whether that be career planning or college readiness.

What happened is that in the education world as well as the political world, that translated into we need to get kids into college, we need to send more kids to college. What we found though is that essentially the numbers stayed about the same as far as kids that actually completed a bachelors degree or masters degree. In Black River Falls and in the nation it is about 30 percent, and it has been there for a long time, Black River Falls High School principal Tom Chambers said.

For those 30 years since then, we (as a nation) have kind of in many ways neglected that 70 percent of the population, he said. A lot of them actually went to four-year colleges, but didnt complete. So then they are coming back and looking at getting into the workforce, but then they dont have a credential because they have two years at a four-year college. They didnt have a completion to show for that.

In this national culture, companies like Regal, which manufactures small engines in Black River Falls, have taken on the responsibilities of doing most of the employee training.

I would say it is under 10 percent of our applicants come with some education or prior work experience that would be relevant to those types of positions, Regal human resources manager Reva Witte said about specialized positions like machinists. Most of our positions are strictly on-the-job training.We can hire somebody that has had no manufacturing experience and provide all of the necessary training once they are here on the job.

It is for these reasons that the district is focusing even more today on students that dont plan to go to college, adding to programs like work study that are already a huge part of some students education.

Connecting students with employers

Aaron Wood is a recent Black River Falls graduate that works at Regal in the assembly department. His first professional encounter with Regal was at a career fair hosted by the school.

That one day I knew it was mandatory, and I knew Regal was there. My mom happens to work here and told me that Regal was going to be there and to just look for them, Wood said. So I applied here and got the job.

Hosting a yearly career fair is one of many initiatives Black River Falls is using to connect students with possible employers.

I think that part of our workforce solution has to come from a better relationship between employers, parents and schools so that we are graduating kids who have more of a career path in mind as they are coming out of high school rather than, Ok, so what am I going to do now?  Black River Country Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Chris Hardie said.

A recent law passed in Wisconsin requires schools to create a written plan for sixth- through 12th-graders for their career goals after college, which is supposed to take effect in all schools in Wisconsin this school year. The program that houses these plans is called Career Cruising.

The 7 Rivers Alliance took this idea one step further and created an additional platform called Inspire that connects students and employers.

Hardie said Jackson County will test the Inspire program for the 7 Rivers Region and the program will be rolled out to the entire region next year.

It links local businesses to the Career Cruising platform, allowing businesses to connect with students and students to connect to businesses right in their local area so that as students start to explore their future plans and their future careers, Chambers said.

Connecting with students and getting them interested in manufacturing jobs is one of the reasons Regal participates in career fairs and is joining the Inspire program.

One of the things that I have seen in speaking with some high school students is I would just encourage them to being open to manufacturing as a career path. I dont know that we always think about all of the opportunities that a career in manufacturing may provide us, so yes you may begin working on an assembly line or working at a machine and you may not see yourself in that position for the next 20 years, but there are a lot of support positions and office positions that might be along that path for the right candidate, but they just need to get their foot in the door, Witte said.

On top of testing the Inspire program and being a part of the Career Cruising platform, Black River Falls High School is also making this resource a part of its daily schedule.

We have an adviser period at the beginning of every day where our students are with the same teacher for the four years that they are here, Chambers said. They use the Career Cruising platform to help the students chart out possible career paths that lead to a job and income that will support the lifestyle each student desires.

This is all in an effort to stack credentials, as Chambers would call it.

I say you think about what makes the most sense for you, and you start by getting as many credentials as you can and then you begin stacking those credentials on top of each other until you begin to feel like you are in the right position, are comfortable with the job you are doing and you are making the kind of money that is supporting the lifestyle you want, Chambers said. High school is not about getting ready for college  high school is about getting ready for life.

Hardie and Chambers are looking for at least 50 businesses to sign-up for the Inspire program in Jackson County. Businesses can sign-up for the Inspire program at www.7riversalliance.org/inspire-7rivers/.

Redefining Ready moves forward at BRF

Not only is the district connecting more students with employers, it is also collecting career-focused data.

As a presentation to the school board, Superintendent Shelly Severson presented a new initiative in education called Redefining Ready, which aims to provide students a road map detailing what they need to accomplish in high school to achieve career success.

I very much want all of our kids to be prepared for whatever their career goals are. If the highest ACT score is the most direct route to their future career success, then great. But for so many professions and career choices, your score on that one test really is not indicative of your future success, Severson said.

Redefining Ready uses a list of indicators to helps students gauge what students need to do to achieve their idea of career success. If someone wants to go to college, Redefining Ready argues you should be taking advanced placement classes, completing Algebra II and have a GPA greater than a 2.8. For those that want to focus on being career ready, students should have a 90 percent attendance record, 25 hours of community service and a workplace learning experience.

Wood had a workplace experience on a farm, which he feels was the most important experience that prepared him for the working world.

Just being more versatile and learning more things and getting to learn stuff faster so you dont have to go back and keep asking questions. I just thought that helped me quite a bit, Wood said. I was out on a farm and it just taught me new mechanics almost every day because you never know when you are going to get new equipment in.

Witte agrees that having workplace experiences are really great indicators that someone will be a good employee.

I think especially if they have had restaurant or fast food experience. Weve had a lot of luck with the younger generation that has had those experiences. It plays really well into manufacturing in terms of teamwork and working efficiently, Witte said.

Severson said these indicators will not replace test scores, but will rather enhance them.

It just looks at kids in a more holistic view as opposed to a one-day test that they sit down for between their junior and senior year. That is what I appreciate the most. It just is much more tangible data that they can impact on a daily basis that will help guide them toward success in whatever they choose after high school, Severson said.

The board approved moving forward with collecting these additional data points.

We definitely are going to move forward with measuring some of that stuff in our student records system. We currently dont hold all of that in there, so I do want that data to be recordable because I think when we talk about us as an organization and education institution, we should know what percentage of our graduates already have college credits under their belt, Severson said. That is a data point we should know. I think that communicates value in education to our community.

School board member Amy Hoffman agrees.

One of the reasons I think a checklist can be helpful is because so many times we only look at grades as a measure of a kids ability to be successful, she said. You can have a valedictorian of a class go nowhere in life and somebody who would very much be considered an average student be wildly successful.
Maybe this will be the bullet that finally kills the zombie.

Recently, the Louisiana Legislative Auditor released an advisory report analyzing the prospects of a reservoir project in Washington Parish. The document painted a poor prognosis. In over a decade, largely due to a string of permit rejections by the federal government that leaves it empty-handed in obtaining necessary authorizations, the Washington Parish Reservoir Commission has next to nothing to show for $3 million spent on trying to dig a big hole and fill it with water.

Further, auditors concluded it would take at least 10 times the money already spent to finish it. The chances of that seem remote, since several landowners where the lake would go refuse to sell. The commission has no power of eminent domain, courtesy of a 2016 law authored by the areas state senator, Beth Mizell. That statute also mandated the appointment by Gov. John Bel Edwards of entirely new commission membership and specifies that the board publicize its meetings on the parish website.

Letters: Finally, Sadow makes sense Finally, Jeff Sadow opined something that was both based upon facts and progressive in nature.

But that wasnt Mizells idea. Originally, her bill would have terminated the body, and it left the Senate that way. However, in House committee hearings, Edwards then-chief of staff Ben Nevers, whom Mizell succeeded as senator and who had co-authored the legislation creating the reservoir district, submitted a card in opposition to the bill prior to testimony, signaling an unspoken threat that Edwards would veto it in that form. Subsequently, another Edwards ally, state Rep. Malinda White of Bogalusa, offered to the committee the language now in law.

The notion behind inundating the area around Oak Grove lingers as an ugly reminder of Louisiana governments long tradition of boondoggles. The obvious model for the project is the Poverty Point Reservoir in Richland Parish. A quarter-century ago, then-state Rep. Francis Thompson, who remains in the Legislature as a senator, championed construction of that lake, steering over $40 million in state funds to do so.

Thompson advanced the argument that it would spur economic development. It did  for Thompson, who brokered real estate deals around it; for the projects lead firm, Denmon Engineering whose management were Thompson allies; and for his brother Michael Thompson, who would run the agency overseeing the reservoir and eventually get convicted of malfeasance in that post. As for everybody else, the 2,700 acres of water hardly produced a ripple.

Noting the bankruptcy of the development idea, years ago those advocating drowning Oak Grove touted a new justification  shoring up the water supply. But as the U.S. Geological Survey noted, the area has reliable, abundant hydrological resources.

Yet the undead reservoir district lumbers on, having acquired a life of its own as it searches for a purpose, with Nevers one-time business partner, former Bogalusa Mayor Charles Mizell (no relation to Beth Mizell), and another legislative author of the project, former state Sen. Jerry Thomas, appointed to the commission. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the commission once employed Michael Thompson as a consultant and continues to retain Denmon Engineering for the project.

Commissioners talk of going ahead with a plan stripped down from the original and muse that they could cajole the Department of Transportation and Development into doing its dirty expropriation work for them. Even this outside chance of frittering away more taxpayer dollars should worry those who support sensible spending.

Nevers has retired, and since the Great Flood of 2016, Edwards needs to worry more about restoring areas that were under water than covering more land under it. Lawmakers and Edwards should put the district and its commission out of its misery.

Jeff Sadow is an associate professor of political science at Louisiana State University-Shreveport, where he teaches Louisiana government. He is author of a blog about Louisiana politics, www.between-lines.com, where links to information in this column may be found. When the Louisiana Legislature is in session, he writes about legislation in it at www.laleglog.com. Follow him on Twitter, @jsadowadvocate or email jeffsadowtheadvocate@yahoo.com. His views do not necessarily express those of his employer.
Are we as a nation getting better at storm response? Its far more than an academic question in Louisiana, where disasters have reshaped our w
Aspen is most famous for its lush scenery and its lavish wealth. But among the crowd that trades in high-level politics and policy, the Rocky Mountain getaway is also known as a prime summer gathering spot.

New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu, who regularly travels in these national circles, got a lot of flack for being there for an Aspen Institute event during the first weekend in August, when the city's pumping system failed during a heavy rain.

But another Louisiana Democrat was there that weekend as well: Gov. John Bel Edwards, who attended a retreat for moderate Democrats hosted by a group called the "Third Way."

It was no real surprise that Landrieu, who is in his last year as mayor, is president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors and is rumored to be eying a future national role in politics, would find himself there. But Edwards' presence is more unexpected.

Less unexpected is that other Democrats are eager to meet him and hear what he has to say.

It's one thing for a Southern Democrat to be elected mayor of a liberal city. It's quite another for one to win decisively in a conservative state. Some Louisiana Republicans see Edwards' 2015 victory as a fluke and blame it on opponent David Vitter's flaws, but outside the state, people look at him as someone who's cracked a daunting code.

According to an account published in The Economist, Edwards was there to explain how he did it, and to argue forcefully against one strain of Democratic thinking, that its leaders should shift to the left.

While Edwards is progressive on economic issues such as Medicaid and the minimum wage, and even on some social issues such as gay rights, he's firmly in the anti-abortion and pro-gun column. This, he has said often, is a key reason he overcame whatever initial skepticism many Louisiana voters might have felt. And this, he argued in Aspen, is what the party needs to tolerate if it wants to elect more people like him in states like his.

Edwards' stances are at least partly a matter of self-preservation, of course. While his poll numbers remain pretty strong, Republican partisans are gearing up for a big challenge in 2019, although it's not yet clear who their standard-bearer will be.

And despite his presence at this and other national events, Edwards studiously avoids any hint that he might have ambitions beyond Louisiana's borders. That's one way he differentiates himself from predecessor Bobby Jindal, whose entire eight-year tenure often felt like a prep session for his failed bid for the Republican presidential nomination. It's also one way he sets himself apart from his own national party, which is a tried and true tradition among Democrats hoping to compete in conservative Louisiana.

But the truth is that Edwards doesn't need to drop any hints to pique the interest of Democratic strategists who want to expand the number of places where they can win. His presence in the Governor's Mansion would be enough, even without his sure-handed leadership during a series of well-publicized disasters and episodes of violence.

Nor is this a new phenomenon. I covered the 2004 Democratic National Convention in Boston, soon after Kathleen Blanco took office and before her legacy became inextricably linked to Hurricane Katrina, and couldnt help but notice that national Democrats were impressed that she'd figured out how to win in the conservative South. The fact that a key part of her strategy was distancing herself from the likes of them seemed lost on this crowd.

And none of it means that Edwards is likely to follow in Landrieu's footsteps and actively pursue a higher national profile anytime soon.

He doesn't need to. Enough of his party's thinkers see him as someone with something to teach them. And judging from his comments at the August gathering, he thinks so, too.
James Gill: With DACA legislation, Congress could give Trump the win he badly needs
A Canberra man convicted of abusing girls at his home, including two of his daughters, has lost an appeal over his sentence.

The man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was sentenced in November to 10 years' jail, with five years' nonparole.

The total sentence was for nine incidents that spanned 20 years and involved 12 offences. There were four young victims, who were aged between 5 and 15.

The offences happened between the 1970s and 1990s.

The Canberra man and his wife were part of a Catholic community in the capital, and other children would often be cared for at their home by the man's wife.
Philanthropy is changing because as the sector gets bigger it's becoming more sophisticated. There is more focus on "impact philanthropy" that asks tough questions about how much difference a dollar of philanthropy really makes. While funding ambulances at the bottom of the cliff makes good pictures for the news, funding the fence at the top of the cliff often provides a much better return on donations.

And this is part of a much bigger trend for philanthropy to fund not-for-profits to conduct research into social issues, and then to advocate for their solutions, which often involve policy change.

But philanthropy is increasingly meeting parliament in ways that are less comfortable. A number of Coalition MPs think that philanthropists fund pesky environmental groups to conduct way too much advocacy, which should presumably be left to professional lobby groups such as the Minerals Council.

This week "philanthropy" meets "parliament" in a biennial summit at Parliament House in Canberra. In the past this might well have been a feel-good exercise in which prominent philanthropists were feted for their good works funding new hospital wings and housing the homeless.

And the realisation is also growing that while philanthropy shares many of the values of government  to improve the lives of all  trusts and foundations spend less than one thousandth of what governments spend each year. So when government provides a comprehensive solution to a problem, there is often little room left for philanthropy to help individuals.

For example, the Commonwealth Government now provides a HELP loan to all Australian undergraduates, which means that fees no longer figure much in people's decisions about whether to go to university. And so philanthropic scholarships primarily shuffle students between universities, rather than increase the number of people who study.

But government could often do better at looking after the public interest in systemic change. And so people who want their philanthropy to have a big impact are increasingly funding groups that will push for change to government policies.

There's a lot to be said for this. The public interest often has few friends. Economist Mancur Olson pointed out that where a small number of people have interests that are significantly affected by a government policy, they will tend to be more organised. They will tend to lobby harder  and more effectively  than a much larger number of people whose interests are affected less. Two or three poker-machine makers will lobby much harder than hundreds of thousands of families with a problem gambler.

The Philanthropy Meets Parliament Summit may be one of the very few times this week that parliamentarians will be in rooms where there are lots of people actually arguing for the public interest. Most of the time our MPs inevitably will be meeting someone whose job it is to advocate for a relatively concentrated vested interest.
These are crucial issues, but instead of tackling them, the government has sought to shift attention by throwing a mere $600,000 at asylum seekers. While I believe the funding is money well-spent, it reeks of Andrews playing politics and using asylum seekers as his "get out of jail free"card. Max Resic, Brunswick Heartened to be a Victorian Daniel Andrews and the Victorian government have made a principled stand. I have felt sullied and diminished by the increasing persecution of refugees by Mr Dutton et al in my name and in the name of every citizen of this country. This hapless group of people have done nothing wrong or illegal, but simply seek our protection.

I am ashamed to be an Australian at this point in time, but I am very heartened to be a Victorian. Ruja Varon, Malvern Can this really be how most feel? Now that the asylum-seeker tragedy has dragged out as long as it has, I am reluctantly and sadly coming to the conclusion that the cruel and vindictive treatment of them from both sides of politics can only be because this is how the majority of Australian voters feel they deserve to be treated. Anthony Hitchman, St Andrews

Appearing tough is not a virtue The human suffering of asylum seekers and the financial costs mean nothing to politicians while "appearing tough" is considered a political virtue. Kate Kennedy, Coburg FORUM Every day a victory

Since my own diagnosis at age 59 with an aggressive prostate cancer in 2009, I have been struck by the formulation that upon dying someone "has lost their battle with cancer". Connie Johnson's brave approach to creating hope and funding research for cancer sufferers has crystallised for me the inappropriateness of this phrase. Her capacity to live to the fullest through her various cancer diagnoses is testament to a victory, not to a lost battle. She lived with cancer and she achieved a great deal in her shortlife. People often live more fully when diagnosed with an incurable disease. My specialist told me that my treatments would prevent me from working again. Since the diagnosis I have worked almost full-time, including 20 arduous work-related overseas trips; obtained a master's degree in counselling and started dance classes. Connie Johnson might have died, but every day she won her battle. At the end of the day, the battle we wage is with ourselves, to live life as fully as possible, despite the adversity that we encounter in life. Roger Frankel, Kew No protection

I am weary of people like Eric Abetz arguing that heterosexual marriage protects women and children. Is he aware of the number of women who are killed by their partners each week/year, the number of children abused in these unions? Does he know what the statistics are for marriages lasting beyond 10 years? Please, don't insult us with platitudes about how necessary it is to guard this institution at the exclusion of all others. Any relationship needs work. Sexual orientation doesn't change that. Dianne Powell, Fairfield Wrong, just wrong Wolfgang and Nigel are voting "no" for the children (Letters, 9/9). Sorry guys but you are answering the wrong question. Children will continue to grow up in all different sorts of families regardless of how we define marriage. Not changing the Marriage Act will just mean that less children grow up in a family where their parents are married. It won't change who their parents actually are.

Allison Christians, Footscray Sky won't fall I support freedom of religion and access to marriage for those brave enough to publicly avow their love. In our secular, pluralist culture no religion has the right to tell others how to live. Civil marriage is a civil matter. We agnostics are sick of religionists telling us what to do. Relax archbishops and ex-PMs, the sky won't fall on your heads.

David Mackay, Macleod Positive results We are asked to say "no" to protect children from same-sex parents as if it is not already happening. Some people seem to not understand that children have already been, and continue to be, successfully raised in unmarried same-sex parent families for many years. The only effect on these children of "allowing" marriage will be positive  or do we continue to tell them there is something wrong with their life? It seems to me that it is the "no" choice that continues some form of stigma on the very children they say they are protecting. Keith Wilson, Rye Change the date

Our political leaders argue stridently that Australia Day unites Australians, while ignoring the fact that its present date excludes some of our fellow citizens. It doesn't take much imagination to see why some don't have much to celebrate on January 26, but if you need an empathy infusion, go and see the marvellous Bangarra Dance Theatre's Bennelong. A reader suggested September 1 as an alternative date  a non-controversial, optimistic time of year. Why not just change the date? It would reinforce our style of democracy and our desire for an inclusive society, where the majority rules but the needs of minorities are respected. Who would lose by changing the date of Australia Day? Chris Pearson, St Kilda East Cost of gambling An eloquent, heartfelt article from Michael Bird ('Gambling reform could save families', The Age, 9/9.

Dr Bird marshalled a telling argument against the terrible costs of gambling addiction to society. It threw light on the power of the gambling lobby and its insidious impact on our polity and family life. It was a compassionate plea for government reform informed by personal experience from childhood of the devastation gambling addiction can cause. We tolerate this situation at our peril. Carolyn Ilsley, Brunswick East Pavement speedsters Following the article ('Speed row hits the footpath', The Age, 9/9) regarding the possibility of speed limits for mobility vehicles and payments, I'd be highly supportive. I work on Station Street, Fairfield, where we have a couple of hoons in such vehicles who move down the pavements, often at inappropriate speeds. People coming out of shops have little time to take evasive action. The vehicles do seem to stop quickly but the drivers need good reaction times, which isn't always the case. I reckon that 6 km/h is too fast on a pavement. Even a pedestrian walking at 6 km/h could be a liability on a busy pavement let alone an electric vehicle with a passenger. Richard Speight, Heidelberg

Just ignore him In 1914, self-important, flag-waving, jingoistic, war-mongering old men led millions to a meaningless death. We must not be so foolish as to repeat this fateful error. Kim Jong-un may be delusional and evil, who treats his people with contempt, but just so long as he plays with his weapons in North Korea, he is no threat to the rest of the world. Surely, one day, the people of North Korea will see through his self-serving propaganda. Perhaps what he craves most is international notoriety and relevance; we should give him neither and we should stop this apparent slide into war. Alan Whittaker, Kew East Ill-suited to the task

What a pity Malcolm Turnbull's language doesn't match his elegant suits and general sartorial splendour. Describing the Opposition Leader Bill Shorten as "so hopeless he couldn't find his backside with two hands" is decidedly more bargain basement than Savile Row. Chris Palfreyman, Malvern Well done, Victoria The recent decision by the federal government to transfer some asylum seekers to final departure visas, cut off their income payments and force them to vacate their accommodation is further punishment and yet another attempt to force these people back to the offshore prison camps or back to the dangerous conditions they were originally attempting to escape. The Andrews government is to be congratulated on its decision to assist these legitimate asylum seekers with funds, accommodation and case worker support. At last a spark of humanity in contrast to Peter Dutton's miserable morass of punishing cruelties.

Peter Meadley, Ballarat Storm of evidence John Vidovich (Letters, 9/9) suggests that the bumper snow season is "bad news" for climate alarmists. Really? Can I suggest that the increased frequency and intensity of hurricanes in the Caribbean might be "bad" news for climate-change deniers but it's tragic for the residents affected. Simon McInnes, Boolarra Myanmar questions

If the leader of Myanmar, Aung San Suu Kyi, alleges that the Rohingya minority are not being persecuted, why does she not allow independent UN observers to enter the area? What has she got to hide? David Ginsbourg, East Bentleigh To be, or not, a town San Remo is not a "hamlet" (The Age Commercial Real Estate 9/9). With a permanent population of more than 1200, it has two pubs, two churches, a primary school, an Italian restaurant, two fish and chip shops, cafes, hairdressers, supermarket, bakeries, a butcher shop, post office/newsagency and fire station (thank you CFA).

Latterly, a sculpture of a pelican made, in part, from recycled cutlery, has taken up residence by the jetty; a hub of piscatorial activity. A memorial cairn on the foreshore honours professional fishermen lost at sea. The town also hosts its own Anzac and Remembrance Day commemorations. And, when the long day is done, eternal rest can be had in a ruggedly beautiful hilltop cemetery with a stunning view! Hamlet indeed. Jane Ross, San Remo History failure

I doubt if Peter Dutton has any sense of history ('Failing a test of decency, from Kisch to Dutton', The Age, 9/9). He might find out about the fascist movement if he did get around to history and how close he is to it. Patricia Rayner, Somers Raw emotion Go Tigers! Joe Garra, Werribee South

AND ANOTHER THING The survey Given that this $122 million survey is largely imposed on us by career politicians, I suggest a second question. "Should all elected politicians be limited to two terms at the trough?" John Bye, Elwood

The fact that we need laws to prevent the survey from getting nasty, is proof enough that it's going to get nasty. Henry Herzog, St Kilda East Yes, please. Toni Howell, Box Hill North If two people, irrespective of their gender, yearn to marry, whose business is it but theirs? The law should allow them to do so and the rest of us should just butt out.

Ross Corben, Knoxfield The vote you have when you're not having a vote, from the government you have when you're not having a government. Scott Poynting, Newtown, NSW Furthermore Just as well the French didn't prevail, otherwise they may have conducted nuclear tests in the middle of our country.

George Migios, Box Hill None of the countries involved in the dual citizenship bunfight has asked for the return of its citizens. Why? Peter McNicol, Masefield What is nature telling us all? It's a growing message we can't afford to ignore. Stan Marks, Caulfield

"Wellbeing on the slide as gap between rich and poor widens", (The Age, 9/9). How will ScoMo explain this? Phil Alexander, Eltham The Roar is back! Paul Murchison, Kingsbury The Nationals have just voted for more hurricanes. How bizarre.
Bill Shorten's popularity and standing as preferred prime minister has taken a hammering from voters, but Labor has kept its election-winning lead over the Turnbull government.

The findings, contained in September's Fairfax-Ipsos poll, show Labor has maintained the 53 per cent to 47 per cent lead in the two-party preferred vote it enjoyed in May, based on 2016 election preference flows.

If repeated on election day, there would be a 3.4 per cent swing away from the Turnbull government. If that movement was uniform, this would trigger a loss of 16 seats  which would comfortably hand power to the ALP given the government's slim one-seat majority.

But Labor strategists will be concerned at the big dip in voters' assessment of Mr Shorten's performance; approval of the Opposition Leader fell 6 percentage points since May, from 42 per cent to 36 per cent while his disapproval spiked from 47 per cent to 52 per cent, a statistically significant net 11 point shift.
The federal government's workplace insurer Comcare could be relocated to Victoria's second biggest city as part of public service decentralisation plan being pushed in Canberra this week.

The City of Greater Geelong is leading a consortium of local groups pitching the bid as the Coalition pursues forced moves of non-policy related public service jobs from Canberra, Sydney and Melbourne to regional centres.

Coming for Comcare: public service jobs could be sent to Geelong. Credit:Penny Stephens

About 450 of Comcare's 670 staff work in the national capital, with 145 already located in Melbourne and fewer than 20 staff in each of Sydney, Adelaide, Perth and Brisbane.

Advocates say moving Comcare from Canberra would help Geelong cement its emerging status as a social insurance hub, adding to public servants employed by the National Disability Insurance Agency, WorkSafe and Victoria's Traffic Accident Commission.
Pa Houa Vang and her husband, Chao Thao, opened Taste of Thai restaurant last Monday  yes, on Labor Day  in Suite 106 at 205 S. Holmen Drive in Holmen. Its in the same multi-tenant building that houses Holmen Ace Hardware & Rental.

Vang predicted some of the Thai restaurants most popular menu items will be chicken satay, egg rolls, fried rice, pad thai, pad see ew, tom yum soup and regular pho noodle soup. And she predicted two of the restaurants most popular desserts will be fried banana and sticky rice with mango.

But Thai ice cream roll  a trendy new menu item in Thailand and more recently in the U.S.  probably wont be available for another week because some equipment hasnt arrived. Well have 10 flavors of ice cream rolls once the equipment for making them arrives, Vang said.

The new restaurants hours are 4 to 8:30 p.m., Monday, 10:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m., Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday; 10 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday and 10 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. Sunday.

Taste of Thais telephone number is 608-399-1585 and its on Facebook. It soon will have a website.

Vang and her husband were born in Thailand and have worked in several restaurants over the years. Thao moved from Thailand to the La Crosse area in 1992. Vang moved from Thailand to California in 1994 and to the La Crosse area in 1995.

Lylli & Ivi Cakes & Sweet Treat Cafe opened Sept. 1 at 16846 S. Davis St., on the town square in downtown Galesville.

Owner Rachel Perez named her new cake shop/coffee cafe after her two daughters. It specializes in fancy cakes  including wedding and special-occasion cakes  but also makes such things as cinnamon rolls, doughnuts, turnovers, muffins, cookies, cupcakes, cake by the slice, caramel corn, fudge and other candy. It also has a variety of coffee drinks.

Perez operates the business with the help of her mother, Kathy Stafford, who has baked for a living for 50 years. Hours are 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday and closed Sunday.

Perez plans to hold a grand opening celebration sometime in November. For more information, visit the cake shop/coffee cafes Facebook page. Perez also plans to have a website soon.

Zara Escobar has launched her new Azizi Chocolates business in Viroqua. Its a new tenant in the Food Enterprise Center, where Escobar makes her chocolates.

Escobar has been selling limited amounts to the Driftless Cafe in Viroqua as an occasional extra dessert, and began selling them at the Saturday farmers market in Viroqua this weekend. She also will sell her chocolates at the Saturday market on Sept. 23 and 30 and all Saturdays in October except Oct. 7.

Escobar also will sell her chocolates at farmers markets and a few large markets in Minneapolis and at the Pleasant Ridge Waldorf School Holiday Fair. Im also happy to do holiday catering, or cater any large event, she said.

Escobar also takes orders for her chocolates by email. At this point I dont have plans for a storefront, she said. Im just planning to do holiday markets, catering and online sales.

Escobar said she makes fine chocolate confections with fair trade and organic chocolate. The chocolates are mostly vegan and low sugar.

For more information, call 808-463-8872, email Escobar at zaraescobar@azizichocolates.com or visit Azizis Facebook page.
Victoria's state-owned logging company breached rules protecting native animals and rainforests almost 30 times over three years, environment groups allege in a new report.

The report comes after a dead koala was found in a logged section of forest in the Acheron Valley near Marysville that was home to the endangered Greater Glider.

The Greater Glider is in decline with environmentalists concerned about continued logging.

As revealed by Fairfax Media earlier this year the state government could have protected the region but ignored advice from its own scientific committee.

Now the latest report alleges there were 27 cases of logging in East Gippsland and the Central Highlands in the past three years that breached an environmental code of practice.
Melbourne Express: Monday, September 11, 2017

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A controversial Labor MP linked to an alleged printing rorts scandal is expected to stand down, paving the way for factional warfare in Premier Daniel Andrews' ranks.

Days after his office was embroiled in the latest allegations to plague the government, upper house deputy president Khalil Eideh is expected to announce shortly that he will not contest the next election, leaving a vacancy in his western metropolitan seat.

Labor MP Khalil Eideh did not deny he was planning to stand down. Credit:Luis Ascui

The move is likely to prove contentious, with competing Labor sub-factions at odds over who should replace him and some insiders warning that war will erupt unless there is an orderly succession plan.

When asked on Sunday if he was planning to quit politics immediately  thereby creating an instant casual vacancy for Labor  Mr Eideh replied: "I am still considering my decision [in the] next coming weeks."
Waves crash against a seawall before Hurricane Irma arrives in Jensen Beach, Florida. Credit:The New York Times Upgraded to Category 4, after a day at sea as a relatively less harmful Category 3, Irma is so wide that the entire state of Florida is now affected. But throughout Sunday, the focus narrowed to the peninsula's western flank  particularly St Petersburg  with warnings that even if destructive winds didn't cripple communities, rising water associated with catastrophic storm surges and torrential rain could be just as destructive. Palm trees blow in the wind as Hurricane Irma passes through Naples, Florida. Credit:AP Still offshore, and tracking the coast on a more westerly line than experts had predicted, Irma's precise intentions remained something of a puzzle.

Michael Brennan, a senior hurricane specialist at the National Hurricane Centre, told reporters early on Sunday: "It could make landfall anywhere along the west coast. It's really hard to predict where the eye will make landfall on the west coast once it leaves the Keys." A man walks on a sea wall as the ocean crashes into el Morro lighthouse, after the passing of Hurricane Irma in Havana, Cuba. Credit:AP "Anywhere" became the coastal community of Marco Island, where wind gusts of about 210km/h were recorded at 3.35pm. But despite that, it seemed that Irma had lost a bit of her punch, because she was ratcheted back to Category 3, and by early evening was back another notch, to Category 2, and winds were gusting about 170km/h. She was later downgraded again to Category 1 as the centre of the storm moved east of Tampa. Despite that seeming diminution of Irma's force, official warnings of the risk of death and damage across the breadth of the state remained in force. US Federal Emergency Management Agency director Brock Long. Credit:AP

On Sunday morning, William "Brock" Long, administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, told ABC's This Week: "It's going to skirt the west coast and drive storm surges not only from the Keys but well up the coast of Florida. So, it's a worst-case scenario for Florida on the west coast." But as Irma dawdles northwards, at 12km/h or 15km/h, emergency response experts fretted that the sprawling Tampa region, likely to be hit in the early hours of Monday, local time, was a worrisome target because its infrastructure providers had not reckoned on the lethal likes of Irma arriving in their midst. A car makes its way up a flooded street in Jacksonville Beach, Florida. Credit:AP And in that, there is double jeopardy - because Tampa is so far north and so removed from the anticipated danger zone, many of the millions evacuated from the east of the state in recent days had made their way there. Tampa fell in with nearby communities - it imposed a curfew to take effect at 6pm Sunday  and Mayor Bob Buckhorn fell back on the philosopher-pugilist Mike Tyson to convey his message on the extent to which Tampa might be winging it.

Plywood covers the doors of a 7-Eleven store ahead of Hurricane Irma in Madeira Beach, Florida. Credit:Bloomberg "Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face  well, we're about to get punched in the face." By Sunday evening, close to 3 million homes and businesses were without power - and the Florida Power and Light company issued a warning that thieves were masquerading as utility staff to gain access to homes, which they were robbing. More than 7 million people were covered by evacuation orders  mostly in Florida, where almost one-third of the state's population was affected  but also in Georgia and South Carolina. And coastal counties, such as Collier and Lee, reported difficulty in finding shelter space for a last surge of thousands who had decided to abandon their homes. Late on Sunday, ABC News in the US reported a fifth storm-related fatality after a person was found dead in their home in Shark Key, an island in the Florida Keys. At least three deaths were attributed to traffic accidents.

Across the state, 29 hospitals, 239 assisted-living centres and 56 other healthcare facilities had been evacuated and more than 60 of hundreds of emergency shelters were geared to people with special needs. The islands of the Florida Keys were forecast to get as much as 63 centimetres of rain. And though the hurricane had moved northward through the afternoon, virtually no detail was being reported on damage - or a lack there of - from the Keys. The Governor told a TV interviewer: "We don't have the exact numbers on everyone who stayed in the Keys - I hope everyone listened [to official warnings that they evacuate]." Loading Though Miami seemed to have been spared destructive winds, many roads were becoming impassable during Sunday as floodwaters rose.
Cartagena: Pope Francis wrapped up his Colombia trip with a deeply personal final day honouring Saint Peter Claver, a fellow Jesuit who ministered to thousands of African slaves who passed through the port of Cartagena during Spanish colonial times.

His visit to Cartagena on Sunday got off to a rocky start, however, when he banged his head on his popemobile, cutting his eyebrow and getting a swollen, black left eye. Francis iced his cheekbone and received a butterfly patch to cover the cut, and he continued his popemobile tour without incident.

Francis was visiting the poor San Francisco neighbourhood to dedicate new houses for the homeless before paying homage to Claver at the church that bears his name in the city's historic centre.

Claver, the self-described "slave of the slaves forever", has been revered by Jesuits, popes and human rights campaigners for centuries for having insisted on recognising the dignity of slaves when others treated them as mere merchandise to be bought and sold.
if the people of Biafra want Republic of Biafra, it will be a reality during my administration. ----Donald Trump Donald Trump I wi...
For years, Joy Cardin has been an companion for hundreds of thousands of Wisconsinites as they drive to work in the morning. But soon, the public radio personality will hang up the headphones.

Cardin announced last month that her final broadcast would be on Sept. 29. She will retire after 14 years broadcasting The Joy Cardin Show, and after more than 30 years with the network as a journalist and as a programming director, in addition to her hosting.

The show has been a call-in current affairs show that, as Cardin puts it, is talk radio minus the shock and minus the shouting. Its a show about informing the public, facilitating civil discussions, and changing the world, said Cardin. Its also a show about culture, technology, music, leisure, travel and health. Topics from the past week include Hurricane Irma, the state budget, ADHD, and Wisconsin destinations for the fall.

The show isnt going away: WPRs Kate Archer Kent will fill in as an interim host starting in October. The name, of course, will have to change  as will many of the other aspects of the show that were imbued with Cardins personality, like the popular Tell Joy Where to Go travel segments.

Take me back to 2003, when you were leading the Ideas Network. Why did you want to do the show in the first place?

I was in the midst of starting a search for a new host after Tom Clark announced his retirement, and a budgeting freeze occurred...so I took it over as a temporary thing. I was interim, until we decided if we could afford to hire a new host.

I was doing both jobs. I was the boss, and the host. It wasn't until many, many, many years later, I think it was 2010, I eventually said, you know, I have to do one or the other. Phil Corriveau was our director at that time, and he said, which one would you want to do? And I said I'd rather host than be the boss.

I felt (hosting) was an important job. It was fun at times, it was aggravating at times. But it was something I did enjoy doing.

When your name is so prominently branding the thing youre making, that must have been lots of pressure. Was building trust and credibility with your audience something you had to think a lot about as a host?

I certainly want people to trust me. But I want them to trust me that I'm going to be fair. And I want them to trust me that this will be a civil discussion. I want them to trust me that they'll hear from a wide variety of viewpoints.

We will, though, bring on viewpoints that you're not going to like. You can't trust that you won't hear things you'll disagree with.

I think our audience for the most part understands that...but some dont understand that. "How dare you have so and so on your air, I don't expect this from public radio."

It's important to me that people know that if not me personally, the show is going to be presenting them with a wide variety of viewpoints on issues that are important to their lives, and that they will hear balance of at least fair treatment of guests no matter what their political view. And that's what they trust me to do.

Still, public radio is a politicized thing, even when youre trying to be apolitical. Was it tough to navigate that as a host?

You talk to the guest who says, you should be defunded and this is why. And you ask that person challenging questions. Just as you would ask the person who says you're the best thing since sliced bread challenging questions.

It's not easy to hear someone say you need to be defunded because you're so liberal, when you truly don't believe you're taking a liberal point of view on everything  when you know the effort that goes into finding as many perspectives on issues as you can. When you truly do invite Republicans, conservatives, Green Party, Libertarians. When you go to the effort that we go to balance topics and to find different viewpoints, and not just two sides to an issue. There's more than two sides to an issue.

I think we do present liberal points of view. And sometimes, we do have conservative points of view that turn us down. That doesn't mean we're not going to talk about the issue. If they don't come on, they don't come on. But the listener or politician who thinks that he's not hearing, or she's not hearing, their side of the story all the time, that we're biased...it's frustrating. I truly believe that we go out of our way to not be.

So, what are you going to be up to now?

I don't have a new career or job. I really do want to spend some time doing nothing. This has been a wonderful job, and a wonderful career. But it's been a lot of work. I've worked hard, and I've had a hard schedule. And I'm ready to not do a whole lot.

Can you tell us more about whats going to happen with your time slot?

The show is going to say essentially the way it's been for the interim, until a new host, or hosts, are hired. Who knows, (Kate Archer Kent) might apply for the job. She's our fill-in host. She'll continue to fill in until a permanent hiring decision is made.

It will be a national search. It will be a Wisconsin-based, Wisconsin-focused show. It's not going to be a nationally syndicated show from somewhere else...I'm happy that it will probably be a Wisconsin-based show with a Wisconsin-based host and it will continue as a live morning program.

Do you see think its important for the call-in show to remain part of the mix of public radio?

In public radio, the focus has not been on the call-in show, hardly at all. I think the call-in show is considered a lesser. In public radio, I think there's a bias in public radio for pre-produced news magazine programming -- highly edited and highly produced.

I think that we don't need to have slick, highly produced, completely edited material to sound good. I know that hearing ordinary people talk about issues, there's a certain benefit to that. You get to hear from people all over the state, or all over the nation.

I love the live call-in talk show. I do think that there's a stronger connection between listeners and a call-in talk show, than there is with listeners and a highly produced news magazine. I know there's some people who don't care what Joe Blow has to say. But I think there's a value in hearing that. I think there's a value in hearing voices from all over.

Youve long had a popular travel segment on your show called Tell Joy Where to Go. Now that youre retiring, you tell us  where should we go?

I love Door County. I go to Door County even when people don't tell me to go there. Because it has the scenic beauty. You can go kayaking, you can go biking, you can watch the sunset. You can hop on a sailboat. Nature hikes. There's just so much there that I absolutely adore.

I love the Bayfield area for a lot of similar reasons. There's arts and culture in both of those areas. I love the Driftless Region. I love the Great River Road.

There's lots of places. It depends on what you like, if you like to hike or bike, or if you like nightlife. I can't be an expert on nightlife, though. I'm super early to bed, super early to rise.

Im guessing youll be ditching that now that you wont have an early morning talk show. Is there anything you'll miss about getting up that early?

I don't think I'm going to give it up entirely because I think my body clock is set a little bit, (but) I'm not going to get up at 1 oclock in the morning.

I love mornings. They're quiet. You can get a lot done when the phone's not ringing. You can focus in on stuff without a lot of distractions.

I don't get to see sunrises very often. I'm usually already (at work). But still, I like the quiet time.
William Lamar Wagner, 19, is charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

According to the Brazos County Sheriffs Office, around 10:30 p.m. July 1 first responders rushed to the Four Hoursemen Trail Ride and Campout event at the Texas World Speedway after receiving a report of a shooting. A 21-year-old man had been shot in the shoulder and was rushed to a College Station hospital. In the crowds and chaos, authorities did not locate a shooter but were able to make contact with witnesses who said they could identify the person suspected of being the shooter.

Authorities said a friend of the victim said he had been at a trail ride in Chappell Hill before the July event with Wagner. The man said during that event, Wagner attacked him with his car and on the night of July 1, the man and his friends wanted to confront Wagner in person about the previous incident.

Several people said they and the victim had gotten into a verbal argument with Wagner and his friends, officials said. At some point during the argument, Wagner is accused of taking out a gun and firing a shot into the victims shoulder.

Following the shooting, the victim did not want to cooperate with police, Brazos County Sheriff Chris Kirk said.

According to the sheriffs office, the victims friends identified Wagner out of a photo lineup, but the victim  who survived his injuries and has been released from the hospital  did not participate.

Kirk said Wagner left Bryan-College Station the night of the shooting, but Waller authorities located him this week and Brazos County deputies traveled to Waller to pick up Wagner. Kirk could not comment on Wagners criminal history, but did say authorities have dealt with him before. His only arrest in Brazos County was on a misdemeanor charge of disorderly conduct in May.

Aggravated assault with a deadly weapon is a second-degree felony punishable by up to 20 years in prison and $10,000 in fines. Wagner is being held in the Brazos County Jail on $40,000 bond.
A couple accused of squatting in an otherwise unoccupied apartment are facing multiple charges after fighting with College Station police officers, authorities said.

Police said officers were called to The Vintage Apartments at 1101 Southwest Parkway on Friday after the complex management reported people were living in an apartment that was supposed to be unoccupied.

Officers noticed two people in a vehicle that matched the description that apartment managers had provided and tried to talk to them, but the woman tried to leave and began struggling with an officer, kicking him in the groin, according to police.

The man in the vehicle then began shouting and struggling with officers, hitting an officer in the chin with his elbow, police said.

Ruby Tirado, 31, of Bryan, and Sirgio Deshun Chambers, 31, of College Station, eventually were taken into custody.

The officers reported minor injuries but were able to return to duty.

Tirado, who had a Brazos County warrant for robbery, was charged with evading arrest and assault on a public servant. She is being held in the Brazos County Jail on $14,000 bond.

Chambers was charged with interfering with public duties, assault on a public servant and resisting arrest. He had warrant from Brazos County related to non-payment of child support and theft. He is being held in the Brazos County Jail on $16,000 bond.
Two residents who live on Fairview Avenue south of the Texas A&M campus have cited a 1927 deed restriction in filing a lawsuit challenging the proposed construction of a new Aggieland Outfitters location on the street where it intersects with George Bush Drive.

The suit, filed Sept. 1, states that the College Station Housing Corporation imposed a number of deed restrictions on the property at 100 Fairview Ave. as part of a 1927 transaction, including a general prohibition of the use of the property as a store. The plaintiffs, Shirley and Fred Dupriest, who live a few doors down from the property, are seeking a declaratory judgment that the deed restriction is enforceable with regard to any construction at the location "in an effort to keep the 'College Park' neighborhood purely residential as was the intent of its creation."

The lawsuit comes ahead of what probably will be a contentious rezoning for the property that will be considered during Monday's College Station City Council meeting. The owners of Aggieland Outfitters, Fadi and Hege Kalaouze, have requested to rezone a little more than half an acre at the southwest corner of George Bush Drive and Fairview Avenue to allow for general commercial uses.

They purchased the 100 Fairview property and adjacent lot in 2015 after learning they would be forced to move from the Southgate George Bush Drive location they have had for about 15 years by the upcoming Bush-Wellborn intersection project, which will cut off vehicular access to the store. Nimitz Properties, a limited liability company that lists the Kalaouzes as directors, is the defendant named in the lawsuit.

Fadi Kalaouze declined to comment on the case. Fred Dupriest also declined to comment, saying he and his wife cannot speak about the case at this time.

Gaines West, the Dupriests' attorney, said in an email Friday that if the City Council rejects the Aug. 17 recommendation from the Planning and Zoning Commission to approve the rezoning, "the immediate issue would be resolved."

"It would be up to my clients if they want to proceed with the Declaratory Judgment action," he said. "I cannot predict what they might decide."

In a letter delivered to College Station City Attorney Carla Robinson on Thursday, West wrote that the Dupriests' property benefits from "certain contractual obligations" in the form of deed restrictions that are "identical to those in place" on the Aggieland Outfitters property. West states Robinson informed him that the council will consider the application at the meeting despite the "contractual obligations" he brought to her attention.

"It appears you are correct that passing zoning ordinances is an exercise of the City Council's legislative powers," West wrote. "However, it appears that, if the application is approved by the City Council, such legislative activity will impair the obligations of the private contract described above."

Should the City Council choose to move forward with approving the rezoning application for the two Fairview Avenue lots, he wrote, the city "will impose itself as a necessary party in a lawsuit."

"We urge the City Council to table final consideration of the application until such time as Judge Smith has adjudicated the attached declaratory judgment action," the letter states.

A city spokesman declined to comment Friday. According to court records, the case is scheduled for a Nov. 8 hearing in the 361st District Court.

Hege Kalaouze said at the Aug. 17 P&Z meeting that they've already been offered twice what they paid for the lots, and that other people are also interested in buying them for commercial purposes.

"We feel that of all the people who might potentially be at Fairview, we would be the most accommodating," she said. "We would be the ones who would gladly accommodate our neighbors. Not because we have to but because we do want to be a part of the neighborhood, and we do appreciate the people who live there."

Some of the conditions included in the P&Z's recommendation to approve the rezoning application are that residential architectural styles for the retail space be used to complement the adjacent historic Southside neighborhoods and the use of a 15-foot landscaped buffer with a masonry wall or decorative fence along the property lines that would abut a residential property. Access to the property is proposed from George Bush Drive via a shared driveway with the adjacent Shell gas station, pending Texas Department of Transportation approval.

The rezoning application has met significant pushback from surrounding property owners, and the Southside Neighborhood Advocacy group has circulated a petition citing 11 objections, particularly concerning neighborhood integrity and traffic.

"It's like you're trying to shake hands with somebody, and they don't want to shake hands with you," Fadi Kalaouze said at the Aug. 17 meeting of the neighbors' reaction. "We're trying to get the neighbors to accept us as neighbors, and [they're] now shutting the door in our face."

Tomorrow's City Council meeting begins at 7 p.m. at City Hall, 1101 Texas Ave.
First Free Church of Onalaska held its formal groundbreaking ceremony last week in anticipation of its almost $3-million, 1,170-seat worship center.

Onalaska Mayor Joe Chilsen, one of the keynote speakers told the crowd of well-wishers, I believe that the bedrock of any community is the strong faith-life of the community.

Executive Pastor Mark Brockberg thanked the mayor, saying, We are blessed to be part of the Onalaska community.

For one member, change has always been part of church life. Mae McDowell joined the church in 1944 as a charter member.

When we first moved into this facility, I thought that would be it, she quipped. Now were doing it again.

Starting with tent meetings in 1914, the church officially organized in 1946, assuming the name Moody Memorial Free Church and meeting in a rented chapel on Campbell Road in La Crosse.

By 1990, attendance had inched up to 100 and the name had been changed to First Free. Brockberg recalled his own affiliation with the church in 1996, several years after it outgrew the Campbell Road facility and moved to Aquinas High School.

Brockberg said the current building constructed in 2002 was only designed to seat 700. The church now averages more than 2,000 worshippers over the course of three weekend services. Jumping ahead to the remodel, Brockberg brought cheers and a round of applause when he announced that the new facility will feature padded seats in place of the old plastic chairs.

We are in existence because of the gospel of Jesus Christit changes lives, said Brockberg. It changes individuals, kids, families and communities.

Brockberg also pointed out that the structure is just a building. What matters is people. Our vision is loving people, he said. Each month we serve families 150 families with food.

Brian Faught, pastor of family life saw the promise of more space as a chance to better serve his young flock. Weve been at capacity in the childrens and youth ministries for months now and this gives us space to grow, he said. Were busting out at the seams and need more room.

But while some pastors wrestled with overcrowding inside the church, missions Pastor Dave Konkol was concerned about the outside. Konkol said hes planning several new initiatives for next year to reach out into the community.

Our goal is to get people out of the church, he said with a grin.

In an interview, Senior Pastor Shane Holden explained the apparent inconsistency between generally declining church numbers nationwide and the growth of First Free.

We put truth in a package so people can understand and make it relevant, he said. Also, the people here are so loving. Our motto is, Come as You Are.

Holden also said the growing numbers of young married couples at First Free despite current statistics showing that nearly 60 percent of millennials drop out of church at some point.

We have about one child for every 2.3 people, he said. When you hold that baby for the first time, things change. People often have a desire for their children to learn about God.

Also, its probably our style, he continued. The coffee, the casualness and the blue jeans.
Waller County authorities arrested a man Friday believed to have been involved in the July shooting at the Texas World Speedway in College Station.

William Lamar Wagner, 19, is charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

According to the Brazos County Sheriff's Office, around 10:30 p.m. July 1 first responders rushed to the Four Hoursemen Trail Ride and Campout event at the Texas World Speedway after receiving a report of a shooting. A 21-year-old man had been shot in the shoulder and was rushed to a College Station hospital. In the crowds and chaos, authorities did not locate a shooter but were able to make contact with witnesses who said they could identify the person suspected of being the shooter.

Authorities said a friend of the victim said he had been at a trail ride in Chappell Hill before the July event with Wagner. The man said during that event, Wagner attacked him with his car and on the night of July 1, the man and his friends wanted to confront Wagner in person about the previous incident.

Several people said they and the victim had gotten into a verbal argument with Wagner and his friends, officials said. At some point during the argument, Wagner is accused of taking out a gun and firing a shot into the victim's shoulder.

"Following the shooting, the victim did not want to cooperate with police," Brazos County Sheriff Chris Kirk said.

According to the sheriff's office, the victim's friends identified Wagner out of a photo lineup, but the victim -- who survived his injuries and has been released from the hospital -- did not participate.

Kirk said Wagner left Bryan-College Station the night of the shooting, but Waller authorities located him this week and Brazos County deputies traveled to Waller to pick up Wagner. Kirk could not comment on Wagner's criminal history, but did say authorities have dealt with him before. His only arrest in Brazos County was on a misdemeanor charge of disorderly conduct in May.

Aggravated assault with a deadly weapon is a second-degree felony punishable by up to 20 years in prison and $10,000 in fines. Wagner is being held in the Brazos County Jail on $40,000 bond.
Lois was a long time resident of Bryan and she considered Texas her home. She was 89 years young. She was born March 1928 in Muncie, Indiana to Luther M and Susie N. Chitty. Lois was an honor graduate from Burris High School in 1946. She then attended Ball Memorial Hospital School of Nursing graduating in 1949. Lois had a passion for nursing and still reminisced on her days as a nurse. Part of her nursing career was spent at the Texas A&M Infirmary. She enjoyed traveling; her adventures included an Alaskan cruise and trip to Europe. She enjoyed listening to music and snuggling her cat Blue Boy in her golden days.
June 20, 1932 - September 7, 2017

Alice Trejo, 85, went to be with the Lord on September 7, 2017.

Alice was born on June 20, 1932 in Houston, to Cecilio and Pauline (Martinez) Vasquez. The oldest of ten children, it was Alice's responsibility to take care of her brothers and sisters and to help her mother shop for the family's needs. Even as a young child, Alice enjoyed church and was active in her youth group. She also took time to read, swim, and go to the movies for fun. She grew up with very strict family values and a love of education and learning. After graduating from Georgetown High School, Alice decided to attend Southwestern University, against her mother's advice.

While Alice attending Southwestern, she met the love of her life, Santa Anna "Santi" Trejo. He was a youth counselor who she met through the church. They married on Southwestern campus and were blessed with two sons.

Alice was a natural born caretaker. She took care of family members who were sick, and helped anyone who needed it in the community. As a pastor's wife, she opened her home to serve others. She was a librarian and a teacher for Bryan ISD and rotated around Bowie, Crockett, and Travis Elementary because she was needed everywhere due to being bilingual. She also taught adults ESL and helped them to gain citizenship. Her life was defined by her faith, and she was a monumental prayer warrior. She was involved in Aldersgate and St. Luke's United Methodist Church and was a part of the Retired Pastor's Wives Club.

The main focuses of Alice's life were family and God. She also enjoyed spending time in the outdoors. She liked roughing it by going tent camping  especially if she could see the mountains. She loved the views in all seasons. She also enjoyed the Kolache Festival and other close-by side trips she could take. Alice loved garage sales, both the finding of great deals and the hosting of them and was a dedicated organizer of the A&M Methodist garage sale.

Alice leaves behind her son and daughter-in-law Edward and Noemi Trejo, son and daughter-in-law Joel and Norma Trejo, her grandchildren Miranda (Dave), Paul, Vanessa (Joseph), Jared, Hannah, Jessie, and Jordan, and her great-grandchildren Ben, Allie, and Andrew. She will be dearly missed. Her visitation will be Tuesday, September 12 from 6 to 8 at Hillier Funeral Home of Bryan. Her funeral service and reception will be at 10 AM at First United Methodist Church of Bryan on Wednesday, September 13, 2017 with interment at Bryan City Cemetery at 1 PM.

Please visit Alice's tribute page at www.hillierfuneralhome.com to share memories and stories.
Our Founders created a brilliant system of government, one with three equal branches and a series of checks and balances. As established, the legislative branch is supposed to make the laws, the judicial branch is to rule on their constitutionality and the executive branch is supposed to enforce those laws.

In a perfect world, this is how our government is supposed to work. But as we all know, this is a far from perfect world.

The president is supposed to appoint nominees to the federal bench and the Senate is supposed to advise and consent  in other words consider the nominees and either approve them or not. In recent decades, however, those nominations have been held hostage by an increasingly partisan Congress. It isnt just the Supreme Court that is affected, as it was when Justice Antonin Scalia died and Congress refused even to consider President Barack Obamas replacement.

Many lower courts are operating with greatly reduced efficiency because there either have been no nominations or those nominated havent been considered.

Then theres Congress, which is so gridlocked by partisanship that virtually nothing gets done. Its no wonder that Congress is so unpopular.

Looking at the executive branch, there is much to criticize. President Donald Trump has decided to declare war on Congress, roundly trashing Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Paul Ryan. Obviously they will be less likely to support the president and his agenda.

But at least Trump acknowledges that Congress exists. President Barack Obama chose simply to ignore Congress. When he didnt get his way  which was most of the time  Obama simply issued executive orders bypassing the proper authority of Congress.

This isnt how it is supposed to work, and a dysfunctional federal government leads to a dysfunctional America.

Now we are caught in a dilemma, trying to figure out what to do by the 800,000 so-called Dreamers, people brought to this country illegally when they were young, some of them babes in arms. Many of these Dreamers remember no other country but America.

Congress during the Obama administration tried to address the issue of how to deal with the Dreamers,is but the Senate wouldnt pass what the House approved and the House couldnt pass what the Senate approved. So, a frustrated President Obama issued an executive order  which even he said he had no authority to do  allowing the dreamers to remain here and eventually gain citizenship. Even if it wasnt a legal decision, it was popular, not only with the Dreamers and their families, but with a majority of Americans.

Last week, though, President Trump said he was ending President Obamas executive order, but staying his decision for six months in hopes that, with a deadline, Congress finally will act. We have our doubts.

U.S. Rep. Bill Flores of Bryan, who represents the Bryan-College Station-Waco area in Congress, said, The current DACA program, despite being well-intentioned, is another example of how former-President Obama abused his constitutional authority. The Constitution clearly states that the legislative branch is responsible for writing all laws; not the president. The decision to rescind this program now brings the important job of fixing our broken and inadequate immigration system into focus for Congress to work out a legislative solution. When it comes to the Dreamers, those children and young adults who are here through no fault of their own, I believe Congress should quickly find a solution to ensure they can stay in the United States, which for many is the only home they know. I look forward to working with President Trump and my House and Senate colleagues to improve our immigration laws and better secure our borders.

Many other representatives and senators echoed Flores thoughts. The real test will be whether they can put aside their partisan bickering and inaction to make the deadline. It is up the all of us to let our elected representatives in both houses of Congress that we stand with the Dreamers.

In all but place of birth, the Dreams are American. This is the only country they know. Many only speak English. Many are in college or have earned their degrees and are productive working members of this society.

To send them back to countries they dont know would be cruel and, frankly, unAmerican.
You feel as though you might need a good book to read. Its gotta be something that sounds right, with lots of pictures and imagination-sparkers, too. A book that doesnt stink. So heres something to get your hands on. Maybe youve heard of it: Ripleys Believe It or Not! Shatter Your Senses.

Sight, sound, smell, taste, touch. Though some say there are more, those are your five main senses and the writers at Ripleys really do what they promise here: they shatter all of them in this book.

First of all, you know that Ripleys books are all in good taste, so why not take a bite out of whats in this one? Find out why people eat the witchetty grub (yum?). Read about the Canadian man whos traveled to more than 50 countries just to dine at McDonalds. Or shiver at the article about blood-eating bats.

Get a whiff of this: in Guangdong Province, China, the villagers sell bags of air to tourists. Would you wear urine-powered socks? Or imagine standing next to this: on July 5 of last year, it got so hot in New York that a pile of horse manure spontaneously caught on fire.

Stick your fingers inside this book and see double-sided cowboy boots and a repurposed statue. Take a look at a touching photo of a chicken and his monkey-friend. Think about more than a dozen scorpions sitting on your arms. And if you had an extremely rare skin disorder like the Bangladeshi man in this book, youd be happy to be able to touch anything.

Feast your eyes on flowers that appear to be animals. See spiders at war  if you dare! Peek at amazing undersea patterns that male pufferfish make to lure the ladies. Get a load of the pink hippo, and read about the giant hamster you can actually ride.

Can emojis become songs? If Sir Paul McCartney gets ahold of them, yes (read about it here). Find out what deadly coincidence befell rock group Jefferson Airplane. Then check out The Isolator, a sensory-deprivation device invented in the 1920s.

Five minutes. Thats all the time your teen has between school, homework, friends, sports, band practice, and the thousand other things going on in his life. And yet, she still has time to read, especially if shes got Ripleys Believe It or Not! Shatter Your Senses!

The Ripleys you loved in your childhood has been reimagined and updated for an all-new audience: there are more pictures in todays Ripleys books, and fewer cartoons.

The feats and weirdness are more modern and less historic. Without a lot of interactive clutter, this book feels easier to use, too, because it doesnt require anything but intrigue, curiosity and, sometimes, a strong stomach.

What more could a young reader want? Um, maybe something to share, because you can enjoy this book right along with your 12- to 18-year-old. Youll both eat up. Its trippy cover is one youll want to touch. Yeah, Ripleys Believe It or Not! Shatter Your Senses! looks good.
With Texas having struggled to keep communications lines open for residents during Hurricane Harvey, and Hurricane Irma straining systems in Florida, Connecticut is nearing completion of a next generation emergency 911 dispatch service designed to help the state cope with any similar inundation of calls  and allowing people to use text and video calling functions on their mobile phones to connect with dispatchers.

The system is one of multiple steps that utilities, carriers, state agencies and municipalities have taken to harden Connecticuts networks following the 2012 storm Sandy, to include a extended effort to cut back trees and branches from overhead lines; add cell phone transmitters; purchase better radios for police and fire departments; and improve the odds of residents being able to get through to emergency 911 dispatchers.

For both Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma, the Federal Communications Commission is getting fresh data on the resilience of communications networks after activating a disaster information reporting system for carriers to report the status of their systems, whether cable, wireline telephone, wireless or over the internet. Frontier Communications was among those reporting in Texas the loss of power at central call-switching stations and damage to poles and cables, with the Norwalk-based company also a major service provider in Florida.

In a few Texas counties hit hard by Harvey, nearly a third of cell sites were knocked offline, even as more and more households turn to mobile phones as their primary  and in an increasing number of cases only  communications link. And both storms have highlighted rescuers monitoring of Twitter for pleas of help as an alternative to flooded 911 call centers.

Overloading 911, out-of-service cells

FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel called in early September for a major study of the resiliency of communications networks to cope with storms like Harvey and Irma, with the storms full impact having yet to be determined.

In recent years, the FCC has focused much of its attention on the nations broadband availability and mobile competition. In 2014, it launched an inquiry into limitations at hotels and corporations that use private branch exchanges to funnel calls to guest rooms or work stations, in recognition of problems for some people in reaching reach 911 service over lines that require dialing 1 or another number to get dial tone. The issue has been examined by Connecticut officials, as well.

As we begin to assess Harveys horrible toll on human life and property, we will need to take stock of what worked, what didnt and how we can improve when it comes to our communications infrastructure, Rosenworcel stated. The commission will need to study this hurricane and issue ... a full plan for fixing the vulnerabilities that we are finding  from overloading 911 systems to out-of-service cell sites.

Under the Connecticut Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection, a Division of Statewide Emergency Telecommunications has spent years developing a new statewide emergency telecommunications system for first responders and residents, with input from a separate Enhanced 9-1-1 Commission appointed by the governor. That mandate included Connecticuts new, next-generation emergency 911 service that can handle massive incoming calls that an Irma-like emergency might generate.

Viper replacing completely outdated systems

Since January, DSET has been undertaking a staged cut over to a new Viper NG9-1-1 system designed by Omaha, Neb.-based West Corp., and training and operation overseen by AT&T which has pledged to implement flexible staffing to acquire additional resources during a major event in its words in one memo to Connecticut authorities. AT&T resumes management of Connecticuts 911 service from Frontier, which inherited the states older system in its October 2014 acquisition of AT&Ts territories here.

Stamford and multiple other southwestern Connecticut communities had already been upgrading 911 systems on their own to be compatible with the statewide system that has been rolled out this year, with Mayor David Martin having described the former system as completely outdated in many respects, including not being able to alert dispatchers as to the location of emergency vehicles.

The town of Fairfields emergency communications center was the second statewide to go live on the new AT&T-West Corp. system, with ECCs and police departments in Shelton, Ridgefield, Norwalk and Darien in the early vanguard last winter to get the Viper system.

Stamfords turn came in June and Greenwichs the month after; the process is scheduled to conclude in November, with Brookfields cut over occurring this past Thursday and Westons on deck two weeks out. Danbury and Bridgeport are scheduled to get Viper in the first few weeks of October.

Among other attributes, Viper allows emergency 911 call centers  styled public safety answering points or PSAPs in official jargon  to receive text and video from people in duress; and to pinpoint the location of people calling for help from a mobile device.

The systems internet-based design also allows it to automatically reroute 911 calls in any burst of volume to other 911 call centers, a critical function to eliminate wait times and promptly dispatch first responders.

Alex.Soule@scni.com; 203-842-2545; @casoulman
NORWALK  During the Contra War in the 1980s, which led to tens of thousands of deaths in Nicaragua, cities around the world began organizing to help. They became sister cities to communities in Nicaragua, sending resources and aid. Among them were Norwalk, New Haven and Hartford.

There were hundreds of them at that time, said Elizabeth Gibbs, who was an original board member of the Norwalk-Nagarote Sister City Project. Many of them have petered out. Ours is growing.

For the rest of the month, the Norwalk-Nagarote Sister City Project has a small exhibit in the Norwalk Public Library. When you walk in, you can see pictures of the work the project has been doing in a glass case on the left. Gibbs said people will be at the exhibit on Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. to share information. We want to have more awareness of the project among people in Norwalk, she said.

The project has provided a tutoring program for elementary school students there, as well as an after-school program, an organic farm and a community center that opened in 2011. Gibbs said the project is currently working to raise money to build a preschool that will be modeled after the Bank Street School for Children in New York. The school is known for its interactive curriculum.

So theyll have play areas, the little kids wont be taught sitting in rows in desks, Gibbs explained. The project has already raised roughly 80 percent of the needed capital to build the school and is campaigning to raise $10,000 more, which a donor has promised to match.

Thirty-one years after the sister city project was founded, three of the original board members, including Gibbs, are continuing their work. When Gibbs began in the 1980s, she never thought that the project would come to command so much of her time. The last 15, 17 years of my life, Ive devoted to running this program. Its a full-time non-paid job, she said. It has been running so long that some of the original participants have since graduated from college and enrolled their own children in the program.

According to Gibbs, the program concentrates on enabling people to help themselves. For example, she said the Norwalk-Nagarote Sister City Project doesnt ask American volunteers to help build their facilities in Nagarote. There are plenty of people in Nicaragua who need work and can build buildings.

The project also doesnt encourage students to come to the United States, instead urging them to assume leadership roles in their home country. To a certain extent, I think (President) Trump would love this program, she said. Because we dont import anybody.
On Aug. 27, a woman named Veronica told Lexington police that her boyfriend had improperly touched her 10-year-old daughter.

Police told the man, Vigail E. Blanco Perez, that he was no longer allowed to go to the Lexington home.

Because the crime allegedly occurred in Cozad, the case was taken over by the Dawson County Sheriffs Department.

A protection order was issued on Aug. 29. The investigation continued, and an arrest warrant was issued Aug. 31.

By that time, Veronica believes, Blanco Perez had left town. She believes he is now in Miami, where he has relatives.

Veronica is upset that Blanco Perez, 43, had time to leave Nebraska.

Her daughter had the courage to tell her what happened. By calling the police, I did my duty to protect my daughter, she said.

Why does it have to take so long she asked, especially when she told law enforcement that Blanco Perez had little reason to stay in Nebraska. He is in the U.S. on a work permit.

An officer asked Veronica if she thought he would run.

Yeah, hes going to run, she said. Hes not man enough to face what my daughter is saying.

She admits that shes not knowledgeable about the law, and has not been in this situation before.

Still, she wishes something had been done before Blanco Perez left the state. I dont get it, she said. I really dont understand.

Veronica now lives in Grand Island. Its believed that the crimes occurred in Cozad and Grand Island. The daughter recently turned 10. She told her mother that Blanco Perez improperly touched her when she was 9.

Blanco Perez is being sought for third-degree sexual assault on a child. He was born in Cuba, Veronica noted, so theres a chance he might even leave the country.

Speaking in general, Dawson County Attorney Liz Waterman said thorough investigations are necessary before people are arrested.

We dont arrest people unless we have reason to charge them, she said. Charges arent made unless theyre the result of evidence or good investigation, Waterman said.

Its unfortunate, she said, if the Blanco Perez case played out the way it was outlined.

But assuming normal protocol was followed, shes confident law enforcement wanted to make sure that we had something viable before he was actually arrested, she said.

Were careful about charging people without feeling that we have a sufficient case to be able to prevail at a trial, Waterman said.

Probable cause can be established fairly quickly once an accusation is made. But when warrants are issued, an affidavit has to be prepared to show probable cause.

Unless theres an immediate need to take somebody into custody, we try to do thorough investigations and get our ducks in a row before we start charging people and arresting them, Waterman said.

Veronicas daughter came to her after the couple had an argument Aug. 27. The girl said her mothers boyfriend had touched her down there.

When Veronica heard the news, she became upset and started crying.

Veronica believes he did not penetrate her. Blanco Perez is not the girls biological father.

The response by Lexington police was prompt and thorough, she said.

Her daughter was interviewed at the Family Advocacy Network in Kearney on Aug. 29. The interview was monitored by an investigator from the Dawson County Sheriffs Department.

A Lexington police officer advised Veronica to get a protection order.

In filling out the form, Veronica received assistance from a victim/witness advocate.

Veronica has also been in contact with Grand Island police, who are following up on her report. An investigator plans to look at the videotape of the interview with the daughter.

Veronica believes that Blanco Perez left the state after he was served with the protection order.

Blanco Perez has lived in the United States for five years, she said. His sister sponsored him to come to the U.S., Veronica said.

She planned to speak to immigration authorities and the Central Nebraska Child Advocacy Center in Grand Island.

Blanco Perez has a 2-year-old son in Nebraska with another woman, Veronica said.

In Miami, he has two sisters, a brother, two aunts and a lot of friends, she said. Im pretty sure hes there, she said.

Waterman pointed out that every case is different.

Visiting a child advocacy center can take time, Waterman said. Those visits are customary when children are victims of a sexual assault.

County attorneys must be careful about their work, Waterman said.

As you can imagine, being accused of a sexual assault is damaging in itself, whether or not a charge is filed, or a trial takes place or theres a conviction. So we take those kinds of accusations very seriously, she said.
The Prairie Pioneer Quilt Guild met Aug. 10 at St. Leos Catholic Church, with 86 members present and two guests. All enjoyed a salad supper.

Suzi Parron presented a program on barn quilts. She showed slides and talked about how the barn quilt movement started and her interest in them. Parron is the author of two books, Barn Quilts and the American Trail Movement and Following the Barn Quilt Trail.

Nebraska State Fair Quilt Superintendent Jan Sittler stated that over 700 quilts were entered in the fair. Sittler said that about 70 percent of the white glove volunteers were from the Prairie Pioneer guild.

Suzie Powell thanked everyone who donated quilts last year for CASA and Toys for Tots. She said 32 quilts went to CASA, and they will continue to accept quilts next year.

Members who chose to be involved in the mystery quilt last spring displayed their quilt tops. Guild members voted on their favorites. Missy Lemons won first place and Vanessa Green was second.

The next meeting will be Sept. 14 at St. Leos. At 6 p.m. a quilt school on vintage hankies will be presented by Shirley Wahlgren. The regular meeting begins at 7.

Guest speaker Sally Manke will talk on confetti quilts and give a trunk show. Manke will have a workshop costing $25 on Sept. 15 at Evangelical Free Church.

For additional information on the guild, contact Peggy Helms at (308) 390-5912 or go online to www.giquilters.com.
Dear Amy: I get along with a male co-worker fairly well, and we go out to lunch at least twice a week.

I have never thought anything of it past a mutual work relationship. Hes 12 years older than I am. I am married, and he has been with his significant other for almost nine years.

There is a fast-food spot we go to often that we both love. The girls who work there know us and are quite friendly.

The other day I went there by myself and one of the girls asked where my boyfriend was.

I made it clear to her that he is just a co-worker, and she told me that he refers to me as his girlfriend. She said that since he always pays, she figured he was my boyfriend.

He expenses all of our meals; our company allows anyone who is salaried to expense one meal a day under $15, so hes technically NOT paying for me!

How can I confront him about this without causing any trouble in the office?  Upset

Dear Upset: You should consider laughing about this. This option does not seem to have occurred to you.

Your colleague is not technically paying for your lunch (the company is), but how is the server supposed to know this? And is it possible that your colleague referred to you as his girlfriend because you are a woman, and also a friend?

You know the nature of your work-friendship better than I do, but many people have close office friendships that become spouse-like. Thats where the term, work-wife (or husband) comes from.

The best way for you to deal with this is to frame this issue as a question, versus a confrontation.

Say, Dude, the server said you referred to me as your girlfriend! My husband would be pretty surprised by that. You were just joking, right?

Dear Amy: My wife and I have been married for 15 years. We have three children, aged 12, 8, and 2.

Recently my wife has been seriously talking about us leaving our home in Texas and moving to Florida.

She says she wants to have an adventure and to make our family closer.

We have lived in Texas all our lives.

We live 10 minutes away from my parents, and we know it will be hard to move their grandkids away, completely changing that dynamic of family and community.

I love my wife and I love the idea of moving.

I have a good job but its not the best in the world. The only true negative that we can see besides moving away from our family is that we will be alone: No more date nights, no more baby-sitting. No more family dinners.

The biggest pro to me is happy wife, happy life.

Is it selfish of us to move and pull our kids away from their schools and their grandparents? Will time heal the loss of family for our kids?  Just a Guy

Dear Guy: Although I can understand the occasional impulse to shake things up and escape from the loving clutches of jobs, family and friends, the way you present this idea, it seems quite unformed and like the impulse of a restless parent who wants to make some big life changes.

Children do usually eventually adjust to new surroundings (especially younger kids), but they dont do so unless their parents are stable and happy. Do not downplay the extreme sacrifice you would be asking your children to make so that you and your wife can change your surroundings. Your 12-year-old would feel the greatest impact. Yes, I would say that so far, this choice seems selfish on your parts.

The most logical way to go about this would be for your family to scout out jobs, schools, and communities before you make any sudden moves. You might be able to do a home swap during a school break, to feel things out.

Dear Amy: Thank you for encouraging Wondering to contact his high school crush after their recent reunion. Im happy to say that I reconnected with a crush at our reunion, and if he hadnt been brave enough to follow up, we wouldnt be enjoying a happy late-life marriage today!  Crushed

Dear Crushed: Judging by the contents of my mailbag, high school reunions are the source of many (and occasionally challenging) connections and reconnections.

Im happy your reconnection is a happy one.
President Jackie Pollock welcomed 18 members of Trinity Lutheran Womens Missionary League to the Aug. 11 meeting.

Marlene Behm opened with a prayer and gave a Bible study, and Margaret Keene presented the mites devotion.

Lois Niemoth reported on the Altar Guild, which will next meet at 9:30 a.m. Sept. 26.

Orletha Block reported 13 quilts were sewed by the Sewing Committee. Behm reported that 14 members made visits to shut-ins, and she played her accordion during 21 separate visits.

Betty Rohweder reported that the Card Committee is pleased with the improvement of a new area for selling and displaying cards. Cards are now ready for sale, and the Christmas cards are ordered.

Rohweder, Mary Ann Niemoth and Jan Pickler served as hostesses.

The next TLWML mission project will be school supplies for Heartland Lutheran High School.
IdeaBank adds two to marketing team

HASTINGS  IdeaBank Marketing in Hastings has added a new finance manager and human resources coordinator and a new copywriter and digital content creator to its team.

As finance manager and human resources coordinator, Sara Swanson handles financial reports, accounts payable, accounts receivable, benefit administration and payroll.

Before joining IdeaBank, she served as staff accountant at PaperWorks in Hastings. She has 18 years experience in the manufacturing accounting/management field.

Swanson earned her Bachelor of Science in business administration/finance from the University of Nebraska at Kearney. She is a graduate of Leadership Hastings and volunteers at Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Roseland and Silver Lake Public Schools in Roseland and Bladen.

Her husband, Bryan, farms near Holstein. They have two children.

As copywriter and digital content creator, R.J. Post writes text for print and broadcast advertisements, press releases, website content and video scripts.

Before joining IdeaBank, he served as assistant managing editor of The Grand Island Independent. He has 31 years experience as a writer and editor.

Post earned his Bachelor of Arts in English from St. Mary of the Plains College in Dodge City, Kan. He is a graduate of Hall County Leadership Tomorrow and previously served on the boards of the Grand Island Multicultural Coalition and Friendship House. He serves as a lector and sings in the mens choir at Resurrection Catholic Church in Grand Island.

He and his wife, Susan, have three daughters.

IdeaBank Marketing has been providing comprehensive marketing and advertising services, including strategic marketing plans, social media marketing, traditional and online ad campaigns, corporate identity packages, and public relations services for a wide variety of businesses and industries in Nebraska, for 35 years.

For more information, contact IdeaBank at (402) 463-0588 or ideabankmarketing.com.

South Beach Tanning promotes two

Courtney Niemoth and Victoria Rojos are now the co-managers for South Beach Tanning Co. in Grand Island.

Niemoth and Rojos have both successfully completed Smart Tan Certification as well as certification with DaVinci Teeth Whitening. Both have been employed with South Beach Tanning Co. for more than a year and will be sharing the responsibilities and duties of managing the salon.

South Beach Tanning 2104 Lawrence Lane, is locally owned and operated by Greg and Tanya Stephens. The state-of-the-art salon offers five levels of UV tanning as well as a UV free spray tanning booth. The salon offers teeth whitening services by certified staff with DaVinci Teeth Whitening which is an all-natural plant based product using the latest in LED cold laser technology.

The salon is open daily and no appointments are necessary.

AMA honors Ord family physician

ORD  Dr. Jennifer Bengston, a family medicine physician at Valley County Health System in Ord, has been recognized as a 2017 Inspirational Physician honoree by the American Medical Association  Women Physicians Section.

One of fewer than 80 physicians nationwide to receive this recognition in 2017, the honor recognizes Bengstons support and contributions to medicine throughout her professional career.

Bengstons nomination, submitted by Vicki Bredthauer, VCHS chief nursing officer discussed her unwavering service to patients, fellow practitioners and VCHS during her 14 years at VCHS.

Her dedication and selfless service has enabled VCHS to progress to the health system it is today, Bredthauer said, one with an eight-person medical staff, growing specialty clinic, numerous satellite clinics and rehab centers, extensive outpatient services and a strong community presence, the nomination read, in part.

The nomination also discussed her commitment to taking time with patients and their families, providing excellent end of life care to hospice patients and their families and staying current with evidence-based research to provide the highest quality care to patients. Bengston was also recognized for her instrumental role in meeting the certification requirement for state trauma designation in 2006, as well as her continuous role in mentoring mid-level practitioners, physicians and medical students.

The honoree program is part of the AMA-WPSs Women in Medicine Month, observed every September, which celebrates physicians who have offered their time, wisdom and support to advance women in medicine.
Order of the Arrow members from three states were able to enhance their leadership skills and build brotherhood at an event this weekend.

Will Nabity of Grand Island, section C-5A chief, said around 150 scouts from six lodges from Kansas, Nebraska and parts of Iowa came together for a section conclave, which is held every year and hosted by each lodge on a rotating basis. This year, the section conclave was held at Camp Augustine. The event began Friday evening and ran through Sunday morning.

Order of the Arrow is the National Honor Society of scouting. Its members are elected by each individual Boy Scout troop.

Adam Eddy of Hastings, vice conclave chief, said this weekends section conclave was centered on leadership training, but also included fun activities for event attendees.

This morning, we are doing some training to build leadership, learn how to run our lodges better, and other things that will help build us up and lead, Eddy said Saturday. This afternoon, we have lots of activities planned. Our theme is Knights of the Council Fire, so some our games have a medieval twist to them. We have breaching the castle walls at the climbing tower, archery and ring jousting.

Eddy added a feast featuring turkey legs and other medieval-themed treats was planned for Saturday evening. A show featuring reenactments from Monty Python and the Holy Grail was also planned.

John Simmons, of Omaha, section C-5A vice chief said some of the training offered for Order of the Arrow members at this weekends section conclave included leadership retention. He added this has been a big issue within the Boy Scouts organization as membership is decreasing and that it is looking to fix the problem.

We are also doing training on goal-setting, adults working with youth and using resources to try to make the organization of Order of the Arrow a more productive one and one that also makes better servant leaders for our communities, Simmons said.

Ben Friend, a current Hastings College student from Lincoln, lodge chief of the Golden Sun Lodge, held a training session during the section conclave called Keys to Delegation. He said this was centered around a leader delegating certain tasks to team members as a one person cannot do everything themselves.

What this training is focusing on is assessing peoples different abilities to be able to put them in the right roles for them to successfully complete certain tasks, Friend said. They have to go through certain planning steps to be able to put on an event, like section conclave, through planning and making a budget, to finding staff. One person cannot do all of that, so this is a good example to use to start talking about delegation.

Scout Perryman, lodge chief of Kidi Kidish Lodge No. 434 based in Kansas said this weekends section conclave was the third one he has attended. He said he attended the event to have some fun and gain knowledge to bring back to his lodge and Boy Scout troop.

From our small corner of the earth, we are a very small (group). We only brought three youth here and I wanted to set an example by going to events like these, Perryman said. I am always looking for new things to talk about and things to teach the lodge. It is a great place to meet up and to learn things.
The Heartland United Way is planning a Poverty Summit on Friday, Nov. 3.

But before that, the United Way wants people to do some brainstorming on the issue of childhood poverty. Those sessions will be from 4 to 6 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 19; 11:30 a.m. Wednesday, Sept. 20; and 4 to 6 p.m., Wednesday, Sept. 20. All meetings will be at Home Federal Bank, 3311 W. Stolley Park Road.

We are gearing up for lots of conversation from the community, said Karen Rathke, Heartland United Way president. She said the conversations will be designed to solicit everyones ideas and thoughts about childhood poverty and the best ways to eliminate it.

She noted that written invitations to the three sessions had a very good summary of what Heartland United Way officials want to happen: Please join us for a facilitated community conversation to innovatively find solutions to tackle barriers that challenge children and families in our communities.

Were asking people to bring their passion, their experience, their expertise, to the table to be part of these conversations, Rathke said. She said representatives from the faith-based community, eduction, health care, business, public service organizations, law enforcement and non-profit communities are being invited to take part in these conversations.

Rathke said consumers also are being asked to be part of the talks, so the United Way can find out what they see in Grand Island area when it comes to the subject of childhood poverty, as well as what they would like to see available.

While a number of people have specifically invited to attend one of the three brainstorming sessions, people from the general public also are being invited attend, Rathke said. We want to continue widening our reach, so we can have more voices, more thoughts and good ideas around the table.

The goal is to start with some very broad ideas on how to best fight childhood poverty during the brainstorming sessions, then begin to narrow them down a bit.

Statistics from the U.S. Census Bureau show that the percentage of persons living in poverty in Hall County is 13.5 percent, while it is 10.4 percent in both Howard County and Merrick County, and 7.3 percent in Hamilton County. Related children under 5 who live in poverty totals 33.4 percent in Hall County; 19.9 percent in Hamilton County; 16.6 percent in Merrick County; and 9.1 percent in Howard County.

Hall County ranks 45th out of 79 Nebraska counties in overall health (14 counties were not rated), while Howard County ranked 18th, Hamilton County 30th and Merrick County 51st.

The teen pregnancy rate in Hall County is 58 per 1,000; 25 per 1,000 in Merrick County; 24 per 1,000 in Hamilton County; and 18 per 1,000 in Howard County. The average rate of teen births in Nebraska is 33 per 1,000.

Circumstances that put young people at risk include:

 Children who witness domestic violence are more likely to become either victims or perpetrators as adults.

 Living in poverty means that by the age of 4, children will be exposed to 30 million fewer words.

 Children living in poverty have less access to play because parental focus is on day-to-day survival.

Rathke said she wants the Poverty Summit to build off the brainstorming done at the three September sessions.

On the Poverty Summit, we want to take all those ideas and then craft a community plan that will help us have a road map that is going to guide us toward addressing childhood poverty, she said. The Poverty Summit is scheduled to run from 8 a.m. to noon on Friday, Nov. 3.

Rathke said she wants individuals to think about how they can combat childhood poverty in their work, their volunteer efforts, their donated dollars and in their church or spiritual life. How will I, in my touch points, be able to impact children and families in a stronger and more positive way? she asked.

Rathke said the United Way board set an ambitious objective to reduce childhood poverty in Hall, Hamilton, Merrick and Howard counties, making that goal part of the United Ways overall strategic plan.

Weve retooled our application and our funds distribution process, weve strengthened our relationships in our area communities, weve built some stronger networks in collecting and distributing food, and collecting and distributing holiday efforts, she said. So were trying to position ourselves to be more nimble and proactive in our work as a United Way.

People who want more information on the September meetings may call (308) 382-2675. They may also use that telephone to RSVP for a meeting. On its website, the United Way has promised to release more information about the Poverty Summit as that November date draws closer.
HASTINGS  Hundreds of people perused downtown Hastings on Saturday to see what all the junk was about.

The third annual Junk Street was from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. at 3rd and Denver, bringing a variety of junk and craft vendors. About 33 vendors lined the street, each offering different things from handmade aluminum signs, garage sale finds and old film cameras to repurposed end tables and lettered welcome mats.

Tiffany Crouse, Junk Street organizer, said vendors from all over the area came out, including some from Kansas, Lincoln and Omaha. She said there was a good variety of vendors that have been coming since the first year and those that have come for the first time.

Of the vendors who keep coming back each year, Crouse said, We have a special place in our heart for those.

Junk Street sprouted when Crouse was talking to her old boss after theyd gone to a similar event in Funk.

She said, Why cant we make this happen in Hastings? Thus, Junk Street was born after that conversation that happened over a desk.

Desiree Gustafson, assistant manager at Charley Noble in Grand Island, said theyve been coming to Junk Street since the first year. The store brought many of the upcycled products, which were made by people in integrated life choices.

The items the mini shop offered at Junk Street included hand-painted signs, tutus and wine racks made with old doors and cabinets. This is a chance to show off what our individuals (in ILC) get to do, Gustafson said.

Not only do the items offer a variety to the diversity of Junk Street, but Gustafson said it offers a greater story behind the product in helping the ILC people.

Crouse said many volunteers help put on Junk Street and the vendors had to set up in the wee hours of the morning at 4 a.m. Thats some dedication to your craft, Crouse said.

She said Junk Street will continue as long as people keep coming, so theyre always scouting for more and different vendors. Some unique vendors this year included one who repurposed items, including a suitcase, into dog beds. Crouse said they try to space the vendors out so similar vendors arent right next to each other.

Crouse said its good to have Junk Street because it incorporates all of downtown, as many businesses had Junk Street specials. She said theres not really anything like it in downtown Hastings.

Next year, Crouse said she would like to add a live music component to Junk Street while adding more vendors. We just want to celebrate all things junk, she said.

Those wanting to participate as a vendor in next years event should contact the Junk Street Facebook page or call (402) 461-8413.
The approximately 800,000 young people in America known as dreamers essentially know no other country other than the United States.

Theyve grown up in the U.S., gone to school here, have jobs here. They were brought to this country when they were young by their parents.

Their parents, who entered the U.S. illegally, are the ones who broke the law  not the dreamers.

These young peoples future has now been thrown into doubt by President Donald Trumps decision to rescind DACA, the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

President Barack Obama instituted DACA by executive action in 2012. It gave these young people a legal status where they could work, go to college and get licenses.

And by all measurements, those who have applied for DACA status are productive, hard-working individuals  just the sort of people wanted in the U.S.

Here are some figures:

- 91 percent of all DACA enrollees are employed.

- 97 percent are either employed or in school.

- Their average age is 25.

It is clear that these young people should have some kind of legal status where they can remain in the U.S.

However, Trump does have a strong legal basis for his action. He is delaying rescinding DACA for six months so that Congress can take action.

That is the important point. A monumental change in immigration policy, such as DACA, shouldnt be done by executive order. It should be done by Congress passing a law that is signed by the president.

Trump, and the U.S. government, were facing the threat of a lawsuit from Republican state officials. They were challenging the legality of the program being instituted by executive order and the courts could have eventually thrown it out.

The immigration issue and the status of these young people is back where it should be  in the hands of Congress. For far too many years, Congress has failed to take action on immigration, leaving the countrys immigration policy a mess.

President Obama became frustrated and acted on his own, although years earlier he had said he didnt have that legal authority.

Congress probably still doesnt have the will to enact a comprehensive immigration law. But at the least, Congress needs to reach some compromise where dreamers are given legal status while at the same time strengthening border enforcement.

People dont want to hear any more excuses from Congress. They want solutions. Nebraskas representatives and senators need to be a part of finding a solution. Rep. Adrian Smith and Sens. Deb Fischer and Ben Sasse need to speak up and work for a compromise.

Most of the dreamers are good people, who through no fault of their own, are left in a very tenuous situation where they have no legal status in the country where they have lived practically all of their lives.

Congress needs to act and not leave these young people without a home or a country.
The 148th annual Nebraska State Fair certainly was a record year and while planning is already underway for next year, we must take a moment to celebrate the successes and accomplishments and acknowledge those who have laid the groundwork for the continued growth of your Nebraska State Fair.

To successfully produce an event of this magnitude, it takes more than one community; it takes an entire state. It was wonderful to watch as friends and supporters from every corner of Nebraska, gathered in Grand Island to celebrate their State Fair.

Each day, we count our blessings that we are surrounded by partners who are so dedicated and knowledgeable. To the many partners of the State Fair, including, 4-H, FFA, Fonner Park, Game and Parks, UNL, fire, law enforcement, city, county and state government, media partners, sponsors, donors and friends  thank you for your direction, guidance and leadership.

To the hundreds of volunteers for the annual State Fair, your sense of community pride is unmatched. You truly are the face of our fair and we couldnt be more proud of you! The thousands of hours you volunteer to make this event run smoothly is a testament to your character and your sense of giving. Thank you for all that you do to make your State Fair so wonderful.

To the members of the Nebraska State Fair 1868 Foundation, we thank you for your commitment to our organization. We are so very fortunate to have your support and are humbled by your generosity. Each of you are like family to our organization and it is both an honor and a privilege to see so many of you come fair time!

To the staff of the Nebraska State Fair, congratulations on another job well done! Its humbling to see a years worth of planning and hard work seamlessly come together for those 11-days. You produce an event that is like no other and the Nebraska State Fair gets better each year because of you. Take pride in knowing that all who pass through the gates of the fair are having an incredible experience because of your efforts, and we see and appreciate your craft.

We want to recognize and thank each of you for your involvement and assistance in assembling the largest annual statewide celebration; one that showcases our commerce, talents and most importantly, the people that make up our great state.

On behalf of the Nebraska State Fair 1868 Foundation, thanks to each of you for your support, your dedication, your volunteerism, your goodwill and your belief in your Nebraska State Fair.

Well see you next year!
Nicholas Rays work has lived on well past his death.

The La Crosse native, who directed James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause and who died in 1975, will be one of the regions many artists highlighted during this years Discover the Silent City cemetery walk. Held at Oak Grove Cemetery on Saturday, the 90-minute tours will focus on five stories on the theme of Leaving a Mark: Artists of La Crosse.

No matter what part of history you look at, artists are the ones who paint the story, Director Diane Breeser said.

The annual event is sponsored by the La Crosse County Historical Society and will run from 11 a.m. until 3 p.m. Tickets can be purchased from the La Crosse County Historical Society website or by calling 608-782-1980, and cost $12 for adults, $10 for members and $6 for students.

Two bus tours will be offered for those with special needs or mobility issues. Tickets for those tours must be purchased in advance.

There will also be a modified version of the tour for school groups during the week. Historical Society Executive Director Peggy Derrick said there are three days open to schools and tours can be scheduled by calling the historical society office.

Focusing on artists was the idea of University of Wisconsin-La Crosse archivist Laura Godden, who helps the Historical Society with its research work for the walk. In the 18 years the walk has been offered, tours frequently focused on big events, such as the Civil War, and Derrick said learning about the citys artistic history was a nice change of pace.

I hope people really enjoy the day, Derrick said. I hope people can have fun and come away with a greater appreciation of the region.

Ray will be one of the historical characters featured on the tour, and that stop will focus on him and his mentor, English teacher Helen Dyson, who helped spark Rays interest in storytelling and literature. The walk will also include portrayals of photographers Helen Mae Hoeft and her husband Millard Reynolds, artist and painter Lillian Pettingill, who founded the La Crosse chapter of the Association for Arts and Crafts, and others.

Denise Christy-Moss started acting in the walk last year when she portrayed her mother-in-law, Robbie Moss, who with her husband, Orby Moss, was the third generation of the family to own barbershops in the city. On Saturday, Christy-Moss will portray Lillian Smith Davenport, an African-American woman who was born in La Crosse in 1884 and graduated from La Crosse High School and the University of Wisconsin Normal School, now UW-La Crosse, before becoming a music teacher and vaudeville performer.

Christy-Moss said that Davenport was a noted pianist and soloist who also directed the Lyceum Theater in Cincinnati, Ohio. During one of her visits back to her hometown during the height of World War II, she protested against signs in the town that turned away colored business and had them taken down with the help of the state chapter of the NAACP.

Christy-Moss will perform some college pageant music she wrote during her time in school, from a play calling for the preservation of the river marsh. She will also perform some period pieces Davenport might have sung during her vaudeville career.

Christy-Moss is a Milwaukee transplant who said she has fallen in love with the region. By working on the cemetery walks, she said, she has learned a lot about the community and its history.

Every tombstone in that cemetery has a story, she said. It represents people who were here and left their mark.
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Linkedin Ni Nyoman Wira (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sun, September 10, 2017 18:05 1890 4065a5a8898c7cc661d4adf97aff572b 1 Art & Culture sriwijaya-nalanda,sriwijaya-kingdom,nalanda-university,India,Indonesia,knowledge-route,history Free

Beside the renowned Silk Route and Spice Trail, there is another lesser-known historical trail.

Dubbed the Knowledge Route, this trail connected the Sriwijaya Kingdom in the southwestern part of Sumatra (previously known as Swarnadwipa) and Nalanda university, located in Bihar state in India.

The history of the Knowledge Route was narrated in a public lecture on Friday at the office of the Ministry of Culture and Education in Jakarta, which uncovered several facts about the route.

Read also: Travel back through time along the spice trail at 'Jalur Rempah' Museum Week

Sriwijaya and Nalanda are centers of knowledge

The Sriwijaya-Nalanda trail is known as the Knowledge Route due to both areas reputation as places of learning.

Built during the Gupta Empire, Nalanda was the location of an ancient university that attracted students from other countries, including China and Tibet. At that time, students did not only learn about Buddhism, but also astronomy, mathematics, medicine, Eastern philosophy and Greek philosophy.

Meanwhile, Sriwijaya, which was built during the Syailendra dynasty, was based on the Buddha Mahayana belief and its influence spread to India and China. Sriwijaya was also known as the center to learn the Sanskrit language.

Sanskrit was a foreign language, but it was taught in Sriwijaya, said Andrea Acri, a researcher from the Nalanda-Sriwijaya Center at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore.

The Knowledge Route

In the 7th century, Yijing, a Buddhist monk from China settled in Sriwijaya and wrote about the center of higher education.

Yijing advised other monks, who wanted to visit India [Nalanda], to learn Sanskrit in Sriwijaya, Acri said.

This encouraged travel from China to Sriwijaya to India, and vice versa, for those who wanted to learn about Buddhism.

Read also: Rajasthani music, perfect harmony

Agus Aris Munandar, an archaeologist from the University of Indonesia (UI), gives a lecture at about Reviving the Sriwijaya-Nalanda Civilization Trail on Aug. 8 in Jakarta. (JP/Ni Nyoman Wira)

The relationship between Sriwijaya and Nalanda

Hassan Wirajuda, a former foreign minister who also attended the seminar, said the ancient university of Nalanda had 15 monasteries.

But the number one monastery was donated by [the King of] Sriwijaya, Hassan said.

Stories about King of Sriwijaya can also be found in one of the inscriptions uncovered in Nalanda. Made of bronze in around the 9th century, it tells about King Balaputradewa from Swarnadwipa (Sriwijaya) who was allowed to build a monastery for Sriwijaya students who were studying in Nalanda.

Among the many monasteries, this monastery [that was built by King Balaputradewa] is the only one that is open for tourists, said Agus Aris Munandar, an archaeologist from the University of Indonesia (UI), during the seminar. If you visit that site, you go to that monastery first before visiting other ruins [] Tourists will be able to see a line of rooms that accommodated monks from Sriwijaya.

Sriwijaya and Nalanda also influenced each other in architecture. One example is a moonstone in Nalanda that bears similarities with the stone that can be found at Kalasan Temple in Central Java.

Also, when Nalanda was destroyed in the 12th or 13th century, its damaged walls still had the remaining cement.

And the same cement can be found in Sari Temple and Kalasan Temple in Java, Agus said.

From Nalanda, you can travel to Vikramshila by land, which takes around six hours. Vikramshila used to be another center for learning about Buddhism. Built by Atisa Dipamkara, a Buddhist monk and renowned scholar from India who traveled to Sriwijaya to learn about Buddhism, its structure and design has similarities with the Muaro Jambi temple compounds in Jambi province. (asw)
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Linkedin (Bloomberg) Beijing, China  Sun, September 10, 2017 19:55 1890 4065a5a8898c7cc661d4adf97aff6e32 2 Business China,environment,car,ban,carbon-emission Free

China will set a deadline for automakers to end sales of fossil-fuel powered vehicles, a move aimed at pushing companies to speed efforts in developing electric vehicles for the worlds biggest auto market.

Xin Guobin, the vice minister of industry and information technology, said the government is working with other regulators on a timetable to end production and sales. The move will have a profound impact on the environment and growth of Chinas auto industry, Xin said at an auto forum in Tianjin on Saturday.

A ban on combustion-engine vehicles will help push both local and global automakers to shift toward electric vehicles, a carrot-and-stick approach that could boost sales of energy-efficient cars and trucks and reduce air pollution while serving the strategic goal of cutting oil imports. The government offers generous subsidies to makers of new-energy vehicles. It also plans to require automakers to earn enough credits or buy them from competitors with a surplus under a new cap-and-trade program for fuel economy and emissions.

Honda Motor will launch an electric car for the China market in 2018, China Chief Operating Officer Yasuhide Mizuno said at the same forum. The Japanese carmaker is developing the vehicle with Chinese joint ventures of Guangqi Honda Automobile and Dongfeng Honda Automobile and will create a new brand with them, he said.

Internet entrepreneur William Lis Nio will start selling ES8, a sport-utility vehicle powered only with batteries, in mid-December. The startup is working with state-owned Anhui Jianghuai Automobile Group, which also is in a venture with Volkswagen AG to introduce an electric SUV next year.

China, seeking to meet its promise to cap its carbon emissions by 2030, is the latest country to unveil plans to phase out vehicles running on fossil fuels. The UK said in July it will ban sales of diesel- and gasoline-fueled cars by 2040, two weeks after France announced a similar plan to reduce air pollution and meet targets to keep global warming below 2 degrees Celsius.
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Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sun, September 10, 2017 20:03 1890 4065a5a8898c7cc661d4adf97aff86a1 1 City #hospital,#BPJSKesehatan,#health Free

Jakarta Health Agency head Koesmedi Priharto has said that fewer than half of hospitals in Jakarta have partnered with the Healthcare and Social Security Agency (BPJS Kesehatan).

There are around 90 hospital that have partnered with the BPJS from a total of 189 hospitals," Koesmedi said on Sunday as quoted by kompas.com.

He said the only hospitals that had been partnering with THE BPJS were local public hospitals (RSUD) and state-owned hospitals as there was no obligation for private hospitals to do so.

However, he said that private hospitals were also supposed to partner with the BPJS because of the planned universal health coverage targets for 2019. By that time, every citizen should be a member of the BPJS Kesehatan program.

"It's a matter of coverage, if they [private hospitals] do not partner [with the BPJS], then they will not be able to get patients," Koesmedi said.

According to the BPJS official website bpjs-kesehatan.go.id the BPJS Kesehatan in cooperation with Jakarta administration is seeking to realize the goal of universal health coverage by Jan. 1, 2019.

Under the cooperation, the city administration will register all Jakartans, without exception, as participants of the National Health Insurance-Healthy Indonesia card (JKN-KIS). (dis)
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Linkedin Rachmadea Aisyah (JP) Jakarta  Sun, September 10, 2017 23:19 1890 4065a5a8898c7cc661d4adf97affb946 2 Business Great-Eastern-Life,bancassurance,OCBC-NISP Free

Singapore-based insurance company Great Eastern Life has repositioned its business orientations in Indonesia as a bancassurance provider, with the latest cooperation with Bank OCBC NISP to launch its new product Legacy Protector.

Great Eastern Life Indonesia president director Clement Lien said the change was driven by the companys recent research, which showed that hardly any similar products have been widely marketed in the country.

After being in operation for some years in Indonesia, we have decided to reposition ourselves as a bancassurance specialist. This allows us to focus our efforts into creating new products to cater to bancassurance needs [in the country], Lien said in a press statement recently.

The new bancassurance offers risk protection not only to the policy holders but also to their descendants to assure their financial safety in the long term, Lien added.

The product can be beneficial for [the next] three to four generations and it is also transferable to the children or grandchildren, he said, adding that the product would be using the US Dollars as its currency peg. (ags)
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Linkedin Safrin La Batu (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sun, September 10, 2017 19:59 1890 4065a5a8898c7cc661d4adf97aff7bc4 1 World Hurricane-Irma,diaspora,Florida,#diaspora,#NaturalDisasters,natural-disaster,#HurricaneIrma Free

Indonesians living in areas not designated as mandatory evacuation zones in Florida, United States, have made the decision to stay put despite the coming arrival of Hurricane Irma, which is predicted to strike a large area of Florida on Sunday morning local time.

Yusnita Oner, who lives in Tampa with her husband and her 16-year-old son, said they stocked up on supplies, such as food and bottled water, several days before the hurricane was predicted to strike.

It is unlikely that we evacuate on Saturday because the roads have been crowded. The airport was closed too, Yusnita told The Jakarta Post via text message.

Yusnita, who has lived in Tampa for 14 years, said she had experience dealing with hurricanes and always evacuated in the past.

Another Indonesian, Widyastri Atsary Rahmi, who lives in Gainesville, a city in northern Florida, said she immediately stocked up on food and water.

"I charged my cellphones and their portable battery packs, and secured my important documents and main electronic devices like my laptop, she said via a mobile messaging platform.

The Indonesian Consulate in Houston, Texas, which oversees services for Indonesian citizens, including those living in parts of Florida, has told Indonesians to follow local authorities advice. It also provides a 24-hour hotline for any citizen that needs help.

There are around 2,617 Indonesian citizens currently living in Florida, according to the consulate. (ipa)
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Linkedin Brian K. Sullivan (Bloomberg) Boston, United States  Sun, September 10, 2017 15:23 1890 4065a5a8898c7cc661d4adf97aff2338 2 World Hurricane-Irma,Florida,US,flooding,disaster,#HurricaneIrma Free

Hurricane Irma strengthened as it churned toward southwestern Florida, threatening severe damage in Tampa and other cities facing the Gulf of Mexico in what could end up being the most expensive storm in US history.

With top winds of 130 miles (209 kilometers) an hour, the deadly storm is expected to strike the Florida Keys Sunday morning and then follow the states Gulf Coast north, the US National Hurricane Center said in an advisory around 2 a.m. New York time. Irma became a Category 4 storm as it moved closer to the state.

President Donald Trump discussed round-the-clock preparations now under way with his Cabinet, calling Irma a storm of enormous destructive power.

Rob Miller, a meteorologist at AccuWeather Inc. in State College, Pennsylvania, said a track near or just to the west is almost, if not, a worst-case scenario for Tampa Bay, said It shoves all the water into Tampa Bay and then shoves it right into downtown.

The storm has left at least 22 people dead and thousands homeless across the Caribbean, and threatens to rack up as much as $200 billion in damages. Irmas anticipated northern turn has begun, raising the threat to Floridas west coast while potentially sparing Miami a direct hit.

Irma was about 70 miles south-southeast of Key West, according to the hurricane center. It could pass over the island city sometime after 7 a.m. local time Sunday as a Category 4 storm, said Alan Reppert, a meteorologist with AccuWeather. It will then continue up the coast making a second landfall between Fort Myers and Sarasota later in the day, said Jeff Masters, co-founder of Weather Underground in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

A trajectory west of previous forecasts will still mean hurricane-force winds for the entire southern portion of Florida from coast to coast, said Shunondo Basu, meteorologist and natgas analyst at Bloomberg New Energy Finance.

Storm damage may worsen if Irma drifts along Floridas west coast without coming ashore and weakening, said David Streit, a meteorologist at Commodity Weather Group LLC in Bethesda, Maryland. On its current path, Irma may wipe out as much as 20 percent of the citrus crop in the worlds second-largest orange juice producer.

Some 6.5 million residents have been ordered to evacuate, Florida Governor Rick Scott said at a press briefing late Saturday. Almost 400 shelters are open in counties in the path of the storm. The Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater area is home to about 3 million people.
WINONA, Minn.  Rick Thomas has had many identities. Father. Veteran. Recovering addict of 42 years. Cancer survivor.

But only one, he said, keeps him grounded and gives him strength and clarity: being a Native American.

Thomas shared his life experiences and how his culture has helped him through them as he led the talk circle Saturday morning at the Great Dakota Gathering, Homecoming and Powwow at Unity Park. The circle was just one of numerous events happening Saturday and through the weekend at the annual event intended to bring together native and local populations to celebrate culture and identity.

Events also included a sunrise ceremony, kids activities, a grand entry, a drum competition, a powwow, vendors and other celebrations, demonstrations and talks about Native American culture.

After clearing the minds of participants in the talking circle with burning sage, Thomas, of the Santee Sioux, began to tell his story as a way of inviting participants to also share.

After his own story, Thomas performed a song often played at funerals and wakes to introduce feelings into the discussion.

Then, he listened.

A talking stick was passed around, and participants shared whatever they felt, needed to or wanted to, creating connections and relatives, Thomas said.

We can be relatives, Thomas said. We can help out each other.

And his own story lent an example of why those connections are important.

He served in Vietnam, seeing unspeakable acts of horror from a foxhole. Despite the treatment of his ancestors, Thomas said the Native Americans still served the U.S. in striking numbers.

He eventually came home but found contempt from others for serving in Vietnam. He drank, did drugs and lived a life muddled with bad choices and influences.

One day, the local Veterans Affairs officer asked him if he had ever contemplated suicide or hurting others. His answer was yes, and their answer was to put him in a padded cell for six weeks.

Despite not wanting any visitors, during that time, an elderly man came to see him and asked Thomas to come visit him when he got out. Upon visiting the 82-year-old man, Thomas said the man held out two rocks. The one hand held his demons  the alcoholism, the drugs, the violence.

The left hand, Thomas said, was healing.

In this hand you have your Indian ways of life, Thomas recalled the man saying to him. I chose that left hand, and I carry that with myself.

Through meditation, songs and love, Thomas said he has found answers to face his biggest life challenges.

Once you meditate, they show you whats wrong. Thomas said.

These ideals got him through two kinds of cancer, the loss of a child and a degenerative disease. Even when it seemed impossible for healing from those experiences, especially after his daughters death, Thomas said he continued down his Native American traditions.

Specifically, Thomas told the story of the buffalo who keeps moving forward even in storms  a story Thomas said gives him strength in pushing ahead.

Other participants stories from the circle also reflected hardship, while others were more about reflection, contemplation and understanding.

For Gloria Alatorre, a Spanish interpreter at Winona Senior High School, the talking circle was about finding connections to different cultures.

Originally from Mexico, Alatorre came to Winona to attend Winona State University and has a passion for expanding her cultural understanding, especially with the ideals often found in Native American cultures.

She said she believes by finding time to confront the discomfort of experiencing other cultures, and learning to understand their presence in society, can bring about change and growth.

Its important for people to come together and to learn from one another, Alatorre said.

Likewise, Thomas told participants that through getting to know him and his story, he will come to know others stories, and those relationships begin to foster.

For now, Thomas has added another identity: that of an author, as he is working on a book about Native Americans and PTSD. But regardless of what identity he will take on next, Thomas still believes in the power behind his culture and traditions.

To have truth, is to be you, Thomas said.
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Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sun, September 10, 2017 12:53 1891 4065a5a8898c7cc661d4adf97afee1ed 1 City #tolerance,#Islamicteachings,#preacher,#PBNU,#Jakarta Free

The Jakarta administration is cooperating with Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), Indonesia's largest Islamic organization, to train and educate Islamic preachers in the city to spread massages of unity and peace.

"We are cooperating with the NU Central Board (PBNU) to educate our preachers to preach properly in line with the Islamic teachings of Rahmatan lil alamien (blessing for the universe) and tolerant Islam," Governor Djarot Saiful Hidayat said on Friday, as quoted by kompas.com.

He added that the cooperation had been initiated because he did not want radicalism and intolerance to emerge in the city.

PBNU chairman Said Aqil Siradj said 1,000 preachers would join the training course.

"The training aims to make preachers fully understand the concept of Rahmatan lil alamin, moderate and tolerant Islam, which is constructive rather than destructive by containing hate-speech or defamation," he said. (yon)
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Linkedin Winny Tang (JP) Bogor  Sun, September 10, 2017 23:07 1890 4065a5a8898c7cc661d4adf97affb2a0 2 Business OJK,MunicipalBond Free

The Financial Services Authority (OJK) hopes to finish the revision of a regulation on municipal bonds by the end of the year to increase the attractiveness of debt papers issued by regional administrations.

The bonds are expected to help finance infrastructure projects in the regions.

Some regions, such as Jakarta, West Java and East Kalimantan, had expressed their interest in rolling out such bonds, said the OJKs deputy director for services company assessment, Muhammad Maulana.

At present, the OJK is revising the regulation in coordination with the Finance Ministry, Maulana said on Saturday, adding that lengthy and complicated procedures had hampered efforts by local administrations to issue such bonds.

One of the procedures is that the administrations must gain approval from the Finance Ministry, the Regional Legislative Council (DPRD) as well as the Home Ministry. Consequently, despite the benefits, none of them have launched such debt papers.

In addition to the complex process, unlike with government bonds, the central government does not provide guarantees for municipal bonds in case of default. (lnd)

Topics : OJK MunicipalBond
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Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sun, September 10, 2017 20:40 1890 4065a5a8898c7cc661d4adf97aff96df 1 National #Umrah,umrah,umrah-business,#Police,police,Religious-Affairs-Ministry Free

The National Police have called on the Religious Affairs Ministry to draft a detailed mechanism on haj and umrah (minor haj) services to ensure fair business competition and prevent scams.

"We hope all related stakeholders issue a clear policy as a guideline for people so that they will know the standard prices for umrah and haj services, National Police spokesman Brig. Gen. Rikwanto said on Saturday as quoted by kompas.com.

The statement was made amid an ongoing investigation into an umrah fraud scandal implicating First Travel, which was reported to have extorted hundreds of billions of rupiah from would-be umrah pilgrims.

Rikwanto said the policy should detail the pricing on the facilities given during the pilgrimage, including airfares, in a bid to help the consumers identify credible umrah or haj travel agencies.

"It [the policy] is to prevent unhealthy business competition that may harm people," Rikwanto said.

Following the First Travel case, the Indonesian Consumers Foundation (YLKI) has called on the police's criminal investigation office (Bareskrim) and the Religious Affairs Ministry to work further to uncover fraud allegedly committed by several other umrah travel agencies, such as Kafilah Rindu Ka'bah and Basmalah Tour.

According to YLKI, several Kafilah Rindu Ka'bah clients reported the agency to Bareskrim last year, while those using the services of Basmalah Tour lodged a report against the agency with the Bandung Police in 2014. (ipa)
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Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sun, September 10, 2017 21:48 1890 4065a5a8898c7cc661d4adf97affa192 2 National saracen,#hate-speech,hate-speech,police,#Police,#Hoax,hoax Free

The National Police continue to dig deeper into the Saracen group, an online syndicate accused of creating and spreading hoax news and hate speech for money, including by investigating their funding over the past three years.

We are still investigating Saracen. We are looking back about three or four years ago to investigate their funding, National Police spokesman Rikwanto said on Saturday as quoted from kompas.com.

The police have teamed up with the Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Center (PPATK) to investigate at least 14 bank accounts allegedly used in the Saracen campaign.

We are still waiting for the results from the PPATK to see what has being going on with the bank accounts, including whether there were flows of funds, Rikwanto added.

Police have named at least three suspects in the case, individuals who had allegedly acted as the groups administrators since July and spread hate speech and hoaxes on social media.

The group is believed to have been involved in spreading hoaxes and hate speech against President Joko Jokowi Widodo and former Jakarta governor Basuki Ahok Tjahaja Purnama, among others.

National Police chief Gen. Tito Karnavian previously promised to solve the case and bring all the culprits before the law. (ipa)
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Linkedin Sarah Frier and Jef Feeley (Bloomberg) San Francisco, United States  Sun, September 10, 2017 22:15 1890 4065a5a8898c7cc661d4adf97affae34 2 Business Facebook,Mark-Zuckerberg,court-hearing,share-ownership Free

Mark Zuckerberg is heading back to court.

Facebooks chief executive officer is expected to testify later this month in a shareholder lawsuit over voting power, according to a person familiar with the plans.

The trial, set to start Sept. 26, will explore whether the board had shareholder interests in mind when it approved a new class of non-voting shares. The move lets Zuckerberg keep voting control of Facebook even if he sells shares.

He asked for the change so he could give away most of his wealth to charities. But shareholders alleged conflict of interest in a complaint that disclosed an embarrassing episode: Director and venture capitalist Marc Andreessen worked with Zuckerberg behind the scenes to pass the change, even though he was on a committee that was supposed to look out for shareholders.

Facebook is confident that the special committee engaged in a thorough and fair process to negotiate a proposal in the best interests of Facebook and its shareholders, the company said in a statement on Friday.

This will be Zuckerbergs second court appearance this year. He testified in a case about whether the companys Oculus virtual reality headset maker used stolen computer code.

Zuckerberg said the claims were false, but Facebook lost, with a jury awarding $500 million to plaintiff ZeniMax Media.
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Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta  Sun, September 10, 2017 11:01 1891 4065a5a8898c7cc661d4adf97afeda1e 1 News AirAsia,frequent-flyer,Airlines,#airlines Free

Low-cost carrier AirAsia has launched a new loyalty program, which gives passengers the opportunity to accumulate frequent flyer points dubbed, "AirAsia BIG Points."

The Freedom Flyer program, said to be the first of its kind in the world, boasts a unique membership status system that is based on how often a passenger flies. The more frequently they hop on an AirAsia plane, the faster they receive BIG Points, no matter how much they spend.

According to a press release, it has four levels of membership status: Red for those who fly less than 13 times for short flights in the past 12 months, followed by Gold, Platinum and Black for members who travel with the airline 50 times or more.

Read also: AirAsia female pilots to wear specially designed hijab

For each Rp 32,000 (US$2.42) spent, Red members can obtain up to 20 BIG Points. Meanwhile Gold, Platinum and Black members can collect up to 40, 70 and 120 points, respectively.

Officially launched on Friday in Sepang, Malaysia, AirAsia founder and AirAsia Group CEO Tan Sri Tony Fernandes said the new program was part of the company's efforts to give its customers more freedom to live the lives they dreamed of. "When I started AirAsia with my partner, Datuk Kamarudin, we dreamed that we could democratized air travel so that it would no longer be a luxury that only some people could enjoy." (kes)
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Linkedin (Pesona Indonesia) Jakarta  Sun, September 10, 2017 14:02 1891 4065a5a8898c7cc661d4adf97aff0a5a 2 News Tourism-Ministry-Pesona-Indonesia,tourism-ministry-wonderful-Indonesia,Bali-tourism,tourism-promotion Free

The success of MATTA Fair that was held from Sept. 8 to 10 at the Putra World Trade Center, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia has motivated the Tourism Ministry to further develop Bali & Beyond Travel Fair (BBTF).

MATTA Fair has motivated me to improve BBTF; I would like for BBTF to rival MATTA Fair in the future, said the ministry's deputy minister for overseas promotion I Gde Pitana during the opening of MATTA Fair.

Last year, with tickets priced at RM 4 (US$0.95), MATTA Fair attracted around 40,000 visitors every day and recorded a total transaction of Rp 42 billion (US$3.18 million).

If we bring their success to BBTF and modify it with Balinese culture, it will be a huge market place and more foreign sellers and buyers who will do transactions in Indonesia, added Pitana.

According to Tourism Minister Arief Yahya, in order to be as successful as MATTA Fair, they need to do benchmarking, The things that MATTA Fair have done; analyze it and modify it to fit Indonesian characteristic, told Arief.

He also advised to not be afraid of outside competitors, If not through us, the [sellers] will sell through any market places from ITB Berlin, WTM London, FITUR Spain, MATTA Malaysia to NATTAS Singapore. Itd be better if they do the transaction in Bali or Indonesia. Lets make Bali a tourism hub, a market place, he added.

This years BBTF was attended by 174 sellers from 19 provinces and 198 local and foreign buyers. (kes)
As Wisconsin employers scramble to find both skilled and unskilled workers, many are wondering how Taiwanese manufacturer Foxconn will be able fill the 13,000 jobs it has promised for a new electronics factory in southeastern Wisconsin.

"When I hear that Foxconn is going to come to southern Wisconsin and have 13,000 jobs Im like: 'Better fly (the workers) over from China, because theyre not here,'" said Erik Anderson, president of Basin Precision Machining in Jefferson.

The project, which includes a nearly $3 billion state subsidy that the Assembly has approved and the Senate is expected to vote on this week, is projected to also create 10,000 construction jobs and 22,000 indirect jobs.

Those numbers are mystifying to Anthony Snyder, CEO of the Fox Valley Workforce Development Board.

"We have businesses that are screaming for labor. One employer wanted 300 people tomorrow and we are racking our brain trying to find these people," Snyder said. "I dont know where theyll find 10,000 people to fill those jobs."

Gov. Scott Walker and his administration counter that Foxconn and its potential $10 billion investment in the state will be a transformational opportunity that will raise Wisconsin's profile nationally, drawing workers and their families and friends to the state.

Workforce Development Secretary Ray Allen likened the situation to when Citibank moved to Sioux Falls, South Dakota, in 1981, turning a small city of 80,000 into a financial services capital now with twice the population.

"Obviously they didnt have the population to support the jobs available there," Allen said. "Foxconn puts Wisconsin on the map for things other than cheeseheads and Green Bay Packers.  Theyll migrate to Wisconsin to address the labor needs of the future."

But while Citibank moved to Sioux Falls during a recession, Foxconn will likely be trying to lure workers to Wisconsin during a time of low unemployment.

A preliminary analysis commissioned by the Wisconsin Economic Development Corp. estimated as many as half of the construction workers and Foxconn workforce could come from other states, primarily Illinois where unemployment and underemployment are higher than in Wisconsin. The Walker administration disputes that figure and says based on the high percentage of jobs in Racine and Kenosha counties filled by Wisconsin workers that only 10 percent of the Foxconn workers would come from out of state.

WEDC CEO Mark Hogan has said the average Foxconn wage will be about $54,000 and factory employees will make at least $20 an hour plus benefits. But Rep. Gordon Hintz, D-Oshkosh, is skeptical the pay will be enough to entice enough workers from other parts of the country to move to the Racine area.

"Will a company that is very cutthroat about its margins respond to the market?" Hintz asked. "If they have a wage of $20 an hour and theyre unable to get people from all over the country to move to these jobs, will they increase wages or will that encourage them to automate?"

In an interview, Walker pointed to the oil boom in North Dakota as an example of workers being drawn to a sparsely populated area. But those jobs were paying at one point on average $112,000 a year with starting salaries averaging $66,000.

Another example state officials cite is the Tesla Motors battery factory in Nevada, which received a $1.3 billion incentive package to create an estimated 6,500 direct jobs, though the company won't disclose wages. The factory opened earlier this year, but only after construction workers walked off the job last year in protest of about a third of the labor force being lower paid and from out of state.

Foxconn, which plans to manufacture liquid-crystal display panels for use in TVs, smartphones, self-driving vehicles, health care devices and other devices, isn't divulging details about its wages. In a statement, the company said "employees are attracted to our company because of the competitive compensation packages we offer, the range of benefits that include access to expanded technical training and other education programs, and the leading-edge technologies that we produce."

The company added it will be "actively engaged in training programs, many in partnership with Wisconsin educational institutions, that will help us meet our recruitment targets for the Wisconsin facility."

According to an economic impact analysis commissioned by the company, about 2,400 employees will be highly skilled engineers, 820 employees will provide business support and the majority, about 9,800 employees, will be hourly operators and technicians.

Compared with other manufacturers, U.S. electronic component manufacturers tend to have a larger share of jobs that require a higher education degree and pay higher wages, and a lower share of jobs that are likely to be automated, according to a recent analysis by UW-Extension community development specialist Matt Kures. U.S. electronic equipment assemblers make on average $15.38 an hour and technicians make $28.38 an hour.

Walker said he has discussed with Foxconn the possibility of building housing at an affordable cost near the plant to further entice workers to move from other states. The company said in a statement it has discussed with Walker "a willingness to support such initiatives if the state and local officials believe they fit the relevant development plans."
Today is World Suicide Prevention Day. Social media and forums often get a lot of bad press. Horrific stories have emerged where people have encouraged others to take their lives and even watched people livestreaming themselves doing just that. However, whilst this dark side of the internet exists, I like to believe that more people are the complete opposite of that.

With the internet and social media, you can connect to people anywhere in the world at any time of day. As someone who has experienced depression, there is something very comforting in the fact that there is always someone there to talk to whenever you need to.

I have been known to get in touch with people I known online at four in the morning to help them see their thoughts in a different light.

In fact, Ive actually searched on Twitter before in my spare time to find people in need. I like to think that Ive helped talk at least a couple of people out of suicide.

After all, it is a permanent solution to a temporary problem. So many people Ive spoken to over the years are so glad they didnt take that final, permanent action.

Although their life seemed so terribly unhappy at that moment in time, they wouldnt have the wonderful lives that they enjoy today.

As well as people like me who try to do their bit to help when they can, there are also organisations such as the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline who developed a Facebook chat add-on.

It allows Facebook users to report behaviour that they believe is suicidal, which then triggers a connection. The user in question is then contacted via email, encouraging them to either call the helpline or click on a link to start an online chat with a trained counsellor.

There are also similar systems on Twitter and Tumblr. Unfortunately, it is reliant on people reporting behaviour that they think could suggest a person is suicidal.

Just think about the amount of times people say things like ugh, kill me now if they have an exam or dead with laughing emojis underneath a meme. Comments such as these could easily be misconstrued by an algorithm.

The fact is it would be too tricky to create something reliable enough to scan everything as suicidal language, or what could be interpreted as such, since it is used in everyday life by people who dont intend to actually harm themselves.

Google Lifeline has also partnered withso that if someone searches suicide, or many related queries, the top sponsored links are suicide prevention resources and the telephone number for Lifeline.

Technology can be used for good, as we have seen time and time again and this use of social media and the internet to help prevent suicide is certainly welcome.
Following his success with the Lula Landry murder case in The Cuckoo's Calling, Strike's business is on the rise, but the disappearance of a controversial author proves too tantalising to resist.The episode begins with disturbing effect, as a woman angrily pours through a mysterious article in the newspaper. Seemingly aggreived, she takes a safety pin and sticks it through her breast with an excerpt of "Father Dearest" attached, before going to the kitchen and placing her head in the oven. A truly unsettling scene, this mysterious suicide sets the tone for the episode - which is just as grim and perplexing. Meanwhile, Strike awakens from a flashback/dream about his ex-fiancee Charlotte, who is now married to another man. In the office, business is booming - as is evident by Strike's more favourable accomodations and the constantly ringing phone. Two clients await him; one is a rude, misogynistic businessman, the other a quiet, dishevelled looking woman. After dismissing his "tosser client", Strike speaks to Leonora Quine (Monica Dolan) who pleads with him to find her husband, Owen, and bring him home. Leonora suspects that Owen is at an author's retreat, or with one of his many mistresses. Although she hasn't much to offer in the way of payment, Strike agrees to look into Owen's disappearance, heading first to visit Quine's agent, Liz Tassel, who speaks venomously about the author and his most recent transcript - "Bombyx Mori" - which she describes as a "thinly disguised attack" on his family, friends and co-workers. Visiting Quine's home, Strike meets Leonora's daughter, Orlando, who is severely disabled and desperate for her Daddy to return home. Clearly devoted to the needs of her daughter, it's hard not to think of Leonora as "one of the good ones" - her plight as a mother wanting to appease her daughter is very sympathetic - not only for the audience, but for Strike as well. Strike gets a hold of the manuscript and begins to round up suspects who feature within it, including a shady editor and an erotic blogger with whom Quine was having an affair.Later, as a form of comic respite, Strike finally meets Robin's humourless fiancee, Matt, as the three gather for drinks at the local pub. It is clear that Matt dislikes Strike (and his effect on Robin) and this shows as they enter a tense, ultra-masculine discussion about sport. In an effort to ease the tension, Robin gives Strike an invitation to their wedding. As Matt discusses work, Strike reveals that he is planning to hire a new investigator to help with the influx of work - much to Robin's surprise and upset. Following their dour meeting, a sullen Strike retreats home to lament more over Charlotte. He briefly skims through the transcript of Bombyx Mori, evoking scenes of a weird cult with skull masks and torturous devices. Clearly, something is awry. As Robin delves further into the transcript and the suspects therein, Strike discovers that Quine co-owned a home with another author, Andrew Fancourt. Fancourt and Quine fell out after Quine (allegedly) published a cruel parody of his wife's work, leading her to commit suicide - the act of which we witnessed at the start of the episode. Curious as to whether Owen could be hiding there, Strike heads to the building, immediately affronted by a bad smell - which as all keen crime-drama fans know, is never a good sign. Inside, Strike discovers the gruesome remains of Quine, whose gutted, acid-doused corpse lays sprawled across the floor. As his missing persons case quickly develops into a murder investigation, Strike deduces that the events of Bombyx Mori came true, with Quine meeting the same grisly fate as the hero. As always in detective stories such as this, the police investigators who visit the scene are quick to jump to the wrong conclusions, eyeing Leonora as their obvious prime suspect. Believing her to be innocent, Strike does his best to dissuade their suspicion while he searches for the true killer. Meanwhile, Matt's mum dies suddenly of a stroke, leading Robin to rush to his side for support. Following the widespread news of Owen's murder, his publisher Daniel Chard (Tim McInnerny) invites Strike to Dorset in order to discuss the case. Split between her loyalty to Matt and her dedication to the work that she and Strike do, Robin elects to drive Strike there herself. When they arrive, Chard asks for a "confidential" meeting with Strike - alienating Robin. Alone, he tells Strike of his suspicions about Bombyx Mori, suggesting that Quine had an accomplice who helped him gather scandalous secrets about his co-workers to incorporate into the transcript. Convinced that there are two voices in the writing, he offers Strike 10,000 to prove who the definitive author of the piece is. Quite what has shaken Chard so much about the transcript has yet to be seen, but with every new piece of information, the plot of Bombyx Mori becomes more intriguing. Later, at a roadside cafe, Robin and Strike engage in an emotional conversation, in which a visibly hurt Robin asks Strike why he hired her if he has plans to hire new investigators and treat her as an assistant. In his own soft, yet gruff manner, Strike explains that as a full-time investigator, her marriage to Matthew would be put under strain. Though Robin clearly has what it takes - including some mad good driving skills - her relationship and her work aspirations seem to be at dire odds with each other. As Strike and Robin return to London, the police arrest Leonora - resulting in a deeply upsetting scene in which an emotional Leonora tries to reassure her distraught daughter as she is led away. The injustice of such an obvious, ill-warranted arrest, coupled with the separation of a mother and her distressed, disabled child is a heart-rending wallop of a cliffhanger - further elevated by Monica Dolan's affecting performance. Though this episode was something of a slow-burner in terms of getting the investigation started, this new case certainly holds promise. Completely disparate from the glamour of The Cuckoo's Calling, The Silkworm has got off to a gruesome start - and marred by the feeling that justice has been sidetracked, we can't wait for the next chapter.
Google has created a website that reveals the most popular How to searches entered into Google around the world, with DIY queries dominating the results.

Research by Google News Labs has been turned into a visual essay by Xaquin G.V. detailing the different things UK internet users turn to Google Search to find out.

(Yui Mok/PA)

The most common searches in the UK revolved around how to fix things around the house  walls, doors and windows were among the most frequent inquiries.

Light bulbs, sinks and toilets also featured in the top results.

But it wasnt just DIY-related tasks that were common How tos  users wanted to know more about  how to boil an egg, how to kiss and how to tie a tie were all common searches among global users.

(Katie Collins/PA)

The essay revealed how so-called coming-of-age questions such as how to make money and how to start a business were also popular searches.

The essay also showed how searches are affected by timing  queries on how to lose weight spike in January and early summer as Google searchers chase that beach body, while cooking asparagus searches follow the vegetables growing season, according to the research.

Googles search engine is the most widely used in the world, clocking up more than 3.5 billion searches every single day.
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In her almost 30 years working in human resources, Wendy Cuevas has never experienced the kind of difficulty hiring workers as she has today.

At Monroe-based Klondike Cheese, where Cuevas is human resources manager, she has hired 188 temporary and full-time workers over the past year  for a company that only has 205 employees total. The starting wage is $13 an hour.

So far, 131 of them have left, some of them fired for missing too many days, others quitting because the work or commute is too difficult, or because it's easy to find another job, she said.

"It takes me so many people to get one that gets in and stays," Cuevas said. "I spend so much time training people. Theyre late. They dont show up.  I was raised in a time when work was the most important thing. (Now its) 'I can get another job tomorrow.'"

Cuevas has worked in human resources at different companies since 1988 and said it has never been this difficult to find workers with basic "employability skills" such as the ability to show up on time. Sometimes employees wouldn't show up at all, she said, because of car trouble, lack of child care and court appearances.

The difficulty persists despite the company offering health and dental benefits, a 1.8 percent 401(k) match, an annual 5 percent profit-sharing 401(k) contribution and two years ago bumping up starting pay from $10 to $13 an hour, or about $33,800 a year based on the required 50-hour work week.

Employees often earn more than that by sometimes working mandatory overtime shifts on Saturdays, but Cuevas acknowledges the labor is hard and keeps workers on their feet for long stretches.

"Ive seen where its difficult to get employees," Cuevas said. "Ive never seen where people dont stay."

But Pat Schramm, CEO of the Workforce Development Board of South Central Wisconsin, said the going rate for starting manufacturing wages is now in the $15 to $18 an hour range, depending on where the company is located. Those paying $10 to $13 are now finding themselves in the lower range.

"The guys who arent going to pay are not going to stay in business," Schramm said. "Theres too much competition."
After clinching Valley title, playoff seed, South Dakota State football prepares for two weeks off

Having two weeks off before the playoffs is unusual, but the Jackrabbits could use it to get healthy
About 150 students at two-year colleges around Wisconsin are expected to enroll in a new UW-Madison program giving first-generation college students a year or more of free tuition when they transfer to the states flagship public university, officials said.

UW-Madison Chancellor Rebecca Blank wrote in a semester welcome message on Wednesday that Badger Promise  a program pledging grants to cover the cost of tuition for transfer students who are the first in their family to attend college  will sign up its first participants this fall.

Blank had floated the program in February, as University of Wisconsin System leaders made their pitch for more higher education funding in the coming state budget, saying she could pursue it only if her university had enough money.

While the overdue budget has not been finished, the UW System is on track to receive $36.2 million in new state funding over the next two years, and Blank said her campus will move forward with Badger Promise.

UW-Madison officials did not offer many specifics about the program following Blanks message, citing plans to formally unveil it later this month. They declined to provide a full list of two-year colleges where students will be eligible for Badger Promise, or an estimate of how much the initiative is expected to cost.

The basics of the program that Blank sketched out in February remain the same, however.

Badger Promise is open to first-generation college students who transfer to UW-Madison from one of the UW Systems two-year campuses or certain technical colleges, including Madison Area Technical College.

Once they transfer, participants will receive grants that cover the cost of tuition for their first year at UW-Madison, campus spokeswoman Meredith McGlone said.

Those who are eligible for federal Pell grants, which are given to low-income college students, would receive a second year of free tuition as well.

The programs inaugural class, which UW-Madison will begin signing up this semester, is expected to include about 150 students who are currently in their first or second year at two-year colleges.

The first students to receive aid from the program will enroll at UW-Madison for the fall 2018 semester, McGlone said.

We hope the program expands as more Wisconsin families learn of this opportunity, Blank said.

Participants, like others who want to transfer from two-year schools to UW-Madison, will have to sign contracts that guarantee them admission to the university if they meet GPA and credit requirements.

Badger Promise comes as UW-Madison has faced questions about its accessibility for low-income and first-generation college students; the number of first-generation students at the university has been declining, even as overall enrollment has grown.

The program is also the latest example of free-tuition promise initiatives that have sprouted up at public colleges and universities in an effort to ease the growing financial burden of higher education for low-income families.

MATC is enrolling its first class this fall of Scholars of Promise  low-income students who receive free tuition. Three-quarters of the 210 participants in the program are first-generation college students.
The Division of Heaven and Earth not only relates to the struggle of the courageous Tibetan people who took part in a large-scale uprising in the Spring of 2008 on the Tibetan plateau but it also brings a different perspective on the tragic fate of the Land of Snows.

Though Tagyal, writing under the pseudonym Shokdung, has lived his entire life under an authoritarian regime, he is convinced about some positive aspects of the Marxist revolution.

On 2 May 1999, on the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the 4 May student revolution in China, he published an article in Qinghai Tibetan News, titled Blood-letting to kill the tumour of ignorance, using the Marxist theory to argue that the new cannot be established without destroying the old. For him Tibetan society and culture were backward, and in order to evolve further the ingrained influence of Buddhism on Tibetan attitudes must be wiped out.

At that time, the article provoked a fierce debate in Tibetan society.

But when The Division of Heaven and Earth was published in China, the government was displeased; it immediately banned the book and Shokdung was arrested. As the preface puts it, But now that he has antagonised the Chinese state and Tibetan society in different ways, this book can be seen as a milestone marking his move into political opposition.

This makes Shokdungs work all the more interesting. An important issue, which has been ignored by most students of history of the 1962 India-China War, is the Tibetan factor, which greatly hampered a longer conflict with India. In early 1962, the population of the high plateau had begun showing strong signs of discontent. It was manifested by a 70,000-character petition sent by the Panchen Lama, then the most senior Lama in Tibet, to the Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai in April 1962.

In September, one month before the war, during a CCP Conference, Mao denounced the poisonous arrow sent by the Lama and called him an enemy of our class. Tibet was in a state of unrest and that certainly shortened the war.

Already on 11 March 1959, the entire population of Lhasa had revolted to protect the Dalai Lama who had been summoned by the Chinese General commanding the PLA in Lhasa to attend a play inside the Chinese camp without his escort.

A week later the Dalai Lama, escorted by a band of some 200 brave Khampas, took the road to exile in India. In September 1987, a few days after the Dalai Lama presented his Five Point Peace Plan to the US Congress in Washington DC, riots erupted again in the Tibetan capital.

Unrest continued sporadically during the following two years, to deteriorate further in March 1989 after the massacre of more than 400 Tibetans near the Central Cathedral on 6 March. Martial law was subsequently imposed for a year. The Chinese State learned its lesson; it installed sophisticated video cameras strategically all over Lhasa and other large cities in Tibet.

That did not stop 500 monks of the Drepung monastery, commemorating the 49th anniversary of the 1959 uprising, to demonstrate on 10 March 2008. Shokdung analysed this important event using historical examples to argue his views.

At the end of the 1940s, Finally the Tibetans, who seek spiritual perfection for all living beings, became aware of the rest of the world, and arranged to send a delegation abroad. The land and people of Tibet appeared to stand for nothing and no one in particular, like a fox riding on a tigers back, at which anyone could aim a kick, and so it has remained until now: a country of nobodies, sitting idle after banging the drum in celebration of their own defeat.

He has strong words for the prevailing political system at that time, a history of repeated capitulation, sectarian conflict, priestpatron alliances and closure to the outside world.

While the world around spoke of liberation,the Tibetans were stuck in their pursuit of religion, and through seeking protection in the political sphere, failed to secure their own political interests.

The authoritarian system imposed by China and the Tibetan aspirations eventually led the author to jail.

His ideas are unusual for an outside reader  our largescale peaceful revolution is a sure sign of a new awareness of nationality, culture and territory.This revolution  was like a stone thrown into a pond, sending ripples out in all directions.

He sees the spontaneous 2008 uprising as a waking up of the Tibetan nation to its own identity, which was earlier centered on Buddhism alone. Shokdung claimed that for a thousand years, the Tibetan people had been taken in by the Non-Self doctrine of Buddhism, thereby losing their own Self, Therefore, unless the engrained influences of the Buddhist Non-Self on the Tibetan psyche were erased, they would never realise the Self of imperial territoriality and ancestry.

The Communist regime was obviously not pleased by this hidden nationalism, but interestingly his beliefs are also far away from the discourse of the Tibetan diaspora.

(The reviewer is an expert on China-Tibet relations and author of Fate of Tibet)
A court here has acquitted an RLD candidate in the 2017 Delhi civic polls of the charge of defacing public property by pasting her campaign posters on an electric pole, as the complainant himself was the investigating officer in the case.

Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Munish Markan absolved the woman, who contested the election from Jaitpur ward on a Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) ticket, of the offence under the Delhi Prevention of Defacement of Property (DPDP) Act.

It was alleged that three posters carrying the womans photograph and phone number appealing for votes were found pasted on an electric pole, a government property.

Acquitting the woman of the charge, the court said, It is well-settled law that the complainant should not be the investigating officer in a case so as to rule out any ill will or bias against the accused.

The court also noted that there was lack of evidence to show that police officials were present on the spot at the time of the commission of the alleged offence.

Therefore, considering the totality of facts and circumstance, in my considered opinion, prosecution has failed to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt on numerous fronts, which are lack of evidence regarding the factum of witnesses 1 and 2 (police officials) being present on the spot at the alleged date and time, failure to prove the photographs, non- joining of public witnesses and the complainant himself becoming the investigating officer, the magistrate said.

According to the complaint lodged by a sub-inspector, three posters of the woman candidate from the RLD were found on an electric pole near NTPC Ground, Jaitpur on April 11 this year as an appeal for votes for the municipal corporations of Delhi (MCD) elections held on April 23.

An FIR was registered for the offence under section 3 of the DPDP Act which provides that whoever defaces a public property by writing or marking with ink, chalk, paint or any other material except for the purpose of indicating the name and address of the owner of such property, may face up to one-year jail or fine which may extend to Rs 50,000 or both.

The woman had denied the allegations and claimed she was innocent as she did not paste any poster on the pole.
Two years ago the photograph of a lifeless little boy washed up on a Turkish beach went viral. For a moment, the indignity done to the boy and his grieving family seemed to offer hope that a prevailing political hostility to refugees fleeing to Europe would be overcome.

Alan Kurdi became a symbol of the plight of so many others fleeing conflict and persecution in Syria and elsewhere.

His tragic death laid bare the consequences of governments refusal to provide the safe routes they and their families need to reach a place where they can rebuild shattered lives. David Cameron, then Prime Minister, declared how deeply moved he was by the dead boys image. He quickly announced a substantial expansion of what had been a tiny UK resettlement programme for Syrian refugees. But hope faded fast.

Theresa May, as Home Secretary, spoke at the Conservative Party conference barely a month later. She vowed to reduce the number of people reaching the UK to seek asylum, and to be even less tolerant of those who did.

Not in a thousand years would the UK join Europe in a common approach, she added. Leadership of this kind on this issue was not new from the then Home Secretary. Needless to say, it did nothing to help secure collective commitment across Europe to respect the right to asylum of people forced to seek safety by crossing the sea.

Instead, various countries rushed to build more walls, fences and other less tangible barriers, from which smugglers and corrupt officials continued to profit by exploiting those needing to get past.

And in spring 2016, with the EU Turkey deal, European countries agreed to pay Turkey to take back people who crossed to Greece while preventing others from making the journey.

This agreement has been celebrated by politicians and political commentators across Europe, including in the UK. Yet, since the deal tens of thousands of women, men and children have been trapped in limbo in Greece. Turkey has descended rapidly into authoritarianism with an increasing risk that many of its citizens will need to flee the country.

And other countries have followed Europe in excluding and evicting refugees. For all the political sound bites about how the UK Government policy has been to keep refugees safe in the region, the reality is that Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan have each been forcing Syrians back to conflict and terror while preventing others from escaping. But it doesnt end there. In her 2015 party conference speech, our current Prime Minister looked back to when as she somewhat modestly put it despite its many flaws and its criminal leadership, Libya was known as Europes forward border.

The nostalgia for a time, in which British officials could work with a repressive Libyan regime to prevent people fleeing war and poverty from reaching Europe, was palpable. The UK Government, like others in Europe, is once again dealing with Libya to try to block migration.

But there is no Libyan regime now.

Rather there are disparate parties, tribes and militias vying for power, legitimacy and money. In this chaos, migrants are especially vulnerable to exploitation whether they came to Libya to work or already hoping to reach Europe.

Slavery, kidnapping for ransom, torture and rape are just some of the myriad abuses and atrocities refugees and other migrants suffer. Whether held in official detention centres or by gangs and militias, they are at risk.

As highlighted by Amnestys recent report Europe: A perfect storm, supporting corrupt bodies in Libya such as the coastguard exposes people to these horrors. As European governments assistance grows in trapping or returning people to Libya, they too will be complicit in human rights violations.

Those vying for power  whether to run the country or control a neighbourhood now see the chance of securing European money by promising to curb migration to Europe. While the cash flows, they may be content to shut down smuggling routes.

If it dries up, they can reopen those routes whatever pays best. And why would they ever completely close these routes? Simply ending migration would remove their hold over those governments willing to pay or provide political backing.

Meanwhile, there are other opportunities to exploit people who need to get out of Libya.

Two years on from a moment when public and politicians cried never again, it is all too clear that our political leaders have not set out to end the death and suffering of people forced to flee, nor their mistreatment at the hands of armed gangs and corrupt officials. Rather, our leaders seem determined merely to keep as far away as possible the death and suffering of the children, women and men who just like Alan Kurdi have only smugglers and other abusers to turn to in their desperate search for safety.

Deals that may temporarily slow migration at the cost of prolonging violence and suffering or exacerbating the root causes of why people need to flee are cruel and short-sighted. Governments must prioritise saving lives by maintaining search and rescue at sea while extending resettlement, family reunion and other visas for refugees to reach safety.

Over the longer term, they must address those root causes like conflict, repression and global inequality.

(The Independent)
BJP President Amit Shah on Sunday appealed to people in Gujarat not to feel the absence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi from the political scenario of the state and stated that he was better placed now to work for the development of the state than as its Chief Minister.

Amit Shah said: There is no need to miss Narendra Modi in Gujarat. He placed Gujarat on the growth map as the Chief Minister, as the Prime Minister he is doing much for the development of the state. Who is more powerful, the Chief Minister or the Prime Minister?

Shah was answering a question during a town hall video interaction with youth located at 100 places across the State. The event was called Adikham Gujarat (Resolute Gujarat) where the BJP chief claimed to have addressed one lakh youth by taking questions through the social media. He said, Today I am not a politician, but a professor. He claimed 3.5 lakh questions had come and this spoke of the expectations and hopes from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Amid applause at the jam-packed Deendayal Hall, a questioner asked: Politically we feel the absence of Narendra Modi and the scenario does not look the same after he has gone. What does the party intend to do?

Shah grinned and said, As the Prime Minister, he is helping in Gujarats development by taking decisions at the snap of a finger. Within 10 days of assuming power in Delhi, the permission to increase the height of the Narmada dam came. And now he has ensured the radial gates are put at the dam.

He travels across India with the interests of Gujarat in his mind and heart. Modi is very much here.

Another questioner praised the Narendra Modi government for demonetization as an effort to put an end to corruption in high places but wanted to know what was being done at the lower echelons of the government structure. In reply, Shah said, We are doing a lot. An example of this is the direct benefit transfer scheme that we brought where subsidy benefits to poor are deposited directly in their bank accounts.

This amount works out to a whopping Rs 59,000 crore. By the direct benefit transfer initiative, we have stopped corruption to the tune of Rs 59,000 crore. No media, no journalist had exposed this huge corruption because it was not visible, the BJP chief said.

The youngsters in the state were asked to send questions through Twitter, Facebook or by giving a missed call on 7878182182 and register themselves to send questions. Alternatively, they could ask questions on www.adikhamgujarat.com.
The Indian Embassy in Yangon with the help of Myanmar police has rescued eight Manipuri tribal girls who were to be taken to Thailand and Singapore by some international human traffickers, an official said.

S. Suresh Babu, Additional Chief Secretary, Manipur in a statement said that the Indian government swung into action following an SOS to Manipur police from the eight girls who were lodged in a hotel near the central railway station, Yangon, before being taken away to Thailand and Singapore for flesh trade.

With this, the number of tribal girls rescued from the clutches of the sex traders in the past few weeks has increased to 15.

Some local members of the international gang, all hailing from Churachandpur district of Manipur, were arrested.

Suresh Babu said: The eight girls from Churachandpur district were taken to Myanmar via Moreh, the border town. The girls managed to ring up the police in the district appealing to rescue them.

The Manipur government got in touch with the central government which in turn instructed the Indian Embassy to do the needful. With the help of the Myanmarese police, the Embassy officials raided the hotel. The girls are now in the protective custody of police. Arrangements are being made to bring them back to Manipur.

Police in Manipur disclosed on Sunday that two persons have been arrested in connection with the trafficking of these girls.
Children cannot be expected to walk three or more kilometres to attend school, the Supreme Court has said. It said to make the right of education meaningful, efforts should be made to have upper primary schools in such a manner that no children have to walk such a distance only to attend schools.

The court was dealing with a matter in which permission granted to a school to upgrade itself was opposed by a nearby school in Kerala, which has the highest literacy rate in the country.

A bench of Justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta noted that students who have passed Class IV in a junior primary school based in Parappanangadi town, have to travel a distance of 3-4 or more kilometres to attend classes.

We cannot expect children in the age group of 10 to 14 years to walk 3 kilometres or more to attend school. The right of education up to the age of 14 years is now a fundamental right under article 21A of the Constitution and if this right is to be meaningful, then efforts must be made to open upper primary schools in such a manner that no child has to walk 3 kilometres or more only to attend school, the bench said.

The school was upgraded to the level of upper primary school and permitted to run from Class V to VIII also by the state government in June 2015. The states order was challenged before the high court by another school which claimed that the procedure prescribed under the Kerala Education Rules, 1959 were not followed and no notice was given to schools in the vicinity to raise any objection with regard to the up gradation.

A single judge of the high court had allowed the plea filed by the school and set aside the states order on the ground that the procedure prescribed under the Act was not followed.

It, however, had allowed the junior primary school to permit students already admitted to continuing their education till the next academic year and said that it would be open for the government to take a fresh decision on the matter.

The junior primary school had challenged the order before a division bench of the high court which dismissed its plea. The school then moved the apex court and its counsel told the bench that the government had taken a conscious decision to give relaxation in its favour and exempt it from certain provisions of the Act and it was then upgraded to an upper primary school from the academic year 2015-2016.

The apex court, while setting aside the high courts orders, said no other school was situated at a distance of fewer than three kilometres from the junior primary school.
Amidst the glitz and glamour, fun and excitement of the 70th anniversary of Independence, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in his high-decibel speech from the rampart of the Red Fort on 15 August, exhorted Team India to strive for the creation of a New India by 2022, when the country is due to celebrate the 75th anniversary of freedom.

To give due credit to his oratorical skills, his appeal for substituting the chalta hai (let it be) approach by badal sakta hai (change is possible) mindset must have stirred up the patriotic fervor of true nationalists, who are beseeched by Modis dream of an India which will be the El Dorado of the poor, the youth and women, and will be free of corruption and black money.

While fervently painting the rosy picture of India to come, Modi made quick and passing references to some aberrations that have pained him, notably the loss of lives and property in the flood-hit areas. On 15 August, a photograph of an elderly school master and his very young pupils, saluting the hoisted national flag while standing in waist-deep water in a flooded village of Assam, went viral and caused a further melting of the hearts of nationalists at such a glorious expression of patriotism..

One hopes that the emotions will bring about a genuine transformation of the chalta hai attitude to a badal sakta hai orientation on the part of those at the helm of governance.

India faces the grave challenge of responding to the threat of climate change, perhaps more than any other country in this planet.

UN humanitarian agencies have recently reported that more than 40 million people have been affected by devastating floods and landslides in South Asia and India alone accounts for 32 million people afflicted by such natural calamities this year.

The countrys monsoon season runs from June to September and usually leads to floods, but this years disaster is said to be the worst to affect the region in years.

Experts have said that rising sea surface temperatures in South Asia have led to more moisture in the atmosphere; hence the torrential rainfall, a situation caused by climate change. Large parts of Assam, Meghalaya, Bihar and West Bengal and even Gujarat were flooded following heavy rain and the resultant destruction of lives and properties.

Many submerged regions remained cut off for days, and it was difficult for relief and rescue operations to be undertaken.

Even the roads of one of our mega cities, Mumbai, turned into rivers of death recently following torrential rain and the tragic death of a reputed doctor who fell into the manhole of a submerged street is testament to the utter failure of the municipal bodies to tackle the deluge. The present government at the Centre has an unflattering record on tackling environmental issues. India continues to be highly dependent on coal and fossil fuel as sources of energy, and the process of switching over to clean energy like solar and wind power have not made rapid progress, despite abundant availability of these renewable sources of energy.

As Modi promised a pucca house for every poor person by 2022 in his Independence day speech, and politicians of lesser importance keep fanning the revolution of rising expectations of the common man for access to concrete roads, bridges, malls and other facilities, the farm lands and wetlands keep disappearing. Land sharks in cahoots with corrupt politicians have wrought havoc to our ecosystem.

The National Mission for Sustaining the Himalayan Ecosystem is in place. And yet unplanned construction in the upper edges of Uttarakhand and adjoining areas are continuing unabated. This has accentuated the threat of landslides and flash floods. Reckless deforestation and urbanization have resulted in record-breaking heat waves, that have killed thousands during the last two summers.

Drought has damaged crops, causing starvation and a spate of suicides by farmers. As global temperatures continue to rise, hotweather countries like India feel that the limits of habitability are being stretched. Excessive heating leads to uncontrolled downpour, as has happened this year, and thus India is caught in the vortex of cyclical waves of drought and floods, with severe repercussions like the rapid spread of vector borne diseases.

After years of neglect and apathy, when push comes to shove, the authorities are driven to drastic measures as happened in Bangalore where the government undertook a demolition drive of buildings constructed illegally on encroached storm-water drains and lake beds across the city. Such constructions were blocking the flow of rain water, and thus submerged of this high-tech city.

How could the rich and powerful realtors construct such structures in flagrant violation of existing environmental norms?

This is the crucial question which is yet to be answered. An all-out effort to sensitise common people about the need to restrict our hunger for urban facilities so as to minimise the destabilizing impact on environment and climate is direly imperative.

Mobilization of massive investment and technological prowess for afforestation, for the prevention of soil erosion, for proper management of our rivers and dams, and for disaster management are required to avert further catastrophes.

The Modi government has decided to ratify the Paris climate pact, which seeks to limit the Earths warming to below 2 degrees Celsius. But to keep its pledge, India needs to confront the unpalatable reality that it alone accounts for 4.5 per cent of the worlds greenhouse gases. India needs to be more active globally to push through the agenda of the Paris deal. Though our Prime Minister avoided raising the issue of climate change during his last meeting with President Trump, now is the time to aggressively campaign on the urgency of tackling climate change and dispel the misconception that climate change is a myth.

In the midst of the chest-thumping after the amicable resolution of the Doklam stand-off with China, our difficult neighbour, hardly any attention was paid to the disturbing news that China did not share hydrological data on the Sutlej and Brahmaputra rivers with India during the flood season this year. Incidentally, rumours were rife in Assam and north Bengal that the exceptionally heavy flooding this year was due to the release of water from a dam built on the Chinese part of Brahmaputra ~ Yarlong Tsangpo ~ though there is no evidence to corroborate this. Improving riparian diplomacy with our neighbours, Pakistan, Bangladesh and China, pulling together technical know-how for better management of crosscountry rivers and for tackling climate change issues call for statesmanship and a visionary approach.

Climate change issues need to be accorded top priority if India wants to avert the apocalypse and if we want to see those children and the teacher of the village of Assam raising the tricolour on dry land in 2022.

(The writer is Associate Professor, Department of Political Science, Womens Christian College, Kolkata)
Three Indian companies had bid for a 20 percent stake in developing the half built East Container Terminal at the Colombo Port, but there has been no response for nearly six months, diplomatic sources said yesterday.

The Ports Authority called for Expressions of Interest (EoI) totaling $400 million in June last year, to complete the half built East Container Terminal ,which in its present form has a 440 meter long 18 meter deep quay wall, a 20 hectares yard area and connected facilities which had cost over $80 million.

The proposed 1,200 meter project when completed, would make the ECT two meters deeper.

The Colombo Port was a transshipment hub for around 75 percent of Indian exports and imports the sources said. Inordinate delays could lead to Indian States going ahead with calls from its shipping companies to develop their own deep sea ports, to the detriment of Sri Lanka.

At the time the EoI was announced, former Ports and Shipping Minister Arjuna Ranatunga said that the Government was looking for an investor who should come in with a shipping operator from India, Pakistan or Bangladesh.

The Port of Colombo, currently handles over five million containers a year.

(The Island)
The Syrian army on Saturday broke the Islamic State (IS) siege on the military airport of Deir al-Zour city in eastern Syria.

The progress came after the troops advanced toward the airbase, which had been besieged by IS along with the city for three years, Xinhua reported citing SANA agency as saying.

The troops, which broke the IS siege on the city earlier this week, reached the airbase and met with the besieged soldiers inside it.

Capturing the airbase is a strategic win for the army in its quest to drive IS out of Deir al-Zour and its countryside.

When the base was besieged, the soldiers could not fly warplanes as IS would target them.

Now, the base is expected to return to operation after the army has cleansed the vicinity of the airbase.

A Syrian officer told Xinhua by phone that IS was collapsing in Deir al-Zour.

Syrian Foreign Ministry said the war on IS is close to the end given heavy defeats the terror group is suffering.
Finnish officials on Saturday confirmed that US Undersecretary of State Thomas Shannon and Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov will meet in Helsinki next week.

They will also meet Finnish President Sauli Niinisto, the Finnish presidential office confirmed to local media.

According Xinhua news agency, the agenda of the meeting, to be held on September 11-12, has not been reported. The US State Department noted that the two ministers will address areas of bilateral concern and cooperation.

Russian newsagency RIA Nowosti also reported the upcoming meeting on Saturday, quoting Russian diplomatic sources.

Teija Tiilikainen, director of the Finnish Institute for International Affairs, told newspaper Helsingin Sanomat that in the current international political situation the meeting has a greater importance than usual.

Although the agenda has not been released, Tiilikainen said it could be long. She mentioned the issues such as the situation in Syria, the Baltic Sea and the North Korea.

US and Soviet politicians and diplomats used to meet in Helsinki especially during the 1980s.

Tiilikainen commented that during his visit to Washington in late August, Niinisto got a lot of attention from US President Donald Trump.

Perhaps the impression was obtained in Washington that Finland has a perspective and that it has a strong dialogue with Russia, Tiilikainen was quoted as saying.

Commentators have seen the Helsinki meeting also as a prelude to the planned talks between foreign ministers Sergei Lavrov and Rex Tillerson, later in September in New York.
The international community has assured Bangladesh of their support in facing the Rohingya refugee crisis, Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali said on Sunday after a meeting with diplomats in Dhaka.

Ali met ambassadors and diplomats representing the US, Britain, Canada, Australia, Turkey and EU countries, reports BDNews24.

Representatives of various aid organisations were also present in the meeting at State Guest House Padma.

The Foreign Minister put the number of Rohingyas already in the country before the latest refugee wave at 400,000.

Another 300,000 have crossed over to Bangladesh after renewed violence in Myanmars Rakhine state, he said.

Every representative of these foreign countries have praised Bangladesh for its role in this crisis. They have commended us for providing food, medical treatment and shelter for this huge mass of people.


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On Thursday, the city of La Crosse has an opportunity to make an important contribution to strengthen our response to the drug and alcohol addiction epidemic we face.

Coulee Council on Addictions is asking for a zoning change that will allow a move from its current, outdated facility on West Avenue to a new location on the 900 block of Ferry Street.

The site is within the Mayo Clinic Health System-Franciscan Healthcare campus in the Washburn neighborhood. Coulee Council on Addictions plans to construct a facility that will enable it to enhance the programs and services it offers for people in recovery, and to provide them in a healing setting that is welcoming and dignified.

Substance abuse in all forms has been identified as a priority health concern for our community. According to the COMPASS NOW 2015 Report, La Crosse County residents ranked illegal drug use as the top issue in the community. Alcohol use ranked second and prescription drug misuse was the fourth-ranked issue. Community forum participants also felt strongly about substance abuse and ranked it as the second-biggest issue in our community. Some participants noted a lack of treatment options and others mentioned a culture that promotes alcohol use.

A new facility will enable Coulee Council on Addictions to build on its current work and provide additional support for the hundreds of individuals working every day to remain sober and drug free.

We submit that the proposed location is compatible with and even complementary to the citys vision of strengthening the Washburn neighborhood as whole. We offer these key points in support of this perspective:

Coulee Council on Addictions is prepared to make a significant capital investment, which has been adapted based on neighborhood feedback, by creating a beautiful space that will complement and expand the resources available in the neighborhood and our community.

Coulee Council on Addictions has been part of a residential neighborhood for decades. The agencys presence there has been positive for the neighborhood, and we are confident that it will continue to contribute to the health and safety of the Washburn neighborhood. In short, Coulee Council on Addictions has been a good neighbor, and will continue to be a good neighbor.

As medical providers, we are committed to improving the health of our community. We hope the Common Council will approve the zoning change. Doing so sends a message that La Crosse is willing to face the problem of addiction head on and support members of our community who willingly seek long-term recovery.
Jim Hand may be reached at 508-236-0399 or jhand@thesunchronicle.com. You can follow him on Twitter at @TSCpolitics.
Two people, including a child, hospitalized following one of three crashes in just over an hour in St. John's Sunday night

Two people were sent to hospital following one of three crashes in just a little more than an hour in St. Johns Sunday night. One of the crashes happened on the Robert E. Howlett highway at Heavy Tree Road at about 7:40 p.m. and left a pickup and an ...
Patnaik's close aides say that to understand him, one has to understand his empathy

By Pratul Sharma/Photos Sanjay Ahlawat
Cities and villages in Wisconsin are investing in the future while they recognize that in order to thrive, they need strong schools and plenty of job opportunities. A recent analysis of 2015 spending patterns revealed that, for the second year in a row, municipal spending for development jumped more than 20 percent compared to the prior year. At the same time, in response to a question about future growth drivers, city and village leaders cited good schools and plentiful job opportunities as the most important factors necessary to attract citizens in the future.

The findings are taken from the Second Annual State of Cities and Villages Report, prepared for the League of Wisconsin Municipalities by the Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance. The report combines an analysis of the most recently available data on city and village spending (calendar 2015) and a 2017 survey of city and village leaders. The results are encouraging.

Development spending is typically 5 to 8 percent of a municipal budget, encompassing the hard and soft public costs of preparing for new residential, commercial or industrial development. Before 2014, development spending had declined 16 percent from 2008 to 2013. The uptick signals renewed optimism, but more than that, it shows that Wisconsins economic recovery has taken hold in many parts of the state.

But this harbinger of recovery is not uniform. The states largest cities (those with 50,000 or more residents) increased spending for new development by a stunning 60 percent in 2014 and another 20 percent in 2015. Cities in the next tier (populations between 30,000 and 50,000) increased 31 percent and 36 percent in 2014 and 2015, respectively. At the same time, however, development-related spending declined in both years for Wisconsins smallest cities and villages (those with populations of less than 2,000). Prosperity hasnt yet reached many of Wisconsins rural municipalities.

The competition for the future has already begun, and its on the minds of local leaders. This years survey asked local officials what they saw as the most important factors for attracting or retaining residents. They were allowed to give their own answers, and proposed almost 650 different items. Two factors were mentioned most often: good schools and good job opportunities. Nearly three out of five city and village leaders in Wisconsin (57.5 percent) recognize they must have a quality school system to have a chance to compete for future growth. More than half (51.7 percent) said their community needs access to jobs and new business.

What does it all mean? It means Wisconsins mayors, village presidents, council members and trustees are looking forward, not backward. After being shaken hard by the Great Recession and constrained by levy limits and flat state aids, cities and villages are investing in their future, preparing for new development. And, perhaps most encouraging of all, those cities and villages recognize that theyre not in the boat alone. They are looking to collaborate with their school system and local business owners to build their community.

As WISTAX President Todd Berry put it in an August column in the Leagues the Municipality magazine, despite the fiscal and regulatory challenges facing municipal officials, the report reveals a keep-calm-and-carry-on spirit.

The report reinforces what many of us already know: that local governments are being pragmatic and cooperative when it comes to building a 21st century Wisconsin. Local leaders have plenty of ideas, are willing to put their hard-earned local resources to work where it counts, and are looking for both private- and public-sector partners.

We invite you to join the collaboration in your community.
A five-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a peon inside the premises of a private school in Gandhi Nagar area of Shahdara in New Delhi, police said.

The accused, identified as Vikas (40), has been arrested, said Nupur Prasad, deputy commissioner of police, Shahdara.

The incident comes a day after a seven-year-old boy was gruesomely murdered for resisting sexual assault by a bus conductor in a Gurgaon school, which sent shock waves across the country.

Vikas had been working in the school for the last three years. Previously he worked as a security guard in the same school, the police said.

He took the girl inside an empty class room around 11.45am when he was walking on the corridors after handing over lunch boxes to teachers, the police said.

After raping the girl, he threatened her of dire consequences, they added.

The matter came to light after the girl complained of bleeding and pain in her private parts to her mother. She was taken to a hospital where her medical examination confirmed sexual assault, the police said.

Traumatised by the incident, the girl was sent for counselling.

According to the police, during her conselling the child said she was assaulted by "a man wearing a cap" and also described his physical attributes.

On the basis of the description, Vikas was nabbed, the police said.
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Sunday ordered a magisterial inquiry into the rape of a five-year-old girl inside a school here and asked for a report to be submitted by Tuesday.

He also said that a protocol will be formulated for all schools to ensure the safety of students.

"Shameful. (Such acts) Won't be tolerated. Police doing its job. Ordered magisterial enquiry. (The government) Will develop protocol for all schools to ensure children safety," Kejriwal tweeted.

The move comes a day after the crime took place in an east Delhi school and a peon was arrested in connection with it.

"The magisterial inquiry is being headed by Sub Divisional Magistrate (SDM) Vivek Vihar into the sexual assault by the school's staffer inside the school in east Delhi's Raghuwarpura near Gandhi Nagar, and its report is to be submitted within three days," a senior officer of the Delhi government said.

Expressing her concern over the incident, Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) Chairperson Swati Jaihind echoed Kejriwal's views and termed the move to chalk out protocol for schools a "very crucial step" to ensure safety of students.

Taking suo moto cognizance of the incident, the DCW Chairperson issued notice to the school and sought the list of male staff or contract workers (teaching and non-teaching) in the school, along with their designations, who have access to girl students.

The DCW in the notice also asked about the steps taken by the school to ensure safety of the children within the premises and also demanded from the school a copy of the CCTV footage of the entire day of the incident.

The incident came to light on Saturday around 3 pm when the child complained of pain in her abdomen. Her mother noticed bleeding in her private parts while taking her to the washroom.

"The accused, identified as Vikas, 40, who works as a peon, was arrested for sexually assaulting the five-year-old girl in an empty classroom," a senior police officer said.

"He was arrested from near his residence in Raghuwarpura after the victim gave his description to the police during a counselling session," he said.

Deputy Commissioner of Police Nupur Prasad said: "The incident occurred on Saturday around 11 a.m. at the Tagore Public School in Shahdara after school hours. The girl did not leave as she was waiting to take her half-an-hour extra class."

The accused has been working in the school for the past three years. He earlier worked in two other schools, said Prasad.

The police said a medical test confirmed sexual assault. Vikas has been booked under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act.

Meanwhile, the girl's grandfather alleged that police misbehaved with them when the minor was taken to Chacha Nehru Hospital. He also said that initially the doctors did not take this case seriously and only admitted the girl around 8.30 p.m. on Saturday.

"The child is still in trauma and terrified since the crime happened with her as Vikas threatened her with dire consequences," the girl's grandfather said.

"He was inebriated at the time of committing the crime and also at the time of his arrest. The girl was later shifted to Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan Hospital from where she was discharged on Sunday morning," he added.
BJP national president Amit Shah on Sunday urged the youth in Gujarat not to get carried away by the false propaganda on the social media and play a decisive role in the upcoming assembly elections in the state.

Shah was addressing a Youth Town Hall in Ahmedabad. Over 1.5 lakh youth from more than 300 places in Gujarat participated in the interaction. He took about 15 live questions and promised to answer the rest in the days to come. The Youth Town Hall was organised as part of the BJP's campaign of Adikham Gujarat (Strong Gujarat).

In response to a question on the Patidar stir, Shah said that there was a limit to which reservation can be given and that the Supreme Court has laid a guideline. In the days to come, you will realize that the Patidar stir is politically motivated, the BJP chief said. For the last two years, Patidars have been demanding reservation under the OBC category.

Replying to another question, Shah said that the people in Gujarat should not feel the absence of Narendra Modi as he is now the prime minister. "There is no need to miss Narendra Modi in Gujarat. He placed Gujarat on the growth map as the chief minister; as the prime minister he is doing much for the development of the state. Who is more powerful, the chief minister or the prime minister?," he asked, even as the audience said the prime minister. Within no time of becoming the prime minister, Modi has taken quick decisions, including that of increasing the height of Narmada dam.

The assembly elections, he said, would be by the end of November or beginning of December and it was necessary for the youth to know their role. You have to assert and play a decisive role, he said.

Shah went on to urge the youth not to hurry, instead, do in-depth study and weigh what development is before taking a call. After all, it is a question of giving the authority to handle a budget of Rs 1,71,000 crore, he remarked.

BJP's clarion call to the youth is apparently aimed at countering a campaign called Vikas gando thayo che (development has gone crazy) that is doing rounds on the social media.

When a young girl asked from the audience, Why should youth vote for the BJP?, Shah smiled and replied that by posing the question, the girl had negated what all he had said in his opening remarks. There are various schemes for the youth, it gives you an opportunity to progress. Vote for someone who gives you an opportunity to progress, he added.

The security was tight at the venue and nobody was allowed to enter without an identity card. This, after the ruling BJP has had bitter experiences in the recent past where representatives of Patidar Anamat Andolan Samiti (PAAS), spearheading the Patidar stir, had created ruckus at party's functions. Police took away a youth who was protesting when Shah stepped out of the venue after the function.

Hitting back at Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi, who had questioned the BJP over the development of Gujarat, Shah said in order to study the development of Gujarat, one should divide the time period as pre-1995 and post-1995. Pre-1995, mainly Congress was in power in Gujarat and post 1995, it has been the BJP, he said.

Referring to Gandhi as Rahul baba and Shehzada on many occasions, Shah said the Congress leader had asked question about development. Well, the place from where Gandhi addressed lay as a dirty pool earlier and now it boasts of a riverfront that people from the world over come to see, he said.

The BJP national president, flanked by Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani and state BJP president Jitubhai Vaghani, gave out figures of universities, education, budget, agriculture production and so on pre-1995 and post-1995. We have done nothing that we need to hide or your heads bow down in shame, Shah said, adding that the details of the progress would be put up on the party's website.

At a time when the BJP ruling civic bodies are facing criticism for the bad roads, Amit Shah said the roads that have been damaged during monsoon will be repaired between September 15 and October 22.

Shah was asked questions on GST, tribal development and also about what the government was doing to win Gujarat a medal in next Olympics.
Home Minister Rajnath Singh, on Sunday, paid rich tributes to security personnel who were killed while fighting militants in Kashmir. He said the security forces are working hard to make Kashmir a paradise on earth once again.

It is an irony that some militants, who only believe in terrorism, say they will get jannat (paradise),'' he said while addressing policemen at Anantnag in south Kashmir. ''Dont they know that security forces want to make Kashmir jannat again by taking its people along.''

He said Kashmir was India's paradise. ''We need everyone's contribution to make this place a paradise again, he said.

Singh, who started his four visit to Jammu and Kashmir, met the CRPF jawans of the 90th battalion and Jammu and Kashmir policemen in Anantnag.

India bows before your bravery. We are proud of you. Courage cannot be bought,'' he said. ''You are born with unmatched courage. It is by your sheer grit and bravery that you are fighting the terrorism.''

Singh said the Centre is trying to provide the best facilities to the security forces. He said a trauma center, which the DGP talked about, has been approved by the Centre. ''We want every police station to have the bullet-proof vehicles. Directions have been issued for bullet-proof vehicles, he said.

Home Minister said funds have also been sanctioned for bullet-proof jackets for the police.

He said funds for upgrading police stations have also been released. ''I salute you because you fight for the security of Kashmir, Kashmiris, and Kashmiriyat, he said.

Later, he flew back to Srinagar where he met delegations of various political parties including ruling PDP and main opposition National Conference, Congress, BJP, Sajad Lone-led Peoples' Conference and independent MLA from Langate, Sheikh Abdul Rashid, besides others.
Rohingya girl at a refugee camp in Bangladesh | AFP

After more than two weeks of violence in Myanmar's Rakhine state, the insurgent group Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) has declared a "temporary cessation of offensive military operations" for a one-month period to enable aid groups to respond to the "humanitarian crisis".



The ceasefire would begin on Sunday until October 9, the statement said.



ARSA's statement urged humanitarian aid to all victims of the crisis "irrespective of their ethnic or religious background". It also called on the Myanmar government to cease all military offensive operations and participate in assisting the victims.



According to latest UN figures at least 290,000 ethnic Rohingyas have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh since August 25 after escaping violence in Rakhine.



Yanghee Lee, the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights for Myanmar, said that at least 1,000 people were killed in violence over the past two weeks, though she said that figure is "very likely an underestimate", CNN reported.



However, the Myanmar government said that only 421 people have died.



The Rohingyas are considered to be among the world's most persecuted people. The predominantly Buddhist Myanmar considers them Bangladeshi but Bangladesh says they are from Myanmar.



According to state media, Rohingya militants killed 12 security officers in border post attacks. In response, the military intensified "clearance operations", driving thousands of people out of their homes.



Satellite photos released by Human Rights Watch show entire villages torched to the ground in clashes between Myanmar's armed forces and local militants.



In the northern Rakhine state there are reports of at least another 30,000 Rohingyas trapped in hilly terrain without basic supplies of food, water or medicine, according to activists.




McCabe deserves support for governor

On Tuesday at 5:30 p.m., on the farm where he grew up near Curtiss, Wis., Mike McCabe will announce that he is seeking the Democratic nomination for governor.

I support him because he speaks the truth and will not be bought off. He knows that the moneyed interests in this state have cleverly pitted us commoners against one another so that we will not come together to make our government work for us.

He has thus not been a strong Democratic partisan. But he believes that the Democratic party now offers the thousands of people who have been politically homeless the best chance of starting a grassroots movement through which we commoners can reclaim our government.

I hope that my fellow Wisconsinites will give him the hearing he deserves.

(You are welcome to join us at The Bodega where a live stream from Curtiss will let residents of the La Crosse area share in the excitement of Mikes announcement and his vision for our state.)

Steve Minnema, La Crosse
Agudath Israel of America has filed an amicus curiae (friend of the court) brief in the U.S. Supreme Court in one of the Courts most closely watched religious liberty cases in recent years.

The case, Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, involves the rights of a Christian baker who was punished by the State of Colorado for refusing on religious grounds to bake and design a wedding cake for the marriage of two men.

Agudath Israels brief, authored by Washington-based attorney Jeffrey Zuckerman, points out that Orthodox Jews have a direct stake in the outcome of the case. A religiously observant Jew, who is halachically prohibited from aiding and abetting anothers sinful practices, would likely refuse to provide catering service, or other services, to a halachically forbidden marriage.

Yet, argues the Agudath Israel brief, if Colorados position  that general anti-discrimination laws trump an individuals constitutional right to free exercise of religion  is upheld, not only would such religiously observant service providers be in jeopardy if they refuse to service the marriage, the state could even penalize an Orthodox rabbi who refuses to preside over the wedding.

Agudath Israels brief takes note of numerous recent instances in other liberal democracies across the globe where the rights of Orthodox Jews to live their lives in accordance with their religious beliefs and values have come under severe attack  for example, the banning of shechita in a number of countries around the world; the recent case of a chasidic girls elementary school in the United Kingdom that was threatened with closure for failing to teach tolerance for religiously prohibited lifestyles; efforts in Western Europe to ban circumcision of infant children.

None of these jurisdictions has a Free Exercise Clause. But the United States does, the brief continues, and this makes all the difference in the world.

Or at least it should.

In recent years, however, the constitutional protection for free exercise of religion has been diluted by a number of court rulings that have severely limited its scope. Indeed, says the brief, if Colorado is allowed to punish a religious believer because he adhered to his core religious beliefs by refusing to do something that was anathema to him, then the foreign bans and proposed bans on ritual circumcision and shechita indicate where we might be going here in the United States.

Allowing for such further erosion in free exercise protection, the Agudath Israel brief cautioned, would be a betrayal of the core value of religious liberty that stands as one of the bedrock principles upon which America was founded.

Agudath Israel also participated in a broader Orthodox Jewish amicus curiae brief, authored by legendary attorney Nathan Lewin on behalf of the National Jewish Commission on Law and Public Affairs (COLPA) and joined in by a number of Orthodox organizations.

The importance of this case cannot be overstated, said Rabbi Chaim Dovid Zwiebel, Agudath Israels executive vice president. We have presented the Supreme Court with some food for thought about the high stakes involved. Now it is up to the Justices to determine the future of free exercise protection  and the future of the United States as a haven for religious liberty.

(YWN World Headquarters  NYC)
To honor women and their service within their churches, the Coalition of Womens Groups for Tomah, Sparta and Norwalk are set to host a presentation on Christmas.

Laurie Graber, organizer and member of the coalition made up of women from the Tomah, Sparta and Norwalk United Methodist Churches, the Evangelical Free Church of Tomah and Acres of Hope Ministry, said the event is meant as a thank you.

I grew up in the area, and when I returned .... (I was) working with the women of the different churches, and we say thank you to women for all that they do and their service, but they dont have an event that says, Thank you, thank you, to them, she said. Thats why we decided ... to do something like this.

The program is a presentation by Casey Schutrop, who will speak about her book Grandmas Christmas Legacy, the Testimony of the Tree.

It will be held at Tomahs First United Methodist Church on Sept. 16 from 1-3 p.m. Fifty-six people were registered to attend as of Sept. 5.

Graber has wanted to bring the presentation to Tomah ever since she first ran across it two years ago while on her way to her granddaughters graduation ceremony.

It didnt work out in our schedule going back down to Florida for the winter to attend it, she said. But last year, as it was getting time to go back, (God) placed it on my heart and I went out and bought (Schutrops) book, and I read it and it just tells a lot about the advent season and her message of hope is amazing. With that (God)e placed it on my heart to be able to give back to the women of our community.

Graber is thrilled for the opportunity to do something for area women.

Im excited because its an opportunity to give back to women, to make them feel loved and appreciated, she said. The women of our community work hard, and theyre very loving and theyre very open. The women of our community have hearts of gold, and its just an opportunity to say thank you.

Sharon Anderson, a member of the First United Methodist Church of Tomah, helped organize the event and is excited about the presentation even though she isnt able to attend.

Im going to get the book and materials because my children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren would benefit from the story shes going to tell, she said. The message of Christmas being so family oriented and the different symbols she will use represent our Christian way of looking at Christmas  not just birth of the child but using the Christmas tree to indicate life, and its a way of looking at Christmas and family, which draws me to it so strongly.

Anderson enjoys the books focus.

Its a way of making traditions at Christmas and also a way of making us think about those traditions we have at Christmas time, she said. The birth of Christ is reason for Christmas. Traditions that each family cherishes each in their own way  Looking at love, joy, peace, patience, kindness and goodness  theres so much involved that we dont think about.
Sir,



There is a positive relationship between the media and politics. For example, our local media always reports on activities that are carried out by the Prime Minister and his Cabinet (not our MPs) such that it becomes boring even to listen the programme Letishisako on SBIS 1 because the general public is not involved. Tiyabandza!



Minister `Small Joe will tell you about SADC while asked about Donald Trump being the American President.

Having lamented above, allow me to say despite the coming into force of the Constitution in 2006, Swaziland cannot be said to be a democratic country. The kingdom remains undemocratic. Even though the Constitution guarantees freedom of expression, our media environment is extremely difficult. I mean so difficult that there is poverty in reporting and no progress has been made in changing the existing restrictive media environment. Our local media is mostly government controlled.

Swazi TV and radio are effectively government departments. Although there is a non-State television channel known as Channel S, it is also failing to engage the public on issues that could drive the future of this country. There are two newspaper groups in the country, the Swazi Observer Group which is effectively controlled by Tibiyo while the Times of Swaziland Group practises strict self-censorship, although it is independent of government.



The existence of newspapers - and by extension other media outlets - that are free from censorship and political interference by government is one of the key features of democratic governance. Interestingly, the Constitution of Swaziland contains the underlying principles, values and laws of the kingdom.

A key constitutional chapter in this regard is Chapter 5, which sets out directive principles of State policy and duties of the citizen. Section 58 sets out the political objectives for the country. In brief, these provide that Swaziland shall be a democratic country, the State shall be guided in the conduct of public affairs by the principle of decentralisation and devolution of governmental functions and powers, to levels where the people can best manage and direct their own affairs.



The State shall cultivate respect for human rights and freedoms and the dignity of the human person.

Also, all associations aspiring to manage and direct public affairs shall conform to democratic principles in their internal organisation and practice, all lawful measures shall be taken to expose, combat and eradicate corruption and abuse of power by those holding political or public office, the State shall promote a culture of political tolerance, and all organs of state and people of Swaziland shall work towards the promotion of national unity, peace and stability and the State shall provide a peaceful, secure and stable political environment, which is necessary for economic development.



This section sets out some important statements of principle and admirable political objectives, which seem to indicate that the authorities of this country recognise a need to chart a new course, away from the undemocratic practices of April 12, 1973.

It should be sadly noted though, that the provisions set out in Section 58 are not capable of being enforced in any court, in terms of section 56(3) of the Constitution.

As stated, the provisions of Sections 57 to 63 inclusive are not enforceable in any court or tribunal. Therefore, it can be concluded that this is a country with a Constitution but without a constitution. There is need to have a constitutional court to ensure that citizens are protected and not impeded in the exercise of their rights.



Closely related to the above is that the Constitution of Swaziland contains a number of important provisions in Chapter 3: Protection and promotion of fundamental rights and freedoms, which directly purport to protect the media, including publishers, broadcasters, journalists, editors and producers. There are other provisions elsewhere in the Constitution that assist the media as it goes about its work of reporting on issues in the public interest.



The most important basic provisions that protect the media are set out in Subsections 24(1) and (2), which state:

(1) A person has a right to freedom of expression and opinion.

(2) A person shall not, except with the free consent of that person, be hindered in the enjoyment of the freedom of expression, which includes the freedom of the press and other media.



This means freedom to hold opinions without interference, freedom to receive ideas and information without interference, freedom to communicate ideas and information without interference whether the communication be to the public generally or to any person or class of persons and freedom from interference with the correspondence of that person.

The freedom applies to every person and not just certain people. Hence, everybody enjoys this fundamental right.



Mbongeni Mkhonta

MANZINI






Sir,



The past week was quite a busy one for the country with the Umhlanga Ceremony - which brought us together as a nation to celebrate the existence of our young girls was just magnificent.



I watched the young girls from all walks of life coming together in one purpose. Not to mention our unifying figure  His Majesty the King, who was more than handsome on this day. Our senior Princess Skhanyiso was such a marvel to watch and let me not touch on the Special Maiden Siphelele Mashwama who proved that though a former Waterford student, she had what it takes.

Thanks to our Majesties for the unifying role they always play.



As I watched the proceedings for the day, something came into my mind that all these young women who were gathered there to celebrate their chastity would one day be mothers and some of them tindlunkhulu.

I calculated that if they were around 80 000 and each one of them in the next 10 years gives birth to at least two children then it can be left to the mathematicians to count as to how many people will be here.



Now as I continued to think hard as my mind drifted away from the scene and started thinking about what the future holds for us as a country.

For a moment I was disturbed by umngani weMakhosi, who asked me something and I had to respond to him.

I then recalled very well that as Swaziland, we have more than enough land/soil.



Our land which has got traditional pegs or beacons stands like this.

King Mswati II, way back in the 18th Century sent out some of his strong regiments to go and set the traditional pegs in the following areas.



May I bring to the attention of the reader that we as Royalty do not eat a black sheep because it was used for kubetsela lelive  the sheep was fed umutsi and carried by very strong warriors to where the land ended. Whoever ate that sheep was automatically sikhonkhwane sekuvimba imphi the first sheep was left in Matola in Mozambique, the second skhonkhwane was left across the Pongola River in South Africa, the third one was left in Paul Pietersburg (DUMBE), the other ones were left in Witbank and going to the North it was left in Mhuluhulu (Arconhoek) all in South Africa.



Now the crux of the matter is, we have a very large protion of land and it must come back as it is rightfully ours. As stated earlier, with the increasing population, we desperately need the land back because Swaziland is getting very small by the day.

It is very true that we have a very dormant Border and Restoration Council (BRC) which is clueless and has run out of ideas on how to get the land back.



I have said in my previous articles that we need a new committee to get back the land. As I speak, if one were to ask, when was the last time they met? What progress has been achieved to date? Your guess is as good as mine! ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!



If we have previously thought to forget about the land, then we are a nation of cowards. What belongs to us must come back. As a senior citizen who is approaching death, I would die a happy man if I were to see the land coming back to our growing population.



It is true those who have been trusted to manage the land for us are dismally failing but that is not to say we can let our land be taken just like that, we need it. So may the BRC consider involving new people who are energetic to take over from the current crop of tired BRC.

Mozambique and South Africa here we come, we need our land back for our future generation,needless to say we are not so soft as other nations can think of us but we are radicals who want what belongs to us by fire by force we want the land.



By: khokhumncadvo dlamini

KA- ZONDWAKO (EBUTSINI)
MBABANE  Just like Sikhumbuzo Shongwes wedding, Zwelethu Dlaminis traditional wedding (Umtsimba) to Sindi Simelane attracted throngs of well-wishers, particularly public figures and royal family members.



The two weddings are comparable in that both men are sons of high profile parents in the country with Shongwe being a son to well-known Bishop Nash Shongwe, while, Dlamini is the one and only child to former head of government, Absalom Themba Dlamini, also known as A.T.



The latter is currently the managing director at Tibiyo Taka Ngwane.

The traditional wedding was held yesterday at Dvumbe area in the outskirts of Sidvokodvo en route to Siphofaneni. The well-organised event was attended by local politicians which included Speaker in Parliament Themba Msibi and royal family members.

Notable was Prince Guduza who is also the Chairman of the Border Restoration Committee.



There were also other influential figures which included Chief Executive Officers like Mbabane City Councils Gideon Mhlongo and Nhlanhla Dlamini of the Construction Industry Council. National Police Commissioner Isaac Magagula was also in attendance and was seated next to A.T for the duration of the event. Before the start of the wedding, the VIPs relaxed in a specially prepared VIP area.

However, when the event started, they joined the other well-wishers who occupied the main tent while the rest of the public utilised the space next to the tent despite the scorching heat.



When the first group of the brides entourage (umtsimba) arrived, traditionalist Qethuka Dlamini was seen by the homestead entrance and was orchestrating the procession to the main arena from the river.Qethukas presence also highlighted the significance of the day.
MBABANE  Unions have all agreed to get a mandate from their members concerning their next step in the stalled negotiations with government.



Following government and public sector associations (PSAs) failure to reach an agreement on Thursday regarding the cost of living adjustment during a Joint Negotiations Forum (JNF) meeting, PSA have all agreed to let their members decide on their next step.

This decision was reached by the different unions during a meeting held at the Swaziland National Association of teachers Centre in Manzini. Each union was represented by the members of their respective National Executive Committee members.



Public sector unions include; the Swaziland National Association of Teachers (SNAT), Swaziland Democratic Nurses Union (SWADNU), National Public Service and Allied Workers Union (NAPSAWU) and the Swaziland National Association of Government Accounting Personnel (SNAGAP).



When questioned by the Times SUNDAY after the joint meeting held yesterday, SNAT Secretary General Zweli Mndzebele, who spoke on behalf of all the other three unions, revealed that after a lengthy meeting of about one and half hours, the unions had all agreed that it was indeed time to meet their respective members in order to receive their mandates as unions.



It was decided during the meeting yesterday that since SNAT had already scheduled a mass meeting with its members on Tuesday, it would make better sense to discuss the issue and receive a clear mandate on what the next step would be, Mndzebele said.

The SNAT secretary general said the other three unions would also do the same and meet with their own members and all the recommendations would then be collated and adopted by the public sector associations.
A 25-year-old Sparta man has been referred to the Monroe County District Attorney for domestic violence after an Aug. 1 incident in the town of Little Falls.

Police received a call from the La Crosse County Sheriffs office that Garrett E. Hazlett had forced a woman from her Highway 71 residence and drove her along back roads into La Crosse County. When they reached Hippler Hill Road in La Crosse County, the report says Hazlett told the woman he was going to kill her.

After Hazlett exited the vehicle, the woman slid into the drivers seat and attempted to drive away, but Hazlett clung to the vehicle before falling off, according to the report. The woman sought help at a nearby residence, and police located Hazlett and took him into custody.

Prior to being taken from the residence, the woman told police that Hazlett had been displaying paranoid behavior and accused her of killing his family. She said Hazlett dragged her into the bathroom and grabbed her neck so hard that she believed she was going to pass out. She said Hazlett also threatened her with a knife.

Hazlett was referred for false imprisonment, strangulation/suffocation, disorderly conduct and violating terms of his parole.

In other Monroe County Sheriffs Department news:

Robert J. Austin, 25, Warrens, was referred to the district attorney for disorderly conduct after an Aug. 5 incident in the town of Lincoln.

Police were dispatched to a Highway O residence, where Austin allegedly broke a beer glass during a loud argument. A preliminary breath test registered a blood-alcohol count of .101, which triggered a probation/parole hold.

Nicholas Duane Fedderly, 29, Woodbury, Minnesota, was referred to the district attorney for disorderly conduct and battery after a July 22 incident in Warrens.

Police were dispatched to Jellystone Campground, where a woman said she believed her wrist had been broken after Fedderly had pushed her into a fire pit. The report said the woman was in considerable pain and screamed as emergency personnel attempted to apply a splint.

When police went to the campsite, the tent had been removed, and police were unable to locate Fedderly. The woman and a child were taken to a nearby hotel.

Austin Lee Ratkus, 23, Melrose, was referred to the district for third-offense operating without a valid drivers license after a July 31 traffic stop in the town of Angelo.

Shortly before 2 a.m., police observed a pickup truck with a defective headlight and initiated a traffic stop. Ratkus told police he wasnt sure if he had a valid drivers license because of a drunk-driving conviction several years ago and that he never did the class. Dispatch confirmed that his drivers license had been cancelled.

Eddie Wayne Effler Jr., 33, Erwin, Tennessee, was referred to the district attorney for hit and run after allegedly fleeing the scene of an accident Aug. 2.

Police were dispatched to Loves Travel Stop in Oakdale, where a witness said the driver of a silver pickup truck backed into another pickup and left the scene shortly after noon. The witness said the driver sped off so quickly that he squealed his tires.

Another witness was able to read the license plate, which was traced to Effler. Police then went to a sand mine where Effler was employed and interviewed him. The report says Effler acknowledged being at Loves at the time of the crash but said he didnt believe he made contact with the truck. He denied squealing his tires.

The report says a dent in Efflers truck matched that of the other truck, and he was placed under arrest and transported to the Monroe County Jail.

Floyd Francis Charles Mueller, 70, Tomah, was referred to the district attorney for battery and disorderly conduct after a July 29 incident in the town of LaGrange.

Police were called to a Formica Road residence shortly before midnight on a report of a man, later identified as Mueller, being physical with other residents in the house and refusing to return to the Tomah Veterans Administration hospital. The report says Mueller slapped a woman in the face, spit on her and threatened to kill her and another person.

Mueller was taken into custody and returned to the VA.

Wade M. Riley, 23, Sparta, and William M. Nelson, 25, Tomah, were referred to the district attorney after a July 15 altercation in the Monroe County Jail.

According to the report, Riley and Nelson got into an argument with Riley punching Nelson in the stomach and Nelson head-butting Riley in the face. The altercation reportedly left Riley with a black eye. Both were referred for battery by a prisoner and disorderly conduct.

Kyra B. Fowler, 33, Oakdale, was referred to the district attorney for obstructing an officer.

Police responded to a report of a domestic incident in the village of Oakdale and observed a residence in disarray. One day later, Fowler told police she lied about the incident. According to the report, she admitted to making her residence appear like a struggle had taken place by pouring water on the floor, ripping a curtain from the wall and tossing clothes around the house.

Antoinette Jewell Langrick, 32, Cashton, was referred to the district attorney for failing to report to the Monroe County Jail. She was scheduled to report July 31.
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By Gina Martinez

Gov. Andrew Cuomo has come out in support of five Democratic candidates for City Council from his home borough in the upcoming September primaries.

The governor, usually restrained about making political endorsements, backed Councilman Peter Koo (D-Flushing), Elizabeth Crowley (D-Maspeth) and Paul Vallone (D-Bayside) for re-election, Adrienne Adams to replace Ruben Wills in Jamaica, and Francisco Moya to take over after Councilwoman Julissa Copeland-Ferraras (D-Corona) decided not to seek re-election. He has not publicly endorsed candidates running in any other borough or the mayoral race.

Koo is running against Alison Tan, the managing director of Ackman-Ziff Real Estate Group, CB 7 board member and wife of state Assemblyman Ron Kim (D-Flushing). Cuomo said he has worked with Koo since his time as president of the Flushing Chinese Business Association.

Now more than ever, we need local leaders who fight for their communities on the issues that matter, Cuomo said. From fighting for affordable housing and against pollution in local waterways, Council member Koo works hard to ensure the interests of his community are represented at the City Council.

Cuomo is backing Moya to represent District 21 in the City Council. Moya is in a heated race against the former Councilman and state Sen. Hiram Monserrate, who was forced to leave politics following a felony conviction for stealing money from a non-profit in his district to finance an election campaign. Cuomo said Moya is a proven leader for Central Queens and that his opponents actions have disqualified him from public service.

From partnering with me to pass a $15 minimum wage, stronger rent laws and immigrant protections, as well as the Womens Equality Act and critically important criminal justice reforms, Assemblyman Moya has worked to move New York forward, Cuomo said. Contrasted with Hiram Monserrates shameful record of domestic violence and abusing the public trust, the choice could not be more clear. Im proud to endorse Francisco Moya for City Council in the 21st District and I know he will continue to be a true champion of Democratic values.

Cuomo is also supporting Adrienne Adams to represent District 28, where Ruben Wills was recently convicted of state corruption charges and forced to give up his Council seat. Adams is chairwoman of CB12 and has worked with Cuomo on his $10 million Downtown Jamaica Revitalization Initiative. Adams is running against public defender Hettie Powell and public sector worker Richard David.

Public service begins at the local level, working to address the concerns of residents and build a stronger community, Cuomo said. This is what sets Adrienne Adams apart as a leader in her community and as a candidate for City Council.

Cuomo has also thrown his support behind Councilwoman Elizabeth Crowley (D-Middle Village), who is running against Juniper Park Civic Association President Bob Holden. Cuomo said that Crowley has fought for Queens families for over a decade.

She has fought and secured education funding so that public schoolchildren are guaranteed a better, brighter future, the governor said. She has prevented the closure of local firehouses and stood up for New Yorks Bravest in their times of need. Most of all, Elizabeth has served as mentor and inspiration to countless women and aspiring officeholders across the city through her work to ensure local government reflects all the voices of the community. I know that, with four more years, Elizabeth Crowley will continue to deliver for the 30th District, and Im proud to endorse her candidacy.

Cuomo has backed Councilman Paul Vallone (D-Bayside) in the September primaries as well. He is running against Bayside activist Paul Graziano. Cuomo said the families of northeast Queens deserve a council member they can be proud of and one who can be counted on to represent their values, keep delivering their fair share and lead by example.

Council member Vallone has led the fight to increase programming for our senior population and his ability to successfully advocate for his constituents has resulted in countless improvements for our public safety, parks and schools. There is no question that he is the right choice for Council member, he said. With four more years, Paul Vallone will continue to unite northeast Queens, and Im proud to endorse his candidacy in the district I used to call home.
Area senior citizens with a unique craft or special hobby are being asked to contact Tomah Memorial Hospital for its upcoming Senior Health Expo in October.

Officials with the hospitals community outreach department are looking for a group of seniors to display their craft or hobby at this years event.

This will be a great opportunity to let other senior citizens get interested in a hobby or craft while showing off some special talents of area residents, said hospital community outreach health educator Whitney Sanjari.

If interested, contact Sanjari via email at wsanjari@tomahhospital.org or call 608-374-0211 by Sept. 22. The annual TMH Senior Health Expo is scheduled Oct. 19 from 8-11 a.m. at the Cranberry Country Lodge, Tomah.
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We write this letter united with unequivocal support for City Councilman Paul Vallone.

Recently, many fellow Democrats received his opponents hate-ridden mail that contained hostile words, repugnant lies and shameful attacks against our councilman and our district.

We are clearly opposed to this type of negative politicking that has poisoned us nationally and now tries to permeate the fabric of our local communities. We must not allow our families and communities to be torn apart. We stand united against those who want to divide us with outlandish smears, heinous hate and ludicrous lies.

Four years ago, Councilman Vallone brought us together as one community. We were a forgotten district without a voice. He gave us a voice  a unified voice that continues to grow stronger. Councilman Vallone has proven his commitment to represent all nationalities, all religions, our seniors and veterans, our schools and libraries, all unions, and civic and community leaders like us.

We raise our voices in unison against anyone who tries to divide us, and this form of divisive politics and hate must end. This is our time to reject anyone, especially Councilman Paul Vallones opponent, who tries to tear us apart with lies and deception.

With one week to go before the Democratic primary the choice could not be clearer.

Show the opposition we stand united against hate.

Signed,

Charles Apelian

Rev. Fr. Dionysios Anagnostopoulos

Rabbi Yossi Blesofsky

Dominick Bruccoleri

YoonHee Choi

Pauline Chu

John Duane

John Dorsa

Mary Ann Dorsa

Stacey Eliuk

Mike DAngelo

Joe Femenia

Jason Garcia

Thomas Grech

Carol Gresser

Dr. Rita Harper

J.D. Kim

Young Jin Kim

Thomas Kim

Sangho Lee

Anthony Lemma Sr.

Debra Markell

John. J. McArdle

Carol Nack

Mario Rossi

Linda Rossi

Warren Schreiber

Malini Shah

Nilesh Shah

Matthew Silverstein

Peter Tu

Hema Virani

John Zullo
Did you vote in the midterm elections as if your countrys existence depended on it?

columns
Airbnb will collect and remit county hotel occupancy taxes for its hosts in Rensselaer County through an agreement expected to increase the county's tax base and allow Airbnb to contribute its share of taxes.

The agreement went into effect Friday. Rensselaer joins 13 other counties throughout New York, including Schoharie, in entering tax agreements with Airbnb.

The average Airbnb host in Rensselaer County earned $5,400 in 2016 and the county's 70 hosts earned $510,000 within the last calendar year. Many hosts use the supplemental income they earn through Airbnb to launch small businesses, save for retirement, repay student loans or pay their rent or mortgage, according to a statement by Airbnb.

"We're excited to work with Rensselaer County to welcome more visitors to the region and grow the County's tax base as the summer travel season winds down," said Josh Meltzer, head of New York Public Policy at Airbnb, in a statement. "We hope the agreements we have reached with New York counties will serve as models for how local and state governments can work collaboratively with our community to boost incomes and provide more tax revenue."

Todd Garofano, president of the Saratoga Convention and Tourism Bureau, said he is "absolutely in favor" of Airbnb collecting taxes on behalf of hosts.

"It's one step towards leveling the playing field with legitimate, commercial lodging businesses," Garofano said. "However, I would like to see it taken a step further and ensure that these properties are properly insured and inspected for safety and security, as hotels, motels and inns are required to do."

Nearly 28,000 guests stayed for a total of more than 74,000 nights in the six-county Capital Region last year, generating roughly $25 million in economic activity, according to an Airbnb report.

About 94 percent of about $32 billion in statewide economic activity generated by Airbnb was located in New York City. The Capital Region made up less than 1 percent of all Airbnb activity statewide.

Under New York State law, Airbnb cannot collect and remit taxes at a statewide level. A bill that would allow Airbnb to collect and remit New York City and state taxes on behalf of hosts was introduced into the state Legislature in April.

miszler@timesunion.com  518-454-5018  @madisoniszler
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Naples, Fla.

Hurricane Irma's leading edge bent palm trees and spit rain as it swirled toward Florida with 120 mph winds Saturday on a projected new track that could expose Tampa  not Miami  to the storm's worst fury.

Tampa has not taken a direct hit from a major hurricane in nearly a century.

The westward swing away from Miami caught many people off guard along Florida's Gulf coast and triggered an abrupt shift in storm preparations. A major round of evacuations was ordered in the Tampa area, and shelters there soon began filling up.

Still, Miami was not out of danger. Because the storm is 350 to 400 miles wide, the metro area could still get life-threatening hurricane winds and dangerous storm surge of 4 to 6 feet, forecasters said.

The window was closing fast for anyone wanting to escape before the storm's arrival Sunday morning. Irma  at one time the most powerful hurricane ever recorded in the open Atlantic  left more than 20 people dead across the Caribbean.

"This is your last chance to make a good decision," Gov. Rick Scott warned residents in Florida's evacuation zones, which encompassed a staggering 6.4 million people, or more than 1 in 4 people in the state.

Irma was chugging forward as a Category 3, with winds down considerably from their peak of 185 mph earlier in the week. But it was expected to strengthen again before hitting the Sunshine State.

For days, the forecast had made it look as if the Miami metropolitan area of 6 million people on Florida's Atlantic coast could get hit head-on by the long-dreaded Big One.

But that soon changed. Meteorologists predicted Irma's center would blow ashore in the perilously low-lying Florida Keys, then hug the state's west coast, plowing into the Tampa Bay area by Monday morning.

Just as predicted, Irma on Saturday evening began making a wide right turn around the southern edge of Florida that could take it straight up the state's west coast.

Tampa has not been struck by a major hurricane since 1921, when its population was about 10,000, National Hurricane Center spokesman Dennis Feltgen said. Now the area has around 3 million people.

The new course threatens everything from Tampa Bay's bustling twin cities of Tampa and St. Petersburg to Naples' mansion- and yacht-lined canals, Sun City Center's retirement homes, and Sanibel Island's beaches.

By late morning Saturday, however, few businesses in St. Petersburg and its barrier islands had put plywood or hurricane shutters on their windows, and some locals grumbled about the change in the forecast.

"For five days, we were told it was going to be on the east coast, and then 24 hours before it hits, we're now told it's coming up the west coast," said Jeff Beerbohm, a 52-year-old entrepreneur in St. Petersburg. "As usual, the weatherman, I don't know why they're paid."

Nearly the entire Florida coastline remained under hurricane watches and warnings, and leery residents watched a projected track that could still shift to spare, or savage, parts of the state.

Forecasters warned of storm surge as high as 15 feet.

"This is going to sneak up on people," said Jamie Rhome, head of the hurricane center's storm surge unit.

With the new forecast, Pinellas County, home to St. Petersburg, ordered 260,000 people to leave, while Georgia scaled back evacuation orders for some coastal residents.

On Saturday morning, the state was already beginning to feel Irma's effects. More than 75,000 people had lost power, mostly in and around Miami and Fort Lauderdale, as the wind began gusting.

More than 75,000 people crowded into 400 shelters across Florida.

In Key West, Carol Walterson Stroud, 60, sought refuge in a senior center with her husband, granddaughter and dog. The streets were nearly empty, and the wind started to blow.

"Tonight, I'm sweating," she said. "Tonight, I'm scared to death."
Flights out of Albany heading to Florida have been canceled for several days as Hurricane Irma continues to batter the southeast.

As a result, property owners wanting to inspect possible storm damage will have to sit tight.

"I would suspect people will be trying to book flights into Florida to see what damage has been done to their property," said Albany International spokesman Doug Myers Sunday, referring to the many Capital Region residents who own houses or condos in Florida.

JetBlue and Southwest said flights will be reduced or canceled until at least Wednesday.

JetBlue, which flies direct from Albany to Fort Lauderdale and Orlando, posted Sunday it has canceled 730 flights nationwide to and from Florida that were originally scheduled through Wednesday. Southwest, which flies through Albany International Airport to Tampa, said flights to Tampa and Fort Myers are canceled through 1 p.m. Wednesday, with travel to Orlando and Fort Lauderdale on a reduced schedule starting Tuesday.

American Airlines said Sunday travel alerts have been issued for more than 50 airports in the southern path of Irma, which now includes parts of Georgia, South Carolina, Tennessee and Alabama. Airport closures would be impacting American Airlines flights to Fort Myers, Tampa, Orlando and Tallahassee through Tuesday. United hadn't posted an update Sunday other than saying all flights to Florida were canceled Monday.

Flights on JetBlue and Southwest from Orlando and Fort Lauderdale to Albany Friday and Saturday were sold out as relatives and friends of Capital Region residents were attempting to escape the hurricane.

Irma's hurricane-force winds are expected to die down throughout Florida by early Monday morning, but massive flooding is predicted to follow in coastal areas because of storm surge. Forecasters say tropical force winds will then descend on Georgia late Monday, possibly reaching into the Atlanta area  which will likely impact Delta flights to and from Atlanta, the carrier said. Delta said Sunday it was tentatively restarting Florida service Monday, pending an assessment of infrastructure damage.

Most airlines say they are waiving change-of-flight fees for selected cities  provided travel is rescheduled for the next couple of weeks and is between the same original cities. Check with your airline before arriving at an airport to book or change travel.
Kassie Siegel's commentary "Scientists fear censorship in new climate report" was mentioned in the Times Union Aug. 30, the same day President Donald Trump visited Corpus Christi, Texas, to view the ravages of Hurricane Harvey.

In his remarks there, Trump promised such effective federal support to the area that it will be "looked at in five years, in 10 years from now as, this is the way to do it."
Last year the Coulee Region Whole Child Initiative was established. This initiative, under the direction of Patrick Clements and with the support of business owners like Dave Skogen of Festival Foods, is designed to help schools build a culture of kindness, service and empathy. Employers in every community want to hire individuals with strong character. Business owners often comment that the work skills needed for a job can be taught on the job. As employers, their larger concern is ensuring that the individual hired is a person with strong character  a person who cares about others and is willing to do what is necessary to get a job done right. How do we teach this in school? How can schools create a culture in which students graduate not just capable but also compassionate?

The Tomah Area School District committed to begin this process, along with over 30 other schools/districts in our area, back in April when Amy Rezin, an English teacher at Tomah High School, and Angie Plueger, the high school dean of students, attended a Character Strong training. This training provided our school district with a curriculum for a leadership class at Tomah High School that is being taught this semester. Building character doesnt just happen. It costs time, energy, and effort  just like building any other skill. Students need opportunities to practice intentional acts of service and compassion in order to build solid skills that will become life-long habits. Our students also need to develop a growth mindset and resiliency skills to assist them when times get tough.

We need to ensure that all students who graduate from Tomah High School believe that they are a leader and that they can make a difference in our world. The words of President John F. Kennedy, Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country seem to be drowned out today by a flurry of cultural messages which focus on it is all about me and what have you done for me lately. It takes thoughtful intervention and education to help our young people understand that they have a responsibility to help make our world a better place. It takes opportunities for our students to discuss and reflect on their daily actions and whether they made a contribution to the greater good. How many of us have asked our children at the end of the day, What did you do for others today?

The Coulee Region Whole Child Initiative has assisted us and other schools in obtaining the Character Strong curriculum and supports the idea that when we teach the whole child, the whole school benefits. Research shows that when a school takes time to cultivate a culture of character and assist students in the development of social and emotional skills, academics improve and problem behaviors decrease. We are grateful to the Coulee Region Whole Child Initiative for its support of our schools. We are appreciative that Rezin accepted the challenge to begin teaching the leadership class at Tomah High School with support from Plueger. We are excited to see how the Character Strong curriculum can improve the culture at Tomah High School. We want every student at Tomah High School to feel safe and supported. We want every student at Tomah High School to value kindness, service and empathy. We want all students at Tomah High School to graduate as capable and compassionate people, believing in their ability to serve as a leader and make positive change in our world. There can never be too many character strong kids!

If you have any questions or comments about the information and opinions expressed in this edition of The School Bell, please contact Cindy Zahrte, district administrator, at cindyz@tomah.k12.wi.us or 374-7002.
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[September 10, 2017] Habitat for Humanity of Independence County, Arkansas to Receive $8K Grant from First Community Bank and FHLB Dallas

Habitat for Humanity of Independence County (HFHIC) will be awarded $8,000 in Partnership Grant Program (PGP (News - Alert)) funds in a check presentation from the Federal Home Loan Bank of Dallas (FHLB Dallas) and First Community Bank, an FHLB Dallas member institution. The nonprofit will use the funds to help with staff expenses and grow its ReStore nonprofit home improvement and decor store in Batesville, Arkansas. The ReStore proceeds support HFHIC's building of one home per year. The media is invited to the check presentation at 1:30 p.m., Monday, September 11, 2017, in Batesville, Arkansas. PGP awards provide grants to community-based organizations (CBOs) of up to $12,000. The funds may be used for research, organizational capacity-building, grant- and funding-application assistance, or contractual services. Through the PGP, FHLB Dallas matches a member's contribution to a CBO of $500 up to $4,000 at a 3:1 ratio for a maximum $12,000 contribution from FHLB Dallas. The grants are offered via a lottery system once a year through FHLB Dallas members. In 2017, FHLB Dallas awarded $300,000 in PGP funds through 31 member institutions to assist 30 CBOs. Combined with the $104,550 contributed by FHLB Dallas members, a total of $404,550 was awarded to the organizations. For more information, visit fhlb.com.







WHAT: Check Presentation WHEN: 1:30 p.m., September 11, 2017 WHO: Boris Dover, President, First Community Bank Laura Cornett, Marketing Director, First Community Bank Shalyn Carlile, Executive Director, Habitat for Humanity of Independence County Thomas Showalter, Board President, Habitat for Humanity of Independence County Andrew Lane, Board Treasurer, Habitat for Humanity of Independence County Jerrod Sandefur, Board Member, Habitat for Humanity of Independence County Bruce Hatton, Vice President, Affordable Housing Program Manager, FHLB Dallas WHERE: First Community Bank Community Room 1325 Harrison Street Batesville, Arkansas 72501

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170910005006/en/

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[September 10, 2017] Uber Partners with Leading Weather Technology Company 'ArabiaWeather'

AMMAN, Jordan, September 10, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Partnership with weather-tech company will help provide access to reliable transportation to a large number of people across the region Uber the technology company providing people with the most convenient way to get a safe, reliable, and affordable ride, has entered into a strategic partnership with ArabiaWeather Inc. - the leading provider of weather products, services and solutions to consumers and businesses in the Middle East. Through this partnership, the two tech companies will leverage each others' technologies to provide people with a reliable weather forecast and an Uber ride when they need it the most and at the push of a button, and especially during severe weather conditions. (Logo: http://mma.prnewswire.com/media/508741/ArabiaWeather_Logo.jpg ) (Photo: http://mma.prnewswire.com/media/553778/Hamdi_Tabaa_Mohammed_Al_Shaker.jpg )

The partnership, allows visitors of ArabiaWeather's platforms in Jordan and Saudi Arabia to easily sign-up for an Uber account when checking local weather conditions in their area. As part of the partnership, Uber created a promo code to offer first time users who sign-up through ArabiaWeather platforms and at the push of a button, 50% of their first two rides. In Saudi Arabia, the promo code will be AwKSA (up to SR20 off each ride), and in Jordan promo code AwJordan will apply (up to JD2 off each ride). "We are very pleased to be partnering with a pioneering company such as Uber, which has demonstrated true leadership in the sharing economy and the realm of innovative technologies. There is a natural synergy between the services that we each provide due to a strong positive correlation between weather and people's behavior in choosing their preferred mode of transportation. Both of our compaies are aiming to provide the public with the tools they need to seamlessly plan, prepare and conduct their lives," said Mohammed Al Shaker, ArabiaWeather Founder and CEO.





Commenting on the partnership, Anthony Khoury, Uber Middle East General Manager said, "We are delighted to partner with ArabiaWeather. Uber is in over 25 cities around the region, and this partnership is aligned with our continuous efforts to provide the largest number of people with safe, reliable and affordable transportation when and where they want it, whether that is on a hot summer day, or a rainy night out in town. As a technology company, we are always excited to work with tech-innovators like ourselves, and with regional players and startups like ArabiaWeather who deliver daily weather conditions to millions around the region."

As part of the partnership, Uber will be part of the weather company's communication channels, which is in-line with Uber's efforts to reach the largest number of people in Jordan and Saudi Arabia. Utilizing ArabiaWeather's unique technology, hyper-local & weather-targeting features, tailored communication will be to deliver to the right people and at the right time, for them to be able to request a reliable and affordable ride when they need it the most. About Uber Uber's mission is to bring reliable transportation to everywhere, for everyone. We started in 2010 to solve a simple problem: how do you get a ride at the touch of a button? Six years and more than two billion trips later, we've started tackling an even greater challenge: reducing congestion and pollution in our cities by getting more people into fewer cars.

In the Middle East, Uber is already in Dubai, Cairo, Alexandria, Amman, Casablanca, Riyadh, Jeddah, Eastern Province, Makkah, Madinah, Hail, Qassim, Kharj, Yanbu, Ehsa, Taif, Manama, Beirut, Doha, Istanbul, Karachi, Lahore, Hyderabad, Islamabad, Rawalpindi, Faisalabad, and Gujranwala with plans for expansion across the region To request a ride, users must download the free application for Android, iPhone, Windows Phone, Blackberry 7, or sign up at uber.com/app. For more information, please visit: About ArabiaWeather Through its media products, enterprise solutions and consumer platforms, ArabiaWeather delivers its forecasts to 70 million Arab users on a daily basis. ArabiaWeather's Enterprise division provides decision support solutions to businesses across the region to sectors that are enormously affected by weather conditions. such as Media, Airline, Oil & Gas, Agriculture, Insurance and Retail, among others. ArabiaWeather also works with various governments and National Weather Services across the region. Through its Consumer division, ArabiaWeather's web properties, mobile applications and social media platforms serve millions of consumers across the Middle East, providing them with timely, accurate and localized weather information in Arabic and English. ArabiaWeather's technology runs on proprietary, hyper-localized data and algorithms. The company has offices in Amman, Riyadh and Dubai, staffed with the region's leading meteorologists, weather experts, as well as talented R&D specialists who endeavor to deliver the most accurate weather forecasts and information in the region. For round-the-clock weather forecasts and services, please visit http://www.arabiaweather.com and download ArabiaWeather apps through http://apps.arabiaweather.com/, and to learn about the business solutions offered by ArabiaWeather, please visit http://corporate.arabiaweather.com .







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[September 10, 2017] Artprice Moves Into Top Gear With Its World-Famous Contemporary Art Museum Headquarters, "L'Organe"

PARIS, September 10, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- In 1997, Artprice installed its HQ in the middle of a Contemporary Art Museum, "L'Organe" (9000 m). Among its activities, the Museum runs the world-famous Demeure du Chaos / "The Abode of Chaos" according to The New York Times. (See Artprice's Reference Documentation submitted each year to France's Financial Markets Authority, the AMF). (Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160228/338238LOGO )

The 2017 attendance figures for Artprice's Museum HQ speak for themselves: The Demeure du Chaos / Musee L'organe is the most visited Contemporary Art Museum in France's Rhone Alpes Region, with 140,000 visitors per year, including to its Borderline Biennale event. Google ranks L'Organe Museum of Contemporary Art as the highest-rated Art Museum in Lyon (data from 28 August 2017). Likewise, Facebook's ranking of the Top-25 cultural destinations in the City of Lyon has placed the Demeure du Chaos / Musee L'Organe in pole position for the last five years running - confirmed again this year in its N48 September ranking. The Demeure du Chaos / Musee L'organe is closely followed by 475,000 subscribers with an average weekly publication audience reach of 4.5 million and by far the highest engagement rate. (full and certified Facebook data). Source: certified Google and Facebook data: https://artpressagency.wordpress.com/2017/08/28/thierry-ehrmann-en-avant-premiere-le-classement-n48-exclusif-de-septembre-2017-des-principaux-acteurs-culturels-du-grand-lyon-la-metropole/ Since it opened in 2006, the Demeure du Chaos / Musee L'organe (under French Law a "registered visitable establishment with museum characteristics" has welcomed 1.34 million of whom 25% from outside France. Its global popularity is beyond any doubt, as confirmed by the following statistic: since the publication in 2013 of its bilingual book "Opus IX of the Demeure du Chaos/ Abode of Chaos " (504 pages, digital and paper format (30x30) and free online at the world-leading issuu.com), the work has been the subject of 37.4 million 'online impressions' (a fact legally certified by MAMET PONS solicitors in 2016). This volume of 'online impressions' is rivalled by very few French cultural institutions or publishers. Source : http://issuu.com/demeureduchaos/docs/demeureduchaos-abodeofchaos-opus-ix-1999-2013 The Museum's circuit covers a territory of 9,000 m with 5,400 artworks in various disciplines. It includes 1,200 monumental sculptures created by Thierry Ehrmann, Artprice's founder and CEO and a visual artist for 35 years. In 2014 the Abode of Chaos organised a retrospective show entitled Thirty years of Sculpture by thierry Ehrmann which alone attracted 180,000 visitors. Artprice's Contemporary Art HQ is a world-renowned phenomenon which for the last 18 years (1999/2017) has inspired more than 3,708 written and audio-visual articles in the world's most prestigious media channels. According to the Anglo-American press, although very different, Artprice's HQ rivals some of the emblematic, ambitious and futuristic head offices in Silicon Valley, which in themselves represent a superb vector of mass communication. The latest example of this media enthusiasm was two months of filming by Arte France / Germany (July and August 2017) at the Abode of Chaos in the framework of two full-length feature films for prime-time diffusion. Following Artprice's collaboration with Arte France / Germany on 9 episoes entitled the "History of Art" in 2016, Artprice will again be working with Arte France / Germany to create 9 episodes on Forbidden Art ("Art interdit").



A recent meeting of Artprice's Board of Directors voted to upgrade the exploitation of the Abode of Chaos / Musee L'Organe by organising regularly quarterly meetings with world-famous artists, one-off artistic events and symposiums focused primarily on Art and Law as of September 2017 (Artprice has been publishing legal and sociological studies that have become references for the Art Market for 20 years) Artprice has long been preparing exhibitions of the most recent artistic disciplines in which science, technology and art underpin a dynamic OTC Art Market. It is precisely to this OTC Art Market - emerging on all 5 continents with remarkable speed and flooding the traditional Market - that Artprice has recently turned its full attention.

See Actusnews press release: Artprice takes a major stake in the OTC Art Market which generates a volume of transactions roughly 7 to 9 times higher than the traditional art market: https://www.actusnews.com/fr/ARTPRICE/cp/2017/06/30/artprice-takes-a-major-stake-in-the-otc-art-market-which-generates-a-volume-of-transactions-roughly-7-to-9-times-higher-than-the This year Artprice will launch its famous Global Contemporary Art Market Report at its Abode of Chaos / Contemporary Art Museum HQ in early October 2017, with its standard preview of the key data via its exclusive partner, AFP. Among other initiatives, the Contemporary Art Museum and Artprice HQ will welcome artists showing at the 2017 Lyon Contemporary Art Biennial which begins shortly. Artprice was the principal sponsor of this event when Lyon was bidding to host France's only biennial art fair (founded by Andre Malraux). At the same time as London's Frieze, Paris's FIAC and the Paris Photo art fairs, the Contemporary Art Museum at Artprice's Abode of Chaos HQ will be hosting a number of artistic events, notably in its famous Bunker (720 m3) that was exhibited in front of the Grand Palais (in Paris) as a monumental sculpture for the Triennial Art Fair, La Force de l'art, in 2006. Since 1999, Serveur Group - Artprice's parent company - has provided the Organe Contemporary Art Museum with all the requisite avant-gardist museum facilities as well as all the Internet infrastructures (including a clean-room dedicated to the Museum) to host artistic events and receive world-famous artists in a variety of different workshops. These artists will be able to create and perform in situ with live transmission on social networks and Network TV. Over the years Artprice has become a dominant player through these channels both as the world leader in Art Market information and as a Contemporary Art Museum at the Demeure du Chaos / Abode of Chaos. Artprice's staff, art historians, editors and researchers will all be involved in these international events. With its unique role as world leader in Art Market information and as a Museum of Contemporary Art, Artprice clearly represents a cutting edge art institution in Europe. By receiving artists in residency and hosting exceptional events, Artprice is moving into another dimension in which the art world's projectors will be focused on its HQ at the world famous Demeure du Chaos / Abode of Chaos Contemporary Art Museum. Artprice will inevitably benefit from the resulting international media exposure, but also from the individual communication strategies of the artists it hosts, via all media channels, including of course the social networks with their 'viral' diffusion potential. Therefore, without any further industrial or property investments, Artprice is creating an unprecedented physical / digital publicity platform for Contemporary Art that will gain permanent exposure all over the planet. Copyright thierry Ehrmann 1987/2017 About Artprice: Artprice is listed on the Eurolist by Euronext Paris, SRD long only and Euroclear: 7478 - Bloomberg: PRC - Reuters: ARTF. Artprice is the global leader in art price and art index databanks. It has over 30 million indices and auction results covering more than 657,000 artists. Artprice Images(R) gives unlimited access to the largest Art Market resource in the world: a library of 126 million images or prints of artworks from the year 1700 to the present day, along with comments by Artprice's art historians. Artprice permanently enriches its databanks with information from 6,300 auctioneers and it publishes a constant flow of art market trends for the world's principal news agencies and approximately 7,200 international press publications. For its 4,500,000 members, Artprice gives access to the world's leading Standardised Marketplace for buying and selling art. Artprice is preparing its blockchain for the Art Market. It is BPI-labelled (scientific national French label). Artprice's Global Art Market Annual Report for 2016 published last March 2017: http://imgpublic.artprice.com/pdf/rama2016_en.pdf Artprice's Contemporary Art Market Annual Report for 2016 - free access at https://www.artprice.com/artprice-reports/the-art-market-in-2016 The text presented hereafter is a translation of Arte Creative's online presentation: ARTE: A gigantic Christmas tree in the guise of a butt plug, a machine that defecates five-star meals, an icon immersed in urine and staged corpses - subversive, trash, provocative or insulting? Thierry Ehrmann, the man behind The Abode of Chaos dixit "The New York Times", an artist and the founder of Artprice, is the mouthpiece for scandal and discloses the workings of the most striking controversies in contemporary art. And scandal sells. 9 episodes are online: http://www.arte.tv/guide/en/weekly-highlight Artprice's press releases: http://serveur.serveur.com/press_release/pressreleaseEN.htm and https://twitter.com/artpricedotcom News Artmarket: http://twitter.com/artpricedotcom https://www.facebook.com/artpricedotcom https://plus.google.com/+Artpricedotcom/posts http://artmarketinsight.wordpress.com/ Discover the Alchemy and the universe of Artprice http://web.artprice.com/video, which headquarters are the famous Museum of Contemporary Art, the Abode of Chaos http://goo.gl/zJssd https://vimeo.com/124643720 The Contemporary Art Museum The Abode of Chaos on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/la.demeure.du.chaos.theabodeofchaos999 The Abode of Chaos/Demeure du Chaos Contemporary Art Museum by thierry Ehrmann,author, sculptor, artist, photograph https://www.flickr.com/photos/home_of_chaos/sets/72157676803169034 Contact: Thierry Ehrmann - e-mail: [email protected] SOURCE Artprice.com

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Is Trump stable enough to continue as president?

The U.S. Constitution, Amendment 25, authorizes Congress to establish a commission to oversee the health of a president and to turn power over to the vice-president when appropriate. Recent events have prompted 28 congress members to sponsor a bill that would set up such a commission.

President Trumps fire and full fury attack on North Korea prompted former CIA director Clapper to question Trumps stability in a time of provocation. Many now question the wisdom of allowing Trumps finger to be on the nuclear trigger that could launch a pre-emptive attack on North Korea, endangering much of the world. North Korea has identified Japan and Guam as targets.

Trumps pardon of former sheriff Arpaio flaunted the democratic process. It intervened in the justice process by pardoning him before the justice process was complete. His attacks on anyone who displeases him, politicians of both parties, public figures and especially the news media do not suggest stability.

A positive side benefit of Trumps behavior seems to be that the news media is now more respected for exposing Trumps antics.

Hurricanes Harvey and Irma have held the attention of this president who seems to thrive on crises. However, when no crisis is evident he seems intent on creating one.

It is time to encourage all Congress members of both parties to join in setting up a commission that oversees the health of this president. A commission to oversee the health of the president is appropriate no matter who is president.

John Hempstead, La Crosse
Kansas prisons chief thinks protests on the streets are responsible for the riots that keep happening inside his prisons You may have heard that there was a terrifying uprising inside a state prison in Norton, Kansas, earlier this week. Corrections officers at the prison-Norton Correctional Facility-described a full-blown riot involving 400 inmates who smashed windows, destroyed computers, knocked over a medical-response vehicle and brandished homemade weapons, before officers from several other prisons arrived and restored order.

The prison industrial complex looks for a scapegoat amid questions about their management, overcrowding and inability to control influx of newbies in the prison population. Checkit:
In these pictures from earlier today you can see the KCPD escorting a contingent of Neo-Nazi Proud Boys (shown in the first picture with the yellow and black flag) from a rally downtown into a KCATA city bus that was labeled "Out of Service." The bus then had police vehicles escorting them away from the premises.





So literal fascists get their very own shuttle service and security provided to them by the City and the Kansas City Missouri Police Department.





The KCPD showed its true colors as a Nazi escort service today."

IS THIS COMPLAINT AND NEWS OF KCPD SEPARATING ARMED PROTESTERS JUSTIFIED OR PART OF KEEPING THE PEACE DOWNTOWN???

There's more fallout after yesterday's Kansas City ANTIFA protest as citizen media alert us to this talk that's gaining ground among social media denizens.Here's a statement from the "Kansas City Revolutionary Collective" expressing their suspicions . . .To be fair and as a fact check . . . TKC TIPSTERS inform us that the "Neo-Nazi" tag deserves further scrutiny from fair-minded people: "The black and yellow colors refer to libertarianism, typically depicted on web forums under a black and yellow banner."However . . . Check the pix closely and these guys are armed as well.More context . . . Police demanded ANTIFA remove ammunition from their weapons yesterday as well.From the comments and some TKC Tipsters:From the comments and TKC Tipsters:Accordingly, we ask our blog community . . .Personal opinion . . . KCPD has enough to confront by way of the local homicide count. While protesters from "many sides" threaten each other with weapons amid culture war discourse . . . The murder count continues to escalate locally and that killing rarely merits cable TV talk show coverage. And so KCMO resources are used to accommodate theoretical blather regarding liberty vs. social justice among those who have now taken up arms while residents of this town desperately hope for more police on local streets to address the ever increasing quotient of killing amid civic scarcity thanks to the misguided local development agenda. And so the distraction continues . . .You decide . . .
Greece will probably not need the full remaining funds available by the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), its head Klaus Regling noted in a lecture on"Germany, Greece and the euro" delivered at documenta14, in Kassel, on Saturday.

"The ESM programs runs until August 2018, but I do not expect that the country will need the total remaining funds of around 46 billion euros in that period. And that means we'll probably stay clearly below the program maximum," he commented.

Regling clarified ESM has disbursed around 39 billion euros to Greece since August 2015 out of a total program of up to 86 billion euros. From the beginning of the first program in 2010, the total now stands at 181 billion euros.

He also slammed the notion that Greece has not implemented any reforms since the beginning of the crisis.

"Particularly in Germany, I hear over and over again that nothing has happened in Greece in the past years. This is an unacceptable distortion of the facts, and an insult to the Greek people, who have had to accept cuts in wages, salaries, and pensions that would have been unimaginable in Germany," he underlined.

"So let me stress that Greece has made considerable progress. The budget trajectory is particularly noteworthy. In 2009, the budget deficit was more than 15 pct of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). In 2016, Greece had achieved a budget surplus of 0.7 percent. Only Germany and three other EU countries had a surplus that was somewhat higher. Such a consolidation success would have been impossible without fundamental reforms. Germany should value and respect that," he stressed.

Regling also referred to the reforms in the public administration - which now employs a quarter fewer staff- in the pension system, the labour market, and the banking sector which were among the most important structural reforms in Greece during the EFSF and ESM programs.

The ESM chief responded as well to critics of the bailouts who argue that Greece"has fallen victim to a neocolonial attitude of its creditors".

Regling characterized this view as "superficial and wrong", adding he strongly rejects it. "Yes, the necessary reforms had a high social cost. They caused substantial losses for many people in Greece, and a lot of pain. But the question is what alternatives were there for a country that investors no longer wanted to lend money to," he continued.

"Greece had very high reform needs in 2008. At the start of the crisis, it became clear that Greek average income had risen by too much in the decade before the crisis. It had almost doubled. That was the highest increase of all euro area countries, and wasn't supported by a comparable increase in productivity. And so, Greece lost competitiveness. The budget and current account deficits became unsustainable and needed to be corrected," he concluded.

Read more here.

RELATED TOPICS: Greece, Greek tourism news, Tourism in Greece, Greek islands, Hotels in Greece, Travel to Greece, Greek destinations , Greek travel market, Greek tourism statistics, Greek tourism report

Source: ANA-MPA
During the tour A Soldiers Tale of Cyprus, Martin Bell, 79, will share his personal recollections of the island and its turbulent struggle for independence

A former British television reporter who served on Cyprus when it was a United Kingdom colony and fighting for independence will lead a group of history buffs on a journey around the island to explain what happened and point out the hot spots of confrontation.

During the tour A Soldiers Tale of Cyprus, Martin Bell, 79, will share his personal recollections of the island and its turbulent struggle for independence, the Cyprus Mail said in a feature on the plans.

The tour is based on the model of another tour that I have been leading, or at least accompanying, in the former Balkan war zones, Bell explained in an interview with the Sunday Mail. The Cyprus conflict, of course, was much longer ago, and my role was very different, he said.

As a young conscript, Bell served with the Suffolk Regiment during the campaign against EOKA, the Greek-Cypriot nationalist guerilla group, which ended with the Zurich and London agreements and independence.

When Bell, 79, returns next year for the eight-day trip, he will be armed with little more than a travel guidebook and memories.

Many of the places he will visit  including the ruins at Salamis and Kourion  still remain instantly recognizable decades after the conflict, the paper said. As far as I know it is the first tour of its kind, but I wish to emphasise that it is totally non-political, he said.

It makes no judgements  except on the British Armys failures at the time, especially Operation Matchbox in July 1958. It is just an old soldier revisiting his past and trying to explain it.

His experiences as a young conscript between 1957 and 1959 were recently documented in his book, The End of Empire, a memoir recounting his national service.

I spent much of the time as a humble corporal, armed but in an unarmoured Land Rover, patrolling potential flash points between Greek and Turkish communities south of Nicosia, he told the paper.

Our Second-in-Command had assured us that the EOKA rebels attacked only when they had the advantages of greater firepower and numbers.

When Bell left the army, he joined the BBC as a reporter and embarked on a career which took him from Vietnam, Nigeria, Angola, the Middle East and Northern Ireland.

Those taking Bells tour, which is organised by Prestige Holidays, will stop off at the Archaeological Museum, St Johns Cathedral, Waynes Keep Memorial, Paphos and Kyrenia Castle.

I expect the people travelling with me to be predominantly British, elderly, open minded and well informed, said Bell.

Read more here.

RELATED TOPICS: Greece, Greek tourism news, Tourism in Greece, Greek islands, Hotels in Greece, Travel to Greece, Greek destinations , Greek travel market, Greek tourism statistics, Greek tourism report

Source: thenationalherald.com
KPMG in Bahrain showcased its cutting-edge technology solutions to administer value added tax (VAT) that can be used and adapted for all businesses locally in Bahrain and across the GCC, at a seminar in Bahrain.



More than 70 senior officials from the local business community attended the informative session on implications of the 2018 forthcoming VAT implementation in Bahrain. A focus session was held on the mandatory compliance processes under the theme beyond the introduction of VAT.



The half-day seminar was organised by KPMG in Bahrain, in cooperation with the Bahrain Capital Club and aimed at helping businesses to further prepare for the new tax system and ensure efficient VAT management in the immediate and longer-term future.



Philippe Norre, head of indirect taxes at KPMG in Bahrain, was the keynote speaker, discussing in a practical way the options available for VAT compliance and reporting.



In his presentation, Norre explained that the complexity of managing VAT throughout the entire supply chain and emphasised the need to have automated and technology-enabled processes in place to ensure a tailored VAT control framework with correct and timely compliance with the VAT reporting requirements.



Traditional methods of compliance, including the use of spreadsheets and manual processes, require tax professionals to spend tremendous amount of time in compilation and cross-checking documents. This carries a high risk of inaccurate reporting and not meeting the tax reporting obligations in time, which can lead to business disruption and severe penalties. However, a tailored level of technology-enabled automation would maintain operations excellence by optimizing resources, reduce risk of errors and facilitate VAT reporting in a timely manner, he commented.



Upon VAT implementation in Bahrain by mid-2018 (as currently expected), businesses within annual supplies threshold of $100,000 (BD37,700) will need to record, assess and report VAT obligations as well as VAT refund entitlements and submit them to the competent authority (to be set up) within specific timeframes. Detailed information about reporting formalities and timelines will be available in the local VAT law, when published in the upcoming months.



Norre also elaborated on the use of information technology to convert potential risks to profitable opportunities. The growing competition and the increasing complexity of market regulations expected with the introduction of VAT put more emphasis on informed decision-making at all levels to make the best decision at the right time. Tax intelligence solutions, including KPMGs TIS, exist and are designed to provide real-time insight on revenue streams by business units, showcasing opportunities to recover tax, improve cash flow and streamline financial processes, he added.



Norre noted that since the volume and type of business transactions differ from one organization to another, there is no one solution that fits all. He encouraged businesses to utilise the current VAT pre-implementation phase to analyse their business landscape and strategy with regard to critical tax issues and determine the best systems and solutions that would streamline their transactions-tax compliance processes.  TradeArabia News Service


Asteco Jordan, a franchise of the UAEs largest real estate firm, has been appointed as exclusive sales agent for the 175-villa Jordanian development Andalucia, near the countrys capital, Amman.



Located on the Airport Road, just 20km from Amman, and developed by Jordan Kuwait Bank, Andalucia (named after the Muslim Kingdom of Andalucia in Spain), is the first gated community to be launched in Jordan and consists of a range of villa configurations including spacious three-, four-, five- and six-bedrooms units. Prices start from JD275,000 ($386,763), said the statement from Asteco.



A total of 588 villas in the development will have access to a host of amenities including a health club, shopping centres, restaurants, coffee shops, parks, clinics, as well as indoor and outdoor swimming pools, it added.



Hussein Safadi, the general manager of Asteco Jordan, said: "Andalucia is one of the premier residential addresses in Amman. Each property is built to the highest specifications with unrivalled build quality, further distinguishing it from other developments in the region."



"We fully expect Andalucia to be popular with investors, end-users and tenants," he noted.



In 2016 the market went through a difficult period and transaction levels were subdued, however sales were still taking place. All indications this year point to improvement in the market as the economy continues to grow and strengthen. Developments, such as Andalucia, create further depth resulting in a more bearish real estate market, stated Safadi.



The partnership with Jordan Kuwait Bank will see Asteco Jordan utilise one of the banks branches to set up a sales centre while also increasing staff numbers to deal with the increased enquiries. An advertising campaign will also run throughout Dubai as the company targets expat Jordanians, he added.



John Stevens, the managing director, Asteco, said: "Our franchise model was launched in 2014 to offer real estate companies, independent realtors and regional entrepreneurs looking to diversify their existing businesses, or launch a start-up, access to Astecos 30-year brand pedigree and its successful business model."



"The licensing division has allowed us to further propagate the strength of the Asteco brand, image and reputation in new markets through our trusted and capable partners," noted Stevens.



Such has been the success of our 14 franchisees, this year from January to July franchisee profits were up 47 per cent compared to the same period last year to over Dh2 million. The team at Asteco Jordan have done exceptionally well to secure this appointment and already H2 profits look well on target to better last years results, he added.-TradeArabia News Service
Irans steel exports to Europe is now safe from punitive measures after EU governments rejected proposals to impose trade tariffs on imports from the country, said a report.



The European Commission, which sets out trade policy in the 28-member European Union, had proposed duties of up to 23 per cent for steel from Iran's Mobarakeh Steel Company (MSC), added the Fars News Agency report.



European steel lobby group Eurofer was at the centre of the campaign, which had also proposed plans to levy tariffs of up to 33 per cent on imports of hot-rolled steel from Brazil, Russia and Ukraine, it said.



But EU countries opposed the plan, with some members believing the measures were too weak while others regarded them too strong.



Eurofers complaint against MSC was that Iranian exports of hot-rolled steel, used in machinery and construction, to Europe had leapt to more than 1 million tonnes annually, accusing Mobarakeh of "trade distorting measures".



Europes tough stance, including its more than 40 restrictive measures aimed at aiding European steel producers, has already sparked accusations of protectionism from international steel exporters, added the report.
The UAE and China have agreed to strengthen economic cooperation by focusing on 13 vital sectors at the sixth UAE-China Joint Economic Committee meeting in Beijing recently.



The sectors include investment, industry, energy and renewable energy, SMEs and innovative industries, health, education, tourism, infrastructure, financial services, standards and measures, space and aviation, and local cooperation, said a statement.



The UAE delegation at the meeting was headed by Eng Sultan bin Saeed Al Mansoori, Minister of Economy, while the Chinese side was led by Zhong Shan, Minister of Commerce of the People's Republic of China.



The meeting was attended by Mohammed Ahmed bin Abdul Aziz Al Shehhi, the UAE Ministry of Economys Undersecretary for Economic Affairs. Also present were Mohammed Al Shamsi, UAE Deputy Ambassador to China; Badir Al Musharrekh, UAE Commercial Attache in China; and senior officials and representatives of government authorities from the UAE.



The two sides also agreed to strengthen cooperation in the field of e-commerce using the experiences and practices of China. They also discussed cooperation in the field of Halal products.



They also reached an agreement on exploring cooperation in the field of intellectual property rights protection to ensure sound and sustainable bilateral trade growth.



The UAE and China also expressed their mutual desire to explore ways to increase the number of connecting flights between their countries.



The non-oil trade between UAE and China reached $46.3 billion in 2016, it was revealed at the meeting, which was aimed at promoting the economic cooperation between China and the UAE in the non-oil commercial and production sectors and it discussed latest plans to develop trade and cooperation between the two countries.



The two parties reported their achievements in the development of cooperative frameworks in several vital areas of common interest since the fifth session of the Joint Economic Committee, it said.



The joint economic committee meeting also witnessed the signing of three memorandums of understanding (MoUs) and two protocols, which included:

* MoU between the UAE Ministry of Economy and the Ministry of Industry and Information technology of China on Cooperation in the fields of Small and Medium Size Enterprises (SMEs) and Innovation;

* MoU between the UAE Ministry of Economy and China's Ministry of Commerce on Trade Remedies

* MoU between the UAE Ministry of Economy and the Investment Promotion Agency of the Ministry of Commerce of China on Bilateral Investment and Related Trade Promotion Cooperation;

* Cooperation Protocol between the UAE Ministry of Economy and the Ministry of Commerce of China on the Five-Year Action Plan on Mutual Business Visits;

* Cooperation Protocol between the UAE Ministry of Economy and the China Chamber of Commerce for Import and Export of Machinery and Electronic Products of China on the Implementation of the Five-Year Action Plan on Mutual Business Visits.



Eng Al Mansoori said: The UAE and China enjoy strong relations based on friendship, mutual respect and common interests. Our countries value the meetings of the Joint Economic Commission as important and highly effective platforms for promoting economic, trade and technical cooperation in line with our common development aspirations.



He added that the two nations have developed an active model of cooperation in the aviation sector, linked by more than 75 flights a week covering various major Chinese cities. In fact, the UAE investments in China exceeded $2.1 billion in 2016.



For his part, Shan said that his country is committed to enhancing its strategic partnership with the UAE, especially in the economic and trade fields. He pointed out the importance of the agreements and memorandums of cooperation signed by the two sides, saying that they will contribute to the development of bilateral trade and investments, SMEs, and innovation.



He also underscored the great potential for further developing partnerships between the two countries, especially in light of the emergence of various development initiatives  most notably the Belt and Road initiative. He assured that Chinese companies remain highly interested in the UAE markets because of its unique business environment, which is being further heightened by preparations for Expo 2020 and strategic projects in infrastructure, transport, and other major fields.



The minutes of the committee's meeting confirmed the importance of cooperative and strategic links between UAE Vision 2021 and China's Belt and Road initiative, particularly through the expansion of existing cooperative frameworks and the strengthening of economic and trade ties between UAE and China, said the statement.
Gov. Scott Walker has shifted the state's focus from job creation to workforce development, but critics say the focus is still on the needs of businesses, rather than of workers.
Over 20,000 ICT industry professionals, thought leaders, and analysts visited Shanghai, China, this week to witness Huawei unveil a stream of innovations, including its vision of building one of five global clouds to power the future of business.



The New International Expo Centre was once again taken over by Huawei for its annual conference, Huawei Connect, in which thousands of representatives from more than 150 countries travelled to explore advancements in digital technology, and embark on a path to new growth, said a statement.



With a commitment of spending $500 million in the next five years to support digital transformations around the world, Huaweis enterprise service strategy is focused towards positioning Huawei as an industry cloud enabler across diverse industries, it said.



Cloud is the most needed technology for governments and enterprises, said Rotating CEO, Guo Ping, Huawei.



Our company is very committed to building a cloud platform to support customer business needs and innovation, he said.



Our business model is not to monetize user data. We do not develop applications or touch the data in our public clouds. We provide technologies and services to help users monetize their data, he added.



At the three-day event, Huawei launched Connection+Cloud, the dual drivers of its digitisation strategy and enterprise network solutions for smart connection of everything. The strategy and solutions help enterprises accelerate their transformation to the cloud by providing comprehensive network connections, and network management that is more intelligent in all scenarios, such as access, WAN, data centre, and interconnection, said a statement.



The company also took the opportunity to release six new innovations into the market, discussing solutions designed to help enterprises with digital transformation. They included innovations in hardware, software, data, connection, architecture, and hybrid cloud, it said.



The major focus was on the Huawei Cloud, which the company described as the cornerstone of the intelligent world. Huawei believes the development of technologies, societies are experiencing a tangible Matthew Effect when it comes to innovation. Because of this, clouds around the world will begin to converge, becoming more and more centralized.



The result will be a small collection of global clouds, powered by the biggest companies on the planet. Huawei has committed to developing one of those clouds with a number of partners.



Increasingly, innovation will take place in the cloud, said Joy Huang, vice president of Huaweis IT Product Line.



Huawei Cloud is committed to being an enabler of the intelligent world, delivering continuous innovations of technologies and capabilities that help customers succeed in their digital transformation, he said.



The Grow With the Cloud theme of the event focused on the practical implementation of Huaweis cloud strategy, first unveiled at last years conference, said a statement.



Rotating CEO, Ping, set the bar for enabling the intelligent world for customers all over the world, through his opening keynote.



He said: Our company has made strategic investments in the public cloud domain, and will provide long-term public cloud services.



I liken our strategy to a major airline alliance, such as SkyTeam or Oneworld. They take passengers wherever they need to go in the world. Huawei Cloud will open up the world to its users, he added.



Adding further weight to its commitment was the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MOU) for cloud services with Microsoft. The US tech giant will release Microsoft applications on the Huawei Cloud, providing optimal experience of cloud services for enterprises as they navigate through their digital transformations.



Huaweis $500 million, five-year commitment to enhancing service capabilities through its cloud transformation strategy will see enterprises embrace cloud transformation more and more.



Huawei also released the new-generation intelligent cloud hardware platform  Atlas. Positioned for scenarios such as public cloud, artificial intelligence (AI), and high-performance computing (HPC), Atlas rides on the advantages of key technologies.



The suite includes heterogeneous resource pooling and intelligent orchestration to deliver new levels of hardware resource utilisation and adapt more flexibly to service demands. As the result of Huawei's Boundless Computing strategy, the Atlas platform makes Huawei well positioned to steer the infrastructure resource pool revolution.



Huawei enterprise network products and solutions have been widely used in more than 100 countries and regions around the world and are accelerating enterprises digital transformation based on Smart Connection of Everything. To date, 197 of the Fortune Global 500 companies, and 45 of the top 100 enterprises have chosen Huawei as their partner for digital transformation, it stated.  TradeArabia News Service
Saudi Arabia's Public Transport Authority has suspended the issuance of new private taxi licences and the addition of vehicles to the activity pending a review of the taxi sector in the kingdom a comprehensive manner.



The auhtority has directed the owners of taxi smartphone applications to get their tariffs approved in various cities by the Public Transport Authority before applying them, and publish them in a clear manner, said a Saudi Press Agency report.



Public Transport Authority head Dr Rumih bin Mohammed Al-Rumaih also urged them not to publish any advertisements without reference to the authority. This includes advertisements in the print media, audio and social networks.
Careem, a leading ride-hailing company, is well on its way to the goal of providing job opportunities for 100,000 captains in Egypt by the end of 2017.



Careem has already increased the number of captains from 50,000 to approximately 80,000 to date. With flexible working hours that fits their needs, captains work full time relying on Careem riders as their main source of income, the company said.



Aiming to change the transportation landscape in the region by providing reliable, safe and affordable transportation choices, Careem co-founders established the business in Dubai in 2012. In just five years, Careem has expanded its network to more than 80 cities across 13 countries in the broader Middle East, including North Africa, Turkey and Pakistan.



Careem prides itself in its mission to improve and simplify peoples lives while creating opportunities for hundreds of thousands to drive as independent contractors and the remaining millions to ride in cost effective, safer environments in the markets where Careem operates, it said.



With more than 250,000 captains moving millions of people every day across the region, Careems culture values independent captains and focuses on enhancing their lives through enriching training and growth opportunities. For example, Careem Egypt has launched multiple captain loyalty programs to reward high-performing captains offering them discounted electrical appliances, access to micro-loans, vouchers from one of the biggest market chains to use on groceries and special offers on car care services.



In recent months, Careem further expanded its impressive footprint across Egypt, doubling its network from seven cities to 14 including: Cairo, Alexandria, North Coast during the summer, Hurghada, Gouna and eight Delta cities: Mahalla, Banha, Damnhour, Mansoura, Tanta, Kafr El Dawar (Behira), Damietta and Zagazig, in addition to the Careem in Canal cities: Suez, Port Said and Ismailia. - TradeArabia News Service
The Ascott, a leading serviced residence owner-operator, has unveiled plans to expand its operation in Saudi Saudi with 20 new properties in the kingdom by 2020, said a report.



Since 2014, The Ascott has rapidly expanded in the Middle East, growing from three operating properties to 10 properties with 1,487 keys today. Five of those serviced residences are in Saudi Arabia, accounting for 608 keys, said a report in Mena Herald.



For the upcoming properties, The Ascott will be focusing on primary cities such as Riyadh, Jeddah and Dammam, with plans to expand further into secondary cities within the next five years.



"The countrys goals fit perfectly with our own vision for expansion. We are ahead of the curve as we already have an established presence of five serviced residences, with another seven in the pipeline.", the report cited Vincent Miccolis, area general manager for the Middle East & Turkey, as saying.



"With the recent news that a long section of the Red Sea coastline is going to be developed, there will be even more opportunities for hospitality providers, like The Ascott Limited, to grow in Saudi Arabia," he said.
Latvian airline airBaltic, in codeshare cooperation with Etihad Airways, will launch a direct service between Riga and Abu Dhabi on October 29.



The four times weekly service will depart from Abu Dhabi at 9:45 in the morning, providing travellers from the UAE and surrounding Gulf countries with convenient access not only to the Baltic States of Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania, but also to the Northern European destinations of Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Russia.



To promote the flights, airBaltic has selected Aviareps, the global leader in tourism, aviation and hospitality representation.



Martin Gauss, chief executive officer of airBaltic, said: We are delighted to link Latvia and the UAE. with our brand-new Bombardier aircraft. Riga is a notable business and leisure hub in Northern Europe, attracting millions of passengers every year. In addition to that, our clients appreciate the convenient transfer possibilities we offer to over 60 destinations in Scandinavia, Russia and the CIS.



Flights between Abu Dhabi and Riga last 6 hours and 15 minutes, with one-way ticket prices starting from Dh1,095 ($298), including airport fees and transaction costs.



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Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, September 9

Three students of DAV College, Sector 10, who were detained for defacing public property, were fined Rs 5,000 each at a Lok Adalat held in the district courts complex here today. Brijeshwar, Dinesh and Sahit, all BA final year students, were apprehended by the police for putting up posters of the Hindustan Student Association (HSA) at the bus stand in Sector 17.

However, the three claimed that they were falsely implicated. Sahit, a native of Jhajjar, said: We were there to have food and those posters were already there. The police detained us for being in possession of similar posters. He also added that he had been fined Rs 500 last year for the same offence.

More than 50 cases of defacement were registered at various police stations of the city during the student elections. However, most of them were against unknown persons. While one defaulter was nabbed on August 31, six student leaders were reportedly booked on September 3, as the poster were carrying their pictures. Most of these cases were registered at the police stations in Sector 3, 11 and 17.

The UT Administration follows the Delhi Prevention of Defacement of Property Act, 2007, under which defaulters are liable to pay Rs 50,000 fine or undergo imprisonment for one year, or both.
Mohali: Two motorcycle-borne snatchers targeted an elderly woman in Phase 3 A at 11 am on Saturday. They snatched a 15-gram gold chain (with a locket) from Jaswinder Kaur while she was going to get clothes ironed near her residence. The snatchers, who were wearing helmets, took a round of the locality before targeting her. The victim raised the alarm but the snatchers escaped. A PCR team reached the spot and tried to procure CCTV footage in the locality. TNS
Vivek Katju

Vivek Katju

PAKISTANS security and foreign policy managers have faced a very difficult period beginning with President Donald Trumps August 21 Afghanistan and South Asia policy address and stretching to the Xiamen BRICS Summit declaration on September 4. The two statements, so different in origin, struck blows, in different ways, against Pakistans policy objectives in Afghanistan and the region in three areas that the country considers vital to its core interests. First, Pakistans reliance on non-official elements in many cases ideologically obscurantist and wedded to violence to act, as directed, in the neighbourhood. Second, the maintenance of the Chinese shield. Third, the reduction, if not the elimination, of Indias presence in Afghanistan.

Trump directly accused Pakistan of pursuing a duplicitous policy in Afghanistan and peremptorily demanded that it close down the safe havens for the Afghan Taliban. He virtually threatened that a failure to do so would invite unspecified consequences. The Americans have known, in the past, that Pakistan was taking vast sums of their money and at the same time allowing the Taliban to operate against their forces in Afghanistan, killing around 2,500 US service personnel since 2003. However, whereas Obama and Bush were obviously willing to overlook Pakistani conduct for larger geopolitical reasons, Trump is not ready to do so. His generals have told him the key to clear up the Afghan mess is to militarily degrade the Taliban and for that purpose the safe havens must end. He has gone along with that view.

Pakistan reacted with fury at Trumps plain speaking. Both the National Assembly and the Senate adopted resolutions condemning Trumps comments. Going beyond words, Pakistan suspended high-level contact with the US, including putting on hold foreign minister Khawaja Asifs official visit to the US. Pakistan also looked to China for support which came quickly. Predictably, the all-weather friend repeated the Pakistani narrative: few countries have done as much and suffered as much in fighting terrorism as Pakistan has.

In this background, the Xiamen declaration caused dismay in Pakistan for China agreed, for the first time, to include foreign-oriented Pakistan-based terrorist groups  Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM), Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), the Afghan Taliban and the Haqqani Network  in a BRICS document, and that too, at the summit level. China joined other countries, including India, in expressing concern at the violence caused by these groups. While doing so, the Chinese sought to provide Pakistan cover by mentioning the Tehreek-e-Taliban-e-Pakistan (TTP) which is fighting the Pakistan state and also because the LeT and JeM are formally banned in Pakistan.

A perception that China had let go of the shield, if only momentarily, on Pakistani double standards on the jihadi tanzeems, caused a jolt. This was exhibited in the dissonance in Pakistani reactions. While defence minister Khurram Dastagir and the foreign ministry formally rejected the BRICS declaration, Khawaja Asif told a private Pakistani TV channel that Pakistan cannot test friends forever and must note the changed international environment. Asif travelled to China and sought reassurance of Chinese steadfastness which has come through Chinese commitment to seek to work for normalising Pakistans ties with Afghanistan. It is noteworthy that it has not said anything on the JeM or the LeT.

Arguably, what Pakistan found most unacceptable in Trumps South Asia policy was the US desire that India should play a more active role in Afghanistan, even if he signalled only the economic sector for this purpose. It has been Pakistans historic desire that Indian influence be curtailed in Afghanistan. In the 1980s, as Pakistan became the base of Afghan jihad, it became more ambitious. It wanted India to be shut out of Afghanistan so that it could get strategic depth against it on Afghan territory.

Generally the West, especially the US, has pandered to Pakistans obsession with Indias presence and position in Afghanistan. It has given a sympathetic ear to Pakistans fears of Indian encirclement through Afghanistan. This has been on account of its need for Pakistan in the Afghan context during the anti-Soviet jihad and since 9/11. To satisfy Pakistan, the West designed international diplomatic mechanisms for peace making in Afghanistan which ensured that India was kept out. It is no secret that it tried its best to put India at the periphery at the Bonn conference in 2001 which mapped out the countrys future after the Taliban was ousted from Kabul.

The US also counselled successive Afghan governments till a few years ago to exclude India from the security sector and generally balance their relations with India and Pakistan. While shades of change in this approach had come in closing years of the Obama administration, Trump has abandoned US reticence altogether and moved in the other direction. Naturally, Pakistan has poured venom on this US decision and also against India.

Pakistan has always lost the plot in Afghanistan for pursuing the aim of acquiring a controlling voice in the countrys India policy. Hardly any Afghan Government has been or would be willing to accept this demand. Only the Taliban played ball but it too was not averse to open up with India. It is this objective which led Pakistan to reject the overtures of both Presidents, Hamid Karzai and Ashraf Ghani. The latter went to the extent of visiting the Pakistan army chief at GHQ, Rawalpindi, to indicate a willingness to exclude India from the security area and build ties in this sector as well as undertake cooperation between the Afghan and Pakistani intelligence agencies. However, even he could not meet the Pakistans unbending maximalist demand.

As Pakistan deals with Trump and Afghanistan what should India do? While naturally keeping a keen focus on the terrorist groups in Pakistan, India should seek to maintain its assistance programme. It should respond to Afghan requests, including in the security sector, without ever seeking to be prescriptive. In the defence area, India should increase the training of Afghan personnel in India, provide such equipment and stores as it can without taking Pakistani sensitivities into consideration.

From time to time, some Indian security experts urge that India should be willing to send combat troops to Afghanistan. A couple of months ago, a section of the media reported a rumour that India was willing to send 15,000 soldiers to Afghanistan. The rumour soon died down for it was obviously without foundation. In any event, India must not ever think of sending troops to Afghanistan. That would provide Pakistan a historic opportunity to turn Afghan sentiment against India.

Thoughtful voices in Pakistan are urging the country to give up its dual approach on fighting terrorism. But they are still in the wilderness.

The writer is a former Secretary, Ministry of External Affairs
Ananya Panda

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, September 9

The Delhi University Election Office has declined the request of the Congress-affiliated National Students Union of India (NSUI) for extending the campaign time by four days for the Delhi University Students Union (DUSU) elections.

Chief Election Officer Prof SB Babbar has appealed to all candidates not to resort to any violations of the Model Code of Conduct, Lyngdoh Committee report and adhere to the Delhi Prevention of Defacement of Property Act 2007 besides urging students to come out and vote during the election slated for September 12.

The refusal by the office of Chief Election Officer Prof SB Babbar has prompted the NSUI to dub him partisan and accused the administration of inaction over a complaint against an Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) presidential nominee of assault and criminal intimidation, allegations the ABVP rejected.

On the issue, the NSUI had filed a complaint alleging ABVPs presidential candidate Rajat Choudhary had offered its rival money to withdraw his nomination. The All India Students Association, too, had filed complaint with DU poll committee.

Yesterday, the Delhi High Court cleared the candidature of NSUIs Rocky Tuseed following which the NSUI renamed him as its presidential candidate.

It had also requested the administration to increase the campaign time by four days in order to allow an equal chance to Tuseed and also constrain all other candidates from campaigning during two days.

It was after the courts relief the DU election committee allotted him ballot number 9 stating his candidature has been included.

Blaming the university poll panel, NSUI media in-charge Neeraj Mishra said, Our stand is vindicated. The NSUI had termed it a victory of democracy and students of Delhi University.

The BJP and ABVP do not want a democratic contest and try and win elections through intimidation, violence and subversion of all democratic values. The judiciary has stood for justice and now the students of Delhi University will stand for democracy, the NSUI said in a statement.

The university is closed over the weekend and campaigning is to stop at 8.30 am on Monday. This leaves our candidate with no time to campaign. This is patently against the principles of free and fair elections, said the NSUI.

The mandate of the Election Committee is to conduct free and fair elections. It is obvious that our candidate has been highly disadvantaged due to this arbitrary decision of the Chief Election Officer. He has been put through great mental stress and has lost valuable campaign time. Therefore, the Chief Election Officer must extend campaign time to ensure that our candidate get a level playing field, said NSUIs Midrash Mathew.
Washington, September 10

Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi will interact with global thinkers, political leaders and overseas Indians in the US this week on international economic and technology issues, an organiser of his visit said.

Gandhi, 47, begins his two-week trip to the US with an address at the University of California, Berkeley, on Monday on contemporary India and the path forward for the worlds largest democracy.

His great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru, Indias first prime minister, delivered a speech at Berkeley in 1949.

The purpose of the visit is two-fold. One is to meet interesting and global thinkers, to have a conversation on what is happening the world over on economy, on technology, on opportunities, and really understand different views from experts on the global scene, technocrat Sam Pitroda, who is involved with the preparations of Gandhis visit, told PTI.

Pitroda worked with Gandhis father and former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi for nearly a decade to transform Indias telecom sector.

He said Gandhi would meet overseas Indians at an event in New York as part of an outreach by the Congress party.

The Congress Vice President is scheduled to visit Washington DC. He is likely to address members of the think-tank community at an event organised by the Centre for American Progress, and interact with the corporate world at another programme organised by the US-India Business Council.

Gandhi may meet some members of the ruling Republican Party. A lot of these meetings are going to be small and private, Pitroda said.

He wants to understand more about whats happening globally and whats the global view of the situation is, he said.

The Congress Vice President has often visited the US, but this could possibly be the first time in his political career that Gandhi would hold public meetings, meet political leaders and deliver speeches in the country.

You know he needs to be out, he needs to express his views. You know he has been not, may be, talking publicly about his trips. But I think, it is important that he meets a large number of people this time and also overseas Congress members, Pitroda said.

Today, the view of India is one short of protected by one group of people. We need to really talk about Indian aspirations, Indian concerns about what is going on not just in India but the world over. Rise of populism is one topic I am sure will come up in the conversation, Pitroda said.

He said Gandhi would interact with Silicon Valley people, where the technology, talent and Indian brain power is concentrated. So, the idea is if you were to meet a lot of Silicon Valley people, it is better to talk about things in San Francisco.

Gandhi will also address a gathering at Princeton University. PTI
Sushil Manav

Tribune News Service

Sirsa, September 9

Dera Sacha Sauda is being accused of having amassed over 750 acres by forcing villagers to sell their prime agricultural land to it at throwaway prices.

Residents of Begu and Nejia villages, located on the two sides of the dera headquarters on the SirsaChopta road, allege that it used arm-twisting methods to force villagers to sell their land at prices much lower than the market rates.

According to conservative estimates, the dera has nearly 975 acres in Sirsa, mostly in the revenue records of Begu and Nejia villages. The estimated cost of the collective land is said to be over Rs 1,500 crore now.

Villagers allege that more than 50 farmers sold their prime fertile land to the dera between 1995 and 2000 due to the coercive methods employed by it. What will one do when thousands of devotees enter his agriculture fields to defecate in the morning or hundreds of canters and jeeps are parked on the standing crops? The dera would first identify the land to be targeted and then tell followers during congregation that they can relieve themselves in that particular field. When the police or political leaders did not intervene, the affected families would go to the dera for mercy and were told that their land could be bought if they have any problem with devotees, says a resident of Begu village. The harried landowners ended up selling their land at throwaway prices.

Lekh Raj Dhot, a senior advocate from Sirsa, says when Shah Mastana set up the dera in 1948, it had merely 35 acres to 40 acres near Begu village. Shah Satnam Singh took over in 1960 and when he died in 1991, the dera had 70 acres.

However, Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh converted the religious sect into a business venture. From 1996 to 2000, the dera had added more than 750 acres using coercive means, alleges Dhot.

The land purchased by the dera during this period includes 612 acres in Begu village and 144 acres in Nejia village. Land in nearby Arniawali village was also purchased through similar means.

Sources say initially the land was purchased in the name of the sadhus of the dera. But later when some sadhus started leaving the dera, the land was got transferred to the dera through hibbanamas (gift deeds).

I have a copy of land records of nearly 900 acres belonging to the dera. I have noticed that almost 90 per cent of the land located in Begu and Nejia villages was transferred in its favour through gift deeds by persons who were not from these two villages, says Dhot.

The sources say besides, the dera has land, ashrams and farmhouses in Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and several other states. Wherever the dera purchased land, it preferred to show it as gift from devotees so that it does not have to pay fees on the registration of sale deed, add the sources.

What will one do when thousands of devotees enter his agriculture fields to defecate in the morning or hundreds of canters and jeeps are parked on the standing crops? When the police or political leaders did not intervene, the affected families would go to the dera for mercy and were told that their land could be bought if they have any problem with devotees. The harried landowners ended up selling their land at throwaway prices. A resident of Begu village
Shahira Naim

Tribune News Service

Lucknow, September 9

Prima facie there appears no irregularity in 14 cadavers donated to the Lucknow-based GCRG Institute of Medical Science by followers of Dera Sacha Sauda, said Lucknow SP (Rural) Satish Kumar, 2013-batch IPS officer.

Satish, in whose jurisdiction the institute falls in Bakshi ka Talab area on the outskirts of the city, said he had personally visited the institute on Friday after a senior officer informed him of bodies arriving from the dera.

College managing director Omkar Yadav furnished all documents. I have checked the papers and collected copies of these. They have the Aadhaar card of every single body that came to them as well as the Aadhaar card of the relative who donated it. There are bills of payments for hearses which brought the bodies here. So where is the irregularity, he asked.

He said the bodies that came were of persons in advanced years who had died of natural causes.

It is the requirement of the Medical Council of India that medical colleges should have such cadavers for teaching purposes. The norm is to have one cadaver per 10 students. As the GCRG Institute of Medical Science has 150 students on their rolls, they require 15 cadavers against which they have 14, he explained.

The institutes marketing and public relations head, Luxmi Kant Pandey, said that getting cadavers of dera followers who had pledged to donate their bodies was the norm. When the institute opened in 2016-17, we inquired from other medical colleges about the procedure of acquiring cadavers for medical students. We were told that it was a tradition with the dera followers to donate their bodies. So we contacted the dera.

The bodies that arrived at the institute between January and August this year came in deep freezer hearses. We gave each family a certificate of voluntary donation of the body and a letter of thanks, he said, claiming he knew of at least five more private medical colleges in Lucknow receiving cadavers from the dera. However, the SP said he had no such information.

No record of bodies: Civil Surgeon

Sirsa: A Health Department team which visited the multi-specialty Dera Sacha Sauda hospital on Saturday found no record of cadavers sent to a private medical college in Uttar Pradesh. Deputy Commissioner Prabhjot Singh said there was no record of death certificates, the cause of deaths or the number of cadavers sent. He said a skin bank at the hospital had been sealed and action would be initiated against the hospital for violating the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act. Four saw mills at the dera had been sealed, he added.  Sushil Manav
Sushil Manav

Tribune News Service

Sirsa/Fatehabad, September 10

The authorities in Sirsa today announced the completion of search operations at Dera Sacha Sauda.

Satish Mehra, Deputy Director (Information and Public Relations Department), who has been authorised by the district administration to brief the media on the issue, announced today that the search operation in the dera was over.

Officials in charge of various sectors made for the purpose of search have submitted their report to Court Commissioner AKS Pawar, who will submit the report to the Punjab and Haryana High Court, said Mehra.

He said that mobile, internet and train services to and from Sirsa will resume from tomorrow. However, curfew will remain in force near Dera Sacha Sauda and relaxation will be given to the residents to make necessary shopping, he said.

Speaking on the sidelines of a state-level Convention of Denotified Tribes in Fatehabad today, Khattar said he would not comment on the outcome of the search because the report is yet to be submitted to the Punjab and Haryana High Court by the Court Commissioner.

Answering a question, Khattar denied that there was any delay on the part of the government to begin search operations.

He said it was necessary to wait for the court orders as the search was to be carried out under the its supervision.

When Khattars attention was drawn to the allegations that family members of the Dera chief were allowed to take away huge cash and other valuables in trucks, he said those who had houses in the Dera and wanted to move out were allowed to leave with their belongings. Earlier, the authorities opened seals rooms, which were sealed during the first two days of the search operation and began technical analysis of the items found there.

Sources said that some rooms on the top floor of Mahi cinema hall and room number 51 and 52 of the dera near its administrative block were sealed on the first day of the operation.

Today, IT experts were sent to these rooms to retrieve and analyse the data, said sources.
Tribune News Service

Shimla, September 9

There seems to be no let-up in the utterances by Virbhadra Singh against state Congress president Sukhwinder Singh Sukhu even as the central leadership is hopeful that the six-time Chief Minister will relent.

Virbhadra, who was on a tour of his Shimla (Rural) Assembly constituency today, again expressed displeasure over the state of affairs in the party. It is sad to see the state of affairs in the Congress now as it seems to be following the principle jiski laathi uski bhains (might is right), he remarked.

The remarks by Virbhadra came at a time when All-India Congress Committee (AICC) president Sushil Kumar Shinde is trying to forge unity between the CM and Sukhu in view of the elections. Shinde is on a three-day tour of Chamba district and is accompanied by Sukhu and other local Congress leaders.

Virbhadra said he had remained the Himachal Pradesh Congress Committee (HPCC) president on five occasions, out of which he was elected four times and not nominated. The state president, District Congress Committee president, block president and other party office-bearers were elected earlier, but all this seems to have changed now, he remarked at Ghanatti. He said in earlier days, even the Congress Working Committee (CWC) used to be elected and not nominated.

Such utterances by the CM indicate that he is no mood to relent and will remain adamant on his demand for replacing Sukhu with a man of his choice. He has made it clear to the high command that if he does not have a complete say, he will prefer not to contest and retire gracefully from politics.

Virbhadra said in other political parties, the situation was no different. There should be complete democracy in any political outfit and new members should keep joining the party. It is only then that everyone will get an opportunity to work, he remarked. He even cautioned against political opportunists, who, he said, never worked in the interest of the party or the state. People should vote to elect their MP, MLA or even panchayat pradhan on the basis of their performance and not on mere speeches, he said.

72 Mahila Mandals receive grant

Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh today presented cheques for Rs 20,000 each to 72 Mahila Mandals of 24 gram panchayats falling under the Shimla (Rural) Assembly segment from the MLA Development Fund. Speaking at the Mahila Sammelan organised at Ghanatti, he said the state government had always accorded top priority to women empowerment. The government has been working towards giving them equal freedom, status and honour. They are being given ample opportunities to excel in every sphere of life and it was a matter of great contentment that they are not lagging behind in any field, he said. On the demand of people of various gram panchayats, Virbhadra announced to open a degree college at Poaba Ka Chonra in the Chanog panchayat of the Shimla (Rural) constituency. He said there were no financial constraints in opening educational institutes in the state. The CM said the Shimla (Rural) constituency had been developed as a model constituency of the state, where every section and sector had been given priority. He said 10 government senior secondary schools, nine high schools, 10 middle schools and 15 primary schools were opened during his present tenure.

Things have changed

I had remained the HPCC president on five occasions, out of which I was elected four times, not nominated. The state president, District Congress Committee presidents, block presidents and other party office-bearers were elected earlier, but all this seems to have changed now. Virbhadra Singh, CM
Our Correspondent

Hamirpur, September 9

Former Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal said today that early selection of the BJP candidates would help party managing the last-minute hassles and would be in better control of the situation.

He was addressing a press conference the after returning from the BJP special meeting at Panchkula. He said there was no discussion on the names of the probables but all were advised to work unitedly for the victory of BJP candidates in their constituencies. He said the names of BJP candidates would be declared by national president Amit Shah and it was expected that the exercise would be completed soon.

Refraining from comments on infighting in the Congress, Dhumal said it was their internal matter and the BJP need not comment on that. He said there was no doubts about the victory of the BJP in the state and the Congress had lost its popularity following failures in providing good governance. He said BJP leaders, workers and people were in election mode and all were waiting to replace th e Congress government eagerly.

Dhumal said Amit Shah would address a youth rally on September 22 at Kangra. Over 1 lakh people would participate. Senior party leaders would address the media and the programme would be initiated by party spokesperson Sambit Patra from Shimla on September 12.

Dhumal said the election campaign would focus on the achievement of the BJP.

Earlier, Dhumal inaugurated solar and streetlight installation programme sponsored by the National Thermal Power Corporation. The selected villages of the district would have dust bins and solar lights.
Tribune News Service

Shimla, September 9

A tourist, reportedly from Hyderabad, who had gone to Kinner Kailash alone, found dead with burn injuries in a cave near the Kinner Kailash peak.

Jagdish, a shepherd, who was grazing his animals, met the tourist a day before his death. Jagdish said the tourist was drenched due to rain and while he came back down, the tourist decided to stay in a cave.

When I went up the next day, I found the burnt body of the tourist in the cave and he immediately informed the pradhan of Ribba panchayat who informed SDM Major Arvind Sharma about the mishap, he added.

As soon as the news spread, a rescue team from Reckong Peo rushed to the spot. The incident dates back to September 7. The rescue team reached the spot today. The deceased is still unidentified and the body will be brought to Reckong Peo tomorrow.

Jagdish said the tourist might have burn some woods to keep himself warm and he was also smoking cigarettes. The cause of death was not known yet. The yatra was over on August 11 and the district administration had asked the people not to venture on the route.

Worker falls off cinema, dies

In another incident, a sweeper died after falling from the roof of Ritz Cinema in Shimla late last night. The deceased was identified as Shravan Kumar of Jalandhar. He was working as sweeper at Ritz for years.
Shyam Sood

Rajouri, September 9

A Border Security Force (BSF) constable and a civilian were injured when Pakistani soldiers initiated unprovoked heavy mortar shelling in the Balnoi sector of Mendhar tehsil in Poonch district on Saturday morning.

The injured have been identified as Mohammed Younis of Bechari (Balnoi) and Constable SK Swain of the BSF, 200 Battalion, a resident of Orissa.

This was the second incident in 48 hours in which a civilian and a BSF constable were injured in the cross-LoC mortar shelling and firing.

On September 7, the Pakistan army resorted to heavy firing on the Indian Armys forward posts in Gulpur sector and two porters, Farooq Ahmed and Mushtaq Ahmed, were injured. They are under treatment at the Army hospital in Poonch.

The police said Mohammed Younis was rushed to a hospital at Mendhar while the BSF constable was admitted at the Field Hospital in Mendhar and both are out of danger.

Todays ceasefire violation by the Pakistan army was the sixth since August 23, when a battalion commander-level flag meeting was held at Chakan-da-Bagh in Poonch district and it was decided that the armies would exercise restraint along the LoC.

Lt Col Manish Mehta, Defence spokesman, said. The Pakistan army initiated unprovoked and indiscriminate firing of small and automatic weapons and mortars around 10.30 am and since then, intermittent firing is on.

Sources said the firing stopped at about 1.40 pm in the Mankot (Balnoi) area and no further loss or injury was reported.
Majid Jahangir and Suhail A Shah

Tribune News Service

Srinagar/Anantnag, September 9

A day before Union Home Minister Rajnath Singhs visit to Anantnag, militants launched an audacious attack on the police, leaving a cop dead and another injured in the town in south Kashmir.

The attack was carried out less than a kilometre away from the District Police Lines, Anantnag, the venue of the Home Ministers visit on Sunday where he is scheduled to interact with J&K policemen. Rajnath is also scheduled to meet CRPF men in Anantnag.

The police said the motorcycle-borne militants struck at about 5:20 pm in the busy General Bus Stand area and fired a burst of 20-25 rounds on the policemen.

The policemen were deployed less than 100 metre from their post inside the bus stand when the militants opened indiscriminate fire, wounding two, a senior police official from Anantnag said.

One of the injured cops succumbed to his injuries. He was identified as Head Constable Imtiyaz Ahmad, a resident of Srinagar.

The fire was retaliated but the militants managed to flee the spot, leaving behind a magazine and a bag.

IGP, Kashmir, Muneer Khan, refused to call the attack a lapse in security.

Nakas have been established to beef up the security ahead of the HMs visit. The militants, riding a bike, fired from a distance of around 30-40 yards. To me that is not a security lapse at all, he said.

Meanwhile, security forces today killed two militants in two encounters in Sopore and Shopian.

In the first gunfight, the police said the district commander of the group, Shahid Ahmed Sheikh of Kachloo Handwara, was killed at Reban village of Sopore when joint teams of the police, Army and CRPF launched a search operation.

There was an intelligence input about the presence of a militant in a house. A cordon was laid around the village and the militant was asked to surrender. However, he fired at the forces which was retaliated. In the gunfight, the militant commander was killed, Superintendent of Police, Sopore, Harmeet Singh Mehta said.

In the second encounter, a militant was killed in Shopian district on Saturday evening. Sources said militants attacked Army vehicles near Barbugh Imam Sahib Shopian this evening, and the fire was returned. In the gunfight that followed a militant was killed. A girl was injured in the cross-fire while the operation was underway as more militants were believed to be trapped.
Jammu, September 10

Police have arrested four people for snatching money and an ATM card from tourists in Udhampur district of Jammu and Kashmir.

Vinod Kumar from Madhya Pradesh lodged a complaint at Udhampur police station on September 7 stating that he and his family were robbed while they were returning from a trip to Leh.

Kumar alleged that they were offered a lift to Udhampur railway station in a white Xylo by four people who said they were headed in the same direction, police said.

The complainant and his three family members accepted the offer and rode along. A little later, Kumar alleged, the four original occupants robbed them of Rs 90,000 and an ATM card, and pushed them off the vehicle before fleeing from the scene.

A case was registered at Udhampur police station and all checkpoints were alerted.

On Saturday, the vehicle was stopped at a checkpoint in Udhampur and after an inspection, its occupants were arrested.

The accused have been identified as Lal Chand from Faridabad, Mohammad Irfan from New Delhi, Shri Nath of Allahabad and Asgar Ali from MP.

Police have seized the vehicle and recovered the cash and the ATM card. PTI
Earlier this week, the Benjamin Center for Public Policy Initiatives at SUNY New Paltz released this notable discussion brief titled, The Marijuana Gateway Fallacy. This short report covers a lot of marijuana reform ground outside the arena of "gateway drug" discourse, but here is one passage from the report on that front highlighting that we still hear "gateway" talk from politicians on both sides of the political aisle:

There are alternative explanations to the gateway hypothesis for why most users of dangerous drugs report the use of marijuana. The Common Liability Model posits that the use of multiple drugs reflects a common risk for drug use, rather than the use of one drug increasing the risk of using other. This may arise from common genetic predispositions, psychosocial factors, drug availability, and opportunity to use. Availability is linked to the age of an individual. Because of the relative ease of obtaining alcohol and marijuana in the home (compared with cocaine and heroin), youth interested in drug experimentation are likely to try these first.

In 2016, the National Institute on Drug Addiction (NIDA)  while not fully rejecting the idea that marijuana is a gateway drugconcluded that, given the evidence to date, further research is needed to explore this question. Shortly after NIDA released this determination, D.A.R.E. quietly removed marijuana from its publicized list of gateway drugs.

Yet, non-evidence-based political factors on both the left and the right remain the reason for the persistence of the gateway myth. In 2015, Chris Christie, New Jersey Governor and former Republican presidential candidate is quoted as saying, Marijuana is a gateway drug. We have an enormous addiction problem in this country, and we need to send very clear leadership from the White House on down through the federal law enforcement.

In Massachusetts, Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh and House Speaker Robert DeLeo, both Democrats, and Republican Governor Charlie Baker formed a coalition opposing legalization of recreational marijuana. Mayor Walsh said Youll hear the other side say that marijuana is not a gateway drug. If you know anyone in the recovery community, talk to them Youll hear that most of them, many of them started with marijuana. Speaker DeLeo added that it would be hypocritical to support legalization of marijuana while fighting the opioid abuse epidemic. When talking about legalization of the medical use of marijuana in Florida, her state, Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Shultz, former chair of the Democratic National Committee, said about marijuana policy: I just dont think we should legalize more mind altering substances if we want to make it less likely that people travel down the path toward using drugs.
Dinesh Manhotra

Tribune News Service

Jammu, September 9

As the head of the high-powered Congress delegation, former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, would seek feedback from cross section of society about the prevailing situation in the state. Apart from members of the civil society and other social organisations, Manmohan is likely to meet a delegation of the opposition parties, such as the National Conference, CPM and Akali Dal.

The Congress Policy Group on J&K is arriving here on Sunday on a two-day visit to meet various organisations of the Jammu region.

Some opposition parties, including the NC, have sought an appointment with Manmohan, Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) spokesman Ravinder Sharma told The Tribune, adding, after reaching Jammu, Manmohan and other members would interact with the PCC executive committee. He said the former Prime Minister was likely to meet all categories of migrants, displaced persons and refugees to get feedback about the programmes which were launched during his tenure.

The panel would meet delegations of the Bar Association, Jammu, and Chamber and Commerce and Industries besides some representatives of Scheduled Tribes, Scheduled Castes and other backward classes.

Other members of the policy group include P Chidambaram, Karan Singh, Ghulam Nabi Azad, Ambika Soni, GA Mir, Sham Lal Sharma, Nawang Rigzin Zora and Tariq Hamid Karra.

According to the Congress spokesman, Manmohan will arrive on September 10 afternoon and meet various delegations. He will be apprised of prevailing political and security situation besides state-related issues.
Ehsan Fazili

Tribune News Service

Srinagar, September 9

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh embarked on a four-day visit to Jammu and Kashmir with an open heart and immediately after landing in Srinagar he began holding closed-door meetings. However, the first day of his visit was marked with violence as militants carried out an audacious attack on policemen in Anantnag.

Besides a meeting with Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti, Rajnath also held a review meeting on the Prime Ministers Development Package (PMDP) besides having meetings with around 35 delegations representing tourism, trade and civil society.

On his maiden J&K visit this year, the Home Minister has already expressed his willingness to meet all those who want a resolution of all issues in the state. In 2016, he visited the state thrice, including once as the head of an all-party delegation amid the five-month-long unrest in Kashmir triggered by the killing of militant commander Burhan Wani in an encounter with security forces on July 8 last year.

Rajnath would be reviewing security situation at a meeting with senior officers of the police and other security forces here on Sunday before visiting Anantnag district in south Kashmir which has witnessed militant violence.

In his meeting with the Chief Minister today, Rajnath discussed the overall situation, implementation of the Agenda of Alliance (AoA) and execution of PMDP in the state.

Mehbooba stressed the need to reach out to all sections of society in the state which has been duly recognised in the AoA.

She said the needs and problems of the people of the state had been recognised in the AoA and there was a need to speed up its implementation. The two leaders recognised the need for timely implementation of the AoA which provides a definite road map to resolve the problems confronting the state, an official spokesman said.

The Chief Minister also requested for regular and timely release of funds for various projects under the PMDP of Rs 80,000 crore, which was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi here on November 7, 2015. Later, both reviewed the PMDP implementation at a meeting of senior state and Central government officers.

Around 35 delegations of social, trade, travel and business organisations from across the Kashmir valley also called on Rajnath here.

The delegations apprised the Home Minister about problems related to their organisations and submitted memorandums.

Chairman, J&K Hoteliers Club, Mushtaq Ahmad Chaya, as the head of a delegation, asked the Home Minister to take steps for the restoration of peace in the state, particularly the Valley.

He said the tourism sector suffered a lot and stressed the need for creating a conducive atmosphere so as to help attract more tourists.

Earlier, Rajnath was received at the airport by Deputy Chief Minister Nirmal Singh, other ministers and senior civil and police officers. Rajnath drove to the Nehru Guest House at Cheshma Shahi overlooking Dal Lake, where he held meetings with senior officers and other delegations.

HM holds discussions with Governor

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh and Governor NN Vohra held extensive discussions on several important issues relating to the challenges being faced in the state at their meeting at Raj Bhawan here on Saturday evening. Besides security management-related issues, the Governor stressed the importance of efficient and accountable functioning of the administrative machinery, eradication of corruption, protection of the academic interests of youth and early conduct of the pending elections to rural and urban local self-governing bodies. TNS
Srinagar, September 10

Normal life in Kashmir was hit on Sunday due to a strike called by separatist groups against the visit of Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh, even as authorities continued restrictions in parts of Srinagar city for a second consecutive day as a precautionary measure.

While most of the public transport remained off the roads, some vehicles could be seen plying in Civil Lines area of the city, officials said.

Shops and business establishments remained closed due to the strike called by separatist leaders Syed Ali Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Mohammad Yasin Malik.

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By observing the strike, the people of Kashmir will prove to the world and the Indian leadership that by using military might against the people or harassing the leadership, the peoples movement in Kashmir cannot be crushed, the separatists had said in a statement while calling for shutdown.

Meanwhile, restrictions under Section 144 of the CrPC continued to remain in force in six police station areas of Srinagar, the officials said.

Curbs were in force in Nowhatta, Maharaj Gunj, Safa Kadal, Khanyar, Maisuma and Rainawari police station areas of the city.

The restrictions had been imposed in view of the apprehensions of law and order disturbances, the official said. PTI
Azhar Qadri

Tribune News Service

Srinagar, September 9

Three top separatists were detained and barred from boarding a flight to New Delhi on Saturday after intelligence reports suggested that the trio was preparing to organise a march to the airport, police officials said.

Syed Ali Geelani, Yasin Malik and Mirwaiz Umar Farooq were scheduled to board a 3 pm flight to New Delhi, where they, as per their earlier announcement, had planned to hold a demonstration outside NIA headquarters to protest against the raids on their aides and dare the investigation agency to arrest them.

However, the state administration, which had decided to allow the three separatists to go to New Delhi, reversed its decision after field intelligence reports suggested that they were mobilising their supporters for a farewell march.IGP, Kashmir, Muneer Khan, told The Tribune that there was no scope for taking a chance as going by past history, such unorganised rallies could have turned violent. We had allowed them to go to Delhi, but then late in evening (Friday) they started mobilisation for taking out the rally from Jamia to Maisuma to Hyderpora, the IGP said.

The rally, police officials said, would have initiated from Jamia Masjid in the old city from where Mirwaiz would have headed it and later Malik along with his supporters would have joined it upon its reaching Maisuma.

Geelani, along with his supporters, would have joined the march to the airport from his home in Hydepora on the citys outskirts. We could not have allowed such thing to happen in the larger interest of security situation, Muneer said.

Taking a pre-emptive action, the police in a mid-night operation detained Malik from his Maisuma residence and detained Mirwaiz inside his home in the Nigeen locality. Geelani continued to remain under detention at his Hyderpora house. Maliks JKLF in a statement said he was arrested at 12:30 am on Saturday and shifted to a nearby police station from where he was sent to Central Jail, Srinagar, on a judicial remand till Monday. The separatist trio in their joint statement said their detention ahead of the Delhi visit completely exposes the so-called investigation and its actual purpose.

Stopping the resistance leadership from courting arrest, giving contradictory statements and creating a law and order bogey they have exposed themselves and their bluff. They said the NIA should put an end to this harassment, the separatists said.

Had announced stir

Syed Ali Geelani, Yasin Malik and Mirwaiz Umar Farooq were scheduled to board a 3 pm flight to New Delhi, where they, as per their earlier announcement, had planned to hold a demonstration outside NIA headquarters to protest against the raids on their aides and dare the investigation agency to arrest them.
Yash Goyal

Jaipur, September 9

One person was killed and 20 others, including eight policemen, were injured after clashes broke out between members of a minority community and the police in the Ramganj area of Jaipur, prompting the district administration to clamp curfew in four police station areas and suspend Internet services in the city.

The incident happened late last night when a motorcycle-borne couple, indentified as Sajid and Harsi, was allegedly beaten up by the police while managing traffic outside the Ramganj police station. The mob went on a rampage and torched part of a power house and set ablaze many vehicles, including an ambulance, three motor cycles and nine government vehicles.

When the situation went out of control, the police opened fire on the mob in which a person, identified as Adil, was killed, said NRK Reddy, ADGP (law and order). He said the body was lying at the mortuary of Sawai Man Singh (SMS) Hospital.

Curfew was imposed in Ramganj, Galtagate, Manak Chowk and Shubhash Chowk areas. Internet and broadband services were suspended and schools in the curfew-bound areas have been closed. Seven companies of police force, including 4 RAC, have been deployed in the curfew-bound areas. The five injured policemen were admitted to SMS Hospital and others to local hospitals, the ADGP said.

No fresh violence has been reported and five cases have been registered in connection with the clashes, the police said.

In a video clip, the couple alleged that they were beaten up and abused by a policeman for no specific reason.
New Delhi, September 9

The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) today formed a two-member committee to probe the killing of a seven-year-old Class II student of Gurgaons Ryan International School and sought a report from its management within two days, even as Haryana Chief Minister ML Khattar ordered that security arrangements in schools across the state be reviewed and strengthened.

The schoolboy was found with his throat slit in the school washroom on Friday. The schools acting principal has been suspended and the security staff removed.

A two-member fact-finding committee has been set up to inquire into the tragic murder. The school has also been asked to submit a report within two days, along with a copy of the FIR, a senior board official said.

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V Arun Kumar, principal of Government Senior Secondary School, Preet Vihar, and Kailash Chand, Deputy Commissioner, KVS, have been appointed as panel members. The panel will visit the school within 30 days and submit a report no later than October 16, the official added.

The panel will probe if the death had occurred owing to negligence on the part of the school authorities and if the school had adopted safety measures as per the CBSE affiliation bylaws. Its report will dwell on whether the authorities had reported the incident to the police and the DEO as well as the circumstances leading to the death.

Meanwhile, angry parents and locals gathered outside the school premises this morning and protested for over two hours, demanding a CBI probe into the gruesome murder, while expressing dissatisfaction over the investigation being carried out by the Gurgaon police.

They also demanded that the school management be booked for murder.

The school, in a damage-control mode, issued a statement: While we are all in great shock and grief at the loss of life of our beloved student Pradhyuman Thakur, we are taking steps to ensure safety measures are in place for all our students and staff. We are closely working with the authorities.

The police claimed the student was killed by bus conductor Ashok Kumar, who tried to sexually abuse him. The accused was arrested within hours of the murder. A local court today sent him into police custody for three days.

The police said it would conclude investigations and file a charge-sheet within seven days. Police Commissioner Sandeep Khirwar claimed the school bus conductor tried to sexually assault the boy, but when he resisted, he slit the childs throat. Ashok Kumar has confessed to the crime, he added.  PTI
Yash Goyal

Jaipur, September 10

Normal life was paralysed as indefinite curfew in four areas of Jaipurs walled city continued for second day on Sunday after Friday nights violence, arson and firing that claimed one life.

The kin of the deceased and members of the minority community were adamant on Rs 1-crore compensation and job for a family member despite several rounds of talks.

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No untoward incident has been reported in the last two days in the curfew-bound Subhash Chowk, Galta Gate, Ramganj and Manak Chowk, the areas that are dominated by the minority community. Armed force is camping and monitoring the situation minute to minute, ADGP (Law and Order) N R K Reddy told The Tribune.

The body of Adil Raees (22), a resident of Gangapole, is still lying in the SMS hospital's mortuary as his family and community people are demanding high monetary compensation along with a job for a member in the family, the ADGP said, adding the talks between senior police officers and people have been held to resolve the deadlock and a headway is expected by night.

On a social media row over a cop who went missing after he was attacked by a violent mob, Reddy said, One Inder Raj Singh, who was coming from somewhere, was injured after he was attacked by a mob. However, he has reached his home after treatment.

Drones were being used for air surveillance, the ADGP said, adding that stones seen lying on the roof tops of some houses, but these were not meant to cause violence.

Mobile internet services, too, were suspended for the second day today on the orders of the Jaipur collector.

Markets wore a deserted look in the walled city and even street vendors were off the trade.

Tourism has also been affected as Jaipurs main attraction Hawa Mahal, temples and way to Amber Fort were either closed or people were diverted through long routes. These are the main draws for tourists, especially foreigners.

The district administration has not made any arrangement for supply of milk and essential commodities in the violence-hit areas, Haji Jameel Ahmed, a social worker, said while appealing for peace.

Forum for Democracy and Communal Amity president Sawai Singh demanded a judicial probe into the police firing after violence and punishment for guilty cops.
Aditi Tandon

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, September 9

Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi is building his team ahead of the upcoming organisational elections of the party. He today appointed confidants Sushmita Dev and Deepak Babaria to important posts.

While Sushmita Dev, Lok Sabha MP from Silchar, has been named president of the All-India Mahila Congress, replacing Madhya Pradesh leader Shobha Oza, another Rahul Gandhi aide Deepak Babaria has been promoted as Congress general secretary in charge of election-bound Madhya Pradesh.

Babaria, former AICC secretary for Gujarat, replaces veteran Congress man Mohan Prakash as general secretary Madhya Pradesh.

Knives had long been out for Prakash for failing to deliver electoral results in the states he holds though he continues to be in charge for Maharashtra.

Sushmita Devs appointment was described in the party circle as important considering she is only a first-time MP. Daughter of late Santosh Mohan Dev, who served as minister in the Indira Gandhi Cabinet, Sushmita Devs rise in the Congress organisational structure has been meteoric.

She started her political career only in 2009 as chairperson, Silchar Municipal Board. Between 2011 and 2014, she was member, Assam Legislative Assembly, and in 2014, she won the 16th Lok Sabha election from Silchar.

Sushmita was on some Congress ticket-screening committees in the recent election cycle and is better known for her lung power in leading the Congress protests in the Lok Sabha. She was among the six Congress MPs who were suspended for grave misconduct by the Lok Sabha Speaker on July 24 and among 25 MPs suspended by her in August 2015.

Sushmita also famously accompanied Rahul Gandhi to an SBI ATM on Parliament Street to withdraw money after Prime Minister Narendra Modis demonetisation announcement.

Babaria is known to be a low key leader, who earlier handled Gujarat. Rahul Gandhi is yet to name Madhya Pradesh Congress president with the position stuck between two choices -- veteran nine-time MP from Chindwara Kamal Nath and Guna MP Jyotiraditya Scindia.

In Madhya Pradesh, Rahul Gandhi today appointed two new secretaries to serve under Babaria. They are Zubair Khan and Sanjay Kapoor.

...slams Centre for poor healthcare

New Delhi: Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Saturday slammed the Centre for condemning thousands of people to death on account of a weak health system and low investments in the sector. In a video message, Gandhi said the Centre had consistently cut healthcare budget, resulting in poor systems and infrastructure. "The current government does not care about healthcare in the country. That is a fact," he said in video message in the context of infant deaths in state-run hospitals across the country. Gandhi attacked the Centre's talk of privatisation of the health sector and said "it is simply a lie that private sector can run the healthcare system of the country as the poor cannot afford it."
Bijay Sankar Bora

Tribune News Service

Guwahati, September 10

In a swift operation launched on the basis of a tip-off Changlang Battalion of Assam Rifles apprehended a hardcore cadre of NSCN (R) in Old Changlang village on Saturday night.

The apprehended militant was Hunmai Taidong. A pistol and ammunition were also seized from him. He has been an active member of the banned outfit since February 2015 and had undergone training at NSCN(R) training camps, Defence spokesman Col C Konwar said.

Security forces have been carrying out aggressive operations in the South Arunachal Pradesh bordering Myanmar where the NE militant groups have pitched their bases under the patronage of the NSCN-K.

Besides using the bordering districts in South Arunachal Pradesh as transit route to Myanmar base, the insurgent groups also involved in criminal activities like extortions and abduction in the area.

Counter-insurgency operations launched last fortnight in South Arunachal Pradesh have resulted in elimination of two hardcore cadres, likely injury of three hardcore cadres, apprehension of two more hardcore cadres, busting of a temporary hideout and recovery of large amount of arms, ammunition and other warlike stores.
New Delhi, September 10

As the Left alliance swept the JNUSU poll, winning all four central panel posts  president, vice-president, secretary and joint secretary  the RSS-affiliated ABVP and the Birsa Ambedkar Phule Students' Association (BAPSA) claimed to have made inroads into its vote share.

The ABVP consolidated its hold on the School of Sciences where its presidential candidate Nidhi Tripathi polled more votes than any other candidate. She called it a huge moral victory. The ABVP's national media convener said: We also won 10 councillor seats, the highest for a single organisation.

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BAPSA, pushed to the third spot, claimed to have increased its voter base as a single unit. Independent presidential candidate Farooque MD Alam got three votes more (419) than AISF's Aparajitha Raja. The NSUI presidential candidate polled a mere 82 votes.

ABVP's Ankit Roy, who was allegedly involved in a scuffle with missing student Najeeb, came third for the post of councillor, School of Language, Literature and Cultural Studies.  PTI
The title of this post is the title of this timely new paper available via SSRN (for a price) and authored by Benjamin Hansen, Keaton Miller and Caroline Weber. Here is the abstract:

Despite federal prohibition, recreational marijuana is available to 21% of the United States population. A chief concern among policy makers across multiple levels of government and political parties is inter-state diversion of marijuana from states with legal markets to others. We measure this diversion with a natural experiment. Oregon opened a recreational market on October 1, 2015 next to an existing market in Washington, which opened on July 8, 2014.

Using comprehensive administrative data on the universe of Washington sales, we find Washington retailers along the Oregon border experienced a 41% decline in sales immediately following Oregon's market opening. Retailers along Washington's borders with Idaho and Canada experienced no such decline. The decline occurred equally across weekdays and weekends, and was largest among the largest transaction sizes, suggesting diversion, not drug tourism, was to blame. Our estimates suggest that 11.9% of the marijuana sold in Washington was diverted out of the state before Oregon legalized and 7.5% remains diverted today.
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, September 10

Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad has come out with a "list of fake babas", which includes Asaram, Radhe Maa, Gurmeet Ram Rahim, Narayan Sai, Nirmal Baba and Om Baba.

In the list of 14, the Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad has asked the government to amend new laws against the "fake gurus".

Following are the names:

Asaram bapu

Sukhvinder Kaur aka Radhe Maa

Sachdarangi

Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh

Om baba aka Vivekanand

Nirmal Baba

Ichachadhari Vishwanand

Swami Asimanand

Om Namah Shivaay

Narayan Sai

Rampal

Asaram Bapu and Dera chief Ram Rahim are already lodged in jails and facing charges of rape. While another self-style godman Rampal from Haryana is also lodged in Hisar district jail and facing many cases.

Earlier this month, the Haryana and Punjab high Court ordered the Punjab Police to file a FIR on Radhe Maa, aka Sukhvinder Kaur, a spiritual leader based in Borivali suburb of Mumbai, in a case. Radhe Maa poses herself as an incarnation of a Hindu goddess.

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Nirmal Baba is a famous spiritual leader on the TV and has many followers. He was slapped with over Rs 3 crore tax evasion charge in February 2014 and the Allahabad High Court has also ordered information and broadcast ministry to probe Nirmal Babas TV programmes, which allegedly encourages superstition and black magic.

Narayan Sai, son of Asaram Bapu, is also facing many charges, including molestation. He owns properties and investments of over Rs 5,000 crores and is presently lodged under judicial custody.

The move by the top body of Hindu religious leaders was prompted by the recent rape conviction and jailing of Gurmeet Singh Ram Rahim, the head of Dera Sacha Sauda, a quasi- religious body based in Sirsa in Haryana.

There is a very strong feeling among saints that because of misdeeds of just one or two religious leaders, the entire community was being shown in a bad light, Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) Joint General Secretary Surendra Jain said.

The VHP works closely with the Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad. Agencies
Keki Daruwalla

Indian public, and more so people from Karnataka and Maharashtra, are turning cynical because nothing has turned up from the investigations of three murders earlier, of Professors Dabholkar, Pansare and Kalburgi, all respected thinkers and writers.

I have written on politics and poetry before. Never knew I would also be writing on politics and murder one day. Every right thinking person in the country is shocked at the murder of Gauri Lankesh, a die-hard anti right editor and journalist, on September 5 in Bengaluru. Indian public, and more so people from Karnataka and Maharashtra, are turning cynical because nothing has turned up from the investigations of three murders earlier, of Professors Dabholkar, Pansare and Kalburgi, all respected thinkers and writers.

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The bereaved brother of Gauri, Indrajit has pleaded, I request that please dont give political colour to Gauris killing, please give justice to a journalist, a woman and to our sister. That is not going to happen, I am referring to the political colouring bit. (Even justice seems a far cry at the moment, seeing the poor will and investigating skills of the Karnataka Police. And the Maharashtra Police hardly did much in the Dabholkar case.)

Some of the other cases had probably a religious tinge. A few of the victims had spoken against idol worship. Let us also not forget the case of the Muslim-turned atheist who was murdered for abjuring Islam. But Gauris murder was purely political. It was murder for thought and word. According to an old Persian saw, a person is killed for zar (money), zan (woman) or zameen (land). One accepts that. But if you are killed for your ideological stand, for the editorials you write, poems you publish, news items that hurt a particular section, then it is every bit political. On the face of it, this murder seems to have right wing politics and thinking all over its face. But we need to refrain from jumping to conclusions.

Notice the red herrings--it could be the Naxalites! She was raising her voice in favour of the Naxalites. (She would have had a hard time from the Chhattisgarh Police, who registered a murder case against Nandini Sundar. I am surprised at such unbridled aggression from the police.) How could the Naxalites be the killers of Gauri? These red herrings are pernicious and floated for malafide reasons, often by the police. Let us not forget the Malegaon blasts, the Samjhauta Express and the Makkah Masjid blast (Hyderabad). Muslim youth were arrested pell mell, and the canard floated was that these blasts, in proximity of Muslim congregations where Muslims were killed, were set off to create a rift between the communities. That gallant officer who lost his life in the 26/11 attack on Mumbai was the first officer who indicted Col Purohit and the Sadhvi and others. After his death, his predecessor who had charged the Muslim youth was back in the saddle and he charged the innocent youth again! So we have to be aware of red herrings.

Was there any misogyny involved in this case. The Indian male, by and large (especially among lumpen elements), is pretty upfront on the misogyny front. Reject a males romantic--which means sexual--advances and see what he does to you. Acid on the face or a knife. On a railway platform, a rejected suitor stabbed his rejector over 30 times. A platform full of males, clicked their tongues in commiseration, but no one came to her aid. They hollered to each other. I am reminded of the lines, And those behind cried forward/And those before cried back. That was the Tuscan army on the bridge over river Tiber.

Four men came to kill poor and brave Gauri. Remember Nirbhay? What about all the women being burnt for dowry? This is not just greed. It is also the feeling that women are dispensable, you can do what you like with them.

The only way to bring investigations to a successful conclusion is to form at least three or four teams, each to follow one clue to its logical end. Give them a free hand, but take an audit every few days. And dont make it time bound. If you do, they could catch the wrong people. The lower ranks of the police lean towards Hindutva (whatever that may mean), let it be remembered.
Washington, September 10

The ties between India and the US have made great progress in the past 15 years, particularly in the defence and economic sectors, a top Indian diplomat here said.

Santosh Jha, the deputy Indian ambassador to the US, said 25-30 years ago Indias main effort focused on keeping the US out of the Indian Ocean, out of the Indo-Pacific. (But) today, we invite the US, we exercise with them...more than any other country in the world, he said on Saturday at a community reception for him hosted by the National Council of Asian Indian Association.

In the defence sector, the bilateral trade had increased to USD 15 billion, he said.

A 1993 Indian Foreign Service official, Jha recently arrived here from New Delhi as Indias deputy ambassador.

He said bilateral trade and economic relations too were beginning to change quite dramatically.

India last month began the first crude oil imports from this country. We hope to take it up to about USD 2 billion by the middle of the next year. We have made a major investment here on gas and we will be importing gas by the end of next year, he said.

Jha cited the potential of Indias civil aviation market as another sector for bilateral cooperation. It would come to about USD 15 billion a year over the next 30 years, Jha said.

He said US President Donald Trumps Make America Great Again policy and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modis New India vision were in sync with each other. PTI
Anirudh Gupta

Ferozepur, September 9

Two pistols dating back to the Anglo-Sikh wars of 1845-46, stolen more than a decade ago from a museum here, are yet to be recovered.

Earlier, swords, firearms and other weapons from these wars had been put on display at the Anglo-Sikh War Museum at the time of its inauguration in 1976. It was constructed in memory of the Sikh soldiers who had attained martyrdom while fighting the British forces.

However, much to the dismay of historians and local residents, these historical weapons have been junked or got stolen.

On the complaint of the then Director, Cultural Affairs, the Ferozepur police had registered a criminal case against two persons at Ghall Khurd police station in June 2006 in connection with the theft, but no follow-up action was taken.

It seems successive state governments deserted this monument the way the generals betrayed their brave soldiers during the Anglo-Sikh wars, said Harish Monga, a local resident.

Paucity of funds, manpower and resources at this sprawling complex are cited among the reasons for its neglect. The iron tripod bearing plaques of the Anglo-Sikh wars have rusted beyond recognition. The collection of murals and wall paintings depicting battle scenes and portraits by renowned painters such as Kirpal Singh and Jaswant Singh have been damaged. The condition of portraits of Maharani Jindan, Sham Singh Attariwala, Diwan Mool Chand and Lord Dalhousie is equally bad.

Instead of setting up more memorials, the state government should first improve the condition of the existing ones, said Lt Gen OP Nandrajog, a former Army commander.

One wonders if the state officials or ministers have ever had the inclination to visit these memorials, he added.

Meanwhile, Army officers from Britain will visit the Saragarhi memorial here on Tuesday to pay tributes to martyrs of the 1897 battle. The Congress government is hosting a state-level function to mark the occasion. Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh, who is on a private visit to the UK, has authored a book on the subject.
Tribune News Service

Mansa, September 9

The Bhikhi police today recovered 480 bags of wheat that were siphoned off from a PUNSUP godown in a truck.

They also booked two food inspectors and two truck operators. While the truck operators were arrested, the inspectors managed to flee the spot.

The police officials said food inspectors Neeraj Kumar and Rohit Kumar Singla got the wheat bags loaded onto a private truck from the godowns under their jurisdiction in Bhikhi. The officers had planned to get the bags transferred to their private vehicles and sell them illegally.

Acting on a tip-off, Bhikhi SHO Paramjit Singh Sandhu set up a police check post, intercepted the truck and arrested drivers Swaranjit Singh and Gulaab Singh.

District Manager of PUNSUP Sandeep Bansal said Kumar and Singla and guards of the godown Bhola Singh and Gurdev Singh had been suspended till further orders.

Mansa Deputy Commissioner Dharampal Gupta said the wheat stock in the godown would now be checked and the data would be compared with the earlier stock record to ascertain the number of bags that had been siphoned off from the godown.
Saurabh Malik

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, September 9

More than three months after Punjab and Haryana were held culpable for not warning people against contacting unregistered or unlicensed agents while seeking greener pastures in foreign lands, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has directed the two states to keep an eye on their activities.

The states are directed to monitor the activities of unlicensed immigrant agents, Justice AB Chaudhari of the High Court said. The two states have already been directed to issue immediate instructions to the district magistrates in each district to publish a list of registered agents and to warn the citizens not to go to unauthorised agents.

Justice Chaudhari was of the view that the list was required to be made public on a regular basis through television, radio, newspapers and any other modes of communication.

The developments took place on a petition filed by Ramandeep Singh, alias Babbu, through counsel JS Thakur. He was seeking a regular bail in an FIR for cheating and other offences registered at the Navi Baradari police station in Jalandhar in February under Sections 420, 465, 467, 468, 471 and 120-B of the IPC, besides provisions of the Punjab Travel Professional Regulation Act and the Immigration Act.

Granting bail to the petitioner on grounds stated in the order, Justice Chaudhari had made it clear that agents, not registered or licensed by the government, were taking money and sending people abroad and gullible citizens were falling in their trap.

He had asserted: In my opinion, one of the reasons appears to be the failure on part of Punjab and Haryana in not warning the people at large to not contact any unregistered or unlicensed person/agent and not give any amount to them.

The people who dont know about the fact that only licensed or registered agents can be approached have been falling in the trap at the cost of losing their valuable properties, money and ornaments, realising that they have been cheated, he added.

Referring to a statement by the Punjab Additional Advocate General that the arrangement had already been made by publishing the information on website and print media, Justice Chaudhari had said it did not appear to be sufficient as the offences were being reported almost daily.

He had also directed submission of a compliance-cum-action taken report by both the states.
New Delhi, September 9

Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (DSGMC) general secretary Manjinder Singh Sirsa has sought the intervention of President Ram Nath Kovind to save gurdwaras in Sikkim.

Sirsa, who met the President today, said Gurdwara Gurudongmar Sahib and Gurdwara Chungthang Sahib  both associated with Guru Nanak  were under threat as the Chungthang SDM had ordered verification of claims of encroachment and illegal construction.

He told Kovind that saroop of Guru Granth Sahib had been shifted from Gurdwara Gurudongmar Sahib by the administration. These incidents have hurt sentiments of Sikhs, said Sirsa, also an Akali MLA from Delhi.  TNS
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, September 10

SAD president Sukhbir Badal on Monday sought an apology from Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi, Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh and Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal for allegedly branding Punjabis as drug addicts.

In a series of tweets, Sukhbir said Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhis lie on the issue of drug addiction in Punjab has been nailed in the wake of a recent survey by PGIMER, Chandigarh.

(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)

The Congress vice-president, Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh and Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal owe an apology to Punjabis for maligning them and branding them as drug addicts, Sukhbir said.

The Cong VP, Pb CM Capt Amarinder Singh and Arvind Kejriwal owe an apology to Pbis for maligning them and branding them as drug addicts./4  Sukhbir Singh Badal (@officeofssbadal) September 10, 2017

A PGI survey has showed drug addiction was less than 1 per cent in Punjab.

Read: Less than 1% in Punjab addicted to drugs

Cong VP Rahul Gandhi lies nailed again. PGIMER Chandigarh survey shows drug addiction less than one per cent in Punjab (0.9 per cent)/1  Sukhbir Singh Badal (@officeofssbadal) September 10, 2017

Earlier, AIIMS had put drug addiction at 0.8 per cent in Punjab. A survey on police recruits put it at 1.27 per cent, while negligent number of addicts was found in Army recruitment drives, he added.

Taking on the Congress vice-president, Sukhbir said Rahul Gandhi had claimed in 2012 that 70 per cent of Punjab youths were drug addicts. During the 2017 election campaign, Rahul insisted that he was speaking the truth, Sukhbir said while demanding an apology from the three.

The findings of a study by the Post-Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research and the Punjab Government has revealed that in Punjab, alcohol and tobacco are the most common intoxicants and not the infamous chitta (heroin), as is the popular perception.

It says less than 1 per cent (0.9)  2.7 lakh of the states population  may be hooked on drugs.

The study was ordered in 2015 amid a raging controversy over the extent of drug addiction among Punjabs youth.
Jupinderjit Singh

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, September 9

I will ask Jassis mother: Was our love a crime that she got her killed? says Sukhwinder Singh Sidhu (38) alias Mithu, reacting to the Canadian Supreme Courts decision to allow the extradition of Jassis mother Malkiat Kaur Sidhu and maternal uncle Surjit Singh Badesha.

Finally, my wifes killers will face trial for murder. My sole wish is to see them behind bars, he said today.

Canada-born Jaswinder Kaur Jassi had fallen in love with Mithu of Kaunke Khosa village (Jagraon) during a visit to Punjab in 1994. Kaunke Khosa is also her mother and uncles native village. Mithu was then a kabaddi player who plied an autorickshaw. Jassis affluent family opposed the match as the youth had a poor socio-economic background. Later, the lovers got married against the wishes of her parents. On June 8, 2000, the couple was attacked by contract killers allegedly hired by Malkiat and Surjit. Jassi died, while Mithu survived. After an investigation, the Punjab Police charged Jassis Canada-based mother and uncle with conspiracy to murder her.

Mithu, now a truck driver, said: Im still her husband. I have rejected hundreds of marriage offers. I cant share my love for Jassi with anyone. I want to tell her mother that my love is true and eternal.

Hailing the extradition order, Mithu said the Canadian Government had never allowed him to plead in their courts. Their government had stonewalled my request to pursue the case, but I believe there is justice in Canada today, he added.

Mithu had recently moved the Justice Mehtab Singh Commission, which is probing false cases registered by the Punjab Police in the past 10 years. The cases slapped on him ranged from rape, for which he spent three-and-a-half years in jail before acquittal, to rioting, snatching and drug smuggling. He was booked in six cases, of which he has been acquitted in four.

He refused to budge despite these cases and the offers of crores of rupees and land to withdraw his statement against the accused duo.

The cops who arrested me didnt ill-treat me, but they told me to forget about Jassi, Mithu said. Whenever I refused an offer for a compromise, another case was slapped on me, he has claimed before the commission. On the basis of his application, notices have been sent to the police.

From the initial offer of Rs 10 lakh to the latest (Rs 1.5 crore), besides the ownership of 14 acres or a well-settled life abroad, supporters of the accused have promised it all to me. But I cant trade my love for all this. I just want Jassis mother and uncle to be punished for what they did to her and me, said Mithu, his voice trembling.

Contract killing
M Rajivlochan

This masterly book captures well the ups and downs of the political life of Master Tara Singh which was singularly devoted to the Sikhs.

The first part of the book deals with colonial rule, the struggle for freedom and Sikh politics. The second part is about Akali politics and the manner in which the idea of a nation conflicted with the demarcation of linguistic states. Ten appendices, on disparate themes that could not be integrated in the main narrative, add value to the book.

The basic story of Master Tara Singhs life and politics is well-known. This book fleshes it out. It adds finer nuances to it and manages to remain sympathetic to a man whose life was marked by constant struggles, and failures. At the time of the creation of the unilingual state of Punjab in 1966, a fight for which Master Tara Singh had suffered much, he had to face the ignominy of being known as a turn-coat, compromiser and worse, someone who did not stand by his promises. Such is life. It goes to the credit of this book that it still manages to empathise with the remarkable political struggles that Master Tara Singh launched. The focus on details makes this book of particular importance to anyone interested in knowing contemporary Punjab better.

Master Tara Singh was born in a family of Malhotra Khatris in a village of Brahmin landlords, as Nanak Chand. On adopting the Sikh faith later in life he was given the name Tara Singh. To this was added the appellation Master when he took up his first job as a school teacher at a salary of Rs 15 per month. His family was not particularly rich but not badly off either. His father, Gopi Chand, was a Patwari in service of the colonial government and a well-respected person in the locality. Now, he was well set to follow that path of local respectability. Except that, Master Tara Singh was prone to consorting with the anti-British ideas. That made him a suspect in the eyes of the administration. The Lucknow Pact of 1916 seemed to him like a division of spoils of office between the Hindus and Muslims leaving the Sikhs to fend for themselves. In subsequent years, his debates with the Arya Samaj ideology further sowed the seeds of a view that the Congress was not up to any good as far as the Sikhs were concerned.

Master Tara Singhs participation in the Akali movement began with a strong secular tinge. This book does not mention it but in the early 1930s Tara Singh was strongly opposed to the political manipulations in which the prominent leader, Baba Kharak Singh, indulged in in the name of Sikhs in danger. In the early 1930s, Tara Singh was of the firm view that religion and politics should not be mixed. The refusal of the Congress to condemn and reject the Communal Award of 1933 made him wonder though about the manner in which people like Nehru defined secularism and nationalist politics. In the subsequent electoral alliances with the Congress, he would take care that the Congress did not overwhelm the Akali identity. He also took note of the indifference of the people of Punjab to the individual Satyagraha movement of 1941. Therefore, when with the 1942 Quit India Movement, the Congress tried to raise the stakes against the colonial government, Tara Singh withdrew the Akalis from the Congress and stood in favour of support for the government.

The mayhem caused by Partition of India in the name of religion posed a particular dilemma to him: how to protect the interest and identity of the Sikhs while not succumbing to the evil created by the presence of religion in politics. It was in this context that he came up with the idea of protecting Punjabi as a language of the Sikhs. Subsequently, this transmogrified into a demand for a Punjabi Suba. Nehru, however, succeeded in scuttling that demand and marginalising Tara Singh. That was a humiliation which the Master could never overcome. Nehru had proven to be more adept at politicking than the Akalis and Master Tara Singh.
This new Washington Post commentary authored by Dana Rohrabacher, a Republican who represents California's 48th District in the US House of Representatives, seeks to make the case for the federal government to stay out of state medical marijuana reform efforts. The piece is headlined "My fellow conservatives should protect medical marijuana from the government." Here are excerpts:

With my Democrat friend Sam Farr, the now-retired California congressman, I wrote an amendment to spending bills that prohibits the federal government from prosecuting medical marijuana cases in states where voters have legalized such treatment. The amendment passed two consecutive years, the second time with a wider margin than the first, and has been extended through continuing resolutions and an omnibus spending bill.

Surprisingly, given the Obama administrations generally liberal approach to marijuana, its Justice Department tried to interpret the amendment in such a convoluted way as to allow counterproductive raids on marijuana dispensaries. The courts  most recently the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit  repeatedly ruled that our amendment meant exactly what it said.

Unfortunately, my longtime friend Jeff Sessions, the attorney general, has urged Congress to drop the amendment, now co-sponsored by Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.). This, despite President Trumps belief, made clear in his campaign and as president, that states alone should decide medical marijuana policies.

I should not need to remind our chief law enforcement officer nor my fellow Republicans that our system of federalism, also known as states rights, was designed to resolve just such a fractious issue. Our party still bears a blemish for wielding the states rights cudgel against civil rights. If we bury state autonomy in order to deny patients an alternative to opioids, and ominously federalize our police, our hypocrisy will deserve the American peoples contempt.

More than half the states have liberalized medical marijuana laws, some even decriminalizing recreational use. Some eighty percent of Americans favor legalization of medical marijuana. Only a benighted or mean-spirited mind-set would want to block such progress.

Despite federal efforts to restrict supply, studies continue to yield promising results. And mounting anecdotal evidence shows again and again that medical marijuana can dramatically improve the lives of people with epilepsy, post-traumatic stress disorder, arthritis and many other ailments. Most Americans know this. The political class, not surprisingly, lags behind them. Part of the reason is the failure of too many conservatives to apply public choice economics to the war on marijuana. Common sense, as well as public choice theory, holds that the governments interest is to grow, just as private-sector players seek profit and build market share.

The drug-war apparatus will not give ground without a fight, even if it deprives Americans of medical alternatives and inadvertently creates more dependency on opioids. When its existence depends on asset seizures and other affronts to our Constitution, why should anti-medical-marijuana forces care if theyve contributed inadvertently to a vast market, both legal and illegal, for opioids?

I invite my colleagues to visit a medical marijuana research facility and see for themselves why their cultural distaste might be misplaced. One exists near my district office at the University of California at Irvine, another at the University of California at San Diego.

Better yet, they might travel to Israel  that political guiding light for religious conservatives  and learn how our closest ally in the Middle East has positioned itself on the cutting edge of cannabis research. The Israeli government recently decriminalized first use, so unworried it is about what marijuana might do to its conscript military.

My colleagues should then return to Washington and keep my amendment intact, declaring themselves firmly on the side of medical progress. Failing that, the government will keep trying to eradicate the burgeoning marijuana business, thereby fueling and enriching drug cartels. Trust me: Hugs from grateful supporters are infinitely better.
Kavita Kanan Chandra

The pair of wooden kharau superimposed on hordes of oppressed peasants pique interest for it is done in the Madhubani style of painting. If one visualises this popular traditional folk art of Bihar; its the image of gods and goddesses that comes to mind, so depiction of Champaran Satyagraha is novelty.

Patna-based talented Madhubani artist Alka Das explains that she loves to do something different. As the centenary year of the Champaran Satyagraha is being celebrated, she wanted to do a series commemorating this important event in Indias modern history. She is doing 25 paintings in the series, each taking almost 10 days to complete. Her first painting symbolically uses Kharau to depict Mahatma Gandhis arrival in Champaran in April 1917.

Change is inevitable and like in any other field new ideas should be welcomed, said Alka, when asked whether purists might scoff insisting on absolute adherence to traditional themes.

A native of Madhubani, she grew up in a village seeing her mother, Godawari Devi making beautiful Madhubani paintings on the mud walls of their house. She took to sketching outlines for paintings early on but not very inclined towards paintings as such. She remembers her mother putting layers of mud, cowdung and then mud to prepare the surface for painting. Then natural colours were made from marigold for yellow, green fava beans leaf (sem ka patta) for green colour, soot from lamps for black and so on. The colours were mixed in milk or gum. The brush was made of old bamboo stick that was manually sharpened to make a pointed tip.

From then to now, the canvas of Madhubani art rapidly shifted from mud walls to paper, fabric, wood, handmade paper, and even ceramics. The acrylic paints replaced natural colours, the pen nibs replaced plant twigs or bamboo for painting. The paintings look resplendent on silk sarees to the ceramic mugs, it is everywhere. But what remained constant is the traditional theme of Madhubani art. The figures of Ram and Sita. Radha and Krishna, Shiva and Parvati, peacock, lotus, Sun and moon are the most common. This is the essence of the 2,500-year-old art. Alka does a lot of traditional paintings but has brought a contemporary twist to the subject matter ranging from environmental issues to modern history.

Prompted by her meeting with a researcher Bhairav Lal Das in Patna, Alka did a series of paintings in 2015 on the Ghadar mutiny. This was a movement launched by patriotic Indian-Americans (mostly Punjabis) from the USA and Canada to free their motherland. The Madhubani paintings by her lend a beautiful visual narrative to the valiant uprising against the British rule. The paintings were displayed in an exhibition in the USA.

Her next project is Champaran Satyagraha, an important chapter in history when there was an intersection of peasant unrest in the country to the national movement for independence. This was Mahatma Gandhis first struggle on Indian soil that started in April 1917 and culminated by the enactment of Champaran Agrarian Act, 1918 in favour of indigo cultivators. This established Gandhis leadership and was a precursor for many such movements.

Alka has also made it a point to highlight women contribution to Champaran movement. Reflecting on her involvement with Madhubani art and evolving into a commercial artist, she attributes support of her husband and mentors. She feels the talent of many artists, especially women, languishes without encouragement and opportunity. While staying at her in-laws place in Madhubani she had joined a one-year professional course at Mithila Art Institute. Under the guidance of artist Santosh Kumar Das, she learnt a lot about the nuances of Madhubani art.

But home and children responsibilities put her art on hold till she got a platform to commercially sell her paintings in 2012. In a short time, her paintings have found space in exhibitions and fairs. She says its the traditional paintings on sarees, dupatta and other stuff that are hot selling pieces. As for her series on historical movements and environment; its her labour of love. She gets a lot of appreciation for these but this does not translate into sale. However, currently she is enthusiastically looking forward to the annual art exhibition by the Lalit Kala Academy to be held during September in Patna. She had been invited to put up her solo exhibition of Madhubani paintings there.
Sujoy Dhar

If you have the iconic Buckingham Palace in London or the magnificent Windsor Castle nearby on your bucket list of must-see residences of Her Majesty, then add one more to it. Well, if you are visiting the beautiful capital city of Edinburgh in Scotland to soak in its year-long festivals and amazing hospitality of the Scots, a visit to the spectacular Royal Yacht Britannia should not be missed.

This royal yacht or the floating holiday home of the Queen had sailed more than one million miles from 1954 to 1997, carrying the Queen, the King and other royal family members to distant shores, completing some 696 foreign visits.

Britannia, which retired from service in 1997, is now a magnet for tourists visiting Edinburgh since it is permanently berthed at Ocean Terminal, Leith.

Britannia was launched from the John Brown & Company shipyard in Clydebank, Scotland on April 16, 953. For more than 44 years, she served the royal family, sailing to different countries as the most iconic ship in the world.

To the Queen, Britannia proved to be the perfect royal residence for glittering state visits, official receptions, royal honeymoons and relaxing family holidays.

For Great Britain, she was a majestic symbol of the Commonwealth and a proud ambassador.

About the yacht, the Queen had said it is "one place where I can truly relax."

This is the yacht in which Prince Charles and Princess Diana had sailed on their honeymoon to the Mediterranean in 1981. So as you step inside the yacht and walk through its corridors and decks, you discover the room in which the royal couple had stayed together. You discover what life was like on board Her Majestys floating royal residence viewing the rooms of the Queen Elizabeth, the King (Duke of Edinburgh) besides royal dining and drawing rooms, the bars of the crew members and the shimmering tea sets or candle stands.

On board, you follow the footsteps of leaders like Sir Winston Churchill, Nelson Mandela and Rajiv Gandhi, all of whom had been hosted on the yacht by the Queen. As you explore Britannia's five decks with highlights, including the elegant Royal Apartments, Crew's Quarters, Engine Room and stunning Royal Deck Tea Room, you can get a good commentary with the free audio guide.

The visit also helps to discover the private, refined taste of the Queen. There is simplicity and minimalism. It is said the Queen and the King had rejected the lavishness of its interiors by the original designers and chose the simple country house decor that goes with the postwar period.

Here you can also have refreshment in a stunning Royal Deck Tea Room.

And yes, you can wrap up the royal visit with a few purchases in the gift shop in the terminal at the entry point.

More about the Yacht

Fabulous state apartments and royal bedrooms

Relaxing sun lounge

Stunning royal deck tea room

Life below decks in the sick bay and the laundry

Sample home-made fudge in the NAAFI sweet shop

The onboard Rolls-Royce Phantom V that used to travel on Britannia

Gleaming engine room

Royal racing yacht bloodhound

Visiting Time
Harish Khare

Harish Khare

THREE weeks ago Rajkamal Prakashan, a leading Hindi publishing house, sent me a book, Lok Ka Prabhash. Written by Ramashankar Kushwaha, it is a literary biography of the legendary Hindi journalist, Prabhash Joshi. I have been meaning to write about the book and this week  when Gauri Lankesh has been killed  seems to be the most appropriate time to talk about Prabhash Joshi and the kind of journalism he embodied and promoted.

With the possible exception of Rajendra Mathur, Prabhash Joshi was the only Hindi editor who made himself read, heard and counted in a journalistic milieu that was dominated overwhelmingly by the English-wallas. His peers respected him, his junior colleagues admired him, and the powers that be learned to appreciate his intrepid approach to men and matters. Prabhash-jee fitted well in the company of the likes of Nikhil Chakravarty, BG Verghese, and Giri Lal Jain.

Lok Ka Prabhash puts together the story of his life. And, this story is a tale of a life anchored in authentic ideas, values, experiences, traditions, dialect of a non-metropolitan India, in rural Malwa.

Ram Bahadur Rai, one of his closest friends and colleagues, has written a longish introduction to this book. And, Rai sahib, perceptively tells us that Prabhash-jee never allowed himself to be mesmerized by Jawaharlal Nehru; he was a Gandhian and he was a Vinoba Bhave man. It was this authenticity that lent so much clarity and so much conviction to his voice.

I was privileged to know Prabhash-jee for many, many years. He was always very generous to me  with his words of encouragement and approval. He had access to powerful leaders and he never made any bones about it. Yet despite all his proximity to chambers of powers and privileges, he maintained a respectful intellectual and mental distance from the high and mighty. He never allowed himself to be co-opted. No political leader could take him for granted. Till his death in 2009, he was unafraid and unintimidated.

For example, he was very close to Chandrashekhar. I remember it was Prabhash-jee who had taken me to meet Chandrashekar at his Bhondsi Ashram. I could see the close friendship between the two; but, Prabhash-jee had no hesitation in breaking ranks with him when it appeared that the former prime minister had allowed some of his aides to play hanky-panky with land allotted for a JP memorial. It was classic lesson in fearless and public-spirited journalism.

He was indeed a role-model for a whole generation of Hindi journalists. This book is a testimonial to the respect and reverence he received and is an effort to keep alive his legacy.

So, the question arises: how would have Prabhash-jee faired in todays New India, when likes of Gauri Lankesh invite the silencing gun?

I have no doubt that had he been alive, Prabhash Joshi would have been in the forefront of the journalistic fraternity that had gathered at the Press Club of India protesting Gauri Lankeshs murder. Had he been around, it is quite possible, he would have raised his voice against the creeping timidity in the mainstream media.

About a decade earlier, Rajkamal Prakashan had also brought out a collection of Prabhash Joshis columns. The collection was provocatively called, Hindu Hone ka dharm (obligations of a Hindu). In a column, dated May 18, 2002 (a few months after the communal riots in Gujarat) he took on Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee. Addressing him as Swayamsevak, Joshi questioned Vajpayee for talking of militant Islam and not talking of militant Hinduism. Today no journalist or editor dare run the risk of telling a thing or two to the prime minister of India

I have no doubt that had he been alive Prabhash Joshi would have been meted out the Gauri Lankesh treatment.

***********

LAST Fridays newspapers had published a photograph of our newly appointed Raksha Mantri participating in a puja at her office before assuming the responsibilities of looking after Indias defences. Seeking divine blessings before undertaking a difficult enterprise is perfectly understandable; what is not so understandable is that the new defence minister should have chosen to make a public display of her religious ritual in the official space.

Admittedly, after last Sundays reshuffle of portfolios, not all new ministers  all devout and god-fearing men and women, presumably  performed any kind of religious rites in their offices. Most of them just went to the new office, shook hands with the predecessor and began the new innings. It can be safely assumed that many must have done a havan or a puja at home. Individual praying in the privacy of ones home is part and parcel of our cultural upbringing, across religions.

When a minister chooses to perform a religious rite in his/her office, it becomes more than a matter of personal preference. It becomes a political statement.

Perhaps the most assertive such display can be attributed to the new Minister of State for Health, Ashwini Kumar Choubey. According to newspaper reports, the new member of the Council of Ministers brought in a group of priests with him to perform havan at his offices in Nirman Bhavan. The priests also performed Ganesh Puja and swastivachan.

The new Minister of State for Health later told reporters that the rituals performed were for curing all. This is an astounding statement from a health minister. If prayers alone could cure ailments and illnesses, then hundreds of children would not have died in Gorakhpur, which presumably has benefitted for decades from the presence of Yogi Adityanath.

Public performance of these religious rituals is more than a political statement; these become an advertisement for a decidedly un-scientific attitude. A minister is not just a politician, he is also a public official that too in a country still committed to a secular polity.

Arti, havan, namaaz, cannot be a substitute for hospitals, doctors, surgeons, cardiologists, clinics and affordable medicines. If the new health ministers logic has any merit, then this ancient and holy land of ours should not be host to any illness, because we have more purohits, maulvis, priests and granthis than doctors and nurses. Minister Choubey represents a backwardness of mind India can do without.

***********

IT can only be a matter of all-round satisfaction that at last the distinguished Punjabi poet Surjit Patar stands confirmed as the chairman of the Punjab Kala Parishad. Mr Patar is a respected literary figure and he should have been spared the embarrassment of an entirely avoidable controversy.

The controversy arose because of the concerned ministers over-enthusiasm and penchant for showmanship. Ministers are political figures and are not expected to be all that well versed in the rules of business. The government has a right to affect a change of guards in Kala Parishad, the premier forum for fashioning out a cultural narrative.

However, the culture minister, Navjot Singh Sidhu, was indeed ill-served by his officials who should have told him that all ministerial discretion and prerogatives are to be exercised in a prescribed manner. Even Chief Ministers officials are guilty of not applying their mind to the matter before Capt Amarinder Singh put his signature to Surjit Patars nomination letter.

The moral of the story: we are a country of laws; and there are rules and there are regulations which even a minister or a chief minister cannot bypass. And, as citizens we should be grateful for that.

Now that Mr. Surjit Patar stands installed as the new cultural czar he will have the inclination to come and have a cup of coffee with me. Join me.

kaffeeklatsch@tribuneindia.com
Saba Naqvi

Saba Naqvi

I had met Gauri Lankesh but did not know her well. We were, however, connected through social media and 23 hours before she was killed she had retweeted a tweet I put out about a particularly noxious TV panellist. Its a strange connect with a famous dead person but thats how it goes these days.

So why did I cry when I heard of a death? Horror at what happened? Fear for myself? Possibly both. And as the best speaker at the protest meet at the Delhi Press Club the next day, anchor-journalist Ravish Kumar put his finger on the feeling. He began by speaking of the fear among all those who are regularly abused before he powerfully implored the PM to stop following on social media those who celebrate Gauris death.

To add to my mood of paranoid depression, at the club, well-meaning friends kept telling me to be careful and a fellow journalist, also a target of threats, asked if I had received a mail she forwarded from a man who threatened to run me down on a dark night. Journalists, many fearless, were in that sort of mood.

As I am constantly threatened online with extermination, I felt very sick about both Gauri and myself and my emotions built to a pitch. I, therefore, cancelled all engagements (including TV) and reflected on life for the next few days.

Calmer now, I have come to some conclusions. First, its true that the trolling is awful and can be seen as incitement to violence. Yes, we should flag the fact with some clarity that high-profile media figures who operate in the English language may attract the most vicious abuse, especially if they happen to be women (consider the recent death threat to journalists Sagarika Ghose and Shobhaa De). So they should exercise caution. But its not the same thing as an ordered assassination.

Gauri in fact had only 5,958 twitter followers when she died. But her views mattered in the region and language in which she operated. Journalists who are killed in India end up dead because they ruffle local power, that be from the Uttar Pradesh sand mafia to Baba Ram Rahim. So who could Gauri have ruffled? There are many theories going around but I dont believe that a general dislike of the RSS and BJP can be the reason for an ordered hit-job, although recognised faces can be roughed up by ideologically driven mobs on the ground. (Thankfully, we cant murder people on social media as yet!)

Im playing detective here, so bear with me. The BJP leaders who had filed defamation cases against Gauri had won and she was out on bail. So I presume they would not need to assassinate her. But what she and Dr MM Kalburgi (the other high-profile execution in Karnataka) had in common perhaps was the fact that they both touched the raw nerve of the Lingayat vs Veerashaiva debate very relevant to the region. This debate flags the demand for a religious identity that is claimed by some as separate from Sanatan Hinduism. Refer to Gauris own piece published in the Wire on August 8 on the complex theme. Its the thread that links her to Kalburgi.

We do live in an age when at both the political and cultural levels a certain Hindu identity is being forged. We can, however, only speculate at this point. But the purpose of this column is to stress that journalists operating in regional languages face a more real and present danger than us English speaking types. Gauri straddled both English and Kannada journalism and came from a class background that gave her a higher profile than several other journalists who have been killed, noted only in single column headlines.

The other critical point is that media protests should not be taken over by politicians. There were too many at the press club event. Equally, activists do not speak for journalists, although there can be a healthy overlap at times. But boundaries must not be crossed. The main social media trend after the Press Club event was Ravish Kumar, authentic journalist, followed by JNU student leader Shehla Rashid. She stood at the gate of the Press Club ordering the crew of Republic TV off the protest. Her main point was that she would not allow them in.

Fellow media and citizens have every right to lodge complaints and/or begin a campaign about practices of other media. But as long as the media is licenced they are entitled to free movement, especially into the Press Club. An activist who is not a journalist cannot presume to bar anyone into the press club. Many scribes who loathe the hyper nationalist channels are annoyed at what the young lady did. As an accredited journalist I dont like it at all. Whats more, I later saw the president of the Press Club on the same channel that Shehla ordered off.

We work in difficult times and there are media divisions and polarisations. But we make our positions weaker if we let a JNU student leader presume to speak for us. Lets not muck it up like this again.
Yash Goyal in Jaipur

Yash Goyal in Jaipur

KRITI Bharti (29) was only a toddler when her father abandoned her along with her mother. Today, Kriti is known for a landmark case: She got Indias first child marriage annulled in 2012. Lakshmi Sargara was a year-old bride and the groom three. At age 17, Lakshmi approached Kritis Saarthi Trust when her parents forced her gauna (sending the girl to her in-laws home for consummation of marriage). Lakshmis freedom was Kritis success: her Trust has annulled 32 child marriages in four years and prevented over 900 more.

Rajasthan tops the states in the prevalence of child marriages, says a report of the Annual Health Survey conducted by the Ministry of Health in collaboration with the Registrar General of India and the Ministry of Home Affairs. Rajasthan is among the empowered action group (EAG) states (Uttarakhand, UP, MP, Chhattisgarh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha and Assam are the others where half of the countrys population lives).

In a unique show of solidarity with efforts to prevent child marriages, 47,000 tent dealers in Rajasthan last year decided to first verify the birth certificates of brides and grooms before supplying tents for marriage ceremonies. The Rajasthan Tent Dealers Kiraaya Vyavsai Samiti (TDKVS) members took an oath that every marriage organizer, particularly of samuhik vivah (mass marriage) event, has to file an affidavit with birth certificates of brides and grooms before hiring any facilities such as lighting, generator sets and orchestra, says Ravi Jindal, TDKVS president.

We didnt mind our losses, especially in rural areas. We are happy that no child marriage took place under our tents in the last one year, adds Jindal. Despite such efforts, figures released by the State Crime Record Bureau are alarming: in 2014-16, as many as 5,995 cases of sexual assault on minor girls were recorded in Rajasthan, of which 4,946 cases are pending in courts.

The state governments lack of focus is apparent, though the department of child and women development has an annual budget of Rs 1,904.51 crore for a strategy and action plan titled Sanjha Abhiyan: Bal Vivah Mukt Rajasthan in partnership with UNFPA and UNICEF. Social activists say this plan works well on Akshay Tritiya/Aakha Teej and Peepal Purnima days  when most of child marriages take place as per tradition  and not before or after the scheduled dates.

About 17 million children in the age group of 10-19 are married, bulk of them (13 millions) are girls (Census 2011), says Anita Bhadel, the minister in-charge.

It is here that Kritis efforts have a hit a wall. Getting a child marriage cancelled legally is one thing, and preventing such marriages is completely another. Villagers are smart enough now. They organize such ceremonies after Akshay Tritiya or Peepal Purnima days without any fear of the district administration and police.

Kriti says stopping gauna is no answer as a girls in-laws return after some months. In one such case, I discovered the annulment in the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006, section 3. Before Lakshmis case, this legal power was never used; no one knew how to take it forward. So, I did what a person does to light up a dark room: switch on each light. And we made history.

Kriti is also a rehabilitation psychologist. Our Saarthi Trust does not get adequate funds. Whatever I earn from rehabilitation consultancy, I spend on our core activity of stopping child marriages. I enjoy living with these girls whose cases are pending in the family court. I do hold a weekly orientation programme in villages and schools to make students aware for their legal rights.

Saarthi has two little brides Pinky and Patli. They have horrifying tales of village life. Now 19, Pinky, a child marriage victim living in Saarthi Rehabilitation Home at Jodhpur and facing legal challenges for her marriage annulment, says she was 10 when she was married off to an 18-year-old boy in 2009.

I refused to live with him. He was HIV+ve. I moved to Jodhpur, completed my BA, and now I am doing B.Ed. I did receive threat calls; they tried to force me into a vehicle, my mother was given warnings. Today I am confident that I would be a government teacher, she says. Patli, now 18, is from Agoloi village, near Jodhpur. She says she was married on Mausar or Mrityubhoj day of her grandfather, and that she would like to relive her life.
AN air of disbelief surrounds the Dera Sacha Sauda headquarters in Sirsa over a fortnight after a CBI court convicted dera chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh of rape, committed over 15 years ago. Among his followers wandering listlessly at Satnam Singh Chowk is a local reporter. He has a story to tell  about himself.

I suffered a paralytic attack about 10 years ago. Doctors were plain negative.

A dera follower told me to see Pita-ji (father-figure as the dera chief is known as), he says, refusing to reveal his name. A few days later when I went to see Pita-ji and told him about my condition, he hugged me tightly in front of his doctors. I am perfectly fine now.

The baba cured several people with his touch as he partook of biscuits offered to him, says a female follower who identified herself as Jas. They summon their (the baba and his gurus) names before going to work. inka naam lete hain to kaam ho jata hai (if we invoke their names, our work gets done), says Gaurav, another follower.

Sirsa is a comparatively newer district of Haryana, and a perfect place for such miracles to happen: healthcare facilities and education standards in rural areas are dismal. People, like in any other such place, often look for divine intervention; just anything that can deliver them from their ailments and socio-economic pressures, says Ramesh Varma, an RTI activist.

Something similar keeps happening elsewhere in the country. An international TV channel recently reported about a guru, Prahlad Jani (82), who lives in Gujarat. He claims he has been without food or water for over 70 years. The channel reporter gained access to his studio apartments cave and found a refrigerator. It did not surprise Sanal Edamaruku, who is an atheist and head of the Indian RationalistsAssociation. Recently, Edamaruku had a confrontation on live TV with a swami who claimed he could kill him by uttering mantras.

Another example Edamaruku cited was of a baba with millions of followers around the globe. He is known for creating jewelry and holy ash from thin air. Recent videos posted on YouTube showed his abilities were just a sleight of hand.

Miracle managers

The world is full of them. In Japan, it was Aum Shinrikyo. The Japanese New Religious Movement gained international notoriety in 1995, when it carried out a lethal sarin gas attack on a Tokyo subway. Its founder Shoko Asahara was sentenced to death and many of his followers arrested for attempting to influence politics through devious means and conspiring to buy weapons from Russia.

The ideas of belief and faith become terrifyingly bizarre when these swing to extremes: any opposition leads to violence. Thats why in Sirsa, where there are 21 deras of various babas, a small argument with any follower could cause serious street fights. These dera supporters are very aggressive. They dont tolerate anything even remotely insulting to their spiritual heads, says a Sirsa resident.

The dera head was accused of forcing castration of around 400 followers in 2014. This was apparently done to safeguard women followers from possible sexual advances.

The Ram Rahim again came under the scanner in December 2014 after the Punjab and Haryana High Court ordered that activities of the sect should be periodically monitored after reports appeared about arms training at the dera.

Why so many babas?

In a country riven with frustration, confusion and ambition, babas are like placebos. People flock to them thinking that they can help in giving them the next big break in their lives, psychologists say. Sociologist Dipankar Gupta says since Hinduism does not have a single book and communion, people tend to believe in one miracle or the other. You go to a baba hoping he will deliver things to you. Religion, as we know it, is just a gloss and doesn't draw Indians to gurus in the first place, says Prof Gupta. As long as belief in magic and miracle survives and times remain uncertain, Indias gurus and babas are assured a place in the sun, he says.

The Indian middle classes are a very schizophrenic bunch of people, says Meera Nanda, author of The God Market: How Globalization Is Making India More Hindu. She says it is time the religious trusts are regulated, audited and taxed. They look at renunciation, asceticism, a life of simplicity as a higher ideal, but that is an ideal hardly anyone can live up to with this growing wealth, she said.

Deras army of motivators

Dera Sacha Sauda was a well-knit outfit of motivators. For the Team Gurmeet, he is the last man to be alive on earth. This deeply entrenched belief and stories of the miracles were enough to impress the rank and file that he was god of gods.

The DSS had an all-powerful 45-member committee assigned to expand the dera by not only getting more people to adopt the naamfrom the Pita-jibut also arranging donations in cash and kind.

This committee comprised full-time members of the dera who enjoyed the confidence of Ram Rahim. The committee members used to take a tour of the specific blocks of the dera and hold meeting with the saadh sangat and to deliver the word from their chief.

The field staff of the dera had a 15-member committee at the district level and a seven-member panel at the block level. A bigger contributor to the DSS kitty of funds was given membership at block and district levels.

The members of these committees are now scared. Most of them were a part of the field team kept at an arms' length from the inner functioning of the dera. However, some of them have a fairly good idea of the business-like approach of the DSS.

 Inputs by Deepender Deswal from Hisar and Prashant Saxena in Chandigarh
Rachna Khaira in Kapurthala

Rachna Khaira in Kapurthala

THE Beas-bisected, jagged terrain of Mand in Sultanpur Lodhi is a dangerous place to live in. Peer Baksh, a revenue clerk, lived there 70 years ago before he migrated to Pakistan during the Partition. Hardy farmers, believing in the fertility of the soil stretched over 6,000 acres, and their fate, later came in. They fear fire and water: A burning piece of wood is enough to cause a big blaze in the forest; and the Beas changes its course almost each year. Today, a rivulet as wide as over 400 feet separates the 5,000 residents from the land. They have everything, yet nothing, as they cross to the either sides in boats; many women lose their lives at childbirth, the old and ailing die on the way and children learn why going to school makes little sense.

On way to work in her grandfathers 2-acre farmland, Jaspreet Kaur (7) struggles to carry a spade and a sickle. She says her mother, fed up with the tortuous routine, left her when she was just four years old. Her father is a daily wager. I can show you my mothers picture, says Jaspreet, wiping her sweat; her eyes moist. She took my younger sister as well.

The island has many Jaspreets for whom crossing the river twice daily means dropping out of school. We have two government schools for 16 villages. But most inhabitants have sent their children to schools located outside this area. Despite several resquests, the state government is yet to construct a permanent structure on the creek to get us connected to the land, says Paramjit Singh, a farmer and district president, Kisan Sangharsh Committee.

Last week Balkar Singh (52) was working in his field at village Baupur when he was bitten by a snake. His neighbours though rushed him to the banks; but he died in the boat. His wife Gurmeet Kaur says there is no dispensary or first-aid clinic in the village. Women in labour either travel by boats to the other side or deliver in the boat.

Three years ago, Balwinder Singh decorated his house with fancy lights and colourful kites. His eldest daughter Minni was to get married three days later. His house and his 17-acre agricultural land were submerged in the overflowing Beas. He could not cope with the sudden loss and hanged himself. His daughter got married after the tragedy with support from villagers, but soon she was thrown out by her in-laws.

A travel to these villages is an adventure in itself: vehicles frequently get stuck in the bog as villagers rush to pull the vehicle to safety. Many villagers have pucca houses and sheds for their domestic as well as pet animals. They have electricity and telephone connectivity. Two big gurdwaras have come up each in villages Sangra and Baupur. The villagers also own farm machines brought through the pontoon bridge operational only three months in year.

The land is highly fertile for organic farming, says Kuldeep Singh Sangra, president of the Kisan Sangharsh Committee. Rice and pulses grown in this area are free from any fertilizer and pesticides, he says. The only challenge is the river. It changes course every second year, says Sangra.

But why cant they leave the island and use it only for cultivation? The land was gifted to us by our ancestors who cleared it up with their own hands for farming. How can we leave it? Also, most of the farmers are poor. So, they cannot afford to buy land elsewhere, says Yadvinder Singh, another farmer.

Another major problem for the villagers is finding brides. No educated girl would marry our boys because of the harsh life of the island. We are forced to send our sons to the other side of the island, says Balkaar Singh, an old resident.

As the villagers make strenuous efforts to make this fertile land livable, their only hope is one day a bridge would come up and change their destiny forever.
LUXOR, September 9

Egyptian archaeologists have discovered a tomb of a prominent goldsmith who lived more than 3,000 years ago, unearthing statues, mummies and jewellery in the latest major find near the Nile city of Luxor.

Egypts Minister of Antiquities Khaled Al-Anani said on Saturday the tomb dated back to Egypts 18th dynasty New Kingdom eraaround 15th century BC. The work did not finish yet and were continuing and working to find more objects and more tombs, he told Reuters at the site.

The site includes a courtyard and niche where a statue of the goldsmith Amenemhat and his wife and one of his sons, as well as two burial shafts, the ministry said.

Earlier this year, authorities announced they had discovered another New Kingdom tomb in Luxor belonging to a judge, and Swedish archaeologists discovered 12 ancient cemeteries near the southern city of Aswan that date back almost 3,500 years.

Egypts ancient relics are a draw for tourists and authorities hope new finds can also help attract more visitors. Egypts tourism revenues jumped by 170 percent in the first seven months of 2017, reaching $3.5 billion, authorities said, in welcome news for an economy heavily reliant on the sector for foreign currency and jobs.  Reuters
Remedios, September 9

Hurricane Irma pounded Cubas northern coast on Saturday as it headed for Florida, where millions of residents were told to evacuate after the storm killed 22 persons in the Caribbean and left devastation in its wake.

Still a Category 5 storm when it crashed into Cuba in the early hours of Saturday, Irma weakened slightly as it tore along the islands northern coastline, downing power lines, bending palm trees and sending huge waves crashing over sea walls.

Maximum sustained winds dropped to around 215 km per hour on Saturday, the US National Hurricane Center (NHC) said, ranking it a dangerous Category 4 storm, the second-highest level.

However, the NHC said Irma would regain strength as it moved away from Cuba and was expected to remain a powerful hurricane as it approaches Florida, arriving in the Keys on Sunday morning.

One of the fiercest Atlantic storms in a century, Irma is expected to cause major damage due to high winds and flooding to the fourth-largest US state by population.

The destruction along Cubas north central coast was similar to that seen on other Caribbean islands over the last week as Irma plowed into Ciego de Avila province around midnight.

State media said it was the first time the eye of a Category 5 storm had made landfall since 1932. In the days before Irma struck, the islands Communist government evacuated tens of thousands of foreign tourists from resorts on the northern coast.

In Ciego de Avila province, Irma was forecast to generate waves of up to 7 meters with flooding expected as far west as the capital Havana, authorities said on Saturday.

With the storm barreling toward the US, officials in Florida ordered an unprecedented evacuation, racing to overcome clogged highways, gasoline shortages and move elderly residents to safety.

A total of 6.3 million people, or about a third of the states population, were ordered to evacuate Florida, according to the Florida Division of Emergency Management.

The US has been hit by only three Category 5 storms since 1851, and Irma is far larger than the last one in 1992, Hurricane Andrew, according to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

President Donald Trump said in a videotaped statement that Irma was a storm of absolutely historic destructive potential and called on people to heed recommendations from government officials and law enforcement. In Palm Beach, Trumps waterfront Mar-a-Lago estate was ordered evacuated.

A shelter in southwest Miami filled to capacity just hours after it opened its doors, with many people there remembering the damage caused by Hurricane Andrew, the most destructive to hit the state. Im scared because it is bigger than Andrew, said Ann Samuels, 49. They say to not stress and not worry, but how can you not?  Reuters

Caribbean islands fear grim tourist season
Juchitan De Zaragoza, Sept 9

Police, soldiers and emergency workers today raced to rescue survivors from the ruins of Mexicos most powerful earthquake in a century, which killed at least 61 persons.

In the southern region hit hardest by the quake, emergency workers looked for survivors, or bodies, in the rubble of houses, churches and schools that were torn apart in the 8.1-magnitude quake.

President Enrique Pena Nieto said 45 persons were killed in Oaxaca, 12 in Chiapas and four in Tabasco. But the actual death toll could be over 80, according to figures reported by state officials.

Adding to the concerns, authorities warned another massive quake could follow within 24 hours of the first hit.

Pena Nieto was speaking from the hardest-hit city, Juchitan in Oaxaca, where at least 36 bodies were pulled from the ruins. The citys eerily quiet streets were a maze of rubble, with roofs, cables, insulation and concrete chunks scattered everywhere.

A crowd had formed at Juchitans partially collapsed town hall, a Spanish colonial building where two policemen were trapped in the rubble.

Rescuers managed to extract one and were still working to save the other 18 hours after the quake. God, let him come out alive! said a woman watching as four cranes and a fleet of trucks removed what remained of the buildings crumbled wing.

A hotel mostly collapsed and many homes were badly damaged in the predominantly indigenous town of 100,000 people, which is tucked into the lush green southern mountains near the coast.  AFP

Katia weakens, but rains still a threat
The Washington State Institute for Public Policy (WSIPP), which serves as a chief research arm for Washingtons legislature in Olympia, has been been tasked with assessing the costs and benefits of marijuana legalization in the state. It is required to produce reports in 2015, 2017, 2022, and 2032. The first 2015 WSIPP report, blogged about here, largely said it was too early to start reaching any conclusions about the impact of legalization. This second 2017 WSIPP report, released this past week, is similarly cautious about reaching firm conclusions about the impact of the state's initiative providing for marijuana legalization, the the report does have this useful summary of findings:

Our outcome analyses were designed to identify causal effects of I-502. However, I-502 is a multi-faceted law that may affect outcomes through a variety of mechanisms including changes to criminal prohibitions; the creation of a regulated cannabis supply system; and investments in substance abuse prevention, treatment, and research. The findings we present in this report are only one portion of a larger body of work designed to address multiple aspects of the law.

In these initial investigations, we found no evidence that I-502 enactment, on the whole, affected cannabis abuse treatment admissions. Further, within Washington State, we found no evidence that the amount of legal cannabis sales affected cannabis abuse treatment admissions.

The bulk of outcome analyses in this report used the within-state approach to focus on identifying effects of the amount of legal cannabis sales. We found no evidence that the amount of legal cannabis sales affected youth substance use or attitudes about cannabis or drug-related criminal convictions.

We did find evidence that higher levels of retail cannabis sales affected adult cannabis use in certain subgroups of the population. BRFSS respondents 21 and older who lived in counties with higher levels of retail cannabis sales were more likely to report using cannabis in the past 30 days and heavy use of cannabis in the past 30 days. We also found two effects that are difficult to interpret. Among the portion of the population aged 18 to 21, BRFSS respondents living in counties with higher sales were less likely to report using cannabis in the past 30 days, in some analyses. It may be that legal cannabis sales have made cannabis more difficult to access by persons below the legal age, for instance, by reducing black market supply through competition.

We also found that in the portion of the BRFSS sample who smoked cigarettes, respondents living in counties with higher levels of legal cannabis sales were less likely to report past-month cannabis use. It is particularly difficult to explain why increased sales would lead to lower cannabis use among cigarette smokers.

We look forward to updating these results with additional data to see if these effects persist.
Islamabad, September 9

Pakistan today summoned the Myanmar envoy and lodged a strong protest over the ongoing violence against the Rohingya Muslims in the Rakhine state, leading to the exodus of about 270,000 refugees to Bangladesh.

Foreign Secretary Tehmina Janjua summoned Myanmar's Ambassador to Pakistan U Win Myint and sought effective measures to prevent the recurrence of such violence, providing security to Rohingya Muslims, the Foreign Office said.

She conveyed a strong protest of the government and people of Pakistan at the ongoing violence against the Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, it said.

Janjua asked for upholding their rights to live and move without fear and discriminations, urgent investigations into recent violence against the Rohingya Muslims and holding accountable those involved in these serious crimes, it said.

She said as part of a durable settlement of the problem, the swift implementation of the recommendations of the Kofi Annan Commission was emphasised, which include urgent and sustained action to prevent violence, maintain peace, foster reconciliation, assure unhindered humanitarian access and address the issue of citizenship.

The envoy assured the foreign secretary to convey the concerns of the government and people of Pakistan to the Myanmar government, the foreign office added.  PTI
The 74070 First Responders hosted their second annual event at Central Park on September 9th to thank the Skiatook community for all of their support.

Skiatook Police Captain Billy Wakefield said he was very pleased and happy with the turnout at the event. Hundreds gathered at the park to thank the departments that are there every single day to keep us safe.

Skiatook Police Chief Pat Dean decided to host this event because of the support the police department has received from the community. It started out as Skiatook Police and Skiatook Fire, but grew to include most of the emergency services available in the 74070.

The first responders passed out free hot dogs, chips, popcorn and snow cones. There were drawings for prizes. The Tulsa County Life Flight helicopter flew in and landed in Central Park.

The Detective Division of the Skiatook Police Department had a mock crime scene where children investigated the area to collect evidence and receive candy prizes for their efforts. Skiatook Paws and Claws Animal Rescue was available for local animal adoptions.

Skiatook Fire and Ambulance Services was on hand and kids loved seeing the fire truck and meeting the firemen.

This event was entirely free to the public and made possible with generous donations from the community.

Skiatook Police Chief Pat Dean said, We hosted this event due to the overwhelming support of the Skiatook Emergency Services from the citizens of Skiatook. Even the simplest gestures have not gone unnoticed by the men and women of the Skiatook Emergency Services. We are very grateful and proud to serve the community in and around Skiatook. This event is to make the people living in the 74070 zip code aware of the many different Emergency Responders who might respond if they have an emergency depending on the type of emergency and where they live within the zip Code.

Follow me on Twitter @SkiatookJournal

E-mail lindsey.renuard @skiatookjournal.com
A weakened but still dangerous Hurricane Irma pushed inland Monday as it hammered Florida with winds and floodwaters that created hazards even for rescuers trying to help beleaguered residents.
OKLAHOMA CITY  When the news came out Tuesday that President Donald Trump would end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, Brisa Ledezma, a first-year teacher at Santa Fe South in south Oklahoma City, found herself in an empty classroom and cried.

As a recipient of DACA, Ledezma, 25, pondered what her future might hold without the deportation relief and work permit it provided.

While her students were at lunch, she took a moment for herself.

I closed the door, cried a little, got myself back together and prepared for the next class and kept on teaching, said Ledezma, who was brought to the United States from Mexico when she was younger than 2 years old.
Seven candidates are on the ballot Tuesday for a winner-take-all Republican special election primary in Senate District 37.

Tuesdays outcome will not decide the successor to Sen. Dan Newberry, who is leaving office for business reasons, but the winner should be a heavy favorite in the Nov. 14 general special election against Democrat Allison Ikley-Freeman.

SD 37 has become a decidedly Republican district that includes all of Tulsa County west of the Arkansas River and the inner dispersal loop except for the Owen Park and Irving Place neighborhoods near downtown Tulsa.

Candidates in Tuesdays election include a Sand Springs municipal judge, a west Tulsa school activist, two small-business owners, two Sand Springs city councilors and a field representative for Congressman Jim Bridenstine.

The field representative, 56-year-old Brian OHara, is a former Jenks city councilor and business executive. He notes that he has represented Bridenstine at more than 4,500 events over the past five years, and says that has given him a better understanding of issues affecting SD 37.

OHara said he believes a better state budgeting process and giving local school districts more latitude in deciding how to spend their money would go a long way toward solving education funding woes and Oklahomas continuing financial problems.

OHara said he favors open transfer among public schools but is opposed to vouchers.

One of only two candidates to have reported more than a few hundred dollars in contributions or expenses, OHara has benefited in the past few days from $20,000 in independent expenditures made through an entity called Catalyst Oklahoma, according to a report filed with the Ethics Commission.

The report was submitted by former Senate President Pro Tem Glenn Coffee, who is now a political consultant.

Sand Springs City Councilor Phil Nollan says he has had a front row seat to state government the past seven years. His wife, Jadine Nollan, is a state representative for a district that includes Sand Springs and some of west Tulsa.

Nollan says legislators should avoid wedge issues such as abortion and guns and concentrate on reforming the states tax system, stabilizing revenue and funding education.

Nollan said he favors a tax system with a broad base and low rates, and thinks raising or revising the gross production tax on oil and gas is maybe a conversation we need to have.

Nollan, 59, is an information technology specialist in the oil and gas industry, and said he will retire from business if elected.

Raising the gross production tax on horizontal wells is a major thrust of R. Jay McAtees campaign, and one he says sets him a part from many Republicans.

Big oil has taken advantage of the people too long, said McAtee, a Sand Springs municipal judge with law offices in Tulsa.

Like Nollan, McAtee said lawmakers need to keep their eye on the ball  the budget  and not be drawn into arguments things that deflect attention from real issues.

McAtee, 60, said he is bold and straightforward and does not always follow the current party line. Citing Ronald Reagan, he was the only one of four candidates present at a recent candidate forum to say he believes abortions should be allowed in some circumstances.

McAtee reported raising about $25,000, much of it from fellow attorneys, and loaning his campaign $10,000.

Grady Grant, 62, said he became a candidate because of frustration with the state bureaucracy and his inability to get current lawmakers to return my calls.

Grant owns Loc-Doc, a locksmith and security integrator, a business that sells, installs and services products related to controlling access.

I just got tired of all the lying and the non-returned phone calls, Grant said.

Running for office, he said, is not something I have to do. Its something I think I could do to be helpful.

Nicole Nixon, 31, is the youngest candidate in the field and also the only woman. She became involved after Tulsa Public Schools closed three westside sites, including an elementary school attended by her children.

I dont want to be a one-issue candidate, but education is at the root of most of the things we talk about, Nixon said.

Nixon said she thinks schools should have more money, but she is also critical of TPS and other districts she says spend too much on administration and non-essentials.

How is it we can have a bunch of administrators paid at nationally competitive wages, but we cant afford to pay teachers a nationally competitive wage? she said.

Nixon said she has pinched pennies most of her life and thinks state government should, too.

Keep it simple, she said. Trace our problems back to the whats really causing them. Get to the root of them.

Rick Hardesty, 56, said he was also upset about the west Tulsa school closings. He grew up there and graduated from Webster High School.

The school system says its not getting enough money, he said. I think theyre getting plenty of money. Its going to administration.

Even so, Hardesty said he supports raising the gross production tax and wasnt convinced anyone who agreed would run.

As it turned out, five of the seven candidates, including McAtee and Nollan, filed on the final day. Hardesty said the other candidates are all good guys, but thinks he has longer ties to west Tulsa.

The seventh candidate, Sand Spring city councilor Brian Jackson, has not actively campaigned, and said in a written statement that he filed as a silent protest of Newberrys decision to resign only months after re-election.

Jackson lost to Newberry in last years GOP primary.

My campaign for Senate District 37 is a silent protest against the blatant disregard of the peoples voice through the elected official (Newberry), who quit one year into his term, Jackson said in his statement.

Too much time and too much money  to the amount of a half million dollars  have been wasted when we went through this political process a year ago. We are tired of the political nonsense we are bombarded with during elections. When will enough be enough?

Jackson asked that donations be made to local school teachers instead of his campaign.
When Terence Crutcher was shot and killed by former Tulsa Police Officer Betty Shelby a year ago this week, it reopened a deep wound in Tulsas African-American community and sparked an initiative by the city of Tulsa to improve race relations.

Leaders differ on whether the pace of putting those actions in place has been quick enough.

Tulsa Mayor G.T. Bynum, who took office just 2 months after the shooting on Sept. 16, 2016, initiated a broad range of programs to deal with racial disparity, calling it the greatest issue we need help with.

He created a commission that has recommended, among other things, seeking more diversity on the police force through minority recruitment, expanding bias training, holding community educational forums and working with schools on discipline policies.

Tulsa is a different city today than it was a year ago when Mr. Crutcher died, Bynum said.

A year ago, a handful of knowledgeable people were discussing community policing. Today, we are implementing over 70 recommendations from the Tulsa Commission on Community Policing  a joint effort among citizens, police officers and city officials. A year ago we were testing body cameras. Today we are deploying them by the hundreds.

A year ago, the nearly 11-year life expectancy disparity between north Tulsa and other parts of the city was acknowledged as a concern. Today, the city is partnering with one of the largest philanthropic foundations in human history, the Rockefeller Foundation, to develop a comprehensive means of addressing issues of racial disparity in our community.

Most of all, our city has endured the kind of pain that can tear a community apart, but instead we have emerged with greater resolve to help one another. There is so much work to be done, but the commitment to carry out that work exists.

Attorney Hannibal Johnson, who was a member of the Tulsa Commission on Community Policing, said the Vision Tulsa package passed in April last year will help in getting to the goal of community policing. Voters approved a permanent public safety tax that will include the addition of about 160 new police officers in the next few years.

Those officers will allow for more effective community policing, Johnson said. Community policing is relationship-oriented and time-intensive. Part of the reason why TPD has not been able to do what it needs to do fully to implement community policing is because they are short 150 or so officers. Its hard to do relational work when strapped like that.

To have long-lasting impact, some aspects cannot be implemented immediately, Johnson said.

Movement is never as swift as people want it to be. Most things, to be effective and make a difference, will take time, like with getting officers, Johnson said. It would be great to hire 150 more officers tomorrow, but it doesnt work that way. It will take years.

Huge disconnect

Immediately after Crutchers death, Tulsa officials took extraordinary steps to engage the black community.

Police met privately with black clergy and community leaders to show them the video of the shooting before it was made public and to hear their concerns and enlist their help.

It was just six days before Tulsa County District Attorney Steve Kunzweiler brought first-degree manslaughter charges against Shelby, in what the Tulsa police union later called a rush to judgment before all of the critical evidence had been reviewed.

Peace prevailed in the months between the shooting and the trial, as north Tulsa leaders urged people to have patience and let the justice system work.

As the trial drew near, black leaders made it clear that they thought the video offered overwhelming evidence that Shelby should be found guilty. They called foul when Shelby appeared on the CBS program 60 Minutes and made her case for why she pulled the trigger on that fateful day.

On May 17, a jury that included two black women cleared Shelby.

State Rep. Regina Goodwin, D-Tulsa, said the past year shows a huge disconnect between folks in the black community and the Police Department.

The killing of Terence Crutcher and the subsequent rehiring of Betty Shelby further confirms that black and white relations have not been repaired, she said. Im in no way anti-police  not the least bit. Police officers are the first persons I call when Im in trouble. I want them to get home safely, and I want our citizens to get home safely.

But we have to tell whats going on in the community and not shy away from honest conversation.

All of us have had incidents  not good incidents  that involved police officers. These are our lived experiences, Goodwin said. I think there are fair-minded folks, black and white, that want more from the justice system. We have to keep fighting for that justice.

Even before Crutchers death, nonprofits and faith groups were sponsoring reconciliation events. The John Hope Franklin Center for Reconciliation formed in 2007 and hosts an annual symposium.

Nearly a decade ago, the Mayors Police and Community Coalition was formed as a way to bring together police and leaders from different faiths and organizations. It has been led by Johnson since its inception.

Those are things that are ongoing. We are not going to repair what I consider to be a gulf of distrust or chasm of distrust in a moment, week or a year, Johnson said. These things are about building relationships. These cannot be done in a crisis but in our day-to-day routines.

Pluck it out at its core

After Shelbys acquittal verdict, a group of protesters took to the streets but remained peaceful. However, the relative calm belied the level of anger and hurt in the black community.

The Crutcher shooting and the acquittal of Betty Shelby have only reinforced my rage around the entrenched nature of the inequitable use of fatal force against people of color in general and black men in particular, said the Rev. Ray Owens, pastor of Metropolitan Baptist Church, one of north Tulsas largest and most influential churches.

This time it was not just a distant encounter with names of people I did not recognize, said Owens, who holds a doctorate of philosophy in religion and society from Princeton Theological Seminary.

With Crutcher it was personal on a new level. I knew him. I knew his character and his capacity for kindness. I know his family. I know he had struggles, but even his personal struggles dont constitute a reasonable rationale for the officers use of fatal force, he said.

Owens said he is concerned about what may lie ahead.

My great fear is that the absence of violence in Tulsa in response to these events may somehow be erroneously interpreted as a signal that Tulsans are better at handling blatant racial injustice than those in other cities. To take this view is to be blind to the deep and  dangerous apathy that permeates the people in our city.

Owens said too many Tulsans treat racism as a permanent and inevitable part of the citys social structure.

The problem of the disproportionate use of excessive and fatal force in black communities will not subside until all people work together to name it for what it is and implement policies that pluck it out at its core, he said. If we are ever going to eradicate this problem, we are going to have to be shaken  all of us  on all sides.

The Rev. Warren Blakney, pastor of the North Peoria Church of Christ, said the shooting, trial and verdict eroded the relationship between the black community and the police.

We dont have a lot of trust in the police when it comes to young black males, he said. We hoped that the system would work for us this time because the evidence was so compelling. We watched the video over and over and over. We thought that the folks who saw the video would see the same thing we saw, but apparently not.

There seems to be no equity when it comes to shootings of African-American males by police, he said.

However, Blakney said, black Americans will continue to seek justice.

Its a battle worth fighting. There needs to be a change in the way we are treated as a community, he said. We are a nation, I believe, and a city that is better than the division we experienced between races.

Need to work much harder

The events of the past year identified for us that our work is not nearly done, said Jerad Lindsey, chairman of the board of directors of the Tulsa Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 93.

We need to work much harder, and be more resolute in our outreach work throughout our community, not just north Tulsa, the police union official said. We need to make sure that people understand and feel that they are being represented and protected properly by those that have sworn to serve them.

Responding to north Tulsans comments that justice was not served by the Shelby verdict, Lindsey said early versions of the video of the shooting shown to the public had not been enhanced or forensically reviewed by the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation.

The evidence they (the public) were looking at was not the best evidence, Lindsey said. The best evidence was put in front of the jury, and thats partially why they came to the verdict that they did.  It showed much clearer what happened.

A year later, this is not any less of a tragedy. Theres an officer whos had her life affected forever, and theres a family thats still trying to figure out how to pick up the pieces and go forward with the loss of a family member.

Tulsa Police Chief Chuck Jordan declined to be interviewed for this story, but FOP President Cpl. Mark Secrest, speaking for the FOP members, said Tulsa police work hard to be thoughtful and considerate of everyone throughout Tulsa.

We let our justice system do what it was supposed to do  look at the facts and make a decision based on facts, Secrest said. Our justice system has some flaws in it and is not going to make everybody happy, but its the justice system we have. Weve all got to work together, and hopefully we can all move forward from this and put this behind us.
If the developments of last week were a chapter in The Art of the Deal, it might be titled, Shock and Confuse.

Thats pretty much what happened when President Trump first sent Attorney General Jeff Sessions to the podium to announce that DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals), a presidential memorandum that President Obama signed in 2012, would be revoked. Sessions called DACA an unconstitutional exercise of authority whose failure to enforce laws in the past has put our nation at risk of crime, violence and terrorism.

Sessions maintained that hard-line anti-immigration stand while in the Senate and has carried it forward to the attorney generals office. He said DACA was a lawless policy that yielded terrible humanitarian consequences while costing hundreds of thousands of Americans their jobs. He insisted that the president does not have the power to take such action by himself.

Well, lets give Sessions credit for consistency. He always has been anti-immigration, even while continuing to play fast and loose with the truth. Trump backed up Sessions false claims later in the day with his own press release.

Then, overnight, the tweeter-in-chief muddied the entire issue in 140 characters. Congress now has 6 months to legalize DACA (something the Obama administration was unable to do). If they cant, I will revisit this issue!

First, he throws the responsibility to get something done on immigration to Congress, then says maybe hell do something about it himself in six months. Not only does that give Congress a good reason to do nothing, but it puts Trump at odds with Sessions who earlier had said the president does not have the power to do such a thing. Leaving everyone with the question of, Which is it?

Its got to make some members of Congress pretty happy. Congress has fumbled around with immigration reform for 16 years, through two full terms of two presidents, and now could possibly make it a third. In 2001, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., authored the Dream Act  Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act. The act established rules that would protect children who were brought to the United States by their parents from deportation.

The Dream Act, which was a reasonable and humanitarian proposal, has failed to pass Congress for 16 years. It failed in 2001, 2007, 2010 and again in 2013. That frustration led President Obama to sign DACA, hoping that it would be temporary until Congress got around to passing the Dream Act.

Congress is the correct branch of government to address immigration reform. But, for almost two decades, it has not found the spine to deal with it. Anytime the subject arises, the xenophobic crowd plays the undocumented-aliens-are-taking-American-jobs-committing-crimes-and-dealing-drugs card. And Congress folds.

The fact is, the vast majority of the more than 800,000 Dreamers as they are called, are law-abiding, educated, hard-working tax-paying young people. So, are they going to take the jobs of West Virginia coal miners? No. West Virginia coal mining jobs are disappearing because, among other factors, the demand for coal is dropping and much of the work is being done by machines. Neither are most of the Dreamers migrant farm workers. Many are engineers, teachers and health-care workers. Some experts believe that deporting them could reduce the gross domestic produce by more than $400 billion over the next 10 years.

There are, however, some pressing questions surrounding the end of DACA.

Those who were accepted into DACA had to supply a lot of personal information such, names, ages, addresses, work histories and fingerprints. They were assured at the time that their information would be secure. But, what now? If Trump rescinds DACA would that information be made available to law enforcement so DACA recipients could be easily rounded up and deported?

Would members of Congress, particularly Democrats, be willing to trade support for DACA for support for funding Trumps wall? I would hope not. But politics is strange.

What if two children in a family were brought here at the age of 5 by their parents and then two more children were born while here? Would the two who were brought here be deported along with the parents? Would the two who were born here and are legally U.S. citizens also be deported? If not, what happens to them? Could they be deported? How would that work? Natural-born U.S. citizens may not have their citizenship revoked against their will, but may choose to renounce their citizenship on their own. For two young people who have lived their entire life in the U.S. and know it as their only home, renouncing citizenship seems doubtful.

As with most things Trump, there are simply too many problems to discuss for the space allowed for one column.

Right now, 800,000 mostly young people who consider themselves good American citizens are wondering where they might be and what they might be doing in six months. And that is neither fair nor humane. They live here. They work here. They belong here. They add something to the country and the countrys economy. Sadly, their hopes are pinned to a president who cant seem to make up his mind and a Congress that fears the primary election vote, and might sacrifice this countrys moral fabric to re-election.
Hi, my name is Scott C. Waring and I wrote a few books and am currently a ESL School Owner in Taiwan. I have had my own UFO sighting up close and personal, but that's how it works right? A non believer becomes a believer when they experience their first sighting. You witnessed it, your perceptual field changes, so now you need to share it.





I created this site to help the UFO community get a little bit organized. I noticed that there was a lot of chaos when searching for UFO sighting reports, so I hope this site helps. I wanted to support those eyewitnesses who have tried to tell others about what they have seen, yet were laughed at by even closest of friends.





More and more each day the governments of the world leak bits and pieces of UFO information to the public. They have a trickle down theory in hopes of slowly getting citizens use to the idea that we are not alone in universe and never have been. The truth is being leaked drop by drop until one day we look around and find ourselves neck high in it.





The discovery of alien species in existence is the most monumental scientific event in human history, suppression of that information is a crime against humanity.





About me:

I live in Taiwan. I OWN MY OWN ENGLISH SCHOOL, AND ONCE HAD 5 SCHOOLS.

Am Former USAF at SAC base (flight line).

Age: 42

Educ: BA in Elem ed. Masters in Counseling ed.





I had two UFO sightings, (30+bus size orbs) in military and in 2012 personally saw the UFO over Taipei 101 building on New Years Day (and recored it).
Students of Nguyen Binh Khiem primary school go to school by bus

That was reported at a conference hosted by the HCMC Department of Transport and Department of Education and Training yesterday to review school bus operation in the city.

Mr. Nguyen Van Cai, vice principle of Quang Trung High School in Cu Chi district, said that formerly when the school received 100 percent financial assistance for students to travel by buses free of charge, over 80 percent of students registered to attend.

However, the number has strongly reduced year by year after the city adjusted the subsidy level forcing parents to pay part of fare. So the school has stopped organizing the service.

In 2014-2015 academic year, the school had 67 students registering school bus. It dropped to 39 in 2015-2016 and 17 students in 2016-2017.

Similarly, Mr. Le Xuan Nguyen, vice principle of Ngo Quyen High School in District 7, said that previously the number of students traveling by buses neared 50 percent. After the city increased the subsidy level, many families have changed into public bus service.

A representative of Long Thoi High School in Nha Be district stated a problem in school bus service. According to regulations, schools must inspect and do statistics on the number of students going to school and home by bus every day while they have not had staff to do that.

In addition, schools have been required to confirm the list of students in each trip.

The principle of a high school in Nha Be said that it was difficult to check the number of students but it was more difficult and unfeasible to confirm student names and ages in each trip. So he had no choice rather than signing the list unwillingly and randomly to make it through.

Statistics by the Department of Education and Training show that by the end of May this year, only 134 schools citywide attended school bus service, a reduction of 7 compared to the end of 2016.

Districts 4 and 7 have withdrawn from the program because students have no need. At present, the city has 37,375 students traveling by subsidized buses mainly in five suburban districts including Can Gio, Cu Chi, Hoc Mon, Binh Chanh and Nha Be.

Mr. Nguyen Lam Hai, deputy director of the HCMC Public Passenger Transport Management and Operation Center, proposed transport firms to take advantage of empty premises of state and government agencies such as ward and commune peoples committee headquarters, stadiums and fitness and sport centers to make bus stops.

Besides carrying students to and from schools and home, transport firms and schools can cooperate to transport them to attend other extracurricular activities. That will help the firms have more revenue to make up labor and fuel costs and improve service quality.

Mr. Tran Quang Lam, deputy director of the city Department of Transport, said that the agency would advise the city Peoples Committee to rebuild subsidy levels of school buses.

Specifically, the subsidization program will be applied in fixed routes instead of trips as present and student management will be conducted through smart cards.

Besides the city will study to pilot operation of tramcars, which are only served tourists now, and taxi cabs to carry students during some fixed time slots to increase the societys belief in this mode of transport.
Theresa May is not too popular around here AFP/Niklas HALLEN

Theresa May is not too popular around here AFP/Niklas HALLEN

A stream of protesters poured through Trafalgar Square and stopped to boo outside Prime Minister Theresa May's Downing Street office before congregating at a rally outside parliament.

The self-styled People's March for Europe comes ahead of a key vote in the House of Commons on Monday night.

"Help! We're trapped on a small island that's been taken over by mad people!" read one sign held aloft above a sea of blue EU flags.

"Take back control from these clowns," demanded a banner featuring photos of senior ministers, while another referenced the divorce negotiations, saying: "This best deal is the deal we've got!"

"There's no good reason for leaving the EU - it's all bad," said Beverley Townsend, a 55-year-old from eastern England, holding up a sign calling for an "exit from Brexit".

She and her husband Dave, both draped in EU flags, said they had been lifelong supporters of May's Conservative party but switched to the pro-European Liberal Democrats.

"I don't believe May listens to anyone, but we've got to do what we can to make the point that this will severely harm our country," Townsend told AFP.

Dr John Wale, who works at Warwick University in central England, brought along his two sons aged 16 and 12, both of them holding up EU flags.

"It's all so negative. Why would you throw away something that is so beneficial to appease the will of a few fanatics?" he said, adding: "The problem is there are more than a few."

Louisa Paches, a 39-year-old Spaniard wearing a beret in the design with the EU flag, said she had lived in Britain for 13 years but was now thinking of leaving.

"I don't feel welcome here," she said, standing with her French partner and two young children, both of whom have British passports.

MPs will on Monday hold their first vote on a crucial piece of legislation intended to smooth Britain's departure from the European Union.

The Repeal Bill would formally end Britain's EU membership and transfer of around 12,000 existing EU laws and regulations onto the British statute books.

May's government is expected to win the vote, but could face rebellions by pro-European members of her own Conservative party as MPs scrutinise the bill in the coming weeks.

May is also under pressure from Conservative Brexit supporters to ensure a clean break when Britain leaves the EU in March 2019, after ministers said they were seeking an implementation period to reduce any disruption.

Britons voted by 52 per cent to 48 per cent to end their membership of the bloc in a referendum in June 2016.
Bojack Horseman Times Arrow Season 4 Episode 11 Editors Rating 5 stars * * * * * Previous Next   Previous Episode Next Episode  Photo: Netflix

Times arrow neither stands still nor reverses  Isnt that true, Henrietta?

Said aloud, the BoJack family motto sounds like its as true a statement as anyone can make. For one, its a pillar of logic, as science tells us, that time can only move forward. Heck, it even seems like a good piece of metaphorical advice for all those genuinely trapped in regret. But for Beatrice, none of those words are true at the episodes opening. Who is Henrietta? Well, right now she is a girl with her face blocked out. And as for times arrow? Well, Beatrice is not marching forward at all. Instead, she is back with her youngest self, in a sea of faded-out white, alone with her past.

Yes, it is time for Beatrices episode. We had a feeling this was coming, but it still arrives with an aching thud of weight beyond contemplation. We start with Beatrice as the happy child, one perhaps yet untouched by the true horrors of her mothers lobotomy. She plays on the schoolyard, but is soon teased by Clamilia Bloodsworth for being overweight and is kicked off the slide. These are the kinds of scarring traumatic incidents that many children face, but Beatrice suddenly has to fight the same shit on two fronts: Her father is just as concerned with her figure, and theres nothing worse than feeling like your bully is right. To make matters worse, she suddenly has scarlet fever, which reveals her sickness within. She looks into the hallway, frightened by her father yelling at her mother, scolding the woman for letting her child get sick. The mother, we dont even see. Shes only a shadow. An obvious metaphor of her former self. She cannot even respond.

We flash-forward to Beatrices late teenage years. Corsets. Debutante balls. All the makings of a culture on the way out with the changing era around it. Why, she even talks back to her father with notions of feminism and rolls her eyes at his bullshit. But as much as Beatrice is trying to be above these social pressures, shes still clearly infected and driven by them. Shes so sure, in her wrong-headed teenage way, that the only way to overcome something is to beat it.

Beatrice keeps phasing through her memories littered with the people she cant entirely remember. She meets the awkward Corbin Creamerman, a young goat who is all nervous sweat and clumsy words. So, of course her father wants Henrietta to marry Corbin and form a business alliance. Even in 1963, money still makes you have to align like royalty 

Enter Butterscotch Horseman. We suddenly remember he has the same voice as BoJack (Will Arnett) and now that choice makes even more sense in the echoes of time. The two play a game of give and take. Beatrice makes fun of his book idea (thats about nothing) and Butterscotch nails her upper-crust dissatisfaction. Oh dearie, hes come in like a breath of fresh air, completely outside the trappings of her house. Its not that she believes in him, its just that he hates the same shit  and more important, hes an excuse to rebel. He even nakedly baits her with a dare: But I suppose daddy wouldnt like that would he?

After their hookup, Beatrice feels Butterscotch was just a fling and ends up going for a mandated walk with Corbin. Sure, hes still dorky, but it turns out hes actually into his business and quite thoughtful. In truth, hes kind and he believes in himself. He and Beatrice even share a genuine understanding of their world. But right when theyre about to have a connection, Beatrice immediately barfs right in his face. (The comic timing on it is perfect.) She is, of course, pregnant. And also, of course, Butterscotch wants her to have an abortion. We see a quick flash of a doll burning in fire, unsure of what it means. She simply says she cant do it, but whats the alternative? Still preoccupied with the notion of rebellion, Beatrice and Butterscotch imagine a future where they escape their trappings and go off to a better life in California. It is the story of hope, and so they ask themselves, Isnt that how the story goes?

Moving forward again, they are in a small apartment in San Francisco and baby BoJack is crying. The simple, innocent, helpless cries of a mere baby, incapable of expressing what is really bothering him. But these cries turn into fodder for his parents to argue. Two parents who came together not out of love, but out of spite for the world around them. And so, inevitably, that spite turned them against each other. Butterscotch even turned on the Beat writers he so idolized, chastising them with a sudden conservative streak, all because he felt rejected by his liberal heroes. He still begrudgingly holds to a ridiculous idealism, not understanding what hes even rebelling against. He screams, You want me to work and get paid for it like some kind of slave? (Thats the opposite of slavery! Beatrice retorts.) But she cannot keep holding this wound for him, just as she cannot keep handling her babys screams. She takes a drink and downs some pills, just for a moment of peace, but then she turns with that familiar horrible mother voice weve come to know and says to her helpless newborn son, You better be worth all this!

Well, youre not. With that, Beatrice takes the memory transition on cue and says those words to Young BoJack. Hes still innocent, wide-eyed, and desperately craving the attachment he needs. His familys daily routine has become something bitterly toxic. Theyre still having the same fight, as if time itself has stood still. Butterscotch even declares, Maybe if the baby stops crying   and Young BoJack must interject, Im not a baby, Im six. But it doesnt matter. It was never even about his cries. It was about their decision.

In the end, Beatrice gets what she wants and Butterscotch accepts a job at her fathers firm. But like the cries, it was never about that. Nor was it about Corbin. It was about the pain of a loveless life. There was never love to build between these two. Only the wrong kind of hope. The hope for escape. The hope to outrun. The hope to never, ever have to deal with the thing that really bothers us at our core.

Finally, we move forward to Henrietta, still with that scratched-out face. It seems she was a young maid in the Horseman house. She was young, kind, and enthusiastic, utterly untouched by the pain of the home. Beatrice scolds Henrietta over nothing, so Butterscotch asks her to be a little nicer. A seemingly innocent request, but Beatrice also sees the heart of it. Of course Butterscotch likes Henrietta. She makes him feel like a big strong man, helping her as shes studying for nursing school. And so he can feel better about himself. He can flirt end on end.

Before this scene continues, Beatrices memories and cognition start firing fast and furiously. Shes with adult BoJack now, and its worth noting how hes actually much nicer to her in this scene. (Perhaps because its only three years after his show was cancelled.) Yes, hes still sarcastic but hes not mean. Hes actually a lot like Hollyhock in this moment. But Beatrice is tries giving her fathers painting to him  clearly an attempt to rid herself of the specter of her father, the monster who still haunts her. But Beatrice cant say those words. Instead, she praises his sense of morality, declaring him to be a man who knew what marriage meant! as we get a quick flash of him shaking his lobotomized wife. Oof. Yes, this is her model. Her hardwiring. The thing shes supposed to be. An idea thats almost too grim to bear, and yet, in the darkest way, thats her happiest dream of nonexistence.

With a flash of a cigarette, we move yet again. This time, Butterscotch is confessing that he got Henrietta pregnant and she wants to have the kid. Tears in his eyes, he pleads with aching sincerity to his wife, I know you hate me B, but God, just think of the poor girl. He doesnt want Henrietta to be like them. And Lord knows, neither does she. So Beatrice talks to Henrietta, at first sensitive to her having fallen for Butterscotch, commiserating about how he probably told her that she reminded him of his dead mother. It seems Butterscotch was also trapped in his own parental curse.

The second Henrietta holds up the sonogram and tells Beatrice, Its a horse, it suddenly dawns on us  this is why shes been saying Henrietta all this time. She is Hollyhockss real mother. BoJack is her half-brother, not her father. And in that moment, Beatrice coerces Henrietta into the devils bargain of payment for school in return for letting the baby go, telling her with passion, You dont want this.

Then  we dont move forward. We move back. And then forward. And all over, the sequence piling and changing in a montage of every direction. The youngest Beatrice gets scolded by her father as all her possessions are burned. He blames the scarlet fever and tells her, Your sickness has infected everything. We learn that it was her stuffed horse doll, her baby that was thrown on the fire. Its not merely that this had to happen. It is his callousness. His ungodly, unspeakable lack of understanding for what this act will mean to her. He can only scold her with, Remember what we say about crying: Crying is stupid! and then, Dont let your womanly emotions get the better of you  You dont want to end up like your mother, do you?

Its one thing to suffer the inhumanity of being lobotomized, a cruel enough act on its own, and its quite another when you hold it over a child as a threat. Beatrices young baby is now gone, gone like the brother she had. This is the heart of her trauma. All the memories of babies, alive and dead, wanted and unwanted, pile up together: the burning of the toy, the birth of BoJack, the birth of Hollyhock. Its the same moment of torture again and again, all of these memories being taken away from her.

The baby toy being burned is the cruelest reversal of Citizen Kane imaginable. Because for Beatrice, that moment is not something lost in the pursuit, but something abjectly taken from her. And there stands her father, the monster of all monsters, the kind of cruel man who doesnt even know it, lording over her. He even has the gall to say, One day this will all be a pleasant memory.

And so, it is simple: Beatrice is angry because she has enough to be angry about for 1,000 lifetimes. To actually face the truth behind that anger would be like getting burned in the fire of 1,000 suns. To cry and cry and cry for every possible day. But it is so much easier to cast that anger at others. Throwing it down, down, down, even to her children.

It is in this moment that Beatrice comes back to the present, confirming that she has really been out of it this whole time. Shes confused. She doesnt know where she is. She needs help. And BoJack could help, but too much damage has been done for that. So instead, it all gives way to one last lie.

BoJack tells her a story about where she really is. He tells her shes in Michigan, back in the Sugarman family lake house from episode two. He tells her that the night is full of stars. A dull happy look comes across her face. We dont know if shes really there in her minds eye, but she sure wants to remember. Can you taste the ice cream? He asks, and thats when you have to remember the crushing truth behind this innocent question: Beatrice wasnt allowed ice cream. And so, it gives way to the real lie, the one where Beatrice looks to the side and responds, Its so  delicious. I welled up.

For this is two sad, broken people sitting in a sad, broken room, lying to themselves and saying, Its okay. It is not okay. It is most definitely not fucking okay. None of it is okay. And yet, they feel they must press on because of the tragic echo of their family decree that times arrow marches on. But its not a straight arrow. It doesnt just march forward. No, its lies and concealments and half-truths are piled up like a car accident. The biggest lie of all being that we have to ignore the center of human experience itself: pain. At the center of depression is pain. At the center of anxiety is pain. At the center of regret is pain. At the center of disease is pain. But theyre not allowed to feel that way, so they must cast it out. Here is the truth: Time is not a straight arrow, for if pain exists, no one has experienced it that way in all of human history. Times arrow is a spinning compass. A noose. A sea of hell fire and demons.

And the hour of reckoning is now.

Best Jokes and Other Notes

 The running gag about The Next Morning and so on thats illustrated through book covers.

 At least Everss death means no one else will be assassinated this year, 1963!

 Poor people find that terribly gauche.

 The horse jumping at the debutante ball

 The mid-memory scrambling of the grand hotel sign and the hat in hand.

 Ohhhhhhh, she got herself pregnant.

 The actual mean-joke target: life itself.

 The moment that made me happiest: Ive mentioned throughout this season that my grandmother suffered from Alzheimers, so theres been a crushing sense of familiarity to all of this. For most of my life, I couldnt help but sit back and wonder what she experienced in her mind during those years. In truth, we cannot know. But so much of this episode built toward some kind of understanding. Even if that understanding unleashes a nightmare dreamscape of hell beyond what we could possibly imagine. But if that does not give you the most outrageous, crushing sense of empathy for those living with dementia or mental illness, I dont know what can.
The Rev. Ramiro Pena has the feeling of walking a tightrope in his unusual double role: Pastor to Hispanic immigrants and adviser to a president who rode to office promising to wall out and deport people like them.

And if he forgets, there are people to remind him.

Its been quite painful, said Pena, senior pastor of Christ the King Baptist Church and a member of President Donald Trumps informal faith advisory committee. Ive had family members say painful things to me.  At a deep, personal level, people have said negative things, called me a coconut  brown on the outside, white on the inside.

But Pena said a face-to-face discussion with the president last weekend about immigration confirmed his sense that he made the right decision.

The occasion was a National Day of Prayer event for Texas hurricane victims, and the subject was Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, the Obama-era policy that for five years has shielded the children of unauthorized immigrants from deportation.

Trump was preparing to announce his decision Tuesday that he would rescind DACA. But Pena said he believes that he was part of a chorus of voices that influenced Trump to extend the phase-out of the program by six months.

I have spoken to the staff and the president often about the DACA recipients, Pena said. I looked him in the eye, and I think his heart is in the right place.

We were all very pleased to see six months. Im convinced that he wants to see Congress codify the premise of DACA into law.

President Barack Obama created DACA as an administrative program in 2012, allowing qualifying young adults to work or study for renewable two-year terms without fear of deportation. Legislation to provide that population permanent legal status, including the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act, or DREAM Act, had repeatedly failed to gain bipartisan support.

Pena agrees with the Trump administration that Obamas implementation of protections for young immigrants administratively was a presidential overreach and could not withstand a lawsuit threatened by state attorneys general led by Ken Paxton of Texas.

Pena said he will pressure Republicans to support legislation giving legal status to so-called Dreamers.

I think theres enough bipartisan support for it to pass, he said. Despite all the rhetoric about a do-nothing Congress, its an issue whose time has come.  Theres going to be an avalanche of pressure for Congress to act. Im going to be part of that effort.

Pena has been a pastor to Waco immigrants for three decades and has advocated for years for comprehensive immigration reform on economic and moral grounds.

The issues are moral and spiritual issues before they become political ones, he said. I completely disagree with anyone demonizing someone who would risk their lives to cross the desert to do hard work. Regarding the Dreamers, theyre innocent children, and this is the only nation theyve known.

Pena has been involved for several years in local and national coalitions seeking to give immigrants a path to permanent status in the United States. He has introduced Congressman Bill Flores, a Bryan Republican, to some young Waco adults struggling with immigration issues.

A Baylor University regent from 2005 to 2014, Pena chaired a diversity task force for the university.

Still, Pena is also a social conservative opposed to abortion, and he said he could not abide Democratic candidate Hillary Clintons pro-choice stance. That weighed in his decision last year to accept an invitation to serve on the Trump campaigns short-lived Hispanic Advisory Council.

He later joined the informal committee of evangelical advisers, and he says he has had several meetings with the president as part of that group.

Pena said the Trump he has met is willing to listen and accept counsel, regardless of his blustery image.

But the relationship got off to a rocky start last summer.

In late July 2016, Pena appeared on The Jim Bakker Show and officially endorsed Trump.

If we dont elect Donald Trump president, were going to end up electing someone who we absolutely know will put justices on the U.S. Supreme Court that will be pro-abortion, he told the audience. They will be pro-gay marriage. They will rob us of religious liberty, will continue to tear away at our right to bear arms, and thats the kind of jurist that will be placed on the Supreme Court and on the federal bench.

Trump had already gained notoriety for a 2015 campaign announcement speech in which he characterized border-crossers as rapists and drug dealers. In June 2016, he complained that a Hispanic federal district judge could not be fair to him because hes a Mexican and were building a wall between here and Mexico.

Republicans who had hoped Trump would moderate his tone in an August 2016 speech on immigration were disappointed when he doubled down on anti-immigrant rhetoric, accusing immigrants of stealing jobs and bringing a crime wave.

Pena that night dashed off a letter to Republican and Trump officials denouncing the speech.

I am so sorry but I believe Mr. Trump lost the election tonight, Pena wrote in a letter acquired by Politico. The National Hispanic Advisory Council seems to be simply for optics, and I do not have the time or energy for a scam.

After a few days praying about it, Pena reconsidered.

I was very angry, he said. I communicated my feelings, and it was leaked. After much dialogue with people I trusted, in and out of the campaign, I felt like I had an obligation to stay, if I was still being offered a seat at the table.  I decided to stay the course. Im glad I did. Ive been able to give very meaningful input on a number of topics.

Hope Mustakim, a leader of the Waco Immigrants Alliance, said she hopes Pena is successful in his diplomacy with Trump, but she is critical of his decision to campaign for the president. The alliance seeks to advocate for DACA recipients and other immigrants now facing stepped-up deportation actions.

I appreciate right now what hes doing with whatever influence he has, Mustakim said. But if we rewind and look at how we got to this point to begin with, I dont understand how so many conservatives or evangelicals or pastors have elevated the abortion issue over the life issue that immigration is.  I dont think its pro-life to deport people to a place that risks their lives.

Im sad that his congregants must feel so conflicted. How do I trust a pastor, trust in God, when everything around me says, This is not going well? 

Pena says hes gotten used to such criticism.

It goes with the territory, he said. Any time you provide leadership of any kind, theres going to be someone who feels alienated. Knowing I was going to be criticized, my burden was to be faithful to my calling as I understand it.

A basic fallacy of logic is to apply a characteristic of a part to the whole. There are things I support that Donald Trump has said, but it doesnt follow that I support everything he has said.  Given todays rhetoric and guilt by association, people who dont know me have chunked rocks at me from the right and left. They dont know my heart and my ministry.

Penas congregation includes a mostly immigrant population of almost 100 that comes to his Spanish-language services, as well as a racially diverse crowd at his English services. Since 2008, his services have been broadcast around the country on various television platforms.

He said he still has the trust of immigrants in his congregation.

I would say there are people in my church who are quite nervous about what is ultimately going to happen. But theyre grateful Im fighting for them, he said.

Pena himself is the great-grandson of Mexican immigrants who had converted to the Baptist faith. His parents grew up in Laredo and both went to Baptist colleges on scholarship. His father, a 1957 Baylor graduate, became a surgeon at Scott & White in Temple, the town where Pena was born.

Pena himself attended Baylor and was ordained as a Texas Baptist minister while still an undergraduate. He served as a youth pastor, then a Spanish-speaking mission pastor before receiving his Baylor diploma in 1988.

In 1990, he went to work for Baylor President Herb Reynolds and did graduate work at Baylor in philosophy in business. He and his wife, Orphalinda, started Christ the King Church in North Waco, with an emphasis on outreach to low-income and immigrant communities.

The couple co-pastors the church, located on Lake Shore Drive, and they continue that mission.

Pena has done a sermon series on the crisis of unaccompanied minors at the U.S. border, calling on the church world to respond.

I went down there and helped build a kitchen, and we helped get over 45,000 pounds of beans and rice there, he said. These kids need help. Its not a political issue. Its a humanitarian issue. Regardless of what your politics are, you need to respond.

Mario Sandoval, pastor of Maranatha Baptist Church and president of the local Hispanic Ministers Alliance, said he respects Penas choices for political engagement. Sandoval said Pena sought his counsel before taking the role in the Trump campaign.

Hes got a servant heart and he cares about the undocumented people living here and living productive lives, Sandoval said. He is an advocate for those who are here, especially the DREAM Act generation, children who had no choice in being here.

Pena said he hopes to see the rhetoric about immigration toned down and for Republicans to work with Democrats to give permanent status to immigrants who are willing to contribute to American society.

These people love this country. They love America, he said.

And he said some of those undocumented immigrants have come to recognize him as a champion.

A manager at a certain restaurant came out to catch me at the door and said in broken English, Thank you for what you are doing to minister to Donald Trump,  Pena said.
China Spring resident Marvin Moore, 70, spent just a brief time in the military, but that was enough. In his 13 months with the Army in Vietnam, he saw more than enough action to last him a lifetime.

Born in Gatesville, Moore lost his mother when he was a baby. Since his father worked, he and his twin sister were adopted out to various family members. There were several moves: to Waco, Lubbock and Cameron, and back to Waco again. He was living 10 minutes outside the city when downtown Waco was hit by a tornado in May 1953.

Moore attended Waco High School for a time before deciding to work. Like many young people, he was unsure of what to do with his life. Joining the U.S. Army seemed just the thing.

I just figured I needed to do something constructive, he said. I thought it was a good thing to do  join the Army.

And so, he did.

On Dec. 29, 1967, at age 20, he joined the U.S. Army and went to basic training at Fort Polk, Louisiana, followed by eight weeks of advanced training at Fort Gordon, Georgia. Pole jockey, or lineman as it more commonly known, was his military specialty in communications with the Signal Corps.

Before Vietnam, Moore spent nearly a year in Germany with the 7th Army, 541st Signal Battalion, for what he called war games. He spent about eight months in the field perfecting his skills. When he returned to the States, he was called up for Vietnam. He was unperturbed.

Thats what you signed up for, to serve your country wherever they needed you, doing whatever it is that needed to be done, he said.

A point of no return

After a 30-day leave, he went to Fort Lewis, Washington, for RVN (Republic of Vietnam) training. A top brass official warned the men that 50 percent of them may not come home.

Thats when you realize this may not turn out good, Moore said.

Serving with the 523rd Signal Battalion Americal Division, Moore went to Chu Lai, less than 100 miles from the demilitarized zone, in the area known to soldiers as the rocket pocket because of all the 120 mm rockets fired by the enemy.

We had some ROK (Republic of Korea) Army with us. They were bad to the bone, he said.

Working in the Headquarters Division Support Command, Moore and the communication men handled the divisions communications, including the main Division Tactical Operations Center where communications were routed from throughout Vietnam. We could even go there and call home occasionally (albeit by ham radio), he said. He called twice.

Life in Vietnam was anything but typical. Moore would climb 90 feet up a pole, often facing rocket attacks, to string communication wires in the northern I-Corps Tactical Zone.

Once, a rocket blew him out of bed when it hit the hooch as the men called their sleeping quarters. Fortunately, no one was injured.

We were on the reactionary force, Moore said. The VC and NVA were trying to penetrate the concertina wire.

In another instance, Moore spotted a sapper, a specially trained NVA /Viet Cong soldier who could infiltrate a well-fortified base and inflict considerable damage.

I took appropriate action, he said. It was the only time he fired his gun. You do what you have to do because you know what his intentions are. He got caught with his "bushes" down, he said, darkley.

Its just a small part of what he witnessed that he prefers not to talk about.

In August 1970, Moores time was up. He was in Cameron Bay, waiting to come home, when all hell broke loose. They had no weapons, as they were preparing for the trip home.

Youre thinking, My God, my last day in-country and Im going to get killed, he said.

Moore came home and was honorably discharged as a sergeant in August 1970. He was not happy with the way people treated him and other veterans. One lady on his plane trip got up and moved away when he sat down next to her.

And I wasnt treated as bad as some of them were. Some threw feces. Thats a real nice welcome home, he said.

Putting the past behind

Still, Moore went on with his life, putting his past behind him and moving forward. Two weeks after he returned home, he married Martha Dameron. They recently celebrated 47 years of marriage and have two daughters and three grandsons.

Moore worked for Central Freight Lines for 20 years, followed by nearly 12 years at Total Restoration disaster services.

Today, hes glad he served his country. Although he doesnt want to do it again, he would in a heartbeat, if needed.
Virginia was born on December 1, 1935, to the late Rob and Pat Milaway Woodson, in the Ewing Community outside of Gatesville which in now part of North Fort Hood. She graduated from Gatesville High School in 1953. Virginia married John Fowler May 25, 1957. She retired from Civil Service on Fort Hood after more than 30 years of service. Virginia loved the Lord and enjoyed listening and singing the old hymns. She looked forward to the annual Thanksgiving River Walk with family and always enjoyed her trips to the beach.
Matthew Wiseman

July 18, 1989 - August 27, 2017

Matthew Thomas Wiseman died on August 27, 2017, in New York City. As a loving and generous man, he was an organ donor and able to help the lives of others.

Matthew was born on July 18, 1989 in Conroe, Texas, to Benjamin Wiseman and Wanda Schronk Wiseman-Houston. He graduated from Midway High School in 2008 before attending the University of Missouri in St. Louis, graduating in 2012 Summa Cum Laude with a Bachelor of Music in Guitar Performance. He then went to Mannes School of Music in New York City graduating in 2014 with a Master of Music in Guitar Performance.

Matthew taught guitar and worked at Ft. Lee School of Music, Barrett Artists and Music before 1800. A talented musician, he played classical guitar, bass, electric guitar, baroque guitar, ukulele and the jarana. He will be remembered for his musical gifts and fun-loving, curious and vibrant personality.

Survivors include his wife and partner of 10 years, Emily Hills of New York City; his mother and stepfather, Wanda Wiseman-Houston and Peter Houston, of Hewitt; his father, Benjamin Wiseman of Waco; and his siblings and their spouses: David and Lacey Armitage of Noblesville, IN, Sarah Wiseman of Denton, Scott and Alissa Wiseman of Waco, and Joseph Wiseman of Lewisville. He is also survived by his nephew, Michael Matthew Armitage of Noblesville, IN, his parternal grandmother, Doris Wiseman of Arlington; his maternal grandfather, Roy Schronk of Lorena; and many aunts, uncles and cousins.

He was preceded in death by his paternal grandfather, Benjamin C. Wiseman; and his maternal grandmother, Ruth Schronk.

A memorial service is planned for December 23, 2017. Memorials may be donated to your local NPR station or any environmental organization, such as NYC's WE ACT for Environmental Justice (www.weact.org ) in which he was actively involved.
For a decade now, the Waco Tribune-Herald has strongly advocated for expansion of state mental-health hospital beds, not only to better address a problem far more prevalent in society than many of us might realize but also to relieve a major burden placed on long-suffering law enforcement agencies and hospital emergency-room staffs. Our humble efforts have gone hand-in-hand with striking research by the Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute for Texas, which has laid down the foundation for solving mental-health problems statewide.

Given the enormity of problems, we praise Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and House Speaker Joe Straus for signifying this legislative session that mental-health services must at last be a priority. We especially praise Republican state Rep. Charles Doc Anderson and Texas Health and Human Services Executive Commissioner Charles Smith for smartly jumping on a generous proposal from Baylor Scott & White  Hillcrest offering up North Wacos old, abandoned but fit Hillcrest Baptist Medical Center as part of the big solution.

As Trib staffer Tommy Witherspoon reported, Anderson, Smith and Baylor Scott & White  Hillcrest President Glenn Robinson are pushing an innovative plan to help free up hospital beds at other state mental-health facilities by converting Hillcrest Baptist Medical Center into a centrally located, state-run, 339-bed mental-health hospital for transitional patients successfully treated and poised for re-entry into society.

Baylor Scott & White is offering the facility  nine floors, 600,000 square feet and 14 acres of land  for an absurdly low price of $975,000. (You can do the math to figure out square-footage cost on this deal.) We see this not only as a major stride in terms of expanding mental-health beds statewide but fulfillment of Baylor Scott & White  Hillcrests commendable commitment to keep the old campus and surrounding neighborhood vital after most of the hospital staff moved to new facilities at Interstate 35 and State Highway 6.

State legislators have approved funding for the hospital purchase and a study of costs for renovating the facility for mental-health treatment. As Anderson told the Trib, the real battle comes in 2019 when the Texas Legislature must approve $65 million to actually renovate the Hillcrest facility. Anderson assures us that state Sen. Brian Birdwell is behind the project and that Rep. Kyle Kacal, who represents part of our county, is being kept up to date.

Acknowledging the anxiety that must come when statewide needs are great and tax revenue is tight, the prospect for renewed use of old Hillcrest nonetheless should hearten Wacoans  and not just because this project would be a shot in the arm for the resilient North Waco neighborhood around it; the professional staff it promises to produce in the next decade; and the jobs it could create locally, but also because its a major step forward in helping some of the most vulnerable among us. As Robinson noted, half of us will one day experience some sort of mental-health episode. And for the rest of us, that means needing pivotal help at a time of crisis for our loved ones.
To their success

One serious problem in our country is that there are too many Democrats and too many Republicans and not enough Americans. When loyalty to party and the quest for power and personal prestige exceed concern for the welfare of the nation, the results should be predictable. The interest of the citizens of our land are often forgotten. We are too often governed more by special-interest groups and lobbyists than by the American voters. Party lines are not always in the best interests of the nation as a whole. There should be more bipartisan effort to reach important legislative decisions. Agreements should be based upon national best interests and not on which party proposed such an action.

As to immigrants affected by Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, many have achieved a successful role as a professional in the medical field, as attorneys, as teachers, as ministers or in some business role and are contributing to the national welfare as productive citizens. Consideration should be given to such people on an individual basis if deportation becomes a factor in their lives. During the influx of immigration that brought these people to our country as children, probably most of their parents were unable because of dire circumstances to go through the legal process for immigration and they slipped into the country in desperation. Many were probably welcomed by American employers to do labor that was shunned by American citizen workers.

Many, if not most, Americans are descended from immigrants who sought better opportunities for themselves and their families in this land of the free. Many of those immigrants probably were no more legal than the parents of current DACA individuals. Perhaps there is no perfect answer to this dilemma, but it would be wise to give consideration to the efforts and achievements of the many who are now successful in some profession or business.

J.R. Chapman, Hubbard

Trib wades too far

I usually refrain from commenting on the daily newspapers editorial. I respect the newspapers opinion and am hesitant to criticize other than to just comment on facts versus no facts.

The Aug. 30 editorial, Time to roll up sleeves, leave politics behind in resurrecting Texas battered coastal communities, justifies my opinion in response. You started out very well. Paragraphs 1, 2 and 3 were excellent and set a tone for moving forward with all things needed. For the rest of the editorial, I believe you stuck your head where you could not get any oxygen. You dove headfirst right into the politics you encouraged everyone to put aside.

Shame on you, shame on you!

Stephen Williams, Hewitt
West Coast veteran Sam Mitchell strongly denies he spat in the direction of Port Adelaide's Sam Gray during Saturday night's elimination final win at Adelaide Oval.

Vision has emerged of spittle travelling from Mitchell's mouth towards the direction of a face down Gray late in the third quarter

Gray had just been awarded a free kick, and Mitchell was standing above him when the incident happened.

Mitchell hunched over, and shortly after a formed piece of saliva dribbled from his mouth onto the turf  only narrowly missing Gray.
Sleeping Giants targeted Bill O'Reilly and his show the O'Reilly Factor. Credit:AP So far 2,760 businesses have agreed to block Breitbart from their advertising buy, but Sleeping Giants believes the news site can survive on wealthy patrons. While Sleeping Giants can't quantify their impact, their campaigns do have real-world consequences. Australian businesses such as TPG, Medibank, Optus, Bupa, Bendigo Bank and Domain Group (owned by Fairfax Media) have already been alerted and agreed to remove their ads. "We do not support the placement of our advertising alongside harmful or inappropriate material," an Optus spokeswoman said. "We removed our advertising from this site following feedback from some of our customers."

We rely on the vigilance and dedication of our followers to bring ad placements to the attention of advertisers. Sleeping Giants Oz A Bendigo Bank spokeswoman said its ad placements and media buying needs to "suit the markets we intend to reach". "In the few instances where our advertising does appear on sites where the content is deemed hateful, racist, violent or generally disrespectful to people in our community, we will take action to remove the advertising." A bigger impact has been on the Murdoch-family-owned 21st Century Fox's attempt to take over British subscription broadcaster BSkyB. The 11.7 billion ($19.6 billion) bid may fail partly because of a Sleeping Giants campaign against US-talk show host Bill O'Reilly.

Sleeping Giants targeted companies advertising on the O'Reilly Factor after the New York Times earlier this year revealed several sexual harassment allegations against him and Fox's tendency towards confidential settlements. "This is going to be a much shorter campaign (hopefully)," Sleeping Giants told followers. "Because this is not about programmatic advertising online, we're thinking we can get our point across in two to three weeks." Indeed, within weeks dozens of advertisers pulled ads from the show and Fox News Network sacked O'Reilly. However, the fact O'Reilly was not sacked until advertising dollars dried up raised concerns inside the British media regulator, Ofcom, during its review of whether 21st Century Fox would be a "fit and proper" owner of British company BSkyB. "It appears to us likely that bad publicity and the associated fall-off of advertising was a major factor behind the company's response to the allegations against Mr O'Reilly," Ofcom's report noted.

"We do not accept Fox's assertion...that there was no commercial pressure because advertising was moving to other Fox programs." Britain's Culture Secretary Karen Bradley is expected to announce the government's final decision on Fox's takeover soon. Meanwhile, advertising agencies and their clients are increasingly being asked to evaluate if they want to be associated with certain opinions. And Australian broadcasters are not immune. "The Australian [Sleeping Giants] team is looking closely at hate speech being normalised in mainstream print publications, television and cable in the Australian market and have plans afoot to bring these to the attention of advertisers," a local representative told Fairfax Media.

Or as the Sleeping Giants' anonymous founder told The New York Times: "It's scary to say it, but maybe companies will have to be the standard-bearers for morals right now". He also denied the movement restricts opinions. "Hate speech is different than free speech. If you're targeting a certain group of people on purpose and aiming your readership at them, that's hate speech. It's pretty simple, " he told the left-leaning news site Mother Jones earlier this year. The person behind Sleeping Giants in Australia likened advertising spending to political donations. However, political donations are usually made by companies that don't sell stuff directly to consumers, but do have a strong interest in certain regulatory changes. Consumer psychologist Adam Ferrier from Thinkerbell agency says brands get high levels of control over where their ads appear in today's fragmented media and can be more choosy. However, they also have to deal with an outrage culture.

"You never quite know what is going to be the next outrage and what's going to upset a small group of people and then turns into a story in the mainstream media," Mr Ferrier said. He recommends brands develop a strong identity and know who their potential customers are, then use that information to curate the context in which their brand appears. The problems associated with Google's programmatic online advertising were highlighted in March this year when advertisers were alerted to the fact their ads were appearing next to extremist videos on YouTube. In some cases government ads were appearing next to videos by terrorist groups. Google and Facebook have both been targeted by activist shareholders wanting them to take more responsibility for the spread of fake news on their sites.
The Turnbull government spent $132 million on community development grants in Coalition seats in NSW and only $3.5 million in Labor-held electorates in the lead up to the 2016 election, Labor figures claim.

The 37 to one ratio in NSW pales in comparison to Queensland, where the Turnbull government spent $138 million on community development grants in Coalition electorates up to the 2016 election and just over $1 million in Labor-held electorates.

The Nationals are strongly disputing the figures.
Mr Foster has got his car parked with emergency supplies in case he has to evacuate once Hurricane Irma hits. "It is going to start getting really bad at 2pm today (early Monday, AEST), just escalating throughout the night." And if the winds get above 120km/h, there is a chance he might lose the roof of his house. Ms Lehman put metal shutters on the window to protect her house in Florida from Hurricane Irma. Credit:Suppllied Mr Foster, and, he said, many of his neighbours, had decided to stay put, some boarding up their windows to guard against the wind.

But in case of an emergency evacuation, Mr Foster had his passport and other essentials ready to go. Friends and family in Perth and Melbourne have all been in touch. Tahra Lehman and family were told to evacuate their Cape Coral Florida home ahead of Hurricane Irma. From back: Daughter Madison, 12, right, son, Jacob. Front: Left, Tahra, Right, husband, Scott. "I am expecting to lose power for three to seven days," he said. He said he had packed a cooler, has plenty of water stored and filled his car with petrol, but the shops had run out of everything by the middle of last week. Australian Evan Foster has the emergency supplies ready to survive Hurricane Irma.

"Middle of the week the shops ran out of everything. I have got lots of water and a full tank of gas. We'll see what happens afterwards ." Florida residents, he said, were quite stoic about the situation, having lived through other hurricanes before, though of a lesser intensity, Chris Loftus who is the chief operating officer at the Lakewood Ranch Medical Centre has been preparing for Hurricane Irma. "Florida people are fairly casual," he said. "It is a matter of just getting on and dealing with it. There is not much you can do. Just lock everything down and hope for the best.

Mr Foster said he had missed out on buying a generator as they had all sold out, but, despite everything, he wasn't scared. "Until it actually starts, it doesn't seem quite real, or you don't know how bad it's going to be," he said. "I haven't been in 60 to 100 miles/h winds (up to 160km/h) before." Down on the west coast, on Friday about 10pm (Saturday afternoon, AEST), Melburnian Tahra Lehman, her American husband, Scott, and children, Madison, 12, and Jacob, 9, all had to evacuate their home in Cape Coral, Florida. They secured their house and put metal shutters over the windows, hoping it will withstand the fury of the storm - enough for them to have a home to return to in a week's time.

"We secured the house, packed up an SUV filled with clothes and belongings and headed to the other side...north-east Florida for safety," Ms Lehman said. "Our concern was running out of gas and finding a hotel room but someone was looking over us. We found everything we needed." Further up the coast, closer to Tampa, it is early hours of the Sunday morning (Sunday night, AEST) and Lakewood Ranch Medical Centre's chief operating officer Chris Loftus hasn't slept for 18 hours. Once the storm hits, he expects to be at the hospital for at least a week. "Right now it is a very slow time because we are prepping up for the storm," Mr Loftus said.

"People have been for quite a while at the hospital, so a lot of people are resting, sleeping as much as they can." All night they helped evacuate some of the most acute patients from their sister concern, Manatee Memorial Hospital, which was closer to the coastline. Now their numbers have swelled to100 patients and 200 staff. They have food, fuel, water to survive the next 96-hours without help. There are generators to supply back up power. The building itself is constructed to withstand the hurricane. "As of right now, the projections have shown the eye of the hurricane goes directly over us. We will 100 per cent be getting impacted," Mr Loftus said.
"I started the business with my older brother and although I have got the creative force in the business, he is more the business mind in it," she says. "We have a very visual product ... and Instagram is the perfect platform to drive this kind of product because it's all picture-based. Being a small business and not having that kind of capital in the beginning to spend on marketing and advertising, Instagram has been a great tool for us to just get our product out there." Starting from a garage The pair set up a commercial kitchen in their parents' garage with a few thousand dollars. Kat Logan says Instagram has been key to building her business

"We just used a little bit of my brother's savings to build the commercial kitchen and the only big-ticket item that we bought was the smallest industrial oven and everything else was just what I had already," says Logan. "It was pretty much one of everything. My little hand mixer that my aunty had given me, one mixing bowl, one set of measuring tools, one cupcake tin but we went for it. We opened an online store and after every sale we made, we slowly upgraded. We bought another set of cake tins, we bought another kitchen bench and then eventually a proper stand mixer until we eventually had a fully functional commercial kitchen." As the business grew Logan needed a bigger kitchen to keep up with demand and wanted a space to showcase her cakes where customers could come in and taste them. Kat Logan runs Buttercream Bakery with her brother. On the brink But opening a bricks-and-mortar store nearly sank Buttercream Bakery.

"This is where we almost saw the end of our business," says Logan. "At the last minute, we decided to add sandwiches in the window and coffee just in case our customers wanted to pick that up when they came to pick up their cakes. That was a very loose and not well-researched plan at all. What initially started as 10 sandwiches in the window, turned into a full-blown cafe. That was a monster in itself and we were not ready for it." Opening a cafe nearly meant the end of Buttercream Bakery. It was a very slow process to get where we are now because we were very careful but I think now it's time for us to take bigger risks as the bigger we get. Kat Logan Logan says she struggled to operate two very different businesses, a cafe and online cake store. There was a disconnect between Buttercream Bakery's online profile and the cafe. "We made the tough decision and we closed the cafe," says Logan. "Even though we were breaking even at that point and we started to really see things heading in the right direction for the cafe, it still wasn't in the direction we wanted our brand, as a whole Buttercream Bakery, to be going."

Logan sold everything from the cafe and reinvested it into the online business, reinventing the store front into a cake studio and gallery. Taking bigger risks Now Buttercream Bakery is "going really, really well" and Logan has to consider her next step. "We're looking at either getting an investor or possibly taking out a business loan in order to expand because that's the only way to get bigger for us anyway," she says. "It was a very slow process to get where we are now because we were very careful but I think now it's time for us to take bigger risks as the bigger we get." Her message to other small business owners is simple.
A Coalition senator has called for a ban on the use of unlicensed drones following an appearance at a senate committee on their use.

Queensland senator Barry O'Sullivan is advocating for a recall on all drones operating without a commercial license until regulations preventing further mid-air incidents are brought in.

Senator Barry O'Sullivan is calling for a ban on all non-commercial drones. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

The senate committee, examining regulations surrounding the use of drones in Australia, held its last public hearing in Canberra in late August.

"If there's a rag doll at Kmart that has a button come off and a child could choke as a result, if one child is at risk, every one of them is recalled and taken off the shelf," he said.
The international refugee agency UNHCR has issued an urgent plea for Australian donations to help deliver lifesaving aid to almost 300,000 refugees who have fled violence in Myanmar's strife-torn Rakhine State.

Aid workers say the plight of the Rohingya Muslims in makeshift settlements is becoming increasingly desperate, as fighting erupts for scant basic resources, and hunger and illnesses soar.

A Rohingya woman after a fight erupted during food distribution at a refugee camp in Kutupalong, Bangladesh Credit:AP

"More and more are coming to camps that already more than full," said Vivian Tan, a UNHCR spokesperson.

Ms Tan, who is at Bangladesh's border with Myanmar, described the situation as "the most desperate and devastating thing I've seen in my 15 years working with refugees."
An 18-year-old man is dead after his vehicle rolled on Saturday morning in Winnebago County.

According to the Winnebago County Sheriff's office, the crash happened around 6:45 a.m. Saturday on Highway 10 in the Township of Clayton.

Authorities say the 18-year-old was found near the crash site. Life saving measures were preformed, but the man succumbed to his injuries. He was the lone occupant of the vehicle.

Highway 10 was closed for about two hours as authorities attended to the crash.

His name is being withheld pending family notification.

The Winnebago County Sheriff's office was assisted by the Fox Crossing Police and Fire Departments and the Wisconsin State Patrol.

The crash is under investigation.
Alec Baldwin sues to 'clear his name' in movie set death
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New Ross mourns tragic death of Anthony Rochford (47): We will remember him for all the great times
On Tuesday Winonans will get another chance to talk about local issues and quench their thirst at the second Pints and Policy event at Eds No Name Bar.

The focus will be on the arts in Winona, their impact and the challenges they face, with a panel of local speakers hosted by Ed Hoffman, the bars owner.

In the first Pints and Policy in May, speakers touched on topics such as construction, plans for development and challenges facing the city in revitalizing.

Hoffman, who founded the pub in 2007, said this discussion will look at what changes, big and small, have happened in the past year and what is going to be going on in the future.

Winona is establishing itself as quite the arts community, Hoffman said. We find it important to the quality of life.

The panel will start at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday and feature Lee Gundersheimer, Winonas Art and Culture coordinator; Anne Scott Plummer, WSU art professor, former chair of the WSU Art Department and member of the Winona Fine Arts Commission; and Nicole Chamberlain-Dupree, executive director of the Minnesota Marine Art Museum and Winona Fine Arts Commission member.

A question-and-answer session will take place at 8:15 p.m.

In addition to the previous Pints and Policy, Eds has hosted events related to politics in the past, including an appearance by former Duluth mayor Don Ness, local candidate announcements and election screenings.

Event organizers will continue to partner with Engage Winona, a local nonprofit founded late last year, to focus on fostering community engagement.

Hoffman said there will continue to be discussions about future events after Tuesday, and the possibility of setting up a schedule.

Pints and Policy was proposed originally as a potential monthly event, but Hoffman said with the volunteer nature of both the speakers and organizers, it can take longer than that to set something up.
The Norway Building is home.

The ornate, stave church replica has returned to its country of origin and was dedicated Saturday not only in front of hundreds of native Norwegians but more than 60 people who traveled from southern Wisconsin to help celebrate what will likely be the final destination in what has been a remarkable 124-year journey.

There were stops in Chicago, Lake Geneva and, for 80 years, the building was the centerpiece of Little Norway, the Norwegian-themed tourist village in the town of Blue Mounds west of Madison.

Now, it is back in Orkdal, Norway, where the building has been reassembled and restored by a volunteer team of about 50 craftsmen so that it can host meetings, weddings, lectures and concerts in the farming community of about 12,000 people just west of Trondheim.

Buildings arent supposed to be this well traveled. But the Norway Building has new life in the old country.

Its a lot of emotions involved, said Arne Asphjell, one of the leaders of Project Heimatt, the Norwegian organization that spearheaded the buildings return and which logged 10,000 hours of work in its disassembly, restoration and reconstruction.

When we started out, there was a lot of skepticism from politicians and the general public, Asphjell wrote in an email from Norway. But now, when they see it, it is a total turnaround, 180 degrees. Former skeptics are ecstatic about it and it gets very high praise.

Saturdays dedication completed a three-year process that began by a visit to Little Norway by the grandson of one of the craftsman who helped build the structure in the early 1890s for a Norwegian display at the 1893 Worlds Columbian Exhibition in Chicago. The 2014 visit by Olav Sigurd Kvaale was followed a few months later by a delegation familiar with stave church construction and, in July 2014, Orkdal officials signed an agreement to buy the church and return it to Norway.

In September 2015, the building, which was in need of repair and restoration, was taken apart, placed in containers and gassed for rodents and insects. Two months later it was shipped in three 40-foot-long containers to Norway. Restoration work on the $600,000 project began in January 2016.

The dedication of what is now being called the Thams Pavillion  named after Christian Thams, a Norwegian industrialist who led the buildings original construction  was preceded Saturday by a parade with children in historical clothing. The opening ceremony on an outdoor stage included speeches by the Minister of Culture, Linda Hofstad Helleland, Mayor Oddbjrn Bang, Kvaale, and Scott Winner, whose great uncle, Isak Dahle, opened Little Norway in 1937.

A red ribbon hung from the mouths of wooden dragons on each side and draped the front of the building that was also topped with a Norwegian flag.

What theyve done is saved the building, Winner said. Its gratifying that (the building) is taken care of. The community of Orkdal really wrote the final chapter in our legacy with that building. I cant imagine it ever moving again. Its as good as new.

Winner made the trip to Norway with his wife, Jennifer, and 25 other family members and friends. They were joined Saturday by a 44-member delegation from the Sons of Norway Vennelag Lodge 5-513 in Mount Horeb. The group left by charter bus on Wednesday from Millers Market in Mount Horeb, flew out of OHare International Airport on Icelandic Air with a stop in Reykjavik, Iceland, before touching down in Trondheim, Norway. The group is scheduled to return Sept. 18.

Cheryl Wille-Schlesser, president of the group and whose great-grandfather was born in Hafslo, Norway, just south of Orkdal, presented officials in Orkdal with a $500 wooden dragon bowl carved by Becky Lusk, a nationally renowned Norwegian-American folk artist from the La Crosse County community of Coon Valley. Wille-Schlesser, a retired middle school science teacher who now works part time at Bergey Jewelry in downtown Mount Horeb, said it was important for the Sons of Norway members to travel to Norway to be at the ceremony because of the connection the building has had to the Mount Horeb area and to local Norwegians.

Many of our (members) have worked at Little Norway, and many have had family pieces that theyve donated to Little Norway. So theres always been a family bond with Little Norway and many of our members, Wille-Schlesser said. Scott had tried and exhausted all the possibilities to try and save the building. So for it to be returned to the place of its birth is almost more than a person can ask for.

The building was one of only eight stave-style churches in the U.S. and one of only three in Wisconsin prior to its departure. But the story and the buildings birth began in Orkdal in the early 1890s when Thams and others wanted to showcase for the world an important part of Norways architectural heritage. Stave churches date back to the Middle Ages and have corner-posts, or staves, and a timber framework with stave walls  wall planks standing on sills.

The building was designed by Waldemar Hansteen, who was hired by Thams and is based on a stave church in Gol, Norway. After its construction along a fjord in Norway, the building was taken apart and shipped to Chicago for the six-month Worlds Fair event. After the fair, the building was again disassembled and moved to the sprawling Wrigley estate along the north shore of Geneva Lake in Walworth County where it was used as a movie house for the wealthy chewing gum family from Chicago.

In 1935, the church was purchased by Dahle, who at the time was creating a Norwegian pioneer village in western Dane County. Through the years, busloads of tourists walked the grounds of Little Norway to experience the Norwegian culture and walk through the stave church replica. The Winners closed Little Norway after lagging attendance and increasing costs and in 2014, they began selling and donating most of the 7,000 Norwegian artifacts that filled many of the buildings.

They sold the Norway Building to the Norwegians for $100,000.

It was, of course, much more work than we anticipated on the outset, said Asphjell, who was born in Orkdal and saw the building for the first time in 1987 when he studied science writing at UW-Madison. In general, for this type of project, it is quite good that you do not know the struggle when you start.

The challenges, beyond moving a large building across an ocean to another continent, included convincing politicians about the project and securing financing through fundraisers, donations and public tax dollars in Norway, a large portion of which came late in the process, Asphjell said.

They also chose to keep a modification made by Dahle after he moved the building from the Wrigley estate to Little Norway. Of the 34 pair of wooden kings and queens, Dahle, during the reconstruction, chose to combine two pairs of wooden queens and two pairs of kings as a low-key signal to different sexual orientations. Gay marriage has been controversial in the Norwegian Church but the Thams Pavilion will be open for gay ceremonies, Asphjell said.

We have chosen to keep Isaks royal twist in order to emphasize that this building has high ceiling, literally as well in spirit, Asphjell said.

For the Winners, Saturdays dedication doesnt mark the end of Little Norway, even though they are in the process of selling the 225-acre property and their home. Instead, with smaller pieces spread throughout local museums and homes, the move and reconstruction of the Norway Building will serve as a continuation of Little Norway, albeit, nearly 4,000 miles from the wooded valley along Highway JG northwest of Mount Horeb.

Little Norway will always exist, Scott Winner said. For 80 years we got to be the people who were custodians of it and we had the honor and the burden of both. But I can smile again.
Brandon Ketchum committed suicide in July 2016 after allegedly being denied inpatient treatment at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Iowa City, Iowa.

Following the tragedy, friends and family of the Marine Corps and National Guard veteran sought to help servicemen and women who struggle with similar issues. After several months of planning, they launched Ketchums Ride, an annual event that invites cyclists to ride in honor of Ketchum, while generating awareness and funds for vets with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

More than 20 cyclists participated in this years bike ride, which took place Saturday at the Reedsburg Area Chamber of Commerce. Now in its second year, Ketchums Ride generated more than $6,000. Organizer Kris Blatterman said the funds will be used to purchase trained companion dogs for Wisconsin veterans.

We reached that decision because a service dog costs between $20,000 and $50,000, but a trained companion dog is only $1,000, she said. We thought, If we can help 20 vets versus one, thats what we wanted to do.

Organizer Debbie Bierman said the dogs provide companionship and can help some veterans cope with symptoms of PTSD.

Ketchum grew up in Baraboo and graduated from high school in Wisconsin Dells. Ketchum enlisted in the Marines in 2004 at the age of 22 and served two tours in Iraq. He was a combat engineer, and his job was to locate and clear roadside bombs. Ketchum served in the Marines Corps until 2008.

Ketchums mother, Bev Kittoe, has been a hair stylist in Baraboo for more than 20 years and said her son always put the needs of his fellow servicemen before his own.

He always put his battle buddies first, she said.

Ketchum returned to military service in 2010, enlisting in the Army and was deployed in Afghanistan with the Iowa Army National Guard. After serving for nine months, he was injured by a roadside bomb. Ketchum was diagnosed with a traumatic brain injury and underwent extensive back surgery.

He was prescribed painkillers and eventually moved on to harder drugs. Ketchum struggled with depression and PTSD, and was flagged multiple times by the VA in the year leading up to his death. After allegedly being denied inpatient treatment at the Iowa City Veterans Affairs Medical Center last July, he took his own life.

Ketchums Ride organizer Jessica Gross said the event is intended to support other veterans who struggle with PTSD. It also raises awareness of the issue among civilians, she added.

Were able to actually help real people when we raise money with the ride to get them the companion dogs, she said. Every person that we ask for donations, every person that we talk to about the ride, every person that sees are posts on Facebook  every single person that has seen that, we are raising awareness for.

Organizers hope to raise additional funds through donations and an online auction that runs through Oct. 12. Their goal is to generate $20,000 for Wisconsin veterans.
EDEN  The eight grass-fed steers didnt bolt in fear or call out in alarm as Keith Huettig and his grandson calmly herded them into the trailer.

Thats the way its supposed to be, Huettig said July 26, leaning forward against the bars of the corral.

He focuses on keeping the animals in a low-stress environment. At their pasture at Homestead of Magic Valley, north of Eden, few cars travel the dirt road. Hawks and dozens of other birds regularly circle overhead.

From here, the eight steers would go to a farm near Middleton, to graze on better pastures for the last six months of their lives. Huettig said the ride from there to the butchering facility in Nampa is less stressful than it would be from his farm.

On graduation day, the steer has only a 15-minute ride versus a three-hour ride, he said.

Because grass-fed beef cattle take longer to finish, Huettig raises lowline Angus and Devon cattle, which are about 25 percent smaller than the typical Angus.

Some of the larger animals wont fatten on grass, he said.

Why this niche?

I was basically a potato farmer until about 10 years ago, said Huettig, 76.

Dreaming of retirement, Huettig learned that his sons-in-law didnt want to farm, but would ranch. So he sold a portion of the potato farm in Hazelton to his nephews, and he began a cow-calf operation north of Eden.

It was a small ranch, and I wasnt making ends meet, so I started looking for value-added, Huettig said.

He studied grass-finished beef at a three-day school, where he met his future business partners. Together, their operations sold grass-finished beef to companies such as Whole Foods.

But two years ago, the partnership dissolved so each businessman could more easily pass on the ranch to the next generation when the time comes.

Now, Homestead of Magic Valley has an agreement with Huettigs nephews Steven and Doug Huettig  who bought the potato farm and brought cattle to the Red Star Ranch.

The 180 cattle from both farms graze at Keith Huettigs pasture in summer, and in the winter go to feed on cover crops at Red Star Ranch. The cover crop grazing nearly eliminates the need for winter hay feeding  30 days instead of 150.

Get a taste

Grass-finished beef is typically leaner than grain-finished beef, making it an ideal choice for people like Keith Huettig who need to consume meats with less fat.

And in his opinion, it tastes better.

What were doing here is more what beef is supposed to taste like, he said.

The Snug Bar and Grill in Eden, owned by Suzy Harper, began using Huettigs beef earlier this year for its Philly and French dip sandwiches. The meat quality is better than they previously used, chef Tawnya Hale said. And many ranching customers can taste and appreciate the difference.

Probably the easiest way to get an order of Huettigs beef is to call him at 208-539-7261. He offers several different boxes of beef with free delivery. For example, for $120 including tax, Homestead of Magic Valley will bring you 10 New York strips and 10 top sirloin; or 19 pounds of grass-finished ground beef.

Homestead of Magic Valley also sells and delivers its frozen product at Countryside Market in Twin Falls. Because its in a separate freezer area, Huettig offers it there year-round even when the market isnt open.

In Burley, the Wagon Wheel Produce stand sells his beef in the C-A-L Ranch parking lot from 2 to 7 p.m. Monday through Saturday.

Whats next

A ninth steer had been separated July 26 for a special purpose: Huettig planned to trade it for five Dorper sheep  a breed thats a cross between Dorset horn and blackhead Persian sheep.

Hed had customers asking about lamb, and because they seemed easier to raise, he thought he would take on sheep breeding as his own project.

By Aug. 17, he had 19 head of Dorper sheep, with some lambs expected to be butchered and available beginning in November.
HOLLISTER  Behind 8-foot fences, hungry eyes watched Phillip Rosen in anticipation of the next meal.

As Rosen drove a tractor load of hay into the enclosure Aug. 10, cow elk and their calves approached. Most hung back until a bale was unloaded into a rubber trough. But one cow with curious eyes went straight for the hay on the moving tractor.

An elk cannot live off just pasture grass, Rosen said. So he also dumped supplemental pellets into long feeders.

Nearby, the bull elk were also contentedly chewing. Soon, they would shed their velvet and begin their annual bugling for mating season, just feet from Rosens house.

I never thought I would be attached to em, the longtime hunter said. But theres nothing quite like that sound.

Why this niche?

He had the property outside Hollister, and he had the connections. When Rosens best friend asked him to board his elk five years ago, Rosen agreed to do it. He keeps telling his wife he will get out of it, but so far, it hasnt happened.

And it probably wont.

I love em, he said.

Rosen continues to hunt elk every year because he cant bear eating his own herd. But many of his customers are also hunters  ready to secure their winter freezer supply so they can afford to be pickier when on the hunt.

Get a taste

All the elk on P-T Elk Farm have been born and raised on farms. Rosen had 42 elk in early August.

Several of the largest 4-year-old bulls were ready for transport to a hunting ranch in Riggins, to eventually become someones trophies.

It sounds odd to me to even pay for such a thing, Rosen said. Some boys back East have never seen an elk.

The smaller bulls are kept at the farm until they grow larger. But the cows are either kept for breeding or sold as meat.

Rosen said he sells only about four to six cows a year for butcher. He encourages interested customers to reach out to Don Scarrow at butcher shop Scarrow Meats in Jerome, who usually has a full elk carcass for sale. They can also call Rosen at 208-404-1555.

The packaged meat typically sells for $6 a pound.

The farm-raised elk, he is told, is more tender than elk that are hunted in the wild  probably because they have no mountains to climb.

P-T Elk Farm also sells goat and rabbit meat.

Whats next

Rosen has no immediate plans to change his operations, and he typically has no shortage of interested customers.

It just kind of happened, he said. It wasnt a thought-out thing to do it.

Sort of like a plan to let free-range rabbits graze his property resulted in more than 200 of them? Not quite. He doesnt expect his elk farm to get much larger. (Separate pens help.)

For now, hell continue getting the regular fence inspections required by Idaho Department of Fish and Game, to ensure the animals dont mix with wild herds. And his wife can have her goats.




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Each year, more than 500,000 critically ill or seriously injured patients rely on emergency air medicine for life-saving care. The Air Methods Corp. is the largest provider of air medical transport services in the United States, with a fleet of about 500 helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft.

Mike Allen, president of Air Medical Services at Air Methods, said in a statement that people shouldnt have to worry about medical insurance coverage for critical services in the midst of an emergency. In a similar comment, Todd York, director of Provider Network Management for Blue Cross of Idaho, stated that the insurer is pleased to bring added peace of mind to members during a medical event, particularly in rural areas.
ORLANDO, Florida (HawaiiNewsNow) - Several former Hawaii residents are among thousands of Florida residents bracing for the impacts from Hurricane Irma.

They've seen the dramatic images from the Caribbean and are hoping their homes will be spared.

Former Makakilo resident Angel Figueroa moved to Florida a little more than two months ago.

The tow truck driver is riding out the hurricane with relatives in the coastal city of Port St. Lucie.

"We managed to buy about six cases of water. We have canned goods, stuff that will get us out through the storm, flashlights, batteries and stuff like that," Figueroa said.

Up north in Port Orange Fla., former Waialua resident Michelle Shockley said she'll be riding out the storm in her mobile home.

"We went around and removed all of the debris outside our home. Anything that could be picked up by a strong wind and turned into a projectile has been moved into the house," Shockley said.

Shockley decided to stay put because of the traffic jams and gas shortages sparked by mass evacuations. Shockley did tie down her mobile home, but is still concerned her preparation may not be enough.

"That's the biggest fear, of course, that the winds would take a portion of the roof. If they do take the roof, we have other options," she said. "We do have a clubhouse that's nearby. Although it's not hurricane certified, it would provide shelter."

Former Aiea resident Khrysti Hunsworth is also hunkering down in Orlando.

"I've put towels in the windows to keep from getting any leakage. We're high enough so we shouldn't get any flooding, but we may get some leaking from windows and doors, and things that may not be sealed all the way. Hunsworth said.

Florida's Governor Rick Scott said, "This is your last chance to make a good decision" as he advised thousands to seek shelter.

Copyright 2017 Hawaii News Now. All rights reserved.
WASHINGTON, D.C. (WTXL) - President Donald Trump has approved federal funding for recovery efforts in the areas affected by Hurricane Irma.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) announced Sunday that the funds have been made available to the state of Florida to supplement state, tribal, and local recovery efforts in the areas affected by Hurricane Irma from September 4, and on.

The President's action makes federal funding available to affected individuals in Charlotte, Collier, Hillsborough, Lee, Manatee, Miami-Dade, Monroe, Pinellas, and Sarasota counties.

Federal funding is also available to state, tribal, and eligible local governments and certain private nonprofit organizations on a cost-sharing basis for debris removal and emergency protective measures, including direct federal assistance, in all 67 counties in the state.

FEMA says funding is also available on a cost-sharing basis for hazard mitigation measures statewide.

Individuals and business owners who sustained losses in the designated area can begin applying for assistance by registering online at www.DisasterAssistance.gov or by calling 1-800-621-FEMA (3362).

Disaster assistance applicants, who have a speech disability or hearing loss and use TTY, should call 1-800-462-7585 directly; for those who use 711 or Video Relay Service (VRS), call 1-800-621-3362. The toll-free telephone numbers will operate from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. (local time) seven days a week until further notice.
HAGERMAN  Northwest Farm Credit Services has awarded the Hagerman Valley Foundation in Hagerman a $500 Northwest FCS Rural Community Grant.

Northwest FCS has been an important community supporter in the Magic Valley for many decades, said Marguerite Janes, Foundation president. We appreciate the grant toward our Hagerman Heritage Tours Project showing our history from its prehistoric age, volcanic era, Oregon Trail pioneers and immigrants into modern times. This will help strengthen Hagermans economic base as well as the documentation of our historic rural town.

In 2017 to date, Northwest Farm Credit Services has committed $156,000 to 115 projects in rural communities across Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington. Since the programs inception in 2007, it has awarded 748 grants totaling more than $1.36 million.

The next rural grant deadline is Oct. 1, 2017. If you think your rural project may be eligible for a grant, visit northwestfcs.com/Stewardship/Rural-Communities for more information and an application.
Stripped of protections offered by a just-ended federal program for young, undocumented immigrants, about a dozen of them sat in the Mexican c
Air quality in Yakima is currently rated as unhealthy, an improvement from "very unhealthy" levels earlier this morning, according to the Ya
Forests west of the Cascades will see more fires, bigger fires with climate change
GOODING  North Canyon Medical Center in Gooding wants to dissolve a taxpayer-supported hospital district and become its own nonprofit organization.

The hospital filed a L-2 budget request recently with Gooding County, meaning it wants to eliminate tax revenue from its operating budget for next fiscal year, it announced Thursday.

Dissolving the hospital district, which was created in 1986, would require community support via a petition and approval by Gooding County Commissioners.

Negotiations are in the early stages.

The district has collected about $800,000 each year in tax revenue.

North Canyon Medical Center has operated for nearly a decade and took over Gooding County Memorial Hospital. A new hospital opened in 2010 and a medical plaza opened in 2016.

The hospital wrote in a statement: With its continued success and growth, NCMC is in a position to operate without tax dollars, creating the opportunity for the hospital to function as a stand-alone, non-profit organization.
Vanessa Ponce is a freshman at West Valley High School and is a member of the Yakima Herald-Republics Unleashed program for teen journalists
Miki Ganor, state witness on the submarine affair, was brought into the interrogation room last week to confront former navy commander Eliezer (Chiney) Marom, also implicated in the affair, to exhort him to reveal all information about their mutual dealings.

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With the outbreak of a second wave of arrests of people related to the affair, also known as Case 3000 involving the scandal-ridden purchasing of Israeli vessels from German submarine company ThyssenKrupp, Marom was questioned under caution at the offices of the police's Lahav 433 unit.

State witness Miki Ganor (L) and former navy commander Eliezer "Chiney" Marom

Marom is believed to have received hundreds of thousands of shekels in bribe money from Ganor, who is suspected of acting on behalf of the German company during the deal. "I received the money for consultation I provided for Ganor," he claimed during his questioning.

Taking Marom by surprise, investigators then brought Ganor into the room who told him directly that the money had not been intended for any consultations, but for carrying out the deal. "I gave you money for your help in the submarine project," Ganor told Marom.

Sticking to his version of events however, Marom denied the claim. "That's not true," former Vice Admiral Marom retorted. "The money was for consultation."

"I told them everything," Ganor then exclaimed. "Tell them the truth."

The confrontation came following a Friday head-to-head between Ganor and strategic advisor Tzachi Lieber in which the former also urged the media strategic advisor to fully cooperate with investigators.

Ganor's testimony incriminated Lieber in the case, accusing him of acting as a middle man in the transfer of cash intended as a brive. While being investigated last week, Lieber indeed confirmed acting as the mediator between Ganor and David Sharan, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's former bureau chief.

Ganor's testimony purports an agreement with Sharan regarding bribe money provided to the latter through Lieber as an intermediary. Ganor initially transferred NIS 28,000 using this method, later moving NIS 50,000 more.

"I was only doing a friend a favor," Lieber claimed during his investigation.

Strategic advisor Tzachi Lieber, also implicated in the affair

After providing the testimony assisting police in untangling the complexities of the case, Lieber's hopes of being released were dashed Thursday when the courts extended his remand by five days.

Following the court's decision, Lieber opted to remain silent and no longer cooperate with the investigative team.

"He realized he'd made a mistake by giving the police free gifts and so decided to clam up," said a source close to the investigation.

In an attempt to extract further information from Lieber, police brought in Ganor. "Tzachi, I told them everything about us," Ganor told Lieber. "They're not trying to get us, only others."

While Lieber remained uncooperative, Ganor continued efforts to get his former friend to open up. "I revealed everything that happened between us. I don't have the defense that you do," he continued.

Simultaneously, following police consideration of a possible state witness agreement to also be signed with Lieber, the latter's attorneys Yair Regev and Yafa Golan quickly arrived to the Lahav 433 offices, spoke with their client for two hours and advised him to remain silent.

Minister of National Infrastructures, Energy and Water Resources Yuval Steinitz (Photo: AFP)

Police are expected to carry out a third wave of arrests related to the affair in the coming days. Ganor provided them with new information, according to which there were some irregularities in managing Minister Yuval Steinitz's primary campaign.

This information may yet implicate more people close to the minister. As a result, Lahav 433 personnel held meetings this past weekend in anticipation of calling Steinitz himself in to testify.

A businessman very close to Steinitz was indeed questioned under caution Sunday on his part in the submarine affair.

The man, also known to be a political wheeler-dealer, was brought in for questioning following Ganor's testimony.
Whoever issued the order early Thursday to attack one of the complexes of Syria's Scientific Studies and Research Center (CERS) near the city of Hama chose the perfect diplomatic timing, and it wasnt by chance.

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A day before the strike, the United Nations Security Council received the conclusions of a commission of inquiry which found that the Assad regime had carried out at least seven chemical attacks on citizens from March to July 2017, including Aprils brutal attack in Idlib, in which 80 citizens were poisoned to death after a Syrian fighter jet released toxic gas, which included sarin. While Syria keeps producing chemical weapons and making military use of them, who will defend Syria when its chemical weapon facilities are attacked?

Whoever gave the order to strike likely also made sure that the reports around the strike would not only focus on the weapons designated for Hezbollah, but also on the fact that the facility produces chemical weapons. And sure enough, the oppositions broadcasting channels, which rushed to report the strike, reiterated the message that the unidentified planes had attacked such infrastructures, as well as missiles intended for Hezbollah.

CERS. Who will defend Syria when its chemical weapon facilities are attacked? (Photo: Intelli Times)

For more than a year and a half now, Assad has been feeling confident enough to resume the activity of the CERS centers labs and factories, which produce short- and medium-range Fateh rockets and M-600 missiles. All these weapons can already be found on Lebanese soil as well.

The Syrian regime is caught in a catch-22. On the one hand, the world understands Syria is a criminal country which is carrying out war crimes; on the other hand, the regime is incapable of refuting the accusations on the production and use of chemical weapons in the attacked facilities, as it would have to invite inspectors there to do so while it likely has something to hide. So Syria is hitand the world is silent. Even the Russians arent backing Assad here.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said last week that there was no truth to the reports that Israels interests in Syria werent being taken into account by his country. Indeed, the only Russian response to the strike was a news agencys headline which quoted the Israeli media quoting the Arab media. Israel, according to the Russian report, has no interest in meddling in Syria's internal affairs but is fighting against threats to its security from Syria, including against Hezbollah forces.

The IDF spokesperson couldn't have articulated this better. This means Israel can keep operating in Syria under certain parameters providing they do not conflict with Russian interests. On the other hand, Israel is incapable of influencing Russia when it decides to prevent a condemnation of the Hezbollah organization in the UN.

The conclusion the Iranians can draw from the latest incident is that the Russians wont prevent Israeli attacks on Iranian forces in the Golan Heights, an area where the Russians have no clear interest.

If the strike was indeed carried out by Israel, the fact that it took place in the middle of a military exercise in the Northern Command cannot be ignored. The unusual number of flights during the drill could have served as an opportunity to surprise the enemy and destroy a facility which is likely under tight aerial defense and on a heightened state of alert. An aerial exercise can also be used to mislead the enemy.
A businessman very close to Minister of Energy Yuval Steinitz was questioned under caution Sunday on his part in the submarine affair.

The man, also known to be a political wheeler-dealer, was brought in for questioning following the testimony of state witness Miki Ganor.
Rami Levy, the owner of an eponymous supermarket chainIsraels third largestwas identified Sunday as the businessman recently arrested on suspicion of fraud and breach of trust.

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Levi, who in 2015 was one of the torchlighters during the state ceremony for Holocaust Memorial Day, was arrested at the conclusion of a covert investigation, which culminated with the police raiding office of a local council, and carrying out a number of arrests.

Among those arrested were Levys partner and lawyer Yoram Shimon, who is the head of the Mevasseret Zion local council, a businessman and an editor of a local newspaper.

Rami Levy (Photo: Gil Yohanan)

Shimon was released this Sunday to five days house arrest and was barred for two months from the council. As part of the agreements between his defense attorneys and the State Prosecutor's Office, Shimon would be prohibited from contacting the parties involved in the case for a period of two months.



Investigators suspect that the head of the council failed to demand that Levy pay betterment taxes for the Rami Levy Hashikma Marketing shopping mall he built.

According to the details currently known about the investigation, as the final touches were being made to the mall's construction, Levy and his partner filed a request for permission to receive an additional 3000 square meters of commercial space, which was approved by the council head.

Rami Levy Hashikma Marketing

When Levy was subsequently requested to pay the betterment taxes in the amount of NIS 20 million, the same council head acted against the local committee in a bid to reduce the sum for Levy.

In addition, Levy was granted permission to build a parking lot next to the mall without paying the extra costs required.

In return for these cost-saving benefits, the mayor's wife was appointed marketing director of the mall while the head of the mayor's election campaign was appointed director general of the mall.
Those who have been following statements made by senior Israeli defense officials in recent weeks werent surprised by the reports that emerged from Syria on Thursday morning.

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The missile accuracy program pursued by Iran, Syria and Hezbollah tops the IDFs list of priorities. Many resources have been invested in the effort to prevent advanced weapons from reaching Hezbollah. The warnings have been issued again and again, the threats have been clear, but neither have deterred the other side from pressing on with the project in Syria and in Lebanon.

If Thursdays strike was indeed carried out by the IDF, Israel has made it clear that it makes good on its threats. Credibility is a very important thing in the changing Middle East, and even more so against what is known as the axis of evil. Following the strike, the Iranians are now expected to speed up the project in Lebanon, after realizing Israel is refraining from attacking there due to unwritten understandings with Hezbollah that attacks are only carried out on Syrian soil.

Thursdays strike in Syria. Has the other side realized perhaps it shouldnt pursue its plans for missile plants given the seriousness of Israels intentions?

Nows the time for an important and sensitive test: Will Israel make good on its threats and risk launching a military conflict against Hezbollah, or will it refrain from doing so out of fear of escalation? And equally important, has the other side realized perhaps it shouldnt even pursue its plans to build missile factories, given the seriousness of Israels intentions?

Thursday marked exactly 10 years and one day since the alleged Israeli attack on the Syrian nuclear reactor in 2007. The IDF hasaccording to foreign reportsstruck on Syrian soil more than 100 times. So far, it has been attacking arms shipments. This time, its a totally different ball game: A state facility, which was built with Iranian aid in a bid to improve the accuracy of Hezbollahs arsenal. The strike was carried out under greater regional difficulties than in 2007, in light of Russias involvement in Syria both on the diplomatic level and on the military level.

In his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin two weeks ago, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu raised Israels main concern: Iran and Hezbollahs accurate missile project. Its unclear whether Putin greenlighted the move, but such a strike points to Israels determination to achieve its goal. Similar determination was missing in the fighting against the same axis of evil, Iran-Syria-Hezbollah, in what eventually led to the Syrian victory over the rebels.

Russia stationed its most advanced aerial defense systems in Syria. From an intelligence point of view, this achievement seems impressive: The accurate missile facility in Syria was attacked despite these defenses.

Israel has not claimed responsibility for the attack, but media outlets affiliated with the Assad regime have blamed the Israel Air Force. If Israel were indeed behind this operation, its safe to assume the cabinet convened recently and gave its general approval for a strike. The attack was carried out in the middle of a wide-scale IDF exercise in northern Israel , while the army is on high alertbut the date of the drill was set at least half a year in advance.

Now, the ball appears to be in Assads court. He will wait for the green light from his patron in Moscow as to whether and how to respond, and whether to get Hezbollah involved. So far, the Syrian president has avoided responding, apart from firing antiaircraft missiles at IAF planes half a year ago following a strike on his soil. But let there be no mistake: We must maintain a high level of alertness.
TWIN FALLS  South Hills Middle School cheerleaders, in partnership with the CSI Alumni Association, are asking for school supplies for the Clear Creek School District near Houston, Texas. Students need backpacks and all essentials by the end of September. Twin Falls stores have school supplies on clearance now. Drop off contributions at the South Hills Middle School office or at CSI Taylor Building, room 119, until Sept. 15.
NICOSIA, Cyprus  Cyprus police say a 36-year-old man has been arrested for allegedly driving one of a pair of boats that brought 305 Syrian refugees to the island's northwestern coast.

Police spokesman Michalis Ioannou said Sunday that the 202 men, 30 women and 73 children who arrived at around midnight are thought to be the largest number of migrants to reach Cyprus in a single day.

Ioannou says they departed from Mersin, Turkey on Saturday.
The Jerusalem District Court sentenced a mashgiach in one of the city's ultra-Orthodox yeshivas to 17 years in prison for sexually abusing three of his female relatives.

The mashgiach confessed to his crimes and was convicted as part of a plea deal that also included a NIS 145,000 fine.
The mustachioed man entering Raghadan Palace was flanked by two assistants. He seemed younger than his seventy years and the hat he donned concealed his graying hair. His visit with Hussein, then King of Jordan, was kept in total secrecy. The man was an Israeli, and in those daysNovember of 1993the two countries hadn't yet established diplomatic relations. In fact, officially, they were still in a state of war.

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The fake mustache and hat made it hard to recognize one of the most recognizable Israelis in the world: Shimon Peres, who was then the foreign minister. His assistants were deputy Mossad director Efarim Halevy and Avi Gil, his chief of staff.

Peres visits the Negev Nuclear Research Center (Photo: Israel Atomic Energy Commission)

"I couldnt help but laugh as I glued the mustache to my face," wrote Israel's former president in his autobiographical book titled No Room for Small Dreams, which will published in Israel and around the world this month to mark the one year anniversary of his death.

"I thought back to the sunglasses we put on Moshe Dayan to hide his eye patch; of the wide-brimmed hat we affixed to Ben Gurion's head to hide his characteristically chaotic white hair. How many times in my life had we put on such silly disguises in pursuit of something that others were certain was impossible? These were some of the very best memories of my relative youth. And knowing at seventy that I was still in the fight, still battling for the future of Israel, gave the mustache a certain power. I looked like an actor in a low-budget stage show, but I felt like the tip of the spear," Peres wrote of his meeting with the Jordanian king.

Peres dons mustache and fedora to visit Amman for peace talks with Jordan.

This meeting, however, in a royal palace overlooking Amman's old city, was not the pair's first. Seven years prior they had secretly convened in London.

"Yet from the moment the conversation began," Peres recalled, "it felt like it had never quite ended. We treated each other as old friends, and found once again a common view of the future."

Peres reveals some of his disguises.

A year later, on October 26, 1994, that view became a reality. In a festive ceremony held in the Arava valley near Eilat, in front of then US President Bill Clinton and 5,000 other guests, King Hussein and Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin signed the historic peace accord between Israel and Jordan.

A copy for Mongolia's foreign minister

Ayelet Frish, who worked alongside Peres for more than a decade, served as spokeswoman during his tenure as Israel's president and now serves as the director of the Innovation Center at the Peres Center for Peace and Innovation, said Peres flatly refused to pen an autobiographical memoir for years.

"When I asked him why he won't write one," said Frish, "he said he simply couldn't bear to write about himself and preferred others do that instead."

In the last months of his life something changed, however. "We thought he'd live to at least 100," Frish reminisced. "He kept on working every day from five in the morning until midnight, and just two weeks before he died, he was the keynote speaker in a conference in Italy. But His Excellency the PresidentI still call him thatmust have felt his days were numbered. He understood he was down to the last few grains of sand in the hourglass, so to speak, and it was now his responsibility to pay his vision forward, to the younger generation of not just Israel but the entire world. He agreed to write only after becoming convinced the book's goal wasn't to simply glorify him, but to tell the awe-inspiring story of the State of Israel from his own point of view."

The goal then became publishing the book in as many languages as possible. "We wanted to reach young executives in China and the leaders of the future in Africa," Frish said.

It was precisely for that reason the book was written in English, and will be published early next week by HarperCollins, one of the world's largest book publishers. There are also talks on translating it to dozens of other languages, including Arabic.

"Even the Mongolian foreign minister has already asked for a copy," Frish said.

The book was finished about a month before Peres passed away at 93 on September 28, 2016. "For several weeks, he secluded himself in a Tel Aviv apartment with staff members and a documenter from the American publisher and just pieced together his life's story again," Frish said about the writing process. "It was quite an experience to get a first-person account of how Israel came to be from practically nothing thanks to people like him. Thanks to the daring, the willingness to take risks, not fearing failure and the recognition our greatest capital lies in our heads and not the land."

Recommendations from Albert Einstein

This attitude is also reflected in the story of the creation of the Dimona nuclear reactor, to which an entire chapter in the book is dedicated.

The vision was David Ben-Gurion's. The application was placed in the hands of scientists, headed by Professors Ernst David Bergmann and Israel Dostrovsky, and the men of execution, chiefly Emmanuel (Manes) Pratt.

No person is more synonymous with the Israeli nuclear project, however, than Shimon Peres. As director-general of the Ministry of Defense and then deputy minister, he was entrusted with the country's most ambitiousand secretiveproject, accompanying it every step of the way: from the complex and sensitive negotiations with the French, who gave the reactor to Israel, through raising the immense funds required to provide Israel with its nuclear deterrence, and ending with locating, training and guiding the reactor's scientists and administrators.

The Negev Nuclear Research Center (Photo: EPA)

To make this project a reality, Ben-Gurion and Peres were forced to handle not only France's inner political turmoil, which almost thwarted the deal, but also fierce objections from within Israel's own ranks.

"Golda Meir insisted such a project would hurt Israels relationship with the United States, while Isser Harel, the Mossad chief, raised fears of a Soviet response," Peres recounted. "Some predicted an invasion by ground forces, while others envisioned an attack from the air. The head of the foreign relations committee said he feared the project would be 'so expensive that we shall be left without bread and even without rice.' For his part, Levi Eshkol, then the finance minister, promised we wouldn't see a penny from him."

At times, it seemed like a mission impossible. "Innovation, I have come to understand, is always an uphill climb. But rarely does it find so many obstacles arrayed against it at all once. We had no money, no engineers, no support from the physics community or the cabinet or the military leadership or the opposition. 'What are we going to do?' Ben-Gurion asked me late one night, as we sat quietly in his office. It was the operative question. What we had was a French promiseonly that, and each other."





A young Peres with David Ben-Gurion in 1966 (Photo: Dan Hadani/IPPA)

One of the project's most critical phases was fundraising. "We took to the phones and made passionate, personal (and highly confidential) appeals to some of Israels most reliable donors from around the world. In short order, we had raised enough money to cover half the cost of the reactormore than enough to start building our team," the former president wrote.

After raising the funds for the Dimona project, the time came to find the right people to actually staff it. "We were lucky to count Israel Dostrovsky as one of our early members," Peres wrote in his memoir. "A decorated Israeli scientist, Dostrovsky had invented a process for manufacturing heavy water and sold it to the French years earlier. But even he could not compete with the brilliance of Ernst David Bergmann, whom I approached to join the mission. In 1934, legend had it that Chaim Weizmann sought Albert Einstein's recommendation for a scientist to lead his newly created institute outside Tel Aviv. Einstein gave him only one namethat of Ernst Bergmann.

"With Bergmann and Dostrovsky, we had scientific know-how. But what we needed even more was a project manager whom we could trust with such a delicate task. We needed a pedantic stickler, someone allergic to compromiseespecially given the dangers involved in radioactive work. And yet we also needed someone who was agile, someone willing to take on a project for which he would certainly lack expertise. There was a natural tension that existed between those requirements, one that quickly whittled down my list of candidates to one."

That one man was Col. (res.) Emmanuel (Manes) Pratt. "We met during the War of Independence, when we worked together on the frantic building up of the IDF," wrote Peres about Pratt. "He was consistently and insistently precise, the kind of man for whom perfection is not a distant pursuit, but a minimum ante. He was quickfooted and quick-witted, and he demanded in those around him the same relentless work ethic he practiced.

"When I explained my proposal and the position I wanted him to consider, he looked as though he could have struck me. He couldnt disguise his disbelief. 'Are you crazy?' he demanded. 'I dont have the slightest idea what it would take to build a reactor. I dont know how it looks; I dont even know what it is! How could you expect me to take charge of such a project?'

"'Manes, look: I know that you dont know anything yet. But if there is somebody in this country who can become an expert after studying it for three months, that person is clearly you,'" Peres said he replied to the bewildered administrator.

Peres visits the Negev Nuclear Research Center (Photo: Israel Atomic Energy Commission)

"I suggested that we would send him to France for three months to study nuclear reactors alongside the experts who would help us build one. And I promised that if he returned to Israel after that time still uncomfortable with his fluency in the topic, he could simply return to his previous work. With no requirement for a permanent commitment, Pratt ultimately agreed. And to no ones surprise, when he returned from France, he did so as the finest nuclear expert we would ever come to know.

"With the leadership in place, I turned to the work of building the rest of the team. I knew the older generation of physicists was deeply opposed to our efforts, but I suspected we could find students and young graduates who were eager to pursue such an ambitious project. Having been turned away by the Weizmann Institute, I turned to the Israeli Institute of Technology, in Haifa, known as the Technion. There I found a group of scientists and engineers who were eager to take the leap alongside us. Like Pratt, I intended to send each Technion recruit to France for a period of study.

"The students went off to France to study nuclear engineering and I joined them, not as the leader of the project but as a peer. Chemistry and nuclear physics were challenging subjects, to be sure, and I came to them without any previous training. But I felt it essential to gain a degree of mastery in the science that would be driving the project. And so, alongside these young physicists, I spent day and night studying atomic particles and nuclear energy, and the process required to harness its power."

The power of ambiguity

In the late fifties, Peres decided to take center stage at last and ran on Mapai's Knesset ticket. After receiving Ben-Gurion's blessing, on November 3, 1959at age 36he began his first political office, ascending to the role of deputy minister of defense.

"By the summer of 1960, the Dimona project had moved forward apace," reminisced Peres. "France was upholding its end of the agreement, and the French and Israeli workforce had broken ground on the barren plateau. That September, I was in West Africa on orders from Ben-Gurion, as part of an effort to build stronger ties between Israel and the broader continent. But the trip was cut short. I received an urgent cable, ordering my immediate return to Israel. There was no indication of what the emergency entailed.

"When I arrived at the airport in Tel Aviv, Isser Harel, the Mossad chief, was waiting with Golda Meir in a helicopter nearby. We barely spoke on the ride to Sde Boker, where Ben-Gurion was awaiting Harel's report.

"'Explain the situation,' Ben-Gurion demanded as we gathered in his sparse and humble 'hut.' Harel relayed two pieces of intelligence. First, Mossad had learned a Soviet satellite had recently flown over Dimona and photographed the construction site. Second, they received word the Soviet foreign minister had made an unexpected visit to Washington. In his estimation, these two facts were linkedand damning. He was concerned the Soviet government would claim our work in Dimona was nefarious, that their foreign minister had likely demanded US intervention while in Washington. Israel, it seemed, was about to be confronted by the world's only two superpowers.

"'What is your recommendation?' Ben-Gurion asked of the group. Harel believed Goldaor even better, Ben-Gurion himselfshould fly to Washington at once and give assurances to the White House. Golda agreed, believing the situation to be dire, perhaps insurmountably so. I listened intently and sympathized with their concerns, but when Ben-Gurion asked me my opinion, I had to be honest.

"'So what if a Soviet satellite has flown the Negev? What has it photographed? Just holes in the ground,' I explained. We were still in the first stage of the project, an extensive excavation followed by the laying of concrete foundation. 'What can be proved from that?' I asked. 'After all, every building needs foundations," Peres remembered he said in the meeting.

Peres at Ben-Gurion's home in Sde Boker, years later (Photo: Elad Malka, Channel 9)

"If Ben Gurion flew to Washington and revealed the work we had undertaken, it would destroy our relations with the French," he concluded. Ben Gurion is said to have concurred.

Just three short years later, Peres found himself standing in the Oval Office opposite US President John F. Kennedy.

"I had traveled to Washington to conclude a deal for the purchase of antiaircraft missiles from the US government. Kennedys Near East advisor, Mike Feldman, had invited me to the White House, along with our ambassador, Avraham 'Abe' Harman. When Id arrived, I was toldquite unexpectedlythat President Kennedy wanted to speak to me. He knew I was in charge of Israel's nuclear program and, according to Feldman, he had a number of questions. Because I wasn't the head of government, it was against protocol for President Kennedy to take a formal meeting with me.

"Instead, I had been escorted through the side entrance of the West Wing of the White House, and around a back corridor to the Oval Office. I was meant to have bumped into President Kennedy along the way, who would then, out of courtesy, invite me to have a conversation," Peres wrote.

Peres then went on to describe his meeting with the young Commander-in-Chief. "Behind his desk in the Oval Office, Kennedy looked stiff and deliberate, and though he had ways of disguising it, I could tell he was coping with pain. He stood up to shake my hand, then offered me a place on the sofa. He sat adjacent to me, in a padded wooden rocking chair.

"'Mr. Peres, what brings you to Washington?' he asked, in his familiar accent."

"I told him I was there to purchase the Hawk missiles, which Israel deeply appreciated. But I added we hoped this arms agreement was just the beginning. We needed supportas much as the Americans were willing to give.

"'Go talk to my brother (then Attorney-General Robert Kennedy) about that,' he replied, shifting attention to the matter of his greater concern. 'Lets you and I talk about your nuclear facility.'"

Kennedy then laid out all of the intelligence the US government had gathered on the nascent Israeli nuclear project.

"When he finished, it felt as though there was nothing that the Americans didn't know about the construction. And yet Kennedy knew that mystery remained, and he was preoccupied with rumors," Peres remembered.

"'You know we follow with great concern any indication of the development of military capacity in that area,' Kennedy said. 'What can you tell me about this? What are your intentions as they relate to nuclear weapons, Mr. Peres?'"

US President John F. Kennedy in 1961 (Photo: AP)

"I hadnt expected to see the president, let alone to be asked such a question," Peres recalled. "Under the circumstances, I did my best to reassure him. 'Mr. President, I can tell you most clearly we shall not be the first to introduce nuclear weapons to the region.'

"My impromptu statement to President Kennedy became Israel's long-term policy. It has been described as 'nuclear ambiguity,' quite simply the decision to neither confirm nor deny the existence of nuclear weapons."

This ambiguity wasand still isIsrael's official policy regarding its nuclear capabilities.

Peres explained exactly why. "The existence of Dimona may have increased our enemies' desire to destroy us. But the suspicions it generated stole from them the belief they could overpower us. Over time, we learned there is tremendous power in ambiguity. By the 1970s, the conventional wisdom among leaders in the Arab world was that Israel possessed nuclear weapons. What they lacked in evidence, they filled in with rumors. We did nothing to confirm such suspicions, and likewise nothing to dissuade them. Believing Israel had the power to destroy them, our enemies one by one abandoned their ambitions to destroy us. Doubt was a powerful deterrent to those who desired a second Holocaust.

"In 1973, during the Yom Kippur War, Egypt and Syria caught Israel by surprise, leaving our cities vulnerable to catastrophic attack during their coordinated offensive. And yet neither country dared to attack the heart of Israel, even when they had the capability to do so; Egyptian troops were ordered not to go beyond the Mitla Pass in the Sinai, while Syrian troops stayed in the Golan Heights. Years later, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat acknowledged he feared an attack on the cities of Israel would have justified a nuclear response."

Far from being only an instrument of war, or dangling the threat thereof, nuclear deterrence also turned out to be a tool for peace. Peres backed this assertion in his book. "In November 1977, Sadat made his historic visit to Jerusalem, one that would culminate in a peace treaty between Egypt and Israel. Upon his arrival, the first issue he raised was Israel's nuclear program. And when he faced criticism from his fellow Egyptians, he described a nuclear attack as the only other possibility. 'The alternative to peace is terrible,' he insisted."

In 1995, Peresthen the foreign ministerarrived in Cairo for a meeting with his Egyptian counterpart Amr Moussa. "We'd come to know each other well over the years, and after a lengthy conversation, he raised an issue still clearly on his mind. 'Shimon, we are friends. Why dont you let me go have a look at Dimona? I swear I will not tell anybody,'" Peres said Moussa told him.

"'Amr, are you crazy?' I replied. 'Suppose I shall bring you to Dimona, and you see there is nothing there? Suppose you stop worrying? For me, this is a catastrophe. I prefer you remain suspicious. This is my deterrence.'"

Peres summed up this chapter of his autobiographyand life. "I had spent so much of my youth trying to secure Israel for its people. But this was a different kind of security altogether. This was the security of knowing the state would never be destroyeda first step toward peace that started with peace of mind. In this way, I felt that our work on Dimona, an effort once marked for certain failure, had fulfilled the covenant I had made with my grandfather, but on a far grander scale: to always remain Jewish and ensure the Jewish people always remain."

The Rehovot 'golem'

Innovation was well-known to be one of the pillars of Peres's worldview. Contrary to popular belief, however, that bug accompanied him throughout his entire life and not just during his twilight years.

"Peres spearheaded the vision of the 'startup nation' as far back as the fifties and sixties," said Ayelet Frish, citing the "golem" story as an example.

The "golem" was one of Israel's very first self-manufactured computers. It took up three gigantic rooms in the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot and required an entire crew of engineers and scientists to operate. The year was 1963 and, save for some technological fanatics, nobody really knew what a computer was.

Shimon Peres in 2016 (Photo: AP)

One of those fanatics was Deputy Minister of Defense Shimon Peres. When he visited the Weizmann Institute that year and saw this clunky monstrosity, he immediately realized what he was seeing was a vision of the future.

Peres vividly recollected his thoughts on the computer. "This is what the army needs, I thoughtone computer could replace one thousand soldiers and give us more data than they alone could gather. I spent many days and nights with the group that managed the computer, learning how it worked, and how it might work on behalf of the military. I returned to the ministry thoroughly convinced of its value, insisting we purchase one of our own.

"'Where are you going to put it?' one general said incredulously of the enormous machine. 'What would we do with it?' another asked. 'Can you take a computer with a division into the field? Of course you can't! We dont even have enough tanks, and you're talking about computers. A tank shoots. It fires. What on earth can a computer do?'"

The rest, as they say, was history.

The Fantasy Council

When an Air France flight was hijacked and rerouted to Entebbe, Uganda in July of 1976, Peres was the minister of defense in the government of Prime Minister Rabin.

In the chapter dedicated to Operation Entebbe , Peres described the meeting in which he asked security establishment officials to present him with a plan to extricate the hostages.

"We have to use our imagination, and examine any idea, as crazy as it may seem," he insisted to the assembled army men.

"We have no plans," one of them responded.

"Then I want to hear the plans you dont have!" he replied.





Welcome ceremony for the hostages (Photo: IDF Archives)

When the meeting adjourned, three alternative courses of action were formulated. "The first came from (IDF chief of operations) Kuti Adam, who argued that if we couldn't rescue the hostages in Entebbe, we should try to get the hostages to come to us. If we could convince the hijackers to fly to Israelperhaps in the belief we would participate in an exchange of hostages for prisoners upon their arrivalwe could conduct a raid similar to the one we'd executed so successfully with the Sabena flight.

"It was a creative approach, to be sure, but it assumed we had leverage where we likely did not. Surely the terrorists had chosen Entebbe for a reasonnot only because of its distance from Israel, but because they had the support of Uganda's president Idi Amin, who we knew had greeted the terrorists as 'welcomed guests.' It seemed implausible they would give up such an advantage. Besides, the Sabena rescue operation had been widely publicized; it was no longer a secret playbook.

"The second approach, proposed by (IDF chief of general staff) Motta Gur, assumed the rescue would have to take place in Entebbe. He described a scenario whereby Israeli paratroopers would sneak into Entebbe by way of Lake Victoria, launch an unexpected attack on the hijackers, and remain to protect the hostages.

"This plan had the virtue of practicality, in that it described a scenario the IDF was more than capable of executing. But what it lacked, fundamentally, was an exit plan. Once the hostages were rescued, there would be no way to evacuate them. If the Ugandan army chose to respond, it could surely send a force large enough to overpower even our finest commandos.

"The third approach was by far the most fantastic in terms of imagination. Maj.-Gen. Benny Peled, who was the commander of the Israeli Air Force, suggested that Israel conquer Ugandaor at least Entebbe itself. Israeli paratroopers would temporarily occupy the city, the airport, and the harbor, after which the hijackers would be attacked and killed. Having secured the area, the air force would land its Hercules military transport plane at Entebbe airport and use it to bring the hostages home.

Peres and Rabin speak to the pilot of the Air France flight after the return of the hostages to Israel (Photo: IDF Archives)

"On its face, the plan seemed preposterous. Gur described it as 'unrealistic, nothing but a fantasy.' The others agreed. And yet, of the three proposals, it was the one that had me most intrigued. Aside from its scale and ambition, it struck me that there was nothing about Peled's plan that was disqualifying. Unlike Gur's plan, this one included a strategy for evacuating the hostages. And unlike Kuti's plan, it didnt require us to manipulate the terrorists into acting against their interests. Indeed, when the meeting was over, Peled's plan was the only one I hadnt dismissed.

"Shortly after, I convened a meeting of my own, one that Gur would coin the 'Fantasy Council.' My intent was to bring the most creative thinkers in the IDF together so that we could consider every known option and be bold in thinking about options that did not exist."

Among the alternative operational courses of action weighed, for example, was one suggesting parachuting forces into Lake Victoria, which was disqualified when it was discovered the lake was infested with alligators.

The IDF never received orders to occupy Entebbe, of course, but the rescue plan that was eventually approved by both Prime Minister Rabin and Peres was arguably no less daring.

The rescue operationcarried out by the air force, Sayeret Matkal and additional forceswas considered an enormous success. And even if it hadn't, Peres stressed, "the decision would still have been correct. This is one of the hardest things for some leaders to understand: a decision can be right even if it leads to failure."

Nevertheless, the moment Peres was informed the Sayeret Matkal commander Lt.-Col. Yoni Netanyahu was killed during the operation was one of the hardest of his career. It came only shortly after the announcement saying Israeli Air Force planes took off from Uganda with the hostages in tow.

Peres and Rabin welcome the hostages back to Israel (Photo: IDF Archives)

"I returned to my office and, at last, planted myself on the couch, ready to catch the first sleep I'd had in days," Peres wrote of the moments leading up to the announcement. "I heard a rustle at the door, and opened my eyes to see Gur standing in front of me. The last time I saw him, he was smiling and cheering. Now his face was sullen and sunken. It was the face of a man who had learned something tragic, but couldn't find the words to share it.

"'What is it?' I asked, as I got to my feet."

"'Shimon,' he said meekly, 'Yonis gone. He was struck by a bullet from a sniper in the control tower. It pierced his heart.'

"I turned away from Gur and faced the wall. In all of the tension of the week, I had steeled myself, holding my emotions tightly in place. I had no words for Gur, nor did he have any more for me. Instead, he left my office and I burst into tears."

Like the army chief of staff's headquarters

A year after Peres's passing, his office in the Peres Center for Peace and Innovation by Jaffa's shore continues ticking as if its occupant only just stepped out for a moment and is expected to return in no time.

"It's like the chief of staff's headquarters," said Frish. "The entire Peres team comes into work every day, continuing to work on the projects he created and fulfilling what he tasked us with doing."

"I can just envision my father stepping into the office now, loosening his tie, sitting down in the chair and carrying on working as if he'd never left," said Chemi, Peres's son.

"The Peres familychiefly his children Tziki Walden, Yoni and Chemiharnessed themselves to working on the book around the clock, knowing it was so important to their father, in order for the it be completed on the one-year anniversary of his passing," noted Frish.

Attorney Or Kornhauser, the book's project manager, also works around the clock. She flew with Chemi to the US last week in anticipation of the book's launch and promotional tour.

"It's going to be an international affair," she said. "Launch events are already booked in San Francisco, Detroit and Atlanta, and that's just the beginning. CEOs of some of the world's largest companies intend to purchase bulk copies of the book and give it out to their employees. Former Presidents Barak Obama, George Bush and Bill Clinton received the book and all praised it. It was also given to the United Nations Secretary General and to French President Emmanuel Macron.

If Peres were alive today and was interviewed about the book, what do you think the takeaway quote would be?

"He would have said: 'The book is behind us now. It's in the past. Let's talk about the next project; the future,'" Frish and Kornhauser answer almost simultaneously.
JEDDAH  Arab countries involved in a diplomatic dispute with Qatar should enter into direct talks with Doha to solve the crisis, Russia's foreign minister said on a trip to Saudi Arabia on Sunday.

Speaking through an interpreter at a news conference, Sergei Lavrov also called for the unity of the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council. Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt severed ties with Qatar on June 5, accusing it of supporting terrorist groups - a charge it denies.

Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir told the news conference that Qatar needed to show seriousness in finding a solution to the crisis.
For the first time since the outbreak of the electricity crisis in the Gaza Strip last April, Hamas has been able to restore the power supply to pre-crisis levels, with every house in the strip receiving about six hours of electricity a day.

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Gaza's power plant had shut down in April after Hamas could no longer afford to buy heavily taxed fuel from the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah.

This left the territory with electricity provided by Israel, but paid for by the PA. The electricity from Israel covered about one-third of Gaza's needs, meaning Gazans were getting power for about four hours a day.

Gaza power shortage (Photo: EPA)

In June, Israel reduced the electricity flow by 40 percent, at Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's request, cutting the time Gazans were getting power for to about two to three hours a day, but refused to stop power to the strip entirely out of fear of exacerbating the humanitarian crisis.

The Israeli government's decision to reduce the electricity to Gaza was criticized both abroad and inside Israel due to its grave consequences for the civilian population in Gaza.

It also changed the Hamas leadership's traditional perception of the PA as the one supplying the energy to the Gaza Strip, and Hamas began purchasing diesel from Egypt to refuel its power plant.

Children eating to candlelight during power outage (Photo: AFP)

However, the decision pushed Hamas into a corner and forced it to assume civil responsibility for an infrastructure issue that cost it a lot of money.

To date, more than 30 million liters of diesel fuel have been brought into Gaza via tanker convoys at a price of three shekels per liter. In other words, Hamas has paid close to NIS 100 million (about $285 million) to refuel the power plant.

At the same time, the warming relations between Hamas and Cairo and the security measures taken by Hamas on the border with Sinai led Egypt to repair the electricity lines from its territory at Hamas's request.

Woman washing dishes to candlelight during power outage (Photo: AFP)

For the moment, Hamas is downplaying this achievement, most likely so that the pressure on the PA to stop the sanctions will continue.
Israeli rescue teams departed Saturday night for Miami ahead of Hurricane Irma, which began ravaging South Florida on Sunday.

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The mission, organized by the Israel Rescue Coalition (IRC), an umbrella group of rescue groups that includes United Hatzalah. The Coalition, which sent a psychotrauma crisis and response unit to Houston, Texas last month, said in a release that volunteers would administer first aid and assist Jewish communities in the aftermath of the storm.

Our job as volunteers will be to help the community and deal with the situation as best we can in the absence of American officials, until they arrive," said Moti Elmaliah, a spokesman for the IRC. We will take care to organize residents committees to deal with the issues that arise from Hurricane Irma, which has been classified as the most powerful storm ever to hit the Atlantic Ocean.

Hurricane Irma hits Miami (Photo: EPA)

Some 650,000 Jews live in Florida, the third largest Jewish community in the United States. But ahead of the storm, many had left town as South Florida became a virtual ghost town. Drone footage of the citys downtown area and Miami Beach showed empty streets and beaches. In total, nearly 7 million people were ordered to evacuate, and local and federal officials warned that residents who refused to leave their homes would be on their own in what the National Hurricane Center called a life-threatening situation.

This is a deadly storm, and our state has never seen anything like it, said Governor Rick Scott Saturday. Its going to be very difficult to survive this if youre in the Keys. Im begging you to get out.

FEMA chief Brock Long added that the damage expected by the storm would prevent rescue teams from reaching affected areas. Youre on your own until we can actually get in there, and its safe for our teams to support local and state efforts, FEMA said in a statement reported by the Miami Herald. The message has been clearthe Keys are going to be impacted, there is no safe area within the Keys, and you put your life in your own hands by not evacuating."

To deal with the situation, synagogues out of the expected path of the hurricane prepared to host individuals and families fleeing the storm.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday he would meet US President Donald Trump in New York later this month during a visit to New York, where he will address the United Nations General Assembly on September 27.

Netanyahu spoke to reporters accompanying him on a trip to Latin America before his plane left Tel Aviv for Argentina on Sunday night. He will also visit Colombia and Mexico before heading to New York.

"From Mexico I will go to New York to speak at the United Nations General Assembly and there I will meet my friend, President Donald Trump," Netanyahu said.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday he would meet US President Donald Trump in New York later this month during a visit to New York, where he will address the United Nations General Assembly on September 27.

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Netanyahu spoke to reporters accompanying him on a trip to Latin America before his plane left Tel Aviv for Argentina on Sunday night. He will also visit Colombia and Mexico before heading to New York.

"From Mexico I will go to New York to speak at the United Nations General Assembly and there I will meet my friend, President Donald Trump," Netanyahu said.
President Donald Trump has tasked Congress with finding a solution for the Dreamers in the next six months. If Congress cant, presumably the 800,000 children of illegal immigrants whove registered with the government will be open to deportation beginning in March, including more than 3,000 youngsters in Idaho.

The clock is ticking, and its time for Idahos Republican leaders to step up.

But please dont consider us cynical for having doubts theyll get much done. So far, Republicans under the Trump administration have been unable to pass a single piece of significant legislation, despite controlling both houses of Congress.

Even Idahos congressional delegation is divided these days. The states two senators split their votes last week over a package deal for debt-ceiling relief and hurricane-recovery funding, with Mike Crapo approving the deal and James Risch against it.

Rep. Mike Simpson probably has the best common-sense approach to immigration: Allow those who are here already to legalize their residence, to stay and work, but without a special path to full citizenship. But Simpson hasnt historically been a major player in the partys immigration platform.

Rep. Raul Labrador has. He is chairman of the Immigration and Border Security subcommittee. And as the Lewiston Tribune reminded readers last week, Labrador has made solving immigration the centerpiece of his work in Washington.

This is what I came to Congress to work on, is to modernize and fix the broken immigration system, Labrador told reporters when he launched his gubernatorial campaign. This is a golden opportunity for me to do this while Im also running for governor. I can walk and chew gum, I think Ive shown that, at the same time.

Problem is, Labrador is a hardliner on immigration, and the Dreamer situation calls for a moderate compromise.

Call it amnesty  call it whatever you want  but clearly the nation is in support of protecting these youngsters. A POLITICO/Morning Consult poll conducted last week found only 15 percent of Americans want the Dreamers deported. In the same poll, even two-thirds of those who said they voted for Trump want the Dreamers to stay.

Dreamers were brought to the country illegally by their parents, but most are Americans in every sense except on paper. The so-called DACA program created by President Obama allows them to stay in this country if they go to school, work, stay out of trouble, pay a fee and keep registered with the government, among other requirements.

These are not bad hombres. Theyre kids whove grown up in the Magic Valley. Theyre studying at the College of Southern Idaho. Theyre working at local businesses.

Republicans must decide if theyre going to solve the Dreamers problem through narrow legislation that addresses DACA only, or through a larger, comprehensive immigration reform package.

Will they try to solve the smaller problem or shoot for the moon?

We suspect a smaller DACA solution has the best chance at passing, and it has the most consensus from the constituency. Idahos congressional delegation may not know what voters collectively want in a full-on immigration reform deal, but they sure as heck know that Idahoans want Dreamers to stay.

They should listen to their constituents and quickly develop legislation to reflect that.
New Delhi: Several prisoners have moved the Delhi High Court complaining about the inhuman conditions and lack of medical and employment facilities at the newly- commissioned Mandoli jail in the national capital.

Flagging eight hand-written letters by the prisoners as a "serious and public interest issue", the high court asked the authorities to examine their grievances and file a status report on the matter.

It also issued show cause notices to the departments concerned of the Delhi government, including Tihar Jail's Director General as he is the administrative head of all the three jails in the national capital.

The letters to the high court, which were put up for perusal before a bench comprising Acting Chief Justice Gita Mittal and Justice C Hari Shankar, were treated as a public interest litigation.

One of the letters has been written by an inmate, who has been on a hunger strike for around two and a half months raising the grievances.

To decongest the Tihar Jail in west Delhi, two other jails -- one at Rohini in northwest Delhi and another at Mandoli in east Delhi, were made operational in December 2004 and October 2016 respectively.

The Mandoli complex, which has six prisons, can house 3,776 inmates. Tihar and Rohini jails have 14,469 prisoners as against the sanctioned strength of 6,250.

The bench directed that "the authorities shall examine the issue raised by the prisoners in Mandoli jail and file their status report at earliest."

The matter was listed for further hearing on November 30.

The inmate, who is on hunger strike since June 23 and is undergoing a 14-year jail term, in his letter in Hindi has alleged that nobody at Mandoli jail has given him a hearing on these problems and jail procedures were being misused by the administration, who were using them as a "tool against the convict".

Another prisoner has stated that no one from Mandoli jail administration listens to convicts while awarding punishment and it "becomes a one-sided process".

One more prisoner has urged the court to direct authorities not to discriminate among the inmates while awarding work, as some of them was allowed to work for only 15 days a month which was not sufficient for the prisoner to earn enough for his family.

The letters complained about the pathetic living conditions in the jail besides the lack of sufficient medical facilities, lack of employment and faulty punishment procedures allegedly being implemented by the jail administration.

As per the Tihar Jail Manual, the inmates, who are handed out jail terms, are imparted education, useful skills and lessons to respect the law. It aims to improve the inmates' self-esteem and strengthen their desire to improve.
New Delhi: Delhi Police Commissioner Amulya Patnaik has asked district police chiefs to ensure that schools in their areas have adequate security measures in place, after a five-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a peon inside the premises of a private school in Shahdara.

The deputy commissioners of police (DCPs) of all districts have been asked to talk to school authorities and conduct regular security audits.

"The DCPs will be advising schools to hire staff from authorised agencies. The schools also should get a police verification done of the hired staff," said Dependra Pathak, chief spokesperson, Delhi Police.

Security audits would mean checking whether there is any particular time the children are left unattended, areas where the staff and children have access to and whether the teachers are handing over the students to their parents or leaving them unattended, explained the officer.

The schools will be asked to ensure that there are CCTV cameras installed inside the premises.

The 40-year-old peon of Tagore Public School has been arrested for allegedly raping the girl inside the Shahdara school yesterday.

The incident came close on the heels of the gruesome killing of a seven-year-old boy who had his throat slit for allegedly resisting sexual assault by a bus conductor of a Gurgaon school - an incident which sent shock waves across the country.
New Delhi: Soon after the announcement of JNU Students Union election results early today, supporters of the victorious United Left alliance celebrated the win by taking out a procession in the varsity campus.

The procession began from the School of International Studies to the famous Ganga Dhaba.

At the forefront were newly-elected leaders, Geeta Kumari - president, Simone Zoya Khan - vice president, Duggirala Srikrishna - general secretary, and Shubhanshu Singh - joint secretary.

Kumari (24) a second year M Phil student of history from the School of Social Sciences hails from Panipat, Haryana.

An activist of AISA for five years she had been elected councillor twice and was a student representative to the GS- CASH (Gender Sensitive Committee Against Sexual Harassment) in 2015.

Kumari, who attributed her victory to students, promised to ensure justice for missing student Najeeb and raise the issue of seat cuts after taking charge.

Zoya Khan (26) born in Banda, Uttar Pradesh and brought up in Numaligarh in Assam, is a second year PhD student from Centre for Indo Pacific Studies in JNU's School of International Studies.

The AISA activist, whose mother tongue is Urdu, found moral support from her parents, particularly from her mother Nishat throughout the election process. Khan's father is a retired school teacher.

First year PhD student Duggirala Srikrishna, who campaigned on the slogan of 'Save JNU, save democracy', hails from Prakasam district, Andhra Pradesh.

An SFI leader, Srikrishna is an active student leader and draws his popularity from being successful after bringing several amenities to students of SIS, the school which he belongs to. He scored the highest number of votes - 2,082 - leaving his rivals from other parties to bite the dust.

Singh (25), doing second year PhD in 'Politics of Naming and Renaming' from School of Social Sciences in JNU is a native of Agra.

An active member of Democratic Students Federation for the past five years, he finished his under graduation from Sri Venkateshwara college, Delhi University, and masters from JNU.

He promised to take up seat cut issue immediately after taking oath as JNUSU joint secretary.
New Delhi: Children cannot be expected to walk three or more kilometres to attend school, the Supreme Court has said.

It said to make the right of education meaningful, efforts should be made to have upper primary schools in such a manner that no children has to walk such a distance only to attend schools.

The court was dealing with a matter in which permission granted to a school to upgrade itself was opposed by a nearby school in Kerala, which has the highest literacy rate in the country.

A bench of Justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta noted that students who have passed Class IV in a junior primary school based in Parappanangadi town, have to travel a distance of 3-4 or more kilometres to attend classes.

"We cannot expect children in the age group of 10 to 14 years to walk 3 kilometres or more to attend school. The right of education up to the age of 14 years is now a fundamental right under article 21A of the Constitution and if this right is to be meaningful, then efforts must be made to open upper primary schools in such a manner that no child has to walk 3 kilometres or more only to attend school," the bench said.

The school was upgraded to the level of upper primary school and permitted to run from Class V to VIII also by the state government in June 2015.

The state's order was challenged before the high court by another school which claimed that the procedure prescribed under the Kerala Education Rules, 1959 were not followed and no notice was given to schools in the vicinity to raise any objection with regard to the upgradation.

A single judge of high court had allowed the plea filed by the school and set aside the state's order on the ground that the procedure prescribed under the Act was not followed.

It, however, had allowed the junior primary school to permit students already admitted to continue their education till the next academic year and said that it would be open for the government to take a fresh decision in the matter.

The junior primary school had challenged the order before a division bench of the high court which dismissed its plea.

The school then moved the apex court and its counsel told the bench that the government had taken a conscious decision to give relaxation in its favour and exempt it from certain provisions of the Act and it was then upgraded to an upper primary school from the academic year 2015-2016.
New Delhi: In August this year, the United States was hit by Hurrican Harvey  the first major hurricane to make landfall in the US since Wilma in 2005, ending a record 12-year drought in which no hurricanes made landfall at such an intensity in the country.

While dealing with Harvey's after-effects, the US state of Florida has come under the radar of Hurrican Irma that has already devastated Cuba.

Hurricanes are large swirling storms, characterised by winds that can go up to 119 kilometers per hour (74 mph) or higher. These fast-moving winds can damage buildings and trees.

Hurricanes form over warm ocean waters and can sometimes strike land, thereby pushing a wall of ocean water ashore. This wall of water is called a storm surge, which is also the biggest threat to human life during a hurricane

Forecasters warn that the storm surge from Hurricane Irma could reach 15 feet (4.5 meters) along parts of the Florida coast in the coming hours.

Here are some facts about storm surge and what makes it so dangerous:

Storm surge does not come from rainfall or flooding, but occurs when powerful winds from a hurricane push ocean water higher than usual over the shore.

Storm surge is an "abnormal rise of water generated by a storm, over and above the predicted astronomical tides," according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

Storm surge begins before the hurricane makes landfall, making it harder for people to evacuate in time.

Most of the 1,800 deaths from Hurricane Katrina, which struck Louisiana in 2005, are attributed to storm surge, NOAA said.

Storm surge can extend for dozens of miles inland, filling buildings with water quickly, making roads impassable and causing people to drown in their cars or homes.

Also, the accumulated weight of water  some 1,700 pounds per cubic yard  can demolish any structure not specifically designed to withstand such force.

Storm surge is shaped by a number of different factors, including storm intensity, forward speed, the size of a storm and the angle of approach to the coast.

The underlying features of the land at the coast, including bays and estuaries, are also at play.

"A shallow slope will potentially produce a greater storm surge than a steep shelf," said NOAA.

The Louisiana coastline has a wide and shallow continental shelf, which can produce a 20-foot storm surge in a Category 4 hurricane.

Miami Beach, on the other hand, has a steep dropoff to its continental shelf, which could limit the storm surge to about eight or nine feet under a Category 4 hurricane.dropoff to its continental shelf, which could limit the storm surge to about eight or nine feet under a Category 4 hurricane.

Even as Irma takes aim at Florida's west coast, both coasts of the peninsula can expect storm surge.

On the west coast, storm surge could reach as far as seven miles (11 kilometers) inland, meteorologists say.

Rising seas and warming oceans due to climate change are also expected to amplify the effects of storm surge in the coming decades.

Numerous studies have predicted that storm surges will become more frequent and deadly as the planet warms.

(With AFP inputs)
Panaji: Amidst the incidents of drowning and drug abuse, Goa Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar has convened a high level meeting on Monday to discuss the situation, a senior official said on Sunday.

State tourism department is mulling the possibility of banning swimming in the sea after sunset.

The state has recently witnessed three different incidents of drowning involving four persons including two youth from a Ahmedabad based institute.

"The meeting comes in the wake of drowning cases and drug related offences will be attended by Tourism Minister Manohar Ajgaonkar, chief secretary Dharmendra Sharma along with tourism stakeholders to chalk out an action plan to curb various nuisances and incidents of drownings, brawls, drunken driving and others in the state," said a statement issued here by the Goa tourism department.

The meeting is scheduled tomorrow in Panaji, it said.

"The meeting will also discuss on framing of guidelines to control the referred issues and enacting a law for controlling indiscipline on beaches and other aspects," the statement adds.

Ajgaonkar had this week mulled the idea of enacting tough laws to control over-adventurous tourists from venturing into the sea.

The meeting is also expected to review the measures taken by the police department and anti narcotic cell pertaining to tracking down of drug trade in tourist places, tourism department sources said.
Ahmedabad: BJP President Amit Shah on Sunday appealed to people in Gujarat not to feel the absence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi from the political scenario of the state and stated that he was better placed now to work for the development of the state than as its Chief Minister.

Amit Shah said: "There is no need to miss Narendra Modi in Gujarat. He placed Gujarat on the growth map as the Chief Minister, as the Prime Minister he is doing much for the development of the state. Who is more powerful, the Chief Minister or the Prime Minister?"

Shah was answering a question during a town hall video interaction with youth located at 100 places across the State. The event was called Adikham Gujarat (Resolute Gujarat) where the BJP chief claimed to have addressed one lakh youth by taking questions through the social media. He said, "Today I am not a politician, but a professor." He claimed 3.5 lakh questions had come and this spoke of the expectations and hopes from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Amid applause at the jam-packed Deendayal Hall, a questioner asked: "Politically we feel the absence of Narendra Modi and the scenario does not look the same after he has gone. What does the party intend to do?"

Shah grinned and said, "As the Prime Minister, he is helping in Gujarat`s development by taking decisions at the snap of a finger. Within 10 days of assuming power in Delhi, the permission to increase the height of the Narmada dam came. And now he has ensured the radial gates are put at the dam."

"He travels across India with the interests of Gujarat in his mind and heart. Modi is very much here."

Another questioner praised the Narendra Modi government for demonetization as an effort to put an end to corruption in high places but wanted to know what was being done at the lower echelons of the government structure. In reply, Shah said, "We are doing a lot. An example of this is the direct benefit transfer scheme that we brought where subsidy benefits to poor are deposited directly in their bank accounts."

"This amount works out to a whopping Rs 59,000 crore. By the direct benefit transfer initiative, we have stopped corruption to the tune of Rs 59,000 crore. No media, no journalist had exposed this huge corruption because it was not visible," the BJP chief said.

The youngsters in the state were asked to send questions through Twitter, Facebook or by giving a missed call on 7878182182 and register themselves to send questions.

Alternatively, they could ask questions on www.adikhamgujarat.com.
Sirsa: The Haryana Government on Sunday informed that 99 per cent of the search operation at Dera Sacha Sauda Headquarters in Sirsa has been completed.

Speaking to ANI, Information and Public Relations Department of Haryana Government Deputy Director Satish Mehra informed that 99 per cent of sanitisation exercise has been completed.

"After the notice from the Haryana and Punjab Government, the Dera search operation is about to get over. The search was done peacefully in the Dera. The operation is 99 per cent completed and but the court commissioner will visits all the sectors and will see if any investigation is left or not. He can visits anytime with deputy commissioner, IG and other officials. Every sector will be investigated according to their instructions," he said.

The search operation inside the Dera Sacha Sauda premises in Sirsa entered its third day on Sunday amidst heavy security deployed around the headquarters.

Yesterday, a skin bank running inside Dera Sacha Sauda headquarters without license was sealed.

Earlier yesterday, the search operations revealed the existence of an illegal explosives factory and firecrackers, which were promptly sealed.

On Friday, a computer, hard disks and cash were recovered.

Earlier on September 5, the Punjab and Haryana High Court gave orders to conduct a search operation in the Dera Sacha Sauda headquarter, under the supervision of a judicial officer.

This order came after the Haryana Police seized 33 licensed weapons from Dera Sacha Sauda. These weapons included 14 revolvers, nine guns, four rifles and other modified weapons.
Shimla: Charred body of a tourist from Hyderabad was today found in a cave near the Kinner Kailash Peak, police said.

Jagdish, a shepherd, who was grazing his animals had met the tourist, a day before his death near the Kinner Kailash Peak at an altitude of 4,650 meters, 260 km from Shimla, they said, adding the tourist was drenched in rain.

While Jagdish came back from the hill, the tourist decided to stay in a cave there. "When I went up today, I found the burnt body of the tourist in a cave and immediately informed village head of Ribba who in turn informed the SDM about the incident," he told police.

On receiving information about the incident, officials of the district headquarter Reckong Peo rushed a rescue team to the spot.

The tourist is yet to be identified.

The exact cause of death was yet to ascertained, police said.

The Yatra was officially closed on August 11 and the administration had asked people not to venture to Kinner Kailash.
Kolkata: Newly appointed Railway Minister Piyush Goyal on Saturday said that all the unmanned level crossings will be removed within a year.

"Initially, the Railways had a target of removing all unmanned crossings in three years. But I told them, why not do it within a year. Around 5,000 unmanned level crossings which account for nearly 30-35 per cent of total rail accidents, need to be removed by the railways in the next one year," Goyal said while addressing a program in IIM-Calcutta.

He also emphasised on leveraging technology to improve Indian Railways' efficiency and claimed to have presented the idea of floating global tenders for laying new railway tracks.

"All you need is some infrastructure and a set of communication devices. The RailTel has already prepared the optic fibre network for improving communication," Goyal added.

RailTel Corporation, a Mini Ratna PSU, is one of the largest railway telecom infrastructure providers in the country.

He further said that the officials have been asked to look into the upkeep of railway tracks and expedite procurement processes.

"These are just ideas that we have discussed. Let's see how soon we can take them forward," Goyal said.

He had chaired a high-level meeting with top Railway Board officials on train safety in New Delhi on September 7.
Allahabad: The Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad on Sunday released a list of 14 "fake babas" and demanded a crackdown on "rootless cult leaders" by bringing in a legislation.

The parishad is a council of akharas, which are monastic orders drawing their spiritual lineage from 8th-century seer Adi Shankara, who is said to have established orders of martial monks with the aim of defending the Hindu Dharma.

Giving out the list, which includes names like Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, Rampal, Asaram and his son Narayan Sai, the parishad's president Swami Narendra Giri said, "We appeal to even the common people to beware of such charlatans who belong to no tradition and by their questionable acts, bring disrepute to sadhus and sanyasis."

He added, "We are going to send copies of this list to the Centre, the state governments as well as all the opposition parties with the demand that a strong legislation be brought to check the activities of these self-styled cult leaders."

The development comes close on the heels of a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) court in Haryana sentencing Dera Sacha Sauda chief Ram Rahim to 20 years in prison for the rape of two of his former disciples.

Large-scale violence took place in various parts of Haryana, Punjab and Rajasthan following his conviction by the court in the two cases.

While Asaram is in jail in connection with a sexual assault case, his son Narayan Sai, also booked in a similar case, is out on bail.

Rampal is behind bars, facing trial in a number of cases relating to violence.

(With PTI inputs)
Dhamupur: Army Chief Gen Bipin Rawat on Sunday unveiled a bust of 1965 Indo-Pak war hero Abdul Hamid here in Ghazipur district and felicitated the widow of the soldier who was awarded the Param Vir Chakra, the highest wartime gallantry medal.

On the occasion of the 52nd anniversary of his supreme sacrifice, Gen Rawat and his wife Madhulika met Rasoolan Bibi, wife of Company Quartermaster Havildar Hamid and several other war widows and felicitated them.

The Army Chief also unveiled a memorial in Hamid's honour in his ancestral village of Dhamupur in Ghazipur district in Uttar Pradesh while exhorting the youth to join the armed forces.

Lauding the contribution made by people of the district to the armed forces, Gen Rawat said a recruitment drive will be held soon in Ghazipur to encourage youths to join the Army and contribute to the country's security.

He said Hamid destroyed several tanks of the Pakistan army during the 1965 war in the Lahore sector.

"Jahan Hindustan ki sena khadi hai, wahan khatra kisi aur se nahi (where the Indian Army is present, there is no threat from anyone)," the Army Chief said.

"Hamid was an inspiration for the youth and his extraordinary bravery made the country proud," he said.

On the Dokalam issue, Gen. Rawat said India and China have held talks and the situation there is under control.
New Delhi: China and Pakistan are not a threat to India, Army chief General Bipin Rawat said on Sunday, weeks after New Delhi and Beijing decided to end their hostilities over Doklam.

None of the country (China or Pakistan) is a threat, the Hindustan Times quoted Rawat as saying in Dehradun.

The army chief's remarks came just a week after he reportedly dubbed the two countries as northern and eastern adversaries.

Reacting to Rawats 'adversary' remark, China had said that ties between the two countries should not be derailed.

What I had said... said, Rawat said on Sunday.

India and China last month ended about a 70-day long military standoff at the Doklam tri-junction near the Sikkim border which had strained bilateral ties.

The general said the army has been extra vigilant after the incident and appropriate action has been taken in sensitive areas.

On the issue of Kashmir militancy, he said the army has been doing everything in its power to restore peace and tranquillity in the Valley.

He said the forces will not hesitate to conduct surgical strikes if needed.

The army chief was reportedly in Dehradun to attend an annual function at Cambrian Hall, his alma mater.

Rawat, who hails from Pauri, reportedly studied at the Cambrian Hall between 1969 till 1972 and then did his senior schooling at St. Edwards School, Shimla.

I have spent my most memorable days in this school, he was quoted as saying during the event.
New Delhi: The Delhi government on Sunday ordered a magisterial probe into the alleged rape case of a five-year-old girl at Tagore Public School in Gandhi Nagar area of Shahdara. The report will be submitted within three days.

Reacting to the incident, Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal said,"Shameful. Wont be tolerated. Police doing its job. Ordered magisterial enquiry. Will develop protocol 4 all schools 2 ensure children safety."

Shameful. Won't be tolerated. Police doing its job. Ordered magsterial enquiry. Will develop protocol 4 all schools 2 ensure children safety https://t.co/YxycU5KTjI  Arvind Kejriwal (@ArvindKejriwal) September 10, 2017

The five-year-old girl was raped allegedly by a peon inside a classroom in the school premises yesterday. The accused, identified as Vikas, 40, who was absconding after the incident, has been arrested.

Earlier while talking to ANI, the victim's father said, "The girl returned home in a very critical condition and told her mother about the horrific incident. The mother of the girl then informed me and we rushed her to the hospital. After the doctors observing her, they informed me to call the police and to file an FIR in this matter. I'm glad that the police have arrested the accused and would want strict action against him. The school has not yet taken any action on this matter."

(With inputs from agencies)
New Delhi: In yet another shocking incident, a seven-year-old boy studying in Class 2 of a private school at Tappachabutra near Hyderabad was beaten mercilessly by Principal.

The incident took place on Friday when the principal of the school Suresh Singh wrote few words on the board and asked the child to read. When the child was not able to read, the principal brutally thrashed him. Following the incident, a city-based NGO Balala Hakkula Sangham demanded immediate arrest of the principal as well as cancellation of schools recognition.

Principal of a school in Hyderabad booked for allegedly beating up a 7-year-old student, case registered under sec 23 Juvenile Justice Act pic.twitter.com/AfQY5vN7mr  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

Talking to news agency PTI, the mother of the victim said, The principal wrote some words on the board in the classroom and when the child was not able to read the words he was beaten up by him on his back. We have lodged a with police."

Tappachabutra Police registered a case under sections 341 (wrongful restraint) and 323 (voluntarily causing hurt) of IPC against the principal, a police official said. However, no arrests have been made so far.
New Delhi: Indian missions in the US on Sunday evacuated scores of Indian-Americans and issued helpline numbers as the Hurricane Irma, with windspeeds of over 130kmph, battered Florida, turning its cities into ghost towns.

The hurricane was upgraded overnight to a Category Four storm as it closed in on Florida Keys. Six million people  one third of the state's population  have been ordered to evacuate their homes ahead of the monster storm.

Thousands of Indian-Americans in Florida braced for "life-threatening" Irma as it hit the state after leaving a trail of destruction across the Caribbean.

Irma has already left at least 25 dead in the Caribbean. About 60 Indian nationals were evacuated from the island of St Martin in the Caribbean.

Some 120,000 Indian-Americans reportedly live in Florida.

The Indian embassy in the US has opened a 24X7 helpline number and rushed senior diplomats to lead relief efforts for Indian-Americans stuck in the region.

The hotline number is 202-258-8819.

Citing embassy officials, the Times of India reported that India's Ambassador to the US Navtej Sarna was closely monitoring the situation.

India's consul-general in New York Sandeep Chakravorty has set up a 24X7 control room in Atlanta to oversee relief efforts.

The Indian Consulate in Atlanta tweeted helpline numbers (+14044052567 & +1678179393) for people seeking assistance. "Atlanta is fully prepared to take care of evacuees from Florida. Some have already reached. Consulate is on call 24x7," TOI quoted the Indian Consulate as saying.

External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar tweeted 24X7 helpline at High Commission of India, Kingston (+1876 833 4500; +1876 564 1378).

He also tweeted email ids for Indians to contact in case of emergency: hc.kingston@mea.gov.in; hoc.kingston@mea.gov.in.

Several Indian businesses have also started contributing to relief efforts, TOI reported.

The deteriorating weather had grounded aircraft and prevented boats from getting relief to hard-hit islands.

The US military was mobilizing thousands of troops and deploying several large ships to aid with evacuations and humanitarian relief.
Srinagar: Two terrorists have been killed during the encounter with the security forces in Shopian district of Jammu and Kashmir on Sunday. As per the reports of ANI, another militant has been arrested and weapons have been recovered from him. One of the slain terrorists has been identified as Tariq Ah Bhat of Hizbul Mujahideen.

On the other hand, the militant who was caught alive by the security forces belonged to Lashkar-e-Toiba. He was identified as Adil Dar. According to the reports, Dar had joined the group three months ago.

Jammu and Kashmir: Terrorist killed in Shopian encounter identified as Tariq Ah Bhat of Hizbul Mujahideen (File picture) pic.twitter.com/O1xmFtGkQF  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

Talking to news agency IANS, polic confirmed that the militant identified as Tariq was killed while another terrorist, Adil was arrested along with his weapon during the security operation in Barbugh village.

Reportedly, the encounter broke out on Saturday evening in Barbugh village where 3 to 4 terrorists were said to be trapped in an orchard.
Chennai: Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) working president MK Stalin will meet Tamil Nadu governor C Vidyasagar Rao on Sunday, in the evening, to stress on the on the need for a trial of strength in the state assembly.

Congress MLAs will also be part of the delegation, led by Stalin.

On August 31, a delegation of opposition parties, including the DMK, the Congress, the Communist Party of India (CPI) and the Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPM) met President Ram Nath Kovind, demanding a floor test in the Assembly.

The opposition parties in Tamil Nadu claimed that the government has been "reduced" to a minority with 21 MLAs owing allegiance to T.T.V. Dinakaran's AIADMK faction withdrawing their support to Chief Minister E. Palanisamy and thereby, demanded a floor test.

CPM general secretary Sitaram Yechury, who was present at the meeting, argued that a party cannot rule a state if the party doesn't command the mandate of the state and believes that a floor test is the only way to come to a solution.

"The point is that any government of a country has to enjoy the majority of legislative members that can be demonstrated only on the floor of the house. Without a floor test, any action taken by the government doesn't have the mandate of a majority," he told the media after the meeting.
New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address a students' convention September 11 to mark the 125th anniversary of Swami Vivekananda's Chicago address and BJP ideologue Deendayal Upadhyaya's centenary celebrations.

The theme of the convention is 'Young India, New India'.

"Tomorrow I look forward to addressing a gathering of students on the theme of Young India, New India'," Modi tweeted.

The convention of students is being held on a day Vivekananda delivered his historic address at Chicago in 1893, he noted.

"This year, we are marking 125th anniversary of Swami Vivekananda's Chicago address and Pt Deendayal Upadhyaya centenary celebrations," the Prime Minister said in another tweet.

He said Vivekananda strongly believed in the power of "Yuva Shakti' (youth power) and saw a vital place for youngsters in the realm of nation-building.

"Inspired by the ideals of Swami Vivekananda, we are working tirelessly towards realising the dreams and aspirations of our youth," the prime minister said.
New Delhi: The sister of 42-year-old bus conductor Ashok, who allegedly killed class II student inside Ryan International School, on Sunday claimed that her brother was beaten up and being pressurised to give wrong statements. She even accused the principal of Ryan International of bribing the police.

Meanwhile, talking to news agency ANI, the father of accused conductor, said that his son is innocent and is just being framed. All this has happened because of the school.

My brother has been beaten up & pressurized to give wrong statements. School principal has bribed the police:Sister of accused bus conductor pic.twitter.com/hF6QJzEKXo  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

Earlier on Saturday, the acting principal of the school was suspended and the district administration ordered a probe by a panel that will give its report by Monday.

The administration also ordered a security audit of all schools in Gurugram while police said they will file a detailed chargesheet in the case that has evoked nationwide concern.





Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar warned of stern action against the school authorities for any lapses. However, Khattar ruled out a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), saying, "There is no question of CBI probe in this matter as Haryana Police have successfully nabbed the perpetrator and he has accepted him crime."



The CBSE has also formed a panel to inquire the case. Human Resource Development Minister Prakash Javadekar termed the murder an "unfortunate incident" and hoped that justice will be served.
New Delhi: Days after a seven-year-old boy was brutally murdered inside the toilet of Ryan International School, Haryana Education Minister Ram Bilas Sharma on Sunday said that stern action will be taken against school management under section 75 Juvenile Act.

Addressing the media, Sharma blamed the school management and said that the accused will be presented before court within a week.

"If the parents would not be satisfied with the police investigations, then the Haryana govt is ready to handover the case to any investigative agency they want. (Agar mata-pita jaanch se santusth nahi honge toh kisi bhi agency se Haryana sarkaar jaanch karane ko tayar hai), the education minister said.

Talking to reporters, the Haryana Education Minister also informed that the future of 1200 students cannot be put at stake so the government will not derecognise Ryan International School. Sharma said that the government has decided to shut down the liquor shop outside the Ryan International School.

Yesterday, while talking to reporters, Haryana CM Manohar Lal Khattar termed the incident a very heinous crime and had said that the state government will soon issue a circular to instruct all schools in the state to tighten security measures.



"The administration has nabbed the suspect. I have directed the authorities to complete investigations within seven days. I would also request the court to punish the perpetrator as earliest as possible,"the CM had said. However, he had ruled out a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation, saying, "There is no question of CBI probe in this matter as Haryana Police have successfully nabbed the perpetrator and he has accepted him crime."

Earlier on Saturday, the mother of the deceased child had demanded CBI probe into the matter. "The principal was indifferent when she came to hospital, we want her in jail. I want to know what exactly happened to my child, I want a CBI probe in this case," the inconsolable mother had said.

Meanwhile, the demonstrations outside Ryan International school took a violent turn today as protesters set a liquor shop on fire. According to the reports, the police resorted to lathi-charge to bring the situation under control.
Srinagar: A delegation of the opposition National Conference, led by former chief minister Omar Abdullah, on Sunday conveyed to Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh the party's concern over the Centre's ambiguity in defending Jammu and Kashmir's special status under Article 35A of the Constitution.

The delegation called on Singh, who is on a four-day visit to the state, here this afternoon.

"While highlighting the political, historical and constitutional context of the state's special status, Omar registered the party's concern and disappointment over the central government's ambiguity in defending the state's special status in the Supreme Court with respect to Article 35A," a spokesman of the National Conference said after the meeting.

Omar also highlighted the "worsened and constantly deteriorating situation" in the valley.

The delegation also sought a sustained and open-ended political engagement with stakeholders in Kashmir irrespective of their ideology, and urged New Delhi and Islamabad to make sincere and sustained efforts towards resumption of a comprehensive dialogue on all outstanding issues including that of Kashmir, the spokesman said.

He said the party delegation also reiterated its struggle for the restoration of autonomy and asked the central government to initiate a process of reversing "erosions" made to the state's autonomy that had been violated by extending various hitherto inapplicable central laws to the state, the Goods and Services Tax (GST) being the most recent example.

"The party also decried the singular focus on operational and military mechanisms in dealing with an inherently political issue and asked the central government to reach out to the alienated and isolated youth of the valley," he added.

Meanwhile, party representatives in the delegation from Leh and Kargil, Phuntsog Wangdan Shunu and Aga Syed Abbas Rizvi respectively, highlighted pressing issues in Leh and Kargil.

"The representatives raised challenges faced on the connectivity, communication and infrastructure front and sought that the central Government resolves these issues that are a cause of great misery and inconvenience to the people," the spokesman said.

Shunu said the exorbitant airfare to Leh round the year, especially during the months when the road-link is closed, is a source of great misery to the people.

He asked the central government to take all possible measures to ensure a reasonable airfare policy for such hilly areas.

He also highlighted poor and in certain places defunct quality of BSNL network connectivity, and said the corporation was solely focussed on reaping benefits of infrastructural monopoly in far-flung areas of Leh while failing to provide even basic connectivity.

They also sought measures be taken for utilisation of allocated funds for the Zojila tunnel and connectivity to the national grid.

Rizvi also reiterated the long-pending demand of a functional civil airport in Kargil and interim, adequate winter air-connectivity arrangement for Kargil that would enable the district to explore it maximum economic and tourism potential.

A PDP delegation, led by party vice president Sartaj Madni, also called on Singh and conveyed the party's views on the issues facing the state.

Delegations of state units of the BJP, Congress, People's Conference and the CPI(M) also called on the home minister.
New Delhi: They felt "strange" with the fame that came with the popularity of their single "Closer", and feel they still have a lot to prove.



American DJs and production duo The Chainsmokers say they want to push themselves and experiment. And they want to spread "positivity with their music without any propaganda."



In a joint email interview to IANS, The Chainsmokers duo Andrew Taggart and Alex Pall reflected upon their journey in the music world and how they are dealing with the fame. They mentioned it is important to use the popularity to send out a positive message amid all the "craziness happening in the world".



"That song (Closer') gave us a lot of acclaim in a good way. (In) a lot of cases for DJs, people know the music but don't know what they look like. And Closer' became so big. We made a couple of TV appearances and we felt famous for the first time, it kind of felt strange," the duo said in their joint reply.



The duo, who wrapped up their two-city India tour on Friday, also appreciated how India is holding onto its "cultural music".



The Grammy Award-winning artists headlined the Indian leg of Road to ULTRA, an independent festival brand, brought to India by ULTRA Worldwide and Percept Live. The fest made its foray into the country with Road To ULTRA show in Mumbai and Greater Noida.



The New York based artists exploded onto the music scene with viral hit "#SELFIE" in 2014. They followed it up with hits like "Roses" and "Don't let me down", for which they won a Grammy. The success of "Closer", featuring Halsey, changed the whole game for them.



"We are having the best time and just enjoying every second of the ride but there is still so much more we want to accomplish and we push ourselves to experiment so we are always thinking about what's next," they said.



The duo continued the successful ride as they released "Paris" and a single in collaboration with Coldplay titled "Something just like this".



A lot of musicians in the US want to use their music for political activism.



Ask The Chainsmokers if they also want to use their beats and sounds for a bigger cause, and they said: "It is important to use the resources you have and say the things you believe in, whatever those positive things may be.



"There is a lot of craziness happening in the world right now and if you have a lot of fans looking upto you, need to create some awareness and spread positivity without a propaganda."



Talking about their India visit, the duo said: "This is our fourth visit to be honest...We just weren't that famous then. We played a fun free festival in Pune. We also went to an orphanage there and met some school kids. Being foodies, we had a lot of naans and tikkas."



The Chainsmokers admire Indian music and say that it was cool to work with globally popular Indian star Priyanka Chopra. They worked with the Bollywood actress back in 2012 for the single "Erase".



"It's amazing how there are only a few countries in the world that support cultural music and India is one of them apart from Brazil and Canada. It is great because there is a strong cultural identity. We have worked with Priyanka Chopra who was pretty cool," said the "All we know" hitmakers.



Any plans to collaborate with any other Indian actor or musician?



"We were supposed to meet Shah Rukh Khan (after the Mumbai gig) but everything got messed up. He seems (to be) pretty cool and (we) wouldn't mind hanging out with him sometime," they said.



But that has to wait now.



"Right now, our schedule is very pretty crazy and we still feel we are relatively new artistes and we have to prove a lot. But there will come a point when we want to put our thing aside and want to work (with) all kinds of artists," they said.
Mumbai: A pianist from Bengaluru jumped to death from a highrise building in suburban Bandra on Saturday morning, police said here.



The deceased has been identified as 29-year old Karan Joseph, a well-known name in the Indie music world, said Mumbai Police spokesperson and Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) Rashmi Karandikar.



"We have registered an accidental death report at Bandra Police Station. Police is carrying out a preliminary inquiry in the matter and his mobile is being sent to the forensic lab," DCP Karandikar told the media.



According to investigators, Joseph had come to Mumbai and was living with a female friend Rishi Shah on the 12th floor of Concorde Apartments in Bandra since last month.



As Shah and some of their friends were watching television this morning, Joseph suddenly got up, ran to the window and jumped down.



His friends immediately informed local police and he was rushed to Bhabha Hospital, were he was declared dead on admission.



Police, who did not recover any suicide note from the site, are investigating the motives leading to his suicide.



Joseph's family in Bengaluru had been informed and they were expected here soon to take possession of the body, police added.



Often called a "child prodigy" for his excellent command over piano, which he started playing at the age of five, Joseph passed with top honours from the Bangalore School of Music, Royal School of Music and the Trinity College of Music.



Later, he learnt to study piano professionally at the Berklee College of Music, in Boston, USA, where he trained under veterans like Danilo Perez, Hal Crook and Jeff Covell.



Over the years, he played piano and performed at many events and venues like Blue Frog in Mumbai, Opus, Bflat & Herbs and Spices in Bengaluru, Shisha Jazz Cafe in Pune, and Rockwood Music Hall, Smalls, Fat Cat, 55 Bar and others in New York.



He also performed with Pentagram on MTV Unplugged and in the past had performed with Victor Wooten, Mike Stern, Dennis Chambers, David Binney, Amit Heri, L. Subramanium and Prasanna.



Music industry paid tributes to Joseph -- who played for the Mad Fingers music group -- terming him a genius who deserved to be far more celebrated than he was.



"Destroyed. Karan Joseph, one of the most incredible Indian musicians has committed suicide. Played with Pentagram on our MTV Unplugged set," music director Vishal Dadlani tweeted.



"He was a genius. He was quite big on the Indie music scene. Wonder what could have pushed him to the brink," Dadlani reacted to the media.
Mumbai: Actor Farhan Akhtar has expressed his grief over the gruesome murder of Pradhuman, a class 2 student at a school in Gurugram.



Farhan on Friday took to Twitter to share his sadness.



"My dear Pradyuman, My heart weeps for you and for your family at this time of unimaginable grief and pain," he tweeted.



Pradhuman was found dead on Friday by a school staffer in the washroom with his throat slit. A knife, presumably the murder weapon, was found near the body.



An angry mob on Saturday broke the lock of the school's main gate. Nobody from either the local administration or the Manohar Lal Khattar government was available for comment.



The principal of the school in Bhondsi has been suspended, informed sources said. An independent investigation by the Central Bureau of Investigation or a High Court judge has been demanded.



The protesters, including Pradhuman's parents, demonstrated outside the office of the Commissioner of Police on Sohna Road and demanded the arrest of the "real culprit".



Protests were also held outside a hospital on the Mehrauli-Gurugram (MG) road where the child's body was lying after the autopsy on Friday.
Mumbai: Despite being the son of veteran actor Shakti Kapoor, who has worked in nearly 700 films, Siddhanth says he and his sister Shraddha never asked their father to recommend them to filmmakers.

Siddhanth, who has worked in films like "Shootout at Wadala", "Ugly" and "Jazbaa", says he got all the films on merit and not by using his father's name.

In an interview with PTI, Siddhanth says, "I have got all the films on my own. I don't let him speak to anyone for me. I will go myself to the director's place and have never asked my father to make a call.

"All the six films I have done, I have got them on my own merit. He does want to help as a father. But my sister and I both have not taken help from our father. Not even one phone call has gone from him to anyone."

On the ongoing debate of nepotism and star kids having it easy in Bollywood, Siddhanth says one may get an opportunity due to family background, but talent is important for survival in the industry.

"I know how the industry works because I have grown up with a lot of star kids and stars. They are amazing people. You do get opportunity as a star kid, but after that it is only your talent which is going to take you ahead."

The 33-year-old actor says it is the baggage of expectations that makes things difficult for star kids.

"People have expectations, they compare you with your father, brother or sister. The pressure comes to your head, and it isn't easy. It's probably easier for an outsider to come here and become stars because they don't carry expectations with them.

"People never had expectations from Anushka Sharma or Kangana Ranaut but they still made it (big) because they are hard working people. We get it on the silver platter, I am not denying that. But then the expectations come."

Siddhanth started his career as an assistant director to filmmaker Priyadarshan and worked on comedy films like "Bhool Bhulaiya", "Bhagam Bhag", "Chup Chup Ke" and "Dhol".

This is in complete contrast to the choices he has made as an actor, gravitating more towards darker films like Anurag Kashyap's "Ugly" or even his latest, "Haseena Parkar".

"The films I have done have a different range because as an actor I like crazy things. Comedy is my favourite genre, and I will do a comedy film. But as an AD (assistant director), I wanted to learn a lot from behind the camera, from the scratch.

"The on-set knowledge you get is phenomenal. I want to do all kinds of role. I can be a girl too if you want, I have no hang ups. If the content is good, I will do anything," he adds.

Director Apoorva Lakhia's biopic on underworld don Dawood Ibrahim's sister Haseena Parkar is set to release on September 22. In the film, Siddhanth plays Ibrahim and insists, grey characters appeal to him the most.

"I am very intrigued with dark, grey characters. I am a very soft guy from heart, very normal. So the characters I have played so far are not me at all and that's what excites me."
Chandigarh: Union Minister Ramdas Athawale on Sunday condemned the attack on the media fraternity in Gurugram, and urged that laws be made for the protection of journalists in the country.

"Media protection is necessary. Journalists are very important to democracy, and thus, laws need to be made for their protection. They are risking their lives and working, and it is our responsibility to make sure that they are free from any pressure. Centre and states must be proactive in this regard," Athawale told ANI.

Extending complete support to the media, Athawale suggested that a commission be set up exclusively to look into the hardships faced by journalists.

"The attack on the media was also reported in Sirsa and Panchkula last month. I will speak to Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar about this. I would also like to appeal to all states to create laws to protect journalists. Additionally, the Centre must also look into the formation of a commission in this regard," he stated.

The media were on Sunday lathi-charged by the Haryana Police during the coverage of a protest being carried outside Ryan International School, where a seven-year-old child was murdered inside the school premises on Friday.

ANI personnel Naveen Yadav and Vinod Kumar sustained injuries during the baton charge conducted by the police on the protestors.

Angry parents and locals gathered outside the school premises since early morning to express dissatisfaction over the investigation being carried out by the Gurgaon Police.

The media was also attacked earlier in August following the conviction of Dera Sacha Sauda Chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh.
Chennai: Ace filmmaker AR Murugadoss said shooting his upcoming bilingual project "Spyder", featuring Telugu superstar Mahesh Babu, was extremely challenging.

The director said making a film was a tough task as they had to shoot simultaneously in Tamil and Telegu.

"While shooting bilinguals, filmmakers usually shoot the close-up sequences alone twice. But, we have walked the extra mile in 'Spyder.'

"We had even filmed some silence sequences twice to ensure authenticity in details for both Tamil and Telugu. It was a taxing experience. It's definitely not an easy task to make an authentic bilingual," AR Murugadoss told reporters at the audio launch of the movie here.

The 42-year-old filmmaker said he wanted to make "Ghajini" and "Thuppakki" in Telugu with Mahesh Babu, but things did not work out.

"Since 'Ghajini' was dubbed in Telugu, I later wanted to remake 'Thuppakki' in Telugu with Mahesh. But, it also didn't happen. When I had an exciting line for a spy thriller and approached him for a straight bilingual in Tamil and Telugu, he gave his nod immediately."

Appreciating the actor's commitment and dedication, Murugadoss said, "When we had to shoot continuously during the night for more than two months, he gave us full support without making any qualms. He was also keen to extend the call sheet if there was a need.

"Last I witnessed such commitment from an actor was when I made "Ghajini" with Aamir Khan."

Mahesh Babu said "Spyder" is an intense film with great action sequences.

"The action sequences in the movie were physically demanding. Stunt master Peter Hein has given his best effort for the film. I had a great experience working on a bilingual project for the first time."

The actor said making a foray into Tamil industry was never planned.

"Even after 18 years in the industry, I still feel like a debutante. By God's grace, I have a huge market in Andhra Pradesh. The immense love of my fans is enough for this lifetime. Since the movie is made on a huge budget it always helps to have an additional market. But I'm glad that I'm making my Tamil debut with a film like 'Spyder'," he said.

The movie features Rakul Preet as the female lead and actor-director SJ Suryah plays the antagonist.

Harris Jayaraj has composed the music for the film.

Produced by NVR Cinema and Tagore Madhu, "Spyder" will release worldwide on September 27.
New Delhi: 20 years after its launch and spending 13 years orbiting Saturn, NASA's Cassini spacecraft is all set to end its probe by performing a death-plunge into Saturn's atmosphere on September 15.

Rich with scientific and technical accomplishments, Cassini has had a super successful run and is already having a powerful influence on future explorations.

One of Cassini's biggest revelations includes unveiling Enceladus  Saturn's icy moon  and the fact that it has many of the ingredients needed for life. With this, the mission has inspired a pivot to the exploration of "ocean worlds" that has been sweeping planetary science over the past decade.

But, what happens after Cassini ends the mission? How does NASA plan to carry on its legacy and how will all the data that has been collected help future missions?

According to NASA, Jupiter's moon Europa has been a prime target for future exploration since NASA's Galileo mission, in the late 1990s, found strong evidence for a salty global ocean of liquid water beneath its icy crust.

But the more recent revelation that a much smaller moon like Enceladus could also have not only liquid water, but also chemical energy that could potentially power biology, was staggering.

That said, many lessons learned during Cassini's mission are being applied to planning NASA's Europa Clipper mission, planned for launch in the 2020s.

Europa Clipper will fly by the icy ocean moon dozens of times to investigate its potential habitability, using an orbital tour design derived from the way Cassini has explored Saturn.

Furthermore, a return to Saturn is also on the cards, says NASA. In the decades following Cassini, scientists hope to return to the Saturn system to follow up on the mission's many discoveries.

Mission concepts under consideration include spacecraft to drift on the methane seas of Titan and fly through the Enceladus plume to collect and analyze samples for signs of biology.

In addition to that, NASA also has its eyes set on probing Uranus and Neptune. So far, each of these worlds has been visited by only one brief spacecraft flyby (Voyager 2, in 1986 and 1989, respectively).

Collectively, Uranus and Neptune are referred to as "ice giant" planets, because they contain large amounts of materials (like water, ammonia and methane) that form ices in the cold depths of the outer solar system.

A variety of potential mission concepts are discussed in a recently completed study, delivered to NASA in preparation for the next Decadal Survey  including orbiters, flybys and probes that would dive into Uranus' atmosphere to study its composition.

Future missions to the ice giants might explore those worlds using an approach similar to Cassini's mission.
Chennai: A delegation of Tamil Nadu opposition parties headed by DMK working president MK Stalin on Sunday urged Governor Vidyasagar Rao to direct Chief Minister K Palaniswami to prove his majority in Tamil Nadu Assembly.

"We have demanded immediate floor test in Tamil Nadu Assembly. Governor has promised to act on this," Stalin told ANI after meeting the governor.

However, if the Governor does not respond to our request within a week, then we will have to take legal resort and mobilize people's mandate," Stalin said further.

"We have apprised the Governor of tally, which is - 89 DMK MLAs, 8 Cong MLAs, 1 IUML MLA which comes to 98. Also total rebel AIADMK MLAs are 21, thus making it 119 in total," he said.

Apprised Guv of tally - 89 DMK MLAs,8 Cong MLAs,1 IUML MLA which comes to 98,also Rebel AIADMK MLAs are 21,making it 119 in total: MK Stalin pic.twitter.com/vS1y4dW7SM  ANI (@ANI) September 10, 2017

A day before meeting the state Governor, Stalin alleged that the ruling AIADMK in the state has 'lost its majority' with the dissent by 21 of its MLAs and the DMK-led opposition commanding a strength of 98 in the House.

"With the DMK and its allies having a strength 98 MLAs in the Assembly and the ruling party's 21 dissenting legislators, the AIADMK government, led by K Palaniswami, has lost its majority in the House," PTI quotes Stalin as saying at a public meeting here on Saturday night.

Stalin said the DMK and its allies, the Congress and the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), would "point out this arithmetic" to Governor Ch Vidyasagar Rao later today.

The opposition parties have sought an appointment with the governor to apprise him of the "prevailing issues" in the state.

Stalin warned of a "people's struggle" to unseat the AIADMK government, if no action was taken.

"This is not for grabbing power, but to safeguard the self-respect of the people of Tamil Nadu," he said.

The opposition leader's comments have come at a time when Chief Minister Palaniswami is locked in a tussle for power with sidelined AIADMK deputy general secretary TTV Dhinakaran, who is seeking his ouster.

In the 234-member Tamil Nadu Assembly, which has one seat vacant (R K Nagar, represented by late J Jayalalithaa), the AIADMK has 134 MLAs, excluding the speaker. The opposition DMK has 89 legislators, its allies Congress eight and IUML one.

The Dhinakaran camp has been pressing for the ouster of Palaniswami as chief minister since the factions, led by the latter and his predecessor O Panneerselvam respectively, merged on August 21.

A group of 19 MLAs, loyal to Dhinakaran, had met the governor on August 22 and expressed lack of confidence in the chief minister, prompting the opposition parties to demand a floor test in the Assembly.

Earlier on August 31, a delegation of opposition parties, including the DMK, the Congress, the Communist Party of India (CPI) and the Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPM) met President Ram Nath Kovind, demanding a floor test in the Assembly.

The opposition parties in Tamil Nadu claimed that the government has been "reduced" to a minority with 21 MLAs owing allegiance to T.T.V. Dinakaran's AIADMK faction withdrawing their support to Chief Minister E. Palanisamy and thereby, demanded a floor test.

CPM general secretary Sitaram Yechury, who was present at the meeting, argued that a party cannot rule a state if the party doesn't command the mandate of the state and believes that a floor test is the only way to come to a solution.
Washington: President Donald Trump has urged any US residents still in Hurricane Irma's path to "just get out of its way" and not worry about possessions, as he monitored the powerful storm's advance on Florida from the secluded Camp David presidential retreat.

Irma was expected to strike the Florida Keys at daybreak today.

Trump called it a "storm of enormous destructive power" and asked "everyone in the storm path to heed all instructions, get out of its way."

"Property is replaceable but lives are not and safety has to come first," Trump said at a Cabinet meeting at the Maryland retreat, where he was spending the weekend with his wife, first lady Melania Trump. "Don't worry about it. Just get out of its way." Trump shared a brief video of his remarks on Twitter.

Irma hammered Cuba yesterday with punishing winds and rain before setting her sights on Florida, where massive evacuations were being carried out.

Trump said the US was grieving for those who were killed by Irma even before she reached the US mainland. The storm left more than 20 people dead in the Caribbean. He said the administration is monitoring the situation "around the clock" and is in "constant communications" with governors and other officials from the affected areas.

"We've never seen anything like this," he said, pledging as he did after Hurricane Harvey that recovery and rebuilding will happen quickly.

Trump has been receiving regular briefings on both Irma and Jose, along with updates on recovery and relief efforts that continue in southeast Texas and Louisiana after Harvey, the White House said. Harvey brought record rainfall and severe flooding to Houston and surrounding areas of the Texas Gulf Coast in late August before it moved on to Louisiana.

Elaine Duke, the acting head of the Department of Homeland Security, was scheduled yesterday to brief Trump and the rest of the team on the storms.

In between storm updates, Trump spent part of his fourth Cabinet meeting discussing administration priorities and how to advance them during what's left of his first year in office.

Trump recently launched a public push to rewrite the tax code to make it simpler and more competitive by cutting taxes for corporations and the middle class. He said at yesterday's meeting that he would press for Congress to complete its work on a bill even sooner this year.

"I think now, with what's happened with the hurricane, I'm going to ask for a speedup. I wanted a speedup anyway, but now we need it even more so," he said in a longer video of the meeting that was released by the White House.

North Korea was also on the agenda. Trump said the Cabinet would discuss North Korea's "latest provocative and destabilizing actions" and "the steps the United States will take to keep our people safe and, frankly, to keep the people of the world safe in this case."

North Korea deepened concerns about advances in its development of nuclear weapons by conducting its strongest nuclear test explosion to date last weekend. Trump said earlier this week that military action against a nuclear-armed North Korea remained an option.

Trump sided with Democrats this week to raise the US borrowing limit and keep the government operating through early December in a bid to speed federal assistance to hurricane victims. Congress acted quickly to pass the USD 15.3 billion deal and send it to Trump, who signed it Friday after he arrived at the Maryland retreat.

The agreement allowed Trump to taste victory after months of legislative setbacks and whet his appetite for more wins. In addition to overhauling the tax code, the president also wants new spending to upgrade roads, bridges and other infrastructure.

Trump has also given Congress six months to resolve the status of individuals who were brought to the US illegally as children after he decided earlier this week to end an Obama administration program that allowed them to live, work and attend school without fear of being deported.

The president and Mrs. Trump invited members of the Cabinet and their spouses to Camp David for the weekend, the White House said. It marked Trump's fourth visit to the retreat. He met there in August with members of his national security team, but yesterday was the first time Trump had entertained the entire Cabinet there, including Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, who turned 67 on Friday.

In a bit of deja vu, Trump was at Camp David when Harvey struck Texas last month.
Frankfurt Am Main: Germany would lend its weight to a diplomatic push to end North Korean nuclear weapons and missile development along the lines of a past deal with Iran, Chancellor Angela Merkel said today.

"I would say yes immediately if we were asked to join talks," Merkel told weekly newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung.

Talks between Iran and six world powers, sealed with a 2015 deal for Tehran to roll back its nuclear programme and submit to inspections in exchange for some sanctions being rolled back, were "a long but important period of diplomacy" that had achieved a "good end," she added.

"I could imagine such a format for the settlement of the North Korea conflict. Europe and especially Germany ought to be ready to make a very active contribution," Merkel said.

The chancellor said she had held telephone talks with the leaders of France, the United States, China, South Korea and Japan about the North Korea crisis over the past week, and is expected to speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Merkel's comments come as Washington has formally requested a Monday vote on tough new sanctions for Pyongyang at the UN Security Council.

US diplomats have called for an oil embargo, an assets freeze against leader Kim Jong-Un, a ban on textiles and an end to payments of North Korean guest workers in response to the nation's sixth nuclear test last week.

But the measures could founder on opposition from permanent Security Council members Russia and China.

Merkel said that she backed sanctions as a means of bringing North Korea to the negotiating table.
Kabul: Gunmen shot and killed at least two people in eastern Kapisa province, including the provincial chief of a religious council, a provincial official said.

Qais Qaderi, spokesman for the provincial governor, said yesterday the religious council chief, Mullah Gul Mohammad Hanafyar, was the target of the attack. He died from his wounds on the way to a hospital. His security guard was the second victim.

The attack yesterday was carried out by gunmen riding a motorcycle who shot Hanafyar as he was about to exit his vehicle near his home, said Qaderi.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, but Qaderi said that as many as eight suspects have been arrested and an investigation is underway.

Elsewhere, in western Farah province four police officers were shot and killed by insurgents, said Mohammad Naser Mehri, a spokesman for the provincial governor.

Mehri said that the attack took place Friday while all four officers were travelling from Bala Buluk district to Farah city.

No one claimed responsibility for this attack either, but Taliban insurgents are active in Bala Buluk and often attack security check points and target Afghan security forces using roadside bombs.
Washington: Florida Governor Rick Scott said on Sunday he has requested President Donald Trump to declare Hurricane Irma as a major disaster.

He also warned that devastating storm surges will hit the western coast of Florida as the hurricane churns northward.

"Areas of south Florida and The Keys have had up 12 inches of rain, and storm surge could reach 15 feet on the west coast," he said at a news conference.

Scott added, We have received direct support from 16 states. We have received National Guard from Texas among other resources."

He further said, We have done everything we can to open shelters. We have worked to make sure people get food. We have been working on getting gas in the state for this entire week. Unfortunately, now the ports are closed."

US President Donald Trump reviewed preparedness with his Cabinet colleagues at Camp David in Maryland. He asked federal and state agencies expedite assistance to affected areas.

"This is a storm of enormous destructive power, and I ask everyone in the storm's path to pay heed to all instructions from government officials," he said.

Meanwhile, as the category four storm bore down on Florida this morning, at least three deaths were reported in the state.

A man in Monroe County, which encompasses Key West, was killed after he lost control of a truck that carried a generator as winds whipped at tropical-storm strength, officials said.

Two other people, including a sheriff's deputy, died in a car crash in the rain in Hardee County, officials said. The sheriff's deputy, identified as Julie Bridges, was a 13-year veteran of the Hardee County force, Hardee County Sheriff Arnold Lanier was quoted as saying by ABC News.

On the other hand, thousands of Indian-Americans evacuated the state. Around 120,000 Indian-Americans reside across Florida while thousands of them live in the now-dangerous zones of Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Tampa.

The Indian Embassy in the US has opened a round-the-clock helpline number and rushed senior diplomats to Atlanta to lead relief efforts for Indian-Americans stuck in the region.

The hotline number is 202-258-8819. Embassy officials said India's Ambassador to the US Navtej Sarna was closely monitoring the situation, as per PTI.

Sandeep Chakravorty, India's Consul General in New York, was in Atlanta overseeing preparation for relief efforts from a 24X7 control room.

The Indian Consulate in Atlanta tweeted helpline numbers (+14044052567 & +1678179393) for people seeking assistance.

"Atlanta is fully prepared to take care of evacuees from Florida. Some have already reached. Consulate is on call 24x7," it said in another tweet.

More than one million homes and businesses have lost power in Florida as Hurricane Irma pummeled the southern part of the state, Florida Power and Light said on Sunday.

Irma crossed over the Florida Keys on Sunday morning and was headed for the state`s southwest coast with maximum sustained winds of 130 miles (215 kilometers) per hour, making it a dangerous Category 4 storm, according to the latest update from the US National Hurricane Center.

It is expected to cause billions of dollars in damage to the third-most-populous US state, a major tourism hub with an economy comprising about 5 percent of US gross domestic product, Reuters reported.

The National Weather Service (NWS) said Irma regained strength as a Category 4 storm - after being downgraded to Category 3 for more than 12 hours - as it moved to Florida.

(With Agency inputs)
New Delhi: Afghanistan Foreign Minister Salahuddin Rabbani arrived here on Sunday on a three-day visit during which he will meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi and co-chair the Indo-Afghan strategic partnership council meeting with External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj.

During the council meeting tomorrow, the two sides will discuss key bilateral and regional issues, including the security situation in the war-torn country and Indian assistance in various areas such as development and capacity- building.

Ahead of the visit, the Afghan media reported that during his meetings with the Indian leadership here, the minister is expected to renew Afghanistan's demand for greater Indian involvement in the war-ravaged nation.

India already has an extensive, USD 2 billion cooperation programme with Afghanistan and has supported road-building and the establishment of hospitals. It also trains Afghan police and army officers at military colleges in India.

India's programmes cover four broad areas infrastructure projects, humanitarian assistance, small and community-based development projects, and education and capacity development.

India has also given four military helicopters to Afghanistan which has been trying to strengthen its air power following significant cut in NATO forces. The last of the four Mi 24 attack chopper was given in November 2016.

Afghanistan has also been seeking India's assistance in making functional Soviet-era helicopters and transport aircraft which were not in flying condition.

This is first high-level meeting between India and Afghanistan after US President Donald Trump has unveiled his Afghan strategy where he envisages greater Indian role.

After the meeting of the council, the two sides are expected to exchange two pacts followed by statements by Swaraj and the visiting minister.
Dubai: Iran says it warned off a US Navy warship during a rescue of a boat in the Gulf of Oman, while American officials say there was no direct contact.

The US Navy said today the incident happened Wednesday and involved a small vessel some 75 nautical miles from the USS Tempest, a coastal patrol boat.

The Navy says another boat much closer offered assistance, with that vessel communicating with Iranian naval forces.

Iran offered a different version of the incident. Press TV, the English-language arm of its state broadcaster, said today that the Iranian navy "warned off an American warship" while rescuing the stranded dhow, a traditional ship.

The US and Iran routinely have tense encounters in the Persian Gulf.
Beijing: Nepal's Foreign Minister Krishna Bahadur Mahara on Sunday called for more Chinese investments in the Himalayan nation, saying Kathmandu is focused on increasing connectivity with Beijing.

Inaugurating the newly-established office of the Consulate General of Nepal at the port city of Guangzhou in China, Mahara, who is also the deputy prime minister, said: "there are good opportunities for investments in inter-country railways, roads and transmission lines".

"Nepal is focusing on investment in infrastructure development and inter-country economic sector in order to increase connectivity between both the countries," the visiting Nepalese leader said.

He also expressed belief that the office will contribute in strengthening bilateral ties and broaden relations in the economic sector, Nepal's foreign ministry said.

Mahara said that economic and trade activities will surge with the establishment of the consulate.

He also added that the relations between people of the two countries will enhance further in the coming days.

Foreign Minister Mahara is on a six-day visit to China for talks with senior Chinese leaders on the invitation of his counterpart Wang Yi.

Nepal in May inked a deal with China to join Chinese President Xi Jinping's ambitious 'One Belt One Road' (OBOR) initiative to link Asia with Europe.

The newly-established consulate is Nepal's fourth such office in China.

There are 200 Nepalese businessmen engaged in various businesses in Guangzhou.
Cox Bazar: The United Nations has appealed for aid to deal with a humanitarian crisis unfolding in southern Bangladesh after the number of Muslim Rohingya fleeing Myanmar neared 300,000, just two weeks after violence erupted there.

The wave of hungry and traumatised refugees is "showing no signs of stopping", overwhelming agencies in the Cox`s Bazar region already helping hundreds of thousands displaced by previous spasms of conflict in Myanmar`s Rakhine state, the U.N. said.

"It is vital that aid agencies working in Cox`s Bazar have the resources they need to provide emergency assistance to incredibly vulnerable people who have been forced to flee their homes and have arrived in Bangladesh with nothing," the U.N. Resident Coordinator in Bangladesh Robert Watkins said.

He said in a statement late on Saturday that agencies urgently needed $77 million to cope with an emergency that was triggered when Rohingya insurgents attacked police posts and an army base on Aug. 25, prompting a military counter-offensive.

The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) insurgent group declared a month-long unilateral ceasefire, starting on Sunday, to enable aid groups bring humanitarian aid to those still in the northwestern state of Buddhist-majority Myanmar.

The impact of ARSA`s move is unclear, but it does not appear to have been able to put up significant resistance against the military force unleashed in Rakhine state, where thousands of homes have been burned down and dozens of villages destroyed.

Thousands of displaced people in Rakhine have been stranded or left without food for weeks. Many are still trying to cross mountains, dense bush and rice fields to reach Bangladesh.

Red Cross organisations are scaling up their operations in Rakhine after the U.N. had to suspend activities there following government suggestions that its agency had supported the insurgents. The U.N. has evacuated non-critical staff from the area over the past two weeks.

VILLAGES BURNT DOWN

In its ceasefire statement, ARSA called on the military to lay down arms and allow humanitarian aid to all affected people.

Myanmar says its security forces are carrying out clearance operations to defend against ARSA, which the government has declared a terrorist organisation.

Rights monitors and fleeing Rohingya say the army and Rakhine Buddhist vigilantes have mounted a campaign of arson aimed at driving out the Muslim population.

About a dozen Muslim villages were burned down on Friday and Saturday in the ethnically mixed Rathedaung region of Rakhine, two sources monitoring the situation said.

"Slowly, one after another, villages are being burnt down - I believe that Rohingyas are already wiped out completely from Rathedaung," said one of the sources, Chris Lewa of the Rohingya monitoring group the Arakan Project.

It was unclear who set fire to the villages, located in a part of northwest Myanmar far from where the insurgents launched their attacks last month. Independent journalists are not allowed into the area.

Three Rohingya were killed by landmines on Saturday as they tried to cross from Myanmar, a Bangladeshi border guard said, and an official with a non-government organisation said two more were injured on Sunday.

In Cox`s Bazar, a Reuters reporter saw about 40 Rohingya, mainly women and children, arriving early on Sunday after a four-day trek and then a border crossing by fishing boat.

"The sea was very rough but we made it here somehow," said 25-year-old Rashidullah, one of the group that was looking for temporary shelter on the beach in an area where there is no room left in refugee camps.

The International Crisis Group said in a report that the strife in Rakhine is causing more than a humanitarian crisis.

"It is also driving up the risks that the country`s five-year-old transition from military rule will stumble, that Rohingya communities will be radicalised, and that regional stability will be weakened," it said.

Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi has come under international pressure to halt the violence. Critics complain that Suu Kyi, who won a Nobel peace prize in 1991 for championing democracy, has failed to speak out for a minority of her country that has long complained of persecution.
September 6, 2017

Morocco has joined the list of countries where Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is pursuing the followers and sympathizers of the Hizmet (Service) movement. Like many countries, Morocco has succumbed to Ankaras pressure and arrested individuals affiliated with the movement that Fethullah Gulen established in 1970.

In January, the Moroccan government announced it was closing several schools that Turkish contractors affiliated with the Hizmet movement had run in the country since 1994. The shutdown was in response to official Turkish orders that classify the group as terrorist and accuse it of being implicated in the failed coup attempt of July 2016.

The Ministry of Interior accused the educational institutions of turning the educational sector into fertile land for promotion of Gulens ideologies and spreading a line of thought that goes against Moroccos religious and educational standards.

A source close to Gulenist circles in Morocco told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity that the Moroccan authorities have been holding four Turks captive since March. The source said that the Moroccan Court of Cassation decided to hand over two of them to the Turkish authorities, but the decision has not been implemented and awaits approval from the Moroccan government. The captives concerned are Esmat Bakay, the owner of a clothes retail company in Casablanca, and Farhat Erdogan, who has lived in Morocco since 2011.

The source added, The UN Committee against Torture intervened and asked the Moroccan authorities to put the decision on hold temporarily until the issue is re-examined. The committee is concerned that the Turkish citizens might be tortured in case they are deported to Ankara.

The other two Turks under arrest are Mustafa Onder, a former teacher at a Gulen-affiliated school in Morocco, and Eidin Elmez, who manages a pastry shop. They await the Sept. 9 decision of the Moroccan Court of Cassation, human rights sources told Al-Monitor. They said Onder and Elmez are not hopeful and believe their verdict will be similar to their two friends because it is a matter of politics.

Attempts by Al-Monitor to get an official comment on the matter went unanswered. One government official told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity that he had no information on the matter.

The source with Gulenist connections in Morocco said, The problem is that the Moroccan Court of Cassation should verify the evidence and the accusations against the men before ruling. But the court is biased toward the Turkish authorities and is acting as though all charges are correct. We were shocked to see this in Morocco because we never did anything to bother the Moroccan authorities, and we expected Morocco to stay out of this dispute.

The Turkish authorities accused the four Turks of being affiliated with and funding a terrorist organization. The Moroccan court is only in charge of verifying the charges and handing over the accused to Turkey per the extradition agreement between the two countries from 1989.

But why is Morocco caving to Erdogans pressure and agreeing to participate in his war to eradicate the religious group outside Turkey? Idris al-Kanabouri, an independent researcher on the affairs of Islamist groups, said that Morocco has trade and economic interests in Turkey it does not want to jeopardize.

Kanabouri told Al-Monitor, The developments did not come as a surprise after the shutdown of the Gulen-affiliated Al-Fatih schools months ago. Erdogan is linking cooperation and friendship ties with countries to respond to his demands to close the schools and pursue their members. He is also trying to pressure the United States to hand over Gulen, who is in US territory  but in vain.

Kanabouri noted that Morocco enjoys sovereignty in its national decisions and must not get carried away with Erdogans policies.

Emri Dimir, the former editor-in-chief of the French edition of Zaman newspaper close to the Hizmet movement, told Al-Monitor that the Moroccan stance that is biased toward Erdogan is in Moroccos economic interests as well as the new foreign policy it has followed for almost a year.

Erdogan already asked the Moroccan king to close the schools affiliated with Hizmet in 2015, but the king did not oblige. The change in stance can be seen as Moroccos attempt to adopt a balanced foreign policy between the different axes and to diversify partners. Economically, there are huge investment incentives that Erdogan can offer Morocco, especially from the industrial groups close to him, Dimir said.

According to the source close to Gulenist circles, dozens of Turks who live in Morocco and are affiliated with Gulens group left the Moroccan territories weeks ago for fear of pursuit. The source said, As soon as the Turkish authorities want someone handed over, they are arrested in Morocco. The Turkish Embassy presents reports about any Gulenist suspects. For that reason, those who have European visas left Morocco as soon as they could, while the others are waiting for the opportunity to flee.

The security authorities have asked several Moroccan religious figures who openly sympathize with the Hizmet movement to halt communication with it and keep their distance, according to sources close to these figures who spoke to Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity. Ahmed Abbadi, the secretary-general of the Mohammadia League of Scholars, which is an official religious institution, is a strong advocate of Gulens ideology in Morocco and a regular contributor to Hira magazine funded by the Hizmet movement that has been distributed in Morocco for years.

Dimir argued, Gulen calls for classic Sunni Islam marked by moderation, which does not threaten Moroccos religious norms, but is close to them. Otherwise, Moroccan authorities wouldnt have allowed Gulen to organize activities that official Moroccan clerics and figures influenced by him repeatedly attended.

He noted that Morocco, by going too far in cracking down on the Gulenists, is losing an objective ally that shares a similar religious vision and joining hands with Erdogan, who has a Muslim Brotherhood perspective.
YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 7, ARMENPRESS. President of the National Assembly of Artsakh Ashot Ghulyan has issued a welcome address to the participants of Armenia: A Look to the Future First Armenian Political Scientific Forum of Moscow. As ARMENPRESS was informed from the press service of the parliament of Artsakh, the address reads as follows,

Dear colleagues,

I warmly welcome the participants and guests of the Armenia: A Look to the Future first Armenian political scientific forum.

The Russian Federation, along with the other OSCE Minsk Group co-chair countries  France and U.S. - continues to play an important role in the settlement of the Azerbaijani-Karabakh conflict and in establishment of peace in the region. Therefore, the initiative on discussing the issues related to the security, doing multiple observation over them and giving scientific recommendations is actual.

Several days ago, on September 2nd, we celebrated the 26th anniversary of proclamation of the Republic. September 21st will mark the 26th anniversary of the proclamation of the Republic of Armenia. The steps of the two Armenian republics towards strengthening the independent statehood and sovereignty being parallel, at the same time were and continue to be on the one surface  on the Armenian surface.

I hope that the representable staff of the forum will allow to make a deep and professional observation over the issues included in the agenda and will become a demanded scientific platform.

I wish all the participants of the forum fruitful work, peace and prosperity.
AMSTERDAM, The NetherlandsThe thought of what not to do when spending money on your business turned into a goldmine of practical advice Saturday at Webmaster Access.

I dont think you should spend money where you dont have the opportunity to share your message, Brad Mitchell, CEO of MojoHost, told the audience during the lead-off seminar titled Taking Charge in North America.

When it comes to B2B marketing, some of the best promotion is absolutely free. Share your story.

Mitchell joined a parade of seasoned executives on the Seminar Stage at the DoubleTree by Hilton for a series of educational sessions sponsored by Stripchat with an international theme. With talk ranging from banking in Amsterdam to nightlife in Bucharest to granny porn in Germany, there was hardly a dull moment at the 13th annual conference.



Panels dedicated to maximizing opportunities in various major regions around the world kept attendees engaged and informed on the second full day of the three-day show presented by iMonetizeIt, TopOffers and Aurora Global.

Moderated by veteran industry attorney Corey Silverstein inside the jammed-to-capacity Leeds 1 Meeting Room, the discussion about doing better business in North America also featured Jamie Rodriguez (Flirt4Free), Jo Merlone (Kiwi Sourcing), Katy (BongaCash) and Todd Spaits (YanksVR).

The founder and chief marketing officer of YanksCash, who holds an MBA from the University of Washington, said the foundation of his company is the 100-percent female-produced content on its flagship site, Yanks.com.

You need a compelling story, Spaits said. You need to have a narrative that people want to be involved in.

Switching topics, Silverstein noted its much harder than it used to be to make a profit in adult.

Just throwing something up isnt enough, Silverstein said.

Mitchell agreed. The 17-year industry veteran, whose company manages an active client list of 700 but has an inactive list of 1000, remarked, I think people dont give enough thought to having a whole business plan or proper budget. Ive seen a generational changing of people every four or five years, and then theres a portion of us you just cant kill.

The best piece of advice I can give is to build something of lasting value, something that has shelf life.

Silverstein asked the panel to recommend what could be done to keep todays affiliate intrigued.

Number One is personalized care, said Katy, who is senior affiliate manager for BongaCash. Every affiliate now has a personal manager. The Number One mistake of affiliates is they dont speak enough with their affiliate managers. They register, but dont really go deeply into it.



Flirt4Frees Director of Product Jamie Rodriguez echoed the sentiment, citing an example of a new cam model who signs up for her platform but then doesnt stay in contact.

Youll see better results by having that clear communication, Rodriguez said.

Tucked between the lineup of international panels, Webmaster Access hosted a lively discussion with six industry heavyweights who took one of the most far-reaching topics of the weekendAge Verification and the U.K. Law.

Tim Henning of ASACP moderated the panel that included Steve Winyard (AV Secure), David Cooke (AgeID), Vince Charlton (AdultWork), Rudd Apsey (VeriMe), Alastair Graham (Xcreds) and Eric Paul Leue (Free Speech Coalition).

Speaking before a standing-room-only crowd, the group shared their knowledge about how to prepare for the U.K.s Digital Economy Act, which takes effect in April 2018.

Cooke, the director of digital & new media for AgeID in Mindgeeks London office, said it was incredibly refreshing to be consulted by U.K. government officials who are crafting the Act.

They want to make a law that works, Cooke said.

Apsey, the managing director of VeriMe who is well-versed in dealing with regulators, consumers and the moral lobbyists in the U.K., suggested that the whole world is watching how the adult industry will respond to the law.

There are a lot of eyeballs on this, Apsey said. If we get it right in the U.K. the principle will be adapted in other parts of the world, like gaming and gambling.

That Age Verification session paved the way for an entertaining panel focused on how to establish your business footprint in Eastern Europe. Experts from the region including Vuk Popovic (Quantox), Igor Komarenko (Aurora Global), Alex Osminin (TrafficHunt), Max Akhlestin (LeadBit) and Mugur Frunzetti (Studio 20) took the stage for the high-energy exchange moderated by YNOT co-owner Jay Kopita.

Frunzetti, who is based in Romania but earned his Masters from Cal-Berkeley, owns a global network of live cam studios operating in Europe and the U.S. He called Romania one of the safest countries in the world to do business and as long as you follow rules and get good written advice from your lawyer, you wont have any problem setting up shop in his country.

Komarenko, who is based in Ukraine, pointed out that low salaries in Eastern Europethe average is 300-500 euros per monthmake it challenging to start something there. Quantoxs Popovic agreed, saying the average salary in his home country of Serbia is 400 a month.

But that doesnt mean there is any lack of talent in terms of finding talented web developers in Eastern Europe, the group added.

The quality is very high, Komarenko said.

Alex Osminin, the CEO of TrafficHunt, revealed that porn is actually illegal in Ukraine.

If you do adult in Ukraine, dont tell anybody, he joked. But fortunately the law is old and nobody care unless its out in the open, Osminin added.

Komarenko, a native of Kiev, said a person technically could be jailed even if you have porn on your hard drive.

Somehow, the banter shifted to the club scene in Eastern Europe, prompting Popovic to declare he has traveled the world and finds the only place with better nightlife than Belgrade is Bucharest.

YNOTs Jay Kopita concurred.

If I had the means and the time I would live in Bucharest, Kopita said.

The Profiting in Germany panel, led by Porndoes Head of Business Development Yannick Ferreri, featured insights from Francis Kinder (TrafficPartner), Sebastian Konig (Exoclick), Patrick Friedrich (ECardon Payments), Andy Wullmer (SGM Media); Lars Bleck (affiliate) and Paul Kluzak (CCBill).

Kluzak, the European sales executive for CCBill who has been with the Arizona-based firm for 15 years, said his grandfather immigrated from Germany to the U.S.

You need to have a bank where your traffic is, Kluzak said. If you dont, conversions will be shit.

Francis Kinder, the senior sales manager for TrafficPartner who has worked in marketing since 2011, shared that in his view, Age is more important than geo.

Age targeting is also important, said Kinder, who is responsible for the acquisition of new traffic sources for TrafficPartner, one of the largest operators of Casual Dating communities in Europe. Theres a big difference between an 18-year-old user and a 60-year-old user. A product targeted for an older audience will make the most money.

The panel emphasized localization, or focusing on niches that perform better in specific regions.

In Germany, the granny stuff never gets old, cracked Lars Bleck, who started with an international online advertising network in 2005 and this month began working as an independent affiliate with a focus on dating and media buying.

Its true, Ferreri added. It sells like fucking crazy.

Sebastian Konig, the German market specialist for ExoClick, said, For us, granny dating is the big thing. Germans are kinky fucks.

Ferreri stressed the importance of having translators for each country to keep pages true to the native language and way of speaking.

If you dont have that native speaker theyll spot you very quickly, Ferreri said.

Blowjob is different in every language, but the sign language is the same.

In the hometown favorite Navigating the Netherlands panel, AVN Hall of Fame webmaster Patrick The Hun, founder of The Huns Yellow Pages, said its hard to get a loan here if you own an adult company.

They only give you a loan if you can prove you dont need it, The Hun said, drawing laughter from another wall-to-wall audience.

He was joined by moderator Norman Hauwert (Leaseweb) and fellow panelists Bram (DatingCash), Jacco Kwakkel (YourChoice.nl), Mike de Jong (Verotel), Leon Dijksman (Telefuture) and MojoHosts Brad Mitchell, who recently set up a Dutch corporation for his industry-leading web hosting company.

We thought we would be serving our customers better if we set up Dutch banking, Mitchell reasoned. An LLC in Netherlands is a BV. Its a lot more paperwork here than in the US.

Hauwert, a hosting veteran also known as The Batman, noted its easier to receive your customers outside of Amsterdam.

Getting hereparking your car hereits a nightmare and expensive, he said. Make sure you stay in the area of Schiphol [Airport], especially when youre doing international business.

Mike de Jong, who does global business development for Verotel, said in The Netherlands credit cards are the last form of payment citizens use.

Were active in 22 countries doing carrier billing and this is the worst country, de Jong said.

It is legal to shoot porn in a private residence in The Netherlands, the group reassured.

Be careful about shooting in church, cracked The Hun.

In a first for Webmaster Access, Japan received a spotlight as the team from Japanese media giant DMM.comparent company of R18.comdelivered a special presentation about their remarkable market share in the country.

Angela Azzarone led the discussion with her colleagues Paolo Ragone, Mingchang Tsai, Alain Garcia and Haruka.

Garcia, a native of Spain who is DMMs overseas department manager, said DMM.comfounded in 1999boasts 25 million registered users, employs 3000 people and did $1.8 billion in sales last year.

They offer a whopping 40 different products and services, including adult videos, Manga, solar panels, robots, games, live chat, dating, adult toys and more. Without disclosing specific sales figures for their adult division, Garcia estimated it is in the hundreds of millions of dollars a year.

Garcia kept the startling figures coming, noting DMM began releasing virtual reality content last December and already has 2000 VR movies in its library.

Sales for VR last month was three million dollarsjust for VR, Garcia added matter-of-factly.

DMM releases 2000 adult movieseach two to three hours in lengthevery month. Perhaps most notable, Garcia said adult performers genitalia is censored in Japanin other words, its illegal to show it.

Japanese porn is the weirdest porn in the world, even more than German porn, said Paolo Ragone, a native of Italy who is the global marketing planner in charge of DMMs affiliate management system, campaign optimization and traffic acquisition.

Its traumatizing to work in the Japanese porn industry, but its fun, Ragone added with a grin.

Haruka, who is in charge of social media and events, said DMM is placing more emphasis on content creation for blogs going foreward in addition to maintaining a specific strategy for Instagram, Twitter and Tumblr.

Responding to a variety of audience questions, Garcia revealed that in Japan 99 percent of the cam girls log on at a studio location like its their office.

They dont like to do it from home by themselves. They think its a joke, Garcia said.

Mingchang Tsai, a native of Taiwan who is global marketing division chief, told the audience that we dont sell traffic from DMM.com.

We do have some exclusive publishers working with us and we sell their trafficbillions of impressions every single day and millions of clicks, Tsai said.

With six seminars complete, attendees got ready for the Big Bash at the Sea Palace, the countrys first floating restaurant, across from the hotel. Sponsored by Epoch, Stripchat and Gamma, the bash went off on the second floor of the scenic landmark, characterized by Chinese pagoda-style architecture and its authentic Cantonese cuisine.

Amsterdam-based DJ Nafthaly Ramona kept the party moving, while guests enjoyed the open bar and views of the canal and skyline. The final full day of Webmaster Access gets underway at 11 a.m. with Speed Networking and the Up Close and Virtual seminar.

For additional coverage of WMA, click here.

Photo from left: Eric Paul Leue, Vince Charlton, Rudd Apsey, Alastair Graham, David Cooke & Steve Winyard, courtesy of ShootXEvents.
A vile strain of racial tension has infected our national discourse.Cable "news" and radio talk shows add to the rancor, which is traceable.Policies and rhetoric from the highest levels of our government have left us unprotected from those who poison American ideals with bigotry and raw hate.An example from a mayoral candidate in Charlotte is as scary as it is nauseating. Not surprisingly, North Carolina has again gained national attention.And, again, it's not the welcome kind.The candidate, Republican Kimberley Paige Barnette, made it a point last week to declare that she is indeed "white."As The Charlotte Observer reported , Barnette turned to Facebook to post:N.C. GOP Chairman Robin Hayes would typically not comment on a local race.But in this case, he did."Any suggestion that a candidate is more or less qualified for political office based on their skin color alone, is offensive to North Carolina Republicans and we condemn it," Hayes said in a statement. "This type of suggestion has no place in our public discourse."Of course it doesn't. But in today's America, the message resonates with a swath of voters, who use it to fuel their hate-filled fires.Barnette, who is 53, has removed the viral post, the Charlotte paper said. Barnette, wrote The New York Times, apologized if she offended anyone. She said she wasn't suggesting she was a better candidate because of her skin color.But she mentioned it anyway.Sadly, some still think the reprehensible acts that sullied the streets of Charlottesville are isolated, disconnected from the hearts and minds of common America.They would be very wrong.Probably emboldened by aforementioned segments of our leadership in Washington, D.C., American citizens have become disturbingly audacious and reckless. With laser-like precision, they spew all sorts of vitriol - targeting race, ethnicity, religion, the Right, and the Left.Our most recent former president is a frequent target. Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un aren't.Hayes was right for condemning Barnette's post.Hayes said in the statement,Hayes is quoting the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.It's part of King's historic "I have a dream" speech. A speech, by the way, that King made in 1963.
Charter schools get more high and low grades than traditional district schools

The State Board of Education released a slew of data during its September board meeting, and while the numbers show higher graduation rates and overall improvement in school performance, significant challenges over low performers and poverty rates remain.Nearly every school in North Carolina each year receives a letter grade - ranging from A to F - based on student achievement and growth.The majority of all schools earned a C or higher, with 3.5 percent getting the highest grade - A +NG. A +NG schools don't have a significant achievement or graduation gap. Only 3.8 percent of schools earned an A. Schools with a B grade made up 28.5 percent of all schools, while 41.6 percent received a C grade.On the other end of the grading scale, 18.7 percent of schools earned a D and 4 percent received an F. The number of schools getting both grades dropped from last year, while schools scoring a B or higher increased.Public charter schools had a higher percentage of A/A +NG and B grades, totaling 43.9 percent compared to 35.2 percent of district schools. However, charter schools also had a higher share of D and F grades with 25.2 percent compared with 22.5 percent of district schools.Public schools set a record graduation rate for the 12th consecutive year: 86.5 percent of students graduated within four years of entering ninth grade. The percentage rose from 85.9 percent for the 2015-16 school year.Bill Cobey, chairman of the State Board of Education, said in a press release The state superintendent of public schools, Mark Johnson, echoed Cobey's words.Johnson said.While graduation rates and school performance grades improved, the number of low-performing schools and districts also increased.In the 2015-16 school year, 489 schools and 10 districts were identified as low-performing. Of the 489 schools, 415 were designated as recurring low-performing schools. In 2016-17, the ranks of low performing schools rose to 505 and districts to 11. Recurring low-performing schools totaled 468.A connection between poverty rates and low-performing schools continues, as schools with 50 percent or more of their students living at or below the poverty line earned more Cs, Ds, and Fs than schools with lower poverty rates.Lisa Godwin, the N.C. Teacher of the Year board advisor, said.The General Assembly launched a new strategy in 2016 to help low performing schools called the Innovative School District , giving control of some of North Carolina's lowest performing schools for five years to charter school management.Eric Hall, the Innovative School District superintendent, revealed 48 schools that qualify for the program. Hall will continue to work over the next month to narrow the list. The board will pick the schools by December.Hall said.
The Democrat leadership has made constant, profound and incredible pronouncements that one's supportive vote for Republicans is tantamount to surrendering Democracy forever. Understanding their sincere thinking in their extreme position: How will you still vote on this election day?

Democrat; because the continuance of this Democracy from the existential threat of extreme Republicans is paramount.

Republican; the process of having a choice is the democratic method within what so called "Democracy" does exists.
President Trump spent his first day as a Democratic president on Wednesday. After months of being excoriated as a racist and a nut by the Democratic Party, Democrats suddenly found a man they could work with - and Trump seemed to revel in it. The day began with a rally in North Dakota, where Trump talked up Democratic Senator Heidi Heitkamp, whom he called a "good woman." He explained, "These are great people. They work hard. They're for you 100 percent."Next, Trump headed back to the White House, where he expressed his hope that President Obama's executive amnesty would be enshrined in law by the Republican Congress. He followed up that doozy by undercutting Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R-WI) and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) by siding with Democratic leaders House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) on raising the debt ceiling. McConnell and Ryan wanted either a clean funding bill for the Hurricane Harvey relief, or such relief connected with other Republican priorities and wrapped up in an eighteen-month debt ceiling increase that would take Republicans beyond the election. Instead, Trump signed off on combining Hurricane Harvey relief with a three-month debt ceiling increase, a total Democratic victory that also gives Democrats the upper hand in budget negotiations in December.So, what's driving Trump to this?A few factors.Trump was elected while stating repeatedly and boisterously that everything would be simple: health care reform, immigration reform, tax reform. All of it would happen so quickly it would make your head spin. You'd win and win and win so much you'd get tired of winning. Etcetera. None of that has materialized, because it turns out that the presidency doesn't operate like Trump thought it would. He doesn't just get to do rallies and then wait for legislation to arrive on his desk. He has to get his hands dirty, negotiate, wheel and deal - all the things he's spent his career saying he does better than anyone else, even though he never did any of it particularly well. Trump is a brand. He's not a negotiator, and he's not a dealmaker. He never was. Now he's angry that Republicans are forcing him into the position of doing a job he never thought he'd have to do.Trump's campaign praise for Heitkamp is telling. While she has voted with him 50% of the time, he apparently likes her; the same isn't true for Senator Jeff Flake (R-AZ), who votes with Trump 93% of the time, but has been beaten senseless by Trump publicly. That's because Flake had the temerity to challenge Trump publicly, and Trump hates him. He doesn't feel the same about Heitkamp, or even about Chuck Schumer.That dichotomy is attributable to Trump's different expectations of Republicans and Democrats. Trump had high expectations for Republicans: he wanted their undying loyalty, and he wanted them to do his job for him. Trump has no expectations for Democrats - he knows they hate him, he doesn't expect them to work with him. That means that any sign of affection or bipartisanship from Democrats comes with an added grain of enjoyment.All of this is particularly true of Ryan and McConnell. Trump hated Ryan - he campaigned against him as much as against the Democrats in 2016. He sees him as a weakling, a pathetic accountant. He thinks Ryan is ineffective. He thinks the same of McConnell. Both Ryan and McConnell have, in small ways, refused to pay homage to Trump's character. That makes Trump angry. What makes him even angrier is that their inability to garner a Republican majority to pass significant legislation has been on display. That's why Trump took positive pleasure, according to Axios, in slapping both Ryan and McConnell today. He wants them to feel the pain.Combine Trump's frustration with the day-to-day grind with his frustration with Republicans' ineffectiveness - and then combine those with the fact that Trump doesn't care about policy. That's a recipe for Trump to look to greener pastures. That's precisely what Trump is doing.Trump is particularly interested in working with Democrats because he has always cared what New York Democrats think. He's spent his entire life being treated as nouveau riche by the upper crust Manhattan elite, and he's always craved their attention and acceptance. That's why he reads The New York Times and obsesses about its coverage; that's why he gives exclusive interviews to the newspaper he supposedly hates most. Now he could get some of it by working with Schumer and Pelosi. After all, Trump said during the campaign that he didn't care too much if the Republicans lost the Senate - he could always work with Democrats. He's said for years that he likes and respects both Schumer and Pelosi. If they show him a little leg, they could easily seduce him.Trump's in a comfortable situation. He knows that a huge percentage of his base simply doesn't care what he does - he masterfully exploited the reactionary anger against Hillary Clinton to establish himself as the Hillary-Slayer. Now he can do no wrong. In the past 72 hours, large segments of the same base that cheered him shouting about deporting millions of illegal immigrants are cheering him pushing DACA; members of the same base that decried Ryan and McConnell as shills doing the bidding of Democrats are cheering him for coddling Pelosi and Schumer. After all, Trump's still hitting the "establishment"!Finally, Trump's frustration with inaction could lead him down the primrose path to pandering to Democrats. Let's say that 61% of the Republican base will follow Trump no matter what (that's the poll number from CNN). And let's say that Democrats are willing to work with Trump in order to push their priorities ... at least until we near 2020 and they move to stab him in the back. Trump can easily grab majority support for Left-leaning policies.All of which means that Ryan and McConnell are now on the hook: they'd better start passing conservative legislation themselves. They can't rely on Trump for leadership or support. But if they don't begin putting conservative legislation on his desk to sign, he'll continue to hobnob with Schumer and Pelosi.
Best Razors for Shaving Your Head

The Best Tools for Achieving a Clean, Sleek Dome

The AskMen editorial team thoroughly researches & reviews the best gear, services and staples for life. AskMen may get paid if you click a link in this article and buy a product or service.

Shaving can be a daunting and treacherous experience for the average man. Being misinformed by major marketing ploys from companies can lead to difficult dates in the bathroom. The selection process for choosing razors can sometimes be a whirlwind of pain and first class ticket to irritation to the skin. Various parts of the body may require more attention when its comes to introducing it to metal blades.

RELATED: How to Shave Your Head

The head remains one of the most delicate areas to shave. At best, they should be taken with sensitivity, time, and effective preparation and exit strategy. With head shaves, its important to understand your bone structure and razor limitations; the skin may be listed as the largest organ in the body but its not immune to receiving wounds, bruises, scars, and cuts.

What to Consider When Shopping for a Razor to Shave Your Head

Sharpness: What kind of machinery will you need?

What kind of machinery will you need? Blades: How many blades does your skin type allow?

How many blades does your skin type allow? Prep: Will you need extra preparation tools (ex. Lubrication products)

Will you need extra preparation tools (ex. Lubrication products) Cleanliness: Is it easy to maintain?

Electric shavers are a great base for achieving a clean cut for the head. Unlike like using razors on the head, its the most time-efficient process. With a simple plug in or even wireless device(s) it's a sure way to eliminate length without any risks of cutting yourself or irritating the skin. See below for our top picks that marry efficiency, cost and longevity of product.

Best for a Quick, Close Shave

Andis Shaver 17200

Andis

This candy bar designed clipper is always ready to work. Its compact and lightweight making it super easy to control in the hands. One thing to keep in mind is that the bronze foil-attachment) should be cleaned out after every 2x times of using to extend the lifespan. Replacements are sold separately and easily be order online. The shaver is built with a lithium-ion battery. After one full charge the shaver lasts an impressive eighty minutes of shaving time, which is more than almost any other shaver on the market today. Note: For maximum removal of stubble, its better to cut in the opposite direction of hair growth. After a couple runs along the scalp, the shaver finishes strong with a quick & easy takedown.

$69.33 at Amazon.com

Most Luxurious Shaver

Braun Series 9

Braun



Braun Series 9 is another part of the supreme collection of electric shavers within the Braun family. The German-made blades are equipped with a rotating head for comfortability allowing a smooth glide. Its also packed with a locking mode on that will stabilize the head in 1-5 positions. Braun Series 9 is a fully flexible shaving system which adapts to all the sections of the head. It may be striking to the wallet but the advanced technology of this device guarantees proper execution & superiority. It includes a charging station with a built-in fan to dry off the razor minimizing any additional cleanup work.

$239.14 at Amazon.com

Best for Clipper Fans

Wahl Balding Clipper

Wahl

The name speaks for itself because thats exactly what these Wahl Clippers are made to do: Bald. If skin irritation and ingrown hairs are an ongoing concern for you these are ones for the toiletry arsenal. Not only is the motor very powerful, but the teeth on the blade are tightly knit for that single pass that can remove virtually all visible hair. With this level of power, there are some small maintenance responsibilities which includes brushing out any hair that may get caught underneath the blade. Its also recommended to oil your clippers, after each use, to make sure theyre continuing to cut effectively after each pass.

$59.86 at Amazon.com

Best for Cordless Control

Bevel Trimmer

Bevel

We love the sleek design of this cordless trimmer from Bevel. You get up to eight hours of use on a single charge, while the body shape makes it easy to hold and control with a single hand. The blade itself is sharp and easily adjustable, and treated with an antimicrobial coating to repel dirt and oil. The screwdriver-free design makes this thing very easy to clean, too.

$199.95 at GetBevel.com

Best Budget Option

HeadBlade ATX

HeadBlade

Part of a successful head shave is being able to attack certain tight, troublesome spots like behind the ears, folds of the neck etc. With the newest Head Blade ATX, youre able to do just that. Unlike any four-blade or more system on the market, it features two wheels on the device that increases control and pacing as it glides smoothly across the head like a moving train. The length of the ATX is only about the width of three fingers and smaller than a safety razor. Its ability to adjust to all heads is supported by the metal spring that is attached below the blades which is an immediate call to comfort. After a couple tries, your hands easily conform to this standout device and head shaving surely will never be the same.

$15 at Amazon.com

Best Classic Design Option

Harrys The Winston



Harrys has been stirring the pot in the shaving world. Their latest release includes the refined Winston handle. Its presented with a sturdy, sleek handle made up of aluminium. Furthermore, theres a rubberized attachment in the middle which leaves you in total command of the head shave. Its German engineering & Swedish steel carry a reputation of excellence when talking razor composition. The lubricating strip (top) makes up for a smooth finish. If youre a person of diligence, it wont hurt your wallet to know the individual blades start at $2 or simply grab the entire kit which includes its soft products for a complete set. Read our review of the Harry's subscription box here.

$20 at Harrys.com

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By Tulay Karadeniz and Dirimcan Barut ANKARA (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump and Turkey's Tayyip Erdogan spoke on Saturday and agreed to continue to work toward stronger ties and regional security, Erdogan's office said, a day after he lashed out at U.S. authorities for indicting one of his ex-ministers. Ties between the United States and its NATO ally have been strained by Washington's support for the YPG Kurdish fighters in the battle against Islamic State in Syria. Turkey considers the YPG a terrorist group. Ankara has also been frustrated by what it sees as Washington's reluctance to extradite the Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen. Turkey blames Gulen, who has lived in Pennsylvania since 1999, for last year's failed coup. "Noting the strategic partnership between Turkey and the United States, the two leaders emphasized the importance of continuing to work together to further strengthen bilateral relations and increase stability in the region," the Turkish Presidency said in a statement. The two leaders agreed to meet in New York at the United States General Assembly, scheduled for this month. The call was notable for its timing, coming a day after Erdogan described a U.S. prosecutor's indictment against Turkey's former economy minister as being politically motivated and tantamount to an attack on Ankara. The former minister, Zafer Caglayan, and the ex-head of a state-owned Turkish bank were charged this week with conspiring to violate Iran sanctions by illegally moving hundreds of millions of dollars through the U.S. financial system on Tehran's behalf. The indictment marked the first time an ex-government member with close ties to Erdogan had been charged in the on-going U.S. investigation, which has strained ties between the two countries. "For the moment, it is impossible to evaluate this within legal logic," he told reporters on Friday. "I see this step against our former economy minister as a step against the Turkish Republic. He had also called on Washington to re-think the charges. "I hope we'll get a chance to discuss this issue in the United States. You may be a big nation, but being a just nation is something else. Being a just nation requires the legal system to work fairly." (Writing by David Dolan; Editing by Ros Russell)
By Benjamin Cooper Sydney - (Reuters) - Australia will send troops to assist Philippine forces in the ongoing battle against Islamic State fighters in the southern city of Marawi, Australias Defense Minister Marise Payne said on Friday. Small contingents of Australian soldiers will be sent to train Philippine troops, Payne said during a press conference with her counterpart, Delfin Lorenzana in Manila. "We are very committed to supporting the Philippines in its efforts to defend itself against terrorist threats," Minister Payne said. "This is a threat to the region (that) we all need to work together to defeat." But no Australian troops will be actively involved in the fighting, Lorenza said. "It would not look good if we would be needing troops to fight the war here. We are happy with the assistance we're getting from Australia." The militants swept through Marawi on May 23 and have held parts of it despite sustained ground attacks by hundreds of soldiers and daily pummeling by planes and artillery. The southern Philippines has been marred for decades by insurgency and banditry. But the intensity of the battle in Marawi and the presence of foreign fighters fighting alongside local militants has raised concerns that the region may be becoming a Southeast Asian hub for Islamic State as it loses ground in Iraq and Syria. The Australian troops will compliment those from their country already sent to the Philippines to train local personnel, Payne said. Philippine troops fighting Islamic State-linked rebels in a southern city have encountered armed resistance from women and children who were likely family member of militants, the Phillipine military said on Monday. A spokesman for Payne said further details of the training contingent would be determined in coming days. (Reporting by Benjamin Cooper; Editing by Shri Navaratnam)
By Nia Williams CALGARY, Alberta (Reuters) - A Canadian regulator's plan to assess indirect carbon emissions when considering TransCanada Corp's Energy East pipeline application sets a harsh precedent for future projects, the Alberta government and supporters of the pipeline said on Friday. TransCanada said on Thursday it may abandon the proposed 1.1 million barrel per day pipeline - from Alberta to New Brunswick - following a decision by the National Energy Board in August to look at upstream and downstream carbon emissions when deciding whether the project is in the public interest. Supporters of Energy East said the NEB's plan to consider indirect emissions, or emissions that come from the production and refining of the crude the pipeline will carry, was unreasonable. "We believe it would be a historic overreach and has potential to impact the future of energy development across Canada," Alberta Energy Minister Marg McCuaig-Boyd said in a statement. "This is not an appropriate issue to include in the review." Calgary-based TransCanada asked the regulator to pause the application for 30 days while it gauges the impact on the pipeline's cost, schedule and viability. That request was granted on Friday. It is the latest blow to a project that Canada's oil industry says is needed to bring oil sands crude to overseas markets and avoid deep discounts on Canadian barrels that eat into revenue for producers already struggling with low prices. McCuaig-Boyd compared deciding the merits of a pipeline based on downstream emission to judging transmission lines based on how the electricity will be used. The Canadian government released transitional rules for energy reviews in January 2016 that said upstream emissions from crude producers should be assessed, but the NEB's plan goes further by including the downstream greenhouse gas impact. "This sets a dangerous precedent for other projects as the things that could qualify as greenhouse gas emissions would start to just burgeon," said Rafi Tahmazian, an energy portfolio manager at Canoe Financial in Calgary. "It's almost impossible to calculate." The NEB has not released any clarification on the process it would use to consider the measurement of upstream and downstream emissions, spokeswoman Sarah Kiley said. While the NEB panel assessing Energy East is an independent body, Chris Bloomer, president of the Canadian Energy Pipeline Association, urged the federal government to step in and clarify what the indirect emissions requirement means. "If it remains unclear and uncertain there's an unfortunate potential consequence that we lose another pipeline project," Bloomer said. New Brunswick's premier, Brian Gallant, said in a statement that he spoke to TransCanada Chief Executive Russ Girling on Thursday evening and the company is considering other options, making it possible Energy East will not be built. Natural Resources Canada, the federal ministry, sees TransCanada's request to pause the application as ultimately a private sector decision, said spokesman Alexandre Deslongchamps, adding that the independent NEB panel is reviewing the request. TransCanada declined to comment beyond its statement on Thursday. (Additional reporting by David Ljunggren in Ottawa; Editing by Leslie Adler and Matthew Lewis)
By Daina Beth Solomon and Stefanie Eschenbacher MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Hurricane Irma's deadly tear through the Caribbean will hobble the region's multi-billion dollar tourism industry for months, just as hotels, airlines, and cruises were gearing up for the region's peak winter season. As one of the most powerful Atlantic storms in a century, Irma has killed 21 people, leaving hotels, airports and other buildings damaged or flattened across prime vacation islands such as St. Martin and Barbuda. On Friday, it hurtled north of Cuba toward Florida. Jack Richards, president of U.S.-based tour operator Pleasant Holidays, said it may be well into next year before the local tourism industry begins to normalize, costing it billions in lost business. The region's busiest travel season runs from mid-December to Easter, when Americans, Canadians and Europeans leave behind snow and cold for the warm, turquoise Caribbean waters. "Can this be repaired in time? The infrastructure to rebuild these countries simply isn't there," he said. "This is just massive." Just a few days after Irma razed the first islands, Richards said his bookings have already dropped for the Caribbean, his company's second-most popular destination worldwide for U.S. tourists. More than 26 million international tourists were expected this year in the Caribbean, the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) projected before Irma hit. In 2016, foreign visitors spent $31 billion in the Caribbean and were expected to spend an additional 5.3 percent in 2017. The WTTC estimates that in 2016, travel and tourism contributed $56 billion in gross domestic product. "Any disruption in the tourism industry is a disruption of our livelihood," Caribbean Tourism Organization (CTO) spokesman Hugh Riley said. Officials across the islands have struggled to gauge the scope of destruction, after Irma knocked out electricity and cell phone service, and forced airports to close. The trouble may not yet be over for the Caribbean, with Hurricane Jose forecast on Saturday to pass as a powerful Category 4 storm close to the same group of islands that were trashed by Irma. The hurricane season is set to run for several more weeks. As of Friday afternoon, the U.S. Virgin Islands Department of Tourism was urging visitors to stay away from St. Thomas, where four people died in the storm and where the airport remains closed to comercial traffic. The St. Croix airport was slated to reopen on Friday. The 150-room Windward Passage, an upscale hotel overlooking the St. Thomas harbor in the U.S. Virgin Islands, plans to close for six months, it reported to the Department of Tourism. 'HOW OUR PEOPLE EAT' On the tiny island of Barbuda alone, home to about 1,800 people and reef-lined beaches, preliminary damage estimates top $100 million, Riley said. Some 95 percent of the island's buildings were destroyed. Cruise lines, tour operators and airlines have scrambled to accommodate tourists or postpone plans. Royal Caribbean Cruises, Carnival Cruise Lines and Norwegian Cruise Line each canceled several of their Caribbean-bound cruises through the weekend and rerouted others to avoid sailing through the storms' dangerous paths. European tour operator TUI said it had evacuated its Florida customers to hotels in inland Orlando, and brought vacationers in Cuba to shelters. German tour operator DER Touristik said it would bus tourists arriving by cruise ship in Miami on Friday directly to shelters, and that ships would leave the harbor again before the hurricane hits. Recovery efforts in hard-hit areas have so far proven difficult. Rolando Brison, St. Martins director of tourism, said firefighters struggled to hose off sand dumped by the storm onto the airport runways, leaving nearly 3,000 tourists stranded. The airport remained closed on Friday. Tourism is the economy," he said. "Its how our people eat." (This version of the story corrects paragraph 11 to show that St. Thomas airport is closed, not St. John's) (Additional reporting by Anthony Esposito, Alana Wise and Joe White; Editing by Frank Jack Daniel and Mary Milliken)
NICOSIA (Reuters) - Two boats crowded with 305 Syrian refugees arrived in Cyprus overnight, police said on Sunday, one of the largest group landings of migrants to the island since the outbreak of the Syrian war in 2011. The vessels were tracked sailing to the north-west of the island and were thought to have set off from the Turkish coastal city of Mersin. "For their safety they were towed to harbor," a police spokesman said. One of the vessels had been taking in water, the spokesman added. Cyprus is the closest European Union member state to Syria, yet many fleeing conflict have largely avoided the island because it has no direct easy access to the rest of the continent. The single largest group arrival since the Syrian conflict started was 345 people who were rescued in September 2014. Police said they were questioning a 36 year old Syrian man believed to have been steering one of the vessels. The others would be taken to a reception center west of the capital, Nicosia. The Syrians, who included many minors, appeared in good health. A woman and her infant were taken to hospital for precautionary reasons, the spokesman added. (Reporting by Michele Kambas; Editing by Mark Potter)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump said on Saturday that he will ask the Republican-controlled Congress to further speed up its efforts to overhaul the U.S. tax code, citing the potential impact of Hurricane Irma as a reason to hasten reforms. "I think now with what's happened with the hurricane, I'm going to ask for a speedup. I wanted a speedup anyway, but now we need it even more so," the president said at the outset of a Cabinet meeting at Camp David. The White House released a video of his remarks. Trump urged Congress in a Friday tweet not to wait until the end of September for tax legislation. (Reporting by David Morgan and Jeff Mason; Editing by Jonathan Oatis)
By Faith Hung TAIPEI (Reuters) - The wife and mother of detained Taiwanese rights activist Lee Ming-che were due to arrive in China on Sunday to attend his subversion trial on Monday, Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council said in a statement, calling for Lee's safe return home. Lee, a community college teacher and pro-democracy and human rights activist, went missing during a March visit to China. Authorities later confirmed he had been detained, straining already-tense ties between the mainland and the self-ruling island. Authorities at the Intermediate People's Court of Yueyang city, in the central province of Hunan, said Monday's trial on suspicion of subversion of state power would be an open hearing. Chinese courts have video-streamed or live-blogged increasing numbers of proceedings in recent years as part of a push towards judicial transparency However, rights activists say that in sensitive cases, holding "open" hearings is a tool for authorities to demonstrate state power and that usually the defendant has agreed to an outcome. On Saturday, Lee's wife, Lee Ching-yu, asked during a news conference that supporters forgive her husband if he says something in court which disappoints them, as he might be required to give testimony against his own free will. On Sunday she declined to comment to a large media contingent as she checked into her flight at Taipei Songshan Airport, where she was to fly to Changsha, in Hunan province, via Shanghai. Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council said it would do everything in its power to facilitate Lee's safe return. "Our government's approach to this case has been predicated on preserving our country's dignity while ensuring Lee Ming-che's safety," it said. Lee's case has strained relations between Taipei and Beijing, which have been particularly tense since President Tsai Ing-wen, leader of Taiwan's independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party, took office last year. Beijing regards the island as a breakaway province and it has never renounced the use of force to bring it back under mainland control. (Reporting by Faith Hung; Additional reporting by Fabian Hamacher; Editing by Tony Munroe and Kim Coghill)
Hunger is a result of poverty, but it also causes poverty. People who do not have sufficient food and nutrition are less able to escape from poverty. In many countries women, although they do much of the farming, lack access to training, credit or land. Conflict, poor or corrupt management of natural resources, displacement of small farmers by natural disasters; and financial and economic crises that eliminate jobs at the lowest levels, all contribute to creating conditions that push the poorest into hunger.

To break this vicious cycle, the United States launched, in 2010, the Feed the Future Initiative, which aims to reduce global hunger, poverty, and undernutrition by focusing on smallholder farmers, increasing investments in agriculture and supporting country-owned plans for improving food security and nutrition while generating opportunities for economic growth and trade.

Back then, the U.S. Government selected 19 countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America to participate in the initiative, based on 5 criteria. Since 2010, Feed the Future has helped 9 million people living in the participating countries, pull themselves out of poverty.

The passage of the U.S. Global Food Security Act of 2016 endorsed Feed the Futures approach and ushered in a new era of U.S. Government global food security investment. A new, corresponding global food security strategy developed by the U.S. Government is guiding Feed the Futures work as the initiative enters its second phase.

On August 31st, USAID Administrator Mark Green announced that Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Ghana, Guatemala, Honduras, Kenya, Mali, Nepal, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, and Uganda were selected to participate in this new phase of Feed the Future.

With the selection of these 12 countries, the second phase of Feed the Future will be focusing its efforts on promoting long-term, sustainable development that brings partners together to help people harness the power of smart agriculture to jumpstart their local economies and lift themselves out of poverty, said Administrator Green.

By equipping people with the tools to feed themselves over the long term, Feed the Future is addressing the root causes of hunger and poverty. This long-term investment builds communities that are more resilient to drought, famine and other natural disasters, and less dependent on emergency food assistance.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 10

Trend:

An Azerbaijani two-year-old child and her grandmother were killed as a result of mortar shelling by Armenia in July this year, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said at the First Summit on Science and Technology of Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in Astana, Kazakhstan Sept. 10.

This is atrocity, the president said. This is another bloody crime of Armenian fascism."

Under orders of the Armenian leadership, all our mosques in occupied Azerbaijani lands have been destroyed. The photos of the destroyed mosques of Shusha, Aghdam and the countrys other cities are documentary evidence of Armenian vandalism.

President Aliyev stressed that Islamophobia in Armenia has reached its peak.

Armenia is trying very hard to expand its ties with various Muslim countries. One should not believe Armenias hypocritical and deceitful words. Armenia, which has destroyed our sacred mosques in Azerbaijan, cannot be a friend of Muslim countries, President Aliyev added.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sep. 8

By Farhad Daneshvar  Trend:

Ahead of the Joint OPEC-Non-OPEC Ministerial Monitoring Committee (JMMC) meeting on Sept. 22, Tehran and Moscow appear undecided on further extension of oil cut deal.

Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh earlier this week said there are unofficial talks underway to extend the OPEC agreement on output cuts beyond March 2018.

"I think the oil market is balanced. OPEC members compliance with output cuts has not fallen in the last six months; it has increased," Zanganeh was quoted by local media as saying on Monday.

Saying that Iran welcomes cooperation between OPEC and non-OPEC members, he further added that cooperation means reducing oil production, but Brazil is very unlikely to agree on output cuts.

In the meantime, Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak has said that Moscow would consider an extension of the deal if the market is imbalanced and risks occur to the market.

"We see stable prices around $50 [per barrel], less volatility, decreasing inventories. If suddenly ... the market is not balanced and we see a risk for the market, then we will discuss options, including an extension," Novak added.

In an interview with Trend on Friday, Charles Ellinas, CEO of Cyprus-based energy consultancy e-CNHC, downplayed the possibility of an agreement between OPEC and non-OPEC producers on extending the deal.

"I do not expect that OPEC and non-OPEC will agree to increase current cuts, even though Saudi Arabia may support further cuts, but it is unlikely to do it alone. The key countries are happy with prices over $50 per barrel."

Irans budget plan for the current fiscal year (starting on March 20) has projected an average oil price of $50 a barrel.

Ellinas suggests there are signs indicating that the oil prices would stand above $50.

"Most in OPEC feel that the oil market is going in the right direction and do not see the need to increase cuts. There are signs that the market is tightening and prices appear to have settled in the $50-$55/b range."
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 10

By Fatih Karimov  Trend:

Regional problems are one of the reasons of the decline in Irans non-oil exports during the current fiscal year (started March 20), Mohammad Reza Izadian, director of planning at Irans Trade Promotion Organization, said.

The decline in non-oil exports during the first five months of current fiscal year is mainly connected with some regional problems such as fall of exports to Saudi Arabia, price fluctuations as well as problems with domestic production, Izadian said Sept. 10.

Regional markets are main destination of Irans non-oil exports, the official told Irans state radio. He added that about 60-80 percent of Irans non-oil exports (excluding gas condensates and petrochemicals) goes to 25 countries in the region.

Izadian further said that purchasing power in regional countries, which were main importers of Iranian goods, has greatly decreased due to economic problems and budget deficit due to fall of oil prices.

Iran's non-oil exports, including gas condensates, reached $17.193 billion during the first five months of the current fiscal year (started March 20, 2017).

The figure indicates a fall of 4.95 percent compared to the same period of preceding year, according to the Iranian Custom Administrations latest report.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 8

By Kamila Aliyeva  Trend:

Austrian Oberbank will continue its professional procedures and support transactions with Iran which have helped the bank to gain an excellent reputation in both countries.

"As the first Austrian bank, we are signing a framework agreement for tied financial loans (G3) in US dollars, yen and euros. This agreement allows Oesterreichische Kontrollbank AG (OeKB) covered financing with maturities of more than 2 years. It also allows the financing of important projects, for example in infrastructure or health care. It is therefore urgently awaited by well-known Austrian exporters, who are also shortly before signing their export contracts. The agreement allows important Austrian exporters to start their projects in strategic Iranian sectors. Our range of services is only offered to customers from our markets," Alexander Turk, from the Austrian Oberbank, told Trend.

In the past, Oberbank already supported the granting of humanitarian supplies during the sanctions period, according to the source.

"Together with our Austrian exporters, we have built up comprehensive know-how over the years, particularly in the field of sanction regulations, and we know the regulations and the customer business very well," he said.

We know exactly what is allowed and what is forbidden, Turk added.

"A major mistake would be to take legal obligations from national regulations as well as from EU or US law easily or even to disregard," he said.

There are still sanctions of the European Union and the USA, which must be bserved in all cases, according to the source.

"This concerns individual persons as well as certain categories of goods, which may not be exported to Iran or which can be exported only with official authorization. The US legal situation is particularly complex. We therefore pay close attention to any US customer relationship in order to not indirectly violate US American legislation and also refuse to monitor US transactions. Such a US reference can be realized by means of payment processing in US dollars, but also by a US value of a product of more than 10 percent," he added.

Austrias Oberbank is expected to sign a deal with Iran on Sept. 21 enabling it to finance new ventures there. Earlier, most banks have stayed away from Iran due to the remaining U.S. sanctions. Oberbank is the only Austrian bank directly interacting and transacting with Iranian banks.

Oesterreichische Kontrollbank Aktiengesellschaft (OeKB) is Austria's main provider of financial and information services to the export industry and the capital market. True to its mandate to support the Austrian economy, OeKB has served trade and industry since the institution's founding in 1946. OeKB acts as a central hub in the markets, operating impartially and in accordance with its sustainability policy. Its shareholders are commercial banks located in Austria.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sep. 8

By Farhad Daneshvar  Trend:

Traders at the Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE) saw a drop of 7.2 percent in automotive sector over the last Iranian week ending September 8.

Market observers suggest that the sharp slump in the auto stocks, Irans largest non-oil subsector of economy, came following the resumption of market trading in SAIPA Group, a leading Iranian car producer.

SAIPA Group resumed its market trading after almost three months as its ticker came off the trading board.

The market regulator had earlier requested to review the companys financial statements for its subsidiary companies.

Following the revision, the company had to change a net profit of $79 million to a net loss of $ 87 million in its consolidated reports for the financial year ending March 2017 after the regulator discovered losses which had not been accurately reported. Over the past week automotive sector ranked as the weakest sector of the TSE.

Over the first five months of the current fiscal year (starting March 20) SAIPA manufactured 134,684 passenger cars, 21 percent up year on year.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 10

By Fatih Karimov  Trend:

A number of Iranian websites have recently announced that Google has canceled their Google Analytics accounts.

It is not clear whether the ban is related to the US economic sanctions on Iran or not.

Google cut access for some Iranian users to some of its services, including Google Analytics and Google Developers in 2012 after economic sanctions were put by the United States on Iran. However, the IT giant made the services available again for Iranians in 2016 after the nuclear deal between Tehran and the six world powers came into force.

In response to a number of Iranian users who have lost their access to Google Analytics, the companys support team has said their accounts have been cancelled due to a "Terms of Service violation."

Google has not yet responded to Trends request for comment on the issue.

Meanwhile, some experts believe that the Google decision will not expose serious challenges for Iranian users.

Iranian teams currently use various foreign and domestic analytics services, including Google Analytics, Fabric, Flurry, Localytics and Facebook analytics to track and report website traffic, Saman Mahdevar, business intelligence team leader at Cafe Bazaar, a local Android app store, told Trend.

Mahdevar confirmed that Google has restricted access for some Iranian teams to its analytics service.

Google Analytics is one of the best services tracking and reporting website traffic, he said, adding that however Iranian website and mobile app developers can use similar services.

Googles recent restriction has not brought a big challenge for Iranian developers, Mahdevar underlined.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sep. 10

By Farhad Daneshvar  Trend:

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani who is in the Kazakh capital, Astana, to attend the first summit of Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) on science and technology, has conferred with the leaders of several countries.

President Rouhani elaborated on cooperation on energy sphere and oil market, expansion of economic and banking ties as well as unity among Muslims and fight against terrorism during his address to the OIC summit at the meetings with the leaders.

The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), founded on Sept. 25, 1969, is the largest and most influential official Muslim governmental international organization, bringing together 57 countries. The two-day summit is taking place on September 10-11.

Unity among Muslims

Addressing the (OIC) summit on Sunday, President Hassan Rouhani called for unity and cooperation among Muslim countries in order to eliminate violence and establish permanent peace in the world.

We have all reached a consensus that the Muslim world is a crucial and effective part of the system of the universe, and its capability, progress and stability leads to global capability, progress and stability, the official website of President Rouhani quoted him as saying.

He also said that the Islamic countries should create political, cultural and economic grounds for attracting the modern science and technologies.

Uzbekistan

Conferring with Uzbekistan President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, on the sidelines of the meeting, the Iranian president touched upon the trade ties between the two countries and said the Islamic Republic is the shortest path for Uzbek merchants to reach the Persian Gulf and international waters.

President Rouhani also expressed his interest in widening mutual trade ties between the two countries and said Iran welcomes Uzbek investors to do business in the Islamic Republic.

President Rouhani also said that the way for strengthening cooperation in the spheres of energy as well as science and research between the two countries has been paved.

Hassan Rouhani also added that Iran is capable of providing Uzbekistan with energy.

The Iranian president went on to speak about banking ties and said expansion of cooperation in banking sector would contribute to boosting the two countries bilateral trade.

The sides also discussed the need for serious fight against terrorism and extremism with Hassan Rouhani warning against the spreading threat of the terrorism in the region.

Rouhani further expressed readiness for cooperation with the Central Asian countries in fight against terrorism and extremism.

Kazakhstan

Hassan Rouhani speaking at a meeting with President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev, said that Tehran welcomes expansion of bilateral ties with Astana.

The two presidents underlined the strong will of their countries to broaden the existing ties in various spheres including economy, transportation and energy.

The two sides also urged for making efforts aimed at improving the situation of oil market.

Venezuela

At a meeting with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, the Iranian counterpart said that it is necessary to continue talks among the oil exporting countries.

Rouhani said that OPEC and non-OPEC countries in particular Venezuela have made efforts for reducing oil production and balancing the prices which have yield positive results.

Rouhani further urged the OPEC and non-OPEC producers to continue such efforts.

Turkey

President Rouhani and his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, met on Saturday evening to exchange views on expansion of bilateral ties.

During the meeting, President Rouhani said that facilitating banking ties would help the two neighboring countries to boost the level of bilateral trade to $30 billion.

The two presidents touched upon the situation of Rohingya Muslims, with Hassan Rouhani urging for the cessation of violence there.

The Iranian president further said that his country is ready to dispatch humanitarian aid to the crisis zones.

In his turn, the Turkish president also said that the officials of Myanmar should immediately stop the violence against Muslims.

In a separate meeting on Sunday, President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and Hassan Rouhani exchanged views on the issues of mutual interest on the sidelines of the OIC meeting.
Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 10

By Elmira Tariverdiyeva  Trend:

The Armenia-EU agreement has every chance of signing and a small chance of success. This is not a paradox. This agreement can be successful only in case of successful implementation. However, it will not be done and here are the following reasons below.

Armenian Prime Minister Karen Karapetyan has recently received head of the EU mission in Armenia, ambassador Peter Svitalsky and discussed the Armenia-EU cooperation issues, as well as the new Armenia-EU treaty.

"I would like to reaffirm that the EU, represented by all its structures, has been and remains one of Armenia's most important foreign policy partners," Karapetyan stressed, but forgot to warn that Armenia may let its partner down if Moscow demands, as it already happened once.

Yerevan was expected to sign the association agreement and free trade agreement with the EU at the Eastern Partnership summit in Vilnius in 2013. However, two months before November, when the agreement was to be signed, Armenia announced its intention to join the Customs Union and participate in the Eurasian integration.

Armenia has joined the Eurasian Economic Union since January 2015 and has begun to hold negotiations on an agreement with the EU, which this year must come to a logical conclusion.

While speaking about the current stage of cooperation, in his turn, Ambassador Svitalsky, said that significant events such as the signing of the new Armenia-EU agreement are ahead and it will become a new page of cooperation.

However, the ambassador did not mention all experts opinion. According to the experts, the new agreement is much weaker than the one which was not signed. One of the main differences of the current agreement from the previous one is that the association agreement contained a provision on a free trade zone between Armenia and the EU. However, the current framework document does not have this item.

That is why, Moscow this time has not hampered Armenia in this issue. It is obvious that Yerevan, as before, notifies Moscow of any contacts with the EU.

Meanwhile, Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan left for Moscow in August to personally settle the recent issues. Afterwards, Armenia refused from participating in NATO exercises in Georgia.

It is not a secret that before concluding an agreement with the EU, Yerevan has thoroughly coordinated this issue with Moscow.

However, Moscow's mood is also unpredictable, like the weather. So, despite the fact that Yerevan initialed this agreement in March, at the last moment Russia may change its mind, and then the signing will be postponed again, as it happened in 2013. Then it will be testified once again that Armenia is an unreliable and Kremlin-dependent partner.

Elmira Tariverdiyeva is the head of Trend Agencys Russian news service
The de-escalation zones in Syria are organized as temporary, and nobody is going to use them to split the country into enclaves, Russias Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Sunday after negotiations with the Saudi Arabian Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir, TASS reported.

"The purpose of the de-escalation zones is to stop the violence," the Russian minister said. "It is not a permanent measure, and nobody who agree those zones has an intention of keeping them for good, thus in fact having long-term enclaves in the Syrian territory."

"The agreement is their term is six months, and it is clear already the result is evident, the ceasefire is generally observed," Lavrov added. The purpose of the de-escalation zones is "to begin spreading across Syria the space, where ceasefire is observed, where peaceful life is developing."

"A very important element of the program to organize the de-escalation zones is beginning of dialogue via the national reconciliation committees," he said. "Inside those zones there is interest to having the committees to begin talks with the government."

"This would be a very important addition to the efforts to have in Geneva a direct dialogue at the negotiation table under auspices of the UN," Lavrov said. "If we establish local reconciliation processes in the regions, I believe, the work would move quicker, more effective, and the space, where ceasefire is observed and where the national dialogue emerges, will be expanding to involve eventually entire Syria."
UK police officers have arrested a man on suspicion of attempted murder after he stabbed another man in a church in Aston, the city of Birmingham, West Midlands Police said in a statement on Sunday, Sputnik reported.

A 46-year-old man was arrested after reports of a stabbing at the New Jerusalem Apostolic Church in Rocky Lane, Aston.

As a result of the knife attack, a 33-year-old man was injured and later taken to a hospital. He is in a stable condition as his injuries are not considered to be life threatening, according to the police statement.

"Early indications suggest that the offender and victim knew each other and that this was a targeted attack," the statement pointed out.

The church said on its Facebook page that three people were injured in the incident.

The police have cordoned off the area and launched an investigation.
PKK terrorists killed a businessman in southeastern Siirt late Saturday, according to security sources.

The sources who spoke on condition of anonymity due to restrictions on talking to the media said 62-year-old businessman, Mehmet Salih Arslan, was shot by PKK terrorists in front of his home in the Kemerli village of Siirt province's Eruh district.

Arslan was critically wounded as a result of the attack and was taken to Siirt State Hospital, however, succumbed to his wounds at the hospital, the sources said.

The sources added that Arslan was threatened by PKK terrorists and they kidnapped his son.

The PKK -- listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the U.S. and EU -- resumed its armed campaign against Turkey in July 2015. Since then, it has been responsible for the deaths of more than 1,200 Turkish security personnel and civilians.

Kaynak: AA
Every company is a tech company, and that's a big problem. Or rather, either every company is a tech company but most suck at it, or most aren't tech companies but should be. Either way, we're gonna have a bad time. Stock photo companies oughta be making more images of hackers because that cat burglar / hoodie dude behind a computer isn't going to cut it when sh*t hits the fan on a weekly basis.

Somehow, no one seemed to realize that connecting the Internet to everything was a terrible idea despite also being a great idea. We built information super-highways...yay, great...but most businesses forgot the guardrails.

The Equifax disaster is just warning shot compared to what's to come.

For more news videos visit Yahoo View, available on iOS and Android.

It used to be that getting hacked or breached meant you had to change all your passwords. Attackers hit tech-first companies that at least had a basic understanding of security, and a limited amount of your immutable personal information. The Yahoo breaches from 2014 and 2015 that impacted over 1 billion users were huge, but not nearly as harmful as what happens now.

Today, the hacks and breaches are hitting banking and credit companies, government databases, voting machines, and public utility infrastructure. That stolen data can't always be changed, like your date of birth. Unless the government decides to reissue everyone a new social security number, once it's stolen, it's permanently vulnerable to exploitation.

Credit cards, a chain and an open padlock is seen in front of displayed Equifax logo in this illustration taken September 8, 2017. (Photo: REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration)

For a quick recap, the Equifax breach hackers stole data including the full names, birth dates, Social Security numbers, home addresses and more from 143 million Americans. That data could be used to steal people's identities, take out fraudulent loans, or power social engineering attacks where hackers call your bank or cell phone carrier and use info only you should have to trick them into providing access to your accounts.

A brief look back on Techmeme surfaces plenty of other hair-raising attacks.

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And those are just a few of the headlines from the past month. We have years or decades of this to come.

That's why we need every company to become a good tech company. Double the security budgets, break up sensitive into different databases, stop issuing unrandomized backup passwords. Clamp down with hardcore firewalls and physical security. Always update to the latest operating system security patches. Let us two-factor everything. Train customer service reps to spot social engineering hacks, and make sure every employee knows how avoid phishing attacks.

Meanwhile, software makers like Microsoft need to step up and take more responsibility for protecting older versions of their operating systems. And governments need to more aggressively punish companies with weak security such that it's too expensive to risk. The US failed to approve a 2015 bill proposed by Obama that would require public disclosures of breaches within 30 days, with penalties for keeping people in the dark. While some states have adopted their own disclosure rules, they're a haphazard patchwork.

Europe has set a good example with its new laws coming into effect in 2018 that levy stiff fines against companies that don't disclose a data breach within 72 hours (with some exceptions). Violators can get slapped with a penalty of up to 2% of their global annual revenue, which would of stuck Equifax with over $60 million in fines.

Unfortuantely, not all these changes are going to happen. So the future will require people and governments to make a new type of judgement call: How secure must a company's technology systems be such that the benefit of giving it access to information or infrastructure outweighs the risk of havoc caused by a potential breach.

Most people won't have the knowledge or interest to be able to accurately make this call. Most governments will be too slow-moving or penny-pinching to effectively make this call. The companies will knowingly downplay the risk to boost their businesses. And the hackers will laugh all the way to the bank, whether they want to steal everything inside or just burn it down.
Chinese automaker BYD was the world's largest producer of plug-in electric cars last year, and the outlook for new markets in its home country are quite healthy, suggesting strong continued growth.

BYD plans to tackle the country's inland cities, viewed as a new frontier for automakers, with a small and very affordable electric car.

The industry considers China's non-coastal cities, which aren't nearly as saturated with cars as the coastal markets, to be ripe for new vehicle sales.

DON'T MISS: China's BYD built more plug-in cars than any other maker last year

Chairman of BYD Wang Chuanfu believes mini electric vehicles could eventually account for 75 percent of its sales in China.

Affordability will help enormously: BYD says its first mini electric car could be priced under $10,000 after subsidies are applied, according to Caixing.

To put matters into perspective, the new cities in which BYD seeks to sell aren't small, even if they rank lower in priority at the moment.

2016 BYD Tang plug-in hybrid SUV, made in China

China has more than 100 cities with a population of 1 million people or moreso it's easy to see why BYD is so optimistic about its future growth.

BYD isn't alone in recognizing the coming need for affordable, small electric cars.

Nissan is said to be readying its own mini electric vehicle for 2020, and Renault-Nissan has described such a vehicle as essential to boosting sales in China and other emerging markets.

READ THIS: More details emerge on low-cost electric car from Renault-Nissan for 2020

The Renault-Nissan alliance has most recently partnered with Dongfeng Motors to build mini-SUV electric vehicles.

But, Nissan is only the most recent to realize it must move quickly to meet aggressive Chinese quotas for electric vehicles.

Volkswagen, Daimler, General Motors, and Ford have all explored or cemented their own joint ventures to build additional electric cars in the world's largest market for automobiles.

BYD Qin EV300

As BYD starts to focus on outlying Chinese markets, it's begun to get serious about the U.S. market as well.

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The Chinese automaker has long focused on public-sector vehicles, but it plans to begin building commercial electric vehicles for private use as well.

CHECK OUT: Chinese maker BYD plans U.S. expansion into other electric industrial vehicles

The electric trucks and other commercial vehicles will be built at its production facility in Lancaster, California; orders have already been placed by such companies as Facebook, along with local California universities.

Its assault on the United States' highly-competitive private car market, however, remains far from ready.

[hat tip: Michael Dunne, of Dunne Automotive consultants in Hong Kong]

_______________________________________

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China's cities are heavily polluted thanks to congestion and emissions on the gridlocked roads - AFP

The Chinese government has signalled it will join the line of nations queuing up to ban the sale of diesel and petrol vehicles in the coming decades.

A senior official has told the Chinese car sector that the industry department in Beijing has begun research on formulating a timetable to stop production and sales of traditional energy vehicles, according to a report from the state news agency Xinhua.

A hybrid-powered Roewe 950 built by Chinese manufacturer SAIC recharges in Shanghai Credit: Reuters

The comments by deputy industry minister Xin Guobin are viewed as a major boost to development of electric vehicles and the associated infrastructure. China is now the worlds largest car market with 25.53m cars and light vehicles sold in the country last year, according to industry analysts JATO.

Sales were up 14.6pc on the previous year and far outstripped the next biggest market, the US, which saw anaemic growth of 0.4pc to 17.55m last year.

Motorists in China are also already the biggest buyers of cars powered by electric and hybrid systems  which use a combination of batteries and internal combustion engines.

Electric cars will becomes a more common sight on Britain's streets with conventional cars being banned from sale from 2040 Credit: Getty

Since 2015, 336,000 of these vehicles have been sold in the country, representing 40pc of global sales. In the first seven months of this year, 204,000 electric vehicles were sold in China and Ford has predicted that demand for electric vehicles in the country will reach 6m a year by 2025.

Mr Xin spoke at a car industry event over the weekend in the eastern city of Tianjin, a key hub for the countrys fast-expanding automotive industry.

A ban could potentially come into force before similar plans announced recently by the UK and France, who have said they will halt the sale of new cars with petrol and diesel engines from 2040.

When the British government revealed its policy two months ago ministers came in for heavy criticism from the car industry. Officials eventually conceding that hybrids would not be covered by the ban.

The Beijing government is desperate to grab a lead in the global race to develop electric cars, both to clean up its heavily congested, smog-bound cities and to secure a leading place in the car industry of the future.

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Volvo boss Hakan Samuelsson announced his cars would have an electric option from 2019 Credit: TT News Agency

Volvo, which is owned by Chinese conglomerate Geely, created a splash in July when it said in July that from 2019 all new cars in its range would come with an electric option, a move which was aped by Jaguar Land Rover  which has a factory in China  last week with a target date of 2020.

The Chinese government is providing billions in incentives to automotive companies to develop electric car technology, offers which have attracted a host of international car makers. In the past few months Renault Nissan, Ford and Volkswagen Group have formed joint ventures as they try to tap into the market.

Renault-Nissan has announced a tie-up with a Chinese manufacturer to develop electric cars Credit: AP

Ian Fletcher, principal automotive analyst with IHS Markit, said: Western companies want to be in such a big market and the only way to get access is to partner up with a local company.

Professor David Bailey, an automotive industry expert at Aston University, added: The government wants to develop an indigenous electric vehicle industry and supply chain as part of its industrial policy.

How to connect with us | Telegraph Business on social media
BEIJING (Reuters) - China has begun studying when to ban the production and sale of cars using traditional fuels, the official Xinhua news agency reported, citing comments by the vice industry minister, who predicted "turbulent times" for automakers forced to adapt.

Xin Guobin did not give details on when China, the world's largest auto market, would implement such a ban. The United Kingdom and France have said they will ban new petrol and diesel cars from 2040.

"Some countries have made a timeline for when to stop the production and sales of traditional fuel cars," Xin, vice minister of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, was quoted as saying at an auto industry event in the city of Tianjin on Saturday.

"The ministry has also started relevant research and will make such a timeline with relevant departments. Those measures will certainly bring profound changes for our car industry's development," he said.

To combat air pollution and close a competitive gap between its newer domestic automakers and their global rivals, China has set goals for electric and plug-in hybrid cars to make up at least a fifth of Chinese auto sales by 2025.

Xin said the domestic auto industry faced "turbulent times" over the years to 2025 to make the switch towards new energy vehicles, and called on the country's car makers to adapt to the challenge and adjust their strategies accordingly.

Banning the sale of petrol- and diesel-powered cars would have a significant impact on oil demand in China, the world's second-largest oil consumer.

Last month, state oil major China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) said China's energy demand will peak by 2040, later than the previous forecast of 2035, as transportation fuel consumption rises through the middle of the century.

Song Qiuling, a senior finance ministry official, said during Saturday's event that government subsidies, intended for jump-starting the new energy auto industry, could easily be abused if held long-term and led to "mindless expansion" and excess capacity in the sector, Xinhua reported.

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She said China would gradually withdraw such financial subsidies for the sector, and instead speed up the establishment of a credits accumulation policy to support the industry.

Late last month, Reuters reported that China was likely to delay implementing tough new sales quotas for electric plug-in vehicles, giving global automakers more time to prepare.

Under the latest proposals, 8 percent of automakers' sales would have to be battery electric or plug-in hybrid models by next year, rising to 10 percent in 2019 and 12 percent in 2020, but the rules would not be enforced until 2019, a year later than initially planned, the sources said.

In July, Britain said it would ban the sale of new petrol and diesel cars from 2040 to cut pollution, replicating plans by France and cities such as Madrid, Mexico City and Athens.

(Reporting by Tony Munroe and Yawen Chen; Editing by Kim Coghill)
LiveOps team before revolt

After an internal investigation into allegations of "sexism and a hostile work environment," as employees described it, the new CEO of LiveOps, Keith Leimbach, is out, Business Insider has confirmed.

He was fired just nine months after being hired.

Also out: Sam Lawrence, the company confirmed. Lawrence was the chief strategy officer hired by Leimbach. Both executives were let go in the past couple of days, after Business Insider contacted board members inquiring about the investigation.

The shakeup is the latest example of bad behavior allegations roiling a tech company, in the wake of high-profile reports of harassment and sexism at Uber and at several venture capital firms. Business Insider spoke to seven current and former LiveOps employees about the events that led to the change.

They described an employee revolt sparked by the arrival of two Silicon Valley execs, whose management style and freewheeling spending sent the Arizona-based call center company into chaos.

But unlike the case of Susan Fowler, the former Uber engineer who said her complaints of sexism were repeatedly ignored by the company's human resources department, LiveOps' took these complaints seriously, said several of the employees Business Insider spoke to. According to the employees, LiveOps' HR boss Julie Boorse and in-house lawyer Purnima King were instrumental in helping to clue the board of directors into the situation, and ensuring that an independent investigation was completed.

He quit in protest, then became CEO

The revolt led to the ouster of Leimbach and Lawrence and caused the board to hire back one of the key executives who had quit in protest: COO Greg Hanover. Hanover wasn't just hired back. He was handed the CEO job after Leimbach departed.

A LiveOps spokesperson explained:

Liveops did receive complaints regarding the workplace and quickly engaged a third party investigator and outside counsel to assist in an investigation. Liveops believes that it has taken steps to address any issues that were raised and is glad its employees took the initiative to come forward with concerns about the workplace. As to Greg Hanovers return as the CEO, Greg has long been a valued and respected member of the Liveops team and we are excited that he has returned to the company.

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LiveOps would not comment on any specific complaints, citing confidentiality, but Business Insider heard a litany of allegations.

One person described a drunken text message, penned by a manager hired in Leimbach's administration, which referred to women using derogatory terms, along with regular workplace jokes full of sexual innuendo and a systemic discounting of women's ideas.

Reports of yelling and demeaning treatment of all employees were also common.

Lawrence could not be reached for comment but Leimbach alleges that there was really another reason why they were terminated, not having to do with this investigation.

He believes he and Lawrence were fired because he planned make changes with a vendor relationship, a vendor that has a relationship with a board member. He wouldn't elaborate on what he meant by that, citing the advice of his lawyer.

"I believe we were terminated for actions that were in conflict at very senior levels related to our intended actions for a specific vendor. I deny any inappropriate behavior," Leimbach told Business Insider.

Imploded over the summer

LiveOps is a call center operator based in Scottsdale, Arizona. LiveOps gained Valley prestige when it nabbed Maynard Webb as its CEO from 2006-2011. He stayed on as chairman until 2014. Webb is the former COO of eBay, former chairman of Yahoo and a so-called super angel investor. He is no longer involved in LiveOps although one person close to the company said he still owns a stake and was in touch with leadership from time to time. His spokesperson said he was not aware of the investigation.

In late 2016, LiveOps spun out its contact center software unit into a separate company. In December it hired Leimbach to be CEO of the remaining business, which operates call centers for retailers, hotels and the like. It's about a $40 million company, with about 120 employees, employees said. It's claim to fame is that it's a cloud-based call center that allows the call operators (most of them contractors) to work from home.

Under Leimbach and Lawrence's leadership, LiveOps practically imploded over the summer, when around 15 managers, many of them women, quit the company shortly after receiving the company's quarterly bonus.

LiveOps exec team after employee revolt

"Bullying, harassment and sexism"

The employee exodus was due to what many describe as a dysfunctional workplace. The internal investigation looked at a wide variety of allegations.

"There's an intimidation allegation, bullying, harassment and sexism, all that stuff is on the table and folks have examples and witnesses to some events which is what required the board to initiate an investigation led by an outside investigator," one exec told us last week.

The atmosphere was bad almost from the start. In Februrary 2017, a few weeks after Leimbach took the reins, he gathered several leaders to help him prep for an appointment with a large customer. It was Leimbach's first time meeting some of the LiveOps leadership team and, according to one person, he quickly instilled fear in the group: "Who am I going to fire after this meeting?" he threatened.

Several people Business Insider spoke to alleged that the new executives engaged in "reckless spending" on things like redecorating their corporate-paid-for apartments or Leimbach expensing his family's flights to visit him in Arizona.

When it came to the sales team, "He berated them and embarrassed them and has been horrible to them in front of other people," one person said of Leimbach.

For instance, one time, he forbade a group of employees who had flown out for a customer meeting to board their return flight home and ordered them to continue working instead, according to documents seen by Business Insider.

He also allegedly crafted a change to the bonus program from revenue targets to revenue and profit targets. When the company missed its revenue targets "by millions" the bonuses were paid at the 100% rate anyway, including the exec team's own hefty payouts, confirmed three people with knowledge of the matter.

"We shouldnt have gotten bonuses. We didnt meet the revenue. It's not right," one of them said.

Negative reviews about Leimbach began showing up on Glassdoor and multiple people believed that he was trying to unmask the employees who wrote them.

We asked Leimbach about the various allegations. He told us: "Many of the items you describe are specifically addressed in my employment agreement, others are the direct result of driving the changes I was hired to make, and others are outright false. My employment agreement prevents me from commenting further."

Employees cheer

LiveOps3

Lawrence, who had served as the Chief Marketing Officer for the workplace collaboration software maker Jive several years ago, earned a reputation for firing people on the spot  often seemingly arbitrarily  and then bringing in his former colleagues. Business Insider has learned of several people who have hired lawyers to explore their options after being let go.

And some of Lawrence's behavior was described as just plain weird. One person told us about a meeting for company leaders that Lawrence hosted called "acid trip," in which everyone had to stay at his house, which meant sharing a bathroom. He reportedly flew managers in for other meetings and then left before they could present their information to him.

Lawerence also oversaw the creation of a new website for the company that raised eyebrows. According to several people, Lawrence's corporate bio on the site promoted and linked to his personal podcast, one that explored all sorts of topics such as "How to practice extreme intimacy with Dominatrix-to-the-Stars Jenny Nordbak". (Lawrence was also known back in the day for launching a startup called Blackbox, a short-lived social network about sex.)

All of this came to head during the investigation. All told about 30 people were involved, multiple people said, so nearly one-quarter of the company. One person who talked to Business Insider last week told us, "I am an existing employee and am scared of what will happen to me and the company if there is no recourse for their actions."

But with the announcement that Leimbach and Lawrence were out and Hanover was back, employees took to Glassdoor to cheer. "Finally the board saw what everyone else did. They did the right thing in replacing the CEO with someone who deserved it all along," one wrote.

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The performance of Equifax Inc.'s board of directors is likely to come under scrutiny after the consumer credit reporting agency said the names, Social Security numbers, birth dates and drivers license numbers of more than 143 million Americans were exposed as result of a cyberattack.

The breach has sparked investigations by the attorneys general of New York and Illinois, as well as a probe by the the U.S. House Financial Services Committee and a $70 billion class-action suit brought by two women in Oregon.

At issue is how well the board lived up to its risk management responsibilities, which includes cybersecurity, according to corporate governance experts. Equifax has apologized to consumers and business customers.

"It's not a good day to be on the Equifax board," said David Finke, who leads global technology sector at the executive search firm Russell Reynolds Associates. Cybersecurity "needs to be a regular topic of discussion, particularly for an industry with sensitive information."

Equifax Chief Executive Officer Richard Smith, 57, is also the chairman of the board of directors. "While we've made significant investments in data security, we recognize we must do more. And we will," Smith said in a statement. The company said it has engaged an independent cybersecurity firm to "conduct an assessment and provide recommendations on steps that can be taken to help prevent this type of incident from happening again." It didn't name the company.

Equifax didn't respond to questions about what investments the company has made on data security, how much it has spent or what changes they are planning on making. The Atlanta-based company has a market capitalization of about $14 billion.

Equifax faces legal liability because "they simply haven't invested the proper resources to protect client data," said Andrew Stotlmann, a securities lawyer in New York who has brought lawsuits and arbitration actions against firms including Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley (MS) involving claims for fraud, unsuitable investment recommendations, excessive trading and breach of fiduciary duty.

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"The Equifax breach has potentially exposed sensitive personal information of nearly everyone with a credit report," New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said in a statement announcing his investigation into the data breach.

Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan urged state residents to take precautions, such as freezing their credit, to reduce any damage, the Associated Press reported.

Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr did not respond to a request for comment on whether his office would be investigating by the time of publication.

In certain industries, a board may wish to have a director who is knowledgeable about cybersecurity, or to create a separate technology committee whose responsibilities include cyber-risk oversight, according to David Katz and Laura McIntosh of the law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz in a May 2017 post on the Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation

"We'd never advocate for a board having single issue directors," said Finke. "You need good board members who can address all issues." Still, Finke said that companies should be looking at their board composition to ensure that they have the right level of expertise to address cybersecurity concerns. He said it's time for boards to add a "qualified technology expert," similar to the qualified financial expert that is required by the SEC.

Five members of Equifax's 11-member board serve on the technology committee, which may have responsibility for cybersecurity, though the company didn't respond to queries about whether any particular board committee has that duty. John McKinley, 60, the chair of the committee, has been the Chief Technology Officer at General Electric Capital Corp., Merrill Lynch & Co., Time Warner Inc. and Twenty-First Century Fox Inc. , according to BoardEx, a relationship mapping service of TheStreet Inc. Mark Feidler, a former chief operating officer at Bellsouth Corp; G. Thomas Hough, a former vice chairman at Ernst & Young LLP; Elane Stock, a former group president at personal care company Kimberly Clark Corp. ; and Mark Templeton, a former CEO at software company Citrix Systems Inc. are the other directors on the committee.

All of those directors except for Hough earned more than $238,000 in compensation for their board work in 2016, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Smith, the CEO and chairman, was paid $14.9 million by Equifax in 2016, a $2 million raise from 2015, according to SEC filings.

Three senior Equifax executives, including the company's chief financial officer, John Gamble, sold shares worth collectively almost $1.8 million in the days after the cyberattack was discovered. The trio had "no knowledge that an intrusion had occurred," Equifax told Bloomberg.

"The best defense-from attacks, from the attendant consequences, and from subsequent litigation-is a carefully tailored and constantly updated protective scheme accompanied by a detailed response plan," wrote Katz and McIntosh.

Shares of Equifax fell 13.7% to $123.23 in Friday trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

More of What's Trending on TheStreet:

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Editors' pick: Originally published Sept. 8.

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bored annoyed disdain

Equifax on Friday responded to concerns surrounding the massive security breach it announced a day earlier.

The credit-monitoring agency said problems with a website established for customers to see if they were among the 143 million affected by the hack had been fixed.

The company said it made three key adjustments to handle the aftermath of the breach:

Consumers can immediately determine whether they were affected by the breach.

The company's arbitration clause and class-action waiver would not apply to this incident

And an expanded call center with over 2,000 agents was also being established

ZDNet security editor Zack Whittaker noted there was still one problem with the website. Entering "Test" in the last name field and "123456" as the last six digits of the Social Security number prompts the system to tell you you are among those impacted by the breach.

Watch below:

Just wow. If you enter "Test" and "123456" on Equifax's hack checker page, it says your data has been breached. pic.twitter.com/cTjTs7Frjv  Zack Whittaker (@zackwhittaker) September 8, 2017

On Thursday, the company said criminals had accessed details including names and Social Security numbers. Credit card numbers for about 209,000 people, and certain documents for another 182,000 were also accessed.

Read the full statement from Equifax below:

A PROGRESS REPORT FOR CONSUMERS We understand that some consumers are experiencing difficulties getting the answers and support they need through our website and call center. Ramping up the website and call center to handle the anticipated volume is ongoing and we are focused on making improvements as quickly as possible. We apologize for any inconvenience this process has created. Thus far today, we've made the following adjustments: 1). YOU CAN DETERMINE YOUR STATUS IMMEDIATELY Some consumers who visited the website soon after its launch failed to receive confirmation clarifying whether or not they were potentially impacted. That issue is now resolved, and we encourage those consumers to revisit the site to receive a response that clarifies their status. 2). NO WAIVER OF RIGHTS FOR THIS CYBER SECURITY INCIDENT In response to consumer inquiries, we have made it clear that the arbitration clause and class action waiver included in the Equifax and TrustedID Premier terms of use does not apply to this cybersecurity incident. 3). EXPANDED OUR CALL CENTER We have tripled our call center team to over 2000 agents and continue to add agents. Our goal is to make this process as convenient and consistent as possible. We will continue to identify steps to improve this process. And we will continue as well to listen to your comments and suggestions.

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A day after announcing that hackers stole personal information tied to 143 million people in the US, Equifax's response to the breach has come under scrutiny. Language on the website where people could find out if they were affected seemed to say that by signing up they would waive any right to join a class action suit against the company -- something New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said is "unacceptable and unenforceable." The company has since explained it does not apply to the data breach at all, but that hasn't stopped misinformation from spreading.

After conversations w my office, @Equifax has clarified its policy re: arbitration. We are continuing to closely review. pic.twitter.com/WcPZ9OqMcL  Eric Schneiderman (@AGSchneiderman) September 8, 2017

Equifax:

In response to consumer inquiries, we have made it clear that the arbitration clause and class action waiver included in the Equifax and TrustedID Premier terms of use does not apply to this cybersecurity incident,

Of course, considering the extent of what has leaked and the number of people affected, a hyperbolic reaction to anything surrounding this incident is understandable. A group claiming to be the hackers behind the theft has threatened to release it unless paid a ransom, but there's no confirmation yet that they actually have anything. As far as how it happened, one analyst told the New York Post that Equifax attributed the hack to the exploitation of a flaw in the Apache STRUTS system. Still, there are a few steps that people can and should take, now that we know someone has stolen more than enough information to perpetrate identity theft on a massive scale.

Now that the language has been clarified, it appears legally clear to use Equifax's website to check things out. Among Engadget staff, a few of us received notices that we aren't among those impacted, but most weren't so lucky. Still, there are questions about how secure the site itself is, since it requests the last six digits of each person' social security number (and guessing first three isn't as hard as you might think). Also, it doesn't appear to work particularly well, responding to test and "gibberish" input with a claim that it's part of the breach also.

The best information on how to respond is available from the FTC. The government agency lays out solid next steps, like checking your credit report for any suspicious entries, as well as placing a freeze (there's more advice on that here) and/or fraud alert on your account with the major credit bureaus. This will make it harder for a thief to create a fake account for you and should force creditors to verify your identity. Finally, it's important to file your taxes early, before a scammer potentially can.
Eric Chase Bolling, son of former Fox News host Eric Bolling, reportedly died on Friday night, shortly after Fox News announced it would be ending its relationship with his father. The cause of death is currently unclear.

Eric Bolling's son, who went by Chase on , was his only child. According to Chase Bollings Facebook profile, he was studying economics at the University of Colorado at Boulder.

The death was first publicly reported by Yashar Ali, the reporter who investigated Eric Bolling's alleged misconduct for The Huffington Post. Eric Bolling himself acknowledged the tragic event soon after, describing himself and wife Adrienne as devastated.

Adrienne and I are devastated by the loss of our beloved son Eric Chase last night. Details still unclear. Thoughts, prayers appreciated.  Eric Bolling (@ericbolling) September 9, 2017

Multiple sources also confirmed Chase Bollings death to Mediaite, with one source initially citing the cause of death as suicide. TMZ also initially reported the death as a suicide, but now suggests the cause was a drug overdose.

Eric Bolling has stated that authorities have informed us there is no sign of self harm at this point.

Authorities have informed us there is no sign of self harm at this point. Autopsy will be next week. Please respect our grieving period.  Eric Bolling (@ericbolling) September 9, 2017

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The elder Bolling's departure from Fox News - effectively a humiliating firing - came after a flood of negative public scrutiny. A report by Ali in July alleged, based on interviews with more than a dozen sources, that Bolling sent sexually explicit images to female coworkers.

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Fox News quickly suspended Bolling, a former commodities trader whose career in media began with business shows including CNBC's Fast Money. He later became a cohost of The Five on Fox News, expanding his purview to politics.

Bolling's alleged misconduct came during the tenure of Roger Ailes, under what has been described as a rampant culture of sexism at Fox News. Ailes' tenure came to an end in July of last year, and a series of high-profile departures followed, including that of Foxs leading host, Bill O'Reilly.

Ali, based on his reporting on the elder Bolling, said on Twitter that Eric Bolling was a devoted father. Many members of the news media from across the political spectrum also expressed their condolences on Twitter.

Eric + his son. You can just tell from this pic that he adored him. The one thing I heard from people consistently: he was a devoted dad. https://t.co/S8Dhgp6bH7  Yashar Ali (@yashar) September 9, 2017

@ericbolling To my dear friend, please know we all love you, will be here for you and your family.  Sean Hannity (@seanhannity) September 9, 2017

Guy-wrenching news about #EricBolling 19-year old only son Eric. Erica and I weep for the Bolling family This is horrible, our condolences  Geraldo Rivera (@GeraldoRivera) September 9, 2017

So awful. My heart goes out to Eric and his family. Tragedy: Eric Bolling Son Dies | Mediaite https://t.co/8DvUNqqi9M  Don Lemon (@donlemon) September 9, 2017

Update 9/10/17: This story has been updated to reflect Eric Bollings tweets on his sons death and updated reporting on the possible cause of death.

See original article on Fortune.com

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donald trump

President Donald Trump is adopting a new approach to governing after a rocky start to his term.

One adviser told Axios' Mike Allen that after seven months in office, the president finally realized, "people really f---ing hate me."

Trump's decision this week to work with House minority leader, Nancy Pelosi, and Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer, may signal that he's open to pivoting to a different strategy after hovering at record low levels of popularity during his first seven months in office: working across the aisle.

Earlier this week, Trump sided with congressional Democrats to bundle Hurricane Harvey relief funds, a three-month debt-limit increase, and a three-month continuing resolution to keep the government funded. The decision pitted Trump against leaders of his own party who wanted a longer extension on the debt ceiling.

House Speaker Paul Ryan had hours earlier called a three-month debt-limit increase "ridiculous" and said Democrats were trying to "play politics" by suggesting tying in aid for Harvey relief.

As the leaders appeared ready to agree to disagree, Trump reportedly interjected and said the group should go with a three-month debt-limit extension and a three-month continuing resolution.

One senior administration official told Axios that Trump's deal with the Democrats had come because "he just wanted to do something popular." The president, famed for his focus on the way he's perceived in the media, reportedly basked in the praise he received from "Morning Joe" after the deal was struck.

Donald Trump Paul Ryan

Trump has appeared to grow impatient with Republican leadership in recent months after several botched attempts at passing healthcare reform. His relationship with Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell has reportedly soured since the failed effort, and Trump has openly backed primary challengers to congressional Republicans like Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake, who frequently criticizes him.

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Axios reported that by working with Democrats, Trump could be hoping to boost his popularity with the American public and engineer a turnaround in which he can blame congressional Republicans for legislative setbacks. The pivot could also be reflective of the new environment Trump created in the West Wing after dismissing divisive, nationalist figures like former chief strategist Steve Bannon. With Bannon gone, the more moderate faction of the West Wing, consisting of New Yorkers like economic adviser Gary Cohn and senior adviser Jared Kushner, will likely hold more sway over the president's decisions.

Trump's compromise with the Democrats may prove useful in the future as well, when he'll need votes from across the aisle as he works to push more legislation and reform. Republicans are acutely aware of that possibility, Axios reported. One Republican told the news website that Trump "accepted a shakedown when he was holding all the cards ... This is quite literally a guy who watches 'ER' trying to perform a surgery."

Related:

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Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Stanley Fischer's decision to resign will leave President Donald Trump with a Fed Board of Governors that has more vacancies than occupants.

Fischer, who was appointed in May 2014 by President Barack Obama, said he will resign from the board, effective on or around Oct. 13. Fischer, 73, whose term was set to expire in 2020, cited personal reasons for his departure. He is married with three adult children. During his tenure at the Fed, he served as chairman of the board's committee on Financial Stability as well as the Committee on Economic and Financial Monitoring and Research.

"Stan's keen insights, grounded in a lifetime of exemplary scholarship and public service, contributed invaluably to our monetary policy deliberations. He represented the Board internationally with distinction and led our efforts to foster financial stability," Fed Chair Janet Yellen said in a statement.

Fischer joined the Fed after serving as a governor of the Bank of Israel, from 2005 to 2013, according to BoardEx, a relationship mapping service of TheStreet Inc. He is a dual citizen of the United States and Israel. Previously, he was vice chairman of Citigroup Inc. for nearly three years. He was also the first deputy managing director of the International Monetary Fund from 1994 to 2001 and was the chief economist for the World Bank between 1988 and 1990.

Fischer, who was born in Zambia in 1943, received his undergraduate and master's degrees from the London School of Economics and a Ph.D. in economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he would go on to become a professor. While at MIT, Fischer oversaw former Fed chairman Ben Bernanke's thesis and taught European Central Bank President Mario Draghi, according to Bloomberg.

Fischer's role as vice chairman meant he had an influential position, assisting and advising Yellen. In his resignation letter, Fischer said it has been a "great privilege to serve on the Federal Reserve Board, and, most especially, to work alongside Chair Yellen."

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But with Fischer's soon-to-be-vacant seat, the president has the responsibility for nominating a candidate to the seven-member Board of Governors, and each much be confirmed by the Senate.

Fischer's departure means that four of the seven seats on the board will be vacant. Only Yellen, Jerome Powell and Lael Brainard will remain on the Board of Governors. The president nominated Randal Quarles, a former Treasury official under President George W. Bush, to be a governor. His nomination, however, still needs to be confirmed by the Senate.

Yellen's term as chair is set to expire in February as well. She has committed to remaining as chair through the end of her term but has declined to speculate on whether she would stay after that. There have been reports that President Trump is considering Gary Cohn, a top White House economic adviser and former Goldman Sachs president, for the chair position.

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Editors' pick: Originally published Sept. 6.

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hillary clinton

In her first television interview since losing the 2016 election, Hillary Clinton reflected on her loss, placing blame on external actors like Russia, while acknowledging places where she could have improved her campaign.

Speaking to Jane Pauley on "CBS Sunday Morning", the former secretary of state  who acknowledged that she did not prepare a concession speech in November  said the loss "hurts a lot", "still is very painful," and that she "felt like I had let everybody down."

"It was a very hard transition," Clinton said of the days following the election. "I really struggled. I couldn't feel, I couldn't think. I was just gob-smacked, wiped out."

She described her reasons for attending President Donald Trump's inauguration, and her reaction to watching his inflammatory, provocative speech on the platform.

"I'm a former first lady, and former presidents and first ladies show up. It's part of the demonstration of the continuity of our government," Clinton said. "And so there I was, on the platform, you know, feeling like an out-of-body experience. And then his speech, which was a cry from the white nationalist gut."

Clinton elaborated on areas where she thought she could have improved her campaign, singling out her inability to connect with many individuals still recovering from the economic recession, and saying her "most important" mistake was using a private email server while serving as secretary of state, which she said was "presented in such a negative way" that her campaign couldn't recover.

She argued that her political situation was the "perfect storm" of obstacles, blaming sexism and misogyny, Russian hacking and the release of private internal Democratic party emails, and former FBI Director James Comey's investigation into her email practices.

Clinton reiterated her argument that Comey's decision fewer than two weeks before the election to publicly re-open  and later close  the investigation into her email practices derailed the campaign, asking why Comey did not announce that he was also investigating Trump's potential ties to Russia.

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"It just stopped my momentum," Clinton said. "At the same time he does that about a closed investigation, there's an open investigation into the Trump campaign and their connections with Russia. You never hear a word about it. And when asked later, he goes, 'Well, it was too close to the election.' Now, help me make sense of that. I can't understand it."

Emphasizing that she was "done being a candidate," Clinton also took plenty of swipes at Trump, saying he acted like a "creep" at one of the presidential debates, and mocking his statement that before taking office, he didn't fully comprehend the responsibilities of the presidency.

"We have a reality show that leads to the election of a president," she said. "He ends up in the Oval Office. He says, 'Boy, it's so much harder than I thought it would be. This is really tough. I had no idea.' Well, yeah, because it's not a show. It's real. It's reality for sure."

Sunday's interview marked the first of a series of high-profile public appearances the former senator will embark on promoting her campaign memoir "What Happened," which is set to be released on Tuesday.

This week, Clinton is scheduled to appear on ABC's "The View" and the popular center-left podcast "Pod Save America," and she will attend a book signing in New York.

Though the interview did not mention Clinton's perspective on the 2016 Democratic primary, many Democrats have privately and publicly grated at the release of the former candidate's book, noting that it reopens many of the intraparty fights that Democrats have been attempting to put behind them since the election.

Indeed, in excerpts of her book that have leaked, Clinton takes swipes at many Democrats, including rivals like Sen. Bernie Sanders for making what she said were unrealistic campaign promises, and Vice President Joe Biden for his criticisms of her inability to connect with some white working class voters.

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Mandatory evacuations have been announced for cities south of Lake Okeechobee, the large inland freshwater lake west of West Palm Beach in Florida, in expectation of Hurricane Irmas arrival.

Vice Mayor Melissa McKinley, who represents the Glades community, including the cities of Belle Glade, South Bay and Pahokee, told a Palm Beach County news conference Thursday evening that following extensive conversations with emergency management teams and experts, and the shift of the storm a little bit to the west, the governors office will be issuing mandatory evacuations for cities south of the lake.

McKinley described the decision to issue evacuationswhich will go from Lake Harbor to Canal Point and extend over to Lake Port over in Hendry Countyas an overabundance of caution.

Officials from other areas in the U.S. that lie in Hurricane Irmas potential path have ordered evacuations and issued states of emergency, including in Broward Country, which ordered an evacuation for low-lying areas, the barrier islands, mobile homes and space east of the Federal Highway from Thursday at noon, and Miami-Dade County, which ordered evacuations for zones A and B along the water from 7 a.m. on Thursday. Georgia, North and South Carolina have also announced evacuations ahead of Hurricane Irma.

Here are all the Hurricane Irma evacuation zones announced as of Friday morning.
Londoners are taking to the streets to call for an exit from Brexit

Last summer, the people of Britain voted to leave the European Union. Well, most of them did, at least. Those who didnt vote for this British exit  aka Brexit  came out en masse on Saturday to protest the unpopular political move that may come to fruition in early 2019.

Brexit was wildly unpopular among young voters; indeed, 75% of people ages 18 to 24 voted against Britains exit from the EU. The entire region was pretty evenly split, in fact, and in the end the decision was determined by a 52%-48% split, meaning that almost half the country was against this major decision. Considering that Brexit will greatly impact the lives of everyone in Britain, those are terrible odds.

This weekend, thousands of Londoners protested at Parliament Square for The Peoples March for Europe.

The call was for parliament to Exit Brexit.

Protesters hoped to influence members of parliament to vote against the EU exit, which theyll do on Monday for the first time since the Brexit vote.

The Guardian reported that First Secretary of State Damian Green said that the government will consider reasonable points about the withdrawal bill, so there may be hope yet for anti-Brexiters  including author J.K. Rowling.

One of the strongest arguments among Brexit-Exit proponents is that leaving the E.U. is xenophobic.

While those in favor of Brexit claim that leaving the European Union, which consists of 28 countries, will allow for Britain to have greater control over its borders and immigration laws, Brexit essentially means that refugees and immigrants will have a more difficult time moving to Britain than any other place in Europe.

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When we know the outcome and the facts, public should have the choice whether to jump off the cliff or #ExitFromBrexit #PeoplesMarch4EU pic.twitter.com/o7gDIPbJGi  Vince Cable (@vincecable) September 9, 2017

Vince Cable, an MP from Twickenham and leader of the Liberal Democrats, spoke about this at the demonstration, saying, Were beginning to see, for example, large numbers of European Nationals feeling here insecure, unwanted, drifting away from the country  some of the best people we have.

Hmm, turning away important members of society based on their places of origin? That sounds eerily familiar.

Considering how unifying the European Unions mission is, its a bold statement from the U.K. to leave it; a statement that many dont agree with. In fact, many at the march sang that those who do support the bill can shove [their] Brexit up [their] arse.

It doesnt get much more British than that.
Network servers and emails are the principal weak links when it comes to health care data hacks, a study in JAMA finds (AFP Photo/Andrew CABALLERO-REYNOLDS)

Washington (AFP) - It could be the worst-ever data breach for American consumers, exposing some of the most sensitive data for a vast number of US households.

The hack disclosed this week at Equifax, one of the three major credit bureaus which collect consumer financial data, potentially affects 143 million US customers, or more than half the adult population.

While not the largest breach -- Yahoo attacks leaked data on as many as one billion accounts -- the Equifax incident could be the most damaging because of the nature of data collected: bank and social security numbers and personal information of value to hackers and others.

"This is the data that every hacker wants to steal your identity and compromise your accounts," said Darren Hayes, a Pace University professor specializing in digital forensics and cybersecurity.

"It's not like the Yahoo breach where you could reset your password. Your information is gone. There's nothing to reset."

Some reports suggested Equifax data was being sold on "dark web" marketplaces, but analysts said it was too soon to know who was behind the attack and the motivation.

"This could be a mercenary group or it could be a nation-state compiling it with other data" for espionage purposes, said James Scott, a senior fellow at the Institute for Critical Infrastructure Technology, a Washington think tank.

"This is the kind of information I would go after if I were a nation-state, to set up psychographic targeting for information and political warfare."

- National security risks -

Peter Levin, chief executive at the data security firm Amida Technology Solutions and a former federal cybersecurity official, said he is concerned over the national security impact of the breach, which follows a leak of data on millions of US government employees disclosed in 2015.

"The implications with regard to national security are very large," he said.

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Because most federal employees also have credit reports, "those people have now been hacked twice," Levin said, offering potential adversaries fresh data to be used against them.

"We've just given the bad guys a lot more information," he said. "Even if they didn't perpetrate the attack, they can buy the data."

An FBI statement said the US law enforcement agency "is aware of the reporting and tracking the situation as appropriate."

The breach raised numerous questions among experts, such as why the company waited more than a month to notify consumers after learning of the attacks July 29.

Some analysts expressed concern that a company with a mission to safeguard sensitive data allowed a breach of this scope to take place.

"Equifax knew it was a prime target for cyberattacks," said Annie Anton, who chairs the Georgia Tech School of Interactive Computing and specializes in computer security research.

"It's amazing that one flaw could lead to a breach involving 140 million people. They should have safeguards in place. Even if a breach happens, it shouldn't grow to that scale."

Even more surprising, Anton said, is that Equifax still used social security numbers for verification despite the known risks from storing these key identifiers.

Anton noted that she testified before Congress in 2007 recommending that credit bureaus be required to use alternatives to social security numbers "and it still hasn't been fixed."

Some details of the attack remain unclear, including whether the data stolen was encrypted -- which would make it harder for the hackers to monetize.

At least two class-action lawsuits on behalf of consumers were filed following the disclosure claiming Equifax failed to adequately protect important data.

Equifax "should have been better prepared for any attempt to penetrate its systems," said attorney John Yanchunis, who filed one of the lawsuits.

Separate lawsuits announced Friday meanwhile said Equifax may have violated securities laws by allowing three high-ranking Equifax executives to sell shares worth almost $1.8 million in the days after the hack was discovered.

An Equifax spokesperson told AFP the executives "had no knowledge that an intrusion had occurred at the time they sold their shares."

Equifax stock fell 13.6 percent in New York trades on Friday following the disclosure.

- How to respond-

The potential impact of the Equifax breach prompted some experts to suggest the government revisit the idea of social security numbers issued for life.

"The government should consider changing social security numbers since there have been so many breaches," Hayes said.

Levin added that he "would be in favor of issuing new social security," even though "it's a fraught political discussion."

Others said the US could follow a European rule set to take effect in 2018 requiring companies to notify consumers within 72 hours of a data breach.

"Companies will put more into cybersecurity if there are tough penalties associated with data breaches," Hayes said.

The House Financial Services Committee will hold hearings on the breach, committee chair Jeb Hensarling said while expressing concern over a "very troubling situation."

New York state attorney general Eric Schneiderman said his office was launching a formal probe to determine if Equifax adequately notified consumers and had appropriate safeguards in place.
Peru's former president Alberto Fujimori was convicted in 2007 for his role in killings by a death squad targeting supposed guerrillas when he was in power from 1990-2000 (AFP Photo/ERNESTO BENAVIDES) (AFP/File)

Lima (AFP) - Former President Alberto Fujimori, convicted and jailed for corruption and crimes against humanity, was hospitalized at a clinic Saturday after suffering a heart condition, the second such episode in recent days, his doctor said.

"This morning, he showed signs of the beginning of tachycardia, and the decision was made to take him immediately to intensive care," Alejandro Aguinaga told AFP.

"He is now in stable condition and has been doing a series of tests."

Aguinaga noted that Fujimori, who led Peru from 1990-2000, experienced an "onset of supraventricular tachycardia," which is a sign of a heart problem, and the second such event for his patient in just 11 days.

The 79-year-old last went to hospital on August 29, for a six-day stay before returning to prison. In May, he also experienced arrhythmia. His doctor says he also suffers from hypertension.

He was convicted in 2007 for his role in killings by a death squad targeting supposed guerrillas when he was in power from 1990-2000.

Fujimori has since been in and out of hospital with heart, back and stomach trouble and growths on his tongue, which has been operated on several times for cancer.

The courts have rejected efforts by his family to have him freed from prison.
At a secret farm outside of the Twin Cities in Minnesota, a pen full of genetically modified pigs are helping researchers find cures to cancer. Advancements in gene editing technology have allowed St. Paul start-up Recombinetics to mimic human conditions in pigs, like Alheizmer's and cancer, so pharmaceutical companies can more quickly get drugs to the market. "Pigs are 98 percent similar to humans," said Recombinetics' President and CEO Tammy Lee Stanoch. "While researchers have been able to cure cancer thousands of times in mice models, it still hasn't been solved yet in humans." Using farm pigs for clinical trials is nothing new, but by using a gene modifying technology called TALENs, the company has created pigs that have human-like traits to improve the outcomes of trials. Stanoch said their pig model could cut the time it takes to find treatments for diseases in half, potentially saving millions in research costs. Dr. Adrienne Watson, Recombinetics' senior research scientist, explained that because mice are so different from humans anatomically, years of research often go to waste. She is currently working on two pigs that they modified to be born with a common genetic disorder called Neurofibromatosis, or NF1. It's a disease that affects one in 3,000 children, and often leads to cancer. She was amazed how similar the symptoms and tumors in their edited pigs were to those of humans. "We've learned so much from these trials," Dr. Watson said. "We've learned better ways to dose patients  as well as to see early on if the drug is being effective." The promise of these pigs goes beyond drugs, however. Recombinetics is also working on growing human organs and tissues in pigs that could then be transplanted into people in need. A patient could have a personal pig to grow tissue from their own stem cells, greatly reducing the rate of rejection. "You would be able to use your skin cell, grow a product and then schedule your surgery at some point in the future," Stanoch said. "This will provide an amazing breakthrough and has the ability to save 22 people every day who are dying waiting for an organ transplant." Stanoch said the company is just a few years away from being able to grow human pancreas, liver and cardiac cells in pigs. They are also close to using a pig as a human blood bank. "So these aren't ideas that are wild and ten years off," she said. "This is the here and now." Recombinetics is also working toward improving agriculture processes with precision gene editing. For example, the company has already found success with their genetically modified hornless cattle. From a single cell in a petri dish, the company created modified cattle, which eliminated the need for a common and painful practice of dairy farmers to remove the horns. To cross-breed cattle to be born without horns can take decades, and result in lower milk productivity along the way. "We are able to precisely edit traits in animals that provide animal welfare benefits or productivity benefits for that animal," Stanoch said. So if Recombinetics can edit a hornless cow, and can edit a pig to have cancer, couldn't they just edit a human to be born without disease? Dr. Watson says that's not a goal. "Recombinetics is not in the business to be editing human cells." Recombinetics has raised $31 million from private investors since the company was founded in 2008.



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Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc. REGN along with partner Sanofi SNY announced that the FDA has granted Breakthrough Therapy status to its experimental candidate, cemiplimab (REGN2810).

Sanofi/Regeneron are looking to get cemiplimab, a checkpoint inhibitor targeting PD-1 (programmed death 1), approved for treating adults with advanced metastatic cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma (CSCC) type of skin cancer. The companies anticipate submitting a biologics license application (BLA) for cemiplimab to the FDA in the first quarter of 2018.

The FDAs Breakthrough Therapy designation aims to expedite the development and review of drugs, intended to treat serious or life-threatening conditions and provide access to patients as soon as possible.

Significantly, shares of Regeneron have declined almost 6% despite the good news as AbbVie ABBV announced its skin treatment candidate upadacitinib to having met primary endpoints in phase IIb study which in turn might increase market competition for cemiplimab. However, shares of the company have outperformed the industry year to date. The stock has surged 28.5% compared with the industrys 15.7% rally during the period.

We remind investors that in June, the companies reported positive, preliminary results from two expansion cohorts of phase I study (n=400), evaluating cemiplimab in patients with advanced CSCC. Data from the study showed that treatment with cemiplimab achieved an overall response rate (ORR) of 46.2% and a disease control rate (DCR) of 69.2%. The data was presented at the 2017 American Society of Clinical Oncology Annual meeting.

Another phase II trial, EMPOWER-CSCC 1, is examining REGN2810 in metastatic CSCC and is currently in the enrolment phase. Additionally, a phase III study evaluating REGN2810 as a first-line treatment for non-small cell lung cancer was initiated in the second quarter of 2017.

Notably, cemiplimab is put under a joint development program by Regeneron and Sanofi, post a global collaboration agreement, entered in July 2015. Regeneron had also inked clinical study agreements with other pharmacy biggies namely, Inovio Pharmaceuticals, Inc. INO and SillaJen, Inc. in the second quarter of 2017 to assess cemiplimab in combination with their respective cancer candidates.

Story continues

Per the companys press release, CSCC is the second most common and deadliest skin cancer after melanoma in the United States. The disease is also responsible for most deaths among non-melanoma skin cancer patients. Although it is easier to apprehend the condition in early stages, it becomes quite difficult to treat the same once progressed to advanced stages. Hence, the candidate is expected to provide the company with access to a market promising huge potential.

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Regeneron currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

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Boats are seen at a marina in Coconut Grove as Hurricane Irma arrives at south Florida, in Miami, Florida, U.S., September 10, 2017. REUTERS/Carlos Barria (Reuters)

By Tom Sims

MONACO (Reuters) - As Hurricane Irma battered Florida on Sunday, the cream of the insurance world -- gathered under the Mediterranean sun in Monte Carlo -- was assessing the costs of the storm for the global industry.

The takeaway so far: Irma and its predecessor Hurricane Harvey, which caused massive flooding in Texas two weeks ago, are likely to take a toll on profits in a sector struggling with thin margins, stiff competition and falling prices.

But at this early stage, the damages are not expected to be so excessive that they hit insurers' capital base in a way that would lift slumping insurance prices or hurt their credit ratings.

Irma is a "major event for Florida and also a major event for the insurance industry", Torsten Jeworrek, member of the board of the German reinsurance giant Munich Re <MUVGn.DE>, told journalists.

Along with some 2,500 insurance executives, he is in Monaco for an annual conclave to haggle over reinsurance prices and strike underwriting deals.

The meeting typically occurs at the height of the Atlantic hurricane season, but not since Hurricane Katrina in 2005 have catastrophes weighed so heavily.

The industry is only slowly coming to grips with Harvey's likely costs.

Munich Re's Jeworrek said the loss assessment was "complex" and that it would "take a long time for the necessary estimates, leaving high uncertainty in the market".

He estimated that insured losses for the global industry would total between $20 billion and $30 billion, which would put the storm on a similar scale to Hurricane Sandy, whose storm surge caused flooding in New York in 2012.

For Irma, which hit Florida early on Sunday after ravaging the Caribbean, the loss estimates are more severe.

AIR Worldwide forecasted total insured losses of between $20 billion and $65 billion. The firm's president Bill Churney said he would publish an updated forecast on Monday.

All combined, the storms are likely to "translate into an underwriting loss for the year", said Robert DeRose, senior director at the insurance ratings agency A.M. Best.

Story continues

His firm estimated that $75 billion in insured losses would result in an average industry-wide combined ratio, a closely-watched measure of expenses to premium income, of 106 percent compared with 95 percent in 2016. Ratios greater than 100 point to losses.

The big question for the industry has been whether reinsurers will see such high losses that they can then demand higher prices for their coverage. That would be the first major reversal since Katrina, the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history with insured losses of around $80 billion.

The verdict so far among analysts is that profit will take a hit, but the dynamics of capital and pricing will not.

"We don't see this as a market-turning event," said Brian Schneider of Fitch Ratings. "Pricing is not likely to respond."

Irma's timing is giving attendees plenty to talk about and in some cases disrupting their own travel plans.

Reinsurance broker AON Benfield told some staff who had planned to travel to Monte Carlo to instead remain to deal with Florida claims, Chief Executive Officer Eric Andersen said.

With Monte Carlo's yacht-filled harbour and billboards advertising private jets offering a contrast to the destruction wrought in Texas and the Caribbean, one journalist asked whether insurers might move their annual meeting to a more modest venue.

Monte Carlo is "the place to be at the end of the day," said Munich Re's Jeworrek. "The industry wouldn't move to another location to get rid of the reputational damage to its image."

"We will also come next year. You can write that."

(Reporting by Tom Sims; Editing by Catherine Evans)
Donald Trump Mike Flynn

White House special counsel Ty Cobb told an email prankster posing as the White House social-media director that President Donald Trump's campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, and former national security adviser, Michael Flynn, had "issues" that would cause the Russia investigation "to linger."

"I've been really worried recently about the whole Russian situation," wrote the prankster, who tweets under the name @SINON_REBORN and provided the emails to Business Insider. "The White House will be okay won't it? I love my job, and the people I work with, I don't want the dream to end up derailing."

Cobb said in response: "I have great confidence there is nothing there implicating the President or the White House. Manafort and Flynn have issues separate and apart from the WH that will cause the investigation to linger but am hoping we get a clean bill of health soon. Best, Ty."

Manafort's spokesman declined to comment. Flynn's lawyer did not respond to a request for comment.

Asked to comment on the exchange, Cobb told Business Insider: "No idea  it is a felony, of course, to impersonate a government official, of course, or to conspire to." He did not respond to follow-up questions.

Cobb's assertion that "there is nothing there implicating the President or the White House" comes amid reports that Robert Mueller, the special counsel leading the FBI's Russia investigation, is building an obstruction-of-justice case against the president over his firing of James Comey, the former FBI director.

Mueller will also be interviewing aides who were aboard Air Force One when the president was said to have drafted a misleading statement on behalf of his son Donald Trump Jr. about a meeting Trump Jr. had with two Russians at Trump Tower last June, according to CNN.

Cobb, who was hired in July to manage the legal and media response to the Russia investigation, may have offered a window into the White House's assessment of Manafort's and Flynn's standing in the ongoing probe.

Story continues

FILE PHOTO: Paul Manafort of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump's staff listens during a round table discussion on security at Trump Tower in the Manhattan borough of New York, U.S., August 17, 2016. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri

"This isn't far off from a reasonable legal analysis based on what we know publicly," said Renato Mariotti, a former federal prosecutor. "We know Manafort has serious potential liability given the search warrant executed at his home, but that could be for something discrete like a false disclosure. Ditto with Flynn."

But Cobb's analysis is "interesting," Mariotti said, because "he presumably has interviewed all of the relevant witnesses and read the documents."

He added: "He knows more than we know."

Manafort has emerged as a focal point of the FBI's investigation into Russia's interference in the 2016 presidential election and whether the Trump campaign colluded with Moscow in that effort.

Mueller recently recruited New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman to help investigate the longtime political operative for possible financial crimes and money laundering. The IRS's criminal-investigations unit has been brought onto the investigation to examine similar issues, according to The Daily Beast, though it is unclear to what extent its work will focus on Manafort.

Mueller's team obtained a search warrant to raid Manafort's home in July.

Mueller's investigators are also reportedly looking into whether Flynn took part in efforts to obtain emails from Russian hackers deleted from former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's private email server.

Flynn came under scrutiny earlier this year over his frequent contact with Russia's ambassador to the US during the election and his belated registration as a foreign agent for his lobbying work on behalf of a Turkish businessman last year.

Russian operatives also boasted during the 2016 election that they could use their relationship with Flynn to make inroads with Trump and his associates, CNN reported earlier this year.

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With Hurricane Irma barreling down on Central Florida, Apopka resident Carmen Nova had a decision to make.

A Mexican immigrant living in the country illegally, she knew her mobile home was at risk in the storm. But the 30-year-old mother of three also knew that seeking protection could pose its own hazards.

In a time of increasing public sentiment against illegal immigration, undocumented immigrants like Nova are nervous about reporting to authorities, even if it is to take refuge from a hurricane.

Theres an internal storm, theres an external storm, and theres a political storm, and theyre all targeting this community, said Sister Ann Kendrick, a Roman Catholic nun, community organizer and immigrant rights advocate.

Theyre getting hammered, said Kendrick, who has worked hard in advance of the hurricane to convince undocumented immigrants that it is safer to take shelter than to remain in less-than-sturdy homes.

Like other counties in Florida, Apopkas Orange County issued an evacuation order for people living in mobile homes, which are also known as manufactured homes and are a popular housing choice for immigrants.

Fears among immigrants in the area were heightened in recent days after the sheriff in neighboring Polk County pledged to check criminal records of people seeking shelter.

Although the statement did not mention immigration status and officials later clarified that undocumented immigrants would not be targeted, the warning nevertheless reverberated in migrant communities.

In Apopka, a town of about 50,000 people outside Orlando, Kendrick had plenty of work to do in advance of the storm.

The areas undocumented immigrants historically came to the area to work on farms but in more recent years have shifted to construction, landscaping and housekeeping.

Tirso Moreno, leader of the Apopka-based Farmworker Association of Florida, said the Polk County warning had an impact in Orange County.

It scared people, said Moreno, who also spread the word with immigrants that they must take shelter.

Story continues

Moreno said he was not convinced that all the undocumented workers he spoke with would take his advice, saying some were likely to wait out the storm in their mobile homes.

The big problem is that many of them dont have enough information, although its better than it used to be now that we have more Spanish-language media, Moreno said.

Kendrick said she fielded calls throughout the day on Friday from undocumented immigrants who wondered if it was safe to report to shelters.

About 50 people, including several undocumented families, were waiting in line outside a shelter at Apopka High School when it opened at 9 a.m. on Saturday, Kendrick said.

They trust the schools, and they trust us, so if we tell them its safe, theyre coming, Kendrick said.

Nova, who cleans houses for a $15 an hour while her husband works as a landscaper for $12 an hour, was among those who decided to seek shelter, saying she would put her fate in Gods hands.

If they ask for papers, I dont have them, Nova said from her mobile home with boarded up windows as she prepared her family to move to the shelter. The authorities will have to do what they have to do. I am not going to live in fear.
A federal judge gave Apple the first round in a patent battle with Qualcomm over technology for the iPhone, refusing to block Apple's legal efforts in other countries (AFP Photo/CHRIS J RATCLIFFE) (AFP/File)

San Francisco (AFP) - A US federal judge Friday rejected an effort by Qualcomm to limit legal challenges from Apple in the contentious patent battles between the two California technology giants.

Federal Judge Gonzalo Curiel refused to grant Qualcomm's request to prevent Apple from pursuing its litigation in a dozen other countries, in a ruling which represents just the first round of legal wrangling with Apple.

Qualcomm, the computer chip giant, sued Apple in response to the iPhone maker's efforts to join antitrust actions in the United States and other countries, contending Apple has been using Qualcomm technology without paying for it.

The procedural ruling still leaves a long road ahead for the two firms, which are battling over the rights for technology used in iPhones and other mobile devices.

The judge said he was unable to enjoin Apple from pursuing legal action against Qualcomm in Britain, China, Japan, Taiwan and elsewhere, rejecting the Qualcomm argument that these are all part of "a single licensing dispute."

"Qualcomm placed global relief on the table, not Apple," the judge wrote.

"Accordingly, the court is not prepared to find that the threat of granting Qualcomm the relief that it seeks, here, is reason enough to enjoin the otherwise legitimate lawsuits that Apple filed elsewhere."

Responding to the latest ruling, Apple welcomed the judge's decision in a statement, adding that "Apple has always been willing to pay a fair price for technology used in our products, but for years Qualcomm has acted unreasonably and refused to negotiate fair terms for the single connectivity component they provide."

Qualcomm spokeswoman Christine Trimble said in an emailed statement: "While we are disappointed by todays rulings, we recognize that the motions involved high procedural hurdles. Nevertheless, we are pleased that the court has set a case schedule that will get us to trial expeditiously."

Apple filed a US lawsuit in January accusing Qualcomm of abusing its market power for certain mobile chipsets to demand unfair royalties, and has also joined efforts in other countries where Qualcomm faces probes from antitrust authorities.

Qualcomm responded with its own claims against Apple and argued that the iPhone maker had been providing "false and misleading information" to antitrust authorities in an effort to reduce its royalty payments to Qualcomm.
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There are several indications to suggest this. For one, the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, last year insulted the Saudi royal family and criticised its role as caretaker of the holiest Islam sites.

Only a few months ago, the former defense minister of Iran Hossein Dehghan warned Saudi Arabia: If the Saudis do anything ignorant, we will leave no area untouched except for Makkah and Madinah. One of the princes of Saudi Arabia said that his country is well aware that it is a main target of the Iranian regime and said that instead of waiting for the battle to come to Saudi Arabia, they would work to have it in Iran.

Saudi Arabia and its allies in the GCC took action to stop Iran from opening the military corridor that would have led the regime right to the Saudi border.

However, there may be an even more pressing danger.

At the minute, Tehran has control over an alarming amount of space in Syria and Iraq. It is using its forces in Iran, and Assads forces, to provide a safe route of almost 2,000 kilometres linking Tehran and Beirut. This will give Iran the chance to supply its militias, including the notorious Hezbollah, with supplies and heavy weapons without being hindered by checks, border verifications, etc.

Iran has been identified as the biggest state sponsor of terrorism in the world and it is not even trying to cover up its terrorist activities.

President Trump announced that he was considering the United States position with regards to the 2015 nuclear deal, and President Rouhani responded by saying that Irans nuclear program could be restarted immediately.

The Iranian regime is out of control and threats like these show that there is no chance of bringing moderation to the ruling powers of Iran.

As well as threatening the international community, the Iranian regime is threatening people at home. The Iranian people have no right to free speech and are threatened with prison, cruel punishments, or in some cases execution.

Now that Iran and Qatar have restored ties and Turkey and Iran are planning joint military action against Kurdish groups, foreign governments need to pick a side. Non-complaint states should have their diplomatic ties severed and a devastating result needs to be avoided.
The United States Secretary of Education plans to change the way colleges and universities deal with accusations of sexual assault.

The era of rule by letter is over, said Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, in comments last Thursday to the news media.

DeVos is promising to replace a set of rules from a 2011 document known as the Dear Colleague Letter. It was given to school officials during the presidency of Barack Obama.

The letter expanded on Title IX, a U.S. law barring sex discrimination in schools that receive financial support from the federal government. It said Title IX can also be used to protect victims of sexual assault and harassment. This meant schools were required to, among other things, offer a clear way for students and employees to report claims. In addition, colleges and universities must provide special medical services for victims.

The schools also have to hold their own fair and open investigations in addition to any criminal investigations by the police. If they fail to meet these and other requirements, the Education Department has the right to block their financial support. However, the government has yet to make use of such punishment.

Secretary Devos has promised to replace those rules, which she says created a system that failed students. She spoke during a visit to George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia.

Instead of working with schools on behalf of students, the [Obama] administration weaponized the Office for Civil Rights to work against schools and against students, she said.

DeVos spoke several times about protecting the rights of both sexual assault victims and those accused of carrying out attacks. She said the discussion about the issue has wrongly been formed as a competition between men and women.

DeVos did not explain how the rules will change. But she did say her office will ask the public and universities for help in developing new ones.

Critics of the Dear Colleague Letter cheered her announcement. They claim the current rules do not treat the accused and victims equally, but instead weigh more heavily against the accused.

Victim activists groups, however, called the education secretarys message a step in the wrong direction.

New York lawyer Andrew Miltenberg has represented students accused of sexual assault. He said he was pleased to see the government recognize that schools had been mistreating the accused.

Up until now, everyones been [frightened] of saying what [DeVos] said because the fear is it would be seen as being against victims rights, he said.

Know Your IX is an activist group for sexual-assault survivors. Its members said the speech sent the message that there is no one that will hold schools responsible for protecting students.

Sejal Singh serves as a policy coordinator for the group. She said, I really fear that DeVos will take us back to the days when schools [often] violated survivors rights and pushed sexual assault under the rug.

Debate over the 2011 memo has been rising in recent years. Critics say the rules ask school officials with little legal experience to act as judges. Also, they say the standards required for evidence are too low.

In U.S. criminal courts, the accusers must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that a suspect is guilty. But the 2011 letter told colleges to judge students based on whether it is more likely than not that they committed the offense.

During her speech, DeVos agreed with critics who say the current rules are too complex and hard to understand. They also depend on the lowest standard of proof, she added.

Every survivor of sexual misconduct must be taken seriously. Every student accused of sexual misconduct must know that guilt is not [already decided], she said.

At the same time, she made it clear that acts of sexual misconduct are  unacceptable and must be dealt with directly.

Never again will these acts only be whispered about in closed-off  rooms or swept under the rug, she promised.

About 25 protesters gathered outside the George Mason University building where DeVos spoke. Some were women who said they were sexually assaulted at their schools.

Former Obama administration officials disputed the comments DeVos made. Catherine Lhamon led the Education Departments Office for Civil Rights during Obamas presidency. She defended the current rules and said the courts have supported them several times.

Lhamon added that her office ruled on behalf of students accused of sexual assault many times. She criticized DeVos for opening the rules to what she called essentially a popular vote.

But others education leaders said it is too soon to know how a change in federal policy would affect schools. Gloria Larson, the president of Bentley University in Massachusetts, said her school would continue to follow the Obama administration rules. American Council on Education senior vice president Terry Hartle says many schools will likely do the same. His organization represents about 1,800 college presidents.

But Hartle disagrees that DeVoss speech means she will treat sexual assault accusations less seriously.

The Obama administration took a very important step and raised the importance of the issue, Hartle said. But they missed the target, and we need to go back and ask whether or not weve got the policies  in place that we should.

Im Dorothy Gundy. And Im Pete Musto.

Collin Binkley and Laurie Kellman reported on this story for the Associated Press. Pete Musto adapted their report for Learning English. George Grow was the editor.

We want to hear from you. What rules does the government in your country have governing how universities deal with sexual assault? Do you think they are strong and fair enough? Write to us in the Comments Section or on our Facebook page.

____________________________________________________________

Words in This Story

assault  n. the crime of trying or threatening to hurt someone physically

era  n.a period of time that is associated with a particular quality, event, person

financial  adj. relating to money

harassment  n. the act of annoying or bothering (someone) in a constant or repeated way

on behalf of  n. something done in support of someone

under the rug  idm. something that is illegal, embarrassing, or wrong that is hidden

standard(s)  n. a level of quality, or achievement that is considered acceptable or desirable

doubt  n. a feeling of being uncertain or unsure about something

misconduct  n. wrong behavior

whisper(ed)  v. to speak very softly or quietly
China will again lay claim to operating the fastest bullet train service in the world.

According to Chinese media, the Beijing to Shanghai train will once again be allowed to reach speeds up to 350 kilometers an hour. A deadly crash between two bullet trains in 2011 caused China to limit the speeds to 300 kilometers an hour.

The South China Morning Post reported the change will cut travel time by one hour on the 1,300 kilometer trip between Beijing and Shanghai. The faster Beijing-Shanghai trains will begin September 21 and additional lines will also be launched, according to the newspaper.

China already has several of the worlds fastest operating trains. The fastest is a non-bullet train - the Shanghai Maglev - that can reach speeds up to 430 kilometers an hour. The train is limited to carrying passengers from Shanghais center to the city's airport.

The term maglev stands for magnetic levitation. In this system, train vehicles are kept off the ground and powered by magnets. High-speed bullet trains have wheels and run on a track.

The second-fastest train in the world is the one running between Beijing and Shanghai, according to the website Railway Technology.

China also has more high-speed rail lines than anywhere else in the world - covering about 19,000 total kilometers, according to the Associated Press.

How fast are trains in other countries?

The fastest non-operating train in the world - undergoing testing in Japan - has reached a top speed of 603 kilometers per hour. It is a Japan Railway maglev train.



In Europe, Germany, Italy and Spain all have trains that can travel more than 320 kilometers an hour.

In the United States, the Amtrak Acela Express  which connects several eastern cities - is the countrys fastest train. It can travel at a top speed of 241 kilometers an hour.

Last year, Amtrak received a $2.45 billion loan from the U.S. government to help develop new high-speed trains expected to launch in 2021. Amtrak says those trains are designed to travel up to 300 kilometers an hour, but will begin service at about 260 kilometers an hour.

Other transport systems

U.S. company Hyperloop One is continuing to test its own high-speed transport system.

Hyperloop is being developed by businessman Elon Musk. He created and owns the aerospace company SpaceX, as well as electric carmaker Tesla.Hyperloop operates in a similar way to maglev trains, but uses vehicles called pods. An electromagnetic force causes the pods to float on air inside a series of steel tubes. The system forces air out of the tubes to reduce pressure and lower the resistance for the vehicles.

Musk recently announced a Hyperloop pod had reached a top speed of 355 kilometers an hour during a new test. This beat the previous record of 324 kilometers an hour, reached by a student team from Germany during a Hyperloop competition in California.

Musk has said he plans to keep developing the Hyperloop system, which he hopes will eventually greatly reduce travel times between major U.S. cities. He previously said Hyperloop would be designed to reach a top speed of about 1,200 kilometers an hour.

To most experts, that goal seems out of reach in the near future. However, a Chinese aerospace company just announced plans to build a super high-speed train that it says could reach a speed of 4,000 kilometers an hour.

An official at China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation recently spoke about the project during a conference in China, the state-run China News Service reported.

The official said the planned train would use maglev technology, combined with a Hyperloop-style tube system. He said a project team is currently working with dozens of researchers and companies to develop the worlds first high-speed flying train.

Im Bryan Lynn.

Bryan Lynn wrote this story for Learning English, based on reports from Reuters, the Associated Press and other sources. Hai Do was the editor.

We want to hear from you. Write to us in the Comments section, and visit our Facebook page.

_____________________________________________________________

Words in This Story

levitation  n. making something rise into the air

electromagnetic  adj. pertaining to a magnetic field that is produced by a current of electricity

style  n. a particular kind of something
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Core Laboratories N.V. provides reservoir description and production enhancement services and products to the oil and gas industry in the United States, Canada, and internationally. It operates through Reservoir Description and Production Enhancement segments. The Reservoir Description segment includes the characterization of petroleum reservoir rock, reservoir fluid, and gas samples to enhance production and improve recovery of oil and gas from its clients' reservoirs. It offers laboratory-based analytical and field services to characterize properties of crude oil and oil delivered products; and proprietary and joint industry studies. The Production Enhancement segment provides services and products relating to reservoir well completions, perforations, stimulations, and production. It offers integrated diagnostic services to evaluate and monitor the effectiveness of well completions and to develop solutions to improve the effectiveness of enhanced oil recovery projects. In addition, the company markets and sells its products through a combination of sales representatives, technical seminars, trade shows, and print advertising, as well as through distributors. It operates approximately in 50 countries. The company was founded in 1936 and is based in Amstelveen, the Netherlands.
The following companies are subsidiares of Illinois Tool Works: A V Co 1 Limited, A V Co 2 Limited, A V Co 3 Limited, ACCU-LUBE Manufacturing GmbH - Schmiermittel und -gerate -, AIP/BI Holdings Inc., Accessories Marketing Holding Corp., Advanced Molding Company Inc., Allen France SAS, Alpine Engineered Products, Alpine Systems Corporation, Anaerobicos S.r.l., AppliChem GmbH, Avery Berkel France, Avery India Limited, Avery Malaysia Sdn Bhd, Avery Weigh Tronix, Avery Weigh-Tronix Finance Limited, Avery Weigh-Tronix International Limited, Avery Weigh-Tronix LLC, Avery Weigh-Tronix Limited, Avery Weigh-Tronix Properties Limited, Avery Weigh-Tronix Suzhou Weighing Technology Co. Ltd., Azon Limited, B.C. Immo, Beijing Miller Electric Manufacturing Co. Ltd., Berkel Ireland Limited, Berrington UK, Brapenta Eletronica Ltda., Brooks Instrument B.V., Brooks Instrument GmbH, Brooks Instrument KFT, Brooks Instrument Korea Ltd., Brooks Instrument LLC, Brooks Instrument Shanghai Co. Ltd, Buell Industries Inc., CCI Realty Company, CFC Europe GmbH, CS Australia Pty Limited, CS Mexico Holding Company S DE RL DE CV, Calvia Spolka z Ograniczona Odpowiedzialnosci, Capital Ventures Australasia S.a r.l, Capmax Logistica S.A. de C.V., Celeste Industries Corporation, Coeur, Coeur Asia Limited, Coeur Holding Company, Coeur Inc., Coeur Shanghai Medical Appliance Trading Co. Ltd, Compagnie Hobart, Compagnie de Materiel et d'Equipements Techniques-Comet, Constructions Isothermiques Bontami C.I.B., Crane Carrier Company, Denison Mayes Group Limited, Despatch Industries, Diagraph Corporation Sdn. Bhd, Diagraph ITW Mexico S. de R.L. De C.V., Diagraph Mexico S.A. DE C.V., Dongguan Ark-Les Electric Components Co. Ltd., Dongguan CK Branding Co. Ltd., Duo Fast de Espana S.A.U., Duo-Fast Korea Co. Ltd., Duo-Fast LLC, E.C.S. d.o.o., E2M Production B.V.., E2M Technologies B.V.., E2M Technologies Inc.., ECS Cable Protection Sp. Zoo, ELRO Grosskuchen GmbH, ELRO Holding AG, ELRO-WERKE AG, Elro Group, Eltex-Elektrostatik-Gesellschaft mit beschrankter Haftung, Envases Multipac S.A. de C.V., Eurotec Srl, Exhibit 21, FEG Investments L.L.C., Filtertek De Mexico Holding Inc., Filtertek De Mexico S.A. de C.V., Filtertek SAS, GC Financement SA, Gamko B.V., Gun Hwa Platech Taicang Co. Ltd., HOBART Gesellschaft mit beschrankter Haftung, Hartness International, Hobart Andina S.A.S., Hobart Belgium B.V., Hobart Brothers International Chile Limitada, Hobart Brothers LLC, Hobart Dayton Mexicana S. de R.L. de C.V., Hobart Food Equipment Co. Ltd., Hobart International Singapore Pte. Ltd., Hobart Japan K.K., Hobart Korea LLC, Hobart LLC, Hobart Nederland B.V., Hobart Sales & Service Inc., Hobart Scandinavia ApS, Hobart Techniek B.V., Horis, ILC Investments Holdings Inc., ITW AEP LLC, ITW AOC LLC, ITW Aircraft Investments Inc., ITW Ampang Industries Philippines Inc., ITW Appliance Components EOOD, ITW Appliance Components S.A. de C.V., ITW Appliance Components S.r.l.a, ITW Appliance Components d.o.o., ITW Australia Holdings Pty Ltd, ITW Australia Property Holdings Pty Ltd., ITW Australia Pty Ltd, ITW Automotive Components Chongqing Co. Ltd., ITW Automotive Components Langfang Co. Ltd., ITW Automotive Japan K.K., ITW Automotive Korea LLC, ITW Automotive Parts Shanghai Co. Ltd, ITW Automotive Products GmbH, ITW Automotive Products Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V., ITW Bailly Comte, ITW Befestigungssysteme GmbH, ITW Belgium B.V., ITW Brazilian Nominee L.L.C., ITW Building Components Group Inc., ITW CER, ITW CP Distribution Center Holland BV, ITW CS UK Ltd., ITW Canada Inc., ITW Celeste Inc., ITW Chemical Products Ltda, ITW Chemical Products Scandinavia ApS, ITW China Investment Company Limited, ITW Colombia S.A.S., ITW Construction Products AB, ITW Construction Products AS, ITW Construction Products ApS, ITW Construction Products CZ s.r.o., ITW Construction Products Italy Srl, ITW Construction Products OU, ITW Construction Products OY, ITW Construction Products Shanghai Co. Ltd., ITW Construction Products Singapore Pte. Ltd., ITW Construction Services Manila Inc., ITW Contamination Control B.V., ITW Contamination Control Wujiang Co. Ltd., ITW Covid Security Group Inc., ITW DS Investments Inc., ITW DelFast do Brasil Ltda., ITW Denmark ApS, ITW Deutschland GmbH, ITW Diagraph GmbH, ITW Dynatec, ITW Dynatec Adhesive Equipment Suzhou Co. Ltd., ITW Dynatec GmbH, ITW Dynatec Kabushiki Kaisha, ITW EAE B.V., ITW EAE Mexico S de RL de CV, ITW EF&C France SAS, ITW EF&C Selb GmbH, ITW EU Holdings Ltd., ITW Electronic Business Asia Co. Limited, ITW Electronic Components/Products Shanghai Co. Ltd., ITW Electronics Suzhou Co. Ltd., ITW Epsilon Sarl, ITW Espana S.L., ITW European Finance Co. Ltd., ITW European Finance II Co. Ltd., ITW European Finance III Co. Ltd., ITW FEG Hong Kong Limited, ITW FEG do Brasil Industria e Comercio Ltda., ITW Fastener Products GmbH, ITW Fluids and Hygiene Solutions Ltda., ITW Food Equipment Group LLC, ITW GH LLC, ITW GSE ApS, ITW GSE Inc., ITW Gamma Sarl, ITW German Management LLC, ITW Global Investments Holdings LLC, ITW Global Investments Holdings Y Compania Sociedad en Comandita por Acciones, ITW Global Investments Inc., ITW Global Tire Repair Europe GmbH, ITW Global Tire Repair Inc., ITW Global Tire Repair Japan K.K., ITW Graphics Asia Limited, ITW Graphics Thailand Ltd., ITW Great Britain Investment & Licensing Holding Company, ITW Group France Luxembourg S.ar.l., ITW HLP Thailand Co. Ltd., ITW Holding Quimica B.C. S.L. Sole Shareholder Company, ITW Holdings Australia L.P., ITW Holdings I Limited, ITW Holdings II Limited, ITW Holdings III Limited, ITW Holdings IV Limited, ITW Holdings IX Limited, ITW Holdings Inc., ITW Holdings V Limited, ITW Holdings VI Limited, ITW Holdings VII Limited, ITW Holdings VIII Limited, ITW Holdings X Limited, ITW Holdings XI Limited, ITW ILC Holdings I Inc., ITW IPG Investments LLC, ITW Imaden Industria e Comercio Ltda., ITW India Private Limited, ITW International Holdings LLC, ITW Invest Holding GmbH, ITW Ireland Holdings Unlimited Company, ITW Ireland Unlimited Company, ITW Italy Holding Srl, ITW Japan Ltd., ITW Korea LLC, ITW LLC & Co. KG, ITW Limited, ITW Lys Fusion S.r.l., ITW Materials Technology Shanghai Co. Ltd., ITW Meritex Sdn. Bhd., ITW Metal Fasteners S.L., ITW Mexico Holding Company S. De R.L. de C.V., ITW Mexico Holdings LLC, ITW Morlock GmbH, ITW Mortgage Investments II Inc., ITW Mortgage Investments III Inc., ITW Mortgage Investments IV Inc., ITW Netherlands Administration BV, ITW Netherlands Beta B.V., ITW Netherlands Finance Alpha BV, ITW New Universal LLC, ITW New Zealand, ITW Ningbo Components & Fastenings Systems Co. Ltd., ITW Novadan Sp. Z.o.o., ITW PPF Brasil Adesivos Ltda., ITW Packaging Technology China Co. Ltd., ITW Participations S.a r.l., ITW Pension Funds Trustee Company, ITW Performance Polymers & Fluids Japan Co. Ltd., ITW Performance Polymers & Fluids Korea Limited, ITW Performance Polymers & Fluids OOO, ITW Performance Polymers ApS, ITW Performance Polymers Wujiang Co. Ltd., ITW Performance Polymers and Fluids Group FZE, ITW Peru S.A.C., ITW Poly Mex S. de R.L. de C.V., ITW Polymers Sealants North America Inc., ITW Pronovia s.r.o., ITW Pte. Ltd., ITW Qufu Automotive Cooling Systems Co. Ltd., ITW Real Estate Germany GmbH, ITW Residuals III L.L.C., ITW Residuals IV L.L.C., ITW Rivex, ITW SMPI, ITW SPG Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V., ITW Simco-Ion Shenzhen Co. Ltd., ITW Slovakia s.r.o., ITW Spain Holdings S.L., ITW Specialty Film LLC, ITW Specialty Films France, ITW Specialty Materials Suzhou Co. Ltd., ITW Sverige AB, ITW Sweden Holding AB, ITW Test & Measurement Equipment Shanghai Co. Ltd, ITW Test & Measurement GmbH, ITW Test and Measurement Italia Srl, ITW Test and Measurement Services Industry and Trade Ltd., ITW Texwipe Philippines Inc., ITW Thermal Films Shanghai Co. Ltd., ITW UK, ITW UK Finance Beta Limited, ITW UK Finance Delta Limited, ITW UK Finance Gamma Limited, ITW UK Finance Limited, ITW UK Finance Zeta Ltd., ITW UK II Limited, ITW Universal II LLC, ITW Welding, ITW Welding AB, ITW Welding GmbH, ITW Welding Products B.V., ITW Welding Products Group FZE, ITW Welding Products Group S. DE R.L. De C.V., ITW Welding Products Italy Srl, ITW Welding Products Limited Liability Company, ITW Welding Produtos Para Solgdagem Ltda., ITW Welding Singapore Pte. Ltd., ITW de France, ITW do Brasil Industrial e Comercial Ltda., Illinois Tool Works Chile Limitada, Illinois Tool Works ITW Nederland B.V., Illinois Tool Works Inc., Impar Comercio E Representacoes Ltda., Industrie Plastic Elsasser GmbH, Inmobiliaria Cit. S.A. de C.F., Innova Temperlite Servicios S.A. de C.V., Innovacion y Transformacion Automotriz S.A. de C.V., Instron Brasil Equipamentos Cientificos Ltda., Instron Foreign Sales Corp. Limited, Instron France S.A.S., Instron GmbH, Instron Japan Company Ltd., Instron Korea LLC, Instron Shanghai Ltd., Instron Thailand Limited, International Leasing Company LLC, Isolenge - ITW Sistemas de Isolamento Termico Ltda., Itw Spraytec, KCPL Mauritius Holdings, Kester, Kleinmann GmbH, Krafft S.L., Loma Systems, Loma Systems BV, Loma Systems Canada Inc., Loma Systems sro, Lombard Pressings Limited, Lumex Inc., Lys Fusion Poland Sp. z.o.o., M&C Specialties Co., MAGNAFLUX GmbH, MEHB Holdings Limited, MGHG Property LLC, MTS 2 LLC., MTS 3 LLC., MTS China Holdings LLC, MTS Europe Holdings LLC, MTS Holdings France S.a.r.l., MTS Japan Ltd.., MTS Korea Inc.., MTS Systems China Co. Ltd., MTS Systems Corporation, MTS Systems Danmark ApS., MTS Systems Europe B.V., MTS Systems Finance C.V.., MTS Systems Germany GmbH, MTS Systems Holding B.V.., MTS Systems Hong Kong Incorporated, MTS Systems Limited, MTS Systems Norden Aktiebolag, MTS Systems S.r.l, MTS Systems., MTS Systems.., MTS Sytems Do Brazil, MTS Testing Solutions India Private Limited., MTS Testing Systems Canada Ltd., Manufacturing Avancee S.A., Meritex Technology Suzhou Co. Ltd., Meurer Verpackungssysteme GmbH, Miller Electric Mfg. LLC, Miller Insurance Ltd., NDT Holding LLC, NOVADAN APS, North Star Imaging Inc., Nova Chimica S.r.l., Orbitalum Tools GmbH, PENTA-91 OOO, PR. A. I. Srl, PT ITW Construction Products Indonesia, Pacific Concept Industries Limited Enping, Panreac Quimica S.L., Paslode Fasteners Shanghai Co. Ltd., Peerless Machinery Corp., Polyrey, Premark FEG L.L.C., Premark HII Holdings LLC, Premark International, Premark International LLC, Prolex Sociedad Anonima, QSA Global Inc., Quimica Industrial Mediterranea S.L., R&D Engineering A/S., R&D Prague s.r.o., R&D Steel ApS., R&D Test Systems A/S., R&D Tools and Structures A/S., RDGDK Engineering Private Limited, Ramset Fasteners Hong Kong Ltd., Rapid Cook LLC, Refrigeration France, S.E.E. Sistemas Industria E Comercio Ltda., ST Mexico Holdings LLC, Sealant Systems International Inc., Sentinel Asia Yuhan Hoesa, Shanghai ITW Plastic & Metal Co. Ltd, Simco Japan Inc., Simco Nederland B.V., Societe de Prospection et dInventions Techniques  SPIT, Speedline Holdings I Inc., Speedline Holdings I LLC, Speedline Technologies GmbH, Speedline Technologies Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V., Speedline Technologies Mexico Services S. de R.L. de C.V., Stokvis Celix Portugal Unipessoal LDA, Stokvis Danmark ApS, Stokvis Holdings S.A.R.L., Stokvis Promi s.r.o, Stokvis Prostick Tapes Private Limited, Stokvis Tapes B.V., Stokvis Tapes Benelux B.V., Stokvis Tapes Deutschland GmbH, Stokvis Tapes France, Stokvis Tapes Hong Kong Co. Limited, Stokvis Tapes Italia s.r.l., Stokvis Tapes Limited, Stokvis Tapes Limited Liability Company, Stokvis Tapes Norge AS, Stokvis Tapes Oy, Stokvis Tapes Polska Sp Z.O.O., Stokvis Tapes Shanghai Co. Ltd., Stokvis Tapes Sverige AB, Stokvis Tapes Taiwan Co. Ltd., Stokvis Tapes Tianjin Co. Ltd., Stolvis Holdings II S.A.R.L., Subsidiaries, Technopack Industria Comercio Consultoria e Representacoes Ltda., Teknek China Limited, Teknek Japan Limited, Teksaleco Ltd., The Miller Group Ltd, Thirode Grandes Cuisines Poligny, Tien Tai Electrode Co. Ltd., Tien Tai Electrode Kunshan Co. Ltd., Unichemicals Industria e Comercio Ltda., VR-Leasing Sarita GmbH & Co. Immobilien KG, VS European Holdco BV, Valeron Strength Films B.V., Veneta Decalcogomme S.r.l., Versachem Chile S.A., Vesta, Vesta Global Limited, Vesta Guangzhou Catering Equipment Co. Ltd, Viltronics Soltec, Vitronics Soltec B.V., Wachs Canada Ltd., Wachs Subsea LLC, Weigh-Tronix Canada ULC, Weigh-Tronix UK Limited, Wilsonart International Holdings LLC, Wynn Oil South Africa Pty Ltd., Wynn's Automotive France, Wynn's Belgium BVBA, Wynn's Italia Srl, Wynn's Mekuba India Pvt Ltd, and Zip-Pak International B.V..

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MDU Resources Group, Inc. engages in the regulated energy delivery, and construction materials and services businesses in the United States. The company's Electric segment generates, transmits, and distributes electricity for residential, commercial, industrial, and municipal customers in Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming, as well as operates 3,500 miles of transmission lines and 4,800 miles of distribution lines. Its Natural Gas Distribution segment distributes natural gas for residential, commercial, and industrial customers in Idaho, Minnesota, Montana, North Dakota, Oregon, South Dakota, Washington, and Wyoming; and offers supply-related value-added services. The company's Pipeline segment provides natural gas transportation and underground storage services through a regulated pipeline system primarily in the Rocky Mountain and northern Great Plains regions; and cathodic protection and other energy-related services. Its Construction Materials and Contracting segment mines, processes, and sells construction aggregates; produces and sells asphalt mix; and supplies ready-mixed concrete. This segment is also involved in the sale of cement, finished concrete products, and other building materials and related contracting services. The company's Construction Services segment designs, constructs, and maintains electrical and communication wiring and infrastructure, fire suppression systems, mechanical piping and services; overhead and underground electrical, gas, and communication infrastructure; and manufactures and distributes transmission lines construction equipment. It serves manufacturing, commercial, industrial, transportation, institutional, and renewable and government customers, as well as utilities. The company was founded in 1924 and is headquartered in Bismarck, North Dakota.
Spirit AeroSystems Holdings, Inc. designs, engineers, manufactures, and markets commercial aerostructures worldwide. It operates through three segments: Commercial, Defense & Space, and Aftermarket. The Commercial segment offers forward, mid, and rear fuselage sections and systems, struts/pylons, nacelles, and related engine structural components; and wings and wing components, including flight control surfaces, as well as other structural parts. This segment primarily serves the aircraft original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) or engine OEMs of large commercial aircraft and/or business/regional jet programs. The Defense & Space segment provides fuselage, strut, nacelle, and wing aerostructures primarily for U.S. Government defense programs, including Boeing P-8, C40, and KC-46 Tanker. This segment also engages in the fabrication, bonding, assembly, testing, tooling, processing, engineering analysis, and training on fixed wing aircraft aerostructures, missiles, and hypersonics works, such as solid rocket motor throats, nozzles, re-entry vehicle thermal protections systems, forward cockpit and cabin, and fuselage work on rotorcraft aerostructures. The Aftermarket segment offers spare parts and MRO services, repairs for flight control surfaces and nacelles, radome repairs, rotable assets, engineering services, advanced composite repairs, and other repair and overhaul services. Spirit AeroSystems Holdings, Inc. has a strategic partnership with Sierra Space to enhance access to commercial space economy of the future. The company was formerly known as Mid-Western Aircraft Systems Holdings, Inc. Spirit AeroSystems Holdings, Inc. was founded in 1927 and is headquartered in Wichita, Kansas.
ONEOK, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, engages in gathering, processing, storage, and transportation of natural gas in the United States. It operates through Natural Gas Gathering and Processing, Natural Gas Liquids, and Natural Gas Pipelines segments. The company owns natural gas gathering pipelines and processing plants in the Mid-Continent and Rocky Mountain regions. It also gathers, treats, fractionates, and transports natural gas liquids (NGL), as well as stores, markets, and distributes NGL products. The company owns NGL gathering and distribution pipelines in Oklahoma, Kansas, Texas, New Mexico, Montana, North Dakota, Wyoming, and Colorado; terminal and storage facilities in Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Iowa, and Illinois; and NGL distribution and refined petroleum products pipelines in Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, and Indiana, as well as owns and operates truck- and rail-loading, and -unloading facilities connected to NGL fractionation, storage, and pipeline assets. In addition, it operates regulated interstate and intrastate natural gas transmission pipelines and natural gas storage facilities. Further, the company owns and operates a parking garage in downtown Tulsa, Oklahoma; and leases excess office space. It operates 17,500 miles of natural gas gathering pipelines; 1,500 miles of FERC-regulated interstate natural gas pipelines; 5,100 miles of state-regulated intrastate transmission pipeline; six NGL storage facilities; and eight NGL product terminals. It serves integrated and independent exploration and production companies; NGL and natural gas gathering and processing companies; crude oil and natural gas production companies; propane distributors; municipalities; ethanol producers; and petrochemical, refining, and NGL marketing companies, as well as natural gas distribution and electric generation companies, producers, processors, and marketing companies. The company was founded in 1906 and is headquartered in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
The following companies are subsidiares of Accenture: 2nd Road, ?What If!, ?What If! China Holdings Limited, ?What If! Holdings Limited, ?What If! Limited, ACN Consulting Co Ltd, AD.Dialeto (Digital Agency acquired by Accenture), AFD.TECH, AGS Business and Technology Services Limited, AIG Shared Services Business Processing Inc, ASM Research Inc., ASM Research LLC, ATAN, Accenture (Botswana) (Proprietary) Limited, Accenture (China) Co. Ltd., Accenture (Shenzhen) Technology Co. Ltd., Accenture (South Africa) Pty Ltd, Accenture (UK) Limited, Accenture 2 Business Process Services S.A., Accenture 2 LLC, Accenture A/S, Accenture AB, Accenture AG, Accenture AS, Accenture Africa Pty Ltd, Accenture Agencia Interativa Ltda, Accenture Australia Holding B.V., Accenture Australia Holdings Pty Ltd, Accenture Australia Pty Ltd, Accenture B.V., Accenture BPM Operations Support Services S.A., Accenture BPM S.C.R.L., Accenture BPS Services S.p. z o.o., Accenture Branch Holdings B.V., Accenture Bulgaria EOOD, Accenture Business Services for Utilities Inc, Accenture Business Services of British Columbia Limited Partnership, Accenture Business and Technology Services LLC, Accenture C.A., Accenture Canada Holdings Inc, Accenture Capital Designated Activity Company, Accenture Capital Inc, Accenture Central Europe B.V., Accenture Chile Asesorias y Servicios Ltda, Accenture Cloud Services GmbH, Accenture Cloud Software Solutions Limited, Accenture Cloud Solutions Australia Pty Ltd, Accenture Cloud Solutions LLC, Accenture Cloud Solutions Pty Ltd, Accenture Co Ltd, Accenture Co. Ltd, Accenture Communications Infrastructure Solutions Ltd, Accenture Company Ltd, Accenture Consulting Pty Ltd, Accenture Consulting Services Ltd Tanzania, Accenture Consultores de Gestao S.A., Accenture Consultoria de Industria e Consumo Ltda, Accenture Consultoria de Recursos Naturais Ltda, Accenture Credit Services LLC, Accenture Customer Services Distribution SASU, Accenture Customer Services Ltd, Accenture Danismanlik Limited Sirketi, Accenture Defined Benefit Pension Plan Trustees Limited, Accenture Defined Contribution Pension Plan Trustees Limited, Accenture Delivery Poland S.p. z o.o., Accenture Dienstleistungen GmbH, Accenture Digital Holdings GmbH, Accenture East Africa Limited, Accenture Ecuador S.A., Accenture Egypt LLC, Accenture Enterprise Development (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Accenture Federal Services LLC, Accenture Finance II Limited, Accenture Finance Limited, Accenture Finance and Accounting BPO Services S.p.A., Accenture Finance and Accounting Services S.r.l., Accenture Financial Advanced Solution & Technology S.r.l., Accenture Flex LLC, Accenture GP LLC, Accenture Global Capital Designated Activity Company, Accenture Global Engagements Limited, Accenture Global Holdings Limited, Accenture Global Services Limited, Accenture Global Solutions Limited, Accenture GmbH, Accenture HR Services S.p.A., Accenture Healthcare Processing Inc, Accenture Holding Brasil Ltda, Accenture Holding GmbH & Co. KG, Accenture Holdings (Iberia) S.L., Accenture Holdings B.V., Accenture Holdings France SASU, Accenture Hungary Holdings Kft, Accenture Inc, Accenture Industrial Software Limited Liability Company, Accenture Industrial Software Solutions Kft, Accenture Industrial Software Solutions SA, Accenture Insurance Services B.V., Accenture Insurance Services LLC, Accenture International B.V., Accenture International LLC, Accenture International Limited, Accenture Japan Ltd, Accenture Korea B.V., Accenture LLC, Accenture LLP, Accenture Lanka (Private) Ltd, Accenture Limited, Accenture Lithuania UAB, Accenture Ltd, Accenture Ltda, Accenture Maghreb S.a.r.l., Accenture Managed Services SRL, Accenture Management GmbH, Accenture Marketing Services LLC, Accenture Marketing Services Limited, Accenture Middle East B.V., Accenture Minority I B.V., Accenture Mozambique Limitada, Accenture Mzansi Pty Ltd, Accenture NV/SA, Accenture NZ Limited, Accenture Nova Scotia Unlimited Liability Co., Accenture OOO, Accenture Operations GmbH, Accenture Operations S.p. z o.o., Accenture Operations Services Private Limited, Accenture Operations Services Sdn Bhd, Accenture Outsourcing S.r.l., Accenture Outsourcing Services S.A., Accenture Oy, Accenture Panama Inc, Accenture Participations B.V., Accenture Participations II Limited, Accenture Peru SRL, Accenture Post Trade Processing SASU, Accenture Post-Trade Processing Limited, Accenture Process (Mauritius) Ltd, Accenture Pte Ltd, Accenture Puerto Rico LLC, Accenture Qiyun Technology (Hangzhou) Co. Ltd, Accenture S.C., Accenture S.L., Accenture S.R.L., Accenture S.p. z o.o., Accenture S.p.A., Accenture SASU, Accenture SG Services Pte Ltd, Accenture SRL, Accenture Saudi Arabia Limited, Accenture Sdn Bhd, Accenture Service Center SRL, Accenture Services (Mauritius) Ltd, Accenture Services AB, Accenture Services AG, Accenture Services AS, Accenture Services GmbH, Accenture Services Morocco SA, Accenture Services Oy, Accenture Services Pty Ltd, Accenture Services S.p. z o.o., Accenture Services SRL, Accenture Services and Technology S.r.l., Accenture Services s.r.o., Accenture Single Member S.A. Organization Information Technology & Business Development, Accenture Solutions Co. Ltd, Accenture Solutions Private Limited, Accenture Solutions Pte Ltd, Accenture Solutions Pty Ltd, Accenture Solutions S.p. z o.o, Accenture Solutions Sdn Bhd, Accenture State Healthcare Services LLC, Accenture Sub II Inc, Accenture Sub III Inc, Accenture Sub LLC, Accenture Systems Integration Limited, Accenture Sarl, Accenture Tanacsado Kolatolt Felelossegu Tarsasag, Accenture Technology Solutions (Dalian) Co. Ltd., Accenture Technology Solutions (HK) Co. Ltd., Accenture Technology Solutions (Thailand) Co. Ltd, Accenture Technology Solutions - Solucoes Informaticas Integradas S.A., Accenture Technology Solutions GmbH, Accenture Technology Solutions Oy, Accenture Technology Solutions Pty Ltd, Accenture Technology Solutions S.A. de C.V., Accenture Technology Solutions S.r.l., Accenture Technology Solutions SASU, Accenture Technology Solutions SRL, Accenture Technology Solutions Sdn Bhd, Accenture Technology Solutions Slovakia s.r.o., Accenture Technology Ventures B.V., Accenture Technology Ventures SPRL, Accenture Tecnologia Consultoria y Outsourcing S.A., Accenture Uruguay SRL, Accenture Vietnam Co. Limited, Accenture Zambia Limited, Accenture do Brasil Ltda, Accenture plc, Accenture s.r.o., Acceria, Acquity Group, Adaptly LLC, Adaptly UK Limited, AddVal Technology, Adqptly, Advantium Inc., Advoco, Agilex Technologies Inc., Alfa Consulting, Allen International, AlphaBeta Advisors, Altevie Technologies S.r.l., Altima, Altima (Beijing) Co. Ltd., Altima Asia Ltd, Altitude, Altitude LLC, Altius Consulting Limited, Altius Data Solutions Private Limited, Analytics 8 LP, Analytics 8 Pty Ltd, Analytics8, Aorui Advertising (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Apis, Apis Group Pty Ltd, Appaloosa Technology SASU, AppsPro, AppsPro, Arca, Arca Ingenieros y Consultoria S.L., Arca Telecom S.L., Ariba - BPO, Arismore, Artio People (Payroll) Pty Ltd, Artio People Pty Ltd, Aspiro Solutions (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd, Automation Partners Pty Ltd, Avanade (Guangzhou) Computer Technology Development Co. Ltd., Avanade Asia Pte Ltd, Avanade Australia Pty Ltd, Avanade Belgium SPRL, Avanade Canada Inc, Avanade Consulting Poland S.p. z o.o., Avanade Denmark A/S, Avanade Deutschland GmbH, Avanade Europe Holdings Limited, Avanade Europe Services Limited, Avanade Finland Oy, Avanade France SASU, Avanade Holdings LLC, Avanade Hong Kong Ltd, Avanade Inc, Avanade International Corporation, Avanade Ireland Limited, Avanade Italy S.r.l., Avanade Japan KK, Avanade Malaysia Sdn Bhd, Avanade Middle East Limited, Avanade Netherlands B.V., Avanade Norway AS, Avanade Poland S.p. z o.o., Avanade Schweiz GmbH, Avanade South Africa Pty Ltd, Avanade Spain S.L., Avanade Sweden AB, Avanade UK Limited, Avanade do Brasil Ltda , Avanade Osterreich GmbH, Avenai, Avieco, Axia Ltd., BABCN LLC, BCS Consulting, BCT Solutions, BCT Solutions Pty Ltd, BENEXT, BPO Servicos Administrativos Ltda, BRIDGE Energy Group, BRIDGEi2i, Beacon Consulting Group Inc., Beijing Genesis Interactive Technology Co. Ltd., Beijing Zhidao Future Consulting Co. Ltd, Benext, Berico Technologies LLC, Bionic, Bionic Solution LLC, Blue Horseshoe, Boomerang Pharmaceutical Communications, Bow & Arrow, Bow & Arrow Limited, Brand Learning, Brand Learning Group Limited, Brightstep AB, Byte Prophecy, Byte Prophecy Private Limited, CAS, CRMWaypoint, CS Technology (Australia) Pty Ltd, CS Technology (UK) Limited, CS Technology Group LLC, CS Technology LLC, CadenceQuest Inc., Callisto Integration Europe B.V., Callisto Integration Europe Limited, Callisto Integration LLC, Callisto Integration Ltd, Capgemini - North American health practice, Capital Consultancy Services Inc, Certus Solutions Consulting Services Limited, Certus Solutions Ltd, ChangeTrack Research Pty Ltd., Chaotic Moon Studios, Chengdu Mensa Advertising Co. Ltd., Cimation, Cirrus Connect Australia Pty Ltd, Cirrus Connect Limited, Cirruseo, Clarity Insights, ClearEdge Partners, Clearhead, Clearhead Group LLC, ClientHouse GmbH, Cloud Sherpas, Cloud Sherpas (GA) LLC, Cloud Sherpas Japan G.K., Cloud Sherpas New Zealand Limited, Cloudeasier SAS, Cloudpoint Limited, Cloudsherpas Inc, Cloudworks, Cloudworks Consulting Services Inc, Cloudworks Technology LLC, Computer Research and Telecommunications LLC, Concrete Desenvolvimento de Sistemas Ltda, Concrete Solutions, Concrete Solutions Ltda, Context Information Security, Context Information Security LLC, Context Information Security Limited, CoreCompete LLC, CoreCompete Limited, CoreCompete Private Limited, Corliant Inc., Creative Drive LLC, Creative Drive US LLC, CreativeDrive, CreativeDrive Digital Content Services (Shenzhen) Co Ltd., CreativeDrive EMEA Limited, CreativeDrive Singapore Pte Ltd, CreativeDrive UK Group Limited, Cutting Edge Solutions Limited, Cygni AB, Cygni Norrsken AB, Cygni Stockholm AB, Cygni Syd AB, Cygni Vast AB, Cygni Ost AB, Cygni Ostersund AB, DAZ Systems Inc, DAZ Systems LLC, DAZSI Systems (India) Pvt. Limited, DI Futures Corporation, Data Essential SARL, Davies Consulting, DayNine Consulting, DayNine Consulting (New Zealand) Limited, DayNine Consulting LLC, Declarative Holdings LLC, Decora Marketplace LLC, Decorado Marketplace Ltda-EPP, Defense Point Security, Deja vu Security, Design Strategy and Research de Mexico S.A. de C.V., Designaffairs LLC, Digiplug S.A.S., Digital Results Group LLC, Double Digit Limitada, Double Digit Pty SA, Droga5, Droga5 LLC, Droga5 Studios LLC, Droga5 UK Limited, Duck Creek Technologies, ESR Labs, ESR Labs AG, EdenOne Solutions Limited, Edenhouse ERP Holdings Limited, Edenhouse Solutions Limited, Enaxis Consulting, Enaxis Consulting LP, End to End Analytics LLC, End-to-End Analytics, Endorphin Medici (M) Sdn Bhd, Energuia Web S.A., Energy Management Brokers Limited, EnergyQuote JHA, Enimbos, Enimbos Global Services S.L., Enkitec, Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions LLC, Enterprise System Partners, Enterprise System Partners B.V., Enterprise System Partners Bilisim Danismanlik Ticaret Anonim Sirketi, Enterprise System Partners Global Corporation, Enterprise System Partners Limited, Enthusian Pty Ltd, Entropia, Entropia (M) Sdn Bhd, Entropia Holdings Pte Ltd, Entropia Intercraft Sdn Bhd, Epylon, Ergo, Espedia S.r.l., Ethica Consulting Group, Ethica Consulting S.p.A., Evopro Group, Exactside Limited, Experity, Exton Consulting, Exton Consulting Spain Strategy&Management S.L., Exton Germany GmbH, Exton International SAS, Exton Italia S.r.l., Exton SAS, FGM LLC, Fairway Technologies Inc, Farah BidCo Limited, Farah MidCo Limited, Farah Topco Limited, Filmproduction ApS, First Annapolis Consulting Inc., First Annapolis Consulting LLC, Fjord, Focus Group Europe, Formicary, Founders Intelligence, Fruendo S.r.l., FusionX, Future State Consulting LLC, FutureMove (Beijing) Automotive Technology Co. Ltd., FutureMove Automotive, FutureMove Automotive Co. Ltd., GRA Supply Chain Pty Ltd, Gagel Group S de R.L. de C.V., Gapso Servicos de Informatica Ltda, Gapso Servicos de Informatica Ltda., Genfour, George Group Consulting L.P., Gestalt LLC, Gevity, Gren utvikling AS, H.B. Maynard and Co. Inc., HRC Retail Advisory, Hagberg Consulting Group, Hahntel Ltda, Halo Partners LLC, Hamilton Holding Company S.A, Hangzhou Aiyunzhe Technology Co. Ltd., Happen, Happen GP Limited, Happen Limited, Headspring, Hjaltelin Stahl, Hjaltelin Stahl A/S, Hjaltelin Stahl K/S, Hytracc Consulting AS, Hytracc Consulting AS, Hytracc Consulting Malaysia Sdn Bhd, IBB Consulting, ICM.S S.r.l., IMJ Corp, IMJ Corporation, INSITUM, IQSP Consulting LLC, IT One Company Limited, ITBS Servicios Bancarios de Tecnologia de la Informacion SL, Icon Integration, Icon Integration (NZ) Limited, Icon Integration Pty Ltd, Imagine Broadband (USA) Limited, Imagine Broadband USA LLC, Imaginea Inc, Imaginea Technologies LLC, Industrie IT (Hong Kong) Ltd, Industrie IT (Singapore) Pte Ltd, Industrie IT Group Pty Ltd, Industrie IT Pty Ltd, Industrie&Co, Infinity Works Consulting Limited, Infinity Works Holdings Limited, Infinity Works Management Limited, Infinity Works Midco Limited, Informatica de Euskadi S.L., Innotec International EAD, Innotec International S.p. z.o.o., Innotec Marketing GmbH, Innotec Marketing International Ireland Limited, Innotec- Marketing Spain S.L, Insitum Consultoria Argentina SRL, Insitum Consultoria S.A. de C.V., International Biometric Group LLC, International Biometric Group UK Limited, Intrepid, Intrepid Futureworks Sdn Bhd, Intrigo Systems Inc, Intrigo Systems India Pvt. Limited, Intrigo Systems LLC, Inventor Technology Ltd, InvestTech, Investtech Systems Consulting LLC, ItSafer Continuity Services S.L., JKD Consulting LLC, Javelin Group, K Comms Group Limited, KSC Studio LLC, Kaper Communications Limited, Karma Communications Debtco Limited, Karma Communications Group Limited, Karma Communications Holdings Limited, Karmarama, Karmarama Comms Limited, Karmarama Limited, King James Group, Knowledge Rules Inc., Knowledgent, Knowledgent Group LLC, Kogentix, Kogentix LLC, Kogentix Limited, Kogentix Singapore Pte Ltd, Kogentix Technologies Private Limited, Kolle Rebbe, Kolle Rebbe GmbH, Kream Comms Limited, Kunstmaan, Kurt Salmon, Kurt Salmon Canada LTD, Kurt Salmon US LLC, LEXTA, LINKBYNET, LINKBYNET Indian Ocean (L.I.O) Ltd, LabAnswer, Lexta GmbH, Lexta UK Limited, Lien par le reseau Inc, Lien par le reseau infrastructures Inc, Lin Bo (Shanghai) Network Technology Co. Ltd., Link By Net SAS, Link By Net SRL, Link By Net Vietnam Company Limited, Linkbynet East Asia Ltd, Linkbynet Singapore Pte Ltd., Loud & Clear Creative Pty Ltd, Lumenup S.A., MAXIM Systems Inc., MCG US Holdings LLC, Mackevision CG Technology and Service (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Mackevision Japan Co. Ltd., Mackevision Korea Ltd, Mackevision LLC, Mackevision Medien Design, Mackevision Medien Design GmbH, Mackevision Singapore Pte Ltd, Mackevision UK Limited, Maglan, Maglan Information Defense Technologies Research Ltd, Maihiro, Matter, Maud Corp Pty Ltd, Maxamine International, Measuretek LLC, Media Audits Ltd., Media Hive, Mediasenz Pty Ltd., Meredith Specialty LLC, Meredith Xcelerated Marketing, Meredith Xcelerated Marketing LLC, Meridian Informed Purchasing Ltd., Mindtribe, Mistral Wind Operations  Servicos Empresariais Unipessoal Lda., MobGen, Mortgage Cadence LLC, Mortgage Cadence an Accenture Company, Most Champion Ltd, Mudano, Mudano Limited, Myrtle Consulting Group LLC, N3, N3 (Dalian) Business Consulting Co. Ltd., N3 Brazil Consultoria em Marketing Ltda, N3 Germany GmbH, N3 LLC, N3 North America LLC, N3 Results Australia Pty Ltd, N3 Results Ireland Limited, N3 Results Japan G.K., N3 Results Limited, N3 Results Malaysia Sdn Bhd, N3 Results Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V., N3 Results S.A.S., N3 Results Singapore Pte Ltd, N3 Results Unipessoal Lda, NYTEC, Nanjing Demeng Advertising Co. Ltd., Nashco Consulting, NaviSys Inc., Nell'Armonia Israel Ltd, Nell'Armonia SAS, Nell'Participation SAS, NellArmonia, Neo Metrics Analytics S.L., Neo Metrics Chile S.A., New Content, New Content Editora e Produtora Ltda, New Energy Group, News Imaging LLC, NewsPage, NewsPage (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd, NewsPage Pte Ltd, Northstream, Novetta Holdings LLC, Novetta LLC, Novetta Solutions LLC, Novetta Topco LLC, OCTO Technology, OPS Rules Management Consultants, Octagon Research Solutions Inc., Octo Technology Pty Ltd, Octo Technology SA, Odgaard ApS, Olikka, Olikka Pty Ltd, Olympus Systems Corporation, Openmind, Openmind S.r..l., Openminded, Openminded SAS, Operaciones Accenture S.A. de C.V., OpusLine, Orbium, Orbium AG, Orbium Consulting Limited, Orbium Inc., Orbium Ltd, Orbium Pte Ltd, Orbium Pty Ltd, Origin Digital, PCO Innovation, PLM Systems S.r.l, PRION GmbH, PT Accenture, PT Asta Catur Indra, PT Kogentix Teknologi Indonesia, PacificLink Group, Paja Finanssipalvelut Oy, Parker Fitzgerald Inc, Parker Fitzgerald International Limited, Parker Fitzgerald Limited, Parker Fitzgerald PTY Ltd, Parker Fitzgerald Services Limited, Parker Fitzgerald Solutions Limited, Pecaso Ltd., Pegasus Production A/S, Pegasus Production K/S, Phase One Consulting Group, Pillar Technology, Pollux, Pollux Automation Mexico S.A. de C.V., Pollux Canada Inc, Pollux S.A.S., Pollux USA LLC, Pragsis Bidoop, Pragsis Bidoop UK Limited, Pramati Technologies Europe Limited, Pramati Technologies Private Limited, Presence of IT Workforce Management North America LLC, PrimeQ, PrimeQ Australia Pty Ltd, PrimeQ Ltd, PrimeQ NZ Pty Limited, Procurian Inc., Prof. Homburg GmbH, Proquire LLC, PureApps Ltd., Qi Jie Beijing Information Technologies Co. Ltd., RBCP Fund 1-A Vapor Blocker LLC, RBCP Platform Vapor Blocker I LLC, REPL Consulting LLC, REPL Consulting Limited, REPL Digital Limited, REPL Group K.K., REPL Group Pty Ltd, REPL Group Worldwide Limited, REPL Pte Ltd, REPL Software Limited, REPL Technology Limited, Radiant Services LLC, Random Walk Computing Inc., Reactive Media Pty Ltd., Real Protect, Realworld OO Systems Ltd., Redcore, Redcore (New Zealand) Limited, Redcore Group Holdings Pty Ltd, Redcore Pty Ltd, Revolutionary Security, RiskControl, Root LLC, Rothco, Rothco Limited, S3 TV Technology Ltd., SALT Solutions GmbH, SEC Servizi, SOPIA Corp., Sagacious Consultants, Salt Solutions, Sandbox Studio LLC, Sapling Bidco Limited, Sapling Midco Limited, Sapling Topco Limited, Schlumberger Business Consulting, Seabury Aviation & Aerospace (UK) Limited, Seabury Consulting, Seabury Corporate Advisors LLC, Seabury Malaysia Sdn Bhd, Search Technologies BPO Inc, Search Technologies International LLC, Search Technologies LLC, Search Technologies Limited, Securiview SAS, Sentelis, Sentor Managed Secuirty Services AB, Servicios Tecnicos de Programacion Accenture S.C., Seven Seas Business Ventures LLC, Shackleton, Shackleton Chile S.A., Shackleton S.L.U., Shanghai Baiyue Advertising Co. Ltd., Shun Zhe Technology Development Co. Ltd., SigInt Technologies LLC, Silveo, Silveo Consulting India Private Limited, Simian Pty Ltd, SinnerSchrader, SinnerSchrader AG, SinnerSchrader Content GmbH, SinnerSchrader Deutschland GmbH, SinnerSchrader Praha s.r.o., Sirvart S.A., Sistemes Consulting S.L., Skylink SAS, Soltians Limited, Solutions IQ LLC, SolutionsIQ, SolutionsIQ India Consulting Services Private Limited, Somers Ventures Ireland Limited, Somers Ventures LLC, Spacelink SAS, Storm Digital, Structure Consulting Group LLC, Sutter Mills, Synership LLC, Systor AG, T.A. Cook, TXF LLC, Tambourine, TargetST8, Tech - Avanade Portugal Unipessoal Lda, Tecnilogica Ecosistemas S.A., Tecnilogica, The Brand Learning Partners Limited, The Callisto Integration Corporation, The Monkeys, The Monkeys Pty Ltd, The Myrtle Group, Total Logistics, Tquila, Trivadis, Trivadis AG, Trivadis Austria GmbH, Trivadis Denmark AS, Trivadis Germany GmbH, Trivadis Holding AG, Trivadis Partner AG, Trivadis Services AG, Trivadis Services SRL, Troop Studios Pty Ltd, VanBerlo, Vector Acquisition Company LLC, Vector Topco LLC, Verax Solutions, Vertical Retail Consulting (Shanghai) Ltd, Vertical Retail Consulting Ltd, Vivere Brasil Servicos e Solucoes SA, Vivere Brasil Solucoes De Credito Ltda., Wabion GmbH, WaveStrike LLC, White Cliffs Consulting LLC, Wire Stone, Wire Stone LLC, Wise Partners SAS, Wolox, Wolox Colombia S.A.S, Wolox LLC, Wolox Mexico S.R.L de C.V., Wolox S.A., Wolox SpA, Workforce Insight, Workforce Insight LLC, Yesler, Yesler LLC, Yesler Limited, Yesler Singapore Pte Ltd, Zag, Zag Australia Pty Ltd, Zag Limited, Zag USA LLC, Zebra Worldwide Australia Pty Ltd, Zebra Worldwide Group Limited, Zebra Worldwide Media Pty Ltd, Zenta, Zenta Global Philippines Inc, Zenta Mortgage Services LLC, Zenta Recoveries Inc, Zenta US Holdings Inc, Zestgroup, Zielpuls, Zielpuls (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Zielpuls GmbH, avVenta, designaffairs, designaffairs Business Consulting (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., designaffairs GmbH, designaffairs group China Co. Ltd., dgroup, i4C Analytics, iDefense, solid-serVision.com GmbH, and umlaut.

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The following companies are subsidiares of PepsiCo: Alimentos Quaker Oats y Compania Limitada, Alimentos del Istmo S.A., Amavale Agricola Ltda., Anderson Hill Insurance Limited, Asia Bottlers Limited, BAESA Capital Corporation Ltd., BFY Brands, BFY Brands LLC, BFY Brands Limited, BUG de Mexico S.A. de C.V., Balmoral Industries LLC, Bare Foods Co., Barrhead LLC, Be & Cheery, Beaman Bottling Company, Bebidas Sudamerica S.A., Beech Limited, Bell Taco Funding Syndicate, Bendler Investments II Ltd, Bendler Investments S.a r.l, Beverage Services Limited, Beverages Foods & Service Industries Inc., Bishkeksut OJSC, Blaue NC S. de R.L. de C.V., Blue Cloud Distribution Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Arizona Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Arkansas Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Colorado Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Florida Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Georgia Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Illinois Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Indiana Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Iowa Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Kentucky Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Louisiana Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Minnesota Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Mississippi Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Missouri Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Nebraska Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Nevada Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of North Carolina Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Ohio Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Oklahoma Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Pennsylvania Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of South Carolina Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Tennessee Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Texas Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Virginia Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Wisconsin Inc., Blue Ridge Sales LLC, Bluebird Foods Limited, Bluecan Holdings Unlimited Company, Bokomo Zambia Limited, Bolsherechensky Molkombinat JSC, Boquitas Fiestas LLC, Boquitas Fiestas S.R.L., Bottling Group Financing LLC, Bottling Group Holdings LLC, Bottling Group LLC, Bronte Industries Ltd, C & I Leasing Inc., CB Manufacturing Company Inc., CEME Holdings LLC, CMC Investment Company, Caroni Investments LLC, Centro-Mediterranea de Bebidas Carbonicas PepsiCo S.L., Ceres Fruit Juices Pty Ltd, ChampBev Inc., China Concentrate Holdings Hong Kong Limited, Chipsy International for Food Industries S.A.E., Chipsy for Food Industries S.A.E., Chitos Internacional y Cia Ltda, Cipa Industrial de Produtos Alimentares Ltda., Cipa Nordeste Industrial de Produtos Alimentares Ltda., Cocina Autentica Inc., Comercializadora CMC Investment y Compania Limitada, Comercializadora Nacional SAS Ltda., Comercializadora PepsiCo Mexico S de R.L. de C.V., Compania de Bebidas PepsiCo S.L., Concentrate Holding Uruguay Pte. Ltd., Concentrate Manufacturing Singapore Pte. Ltd., Confiteria Alegro S. de R.L. de C.V., Copella Fruit Juices Limited, Copper Beech International LLC, Corina Snacks Limited, Corporativo Internacional Mexicano S. de R.L. de C.V., CytoSport Holdings Inc., CytoSport Inc., Davlyn Realty Corporation, Defosto Holdings Limited, Desarrollo Inmobiliario Gamesa S. de R.L. de C.V., Dilexis S.A., Donon Holdings Limited, Drinkfinity USA Inc., Drinkstation Inc., Drinkstation Innovation Co. Ltd., Drinkstation Limited, Dutch Snacks Holding S.A. de C.V., Duyvis Production B.V., EPIC Enterprises Inc., Echo Bay Holdings Inc., Elaboradora Argentina de Cereales S.R.L., Enter Logistica LLC, Environ at Inverrary Partnership, Environ of Inverrary Inc., Eridanus Investments S.a r.l, Evercrisp Snack Productos de Chile S.A., FL Transportation Inc., FLI Andean LLC, FLI Colombia LLC, FLI Snacks Andean GP LLC, Fabrica PepsiCo Mexicali S. de R.L. de C.V., Fabrica de Productos Alimenticios Rene y Cia S.C.A., Fairlight International SRL, Far East Bottlers Hong Kong Limited, Food Concepts Pioneer Ltd., Forest Akers Nederland B.V., Forty-Six Peaks Holding Inc., Fovarosi Asvanyviz es Uditoipari Zartkoruen Mukodo Reszvenytarsasag, Freshwater International B.V., Frito Lay Gida Sanayi Ve Ticaret Anonim Sirketi, Frito Lay Poland Sp. z o.o., Frito Lay Sp. z o.o., Frito Lay de Guatemala y Compania Limitada, Frito-Lay Australia Holdings Pty Limited, Frito-Lay Dip Company Inc., Frito-Lay Dominicana S.A., Frito-Lay Global Investments B.V., Frito-Lay Inc., Frito-Lay Investments B.V., Frito-Lay Manufacturing LLC, Frito-Lay Netherlands Holding B.V., Frito-Lay North America Inc., Frito-Lay Sales Inc., Frito-Lay Trading Company Europe GmbH, Frito-Lay Trading Company GmbH, Frito-Lay Trading Company Poland GmbH, Frito-Lay Trinidad Unlimited, Fruko Mesrubat Sanayi Limited Sirketi, GB Czech LLC, GB International Inc., GB Russia LLC, GB Slovak LLC, GMP Manufacturing Inc., Gambrinus Investments Limited, Gamesa LLC, Gamesa S. de R.L. de C.V., Gas Natural de Merida S. A. de C. V., Gatorade Puerto Rico Company, General Bottlers of Hungary Inc., Golden Grain Company, Goveh S.R.L., Grayhawk Leasing LLC, Green Hemlock International LLC, Grupo Frito Lay y Compania Limitada, Grupo Gamesa S. de R.L. de C.V., Grupo Mabel, Grupo Sabritas S. de R.L. de C.V., Gulkevichskiy Maslozavod JSC, Hangzhou Baicaowei Corporate Management Consulting Co. Ltd., Hangzhou Haomusi Food Co, Hangzhou Haomusi Food Co. Ltd., Hangzhou Tao Dao Technology Co. Ltd., Health Warrior, Health Warrior Inc., Heathland LP, Helioscope Limited, Hillbrook Inc., Hillgrove Inc., Hillwood Bottling LLC, Hogganfield Limited Partnership, Holding Company "Opolie" JSC, Homefinding Company of Texas, Hudson Valley Insurance Company, IC Equities Inc., IZZE Beverage Co., Inmobiliaria Interamericana S.A. De C.V., Integrated Beverage Services Bangladesh Limited, Integrated Foods & Beverages Pvt. Ltd., International Bottlers Management Co. LLC, International KAS Aktiengesellschaft, Inversiones Borneo S.R.L., Inversiones PFI Chile Limitada, Inviting Foods Holdings Inc., Inviting Foods LLC, KAS Anorthosis S.a r.l, KAS S.L., KFC, Kevita Inc., Kinvara LLC, Kungursky Molkombinat JSC, Larragana S.L., Latin American Holdings Ltd., Latin American Snack Foods ApS, Latin Foods International LLC, Lebedyansky, Lebedyansky Holdings LLC, Lebedyansky LLC, Limited Liability Company "Sandora", Linkbay Limited, Lithuanian Snacks UAB, Mabel, Marbo Product d.o.o. Beograd, Marbo d.o.o. Laktasi, Matudis - Comercio de Produtos Alimentares Limitada, Matutano - Sociedade de Produtos Alimentares Lda., Mid-America Improvement Corporation, Mountainview Insurance Company Inc., Muscle Milk, NCJV LLC, New Bern Transport Corporation, New Century Beverage Company LLC, Noble Leasing LLC, Northeast Hot-Fill Co-op Inc., Office at Solyanka LLC, Onbiso Inversiones S.L., One World Enterprises LLC, One World Investors Inc., P-A Barbados Bottling Company LLC, P-A Bottlers Barbados SRL, P-Americas LLC, PAS Luxembourg S.a r.l, PAS Netherlands B.V., PBG Canada Holdings II LLC, PBG Canada Holdings Inc., PBG Cyprus Holdings Limited, PBG Investment Partnership, PBG Midwest Holdings S.a r.l, PBG Soda Can Holdings S.a r.l, PCBL LLC, PCNA Manufacturing Inc., PR Beverages Cyprus Holding Limited, PR Beverages Cyprus Russia Holding Limited, PRB Luxembourg S.a r.l, PRS Inc., PSAS Inversiones LLC, PSE Logistica S.R.L., PT Quaker Indonesia, Papas Chips S.A., Pei N.V., Pep Trade LLC, Pepsi B.V., Pepsi Beverages Holdings Inc., Pepsi Bottling Group Global Finance LLC, Pepsi Bottling Group GmbH, Pepsi Bottling Group Hoosiers B.V., Pepsi Bottling Holdings Inc., Pepsi Bugshan Investments S.A.E., Pepsi Cola Colombia Ltda, Pepsi Cola Egypt S.A.E., Pepsi Cola Panamericana S.R.L., Pepsi Cola Servis Ve Dagitim Limited Sirketi, Pepsi Cola Trading Ireland, Pepsi Logistics Company Inc., Pepsi Northwest Beverages LLC, Pepsi Overseas Investments Partnership, Pepsi Promotions Inc., Pepsi-Cola Advertising and Marketing Inc., Pepsi-Cola Bermuda Limited, Pepsi-Cola Bottlers Holding C.V., Pepsi-Cola Bottling Company Of St. Louis Inc., Pepsi-Cola Bottling Company of Ft. Lauderdale-Palm Beach LLC, Pepsi-Cola Company, Pepsi-Cola Ecuador Cia. Ltda., Pepsi-Cola Far East Trade Development Co. Inc., Pepsi-Cola Finance LLC, Pepsi-Cola General Bottlers Poland Sp. z o.o., Pepsi-Cola Industrial da Amazonia Ltda., Pepsi-Cola International Cork, Pepsi-Cola International LLC, Pepsi-Cola International Limited, Pepsi-Cola International Limited U.S.A., Pepsi-Cola International Private Limited, Pepsi-Cola Korea Co. Ltd., Pepsi-Cola Management and Administrative Services Inc., Pepsi-Cola Manufacturing Company Of Uruguay S.R.L., Pepsi-Cola Manufacturing International Limited, Pepsi-Cola Manufacturing Mediterranean Limited, Pepsi-Cola Marketing Corp. Of P.R. Inc., Pepsi-Cola Mediterranean Ltd., Pepsi-Cola Metropolitan Bottling Company Inc., Pepsi-Cola Mexicana Holdings LLC, Pepsi-Cola Mexicana S. de R.L. de C.V., Pepsi-Cola National Marketing LLC, Pepsi-Cola Operating Company Of Chesapeake And Indianapolis, Pepsi-Cola Sales and Distribution Inc., Pepsi-Cola Technical Operations Inc., Pepsi-Cola Thai Trading Co. Ltd., Pepsi-Cola de Honduras S.R.L., Pepsi-Cola of Corvallis Inc., PepsiAmericas Nemzetkozi Szolgaltato Korlatolt Felelossegu Tarsasag, PepsiCo ANZ Holdings Pty Ltd, PepsiCo Alimentos Antioquia Ltda., PepsiCo Alimentos Colombia Ltda., PepsiCo Alimentos Ecuador Cia. Ltda., PepsiCo Alimentos Z.F. Ltda., PepsiCo Alimentos de Bolivia S.R.L., PepsiCo Amacoco Bebidas Do Brasil Ltda., PepsiCo Asia Research & Development Center Company Limited, PepsiCo Australia Financing Cyprus Limited, PepsiCo Australia Financing Limited Partnership, PepsiCo Australia Financing Partner 1 LLC, PepsiCo Australia Financing Partner 2 LLC, PepsiCo Australia Financing Pty Ltd, PepsiCo Australia Holdings Pty Limited, PepsiCo Australia International, PepsiCo Austria Services GmbH, PepsiCo Azerbaijan Limited Liability Company, PepsiCo BeLux BV, PepsiCo Beverage Sales LLC, PepsiCo Beverage Singapore Pty Ltd, PepsiCo Beverages Bermuda Limited, PepsiCo Beverages Hong Kong Limited, PepsiCo Beverages International Limited, PepsiCo Beverages Italia Societa' A Responsabilita' Limitata, PepsiCo Canada Finance LLC, PepsiCo Canada Holdings ULC, PepsiCo Canada Investment ULC, PepsiCo Canada ULC, PepsiCo Captive Holdings Inc., PepsiCo Caribbean Inc., PepsiCo China Limited, PepsiCo Consulting Polska Sp. z o.o., PepsiCo De Bolivia S.R.L., PepsiCo Del Paraguay S.R.L., PepsiCo Deutschland GmbH, PepsiCo Eesti AS, PepsiCo Euro Bermuda Limited, PepsiCo Euro Finance Antilles B.V., PepsiCo Europe Support Center S.L., PepsiCo Finance Americas Company, PepsiCo Finance Antilles A N.V., PepsiCo Finance Antilles B N.V., PepsiCo Finance South Africa Proprietary Limited, PepsiCo Financial Shared Services Inc., PepsiCo Food & Beverage Holdings Hong Kong Limited, PepsiCo Foods A.I.E., PepsiCo Foods China Company Limited, PepsiCo Foods Group Pty Ltd, PepsiCo Foods Guangdong Co. Ltd., PepsiCo Foods Nigeria Limited, PepsiCo Foods Private Limited, PepsiCo Foods Sichuan Co. Ltd., PepsiCo Foods Taiwan Co. Ltd., PepsiCo Foods Vietnam Company, PepsiCo France SAS, PepsiCo Global Business Services India LLP, PepsiCo Global Business Services Poland Sp. z o.o., PepsiCo Global Holdings Limited, PepsiCo Global Investments B.V., PepsiCo Global Investments S.a r.l, PepsiCo Global Mobility LLC, PepsiCo Global Real Estate Inc., PepsiCo Global Trading Solutions Unlimited Company, PepsiCo Golden Holdings Inc., PepsiCo Group Finance International B.V., PepsiCo Group Holdings International B.V., PepsiCo Group Spotswood Holdings S.a r.l, PepsiCo Gulf International FZE, PepsiCo Hellas Single Member Industrial and Commercial Societe Anonyme, PepsiCo Holding de Espana S.L., PepsiCo Holdings, PepsiCo Holdings LLC, PepsiCo Holdings Toshkent LLC, PepsiCo Hong Kong LLC, PepsiCo Iberia Servicios Centrales S.L., PepsiCo India Holdings Private Limited, PepsiCo India Sales Private Limited, PepsiCo Internacional Mexico S. de R. L. de C. V., PepsiCo International Hong Kong Limited, PepsiCo International Limited, PepsiCo International Pte Ltd., PepsiCo Investments Europe I B.V., PepsiCo Investments Ltd., PepsiCo Ireland Food & Beverages Unlimited Company, PepsiCo Japan Co. Ltd., PepsiCo Light B.V., PepsiCo Logistyka Sp. z o.o., PepsiCo Malaysia Sdn. Bhd., PepsiCo Management Services SAS, PepsiCo Manufacturing A.I.E., PepsiCo Max B.V., PepsiCo Mexico Holdings S. de R.L. de C.V., PepsiCo Nederland B.V., PepsiCo Nordic Denmark ApS, PepsiCo Nordic Finland Oy, PepsiCo Nordic Norway AS, PepsiCo Nutrition Trading DMCC, PepsiCo One B.V., PepsiCo Overseas Corporation, PepsiCo Overseas Financing Partnership, PepsiCo Panimex Inc, PepsiCo Products B.V., PepsiCo Products FLLC, PepsiCo Puerto Rico Inc., PepsiCo Sales Inc., PepsiCo Sales LLC, PepsiCo Services Asia Ltd., PepsiCo Services CZ s.r.o., PepsiCo Services LLC, PepsiCo Twist B.V., PepsiCo UK Pension Plan Trustee Limited, PepsiCo Ventures B.V., PepsiCo Wave Holdings LLC, PepsiCo World Trading Company Inc., PepsiCo Y LLC, PepsiCo de Argentina S.R.L., PepsiCo de Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V., PepsiCo do Brasil Industria e Comercio de Alimentos Ltda., PepsiCo do Brasil Ltda., PepsiCola Interamericana de Guatemala S.A., Pet Iberia S.L., Pete & Johnny Limited, Pine International LLC, Pine International Limited, Pinstripe Leasing LLC, Pioneer Food Group Pty Ltd, Pioneer Foods Groceries Pty Ltd, Pioneer Foods Group Ltd., Pioneer Foods Holdings Pty Ltd, Pioneer Foods Pty Ltd, Pioneer Foods UK Ltd, Pioneer Foods Wellingtons Pty Ltd, Pipers Crisps Limited, PlayCo Inc., Pop corners, PopCorners Holdings Inc., Portfolio Concentrate Solutions Unlimited Company, Premier Nutrition Trading L.L.C., Prestwick LLC, Prev PepsiCo Sociedade Previdenciaria, Productos Alimenticios Rene LLC, Productos S.A.S. C.V., Productos SAS Management B.V., Punch N.V., Punica Getranke GmbH, Q O Puerto Rico Inc., QFL OHQ Sdn. Bhd., QTG Development Inc., QTG Services Inc., Quadrant - Amroq Beverages S.R.L., Quaker Development B.V., Quaker European Beverages LLC, Quaker European Investments B.V., Quaker Foods, Quaker Global Investments B.V., Quaker Holdings UK Limited, Quaker Manufacturing LLC, Quaker Oats Asia Inc., Quaker Oats Australia Pty Ltd, Quaker Oats B.V., Quaker Oats Capital Corporation, Quaker Oats Europe Inc., Quaker Oats Europe LLC, Quaker Oats Limited, Quaker Sales & Distribution Inc, Raptas Finance S.a r.l., Rare Fare Foods LLC, Rare Fare Holdings Inc., Reading Industries Ltd, Real Estate Holdings LLC, Rockstar Energy Drink, Rolling Frito-Lay Sales LP, S & T of Mississippi Inc., SIH International LLC, SVC Logistics Inc., SVC Manufacturing Inc., SVE Russia Holdings GmbH, Sabritas LLC, Sabritas S. de R.L. de C.V., Sabritas Snacks America Latina de Nicaragua y Cia Ltda, Sabritas de Costa Rica S. de R.L., Sabritas y Cia. S en C de C.V., Sakata Rice Snacks Australia Pty Ltd, Sandora Holdings B.V., Saudi Snack Foods Company Limited, Sea Eagle International SRL, Seepoint Holdings Ltd., Senselet Food Processing PLC, Senselet Holding B.V., Servicios GBF Sociedad de Responsabilidad Limitada, Servicios GFLG y Compania Limitada, Servicios Gamesa Puerto Rico L.L.C., Servicios SYC S. de R.L. de C.V., Seven-Up Asia Inc., Seven-Up Light B.V., Seven-Up Nederland B.V., Shanghai PepsiCo Snack Company Limited, Shanghai YuHo Agricultural Development Co. Ltd, Shoebill LLC, Simba (Proprietary) Limited, Simba Proprietary Limited, Sitka Spruce, Smartfoods Inc., Smiles and Bites Holdings S.de R.L. de C.V., Smiths Crisps Limited, Snack Food Investments GmbH, Snack Food Investments II GmbH, Snack Food Investments Limited, Snack Food-Beverage Asia Products Limited, Snacks America Latina S.R.L., Snacks Guatemala Ltd., So Spark Ltd., Soda-Club CO2 Atlantic GmbH, Soda-Club CO2 GmbH, Soda-Club CO2 Ltd., Soda-Club Switzerland GmbH, Soda-Club Worldwide B.V., SodaStream, SodaStream Australia Pty Ltd, SodaStream CO2 SA, SodaStream Canada Ltd., SodaStream Enterprises N.V., SodaStream France SAS, SodaStream GmbH, SodaStream Iberia S.L., SodaStream Industries Ltd., SodaStream International B.V., SodaStream International Ltd., SodaStream Israel Ltd., SodaStream K.K., SodaStream New Zealand Ltd., SodaStream Nordics AB, SodaStream Poland Sp. z o.o., SodaStream SA Pty Ltd., SodaStream Switzerland GmbH, SodaStream USA Inc., SodaStream Osterreich GmbH, South Beach Beverage Company Inc., South Properties Inc., Spitz International Inc., Sportmex Internacional S.A. de C.V., Springboig Industries Ltd, Spruce Limited, Stacy's Pita Chip Company Incorporated, Star Foods E.M. S.R.L., Stokely-Van Camp Inc., Stratosphere Communications Pty Ltd, Stratosphere Holdings 2018 Limited, Streamfoods Ltd, TFL Holdings LLC, Tasman Finance S.a r.l, The Gatorade Company, The Good Carb Food Company Ltd., The Pepsi Bottling Group Canada ULC, The Quaker Oats Company, The Smith's Snackfood Company Pty Limited, Thomond Group Holdings Limited, Tobago Snack Holdings LLC, Tropicana Alvalle S.L., Tropicana Beverages Limited, Tropicana Europe N.V., Tropicana United Kingdom Limited, Troya-Ultra LLC, United Foods Companies Restaurantes S.A., V-Water, VentureCo Israel Ltd, Veurne Snack Foods BV, Vitamin Brands Ltd., Walkers Crisps Limited, Walkers Group Limited, Walkers Snack Foods Limited, Walkers Snacks Distribution Limited, Walkers Snacks Limited, Whitman Corporation, Whitman Insurance Co. Ltd., Wimm-Bill-Dann Beverages JSC, Wimm-Bill-Dann Brands Co. Ltd., Wimm-Bill-Dann Central Asia-Almaty LLP, Wimm-Bill-Dann Foods LLC, Wimm-Bill-Dann Georgia Ltd., Wimm-Bill-Dann JSC, and Wimm-Bill-Dann Ukraine PJSC.

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B&G Foods, Inc. manufactures, sells, and distributes a portfolio of shelf-stable and frozen foods, and household products in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. The company's products include frozen and canned vegetables, vegetables, canola and other cooking oils, vegetable shortening, cooking sprays, oatmeal and other hot cereals, fruit spreads, canned meats and beans, bagel chips, spices, seasonings, hot sauces, wine vinegar, maple syrups, molasses, salad dressings, pizza crusts, Mexican-style sauces, dry soups, taco shells and kits, salsas, pickles, peppers, tomato-based products, baking powder and soda, corn starch, cookies and crackers, nut clusters, and other specialty products. It markets its products under various brands, including Ac'cent, B&G, B&M, Back to Nature, Baker's Joy, Bear Creek Country Kitchens, Brer Rabbit, Canoleo, Cary's, Clabber Girl, Cream of Rice, Cream of Wheat, Crisco, Dash, Davis, Devonsheer, Don Pepino, Durkee, Emeril's, Grandma's Molasses, Green Giant, Joan of Arc, Las Palmas, Le Sueur, MacDonald's, Mama Mary's, Maple Grove Farms of Vermont, McCann's, Molly McButter, New York Flatbreads, New York Style, Old London, Ortega, Polaner, Red Devil, Regina, Rumford, Sa-son, Sclafani, Spice Islands, Spring Tree, Sugar Twin, Tone's, Trappey's, TrueNorth, Underwood, Vermont Maid, Victoria, and Weber and Wright's. The company also sells, markets, and distributes household products under the Static Guard brand. It sells and distributes its products directly, as well as through a network of independent brokers and distributors to supermarket chains, foodservice outlets, mass merchants, warehouse clubs, non-food outlets, and specialty distributors. The company was formerly known as B&G Foods Holdings Corp. and changed its name to B&G Foods, Inc. in October 2004. B&G Foods, Inc. was founded in 1822 and is headquartered in Parsippany, New Jersey.
Where To Go When Your Local Emergency Room Goes Bankrupt?" During the past ten years 84 California hospitals have declared bankruptcy and closed their Emergency Rooms forever. Financially crippled by legislative and judicial mandates to treat illegal aliens have bankrupted hospitals! In 2010, in Los Angeles County alone, over 2 million illegal aliens recorded visits to county emergency rooms for both routine and emergency care. The cost is $1,000 dollars for every taxpayer. VIVA LA RAZA?
Best Buy Co., Inc. retails technology products in the United States and Canada. The company operates in two segments, Domestic and International. Its stores provide computing products, such as desktops, notebooks, and peripherals; mobile phones comprising related mobile network carrier commissions; networking products; tablets covering e-readers; smartwatches; and consumer electronics consisting of digital imaging, health and fitness, home theater, portable audio comprising headphones and portable speakers, and smart home products. The company's stores also offer appliances, such as dishwashers, laundry, ovens, refrigerators, blenders, coffee makers, and vacuums; entertainment products consisting of drones, peripherals, movies, music, and toys, as well as gaming hardware and software, and virtual reality and other software products; and other products, such as baby, food and beverage, luggage, outdoor living, and sporting goods. In addition, it provides consultation, delivery, design, health-related, installation, memberships, repair, set-up, technical support, and warranty-related services. The company offers its products through stores and websites under the Best Buy, Best Buy Ads, Best Buy Business, Best Buy Health, CST, Current Health, Geek Squad, Lively, Magnolia, Best Buy Mobile, Pacific Kitchen, Home, and Yardbird, as well as domain names bestbuy.com, currenthealth.com, lively.com, yardbird.com, and bestbuy.ca. As of January 30, 2022, it had 1,144 stores. The company was formerly known as Sound of Music, Inc. The company was incorporated in 1966 and is headquartered in Richfield, Minnesota.


@PatriciaMazzei

After long days of anxious preparations and waiting, Hurricane Irma is arriving in South Florida on Sunday morning, still a dangerous Category 4 storm even though Miami-Dade and Broward counties will be spared the worst. The Florida Keys, however, will not be so lucky: Irmas eye is expected to hit Key West before moving northwest up Floridas Gulf Coast. Hundreds of thousands of people are already without power, and dangerous flooding and tornadoes are possible.

Stay with the Miami Herald for all the latest news on Sunday.

More here.

Photo credit: Pedro Portal, el Nuevo Herald
Milan, Italy: Respiratory tract infections in young children are linked to an increased risk of asthma and worse lung function in later life, according to new research to be presented at the European Respiratory Society International Congress today.

An international study of 154,492 European children found that those who had had upper respiratory infections, such as colds, sinusitis, laryngitis, tonsillitis, pharyngitis and otitis, by the age of five years had a 1.5-fold increased risk of developing asthma in later life. Children who had suffered from lower respiratory tract infections, such as bronchitis, bronchiolitis, pneumonia and general chest infections, had a two- to four-fold increased risk of developing asthma in later life and were also more likely to have worse lung function.

Dr Evelien van Meel (MD), from the Generation R Study Group at Erasmus MC University Medical Centre, The Netherlands, will tell the congress: "These findings support the hypothesis that early-life respiratory tract infections may influence the development of respiratory illnesses in the longer term. In particular, lower respiratory tract infections in early life seem to have the greatest adverse effect on lung function and the risk of asthma.

"However, at this stage we cannot say for certain whether the relationship is causal. Further studies that measure lung function and wheezing from birth onwards are needed to explore whether the infections cause asthma and lower lung function, or whether wheezing and lower lung function may be predisposing these children to develop the infections. Studies that aim to prevent or treat respiratory tract infections at an early stage, perhaps by vaccination, would also help to shed light on this."

Lung function and asthma are two different measures of respiratory health and are only partly related. "Lung function is an objective measure of the function of the lungs and airways. Lung function could be affected without leading to symptoms, or it could lead to asthma or other complaints such as wheezing. Additionally, a child could be diagnosed with asthma but their lung function could be fairly unaffected, for example because they are taking adequate asthma medications," says Dr van Meel.

The researchers analysed data from 37 groups of children from several European countries who were born between 1989 and 2013. Children were included in this meta-analysis if data were available on respiratory tract infections in early life (from age six months up to five years old), and childhood lung function and/or asthma. The length of follow-up varied between groups, but ranged from birth until the age of four to 15 years.

The children's lung function was measured as they grew older with a spirometer, an instrument that measures:

forced vital capacity (FVC) - a measure of the amount of air that can be exhaled from the lungs after taking the deepest breath possible

forced expiratory volume in one second (FEV1) - how much air can be exhaled in the first second

forced expiratory flow at 75% of FVC (FEF75) - the speed of air exhaled after exhaling three quarters of the total lung volume during a forced exhalation.

"Lung function was not measured in very young children," explains Dr van Meel. "The youngest children with lung function measurements were four years of age and the oldest 15 years of age, with an average age of eight years."

The researchers adjusted their analysis to take account of factors that could affect the results, such as socio-economic status, lifestyle, birth weight, gestational age at birth, gender, age, height and ethnicity.

They found that upper respiratory tract infections were not associated with worse lung function in later life. However, lower respiratory tract infections at almost all ages were associated with worse lung function as indicated by lower scores for FVC, FEV1 and FEF75.

Dr van Meel says it will be interesting to examine the long-term consequences in adulthood of respiratory tract infections on lung function and asthma. "At the age of eight years, asthma is usually well established, as is lung function. Lung function in childhood is most likely related with lung function in adulthood."

The researchers are planning further research. "Specifically, we want to study the roles played by antibiotics, paracetamol and exposure to second-hand smoke in the relationships between respiratory tract infections and lung function or asthma. Also, we would like to study what percentage of the association between respiratory tract infections and asthma can be explained by changes in lung function, and whether the associations change when we take early-life wheezing into account," she will conclude.

More information: Abstract no: OA499, "Early-life respiratory tract infections and the risk of lower lung function and asthma: a meta-analysis of 154,492 children"; Determinants of childhood asthma and atopy session, 10.45-12.45 hrs CEST, Sunday 10 September, Brown 1+2 (south).
The Gupta family is pinning its hopes on the South African Post Office being granted a banking licence as a way to save its businesses, according to a report by the Sunday Times.

The report stated that this followed the family selling The New Age and ANN7 due to the Bank of Baroda processing the closing of Gupta accounts.

The action by the Bank of Baroda came after South Africas major banks shut the business accounts of the family in 2016, and blacklisted the family.

While other international banks will be looked at by the Guptas, the prospect of the SA Post Office running Postbank with full banking solutions may provide a solution to their problem.

Post Office CEO Mark Barnes said in June the company was waiting for the Reserve Bank to issue the Postbank a banking licence, stated the report.

If Postbank starts providing full banking services, the Guptas hope it will be unbiased and will consider their requests for opening accounts favourably, said Oakbay Investments acting CEO Ronica Ragavan.

The sale of major Gupta-run companies by the family comes alongside the Guptaleaks emails, which revealed reportedly shady dealings between the Guptas and powerful politicians.

It is also alleged that the Guptas conducted questionable deals with major tech companies in South Africa.
The highest recorded speed on the MyBroadband Speed Test server in August 2017 was from a Vox user who clocked 1.39Gbps.

244,268 speed tests were conducted on the MyBroadband Speed Test platform during the month.

MyBroadbands HTML5 speed test servers are hosted in Teracos vendor-neutral data centres to ensure a neutral testing environment.

Through NAPAfrica, all network operators present at its peering points are provided with a free connection to the MyBroadband Speed Test platform.

The MyBroadband Speed Test platform was designed to be lightweight and easy to use on mobile devices.

Test your speed now  Click here

Highest speeds

The table below provides an overview of the highest speeds recorded over the last month.

Top MyBroadband Speed Test Results Service Provider Download (kbps) Upload (kbps) Vox 1,385,396 1,298,631 InfoGro 998,998 996,490 Axxess 998,979 996,772 Afrihost 998,972 994,293 Mitsol 998,945 995,449 Vanilla 942,826 880,541 Cybersmart 942,674 703,250 Vodacom 941,841 675,688 University of Stellenbosch 939,528 918,340 Converged Telecoms 938,945 938,929 University of the Witwatersrand 934,124 916,885 Audatex 930,443 832,310 Reflex Solutions 917,216 88,966 Dimension Data Optinet 909,363 772,897 TENET 894,830 682,288 Outsideheaven 881,123 628,159 SAPPI 844,282 305,626 Cool Ideas 786,770 103,658

Now read: South African companies with the highest Internet speeds
Iranian lawmakers sharply criticize Aliyev

Ambassador-at-Large: Azerbaijan's attacks on Armenia are a terrorist attack

Germany needs to diversify its business interests in Asia to reduce dependence on China

Head of U.S. Treasury Department says sanctions against Russia should remain in force even after war in Ukraine

Natasa Pirc Musar to become Slovenia's first woman president

IMF: World economic outlook even bleaker than predicted

Pashinyan: Azerbaijan calls Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh 'our citizens' and at the same time shoots at them

Turkish Interior Minister announces arrest of suspect in attack on Istiklal Avenue in Istanbul

Alpine to make 3 electric crossovers

Number of injured in Istanbul blast rises to 81

Paul McCartney sells guitar for $77,000 to support Ukraine

Erdogan says preliminary findings after Istanbul bombing point to terrorist attack

Erdogan says number of victims of Istanbul bombing rises to six

Authorities forbid TV channels to broadcast from Istanbul bombing site

Istanbul blast: Governor reports 4 dead and 38 wounded

Media: Terrorist attack considered as one of versions of bombing in Istanbul

Blast in Istanbul: victims reported

Reuters: National Bank of Ukraine prepares banking system for power outages

Explosion hits pedestrian street in Istanbul

Former Pentagon official Michael Rubin calls for Turkey to be recognized as sponsor of terrorism

Bloomberg columnist says Japan may be preparing for war with China

Reuters: U.S. to demand EU colleagues to continue aid to Kyiv at G20

Washington Post: U.S. intelligence believes UAE tried to interfere in U.S. politics

Yeni Safak: Turkey increases sales of winter products, blankets in EU by almost third since beginning of year

Fox News: Trump has been silent on social media for over 24 hours amid Republican failures

Lebanon extradites to Iraq relative of Saddam Hussein

Financial Times: Kyiv plans to nationalize more private companies

U.S. Senate declares 'death' of Republican Party after congressional elections

Head of U.S. Customs resigned

President of Georgia Zourabichvili says about 100 thousand Russians settled in country

CNN: Democrats to retain control of Senate after congressional elections

Alen Simonyan: We are truly and sincerely committed to the peace agenda

Artak Beglaryan: Genocidal purpose is apparent

French maritime services rescue more than 140 migrants trying to swim across English Channel

Biden says he is satisfied with results of midterm elections in U.S.

Slovenia holds second round of presidential elections

'Witch' burned alive in India, 14 arrested

COVID-19 cases are expected to surge in Germany this winter

Dollar makes worst showing in week since early days of COVID-19 pandemic

Macron confirms France's readiness to support normalization of relations between Yerevan and Baku

Germany withdraws from Energy Charter Treaty

Is Jordan country that has not supplied arms to Armenia?: 'The press usually has reliable information'

European Commission approves nationalization of Russian Gazprom's German subsidiary

Pashinyan: If the state interferes with the exchange rate unnecessarily, the economy will only suffer

U.S. to work with strategic coalition of Southeast Asian countries

Armenian PM: To reform army, it is necessary to make military service more attractive

Defense Ministry: Azerbaijani Armed Forces opened fire at Armenian positions

Putin and Raisi discuss topical issues of the bilateral agenda

Blinken: Ukraine must decide on timing and content of any talks with Russia

Catholicos expresses hope that Russia efforts will contribute to ensuring free, safe life of Artsakh Armenians

More than 50 of poorest developing countries are on brink of bankruptcy, says UN official

Armenia ex-ombudsman: We are facing serious national security issues (PHOTOS)

Biden has no plans to meet with Saudi crown prince at G20 summit

EU offers natural gas price cap assurances amid disagreements with member countries

Scholz is against establishment of ceasefire in Ukraine on Kremlin's terms

Turkologist: Turkey does not support agenda of achieving peace with Armenians

Sweden to not permit deployment of nuclear weapons on its territory after joining NATO

Erdogan signs decree on appointing Turkey ambassador to Israel

Information security expert: Some Armenia officials received letter that they were victims of national hackers attack

Armenia FM meets with France minister of foreign trade

Foreign Policy: US to resume nuclear arms control talks with Russia

Armenia opposition MP: Artsakh army reduction is impermissible

Biden to warn Chinas Xi that North Korea path could lead to increase in US military presence

US Treasury chief: India can buy as much Russian oil as it wants

Newspaper: Armenia authorities trying to find legal grounds for signing peace treaty

Newspaper: People of Karabakh not going to tolerate final destruction of their army

Texas woman sentenced to death for killing pregnant woman, removing fetus from victim

Van Gogh's painting sold for a record $117 million

Gentiloni: EU countries have accumulated enough gas to get through the coming winter

Several dozen activists detained at protest rally in Baku: They chant slogans 'Freedom!', 'Resign!'

Princess Haya seeks asylum in Wales

Pashinyan: Iran is concerned about the presence of other actors in our region, which are not in the territory of Armenia

Pashinyan: Presidents of Russia and Azerbaijan listened to presented proposals

Volvo reveals its flagship EX90 electric crossover

Pashinyan: Yerevan supports Russia's proposals for Armenian-Azerbaijani settlement

Pashinyan: Russia cannot withdraw from Karabakh unless it creates additional guarantees for peacekeeping mission

Pashinyan: We will do everything to Armenia-Azerbaijan sign peace treaty by end of year

Russia bans entry of Biden's family and White House press secretary

Pashinyan: We believe there should be a dialogue between Azerbaijan and Nagorno-Karabakh

Pashinyan says positions voiced by some member countries of CSTO are unacceptable

19 countries that use euro currency will slide into recession over winter

Pashinyan to Baku: If 1991 border is mutually recognized, what are your troops doing near Jermuk?

Pashinyan: If the Karabakh issue is solved, why is Azerbaijani Armed Forces shooting at Karabakh residents?

Pashinyan: Russia should say whether their version of peace settlement is still circulating?

Pashinyan: Maybe Azerbaijan doesn't want Armenia to receive revenues?

Pashinyan: Azerbaijan must withdraw its troops from Armenia

Pashinyan: My yesterday's speech served its purpose, Azerbaijani MFA no longer uses 'corridor' term

Microsoft founder Paul Allen's collection of world masterpieces sold for $1.6 billion

Public TV of Armenia hosts Armenian PM Nikol Pashinyan

China shows drone killer

Armenian FM meets his French counterpart

Rishi Sunak decides to close hole in British budget through austerity

Delegation of Russian MPs visits Jermuk resort town

Lavrov and Mirzoyan discuss regional agenda

Harut Sasunyan: The best way to achieve peace is to be prepared for war

Turkish prosecutor demands court to ban Istanbul mayor from political activities

German business leaders warn against leaving China

Sasunyan: Russia and US pursue their own interests in South Caucasus

British economy shrinks in three months, foretelling prolonged recession

Iranian Ambassador to Azerbaijan summoned to Foreign Ministry
Losing a loved one to suicide can leave people feeling lost and alone, but at Missoulas Out of the Darkness suicide prevention walk, more than 260 people showed up to support one another and raise awareness.

The walk, directed by the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, surpassed its fundraising goal of $25,000, Missoula organizer Nancy Yates said.

Yates lost her son six years ago to suicide. After participating in an AFSP walk in Billings, she helped revive the event in Missoula. She was excited, and emotional, about the great turnout at her second year leading the walk.

Seeing everyone here, and all the colorful teams of walkers is so amazing, she said. Just knowing youre not alone in this struggle, that there are so many people and resources available for you, its just so encouraging.

The funds raised by the walk will help to further AFSPs goal of reducing the national suicide rate by 20 percent by 2025.

Sunday marks World Suicide Prevention Day, and the start of National Suicide Prevention Week.

The local suicide prevention nonprofit Project Tomorrow joined with the Out of the Darkness walk. Mike Craig, a volunteer with Project Tomorrow, said the fledgling group is focused on removing the stigma around suicide. He said the more people talk about it, the easier it will be to prevent.

There have been public service campaigns to talk with kids about being safe with sex and drugs, but we need to talk about death and suicide, Craig said. All the prevention efforts taking place are wonderful, but something still isnt being done right, as shown by the prevalence of suicide in young people, especially in the Rocky Mountain region.

Suicide rates in Montana have been among the highest in the country for more than 40 years, Craig said. He lost his 13-year-old son in 2000.

He said that as a frustrated parent, he is doing what he can to search for solutions. He spent a few hours tabling for Project Tomorrow during the University of Montanas Welcome Feast on Friday.

College students are a high-risk population, so the more students that know someone cares, the easier they can avoid slipping into suicidal thoughts, said Craig, who is currently earning his teaching certificate at UM. We want college to be the best experience of their lives, but there are bumps in the roads.

Missoula Mayor John Engen spoke at the event, and said that as an alcoholic living with depression, he has lived with the pain and darkness of suicide.

I understand a little bit about mental illness. I understand a little bit about helplessness, Engen said. But these days, I mostly understand help and hope. The fact of the matter is that everyone here today has an opportunity to lean in and offer both of those things, help and hope.
Not bad. I dont know, I have less of a problem with her than the other nepotism girls probably because ive always liked Cindy.

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I'm kind of the opposite. I get the impression that her modeling career has been a carefully calculated business decision on the part of her billionaire dealmaker dad and super fashion insider mom, since she was like 12. Say what you will about the daughters of random Housewives, they weren't being made to get attention as this !!next generation!! as middle schoolers.



If anyone is getting a job by sheer virtue of who her parents are/ is, it's this girl. "Daughter of Yolanda, that one lady from Bravo" doesn't really have the same novelty to it as "Daughter of Cindy Crawford". At the end of the day though, modeling isn't down to true merit of any sort. As long as you're pretty, young, and attention getting enough for WHATEVER reason, it's all fair. You can't hold any of that against these girls and the idea that they are taking jobs from those more *qualified* is sort of ridiculous.

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I mean tbf she had the best walk in that show she really shined in the mix of all those mediocre walks but I'm sure her mom gave her a lot of tips lol

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True, modelling isn't about merit at all but doing it well is still a skill of sorts and not one of those insta models is any good at that shit (except arguably Gigi, who photographs well).



tho ia that this girl has has Cindy pushing her almost since the minute her age hit double digits, it's crazy. I mean, we all know she would never be booking Vogue Paris if her mother was some random from nowhere.

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teach em! she's been prepped for this since she was a kid. i feel so bad for her.

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Hasn't Gigi been modeling since she was a child though... I know having Cindy as your mom would probably get you even more credit in the industry but at least this girl doesn't seem like a total bore on the runway tbh.

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I don't understand how one can be better than another in terms of walking on the catwalk.



You're walking.



....how is there an art to that?



Someone please explain because I just see them walking and I'm like "That's a walk."

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Watch a video of Cara Delevigne walking down the runway then go search for Mariacarla Boscono walking down the runway. Should explain the difference.

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Do you have a video of a specific mariaclara walk? I watched a compilation and was only impressed about half the time with her walks

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honestly cara makes gigi look like mariacarla or natasha poly. gigi has never had a walk as bad as cara at dsquared2

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Holy shit! Cara Delevingne is terrible. I'd never seen her walk, she sucks.

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or natasha poly or vlada roslyakova

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watch gigi hadid or cara walk and then naomi you'll understand

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just a walk???





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Sis, do you ever walk in heels? It takes practice or natural talent and the natural talents make the runway their bitch. Look up Natasha Poly, Mariacarla Boscono, Raquel Zimmerman, Karlie Kloss (not a great walker but someone who still owns it)

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clearly you've never watched ANTM lol

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I feel like having an interesting walk is good for helping the model stand out but not the clothes.

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literally just like everyone else when you look at someone walking sometimes it looks weird, models have the added dilemma of accentuating the clothing (eg. the way naomi walked in the VS fashion show the penis dog linked, the thing is swishing perfectly on beat with the music)



you're probably over thinking it

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Oh sis.... no....

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They need to learn from the queen Arizona Muse

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watch shalom harlow's vids. she had the walk of the 90s. these new girls are doing horse impressions.

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Model walking is a combination between stage presence (which can't be taught), walking with intent and confidence/not like you stumbled onto the stage accidentally, and walking so that the clothes look their coolest, and not ugly and/or impractical as they usually are to me. The last two can be practiced.

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What's to explain? It's not like judging the way a person moves their body is some strange and unheard of concept.

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She looks good.



In other news, who else is in Florida right now? I'm in South Florida on the east coast (north of West Palm Beach) and I can already feel it.

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Stay safe please!!

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I'm on the west coast. We'll get through this. Stay safe!

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Oh jeez. Good luck getting through today <3

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Oh yikes - stay safe!

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Stay safe!

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I'm in Orlando. Stay safe!

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Stay safe sis, you and all ontd Florida ppl!

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in Volusia! Praying for you, all of us really

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Orlando here. As prepared as we're gonna get. Stay safe bb.

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Orlando here. The rain is falling pretty hard and it hasn't even begun here yet.

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i would hope her mom gave her some tips lmao

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She had the best walk in that flop show you could tell she got practice lol

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She looks much better than Kendall, Gigi or Bella after dozens of show but still ain't no Natasha Poly

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I miss Natasha so much. I saw her at an even last year having to pose with emrat, these new girls don't even ben compare

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I agree especially since allegedly she's a straight As student . This is like when Cindy majored in science and her professor made fun of her for being too pretty to be in his class so she went and became a model..

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And got rewarded for it since she's way more successful at modeling than she would have ever been with a chemical engineering degree.

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fashion just seems like such a predatory industry.



that and adult women are supposedly the target group but we're all expected to have the body of a 15-year-old (no offense to the skinnies)

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I think it should be a law that you have to be at least 18 to model for adult clothing, there's no need for a 13 year old girl to be modeling chanel

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She's ok. But lacks that je ne sais quoi her mother had.



Edited at 2017-09-10 01:21 pm (UTC)

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Give her time. This is her first fashion week and she's only 16...

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K but I'm not talking about her walk...it's more of an inherent quality you either have or you don't.

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can someone id the song?

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Cho - Popalik

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the info i truly need in this post, thanks

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1000x thanks

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She slayed. This show should have been her debut one.

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I was looking at pictures of the Alexander Wang show and I know some models have always had an "interesting" look, but a lot of them were downright ugly as hell?

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Well, there's a bit of life in there but

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At least the "Get it girl. Get itttt. Uh huh. Work it!" fits with this post.

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Omg where is that sound coming from??

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Everyone is talking about cindy crawfords' daughter but what about Helena Christensen's son? He was modeling too.

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Is he old enough to model?! Ugh, put me in a home already.

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who honestly cares about male models tbh

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my septuagenarian grandma is better than kendall and gigi

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i agree

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no

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I find her ugly tbh

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Absolutely not. Cindy had an iconic look.

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This is incredibly sad. Both of them have to deal with really shitty things, I wish them the best.

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the diff might be that LaBeouf's abusive, woman hating ass is pushing himself on the public with pretentious-at-best art projects every other month to remind us of his shitty existence, while this dude only every pops up on gossip sites once or twice a year when ppl catch him being an alcoholic in public

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yep

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Hes a racist though

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It also has to do with how famous they are. JRM doesn't do much high profile stuff, while Shia is out getting cast in all sorts of projects and has Spielberg on his side.

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Everything you said was true, even if Shia wasn't the best example.

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you say this like everyone here is aware of every part of a celeb's history

most people dont know much about this guy, you cant expect them to

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Shia's shit isn't simply being an addict. He spews words of hatred as well. THAT'S the difference. Alcohol literally unleashes his true believes. Much like Mel Gibson. JRM's situation is literally a broken drunk staggering around town. It's tragic, that's why we feel sorry. People could make the argument that Shia's situation is tragic as well, and I wouldn't DISAGREE, but it's wholly different than JRM, and some others.



The eye witness report from JRM's incident is literally:



"He was staggering around for a good while. ~He wasnt causing any hassle with anyone~, he just seemed to be really intoxicated. It was very sad to see him like this."



"He looked like someone who didnt have a clue where he was. He was completely out of it. Other passengers were concerned to see him in such a way just after 10am."



Compare that to:



"Bitch, whore. If I had my gun, I'll blow your shit up. You're a bitch, though. So you got your shit, you do nothing. Whore, fucking bitch, coward. Fuck you and your legacy. You're a bitch. Bitch, and you put your own kind in the fucking pen. For nothing. You put a white man in the pen for what?! You fucking bitch! For asking for a black man for a fucking cigarette?! I pay my taxes you dumb bitch. You about to meet my lawyer. And you'll feel like a stupid slimy whore. Enjoy your life, that's your legacy you fucking coward."



All to a Black officer, who he then tells is going to hell for being Black, and tells is an idiot for arresting a White man who actually likes Black people.



Add to that the violence.



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heartbreaking, i hope they pull through as best they can.



and i really hope she didn't feel pressure to share this deeply personal and painful information to head off the media speculating about/inaccurately spinning her husband's relapse and subsequent detox :(

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Wait... what? Did the kid have an accident while baking? I'm sorry if this is gouche but I don't understand... did he like, trip and fall in or something?



No matter what, that's completely devastating. I don't know how you keep going on after something like that. I feel like self-medication would be the least of my problems.

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Yeah :(

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I'm leaving these comments up as a reminder of my idiocy.

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"baking in the oven" is a colloquialism meaning pregnant. She had a miscarriage while pregnant with their 2nd child.

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Baking in the oven is a phrase that means someone is pregnant with a baby. Like "a bun in the oven" is another saying that is used to describe pregnancy. So she's telling that the baby died while it was still inside her. She had a miscarriage

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Ach ach ach, poor people.

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she sounds supportive and understanding. i hope she'll be able to help him, and he'll let himself be helped.

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that is really sad. i hope they both get help to deal with that, especially him. i hope they don't have people tell them to stop being sad because they can always make another one. that's what

my cousin was told by a family member after her miscarriage :-(

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I get that people are trying to look to a positive note, but it's a deeply insensitive thing to say. Future children are not replacements for the one you've lost and they don't stop you grieving. (If anything I think the fear of a reoccurence makes future pregnancies more stressful, though of course worth it in the end).

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sadly she will probably misscarry again if she gets pregnant, so they will probably never have biological children. so these kind of comments are especially hurtful. it's really sad and difficult for them atm.

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absolutely. i miscarried last year. i was able to get pregnant again after surgery on my uterus and am currently 35 weeks. but this baby is not a replacement for the one we lost. we lost a baby girl - i had always wanted a little girl. this baby is a boy. i love him and am super excited, but i still grieve for the daughter we lost. and the entire 1st trimester with this pregnancy i was terrified. i didn't let myself get attached because i felt like at any time the shoe was going to drop.

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I hope she's doing better.

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Ugh, that's the worst thing people can say. It's not a sweater that can just be replaced.

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ugh my dad said that to my mom after a miscarriage before they had me.



no, they are not together anymore.

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Ohh damn 

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It's a very well written statement but I'm hoping she didn't feel she had to make it to pre-emptively win back sympathy for him, as if he wasn't deserving of it anyway. Addiction is a disease and relapse is part of it. Even if he'd only relapsed because it was a Tuesday and not because he was grieving.

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+1 - it is well written but i think it's sad she even had to make one. so generous of her to do so for the public all things considered. i loved him in bend it like beckham and a lot of users always say they loved his work. keep hoping he will be able to manage his demons/issues and live a good long life.

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this. there isn't always a bigger reason for why relapses happen. sometimes they just do. <3

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I'm really sorry to hear about your two tragedies, bb.

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During times of trials it's so easy to find someone to blame and walk away. I'm glad JRM has an understanding partner by his side to help him through this. Bless you Mara <3

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I missed the first post with the pics, but the person who took them is "slightly" in the wrong?! That's incredibly big of her to say, considering; that was a really shitty thing to do even without the tragedy part. What a sad situation.

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??? it's just pics of him being drunk at the airport.

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honestly.......this statement is kind of a codependent mess. i feel for her but this doesnt seem very healthy.

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ia

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exactly.

yikes

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im wondering how many people that find this sweet/healthy/good have been in a relationship with an addict (or are addicts/in recovery themselves) because........this is not healthy.

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Same :(

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Exactly. It's really sad.

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It's giving me flashbacks.

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What does she mean he was born with alcoholism? Like he was addicted to it when born because his mother was an alcoholic while pregnant?

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Was wondering the same thing? Or maybe she means there are others in the family who are addicted to alcohol?

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i was curious as well. sometimes i feel like i was born with it because it's in every generation of my family (on both sides)? but i wasn't born w/foetal alcohol syndrome. hse is pretty fucked up in terms of accessing treatment

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Addiction can run in families - though whether that's because of some genetic predisposition or just a learned cycle, I don't know.

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maybe fetal alcohol syndrome? It can predispose to addictions.

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The best research we have says alcoholism is heavily influenced by genetic factors. Some people are genetically pre-disposed to metabolizing alcohol in a way that increases the response in the reward centers of their brain. There are so-called alcoholic genes whose presence is indicative of a high-risk of alcoholism in the bearer. Any child of an alcoholic bears a greatly increased risk of exhibiting the same disease compared to children of non-alcoholics, because there's the chance they got the genetic makeup from their parent.

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Genetically predisposed to alcoholism. We have this in my fam and have had alcoholics in every generation on my dad's side. It's sad

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MUDDY CREEK  When the trail disappeared into a boggy marsh after the stream crossing, the bleached cow bones littering the ground should have been proof that we had wandered too far into the brush.

Or maybe the large black bear track in the mud next to the first small spring should have served as a warning.

When the route later disappeared into another marsh and we ended up scrambling up and down a steep, rocky hillside, doubt, frustration and a bit of exhaustion finally settled in.

Backpack cram

It was the last official weekend of summer, and not having backpacked the entire season I was trying to cram all of my winter-long dreams of mountain adventure into two days.

The route chosen was supposed to gain little elevation and be reasonably short, about five miles. The trek would take us from the Muddy Creek Trailhead to Granite Lake. The lake is a backward-L-looking, 228-acre mountain pool that straddles the Montana-Wyoming border in the Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness. At about 1.4 miles long and nine-tenths of a mile wide, it is one of the largest lakes in the wilderness.

With all of the route-finding and side treks, though, the path was beginning to seem a lot longer than originally planned. And once the mornings caffeine boost had worn off, feet were sore and shoulders were aching, it seemed like a bad idea not to have purchased a more detailed map of the area, or to at least have brought along a GPS.

As my daughter pointed out though, whats a backpacking trip with the Frenches without a little wandering and bushwhacking, some minor dehydration and bonking from a shortage of food? That made me think that we should have a special name for our unusual bad luck with family outings. Combining the words French and adventure I came up with Frenventure. Not the greatest, but Im going with it until I think of something better.

Adventures with Brett

Frenventures date back to when my wife and I were newly married. Our first backpacking outing into the Bitterroot-Selway Wilderness included a visit from a cow and calf moose while my wife sat frozen with fear in a hot springs; post-holing through knee-deep snow to try to reach a lake and eventually running out of daylight and settling for a narrow camping spot under a fir bough in an attempt to avoid bivouacking in the snow.

My children were just wee ones when they were initiated to the fun of Frenventures. Tucked into sleeping bags under a tarp to keep the rain off and stave off hypothermia, they giggled and played while I frantically rowed the raft to reach a takeout on the upper Dearborn River. Leaving them under a bridge after warming up hot cocoa, they resembled a homeless family as I hopped on my motorcycle for a greasy ride back to the truck in the continuing downpour.

These are the sinews binding their muscle memories of growing up with a misadventurous father. Luckily for me, they dont seem to carry any lasting scars from the many debacles. Even my daughters swelling from numerous mosquito bites she sustained as a young girl while camping on the side of Clay Butte hasnt deterred her from enjoying the outdoors, an astonishing point I made as we crossed under the unusual 10,000-foot tall geologic feature on our way back from Granite Lake on day two of what was a relatively mosquito-free trip.

Course correction

We had arrived below Clay Butte thanks to yet another navigational correction on this trip of reroutes and course corrections. Recognizing that the trail back down Muddy Creek was riddled with miscues and downfall, I decided to switch our exit to the Clay Butte Trailhead. The trail looked much shorter, and since horseback riders had taken that path, it seemed more likely to be free of downfall and better marked. Plus, wed see some new country on the way  always a benefit. The only catch was one of us would need to hitchhike a ride back down to the car, which didnt seem impossible.

What the map didnt show me, and I failed to consider, was that the route up to Clay Butte would require climbing almost 1,000 feet higher. (Thats about 100 stories.) Imagine climbing to the top of a 100-story building with a backpack on, and youll have only a small idea of the strain involved. Thats because mountain trails arent smooth and regular, and in the Beartooths we were starting out at an elevation of 8,600 feet in air choked with wildland fire smoke. So really, there's no comparison to climbing the stairs up a 100 story building.

As I paused to catch my breath on one of the trails switchbacks on the way out, I questioned the logic of my directional decision. Looking down, the Muddy Creek meadow that wed wandered through the day before seemed like it was a mile below. Better trail quality but elevation gain seemed like a bad tradeoff at that lung-searing point.

But then I realized that by the end of the week, if not sooner, my feet wouldnt hurt, the shoulder soreness would be long gone, and it wouldnt matter a bit which route we had taken, except to serve up more fodder for the memories of our family outings.
At another glacier in the Valais region in July mountaineers discovered the remains of a German backpacker, who died 30 years ago while climbing the Swiss Alps

Swiss authorities have evacuated hundreds of people in the alpine glacier area of Trift in the country's south, warning of a possible glacial ice avalanche.

"A large serac could collapse at any moment," the police in the canton of Valais said in a statement. A serac is a pinnacle or ridge of ice on the surface of a glacier.

Geologists have recently noticed significant movement along the "tongue" of the Trift glacier, most recently up to 130 centimetres (50 inches) in a single day, local authorities said.

A collapse would threaten the municipality of Saad-Grund. Authorities have already evacuated 222 people, a police spokesman Simon Bumann told AFP.

A glacial collapse could trigger an ice avalanche which could reach the village.

The area directly below the glacier and hiking trails in the region has been closed, while lifts and a local road have been sealed off.

The glacier has been under observation since October 2014, when the area was closed for three weeks. With a return to colder temperatures, the situation stabilised and the access ban was lifted.

But since the start of the week, movement has increased on the lower part of the glacier. Radar surveillance has been put in place.

In late August, a massive rockfall triggered an avalanche which buried eight hikers in another valley in the Swiss alps, near Bondo.

 2017 AFP
The Covellite International Film Festival in Butte is back for another showing, and organizers Brian Boyd and Don Andrews say this year general admission is free.

The festival runs Sept. 12 through 17 and will feature more than 110 films, ranging from short- and feature-length dramatic and documentary films to movies made by youth. (See sidebar.)

Andrews said the festival received about 300 submissions (up from last year) and that the filmmakers who submitted their work come from throughout the U.S. and world -- including from places as far away and exotic as Canada, Andrews said.

Both Boyd and Andrews expressed enthusiasm for the 2017 lineup.

I think the quality of films weve been getting has just been unbelievable said Andrews.

Boyd, meanwhile, said a surprising highlight for him is Perfect, a documentary about synchronized swimming.

At first, Boyd said, he thought hed have no interest in the film because, you know, its synchronized swimming.

But Boyd said the Perfect filmmakers did what filmmakers do best: find a compelling human story within even the most seemingly obscure subject.

Its about the pursuit of excellence at the highest level in a field where success is subjective, said Boyd. So its completely out of their control -- but its all about control.

Andrews said one of his favorites is the Covellite opener, a documentary called Charged: The Eduardo Garcia Story, which documents the life of Eduardo Garcia, a man who was shocked with 2400 volts of electricity in a freak incident in Montanas backcountry, according to the films synopsis, and who later became a celebrity chef known as the bionic chef because of his prosthetic arm, a relic from his brush with death.

He loses part of his arm and had burns all over his body. He has to go through this whole life-changing process, and through this process, he becomes the person he actually wants to become, said Andrews.

Andrews also said hes excited for audiences to see Chasing Evel, a film about Robbie Knievel, and the feature-length film Scent of Cigar by Indian filmmaker Nandaian K.A.

Its like Christopher Nolan meets Alfred Hitchcock, but theyre Indian, said Andrews.

Several of the filmmakers who presented in 2016 will return, but there will also be some fresh faces.

New to the lineup this year is the youth block, which will feature films by filmmakers 18 years old and younger.

Also new is a second-run screening location.

Andrews said that anyone wishing to see a movie after its initial screening can do so from 3 p.m. to 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday during the festival at Thunder Alley, 821 S. Montana St.

But perhaps the biggest change to the festival is the price of admission.

General admission will be free for 2017, Andrews said, but participants can still get premium features by purchasing a day or VIP pass, which gives them reserved seating for workshops, filmmaker forums, and films.

Since the festivals premier last year, Andrews and Boyd have kept themselves busy.

The two have started the Covellite Cinema Club, which meets every Sunday in the Covellite Theatre, 215 W. Broadway St., where folks watch and discuss movies, while Boyd, an actor, took on a leading role in No Greater Love, the musical depicting the Granite Mountain-Speculator Mine fire.

The duo also launched their own production company called Covellite Studios, took part in three ongoing or planned projects with scenes filmed in Butte, and bought an Uptown building to house their operations.

To some, the Covellite Studios building at 61 W. Broadway St. might seem like a series of dilapidated old store fronts, replete with signage from businesses that have long ago shut their doors. But in the two-story building, Boyd and Andrews see a field of dreams. In the building they want to create an animation bay, sound studio, rooms for editing and effects, living quarters, and an office and welcome center for the film festival on the ground level.

They purchased the building for $1,000 from Buttes Urban Revitalization Agency last year. Since then, theyve been slowly gutting the building, tearing down walls and drop ceilings, and building new load-bearing beams.

Its one of the things I use for a therapy, Boyd said. Ill come up here and Ill start scraping on the walls.

As for the festival, Boyd and Andrews encouraged Butte residents who may have missed the films last year to stop by one of the Covellites nine screening locations.

Come out, watch movies, meet some filmmakers, said Andrews.
Wireless Security Camera Systems 101

Purchasing a wireless security camera system for your business can be a bit intimidating due to the vast array of options now available. The importance of having security for your retail business is common knowledge. A security camera system can make or break your business by preventing theft, identifying violators, and protecting employees and customers.

Although these security camera systems have been around for many decades, in the past the sophistication of the systems was somewhat lacking. Oftentimes the clarity of the picture was dull, the amount of available footage was insufficient, and the installation process was costly and complicated. But with ongoing advances in technology, we are beginning to see progress in overall system quality. We have advanced from CCTV (closed circuit television), which needed to be monitored continuously, to video tape recordings, tomost recentlywireless security cameras.

There are many benefits to investing in a wireless security camera system, along with very few risks. Most significant is the capability of deploying wireless security cameras in areas previously inaccessible due to the requirement for outlet access. Wireless components allow for placement anywhere, permitting more comprehensive surveillance indoors or outdoors. Additionally, without the need for installment of electrical wires, wireless security cameras can be repositioned at any time.

Another advantage of going wireless is the cost-effectiveness of installation. Without the need to run and conceal wires, installation is fast and inexpensive and can typically be done without having to hire someone to help. Most wireless security camera systems are plug and play and can be set up in a matter of moments.

Besides just understanding the benefits of wireless security camera systems, there are also various factors to consider before making a purchase. It is important for the retailer to first consider their specific needs. The budget available, the size of the store(s), and desired functionality are all key to a successful first step.

Digital security camera systems range in price from around $200 to $1,000 per unit depending on overall quality, number of cameras, and viewing access. Obviously, with a larger store or multiple stores, it would be important to purchase a system with more cameras.

The options available are almost endless. Once a decision has been made on what type of security camera is required, the additional features below should be explored:

Remote monitoring: Most wireless security camera systems are set up to be viewed on a monitor, typical 7 to 9 in size. Many can also be hooked up to a TV screen. If viewing footage on the go is important, investigate those that allow for smartphone access.

Amount of saved footage: If looking back at footage over a period of time, rather than on a daily or weekly basis, opt for a wireless security camera that can save up to one month of footage or more.

Night vision and motion detectors: If the camera is only going to be used inside a store that is open all night, such as a convenience store, this is clearly not important. But if night security is a concern, investigate these options. With the advances in technology, many wireless security cameras are now capable of revealing amazingly clear images in the dark.

Communication: Some wireless security camera systems come with a communication system that allows verbal communication between two people via the receiver and the camera. For example, if a wireless camera is mounted near the cashier, the cashier can talk to anyone who is situated at the receiver. This could be helpful for preventing theft and protecting employees when customers get out of hand.

Black & white/Color: Although this is basically a personal preference, clarity comes into play here. You can find wireless cameras with either, and budget may be the determining factor.

Customization: Decide if it is important to be able to customize the wireless units in the future by choosing a system that allows for the capability to add additional cameras, monitors and storage.

Other options to consider include:

Online storage systems

Visual quality

Viewing range

Battery power or power cord

Warranty

Return Policy

In-store signal strength

Date-stamp recordings

Analog or digital

After understanding the options available when purchasing a wireless security camera system, remember to never buy sight unseen. With something as crucial as security, its imperative to speak with someone, ask questions and request a demonstration.

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Former Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili and hundreds of his supporters on Sunday forced their way into Ukraine in a bid by the firebrand politician to reclaim his citizenship stripped by President Petro Poroshenko after they fell out. An AFP reporter saw the one-time Ukraine governor and his supporters enter from Poland's Medyka border crossing, pushing aside Ukrainian border guards who had turned him back just hours earlier. "They did it against all the rules, what's happening here?" Saakashvili told reporters in Medyka when he was initially refused entry, adding: "We hope that we can still break through." At that point hundreds of his supporters chanting "Misha, Misha" -- a diminutive of his name -- forced their way into Poland from Ukraine and marched back along with Saakashvili, who now risks extradition to his native Georgia. Tbilisi on Tuesday asked Kiev to extradite Saakashvili to face charges of misappropriation of property and abuse of office among others. Saakashvili denies the accusations branding them a political witch hunt. He says Georgia's extradition request was driven by "oligarchs" who fear his presence in Ukraine, where he fought corruption. Earlier Sunday, Ukrainian authorities blocked a Kiev-bound train in Poland carrying Saakashvili, who eventually got off and took a bus to the Medyka crossing. Ukraine's outspoken ex-prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko threw her support behind the 49-year-old, accompanying him as he attempted to cross into Ukraine the first time. Saakashvili said "several hundred thugs were mobilised by the Ukrainian government to stop several thousand" of his supporters waiting to greet him on the Ukrainian side. Kiev is "panicking," Saakashvili said, adding that he did "not want to overthrow President Poroshenko" but just defend his rights. - 'Future president'? - "We believe that Mikheil Saakashvili can lead our country out of the crisis," Lyudmyla Goretska, one of thousands of supporters waiting in Krakovets on the Ukrainian side of the border, told AFP. "We see what he did in his own country and that's enough for us," Goretska said of Saakashvili, who set up the Movement of the New Forces political party in Ukraine. "The main problem in our country is corruption... We need to overcome the oligarchy." The charismatic Saakashvili is credited with pushing through pro-Western and anti-graft reforms in Georgia which he led from 2004 to 2013. Another supporter, Maria, 49, who declined to give her surname, said she believes "Saakashvili is the future president" of Ukraine and "will finish the war" with Russia. Saakashvili is also wanted in his homeland for alleged abuse of power during a tumultuous nine years as president that saw him fight and lose a brief war with Russia in 2008. He left in disgrace for Ukraine in 2015 to work for the country's pro-Western authorities as governor of the key Odessa region on the Black Sea. But he quit in November 2016 amid a dramatic falling out with Poroshenko, who stripped him of his Ukrainian citizenship in July while he was out of the country. Now, Saakashvili wants to return to challenge that decision in court and get back into politics. "We see a roll-back of reforms in Ukraine, we see a crackdown on anti-corruption activities in Ukraine. This is very sad," Saakashvili said Friday in Warsaw. - 'Stateless in Ukraine - Saakashvili lost his Georgian citizenship when he was granted a Ukrainian passport in 2015, as the country does not allow dual citizenship. He has brandished his Ukrainian passport on several occasions and also maintains that officials working for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees in Geneva have confirmed his status as "stateless in Ukraine", meaning he has the right to be there to appeal against Poroshenko's decision to withdraw his citizenship. Kiev justified the move by claiming that Saakashvili had provided "inaccurate information" in his citizenship application.
Nearly 1.3 million worshippers flocked to a mass by Pope Francis on Saturday in the Colombian city known as the stronghold of the late drug lord Pablo Escobar. On the third stop in a four-city Colombian tour, Francis held an open-air mass in Medellin, home of the cocaine cartel depicted in the hit Netflix series "Narcos." The Argentine pope, 80, has spent the trip pleading for reconciliation following a peace agreement that ended Colombia's half-century civil war. Francis met with victims and ex-fighters. In Medellin he also urged the Church to get out its comfort zone in order to confront challenges such as Colombia's peace process. "The Church is 'shaken' by the Spirit in order to lay aside comforts and attachments," he said in his homily. "We should not be afraid of renewal. The Church always needs renewal... Renewal entails sacrifice and courage." Medellin is the political stronghold of former president Alvaro Uribe, the leading opponent of a recent peace accord between the government and the FARC rebel group. Organizers of the mass said 1,293,000 people were in attendance. "The pope has come to Medellin to talk about vocation," said Marcela Hincapie, 40, who spent all night waiting to take her place at the service. "I would like the church to help the young people, drug addicts, hitmen and those who get involved in drug trafficking," Hincapie told AFP. Francis supported the contested peace process that has led to Colombia's biggest rebel group, the FARC, disarming and turning into a political party. The government pushed the FARC accord through congress despite resistance from critics who said the rebels were getting off too lightly with amnesties and alternative sentences.
By Prak Chan Thul PHNOM PENH (Reuters) - Cambodia's main opposition party will boycott a parliamentary vote to strip their detained leader of immunity on Monday and will instead go to Kem Sokha's jail to demand his release, one of his deputies said on Sunday. Kem Sokha, the head of the Cambodian National Rescue Party (CNRP), was arrested a week ago and charged with treason for allegedly plotting to win power with the support of the United States, escalating a crackdown on critics of Prime Minister Hun Sen and independent media ahead of a general election next year. Two aid groups run by the publisher of the Cambodia Daily, shut a week ago in a dispute over a crippling tax bill, said they were suspending work after their accounts were frozen. Parliament is due to vote on whether to remove the immunity from prosecution which Kem Sokha gets as an elected member of parliament. The ruling Cambodian People's Party's (CPP) majority means the motion is certain to pass anyway. CNRP deputy leader Mu Sochua said the parliament vote was illegal. "We can't accept this. We will demand that Kem Sokha, who has not done anything wrong, be released," she said, adding members of parliament would hold a protest at the prison where he is being held near the border with Vietnam. CPP spokesman Sok Eysan said the opposition boycott would be unconstitutional, but the CPP had enough votes to strip Kem Sokha of his immunity anyway. Hun Sen, a 65-year-old former Khmer Rouge commander, has ruled Cambodia for more than 30 years and said last week he planned to stay in power for another decade. Next year's election had been expected to be his toughest electoral test, but Western countries and human rights groups have raised doubts as to whether the vote will be fair. They have criticised Kem Sokha's arrest, but China has given its backing to close ally Hun Sen. The evidence presented against Kem Sokha so far is a video recorded in 2013 in which he discusses a strategy to win power with the help of unspecified Americans. His lawyers have dismissed the evidence as nonsense and said he was only discussing election strategy. In recent weeks, Hun Sen has also expelled the National Democratic Institute, a non-governmental organisation that promotes democracy, and ordered 19 radio stations off the air. The independent English-language Cambodia Daily shut last week after being given a month to pay a $6.3 million tax demand. Japan Relief for Cambodia and World Relief for Cambodia, aid groups financed by the paper's publisher, said their accounts had been frozen and they would have to suspend building schools and teaching English and computing to thousands of pupils. (Editing by Matthew Tostevin and Mark Potter)
The nonprofit stewards of the Clark Chateau want to turn the county-owned Jacobs House into a museum about Butte's first mayor and his home, a community center, and a place where visiting artists and writers can stay.

There's a lot of interior work required first, and a kitchen and laundry room are needed, but The Root & The Bloom Collective says it can raise money and work with Mary McCormick, Butte-Silver Bow's historic preservation officer, to get it done.

That might take up to two years by itself, but the nonprofit says it could then oversee and operate the house  which is at 201 W. Granite St., directly west of the courthouse  and replicate and complement the successes it's had with the chateau.

Once operational, the plan is to make enough money from donations and rentals to cover insurance, maintenance, and utility costs for the house.

Ellen Crain, director of the Butte Archives, says she's confident that will happen, given the transformation of the chateau since the people behind The Root & The Bloom took it over in 2015.

"They have magic going on in that building (chateau)," Crain said. "They have high school programs, and they have galleries, and they have music and dance and literature and things for youth.

"They have everything going on there, and it's a delight to watch that building being used in so many ways," she said. "I think their proposal for the Jacobs House will be equally magical."

The proposal will be detailed to commissioners later this month, but supporters, including McCormick, aren't asking for immediate approval.

"They will have plenty of time to consider it," McCormick said.

Henry Jacobs and his wife, Adele Levy Jacobs, were Jewish immigrants from Western Europe who had the house built in 1878. Jacobs was a merchant and Butte's first mayor, and more than a century later, the last of many private owners over the years donated the house to the city.

The city-county remodeled the interior and used it as office space and made it available to local government and nonprofit groups, according to The Root & The Bloom's proposal, but the house has been unoccupied since 2012.

With a recent $14,400 grant from the Superfund and Redevelopment Trust Authority and an equal match from the county, the house has new roofing and gutters, fresh paint, and a reconstructed front porch. An old office bathroom was refurbished and a shower added.

McCormick said the county put new heating and plumbing in when it got the house in the 1980s. But for people to stay there overnight or longer, it needs at least a small kitchen and laundry room, she said.

"We are not trying to make it into the Taj Mahal or anything, but we want it to be nice and comfortable," she said.

Carson Becker and Callison Stratton, co-founders and board members of The Root & The Bloom, have drawn accolades for preserving the four-story Clark Chateau through sorely needed repairs and upgrades and breathing new life into it with arts and humanities offerings.

Since becoming stewards of the mansion in 2015, foot traffic has quadrupled; $16,000 in grants have been secured; and more than $20,000 in rental income has come in from hosting weddings, recitals, and dinners and renting office space, its backers say.

Stratton, who oversaw day-to-day operations at the chateau, recently moved to New York but is still on The Root & The Bloom board.

Becker said the idea for the Jacobs House began when The Root & The Bloom partnered with The Montana Standard and Butte Archives last year to create the Mining City Writers Project. Among other things, four laureate writers spent a week in Butte under the program, writing essays and giving lectures and readings.

"We thought the Jacobs House could be a place for the writers to stay when they came here," Becker said.

The lack of a kitchen and other factors made that unworkable, but once money is raised and more work is done, the house could be used for that and other things, including:

 short-term housing for arts and humanities residency programs

 a museum about the Jacobs family's contributions to the growth of Butte and Montana and the greater role of Jewish culture in the American West

 community space for artistic events and activities centered on cultural diversity

 perhaps a vacation rental during the summer festival season and holidays, following state laws and rules for public accommodations

Becker said the proposal calls for a full two years of raising money and making needed improvements first then becoming an "imaginative, self-sufficient" house and operation.

"I feel very confident that we can make it work and it can be a shared resource for the community," she said. "It's a perfect location."
By Raya Jalabi and Ulf Laessing SOUTH OF MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters) - Iraqi authorities are holding 1,400 foreign wives and children of suspected Islamic State fighters in a camp after government forces expelled the jihadist group from one of its last remaining strongholds in Iraq, security and aid officials said. Many of them say they are from Russia, Turkey and Central Asia, but there are also some from European countries, the officials said. They have mostly arrived at the camp south of Mosul since Aug 30. An Iraqi intelligence officer said that they were in the process of verifying their nationalities with their home countries, since many of the women no longer had their original documents. It is the largest group of foreigners linked to Islamic State to be held by Iraqi forces since they started expelling the militants from Mosul and other areas in northern Iraq last year, an aid official said. Thousands of foreigners have been fighting for Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. A senior security officer said the authorities were trying to find a safe place to house the families while negotiating with embassies for their return home. They are not allowed to leave the camp. Reuters reporters saw hundreds of the women and children sitting on mattresses crawling with bugs in tents in what aid workers called a "militarized site". Turkish, French and Russian were among the languages spoken. "I want to go back (to France) but don't know how," said a French-speaking veiled woman of Chechen origin who said she had lived in Paris before. She said she did not know what had happened to her husband, who had brought her to Iraq when he joined Islamic State. The security officer said the women and children had mostly surrendered to the Kurdish Peshmerga near the northern city of Tal Afar, along with their husbands. The Kurds handed the women and children over to Iraqi forces, but kept the men - all presumed to be fighters - in their custody. Many of the families had fled to Tal Afar after Iraqi troops pushed Islamic State out of Mosul on Aug 30. Iraqi forces retook Tal Afar, a city of predominantly ethnic Turkmen that has produced some of Islamic State's most senior commanders, last month. Most of its pre-war population of 200,000 have fled. TENSION Aid workers and the authorities are worried about tensions between Iraqis, who lost their homes and are also living in the camp, and the new arrivals. Many Iraqis want revenge for the harsh treatment they received under the extremists' interpretation of Sunni Islam they imposed in Mosul and the other areas they seized in 2014. "The families are being kept to one side (of the camp) for their own safety," an Iraqi military intelligence officer said. The Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), which is supporting the 541 women and their children, said Iraq "must swiftly move to clarify its future plans for these individuals". "Like all those fleeing conflict, it is imperative that these individuals are able to access protection, assistance, and information," NRC said in a statement. "They are in de-facto detention." Western officials are worried about radicalized fighters and their relatives coming home after the collapse of Islamic State's "caliphate". French officials have indicated a preference for citizens found to be affiliated with IS to be prosecuted in Iraq. "The general philosophy is that adults should go on trial in Iraq," a French diplomatic source told Reuters last month, of those found to have been fighters. "We think children would benefit from judicial and social services in France." "TRICKED" The women in the camp were cooking noodles or lying on mattresses with their babies in the hot tents. Many were still wearing the black abayas and face-veils, which was mandatory in areas the militants controlled. "My mother doesn't even know where I am," said a 27-year-old French woman of Algerian descent who said she had been tricked by her husband to come with him via Turkey into Syria and then Iraq when he joined Islamic State last year. "I had just given birth to this little girl three months before," she said holding the infant and asking not to be named. "He said 'let's go for a week's holiday in Turkey.' He had already bought the plane tickets and the hotel." After four months in Mosul, she ran away from her husband to Tal Afar in February. She was hoping to make it back to France but he found her and would not let her leave. She tearily recounted how her five-year-old son was killed in June by a rocket while playing in the streets. "I don't understand why he did this to us," she said of her husband, who she said was killed fighting in Mosul. "Dead or alive - I couldn't care less about him." She and a few other families had walked for days to surrender at a Kurdish Peshmerga checkpoint beyond al-Ayadiyah, a town near Tal Afar where the militants took their last stand. "We were getting bombed, shelled and shot at," she said. Kurdish officials said dozens of fighters surrendered after the fall of Tal Afar but gave no details. One Tal Afar resident said he had seen between 70 and 80 fighters fleeing the town in the final days of the battle. (Additional reporting by John Irish in Paris; Editing by Anna Willard)
LONDON (Reuters) - North Korea's "reckless behaviour" is a global threat and requires a global response, the head of the NATO military alliance said on Sunday. NATO has not been directly involved in the crisis, which saw Pyongyang carry out its sixth and most powerful nuclear test a week ago, but has repeatedly called on North Korea to abandon its nuclear and ballistic missile programmes. "The reckless behaviour of North Korea is a global threat and requires a global response and that of course also includes NATO," NATO head Jens Stoltenberg said in an interview with BBC television. Asked whether an attack on the U.S. Pacific territory of Guam would trigger NATO's Article 5, which requires each member of the alliance to come to the defense of any other, Stoltenberg said: "I will not speculate about whether Article 5 will be applied in such a situation." "We are now totally focused on how can we contribute to a peaceful solution of the conflict," he said. "There is no easy way out of this difficult situation, but at the same time we have to ... continue to work for political solution, continue to press also the economic sanctions." The United States and its allies had been bracing for another long-range missile launch in time for the 69th anniversary of North Korea's founding on Saturday, but no fresh provocations were spotted while the North held numerous events to mark the holiday. Throughout last week, South Korean officials had warned the North could launch another intercontinental ballistic missile in defiance of U.N. sanctions and amid escalating tensions with the United States. British defence minister Michael Fallon also told the BBC he was very concerned about the situation. "We are doing now what we can to bring about a diplomatic solution, what we have to avoid at all costs is this spilling over in to any kind of military conflict," he said. "The U.S. is fully entitled to defend its own territory, to defend its bases and to look after its people but this involves us, London is closer to North Korea and its missiles than Los Angeles." Fallon said he did not believe North Korea currently had a missile capable of hitting London but said the missile programme was accelerating and their range was getting "longer and longer". "We have to get this programme halted because the dangers now of miscalculation, of some accident triggering a response are extremely great," he said. (Reporting by Kylie MacLellan; Editing by Mark Potter and Elaine Hardcastle)
Pope Francis prayed Sunday for a peaceful end to Venezuela's "grave crisis" which has left scores dead, as he wrapped up a tour to support peace in neighboring Colombia. The Argentine pope, 80, spoke during a prayer service in Cartagena, one of Colombia's top tourist draws but also one of its poorest cities, on the last day of his tour of the country. "I assure all of you of my prayers for each of the countries of Latin America, and in a special way for neighboring Venezuela," Francis said. "I appeal for the rejection of all violence in political life and for a solution to the current grave crisis, which affects everyone, particularly the poorest and most disadvantaged of society." - 'Pope should intervene' - Venezuela's crisis has caused food and medicine shortages and calls for President Nicolas Maduro to quit. Clashes with security forces at anti-government protests left 125 people dead from April to July. The Vatican tried to mediate in negotiations last year between Venezuela's government and opposition. The talks broke down with the sides accusing each other of bad faith. Thousands of Venezuelans have fled to Colombia to escape the crisis. "We could ask the pope to intervene directly for dialogue," said Venezuelan housewife Nancy Pugliese, 35, who attended Francis's visit in Cartagena. "We need all the spiritual support we can get to free Venezuela... The pope should tell President Maduro directly to listen to the people." - Venezuelans vote - On Sunday, Venezuela's center right-led opposition was holding a vote to choose candidates for regional governorship elections scheduled for October. The opposition MUD coalition and international powers have accused Maduro of stifling democracy by taking over power from state institutions. Francis met in Bogota on Thursday with Venezuelan bishops, who warned him that priests and nuns had faced threats in their country. They said in a statement that they "informed him about the worsening of the crisis and the radicalization of the government's stance." The statement said Francis "expressed his concern for the worsening of the humanitarian crisis." - Praying for the poor - Francis was due to fly back to Rome on Sunday evening after a four-city tour of Colombia. During his visit, he pleaded for lasting peace in Colombia as it moves toward the end of a half-century civil war. In Cartagena, he visited the impoverished district of San Francisco, where he blessed the foundations of a new homeless shelter. "We have a lot of faith in Francis's visit to this forgotten district," said Willy Martinez, a 43-year-old bricklayer. "Here, there are lots of people who only eat once a day. The worst thing is the corruption -- that is worse than the bullets of the guerrillas or the paramilitaries." Francis prayed in the name of local holy figures, including Saint Peter Claver, the patron saint of slaves, who lived in this colonial port city during the slave trade. They "invite us to work to promote the dignity of all our brothers and sisters, particularly the poor and the excluded of society," he said. "Those who are abandoned, immigrants and those who suffer violence and human trafficking." - Pope gets 'bashed' - Earlier, Francis got a cut on his brow and blood on his white cape when he bumped into the window of his Popemobile. He was standing up in the specially designed vehicle, waving to admirers, when it braked sharply and he collided with the glass. He was seen later with a bruise on his cheek and a small dressing on his brow, but still smiling. "I got bashed," he joked to reporters.
Saudi Arabia said Sunday it would keep pressuring Qatar until demands by a bloc of Arab states are met, dampening hopes for a US-mediated resolution to a diplomatic crisis. "We will continue to take action and we will maintain our position until Qatar responds," Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir said, speaking alongside his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in the Saudi city of Jeddah. The bloc's 13 demands include Doha ending its alleged support for Islamist extremist groups, closing a Turkish military base in the emirate and downgrading diplomatic ties with Tehran. Qatar "must respond to these requests in order to open a new page," Jubeir said. The Saudi move came just two days after US President Donald Trump spoke with the leaders of Saudi Arabia and Qatar in a bid to mediate. Trump said he believed the dispute could be solved "fairly easily". The Saudi and Qatari rulers spoke by phone on Saturday, raising hope for talks. But Riyadh later suspended the dialogue, accusing Doha of distorting facts by wrongly implying that Saudi Arabia had initiated the outreach. A United Arab Emirates minister late Saturday voiced support for the Saudi decision on Twitter, accusing Qatar of "wasting an opportunity" to resolve the crisis. "I hope that Doha will stop manoeuvring... and act transparently. There is no other way," state minister for foreign affairs Anwar Gargash said on his official Twitter account. Saudi Arabia led the UAE, Egypt and Bahrain in cutting ties with Qatar in June, accusing it of bankrolling extremist groups and of being too close to Riyadh's regional arch-rival Tehran. Doha denies the accusations. Qatar and Saudi Arabia are both key US allies. Doha hosts a major US air base, home to the headquarters of Centcom -- the regional command which leads operations against the Islamic State jihadist group. Qatar's emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamid al-Thani is set to meet German Chancellor Angela Merkel for talks on September 15, in what will be his first trip to a western capital since the crisis began.
By Malena Castaldi MONTEVIDEO (Reuters) - Uruguay's Vice President Raul Sendic resigned on Saturday amid accusations that he misused public funds while heading state oil company Ancap. He first made the announcement at a special meeting of the Frente Amplio (FA) governing party. "I presented to the plenary of the FA my irreversible resignation from the vice presidency. I also told President Tabare Vazquez," Sendic wrote in a tweet. The party's ethics committee has ruled that Sendic used his Ancap credit cards to buy personal items including books and furniture. He headed the oil company from 2008 to 2009 and 2010 to 2013. It was the first time a Uruguayan vice president has quit the job, but the scandal should have little effect on policy. For years Uruguay has mixed progressive social policy, such as legalizing marijuana, with market-friendly regulations that have allowed the country to become known as the "Switzerland of the South," thanks to the low taxes it puts on financial assets. Uruguay's constitution says Sendic should be replaced by the senator who received the most votes in the last elections. But that person is former President Jose "Pepe" Mujica, who by law could not assume the responsibilities of president should something happen to Vasquez. Next in line would be the Senator with the second biggest number of votes. That person is Mujica's wife Lucia Topolansky. (Writing by Hugh Bronstein; Editing by Cynthia Osterman and Alistair Bell)
Russian air strikes Sunday killed 34 civilians on ferries fleeing violence in Syria's eastern province of Deir Ezzor, where jihadists face separate assaults by US-backed forces and Russian-backed government troops, a monitor said. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor initially reported 21 deaths but later raised the toll to 34, saying that "more bodies have been found in the river" Euphrates. Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said nine children were among those killed fleeing fighting and that "dozens" of people were wounded in the strikes. He said the raids targeted "more than 40 ferries" that had left Al-Boulil town southeast of Deir Ezzor city for the eastern shore of the river. The Observatory relies on a network of sources inside Syria, and says it determines whose planes carry out raids according to type, location, flight patterns and munitions used. Moscow intervened in Syria in September 2015 in support of its ally President Bashar al-Assad. Sunday's reported raids came as Syrian troops with Russian air cover pressed an offensive against Islamic State group jihadists across Deir Ezzor province. On Saturday, government forces broke a nearly three-year jihadist siege of a Syrian airbase on the southern edges of Deir Ezzor city, the provincial capital. Assad's troops advanced further Sunday, capturing Mount Tharda west of the military airport from IS as well as another mountain overlooking the city, the Observatory said. IS holdouts were still entrenched in southern parts of the city, the monitor said. The army's advances in the oil-rich province come as US-backed forces press their own assault on IS in Deir Ezzor. - A strategic prize - The province borders Iraq and is a strategic prize for both the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) alliance and government troops. The SDF announced on Saturday it had begun clearing IS from areas east of the Euphrates, which cuts diagonally across the province. By Sunday, fighters from the SDF's Deir Ezzor Military Council (DEMC) had seized much of the province's northeast, the Observatory said. "They seized control of a hilltop seven kilometres (four miles) from the eastern banks of the Euphrates, across the river from Deir Ezzor city," Abdel Rahman said. He attributed the speedy gains to the fact that "eastern parts of Deir Ezzor are desert and not densely populated". The DEMC's advance is being backed by the US-led coalition battling IS in Iraq and Syria since 2014. The coalition, the SDF, Syria's government and Russia have agreed on a "de-confliction line" in northeastern Syria to prevent the two offensives from clashing. Regime forces were on Sunday also locked in fierce clashes with IS southwest of the city as they prepared a push into neighbourhoods still held by the jihadists, the Observatory said. According to the War Media channel operated by regime ally Hezbollah, Syrian troops seized full control of the 450-kilometre (280-mile) road linking the capital to Deir Ezzor for the first time in four years. "The Syrian army and its allies now control the entire international highway between Deir Ezzor and Damascus, through the cities of Al-Sukhna and Palmyra," it said, referring to other central Syrian cities recaptured from IS. "The international highway had been unusable in the area between Al-Sukhna and Deir Ezzor for four years." Since 2014, IS has held about 60 percent of the city and much of the surrounding province. Syria's conflict erupted in 2011 with protests demanding that Assad step down, but it has since evolved into a complex, multi-front war. More than 330,000 people have been killed and millions have fled their homes, but international attempts to reach a peace deal have faltered.
The wife of a Taiwanese rights activist being held in China arrived in the mainland Sunday on the eve of his trial in a case that has further soured cross-strait relations. Lee Ching-yu, wife of NGO worker Lee Ming-cheh who has been held incommunicado in China for more than 170 days, left for Shanghai around noon to connect to a flight to the central province of Hunan where her husband's trial will be held. "We landed and are on our way to our hotel in Yueyang city," Xiao Yimin, a Taiwanese legal activist accompanying Lee, told AFP. "As we understand, she will be allowed in court, but we don't know if the rest of us will be able to get in," said Xiao, who is general secretary of the Judicial Reform Foundation. Lee's trial is set to start Monday at a court in Hunan's Yueyang city, according to his wife. The activist's mother arrived in Yueyang Sunday evening. Both women were accompanied by several officials from Taiwan's semi-official Straits Exchange Foundation, which handles relations with the mainland. Lee went missing during a visit to the mainland in March and Chinese authorities later confirmed he was being investigated for suspected activities "endangering national security". Lee Ching-yu made no comment at the airport but has pleaded for Taiwanese people to understand if her husband is "forced to confess" in court. "I go to (China) not to provoke or argue. I hope to see the arrival of justice and let Lee Ming-cheh return to Taiwan safe and soon," she told reporters before leaving on Saturday. She attempted to fly to Beijing in April to "rescue" her husband but Chinese authorities at that time revoked her travel permit. Xiao told AFP that Lee was unavailable to speak with media Sunday night. Their supporters shared a video on social media Sunday saying it showed workers setting up roadblocks outside the Yueyang courtroom. - 'No evidence of wrongdoing' - Beijing has repeatedly ignored Taipei's requests for information on Lee's whereabouts and details of the allegations against him. Relations between the two sides have worsened since Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen took office in May last year. Since then Beijing has cut off all official communications with Taipei. China sees self-ruled Taiwan as part of its territory waiting to be reunified. It wants Tsai to acknowledge the island is part of "One China", which she has refused to do. Lee has long supported civil society organisations and activists in China, according to Amnesty International. He had shared "Taiwan's democratic experiences" with his Chinese friends online for many years and often mailed books to them, said the Taiwan Association for Human Rights. "We urge the Chinese authorities to allow Lee's wife to attend the trial tomorrow," Amnesty International China researcher Patrick Poon told AFP. "Lee hasn't been given any access to his family and a lawyer of his choice since he was detained in March. Such practice does not meet international standards on fair trial," Poon added. Sophie Richardson, China director of Human Rights Watch, told AFP that Beijing had provided "no evidence of actual wrongdoing" in Lee's case. "The charges should be dropped immediately and he should be allowed to return home," Richardson said.
2017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #36

Posted on 10 September 2017 by John Hartz

Article of the Week... Editorial of the Week... Toon of the Week... Graphics of the Week... SkS in the News... Video of the Week... Coming Soon on SkS... Poster of the Week... SkS Week in Review... 97 Hours of Consensus...

Article of the Week...

Irma and Harvey lay the costs of climate change denial at Trumps door

The presidents dismissal of scientific research is doing nothing to protect the livelihoods of ordinary Americans

Hurricanes Irma (left) and Jose move across the Atlantic Ocean. Photograph: NOAA/Reuters

As the US comes to terms with its second major weather disaster within a month, an important question is whether the devastation caused by hurricanes Harveyand Irma will convince Donald Trump and his administration of the reality of climate change.

The presidents luxurious Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida may escape Irmas wrath, but with the deaths of so many Americans, and billions of dollars in damage to homes and businesses, the costs of climate change denial are beginning to pile up at the door of the White House.

Just days before Harvey formed in the Atlantic last month, Trump signed an executive order to overturn a policy, introduced by his predecessor Barack Obama, to help American communities and businesses become more resilient against the risks of flooding, which are rising because of climate change.

But the merciless assault on the US mainland by Harvey and Irma should be forcing the president to recognise the consequences of his arrogance and complacency in dismissing the research and analysis carried out by scientists.

The flooded streets of Houston and the wind-ravaged homes of south Florida bear the unmistakable fingerprint of extreme weather made worse by manmade greenhouse gas emissions.

Irma and Harvey lay the costs of climate change denial at Trumps door by Bob Ward, The Observer/Guardian, Sep 9, 2017

Editorial of the Week...

President Trumps War on Science

The news was hard to digest until one realized it was part of a much larger and increasingly disturbing pattern in the Trump administration. On Aug. 18, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine received an order from the Interior Department that it stop work on what seemed a useful and overdue study of the health risks of mountaintop-removal coal mining.

The $1 million study had been requested by two West Virginia health agencies following multiple studies suggesting increased rates of birth defects, cancer and other health problems among people living near big surface coal-mining operations in Appalachia. The order to shut it down came just hours before the scientists were scheduled to meet with affected residents of Kentucky.

The Interior Department said the project was put on hold as a result of an agencywide budgetary review of grants and projects costing more than $100,000.

President Trumps War on Science, Editorial Board Opinion, New York Times, Sep 9, 2017

Toon of the Week...

Graphics of the Week...

Hurricanes and Climate Change: What We Know

Climate change intersects with hurricanes by increasing storm rainfall, intensity, and surge.

A warming atmosphere causes more evaporation, meaning more water is available for precipitation. For every 1F increase in temperature, the atmosphere can hold around 4 percent more water vapor, which leads to heavier rain and increases the risk of flooding of rivers and streams. We saw the impact of extreme rainfall during Harvey. Though no research has yet been done to attribute the staggering rainfall totals from this storm to climate change, the downpours are very much in line with heavy precipitation trends.

Warm water provides the fuel for hurricanes. Climate change has heated up ocean waters around the world by 1-3F over the past century, including in regions where hurricanes develop. That allows hurricanes to grow stronger, potentially increasing their maximum wind speed. One study indicates that hurricanes are intensifying more quickly than 30 years ago. Of course, there are other factors that can limit how powerful a hurricane becomes, such as how the wind changes directions and speed upward through the atmosphere.

Warming oceans and melting land ice have also caused about seven inches of global sea level rise over the past century. This gives storm surge the coastal flooding that hits suddenly before landfall  a springboard to send floodwaters higher and push further inland than they used to. That in turn can cause more damage to infrastructure and puts additional lives at risk.

There has already been an increase in frequency and intensity of the strongest hurricanes in the Atlantic since the satellite era began. Looking forward, hurricanes are projected to produce more rain. The strongest storms are also expected to become more common. However, the overall frequency of hurricanes is projected to be nearly the same, or perhaps even decrease.

Hurricanes and Climate Change: What We Know, Climate Central Sep 8, 2017

SkS in the News...

In his Miami Herald opinion piece, President Trump, hurricanes Harvey and Irma are sending you a message, Andres Oppenheimer states...

But 97 percent of climate scientists agree that global warming is being caused by man-made toxic gases, according to a 2013 scientific paper that examined 11,944 climate abstracts. That paper drives climate skeptics mad, but virtually all studies show that there is a near total consensus around man-made climate change among scientists, and that climate deniers are in most cases pseudo-scientists or conservative radio charlatans.

A. Siegel begins his blog* post article, For @NASA, @RealDonaldTrump proposes #climate #science denier with...

In another Friday dump, Team Trumps choice for NASA:Representative Rep. Jim Bridenstine (R-OK), a true climate zombie. Here is material from his statement that called on President Obama to cut climate science funding to move it to weather research. global temperatures stopped rising 10 years ago. False. This is such classic twisted denial that Skeptical Science created the escalator gif to provide context. Okay, Im lazy. Ill stick with Skeptical Science and climate science denial by the numbers.

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Climate Change Explained

Climate Change Explained. The Daily Conversation Dec 2, 2015

A straightforward explanation of Climate Change: the heat from human emissions is roughly equal to exploding 400,000 Hiroshima atomic bombs every day. Historically, every time carbon dioxide levels increase in Earth's atmosphere, the average surface temperature increases, ice melts, and the seas rise.

Subscribe to TDC: https://www.youtube.com/TheDailyConve...

The New York Times article: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/20...

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New research, August 28 - September 3, 2017 (Ari)

(Ari) Trump promised to hire the best people. He keeps hiring the worst (Dana)

(Dana) Video: the Path Post-Paris (Peter Sinclair)

(Peter Sinclair) Guest Post (John Abraham)

(John Abraham) New research, September 4 - 10, 2017 (Ari)

(Ari) 2017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #37 (John Hartz

(John Hartz 2017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Waming Digest #37 (John Hartz)

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Miamis cranes, the towering symbols of South Florida growth, are collapsing.

The city dodged a bullet when Irma tilted toward Floridas southwest coast, but even 125 miles from the eye of the storm, the surge from Biscayne Bay turned Brickell streets into rivers. Gusts of nearly 100 miles per hour whipped palm trees back and forth like reeds.

VERO REPORT: Current scene in downtown Miami as #HurricaneIrma rages pic.twitter.com/ZH0kR8rtnR  Josh Caplan (@joshdcaplan) September 10, 2017

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Sunday morning, a crane atop a 25-story downtown rental building called Vice came apart in the wind. The boom is hanging off the tower by a cable; the counterweight has fallen at least a story through the buildings interior.

Later in the afternoon, another crane collapsed, this one two miles north on top of the Gran Paraiso, a luxury condo building under construction in Edgewater. Video showed the boom dangling next to the mast. No one has been injured.

The citys two-dozen construction cranes were a known hazard. On Tuesday, the deputy director of Miamis Building Department Maurice Pons warned residents not to stay in buildings next to construction sites with cranes during the storm.

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Why isnt taking down construction cranes part of Miami hurricane prep? There just wasnt enough time: Streets have to be closed, another crane has to be brought in, the city manager told a local radio station. That can take five to six days per crane, and in a booming city like Miami, cranes need to be reserved in advance. The prospect of doubling the citys crane count to disassemble all the construction sites just wasnt realistic.

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So they focused on minimizing the damage instead. These tower cranes are designed to withstand winds up to 145 miles per hour, Pons said in his statement. Building cranes booms are usually fixed at 67-degree angles before a storm but left to rotate in the wind like a weather vane.

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Clearly, though, some were not designed for that kind of wind. One reason why? In 2008, Miami-Dade passed a law to require construction cranes in the county to withstand 145-mile winds. It was overturned by federal appeals court after a challenge from the construction industry, which argued that crane regulation was a workplace issue and not a matter of public safety.

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Miami isnt the only city wrestling with crane regulation. When Superstorm Sandy hit New York, high winds left a 26,000-pound boom dangling from the top of a 74-story building whose penthouse sold for $95 million. The building engineer later told the New York Times he thought the boom had an 80 percent chance of falling onto the busy street below, and the blocks around the site were under evacuation for several days.

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Four years later, a crawler crane (mounted from a truck, not on top of a building) collapsed in New York during a blizzard, killing a 38-year-old man. The city reacted with strict new rules that the construction industry said were onerous and would grind work to a halt, driving up construction costs (and by extension, housing costs).

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Miamis downtown residential boom is one of the few real urban revival stories in the U.S. Nearly all that growth has occurred since Hurricane Andrew in 1992; there are some signs that, despite post-Andrew revisions to the states building code, Miamis high-rise architecture wasnt quite ready for a storm like this.

Six foot glass panels falling from the Panorama - tallest building in Miami - extremely dangerous #irma pic.twitter.com/wRkIneqLql  Bryan Llenas (@BryanLlenas) September 10, 2017

And yet. Those cranes may be symbols of the folly of human settlement in South Florida, but they represent a very anomalous piece of the city. And one that is, all told, a slightly more sustainable proposition for life in the flood zone than the barely reclaimed swampland that constitutes much of South Floridas urban development.
On Monday, two plucky Senate Republicans are set to embark on one final madcap effort to repeal and replace Obamacare. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Bill Cassidy of Louisiana have promised to introduce a piece of practical, compromise legislation that will simply let states decide whether to keep the Affordable Care Act or ditch it for something they prefer.

It would leave in place taxes on the wealthy, taking that money and giving it back to governors to come up with better health care, Graham has told CNN. If you like Obamacare, you can keep it. If you want to replace it, you can.

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This modest pitch is wildly misleading. Graham and Cassidy have been shopping versions of their bill for months now, and submitted a detailed version as an amendment in July. As it stands, the legislation would make it virtually impossible for dozens of states to continue operating Obamacare as we know it without kicking in unrealistic amounts of their own money. Thats because, in the short term, the law is designed to penalize states that embraced the ACA while rewarding those that resisted it. Further down the line, the legislation simply zeroes out all of Obamacares spending, a de facto repeal of the entire program that doesnt include a replacement. As policy, its a bit like walking into somebodys house, lighting the whole ground floor on fire, then telling them, Hey, you can keep living hereif you like it.

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In its early years, Graham-Cassidy is about robbing Peter to pay Paulor, to be more precise, raiding Californias health-care budget in order to temporarily lavish some extra dough on North Dakota. The bill would take all of the money Washington currently spends on Obamacares Medicaid expansion and premium subsidies, then distribute it to states in the form of block grants that, in theory, lawmakers in Albany or Topeka could use to fund whatever health care system they desired. Meanwhile, it leaves in place some of Obamacares consumer protections for patients with pre-existing conditions.

Sounds reasonable? Theres a catch. Instead of determining each states block grant based on how much money it receives under Obamacare today, the bill would doll out funding based on a baroque formula that favors poorer, older, sparsely populated parts of the country. As a result, it shifts spending from large states that expanded Medicaid, like California and New York, to small states that did not, like Mississippi and Alabama. There are some exceptions to this rule. For instance, nonexpansion states like North Carolina and Florida could see their health-care funding slashed, since lots of their residents get premium subsidies through the ACAs exchanges today. Nevada, which did take up the expansion, could see a slight funding bump. But, as a whole, the bill starts off as a giant slap at states that committed the sin of trying to get more of their residents insured through Obamacare.

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It gets worse. Graham-Cassidy schedules its block grants to grow slower than the cost of health care or insurance, thus eroding their value over time. According to the progressive Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, the system would would lead to a 34 percent spending cut by 2026. Nine statesCalifornia, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, and Virginiawould see their federal health-care funding cut in half under the block grant system, compared to what they would have received from Obamacares Medicaid expansion and subsidy spending. Keeping the ACA in place would require spending vastly more of their own state revenue, which would be prohibitively expensive.

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And what about the winners under the block grant setup? Many of them turn out to be losers, too. Thats because, like previous Republican House and Senate health-care bills, Graham-Cassidy would impose a per-capita cap on traditional Medicaid, designed to throttle its spending over time. By 2026, just eight states would end up with more overall health care funding than under current lawand many of them would probably be better off if lawmakers just swallowed their irrational animosity toward the ACA and expanded Medicaid.

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But the real kicker comes after 2026. At that point, the block grant simply disappears, leaving states to fund whatever insurance scheme theyve set up without federal assistance. As CBPPs Edwin Park noted to me, this is even more draconian than what Republicans dreamed up in the previous House and Senate bills, both of which would have left in place subsidies that Americans could use to buy insurance. Looking past 2026, both the House and Senate had their grossly inadequate tax credits, but they were permanent. Here, all funding for expanded coverage, the marketplace subsidies and Medicaid expansion, disappears, Park said.

So far, nobody seems to be taking Graham and Cassidy too seriously, mostly because time is working against them. While Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has dangled the possibility of a vote, few seem to think the pair can move their bill before the end of the month, when the legislative vehicle Republicans are counting on to pass repeal with a bare majority expires.I dont think theres much of a chance, Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah, the Senate Finance Committee chairman, told Politco. Plenty of other Republicans apparently agree. President Trump, meanwhile, has not-so-subtly nudged everybody to move on.

Even so, this bill should make Obamacares supporters nervous, at the very least. It doesnt merely shuffle Obamacares funding around, but rather chokes it off entirely over the course of a decade. Graham and Cassidy may be attempting the legislative equivalent of a half-court buzzer beater. But were in big trouble if they just happen to sink it.
Mugshots.com Writing Staff. Houston, TX - Asterio Maldonado-Nunez has been exonerated of Child Sex Abuse. He was convicted in 2013 and sentenced to ten years in prison.

In May 2012, Houston police were called to investigate a report that a six-year old girl, identified as J.L., had been sexually molested. The report was prompted after the mother of another girl told J.L.s mother that the pair were at a neighbors residence known as the candy man because he sold snacks from his apartment.

J.L.s mother was told that the candy mans son, Maldonado-Nunez, was swinging her around in circles and he started kissing her on the cheeks and then he set her between his legs. During the course of the investigation, police went to J.L.s house and woke her.

J.L. reportedly told police that Maldonado-Nunez held her tightly, reached inside of her panties, touched her butt and anus, and inserted his index and middle fingers in her vagina. She allegedly said that her middle part still hurt.

A nurse conducted a physical examination of J.L. and other girls who were present at the candy mans apartment, but no evidence of sexual abuse was discovered. J.L. gave several different and conflicting accounts of what occurred. Nevertheless, he Maldonado-Nunez was arrested on a charge of indecency with a child.

At trial, she again gave widely conflicting accounts, ranging from he never touched her to he only touched her anus. Other girls from the neighborhood testified that they observed Maldonado-Nunez touching J.L. A sexual assault nurse testified at trial that she found no evidence of sexual abuse.

Maldonado-Nunez did not take the stand, and his lawyer presented no defense. The jury found him guilty, and he was sentenced to ten years in prison.

In 2016, his new attorney filed a state law petition for a writ of habeas corpus on grounds of an inadequate legal defense. Evidence emerged that many of the things to which various witnesses testified to at trial couldnt have taken place because they were physically impossible. For example, one girl claimed to see Maldonado-Nunez molest the victim through a window, but the window contained window coverings that made it impossible to see inside. His defense lawyer at trial failed to introduce evidence that he was at work on the day of the alleged sexual assault.

After a hearing, the judge concluded that his defense was constitutionally deficient, denying him a fair trial. On March 2017, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals granted the writ and vacated his conviction. Subsequently, the Harris County District Attorneys office dismissed the charge against him.
In todays market, geographic boundaries dont always mean much. With the web, companies sell and hire across time zones and continents. But if youre expanding into a new state, youve got to make sure you have your legal ducks in a row. In some cases, this may entail registering your business as a foreign corporation in the new state.

If your business operates across state boundaries, or youre considering expanding your reach, read on to learn if a foreign qualification is necessary.

Whats the definition of doing business in another state?

Be aware that just having a client or selling to customers in another state doesnt necessarily mean youre operating in that state and must register as a foreign corporation (or LLC). While exact requirements vary state to state, operating in a state generally means:

Having a bank account in the state

Selling in the state through some party directly tied to your business (a distributor or sales rep)

Owning property in the state

Having offices, facilities, or holding regular meetings in the state

Lets take a look at a few examples. Michael runs a small consulting business based in New York. His company serves clients outside New York, but at this point the company is most likely not considered to be operating out of state. However, once Michael opens a small office with an employee or two in California, he will probably be considered doing business in California and will have to file a Statement and Designation by Foreign Corporation form with California.

In another scenario, Jennifer launched a software business. She lives in California, but wanted to take advantage of Nevadas lack of state income tax, so she incorporated her business in Nevada. Since her business is physically located in California ? thats where her office and employees reside ? her business needs to file as a foreign corporation in California (and, her company will also be subject to all the regulatory and tax requirements of California too!)

Whats required to file a foreign corporation?

Foreign Corporation paperwork is relatively similar for each state, although the names may differ. In some states, its called the Statement and Designation; in others its the Foreign Qualification application. Take a look at your states Forms and Fees page (generally part of the Secretary of States office) to determine whats the correct form for your new state.

In essence, the foreign corporation paperwork will resemble the Articles of Incorporation document you first used to file your corporation. Some of the information will include: name of your corporation, your domestic state, stock information (how many shares authorized, etc), list of corporate officers, registered agent, and the principle office or location youll be using in your new state.

In most states, youll also be required to have a Certificate of Good Standing document. This document is produced by your domestic state (the state where you incorporated) and shows that your corporation is in active status. If your corporation does not currently have an active status, its most likely due to the fact that you didnt file an Annual Report or some other required filing and can be easily remedied by filing a form and paying a fee.

How to file a foreign qualification

Just like other corporate filings, you have several options depending on your budget, available time, and level of comfort when dealing with legal forms. You can register your foreign corporation on your own, by going directly to the secretary of states office. If you arent certain about the requirements (and have the budget), you can hire a corporate attorney to register your foreign corporation for you. The third option is to use a legal document filing service. This is a good option is youre fairly confident about what you need, would prefer to spend your cash on something other than attorney retainer fees, but would like some professional help in tracking down all the necessary paperwork and making sure all the is are dotted and ts are crossed.

Whatever method you choose, be sure to take your legal obligations seriously when crossing state borders. Filing upfront will be simpler and far more affordable than having to deal with the ramifications of operating improperly.



United States Photo via Shutterstock





CorpNet offers business formations, filings, state tax registrations, and corporate compliance services in all 50 states. Express and 24 hour rush filing services available upon request. Click here to learn more.
The Square Kilometre Array (SKA) has been branded as one of the biggest scientific projects to date and spans not only country borders but also continents. Although the SKAs primary aim is to address many of the questions around our universe, the spin-offs of this project will touch people from all research disciplines as well as communities around the SKA sites.

One of the spin-offs is expanded human and infrastructure capacity in terms of High Performance Computing (HPC) in other African countries. The South African Centre for High Performance Computing (CHPC) is involved in a programme named the HPC Ecosystems Project. The Ecosystems Project focuses on the distribution of decommissioned HPC equipment to be used as mid-tier systems at various sites across Africa. This is followed with training of the system administrators to run the equipment.

Over the past few years the CHPC has been working with countries in Africa to:

develop an African Framework on HPC that has been adopted by the SADC Ministerial Committee on Science and Technology;

facilitate access for African researchers and students to HPC training programmes in South Africa;

providing access to HPC facilities for researchers on the continent; and

through the partnership with the Texas Advanced Computing Center and the University of Cambridge, parts of the HPC systems have been provided to African sites to develop computing capabilities.

The first country to host a Software Carpentry workshop in conjunction with the deployment of the donated HPC infrastructure is Mauritius. The event was sponsored by the CHPC, Talarify, and the University of Mauritius.

From 19 - 21 July this year, we ran a Software Carpentry workshop to potential users of the new, and first HPC system, at the University of Mauritius. Participants hailed from disciplines such as Bioinformatics, Computational Chemistry, Mathematics, Life Sciences, Engineering, Business, Medicine, and more. A total of 27 participants, mostly postgraduate students and faculty from the University of Mauritius, learned about the Linux Shell, Python, and version control with git and Github. The feedback in general was good (90% of the participants said they will recommend this workshop to colleagues) and several people indicated that they would be interested to become instructors. 50% of participants were females.

Mauritius is a fascinating country with total area around 2,040 km2 and a population of around 1,348,242. Over the past few years it has evolved from mostly an agricultural community to a knowledge economy with information and communication technology, seafood, hospitality and property development, healthcare, renewable energy, and education and training fast becoming large drivers of the economy. People mostly speak English and French with the local language, Creole also in the mix. The country has six universities and many other educational institutions.

It was a great opportunity to work with our host, Roshan Halkhoree (Director, Centre for Information Technology and Systems) and colleagues from the University of Mauritius and we look forward to future collaborations around data and computational capacity building.
Suncor Energy Inc. operates as an integrated energy company. The company primarily focuses on developing petroleum resource basins in Canada's Athabasca oil sands; explores, acquires, develops, produces, transports, refines, and markets crude oil in Canada and internationally; markets petroleum and petrochemical products under the Petro-Canada name primarily in Canada. It operates through Oil Sands; Exploration and Production; Refining and Marketing; and Corporate and Eliminations segments. The Oil Sands segment recovers bitumen from mining and in situ operations, and upgrades it into refinery feedstock and diesel fuel, or blends the bitumen with diluent for direct sale to market. The Exploration and Production segment is involved in offshore operations off the east coast of Canada and in the North Sea; and operating onshore assets in Libya and Syria. The Refining and Marketing segment refines crude oil and intermediate feedstock into various petroleum and petrochemical products; and markets refined petroleum products to retail, commercial, and industrial customers through its other retail sellers. The Corporate and Eliminations segment operates four wind farms in Ontario and Western Canada. The company also markets and trades in crude oil, natural gas, byproducts, refined products, and power. The company was formerly known as Suncor Inc. and changed its name to Suncor Energy Inc. in April 1997. Suncor Energy Inc. was founded in 1917 and is headquartered in Calgary, Canada.
A rural New Boston man is dead after a vehicle crash near Mannon, Illinois, the Mercer County Sheriffs Department said.

Jesse H. Bullock, 37, of rural New Boston was killed Thursday when his vehicle went off the roadway and crashed. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

Bullocks death marks one more tragedy for the mans family.

Bullock was the father of two sons who drowned while swimming in the Edwards River in July of 2013.

Jesse Bullock, 12, and Nicholas Nic Bullock, 9, were swimming with their younger brother Thomas and a cousin, Jamie Vermast, in the Edwards River when the current became too strong for the boys.

Jaimie was able to save Thomas, but could not get to Jesse and Nic.

Visitation for Bullock is noon until 2 p.m. Wednesday at First Christian Church, Keithsburg. Funeral services will be held after the visitation. Burial with military rites will be in Mannon Cemetery.

Dennison Funeral Home, Aledo, is in charge of arrangements.
Royal Bank of Canada operates as a diversified financial service company worldwide. The company's Personal & Commercial Banking segment offers checking and savings accounts, home equity financing, personal lending, private banking, indirect lending, including auto financing, mutual funds and self-directed brokerage accounts, guaranteed investment certificates, credit cards, and payment products and solutions; and lending, leasing, deposit, investment, foreign exchange, cash management, auto dealer financing, trade products, and services to small and medium-sized commercial businesses. This segment offers financial products and services through branches, automated teller machines, and mobile sales network. Its Wealth Management segment provides a suite of advice-based solutions and strategies to high net worth and ultra-high net worth individuals, and institutional clients. The company's Insurance segment offers life, health, home, auto, travel, wealth, annuities, and reinsurance advice and solutions; and business insurance services to individual, business, and group clients through its advice centers, RBC insurance stores, and mobile advisors; digital, mobile, and social platforms; independent brokers; and travel partners. Its Investor & Treasury Services segment provides asset servicing, custody, payments, and treasury services to financial and other investors; and fund and investment administration, shareholder, private capital, performance measurement and compliance monitoring, distribution, transaction banking, cash and liquidity management, foreign exchange, and global securities finance services. The company's Capital Markets segment offers corporate and investment banking, as well as equity and debt origination, distribution, advisory services, sale, and trading services for corporations, institutional investors, asset managers, private equity firms, and governments. The company was founded in 1864 and is headquartered in Toronto, Canada.
Les blattes ou cafards (Blatta orientalis) sont des insectes qui appartiennent a la famille des Blattoptera. Ils se caracterisent par leur forme allongee, leurs ailes []
By John O'Donnell FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Europe's regulators are competing to hire risk specialists to prepare for an influx of banks escaping Brexit, nudging up salaries and stretching staff budgets. Wall Street giants Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and Morgan Stanley, which have big operations in London, intend to expand in the European Union after Britain's departure. Germany's financial regulator, Bafin, and the French and Irish central banks intend to hire dozens of new recruits in the coming year, according to officials. The European Central Bank, which has overall responsibility for supervising banks, is also seeking new staff. But filling such positions is difficult, partly because risk specialists are in hot demand and budgets of public institutions are limited. "We are seeing a lot more competition in hiring people for risk, in both the public sector and the private sector," said Nigel David, a head-hunter at Charles Levick in London. "You are seeing salaries shoot up." Ireland's central bank said late last year it had set a target of boosting staff numbers this year by almost 10 percent, or 170 people, in part to cope with Brexit. By May, the numbers were broadly unchanged at about 1,600 employees. A central bank spokeswoman declined to say why it had not hired more staff. But Philip Lane, its governor, spoke of the challenge of hiring in a newspaper interview in July. "Any regulator in a major financial center, I'm sure the Bank of England or the New York Fed have similar challenges, there is always going to be the issue of how to compete with the other opportunities," he said. The majority of its employees earn between 25,000 euros and 75,000 euros ($90,400). Starting salaries for risk managers at an investment bank are around $52,600. Ireland's problem has been exacerbated by pay restrictions and extra taxes on civil servants, imposed by the government as it seeks to recover from a financial collapse. The central bank recently approved the creation of 26 new posts to deal with the "increased workload post the Brexit referendum". MATHS, PHYSICS DEGREES With the clock ticking to Britain's EU departure by April 2019, banks are already beginning to migrate from London. The shift will give Europe's regulators a greater say over global finance after Brexit even though they are still dealing with the regulatory fallout from the last financial crash. Regulators in Paris wants to hire 50 additional people, while Germany's Bafin is examining new staff as part of budget negotiations for 2018 now taking place, people familiar with the matter said. But like Dublin, they may find that their hiring pot is not big enough. A survey of risk experts by recruiter Barclay Simpson found that salaries for European market risk specialists at an investment bank began at 40,000 pounds ($52,600) for graduates and climbed above 400,000 pounds for top managers. By comparison, Daniele Nouy, the ECB's top regulator, earned just 278,000 euros ($335,300) last year. The typical candidate for a risk management job would have a degree in maths or physics to help spot the risk of, for example, a mortgage default, one headhunter said. They might also have experience of working in a retail bank. "Risk is a very competitive market," said Liam O'Mahoney, of head-hunter Eames Consulting in London. "It's going to be very difficult for a central bank to attract people." The ECB, which has an annual budget for policing banks of more than 400 million euros, may be one of the few institutions able to keep pace. It is seeking to hire contractor risk specialists at daily rates of 1,000 euros - plus expenses, people familiar with the program said. A spokeswoman for the ECB declined to comment. For others, such as Germany's Bafin, where salaries range between 35,000 euros and 80,000 euros, the hope is that the appeal of a secure job in a predictable civil service will appeal. "It's international," said one employee. "The work is interesting. And unlike the private sector, people here work 41 hours a week." (Editing by Anna Willard)
By John O'Donnell FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Europe's regulators are competing to hire risk specialists to prepare for an influx of banks escaping Brexit, nudging up salaries and stretching staff budgets. Wall Street giants Goldman Sachs , Citigroup and Morgan Stanley , which have big operations in London, intend to expand in the European Union after Britain's departure. Germany's financial regulator, Bafin, and the French and Irish central banks intend to hire dozens of new recruits in the coming year, according to officials. The European Central Bank, which has overall responsibility for supervising banks, is also seeking new staff. But filling such positions is difficult, partly because risk specialists are in hot demand and budgets of public institutions are limited. "We are seeing a lot more competition in hiring people for risk, in both the public sector and the private sector," said Nigel David, a head-hunter at Charles Levick in London. "You are seeing salaries shoot up." Ireland's central bank said late last year it had set a target of boosting staff numbers this year by almost 10 percent, or 170 people, in part to cope with Brexit. By May, the numbers were broadly unchanged at about 1,600 employees. A central bank spokeswoman declined to say why it had not hired more staff. But Philip Lane, its governor, spoke of the challenge of hiring in a newspaper interview in July. "Any regulator in a major financial centre, I'm sure the Bank of England or the New York Fed have similar challenges, there is always going to be the issue of how to compete with the other opportunities," he said. The majority of its employees earn between 25,000 euros and 75,000 euros ($90,400). Starting salaries for risk managers at an investment bank are around $52,600. Ireland's problem has been exacerbated by pay restrictions and extra taxes on civil servants, imposed by the government as it seeks to recover from a financial collapse. The central bank recently approved the creation of 26 new posts to deal with the "increased workload post the Brexit referendum". MATHS, PHYSICS DEGREES With the clock ticking to Britain's EU departure by April 2019, banks are already beginning to migrate from London. The shift will give Europe's regulators a greater say over global finance after Brexit even though they are still dealing with the regulatory fallout from the last financial crash. Regulators in Paris wants to hire 50 additional people, while Germany's Bafin is examining new staff as part of budget negotiations for 2018 now taking place, people familiar with the matter said. But like Dublin, they may find that their hiring pot is not big enough. A survey of risk experts by recruiter Barclay Simpson found that salaries for European market risk specialists at an investment bank began at 40,000 pounds ($52,600) for graduates and climbed above 400,000 pounds for top managers. By comparison, Daniele Nouy, the ECB's top regulator, earned just 278,000 euros ($335,300) last year. The typical candidate for a risk management job would have a degree in maths or physics to help spot the risk of, for example, a mortgage default, one headhunter said. They might also have experience of working in a retail bank. "Risk is a very competitive market," said Liam O'Mahoney, of head-hunter Eames Consulting in London. "It's going to be very difficult for a central bank to attract people." The ECB, which has an annual budget for policing banks of more than 400 million euros, may be one of the few institutions able to keep pace. It is seeking to hire contractor risk specialists at daily rates of 1,000 euros - plus expenses, people familiar with the programme said. A spokeswoman for the ECB declined to comment. For others, such as Germany's Bafin, where salaries range between 35,000 euros and 80,000 euros, the hope is that the appeal of a secure job in a predictable civil service will appeal. "It's international," said one employee. "The work is interesting. And unlike the private sector, people here work 41 hours a week." ($1 = 0.8292 euros) (Editing by Anna Willard)
By Sergei Karazy and Margaryta Chornokondratenko SHEHYNI, Ukraine (Reuters) - Former Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili and a crowd of supporters barged past guards to enter Ukraine from the Polish border on Sunday after a prolonged standoff between Saakashvili and the Ukrainian authorities. Amid shouts of "victory" and "glory to Ukraine", Saakashvili returned to Ukraine despite being stripped of Ukrainian citizenship by his one-time ally, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, and facing possible arrest and deportation. Poroshenko invited Saakashvili to be a regional governor to help drive reforms after protests in 2014 ousted a pro-Russian president in Kiev. But Saakashvili quit as governor of Odessa in November, accusing Poroshenko of abetting corruption. Thousands of Saakashvili's supporters gathered on the border on Sunday while prominent lawmakers, including former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, travelled with him from Poland. Saakashvili had tried to cross the border by train but the train did not leave its station in the Polish town of Przemysl. The woman in charge of the Ukrainian train said she had been ordered by the authorities - she declined to specify whether Polish or Ukrainian - to stop the train leaving until Saakashvili got off. He then travelled by bus to the border and was stopped by guards who sealed off the area, causing a tailback of vehicles. Supporters pushed their way through and escorted him across. "I came with my Ukrainian passport, I wanted to show my passport and make a statement," a triumphant Saakashvili told supporters after crossing. "Instead, the authorities arranged this circus." Poroshenko's spokesman did not respond to a request for comment. "The crowd broke through the Shehyni checkpoint," Oleh Slobodyan, a spokesman for the Ukrainian border service, wrote on Facebook. "The fight started. It's hard to predict the consequences of this situation." A statement by the border service said several police and border guards were injured during the clash and said a group of people, whom it did not name, had crossed the border illegally. Saakashvili took power in Georgia after a peaceful pro-Western uprising, known as the Rose Revolution, in 2003. The 49-year-old is now wanted on criminal charges in Georgia, which he says were trumped up for political reasons. Loathed by the Kremlin, Saakashvili was once a natural ally for Poroshenko after Moscow annexed Ukraine's Crimea region in 2014. But he has become one of the Ukrainian president's most vocal critics, casting doubt on the Western-backed authorities' commitment to tackle entrenched corruption. Saakashvili has accused the Ukrainian authorities of using pressure tactics to deter him from returning to Kiev, where he has launched a campaign to unseat Poroshenko. Speaking to reporters earlier in the Polish city of Rzeszow, Saakashvili said Poroshenko viewed him as an "existential threat". "It looks like he is getting rid of a political opponent and no matter how many times he says that I am not a danger to him, every action of his shows exactly the opposite, that he regards me as a great and immediate danger," he said. (Additional reporting by Pavel Polityuk in Kiev and Marcin Goettig in Warsaw; writing by Matthias Williams; Editing by Gareth Jones)
By Raya Jalabi and Ulf Laessing SOUTH OF MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters) - Iraqi authorities are holding 1,400 foreign wives and children of suspected Islamic State fighters after government forces expelled the jihadist group from one of its last remaining strongholds in Iraq, security and aid officials said. Most came from Turkey. Many others were from former Soviet states, such as Tajikistan, Azerbaijan and Russia, Iraqi army and intelligence officers said. Other Asians and a "very few" French and Germans were also among them. The wives and children are being held at an Iraqi camp south of Mosul. Most had arrived since Aug. 30, when Iraqi troops drove Islamic State out of Mosul. One intelligence officer said that they were still in verifying their nationalities with their home countries, since many of the women no longer had their original documents. It is the largest group of foreigners linked to Islamic State to be held by Iraqi forces since they began driving the militants from Mosul and other areas in northern Iraq last year, an aid official said. Thousands of foreigners have been fighting for Islamic State, or Daesh, in Iraq and Syria. "We are holding the Daesh families under tight security measures and waiting for government orders on how to deal with them," said Army Colonel Ahmed al-Taie from Mosul's Nineveh operation command. "We treat them well. They are families of tough criminals who killed innocents in cold blood, but when we interrogated them we discovered that almost all of them were mislead by a vicious Daesh propaganda," he said. Reuters reporters saw hundreds of the women and children sitting on mattresses crawling with bugs in tents without air-conditioning in what aid workers called a "militarized site". Turkish, French and Russian were among the languages spoken. "I want to go back (to France) but don't know how," said a French-speaking veiled woman of Chechen origin who said she had lived in Paris before. She said she did not know what had happened to her husband, who had brought her to Iraq when he joined Islamic State. A security officer said the women and children had mostly surrendered to the Kurdish peshmerga near the northern city of Tal Afar, along with their husbands. The Kurds handed the women and children over to Iraqi forces but kept the men - all presumed to be fighters - in their custody. Many of the families had fled to Tal Afar after Iraqi troops pushed Islamic State out of Mosul. Iraqi forces retook Tal Afar, a city of predominantly ethnic Turkmen that produced some of Islamic State's senior commanders, last month. Most of its pre-war population of 200,000 have fled. An interior ministry official said Iraq wanted to negotiate with embassies the return of the women and children. "We can't keep this number in our custody for a long time," he said. Officials had counted so far at least 13 nationalities, said Army Lieutenant Colonel Salah Kareem. TENSION Aid workers and the authorities are worried about tensions between Iraqis, who lost their homes and are also living in the camp, and the new arrivals. Many Iraqis want revenge for the harsh treatment they received under the extremists' interpretation of Sunni Islam, which they imposed in Mosul and the other areas they seized in 2014. "The families are being kept to one side (of the camp) for their own safety," an Iraqi military intelligence officer said. The Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), which is supporting the 541 women and their children, said Iraq "must swiftly move to clarify its future plans for these individuals". "Like all those fleeing conflict, it is imperative that these individuals are able to access protection, assistance, and information," NRC said in a statement. "They are in de-facto detention." Western officials are worried about radicalized fighters and their relatives coming home after the collapse of Islamic State's "caliphate". French officials have indicated a preference for citizens found to be affiliated with IS to be prosecuted in Iraq. "The general philosophy is that adults should go on trial in Iraq," a French diplomatic source told Reuters last month, of those found to have been fighters. "We think children would benefit from judicial and social services in France." "TRICKED" The women in the camp were cooking noodles or lying on mattresses with their babies in the hot tents. Many were still wearing the black abayas and face veils, which were mandatory in areas the militants controlled. "My mother doesn't even know where I am," said a 27-year-old French woman of Algerian descent. She said she had been tricked by her husband into coming with him through Turkey into Syria and then Iraq when he joined Islamic State last year. "I had just given birth to this little girl three months before," she said holding the infant and asking not to be named. "He said 'let's go for a week's holiday in Turkey.' He had already bought the plane tickets and the hotel." After four months in Mosul, she ran away from her husband to Tal Afar in February. She was hoping to make it back to France but he found her and would not let her leave. She tearfully recounted how her five-year-old son was killed in June by a rocket while playing in the streets. "I don't understand why he did this to us," she said of her husband, who she said was killed fighting in Mosul. "Dead or alive - I couldn't care less about him." She and a few other families had walked for days to surrender at a Kurdish peshmerga checkpoint beyond al-Ayadiyah, a town near Tal Afar where the militants made their last stand. "We were getting bombed, shelled and shot at," she said. Kurdish officials said dozens of fighters surrendered after the fall of Tal Afar but gave no details. One Tal Afar resident said he had seen between 70 and 80 fighters fleeing the town in the final days of the battle. (Additional reporting by Ahmed Rasheed in Baghdad and John Irish in Paris; Editing by Anna Willard, Larry King)
M&M Wind advert

Mars

LONDON  Chocolate brand M&Ms will promote wind power in a global advertising campaign set to run later this year and into 2018.

Chocolate and pet food giant Mars Inc this week announced a $1 billion sustainability drive, aiming to do its bit to tackle climate change and improve conditions for farmers in its supply chain.

As part of the plan, Mars' M&Ms brand will "champion the power of renewable energy and highlight the need for action in addressing climate change."

Barry Parkin, Mars' chief sustainability officer, told Business Insider: "We're going to be using red and yellow. They're going to be enthusiastic advocates of wind power energy. Hopefully, it will continue to engage consumers in this important topic. We know consumers care about the planet and we're trying to do our part to help."

Mars plans to launch the campaign during the UN General Assembly in New York later this month when world leaders will be gathering to discuss climate change.

Mars CEO Grant F. Reid said in a release announcing Mars' $1 billion sustainability drive: "Through our much-loved M&Ms brand, we can inspire consumers on this important topic and shine the spotlight on renewable energy  one of the solutions that will help us to tackle climate change and meet the UN Sustainable Development Goals."

Over the last decade, Mars has built two massive wind farms in Scotland and Texas to provide 100% renewable energy to its operations in the UK and US. The company plans to build similar wind farms in 11 more major markets around the world, such as Russia and India.

Parkin said: "We're doing this at cost parity or better than fossil fuel. We're at an absolute tipping point here. Any company can switch to renewables without cost penalty if you do it in a smart way. This is absolutely the time for us and everyone else to accelerate."

NOW WATCH: The looming war between Alibaba and Amazon

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SEE ALSO: 'We're trying to go all in': Chocolate giant Mars pledges $1 billion to fight climate change

DON'T MISS: 28 major US companies that don't want Trump to abandon the Paris agreement
REUTERS/Afolabi Sotunde

Sierra Leone is still reeling from the effects of a mudslide that killed nearly 1 000 people, left hundreds missing and rendered thousands homeless.

After about five hours of heavy rainfall, the mudslide came down Mount Sugar-Loaf and almost wiped out Mortome. This is a relatively new settlement which emerged as a result of the rapid urbanisation of Freetown, Sierra Leones capital city. The heavy downpour also caused huge flooding that inundated the city, including areas previously unaffected by heavy rains.

For the past five years floods have become almost an annual occurrence in Freetown. Whenever they occur, such as the floods in 2015, they overwhelm the capacity of government. They affect nearly the whole city, causing a huge humanitarian crisis.

Freetown is a coastal city built on wooded hills. Though mudslides are a rare event, this incident was not surprising. Over the past 10 years research papers and civil society organisations have repeatedly warned the government, and individuals who choose to build in unstable areas, that the city faces a serious threat from deforestation on the peninsula.

As the city pushes up into the mountains, the population pressures are taking a toll on the forest. Trees are being cut down by people who want land for housing and those who cut wood for their daily needs. About 14.7% of dense forest in 1986 was converted to built-up by 2015.

This increases the risk of mudslides as trees usually prevent run-off and forests hold water. When there is prolonged or intense rainfall in places with no trees, the soil becomes saturated and erodes.

There have been calls to stop the extension of settlements into the peninsulas hills and for the government to better manage the citys development. But the authorities have rarely taken steps to address this. Action ahead of rains is occasionally taken, but this is done at a household level. It consists of measures such as clearing drains, strengthening house foundations, repairing roofs and pruning trees to prevent damage if branches were to fall.

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In response to the recent tragedy, the citys director of surveys and land, Christian Pratt, pointed out that:

The laws are there to control development but the attitude of citizens is a serious concern. We have done several sensitisationswe set up a cut off line and brought it to the attention of people but these were not heeded.

Inaction caused a predictable tragedy. What nobody expected was the scale of damage it caused.

Contributing factors

The simple truth is that people are living where they shouldnt be, in areas that are now vulnerable to both flooding and mudslides.

Typically, the poor suffer the most whenever there is a disaster in Freetown. This is because they tend to live in high risk areas, such as slopes or coastal slums. In this case, though, well built homes were also affected as they were located in unstable areas.

There are several reasons why people live in these areas and under these conditions.

Firstly, most places have developed chaotically. Houses have often been built by powerful or influential individuals without following basic, town and country planning, rules.

Secondly, there has been a lack of good spatial planning. With limited available land the city should have managed the use of land better. Settlements should have been clearly laid out and provided with services like water and sanitation before houses were built.

Thirdly, there has been a surge in demand for home ownership combined with a widespread practice of public land grabs by both the poor and the rich.

Fourthly, as seen above, warnings about the environmental dangers were disregarded.

Freetown is already home to 40% of the countrys urban population. The citys population was over one million in 2015 and is expected to increase by 3-5% in its various wards.

Unless urban planning is taken seriously theres a risk that more locations could experience similar events, potentially more devastating than this one.

Several steps are needed urgently. Legislation in settlement planning and land use must be reviewed and improved. Instead of focusing on evictions, relocation and resettlement, political action should respond to the reasons people live in risky areas.

Finally, the relevant government bodies need skills training in disaster risk reduction and land use planning.

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

The Conversation

Joseph Macarthy works for the Sierra Leone Urban Research Centre (SLURC). SLURC was established with funding by Comic Relief and with a matching fund from the DFID. They also work in partnership with a few other organisations including the IIED (on Urban Humanitarian Response), Urban Ark (on Urban Disaster Risks), John Hopkins University (on Future Health Systems Research)
By Ed Stoddard JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South African Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa, a leading contender to become head of the ruling ANC in December, stepped up his criticism of the government on Sunday, saying state-owned companies had been "captured" and funds looted from them. Ramaphosa's remarks during a speech to an African National Congress meeting in the old diamond-mining town of Kimberley were tougher than others he has made on government graft, signalling the issue will be a main theme of his campaign. He also took aim -- without naming them - at the wealthy Gupta family, friends of President Jacob Zuma who have been accused of using undue influence to win lucrative state contracts. Zuma and the Guptas have denied any wrongdoing. "Many of these state-owned enterprises have been captured by certain people, by a certain family," Ramaphosa said. "All of our state-owned enterprises have been captured and we are saying we want to see an end to state capture and the money that has been stolen, we want it back," he said, to roars of approval from the audience. South Africa's top prosecutor said on Wednesday police were examining a trove of leaked documents detailing relations between the Guptas and Zuma, but it was too early to say if a prosecution should be launched. Ramaphosa said in May that South Africa was in danger of becoming a "mafia state" and he took a swipe in July at the Guptas over media reports that state funds were diverted in 2013 to pay for a lavish Gupta family wedding. But Sunday's remarks about a "certain family" were more pointed and come as the race heats up for the ANC's top spot. The next head of the party, who will be selected in December, will be its presidential candidate in 2019 national elections. Ramaphosa's main challenger, veteran politician and Zuma's ex-wife Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, will next week be sworn in as a member of parliament, a move which could see the former minister brought back into the cabinet, raising her profile. Analysts say she has the backing of Zuma's well-established patronage network as well as organisations such as the party's Women's League. Ramaphosa is a trade unionist-turned-business tycoon who has the backing of a diverse group of unions, communists and investors who do not always see eye to eye but want to rid the ANC of Zuma's influence and legacy. The opposition has long accused Zuma of sleaze and influence-peddling while in office. He survived a no-confidence vote in parliament on Aug. 8 but 30 ANC lawmakers voted with the opposition, indicating deep divisions in the party that has dominated South African politics since the end of apartheid in 1994. (Editing by)
ROME (Reuters) - Italy's defence minister has said there is "some basis" to allegations by two American students that they were raped in Florence by Carabinieri policemen. The two women, aged 19 and 21, have said they were raped in the early hours of Sept. 7 after they were given a lift home from a nightclub in the Italian city by a Carabinieri police patrol. The two policemen have denied the accusations. Italian media say the police were called to the nightclub after a fight broke out on the premises. The students told investigators that two officers had offered to give them a ride back to their residence. The students said they were raped inside the building before they could reach their rooms. "Investigations are still ongoing, but there is some basis regarding the allegations," Defence Minister Roberta Pinotti told a conference on women's issues late on Friday. "Rape is always a serious matter. But it's of unprecedented seriousness if it is committed by Carabinieri in uniform." The Carabinieri is a paramilitary police force under the control of the Defence Ministry. It works alongside the national police, which is controlled by the Interior Ministry. Italian media say the two women, who come from the states of Maine and New Jersey, told investigators they had drunk alcohol and smoked cannabis the night of the attack. They said they had been too frightened to scream or shout as the alleged assault took place. Police are carrying out DNA tests to try to verify their accusations, with results expected in the coming days. The case, which has received wide play in the Italian media, comes less than two weeks after a Polish tourist and Peruvian transsexual were brutally raped in the seaside resort of Rimini. Two Moroccans, a Nigerian and a Congolese asylum seeker have been arrested over the attacks, which led to a sharp increase in anti-immigrant sentiment in Italy. The allegations levelled against the Carabinieri have dismayed the Italian establishment. "If this is true, and I hope that light is shed on the matter as soon as possible, then it would be an act of unheard of gravity," Tullio Del Sette, the head of the army, told the ANSA news agency. (Reporting by Crispian Balmer; Editing by Helen Popper)
BAE Systems plc provides defense, aerospace, and security solutions worldwide. The company operates through five segments: Electronic Systems, Cyber & Intelligence, Platforms & Services (US), Air, and Maritime. The Electronic Systems segment offers electronic warfare systems, navigation systems, electro-optical sensors, military and commercial digital engine and flight controls, precision guidance and seeker solutions, military communication systems and data links, persistent surveillance systems, space electronics, and electric drive propulsion systems. The Cyber & Intelligence segment provides solutions to modernize, maintain, and test cyber-harden aircraft, radars, missile systems, and mission applications that detect and deter threats to national security; systems engineering, integration, and sustainment services for critical weapons systems, C5ISR, and cyber security; and solutions and services to intelligence and federal/civilian agencies. It also offers data intelligence solutions to defend against national-scale threats, protect their networks, and data against attacks; security and intelligence solutions to the United Kingdom government and allied international governments; anti-fraud and regulatory compliance solutions; and enterprise-level data and digital services. The Platforms & Services (US) segment manufactures combat vehicles, weapons, and munitions, as well as provides ship repair services and the management of government-owned munitions facilities. The Air segment develops, manufactures, upgrades, and supports combat and jet trainer aircraft. The Maritime segment designs, manufactures, and supports surface ships, submarines, torpedoes, radars, and command and combat systems; and supplies naval gun systems. It also supplies naval weapon systems, missile launchers, and precision munitions. The company was founded in 1970 and is based in Farnborough, the United Kingdom.
Bank of Montreal provides diversified financial services primarily in North America. The company's personal banking products and services include checking and savings accounts, credit cards, mortgages, and financial and investment advice services; and commercial banking products and services comprise business deposit accounts, commercial credit cards, business loans and commercial mortgages, cash management solutions, foreign exchange, specialized banking programs, treasury and payment solutions, and risk management products for small business and commercial banking customers. It also offers investment and wealth advisory services; digital investing services; financial services and solutions; and investment management, and trust and custody services. In addition, the company provides life insurance, accident and sickness insurance, and annuity products; creditor and travel insurance to bank customers; and reinsurance solutions. Further, it offers client's debt and equity capital-raising services, as well as loan origination and syndication, and treasury management; strategic advice on mergers and acquisitions, restructurings, and recapitalizations, as well as valuation and fairness opinions; and trade finance, risk mitigation, and other operating services. Additionally, the company provides research and access to markets for institutional, corporate, and retail clients; trading solutions that include debt, foreign exchange, interest rate, credit, equity, securitization and commodities; new product development and origination services, as well as risk management advice and services to hedge against fluctuations; and funding and liquidity management services to its clients. It operates through approximately 900 bank branches and 3,300 automated banking machines in Canada and the United States. Bank of Montreal was founded in 1817 and is headquartered in Montreal, Canada.
Ashland Inc. provides additives and specialty ingredients worldwide. It operates through Life Sciences; Personal Care & Household; Specialty Additives; and Intermediates and Solvents segments. The Life Sciences segment offers pharmaceutical solutions, including controlled release polymers, disintegrants, tablet coatings, thickeners, solubilizers, and tablet binders; nutrition solutions, such as thickeners, stabilizers, emulsifiers, and additives; and nutraceutical solutions comprising products for weight management, joint comfort, stomach and intestinal health, sports nutrition, and general wellness, as well as custom formulation, toll processing, and particle engineering solutions. The Personal Care & Household segment provides a range of nature-based, biodegradable, and performance ingredients; solutions for toothpastes, mouth washes and rinses, denture cleaning, and care for teeth; and household supplies nature-derived rheology ingredients, biodegradable surface wetting agents, performance encapsulates, and specialty polymers. The Specialty Additives segment offers rheology modifiers, foam control agents, surfactants and wetting agents, pH neutralizers, advanced ceramics used in catalytic converters, environmental filters, ingredients for the manufacturing of ceramic capacitors, plasma display panels and solar cells, ingredients for textile printing, thermoplastic metals, and alloys for welding. The Intermediates and Solvents segment produces 1,4 butanediol and related derivatives, including n-methylpyrrolidone. It offers its products to customers in a range of consumer and industrial markets, such as architectural coatings, construction, energy, food and beverage, nutraceuticals, personal care, and pharmaceutical. The company was formerly known as Ashland Global Holdings Inc. Ashland Inc. was founded in 1924 and is based in Wilmington, Delaware.
SunTrust Banks, Inc. operates as the holding company for SunTrust Bank that provides various financial services for consumers, businesses, corporations, institutions, and not-for-profit entities in the United States. It operates in two segments, Consumer and Wholesale. The Consumer segment provides deposits and payments; home equity and personal credit lines; auto, student, and other lending products; credit cards; discount/online and full-service brokerage products; professional investment advisory products and services; and trust services, as well as family office solutions. This segment also offers residential mortgage products in the secondary market. The Wholesale segment provides capital markets solutions, including advisory, capital raising, and financial risk management; asset-based financing solutions, such as securitizations, asset-based lending, equipment financing, and structured real estate arrangements; cash management services and auto dealer financing solutions; investment banking solutions; and credit and deposit, fee-based product offering, multi-family agency lending, advisory, commercial mortgage brokerage, and tailored financing and equity investment solutions. This segment also offers treasury and payment solutions, such as operating various electronic and paper payment types, which comprise card, wire transfer, automated clearing house, check, and cash; and provides services clients to manage their accounts online. The company offers its products and services through a network of traditional and in-store branches, automated teller machines, Internet, mobile, and telephone banking channels. As of December 31, 2018, it operated 1,218 full-service banking offices located in Florida, Georgia, Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Maryland, South Carolina, and the District of Columbia. SunTrust Banks, Inc. was founded in 1891 and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia.
Oil States International, Inc. engages in the provision of manufactured products and services used in the drilling, completion, subsea, production and infrastructure sectors of the oil and natural gas industry, as well as in the industrial and military sectors. It operates through the following segments: Well Site Services, Downhole Technologies and Offshore or Manufactured Products. The Well Site Services segment includes a broad range of equipment and services that are used to drill for, establish and maintain the flow of oil and natural gas from a well throughout its life cycle. The Downhole Technologies segment provides oil and gas perforation systems and downhole tools in support of completion, intervention, wireline and abandonment operations. It also designs, manufactures and markets its consumable engineered products to oilfield service as well as exploration and production companies. The Offshore or Manufactured Products segment designs, manufactures, and markets capital equipment utilized on floating production systems, subsea pipeline infrastructure, and offshore drilling rigs and vessels, along with short-cycle and other products. The company was founded in July 1995 an
The following companies are subsidiares of Cummins: Anvl, Apollo FC Holdings Ltd., Atlantis Acquisitionco Canada Corporation, Atlantis Holdco UK Limited, Brammo, CIFC Worldwide Partner C.V., CMI Africa Holdings BV, CMI CGT Holdings LLC, CMI Canada Financing Ltd., CMI Canada LP, CMI Foreign Holdings B.V., CMI Global Equity Holdings B.V., CMI Global Equity Holdings C.V., CMI Global Holdings B.V., CMI Global Partner 2 C.V., CMI Global Partners B.V., CMI Group Holdings B.V., CMI Group Holdings Cooperatief U.A., CMI International Finance Partner 1 LLC, CMI International Finance Partner 2 LLC, CMI International Finance Partner 3 LLC, CMI International Finance Partner 4 LLC, CMI International Finance Partner 5 LLC, CMI Mexico LLC, CMI Netherlands Holdings B.V., CMI PGI Holdings LLC, CMI PGI International Holdings LLC, CMI Turkish Holdings B.V., CMI UK Finance LP, CMI UK Financing LP, Cherry Island Renewable Energy LLC, Consolidated Diesel Company, Consolidated Diesel Inc., Consolidated Diesel of North Carolina Inc., Cummins (China) Investment Co. Ltd., Cummins (Xiangyang) Machining Co. Ltd., Cummins Africa Middle East (Pty) Ltd., Cummins Afrique de l'Ouest, Cummins Americas Inc., Cummins Angola Lda., Cummins Argentina-Servicios Mineros S.A., Cummins Asia Pacific Pte. Ltd., Cummins Aust Technologies Pty. Ltd., Cummins BLR LLC, Cummins Battery Systems North America LLC, Cummins Belgium N.V., Cummins Botswana (Pty.) Ltd., Cummins Brasil Ltda., Cummins Burkina Faso SARL, Cummins CDC Holding Inc., Cummins CV Member LLC, Cummins Canada ULC, Cummins Caribbean LLC, Cummins Center of Excellence Singapore Pte. Ltd., Cummins Centroamerica Holding S.de R.L., Cummins Child Development Center Inc., Cummins Colombia S.A.S., Cummins Comercializadora S. de R.L. de C.V., Cummins Corporation, Cummins Cote d'Ivoire SARL, Cummins Czech Republic s.r.o., Cummins Deutschland GmbH, Cummins Diesel International Ltd., Cummins Distribution Holdco Inc., Cummins EMEA Holdings Limited, Cummins East Asia Research & Development Co. Ltd., Cummins Eastern Marine Inc., Cummins Electrified Power Europe Ltd., Cummins Electrified Power NA Inc., Cummins Emission Solutions (China) Co. Ltd., Cummins Emission Solutions Inc., Cummins Empresas Filantropicas, Cummins Energetica Ltda., Cummins Engine (Beijing) Co. Ltd., Cummins Engine (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Cummins Engine (Shanghai) Trading & Services Co. Ltd., Cummins Engine Holding Company Inc., Cummins Engine IP Inc., Cummins Engine Malaysia Sdn. Bhd., Cummins Engine Venture Corporation, Cummins Enterprise LLC, Cummins Filtration (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Cummins Filtration GmbH, Cummins Filtration IP Inc., Cummins Filtration Inc., Cummins Filtration International Corp., Cummins Filtration Ltd., Cummins Filtration SARL, Cummins Filtration Trading (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Cummins Filtros Ltda., Cummins Franchise Holdco LLC, Cummins Fuel Systems (Wuhan) Co. Ltd., Cummins Generator Technologies (China) Co. Ltd., Cummins Generator Technologies Americas Inc., Cummins Generator Technologies Germany GmbH, Cummins Generator Technologies India Private Ltd., Cummins Generator Technologies Italy SRL, Cummins Generator Technologies Limited, Cummins Generator Technologies Romania S.A., Cummins Generator Technologies Singapore Pte Ltd., Cummins Ghana Limited, Cummins Ghana Mining Limited, Cummins Global Financing LP, Cummins Global Technologies LLP, Cummins Grupo Comercial Y. de Servicios S. de R.L. de C.V., Cummins Grupo Industrial S. de R.L. de C.V., Cummins Holland B.V., Cummins Hong Kong Ltd., Cummins India Ltd., Cummins Intellectual Property Inc., Cummins International Finance LLC, Cummins International Holdings Cooperatief U.A., Cummins International Holdings LLC, Cummins Italia S.P.A., Cummins Japan Ltd., Cummins Korea Co. Ltd., Cummins LLC Member Inc., Cummins Ltd., Cummins Maroc SARL, Cummins Middle East FZE, Cummins Mining Services S. de R.L. de C.V., Cummins Mobility Services Inc., Cummins Mongolia Investment LLC, Cummins Mozambique Ltda., Cummins NV, Cummins Namibia Engine Sales and Service PTY LTD, Cummins Natural Gas Engines Inc., Cummins New Zealand Limited, Cummins Nigeria Ltd., Cummins Norte de Colombia S.A.S., Cummins North Africa Regional Office SARL, Cummins Norway AS, Cummins PGI Holdings Ltd., Cummins Power Generation (China) Co. Ltd., Cummins Power Generation (S) Pte. Ltd., Cummins Power Generation (U.K.) Limited, Cummins Power Generation Deutschland GmbH, Cummins Power Generation Inc., Cummins Power Generation Limited, Cummins PowerGen IP Inc., Cummins Research and Technology India Private Ltd., Cummins Romania Srl, Cummins S. de R.L. de C.V., Cummins Sales and Service Korea Co. Ltd., Cummins Sales and Service Philippines Inc., Cummins Sales and Service Private Limited, Cummins Sales and Service Sdn. Bhd., Cummins Sales and Service Singapore Pte. Ltd., Cummins Sinai ve Otomotiv Urunleri Sanayi ve Ticaret Limited Sirketi, Cummins South Africa (Pty.) Ltd., Cummins South Pacific Pty. Limited, Cummins Southern Plains LLC, Cummins Spain S.L., Cummins Sweden AB, Cummins Technologies India, Cummins Trade Receivables LLC, Cummins Turbo Technologies Limited, Cummins Turkey Motor Guc Sistemleri Sats Servis Limited Sirketi, Cummins U.K. Holdings Ltd., Cummins U.K. Pension Plan Trustee Ltd., Cummins UK Global Holdings Ltd., Cummins UK Holdings LLC, Cummins Vendas e Servicos de Motores e Geradores Ltda., Cummins Venture Corporation, Cummins West Africa Limited, Cummins West Balkans d.o.o. Nova Pasova, Cummins XBorder Operations (Pty) Ltd, Cummins Zambia Ltd., Cummins Zimbabwe Pvt. Ltd., Distribuidora Cummins Centroamerica Costa Rica S.de R.L., Distribuidora Cummins Centroamerica El Salvador S.de R.L., Distribuidora Cummins Centroamerica Guatemala Ltda., Distribuidora Cummins Centroamerica Honduras S.de R.L., Distribuidora Cummins S.A., Distribuidora Cummins Sucursal Paraguay SRL, Distribuidora Cummins de Panama S. de R.L., Dynamo Insurance Company Inc., Efficient Drivetrains, Efficient Drivetrains (Beijing) New Power Technology Co. Ltd., Efficient Drivetrains (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Hilite International, Hydrogenics, Hydrogenics Corporation, Hydrogenics Europe N.V., Hydrogenics GmbH, Hydrogenics Holding GmbH, Hydrogenics USA Inc., Markon Engineering Company Ltd., Nelson Burgess Ltd., Nelson Industries, Newage Engineers GmbH, Newage Ltd. (U.K.), Newage Machine Tools Ltd., OOO Cummins, Petbow Limited, Power Group International (Overseas Holdings) B.V., Power Group International (Overseas Holdings) Ltd., Power Group International Ltd., Quickstart Energy Projects SpA, Shanghai Cummins Trade Co. Ltd., TOO Cummins, Taiwan Cummins Sales & Services Co. Ltd., Worldwide Partner CV Member LLC, Wuxi Cummins Turbo Technologies Co. Ltd., Wuxi New Energy Automotive Technologies Co. Ltd., and ZED Connect Inc..

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The following companies are subsidiares of Ingersoll Rand: 13125882 Canada Inc., 211 E. Russell Road LLC, 4458664 Canada Inc., ACCUDYNE INDUSTRIES ASIA PTE. LTD., ACCUDYNE INDUSTRIES BORROWER S.C.A., ACCUDYNE INDUSTRIES INDIA PRIVATE LIMITED, ACCUDYNE INDUSTRIES LLC, ACCUDYNE INDUSTRIES MIDDLE EAST FZE, ACCUDYNE INDUSTRIES SERVICES LIMITED, ASTRUM IT GmbH, Accudyne Industries Acquisition S.A r.l, Accudyne Industries Canada Inc., Accudyne Industries S.A r.l., Air Dimensions, Air Dimensions Inc., Albin Pump SAS, BOC Edwards Global Low pressure Air business, CISA S.p.A., Cameron-Centrifugal Compression, Comercial Ingersoll-Rand (Chile) Limitada, Comingersoll-Comercio E Industria De Equipamentos S.A., CompAir, CompAir (Hankook) Korea Co. Ltd., CompAir Acquisition (No. 2) Ltd., CompAir Acquisition Ltd., CompAir BroomWade Ltd., CompAir Finance Ltd., CompAir GmbH, CompAir Holdings Limited, CompAir International Trading (Shanghai) Co Ltd, CompAir Korea Ltd, CompAir South Africa (SA) (Pty) Ltd., Consolidated Distribution Holdings Ltd., DV Systems Inc., Dosatron International SAS, Emco Wheaton Gmbh, Emco Wheaton USA Inc, Enza Air Proprietary Limited, FlexEnergy Holdings LLC, Frigoblock Grosskopf Gmbh, GD Aria Holdings Limited, GD Aria Holdings Limited, GD Aria Investments Limited, GD First (UK) Ltd, GD German Holdings GmbH, GD German Holdings I Gmbh, GD German Holdings II GmbH, GD German Investments GmbH, GD Global Holdings II Inc., GD Global Holdings Inc., GD Global Holdings UK II Ltd., GD Global Ventures I B.V., GD Global Ventures II B.V., GD Global Ventures III B.V., GD Industrial Products Malaysia SDN. BHD., GD Investment KY, GD UK Finance Ltd., GPS Industries, Gardner Denver (Thailand) Co. Ltd., Gardner Denver Austria GmbH, Gardner Denver Bad Neustadt Real Estate GmbH & Co KG, Gardner Denver Belgium NV, Gardner Denver Brasil Industria E Comercio de Maquinas Ltda., Gardner Denver CZ + SK sro, Gardner Denver Canada Corp (Canada), Gardner Denver Cyprus Investments II Limited, Gardner Denver Cyprus Investments Limited, Gardner Denver Deutschland GmbH, Gardner Denver Engineered Products India Private Limited, Gardner Denver FZE, Gardner Denver Finance II LLC, Gardner Denver Finance Inc & Co KG, Gardner Denver France SAS, Gardner Denver Group Svcs Ltd, Gardner Denver Holdings Limited, Gardner Denver Hong Kong Investments Limited, Gardner Denver Hong Kong Ltd, Gardner Denver Iberica SL, Gardner Denver Inc., Gardner Denver Industries Ltd., Gardner Denver Industries Pty Ltd., Gardner Denver International Inc., Gardner Denver International Ltd., Gardner Denver Investments Inc., Gardner Denver Italy Holdings S.r.L., Gardner Denver Japan Ltd., Gardner Denver Kirchhain Real Estate GmbH & Co KG, Gardner Denver Korea Ltd., Gardner Denver Ltd., Gardner Denver Machinery (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Gardner Denver Nash Brasil Industria E Comercio De Bombas Ltda, Gardner Denver Nash LLC, Gardner Denver Nash Machinery Ltd., Gardner Denver Nederland BV, Gardner Denver Nederland Investments B.V., Gardner Denver Oy, Gardner Denver Polska Sp z.o.o., Gardner Denver Pte. Ltd., Gardner Denver S.r.l., Gardner Denver Schopfheim GmbH, Gardner Denver Schopfheim Real Estate GmbH & Co KG, Gardner Denver Schweiz AG, Gardner Denver Slovakia s.r.o., Gardner Denver Sweden AB, Gardner Denver Taiwan Ltd., Gardner Denver Thomas GmbH (f/k/a ILMVAC GmbH), Gardner Denver Thomas Inc., Gardner Denver Thomas Pneumatic Systems (Wuxi) Co. Ltd., Gardner Denver Thomas Real Estate GmbH & Co KG, Garo Dott. Ing. Roberto Gabbioneta S.r.l., Ghh-Rand Schraubenkompressoren Gmbh, HASKEL EUROPE LTD., HASKEL HOLDINGS UK LIMITED, HASKEL INTERNATIONAL LLC, Hamworthy Belliss & Morcom, Haskel France SAS, Haskel Sistemas de Fluidos Espana S.R.L., Hibon Inc., Highspeed Newco LLC, Hingerose Limited, ILMVAC (UK) Ltd., ILS Innovative Labor Systeme, ILS Inovative Laborsysteme GmbH, INGERSOLL RAND ITS JAPAN LTD., INGERSOLL-RAND (CHANG ZHOU) TOOLS CO. LTD., INGERSOLL-RAND (CHINA) INDUSTRIAL EQUIPMENT MANUFACTURING CO. LTD., INGERSOLL-RAND CHINA LLC, INGERSOLL-RAND COMERCIO E SERVICOS DE MAQUINAS E EQUIPAMENTOS INDUSTRIAIS LTDA., INGERSOLL-RAND DE PUERTO RICO INC., INGERSOLL-RAND INDUSTRIAL COMPANY B.V., INGERSOLL-RAND INDUSTRIAL SP. Z O.O., INGERSOLL-RAND INDUSTRIAL U.S. INC., INGERSOLL-RAND PHILIPPINES INC., INGERSOLL-RAND SPAIN S.A., INGERSOLL-RAND U.S. HOLDCO INC., IR HPS Holdco. Inc., ITO Emniyet, Ingersoll Rand Cyprus Investments Ltd., Ingersoll Rand Finance LLC, Ingersoll Rand Global Investments LLC, Ingersoll Rand Global Ventures LLC, Ingersoll Rand Hong Kong Investments Limited, Ingersoll Rand Inc., Ingersoll Rand Investments (SG) Pte. Ltd., Ingersoll Rand Investments B.V., Ingersoll Rand Schweiz Investments Gmbh, Ingersoll Rand Technology R&D (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Ingersoll-Rand (Australia) Ltd., Ingersoll-Rand (China) Investment Company Limited, Ingersoll-Rand (Guilin) Tools Company Limited, Ingersoll-Rand (Hong Kong) Holding Company Limited, Ingersoll-Rand (India) Limited, Ingersoll-Rand Ab, Ingersoll-Rand Air Solutions Hibon Sarl, Ingersoll-Rand Beteiligungs Und Grundstucksverwaltungs Gmbh, Ingersoll-Rand Colombia S.A.S., Ingersoll-Rand Company Limited (Uk), Ingersoll-Rand Company South Africa (Pty) Limited, Ingersoll-Rand Cz S.R.O., Ingersoll-Rand De Mexico S.A. De C.V., Ingersoll-Rand Equipements De Production S.A.S., Ingersoll-Rand Holdings Limited, Ingersoll-Rand Industrial Ireland Limited, Ingersoll-Rand International (India) Private Limited, Ingersoll-Rand International Holding Llc, Ingersoll-Rand Italia S.R.L., Ingersoll-Rand Italiana Manufacturing S.R.L., Ingersoll-Rand Korea Holding Llc, Ingersoll-Rand Korea Limited, Ingersoll-Rand Lux Investments II S.A R.I., Ingersoll-Rand Lux Investments S.A R.L., Ingersoll-Rand Luxembourg Industrial Company S.A R.L., Ingersoll-Rand Machinery (Shanghai) Company Limited, Ingersoll-Rand Malaysia Co. Sdn. Bhd., Ingersoll-Rand S.A. De C.V., Ingersoll-Rand Services And Trading Limited Liability Company, Ingersoll-Rand Services Company, Ingersoll-Rand Services Limited, Ingersoll-Rand Singapore Enterprises Pte. Ltd., Ingersoll-Rand South East Asia (Pte.) Ltd., Ingersoll-Rand Superay Holdings Limited, Ingersoll-Rand Technical And Services S.A.R.L., Ingersoll-Rand Technologies And Services Private Limited, Ingersoll-Rand Technology R&D (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Ingersoll-Rand Tool Holdings Limited, Ingersoll-Rand Trading Gmbh, Ingersoll-Rand Vietnam Company Limited, Instrum Rand JSC, Interflex Datensysteme, Ir Canada Holdings Ulc, Ir Canada Sales & Service Ulc, Ir France Sas, Kryptonite corp, Lawrence Factor Inc., LeROI, LeRoi International Inc, MILTON ROY (HONG KONG) LIMITED, MILTON ROY (UK) LIMITED, MILTON ROY EUROPA B.V., MILTON ROY EUROPE SAS, MILTON ROY INDUSTRIAL (SHANGHAI) CO. LTD., MILTON ROY LLC, MILTON ROY US PURCHASER INC., MP Pumps Inc., Maximum AG Technologies Inc., Maximus Solutions, Mb Air Systems Limited, Nash Elmo, Officina Meccaniche Industriali Srl, Oina VV, Oina VV Aktiebolag, Plurifilter D.O.O., Pt Ingersoll-Rand Indonesia, Robuschi, Runtech Systems, Runtech Systems (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Runtech Systems Inc., Runtech Systems OY, SEEPEX, Seepex (M) SDN, Seepex Australia Pty Ltd, Seepex Beteiligungs-Gesellschaft mit Beschrankter Haftung, Seepex France S.a.r.l., Seepex GmbH, Seepex Inc., Seepex India Private Ltd., Seepex Italia SRL, Seepex Japan Co. Ltd., Seepex Nordic A/S, Seepex OOO, Seepex Pumps (Shanghia) Co. Ltd., Seepex UK Ltd., Shanghai CompAir Compressors Co Ltd, Shanghai Compressors & Blowers Ltd., Shanghai Ingersoll-Rand Compressor Limited, Shenzhen Bocom System Engineering Co., Superay, Syltone, TIWR Real Estate GmbH & Co. KG, Tamrotor Marine Comp AS Norway, Tecno Matic Europe s.r.o., Thomas Industries Inc., Trane Technologies, Tri-Continent Scientific Inc., Vacuum and Blower Systems division, Welch Vacuum Equipment (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Zaxe Technologies Inc., Zeks Compressed Air Solutions Llc, Zinsser Analytic, Zinsser Analytik GmbH, Zinsser NA Inc., and crayon interface.

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Telefonica, S.A., together with its subsidiaries, provides telecommunications services in Europe and Latin America. The company's mobile and related services and products comprise mobile voice, value added, mobile data and Internet, wholesale, corporate, roaming, fixed wireless, and trunking and paging services. Its fixed telecommunication services include PSTN lines; ISDN accesses; public telephone services; local, domestic, and international long-distance and fixed-to-mobile communications; corporate communications; supplementary value-added services; video telephony; intelligent network; and telephony information services, as well as leases and sells handset equipment. The company also provides Internet and broadband multimedia services comprising Internet service provider, portal and network, retail and wholesale broadband access, narrowband switched access, high-speed Internet through fibre to the home, and voice over Internet protocol services. In addition, it offers leased line, virtual private network, fibre optics, web hosting and application, outsourcing and consultancy, desktop, and system integration and professional services. Further, the company offers wholesale services for telecommunication operators, including domestic interconnection and international wholesale services; leased lines for other operators; and local loop leasing services, as well as bit stream services, wholesale line rental accesses, and leased ducts for other operators' fiber deployment. Additionally, it provides video/TV services; smart connectivity and services, and consumer IoT products; financial and other payment, security, cloud computing, advertising, big data, and digital telco experience services; virtual assistants; digital home platforms; and Movistar Home devices. It also offers online telemedicine, home insurance, music streaming, and consumer loan services. The company was incorporated in 1924 and is headquartered in Madrid, Spain.
Women from all walks of life are expected to gather in Downtown Albuquerque on Sept. 16 for a large convention aimed at inspiring women to make their communities a better place to live.

Organizer Andrea Monfredi said New Mexico lags behind other states when it comes to economic recovery and she believes women are the key to its future success.

New Mexico is known for really great things, she said. But its a little behind the times in economic development. The heart of a strong economy starts with women.

The convention, called Women of Light, will feature more than a dozen speakers aiming to inspire attendees with their words. Monfredi said the name of the convention was selected for a few reasons.

Theres no other place on the planet where the light shines like it does in New Mexico, she said. We want to inspire women and help them connect, illuminate them.

Although many of the speakers have religious affiliations, Monfredi said the convention is open to all women and she chose speakers to whom most women can relate. The keynote speaker for the convention is Elizabeth Smart, who was abducted as a teen from her bedroom in 2002 and sexually assaulted. She was rescued nine months later.

The biggest boundaries between women are religion, politics and socioeconomics, Monfredi said. We needed someone who could speak to all of these.

Smart, she said, speaks about the role pornography played in her abuse and advocates against the sexualization of women in the media.

Most women can get behind that type of movement, Monfredi said. Her story can cross those boundaries.

Smart wrote a best-selling book, My Story, about her experience and is now a motivational speaker. She has worked to promote efforts such as the AMBER alert system and the Adam Walsh Child Protection & Safety Act. She also helped the Department of Justice, along with other kidnap survivors, create a survivors guide for children who have gone through similar experiences.

She is somebody well known for the good she is doing, Monfredi said. Its quite inspiring.

Monfredi did not grow up in New Mexico but her family was from the area. Her parents own an event company in California, which is where she learned how to organize a large gathering. She moved back to New Mexico five years ago.

My roots run very deep in New Mexico and its marvelous to come back to the land of my heritage, she said.

Another speaker is Stephanie Nielson, who suffered burns over 80 percent of her body in 2008. She and her husband, Christian Nielson, along with a family friend, were flying a small plane when it crashed, burning Nielson and her husband, and killing their friend.

Before her accident, Nielson was already a popular blogger. She is the author of the NieNieDialogues, which chronicles her everyday life as a mother and wife. The couple has five children and relocated from Utah to a ranch in New Mexico last month.

Nielson will speak during the closing session about her ordeal and how she came back from it to go on and thrive in her life. She wrote the New York Times best-selling memoir Heaven Is Here detailing her accident and recovery.

Other speaker topics include the effects of body language, overcoming adversity, reaching ones full potential, giving back to the community and succeeding in the workplace.

The convention starts at 8 a.m. with break-out sessions in the morning and afternoon and a luncheon.

Marketplace during the event will showcase businesses owned by women. Vendors will include photographers, make-up and other beauty consultants, insurance companies, authors, jewelry makers and cooking supplies representatives.

The day will end about 6:30 p.m.

If you go

WHAT: Women of Light Convention

WHEN: 8 a.m.-6:30 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 16

WHERE: Albuquerque Convention Center

COST: $70

CONTACT: 585-3831; for tickets, 800-838-3006; thewomenoflight.com
Kiko Sanchez enjoys capturing images.

In fact, he loves it.

The New Mexico native recently put up a show at Flying Star in Nob Hill that runs through November.

Its his first solo photography show, and its titled Windows of Enchantment.

Ive been a photographer since college, he says. I always wanted to do a solo show. Ive done smaller ones in the past.

Sanchez is drawn to landscape photography.

And what hes done with his current exhibit is put his favorite landscapes within vintage windows.

Hes been collecting vintage window frames for a few years.

While he was cleaning out his late grandmothers storage shed, he found about a dozen old windows.

I wanted to take something from the past and combine them with the pictures of the present, he says.

In the photo series, there are mountains, sunsets, the desert and blue skies  basically everything that makes New Mexico magical.

Sanchez says the most difficult part of the project was finding the right window for each photo.

The Tome native searched yard and garage sales and Craigslist to find some of the frames.

I hit the jackpot a few weeks ago, he says. There was a man who had just done a renovation of a home in Downtown area and was getting rid of the windows. They dated back to the early 1900s, and I snagged them as quick as I could.

The photo series has about eight hanging at Flying Star, yet Sanchez says there are 20 in the series and he will rotate the pieces over the three months.

I still have a bunch of windows that I need to put the photos in, he says.

While landscape photography keeps him busy, Sanchez also balances his time with his graphic design and video production business  not to mention that hes also involved with the New Mexico film industry as an actor.

Im about one movie away from getting into the Screen Actors Guild, he says. Everything seems to be working out.

With all the good going on in Sanchezs life, he always is pulled back to the famous New Mexico light.

The light changes so drastically here, he says. Sometimes I go out with a purpose. Other times, if Im having a bad day or in a bad mood, I just grab my camera and drive. I make a lot of stops along the way, which makes me late for everything. It just takes one moment to capture something great. This series elevates everything to another level. I clean up the frames just enough to leave a rustic feel.

If you go

WHAT: Windows of Enchantment, photo series by Kiko Sanchez

WHEN: 7 a.m.-10 p.m. daily through November

WHERE: Flying Star in Nob Hill, 3416 E. Central

HOW MUCH: Free
LOS LUNAS, N.M.  A New Mexico corrections officer has been arrested and accused of taking drugs into a state prison in Los Lunas.

The State Police says 21-year-old Manuel Romero of Belen was arrested Wednesday after investigators determined he had distributed narcotics inside the Central New Mexico Correctional Facility.

The State Police says prison personnel had reported that Romero was spotted giving an item to an inmate and that the inmate later was discovered suffering from a narcotics overdose. Drugs were found in the inmates cell and the inmate was medically treated for the overdose.

Romero was arrested on suspicion of conspiracy and of bringing contraband into a prison.

Online court records dont list an attorney who could comment on the allegations and no phone is listed under Romeros name.
LAS CRUCES, N.M.  A federal court has ruled that a Dona Ana County sheriffs detective has a legal shield against a lawsuit filed by the estate of an armed man fatally shot by the detective during a 2015 encounter in an alley.

The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling Friday says Chase Thouvenell had qualified immunity because 34-year-old Michael Malones estate hadnt shown that Thouvenell clearly used excessive force in violation of Malones Fourth Amendment rights.

Thouvenell was among officers who went to a motel to arrest Malone. He was wanted on charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, felon in possession of a firearm and battery against a household member.

Authorities say Malone fled the motel through a window and was shot after he ignored commands to drop his gun.
SANTA FE  At least some of the protesters arrested following Fridays Entrada re-enactment on the Santa Fe Plaza were being released Saturday.

Mayor Javier Gonzales tweeted that release orders were being faxed by courts to the Santa Fe County jail to get the protesters out, unless they had other court matters pending.

Lt. Marvin Paulk of the Santa Fe Police Department said Saturday that a total of eight people were arrested after the Entrada, an annual re-enactment of the Spanish reoccupation of Santa Fe in 1692, 12 years after the Pueblo Revolt. Native American groups and others have protested the event in recent years. On Friday, protesters chanted during the Entrada pageant, then about 150 people continued to protest at or near the Santa Fe Plaza afterward, leading to the arrests.

Paulk said seven protesters were charged with criminal trespass. Jennifer Marley, from San Ildefonso Pueblo and part of the Red Nation group, faces two felony counts of battery on a police officer as well as criminal trespass.

He said the battery counts were for Marley allegedly hitting officers with a sign and trying to push past them. Paulk said the criminal trespass charges were for refusal to leave the Plaza space for which Fiesta de Santa Fe had a permit for its activities this weekend, including the Entrada. The permit holder makes the rules, he said.

Attorney Dan Cron of Santa Fe said he is part of a legal strike force formed last year to represent arrested protesters. He said he made calls to check on when judges would consider bail or bond for those arrested Friday. Under new state law, that must be done within 48 hours of arrest. Cron said it was his understanding that everyone charged in Municipal Court was being released.

The jails website showed that Marley was still incarcerated as of Saturday afternoon. With felony counts, she was likely charged in Magistrate Court.

On Saturday, Red Nation was promoting a #FREEJEN campaign on Facebook.
Sarah of Albuquerque got a strange letter recently purporting to be from Discover and asking her for proof of citizenship and proof of her occupation (shes retired), as well as proof that Im not laundering money.

The letter was from Salt Lake City, but it was not from the same address marked on the statements the credit card company sends out.

There was no name or signature on the letter, but Sarah was to provide the requested information at either the website or phone number listed.

She did not, sensing it was a scam.

Derek Cuculich, a Discover spokesman, said he had not heard of any such letters being received last year. However, he said, Our fraud team is always looking at those types of incidents.

He recommended a new service the credit card company launched recently that alerts customers if their Social Security numbers are found on risky websites known to illegally sell or trade personal data, according to a news release.

The service, which is free, also alerts customers if any new credit cards, car loans or other accounts are opened on their Experian credit report. Experian is one of the three major credit-reporting agencies.

The alerts can be made by text or email, Cuculich said.

These new alerts are aimed at helping Discover cardmembers protect themselves from identity theft or fraud, according to the news release.

Cuculich said that card members who suspect fraudulent activity can call either 1-800-Discover, or the companys U.S.-based Fraud Specialists any time at 1-866-240-7938.



The feds have settled a case with online tax preparer TaxSlayer, LLC, and there are some lessons to be learned about turning to the computer to get your taxes done.

The Federal Trade Commission said hackers used names and passwords stolen from other sites to log into TaxSlayer Online, which is operated by a Georgia company.

They were able to do that because people often use the same passwords for a variety of functions. The thieves hit it lucky in the case of 8,800 accounts and were able to access private information about those taxpayers.

The FTC said TaxSlayer did not require users to have strong passwords nor did it have a written information security program or a way to assess possible identity theft. The settlement requires the company to have a security program and to take other safeguards.

Here are some lessons, when it comes to keeping tax information safe:

 Use a strong password or pass phrase when logging into any online tax filing program. Use at least 10 characters, the FTC advises, because longer, unique, and memorable passwords or passphrases (which are a sequence of words) are better than short passwords. And dont reuse a password youve used for another account.

 Choose multi-factor authentication. In fact, if you use a tax prep software, make sure it requires this. This will involve the company calling or texting you with a PIN youll you use in addition to login and password. In the TaxSlayer case, hackers were no longer able to get into accounts once the company started required this extra level of security.

 Never use public Wi-Fi when working on your taxes. Its easy for hackers to get access to your personal information if you do so.



Xcel Energy recently warned customers in New Mexico and Texas about another round of scamming attempts.

Fake utility employees are calling to say someone is on their way to disconnect service unless a supposedly delinquent bill is paid immediately through use of a debit card. In some instances, the callers try to make their pitch even more convincing by providing the last four digits of the vehicle number of the serviceman they claim is on his way to disconnect service, the utility says.

The company is reminding customers that they will receive a notice in the mail before a serviceman is sent to disconnect the meter.

Ellen Marks is assistant business editor at the Albuquerque Journal. Contact her at emarks@abqjournal.com or 505-823-3842 if you are aware of what sounds like a scam. To report a scam to law enforcement, contact the New Mexico Consumer Protection Division toll-free at 1-844-255-9210a.
Police are on dealing with a man who is refusing to leave his home on Saturday evening on the 6700 block of Ranchitos NE, according to an Albuquerque Police Department spokesman.

Officer Simon Drobik said the incident began when the man threatened his neighbor earlier in the day with a weapon.

This is in the early stages of investigation, he said. Drivers should avoid the area.

Drobik did not identify the man or say what kind of weapon he had.
It would seem to be kind of a no-brainer.

Back in March, the New Mexico State Investment Council adopted a strengthened Council Code of Conduct requiring its 11 members to publicly affirm their fiduciary duty to the more than $22 billion they oversee for the state. There was nothing extraordinary about this updated ethics policy  in fact, virtually all trustees who manage pensions, endowments and sovereign wealth funds like New Mexicos are required to observe such a code. Its a promise to act only in the best interest of the funds, and acknowledgement of your $22 billion responsibility.

But four of the 11 members of the State Investment Council didnt see it that way. For five months, they let the new code linger, deflecting requests to sign it. One member said his attorneys were reviewing the code. One said that as an elected official he wasnt required to sign. One said he had no problem with the policy but felt he shouldnt be forced to acknowledge his duty in writing.

So last month, many months since the code draft was first discussed, seven members  a supermajority of the council  decided we could no longer stand by. Not signing the code, we argue, is equivalent to either admitting an ongoing conflict of interest, or worse, reserving the right to self-deal in the future. As a result, seven council members, including Gov. Susana Martinez, voted to sanction the four members who refused to put their pledge to paper.

Rather than accepting the basic need for ethical conduct requirements, sanctioned members doubled down with cries of politics!

Its worth noting that the seven members who voted to hold our fellow fiduciaries on the council accountable are a combination of Democrats, Republicans, and an independent. The four sanctioned members are also bipartisan: two Democrats and two Republicans. This fight is about fiduciary duty, not political smokescreens.

Republican Land Commissioner Aubrey Dunn, backed by the opinion of his own attorney, says his behavior on the council is already covered by the state Constitution and cites many legal reasons he cannot be required to sign the code. He has not explained, however, how his refusal to sign a code of ethics is in the best interests of permanent fund beneficiaries.

Tim Jennings, a Democrat and former legislative leader appointed to the council by the state Senate, says the code would somehow hide council actions from the public. That is simply not the case.

To clarify, the sanction and its penalties are not over-the-top. They say if you wont sign a code upholding the high standards required to responsibly invest billions, then you are barred from participating in the councils executive sessions and related public votes. These closed sessions, held only occasionally, cover confidential topics like litigation strategy and personnel matters. They are confidential by law, and for good reasons. That said, when the council reaches a decision in closed session, members are required to exit into the public forum and formally vote in open session. If theres no public vote, there is no action allowed, period.

In fact, one reason the council strengthened its code involves concerns that a council member improperly leaked privileged legal communications to third parties. That, and the subsequent discussion of confidential personnel matters outside of executive session, are not only unethical, they potentially put the funds at risk. Observing a code of conduct that guides fiduciary behavior is just a basic best practice.

Discord aside, New Mexicos Land Grant and Severance Tax Permanent Funds are writing a winning story. Investments for the fiscal year topped 13 percent, 1.5 percent higher than benchmarks and far exceeding annual return targets of 7 percent. The funds will produce a record $900 million in benefits for schools and taxpayers this year, saving the average N.M. household more than $1,100 in taxes. The funds are prudently invested, well-diversified and generating income for the state.

It can never be forgotten that these billions of permanent fund dollars havent always been managed properly. With a pay-to-play scandal less than a decade in the rear-view mirror, State Investment Council members should not make up excuses as to why they arent responsible fiduciaries who cant put their ethical promises in writing.
As expressed in the Aug. 30 board meeting, the Board of Regents sincerely appreciates the stakeholder input received both publicly and privately over the past couple of weeks. The input affirms the level of commitment and passion we are blessed with at New Mexico State University. While the university faces many challenges, the input has created a great opportunity to get the word out on some of the positive things happening at NMSU  accomplishments that are a result of exceptional people: students, staff, faculty, administration, and regents who enabled those successes and make up what NMSU is.

In the same meeting, the Board of Regents took the first step in charting the course for NMSUs future success  hiring the universitys top leader. Of great importance to the board is not to look one to two years down the road in its hiring decision, but rather seven to 10 years down the road.

Students needs and options for a college education are changing rapidly. We must anticipate to the best of our ability how to achieve strong student outcomes for the next decade, recognizing the needs of NMSU five years ago are different than the needs going forward.

Relative to our peer group and regional universities, NMSU has lost revenue-generation opportunities by not reversing multi-year trends in several key performance areas resulting in declining enrollment, retention, and research. The board has expressed in multiple public meetings the importance of maintaining a balanced focus between cutting the universitys costs and increasing revenue through student enrollment, student success outcomes and research.

This balanced focus is necessary not only because it is core to our mission but because it mitigates downward trends in public funding. Enrollment in 2011-2012 was 18,024 students. The projection for 2017-2018 is 14,432  a 19.9 percent decrease. Each 1 percent change in enrollment equates to about $1 million annual revenue. This has resulted in the need to cut more jobs, programs and resources that would not have been necessary had we performed closer to area peers.

The board has and will continue to show professionalism, confidentiality, restraint and integrity by not engaging in communication regarding personnel matters. As regents it is our job to uphold the mission of the university. Our decisions are based upon input from stakeholders, evaluation of data/performance metrics and what is necessary to serve the educational needs of New Mexicos diverse population.

Ultimately, long-term sustainability is achieved by success in the outcomes of the university relative to its mission.

It is our hope that as Aggies we will move forward Transforming lives through Discovery.

Rumors have also been circulated that the boards decision is the result of the governors interest in the position, or a result of her dissatisfaction with the chancellors position on the recent funding veto vote. Both rumors are absolutely false and a distraction to the important work ahead. The governor herself has publicly said she has no interest in seeking a N.M. university leadership role.

For the past three-plus years the board has set clear directional priorities for the chancellor and has monitored performance against these priorities. The details of these conversations are personnel-related and will remain confidential.

Finally, without question the board is deeply grateful to the chancellor and the NMSU team for the key contributions made  especially in improving graduation rates, development and unprecedented fundraising in the Ignite Aggie Campaign. So much so that the board has offered, and the chancellor is agreeable, to consider developing a key role for him at NMSU to continue to champion and contribute in those areas the chancellor most successfully impacted, including fundraising. We look forward to advancing these discussions with the chancellor once the search is concluded.
Compared to the other big news of our era, the story didnt get much attention  just a short article inside the A section of this newspaper and mostly minor treatment by other media outlets across the country.

But the Trump administrations decision to reopen a pipeline that funnels war-fighting weapons including tanks, grenade launchers and machine guns to U.S. police departments deserves closer scrutiny.

A week before Labor Day, U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced in a speech to the Fraternal Order of Police that he was canceling former President Obamas ban on the distribution of high-powered weaponry to local police departments, saying Obama went too far. Sessions said the Trump administration would resurrect the 1033 program that has flooded U.S. law enforcement agencies  including Albuquerques  with billions of dollars of fearsome gear from war zones in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Sessions decision sparked criticism from civil rights and police watchdog groups, who contend the weaponry is meant for the battlefield, not U.S. cities and towns. Critics have long argued the heavy weaponry fuels an us-against-them mentality among the police and the citizens they serve, especially in minority communities.

We will not put superficial concerns above public safety, Sessions countered in making the announcement, while assuring police they would get the lifesaving gear that you need to do your job and send a strong message that we will not allow criminal activity, violence and lawlessness to become the new normal.

Few want to deny police equipment to do their jobs safely, but under President Trump it seems the new normal is endorsing an aggressive  potentially even abusive  form of law enforcement. After all, Trump, who campaigned on law and order, seemed to condone at least a degree of police brutality in July when he told an audience of police officers please dont be too nice to thugs when arresting them and putting them into squad cars. For example, instead of protecting the suspects head from the metal door frame, you can take the hand away, OK? the president said, to significant applause.

Last month, the president seemed to disregard the rule of law himself when he pardoned Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio, whose deputies routinely violated Hispanics civil rights with racial profiling. The practice led to a criminal contempt conviction of Arpaio after he ignored a court order to stop. Now, Trump and his attorney general want to return to a practice of arming Americas police officers to the teeth at a time when police and the communities they serve need more trust, not less.

Regular Journal readers may recall a series I wrote in 2014 titled Mission Creep that documented the explosive growth of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, with an in-depth section on the departments role in militarizing police departments. In that piece, former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge assailed the regular use of battlefield gear such as Humvees by cops, calling it ridiculous.

Four months after the Journal published the series, police in Ferguson, Mo., responded to protests of the controversial killing of Michael Brown with tanks, tear gas, pepper spray and rubber bullets. The place erupted in violent riots. Soon after, Obama issued his executive order canceling the 1033 program.

Weve seen how militarized gear can sometimes give people a feeling like theres an occupying force as opposed to a force thats part of the community thats protecting them and serving them, Obama said at the time. It can alienate and intimidate local residents and send the wrong message.

Again, most dont begrudge police officers the weapons and other equipment they need to keep themselves and other citizens safe. In a high-crime city like Albuquerque, it may seem at times that violent criminals are winning the battle against civil society. Albuquerque Police Department Chief Gorden Eden didnt respond to a request for comment for this column, but it seems to me that while cops should be able to protect themselves and others, there should also be a degree of restraint in the types of equipment that is used. Some U.S. police departments have posted recruitment videos that celebrate their weaponry, while others flaunt their militarized might in public.

After Sessions announcement, Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, a libertarian-leaning Republican, offered a sensible compromise. His Stop Militarizing Law Enforcement Act would bar the transfer of military equipment deemed offensive such as weapons, but allow equipment used for defensive purposes, such as helmets or body armor.

Its a proposal that I hope gets a second look in Congress, especially since Sessions announcement last month didnt receive enough attention in the first place.

Email: mcoleman@abqjournal.com. Go to www.abqjournal.com/letters/new to submit a letter to the editor.
Bad Idea of the Week: Eliminating the presidentially appointed, nine-member Base Realignment and Closure Commission and relying instead on the Department of Defense and General Accounting Office to decide which U.S. military installations will be closed or shrunk.

It comes courtesy of Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Jack Reed, D-Rhode Island, party leads on the powerful Senate Armed Services Committee, who are suggesting moving forward with a new BRAC but eliminating the BRAC commission.

While theres no question the military has far more infrastructure than it needs, as well as firsthand knowledge of which infrastructure and missions are obsolete and which will take it into the next decades, simply turning defense lobbyists loose on the Pentagon is in no way preferable to allowing local communities  and outfits like the Kirtland Partnership Committee who live and work next to these installations  to make their cases to an independent BRAC commission.

No community wants to lose or shrink a base, but those that have them want theirs to be vibrant, with an essential mission that helps drive the local economy as well as national security. That goes hand-in-hand with why we have BRAC in the first place: Politicians have always been staunch promoters and defenders of military installations in their districts, sometimes for decades after those facilities are no longer needed for national defense. As a result, the military winds up with more bases, and maintenance costs, than it needs. Though the Pentagon has been calling for a new BRAC round for several years, pork-reliant Congress denied former President Barack Obamas requests for closures and realignments four times. Yet the Air Force says it has 25 percent more base infrastructure than it needs; the Army says it has 21 percent more base infrastructure than it needs  even if it added 25,000 troops; and the Center for Strategic and International Studies estimates the upkeep costs on excess properties cost the Pentagon $2 billion annually.

Secretary of Defense James Mattis says BRACs are the most significant and successful way of keeping the military lean and mean. But the proposal by McCain and Reed to severely curtail public input by allowing a mere 60-day public comment period  which could amount to little more than emails that are never read  is seriously flawed.

The current process, governed by the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Act of 1990, begins with a DoD threat assessment of the future national security environment, followed by development of a force structure plan and basing requirements to meet these threats. DoD then applies published selection criteria to determine which installations to recommend for realignment and closure, the secretary of Defense publishes a report with realignment and closure recommendations and sends it to an independent commission appointed by the president, in consultation with congressional leadership. This BRAC commission holds regional meetings to solicit public input prior to making its recommendations  thats when interested citizens have the opportunity to explain why their military base should be spared. The commission has the authority to change DoD recommendations if it determines they deviate from the force structure plan and/or selection criteria, and it forwards its recommendations to the president for review and approval, who then forwards the recommendations to Congress, which has 45 legislative days to act on the commission report on an all-or-nothing basis.

Even Sen. Martin Heinrich, a New Mexico Democrat who sits on the Senate Armed Services Committee, is skeptical of cutting out the BRAC commission  and he was in the camp that voted against initiating the base closure process four times. He says Im not sure what problems are addressed by a new version of BRAC that involves more lobbying.

Albuquerque businessman Sherman McCorkle, founder of the Kirtland Partnership Committee, is a veteran of the 1995 and 2005 BRAC rounds in New Mexico. He maintains the commission has been a critical part of the process, with community members allowed to make in-person presentations regarding the value of bases, to appeal and present evidence.

New Mexico fared well in the 1991, 1993, 1995 and 2005 BRACS  because New Mexicans in conjunction with Kirtland, Holloman and Cannon Air Force bases and the Armys White Sands Missile Range did their homework. Over the years there have been changes and new missions, and Heinrich points out as a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, I know that our best investment is to ensure our missions represent the future of our defense infrastructure  just look at the new Patriot missile detachment at White Sands, RPA mission and F-16s at Holloman, combat rescue helicopters at Kirtland, or special operations training infrastructure at Cannon weve successfully secured.

The United States needs right-sized military installations with meaningful missions that address national security today and for many tomorrows to come. The advent of fifth-generation stealth aircraft, remotely piloted drone warfare, cyber warfare and laser-firing helicopters show our military  and its infrastructure needs  continues to evolve. But our military bases are also integral parts of the larger communities they are in, and those communities are better situated to explain their value than a D.C. lobbyist, bureaucrat or politician.

Congress, which has rejected a BRAC for years, should not be allowed to summarily change the rules of engagement and kick the public off the BRAC battlefield. Yes, hard decisions need to be made, and bases need to be realigned and even closed. But history has shown that an independent commission and public meetings, where community members can make the best case for their military installations, make the BRAC process as open and fair a fight as possible.

This editorial first appeared in the Albuquerque Journal. It was written by members of the editorial board and is unsigned as it represents the opinion of the newspaper rather than the writers.
Copyright  2017 Albuquerque Journal

WASHINGTON  The White House is considering five names to replace retiring Judge Paul Kelly Jr. of Santa Fe on the federal 10th Circuit Court of Appeals  including one surprise contender who is raising eyebrows in New Mexicos legal community because of his lack of roots and legal experience in the state.

The list submitted by the White House to the states congressional delegation for review includes four candidates who fit the typical profile for what has traditionally been a New Mexico seat on the federal appeals court. They include Judge James Browning of the U.S. District Court in Albuquerque; Judge Miles Hanisee of the New Mexico Court of Appeals; Joel Carson, a lawyer with Carson Ryan law firm in Roswell and a part-time U.S. magistrate judge; and Ben Allison, a partner in the Santa Fe law firm of Bardacke Allison.

The surprising fifth name is William Levi, a 33-year-old Washington lawyer with the Sidley Austin firm, whose relatively short legal career has included stints clerking for Judge Anthony J. Scirica on the U.S. Court of Appeals and Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito Jr. He also served as chief counsel for Sen. Mike Lee, a Utah Republican, on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Levis family has owned the Ranney cattle ranch in Corona since 1968, according to the ranchs website, but Levi told the Washington Examiner in 2016 that his hometown was Fair Oaks, Calif.

His biography on the Sidley Austin website makes no mention of New Mexico, except to say he has been admitted to the state bar. He also worked on the House re-election campaign of former Rep. Heather Wilson, a New Mexico Republican, in 2006. Wilson is now secretary of the Air Force.

Andy Schultz of the Rodey Law Firm in Albuquerque said Levis lack of New Mexico legal practice  and relatively limited legal experience related to the other contenders in general  is an issue.

When I first saw his name on the list, my first reaction was who?  Shultz said of Levi. He was not born in New Mexico and as far as I know he was not raised in New Mexico. If you do a search online, you will see he has never been listed as a counsel of record in any appellate case coming from New Mexico, either in state or federal court, and hes never practiced with any New Mexico law firm.

Schultz said that, if Levi were to win the appointment, my perception is the legal community would be up in arms because they do not know this guy.

The 10th Circuit hears appeals from the states of New Mexico, Colorado, Oklahoma, Kansas, Utah, Wyoming and parts of Montana and Idaho. In addition to Kelly, Judge Harris Hartz of Albuquerque sits on the court now as does senior status Judge Bobby Baldock of Roswell.

University of New Mexico law professor Michael Browde also said Levi is an unknown in the New Mexico legal community.

He may have taken the New Mexico bar, but I wouldnt call him active in any sense, and I think thats somewhat offensive to the (New Mexico) bar as a whole, said. We pride ourselves on the number of New Mexico lawyers or practitioners who have been elevated to the federal bench. I think that is the tradition. The circuits are composed of active members of the bar of the various members of the circuit.

Levi, who did not respond to voice and email messages left by the Journal, could face tough sledding in the Senate confirmation process.

Sen Tom Udall, D-N.M. and a former New Mexico attorney general, wrote a letter to White House Counsel Donald McGahn II in August, noting that a New Mexico background is crucial to wining his vote for confirmation.

To gain my support, the presidents nominee must be a native New Mexican with a deep understanding of the legal issues that arise in the state, such as water rights, Indian law and public lands, Udall wrote in a letter to McGahn on Aug. 9, before the White House had forwarded its list of potential nominees to the New Mexico congressional delegation.

Udall also noted in the letter that Browning would be an excellent appellate court judge and I would accept his nomination contingent on a clean FBI background check and acceptable rating by the A.B.A (American Bar Association).

Former Sen. Pete Domenici, a Republican, wrote a letter to Udall recommending Browning  a Hobbs native and former deputy under Republican Attorney General Hal Stratton  for the job.

Browning has been on the federal bench since 2003. Levi, meanwhile, has just seven years of legal experience.

American Bar Association guidelines say a federal judicial nominee ordinarily should have at least twelve years experience in the practice of law.

In evaluating the professional qualifications of a nominee, the Committee recognizes that substantial courtroom and trial experience as a lawyer or trial judge is important, the American Bar Association guidelines also say.

One possible strike against Brownings nomination is his age  at 61 he may be considered too old for the post because presidential administrations often like to appoint younger judges to lifetime positions.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment on the 10th Circuit court appointment decision.

Despite his seeming lack of New Mexico roots, no one disputes that Levi is on an impressive career track and hails from a family with stellar legal credentials.

He comes with a blue-chip educational pedigree, having graduated from Stanford University and Yale Law School in addition to clerking for Scirica and Alito and working for Lee. His father is the dean of the Duke University law school. Levi is also the grandson of the late Edward H. Levi, who served as the United States attorney general from 1975 to 1977.

Several members of the delegation declined to comment last week on the candidates or on whether they have concerns about Levis New Mexico experience.

The New Mexico delegation continues to work together to identify and recommend qualified New Mexicans for presidential appointments, as it did with the U.S. Attorney and U.S. Marshal nominations, said Sens. Udall and Martin Heinrich  both Democrats  and Rep. Steve Pearce, a Republican, in a joint statement.
Copyright  2017 Albuquerque Journal

For the Record: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated the New Mexico Air National Guard participated in World War II. While other branches of the New Mexico National Guard were in World War II, the New Mexico Air National Guard was not recognized until 1947, after the wars end.

The New Mexico Air National Guard has a long history of heroism high above the rest of us.

The 188th Fighter Bomber Squadron was federally recognized in 1947.

From there, the unit served as fighters in the Korean and Vietnam conflicts and in the Middle East.

Today, now known as the 150th Special Operations Wing, it has been left without its own aircraft and without an operational flying mission.

Brig. Gen. Ken Nava, the New Mexico National Guards adjutant general, has made it his mission to see them both restored.

The 150th Special Operations Wing, the Tacos, they have a long legacy of service to our nation, Nava said. Theyve done incredible service to our nation in every conflict since their inception.

In 2010, the 21 F-16s flown that belonged to the unit were retired.

Their main mission became supporting Kirtlands 58th Special Operations Wing, maintaining its aircraft and assisting in training pararescuemen for the Air Force.

While Nava said that partnership is very, very rewarding, the lack of an operational flying mission means the unit misses out on training opportunities overseas and is unable to be deployed in combat.

The New Mexico Air National Guard is the only one in the country without an operational flying mission and one of three without its own aircraft.

A few of NMANGs smaller units are able to deploy, including the RED HORSE, acronym for Rapid Engineer Deployable Heavy Operational Repair Squadron Engineer squadron, which performs construction, and Intelligence Squadron.

One of the Air National Guards Capstone Principles provides that each states Guard have a unit-equipped wing and flying squadron to enable the Guard to deploy and employ as complete warfighting packages, not just augmentation personnel.

Nava said that, although he would love to see the Tacos return to a fighting mission, he is willing to take on whatever the Air Force needs them for.

In June testimony to the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense, Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M., questioned Secretary of the Air Force Heather Wilson on a path forward.

Her answer wasnt exactly optimistic.

As you well know, I have kind of a close affiliation and affection for the Tacos, and wed all like to see them have a flying mission again, said Wilson, a former U.S. representative for New Mexico. But the reality is the budget we have and the size of the force we have doesnt support it and we need to fix it.

The Air Force has 30 percent fewer Airmen and 37 percent fewer aircraft than it did in 1991, according to Air Force data.

 26 years of continuous combat operations and ongoing budget uncertainty have taken a toll on our Airmen, our readiness, and our equipment, reads the Air Forces Fiscal Year 2018 budget overview.

Nava acknowledged that acquiring new or used aircraft would be extremely expensive.

But the Guard already has 24 empty canopies and access to munition storage on Kirtland Air Force Base, he pointed out.

It (the cost of aircraft) would be minor compared to a facility that doesnt have what we have right now, he said.

Nava said he has been working with Air Force leadership, the congressional delegation and the Governors Office to find a path toward accomplishing the two goals.

New Mexico is a perfect location for additional aircraft, Sen. Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., said in a statement. I look forward to working with Maj. Gen. Nava in identifying the right aircraft for the New Mexico Air National Guard to operate and to working with the rest of the congressional delegation in seeking aircraft that makes sense for New Mexico, the Air Force, and the National Guard.

In the meantime, Nava said the NMANG is happy to continue assisting the 58th Special Operations Wing.

But he worries the lack of an operational flying mission and aircraft is hurting morale and retention for the unit, which has traditionally had the opportunity to train in Italy and the Philippines along with being deployed to conflicts around the world.

We have the New Mexico Air National Guard men and women that are ready, willing and able to accept an operational flying mission, he said. They are ready to accept the challenge of an aircraft, of an airframe, here that theyll learn and maintain and take care of.

Nava was named adjutant general in July. He said he hopes to make progress on the goals by the end of his five-year term.
The Albuquerque mother and three young boys whose disappearance triggered an Amber Alert and multistate search were found safe in southern California late Sunday, according to the Bernalillo County Sheriffs Office.

Detective Kyle Hartsock said at a news conference Sunday afternoon that Laria Walker-Anderson made threats against herself and her three young sons after leaving with them early Sunday morning.

Hartsock said Walker-Anderson had family in Southern California, and that BCSO was working with law enforcement there and in Arizona to find the group. Later in the day, the Amber Alert was extended to Arizona and five California counties.

Around 11:30 p.m., BCSO announced that the mother and her sons had been found in Lancaster, Calif., and were safe.

Lloyd Wyatt, 9, Lakai Wyatt, 8, and Lexxington Wyatt, 6, were reported missing around 5 a.m. Sunday morning. BCSO asked the public to keep an eye out for a silver Kia Spectra that was last seen headed west on Interstate 40 in the early morning hours on Sunday.

Hartsock said Walker-Anderson made the threats in a phone conversation with the father of her children. The family of five live together in a home near Gun Club and Coors, and Walker-Anderson has full custodial rights. Hartsock said that the vehicle was equipped with a handgun.

Hartsock said Sunday afternoon that there were no criminal charges pending against Walker-Anderson and the department was focused only on ensuring all four are safe.

With those statements combined with the age and the vulnerability of the children, he said, we have a very high concern just to physically see them with our own eyes and make sure theyre OK.

A sheriffs office spokeswoman said late Sunday that the incident remained under investigation and additional details would be released Monday morning.
SPOKANE, Wash.  The four members of a well-known Polish death metal band have been arrested on suspicion of kidnapping a woman after a concert last month in Washington state, authorities said.

The members of the band Decapitated were arrested early Saturday in Santa Ana, California, on suspicion of kidnapping a woman after their Aug. 31 concert in Spokane, Spokane Police Department spokeswoman Cpl. Teresa Fuller said in a statement.

The woman told police just before 2 a.m. on Sept. 1 about the alleged kidnapping by the band members, Fuller said. The band had performed at a concert in downtown Spokane. The woman attended the heavy metal concert, Fuller said.

Band members were arrested by the Los Angeles County Sheriffs Office after their Friday night concert in Santa Ana, Fuller said. They are 27-year-old Michal M. Lysejko, 35-year-old Waclaw J. Kieltyka, 31-year-old Rafal T. Piotrowski, and 30-year-old Hubert E. Wiecek. All are Polish citizens.

They are being held in the Los Angeles County Jail and will face extradition to Spokane, Fuller said.

Steve Graham, the bands Spokane-based defense attorney, told the Spokane Spokesman-Review that the band members are innocent of the accusations.

There is another side to this, he told the newspaper. We have witnesses that can testify to the fact that the accuser came to visit (the) band of her own free will and left on good terms.

Graham said he told police that the band members had offered to surrender but never heard anything back.

The attorney said he fears the band members will spend weeks in the Los Angeles County Jail before being returned to Spokane. But Graham told the newspaper that the four will not fight extradition and will return to Spokane willingly.

The band, founded in Poland in 1996, has won critical acclaim for its albums among fans of death metal.
Auctioned at the Ferrari 70th Anniversary sale at Fiorano by RM Sothebys, the final Aperta found itself an owner with 8.3 million to spare. Translating to almost $10 million, the 210th Aperta supersedes the 500th LaFerrari in being the most expensive 21st century car sold at auction. Yup, new record.As mentioned in the original story on the final Ferrari LaFerrari Aperta , all the proceeds from the sale will be donated to Save the Children, an international organization that works to improve the lives of disadvantaged children in over 120 countries worldwide. On this occasion, the raised funds will be used by the non-governmental organization for educational projects in Asia and Africa.Not planned for production when the LaFerrari Aperta went official, the 210th example of the breed prides itself on a one-off livery, combining Rosso Fuoco paint with two Bianco Italia racing stripes on the hood and tail. Further beautified by 70th Anniversary badges, the car feels just as special inside thanks to the red piping and stitching, plus the exposed carbon fiber trim.Despite it being rarer and more expensive than the coupe, the LaFerrari Aperta doesnt differ from its fixed-head peer when it comes to performance. With 950 horsepower (963 PS) coming from a naturally aspirated V12 and a mild-hybrid KERS system, the LaFerrari Aperta will happily hit 217 miles per hour (350 km/h) provided that the driver finds a long enough stretch of road.At the event, RM Sothebys found new owners for a handful of other exotic machines with the Prancing Horse logo adorning the hood. An example of the California 250 GT SWB , for instance, sold for 7.9 million. A 250 GT Cabriolet Series I brought in 4.7 million, while an aluminum-bodied 365 GTB/4 found slumbering in a Japanese hayloft was auctioned for 1.8 million.
kW

Known as the XV50, the former-generation Camry is the best-selling mid-size car in Australia. In fact, the record run hasnt been broken since 1994, which is a testament to how popular the Camry is outside of the United States. The imminent stop of local manufacturing puts an end to a story that started with the Tiara in 1963, but the business decision has been taken back in 2014. Toyota Australia staff will drop from 4,000 to 1,300 people once Altona shuts down the assembly line, with the remaining workforce moving from blue-collar manufacturing to white-collar jobs. After October 3, the Australia-spec Camry will be imported from the Tsutsumi factory in Japans Aichi prefecture.Marking the end of local Camry production, Toyota came up with the Commemorative Edition. Only 54 examples will be offered, each one representing a year of Australian manufacturing. Based on the Atara SL trim level, the Camry Commemorative Edition benefits from hybrid oomph.With 151(202 horsepower; 205 PS) of maximum power from the combination between 2.5-liter inline-four engine and electric motor, the special edition returns 5.2 liters per 100 kilometers. Thats 45.2 miles per gallon in U.S. currency, which is exceptionally frugal for a car of this size.Priced at AUD 41,150, the Commemorative Edition is AUD 710 more expensive than the trim level on which its based. Needless to say, it comes with all the bells and whistles imaginable, including autonomous braking, JBL audio system, leather-accented seats, and premium sat-nav system."One of the 54 Commemorative Camrys will be kept by Toyota Australia and another sent for display at the Toyota Motor Company Museum in Japan, confirming our parent company's high regard for the employee commitment, local engineering input and quality achieved in 54 years of local manufacture, commented Toyota Australia head honcho Dave Buttner.
Trump shouts to reporters as he walks with first lady Melania Trump to Marine One on the South Lawn yesterday. Evan Vucci / AP

A Trump adviser says that after a tumultuous seven months in office, it had finally dawned on the president: "People really [email protected]&@ing hate me." For someone who has spent his life lapping up adulation, however fake, it was a harsh realization. This is a man with an especially acute need for affirmation.

This week's bear hug of Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer opened Trump's eyes to one solution: Stop doing things that people hate, and start striking deals.

Who knows if this will stick. But there's reason to think it might, according to Trump's friends and aides. Here's why, based on conversations Jonathan Swan and I had in the aftermath of the surprising deal:

He can blame Republicans for his troubles. Trump has convinced himself he was duped by GOP leaders into repealing health care and blowing his first seven months on a fool's errand. If he can strike a few deals, he can reshape history to make the party  not himself  the culprit.

He can please the kids and New Yorkers. With the banishment of Bannon and his allies, Trump is left with a largely moderate to Democratic staff.

With the banishment of Bannon and his allies, Trump is left with a largely moderate to Democratic staff. A senior administration official said of Trump's deal with Chuck and Nancy: "He just wanted to do something popular." He's reveling in the coverage, including lavish praise from "Morning Joe."

said of Trump's deal with Chuck and Nancy: "He just wanted to do something popular." He's reveling in the coverage, including lavish praise from "Morning Joe." He can spend money, not take it away. Trump hates complex topics and gravitates to things you can build, such as planes or new infrastructure projects.

not take it away. Trump hates complex topics and gravitates to things you can build, such as planes or new infrastructure projects. Remember he told Republican senators the House healthcare bill was "one mean sonofabitch." He said he wanted the Senate version to be much more generous, with no worry about cost.

Republican senators the House healthcare bill was "one mean sonofabitch." He said he wanted the Senate version to be much more generous, with no worry about cost. One senator recalled Trump saying: "We're going to have so much ... economic growth, that we'll have so much money  more than you imagine."

Trump saying: "We're going to have so much ... economic growth, that we'll have so much money  more than you imagine." He can liberate himself. He feels boxed in inside the White House and felt handcuffed to GOP leaders. No more. He had it with McConnell  thinks he's past his prime, no longer capable of leading. Considers him low-energy. He has much more natural rapport with Schumer, a friend from the New York days.

Be smart: With the expiration of vehicles allowing simple-majority votes in the Senate, Trump achievements soon will require substantial Democratic votes. So he was going to have to pivot at some point anyway, building bridges and finding new dance partners.

But we can't overstate the level of despair among Republicans. One person very close to Republican leadership told us: "He accepted a shakedown when he was holding all the cards. ... This is quite literally a guy who watches 'ER' trying to perform a surgery."

Will it stick? With Trump, who the hell knows?
10 September 2017 11:25 (UTC+04:00)

By Trend

The First Summit on Science and Technology of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) has kicked off in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan.

President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev is attending the Summit.

President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev greeted President Aliyev and other heads of state and government.

The Summit participants posed together for photographs.

An initiative of President Nazarbayev, the First OIC Summit on Science and Technology is attended by heads of state and government, ministers responsible for science and technology from 57 countries, and nearly 80 delegates from observer countries and international organizations.

The Summit opened with the recitation of verses from the Quran.

Addressing the opening session, President Nazarbayev expressed his confidence that the Summit will give impetus to cooperation in the Islamic world.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, President of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan Mamnoon Hussain and other heads of state made speeches.

The Summit aims to identify priorities, goals and targets for the advancement and promotion of science, technology and innovation in the OIC Member States.

The Summit, which is the first ever meeting of heads of state and government devoted exclusively to science and technology, will set the stage for shaping the future of science and technology agenda, reaffirm the commitment of the leadership to science and technology at the highest level and identify priorities, targets and recommended actions for the Muslim countries in the field of science and technology for the next decade.

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10 September 2017 17:15 (UTC+04:00)

By Azertag

A meeting of religious leaders of Azerbaijan, Russia and Armenia is a positive result. These meetings will have a positive impact on the relations between the peoples, Chairman of the Caucasus Muslims Office Sheikhulislam Allahshukur Pashazade has told AZERTAC as he commented on a meeting of Azerbaijani, Russian and Armenian religious leaders in Moscow.

Pashazade noted that the trilateral meeting once more shows that there is no alternative to a peaceful solution to the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. This conflict must be solved within the international law.

During the meeting we heard some accusations from the Armenian Catholicos. I raised the issue of release of the Azerbaijanis held captive by the Armenians, said Pashazade.

He noted that the Armenian Catholicos also recalled the April events, adding I told him that those battles occurred in Azerbaijani lands. I also expressed my concern over the fact that our religious monuments, mosques in the Armenian territories and in our occupied lands are in very bad conditions. I read prayers in most of those mosques. But now those mosques are destroyed.

Pashazade noted that the Armenian Catholicos alleged that the Armenian church in Baku is also in very poor conditions. I invited Russian Patriarch Kirill to Baku to visit the Armenian church.

Pashazade said that the religious leaders should help normalize relations between the two peoples. Armenia must return Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent districts. And then heads of state, politicians can consider a status for the Nagorno-Karabakh, of course, within Azerbaijan`s territorial integrity, he added.

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10 September 2017 17:58 (UTC+04:00)

By Azertag

Indonesia will host the Days of Azerbaijani Culture next year. This was agreed by Azerbaijani Deputy Minister of Culture and Tourism Adalat Valiyev and Indonesian ambassador Husnan Bey Fanani as they met on the sidelines of the second Indonesian Cultural Festival, which kicked off in Baku.

Valiyev said Azerbaijan wants to organize Culture Days so that Indonesias 270 million population familiarize themselves with our cultural values.

The Indonesian ambassador welcomed the idea, and expressed his readiness to assist in organizing events promoting Azerbaijan`s culture.

Husnan Bey Fanani also revealed plans to open an Azerbaijani center in Jakarta. I am conducting negotiations with appropriate officials in Jakarta, said the ambassador, stressing the role of culture in developing relations between the two countries.

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10 September 2017 10:56 (UTC+04:00)

By Trend

Frances Emmanuel Macron discussed increased pressure and sanctions on North Korea on the telephone with U.S. President Donald Trump and Japans Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Saturday, the French presidents office said, Reuters reported.

The three leaders stressed the need for a united and firm reaction from the international community toward Pyongyang, Macrons office said.

South Korea was bracing on Saturday for a possible further missile test by North Korea as it marked its founding anniversary, just days after its sixth and largest nuclear test.

The French presidency said North Koreas repeated provocations were a threat to peace and international security. It also said Macron had expressed Frances solidarity with Japan.

Tension on the Korean peninsula has escalated as North Koreas leader, Kim Jong Un, has stepped up the development of weapons, testing a string of missiles this year, including one flying over Japan.

Experts believe the Pyongyang government is close to its goal of developing a powerful nuclear weapon capable of reaching the United States, something U.S. President Trump has vowed to prevent.

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10 September 2017 11:20 (UTC+04:00)

By Trend

Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim Saturday reiterated his country's determination in fighting terror organizations PKK and Daesh, Anadolu reported.

Yidirim was peaking at an opening ceremony of a youth center named after a murder victim as part of events commemorating the 95th anniversary of western Izmirs liberation from Greek forces.

What we thought about when naming this center after Yasin Boru is: This country will always maintain its unity, solidarity, and brotherhood. The city of Izmir is the symbol unity and solidarity, Yildirim said.

We do not want to see our young ones be part of dark feuds, he added.

On Oct. 5, 2014, 16-year-old Yasin Boru and his friends, Ahmet Dakak, Riyat Gunes and Hasan Gokguz, who were distributing food aid to syrian refugees, were chased down and lynched by alleged pro-PKK supporters on the second day of Eid al-Adha.

The murderers had accused Boru and his friends of being Daesh members before killing them, according to the indictment.

A court in Ankara on April 24 convicted 24 out of 41 suspects, sentencing them to life in prison for their involvement in the murder of the teenagers.

The court said the sentence had been handed down for "killing by torture and with atrocious feelings" as well as "disrupting the unity and territorial integrity of the state".

The prime minister attended a number of other events in Turkeys third largest city for the anniversary, including a groundbreaking ceremony for three stadiums, an opening ceremony for a new line of a commuter rail system and another for a 250-bed hospital.

The Greek occupied Izmir on May 15, 1919. It was one of the events that sparked the war between Turkey and Greece. On Sept. 9, 1922, the Turkish Army took Izmir back after a three-year occupation.

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10 September 2017 12:25 (UTC+04:00)

By Trend

Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had a phone conversation with U.S. President Donald Trump on Saturday, according to Turkish Presidency, Anadolu reported.

Two leaders, said a statement by the Presidential Press Office, agreed to hold a private meeting during the upcoming UN General Assembly in New York later this month.

During the phone talk, Erdogan and Trump also stressed Turkey-US strategic partnership as well as the importance of continuing joint efforts to further strengthen the bilateral relations and promote stability in the region.

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Diane Meyer of St. Helena recently began an internship with the Certified Angus Beef brand while completing a research-oriented masters degree in ag communications at Texas Tech in Lubbock.

Meyer holds a BS in animal science from Cal Poly, with minors in ag business and communications.

Currently serving on the Certified Angus Beef team, Meyer writes a wide range of articles and news releases that help connect the brand with its cattle producing member-owners and their customers.
10 September 2017 12:54 (UTC+04:00)

By Trend

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, at a meeting in Astana on Sunday evening called for expansion of bilateral ties.

The two presidents have arrived in the Kazakh capital to attend the First Science and Technology Summit of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), the official news website of the Iranian president reported.

During the meeting, President Rouhani said that facilitating banking ties would help the two neighboring countries to boost the level of bilateral trade to $30 billion.

The two presidents further touched upon the situation of Rohingya Muslims, with Hassan Rouhani urging for the cessation of violence there.

The Iranian president further said that his country is ready to dispatch humanitarian aid to the crisis zones.

In his turn, the Turkish president also said that the officials of Myanmar should immediately stop the violence against Muslims.

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10 September 2017 16:20 (UTC+04:00)

By Trend

Iranian gold producers are taking proper measures to improve their international ranking through increasing the quality of the products, an official with Tehran Gold and Jewelry Union told Trend.

Ahmad Vafadar has said that Iranian producers have recently imported state of the art technologies from Italy which would defiantly leave a positive impact on the industry in the near future.

Speaking about Iranian gold producers international ranking he said that the country currently is among the top six gold producers.

He further called for cooperation between entrepreneurs from his country and Azerbaijan in the gold industry, saying there are suitable opportunities for cooperation between the two neighboring countries.

Gold price has been in surge over the past weeks in Iranian market. Per gram of the 18-karat gold hit $ 32.3 (1.258 million rials) in the Iranian market on Sep. 7.

The surge in the global prices and a recent decision by the Central Bank of Iran appear to be among main reasons causing the price hike in the countrys gold market.

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Californias labor unions should have been celebrating on this Labor Day because theyve been on a political roll.

Overall union membership in California, 2.6 million, is by far the most of any state, according to the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics, and at 15.9 percent of the states workers, is one of the nations highest.

Over half of those members are government workers and their unions and their private sector brethren spend tens of millions of dollars each year on campaign contributions, lobbyists and other forms of political action.

They are also the most important component of the states dominant Democratic Party, demonstrated by the recent election of labor union official Eric Bauman as state Democratic chairman.

Union leaders have not been shy about using that clout. At their behest, dozens, or even hundreds, of bills are introduced in each legislative session, and while not all make it into law, many  especially those sponsored by the public sector unions  are successful.

The efforts of private economy unions often face stiff opposition from business and employer groups, but theres only weak opposition to the public worker unions from taxpayer organizations.

The current legislative session, which will end on Sept. 15, offers numerous examples of efforts by unions to enhance themselves.

The drive by the states construction trades unions to extend prevailing wage laws on public works projects to private developments is one. Its included in several bills, including the major effort to reduce local red tape for much-needed housing construction, Senate Bill 35.

One of the more controversial union bills, Assembly Bill 1250, would virtually bar county governments from using private contractors or even non-profit groups to provide services.

The California State Association of Counties is opposed, of course, but has been unable to persuade union-oriented legislators to back off. The counties only hope may be Gov. Jerry Brown, who has an on-again, off-again relationship with unions and whose Department of Finance is highly critical of the measure.

The California Nurses Association used its influence to gain Senate passage of sweeping legislation to establish a universal health care system in California, and also mounted a nearly successful drive to block Baumans election despite his union affiliation and his professional background as a nurse.

When Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon halted further action in his house this year, saying the health bill lacked too many details, including a financing mechanism, the CNA launched vitriolic and personal advertising against him.

One win for the unions in the Capitol this year indirectly symbolizes a potential threat to their continued political clout.

A budget trailer bill gives unions mandatory access to newly hired state, local and school employees for orientation, including personal email addresses and other data that the legislation prohibits anyone else from receiving.

The reason: the U.S. Supreme Court was on the verge of barring public employee unions from collecting dues from non-members when conservative Justice Antonin Scalia died. However, another case on the issue is looming, and it could deprive unions of untold million of political dollars.

The trailer bill helps the unions retain their memberships, should the case succeed, while denying anti-union right-to-work groups a similar ability to contact public employees.

Nor is that the only threat on the horizon. A case now pending in the state Supreme Court could overturn the long-held legal assumption that public employee pension benefits, once granted, cannot be reduced.

If unions lose that case, it will touch off a political war since governments retirement costs have been escalating sharply, and will become a new test of their hegemony.
Right-wing US radio host Rush Limbaugh, who has suggested that the "panic" caused by the hurricanes benefits retailers, the media and climate change activists, abandoned his south Florida studio ahead of Hurricane Irma.

Limbaugh recently claimed the media is manufacturing unwarranted panic about Irma as part of a plot to hype climate change, boost ratings and increase advertising revenue from businesses that stand to make money from purchases of batteries and bottled water.

Limbaugh then accused The Washington Post and other news outlets of twisting his words while simultaneously doubling down on his conspiracy theory on Thursday.

"I explained how severe weather events are opportunities for big ratings boosts in the media and explained how it happens," he said.
But when Luca was still unwell on Thursday, Michelle grew increasingly concerned. "He kept saying 'mummy, my tummy hurts'. He looked so sick and he was very lethargic. He wasn't at all well," she said. Michelle called the clinic again and made an appointment for Friday. The GP again diagnosed gastroenteritis. No pathology tests were ordered. By Monday morning, February 27, his condition was dire. He started vomiting a brown syrupy liquid. His cheeks were sunken. She called the medical centre and described Luca's condition. She was told that the earliest appointment available was in the afternoon.

"I couldn't wait. I said 'Luca, just go to the toilet and we'll get in the car and go to hospital," Michelle said. But he was too weak to even walk to the toilet without his older brother's support. Luca Raso with his mother Michelle Degenhardt Credit:Max Mason-Hubers "That's when I realised he was too sick to get down the stairs to the car so I called for an ambulance. "While I was on the [Triple Zero call] I heard him fall at the toilet and start groaning."

Michelle found Luca on the floor, his eyes rolling back into his head and his teeth clenched. Luca's heart had stopped. Michelle and Luca's brother started CPR. "It was the most horrific thing," Michelle said. Paramedics arrived, taking over CPR, and starting defibrillation and adrenalin. They rushed Luca to Tomaree Local Hospital, continuing CPR in the ambulance. Hospital staff worked on Luca for about two hours, getting his heart going but only momentarily, Michelle said.

He was rushed to a larger tertiary hospital under police escort, but he died before he reached the second hospital. "I just kept saying 'he's just got gastro, he's just got gastro. We live in Australia. People don't die from gastro," Michelle said. "I didn't find out until the next day what it really was." An autopsy report would later confirm Luca died of peritonitis complicated by ruptured gangrenous appendicitis. "It was like I was suspended in time. I could hear people speaking but I couldn't take it in. I was hysterical. A mess. I couldn't understand what was happening," she said.

"As a mother, as soon as you get pregnant you'd do everything the doctor tells you to keep your child healthy. "We keep all our faith and trust in them. But people just can't afford to take a doctor's word as gospel. "My son died of a completely preventable condition." Luca Raso was a happy, otherwise healthy 13-year-old who loved Credit:Max Mason-Hubers Luca's case went before a local magistrate acting as an assistant coroner. The magistrate is investigating the matter further and will be back before the assistant coroner on 16 November.

Michelle wants the magistrate to recommend a formal coronial inquest to investigate the circumstances surrounding her son's death. "That's the only thing I can do for my son now: find out how this could possibly have happened and to do something so it never happens again," she said "I want someone to explain to me, where are the standards and policies and procedures to make sure this doesn't happen ever again? "What kind of health system allows a perfectly healthy boy to die of something as preventable and curable of [complications from] appendicitis? "How does something like this happen?"

Michelle had called the clinic five times between Wednesday and Saturday, and Luca had been taken to the clinic twice. "I'm told like some neurotic mother that he has gastro. "It wasn't gastro and now my boy is gone." Michelle Degenhardt of Soldiers Point is pushing for a coronial inquest into the death of her son Luca Raso, 13. Luca died of peritonitis as a result of appendicitis which his GP failed to identify. Pic shows Michelle loking through an album of pictures of Luca, in the kitchen of her home. Picture: Max Mason-Hubers MMH Credit:Max Mason-Hubers Michelle's warning to parents is to trust their instincts when it concerns the welfare of their children.

"As a mother, you just know. You just have a sixth sense that something's not right." Medical negligence lawyer at Maurice Blackburn Libby Brookes said the firm was investigating whether there was a breach of duty of care by the GP who examined Luca during the two consultations. "People shouldn't be dying of appendicitis, especially a child," Ms Brookes said. Current practice standards stipulate GPs should take a detailed history, conduct a thorough examination and assess a patient's symptoms, and order pathology tests when appropriate. "The question is whether or not a proper examination was performed in this case and whether Luca's symptoms should have led to more testing being done," Ms Brookes said.

"We want to make sure that any lessons that can be learned from this tragic death are fully explored. "Parents need to know it's okay to seek a second opinion and to ask questions." The common symptoms of appendicitis are abdominal pain, fever, nausea and vomiting, and diarrhoea. The condition can be difficult to diagnose, according to state and commonwealth health resources. It is usually diagnosed by examining the patient and discussing symptoms. Blood and urine tests, and ultrasound can help make a diagnosis. Because appendicitis is life-threatening, doctors will often err on the side of caution and recommend an appendectomy if there is not a definitive diagnosis. A negative appendectomy rate  removing a healthy appendix  of 10 to 20 per cent is deemed acceptable, considering the fatal risks of overlooking appendicitis.

The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP) declined to comment on the standards and training in place for GPs and clinics while Luca's case was before the assistant coroner. A study published on Monday found fewer than half of parents are completely confident in their GP's ability to care for their children. The national survey of 2100 parents published in the Journal of Paediatrics and Child Health found just 44 per cent were completely confident their GP could handle "almost all general health issues" for their children. The authors at the University of Melbourne concluded this diminished confidence in GPs could be contributing to overcrowding in emergency departments as parents sought medical care for children with lower-urgency conditions. "People should never be discouraged from going to an emergency department," Ms Brookes said.
About 30 workers were exposed to contaminated water for almost six months after a plumbing error at Canberra's main sewerage treatment facility.

The contractors - working to upgrade the Lower Molonglo Water Quality Control Centre - drank and washed in the non-potable water after it was incorrectly connected to two demountable work sites and the liquid waste receival facility bathrooms and fire services.

Allen Robinson, 60, was exposed to non-potable water after a plumbing error at Canberras main sewerage treatment facility. Credit:Rohan Thomson

Tests on the water, conducted immediately after the issue was identified, revealed it contained levels of lead and copper above Australian Drinking Water standards.

Information sent to workers outlined other potential microbiological and chemical contaminants, including hepatitis, cryptosporidium, pharmaceuticals, and industrial chemcials.
An 87-year-old woman died after being hit by a van driven by a 90-year-old man in a supermarket car park in Melbourne's southeast on Saturday.

The driver and the dead woman were from Moama.

A woman has died after being hit by a 90-year-old driver in a shopping centre car park. Credit:Paul Rovere

A worker said an older driver had struck his wife in the Woolworths car park at Lakeview Shopping Centre in Patterson Lakes.

Paramedics were called to the corner of Thompson Road and Gladesville Boulevard about 12.40pm.
A violent home invader who is alleged to have bashed a 65-year-old woman in Perth's southern suburbs before stealing her car and handbag and going on a rampage through surrounding streets will appear in court on Sunday.

The 18-year-old Tuart Hill man has been charged with aggravated burglary, aggravated robbery, stealing a motor vehicle and reckless driving after allegedly breaking into a home on Sixth Road on Wednesday afternoon.

The man is alleged to have punched Mary to the ground and kicked her in a relentless assault. Credit:9 News Perth

His alleged victim, known only as Mary, told 9 News Perth how she got out of her car in her driveway at about 5.10pm when the man followed her inside and attacked her in the living room.

"I turned around and this man just walked straight past the doorway and I said to him 'Oi, get out' and he turned around and said to me 'Where's your car keys'," she said.
Phnom Penh: Cambodia's main opposition party will boycott a parliamentary vote to strip their detained leader of immunity on Monday and will instead go to Kem Sokha's jail to demand his release, one of his deputies said on Sunday.

Kem Sokha, the head of the Cambodian National Rescue Party (CNRP), was arrested a week ago and charged with treason for allegedly plotting to win power with the support of the United States, escalating a crackdown on critics of Prime Minister Hun Sen and independent media ahead of a general election next year.

Two aid groups run by the publisher of the Cambodia Daily, shut a week ago in a dispute over a crippling tax bill, said they were suspending work after their accounts were frozen.

Parliament is due to vote on whether to remove the immunity from prosecution which Kem Sokha gets as an elected member of parliament. The ruling Cambodian People's Party's (CPP) majority means the motion is certain to pass anyway.
'Personally, I love a great love story," Meghan Markle tells the October issue of US Vanity Fair. Don't we all? And if it's stuffed full of romantic tropes, so much the better: the prince and the showgirl, the Anglo-American romance (a burbling Richard Curtis-style Brit rendered eloquent by the force of his love), the older woman with a past, the girl from the wrong side of the tracks... With almost nothing to go on since it was revealed that Prince Harry was in a relationship with the 36-year-old American divorcee last November, we've worked our way through every one of these tropes, never getting any closer to finding out the truth behind one of most intriguing royal love stories since Edward and Wallis.

Now, thanks to Markle's most in-depth interview to date, we've been given a glimpse of a relationship that looks stable, durable, and increasingly likely to be formalised soon.

Meghan Markle has revealed she was dating Prince Harry for six months before it became public.

"At the end of the day I think it's really simple," the Suits star tells Sam Kashner, Vanity Fair's contributing editor. "We're two people who are really happy and in love. We were very quietly dating for about six months before it became news, and I was working during that whole time, and the only thing that changed was people's perception. I'm still the same person."

Anyone who has come across Markle in LA, where the actress was born and raised by her African-American social worker mother, Doria Ragland, will confirm this. That's if you can get them to talk to you at all. "People are really protective of Meghan," says one industry acquaintance. "She's extremely well liked and since she's started dating Harry, her friends and co-stars have formed a wall around her. She's in a very tight-knit group of girlfriends (the closest of whom are actresses Abigail Spencer, Priyanka Chopra and fashion designer Misha Nonoo), and when she's not in Toronto filming Suits, she stays with her mum and sticks to the same restaurants and bars she's been going to for years."
Power Grid Corporation Of India Limited (PGCIL) has released an official employment notification, calling out for candidates to apply for the posts of Executive Trainee. Interested candidates must follow the procedure given here to apply for the job.

Vacancy Availability

Company

Power Grid Corporation of India Limited

Name of the post

Executive Trainee

Number of posts

Not disclosed

Departments recruiting

Electrical

Electronics

Civil

Computer Science

Eligibility

Educational Qualification

Full Time B.E./B.Tech/ B.Sc(Engg.) from recognized University/ Institute who have done their course in any of the following disciplines:

Electrical/ Electrical (Power)/ Electrical and Electronics/ Power Systems Engineering/ Power Engineering (Electrical)

Electronics / Electronics & Communication/ Electronics & Telecommunication / Electronics &

Electrical Communication / Telecommunication Engineering

Civil Engineering

Computer Science/ Computer Engg./ Information Technology

Marks required

Minimum 65% or Equivalent CGPA

Age limit

Candidates must have completed 28 years as on 31.12.2017

Selection Process

Candidates will be selected on the basis of GATE scores, a written test and interview.

IBPS CWE Clerk Recruitment 2017: Apply from September 12!

Note:

Selected candidates must sign a bond of three years which is subject to compensation of money if not followed.

Salary Details

During training, the candidates will be paid Rs. 8.6 lakhs per annum and after the completion of the period, they will get an increment of salary that is raised to 15 lakhs.

How to apply for the Power Grid Corporation of India Limited Recruitment 2018?

In order to apply for the Power Grid Corporation of India Limited recruitment, follow the steps given here:

Register and attend GATE 2018

Procure good percentage of score above 85 in GATE

Log on to the official website of PGCIL

Click on the registration link and enter the necessary details

Upload your GATE scores and all other requisite documents for verification

Click to submit

Complete the registration process

Dates to remember

Last date to apply for GATE: 5 October 2017

PGCIL application starting date: 5 January 2018

Last date to apply for PGCIL recruitment: 31 January 2018

Also Read: Vizag Steel Recruitment 2018: Apply through GATE Scores
Students live a life which has too much going on the whole time. There is the academics, and the continuous pressure to excel at examinations. Following this would be peer pressure, and the expectations of their own friends. Students also have their own dreams and desires to fulfill. In all of this going on at the same time, there is a lot of friction that generates which results in stress.

Young minds, that are not ready to take on the world's tough ways might not be able to take the stress in a good way. Many students look for escape from such situations, and one of the most gruesome ways that students decide to trod on is Suicide.

One must really understand a child's situation and what goes on their headsbefore making statements. And most importantly, parents must make sure that they do not say such things, or express their thoughts in such a way that students are forced to take extreme steps.

World Suicide Prevention Day

World Suicide Prevention Day is a day of awareness that is observed on September 10 of every year. This day is kept to observe a global commitment and focus on the prevention of suicides.

The International Association for Suicide Prevention along with the World Health Organization and World Federation for Mental Health hosts the day. More than 800,000 people die each year because of suicide.

It is not uncommon to hear a news piece about a suicide because of failure in examination, or because of stress caused by bullying at schools or colleges among students.

It is very sad, but we must also know one thing that, as parents we must make sure that our children do not take such steps. So on this World Suicide Prevention Day, let us understand a bit more about suicide and try to prevent it in our society.

Among the young population, there can be many reasons to take the extreme step. One must accept that at a young age, students are under a lot of stress and don't know any better.

There are a few reasons that we usually see for suicides:

Bullying

Sexual Ornamentation

Mental health Issues

failure at examinations

Cyber bullying and Abuse

Sexual Abuse

Domestic Abuse

Neglect

You may say that not everyone goes through all of this. That might be true, but that's one reason we face so much problem to find out what's wrong. We are ignorant. We can't accept that any these is or was happening to our kids.

These are the tendencies that you need to look for in your children, if you think they are suicidal:

Withdrawing from social situations, family and peers

Showing less interest in activities they were previously interested in

Finding difficulty in focusing on schoolwork

Changes in personality that are visible

Changes in eating habits

Changes in sleep pattern

Drug or Alcohol abuse

Loss of the ability to stand praise or rewards

Remember these are some of the signs. If you are concerned about you ward, or any one whom you think is suicidal, then you must approach a professional in medical and emergency services like a psychiatrist, counseller or a psychologist.

What Can you as Parents do to Prevent Suicide?

Understand, Accept and Be Serious

You need to know the gravity of the situation. Do not push this aside as one of their tantrums. Today you take a right move and you might be saving your child's life in future. Do not cast them and their problems away and accept the fact that children can feel extreme pressure and that they can break too.

Listen and Talk

One of the best things you can do is to develop a system where you and your child keep conversing with each other about whatever you have in your mind.

While doing so listen to them. They might say something, which might hint at something big. Remember to not be paranoid, at everything that they tell you and start accepting them.

How to Keep Out Children from Blue Whale Challenge?

Don't leave Them

If you think your ward is having thoughts about suicide, or if they have told you make sure you are in some way always around them. Keep their mind away, until professional help comes. Don't leave them alone.

Get Professional Help

What majority of parents do not do is take their children for professional help. They think it shows that there is something wrong with their kids. Well, that is false.

Professional help is always the better approach. Hiding it, and being concerned about what the society will think is not what one must be doing as a parent.

Be Respectful to Your Kids

Some parents become too authoritative with their parents, which makes it very difficult for the latter to express their views. As parents, you must be their support, their strong hold.

How to be your child's best friend?

If the parent becomes one of the reason for why the child is disturbed, it will become very difficult for the parent to help the child later. So always respect your kids and their thoughts and opinions.

Suicide is a serious issue that needs to be tackled today. We hope the parents take the initiative to help remove this problem from lives of children and the youth.

Here is an helpline that one call if they want help related to Suicide - 022 2754 6669

Tips for Parents to Deal with Bullying
When youre traveling abroad, you probably think youre out of the woods when you arrive on time and with your luggage in one piece. But you need to be careful about how you conduct yourself, even after you get through airport security and spend hours on the plane. Americans inadvertently do plenty of rude and offensive things when they travel abroad.

Check out some of the things you should never do when you travel to Japan, France, Morocco, and other exciting destinations.

1. Dont point at people in China

Vogue reports traveling to China sets you up for some major culture shock. Many of the etiquette taboos with which Americans are indoctrinated seem to go out the window, like: Dont slurp your soup! Dont ask personal questions to strangers! And whatever you do, dont invade someones personal space. A good example? You should never point at someone. Even though the gesture is harmless in the U.S., its considered hostile and rude in China.

2. Dont try to split the bill in China

Another custom youll need to remember when you visit China? You shouldnt expect to split the bill when you go out to a restaurant in China. Vogue explains, One person will pay  usually the most senior person or whoever extended the dinner invitation. And whereas in America it might be polite to do the obligatory fight-over-the-bill scramble, this is unacceptable in China. If it is clear who the host is, dont try to pay  its offensive. The only exception would be if youre in a group of friends your own age. In that case, splitting the bill might be acceptable.

3. Dont pour your own wine in France

Conde Nast Traveler reports among certain Americans, France has a prickly reputation. After all, the countrys language gave us the words etiquette and faux pas. But getting along in this ancient European culture is relatively simple if you play by the rules. One of the most surprising? You should never pour your own glass of wine at a restaurant. Wait for the server to pour it. If you find yourself at a dinner party, your host will pour the wine for you. If you dont want more, dont finish your glass. And if you attend a dinner party, always arrive 15 minutes late and never bring a bottle of wine.

4. Dont talk loudly in France

Another rule to keep in mind when you visit France, whether on vacation or for business? You shouldnt speak loudly in public. Conde Nast Traveler reports doing so is regarded as an ugly American trait. You shouldnt shout into your cellphone. In fact, you should silence it when youre in public or with company. Additionally, you should try to avoid taking up too much space in public. Carry a smaller bag if you can.

5. Dont eat with your left hand in India

A trip to India can quickly feel overwhelming, both because of the chaotic streets and the numerous social rules youll need to follow. Conde Nast Traveler reports when you sit down to a meal in India, you should never eat with your left hand. You should use your left hand only to hold your drink or to pass food to others. Only use your right hand to tear the chapati (flatbread). And before every meal, you should wash your hands.

6. Dont call businesses in India

Another interesting etiquette tip Conde Nast Traveler says visitors to India should keep in mind? Most small businesses are run with cellphones. But many business owners prefer that you text them instead of calling them. In fact, some will be surprised if you first contact them via a phone call instead of sending a text. When in doubt, send a text message.

7. Dont tip in Japan

Japanese culture can feel equally welcoming and inscrutable, according to Lonely Planet. Most travelers know you should bow politely when you meet someone. And theyre also aware you should remove your shoes when you enter a private home or a temple. But did you know even when you get great service at a restaurant in Japan, you should never leave a tip? There is no custom of tipping in Japan. Leaving a little extra cash on the table at a restaurant will often result in a waiter chasing you down the street to give it back.

8. Dont talk on your phone on Japanese public transportation

Another interesting rule you should remember to follow when you visit Japan? You should never talk on your phone when youre on a train or a bus in the country. Lonely Planet reports, Its considered rude to speak on your mobile phone while on trains and buses, and announcements encourage travelers to switch phones to silent mode. People also tend not to speak loudly when traveling on public transport, so as not to disturb fellow passengers.

9. Dont talk about America in Mexico

According to the SFGate, Everyday Mexican customs can feel just as foreign as Espanol to a U.S. traveler  and can present a potential minefield of embarrassment. One of the most interesting things to keep in mind when you visit Mexico is you shouldnt refer to citizens of the United States as Americans or even North Americans. (The term North America includes Mexico and Canada, as well.) The publication advises, If you cant work in Im from the United States (or California), then U.S. American will work.

10. Dont smoke during a meal in Mexico

Many people know in Mexico, youll have to ask the waiter for the check. He wont just give it to you, for fear of making you feel like hes rushing you out the door. But speaking of restaurants, you should know its common to smoke in restaurants  but never during a meal. SFGate explains, Lighting up is acceptable only after the plates have been cleared. And keep in mind Mexicans dont split the bill. If youre dining with a Mexican, either pay the whole bill or keep quiet.

11. Dont wear revealing clothing in Morocco

Frommers reports though Morocco is a Muslim and conservative country, Moroccans understand Western culture. But you shouldnt take advantage of their tolerance and dress disrespectfully. Travelers will be treated with undoubtedly higher respect by all Moroccans if dressed conservatively. Men should wear a collared shirt or a T-shirt with long pants or jeans. You should only wear running shorts, sleeveless shirts, and beachwear on the beach or when playing sports. Women should wear loose pants, short-sleeve shirts, or even a full-length Moroccan robe. Frommers recommends classy over revealing when choosing your wardrobe for a trip to Morocco.

12. Dont photograph the interior of a mosque in Morocco

We all love taking photos when we go on vacation. But Frommers advises that you should always show respect when youre near a mosque. Photographing a mosque is usually acceptable, so long as youre not too close or appear to be photographing the interior. You may be invited to come closer, but its best to wait for this. Other subjects that are off-limits to amateur photographers in Morocco? Border checkpoints, military, police, and airport installations.

13. Dont use your car horn in Norway

Depending on where you live in the United States, you might be used to honking the car horn to express your frustration with fellow drivers. But TripAdvisor reports in Norway, you should never use the car horn. In fact, Norwegians only use the car horn in an emergency. And TripAdvisor warns that abuse is an offense. Other traffic violations that might get you in trouble with the police? Failing to keep your headlights on, neglecting to yield to pedestrians at intersections without traffic lights, and making risky maneuvers to pass other cars.

14. Dont shout or whistle for a taxi in Norway

If you choose to travel by taxi instead of driving in Norway, TripAdvisor notes Norwegians consider it rude to shout or whistle for a taxi. And drivers are likely to ignore you if you do. Instead, you should wave your hand or phone at the taxi, or simply walk up to one that has a lighted sign on its roof. If you take a bus or another form of public transportation, its unusual to say excuse me to someone whos blocking your exit or seat. You should grunt, shuffle, or clear your throat to get their attention instead.

15. Dont give a firm handshake in the Philippines

In the United States, most people prefer a firm handshake. But the opposite is true in the Philippines. Fodors reports, Men and women shake hands with everyone present at any gathering, both on arrival and departure. That sounds easy enough. But dont count on your usual handshake to do the trick. The publication warns when youre meeting Filipinos, Handshakes should be limp, not firm.

16. Dont eat all the food on your plate in the Philippines

Fodors also has a word of advice for travelers who eat out at restaurants in the Philippines. You shouldnt expect people to arrive on time when you schedule a dinner together. In fact, Fodors explains, Filipinos are relaxed about time and are usually late for appointments. Another custom you should keep in mind when you meet friends at a restaurant? You should never finish all of the food youve been served. Instead, leaving a small amount of food on your plate shows you have had enough.

17. Dont smile at strangers in Russia

The Atlantic reports, Grinning without cause is not a skill Russians possess or feel compelled to cultivate. Theres even a Russian proverb that translates, roughly, to laughing for no reason is a sign of stupidity. The society doesnt encourage casual smiling. And psychologists have determined Russians associate smiling with a lack of intelligence. NPR reports Russians think the American smile is insincere. Smiles in Russia are personal and intimate, exchanged only between family and friends. So if you smile at strangers in Russia, you might make them feel uncomfortable or suspicious about your intentions (or intelligence).

18. Dont be too familiar in Russia

As you might imagine after learning Russians dont casually smile at strangers, you might want to avoid being too friendly when you visit Russia. Conde Nast Traveler explains, One thing to control is an Americans natural tendency to go straight into personal topics like family, upbringing, and education. Most Russians would prefer you dont get so friendly or familiar too quickly.
CofE's floating church to take the Gospel to London's canals

The Church of England has launched a pioneering new initiative to bring its message to a sometimes forgotten demographic  those who dwell not on land, but on the water.

The Diocese of London has commissioned the construction of a church-boat that will sail through East London's canal network, according to The Telegraph.

The ecclesial vessel, designed by the architects Denizen Works, will operate in the area's canal network near Newham's Olympic Park. It is designed to look like a conventional barge, but will include an expanding, concertina-style roof akin to the sleeping berths in a VW camper van, which will give the 650 square foot barge extra space.

The diocese said that plans for a floating church community have been under consultation during the summer. They have sought planning permission from Newham Council to moor the boat at various points along the canal, from the River Thames to the Olympic Park.

The Bishop of Stepney, Adrian Newman, told the East London Advertiser in July: 'A floating church in East London shows the way the diocese is seeking to spread its ministry and support communities. The design is a "vision" to become a reality.'

The vessel is yet to be constructed. But while it awaits completion another famous boating venue, West London's 'floating classroom' Elsdale II would be used instead.

Elsdale II is an electrically powered barge used for schools and community events, and has been active for more than a decade.
Strictly Come Dancing should introduce same-sex couples, says Rev Richard Coles

The popular broadcaster and cleric the Rev Richard Coles had suggested it's time for same-sex dancing couples to be introduced on the BBC's Strictly Come Dancing, in which Coles stars this year.

Coles, part of the celebrity line-up for the long-running TV-contest, said that 'discussions' have been had with the BBC about including same-sex dancing partners, according to The Telegraph.

Coles, an Anglican priest who is openly gay himself, said: 'We've had a discussion about it actually, and I don't know. I mean, it's in no sense that anyone resists the idea in principle, it's just a question of doing it.'

The reverend added: 'I think it's a good year to do it actually, with the 50th anniversary of the Sexual Offences Decriminalisation Act.'

Strictly, which began again on Saturday night, sees celebrities paired with professional dancers and put through a series of gruelling dance challenges before a judging panel that see couples voted off every week.

Coles' comment come after another celebrity contestant on the show, the lesbian comedian Susan Calman, defended herself from detractors in the LGBT community who criticised her for dancing with a man in the show. 'There will be a time for same-sex dancing,' she said.

A BBC spokeswoman said there was currently 'no plans' to change the traditional mixed-sex couples setup, though some BBC sources suggested the notion hadn't been 'completely ruled-out'.

Holy moly! @RevRichardColes has got some serious moves

Coles, who presents BBC Radio 4's Saturday Live, is the only vicar in Britain to have had a number one hit single, having topped the charts with Don't Leave Me This Way with The Communards. The group went on to have three UK top 10 hits and the biggest-selling single of 1986.

He is also an inspiration for the main character in the BBC hit comedy Rev and served as consultant to the series. He is Vicar of St Mary's Church in Finedon, Northamptonshire and Chancellor of the University of Northampton.

Of his involvement in the show, he previously told BBC Radio 2's Chris Evans Breakfast Show: 'A major dance talent was waiting to be discovered. I just wonder what took them so long. I'm in it to win it, as they say.'
The death toll across the Caribbean from Hurricane Irma climbed Sunday while fears of more damage from Hurricane Jose eased as the latter storm turned northward.

Jose maintained Category 4 strength after moving away from the Northern Leeward islands and continuing to shift north from battered Puerto Rico, according to the National Hurricane Center on Sunday.

At least 24 people were killed by Irma in the Caribbean, Reuters reported Sunday.

Officials feared the worst was yet to come with Jose heading toward the Caribbean, but the storm veered north without causing much damage.

"We are talking about existing devastation from a Category 5 hurricane, and right as we are starting the relief operation, we have another hurricane coming," Raphael Hamoir, the emergency coordinator for the French Red Cross in the region, told the New York Times on Saturday before Jose turned away.

Due to Jose's more northerly route, islands such as Antigua and Barbuda, ravaged by Irma, dodged the worse of the second storm, according to the New York Times. St. Martin and St. Barts also escaped further damage from Jose, as French state meteorological agency Meteo-France said Sunday the second hurricane took "a passage which was farther away than anticipated."

While only preliminary estimates are in of the extent of Irma's devastation, officials told the New York Times that 80 to 90 percent of the buildings were destroyed on Antigua, Babuda, Anguilla, St. Martin and St. Barthelemy.

Irma made landfall in Florida on Sunday, and its center was forecast to move up the state's Gulf Coast. But the effects are being felt far from the center because of Irma's size. Florida utility officials say more than 1 million customers have lost power as Hurricane Irma hits the state.

Read the full report from the New York Times here.
Hurricane Irma inspires messages on plywood used to protect windows as Hurricane Irma approaches Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

Fort Lauderdale police arrested nine people that a local television news station caught looting.

The police department said Sunday on Twitter the nine were looting CashAmerica Pawn and Simon's Sportswear on Sunrise Boulevard in Fort Lauderdale.

"Going to prison over a pair of sneakers is a fairly bad life choice," Police Chief Rick Maglione said in a statement. "Stay home and look after your loved (ones) and be thankful they are all safe."

A local ABC film crew taped people looting Simon's Sportswear on Sunday. The station shared the footage on Twitter.

#BREAKING Local 10 cameras catch looters breaking into stores in Fort Lauderdale during #Irma http://bit.ly/2fconJ6

Fort Lauderdale police have been discouraging people on social media from looting.

#FLPD WARNING from Chief: "anyone who intends to victimize our neighbors during this difficult time...will be captured and arrested."

Earlier in the week, the police department said it would deploy burglary suppression teams, which would focus their efforts on evacuated areas.

"The teams will work 24/7 with the sole mission to apprehend criminals," Maglione said in a statement. "They are quite good at what they do."
Hurricane Irma churned viciously up Florida's west coast on Sunday, aiming at Tampa-St. Petersburg after making landfall twice, swamping Florida's Keys and pummeling Miami.

The storm was downgraded to a Category 2 storm with 110 mph winds late Sunday afternoon, the National Hurricane Center said.

No deaths were reported, but the economic impact on the state was expected to mount. An estimated 127,000 people were in shelters around the state, and power was knocked out to more than 1 million customers across Florida, The Associated Press reported.

Thousands of flights on four continents have been grounded as well.

A Miami woman who went into labor was guided through delivery by phone when authorities couldn't reach her in high winds and street flooding, the AP reported. It said firefighters later took her to the hospital.

The second landfall came at Marco Island, south of Naples, around 4 p.m. ET Sunday afternoon. It had first made U.S. landfall at Cudjoe Key in the Florida Keys at 9:10 a.m Sunday.

A man who stayed in his Key Largo home told AP he saw small boats, furniture and refrigerators floating down the street. "Very noisy," John Huston said by text message to AP. "Shingles are coming off."

Both its movement over land throughout the night and its southwesterly wind shear will likely weaken the storm, forecasters said Sunday evening. Its expected course takes it inland over northern Florida into southwestern Georgia on Monday afternoon. It is expected to retain hurricane strength until at least Monday morning.

Before its first Florida landfall, Irma had weakened from Category 4 to 3 while over Cuba before churning back out to sea.

NWS Tweet

NOAA's GOES-16 satellite captured this image of the storm:

GOES16

And the Air Force Reserves Hurricane Hunter planes caught this footage from above the storm:

Hunters

Forecasters issued storm surge warnings for the Keys and for Tampa Bay on the state's west coast. Surge warnings also were in effect for the area from North Miami Beach southward around the Florida peninsula, as well as for the area between the South Santee River and Jupiter Inlet.

"A Storm Surge Warning means there is a danger of life-threatening inundation, from rising water moving inland from the coastline, during the next 36 hours in the indicated locations," the hurricane center said.

Tides more than 3 feet higher than normal were reported Sunday afternoon in Miami Beach, likely the result of storm surge.

tides

The Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater area, which is built around a huge bay that cuts into the mainland, has not taken a direct hit from a major hurricane in nearly a century.

Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn tweeted that the city is about to be "punched in the face" by the storm.

Buckhorn

Buckhorn2

He added that the city was putting a 6 p.m curfew in place.

Buckhorn3

In preparation for the storm, officials issued dire warnings to Florida residents, with mandatory evacuation orders sending millions fleeing for safety.

Police officers in Miami Beach told surfers to leave beaches over the weekend.

Police

On Friday, the National Weather Service warned via Twitter that "nowhere in the Florida Keys will be safe," and that residents should clear out while they were able.

NWS Tweet
A construction crane collapsed onto a high-rise building in Miami on Sunday as wind from Hurricane Irma intensified across the city, bringing significant flooding and storm surges.

The crane fell on Biscayne Boulevard in the heart of downtown Miami.

If you're in a building in the area of NE 3rd street & Biscayne Blvd facing the crane seek shelter in the opposite side of Bldg or stairwell.

Brickell Avenue, an upscale business and residential district near Miami Beach, was already being flooded out as Irma's fury rained down on the region.
Hurricane Irma is grounding travelers as far away as London and Doha, and cancellations will likely continue well into the week.

Flights will be suspended at Miami International Airport, Florida's busiest, through Monday after the airport suffered "significant water damage," the airport's chief executive tweeted late Sunday.

@emiliotgonzalez tweet.

Airlines on four continents have canceled around 12,600 flights through Tuesday because of the storm, according to plane tracker Flight Aware. That number is set to rise as a weakened yet still powerful Irma heads north near Atlanta  a Delta Air Lines hub and the world's busiest airport.

The National Hurricane Center has downgraded Irma to a Category 2 hurricane, but the storm is still barreling up Florida's west coast, bashing the state with heavy rains and fierce winds.

In Florida alone, airlines have called off nearly 9,000 flights to and from the state.

American Airlines said late Sunday that it is planning to resume flights from its Miami hub when it reopens on Tuesday. The carrier has so far cancelled close to 2,500 flights through next Friday because of the storm.

The airline's competitors, including Delta Air Lines , JetBlue and Spirit , have also canceled flights to the area, but Irma's impact on travelers also reaches Asia, South America and Europe.

canceled its twice-daily flight from London to Miami on Sunday and Monday, while Qatar Airways said it won't fly its Doha-to-Miami round trip route on Monday.
As Hurricane Irma punished Florida with blistering 130 mph wind that turned deluges into horizontal sheets of water, Georgia was the next state in the monster storm's sights.

Irma could hit southwestern Georgia by Monday afternoon and could dump up to 20 inches in the southeast, according to the National Weather Service, which warned that significant river flooding was possible Monday and Tuesday.

"We have a high flood potential. We are expecting Matthew-like conditions," said Dennis Jones, director of the Chatham County Emergency Management, referring to the hurricane that struck last October. "We are ready."

Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal on Sunday added 65 counties to his previous state of emergency declaration, which now encompasses the entire state.

I've expanded the state of emergency to include all 159 counties in GA. Read more: http://ow.ly/n6yp30f2TUC

In south Georgia, residents were warned on Sunday to expect six hours of continuous hurricane-force winds until midday Monday, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.

"It'd tickle me to death if the forecast isn't as bad as they said, but obviously we have to plan that the forecasters have nailed it, and unfortunately that doesn't bode well for us," Ashley Tye, Lowndes County emergency services chief, said at a briefing, according to the newspaper.

State government offices were ordered to stay closed Monday and Tuesday for all employees except essential personnel. Classes at Atlanta-area schools also were canceled for Monday.

The governor ordered the evacuation of all people east of Interstate 95.

"The network of rural roads may be rendered impassable throughout the state of Georgia, isolating residences and farms from access to public services," the governor said Sunday.

The disruptions from Irma could be felt far from the state if it disrupts travel at the world's busiest airport, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International. Nearly 2,500 planes take off and land every day at the airport, which is Delta Air Lines ' main hub.

More than 104 million travelers last year passed through the airport last year, according to Airports Council International.

Delta advised passengers to monitor the situation

Delta tweet

Near Georgia's Atlantic coast, few restaurants were open Saturday night for the residents of Savannah who decided to stay put in the low-lying city. Stores throughout the historic downtown and along the popular river walk were shuttered throughout the day Saturday, even with Irma's winds two days away.
In this NOAA-NASA GOES Project handout image, GOES satellite shows Hurricane Irma as it moves over Cuba and towards the Florida coast as a category 4 storm in the Caribbean Sea taken at 14:15 UTC on September 09, 2017.

Hurricane Irma gained strength as it broke loose from Cuba and was upgraded to a category 4 storm in the early morning hours Sunday.

One of the most powerful Atlantic hurricanes of the last century is roaring toward the Florida Keys with maximum sustained winds of 130 miles per hour, and the National Hurricane Center warned that it's bringing a "life-threatening storm surge" that will stretch up the west coast of Florida.

As of 2 a.m. Eastern Saturday, the eye of Irma was 70 miles from Key West, moving northwest toward the Keys at 6 miles per hour. It temporarily weakened to a category 3 storm while over Cuba before churning back out to sea.

The NHC issued storm surge warnings for the Keys, and for Tampa Bay on the state's west coast. Surge warnings also were in effect for the area from North Miami Beach southward around the Florida peninsula, as well as for the area between the South Santee River and Jupiter Inlet.

"A Storm Surge Warning means there is a danger of life-threatening inundation, from rising water moving inland from the coastline, during the next 36 hours in the indicated locations," the NHC said.

The Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater area, which is built around a huge bay that cuts into the mainland, has not taken a direct hit from a major hurricane in nearly a century.
Bridgewater Associates is planning a big expansion into China, according to a report.

The Wall Street Journal sreports that the hedge fund received Chinese government approval for a venture that will raise billions of dollars to invest and sell assets in the country.



The report said the firm also received permission to trade directly on the local Chinese exchanges. Bridgewater already counts the China Investment Corp., the country's sovereign wealth fund and the State Administration of Foreign Exchange, as clients, according to the Journal.



The new China fund's strategy will be similar to one of Bridgewater's key hedge funds.



"It is being created in the mold of Bridgewater's low-fee All Weather portfolio, which follows a 'risk parity' strategy and uses computer-driven bets," the Journal said.

Risk parity is an investment strategy that dynamically adjusts portfolio allocations to stocks, bonds and commodities based on the respective volatility of the asset classes. It often uses leverage to amplify returns.



The firm's founder, Ray Dalio, recently wrote in a LinkedIn blog post that "risks are now rising" in the market and recommended gold as a hedge. He cited increasing geopolitical tensions between the U.S. and North Korea.

Bridgewater is the world's largest hedge fund, managing about $160 billion, according to its website. The firm did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Note: Ray Dalio will be one of the headline speakers at the 7th Annual Delivering Alpha Conference in New York on Tuesday.



See here for the full Wall Street Journal report.






As'ad's Bio

As'ad AbuKhalil, born March 16, 1960. From Tyre, Lebanon, grew up in Beirut. Received his BA and MA from American University of Beirut in pol sc. Came to US in 1983 and received his PhD in comparative government from Georgetown University. Taught at Tufts University, Georgetown University, George Washington University, Colorado College, and Randolph-Macon Woman's College. Served as a Scholar-in-Residence at Middle East Institute in Washington DC. He served as free-lance Middle East consultant for NBC News and ABC News, an experience that only served to increase his disdain for maintream US media. He is now professor of political science at California State University, Stanislaus. His favorite food is fried eggplants.
The Missourians Opinion section is a public forum for the discussion of ideas. The views presented in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Missourian or the University of Missouri. If you would like to contribute to the Opinion page with a response or an original topic of your own, visit our submission form
Carnival Cruise Line is stepping up efforts to aid in the Caribbean following Hurricane Irma.

The Miami-based cruise line, the worlds largest by passenger capacity, will deliver supplies to St. Kitts later this week during a call from the Carnival Fascination.

In addition, the cruise line will also land supplies in Grand Turk, and according to a statement, is working with a number of Caribbean islands to bring in supplies on a long-term basis.

This follows announcements from Royal Caribbean, which is deploying ships to aid in relief efforts, and Norwegian Cruise Line, which is sending the Sky to St. Thomas to help evacuees.
Genpact Limited provides business process outsourcing and information technology (IT) services in India, rest of Asia, North and Latin America, and Europe. It operates through three segments: Banking, Capital Markets and Insurance; Consumer Goods, Retail, Life Sciences and Healthcare; and High Tech, Manufacturing and Services. The company offers CFO advisory services; and environmental, social, and governance (ESG) services, such as data management, carbon accounting, human rights assessment, sustainability diligence, and ESG reporting. It also provides finance and accounting services, which include accounts payable, such as document management, invoice processing, approval and resolution management, and travel and expense processing; invoice-to-cash services, including customer master data management, credit and contract management, fulfillment, billing, collections, and dispute management services; record to report services comprising accounting, treasury, tax, product cost accounting, and closing and reporting services; financial planning and analysis consisting of budgeting, forecasting, and business performance reporting; and enterprise risk and compliance services, including operational risks and controls. In addition, the company provides supply chain advisory services, and after-sales services; sourcing and procurement services comprising direct and indirect strategic sourcing, category management, spend analytics, procurement operation, and master data management; and sales and commercial services, including campaign, order, and dispute management, lead generation, pricing, and promotion optimization. Further, it offers IT services, which comprise end-user computing support, infrastructure management, application production support, and database management services; and transformation services that include digital solutions, consulting services, and analytics services and solutions. The company was founded in 1997 and is based in Hamilton, Bermuda.
The following companies are subsidiares of Colgate-Palmolive: 887357 Ontario Inc., COLGALIVE S.A., CP GABA GmbH, CP International Holding C.V., CP West East Investment Limited, Cleaning Dimensions Inc., Colgate (BVI) Limited, Colgate (Guangzhou) Company Limited, Colgate (U.K.) Limited, Colgate Business Services of the Americas S.C., Colgate Flavors and Fragrances Inc., Colgate Global Business Services Private Limited, Colgate Holdings, Colgate Inc., Colgate Oral Pharmaceuticals Inc., Colgate Palmolive Ghana Limited, Colgate Palmolive Holding S.Com.P.A., Colgate Palmolive Nouvelle Caledonie Sarl, Colgate Palmolive Tanzania Limited, Colgate Sanxiao Company Limited, Colgate Venture Company Inc., Colgate-Palmolive (America) Inc., Colgate-Palmolive (Asia) Pte Ltd, Colgate-Palmolive (Blantyre) Limited, Colgate-Palmolive (Brunei) Sdn Bhn, Colgate-Palmolive (Central America) Inc., Colgate-Palmolive (Central America) Inc. y Compania Limitada, Colgate-Palmolive (Centro America) S.A., Colgate-Palmolive (China) Co. Ltd, Colgate-Palmolive (Costa Rica) S.A., Colgate-Palmolive (Dominica) Inc., Colgate-Palmolive (Dominican Republic) Inc., Colgate-Palmolive (East Africa) Limited, Colgate-Palmolive (Eastern) Pte. Ltd., Colgate-Palmolive (Egypt) S.A.E., Colgate-Palmolive (Far East) Sdn Bhd, Colgate-Palmolive (Fiji) Pte Limited, Colgate-Palmolive (Gabon) S.A., Colgate-Palmolive (Guyana) Ltd., Colgate-Palmolive (H.K.) Limited, Colgate-Palmolive (Hellas) S.A. I.C., Colgate-Palmolive (Hong Kong) Holding Limited, Colgate-Palmolive (Kazakhstan) L.L.P., Colgate-Palmolive (Latvia) Ltd., Colgate-Palmolive (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd, Colgate-Palmolive (Middle East Exports) Ltd., Colgate-Palmolive (Myanmar) Limited, Colgate-Palmolive (New York) Inc., Colgate-Palmolive (Poland) Sp. z o.o., Colgate-Palmolive (Proprietary) Limited, Colgate-Palmolive (Research & Development) Inc., Colgate-Palmolive (Romania) SRL, Colgate-Palmolive (Thailand) Limited, Colgate-Palmolive (UK) Limited, Colgate-Palmolive (Uganda) Limited, Colgate-Palmolive (Vietnam) Ltd., Colgate-Palmolive (Zambia) Inc., Colgate-Palmolive (Zimbabwe) Inc., Colgate-Palmolive A.B., Colgate-Palmolive A/S, Colgate-Palmolive Adria Ltd., Colgate-Palmolive Argentina S.A., Colgate-Palmolive Asia Pacific Limited, Colgate-Palmolive Asia Pacific Treasury Services Limited, Colgate-Palmolive Belgium S.A., Colgate-Palmolive Bolivia Ltda., Colgate-Palmolive Canada Inc., Colgate-Palmolive Caricom Service Co. Inc., Colgate-Palmolive Central European Management Inc., Colgate-Palmolive Chile S.A., Colgate-Palmolive Cia., Colgate-Palmolive Comercial Ltda., Colgate-Palmolive Commercial (Hellas) SP LLC, Colgate-Palmolive Commerciale S.A.S., Colgate-Palmolive Commericale S.r.l., Colgate-Palmolive Compania Anonima, Colgate-Palmolive Company Distr. LLC, Colgate-Palmolive Company GmbH, Colgate-Palmolive Cote dIvoire S.A., Colgate-Palmolive Cyprus Limited, Colgate-Palmolive Development Corp., Colgate-Palmolive East West Africa Region (Pty) Ltd, Colgate-Palmolive Enterprises Inc., Colgate-Palmolive Espana S.A., Colgate-Palmolive Europe (Holdings) Sarl, Colgate-Palmolive Europe Sarl, Colgate-Palmolive Finance (UK) plc, Colgate-Palmolive Global Trading Company, Colgate-Palmolive Holding Argentina S.A., Colgate-Palmolive Holding Inc., Colgate-Palmolive Hungary Kft Limited Liability Company, Colgate-Palmolive IHQ Services (Thailand) Limited, Colgate-Palmolive Inc., Colgate-Palmolive Inc. S.A., Colgate-Palmolive Industrial Ltda., Colgate-Palmolive Industriel S.A.S., Colgate-Palmolive International Holding LLC, Colgate-Palmolive International LLC, Colgate-Palmolive Investment Co. Inc., Colgate-Palmolive Investments (BVI) Ltd., Colgate-Palmolive Investments (PNG) Ltd., Colgate-Palmolive Investments (UK) Limited, Colgate-Palmolive Investments Inc., Colgate-Palmolive Israel Ltd., Colgate-Palmolive Italia S.r.l., Colgate-Palmolive JSC, Colgate-Palmolive Lanka (Private) Limited, Colgate-Palmolive Latin America Inc., Colgate-Palmolive Limited, Colgate-Palmolive Manufacturing (Poland) Sp. z o.o., Colgate-Palmolive Marketing Sdn Bhd, Colgate-Palmolive Maroc S.A., Colgate-Palmolive Mocambique Limitada, Colgate-Palmolive NJ Inc., Colgate-Palmolive Nederland B.V., Colgate-Palmolive Norge A/S, Colgate-Palmolive Participacoes e Investimentos Imobiliarios Lda., Colgate-Palmolive Peru S.A., Colgate-Palmolive Philippines Inc., Colgate-Palmolive Pty Ltd, Colgate-Palmolive Retirement Trustee Limited, Colgate-Palmolive S.A. de C.V., Colgate-Palmolive S.p.A., Colgate-Palmolive Senegal S.A., Colgate-Palmolive Services (Hellas) LLC, Colgate-Palmolive Services (Poland) Sp. z o.o., Colgate-Palmolive Services CEW GmbH, Colgate-Palmolive Services S.A., Colgate-Palmolive Slovensko s.r.o., Colgate-Palmolive Support Services, Colgate-Palmolive Temizlik Urunleri Sanayi ve Ticart S.A., Colgate-Palmolive Transnational Inc., Colgate-Palmolive Ukraine LLC, Colgate-Palmolive Unipessoal Lda, Colgate-Palmolive de Paraguay Sociedad Anonima, Colgate-Palmolive de Puerto Rico Inc., Colgate-Palmolive del Ecuador S.A.I.C., Colgate-Palmolive del Peru (Delaware) Inc., Colgate-Palmolive Eeska republika spol. s r.o., Colpal CBS S de R. L. de C. V., Consumer Viewpoint Center Inc., Cotelle S.A., Dimac Development Corp., Dominica Coconut Products Limited, EKIB Inc., ELM Company Limited, Elta MD Holdings Inc., Elta MD Inc., EltaMD, Filorga Americas Inc., Filorga Asia Limited, Filorga Benelux SA, Filorga Cosmetiques Polska, Filorga Middle East DMCC, Filorga Portugal Unipessoal Lda., Filorga RU Limited Liability Company, GABA Europe Holding GmbH, GABA International, GABA International Holding LLC, GABA Schweiz AG, GABA Therwil GmbH, Gamma Development Co. Ltd., Global Trading and Supply LLC, Hamol Ltd., Hello Products, Hello Products LLC, Hills Funding Company, Hills Pet Nutrition (NZ) Limited, Hills Pet Nutrition (Thailand) Co. Ltd., Hills Pet Nutrition Asia Limited, Hills Pet Nutrition B.V., Hills Pet Nutrition Canada Inc., Hills Pet Nutrition Denmark ApS, Hills Pet Nutrition Espana S.L., Hills Pet Nutrition GmbH, Hills Pet Nutrition Holding B.V., Hills Pet Nutrition Inc., Hills Pet Nutrition Indiana Inc., Hills Pet Nutrition Italia S.r.l., Hills Pet Nutrition Korea Ltd., Hills Pet Nutrition Ltd., Hills Pet Nutrition Manufacturing B.V., Hills Pet Nutrition Manufacturing s.r.o, Hills Pet Nutrition Norway AS, Hills Pet Nutrition OOO, Hills Pet Nutrition Pty. Limited, Hills Pet Nutrition S.p.A., Hills Pet Nutrition SNC, Hills Pet Nutrition Sales Inc., Hills Pet Nutrition South Africa Proprietary Limited, Hills Pet Nutrition Sweden AB, Hills Pet Nutrition Switzerland GmbH, Hills Pet Nutrition Taiwan Ltd, Hills Pet Nutrition Trading (GZ) Co. Ltd, Hills Pet Nutrition de Mexico S.A. de C.V., Hills Pet Nutrition de Puerto Rico Inc., Hills Pet Nutrition s.r.o., Hills Pet Products (Benelux) S.A., Hills Pet Products Inc., Hills Veterinary Companies of America Inc., Hills-Colgate (Japan) Ltd., Hopro Liquidating Corp., Hygiene Systemes et Services SA, IES Enterprises Inc., Inmobiliaria Colpal S. de R.L. de C.V., Inmobiliaria Hills S.A. de C.V., Innovacion Creativa S.A. de C.V., Kolynos Corporation, Laboratoires Filorga Cosmetiques Espana S.L.U., Laboratoires Filorga Cosmetiques Italia S.R.L., Laboratoires Filorga Cosmetiques S.A., Laser Brand Toothpaste, Lournay Sales Inc., Mennen Company, Mennen Interamerica Ltd., Mennen Limited, Mennen South Africa Ltd., Mennen de Chile Ltd., Mennen de Nicargua S.A., Mission Hills Property Corporation, Mission Hills S.A. de C.V., Norwood International Incorporated, Olive Music Publishing Corporation, PCA SKIN, Paramount Research Inc., Penny LLC, Pet Chemicals Inc., Physicians Care Alliance LLC, Productos Halogenados Copalven C.A., Purity Holding Company, Purity Music Publishing Corporation, Refresh Company Limited, Samuel Taylor Holdings B.V., Sanex, Sanxiao Company Limited, Services Development Co. Ltd., Societe Generale de Negoce et de Services (GENESE) S.A., The GDN - The Global Distributive Network SAS, The Lournay Company Inc., The MPDP - The Medical and Pharmaceutic Distributive Platform SAS, The Murphy-Phoenix Company, Tom's of Maine, Toms of Maine Holdings Inc., Toms of Maine Inc., Veterinary Companies of America Inc., Vipont Pharmaceutical Inc., and XEB Inc..

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The following companies are subsidiares of Pearson: AEL (S) PTE Limited, ATI Professional Development LLC, Addison Wesley Longman Inc., Addison-Wesley Educational Publishers Inc., Aldwych Finance Limited, Americas Choice Inc., Atkey Finance Limited, Author Solutions, Axis Finance Inc., CAMSAWUSA Inc., CTI Education Group (Pty) Limited, Camsaw Inc., Casapsi Livraria e Editora Ltda, Centro Cultural Americano Franquias e Comercio Ltda., Century Consultants Ltd., Certiport, Certiport China Co Ltd, Certiport China Holding LLC, Certiport Inc., Cogmed Systems AB, Connections Academy of Arkansas LLC, Connections Academy of Florida LLC, Connections Academy of Iowa LLC, Connections Academy of Maine LLC, Connections Academy of Maryland LLC, Connections Academy of Minnesota LLC, Connections Academy of Missouri LLC, Connections Academy of Nevada LLC, Connections Academy of New Jersey LLC, Connections Academy of New Mexico LLC, Connections Academy of New York LLC, Connections Academy of Oregon LLC, Connections Academy of Pennsylvania LLC, Connections Academy of Tennessee LLC, Connections Academy of Texas LLC, Connections Education Inc., Connections Education LLC, Connections Education of Florida LLC, Dominie Press Inc., Dorian Finance Limited, Dorling Kindersley Australasia Pty Limited, EBNT Canada Holdings ULC, EBNT Holdings Limited, EBNT USA Holdings Inc., Edexcel Limited, Edexcel South Africa Pty Ltd, Education Development International plc, Education Resources (Cyprus) Limited, Educational Management Group Inc., Educational Publishers LLP, Embanet ULC, Embanet-Compass Knowledge Group Inc., EmbanetCompass, Embankment Finance Limited, English Language Learning and Instruction System Inc., Escape Studios Limited, FBH Inc., Falstaff Holdco Inc., Falstaff Inc., GED Domains LLC, GED Testing Service LLC, George (Shanghai) Commercial Information Consulting Co. Ltd, Global Education, Global George I Limited, Global George II Limited, GlobalEnglish, Globe Fearon Inc., Guangzhou Crescent Software Co. Ltd, Heinemann Education Botswana (Publishers) (Proprietary) Limited, Heinemann Publishers (Pty) Ltd, INTELLIPRO INC., Icodeon Limited, IndiaCan Education Private Limited, Integral 7 Inc., Integrated Analytics LLC, J M Solucoes Exportacao e Importacao Ltda, K12 Learning Services LLC, Kagiso Education Pty Ltd, Knowledge Analysis Technologies LLC, LCCI International Qualifications (Malaysia) Sdn. Bhd., LCCIEB Training Consultancy. Ltd, Learning Catalytics, LessonLab Inc., Lignum Oil Company, Linx Brasil Distribuidora Ltda., Longman (Malawi) Limited, Longman Australasia Pty Ltd, Longman Group(Overseas Holdings)Limited, Longman Indochina Acquisition L.L.C., Longman Kenya Limited, Longman Mocambique Ltda, Longman Romania S.R.L., Longman Swaziland (Pty) Limited, Longman Tanzania Limited, Longman Zambia Educational Publishers Pty Ltd, Longman Zambia Limited, Longman Zimbabwe (Private) Ltd, Longmaned Ecuador S.A., Major123 Limited, Maskew Miller Longman (Pty) Limited, MeasureUp LLC, Modern Curriculum Inc., Multi Holding, Multi Treinamento e Editora Ltda, NCS Information Technology Services (Beijing) Co Ltd, NCS Pearson Inc., NCS Pearson Pty Ltd, NCS Pearson Puerto Rico Inc., National Computer Systems Japan Co. Ltd, Ordinate Corporation, PN Holdings Inc., PT Efficient English Services, Pearson (Beijing) Management Consulting Co. Ltd., Pearson (Guizhou) Education Technology Co. Ltd., Pearson Affordable Learning Fund Limited, Pearson America LLC, Pearson Amsterdam B.V., Pearson Australia Finance Unlimited, Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd, Pearson Australia Holdings Pty Ltd, Pearson Australia Pty Ltd, Pearson Benelux B.V., Pearson Books Limited, Pearson Brazil Finance Limited, Pearson Business Services Inc., Pearson Canada Assessment Inc., Pearson Canada Finance Unlimited, Pearson Canada Holdings Inc, Pearson Canada Inc., Pearson Central Europe Spoka z ograniczona odpowiedzialnoscia, Pearson College Limited, Pearson DBC Holdings Inc., Pearson Desarrollo y Capacitacion Profesional Chile Limitada, Pearson Deutschland GmbH, Pearson Digital Learning Puerto Rico Inc., Pearson Dollar Finance Two Limited, Pearson Dollar Finance plc, Pearson Educacion SA, Pearson Educacion de Chile Limitada, Pearson Educacion de Colombia S A S, Pearson Educacion de Mexico S.A. de C.V., Pearson Educacion de Panama SA, Pearson Educacion de Peru S.A., Pearson Education (Singapore) Pte Ltd, Pearson Education Achievement Solutions (RF) (Pty) Limited, Pearson Education Africa (Pty) Ltd, Pearson Education Asia Limited, Pearson Education Botswana (Proprietary) Limited, Pearson Education Hellas SA, Pearson Education Holdings Limited, Pearson Education Inc., Pearson Education Indochina Limited, Pearson Education Investments Limited, Pearson Education Korea Limited, Pearson Education Limited, Pearson Education Namibia (Pty) Limited, Pearson Education Publishing Limited, Pearson Education S.A., Pearson Education SA, Pearson Education South Africa (Pty) Ltd, Pearson Education South Asia Pte. Ltd., Pearson Education Taiwan Ltd, Pearson Education do Brasil S.A, Pearson Educational Measurement Canada Inc., Pearson Educational Publishers LLC, Pearson Egitim Cozumleri Tikaret Limited Sirketi, Pearson Falstaff (Holdings) Inc., Pearson Falstaff Holdco LLC, Pearson France, Pearson Funding Five plc, Pearson Funding Four plc, Pearson Funding Two Limited, Pearson Holdings Inc., Pearson Holdings Southern Africa (Pty) Limited, Pearson IOKI Spoka z ograniczona odpowiedzialnoscia, Pearson India Education Services Private Limited, Pearson India Support Services Private Limited, Pearson Institute of Higher Education, Pearson International Finance Limited, Pearson Investment Holdings Inc., Pearson Italia S.p.A, Pearson Japan KK, Pearson Lanka (Private) Limited, Pearson Learning China (HK) Limited, Pearson Lesotho (Pty) Ltd, Pearson Loan Finance No. 3 Limited, Pearson Loan Finance No. 4 Limited, Pearson Loan Finance No.2 Unlimited, Pearson Loan Finance Unlimited, Pearson Longman Uganda Limited, Pearson Malaysia Sdn. Bhd., Pearson Management Services Limited, Pearson Management Services Philippines Inc., Pearson Maryland Inc., Pearson Netherlands B.V., Pearson Netherlands Holdings B.V., Pearson Nominees Limited, Pearson Online Tutoring LLC, Pearson Overseas Holdings Limited, Pearson PEM P.R. Inc., Pearson PRH Holdings Limited, Pearson Pension Nominees Limited, Pearson Pension Property Fund Limited, Pearson Pension Trustee Limited, Pearson Pension Trustee Services Limited, Pearson Professional Assessments Limited, Pearson Real Estate Holdings Inc., Pearson Real Estate Holdings Limited, Pearson Schweiz AG, Pearson Services Limited, Pearson Shared Services Limited, Pearson South Africa (Pty) Ltd, Pearson Strand Finance Limited, Pearson Sweden AB, Pearson VUE Philippines Inc., Pearson in Practice Holdings Limited, Pearson in Practice Skills Based Learning Limited, Pearson in Practice Technology Limited, Penguin Capital LLC, Phumelela Publishers (Pty) Ltd, ProctorCam Inc., Reading Property Holdings LLC, Rebus Planning Associates Inc., Reston Publishing Company Inc., Rycade Capital Corporation, Shanghai AWL Education Software Ltd, Silver Burdett Ginn Inc., Skylight Training and Publishing Inc., Smarthinking Inc., Sound Holdings Inc., Spear Insurance Company Limited, Stark Verlag GmbH, Sunnykey International Holdings Limited (BVI), TQ Catalis Limited, TQ Clapham Limited, TQ Education and Training Limited, TQ Global Limited, TQ Group Limited, TQ Holdings Limited, The Financial Times (I) Pvt Ltd, The Learning Edge International pty Ltd, The Waite Group Inc, Trio Parent Holdings LLC, US Learning Services LLC, USLS Holdings LLC, Virtual Nerd, Vue Testing Services Israel Ltd, Vue Testing Services Korea Limited, Wall Street Institute Kft., Williams Education GmbH, eCollege.com, and Editions Du Renouveau Pedagogique Inc..

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AbbVie Inc. discovers, develops, manufactures, and sells pharmaceuticals in the worldwide. The company offers HUMIRA, a therapy administered as an injection for autoimmune and intestinal Behcet's diseases; SKYRIZI to treat moderate to severe plaque psoriasis in adults; RINVOQ, a JAK inhibitor for the treatment of moderate to severe active rheumatoid arthritis in adult patients; IMBRUVICA to treat adult patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), small lymphocytic lymphoma (SLL), and VENCLEXTA, a BCL-2 inhibitor used to treat adults with CLL or SLL; and MAVYRET to treat patients with chronic HCV genotype 1-6 infection. It also provides CREON, a pancreatic enzyme therapy for exocrine pancreatic insufficiency; Synthroid used in the treatment of hypothyroidism; Linzess/Constella to treat irritable bowel syndrome with constipation and chronic idiopathic constipation; Lupron for the palliative treatment of advanced prostate cancer, endometriosis and central precocious puberty, and patients with anemia caused by uterine fibroids; and Botox therapeutic. In addition, the company offers ORILISSA, a nonpeptide small molecule gonadotropin-releasing hormone antagonist for women with moderate to severe endometriosis pain; Duopa and Duodopa, a levodopa-carbidopa intestinal gel to treat Parkinson's disease; Lumigan/Ganfort, a bimatoprost ophthalmic solution for the reduction of elevated intraocular pressure (IOP) in patients with open angle glaucoma (OAG) or ocular hypertension; Ubrelvy to treat migraine with or without aura in adults; Alphagan/ Combigan, an alpha-adrenergic receptor agonist for the reduction of IOP in patients with OAG; and Restasis, a calcineurin inhibitor immunosuppressant to increase tear production, as well as other eye care products. AbbVie Inc. has a research collaboration with Dragonfly Therapeutics, Inc. The company was incorporated in 2012 and is headquartered in North Chicago, Illinois.
Alexandria Real Estate Equities, Inc. (NYSE:ARE), an S&P 500<sup></sup> urban office real estate investment trust ("REIT"), is the first, longest-tenured, and pioneering owner, operator, and developer uniquely focused on collaborative life science, technology, and agtech campuses in AAA innovation cluster locations, with a total market capitalization of $31.9 billion as of December 31, 2020, and an asset base in North America of 49.7 million square feet ("SF"). The asset base in North America includes 31.9 million RSF of operating properties and 3.3 million RSF of Class A properties undergoing construction, 7.1 million RSF of near-term and intermediate-term development and redevelopment projects, and 7.4 million SF of future development projects. Founded in 1994, Alexandria pioneered this niche and has since established a significant market presence in key locations, including Greater Boston, San Francisco, New York City, San Diego, Seattle, Maryland, and Research Triangle. Alexandria has a longstanding and proven track record of developing Class A properties clustered in urban life science, technology, and agtech campuses that provide our innovative tenants with highly dynamic and collaborative environments that enhance their ability to successfully recruit and retain world-class talent and inspire productivity, efficiency, creativity, and success. Alexandria also provides strategic capital to transformative life science, technology, and agtech companies through our venture capital platform. We believe our unique business model and diligent underwriting ensure a high-quality and diverse tenant base that results in higher occupancy levels, longer lease terms, higher rental income, higher returns, and greater long-term asset value.
Koppers Holdings Inc. provides treated wood products, wood preservation chemicals, and carbon compounds in the United States, Australasia, Europe, and internationally. The company operates through three segments: Railroad and Utility Products and Services (RUPS), Performance Chemicals (PC), and Carbon Materials and Chemicals (CMC). The RUPS segment procures and treats crossties, switch ties, and various types of lumber used for railroad bridges and crossings. It also provides rail joint bars to join rails together for railroads; transmission and distribution poles for electric and telephone utilities; and pilings. This segment also provides railroad services, such as engineering, design, repair, and inspection services for railroad bridges. The PC segment develops, manufactures, and markets copper-based wood preservatives, including micronized copper azole, micronized pigments, alkaline copper quaternary, amine copper azole, and chromated copper arsenate for decking, fencing, utility poles, construction lumber and timbers, and various agricultural uses; and supplies fire-retardant chemicals for pressure treatment of wood primarily in commercial construction. The CMC segment manufactures creosote for the treatment of wood or as a feedstock in the production of carbon black; carbon pitch, a raw material used in the production of aluminum and steel; naphthalene for use as a feedstock in the production of phthalic anhydride and as a surfactant in the production of concrete; phthalic anhydride for the production of plasticizers, polyester resins, and alkyd paints; and carbon black feedstock for use in the production of carbon black. The company serves the railroad, specialty chemical, utility, residential lumber, agriculture, aluminum, steel, rubber, and construction industries. Koppers Holdings Inc. was founded in 1988 and is headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Team, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, provides asset performance assurance and optimization solutions in the United States, Canada, Europe, and internationally. It operates through Inspection and Heat Treating (IHT), Mechanical Services (MS), and Quest Integrity segments. The IHT segment offers non-destructive evaluation and testing, radiographic testing, ultrasonic testing, magnetic particle inspection, liquid penetrant inspection, positive material identification, electromagnetic testing, alternating current field measurement, and eddy current testing services. This segment also provides long-range guided ultrasonic testing, phased array ultrasonic testing, terminals and storage inspection and management program, rope access, mechanical and pipeline integrity, heat treating, and robotics and inspection services. The MS segment offers engineered composite repair, emissions control/compliance, hot tapping, valve insertion, field machining, bolted joint integrity, vapor barrier plug and weld testing, and valve management services, as well as leak repair services for pipes, valves, and flanges, as well as other parts of piping systems, pipelines, and related assets. The Quest Integrity segment provides furnace tube inspection system-enabled, in-line inspection, pipeline integrity management, engineering and condition assessment, and robotics and inspection services. It also offers onstream services comprising of line stopping and on-line valve insertion solutions. The company serves refining, power, renewables, nuclear, liquefied natural gas, chemical, petrochemical, pulp and paper, automotive, mining, valves, terminals and storage, pipeline, offshore oil and gas, and aerospace and defense industries, as well as amusement parks, bridges, ports, construction and buildings, roads, dams, and railways. Team, Inc. was founded in 1973 and is headquartered in Sugar Land, Texas.
BlackRock, Inc. is a publicly owned investment manager. The firm primarily provides its services to institutional, intermediary, and individual investors including corporate, public, union, and industry pension plans, insurance companies, third-party mutual funds, endowments, public institutions, governments, foundations, charities, sovereign wealth funds, corporations, official institutions, and banks. It also provides global risk management and advisory services. The firm manages separate client-focused equity, fixed income, and balanced portfolios. It also launches and manages open-end and closed-end mutual funds, offshore funds, unit trusts, and alternative investment vehicles including structured funds. The firm launches equity, fixed income, balanced, and real estate mutual funds. It also launches equity, fixed income, balanced, currency, commodity, and multi-asset exchange traded funds. The firm also launches and manages hedge funds. It invests in the public equity, fixed income, real estate, currency, commodity, and alternative markets across the globe. The firm primarily invests in growth and value stocks of small-cap, mid-cap, SMID-cap, large-cap, and multi-cap companies. It also invests in dividend-paying equity securities. The firm invests in investment grade municipal securities, government securities including securities issued or guaranteed by a government or a government agency or instrumentality, corporate bonds, and asset-backed and mortgage-backed securities. It employs fundamental and quantitative analysis with a focus on bottom-up and top-down approach to make its investments. The firm employs liquidity, asset allocation, balanced, real estate, and alternative strategies to make its investments. In real estate sector, it seeks to invest in Poland and Germany. The firm benchmarks the performance of its portfolios against various S&P, Russell, Barclays, MSCI, Citigroup, and Merrill Lynch indices. BlackRock, Inc. was founded in 1988 and is based in New York City with additional offices in Boston, Massachusetts; London, United Kingdom; Gurgaon, India; Hong Kong; Greenwich, Connecticut; Princeton, New Jersey; Edinburgh, United Kingdom; Sydney, Australia; Taipei, Taiwan; Singapore; Sao Paulo, Brazil; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Washington, District of Columbia; Toronto, Canada; Wilmington, Delaware; and San Francisco, California.
Simpson Manufacturing Co., Inc., through its subsidiaries, designs, engineers, manufactures, and sells wood and concrete construction products. The company offers wood construction products, including connectors, truss plates, fastening systems, fasteners and shearwalls, and pre-fabricated lateral systems for use in light-frame construction; and concrete construction products comprising adhesives, specialty chemicals, mechanical anchors, carbide drill bits, powder actuated tools, fiber-reinforced materials, and other repair products for use in concrete, masonry, and steel construction, as well as grouts, coatings, sealers, mortars, fiberglass and fiber-reinforced polymer systems, and asphalt products for use in concrete construction repair, and strengthening and protection products. It also provides connectors and lateral products for wood framing, timber and offsite construction, structural steel construction, and cold-formed steel applications; and mechanical and adhesive anchors for concrete and masonry construction applications. In addition, the company offers engineering and design services, as well as software solutions that facilitate the specification, selection, and use of its products. It markets its products to the residential construction, light industrial and commercial construction, remodeling, and do-it-yourself markets in the United States, Canada, France, the United Kingdom, Germany, Denmark, Switzerland, Portugal, Poland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Sweden, Norway, Australia, New Zealand, China, Taiwan, and Vietnam. The company was founded in 1956 and is headquartered in Pleasanton, California.
Aviva plc provides various insurance, retirement, investment, and savings products in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada, and internationally. The company offers life insurance, long-term health and accident insurance, savings, pension, and annuity products, as well as pension fund business and lifetime mortgage products. It also provides insurance cover to individuals, small and medium-sized businesses for risks associated with motor vehicles and medical expenses, as well as property and liability, such as employers' and professional indemnity liabilities. In addition, the company provides investment management services for institutional pension fund mandates; and manages various retail investment products, including investment funds, unit trusts, open-ended investment companies, and individual savings accounts for third-party financial institutions, pension funds, public sector organizations, investment professionals, and private investors. It markets its products through a network of insurance brokers, as well as MyAviva platform. The company was formerly known as CGNU plc and changed its name to Aviva plc in July 2002. Aviva plc was founded in 1696 and is headquartered in London, the United Kingdom.
15:06

The Haryana government today said it was not averse to ordering a Central Bureau of Investigation probe into the killing of the seven-year-old boy at Ryan International School and has asked the Gurugram Police to book the school owner under the Juvenile Justice Act.



Education minister Ram Bilas Sharma also said that there have been lapses on part of the school administration.



"We accept negligence on part of the Ryan International School but the school cannot be de-recognised as the future of 1200 students is at stake," Sharma said.



"We have directed the Gurgaon Police to book the owner of Ryan International School, Albert Pinto under section 75 Juvenile Justice (care and punishment act) Act 15 for punishment for cruelty to child meted out by the custodian in the charge sheet to be submitted in the court within 7 days.



"Some loopholes in the security are visible in the case and the toilet window was also found broken from inside," Sharma told PTI.



He said the charge-sheet in the case will be ready within a week as police was speedily conducting the probe, but stressed that if the parents of the child insist on a probe by the CBI or any other agency the government will accede to their demand.



Talking to reporters here, Sharma also made it clear that school management has to take responsibility for the safety and security of children.



"We are issuing directives in this regard to all schools including private ones," he said.



"We held a meeting today in which the demand to derecognise the school came up, but we also had to take into account the fact that 1200 students are studying there. The parents of students studying in this school were against this step and therefore we felt taking such a step will not be right," he said.



"However, any kind of lapse, by the management or the owner, against all of them we have initiated action," he said.



"The murder accused has already been arrested. Now, within a week, police after collecting all necessary evidence will submit a chargesheet in court. However, still if the parents are not satisfied, then Haryana government is ready to get the matter probed by any agency.



"I am hopeful that when we will produce the accused before court within a week with all evidences collected by the police, the parents of the child will be satisfied with the action being taken," he said.



Sharma said, "We have fixed a seven-day deadline and in case where the accused is booked under Section 302 of IPC (for murder), this is the minimum time in such cases. However, if the child's parents still feel they are not satisfied,then as per their wish we can get the case investigated by any agency including CBI".



"We have full sympathy with the parents of the child. If any issue of providing financial help the Haryana government comes up will be willing to help," he said.



The minister made it clear that the Haryana government will not show any leniency in the matter.



"Whatever strict action needs to be taken as per law will be taken in this case," he asserted.



He also said a liquor vend near the school has been ordered to be shut down permanently. -- PTI



Photograph: PTI Photo


Matson, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, provides ocean transportation and logistics services. The company's Ocean Transportation segment offers ocean freight transportation services to the domestic non-contiguous economies of Hawaii, Alaska, and Guam, as well as to other island economies in Micronesia. It primarily transports dry containers of mixed commodities, refrigerated commodities, packaged foods and beverages, building materials, automobiles, and household goods; livestock; seafood; general sustenance cargo; and garments, footwear, e-commerce, and other retail merchandise. This segment also operates an expedited service from China to Long Beach, California, and various islands in the South Pacific, as well as Okinawa, Japan; and provides container stevedoring, refrigerated cargo services, inland transportation, container equipment maintenance, and other terminal services to ocean carriers on the Hawaiian islands of Oahu, Hawaii, Maui, and Kauai, as well as in the Alaska locations of Anchorage, Kodiak, and Dutch Harbor. In addition, the company offers vessel management and container transshipment services. Its Logistics segment provides multimodal transportation brokerage services, including domestic and international rail intermodal, long-haul and regional highway trucking, specialized hauling, flat-bed and project, less-than-truckload, and expedited freight services; less-than-container load consolidation and freight forwarding services; warehousing and distribution services; supply chain management services, and non-vessel operating common carrier freight forwarding services. The company serves the U.S. military, freight forwarders, retailers, consumer goods, automobile manufacturers, and other customers. The company was formerly known as Alexander & Baldwin Holdings, Inc. and changed its name to Matson, Inc. in June 2012. Matson, Inc. was founded in 1882 and is headquartered in Honolulu, Hawaii.
Huntington Ingalls Industries, Inc. engages in designing, building, overhauling, and repairing military ships in the United States. It operates through three segments: Ingalls Shipbuilding, Newport News Shipbuilding, and Technical Solutions. The company is involved in the design and construction of non-nuclear ships comprising amphibious assault ships; expeditionary warfare ships; surface combatants; and national security cutters for the U.S. Navy and U.S. Coast Guard. It also provides nuclear-powered ships, such as aircraft carriers and submarines, as well as refueling and overhaul, and inactivation services of ships. In addition, the company offers naval nuclear support services, including fleet services comprising design, construction, maintenance, and disposal activities for in-service the U.S. Navy nuclear ships; and maintenance services on nuclear reactor prototypes. Further, it provides life-cycle sustainment services to the U.S. Navy fleet and other maritime customers; high-end information technology and mission-based solutions for Department of Defense (DoD), intelligence, and federal civilian customers; nuclear management and operations and environmental management services for the Department of Energy, DoD, state and local governments, and private sector companies; defense and federal solutions; and unmanned systems. Huntington Ingalls Industries, Inc. was founded in 1886 and is headquartered in Newport News, Virginia.
Allergan plc, a pharmaceutical company, develops, manufactures, and commercializes branded pharmaceutical, device, biologic, surgical, and regenerative medicine products worldwide. The company operates in three segments: US Specialized Therapeutics, US General Medicine, and International. It offers a portfolio of products in various therapeutic areas, including medical aesthetics and dermatology, eye care, neuroscience, urology, gastrointestinal, women's health, and anti-infective therapeutic products. The company also offers breast implants and tissue expanders; and RM-131 (relamorelin), a peptide ghrelin agonist for the treatment of diabetic gastroparesis. In addition, it develops medical and cosmetic treatments; therapies for non-alcoholic steatohepatitis and other liver diseases; inhibitor for the treatment of psoriasis and other autoimmune disorders; atopic dermatitis drug candidate; peri-ocular rings for extended drug delivery and reducing elevated intraocular pressure in glaucoma patients; and treatments for neurodegenerative disorders, including Alzheimer's disease. Further, the company develops RST-001, a novel gene therapy for the treatment of retinitis pigmentosa; small molecule therapeutics for inflammatory and fibrotic diseases; topical medicines for fat reduction; and delivery system and botulinum toxin-based prescription products. It has collaboration, option, and license agreement with Lyndra, Inc.; and strategic alliance and option agreement with Editas Medicine, Inc. Allergan plc also has licensing agreements with Assembly Biosciences, Inc.; MedImmune; and Heptares Therapeutics, Ltd. The company was formerly known as Actavis plc and changed its name to Allergan plc in June 2015. Allergan plc was founded in 1983 and is headquartered in Dublin, Ireland.
Carter's, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, designs, sources, and markets branded childrenswear under the Carter's, OshKosh, Skip Hop, Child of Mine, Just One You, Simple Joys, Carter's My First Love, little planet, and other brands in the United States and internationally. The company operates through three segments: U.S. Retail, U.S. Wholesale, and International. Its Carter's products include babies and young children products, such as bodysuits, pants, dresses, knit sets, blankets, layette essentials, bibs, booties, sleep and play products, rompers, and jumpers; and OshKosh brand products comprise playclothes, such as denim apparel products with multiple wash treatments and coordinating garments, overalls, woven bottoms, knit tops, and bodysuits. The company also provides products for playtime, travel, mealtime, bathtime, and homegear, as well as kid's bags and diaper bags under the Skip Hop brand. In addition, it offers bedding, cribs, diaper bags, footwear, gift sets, hair accessories, jewelry, outerwear, paper goods, socks, shoes, swimwear, and toys. The company operates 18,800 wholesale locations, including department stores, national chain stores, and specialty stores. As of December 31, 2021, it operated 980 retail stores. The company also sells its products through its eCommerce websites, such as carters.com, oshkoshbgosh.com, oshkosh.com, and skiphop.com, as well as other international wholesale accounts and licensees. Carter's, Inc. was founded in 1865 and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia.
Pediatrix Medical Group, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, provides newborn, maternal-fetal, pediatric cardiology, and other pediatric subspecialty care services in the United States and Puerto Rico. It offers neonatal care services, such as clinical care to babies born prematurely or with complications within specific units at hospitals through neonatal physician subspecialists, neonatal nurse practitioners, and other pediatric clinicians. The company also provides maternal-fetal care services, including inpatient and office-based clinical care to expectant mothers and unborn babies through affiliated maternal-fetal medicine subspecialists, as well as obstetricians and other clinicians, including maternal-fetal nurse practitioners, certified nurse mid-wives, ultrasonographers, and genetic counselors. In addition, it offers pediatric cardiology care services comprising inpatient and office-based pediatric cardiology care of the fetus, infant, child, and adolescent patient with congenital heart defects and acquired heart disease, as well as adults with congenital heart defects through affiliated pediatric cardiologist subspecialists and other related clinical professionals; and specialized cardiac care to the fetus, neonatal and pediatric patients. Further, the company provides other pediatric subspecialty care services through pediatric subspecialists, such as pediatric intensivists, pediatric hospitalists, pediatric surgeons, and pediatric ophthalmologists, as well as pediatric ear, nose, and throat physicians; and support services in the areas of hospitals, primarily in the pediatric emergency rooms, labor and delivery areas, and nursery and pediatric departments. As of February 17, 2022, it operated a network of approximately 2,700 physicians. The company was formerly known as MEDNAX, Inc. and changed its name to Pediatrix Medical Group, Inc. in July 2022. Pediatrix Medical Group, Inc. was founded in 1979 and is based in Sunrise, Florida.
Human rights groups slam Israel for selling weaponry to the Myanmar junta amid intensified violence against Rhingya Muslims, including 100 tanks and light weapons. (AFP Photo)

CAIRO, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- Human rights groups criticized Israel for the continued sale of weaponry to the Myanmar junta amid violence against Rohingya Muslims, local media reported on Saturday.

More than 100 tanks as well as boats and light weapons have been sold to the Myanmar government by Israeli arms companies, investigations by several human rights watchdogs have found, according to MENA news agency.

One company, TAR Ideal Concepts, has also trained Myanmar special forces in northern Rakhine state, where much of the violence is taking place, posting pictures on their website of its staff teaching combat tactics and how to handle weapons.

There is a U.S. and EU embargo on selling arms to Myanmar, which was under military rule.

Israel's high court will decide on whether to ban arms sales to the country later this month after a petition by Israeli acitivists.

The Israeli defense ministry defended arms sales, saying the courts had no jurisdiction over a "diplomatic" issue, the report said.
The following companies are subsidiares of Molina Healthcare: Aetna & Humana - Medicare Advantage, Affinity Health Plan, AmericanWork Inc., Better Health Network, Camelot Care Centers Inc, Children's Behavioral Health Inc., Choices Group Inc., College Community Services, Dockside Services Inc, Family Preservation Services Inc., Family Preservation Services of Florida Inc., Family Preservation Services of North Carolina Inc., Family Preservation Services of Washington D.C. Inc., Family Preservation Services of West Virginia Inc., Florida NetPASS LLC, Hclb Inc., Magellan Complete Care, Maple Star Nevada Inc., Maple Star Oregon Inc., Mercy CarePlus, Molina Clinical Services LLC, Molina Healthcare Data Center Inc., Molina Healthcare of Arizona Inc., Molina Healthcare of California, Molina Healthcare of Florida Inc., Molina Healthcare of Georgia Inc., Molina Healthcare of Illinois Inc., Molina Healthcare of Iowa Inc., Molina Healthcare of Louisiana Inc., Molina Healthcare of Maryland Inc., Molina Healthcare of Michigan Inc., Molina Healthcare of Mississippi Inc., Molina Healthcare of Nevada Inc., Molina Healthcare of New Mexico Inc., Molina Healthcare of New York Inc., Molina Healthcare of North Carolina Inc., Molina Healthcare of Ohio Inc., Molina Healthcare of Oklahoma Inc., Molina Healthcare of Pennsylvania Inc., Molina Healthcare of Puerto Rico Inc., Molina Healthcare of South Carolina LLC, Molina Healthcare of Texas Inc., Molina Healthcare of Texas Insurance Company, Molina Healthcare of Utah Inc., Molina Healthcare of Virginia Inc., Molina Healthcare of Washington Inc., Molina Healthcare of Wisconsin Inc., Molina Holdings Corporation, Molina Hospital Management LLC, Molina Information Systems LLC dba Molina Medicaid Solutions, Molina Medical Management Inc., Molina Pathways LLC, Molina Pathways of Texas Inc., Molina Youth Academy, NextLevel Health Illinois, Pathways Community Corrections Inc., Pathways Community Services LLC, Pathways Community Support of Texas Inc., Pathways Health and Community Support LLC, Pathways Human Services LLC., Pathways of Arizona Inc., Pathways of Delaware Inc., Pathways of Idaho LLC, Pathways of Maine Inc., Pathways of Massachusetts LLC, Pathways of Oklahoma Inc., Pathways of Washington Inc., Providence Community Services, Providence Human Services, Raystown Developmental Services Inc., The Game of Work LLC, The RedCo Group Inc., Total Care Medicaid plan, Transitional Family Services Inc., Unisys -Health Information Management, and YourCare Health Plan.

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STERIS plc provides infection prevention and other procedural products and services worldwide. It operates through four segments: Healthcare, Applied Sterilization Technologies, Life Sciences, and Dental. The Healthcare segment offers cleaning chemistries and sterility assurance products; automated endoscope reprocessing system and tracking products; accessories for gastrointestinal (GI) procedures, washers, sterilizers, and other pieces of capital equipment for the operation of a sterile processing department; and equipment used directly in the operating room, including surgical tables, lights, and connectivity solutions, as well as equipment management services. It also provides capital equipment installation, maintenance, upgradation, repair, and troubleshooting services; preventive maintenance programs and repair services; instrument and endoscope repair and maintenance services; and custom process improvement consulting and outsourced instrument sterile processing services. The Applied Sterilization Technologies segment provides contract sterilization and testing services for medical device and pharmaceutical manufacturers through a network of approximately 50 contract sterilization and laboratory facilities. The Life Sciences segment designs, manufactures and sells consumable products, such as formulated cleaning chemistries, barrier and sterility assurance products, steam and vaporized hydrogen peroxide sterilizers, and washer disinfectors. This segment also offers equipment installation, maintenance, upgradation, repair, and troubleshooting services; and preventive maintenance programs and repair services. The Dental segment provides hand and powered dental instruments, infection control products, personal protective equipment, and water quality products for dental suite. The company serves its products and services to hospitals, other healthcare providers, and pharmaceutical manufacturers. The company was founded in 1985 and is based in Dublin, Ireland.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 02:00:40|Editor: Mu Xuequan

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BUCHAREST, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- The Romanian Black Sea Coast Guard has intercepted two boats with illegal migrants on board in the Black Sea within 24 hours.

According to the Coast Guard, one of the boat with people on all decks, including the superstructure, sailing from Bulgaria to the Romanian waters, was detected Saturday morning.

The suspect boat, a pleasure boat with a legal capacity of 25 people, was escorted by the Coast Guard ships safely to the Mangalia Port, southeastern Romania, some four hours later. As many as 97 people, 40 men, 21 women and 36 children, were found on board, who said they were citizens of Iran and Iraq.

Earlier, later Friday, the Coast Guard acted with three ships, succeeding in blocking a suspect fishing boat heading for the Romanian territorial waters in the Black Sea. The boat carrying about 120 people on board were later taken over by the Turkish Coast Guard ship that arrived soon after.

Romania has become one of the transit countries for immigrants from the Middle East to Western Europe. Only this year, local media have repeatedly reported incidents in which foreigners arrived illegally by land and by sea in Romania and attempted to leave for Hungary inside trucks.

Official data of the Romanian Border Police showed that in the first half of this year, about 2,500 foreigners tried to cross the Romanian border illegally, a five-fold increase compared with the same period of 2016.

Some 1,437 of these migrants were caught at entry and 1,037 while trying to leave the country for western European countries, mainly via Hungary.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 02:45:48|Editor: Mu Xuequan

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DAR ES SALAAM, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- Tanzanian Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa said on Saturday the government was planning to revive the cultivation of five major cash crops of cotton, tea, coffee, cashew nuts, and tobacco in the coming farming season.

The government has decided to make a close follow-up specifically on cotton farming where it will supervise the whole process from farm preparation, planting, application of fertilizers and insecticides, harvesting and marketing, Majaliwa said.

Majaliwa was speaking in the political capital Dodoma during his meeting with 10 regional commissioners from cotton-growing regions.

"It was high time that cotton farmers benefited from their sweat," he told the meeting, organized to discuss the revival of cotton farming in the regions of Shinyanga, Singida, Kagera, Tabora, Morogoro, Mara, Mwanza, Simiyu, Katavi and Geita.

"We are determined to revive cultivation of our major cash crops including cotton," Majaliwa said. "I have started with you because I know you have the capacity to supervise and guide farmers."

The prime minister directed the regional commissioners to make sure that district extension officers worked closely with farmers at all the stages, from farm preparation to harvesting.

"The main job of extension officers in these regions will be to ensure enough cotton yields in the coming farming season," he said.

Majaliwa said cotton had to become the number one export crop as it had been in previous years when people referred to it as "white gold."
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 03:05:51|Editor: Mu Xuequan

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BUCHAREST, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- A large first aid course was organized on Saturday in Romania at national level to mark the World First Aid Day.

According to the Romanian Red Cross, as many as 1,000 people joined the six-hour first aid course held at the Red Cross branches in all the 41 county seats and the six districts of the capital city of Bucharest.

"The more people who know how to give first aid, the more safe we feel," Director General of the Romanian Red Cross Ioan Silviu Lefter was quoted as saying by official Agerpres news agency.

"The Romanian Red Cross always organizes first aid courses, but the reality shows us that no matter how many people we are training, many tragedies are still happening, tragedies that could have been avoided by using the techniques learnt at these courses," he added.

According to the Romanian Red Cross, it responded to an increased number of requests that came from various companies, institutions and individuals in 2016, ensuring first aid courses to a number of approximately 56,000 persons.

This year's theme is performing first aid in case of domestic accidents and refers to all unexpected events that can occur at home and cause injuries or death.

It also coincides with the theme of World First Aid Day this year, which is "Domestic Accidents" referring to preventable or unintentional injuries that occur at home, a place often perceived as safe but unfortunately where 80 percent of accidents occur.

The World First Aid Day also recognizes the important role that National Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies and other organizations have in providing quality First Aid training worldwide as a way of building peoples' capacity to respond in situations of injury or illness.
An Indian deal-maker who is on Interpols wanted list is working on a takeover of three high street chains. Emerisque Brands , a private equity firm founded by Ajay Khaitan, has entered exclusive talks to buy the fashion retailers Oasis , Warehouse and Coast from the Icelandic bank Kaupthing . - The Sunday Times

Google will launch a fightback against Brussels this week when the company lodges an appeal against its record monopoly abuse fine. The internet giant is expected to file the response to the European Commissions 2.4bn (2.2bn) penalty on Monday, the deadline for submitting an appeal. - Sunday Telegraph

The Middle East arm of Bell Pottinger is in talks to separate from the scandal-hit PR agency, as its parent prepares to go into administration as soon as Monday. Bell Pottinger Middle East (BPME), a separate legal entity headquartered out of the United Arab Emirates, said that it had rejected the opportunity to work on the Oakbay account in South Africa which is at the centre of the scandal that has brought down its London-based parent company. - Observer

Television presenter Noel Edmonds has secured litigation funding for his 300 million action against Lloyds as he steps up his campaign against the banks treatment of small businesses a decade ago. In a wide-ranging interview with the Mail on Sunday, Edmonds revealed he had tried to talk to Mark Dobson, who used to be his business banker at HBOS. Dobson was jailed earlier this year for fraud. He wouldnt agree for me to see him, Edmonds said.

BP is to call time on chairman Carl-Henric Svanbergs chequered seven-year reign by hiring headhunters to find a replacement. The oil giant is believed to be close to triggering a search process, although a formal decision has not yet been taken by the board. - The Sunday Times

Sports Directs chairman Keith Hellawell shielded himself from reporters with his brown, battered briefcase and fled the companys annual meeting on Thursday. The 75-year-old who once used to make the most of his intimidating broad-shouldered stature seemed to have shrunk from the stress of having his stewardship of the sportswear giant come under fire for the third time in as many years. - Sunday Telegraph

A previously muted British business establishment is now in full cry over Brexit. The leak last week of proposals to restrict the ability of European Union nationals to live and work in the UK were described as catastrophic by one employers group. Voices from housebuilding to aerospace, farming and hotels raised concerns over the plans, which signalled a hard Brexit is very much on the cards. - Observer

Almost a third of Britains biggest firms have suffered a revolt on pay that would have seen them blacklisted under the Prime Ministers plans to name and shame greedy bosses, a major investigation by the Mail on Sunday has found. The analysis of about 400 documents over four years reveals the extent to which firms are feathering the nests of their highest paid executives in a system that appears to be out of control.

On September 30, 42 cheap fixed-rate energy deals end - double the number in a typical month - according to the price comparison site Energyhelpline. The spike comes because wholesale energy costs were much lower at about this time one and two years ago, allowing providers to offer relatively cheap fixed deals that are now running out. Those who do nothing will be automatically moved to their suppliers most expensive deal, known as the standard variable rate (SVR). - The Sunday Times

Ministers are ready to approve the swift development of a fleet of mini reactors to help guard against electricity shortages, as older nuclear power stations are decommissioned. The new technology is expected to offer energy a third cheaper than giant conventional reactors such as the ongoing Hinkley Point in Somerset. - Sunday Telegraph

Its that time of year when thousands of fashion buyers, press and digital influencers decamp to London to take in the catwalk shows that will shape what we wear come spring. On Wednesday, the Polish brand Reserved put on a show of its own, hiring Kate Moss to draw the fashion crowd to its debut store on Londons Oxford Street, where 120 million shoppers pass by each year. - Observer

Demand for emerging market investment trusts has fallen by the wayside, despite their bumper 68 per cent returns over the past two years, as investors focus instead on developed markets. That means that some top performing emerging market investment trusts have share prices that trade at double-digit discounts to the value of all the assets they own, highlights Stifel analyst Anthony Stern. - Mail on Sunday
The Destruction and Reconstruction of North Korea, 1950 - 1960

Charles Armstrong

This article is part of an ongoing series at The Asia-Pacific Journal commemorating the sixtieth anniversary of the start of the US-Korean War.

The American Air War and the Destruction of North Korea

The Korean War, a limited war for the US and UN forces, was for Koreans a total war. The human and material resources of North and South Korea were used to their utmost. The physical destruction and loss of life on both sides was almost beyond comprehension, but the North suffered the greater damage, due to American saturation bombing and the scorched-earth policy of the retreating UN forces.1 The US Air Force estimated that North Koreas destruction was proportionately greater than that of Japan in the Second World War, where the US had turned 64 major cities to rubble and used the atomic bomb to destroy two others. American planes dropped 635,000 tons of bombs on Korea -- that is, essentially on North Korea --including 32,557 tons of napalm, compared to 503,000 tons of bombs dropped in the entire Pacific theatre of World War II.2 The number of Korean dead, injured or missing by wars end approached three million, ten percent of the overall population. The majority of those killed were in the North, which had half of the population of the South; although the DPRK does not have official figures, possibly twelve to fifteen percent of the population was killed in the war, a figure close to or surpassing the proportion of Soviet citizens killed in World War II.3

The act which inflicted the greatest loss of civilian life in the Korean War by far, one which the North Koreans have claimed ever since was Americas greatest war crime, was the aerial bombardment of North Korean population centers. American control of the skies over Korea was overwhelming. Soviet MIGs, flown by Soviet, Chinese, and North Korean pilots, were sometimes effective against American air power. But under Stalins orders, the Soviet fighter planes were strictly limited in number and in the range they were allowed to fly, lest US-Soviet air battles lead to a larger war.4 And in any case, Soviet air support did not come until the end of 1950. During the summer and fall, North Korean air defenses were virtually non-existent. Lightly armed, local self-defense units in occupied South Korea could only watch and suffer as their towns and villages were obliterated from the air.5 By the end of the war, North Korea claimed that only two modern buildings remained standing in Pyongyang.

Pyongyang, 1953

For the Americans, strategic bombing made perfect sense, giving advantage to American technological prowess against the enemys numerical superiority. The American command dismissed British concerns that mass bombardment would turn world opinion against them, insisting that air attacks were accurate and civilian casualties limited.6 Russian accusations of indiscriminate attacks on civilian targets did not register with the Americans at all. But for the North Koreans, living in fear of B-29 attacks for nearly three years, including the possibility of atomic bombs, the American air war left a deep and lasting impression. The DPRK government never forgot the lesson of North Koreas vulnerability to American air attack, and for half a century after the Armistice continued to strengthen anti-aircraft defenses, build underground installations, and eventually develop nuclear weapons to ensure that North Korea would not find itself in such a position again. The long-term psychological effect of the war on the whole of North Korean society cannot be overestimated. The war against the United States, more than any other single factor, gave North Koreans a collective sense of anxiety and fear of outside threats that would continue long after the wars end.

North Koreas considerable economic achievements since liberation were all but completely wiped out by the war. By 1949, after two years of a planned economy, North Korea had recovery from the post-liberation chaos, and economic output had reached the level of the colonial period.7 Plans for 1950 were to increase output again by a third in the North, and the DPRK leadership had expected further economic gains following integration with the agriculturally more productive South after unification. According to DPRK figures, the war destroyed some 8,700 factories, 5,000 schools, 1,000 hospitals and 600,000 homes.8 Most of the destruction occurred in 1950 and 1951. To escape the bombing, entire factories were moved underground, along with schools, hospitals, government offices, and much of the population. Agriculture was devastated, and famine loomed. Peasants hid underground during the day and came out to farm at night. Destruction of livestock, shortages of seed, farm tools, and fertilizer, and loss of manpower reduced agricultural production to the level of bare subsistence at best. The Nodong Sinmun newspaper referred to 1951 as the year of unbearable trials, a phrase revived in the famine years of the 1990s.9 Worse was yet to come. By the fall of 1952, there were no effective targets left for US planes to hit. Every significant town, city and industrial area in North Korea had already been bombed. In the spring of 1953, the Air Force targeted irrigation dams on the Yalu River, both to destroy the North Korean rice crop and to pressure the Chinese, who would have to supply more food aid to the North. Five reservoirs were hit, flooding thousands of acres of farmland, inundating whole towns and laying waste to the essential food source for millions of North Koreans.10 Only emergency assistance from China, the USSR, and other socialist countries prevented widespread famine.

Aerial bombardment of Hwachon Dam. Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

North Korean Reconstruction as a Fraternal Socialist Project

When the fighting stopped in the summer of 1953, the entire Korean peninsula lay in utter ruin. South of the DMZ, the United States and its allies led an ambitious, and well-funded, effort to rehabilitate South Korea under the auspices of the United Nations Korea Reconstruction Agency (UNKRA).11 North Korea, even more devastated than the South and suffering as well from a labor shortage caused by the population hemorrhage of the war, had far fewer resources with which to rebuild itself. Yet through a combination of tremendous work and sacrifice on the part of the North Korean people, generous economic and technical assistance from the fraternal socialist countries, and the advantage of a pre-war industrial infrastructure more developed than that of South Korea, the DPRK soon achieved economic growth rates that far surpassed South Koreas into the 1970s. In the late 1950s North Koreas growth rate of total industrial output (averaging 39% between 1953 and 1960) was probably the highest in the world.12

North Korea had been virtually destroyed as an industrial society, and the first priority of the DPRK leadership was to re-build industry. Within days of the armistice, Kim Il Sung sent a report to the Soviet embassy in Pyongyang, detailing the extent of war damage and the need for Soviet assistance to rehabilitate North Koreas industrial economy. Fraternal aid to the DPRK began during the Korean War. Of course the great bulk of direct military assistance came from the USSR and China, but the East European Peoples Democracies also contributed to the war effort with logistical support, technical aid, medical supplies and the like. Among the most poignant forms of assistance was the taking in of thousands of Korean war orphans. Romania alone reportedly sheltered some 1,500 of these children, who were returned to the DPRK with the completion of North Koreas 1957  1961 Five-Year Plan. The first group of 205 Korean children were sent to the GDR in January 1953. These and hundreds of others were also returned to North Korea several years later.

Kim Il Sung led a delegation to Moscow in September 1953, primarily to settle the terms of Soviet assistance. The Soviet government agreed to cancel or postpone repayment for all of North Koreas outstanding debts, and reiterated its promise to give the DPRK one billion rubles in outright aid, both monetary and in the form of industrial equipment and consumer goods. Soviet technicians were sent to North Korea to help with the rehabilitation effort. The bulk of factory reconstruction in post-war North Korea was supervised by Soviet experts. Pyongyang also received promises of aid from East European countries and the Mongolian Peoples Republic, the latter promising to send North Korea some 86,500 head of livestock. The third-largest contributor of external assistance after the Soviet Union and China was East Germany, which played a major role in the rebuilding of Hamhung, North Koreas second-largest city and an important industrial center,.

Kim visited Beijing in November and received similarly generous pledges from the PRC, reflecting in part the Chinese governments interest in competing with the USSR for influence in North Korea. China cancelled North Koreas debts from the Korean War, and offered the DPRK 800 million yuan in aid for the period 1954  1957, of which 300 million would come in the first year. North Korea and China also signed an agreement on economic and cultural cooperation similar to the one signed between the DPRK and USSR in March 1949. China helped North Korea in factory reconstruction, although not on the scale that the USSR did, and became a major source for North Korean consumer goods, including textiles, cotton, and foodstuffs. Chinese technical experts went to North Korea, and Koreans traveled to China for technical training. But perhaps the most important contribution that China made to North Koreas reconstruction, in addition to monetary aid and debt cancellation, was the manpower supplied by Chinese Peoples Volunteer (CPV) troops who remained in North Korea until 1958. These troops, who numbered in the thousands, helped repair roads and rail lines damaged by war and rebuild schools, bridges, tunnels and irrigation dams. In labor-short North Korea, the physical assistance of Chinese Peoples Volunteers was invaluable for the rehabilitation of the war-damaged infrastructure.

The period of post-war reconstruction in North Korea was the first and only time the Soviet Union, China, and the Soviet-aligned countries of Eastern Europe and Mongolia cooperated on a large-scale economic project of this nature. It was the historical high point of international socialist solidarity, one that would never be repeated after the USSR and China fell out in the early 1960s. Considering that the Soviet Union was still rebuilding from the devastation of World War II, that China had only recently concluded its civil war, and that East Germany (the third-largest aid source) was rebuilding from war as well, the scale of aid to North Korea is remarkable. Contemporary Soviet sources give a breakdown in foreign assistance to the DPRK between 1953 and 1960 as dividing roughly into thirds, no doubt a division of labor suggested by Moscow. Exactly one-third (33.3%) of reconstruction aid came from the USSR, 29.4% from China, and 37.3% from other countries. The monetary figures do not take into account aid in labor, which was particularly important on the Chinese side.

Source: SSSR i Koreia (Moscow: USSR Academy of Sciences, 1988), p. 256

North Korea was dependent on fraternal assistance for more than 80% of its industrial reconstruction needs between 1954 and 1956, the period of the Three-Year Plan.

North Korea could not possibly have rebuilt its economy as quickly as it did without this massive inflow of aid into nearly every sector of production and consumption. But the DPRK did not remain aid-dependent for long. Partly this was out of necessity, as socialist-bloc aid was intended from the beginning to be phased out as reconstruction was completed. Yet it is remarkable how quickly North Koreas aid dependency dropped  North Koreas declaration of self-reliance by the end of the 1950s was not without substance. In 1954, 33.4% of North Koreas state revenue came from foreign aid; in 1960, the proportion was down to a paltry 2.6%. By contrast, well over half of South Koreas government revenue came from foreign assistance in 1956. By the early 1960s, well before South Koreas industrial take-off, the North had impressively re-industrialized. This difference cannot be explained by foreign aid alone, which was far greater in absolute terms in South Korea than in the North. The regimes ability to mobilize the North Korean population was also indispensable for the success of this project. As Kim Il Sung had said, economic reconstruction would require all the work and resources the North Korean people could muster.

Rebuilding Pyongyang. From Chris Marker, Coreennes (Paris: Seuil, 1959).

Urban Reconstruction in Pyongyang and Hamhung

In the reconstruction of Pyongyang, as in the North Korean economy more generally, fraternal assistance was massive, diverse, and crucial. At the time, this help was warmly and extensively acknowledged in the DPRK media. After the 1960s, when self-reliance became both the dominant slogan and the lens through which all previous North Korean experiences were filtered, the role of foreigners in post-war reconstruction was rarely if ever mentioned. Broadly speaking, China contributed mainly manpower and light consumer goods, the Soviets and East Germans supplied technical assistance and supervision, and the other East European countries gave equipment and technical assistance for specific industries. Kim Il Sung publicly thanked the Chinese Peoples Volunteers, who had fought shoulder-to-shoulder with the Korean Peoples Army, for their continued role in the post-war reconstruction effort. CPV soldiers helped rebuild bridges, elementary schools, factories and apartments. In February 1955, for instance, the 47th Brigade of the CPV rebuilt the Pyongyang Electric Train Factory. A group of more than 770 Chinese construction experts stayed in Pyongyang from November 1954 to the end of 1956 to help oversee reconstruction. Albania donated asphalt for paving roads, Czechoslovakia gave buses, Hungary built a precision tool factory, East Germany gave telephones and switchboards for the citys communication services and modernized the National Film Production Center. Poland built the West Pyongyang Railway Factory, Bulgaria built a factory for wooden tools, Romania built up Pyongyang Central Hospital, and the USSR, Czechoslovakia, China and East Germany each contributed engines and freight and passenger cars to develop the North Korean railroad industry. During the period of the Three-Year plan, many East European leaders visited Pyongyang, where they were warmly thanked for their countries contributions to post-war reconstruction, including Otto Grotewohl of the GDR, Enver Hoxha of Albania, and Gheorghiu-Dej of Romania.

In the face of the Chinese advance in late November and December 1950, the US Army X Corps withdrew toward the Hamhung/Hungnam area to be evacuated by sea. Hamhung had already been bombed by the US Air Force, but the X Corps had been ordered to deny the Communist troops supplies and transportation facilities before they left the area. For several days, beginning December 11, the 185th Engineering Battalion of X Corps hauled some four tons of dynamite to the industrial outskirts of Hungnam and began to destroy what remained of the factories. On December 15, the railroad bridge leading south from Hamhung was blown up. All the highway bridges in the vicinity were similarly demolished. Three days later, the First Platoon burned all the buildings and destroyed all aviation supplies at Hamhungs Yongpo airport, about five miles south of Hungnam, with gasoline, tracer bullets and grenades; for good measure, a naval bombardment hit the airport later that afternoon. Meanwhile, some 100,000 North Korean refugees were transported from Hungnam to South Korea by US navy LSTs in the so-called Christmas Evacuation of December 19  24. Out of the rubble of a destroyed and depopulated Hamhung, the North Koreans and East Germans built a new industrial city.

Korean and German workers in the Hamhung reconstruction project, late 1950s. From Paek Sung-jong, Tongdok topyonsu Ressel ui Puk Han chuok (Seoul: Hyohyong chulpansa, 2000)

It is not clear exactly when, and by whom, the decision was made for East German aid to focus on the city of Hamhung. It appears that GDR Prime Minister Otto Grotewohl personally promised Kim Il Sung help in rebuilding a city when the two men met at the Geneva Conference in 1954. Later that year, in late June or early July, a North Korean leader (presumably Kim Il Sung) wrote to Grotewohl:

The government and the whole Korean people are endlessly touched and thankful for the promise given by you, dear comrade Prime Minister, to our delegation at the Geneva Conference, to rebuild one of the destroyed towns by the efforts of the German Democratic RepublicThe government of our Republic has decided as the object of reconstruction and recovery by your government the city of Hamhung, one of the provincial centers of our Republic.13

Perhaps Grotewohl, presiding over a war-damaged country himself, was moved by a sense of common bond with the Koreans; perhaps he was pressured by the Soviets to give East German aid to a major industrial reconstruction project, but not in the capital, which would be a showcase of Soviet aid. In any case, Grotewohl himself headed a German Work Team (Deutsche Arbeitsgruppe, DAG) to direct the project. Hundreds of East German engineers, technicians, craftsmen and their families were sent to Hamhung, some residing for several years, and gained the collective, ironically German-sounding nickname Hamhunger. In the fall of 1954 a GDR delegation visited Hamhung to lay the groundwork for the reconstruction project, and the following year the East German government announced its plan to help in the reconstruction of Hamhung for the period 1955  1964.

East German engineers and their families in Hamhung, celebrating the 10th anniversary of the founding of the DPRK, 1958. From Paek, Tongdok topyonsu Ressel ui Puk Han chuok.

In just over five years, North Koreans with East German assistance rebuilt Hamhung as a modern industrial city, and for decades the city would be the main industrial hub of North Korea outside the capital Pyongyang. In 1960  long before the term would be applied to South Korea  the East German press called North Korea an economic miracle in the Far East.14 In June 1956, Kim Il Sung visited the GDR and personally thanked the East Germans for their help.15 But from the beginning of the reconstruction process, the DPRK leadership had seen foreign assistance as a limited process that would gradually give way to North Korean self-reliance.16 In December 1955 Kim made his subsequently famous speech about Juche or self reliance, Originally referring to ideological independence, especially with regard to the Soviet Union, over the course of the next two decades Juche would be extended to all aspects of North Korean behavior, from politics to economics to military defense.

The DPRK and GDR governments declared the Hamhung project completed in1962, two years ahead of schedule. The German specialists and their families went home. At the same time, the thousands of Korean orphans taken in by German, Romanian, and other East European families, were sent back to Korea. Some North Korean students remained in Eastern Europe and the USSR, but the era of close fraternal cooperation had come to an end. North Korea had been rebuilt, and from this point onward would chart its own distinct course of political and economic development, connected but never subordinated to the broader socialist community of nations.

Charles Armstrong is professor of history and Director of the Center for Korean Research at Columbia University. He is the author of The North Korean Revolution, 1945  1950 and The Koreas, and editor of Korean Society: Civil Society, Democracy and the State and Korea at the Center: Dynamics of Regionalism in Northeast Asia.

Recommended citation: Charles Armstrong, The Destruction and Reconstruction of North Korea, 1950 - 1960, The Asia-Pacific Journal Vol 8, Issue 51 No 2, December 20, 2010.

Other articles on the sixtieth anniversary of the outbreak of the US-Korean War are:

Steven Lee, The United States, the United Nations, and the Second Occupation of Korea, 1950-1951.

Heonik Kwon, Korean War Traumas.

Han Kyung-koo, Legacies of War: The Korean War  60 Years On.

Additional articles on the US-Korean War include:

Mel Gurtov, From Korea to Vietnam: The Origins and Mindset of Postwar U.S. Interventionism.

Kim Dong-choon, The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Korea: Uncovering the Hidden Korean War

Tessa Morris-Suzuki, Remembering the Unfinished Conflict: Museums and the Contested Memory of the Korean War.

Notes

1 Far East Command ordered General Walker to destroy everything that might be of use to the enemy as the Eighth Army fled South in December 1950. Roy E. Appleman, Disaster in Korea: The Chinese Confront MacArthur (College Station, TX: Texas A & M Pres, 1989), p. 360.

2 Cited in Rosemary Foot, A Substitute for Victory: The Politics of Peacemaking at the Korean Armistice Talks (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990), pp. 207  208.

3 Jon Halliday, The North Korean Enigma, New Left Review no. 127 (May  June 1981), p. 29.

4 The extent of Soviet air involvement in the Korean War was long a secret of the Cold War, whose details only become known after the collapse of the USSR. See Xiaoming Zhang, Red Wings over the Yalu: China, the Soviet Union, and the Air War in Korea (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2002).

5 US National Archives, Record Group 242, shipping advice 2013, item 1/191. Organization of Armed Home Defense Units (DPRK), September 1950. Reports include graphic descriptions of an air attack on the city of Yochon on August 26, and the bombing of an elementary school on September 1.

6 Conrad C. Crane, American Airpower Strategy in Korea, 1950  1953 (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2000), pp. 42 43.

7 US National Archives, Record Group 59. U.S. Embassy to State, Economic Conditions in North Korea, October 11, 1949, p. 8.

8 The Three Year Plan, Kyongje konsol [Economic Construction], September 1956, pp. 5 6.

9 Nodong Sinmun, March 16, 1952, p. 1.

10 Callum MacDonald, Korea: The War Before Vietnam (London: Macmillan, 1986), pp. 241  242.

11 The post-war reconstruction of South Korea was the worlds largest multilateral development project at the time. See Stephen Hugh Lee, The United Nations Korea Reconstruction Agency in War and Peace, in Chae-Jin Lee and Young-ick Lew, eds., Korea and the Korean War (Seoul: Yonsei University Press, 2002), pp. 357  96.

12 John Yoon Tai Kuark, A Comparative Study of Economic Development in North and South Korea during the Post-Korean War Period, Ph.D. dissertation, University of Minnesota, 1966, p. 32; Joseph S. Chung, The North Korean Economy: Structure and Development (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1974), pp. 146-47.

13 Cited in Ruediger Frank, Die DDR und Nordkorea: Dier Wiederaufbau der Stadt Hamhung von 1954  1962 (Aachen: Shaker, 1996), p. 23.

14 Martin Radmann, Ein Wirtschafstwunder im Fernen Osten, Neues Deutschland, December 27, 1960.

15 GDR Foreign Ministry, Korea section. Visit of a Government Delegation of the DPRK in the GDR, June 1956. MfAA A 6927, Fiche 1.

16 Kim Il Sung, On Eliminating Dogmatism and Formalism and Establishing Juche in Ideological Work, Works vol. 9, pp. 395  417.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 03:40:58|Editor: Mengjie

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ANKARA, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and U.S. President Donald Trump held a phone conversation and discussed the regional developments on Saturday, said Turkish presidency.

Both leaders highlighted the significance of a continued cooperation for further strengthening bilateral relations and stability in the Middle East, the Presidential Press Office said in a written statement.

During the phone talk, Erdogan and Trump agreed to meet during the U.N. General Assembly in New York later this month.
A gala concert is staged in Red Square in Moscow, Russia, Sept. 9, 2017 to mark the city's 870th anniversary. (Kremlin Photo)

MOSCOW, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- Massive festivities will be staged on the weekend across Moscow to mark the 870th anniversary of the city's founding.

According to the Moscow municipal government, 427 events will be held in more than 300 locations. A total of 10 million visits to these events are expected.

Russian President Vladimir Putin attended a gala concert on Saturday in the Red Square, where he congratulated Moscow residents and visitors on City Day.

"This day is always marked by grand and festive celebrations, with people expressing their sincere love for Moscow, its centuries' old history and its contemporary achievements and their pride for our beautiful capital," he said.

Putin said a large-scale reconstruction is underway in the city to improve the quality of life for Muscovites, although the work is arduous.

Located in the East European Plain, Moscow is the capital of and the largest city in Russia as well as a major global metropolis.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 04:46:13|Editor: Mengjie

Burundian people demonstrate in the street in Bujumbura, capital city of Burundi, on Sept. 9, 2017. Burundi's Attorney General Sylvestre Nyandwi on Saturday said an investigation by the International Criminal Court (ICC) into alleged crimes against humanity in Burundi since 2015 would be legally groundless.(Xinhua/Evrard Ngendakumana)

BUJUMBURA, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- Burundi's Attorney General Sylvestre Nyandwi on Saturday said an investigation by the International Criminal Court (ICC) into alleged crimes against humanity in Burundi since 2015 would be legally groundless.

Speaking during a press briefing, Nyandwi deplored the fact that the United Nations investigators declared that the east African country's jurisdictions are "not willing" and are "not capacitated" to prosecute perpetrators of crimes against humanity happening in Burundi since 2015.

"We have always demonstrated that Burundian jurisdictions are able to prosecute people accused of crimes. We discussed with the ICC about crimes that were committed since 2015 and measures taken to repress them, but it is surprising to realize that the UN (United Nations) investigators are questioning the competence of our jurisdictions," said Nyandwi.

Three UN investigators, appointed by the UN Human Rights Council, on Monday issued a report whereby they urged the ICC to open a case "as soon as possible" against the Burundian government on alleged crimes against humanity committed since 2015.

The UN inquiry commission said that it had reasonable grounds to believe that crimes against humanity had been perpetrated by the country's highest authorities.

The report detailed what it described as widespread and systematic abuses including extrajudicial executions, forced disappearances, torture and sexual violence.

The investigators had collected views from Burundian refugees living in neighboring countries and in Europe, but were denied access to the Burundian territory due to a previous "biased and wrong" report, according to the Burundian government.

Burundi plunged into a crisis since April 2015 when Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza decided to run his controversial third term bid.

His candidature, which was opposed by the opposition and civil society groups, resulted in a wave of protests, violence and even a failed coup on May 13, 2015.

Over 410,000 people have fled to other countries, mostly Tanzania, Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Uganda, since the outbreak of the crisis.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 06:01:25|Editor: Mu Xuequan

Syrian military vehicles take position on the outskirts of Deir al-Zour city in eastern Syria on Sept. 5, 2017. Following days of intense battles on the outskirts of Deir al-Zour in eastern Syria, the Syrian forces and allied fighters broke Tuesday the three-year siege of the Islamic State (IS) to government-held parts in the city. (Xinhua/Ammar Safarjalani)

DAMASCUS, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- The Islamic State (IS) is rapidly losing ground in Syria's Deir al-Zour province, with the Russian-backed Syrian army and the U.S.-backed forces separately beating the terror-designated group.

On Saturday, the Syrian government forces backed by the Russians, Iranian-backed fighters, and the tribal forces, succeeded to break the IS siege on the key air base of Deir al-Zour, where Syrian soldiers and fighters of the Lebanese Hezbollah group have been besieged for three years.

The victory was achieved by the Syrian military units advancing from the western part of the city, more specifically from the Brigade 137.

Those units have spearheaded the attack on IS in Deir al-Zour earlier this week, when they advanced from the southern countryside of Raqqa province in northern Syria toward Deir al-Zour, breaking IS three-year siege on the Brigade 137 and thus lifting the siege of the capital city of Deir al-Zour, where 93,000 civilians have been besieged as well.

These units are the ones who advanced in the city and broke the IS siege on the air base and capturing areas surrounding it.

From the south, other military units have been advancing toward Deir al-Zour from the desert region of the remote eastern countryside of Homs province in central Syria.

The second troops gutted IS-held areas in the desert one by one until finally reaching Deir al-Zour from its southern gate, capturing on Saturday the key energy field of Teym, which produces oil and gas.

Teym field produced gas and oil and is one of the most important energy fields in Syria as it supports the electricity production to most Syrian cities.

Meanwhile, a military source told Xinhua that the Syrian forces also captured surrounding areas near the oil field, proceeding toward the graveyard area where the first incursion team is advancing, coming from the Brigade 123.

With both forces advancing against IS in Deir al-Zour, the terror-designated group started losing key ground in the capital city of that oil-rich province.

Syria's Foreign Ministry said Saturday that the war on the terrorist group is nearing its end with IS losing ground in Deir al-Zour.

The state TV said celebrations broke out in Deir al-Zour with the army advancing and breaking the air base siege.

Breaking the siege of the airport will largely play into the hands of the Syrian government forces in their push to eliminate the IS presence in the city before proceeding to the countryside where IS also controls large swathes of areas near the Iraqi border.

When the base was besieged, the soldiers couldn't fly warplanes as IS would target them. Now, the base is expected to return to operation after the army has cleansed the vicinity of the airbase.

A military source told Xinhua that 90 percent of IS supply routes to the capital city of Deir al-Zour have been blocked.

He added that commanders of IS are fleeing their positions toward other areas in the countryside of Deir al-Zour.

Since entering the city, the Syrian government has sent several truckloads of food and medicine to the city.

The Russian air force played a significant role in supporting the ground forces of the Syrian army and allied fighters of Iranian-backed troops and tribesmen fighters.

In the northern countryside of Deir al-Zour, the U.S.-backed Deir al-Zour Military Council declared Saturday the commencement of a new battle against IS in northern and eastern countryside of Deir al-Zour province and the southern countryside of Hasakah province in northeastern Syria.

The group said it captured the towns of Ruaishid and Zarab from IS in the northern countryside of Deir al-Zour on Saturday, as some activists said the presence of IS in the southern countryside of Hasakah, bordering the northern countryside of Deir al-Zour, has largely diminished under the strikes of the U.S.-backed forces.

The northern countryside of Deir al-Zour is seen by the U.S. as an area of influence as it's close to the northeastern province of Hasakah, a largely Kurdish-controlled territory.

The eastern province of Deir al-Zour is important to the U.S. because of its proximity to the Iraqi border, where the U.S. is trying to establish a foothold to quell the cross-border Iranian support to Syria and Lebanon's Hezbollah.

The government has yet to comment on the U.S.-led operation in Deir al-Zour, but it has repeatedly slammed the U.S. coalition as "illegitimate."

Deir al-Zour is the last major stronghold of IS, as the terror-designated group is also losing its de facto capital of Raqqa to the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, which has captured more than 60 percent of Raqqa.
With no path to win, Mastriano still silent on conceding blowout loss
Milan, Italy: Two new studies presented at the European Respiratory Society International Congress highlight the risks associated with using e-cigarettes, especially for those who also smoke conventional cigarettes.

One study examined 122 of the most commonly sold e-cigarette liquids in nine European countries and found that all contained at least one substance classified as a health risk.

The other study, a survey of more than 30,000 people in Sweden, found that e-cigarette use was most common among people who already smoke, and that people who use both experience more symptoms, such as a persistent cough, wheezing and coughing up mucus.

The research on the combined effects of smoking and e-cigarettes will be presented by Dr Linnea Hedman, a behavioural scientist at Umea University in Sweden.

Dr Hedman and her colleagues questioned more than 30,000 people, who were randomly selected from the general population in Sweden, about their smoking habits, use of e-cigarettes and respiratory symptoms.

Around 11% of people surveyed said they only smoke conventional cigarettes, while 0.6% said they only use e-cigarettes and 1.2% said they use both. The results revealed that e-cigarette use was more common among people who currently smoke conventional cigarettes (9.8%), compared to former smokers (1.1%) or non-smokers (0.6%).

The results also showed that people who use both conventional cigarettes and e-cigarettes were the most likely to suffer with respiratory symptoms. Among non-smokers 26% experienced any respiratory symptoms, compared with 34% among those using only e-cigarettes, 46% among those only smoking conventional cigarettes, and 56% among dual users.

Dr Hedman will tell the congress: "Our results show that a proportion of smokers are also using e-cigarettes. It could be that they're turning to e-cigarettes when they're in places like cafes and restaurants where they cannot smoke conventional cigarettes, or it could be that they're using e-cigarettes in the hopes of quitting smoking. One argument for e-cigarettes is that they could help smokers to quit, but our study does not support this argument. If that was the case, e-cigarette use would have been most common among former smokers.

"We have also found that people who use both conventional and e-cigarettes are more likely to suffer wheezing, or a long-standing or productive cough. It could be that some smokers, who are already suffering these symptoms, want to quit smoking by changing to e-cigarettes but they are not managing to stop. Alternatively, it could be that using both products causes worse respiratory effects than either alone. More research is needed to determine whether e-cigarette use contributes to smoking cessation or if it increases the burden of respiratory disease.

"The possible health effects of e-cigarettes are far from established and it will take some years before the long-term effects will be revealed. However, this research adds to the evidence that e-cigarettes cannot yet be marketed as a safe alternative to conventional cigarettes.

The research on the content of e-cigarette refills was presented by Dr Constantine Vardavas (MD, PhD), from the University of Crete.

Dr Vardavas and his colleagues selected a random sample of e-cigarette liquids from the most popular brands on sale in Greece, Spain, Germany, The Netherlands, the UK, Hungary, Romania, Poland and France, which included a variety of different flavours and nicotine strengths.

They analysed each sample to find out exactly which chemicals were present and in what quantities. Every liquid they tested contained at least one substance that has some level of risk to health according to the United Nations (UN) classification system [1].

These included methyl cyclopentanolone (found in 26.3% of samples) and a-ionone (found in 8.7% of samples), both which "may cause allergy or asthma symptoms or breathing difficulties if inhaled", according to their classification. Other substances, such as menthol (42.9% of samples), ethyl vanillin (16.5% of samples) and acetyl pyrazine (8.2% of samples), are classified as "able to cause respiratory irritation".

Dr Vardavas told the congress: "The most recent evidence from across the European Union shows a substantial increase in e-cigarette use over the past few years. The EU Tobacco Products Directive notes that e-liquids should not contain ingredients that pose a risk to human health. However, despite growing research on the effect of different ingredients within e-liquids there is little knowledge on the impact they may have on respiratory health.

"Our research reveals that e-cigarette liquids on sale in Europe have ingredients that are potential respiratory irritants. This means that they are substances which irritate the airways according to previous research and international classification standards.

"An EU Directive on e-cigarettes rules that: 'except for nicotine, only ingredients are used in the nicotine-containing liquid that do not pose a risk to human health in heated or unheated form'. We think the respiratory irritants we found may be a breach of this legislation.

"Based on this work, we also think users should be aware that e-cigarettes are not risk-free, and that doctors should inform their patients that e-cigarettes may contain respiratory irritants."

In a separate study also presented at the Congress, Dr Vardavas and his team examined trends in smokers' attempts to quit, with surveys of almost 10,000 Europeans in 2012 and in 2014. They found that use of nicotine replacement therapy declined (from 14.6% in 2012 to 12.2% in 2014) and quitting with the help of healthcare professionals and smoking cessation clinics also fell (6.7% to 5.0%). However, experimentation with e-cigarettes for the purpose of quitting increased (from 3.7% in 2012 to 11.0% in 2014).

###
Milan, Italy: Respiratory tract infections in young children are linked to an increased risk of asthma and worse lung function in later life, according to new research to be presented at the European Respiratory Society International Congress today (Sunday).

An international study of 154,492 European children found that those who had had upper respiratory infections, such as colds, sinusitis, laryngitis, tonsillitis, pharyngitis and otitis, by the age of five years had a 1.5-fold increased risk of developing asthma in later life. Children who had suffered from lower respiratory tract infections, such as bronchitis, bronchiolitis, pneumonia and general chest infections, had a two- to four-fold increased risk of developing asthma in later life and were also more likely to have worse lung function.

Dr Evelien van Meel (MD), from the Generation R Study Group at Erasmus MC University Medical Centre, The Netherlands, will tell the congress: "These findings support the hypothesis that early-life respiratory tract infections may influence the development of respiratory illnesses in the longer term. In particular, lower respiratory tract infections in early life seem to have the greatest adverse effect on lung function and the risk of asthma.

"However, at this stage we cannot say for certain whether the relationship is causal. Further studies that measure lung function and wheezing from birth onwards are needed to explore whether the infections cause asthma and lower lung function, or whether wheezing and lower lung function may be predisposing these children to develop the infections. Studies that aim to prevent or treat respiratory tract infections at an early stage, perhaps by vaccination, would also help to shed light on this."

Lung function and asthma are two different measures of respiratory health and are only partly related. "Lung function is an objective measure of the function of the lungs and airways. Lung function could be affected without leading to symptoms, or it could lead to asthma or other complaints such as wheezing. Additionally, a child could be diagnosed with asthma but their lung function could be fairly unaffected, for example because they are taking adequate asthma medications," says Dr van Meel.

The researchers analysed data from 37 groups of children from several European countries [1] who were born between 1989 and 2013. Children were included in this meta-analysis if data were available on respiratory tract infections in early life (from age six months up to five years old), and childhood lung function and/or asthma. The length of follow-up varied between groups, but ranged from birth until the age of four to 15 years.

The children's lung function was measured as they grew older with a spirometer, an instrument that measures:

forced vital capacity (FVC) - a measure of the amount of air that can be exhaled from the lungs after taking the deepest breath possible

forced expiratory volume in one second (FEV1) - how much air can be exhaled in the first second

forced expiratory flow at 75% of FVC (FEF75) - the speed of air exhaled after exhaling three quarters of the total lung volume during a forced exhalation.

"Lung function was not measured in very young children," explains Dr van Meel. "The youngest children with lung function measurements were four years of age and the oldest 15 years of age, with an average age of eight years."

The researchers adjusted their analysis to take account of factors that could affect the results, such as socio-economic status, lifestyle, birth weight, gestational age at birth, gender, age, height and ethnicity.

They found that upper respiratory tract infections were not associated with worse lung function in later life. However, lower respiratory tract infections at almost all ages were associated with worse lung function as indicated by lower scores for FVC, FEV1 and FEF75.

Dr van Meel says it will be interesting to examine the long-term consequences in adulthood of respiratory tract infections on lung function and asthma. "At the age of eight years, asthma is usually well established, as is lung function. Lung function in childhood is most likely related with lung function in adulthood."

The researchers are planning further research. "Specifically, we want to study the roles played by antibiotics, paracetamol and exposure to second-hand smoke in the relationships between respiratory tract infections and lung function or asthma. Also, we would like to study what percentage of the association between respiratory tract infections and asthma can be explained by changes in lung function, and whether the associations change when we take early-life wheezing into account," she will conclude.

###

Abstract no: OA499, "Early-life respiratory tract infections and the risk of lower lung function and asthma: a meta-analysis of 154,492 children"; Determinants of childhood asthma and atopy session, 10.45-12.45 hrs CEST, Sunday 10 September, Brown 1+2 (south).

[1] The European countries involved were Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Ireland, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the UK.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 06:36:33|Editor: Song Lifang

Director Guillermo Del Toro shows the Golden Lion Award for Best Film for his movie "The Shape of Water" during the 74th Venice Film Festival, at the Lido of Venice, Italy, Sept. 9, 2017. "The Shape of Water" by director Guillermo Del Toro won the Golden Lion, the highest prize presented at the 74th Venice Film Festival, which concluded here on Saturday evening. (Xinhua/Jin Yu)

by Alessandra Cardone

VENICE, Italy, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- "The Shape of Water" by Mexican filmmaker Guillermo Del Toro was awarded the Golden Lion as best film at the 74th Venice Film Festival, which closed Saturday evening.

The movie is a fantasy romance about a mute woman who falls for a mysterious, amphibious creature captured in water depths, and subjected to a secret experiment by the U.S. military.

With Sally Hawkins playing the main character, the story is set in the United States in the early 1960s, against the backdrop of the Cold War era.

"There is a moment in every storyteller's life, no matter what age you are, when you risk it all, and do something different," Del Toro said at the awarding ceremony.

Del Toro also encouraged peers from Latin America to pursue their dream.

"As Mexican, I want to dedicate this prize to every young Mexican filmmaker, or Latin American filmmaker, who is dreaming of doing something in the fantastic genre, but is told it cannot be done. It can be done," he added.

"All I know is that if you remain pure, and stay with your faith -whatever you have faith in, and in my case is monsters - eventually things will go right."

Israeli director Samuel Maoz was awarded the Silver Lion-Grand Jury Prize for "Foxtrot," the story of an Israeli couple grieving for the loss of their soldier son. Maoz won the Golden Lion here in 2009 with "Lebanon."

The Silver Lion for best director went to French Xavier Legrand with his family drama "Jusqu'a la Garde" (Custody), which also won the Luigi De Laurentiis Award for a Debut Film.

British Martin McDonagh received the Best Screenplay Award for "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri," which starred Frances McDormand playing the role of a grieving and enraged mother who loses her daughter, and resorts to drastic steps to find justice.

The Special Jury Prize went to Australian Warwick Thornton for his drama "Sweet Country" set in the Australian outback.

Charlotte Rampling in the film "Hannah" by Italian Andrea Pallaoro, and Kamel El Basha in "The Insult" by Lebanese Ziad Doueiri, won the Volpi Cups as best actress and best actor in the festival.

The festival's Horizons competition devoted to new cinema trends awarded best film to music biography "Nico, 1988" by Italian Susanna Nicchiarelli.

Finally, in the first ever competition launched for Virtual Reality works, a specific jury led by director John Landis bestowed the Best VR Award on short animation movie "Arden's Wake" by American Eugene YK Chung.

Installation "La Camera Insabbiata" by Laurie Anderson and Hsin-Chien Huang won the Best VR Experience Award, and short film "Bloodless" by South Korean filmmaker Gina Kim won the Best VR Story Award.

Overall, 21 world premieres competed for the Golden Lion this year, while 22 works run out of competition, and another 19 in the Horizons section.
LUGANO-MADRID, 10 September, 2017 - Clinical trials are fundamental to the development of new treatments for cancer, yet the annual accrual to cancer clinical trials worldwide is low, estimated at three to five percent. A nationwide study in Ireland (1), the preliminary results of which are to be presented at the ESMO 2017 Congress in Madrid, shows that although most oncology patients consider it important to have clinical trials available, many struggle with the central concepts that underpin trial methodology.

"As a medical oncologist, I have experienced situations where patients have declined clinical trial options because of misconceptions about them," said study author Dr. Catherine Kelly from Mater Misericordiae University Hospital in Dublin, Ireland. "To improve participation in clinical trials, we need to understand the factors influencing patients' decisions about taking part."

In the course of the study, 1090 adult patients with a diagnosed malignancy and being treated at one of 14 participating oncology centres across Ireland filled out anonymised questionnaires in which they were asked to evaluate statements about clinical trials and research.

"Consistent with previous studies, the concepts of chance and randomisation posed difficulties to a significant proportion of patients. Over half of previous medical trial participants and 73 percent of those who had never been on a cancer clinical trial did not understand that in a randomised trial, the treatment given was decided by chance," Kelly reported.

"We also found that most patients did not understand clinical equipoise: the fact that no one knows which treatment is best. Surprisingly, this was more marked in previous clinical trial participants, 60 percent of whom believed that their doctor would know which study arm was best," she said.

"To provide informed consent when participating in a trial, patients need to understand these key concepts - and doctors explaining them well is essential to alleviating any fears that might prevent patients from participating. For example, many didn't realise that clinical trials are not just an option for when standard treatment has failed," she observed.

"Doctors have a responsibility to properly inform their patients in this regard, because they are the ones patients trust the most," Kelly said. "As we analyse the data further, we will be able to offer physicians a more detailed picture of the questions patients need answered and the factors that influence their decision-making according to age group, cancer type, educational background and other demographics."

Dr. Bettina Ryll, Chair of the ESMO Patient Advocates Working Group (PAWG) (2), commented: "The question of whether patients understand clinical trial methodology is a very valid one, and what makes this study so interesting is that more than a quarter of the patients questioned had actually been on clinical trials before," she said.

"However, I was surprised at the median age of the cohort: 60 years. It would be interesting to compare the data collected here with younger patient groups, who access information in a very different way," Ryll observed. "I would also expect to see differences across tumour groups: among breast cancer patients, for instance, who make up almost a third of the study cohort and for most of whom there is a well-established standard of care, clinical trials are likely to be of less interest than among lung cancer patients, for whom the standard treatment is less effective."

Ryll further cautioned: "When we talk about understanding, it is important to consider that patients and physicians approach clinical trials from different perspectives: For example, the concept of randomisation is one that many patients question from a moral standpoint. Equipoise, by contrast, may be a laudable moral concept, but it is difficult to uphold if the results of earlier trials are already known: finding out whether a treatment is, say, 51 percent better or only 49 percent, may matter to an Health Technology Assessment (HTA) assessor - but not to a patient. This undermines the conclusion that patients simply do not understand equipoise."

Trial design is a complex issue - one of many that cancer patients can face in the course of their treatment. Complementing the educational role of doctors, ESMO's Patient Advocates also play a crucial part in making sure that patients are well-informed and giving them the opportunity to take part in research that can truly benefit them.

###

References

1 Abstract 1465P_PR 'Do oncology patients understand clinical trials? A nationwide study by Cancer Trials Ireland' will be presented by Catherine Kelly during the Poster Display Session on Sunday, 10 September, 13:15 to 14:15 (CEST) in Hall 8.

2 ESMO Patient Advocates Working Group http://www.esmo.org/Patients/Patient-Advocates-Working-Group

3 Workshop: 'Cancer Patient Advocacy Networks Driving Research' http://www.esmo.org/Conferences/Workshops-Courses/ESMO-Workshop-Cancer-Patient-Advocacy-Networks-Driving-Research

4 ESMO 2017 Patient Advocacy Track http://www.esmo.org/Patients/Patient-Advocacy-Track

Disclaimer

This press release contains information provided by the authors of the highlighted abstracts and reflects the content of those abstracts. It does not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of ESMO who cannot be held responsible for the accuracy of the data. Commentators quoted in the press release are required to comply with the ESMO Declaration of Interests policy and the ESMO Code of Conduct.

About the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO)

ESMO is the leading professional organisation for medical oncology. With 16,000 members representing oncology professionals from over 130 countries worldwide, ESMO is the society of reference for oncology education and information. We are committed to supporting our members to develop and advance in a fast-evolving professional environment. http://www.esmo.org
Almost nine out of ten people in the UK do not trust foreign food chains, with just 12% of people having confidence in the European food chain and 7% in global food suppliers, according to new research.

The NFU Mutual Food Fraud Report 2017, published today (7th September), also reveals that almost three quarters (72%) think there is an issue with food fraud in the UK, with over a quarter also believing that they have personally experienced it (27%).

Hearing about high profile cases of fraudulent food in the media, such as the horse meat scandal in 2013, is the most common cause of reduced confidence in nearly half of consumers (46%).

In July, police dismantled an organised crime group trading horsemeat in Europe that was unfit for human consumption. Over 60 people were arrested in the Europe-wide investigation.

The recent mass egg recall due to poison fears also caused shoppers to question the origin of their food purchases.

The report goes on to state that takeaways are the outlet that UK consumers are least trusting of, receiving 42% of the vote followed by online (21%) and convenience stores (16%). The least trusted product types are processed foods (35%), red meat (18%) and supplements (15%).

One third of consumers (33%) are less trusting of products and retailers than they were five years ago, compared with only 9% whose trust has increased.

A further 33% believe that food crime is likely to increase in the future.

'Tough scrutiny'

Commenting on the report, Frank Woods, Retail Sector Specialist at NFU Mutual, said leaving the EU provides an "important time" for tackling food fraud and getting regulation right.

He said: Government proposals for where we will get our food from are already under tough scrutiny from industry and consumers alike with concerns over skilled workers and quality.

Producers are under immense pressure to offset price rises caused by the weakened value of sterling and higher import costs, squeezing already tight budgets and resources and potentially cornering them into using cheaper global suppliers that may be more vulnerable to fraud.

The UK food and drink industry could be losing up to 12bn annually to fraud, entering the food chain through means including falsified or inaccurate documentation, and redirection of waste products back into the supply chain or re-dating of stock.

The British farming industry has seen today's report as a sign that consumers are opting to buy British more than ever, due to its reputation for trustworthiness and safety.

Mr Woods continued: Our research exposes the damaging effect that various influencers have had on consumer confidence over time.

Much of the industry is addressing this by changing its supply strategy and supporting British produce - likely to be popular with a majority of consumers who want to support local businesses on home soil as shown in our research.

How British farmers, producers, retailers and caterers will be supported and enabled to deliver the quantity of food required and improve consumer confidence remains to be seen.

'Field to fork'

The Food Fraud report, which is designed to understand challenges facing businesses working across the field to fork supply chain, explores attitudes and influencers of trust, perceived blame, impact upon behaviour and awareness of food crime.

The report includes viewpoints and advice from major industry bodies including the British Retail Consortium, Food and Drink Federation, British Hospitality Association and National Farmers Retail & Markets Association.

The report also found that over two thirds of people (70%) regularly take measures to ensure their food is legitimate and 17% avoid certain foods altogether that they believe could be susceptible to fraud.

Almost four out of five respondents though (77%) said that they would not know how to spot a counterfeit product.

The Soil Association is hoping to change this. Consumers can now scan their produce to find out exactly where it's come from, thanks to their new pilot scheme aiming to highlight food transparency.
Mohanlal and Mammootty, the superstars of Malayalam movie industry, have been considered as two of the finest actors Indian cinema has ever seen. It is extremely difficult for both the industry members and audiences to choose between Mammootty and Mohanlal.

But recently, director Ranjith stunned the audiences, especially the Mohanlal fans, by choosing Mammootty over him. The director labeled the megastar as his personal favourite in the recently aired Lalsalam show, hosted by the complete actor.

When Mohanlal asked Ranjith 'Me or Mammootty?' during the rapid fire round in the show, Ranjith answered 'Mammootty' without a second thought. The complete actor welcomed Ranjith's reply wholeheartedly as if he already knew the writer-director's answer.

The film-maker had earlier revealed that he shares a very close personal bonding with Mammootty, while with Mohanlal, it is a more professional bond. With Mammootty, he can discuss every topic in the world, including his personal life and family matters.

According to Ranjith, it is Mohanlal who taught him to control the temper. The director had also stated that making characters for Mammootty is much easier. He points out that he can easily convince Mammootty to play a role.
Moto X4 Android One edition to be launched in the market soon? News oi -Samden Sherpa Moto X4 was unveiled at this year's IFA tech trade show in Berlin.

It seems like Google is working on expanding its Android One program with several smartphone brands. While we have already seen that the company has collaborated with Xiaomi to launch the latest Xiaomi Mi A1 smartphone, now reputable leakster Evan Blass (a.k.a. evleaks) has posted an image of another Android One smartphone. And this time it looks like it will be from Lenovo owned brand Motorola.

Besides the high-resolution image of the Moto X4 with Android One branding has been posted on his twitter feed. Looking at the image we can see the back of the smartphone and it seems to come in black color. Further, the image clearly shows the Android One branding at the bottom of the phone.

The Twitter post doesn't reveal much about the device or even its name, but it has been said that it will likely be an Android One edition of Moto X4. Or there is also a possibility that it will come with some other name. We know Xiaomi Mi A1 is also basically the same phone as Mi 5X but the only difference is the stock Android experience. And the same thing could happen with Moto X4 as well.

It will be interesting to see what Motorola will bring in the coming days.

Meanwhile, Moto X4 was unveiled at this year's IFA tech trade show in Berlin. And considering the specifications, the Moto X4 Android One edition is also expected to have the same specifications as the original model.

Interestingly, Moto X4 will be the first Android One smartphone to be launched under Google's initiative in the U.S. Android One devices were limited to developing countries, such as India mostly. Google's Android One Program has mostly been initiated to provide affordable devices with stock experience to those users who cannot afford high-end Android smartphones.

Off late, the company's strategy seems to have been changed, and Google is launching smartphones in the mid-range category with higher price tags.

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Google accused of being a bully in web search and online advertising space News oi -Samden Sherpa While Google enjoys monopoly both in search and advertising, unfortunately, the company shows that they are not able to resist the misuse of power.

Well, no doubt Google has dominated the web search field with Chrome, while its competitor like the Opera and Vivaldi browsers have more or less been downtrodden in the space.

At least, the Co-founder and CEO of Vivaldi, Jon von Tetzchner thinks so. In his latest official blog, the creator of Opera and Vivaldi slams Google for being a "bully" and he has also said that the company is "misusing" its power in the internet world.

"A monopoly both in search and advertising, Google, unfortunately, shows that they are not able to resist the misuse of power. I am saddened by this makeover of a geeky, positive company into the bully they are in 2017," he wrote.

Why is he throwing arrows at Google? Tetzchner alleges that Google recently blocked Vivaldi's access to AdWords- Google's online advertising platform-and that cost his company a major loss.

Google is the biggest online advertising company in the world, and with such standards, the company is often the first choice for businesses that want to promote their products or services on the Internet. So if digital companies were to be blocked from using Google AdWords it could be a major problem.

"Recently, our Google AdWords campaigns were suspended without warning. This was the second time that I have encountered this situation," he explains. "We are making the Vivaldi browser. It is based on Chromium, an open-source project, led by Google and built on WebKit and KHTML. Using Google's services should not call for any issues, but sadly, the reality is different. We still have to hide our identity when visiting services such as Google Docs."

Tetzchner further reckons that Google's block could also have been a response to his criticism of the search giant in a recent media interview. Just two days ago Tetzchner had done interviews and his thoughts were published in a Wired article. He had basically questioned Google's and Facebook's business practices in terms of how they collect and aggregate customer data for targeted ad practices.

And coming back to the block, Tetzchner wrote, "Was this just a coincidence? Or was it deliberate, a way of sending us a message?"

However, after encountering the blockade, Vivaldi approached Google with the issue but only to be responded with "clarifications masqueraded in the form of vague terms and conditions." Moreover, in terms of those terms and conditions, Google also admitted themselves, that it was not a 'hard' requirement".

Tetzchner explained in the blog that it was only after almost three months of back-and-forth, the suspension of the account was lifted. It was also lifted only because "we bent to their requirements," he said.

Meanwhile, Google is yet to respond to these allegations.

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Wright-Patterson AFB to provide safe haven to aircraft from multiple service branches

By Amy Rollins, 88th Air Base Wing Public Affairs / Published September 08, 2017

WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Ohio (AFNS) -- The 88th Air Base Wing at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base is receiving aircraft and their associated aircrews evacuating from several military installations threatened by approaching Hurricane Irma.

Eight F-15 Eagles from the 125th Fighter Wing, Jacksonville Air National Guard Base, Florida, landed at Wright-Patterson AFB Sept. 7, 2017.

The F-15s are expected to be joined by eight Navy P-8A Poseidons and six Navy P-3C Orions from Patrol Squadron Thirty, Naval Air Station Jacksonville, Florida; and three C-17 Globemaster IIIs from the 437th Airlift Wing, Joint Base Charleston, South Carolina.

Col. Bradley McDonald, 88th ABW commander, spoke to the importance of providing hurricane relief efforts and assistance. He said support was already provided in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey by the 88th ABW and Reserve partners, the 445th Airlift Wing at Wright-Patterson AFB.

"Our hearts go out to all those impacted by Hurricane Irma, and we are grateful that we have the opportunity to help and support those in need," McDonald said. "We have the resources and capabilities to be a safe haven for aircraft, both Air Force and our sister services, that need to move out of the potential path of Hurricane Irma."

Anticipated aircraft seeking safe haven include KC-130 Super Hercules from Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point, North Carolina, and F/A-18 Hornets from NAS Paxtuxent River, Maryland.

Additionally, the colonel announced that 100 of the base's medics and equipment are prepared to deploy as part of an emergency medical clinic capability and are awaiting orders.

Base officials here are closely watching the approaching storm's track and intensity.

Air National Guard responds, too

Meanwhile, a team of six personnel from the 269th Combat Communications Squadron at Springfield-Beckly ANGB, Springfield, Ohio, left Sept. 7, with a truck and trailer full of equipment to provide communications assistance in Puerto Rico.

Capt. Craig Conner, the 269th Combat Communications Squadron detachment commander, is one of the personnel going to Puerto Rico.

"We started preparing at the beginning of this week. We can provide a quick response to enhance much-needed emergency communications," he said. "It's something we expect. We understand there is a great need, and we are looking forward to providing assistance."

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Return of refugees in DR Congo fraught with challenges, reports UN agency

8 September 2017  Despite improvements in the security situation in conflict-affected parts of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the return to peace continues to be fragile and the return of the displaced populations remains fraught with challenges, the United Nations refugee agency said.

"Despite the critical situation, some Congolese who had sought refuge in Angola are trying to return to their homes in Kasai," Cecile Pouilly, a spokesperson for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), told journalists at a news briefing in Geneva today.

However, many of those spontaneously returning to their origins saw their homes destroyed and are now forced to live in internal displacement-like conditions.

"UNHCR staff saw entire villages burnt down and civilians in a dire situation, as basic services had largely stopped and lawlessness prevailed," she added, relaying information gathered by the UN agency's field mission to the area.

In the area near the border town of Kamako, nine out of ten villages had been burnt down in attacks by armed groups or fighting between them and Government forces. In addition, health posts, schools and public buildings were systematically destroyed or pillaged by local armed groups.

Children were the ones worst affected and hundreds have been separated from their families or witnessed their murders. Equally precarious is the situation of the elderly, those needing medical attention and persons with disabilities.

UNHCR's response in the country is hampered by lack of resources. Of the $102.5 million needed, only about 17 per cent has been received. Lack of access is also causing significant difficulties.

The Kasai crisis had begun over a year ago, spreading from local tensions to a conflict affecting nine out the 26 provinces of the African nation. Since April 2017, some 33,000 refugees fleeing the conflict had been registered in the country's Lunda Norte province, according to UNHCR.

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Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 06:36:34|Editor: Mengjie

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BAGHDAD, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdish region will go ahead with an independence referendum on Sept. 25 despite a request by Arab League (AL) chief to postpone it, the Kurdish regional government said on Saturday.

The rejection came after the AL Secretary-General Ahmed Aboul-Gheit met with the Kurdish President Masoud Barzani in the city of Arbil, the capital of the Kurdish semi-autonomous region.

"Aboul-Gheit expressed his concern for Barzani on the referendum," the regional presidency office said in a statement.

The AL chief urged Barzani to postpone the referendum and to hold dialogue with Baghdad under international supervision, the statement said.

However, Barzani told Aboul-Gheit "the decision to hold the referendum is not a personal one to be postponed easily, but a decision of the people of Kurdistan and the political parties in the region," according to the statement.

Barzani said "the referendum will be held on time," after Baghdad government failed to meet its obligations in partnership, constitution and the agreements between Baghdad and Arbil during the previous stages, it said.

Earlier in the day, Aboul-Gheit arrived in Baghdad and met Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi to confirm AL's keenness to preserve Iraq's unity and revive dialogue between Baghdad and the Kurdistan region ahead of the latter's independence referendum.

The AL chief urged Iraqi leaders to focus on "completing the liberation of Iraq's territory and resorting to dialogue, as well as to abiding by the Iraqi constitution to resolve any problems," according to a statement issued by Abadi's office.

On June 7, Barzani announced his intention to hold a referendum on the independence of the Kurdish region from Iraq on Sept. 25, a step which has been criticized by Baghdad as "unconstitutional and illegal."

The referendum is opposed by other countries including the Iraqi neighbors Iran and Turkey, which both have sizeable Kurdish minorities of their own.
Coalition Strikes Target ISIS Terrorists in Syria, Iraq

From a Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve News Release

SOUTHWEST ASIA, Sept. 9, 2017  U.S. and coalition military forces continued to attack the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria yesterday, conducting 43 strikes consisting of 47 engagements, Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve officials reported today.

Officials reported details of yesterday's strikes, noting that assessments of results are based on initial reports.

Strikes in Syria

In Syria, coalition military forces conducted 40 strikes consisting of 40 engagements against ISIS targets:

-- Near Raqqa, 40 strikes engaged 11 ISIS tactical units and destroyed 24 fighting positons, four logistics node, two vehicles, an ISIS communication line, a mortar system, a command-and-control node and suppressed four fighting positions.

Strikes in Iraq

In Iraq, coalition military forces conducted three strikes consisting of seven engagements against ISIS targets:

-- Near Qaim, a strike destroyed a vehicle-borne bomb facility.

-- Near Bashir, a strike engaged an ISIS tactical unit and destroyed a command-and-control node.

-- Near Rawah, a strike destroyed a vehicle-borne bomb.

Additional Strikes

Additionally, 34 strikes consisting of 46 engagements were conducted in Syria on Aug. 23 and Sept.3-7 that closed within the last 24 hours:

-- On Aug. 23, near Raqqa, a strike suppressed a fighting position.

-- On Sept. 3, near Raqqa, two strikes destroyed two command-and-control nodes, a logistics node, a fighting position and suppressed a fighting position.

-- On Sept. 4, near Raqqa, two strikes destroyed four fighting positions.

-- On Sept. 5, near Raqqa, a strike destroyed a fighting position.

-- On Sept. 6, near Raqqa, two strikes engaged an ISIS tactical unit and destroyed two fighting positions and a command-and-control node.

-- On Sept. 7, near Abu Kamal, a strike destroyed an ISIS tactical unit and a vehicle.

-- On Sept. 7, near Dayr Az Zawr, three strikes engaged two ISIS tactical units and destroyed two vehicles and an ISIS communication line.

-- On Sept. 7, near Raqqa, 22 strikes engaged seven ISIS tactical units and destroyed 15 fighting positions, 15 vehicles, four vehicle-borne bombs and suppressed four fighting positions.

Part of Operation Inherent Resolve

These strikes were conducted as part of Operation Inherent Resolve, the operation to destroy ISIS in Iraq and Syria. The destruction of ISIS targets in Iraq and Syria also further limits the group's ability to project terror and conduct external operations throughout the region and the rest of the world, task force officials said.

The list above contains all strikes conducted by fighter, attack, bomber, rotary-wing or remotely piloted aircraft; rocket-propelled artillery; and some ground-based tactical artillery when fired on planned targets, officials noted.

Ground-based artillery fired in counterfire or in fire support to maneuver roles is not classified as a strike, they added. A strike, as defined by the coalition, refers to one or more kinetic engagements that occur in roughly the same geographic location to produce a single or cumulative effect.

For example, task force officials explained, a single aircraft delivering a single weapon against a lone ISIS vehicle is one strike, but so is multiple aircraft delivering dozens of weapons against a group of ISIS-held buildings and weapon systems in a compound, having the cumulative effect of making that facility harder or impossible to use. Strike assessments are based on initial reports and may be refined, officials said.

The task force does not report the number or type of aircraft employed in a strike, the number of munitions dropped in each strike, or the number of individual munition impact points against a target.

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Coalition Partner Force Mounts ISIS Clearing Operation in Eastern Syria

From a Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve News Release

SOUTHWEST ASIA, Sept. 9, 2017  Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve welcomes today's announcement by the Syrian Arab Coalition of the commencement of their offensive to defeat the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria in the Khabur River Valley, dubbed "Operation Jazeera Storm," north of Dayr Az Zawr in eastern Syria.

The Syrian Arab Coalition is a multi-ethnic, battle-tested, proven partner force in the coalition's fight to defeat ISIS in northern Syria. The operation will be run by the Dayr Az Zawr Military Coalition.

Army Lt. Gen Paul E. Funk II, commanding general of the CJTF Operation Inherent Resolve, said that the fight for the Khabur River Valley is a strategic axis of advance towards the Middle Euphrates River Valley, one of the last holdouts of ISIS.

Defeating ISIS

"The very existence of ISIS poses a real threat to the civilized world and our way of life," Funk said. "Our collective effort will defeat them."

Coalition forces will support the SAC during the Khabur River Valley offensive as part of their advise and assist mission, providing equipment, training, intelligence and logistics support, precision fires and battlefield advice.

Once the Khabur River Valley is cleared of ISIS, the SAC states the region will be turned over to representative bodies of local civilians who will then oversee security and governance as with Tabqa and Manbij.

The SAC is operating along two corridors, and the local citizens and non-combatants in those areas are evacuating northward to SAC-controlled safe areas. The coalition takes every precaution to prevent needless human suffering and casualties.

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Strengthening U.S. and Singapore partnership during Tiger Balm 2017

By Sgt. 1st Class Theresa Gualdarama September 9, 2017

MANDAI HILL CAMP, Singapore -- Soldiers with the Hawaii Army National Guard (HIARNG), U.S. Army Pacific, 25th Infantry Division and Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) participated in exercise Tiger Balm 2017 at Mandai Hill Camp (MHC) from July 17-27, 2017.

"Tiger Balm exercise demonstrates a strong commitment to our regional security partnership with all involved, said Col. Steve Logan, chief of staff, HIARNG.

This marks the thirty-seventh annual exercise between U.S. Army Pacific and Singapore Armed Forces promoting regional stability and security.

"This is the longest standing bilateral exercise in the SAF, with any defense partner," said Brig. Gen. Goh Si Hou, Commander of 6th Singapore Division. "This speaks volumes not only for the strong bilateral ties between our two nations and militaries, but the value and trust we continue to hold in this special relationship."

Tiger Balm 2017 enhances the professional relationship, combat readiness, and interoperability between the United States and Singapore Armies to meet and demonstrate regional security partnership and resolve.

"Our Armies can make use of this platform to inter-operate and learn from each other from the planning to execution phases of operation," said Col. James Teo, Chief of Staff, 6th Singapore Division, "such training in peacetime will be beneficial should we be called upon to operate alongside one another."

The partnership between U.S. and Singapore armed forces and the professional value of this exercise will continue to deepen, said Brig. Gen. Goh.

"Singapore and U.S. Armed forces worked very well together during this exercise; the knowledge and experience gained through hard work, sweat and determination that will illustrate the relevancy of this exercise," Brig. Gen. Arthur Logan, Adjutant General Hawaii Army National Guard.

This two-week long bilateral exercise is hosted in Hawaii on even years and in Singapore on odd years. Concurrently, this exercise is held at multiple locations in Singapore, Hawaii and Alaska with U.S. Command Post Exercise response cells at several locations.

"U.S. and Singapore military leaders envisioned and developed a command post exercise designed to win in a complex world," said Col. Logan. "They can validate their staff's planning processes, tactics and commitment of forces to extract critical lessons learned without the accompanying violence and expense of actual combat."

For the first time in SAF history, a Stryker unit is operating in Singapore executing live-fire and field exercises to further strengthen the operations and Tactics, Techniques and Procedures for U.S. Strykers and Singapore Terrex units.

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Philippines won't let Daesh flee in exchange for hostages: Duterte

Iran Press TV

Sat Sep 9, 2017 6:13PM

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte says the country will not allow Daesh Takfiri terrorists to escape the country's southern city of Marawi in return for release of dozens of hostages they hold.

"No way," Duterte told reporters in response to a question about a report that the Takfiri group's local leader Omarkhayam Maute has offered to free an estimated number of 20 to 30 hostages in Marawi in exchange for the safe exit of the militants.

"If I can save one life there, I am willing to wait one year (to retake the city)" Duterte said in Cagayan de Oro, a few hours away from Marawi.

In May, the militants captured large parts of Marawi on the island of Mindanao and managed to continue the occupation of the city, despite over 100 days of airstrikes and ground attacks by government troops.

According to the army, nearly 655 militants, 45 civilians and 145 soldiers and policemen have been killed in Marawi, while 1,728 civilians have been rescued. At least 400,000 have been displaced.

The military has launched its final push to recapture Marawi, which has been devastated by artillery and bombings, as troops try to secure buildings and navigate through mines and booby traps.

The army says the Takfiri militants are forcing some of the hostages to take up arms against the government troops.

The army has imposed martial law on Mindanao Island, which is home to 22 million people, until the end of 2017, in an attempt to prevent formation of an alliance between Daesh and other militant groups.

Army spokesman Colonel Edgard Arevalo said rescuing the hostages will be the top priority for the army, adding, "We are still very mindful of the presence of civilians - guns against their heads - who were made human shields or ordered to wield firearms and ammunition, were converted to become fighters and shoot at our troops."

Security officials say terrorist groups in the region have pledged allegiance to Daesh in order to increase their military influence in Muslim-populated areas in Southeast Asia.

Governments across Southeast Asia have been on high alert since terrorists from local militant groups, which have pledged allegiance to Daesh, overran Marawi.

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World at its most dangerous point in generation: NATO head

Iran Press TV

Sat Sep 9, 2017 8:57AM

The NATO chief says the world is currently at its most dangerous point in a generation, citing 'threats' by Russia and the North Korean weapons program to support his remarks, without touching on the US-led Western military alliance's role in global conflict zones.

In an interview with The Guardian published on Friday, Jens Stoltenberg, the Norwegian secretary general of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), said the world today is increasingly perilous given the number of the converging threats it is facing.

"We have proliferation of weapons of mass destruction in North Korea, we have terrorists, instability, and we have a more assertive Russia. It is a more dangerous world," according to the NATO head, who was speaking during his visit to an Estonian military base near the Russian border.

Stoltenberg, however, appeared reserved when asked if he supported US President Donald Trump's aggressive rhetoric and threats against North Korea, which many observers regard as the contributing factor to tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

"If I started to speculate about potential military options I would only add to the uncertainty and difficulty of the situation so I think my task is not to be [sic] contribute to that. I will support efforts to find a political, negotiated solution," he said.

He also voiced support for Japan and South Korea's US-backed military measures amid tensions with the North.

"I fully understand and support the military message that has been implemented in the region by South Korea and to some extent Japan, as they have the right to defend themselves. They have a right to respond when they see these very aggressive actions. I also support the presence of US troops and capabilities in Korea," he said.

Stoltenberg's remarks come amid rising tensions on the Korean Peninsula after Pyongyang, angered by soaring Washington-Seoul military moves, test-fired a ballistic missile last month that traveled over Japan, threatened the US Pacific territory of Guam and tested a hydrogen bomb.

The North says it needs to improve its military and nuclear capabilities as deterrence against a possible US invasion. Pyongyang has repeatedly urged Seoul to stop its annual war games with Washington, which it views as a rehearsal for a war against the North.

Washington has also infuriated the North by deploying the so-called THAAD missile systems to South Korea's soil, a move which has also elicited protests from the South Korean public as well as Russia and China.

The latest spate of North Korean weapons tests came after Trump threatened in August to unleash "fire and fury" on North Korea.

Stoltenberg was speaking after he completed a tour of NATO's four battle groups stationed in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland, which form the alliance's advanced forces in Eastern Europe at the Russian doorstep.

Russia has been wary of the US-led alliance's military buildup near its border, viewing it as a threat to its national security.

The NATO leader emphasized that the "defensive" mobilization served as a message to Moscow that an attack on a NATO ally was an attack on all, and that he remained confident about the security of Eastern Europe.

He further pointed to the biennial Russian-Belorussian Zapad exercises scheduled for September 14-20.

The large-scale drills will see thousands of servicemen active around the Baltic Sea, western Russia, Belarus and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad.

Stoltenberg expressed concern over what he described as Russia's looming failure to live up to its international obligations to allow observers for the military drills.

"Russia has said it is below 13,000. They briefed that on the NATO-Russia council a few weeks ago," Stoltenberg said. "That was useful but at the same time we have seen when Russia says that an exercise has less than 13,000 troops that's not always the case. We have seen that in Zapad 2009 and 2013  the two previous Zapad exercises. There were many more troops participating."

Stoltenberg also insisted that the 29 NATO members remained united within the alliance, saying that he did not believe there was an imminent threat to member states.

NATO and its allies are planning to significantly increase their military activity on Russia's borders ahead of the Russian-Belorussian drill.

Sweden, a member of NATO's "Partnership for Peace" program, is hosting a rare 20,000-strong Aurora 2017 drills between September 11 and 29, with Finland, also not a NATO member state, in attendance.

The war games will be conducted in the air, on land and at sea, with the participation of a US Patriot missile battery, helicopters and a unit of National Guard tanks.

The NATO head also stopped short of pointing to massive weapon sales by NATO members, particularly the US, Britain, to promote the repressive regimes involved in deadly military campaigns and crackdowns.

Since 2014, the US and many of its NATO allies have also been bombing what are claimed to be Daesh positions in Syria and Iraq. The missions have failed to boost the fight against the world's most notorious terror group, but have, instead, claimed hundreds of civilian lives and taken a heavy toll on the Arab country's infrastructure.

In Afghanistan, the US and its allies have failed to contain the militancy fueled by the Taliban militant group, more than a decade into their invasion of the Asian state.

In addition to deadly Taliban militancy, Daesh has also managed to expand its terror activities to Afghanistan despite the presence of thousands of foreign boots on the ground in the war-torn country.

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Lithuania proposes creation of 'military Schengen'

Iran Press TV

Sat Sep 9, 2017 7:18AM

Lithuania has proposed the creation of a "military Schengen" zone within the European Union (EU), where defense cooperation among member states would be increased.

Lithuania's Defense Minister Raimondas Karoblis made the proposal at a meeting of EU defense ministers in the Estonian capital of Tallinn on Friday, calling on the member states to join a "military Schengen project that would facilitate the movement of troops in Europe."

Lithuania is already a member of the NATO, a military alliance of mainly European countries, and its "military Schengen" proposal would, if materialized, only create an alliance within an alliance.

Karoblis said the project was meant at "simplifying procedures and investing in infrastructure."

He claimed the proposal was supported by many of the EU's member states and its implementation was "important both in the EU and for NATO."

"Lithuania supports enhanced EU defense cooperation, and permanent structured defense cooperation must contribute to the increase in defense spending in the EU and the creation of real defense capabilities in Europe," he said.

The European Commission had earlier proposed the establishment of a common defense fund, allocating 500 million euro ($601 million) to finance military projects and develop defense capacity by 2020.

Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite announced last month that the US aimed to increase its military presence in the Baltic state  close to Russia's borders  and possibly double the number of its warplanes there during joint drills between Russia and Belarus in September.

The biennial drills are to be held in Belarus from September 14 to 20 and will involve some 13,000 troops, 70 aircraft, and nearly 700 land vehicles. They will span across Belarus, the Baltic Sea, western Russia, and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad.

Russia features prominently in the military calculations of the West. During the Cold War, the NATO essentially served as a bulwark against Russia, and an anti-Russia mentality continues to this day.

NATO member Poland has criticized the planned joint drills by Russia and Belarus.

Warsaw claims that Moscow could not only deploy more than the declared number of troops but also that the military exercises could provide cover for a possible permanent relocation of offensive equipment near the Baltic countries.

This is while Russia has repeatedly declared that the upcoming drills will be purely defensive, rejecting as a "myth" any allegation that the maneuvers would threaten other countries.

Russia and the NATO have had strained ties since conflict erupted in eastern Ukraine some three years ago. More than 10,000 have been killed in the war in Ukraine's industrial east, where the Kiev government is fighting pro-Russia forces.

Russia has also long been wary of the NATO's expansion eastward  toward Russia's western borders. NATO has deployed around 4,000 troops, consisting of four battle groups, to Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, and Poland in recent years.

Meanwhile, the pro-Western government in Moldova has sent 57 troops to participate in drills in Ukraine, in a hostile gesture against Russia.

Moldova is not a member of the NATO, and its president, Igor Dodon, who is the country's commander-in-chief, had vetoed the decision to send the troops to Ukraine. The Moldovan Defense Ministry, however, ignored the president, deploying the troops anyway.

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US approves $3.8-billion arms sales to Bahrain amid its crackdown on dissent: Report

Iran Press TV

Sat Sep 9, 2017 2:16AM

The US has reportedly approved arms sales worth over $3.8 billion to Bahrain as the ruling Al Khalifah regime continues its heavy-handed crackdown on dissent in the small Persian Gulf island country.

The package of the potential weapons deal, which includes F-16 fighter jets, upgrades, missiles and patrol boats, was approved by the US State Department, Reuters cited a US official, speaking on condition of anonymity, as saying on Friday.

The official added that the proposed arms sales included 19 F-16 warplanes, manufactured by the Lockheed Martin Corp, which could cost up to $2.7 billion. Back in March, the State Department informed Congress that it had planned to approve a request by Manama to purchase the fighter jets.

Furthermore, the State Department approved the sale of a pair of 35-meter patrol boats, equipped with machine guns, and 221 anti-tank missiles. According to the potential deal, Washington also demands $1.8 billion from Bahrain in exchange for upgrading the country's existing fleet of F-16 jets.

Back in May, Trump said Washington's relations with Manama were set to improve, after meeting with Bahraini King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifah during a visit to Saudi Arabia.

Thousands of anti-regime protesters have held demonstrations in Bahrain on an almost daily basis ever since a popular uprising began in the country in mid-February 2011.

They are demanding that the ruling Al Khalifah dynasty relinquish power and allow a just system representing all Bahrainis to be established.

Bahrain, currently home to the US Navy's 5th Fleet, has gone to great lengths to clamp down on any sign of dissent. On March 14, 2011, troops from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates were deployed to assist Bahrain in its crackdown.

Scores of people have lost their lives and hundreds of others sustained injuries or got arrested as a result of the Al Khalifah regime's ruthless crackdown against domestic dissent.

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Saudi 'suspends' planned talks with Qatar minutes after rulers' contact

Iran Press TV

Sat Sep 9, 2017 1:48AM

Saudi Arabia has suspended plans to hold talks with Qatar on how to resolve the ongoing crisis between Doha and four Arab states minutes after the Saudi crown prince and the Qatari ruler discussed the planned negotiations during a phone call.

On Friday, Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani called Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, expressing his willingness to hold dialogue over the demands of the four Arab states from Doha.

During the phone conversation, both leaders stressed the need to resolve the crisis through dialogue.

"During the call, the emir of Qatar expressed his desire to sit at the dialogue table and discuss the demands of the four countries to ensure the interests of all," Saudi state news agency SPA reported, adding that "the details will be announced later" after consulting with the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain and Egypt.

Qatar News Agency's (QNA) reported that during the phone call both sides "stressed the need to resolve the crisis by sitting down to the dialogue table to ensure the unity and stability" of (Persian) Gulf Cooperation Council countries.

Sheikh Tamim welcomed the proposal of Prince Mohammed during the call "to assign two envoys to resolve controversial issues in a way that does not affect the sovereignty of the states," the Qatari news agency added.

The phone call is believed to be the first official contact between the two Arab kingdoms since the beginning of the crisis three months ago.

Minutes later, however, Saudi Arabia's state news agency cited a Saudi Foreign Ministry official as saying that Riyadh suspended plans for negotiations over QNA's failure to mention that Doha had initiated the phone call.

QNA was not accessible at the time of this report, but according to Qatari news network Al Jazeera, QNA had said that the phone call was coordinated by US President Donald Trump.

"What was published on the Qatar News Agency is a continuation of the distortion of the Qatari authority of the facts," SPA reported, citing the Saudi official.

"The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia announces the suspension of any dialogue or communication with the authority in Qatar until a clear statement is issued clarifying its position in public," it added.

Earlier on Friday, Trump held separate phone calls with the Qatari and Saudi rulers as well as UAE Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan.

According to a White House statement, Trump told the three Persian Gulf Arab rulers that unity among Washington's Arab partners to promote regional stability and counter "the threat of Iran."

Trump also stressed that all countries must remain committed to countering terrorism and extremist ideology and cut off funding for terrorist groups, the statement added.

Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Egypt, and the United Arab Emirates cut their diplomatic ties with Qatar on June 5, accusing Doha of sponsoring terrorism and destabilizing the region.

The Saudi-led bloc has imposed sanctions against the tiny Persian Gulf country, including restrictions on Qatari aircraft using their airspace. Qatar's only land border with Saudi Arabia has also been blocked as a result.

The boycotters later released a 13-point list of demands, including the closure of Al Jazeera news network and downgrade of relations with Iran, in return for the normalization of diplomatic relations with Doha.

Qatar has rejected the demands as an attack on its sovereignty.

Experts have touted the Qatar crisis as the fallout of Trump's visit to Riyadh in early June, when he signed the largest single arms deal in US history with King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud to sell Riyadh $110 billion in arms.

In the early days of the crisis, Trump took to Twitter to praise the Saudi-led bloc's decision to cut ties with Qatar, implying that it was the fruit of his first visit to the Middle East.

However, on June 14, the US signed a $12-billion deal with Qatar to sell F-15 fighter jets to the country.

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Kosovo Parliament Approves PM Haradinaj, Cabinet

RFE/RL September 09, 2017

The parliament of Kosovo has approved Ramush Haradinaj, the leader of the center-right Alliance for the Future of Kosovo (AAK) and a former guerrilla fighter, as the Balkan country's new prime minister.

The 120-seat parliament endorsed Haradinaj's appointment on September 9 with 61 votes in favor and one abstention. Opposition members boycotted the vote.

The parliament also approved Haradinaj's cabinet, with the main ethnic Serb party, Sprska Lista, backing the new prime minister.

The moves led to optimism that a months-long political stalemate created by inconclusive June elections may be coming to an end in the Western-backed nation with a large ethnic-Albanian majoirty.

Haradinaj was nominated by President Hashim Thaci on September 7 to form a new government after his coalition struck an agreement with several smaller parties to give his bloc the majority needed to rule.

Under the coalition agreement, Sprska Lista will receive three ministry posts, while non-Albanian and non-Serbian communities will also receive ministries.

The key junior partner in the coalition, the Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK), will receive a deputy prime minister post and six ministries. The PDK leader, Kadri Veseli, was elected speaker of the parliament on September 7.

Haradinaj's AAK gets three other ministries, while another junior partner, NISMA, will receive a deputy prime minister and three ministries.

Behgjet Pacolli of the New Kosovo Alliance (AKR) will be foreign minister.

Pacolli, who also holds a Swiss passport, is widely considered the richest Kosovar. He made his money rebuilding state buildings in Moscow in the 1990s and has since moved his company to Kazakhstan from Russia.

A day earlier, the Pristina-based FOL think tank had criticized the prime minister nominee for an "endless appetite" for ministry posts to satisfy the demands of all the coalition partners.

Reports said Haradinaj had set a total of five deputy prime ministers, 21 ministers, and some 50 deputy ministers.

Speaking ahead of the vote, Haradinaj pledged to maintain dialogue with former foe Serbia, saying "there is no alternative to dialogue with Serbia."

Despite "a tragic history, we cannot change the fact that we are neighbors," Haradinaj told parliament.

The European Union has urged Pristina and Belgrade -- both with desires of joining the EU -- to normalize relations and is sponsoring talks in hopes of ending years of hostility.

Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008, but Serbia doesn't recognize the move.

Haradinaj, 49, has been arrested twice on a warrant from Serbia - in Slovenia in 2015 and in France earlier this year - but was released both times.

Haradinaj was also charged with war crimes, tried, and cleared twice by the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague.

He served as prime minister for three months in 2005, but resigned to face the first trial.

With on reporting by RFE/RL's Balkan Service, Bloomberg, AP, Balkan Insight, Reuters, dpa

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/kosovo-haradinaj- new-prime-minister/28726185.html

Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

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US Approves Big Bahrain Arms Deal Including F-16 Aircraft, TOW Missiles

Sputnik News

03:18 09.09.2017(updated 03:24 09.09.2017)

The Defense Security Cooperation Agency said that Pentagon approved more than $3.8 billion in military sales to the government of Bahrain, which includes F-16 aircraft upgrades, TOW missiles and patrol boats.

WASHINGTON (Sputnik)  The US State Department approved more than $3.8 billion in military sales to the government of Bahrain, which includes F-16 aircraft upgrades, TOW missiles and patrol boats, the Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) said in a press release.

"The State Department has made a determination approving a possible Foreign Military Sale to the Government of Bahrain for F-16V aircraft with support," the release said on Friday. "The estimated cost is $2.785 billion."

The arms sales also include an upgrade of Bahrain's Lockheed Martin F-16 jets estimated at a total cost of $1.082 billion, the release stated.

Other sales include $27 million for TOW missiles and $60.25 million for 35 Meter Fast Patrol Boats, the release added.

The arms sales are meant to enhance Bahrain's capability to deter regional threats and strengthen its homeland defenses, the release stated.

 Sputnik

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Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 07:41:44|Editor: Mengjie

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By Edna Alcantara and Wu Hao

JUCHITAN, Mexico, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- "I thought it was the end of the world," says Ivan Santiago, a resident of Juchitan, the small town in Mexico's southern state of Oaxaca that bore the brunt of Thursday night's powerful 8.2-magnitude earthquake.

Home to approximately 70,000 inhabitants, Juchitan saw 36 people killed, nearly half the national total of 65, as well as 300 injured and more than 2,000 homes severely damaged.

"It was scary. The sky was rumbling and at the same time there were flashes of green, pink and orange lights," Santiago, a vendor whose home was partially damaged, told Xinhua.

Many of his neighbors were unable to run out of their homes when the quake struck a few minutes before midnight, due to old age or illness, he said.

"It was a moment of helplessness that paralyzed me," he added.

His friend Antonio had a similar recollection.

"It was shocking ... in those seconds that feel like an eternity, you could hear from nearby and afar the desperate screams of people from falling trees, a transformer, several roofs and entire houses," said Antonio.

Having survived the quake, he now worried about his inability to get insulin to treat his diabetes, as many pharmacies were destroyed.

The strongest quake to hit Mexico in nearly a century struck at 11:49 p.m., sending seismic waves through south and central Mexico, where it was felt by some 50 million people across 12 states.

In Mexico City, more than 400 km away from the epicenter off Mexico's south coast, residents ran into the streets and remained there for the duration of the 135-second long earthquake.

Another 15 people were killed in neighboring Chiapas state and four others in Tabasco, Luis Felipe Puente, head of Civil Protection, said on Saturday.

The recovery effort will be considerable, Juchitan's Mayor Gloria Sanchez told Xinhua.

"Juchitan is in total disaster," said Sanchez.

Hundreds of residents are spending the night outside their damaged homes, afraid of being trapped or killed by falling debris in one of the many aftershocks.

The quake also knocked down power lines and disrupted the water supply system.

"The situation is critical because on top of it all there is no medication and there are no specialists. We are undergoing a very difficult situation," said Sanchez.

Mexico's President Enrique Pena Nieto visited Juchitan on Friday, with members of his cabinet, and said an emergency fund had been activated to help this town and others in Oaxaca and Chiapas that were hard hit.

Medicine, doctors, food supplies, potable water and sleeping mats were also on the way, Interior Minister Miguel Angel Osorio Chong said.

Alfredo Sanchez, a resident and medical student, told Xinhua, "what we need now is first for them to help us with some important things, like supplying us with enough water, bandages for wounds and medication, basically."

Sanchez is currently camping outdoors with his parents, uncles, cousins, grandmother and a dog.

"It's safer, in case of an aftershock, we won't be exposed to risks such as (falling) fences or electric cables," he said.

The quake has brought relatives and neighbors closer together, he said, but more importantly, it has led him reflect on the "value of what you have ... not material things, which in the end you can recover. I mean values and family."

His family is going to continue camping out until they feel the danger has subsided, said Sanchez, adding that a neighbor who lived across the street from them was killed when her house was toppled by the quake.

"That left me shocked. Her house, where she had a pharmacy, collapsed. I didn't know how to react," said Sanchez.
Rising Ethnic Tensions in CAR Fuel Fears of Spike in Violence

By Lisa Schlein September 09, 2017

The head of United Nations peacekeeping says rising ethnic tensions in Central African Republic are likely to spur greater conflict between the Muslim and Christian communities unless action is taken to defuse the situation.

U.N. Undersecretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations Jean-Pierre Lacroix says ethnic hate speech is running in parallel with an increase in violence in the Central African Republic. And, he says, he finds this very worrisome.

"We are seeing a surge in very negative messages, very negative antagonistic rhetoric to the effect that 'foreigners should be eliminated.' Sort of putting one ethnic component or religious component of this country against the other and this is very worrying and serious."

Lacroix says it is a key responsibility of the leadership and all those in positions of influence in the Central African Republic to counter those messages.

War between the Muslim Seleka and Christian anti-Balaka armed groups broke out in 2013 after Seleka rebels toppled the Christian president, Francois Bozize.

Peacekeeping chief Lacroix tells VOA every effort is being made to redeploy U.N. forces on the ground to try to mitigate the impact of this violence and to protect civilians.

"We do protect thousands of them [civilians] again in different locations in Central African Republic. We really not only protect them physically from those who want to go after them, but we help them get humanitarian assistance even though this is becoming quite challenging in many areas," Lacroix said.

The war in the Central African Republic has displaced about half a million people internally and has prompted an almost equal number of people to seek refuge in neighboring countries. The United Nations reports an estimated 2.4 million people - about half the CAR's population - are in need of humanitarian assistance.

Lacroix says the United Nations is trying to reconcile the two ethnic communities by working with religious, civic and political leaders from different walks of life. He says it is crucial to move the political process forward in the CAR to achieve a durable peace.

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Phone Call Between Saudi Crown Prince, Qatar's Emir Sparks Media Row

By Edward Yeranian September 09, 2017

Saudi Arabia says it has suspended dialogue with Qatar to resolve an ongoing conflict with its Gulf neighbors, following a fresh row over a phone conversation between Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Qatar's Emir Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani. Saudi Arabia claims the Qatari News Agency misrepresented the substance of the call.

Saudi Arabia and Qatar appear to be engaging in diplomacy-by-megaphone once again, as the media of both states wrangle over a phone call Saturday between leaders of the two countries, ostensibly to mediate a three-month-old conflict.

Salman and al-Thani spoke after efforts by U.S. President Donald Trump and Kuwaiti Emir Sheikh Sabah Ahmed al Sabah to bring the two sides together.

Qatari media reported that Salman and al-Thani each agreed to appoint an envoy to sit down and discuss outstanding differences, following mediation efforts by Trump. It said both sides agreed on the need to resolve their conflict at the negotiating table "to preserve the unity and stability of the Gulf Cooperation Council, while not compromising the sovereignty of individual states."

But the Saudi Press Agency made no mention of the appointment of envoys to discuss the conflict, insisting that Salman would talk to allies Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt before releasing details about the substance of his conversation with Qatar's emir.

The conflict between Qatar and its Gulf neighbors Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and the United Arab Emirates, bolstered by Egypt, erupted on June 5, after those states demanded that Qatar put an end to its alleged support for terrorist groups in the Middle East and North Africa. Qatar's neighbors also imposed an economic boycott on Doha, closing their borders, ports and airspace to the nation until it fulfilled 13 key demands.

A previous row between Qatar and the GCC in 2014 was resolved after Qatar pledged to refrain from activities deemed hostile by its neighbors.

Hilal Khashan, who teaches political science at the American University of Beirut, tells VOA the fresh media row between Qatar and Saudi Arabia is merely a smokescreen for ongoing mediation efforts, and that Saudi Arabia does not want to anger its allies by giving the impression that it is giving in to Qatar.

"What matters is not what the Saudi media is saying. What matters most is that this [phone] conversation took place. The Saudis say they will not budge. They need to do that to give the impression that they did not back off [on their initial demands]."

Khashan points out that negotiations in the Arab world involve saving face as much as substantive action.

"If the Saudis decide to put an end to the conflict, they need to give everybody the impression that they prevailed. For Arabs, the question of saving face is important. They can't say 'we talked to the prince of Qatar and will put an end to the conflict.' So, as they make a move forward, they try to justify it, and move a step backward [again]."

Khashan argues that the conflict with Qatar - if it continues - will in the long term benefit Iran, and he stresses that end would be totally unacceptable to Saudi Arabia.

Doha recently resumed diplomatic ties with Tehran, following a break in relations that had been coordinated with other Gulf Cooperation Council states. The GCC has yet to resume ties with Tehran.

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Kentucky Guardsmen deploy to Caribbean for Hurricane Irma response

By Army Staff Sgt. Benjamin Crane, 133rd Mobile Public Affairs Detachment / Published September 08, 2017

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AFNS) -- Soldiers from the Kentucky Army National Guard's 63rd Theater Aviation Brigade departed from the Kentucky Air National Guard Base in Louisville, Sept. 7, 2017, for the Caribbean to assist with rescue and recovery efforts in the wake of Hurricane Irma.

Approximately 20 Soldiers from Charlie Company, 2nd Battalion, 238th Aviation, deployed to the Virgin Islands with two UH-60 Blackhawks equipped for medical evacuations. Six Airmen from the Kentucky Air National Guard's 123rd Special Tactics Squadron also deployed as part of Kentucky's response to provide search and rescue.

"Our main job is to focus on humanitarian efforts and provide medical evacuation and triage, as well as patient transfer from hurricane-affected areas in the Caribbean, especially the Virgin Islands," said 1st Lt. John Kerr, a Blackhawk pilot with the 2/238th. "The mission will be to go where others cannot to rescue and aid any civilian personnel we can."

The Blackhawks were loaded into a C-17 Globemaster III from the Hawaii ANG's 204th Airlift Squadron and are expected to begin rescue operations immediately.

All the Soldiers are trained in rescue hoist operations and swift-water rescue, and can provide expedient critical care en route from hospital to hospital in the area.

With Hurricane Harvey barely in the rearview mirror, and the potential for more hurricanes to follow Irma, the operations tempo of Soldiers in units like these has been at peak levels.

"It's always somewhat hectic at times like these but our leadership is very good at planning and keeping us involved," added Kerr. "Morale is very high, and everyone is excited to be a part of the mission."

It is of the upmost importance for the Soldiers to have perfect communication.

"The hardest part of the mission will be to make sure everyone is on the same sheet of music and communicating effectively," Kerr said.

The unit is heading to the Caribbean without any real timeframe for mission completion.

"We are planning to provide support for a couple of weeks," said veteran Blackhawk pilot Chief Warrant Officer Steve Knight. "From there we'll re-evaluate and see if we need to swap people out, pull back or whatever the case may be."

Knight brings more than 38 years of experience to the mission and also has his son as one of the crew members.

Col. Dwayne Lewis, 63rd TAB's brigade commander, was on hand for the departure and was extremely confident in their capabilities.

"Kentucky's aviators and crew members are highly trained in their craft and fully prepared to provide support to our neighbor states," Lewis said. "Our thoughts and prayers are with them as they work to assist residents who have been affected by Hurricane Irma and the potential historic devastation in the Caribbean and Southern Atlantic states."

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DoD Continues Caribbean, Florida Hurricane Response Operations

DoD News, Defense Media Activity

WASHINGTON, Sept. 9, 2017  The Defense Department continues its response to "significant" levels of destruction throughout the U.S. Virgin Islands and other Caribbean locales, while posturing forces to support the response to Hurricane Irma in Florida, DoD spokesman Army Lt. Col. Jamie Davis said today in a statement.

DoD is evacuating U.S. citizens from St. Martin in response to a State Department request, Davis added.

Irma is currently a Category 3 hurricane that's expected to reach the southern Florida coast early tomorrow morning, according to news reports.

Virgin Island, Puerto Rico Operations

Regarding operations in the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico, the commander of Task Force-89 with the amphibious assault ship USS Kearsarge with the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit embarked and the amphibious assault ship USS Oak Hill arrived on station in the Virgin Islands. The amphibious assault ship USS Iwo Jima and the amphibious transport dock ship USS New York, and the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln departed Norfolk, Virginia, Sept. 8 to support the response to Hurricane Irma. The vessels will adjust course to avoid Hurricane Jose.

Assets from U.S. Transportation Command and the amphibious assault ship USS Wasp evacuated patients from St. Thomas to St. Croix and Puerto Rico for hospital care.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is continuing to assist with disaster assessment in the Virgin Island-Puerto Rico area today, and will have power restoration teams in the area. The Army engineers are assisting with debris management, and working with the U.S. Coast Guard to re-open ports. The Corps of Engineers is posturing temporary housing teams for deployment if or when requested.

The Defense Logistics Agency is coordinating movement of life-sustaining commodities such as food and water to the Virgin Island-Puerto Rico region.

Florida

In Florida, search and rescue forces, strategic and vertical lift, planning, communication and medical capabilities are preparing to facilitate a timely post-Irma-landfall response.

DLA is positioning a second Distribution Expeditionary Package at Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama, sourcing 51 high-end generators to stage at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, New Jersey, and transporting food to two bases in Alabama and one in North Carolina.

The Corps of Engineers will monitor Lake Okeechobee for storm-driven over wash and is posturing temporary housing and power generation teams.

U.S. Northern Command and U.S. Transportation Command are responding to requests for strategic lift to move U.S. Department of Health and Human Services responders into Florida and to support aeromedical evacuation of up to 560 patients per day.

Meanwhile, U.S. Southern Command is employing five C-130 aircraft to evacuate American citizens from St. Martin to Puerto Rico. Southcom assets evacuated 158 American citizens yesterday, and the command expects to evacuate approximately 700 more today. Evacuations will continue following the passage of Hurricane Jose.

The U.S. Agency for International Development reports no humanitarian requirement for Haiti and the Dominican Republic. USAID is anticipating requests for humanitarian assistance from the Bahamas.

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France must scrap own nuclear arsenal instead of criticizing Pyongyang: North Korea

Iran Press TV

Sat Sep 9, 2017 2:35PM

A senior North Korean official has lashed out at France over its criticism of Pyongyang's atomic program, urging Paris to scrap its own nuclear arsenal.

"Recently, high ranking French politicians startled the people by saying absurd things with regards to the DPRK's (North Korea's) successful detonation of a hydrogen bomb for ICBM (intercontinental ballistic missile)," said Ri Tok-Son, North Korea's deputy director of the Foreign Ministry's European department, in a Friday interview with AFP in Pyongyang.

"They busied themselves ... making preposterous remarks like 'the nuclear missile of North Korea are military means that can strike Europe,'" Ri pointed out.

There has been an uproar over Pyongyang's sixth and the biggest nuclear test to date, which was conducted on September 3. Experts say the hydrogen bomb was about three times more powerful than America's atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945.

On Sunday, French President Emmanuel Macron called on the UN to "quickly react" to North Korea's nuclear tests and urged the EU to come up with a "clear and united" response.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian has also warned that North Korea is capable of launching a nuclear strike on the US and even Europe "within months."

"It is ridiculous to say that the nuclear weapons of the DPRK, the deterrent force against the nuclear threat and blackmail of the US, can aim at Europe," Ri pointed out.

"If nuclear weapons are such bad things, then France should first give up its nuclear weapons since it is not under anyone's nuclear threat," the North Korean official said.

The comments came just hours before the US presented a draft resolution to the UN Security Council, calling for an oil embargo on North Korea, an assets freeze on the country's leader Kim Jong-un, a ban on textiles and an end to payments of North Korean guest workers.

North Korea has been subjected to an array of sanctions by the United Nations over its nuclear and missile programs. However, Pyongyang says it needs to continue and develop the programs as a deterrent against hostility by the United States and its regional allies, including South Korea and Japan.

On Friday, a commentary by the official North Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) warned that the US would "pay dearly" after Washington's Ambassador to the UN Niki Haley said during the Monday emergency session of the Security Council that Pyongyang was "begging for war" and called for adoption of the harshest diplomatic measures against the North.

France, US, Japan discuss more pressure on North Korea

Separately on Saturday, Macron discussed increased pressure and sanctions on North Korea during separate telephone conversations with US President Donald Trump and Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, the French president's office said.

The three leaders stressed the need for a "united and firm" reaction from the international community toward Pyongyang, Macron's office added.

Tensions on the Korean Peninsula have also heightened over the nuclear tests. Last week, the South Korean military said the North was preparing for another missile launch, possibly an ICBM test, a few hours after Seoul conducted a live-fire ballistic missile exercise, simulating an attack on the North's main nuclear site.

South Korea is among the countries that have voiced strong criticism of the North's sixth nuclear test.

Meanwhile, Russia and China have warned that peace on the Korean Peninsula is in jeopardy, calling for a dialogue between North Korea, on the one side, and the US allies, on the other side, to put an end to the tensions in the region.

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US formally requests UNSC vote on N Korea sanctions

Iran Press TV

Sat Sep 9, 2017 1:47AM

The United States has formally requested the United Nations Security Council to vote on a draft resolution for the new sanctions against North Korea over its sixth and largest nuclear test.

"This evening, the United States informed the UN Security Council that it intends to call a meeting to vote on a draft resolution to establish additional sanctions on North Korea on Monday, September 11," according to a statement from the US mission to the UN issued on Friday.

The new draft UN resolution would prohibit exports of crude oil, condensate, refined petroleum products, and natural gas liquids to North Korea.

During a meeting of experts Friday, China and Russia, which both supply North Korea with oil, opposed the measures as a whole.

While China supplies North Korea with roughly 500,000 tons of crude oil and 200,000 tons of oil products annually, Russia provides the country with 40,000 tons of crude oil.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov earlier said, "Along with pressure on the North Korean regime to induce it to abandon provocations in the implementation of its nuclear and missile programs, it is necessary to emphasize and increase the priority of efforts to resume the political process."

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying has also urged a peaceful resolution of the standoff, calling on the US to take concrete actions to deescalate tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

The US is against North Korea's nuclear weapons but Pyongyang says it will not give up on its nuclear deterrence unless Washington ends its hostile policy toward the country and dissolves the US-led UN command in South Korea. Thousands of US soldiers are stationed in South Korea and Japan.

On Sunday, North Korea sent shock waves across the world by detonating a hydrogen bomb, which was its sixth and the biggest nuclear test to date. The bomb was also about three times more powerful than America's atomic bomb that destroyed Japan's Hiroshima in 1945.

Two days later, Pyongyang warned the United States that it is prepared to send "more gift packages" to Washington.

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U.S. Demands UN Vote On North Korea Sanctions Despite Russian, Chinese Resistance

RFE/RL September 09, 2017

The United States on September 8 formally requested a vote of the United Nations Security Council on a U.S. resolution to impose severe new economic sanctions on North Korea over its latest nuclear test, despite resistance from China and Russia.

The resolution, which the U.S. mission to the UN said it wants the UN council to vote on September 11, would impose an oil embargo on North Korea and ban its exports of textiles as well as the hiring of North Korean laborers abroad, mostly by Russia and China, U.S. media have reported. It also reportedly would impose an asset freeze and travel ban on leader Kim Jong Un.

U.S. officials have said they want tough sanctions to maximize pressure on Pyongyang to agree to negotiations aimed at ending its nuclear and missile tests.

UN diplomats said the latest U.S. proposals would be the toughest ever imposed on North Korea as punishment for its sixth and largest nuclear bomb test on September 3.

Chinese, Russian Reluctance

North Korean ally China and neighboring Russia have resisted further sanctions, although both nations' UN representatives participated in discussions about a new round of sanctions this week.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said this week that sanctions alone could not resolve the impasse on the Korean Peninsula. Both Beijing and Moscow have called for negotiations and a diplomatic solution.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on September 8 that it was too early for a UN Security Council vote on new North Korean sanctions.

"Work is currently going on over a new resolution in the Security Council and it is still early to make predictions about its final form," Lavrov said at a news conference in Moscow after talks with his French counterpart Jean-Yves Le Drian on September 8.

"Along with pressure on the North Korean regime to induce it to abandon provocations in the implementation of its nuclear and missile programs, it is necessary to emphasize and increase the priority of efforts to resume the political process," Lavrov said.

The Reuters and AFP news agencies cited UN diplomatic sources as saying that they doubted either China or Moscow, both of which have the power to veto UN council resolutions, would accept anything more stringent than a ban on imports of North Korean textiles.

Radioactive Isotopes

Chinese officials have expressed disquiet about imposing an oil embargo, which they said could trigger instability in North Korea, and Putin has expressed concern that such stringent measures would hurt the nation's impoverished citizens as much as the government.

The UN council earlier this summer passed economic sanctions aimed at thwarting about a third of North Korea's earnings from exports, in what were the harshest measures to date.

The renewed debate on sanctions at the UN came as South Korea reported detecting small traces of radioactive particles that could have come from the detonation of what Pyongyang said was its most powerful hydrogen bomb in an underground test last weekend.

Radioactive isotopes of Xenon were detected in samples taken on land, sea, and air, but were too small to hurt people or the environment, Seoul's Nuclear Safety and Security Commission said.

South Korean officials have said they are bracing for a possible further missile test by North Korea when it marks its founding anniversary on September 9.

Experts say Pyongyang appears close to its goal of developing a powerful nuclear weapon capable of reaching the United States, something U.S. President Donald Trump has vowed to prevent.

With reporting by AFP, Reuters, and dpa

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/us-demands-un- vote-north-korea-sanctions-despite-russian-chinese- resistance-nuclear-test-/28725448.html

Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

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UN Chief Says North Korea Dispute Is Worst Crisis 'In Years'

September 10, 2017

The secretary general of the United Nations says the dispute over North Korea's nuclear and ballistic-missile programs is the world's worst crisis "in years."

"We have to hope that the seriousness of this threat puts us on the path of reason before it is too late," Antonio Guterres said in an interview published on September 10 by the French newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche.

"It's the most serious [crisis] we have had to face in years," he said, adding that he was "very worried."

"In the past, we have had wars that have been initiated after a well thought-out decision," he said.

"But we also know that other conflicts have started through an escalation caused by sleepwalking."

Guterres said it was important to get Pyongyang to end development of its nuclear and ballistic-missile programs and respect Security Council resolutions.

"We must also maintain the unity of the Security Council at all costs, because it is the only tool that can carry out a diplomatic initiative with a chance of success," he said.

The United States on September 8 formally requested a vote of the Security Council on a U.S. resolution to impose severe new economic sanctions on North Korea over its latest nuclear test, despite resistance from China and Russia.

The resolution, which the U.S. mission to the UN said it wants the Security Council to vote on September 11, would impose an oil embargo on North Korea and ban its exports of textiles as well as the hiring of North Korean laborers abroad, mostly by Russia and China.

It would also impose an asset freeze and travel ban on leader Kim Jong Un.

U.S. officials have said they want tough sanctions to maximize pressure on Pyongyang to agree to negotiations aimed at ending its nuclear and missile tests.

UN diplomats said the latest U.S. proposals would be the toughest ever imposed on North Korea in punishment for its sixth and largest nuclear bomb test on September 3.

News agencies Reuters and AFP cited UN diplomatic sources saying they doubted either Beijing or Moscow, both of which have the power to veto UN council resolutions, would accept anything more stringent than a ban on imports of North Korean textiles.

Chinese officials have expressed fear that imposing an oil embargo could trigger instability in North Korea, and Russian President Vladimir Putin has expressed concern that such stringent measures would hurt the nation's impoverished citizens as much as they would punish the government.

With reporting by Le Journal du Dimanche, AFP, and Swiss Info

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/united- nations-north-korea-nuclear-russia-china- united-states/28726627.html

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Report: British Suspect Iran Or Russia May Have Helped N. Korea Nuclear Program

September 10, 2017

Britain's Telegraph newspaper is reporting that U.K. officials fear that Iran or Russia may have helped North Korea's "sudden advancement" in the development of nuclear weapons.

The paper on September 10 said the British Foreign Office is investigating whether "current and former nuclear states" helped Pyongyang develop nuclear weapons capable of being mounted on missiles.

"Iran is top of the list of countries suspected of giving some form of assistance, while Russia is also in the spotlight," the paper reported.

Unidentified senior officials told the newspaper it was "not credible" that North Korea's scientists alone could have accomplished the nuclear advances.

"North Korean scientists are people of some ability, but clearly they're not doing it entirely in a vacuum," the paper quoted a U.K. government minister as saying.

North Korean on September 3 said it had successfully tested an advanced hydrogen bomb that can be loaded onto an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), a move condemned by the United States, Russia, China, and most other world powers.

Based on reporting by The Telegraph

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/iran- russia-north-korea-nuclear-missiles-british- officials/28726626.html

Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

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Iran will adhere to nuclear deal even if US withdraws, AEOI chief says

Iran Press TV

Fri Sep 8, 2017 11:14PM

Iran plans to adhere to its nuclear deal with world powers regardless of any probable US decision to withdraw from the agreement, the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) says.

"We are continuously assessing if this agreement benefits us, or if the price is too high to stay in the deal. If the United States pulls out of the agreement, but the rest of the countries stay committed -- namely Britain, France, Germany, China, Russia -- then Iran would most probably stick with the commitments to the agreement without the US," Ali Akbar Salehi said in a Friday interview with Der Spiegel.

"But if the US leaves the treaty and Europe follows, then this deal will certainly collapse and Iran will go back to what it was before, and, technically speaking, to a much higher level. As a person who has taken part in these negotiations, I wouldn't like to see that happen," he pointed out.

"I think our partners in this treaty have more to lose than we do" if the agreement falls through, the AEOI chief added.

Salehi referred to Washington's new sanctions and pressures against Iran, saying, "The US is trying to poison the business environment. It discourages big banks and companies from working with Iran. It is fearmongering. But in reality they cannot accomplish much. There is a lot of rhetoric."

The AEOI chief argued that the US refusal to waive Tehran's nuclear-related sanctions constitutes "significant noncompliance" with the nuclear deal on their part.

'Boosting military capability Iran's right'

The official rejected US allegations against Iran over its ballistic missile program and noted that the Islamic Republic's military capability has nothing to do with its nuclear activities.

"If the US considers this an issue, then it is their problem. Nowhere in the nuclear agreement does it say that Iran does not have the right to develop its missile capacity. We are exercising our rights and it is the other side that is trying to interpret this as a provocative act," Salehi pointed out.

Iran's nuclear agreement, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), was inked between Iran and the P5+1 countries  namely the US, Russia, China, France, and Britain plus Germany  in July 2015 and took effect in January 2016.

Under the deal, limits were put on Iran's nuclear activities in exchange for the removal of all nuclear-related bans imposed on the Islamic Republic, among other things.

US President Donald Trump, who had made no secret of opposing the nuclear agreement in his election campaign, has threatened to "tear up" the agreement, calling it "the worst deal ever negotiated."

In late August, the Trump administration sent US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley to Vienna to lobby with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to request access to Iranian military sites as part of the deal, in spite of the fact that the IAEA has confirmed Iran's compliance with the JCPOA in all its reports.

Tehran has repeatedly contended that Washington's demands for access to Iran's military sites are aimed at politicizing the JCPOA and that issues pertaining to the Islamic Republic's defense capabilities are non-negotiable.

Trump has also set up a team of his White House confidants to present him with "options" other than certifying Iranian compliance with the deal to the Congress. Such certification is needed by US law every 90 days in order for the Congress to continue to withhold nuclear-related sanctions against Iran.

The Trump administration has twice so far certified Iran's compliance with the deal. US media reports said Trump agreed to those certifications only "reluctantly." All indications are that he wants to avoid a third certification.

The White House has been further pressuring US intelligence officials to produce intelligence that could be used to declare Iran in violation of the nuclear agreement.

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Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 10:32:11|Editor: Song Lifang

Video Player Close

RIO DE JANEIRO, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- Barcelona have struck a deal to sign Colombia international defender Yerry Mina from Brazilian outfit Palmeiras, according to media reports.

The 22-year-old will arrive at the Camp Nou next July after Barcelona agreed to trigger his nine million-euro release clause, the Estado de S.Paulo newspaper said.

The Blaugrana had expressed a wish for the center-back to arrive in January but are said to have changed their mind after talks with Palmeiras officials during the week.

Mina has made 32 appearances for Palmeiras since his 3.5 million-euro move from Colombia's Independiente Santa Fe in May 2016.

He has been capped nine times for Colombia's national team, having made his international debut last year.
Trump Urges Gulf Arab States To Settle Disputes And Unite Against Iran

RFE/RL September 09, 2017

U.S. President Donald Trump on September 8 urged Saudi Arabia and other Arab states to resolve their differences with Qatar and present a united front against Iran, the White House said.

Trump spoke separately with Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman, United Arab Emirates (U.A.E.) Crown Prince Sheikh Muhammad bin Zayed al-Nahyan, and Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani.

Trump told them that unity among Washington's Arab partners was essential to promoting regional stability and countering the threat of Iran, the White House said.

The leaders "discussed the continued threat Iran poses to regional stability," it said.

"The president also emphasized that all countries must follow through on commitments from the Riyadh Summit to defeat terrorism, cut off funding for terrorist groups, and combat extremist ideology."

Trump said on September 7 that he was willing to step in and mediate the dispute between Qatar and other Gulf Arab states, and he thought a deal could come quickly.

Saudi Arabia, the U.A.E., Egypt, and Bahrain in June cut diplomatic, trade, air, and shipping ties with Qatar, which is home to the Persian Gulf's biggest U.S. military base.

The Saudi-led group of Arab states said Qatar was too close to Saudi archrival Iran and too lenient on Islamic extremists -- accusations that Doha denies.

The leaders of Qatar and Saudi Arabia for the first time since the dispute broke out spoke by phone on September 8 and Qatar's Thani subsequently expressed willingness to negotiate a settlement of their dispute, media reported.

However, Saudi Arabia early on September 9 said it was suspending any dialogue because Qatar's state news agency, which had portrayed the call as a breakthrough coordinated by Trump, had "distorted facts."

As Kuwaiti officials visited Washington during the week, Trump and U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson also endorsed an effort to mediate the Gulf Arab dispute by Kuwaiti Emir Sheikh Sabah Al Ahmad Al Sabah.

"We support his efforts to help bring about a settlement," Tillerson said on September 8. "The United States and Kuwait both recognize the important of [Gulf Cooperation Council] unity to meet the challenges of the region that we all face together, not the least of which is the threats from Iran."

With reporting by AFP, AP, and Reuters

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/trump-urges- saudi-arabia-persian-gulf-arab-states-resolve-dispute- qatar-united-against-iran/28725438.html

Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

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Iraqi army soldiers, allies kill 14 Daesh bombers in Diyala

Iran Press TV

Sat Sep 9, 2017 2:58PM

Iraqi army troops, backed by allied fighters from the Popular Mobilization Units, have launched a counter-terrorism operation to hunt down Daesh Takfiri terrorists in the country's eastern province of Diyala, killing more than a dozen extremists in the process.

Lieutenant General Mazhar al-Azzawi told Arabic-language Baghdad Today news agency on Saturday that Iraqi army soldiers, police and pro-government volunteer fighters  commonly known by the Arabic name Hashd al-Sha'abi  started a multi-pronged offensive in the area between the oil-rich town of Naft Khana and the city of Khanaqin near the Iranian border.

Azzawi added that the forces killed fourteen Daesh bombers wearing explosive belts during the operation, noting that three militant hideouts were destroyed in the outskirts of Naft Khana, located some 155 kilometers northeast of the capital Baghdad, as well.

The development came only a day after the media bureau of Tigris (Dijla) Operations Command announced in a statement that Iraqi Air Force fighter jets had carried out a string of airstrikes in al-Khalawiyah region northeast of Baqubah, located some 50 kilometers northeast of Baghdad, killing 15 Daesh Takfiris.

The aerial attacks also destroyed Daesh fortifications, a vehicle and five motorbikes.

Separately, Kurdish Peshmerga forces have killed five Daesh terrorists as they tried to infiltrate into security checkpoints in Sahl al-Malih region near al-'Ayadiyah district, which lies 11 kilometers northwest of Tal Afar.

A local source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said all the militants were wearing explosive belts.

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Japan conducts air exercise with US over East China Sea

Iran Press TV

Sat Sep 9, 2017 10:20AM

The Japanese military has conducted a joint aerial combat drill with the United States over the East China Sea amid escalating tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

Japan's Air Self Defense Force (ASDF) said Saturday that the military drill involved two Japanese F-15 jet fighters joining two US Air Force B-1B Lancer bombers that were flying from Andersen Air Force Base on the US Pacific island territory of Guam.

Japanese F-15 fighters on August 31 also carried out an air exercise with US B1-B bombers and F-35 stealth fighters in skies south of the Korean Peninsula.

The joint air exercise on Saturday between the two allies comes as Seoul prepares for a possible missile test by the North as it marks its founding anniversary.

North Korea carried out its sixth and largest nuclear test on September 3, rattling global financial markets and further escalating tensions in the region.

Last month, Tokyo and Washington agreed to increase their military cooperation in an attempt to counter the perceived threat from North Korea.

North Korea is under mounting international pressure over its missile and military nuclear programs and has been subjected to an array of United Nations sanctions.

However, Pyongyang says it will not give up on its nuclear deterrence unless Washington ends its hostile policy toward the country and dissolves the US-led UN command in South Korea. Thousands of US soldiers are stationed in South Korea and Japan.

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U.S. State Department Expresses Concern Over Plight of Rohingya Refugees

RFE/RL September 09, 2017

The U.S. State Department has expressed concern over the plight of the tens of thousands of Rohingya Muslims who have crossed into Bangladesh since fresh violence erupted in neighboring Burma late last month.

In a statement on September 9, spokesperson Heather Nauert said: We are very concerned by the United Nations announcement on September 8 that an estimated 270,000 Rohingya have arrived in Bangladesh  following allegations of serious human rights abuses in Burma's Rakhine State, including violent attacks and mass burnings of villages."

The statement said that the United States continues to coordinate closely with its partners, including several UN agencies, to provide emergency assistance to Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh.

Washington has provided nearly $63 million in humanitarian assistance for vulnerable communities displaced in and from Burma throughout the region, the statement added.It also welcomed Bangladesh's "generosity in responding to this humanitarian crisis."

The United Nations said on September 9 that the number of Rohingya refugees, who arrived in Bangladesh since August 25 now stands at around 290,000.

Most of the Rohingya are arriving by foot or boat across Bangladesh's 278 kilometer border with Burma (also known as Myanmar).

Fights are erupting over food and water at the camps and makeshift settlements in Bangladesh as the refugees are becoming desperate for dwindling supplies of basic resources.

Refugees accuse Burmese security forces and Buddhist mobs of burning their villages. The government says the security forces are responding to an attack last month on police posts by Rohingya militants.

Meanwhile, Rohingya militants declared a month-long unilateral ceasefire, starting on September 10, to enable aid groups to help ease the humanitarian crisis in the Rakhine State.

The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) said in a statement that it "strongly encourages all concerned humanitarian actors resume their humanitarian assistance to all victims of the humanitarian crisis, irrespective of ethnic or religious background during the cease-fire period."

The impact of the move is unclear.

The latest violence in the decades-old conflict began when the military launched a counteroffensive following attacks by ARSA insurgents on 30 police posts and an army base on August 25.

With reporting by Reuters

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/burma-rohingya- refugees-u-s-state-department- concern/28726160.html

Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

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Rohingya Insurgents Call for Humanitarian Cease-fire

By VOA News September 09, 2017

Rohingya insurgents in Myanmar have called for a monthlong cease-fire starting Sunday in order to allow humanitarian aid to reach those affected by the conflict.

Insurgents from the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) attacked dozens of police posts and an army base late last month. Fighting led to the displacement of more than 300,000 people.

In a statement Saturday, the group encouraged aid groups to "resume their humanitarian assistance to all victims of the humanitarian crisis, irrespective of ethnic or religious background, during the cease-fire period."

The cease-fire announcement came a day after U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley reminded Myanmar that while Washington supported efforts to end violence in northwestern Rakhine state, humanitarian aid must reach those in need.

Haley's statement said, "We welcome the Burmese government committing humanitarian assistance to all displaced by violence. However, we will continue to urge them to make sure this aid actually reaches those in need, as quickly as possible, and that it is delivered in a manner that protects their rights and dignity."

Earlier Friday, the State Department said it was "very focused" on restoring humanitarian assistance to Rakhine state and was "very concerned about sustained allegations of abuses" in that area.

Patrick Murphy, deputy assistant secretary of state for Southeast Asia, told reporters by phone Friday that the United States was urging all parties to calm tension in the area. He said since August, "probably well over" 200,000 refugees had crossed the border into Bangladesh to escape the violence.

He said the number of internally displaced persons  those who have left their homes but not left Myanmar  was unknown. Murphy noted that members of the Rohingya ethnic group and non-Rohingya were among the displaced persons in the area.

Discussions with the Myanmar government are "ongoing," he said, through the U.S. ambassador to the country, which also is known as Burma.

Fleeing violence

The latest violence began August 25 when Rohingya insurgents attacked the police and army sites in what they said was an effort to protect their ethnic minority from persecution. Rakhine state is home to most of the Rohingya minority group.

Subsequent clashes and a military counteroffensive killed at least 400 people and triggered the latest exodus of Rohingya villagers to Bangladesh.

U.N. refugee agency Asia director Vivian Tan in Bangladesh told VOA Burmese that aid workers estimated there were about 164,000 new arrivals in Bangladesh.

The United Nations said about 146,000 people had crossed the border into Bangladesh's Cox's Bazar district since August 25.

Officials said the U.N. World Food Program had provided tens of thousands of people with food, including high-nutrient porridge, to women and children who were arriving in Bangladesh hungry and malnourished. The agency said it needed $11.3 million to support the influx of people, in addition to those already living in camps.

Suu Kyi under fire

Myanmar's de facto leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, has been criticized for her response to the violence.

Many observers say she has played down reports of the Burmese military's brutal treatment of Rohingya civilians. Suu Kyi maintains there has been "a huge iceberg of misinformation" about the Rohingya crisis and violence in Rakhine following the attacks on security posts.

A series of Twitter photos that allegedly showed dead Rohingya were later proved to be unrelated to the current violence, according to a statement posted on Facebook by Suu Kyi's office.

The Nobel Peace laureate said "fake information" was used to promote the interests of "terrorists," a word she used to describe ARSA insurgents.

Priscilla Clapp, who served as chief of mission and permanent charge d'affaires at the U.S. Embassy in Myanmar from 1999 to 2002, said a lot of the criticism of Suu Kyi was unfair because of the limitations on her power and influence.

"In a way, she's at a great disadvantage with the military, which controls all the security of the country and much of the government administration from before," said Clapp, currently a senior adviser at the U.S. Institute of Peace and the Asia Society.

Clapp also blamed the ARSA insurgents, whom she called terrorists who have deliberately provoked the extreme reaction on the part of the security forces. She maintained, however, that security forces must be "much more moderate in the way they approach these things, and sensitive to community relations."

International pressure

Human rights advocates urged the Burmese government to stop the violence.

"The governments of the world have to press very hard on Aung San Suu Kyi and also the Burma military to stop the violence," Phil Robertson, Human Rights Watch's deputy Asia director, told VOA, adding that independent monitors should be granted access to assess allegations of serious human rights violations made by ethnic Rohingya refugees who have fled into Bangladesh.

Robertson urged the United States and the international community to provide more humanitarian relief and medical assistance to the refugees.

"So far we have seen very little comments from the Trump administration about the situation, which is quite shocking," he said. "There is a massive humanitarian crisis in a country which, until recently, the United States spent a great deal of time trying to understand them and work with the government on various developments and trade."

Complex issue

Former U.S. diplomat Clapp said the complexity of the situation merited a more nuanced reaction from the international community.

"To reduce it to simplicity and black-and-white equations is not helpful. It's just inflaming further problems inside the country, and it's making the population more resistant to international advice," Clapp said. "We have to be much more understanding and get involved on the ground in helping them resolve this problem."

Abuses against and restrictions on members of the Rohingya population were cited as one of the leading human rights problems in Myanmar, according to the State Department's 2016 Human Rights Report.

The Rohingya are one of Myanmar's many ethnic minorities in the Buddhist-majority nation. The Myanmar government considers the Rohingya to be economic migrants from Bangladesh, and it has never granted them citizenship, even though most can show their families have been in the country for generations.

VOA's Burmese service contributed to this report.

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Russia Holds Elections For Governors, Local Legislatures

RFE/RL September 09, 2017

People across Russia go to the polls on September 10 to elect local and regional councils and governors in the last major voting before a presidential election in March.

Much of the attention will be focused on municipal voting in the capital, Moscow, where opposition candidates are hoping for a strong showing but have accused authorities of trying to discourage voter turnout. City officials have rejected those allegations.

Voters will cast ballots for local legislatures in six far-flung regions where councils, known as dumas, are expected to continue to be dominated by President Vladimir Putin's United Russia party allies: North Ossetia, Udmurtia, Krasnodar Krai, Penza Oblast, Saratov Oblast, and Sakhalin Oblast.

Direct governors' races are being held in 16 of Russia's 83 regions, and complaints surfaced ahead of the elections from would-be candidates saying they had been unfairly excluded from the ballot.

In nine of the 16 regions with gubernatorial voting on September 10, United Party incumbent governors are running for reelection. A second round of voting is scheduled for September 24 in places where no candidate wins a majority.

A recent requirement is being blamed by some for unduly narrowing the field of candidates for governor. To get on the ballot, would-be candidates must get signatures of support from as high as 10 percent of local lawmakers. In most cases, such local legislatures are either members or allies of United Russia.

Critics say they have little incentive to see potential opponents get on the ballot.

The rule, dubbed the "municipal filter," was introduced after Dmitry Medvedev reinstated direct gubernatorial elections toward the end of his presidency in 2012.

The Kremlin enacted even tighter controls over Russia's political landscape after street protests in Moscow and other cities five years ago sparked by accusations of vote rigging in parliamentary elections in December 2011 and Putin's return to the presidency in 2012.

At least four potentially formidable candidates had their bids quashed after they failed to secure the required signatures.

Yevgeny Roizman, a Yekaterinburg mayor with the reputation as a political maverick, failed to get on the gubernatorial ballot in his native Sverdlovsk region. In an interview with RFE/RL's Russian Service in August, Roizman alleged that local authorities made sure "they cleared the entire field." https://www.svoboda.org/a/28675569.html

"There's not a single strong challenger," Roizman said of the process. "Not a single strong candidate was even allowed to get close." Roizman predicted that he would have won "plain and simple" if he had been in the race.

Ella Pamfilova, the head of Russia's Central Election Commission, rejected suggestions that Roizman had been unfairly targeted by the Kremlin.

"It's difficult for me to believe that the ruthless Mr. Roizman -- a senior official, a statesman, the head of a major city who has certain administrative resources -- is a sort of weak little victim hounded by the regime," Pamfilova told the Russian business daily RBK in August.

But analysts say the choices are limited and voter turnout may be low as a result.

"There won't be any surprises in the regions because everything is under control," Dmitry Oreshkin, director of the Mercator think tank in Moscow, told RFE/RL.

Oreshkin predicted that United Russia or "people approved by United Russia" will emerge victorious in regional races.

And he suggested the current domination of the Kremlin in budgeting and other areas would spell trouble for more independent candidates for governor.

"In any case, it's not that important [who wins governors' races] because, in terms of function, any governor depends entirely on Moscow simply because that's the way the federal budget works. He receives money from Moscow and depends on Moscow," Oreshkin said. "So even if a Communist or Liberal [Democrat] did win, he would in any case have to become part of the system of values."

"In any case, they won't win."

Although he has not officially announced his candidacy, Putin is expected to dominate the presidential election slated for March. It would be his fourth term in the presidency, a tenure dating back to late 1999 and interrupted only by a four-year stint as prime minister to avoid a presidential term limit in Russia's constitution.

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-regional-election- moscow-putin-governors/28726207.html

Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

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Russia's Black Sea Fleet Test Fires Utes Coastal Missile System

Sputnik News

16:02 09.09.2017(updated 16:06 09.09.2017)

Russia's Black Sea fleet said Saturday it tested its Utes coastal missile system, firing two cruise missiles in "the interests of a surface action group."

MOSCOW (Sputnik)  The Utes coastal missile system launched two cruising missiles as part of scheduled drills, the Fleet's Spokesman Capt. 1st Rank Vyacheslav Trukhachev said Saturday.

"The Utes coastal stationary missile system launched two cruising missiles during exercises of Russia's Black Sea Fleet in the interests of a surface action group," Trukhachev said.

The spokesman specified that the drills were aimed at collective air defense training.

The Utes missile systems that are located on the Crimean Peninsula, with P-35 cruise missiles, are capable of hitting targets at a distance of 300 kilometers (186 miles). The P-35s are equipped with 560-kilo high-explosive warheads, and the flight speed of the missiles exceeds 2,000 kilometers per hour.

There are currently two missile systems of the kind at the disposal of the Russian Black Sea fleet; each of them has two missile launch containers. Their combat readiness was restored and confirmed by successful launches in late 2016.

The previous drills in Crimea were held last summer; the Russian Black Sea Fleet put its naval and coastal defense units on high alert. The Russian Fleet's impromptu drills came amid Sea Breeze 2017, large-scale Black Sea naval drills co-hosted by the United States and Ukraine involving air, land, naval and amphibious forces.

 Sputnik

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Syrian army, allies break Daesh siege on Dayr al-Zawr air base

Iran Press TV

Sat Sep 9, 2017 3:3PM

Syrian army soldiers, backed by allied fighters from popular defense groups, have managed to break a nearly three-year siege imposed by Daesh Takfiri terrorists on a strategic airbase in the eastern city of Dayr al-Zawr as they continue to make substantial gains against the extremists.

Syria's official news agency SANA reported that the breach came after government forces and allies that were advancing from the Maqabir (Cemetery) district of the city, located 450 kilometers northeast of the capital Damascus, linked up with the soldiers holding the military site.

Syrian army troops and pro-government fighters had launched a new push on Friday towards the besieged military airport, as part of a multi-pronged offensive to retake the entire eastern city from Daesh Takfiris.

Earlier, Syrian soldiers and their allies established complete control over the town of Ash Sholah and the village of Tal Alloush.

At least 40 trucks carrying basic commodities such as fuel, food and medical supplies to civilians, in addition to two mobile clinics, arrived in Dayr al-Zawr on Thursday, only two days after Syrian army forces and fighters from popular defense groups reached the eastern city and breached the Daesh siege.

Daesh overran large parts of Dayr al-Zawr province, including its many oil fields, in mid-2014 as it seized swathes of land in Syria and neighboring Iraq.

By early 2015, the Takfiri terrorists were in control of some parts of Dayr al-Zawr city and besieged the remaining parts, which were under government control.

It is estimated that 100,000 people remain in the government-held parts of the city.

The so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights estimates that more than 10,000 people may be living in the Daesh-held parts of Dayr al-Zawr.

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US-backed militants eye Syria city amid govt. advances

Iran Press TV

Sat Sep 9, 2017 8:39AM

A coalition of US-backed Kurdish and Arab militants has launched an offensive against Daesh-held areas in Syria's Dayr al-Zawr Province amid decisive government victories in the area, raising the prospect of a confrontation with Syrian army forces.

Earlier in the week, the Syrian army and its allies reached the provincial capital of the same name, breaking a nearly three-year-old siege by the Takfiri terrorist group of Daesh on government-held parts of the city.

The exploit was a debilitating blow to the outfit and facilitated the army's ongoing efforts to secure the area bordering Iraq. The liberation of the entire border area would be particularly important because it would stop the Takfiri terrorists' cross-border transit between Syria and Iraq.

Syria's ultimate control of the oil-rich province would also help revive its economy.

Just on Saturday, the Syrian army and its allies recaptured the Teym oilfield from Daesh near the city of Dayr al-Zawr.

Amid the advances by the Syrian military and its allies, the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) militant group on Saturday announced the launch of an offensive against Dayr al-Zawr with the participation of thousands of militants.

Ahmed Abu Khawla, the commander of the so-called Dayr al-Zawr military council  part of the SDF involved in the attack on the province  said he commanded a force of 4,000 fighters.

He said the SDF was already forming a local civilian council to administer the area after the pending military operations.

The US-backed SDF, which has not been in coordination with the Syrian government, has already been a source of tension in the Arab country.

In late August, Syrian Kurds said they would hold three elections in a "federal region" they are establishing in Syria's north, despite having reiterated in the past that they had no such plans.

The Kurds declared three "autonomous" cantons in the north in 2013, taking advantage of the Syrian army's withdrawal from swathes of territory there.

Massoud Barzani, the president of the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Region in northern Iraq, announced earlier in the year that his region was planning to hold an independence vote on September 25. Various regional and international players have strongly cautioned against the vote and its implications for Iraq and the entire region.

Turkey and Iran are opposed to the prospect of Kurdish independence. Ankara has been wary of the advance of the Kurdish forces close to its borders. It says the forces are linked with the Kurdish separatists it has been fighting inside Turkey for decades, and has deployed troops to northern Syria to drive them back.

'SDF too undermanned to win'

Ahmad al-Ahmad, who heads the armed Syrian opposition's Syria Press center, meanwhile, said the SDF did not have the manpower to control Dayr al-Zawr, adding that government forces had brought in lots of troops and allies for the battle.

He said the government, on the other hand, was capable of retaking territory on the Syrian-Iraqi border.

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Syrian forces flush Daesh terrorists from town near Dayr al-Zawr

Iran Press TV

Sat Sep 9, 2017 12:10AM

Syrian army forces, backed by allied fighters from popular defense groups, have established control over al-Shoula town near the eastern city of Dayr al-Zawr, whose nearly three-year-long siege, imposed by Daesh Takfiri terrorists, has recently been broken by government forces.

Syria's official news agency, SANA, citing an unnamed military source, reported that Shoula, which lies some 22 kilometers southwest of Dayr al-Zawr, was fully liberated from the grips of Daesh on Friday after an army operation, supported by the Syrian and Russian air forces, eliminated the last pockets of terrorists in the town.

It added that the Syrian troops also flushed out terrorists from a number of overlooking hills near Shoula.

Meanwhile, Syrian government forces, backed by fighter jets, are tightening the noose around Daesh terrorists, who are holed up in Dayr al-Zawr's military airport. Local sources say the troops are now less than two kilometers away from the airport and Maqabir district.

The developments came three days after Syrian army units, backed by government and Russian warplanes, managed to reach pro-government forces trapped in the eastern city in a major breakthrough. The move effectively breached the siege that Daesh militants had laid since January 2015.

Syrian troops and allied volunteer fighters had been advancing for months toward Dayr al-Zawr, the provincial capital city of the oil-rich province of the same name.

Daesh militants overran large parts of Dayr al-Zawr province, including its many oil fields, in mid-2014 as they seized areas in Syria and neighboring Iraq. By early 2015, the Takfiri terrorists were in control of parts of Dayr al-Zawr city, and besieged the remaining parts of it under government control.

It is estimated that 100,000 people remain in government-held parts of the city. The eastern province served as Daesh's main supply corridor to Iraq.

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Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 10:32:12|Editor: Mengjie

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YANGON, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- The Myanmar government has vowed to take action against the incitement of violence as such rumors are being spread to people via mobile phone messages and social media.

In a statement released late Saturday, the Information Committee of the government asked Myanmar people not to be instigated among communities, and urged them to report to authorities about acts suspicious of such incitement.

The local government in Maungtaw, Myanmar's northern Rakhine state, also called on people not to support terrorists in burning homes or properties and prevent them from entering restricted areas as part of a new order issued on Saturday.

The order, announced by Maungtaw District's General Administration Department, said the security forces will fire warning shots at any law-breakers.

It also called for people's cooperation with the authorities by following instructions not to rob, steal or destroy properties in the restricted areas, or possess sticks, machetes or explosives.

The security forces have been entering villages to search for Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) extremist terrorists to maintain peace and stability in the areas.

Terrorist attacks in Myanmar's northern Rakhine state have displaced more than 30,000 people, according to the Information Committee.

From Aug, 25 to Sept. 4, residents from Taungpyo, Letwe, Kwuntheepin, Thechaung and Meetaik areas in Maungtaw district fled to border areas for refuge and camped along the Myanmar side of the border with Bangladesh.

Earlier reports said 97 terrorist attacks by the ARSA during the period killed 36 people, including 13 security force members, two government service personnel and 21 ethnic people, and injured 22 others.

A total of 59 villages and 6,842 houses were also burnt down by the terrorists with eight bridges being destroyed by planted mines.

Some 371 terrorists were killed in clashes with the security forces.
U.S.-Backed Fighters, Syrian Army Advance Against IS In Eastern Syria

RFE/RL September 09, 2017

U.S.-backed fighters and the Syrian government forces have advanced in separate offensives against the extremist Islamic State (IS) group in the province of Deir al-Zour in eastern Syria, piling pressure on shrinking territory IS still holds in oil-rich areas near the Iraqi border.

The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a U.S.-backed alliance of mostly Arab and Kurdish fighters, launched an offensive against IS in the north of the province on September 9, in an operation to capture areas east of the Euphrates River.

"We're not specifying a time-frame but we hope it will be a quick operation," said Abu Khawlah, who heads the SDF's Military Council.

The U.S.-trained Deir al-Zour Military Council said it was calling its operation Jazeera Storm.

Abu Khawlah said US-led coalition air strikes had already helped his forces advance "around 30 kilometers " in the first day of the operation.

He said forces had begun to push IS out of territory in Hasakeh Province and further south in Deir al-Zour.

Meanwhile, Syrian state media announced on September 9 that government forces and their allies fought their way to Deir al-Zour military airport on the other side of the Euphrates, where troops had been holed up since 2014, surrounded by IS fighters.

The advance came days after the Syrian Army and its allies -- Iran-backed militias and the Lebanese Shi'ite group Hezbollah -- broke the siege of the main part of the city.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights also confirmed that government forces had breached the airport siege.

The British-based monitoring group said that Syrian forces also recaptured the Teym oil field southwest of Deir al-Zour and seized part of a main highway running downstream to the city of Al-Mayadeen, to which many IS militants have retreated.

Since 2014, IS has held swaths of Deir al-Zoir province, and about 60 percent of the provincial capital.

The SDF are also fighting against IS militants over the jihadists' de-facto capital city, Raqqa, in north Syria. Ground and air support have been provided by the U.S.-led coalition that has carried out air strikes against IS in Syria since 2014.

The offensive to retake Raqqa was launched by the SDF in early June and forces have already seized around 65 percent of the city.

The coalition, the SDF, Syria's government, and Russia, a key ally of the Syrian government, have agreed on a "de-confliction line" in northeast Syria to prevent clashes.

The coalition said the line runs from Raqqa Province southeast along the Euphrates River towards Deir al-Zour.

"The de-confliction line with the Russians is necessary in the complex and congested battlespace over eastern Syria," coalition spokesman Colonel Ryan Dillon said.

With reporting by Reuters, AP, AFP, and dpa

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/syrian-army-seizes-oil- filed-islamic-state/28725731.html

Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

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Syrian Army Breaks Daesh Blockade of Airbase in Deir ez-Zor

Sputnik News

18:12 09.09.2017(updated 21:11 09.09.2017)

The Syrian armed forces broke the siege of an airbase in the city of Deir ez-Zor, a Sputnik correspondent reported on Saturday, saying that the clashes continue.

The elite units of the Syrian army supported by artillery and aviation recaptured a number of hills near Deir ez-Zor and reached the airbase located in the eastern part of the city.

The troops have destroyed Daesh's (a terrorist group banned in Russia) equipment and defensive constructions during the offensive, a Sputnik correspondent noted. The fights are continuing along the perimeter of the airbase.

The Syrian military started an operation to break the siege of the airbase on Friday, having captured a strategic hill in the vicinity of the facility. It was reported that the troops broke into the area near the airbase from the direction of the city's graveyard.

The US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) announced Saturday they launched their own operation to liberate the eastern borders of Deir ez-Zor from Daesh terrorists.

Deir ez-Zor, located 140 km south east of Daesh's self-proclaimed capital city of Raqqa, has been under siege for over three years. On September 5, Syrian troops unblocked the city with Russian air support.

The operation to lift the bockade had been developed since the liberation of Syria's eastern city of Aleppo in January. It ended rebel activity in western Syria, paving the way for the Damascus forces to move towards the east across the country's desert region into Daesh heartlands.

 Sputnik

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Deir Ez-Zor, Syria to Be Liberated From Terrorists in Coming Days  Army General

Sputnik News

15:19 09.09.2017(updated 15:47 09.09.2017)

The commander of the operation in the region said that the Syrian city of Deir Ez-Zor will be liberated from Daesh terror group militants in the coming days.

DAMASCUS (Sputnik)  The Syrian city of Deir Ez-Zor will be liberated from Daesh terror group militants in the coming days, Gen. Mohamed Khadur, the commander of the operation in the region, told Sputnik on Saturday.

"In the coming days, we will raise the Syrian flag in the skies of Deir Ez-Zor," Khadur said.

According to the commander, the liberation of Deir Ez-Zor depends in particular on regaining control of the road that links Deir Ez-Zor and the city of Palmyra.

Khadur also noted that the operation under his leadership had been carried out for more than two months, and the servicemen gained control of 185 out of 200 kilometers (115 out of 124 miles) of the road.

Earlier in the day, local media reported that the Syrian Armed Forces had liberated the Taim oil field near Deir Ez-Zor and continued moving toward the city. The armed forces also regained full control over several settlements in the east of Homs province.

On Tuesday, the Syrian army lifted the three-year-old blockade of Deir ez-Zor. According to Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, the efforts of the Syrian government forces were backed by Russian airstrikes and cruise missile strikes.

Syria has been in the grip of a civil war for over six years. Government forces are fighting against Syrian opposition groups, who strive to overthrow President Bashar Assad, as well as numerous extremist and terrorist groups, such as the Daesh and Jabhat Fatah al Sham, also outlawed in Russia.

 Sputnik

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Security forces kill almost 100 PKK terrorist in southeast Turkey

Iran Press TV

Sat Sep 9, 2017 11:54PM

Turkish troops have killed almost 100 members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) during operations in the country's southeast regions.

According to a statement released by the Turkish General Staff on Saturday, they were killed over the past two weeks during operations carried out in the districts of Beytussebap in the province of Sirnak and Yuksekova in the Hakkari province.

The statement added that some 12 hideouts belonging to the terrorists were also destroyed in the operations in which large amounts of weapons and explosives were also seized.

Turkey has declared the PKK a terrorist organization and has banned it. The militant group has been seeking an autonomous Kurdish region since 1984.

A shaky ceasefire between the PKK and the Turkish government collapsed in July 2015. Attacks on Turkish security forces have soared ever since.

Over the past few months, Turkish ground and air forces have been carrying out operations against the PKK positions in the country's southeastern border region as well as in northern Iraq and neighboring Syria.

More than 40,000 people have been killed during the three-decade conflict between Turkey and the autonomy-seeking militant group.

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Turkish Armed Forces Kill Nearly 100 PKK Militants Within Last Two Weeks

Sputnik News

17:38 09.09.2017(updated 18:17 09.09.2017)

Turkish forces have eliminated roughly 100 members of the Kurdistan Workers' Party in the last two weeks in the country's southeastern provinces, the Turkish General Staff said Saturday.

ANKARA (Sputnik)  The General Staff said in a statement that nearly a hundred Kurdish militants in the southeastern region of the country had been eliminated.

"Between August 24 and September 7, a total of 99 terrorists, including one of their leaders, were killed during operations carried out against the separatist terrorist organization [PKK] in Sirnak and Hakkari provinces," the statement read.

The statement specified that PKK shelters, weapons and ammunition were also destroyed during the combat operations.

In light of intensified assaults by PKK militants the Turkish authorities launched the construction of a 10-foot high wall in eastern Agri province this summer. As local media reports, this fortification is a part of the efforts to defend the territory from the Kurdistan Workers' Party, listed by Ankara as a terrorist organization.

The tensions between Turkey and Kurdish militant groups seeking independence escalated in July 2015, after a three-year ceasefire between the two sides collapsed over a series of terror attacks allegedly committed by PKK members. Thus prompting Ankara to launch a military operation in the Kurdish-dominated southeastern regions of the country. According to the Turkish Defense Ministry, the security forces neutralized more than 10,000 PKK members within this period.

 Sputnik

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Situation in Donbass far From Sustainable Peace  Ukrainian President

Sputnik News

23:19 09.09.2017

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said that there is still a long way to go to establish sustainable peace in Ukraine's Donbass region despite all efforts made by Ukrainian diplomats to settle the issue by political and diplomatic means.

KIEV (Sputnik)  There is still a long way to go to establish sustainable peace in Ukraine's Donbass region despite all efforts made by Ukrainian diplomats to settle the issue by political and diplomatic means, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said Saturday.

"Regardless of the great efforts that the country's leadership and our Ukrainian diplomats are making to solve the issue of the liberation of the Ukrainian territory by political and diplomatic means, the situation, unfortunately, is still very far from sustainable peace. In these difficult circumstances we particularly appreciate and support Armed Forces and National Guard of Ukraine," Poroshenko told the 112 Ukraine TV channel.

The Ukrainian president noted that the peace in Donbass could only be achieved by diplomatic and political means, but with the strong army at the same time.

Ukraine's authorities have been conducting a military operation in the country's eastern regions since April 2014, after local residents refused to recognize the new government in Kiev. In February 2015, Kiev and the Donbass militias signed a ceasefire agreement but, despite the deal, both sides have been reporting violations of the ceasefire.

 Sputnik

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Haiti - NOTICE : EDH repairs damaged lines





The General Direction of Electricity of Haiti (EDH) informs its clientele that following the passage of hurricane IRMA, 18 circuits of the metropolitan area have unfortunately not yet been fed. Nevertheless, due to the diligence of the EDH teams, only 2 circuits are still out of service.



The EDH wishes to advise its clientele of the Plaine du Cul de Sac and of Croix des Bouquets that its teams are working relentlessly to complete the repair works and to feed them incessantly.



HL/ HaitiLibre






















Haiti - News : Zapping...





Diaspora : IRMA, message from the Embassy of Haiti

The Embassy of Haiti in Washington DC calls for caution to Haitian compatriots in Florida and invites them to evacuate areas at risk. "We encourage our compatriots in Florida to follow the instructions of local authorities, to reach temporary shelters."



Red Alert raised but...

The red alert is lifted but the risk of landslides and flooding remains on the Great North. The resumption of domestic and international flights and transports is authorized under the responsibility of the transport companies. The ban on cabotage operations is maintained for the northern coast of the country where dangerous sea conditions remain until Saturday evening.



It's the old border bridge that has ceded

"The bridge linking Haiti to the Dominican Republic between Ouanaminthe and Dajabon remains solid and viable. It was the old, out-of-service bridge that fell under the effects of hurricane IRMA," said Aviol Fleurant, Minister of Planning.



Reopening of Embassies of France and USA

The French Embassy and its consular section will re-open their doors to the public on Monday 11 September. The US Embassy will resume regular operations on Monday, September 11, including the full range of consular services.



Food for the Poor in the field

Following the passage of Hurricane Irma, the team of "Food For The Poor" made a field visit Friday morning and found that the Northeast department was heavily hit. They noted flooded rivers, destroyed rice fields, damaged houses, cooking utensils, school materials and important parts carried away by the rise of water in the community of Malfety of 12,000 inhabitants, located at the entrance of Garate, not far from Garde Saline and the city of Fort-Liberte.



Message of sympathy from the Ministry of Education

"Sympathy to victims and families of educational agents affected at the passager of Hurricane IRMA in the Great North of the country," Ministry of Education.



HL/ HaitiLibre


















Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 10:52:17|Editor: Song Lifang

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NEW YORK, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- American Sloane Stephens defeated compatriot and close friend Madison Keys 6-3, 6-0 to win the US Open women's singles title on Saturday.

The 24-year-old Stephens had total control over the final, breaking twice in the opening set to draw the first blood and then won the second at love.

Stephens, who will move to 17th in the world rankings on Monday, won the last eight games of the match, with Keys putting up a brief late fight by saving two match points in the final game. Stephens just needed one hour or so to take the victory.

"It's incredible, I had surgery on January 23. If someone would have told me I'd win the US Open, I'd say it was impossible," Stephens said.

"It's a special moment. I said to her that I wished it could have been a draw. If the situation was the other way around, she would have said the same thing. It's incredible. It's what true friendship is all about."

Stephens only returned to the tour at Wimbledon after missing 11 months having undergone left foot surgery.

Her world ranking slid to 957 before semifinal runs in Toronto and Cincinnati events.

While Keys, the 15th seed at the US Open, said she felt nervous during the match.

"I definitely think my play today came down to nerves and all of that, and I just don't think I handled the occasion perfectly," admitted Keys, playing in her first Slam final.
Eminem fans now have even more reason to see Bodied, the upcoming battle rap comedy the emcee produced. According to a report from The Hollywood Reporter, Eminem will contribute a number of songs to the movies soundtrack, while his mentor, Dr. Dre, has also been tapped for a couple of songs. Its unclear whether the two will be working together on any of the material.

The Joseph Kahn-directed film just premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival this weekend, but did not feature new music, which will likely be added after the film is bought and ready for distribution.

Kahn has described the film as a comment on free speech, telling The Hollywood Reporter, In battle rap, people would say the meanest, craziest, most racist things, and then they would get a beer together, and they would be friends. I wanted to explore that in a movieThe battle rap world is an underground message of free speech. But the film doesnt automatically take the side of free speech because theres still the question that were asking: Is there a limit to it? Its a legitimate question. He showed Eminem a rough cut of the film and the rapper was immediately impressed. He watched the movie and loved it.

Eminem was criticized for his use of homophobic slurs in his 2013 song Rap God, which he defended by pointing to battle rap culture.

It was more like calling someone a bitch or a punk or asshole, he told Rolling Stone of his use of the slur. So that word was just thrown around so freely back then. It goes back to that battle, back and forth in my head, of wanting to feel free to say what I want to say, and then [worrying about] what may or may not affect people Not saying its wrong or its right, but at this point in my career  man, I say so much shit thats tongue-in-cheek. I poke fun at other people, myself. But the real me sitting here right now talking to you has no issues with gay, straight, transgender, at all. Im glad we live in a time where its really starting to feel like people can live their lives and express themselves. And I dont know how else to say this, I still look at myself the same way that I did when I was battling and broke.

In July, it was reported that Dr. Dre was working on music for a new Eminem album. Another report stated that Em was expected to release his 9th studio album this fall. There has been no official announcement up to this point.
While most of South Florida is readying themselves for the impending destruction of Hurricane Irma , the state, now in a state of emergency, is being fled by its residents in hopes of making it somewhere safe before landfall. All the while rapper and self-taught meteorologist Jim Jones is hunkering down in the Sunshine State as he is stuck in Miami, and shows plans of weathering through the storm. In a recent series of videos, hes been updating fans on safety conditions as Hurricane Irma makes her way through the the southeastern seaboard.

Its your nigga, the meteorologist, he begins on a balcony in one of the several clips posted to his Instagram page. Stuck down in Miami, We got a few things to talk about. I heard Key West, Homestead, yall really need to get the f*ck out of there. If you cant make it out of there, yall really need to put the shutters up and buckle down and hold tight.

Capo seems to adopt the whole persona of a seasoned meteorologist as he switches scenes frequently, switching indoors in front of a backdrop with multiple screens displaying birds eye view shots of Miami, while the next clip show Jones hitting the beach for a brief field reporting stint letting viewers know that Its choppy out here.

Dont go to the beach mother*cker. Its that simple, he says. In one final clip, Jim Jones breaks down the five storm categories, using the phrase your ass is out to best describe a Category 5 storm, and comically dubbing a Category 3 storm as the category in which you still have time to run to your plug in case you run out of weed.

Irma has recently been downgraded to a Category 3 storm which explains Jims nonchalance given his comparison. However, its still worth noting that Irma is still slated to cause substantial damage throughout the state of Florida, hence the widespread panic. Were hoping anyone sticking around in the southern portion of Florida, including Jim, finds adequate shelter and stays safe while Irma passes through.

Check out all of Jims videos below.

Hurricane Irma
Image: Wallpaper

Shopian, Sep 10 (IBNS): At least one militant was killed in an encounter in Jammu and Kashmir's Shopian district, police said, adding that one other militant was arrested after he surrendered on Sunday morning along with arms.

"Barbug #Shopian encounter. 1 terrorist killed with @JmuKmrPolice @adgpi @crpfindia. One terrorist arrested with weapon. search on. @spvaid," the official Twitter handle of Jammu and Kashmir Police tweeted.

The nabbed militant was identified Adil, a resident of Chitipora area in Shopian.

He had joined militant ranks in May this year.

This is for the first time in recent months that a militant has laid down his arms during an encounter, police said.

The cadaver of the slain militant was recovered by police from the encounter site, who identified him as Tariq Ahmad.



(Reporting by Saleem Iqbal Qadri)

Image: Wallpaper
New Delhi, Sept 10 (IBNS): In another horrific incident in school premises, a 5-year-old girl was raped allegedly by a peon inside a classroom of a school in north Delhi's Shahdara on Saturday, media reports said.

The peon, identified as Vikas and working in the school for three years, has been arrested.

According to reports, the accused allegedly took the girl inside an empty class room in the afternoon where he raped the minor.

He then reportedly threatened the girl, who on returning home complained of bleeding and pain in her private parts to her mother.

A medical test was conducted which confirmed the assault.

This comes a day after a class two student, identified as Pradyuman, was found dead inside his school's toilet with his throat slit.

The incident took place a little before 8 am on Friday morning.

Following an investigation, the police later arrested the conductor of school bus.

The accused, identified as Ashok Kumar, said that he killed the boy because the latter refused to have sex with him.

He has been working in Ryan International School for the last eight years and is a resident of Ghamroj village in Gurgaon.

The victim's father said that he saw his son's body an hour after dropping him off at the school gate.
New Delhi, Sept 10 (IBNS): Two days after the class two student, identified as Pradyuman, was found dead inside Ryan International School's toilet with his throat slit, protesters on Sunday set ablaze a liquor shop close to the school in Gurugram.

Earlier in the day, protesters gathered in large number outside the school premises demanding a CBI probe into the case.

According to reports, police have resorted to lathi-charge to disperse the people protesting outside the school.

The accused in the case, Ashok Kumar, is currently in the police custody.

Police have said that the accused, who is a conductor of the school bus, had confessed to killing the class two student after a failed attempt to sexually abuse the child.

According to media reports, the conductors family had claimed that he is being framed.

On Saturday, the school authorities suspended principal Neerja Batra while police took action against the security agency of the school.

The incident took place a little before 8 am on Friday morning.

The accused has been working in Ryan International School for the last eight years and is a resident of Ghamroj village in Gurgaon.

The victim's father said that he saw his son's body an hour after dropping him off at the school gate.

Holding the school authorities responsible, the grieving father was quoted in the media as saying, "My son had told me that the bus conductor would use the bathrooms. Does the school not take into account this kind of gross misconduct? The bigger culprits are the school authorities who mint money like an industry."

Playing down the claim, the principal had told The Indian Express, "There are many times when we undertake surprise checks. This was an unfortunate incident and we are cooperating with the police. We want the culprits to be brought to justice."
New Delhi, Sept 10 (IBNS): Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Sunday ordered a magisterial inquiry into the alleged rape of a 5-year-old girl by a peon inside the classroom of a school in Shahdara on Saturday, media reports said.

This is another horrific incident occurring in school premises where the 5-year-old girl was raped allegedly by a peon inside the classroom just a day after a 7-year-old boy was found dead inside a toilet at Ryan International School in Gurugram.

In Saturday's case, the peon, identified as Vikas and working in the school for three years, has been arrested.

According to reports, the accused allegedly took the girl inside an empty class room in the afternoon where he raped the minor.

He then reportedly threatened the girl, who on returning home complained of bleeding and pain in her private parts to her mother.

A medical test was conducted which confirmed the assault.

On Friday, the class two student, identified as Pradyuman, was found dead inside his school's toilet with his throat slit.

The incident took place a little before 8 am.

Following an investigation, the police later arrested the conductor of school bus.

The accused, identified as Ashok Kumar, said that he killed the boy because the latter refused to have sex with him.

He has been working in Ryan International School for the last eight years and is a resident of Ghamroj village in Gurgaon.

The victim's father said that he saw his son's body an hour after dropping him off at the school gate.
Bhubaneswar, Sept 10 (IBNS): At least one person was killed and more than 15 others were injured after a portion of an under-construction flyover collapsed at Bomikhal in Odisha's capital Bhubaneswar on Sunday afternoon.

Bhubaneswar Police Commissioner Yogesh Bahadur Khurania told IBNS, "One is confirmed dead so far and over 15 persons have been rescued from the area and rushed to hospital. Our rescue operation is currently underway."

The deceased person has been identified as Satya Patnaik.

"The deceased has been identified as Satya Patnaik (40). We will start investigation into the matter after rescue operation ends and book everyone, who are responsible for the disaster," he added.

A senior official of Odisha Fire and Emergency Services told IBNS, "We have no specific information how many person are trapped under the wreckage. We are looking for survivors at the crash site."

More than 10 fire tenders, few cranes and several teams of Orissa Disaster Rapid Action Force (ODRAF) have joined the rescue operations.

Odisha government has announced an ex-gratia of Rs. 5 lakh to the next kin of deceased.

State Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has condoled the loss of life in the incident.

Patnaik assured that the guilty will be punished.

He said high level enquiry into the tragedy has been instituted by the government.

The CM said two engineers have been placed under suspension.

"High-level enquiry instituted into mishap and exemplary action to be taken against guilty. Two engineers placed under suspension 2/2," CMO Odisha tweeted.

The Chief Minister announced Rs. 5 lakh ex-gratia has been announced for the bereaved family.{image_4}

"CM @Naveen_Odisha condoled loss of life in Bomikhal flyover collapse; a5 lakh ex-gratia for bereaved family & free treatment of injured 1/2," read another tweet posted by the CMO Odisha.
Srinagar, Sept 10 (IBNS) Jammu and Kashmir National Conference Working President Omar Abdullah on Sunday led a party delegation that met Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh in Srinagar.

While highlighting the political, historical and constitutional context of the States special status, Omar Abdullah registered the partys concern and disappointment over the Central Government's ambiguity in defending the States Special Status in the Supreme Court with respect to Article 35-A and also highlighted the constantly deteriorating situation in the Valley.

The delegation also sought a sustained and open-ended political engagement with stakeholders in Kashmir irrespective of their ideology and urged New Delhi and Islamabad to make sincere and sustained efforts towards resumption of a comprehensive dialogue on all outstanding issues including that of Kashmir.

He urged the Central Government to initiate a process of reversing erosions made to the States Autonomy that had been violated by extending various hitherto inapplicable Central Laws to the State, with GST being the most recent example.

The party also decried the singular focus on operational and military mechanisms in dealing with an inherently political issue and asked the Central Government to reach out to the alienated and isolated youth of the Valley.

(Reporting by Saleem Qadri)
Andrew Pallotta isn't a congressman or state legislator, but he has more than 600,000 constituents counting on him to represent their interests.

Pallotta was elected president of New York State United Teachers in April. The labor union represents public school teachers, college and university staff, nurses and health care workers. On education issues, the organization is one of the most powerful stakeholders in the state.

During a phone interview with The Citizen last week, Pallotta outlined his vision for NYSUT and addressed some of the important issues affecting his members, including teacher shortages across the state and the upcoming vote on a possible constitutional convention.

"I think the key piece here is that NYSUT continues to have a strong voice for the professions that we represent," Pallotta said. "We're involved in a lot of people's lives and we want to make sure we're a strong voice and a leading voice for the labor movement in general."

Pallotta is a product of public schools and was an elementary school teacher in the Bronx for 24 years. He previously served as NYSUT's executive vice president before being elected president last spring.

With his public school experience, one issue he highlighted was the need for more resources. He said schools are owed $3.5 billion after a state Court of Appeals ruling in 2006 that determined the state was violating the constitution by not providing enough education aid.

Schools were slated to receive $5.5 billion in aid over a four-year period, but that was before the recession wreaked havoc on the economy and the state's finances.

"We saw what it was like with the budget cuts  mid-year cuts  and how the entire system was in flux because of the amount of layoffs that were done," he said. "We've come back a long way from that, but of course there's still a long way to go. That can never be made up. We have to ensure that there's a steady stream of sound financial backing for these schools."

Aside from state aid, another challenge is the number of teachers in schools. A report released over the summer by the SUNY Rockefeller Institute of Government found that a major teaching shortage looms across the country.

The report cited a few factors for the potential shortage, including declining enrollment in teaching programs, the "demonization" of the profession and fewer teachers with necessary certifications for subject areas.

To address the shortfall, Pallotta said teaching should be respected. He noted that there has been "disrespect for educators" over the past couple of years. He also believes teachers have been frustrated by high-stakes testing.

"What made me go into it: the idea that I could make a difference and after 24 years, I felt I did," Pallotta said. "Going into teaching changes lives. It's not all about giving kids tests."

Respect for teachers and public schools has been raised as an issue after President Donald Trump nominated Betsy DeVos to serve as education secretary.

DeVos doesn't have an educational background, but she comes from a wealthy family and is an advocate for charter schools. One concern for Pallotta and other teacher union leaders is that resources intended for public schools will be diverted to support "privatization"  the expansion of charter schools.

"We don't need that here in New York and we certainly don't want to see the entire country go that route," Pallotta said.

While dealing with DeVos will be a long-term challenge, NYSUT is focused on a key state vote for the next two months.

In November, voters will head to the polls to determine whether the state should hold a constitutional convention. The constitutional convention vote is mandated every 20 years and was last held in 1997.

Supporters believe a constitutional convention could secure significant reforms, such as stricter ethics policies for lawmakers and possibly term limits for state officials. But critics say the constitutional convention could threaten pensions for public employees, including teachers.

NYSUT opposes the constitutional convention and is part of a coalition urging New Yorkers to vote "no" on Nov. 7.

Pallotta said collective bargaining rights are one of NYSUT's concerns. But there is another  that a constitutional convention would be costly.

"It's very expensive. It could be hundreds of millions of dollars," he said. "The state could spend that much more wisely."

In Pallotta's view, NYSUT is in a good position. He has discussions with federal and state officials about the need for more education funding. He wants teachers to be respected, whether it's by the top education official in the country or the state government tasked with financially supporting schools.

NYSUT has scored some victories on these issues over the years. Pallotta is looking for more during his tenure. His next target: the constitutional convention vote.

"We're in a good place," he said. "We hope to have some more successes coming up and especially on Nov. 7."
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 11:02:19|Editor: Xiang Bo

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THESSALONIKI, Greece, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on Saturday extended congratulations on the opening of Greece's largest annual trade fair in the northern port city of Thessaloniki with China as the guest of honor.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras attended the opening ceremony of the 82nd Thessaloniki International Fair (TIF) and toured the Chinese pavilion.

The Chinese exhibition area covers nearly 6,000 square meters, with the participation of more than 100 Chinese brand enterprises from such sectors as transportation, telecommunications, energy, intelligent manufacturing and environmental protection.

In his congratulatory message, Li recalled that China was the first country as the guest of honor participating in the TIF in 1998.

"It was a new bridge for China-Europe economic and trade exchanges, which not only bore historic significance for the TIF's development, but also ushered in a new stage of China-Europe and China-Greece ties," said Li.

The Chinese premier praised the fruitful results of bilateral cooperation in the past 19 years, and stressed that China's participation as the guest country in the 82nd TIF marked a new starting point for China-Greece relations on a higher level with broad prospects.

Li said the Chinese government is willing to work with Greece and other countries to better synergize the Belt and Road Initiative with their respective development strategies to create broader common interests and carry out win-win cooperation at a deeper level, so as to better serve their peoples, promote the continued recovery of the global economy and achieve strong, sustainable, balanced and inclusive growth.

In his speech on Saturday, Tsipras applauded Greece-China cooperation and expressed confidence in the further deepening of bilateral ties.

The Greek leader cut the ribbon at the Chinese pavilion during a ceremony which was broadcast on Greek national broadcaster ERT, welcoming China's role as the guest of honor at the TIF as "a landmark in bilateral relations, which have become stronger in recent years and have great prospects for the future."

Addressing the event, he praised China's Belt and Road Initiative, reiterated Greece's strong support and underlined the key role Chinese investments hold in Greece's efforts to overcome its debt crisis and restore growth.

The TIF has been the largest trade fair in Greece in terms of the number of participants and visitors in the past decade, according to the Greek organizers.

Until the TIF closes on Sept. 17, some 250,000 visitors from 17 countries are expected to browse the booths of 1,500 exhibitors.
Sirsa, Sept 10 (IBNS): The search operation at the Sirsa headquarter of Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh Insan has been completed, media reports said on Sunday.

Satish Mehra, Deputy Director (Information and Public Relations Department) was quoted as saying by The Tribune: "Officials in charge of various sectors made for the purpose of search have submitted their report to the Court Commissioner AKS Pawar who has to submit the report to the Punjab and Haryana High Court."

He also informed that mobile internet services as well as train services will resume to and from Sirsa town in Haryana on Monday.

A Haryana court last month sentenced the self-styled religious leader to 20 years in prison for raping two of his women followers.

He was convicted of rape charges on Aug 25.

Following the conviction, his followers attacked journalists, policemen and destroyed public property and vehicles in Pachkula city on Haryana.

Violence was also reported from other parts of Haryana and other parts of north India.


New Delhi, Sept 10 (IBNS): Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi will address students at a US university during his visit to the country.

Gandhi said he will be addressing students at the University of California, Berkley.

Gandhi said he will interact with Indian Overseas Congress members.

His office tweeted: "Looking forward to addressing students @UCBerkeley & interacting w/Indian Overseas Congress members w/@sampitroda during my visit to the US."

Entrepreneur Sam Pitroda confirmed that Gandhi will not be giving lecture on Artificial Intelligence during his visit to the US.

He tweeted:"I have seen news in media that Rahul Gandhi is coming to the US to give a talk on Artificial Intelligence. This is FALSE information."

"I dont know who is behind it but, it seems like it has gone viral. Rahul Gandhi is not coming to talk about Artificial Intelligence," Sam Pitroda said.

Pitroda said Gandhi will be visiting the nation to meet with students and academicians and various thinking people in the US.

He tweeted: "He will be giving a talk at University of California, Berkley. He will be also meeting with Indian Overseas Congress exe. members and others."

Giving details of the Congress leader's visit to the nation, Pitroda said: "There is a major event planned in NY with the Indian Overseas Congress. Which he will be attending."

Image: twitter.com/OfficeOfRG


Karachi, Sept 10 (IBNS): At least 12 people were drowned in Hawkesbay Beach in Pakistan's Karachi city on Saturday, media reports said.

The drowned people belonged to the same family.

Two people, who were saved by rescue teams, were reported dead a few hours after they were admitted to civil hospital, according to Chief Fire Officer Tehseen Siddiqui, Geo News reported.

According to media reports, the deceased people were identified as Muhammad Sami, Faiza, Ali, Misbah, Atif, Saud, Ameer, Hamza, Waqar and Wahaj.

The deceased reportedly did not listen to orders and moved to deeper water.

, Chief Minister Sindh Murad Ali Shah has summoned a report on the mishap.

Image: Wikimedia Commons
Islamabad, Sept 10 (IBNS): Fire, which broke out at Awami Markaz building in the Red Zone of Pakistan's Islamabad city, has been brought under control, media reports said.

According to reports, two people were killed in the fire.

Two people were killed and at least five injured after the fire erupted initially in the morning, Geo News reported.

To know the exact cause behind the fire incident a four-member committee has been formed.

Firefighters and the Pakistan Navy fought hard to bring the fire under control.

The building assumes significance as it houses several private and government offices.

Acting Islamabad Deputy Commissioner Farasat Khan, talking to Geo News, explained that when the cooling operation was under way on the third and fourth floors, the fire restarted after it received oxygen as the doors were opened by rescue staff.

"All measures are being taken to control the situation," he said.

(Image: Representative picture of a fire)
Activists in the South-West of Germany created linksunten.indymedia.org  the name linksunten (bottom left) alludes both to the groups geographical origins on the German map and to the leftist underground to which some of its supporters felt drawn.

[ German interior minister Thomas de Maiziere  Thierry Charlier / AFP ]

RSF criticizes Germanys ban of leftist website as constitutionally questionable

Reporters Without Borders criticizes as constitutionally questionable the ban announced by Germanys ministry of interior against linksunten.indymedia.org, an online portal deemed left-wing extremist by security authorities.

German interior minister Thomas de Maiziere announced the websites ban last Friday, invoking the law of associations by classifying its group of operators as an association which he declared dissolved. De Maiziere called the portal the most influential online platform of violent left-wing extremists in Germany, saying the latter had used the website for years for spreading posts with criminal and anti-constitutional contents. His ministry cited examples such as calls for violent protests and claims of responsibility for arson attacks posted on the platform, including in the run-up to violent protests against the G20 summit in Hamburg in early July. Other examples included calls for acts of violence targeting police officers and dissenters as well as repeated post giving detailed instructions for building Molotov cocktails and time-controlled arson bombs.

Radical offshoot of international anti-globalist network

Linksunten.indymedia.org is a radical offshoot of Indymedia, an international network of anti-globalization media activist founded after the 1999 WTO summit in Seattle to help create an alternative media public. The network spread to more than 60 countries including Germany, where de.indymedia.org became a discussion platform for various leftist alternative groups. After internal disputes, a group of more radically-minded activists in the South-West of Germany split off and created linksunten.indymedia.org  the name linksunten (bottom left) alludes both to the groups geographical origins on the German map and to the leftist underground to which some of its supporters felt drawn.

The portal was used by activists to coordinate protests against racism or nuclear waste transports, to discuss the political consequences of a series of Neonazi terror attacks or to exchange experiences, opinions and analyses. Activists also used it as a platform to track right-wing extremism in Germany. One recent post there was a protocol of an internal WhatsApp chat group of the populist AfD party that was widely discussed in German media because it included radical views such as calls for rigorous media controls or to overthrow the political system. Contributors usually wrote their posts anonymously, but according to the interior ministry they were moderated by the websites administrators afterwards.

Watched by security authorities

German authorities had been watching the websites activities for some time. Some media reports quoted security sources as saying they had had difficulties identifying the portals operators due to the latters secretive ways of working. They also said numerous criminal complaints had been made because of criminal content on the website, but the investigations had to be dropped because the authors could not be identified.

However, as last weeks operation shows, authorities have by now been able to identify several alleged administrators of the website. It is therefore not evident why they neither summoned these to delete the incriminated posts nor sued them, choosing instead to ban the website as a whole.

G20 accreditation withdrawals based on faulty or illegally stored information

According to unsourced media reports, two of the three supposed administrators of the website were among the 32 journalists whose accreditations were withdrawn during the G20 summit in Hamburg last month, and at least one of them was considered by security authorities to be part of the pro-violence left-wing extremist scene.

However, the reference to the G20 summit raises questions because at least ten of the 32 accreditation withdrawals have by now been shown to be based at least partly on either false assumptions or on information illegally stored in police databases such as accusations of criminal acts that have long been cleared in court. After ARD TV published its findings on these cases on Thursday, the interior ministry admitted that in at least four cases the decision to withdraw the accreditation was wrong.

It is becoming more and more clear that during the G20 summit German security authorities restricted some journalists ability to work and stigmatized them as supposed perpetrators of violence based on faulty and in parts illegally stored information, said RSF Germanys Mihr. The Federal Office of Criminal Investigation obviously stores information of questionable security relevance on a large scale as it thinks best. The federal government now has to explain quickly how many journalists have been affected and how this practice is to be stopped.

Germany is ranked 16th among 180 countries on RSFs annual World Press Freedom Index.
Akbayan Partylist condemns President Rodrigo Dutertes denial of his policy to kill under the War on Drugs.

Duterte, in a press conference on September 5, attacked Akbayan Senator Risa Hontiveros after her call-out against PNPs policy to kill under his War on Drugs. Duterte said: Does the killing of two people make a policy? Ang bobo naman niyan.President Duterte, the killings have reached 8,000 under your regime. This proves your policy to kill is real, Akbayan President Machris Cabreros said.President Dutertes orders to kill are undeniable as he has made this public in many occasions even in front of the Chief PNP. The attempt of denying is futile. Hes basically lying through his teeth, Akbayan President Machris Cabreros said.Cabreros said that Dutertes policy to kill has already corrupted the police force, using his War on Drugs to kill, threaten or extort people.President Duterte even admitted this when he called the police force corrupt to the core after the death of foreigner Jee Ick Joo under Batos watch. The list of victims pile up and it all points to Dutertes policy to kill.Cabreros said that even before the Senate can close the probe of 17-year-old Kian Delos Santos slay, PNP has taken another victim with UP freshman Carl Angelo Arnaiz who was reportedly tortured and accused of possessing illegal drugs on August 18.PNPs policy to kill is now targeting the young and the poor, Cabreros added. Instead of fighting criminals, it seems that our police have joined their ranks and are out murdering our children.Akbayan dares President Duterte to heed the call of human rights groups to cease all statements encouraging the policy to kill in police operations. Oplan Double Barrel and all operations using excessive force should be suspended until human rights abuses are answered to. PNP should open up for independent investigations on reports of paid killings.__________________________________________________________________________Among those in attendance were Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven, Martin Schulz, SPD Germany candidate for Chancellorship, Prime Minister Antonio Costa of Portugal, Christian Kern, Chancellor of Austria, Maria Joao Rodrigues, Vice Chair of Socialists and Democrats in the European Parliament, among others...............................140 political parties and heads of government call out Duterte administration for deaths and violence in the PhilippinesAn international grouping of progressive and left-wing political parties, with some Prime Ministers and Presidents expressed alarm over what it called the rising tide of violence and death in the Philippines.The Progressive Alliance, an association of social democratic, socialist and labour parties, in a statement approved during its Convention in Berlin, Germany, reiterates its concern over the escalating situation in the Philippines, which it said threatens to erode its decades-long struggle for democracy and human rights.Among those in attendance were Swedish Prime Minster Stefan Lofven, Martin Schulz, SPD Germany candidate for Chancellorship, Prime Minster Antonio Costa of Portugal, Christian Kern, Chancellor of Austria, the Maria Joao Rodrigues, Vice Chair of Socialists and Democrats in the European Parliament, among others.The statement, approved by a gathering of 140 representatives of major leftist political parties, including some heads of governments and members of parliament in attendance, said that the government's current anti-drugs campaign manifests as a violent witch hunt that primarily victimizes poor people unable to afford legal defense, and that the Philippines under President Duterte seems intent on going down a path of death and violence because of the priority legislation reimposing the death penalty and lowering the minimum age of criminal responsibility to 9 from the current 15.The PA called on the Duterte administration to abandon these measures as it called out President Dutertes inflammatory language and pronouncements that explicitly condone the killing of suspected drug users, and branding those who oppose his campaign as protectors of drug trade lords and coddlers.The PA also dared President Duterte to desist from baiting the public with dictatorship and Martial Law as solutions to the country's problems, according to its statement.The group, which includes social democratic parties from Scandinavian countries like Sweden and Norway, as well as Denmark and Germany, the Workers Party in Brazil and Akbayan party-list in the Philippines called on the global community to pay closer attention to the developments in the fragile and contested democracy that is the Philippines.They said that the United Nations, in the absence of tangible, decisive action on the part of (Philippine) authorities to desist from these anti-democratic practices, should investigate the situation and forward recommendations how the international community can help (Filipino) citizens.FULL STATEMENT BELOW:Progressive Alliance condemns continuing massive violence and deaths in Philippines13 March 2017The Progressive Alliance, an association of social democratic, socialist and labour parties, political organisations and networks all over the world, reiterates its concern over the escalating situation in the Philippines which threatens to erode its decades-long struggle for democracy and human rights.First, the extra judicial killings resulting from a government campaign targeting people for their supposed links to drugs, is shredding the country's adherence to the presumption of innocence and equal protection of the law. The government's current anti-drugs campaign manifests as a violent witch hunt that primarily victimizes poor people unable to afford legal defense. More than 8,000 bodies, often wrapped in packaging tape, have littered Manila's streets in vigilante-style killings which remain unresolved to this day.We also view with concern the Duterte administration's latest response to opposition against these killings such as incarcerating Senator Leila de Lima and announcing its openness to restore Martial Law. Women leaders of the opposition like Leila de Lima, Leni Robredo and Risa Hontiveros have been subjected to well-orchestrated online campaigns of harassment, bullying, and misogynistic attacks.The Philippine government has been intent on going down a path of death and violence with its priority legislative measures. The House of Representatives recently passed the bill to reinstate the death penalty. It also seeks to pass the proposal to lower the minimum age of criminal responsibility from the current 15 to a scandalous 9 years old. Both measures are backward, barbaric, cruel and violent -- they should not be accepted in societies today.The Progressive Alliance therefore once again calls on Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte and his administration, to:1) Abandon the legislative measures reinstating the death penalty and lowering the minimum age of criminal responsibility, in the spirit of its commitments to various human rights instruments such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Convention against Torture and Others Forms of Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Punishment, Convention on the Rights of the Child, among others; and join the rest of civilized society in advancing humane reforms that strengthen the criminal justice system, nurture and protect mothers and children, and do not equate vengeance with justice.2) Desist from inflammatory language and pronouncements that explicitly condone the killing of suspected drug users and pushers and other perpetrators of petty crimes, and branding those who oppose his campaign as protectors of drug trade lords and coddlers; as well as desist from baiting the public with dictatorship and Martial Law as solutions to the country's political, economic and societal problems;3) Craft and implement humane and preventive public health and harm reduction policies based on actual evidence, and work with various stakeholders as a strategic solution as a means to combat the problem of drugs in the Philippines;4) Act swiftly and conduct a thorough, fair and transparent investigation into the cases of extra judicial killings and bring the perpetrators of these killings to justice; including reparations and indemnification to the victims of these extra judicial killings towards justice for a campaign that has only claimed the lives of the poor, and not necessarily the guilty.The Progressive Alliance, which counts among its members Labor and Social Democratic parties from Germany (SPD), Sweden (SAP), Italy, Denmark, Spain, United Kingdom, Canada, Norway, among others will exert all efforts to support the Filipinos in their struggle for a just, humane society that is free from injustice and inequality.The Progressive Alliance also calls on the global community to pay closer attention to the developments in the fragile and contested democracy that is the Philippines. We believe the United Nations, in the absence of tangible, decisive action on the part of its national authorities to desist from these anti-democratic practices, should investigate the situation in the Philippines and forward recommendations how the international community can help its citizens.The Progressive Alliance, in solidarity with the Filipino people, remains steadfast that the dark days of fear, intimidation, violence and death will be defeated by the vigilance and commitment of active citizens.Progressive Alliance members concurring (84 parties from 72 countries and 10 international organizations):Socialist Party (Argentina) Gen Party (Argentina) Labour Party (Australia) SPO (Austria) Waad (Bahrain) Socialist Party - PS (Belgium) Socialist Party  S.PA (Belgium) Socialist Democratic Party (Bosnia-Herzegovina) Workers Party  PT (Brazil) Socialist Party (Bulgaria) MPP (Burkina Faso) Social Democratic Front (Cameroon) New Democratic Party (Canada) MLPC (Central African Republic) Socialist Party (Chile) Party for Democracy (Chile) Citizens Action Party (Costa Rica) Social Democratic Party (Croatia) CSSD (Czech Republic) Social Democratic Party (Denmark) Modern Revolutionary Party (Dominican Republic) UDPS (Congo) ESDP (Egypt) CPDS (Equatorial Guinea) EPDP (Eritrea) Finnish Social Democratic Party  SDP (Finland) Socialist Party (France) Dream Party (Georgia) NDC (Ghana) Social Democratic Party of Germany SPD (Germany) Labour Party (Great Britain) PASOK (Greece) MSzP (Hungary) Indian National Congress (India) PDI-Perjuangan (Indonesia) Nasdem (Indonesia) PDKI (Iran) KPIK (Iran) PUK (Iraq) Kurdistan Socialist Democratic Party  KSDP (Iraq) Labour Party (Ireland) Labour Party (Israel) Meretz Party (Israel) Democratic Party (Italy) CUDD (Ivory Coast) JSDP (Jordan) SDPS (Latvia) PSP (Lebanon) Democratic Action Party  DAP (Malaysia) Mauritius Militant Movement (Mauritius) PRD (Mexico) MC (Mexico) DPM (Moldova) SDP (Montenegro) DPS (Montenegro) USFP (Morocco) NCP (Nepal) Labour Party PVdA (Netherlands) MRS (Nicaragua) Labour Party (Norway) Fatah (Palestine) PNI (Palestine) PPS (Paraguay) AKBAYAN (Philippines) Democratic Left Alliance (Poland) Socialist Party (Portugal) Citizens Convergence (Rep. of Congo) Socialist Party (Senegal) Democratic Party (Serbia) SDS (Serbia) Social Democrats (Slovenia) SSUP (Somalia) Socialist Workers Party PSOE (Spain) Social Democratic Party  SAP (Sweden) Social Democratic Party (Switzerland) Democratic Peoples Party (Syria) CCM (Tanzania) Ettakatol (Tunisia) CHP (Turkey) HDP (Turkey) PSU (Uruguay) Democratic Party (USA) Frente Polisario (Western Sahara) Yemeni Socialist Party (Yemen) International Union of Socialist Youth (IUSY) Network of Social Democracy in Asia (SOCDEM Asia) Arab Social Democratic Forum (ASDF) Central African Progressive Alliance (APAC) Party of European Socialists (PES) Solidar Global Progressive Forum (GPF) Foundation for Progressive European Studies (FPES) Association for Democratic Socialism (ADS)
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 11:07:21|Editor: Mengjie

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HARARE, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe on Saturday said he will not choose a successor as that would go against his ruling ZANU-PF party's constitution.

Addressing the eighth provincial youth interface rally in Bindura, the president said it was the responsibility of the party to choose his successor.

"We have never had our presidential system proceed unguided by the rules of the party. As the President, I can not just decide now to say I am appointing either my wife, Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa or Vice President Phelekezela Mphoko as my successor. It's contrary to the party constitution. I can not do it. It's not allowed," Mugabe said.

His comments came after his wife Grace two months ago challenged him to name a successor to help tame current intense infighting in his party over his succession.

Mugabe said the party congress, held every five years, was mandated with the responsibility of choosing his successor. The next ZANU-PF congress is due in 2019.

He said that as a trained lawyer, he can not afford to violate party rules.

"I have to follow party regulations very strictly. I will not appoint my wife as successor," he said.

The Zimbabwean First Lady has gained political influence in recent years and currently chairs ZANU-PF's women's wing. This has led some to speculate that she may harbor ambitions for the presidency.

Mugabe, 93, will seek re-election in next year's elections after being endorsed by his party as its presidential candidate.

Mugabe's party, however, is battling intense factionalism over his succession.

At the rally, Mugabe criticized the two warring factions that are vying to succeed him.

Openly naming them as Lacoste and G40, Mugabe urged the factions to stop fighting over his position and unite for the success of the party.

He attacked the G40 faction for calling for young leadership in the party, saying that concept was borrowed from the United States after the young Barack Obama became president of the United States.

"We are not Americans so we can not be Obamas. We are not British, we can't be Blairs. We are Zimbabweans," Mugabe said.
Burma Myanmar Muslim Organizations Condemn ARSA, Pledge Collaboration

Muslims sit as they wait to perform the Eid al-Adha prayer at a mosque in Yangon, Myanmar, Sept. 25, 2015. / Reuters

YANGON  The All Myanmar Islamic Religious Organization on Saturday strongly condemned the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) for its terrorist acts in northern Rakhine State, and pledged collaboration with the government, interfaith groups and the public to prevent such acts.

Northern Rakhine State is reeling from the Muslim militant groups attacks on 30 police outposts on Aug. 25 and subsequent violence against civilians. The Myanmar government declared the group a terrorist organization shortly after the attacks began and has since begun clearance operations in the area, causing ethnic Rakhine, self-identified Rohingya and other Rakhine sub-ethnicities to flee their homes. The UN said that as of Friday, some 270,000 Muslim refugees had fled to Bangladesh.

The announcement from the national Islamic organization made up of five local Muslim organizations  including Jamiat Ulama-al Islam (H.Q), The Islamic Religious Affairs Council, All Myanmar Muslim Youth (Religious Affairs) and Myanmar Muslim Nation Affairs Organization  came a few days after anonymous warnings against possible Muslim and Buddhist attacks on Monday circulated via Facebook messenger and SMS to both Buddhist and Muslim communities across the country. Both the Myanmar government and the military issued a public alert that the ARSA was preparing for terrorist acts in the countrys major cities, including Yangon and Naypyitaw.

The statement released by the Islamic umbrella organization said they have never accepted terrorism and are totally against it.

We are very much concerned about the attacks given the governments alert. The government needs to strictly prevent the online instigations calling for racial and religious conflict at the moment, it read.

It also added that the organization felt sorry along with the bereaved families of innocent civilians killed by terrorists in Rakhine State as well as for displaced people.

U Nyunt Maung Shein, the chairman of The Islamic Religious Affairs Council, one of the signatories, told The Irrawaddy on Sunday that the statement was the result of a meeting between members from all of the organizations on Saturday.

He added that the statement had been delayed after the attacks as some members were on religious trips and they were waiting for their return.

In a separate statement released on the same day, the Islamic organization urged all Muslims in Myanmar to condemn terrorism and collaborate with others for stability.

Please dont share, believe nor react emotionally to those online instigations. If you find out any suspicious activity in your neighborhood, please report it to the authorities, it said.

On Saturday, the government also requested the public not spread the online and SMS attack warnings, and announced that it would take legal action against those instigating public panic.
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By Josh Hoxie | ( Inequality.org ) |  

Big money will pull out all the stops to sell you a tax plan that exclusively benefits the wealthy. Dont buy it.

Soon youre going to hear about taxes.

Youll see images of families flashing across your TV screen while a soothing narrator assures you that the tax plan being debated in Washington really is good for you. The newspapers you read, the social media apps you scroll through, the websites you frequent, and the snippets of radio you catch will all feature ads talking about it.

Thats what a marketing blitz looks like, and theres one coming for the Trump tax plan. It will be well-produced, well-orchestrated, and completely devoid of facts.

This is probably the biggest wealth grab in American history by the wealthy, for the wealthy.

President Trump started his sales pitch for his tax cutting agenda in Missouri in August, where the assembled audience was treated to a fact-free sermon on the virtues of his plan. Gone were any specifics of whats in it, or who gets what.

Looking at Trumps tax plan from the campaign, as well as what the Republican majority in the House of Representatives have proposed, we can see the basic outlines of whats coming.

Corporations will see their nominal tax rates drop from 35 percent to 20 or even 15 percent. Individual rates will go down  possibly for everyone, but definitely and most strikingly for the very wealthy. Overall tax revenue will tank, potentially by as much as $10 trillion over ten years.

What does all this look like in the real world?

On the corporate side, we know for sure that lower corporate taxes do not create jobs.

In the ads to come, maybe youll see a guy in a hard hat claim that corporate tax cuts will put him back to work. Hes lying.

A recent Institute for Policy Studies report looks at 92 profitable companies that already pay an effective 20 percent tax rate, thanks to loopholes. On average theyve cut jobs, even as the rest of the private sector saw a 6 percent jobs increase.

On the individual side, half of the proposed cuts will go to millionaires, according to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. Less than 5 percent go to families with household incomes below $45,000.

This is probably the biggest wealth grab in American history by the wealthy, for the wealthy. Selling it as a middle-class tax cut, regardless of the images in the ads you see, is just old-fashioned lying.

And finally theres the revenue. Trump claims his tax cuts will pay for themselves with increased economic growth. That theorys been debunked many times over and yet remains stubbornly in play.

So what happens when trillions of dollars of tax revenue get slashed?

Congress currently bans itself from passing bills that increase the deficit in one of their better acronyms  Pay As You Go (PAYGO). That means the tax cuts Trump proposes will have to come out of public programs.

No matter how much hype you hear, youd better believe those cuts are gonna hurt. From food assistance like the Women, Infant, and Children (WIC) program to Head Start, and from clean water protections to unemployment insurance  its all on the line.

Its hard to keep an eye on the truth when savvy marketing campaigns are hell-bent on deflecting your attention away from it. Dont buy it. The Trump tax cut plan is disastrous for working families and for anyone who cares about a fair and just economy.

Josh Hoxie directs the Project on Taxation and Opportunity at the Institute for Policy Studies

Content licensed under a Creative Commons 3.0 License

Via Inequality.org

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Related video added by Juan Cole:

The Young Turks: Trump Caught Stealing From The Middle Class To Pay For Corporate Tax Cuts
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Mustafa Habib | Baghdad | (Niqash.org) |  

Iraqi forces are upset about the safe passage granted to Islamic State fighters from Syria. They will enter Iraq, where, locals say, thousands of their comrades await them in the extremists secret capital.

Last week, Lebanese officials confirmed that around 670 defeated members of the extremist group known as the Islamic State would be given safe passage. Some would be allowed to travel from the Lebanese-Syrian border to the Syrian-Iraqi border. The fighters, aboard a number of buses, were bound for Albu Kamal, a Syrian border town. On the Iraqi side of the border lies the town of Al Qaim. Both of the towns are strongholds for the extremist group.

Naturally the Iraqis were far from pleased at this turn of events. Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has described it as an insult to the Iraqi people and plenty of other senior politicians and officials have also criticised the controversial move.

Why are hundreds of extremists being transported to our borders? There is a conspiracy to give Anbar back to the terrorists!

The main reason it is of concern is because the Islamic State, or IS, fighters will doubtless also head over the Iraqi border towards Al Qaim.

In August 2014, the IS group declared a new state on this border, abolishing the existing borders between Iraq and Syria, and since then, the area has remained one of the safest for the group. There are various reasons for this but one involves the geography of the area. Basically, the location of the city means that it would require both countries to coordinate in a campaign against the IS group.

Additionally, as Omar al-Ubaidi, an officer with the Iraqi armys 7th Division, explains, Al Qaim is a long way from any military bases. Fighting for Al Qaim would be very difficult, says al-Ubaidi, who is stationed at the Ain al-Asad air base in Anbar, working alongside US soldiers. The IS fighters would move to the other side of the border for a while and then return to Iraq, he explains: Iraqi forces cant control the 600-kilometre-long border by themselves.

The Iraqi military fought in the province of Anbar, where Al Qaim is located, and pushed the IS group out of major cities like Fallujah and Ramadi. However they decided to leave Al Qaim until after they had retaken Mosul, in the north.

Local politicians have been asking the Iraqi government to speed up the operation for Al Qaim and to secure the borders, fearing increased attacks by the IS group. But they are being ignored, they say.

This Lebanese deal done with the IS group is a disaster for Anbar, says Rajeh al-Issawi, who heads Anbars provincial security committee. Everyone knows that the IS groups strongest force is concentrated on the borders with Syria, that they consider Al Qaim and Albu Kamal one city and that they call it their Euphrates state, al-Issawi argues. Why are hundreds of extremists being transported to our borders?! There is a conspiracy to give Anbar back to the terrorists, he said angrily, before calling upon the Iraqi government to send reinforcements to his province to prevent further attacks by the IS group.

Majid al-Mahalawi is on the frontline of this fight and he too has grave concerns about the convoy heading to the Iraqi-Syrian border. The tribal leader and his fighters are in Haditha, about 150 kilometres from Al Qaem. The tribal fighters and the Iraqi army have repelled many attempts by the nearby extremists in Al Qaim to take over Haditha.

Together with the Iraqi armys 7th division, the fighters here have built earth mounds up to prevent suicide bombers in cars from getting into town. They also launch infrequent raids on the surrounding desert areas to ensure that there are no extremists hiding out nearby.

The Euphrates state, which includes Albu Kamal and Al Qaim, is the IS groups secret capital, al-Mahalawi explained. The organizations leaders are based there. A lot of people think that the IS groups main strength was in Mosul or in Raqqa, but they are mistaken: It is here and the organization will meet its end here, nowhere else. But it will be difficult and complicated.

His intelligence indicates that thousands of IS fighters, who fled battles in Anbar, Salahaddin and Mosul, are now gathering on this border. The recent deal between the IS group and Syrian and Lebanese forces is a serious problem, al-Mahalawi notes. We do not, and we will not, negotiate with terrorists, he adds.

Via Niqash.org

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Related video added by Juan Cole:

The Hunt For ISIS: In The Desert With Iraqs Fighter Pilots | NBC News
By Stephen Costello





Sanctions and pressure on North Korea are tools aiming to fix a problem that does not exist. North Korea's behavior is not due to a lack of pressure from the outside. Nor is it due to a misunderstanding of the military power at hand if Seoul or Washington decided to use it. Rather, it is primarily due to Pyongyang's fear and mistrust of, and need for, the U.S. More pressure obviously will not address these issues; it will do quite the opposite. Perhaps U.S. leaders should have thought this through before they decided to unilaterally destroy a working multilateral agreement with the North 17 years ago. At that time the DPRK had no nuclear weapons.

For South Korea, more stern warnings and more robust military defenses are addressing a threat that remains remote. North Korea's missile and nuclear tests are aimed at Washington, not Seoul. Seoul's only convincing message to Pyongyang would be that it will work on Washington  in the interests of all three  to diffuse tensions, get diplomacy started again, and drive for a lasting deal. If the Blue House cannot influence the White House or other capitals, the North Koreans will see no reason to talk to them.

For the US, forcing the DPRK to capitulate in order to begin some fuzzy "talks" will not address the issue of the North's compliance with any new deals. Only creating a deal that addresses what both sides require will do that. And in order for the U.S. to even begin to plan for diplomacy that caps and then rolls back nuclear and missile capabilities, it must create or agree to a roadmap for denuclearization, security, diplomatic ties, and development. In order to do this, a senior, experienced and enabled U.S. team would need to talk directly to senior North Koreans.

As of this writing, there is no sign that the U.S. administration has grasped what it needs to do, much less how to structure a deal so that the North's compliance is more "baked in" and U.S. compliance is more long-term and less dependent on elections. Nevertheless, these are the three guiding requirements of the next deal: an end to extreme or unilateral sanctions, reduced or postponed military exercises, and the start of realistic, credible and detailed talks about what each party needs.

In this situation, South Korea is the only party that could play a convening and managing role. Because the U.S. and South Korea are democracies, they have no time to waste. Because Donald Trump and Kim Jung Un are both  for different reasons  unable to act first to de-escalate this crisis and propose realistic steps toward agreements, Seoul must do so.

It makes practical and institutional sense for South Korea to work closely with the U.N. in order to put such a proposal forward. Luckily, Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-hwa knows her way around the organization, and was a top advisor to Secretary-General Antonio Gutierres.

At least until the next U.S. president takes office, the U.S. would have to be led by allies, friends and partners to use its considerable assets to help address and diffuse the Korea crisis, and transform it into an engine for regional security and development. We have watched in the past nine months as individual players have been unable to break the momentum of boasts and threats that now define U.S.-North Korea relations. If, however, many of those players were asked by a legitimate democratic authority to help, they would be eager to do so.

The result of these unfolding events and moving parts is that great pressure and responsibility rest on the shoulders of South Korean President Moon Jae-in. He seems not to have expected this, and to be fashioning the best response he can. If he was not prepared for his main ally to become a rogue element acting against Korea's interests; or for his Chinese neighbor to be more concerned with a symbolic missile battery than with regional peace; or for his fellow Korean counterpart to ignore him unless he addresses U.S. policy; then he has plenty of company. The list of heads of government who arrived in office unprepared is very long.

Moon's options and flexibility seem constrained, and he appears to find himself in an ideological and political box. However, he may have more room to maneuver, and a wider list of options, than he thinks.

Regarding the alliance with the U.S., it is worth remembering that the U.S. has refused for 15 years to understand its error in destroying the Agreed Framework (A.F.) of 1994. Hillary Clinton was on course to follow much the same approach Trump has. So President Moon would have had to deal with an ally "in denial" in any case. Presidents Kim Dae Jung and Roh Moo Hyun both endured a post-A.F. American president who misunderstood and sacrificed Korea's interests in the service of mistaken or ideological assumptions. Unlike them, however, Moon has a weakened and far less capable White House to deal with. The Trump team needs his leadership, ideas and friendship more than ever before.

Regarding the Chinese, not one of the four players: Trump, Xi Jinping, Kim Jung Un or Moon, cares much about one missile battery. THAAD is instead symbolic of how strong and how independent South Korea will be on the issues of security in the region. The fact that it is the subject of heated debates among governments demonstrates Seoul's latent power, not its limitations.

On the North Korea question, China's interests overlap South Korea's far more than do those of the current US administration. This is why the U.S.-DPRK A.F. garnered unprecedented regional support, and why China would be one of Seoul's most important allies in advancing a return to that basic bargain. What China will NOT do is abandon its interests to join the misconceived US pressure campaign. If he has the boldness to do so, Moon can leverage the THAAD battery in exchange for Xi's specific assistance in advancing a new denuclearization and development roadmap. He should also publically hand Xi a bill for the $15 billion or so his illegal boycott has cost Seoul so far.

Regarding the North Koreans, it should not be surprising that Pyongyang is absorbed in its existential conflict with the U.S. Because of this, Seoul will only be seen as helpful if it can move the US back to new, mutually advantageous and durable deals with them.

Moon should do so. This would require tough bargaining. But Moon can rely on his background and on an experienced staff. He has been close to policymaking, and to institutional and presidential power. Many of his staff and ministers know these realities. It is in Korea's and the region's interest for his administration to drive forward a new solution and to take on additional responsibilities. Needless to say, such an initiative would also be in Washington's interest. The U.S. is in a jam. Helping it now would be the best demonstration of friendship Korea could possibly make.





Stephen Costello is a producer of AsiaEast, a web and broadcast-based policy roundtable focused on security, development and politics in Northeast Asia. He writes from Washington, D.C. He can be reached at scost55@gmail.com.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 11:42:29|Editor: ZD

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SUVA, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Tenacious, the largest wooden tall ship built in Britain in the past 100 years, was visiting in Suva, capital of Fiji, causing excitement among Fijians.

The 586-ton Tenacious, which arrived here from New Zealand on Friday, was sailed by a permanent crew made up of professional seafarers and 40 voyage crew.

School students from Fiji were visiting the ship berthed at the Suva Harbor. For some of the students, the brief tour opened their minds to the possibilities of an adventure at sea.

The ship has the history of being the largest wooden tall ship to be built in Britain, and the impressive 65-meter barque was designed in the early 1990s and launched in 2000.

Tenacious and her smaller sister ship Lord Nelson are the only two of their kind in the world that have been designed and built to enable people of all physical abilities to sail side by side on equal terms.

The crew members were in Fiji to learn and experience the variety of marine life as they voyaged across the South Pacific Ocean and also to learn new skills like celestial navigation.

There are day sails for all the family (children from the age of 12 can join in). A wide range of short tall ship tasters (3-5 day voyages) which make great gift presents or longer adventures with plenty of sea miles and ports and anchorages to discover.

Tenacious is expected to leave Suva for Cairns, Australia, on Sept. 23.
Here, hurricanes Katia, Irma and Jose swirl in the Atlantic on Sept. 8, 2017. The raging trio was captured by the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on the Suomi NPP satellite. The day-night band allowed the instrument to show both the city lights as well as the swirling hurricanes.

As if Hurricane Irma  now a major Category 4 storm that's battering Key West with the west coast of the Florida Peninsula in its crosshairs  weren't enough to worry about: The monster storm could spawn tornadoes in parts of the Sunshine State.

Hurricanes and tornadoes are typically thought of as separate phenomena, with tornadoes conjuring up images of the flat prairie and hurricanes associated with the warm, coastal tropics. Hurricanes are much, much larger than tornadoes (Irma's innards stretch some 400 miles, or TK kilometers, across), but tornadoes can generate much faster winds than hurricanes.

Sometimes, tropical storms and hurricanes, like Hurricane Irma, can spin out tornadoes.

But how do hurricanes and tropical storms create tornadoes?

RELATED:

Hurricanes and tropical storms, collectively known as tropical cyclones, provide all the necessary ingredients to form tornadoes. First, most hurricanes carry with them individual supercells, which are rotating, well-organized thunderstorms. These are typically the storms that spin up monster twisters in the Plains. All tornadoes need thunderstorms to form, said Brian McNoldy, a researcher at the University of Miami.

Second, hurricanes bring with them warm, moist air, which acts as their fuel. The result? An instability in the atmosphere  namely, a layer of warm air with slightly colder and less-moist air above it. This arrangement is unstable because the warm air wants to rise, since it is less dense than the cooler air. [50 Amazing Hurricane Facts]

Finally, hurricanes create wind shear, or an abrupt change in wind speed and direction over a short change in height. These alternating winds can create swirling air, called rolls. These vortices may then be flipped vertically  creating tornadoes  by thunderstorm updrafts, which are basically currents of warm, rising air, McNoldy told LiveScience in 2013.

Most hurricanes that make landfall create tornadoes, McNoldy said.

"It's pretty uncommon to not have tornadoes with these," he said. Tornadoes mostly form over land, instead of over water, because the land slows down surface-level winds, creating even more wind shear, McNoldy said. Tornadoes form wherever these pre-existing supercells happen to be, he added, but meteorologists are still unable to predict exactly where tornados will strike.

These twisters usually form in the swirling bands of rain outside the cyclone, typically in the "front-right quadrant" of the storm, McNoldy said. In other words, if the storm is moving north, you're most likely to find tornadoes to the northeast of the cyclone's eye, he said. In the case of Irma, which is moving currently in the north-northwest direction, the National Hurricane Center says tornadoes are a possibility in the southern, central and eastern portions of the Florida Peninsula.

Cyclone-spawned tornadoes are not fundamentally different from the tornadoes that form in the Great Plains. However, tornadoes born out of hurricanes tend to be less powerful, usually not exceeding a rating of EF2 on the Enhanced Fujita scale. Secondly, twisters that form in the Plains, like the tornado that struck Moore, Oklahoma, in 2013, get all of their ingredients from separate places. In the case of the Oklahoma tornado outbreak, for example, the warm air came north from the Gulf of Mexico, while the cold air came south from Canada. In the case of hurricanes, however, they provide all the required components for twisters themselves.

Originally published on Live Science.

Editor's Note: This article was first published in 2013 and updated by Live Science's Jeanna Bryner with information about Hurricane Irma.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's GOES East satellite captured this visible image of Hurricane Irma at 10:37 a.m. EDT on Saturday (Sept. 9) when it was a Category 4 storm.

After a week of developing into a monster storm  the likes of which are rarely seen in the Atlantic basin  Hurricane Irma is finally about to make a turn toward the U.S. mainland, with Florida firmly in its sights.

Irma spent Friday (Sept. 8) night raking the coast of Cuba, an interaction that weakened the swirling beast somewhat, though it is still a Category 3 hurricane. But as it moves over a bathwater-warm part of the ocean, it could regain more of its former might.

"This storm's pedigree is a nasty one," Phil Klotzbach, a hurricane specialist at Colorado State University, told Live Science. "I wouldn't rule anything out with this storm."

RELATED:

Even before its expected impacts on South Florida, the trail of devastation Irma has wrought and the strength it has achieved would ensure its place in the annals of the worst storms on record for the region. It scoured Barbuda, St. Martin and parts of the Virgin Islands as it swept over as a Category 5 hurricane with winds over 180 mph (290 km/h)  and maintained that strength for longer than any other storm on record.

Irma weakened some, then jumped up to a Category 5 again before it made landfall on Cuba, a rare occurrence for that island. But as it plowed along Cuba's north coast, its winds died down. By the time it began to pull away this afternoon (Sept. 9), it was a Category 3 storm with winds of 125 mph (200 km/h). While that's a big drop from its peak, Irma is still a dangerous, major hurricane poised to batter Florida's west coast.

And the storm could ratchet back up in strength as it heads away from land and moves over extremely warm ocean waters. Warm water is the fuel that drives the convection at the heart of a hurricane.

"I think it's certainly got the potential to intensify," Klotzbach said.

The official National Hurricane Center forecast calls for Irma to be a Category 4 storm when it makes landfall on the Florida Peninsula.

See more

Irma's central pressure has already dropped over the past few hours, "and if the pressure there starts to go down, that's when bad things happen," he said. The lower the central pressure of the storm, the stronger it is.

But how much it might intensify, and how quickly it could do so, are uncertain.

"It's hard to really know what's going on deep down inside the bowels of a storm," he said, and whether that drop in pressure is causing the inner or outer winds of the storm to intensify. If the inner winds ramp up, that somewhat worsens the damage the core of the storm could deliver. If the outer winds strengthen, that could broaden the area that sees damage and could intensify the storm surge.

Any intensification likely won't be enough to make a major difference in the impacts, though, Klotzbach said. "I think at this point it's almost too little, too late."

The storm surge potential is already dire for Naples and Tampa, he said, and the Florida Keys will take a direct hit.

"The Keys are just toast," he said.

The only thing that could make a big difference is if the storm makes landfall on the southern tip of Florida instead of paralleling the west coast. Such a track would prevent the worst storm surge along the coast and weaken the storm much more quickly.

"That's really the best hope, is that if it goes inland as quickly as possible," Klotzbach said.

Original article on Live Science.
Water flowing out of the Miami River floods a walkway as Hurricane Irma passes through on Sept. 10, 2017, in Miami, Florida.

Hurricane Irma made its first U.S. landfall as a Category 4 storm in the Florida Keys Sunday morning (Sept. 10). This is the first year on record that two storms of that strength or higher have made landfall in the continental United States, with Harvey hitting Texas also as a Category 4 hurricane.

As Irma leaves the Keys and heads up along the west coast of Florida, it will cause catastrophic storm surge. The storm's relatively large size means it is also battering the east coast of the state, with punishing winds hitting Miami and pushing water into the streets between the high-rise buildings.

RELATED:

Irma has already left more than 1 million customers without power across the state, according to news reports.

Irma remarkably hit the Keys exactly 57 years after Hurricane Donna, the last time the archipelago faced a storm this strong.

See more

It is also remarkable to have such a strong storm make landfall again so soon after Harvey. As Steve Bowen, a director and meteorologist with the reinsurance firm Aon Benfield, pointed out on Twitter, just 16 days separated the two landfalls; before Harvey, it had been 4,323 days since the last major hurricane (Category 3 or higher) had hit the U.S. mainland. That was Hurricane Wilma, in 2005.

Irma spent Saturday night (Sept. 9) lashing the Keys with strong winds, storm surge and crashing waves. It made landfall at 9:10 a.m. EDT on Sunday at Cudjoe Key, about 20 miles (32 km) northeast of Key West. A wind gust of 120 mph (195 km/h) was reported at the National Key Deer Refuge on Big Pine Key as Irma passed over on Sunday morning.

The hurricane will keep pushing north, with its expected track taking it right along the coast. Places like Fort Myers, Naples and Tampa are in peril of very dangerous and high storm surge  up to 15 feet (4.6 m)  the likes of which haven't been seen there in more than a generation.

See more

Heavy rain will exacerbate the flooding from the surge, especially where the surge pushes up coastal rivers.

As the storm approaches, its winds will blow offshore and pull water out of areas like Tampa Bay. Photos show this is already happening. As Irma passes, its winds will shift and send water rushing back in. Local officials are concerned because the worst surge won't coincide with the highest winds, leaving the possibility that people riding out the storm could think the danger has passed with the winds, only to be caught by surprise.

"This is a life-threatening situation," the National Hurricane Center warned in its forecast.

NOAA's GOES satellite captured this visible image of Hurricane Irma, a Category 4 storm, at 12:15 p.m. EDT (1615 UTC) on Sunday (Sept. 10). (Image credit: NOAA)

Irma is also lashing Florida's east coast, especially the Miami area, where wind gusts up to 100 mph (160 km/h) were expected. A wind gust of 94 mph (151 km/h) was recorded at Miami International Airport, according to the NHC. A National Weather Service employee captured the collapse of a construction boom and counterweight over a high-rise building in the city. High-rises get the strongest winds because winds increase with height from the ground.

Tornado warnings are also being sounded as the storm produces tornadoes and waterspouts.

See more

Whether and where Irma makes landfall along the west coast depend on its exact track. The current forecast shows this could happen anywhere from around Naples to the panhandle. If Irma tracks closer to the coast, it could improve the surge situation, as it gives the storm a bit less space to work with to push that surge, Hal Needham, founder of Marine Weather and Climate, a private company that helps communities improve resiliency against coastal hazards, told Live Science.

The storm will gradually weaken as it moves northward and interacts with land and is exposed to higher wind shear, or the change in wind speed and direction at different levels of the atmosphere that can tear hurricanes apart.

By late Monday (Sept. 11), Irma will be a tropical storm over southwestern Georgia and southeast Alabama, and by Tuesday, it will have weakened into a tropical depression over the northern portions of those states.

Original article on Live Science.
10.09.2017 LISTEN

As the revolution of local comedy in Ghana is on the rise, leading PR & Media Relations agency, Avance Media in collaboration with Ace Incorporated have successfully launched Ghana's first comedy & parody news website www.nogokpo.com in its pursuit to boost the rapidly growing industry in the country.

The platform which has also seen endorsement from local comedians, will evolve around comedians highlighting their works, lifestyle & accomplishments.

It's parody segment has also been strategically positioned to create humorous satirical news articles with incisive humour and sarcasm on the political and social scenario of Ghana vis-a-vis the Ghanaian and World's pop culture spectrum to keep readers overdosed with laughter and crying.

Other features and pursuits of the blog include; Trolls, Troll Battles, Comedy Forum, Event update, Skit premiers, Interview, Award shows, etc.

The platform is also gearing to hire young and creative writers who want a platform to horn their skills through writing.

In an interaction with Felix G, the Co-founder and Editor-at-Large of the blog, he decries the nonexistence of comedy dedicated blogs for the comedy industry and labels it as unsound and undesirable. Nogokpo.com is here to address that snag. He also stated that the media is now too saturated with unabated depressing news and this project is borne to turn attention from them.

Also set to host series of collaborations with international organisations to boost the local industry, the blog will incorporate an online booking for local comedians.

Hosting Corporate Comedy Show is another package in the offing. This will feature local comedians at corporate events to boost their relationship with the corporate world and how they can take their career to the next level.

The project is currently being incubated at Ghana's first creative arts confederate, TANOE Hub in Accra.
10.09.2017 LISTEN

A social media icon popular known as G Sam is calling for the head of the controversial TV and radio personality Afia Schwarzenegger for intentionally releasing her own naked pictures to regain her popularity and to gain public sympathy.

According to G Sam for the past three days the name Afia Schwarzenegger has become the most popular name on the social media because her naked pictures and video have been released by unknown person.

Majority of Ghanaians are pointing fingers on her husband for such an awkward act.

"My own investigations reveals that Afia herself intentionally released the video to gain public sympathy for her immoral act.

Also the name Afia Schwarzenegger is no more as popular as the Afia Schwarzenegger we used to know so she intentionally released the said video to regain her popularity as her name has been fading away" he added.

The marriage counsellor who doubled as women advocate on the social media reiterated that the general public should stop sympathising with her as she has not regretted from cheating on her husband but she shamefully came out to lambast her fans in addition for not sharing the video to her expectations.

Meanwhile,Lawrence Abrokwah, the husband of TV host Valentina Nana Agyeiwaa, popularly known as Afia Schwarzenegger, has finally given his version of the story following the leakage of his wife's amorous affair with another man. The comedienne was reportedly caught red-handed by her husband engaging in a sexual act with another man, and he recorded the episode on video. Since the story broke on Wednesday, there have been numerous videos and pictures of Afia almost naked when she was caught by her husband.Her husband, though, has now broken his silence on the issue and has opened up on his own version of the story.

Speaking in an exclusive interview with Kofi TV, which was streamed live on Facebook, Abrokwah admitted to personally recording the video but said he knew nothing about its leakage.According to him, despite everything that had happened, he could never do something as disgraceful as that to his wife.

"Yes, I did record my wife but I will never do such a thing as putting her video in social media," Abrokwah said. "Who can prove that I put the leaked video of my wife on my Facebook page? No, I don't know anything about the leaked video. "Yes I recorded the video which Afia has a copy, and I also sent a copy to Afia's father and the police also has a copy so how can I leak it? No."
Accra, Sept. 08, GNA - Former President John Dramani Mahama has said, he would be participating in the Northern Region National Democratic Congress' (NDC's) 'Unity Walk' in Tamale on Saturday, September 9.

He said the solidarity walk was designed to show that members of the party were one, and to raise the spirit of their people.

Former President Mahama made the announcement, in his address, on Friday, in Accra, during the induction of the first batch of students to be admitted at the Ghana Institute of Social Democracy (GISD), an ideological school of the NDC.

The GISD courses outlined in this module include, Political Leadership and Party Organisation and Political Activism; the History of the NDC, the Philosophy, Principles and Practice of Social Democracy.

The former President noted that the NDC had enough people in the Northern Region to ensure a successful 'Unity Walk'; adding that it would be replicated in all the regions.

He explained that due to an international assignment, he would not be able to participate in the Greater Accra Region's NDC 'Unity Walk'.

He appealed to all party members and cadres to fully partake in the event in their respective regions in due course.

The induction ceremony was attended by former Vice President Paa Kwesi Bekoe Amissah-Arthur; Mr Julius Debrah, former Chief of Staff; Mr Johnson Asiedu Nketiah, the General Secretary of the NDC; and Mr Lee Ocran, first National Vice Chairman/Acting National Chairman of the NDC.

Others are Professor William Ahadze, Acting Rector, GISD/the NDC's Director of Research; Alhaji Huudu Yahaya, a Member of the NDC's Council of Elders; and Madam Anita Desoso, a National Vice Chairperson of the NDC.

GNA

By Iddi Yire, GNA
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 12:37:35|Editor: ZD

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YANGON, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Myanmar is facing new challenges of extremist terrorists' threatened violence and the government has taken various actions to safeguard security.

In a statement released late Saturday responding to recent online messages instigating violence, the Information Committee of the government asked Myanmar people not to be instigated among communities, and urged them to report to authorities about acts suspicious of such incitement.

The local government in Maungtaw, Myanmar's northern Rakhine state, also called on people not to support terrorists in burning homes or properties and refrain from entering restricted areas as part of a new order issued on Saturday.

The order, announced by Maungtaw District General Administration Department, warned of punishment against violators of rule of law.

The statement called for people's obligation to cooperate with the authorities by following instructions of the authorities.

Since early this month, hundreds of Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) extremist terrorists continued attacks on security forces in Maungtaw as well as family members of some ethnic groups, including Hindu and Daingnet.

The terrorists set on fire hundreds of houses as they stormed some villages in Maungtaw, namely Aukpyuma, Ountaw, Dingar, Sawkeenama, Hontarya and Thinbawgwe.

The recent series of extremist terrorists' attacks have so far displaced a total of 30,200 people, officials said.

The Myanmar security forces vowed preparedness to counter the terrorist attacks, reiterating its warning to take effective actions on any law-breaching acts.

Ministers concerned, who made a field trip to the conflict-torn northern Rakhine state of Maungtaw and Buthidaung areas, briefed President U Htin Kyaw on the latest situation there.

They proposed to the president on future tasks to address the Rakhine issue.

The president stressed that it was the critical moment to meet the responsible officials and asked authorities concerned to renovate the damaged border fences as soon as possible and erect new ones with government fund.

The president also called for reinforcement of security forces to combat the terrorist attacks.

The State Counselor's Office called on the people to be vigilant against any incitement by the ARSA extremist terrorists, urging all people to stay calm in accordance with law and support the government in law enforcement.

Myanmar's National Security Advisor to the government U Thaung Tun urged the media to join hands with the government in its bid to bring in peace, stability and development in northern Rakhine state by reporting the situation there in an objective manner.

U Thaung Tun warned that some fabricated news on the situation in the state is spread with the intent to mislead the public. He said these social media campaigns are aimed at promoting the interests of the terrorists by creating further division between the already divided communities in the northern state, which also caused international misperception on Myanmar.

He pointed out that the current attacks indicated the intention of the terrorist groups to seize and separate the territory.

He stressed that the government cannot condone terrorism in any form or manner and will do its utmost to prevent terrorism from spreading to other parts of the state, adding that there are enough security forces to control the situation.

U Thaung Tun reiterated the government's commitment to carrying out the recommendations of the Advisory Commission, led by former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, to the fullest extent within the shortest possible time frame in keeping with the situation on the ground.

He underlined the roadmap for the implementation which includes the establishment of a new ministerial-led committee to oversee progress as well as an advisory board with eminent persons at home and abroad to give advice.

The Myanmar government has also held roundtable talks on Rakhine issue under the topic of "Finding Solutions through Discussions" in Yangon.

Such topics as external involvement in Rakhine affairs and how the conflict can be solved were also discussed at the talks.

Extremist terrorists launched renewed attacks on police outposts in Rakhine on Aug. 25, killing 12 security personnel and one immigration officer. Some 77 terrorists were killed and two captured.

The assaults continued until now, prompting a military sweep against the terrorists. From Aug, 25 to Sept. 4, residents from Taungpyo, Letwe, Kwuntheepin, Thechaung and Meetaik areas in Maungtaw district fled to border areas for refuge and camped along the Myanmar side of the border with Bangladesh.

Earlier reports said 97 terrorist attacks by the ARSA during the period killed 36 people, including 13 security force members, two government service personnel and 21 ethnic people, and injured 22 others.

A total of 59 villages and 6,842 houses were also burnt down by the extremist terrorist with eight bridges destroyed by planted mines.

Meanwhile, 371 terrorists were killed in clashes with the security forces, according to the reports.
The Tema Metropolitan Assembly (TMA) has unanimously voted to lift Wednesdays suspension of Mr. Carlos Kingsley Ahenkorah, Member of Parliament (MP) for Tema West for obstructing the lawful work of Assembly officials.

This decision was premised on the plea by the Tema Metropolitan Chief Executive (MCE) to the TMA on Friday to reconsider the decision as he felt was harsh considering Mr. Ahenkorahs inability to give his side of the story.

I will like to say to Members that I made a complaint to the PRCC, and that is what warranted Wednesdays meeting. I am assuring all of you that I am going to review that complaint and upon review, the PM will let you know, the MCE, Felix Mensah Nii Annan-La said.

Mr. Annan-La said his gesture was in the spirit of unity and development that was calculated to bring all who matter together to achieve his vision for Tema.

I will take this opportunity to once again thank all honorable members whose expertise and experience has seen us through this exercise today, he added.

I sit here today very sad because of what has happened throughout the week. We all know it has good and bad sides, he said whilst he looked back on the clash that occurred between the TMA Task Force and the MP over the siting of some containers in front of the Cocoa Village at Community Two, Tema.

The incident was caught on audio visual storage devices and had gone viral on social media.

He observed that it was not only Mr. Ahenkorah who was affected by the decision of TMA, adding that what happened to him has affected many, and if we have done something to affect their reputation I stand on behalf of the Assembly, as the Mayor of Tema to apologize and at the appropriate time what need to be done will be done.

The MP for Tema Central, Mr. Kofi Brako advised Assembly Members to desist from encouraging the unlawful siting of containers.

He observed that we are their representatives so if they come appealing to us that our containers which have been sited here for years is being removed, for humanitarian reasons we also try to assist them. If we the Assembly Men do not allow the containers to be placed at the wrong places, I am sure we will also not come around to do something at all.

He was happy for the decision and promised the Assembly that there is never going to be a time that we will have that sort of confrontation with your MCE.

The Presiding Member (PM) of the Assembly, Richard Fiadomor, observed that it was the suspension that was looked at, but that the MP, who was also a Deputy Minister for Trade and Industry, will still appear before the Public Relations and Complaints Committee (PRCC).

He didnt appear the first time that was why we saw it as an affront to the house. That is why we went ahead to suspend him. Now we have given him the opportunity to restart the process by appearing before the PRCC and then come before the General House to apologise if need be, he said.

If he comes and we hear his side of the story and we think it is still not good, we will profile his story to the General Assembly to implement, and that is why we will want to send him back.

"We have not freed him; we have now given him the chance to appear before the PRCC and subsequently the General Assembly, he added.

Story by Ghana| Myjoyonline
Former President John Dramani Mahama has challenged his successor, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to move beyond propaganda and work to assuage the plight of the suffering masses who voted for change at the last elections.

According to him, Akufo-Addo has no excuse than to implement the juicy campaign promises that won him power at the last elections.

Buttressing his standpoint, he cited the then New Patriotic Party in opposition promise to drastically reduce fuel prices and electricity tariffs as some of the juicy promises.

Former President John Dramani Mahama was addressing a teeming crowd at the Kulikuli School Park to climax the partys maiden unity health walk held in Tamale.

No amount of propaganda can make the people oblivious of their own responsibilities because they are living with the prevailing circumstances.

He called for a formidable opposition to represent the voiceless by constructively criticizing government to keep it on track.

He said the NDC cannot win the next general elections with a divided front for which reason party loyalists and leadership should bury their differences and unite for a common good.

He recalled the partys humiliating defeat at the last elections saying, It was good we lost the 2016 elections for Ghanaians to feel the deceptive nature of the governing NPP then in opposition.

Former President Mahama commended the NDCs minority caucus in Parliament for keeping the Nana Addo administration on its toes.

He also thanked the event organizers for their forethought and promised to unveil himself for similar events if replicated nationwide.

Haruna Iddrisu mocks Free SHS policy

Minority leader, Haruna Iddrisu mocked at the governing NPPs much touted Free SHS policy and described it as political gimmick.

According to him, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addos administration is in a haste to implement the policy without proper financing.

He served notice that the NDC minority caucus in Parliament will fiercely resist any attempts to implement the policy at all cost for political expediency.

He explained that the NDC as a social democratic party was not against the implementation of the Free SHS policy but insisted that the right structures must be put in place to ensure its sustainability.

Haruna Iddrisu thereby admonished President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to rethink about the Free SHS policy and promote national dialogue on the policy.

Asiedu Nketiah cautions NDC communicators

The NDC General Secretary, Johnson Asiedu Nketiah cautioned the partys communicators against politicizing his reported attack at gun point on the Kumasi-Accra highway.

He trusted that state institutions handling the case are capable of apprehending the culprits and called for maximum restraint commenting on the issue.

He nonetheless stated that the party will draw its conclusion on the issue should the state institutions fail in their investigations.

The Member of Parliament for Sagnarigu constituency and also the NDC minority caucus communications Director appealed told all party loyalists to genuinely forgive each other.

He said the NDC cannot afford to be in opposition beyond 2020 and that success of the unity health walk should nor be jeopardized.

The event which lasted for several hours caused heavy vehicular and human traffic on the streets of Tamale but nothing untoward happened and there were no casualties.



By: Abdul Karim Naatogmah/citifmonline.com/Ghana
09.09.2017 LISTEN

Accra, Sept. 9, GNA - President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has called on chiefs from the Northern Region to speedily settle all chieftaincy, land and ethnic disputes to accelerate the development and progress of the area.

He made a passionate appeal to eminent traditional rulers handling the 15-year-old Dagbon chieftaincy crises to find an amicable and lasting solution to the conflict, to enable the people of Yendi install a new Ya Na, during the Damba Festival in December.

President Akufo-Addo made the call when the Regent of Gonjaland, Tun Tumba Yagbong Wura Boresa Sulemana, and the Overlord of the Mamprugu Traditional Area, Nayiri Naa Bohigu Abdullai Mahami Sheriga paid separate calls on him at the Flagstaff House.

The traditional rulers were there to congratulate him on his victory at the December 2016 polls and for his ascension to the highest office of the land, as well as table their concerns to him for redress.

Emphatic on the need for peace and tranquility in the north, President Akufo-Addo said those areas of the country were the most deprived and that the continuous engagement in conflict of any kind would deny the area of the expected development that his administration had lined out in policies and programmes for the entire country.

The President expressed confidence in the eminent chiefs, including the Asantehene, Otumfuor Osei Tutu II, negotiating peace in Dabgon, would find a solution that would bring closure to the conflict in the area.

He said the time had come for all to work together to find a lasting solution, thus, government would support any decision the chiefs arrived at to deal with the issue.

"My understanding is that now, the possibilities for it (peace) are very strong. Peace in Dagbon doesn't just involve Dagbon. It involves the whole Ghana. It is a matter of high national priority to get Dagbon to succeed.

"We are prepared to support fully, any formula that you (traditional leaders) think will bring lasting peace,' President Akufo-Addo said adding that it was in the interest of Dagbon and the entire Ghana that there was a roadmap that all could support to bring peace to the area.

'I would love to see that this year, by the time of the Damba Festival in December, there is a new Ya Na in Yendi. I am counting on you to help this to happen," he said, and urged the chiefs and people of the area to support the eminent rulers to solve the problem.

On a request by the traditional rulers for the creation of a new region from the Northern Region due to its large size that made it difficult to settle land and chieftaincy issues, President Akufo-Addo explained that all due processes to the realisation of those plans were well afoot.

He asked the chiefs and leaders to educate their people to actively participate in the process leading to the creation of the new region, saying; 'There is work to be done. So you chiefs would have to use your influence to get your people to support the move.'

He told them that based on the advice from the Council of State to proceed to create the new region, he would constitute a Commission of Enquiry, latest by next week, to start taking views from the people on their demand for new regions.

Based on the work and recommendation of the Committee, and 'if everything goes well, by May next year, there could be a referendum if there is a broad demand for the creation of new regions,' he said.

President AKufo-Addo promised the chiefs and people of Dagbon that the Government would construct a teachers' training college in the area to improve the quality of basic education there.

He said the promises he made to Ghanaians to win last years' election were not made just to win votes but to transform the lives and fortunes of Ghanaians.

The two leaders, in separate addresses, commended the President for his commitment to implement policies such as the Free Senior High School, One District One Factory, and One Village One Dam and wished him well.

They express their commitment to support the President and his Government to improve the living condition of the people in their respective traditional areas.

GNA

By Ken Sackey, GNA
10.09.2017 LISTEN

For the past two decades since computers were made easily affordable, and the modem allowed networking and communications, Ghana Leadership Union (GLU) has had her share of discussions on vital issue affecting the nation, using members voices from the US, Canada, UK, Germany, Australia, as well as some African nations and our own Ghana.

We have built enormous friendships especially since 2001, but have become more of a repository of Ghanaian global expertise matched by none. Many of our ideas have been shared with governments but with no formal acknowledgment. Ideas and Business plans have also been stolen by government executives but so far as they serve the public interest the same God may forgive. While this is discouraging to others, we never cease to have more who hear and write to join us and increase the number. But as a Pressure group we need action!

The History and Lesson:

Nothing tells a story better than personal experience! Hence as President and Co-Founder it gives me pleasure to share this. It was in the mid 1970s that as an Engineering Scholarship student at University of California at Berkeley I wrote my first advice to then Head of State Col. I.K. Acheampong explaining the concept of a database for managing society and hence asking for all houses in Ghana to be numbered logically and consecutively and streets named.

The good news is that the Head of State's

Office replied the letter and said they were "looking into it", a term that became our joke and carried with me all the last 40 plus years.

The sad aspect is that no President or Head of Sate ever understood my advice and hence today Ghana has at best, thanks to former President John Mahama, some streets named. The irony is that no size or format was specified and hence a friend told me of a street sign that was put on a peg two feet high on a street corner. Most street and even Highway signs in Ghana are not large enough and readable till one stops! Like 40 years ago nobody in 2016 understood the concept! The funny thing also is that the House Numbering was forgotten- perhaps left for another day!

Land and the Problems:

I read a World Bank report once that said Land Litigation takes an average of 11-13 years in Ghana!

I don't have any litigation on land but I have seen major fraud cases where crooked Lawyers and Judges have awarded judgement to give 6 properties owned by a Ghanaian couple in the US all to one party during divorce proceeding! Incredible! The legal rights on land ownership are as critical and perhaps the most important of laws of man on this earth.

It has taken 27 years but I am still chasing after a Title Certificate of ownership on a land I paid for in 1990.

Some document were recorded in 1992, and the seller died, and since then I built 2 structures or Houses on the 2 plots in East Legon, and have enjoyed the use of the land and paid my property taxes for 13-14 years since we moved in!

Why we Invest to Shed Tears:

Ghana is a land where People born there have tremendous love for the country; however one may weep and cry sometimes, and sometimes you get mad like Hell and can't take it anymore!!

For this final and 5th attempt, I have personally been to Lands Department with my Executive Assistant in the last 8 weeks and still not completed!! I heard ten years ago they were putting everything on Computers and they have not completed the arrears of paperwork transfer! Fine. Understood!

- So were there any records in Notebooks?

- Are Government workers output ever evaluated on how many transactions they complete for the taxpaying clientele?

Previous attempts to have the land registered when I was overseas led to only money paid to Lands Department and many officials but not even a letter telling me of the status or what steps were reached! I forgot to add that some Land Guards successfully persuades me to pay about $900 settlement agreement money on these East Legon plots because history going back 50 or more years says first and second Prime Ministers/Presidents of Ghana had given the lands in the current East Legon to the people from Nima! And they refused to move and occupy the lands; but feel they have a right to demand money when somebody is building on it.

So What's the Story and Who Cares!

For the Diaspora Ghanaian returning home Ghanaian custom and expectations demands one builds a house to avoid what they call animguase, a concept that could mean not keeping up to social expectations or even disgrace to the family.

In my case I did meet the test of expectations but trying to sell one of them has become a major headache in the last few years due to lack of Ghana government's documentation storage and retrieval system. Trying to sell one of the houses family lives in is hard but life is War!

The attached picture shows how land documents are packaged in plastic bags manually for storage!

And you see how and why after 25 years Land Certificate, even if issued at the time, may take time to locate!,, err,, maybe a few months if sustained effort, and if not, then years until one gives up!!

I guess these are the reasons why the white man invented Computers for STORAGE and RETRIEVAL,, but for the Educated Ghanaian, they use tax money to buy laptops now; but using the computer to store, retrieve, network and facilitate processes and speed up service for the customer is not part of their work!,, well at least not priority enough to put deadlines!

In Ghana this is nothing new and I know the workers may do the best they can; and some may even hide the documents for some bribe money to frustrate a customer. There are still some good decent civil servants. Looking at the buildings at Lands, one can only cry for Kwame Nkrumah and why nobody feels the need to plan long term and even cover the grounds with grass lawn!

It is sad visiting some District offices!

Some Ghanaians have suggested we need prayers but on the GLU forum the acceptable proposal may be the need for a big cane and some carrots to reward good performing government employees beyond salaries!

Picture showing how land documents are packaged in plastic bags manually for storage ((c) by K. Danso Sep.8, 2017).

It is the hope that the current government's attempt to computerize processes will not end at the Ghana ports to expedite imported goods retrieval, termed "paperless ports" by Ghana's Vice President Dr. Bawumia. There are lots of work to be done for Housing also and the wealth hidden in houses is hundreds of times more than in vehicles and imported chicken, if only we knew how taxation system works!

But I know we don't - so I only wish our nation the best of luck!

God bless our homeland Ghana!

Dr. Kwaku A. Danso ([email protected] )

President Ghana Leadership Union
Patenting seeds has led to a farming and food crisis - and huge profits for US biotechnology corporations.

Activist and author Dr Vandana Shiva is the founder of the Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology.

New Delhi, India - The seed is the first link in the food chain - and seed sovereignty is the foundation of food sovereignty. If farmers do not have their own seeds or access to open pollinated varieties that they can save, improve and exchange, they have no seed sovereignty - and consequently no food sovereignty.

The deepening agrarian and food crisis has its roots in changes in the seed supply system, and the erosion of seed diversity and seed sovereignty.

Seed sovereignty includes the farmer's rights to save, breed and exchange seeds, to have access to diverse open source seeds which can be saved - and which are not patented, genetically modified, owned or controlled by emerging seed giants. It is based on reclaiming seeds and biodiversity as commons and public good.

The past twenty years have seen a very rapid erosion of seed diversity and seed sovereignty, and the concentration of the control over seeds by a very small number of giant corporations. In 1995, when the UN organised the Plant Genetic Resources Conference in Leipzig, it was reported that 75 per cent of all agricultural biodiversity had disappeared because of the introduction of "modern" varieties, which are always cultivated as monocultures. Since then, the erosion has accelerated.

The introduction of the Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights Agreement of the World Trade Organisation has accelerated the spread of genetically engineered seeds - which can be patented - and for which royalties can be collected. Navdanya was started in response to the introduction of these patents on seeds in the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade - a forerunner to the WTO - about which a Monsanto representative later stated: "In drafting these agreements, we were the patient, diagnostician [and] physician all in one." Corporations defined a problem - and for them the problem was farmers saving seeds. They offered a solution, and the solution was to make it illegal for farmers to save seed - by introducing patents and intellectual property rights [PDF] on those very seeds. As a result, acreage under GM corn, soya, canola, cotton has increased dramatically.

Threats to seed sovereignty

Besides displacing and destroying diversity, patented GMO seeds are also undermining seed sovereignty. Across the world, new seed laws are being introduced which enforce compulsory registration of seeds, thus making it impossible for small farmers to grow their own diversity, and forcing them into dependency on giant seed corporations. Corporations are also patenting climate resilient seeds evolved by farmers - thus robbing farmers of using their own seeds and knowledge for climate adaptation.

Another threat to seed sovereignty is genetic contamination. India has lost its cotton seeds because of contamination from Bt Cotton - a strain engineered to contain the pesticide Bacillus thuringiensis bacterium. Canada has lost its canola seed because of contamination from Roundup Ready canola. And Mexico has lost its corn due to contamination from Bt Cotton.

After contamination, biotech seed corporations sue farmers with patent infringement cases, as happened in the case of Percy Schmeiser . That is why more than 80 groups came together and filed a case to prevent Monsanto from suing farmers whose seed had been contaminated.

As a farmer's seed supply is eroded, and farmers become dependent on patented GMO seed, the result is debt. India, the home of cotton, has lost its cotton seed diversity and cotton seed sovereignty. Some 95 per cent of the country's cotton seed is now controlled by Monsanto - and the debt trap created by being forced to buy seed every year - with royalty payments - has pushed hundreds of thousands of farmers to suicide ; of the 250,000 farmer suicides, the majority are in the cotton belt .

Seeding control

Even as the disappearance of biodiversity and seed sovereignty creates a major crisis for agriculture and food security, corporations are pushing governments to use public money to destroy the public seed supply and replace it with unreliable non-renewable, patented seed - which must be bought each and every year.

In Europe, the 1994 regulation for protection of plant varieties forces farmers to make a "compulsory voluntary contribution" to seed companies. The terms themselves are contradictory. What is compulsory cannot be voluntary.

In France, a law was passed in November 2011, which makes royalty payments compulsory. As Agriculture Minister Bruna Le Marie stated: "Seeds can be longer be royalty free, as is currently the case." Of the 5,000 or so cultivated plant varieties, 600 are protected by certificate in France, and these account for 99 per cent of the varieties grown by farmers.

The "compulsory voluntary contribution", in other words a royalty, is justified on grounds that "a fee is paid to certificate holders [seed companies] to sustain funding of research and efforts to improve genetic resources".

Monsanto pirates biodiversity and genetic resources from farming communities, as it did in the case of a wheat biopiracy case fought by Navdanya with Greenpeace, and climate resilient crops and brinjal (also known as aubergine or eggplant) varieties for Bt Brinjal. As Monsanto states, "it draws from a collection of germ-plasm that is unparalleled in history" and "mines the diversity in this genetic library to develop elite seeds faster than ever before".

In effect, what is taking place is the enclosure of the genetic commons of our biodiversity and the intellectual commons of public breeding by farming communities and public institutions. And the GMO seeds Monsanto is offering are failing. This is not "improvement" of genetic resources, but degradation. This is not innovation but piracy.

For example, the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) - being pushed by the Gates Foundation - is a major assault on Africa's seed sovereignty.

Agribusiness

The 2009 US Global Food Security Act [PDF] also called the Lugar-Casey Act [PDF], "A bill to authorise appropriations for fiscal years 2010 through 2014 to provide assistance to foreign countries to promote food security, to stimulate rural economies, and to improve emergency response to food crisis, to amend the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 and for other purposes".

The amendment to the Foreign Assistance Act would "include research on bio-technological advances appropriate to local ecological conditions, including genetically modified technology". The $ 7.7bn that goes with the bill would go to benefit Monsanto to push GM seeds.

"Royalties for Monsanto are based on debt, suicidal farmers and the disappearance of biodiversity worldwide."

An article in Forbes, titled "Why Uncle Sam Supports Franken Foods", shows how agribusiness is the only sector in which US has a positive trade balance. Hence the push for GMOs - because they bring royalties to the US. However, royalties for Monsanto are based on debt, suicidal farmers and the disappearance of biodiversity worldwide.

Under the US Global Food Security Act, Nepal signed an agreement with USAID and Monsanto. This led to massive protests across the country. India was forced to allow patents on seeds through the first dispute brought by the US against India in the WTO. Since 2004, India has also been trying to introduce a Seed Act which would require farmers to register their own seeds and take licenses. This in effect would force farmers from using their indigenous seed varieties. By creating a Seed Satyagraha - a non-cooperation movement in Gandhi's footsteps, handing over hundreds of thousands of signatures to the prime minister, and working with parliament - we have so far prevented the Seed Law from being introduced.

India has signed a US-India Knowledge Initiative in Agriculture , with Monsanto on the Board. Individual states are also being pressured to sign agreements with Monsanto. One example is the Monsanto-Rajasthan Memorandum of Understanding, under which Monsanto would get intellectual property rights to all genetic resources, and to carry out research on indigenous seeds. It took a campaign by Navdanya and a "Monsanto Quit India" Bija Yatra ["seed pilgrimage"] to force the government of Rajasthan to cancel the MOU.

This asymmetric pressure of Monsanto on the US government, and the joint pressure of both on the governments across the world, is a major threat to the future of seeds, the future of food and the future of democracy.

Dr Vandana Shiva is a physicist, eco-feminist, philosopher, activist and author of more than 20 books and 500 papers. She is the founder of the Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology, and has campaigned for biodiversity, conservation and farmers' rights, winning the Right Livelihood Award [Alternative Nobel Prize] in 1993.

The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily represent the editorial policy of Al Jazeera.
I have been WhatsApped video recordings on one Afia Schwarzenegger, a supposedly Ghanaian celebrity and a role model. In one of them, she was caught red-handed by her husband naked and in bed with another man. Her total nudity with her disgusting physique and nauseating tattoos has been exposed to the whole world to see how ugly this bitchs body is under clothes.

In the subsequent videos recorded and posted by her on the social media, she was castigating Ghanaians for failing to let go viral the first video exposing her nakedness. In another, she was invoking curses on anyone that will approach her for the settlement between her and her estranged husband who caught her in the process of bonking by another man.

In the final video as at writing, she is with that equally-uncivilized coward and infidel who sneaked behind her husbands back to have steaming sexual intercourse with her. They were boasting of their obnoxious, irresponsible and shameful acts of infidelity and how they have preferred charges of assault, indecent publications etc. against the husband.

For the attention of the two promiscuous bastards, they should thank their stars that the husband did not spray them with real acid. If he had, he would have been found guilty and goaled if taken to court.

In the circumstance that the woman was caught, no sensible judge that is worth his salt will pronounce favourable ruling for Afia Schwarzenegger and her new Aben wo aha lover. There are occasions in the world where people have emotionally been moved to kill such cheating lovers but end up being charged with manslaughter instead of first degree murder. They will plead on diminished responsibility driven by the extreme momentary pain of anger that took the best part of them at the moment of committing their act.

Yes, the law does not permit any married couple to harm their partner when caught in a compromising situation as Afia Schwarzenegger was found. However, the momentary rush of adrenalin-madness emanating from the pain of catching your wife in that act will engulf your sense of reasoning hence pushing you to act anyhow. This is natural. Once the absurdity of the husbands action is established not to have been premeditated, Afia Schwarzenegger should not hope to have her husband jailed for doing what he did but should rather be thankful to him that he did not spray her face with actual corrosive acid as threatened.

Will the trial judge accept to see his wife in such a situation? I am certain common sense will prevail to set the husband free. Is the wife not even asking for the video to trend on social media? Therefore, what wrong has whoever put it out there done? The only mistake the person did is to have caused me nausea by her ugly nakedness and bush girls defence she seemed to have put up  I borrowed money for the wedding, she kept saying.

She borrowed money so she has to pay it off through prostitution. Stupid woman!

She has brought shame on her family, especially her mum. All that many a discerning person will say is like mother like daughter. She has to bury her head in shame rather than putting up that uncivilized bravado of defence. Whatever the case, she has been caught engaged in extra marital affairs. All her defence will be stupid before any rational Ghanaian.

If she was in any of the civilized Western world, she would be forced to resign her media job since it will be a disgrace to the employer and the company she works for. Her ugly body does not match her badmouthing. She is a disgrace to Ghanaian married women!

All her curses invoked on people should return upon her own head by the grace of God.
10.09.2017 LISTEN

I watched with keen interest a video of an individual referred to as Lawyer Maurice Ampaw and his client Lawrence Abrokwah, posted on Ghanaweb. The video was titled "Court has to prove Abrokwah leaked Afia Schwarzenegger's video", dated Saturday 9th September 2017.

As I watch the video with my prior knowldhe on most of the build ups, I could not imagine how hopeless a lawyer of the potentially accuse person and his client can be. I could not stop wondering whether the two individuals granting interview in the video, are mindful of what they are saying in the to the public. I was convinced the two individuals were under the influence of substances enough to make thme incapable of being in charge of their physical and psychological composition. Both gave so much away, by their body languages.

Dear reader, without wasting your time with all the details of how it all got to this as I know there are enough information out their to inform you, I want to make it very clear to Mr. Ampaw that the court of law or the Ghana police, do not have any obligation to prove the leakage of the said video, was not by ypur client Mr. Abrokwah. The one who recorded the video of another person's nudity is the person responsible for ensuring that the material does not fall into wrong hands. So it is the duty of Mr. Abrowah to safe guard the content of the video of another person he recorded without the consent of the offended. If out of stupidity, Mr. Abrokwah gave copies to others and the video got leaked that is his negligence. It is without doubt that Mr. ABrokaw entrapped Afia with a motive which in this case, turn out to be humiliating her in public and creating fear in her. Are these not exactly the issues under contention?

Since there is a position that Mr. Abrokwah made a copy available to the police, what a good lawyer is suppose to be doing in favour of his client, is to explore favourable possibilities for his client along this line. He is suppose to be exploring the basis on which the copy was made available to the police to lay the betrayal of trust on the police. He should be asking whether police request to client in hamding over the video was carry put formally or the accuse embarked on the act of giving the material to the police voluntarily? If Mr. Ampaw is to go on this targent, he shall be finding out if his client had evidence of a written request given to him by the police on the subject?

Even in going along this line, it is important for Afia to be notify of the police requesting for her nude video and she must consent to that? I am very sure all the answers to all the above are, negative.

The next issue is, how lawful is it to threaten another enough to the extent of making the person convince they are going to losing their life? Is it lawful for anyone to point a gun or a knife at another, with a backed up verbal threat of terminating their life? If a person threaten anyone with a gun, even if it turn out that it is a toy (replica) gun, is the person not liable to a criminal act under "unlawful intent"?

The fact is, Afia believed at the time of the incidence that Mr. Abrokwah genuinely had acid with him to carry out his threat of terminating her life. She knelt on her knee to be for mercy. She asked Abrokwah to spare her life. So Afia believe the content of the bottle in the hand of Abrokwah was acid. Mr. Abrokwah wad also heard backing up his threat with words to reinforce his intent to highten Afia's fear.

If Mr. Abrokwah had said to Afia that the content of the bottle in his hand is water, she would have believed him and her fear would have been lesser, even if it was actually acide. After all he did not use it and so, it could have been his medical syrup.

This is a serious case and the so called Lawyer Ampaw must stop behaving like a clawn, to let his client understand the gravity of the charges. Afia is absolutely on the right course in this case and strangely, the report had it thst she was relax and singing in her case, as the police were dealing with the issue. This only confirms she good lawyers in the shadows guiding her. There is no law in the constitution of Ghana or act of parliament, criminalizing a man or a woman in marriage, for having extra marital affair, as Mr. Ampaw is making it seem. Such acts, if uncovered, are only helpful for the agrived party to use as the basis for desolving the marriage. Any form of physical attack on any person within marriage, for engaging in extra marital affair, is criminal. Physically attacking a person enough to make the individual believe his or her life is going to be terminated, is a voilation of the person's right to life. Since the state ia the guarantor of the life of the citizen, by which the state act when life is terminated under the criminal act, an intent to terminate the life is as good as the act itself.

Afia has every right to go to bed with who ever she want. It is totally within her personal right, married or not. Marrying a man or a woman, is not a right for anyone to own any part of another person's body. We are not living under any mosaic religious law where such acts are coded and foebidden. The fact that one's moral make these action wrong, does not make it so under the laws of the state of Ghana and it is very clear.

Our criminal laws are fashioned in line with the British law, and Brirish law criminalizes the act of invading on another personal privacy.

We may all dislike Afia's ways of life and will wish she meet her waterloo soon, this is not the case in this instance.Afia's understanding of moral rightiousness might be totally different from ours but she has not broken any law of the state of Ghana. And if Afia has violated any law of the state of Ghana, it is the responsibility of the enforcers of such law to punish her and not you, or I.

Afia and the state of Ghana can put Mr. Abrokwah behind the bar for at least seven (6) years. MauriceAmpaw must back off if he is incapable of helping Mr. Abrokwah, than encouraging his client to make further mess of what is already a bad case. This is a criminal case and the Ghana police must be seen to live up to the public expectation, in their duty to uphold the law.

What kind of a lawyer publicly threaten the court, the police and the poor defendant? What kind of a layer goes to police station to represent his client, and end up engaging in fighting the police instead? What kind of a lawyer as the police to arrest every who has committed the crime his client is charge of? Maurice Ampaw is a disgrace to the legal profession. I look forward to the GBA (Ghana Bar Association) to take an action against Mr. Ampaw for dragging the sactinonious profession of law in Ghana into the mud. The GBA has done this before and hope to see it cracking the whip again.

Kofi Ali Abdul-Yekin

Chairman ECRA

(ECOWAS Citizens Right Advocates)
The quality of a countrys human capital determines to some extent, its level of development. One factor that can considerably affect the quality of a countrys labor force and hence, suppresses its development is the standard of health of the people living in it. Any country that has unhealthy population is bound to suffer in the implementation of development programs to improve the quality of life of the people. It is an undeniable fact that countries with easy access to improved healthcare systems have high life expectancy ratio. Quality health is a key to development and therefore should not be toyed with by any serious nation.

Health, which is mainly the relief or cure of ill health, is universally vital and this results in the imperative to provide high-quality services in response to developments in medicine and the desire of the caring professions to aspire to clinical excellence (Sewell, 1997). In Ghana, accessing timely quality healthcare services in public health facilities has become a nightmare and therefore a disincentive to many people who look elsewhere for alternative solutions to their health needs. In an attempt to address this canker, I would first refresh our minds with the background to the health system in Ghana today to ascertain whether indeed it has lived up to expectations.

In the 16th century, traditionally, village healers and clerics were the primary care givers, offering herbal remedies. Though herbalists have traditionally offered the most ready treatment of illness, pre-modern traditional beliefs stressed the combination of spiritual and physical healing. Western medicine was introduced by Christian missionaries to the Gold Coast in the 19th century. This region was most involved in the development of a new health care system.

A pre-medical department was formed initially, and in 1878, the Towns, Police, and Public Health Ordinance was enforced under its direction, initiating the construction and demolishing of infrastructure, draining of the streets, and issuing of fines to those that failed to comply with the heads of the colony. In 1893, a Public Works Department was introduced to implement a working sanitation system for the colony.

In the 1880s, a Medical Department was formed, bringing about an introduction to a formal medical system, consisting of a Laboratory Branch for research, a Medical Branch of hospitals and clinics, and the Sanitary Branch for public health. The central government made a concentrated effort to expand western style medical facilities; and after World War II, both the World Health Organization and the United Nations Childrens Fund had been active in providing money and support to provide additional western medical care in Ghana.

In Ghana, most health care is provided by the government and largely administered by the Ministry of Health and Ghana Health Services. The healthcare system has five levels of providers: health posts which are first level primary care for rural areas, health centers and clinics, district hospitals, regional hospitals and tertiary hospitals.

These programs are funded by the government of Ghana, financial credits, Internally Generated Fund (IGF), and Donors-pooled Health Fund. Hospitals and clinics run by Christian Health Association of Ghana also provide healthcare services.

Health care is very variable through Ghana. Urban centers are well served, and contain most hospitals, clinics, and pharmacies in the country. Rural areas often have no modern health care. Patients in these areas either rely on traditional African medicine, or travel great distances for health care.

Ghana has a universal health care system, National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), and until the establishment of the National Health Insurance Scheme, many people died because they did not have money to pay for their health care needs when they were taken ill. The system of health which operated was known as the "Cash and Carry" system. Under this system, the health need of an individual was only attended to after initial payment for the service was made. Even in cases when patients had been brought into the hospital on emergencies, it was required that money was paid at every point of service delivery. When the country returned to democratic rule in 1992, its health care sector started seeing improvements in terms of service delivery, human resource improvement, and public education about health condition. Even with these initiatives in place, many still could not access health care services because of the cash and carry system.

The idea for the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) in Ghana was conceived by former president John Kufuor who when seeking the mandate of the people in the 2000 elections, promised to abolish the cash and carry system of health delivery. Upon becoming president, former president Kufuor pushed through his idea of getting rid of cash and carry and replacing it with an equitable insurance scheme that ensured that treatment was provided first before payment. In 2003, the scheme was passed into law. Under the law, there was the establishment of National Health Insurance Authority which licenses, monitors and regulates the operation of health insurance schemes in Ghana. Like many countries in the world, Ghana's health insurance was fashioned out to meet specific needs of its citizens. Since its inception, the country's health facilities have seen constant rise in patient numbers and a considerable reduction in deaths.

Although death is inevitable, a lot can still be done to drastically reduce the unnecessary deaths that are registered particularly in our public hospitals day in and day out. Frankly speaking, its unacceptable considering the times we are in where there is a tremendous improvement in medicines and health equipment. The elimination of the cash and carry system alone is not enough.

In fact, health care can be made entirely free but without proper management of time by health practitioners combined with other good work practices, the quest for quality health care in Ghana will continue to be a mirage. It is a common knowledge that the amount of time spent when one visits a public hospital in Ghana is too much and does not worth it. As a matter of fact, it leaves the patient with dozens of questions in mind.

In most cases, I am tempted to ask myself if this is really a hospital or not? Is that really a nurse or a doctor, how long must I wait and how long must I suffer? Do we visit the hospital to recover or to die? I believe most of us have asked these questions over and over again each time we have visited a healthcare center within the country especially the public ones.

It is sometimes really sad and unbearable when we have to sit, watch and listen at a hospital reception, emergency room, or at the out-patients department as people suffer in pain. Most often, their silent cries, tears, moans and groans are the unmistakable and lasting memories we take home with us at the end of the day. The cries of little children as they cry their little hearts out to the helpless parents can be a heart-breaking experience. Others in critical conditions, unable to take this pain any more, have in the end given up ghost. The worse experiences most people have shared have had a health institution as its venue.

Each day in hospitals and clinics in the various regions within the country, patients die either on admission or at the out-patients departments respectively. These deaths have in a lot of cases been as a result of negligence on the part of medical personnel within these health centers. This negligence has most often been largely as a result of delays. Several people have varied experiences and stories to share on this issue of negligence in hospitals. It would be quite intriguing if a platform was provided for people to share their various experiences. I believe many people are yearning for appropriate platforms to vent their spleens but none exists.

The situations in our wards most especially cannot be overemphasized. Most patients on admission are usually at the mercy of some heartless attendants who ignore, verbally abuse or compound the medical conditions of these helpless victims. People go to the hospital in the event of an illness to seek relief and not dejection. People visit the hospital to seek remedy and not condemnation. The healthcare profession is indeed a noble one! In fact, it is a religious one! It is however unfortunate that some unscrupulous people have taken this platform to perpetuate their own evil intents of inflicting pain on people instead of relief.

The general atmosphere in our hospitals is one of helplessness and hopelessness. From the old and rundown furniture, congested wards, outdated equipment, to the tired, angry-looking, and depressing faces of nurses and attendants, hospitals in Ghana have become the most dreaded places for most people.

I have had several encounters with health care practitioners for quite some time especially in the past three years as a result of ill-health, and I can conclusively say that the situations in our public hospitals are very abhorring. In fact, it is worse in the Ashanti region. I have received rude treatment from nurses, experienced unnecessary delays on several counts, and so many other unbearable experiences. My own mother passed through a worse ordeal before her unforgettable demise in a renowned hospital in the Ashanti region. The memory of my mums demise triggered some hatred in me for any health care practitioner until my encounter with an extraordinary nurse called Doreen Mensah, in Aboaso Government Health center, in the kwabre-East district of Ashanti in the year 2015. She is indeed, an epitome of a true nurse based on her level of professionalism. This is an indication that we have a handful of better elements within the system. A friend revealed to me how a nasty attitude of a nurse drove him away from receiving treatment from a particular hospital after wasting his precious time there, because he could not stand the annoying scene any longer. Sometimes I wonder, if health workers value time at all.

It has been truly said that time is one of those indispensable realities that simply are, whether one acknowledges them or not. There is no human being who is not affected by time. It is a fact that

the acknowledgement of time is not what makes time matter. If that were the case, time would stop when we are asleep, unconscious, or dead! Indeed, time, even if we are not cognizant of it, will still be. And instead of the individual using time, or reckoning it, others will still be able to say Hes been unconscious for ten hours; Shes been asleep for a day or Hes been dead five years. In other words, not even our inability or refusal to recognize time, and not even death, stops time from marching on. (Afful-Broni, 2008).

According to Afful-Broni, time once lost is gone forever. It is, humanly speaking, impossible to turn back the clock. Time is such that if we allow it to slip away, we can never retrieve it. A fuller understanding of the tragedy of losing precious time would prevent us from waiting to do tomorrow that which can be done today. Therefore, health care workers should realize that lives lost out of their negligence can never be brought back. Even the scriptures give us the solemn reminder that we must do the work assigned us while there is still light, for the darkness comes when no man may work. (John 12:35)

An observation I have made from my constant visits to hospitals in the recent past three to four years, has given me a fair idea about the processes and procedures involved in accessing health care when one attends hospital with a normal Out Patient Department (OPD) case. At first, one must get a folder based upon which a hospital card is prepared for him. You then proceed to check your vital signs after which you go to the consulting room to meet with the physician. Depending on the nature of your case, you may be required to go for a laboratory test and bring the test results to the doctor. The doctor will then prescribe medicines for you to be collected at the pharmacy department. So approximately, about five steps should be followed before one exits the hospital. If that is the case, why then should one spend an average of five to six hours just to go through the afore-mentioned processes? For example, on September 6, 2017, I accompanied a friend to the Suntreso Government Hospital in Kumasi and for about five hours, we had not seen a doctor. Meanwhile the facility could contain more than three doctors at a time for consulting. It was annoying seeing the only one doctor present moving about unconcerned about the plight of waiting patients. It is disheartening to see how these doctors commit to duty when they are working in private hospitals. Must we all accept the reality that until we run to these same doctors in their private health facilities, our relatives will continue to meet their untimely deaths at where they are supposed to receive treatment? Is the time spent not a disincentive to people who would want to patronize public health facilities? Are health workers exhibiting professionalism at work? Do patients even know their rights at the hospital? These and a couple of other thought provoking questions remain unanswered, which I will make an attempt at.

People end up contracting infections at the hospitals as a result of the long periods of waiting in queues, with other patients with all sorts of sicknesses some of which could be highly contagious but they themselves may not even be aware of, because it has not been diagnosed yet. Patients come with varied sickness ranging from malaria, typhoid, cholera, hepatitis, chicken pox, tuberculosis, and HIV/AIDS and they mix up in waiting for treatment. Again, others prefer over the counter drugs to attending hospitals due to the delay and waste of working hours, thereby resulting to self medication in most instances. Now, to talk of professionalism of health workers, I would want to highlight the code of ethics of the Ghana Health Service before I continue.

The Code of Ethics for the Ghana Health Service (GHS) defines the general moral principles and rules of behavior for all service personnel in the Ghana Health Service. The Service shall be manned by persons of integrity, trained to a high standard to deliver a comprehensive equitable service for the benefit of patients/clients and society as a whole.

All Service personnel shall be competent, dedicated, honest, client-focused and operate within the law of the land All Health Professionals shall be registered and remain registered with their Professional Regulatory Bodies All Service personnel shall respect the Rights of patients/clients, colleagues and other persons and shall safeguard patients'/client' confidence. All Service personnel shall work together as a team to best serve patients'/clients' interest, recognizing and respecting the contributions of others within the team. All Service personnel shall co-operate with the patients/clients and their families at all times. No service personnel shall discriminate against patients/clients on the grounds of the nature of illness, political affiliation, occupation, disability, culture, ethnicity, language, race, age, gender religion, etc. in the course of performing their duties. All Service personnel shall respect confidential information obtained in the course of their duties. They shall not disclose such information without the consent of the patient/client, or person(s) entitled to act on their behalf except where the disclosure of information is required by law or is necessary in the public interest. All Service personnel shall treat official discussions, correspondence or reports obtained during official duties as confidential except where disclosure is required by law. All information obtained from patients/clients shall only be used for the prime purpose of their management. Any other use of such information shall only be done with the prior consent of the patient or person(s) entitled to act on his/her behalf. All Service personnel shall provide information regarding patient's condition and management to patients or their accredited representatives humanely and in the manner they can understand. All Service personnel shall protect the properties of the Service including properties entrusted in their care. All Service personnel shall respect the rights and abilities of disabled persons and the aged and work together to serve or safeguard their interest All Service personnel shall keep their professional knowledge and skills up to date. No Service personnel shall demand unauthorized fees from patients/clients No Service personnel shall accept any gift, favor or hospitality from the patient/public which might be interpreted as seeking to exert undue influence to obtain preferential consideration in the course of their duty All Service personnel shall refrain from all acts of indiscipline including drunkenness, smoking, immorality, abuse of drugs and pilfering in the course of performing their duties. All Service personnel shall avoid the use of their professional qualifications in the promotion of commercial products. All Service personnel shall act in collusion with any other person for financial gain. Service facilities and resources shall not be used for unauthorized private practice.

I am very much concern about the point number one (1), especially the aspects which talk about dedication and client-focus. Most health workers, particularly nurses, sometimes behave as if it is a mere favor that they are doing to the patient without receiving salaries at the end of the month. They simply do not work with passion. In fact, until you find yourself in a ward, you might not better understand how rude some nurses could be towards inmates. It is high time some nurses realized that the patient is a client, a customer, and a partner in business without whom their profession is useless.

The point six (6) stresses on acts of discrimination. Discrimination on religious and ethnic grounds is a common thing that we always experience. It is not strange for you to see somebody come late, yet leaves the hospital before you simply because of his affiliation with a worker there.

If the code of ethics is observed and things are done in orderly manner, I do not think that one has to be given a preferential treatment before he/she becomes satisfied with services accessed. Some practitioners talk to patients in a manner that is so intimidating that the patients are not able to ask relevant questions regarding their condition.

This therefore, puts a limitation on the point ten (10) above. With point sixteen (16), I have witnessed a doctor working whilst watching a movie on his laptop in a consulting room during one of my numerous visits to hospitals in Kumasi.

This doctor would finish prescribing medicines for you, even before you are done with your complaint simply because he has to get back quickly to the movie. Again, it is very common to see health workers playing with their mobile phones at work, totally disregarding the presence of their clients. The rate of indiscipline within the Ghana Health Service is alarming.

The hospital should be a place where patients would go and receive treatment and come home with a free mind. Access to quality health care shouldnt be the privilege of a selected few due to the negligence on the part of some health professionals. However, this can only be achieved through a concerted effort of all the major stake holders in the health sector. The code of ethics of the Ghana Health Service must be followed religiously. Then again, health professionals should always remember that their clients are mostly people with physical, emotional, and psychological challenges and therefore should be handled with much love and care.

Aside from the fact that the time wasted at hospitals should be reduced drastically for the betterment of us all, there should also be excellent human relations between health professionals and their patients. I am a living testimony to the fact that, there is a positive result out of a good relationship between health professionals and patients.

I refuse to side with those nurses who attempt to justify their actions because of stress emanating from over-work for the simple reason that, each one had an idea about the profession before venturing into it. In addition, they are paid for over-time if they exceed the normal eight working hours. Then again, if the number of nurses is inadequate, why must we have a huge number of trained nurses on the street unsuccessfully searching for jobs?

On May 13, 2016 which happened to be International Nurses Day, a very stunning revelation was made by Tony Goodman, the public relations officer of the Ghana Health Service on GH Today, a morning show on GHOne TV. According to Goodman, it is not the responsibility of the ministry to employ all trained nurses and that private employers must help to absorb the excess. He continued to say that the government is bound to employ only those who received training from public training institutions, and even with that, it has been discontinued effective 2016 due to the abolishing of the nursing trainees allowances. I find this shocking knowing very well that such a move will encourage brain-drain thereby worsening the nursing deficit in the country. It was revealed that, currently the nurse to patient ratio in the country is around one nurse to seven hundred and ninety-five patients, which is quite high. I think the government too has not done enough to improve the health canker in Ghana.

The change of government in December 2016 has however reversed the governments policy intended to scrap nursing trainees allowances which bound government to offer them direct postings after school. Despite this, the first half of 2017 has witnessed series of picketing by unemployed nurses at the premises of the Ministry of Health (MOH) demanding that the government should offer them employment. This is a clear indication that we have more than necessary number of trained nurses to effectively work in our hospitals and clinics.

Most politicians are quick to argue that the high unemployment rate is attributed to the fact that, students are not reading employable courses which I find absurd. How can one blame a nurse or a teacher for being jobless after several years of professional training? Are politicians not playing on our intelligence? Is there any specific field in Ghana where there is a massive demand for certain skills which these graduates are lacking? Let the politicians brief us on that.

Although we all have a stake in making the healthcare system in Ghana very attractive, but without governments commitment to dealing with the realities, all efforts would be rendered fruitless. I want to remind the government of Ghana that, our graduates who find themselves in the western world easily get jobs to do despite the fact that their citizens also school. Ghana is not populous than Germany, U.S.A, or U.K, neither do we have more nurses than any of these nations yet they are able to absorb our excesses who find their ways into these countries. Our political leaders should be up their game and stop the unnecessary loose talks in the media. In addition, civil servants and heads of institutions, especially, in the health sector should exercise their supervisory roles effectively to save lives, time and make access to healthcare in Ghana attractive.

The inadequacies in the public healthcare system has created a room for new crop of self acclaimed traditional herbal practitioners (herbalists) who are blowing their own trumpets, courtesy the mass media, to exploit and extort monies from helpless patients who are tired of the frustrations endured in the public hospitals. Most of these herbalists make juicy promises to their victims, charge exorbitant prices, drain them financially and leave them with disappointments.

To add salt to injury, in their quest to run to a safe haven, they land themselves in the hands of self-acclaimed men of God, once again, popularized by the media. These so-called prophets feed them with a host of superstitious beliefs, create problems for their families and completely drain them financially.

When all hope is lost, these patients most of whom are either Christians or Muslims abandon their faith and secretly run to fetish priests and shrines. What happens there is not something we are all oblivious to, so let me hold my breath on that.

Should these continue, until when are we as a nation going to achieve the Sustainable Development Goal 3?

NSIAH KWAME ANTHONY

0249483214

[email protected]

REFERENCES

Afful-Broni, A. (2008). Principles and Practice of Time Management (Accra: Yamens Press Limited).

Challenges of Ghanas Health System; Akosa & Quashigah Diagnose! Feature Article 2008-10-17. Retrieved from https://mobile.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/Challenges-of-Ghana-s-Health-System-Akosa-Quashigah-Diagnose-151163

Code of Ethics of Ghana Health Service. Retrieved from www.ghanahealthservice.org/ghs-subcategory.php?cid=2&scid=45

La Verle Berry, ed. (1994). Health and Welfare. Ghana: A country Study.

National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS). nhis.gov.gh. retrieved 5 June 2003.

Sewel, N. (1997). Continuous quality improvement in acute healthcare, International Journal of Healthcare Quality Assurance, Vol. 10, No. 1, pp. 20-6.

Canagarajah, Sudharshan; Ye, Xiao (April 2001). Public Health and Education Spending in Ghana in 1992-98 (PDF). World Bank Publication. P. 21.

Awuah, A. P. (January 2014). Determinants of Patients Satisfaction at Sunyani Regional Hospital, Ghana, International Journal of Business and Social Research (IJBSR), Volume 4, No. 1, pp. 96-106.
10.09.2017 LISTEN

Nationalism and patriotism have become very deficient in Ghana today. Absolutely nobody thinks about the country first; we all think about ourselves first, our families second, our parties third, maybe, our communities fourth and Ghana comes a distant fifth or sixth or even tenth, The former President made this assertion in his speech at the induction ceremony of the newly opened Ideological institute.

His assertion has generated heated debate on social media, in the academia, and in the media by politicians. Patriotism means the love for one's country and the willingness and zeal to defend it. It rekindle in us the spirit to live for our countries, make sacrifices and protect their values and even die for it if necessary. The former President's assertion is not far from the truth.

Patriotism, the inner determination for owning our country, the spirit to stand and face all odds to liberate country, the love and emotion for mother Ghana has lost for sometime now. But in discussing this crucial issue, I think we must categorise it into four perspective if not more, the political perspective,social, economic and religious perspectives.

The former President, being a politician and a former President, shared some of his political experiences with us to support his assertion. Those seeking to discuss the topic comprehensively, must put off their political lenses to enable them deal with the issues objectively. The problem is that, we Ghanaians are not able to define our identity clearly and after 60 years after independence are just hanging from the labyrinth of several dogmas and fake theories and populist policies etc, but the simple doctrine of patriotism is remained forgotten and buried in the books of Ghanaian history.

I don't think we must reduce this important subject to who joined the masses to clean choked gutters and who didn't. To claim that President Mahama did not instill patriotism among many young people all because, "allegedly" he didn't willingly affiliate with ordinary people and joined them to clean choked gutters, is false. On many occasions he joined the people to clean choked gutters. He joined some residents in Kumasi to clean up some areas in the region, on 30th August 2014, he, together with some of his appointees descended into filthy drains and went round garbage- choked spots at James Town etc , he joined to people of Pampaso around Kejetia Bus terminal and its surroundings to clean up the area. When the President affiliated the people and joined the people to clean up our cities and choked gutters, these were some of the responses: https://www.modernghana.com/news/568509/14374/who-did-the-president-think-he-was-fooling.html This was what one of stalwarts in the opposition party wrote and published it in our newspapers and online. Another response was this - http://www.peacefmonline.com/pages/local/news/201409/213423.php?page=1&storyid=100& From one of our renowned journalists and an officer in the media business I respect and admire so much. Chairman General Kwami Sefa Kayi questioned the rationale behind President Mahama's decision to personally descend into the gutter simply to demonstrate to Ghanaians the need to clean up their environment frequently so as to stay healthy And this was the how some people reacted to his action- https://www.graphic.com.gh/news/general-news/apathy-at-kejetia-as-president-mahama-joins-oseikrom-in-clean-up.html Patriotism as i described earlier, is the determination for owning our country, the spirit to stand and face all odds.

Did those basing their PATRIOTISM analysis on who jumps into choked gutters defend the President's action when people vehemently chastised him for joining the people to clean choked gutters? Where was our patriotic lenses when people attacked the former President for embarking on what we today describe as one of the activities a president must do to instill patriotism among the masses. Let me hang this issue somewhere and deal with the phenomenon categorised into the segments earlier stated.

POLITICAL

The former President touched on ideological issues and the need for party folks to understand the values and principles underpinning the ideology. The need to understand that social democrats believe in certain unique political virtues including its economic ideology and social values. He advised party folks that strict adherence to these cherished values would ensure internal discipline, egalitarian and solidaristic outcomes.

Backbiting, bootlicking, unnecessary competitions, baseless hatred, funny gossips etc make our politics unattractive and the arena, unsafe and the President's assertion was not far from the truth. Lazy and greedy politicians seeking to be kings in tiny islands fan the ember of disconnect between the political class, government and the masses causing unnecessary tension and hatred in the party.

The backbiting, hatred and unnecessary clashes were see in the party could rightly be attributed to lack of understanding of the parties ideological principles and virtues among some of the members and the president was spot on.

If we link it to our national politics, then we must look at how some of our partisan decisions and hypothetical stance on national issues details accelerated development, peace and unity in the country. We deliberately keep quiet for power- hungry politicians to hoodwink citizens into believing their lies because of our political biases. We offer our respected platforms to politicians to attack policies we know are prudent as part of our support for a "regime change" agenda.

We fail to criticise actions and policies of government we vehemently attacked when a particular government implemented because of our partisan stance. ACADEMIA- Do our lecturers, tutors and teachers teach our students materials and information captured in our books or distort facts in these documents to suit their partisan interest.

One practical case is the ongoing "who is the founder of modern Ghana" debate. We know the facts yet we feed our students with distorted stories to suit our interest without considering the longterm effect. We use our lessons to incite students against regimes and political parties whose ideological inclinations we do not agree with.

SOCIAL

We have consciously and unconsciously buried about 90% of our traditional values.

We no more support each other and have lost that wonderful community spirit which brought our families and communities together. Each for himself, is the new phenomenon. That traditional patriotic spirit our elders cherished and exhibited which inspired them to purchase lands, ornaments and other properties for their extended families is dead and buried. Today, we buy our lands and build our house according to the number of kids we have.

RELIGIOUS

How patriotic are our men of God. Do they preach about issues which instill among their congregation the spirit of patriotism? Do they educate their members to understand policies of our governments? Many of our men of God are more political than religious using their pulpits as platforms for propagation of parties and governments propaganda.
Cape Town (AFP) - As a child in the 1970s, Charmaine Marcus was forcefully removed from her Cape Town neighbourhood when the apartheid government declared it a whites-only area.

Now, as a property boom transforms once-neglected suburbs into trendy and expensive enclaves, she faces being pushed completely out of the city she calls home.

"It seems to me they just don't want us here," says Marcus, who is fighting a pending eviction in court after a dispute with her landlord.

"But this is our city. We are this city."

South Africa's slowing economy and political uncertainty have curtailed the property market countrywide.

But Cape Town has proved to be an exception, with houses here on average 78.5 percent more expensive than they were in 2010, according to the South African FNB bank.

Property expert Toni Enderli says the boom is driven by families from across the country moving to Western Cape province, in part because the region has a reputation for good governance under the Democratic Alliance party that is in power at provincial government level.

"The population in the province has gone up 33 percent in the last 15 years," Enderli told AFP.

Ismail Sheik Rahim says he feels like an outsider in his own country

"People want to be in Cape Town, they want the lifestyle. But the supply of houses that should be developed on a yearly basis is not keeping up with that."

Gentrification

In the suburb of Woodstock, where Marcus has lived for 35 years, the evolution of decayed buildings into modern apartment blocks, restaurants and markets has made it a favourite among young professionals -- and doubled housing prices in just the last five years.

Marcus' home reveals a different picture. The paint peels off the living room ceiling as a wide crack traces its way down to the floor.

Upstairs, one apartment stands exposed to the elements, gutted.

Residents began withholding their rent here after a fire two years ago ripped through a section of the building, killing one of the tenants.

They blame the landlord for failing to maintain the structure. He responded to the non-payment of rent by issuing eviction notices.

Based on current trends, the building could be a prime site for redevelopment as modern, expensive flats in future.

Relocation

Campaign group Reclaim the City has occupied an abandoned hospital in Cape Town

If Marcus, 48, and her neighbours lose their eviction case, which, they believe, seems probable as the landlord was acting within his rights, none will be able to afford the area's new rental rates.

Instead, they will likely be relocated to an emergency resettlement camp on a farm some 30 kilometres (18 miles) away.

Wolwerivier, or Wolves River, has neither a clinic nor a school and little access to shops or affordable public transport -- which could cost Marcus her inner-city job as a cleaner at a clothing company.

Landlords in South Africa need a court order to evict tenants, but the Constitutional Court earlier this year ruled that a court cannot issue an eviction order that would leave a person homeless.

Many tenants however are backyard-dwellers and have no formal contracts.

'Strangers in own country'

Activist Shane van der Mescht says Cape Town "doesn't work for you, it works against you"

"This city doesn't work for you, it works against you," says activist Shane van der Mescht, who is part of a group called Reclaim the City occupying an abandoned hospital in Woodstock where wards and offices have been turned into bedrooms and meeting spaces.

Many of the activists here were sleeping rough until a few months ago, and each has their own eviction story.

"I see them building these apartment blocks, but we can't afford it," says activist Ismail Sheik Rahim.

"We feel like outsiders, like strangers in our own country... Where am I going to get 1.4 million rand ($110,000) for a flat?"

Reclaim the City says the government should be doing more to provide affordable accommodation closer to the city centre.

Last month, the city announced plans to develop 10 sites in and around the inner city for affordable housing. Work on most of these sites is expected to ramp up in 2018.

"I understand residents' concerns about temporary or emergency housing only being available in Wolwerivier," Brett Herron, the city's head of urban development, told AFP.

"The reality is that that is the only emergency or transitional housing available.

"What we're working on now is to identify sites spread across the city so that if there is a displacement or there is an eviction, people are not required to move so far."

Sitting on her front step, Marcus says she knows she will ultimately be evicted from her building. But leaving her neighbourhood is not an option.

"If the council doesn't have alternate accommodation for us in or near the city, we're not going nowhere. We're here to stay."
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 12:57:39|Editor: ZD

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BEIJING, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- RYB Education Institution, a Chinese firm providing early childhood education, plans to raise up to 100 million U.S. dollars through an IPO in the United States.

The company said in a press release that it has applied for a listing on the New York Stock Exchange under the name "RYB".

Established in 1998, by the end of June the Beijing company had 1,108 kindergartens or play-and-learn centers with revenue of 108 million dollars last year, up from 82.9 million dollars in 2015.

Net profits in H1 rose 19.5 percent from a year earlier to 4.9 million dollars, mainly through increased kindergarten enrollment, with 255 kindergartens in 130 cities and towns at the end of June.

Revenue from kindergartens and play-and-learn centers accounted for over 70 percent of revenue in H1.

More births brought by a change in birth control policy will bring stronger demand for nursery education around 2018, while the supply of kindergarten places will lag behind in the short term, the company predicted.

China has allowed all married couples to have two children since last year.

In 2016, there were 18.7 million liver births in China, 11 percent more than in 2015. About 45 percent of them were not a first child.
10.09.2017 LISTEN

Although the government has issued regulations on admission in the secondary schools through the placement system, hundreds of children have failed to get into the schools of their parents choice. Parents going through the arduous school choice and application process have started attacking government over the hasty implementation of the free SHS policy.

According to the affected parents, the current system is more complex and skeptical that the new policy can fulfil the hope government gave parents. According some of the parents their were placed in schools they did not apply for although their results qualified them for admission into their schools of choice.

The week of school for some Ghanaian parents had been a struggle as they were turned away from schools their wards have applied as their schools of choice. Thousands of children are still waiting to be placed. Madam Angela Kumi said she has no option than sending her ward to a private school. She said she was not interested in sending her child to a private school as it was expensive and did not offer too many advantages but with this disappointment she has no option than to act against her will" Nana Bekoe whose male child was placed at Aburi Girls, said "it is heartbreaking that my male child has to miss one of the most important days of his life, a day he will never get back. I do however sympathise with the schools, as there is not much they can do about the ordeal the government is taking parents through".

Another parent who was a quest on Kofi Kapito's show on GTV whose ward was placed at West Africa Secondary School, lauded former President Mahama for building more community day schools. He said "There is a dire need for more schools in our communities. I am struggling to get my ward enrolled in Kwabenya Community Day School".

According to Madam Eugenia Bediako, she was told that her child's choice was full but working hard to ensure that she is placed in a community day school in her area before the end of the term. She said, there is often real advantage to going to your local school.

My child will be part of the family and the community. She said, with the current challenges parents are going through, parents must commend the last administration for building more schools. She said "if the community schools are not meeting aspirations and requirements for our wards, you have a powerful say in changing the school" she said.
Now that we are discussing politics of 2019, my desire for the birth of Oodua Republic is not going to hold me back from knocking in some nails into their appropriate holes. Many, some of them uninformed, some of them mischievous, are prancing all over, yelling why Atiku Abubakar cannot be PRESIDENT. I think many of those voices are not WELL reasoned and to my mind, it is important to derobe such unreasonabilities lest they continue to contaminate the political discourse.

As a matter of integrity, it is important that I make disclosures that the former Vice President is my former boss. I must also disclose that I have publicly criticized him several times. My many public criticisms of him were considered so hurtful that some in his camp asked him to institute legal actions against me. Omoyele Sowore, the publisher of Saharareporters may be be able to attest to this, because he got the "briefs." All the proofs on the above are in the public space for those who care to investigate my claims.

Now, that being said, the TRUTH must be told. Today, the only person who has what it takes to save Nigeria from messy disintegration is ABUBAKAR ATIKU. I used the word "messy" advisedly because I don't think anyone can stop Nigeria's disintegration. As the trajectory of Nigeria proceeds towards its destiny of Balkanization, the more innocent lives of women, children and the weak we can save and preserve, the better. Atiku is the only one who can get this done.

Atiku, I know, will NEVER preside over the dismemberment of Nigeria. But he is best placed and prepared to create the requisite mutual understanding of the issues that would elicit positive discussion among the constituent units to bring everyone to the table and prevent a possible war of attrition for Balkanization. The task to prevent shedding of blood is a fundamental one that we must strive to accomplish. Atiku is the best anchor of and for this.

The first variable of a functioning intellect is to assume you don't know. The second variable is to be skeptical of any idea or a concept until it has been properly looked at in critical manner and flushed of all irrelevances that could shortchange the goal for which it was intended to improve. The third variable which is very important in leaders is to be able to appreciate the value of those around you and be able to appropriately deploy them for maximum results.

Abubakar Atiku as a politician and a leader has been able to manifest the above variables in his style. Unlike many of his friends, he is a man of ideas who is always ready to learn.

I will give a couple of examples and former President Olusegun Obasanjo is my number one witness on this first example among many other respectable personalities.

In 1999, after they had been sworn in, President Obasanjo requested of Vice President Atiku to bring in the list of his staff. When he complied, Obasanjo had a complaint - "How come almost everyone on this list is a Doctorate degree holder?" Atiku's response which later became "the talk of Aso Rock" was "No one is an expert in everything. You need those who know around you so that you can learn and improve." That is the mindset of a true leader.

Still speaking about ideas, Atiku has prepared a position paper for Federal Government on RESTRUCTURING as far back as 2003. He is not new to this idea or concept of RESTRUCTURING. He presented this to Obasanjo who pretended he was open to the idea. President Obasanjo was later to use his kangaroo National Conference to undercut and undermine this noble idea, in a diabolical move to ensure his third term as President.

Despite this Atiku never gave up on RESTRUCTURING. He has been meeting with all the Northern leaders trying to convince them on the need for RESTRUCTURING in the interest of Nigeria. He has met many Yoruba leaders. He has met many leaders of Ndi'igbo.

He has met many concerned minority group leaders from the Middlebelt. Obviously, he has not been able to convince everyone of them, especially, some of the staunch members in the Arewa block. But Alhaji Lawal Kaita told me that Atiku was the one who brought him around to accept the concept of RESTRUCTURING. If you are conversant with Nigerian politics, you would know who Alhaji Kaita is in the scheme of Northern politics, and appreciate what that means.

More often than not, people of means are not always enamoured by the travails of the needy. At times, it is not because they are wicked, mean or cruel, it is because they have never lacked. And, whether we like it or not, everyone is a product of his experience. Hence, when you come across a few men of means who give of what they have to elevate the needy, it has to be appreciated.

Atiku is in this mode. He is not a revolutionary by any means. But he is just a reformer who sees the need to shake up and reform the status quo for enlightened self interest. Enlightened self interest is what Capitalism is all about. Our own brand of Capitalism is yet to understand this concept. It is this lack of understanding of this concept that is regrettably acting as a catalyst for the political elites noxious indifference to the social, religious and economic decadence in the polity. But Atiku does understand. It is part of what drives him.

Thus, it wasn't a surprised when in a conversation recently, Vice President Atiku was quoting John F. Kennedy to buttress his point of the need to reform the system. The famous quote that he used is as follows:

"Any Nation that is not able to provide for the many that are poor will not be able to protect the few that are rich."

In this quote is an urgent message which only a thinking leader, a caring leader and a selfless leader could grasp. And Atiku, obviously, does.

As a man of ideas, Atiku is also a good manager of men and resources. You don't have to take my word, check out his businesses. They are success stories. Why? This is because he knows how to put round pegs in round holes and square pegs in square holes. He rewards competence generously. He also is always learning and improving himself.

Still as a man of ideas, if you give Atiku a proposal about any subject, you better be sure of what you have put down. Atiku would take the proposal and ask you to see him at an appointed date usually between two weeks. During this, he would go through your proposal meticulously, write out his questions, his disagreements and agreements. Your next appointment is meant to discuss these concerns and observations. You must be able to defend your ideas convincingly before he would buy into it. That is a proof of a thinking leader. He knows where he wants to lead the country, but ideas and contributions are welcome.

Atiku is a human being. What do I mean by such a statement that seems self evident and obvious? He is caring. He is loyal. He is compassionate. He is considerate. He believes in taking care of anyone who crosses his path without expecting anything in return. He had blood of kindness flowing in his veins. He has a big heart. You can always count on him in distress if you can get his ears, which is not difficult. It is an added bonus if you are his friend and or his staff.

Atiku is a cosmopolitan politician. His marriages are attestation to this fact. He sees beyond his immediate environment. While he is fiercely loyal to his people and community, he would fight to the last to ensure that a third party's entitlement is not taken away from him or her. He is willing to see from the perspective of the others and seek a common ground. Some think this is inconsistency. But the primary responsibility of a leader is to listen and create a vision to lead accordingly. I see this as a virtue rather than vice. He knows how to bring people together.

Atiku, unlike some of his political friends, believes in the rule of law. What is my proof? Throughout his disagreements with President Obasanjo, Atiku was always resorting to court to resolve the disagreements. If I remember correctly, he took OBJ to court about eleven times and won every time. This further embittered Obasanjo against him and soured their relationship more. Nigeria needs a leader who believes in and respect the law.

Atiku is always willing to give up on his ambition for the greater good of all. His good heart and the unquenchable desire for the greater good has made him vulnerable to the political hawks around. As a result of this, he has ended up being the most betrayed politician in this era. My brother, Barrister Ayo Turton succinctly put it on his page on Facebook as follows:

"It was a 3-way run between him, MKO and Kingibe for SDP primaries in 1993. No clear winner, so MKO appealed to him through Yar'Adua to step down with a promise to make him the Vice President. He agreed. Along the line he was schemed out, Kingibe became the VP. The rest is history.

In 2003, he was the most powerful politicians in Nigeria, he had most of the delegates and PDP Governors urging him to run against Baba Obasanjo, he could have won easily. Baba cajoled and appealed to him to wait till 2007 when he will hand over to him. He agreed. As 2007 approaches, Baba started scheming for a third term in defiance of that promise. Atiku screamed and kicked. That signal the beginning of their fight. Baba lost third term bid, Atiku lost Presidential bid. The rest is history.

After APC primaries in 2015, he put everything in to support Baba Buhari after he lost the primary to him. He is now complaining that he has been sidelined again. Even Asiwaju Tinubu got sidelined. I hate betrayal, maybe that's why I have sympathy for Atiku."

On the last paragraph in Barrister Turton's statement, I will make this comment. Many Buharists or Buharideens who are vilifying Atiku are uninformed. They should be showing gratitude to Atiku for being there for President Buhari at difficult times. I do understand that they may not know a lot of things that transpire behind the curtains, but Atiku has been there for President Buhari despite being sidelined by the Administration. And Buhari himself knows.

More so, President Mohammadu Buhari should remember the day he sat in a particular place in Abuja, with his head in both his hands, confused, unhappy and sad, pleading with Vice President Atiku in the days leading to the general elections in 2015. This was shortly after the party primaries and he was in the process of picking his running mate. It was a "one on one" private meeting.

At this point again, another perfidy against Atiku had taken place. But that would be a story for another day. But Atiku still gave his words to Buhari and cheered him up not to worry too much, assuring Buhari of his support. Buhari left the place of the meeting, feeling better but still unsure.

About five hours later after Buhari had left, a delegation arrived at the same place to see Atiku. The delegation was led by Asiwaju Bola Tinubu. Pa Bisi Akande and Rauf Aregbesola were in that delegation. Buhari did not tell them before he met Atiku but brought their attention to the fact that they had to meet him (Atiku) and plead with him before things could move further.

At this meeting, Atiku was very blunt. He reminded Tinubu of their agreement and the conditions they both agreed on before Atiku joined APC. He pointed out that once again, he has been betrayed. At the appropriate time, some of the details might be made public if necessary. Tinubu and the members of that delegation pleaded with Atiku to forgive. They appealed to the importance of "collective good".

He did. He forgave.

And as Barrister Turton quipped on his Facebook page, "The rest is now History."

Nigeria is in dire straits. One's concern is the gradual descent into anarchy because of incompetence, nepotism, injustice and imbalance of this current administration. Nigeria and Nigerians need a rescuer. And Atiku is it. Buharists and Buharideens would not be able to stop Nigerians who want a good manager which Atiku represents. The bus is moving away. They are being left behind at the station.

The demonization of Abubakar Atiku, the Man, must cease. He has been betrayed over and over because of his trusting nature. He has been victimized over and over because of his willingness to accommodate. Good nature is a virtue not a vice. It is not a sign of weakness in a leader but that of strength that could and should be positively appropriated for the good of all. His ambition is not a crime. And it is not morbid either. If his ambition was morbid, Obasanjo would not have had a second term. He (Atiku) would have been President in 2003.

As for me, I am resolved about my desire for an Oodua Nation. It is an inevitable goal that is destined to materialize. And it is a matter of time before it becomes a reality. But while we are still here, in this contraption called Nigeria, as our people eke out survival, it is important to be alert to what is happening around us. We can't and we are not operating in a cocoon. Our arms should not and must not remain akimbo as social, religious and economic damages are being done to our polity.

Hence, to this end, we must derobe ourselves of blinding sentiments and emotion as we tackle and navigate the vicissitudes of the Nigerian politics, with our eyes fixated on the ultimate goal. There is no gain saying the fact that ABUBAKAR ATIKU is THE MAN. His are capable hands, tested and proven in its being stable, knowledgeable, accommodating, considerate and able.

It is time to get serious.
10.09.2017 LISTEN

The question of who gets to be awarded a concession to either prospect or undertake any mining venture in the country, expressly belongs to the central government, and not the chiefs and people of any particular locality in the country. Which is why it comes as nothing short of the patently absurd for the chiefs of such towns and villages as Nyinahin, Nkawie and Mpasaaso to be huffing and puffing over the perfectly legitimate refusal by the Akufo-Addo-led government of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) to allow the mining company owned by Mr. Ibrahim Mahama, the younger brother of former President John Dramani Mahama, to exploit the bauxite-laden hills of the Atwima-Mponua District of the Asante Region.

What is significant to highlight here is the fact that the governments refusal, even as the Chairman of the Minerals Commission and, I believe, also the Chairman of the Forestry Commission, as well as the Minister of Lands and Natural Resources, Mr. John Peter Amewu, have amply explained, is squarely based on some serious contractual violations committed by the owner and operatives of the Engineers & Planners firm. It has absolutely nothing, whatsoever, to do with the well-known fact that Mr. Ibrahim Mahama took undue advantage of his brothers executive position to wantonly ride roughshod over the laws of the land.

Him being an indigenous Ghanaian citizen has also not prevented Mr. Ibrahim Mahama from being reckless and less protective of the concessionary environment than many of the foreign mining companies that some of the chiefs and people of Nyinahin fault for unceremoniously abandoning their neighborhood or community. Maybe these dissenting traditional rulers would do themselves a dosage of good by enquiring from the Minerals and Forestry commissions why some of the foreign mining companies abandoned the Nyinahin vicinity. Insulting the intelligence of President Addo DankwaAkufo-Addo, by making pointless and illogical comparisons with the Atiwa bauxite deposits, near Kyebi, Nana Akufo-Addos hometown, will not address the real issue of legal violations at stake in the Ibrahim Mahama impasse.

We are here talking about a scofflaw entrepreneur who has the routine and criminal habit of paying for import duties on his mining equipment with dud, or fake, checks. And these Nyinahin and Atwima-Mponua chiefs would have the rest of the nation believe that a pathologically irresponsible concessionaire like the Chief Executive Officer of the Engineers & Planners firm is a reliable potential employer of their youths. How pathetic! Indeed, they may not care about whether Mr. Ibrahim Mahama is a serial tax-dodger or not, but President Akufo-Addo does not have this kind of luxury. Rather, he has to account for every cedi or pesewa collected and deposited into our national treasury vault or lost through the callous and systematically unpatriotic scam-artistry of well-positioned reprobate Ghanaian citizens like Mr. Ibrahim Mahama.

Indeed, if the so-called Nkawiepaninhene who claims Mr. Ibrahim Mahama to be his bona fide scion or heir were that much of a responsible adult and traditional ruler himself, he would have ensured that his son or royal prince promptly paid his taxes as part of his obligation to our national development effort. In the latter sense, the relevant operatives of the Akufo-Addo Administration may be aptly envisaged to be wisely and honorably engaged in the business of protecting the evidently self-destructive Nyinahin chiefs from themselves. Very likely, some of these chiefs have had their palms literally greased by the operatives of the Exton Cubic firm. That is their problem, and one which they need to keep to themselves.

*visit my blog at: kwameokoampaahoofe.wordpress.com Ghanaffairs
10.09.2017 LISTEN

TOMORROW, 11 SEPTEMBER 2017, IS FREE SHS DAY: A very historic day in the annals of this nation. That for the first time, a Government is attempting to offer free secondary education to ALL its young people including feeding them, despite concerns about quality and equity issues. A bold attempt to reduce poverty and stimulate increased economic development. The goals of equitable economic growth, poverty reduction, coupled with strong social demand for democratization for Ghana depend on equitable access to high quality education and secondary education plays an important role in this regard.

Whilst we celebrate this momentous occasion, I would want to make one quick and very final comment on the benchmark for selecting free SHS beneficiaries. I start by reechoing three important facts about the BECE assessment( which have stated many times):

BECE assessment compares an individual child's performance to that of his or her classmates or some other larger group. BECE assessment tells how one child compares to similar children on a given set of skills and knowledge, but DOES NOT provide information about what the child does and does not know. As a norm-referenced test, BECE scores indicate the student's ranking relative to that year group and that a score (say 45%) for Grade 9 in BECE 2017 could become the score for Grade 7 in BECE 2018 due to the variations in performance between the two year groups.

Therefore, to deny any child or over 36,000 children access to SHS/TVET on the basis of a score of 9 in Math or English, as weve done, is purely a political decision....it has nothing to do with the conceptual interpretation of the BECE assessment, within the context of measurement and evaluation. Note that, in each year, 4% of the BECE candidates will obtain Grade 9 in Maths or English by default ( the stanine system), even if they re-sit as they've been told to do. Effectively, some people will NEVER get access to free SHS/TVET under the current arrangement, contrary to the Government's rhetoric of No Child is Left Behind.

BECE has always been a political tool to control access to secondary education since inception in the early 1990s, and I thought we've got a great opportunity to break this decades of social injustice and rewrite the narrative. I want you to take off your party lenses for once and reflect on this:

Where should the affected young people go (many of them are likely to come from low income backgrounds and attended poor quality public JHS, the very group the policy is meant for)? Will Government enroll them on some apprenticeship programme to prepare them for the world of work? Whats their faith, in this era of massification of secondary education?

Wear your voice and ask Government to reconsider its decisionIf we managed to convince Government not to limit free SHS to ONLY 2017 BECE as it originally intended, then its not too latestand up to be counted..let's do this together.

NB: Im not the only person who knows this fact, but for those who know and have kept quiet, its up to them...be on the side of history. #Share

#forGodandCountry #freeSHS #AdvocacyWorks
10.09.2017 LISTEN

The political terrine is actually full of issues. There are very challenging issues begging for national attention but the very people who suppose to use their expertise to raise those issues up are rather jumping in glory for an attempt by government to implement progressively free secondary education.

We must be serious and stop making mockery of academia. After we have implemented, monitored, assessed and evaluated the process and get positive feedbacks or position results, we shall then celebrate our milestone in that regards. We are not there yet!!

As a teacher, I pray for a successful implementation of the program but let me be quick to add that every intervention comes with emerging problems. This is not any uncommon knowledge to policy analysts.

Government is really doing well in the implementation process but it is as if teachers and other stakeholders are only spactators. Teachers and students are the base of this policy and teachers in particular must have a voice in the process. The teacher is not a slave to educational policies. This is why national dialogue is still required.

Foresight is required to envisage challenges that are bound to happen. A holistic consultation with this, would help one to appreciate or otherwise of the relevance of the intervention.

Progressively free secondary education requires a massive proportionate intervention at the tertiary institutions. Infrastructure must be expanded, more institutions must be established to absorb the gargantuan numbers that would possibly be churned out by secondary schools.

If access is limited at the tertiary educational level like we have already introduced the quota system at the training colleges, then there would be a gap. This gap would be a threat to the policy and has an almost infinitive propensity to defeat the essence of the intervention.

I think we can slow down, put the quick glorification aside and think of the sustainability of the policy. We could stand more exposed to other internal and external shocks(educationally) if we don't adopt a holistic approach in our quest to providing better and quality education in the country. The truth is that as a developing country, we need policies that are sustainably viable and not what is politically expedient.

I think we can take Uganda as a case study because it has a better experience in a similar policy. A similar intervention compounded the educational predicaments of Uganda and the country has since been struggling to raise educational standards.

Let's engage in a nationalistic discourse and find better alternatives to sustaining any intervention by the state after all, it is for the progress of the state.

Unfortunately, anybody who wants to offer any critique on the implementation of this free secondary education is called names and insulted. Today, people think that they right to offer critique on this policy is reserved for only NPP. That has always been the mistake of many African countries.

Government cum NPP communicators should know that it is the sweat of the citizenry that will be used to finance this policy. All of us are contributing in one way or the other and so the political jabbing must be given a reasonable ceiling in the interest of the government and Ghana.

Rubbishing critique is tantamount to discrimination and exposes our shallow understanding of democratic governance. We are all Ghanaian.

Everything requires nationalism but everything does not require politics.

Denis Andaban

[email protected]
10.09.2017 LISTEN

It is such a pity that the most influential of the people around former President Mahama still don't seem to understand the national mood regarding John Mahama's years in power as Ghana's leader.

Ditto the feelings he evokes amongst many ordinary Ghanaians - the vast majority of whom (when they are being generous) regard him as a politican who was lucky to become Ghana's leader: but was too nice to people to be an effective leader of a nation with a Byzantine system that is difficult to govern and requires tough-minded leadership if it is to be well-governed.

If John Mahama's handlers understood that reality - and do indeed have his best interests at heart - they would recommend: that he stays permanently out of active politics; never criticises his successor in office; and maintains a dignified silence on domestic political issues at all material times. It is the smartest way to rehabilitate his battered image.

To be generous (on a purely human level) to him, perhaps if the office of President of the Republic of Ghana was a ceremonial one, John Mahama would have been more suited to that role. Unfortunately for him and his many supporters in the NDC that however is not the case.

Furtheremore, when the prosecutions of those amongst our vampire-elites who participated in the brutal gang-rape of Mother Ghana finally get under way, and the shocking revelations of how they ruthlessly swindled our nation out of trillions of cedis become public, perhaps the National Democratic Congress (NDC) will then finally accept that the Mahama-era is well and truly over - and that the harsh reality facing them is that their party must rid itself of all the corrupt elements in its ranks if it is ever to return to power again.

Finally, there are some who describe John Dramani Mahama's presidency as a missed opportunity - for both the man and for his party. This blog reluctantly shares that view. Alas, politics isn't about being nice to people - it is about offering decisive leadership that is transformational in its impact on society when it matters most. Sadly, our immediate past president was unable to do so when it was what Ghanaian society required of its leader in the national interest.

That is why former President John Mahama would be wise to call it quits now and leave the hurly-burly of the Ghanaian political world behind him - and enjoy a dignified retirement (with former U.S. President Carter's good works on the global stage in his retirement years as his inspiration for a similar role in Africa) instead. Food for thought.
10.09.2017 LISTEN

Two Nigerians, Imrana Alhaji Buba and Adepeju Jaiyeoba, have been announced as recipients of JCI Ten Outstanding Young Persons (JCI TOYP) of the year award for 2017. This is the first time in the organisations 34 years history that two Nigerians will appear on the global list, which features inspiring young achievers nominated by JCI organisations in over 120 countries, and selected through public votes and a panel of judges.

The remarkable achievement was revealed in a statement released by Junior Chamber International from its St. Louis, United States global headquarters.

Adepeju and Imrana were recently honoured at the JCI Nigeria 60th Anniversary TOYP Gala in Lagos alongside other recipients of the national edition of the awards. The two will later join 8 other global honorees to be celebrated at the 2017 JCI Awards Ceremony on November 9th, 2017 during the JCI World Congress in Amsterdam, Netherlands.

Imrana Buba, an indigene of Yobe State is being honoured for Contribution to Children, World Peace and Human Rights based on his efforts in founding and leading Youth Coalition Against Terrorism (YOCAT), a team of over 600 students, lawyers, health care professionals, educators, development workers, and activists working since 2010 to unite youth against violent extremism in North-Eastern Nigeria.

Adepeju Jaiyeoba, a trained lawyer, is being honoured in the Medical Innovation category for her efforts in addressing the national challenge of inadequate maternal healthcare, through her Brown Button Foundation, which has trained over 60,000 Traditional Birth Attendants (TBAs) on modern medical skills across 33 Nigerian states, touching the lives of 60,000 women and babies.
Nollywood Ambassadors Awards (NAA) International Initiative, says it will honour stakeholders who have contributed to the growth of the Nigerian movie industry at its maiden event scheduled for Sept. 29.

Mr Sunny-Ken Awoji, President of the Initiative, organisers of the award, made this known in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Friday in Abuja.

Nollywood has evolved to become a global brand, and it is time to celebrate our brand ambassadors for their immense contributions to the growth of a brand that has created jobs for many Nigerians.

According to Awoji, there are individuals and organisations, within and outside the Nigerian motion picture industry, popularly known as Nollywood, that have contributed toward its astronomical growth.

He said also that anyone, across every sector, who have shown uncommon patriotism and contributed to the exponential growth of the film making industry to where it is today, is our worthy ambassador that deserves accolade.

These worthy ambassadors of our great industry are worth celebrating, he said.

Awoji explained that since the initiative was geared towards recognising both practitioners and supporters of the industry alike, the award has been classified into internal and external awards respectively.

It is time to look beyond the industry and acknowledge those who have helped us thus far that is why the award is classified into internal and external awards.

He added that the roll of honour cuts across over 20 categories, with recipients picked from various field of human endeavours.

He explained that the categories; the external awards include Most Supportive Personality of the Year, Humanitarian Man/Woman of the Year, Most Supportive Clergy Man of the Year and the Most Creative Politician of the Year.

Others he said are: Excellent Media, Media personality Award, Youngest Entrepreneur and the Print Media Personality, and others.

He added that the internal category of the award include Best Guild President of the year, Most Creative Director of the year, Best Producer and the Best Director.

The Best Actors (Male and Female), Kannywood Best Actor, and the Most Promising Actor, male and female respectively, would also be honoured among others.

According to him, the Federal Ministry of Information and other relevant government agencies such as the National Council for Arts and Culture and the Nigeria Film and Video Censors Board are also in support of the awards.

Awoji explained that the choice of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) as venue for the awards was to represent unity and oneness of Nollywood.

Nollywood cuts across the different states and tribes of Nigeria, therefore our centre of unity is the most appropriate place to host this prestigious event, he said.
Popular Yoruba actor, Femi Adebayo, is not one that really likes taking about his private life especially in public but when he feels there is need to address an issue, he takes his time to do that.

The actor recently gave his fans the avenue to ask him any question they feel like and trust his fans, they were able to ask him questions about his life they were not clear with.

Femi was asked if there is any possibility of him marrying another wife and he was quick to reply that there is possibility because his religion permits it.

According to the fan who asked him the question, Can you marry another wife? since he gave way for the questions, he replied, Yes, my religion permits it.

The actor further went on to clear the air about his failed marriage to his first wife by explaining that he was never the brain behind the divorce but his wife and it was because things did not work out fine between them.

When asked why he divorced his first wife, he said, Point of correction, she divorced me. Guess it did not just work and now we both happily married to our loved ones.

He also added that legally, he does not have custody of the kids but he still has access to them. legally she has the custody and I have the access.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 13:17:44|Editor: Song Lifang

Models present creations of the Spring/Summer 2018 Taoray Wang collection during the New York Fashion Week in New York, the United States on Sept. 9, 2017. (Xinhua/Wang Ying)

NEW YORK, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- Shanghai designer Taoray Wang's newest creations at the New York Fashion Week on Saturday were a visual feast as the beautiful clothes impressed visitors with a unique blend of Chinese and Western cultures that were manifested in the designs.

On the third day of the fashion week, Wang fused East and West, modern and classic, masculinity and femininity into the Spring/Summer 2018 collection, named "Shanghai Baroque."

"The inspiration came unexpectedly as I was listening to a concert in which a group of a very young fashionable Chinese musicians were playing Baroque British court music," said Wang.

Her namesake brand, Taoray Wang, first appeared at New York Fashion Week in the fall of 2014, and soon won applause for attaching great importance to combining modern art and traditional Chinese elements.

Wang, who studied fashion in Japan after graduating with a degree in history, has a diverse background and a global point of view. Still, she once said that Chinese culture is deeply rooted in her, as can be seen from the tailoring and the colors she uses.

"I'm so proud of being Chinese. Chinese culture is something you have to take time to discover and understand," said Wang.

Tiffany Trump, the younger of U.S. President Donald Trump's two daughters, was among the celebrities who watched Wang's show in the front row on Saturday.

She told Xinhua that clothes designed by Wang are impeccable, and the way Wang incorporates strength and fluidity into the clothes "is something that a lot of designers can't do."

The 23-year-old first daughter was wearing a Taoray Wang dark strapless frock and white sash from the brand's latest collection on Wednesday.

In January, she wore a white double-breasted coat from the designer at her father's inauguration.

Wang said she was surprised to see Tiffany wearing it on that big day and she is thankful to Tiffany for her trust and choice of the Chinese brand.

Peter Brant Jr., son of a fashion model and a billionaire, was wearing a white outfit with line embroidery from the new Taoray line on Wednesday.

"I love the collection. It's post-modern with classic fabric," said the model.

He loved Chinese fashion because Eastern and Western elements are now coming together in a unique way in Chinese fashion brands, he said.

"Western arts had so much influence from the East historically and now Asia is re-purposing all kinds of Western styles and making their own," said Brant.

Indeed, Wang herself once said, "fashion transcends cultures, time and geographies."
'The big truck is still on ...
Who is Ray Hushpuppi? According to his Instagram bio, he is a real estate developer. But is this really the case? Here is the man's biography.

Image: instagram.com, @hushpuppi

Source: Instagram

Hushpuppi is known by many all over the world. While multitudes know about his luxurious lifestyle, the one he flaunts on social media, almost no one knows exactly what he does for a living. This is his story.

Ray Hushpuppi profile summary

Ray Hushpuppi real name: Ramon Olorunwa Abbas

Ramon Olorunwa Abbas Nicknames: Aja Puppi and Aja 4

Aja Puppi and Aja 4 Birthday: October 11th

Biography

Although many news outlets report that the celebrity was born on 14th June, Hushpuppi took to Instagram on October 11, 2019, to wish himself a happy birthday.

As I turn a year older into my 30s today, I want to celebrate all of you out there who have through the years been very supportive in any form to me, those of you who mostly I have never met, spoken to or anything but have been a strong supporter of me through every situation until this point and still riding for me, I want you to know wherever you are that I celebrate and appreciate you today, today is OUR DAY!"

Source of his wealth - Is Hushpuppi Yahoo Boy?

Ray never opens up about his fortune  only he knows how he went from rags to riches. People have a lot of speculations; however, no one is really aware of how he made his money.

Some say that he has influential friends or sponsors, and some are convinced that he invested his money into a profitable business which is now booming.

One of the other theories is that the man is a Yahoo boy, an individual who makes money by duping people online.

Image: instagram.com,@hushpuppi

Source: Instagram

Hushpuppi cars

Hushpuppi's cars include a Rolls Royce Wraith, Range Rover Sport, Range Rover Vogue, and a Ferrari.

Hushpuppi net worth

His net worth is guesstimated at 20 million USD as of 2020.

Hushpuppi's scandals with famous people

Fans are interested in Ray but not only for his style and show of wealth; his verbal battles on social media are also quite interesting. He once attacked the famous rappers Ice Prince and Phyno. Hushpuppi said that these celebrities wear fake wristwatches, so they should not be surprised if someone starts stealing their music.

The Gucci fan often commits to such raids and calls for justice. So Nigerian celebrities should be very careful. Ray called his victims hypocrites on Snapchat, which led to a lot of scandals and more reasons for people to talk about him.

The famous star Davido is a well-known competitor of Ray. Their media wars have been epic. It seems both men want to prove to each other that he is richer than the other.

Stars who Ray attacked also responded quite harshly. Phyno replied that he has other priorities. Ray can live for Gucci and die for this brand but he has no business forcing others to be like him. Everyone has different needs.

According to Phyno, the only things Hushpuppi has to worry about are flights and the choice of goods in the store. The rapper said that not everyone has time for such frivolities. And it's not classy to be too loud and boast of one's riches.

Image: instagram.com, @hushpuppi

Source: Instagram

Ice Prince asserted that he represents the whole nation, his beloved people, while Hushpuppi represents Gucci. He found this ridiculous.

KCee, one of the big figures of the Nigerian music industry, has also been involved in a dispute with Hushpuppi. He decided to take revenge on Ray and asked the EFCC to investigate the source of income of the fashionista. He accused Hushpuppi of attacking musicians who work in the studio honestly and industriously to create high-quality music. Hushpuppi called for 'Amadioha' to crush KCee.

The musician, in turn, said that Ray has no right to bother artists. They, unlike him, do not hide their incomes. Where did his wealth come from? - the answer must be unclean.

KCee said that he was tired of this disrespect and would like to know what Hushpuppi's talent is and how he works to earn so much money. The threat of writing a petition did not sound like a joke. The offended stars really wanted honesty about Hushpuppi's money. There were questions about his family and paying taxes. KCee called on the authorities to pay more attention to Ray and uncover his filthy secrets.

As you can see, Ray is a rather controversial personality. If you take into consideration various rumours, it is not easy to understand who is Hushpuppi in real life. He treats his fans with great warmth. He attends many events and hangs out with major celebrities. It seems there are a lot of people who love him. Hushpuppi has even said that he is always pleased to meet new people and make friends.

Some people even respect him. He believes in himself and continues to work at his goals, not paying attention to the words of ill-wishers. He believes that his hard criticism is for those who deserve it.

Fans have, however, advised Ray to be careful and that he is playing a dangerous game. Not everyone likes his straightforwardness.

Of course, he has gotten into trouble. He calls his problems a useful experience that makes him stronger.

Ray also encourages people who see him on the streets to stop and say hello. He has thanked all those who hated him, as they attracted attention and helped Hushpuppi to earn more money. Bad PR is also PR.

He also added that people should not complain about their lives, but work their way up to the top to succeed. According to Ray, relying on someone in life will do you no good  you should rely only on yourself and your abilities.

Image: instagram.com, @hushpuppi

Source: Instagram

His recent arrest

As reported by CNN, in June 2020, United Arab Emirates investigators swooped into Ray's Dubai apartment, arrested him, and handed him over to FBI agents, who flew him to Chicago on July 2.

This was after a federal affidavit alleged his extravagant lifestyle was financed through hacking schemes that stole millions of dollars from major companies in the United States and Europe.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) accuses Hushpuppi of being part of a network that made hundreds of millions of dollars from business email compromise frauds and other scams.

He was arrested along with 11 others. His attorney, Gal Pissetzky, declined to get into details on how his client earns his money. But what he does for a living is going to be "one of the main points of contention here," he told CNN.

Pissetzky called his client's arrest a kidnapping, saying Dubai handed him to the United States with "no legal proceedings whatsoever."

Interestingly, Hushpuppi's social media helped the authorities track him down. His Instagram account, for example, had an email and phone number saved for account security purposes. The authorities got this information and linked his email and phone number to financial transactions and transfers with people the FBI believed were his co-conspirators.

Ray's cybercrimes reportedly involved huge amounts of money. A paralegal at a New York law firm wired nearly $923,000 meant for a client's real estate refinancing to a bank account controlled by Ray and his co-conspirators.

Hushpuppi and an unnamed person also conspired to launder $14.7 million from a foreign financial institution last year, according to a criminal complaint.

The man also has also been accused of conspiring to try to steal $124 million from an unnamed English Premier League soccer club.

Hushpuppi was formerly held in the Metropolitan Correction Centre in Chicago but he was transported to Los Angeles by the U.S. Marshals Service, following a court ruling in the Northern District of Illinois.

Ray Hushpuppi is a highly controversial man, especially when it comes to how he earns his money. However, what is as clear as day is that the man really enjoys his lavish lifestyle, and he has no problem flaunting it.

READ ALSO: Hushpuppi reveals he has three kids with different women

Legit.ng recently reported that Ray Hushpuppi shared more information about his personal life. Ray disclosed that he has a family even if he does not put their pictures up on social media. He revealed that he has three kids from three different women.

He also added that in the past five years, he has been in an unsteady relationship with the mother of his last child.

Source: Legit.ng
- Shehu Sani, a Nigerian senator from Kaduna state, is warning President Muhammadu Buhari to watch his back

- Sani believes Aisha Alhassan, a minister, is even of lesser evil compared to some who claim to love Buhari

- He spoke as part of his reaction to the controversy generated by Alhassan, who professes loyalty to Atiku Abubakar

Senator Shehu Sani has warned President Muhammadu Buhari to be careful about those who publicly declare their support and loyalty at this current period when one of his ministers has warned him against seeking re-election in 2019.

Sani spoke in a post on social media on Saturday, September 9, after Governor Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna state had claimed he warned Buhari against appointing Aisha Alhassan as minister with the argument that she never campaigned or voted for the president.

READ ALSO: My hope and prayer is Buhari will contest in 2019 - El-Rufai

In his usual parable which he illustrated with snakes, Sani warned Buhari to be mindful that those who spat venom before him and those who did behind him are all snakes.

He went further to state that the former are even of lesser evil than the latter.

The Disloyal cobra who spat venom before you and the friendly viper who sprayed venom behind you are all snakes. In comparison, the former is of lesser evil than the later, he said.

The senator did not however mention any particular name, but it is believed that he was speaking about the recent claim by Alhassan that she was very loyal to Atiku Abubakar, a former vice president, and the fact that some top politicians in the country had been reacting.

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It is also public knowledge that Sani is not in a good relationship with El-Rufai and this has lingered almost since they both won election as senator and governor respectively.

Legit.ng earlier reported that a chieftain of the APC, Comrade Timi Frank, also cautioned the presidency not to fall for the antics of Governor Nasir El-rufai of Kaduna state.

In a statement on Saturday, September 9, Frank stated that the governor has a record of betraying all his benefactors.

Watch this video as Nigerians speak about the recent claim that the country is out of recession:

Source: Legit.ng
- Northern governors said President Buhari has performed well in two years

- They promised to vote for him if he seeks re-election in 2019

- Governor Ibikunle Amosun said he deserves to contest in 2019

The Northern Governors Forum has said that based on the performance of President Muhammadu Buhari in the last two years in power, it will vote for him if he recontests in 2019.

There has been talk about the 2019 presidency following Aisha Alhassans open endorsement for Atiku for the 2019 presidency.

READ ALSO: IPOB takes Nigeria Police Force, commissioner to court

The Punch however reports that the northern governors said it would be better to continue with President Buhari in 2019 so as to consolidate with the foundational work he has done.

Governor Abdullahi Ganduje who is the deputy chairman of the forum spoke through his commissioner for information and culture, Mr. Muhammed Garba said the transparent manner in which the president has been handling the nations economy and his war on corruption has increased support for him.

He said: The Buhari brand is a unifying factor because Nigerians across ethno-religious divides have come to see him as a man who walks the talk.

For us in Kano for example, our support for him is 100 per cent. We know him as an honest Nigerian who thinks Nigeria first before anything else.

His performance over the last two years  especially in the war against corruption, insecurity and terrorism  has been exemplary.

Should he decide to hear our cry to seek re-election, we will not only support him but also do everything humanly and legally possible to ensure his victory.

For those who have the privilege of travelling outside Nigeria, it is common knowledge that we are now respected because of the value the Buhari administration has brought to governance.

The Arewa Consultative Forum also said it would support President Buhari in 2019 but gave some conditions before it will do so.

Anthony Sani who is the secretary general of the group said: If President Muhammadu Buhari is able to deliver on his campaign promises substantially and be as fit as a fiddle to undertake presidential responsibilities and tasks by the end of his tenure, there will be no reason not to support him.

PAY ATTENTION: Read the news on Nigerias #1 new app

Governor Ibikunle Amosun also said President Buhari has the right to contest in 2019.

He said: The only thing that can prevent President Buhari from contesting is if his health cannot take it.

If not for this present administration, only God knows where Nigeria would have been. When the government came on board, it was like jumping into the pool at the deep end.

Meanwhile, The special adviser to President Buhari on justice sector reforms and the national coordinator of OGP, Barrister Juliet Ibekaku- Nwagwu praised the efforts of Kano state government in pursuing policies and programs aimed at improving governance in the state.

She stated this in a statement delivered on her behalf by Dr. Haruna Abdullahi at the inception visit of the OGP national secretariat to the state on Friday, September 8.

Watch a Legit.ng TV video below of Nigerians speaking about whom they will vote for between President Buhari and Governor Ayo Fayose if given the choice in 2019

Source: Legit.ng
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 13:37:48|Editor: Xiang Bo

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NEW DELHI, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- India and China are two crucial countries in BRICS and their mutual understanding and cooperation will go a long way in sustaining BRICS and its future prospects, an Indian scholar said.

In a recent interview with Xinhua, A. K. Sinha, a retired professor of Delhi University and foreign affairs expert, said the successful meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is "an extremely positive sign for BRICS all together."

The Chinese president's remarks of putting bilateral relationship with India on "the right track" signify stable bilateral ties in the future, Sinha said.

During the ninth BRICS summit in China's southeastern city of Xiamen, President Xi Jinping said China is willing to work with India on the basis of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence to improve political mutual trust, promote mutually beneficial cooperation, and push Sino-Indian ties along the right track.

Modi agreed that India and China should not see each other as rivals and should instead make cooperation the focus of bilateral ties.

The Indian prime minister said the two sides should advance mutual political trust, expand practical cooperation, increase people-to-people exchanges, and jointly protect regional peace and stability.

"This is in consonance with the larger principles of BRICS as well," Sinha commented. "Cooperation between the two countries will raise the efficacy of BRICS and make the group a strong contributor to the new global growth order."

India and China are both influential economies in BRICS, said the Indian scholar, adding that the two countries putting up a united front at BRICS after recent resolution of Doklam (Dong Lang) stand-off was a remarkable achievement of the summit.

"By finding common grounds, BRICS can further make contribution to global economic development," he said. "BRICS has a bright future."

The share of BRICS countries - Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa - in the global economy has risen from 12 percent to 23 percent in the past decade and they collectively contribute more than half of global growth, the professor pointed out.
- Nigerian army intensified its operation against Boko Haram

- They shared photos of terrorists neutralized in a recent operation

The Nigerian army has shared pictures of high ranking Boko Haram terrorists killed by soldiers during aerial bombardment on their hideout.

The pictures were shared by army spokesperson, Brigadier General Sani Kukasheka Usman, on Saturday, September 9.

READ ALSO: Northern Governors Forum speak on 2019 presidency

He wrote: "Please recall that in our release of Tuesday 4th September 2017, we informed you that some senior Boko Haram terrorists commanders were neutralized last week Friday, 1st September 2017, during aerial bombardment on their hideout.

One of the Boko Haram terrorists killed during operation. Credit: Facebook, SK Usman

"Below are the photographs of the neutralized Ameers, Abubakar Benishek, Modu Bako and Audu Kubuiri, for your kind information."

One of three Boko Haram commanders killed by Army during operation. Credit: Facebook, SK Usman

Legit.ng had reported that Nigerian troops battling Boko Haram in the north-eastern state of Borno reportedly recorded a major success against the terrorist group.

Brigadier General Usman confirmed that the terrorists were neutralized after they ran into a military ambush.

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The troops of Mobile Strike Teams (MSTs) 21, on operation LAFIYA DOLE, deployed within the 21 Brigade Nigerian Army Area of Operations, at the early hours of today, Monday 4th September 2017, laid a successful ambush on suspected Boko Haram terrorists crossing point along Firgi- Banki Junction road, Borno state.

Watch a Legit.ng TV video below of the Air Force giving an update on Boko Haram operations:

Source: Legit.ng
- President Buhari is reportedly planning to reshuffle his cabinet at the FEC meeting

- This is coming after Aisha Alhassan's endorsement of Atiku Abubakar

- A source said the president is not considering outright sack of the ministers

President Muhammadu Buhari is reportedly planning to reshuffle his cabinet at the Federal Executive Council meeting on Wednesday, September 13.

According to report, this was as a result of tension caused by Aisha Alhassans endorsement of Atiku Abubakar for 2019 presidency.

READ ALSO: Ojukwu's son speaks on Nnamdi Kanu's Biafra agitation

A reliable source of the presidency said President Buhari was said to have been contemplating a rejig of his cabinet and that the outright sack of ministers was in doubt.

You know PMB has not really been in the country this year; he might have reshuffled before now. But recent episodes have raised the question of how much appointees are committed to their job.

But with the declaration by Mama Taraba, the president is likely to remove those he feels have underperformed as well as those who are not loyal.

It is not really a hard task for him. He appointed all the security heads, so all he needs to do is give directive for reports of movements, meetings and calls made by his appointees.

However, Femi Ojudu who is special adviser to the president on political matters said: My brother I know nothing about that. I left Abuja four days ago. I am in Ekiti as I speak and will be back on Tuesday.

If some people are saying that, I cannot confirm. So right now, I have no information about the soeculation. I will be back on Tuesday, we can talk again then.

PAY ATTENTION: Read the news on Nigerias #1 new app

The national working committee of the party promised to meet concerning the minister of women affairs comment on Monday, September 11.

Mustapha Salihu who is the national chairman of the party in the north east said: This is a national issue. I think by Monday, we will sit and we will address the matter, but I can assure you that there is no cause for alarm. Our party is intact and on ground.

Meanwhile, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar hailed Aisha Alhassan for stating that she would resign if the latter decides to continue in office beyond 2019.

Alhassan, popularly called Mama Taraba, also confirmed her loyalty to Atiku and stated that she was not scared of being sacked by Buhari.

In his reaction, days after the issue generated widespread controversy, Atiku said there was no better way the minister could have expressed her belief than how she did it.

Watch a Legit.ng TV video below of Nigerians talking about whom they will vote for between President Buhari and Governor Fayose in 2019

Source: Legit.ng
- Senator Abba Ali said President Buhari is medically fit to contest in 2019

- The childhood friend of the president said he should contest fr presidency

- He said no other person has the same pedigree as the president

Senator Abba Ali who is the childhood friend of President Muhammadu Buhari has advised him to contest in the 2019 presidential election saying he is the best man for the job.

In an interview with The Punch, the senator who represented Katsina/Dutsinma senatorial district under the defunct National Party of Nigeria from 1979 to 1983 said many people have alleged that the president was not medically fit.

READ ALSO: IPOB takes Nigeria Police Force, commissioner to court

Ali however insisted that the president was in good shape to contest for the election.

He said: President Buhari is hale and hearty; let me first clear that impression on his health. Those urging him to resign on health ground have forgotten that God is the creator of mankind and he has the final say on when one will die. I have seen an old man in Katsina here who was in coma for four months, yet the old man thereafter lived for another eight years before he eventually died. I have also seen a situation where a man was seen today in good health and died the following day not as a result of accident but normal natural death.

That is God for you. So, those saying President Buhari should resign on health grounds are going beyond their limits. They are not God and they are playing God by saying so. Only God knows beyond anybody.

President Buhari should go for a second term in office. He has started a good job which is acknowledged both within the country and globally and it is better he contests again for a second term in office so that he can finish the good job he has started. Everybody knows that this man is not out to accumulate wealth but to put Nigeria in its appropriate place in the comity of nations. This man is out to see that Nigeria is great again. And he has been doing all within his powers to achieve this. He realises that no country can be great with corruption. So he is fighting it with zeal and he is also tackling insurgency and all forms of criminality.

He knows that Nigeria needs good infrastructural development and he is pursuing this. Look at the Mambilla power project that has been abandoned. He has resuscitated it. There are other projects being embarked upon by his government to ensure that the Nigerian youths are no longer jobless. So, I strongly support the call for his second term in office. By the time his second term ends, he would have laid a very solid foundation for whoever that is coming after him to leverage on. God, in his own wisdom, made President Muhammadu Buhari to be above board compared to his fellow politicians.

We are prepared to support him to ensure that his second term bid succeeds and I believe that President Buhari will succeed while his detractors will fail.

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Asked if President Buhari is the only politician that can handle the menace of corruption in the country, the senator said: Based on my experience in politics and with my age, I am saying it with all seriousness that I have not seen anybody among the current crop of politicians in the country who has a good intention like President Buhari. Many of them have amassed enormous wealth meant to take care of their people. Many are still stealing blindly. President Buhari stands out among the current political class in Nigeria. I will rather encourage him to go for a second term so that there will be sanity in the political sphere.

Watch a Legit.ng TV video below of Nigerians speaking about whom they will vote for between President Buhari and Governor Ayo Fayose if given the choice in 2019

Source: Legit.ng
- Governor Amosun says women affairs minister Jummai Alhassan ought to have resigned after her statements against President Muhammadu Buhari

- The minister had said she would not support President Buhari in 2019

- Amosun said that Alhassans outburst shows she was not interested in the success of Buharis administration

Governor Ibikunle Amosun of Ogun has said that women affairs minister Jummai Alhassan ought to have resigned after declaring that she would not support President Muhammadu Buhari in 2019.

The minister is entitled to her opinion; but I would have saluted her if she had resigned her appointment because she cannot blow hot and cold at the same time, Amosun said at a book launch in Abeokuta.

READ ALSO: Northern Governors Forum speak on 2019 presidency

Alhassan had, at a Sallah visit to former Vice President Abubakar Atiku, declared that she would not support Buhari if he contested the 2019 election.

She claimed that the President had promised to serve one term, and promised to support the emergence of Atiku as president in 2019.

But Amosun, in a reaction, said that Alhassans outburst had shown that she was not interested in the success of Buharis administration and must have worked against it since she became a cabinet member.

I expected her to resign immediately after the comments. You cannot be inside and sing a different song, he said.

He declared that nobody had the right to stop Buhari from seeking a second term in 2019 except he decides against it on health ground.

I am not Mr President; I believe he will review the development at the right time, but for somebody to go public like she did, it means she might be working against the government and will not want it to succeed, he said.

Amosun commended Buhari for the positive changes he had brought to the country, saying that he was the appropriate person the nation needed when he became President.

He said that the President had performed credibly well on his three cardinal programmes  security, economy and the fight against corruption  and urged Nigerians to continue to support him.

PAY ATTENTION: Read the news on Nigerias #1 new app

Legit.ng earlier reported that Aisha Alhassan was caught on tape endorsing Atiku as replacement for Buhari in 2019.

She also later said: Let me tell you today that if Baba said he is going to contest in 2019, I swear to Allah, I will go before him and kneel and tell him that Baba I am grateful for the opportunity you gave me to serve your government as a minister.

But Baba just like you know I will support only Atiku because he is my godfather. If Atiku said he is going to contest.

Watch this Legit.ng TV video about how Nigerians reacted to 2019 Buhari campaign posters flooding the streets:

Source: Legit.ng
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 13:42:49|Editor: Xiang Bo

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GUIYANG, Sept. 10 (Xinhua ) -- Kweichow Moutai, China's national liquor, has seen overseas sales grow in the Belt and Road countries.

Overseas sales in H1 grew by 40 percent year-on-year, said Zhang Deqin, deputy general manager of the group, who is attending an international expo in southwest China's Guizhou Province.

Sales in central and eastern Europe have grown by almost 90 percent since the Belt and Road initiative was proposed in 2013, according to Zhang.

Sales in 26 countries along the Belt and Road accounted for nearly 19 percent all sales, Zhang said.

"We will explore more markets with better understanding of consumption habits, levels, economic conditions of Belt and Road countries," said Zhang, adding that the group would look for overseas franchise opportunities.

Moutai is sold in 78 countries and regions. Last year the Group earned 314 million U.S. dollars through exports of 1,721 tonnes of Kweichow Moutai and other alcoholic beverages.

Moutai, produced in Renhuai City of Guizhou Province, is often served on official occasions such as state banquets. Despite its high prices (up from 200 U.S. dollar per bottle), domestic demand for Moutai has always exceeded supply.
- Femi Fani-Kayode applauded Aisha Alhassan for endorsing Atiku

- He described President Buhari as a curse

- He said the world will soon know the truth about kidnap of Chibok girls

Femi Fani-Kayode has saluted Aisha Alhassan for coming out to endorse Atiku Abubakar for 2019 presidency describing him as a blessing for Nigeria.

The minister of women affairs had caused a stir when she openly endorsed the former vice president as president for 2019.

READ ALSO: Northern Governors Forum speak on 2019 presidency

Fani-Kayode took to his Facebook page to commend the minster for her move and described Atiku as a blessing.

He also called on the minister to expose Governor Nasir El-Rufais role in the Chibok girls kidnapping.

He wrote: Mama Taraba is a courageous woman who has spoken the truth. Vice President Abubakar Atiku is a blessing to this nation whilst President Muhammadu Buhari is a curse. The APC sun is about to set.

Mama Taraba has a duty to tell us all she knows about Governor Nasir El Rufai's alleged role in the Chibok girls scam and Boko Haram. I urge her to do so.

I said it BEFORE, DURING and AFTER the 2015 presidential campaign that the truth about the Chibok girls and those behind BH was yet to be heard. Now it is all coming out. Nothing is hidden under the sun.

PAY ATTENTION: Read the news on Nigerias #1 new app

Thank you Mama Taraba. Others will also come out to tell us what they know. Soon the world will know who the real terrorists are.

Meanwhile, Senator Abba Ali who is the childhood friend of President Buhari advised him to contest in the 2019 presidential election saying he is the best man for the job.

In an interview with The Punch, the senator who represented Katsina/Dutsinma senatorial district under the defunct National Party of Nigeria from 1979 to 1983 said many people have alleged that the president was not medically fit.

Watch a Legit.ng TV video below of Nigerians speaking about whom they will vote for between President Buhari and Governor Ayo Fayose if given the choice in 2019

Source: Legit.ng
- Minister of women affairs reacts to fake news circulating that she claimed Governor El-Rufai has something to do with the kidnap of Chibok girls

- She debunked the news as totally untrue and a plot to cause dispute between her and other APC members

The minister of women affairs, Aisha Alhassan, has reacted to the fake news circulating in some online media (not Legit.ng) that Kaduna state governor, Nasir El-Rufai, has a hand in the kidnap of Chibok girls.

Alhassan is being accused by some online media of saying the Kaduna governor is involved in the Chibok girls kidnap.

The minister said the news that she claimed that the Kaduna governor knows something about the 2014 kidnap of over 200 secondary school girls in Chibok, Borno state, was totally untrue.

One of the online media who reported the news.

READ ALSO: Northern Governors Forum speak on 2019 presidency

Alhassan, in a series of tweets, said the fake news was from enemies trying to plot a seed of discord between her and other members of the All progressives Congress (APC).

Her tweets read: "The attention of the Minister Of Women Affairs, Aisha Jummai Alhassan has been drawn to a statement allegedly made by her against Governor Nasir Elrufai.

"The statement allegedly made by her is another ploy by mischief makers to tarnish her hard earned reputation.

"The current APC government under President Buhari inherited series of problems from the past administration, the kidnap of the Chibok girls by the dreaded Boko Haram happens to be one of them and President Buhari and our military has been able to rescue some of them and checked Boko Haram's excesses.

"Senator Jummai is not in possession of any security report and therefore will never have made the statement allegedly made by her against the person of Governor El Rufai.

"Boko Haram kidnapped many others, including women and children apart from Chibok Girls. And this government has been able to rescue most of them.

"The plot to cause bad blood between Senator Jummai and her APC colleagues will continue to hit brick wall."

See Alhassan's tweets below:

PAY ATTENTION: Read the news on Nigerias #1 news app

Meanwhile, Femi Fani-Kayode has saluted Aisha Alhassan for coming out to endorse Atiku Abubakar for 2019 presidency describing him as a blessing for Nigeria.

The minister of women affairs had caused a stir when she openly endorsed the former vice president as president for 2019.

Fani-Kayode took to his Facebook page to commend the minster for her move and described Atiku as a blessing.

Watch a Legit.ng TV video below of Nigerians speaking about whom they will vote for between President Buhari and Governor Ayo Fayose if given the choice in 2019.

Source: Legit.ng
- Igbo National Council has called on the Nigeria army to withdraw the soldiers deployed to the region for Operation Python Dance II

- The group said the south-east is not a war zone and the soldiers have no business in the region

- They threatened to sue the Nigeria army if the soldiers are not evacuated within the stipulated time

The Igbo National Council (INC) has given army Chief of Staff, Lieutenant General Tukur Buratai, a 21-day ultimatum to end the Operation Python Dance II in the south-east.

The group said the south-east region is not a war zone and asked the army chief to withdraw all the soldiers posted to the area within 21 days or be sued at the International Criminal Court (ICC), Daily Post reports.

In a statement signed by the group's national president, Chilos Godsent, the group said: In view of the above, the Igbo National Council, INC, has analysed the state of the Southeast and the Nigerian state and hereby state the following.

READ ALSO: Mama Taraba blasts Fani-Kayode over El-Rufai Chibok girls fake news

The Nigeria state is not at war with the people of South-East Nigeria, and therefore wish to call on the president and Commander in Chief of Armed Forces.

The leadership of the National Assembly to mandate the Minister of Defence staff, Chief of Army Staff, to immediately withdraw the military arbitrarily deployed to Southeast to murder innocent civilians.

If this is not adhered to within twenty one days (21) the Igbo National Council, INC, will petition and also sue the Nigeria Army and the Federal government, to International Criminal Court (ICC) for genocide against the armless people of the southeast Nigeria.

PAY ATTENTION: Read the news on Nigerias #1 news app

Meanwhile, the chief of army staff has warned members of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) and the Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) against any action capable of breaching the peace of the southeast.

Buratai made this known while addressing a press conference at the army headquarters in Abuja.

Legit.ng gathered that he said the warning has become necessary as the military will commence the second phase of Exercise Egwu Eke II (Python Dance II) by September 15.

Watch the first appearance of Nnamdi Kanu as he stepped out of prison recently in the Legit.ng TV video below:

Source: Legit.ng
- Soldiers have allegedly invaded the home of IPOB leader Nnamdi Kanu

- According to Kanu's lawyer, 3 people died while over 20 were injured in the shootout

- Those who were injured are reportedly currently receiving treatment in a nearby hospital in Umuahia

Soldiers allegedly from the Nigeria army have reportedly laid a siege on the country home of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) leader Nnamdi Kanu in Umuahia. This allegation was contained in a statement issued by Kanu's lawyer.

According to Kanu's lawyer, Ifeanyi Ejiofor, the military had on Sunday, September 10, shot sporadically into the air through which 3 people have been reported dead and over 20 injured.

Ejiofor said that those who were wounded during the incident are currently receiving treatment in a nearby hospital in Umuahia.

READ ALSO: Close confidants of Buhari make up the cabal - Shehu Sani

He said: "There is no doubt that the present deployment of troops to the South East is to haunt for my client and possibly eliminate him. Let the whole world know that if anything untoward happen to my client, that president Buhari and his Chief of Army Staff should be held responsible by the international Community."

IPOB members defend Nnamdi Kanu's residence (snapshots from a video)

"The world should be immediately notified about the tension in Biafra land, created by the Government in power.

"We must adopt all know legal mechanism to resist the unconstitutional but violent approach in dealing with unarmed people merely operating within the confines of law. Buhari must be held responsible.

"We are ready to present our case once more before the international court of Justice. The families that lost their beloved ones in the last year may 29th violent attack by the military are yet to recover from the shock of losing their love ones. This situation must be arrested in time," Ejiofor said.

Watch the video below:

In an earlier report by Legit.ng, the Igbo National Council (INC) gave the Army Chief of Staff, Lieutenant General Tukur Buratai, a 21-day ultimatum to end the Operation Python Dance II in the south-east.

The group said the south-east region is not a war zone and asked the army chief to withdraw all the soldiers posted to the area within 21 days or be sued at the International Criminal Court (ICC).

PAY ATTENTION: Read the news on Nigerias #1 news app

In a statement signed by the group's national president, Chilos Godsent, the group said: In view of the above, the Igbo National Council, INC, has analysed the state of the Southeast and the Nigerian state and hereby state the following."

Watch the first appearance of Nnamdi Kanu as he stepped out of prison recently in the Legit.ng TV video below:

Source: Legit.ng
- Femi Fani-Kayode has replied minister of women affairs Hajia Aisha Jummai Alhassan's allegation that he engages in peddling fake news

- The former minister of aviation insists that Alhassan should blame the original source of the allegation and not him

- Fani-Kayode also urged the minister of women affairs to clean up her mess

Nigeria's former minister of aviation, Chief Femi Fani-Kayode, has asked the minister of women affairs, Hajia Aisha Jummai Alhassan (Mama Taraba), not to blame him for her mess.

Fani-Kayode in a series of tweets on Sunday, September 10, replied the minister after she accused him of peddling lies against her.

READ ALSO: Close confidants of Buhari make up the cabal - Shehu Sani

He said: "Mama Taraba should continue to stand on the platform of truth and not allow herself to be intimidated.

I reacted to a story in which she allegedly exposed El-Rufai. It took her 24 hours to deny the story and I wonder why. If the story is not true she should blame the original source, medium and author of the allegation and not me.

I merely reacted to it like millions of other Nigerians did. She should clean up her stinking mess and not blame me for it."

Read the tweets below:

Legit.ng had earlier reported that the Nigeria's minister of women affairs, Aisha Alhassan, blasted former minister of aviation, Femi Fani-Kayode, for saying she knows about Governor Nasir El-Rufai's alleged role in the Chibok girls scam and Boko Haram.

PAY ATTENTION: Read the news on Nigerias #1 new app

In a series of tweets on Sunday, September 10, Mama Taraba as she is popularly called in reaction to FFK's Facebook post, asked the former minister to stop engaging in peddling false news as she never said she knows about Governor Nasir El Rufai's alleged role in the Chibok girls scam and Boko Haram.

Watch a Legit.ng TV video below of Nigerians speaking about whom they will vote for between President Buhari and Governor Ayo Fayose if given the choice in 2019.

Source: Legit.ng
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 13:57:52|Editor: Mengjie

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KUNDUZ, Afghanistan, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Four militants, including a Taliban key commander, were killed in Qala-e-Zal district of Afghanistan's northern Kunduz province on Sunday, a local official said.

"The security forces launched coordinated offensive on Taliban hideout in Ghushi village of Qala-e-Zal district early Sunday, killing four rebels including their notorious commander Mawlawi Ismael on the spot," district governor Abdul Momin told Xinhua.

Two more militants sustained injuries in the fighting, the official asserted.

Taliban militants are yet to make comment.
- Nigerian army reacts to reports that soldiers allegedly invaded the home of IPOB leader Nnamdi Kanu

- Army in a statement said it was a group of suspected IPOB militants that blocked the road against troops of 145 Battalion

- Kanu's lawyer had alleged that 3 people died while over 20 were injured in the shootout

The Nigerian army has denied reports that it invaded the residence of the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Nnamdi Kanu, in Umuahia, Abia state.

Legit.ng had earlier reported that Kanu's lawyer, Ifeanyi Ejiofor, alleged that soldiers laid a siege on the country home of the IPOB leader.

READ ALSO: Igbo National Council gives army chief 21 days to call off operation in south-east

However, Major Oyegoke Gbadamosi, the assistant director of public relations, 14 Brigade Nigerian Army in a statement denied reports that it invaded Kanus home or killed anybody.

Gbadamosi, said it was the residents that threw stones at the military officers.

Read the statement below:

"The attention of 14 Brigade Nigerian Army, has been drawn to fictitious news going round especially on the social media that troops have invaded the home of Nnamdi Kanu and killed 3 persons.

This is far from the truth. Rather, it was a group of suspected IPOB militants that blocked the road against troops of 145 Battalion while on show of force along FMC-Word Bank Road in Umuahia town, Abia State at about 6.00-6.30pm, today.

They insisted that the military vehicles would not pass and started pelting the soldiers with stones and broken bottles to the point of injuring an innocent female passerby and a soldier, Corporal Kolawole Mathew.

The troops fired warning shots in the air and the hoodlooms dispersed. No life was lost.

Therefore the public are kindly enjoined to disregard the rumours going round and the fictitious photographs of purported victims of attack. Both the soldier and the innocent female passerby have been evacuated to the unit's Medical Inspection Room and are receiving treatment.

We would like to use this opportunity to warn mischief makers threatening the peace and security of the country through falsehood such as above.

Members of the public are please requested to go about their lawful business and report any suspicious activity to the nearest police station or security outfit."

PAY ATTENTION: Read the news on Nigerias #1 news app

In an earlier report by Legit.ng, Abdulkadir Erkahraman a Turkish diplomat in reaction to the reports that Kanu's country home was allegedly invaded by soldiers said the Nigerian government is crossing the red line and wants to push Biafrans to arm struggle.

You can listen to this Legit.ng's exclusive chat with Nnamdi Kanu below:

Source: Legit.ng
(Natural News) If this doesnt convince you liberal compassion and tolerance is as thin as Hillary Clintons credibility, nothing will.

You may have heard of a former Olympian named Bruce Jenner. Well, hes a she these days, and she calls herself Caitlyn. And while theres nothing wrong with this if thats your thing, far-Left liberals are said to champion folks like him/her because liberals have long cornered the market on human qualities like understanding, acceptance, and of course compassion and especially tolerance.

But their tolerance, acceptance, understanding, and compassion are conditional: To earn it, you must conform to their political ideology. Otherwise, no matter how cause celebre you are, youre going to be shunned, derided, ridiculed, insulted, mistreated, and made to generally feel like the south end of a rhino.

In other words, liberals are going to treat you just like they accuse conservatives and Trump supporters of treating you (even if they dont, really  and most dont).

Which brings us back to Caitlyn. It seems she kind of supports President Donald J. Trump or, at least, doesnt hate on him as much as most celebrities do, so for that, she has now drawn the ire of the compassionate Left.

As reported by the UKs Daily Mail:

Caitlyn Jenner was ambushed by a trans woman over her support of Donald Trump.

The reality star, 67 was attending the Trans Chorus of Los Angeles on Saturday night when she was confronted by Ashlee Marie Preston.

The activist and journalist found it ridiculous that Caitlyn  a trans woman herself  allegedly continues to support Trump after he authorized banning trans people from serving in the military on Friday.

Youre a f**king fraud and a fake, said Preston.

Not only are liberals hypocrites, theyre bullies, too  and dont liberals hate bullies?

Geez, even Left-wing HBO host Bill Maher recognizes the hypocrisy in that equation: Hating bullying but then using it at every opportunity to force people to accept their way of thinking.

I thought we hated bullying now. When it happens in high school these days, people go nuts. When I was a kid, adults just shrugged and went, eh, kids are a**holes, what are you going to do? Yeah, liberals hate bullying all right, but theyre not opposed to using it. When they casually throw out words like bigot and racist, it does cow people into avoiding this debate, he said to kick off a January 2015 show.

So, Caitlyns a fake and a fraud  not a racist and bigot, but the bullying technique is the same  because she dares to have her own opinion and thoughts about the days events and politics.

You continue to support somebody that does everything with the military to erase our community, Preston argued. Its really f**ked up that you continue to support him.

No, honey, whats messed up is your belief that your opinion is the only one that matters or counts, which is the same problem I have with just about every other liberal. You all think that way.

Fact is, Donald Trump isnt a racist, bigot, homophobe just because you call him one. You may not like his political ideology and you may not agree with his policy choices  and thats okay because you dont have to like or agree with them. (Related: More Dem hypocrisy: Unhinged Gillibrand drops F-bomb in tirade against Trump.)

But what you cant do is make up some version of him that isnt real and then use it as an excuse to berate, belittle, and otherwise attack people who support him.

The only way this American experiment in self-government works is if we allow it to work. If one side  Im talking to you, liberals  assumes it has sole responsibility and authority to decide what is and isnt right, then this democratic experiment fails and America becomes a very large version of Venezuela.

Googles company motto is Dont be evil. Liberals motto ought to be Dont be a hypocrite.

J.D. Heyes is a senior writer for NaturalNews.com and NewsTarget.com, as well as editor of The National Sentinel.

Sources include:

Breitbart.com

DailyMail.co.uk

TheNationalSentinel.com
Fifteen years ago, if you added up the gross domestic product of all Chinas 31 provinces, youd get a number more than 10 per cent larger than the official national total. By around 2019, the country will nearly eliminate that gap, according to Sheng Laiyun, chief economist of the National Bureau of Statistics.

China is shifting to the latest United Nations-based statistical standard, gathering more comprehensive data from a major census next year, and cutting local interference and double accounting by computing GDP for the provinces instead of relying on their own reports, Sheng said in an interview in Beijing.

Output reported by 31 provinces last year totaled a mere 3.7 per cent more than the statistics bureaus figure for national GDP.

If its convincing, a reform that closes the gap would be a major win in Chinas battle against flawed or fake economic data, which has fed scepticism from investors wanting to be able to trust what they read about the worlds second-largest economy. It would also be a triumph for the countrys economic chiefs, such as Premier Li Keqiang, who once complained that some statistics were man-made.

Beyond statistical rigor, China has also shifted the incentives. Pure economic output has become less important for evaluating local party officials performance, and punishments for fraud have been increased.

The statistics bureau also plans to roll out a new barometer of economic health, said Sheng, who became chief economist earlier this year after serving as spokesman for the agency and as the director of the division that compiles national economic output statistics. The green development index will include more than 50 indicators ranging from pollution to economic structure, and will have provincial breakdowns, he said.

A fourth census next year will provide even more accurate and comprehensive basic figures, and likely result in a smaller revision. A fresh national account system released in July will also improve accuracy of the calculation, according to the NBS.
A Chinese television propaganda piece that the english title claims to describe the EMdrive propellentless drive project. It appears they have or will very soon attempt to put the EMdrive into space in a satellite. The piece does not make the technical or other aspects explicit.

They are indicating that they are making progress at the same pace as developed countries for communication satellites.

However, the level of developed country effort is not clear because EMdrive is widely believed to be impossible physics.

NASA has had a small group perform some ground tests and they have detected small amounts of thrust.

The bulk of the video refers more to catching up in communication satellite technology and not needing to import technology.

The details of the EMdrive are not discussed and there do not appear to be any claims of proving the controversial physics.

They discuss 2000 kilogram payload and 120 transponder channels.

In December 2016, Yue Chen told a reporter at Chinas Science and Technology Daily that his team was testing an EmDrive in orbit, and that they had been funding research in the area for five years. Chen noted that their prototypes thrust was at the micronewton to millinewton level, which would have to be scaled up to at least 1001000 millinewtons for a chance of conclusive experimental results. Despite this, he said his goal was to complete validation of the drive, and then to make such technology available in the field of satellite engineering as quickly as possible.

In November 2016 the International Business Times reported that the U.S. government was testing a version of the EmDrive on the Boeing X-37B and that the Chinese government has made plans to incorporate the EmDrive on its orbital space laboratory Tiangong-2.

Cannae drive (similar technology to EMdrive) has claimed that would put cubesats with their propulsion into space. Their website is not working at this time.
Brian Wilcox of Nasas Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) at the California Institute of Technology came to the conclusion that the supervolcano threat is substantially greater than the asteroid or comet threat.

There are around 20 known supervolcanoes on Earth, with major eruptions occurring on average once every 100,000 years. One of the greatest threats an eruption may pose is thought to be starvation, with a prolonged volcanic winter potentially prohibiting civilization from having enough food for the current population. In 2012, the United Nations estimated that food reserves worldwide would last 74 days.

What is a Supervolcano?

A volcano which erupts and throws magma and rocky particles over an area greater than 240 cubic miles (1000 cubic kilometers) is considered a supervolcano. These massive eruptions dwarf typical volcanic eruptions. It is like comparing a small shock from static electricity to a lightning bolt: Mount Vesuvius produced 100,000 cubic yards of magma per second during its massive explosion in A.D. 79. The damage from this ordinary volcano was legendary. If Mount Vesuvius had been a supervolcano, it would have produced 100 million cubic yards of magma per second.

Yellowstone National Park is a famous supervolcano. The last time Yellowstone erupted, 640,000 years ago, the ash blanketed an area from California to Minnesota. If Yellowstone were to erupt again, the ash would be thick enough to collapse roofs on houses in neighboring states. The loss of life would be massive: Tens of thousands of people would die from the immediate eruption and pyroclastic (lava) flow.

The most logical solution could simply be to cool a supervolcano down. A volcano the size of Yellowstone is essentially a gigantic heat generator, equivalent to six industrial power plants. Yellowstone currently leaks about 60-70% of the heat coming up from below into the atmosphere, via water which seeps into the magma chamber through cracks. The remainder builds up inside the magma, enabling it to dissolve more and more volatile gases and surrounding rocks. Once this heat reaches a certain threshold, then an explosive eruption is inevitable.

Nasa estimates that if a 35% increase in heat transfer could be achieved from its magma chamber, Yellowstone would no longer pose a threat. The only question is how?

One possibility is to simply increase the amount of water in the supervolcano. But from a practical perspective, it would likely be impossible to convince politicians to sanction such an initiative.

Nasa have conceived a very different plan. They believe the most viable solution could be to drill up to 10km down into the supervolcano, and pump down water at high pressure. The circulating water would return at a temperature of around 350C (662F), thus slowly day by day extracting heat from the volcano. And while such a project would come at an estimated cost of around $3.46bn (2.69bn), it comes with an enticing catch which could convince politicians to make the investment.

Yellowstone currently leaks around 6GW in heat, Wilcox says. Through drilling in this way, it could be used to create a geothermal plant, which generates electric power at extremely competitive prices of around $0.10/kWh. You would have to give the geothermal companies incentives to drill somewhat deeper and use hotter water than they usually would, but you would pay back your initial investment, and get electricity which can power the surrounding area for a period of potentially tens of thousands of years. And the long-term benefit is that you prevent a future supervolcano eruption which would devastate humanity.

The idea is to drill in from the supervolcano from the lower sides, starting outside the boundaries of Yellowstone National Park, and extracting the heat from the underside of the magma chamber. This way youre preventing the heat coming up from below from ever reaching the top of the chamber which is where the real threat arises, Wilcox says.

Cooling Yellowstone in this manner would happen at a rate of one meter a year, taking of the order of tens of thousands of years until just cold rock was left.

4 in the USA

Yellowstone in Wyoming and Montana is the most famous -and potentially dangerous

Long Valley Caldera, California

La Garita Caldera, Colorado

Valles Caldera, New Mexico

1 in Canada

Bennett Lake Volcanic Complex, Yukon, Canada

A supervolcano exists in Naples, Italy. The Campi Flegrei, or Phlegraean Fields.

Several supervolcanoes exist in Asia, including:

Toba in Indonesia

Tambora in Indonesia

Baekdu Mountain on the border of North Korea and China

Aira Caldera, Japan

Kurile Lake, Russia

Karymshina, Russia

Pacana Caldera, Chile  Pacana Caldera, San Pedro de Atacama, Antofagasta Region, Chile

Cerro Galan, Argentina  Galan  Catamarca Province, Argentina

Pastos Grandes Caldera, Bolivia

Lake Taupo, New Zealand  Lake Taupo, Waikato, New Zealand

Macauley Island, New Zealand
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 14:12:55|Editor: Xiang Bo

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BEIJING, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Containerized trade among BRICS nations saw robust growth in the first half of this year, according to the world's largest container shipping company Maersk Line.

Demand has improved as most of the world's major economies started to recover this year, and the growth among BRICS countries continued to outpace the global average, said Mike Fang, managing director for Maersk Line's Greater China Cluster.

"There is much potential to enable trade among BRICS nations and we will definitely look into it," he said in a statement.

Maersk's exports from China to India increased 26.2 percent year on year in the first half, those to Brazil and South Africa both rose 8.7 percent, while Maersk's imports from South Africa to China surged 43.9 percent, according to Fang.

The company's statistics showed customers in other BRICS countries were most attracted to Chinese textiles and clothing, consumer electronics and furniture.

While China's imports still focused on raw materials and resources, Maersk saw increases in the imports of meat from Brazil as well as fruit and nuts from South Africa.

E-commerce developed very fast with other BRICS countries' products gaining traction on the Chinese market, Fang said.

Customs data showed a 37.7-percent year-on-year growth in China's imports from other BRICS countries in the first seven months of this year, faster than the 28.7-percent increase in exports to those countries.

Grouping Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, BRICS accounted for 23 percent of the 2016 global economy, almost double their share in 2006, and contributed to more than half of global growth.
125 YEARS AGO

From 1892: Governor Murphy has issued a proclamation designating October 21 as Columbus Day to be observed by all schools in Arizona Territory.

Sheep raisers are now gathering for the fall clip.

On Wednesday night, the shop of A. T. Cornish was burglarized and the safe blown open. The contents of the cash drawer containing about $50 were carried away. The thief has not been identified.

Ashurst and Marshall are getting out a carload of onyx from their claims and will ship it to Denver from Walnut probably sometime next week.

The School Trustees should have the pole fixed so the flag can be run up.

It is said that in short time the Fort Verde Military Reservation land will be thrown open to settlement.

If you could see your own scalp through an ordinary magnifying glass you would be amazed at the amount of dust, dandruff and just plain dead skin that had accumulated. The best and most popular preparation for scalp cleansing is Ayers Hair Vigor.

On Monday, James Munds, who lived about 20 miles south of this place on the Upper Verde, met with an accident that cost him his life. He had set his Winchester down by a fence and while dismounting his horse picked up his gun by the muzzle. The hammer caught in the fence and went off. The bullet passed through his temple and out the top of his head.

Mark Willard, who was nearby, heard the gun go off and saw him fall from his horse. He gathered him up and carried him home, where he died on Tuesday morning. Dr. Brannen was called but failed to arrive before he was gone. He leaves a wife and two children.

FAHRNEY - Hammock Carts. No horse motion or no sale. Patent June 30, 1891. Phaeton Company. Chicago. Illinois.

A fine shower fell on Wednesday.

100 YEARS AGO

From 1917: A big crowd said farewell to the Coconino Contingent on Thursday night as they left on No. 10 for Fort Reilly, Kansas.

The lumberjacks from the Arizona Lumber and Timber Co., the Flagstaff Lumber Co., Greenlaw Co.and the Saginaw & Manistee of Williams declared a strike on conditions they claim are unfair. Requested are: 9 hours a day at the same pay as current 10 hours, double pay for overtime, full pay during recovery from on-job injury, abolition of the Black List, better sanitary conditions in camps, equal pay for all regardless of color or nationality and the right of the union business representative to ride the log trains without paying.

Night Marshal Wick Thompson and two Sheriffs Deputies picked up two alleged bootleggers Mark Baubeau and Al Wishwas at Hicks Rooming House Monday night along with several jugs of whiskey, which they were busy putting into bottles. They were all headed for the jail when at the alley crossing of San Francisco Baubau started to run. Thompson dropped his load of whiskey and fired several shots without effect. The bootleggers have not been seen since.

Fireman Dickson and Brakeman McCray of Winslow were killed last Saturday night when a light eastbound engine which they were driving left the tracks and turned over west of Ash Fork. Engineer Davis was severely injured and later taken to Los Angeles medical care.

Water Superintendent John Marshall states that the supply of water in the city reservoir is increasing and now is at 25 feet of depth with an incoming rate of 933,000 gallons per day. The Railroad is taking 200,000 per day.

The Range is generally still in fair condition though deteriorating on account of the dry weather.

75 YEARS AGO

From 1942: Sugar ration books belonging to men who have joined the armed forces should be returned unused to the local War Price and Rationing Board. In the event of a death it should be returned within 10 days. Howard B. Ross, State Ration Office.

Stamp No. 8 in your ration book will be valid for 5 pounds of sugar for 10 weeks between Aug. 23 and Oct. 31. National OPA Office.

Get your canning sugar before Sept. 15. Certain parties may be able to get more. Call at the Ration Office.

H. T. (Jack) Wilson announced that as of Wednesday this week his buses have made their last trip to the Grand Canyon and that all other scenic tours have been ended until the end of the war. He will be using his buses to haul defense workers between Flagstaff and Bellemont.

Wanted: Telephone operators. Apply to Phone Manager, 211 W. Aspen Ave.

Wanted: Cashiers and Ushers for afternoon work. Married women acceptable. Apply immediately at the Orpheum.

Westbound #23 struck a pickup at the Garland Crossing at 8:30 am Sunday morning. Two men killed and three men injured.

For Sale: Roomy 11x11 pyramidal tents complete with pole, stakes, four cots Coleman Lantern & wood floor. $75 or $65 without floor. Drews Sporting Goods.

72 Coconino County men left on Wednesday for examination prior to induction into the U.S. Army.

Saginaw & Manistee Lumber Co. has released 25 sections on the Kaibab National Forest. It will take many years to replace the stand of timber.

Velma Holcomb pled guilty to the charge of overtaking and passing a vehicle without clear vision of the road and was assessed a $10 fine by Justice of the Peace W. E. Jolly on Monday.

Wanted: A party to bale hay by the ton. Power baler furnished. Box 424, Flagstaff.

For sale: Green Beans for canning. Mrs. Oscar Hubbard. Rt. 1, Box 430, Flagstaff.

H. 78 Mon. L. 42 Rain a trace

50 YEARS AGO

From 1967: Watch out for counterfeit $20 bills. They have begun appearing in Phoenix. They are on the Federal Reserve in Chicago, Series 1950D. The Treasury Seal is poorly reproduced. If noticed bring them to your bank. Chief Elmo Maxwell

On Sunday, as a part of a nationwide plan to have Guard Units ready to control any disturbance, there will be joint field exercises with the Flagstaff Police Dept. and the Arizona National Guard in downtown Flagstaff.

The National Park Service has issued an announcement that a contract has been signed and the loop road at Wupatki and Walnut Canyon is to be reconstructed and resurfaced.

Winslow ia fighting the battle of Flies and Mosquitoes. The Kiwanis paid for a fogging machine and the chemicals for it, with the businessmen and professionals taking turns in the operations. It seems that the local pests promptly developed immunity.

The Kolb Grand Canyon Photograph Collection is to be housed in Special Collections in the NAU Library. Richard Quick, Director of Library Services.

The City Council has accepted a Federal Grant of $19,000 to conduct an economic Survey of the 4th Street Corridor.

Clip your coupon. Regular $1.65 Pizza -- .98 cts. plus tax. Pizza Inn, 1555 South Milton.

Bobs Bronco Sweep Stakes. Grand Prize 1967, 4 wheel Drive, Ford Bronco with Trailer. Prizes every week. Drop by and check it out.

James I. Garner, who has been Assistant Editor and Publisher for the past 20 months, has been named as the Editor and Publisher of the SUN replacing Platt Cline, who has held this position since 1953. He will now assume duties as President of Flagstaff Publishing.

Play Strike the Gold at Bayless. Mrs. Georgia Wolfe just won a Plymouth Barracuda last week.

H. 77 Sun. A cold Front Swept through town Wednesday night taking temperatures down to 37 degrees. No rain.

25 YEARS AGO

From 1992: NAU is the 3rd client to sign up to buy water from the citys new reclaimed water plant. So far they are planning on about 10 acres of irrigation beginning next summer but plans are already underway for more in the future. Catholic Cemeteries and the Flagstaff Unified School District are also in on the plan as well as the city itself. City crews are currently engaged in laying about 10 miles of pipe line to bring this treated water to useful irrigation purposes next summer. The cost is being covered by the Water and Sewer Bonds approved by voters in 1990.

Threatened with extinction by a cost saving plan, student nurses at NAU are mounting a grassroots campaign to save their program. Over 50 students including those in the dental program, which is also threatened, met on Wednesday in a meeting called by Junior Dette Hancock. The program, which opened in 1962, has 176 students and 15 faculty members. Many of the minority students are planning to stay and serve positions in rural Arizona.

Orchids Paper Products, which took over the paper plant in Flagstaff in 1989, has no plans to lay off any of its workers including 69 in Flagstaff although it has filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy. Orville Simms, Company Executive and Chief Executive officer, stated that We will continue to provide our customers with the same high level of service and products. The company using recycled office paper manufactures a wide variety of tissue products.

Homes by Neal Klein, presents 2,173 sq. ft. of comfortable living. Stop by and visit our homes now under construction at the corner of W. University Heights and W. Dylan.

In Flagstaff the Building Plans Examiner is so swamped with 35 residential plans under consideration that he has hired a temporary assistant checker at $12.43 an hour. Rebecca Blaha, City Spokesperson.

Flagstaffs heavyweight supermarkets, since the first full month Mega Foods was in business, have increased their sales by 8 percent over last July to $10.3 million. Convenience stores did even better with a 25 percent increase.

FUSD enrollment is at an all-time high of 12,181 students despite declines of enrollment at DeMiguel, Killip and Weitzel.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 15:43:08|Editor: Yurou

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LASHKAR GAH, Afghanistan, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- At least eight Taliban insurgents have been killed and seven others wounded in Afghanistan's southern province of Helmand, the provincial governor office said Sunday.

"Over the last 24 hours, Afghan security forces launched a series of airstrikes on the militants' hideouts in Sangin, Nahri Sarraj, Garmser and Washer districts of the province, leaving five militants dead and three others wounded," it said in a statement.

According to the statement, three Taliban were killed and four others wounded after an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) they were planting went off accidentally in Yakhchal area of Nahri Sarraj district over the same period.

The Taliban have not commented on the incidents.

Helmand, notorious for poppy growing, is also a known Taliban stronghold.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 16:03:12|Editor: An

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MANILA, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and its three East Asian dialogue partners China, Japan and South Korea reaffirmed on Sunday to further intensify economic cooperation to build a stronger ASEAN Plus Three (APT) community.

Philippine Trade Undersecretary Ceferino Rodolfo told a news briefing that APT ministers reaffirmed further cooperation efforts with the development of the renewed APT Economic Work Plan that will set broader goals of building a stronger APT community in the long-run.

In relation to the work plan, Rodolfo said the Philippines can benefit from APT cooperation initiatives with priorities given to e-commerce in moving the country towards a digital economy, supply chain connectivity, micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME) development, and trade facilitation.

The development of the work plan can further assist the Philippines in its pursuit towards greater connectivity to Plus Three countries, Rodolfo said referring to China, Japan and South Korea.

For his part, Philippine Trade Secretary Ramon Lopez said in a statement that the ministers also welcomed the efforts of the East Asia Business Council (EABC) in helping regional MSMEs capture digital trade opportunities, find new ways of doing business, and enhance MSME engagement.

He said the ministers showed their expectation as well towards APT cooperation in facilitating e-commerce development, Lopez said.

The Philippines, as chair of this year's ASEAN, is hosting the 49th ASEAN Economic Ministers' (AEM) meeting and related meetings.

ASEAN economic ministers kicked off a four-day meeting in Manila on Thursday to discus ways on how to further strengthen economic ties and integrate trade and investment in Southeast Asia.

Also participating the meeting are economic and trade ministers from ASEAN dialogue partners -- Australia, Canada, China, India, Japan, South Korea, New Zealand, Russia and the United States.


Protests after cancellation of elections

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[Republished from Black Agenda Report by Glen Ford]





The NY Times tried to pin Black voter suppression in North Carolina on Russia -- which makes the newspaper an accomplice in the actual crime.

"The Times reporters could not find anyone to add substance to the impression the story was designed to make: that the Russians had something to do with voting disruptions in North Carolina or anywhere else."

If you believe the New York Times, the Russian state is the diabolical force behind Black voter suppression in North Carolina -- and, by imaginary extension, the main suspect for polling irregularities in Black precincts across the country during last year's election. In a 2,000-plus word article published September 1, the Timesignored the North Carolina Republican Party's multitudinous schemes to prevent Blacks from casting their ballots in the fiercely contested "swing" state, and instead speculated that "the Russians" caused problems for voters in heavily Black Durham County.

As with all things allegedly Russian, no proof is necessary. Indeed, as the reporters repeatedly admitted, beginning in the article's third paragraph, "no clear-cut evidence of digital sabotage has emerged, much less a Russian role in it."Moreover, the article reports that, "Despite the disruptions, a record number of votes were cast in Durham," overwhelmingly for Hillary Clinton.

Nevertheless, the near-total lack of facts did not discourage the Timesfrom spinning its speculative web of intrigue to conclude, "Russian Election Hacking Efforts, Wider Than Previously Known, Draw Little Scrutiny. "

Nothing in the story backs up the headline. Even the article's main protagonist, Susan Greenhaigh, described as "a troubleshooter at a nonpartisan election monitoring group," cannot connect Durham's ballot problems to Russians. "We still don't know if Russian hackers did this," she said. "But we still don't know that they didn't."

"As the reporters repeatedly admitted, 'no clear-cut evidence of digital sabotage has emerged, much less a Russian role in it.'"

The Kremlin is guilty until proven innocent. When it comes to Russians, journalistic standards do not exist in the U.S. corporate media, whose owners and editors are in active "collusion" -- to use their favorite word -- with U.S. security agencies and other sectors of the bipartisan War Party, with the aim of keeping tensions with Moscow at fever pitch. The Times article attempts to link polling disruptions in North Carolina to a National Security Agency Report "leaked" to The Intercept, claiming Russian military intelligence had gone "spear-phishing" emails at VR Systems, the Florida-based company that owns voting equipment in North Carolina and other states. According to the Intercept story, the NSA does not purport to know what VR Systems data, if any, was accessed.

And that's the extent of the "evidence." Russians attempted to get inside VR Systems, according to a "leaked" document from U.S. super-spooks, who don't know if the alleged hackers got what they were looking for or not. VR Systems denies that anything seriously intrusive occurred.

But, bad things did happen in Durham County on the way to Election Day, all of it attributable to the racist Republican state government, which placed every possible barrier in the way of fair and orderly balloting in heavily Black and Democratic areas. The state reverted to paper ballots on Election Day, causing many voters to give up in disgust, including students at historically Black North Carolina Central University. Despite these state-imposed disruptions, Clinton beat Donald Trump in the County by substantially more votes than Barack Obama did over Mitt Romney.

"When it comes to Russians, journalistic standards do not exist in the U.S. corporate media."

The Black elections director for Durham County, Derek Bowens, said: "We do not believe, and evidence does not suggest, that hacking occurred on Election Day."

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Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 16:18:16|Editor: Yurou

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MANILA, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Economic ministers from countries of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) met on Sunday to move forward their talks to establish the proposed regional trade pact.

Philippine Trade Secretary Ramon Lopez said in a statement that the ministers are "hard at work to resolve the key outstanding issues" that are slowing down the negotiations and seek options that provide flexibilities to move the RCEP talks forward.

"The ministers will finalize the RCEP key elements for significant outcomes by end 2017, which clearly outlines the negotiating areas viewed as realistically achievable by end of the year," Lopez said.

At the opening of the ASEAN Economic Ministers' (AEM) meeting on Thursday, Lopez urged the 10 member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the bloc's dialogue partners to expedite talks on the RCEP, saying the proposed pact will "tremendously" benefit Southeast Asia.

Lopez said "the substantial conclusion" of the RCEP negotiations remains high on ASEAN's overall economic agenda. "It is a priority deliverable for the Philippines' chairmanship of ASEAN 2017 and in time for the 50th anniversary of ASEAN," he said.

Lopez stressed the need to finalize the key elements before the 20th RCEP Trade Negotiating Committee (TNC) negotiations in South Korea next month as well as the ASEAN Leaders' meeting in Manila in November.

Philippine Trade Undersecretary Ceferino Rodolfo said Sunday's RCEP talks is significant.

"With the fifth RCEP ministerial meeting to continue this afternoon, at this critical juncture where there is a general slowdown in growth across the world and rising protectionist mindset, it is important for RCEP to step up and set the example for the pursuit of freer trade," Rodolfo said.

He added, "RCEP is the only game in town given the current negotiations of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)."

For the Philippines, Rodolfo said RCEP remains an important engagement. He said 60.54 percent of the country's total trade is centered on other 15 RCEP participating countries, with more than 51.85 percent of exports going into these countries.

"Achieving a single set of rule to do business with member countries will significantly facilitate the conduct of business and spur growth of our industries," Rodolfo said.

RCEP is a 16-nation proposed free trade pact eyed to further strengthen ASEAN markets, namely Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam, and its major trading partners China, South Korea, Australia, India, Japan, and New Zealand. RCEP will expand the ASEAN market from 600 million people to 3.5 billion.

Launched in November 2012, RCEP is designed to cover trade-in goods and services, investments, economic and technical cooperation, intellectual property rights, competition policy, and dispute settlement, among others. It is seen as a good platform for the region to negotiate with other regional blocks.
From WSWS

The catastrophic impact of Hurricane Harvey in southeast Texas and the unfolding disaster of Hurricane Irma in south Florida are ruthlessly objective tests of the ability of America's ruling elite to manage the affairs of society. By any reasonable standard, the capitalist class has failed, and failed miserably.

Two weeks after the Texas Gulf Coast was devastated by Harvey, millions of people are seeking to rebuild their lives with minimal social assistance. Hundreds of thousands of homes were damaged or destroyed, one million cars rendered inoperable, countless schools and other public facilities flooded and likely ruined beyond repair. At least 22 people are missing, most now presumed dead, on top of the more than 70 deaths officially acknowledged.

To address the costliest natural disaster in American history -- at least until the toll of Hurricane Irma is tallied -- with damage estimates approaching $200 billion, the Trump administration and Congress have approved a derisory $15 billion in federal assistance, ratified by the House of Representatives Friday.

The bulk of this money goes to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which doles out funds limited to $30,000 per family, through a nearly impenetrable bureaucratic process in which the victims of the storm will be treated like criminals or con-men. Other funding is routed through the Small Business Administration, in the form of loans that those driven from their homes by the hurricane will be hard-pressed to repay.

Hurricane Irma is even more powerful than Harvey. The storm has already laid waste to several of the Lesser Antilles and to the Turks and Caicos Islands, as well as battering Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, Haiti and Cuba. Irma began passing the Bahamas on Friday and is scheduled to make landfall somewhere in south Florida on Sunday afternoon.

Hurricane Irma is the most powerful storm ever recorded on this planet, with the most "accumulated cyclone energy," one measure of overall intensity. It has sustained maximum wind speeds of at least 180 miles per hour for 37 hours, longer than any previous storm. Its size is vast: twice the extent of Hurricane Andrew, which devastated south Florida in 1992. The storm is so large that it is wider than the Florida peninsula itself, raising the possibility of simultaneous storm surges on both the Gulf Coast and the Atlantic Coast, an unheard-of phenomenon.

A lethal threat faces one of the most densely populated areas in the United States. But the response of local, state and federal officials has been to tell the potential victims of Irma: "You're on your own." This was the theme of several press conferences and briefings on Friday, as government officials told some six million people in south Florida to leave the region if possible, or else go to hurricane shelters.

These shelters are entirely inadequate -- some sizeable cities, like Ft. Myers on the Gulf coast, have none. They are unavailable to many poor and working-class residents. The Coalition for Racial Justice complained that Miami-Dade's shelters are open only in wealthy areas, a more than 30-minute drive from the city's poorer neighborhoods.

Mandatory evacuations have been ordered for the Florida Keys, for Miami Beach and much of Miami-Dade, the state's largest metropolitan area, as well as portions of Broward and Palm Beach counties and much of the southwestern corner of the state as well. Combined, they are the largest mandatory evacuation in US history, leaving all highways north completely jammed with traffic. Most gas stations have run out of supplies, leaving many residents stranded in their cars as the hurricane approaches.

The most basic measures to ensure that people can leave have not been taken, such as a mass coordination of free rail, bus and airplane transportation. Many of those leaving have no idea where they will stay, as hundreds of thousands attempt to find accommodations on the route north. Many are stuck at the airport, with no open flights and all shelters filled.

The Trump administration "prepared" for the one-two punch of Harvey and Irma by proposing to slash spending on FEMA and other relief and disaster management agencies, to say nothing of its war against climate science, waged on behalf of the oil, gas and coal producers and other big industrial polluters.

Even the succession of hurricanes -- with Jose and Katia lined up to follow Harvey and Irma, four giant storms in only three weeks, fueled by ocean waters now at an unprecedented temperature of 90 degrees Fahrenheit -- has not produced any rethinking by the know-nothings of the Trump administration. The unending stream of disasters proves the reality of climate change -- to which one must add the fires raging on the US West Coast and the floods that have devastated South Asia -- demonstrating the inability of the ruling classes of all countries to take any serious measures to address the growing threat.

EPA administrator Scott Pruitt, a notorious global warming denier, denounced any discussion of climate change as "very, very insensitive" to the people of Florida. "To have any kind of focus on the cause and effect of the storm, versus helping people, or actually facing the effect of the storm, is misplaced," he argued.

By the same logic, any discussion of plate tectonics or seismic faults should be banned during an earthquake, nor should there be any analysis of El Nino wind effects during wildfire season. Nuclear physics would be off-limits during a reactor meltdown. And, we might add, there could be no discussion of the economic laws of capitalism during a meltdown of the financial markets.

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From Wallwritings



Chicago Alderman Carlos Ramirez-Rosa, right, was on Illinois State Senator Daniel Biss' gubernatorial ticket for a week, before Israel lobby pressure forced him off.

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A foreign nation is having an impact on the Illinois Democratic 2018 primary campaign for governor.

Israel's lobbies, led by AIPAC, are demanding absolute loyalty to Israel from all leading candidates.

Few Illinois voters know the difference between Ramallah and Ramla.

Israel's lobbies do not care what voters know.

What they do care about, is that the Illinois Democratic nominee for governor, must be loyal to Israel.

The leading Democratic candidate in the March 20, 2018, primary, is J.B. Pritzer, one of the nation's richest men. The winner will face incumbent Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner in the 2018 general election.

Running further down in the Democratic primary pack, had been the team pictured above on the campaign trail, State Senator Daniel Biss (left), candidate for governor and Chicago Alderman Carlos Ramirez-Rosa, candidate for Lt. Governor.

Now the two have split over BDS, a litmus test AIPAC uses to measure loyalty.

Biss and Ramirez-Rosa had been favored by the state's Progressive voting bloc, until the split.

As Robert Mueller and congressional committees dig into Russia's role in the 2016 election, the Biss and Ramirez-Rosa progressive candidacy was smashed by Israel's intervention in Illinois politics.

What's the difference between Russian and Israeli intervention?

One nation has a U.S. base in the form of lobbies. The other does not have a base, unless it is eventually proven that the Trump campaign served as a Russian lobby-agent for Russia.

Ali Abunimah describes in his Electronic Intifada how the BDS issue has shaped the Democratic race.

"Pressure from the Israel lobby has forced a promising progressive politician out of the 2018 Illinois governor's race.

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To my knowledge, and I very, very much hope I am wrong, this upcoming conference will be the very first environmental conference in the United States to take on the single gravest threat to the world's natural environment and to the natural environment right here within the United States. May many more conferences and actions follow!

With some drugs, we have learned that we must take on the demand as well as the supply, and that we must treat that demand as an illness when harmful. Not so with petroleum. Thus far we have been more than content to go after the pipelines, while the consumer is let off the hook entirely. I use the singular term "consumer" purposively.

There is one entity in the United States that alone consumes more petroleum than most entire countries. The same entity primarily demolishes the natural environment far from these shores and on an unimaginable (and carefully unimagined) scale, but it is also the producer of 69% of U.S. environmental disasters that have been named Superfund sites by the EPA. It is also the third greatest polluter of U.S. waterways, despite its concentration on polluting other waters. It is the greatest producer of nuclear waste and threat, and the only institution intentionally spreading nuclear waste far and wide in the open air. It is the greatest proliferator of tools for destroying the natural environment abroad as well. Unlike any other entity on earth, it has displaced entire populations and rendered entire islands and other territories uninhabitable for millennia to come. And yet, as a problem worth focusing on, it has thus far escaped the attention of big environmental organizations.

This is like taking on racist buffoon politicians except Donald Trump, or oil companies except ExxonMobil, or nasty media outlets except Fox News. Who does such things? How to make sense of them?

The conference I am referring to is #NoWar2017: War and the Environment, happening in Washington, D.C. on September 22-24, and preceded by a September 17th flotilla to the Pentagon. You can sign up for either one at WorldBeyondWar.org. If you're still waiting in suspense, the entity I am referring to is, of course, the United States military.

Speakers at #NoWar2017 will include, among many others:

Natalia Cardona is the North America Frontline Engagement Coordinator at 350.org. She is based in Philadelphia, Penn. She tweets at @natycar74.

Eric Teller is coordinator of Fossil Free GW at George Washington University. He is a sophomore majoring in International Affairs with a dual concentration in Comparative Social, Political, and Economic Systems and International Environmental Studies, along with a minor in Sustainability.



worldbeyondwar.org/nowar2017

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Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright is US Coordinator with The Leap. He has presented the case for climate justice, environmental justice, and climate change action at universities nation- and world-wide and written on the subjects for various publications. Anthony was named one of Grist's "50 People You'll Be Talking About in 2016."



worldbeyondwar.org/nowar2017

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Tim DeChristopher is Founder of the Climate Disobedience Center. Tim DeChristopher disrupted an illegitimate Bureau of Land Management oil and gas auction in December of 2008, by posing as Bidder 70 and outbidding oil companies for parcels around Arches and Canyonlands National Parks in Utah.



worldbeyondwar.org/nowar2017

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Robin Taubenfeld is a national nuclear spokesperson with Friends of the Earth Australia, a mother, teacher, artist, media maker, community worker, and a recipient of a Women's International League for Peace & Freedom's Peacewomen Award 2016.



worldbeyondwar.org/nowar2017

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Mike Stagg is a writer, documentarian, podcast host, free lance journalist and activist based in Lafayette, LA. He's been active in Louisiana environmental and social justice fights for four decades.



worldbeyondwar.org/nowar2017

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is Food & Water Watch's Co-Organizing Director. Emily conducts research and promotes policies at the local, state and federal level to help protect the nation's water systems as public assets, and to safeguard the country's water resources.

Nadine Bloch is currently Training Director for Beautiful Trouble and an innovative artist, nonviolent practitioner, political organizer, direct-action trainer, and puppetista.

Suzanne Cole is a senior at the George Washington University studying international affairs with a focus in international sustainability and development. She is a coordinator with GW Fossil Free, and has been heavily involved in divestment and environmental activism both on campus and within the larger DC community.



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Dale Dewar is retired from her position as Executive Director of Physicians for Global Survival, the Canadian affiliate of International Physicians for Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW). Much of her clinical work was in Northern Saskatchewan, among the largest uranium mines in the world. She and her husband, Bill Curry, received the Global Citizen's Award for Saskatchewan in 2010 for environmental activism and international volunteer work.

Jonathan Alan King is Professor of Molecular Biology at MIT where he has long taught biochemistry and directed biomedical research on protein misfolding and human disease. Prof. King is a Past President of the national Biophysical Society, and former Councilor of the American Society of Virology and of the American Society for Microbiology. He is a recipient of MIT's M.L. King Jr. Faculty Leadership Award.



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Gar Smith has sailed on the Rainbow Warrior and the peace ship Fri. He is the founding editor of Earth Island Journal. In 2003, he co-founded Environmentalists Against War and organized the "Carbon-Free" contingent in San Francisco's massive peace march. He is the author of The War and Environment Reader.

Susi Snyder is the Nuclear Disarmament Programme Manager for PAX in the Netherlands. Mrs. Snyder is the primary author and coordinator of the Don't Bank on the Bomb annual report on nuclear weapon producers and the institutions that finance them.



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Richard Tucker is an environmental historian at the University of Michigan. He specializes on the world history of environmental impacts of war and militarism. He hosts the website environmentandwar.com.



worldbeyondwar.org/nowar2017

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Diane Wilson is a fourth generation shrimper, mother of five, author, and an environmental, peace, and social justice advocate. During the last 30 years, she has launched legislative campaigns, demonstrations, hunger strikes, sunk boats, and even climbed chemical towers in her fight to protect her Gulf Coast bay.

The purpose of #NoWar2017 is not just to hear from great speakers, but to bring together people who care about and want to take action to save the environment and to end war -- to build alliances, to strategize more wisely together, and to act with greater strength as a unified movement wherever our interests overlap. Preventing nuclear apocalypse and climate apocalypse should not be segregated movements. Let's bring them together and transform our world.
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Bill McKibben

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In the Caribbean, at least 10 people have died as the historic Category 5 Hurricane Irma barrels across the Atlantic Ocean and toward the U.S. coast. Hurricane Irma is the most powerful storm ever recorded over the Atlantic Ocean. On Barbuda, 90 percent of all structures were destroyed. The prime minister, Gaston Browne, has declared Barbuda is "practically uninhabitable." This comes as Houston, the fourth-largest city in the U.S., is beginning to rebuild from Hurricane Harvey, one of the most powerful hurricanes in U.S. history. Wide swaths of the Pacific Northwest are also on fire, as uncontrollable wildfires burn hundreds of thousands of acres across Oregon, Montana and Washington state. For more on climate change and extreme weather, we're joined by Bill McKibben, co-founder of 350.org, from his home in Vermont. He's the author of several books, including "Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet."

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: In the Caribbean, at least 10 people have died as the historic Category 5 Hurricane Irma barrels across the Atlantic Ocean and towards the U.S. coast. Hurricane Irma is the most powerful storm ever recorded over the Atlantic Ocean. On Wednesday, eight people died on the Island of Saint Martin, one person died on Anguilla, and a 2-year-old child died on Barbuda. Barbuda and Saint Martin were devastated by the 185-mile-an-hour winds. On Barbuda, 90 percent of all structures were destroyed. The prime minister, Gaston Browne, has declared Barbuda is "practically uninhabitable," and warns the entire island may need to be evacuated as another storm approaches.

PRIME MINISTER GASTON BROWNE: You know that we are threatened now potentially by yet another storm, Hurricane Jose.

ABS INTERVIEWER: Jose, right.

PRIME MINISTER GASTON BROWNE: And if that is the case, and it's coming our way, then, clearly, we will have to evacuate the residents of Barbuda.

AMY GOODMAN: In Puerto Rico, more than a million people have lost power, as authorities warn some areas could be without electricity for up to six months, partly because the island's electrical infrastructure has gone neglected due to Puerto Rico's debt crisis.

The death toll from Hurricane Irma is expected to rise in the coming days as the storm moves toward the Dominican Republic and Haiti, then on to the U.S. southern coast in Florida. More than 100,000 people have been told to evacuate their homes in Miami-Dade County, as Irma is predicted to be one of the worst storms to ever hit Miami.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: All this comes as the Trump administration, and the state of Florida, continues to deny the existence of climate change. In 2015, Florida Governor Rick Scott banned agencies from using the term "climate change." On Wednesday, President Trump traveled to Mandan, North Dakota, and celebrated his decision to pull out of the landmark 2015 climate deal, while speaking outside an oil refinery.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: In order to protect American industry and workers, we withdrew the United States from the job-killing Paris climate accord. Job killer. People have no idea. Many people have no idea how bad that was. And right here in North Dakota, the Dakota Access pipeline is finally open for business. ... I also did Keystone. You know about Keystone, another one, big one. Big. First couple of days in office, those two. Forty-eight thousand jobs. Tremendous, tremendous thing. I think environmentally better. I really believe that. Environmentally better.

AMY GOODMAN: President Trump was speaking in Mandan, the North Dakota town where hundreds of Native Americans and their allies have been jailed and strip-searched during the months-long resistance to the Dakota Access pipeline.

All this comes as Houston, the fourth-largest city in the country, is beginning to rebuild from Hurricane Harvey, one of the most powerful hurricanes in U.S. history. The death toll has now risen to 70 people. And while Houston, the Petro Metro, was underwater, wide swaths of the Pacific Northwest continue to be on fire as uncontrollable wildfires burn hundreds of thousands of acres across Oregon, Montana and Washington state. Well over a thousand more people have died in historic flooding in South Asia, as well as parts of Africa, in recent weeks. A third of Bangladesh is underwater.

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From Alternet

Unless the U.S. and its allies downgrade their threats against North Korea, peace in northwest Asia is unlikely.



U.S.-South Korean Alliance Ready to Defend Against North Korea

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US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley told the Security Council that North Korea was "begging for war." She said this in reference to the test of a thermonuclear -- hydrogen -- bomb by the North Korean military. "Enough is enough," said Ambassador Haley. "We have taken an incremental approach, and despite the best of intentions, it has not worked."

Ambassador Haley made these comments at the UN Security Council, where there are five permanent members and 10 rotating members. These five permanent members (China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States) are all nuclear weapon powers. They are not on the Council permanently (with veto power) because they have nuclear weapons. There are declared nuclear weapon states (India, Israel and Pakistan) that do not have a permanent seat on the UN Security Council. It is an accident of history that gives these five countries the right to be the judges of the planet.

Each of these five permanent members of the UN Security Council is already in possession of a thermonuclear bomb. The United States tested its hydrogen bomb in 1952; the Soviets followed the next year. The British tested their bomb in 1958, with the Chinese following in 1967 and the French in 1968. That means that almost 50 years ago, the five permanent members of the UN Security Council already had a thermonuclear -- namely hydrogen -- bomb.

The US bomb tested in the Bikini Atoll in 1954 was a thousand times more powerful than the atomic bomb that the United States dropped on Hiroshima. The North Korean bomb is similar to the hydrogen bombs that are held by the permanent members of the UN Security Council. It is a bomb that could destroy New York City, Seoul or even Pyongyang.

There is something unseemly about the fact that we -- humans -- have accepted the presence of thermonuclear bombs in the arsenals of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council. The hyperventilation of these five hydrogen bomb powers to the North Korean test would bewilder a normal person, a person who sees world affairs with an element of rationality. What makes it morally impossible for North Korea to have a dangerous weapon of this magnitude, while it is seen as perfectly acceptable for the quivering finger of Donald Trump to rest on the button of a US inter-continental ballistic missile that carries a hydrogen bomb?

The View from Pyongyang.

Why is North Korea, this country with great economic uncertainty, making such a great effort to build a nuclear arsenal? Why not use its scarce resources to tend to its own people?

There are at least four important points to consider when studying why the North Koreans continue to build a nuclear arsenal. If these four points are seriously understood, then their actions appear less irrational than otherwise assumed.

The War Has Not Ended: US Ambassador Nikki Haley says that the North Koreans are "begging for war." But North Korea has been in a permanent state of war against South Korea and its allies since June 1950. When the guns stopped firing in July 1953, the war did not end. There has been an armistice since 1953, but no peace treaty. The Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) is not a border between North and South Korea, but a tense border for hostilities that remain vital.

The US Conduct in the War Is a Sign of Its Belligerence: Most US high school students study the history of World War II and the US war in Vietnam, but do not get taught the Korean war. They learn little of the great barbarity of the US bombing of that country, not only of the bridges on the Yalu River but of dams and schools, hospitals and factories, government offices and residential homes. During the active phase of the war, the United States dropped 635,000 tons of bombs (including 32,557 tons of napalm -- a chemical weapon) on Korea -- more than the US tonnage dropped in the entire Pacific theatre of World War II. On November 5, 1950, Far East Air Forces General George E. Stratemeyer wrote that the instructions he got from General Douglas MacArthur was that "every installation, every facility, and village in North Korea now becomes a military and tactical target." Three days later, the US bombers dropped 500 tons of incendiary bombs on Sinuiju, destroying 60% of the city. Almost all of the cities of Chosan, Hoeryong, Huichon, Koindong, Manpojin, Namsi, and Sakchu were destroyed. On December 30, Stratemeyer told his officers that they would now destroy North Korea's four largest cities -- Pyongyang, Hamhung, Hungnam and Wonsan. At the close of the bombing, 18 of 22 major North Korean cities were levelled. This is data from the United States Air Force, not from North Korean textbooks. Every American should digest this history.

George W. Bush Raises the Belligerence: In 1994, North Korea and the United States signed the "Agreed Framework" for negotiations. This was a real breakthrough. In exchange for material demonstration that it would not increase its weapons programs, the North Koreans would be able to replace their aging Yongbyon nuclear reactor by two light water reactors. North Korea had -- in 1985 -- joined the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). This was a major confidence builder for any negotiations. What the North Koreans wanted more than anything was for the US to draw down its troop levels in South Korea and to cease its provocative war games near the North Korean frontier. There are about 30,000 US troops in South Korea and 50,000 US troops in Japan -- two detachments that threaten North Korea. The Clinton administration agreed to postpone the Team Spirit war games with South Korea. This was seen by the North as a major concession. Construction on the light water reactors began in August 2002. But this was already too late. In January of 2002, US President George W. Bush added North Korea into his "axis of evil." The three countries in that axis were Iraq, Iran and North Korea. In 2003, the US conducted a "regime change" war against Iraq. The following year -- in 2004 -- the US pushed an isolation policy against Iran through the "nuclear threat" agenda. The Europeans, driven to the wall by the war on terror, backed the US even though many European diplomats knew that there was no fire behind the smoke that the Americans claimed to see. North Korea, watching Baghdad being destroyed and Iran being threatened, walked away from the talks. Construction on the light-water reactor ended in 2006 and in 2009 the Six Party talks over peace with the North collapsed. George W. Bush's "axis of evil" speech pushed the North towards a reopened nuclear weapons agenda.

Libya Gives Up Its Nukes and Finds Regime Change is the Answer: In 2003, Libya's government led by Colonel Muammar Gaddafi decided to end its clandestine nuclear weapons program. At that time, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency -- Mohamed ElBaradei said that he had a "gut feeling" that Libya was about three to seven years away from building a nuclear weapon. But Libya decided to end that program, and the following year to end its chemical weapons program. By the end of 2004, then, Libya was largely without weapons of mass destruction -- all removed voluntarily. The US promised the Libyans security guarantees for their removal of these weapons. But then, in 2011, the United States and NATO -- under a UN mandate -- conducted a "regime change" operation against Libya. The country is now in great pain, destroyed by this regime change operation of 2011. The message to North Korea is clear -- if you give up your nuclear weapons, you will be a victim of regime change.

You don't need to understand Korean culture to see why the North Korean regime is obstinate to build up its nuclear shield. Unless the United States and its allies downgrade their threats against North Korea, there will be no possibility of peace in northwest Asia. Indeed, this no longer a regional struggle. The hydrogen bomb changes everything. This is a global catastrophe. It is necessary to demand the creation of a real process for peace, not belligerent talk from the UN chamber.

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From The Hill

The walls are closing in on Congress.

Terrifying walls of water from Hurricanes Harvey and Irma, which, when the damage is totaled, could rise to a half trillion dollars. The Walls of War: The multi-trillion dollar ongoing cost of Afghanistan, Iraq and other interventions. The crumbling walls of the U.S. infrastructure, which need at least $3 trillion to be repaired or replaced. A wall of 11 million undocumented immigrants, whose deportation could easily cost $200 billion. The planned wall at the Mexican border, which some estimates place at $67 billion. Then there is the Wall of All, the $20 trillion national debt. The walls of debt are closing in.

At moments of crisis in our nation, in addition to invoking the assistance of Higher powers, we can call upon the Constitution for guidance.

Article I, Section 8, of the U.S. Constitution contains a long-forgotten provision, "the coinage clause," which empowered Congress "to coin (create) Money." The ability to create money to meet the needs of the nation is a sovereign power, which enables a nation to have control of its own destiny.

The same article indicates the Founders anticipated having to borrow money on the full faith and credit of the United States. Enter the Funding Act of 1790, which assumed and paid off the debt of the colonies and retired the financial obligations of the newly created states now united. This was a powerful, object lesson in debt retirement, relevant today.

It is abundantly clear from a plain reading of the coinage clause that the Founders never intended that the only way the government was to be funded was to borrow money.

The needs of the nation were to come from a system of not borrowing wherein money was a neutral value of exchange connecting resources, people and needs, without debt attached.

In 1913, the passage of the Federal Reserve Act ceded the constitutional power to create money (and control of our national destiny), to the Federal Reserve, a quasi-private central bank. At this fateful point, the only way money could be brought into being was to borrow it, whereby money became equated with debt. The money system transited from public control to private control, and there it has remained.

Instead of following the path set forth by the Founders to create money directly, our government became obliged to borrow from private banks, which assumed the sovereign power to create money from nothing and then loan it to the government, turning on its head the intention of the Founders.

As a member of Congress, I came to the conclusion that while the debate over taxation was interesting, it was wholly insufficient. One must first study how money is created, before one can sensibly have a discussion of how it is to be taxed.

With the help of staff, I spent a full five years working with legislative counsel to come up with a way to realign with the founding principles, to reclaim and to re-establish for our nation the sovereign power to create money.

The vehicle was H.R. 2990, the National Emergency Employment Defense (NEED Act), which articulates why the current debate over the debt ceiling should lead directly to a debate about monetary policy, and the origins of the debt-based economic system.

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The more taxpayer dollars that are sucked into that black hole of war the more cracks appear in the foundation of America, its national infrastructure, at the center of almost everything that goes on in America; from the transportation of goods to people driving to work and a great deal in between.

This government's ongoing obsession with war, together with the massive costs of the U.S, military empire are, in effect, contributing to this deterioration which is happening all across America; with the interstates, main highways, local roads, and the rail system. There are areas of substantial decay that we can't really see, such as bridges, dams, waterways, sewer systems and the electrical grid.

There is no question but that the repair and rebuilding of the infrastructure will generate excellent returns on investment for America. It will create millions of new jobs calling for a wide variety of skills and experience such as heavy equipment operators, engineers, electricians, steel workers and a host of others. This would be a tremendous shot in the arm for our economy, just what this nation needs.

In contrast, the proliferation of war has a reverse effect; it not only wastes a tremendous amount of taxpayer dollars on acts of destruction, but it creates untold thousands of new enemies that will find ways to retaliate; that's exactly what the war on terror is doing.

The infrastructure, the physical heart of America, is in this state of disrepair because the funds that would even bring it up to normally accepted standards are not being appropriated. Members of Congress have no hesitation when it comes to rubber stamping funds for the military but when it comes to this important domestic need they give it no great priority.

Experts on this matter indicate that bring it up to normal standards will take $1 trillion; and to go further and bring it in line with the high levels present in a good number of countries in Europe proper, Scandinavia and Japan, it would take another trillion.

In collecting the necessary statistics for this article, I came across an excellent book, Third World America, by Ariana Huffington. Here are some very interesting and also very troubling stats relating to this deterioration as brought out in this book.

*The U.S. invests only 2.4% of its gross domestic product on infrastructure; in Europe it's 5% and in China it's 9/%. Why the great difference? Because these other countries don't waste theirs on war.

*According to the EPA, on average, an important water line breaks in this country every two minutes; such a break occurs almost every day in Washington, D.C. Also, waste water treatment plants are rapidly deteriorating across America.

*25% of this country's bridges are either structurally deficient or functionally obsolete. Bridges which have an average life span of 50 years are now averaging 43 years.

*Broadband, fast becoming one of the most important foundations of our economy, dropped from a ranking of 4th in the world in 2001, to 15th in 2009. Worse yet, it is not being upgraded and expanded to keep up with the rapidly increasing demand for this important service.

*School buildings are a critically important part of our national infrastructure; the bad news is that it is estimated that it will take some $322 billion to bring them into a state of good repair.

So that's a snapshot of the condition of this infrastructure. Alarms should be sounding across America over this situation. But would this Congress even hear them since its members are so very busy addressing the needs of the masters of Corporatism and the Military-Industrial Complex.

We have a government filled with politicians who can't seem to grasp this fact of life. When a bridge collapses, when a primary waterway becomes impassable, when large portions of key highways and interstates are shut down because of massive deterioration, the costs of rebuilding, just getting them back to basic operations is far more costly than if they had received basic maintenance and repair.

How in the world can this government fail to address this massive problem? In this world rankings report on infrastructure the U.S. is ranked #11. For a country which its politicians like to refer to it as great and exceptional how can that be?

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From Consortium News



President Donald Trump being sworn in on Jan. 20, 2017.

(Image by (Screen shot from Whitehouse.gov)) Details DMCA



The showdown with the Democratic People's Republic of Korea is a seminal event that can only end in one of two ways: a nuclear exchange or a reconfiguration of the international order.

While complacency is always unwarranted, the first seems increasingly unlikely. As no less a global strategist than Steven Bannon observed about the possibility of a pre-emptive U.S. strike: "There's no military solution. Forget it. Until somebody solves the part of the equation that shows me that 10 million people in Seoul don't die in the first 30 minutes from conventional weapons, I don't know what you're talking about. There's no military solution here. They got us."

This doesn't mean that Donald Trump, Bannon's ex-boss, couldn't still do something rash. After all, this is a man who prides himself on being unpredictable in business negotiations, as historian William R. Polk, who worked for the Kennedy administration during the Cuban Missile Crisis, points out. So maybe Trump thinks it would be a swell idea to go a bit nuts on the DPRK.

But this is one of the good things about having a Deep State, the existence of which has been proved beyond a shadow of a doubt since the intelligence community declared war on Trump last November. While it prevents Trump from reaching a reasonable modus vivendi with Russia, it also means that the President is continually surrounded by generals, spooks, and other professionals who know the difference between real estate and nuclear war.

As ideologically fogbound as they may be, they can presumably be counted on to make sure that Trump does not plunge the world into Armageddon (named, by the way, for a Bronze Age city about 20 miles southeast of Haifa, Israel).

That leaves option number two: reconfiguration. The two people who know best about the subject are Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping. Both have been chafing for years under a new world order in which one nation gets to serve as judge, jury, and high executioner. This, of course, is the United States.

If the U.S. says that Moscow's activities in the eastern Ukraine are illegitimate, then, as the world's sole remaining "hyperpower," it will see to it that Russia suffers accordingly. If China demands more of a say in Central Asia or the western Pacific, then right-thinking folks the world over will shake their heads sadly and accuse it of undermining international democracy, which is always synonymous with U.S. foreign policy.

There is no one -- no institution -- that Russia or China can appeal to in such circumstances because the U.S. is also in charge of the appellate division. It is the "indispensable nation" in the immortal words of Madeleine Albright, Secretary of State under Bill Clinton, because "we stand tall and we see further than other countries into the future." Given such amazing brilliance, how can any other country possibly object?

Challenging the Rule-Maker

But now that a small and beleaguered state on the Korean peninsula is outmaneuvering the United States and forcing it to back off, the U.S. no longer seems so far-sighted. If North Korea really has checkmated the U.S., as Bannon says, then other states will want to do the same. The American hegemon will be revealed as an overweight 71-year-old man naked except for his bouffant hairdo.



Chief White House Strategist Steve Bannon speaking at the 2017 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in National Harbor, Maryland.

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Not that the U.S. hasn't suffered setbacks before. To the contrary, it was forced to accept the Castro regime following the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, and it suffered a massive defeat in Vietnam in 1975. But this time is different. Where both East and West were expected to parry and thrust during the Cold War, giving as good as they got, the U.S., as the global hegemon, must now do everything in its power to preserve its aura of invincibility.

Since 1989, this has meant knocking over a string of "bad guys" who had the bad luck to get in its way. First to go was Manuel Noriega, toppled six weeks after the fall of the Berlin Wall in an invasion that cost the lives of as many as 500 Panamanian soldiers and possibly thousands of civilians as well.

Next to go was Mullah Omar of Afghanistan, sent packing in October 2001, followed by Slobodan Milosevic, hauled before an international tribunal in 2002; Saddam Hussein, executed in 2006, and Muammar Gaddafi, killed by a mob in 2011. For a while, the world really did seem like "Gunsmoke," and the U.S. really did seem like Sheriff Matt Dillon.

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This piece was reprinted by OpEd News with permission or license. It may not be reproduced in any form without permission or license from the source.

A recent report by the U.N Commission of Inquiry[1] on Syria, fruit of terrorist-perpetrated false-flag attacks such as the incident at Khan Shaykhun, in Idlib province, is yet another example of the U.S Empire's corrosive influence in world affairs.

Circumstances surrounding the incident at Khan Shaykhun are the rule, rather than the exception.

The U.N Commission's findings are clearly flawed since they rely on al Qaeda terrorists as witnesses, since the chain of custody for evidence was not secured, and for numerous other well-documented reasons. But the report will nonetheless have some (limited) traction because it serves criminal propaganda agendas of those who still seek to expand the war, to destroy the forces of international law and order, to empower terrorism, and to force duly-elected and much-loved President Assad "to go".

Washington regularly uses fake intelligence to provide fake pretexts for war and more war. Time and again, we see that policies are first established (i.e., the invasion of any number of countries), and then intelligence is "fixed" around the previously established policy to "justify" that which is not justifiable.

Author David Ray Griffin demonstrates in Bush and Cheney|How They Ruined America And The World that "(e)very claim made by the Bush-Cheney administration about WMD (in Iraq) proved to be false." In reaching this conclusion, Griffin shows that in every instance where solid intelligence did not support invasion plans, fake/corrupt "intelligence" was used instead. Intelligence was "fixed" around policy.[2]

NATO terrorists have used "fixed" intelligence for all of their false-flag terror incidents in Syria, and the incident at Khan Shaykhun[3] is no exception.

The U.N has proven itself, yet again, to be an agency for corruption and imperialism rather than as an agency for peace and the rule of law.

Notes

[1] Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic

(http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/HRC/IICISyria/Pages/IndependentInternationalCommission.aspx) Accessed September 8, 2017.

[2] David Ray Griffin, Bush and Cheney|How They Ruined America And The World (Northampton, Olive Branch Press, 2017), 57.

[3] Mark Taliano, "Syria Chemical Weapons Red Flags and False Flags." Global Research, April 6, 2017.

(http://www.globalresearch.ca/syria-chemical-weapons-red-flags-and-false-flags/5583616) Accessed September 8, 2017.

Featured image is from honestreporting.com

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Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 16:23:18|Editor: Yurou

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CAIRO, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- The Egyptian police killed seven terrorists during a raid on their hideout in a house in Giza province near the capital Cairo, state-run Al-Ahram newspaper's website reported on Sunday.

"The security forces exchanged fire with a number of terrorists inside a building in Agouza district which left seven of them killed and two policemen wounded," Al-Ahram quoted a security source in Giza as saying.
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By Ian Reifowitz

"Thinking sets the agenda for action, and thinking of humans as less than human paves the way for atrocity." -- David Livingstone Smith, author of Less Than Human: Why We Demean, Enslave, and Exterminate Others

The policies put forth by Donald Trump this past week were bad enough. The announcement by Attorney General Jeff Sessions -- Trump lacked the, er, courage to make it himself -- that the White House was ending the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program put in place by President Obama threatens 800,000 people, most of whom barely remember living in any country other than ours. The average age a DACA recipient arrived in America was 6.5 years old. Perhaps Congress will save DACA, but either way, Trump's actions were cruel, harmful, and, as President Obama wrote in a Facebook post viewed by 1.4 million people, simply "wrong."

Those actions were preceded by years of rhetoric in which Trump dehumanized undocumented immigrants. It was rhetoric that prepared the ground for those actions, and that stood at the center of his rise to political power.

"Illegals" are "pouring across." [snip] "These are not their best and their finest. These are not you coming across," he said, gesturing to the audience. "These are people ... and some are very fine, I'm sure ... but they're sending their killers, their rapists, their murderers, their drug lords. This is what we're getting." [snip] "Everything's coming across the border: the illegals, the cars, and the whole thing. It's like a big mess. Blah. It's like vomit." [snip] "[Undocumented immigrants] are coming over by the millions through the border like it's water, like it's a sieve."-- Donald Trump, April 30, 2015

"When Mexico sends its people, they're not sending their best. They're not sending you. They're not sending you. They're sending people that have lots of problems, and they're bringing those problems with us. They're bringing drugs. They're bringing crime. They're rapists. And some, I assume, are good people." -- Donald Trump, June 16, 2015

"The Mexican Government is forcing their most unwanted people into the United States. They are, in many cases, criminals, drug dealers, rapists, etc...Likewise, tremendous infectious disease is pouring across the border." -- Donald Trump, July 6, 2015

And that was just Trump in 2015. Now, he's president.

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For the New World Order, a world government is just the beginning. Once in place they can engage their plan to exterminate 80% of the world's population, while enabling the "elites" to live forever with the aid of advanced technology. For the first time, crusading filmmaker ALEX JONES reveals their secret plan for humanity's extermination: Operation ENDGAME.

Jones chronicles the history of the global elite's bloody rise to power and reveals how they have funded dictators and financed the bloodiest warscreating order out of chaos to pave the way for the first true world empire.

Watch as Jones and his team track the elusive Bilderberg Group to Ottawa and Istanbul to document their secret summits, allowing you to witness global kingpins setting the world's agenda and instigating World War III.





to Ottawa and Istanbul to document their secret summits, allowing you to witness global kingpins setting the world's agenda and instigating World War III. Learn about the formation of the North America transportation control grid, which will end U.S. sovereignty forever.





Discover how the practitioners of the pseudo-science eugenics have taken control of governments worldwide as a means to carry out depopulation.





View the progress of the coming collapse of the United States and the formation of the North American Union.

Never before has a documentary assembled all the pieces of the globalists' dark agenda. Endgame's compelling look at past atrocities committed by those attempting to steer the future delivers information that the controlling media has meticulously censored for over 60 years. It fully reveals the elite's program to dominate the earth and carry out the wicked plan in all of human history.

Endgame is not conspiracy theory, it is documented fact in the elite's own words.




"The Kidnapping of Senator Andy Thompson" is a political thriller written by Celine Rose Mariotti and published by Dreaming Big Publications. This novel is perfect for those that love a great mystery.

Kidnapping of Senator Thompson Cover

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Dreaming Big Publications

***@outlook.com Dreaming Big Publications

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-- ABOUT THE BOOK:Senators Andy Thompson and Hunt Wagner lead the way in a spirited debate on a new health care bill and whether or not to stop President Robinson and Secretary Von Schumann from sending troops to Botswana. A real adventure begins when Senator Thompson is kidnapped and Brian Travors, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State is suspected of being involved. Senators Hunt Wagner and Darius Clemens head a committee hearing to get to the truth. President Robinson suffers a heart attack and Vice-President Barry Newman takes over temporarily.Dive into the mysteries uncovered by Senators Hunt Wagner and Darius Clemens and the rest of the committee in "The Kidnapping of Senator Andy Thompson." Written by Celine Rose Mariotti, this book captures the secrets in the lives of these politicians. Join the committee in their discoveries to find out what happened and why."The Kidnapping of Senator Andy Thompson" is available now from Amazon with a price of just $.99 (eBook) or $8.00 (paperback). Please contact Kristi at dreamingbigpublications@outlook.com to request review copies or to receive exclusive author interviews, notice of new releases, and cover reveals.Dreaming Big Publications is a publishing company on a mission to reach more people on a global level by publishing books that educate and advocate for mental health and social justice issues. Our main focus is nonfictionself-help, memoirs, and books written for professional mental health providersbut we publish fiction as well and enjoy anything that is a good, fun read, including fantasy and sci-fi.Amazon Link:DREAMING BIG PUBLICATIONS:Contact info:(601) 394-8813dreamingbigpublications@outlook.comDreaming Big Publications102 First East StSumrall, MS 39482
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Body cameras for the Mooresville Police Department have arrived. Find out when they will be used.
An Iranian teenager sneaks up behind a cleric in the capital, Tehran, and knocks his turban off his head before dashing off.

The incident, uploaded on social media, is part of a new tactic employed by anti-government demonstrators in Iran.

Nationwide antiestablishment protests have raged across the Islamic republic since the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman who died on September 16 shortly after she was arrested for allegedly violating the hijab law on women's dress.

As the authorities have waged a deadly crackdown on the rallies, some demonstrators have turned to new tactics to sustain the monthslong protests, including tipping off Islamic clerics' turbans in the streets.

Many Iranians associate members of the clergy with Iran's Islamist regime, which many blame for the repression and corruption in the country.

While some Iranians have praised the "turban throwing" as an act of resistance, others have expressed concern that low-level clerics who are not affiliated with the state could become the victims of harassment and violence.

Lawmaker Mohammad Taghi Naqd Ali on November 10 called the new trend "the devil's conspiracy" and warned that young protesters tossing clerics' turbans were "playing with the lion's tail."

State media reported the arrests of two people in recent days who were accused of knocking off clerics' turbans.

London-based human rights lawyer Shadi Sadr said the tactic was a "brave and revolutionary act." Sadr, the co-founder of the rights group Justice for Iran, told RFE/RL that protesters were "humiliating" clerics without resorting to violence. "They're [targeting] the clergy's turban as a symbol of the crimes and corruption of the past 43 years as well as the privileges clerics have enjoyed," she said.

"There is no violence in it, and it also includes youthful mischief, which highlights the spirit of the revolution," Sadr added, referring to the monthslong protests that have posed the biggest threat to the establishment in years.

But Ahmad Zeidabadi, a Tehran-based journalist and former political prisoner, said that some of the clerics targeted in the streets "may be critics or even victims of [state] policies."

"This phenomenon...mainly targets clerics who do not hold any government positions," he said on Twitter, adding that senior clerics in powerful positions rarely appear in public and are often protected by security guards if they do.

Reformist cleric Hojatoleslam Ahmad Heidari, who was jailed in the past for his support for the opposition Green Movement, warned that the new trend could taint the "beautiful face of [the] protest movement against oppression and injustice."

"You're right to be angry at those wearing turbans," Heidari wrote on the news site Esafnews.com. But he added that "those who have a hand in power and are your target" are out of reach. He said many of the clerics targeted were "young and elderly" clerics who are not sitting in "ivory towers."

Attacks on clerics, particularly those who attempt to enforce Islamic codes in public, had been on rise in Iran even before the protests erupted, forcing many clerics to appear in public without their robes and turbans.

Last week, a cleric was reportedly hospitalized after being wounded in Karaj, near Tehran, amid antiestablishment protests in the city. The hard-line Fars news agency claimed that protesters attacked the cleric with knives.

Hassan Fereshtian, a Paris-based Iranian cleric and researcher, said the turban-throwing trend was the result of the "suppressed anger of the past four decades."

"If it aims at eliminating the clergy, we could be facing the start of violence," he warned in comments to RFE/RL's Radio Farda. "In fact, the clergy should be eliminated from the centers of power. But they shouldn't be eliminated from society."

Fereshtian, a student of the late dissident Grand Ayatollah Hossein-Ali Montazeri, expressed hope that Iran will reach a point "where secular people can live peacefully next to the clergy and unveiled women next to those who choose to wear the hijab."

In the past year, regime supporters have knocked off the turbans of clerics who had criticized the establishment, including former Interior Minister Abdollah Nuri and former parliament speaker Mehdi Karrubi, who has been under house arrest since 2011 for disputing the 2009 reelection of former President Mahmud Ahmadinejad.
Kosovo's parliament narrowly approved a cabinet headed by Ramush Haradinaj, the leader of the center-right Alliance for the Future of Kosovo (AAK) and a former guerrilla fighter. The cabinet received 61 votes in a session of the 120-member parliament in Pristina late on September 9 amid a boycott from opposition parties. Haradinaj is wanted in Serbia on war crimes charges. While traveling abroad, he has been arrested twice on a Serbian warrant but was released both times. (RFE/RL's Balkan Service)
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 17:03:30|Editor: An

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BEIJING, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Chen Yuqing, 63, practices basic English sentences every morning: "Welcome to Xiamen! I wish you a pleasant stay here."

Chen, a resident of Xiamen in southeast China's Fujian Province, where the BRICS Summit was held, was one of the volunteers at the event.

"It was great for Xiamen to host the BRICS Summit," she said in Chinese. "I felt very proud and wanted to make a contribution."

In Xiamen, 2,000 volunteers took two months of training on etiquette, first aid, foreign languages, and cultural differences to handle guests from Brazil, India, Russia and South Africa.

The city has over 3,000 volunteer organizations and more than 500,000 registered volunteers, one volunteer in every eight Xiamen residents.

Across the country, volunteers are increasingly conspicuous in areas, from big international events to everyday community service.

Data from the Ministry of Civil Affairs show China has over 300,000 voluntary organizations and the number of volunteers on the national information system has reached 50 million.

However, this amount to only about 4 percent of the population, far behind many other countries. To try to improve the situation, the State Council, China's cabinet, issued a guideline on Sept. 6.

The guideline, which will go into effect on Dec. 1, states that volunteering must be "free, honest and legal" and that authorities should clarify their responsibilities. Volunteers should be well informed about their activities and the risks involved. Government policy should be in line with social and economic conditions and an appropriate budget should be set aside.

Lu Xiangang, head of a charitable association in northeast China's Jilin Province, said the regulation means more capital support to voluntary groups.

"Currently, many non-governmental bodies organize voluntary services on their own," Lu said.

Li Fang, a professor of law at Qingdao University, said professionalization is growing in voluntary services in China.

"Only professionals can ensure voluntary services better serve the public interest and solve social problems," Li said.

The regulation encourages businesses and other organizations to employ candidates with voluntary service records on a preferential basis if they have the same professional qualifications as other candidates.

Dang Xiuyun, a professor at Minzu University of China, said government support can help the popularization of volunteering.

"More people need to engage in the cause," said Dang.
Reports from Pakistan say at least 10 people were killed and 14 injured when a passenger van collided with a trailer in the southern province of Punjab.

Police said the accident was caused by the speeding driver of the van, who lost control and collided with the trailer late on September 9 near the town of Layyah.

Authorities say the 10 people who were killed were passengers in the van and were all members of the same family. Police said they were traveling to attend a marriage ceremony.

Local police said the dead included three women, two men, five girls, and a young boy.

The 14 injured people included eight children. They were taken to Nishtar Medical Hospital in Multan for treatment.

With reporting by AP and dpa
Russian President Vladimir Putin cast his ballot in local and regional elections at a voting station in downtown Moscow on September 10. Voters went to the polls to elect local and regional councils as well as governors across Russia and in the Russia-annexed Crimean Peninsula. (Reuters)
MOSCOW -- Sidelined from big-time politics, Russia's opposition threw its energies into this year's municipal elections hoping to steal a march on the Kremlin from the grassroots up. But as voting progressed on September 10, they were looking with concern at an anemic turnout and "anomalous" home-voting figures.



By 6 p.m., election authorities said turnout in Moscow's municipal elections was a meager 12 percent, while opposition leader Dmitry Gudkov alleged that unusually large home-voting figures in Moscow -- four times higher than in previous years -- indicate vote manipulations.



"This is where violations are hidden: the signatures in home-voter statements don't match those in the election register. Observers sent to apartments see that social-welfare workers are compelling elderly people to vote," he wrote in a Facebook post. "And those who vote of their own accord are holding [United Russia ruling party] flyers that were handed to them earlier."



Ilya Yashin, a prominent opposition politician running for a seat in a Moscow district council, wrote on Facebook that observers he has spoken to echo Gudkov's complaint: "Elderly voters everywhere say that they have just been visited by a social worker who told them the surnames of the United Russia candidates whom they have to vote for."

'Deliberate Strategy'

Anticorruption crusader and prominent opposition leader Aleksei Navalny made similar allegations in a blog post, calling the turnout catastrophically low and the result of a deliberate strategy signed off by Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin.

He alleged that city authorities had used social workers to organize home votes for elderly voters and the disabled -- even if they clearly didnt want them  hoping to press them into voting for the authorities.

He posted a video published by the Golos election monitor apparently showing a 90-year-old woman with bad sight and hearing in her home surrounded by people asking her to put on her glasses to read the candidates and vote. She almost cries, protesting that she has no idea who the candidates are, before they finally leave her alone.

By evening, the Yabloko party had called for the head of the Moscow Election Commission to be dismissed for "deliberately reducing" turnout.

In a press release on the opposition party's website, Nikolai Rybakov, deputy chairman of the party, said Moscow's Sobyanin bears direct "political responsibility" for the low turnout, and that the capital's top election official, Valentin Gorbunov, should be fired for carrying out an order to keep it to a minimum.

Myriad elections are being held on September 10 in 82 Russian regions. They include votes for regional governors, city and regional councils, and municipal lawmakers. Although municipal lawmakers have only limited real power, the municipal elections in Moscow have been watched closely as observers look for clues to gauge the public mood in the capital ahead of presidential elections in March 2018.



In Moscow, Gudkov, an opposition politician and former State Duma deputy, who was expelled from the pro-Kremlin A Just Russia party in 2013, has backed over 1,000 Muscovites -- many of them young activists and students -- to challenge for 1,502 seats on district councils. They aim to win enough mandates to nominate Gudkov as their candidate in mayoral elections due in September 2018.



On September 10, Gudkov accused the authorities of deliberately hushing up the elections, and called on Muscovites to cast their ballots and to call on their friends to do the same. "Turnout is still really low  and that is really dangerous," he said on Facebook. Wake up your parents, phone your neighbors, canvas your acquaintances. Today, everything is in our hands. At the elections in [Moscow district] Shchukino last year, 12 votes decided everything.



Those by-elections last September handed a majority of 8 out of 15 municipal council mandates to independent candidates not allied with the Kremlin.

'Administrative Resource'



Gudkovs municipal election candidates  who have gone to door to door meeting voters -- have consistently said the biggest barrier to success is low turnout, which, they allege, favors incumbents backed by the so-called "administrative resource"  whereby officials use their power and influence to inflate the vote for candidates backed by the authorities.



A low turnout, says the opposition, means that this "resource" carries more weight.

Amid accusations that city authorities deliberately hushed up the elections, Human Rights Ombudsman Tatyana Moskalkova told Novaya Gazeta she would probe why so little information about the elections had been circulated. She said she understood there had been a direct "order" to remove all information about polling stations and elections from stairwells.

The potential for a low turnout in the capital is higher than last time in 2012 when municipal elections fell on the same day as the presidential elections and thus had high turnout.



Speaking to RFE/RL's Russian Service on September 10, Ilya Azar, a prominent Russian journalist who is running in the municipal election race, said he believes 100 opposition candidates could win mandates, but warned turnout could be as low as 10 percent.



"This is really not a lot. The authorities have done everything for the turnout to be this [small]," he said. "The entire district press reported nothing about the elections. The candidates themselves have had to inform voters about the elections, or else they would not have known about them."



"The authorities are banking on a minimal turnout that will consist of people whom they have brought to the ballot box. That is to say, city workers, public-sector workers, soldiers, street-sweepers and so on."
Dozens of French cultural figures have gathered in Paris to call for the release of acclaimed film director Kirill Serebrennikov, who is under house arrest in Russia and faces embezzlement charges.

More than 40 performers and directors posed for the photographer Olivier Ciappa on September 10 at Pariss Chaillot national theater, holing a placard reading "We are here. Kirill Serebrennikov. Freedom."

The event was aimed at alerting public opinion about Serebrennikovs fate and "expressing our protest so that freedom of expression is not gagged, said French stage director David Bobee, according to French newspaper Le Monde.

Other members of the support group include director Olivier Py, choreographer Didier Deschamps, and former Culture Minister Jack Lang.

"Russian artists, like all artists in the world, have the right to engage politically, aesthetically, ethically, in their works without risking imprisonment," the group said in an online petition. "The accusations of embezzlement against artists are a classic [tool] of dictatorships that want to muzzle the arts."

Serebrennikov was detained on August 22 and could be sentenced to 10 years in prison if tried and convicted on fraud charges that he has dismissed as unfounded and absurd.

Investigators accuse him of embezzling at least 68 million rubles ($1.1 million) in state arts funding.

On September 4, a Moscow court rejected Serebrennikov's bid for release on bail, but ruled that he will be allowed to leave his apartment to take a walk daily from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.

Dozens of prominent Russian artists submitted character-witness testaments to the court in support of Serebrennikov.

Serebrennikov, 47, is artistic director of the Gogol Center theater in Moscow and founded a dramatic collective called Seventh Studio.

He has participated in antigovernment protests and voiced concern about the increasing influence of the Russian Orthodox Church in cultural matters.

Kremlin critics say his prosecution is part of a crackdown on dissent ahead of a March 2018 election in which President Vladimir Putin is widely expected to seek and secure a new term.

A petition set up by German theater director Thomas Ostermeier and director and playwright Marius von Mayenburg is calling on Russian authorities to drop the criminal investigation into Serebrennikov.

It has been signed by more than 30 cultural figures from different countries, including Australian actress Cate Blanchett, German actress Nina Hoss, and German film director Volker Schloendorff.

With reporting by Le Monde


British Defense Secretary Michael Fallon has said Russia's upcoming military maneuvers with Belarus are aimed at "provoking" NATO and "testing" its defenses.

"Russia is testing us and testing us now at every opportunity," Fallon said on the BBCs Andrew Marr Show on September 10. "Were seeing a more aggressive Russia. We have to deal with that."

Under Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) rules known as the Vienna Document, states conducting maneuvers involving more than 13,000 troops must notify other nations in advance and be open to observers.

Russia and Belarus say the Zapad (West) 2017 exercises, which are set to be held in Belarus and parts of western Russia on September 14-20, will involve about 12,700 troops.

But Western military officials and experts say that the true numbers could be far higher, with as many as 100,000 military personnel involved.

Russia charges that Western concerns about the exercises are unfounded, saying the war games will be defensive and pose no threat to Russia's neighbors, NATO, or the West.

"This is [Russias] biggest exercise I think for four years -- over 100,000 Russian and Belarusian troops ... on NATOs borders," Fallon said. "This is designed to provoke us, its designed to test our defenses, and thats why we have to be strong.

NATO says it will send three observers to Belarus and Russia to monitor Zapad 2017, but it has repeatedly called on the two countries to allow broader monitoring of the drills.

The alliances secretary-general, Jens Stoltenberg, called on Russia to be "fully transparent," telling the BBC on September 10 that Russia has a history of "under-reporting" the number of troops in its exercises and "using loopholes in international agreements to avoid international observation."

"We have seen before that Russia has used big military exercises as a disguise or a precursor for aggressive military actions against their neighbors," Stoltenberg also said. "That happened in Georgia in 2008 when they invaded Georgia, and it happened in Crimea in 2014 when they illegally annexed [Ukraines] Crimea [region]."

Speaking on September 7 in the Estonian capital, Tallinn, the French and German defense ministers condemned the Zapad 2017 exercises, saying Moscow is seeking to show off military might on the borders of the EU and NATO.

"It is particularly important in this context that we reaffirm our presence in the face of...this demonstration the Russians are making which is a strategy of intimidation," France's Defense Minister Florence Parly said.

"It is undisputed that we see a demonstration of capabilities and power of the Russians," German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen said. "Anyone who doubts that only has to look at the high numbers of the participating forces in the Zapad exercise: more than 100,000."

The Russian Defense Ministry said on September 9 that it was "bewildered by the statements of Ursula von der Leyen, publicly talking through her hat and making arbitrary allegations about 100,000 Russian troops ...and about hidden threats to Europe."

On September 7, the ministry said that Russias Armed Forces General Staff chief Valery Gerasimov used a meeting in Azerbaijan with the chairman of the NATO military committee, Petr Pavel, to reassure him about the war games.

Gerasimov told Pavel that the joint exercises with Belarus were "long-planned and defensive" and "not aimed against any third country," a statement carried by Russian news agencies said.

NATO said the September 7 meeting in Baku "demonstrates a clear mutual interest to maintain the military lines of communication," but did not give any details on what was discussed.

Russia holds the Zapad exercises every four years, rotating them with drills in three other parts of the country.

Belarus borders NATO members Poland, Lithuania, and Latvia, as well as Ukraine. The area the upcoming exercises are due to take place also includes the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, which lies between Poland and Lithuania on the Baltic Sea.

Russia's military actions in Ukraine have increased concerns about Moscow's intentions in NATO nations, particularly former Soviet republics or Warsaw Pact satellites of the Soviet Union.

Russia occupied and seized the Crimean Peninsula in March 2014 and backs separatists whose war against Kyiv's forces has killed more than 10,000 people in eastern Ukraine since April of that year.

Those actions have prompted NATO to step up its defenses in the east, deploying four multinational battle-groups in the three Baltic states and Poland -- totaling approximately 4,500 troops.

With reporting by Bloomberg, AFP, and Reuters
Ukrainian officials and local residents moved to stabilize conditions in the freshly recaptured southern city of Kherson, as Russian symbols were being torn down and with the restoration of Ukrainian radio and television service and a new police presence.

Live Briefing: Russia's Invasion Of Ukraine RFE/RL's Live Briefing gives you all of the latest developments on Russia's ongoing invasion, Kyiv's counteroffensive, Western military aid, global reaction, and the plight of civilians. For all of RFE/RL's coverage of the war, click here.

The action on November 12 came after months of occupation by Russian forces following their unprovoked invasion of Ukraine in February and as Ukrainian and Western officials hailed Kyivs latest extraordinary battlefield success and Moscows strategic failure.

Separately, Russian occupying forces said late on November 12 that they were preparing to leave the city of Nova Kakhovka, the site of a damaged dam on the Dnieper River, to a safer location, according to Russian state-run TASS news agency.

As jubilant Kherson residents awoke the morning following the arrival of the first Ukrainian troops, Ukraines military said it was putting stabilization measures in place to ensure safety.

Ihor Klymenko, chief of the National Police of Ukraine, said about 200 officers were at their posts in Kherson and that checkpoints had been set up. Authorities also began seeking out any evidence of possible Russian war crimes, he said in a Facebook post.



The Ukrainian communications watchdog said national TV and radio broadcasts had resumed in the strategic southern city and officials said aid supplies had begun to arrive from nearby regions.

Social media postings on November 12 showed local residents removing memorial plaques put up by Kremlin-installed authorities during the occupation.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and other officials warned that while special forces had entered central Kherson, the full deployment of Ukrainian troops was still under way and that some Russian soldiers could have shed military uniforms for civilian clothing and remained in the city.

Even when the city is not yet completely cleansed of the enemys presence, the people of Kherson themselves are already removing Russian symbols and any traces of the occupiers stay in Kherson from the streets and buildings, Zelenskiy said in his nightly video address.

But he said that medicine, communications, social services are returning. Life is returning.

WATCH: Local residents welcomed Ukrainian soldiers into Snihurivka on November 10, as advance forces of the Ukrainian military recaptured the town in the southern Mykolayiv region.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba, speaking to world leaders at an ASEAN summit in Cambodia, warned that the celebratory mood could turn grim with the possible discovery of war crimes evidence in Kherson.

Such evidence was discovered after Russian troops pulled out of the Kyiv and Kharkiv regions months ago.

Every time we liberate a piece of our territory, when we enter a city liberated from the Russian Army, we find torture rooms and mass graves with civilians tortured and murdered by the Russian Army in the course of the occupation of the territories," he said. "Its not easy to speak with people like this. But I said that every war ends with diplomacy and Russia has to approach talks in good faith.

The White House on November 12 hailed Russias withdrawal from Kherson as an "extraordinary victory" for Ukraine.

"It does look as though the Ukrainians have just won an extraordinary victory where the one regional capital that Russia had seized in this war is now back under a Ukrainian flag -- and that is quite a remarkable thing," U.S. national-security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters as he accompanied President Joe Biden to the ASEAN summit.

Sullivan said that the Russian retreat would have "broader strategic implications," including relieving the longer-term threat by Russia to other southern Ukrainian cities such as Odesa.

"It's a big moment, and it's due to the incredible tenacity and skill of the Ukrainians, backed by the relentless and united support of the United States and our allies," Sullivan said.

Asked about reports that the Biden administration has started to press Zelenskiy to explore negotiations with Moscow, Sullivan said Russia, not Ukraine, was the side that has to decide whether or not to go to the table.

"This whole notion, I think, in the Western press of, 'When's Ukraine going to negotiate?' misses the underlying fundamentals," Sullivan said.

Russia, he added, continues to make "outlandish claims" about its self-declared annexations of Ukrainian lands, even as it retreats from Ukrainian counterattacks.

"Ultimately, at a 30,000-foot level, Ukraine is the party of peace in this conflict and Russia is the party of war. Russia invaded Ukraine. If Russia chose to stop fighting in Ukraine and left, it would be the end of the war. If Ukraine chose to stop fighting and give up, it would be the end of Ukraine," he said. "In that context, our position remains the same as it has been and fundamentally is in close consultation and support of President Zelenskiy.

Separately, British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace said on November 12 that Moscow's "strategic failure" in Kherson will sow doubt among the Russian public about the point of the war in Ukraine.

"Russia's announced withdrawal from Kherson marks another strategic failure for them. In February, Russia failed to take any of its major objectives except Kherson," Wallace said in a statement. "Now with that also being surrendered, ordinary people of Russia must surely ask themselves: 'What was it all for?'"

Meanwhile, Pavel Filipchuk, the head of the occupation government in Nova Kakhovka, told administrators and residents that Russian forces will be pullng back from the city on the right bank of the Dnieper River.

He cited concerns that the key dam could be damaged by missiles, which would result in flooding.

Both Kyiv and Moscow have accused each other of planning to blast the dam, which has already been severely damaged.

With reporting by AFP, AP, dpa, and Reuters
Ukrainian police arrested a topless woman protester affiliated with the Ukrainian feminist group Femen at Ukraine's Krakovets border checkpoint on September 10. The seminaked protest against "fools without borders" took place as supporters of Mikheil Saakashvili, the former Georgian President and ex-governor of Ukraine's Odesa Oblast, gathered at the border crossing in anticipation of his attempt to enter Ukraine from Poland despite the fact that he has been stripped of his Ukrainian citizenship. Ukrainian police said they had also arrested a group of more than 100 young men wearing camouflage clothing who arrived at the border on foot. (RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service, natural sound)
Supporters of Mikheil Saakashvili, the former Georgian president and ex-governor of Ukraine's Odesa Oblast, managed to get him through a Polish-Ukrainian border crossing near the village of Shehyni in Ukraine late on September 10. Ukrainian authorities had previously stopped him from entering the country by train earlier that day. RFE/RL footage shows dozens of Saakashvili's supporters scuffling with Ukrainian security forces and eventually breaking through their cordon. After entering Ukrainian territory, they march onward, singing the Ukrainian national anthem.(RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service)
Supporters of Mikheil Saakashvili, the former Georgian president and ex-governor of Ukraine's Odesa Oblast, managed to get him through a Polish-Ukrainian border crossing near the village of Shehyni in Ukraine late on September 10. Ukrainian authorities had previously stopped him from entering the country by train earlier that day. Footage taken by an RFE/RL reporter on a mobile phone shows a crowd of Saakashvili's supporters marching and singing the Ukrainian national anthem after he had crossed the border. (RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service)
SHEHYNI, Ukraine -- Mikheil Saakashvili, the ex-president of Georgia and former governor of Ukraine's Odesa region, has forced his way into Ukraine across the Polish border, helped by hundreds of his supporters.

Prosecutor-General Yury Lutsenko said late on September 10 that charges would be pursued against the people who helped organize Saakashvili's entry. The Ukrainian Interior Ministry said 17 police and border guards were injured in the confrontation at the border.

The incident occurred at the Medyka-Shehyni crossing point between Poland and Ukraine following a day of confusion and several changes of plan.

Saakashvili -- formerly Georgian, then Ukrainian -- has been a stateless person since President Petro Poroshenko, once a supporter, stripped him of his Ukrainian citizenship in July.

The former Georgian president, who has vowed to return to Ukraine to challenge the revocation of his Ukrainian citizenship and to reenter politics, now runs the risk of being arrested on the grounds that he illegally entered Ukraine. He is also wanted in Georgia on criminal charges, which he claims are politically motivated.

Saakashvili was allowed to pass through the Polish checkpoint at Medyka, before a line of border guards tried to block his approach to the Ukrainian side.

But Saakashvili, surrounded by a crowd of supporters, broke through the line before proceeding toward the small town of Shehyni on foot amid shouts of "victory" and "glory to Ukraine."

"I want to thank everyone, all our heroes, all those people, all the veterans, all the lawmakers who have helped us," Saakashvili said after crossing. "We had absolutely peaceful intentions. You saw how they provoked you. You saw how they incited the violence."

He then hopped into a car bound for the western Ukrainian city of Lviv, where supporters greeted him on his arrival, the AFP news agency reported. He was quoted as saying he would decide while in Lviv if he would travel on to the capital, Kyiv.

Police, Border Guards 'Injured'

Oleh Slobodyan, a spokesman for the Ukrainian border service, wrote on Facebook that a crowd "broke through" the checkpoint and that a fight broke out with the border guards.

"It's hard to predict the consequences of this situation," he added.

Saakashvili and his supporters, including former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, had earlier tried to travel to Lviv by train, but it was held up in the Polish city of Przemysl for hours until he got off and traveled by bus to the Medyka-Shehyni border crossing.

An announcement made for passengers on the Ukrainian-operated train said the National Police of Ukraine had informed the rail service that "a person without a permit to enter the territory of Ukraine" was on board. The announcement said that "in accordance with Ukraine's legislation, the train will move on as soon as that person leaves the train."

However, the Ukrainian Interior Ministry tweeted that the Ukrainian police had "no relation to the movement of the Intercity train."

'Existential Threat'

Speaking to reporters in Rzeszow, the 49-year-old Saakashvili said that Poroshenko's actions, "the way how he mobilized the whole of the state apparatus" against him, "means that he feels some existential threat" from the former Georgian president.

"It looks like [Poroshenko] is getting rid of a political opponent. No matter how many times he says that I am not a danger [to] him, every action of his shows exactly the opposite -- that he regards me as a great and immediate danger," Saakashvili also said.

The stateless Saakashvili had initially intended to travel through the Krakovets border crossing where hundreds of supporters of his Movement of the New Forces party had gathered. But he changed his plans because of concerns that "provocateurs" could cause trouble at the crossing point.

An RFE/RL correspondent at the border reports that Ukrainian police on September 10 detained about 40 Ukrainian men wearing camouflage military uniforms who allegedly were "hired" to disrupt events marking Saakashvilis attempted return.

A topless woman protester affiliated with the Ukrainian feminist group Femen was also arrested.

Georgia's government is seeking Saakashvili's arrest and extradition on allegations that he misappropriated property and abused his powers when he was president of his native Georgia from 2004 to 2013.

Saakashvili denies the allegations and says Georgia's extradition request was made on behalf of "oligarchs" who fear his presence in Ukraine.

After leaving Georgia for self-imposed exile in the United States in 2013, Saakashvili went to Ukraine in 2015 to work for the country's pro-Western authorities as governor of the Odesa region.

He lost his Georgian citizenship when he was granted a Ukrainian passport in 2015 because Georgia does not allow dual citizenship.

Saakashvili had said he would present his Ukrainian passport to Ukrainian border officials on September 10, along with other "legal documents," in his attempt to enter the country.

It was not immediately clear what documents he actually showed when he crossed the border.

With reporting by AFP, UNIAN, Reuters, AP, and TASS
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 17:43:44|Editor: Yurou

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MANILA, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- The Philippines plans to ban security personnel from carrying mobile phones while on duty during the leaders' summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and East Asian Summit (EAS) in November, local media reported on Sunday.

Quoting ASEAN Security Task Force Director Napoleon Taas, the GMA News Online reported that the use of mobile phones while on duty compromises the security plan laid out for the leaders of ASEAN and major dialogue partners including the United States, Japan, India and Russia.

"We believe that banning security personnel from using mobile phones while on duty would immensely help in ensuring the safety and security of all ASEAN delegates," Taas said.

"The directive is very clear: the use of cellular phones while on duty is strictly prohibited and anyone while on duty seen or caught tinkering with their device will be held accountable."

ASEAN groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
WASHINGTON -- When thousands of Russian troops wheeled and maneuvered through the steppes of southern Siberia two years ago, as part of massive military exercises known as Tsentr, Western experts spotted something unusual.

Amid Defense Ministry orders for tank brigades, paratrooper battalions, motorized rifle divisions, and railroad cars carrying howitzers, there were orders for the federal fisheries agency.

"And I wondered, 'What the hell is the fisheries ministry doing?'" recalls Johan Norberg, senior military analyst at the Swedish Defense Research Agency. The eventual conclusion, he says, was that the Russian fisheries fleet was seen by military planners as an intelligence asset, playing a small role in national defense.

It's an example offering a small window into not only how Russian commanders approach large-scale military games. It's also the kind of insight that Western analysts hope to gain beginning next week when one of the largest exercises Moscow has conducted on its western borders since the Cold War get under way: a real-world, real-time glimpse at what Russia's military is truly capable of, after years of institutional reforms.

The Zapad drills, taking place in Belarus and the regions east of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania and formally kicking off on September 14, are the first to be held in close proximity to NATO member countries since Russia seized Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in 2014.



For that and many other reasons, they are giving heartburn to NATO allies from the Baltic to the Black Sea, with some observers predicting that the number of participating personnel could exceed 100,000, along with tanks, artillery units, aircraft, and other equipment.

Midterm Exam

Though few, if any, Western planners anticipate any outbreak of hostilities with Russia, NATO states have taken steps to reassure their populaces and to show they are taking the Russians seriously. U.S. Air Force fighter jets are now patrolling Baltic airspace; Poland is closing its airspace near Russia's Baltic exclave of Kaliningrad; and four NATO battle groups, featuring 4,500 troops, are on alert in the Baltics and Poland.

That said, as much as anything, the Zapad exercises serve as a midterm exam for Russian armed forces and military planners, a measure of reforms made over the past decade.

"The exercise is actually a very good opportunity for us to...get a better sense of what the Russian military is actually capable of: how it can handle logistics, move different units, or, in an operation, exercise command and control over combined armed formations in the Baltic theater, which is the one we're principally concerned with, right?" says Michael Kofman, a senior research scientist at CNA Corporation and a fellow at the Kennan Institute in Washington.



"This one is a lot more interesting to us because we don't plan on fighting Russia in Central Asia," Kofman says.

Preparations have been ongoing for weeks, with large numbers of railroad cars shipping heavy weaponry and vehicles into Belarus and civilians mobilized at some large state-owned enterprises in Kaliningrad and elsewhere.



"As we've seen before, Russians train exactly as they intend to fight," Kristjan Prikk, undersecretary for policy at the Estonian Defense Ministry, said during a July event at the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based think tank. "Thus, Zapad will give ample information on their military development and certainly on their political thinking, as it is right now."

Structural Reforms



In 2008, when Russia invaded its former Soviet neighbor Georgia, its armed forces easily overcame Georgia's defenses and some of its U.S.-trained personnel, but the five-day war showcased significant weaknesses. For example, some Russian officers were reportedly unable to communicate with others over existing radio frequencies and were forced to use regular mobile phones. Russian surveillance drones performed poorly.

Other reforms already under way at the time included a shift from the Soviet military structure, organized around divisions, to a smaller brigade structure and the increased use of contract, rather than conscripted, soldiers.

Reforms also included a substantial increase in defense budgets, something made possible by high world oil prices that stuffed Russia's coffers. A 10-year plan to upgrade weaponry and other equipment originally called for Russia to spend $650 billion between 2011 and 2020, according to NATO figures, though Western sanctions, plummeting oil prices, and the economic downturn in 2015-16 are believed to have slowed some purchases.

"They've had now, say, eight or nine years with plenty of money and the willingness to train, and they have a new organization that they want to test," Norberg says.

While the Defense Ministry conducts a cycle of exercises roughly every year, alternating among four of the country's primary military districts, Western analysts got a surprise lesson in early 2014 when Russian special forces helped lead a stealth invasion of Crimea and paved the way for the Black Sea region's illegal annexation by Moscow in March.

Real-World Laboratory

That, plus the outbreak of fighting in eastern Ukraine in the following months, offered a real-world laboratory for testing new tactics and equipment for Russian forces, including new drones, some manufactured with help from Israeli firms.

The Crimea invasion was preceded by the months of civil unrest in Ukraine's capital, Kyiv, which culminated in deadly violence and the ouster of President Viktor Yanukovych.

For many Kremlin and defense thinkers, that was just the latest in a series of popular uprisings, fomented by Western governments, that toppled regimes and governments stretching back to Georgia in 2003 and lasting through the Arab Spring beginning in 2010.

The scenario that Russian and Belarusian commanders have announced ahead of Zapad 2017 hints at that thinking: The theoretical adversary is one seeking to undermine the government in Minsk and set up a separatist government in western Belarus.

Inside Russia, the thinking that NATO and Western governments used the popular uprisings as a strategy led to the reorganization of internal security forces, such as riot police and Interior Ministry special troops into a specialized National Guard under the command of President Vladimir Putin's former bodyguard. Some parts of that force, whose overall numbers are estimated at 180,000, are expected to participate in the Zapad exercises.



That, Kofman says, should yield insight into "how Russia will mobilize and deploy internal security forces to suppress protest and instability...basically how the regime will protect itself and defend itself against popular unrest."


I dont know how to explain, she said now. I dont know the real world, whats happening. Ive never experience someone cheat me. Many time I want to end my life. I feel hopeless. Developing a strong relation in a short time, based on active Facebook communication, the scammers invented a situation requesting womans help and financial participation. She was emotionally determined to make 33 payments, her entire life savings, plus some of her husbands superannuation. Malaysian police managed to track down and arrest one of the mules in the northwestern state of Kedah but this not helped to recuperate any money.

Australian police declined competence to obtain the information needed from multiple financial institutions which received payments. The photo of Dr Harrison is a picture of US weight loss expert Dr Garth Davis from the Methodist Hospital in Houston, Texas, who warned online about the scam and the fake accounts.In 2016, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and the Australian Cybercrime Online Reporting Network together received more than 200,000 reports of online scams. In Nigerian scams people had lost $15.6 million.
C ambridge University is looking to hire a sexual assault adviser amid claims one in five UK students will face harassment during their first week of term.

The new position will be introduced as part of the institutions counselling service and will work with police and rape charities to protect students.

According to an advert posted on the universitys website, the role has been created to bolster the advice and support available to (students), and in particular offer a source of specialist emotional and practical support to students following sexual harassment or sexual assault.

It involves "individual work with students" and also "designing and running workshops for staff".

New role: Cambridge University is advertising for a Sexual Assault and Harassment Adviser / Cambridge University

A University of Cambridge spokesman told the BBC: "The university is continuously and actively working to improve the prevention, response, support and investigation of all instances of harassment, hate crime and sexual misconduct.

The job was announced amid a five-year campaign by the National Union of Students to push universities to address the harassment of students.

Figures published as part of a report into sex assaults on campus showed one in five students said they had been a victim of harassment in their first week.

An NUS spokeswoman said during the start of term last year: We know sexual harassment and violence is prevalent on our campuses and women are disproportionately affected by this.

No student should have to face this on their campus and we welcome the opportunity this guidance presents in offering clear recommendations to the leadership in education on the actions they need to take to challenge these issues.

NUS will continue to work with students unions and across the education sector to end sexual harassment, violence and hate crime.
S teel-spiked road mats which could stop attackers ploughing vehicles into large crowds are to be rolled out at major events across the capital in a new anti-terror measure.

Scotland Yard said the new equipment can stop a vehicle weighing up to 17 tonnes in its tracks, significantly reducing the risk to crowds.

Vehicle ramming has become a major terrorist tactic in recent years, with recent massacres in Barcelona, Westminster and London Bridge caused by attackers using cars or vans as weapons.

The new nets, called Talon by the Met Police, have tungsten steel spikes which puncture the tyres of any vehicle. The net then becomes tangled around the front wheels of the car or van.

Talon: The steel-spiked nets which can be laid over the road to protect crowds. / Met Police

The new technology was used for the first time today at the Naval Association Parade in Whitehall and the Met said it will likely become a familiar sight at events that attract large crowds in London.

Protection: Vehicle ramming has become a major terrorist tactic in recent years. / Met Police

The net can be deployed quickly by just two officers in less than one minute and can effectively stop a vehicle up to 17 tonnes, the Met said on Sunday.

The speed and low manpower required for deployment means that the nets can be relocated very quickly if necessary.

Chief Inspector Nick Staley said: This equipment undoubtedly has the potential to save lives and is just one of a number of measures being taken to provide protection to crowds attending major events in London and reassuring businesses, workers and visitors as they go about their daily lives."

Hostile vehicle mitigation barriers have already been installed on nine bridges across the capital and on a number of other sites following Londons two terror attacks earlier this year.


A tearful Noel Gallagher paid tribute to his hometown as he closed the first concert at the Manchester Arena since it was targeted in a deadly terror attack in May.

Some 14,000 people turned out for the We Are Manchester benefit gig, which moved the Oasis star to tears as headlined the emotional night

The concert, which raised money for survivors and families of 22 who were killed, was held exactly 110 days after Salman Abedi detonated a homemade nail bomb amid crowds as they left the arena after Ariana Grande finished her set on May 22.

In the wake of the attack, Oasis hit Dont Look Back In Anger became an unofficial anthem of Manchesters defiance in the face of terror, with people memorably launching into a spontaneous rendition of the classic at the end of a moments silence for victims.

Emotions: Noel Gallagher wipes away a tear during a rendition of Don't Look Back In Anger / Getty

Tears rolled down Noel Gallaghers cheek as he played the song during the climax of Saturday nights gig.

Before he began singing, the star told crowds: I was sat at home watching Sky News broadcast the minute's silence after what happened here and during that silence one girl broke it and started to sing.

I don't know if she is here tonight but if she is I ******* love you. It's amazing how everyone rallied around and started to sing. It's become some sort of anthem for defiance I think.

Manchester Arena reopening

He added: Every time you sing, we win. So sing like you've never sang before.

Defiance: 14,000 music fans turned out for the benefit concert / Getty

Other stars on the bill included Pixie Lott, The Courteeners and Rick Astley, while comedian Peter Kay returned to the arena where he once worked as a steward.

The Phoenix Nights star told the crowd: "I've played here many times, I've watched a lot of acts here and I've seen a lot of happiness and joy in this building and in this room.

"There's been a lot of joy in this room, including the night of May 22, right up until the terrorist attack.

"We cannot let terrorists win. The victims will never ever be forgotten."

Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham had opened the concert by reciting the 22 names of those killed in the bombing, with thousands of music fans cheering as they were read out.

Tributes: Peter Kay told crowds 'we cannot let terrorists win' / Getty

He said: Thank you to the city for coming together.

"Thank you for being who you are. We are Manchester, a city united, nothing will ever change us, nothing will ever divide us."

Families who lost loved ones and those injured in the terror attack three months ago were among the crowd at the sold-out gig.

Charlotte Campbell, whose daughter Olivia, 15, was among the victims, said she "had to come back as a show of defiance".

"We have to show we are not scared and we don't want Manchester to be scared. We are proud coming here," she told the Sunday People.
B oris Johnson has pledged to be there "in the long term" for British people whose Caribbean homes were ripped apart by Hurricane Irma.

Despite heavy criticism, the Foreign Secretary said there had been an "unprecedented" relief effort from the UK and that he had "no doubt" Britain would meet the challenges ahead.

Irma claimed at least 24 lives, including five in the British Virgin Islands and one on both Anguilla and Barbuda, and left thousands of people homeless when it smashed into the region on Wednesday.

It hit Florida over the weekend, bringing widespread flooding and leaving more than 2.1 million homes and businesses without power, and the category-three storm is now expected to tear up the state's west coast.

Devastating floods: Water flows down the sidewalk in storm-hit Miami / REUTERS

Mr Johnson said, in addition to the 32 million already set aside to fund the relief effort, the Government would be matching public donations to the Red Cross appeal.

Returning from the latest in a series of emergency Cobra meetings, chaired by Defence Secretary Sir Michael Fallon, he said: "This is just the beginning.

"A terrible thing has happened to British overseas territories."

"These are British people and we are here for the long term and we will come through with a recovery plan working with our partners in the region."

"We will come through with a recovery plan for those islands and make sure they get back on their feet again."

More than 500 British troops are believed to be in the region, including 125 troops working with the local police on the British Virgin Islands, amid reports of looting.

UK Armed Forces respond to Hurricane Irma - In pictures 1 /16 UK Armed Forces respond to Hurricane Irma - In pictures UK Armed Forces disaster relief operation in Anguilla MoD/Crown copyright 2017 UK Armed Forces disaster relief operation in Anguilla MoD/Crown copyright 2017 Soldiers booking equipment in at RAF Brize Norton ready to deploy to Operation Ruman, as part of the United Kingdom's response to the emerging disaster following Hurricane Irma PA A Royal Air Force C-17 Globemaster III aircraft at Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, before Dfid aid is loaded and flown to the areas affected by Hurricane Irma as winds of up to 175mph left death and destruction in the Atlantic PA Soldiers booking equipment in at RAF Brize Norton ready to deploy to Operation Ruman, as part of the United Kingdom's response to the emerging disaster following Hurricane Irma PA UK Armed Forces disaster relief operation in Anguilla MoD/Crown copyright 2017 UK Armed Forces disaster relief operation in Anguilla MoD/Crown copyright 2017 Ultra-light airfield damage repair plant ready to be loaded at RAF Brize Norton ready to deploy to Operation Ruman, as part of the United Kingdom's response to the emerging disaster following Hurricane Irma PA A Royal Air Force C-17 Globemaster III aircraft is fuelled at Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, before Dfid aid is loaded and flown to the areas affected by Hurricane Irma as winds of up to 175mph left death and destruction in the Atlantic PA UK Armed Forces disaster relief operation in Anguilla MoD/Crown copyright 2017 UK Armed Forces disaster relief operation in Anguilla MoD/Crown copyright 2017 HMS Ocean, as a military task group, is on its way with several hundred UK troops to offer assistance to those affected by Hurricane Irma PA

The presence of the troops has had "a massive psychological effect" on morale on the islands, said Mr Johnson, adding that more than 50 British police were on their way to the region.

Three planes were on their way to deliver crucial supplies, he said, while the UK will be sending a military operation to Anguilla, one of the first islands to be hit by Irma and receive aid, as soon as possible to ensure it "does not now slip behind".

Hurricane Irma in Florida

The Royal Navy ship RFA Mounts Bay, carrying engineers, marines and medics, delivered six tonnes of supplies to the British overseas territory and carried out repair work before moving on to the British Virgin Islands.

Mr Johnson said suggestions the UK response was not good or fast enough were "completely wrong".

Foreign Secretary: Boris Johnson / PA

He said: "Other countries actually now been asking us for help including the French, we've got three planes going out today, it's an unprecedented effort by the UK to meet what has been an unprecedented catastrophe in that part of the Caribbean.

"But I've absolutely no doubt that we can face up to the challenge, we can deliver the help that those islanders need, we are seeing some signs of improvement, things are getting better on BVI, we've now got to make sure Anguilla gets the help it needs."

More than six million people in Florida and Georgia were urged to leave their homes as Hurricane Irma loomed.

A storm surge warning is in place for areas including the low-lying Florida Keys and Tampa Bay, with people urgently warned to stay away from the water.

Water levels are expected to rise between 10-15ft in the areas at risk.
A sheriff in Florida has ordered residents not to fire their guns at Hurricane Irma after tens of thousands of people showed interest in a bizarre mass shooting when the storm arrived.

More than 53,000 people showed interest in a Facebook event titled Shoot at Hurricane Irma, while 25,000 others said they were going to take part.

Lets show Irma that we shoot first, wrote the organisers, as Americans added nothing in the world can break the spirit of Florida, egging others on with the words: Stay strong, shooters.

The deadly superstorm, which ripped through the Caribbean on a six-day rampage, is due to hit the coast of Florida on Sunday.

Ryon Edwards, one of the creators of the Shoot at Hurricane Irma online phenomenon, told the BBC: A combination of stress and boredom made me start the event.

Hurricane Irma - In pictures 1 /153 Hurricane Irma - In pictures Boats wrecked by Hurricane Irma are seen from a plane in Sint Maarten, Netherlands Reuters A van remains in a sinkhole,at the Astor Park apartment complex in Winter Springs, Florida AP This combination of natural-color images provided by NASA Earth Observatory shows the U.S. and British Virgin Islands islands on 25 August 2017 (top) before the the passage of Hurricane Irma, and after the storm passed on 10 September 2017 (bottom) AP Property damage is seen at a mobile home park after passing of Hurricane Irma in Naples, Florida Reuters Debris lies from a destroyed building in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in Key Largo, Florida AP A house slides into the Atlantic Ocean in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida AP John Duke tries to figure out how to salvage his flooded vehicle in the wake Hurricane Irma AP Damaged houses are shown in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in the Florida Keys AP Property damage is seen at a mobile home park after the passing of Hurricane Irma in Naples, Florida Reuters The Sunrise Motel remains flooded after Hurricane Irma hit the area in East Naples, Florida Getty Images Debris from Hurricane Irma lays on the side of the Overseas Highway in Islamorda in the Florida Keys AP A mobile home, destroyed by Hurricane Irma, is seen in Naples, Florida Reuters A Florida Highway Patrol trooper inspects a closed segment of Interstate 4, near State Road 434 in Longwood AP Steve Slonan inspects a friend's home after Hurricane Irma hit the area in East Naples, Florida Getty Images Olga Teakell hugs her grandson Gabriel Melendez, 9, after he cut his finger on glass, while he and his bother Ellisha, 12, (left) help clean debris from Olga's destroyed home in the Naples Estates Mobile Home Park, Florida AP Damaged sail boats are shown in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma AP Two men walk their bicycle along a flooded street on the waterfront of Fort Lauderdale, Florida., as Hurricane Irma passes through AP Boats ride out the storm in a marina in Miami, Florida. Getty Images View of damages after the passage of Hurricane Irma, in Cojimar neighborhood in Havana AFP/Getty Images The epic scale of Hurricane Irma has been revealed in incredible satellite images sent from the International Space Station Nasa/Randy Bresnik Randy Bresnik/NASA A fallen tree crashes atop a row of cars in Miami, Florida AFP/Getty Images People waded through flood-hit streets in Cuba AP Sheryl and Rick Estes (R) take shelter from Hurricane Irma inside the Germain Arena in Estero, Florida. Reuters Cars that have been wrecked by Hurricane Irma on the British Virgin Islands. AP Debris litters the street after the passage of Hurricane Irma in Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP People battle high winds and rain to take in the sights along the Miami River which is flooding as Hurricane Irma passes through on September 10, 2017 in Miami, Florida Getty Images A man swims on a flooded street in Havana, Cuba EPA Tourists lie on a beach, littered with palms, one day after Hurricane Irma passed the resort area in Varadero, Cuba AP A stranded manatee in Manatee County, Florida. The mammal was stranded after waters receded from the Florida bay as Hurricane Irma approached AP A houses is surrounded by water as Hurricane Irma passes through Naples, Florida AP A defiant man braves the full force of Irma and takes a selfie as the storm strikes Miami, Florida EPA Flooding in the Brickell neighborhood as Hurricane Irma passes Miami, Florida Reuters A speed limit sign stands tilted and a power line that snapped it half lays on a building, after the passage of Hurricane Irma in Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP People tend to a car that flipped over on Cape Coral Parkway during Hurricane Irma in Florida AP Richard Branson posted this picture from Puerto Rico after revealing the devastation to Necker Island @richardbranson A woman walks her dog in the brisk wind downtown as the weather conditions deteriorate due to Hurricane Irma in Miami, Florida EPA Satellite shows Hurricane Irma as it moves on the Florida coast as Tropical Storm Jose (right) moves west in the Atlantic Ocean taken at 06:30 GMT on 11 September 2017. As Irma heads up Florida's west coast its leaving hundreds of thousands of residents without power as more than 100,000 people have taken refuge in shelters and millions have evacuated the area Getty Images Firefighters Dohnovan Simpson and Jacob McGovern carry Dolores Gevaza, 83, across the courtyard in the rain at John Hopkins Middle School in St. Petersburg, Florida. The school filled classrooms and hallways with people evacuating before Hurricane Irma makes landfall AP Samantha Belk says goodbye to her maltese, Gardolf until after the hurricane in a locker room at John Hopkins Middle School in St. Petersburg, Florida AP Debris is piled up next to the houses on the seashore in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic Reuters Heavy traffic traveling north bound on Interstate 75 moves slowly, as a major evacuation has begun in preparation for Hurricane Irma AP Soldiers board a Royal Air Force C-17 Globemaster III aircraft at Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, before they are flown to help out in the areas affected by Hurricane Irma as winds of up to 175mph left death and destruction in the Atlantic PA A woman takes a break from cleaning the debris in front of a house, in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic Reuters Marie Charlotte walks through water near her house that was flooded in Malfeti, Fort Liberte, north east of Haiti AFP/Getty Images Customers buy supplies and wood to secure their property in preparation of Hurricane Irma in Miami AP Dfid aid is loaded onto a Royal Air Force C-17 Globemaster III aircraft at Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, before it is flown to the areas affected by Hurricane Irma as winds of up to 175mph left death and destruction in the Atlantic PA Damage outside the "Mercure" hotel in Marigot, on the Bay of Nettle, on the island of Saint-Martin in the northeast Caribbean, after the passage of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images UK Armed Forces disaster relief operation in Anguilla MoD/Crown copyright 2017 Edward Pastrana installs wood shutters at the Miami City Ballet in Miami Beach AP UK Armed Forces disaster relief operation in Anguilla MoD/Crown copyright 2017 Debris and trash is seen on a beach in Cap-Haitien as Hurricane Irma approaches. AFP/Getty Images Workers hang plywood in front of doors and windows at Mango's, a salsa club, following mandatory evacuation orders in Miami Beach, Florida ahead of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images A nearly-deserted beach after residents and visitors evacuated from Miami Beach, Florid AFP/Getty Images A family readies to evacuate from a mobile home park in the Little Haiti neighborhood ahead of the expected arrival of Hurricane Irma in Miami, Florida EPA Motorists remove debris caused by Hurricane Irma from the road in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP A young man walks along the beach covered with debris carried by strong winds in Cap Haitian, Haiti EPA UK Armed Forces disaster relief operation in Anguilla MoD/Crown copyright 2017 the aftermath of Hurricane Irma, in St. Maarten AP Storm damage in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in St. Martin. Irma cut a path of devastation across the northern Caribbean, leaving thousands homeless after destroying buildings and uprooting trees AP Flooding caused by Hurricane Irma on Charlotte Amalie, in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP Volaris Airlines ticket agent Cely Vasquez (left) attends to Mexico bound passengers at Miami International Airport AP Satellite image showing the eye of Hurricane Irma (centre) is just north of the island of Hispaniola with Hurricane Katia (left) in the Gulf of Mexico, and Hurricane Jose, (right) in the Atlantic Ocean AP sStellite image shows the eye Hurricane Irma just north of the island of Hispaniola. The fearsome Category 5 storm cut a path of devastation across the northern Caribbean AP Yanina Fernandez (left) and her sister Liz, wait for an available flight to Argentina after their flight was cancelled at Miami International Airport AP damage to a post office caused by Hurricane Irma in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP Aerial image of several damaged houses by Hurricane Irma in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP Residents clear debris from the road in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP Cars piled on top of one another in Marigot, near the Bay of Nettle, on the French Collectivity of Saint Martin, after the passage of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Destroyed palm trees, outside the "Mercure" hotel in Marigot, on the Bay of Nettle, on the island of Saint-Martin in the northeast Caribbean, after the passage of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images A car turned onto its side in Marigot, near the Bay of Nettle, on the French Collectivity of Saint Martin, after the passage of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Damage outside "Le flamboyant" hotel and resort in Marigot, on the Bay of Nettle, on the island of Saint-Martin in the northeast Caribbean, after the passage of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Devastation in Philipsburg, Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma slams Saint Martin Splash News Pleasure craft lie crammed against the shore in Paraquita Bay, British Virgin Islands Reuters Satellite image shows Huricane Irma at 12:30 UK time. Irma cut a swathe of deadly destruction as it roared through the Caribbean, claiming at least nine lives and turning the tropical islands of St. Martin and Barbuda into mountains of rubble. One of the most powerful Atlantic storms on record, Irma churned westward off the northern coast of Puerto Rico early Thursday on a potential collision course with south Florida AFP/Getty Images A street in Gustavia on the French overseas collectivity of Saint-Barthelemy in the Caribbean AFP/Getty Images Damage caused by hurricane Irma in Saint-Martin, Leeward Islands Rex Damage caused by hurricane Irma in Saint-Martin, Leeward Islands Rex Hurricane Irma evacuating traffic streaming out of Florida creeps along northbound Interstate 75 after a vehicle accident in Lake Park, Georgia, USA epa Hurricane Irma slams Saint Martin Splash News iew of the aftermath of Hurricane Irma on Saint Martin Reuters Hurricane Irma slams Saint Martin Splash News Barbuda Members of the civil defence in Fajardo, Puerto Rico Reuters A destroyed building in Gustavia on the French overseas collectivity of Saint-Barthelemy AFP/Getty Images Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images Barbuda Rescue staff from the Municipal Emergency Management Agency check a flooded car in Fajardo, Puerto Rico AP Flooded houses in Gustavia, Saint-Barthelemy AFP/Getty Images People pick up debris in Fajardo, Puerto Rico Reuters Barbuda A flooded street on the French overseas island of Saint-Martin, after high winds from Hurricane Irma hit the island AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma and Hurricane Jose in the Atlantic Ocean on Wednesday. Jose strengthened into a category 1 hurricane, as Irma, a category 5 hurricane continues to move through the Caribbean, battering Barbuda, St. Martin and Puerto Rico EPA The destruction at Sir Richard Branson's island of Necker Sir Richard Branson Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images A woman pushes out floodwaters on her property in St John's AP Cars left flooded in Saint Martin Saint Martin is suffering catastrophic flooding Hurricane Irma hitting Saint Martin Some of the devastation left behind at Saint Martin Hurricane Irma hits Saint Martin Floodwaters run down a street in Saint Martin Carole Greaux Saint Martin Residents in St Petersburg, Florida, carry sandbags ahead of Hurricane Irma AP A satellite image shows Hurricane Irma at 11AM UK time slamming into the French Caribbean islands. Countries can be seen outlined on the image AFP/Getty Images A view of the Baie Nettle beach in Marigot ahead of the arrival of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Employees load plywood for customers in preparation for Hurricane Irma at Lowe's in Jacksonville, Florida AP Shoppers in Florida ransacked a supermarket as they prepared for Hurricane Irma Getty Images Shoppers at Costco waited up to eight hours for water and essentials in preparation for Hurricane Irma in North Miami AFP/Getty Images Policemen talk to customers at a Costco shop in North Miami as mineral water is sold out and people shop ahead of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Members of the Civil Defense prepare their gear ahead of Hurricane Irma, in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic Reuters People put boards on their windows in Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images People load up their cars with sandbags in St Petersburg as the storm approaches AP A thermal image of Harricane Irma NOAA Satellite image shows Hurricane Irma at 10.45am UK time followed by Tropical Storm Jose AFP/Getty Images

The response is a complete and total surprise to me. I never envisioned this event becoming some kind of crazy idea larger than myself.

His event forced the sheriffs office in Pasco County, on the west coast of the state, to tweet a message discouraging gun-owners from shooting into the storm.

To clarify, DO NOT shoot weapons at Irma, the sheriff said.

You wont make it turn around and it will have very dangerous side effects.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which studies the oceans and atmosphere, has previously said that every hurricane season the suggestion of using nuclear weapons to destroy the storms is suggested.

Apart from the fact that this might not even alter the storm, this approach neglects the problem that the released radioactive fallout would fairly quickly move with the tradewinds to affect land areas and cause devastating environmental problems," the centre said.

Needless to say, this is not a good idea.

The storm has reportedly strengthened to a category four hurricane as it heads towards south Florida, the National Hurricane Centre said early on Sunday morning UK time.

Irma has already sent squalls  violent and heavy gusts of wind  and tornadoes across the Sunshine State.

Millions of people have left their homes and tens of thousands more are holed up in shelters.


I t's the waiting that's the worst.

That and trying to guess where the biggest Atlantic storm in history is likely to come ashore.

Oh, and making sure you are close enough to give a first-hand account of the drama as it takes place, but not too close so you become the drama - and doing it all in 30 degrees of heat and stifling humidity.

I've spent the best part of the last week in the glamour of Miami in southern Florida, all big boats and art deco grandeur. But the only talk was of Irma , how mean was she, and how did she stack up against Andrew, the last mythologised killer hurricane to slam these parts.

Hurricane Irma - In pictures 1 /153 Hurricane Irma - In pictures Boats wrecked by Hurricane Irma are seen from a plane in Sint Maarten, Netherlands Reuters A van remains in a sinkhole,at the Astor Park apartment complex in Winter Springs, Florida AP This combination of natural-color images provided by NASA Earth Observatory shows the U.S. and British Virgin Islands islands on 25 August 2017 (top) before the the passage of Hurricane Irma, and after the storm passed on 10 September 2017 (bottom) AP Property damage is seen at a mobile home park after passing of Hurricane Irma in Naples, Florida Reuters Debris lies from a destroyed building in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in Key Largo, Florida AP A house slides into the Atlantic Ocean in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida AP John Duke tries to figure out how to salvage his flooded vehicle in the wake Hurricane Irma AP Damaged houses are shown in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in the Florida Keys AP Property damage is seen at a mobile home park after the passing of Hurricane Irma in Naples, Florida Reuters The Sunrise Motel remains flooded after Hurricane Irma hit the area in East Naples, Florida Getty Images Debris from Hurricane Irma lays on the side of the Overseas Highway in Islamorda in the Florida Keys AP A mobile home, destroyed by Hurricane Irma, is seen in Naples, Florida Reuters A Florida Highway Patrol trooper inspects a closed segment of Interstate 4, near State Road 434 in Longwood AP Steve Slonan inspects a friend's home after Hurricane Irma hit the area in East Naples, Florida Getty Images Olga Teakell hugs her grandson Gabriel Melendez, 9, after he cut his finger on glass, while he and his bother Ellisha, 12, (left) help clean debris from Olga's destroyed home in the Naples Estates Mobile Home Park, Florida AP Damaged sail boats are shown in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma AP Two men walk their bicycle along a flooded street on the waterfront of Fort Lauderdale, Florida., as Hurricane Irma passes through AP Boats ride out the storm in a marina in Miami, Florida. Getty Images View of damages after the passage of Hurricane Irma, in Cojimar neighborhood in Havana AFP/Getty Images The epic scale of Hurricane Irma has been revealed in incredible satellite images sent from the International Space Station Nasa/Randy Bresnik Randy Bresnik/NASA A fallen tree crashes atop a row of cars in Miami, Florida AFP/Getty Images People waded through flood-hit streets in Cuba AP Sheryl and Rick Estes (R) take shelter from Hurricane Irma inside the Germain Arena in Estero, Florida. Reuters Cars that have been wrecked by Hurricane Irma on the British Virgin Islands. AP Debris litters the street after the passage of Hurricane Irma in Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP People battle high winds and rain to take in the sights along the Miami River which is flooding as Hurricane Irma passes through on September 10, 2017 in Miami, Florida Getty Images A man swims on a flooded street in Havana, Cuba EPA Tourists lie on a beach, littered with palms, one day after Hurricane Irma passed the resort area in Varadero, Cuba AP A stranded manatee in Manatee County, Florida. The mammal was stranded after waters receded from the Florida bay as Hurricane Irma approached AP A houses is surrounded by water as Hurricane Irma passes through Naples, Florida AP A defiant man braves the full force of Irma and takes a selfie as the storm strikes Miami, Florida EPA Flooding in the Brickell neighborhood as Hurricane Irma passes Miami, Florida Reuters A speed limit sign stands tilted and a power line that snapped it half lays on a building, after the passage of Hurricane Irma in Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP People tend to a car that flipped over on Cape Coral Parkway during Hurricane Irma in Florida AP Richard Branson posted this picture from Puerto Rico after revealing the devastation to Necker Island @richardbranson A woman walks her dog in the brisk wind downtown as the weather conditions deteriorate due to Hurricane Irma in Miami, Florida EPA Satellite shows Hurricane Irma as it moves on the Florida coast as Tropical Storm Jose (right) moves west in the Atlantic Ocean taken at 06:30 GMT on 11 September 2017. As Irma heads up Florida's west coast its leaving hundreds of thousands of residents without power as more than 100,000 people have taken refuge in shelters and millions have evacuated the area Getty Images Firefighters Dohnovan Simpson and Jacob McGovern carry Dolores Gevaza, 83, across the courtyard in the rain at John Hopkins Middle School in St. Petersburg, Florida. The school filled classrooms and hallways with people evacuating before Hurricane Irma makes landfall AP Samantha Belk says goodbye to her maltese, Gardolf until after the hurricane in a locker room at John Hopkins Middle School in St. Petersburg, Florida AP Debris is piled up next to the houses on the seashore in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic Reuters Heavy traffic traveling north bound on Interstate 75 moves slowly, as a major evacuation has begun in preparation for Hurricane Irma AP Soldiers board a Royal Air Force C-17 Globemaster III aircraft at Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, before they are flown to help out in the areas affected by Hurricane Irma as winds of up to 175mph left death and destruction in the Atlantic PA A woman takes a break from cleaning the debris in front of a house, in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic Reuters Marie Charlotte walks through water near her house that was flooded in Malfeti, Fort Liberte, north east of Haiti AFP/Getty Images Customers buy supplies and wood to secure their property in preparation of Hurricane Irma in Miami AP Dfid aid is loaded onto a Royal Air Force C-17 Globemaster III aircraft at Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, before it is flown to the areas affected by Hurricane Irma as winds of up to 175mph left death and destruction in the Atlantic PA Damage outside the "Mercure" hotel in Marigot, on the Bay of Nettle, on the island of Saint-Martin in the northeast Caribbean, after the passage of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images UK Armed Forces disaster relief operation in Anguilla MoD/Crown copyright 2017 Edward Pastrana installs wood shutters at the Miami City Ballet in Miami Beach AP UK Armed Forces disaster relief operation in Anguilla MoD/Crown copyright 2017 Debris and trash is seen on a beach in Cap-Haitien as Hurricane Irma approaches. AFP/Getty Images Workers hang plywood in front of doors and windows at Mango's, a salsa club, following mandatory evacuation orders in Miami Beach, Florida ahead of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images A nearly-deserted beach after residents and visitors evacuated from Miami Beach, Florid AFP/Getty Images A family readies to evacuate from a mobile home park in the Little Haiti neighborhood ahead of the expected arrival of Hurricane Irma in Miami, Florida EPA Motorists remove debris caused by Hurricane Irma from the road in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP A young man walks along the beach covered with debris carried by strong winds in Cap Haitian, Haiti EPA UK Armed Forces disaster relief operation in Anguilla MoD/Crown copyright 2017 the aftermath of Hurricane Irma, in St. Maarten AP Storm damage in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in St. Martin. Irma cut a path of devastation across the northern Caribbean, leaving thousands homeless after destroying buildings and uprooting trees AP Flooding caused by Hurricane Irma on Charlotte Amalie, in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP Volaris Airlines ticket agent Cely Vasquez (left) attends to Mexico bound passengers at Miami International Airport AP Satellite image showing the eye of Hurricane Irma (centre) is just north of the island of Hispaniola with Hurricane Katia (left) in the Gulf of Mexico, and Hurricane Jose, (right) in the Atlantic Ocean AP sStellite image shows the eye Hurricane Irma just north of the island of Hispaniola. The fearsome Category 5 storm cut a path of devastation across the northern Caribbean AP Yanina Fernandez (left) and her sister Liz, wait for an available flight to Argentina after their flight was cancelled at Miami International Airport AP damage to a post office caused by Hurricane Irma in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP Aerial image of several damaged houses by Hurricane Irma in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP Residents clear debris from the road in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP Cars piled on top of one another in Marigot, near the Bay of Nettle, on the French Collectivity of Saint Martin, after the passage of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Destroyed palm trees, outside the "Mercure" hotel in Marigot, on the Bay of Nettle, on the island of Saint-Martin in the northeast Caribbean, after the passage of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images A car turned onto its side in Marigot, near the Bay of Nettle, on the French Collectivity of Saint Martin, after the passage of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Damage outside "Le flamboyant" hotel and resort in Marigot, on the Bay of Nettle, on the island of Saint-Martin in the northeast Caribbean, after the passage of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Devastation in Philipsburg, Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma slams Saint Martin Splash News Pleasure craft lie crammed against the shore in Paraquita Bay, British Virgin Islands Reuters Satellite image shows Huricane Irma at 12:30 UK time. Irma cut a swathe of deadly destruction as it roared through the Caribbean, claiming at least nine lives and turning the tropical islands of St. Martin and Barbuda into mountains of rubble. One of the most powerful Atlantic storms on record, Irma churned westward off the northern coast of Puerto Rico early Thursday on a potential collision course with south Florida AFP/Getty Images A street in Gustavia on the French overseas collectivity of Saint-Barthelemy in the Caribbean AFP/Getty Images Damage caused by hurricane Irma in Saint-Martin, Leeward Islands Rex Damage caused by hurricane Irma in Saint-Martin, Leeward Islands Rex Hurricane Irma evacuating traffic streaming out of Florida creeps along northbound Interstate 75 after a vehicle accident in Lake Park, Georgia, USA epa Hurricane Irma slams Saint Martin Splash News iew of the aftermath of Hurricane Irma on Saint Martin Reuters Hurricane Irma slams Saint Martin Splash News Barbuda Members of the civil defence in Fajardo, Puerto Rico Reuters A destroyed building in Gustavia on the French overseas collectivity of Saint-Barthelemy AFP/Getty Images Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images Barbuda Rescue staff from the Municipal Emergency Management Agency check a flooded car in Fajardo, Puerto Rico AP Flooded houses in Gustavia, Saint-Barthelemy AFP/Getty Images People pick up debris in Fajardo, Puerto Rico Reuters Barbuda A flooded street on the French overseas island of Saint-Martin, after high winds from Hurricane Irma hit the island AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma and Hurricane Jose in the Atlantic Ocean on Wednesday. Jose strengthened into a category 1 hurricane, as Irma, a category 5 hurricane continues to move through the Caribbean, battering Barbuda, St. Martin and Puerto Rico EPA The destruction at Sir Richard Branson's island of Necker Sir Richard Branson Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images A woman pushes out floodwaters on her property in St John's AP Cars left flooded in Saint Martin Saint Martin is suffering catastrophic flooding Hurricane Irma hitting Saint Martin Some of the devastation left behind at Saint Martin Hurricane Irma hits Saint Martin Floodwaters run down a street in Saint Martin Carole Greaux Saint Martin Residents in St Petersburg, Florida, carry sandbags ahead of Hurricane Irma AP A satellite image shows Hurricane Irma at 11AM UK time slamming into the French Caribbean islands. Countries can be seen outlined on the image AFP/Getty Images A view of the Baie Nettle beach in Marigot ahead of the arrival of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Employees load plywood for customers in preparation for Hurricane Irma at Lowe's in Jacksonville, Florida AP Shoppers in Florida ransacked a supermarket as they prepared for Hurricane Irma Getty Images Shoppers at Costco waited up to eight hours for water and essentials in preparation for Hurricane Irma in North Miami AFP/Getty Images Policemen talk to customers at a Costco shop in North Miami as mineral water is sold out and people shop ahead of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Members of the Civil Defense prepare their gear ahead of Hurricane Irma, in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic Reuters People put boards on their windows in Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images People load up their cars with sandbags in St Petersburg as the storm approaches AP A thermal image of Harricane Irma NOAA Satellite image shows Hurricane Irma at 10.45am UK time followed by Tropical Storm Jose AFP/Getty Images

Local TV and a lot of the networks were wall to wall with "Irmalysing", and of course the rhetoric was as high octane as the predicted wind speeds .

The immediate run up was spent reporting the preparations for the storm: to flee or not to flee, to shutter or not to shutter, and how long was it safe to prevaricate.

Sky News presenter David Bowden / David Bowden

Of course it is the reporters dilemma to bear all of this in mind while knowing full well you are going to stay, because that's what you're paid for.

Destruction: Heavy winds have already torn down trees on Ocean Drive in Florida's South Beach / Reuters

Things moved up a gear on Saturday. The weather turned ugly: palm trees shed their fronds, turning the roads into slalom courses.

On the famous Miami Beach , the gentle waters of earlier in the week ,where people had been swimming and laughing, churned angrily as Irma sent her outriders to rough up the die hards who'd stayed.

Now there was horizontal rain stinging your face and winds that whipped the palm fronds into a frenzy. The squall also drenched me and my crew, drowned the camera to uselessness and forced us to broadcast to the Sky news audience using a camera phone in a plastic bag.

But all of this was mere bagatelle compared with the main event on Sunday. We had to make a break from our hotel as they threatened to lock everyone in (which eventually didn't happen) to keep Irma out.

In the early hours, the skies filled with green flashes as electricity transformers popped and tens of thousands of people lost power.

Irma was here in person and packing wind gusts of 100 mph, and in the Florida keys the storm surge overtopped sections of the only road in and out.

As I write the hurricane continues to lash southern Florida. Trees bend to breaking point and beyond, and the emergency services will not turn out because the driving conditions are too dangerous.

Irma is not a very well behaved visitor.
T he eye of deadly superstorm Irma has made landfall on the southern tip of the Florida peninsular with residents being given a last-minute warning to find shelter.

US weather monitors the National Hurricane Center said the storm's northern eyewall had reached Lower Florida Keys shortly after noon UK time, with the eye 15 miles south-east of Key West.

The category 4 hurricane, which has ripped through the Caribbean in a six-day rampage leaving devastation in its wake, is now set to speed inland and up the western coastline with wind speeds of 130 mph.

One man died in a truck crash caused by the stormy weather in the Florida Keys, police said.

It has already sent tornadoes and heavy squalls - violent and sudden gusts of winds - across south Florida as tens of thousands of people huddled in shelters awaiting the storm.

Rough surf churned up buy the approaching hurricane damage the docks at Whale harbour in the Florida Keys. / AFP/Getty Images

Forecasters said there had been a major shift in the hurricanes path, meaning St Petersburg further along the coast could get a direct hit.

Waves crash against the Southernmost Point in Key West, Florida, as the storm swirls towards the coast. / AP

The edge of the storm has already bent palm trees and lashed heavy rain across the south of the Sunshine State, causing more than 170,000 homes and businesses to lose power.

Authorities told 6.4 million people to evacuate their homes, but on Saturday night (UK time) the Florida governor said it was now too late to leave.

Palm trees sway in the strong wind in Key Largo, Florida. / REUTERS

Rick Scott issued a stark message to anyone remaining in the path of the storm to seek shelter and get off the roads, adding: People cannot survive this.

Under the new trajectory forecast, Tampa and Miami may both be spared a head-on blow. But because the storm is 350 to 400 miles wide, the entire Florida peninsula is exposed and the greater Miami area of six million people could still get life-threatening hurricane winds and storm surge of four to six feet.

Hurricane Irma - In pictures 1 /153 Hurricane Irma - In pictures Boats wrecked by Hurricane Irma are seen from a plane in Sint Maarten, Netherlands Reuters A van remains in a sinkhole,at the Astor Park apartment complex in Winter Springs, Florida AP This combination of natural-color images provided by NASA Earth Observatory shows the U.S. and British Virgin Islands islands on 25 August 2017 (top) before the the passage of Hurricane Irma, and after the storm passed on 10 September 2017 (bottom) AP Property damage is seen at a mobile home park after passing of Hurricane Irma in Naples, Florida Reuters Debris lies from a destroyed building in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in Key Largo, Florida AP A house slides into the Atlantic Ocean in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida AP John Duke tries to figure out how to salvage his flooded vehicle in the wake Hurricane Irma AP Damaged houses are shown in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in the Florida Keys AP Property damage is seen at a mobile home park after the passing of Hurricane Irma in Naples, Florida Reuters The Sunrise Motel remains flooded after Hurricane Irma hit the area in East Naples, Florida Getty Images Debris from Hurricane Irma lays on the side of the Overseas Highway in Islamorda in the Florida Keys AP A mobile home, destroyed by Hurricane Irma, is seen in Naples, Florida Reuters A Florida Highway Patrol trooper inspects a closed segment of Interstate 4, near State Road 434 in Longwood AP Steve Slonan inspects a friend's home after Hurricane Irma hit the area in East Naples, Florida Getty Images Olga Teakell hugs her grandson Gabriel Melendez, 9, after he cut his finger on glass, while he and his bother Ellisha, 12, (left) help clean debris from Olga's destroyed home in the Naples Estates Mobile Home Park, Florida AP Damaged sail boats are shown in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma AP Two men walk their bicycle along a flooded street on the waterfront of Fort Lauderdale, Florida., as Hurricane Irma passes through AP Boats ride out the storm in a marina in Miami, Florida. Getty Images View of damages after the passage of Hurricane Irma, in Cojimar neighborhood in Havana AFP/Getty Images The epic scale of Hurricane Irma has been revealed in incredible satellite images sent from the International Space Station Nasa/Randy Bresnik Randy Bresnik/NASA A fallen tree crashes atop a row of cars in Miami, Florida AFP/Getty Images People waded through flood-hit streets in Cuba AP Sheryl and Rick Estes (R) take shelter from Hurricane Irma inside the Germain Arena in Estero, Florida. Reuters Cars that have been wrecked by Hurricane Irma on the British Virgin Islands. AP Debris litters the street after the passage of Hurricane Irma in Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP People battle high winds and rain to take in the sights along the Miami River which is flooding as Hurricane Irma passes through on September 10, 2017 in Miami, Florida Getty Images A man swims on a flooded street in Havana, Cuba EPA Tourists lie on a beach, littered with palms, one day after Hurricane Irma passed the resort area in Varadero, Cuba AP A stranded manatee in Manatee County, Florida. The mammal was stranded after waters receded from the Florida bay as Hurricane Irma approached AP A houses is surrounded by water as Hurricane Irma passes through Naples, Florida AP A defiant man braves the full force of Irma and takes a selfie as the storm strikes Miami, Florida EPA Flooding in the Brickell neighborhood as Hurricane Irma passes Miami, Florida Reuters A speed limit sign stands tilted and a power line that snapped it half lays on a building, after the passage of Hurricane Irma in Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP People tend to a car that flipped over on Cape Coral Parkway during Hurricane Irma in Florida AP Richard Branson posted this picture from Puerto Rico after revealing the devastation to Necker Island @richardbranson A woman walks her dog in the brisk wind downtown as the weather conditions deteriorate due to Hurricane Irma in Miami, Florida EPA Satellite shows Hurricane Irma as it moves on the Florida coast as Tropical Storm Jose (right) moves west in the Atlantic Ocean taken at 06:30 GMT on 11 September 2017. As Irma heads up Florida's west coast its leaving hundreds of thousands of residents without power as more than 100,000 people have taken refuge in shelters and millions have evacuated the area Getty Images Firefighters Dohnovan Simpson and Jacob McGovern carry Dolores Gevaza, 83, across the courtyard in the rain at John Hopkins Middle School in St. Petersburg, Florida. The school filled classrooms and hallways with people evacuating before Hurricane Irma makes landfall AP Samantha Belk says goodbye to her maltese, Gardolf until after the hurricane in a locker room at John Hopkins Middle School in St. Petersburg, Florida AP Debris is piled up next to the houses on the seashore in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic Reuters Heavy traffic traveling north bound on Interstate 75 moves slowly, as a major evacuation has begun in preparation for Hurricane Irma AP Soldiers board a Royal Air Force C-17 Globemaster III aircraft at Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, before they are flown to help out in the areas affected by Hurricane Irma as winds of up to 175mph left death and destruction in the Atlantic PA A woman takes a break from cleaning the debris in front of a house, in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic Reuters Marie Charlotte walks through water near her house that was flooded in Malfeti, Fort Liberte, north east of Haiti AFP/Getty Images Customers buy supplies and wood to secure their property in preparation of Hurricane Irma in Miami AP Dfid aid is loaded onto a Royal Air Force C-17 Globemaster III aircraft at Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, before it is flown to the areas affected by Hurricane Irma as winds of up to 175mph left death and destruction in the Atlantic PA Damage outside the "Mercure" hotel in Marigot, on the Bay of Nettle, on the island of Saint-Martin in the northeast Caribbean, after the passage of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images UK Armed Forces disaster relief operation in Anguilla MoD/Crown copyright 2017 Edward Pastrana installs wood shutters at the Miami City Ballet in Miami Beach AP UK Armed Forces disaster relief operation in Anguilla MoD/Crown copyright 2017 Debris and trash is seen on a beach in Cap-Haitien as Hurricane Irma approaches. AFP/Getty Images Workers hang plywood in front of doors and windows at Mango's, a salsa club, following mandatory evacuation orders in Miami Beach, Florida ahead of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images A nearly-deserted beach after residents and visitors evacuated from Miami Beach, Florid AFP/Getty Images A family readies to evacuate from a mobile home park in the Little Haiti neighborhood ahead of the expected arrival of Hurricane Irma in Miami, Florida EPA Motorists remove debris caused by Hurricane Irma from the road in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP A young man walks along the beach covered with debris carried by strong winds in Cap Haitian, Haiti EPA UK Armed Forces disaster relief operation in Anguilla MoD/Crown copyright 2017 the aftermath of Hurricane Irma, in St. Maarten AP Storm damage in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in St. Martin. Irma cut a path of devastation across the northern Caribbean, leaving thousands homeless after destroying buildings and uprooting trees AP Flooding caused by Hurricane Irma on Charlotte Amalie, in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP Volaris Airlines ticket agent Cely Vasquez (left) attends to Mexico bound passengers at Miami International Airport AP Satellite image showing the eye of Hurricane Irma (centre) is just north of the island of Hispaniola with Hurricane Katia (left) in the Gulf of Mexico, and Hurricane Jose, (right) in the Atlantic Ocean AP sStellite image shows the eye Hurricane Irma just north of the island of Hispaniola. The fearsome Category 5 storm cut a path of devastation across the northern Caribbean AP Yanina Fernandez (left) and her sister Liz, wait for an available flight to Argentina after their flight was cancelled at Miami International Airport AP damage to a post office caused by Hurricane Irma in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP Aerial image of several damaged houses by Hurricane Irma in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP Residents clear debris from the road in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands AP Cars piled on top of one another in Marigot, near the Bay of Nettle, on the French Collectivity of Saint Martin, after the passage of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Destroyed palm trees, outside the "Mercure" hotel in Marigot, on the Bay of Nettle, on the island of Saint-Martin in the northeast Caribbean, after the passage of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images A car turned onto its side in Marigot, near the Bay of Nettle, on the French Collectivity of Saint Martin, after the passage of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Damage outside "Le flamboyant" hotel and resort in Marigot, on the Bay of Nettle, on the island of Saint-Martin in the northeast Caribbean, after the passage of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Devastation in Philipsburg, Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma slams Saint Martin Splash News Pleasure craft lie crammed against the shore in Paraquita Bay, British Virgin Islands Reuters Satellite image shows Huricane Irma at 12:30 UK time. Irma cut a swathe of deadly destruction as it roared through the Caribbean, claiming at least nine lives and turning the tropical islands of St. Martin and Barbuda into mountains of rubble. One of the most powerful Atlantic storms on record, Irma churned westward off the northern coast of Puerto Rico early Thursday on a potential collision course with south Florida AFP/Getty Images A street in Gustavia on the French overseas collectivity of Saint-Barthelemy in the Caribbean AFP/Getty Images Damage caused by hurricane Irma in Saint-Martin, Leeward Islands Rex Damage caused by hurricane Irma in Saint-Martin, Leeward Islands Rex Hurricane Irma evacuating traffic streaming out of Florida creeps along northbound Interstate 75 after a vehicle accident in Lake Park, Georgia, USA epa Hurricane Irma slams Saint Martin Splash News iew of the aftermath of Hurricane Irma on Saint Martin Reuters Hurricane Irma slams Saint Martin Splash News Barbuda Members of the civil defence in Fajardo, Puerto Rico Reuters A destroyed building in Gustavia on the French overseas collectivity of Saint-Barthelemy AFP/Getty Images Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images Barbuda Rescue staff from the Municipal Emergency Management Agency check a flooded car in Fajardo, Puerto Rico AP Flooded houses in Gustavia, Saint-Barthelemy AFP/Getty Images People pick up debris in Fajardo, Puerto Rico Reuters Barbuda A flooded street on the French overseas island of Saint-Martin, after high winds from Hurricane Irma hit the island AFP/Getty Images Hurricane Irma and Hurricane Jose in the Atlantic Ocean on Wednesday. Jose strengthened into a category 1 hurricane, as Irma, a category 5 hurricane continues to move through the Caribbean, battering Barbuda, St. Martin and Puerto Rico EPA The destruction at Sir Richard Branson's island of Necker Sir Richard Branson Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images A woman pushes out floodwaters on her property in St John's AP Cars left flooded in Saint Martin Saint Martin is suffering catastrophic flooding Hurricane Irma hitting Saint Martin Some of the devastation left behind at Saint Martin Hurricane Irma hits Saint Martin Floodwaters run down a street in Saint Martin Carole Greaux Saint Martin Residents in St Petersburg, Florida, carry sandbags ahead of Hurricane Irma AP A satellite image shows Hurricane Irma at 11AM UK time slamming into the French Caribbean islands. Countries can be seen outlined on the image AFP/Getty Images A view of the Baie Nettle beach in Marigot ahead of the arrival of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Employees load plywood for customers in preparation for Hurricane Irma at Lowe's in Jacksonville, Florida AP Shoppers in Florida ransacked a supermarket as they prepared for Hurricane Irma Getty Images Shoppers at Costco waited up to eight hours for water and essentials in preparation for Hurricane Irma in North Miami AFP/Getty Images Policemen talk to customers at a Costco shop in North Miami as mineral water is sold out and people shop ahead of Hurricane Irma AFP/Getty Images Members of the Civil Defense prepare their gear ahead of Hurricane Irma, in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic Reuters People put boards on their windows in Saint Martin AFP/Getty Images People load up their cars with sandbags in St Petersburg as the storm approaches AP A thermal image of Harricane Irma NOAA Satellite image shows Hurricane Irma at 10.45am UK time followed by Tropical Storm Jose AFP/Getty Images

Tens of thousands of people are gathered in shelters watched for updates as the storm swung to the west.

"Tonight, I'm sweating. Tonight I'm scared to death," said 60-year-old Carol Walterson Stroud, who sought refuge in a senior center in Florida's southernmost city with her husband, granddaughter and dog.

Sheryl and Rick Estes (R) take shelter from Hurricane Irma inside the Germain Arena in Estero, Florida. (REUTERS) / Reuters

Irma - at one time the most powerful hurricane ever recorded in the open Atlantic - left more than 20 people dead across the Caribbean as it steamed toward the US.

Its winds dropped to Category 3, down considerably from their peak of 185 mph (300 kph) earlier in the week. But as it moved north over the Gulf of Mexico's bathtub-warm water of nearly 90 degrees, it regained strength.

Caribbean: A man walks on a street covered in debris after hurricane Irma hurricane hit Saint-Martin, near Marigot. / AFP/Getty Images

Nearly the entire Florida coastline remained under hurricane watches and warnings, and the latest projections could shift again, sparing or savaging other parts of the state.

Forecasters warned of storm surge as high as 15 feet (4.5 meters).

Given its mammoth size and strength and its course up the peninsula, it could prove one of the most devastating hurricanes ever to hit Florida, and inflict damage on a scale not seen here in 25 years.

Hurricane Andrew smashed into suburban Miami in 1992 with winds topping 165 mph (265 kph), damaging or blowing apart over 125,000 homes. The damage in Florida totaled $26 billion, and at least 40 people died.
T he people of Florida have been urged to pray, pray, pray as Hurricane Irma devastates the Sunshine State.

The deadly stormed roared through the state on Sunday as punishing 130mph winds and 15ft storm surges left 2.5 million buildings without power.

Four people died  three in storm related car crashes and one from natural causes at a hurricane shelter  as Irma levelled 12 hours of carnage after making landfall in the US.

As Irma headed north towards Tampa-St Petersburg it was downgraded to a category three storm but the states governor Rick Scott urged citizens to pray, pray, pray for everybody in Florida in the wake of potentially devastating floods.

Devastating winds: Irma rolls through Florida / AP

More than six million people were told to evacuate their homes and tens of thousands of people are currently holed up in shelters in anticipation for the destruction.

More than one million homes and businesses were left without power as the storm pummelled cables.

Officials from Florida Power and Light said it could take weeks for electricity systems to be fully restored.

Rescue mission: A man is saved from flooded streets in Havana, Cuba / REUTERS

Images emerged of residents in storm-hit Cuba waist deep in flood water while deluges hit downtown Miami.

Winds began to pick up in St Petersburg, some 400 miles north the Keys on Sunday evening, as people began bracing for the onslaught.

Destruction: People waded through flood-hit streets in Cuba / AP

"I've been here with other storms, other hurricanes. But this one scares me," resident Sally Carlson said she snapped photos of the waves crashing against boats.

"Let's just say a prayer we hope we make it through."

The governor activated all 7,000 members of the Florida National Guard, and 30,000 guardsmen from elsewhere were on standby.

Miami Beach a ghost town as Florida braces for Hurricane Irma 1 /18 Miami Beach a ghost town as Florida braces for Hurricane Irma A nearly-deserted beach after residents and visitors evacuated from Miami Beach, Florida AFP/Getty Images Edward Pastrana installs wood shutters at the Miami City Ballet in Miami Beach AP Workers finish covering the ground floor windows of the Chesterfield Hotel as the city prepares for the approaching Hurricane Irma Getty Images A 55 Chevy sits in front of the closed Oceans Ten Restaurant at the Edison Hotel on Ocean Drive as the city prepares for the approaching Hurricane Irma Getty Images The Boulevard Hotel remains open as the city prepares for the approaching Hurricane Irma in Miami Beach, Florida Getty Images The Carlye Hotel on Ocean Drive is closed as the city prepares for the approaching Hurricane Irma Getty Images The Breakwater Hotel on Ocean Drive is closed as the city prepares for the approaching Hurricane Irma Getty Images A nearly-deserted beach after residents and visitors evacuated from Miami Beach, Florida AFP/Getty Images A runner jogs on a nearly-deserted beach in Miami Beach, Florid AFP/Getty Images A nearly-deserted beach after a mandatory evacuation order from Miami Beach, Florida AFP/Getty Images The Leslie Hotel on Ocean Drive is closed as the city prepares for the approaching Hurricane Irma Getty Images AP A man takes a photo with his cellphone alongside a boarded-up restaurant following mandatory evacuation orders in Miami Beach, Florida AFP/Getty Images Trash cans and all beach items will be removed from the beach in preparing for approaching Hurricane Irma Getty Images

Forecasters warned that after moving up Florida's west coast, a weakened Irma could push into Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee and beyond.

A tropical storm warning was issued for the first time ever in Atlanta, some 200 miles from the sea.

Hurricane Irma in Florida

Given its mammoth size and strength and its projected course, Irma could prove to be one of the most devastating hurricanes ever to hit Florida and inflict damage on a scale not seen in the state in 25 years.

The damage is likely to cost billions of dollars.

A fund set up by all five living former US presidents to help Hurricane Harvey victims, the One America Appeal, is already making preparations to send money to the crisis-hit area.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 17:48:47|Editor: Yurou

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CAIRO, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- At least nine terrorists were killed and five policemen were wounded on Sunday during a security raid in Giza province near the capital Cairo, official MENA news agency reported.

The terrorists have been hiding in two apartments at the same street in Giza's Agouza district in preparation for carrying out a number of terror operations, MENA quoted a senior security source as saying.

According to the source, the militants started gunfire upon the forces' approach, and during fire exchange at one of the apartments, a terrorist from the other blew off an explosive device.

"The confrontation wounded five policemen and killed nine of the terrorist elements," he added, noting that weapons, ammunition, explosives and terror-related papers were also seized during the raid.

Since March, similar security campaigns killed about 50 militants in the provinces of Cairo, Giza, Alexandria, Beheira, Fayoum, Qalioubiya, Minufiya, Ismailia and others.

Egypt has been fighting against a wave of terror activities that killed hundreds of policemen and soldiers since the military toppled former Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in July 2013 in response to mass protests against his one-year rule and his currently outlawed Muslim Brotherhood group.

Terror attacks in Egypt used to focus on police and military men in North Sinai before spreading nationwide and targeting the Coptic minority as well, with most of them claimed by a Sinai-based group loyal to the regional Islamic State (IS) militant group.

Another militant group referring to itself as Hasm, which appeared late last year and is regarded by the police as an affiliate with the Brotherhood, claimed responsibility for a number of terrorist attacks that killed several policemen in the country.

Meanwhile, the Egyptian military and police have killed hundreds of militants and arrested a similar number of suspects as part of the country's anti-terror war declared by President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi, the army chief then, following Morsi's removal.
After two years of negotiations Indonesia announced that it was going to buy eleven Russian Su-35 aircraft to replace its aging (and grounded) American made F-5s. Indonesia originally discussed obtaining 16 Su-35s and that is still a possibility if the August 2017 deal works. Indonesia drove a hard bargain and while it is paying $104 million per aircraft (including maintenance, spare parts and tech support) only 15 percent of that is being paid in cash. Half the price is being paid in Indonesian goods. This would mainly consist of items Russia has to import and that Indonesia produces like palm oil, rubber, coffee, cocoa, tea, processed fish, copra, and spices. Indonesia also has some manufactured goods Russia could use like footwear, furniture, paper, textiles and several kinds of machinery. Indonesia also produces some defense related goods. Then there is the 35 percent of the aircraft price that will be offset. This will include technology transfer for components and service (maintenance, assembly) to be done in Indonesia. The 35 percent offset for defense related purchases is standard with Indonesia. Details of the offset and exports to Russia have still to be worked out. Russia was eager to make this sale as it would be the second export sale for the Su-35.

The first export sale was to China, which received the first of these Su-35s in 2016. Because of frequent illegal copying of Russian technology this is expected to be the last Russian warplane exported to China. The Indonesia sale is important because it may help convince other potential customers (UAE, Pakistan, Vietnam, Algeria, Kazakhstan and Egypt) that Russia has been negotiating with. Brazil and South Korea rejected the Su-35 and Venezuela and Libya were interested but both have run into political and financial problems. Currently Russia has about 60 Su-35s and China has four (out of 24 ordered). Russia received its first Su-35s in 2013 and four were sent to Syria in early 2016 for some combat experience. These were apparently successful, especially when delivering Russian built smart bombs.

On paper the Su-35 is impressive. It is a 34 ton fighter that is more maneuverable than the original, 33 ton, Su-27 that it was based on, and has much better electronics. It can cruise at above the speed of sound. It also costs at nearly twice as much as the Su-27. That would be some $80 million (for a barebones model), about what a top-of-the-line F-16 costs. The Su-27 was originally developed to match the F-15, which is larger than the single engine F-16. The larger size of the Su-27/30/35 allows designers to do a lot more with it in terms of modifications and enhancements.

The Su-35 has some stealth capabilities (or at least be less detectable to most fighter aircraft radars). Russia claims the Su-35 has a useful life of 6,000 flight hours and engines good for 4,000 hours. Russia promises world-class avionics, plus a very pilot-friendly cockpit. The use of many thrusters along with fly-by-wire means an aircraft even more maneuverable than Su-30s (which were Su-27s tweaked to be extremely agile). The Su-35 was in development for two decades before it was declared ready for production in 2005. But even then there were problems with the new engines that gave it its superior performance. Russia says the engine problems are solved, but only time will tell if that is true.

The Su-35 is not meant to be a direct rival for the F-22 because the Russian aircraft is not nearly as stealthy. The Su-35 carries a 30mm autocannon (with 150 rounds) and up to eight tons of munitions, hanging from 12 hard points. This reduces stealthiness, which the F-22 and F-35 get around by using an internal bay for bombs and missiles. But if the maneuverability and advanced electronics of the proposed Su-35 live up to the promises, the aircraft would be more than a match for every fighter out there except the F-22. Since the Su-35 is to sell for well under $100 million each, there should be a lot of buyers. There werent and Russia is eager to change that if only to just to improve the reputation of the Su-35.

Meanwhile the Indonesian Air Force is trying to recover from two decades of neglect and mismanagement. In the late 1990s Indonesia, blocked from receiving spares and support from its American jet fighters (ten F-16s, and sixteen F-5s) turned to Russian. The U.S., and the West in general, was angry at the Indonesian military government for its corruption and brutality against its own people. Between 2003 and 2013 Russia delivered six Su-27s and eight more advanced Su-30MK2s. At that point few of these fighters were operational because Russia had delivered few weapons for them. It was all about money, or the lack of it. For example in 2009 Qatar had offered the Indonesian Air Force ten used French Mirage fighters but the budget simply doesn't have the money to maintain and operate these older aircraft. Currently only ten of the F-16s are flyable and only two of the F-5s.

By 2010 a new government and reforms had refurbished Indonesias reputation to the point that the United States was again willing to provide support for F-16s as well as another 24 of them. Most (18) of the 24 free and refurbished F-16s have been delivered with four arriving in March 2017.
Things you can do with an extra robotic arm Having extra robotic limbs sure sounds cool, in theory. With an extra arm, you could do all kinds of stuff! Throwing three frisbees at once! Eating three times as many slices of pizza at the same time! Giving three thumbs up! Er, other things! Seriously though, if we're going to get real about supernumerary robotic limbs, we have to know what people really want them for. IEEE Spectrum

iOS 11 GM leak confirms D22 'iPhone 8' features: Portrait Lighting, True Tone Display, revised AirPods, much more Here we go. We're digging through the iOS 11 GM we received this evening to unpack what we can learn about the D22 'iPhone 8' and the rest of the lineup ahead of Apple's big unveiling on Tuesday. It looks like the infamous HomePod leak left a few surprises for us after all. 9to5Mac

Wi-Fi IoT electrical outlet: Turning on a coffee maker remotely They say necessity is the mother of invention, and there's no question that the need to turn on my coffee maker while still in bed is a necessity. I don't want to wait for my coffee to brew after I go down to the kitchen in the morning. I want my coffee ready as soon as I get there. It's not that I'm impatient, I just have lots of electronics work to do, right? Project Lab

My friends at Google: it is time to return to not being evil I have known Google longer than most. At Opera, we were the first to add their search into the browser interface, enabling it directly from the search box and the address field. At that time, Google was an up-and-coming geeky company. I remember vividly meeting with Google's co-founder Larry Page, his relaxed dress code and his love for the Danger device, which he played with throughout our meeting. Later, I met with the other co-founder of Google, Sergey Brin, and got positive vibes. My first impression of Google was that it was a likeable company. Jon von Tetzchner of Vivaldi

How neural networks think Artificial-intelligence research has been transformed by machine-learning systems called neural networks, which learn how to perform tasks by analyzing huge volumes of training data. During training, a neural net continually readjusts thousands of internal parameters until it can reliably perform some task, such as identifying objects in digital images or translating text from one language to another. But on their own, the final values of those parameters say very little about how the neural net does what it does. MIT

How to hurricane-proof a Web server I had enough to worry about as Hurricane Harvey plowed into the Texas Gulf Coast on the night of August 25 and delivered a category 4 punch to the nearby city of Rockport. But I simultaneously faced a different kind of storm: an unexpected surge of traffic hitting the Space City Weather Web server. This was the first of what would turn into several very long and restless nights. Ars Technica

Firefox 57 will hide search bar and use a uni-bar approach, like Chrome Mozilla will hide an iconic section of its UI --- the search bar --- and will use one singular input bar atop the browser, similar to the approach of most Chromium browsers. This change will go live in Firefox 57, scheduled for release on November 14, and will be part of Photon --- the codename used to describe Firefox's new user interface (UI) --- also scheduled for a public release in v57. Bleeping Computer

A simple design flaw makes it astoundingly easy to hack Siri and Alexa Chinese researchers have discovered a terrifying vulnerability in voice assistants from Apple, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Samsung, and Huawei. It affects every iPhone and Macbook running Siri, any Galaxy phone, any PC running Windows 10, and even Amazon's Alexa assistant. Fast Co

Six leading car makers seek to electrify e-vehicle plan Six leading car makers are eyeing the government's plan to buy 10,000 electric vehicles while policy makers are considering generous fiscal incentives to make their capital and running cost cheaper than petrol cars within five years. Broadly, the aim is to put on roads 1 million electric three-wheelers and 10,000 electric city buses by mid-2019 and make India the world leader in at least some segments of the market as the country strives to shift entirely to battery-powered transportation by 2030... India Times

Traditional radio faces a grim future, new study says A new study published today by the head of New York University's Steinhart Music Business Program casts a sobering outlook on the future of terrestrial radio. In the 30-page report, Larry Miller argues that traditional radio has failed to engage with Generation Z --- people born after 1995 --- and that its influence and relevance will continue to be subsumed by digital services unless it upgrades. Key points made in the study include... Variety

Identity theft, credit reports, and you This is outside my usual brief, but one of my hobbies is that I used to ghostwrite letters to credit reporting agencies and banks. It is suddenly relevant after the Equifax breach, so I'm writing down what I know to help folks who might need this in the future. Kalzumeus

'No fire risk' with new lithium batteries The devices produced sufficient energy for use in household electronics, but did not ignite - even when punctured repeatedly with a nail. The batteries use a water-salt solution as their electrolyte, removing the risks carried by some non-aqueous commercial models. BBC

3D printed nuclear powered motor - TriNano EZ-Spin - Tritium I finally got this ultra low power motor working! I learned a lot on this build. Low power motors are a fun challenge. lasersaber on YouTube

Intel wins round in fight over $1.26 billion antitrust fine Intel Corp. won a round in its eight-year fight with the European Union over a 1.06 billion-euro ($1.26 billion) fine in a case that could have ramifications for a list of disputes involving U.S. tech giants including Google and Qualcomm Inc. Bloomberg

Product graveyard Commemorating the most memorable products that have gone away, and finding some alternatives along the way... Product Graveyard

TV turns 90 today A live webcast today will celebrate the transmission of the first electronic TV signal on Sept. 7, 1927, and the man behind it, Philo T. Farnsworth... Axios

List of Android 8.0 Oreo Custom ROMs for Popular Devices Android 8.0 Oreo is more than a week old, this update to Android may be considered incremental in nature, but that in no way diminishes the improvements it brings to the table. But unless you have a Google Pixel device or a currently supported Nexus, there's a very good chance that you will have to wait for a few months to have your OEM send across the latest dessert onto your phone. XDA Developers
Venezuela condemns this event and maintains its principled position of absolute condemnation of terrorist acts, methods and practices. | Read More
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 17:48:49|Editor: Yurou

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MUMBAI, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Terminal 2 of Mumbai Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport was evacuated due to "security reasons" in a mock drill on Sunday.

"All passengers including those have boarded are required to go through security check again. Shuttle buses are lining up on parking apron, taking them back to the terminal building. Massive flights are delayed hence," a passenger at the airport told Xinhua.

A picture tweeted shows a screen at one check-in counter, reading "due to security reasons, terminal building requires evacuation. Passengers and staff members are requested to follow directions and reach respective safe assembly."

An anonymous member of an airline told Xinhua that "it's just a mock drill rehearsal they are carrying out and that's why they have closed the airport."

But the reason for the drill has not been disclosed yet.
Nutson's Weekly Automotive News Digest Sept 4-10, 2017: For Sale VW Fixed Diesels; EV's, EV's, New Leaf; IIHS PIck-up Tests; Autonomous; Emissions Rising







AUTO CENTRAL CHICAGO, September 10, 2017 Every Sunday Larry Nutson, Senior Editor and Chicago Car Guy along with fellow senior editors Steve Purdy and Thom Cannell from The Auto Channel Michigan Bureau, give you TACH's "take" on this past week's automotive news in easyeasily "catch up" or put these stories in context by searching the past 25 year's millions of (Indexed By Google) pages of automotive news, automotive stories, articles, reviews, archived news, video, audio, rants and raves accessible from The Auto Channel's Automotive News Archive.

If you are a car and driving fan like we all are here at The Auto Channel, you can "learn more" about any story; just copy the article headline, paste it into our custom search and click on the links that will take you to the exact information as published here on The Auto Channel.

Hey TV viewers, you can now enjoy The Auto Channel TV Network "Free and Clear" on WHDT Channel 3 in Boston and on many local cable systems. All South Florida auto fans can continue to watch The Auto Channel TV Network on WHDT-TV Channel 9 in West Palm Beach as well as cable channel's 17 and 438, channel 9 Miami. WHDN launched its full schedule (including The Auto Channel)of broadcasting in the Naples-Fort Myers market on digital PSIP channel 9.1 channel, look for us On Roku, Hulu and on TUNAVISION.

Nutson's Nuggets: September 10, 2017

* Volkswagen plans to resell to its 652 U.S. dealers the diesel vehicles it bought back under recalls stemming from the company's diesel emissions scandal. VW has repurchased about 67 percent of the estimated illegal 485,000 turbodiesel vehicles it sold in the U.S. between 2009 and 2014. Newer VW diesels that were recalled have had their fixes approved by regulators and have returned to dealership lots. VW fixed and returned for sale about 8,000 of an estimated newer 70,000 Passats.

* The University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute's latest report from Michael Sivak and Brandon Schoettle says the average fuel economy (window-sticker value) of new vehicles sold in the U.S. in August was 25.3 mpgdown 0.1 mpg from July. The value for August is up 5.2 mpg since October 2007 (the first month of their monitoring), but still down 0.2 mpg from the peak of 25.5 mpg reached in August 2014.

* The University of Michigan Eco-Driving Index (EDI)an index that estimates the average monthly emissions of greenhouse gases generated by an individual U.S. driverworsened to 0.83 in June 2017, up from 0.82 in May 2017 (the lower the value, the better). The EDI indicates that the average new-vehicle driver produced 17% lower emissions in June 2017 than in October 2007, but 5% higher emissions than the record low reached in November 2013. The EDI takes into account both vehicle fuel economy and distance driven.

* The Miami International Auto Show has postponed its opening due to the threat of Hurricane Irma. The best case scenario in which the storm turns away from South Florida, the show would hope to reopen on Sept. 13 and run through its scheduled end on Sept. 17. The opening date will depend on Irmas course.

* In IIHS tests of eight midsize pickups the Toyota Tacoma double cab, Tacoma access cab, Chevrolet Colorado crew cab and GMC Canyon crew cab earned "good" ratings. The Colorado and Canyon extended cab both earned "acceptable" ratings, while the Nissan Frontier king cab and crew cab earned "marginal" ratings. IIHS said it tested two body styles of each pickup because results can differ between cab designs. Although four of the eight pickups earned "good" ratings, none of the vehicles qualify for either of IIHS's Top Safety Pick awards because they have poorly rated headlights and don't have an automatic emergency braking system.

* The U.S. House of Representatives passed legislation that gives federal regulators final say over performance standards for self-driving vehicles and could allow for as many as 100,000 such vehicles a year to be exempted from safety standards while the technology is developing. The legislation requires the U.S. DoT to develop rules within a year regarding self-driving cars sharing roads with traditional vehicles and identify other aspects of autonomous vehicles that may require performance standards to be set, such as sensors, software and the interaction between passengers and the car. Now the bill goes to the Senate.

* The House legislation also includes a separate provision that calls for the NHTSA to develop a rule within two years requiring new vehicles to be equipped with an alarm alerting drivers to check rear seats after a vehicle stops. Its a change that would help reduce the number of deaths to children or animals left in vehicles inadvertently.

* Nissan debuted the Leaf 2.0 this week. Priced at just $29,990  $690 below the outgoing Leaf  the all-new, 2018 Leaf promises a 40 percent bump in range to 150 miles and has a more mainstream design. EV sales remain under 1 percent of the U.S. market. The Leaf has been the best seller up to now and aims to capitalize on increasing government mandates for zero-emission cars. Chris Reed, Nissans VP of component engineering, said they are working on increasing that range to 200 miles expecting to roll out that extra performance in about a year. Reed predicted a doubling in global Leaf sales with this new version.

* The fastest growing automotive segment in Europe is electrics, according to a story in Automotive News Europe this week. The segment grew by 56% to 73,000 units. Introduction of the new Hyundai Ioniq contributed to that increase along with the popular BMW i3. The Nissan Leaf and Renault Zoe were not far behind. In spite of this current flush of enthusiasm for electrics the whole battery-powered car segment still accounts for less the 1% of total market share.

* BMW Group announced in Munich this week it will offer 25 electrified vehicles with at least 12 being powered exclusively by electrons by 2025. Some of the electrics they revealed will have ranges over 400 miles. BMW intends to show a new electric vehicle slotted between the i3 and i8, a sporty sedan that will be for sale in 2021. BMW CEO Harald Krueger said they will even electrify vehicles from Rolls-Royce and the ?M brands.

* The Natural Resources Defense Council, Sierra Club and the Center for Biological Diversity joined in a lawsuit against the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration charging NHTSA with unlawfully delaying a rule that would increase penalties for carmakers that violate fuel economy standards. NRDC attorney Irene Gutierrez, representing the plaintiffs, said . . . we have an administration that is doing the automakers bidding," and the NRDC will step in to protect public health and uphold the law.

* Lyft, second largest ride sharing company in the U.S., is preparing to launch an autonomous vehicle pilot program in San Francisco in partnership with technology firm Drive.ai based in Silicon Valley. During this experimental phase the cars will not be fully autonomous since a driver will be in the car ready to take over if necessary. Uber launched a similar program last fall that met with many problems. Customers for these Lyft rides will opt in for the project and ride free.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 18:28:56|Editor: An

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KABUL, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- One suicide bomber and a drug trafficker were captured in Afghanistan, said National Directorate of Security (NDS) on Sunday.

The NDS personnel launched eight Special Operations in different places within the last 48 hours. And they also captured one would-be suicide bomber and a drug trafficker over the period, NDS, the country's primary intelligence agency, said in a statement reaching Xinhua.

The statement also revealed that 129 Taliban militants and 18 Islamic State (IS) fighters were killed when Afghan army, police and NDS operatives lunched 14 joint operations across the country in two days.

It also said seven Taliban militants and seven IS militants were wounded and eight Taliban were detained by the joint forces.

The security forces also destroyed nine rounds of weapons and nine militants' motorcycles during the above raids, the statement read.

The Afghan security forces have beefed up security operations against militants as the Taliban militants and Islamic State (IS) fighters have been attempting to take territory and consolidate their positions across the country.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 18:33:59|Editor: An

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SANYA, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Sanya, a costal resort in south China, has converted fishing boats into a floating public library.

"Sea Study" is the first public library on the island of Ximaozhou, eight nautical miles west to the downtown Sanya, Hainan Province.

"A life can not be called life without books," said Chen Muhu, 78, a fisherman who was browsing archeology books in the library.

The pyramid-shaped Ximaozhou Island is home to 4,000 residents, but has only one primary school.

"Locals needed a library badly," said Qin Jiayi, the instigator of the project. "We see quite a few readers every day."

More than 30 fishermen spent four weeks renovating three abandoned fishing boats into a reading cabin, a salon, and a 16-bed hostel.

Qin planned to double the library's collection to 4,000 books.

Due to limited fishing resources nearby and out-of-date equipment, fishermen from Ximaozhou Island are less dependent on the traditional way of making a living. Twenty-four fishing boats have been taken out of service. Timber from some was made into furniture.

Qin decided to bring the boats back to life in a different way, with support from the local government.

The library satisfies local people's needs while making their village more appealing to outsiders, said Jia Peng, a government official.

The government plans to renovate another 21 vessels into theaters, shops and hostels.

"It sounds cool," said Feng Yuetao, a tourist from the plateau province of Qinghai who said would like to visit the library with his family.
Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne says a former banking executive will help guide the provinces bid to become the home of Amazons new corporate headquarters.

The online retail giant announced earlier this week that it planned to establish a second North American office, and many cities have already expressed their interest in the project.

Wynne joined their ranks on Saturday, announcing she had named former TD Bank chief executive Ed Clark as the head of a group tasked with landing the project.

Clark, who retired from TD in 2014, now serves as the Wynnes business adviser.

Wynne says he will head a group of business leaders who will work to secure Amazons interest in locating its headquarters in Ontario.

Read more: Toronto fighting to land Amazons new headquarters

Toronto Mayor John Tory has already expressed keen interest in bidding to make Toronto Amazons next home.

Amazon says that it will spend more than $5 billion U.S. to build another headquarters in North America to house as many as 50,000 employees. The technology company plans to stay in its current Seattle headquarters and the new space will be a full equal of its current home, said Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos.

Cities have until Oct. 19 to apply through a special website, and Amazon said it will make a final decision next year.

While many cities will likely be clamouring to make their pitch to Amazon as well, candidates must meet specific requirements to be considered. Key criteria include: a prime location, access to mass transit and proximity to an international airport. Any potential site must have room to grow, as Amazon wants to expand its new headquarters to as much as eight million square feet in the next decade. Thats about the same size as its current home in Seattle.

Other Canadian cities, such as Waterloo, Ont., or Vancouver, may also fit the bill.

Amazon said its search is open to any metropolitan area in North America that meets the parameters. The city itself doesnt necessarily have to be one million people, but declined to say how open it was to going outside of the United States.

Amazons current campus in Seattle takes up 8.1 million square feet, has 33 buildings and 24 restaurants and is home to more than 40,000 employees. At the second headquarters, Amazon said it will hire up to 50,000 new full-time employees over the next 15 years who would have an average pay of more than $100,000 U.S. a year.

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Melvin Mingo loves it when he sits around an RV park and fellow retirees get to talking about what they used to do for a living.

I am a retired bank robber, Mingo, 67, says to a round of chuckles.

Pressed a little further, he might add, Im a retired unsuccessful entrepreneur.

The affable man loves to joke but hes telling the truth.

Mingo was the mastermind of what is considered the largest holdup in Canadian history  a $68.5-million bond and securities heist at the Merrill Lynch Canada Inc. headquarters in downtown Montreal in 1984.

His eyes light up when asked about the caper that landed him almost a decade in some of Canadas toughest prisons.

It was such a beautiful score, he says. That was like everyones big dream. The big last one.

Some $5.75 million of that loot has never been recovered. Mingo has a stock answer when asked where it went.

Thats a story for another time, Mingo told the Star, with a smile, during a stopover last month with his wife Susie at the Glen Rouge Campground in Scarborough.

He is happy to talk about how, with the advent of online money transfers, his record will likely never be broken.

He definitely didnt spend it on his RV, which is circa 1986.

And RV culture is a far cry from Mingos bank robbery days. Growing up in Montreal among criminals, drugs and schemes, he says it was the heist he always dreamed of.

If you hang around with thieves, what will you be? An artist? A plumber? A pizza delivery guy?

Mingos friends included members of Montreals Irish mob, called the West End Gang. In the 1960s, 70s and 80s, they were a force to be reckoned with in the world of truck hijackings, extortion and armed robbery. They later moved into drug trafficking, which, Mingo says, ruined everything.

Mingos circle included the late Theodore (Bootsie) Orben, who worked with mobster Frank Cotroni to try to tunnel into the City and District Savings Bank in Montreal in 1967.

Asked how they got caught, Orben told Mingo: (I) told one person too many.

There was also the late John (Jackie) McLaughlin, a debt collector and scary figure even by West End Gang standards.

He would kill you and not think twice, Mingo says of McLaughlin, who was killed alongside his pit bull in 1984.

Another hit man Mingo became friendly with was Dickie Lavoie, who could do 1,000 pushups at a time. He died of natural causes in the 1980s.

I used to like him but he was a hit man, Mingo says. There is not too many people I dont like.

But when it came time for his ultimate caper, he kept it secret from these nefarious associates.

The idea for the Merrill Lynch heist came to Mingo when he was sitting in a bar that the West End Gang frequented on Crescent Street in downtown Montreal in the fall of 1984. A man who worked in the corporations office was trying to impress a woman from their group by telling her how much money he handled.

Mingos ears perked up when he heard that millions of dollars in securities were taken by couriers up and down the elevators of the office tower on Dorchester Blvd. W. from a main floor bank.

He didnt tell anyone, but spent the next month scoping out the site near the Queen Elizabeth Hotel Across from Place Ville Marie.

He did his spying from a bus stop, where there were plenty of passersby, and sometimes dressed as a courier.

Other times, he carried a brief case and looked like an office worker on his way to work.

Hed spend about half an hour at the bus stop each morning.

Im a good blender inner. People do not pay attention.

He noticed that there were eight elevators in the office tower, but only one went all the way down to the basement.

He also noted that Merrill Lynch couriers didnt carry guns as they rode up and down the elevator.

He cultivated a contact inside Merrill Lynch as he hatched his plan.

I had somebody inside, Mingo says. They used to trade every day. I watched for about four weeks.

He was particularly interested in the varied habits of the couriers who worked in the building.

There were two that I found particularly lazy.

Those two couriers always took the same elevator to the bank as it meant less walking. That was the elevator where the heist would have to take place.

As Mingo hatched his plan, he strove to keep things as simple as possible so that fewer things could go wrong. While he likes the Oceans Eleven movies, he says their plots are far too convoluted for the real world.

To me, it would never happen. Its too complicated. Too many things can go wrong. Its nice to watch but youve always got to have a little reality.

Mingo also studied a guard who sat outside the bank near the elevator.

He got distracted  a woman with cleavage. I knew what we had to do with him.

Finally, on Dec. 21, 1984, Mingo and his crew were ready to roll.

Mingo parked his station wagon nearby on University Street. His accomplices arrived separately. One of them was a woman with pronounced cleavage, whose only job was to distract the guard outside the bank.

Mingo was dressed as a courier and pushed a dolly as he entered the building.

As usual, he blended in. His silver semi-automatic pistol was tucked out of sight.

His contact at Merrill Lynch had agreed to page him as soon as the crew of targeted couriers left the office for the bank.

The plan was to ride the elevator with them, taking the securities and locking them in a basement washroom for maintenance workers.

It should have been quick and simple but something went wrong.

Mingos contact buzzed him.

We all made a move.

A husky member of his crew rode the elevator with him.

Soon their prey would be getting on, too  they hoped.

Mingo rode the elevator all the way up to the 24th floor and all the way back down.

The couriers should have been on board but they werent.

I was sweating. I couldnt figure what was holding these guys up.

Mingo had no idea that Brinks couriers had priority over all others and a Brinks team had jumped the line, making the Merrill Lynch couriers wait.

Finally, about 10 minutes behind schedule, the door opened and the Merrill Lynch couriers finally appeared.

Come on in, Mingo told them. Weve got plenty of room.

Once they were inside and the door was securely closed, Mingo pressed his pistol into the side of one of them and gestured towards his partner, Youre just going to follow me and that person in front.

He saw the chrome of the gun, Mingo said.

They rode all the way back up to the 24th floor, and then began heading down to the basement.

I told them, Just keep your eyes down. 

The elevator seemed to stop 10 times as they headed for the basement. Whenever someone got on, Mingo tensed up.

I thought, I hope you get off somewhere because youll have a bad weekend if you dont.

Finally, they reached the basement and the two couriers were left in a darkened maintenance washroom.

Mingo and his associate tried to give them the impression that one of their crew was watching them, somewhere in the dark.

Mingo said he didnt dwell on the feelings of the terrified guards.

Im not going to lie. I didnt feel bad. I was pretty pumped up myself.

Three of his crew left in separate cars, driving slowly. The other left the scene on public transit.

Fifteen minutes later, someone went into the maintenance washroom and freed the guards.

The hunt for Mingo was on.

Twenty-five minutes later, Mingo and his crew met at a pre-arranged spot  his house on Gouin Blvd.

Its just a matter of stashing and counting.

They counted $40.4-million in negotiable securities and $28.1-million in non-negotiable items.

Mingo found it interesting that some of the personal bonds belonged to Olympic speedskating hero Gaetan Boucher.

Their next move was to do and say nothing.

They just sat tight for a month, careful not to attract any attention.

It was all over the news, Mingo says. For a month I was totally quiet.

The heist was the talk of the town, especially in Mingos circles. I said, It had to be an out-of-towner.  He felt the lie was necessary. If I stole it, whos to say they wouldnt steal it from me? Its only common sense.

Mingo had already thought out what to do with the bonds.

Were not going to sit with them and never sell them and make wallpaper.

The problem was that some of the securities had identification numbers and there was the danger they could be traced or cancelled.

In addition to the police, private detectives had been dispatched from the Merrill Lynch main office in New York City to locate the loot.

Mingos plan was to sell the securities to an offshore banker, who would pay 10 per cent of their face value.

That would net Mingo some $1.25 million U.S. for his share of the job.

Moving the securities would be the bankers challenge.

40 days after the robbery he took a trip to Toronto to meet the banker at the Harbour Castle Hilton.

All of the bonds fit into two suitcases.

They were simple cheap suitcases. The contents were nice.

The banker seemed impressed when Mingo opened them up but now there was another switch in plans.

The banker said he needed time get his money together.

They would have to meet again once he had the cash.

Mingo still wonders if he should have done something different at this point. Perhaps it would have been best to stash the securities in Toronto.

Again, he was worried about being robbed himself.

It all comes back to paranoia.

Twelve days after the Harbour Castle meeting, Mingo sat in a car outside the Dorval train station in suburban Montreal. He was heading back to Toronto to finally close the deal with the banker.

Another member of his crew was driving to Toronto. Two more were taking a plane.

If all went according to plan, soon they would all be millionaires.

He smoked a joint to calm his nerves and noted a bellhop passed in front of the car twice.

Get out of the car!, someone yelled.

They were ordered to lie on their bellies on the dirty snow and the slush by police tactical officers with machine-guns.

Mel, whats going on? Bobby asked.

I dont know, Mingo recalls replying. Maybe parking tickets.

The police looked in the trunk of the car.

Nothing was there.

The biggest thing was they wanted the loot. They wanted the loot big time.

Mingo said he feels oddly grateful, even though he got a nine-year-prison term for robbery and forcible confinement instead of the $1.25 million.

Couldve been a big party. Blew it in two years. I say, Thank you. 

Mingo says he has been out of the crime world for 30 years. He had an epiphany of sorts when he had his parole taken away for trying to bribe a police officer at a speed trap while leaving a party for since-murdered mobster Frank Cotroni Jr.

Mingo says he gave up drinking, cocaine and crime when he connected with Susie shortly after his final release.

He credits her with saving his life, as well as enriching it.

I made a choice in the 80s and left all that world behind.

Nowadays, his scheming is mostly concerned with how to get to a big tractor pull with Susie.

This is such a nice life. No one judges you.

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Self-deception has repeatedly served as a bedrock of cruelty.

It has transformed greed into gallant heroism, where invasion of lands is adventure, displacement of natives is about saving the savages, and theft and self-enrichment is ingenuity.

It has rationalized subjugation as the natural order of things. Women  at home; gays  in the closet; natives  in reserves; and Blacks  in farms or in ghettos.

And when there emerges an equal and opposite reaction  resistance that challenges that deception  it is met with denial (Brutal  us? No, we saved you!) and dismissal (Youre not qualified to speak on this) and demand (Cant we just leave the past behind and get along?).

In this, I include groups around the world that have utilized cruelty to enforce domination.

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LOreals firing of Munroe Bergdorf boiled down to one word: Paradkar

Canadian history lessons need a back-to-school reboot: Paradkar

What white supremacy looks like minus the Charlottesville paraphernalia: Paradkar

Settler deception in Canada, however, is unique in the euphemism it employs.

A new, painstakingly researched book debunks the myth of Canadian white benevolence and draws a straight line between past state-sanctioned injustices and current tensions.

In Policing Black Lives: State Violence in Canada from Slavery to the Present, Black feminist, activist-writer Robyn Maynard analyzes the work of dozens of scholars to pierce through centuries of deception and offer us a bold, unblinking  and frankly, shocking  rebuttal to the widespread sentiment that were not as bad as the U.S.

The book weaves in Indigenous experiences and addresses how racial violence specifically impacted Black women. It is written for academics and lay people alike.

One of the things that prompted me to write it is that working in Black communities, growing up Black in Canada, there was so much history of anti-Black racism that even I was not aware of for much of my life, Maynard told me.

People would experience anti-Black racism, but it was so negated by non-Black people around them. Their experience was seen as exaggerated or treated with disbelief. A lot of that disbelief stems from the broader disbelief that anti-Black racism has been in place for 400 years.

Just as climatic unsuitability was long used to disguise the racist motivations behind demographic selections, Maynard writes, so was a desire to avoid the Negro problem that existed in the United States.

Irony alert! Canadians believed the best way to keep racism out of the country was to keep Black people out altogether.

It was in the interest of coloured people themselves not to encourage their settlement in this country, Maynard cites William D. Scott, a superintendent of immigration from 1903 to 1924. In private correspondence, though, he doesnt hold back. Africans, no matter where they come from, are not among the races sought.

This, although slavery was practised in Canada for more than 200 years.

This, although 4,000 enslaved Indigenous and Black people helped build infrastructure and wealth for white settlers in the 17th and 18th centuries.

While the absence of plantations meant there were fewer enslaved Black people, leaving them acutely isolated, white settler society here was not benign. It brutalized them physically and psychologically. Black women would be beaten, sexually abused, used for breeding and have their children torn from them.

The inferiority ascribed to Blackness in this era would affect the treatment of Black persons living in Canada for centuries to come, Maynard writes.

Maynard also exposes the hollowness of the claim that Canada was a sanctuary for runaway slaves from the U.S. and for Black Loyalists. Few freed Black people to whom the British promised land and equality if they fought on the British side of the 1775-1783 conflict received that promised land. Those who did were given land that was known to be infertile. Instead, Black people were forced to become cheap labour for white farmers and domestic help in white homes.

On the other hand, in the early 20th century whites from Europe were promised and given 160 acres of free farmland.

White landowners refused to lease or sell land to those with African features well into the 20th century. In 1959, over 60 per cent of landlords surveyed (in Toronto) said they would not be comfortable renting to Blacks, Maynard writes.

This is the face of structurally enforced impoverishment.

It continues with segregation of schools, the last of which closed in Canada in 1983. Segregated Black schools were underfunded and even abandoned by governments. Many children studied in dilapidated unheated buildings, Maynard says, taught by poorly trained teachers.

This is the face of structurally built inequality.

Perhaps knowing this will give pause to those among us who say things like, These people are poor because theyre lazy.

Since 1444, the year that Maynard says marked the beginning of the global devaluation of Black bodies, when European raiders captured and chained Africans into ships, rebellion was so incessant that they were chained right hand to right leg, left hand to left leg. This also marked the beginning of the institutionalized belief that Black movement needed to be surveilled and contained.

In the 1920s in Canada, Black presence in public spaces continued to be restricted, in some places with sundown laws, or curfews imposed on Black people to be indoors by a certain time in the evening.

The fact is this is ongoing, Maynard told me. Look at how we devalue Black peoples lives.

The 2016 case of a six-year-old Black Grade 1 student, in a Mississauga school, written about in the Star and detailed in the book, marks the continuing containment of Black bodies.

The child was handcuffed by attaching her hands and feet together at the wrists and ankles for apparently acting in a violent manner.

Peel police deemed this containment necessary in the interest of safety of the 48-pound, unarmed child who was considered that dangerous even in the presence of school officials and two policemen.

This, too, is the face of state-sanctioned racial violence.

Maynards investment of emotional labour situates her book in continuing Black resistance to this violence.

Supremacist values were foundational for the creation of white wealth.

This does not mean all whites are supremacist. Nor does it mean all whites are wealthy.

But perhaps it will help clarify what people mean when they say racial violence benefits all white people.

Shree Paradkar writes on discrimination and identity. You can follow her @shreeparadkar

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Major labour law changes, including a $15 minimum wage, and marijuana will be on the front burner as Ontarios legislature returns from its summer break on Monday.

But the business of legislating also resumes at the same time as two Liberal trials get underway and are sure to dominate Ontario politics.

Both opposition parties will likely try to keep reminding people of the Election Act bribery charges trial in Sudbury related to a 2015 byelection and mischief and the breach of trust trial in Toronto related to the cancellation of two gas plants before the 2011 election.

Premier Kathleen Wynne is set to testify in the bribery trial in Sudbury on Wednesday.

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Its a sad day for the people of Ontario that they will be seeing their premier as a witness on the stand in court on Wednesday, Progressive Conservative Leader Patrick Brown said in a statement.

Wynne was asked last week if she was worried the trials would overshadow her agenda.

I really dont have control over that, she said. My job is to implement our plan to make sure that we do everything that we can to make this a fair place to live.

Wynne and her team have been pushing the fairness theme hard over the past months. Expect that to continue through the fall and all the way to the June 2018 election.

A key part of that is the Liberal governments labour bill that would increase the minimum wage to $15 an hour in 2019 as well as give equal pay for part-time workers, increased vacation entitlements and expanded personal emergency leave.

Public hearings on the bill were held this summer and it will go back before the House with some tweaks for second reading, before being sent for a second round of committee hearings.

Though the minimum wage increase has proven popular in government polling, business groups have been campaigning hard against the phase-in period, saying the increase  it is currently set to rise to $11.60 in October  is too much to absorb that quickly.

The business groups say theyll continue to press for amendments to the bill, but theyre also eager for the government to unveil a promised package of offsets to help businesses cope with increased costs the labour bill will bring.

That is set to be announced in the fall and Economic Development Minister Brad Duguid has said a break for small businesses will come likely on the tax side.

The NDP will continue to push for more changes to the labour bill, including more vacation days and paid sick days. Party Leader Andrea Horwath also indicated in a statement she would turn part of her attention to Progressive Conservative Leader Patrick Brown  who is leading in the polls.

Patrick Brown wont tell us what his plans are, but after years of standing with Conservatives who cut like Stephen Harper, Mike Harris and Tim Hudak, we can expect his priorities to be conservative cuts and conservative privatization, she wrote.

Legislation to control the sale of recreational marijuana is set to be tabled this fall, after the Liberal government on Friday announced its plan to sell pot to people 19 and older in as many as 150 stand-alone stores run by the provinces liquor control board.

Opposition parties and cannabis activists slammed the plan and are expected to continue to be vocal as the legislation is crafted and goes to public hearings.

Other policies the government has previously said will come this fall include:

The next long-term energy plan

Police oversight legislation

Legislation to create two new northern ridings

An updated Police Services Act

Ticket sales and resales legislation

Legislation to create safe zones around abortion clinics

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JERUSALEMIsraeli political leaders lashed out at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahus eldest son Sunday for posting an anti-Semitic caricature aimed at his fathers critics.

Yair Netanyahus meme shows American Jewish billionaire George Soros and a figure that resembles Nazi depictions of world Jewry manipulating former prime minister Ehud Barak and two leaders of weekly protests calling on Netanyahu to step down over corruption allegations.

Neo-Nazi groups in the United States and Holocaust denier David Duke, a former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, liked the post.

Yair Netanyahu is a total bro, wrote Andrew Anglin in the neo-Nazi Daily Stormer. Next hes going to call for gassings.

Duke tweeted about it: Welcome to the club, Yair  absolutely amazing, wow, just wow.

The opposition Labour partys chairman Avi Gabbay told Army Radio the post crossed every line imaginable, saying it was a very sad day for Israel and the Jewish people when the prime ministers son posts a cartoon that the leader of the Ku Klux Klan agrees with. Barak wondered on Twitter whether Yair Netanyahu, who enjoys a state-funded driver and bodyguard while living at the prime ministers official residence, absorbed such ideology at home.

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What is it, genetics or a spontaneous mental illness? It doesnt matter. In any case, we ought to pay for him to have a psychiatrist, not a bodyguard and a chauffeur, Barak wrote. Yair Netanyahu responded by calling Barak a drunk who needed geriatric care.

The 26-year-old Yair Netanyahu has drawn criticism for living a life of privilege at taxpayers expense and for his crude social media posts.

Last month, at the time of the neo Nazi march in Charlottesville, Yair Netanyahu also caused controversy by equating neo-Nazis with activists from far-left anti-fascist groups kn known as antifa.

Im a Jew, Im an Israeli, the neo nazi scums in Virginia hate me and my country. But they belong to the past. Their breed is dying out, the 26-year-old wrote on Facebook. However the thugs of Antifa and BLM who hate my country (and America too in my view) just as much are getting stronger and stronger and becoming super dominant in American universities and public life.

The Netanyahu family is facing a slew of corruption allegations. The prime minister has been questioned about his ties to executives in media, international business and Hollywood. His associates have been engulfed in a probe relating to a possible conflict of interest involving a $2-billion (U.S.) purchase of German submarines. Israels attorney general has said he intends to indict the prime ministers wife, Sara, for fraud over her bloated household expenses.

Yair Netanyahu, who has reportedly taken a leading role in his fathers aggressive social media platform, has also been drawn into the scandals. Australian billionaire James Packer has reportedly lavished Yair with gifts that included extended stays at luxury hotels in Tel Aviv, New York and Aspen, Colorado, as well as the use of his private jet and dozens of tickets for concerts by Packers former fiancee, Mariah Carey.

Police are trying to determine whether these constitute bribes, since Packer is reportedly seeking Israeli residency status for tax purposes.

The prime minister has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing, portraying the accusations as a witch hunt against him and his family by a hostile media. He has resisted increasing calls to step down.

With files from the Washington Post

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WASHINGTON  Most workers received holiday pay if they clocked in on Labor Day, but for a rapidly growing sector of the labor force it was just another day on the job.

Uber drivers, TaskRabbit handymen, Rover dog-walkers, Airbnb hosts and countless others in the new gig economy are all considered independent contractors and not employees of the online platforms that steer business their way.

Numbers are hard to come by, but private and government analysts and economists all agree that that sector is growing.

That is troubling to traditional labor groups, who worry that workers will be exploited in the largely unregulated businesses. But others say it empowers workers, letting them supplement their incomes, set their own schedules and have some security in an otherwise insecure job market.

It certainly has picked up slack during times of volatility or instability in the economy, said Mark Muro, a senior fellow with the Metropolitan Policy Program at the Brookings Institution.

Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey highlighted the gig economy, also known as the sharing economy, last year when he created the Governors Council on the Sharing Economy.

Arizona should be to the sharing economy what Texas is to oil, Ducey said in his 2016 State of the State Address.

Even though most people recognize a gig economy business when they see it  Uber is probably the best-known example  the sharing economy remains hard to define.

A 2016 report by JPMorgan Chase Institute looked at jobs where an online platform helped with unbundling a job into discrete tasks and directly connecting individual sellers with consumers.

That report found that the number of customers using such platforms rose 47-fold between 2012 and 2015 while the number of people working one of those jobs went up by a factor of 10 over the same period.

Also in 2016, the Pew Research Center asked people to describe companies in the sharing economy. That report found that 58 percent of respondents saw such firms as being primarily software companies. Their business is connecting drivers with people who are looking for a ride.

Rather than being employees, gig workers are considered independent contractors and are not eligible for employment benefits. For labor organizations, this model is a problem.

Kelly Ross, the deputy policy director of the AFL-CIO, said the status of gig work is a threat to workers rights.

If you dont treat them as employees and instead treat them as independent contractors, then they have fewer rights, fewer protections, he said.

The legal status of gig work is currently left to the states, and Ross doesnt like the trend hes seeing.

A number of states are passing legislation that deems workers who work for platform companies to be independent contractors instead of employees, making their jobs more insecure, Ross said.

Muro does not think the new economy poses such a stark threat to workers. He says gig work  which is often performed on the side  can also help relieve job insecurity. But that does not mean the issue can be ignored by policymakers, he said.

A good share of people working on the platforms are in fact working at it as their main employment, he said. We shouldnt simply assume that this is less important or secondary work and therefore doesnt need to be regulated.

Romina Boccia, the deputy director for economic policy at the Heritage Foundation, also sees the positives in the gig economy, which she thinks will continue to grow.

Some of them choose to work for various gig economy platforms at the same time, Boccia said of gig workers. I think we need to be more forward-looking if more people choose this as a full time model.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 18:39:02|Editor: Lu Hui

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JALALABAD, Afghanistan, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Three civilians have been killed by Islamic State (IS) militants in Afghanistan's eastern province of Nangarhar overnight, the provincial governor office said on Sunday.

"Three innocent civilians were brutally martyred by Daesh (IS) in Zagho area of Chaparhar district, south of provincial capital Jalalabad city, at around 9 p.m. Saturday," it said in a statement.

Among the killed civilians were a newly-wed groom named Bilal, who got married a week ago, and a local high school student, who was expected to graduate later this year, the statement read.

The motive behind the killing remained unknown but Afghan officials blame Taliban and IS for targeting civilians in order to terrorize the villagers in remote areas.

The mountainous province, 120 km east of Kabul, has been the scene of clashes between security forces and IS militants since the emergence of IS there in early 2015.

Afghan civilians continue to bear the brunt of armed conflicts as more than 1,660 civilians were killed and over 3,580 others injured in conflict-related incidents in the first half of the year, according to figures released by the United Nations mission in the country.
WASHINGTONFormer secretary of state Hillary Clinton said Sunday that racial grievances had a significant influence on the 2016 presidential election and continue to be stoked by U.S. President Donald Trump.

He was quite successful in referencing a nostalgia that would give hope, comfort, settle grievances for millions of people who were upset about gains that were made by others, Clinton said on CBSs Sunday Morning ahead of the Tuesday release of her campaign memoir, What Happened.

Host Jane Pauley replied, What youre saying is millions of white people.

Millions of white people, yeah, Clinton said. Millions of white people.

Read the latest news U.S. President Donald Trump

Clinton also criticized Trumps address at his inauguration, which she attended in January out of what she deemed a sense of duty, as a speech that spoke to the anger of some white voters.

Im a former first lady, and former presidents and first ladies show up, Clinton said. Its part of the demonstration of the continuity of our government. And so there I was, on the platform, you know, feeling like an out-of-body experience. And then his speech, which was a cry from the white-nationalist gut.

Clintons remarks on Sunday came a little more than a year after she gave a major campaign speech in which she described the disturbing connection between Trumps campaign and the alt-right, a movement associated with white nationalism.

He is taking hate groups mainstream and helping a radical fringe take over the Republican Party, Clinton said in Reno, Nevada, last year. His disregard for the values that make our country great is profoundly dangerous.

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Trump responded at the time by saying that Clinton was using the oldest play in the Democratic playbook.

She paints decent Americans, you, as racists, Trump told a crowd in Manchester, New Hampshire, after her speech.

Clinton also said Sunday that she will not pursue the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination.

I am done with being a candidate, Clinton said.

But I am not done with politics because I literally believe that our countrys future is at stake, she said in an interview with Jane Pauley.

The former Democratic nominee said she has moved on from her 2016 election loss but acknowledged that the sting of defeat has not entirely faded away.

I am good, Clinton said. But that doesnt mean I am complacent or resolved about what happened. It still is very painful. It hurts a lot.

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Call me sensitive: my mother was a severe alcoholic. Call me a killjoy: yes, Ive had my own issues with alcohol. But something just isnt sitting right when I see the promotion for the upcoming A Very Mommy Wine Festival.

Advertised with the tagline Baby on the hips, wine on the lips, the event is hosted by MomsTO, which proclaims: Its going to be an amazing afternoon of drinking, baby feeding and having hella (sic) good time with some of the coolest moms in Toronto. Get Your Wine On. Big Time, the website blares.

This event is just one of many wine-themed MomsTO gatherings. In fact, the group claims to be re-inventing maternity leave with its weekly very boozy Rose playdates, which start at 11:30 on Fri-yay mornings. Call me critical, but is there not something intrinsically disturbing about mothers getting their wine on  big time while they bounce their babies? Have a gander at the MomsTO trailer reel: a series of happy infants are interspersed with images of glowing wine glasses. Hey, what could go wrong?

Since when did wine and motherhood become synonymous? Is there not something a little creepy about the meme of the wine label: The most expensive part of having kids is all the wine you have to buy. How about Indigo selling wine glasses emblazoned with: Best Mom Ever? Or Real Simple magazine announcing the Best. News. Ever. Namely, Amazon Prime will now deliver wine to your doorstep within the hour.

As North Americans, we live in an alcogenic culture with surround-sound messaging: booze is fun, booze is sophisticated, booze is the fastest way to decompress. No surprise: female risky drinking is on the rise. According to Gerald Thomas, director of alcohol policy at the B.C. Ministry of Health, there has been a steady and statistically significant increasing trend in female drinking in Canada since 2003.

And according to a major study in JAMA Psychiatry last month, the incidence of female alcohol abuse and dependence in the United States increased 83.7 per cent between 2002 and 2013. The researchers warn of a public health crisis, given that high-risk drinking is linked to more than 200 diseases and cancers, as well as psychiatric problems, violence and more.

Meanwhile, in Canada, 62 per cent of babies are born to women between the ages of 25 and 34, the age group with the largest spike in risky drinking. Bear in mind that in this country, roughly 3,000 babies are born each year with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, a totally preventable disability.

I reached out to MomsTO, suggesting we might go for coffee. They didnt respond. Had they done so, I would have suggested they boost the information on their website.

They might share the news that alcohol consumed by a mother passes easily into her breast milk at concentrations similar to those found in her own blood; that the alcohol level in breast milk peaks 30 to 60 minutes after she drinks; that consuming alcohol while breastfeeding can impair a babys motor development. They might share the news that if any of the moms in the community are trying to get pregnant again, there is no known safe amount of alcohol that can be consumed safely during pregnancy. Finally, they might want to have some information on postpartum depression: alcohol is a known depressant.

I am not blaming MomsTO for trying to create a community of mothers. But why wine? I blame our culture, one which pushes such products as Mommyjuice and Happy Bitch wine; one which messages that alcohol is an essential survival tool for overstressed parents.

For those of us who lived through the era of the two-martini playdate, who owned the book Sippy Cups are not for Chardonnay, who remember the tragic story of Diane Schuler driving the wrong way on New York states Taconic Parkway with her young daughter and nieces in the car, a jumbo Absolut vodka bottle rolling around in the back, the MomsTO events provoke a profound sense of deja vu.

I am no prohibitionist; far from it. But this is not harmless fun. More than one young mother I know drove drunk with children in the car; more than one gave birth to a child with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder. And many more ended up with serious alcohol problems. Their children suffered.

In other words, craving connection is one thing. Mixing booze and babies is another.

Ann Dowsett Johnston is the author of Drink: The Intimate Relationship Between Women and Alcohol.

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One can see the logic of giving away and installing 100,000 smart thermostats across the province, an initiative Environment and Climate Change Minister Chris Ballard recently announced along with the unveiling of a new provincial agency, the Green Ontario Fund.

Homeowners who sign up for the offer also get a free energy audit, part of a broader effort to reduce the carbon footprint of Ontarios building stock.

As a first step, the campaign is an attention getter. Everyone likes free stuff, especially if what youre getting is a cool piece of iPhone-esque gadgetry that will help you save money in the long run. Smart thermostats help homeowners use the least amount of energy to achieve just the right amount of comfort.

This is core to the agencys mandate. Using $377 million raised through the provinces carbon cap-and-trade program, the fund was created to help home and business owners get easier access to GHG-reducing technologies by aggregating information, incentives and low-cost financing programs under one roof (found online at GreenOn.ca).

If weve learned anything from the record-breaking hurricanes, wildfires and temperatures witnessed this summer, its that we need to double down on climate action. But as the agency embarks on this important mission, its worth reminding ourselves that rebates and other incentives alone wont get us to where we need to be. We have to be more creative than that.

Earlier indication suggests we will. Ontarios Climate Change Action Plan, released in June 2016, promised to create a green bank modelled on similar agencies in the United States  namely, Efficiency Vermont and the New York Green Bank.

Green banks, as a new tool of government, are a 21st-century response to a global challenge and opportunity. They are generally set up to invest in the transition to a low-carbon economy in a way that reduces GHG emissions, while also creating jobs and economic wealth.

Why wont conventional banks do this? Conventional lenders shy away from these types of investments because they lack the experience and expertise needed to properly assess them, resulting in a persistent  and increasingly false  belief that green projects and technologies are too risky, or dont deliver a high enough return on investment.

Conventional lenders default to the perceived safest bet, which has historically been a huge barrier to the adoption of low-carbon technologies.

Green banks, ideally, are created to lower that barrier. They staff up with experts who know the sector and technologies inside and out and have experience developing projects. They help mainstream green projects by using what is a relatively small amount of public capital to show private investors that, yes, theres money to be made and its not as risky as they think.

It seems to work. The green bank in Connecticut, for example, has found that for every $1 of public money it invests, up to $10 in private investment has followed.

In New York, a startup company called Sealed has used a $7.5 million (U.S.) low-interest credit facility from that states green bank to prove to private investors that its home retrofit business model works.

Sealed covers the cost of energy-efficiency upgrades in homes, then gets paid back with interest from the energy savings it guarantees for customers. The company used the green bank credit facility to finance a successful 400-household pilot project. It now has a track record that is making it easier to secure private financing.

The point here is that banks dont give away money, so why should a green bank?

This isnt to suggest that incentives and rebates dont have a place. The Green Ontario Funds smart thermostat campaign will create much-needed awareness of the agency, and directly engage 100,000 provincial households in an energy conservation dialogue. Toronto-based smart thermostat maker Ecobee, one of the fastest growing tech companies in Ontario, will benefit from market demand created.

And imagine if those devices were networked together and intelligently controlled to help manage demand on the power grid. It could prove an effective way to reduce electricity system costs.

It is still early days. When Ballard launched the agency on Aug. 30, he made clear the thermostat campaign was just the first of several programs to be launched over the coming years as the green bank gets into full gear.

As those programs are conceived, its essential that we resist the temptation of giveaways. We need to regularly remind ourselves that the Green Ontario Fund will be more effective as a bank guided by a public mandate, not a charity funded by price on carbon.

Tyler Hamilton is business development manager for cleantech venture services at MaRS Discovery District.

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The hypocrisy of Myanmars de facto leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, is astounding. Her complicity in the face of horrific state violence against the countrys Rohingya Muslim minority is surely redefining her place in history.

The Nobel Peace laureate, who for decades fought against the junta that kept her under house arrest and terrorized her country, who spoke so eloquently of the power of non-violence and of the importance of multi-ethnic unity to Myanmars future, apparently does not stand by the words that built her reputation as a great humanitarian  or perhaps does so only insofar as they pertain to the Buddhist majority.

The United Nations has called Myanmars Rohingyas the worlds most persecuted minority. Baselessly vilified as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, they have long been unfairly denied citizenship and otherwise made subject to myriad discriminations.

Yet in recent years their plight has significantly worsened as violent attacks from government and other nationalist factions have deepened their poverty and forced many into squalid internment camps. Hundreds of thousands have fled to Bangladesh, another country that does not want them.

The current wave of military violence began in August, after a group of Rohingya farmers took up arms against state security forces. By all credible accounts the government crackdown that followed has been grossly disproportionate and highly indiscriminate. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres warns that we are seeing something approaching ethnic cleansing. Many others, citing satellite footage of scorched villages in Rakhine state and countless accounts of rape and the mass murder of civilians, insist that bar has already been met. Some 160,000 Rohingyas have fled the country in the two weeks since the violence began.

About the mounting international condemnations, Suu Kyi will say only that they reflect an iceberg of misinformation being propagated by terrorists. The evidence against this claim is overwhelming. Plus, if theres nothing to hide, why have the ministries under Suu Kyis control worked so hard to keep independent monitors out of the country?

So what can be done? At home, some have argued that the Trudeau government should revoke Suu Kyis honorary Canadian citizenship, one of six ever awarded, in response to her profound moral failure. Others have called for her Nobel Peace Prize to be rescinded. But such moves would be distractions from the real challenge at hand. There will be plenty of time to rewrite Suu Kyis place in history. More urgent by far is that we do all we can to protect the Muslim minority now under siege.

To that end, the Trudeau government has taken important steps, pledging $1 million in humanitarian aid for Rakhine state and strongly condemning the persecution of Rohingyas. The prime minister says Ottawa continues to apply pressure on Suu Kyi. He is right to use Canadas strong relationship with the leader to try to push her to show some of the courage and humanity that led to her many awards. But personal diplomacy can accomplish only so much.

Suu Kyi alone cannot end the violence. Although she was elected in a landslide, her power extends only so far; many parts of the Myanmarese state are still controlled by the military. The challenge for Ottawa and the international community will be to find a way to exert real pressure on the still-powerful remnants of Myanmars erstwhile junta.

Suu Kyis complicity in the ongoing atrocities in her country has left her once-totemic reputation in ruins. But symbols of our disapproval will do little to help those in need. We should be using every tool at our disposal, including our close ties with Suu Kyi, to aid the embattled Rohingyas and push Myanmars military to end its brutal campaign.

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Re: He might as well have told me to go back to the kitchen, Keesmaat fumes, Sept. 8

He might as well have told me to go back to the kitchen, Keesmaat fumes, Sept. 8

Stick to the knitting is neither a sexist remark nor bad advice. Unfortunately, this phrase is often misquoted as stick to your knitting, which makes it more prone to being perceived as a personal attack rather than the need to focus on an important business activity.

Therefore, Toronto deputy mayor Denzil Minnan-Wong actually got it right and shouldnt have had to apologize. All the time spent on apologizing and fuming is simply not well spent.

Stick to the knitting alludes to one of the best strategies of successful individuals and organizations, as explained by Tom Peters and Robert Waterman Jr. in their 1982 book, In Search of Excellence. The advice is supported by evidence-based research of Americas best-run companies at the time (3M, Boeing, Dana, Delta, GE, Frito-Lay).

Nor is the advice just an American thing. One of the contributing researchers for this book was from Canadas McGill University.

The lesson learned here is simple: its tough being a good communicator. It takes a lot of effort to get a message across, so start with simple, clear, concise and comprehensive explanations, then seek agreement and mutual understanding. Then, perhaps, collapse it into a cute phrase.

Tom Bechtel, Next Step Business Education, Thornhill

I was both amused and saddened by Jennifer Keesmaats reaction to Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wongs comment.

In the book In Search of Excellence, which many call the greatest business book of all time, there is a chapter entitled, Stick to the knitting  stay with the business that you know.

Over the years, I have heard the phrase many times, directed at both sexes. Ms. Keesmaats reaction is an example of how society is so overly sensitive to comments that are well-intended but are taken the wrong way.

John Stookes, Carlisle, Ont.

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Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 18:49:05|Editor: An



Meng Jianzhu (R), member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and head of the Commission for Political and Legal Affairs of the CPC Central Committee, meets with Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, Sept. 9, 2017. (Xinhua/Sadat)

TASHKENT, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- China and Uzbekistan have agreed to strengthen alignment of their development strategies and comprehensively deepen cooperation in various fields.

The agreement was reached when Meng Jianzhu, member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and head of the Commission for Political and Legal Affairs of the CPC Central Committee, met with Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev here on Saturday.

At the meeting, Meng recalled that the Chinese and Uzbek presidents met in May and unanimously decided to deepen the two countries' comprehensive strategic partnership featuring sincerity, mutual trust, mutual benefits and win-win cooperation, opening a new chapter for bilateral relations.

Mirziyoyev said that he highly appreciates China's efforts to implement the agreements reached by the two leaders, and that Uzbekistan attaches great significance to the comprehensive strategic partnership between the two countries.

Uzbekistan is ready to seize the opportunity of the joint construction of the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road to push for more concrete achievements in bilateral cooperation to benefit the two peoples, he said.

Also on Saturday, Meng met with Uzbek Prime Minister Abdulla Aripov. They co-chaired the fourth meeting of the committee for China-Uzbekistan intergovernmental cooperation.

Both sides agreed to strengthen cooperation in the fields of trade, energy, transportation, agriculture, science and technology, people-to-people exchange and security.
Valley National Bancorp operates as the holding company for Valley National Bank that provides various commercial, retail, insurance, and wealth management financial services products. It operates through Commercial Lending, Consumer Lending, and Investment Management segments. The company offers non-interest bearing, savings, NOW, money market, and time deposit accounts; commercial and industrial, commercial real estate, residential mortgage, and automobile loans; loans secured by the cash surrender value of life insurance; home equity loans and lines of credit; and secured and unsecured other consumer loans. It also invests in various securities and interest-bearing deposits with other banks; and provides international banking services, such as standby and documentary letters of credit, and related products, as well as foreign exchange transactions, documentary collections, foreign wire transfers services, and transaction accounts for non-resident aliens. In addition, the company offers investment services for individuals and small to medium sized businesses; and trusts and custom -tailored investment strategies for various retirement plans. Further, it provides trust services, such as living and testamentary trusts, investment management, custodial and escrow services, and estate administration to individuals; tax credit advisory services; property and casualty, life, health, and title insurance agency services; and health care equipment lending and other commercial equipment leasing services, as well as owns real estate related investments. Additionally, the company offers online, mobile, and telephone banking services; and overdraft, drive-in and night deposit, automated teller machine, remote deposit capture, and safe deposit facility services. As of December 31,2021, it operated 232 branch offices in New Jersey, New York, Florida, and Alabama. The company was incorporated in 1927 and is headquartered in New York, New York.
Validus Holdings, Ltd. provides reinsurance coverage, insurance coverage, and insurance linked securities management services worldwide. It operates through three segments: Reinsurance, Insurance, and Asset Management. The Reinsurance segment underwrites property reinsurance products on a catastrophe excess of loss, per risk excess of loss and proportional basis; and aerospace and aviation, agriculture, composite, marine, technical lines, terrorism, trade credit, workers' compensation, and other specialty lines, as well as casualty and financial lines. The Insurance segment underwrites property, accident and health, agriculture, aviation, contingency, marine, and political lines insurance products; bankers blanket bond, commercial crime, computer crime, cyber- crime, professional indemnity, and directors' and officers' insurance products for various financial institutions and other companies; and commercial and institutional risks comprising general, professional, and product liability, as well as miscellaneous malpractice insurance products. This segment also underwrites marine and energy liability, and political risk insurance products, as well as insurance products for repair, maintenance, and upkeep of aircrafts and premises for small companies. The Asset Management segment manages capital for third parties through insurance-linked securities, and other property catastrophe and specialty reinsurance investments. Validus Holdings, Ltd. was founded in 2005 and is based in Pembroke, Bermuda.
The Hanover Insurance Group, Inc., through its subsidiaries, provides various property and casualty insurance products and services in the United States. The company operates through three segments: Commercial Lines, Personal Lines, and Other. The Commercial Lines segment offers commercial multiple peril, commercial automobile, and workers' compensation insurance products, as well as management and professional liability, marine, specialty industrial and commercial property, monoline general liability, surety, umbrella, fidelity, crime, and other commercial coverages. The Personal Lines segment provides personal automobile and homeowner's coverages, as well as other personal coverages, such as personal umbrella, inland marine, fire, personal watercraft, personal cyber, and other miscellaneous coverages. The Other segment markets investment management services to institutions, pension funds, and other organizations. The Hanover Insurance Group, Inc. markets its products and services through independent agents and brokers. The company was formerly known as Allmerica Financial Corp. and changed its name to The Hanover Insurance Group, Inc. in December 2005. The Hanover Insurance Group, Inc. was founded in 1852 and is headquartered in Worcester, Massachusetts.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 19:44:18|Editor: Yurou

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CAIRO, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Egypt is considering rejecting 59,000 tonnes of French wheat purchased by state grain buyer GASC due to the presence of poppy seeds, Egypt's agricultural ministry said on Sunday.

Egypt's agricultural ministry said on Sunday its quarantine authority was examining seeds in the French cargo.

"If they prove to be poppy seeds a decision will be taken to reject the shipment and transfer the case to the general prosecutor," spokesman Hamid Abdel Dayim said.

A 63,000 tonne Romanian wheat cargo is currently being considered for final rejection and re-export at the office of the general prosecutor after the quarantine authority found it contained poppy seeds.

Cairo-based traders said poppy seeds were becoming "the new ergot."

Egypt spends billions of pounds each year on wheat and bread subsidies to secure food for tens of millions of its poorest.
BNL girls thump Mitchell at The Hive

Bedford North Lawrence defeated Mitchell 78-20 at the Hive on Saturday evening. The win moved the Stars to 3-0 on the season.
I am a 21-year-old American foreign exchange student studying in Sydney for the semester, and I finish my studies on October 27. I plan to do a 3-day tour of Uluru/Kings Canyon immediately after the semester, and then I'll bounce around the South Pacific region solo for ~34 days, arriving back in Sydney to catch my departing flight on December 6. I'm much more of an adventurer than a partier, so I want to see the beautiful natural scenery, explore exciting cities, meet friendly people, and experience what the world has to offer.

Ideally, I would like to be able to go to WA (Perth/Fremantle), Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Indonesia, and New Zealand (both islands), but I know time is a major constraint. Perth/Fremantle would be primarily for Rottnest Island because I'm a sucker for those quokkas. From what I've read, 3 days should be plenty to explore that area. New Zealand sounds like the adventurer's dream, and I've tentatively allocated 3 weeks for it. However, it is relatively expensive and that leaves me with only 10 days for SE Asia.

My high-level plan at the moment is Alice Springs -> Perth -> SE Asia -> Auckland -> Queenstown, but I still need to evaluate and optimize the route based on time and cost. I would greatly appreciate some advice on how to make/adjust my itinerary  for example, if I should shorten my stay in NZ or if I should go to SE Asia at all.

Thank you in advance!

Edited: 5 years ago
Hi, I'm planning a family trip with my husband & 4 yo son this coming December (15 Dec - 4 Jan 18). We have 21 weeks & plan to do self drive, I'd love to visit main cities on the east coast & canada. We will arrive in NYC and return back home from NYC too. Any suggestion on itinerary & transportation would be appreciated. Here is what's on my mind:

- NYC (2 days)

- Philadelphia (1 day) planning to drive from NYC but I read the forum it is better to take train, so I am considering train & use public transport instead of renting a car

- Washington DC (4 days) - public transport or should I hire a car?

- Drive from DC to Harrisburg to visit Hersheys World, then to Corning to stay overnight before heading to Buffalo (1 day)

- Buffalo - cross the border to Niagara Falls (canadian side).

What is the cost efficient way to go to Canada? I read at the forum that the rental companies charge a one way fee if we bring the car across the border. Can I return the rental car in Buffalo, take taxi/ bus to Niagara Falls, then hire a car in Canada side, drive it to Quebec City?

Is it do-able with large baggage & a kid?

- Drive to Toronto - Ottawa- Montreal - Quebec City. How many days would I need to spend on each city to see the main attraction? I plan to spend 5-6 days in Canada.

- Fly from Quebec City to Orlando

- Orlando (4 days)

- Fly to NYC (2 days)

Thank you so much.
Dear all,

I need some advices please ><

I have planned a trip to Tokyo in mid November for total of 6 days. As i have already done Tokyo city , i was thinking of taking a domestic flight out to Sapporo for 3 days.

It start to strike me if this will be productive/economical as considering the time factor for travelling... ? Buget airline like Jetstar offered quite worthy tickets like Jpy 12,000 for the domestic (however it fly out from Narita airport)

Reason for wanting to visit Hokaiddo is because i have never been there and heard of the beautiful scenery and The food. And the cold weather ^^

Or should i consider to explore out of Tokyo? What are the recomendations?

I will be travelling alone. Thanks for any advice!!
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 19:49:20|Editor: Yurou

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RIYADH, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Russia and Saudi Arabia discussed on Sunday their support to the establishment of de-escalation zones in Syria, Al Arabiya local news reported.

This was revealed during a press conference by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on the sideline of his visit to Riyadh and his Saudi counterpart Adel bin Ahmed Al-Jubeir.

The Russian official highlighted that these zones will contribute to solving the crisis through the elimination of terrorism risks to pursue comprehensive political operations.

He said that his country supports the Saudi efforts to unify the Syrian oppositions to one group while stressing that Syrians are the one who will decide the destiny of their country.

Meanwhile, Al-Jubeir highlighted that the two sides discuss counterterrorism coordination while hailing the stand of Russia about the Yemeni crisis. He said that Saudi Arabia and Russia share the same stands about regional issues.
Beware! We just returned from Fiji and had had a wonderful time. In our euphoria I must have turned my radar off as we caught the local bus into Nadi for some last minute souvenir shopping. As we walked towards the main road a Fijian lady started chatting with us, seemed natural enough. She was saying there was a Fijian Cultural Market nearby and was recommending we avoid the Indian and Chinese shops. She offered to show us a market where you could see locals make handcrafted items for sale. Thinking she would just point out a shop, she lead us to a place upstairs in a lane on the corner of Notolo Lane and the main road near Nadi Markets and the bus terminal. We were greeted by other locals who then offered us a traditional kava ceremony welcome. I then realised we were the only customers in the shop. They sold the usual carvings and souvenirs but at hugely jnflated prices, between 4-10 times higher than other shops. They also talked to us about next visit coming to stay for free in their mountain village. We soon saw red and got out of there as fast as we could. There was a group of young men at the bottom of the stairs and we almost ran to the main road in case they intended to mug us.

Now you may think us silly for following her but she was very natural and convincing, talking about the floods being why they moved to an upstairs shop. Her name was Lucy and she claimed to work at the Sofitel Denauru Island. I have since found out that the shop is actually Indian owned with locals paid commission on the customers they can bring to the shop.

Be very careful if you are approached by anyone like this at the bus terminal or nearby taxi area. We were also approached there once by a guy trying to tell us we had missed the last bus and trying to get us into his car. Only cars with a number plate LH or LT have the license and insurance to carry passengers.

This is a rare experience in beautiful Fiji but forewarned is forearmed!
Not sure if these are sort of like counter propaganda and I'm not going to put the links in youtube videos here, but if you go there and type in something-something (like shocking/surprising/weird) *facts* about NK then you see what you never want to believe. Yes, I know some of the 'facts about ---' (put the name of any nation) on youtube are ludicrous to bizarre to abominable. Yes, opinion may differ, but I wouldn't put it past NK to do what was depicted in the videos. Wish I could quote some episodes on here, but I can't because of an obvious reason. Yet, my thoughts and probably yours too would be with the people there if it was real they way they were treated. Would such a *world-class* destitute nation wage a war? Probably not, but a maniacal despot who reigns over his regime would keep acting as a real menace if he thought that's the only way to survive... Poor the young man; poorer the people having to follow...
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An Iranian missile boat warned off a U.S. warship approaching Iran's dhow in the Sea of Oman. (AFP Photo)

TEHRAN, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- An Iranian missile boat warned off a U.S. warship approaching Iran's dhow in the Sea of Oman, the navy of the Islamic republic said in a statement on Sunday, Press TV reported.

"The dhow, Shams (Sun), had set sail from the port city of Jask in southeastern Iran to test its engine. Forty-five miles (72 kilometers) into the sea, the vessel's engine started to malfunction, and its sailors informed the Iranian navy of the incident," the statement said.

The navy dispatched Falakhan (Sling) missile boat to the vessel's rescue, which towed the broken-down dhow to the port, but before that a U.S. destroyer was seen approaching the dhow, it said.

The U.S. warship left the area with a warning of the Falakhan missile boat, the statement read.

The U.S. navy and Iran's speed boats have so far had several encounters in the Persian Gulf, but nothing serious has followed.

On Aug. 24, On Monday, the U.S. Naval Forces Central Command said an Iranian drone came within 300 meters of the USS Nimitz which was in international waters in the Persian Gulf.

Besides, a U.S. navy official said that the USS Thunderbolt fired warning shots at an Iranian patrol boat in the Persian Gulf, as it came within 150 yards (about 137 meters) in the northern end of the Persian Gulf.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 20:09:35|Editor: Yurou

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SHEBERGHAN, Afghanistan, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- As many as 35 civilians have been kidnapped by militants loyal to both the Islamic State (IS) and the Taliban in northern Afghanistan's Jawzjan province, locals said Sunday.

"Both IS and the Taliban have created checkpoints along the way between Qush Tipa and Darzab districts of the province, arresting individuals on charges of having links with the other side, as recently, 35 people, all civilians, have been taken in hostage by the two rival groups," local residents said.

Meanwhile, Nasratullah Jamshidi, the press officer of the 209th Shaheen Corps of the Afghan National Army, confirmed the incident, saying he had received such a report.

Fighting has escalated in Afghanistan as the Taliban insurgency spreads from its traditional strongholds in the south and east to the once peaceful region in the north, where the militants have been recruiting from among the youth.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 20:14:37|Editor: Yurou

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MOGADISHU, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- At least two people were killed and 15 others injured, including three journalists, in a suicide bomb attack in central Somalia Sunday.

Hiiran Governor Omar Adan Ibrahim confirmed that two people instead of three that was reported earlier were killed noting investigations were ongoing.

"I can confirm to you that two people were killed in the attack at the restaurant. 15 other people have been injured," said Ibrahim.

Ibrahim said the suicide bomber blew himself up in a popular shop near the Djiboutian military base in Hiraan region.

"Somali journalists are among those injured in the attack after a suicide bomber blew up himself near a second control point in Beledweyne town," Ibrahim said.

Al-Shabaab terrorists who have been fighting to topple the Western-backed government claimed reasonability for the attack which came amid surge in terror incidences in central Somalia.

Abdiasis Abu Musab, Al-Shabaab's military operation spokesman, said the attack, which took place outside the office of the governor of the Hiraan region where he was holding a meeting, targeted workers of the regional administration.

"We are behind the attack at the Hiraan governor's headquarters. There are casualties. We targeted the workers of the Hiraan administration," Musab said.

The militant group frequently overstates the death toll from its attacks. The group which previously vowed to continue the fight against the new Somali government has released the name of the 13 soldiers killed at the military camp.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 20:19:40|Editor: An

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MADRID, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Some Chinese companies are world leaders in their sectors and rank highly in the rankings of global companies, Spanish Secretary of State for Commerce Marisa Poncela has said, adding the numbers back up Spain's decision to look to the Chinese market.

Poncela made the statement in the Forum for Investment and Development of Chinese Companies in Spain, which was celebrated in the Spanish capital of Madrid with the aim of establishing a platform for exchange between companies from the two countries and to promote bilateral investment and development.

The Forum was also attended by Chinese Ambassador to Spain Lyu Fan, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) President Gu Shu, and representatives of around 30 Chinese and Spanish companies.

Poncela explained that for several years now the commercial exchange between Spain and China have been above the 20-billion-euro benchmark, when it was only just over 5 billion euros in the year 2000.

She highlighted that Spanish exports to China are evolving positively and were worth more than 5,000 million euros in 2016, making China Spain's main commercial partner in Asia.

There are now 180 Spanish companies with investments in China and over 6,000 Spanish companies with a permanent commercial presence in the country.

While the stock of the investment of Spanish companies in China is worth more than 6 billion euros and extends into several sectors -- industry and technology, automobiles and aeronautics, tools and machinery, consumer goods, agriculture, tourism, finance and insurance among others.

Chinese Ambassador Lyu Fan told the Forum that the tendency for Chinese companies to look abroad for international cooperation is irresistible and as a result he hoped that businesses in both nations search for better partners, more opportunities and more exchange.

ICBC President Gu Shu said his bank has been working in Spain for the past seven years as a focus on economic and commercial exchange to offer a more diverse financial service.

ICBC currently works with 80 Spanish companies that have investments in China in areas such as finance and deposits, according to Gu.
Meng Jianzhu (R), member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and head of the Commission for Political and Legal Affairs of the CPC Central Committee, meets with Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, Sept. 9, 2017. (Xinhua/Sadat)

TASHKENT, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- China and Uzbekistan have agreed to strengthen alignment of their development strategies and comprehensively deepen cooperation in various fields.

The agreement was reached when Meng Jianzhu, member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and head of the Commission for Political and Legal Affairs of the CPC Central Committee, met with Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev here on Saturday.

At the meeting, Meng recalled that the Chinese and Uzbek presidents met in May and unanimously decided to deepen the two countries' comprehensive strategic partnership featuring sincerity, mutual trust, mutual benefits and win-win cooperation, opening a new chapter for bilateral relations.

Mirziyoyev said that he highly appreciates China's efforts to implement the agreements reached by the two leaders, and that Uzbekistan attaches great significance to the comprehensive strategic partnership between the two countries.

Uzbekistan is ready to seize the opportunity of the joint construction of the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road to push for more concrete achievements in bilateral cooperation to benefit the two peoples, he said.

Also on Saturday, Meng met with Uzbek Prime Minister Abdulla Aripov. They co-chaired the fourth meeting of the committee for China-Uzbekistan intergovernmental cooperation.
MOGADISHU, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- At least two people were killed and 15 others injured, including three journalists, in a suicide bomb attack in central Somalia Sunday.

Hiiran Governor Omar Adan Ibrahim confirmed that two people instead of three that was reported earlier were killed noting investigations were ongoing.

"I can confirm to you that two people were killed in the attack at the restaurant. 15 other people have been injured," said Ibrahim.

Ibrahim said the suicide bomber blew himself up in a popular shop near the Djiboutian military base in Hiraan region.

"Somali journalists are among those injured in the attack after a suicide bomber blew up himself near a second control point in Beledweyne town," Ibrahim said.

Al-Shabaab terrorists who have been fighting to topple the Western-backed government claimed reasonability for the attack which came amid surge in terror incidences in central Somalia.

Abdiasis Abu Musab, Al-Shabaab's military operation spokesman, said the attack, which took place outside the office of the governor of the Hiraan region where he was holding a meeting, targeted workers of the regional administration.

"We are behind the attack at the Hiraan governor's headquarters. There are casualties. We targeted the workers of the Hiraan administration," Musab said.

The militant group frequently overstates the death toll from its attacks. The group which previously vowed to continue the fight against the new Somali government has released the name of the 13 soldiers killed at the military camp.
- Raila Odinga's supporters in the USA have raised KSh 1.87 million for his presidential campaigns so far

- They intend to raise KSh 5 million and hope the amount will be surpassed

- Raila asked his supporters to help him raise funds so that he can mount an even bigger campaign than he did ahead of the August 8 poll

- Opposition politicians have so far pledged about KSh 100 million to his campaign kitty

On Friday, September 8, Raila Odinga and his running mate, Kalonzo Musyoka held a press conference and unveiled a paybill number, asking their supporters to contribute funds to their election campaign ahead of the October 17 repeat presidential election.

Saying the contribution will be a way for Kenyans to buy their tickets into Canaan, Raila called on Kenyans to help him raise funds because his resources were exhausted in the first round election.

The opposition brigade now intends to mount a more intense campaign that they did ahead of the August 8 election.

READ ALSO: St George's girls High School, Nairobi Kitchen goes down in flames (Photos)

The NASA paybill number for the public to contribute to Raila's presidential campaigns. Photo: Robin Njogu.

READ ALSO: Raila and NASA is now broke and I know why - Uhuru

They unveiled the mobile platform contribution paybill number, a bank account number, and a GoFundMe account was opened by NASAs diaspora supporters.

In the latest information seen by TUKO.co.ke on Sunday, September 10, the NASA diaspora USA intend to raise KSh 5.3 million for the campaigns.

In 6 days, 115 people raised KSh 1.56 million, and in 7 days, the amount was up to 1.87 million, raised by 154 people.

READ ALSO: DP Ruto arm-twists Raila with a tricky request

Screenshots from the GoFundMe account showing the contribution progress. Photo: Facebook, Ndungu Nyoro.

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Haba na haba hujaza kibaba. Ukitoa utakuwa unanunua tiketi ya gari inayoelekea Canaan (little contribution will help. Your contribution will be a ticket for the journey to Canaan),said Raila during their presser.

Aside from contributions from the public, a number of opposition leaders allied to NASA announced that they will forgo their first salaries and instead, pool it together for Railas presidential campaigns.

READ ALSO: Mike Sonko's victory challenged in court

Uhuru Kenyatta and Raila Odinga will face off for a second time in 2017 after the Supreme Court nullified Uhuru's August 8 victory. Photos: Facebook, Uhuru Kenyatta and NASA Coalition.

READ ALSO: Jalang'o introduces his baby sister and the internet cannot cope (Photos)

Prior TUKO.co.ke reports indicate that the amount was estimated to have reached KSh 100 million.

All leaders, from the Member of County Assembly to the Governors, pledged to support Raila and Kalonzo to make sure they beat President Uhuru Kenyatta in the grand rematch.

Have something to add to this article? Send to news@tuko.co.ke

Source: TUKO.co.ke
The Mayor of the nation's capital city says the police are working and it is not for him to assess their performance.

This,. as he called on the entire society to work together on getting rid of any perception that crime is an opportunity.
A recently released federal recovery plan for the endangered Mexican gray wolf has received harsh criticism from three of the biologists the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service pulled together six years ago in an unsuccessful attempt to draft the same type of recovery document.

Overoptimistic assumptions, flawed and impractical were among the words used in the biologists' comments on the federal plan. It sets a recovery goal of 320 wolves in an area of Arizona and New Mexico south of Interstate-40 and another 170 wolves in northern Mexico.

The biologists were part of a nine-member science advisory group that in 2012 concluded more than double that number of wolves spread out over a much larger range would be needed to establish a self-sustaining population in the Southwest.

Their feedback stands in stark contrast to comments submitted by the Arizona Game and Fish Department, which complimented the federal recovery plan, saying it includes the most current and best available data and establishes practical and achievable recovery criteria.

The divergent comments indicate that even after 40 years of federal wolf recovery efforts, scientists and many conservation organizations disagree with state and federal wildlife managers on basic scientific data about the animals historical range, population viability and potential habitat.

In all, the Fish and Wildlife Services draft plan received nearly 100,000 comments by the Aug. 29 deadline. The Fish and Wildlife Service will review the input before coming out with a final recovery plan by a court-mandated deadline of November 2017. It will be the first update to the recovery plan since 1982 after three past attempts, all of which were unsuccessful.

FAULTY SCIENCE

Carlos Carroll, with the Klamath Center for Conservation Research, Montana-based biologist Rich Fredrickson and Mike Phillips, the executive director of Turner Endangered Species Fund, were the only three members of the 2011 science team to comment on the most recent Mexican wolf recovery draft plan. With more than 60 years of experience with wolf populations between them, the biologists were united in their disapproval of the population viability modeling that underpins the federal plan.

The model is over-optimistic in its assumptions about things like the proportion of breeding females and the frequency and intensity of future disease outbreaks, Carroll and Fredrickson wrote. It also assumes continued supplemental feeding of the wolves to avoid conflicts with livestock, which is problematic and unrealistic, Phillips and Fredrickson wrote.

The Fish and Wildlife Service overestimates the amount of suitable habitat in Mexico as well, Phillips wrote. He noted that hurdles to wolf recovery across the border include a high amount of private land, abundant livestock that could lead to frequent wolf-livestock conflicts, unknown numbers of native prey and infrequently enforced wildlife protection laws.

"If the final plan is a close reflection of the draft, then I am confident in predicting that it will set the Mexican wolf adrift for decades without ever approaching the shore of recovery," he wrote.

As for the plans designation of wolf recovery areas only south of Interstate-40, Carroll wrote that neither Fish and Wildlife policies nor the Endangered Species Act requires an exclusive focus on historical range.

The lack of sufficient suitable habitat with low mortality risk in Mexico requires defining a broader recovery region that includes the Grand Canyon region and Southern Rockies, he wrote.

PLAN SUPPORT

Habitat in Mexico is cast as much more promising in comments submitted by Jim deVos, assistant director of wildlife management for the Arizona Game and Fish Department. Writing for the state wildlife agency, deVos called the Fish and Wildlife Services habitat analysis state of the art and affirmed that it shows large areas of high quality habitat in Mexico.

Devos also took aim at methods of genomic analysis that advocates say provide evidence that the Mexican gray wolfs ancestors roamed north of I-40, calling them poorly understood molecular markers. Instead, deVos referred to a 2017 study by Game and Fish Wildlife Science Coordinator Jim Heffelfinger that the animals historical range was limited to southeastern Arizona, southwestern New Mexico, and portions of Mexico.

When it comes to the population viability analysis that Fredrickson, Carroll and Phillips each described as flawed, deVos wrote that it represents the most current and best available data and the best predictive model of future population viability.

Game and Fish's plan includes not only redundancy in designating two populations, but also resiliency in the numerical recovery criteria that it establishes, deVos wrote.

One of the few facts that all sides agree on? At last count, the wolves wild population numbered at least 113, which is the highest number since the animals were first reintroduced into the forests of eastern Arizona and western New Mexico nearly two decades ago.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 21:04:55|Editor: Lu Hui

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BERLIN, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- German Chancellor Angela Merkel is ready to intervene directly in a diplomatic initiative to end the nuclear and missile program of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), a German newspaper reported Sunday.

"If our participation in talks is desired, I will say yes," Merkel said in an interview with the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung.

The German Chancellor drew attention to the negotiations on the Iranian nuclear program, in which Germany had participated alongside the five veto-voters in the UN Security Council. It was a "long but important period of diplomacy", which had come to a "good end" last year.

Merkel said she could also imagine such a format for the settlement of the DPRK issue. Europe and in particular Germany should be ready to contribute a very active part.

After the DPRK announced the success of its first hydrogen bomb test earlier this month, Merkel issued a statement strongly condemning DPRK's nuclear test, calling for further and stricter sanctions against Pyongyang and seeking a peaceful solution with negotiation.

Merkel in last week had already spoken over the phone with the presidents of France, the United States, China and South Korea, as well as the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to discuss the issue. The report on Sunday said she will call Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 21:50:08|Editor: An

NANJING, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- A joint editorial committee of scholars from China, Japan and the Republic of Korea is writing a new history textbook to resist efforts to white-wash Japan's militaristic past.

The committee has published two books: The Contemporary and Modern History of Three East Asian Countries in 2005 and A Modern History of East Asia Beyond The Boundaries in 2012.

Committee members attending a history seminar in Nanjing, east China's Jiangsu Province, told Xinhua Sunday that work on a third book has begun and is expected to be completed in 2020.

Li Xizhu, a fellow of the Institute of Modern History, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said scholars from the three countries have reached consensus on the focus of the book.

"It is to address the differences in how we, the three countries, see history and to respond to the current debate on historical issues," Li said.

Ueyama Yurika, a Japanese member, said the committee will create contents in line with education practice in each country's context so that the textbooks can be used more widely.

Scholars agree that a correct perception of history is the foundation for reconciliation in East Asia.

Japanese scholar Kasahara Tokushi said history textbooks in Japan contain fewer and increasingly more obscure contents on the 1937 Nanjing Massacre.

Japanese troops captured Nanjing, then China's capital, on Dec. 13 of 1937 and started a slaughter lasting more than 40 days. About 300,000 civilians and Chinese soldiers who had laid down their arms were murdered. Over 20,000 women were raped.

Tokushi warned that if teachers can't teach it, neither do media report on it, young Japanese might be harder to find out the truth.
AMMAN, 11 September 2017  Nearly one in five children across the Middle East and North Africa need immediate humanitarian assistance, according to latest data and analysis. Over 90 per cent of these children live in countries affected by conflict.

Conflict continues to rob millions of girls and boys of their childhood. Decades of progress are at a risk of being reversed across the Middle East and North Africa, said Geert Cappelaere, UNICEF Regional Director.

Children have been hit hardest by ongoing years of violence, displacement and lack of basic services. Civilian infrastructure, including hospitals, energy, water, sanitation and hygiene installations have often come under attack, exposing children to the risk of death and diseases.

Millions of families were forced to flee their homes  some multiple times and under fire. Continued violence and displacement have increasingly made it difficult for children and families to cope.

With no end in sight to these conflicts and with families dwindling financial resources, many have no choice but to send their children to work or marry their daughters early. The number of children affiliated with the fighting has more than doubled said Cappelaere.

According to the latest analysis:

Inside Syria and in refugee hosting countries, almost 12 million Syrian children require humanitarian assistance - up from half a million in 2012. An estimated 2 million children live in hard-to-reach or besieged areas in Syria have received limited humanitarian assistance over the years.

In Yemen, the fighting has destroyed water and sanitation systems, sparking the worlds worst cholera and acute watery diarrhea outbreak with over 610,000 suspected cases to date. More than half of Yemens health facilities are out of service and water systems have been destroyed, cutting off almost 15 million people from safe water and access to basic healthcare.

Across Iraq, more than 5 million children are in need of assistance as heavy fighting intensified including in Mosul and recently in Tel-Afar. They need water, food and shelter and education.

In the Gaza Strip, an ongoing electricity crisis has reduced access to water by 30 per cent. Cases of diarrhea among young children have doubled in just three months.

Children in the Middle East and North Africa region have undergone unprecedented levels of violence and witnessed horrors that no one should witness. If violence and wars continue, the consequences- not only for the region- but for the world as a whole will be dire. World leaders must do much more to put an end to violence for the sake of boys and girls and their future said Cappelaere.

###

For more information contact:

Juliette Touma, UNICEF Regional Office, Amman, +962 79 867 4628, jtouma@unicef.org

Lina Elkurd, UNICEF Regional Office, Amman +962 79 109 6644, lelkurd@unicef.org
This week on Issues in the News, prominent Washington correspondents discuss topics making headlines around the world, including North Koreas continued missile testing, and the plight of tens of thousands of Rohingya refugees displaced by violence in Myanmar. Join moderator David Rennie of The Economist, along with our panelists, Paul Brandus of West Wing Reports and Israeli-based i24News correspondent Dan Raviv.
Australians have surrendered more than 400 guns a day under a firearms amnesty that began in July. The weapons turned in include several high-powered military assault rifles as well as shotguns from the Vietnam War.

This is the first national no-questions-asked amnesty since one following a mass shooting in the state of Tasmania in 1996. 26,000 firearms have been handed in so far, much to the surprise of Australian officials. They had not expected so many weapons to be surrendered during the three-month program.

Law enforcement authorities have been worried that unwanted military-style rifles, pistols and shotguns could fall into the hands of extremists and criminal gangs.

The New South Wales assistant police commissioner is Dave Donohue.

Because it is an amnesty we do not know the history of those firearms. We are not running searches on those firearms but certainly it is a potential there that those firearms could have been stolen or otherwise unlawfully obtained, he said.

A similar amnesty followed the Port Arthur massacre in Tasmania more than 20 years ago. Measures enacted then also restricted possession of automatic and semi-automatic firearms.



Thirty-five people died when a lone gunman, using a semi-automatic rifle, attacked a former penal colony at Port Arthur, a popular tourist destination. It was the worst mass shooting in Australia's history.

After the current amnesty finishes at the end of the month, anyone found with an unregistered firearm faces up to 14 years in prison or a very hefty fine. Surrendered weapons are destroyed.

It is estimated there are more than a quarter-million illegal guns in Australia, although officials concede the exact number is impossible to gauge.
The former chairman of the world's largest meatpacker, whose testimony implicated Brazil's president in corruption, turned himself in to police Sunday after the country's Supreme Court ordered his arrest.



Joesley Batista has avoided prosecution under a plea bargain deal in which he described how meatpacking giant JBS had bribed dozens of politicians, including President Michel Temer.



Earlier this year, Temer was charged with corruption for allegedly orchestrating a scheme in which he would get payouts totaling millions of dollars for helping JBS resolve a business issue.



Temer denies wrongdoing, and Congress voted in August that he would not stand trial on the charge while in office.



But Brazil's sprawling probe into the massive trade in bribes and kickbacks for favors between companies and politicians, known as Operation Car Wash, continues to churn out new allegations on almost a daily basis. Just this week the country's chief prosecutor, Rodrigo Janot, filed charges against three former presidents and several other powerful politicians, accusing them of forming criminal organizations to pilfer from public coffers, and authorities detained a former Cabinet minister and close ally of Temer after $16 million in cash was found in an apartment linked to him.



Janot also has said he plans to file more charges against Temer. To do so, he'll need to act in the coming days since his terms ends on Sept. 18.



But the specter that Batista and others withheld information could cast a pall over the Car Wash investigation, which has relied heavily on plea bargain deals, a fairly new innovation here. Many in Brazil are uneasy with the agreements, in general, and the deals JBS executives got provoked specific outrage from those who thought they were too lenient.



Janot said last week that he is investigating whether Batista and other cooperating witnesses omitted some information from their testimony and he has threatened to revoke the deals if they didn't tell the whole truth.



The revelation came after Janot's office received audio of a conversation between Batista and Ricardo Saud, an executive at J&F Investimentos, the holding company that controls JBS. The men apparently did not know they were being recorded, and Janot said it contained vague references to potentially illicit activity not previously disclosed, including the possibility of wrongdoing in his own office and at the Supreme Court.



He was careful to add that any information they have given  like the allegations against Temer  was still valid.



In his decision, Justice Edson Fachin said there was sufficient indication that Batista and Saud had withheld information from prosecutors when formalizing their plea bargains. Fachin ordered both men be detained. The decision was made Friday but was only made public by the court on Sunday.



Guilherme Barros of the public relations firm GBR that represents J&F said Batista and Saud have turned themselves in to Federal Police in the city. A statement e-mailed by GBR said that both Batista and Saud deny that they lied or omitted information in their deals and that they are fulfilling the terms of the agreement.
Cambodia's main opposition party will boycott a parliamentary vote to strip their detained leader of immunity on Monday and will instead go to Kem Sokha's jail to demand his release, one of his deputies said on Sunday.

Kem Sokha, the head of the Cambodian National Rescue Party (CNRP), was arrested a week ago and charged with treason for allegedly plotting to win power with the support of the United States, escalating a crackdown on critics of Prime Minister Hun Sen and independent media ahead of a general election next year.

The arrest has been criticized by Western countries, but China has backed Hun Sen's government.

Parliament is due to vote on whether to remove the immunity from prosecution which Kem Sokha gets as an elected member of parliament. The ruling Cambodian People's Party (CPP)'s majority means the motion is certain to pass anyway.

CNRP deputy leader Mu Sochua said the parliament vote was illegal.

"We can't accept this. We will demand that Kem Sokha, who has not done anything wrong, to be released," she said, adding that members of parliament would hold a protest at the prison where he is being held near the border with Vietnam.

CPP spokesman Sok Eysan said the opposition boycott would be unconstitutional, but the CPP had enough votes to strip Kem Sokha of his immunity anyway.

Hun Sen, a 65-year-old former Khmer Rouge commander, has ruled Cambodia for more than 30 years and said last week that he planned to stay in power for another decade.

Next year's election had been expected to be his toughest electoral test, but Western countries and human rights groups have raised doubts as to whether the vote will be fair.

The evidence presented against Kem Sokha so far is a video recorded in 2013 in which he discusses a strategy to win power with the help of unspecified Americans. His lawyers have dismissed the evidence as nonsense and said he was only discussing election strategy.

In recent weeks, Hun Sen has also expelled the National Democratic Institute, a non-governmental organization that promotes democracy, and ordered 19 radio stations off the air.

The independent English-language Cambodia Daily shut last week after being given a month to pay a $6.3 million tax demand which it believed was politically motivated.

The paper's 86-year-old American founder, Bernard Krisher, said in a letter to Hun Sen and made available to media that he planned to travel to Cambodia from his home in Japan to take responsibility for the tax dispute.
Hurricane Irma strengthened to a Category 4 storm early Sunday as it lashed coastal Florida with 210 kph wind and heavy rain ahead of its expected landfall.

Irma is forecast to cross the Florida Keys before tracking up the western coast of the state.

The National Hurricane Center said the storm's projected track has shifted slightly to the west. That path could allow the storm's center to remain over the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico, allowing it to strengthen more before moving ashore at St. Petersburg, just west of Tampa.

According to the Florida Power and Light website, more than 250,000 homes and businesses are already without electricity.

Florida Governor Rick Scott told Floridians Saturday evening, We are under a state of emergency, urging them to leave evacuation zones.

This is your last chance to make a good decision," he added.

WATCH: Florida Governor: 'The Storm Is Here'

Scott also repeated his call for nurses and emergency workers to volunteer their help in the aftermath of the storm.

More than 75,000 people heeded the governor's advice and checked into some 400 emergency shelters in the state.

Trump: 'Get out of its way

Meanwhile, President Donald Trump and his Cabinet met Saturday at the presidential retreat in Camp David, Maryland, to discuss the hurricane.

Citing the expected impact of Hurricane Irma, which came on the heels of Hurricane Harvey's destruction in Texas just two weeks ago, Trump said he would ask the Republican-controlled Congress to speed up efforts to overhaul the U.S. tax code.

"I think now with what's happened with the hurricane, I'm going to ask for a speed-up. I wanted a speed-up anyway, but now we need it even more so," he told Cabinet members. The White House released a video of his remarks.

He also called Irma a "storm of enormous destructive power" and asked "everyone in the storm path to heed all instructions, get out of its way."

Irma was a Category 5 when it hit Cuba late Friday. Its time over land reduced the storm's strength. It was a downgraded to a Category 3 storm Saturday but regained power as it moved across the warm waters between Cuba and the U.S.

Florida's slender Key islands  with their population of retirees, vacationers and refugees from mainland culture  were under mandatory evacuation orders.

WATCH: Florida Official: Be Prepared, Be Patient, Get to Shelters

For those who resisted the order and planned to ride out the storm on the Keys, "you're on your own," Federal Emergency Management Agency head Brock Long said Saturday.

"There is no safe area within the Keys," Long said. "You put your life in your own hands by not evacuating."

He added, "We are not going to be there right after the storm passes. We need to make sure roadways are clear, we need to get trucks in to get stuff there."

Curfews for Florida

Further inland, some areas were under curfew late Saturday and early Sunday as residents awaited Irma's onset.

In Homestead, Florida, south of Miami, people have been threatened with arrest if they are out after hours without a "valid, emergency purpose," Zachary Good, spokesman for the city, said.

In Miami-Dade County, officials said more people had checked into hurricane shelters than at any other time in the county's history. About 29,000 people were reported to have checked into county-run shelters, along with about 1,000 pets.

But space remained for last-minute decision-makers: As of Saturday afternoon local time, only 16 of 42 shelters were reported full.

Scott asked residents who planned to stay home to have three days' worth of supplies on hand to sustain themselves until emergency help arrived.

In all, Florida asked 5.6 million people  more than one-quarter of the state's population  to evacuate their homes ahead of the storm. Scott told all Floridians to be prepared in case they needed to leave.

Destruction in the Caribbean

At least 25 people have died since the storm began raking its arms over land, starting with the Caribbean island of Barbuda.

The resort island with a population of fewer than 2,000 was devastated. Prime Minister Gaston Browne estimated that 95 percent of Barbuda's buildings had been damaged or destroyed.

Until late Saturday, the island nation was braced for another direct impact, this one from Category 4 Hurricane Jose. By Saturday evening, Jose had skirted the island without imposing a direct hit.

It could be up to six months before all power is restored on cash-strapped Puerto Rico, a U.S. commonwealth, where Irma knocked out power to more than 1 million people.

The U.S. Defense Department deployed three Navy ships, about two dozen aircraft and hundreds of Marines to help with recovery efforts in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

VOA Turkish service's Mehmet Sumer contributed to this report.
The Iraqi air force and the U.S.-led coalition on Saturday stepped up a campaign of airstrikes on the Islamic State-held town of Hawija ahead of a planned ground assault there, according to Iraq's minister of defense.

Also Saturday, the secretary-general of the Arab League visited Baghdad to encourage political dialogue with Irbil as Iraq's Kurdish region pushes forward with plans to hold a referendum on independence September 25.

Despite ongoing military operations to clear out the last pockets of territory held by IS, the looming referendum has increased tensions between the central government and the Kurdish region.

"There are large operations underway ahead of the liberation of Hawija and surrounding areas," Iraqi Defense Minister Erfan al-Hayali told The Associated Press, explaining that his forces were working closely with Iraqi Kurdish forces known as the Peshmerga as well as the coalition.

During the operation to retake Iraq's second-largest city of Mosul, Iraq's military coordinated attacks with the Kurdish Peshmerga forces. After a grueling nine-month fight, Mosul was declared liberated in July.

It is unclear whether Iraqi security forces and the Peshmerga will continue to cooperate once the referendum is held.

Last month, the Iraqi military command overseeing the IS fight declared victory in Tal Afar, west of Mosul, and announced Hawija, 150 miles (240 kilometers) north of Baghdad, would be the site of the next battle against the extremists.

The stepped-up coalition strikes are targeting IS territory in western Anbar as well as Hawija, said U.S. Army Colonel Ryan Dillon, coalition spokesman.

"Coming off of their victory in Tal Afar [Iraqi security forces] will use a lot of the same techniques," Dillon said. "Simultaneous attacks proved to be very successful, as did operations ahead of time to let civilians know what to do."

Defense Minister al-Hayali said his forces began radio broadcasts and leaflet drops on Hawija, warning civilians of the planned push.

The United Nations said the operation to retake Tal Afar forced 20,000 people to flee, according to counts by Iraqi authorities. When the fight for Hawija begins, the U.N. estimates 60,000 people will be affected.
Hurricane Irma battered Florida days after the U.S. Congress approved $15 billion for disaster funding. VOAs Michael Bowman reports, the bill will bankroll hurricane relief efforts and give Washington a reprieve from fiscal deadlines, but it remains to be seen whether bipartisan action on Capitol Hill will last.
More than three million people in Florida were in the dark Sunday night due to the effects of a fierce hurricane that pounded parts of the state's Gulf Coast with winds of more than 200 kilometers per hour.

Hurricane Irma weakened slightly as it moved slowly north through the third most populous U.S. state Sunday, but its swirling winds were still measured at 165 kph as darkness fell.

The storm slammed into the Florida Keys early Sunday, when it was near its greatest strength. By evening it was closing in on Tampa and St. Petersburg, the two largest cities around Tampa Bay, where a storm surge was expected to push waves of water up to three meters deep into streets, yards and homes.

A major hurricane has not hit Tampa in more than 100 years. Hurricane Irma was an unusually wide storm, and high winds and rain covered the entire Florida Peninsula, from Jacksonville south to Miami.

'Worried about lives'



President Donald Trump declared Florida a major disaster area Sunday, a step that will release federal aid funds for storm victims more quickly.

Trump, who called his Cabinet into session to see what the government can do to help hurricane victims, said he will visit the storm zone in Florida very soon. He praised rescue efforts by the U.S. Coast Guard as "amazing" and said coordination among federal, state and local agencies working on the storm was going "really well."

Asked how much Florida's recovery will cost, Trump said he is "worried about lives, not cost" at this point.

Hurricane Irma has been called the most powerful Atlantic storm ever recorded, and it delivered as advertised.



Watch related video by VOA's Michael Bowman:

Hurricanes are tropical cyclones that originate in the Atlantic Ocean Basin. In the Northern Hemisphere they form circular masses of high winds and heavy rains rotating counterclockwise. The "eye" of a hurricane is an area of calm at the center of the storm - clearly visible in satellite photographs. When the eye passes overhead a hurricane is only half over for someone on the ground, and sometimes the edge of the open eye, called the eyewall, can be the most violent area of the storm.

The National Hurricane Center predicted Irma will stay on its northern course, traveling up Florida's west coast Sunday night into Monday, then weaken further as it pushes deeper inland in southern Georgia.

Hurricane Irma was a maximum-strength hurricane - category five on a five-point scale that the U.S. follows - when it first crashed into the Leeward Islands in the Caribbean last week. It weakened to a category four storm when it grazed Cuba, and then was measured at category three, but regained strength over warm open waters between Cuba and Florida and was listed as category four again on Sunday. Later on Sunday it was downgraded to a category two storm, but was considered still dangerous.

At least six tornadoes and several waterspouts were sighted in and around the Miami area Sunday, and Miami Beach, usually bustling with tourists, surfers, and swimmers, was a rain-soaked ghost town. Streets in downtown Miami were flooded.

Graceful palm trees, a trademark of "the sunshine state," became hazards as gusts turned leaves, branches, and coconuts into wind-blown weapons.

I want everybody to survive

Florida Governor Rick Scott, a familiar face to all Americans from his frequent live appeals on television about evacuation orders and other precautions, said Sunday was no time for anyone to relax: "I want everybody to survive this storm. I want everybody to be safe. During the storm, as you know, we cant send out first responders to save you."

Scott also repeated his call for nurses and emergency workers to volunteer their help in the aftermath.

More than 75,000 people checked into 400 emergency shelters statewide, but overall, only three storm-related deaths were reported in Florida through late Sunday. At least 25 people have been killed since Irma clobbered the Caribbean late last week.

Prime Minister Gaston Browne of Antigua and Barbuda says 95 percent of Barbuda's buildings were either destroyed or severely damaged. Reporters who flew over the island agreed with his assessment.

The U.S. territory of Puerto Rico suffered losses in its electricity network that blacked out more than one million people. Authorities said it could take up to six months to rebuild the island's power grid.

The Pentagon deployed Navy ships and aircraft and hundreds of Marines to help with recovery efforts in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the U.S. Air Force flew evacuation flights to Puerto Rico and to the Dutch Caribbean island of St. Maarten, which also suffered severe damage.

Netherlands' king is reported to be headed to St. Maarten to assist in recovery efforts, and French President Emmanuel Macron said he would be arriving in St. Martin aboard an Airbus plane packed with aid supplies.

France and the Netherlands share jurisdiction over the island that is home to St. Martin and St. Maarten. The smaller French island of St. Barthelemy, which is nearby, also was badly damaged.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 22:50:32|Editor: yan

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By Maria Spiliopoulou, Valentini Anagnostopoulou

THESSALONIKI, Greece, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Greek cabinet ministers welcomed on Sunday the congratulatory message Chinese Premier Li Keqiang extended on the opening of Greece's largest annual trade fair in the northern port city of Thessaloniki.

With China as the honored country of the 82nd Thessaloniki International Fair (TIF), Chinese Ambassador to Greece Zou Xiaoli read Li's letter at the opening ceremony on Saturday evening, shortly before Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras delivered his speech.

In his congratulatory message, Li recalled that China was the first country as the guest of honor participating in the TIF in 1998.

"It was a new bridge for China-Europe economic and trade exchanges, which not only bore historic significance for the TIF's development, but also ushered in a new stage of China-Europe and China-Greece ties," said Li.

The Chinese premier praised the fruitful results of bilateral cooperation in the past 19 years, and stressed that China's participation as the guest country in the 82nd TIF marked a new starting point for China-Greece relations on a higher level with broad prospects.

Li said the Chinese government is willing to work with Greece and other countries to better synergize the Belt and Road Initiative with their respective development strategies to create broader common interests and carry out win-win cooperation at a deeper level, so as to better serve their peoples, promote the continued recovery of the global economy and achieve strong, sustainable, balanced and inclusive growth.

The Chinese pavilion at the 82nd TIF covers nearly 6,000 square meters, with the participation of more than 100 Chinese brand enterprises from such sectors as transportation, telecommunications, energy, intelligent manufacturing and environmental protection.

"We believe that China's Belt and Road initiative can benefit Greece, but also that Greece has a lot to give back to this great country," Digital Policy, Telecommunications and Media minister Nikos Pappas told Xinhua on Sunday, commenting on the content of Premier Li's letter.

Pappas made the remark on the sidelines of a forum on the New Silk Road organized in the context of TIF with the participation of many national news agencies worldwide, including China's Xinhua.

"We are very happy. I believe that this is a cooperation which will give excellent results in coming years," Greek Tourism Minister Elena Kountoura added during the same forum.

"China's presence essentially upgraded the exhibition," State Minister Alekos Flambouraris told Xinhua after the opening ceremony on Saturday.

"Greece is emerging as a critical junction linking Europe to China... The framework of our cooperation with China is based on mutual respect," Shipping Minister Panagiotis Kouroumblis stressed.

"This is a major step in Sino-Greek cooperation... The fair seals a course and opens a new era... It is a convergence of strategies which will lead to great results," Economy and Development Deputy Minister Stergios Pitsiorlas said on China's presence in this year's trade exhibition and Sino-Greek ties.

The Greek leader toured the stands on Saturday after cutting the ribbon in an opening ceremony, hailing bilateral cooperation.

This year's fair is the largest in terms of number of participants and visitors in the past decade, according to the Greek organizers.

Until the TIF closes on Sept. 17, approximately 250,000 visitors from 17 countries are expected to visit the kiosks of some 1,500 exhibitors.
Mexico's top diplomat will make a two-day visit to immigrant-friendly California amid strained relations between his country and the U.S. over President Donald Trump's border wall and immigration and trade proposals.



Mexico's Foreign Relations Secretary Luis Videgaray is expected to meet Monday with Gov. Jerry Brown and state legislative leaders in California's capital. He will later head to Los Angeles to announce support for young immigrants whose protection from deportation is being terminated by Trump and meet with business and community leaders. He also plans a trip to Washington later in the week, officials at the Los Angeles consulate said.



The trip comes at a critical time in relations between the two countries. In the last few weeks, Trump has stepped up efforts to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border and moved to end the program that let roughly 800,000 immigrants _ three-quarters of them Mexican  work in the country even though they lack immigration status.



It also comes as negotiations to revise the North American Free Trade Agreement with Mexico and Canada, demanded by Trump, got off to a rocky start.

The trip aims to awaken Mexico's so-called natural allies and send a message to Washington that the countries ought to work together, said Rafael Fernandez de Castro, director of the Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies at the University of California, San Diego.



"It is complicated to have a strong relationship with the White House because of who is there, so now Mexico is playing the Washington game and the Washington game is very decentralized,'' he said. "He is coming, I would say, to friendly ground in which his message is going to be well-received.''



Mexico and the United States share a long border and extensive ties. But the relationship has faced new challenges since the election of Trump, who  referred to Mexican immigrants as criminals and rapists during his campaign and has taken a series of measures to boost immigration enforcement.



California has pushed back against Trump's efforts to enlist local law enforcement to carry out his immigration plans. The state is home to 10 million foreign-born residents, about 4 million from Mexico.

On Monday, Videgaray will meet with some of the immigrants currently protected under the program that Trump is rescinding. The Obama administration began the program in 2012 to let immigrants brought to the country as children work even though they don't have legal status here.



He will also discuss ways the Mexican government can support these immigrants. The country last week lamented Trump's decision to yank the program and announced plans to create a special job bank for those affected and support their education.



Videgaray met with U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in late August, just days before Trump announced his decision on the program.



Mexico and the United States recently participated in a second round of NAFTA renegotiations along with Canada. Trump has said he could withdraw the United States from the 23-year-old pact, and Mexico said it won't stay at the table if it doesn't get a fair deal. The talk has raised concerns among businesspeople on both sides of the border.
North Korea illegally exported coal, iron and other commodities worth at least $270 million to China and other countries including India, Malaysia and Sri Lanka in the six-month period ending in early August in violation of U.N. sanctions, U.N. experts say.

The experts monitoring sanctions said in a report released Saturday that Kim Jong Un's government continues to flout sanctions on commodities as well as an arms embargo and restrictions on shipping and financial activities.

They said North Korea is also reportedly continuing prohibited nuclear activities with weapons-grade fissile material production at the Yongbyon nuclear complex, construction and maintenance at the Punggye-ri nuclear test site, and at a uranium mine in Pyongsan.

The eight-member panel of experts said it is also investigating the widespread presence of North Koreans in Africa and the Middle East, particularly in Syria, "including their involvement in prohibited activities."

The experts said one inquiry is into "reported prohibited chemical, ballistic missile and conventional arms cooperation" between Syria and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, the country's official name. They said this includes activities on Syrian Scud missile programs and "maintenance and repair of Syrian surface-to-air missiles (SAM) air defense systems."

The panel noted that two unnamed countries reported intercepting shipments destined for Syria. It did not identify the contents and said Syria has yet to respond to its inquiries.

The 111-page report was written before North Korea's sixth and most powerful nuclear test last Sunday and its latest launch of a powerful new intermediate-range ballistic missile over Japan.

It was made public two days before the United States has called for a vote on a new sanctions resolution. The original U.S. draft would impose the toughest-ever sanctions on North Korea including banning all oil and natural gas exports to the country and freezing all foreign financial assets of the government and its leader Kim Jong Un.

The experts said implementation of existing sanctions "`lags far behind what is necessary to achieve the core goal of denuclearization" of the Korean peninsula.

They blamed "lax enforcement" of sanctions coupled North Korea's "evolving evasion techniques" for undermining the achievement of this goal which would see the North abandon all weapons of mass destruction.

On the export of commodities -- a key source of foreign exchange for the DPRK -- the experts said that following China's suspension of coal imports from the North in February, the DPRK has been rerouting coal to other countries including Malaysia and Vietnam.

"The panel's investigations reveal that the DPRK is deliberately using indirect channels to export prohibited commodities, evading sanctions," the report said.

The panel said imports of DPRK coal, iron and iron ore violate U.N. sanctions unless the countries have received an exemption.

Between December 2016 and May 2017, for example, the DPRK exported over $79 million of iron ore to China, the report said. And between October 2016 and May 2017, it exported iron and steel products to Egypt, China, France, India, Ireland and Mexico valued at $305,713.

There are no exemptions for importing silver, copper, zinc, nickel and gold from the DPRK. And since December 2016, the experts said China, Sri Lanka, and India imported one or more of these minerals in violation of sanctions.

As for violations of the arms embargo, the panel said it was conducting investigations in Angola, Congo, Eritrea, Mozambique, Namibia, Tanzania and Uganda as well as Syria.

In Mozambique, for example, the experts said they are looking into the reported supply of shoulder-launched surface-to-air missiles, air defense systems, other surface-to-air missiles and radar by a North Korean trading company. They are also investigating reports that the same company is repairing and upgrading Tanzania's surface-to-air missile systems.

When it comes to financial sanctions, the panel said the DPRK continues to evade and violate them in a number of ways: Many DPRK financial institutions maintain representatives overseas who conduct transactions that facilitate prohibited programs; many foreign financial institutions wittingly or unwittingly provide banking services to DPRK front companies and others engaged in prohibited activities; and foreign investments in DPRK banks or joint ventures give those banks access to funding and the international financial system.

In addition, the experts said, "DPRK officials and entities have engaged in deceptive financial practices, including opening multiple bank accounts in the same country and in neighboring countries in their own names, under family members' names, and in the names of front companies."

As for shipping, the experts said the number of foreign-flagged DPRK vessels has been "dramatically reduced" in response to U.N. sanctions. But they said North Korea "continued to hone its evasion tactics" by increasing the number of DPRK-flagged ships by a corresponding number.
A new al-Qaida-inspired militant group, which has recently emerged in Pakistans southern port city of Karachi claims to act as a platform for militants who have grown disaffected with the Islamic State militant group (IS) in the country.

The group, Ansar al-Sharia Pakistan, was reportedly formed by two former al-Qaida members who had severed ties with the organization in early 2017. Since then, the group has been involved in several attacks in Karachi, according to Pakistani counterterrorism authorities.

The Ansar al-Sharia group started killings in Karachi since the beginning of this year and claimed responsibility for killing an army officer on Faisal Highway [in Karachi], Major General Mohammad Saeed, the head of Rangers paramilitary security force in Karachi, told local media. He added the group has been focusing attacks on the police only.

The group was allegedly created to operate as a platform for militants who have parted ways with IS in the country, it said in an online statement. It claimed to be active in several parts of the country.

We give glad tidings to Muslim Ummah that a large number of Mujahideen from Karachi, Punjab and tribal areas are leaving ranks of IS and announce disassociation with [it], the group said in an announcement through a Twitter account, adding that IS has spread differences and secession instead of unity.

The group has vowed to continue its struggle through jihad against infidel and apostates.

Though the newly-emerged group asserts no official affiliation with al-Qaida and other foreign militant organizations, the group said its ideology is inspired by Osama bin Laden, al-Qaidas slain founder.

VOA was unable to independently verify the authenticity of the Twitter account.

According to the counterterrorism department of Karachi police, Ansar al-Sharia has a presence in areas between Sindh and Baluchistan provinces.

"Unfortunately, according to the names that have come up in the investigation, their kill team has three young men who have masters [degrees] in applied physics, Maj. Gen. Saeed said.

Pakistani media reported the terror outfit also has female members. Police have reportedly arrested four women, including a doctor, suspected of membership in the group.

Pakistani authorities have vowed action to seize members of the group in the country, including in Karachi.

A police officer has reportedly been arrested for links with an alleged Ansar-al-Sharia member in Karachi, Pakistani media reported.

Al-Qaidas branch in South Asia, known as al-Qaida in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS), has been active in the region. Several militant groups in Pakistan that had an ideological association with bin Ladens al-Qaida, have pledged allegiance to AQIS.

Much of AQISs power is concentrated in Karachi and IS has also claimed presence in in Pakistans largest city.
Pope Francis wrapped up his Colombia trip with a deeply personal final day Sunday honoring St. Peter Claver, a fellow Jesuit who ministered to hundreds of thousands of African slaves who arrived in the port of Cartagena to be sold during Spanish colonial times.



Francis' visit to Cartagena got off to a rocky start, however, when he banged his head on his popemobile when it stopped short amid swarms of well-wishers. Francis, who only had a hip-high bar to hold onto, lost his balance and suffered a bruised, black left eye and a cut on his eyebrow that dripped blood onto his white cassock.



The cut was quickly bandaged with a butterfly patch and Francis carried on without incident with his program. Devotees reacted to the wound with a mix of amazement and concern.



"This holy blood is staying in Colombia,'' said Ricardo Morales, a lawyer who lined up outside St. Peter Claver's church for a glimpse of the pope. "He made a great effort to be here and from now on it's our obligation to make a similar effort to thank him for everything he has done.''



Once recovered, Francis visited the St. Peter Claver church, where he praised the 17th century missionary for having recognized the inherent dignity of slaves. Francis, known for his own simple and austere style, said Claver was "austere and charitable to the point of heroism.''



Claver, the self-described "slave of the slaves forever,'' has been revered by Jesuits, popes and human rights campaigners for centuries for having insisted on treating slaves as children of God and worthy of love when others considered them mere merchandise to be bought and sold.

In a prayer Sunday in front of Claver's church, Francis said the legacy of the Spanish priest should serve as a model for the Catholic Church today to "promote the dignity of all our brothers and sisters, particularly the poor and the excluded of society, those who are abandoned, immigrants and those who suffer violence and human trafficking.''



"Here in Colombia and in the world, millions of people are still being sold as slaves; they either beg for some expressions of humanity, moments of tenderness, or they flee by sea or land because they have lost everything, primarily their dignity and their rights,'' he said.



Like Claver, history's first Latin American pope has insisted on ministering to society's most marginal. He takes special care of the homeless who live around the Vatican, makes regular phone calls to prisoners, brought a dozen Syrian refugees home with him from a Greek refugee camp, and embraces the sick, the maimed and the deformed every chance he gets.



He has also strongly denounced current-day slave trade, calling human trafficking a crime against humanity and leading other faith leaders to take a united stand against it.



Francis prayed at Claver's tomb after laying the foundation for new residences for homeless people in Cartagena, the city famous for its UNESCO-awarded colonial center but also home to slums and shanties.



He was to celebrate Mass in Cartagena's port Sunday before returning to Rome, ending a five-day visit highlighted by a huge prayer of reconciliation that brought together victims of Colombia's long-running conflict and demobilized guerrillas and paramilitary fighters.

Francis had refrained until Sunday from speaking out about the political and humanitarian crisis next door in Venezuela. But in remarks added into his Sunday prayer, Francis called for an end to political violence in Venezuela and protection for the poor who have been most hurt by the crisis.



The large community of Venezuelan exiles in Colombia had been pushing Francis to make a strong statement against President Nicolas Maduro. Francis met with Venezuelan bishops in Colombia but refrained from taking the same strident tone taken by the Vatican in recent statements in which it has called on Maduro to respect human rights and withdraw plans to rewrite Venezuela's constitution.
Prominent Russian political commentator and writer Yulia Latynina has left Russia fearing for her life, she told a Moscow radio station.

Latynina's car was set on fire at the beginning of September, weeks after unidentified assailants sprayed a poisonous substance on her house outside Moscow and the car.

"I'm quite scared ... I'm terrified that the people who did it were prepared for fatalities," Latynina said of the arson.

"I'm abroad, my parents are also abroad. It's unlikely I'll be going to Russia soon," she told the Echo of Moscow radio station late Saturday.

Latynina, who works as a columnist at the Novaya Gazeta newspaper, has been critical of the Kremlin's policy in the Chechnya republic in the Caucasus, as well as the local authorities.

Last year, Latynina was attacked in the center of Moscow.
Nancy Hatch Dupree, a prolific American expert on the history, art, and archaeology of Afghanistan, died Sunday at the age of 90 after battling an illness in a Kabul hospital, officials announced.

Dupree arrived in the country in 1962 as a diplomats wife and dedicated the rest of her life to collecting and preserving the war-shattered countrys cultural heritage.

In 2013, she founded and opened the Afghanistan Center at Kabul University (ACKU), the first facility of its kind in the country dedicated to the study of Afghanistan's history, culture and society. The late historian was the director of the center until recently.

Her vision for ACKU was that it would contribute to the reconstruction of Afghanistan by gathering in one place scholarship on the countrys culture, history and politics, the center said in a statement.

In several VOA interviews over the years, Dupree said the ACKU was inspired by the work and vision of Louis Dupree, a renowned archaeologist and scholar of Afghan culture and history, for whom she left her diplomat husband.

The couple took refuge in neighboring Pakistan after they were pushed out of the country in 1978 by the then Soviet-backed Afghan government, which suspected Louis of being an American spy.

After the death of her husband in 1989, Dupree continued her mission of preserving Afghan history for years using her residence in the Pakistani border city of Peshawar as a base and storage facility.

The Afghan civil war of the 1990s and subsequent emergence of the Islamist Taliban government did not deter Dupree from visiting Kabul regularly and bringing back books, maps, photographs and rare Afghan folk music.

The material also included government and non-government documents, as well as surveys, reports, and newspapers from the Afghan factional fighting and the Taliban regime.

In several interviews to VOA over the years, Dupree said her team often found torn copies and pages of looted priceless history books on the streets of Kabul being used by shopkeepers to wrap food material for customers, or to use as fuel.

Speaking to VOA at her residence in the University Town of Peshawar in early 2008, Dupree explained difficulties she faced while collecting the material during the Afghan civil war.

We discovered that a lot of house have been looted and the books were on the sidewalk being used by people who were selling [food items] and all these things, they would tear a page out of a book and give it you. These were books by some of the noted scholars and we knew that probably nobody else would be able to find these books. So we had a concerted campaign to go around the city and buy up all the books, the looted books, that we could find.

In 2005, Dupree packed the preserved documents in nearly 300 plastic bags, used for filling wheat or fertilizer, and then loaded them on trucks to smuggle them back to Kabul from Peshawar.

They are now safely stored in ACKU and are in the process of being digitalized to make them available for students cross the globe studying Afghan history. Nancy Dupree traveled across Afghanistan and wrote several guidebooks on the country.

Afghans viewed her as one of their own and even the Taliban did not hamper her work when the Islamist group was in power in Kabul from 1996 to 2001.

Afghanistans mainstream media paid tributes to Duprees work and dedication while social media was flooded with condolence messages.

The U.S. Embassy in Kabul described Dupree as a pillar of the American community in Afghanistan for many decades, saying she worked tirelessly for the preservation of Afghan history and culture.

Future generations will remember Ms. Dupree as a wonderful example of the strength of U.S.-Afghanistan relations and friendship May we honor her example in decades to come by working for a common goal of building lasting fraternal ties between our nations, said an embassy statement.
Mikheil Saakashvili, the former president of Georgia and later a Ukrainian citizen, crossed from Poland into Ukraine in a crowd of his supporters Sunday.

Saakashvili has been stateless since his former mentor, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, stripped him of Ukrainian citizenship two months ago. He is wanted in Georgia on charges related to his political career there, and Tbilisi has asked the Kyiv government to extradite him, but it is not clear whether the request will be honored.

Saakashvili said he wanted to return to Ukraine to contest Poroshenko's action stripping him of his citizenship while he was out of the country. Ukrainian authorities in the border region tried to block Saakashvili's return - first by train, then by bus - but then he walked across the Ukrainian border at Shehyni in the midst of a crowd of his supporters.

The Ukrainian border service said in a Facebook post that the crowd broke through a checkpoint and that fighting broke out when guards tried to block Saakashvili's supporters. Those who accompanied the former Georgia leader included former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko.

Courtesy - RFE/RL

Also with Saakashvili was Mustafa Nayyem, who was active in protests in Ukraine in 2013-14 that drove then pro-Russia president, Viktor Yanukovych, out of the country. Saakashvili was a strong supporter of those protests and later was a staunch ally of Poroshenko, but more recently he has opposed the current administration in Kyiv, accusing Poroshenko and others of contributing to widespread corruption.



Later Sunday in Lviv, the largest city in western Ukraine, about 80 kilometers from the Polish border, Saakashvili said the border crossing took place "according to all legal procedures," and promised to defend anyone who accompanied him from threatened criminal charges. Government officials at the border said 17 police and guards were injured during the confrontation with Saakashvili's supporters.

After leaving Georgia, where he led the Rose Revolution in 2003 that toppled then president Eduard Shevardnadze, Saakashvili wound up in Ukraine, where President Poroshenko appointed him governor of the Odessa Oblast (region) in May 2015. He served for 18 months before the political split with Poroshenko that led to his present circumstances. He has been known as a pro-Western, pro-NATO political leader in both Georgia and Ukraine.

Georgia has pursued Saakashvili on criminal charges of abuse of power and misappropriation of property. The former Georgian president, who left office after two terms, contends those claims are politically motivated. He forfeited his Georgian citizenship when he accepted Poroshenko's welcome to Ukraine and the post as Odessa governor two years ago.
Saudi Arabia and Iran are rethinking their rivalry and a highly tentative, as well as a deniable, courtship is underway, say analysts. But it is fraught pitfalls and last week in London Saudi Arabias foreign minister dismissed talk of a possible thaw as laughable, saying Iran would have to change its policies dramatically for that to happen.

Even so, Riyadh has softened its opposition to Syrias President Bashar al-Assad, Irans ally, and has dialed down its own sectarian rhetoric against the mullahs in Tehran.

And Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said last week his country, a majority-Shiite country, is ready for dialogue with Sunni Muslim Saudi Arabia to see how they can overcome their enmity and end a decades-long battle for influence across the Middle East.

We are prepared to cooperate with Islamic countries on all issues that are important to the Islamic world, Zarif told a local news outlet. If the Saudi government is ready to turn the page, Iran is ready for that as well, he added.

At first glance, any rapprochement, however mild, between the rivals would appear unlikely. Each accuses the other of subverting regional security and they are supporting opposite sides in conflicts in Syria, Iraq and Yemen.

But efforts to ease tensions between the Gulf rivals has been on display the past few months. In Mecca, the annual haj (pilgrimage) was attended by an estimated 90,000 Shiite Iranians after Tehran lifted a boycott imposed last year amid sharp tensions between Iran and the Saudis. Mecca authorities went out of their way to welcome Iranian worshippers and were praised for doing so by Tehran.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani suggested a trouble-free hajj would help build confidence in other areas of dispute between the arch-rivals. If our pilgrims come back satisfied, and if Saudi Arabias behavior is within religious and international frameworks, I think the situation would be more convenient to resolve the issues, he was quoted as saying by state news agency IRNA earlier this year.

A difficult path



Hajj has ended, but engineering a rapprochement won't be easy, as was stressed by Saudi Arabias foreign minister at an event last week in London.

We have an Iran which is on the rampage, that has to decide whether it is a revolution or a nation state, that part of it seeks to restore the Persian empire from thousands of years ago, and another part of it seeks a better future for its people and that supports terrorism and interferes in the affairs of others, warned Adel Al-Jubeir speaking Thursday at Chatham House, a London-based policy research group.

He added, Iran believes in exporting its revolution... supports terrorism, smuggles weapons into neighboring countries and tries to destabilize. He sadi Iran needs to live by international rules, be neighborly and stop interfering in the affairs of others, otherwise it will be difficult to accept them.

He stressed, though, the Saudi kingdom would approach regional issues with a pragmatic, practical and non-ideological mind.

Complicated regional politics



A changing and volatile Middle East at least makes the timing right for attempts to ease hostilities, say analysts. The two states, who have clashed in multiple countries, now find themselves in a new political situation which may force them to work together, according to analyst Baraa Sabri.

He argues that at the very least they may have to modify their respective policies by reinforcing those that could help lead to a rapprochement and by turning a blind eye to the most contentious matters between them, Syria and Yemen, even if only temporarily.

Factors pushing Riyadh and Tehran to re-think include a developing Turkish-Russian alliance and doubts about Moscow, allied to Iran, and Washington, an ally of the Saudis, are to be trusted.

In August, for all his public dismissal now of the possibility of improved relations, the Saudi foreign minister shook hands with his Iranian counterpart at a meeting in Istanbul of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, of which Iran and Saudi Arabia are members. At the meeting, Irans Zarif called for re-establishing diplomatic relations between the two countries and said the two may soon exchange diplomatic visits.

But it will take more than a handshake or two and a few diplomatic exchanges to bridge the huge sectarian gap between the two countries. Analyst Bruce Riedel of the Washington-based Brookings Institution scorns the idea of an Iranian-Saudi thaw, arguing Saudi monarch Salman bin Abdul-Aziz al-Saud is the most hostile king toward Iran since the Iranian Revolution.
U.S. Senator John McCain, who recently returned to Washington after treatment for brain cancer, said on Sunday the disease is vicious but that the treatment is going well and he has more energy than before.

"This is a very vicious form of cancer that I'm facing," McCain, a Republican who ran unsuccessfully for president in 2008, told CNN's "State of the Union" program. The 80-year-old Arizona senator was found to have an aggressive form of brain tumor, glioblastoma, after surgery in July for a blood clot above his left eye.

"All the results so far are excellent," McCain said of his treatment, adding that the prognosis was "pretty good." "I'm facing a challenge, but Ive faced other challenges, and Im very confident about getting through this one as well," the senator said. "I've had no side effects, no nothing except frankly an increased level of energy."

McCain recently completed his first round of chemotherapy and radiation, and he said that he would have an MRI on Monday, an imaging technique used to evaluate medical conditions.

McCain, who chairs the Senate Armed Services Committee, is also going to oversee work on a defense policy bill on the Senate floor next week.

"Every life has to end one way or another," he told CNN, adding that he was very happy with his life, including the 2008 campaign that he lost to former President Barack Obama.

"I am able to celebrate a wonderful life and I will be grateful for additional time that I have," McCain said, adding: "Remember, Im the guy who stood fifth from the bottom of his class at the Naval Academy."

McCain was re-elected to a sixth Senate term in November. In the past, he has been treated for melanoma, a form of skin cancer.

He is the son and grandson of Navy admirals, and a U.S. Navy pilot whose plane was shot down over Vietnam in 1967. He spent more than five years as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam and was tortured repeatedly.

McCain said Sunday he hoped that people would remember him as someone who had served his country. "Made a lot of mistakes, made a lot of errors, but served his country, and I hope we could add, honorably."
At least three people were killed and 13 others were wounded after a suicide bomber blew himself up at a teashop in the central Somali town of Beledweyne Sunday, police and witnesses said.

Police said the attack occurred close to the headquarters of Hiran regional administration in Beledweyne.

The explosion happened at 12:10pm [local time] it was a time people at the teashop were preparing to go to the mosques to pray, Commander of the police Colonel Isaq Ali Abdulle told VOA Somali.

Three journalists are among the wounded, says VOA Somali reporter Hussein Hassan Dhaqane.

Al-Shabab has claimed responsibility for the attack.

All of the victims are innocent Somalis, the teashop is owned by civilians, this is a place where people sit, drink tea and rest, said Colonel Abdulle, who referred to al-Shabab as a "blood thirsty group."

Witnesses told VOA Somali that the explosion was loud and shook the area.

I was just 20 meters away when it exploded, I left the teashop moments earlier because I received a call, the place was packed, said a witness who requested anonymity.

Beledweyne, 345 kilometers north of Mogadishu, is the capital of Hiran region. The town is also a base for African Union troops from Djibouti and Ethiopia.

The attack comes just three days after another suicide bomber wearing an explosive vest attacked a restaurant in Baidoa, killing five people including two Somali humanitarian aid workers
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 23:40:49|Editor: Zhou Xin

British Brexit secretary David Davis (L) and European Union (EU) chief negotiator Michel Barnier attend a joint press briefing in Brussels, Belgium, Aug. 31, 2017. No decisive progress has been reached in the third round of Brexit talks, EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier said here Thursday, warning that the talk mandate given by the European Parliament should not be underestimated. (Xinhua file photo/Ye Pingfan)

LONDON, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- As MPs in the House of Commons prepare to hold their first votes on a crucial Brexit Bill, two leading law experts warned Sunday of the high risks to Britain's future.

European and British law experts, Professor Michael Dougan and Dr. Michael Gordon from the University of Liverpool, have both highlighted the potential hurdles for the European Union Withdrawal Bill, known as the Repeal Bill.

On Monday, MPs will vote on a number of amendments to a bill that is aimed at transferring more than 40 years of EU law into British law.

The main opposition Labor Party plans to oppose the bill, describing it as a power grab by the governing Conservatives.

With fears that a number of pro-European Conservatives may vote against the bill, all eyes will focus on how Prime Minister Theresa May, heading a minority government, handles the situation.

Thousands of people campaigning for Britain to remain in the EU staged a march through London on Saturday to the Parliament Square.

In the world of academia, experts have been mulling the possible impact and repercussions of the repeal bill.

In a joint briefing paper, Dougan and Gordon say the Repeal Bill could be seen as the source of significant problems.

They say: "The scheme set out in the bill is based on an extensive centralization of power as well as a massive delegation of power, to the British government.

"The bill's approach generates considerable costs and risks for the relationships between the British government and those in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. It has a clear potential to destabilize key constitutional relationships, or infringe key constitutional values, not least those relating to democracy and legitimacy.

"Some of those risks could well be mitigated, but it is difficult to envisage any fundamentally different approach to that proposed by the government. As such, the bill demonstrates the inevitable and high price to be paid for the government's strategic choices.

"Protecting our economy and society from significant disruption and uncertainty will require us to sacrifice other constitutional values of at least equal (if not greater) importance," added Dougan and Gordon.

In another major intervention Sunday, former Labor prime minister Tony Blair put forward a plan he said would enable Britain to control immigration while staying as a member of the EU.

Writing in the Sunday Times newspaper, Blair put his name to a report calling on the British government to force EU migrants coming to Britain to register on arrival so they can be counted in and out of Britain. Those who failed to register would be banned from renting a home, opening a bank account or claiming benefits.

The Sunday Times described Blair's move as "an explosive intervention that will electrify the Brexit debate". The former prime minister says proper immigration controls would make it possible to take back control of Britain's borders without leaving the EU.

The report, adds the newspaper, will make uncomfortable reading for Prime Minister May.

Meanwhile, the Sunday Telegraph says an unrepentant Blair has called on MPs and Conservative ministers on the eve of the Brexit vote to rise up against the government and oppose Brexit, as he hinted at plans for a new political party to offer a second referendum.

Blair has also called on the Labor party, now led by Jeremy Corbyn, to reverse its position on Brexit and oppose leaving altogether.

Labor say they support the Brexit referendum decision but they favor Britain continuing with a European single market and customs union trading arrangement with Brussels.
U.S. President Donald Trump declared Hurricane Irma a major disaster for the state of Florida Sunday, and ordered federal government officials to make a priority of supplying aid to the worst-hit areas of the country's third most populous state.

I hope there arent too many people in that path, Trump said. We tried to warn everybody. Thats a bad path to be in.

The president spoke outside the White House just after he and first lady Melania Trump returned to Washington from Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland.

Trump held meetings about the federal government's hurricane response earlier in the day, and said there would be more discussions of the weather crisis in the southern United States. Coordination among federal, state and other agencies responding to the hurricane has been proceeding really well, the president said, but the bad news is that this is some big monster.

Federal assistance

Trumps disaster declaration made federal aid funds available to storm victims in a wide area of southern Florida, where floods and other storm damage has affected millions of people. Assistance can include grants for temporary housing and home repairs, low-cost loans to cover uninsured property losses, and other programs to help individuals and business owners recover from the disaster.

Federal funds also are available for emergency work throughout Florida.

Hurricane Irma caused death and devastation in the Caribbean before turning north and crashing into Florida. Trump said the storm was about the biggest ever recorded that hit land.

Asked by a reporter to estimate the economic impact, the president responded: Its going to cost a lot of money. Right now, were worried about lives, not money.

During a briefing earlier at Camp David, White House officials said Trump advised he has been in regular contact with state governors in the hurricanes path, as well as governors of territories already impacted by the storm.

We need help

The president also issued a disaster declaration for Puerto Rico Sunday and expanded federal funds available for the U.S. Virgin Islands for hurricane recovery efforts.

We need help. We need the United States government to step up. We need military. We need security, blogger Jenn Manes posted on the News of St. John Facebook page on Sunday. We all survived this monster storm. But will we survive the aftermath? No one knows.

The U.S. government has evacuated more than 1,200 people from the U.S. Virgin Islands since Friday, the State Department reported.



Wherever Hurricane Irma goes, well be there first, Vice President Mike Pence told reporters Sunday on a visit to the headquarters in the capital of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, along with several Cabinet members.

Saving lives is the priority of all of us from the president to (Florida) Governor Scott on down. And well stay focused on the life-saving mission, Pence added.

Trump's full Cabinet met to discuss the hurricane on Saturday at Camp David. Their discussions also touched on the president's plans for tax cuts and overall tax reform. I think now with whats happened with the hurricane Im going to ask for a speedup, Trump said. I wanted a speed-up anyway, but now we need it even more so.
U.S. and Russian envoys are to meet in Finland next week in a bid to calm diplomatic tensions that have risen to levels of the Cold War.

The State Department's third-ranking official, Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Thomas Shannon, will meet Monday and Tuesday with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov.

Shannon and Ryabkov have held several rounds of talks this year focused on resolving irritants in U.S.-Russian relations, such as the tit-for-tat closures of diplomatic missions and expulsion of diplomats. They're expected to address broader strategic relations and arms control as well.

On August 31, in response to an order from Moscow to reduce the U.S. diplomatic presence in Russia by several hundred people, the U.S. ordered Russia to close its consulate in San Francisco and two annexes in Washington and New York. Those actions followed the U.S. seizure of two Russian compounds in Maryland and New York and the expulsion of dozens of Russian diplomats in retaliation for Moscow's alleged interference in the 2016 presidential election.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who are expected to meet this month in New York on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly, charged Shannon and Ryabkov earlier this year with exploring ways to resolve bilateral disputes that are hindering broader cooperation on strategic and security issues, such as the war in Syria and the conflict in Ukraine.

Among the top complaints from Washington: the harassment of American government personnel in Russia, a Russian ban on adoptions of children by U.S. families, and Moscow's halting of plans to construct a new U.S. consulate in St. Petersburg. Russia's complaints include U.S. sanctions imposed after its annexation of Ukraine's Crimea region and the seizure of its properties.

Two earlier rounds of talks between Shannon and Ryabkov ended inconclusively.

The State Department announced the new talks Saturday and said Shannon would also meet Finnish President Sauli Niinisto and other Finnish officials while in Helsinki.
The wife and mother of detained Taiwanese rights activist Lee Ming-che were due to arrive in China on Sunday to attend his subversion trial on Monday, Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council said in a statement, calling for Lee's safe return home.

Lee, a community college teacher and pro-democracy and human rights activist, went missing during a March visit to China.

Authorities later confirmed he had been detained, straining already-tense ties between the mainland and the self-ruling island.

Authorities at the Intermediate People's Court of Yueyang city, in the central province of Hunan, said Monday's trial on suspicion of subversion of state power would be an open hearing.

Chinese courts have video-streamed or live-blogged increasing numbers of proceedings in recent years as part of a push towards judicial transparency However, rights activists say that in sensitive cases, holding "open" hearings is a tool for authorities to demonstrate state power and that usually the defendant has agreed to an outcome.

On Saturday, Lee's wife, Lee Ching-yu, asked during a news conference that supporters forgive her husband if he says something in court which disappoints them, as he might be required to give testimony against his own free will.

Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council said it would do everything in its power to facilitate Lee's safe return.

"Our government's approach to this case has been predicated on preserving our country's dignity while ensuring Lee Ming-che's safety," it said.

Lee's case has strained relations between Taipei and Beijing, which have been particularly tense since President Tsai Ing-wen, leader of Taiwan's independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party, took office last year.

Beijing regards the island as a breakaway province and it has never renounced the use of force to bring it back under mainland control.
YouTube, citing violation of "community guidelines," removed the state-run North Korea propaganda channel, Uriminzokkiri, from its website.

"This account has been terminated for violating YouTube's community guidelines," YouTube said.

The video-sharing website did not immediately respond to requests about why the channel had been removed Friday, according to media reports. Revenue generated from advertising on the account, however, may have violated U.S. trade sanctions, resulting in the suspension, media reports stated.

Uriminzokkiri, part of the country's propaganda arm, frequently posts video of state TV news clips. Its video content seems targeted for North Koreans living abroad, The Guardian reported. The channel also shows footage of missile launches as well as official tours taken by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

North Korea researchers and academics said the removal of channels is a cause for concern, as is their content.

'Insight' valued

Arms control expert Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, said he uses the propaganda channels to better understand North Korea's nuclear capabilities.

"When [Kim] visits a factory in the middle of nowhere and stares at machine tools, it provides an important insight into the progress they are making," Lewis told The Guardian.

Scott Lafoy, a Washington-based satellite imagery analyst, told NK News, "It is incredibly frustrating for researchers who use North Korean propaganda for analytic purposes. ... Tracking and digitally reconstructing events is going to be more difficult as these accounts get deleted."

According to YouTube, the channel had 18,000 subscribers.

The move by YouTube came amid action by the U.S. to impose harsher sanctions on North Korea after its sixth nuclear test, in which it claimed to have detonated a hydrogen bomb September 3.

Late Friday, the United States formally requested a vote of the U.N. Security Council on Monday of a draft resolution to establish new sanctions against North Korea, according to a statement by the U.S. mission.

A draft of the resolution calls for a ban on the sale of oil, refined petroleum products and natural gas liquids to North Korea.
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This post has been updated to add subsequent comment from Babel Street.

In a small office in Ashburn, Va., ensconced among the government contractors that make up the Dulles Technology Corridor, a start-up called Babel Street is bringing government-style surveillance to an entirely new market.

The companys Web crawlers, offered under a subscription called Babel X, trawl some 40 online sources, scooping up data from popular sites such as Instagram and a Korean social media platform as well as inside dark Web forums where cybercriminals lurk.

Police departments investigating a crime might use the service to scan posts linked to a certainneighborhood over a specified period of time. Stadium managers use it to hunt for security threats based on electronic chatter.

The Department of Homeland Security, county governments, law enforcement agencies and the FBI use it to keep tabs on dangerous individuals, even when they are communicating in one of more than 200 languages, including emoji.

The firm, staffed by former government intelligence veterans, is part of an insular but thriving cottage industry of data aggregators that operate outside of military and intelligence agencies. The 100-person company said it is profitable, something that is rare for a tech start-up in its third year. (It declined, though, to release financial details.) It recently took on $2.25 million from investors, bringing its total capital raised from investors to just over $5 million.

A U.S. subsidiary of the European software giant SAP is its largest institutional investor.

Businesses like Babel Street have to tread an ethical line to avoid igniting privacy concerns, even though the data they access is generally publicly available on the Internet. Groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) regard the industrys growth as a worrying proliferation of online surveillance.

These products can provide a very detailed picture of a persons private life, said Matt Cagle, an ACLU lawyer who studies the issue.

Last year, Chicago-based social media aggregator Geofeedia was thrust into the national spotlight when the ACLU published a report alleging it had helped police departments track racially charged protests in Baltimore and Ferguson, Mo.

[]

The report prompted Twitter, Facebook and Instagram to cut ties with Geofeedia, eliminating important data sources. The company laid off half of its employees soon afterward amid a broader restructuring.

Perhaps as a result, Babel Street does not access individuals' people's Facebook profiles, though the company's executives say they have "a close relationship with Facebook."

Babel Streets executives say they have avoided controversy by closely adhering to privacy standards and limiting law enforcement officers access to the social media information they collect.

If someone has arrest powers, they get less access to the data than other customers, said Jeff Chapman, a former Navy intelligence officer who founded Babel Street in 2014.

The Pentagon was Babel Streets first customer. Agencies focused on counterterrorism would use the companys technology to monitor terrorists online chatter to predict attacks. Police departments and the FBI soon started signing up for the service, public contract documents reviewed by The Washington Post show.

The Department of Homeland Security pays for the product through fusion centers that gather and pass data to state and local first-responders, showing them the electronic footprint of an emergency event in real time.

Theyve got the ability to go in and look at the entire spectrum of social media platforms, said Lee Smithson, executive director of the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency, which coordinates the states disaster response activities.

Theyll look for keywords like rescue or dire situation . . . that kind of thing. And theyll pass those messages to us, he said.

During the past few years, Babel Street has been doing more and more work for private industry.

Chapman says word spread about the business when government chief security officers left their posts for lucrative private-sector gigs, bringing Babel Street business in the process.

Guiding the company as an investor and board member is Arthur Money, a former chief information officer at the Pentagon who later became involved in the business side of government intelligence work.

Money is the former chairman of the FBIs Science and Technology Advisory Board and is a board member for privately held intelligence contractor Keyw, a Maryland-based cybersecurity company.

Money also has ties to numerous defense and intelligence businesses including Kestrel Enterprises, an intelligence analytics company owned by defense giant Boeing.

Today about half of Babel Streets users hail from the private sector, Chapman says. The shift has been good for business: Chapman says the company has a few thousand users, some of them paying more than $20,000 a year for a subscription.

As the Internet has evolved, Babel Streets intelligence work has evolved with it. Emoji have been a challenge for Chapmans team of technologists lately, for example.

We are seeing emoji increasingly used to get around text analysis, Chapman said. Guys that want to be nefarious in their activities will use things like emoji to communicate with each other.

Brand management has become an important line of business, as corporations face the increasingly difficult challenge of tracking their digital reputations. Some companies pay Babel Street to find out whether their intellectual property is being used without permission.

The company is even getting involved in hurricane response. The firm has trained its Web crawlers to look for people stranded in Houstons floodwaters or waiting out Hurricane Irma in Florida. They are tracking online scammers that might try to profit from the disaster.

Chapman says Babel Streets brand of public metadata collection will one day be just as important to first responders as 9-1-1 phone lines.

There are billions of smartphones on the planet, Chapman says. All you have to do is listen to them.

A spokesperson representing Babel Street contacted the Washington Post following the publication of this story to say the company does not literally listen to private phone calls. The company gathers information from public social media postings and websites.
Marching seductively to its own enchanting drummer, "The Band's Visit" may prove to be the best original musical of the new Broadway season. It's too early to remove the qualifying words from that statement  we still have the likes of Disney's forthcoming stage version of "Frozen," among others, to consider. But it's not incautious to say that this droll, intimate show, with a luscious score by David Yazbek and the critical wind already at its back, is the most intriguing musical of the New York fall.

Its world-premiere engagement last year by off-Broadway's Atlantic Theater Company revealed its offbeat charm  a Mediterranean fish-out-of-water comedy. Based on a 2007 movie of the same title by Israeli director Eran Kolirin, "The Band's Visit" is a funny and affecting story of the establishment of accidental international relations. An Egyptian military band has been invited to perform in the Israeli town of Petah Tikvah, near Tel Aviv, but a travel-booking error sends the musicians to a dusty town of similar-sounding name in the Negev Desert, a backwater in which the only thing drier than the earth is the torpor of its citizens.

The mistake is of barely measurable consequence, except to this bewildered corps of Egyptian band members and the equally befuddled Israelis who uncertainly welcome them into their midst. Like "Come From Away," the hit musical about a Canadian town that cares for thousands of stranded travelers after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks shut down U.S. airspace, "The Band's Visit" is about the unexpectedly powerful electricity sparked when planets collide. Except in this musical, with a sharp book by Itamar Moses to go with Yazbek's Middle Eastern-accented music and lyrics, there's an added wistful dimension, of people who haven't been able to cross over and fully share one another's joy and pain.

The director, David Cromer, and much of the cast, led by Tony Shalhoub as the courtly band director, and Katrina Lenk, playing an Israeli woman stifled by an emotionally parched existence, transfer from the Atlantic production that begins performances Oct. 7 at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre. John Cariani and Ariel Stachel are among other returning members of a fine ensemble that is being put through its paces on Scott Pasks turntable set by choreographer Patrick McCollum.

Expectations are also high for a new drama taking up residence in October in Lincoln Center Theater's Vivian Beaumont Theater. The play goes by a potentially disconcerting title  "Junk"  but it has an estimable pedigree. The author is Ayad Akhtar, whose Pulitzer Prize-winning "Disgraced" recounted the predicament of a high-powered Muslim American lawyer forced to confront the guilt and compromises of assimilating into a culture that never totally accepts him.

In "Junk," Akhtar turns his attention to another chapter in the history of morally murky, highflying America: the era of the hostile corporate takeovers that are so identified with the 1980s, a time powered by the questionable fuel of high-risk junk bonds and the mercantile cowboys who used them to make fortunes off flagging industries. "Brisk, lucid and at times highly suspenseful" is how Charles McNulty, theater critic for the Los Angeles Times, described the sprawling drama at its world premiere a year ago at the La Jolla Playhouse in Southern California.

Steven Pasquale plays the central character of Robert Merkin, a fictional figure who has been likened to onetime junk bond king Michael Milken, the financier who pleaded guilty in 1990 and went to prison for financial crimes. The 17-person cast, shepherded by director Doug Hughes, also includes Matthew Saldivar, Miriam Silverman, Michael Siberry and Joey Slotnick. Arriving at a time when politicians in Washington are poised to give massive tax breaks to corporate America, Akhtar's "Junk" could offer a treasure trove of valuable lessons.

The Band's Visit, music and lyrics by David Yazbek, book by Itamar Moses. Directed by David Cromer. $59-$175, Performances begin Oct. 7 at Ethel Barrymore Theatre, 243 W. 47th St., New York.

Junk, by Ayad Akhtar. Directed by Doug Hughes. $107-$199. Performances begin Oct. 5 at Vivian Beaumont Theater, 150 W. 65th St., New York. For both shows, visit telecharge.com or call 212-239-6200.
Dear Amy: I get along with a male co-worker fairly well, and we go out to lunch at least twice a week.

I have never thought anything of it past a mutual work relationship. Hes 12 years older than I am. I am married, and he has been with his significant other for almost nine years.

There is a fast-food spot we go to often that we both love. The girls who work there know us and are quite friendly.

The other day I went there by myself and one of the girls asked where my boyfriend was.

I made it clear to her that he is just a co-worker, and she told me that he refers to me as his girlfriend. She said that since he always pays, she figured he was my boyfriend.

He expenses all of our meals; our company allows anyone who is salaried to expense one meal a day under $15, so hes technically not paying for me!

How can I confront him about this without causing any trouble in the office?

Upset

Upset: You should consider laughing about this. This option does not seem to have occurred to you.

Your colleague is not technically paying for your lunch (the company is), but how is the server supposed to know this? And is it possible that your colleague referred to you as his girlfriend because you are a woman, and also a friend?

You know the nature of your work-friendship better than I do, but many people have close office friendships that become spouse-like. Thats where the term, work-wife (or husband) comes from.

The best way for you to deal with this is to frame this issue as a question, versus a confrontation.

Say, Dude, the server said you referred to me as your girlfriend! My husband would be pretty surprised by that. You were just joking, right?

Dear Amy: My wife and I have been married for 15 years. We have three children, ages 12, 8, and 2.

Recently my wife has been seriously talking about us leaving our home in Texas and moving to Florida.

She says she wants to have an adventure and to make our family closer.

We have lived in Texas all our lives.

We live 10 minutes away from my parents, and we know it will be hard to move their grandkids away, completely changing that dynamic of family and community.

I love my wife, and I love the idea of moving.

I have a good job, but its not the best in the world. The only true negative that we can see besides moving away from our family is that we will be alone: No more date nights, no more babysitting. No more family dinners.

The biggest pro to me is happy wife, happy life.

Is it selfish of us to move and pull our kids away from their schools and their grandparents? Will time heal the loss of family for our kids?

Just a Guy

Just a Guy: Although I can understand the occasional impulse to shake things up and escape from the loving clutches of jobs, family and friends, the way you present this idea, it seems quite unformed and like the impulse of a restless parent who wants to make some big life changes.

Children do usually eventually adjust to new surroundings (especially younger kids), but they dont do so unless their parents are stable and happy. Do not downplay the extreme sacrifice you would be asking your children to make so that you and your wife can change your surroundings. Your 12-year-old would feel the greatest impact. Yes, I would say that so far, this choice seems selfish on your parts.

The most logical way to go about this would be for your family to scout out jobs, schools and communities before you make any sudden moves. You might be able to do a home swap during a school break, to feel things out.

Dear Amy: Thank you for encouraging Wondering to contact his high school crush after their recent reunion. Im happy to say that I reconnected with a crush at our reunion, and if he hadnt been brave enough to follow up, we wouldnt be enjoying a happy late-life marriage today!

Crushed

Crushed: Judging by the contents of my mailbag, high school reunions are the source of many (and occasionally challenging) connections and reconnections.

Im happy your reconnection is a happy one.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-10 23:50:52|Editor: Zhou Xin

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BLANTYRE, Malawi, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Fifteen people died in two separate road accidents in Malawi's southern city of Blantyre on Saturday while more than 15 others were seriously injuries, police confirmed on Sunday.

The first accident occurred at around 15:30 p.m. when a minibus traveling from the border district of Mulanje to Limbe in Blantyre had a burst tyre and overturned several times.

The driver of the minibus and six passengers were pronounced dead upon arrival at the nearest hospital while other 7 passengers survived with fractures, according to the police report.

The second accident at around 19:20 p.m. involved a lorry with 40 passengers on board, which collided with a freightliner truck.

Eight passengers were killed and close to 20 passengers sustained injuries, said the report.

Malawi President Peter Mutharika has expressed grief over the accidents and passed condolences to the bereaved families.

A statement signed by the government spokesperson Nicholas Dausi said the two accidents have saddened the country's first couple.

"The President and the First Lady join all Malawians in expressing their condolences to the bereaved families and also wishing those injured a quick recovery," reads the statement.

On June 10, a fatal bus accident in the country left 10 dead and dozens injured when a bus had its front tyre burst at a bridge and overturned.
MARYLAND

Police locate vehicle of missing teacher

Investigators have found the vehicle of a pregnant Maryland high school teacher reported missing last week, Montgomery County police said Saturday.

Laura Elizabeth Wallens black 2011 Ford Escape was discovered Thursday evening in Howard County at an apartment complex in the 10600 block of Gramercy Place in Columbia. The apartment complex is less than a five-minute drive from Wilde Lake High School, where Wallen, 31, teaches.

Montgomery police have called her disappearance suspicious.

 Katherine Shaver

Two die after car crashes into tree

Two people were killed in a single-car crash early Saturday in Prince Georges County when the vehicle they were traveling in slammed into a tree.

The crash occurred just after 3 a.m. in the 6500 block of Columbia Park Road in front of Fairmont Heights High School, according to police spokesman Lamar Robinson.

Police have not yet identified the driver or passenger. Both were pronounced dead at the scene.

 Ann E. Marimow

Mans body found in Wheaton park

Montgomery County police are investigating the death of a man whose body was found last week in Wheaton Regional Park.

Investigators found the body on Tuesday at the park on Orebaugh Avenue in Wheaton. The park spans 536 acres and includes hiking trails .

Police did not identify the man. Anyone with information is asked to call the major crimes division at 240-773-5070.

 Ann E. Marimow
The Shrimp Boat Plaza is seen on Sept. 6. A local businessman purchased the building at Benning Road and East Capitol Street NE more than a year ago. (Salwan Georges/The Washington Post)

The dining options in Debra Bacons Northeast Washington neighborhood are so few and unappetizing that she found herself delighted recently when the new owner renovated a long-bedraggled carryout and remade its menu.

At the Shrimp Boat, a geographic and once-gastronomical landmark for generations of Washingtonians, the walls are freshly painted, the lights are bright and the choices now include everything from pepper steak to frozen yogurt to cafe au lait.

No tables are available yet, but the owner, an Ethiopian immigrant, hopes to add indoor and outdoor seating, as well as an adjoining organic grocery at the corner of Benning Road and East Capitol Street NE, a busy intersection that also hosts a Metro station.

It feels like youre in another neighborhood, Bacon, 60, an accountant with the District government, said on a recent afternoon, smiling as she sipped an iced mix of peach and mango flavorings that the server behind the counter had concocted.Its just so clean in here and theyre focused on the customers.

Healthy food options are a staple in prosperous Washington enclaves, but a dearth of quality choices is a chronic problem on the Districts eastern edge, one recently documented by a hunger advocacy group that warned of a grocery gap between the citys richest and poorest neighborhoods.



Customers wait for their food inside the Shrimp Boat Plaza during the lunch rush on Sept. 7. (Salwan Georges/The Washington Post)

[D.C.s grocery gap reveals citys income divide]

The gap isnt any less discernible when it comes to restaurants, a problem that D.C. officials have sought to conquer in the past, with little success. While new eateries have become ubiquitous in flourishing neighborhoods across the city, the few choices east of the Anacostia River include a couple of diner-like establishments, a Thai restaurant and an abundance of carryout counters where patrons order food they take away in foam boxes.

Across the street from the Shrimp Boat is a Dennys, one of two restaurants in Ward 7 with tables and servers. There are also several carryouts, including a Yums and a 24-hour Subway, where patrons order through holes cut through protective plexiglass.

When we want to go somewhere nice, we have nothing here, said Dave Belt, 59, an IT specialist who has lived on Benning Road for 18 years. We have to travel. We go some place else in D.C. or to Maryland. Thats the reality.

For years, neighborhood leaders have yearned for the kind of market-rate housing and retail burgeoning in other parts of the city. Instead, alongside the Metro station that borders the Shrimp Boat, 200 units of affordable housing are being built by So Others Might Eat, a community-based organization established to help the poor and homeless.

The project is one of two subsidized housing complexes nearing completion in that area of Benning Road.

It concentrates poverty in a poverty-stricken neighborhood, said David Smith, president of the Deanwood Civic Association. He is worried that the projects will discourage potential investors from migrating to the area. Its absolutely the wrong location, he said.

When he bought the Shrimp Boat property for about $1 million more than a year ago, Woundim Demissie, 37, who immigrated from Ethiopia in 2008, hoped to open a Checkers franchise that could thrive off the daily flow of commuters passing through the intersection.

But Demissie, the owner of four 7-Eleven franchises in Washington, changed course after neighborhood leaders persuaded him that residents want more than burgers and fried chicken.

The community didnt want more fast food, said Janis Hazel, a local advisory neighborhood commissioner and an aide to D.C. Council member Vincent C. Gray (D-Ward 7).

[A push for better restaurants east of the Anacostia River]

Demissie also came to appreciate the Shrimp Boats rich history and significance to many Washingtonians. Opened in the early 1950s, it served steamed crabs and fried shrimp that drew an integrated crowd from across the area. Later, it was a video store, and then a carryout, its exterior cinder block walls ragged and light blue awning in need of repair.

No matter the changes, the propertys configuration  a stand-alone, two-story rectangle with Shrimp Boat and Seafood lettering atop its roof and, at one time, a decorative boat  made it instantly recognizable to passersby.

Its our unofficial landmark, our compass, said Edith Hancock, a longtime neighborhood resident. It speaks to a time and an era when we had a vibrant community. Theres a legacy there and a history.

Hancock is helping Demissie develop his vision for the Shrimp Boat and to navigate the Districts bureaucracy. Along the way, she has sampled his food and was astonished when she tasted curry in her order of Asian noodles.

I never thought Id have anything with curry in my neighborhood, she said. The other day I had baked chicken. In other neighborhoods, this is no big deal. To get baked chicken and greens in my neighborhood is a big deal. We are a community that used to have this kind of thing. We just havent had it in the last 15-20 years.

Demissie decided to retain the Shrimp Boat name after overhearing enough people invoke it to give directions, though he added the word Plaza to signal a new era and that a variety of services would be offered, including a new Metro PCS store.

On a website he created, the owner promised to "recreate a new legacy" at the intersection and that "we will never have a lottery machine, Keno Screens or a big obnoxious TV blaring at you."

We want to make the corner of East Cap and Benning a place where community happens again, he wrote.

Demissie envisions apartments or offices over the adjoining supermarket, the idea for which he got after observing people emerging from the Metro station with Whole Foods and Harris Teeter shopping bags.

To help finance the supermarkets construction, Demissie applied for an $840,000 grant from a District government fund established to help businesses in areas with unemployment rates exceeding 10 percent. In his application, Demissie said the supermarket would create 25 jobs, more than half of them full-time. But the Bowser administration last month turned him down.

It was extremely competitive, said Chanda Washington, an administration spokeswoman. There were other applicants that met the criteria at a higher level. She declined to identify the citys choice for the grant, saying that final details were being worked out.

Demissie said he would press on with his plan for the grocery, nevertheless.

There is demand here, he said.

His rejuvenation of the Shrimp Boat has spawned social media chatter that the changes might be a harbinger of the areas impending gentrification. Some worry that Demissie is using the locations famous name to promote a business that has nothing to do with the Shrimp Boats history.

It now serves doughnuts  the name dont go with the business, said Chris Cummings, 34, a real estate broker who grew up in the area. Its kind of like a slap in the face to Northeast. To call it Shrimp Boat Plaza is to piggyback off the people who came before him.

Others are not sure what to make of the changes.

Wheres the plaza? asked Denise Smith, 64, her eyes narrowing as she gazed at the Shrimp Boats exterior. Her son, Delonta Smith, 27, a retail clerk, was taking in the Shrimp Boats new colors  freshly painted brown and tan instead of blue and white.

Its a little disorienting, he said. It takes getting used to.

But most patrons sampling the new Shrimp Boat expressed appreciation for what they were getting.

How many places can you get teriyaki chicken, doughnuts and pay your phone bill? asked Josh Burrell, 29, as he ordered his lunch.

Qadira Eaves, 42, a nurse who works across the street, interrupted a phone conversation she was having with her mother to ask the man behind the counter when they would have more strawberries to mix in the smoothie she likes to order.

Soon, he responded.

In her ear, her mother wanted to know why she was getting lunch at the Shrimp Boat, of all places.

They changed, Eaves assured her. Its not like it used to be.
Columnist

In 1980, my wife, Linda, and I, both American journalists in Beijing, enrolled our 3-year-old son, Peter, in an elite government-run kindergarten. Classroom songs about Chairman Mao had been dropped after the chaos of the Cultural Revolution. A more ancient authority had returned to favor.

My teacher is like my mother / We need not be afraid of her, Peter sang with nine Chinese children and six other foreigners in his class.

In 2010, Lenora Chu and her husband, Rob Schmitz, both American journalists in Shanghai, enrolled their son, Rainey, 3, in an elite government-run kindergarten. Mao was back. Rainey and his 27 Chinese classmates sang the Cultural Revolution anthem:

The east is red. The sun is rising. / From China comes Mao Zedong.

That barely begins to reveal the startling changes chronicled in Chu's new book, "Little Soldiers: An American Boy, a Chinese School, and the Global Race to Achieve." No reporter has gone as deep as she has into what makes Chinese and American schools different today, or given more reasons we should not copy the Chinese. Yet her rollicking account has hope for both cultures, because they share a deep interest in what children learn.

I have written about the frenzied extremes of Chinese high schools and the gaokao annual college entrance exam, and why Chinese education officials are trying  without much success  to put their schools on a more relaxed, American-style path. Chu gets deep into that and adds a crucial new twist  the mind-blowing surge of the Chinese middle class.

The Chinese parents at the Beijing No. 1 Kindergarten my son attended 37 years ago were part of the government elite. But they had nothing close to the money and experience abroad of the parents Chu encountered at her sons school in Shanghai, which she identifies with a pseudonym. I never saw anything like the antics she witnessed.

One well-traveled mother decided to amaze her friends with a pinata at her daughters birthday party. Instead of taking turns hitting the hanging effigy of Elsa from the film Frozen, the Chinese children attacked en masse. When the pinata finally broke, they wandered off, bored, because the mother did not know she was supposed to fill it with candy.

Rainey demonstrated his rapid assimilation by saying to Chu, Mom, I know. But dont say anything, okay?

Chu likewise held her tongue while exploring the favor-trading habits that have survived the Communist Revolution. She took orders from teachers who wanted her husband, who was visiting the United States, to score some Western swag. One teacher asked for "Qianbi," a brand-name transliteration even the Chinese-speaking Chu did not recognize. The teacher pointed to an ad on her classroom computer. "Clinique!" Chu said.

As Rainey grew older, his parents were torn between pride in his grasp of a foreign language and culture, and disgust with the pounding memorization and reigns of teacher terror even in his upper-crust classroom. The politics were always there, including Mao. The thoughts of the Chairman and Confucius squashed the imaginations that most American teachers encourage.

Chu concludes, Obstacles to the creative process litter the Chinese education landscape: Domineering teachers who discourage open questioning; exam metrics that keep children studying rather than exploring; social collectivism that promotes conformity.

She rightly gives the Chinese credit for their rigorous early education system, particularly in math, but is too optimistic when she says they will eventually catch up with the soft skills of the West. By that she means independent and creative thinking. How will they do that without massive changes in the political and social system she wisely derides?

Still, Chu proves the great value of her book by making clear that Shanghais high test scores are an affluent distortion. Chinese schools nationwide remain mediocre and in rural communities are quite awful. She says Rainey will eventually transfer to something more Western.

He is lucky to be able to absorb so much. Our son Peter attended the Beijing school only one year but still likes Chinese pop music. Rainey will have a very interesting life.
Shops and business along the boardwalk in Ocean City, Md., are among those that depend on workers hired through the J-1 visa program. (Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post)

To Amy Owens, the State Department program that allows babysitters to come from overseas and work for little more than room and board is a working moms lifesaver. To her 23-year-old German au pair, Ann Kathrin Lentsch, the program is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see the United States through the eyes of an American family.

Now Owens fears that both those benefits may be in jeopardy after receiving an email last week from Interexchange, the agency that sponsors her au pair, saying that the Trump administration is planning to eliminate the Au Pair Program.

I dont know what we would do, the mother of three from Alexandria said. Its such a valuable program to us.

The State Department declined to answer questions about the future of the program but said in a statement: We continue to implement J-1 visa programs at the same levels we have for the past few years. There has been no change in our procedures for handling applications for J-1 visas.

The White House did not respond to requests for comment.



Shops and business along the boardwalk in Ocean City, Md., are among those that depend on workers hired through the J-1 visa program. (Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post)

But businesses and families who employ foreign workers on J-1 visas are convinced something is happening, in part because of a May email J-1 sponsors received from G.K. Saba, acting deputy assistant secretary for the State Departments Private Sector Exchange division. The email warned of emerging Administration policies and themes that would put certain J-1 visa programs under sharper scrutiny.

Advocates who have been informed about the situation said some categories of the visa program were being reviewed by a small working group under the White Houses Buy American and Hire American executive order. Areas that could be cut include the au pair program, summer workers and camp counselors.

Critics of the J-1 visa program say it provides an easy way for employers to choose inexpensive labor instead of hiring American workers whom they would have to pay higher wages.

In 2016, 19,233 au pairs, 101,061 summer workers and 22,994 camp counselors worked in the United States on J-1 visas, according to State Department data.

Its been used by businesses to basically bring in cheap foreign labor to fill temporary jobs, said Chris Chmielenski, director of content and activism at NumbersUSA, which opposes J-1 visas in their current form.

Ian Band, an immigration attorney at Hunton & Williams who has seen the email from Saba, said his clients who sponsor J-1 recipients are concerned because this is the time of year they begin to plan for next season.

I think its part of a broader anti-immigrant view that plays to the presidents base, Band said. Its easy to pitch it as saving U.S. jobs.

As a candidate, President Trumps immigration revision plan pledged to eliminate the J-1 visa program and replace it with what his campaign website described as a jobs program for inner city youth.

But advocates for the program say jobs that go to J-1 visa workers, particularly those employed at seasonal destinations such as beach towns, are ones that could not easily be filled by U.S. workers. They also say J-1 visa holders introduce American communities to foreign cultures and languages in a valuable and enriching way.

"For young people, it's great to get to come to a new country and learn about a different family and a different culture," said Lentsch, the au pair for Owens's family.

In Ocean City, where the population explodes in summer months, 4,000 foreign workers are employed up and down the boardwalk, many on J-1 visas. Melanie Pursel, executive director of the Ocean City Chamber of Commerce, said there arent enough young people in proximity to fill all the jobs needed.

Moreover, Pursel said, most U.S. workers who take these jobs are students who cant work during the shoulder seasons, late spring and late summer, because they have to be in school. Summer tourism allows these businesses to stay afloat year-round, so having foreign workers actually protects the jobs of full-time U.S. employees, she said.

After word spread about possible cuts in the J-1 visa program, Pursel sent a survey to area businesses. Preliminary responses show that nearly 93 percent said their businesses would be negatively affected if they could not hire workers on J-1 visas, and 95 percent said they first look to employ qualified American workers.

Summer camps are also sounding the alarm. The Foundation for Jewish Camp, whose more than 300 camps employ counselors from Israel and other countries, sent a letter to Trump urging him to preserve J-1 visas.

"Any threat to these programs and their educational impact could cause ripples across our entire faith community and deeply impact the development of future Jewish faith leaders and their connection to Israel," the letter said.

The foundation wrote that there are not enough American students to fill all the jobs at summer camps, especially those in rural areas.

The J-1 visa program hasnt been studied as closely as other foreign worker programs, so data is limited, Chmielenski said.

But he noted that criticism of the program has come from different parts of the political spectrum: In 2013, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said the program was intended to be for cultural understanding but is now a low-wage jobs program where companies can replace young American workers with cheaper labor from overseas.

Still, there is bipartisan support on Capitol Hill for keeping the program intact. Lawmakers from the House and Senate wrote to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson this summer espousing the benefits of J-1 visas for diplomatic purposes.

At a time when the values of the United States are misrepresented in many parts of the world, this program plays an ever-increasing role to correct those impressions of America, expose international students to our culture and values, and give Americans the opportunity to learn about corners of the world to which they may never travel, said the letter from 33 House members, both Democratic and Republican.

Ilir Zherka, executive director of the Alliance for International Exchange, an umbrella organization for sponsors of J-1 visa programs, said Congress has received 100,000 letters urging it to protect the program.

And it may already be working. On Thursday, the Senate Appropriations Committee added an amendment to a State Department spending bill mandating that any changes to the J-1 program must be transparent.
MARYLAND

Driver is suspended

for reading on bus

A Metrobus driver has been suspended after social media footage showed him reading a newspaper while driving Friday, according to the transit agency.

Myles Hill, the passenger who posted the video to Twitter, said he spotted what looked like a newspaper in the bus drivers hands Friday afternoon, shortly after boarding the F6 in College Park about 2 p.m.

At first, he couldnt believe what he was seeing, so he asked a friend, Is that bus driver reading the paper? She replied, Oh my gosh, yeah! the 20-year-old University of Maryland student said Sunday.

Metro spokesman Dan Stessel said the driver was identified and put on paid leave while Metro investigates.The incident occurred in the area of Annapolis Road, near the routes New Carrollton terminus.

Stessel declined to identify the driver Sunday.

Man charged in setting

pregnant woman afire

A 34-year-old man accused in Prince Georges County of setting a pregnant woman on fire has been identified, and police said the victim and her newborn are both in critical condition at a hospital.

Laquinn Phillips, 34, of Southeast Washington has been charged with attempted first- and second-degree murder, arson, assault, and other charges. Police said he had a relationship with the victim. He is being held in the District pending extradition to Maryland.

The incident occurred about 11:45 a.m. Friday in the 1400 block of Elkwood Lane in Capitol Heights. Police and firefighters reported finding the woman outside suffering from severe burns. She had fled an apartment seeking help.

The baby was delivered after the woman went to the hospital. Authorities said the woman suffered burns over a large part of her body.

 Peter Hermann

1 dead, 1 injured in Bethesda house fire

A man died Sunday afternoon in a house fire in Montgomery County, authorities said. A second man escaped the flames and was taken to a hospital.

The fire broke out about 4:20 p.m. in a single-family house in the 5200 block of Danbury Road in the Bethesda area, county fire department battalion chief Dan Ogren said.

Ogren said that the man who escaped is 31 years old, and that he was being treated for minor burns and smoke inhalation. He was thought to be the grandson of the owner of the house, who was not at the scene, Ogren said.

He said the dead mans relationship to the others was not clear. He was about the same age as the man who fled and may have been a friend, Ogren said.

The victim was found in the basement, which, according to firefighters, contained a lot of clutter, Ogren said.

The cause of the fire was not immediately known.

The house is in the Alta Vista area, north of West Cedar Lane.

 Martin Weil
An earlier version of this story incorrectly attributed a photo, of work done on a Nokesville home to remove bees, to Jonathan Hunley. The photo was taken by Jim Gehlsen. The story has been updated.

Apiculturist and building contractor Jim Gehlsen shows some of his honeybees at his 97-acre farm, Evergreen Acres, in Nokesville. The 63-year-old starting doing bee rescues this spring. He removes the insects from houses and structures and gives them a new home. (Jonathan Hunley for The Washington Post )

It was midday on a Tuesday last month, and contractor Jim Gehlsen was ready for the carpentry the job on a house in Nokesville would require, including the removal of a gutter downspout and a piece of siding to reach the problem.

Gehlsen drives a blue 1996 Ford pickup stocked with any equipment he might need, including protective clothing, when hes responding to calls. But on that day a honeybee, stirred up by his work, stung him on the hand before he had suited up for safety.

The 63-year-old knew a sting was possible. Eventually, another bee got him on the other hand. He ended up having to deal with the buzzing insects for about four hours.

There was a time when Gehlsen wouldnt have tolerated such working conditions, but the bees were actually the reason he was chosen for this task.

A few months earlier, he combined his construction experience with his love of beekeeping to begin rescuing the insects. Many people are familiar with dog rescue, or even horse rescue, but Gehlsen and a handful of other beekeepers in Northern Virginia remove unwanted bees from tricky spots, and then cart them to a new home.



Jim Gehlsen, called in to relocate honeybees without harming them, took down part of the siding of a Nokesville house to get access to their hive. Gehlsen charges about $500 for a removal project. And, of course, he gets to keep the bees. (Courtesy of Jim Gehlsen)

The job in Nokesville was Gehlsens most recent removal. He was called in because about 100 dead bees were found in a room during a rental walk-through on the property, said Brittney Copeland, real estate agent for Platinum Property Management.

At the same time, workers renovating the home next door noticed bees outside. Platinum had never dealt with such an issue, Copeland said, but it seemed as though some bees must be living in a hive in the rental house, while others had gotten trapped inside the structure and died.

So Gehlsen was called in to relocate the remaining bees without harming them, per the property owners request.

Gehlsen didnt want the insects to perish, either, but removing the hive from the side of the house did startle them, especially at first.

They were rather aggressive to me because, see, Im disturbing their home place, he said.

Gehlsen discovered honeycomb, which he removed and placed in a box used to store hives. Then he reinstalled the siding and gutter.

He left the hive box outside and returned that night. By then, all the bees had gathered in the box with the honeycomb, so Gehlsen could seal it and take it back to the apiary on his 97-acre farm, Evergreen Acres in Nokesville.

This kind of job is called a cutout because of the carpentry that is required. Gehlsen also has done trapouts, in which he lures bees out of a space and into a hive box. That was the approach he used this year when Prince Williams Public Works Department hired him to get bees out of the historic Bennett School next to the county courthouse in Manassas.

Gehlsen, who has lived in Prince William since 1980, charges about $500 for a removal project. And, of course, he gets to keep the bees.

Getting paid for removing the insects is nice, but the bees certainly are an added bonus, said Richard Fell, professor emeritus of entomology at Virginia Tech.

Depending on the job, a beekeeper could walk away from a removal with more than $100 worth of bees, Fell said.

But Gehlsen said he doesnt do rescues just for the financial benefit. Hes fascinated by bees and mindful of preserving the pollinators.

I could make more money doing easier work and not getting stung, he joked.

Gehlsen is in his third year of beekeeping, and he learned about rescue as a member of the Prince William Regional Beekeepers Association. That group gave him the leads on the six jobs he has done so far, which have included sites in the Prince William area and as far away as Marshall and Warrenton.

Rescues can be complex, said Diana Graves, president of the association.

She said she and other beekeepers can collect swarms of bees for homeowners when the insects are outside and easy to reach. But Gehlsen has the skills and equipment to get bees out of walls or down from heights, and then also ensure that any structure involved is put back together.

Very few people will do the rescue from buildings, Graves said.
A 12-year-old and a 15-year-old have been arrested in separate robberies last week on Capitol Hill and in Northeast Washington, D.C. police said Sunday.

The Capitol Hill robbery occurred about 9:30 a.m. Tuesday in the 1500 block of Independence Avenue SE. Police said a 15-year-old boy was charged with snatching a phone from a persons hand.

Also Tuesday, police said, a 12-year-old boy was charged with armed robbery after a person was held up with a knife in the 5500 block of South Dakota Avenue NE.

Police said the attack occurred shortly before 6 p.m. The boy asked for money, police said in a statement, and after the person refused, the suspect brandished a knife and repeated the demand.

The victim handed over money, and the suspect allegedly ran away. Police said the suspects were arrested shortly after the robberies.
A 34-year-old man accused in Prince Georges County of setting a pregnant woman on fire has been identified, and police said the victim and her newborn child are both in critical condition at a hospital.

Laquinn Phillips, 34, of Southeast Washington, has been charged with attempted first- and second-degree murder, arson, assault, and several additional related charges. Police said he had a relationship with the victim. He is being held in the District pending extradition to Maryland.

[Police say man set pregnant woman on fire]

The incident occurred about 11:45 a.m. Friday in the 1400 block of Elkwood Lane in Capitol Heights. Police and firefighters reported finding the female victim outside suffering from severe burns. She had fled an apartment seeking help.

Police said officers in the District arrested Phillips outside his home in Southeast Washington after he agreed to surrender.



Laquinn Phillips, 34, of Southeast Washington, has been charged with attempted first- and second-degree murder, arson, assault, and several additional related charges. (Prince Georges County Police)

The victims baby was delivered after she went to the hospital. Authorities said the woman suffered burns over a large part of her body. No further details about the dispute or the fire were made public over the weekend.
Police in riot gear contain a group of protesters at the corner of 12th and L streets NW on Inauguration Day, Jan. 20, 2017. (Jahi Chikwendiu/The Washington Post)

Executives from a Los Angeles-based tech company said they are weighing whether to fight a judges order to provide D.C. prosecutors with email addresses and other information from people who visited an anti-Trump website in the months before Inauguration Day.

The company, DreamHost, filed a motion with D.C. Superior Court Judge Robert E. Morin last week requesting that he put his order on hold while they consider whether to appeal.

But prosecutors, concerned that such a delay could hinder their cases against dozens charged in Inauguration Day riots, have asked the judge to force DreamHost to turn over the data immediately.

In a year when DreamHost was looking forward to celebrating its 20th anniversary, the company has been propelled into a high-profile privacy-rights case as a result of managing the server for a website that authorities say facilitated rioting on the day of President Trumps inauguration.

DreamHosts co-founder and chief executive, Dallas Kashuba, said in an interview that the potential implications go beyond this case. He said there is concern among tech companies that Internet users could become fearful of visiting websites if they know government authorities can monitor such information.



DreamHost CEO Dallas Kashuba. (DreamHost)

This is a fundamental issue of online privacy and how the Internet works. If this goes the wrong way, it could detrimentally impact the Internet itself, Kashuba said. If people become afraid to access websites because they may be found out, he said, it could chill the online communication.

[Tech firm fights federal demand for data to anti-Trump website]

Prosecutors from the U.S. attorneys office in the District have filed felony rioting charges against about 200 people who they say participated in the riots.

In court, they said they were seeking emails, email addresses and IP addresses of anyone who might have engaged with the alleged rioters through the website Disruptj20.org, the site hosted by DreamHost.

Orin Kerr, a computer-crime law professor at George Washington University, said the case has drawn national attention as observers watch how prosecutors handle concerns over constitutional rights prohibiting unreasonable searches and seizures.

This is testing the limits of the Fourth Amendment, Kerr said. Its an important question of the government trying to get records that they havent obtained in the past.

DreamHost is not the first Internet company to challenge the government in its quest to prosecute individuals associated with the riots.

On Thursday, attorneys for Facebook are scheduled to argue in front of the D.C. Court of Appeals a court order that blocks the social media giant from letting users know when law enforcement investigators ask to search their online information, particularly their political affiliations and comments.

The riots left six police officers injured and caused tens of thousands of dollars in damage when downtown D.C. businesses were vandalized just blocks from where Trump and his family paraded after the swearing-in ceremony.

Prosecutors first contacted DreamHost on Jan. 27, seven days after the inauguration. At that time, prosecutors made a preservation request, asking DreamHost to save a snapshot of its data on its servers. DreamHost rebuffed the governments initial request. Then on Feb. 8, prosecutors obtained their first court request for the information they wanted, forcing DreamHost to comply.

On July 17, prosecutors filed a search warrant that the company said would have required it to turn over the IP addresses of about 1.3 million users of its site.

DreamHost objected to such a sweeping petition and requested a hearing before the judge. But days before the hearing, prosecutors scaled back their request to include email addresses from just those people who engaged with the website by, for instance, providing their email addresses or signing up to receive information.

Prosecutors argued that their request had to be somewhat broad because they have no idea which users of the site might be associated with the rioting until they review the data.

[Judge orders tech company to release Web user data on anti-Trump website]

Morin ordered DreamHost to turn over user information from the sites inception through Inauguration Day. DreamHost said the request involves information regarding people associated with about 10,000 email addresses.

Kashuba said he thinks prosecutors are trying to charge more people in the case and are attempting to use data from his company as evidence to bolster those charges.

They are trying to figure out every person who they believe may be associated with this group and may have supported them in some way. That would go beyond the 200 people who are already charged, Kashuba said. They are trying to leverage us and the information we have to assist in their investigation.

Kashuba said DreamHost  which employs about 200 people and had revenue of about $50 million last year  has already spent about $25,000 in legal fees fighting with prosecutors over their requests. To file an appeal would cost another $150,000.

It does make me wonder how far theyre allowed to go, Kashuba said. How much of our time should be put into aiding their investigation?

An earlier version of this story incorrectly said D.C. prosecutors submitted a subpoena to DreamHost in July seeking data regarding the website disruptj20org. Prosecutors filed a search warrant.
Aside from cars, few inanimate objects seem to be so widely discussed as guns, and four incidents in the Washington area last week helped suggest the pervasiveness of firearms and, in one case, their possible usefulness.

The incident that appeared to demonstrate the utility of a firearm occurred Sept. 3 in Prince William County.

According to the police, two Manassas residents, a man, 38, and a woman, 34, were assaulted there by three men whom they knew.

The attack, in the 8400 block of Stoney Lane, came in the course of an argument, and it apparently ended, according to the police account, when one of the two assault victims showed a gun.

A police statement said a victim brandished a firearm in self-defense and the suspects fled.

Police reported three arrests.

In the latest of the firearms incident, police in Frederick Md., said they were told that shots had been fired in Carrollton Park shortly before 5 p.m. Saturday. Luckily, they said, no one was hurt.

In the two other firearms incidents, shots were apparently fired in residential neighborhoods with no known motive.

In one incident, police were told Friday night that shots had been heard near 18th and A streets SE, in the Hill East area.

Police said they found that someone had stood in the intersection, firing a handgun.

In Fairfax County, police said shots were reported shortly after midnight Thursday in the 3800 block of Birchwood Road, in the quiet Lake Barcroft area.

Ammunition casings were later found in front of a home.

No injuries were reported in either incident, but both are being investigated.

Although there are many guns in the area, it is not all firearms here. Fairfax County police said the annual effort to reduce the deer population was to begin Saturday. The deer-slaying technique was to be archery.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-11 00:10:58|Editor: Yamei

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Syrian military vehicles take position on the outskirts of Deir al-Zour city in eastern Syria on Sept. 5, 2017. Following days of intense battles on the outskirts of Deir al-Zour in eastern Syria, the Syrian forces and allied fighters broke Tuesday the three-year siege of the Islamic State (IS) to government-held parts in the city. (Xinhua/Ammar Safarjalani)

DAMASCUS, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- The Syrian army on Sunday captured the Tharda Mountains in the southern rim of Deir al-Zour province in eastern Syria, securing the airbase of Deir al-Zour, a military source told Xinhua.

The capture of the Tharda Mountains has secured the vicinity of the airbase of Deir al-Zour, as the mountains function as the airbase's first defense line.

A day earlier, the Syrian army and allied troops broke the Islamic State (IS) siege on the airbase, just a week after lifting the IS' three-year siege on the capital city of Deir al-Zour.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, the source said that the United States had bombed Syrian army in the Tharda Mountains in September 2016, during which 90 soldiers were killed.

The U.S. strike facilitated the IS control over the mountains in 2016.

The extremist militants had suffered big losses due to the advance of the Syrian forces in Tharda Mountains, the source said, adding that many IS commanders had fled to the city of Bukamal in the countryside of Deir al-Zour.

The source said that to capture the mountains, Syrian forces had launched offensives from two directions; one from the Panorama roundabout at the southern entrance of Deir al-Zour capital city, the other one from the Tyem energy field in the southern countryside of Deir al-Zour province.

The progress comes as Syrian army on Sunday seized full control of the main road from the capital Damascus to Deir al-Zour city in eastern Syria, stripping the IS of key areas along the road.

On Sept. 5, the army succeeded in breaking the three-year siege by IS on Deir al-Zour city from its western entrance at the Brigade 137 base.

Later on, the Syrian army continued to advance toward the graveyard area and the Panorama roundabout, while other forces advanced toward the city from the desert region south of Deir al-Zour.

The first batch of troops reached the airbase, while the second one captured the Teym field and reached Deir al-Zour, capturing thus the entire road to Deir al-Zour.

Deir al-Zour is a key stronghold for IS and of a strategic geographic importance due to its proximity to Iraq. The U.S.-backed Deir al-Zour Military Council group has launched an offensive on IS in the northern countryside of Deir al-Zour, capturing several towns since starting their attack on Saturday.
Ed Rappaport, left, the acting director of the National Hurricane Center, watches hurricane specialist Robbie Berg conduct a conference call for the 11 p.m. Hurricane Irma forecast package on Sept. 9 at the hurricane center in Miami. (Andy Newman/AP)

The forecasters at the National Hurricane Center are the calm voices before the storm. Even off camera, they speak in a steady register, giving no indication that they are in the path of a violent tropical cyclone.

With Hurricane Irma headed toward Florida, the forecasters have been working around the clock, updating storm tracks and issuing watches and warnings  not only for this killer storm but also for two other hurricanes, Jose and Katia.

This is life-or-death stuff. People have to decide whether to evacuate. Florida has ordered evacuations for nearly 6 million people as the entire state has been imperiled. The Coast Guard, the National Guard, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Pentagon and the White House all hang on every word and data point from the people here at the center.

And yet, acting director Ed Rappaport remains unruffled.

He says, mildly, Ill be looking forward to a quieter period.

Irmas journey from the remote Atlantic Ocean through the Caribbean and toward Floridas southern tip has affirmed the improving forecasting skills of the meteorological community and shown that storm prediction remains an inexact science.

The storms are much more likely to go where the experts say theyll go. Twenty years ago, Rappaport said, the hurricane center had a 1-2-3 rule  meaning that a day out, the forecast of the storm track was likely to be, on average, incorrect by 100 miles. Two days out, it would be off by 200. Three days, 300.

Today, the two-day forecast is on average within 70 miles, Rappaport said.

Weve cut out two-thirds of the error of the track. That was science and technology, he said.

The practical consequence is that the center now issues a five-day forecast rather than merely a three-day forecast. That gives people more time to prepare. For residents here in Miami, it also has prolonged the frantic period in advance of the storm. People began making a run on stores and gas stations and buying up the last plane tickets out of town on Tuesday, for a storm that isnt expect to reach Florida until Sunday.

Forecasters here have repeatedly stated that people shouldnt focus heavily on the precise center of the forecast storm track. The experts have tried to normalize uncertainty, and make people comfortable with margins of error, which is why the Cone of Uncertainty has become a regular feature on projection maps in their advisories.

The centers website explains: Historical data indicate that the entire 5-day path of the center of the tropical cyclone will remain within the cone about 60-70% of the time.

The National Hurricane Center remained Saturday within the Cone of Uncertainty. The center, which is on the campus of Florida International University in west Miami-Dade County, has been bashed by a hurricane before. In 1992, the center was located in an office building on U.S. highway 1 in Coral Gables, across from the University of Miami.

Rappaport was a young forecaster at the time and remembers being so engaged with the high-pressure job of putting out the 5 a.m. forecast for Hurricane Andrew that he didnt notice that the building was swaying until a colleague pointed it out.

The storm knocked the radome, the domed structure over the radar, off the roof of the building. A wind gauge measured a gust of 164 miles per hour.

There were cars flying through the air, Rappaport said. I was relatively new and didnt know what to expect from a hurricane, let alone a Category-5 hurricane.

With Irma approaching, the center has remained a remarkably calm environment. The top forecasters take turns speaking to television stations and networks around the country, and they tend to speak in a neutral, just-the-facts tone.

Mark DeMaria, the centers acting deputy director, employed the same deadpan tone when asked how he feels about Irma. Betraying no emotion, he said, Im very concerned about this one.

DeMaria moved to South Florida three years ago and bought a house in the western suburbs, which is what you expect from someone who spends a lot of time talking about storm surge.

I was thinking maybe its a little bit nicer to the east, but Id prefer to live a little further from the beach, he explained.

The hurricane center looks like a hurricane center, with three radio antennae aiming skyward on a side lawn and a forest of dishes on the roof. A stray cat name Pit patrols the exterior. The cat eats a lot, hence the name. The security guards say theyre making sure theres a way to shelter Pit during the storm.

An interior hallway is lined with vintage newspaper front pages, hurricane-themed cartoons and photographs of major hurricanes from space. Peek into an office and youll see loaves of bread and jars of peanut butter and jelly. Its government work, and survival food is pretty basic.

The spokesman here, Dennis Feltgen, is a former TV weatherman.

I was one of the very first TV meteorologists out there screaming in the wind, he says.

Feltgen said he sometimes asks his colleagues to be more demonstrative when theyre talking to the press or recording advisories for the public  but theyre scientists he said.

Born in 1952, Feltgen grew up in Florida back when hurricanes seemed to blow through Florida every couple of years. He said he was sound asleep when Hurricane Cleos eye passed right over the house in 1964.

My dad put masking tape on the plate glass windows, he says. Yeah, dad, right.

After all these years in the hurricane business, he still has one regret: As a weatherman chasing hurricanes, he was never in the eye of the storm.

And if Irma holds its current track  with the eye heading west of Miami  hell have to wait longer.

Read more: The latest forecast from Capital Weather Gang

Its not a Category 6: Debunking viral myths about Irma

Irma devastates world-famous St. Martin airport
Got pot? Colorado does: The state was one of the first to legalize marijuana for recreational use. But the botanical genus Cannabis is more than bongs and brownies. Viewed as a plant, not a drug, it intrigues the artistic eye with its fronds, veins and flowers. That's the premise of "Cannabis: A Visual Perspective," a first-of-its-kind exhibition at the Museum of Natural History at the University of Colorado at Boulder that focuses on the famed botanical's visual allure.

The juried show features illustrations, paintings and prints of pot plants  images that suggest that the dominant story of stoners may obscure the scientific marvels of the plant.

The images, presented by the Rocky Mountain Society of Botanical Artists, explore cannabis plants in all their diversity and detail. That range is mirrored by the techniques used to portray the plant: Acrylic, colored pencil, watercolors, oil and other media are part of the display.



From the exhibit Cannabis: A Visual Perspective. (Museum of Natural History, University of Colorado at Boulder) )

Cannabis isnt a single species: Its a genus of flowering plants with up to three species: sativa, ruderalis and indica. (Debates about how to classify the species have raged since the plant was first classified in 1753.)

Theres more to the exhibition than art. It also features information about CU Boulders scientific work with cannabis. Last year, the university received more than $830,000 to study the effects of high-potency cannabis on the brain and human behavior. Its one of multiple state-funded grants to study the effects of marijuana on public health  research funded by sales of legal pot in the state.

Cannabis: A Visual Perspective opened Sept. 8 and goes up in smoke in January.

Read more

A powerful new form of medical marijuana, without the high

How legalization caused the price of marijuana to collapse
NEW YORK

Lawyers question DNA analysis methods

Two techniques for analyzing DNA evidence once considered cutting edge are now under fire amid questions about their reliability, and criminal defense attorneys in New York have asked a state agency to investigate the renowned lab that once used both methods.

The New York City medical examiners lab developed one of the techniques and became a leader in sophisticated DNA examinations partly because of its work identifying the remains of 9/11 victims.

Both techniques have been phased out in favor of new technology.

Attorneys for the Legal Aid Society and Federal Defenders of New York asked the New York State inspector generals office to investigate in a Sept. 1 letter.

Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Barbara Sampson wrote in a post published Wednesday on the website Medium that the two methods were discarded to meet changing FBI requirements and to reflect new, better science, not because of inaccurate results.

 Associated Press

COLORADO

Former Fox News hosts son dies

The son of former Fox News host Eric Bolling has died, just hours after Fox announced Bolling was leaving the network.

Bolling said in a tweet on Saturday he and his wife, Adrienne, were devastated by the loss of their son, Eric Chase Bolling. A sophomore at the University of Colorado in Boulder, Eric Chase Bolling died Friday night.

Eric Bolling said the cause of his sons death is under investigation but authorities told him there was no sign of self harm at this point.

On Friday, Fox News Channel said it had parted ways with Eric Bolling, who had been suspended in August following allegations he sent lewd photos to female co-workers.

 Associated Press

Police chase stolen paramedic truck 50 miles: Authorities said a woman stole a paramedic truck in Las Vegas and led pursuing police officers on a 50-mile freeway chase that reached California. Firefighters had parked the truck outside a pharmacy on Friday when it was stolen. The woman ended the chase, apparently realizing officers were going to use tire-puncturing spike strips to stop the vehicle.

Four charged in girls' deaths: Four people have been arrested in the deaths of two young girls whose bodies were found on a farm in Colorado. The San Miguel County Sheriff's Office said Saturday the bodies of the girls, who were between 5 and 10, were found Friday about 30 miles west of the ski resort town of Telluride. Investigators said the girls had been dead for at least two weeks.

 From news services
Rohingya refugees walk across Paddy fields in the pouring rain at dusk after crossing the border from Myanmar on September 09, 2017 in Gundum, Bangladesh. (Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

EUROPEAN UNION

Trumps economic policy is criticized

The European Unions Economic and Financial Committee is criticizing President Trumps economic policy and is worried that his efforts to boost protectionism pose a threat to the global economy, a German magazine reported Saturday.

The effects of that could be much more damaging than had been thought until now, Der Spiegel said, citing an internal paper from a committee of top officials from the finance ministries of E.U. member states.

It also said the Europeans were concerned by the Trump administrations spending plans, because public debt is already on a path that is not sustainable.

It said lenders had recently avoided the United States. The decline in international investments is a possible vulnerability, Der Spiegel cited the paper as saying of the United States.

It also said plans to reform taxes in a way that would especially reduce the burden on top earners would exacerbate the challenges the U.S. economy faces rather than alleviate them.

The European Commission declined to comment.

 Reuters

BURMA

Rohingya insurgents declare cease-re

Rohingya insurgents have declared a month-long truce to allow humanitarian aid into Burmas Rakhine state, where military operations have left hundreds dead and prompted nearly 300,000 to flee into neighboring Bangladesh.

The ragtag band of Muslim insurgents calling itself the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army issued the truce statement on its Twitter account, which is how it generally communicates. It urged government forces to reciprocate to assist all victims regardless of their background.

The Burmese government did not comment immediately.

The rebels first known attacks on security posts in October and again on Aug. 25 drew savage military reprisals. According to Rohingya refugees, entire villages have been burned to the ground and hundreds of civilians killed. The government said most of the 400 dead were terrorists.

Analysts blame the government of Burma, also known as Myanmar, for the conditions that led to the groups creation. The Rohingya minority is denied basic rights and citizenship.

 Associated Press

Creditors' supervision may end for Greek economy: Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras says the Greek economy is turning around and will no longer be under the supervision of the country's creditors in 2018. Speaking at the opening of

the 82nd Thessaloniki International Fair in Greece's second-largest city , Tsipras said the Greek economy will grow in 2017 after a nine-year recession. He said that the number of jobs is increasing at the fastest pace since 2001 and that foreign investors are eager to capitalize on the opportunities.

Spanish judge takes action against Catalonia vote: A Spanish judge ordered police to search a printer's shop and two offices of a regional newspaper in Catalonia as part of an investigation into alleged preparations for an illegal referendum on independence for the region. The court said the searches formed part of an investigation into possible disobedience, prevarication and the embezzlement of public funds by Catalan officials.

Uruguay's vice president resigns amid corruption allegations: Uruguay's vice president, Raul Sendic, accused of misusing a credit card during his tenure as head of state oil company ANCAP, has resigned. A tribunal of his political party determined that he may have engaged in "unacceptable use of public funds." The weekly publication Busqueda reported in June that between 2010 and 2013, Sendic used corporate credit cards to make purchases at jewelry, electronics, furniture and other stores apparently unrelated to official business.

North Korea's Kim honors nuclear scientists: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un hosted a massive celebration to congratulate the nuclear scientists and technicians who steered the country's sixth and largest nuclear test a week ago, its official news agency said on Sunday. South Korea had been bracing for another long-range missile launch in time for the 69th anniversary of North Korea's founding on Saturday, but no fresh provocations were spotted.

 From news services
Stephen K. Bannon  President Trumps former chief strategist who left the White House in August  declared war Sunday against the Republican congressional leadership, called on Gary Cohn, Trumps top economic adviser, to resign, and outlined his views on issues ranging from immigration to trade.

Bannon, in an interview on CBSs 60 Minutes, accused Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) of trying to nullify the 2016 election. It was Bannons first television interview since leaving the White House and returning as executive chairman to Breitbart News, the conservative website he previously led.

He blamed them for failing to repeal and replace former president Barack Obamas signature health-care law and made clear that he would use his Breitbart perch to hold Republicans accountable for not helping Trump push through his agenda.

Theyre not going to help you unless theyre put on notice, he told CBSs Charlie Rose. Theyre going to be held accountable if they do not support the president of the United States. Right now theres no accountability.

Stressing absolute loyalty to Trump, Bannon criticized members of the administration who, he said, had leaked to the news media their displeasure with the way Trump handled the white-supremacist-fueled violence in Charlottesville, which left one dead and more injured.

You can tell him, Hey, maybe you can do it a better way. But if youre going to break, then resign. If youre going to break with him, resign, he said. If you find it unacceptable, you should resign.

He explicitly mentioned Cohn, Trumps director of the National Economic Council who had criticized Trumps response in an interview with the Financial Times, and said he absolutely thought Cohn should have resigned.

[Steve Bannon is a good Catholic, Charlie Rose said on 60 minutes. Was he right?]

Bannon joined the Trump campaign in August 2016 and emerged as the presidents ideological id, channeling his populist and nationalist impulses. Though he made many enemies in the West Wing, including the presidents son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner, and clashed with John F. Kelly, Trumps second chief of staff, Bannon remains close to Trump.

Recalling a particularly low moment in the campaign  the emergence of the Access Hollywood tape that captured Trump bragging about groping women  Bannon dismissed it as just locker room talk, but he said the moment served as an important litmus test for loyalty to Trump.

At the time, Reince Priebus, Trumps first chief of staff, urged the then-candidate to either drop out of the race or face a historic loss. And, Bannon said, Gov. Chris Christie (R-N.J.), who served as a campaign adviser overseeing Trumps transition plan, lost a likely spot in the presidents Cabinet because of his response to the video.

I told him: The plane leaves at 11 oclock in the morning. If youre on the plane, youre on the team,  Bannon said, referring to Christie. Didnt make the plane.

On China, Bannon reiterated his calls for the United States to take a tougher stance over trade and appropriating U.S. technology. Donald Trump, for 30 years, has singled out China as the biggest single problem we have on the world stage, he said. The elites in this country have got us in a situation. Were at not economic war with China; China is at economic war with us.

And he also seemed to criticize the presidents recent decision to rescind protections for dreamers  those 690,000 undocumented immigrants brought to the country as young children  while giving Congress six months to devise a legislative solution. The move, he said, could cost Republicans the House in the 2018 election.

"If this goes all the way down to its logical conclusion, in February and March, it will be a civil war inside the Republican Party that will be every bit as vitriolic as 2013," Bannon said. "And to me, doing that in the springboard of primary season for 2018 is extremely unwise."
Former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton pausing while speaking during a campaign rally last November at the Grand Valley State University Fieldhouse in Allendale, Mich. (Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images)

Declaring that she is done with being a candidate, former secretary of state Hillary Clinton looked back on the 2016 presidential campaign Sunday with a mix of regret and frustration over the way she thinks President Trump won the election by stoking racial grievances.

He was quite successful in referencing a nostalgia that would give hope, comfort, settle grievances for millions of people who were upset about gains that were made by others, Clinton said on CBSs Sunday Morning ahead of the Tuesday release of her campaign memoir, What Happened.

Host Jane Pauley replied, What youre saying is millions of white people.

Millions of white people, yeah, Clinton said. Millions of white people.

Clinton, the Democratic Party nominee in 2016, said she will not pursue the partys 2020 presidential nomination.

I am done with being a candidate, Clinton said. But I am not done with politics because I literally believe that our countrys future is at stake.

Her remarks on Sunday came a little more than a year after she gave a major campaign speech in which she described the disturbing connection between Trumps campaign and the alt-right, a small, far-right movement that seeks a whites-only state.

He is taking hate groups mainstream and helping a radical fringe take over the Republican Party, Clinton said in Reno, Nev., last year. His disregard for the values that make our country great is profoundly dangerous.

Trump responded at the time by saying that Clinton was using the oldest play in the Democratic playbook.

She paints decent Americans, you, as racists, Trump told a crowd in Manchester, N.H., after her speech.

In the Sunday interview, Clinton criticized Trumps inaugural address, which she said she attended in January out of a sense of duty, as a speech that spoke to the anger of some white voters.

Im a former first lady, and former presidents and first ladies show up, Clinton said. Its part of the demonstration of the continuity of our government. And so there I was, on the platform, you know, feeling like an out-of-body experience. And then his speech, which was a cry from the white-nationalist gut.

Clinton also criticized Trumps preparedness for the White House.

We have a reality show that leads to the election of a president. He ends up in the Oval Office. He says, Boy, its so much harder than I thought it would be. This is really tough. I had no idea,  Clinton said. Well, yeah, because its not a show. Its real. Its reality, for sure.

The former Democratic nominee said she has moved on from her election loss but acknowledged that the sting of defeat has not entirely faded away.

I am good, Clinton said. But that doesnt mean I am complacent or resolved about what happened. It still is very painful. It hurts a lot.
When Carlos E. Moore became a part-time municipal judge in Clarksdale, Miss., his first order of business was to remove the state flag from his courtroom.

The banner, adopted in 1894 and retained by Mississippi voters in a 2001 referendum, features the Confederate battle flag in its upper left corner and has been a continuing source of controversy, especially for African Americans such as Moore.

That flag  I do not believe it stands for justice, the 40-year-old lawyer said in an interview last week. I did not want it standing behind me as I tried to administer justice.

In fact, Moore would like to eliminate the flag all together. He has ignored death threats and asked the Supreme Court to intervene in what so far has been an unsuccessful federal lawsuit claiming the flag promotes white supremacy and violates the equal-protection rights of black Mississippians.

[In Mississippi, defenders of the state flag dig in]

It seems it would be a substantial lift to ask the Supreme Court to tell a state it cannot fly the flag it favors. Even Moores lawyer, Philadelphia attorney Michael T. Scott, acknowledges there is no reason to think the court is particularly anxious to join the national debate over what should be done about the nations lingering memorials to the Confederate States of America.

The state of Mississippi did not bother to file a response to Moores Supreme Court petition. But the court last month told the state it wanted to know more, and to file a brief.

So at least somebody at the Supreme Court does not think it is frivolous, Moore said.

Moores petition to the court says that the message in Mississippis flag has always been one of racial hostility and insult. It encourages violence, Moore alleges, and sends a message to African-American citizens of Mississippi that they are second-class citizens.

[Read the lower court decisions and Moores Supreme Court petition]

It seemed he had caught a break when his lawsuit was randomly assigned to U.S. District Judge Carlton Reeves.

Reeves, nominated by President Barack Obama, is only the second African American federal judge in Mississippi and already has made a name for himself.

He struck down the states law forbidding same-sex couples to marry, one of several rulings around the country that preceded the Supreme Courts decision in 2015 that such prohibitions violate the Constitution.

And Reeves became something of an Internet sensation in 2015 when he delivered an eloquent speech on racial animosity and his state's tragic past when sentencing three young white men who had killed an African American.

The simple fact is that what turned these children into criminal defendants was their joint decision to act on racial hatred, he said, in a long speech whose transcript went viral.

In Moores case, Reeves resurrected some of those themes.

He devoted about half of his 32-page decision to what he called historical context and dismissed the idea that the Confederate battle flag celebrates heritage, not hate, as supporters often declare.

It should go without saying that the emblem has been used time and time again in the Deep South, especially in Mississippi, to express opposition to racial equality, Reeves wrote. Persons who have engaged in racial oppression have draped themselves in that banner while carrying out their mission to intimidate or do harm.

He added, It is difficult to imagine how a symbol borne of the Souths intention to maintain slavery can unite Mississippians in the 21st century.

Still, Reeves wrote, Moore must lose.

To bring a federal lawsuit, a plaintiff must show an actual or imminent injury, specific and concrete to that person.

Moore needs to identify that part of the Constitution which guarantees a legal right to be free from anxiety at state displays of historical racism, Reeves wrote. There is none.

Scott, a corporate lawyer who normally represents pharmaceutical companies but had been looking to be involved in a case involving government endorsement of the Confederate flag, offered Moore help at the appellate level. Moores case next moved to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit, considered one of the nations most conservative.

But again, Moore seemed to luck out. His randomly assigned three-judge panel comprised a George H.W. Bush nominee and two judges nominated to the court by Obama, one of them African American.

Ive got to admit, when I saw that panel, I wasnt unhappy, said Scott. When I saw the opinion, I was.

The judges were unanimous in affirming Reevess ruling. The Equal Protection Clause demanded a showing of government action that hurts an individual, Judge Stephen A. Higginson wrote.

The gravamen of an equal protection claim is differential governmental treatment, not differential governmental messaging, he wrote.

Scotts petition to the Supreme Court asks the justices to look at it this way: If the Constitutions Establishment Clause means that a state may not favor one religion over another, its Equal Protection Clause should be read to prohibit a state from expressing the view that one race is superior to, or preferred over, another.

Under the 5th Circuits decision, Scott tells the court: A city could adopt White Supremacy Forever as its official motto . . . or a state could incorporate a Nazi swastika, as an endorsement of Aryan/white supremacy, in its state flag. So long as the governments race-based message was limited to speech, without further proof of a more tangible denial of equal treatment, it would be immune from attack under the Equal Protection Clause.

Moore acknowledges that the best way to accomplish his goal would be for Mississippis elected officials to change the flag. After white supremacist Dylann Roof killed nine people in the Charleston, S.C., church massacre, Confederate flags came down across the South.

But Mississippi remains the only state to incorporate the battle flag in its official emblem, and Moore said legislative efforts to change it have foundered. He sees no reason to believe that will change.

The final straw that led to his suit, he said, came in February 2016, a month traditionally celebrated as African American History Month. It was then that Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant (R) announced that April would be Confederate Heritage Month.
Florida Gov. Rick Scott said Sunday that hes been pleased with the responsiveness of the Trump administration as his state faces damage from Hurricane Irma. (Lynne Sladky/AP)

Top elected officials in Florida are so far pleased with the federal response to Hurricane Irma and expect Congress to consider an emergency relief package in the coming weeks with the full support of President Trump.

The president said, Look, I will provide whatever resources you need when I talked to him. I pretty much talk to him every day, Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) said on Fox News Sunday.

Its been very good, and there is cooperation between the federal level, the state and the locals, Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) said Sunday on CBSs Face the Nation, adding that the coordination between agencies has been seamless.

Nelson, who was first elected to Congress in 1978 and also has served in state office, said the federal responsewas better than in previous hurricanes, such as Hurricane Andrew in 1992, which devastated Florida.

The Trump administration on Sunday signaled its support for quickly sending emergency funds to states hit by the storm.

Last week, Congress passed legislation to give more than $15 billion in disaster aid to areas affected by Hurricane Harvey, which made landfall last month in Texas as a Category 4 storm, battering Houston and causing massive flooding.

Trump, who signed that measure Friday, spent Sunday at Camp David. While at the presidential retreat, he monitored Irma developments and received a comprehensive update on the storm, according to White House officials.

Beyond Scott and Nelson, Trump also spoke with Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and the governors of Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina and Tennessee  four more states that could be affected by Irma.

Together, we will restore, recover and rebuild, and well do it quickly, Trump said on Saturday in a meeting at Camp David.

Later Sunday, Vice President Pence visited the Washington headquarters of the Federal Emergency Management Agency along with several members of the Cabinet.

On Monday, Pence will travel to Shanksville, Pa., to commemorate the 16th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. He will tour and speak at the Flight 93 National Memorial.

FEMA Administrator Brock Long said there is great communication between Congress and the Trump administration as both prepare for handling the next iteration of emergency relief.

The Congress did its due diligence and passed the supplemental to allow us to keep moving, Long said on Fox News Sunday. And as Ive been saying, paperwork and money should not get in the way of saving lives, and I believe Congress recognizes that.

The Harvey bill passed a House vote, 316 to 90; every member opposed was a Republican, underscoring the opposition among some conservatives about attaching relief money to other legislation. The bill was part of a package that extended government funding and the federal borrowing limit until Dec. 8.

About the only good news in this whole endeavor is that it does provide funding for FEMA, and it does those sorts of things Ive talked about until December, which hopefully gives us time to go about doing it the right way, Rubio told Fox News Radio last week.

Meanwhile, two Senate Republicans generated interest Sunday for their personal efforts and struggles.

Sen. Tim Scott (S.C.), who said President Trumps moral authority was compromised by his response to the white-supremacist-fueled violence in Charlottesville last month, is set to meet with the president Wednesday to discuss race relations, said two people familiar with the meeting.

Scott, who has sharply criticized Trump and his rhetoric on racial issues, had expressed interest in meeting with the president before the violence, the people said, but that get-together took on newfound urgency after Charlottesville.

For Trump, the meeting with serve largely as a listening session, one of the people said. Both spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive meeting.

Trump came under intense criticism for his response to the white-supremacist rally in Charlottesville, which left one counterprotester dead and several injured. At the time, Trump refused to immediately condemn the violence and said that both sides were to blame.

Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), battling brain cancer, reflected on a life well lived in an emotional interview Sunday, saying he was very happy with his 81 years and noting, Every life has to end, one way or another.

Speaking to Jake Tapper on CNNs State of the Union, McCain offered an optimistic update on his health  the prognosis is pretty good  and acknowledged the challenges hes facing. Look, this is a very vicious form of cancer that Im facing, but all the results so far are excellent, he said.

McCain thanked the doctors overseeing his treatment, citing the Mayo Clinic and the National Institutes of Health, and presenting himself as a man at peace.

Im very happy with my life, Im very happy with what I have been able to do, he said. And theres two ways of looking at these things. And one of them is to celebrate. I am able to celebrate a wonderful life, and I will be grateful for additional time that I have.

When Tapper said he hoped it was not his last interview with McCain, the senator quipped, A lot of people want it to be the last.
Rank-and-file senators are eyeing the annual defense bill the Senate will take up this week as a chance to challenge President Trumps recent controversial moves on national security  but thus far, Republican leaders have resisted their efforts.

Senators of both parties are drafting amendments that would step up sanctions against North Korea, roll back Trumps order to ban transgender troops from the military and force Congress to vote within six months on a replacement authorization for use of military force, or AUMF, against extremist groups. Each of those initiatives grapples with an international crisis that Trump has tackled  with mixed reviews  in the past several weeks, from committing troops to combat in Afghanistan to promising fire and fury against North Korea.

But the defense bills gatekeeper, Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John McCain (R-Ariz.), has not promised support to any of the amendments and has been unclear about whether he will even allow the measures a vote on the floor.

The behemoth annual defense bill, which this year outlines $700 billion to improve military readiness, upgrade defense systems and fund combat operations, is an attractive vehicle for controversial measures because it is considered must-pass legislation. But McCain is wary of letting lawmakers wage too many policy fights on the bill.

Last week, McCain said he had not read, and may not even support, proposals to enhance sanctions against North Korea. He was similarly skeptical about Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) trying to counter Trumps ban on transgender soldiers, saying that right now its not necessary because Defense Secretary Jim Mattis froze the directive until Feb. 1.

McCain also appears to be ignoring Sen. Rand Paul's attempt to delay progress on the defense bill until Paul (R-Ky.) secures a vote on an amendment phasing out existing AUMFs after six months.

Why waste my time? McCain said when asked whether he was speaking with Paul.

The defense bill is, by sheer size, Congresss biggest policy and funding lift in any given year, apart from periodic budget and debt limit fights. For the past two years as chairman of his committee and several years before as the ranking Republican, McCain has refereed policy fights, faced down veto threats and sent the defense bill to the presidents desk, where it has ultimately been signed into law for the past 55 years.

There is poignancy in that task this year since McCain announced this summer that he had been diagnosed with brain cancer. His Senate colleagues, Democratic and Republican, pledged to move procedural heaven and earth to ensure McCain could see the defense bill through.

A controversial amendment could complicate that task. Still, McCain's skepticism toward amendments challenging Trump does not mean his defense bill is in lockstep with the president.

On Friday, the White House's Office of Management and Budget released a list of complaints about the Senate's defense bill, pushing back against prohibitions on base closures, restrictions on alternative pay structures for service members and restructuring at the Pentagon. The administration also objected to policy statements in the bill as Congress intruding on the president's constitutional right to conduct diplomacy and be commander in chief.

But the administration stopped short of a veto threat, even praising the bill for helping counter the Islamic State and end defense budget cuts known as sequestration.

That means the main hurdles for the defense bill are policy fights senators might raise.

If McCain is able to get around Pauls threats, the AUMF issue likely will not rise again. The chief agitators for an AUMF, Sens. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) and Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), are committed to addressing the topic in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, where they have been promised a markup soon.

Senate Banking Committee Chairman Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) has promised markups, probably next month, to the authors of the North Korea sanctions bills.

But that isn't fast enough for Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.), whose bill blocks firms and banks that deal with North Korea from the U.S. financial system, or for Sens. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) and Patrick J. Toomey (R-Pa.), whose bill models secondary sanctions against Pyongyang on the Iran sanctions Congress passed in 2010 and 2012. Their proposal also lets Congress block the president from rolling back sanctions on North Korea; the Trump administration objected vehemently to a similar provision concerning sanctions against Russia that Congress approved in July.

The North Korea proposals' authors want their measures attached to the defense bill. But it's not just McCain resisting their efforts  other leading Republicans also believe it is smarter, right now, to stand down.

Were much better off trying to work in conjunction, at this juncture, with the White House, instead of jumping out there and trying to pursue something independently, said Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker (R-Tenn.). He said the North Korean nuclear crisis has become too acute for Congress to act alone.

Gillibrand and Collins may also face difficulty drumming up support for a transgender troops amendment because despite bipartisan backlash to the presidents ban, the order has not been implemented. As of the end of last week, the senators drafts were not ready to circulate among colleagues.

But the main hurdle to proposals challenging Trump may simply be that congressional leaders do not have much time or space to maneuver. The Senates defense bill must be reconciled with the Houses product  a process promising policy fights of its own. And both McCain and his House counterpart are determined not to leave the military underfunded at a time when the president is grappling with so many international crises.

The most important thing we can do is get our work done . . . and thats a defense budget for the year, House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mac Thornberry (R-Tex.) said. The most important thing we can do is be strong militarily  that enhances Secretary [Rex] Tillersons plans in diplomacy, that gets the Chineses attention. . . thats the most important thing we can do.

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Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-11 00:51:03|Editor: yan

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SKOPJE, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Support for companies and for infrastructure and energy sectors will be the main pillars of the economic policies of the Macedonian government, Macedonian deputy Prime Minister Koco Angjusev said Sunday.

Angjusev told a press conference that the program for industrial growth and increase of the competitiveness of the Macedonian economy was already prepared, and would be announced on Wednesday.

According to Angjusev, the Macedonian government will propose several measures that will apply to all economic entities in Macedonia, i.e. both to foreign and domestic companies.

Angjusev told reporters that the only criterion that all companies would have to fulfill in order to get support by the government was to show an increase, thus certain funds that would be returned to their companies after the achieved results.

Further on, he said the Macedonian government would present a detailed report on the aid that Macedonia provides to foreign investors, noting that support to them would continue.
Cambodian opposition leader Kem Sokha, left, is escorted by police at his home in Phnom Penh on Sept. 3 after being accused of treason. (Agence France Press)

The opposition leader is in jail charged with treason, senior party officials have fled abroad and fear is spreading through Cambodia's civil society as a government crackdown intensifies ahead of national elections next year.

The arrest of the president of the Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP), Kem Sokha, in a raid of his home just after midnight on Sept. 2 sent shock waves through a country already on edge after attacks on nongovernmental organizations and the media.

In recent weeks, Radio Free Asia and Voice of America have been forced off the airwaves, an independent newspaper, the Cambodia Daily, was shuttered amid government pressure, and the U.S.-funded National Democratic Institute was expelled from the country.

Sokha has been accused of conspiring with the United States to overthrow Cambodias authoritarian government. He was charged with treason Tuesday and, if convicted, faces up to 30 years in prison while the opposition CNRP could be dissolved under a controversial law passed in February that bans party leaders with criminal convictions.

The 64-year-old is being held in a maximum-security prison near the Vietnamese border, unable to communicate directly with his deputies, several of whom have been named by government-aligned news outlets as being involved with the alleged plot.

His daughter, Kem Monovithya, said the opposition was no longer functioning while its leader remains behind bars and a cloud of uncertainty hangs over senior officials.

The mood in the country, especially among the CNRP officials, is full fear, she said. She is also a party official and has been named on a leaked blacklist that is fueling safety concerns.

Referring to the ruling Cambodian Peoples Party, she said, They are going to go after the whole leadership until the party cannot function anymore or until the party submits to the CPP, so that we would just be a puppet party that legitimizes the election in 2018.

The opposition plans to boycott an extraordinary session of the National Assembly on Monday that is being held to decide whether the courts can proceed with the case in light of Sokha's parliamentary immunity. Instead, CNRP lawmakers plan to gather outside the prison where he is being held, where government-aligned media report that they will be met by 300 police officers and soldiers.

CNRP Vice President Mu Sochua said the atmosphere was reminiscent of the period leading up to the bloody 1997 coup that saw Prime Minister Hun Sen oust his co-premier, Prince Norodom Ranariddh. Many of the opposition partys most senior officials have left the country, she said, amid the panic. The prime minister repeats the same thing: We will get to the accomplices of Kem Sokha. He can name anyone he wants. So, whos next?

The CNRP was formed in a 2012 merger of two opposition parties, and in June it made huge gains in nationwide local elections against the ruling CPP. That came after a surprise strong showing in 2013 national elections, when large numbers of votes cast by young people almost carried the opposition to victory. Months of unrest followed as supporters took to the streets to protest the result, dovetailing with garment sector wage demonstrations that ended when security forces shot into a crowd, killing at least five.

Since then, nongovernmental organizations working on sensitive issues such as labor advocacy and human rights say they have come under increasing pressure. The government has also indicated in recent months that it was investigating such organizations for alleged links to the CNRP.

Naly Pilorge, director of the Cambodian League for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights, said the government appears to be using almost every tool at its disposal to curtail the work of civil society.

This includes court cases, tax probes, hacking and aggressive, constant surveillance. Its been quite a range and its intensified at multiple levels, she said, adding that the situation began worsening in the run-up to the June ballot.

Moeun Tola, executive director of the Center for Alliance of Labor and Human Rights, said surveillance had expanded beyond leaders to encompass lower-level employees, who reported being followed and believed their phones were tapped.

Its not easy to reach out to communities at the moment, as the workers are always blocked or disturbed by authorities, he said.

Ministry of Interior spokesman Khieu Sopheak said that if NGO staff members did not break the law, they would not be under surveillance, dismissing those who made claims to the contrary as attention seekers.

The governments purported evidence in the case against Sokha is a 2013 video that shows him addressing a group of Cambodians in Australia about his attempts to create political change and the support he had received from the United States over the years.

Sopheak accused the opposition leaders supporters of wanting to mimic popular uprisings of the kind seen in Libya and Syria. They want to have chaos; they say it is democracy, he said.

Since the CNRPs electoral gains, ruling party officials have been warning of an Arab Spring-style revolt or a color revolution that would push Cambodia into civil war. Hun Sen, who has ruled the country for more than 30 years and on Wednesday vowed to continue for another decade, has given regular speeches replete with such warnings.

Lee Morgenbesser, a lecturer at Australias Griffith University who studies authoritarian regimes, said that even by the minimum standards Cambodia could not be described as a democracy.

The debate, if there is a debate, is to the degree of authoritarianism in Cambodia, he said.

Morgenbesser said the timing of the crackdown was explained by a U.S. retreat from human rights promotion in Southeast Asia while China offers Cambodia increasingly large sums of aid and investment with no conditions attached. This, he said, had allowed the ruling party to become emboldened at a time when it feels threatened by the possibility of relinquishing power.

"I'm not convinced it would be occurring [immediately] before the election, when there's more international focus on Cambodia and more domestic, for that matter," he said. "So I think if they were going to do it, they would have to do it now."

In Phnom Penh, the mood on the streets was seemingly unaltered, but concerns bubbled beneath the surface.

I dont care about politics, said real estate agent Kor Touch, because when you care about politics, it can cause you trouble.

Phearum Pheang, a cook, said people were aware of the crackdown but did not want to talk about it. They know that the power is being exercised by only one single person, he said. You know who they are.

Leng Len contributed to this report.

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Legendary documentarian Marcel Ophuls. The ability for people to stomach the seemingly unfathomable has long been a mainstay of Ophulss discerning  and some would say unforgiving  lens. (James McAuley/The Washington Post)

These days, Marcel Ophuls lives in the foothills of the Pyrenees, on the outskirts of a small village overlooking the mountains in the distance. The Spanish border is just over the horizon, which, in a sense, is the point.

The Academy Award-winning filmmaker, who forced France to confront its wartime past , smokes a cigarette as he speeds his silver Peugeot down a country back road toward his relatively modest house. He has lived here for decades, documenting the darkness of the 20th century. But his reasons for hiding out in the middle of relative nowhere, he insists, have more to do with return than retreat. It was over these same mountains that Ophuls and his German-Jewish family fled the Nazis in 1941  to Spain, Portugal and, ultimately, Los Angeles. Now, he sees the mountains every day.

You want to know why Im here? he asked, gesturing at the view from his terrace. Thats why. This house.

Ophuls, 89, is among the last surviving members of the generation that created Europes postwar consciousness, a dying breed of politicians, artists and intellectuals who responded to the catastrophe of World War II to ensure it never happened again. Best known for The Sorrow and the Pity, his nearly five-hour 1969 examination of Nazi collaboration in France, Ophuls has always been transfixed by the question of how ordinary people succumb to madness. For him, that question remains as urgent in 2017 as it was in 1933, the year Adolf Hitler came to power.

Recently, Ophuls said, he was shocked to see certain phenomena he never thought possible become undeniable realities. The first was the election of Donald Trump in the United States, of which Ophuls remains a citizen. The second was the rise of Marine Le Pen, the daughter of a convicted Holocaust denier, in France, his other nationality. Although Le Pen ultimately lost to Emmanuel Macron in May's second round of the French presidential election with 34 percent of the vote, she transformed a party that was once a fringe into a real-life force in the European political arena. The National Front, in some form or other, is here to stay.

She blew the election because during the last debate she got hysterical, Ophuls said, referring to Le Pens performance in the elections final televised faceoff. But thats just a matter of luck  it could have gone the other way.

Sometimes it does go the other way, as in the case of Trump. Ophulss fame largely derived from having held former Nazis and their collaborators accountable on camera. The U.S. presidents rhetoric and appeal have proved a surprising reminder of the subject Ophuls has spent a lifetime investigating.

During the campaign, [Trump] refused to repudiate the Ku Klux Klan, and with what just happened in Charlottesville, it took him a very long time to cease being neutral about what had happened, Ophuls said. And I dont think he lost a single one of his voters.

The ability for people to stomach the seemingly unfathomable has long been a mainstay of Ophulss discerning  and some would say unforgiving  lens. Ophuls rejects the notion that his films have a message. When pressed, he put it this way: Howard Hughes once said: If you want to send a message, use Western Union. Ive tried to avoid messages my whole life. And yet there is an undeniable red thread that appears to unite much of his work.

Here is what might be called the Ophuls thesis: One of the reasons I should be vegetarian like you is that I like animals better than people, he said. By now we are sitting on his terrace, where he eats a hamburger steak while I eat a bowl of boiled frozen vegetables he has kindly prepared for me. Most people will put up with just about anything, just as long as its not happening to them. Thats what we call human nature.

In the late 1960s, Ophuls interviewed the likes of Christian de la Maziere, a French aristocrat so seduced by fascism that he fought on the Eastern Front in Nazi uniform. In the 1970s  mostly for The Memory of Justice, which he considers his masterpiece  Ophuls turned his camera on the Americans who turned a blind eye to torture in Vietnam, as well as the French who refused to confront the bloody brutality that characterized the conflict in Algeria.

Along the same lines, Ophulss latest project  stalled in production  is a film about Israel and Gaza, tentatively titled Let My People Go. As he put it: The thought of Jews bombarding what in my mind is nothing more than a huge concentration camp seems to me unbelievable  and that is Gaza.

One might suspect, then, that populisms return in 2017 may not have taken a man like Ophuls by surprise, although he insisted that he did not see it coming. Im not a prophet, he said, and I didnt know about the disastrous effects that Facebook and Twitter would create. Years ago, he said, he created both a Facebook and a Twitter account but cannot be bothered to use either.

This is not to say he is averse to inserting his own identity in his work  quite the contrary. Along with haunting sequences of background music, an Ophuls trademark is the subtle presence of the filmmaker  cool and unflinching  throughout his films. He calls this subjectivity, and, for him, subjectivity is the key to ethical reporting in times like these: being honest about who one is as a filmmaker or journalist, and not suffering fools when one meets them.

Elie Wiesel, another member of Ophulss generation, put it this way: We must always take sides. Neutrality only helps the oppressor. Never the victim. Ophuls said much the same: If you want to defend your point of view, and not in some way lie down in front of the powers that be, it takes more courage.

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In this 2014 photo, American historian Nancy Hatch Dupree talks during an interview at the Afghanistan Center at Kabul University. Dupree, who spent decades in Afghanistan working to preserve the heritage of the war-torn country, has died following a long illness. She was 90. (Massoud Hossaini/AP)

Nancy Hatch Dupree was a rare American fixture in Afghan life and lore for half a century: a petite, adventuresome historian and bonne vivante whose efforts to preserve Afghan history and artifacts from the vicissitudes of conflict survived the Soviet invasion, the civil war and the Taliban.

She was still at it, organizing and running an archival center of 60,000 Afghan documents at Kabul University, when she died early Sept. 10 at age 89 in a hospital in Kabul. Waheed Wafa, a spokesman for the center, said she died of protracted heart, kidney and lung problems.

By midmorning, accolades and affectionate remembrances were pouring in from diplomats and preservationists, Afghan officials and Western friends spanning several eras.

Future generations will remember Ms. Dupree as a wonderful example of the strength of U.S.-Afghan relations and friendship, Hugo Llorens, the special charge daffairs at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, said in a statement. He described her as a pillar of the American community and said her love for this country and dedication to its culture and history will be forever remembered.

The grandmother of Afghanistan has passed away, Sattar Saeedi, an Afghan journalist, posted on Facebook.

Nancy Hatch was far from grandmotherly when she arrived in Kabul in 1962 as the wife of an American diplomat. Raised in India, where her father directed agricultural projects, she had studied Chinese history at Barnard College and Columbia University. She was 34, curious about Afghanistan and quickly bored with embassy teas.

She soon met Louis Dupree, a young ethnographer and archaeologist from North Carolina, who was also married. They fell in love, weathered the ensuing scandal, remarried and spent the next 25 years engrossed in a tumultuous romance with Afghan history, society and culture.

At first, during an era of liberal modernization in the Afghan capital, the Duprees became famous for throwing cocktail bashes known as five oclock follies. Together, Wafa wrote in a lengthy tribute Sunday, they galloped their horses, danced late into the night, and celebrated their marriage on a hilltop overlooking their beloved Kabul. Meanwhile, she wrote guidebooks and he researched ancient settlements.

That heyday crashed with the Soviet invasion of 1979. Louis Dupree was briefly imprisoned by the Moscow-backed Afghan government, and the couple fled to the United States, settling into university life in North Carolina. Later they moved to Peshawar, Pakistan, a nerve center for Afghan refugees. There they founded a resource and information center, collecting Afghan documents that would eventually form the basis of the Kabul University center.

Louis Dupree died of cancer in 1989, the year the Soviets pulled out of Afghanistan, but Nancy carried on their research, writing and collecting efforts. She waited out the civil war in Pakistan but said she made contacts with moderate Taliban officials after they took power in 1996, hoping to help preserve historic artifacts. Once, she said, she briefly met Osama bin Laden, the al-Qaeda leader who orchestrated several terrorist attacks, including the 9/11 attacks in the United States.

In 2005, three years after the return of civilian rule, she lugged a trove of material back to Kabul in agricultural sacks. The next year, she founded the university center and began curating thousands of documents reflecting years of conflict and political upheaval, refugee work and international involvement in Afghanistan.

Already in her 80s, Dupree once again became an active presence in Kabul. Charming but formidable, she pushed officials and donors to support her work and befriended a new generation of foreigners intrigued with Afghanistans story. She always spoke of carrying on her late husbands mission, but by then it had become mainly associated with her.

No one who met her could ever forget her, Lyse Doucet, a BBC correspondent who visited Dupree often, posted on Facebook. She did so much to preserve the history of Afghanistan . . . she takes some of it with her but leaves so much behind.

In 2013, after numerous delays, the university center opened in a majestic new building of Afghan stone, marble and cedar. Dupree was eager to make it attractive to Afghan students, not just visiting scholars. In an interview with The Washington Post in 2015, she said many young Afghans had grown up in refugee camps and learned little about their nation's history.

They dont have a sense of belonging to Afghanistan, of what does it mean to be an Afghan, she said. What we are trying to do is inject this idea that to have a sense of identity is what makes you strong.

Dupree, many of her admirers noted, remained strong to the last, fussing about organizing slides and promoting the university center even from her hospital bed.

Her body was frail, but her spirit and passion for her work was alive and well, said Andrew Wilder, vice president of Asia programs at the U.S. Institute of Peace in Washington, who visited her at Kabuls Amiri hospital Friday. He said she spent much of their conversation insisting that he tour the university center while in Kabul.

It is a very fitting legacy to her and her husband, Wilder said. It was her pride and joy.

Walid reported from Kabul.

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 The storm-stricken Caribbean took on the feel of a sprawling disaster zone Sunday, with Cuban first responders using inflatable rafts to navigate flooded streets as panicked families sent up social-media pleas in search of loved ones on hard-hit islands farther east.

On St. John in the U.S. Virgin Islands, people there are roaming like zombies, said Stacey Alvarado, a bar owner who managed to leave for the mainland. Her husband, who is still there, told her Sunday that residents and tourists are in shock. They dont know what to do. The island was wiped out. Its like the walking dead down there. Other islanders sent social media messages pleading for help, decrying looting and a series of armed burglaries.

We need help, wrote St. John blogger Jenn Manes. We need the United States government to step up. We need military. We need security.

In Cuba, where the government said it had evacuated 1 million residents, Hurricane Irma's driving winds and pelting rains sent roofs flying, knocked over trees, wrecked building and caused large-scale flooding along the northern coast. Officials in Havana warned of flooding that would last through Monday. In the city of Santa Clara, the Associated Press reported that 39 buildings had collapsed.

As streets turned into rivers, authorities took to inflatable rafts to access coastal neighborhoods. Some Cubans had even sought shelter in caves. The brutal storm struck Cuba along a coast studded with resorts that are among the pillars of the islands economy. Authorities warned of heavy damage from the storm, which has killed at least 25 people across the Caribbean.

The hardest-hit provinces are Camaguey, Villa Clara, Sancti Spiritus and to some extent Matanzas, the resort area of Varadero, which was directly in the path of the hurricane and where all the tourists were evacuated, Richard Paterson, the CARE organizations representative in Cuba, said by phone from Havana.

Power has been turned off throughout the city, in fact, throughout the country, he said. The electricity infrastructure received extensive serious damage.

European governments came under fire as critics accused them of being slow to respond to crises in their Caribbean territories, where massive damage left thousands homeless as looting broke out in the streets.

On Sunday, the French government announced that President Emmanuel Macron would travel to St. Martin, an island split between France and the Netherlands, on Tuesday. The French have already deployed more than 1,000 personnel to the Caribbean region in an aid-and-relief effort.

The evacuation of U.S. citizens from the Dutch side resumed Sunday, according to State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert, after being suspended in anticipation of Hurricane Jose, which later veered off to the north. Priority is being given to those needing urgent medical care, she said.

Residents in the devastated British Virgin Islands used Facebook in frantic calls for help.

One user, Lanein Blanchette, echoed many others still looking for word from relatives and friends whom they had not heard from since Irma began belting the region last week.

There is absolutely no news about East End on any of these pages, she wrote. Ive posted over ten times asking for assistance as to whether anyone has seen my uncle Kingston Iman Eddy and not one person has replied. I am lost for words at this point. I honestly dont know what else to do.

At the same time, dramatic tales of escape began to emerge.

Lauren Boquette, a 48-year-old restaurant manager on St. John, said his family had barricaded themselves in the bathroom of their home. When they emerged, he said, they saw a scene of total destruction.

It was beyond rough times, it was end-of-the-world times. Everything normal to us has been destroyed, he said.

Authorities in the devastated island nation of Antigua and Barbuda faced a historic effort ahead to rebuild. The island of Barbuda suffered damage to almost 100 percent of its structures.

In Barbuda, where they evacuated everybody, now they have to figure out where to start, how to construct basic need services, how to figure out what to do with families that lost their homes, said Jan Gelfland of the International Federation of the Red Cross.

Rachelle Krygier in Caracas contributed to this report.

Read more:

Hurricane Irma makes landfall in Florida Keys

Hurricane Irma ravages Caribbean islands

When you look at the carnage, you ask how anybody at all survived

Todays coverage from Post correspondents around the world

Like Washington Post World on Facebook and stay updated on foreign news
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-11 01:51:14|Editor: Zhou Xin

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ARUSHA, Tanzania, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Protected forest in northern Tanzania's Chome Nature Reserve is threatened by illegal activities of artisanal gold mining, authorities warned on Sunday.

Rosemary Staki, Same District Commissioner, said groups of artisanal miners have stormed the reserve in search of gold, polluting rivers and the ground with toxic substances.

The reserve lies in the Eastern Arc Mountains, and is located few kilometers from Mount Kilimanjaro, Africa's highest mountain.

Staki said that Tanzanian government plans to set up a patrol camp deep into the forest to save the 14,000 hectares of forests located in the Pare Mountains, between the West Usambara and the North Pare Mountains.

"I have witnessed the environmental destruction of highest scale. In some areas, 2 kilometers of the forest are completely destroyed by the miners," she said in an interview.

The official added that a team of forest rangers has been sent into the affected forests to remove the artisanal miners.

According to her, local governments have been tasked to come up with community policing groups as a sustainable measure to address illegal mining in the forest, which is surrounded by 27 villages.

Asteriko Mahiga, Officer Commanding District (OCD), said so far, six artisanal miners have been arrested for mining in the protected areas.

According to the country's Mining Act Number 14 of 2010, no one will be allowed to perform any exploration or mining activity without the approval of the authorities.
A resident walks outside her severely damaged home in Juchitan, Oaxaca. A 8.2-magnitude earthquake on Thursday night killed dozens in southern Mexico and left a wide trail of destruction. (Ronaldo Schemidt/AFP via Getty Images)

At night, they drape blankets on the sidewalks and drag bare mattresses to the middle of the road, away from precarious buildings.

They find what rest they can on park benches, in hammocks, on woven cots, in stringy Acapulco chairs, beneath tarps and lean-tos, or on the bare ground under a rainless sky.

The 8.2-magnitude earthquake Thursday night laid waste to hundreds of buildings in and around this small Oaxacan village, leaving residents effectively homeless as they endure aftershocks while awaiting a rebuilding effort that has barely begun.

Our house is now this almond tree, said Eneida Jimenez, a 55-year-old retired elementary school teacher and single mother of two whose home across the street was still standing, barely, its walls riven with massive cracks and its rooms littered with debris.

[The Mexican city with the highest number of quake deaths mourns  and gets to work]

Jimenez, her mother, her children, her grandchildren, and clusters of other neighbors and relatives pass their hours under the tree, waiting for government workers to catalogue the damage and maybe offer some assistance to rebuild.

Like many residents here, Jimenez does not have insurance for her home  We dont have this custom here, she said  and they will be relying on government aid or whatever remittances might be sent by relatives in the United States.

For 30 years, this was my sacrifice, my savings, the nights I ate, when I didnt eat, to give this house to my children, she said as she surveyed her broken home. And Ive lost everything.

Many Oaxaca residents worry about the structural integrity of their devastated homes, and they fear that the repeated rumblings might cause further damage. Since the earthquake, there have been hundreds of aftershocks, including a 5.2-magnitude quake Sunday morning in Juchitan, a few miles down the road.

[Dozens killed in massive earthquake off Mexico coast]

Hundreds of municipalities such as this one have been declared disaster zones across the southern states of Oaxaca, Chiapas and Tabasco, a part of the country that is poorer and less developed than other regions of Mexico. Juchitan has accounted for many of the 90 deaths from the earthquake. Residents in far smaller Asuncion Ixtaltepec have counted at least 11 dead, in addition to the blocks of ruined government buildings, schools and churches.

My great-grandfather built this house 80 or 90 years ago, and it collapsed in one minute, said Carlos Alberto Chinas Nolasco, a 21-year-old stylist sleeping under a slab of tin in his yard with the remnants of his destroyed house all around him.

Chinas was asleep Thursday night along with his father, a retired soldier; his mother, who runs a beer store; and his uncle when the earthquake struck. They fled outside and watched as their home fell to the ground.

[Mexicos cataclysmic history of earthquakes]

On Sunday, government cargo planes arrived in Oaxaca with supplies, and soldiers distributed food. Search teams picked through rubble, and religious groups handed out donations. Many quake victims said they had no idea where they would find the money to begin the rebuilding process.

Were just going to wait for some kind of support, Chinas said, amid piles of bricks and roof beams. These are ruins, and were left with nothing. Without any work. What are we going to do?

In the distance, trumpets heralded another funeral procession to the cemetery. Even the graveyards were not spared, with the quake cracking tombs and toppling headstones.

At the municipal cemetery in Juchitan on Saturday evening, Margarita Degante Lopez, 62, was laid to rest in a tomb with broken glass next to a gravesite with toppled flower vases.

She and her husband, Miguel Lopez, owned Hotel del Rio in Juchitan and were asleep there when the earthquake started. The couple, along with three other family members, were trapped when the building collapsed.

When we arrived at the hotel, we saw that it was pure rubble, said Degantes son-in-law, Gonzalo Martinez, a state government official, who attended the funeral. It was an extremely desperate moment for us, to think they were under the rubble and we couldnt do anything at that moment.

With the help of neighbors and authorities, four of the five family members were rescued; Degante did not survive. Her husband suffered cuts on his forehead and other injuries. When the family drove him home, they discovered that his house also had crumbled.

After watching his wifes funeral from his wheelchair, he could muster no words.

Im sorry, he said. I cant.

Read more:

Mexico just legalized medical marijuana

Fearing Trumps wall, Central Americans rush to cross the U.S. border

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Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 09/09/2017 (1892 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

INCIDENT 731

When: June 1, 2017

Where: Regent Avenue

A man and a woman riding a city bus stole personal items from the drivers purse.

Incident 731

INCIDENT 732

When: May 19, 2017

Where: 1200 block of St. Marys Road

A male entered a sunglasses store where grabbed several pairs of expensive glasses before fleeing. A customer gave chase and recovered some of the stolen glasses.
Hey there, time traveller!

This article was published 09/09/2017 (1892 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Winnipeg police officer shot by his own weapon on Aug. 7 has been released from hospital and is recovering at home.

The officer has been in hospital since his holstered pistol went off while entering his vehicle outside a south end grocery store where hed stopped to get lunch. He was on duty at the time of the incident.

The officer is a veteran member of city polices tactical support unit and had just finished a firearms training exercise before his gun discharged, severing three arteries in his leg.

Mark Mulligan / Houston Chronicle Files Most Winnipeg police officers carry a Glock 22 (top), but the injured officer carried a Glock 35 as a member of the tactical support unit.

In a past interview with the Free Press, a police spokesman described the officers injuries as life-altering.

Police say he was entering his vehicle with one hand on the door of his SUV and the other holding his lunch, when the shot rang out.

Following an investigation, police believe they know the reason the gun discharged, Const. Rob Carver confirmed Saturday.

He wouldnt provide details about what the investigation revealed, but Carver described the issue with the officers gun as not common, but not unique to Winnipeg.

Police say steps have been taken to make sure no other mechanical failures will happen with pistols carried by Winnipeg police.

While most Winnipeg police carry Glock 22s, the injured officer carried a Glock 35 as a member of the tactical support unit.

Semi-automatic Glock pistols, which the majority of city police carry, do not have external safeties. Instead, they have three mechanical safeties incorporated into the build of the gun: the trigger, a firing pin and drop safeties. These are independently operated, disengaging when the trigger is pulled and automatically re-engaging when released.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-11 01:56:16|Editor: yan

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SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- A new study challenges a long-held assumption in psychology that most human emotions fall within the universal categories of happiness, sadness, anger, surprise, fear and disgust.

Using statistical models to analyze the responses of 853 men and women, who are demographically diverse, to 2,185 emotionally evocative video clips, University of California, Berkeley, researchers have identified 27 distinct categories of emotion and created a multidimensional map to show how they're connected.

Moreover, in contrast to the notion that each emotional state is an island, the study published in the early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal indicates that there are smooth gradients of emotion between, for instance, awe and peacefulness, horror and sadness, and amusement and adoration.

"We don't get finite clusters of emotions in the map because everything is interconnected," study lead author Alan Cowen, a doctoral student in neuroscience at UC Berkeley, was quoted as explaining in a news release.

For the study, the study participants went online to view a random sampling of silent 5- to-10-second videos intended to evoke a broad range of emotions. Themes from the video clips included births and babies, weddings and proposals, death and suffering, spiders and snakes, physical pratfalls and risky stunts, sexual acts, natural disasters, wondrous nature and awkward handshakes.

Three separate groups of participants watched sequences of videos, and, after viewing each clip, completed a reporting task.

The first group freely reported their emotional responses to each of 30 video clips. "Their responses reflected a rich and nuanced array of emotional states, ranging from nostalgia to feeling 'grossed out,'" noted Cowen.

The second group ranked each video according to how strongly it made them feel admiration, adoration, aesthetic appreciation, amusement, anger, anxiety, awe, awkwardness, boredom, calmness, confusion, contempt, craving, disappointment, disgust, empathic pain, entrancement, envy, excitement, fear, guilt, horror, interest, joy, nostalgia, pride, relief, romance, sadness, satisfaction, sexual desire, surprise, sympathy and triumph. The participants converged on similar responses, with more than half of them reporting the same category of emotion for each video.

The final cohort rated their emotional responses on a scale of 1 to 9 to each of a dozen videos based on such dichotomies as positive versus negative, excitement versus calmness, and dominance versus submissiveness. Researchers were able to predict how participants would score the videos based on how previous participants had assessed the emotions the videos elicited.

Overall, the results showed that study participants generally shared the same or similar emotional responses to each of the videos, providing a wealth of data that allowed the researchers to identify 27 distinct categories of emotion.

Through statistical modeling and visualization techniques, the researchers organized the emotional responses to each video into a semantic atlas of human emotions. On the map, each of the 27 distinct categories of emotion corresponds to a particular color.

"We found that 27 distinct dimensions, not six, were necessary to account for the way hundreds of people reliably reported feeling in response to each video," said study senior author Dacher Keltner, a UC Berkeley psychology professor and expert on the science of emotions.
Was the Death of Two Young Girls Part of a Voodoo Ritual?

Four suspects have been arrested in the tragic deaths of two young girls whose bodies were found Friday on a farm in San Miguel County, Colorado, according to multiple reports.

The girls, who were between the ages of 5 and 10, were said to be dead for at least two weeks before being discovered in the rural southwestern Colorado farm about 30 miles west of the ski resort town of Telluride, the Associated Press reports.

In my 37 years as Sheriff, I have never seen anything as cruel and heartless as this, San Miguel County Sheriff Bill Masters told ABC News-13.

The four people arrested  23-year-old Frederick A. Blair of Norwood, 37-year-old Madani Ceus from Haiti, 50-year-old Nathan Yah from Haiti, and 53-year-old Ika Eden from Jamaica  have been initially charged with felony child abuse causing death, CBS Denver reports.

Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Click here to get breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases in the True Crime Newsletter.

All are being held in the San Miguel County Jail, ABC News-13 reports, as the San Miguel Sheriffs Office leads the homicide investigation with assistance of the Colorado Bureau of Investigation (CBI). It is not known if they have entered a plea or retained attorneys.

A fifth suspect named Nashika Bramble is still at large, ABC News-13 reports. She is wanted on various charges including second-degree murder.

Police are asking for the publics help in locating Bramble, who was last seen Wednesday morning hitch-hiking in the Norwood area, CBS Denver reports. Those with any information should call local dispatch at (970) 728-1911.

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Former Fox News host Eric Bolling, apparently responding to media reports that his late 19-year-old son committed suicide, says that authorities have informed us there is no sign of self harm at this point.

Bolling, the former Fox News host whose departure was announced by the network yesterday, confirmed earlier today that son Eric Chase Bolling died last night.

The death occurred just hours after Fox News announced that it had parted ways with the host and canceled his show The Specialists. Bolling had been under suspension since August during an investigation into accusations that hed sent lewd photos to female colleagues.

Autopsy will be next week, Bolling tweeted this afternoon. Please respect our grieving period.

Authorities have informed us there is no sign of self harm at this point. Autopsy will be next week. Please respect our grieving period.  Eric Bolling (@ericbolling) September 9, 2017

Bolling had previously confirmed news of his sons death. Adrienne and I are devastated by the loss of our beloved son Eric Chase last night. Details still unclear. Thoughts, prayers appreciated, Bolling tweeted this afternoon.

Eric Chase Bolling was found dead Friday night in Boulder, Colorado, where he was a student studying Economics at University of Colorado Boulder. Police are investigating the death.

Adrienne and I are devastated by the loss of our beloved son Eric Chase last night. Details still unclear. Thoughts, prayers appreciated.  Eric Bolling (@ericbolling) September 9, 2017

Fox News Channel released a statement today: We are very saddened to hear of the passing of Eric Bollings son. Eric Chase was a wonderful young man and our thoughts and prayers are with the entire Bolling family.

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Bollings colleagues and friends, from Jake Tapper and Sean Hannity to Kellyanne Conway, Donald Trump Jr. and Mike Huckabee, expressed their condolences today.

I am so sorry for your loss. I know how devoted you were to your son. I cannot fathom how difficult this must be. https://t.co/hJ56gmqGnf  Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) September 9, 2017

Love and prayers for friends Adrienne & Eric Bolling. May Eric Chase know eternal peace. https://t.co/rtoCsVpPGy  Kellyanne Conway (@KellyannePolls) September 9, 2017

My thoughts and prayers are with my friend @EricBolling and his family during this unimaginably sad time.  Monica Crowley (@MonicaCrowley) September 9, 2017

Deepest condolences, thoughts and prayers from all the Tappers, Eric. I am so, so sorry.  Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) September 9, 2017

Just heard that Fox colleague and friend @ericbolling 19 yr. old son died; Prayers for Eric and family.  Gov. Mike Huckabee (@GovMikeHuckabee) September 9, 2017

@ericbolling To my dear friend, please know we all love you, will be here for you and your family.  Sean Hannity (@seanhannity) September 9, 2017

Guy-wrenching news about #EricBolling 19-year old only son Eric. Erica and I weep for the Bolling family This is horrible, our condolences  Geraldo Rivera (@GeraldoRivera) September 9, 2017

So awful. My heart goes out to Eric and his family. Tragedy: Eric Bolling Son Dies | Mediaite https://t.co/8DvUNqqi9M  Don Lemon (@donlemon) September 9, 2017

This is incredibly sad. Just heartbreaking for this family. Deepest condolences. https://t.co/tRKxxkPUmW  Joy Reid (@JoyAnnReid) September 9, 2017

The death of a child is a pain no parent should have to bear. Hope you'll all join me in keeping @ericbolling and his family in my prayers.  Jedediah Bila (@JedediahBila) September 9, 2017

I am so sorry to hear about @ericbolling 's son.words are inadequate.  Greta Van Susteren (@greta) September 9, 2017

Praying for @ericbolling & Adrienne. Doug and I heartbroken. Lighting a candle for you all tonite.  Megyn Kelly (@megynkelly) September 9, 2017

You're in the thoughts and prayers of many today @ericbolling . Sending peace and strength to your family. https://t.co/JA1x6L3Cnd  Nicolle Wallace (@NicolleDWallace) September 9, 2017

Condolences and strength to you and family. so sorry Eric  Maria Bartiromo (@MariaBartiromo) September 9, 2017

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It was models night out in New York City!

Hollywood's hottest stars collided with fashion's best and brightest at Harper's Bazaar Celebration of Icons By Carine Roitfeld at New York's The Plaza Hotel on Friday.

RELATED: Selena Gomez and The Weeknd Step Out During NYFW -- See the Pics!

Kim Kardashian showed off her new silver locks in a platinum shimmering gown featuring cut out panels and a matching choker.

Photo: Getty Images

The reality star's sister, Kendall Jenner, meanwhile, showed off her model physique in a classic silhouette with a sexy, sheer twist. Earlier in the night, Jenner was honored with the Fashion Icon Of The Decade award at the Daily Front Row Fashion Media Awards.

Photo: Getty Images

RELATED: Kelsey Grammer's Daughter Mason Returns to NYFW as Mom Camille Gushes on Instagram: 'My Angel'

Heidi Klum also showed off her supermodel legs in a slinky gold number.

Photo: Getty Images

It was a family affair for the Hadids. Gigi made an entrance on the red carpet in a sparkling orange suit and matching shoes, while her little brother, Anwar, made his red carpet debut with his girlfriend, Nicola Peltz.

Photo: Getty Images

Photo: Getty Images

EXCLUSIVE: Rihanna Talks Beauty and Insecurities: 'I'm Very Realistic When I Look in the Mirror'

Cindy Crawford made a glam appearance with her husband, Rande Gerber, while their daughter Kaia, who made her runway debut on Thursday, walked the carpet solo.

Photo: Getty Images

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See more of the night's best looks below:

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Savanna Lafontaine-Greywind, the 22-year-old expectant mother who was allegedly murdered in August, was laid to rest Thursday morning in an emotional service.

It was a very beautiful service befitting of Savanna, family spokeswoman Janel Herald tells PEOPLE.

Lafontaine-Greywinds parents and her longtime boyfriend, Ashton Matheny, brought a newborn infant believed to be the baby that was ripped out of her womb, to the service. (Authorities are awaiting DNA testing to confirm that the baby, named Haisley Jo, is Lafontaine-Greywinds.)

It was wonderful that Haisley Jo was able to spend those moments along with her family, as well, she says.

Nearly 1,000 mourners joined the slain womans family and friends at the First Assembly Church in Fargo, North Dakota, to pay their final, tearful respects to Lafontaine-Greywind, who was remembered as kind and loving.

After the church service, a horse-drawn carriage carried the casket to the cemetery for a private burial. Ten horses followed behind in the somber procession, including one that didnt have a rider, signifying Lafontaine-Greywind, who according to reports was a member of the Spirit Lake Tribe.

The service included Native American songs and tributes, according to local news station KFYR TV.

Mourners wore red shirts to honor Lafontaine-Greywind and other murdered and missing indigenous women, the outlet reports.

Fargo Mayor Tim Mahoney said that the entire community lost a daughter, local news station KVRR reports.

She Loved Everyone

Lafontaine-Greywind was eight months pregnant when she vanished on Saturday, Aug. 19 after walking upstairs to the apartment of neighbor Brooke Lynn Crews, 38, who had asked her to model a dress she claimed she was sewing and needed to pin, according to the Fargo Police.

She and Matheny, her boyfriend of 7 years, were expecting their first child together and were planning on moving into a new apartment in Fargo in September.

Her parents were thrilled that their eldest child was going to become a mother. She loved everyone, her mother, Norberta Lafontaine-Greywind told PEOPLE previously.

Story continues

 Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Click here to get breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases in the True Crime Newsletter.

When Lafontaine-Greywind failed to return home after more than an hour that fateful Saturday, her worried parents called the police, who questioned Crews and searched her apartment, finding no sign of the mother-to-be.

Several days after Lafontaine-Greywind vanished, neighbors in the seven-unit apartment building where she lived with her parents and 16-year-old brother, told police they heard a baby crying, noting they were unaware that a baby lived in the building.

The apartment in Fargo, North Dakota, where Lafontaine-Greywind lived with her family and where she was last seen.

When authorities searched the neighbors apartment with a search warrant, they found Crews with a newborn, whom authorities strongly believe is Lafontaine-Greywinds baby girl but are awaiting DNA confirmation to prove that.

On Aug. 24, Crews and her boyfriend, William Henry Hoehn, 32, who police say also lived in the apartment, were both arrested and charged with conspiracy to commit murder, conspiracy to commit kidnapping and giving false information to police.

Both Crews and Hoehn remain in Cass County Jail where they are being held on a $2 million bond. They have not yet entered pleas to the charges against them.

Hoehns attorney, Steve Mottinger, had no comment. Crews attorney did not immediately return calls for comment.

The pair gave authorities information that led them to believe the baby belonged to Lafontaine-Greywind, but the pair would not reveal where her body had allegedly been taken, police said.

Nine days after Lafontaine-Greywind vanished, kayakers found her body in the nearby Red River, wrapped in plastic and duct tape.

Police have not released details about when or how LaFontaine-Greywind died or how the baby was allegedly taken from her.

 PEOPLEs special edition True Crime Stories: 35 Real Cases That Inspired the Show Law & Order is on sale now.

The court has since sealed search warrant records to help maintain the suspects rights to a fair trial, local news station Valley News Live reported.

A preliminary autopsy report said the young mother-to-be was a victim of a homicide. The baby has been placed under the care of Cass County Social Services while authorities await DNA confirmation.

Family was everything to Savanna, the Boulger Funeral Homes website says. She helped raise her niece, Odessa, and nephew Shane Jr. Those kids were a huge part of her life and everything she did revolved around them. All of Savannas family and Ashton will miss her tremendously.

A donation page has been set up for the newborn believed to be Lafontaine-Greywinds daughter, Haisley Jo, at https://www.paypal.me/SavannaGreywind.
Caty Davis, Miss Tennessee, will compete in the Miss America competition on Sunday, with a platform inspired by her late father. (Photo: Courtesy of Miss America)

When Caty Davis, Miss Tennessee, takes part in the 2018 Miss America competition on Sept. 10, shell be doing so for her dad  a man who took his own life four years ago after a long battle with alcoholism and opioid addiction.

I know Im honoring him today, being able to share the message that he tried to [share] for so, so long and just couldnt, unfortunately, Davis, 22, tells Yahoo Beauty. The disease was the problem. His intentions were good.

Miss America is a platform competition, after all, and mixed in with a lineup of other important issues  military families, mental illness, diabetes, disabilities, STEM for girls  is Daviss passionate personalized platform: Attacking addiction: Prevention, recovery, and restoring families.

Its the culmination of dealing with the effects of multigenerational addictions, including but not limited to her father, grandfather, uncle, and stepbrother, who took his own life five years ago, when he was just 23.

Its an emotional ride a lot of the time, but its nothing that Im not capable of doing, Davis, of Knoxville, says about speaking so publicly about her pain. I think that what Ive been through, and the loss, technically allowed me to become stronger and handle things differently than others. But I think it has allowed me to heal too. By sharing my story, Im kind of sharing what I was ashamed of for a really long time, and it doesnt have power over me anymore.

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Davis adds that she is always very aware of her hereditary risk of addiction. Honestly, just knowing that Im predisposed to it has helped me make decisions in my life and even handle peer pressure very differently than my peers, she says.

Davis first got involved with pageants when she was a teenager, joining local competitions as a way to showcase her singing talent. She won her first title as a junior in high school and moved into the Miss America Outstanding Teen pageant, placing second runner-up. Competing for the title of Miss America, she says, is an absolute dream come true.

Miss Tennessee Caty Davis says her father passed on to her a love of music. (Photo: Courtesy of Miss America)

Still, Davis is haunted with memories of the night, just after finishing her freshman year of college, when she learned her father had hanged himself in his garage and was found by her stepmother.

There was an undercover-looking squad car in my driveway when I returned home from dinner, Davis shares with Yahoo Beauty. They were like, We have to alert you as the next of kin, and she repeated the story, and I had to specifically ask how he had taken his own life. Then we had to wait for my sister [in high school at the time] to come home and relay the message to her, going through it all again. It was just absolutely horrific.

Her father had gone through rehab four times. I honestly knew he had taken a turn for the worse, she says. He had bounced back multiple times, hed gone to recovery and treatment centers before, so, this is horrible, but I was like, I hope he hits rock bottom and comes back up. And that didnt happen.

Davis hadnt been in contact with her dad during her freshman year of college but had seen through someone elses Twitter feed that hed been arrested for public intoxication. I was so ashamed but so worried the whole time that I wasnt speaking to him, she shares. But he was such a charismatic and fantastic, full-of-heart guy.

She didnt know much about her dads demons as a kid, as he did his best to protect Davis from them, she says.

He saw his own father battle with addiction and alcoholism, and he died in a drunk driving accident when my dad was 14. I realize now that when he wasnt there he was protecting us. Unfortunately, to us, it just felt like he was choosing drugs or alcohol over us, Davis explains. I realized he had an addiction, and I was a very intuitive child. The first time he relapsed was when I was in sixth grade, and we were actually at Myrtle Beach by ourselves. That was the first time Id ever seen my dad like that.

She says that competing in pageants was a way to make sense out of the chaos she grew up with.

Im a perfectionist to the tee. And with the pageants, I feel like I have control over things  things I couldnt control in my life, says Davis, who just received her degree in psychology from the University of Tennessee and hopes someday to work with kids and families who are struggling with addiction. I almost wanted to grab my dads attention, so pageants were a way. I know he is proud of me.

The 2018 Miss America Competition airs Sunday, Sept. 10, at 9 p.m. EDT on ABC.

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Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-11 02:01:18|Editor: Yamei

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THASSALONIKI, Greece, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Chinese investment in Europe is an opportunity instead of a threat, senior representatives of news agencies along the route said Sunday during the New Silk Road Forum.

Organized by Greece's Athens News Agency (AMNA), national agency of the Mediterranean country, the forum focuses on the cooperation of news agencies along the Belt and Road and aims at improving communication, facilitating trade and enhancing cultural ties.

Responding to the uninvited worry of some U.S. media on Chinese investment in Greece, Michail Psylos, president of AMP, told Xinhua that "nobody cares about the report."

China-proposed Belt and Road initiative "gives Greece the room and potential to upgrade its own role in the modern world as a member of the European Union," said the president in his opening remarks.

"We think the relationship between China and Greece is of strategic and geopolitical importance, and the news agencies in both countries wish to continue the promotion of the cooperation for it is mutual beneficial for the two countries and the two peoples," he told Xinhua.

Miguel Sanchez, Spain's EFE Agency's director economic and financial sector, said that "we are very happy to see in these days the growing number of Chinese companies in Spain... because Chinese companies are offering more and more high-quality products."

As to the competition between Chinese and local companies, he said that Spain should be creative on this issue, "because it is a way to improve local business."

Responding on the "threat" of Chinese investment hyped by some Western media outlets, he said he is not the right person to comment because he is not a politician.

But he still gave his explanation. China is "growing and becoming more and more competitive each day, the best way to fight against you is to say that you are doing nothing or doing things in the wrong way," he told Xinhua.

Chinese investment is not focused on one country, but is a boon to the economic development of countries in the South Europe, said Nenad Babic, executive officer of Serbia's TANJUG news agency.

"The Belt and Road initiative proposed by the Chinese government has given us a chance to strengthen our relationship in more than just political way. Concrete projects with Chinese investment obviously facilitate that process," said Babic.

"China invested in Serbia's biggest iron producer under the framework of Belt and Road initiative. The construction of the railway connecting Serbia and Hungary will be done also with the financial help of Chinese banks. The railway will connect the south Europe with the Piraeus port in Greece which will facilitate the big trade in the whole region," he told Xinhua.

During the forum, representatives from 25 news agencies agreed to further strengthen the cooperation in such fields as economy, science and technology as well as people-to-people exchanges.

In his speech, Zhang Sutang, vice president of China's Xinhua News Agency, said that Xinhua is willing to cooperate with other news agencies along the Belt and Road to build an information-sharing platform and expand room for media cooperation, so as to play a more active role in building a more beautiful world.

Agencies from China, Greece, Spain, Russia, Italy, Bulgaria, Serbia, Poland, among others, were represented at the forum. At the end of the forum, delegates from the 25 news agencies unanimously approved a joint declaration to enhance relations and strengthen their contacts at all levels.
(ROME)  Florence prosecutors on Friday were investigating allegations by two U.S. students that they were raped by Carabinieri policemen who escorted them home in a patrol car from a nightclub, allegations the U.S. State Department said it was taking very seriously.

Italian authorities said the 21-year-old students were questioned by prosecutors for several hours Thursday about their allegations. The women accused the officers of raping them early Thursday morning in their apartment building.

Italy has two main police forces that patrol its streets  the paramilitary Carabinieri, which are under the defense ministry, and the state police, who report to the interior ministry.

Italys defense minister said the two policemen will be immediately suspended if rape charges are lodged against them.

Investigation is still underway, but there is some basis in respect to the allegations, Minister Roberta Pinotti said Friday evening at a forum about womens issues in Milan. Rape is always something grave. But its of unprecedented gravity if it is committed by Carabinieri in uniform, because citizens turns to them and to their uniform to have assurances and security.

Italian media say three patrol cars went to a nightclub to investigate a fight. Two cars left after calm was restored, but the third remained. The women, who reportedly spent the evening in the nightclub, told authorities that the officers drove them to their apartment building and raped them.

News reports described witnesses as confirming that they saw the women enter the patrol car.

The U.S. consul general in Florence met for about an hour with Florences state police chief Friday morning about the case, the Italian news agency ANSA said.

The U.S. Embassy in Rome refused to comment due to the sensitive nature of this case and to protect the privacy of those involved.

The women reportedly arrived in Florence several months ago to study Italian at a language institute.

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Florence, with its many museums and churches full with Renaissance masterpieces, is a popular destination for many Americans, especially university students.

One heavily followed crime case involved the murder of American Ashley Olsen in her apartment in January 2016. Later that year, a court in Florence convicted a Senegalese man of killing the 35-year-old and sentenced him to 30 years in prison. An autopsy had determined that she had been strangled and suffered skull fractures.

Witnesses said Olsen and her attacker had met at a Florence nightclub a few hours before she was killed.
MIRAMAR, Fla.  A makeshift sign hanging from a fence outside of New Renaissance Middle School warned residents seeking last minute shelter from Hurricane Irma that the schools gym had reached its capacity and couldnt accept any more people.

Outside, nearly 160 cars filled the schools main parking lot. Inside, hundreds of people had gathered.

Hurricane Irma, one of the most powerful storms to ever form in the Atlantic Ocean, is expected to make landfall somewhere in southern Florida early Sunday morning. And in the hours and days before it does, schools across the states southernmost counties have transformed into shelters for people seeking refuge from the storms fury.

Miami has become a ghost town just one day before Hurricane Irma is set to hit. (Photo: Sebastian Murdock / HuffPost)

New Renaissance opened on Thursday and reached capacity by Friday evening.

Yesterday we had a busy day getting everyone in, but we got everyone in safe and secure, said Mark Norville, the schools head of facility services. Organizing, putting them into place, getting everybody into a comfortable spot. We wanted to make sure everyone who got in was comfortable, and we were able to reach that goal.

New Renaissance is one of 21 schools in Broward County, which sits just north of Miami and includes coastal towns like Fort Lauderdale, that is now serving as a shelter. To the south, Miami-Dade County opened 42 schools to shelter vulnerable residents who couldnt evacuate before the storm.

In case you or someone you know is seeking shelter in Miami-Dade, here's the full list. 43 total, 3 pet-friendly, 6 at capacity. #Irma pic.twitter.com/NxG2VOwMi6  Travis Waldron (@Travis_Waldron) September 9, 2017

Not everything has gone according to plan. In certain locations in Miami-Dade County on Friday, confusion set in among some local residents as certain shelters reached capacity, and others that had been announced as open werent quite ready yet.

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But at New Renaissance, the process has been smooth so far, said Red Cross volunteer Pauletta Scott.

Everybody is compliant, to say the least, Scott said as she stood outside the shelter. Theyre not happy, but they are following the rules.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) and local officials have ordered more than 6 million Florida residents  including at least 650,000 who live in Miami-Dade County  to evacuate their homes ahead of Irma, which could smash the state with winds in excess of 130 miles per hour. Storm surges could send 2- to 4-foot walls of seawater into coastal towns, and Broward County officials said they expect 10 to 20 inches of rain.

That threat has made the schools-turned shelters a vital resource for many Floridians who couldnt afford to evacuate the state or didnt get out in time, and they are a sign of how well state and local authorities have prepared for the storm, Pauletta Scott said.

As a Red Cross volunteer, Pauletta Scott has worked through Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans and Hurricane Sandy in New York. Compared to those storms, Scott said, Florida is an A1 prototype for how to prepare for a potentially catastrophic storm.

Still, its been a trying few days for volunteers and those seeking shelter alike. Since doors across the state opened Thursday, thousands of people seeking refuge have swarmed shelters seeking help. Broward County had served 16,000 people as of Friday night, according to the countys emergency management division. Miami-Dade Countys shelters have the capacity to accept 100,000 residents.

Even with those resources, shelters in more vulnerable areas have filled rapidly, leaving some residents stuck outside and searching for the next closest option. It hasnt been easy to turn people away when shelters get full, but Red Cross volunteers have tried to direct those in need to other areas that still have room.

A Red Cross volunteer at North Miami Beach High School comforts an elderly woman turned away from the shelter. She was given locations of other shelters in the area still open. (Photo: Daniel Fox / HuffPost)

When we turn them away, we do it lovingly, we do it with empathy, Scott said. We dont turn them away until we have to.

Scotts words were echoed at another shelter, where Red Cross volunteers had to turn away elderly and direct them to shelters still open.

If I could take you in, I would take you in  swear on my heart, one volunteer said Friday afternoon at North Miami Beach High School, which had accepted 400 people in the previous 24 hours.

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At a high school in North Miami, shelter is already full. Red Cross worker tells me 400 people came in within 24 hours. pic.twitter.com/2SUzFDFHpO  Sebastian Murdock (@SebastianMurdoc) September 8, 2017

Though North Miami Beach High was at capacity Friday, Miami-Dade County now lists it among the 31 that are still open. New Renaissances capacity could also fluctuate depending on the scope of the emergency, Scott suggested.

While anxiety is still present, those staying at New Renaissance Middle School Saturday said people have generally been getting along.

Its my first hurricane, said Alexander Jackson, who worked for a traveling carnival circuit in Indiana before it brought him to Florida last year. Here is nice, aint had no problems. Everybody is cool, calm, collected. Nobody fighting, no one doing any wrong, just waiting for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Joe Vano stood outside smoking a cigarette as he watched gray clouds twist and glide forward. A native New Yorker, Vano came to Florida ten months ago for work with AT&T. Its his first hurricane.

Ive never done this before, Vano told HuffPost. I usually leave, I go west. I just didnt make it this time. Everybody left and I was basically left behind.

While Vano has a house in Hollywood, Florida, he said it wasnt an option to stay in a home built like a tin can. But he said hes making do at the shelter.

Im not worried at all, Vano said of the impending storm. I come from New York, you know how it is, man. You deal with a lot out there, so this is not a big deal. This is my first time but why should I be nervous? Whats gonna happen is whats gonna happen. They got mattresses.

As he finished his cigarette, the darkening skies opened, dumping rain onto the shelter below. It was time to go back inside.

This article originally appeared on HuffPost.
Bobigny (France) (AFP) - A Jewish family was beaten, held hostage and robbed in their home near Paris because of their religion, French authorities and anti-hate groups said Sunday.

Three attackers burst into the house in the Paris suburb of Livry-Gargan late Thursday, cut off the electricity and confined three members of a Jewish family, beating them and threatening to kill them, until one of them managed to escape and alert the police, said anti-Semitism watchdog BNVCA.

It said the assailants told the three victims: "You are Jews, you have money. We take money from Jews to give to the poor."

One of the victims was Roger Pinto, the 78-year-old head of Siona, an association "defending the Jewish people and the state of Israel," Pinto's lawyer, Marc Bensimon, said.

Pinto was kicked several times in the head and throat, Bensimon said. The other two victims were Pinto's wife, who managed to sound the alarm, and Pinto's son.

The assailants made off with jewellery, cash and credit cards, the attorney said.

Police said they had opened a formal inquiry into illegal detention, theft and extortion with violence motivated by the religious affiliation of the victims.

French Interior Minister Gerard Collomb promised a major effort to arrest those responsible "for this cowardly act (which) appears directly linked to the victims' religion".

"Everything will be done to identify and arrest those who carried out this foul attack," he said in a statement.

The BNVCA condemned what it called a "clearly anti-Semitic" crime.

Francis Kalifat, president of the CRIF umbrella grouping of French Jewish organisations, said "this horrible act is proof that Jews in France are particularly threatened in the street... and even in their homes."

French Jews, the largest community outside of the United States and Israel, have been leaving France at a steady pace for around a dozen years.

Some 5,000 departures in 2016 add to the record 7,900 who left in 2015 and 7,231 in 2014. In total, 40,000 French Jews have emigrated since 2006.

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The community was shocked in 2006 by the kidnapping and brutal anti-Semitic killing of a 23-year-old Jewish man, Ilan Halimi, in the Paris suburbs, which was followed by a shooting in a Jewish school in the southwest city of Toulouse in 2012.

Experts and members of the Jewish community in France say that the terror attacks in recent years -- including one at a kosher supermarket in January 2015 -- are not the only reason people are leaving.

Family, religious and economic reasons have also played a role in decisions to emigrate.
(NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J.)  A judge sentenced a former New Jersey police officer on Thursday to 20 years in prison for firebombing his supervisors home, and said his time on the force was a complete fraud.

Under terms of a plea agreement, Michael Dotro, 40, of Manalapan, must serve 17 years before hell become eligible for parole.

The reality is that this person took his position as a police officer and turned it into a nightmarish story line, Superior Court Judge Pedro Jimenez said.

Dotro did not speak during Thursdays sentencing. He had been an Edison police officer for 10 years.

He previously pleaded guilty to attempted murder and arson. He admitted setting fire to Edison police Capt. Mark Anderkos home in Monroe Township in May 2013. Anderkos wife, two children and mother were in the house at the time, but werent injured.

Authorities have said Dotro was angry about a recent transfer and a forced psychological evaluation.

Sneaking up on a home in the early morning hours while everyone was asleep and knowing that other people were in the home, thats depraved, theres no doubt, the judge said.
Barack Obama has delighted students at a Washington DC school after walking into their classroom unannounced.

Pupils at McKinley Tech High school gasped and screamed in excitement at the sight of the former president, who has largely avoided the public eye since leaving office.

The visit, video of which was shared on Mr Obama's Instagram account, was part of "supporting the next generation of leaders", a spokesman said.

Proud of these McKinley Tech studentsinspiring young minds that make me hopeful about our future. pic.twitter.com/nqYC1mjjTB  Barack Obama (@BarackObama) September 8, 2017

Hey, hows it going everybody? Mr Obama said, as he strode into the room.

The chancellor told me you guys were meeting, so I thought Id stop by. You dont mind me crashing, right?

As pupils reacted in an apparent state of disbelief at the surprise visitor, the former leader added: One of the things that I did throughout my presidency was Id meet with groups of young people everywhere I went, whether it was here in the United States, or travelling overseas just to kind of hear from them, find out what theyre interested in.

I do believe that most of the problems that we have are going to be solved by you.

Before he left the building he told one girl: "Remember what I say: don't back down".

As he departed, students could be heard screaming in excitement.

Mr Obama's spokesman Keith Schiller said in a statement the former president attended the school for a discussion with students about their life goals, pursuing higher education and giving back to their communities.

President Obama is focused on supporting the next generation of leaders," he said. Todays meeting is part of that ongoing conversation with young people.

The former president recently condemned Donald Trump's decision to axe the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (Daca) immigration policy  one of Mr Obama's signature manoeuvres  calling the decision cruel, self-defeating and wrong.

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Mr Obama had personally appealed to Mr Trump to keep the programme, which prevented nearly 800,000 people who came to the US as children from being deported.

Whatever concerns or complaints Americans may have about immigration in general, we shouldnt threaten the future of this group of young people who are here through no fault of their own, who pose no threat, who are not taking away anything from the rest of us, Mr Obama said.

Mr Obama will reportedly be hosting his first fundraising event for the Democratic National Committee later in September in Washington. The money raised will go towards state parties and upcoming elections in Virginia.
London (AFP) - The premier of the British Virgin Islands on Sunday called for the UK to provide long-term support in the wake of Hurricane Irma, which killed five people in the territory.

"We are a resilient people but this has shaken us to our core," Premier Orlando Smith said, describing the "critical" situation after the islands were struck by the superstorm.

British military personnel have been deployed to the archipelago, with the Royal Navy on Sunday saying locals had helped a helicopter crew unload medical supplies, including vaccines.

While Smith praised efforts so far by the Marines and engineers, he called on London to craft more substantial plans for the territory, home to roughly 28,000 people and heavily reliant on tourism.

"A comprehensive economic package for reconstruction backed by the UK Government will be needed over the long-term in order to return to normalcy," he said.

The British Virgin Islands will need "major help to rebuild people's homes, buildings, livelihoods", British billionaire Richard Branson, who owns Necker island, said Thursday.

Five people were killed in the territory when Irma struck the Caribbean with winds of up to 294 kilometres (185 miles) per hour. The region's overall death toll is at least 30.

The British government held an emergency meeting on Sunday to discuss the hurricane, which Foreign Minister Boris Johnson described as a "catastrophe that's engulfed our friends."

Johnson said three planes would be flying to the region on Sunday to support the relief effort, while 500 troops were already in the area hit by Irma.

Fifty-three police officers were also being deployed "to help sort things out, get these wonderful places back on their feet," Johnson said.

As well as delivering emergency shelter kits, rations and water, Britain's ministry of defence said troops were working on re-establishing communications on the British Virgin Islands and clearing the runway to allow further aid to reach the islands.
Beijing (AFP) - Chinese President Xi Jinping called on France to help ease the situation in North Korea during a phone call with French President Emmanuel Macron, state media said Friday, days after Pyongyang's largest ever nuclear test.

The conversation came one day after statements from China supporting stronger sanctions against Pyongyang and "necessary measures" at the UN Security Council, where China and France both hold vetoes.

"China hopes that France, as a permanent member of the UN Security Council, will play a constructive role in easing the situation and restarting dialogue" on North Korea, Xi said, according to state broadcaster CCTV.

North Korea triggered global alarm Sunday with its most powerful nuclear blast to date, claiming to have successfully tested a hydrogen bomb.

During the call, the Chinese leader expressed his desire for the "denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula," which he had also noted during a conversation with German Chancellor Angela Merkel hours earlier.

Macron told Xi that France is willing to strengthen cooperation with China to promote the proper settlement of the nuclear issue.

Macron "reiterated the international community's condemnation of North Korea's provocations," the French president's office told AFP.

"These provocations call on the international community to place new pressure towards the goal of bringing Pyongyang back to negotiations and avoiding dangerous escalations," it said.

On Thursday, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi had said: "China agrees that the UN Security Council should respond further by taking necessary measures."

Earlier, Merkel's spokesman Steffen Seibert said the German leader and Xi both agreed to support tougher sanctions against North Korea.

China, which is the North's biggest ally and accounts for 90 percent of its trade, is seen as key to efforts to convince Pyongyang to abandon its weapons programme.

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Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States are the other veto-wielding permanent members of the security council.

Xi also spoke to US President Donald Trump over the phone Wednesday, telling his American counterpart that China remains firm in its wish to resolve the situation through talks leading to a peaceful settlement.

The US has accused North Korea of "begging for war" and pushed for the "strongest possible measures" against Pyongyang.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, who held talks with Xi in eastern China during the BRICS summit earlier this week, has repeatedly insisted that further economic pressure on Pyongyang will not work.

Beijing has been infuriated by Seoul and Washington's full deployment of the Thaad missile defence system in South Korea, which the allies say is to defend against threats from the North.

The four remaining launchers were deployed on Thursday, and South Korean President Moon Jae-in said Friday the installation was an inevitable decision to protect his country from Pyongyang's provocations.

"While North Korea's nuclear and missile technologies continue to advance, we have no choice but to increase our defense capabilities to the maximum level," he said.

However, Moon said the full deployment of the US missile shield in South Korea was "temporary".
Washington (AFP) - The US-led coalition on Friday pulled aircraft from the skies above a convoy of Islamic State buses stranded in the Syrian desert so regime and Russian forces could go past, officials said.

Coalition drones had been circling the stranded 11-vehicle convoy for days and periodically picking off IS fighters if they strayed too far from the vehicles.

The buses themselves, which are packed with civilians believed to be family members, have not been targeted. As many as 200 jihadists and 200 civilians, thought to be family members, are on board.

The fighters had been headed from Lebanon to the Iraq border under an evacuation deal negotiated between IS and the powerful Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah, which has intervened in the war in neighboring Syria to prop up the Damascus government.

Russia notified the coalition through a special "deconfliction" line that regime forces were going to be passing through the area on their way to the city of Deir Ezzor, and asked for US aircraft to clear the area.

"To ensure safe deconfliction of efforts to defeat ISIS, coalition surveillance aircraft departed the adjacent airspace at the request of Russian officials during their assault on Deir Ezzor," the coalition said in a statement.

A US defense official told AFP the coalition was able to monitor the convoy until regime forces had passed through the area, but he would not say if the coalition was continuing to watch the buses.

The United States has repeatedly stressed that it was not party to the Hezbollah deal and said the fate of those aboard the buses was not a coalition issue.

"The regime's advance past the convoy underlines continued Syrian responsibility for the buses and terrorists," Brigadier General Jon Braga, director of operations for the coalition, said in a statement.

"As always, we will do our utmost to ensure that the ISIS terrorists do not move toward the border of our Iraqi partners."
Flagstaff Unified School District teachers and principals have been working on a plan to improve AzMERIT scores at the districts schools for the past year, said Robert Hagstrom, the director of research and assessment for Flagstaff Unified School District. And theyre about to release those plans to the public at the Sept. 26 FUSD Governing Board meeting. The districts AzMERIT scores will also be discussed at the meeting.

Each schools teachers and principals were asked earlier this year to take information from last years AzMERIT scores, student grades and other metrics and come up with a comprehensive plan to improve the curriculum and how students are taught at each school, Hagstrom said. Each plan, once it is finalized, will be posted to each schools webpage.

AzMERIT isnt the best measurement of a students overall knowledge and parents and the public need to take that into account when looking at the scores, he said. It only tests two subjects. It doesnt take in all the variables in the curriculum, the school community, student grades, the way a class is taught, etc. Its hard to tell exactly why the number of students passing English or math may be up in one school or grade level and down in another.

Its a shot in the dark, he said. Im not trying to make excuses, but its just one source of information.

All of the other data that the district has collected on student progress over the years has shown that FUSD students are doing pretty darn well, but we still want them to do better, he said. He said a study of the last 10 years of data from both AIMS and AzMERIT shows a gradual improvement in both FUSD student and Arizona student scores.

Weve had an intervention framework for students in the schools for several years, he said. Students who need extra help learning a concept are first given extra help in the classroom. If they need additional help a more focused approach is taken. Students who need additional help, usually ones with special needs, are given more one-on-one instruction outside of the classroom during the school day.

Hagstrom said the intervention process is solid but each school is different -- they have different teachers, principals and students who all learn and teach in different ways. The data story plans principals and teachers are working on for each school are designed to complement the current intervention system and tweak it to improve education at each school for all of the schools students.

Theyre targeting the weakest parts of the all the data that weve collected and creating an improvement plan, he said.

That improvement plan includes a districtwide quarterly assessment that will test first-grade through eighth-grade students before, during and just before the end of the school year, Hagstrom said. The tests are designed to be completed in a day and to let teachers know where students are on specific subjects and get students timely, additional help.

Hagstrom is also worried about the letter grades the state is due to release in early October for schools. The committee in charge of creating the formulas for the letter grades has been having trouble figuring out the best way to calculate the grades. The grades are supposed to be based on the improvement of individual students and the improvement of each school. The committee is having a hard time balancing the ability of school to earn an A without making it too easy. The formulas and the information used in them to calculate the grades has become so complex that Hagstrom worries that parents, teachers and principals may have a hard time understanding how the grades were arrived at.

Im having a hard time figuring out how theyre calculating it and Ive dealt with these kinds of calculations for years, he said. If parents, teachers and principals cant easily figure out how the grades are calculated it will difficult to figure out where changes in curriculum and teaching need to be made to make improvements.

If parents really want to know how their children are doing, they should speak directly with their childs teachers, Hagstrom said. Teachers are always the best source of information on how a student is doing.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-11 02:16:22|Editor: yan

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CAIRO, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- The Egyptian-U.S. joint military exercise, known as "The Bright Star," kicked off on Sunday at a military base in Egypt, the Egyptian military spokesman said in a statement.

The 10-day joint maneuver activities will continue until Sept. 20, including joint land, air and naval operations, Egyptian Military Spokesman Tamer al-Refaay said in the statement.

On the sidelines of the training, a research symposium will be held to exchange visions on strategic topics on the international arena and Egypt's comprehensive strategy of fighting terrorism, Refaay added.

Launched in 1981, the joint biennial training has been suspended since 2009, due to the ouster of former presidents Hosni Mubarak and Mohamed Morsi in addition to the dissatisfaction of former U.S. President Barack Obama's administration with the Egyptian new leadership.

Obama's successor, U.S. President Donald Trump promised to resume the exercise. Both Trump and Sisi have repeatedly exchanged remarks of praise and promised further cooperation and partnership.

"The Bright Star exercises reflect the depth of strategic cooperation between the Egyptian and the U.S. armed forces," said the Egyptian military spokesman.

Resumption of the Bright Star comes a few weeks after Washington announced to withhold some 300 million U.S. dollars of aid to Egypt over human rights concerns.

Egypt receives an annual of 1.5 billion U.S. dollars in military and economic aid since it signed the 1979 U.S.-sponsored peace treaty with Israel.

Earlier in April, the Egyptian and the U.S. navies launched a joint exercise in the waters of the Red Sea, known as "Eagle Salute 2017," where Italy, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Kuwait and Pakistan participated as monitors.
A Philadelphia father was killed after he refused to give up his keys to carjackers while his 2-year-old daughter was in the backseat.

Gerard Grandzol was returning home Thursday evening with his little girl when two men tried to rob him, police said.

Read: 3 Dozen Cops Give Kind Send-Off to Slain Officer's Son on First Day of Kindergarten: 'I Was Blown Away'

The 38-year-old gave the men his wallet, but would not give up his keys because his toddler was still in the SUV, police said.

Grandzol was reportedly shot at least once in the face.

Emergency responders found his daughter crying in the backseat, police said.

The dad died later at a local hospital.

We blindly lost a beautiful soul on September 7th, who tragically gave his life to protect that of his two-year old-daughter, the family wrote on a GoFundMe. We will never be able to replace the, love, laughter and light that Ger brought to our lives.

Grandzol was a dad of two. His other daughter is just 6 weeks old.

Maurice Roberts, 21, of Philadelphia, and his 16-year-old brother were later arrested by police in connection with the murder. Police said the teen, whose name was not released, was the shooter.

Still in shock. I can't believe I will never get to backpack, fish, ride, snowboard with Gerry again. Most of all, I won't be able to see him being a loving father and husband, Rich Grandzol, a family member, posted on Facebook.

Family members created a Facebook page Remembering Gerard Grandzol for those who knew him.

Read: Man Proposes to Woman 10 Years After She Interrupted His Suicide: 'Thanks for Saving My Life'

Gerry was your friend, from the moment you met him, one friend wrote the page.

Another wrote, Gerry Grandzol died protecting his daughter. As senseless and infuriating as this crime was, he was equally goddamn brave and one-of-a-kind"

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Watch: 4-Year-Old Boy with Special Needs Killed by Truck After Wandering From Hotel

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He felt he had to speak up - AP/STUART CONWAY/THE TELEGRAPH

Desmond Tutu has condemned his fellow Nobel laureate and old friend Aung San Suu Kyi over her silence on the treatment of the Rohingya Muslims.

The 85-year old archbishop has written an open letter to the Burma leader asking her to speak out and end the suffering of the Rohingya people.

He said he had to speak out despite the leader being a dearly beloved sister because he said the unfolding horror and ethnic cleansing horrified him.

Mr Tutu said that he had come out of retirement to make the comments because he was so deeply moved by the situation.

As we witness the unfolding horror we pray for you to be courageous & resilient again. #Rohingya#PrayForRohingyapic.twitter.com/BIDSYY9e1X  DesmondTutu Official (@TheDesmondTutu) September 7, 2017

He wrote: "I am now elderly, decrepit and formally retired, but breaking my vow to remain silent on public affairs out of profound sadness".

The archbishop said: "For years I had a photograph of you on my desk to remind me of the injustice and sacrifice you endured out of your love and commitment for Myanmars people. You symbolised righteousness.

Rohingya Muslim refugees arrive from Myanmar Credit: ASADK M ASAD/AFP/Getty Images

Your emergence into public life allayed our concerns about violence being perpetrated against members of the Rohingya. But what some have called ethnic cleansing and others a slow genocide has persisted  and recently accelerated.

It is incongruous for a symbol of righteousness to lead such a country, said the 85-year old anti-apartheid activist. If the political price of your ascension to the highest office in Myanmar is your silence, the price is surely too steep.

Fellow Nobel Laureate Malala also spoke out.

Stop the violence. Today we have seen pictures of small children killed by Myanmars security forces, Miss Yousafzai said in a statement on Twitter.

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Over the last several years, I have repeatedly condemned this tragic and shameful treatment. I am still waiting for my fellow Nobel Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi to do the same. The world is waiting and the Rohingya Muslims are waiting, she added.

Thousands of people have signed an online petition calling for the Nobel committee to revoke Aung San Suu Kyi's peace prize over the Burmese government's treatment of its Rohingya Muslims.

Rohingya refugees walk through water after crossing border by boat through the Naf River in Teknaf, Bangladesh Credit: REUTERS/Mohammad Ponir Hossain

But the Norwegian Nobel committee has ruled out any such move, saying only that the work which led to the awarding of the prize was taken into account.

The Change.Org petition has gathered over 365,000 signatures as of Thursday, reflecting growing outrage over a massive security sweep in Rakhine state by Myanmar forces after a series of deadly ambushes by Rohingya militants.
Donald Trump Jr. loves his children so much that he doesn't actually look at them all day.

The father of five was pictured sitting at his desk in Trump Tower, contemplating his fate in a New York Times article earlier this week about his meeting with Senate investigators over his ties to Russia.

On Saturday, however, Twitter noticed something odd about the photo, taken in February.

I, too, casually arrange photographs of my 100 children to face outwards so I can only see the backs of frames pic.twitter.com/Pa0cHP5ayj  Ashley Feinberg (@ashleyfeinberg) September 8, 2017

Ah, yes. Trump Jr. doesn't actually seem to look at the photos of his brood all day. Or, more likely, he turned them around for his New York Times photoshoot. Which is weird.

Also, he has a bobblehead doll of his dad. Which is also weird.

*100 children and large portrait of myself https://t.co/ixWh3I2ESE  Alessandra T Codinha (@ATCodinha) September 8, 2017

Today in Not at All Staged Photoshoot: https://t.co/4UeHz19DRu  Hubert O'Hearn (@BTBReviews) September 9, 2017

The bobblehead is a nice touch. https://t.co/hluG3BLlAl  Annemarie Conte (@annemarieconte) September 9, 2017

Is there really any other way to do it?   https://t.co/I8nDRn9EU7  Aleem (@TrudeauMacron) September 9, 2017

His photos shoots are all awkward af pic.twitter.com/LoVhqrVpyr  pauisanoun (@pauisanoun) September 8, 2017

Donald Trump III and his four siblings really appreciate getting in the shot.
New York states attorney general will probe the huge data breach at Equifax, one of the U.S.s three major credit reporting agencies, to determine when and how the company learned of the attack and to find out whether customer information has been offered for sale on the black market, a source familiar with the investigation tells Newsweek.

Equifax said Thursday that hackers gained access to consumer information from 143 million Americans, including names, Social Security numbers, birth dates and addresses, according to the Federal Trade Commission.

The Equifax breach has potentially exposed sensitive personal information of nearly everyone with a credit report, and my office intends to get to the bottom of how and why this massive hack occurred, Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said in a statement Friday afternoon. I encourage all New Yorkers to immediately call Equifax to see if their data was compromised and to consider additional measures to protect themselves.

Schneidermans office sent a letter to Equifax on Friday seeking information about the breach.

The letter also asked Equifax about the attack vectors and intrusion causes and for any evidence of identity theft or wrongful use of financial information, according to the source with knowledge of the probe.

Under New York state law, businesses with customers in the state are required to inform both customers and the Attorney Generals Office about security breaches that put personal information in jeopardy, the office said in its press release about the letter. The release added that it probes security breaches (like the Equifax fiasco) to determine whether companies properly notified customers and whether they had appropriate safeguards to protect the data.

And while Equifax set up a site so customers can check whether their personal information was compromised, the site appears to require consumers to agree to waive some of their legal rights in order to use it. Buried in the terms of service is language that bars those who enroll in the Equifax checker program from participating in any class-action lawsuits that may arise from the incident, The Washington Post reported Friday.

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Schneiderman tweeted that the language is unenforceable and that his office contacted Equifax about the issue.

They cant be telling people who are going online to see if their information was hacked that they give up their right to sue. Thats not acceptable, says the source with knowledge of the probe.

Representative Ted Lieu, the Democrat from California, sent a similar letter on Friday, writing the House Judiciary Committees leadership asking for an investigation into the Equifax data breach, The Hill reported.

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As news of the Equifax hack, a data breach that rendered the information of 143 million Americans vulnerable, broke on Thursday, people were pissed online.

In fairness to Equifax, people are outrage is in high supply online, over subjects ranging from low-calorie ice cream to eel-related disasters. But in this case, the outrage is totally warranted.

The fact is that the data exposed, including social security numbers, birthdays and addresses, is some of the most valuable for hackers looking to commit identity fraud or unlock personal accounts. Combine that with the news that three Equifax executives sold millions of dollars worth of stock after the leak was revealed within the consumer credit reporting agency but before it went public and youve got a recipe for some sizzling discourse.

Many users took umbrage with the fact that the Atlanta, Georgia-based credit monitoring agency isnt a client-based experience, and the users exposed didnt choose to trust Equifax with their data.

Other tweets called out the callous behavior of Equifax and other credit monitoring agencies of its ilk.

Users also pointed out that if consumers want to check whether their data was compromised, Equifax has a site for that but in the process, users waive their right to sue the company.

And the people who did try to engage with the process saw disappointing results, to say the least. Some customer service representatives with Equifax werent aware of the scale of the data breach, and the information-checking service was easily gamed.

A few people offered solutions, or at least ways that Equifax could make it up to customers whose information had been compromised.

But overall, the feeling of anger and desire for some kind of recourse is palpable online, and for good reason. It remains to be seen how many Americans will fall victim to identity-related crimes as a result of this hack. Equifaxs future is also unclear. But one thing is for sure: they are extremely unpopular right now.

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Photos via Flickr / devdsp

Written by Katie Way

More articles by Katie  Follow Katie on Twitter

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By Sergei Karazy and Margaryta Chornokondratenko SHEHYNI, Ukraine (Reuters) - Former Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili and a crowd of supporters barged past guards to enter Ukraine from the Polish border on Sunday after a prolonged standoff between Saakashvili and the Ukrainian authorities. Amid shouts of "victory" and "glory to Ukraine", Saakashvili returned to Ukraine despite being stripped of Ukrainian citizenship by his one-time ally, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, and facing possible arrest and deportation. Poroshenko invited Saakashvili to be a regional governor to help drive reforms after protests in 2014 ousted a pro-Russian president in Kiev. But Saakashvili quit as governor of Odessa in November, accusing Poroshenko of abetting corruption. Thousands of Saakashvili's supporters gathered on the border on Sunday while prominent lawmakers, including former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, traveled with him from Poland. Saakashvili had tried to cross the border by train but the train did not leave its station in the Polish town of Przemysl. The woman in charge of the Ukrainian train said she had been ordered by the authorities - she declined to specify whether Polish or Ukrainian - to stop the train leaving until Saakashvili got off. He then traveled by bus to the border and was stopped by guards who sealed off the area, causing a tailback of vehicles. Supporters pushed their way through and escorted him across. "I came with my Ukrainian passport, I wanted to show my passport and make a statement," a triumphant Saakashvili told supporters after crossing. "Instead, the authorities arranged this circus." Poroshenko's spokesman did not respond to a request for comment. "The crowd broke through the Shehyni checkpoint," Oleh Slobodyan, a spokesman for the Ukrainian border service, wrote on Facebook. "The fight started. It's hard to predict the consequences of this situation." A statement by the border service said several police and border guards were injured during the clash and said a group of people, whom it did not name, had crossed the border illegally. Saakashvili took power in Georgia after a peaceful pro-Western uprising, known as the Rose Revolution, in 2003. The 49-year-old is now wanted on criminal charges in Georgia, which he says were trumped up for political reasons. Loathed by the Kremlin, Saakashvili was once a natural ally for Poroshenko after Moscow annexed Ukraine's Crimea region in 2014. But he has become one of the Ukrainian president's most vocal critics, casting doubt on the Western-backed authorities' commitment to tackle entrenched corruption. Saakashvili has accused the Ukrainian authorities of using pressure tactics to deter him from returning to Kiev, where he has launched a campaign to unseat Poroshenko. Speaking to reporters earlier in the Polish city of Rzeszow, Saakashvili said Poroshenko viewed him as an "existential threat". "It looks like he is getting rid of a political opponent and no matter how many times he says that I am not a danger to him, every action of his shows exactly the opposite, that he regards me as a great and immediate danger," he said. (Additional reporting by Pavel Polityuk in Kiev and Marcin Goettig in Warsaw; writing by Matthias Williams; Editing by Gareth Jones)
Shegyni (Ukraine) (AFP) - Former Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili and hundreds of his supporters forced their way into Ukraine on Sunday in a bid by the firebrand politician to reclaim his citizenship stripped by President Petro Poroshenko after they fell out.

Saakashvili says he wants to return to challenge that decision in court and get back into politics.

An AFP reporter saw the one-time regional Ukraine governor and his supporters enter from Poland's Medyka border crossing, pushing aside Ukrainian border guards who had turned him back just hours earlier.

"They did it against all the rules, what's happening here?" Saakashvili told reporters in Medyka when he was initially refused entry, adding: "We hope that we can still break through."

At that point hundreds of his supporters chanting "Misha, Misha" -- a diminutive of his name -- forced their way into Ukraine with Saakashvili, who now risks extradition to his native Georgia.

Around 1,500 supporters marched with the exiled ex-Georgian leader on the Ukrainian side of the border before he hopped into a car bound for the western city of Lviv, where around 500 supporters greeted him on his arrival.

Saakashvili was then reported to be meeting with Lviv Mayor Andriy Sadovyi late Sunday night.

The border-breach drew ire in Kiev, with the interior ministry saying in that 11 policemen and five border guards had been injured in clashes with Saakashvili supporters, suggesting prison terms for those responsible.

"By fighting for power, supporters of Saakashvili are destroying the state," Yuriy Lutsenko, Ukaine's Prosecutor General, wrote on Facebook.

Tbilisi on Tuesday asked Kiev to extradite Saakashvili to face charges of misappropriation of property and abuse of office among others.

Saakashvili denies the accusations, branding them a political witch hunt.

He says Georgia's extradition request was driven by "oligarchs" who fear his presence in Ukraine, where he fought corruption.

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Earlier Sunday, Ukrainian authorities blocked a Kiev-bound train in Poland carrying Saakashvili, who eventually got off and took a bus to the Medyka crossing.

Ukraine's outspoken ex-prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko threw her support behind the 49-year-old, accompanying him as he attempted to cross into Ukraine the first time.

Saakashvili said "several hundred thugs were mobilised by the Ukrainian government to stop several thousand" of his supporters waiting to greet him on the Ukrainian side.

Kiev is "panicking," Saakashvili said, adding that he did "not want to overthrow President Poroshenko" but just defend his rights.

- 'Future president'? -

"We believe that Mikheil Saakashvili can lead our country out of the crisis," Lyudmyla Goretska, one of thousands of supporters waiting on the Ukrainian side of the border, told AFP.

"We see what he did in his own country and that's enough for us," Goretska said of Saakashvili, who set up the Movement of the New Forces political party in Ukraine.

"The main problem in our country is corruption... We need to overcome the oligarchy."

The charismatic Saakashvili is credited with pushing through pro-Western and anti-graft reforms in Georgia which he led from 2004 to 2013.

Another supporter, Maria, 49, who declined to give her surname, said she believes "Saakashvili is the future president" of Ukraine and "will finish the war" with Russia.

Saakashvili is also wanted in his homeland for alleged abuse of power during a tumultuous nine years as president that saw him fight and lose a brief war with Russia in 2008.

He left in disgrace for Ukraine in 2015 to work for the country's pro-Western authorities as governor of the key Odessa region on the Black Sea.

But he quit in November 2016 amid a dramatic falling out with Poroshenko, who stripped him of his Ukrainian citizenship in July while he was out of the country.

Kiev justified the move by claiming that Saakashvili had provided "inaccurate information" in his citizenship application.

Saakashvili lost his Georgian citizenship when he was granted a Ukrainian passport in 2015, as the country does not allow dual nationality.

The reformer has said he now wants to go to court to get back his Ukrainian citizenship, a move that would allow him to stand for election.

"We see a roll-back of reforms in Ukraine, we see a crackdown on anti-corruption activities in Ukraine. This is very sad," Saakashvili said Friday in Warsaw.
The Federal Election Commission is running low on commissioners.

President Donald Trump on Thursday nominated Republican Matthew Petersen to a federal judgeship, meaning the FEC is poised to putter on with the minimum number of commissioners  four  required to take official action on most anything of consequence.

Three of those remaining four commissioners are themselves wavering on whether theyll continue serving. With 2018 midterm campaigns already afoot, what would it mean if the FEC fell short of a quorum? Plenty.

No penalizing candidates and committees found breaking campaign laws.

No completing new investigations of political actors suspected of misdeeds.

No new rules or opinions governing how campaign cash must be raised and spent. For example, in July, the commission ruled that members of Congress, still reeling from the shooting of House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., could use campaign funds for home security systems.

And certainly no action on whats easily the thorniest topic now before the commission: whatever to do about Russian influence in U.S. elections.

In a very practical sense, the FEC has no margin of error, said Adav Noti, senior director for trial and litigation at the nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center who until April served as the FECs associate general counsel for policy.

And losing that quorum of four commissioners is hardly hypothetical: Republican Commissioner Lee Goodman wants to quit the FEC before Christmas.

In an interview Thursday with the Center for Public Integrity, Goodman wouldnt say whether Petersens nomination will cause him to delay his own resignation. Matts nomination certainly adds a dimension to my plan, Goodman said.

Independent Steven Walther, meanwhile, hasnt committed to staying on much past his one-year term as FEC chairman, which ends at the years conclusion.

And Republican Vice Chairwoman Caroline Hunter, a nine-year commission veteran who couldnt be reached for comment, has previously been coy about whether she soon plans to leave the FEC for other potential opportunities  private practice, party politics, a spot in the Trump administration.

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Even with a quorum, FEC action of any sort would require almost unprecedented unanimity among members of a frequently fractious foursome. If just one of the four commissioners fell ill, or declared a recusal-triggering conflict of interest, the remaining regulators would be forced to shelve commission business, at least in part.

The FEC is already so dysfunctional now, said Ann Ravel, a former Democratic commissioner who frequently clashed with her Republican colleagues and resigned March 1. But it may [now] be exacerbated so people will understand that there is literally no chance of there being any consequence to the failure to abide by the law.

As it stands, Trump could nominate a new slate of regulators to fill all six FEC commissioner slots.

Thats because Petersen and his four commissioner colleagues continue to serve as holdovers despite their six-year FEC terms having all long ago expired.

Ellen Weintraub, the commissions lone Democrat, is an extreme: her term ended in April 2007  two years before a certain billionaire businessman with an NBC reality show would tweet his first tweet. (Weintraub, who said Thursday she lamented how people now may feel even more empowered to push against the law, added she has no plans to leave the FEC voluntarily.)

But Trump, despite his drain the swamp mantra and anti-voter fraud zeal, has all but ignored the FEC  Congresss post-Watergate answer to campaign shenanigans and election corruption.

His lack of interest is even more striking given that his White House counsel, Don McGahn, is a campaign finance and elections lawyer previously best known for waging war on campaign finance restrictions as an FEC commissioner.

Trump has yet to nominate anyone to fill Ravels seat, which has been vacant for more than six months.

White House spokeswoman Lindsay Walters declined to answer Center for Public Integrity questions about when the president plans to replace Petersen or nominate other new FEC commissioners. She also did not say whether Trump considers the FEC integral to fighting political swampiness.

Walther, the FEC chairman, said Thursday he hasnt spoken with the president and has no information at all about Trumps plans  if he has them  to name new commissioners.

While the FECs situation may look bleak, Andrew Woodson, an election law attorney at Wiley Rein LLP and Goodmans former staff counsel, noted it might not be as rotten as some assume. Even an FEC without commissioners would still employ more than 330 staff members who in turn would field inquiries, process paperwork and attend to the agencys most basic function: public disclosure of political committees spending and fundraising, as required by law.

Thats what happened in 2008, when the FEC lost its quorum for almost half a year while the U.S. Senate, which must confirm a presidents FEC nominees, clashed over then President George W. Bushs picks.

Noti of the Campaign Legal Center added that a commission shutdown could, in the long run, even help the agency by getting the press to write a bunch of stories about how the commission is powerless, which is the sort of pressure that, finally, could lead to significant changes and stop it from living in this zombie state. But in the interim, it is going to lead to confusion and uncertainty.

One issue more than a dozen current and former FEC officials of all political ideologies could agree upon during interviews Thursday: theyll miss having Petersen around.

He has the temperament and competence to be an outstanding judge. Hes a gentleman, Walther said.

Matt was a calm and deliberate commissioner more than any commissioner Ive ever witnessed, Goodman said. Some of us press the envelope a little with each other. Matt is a grounding force with a faithful and studied approach to FEC business.

In a statement, Petersen indicated he would not immediately leave the FEC but declined to comment on when he might resign or whether the White House has committed to naming someone to fill his soon-to- be-vacated commissioner position.

Petersen is slated to join the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, which routinely reviews cases involving the FEC.

Given this, Petersen is reviewing the relevant standards to determine when recusal would be appropriate, he said.

It remains an open question whether Petersen would recuse himself if faced with an FEC case involving a U.S. senator who will ultimately vote on his judicial nomination or Trump himself, since the president nominated Petersen in the first place.

This story is from the Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit, nonpartisan investigative media organization in Washington, D.C.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-11 03:06:36|Editor: Zhou Xin

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by Maria Spiliopoulou, Alexia Vlachou

THESSALONIKI, Greece, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- China is a power with a strategic plan and Greece can only benefit from bilateral cooperation, Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said during a press conference on Sunday in the northern city port of Thessaloniki.

As the honored country of the 82nd Thessaloniki International Fair (TIF), Greece's top annual trade exhibition, China is at the spotlight of the fair's opening this weekend.

During a press briefing after his opening speech, the Greek leader commented on Greece's strategic partner, expressing his admiration over the strategy of "a strong and peaceful country".

China is one of "the few countries with such strength, having a strategy, a plan, knowing what she wants," he said.

Greece is thirsty for foreign investments and is open to discuss collaboration projects with all interested sides, as it can only benefit from investments such as the one Chinese made at the port of Piraeus in recent years, he added.

"Greece is a member of the eurozone, of Europe, a pillar of the European policy thanks to its history and culture, and in parallel a country which can communicate like no one other with Russia, China and the Arab world. Only a few countries are in position to do this," the Greek leader stressed.

"Greece must become the country, and this is our vision for our foreign policy, which will certainly have roots in the eurozone, in the heart of Europe, but will also extend its branches to the East and the North and the South," he said.

Tsipras inaugurated on Saturday the Chinese pavilion, which covers 6,000 square meters at TIF, calling for more Chinese companies to invest in Greece.

The exhibition runs to Sept. 17 and until then it is estimated that at least 250,000 visitors from 17 countries will stroll through the booths of some 1,500 exhibitors, making it the most successful exhibition of the past decade, according to organizers.
Donald Rumsfeld once said there are known unknowns.

That is to say, there are things that we now know we dont know, Rumsfeld said before a meeting of NATO in 2002.

And in the U.S., we now know there will be a second major hurricane making landfall over the weekend. What the total economic impact of these storms will be is unknown.

Hurricane Irma is bearing down on Florida as a category 4 storm and follows Hurricane Harvey, which impacted the Texas coast and dumped up to 50 inches of rain on parts of the Houston metro area late last month.

Estimated damages from Harvey peg the storms impacts at somewhere north of $50 billion; Irmas impacts are likely to exceed this total.

So what we know is that these storms will cost the U.S. economy some amount of productivity, some amount of output, and some amount of money. The storm will also require investment in rebuilding affected areas, leading to some amount of economic growth.

Economic growth does not always correspond with economic well-being

As JP Morgan economist Michael Feroli wrote late last month following Harvey, As a general rule, hurricanes tend to be a short-run depressant and a medium-run boost to economic activity.

But Feroli added that, Here we should pause to emphasize the usual disclaimer: economic growth does not always correspond with economic well-being.

And it is this split between economic growth and economic well-being that provides the unknown associated with the storms impact on the U.S. economy, and which illustrates why a simple accounting of a natural disasters impact never quite captures the true economic cost.

The track of Hurricane Irma, projected as of Friday afternoon, September 8, 2017. (Source: NHC)

On Friday, Florida governor Rick Scott said all Floridians should be prepared to evacuate; there are 21 million residents of the state.

Where are Florida residents going? North, at least. Hotel rooms around Atlanta were filling up late in the week. Airlines were also scrambling to get Floridians out of the state ahead of the storm; Reuters reported that each of United (UAL), American Airlines (AAL), and Delta (DAL) were looking to wind down operations in south Florida by end of day Friday.

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Evacuations are aimed at keeping citizens safe from the storms most direct impacts. But this departure also requires a return, and raises the question of what happens when Floridas citizens go back home. When will highways be open? When will airports re-open? Schools? Power? Will their homes be intact? And so on.

Why growth immediately follows natural disasters

Answering each of these questions  and then fixing the damage inflicted by the storm  is where a simple economic analysis can shed some light on what happens after the storm. A household that hoped to repaint their house in the next year or two may find itself needing wholesale repairs  a new roof, new siding, new furniture, and so on.

The economist here sees demand for durable goods, homebuilding supplies, and overall consumption pulled forward. This is positive for gross domestic product, which is the sum of all consumer spending, plus investment, plus government spending, plus the difference between exports and imports. It is a somewhat crude measure to count all of the stuff we make, buy, and trade.

Motorists evacuate for the anticipated arrival of Hurricane Irma on the northbound lanes of Floridas Turnpike near the intersection of I-75 in Wildwood, Fla. on Friday, Sept. 8, 2017. (Stephen M. Dowell/Orlando Sentinel via AP)

But it is on this basis that the recovery from a natural disaster becomes, as Feroli wrote, a medium-run boost to economic activity.

Of course, the storms recovery costs and disruptions also weigh on the economy.

Deutsche Bank economist Brett Ryan noted Friday that labor market data for September will be severely impacted by Harvey and potentially Irma as well. Industrial production data  which tracks, among other things, output at U.S. energy plants  will also likely be impacted by the hurricane-related disruptions.

But this high-level economic accounting for storm-related impacts also misses the household-level stresses these costs can cause. Because the household that was to paint the house but required to totally rebuild after a hurricane, a rebuild that was only 80% covered by insurance, may have been required to wipe out significant savings to make themselves whole.

And while economists often bristle at the notion that pulled-forward demand is not real growth, increased outlays as a result of a natural disaster that are above the scope of a household or businesses prior budget is not the kind of durable growth that underwrites a strong economy.

More growth, as Feroli noted, does not mean more well-being.

So what we know is that there will be a major hurricane hitting Florida in the coming days. The economic and emotional tolls will be considerable. Attempts will be made to calculate much it costs and how long fixes will take.

These efforts, however, will necessarily fall short of capturing the full impacts these disruptions will have on our economy  now and in the future.



Myles Udland is a writer at Yahoo Finance. Follow him on Twitter @MylesUdland

Read more from Myles here:
By Michelle Martin BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany's Greens on Saturday all but ruled out a three-way coalition with Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives and the pro-business Free Democrats (FDP) after the Sept. 24 election and a conservative said such an alliance would not be ideal. Polls show Merkel's conservatives are likely to win the election with around 38 percent of the vote but will be left in need of a coalition partner. Their rival Social Democrats (SPD) are lagging on around 22 percent. Possible coalition options include a repeat of the current 'grand coalition' between the conservatives and SPD or a 'Jamaica coalition' of the conservatives, FDP and Greens - the name referring to the black, yellow and green colors of the Jamaican flag. Katrin Goering-Eckhardt, one of the Greens' two top candidates, told regional newspaper Passauer Neue Presse: "I can't imagine Jamaica." Coalitions tend to be tested at the state level before they are formed at the national level. A Jamaica alliance was formed in the coastal state of Schleswig-Holstein after Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU) won an election there in May. But Goering-Eckhardt said the Greens and FDP had "diametrically opposed positions" on issues including climate protection, emission thresholds for clean cars and refugees. "I can't see how it could work at the national level," she said. FDP leader Christian Lindner told Focus magazine he was also unable to envisage a Jamaica coalition given the hurdles to reaching agreement with the Greens on immigration and energy. Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere, a senior conservative, told regional newspaper Rheinische Post neither the conservatives nor the SPD wanted to continue the current 'grand coalition' because it "is not good for democracy", referring to the small parliamentary opposition that such a tie-up leaves. But he added that it would be harder to reach agreements with the Greens and FDP on domestic security than it has been with the SPD. "From a security perspective it would be good if the conservative bloc could choose a two-way alliance," he said. Cem Ozdemir, the Greens' other top candidate, said in an interview with Tagesspiegel am Sonntag newspaper that his party wanted to be in the next federal government, which he suggested would be formed by Merkel: "The race for first place seems to be over - Angela Merkel is out in front." But the latest polls show Merkel's conservatives and the Greens would not be able to muster enough support between them to form a two-way alliance. While support for the Greens has dropped to single digits this year - it is on 8 percent in the latest polls - a Forsa survey published this week showed half of Germans would welcome the Greens being part of the post-election government. Merkel on Saturday reiterated her warning to voters about a coalition between the SPD, radical Left party and Greens, telling voters in the southwestern city of Reutlingen that a red-red-green tie-up would be "bad for our country" and Germany should not embark on any experiments at a time of uncertainty. A red-red-green alliance, which had seemed a possible option early this year, has not been able to get a majority in polls for weeks. (Reporting by Michelle Martin; Editing by Ros Russell and Dale Hudson)
Thessaloniki (Greece) (AFP) - Halting accession talks with Turkey would be a strategic mistake by the EU, Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said Sunday as a war of words raged between Berlin and Ankara.

During a recent election debate both Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel and her Social Democratic rival Martin Schulz endorsed ending Turkey's EU accession talks.

Ties between the two nat ons have become strained since last year's attempted overthrow of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Germany's strong criticism of an ensuing crackdown which saw more than 50,000 people arrested.

Relations further deteriorated after the detention of several German citizens including Deniz Yucel, a correspondent for the Die Welt newspaper.

But Tsipras said "ending Turkey's accession talks would be a strategic mistake that would maybe benefit only for Erdogan."

Turkey is an important regional power and should remain engaged, added Tsipras, but also called on Turkey to respect international law and stop provocations.

While Greece and Turkey have long had difficult relations, ties between Athens and Berlin have frayed in recent years over the terms of Greece's international bailouts as Germany has insisted on spending cuts and tax hikes and objected to providing any considerable debt relief.
Heidi Klum set the gold standard at the 2017 Harper's Bazaar Icons party.

The German supermodel hit the red carpet in a head-to-toe gold look -- a figure-hugging gold dress with a bold belt that cinched at her waist, polished off with a pair of pointy pumps. Klum definitely made heads turn in the sparkling ensemble, flaunting her toned figure with every photo she took.

The "America's Got Talent" judge kept her her hair simple, in relaxed waves, and her makeup light. She accessorized with a few minimal accessories, including silver hoop earrings.

After posting for solo snaps in front of the camera, Klum also took some silly photos with Lewis and Swizz Beatz.

She was joined by a number of Hollywood stars at the event hosted by the magazine's fashion director Carine Roitfeld. Kendall Jenner, Gigi Hadid and Selena Gomez were just some of the A-listers in attendance.

The guests looked like they were having a blast inside the iconic Plaza Hotel venue as they danced the night away -- with The Weeknd as the special performer -- and sipped on cocktails provided by Belvedere and Moet & Chandon.

For the rest of the star-studded red carpet, check out the slideshow below:


Speaking in her first televised interview since her stunning defeat in the election in November, Clinton says she was gobsmacked by Donald Trumps win

Hillary Clinton speaks during the second presidential debate at Washington University in St Louis on 9 October 2016. Photograph: Rick T Wilking/AP

Hillary Clinton on Sunday called Donald Trumps inaugural speech as president a cry from the white nationalist gut.

Clinton was speaking in her first televised interview since her defeat in the election in November, two days before the publication of What Happened, her book about her defeat.

Sitting onstage as Trump was sworn in on 20 January was an out-of-body experience, Clinton said, recalling that she attended in the hope of presenting a unified front following an ugly and bitter campaign.

Im a former first lady, and former presidents and first ladies show up, she told CBS This Morning. Its part of the demonstration of the continuity of our government. And so there I was, on the platform, you know, feeling like an out-of-body experience. And then his speech, which was a cry from the white nationalist gut

Trumps dark-hued oration famously focused on a vision of American carnage, a crime-riddled post-industrial dystopia the new president said only he could fix.

Clinton continued: What an opportunity [Trump had] to say, OK, Im proud of my supporters, but Im the president of all Americans. Thats not what we heard at all.

Clinton addressed everything from her missteps as a candidate to the shock of realizing that she would not become the first female president. She was perhaps most candid in her assessment of Trumps appeal to millions of white people, in opposition to the changing demographics of America.

He was quite successful in referencing a nostalgia that would give hope, comfort, settle grievances, for millions of people who were upset about gains that were made by others, Clinton said.

During the campaign, in a moment widely criticized and weaponised by the Trump campaign, Clinton referred to half of Trumps supporters as a basket of deplorables. She expressed regret at the time. On Sunday, Clinton was unapologetic for the context of her remarks and said Trumps base was already energized by his divisive rhetoric before her words became public.

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I thought Trump was behaving in a deplorable manner, she said. I thought a lot of his appeals to voters were deplorable.

She cited the leaked 2005 Access Hollywood tape in which the former reality TV star bragged about groping and kissing women without their consent.

There were a large number of people who didnt care, Clinton said. It did not matter to them.

When CBS interviewer Jane Pauley suggested Clinton had offended those who did not personally feel deplorable, Clinton disagreed emphatically.

I dont buy that, she said. I dont buy that. Im sorry I gave him a political gift of any kind.

Published excerpts of Clintons memoir have suggested a deeply personal take on a campaign nearly everyone predicted she could not lose. Clinton said on Sunday she was among those who never envisaged a Trump victory.

I had not drafted a concession speech, she said. Id been working on a victory speech. I just felt this enormous letdown, just kind of loss of feeling and direction and sadness  It was a very hard transition.

I really struggled. I couldnt feel, I couldnt think. I was just gobsmacked, wiped out.

In the book, Clinton reflects on the factors that led to her defeat. There is a section that criticizes the Vermont senator Bernie Sanders, her rival in the Democratic primaries, for inflicting lasting damage on her campaign, and there is regret for not hitting back more forcefully against James Comey, the then FBI director who caused a frenzy 11 days before the election with a letter suggesting a new inquiry into Clintons use of personal email.

The most important of the mistakes I made was using personal email, Clinton told CBS of her controversial decision as secretary of state to use a private email server. Comeys letter, she said, raised the specter that, somehow, the investigation was being reopened.

It just stopped my momentum.

Clinton also emphasized her frustration over the lack of focus on and response to Russian interference during the US election, reports of which were released during the course of the campaign, and Comeys refusal to draw attention to the investigation of possible ties between the Trump campaign and Moscow.

You never hear a word about it, she said. And when asked later, he goes, Well, it was too close to the election. Now, help me make sense of that. I cant understand it.

In excerpts published by Vogue on Sunday, Clinton also explained the color of her suit and the tie worn by her husband, former president Bill Clinton, for her concession speech the morning after the election.

The morning after the election, Bill and I both wore purple. It was a nod to bipartisanship (blue plus red equals purple), Clinton writes. The night before, I had hoped to thank the country wearing white  the color of the suffragettes  while standing on a stage cut into the shape of the United States under a vast glass ceiling. Instead, the white suit stayed in the garment bag.

She also recalls the drive back to her home in Chappaqua, the quiet settlement in northern Westchester County, New York, the day after the election.

Every few minutes, Bill would repeat what he had been saying all morning: Im so proud of you, Clinton writes. To that he now added, That was a great speech. History will remember it.

Clinton told CBS that she would no longer seek public office. But she also signaled that she is not done with the Trump presidency.

As an active politician, its over, she said. I am done with being a candidate. But I am not done with politics, because I literally believe that our countrys future is at stake.
Ukrayinska Pravda

Several journalists working for foreign media have been stripped of their accreditation for reporting from liberated Kherson. Source: Detector Media; General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Details: On Sunday, a post appeared on the official Facebook page of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine saying that "a number of media representatives who have broken the rules on working in the area of hostilities have had their work permits revoked and their press cards invalidated.
India has called for an immediate end to violence in Myanmar's western state of Rakhine, urging its ally to act with restraint as hordes of Rohingya flee to neighbouring Bangladesh.

"We would urge that the situation in Rakhine State be handled with restraint and maturity, focusing on the welfare of the civilian population alongside those of the security forces," the foreign ministry said in a statement late Saturday.

"It is imperative that violence is ended and normalcy in the State restored expeditiously," it said, adding it was concerned about the outflow of refugees.

The call came days after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a state visit to the Buddhist-majority country amid spiralling violence in Rakhine that has forced nearly 300,000 Rohingya Muslims to flee.

Modi condemned a series of coordinated attacks by Rohingya militants on Myanmar troops and police on August 25, but did not comment on the subsequent violence against the Rohingya and their mass exodus.

Fleeing Rohingya accuse the security forces of mass killings and rapes and the burning of hundreds of villages.

Myanmar does not want its 1.1 million Rohingya, who are seen as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh and are refused citizenship.

Successive regimes have historically discriminated against them even though many have lived for generations in Rakhine state.
PARIS (Reuters) - People on the Dutch-French Caribbean territories of Saint Martin and Saint Barthelemy were bracing on Saturday for Hurricane Jose, a Category 4 storm expected to swipe the region after fellow storm Irma headed toward Florida. Weather office Meteo France said the area would face new gusts of winds of more than 200 kph (125 mph) as well as torrential rains in the coming hours. The police presence on the two islands has been boosted to close to 500 staff following reports of violence and looting after the passage of Irma, the French interior ministry said. The ministry added 11 people suspected of "malicious actions" had been arrested since Friday. Television footage showed scenes of chaos in Saint Martin and Saint Barthelemy with submerged streets, boats and cars tossed into piles and rooftops ripped off. A resident of Saint Martin told BFM TV she had heard gunshots and had seen people breaking into houses and shops in search of food. France's Caisse Centrale de Reassurance, a state-owned reinsurance group, said Irma would go down as one of the most damaging disasters in decades on French territory and evaluated its cost at 1.2 billions euros ($1.44 billion). Saint Barthelemy lies about 35 km southeast of Saint Martin, whose territory is divided between France and the Netherlands. The French interior ministry said Irma had killed at least 10 people on the two islands. (Reporting by Matthias Blamont; Editing by Ros Russell)
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-11 04:01:44|Editor: yan

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KHARTOUM, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Sudanese government on Sunday urged the European Union (EU) countries to work for the permanent lifting of U.S. sanctions on Sudan as scheduled in October.

Sudan's Foreign Minister Ibrahim Ghandour met Jean-Michel Dumond, head of the delegation of the European Union to Sudan, together with ambassadors and representatives from Britain, Italy, Norway, Sweden, Germany, France, Spain and Netherlands.

"It has been stressed on the common goal of Sudan and the EU countries to achieve the permanent lifting of the U.S. sanctions on Sudan by the upcoming October," said Sudan's Foreign Ministry in a statement, adding that EU countries' support is important to achieve the goal.

"Lifting of the U.S. sanctions will pave the way for the promotion of Sudan's economic and trade ties with the European countries and the rest of the world," it added.

Late July, the United States extended a review period of three months to decide whether to permanently lift trade sanctions on Sudan given its human rights records and other issues.

On Jan. 13, former U.S. President Barack Obama issued a decision to cancel two executive orders imposing economic sanctions on Sudan.

The executive orders gave 180 days for review before the sanctions are fully lifted to ensure the Sudanese government maintains its efforts on human rights and anti-terrorism.

The decision also allowed resumption of all banking transactions and trade exchange between the two countries.
As Hurricane Irma barrels toward Cuba and makes its way to Florida, the region is in panic. But there is one group that is rejoicing: jihadis, specifically supporters of the Islamic State militant group (ISIS) and Al-Qaeda.

Fanboys of the radical Islamist groups are sharing messages celebrating the catastrophic trail by the natural disaster, which has killed at least 18 people, all on Caribbean islands.

In screenshots shared with Newsweek by monitoring site Jihadoscope from the encrypted messaging app Telegram, an array of jihadis are hailing the devastation caused by Hurricane Harvey and the looming landfall of Hurricane Irma in Florida, using as justification their religiosity and the U.S.'s overseas conflicts.

One user posted a montage of images from Florida and Texas alongside sarcastic messages: "Pray for Florida" and "Pray for Texas."

One jihadi, writing in Arabic, said, "A historic hurricane will hit Florida, especially the city of Miami" soon, one that would leave an "international tragedy" on American soil. He quotes Allah saying that a "roaring wind in the days of the snakes" had been sent and makes use of hurricane emojis.

Another user, whose name is given as Abu Jandal, said that the natural disasters were a form of payback for the U.S.'s foreign policy.

"Due to the threat of [a] storm millions of people from Florida are displaced from their homes. O Crusaders! This is the reward of your crimes against Muslims. Do not forget it," he wrote.

He proceeds to call the disasters "revenge" for the "people of Mosul and Al Raqqa," in reference to the Iraqi and Syrian cities, respectively, besieged by U.S.-backed ground forces.

Jihadis hold ultraconservative Islamic beliefs and regularly celebrate atrocities in the West because of their hatred of non-Muslims, capitalism and Western military action in the Middle East.

And it's not just ISIS supporters celebrating the natural disasters. Those who support Al-Qaeda, its jihadi rival, are too.

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In one post, a pro-Al-Qaeda cleric, Saudi national Dr. Abdullah al-Mohaisany, wrote that such disasters are "normal" because "they [the Americans] oppressed within the lands, they increased their corruption and indeed, your Lord is in observation."

Earlier in the week, supporters of ISIS called on American jihadis to target relief centers for those displaced by Hurricane Harvey, which killed at least 70 people.

"To all the LM's [lone mujahids] in the U.S.," the message posted on Monday began, using the term for "warrior" in Arabic, "pop down to Houston and drop in at any of the relief centers housing displaced people from the Houston floods, make sure to bring lots of supplies/gadgets/toys to see if you can help put any kuffs out of their misery," the message said.

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Jerusalem (AFP) - Israeli authorities in Jerusalem on Sunday deferred for three days a debate on building permits that would create the largest Israeli settlement inside a Palestinian neighbourhood, city councillors said.

The council's planning and construction committee had been set to examine issuing permits for a settlement in the occupied east Jerusalem Palestinian neighbourhood of Jabel Mukaber, committee members told AFP.

They said the matter was now on the agenda for a Wednesday meeting, without giving reasons for the postponement.

Settlement watchdog Peace Now said it was because of a scheduling conflict concerning a lawyer for opponents to the scheme.

The permits, if granted, would allow for expansion of the Nof Zion settlement to add 176 housing units to the 91 existing units.

Plans for the new units have already been approved and issuing building permits is the last major bureaucratic step.

Peace Now and other NGOs say the approvals would make Nof Zion the largest Israeli settlement inside any Palestinian neighbourhood.

Most settlements, particularly in the occupied West Bank, are located outside of Palestinian residential areas.

"Within east Jerusalem, it's a very serious development," Peace Now spokeswoman Anat Ben Nun told AFP.

"It's indicative of a trend that we're seeing of settlement expansion inside Palestinian neighbourhoods in east Jerusalem."

Jerusalem's status is ultra-sensitive and central to the Israel-Palestinian conflict.

Israel occupied east Jerusalem in the 1967 Six Day War and later annexed it in a move never recognised by the international community.

It sees the entire city as its undivided capital, while the Palestinians want the eastern sector as the capital of their future state.

The Israeli government has announced several settlement expansions since US President Donald Trump took office.

Trump has been far less critical of Israeli settlement expansion than his predecessor Barack Obama.

Israeli settlements are seen as illegal under international law and major stumbling blocks to peace as they are built on land the Palestinians see as part of their future state.

Settlement watchdogs and Palestinians accuse far-right Israeli groups of pushing for settlements in east Jerusalem to ensure the city can never be divided.
Benjamin Netanyahu (C) reads a prayer with Western Wall Rabbi Shmuel Rabinowitz (L) as his son Yair (R) stands next to him, at the Western Wall, Judaism's holiest prayer site, in Jerusalem's Old City March 18, 2015. - Reuters

Yair Netanyahu, the Israeli prime ministers son, is under fire for posting an anti-Semitic caricature aimed at his father's critics on social media.

Mr Netanyahu, 26, shared a meme on Facebook captioned "the food chain," which featured a photo of Jewish billionaire George Soros dangling the world in front of a reptilian creature, who in turn dangles an alchemy symbol in front of the pejorative happy merchant image.

The other figures in the chain are former Prime Minister Ehud Barak, who has led weekly protests calling on Benjamin Netanyahu to step down over growing corruption allegations.

Mr Soros, a Hungarian-born Jewish American businessman, has spent part of his fortune funding left-wing groups and Human Rights Watch, a frequent critic of Israels occupation of the West Bank and its policies toward the Palestinians.

The images of Mr Soros and the reptile evoke anti-Semitic conspiracy theories claiming that Jews control the world.

The post was shared by David Duke, former Ku Klux Klan leader, and other anti-Semites.

Netanyahu's son posts a meme suggesting (((Soros))) is controlling the world: "Meme rife with anti-Semitic themes"https://t.co/6WxSTUNU4e  David Duke (@DrDavidDuke) September 9, 2017

Avi Gabbay, Israels Labor Party chairman, said on Sunday the post "crossed every line imaginable" and was a "very sad" day for Israel.

The Israel office of the Anti-Defamation League denounced the cartoon on Twitter, writing: "The caricature posted by Yair Netanyahu includes explicit anti-Semitic elements. One cannot belittle the danger inherent in an anti-Semitic discourse."

In further Facebook posts following criticism for posting the cartoon, Yair Netanyahu, who is a university student, condemned the Israeli left for being two-faced in trying to silence him.

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A family spokesman said the younger Netanyahu would not be making any other comment.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin (R) Netanyahu, his wife Sara Netanyahu (L) during the opening ceremony of the Maccabiah games in Ramat Gan, Israel. Credit: EPA

The prime minister refused to ask questions from reporters about the post on Sunday morning at the start of his weekly cabinet meeting.

Last month, the son made another headline-grabbing post after a protester was killed during a white nationalist rally in the US state of Virginia.

It appeared to suggest that hard-left organisations now pose more of a danger than neo-Nazi groups, which he wrote are a dying breed.

Some critics in Israel suggested Netanyahu junior's online activities were meant to deflect attention from his parent's legal troubles.

The Netanyahu family is facing a slew of corruption allegations. The prime minister has been questioned about his ties to executives in media, international business and Hollywood.

His associates have been engulfed in a probe relating to a possible conflict of interest involving a $2 billion purchase of German submarines.

Israel's attorney general has said he intends to indict the prime minister's wife, Sara, for fraud over her bloated household expenses.

Both deny all the allegations.
North Korean residents offer flowers before the statues of Kim Il-Sung and Kim Jong-Il during celebrations of the 69th anniversary of North Korea's founding: AFP/Getty Images

North Korea celebrated its 69th founding anniversary with flowers and music, while Japan marked the occasion with fighter jet drills over the East China Sea.

The North Korean anniversary has traditionally been a time for the country to display its latest military advances. In the wake of the its sixth-ever nuclear test last week, the international community was poised for another demonstration of the Norths increasing nuclear power.

The demonstration, however, never came. Residents of Pyongyang paid the usual respects to late leaders Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il, without any major military display.

"Because we firmly support our respected supreme leader comrade Kim Jong Un, our country will become stronger as a self-reliant, nuclear power, and we will have a great future," Pyongyang citizen Pak Kum Hyang told the Associated Press.

Meanwhile, Japan and the United States conducted a joint military air exercise above the East China Sea.

Two Japanese fighter jets met up with two US bombers from the Andersen Air Force Base in Guam  the US island territory that North Korea threatened to attack last month. North Korea also launched a ballistic missile over northern Japan that same month.

These missile launches  and other military displays  have increased tensions around North Korea in recent weeks. The country is now reported to have missiles capable of delivering miniaturised nuclear warheads to the US mainland. Its latest nuclear bomb test was its largest ever, and experts believe the regime is close to its goal of developing a powerful nuclear bomb.

North Korean youth during a dance party in Pyongyang celebrating the 69th anniversary of North Korea's national day (KNS/AFP/Getty Images)

US President Donald Trump, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, and French President Emmanuel Macron discussed the situation by phone on Saturday, Mr Macrons office said.

The leaders emphasised the need for a united and firm international reaction to Pyongyang, and discussed increased pressure and sanctions. Mr Macron said the Norths "repeated provocations" were a "threat to peace and international security".

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The White House made no mention of the call.

The UN Security Council is considering additional sanctions against North Korea in the wake of its latest nuclear test. The US is pushing for an oil embargo on North Korea, as well as a ban on its exports of textiles and the hiring of North Korean workers, according to a draft resolution obtained by Reuters.

"Enough is enough," US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley told the council this week. "We have taken an incremental approach, and despite the best of intentions, it has not worked."
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-11 04:21:46|Editor: Zhou Xin

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DOHA, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Japan's Foreign Minister Taro Kono expressed his government's support to resolve the diplomatic rift between Qatar and the Saudi-led bloc through consecutive dialogue during his meetings with Qatari officials in Doha on Saturday, Qatar's state news agency QNA reported Sunday.

Kono held separate meetings with Prime Minister and Minister of Interior HE Sheikh Abdullah bin Nasser bin Khalifa al Thani and Foreign Minister HE Mohammad bin Abdulrahman al Thani.

During the media briefing, Japan's Deputy Press Secretary Toshihide Ando said that the outstanding Gulf dispute was one of the key issues discussed during the meetings, QNA said.

Ando mentioned that the Japanese FM supports the mediation efforts of Kuwait and the U.S. to end up the Gulf crisis.

"Foreign Minister Kono said that Qatar and the region are important not only for energy security, but also for regional stability and therefore, Japan is watching the situation closely," he added.

Meanwhile, The Japanese FM discussed with the Qatari officials about what Japan can do in resolving the gulf crisis. The Qatari side responded positively to his comments, Ando said.

Ando said that Kono will be visiting Jordan, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Egypt during his Middle East route after Qatar.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-11 04:26:48|Editor: yan

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KHARTOUM, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Sudanese government on Sunday said it was ready to resume negotiations with rebels of Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM)/northern sector on South Kordofan and Blue Nile areas, Sudan's Ashorooq net reported.

"The government delegation is ready and authorized to resume the negotiations with the SPLM/northern sector according to the axes set by the African mediation," Abdul-Rahman Abu-Median, member of the government's negotiation delegation, was quoted as saying.

"We are committed to the framework agreements signed with the SPLM/northern sector and ready to resume the talks based on the negotiations' references," he noted.

Last August, the African Union High-Level Implementation Panel (AUHIP), which is supervising the negotiations between the Sudanese government and the rebels of the SPLM/northern sector, started consultations to resume the negotiations between the two sides.

The SPLM/northern sector has recently been suffering from internal divisions which, last July, resulted in the removal of the movement's Chairman Malik Agar and appointment of his former deputy Abdel Aziz al-Hilu in his place.

The SPLM/northern sector has been fighting Khartoum government at South Kordofan and Blue Nile areas since 2011.

More than ten rounds of peace talks have been held in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa between the Sudanese government and the SPLM/northern sector, but have failed to reach a peace deal regarding South Kordofan and Blue Nile areas.
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-11 04:36:49|Editor: yan

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DUBLIN, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Ireland's Police Commissioner Noirin O'Sullivan on Sunday announced she is retiring from the national police service.

O'Sullivan notified Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar and Justice Minister Charlie Flanagan of her intention to retire from the country's highest police position.

O'Sullivan was the first woman to become Ireland's police commissioner. She has been a member of the force for 36 years, serving at every rank.

In her role as head of the national police service, she had been seen several police controversies, including the falsification of breath tests, financial irregularities at the police college and questions about the treatment of whistleblowers.

The government continued to defended her and she insisted she was not guilt of anything.

Despite the majority of TDs (members of parliament) wanting her to go, she indicated she would not be standing down.

Meanwhile, Flanagan said he is appointing Deputy Police Commissioner Donall O Cualain as acting police commissioner, with effect from Sunday midnight.

In a statement, Flanagan spoke highly of O'Sullivan's 36-year public service to the country in a variety of roles in the national police service, which ranged from under-cover detective work in Dublin's inner city in the 1980s to being appointed to the most senior position in the service in March 2014.

The Irish justice minister said that during her tenure, she was faced with particularly significant difficulties, many of which had built up over several decades.
Several planets in other solar systems are in an excellent position to view Earth crossing in front of the sun during its orbit, meaning if those exoplanets contain extraterrestrial intelligence, the aliens there could have discovered Earth in their skies much like we discover exoplanets in our own.

Telescope-wielding scientists here use the transit method to detect planets in faraway solar system  when a planet passes in front of its host star from the viewpoint of the observer, known as transiting the star, scientists can spot it because a portion of the star is obscured and some of its light is blocked. In this way, experts have found and catalogued thousands of planets outside our solar system, although the same method can be used to detect objects other than exoplanets.

A group of astronomers wondered whether planets in the greater universe could find Earth in this way. According to a study in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, the team investigated in what portions of the sky one could spot planets within our solar system transiting the sun. The analysis showed that outside the solar system, other worlds would be able to observe a maximum of three of our eight planets.

Overall only 2.5 percent of all the vantage points would be in a good position to see even one of our planets. To observe the maximum three planets, the chances drop to 0.027 percent.

According to the researchers, there are 68 known exoplanets that would be able to see transits in our solar system, although that number may increase as astronomers continue discovering exoplanets. Of those 68 exoplanets, about nine temperate, Earth-sized planets in orbit around the coolest types of stars are located where they could view Earth transits.

view-of-earth

Photo: 2MASS/A. Mellinger/R. Wells

They are not believed to be habitable but as organizations like NASA, with its alien-hunting Kepler spacecraft, search the sky for signs of exoplanets and extraterrestrial life, things may change.

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The team estimate that there should be approximately 10 (currently undiscovered) worlds which are favorably located to detect the Earth and are capable of sustaining life as we know it, the Royal Astronomical Society said in a statement about the research. To date however, no habitable planets have been discovered from which a civilization could detect the Earth with our current level of technology.

Even though the planets in the outer solar system are much larger, their distance from the sun would make Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune more difficult to spot than the terrestrial planets in the inner solar system: Mercury, Venus, our Earth and Mars.

Larger planets would naturally block out more light as they pass in front of their star, lead study author Robert Wells, from Queens University Belfast, said in the statement. However the more important factor is actually how close the planet is to its parent star  since the terrestrial planets are much closer to the Sun than the gas giants, theyll be more likely to be seen in transit.

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(Adds comments, details from Juchitan)

By David Alire Garcia and Jose Cortes

JUCHITAN, Mexico, Sept 8 (Reuters) - At least 61 people died when the most powerful earthquake to hit Mexico in over eight decades tore through buildings and forced mass evacuations in the poor southern states of Oaxaca and Chiapas, triggering alerts as far away as Southeast Asia.

The 8.1 magnitude quake off the southern coast late Thursday was stronger than a devastating 1985 temblor that flattened swathes of Mexico City and killed thousands.

The tremor rattled Mexico City and shook Guatemala and El Salvador, but the Oaxacan town of Juchitan bore the brunt of the disaster, with sections of the town hall, a hotel, a church, a bar and other buildings reduced to rubble.

Dalia Vasquez, a 55-year old cook, said she watched emergency workers haul the bodies of her elderly neighbor and her middle-aged son from their collapsed home.

Her own house was badly damaged. Frightened by the possibility of aftershocks, she planned to sleep with dozens more in the streets and parks. "We have nothing now. We don't have any savings," she said.

President Enrique Pena Nieto flew to the battered town to oversee rescue efforts. The town's mayor, Gloria Sanchez, called it "the most terrible moment" in Juchitan's history.

Facades of shattered buildings, fallen tiles and broken glass from shop fronts and banks littered the pavements of Juchitan while heavily armed soldiers patrolled and stood guard at areas cordoned off due to the extent of the damage.

Startled residents stepped through the rubble of about 100 wrecked buildings, including houses, a flattened Volkswagen dealership and Juchitan's shattered town hall. Scores paced the terrain or sat outside warily, mindful of the frequent aftershocks and reliving the night's terror.

"It was brutal, brutal. It was like a monster, like a train was passing over our roofs," said Jesus Mendoza, 53, as he milled about in a park across from the damaged town hall.

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Alma Rosa, sitting in vigil with a relative by the body of a loved one draped in a red shroud, said: "We went to buy a coffin, but there aren't any because there are so many bodies."

All the deaths were in three neighboring states clustered near the epicenter that lay about 70 km (40 miles) off the coast.

At least 45 people died in Oaxaca, many of them in Juchitan, while in Chiapas the count reached 12 and in Tabasco four people lost their lives, according to federal and state officials.

In Chiapas, home to many of Mexico's indigenous ethnic groups, thousands of people in coastal areas were evacuated as a precaution when the quake sparked tsunami warnings, but only two-foot waves were produced by the quake.

State oil company Pemex said there was no structural damage to it's 330,000 barrel-per-day Salina Cruz refinery, which it had shut down as a precaution, but it said it was checking problems in the electrical system before restarting the plant.

WOKEN IN THE NIGHT

At least 250 people in Oaxaca were also injured, according to agriculture minister Jose Calzada.

Classes were suspended in much of central and southern Mexico on Friday to allow authorities to assess the impact. Dozens of schools were damaged, officials said.

People ran into the streets in Mexico City, one of the world's largest metropolises and home to more than 20 million, and alarms sounded after the quake struck just before midnight.

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) said the quake's epicenter was 54 miles (87 km) southwest of the town of Pijijiapan at a depth of 43 miles (69 km).

John Bellini, a geophysicist at the USGS National Earthquake Information Center in Golden, Colorado, said it was the strongest quake since an 8.1 temblor struck the western state of Jalisco in 1932.

Across the Pacific, both the Philippines and New Zealand were on alert for possible tsunamis.

OUTAGES, AFTERSHOCKS

Windows were shattered at Mexico City airport and power went out in several neighborhoods of the capital, affecting more than 1 million people. The cornice of a hotel came down in the southern tourist city of Oaxaca, a witness said.

Mexico City is built on a spongy, drained lake bed that amplifies earthquakes along the volcanic country's multiple seismic fault lines. The 1985 earthquake was just inland, about 230 miles from Mexico City, while Thursday's was 470 miles away.

Authorities reported dozens of aftershocks, and President Pena Nieto said the quake was felt by around 50 million of Mexico's roughly 120 million population.

Mexico is evaluating whether the quake will trigger a payout from a World Bank-backed catastrophe bond, Finance Minister Jose Antonio Meade said on Friday. Meade said the bond's coverage could reach $150 million, depending on magnitude and location.

But he said Mexico has sufficient funds to pay for a cleanup whether the bond was triggered or not. (Reporting by Mexico City Newsroom; Writing by Dave Graham; Editing by James Dalgleish, Jonathan Oatis & Shri Navaratnam)
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-11 04:51:52|Editor: yan

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SANAA, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- The party of Yemen's former President Ali Abdullah Saleh on Sunday rejected a set of appointments made unilaterally by dominant Shiite Houthi rebels that ousted Saleh's loyalists amid rising rift over controlling the country.

The rejection came in a statement carried by almotamar.net, the mouthpiece of Saleh's party, the General People's Congress (GPC).

"The new appointments and other recent decisions were taken and issued unilaterally by Houthi group without consensus," the GPC said in the statement.

"The unilateral decisions violate the partnership agreement between the GPC and Houthi group and are legally non-binding," said the GPC.

On Saturday, the Houthi rebels appointed new military commanders in the army and new chiefs and general managers in the Supreme Judicial Council and the Ministry of Finance, and ousted commanders and officials loyal to toppled former president Saleh.

The action came amid highly growing strife between allies as Houthis seek to strip Saleh from resources of legal power and unilaterally take full control of the country's army, finance, judiciary.

Saleh and Houthis, once partners in the coup against internationally recognized President Abdu-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, have recently fallen out with each other.

The Republican Guards in support of Saleh stepped up measures to be ready to confront any developments in Sanaa.

Saleh directed the Republican Guards to protect both camps and strictly deal with any Houthi attempt to raid them or come near them.

Yemen has been entangled in civil war when Houthi and Saleh supporters attempted a coup against the internationally recognized Yemeni government of Hadi.

Almost two years and a half ago, Saudi Arabia led an Arab coalition forces to back Hadi and resistance forces.

Over 10,000 people, mostly civilians have been killed in the war that displaced 3 million others, according to UN aid agencies.
The ex-husband of a Texas mother of two who disappeared a day before Hurricane Harvey has been arrested after her body was found Saturday.

Steven McDowell, 44, was charged with murder after the body of Crystal McDowell, 37, was found in a wooded area of Chambers County, where she was expected to pick up her children on Aug. 25, according to reports.

Read: Center of the Storm: Simulator Shows What Happens in a Category 5 Hurricane

McDowells cousin took to Facebook to express his deep sadness at the news.

Im sick... so sick... there are no words to how I feel. Im physically sick to my stomach and dizzy, Matt Petters wrote. I hope he goes away for the rest of his life, but I want him to live. I want him to think about this every day for the rest of his life.

McDowells two children, ages 5 and 8, were at her ex-husbands home.

Police did not reveal how the mother died.

McDowell was temporarily staying with her ex-husband while her home was being renovated, reports said. Their divorce was finalized months ago and McDowell had been dating someone else.

Before her ex-husband's arrest, investigators had at least nine persons of interest, reports said

McDowell was last seen leaving her boyfriends house on her way to pick up her kids from her ex-husband. She then planned to drive to Dallas to wait out Hurricane Harvey, but she never made it.

Her boyfriend, Paul Hargrave, began to worry after he didnt hear from her.

I started to get worried because the storm was coming in," he previously told Inside Edition. "I wanted to make sure she was OK."

Read: Some Miami Residents Staying Put, and Braving Hurricane Irma in Concrete-Encased Garage

McDowells Mercedes was found last Tuesday in a flooded motel parking lot.

Petters added on Facebook, She didnt deserve this. She didnt have a drop of hate or selfishness in her bones. And to say that she was kind and loving is an extreme understatement I cant say goodbye because it still doesnt feel real. God willing, we will all see you again some day.

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Watch: Woman Opens Her Home to Neighbors Escaping Harvey Flooding

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Muellers team keen to speak to Reince Priebus and Sean Spicer among others

Former FBI director investigating Russian interference in 2016 election

Muellers investigation is examining ties between Trump associates and Russian officials. Photograph: Jonathan Ernst/Reuters

Special counsel Robert Mueller has reportedly notified the White House that his team will try to seek interviews with six current and former aides to Donald Trump as part of the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election.

According to a report in the Washington Post on Friday, former press secretary Sean Spicer, former chief of staff Reince Priebus and interim communications director Hope Hicks are among the aides Muellers team is interested in interviewing.

The other three aides the team signalled it might interview were identified in the Post as White House counsel Don McGahn; one of his deputies, James Burnham; and White House spokesman Josh Raffel, who works closely with Jared Kushner, Trumps son-in-law and a senior West Wing adviser.

Each of the six aides were privy to important internal discussions that have drawn the interest of Muellers investigators, the Post reported, citing people familiar with the investigation. This includes Trumps decision to fire FBI director James Comey in May and prolonged inaction after warnings that Michael Flynn, then national security adviser, has lied about meetings with the Russian ambassador to the US.

The justice department inquiry is investigating ties between Trump associates and Russian officials. Muellers team is also examining whether Trump or others in the White House attempted to obstruct justice when the president fired Comey, who had been leading the Russia investigation until his dismissal.

The Post story was followed by quickly by a report in Politico that Muellers team was planning to interview up to a dozen White House aides. That report anonymously quoted one person involved in the case as saying the current aides of interest are not the marquee names you would think.

Muellers team has requested documents from the White House related to the firing of Comey. According to the New York Times, Mueller has also obtained a copy of a letter Trump reportedly wanted to send to Comey outlining his rationale for firing him. The president was stopped from sending the letter by McGahn.

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The Russia investigation has dogged Trumps presidency and continues to flare on multiple fronts. As well as the justice department, several House and Senate committees are examining ties between Trump associates and Russians.

CNN has reported that that Mueller is interested in interviewing White House staffers who were aboard Air Force One during the crafting of a statement  which later turned out to be misleading  that defended the presidents eldest son, Donald Trump Jr, in response to a report that he had met with a Russian lawyer believed to have ties to the Kremlin.

In the statement, reportedly drafted in part by Donald Trump, the president said that his son primarily discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children during the meeting, which Kushner and then campaign chairman Paul Manafort also attended. Emails released later by Trump Jr revealed that he was in fact promised damaging information about Hillary Clinton, the Democratic nominee.

On Thursday, Trump Jr answered questions from a Senate panel about the meeting. After the appearance, Senator Chris Coons, a Democrat from Delaware, distributed a memo that spotlighted the federal statute prohibiting false statements to Congress. It was something to keep in mind regarding Donald Trump Jrs testimony today, Coons said.
By Maayan Lubell JERUSALEM (Reuters) - From an argument over dog poo to an alleged anti-Semitic caricature he posted on Facebook, Yair Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister's 26-year-old son, is courting controversy with his social media activity. The criticism of Netanyahu in Israel is turning into a sideshow to more weighty events: criminal investigations into corruption allegations against his father and mother. They both deny any wrongdoing. The young Netanyahu is widely seen in Israel as being groomed by his parents as a future political leader and the Facebook posts have attracted particular public interest. On Saturday, he posted a cartoon using what the Anti-Defamation League, which monitors anti-Semitism worldwide, described as anti-Semitic imagery in a Facebook post mocking some of his father's critics. It included a depiction of U.S. billionaire George Soros at the top of a food chain, dangling the world in front of both a reptile and former prime minister Ehud Barak, a frequent critic of Netanyahu. Jewish financiers controlling the world is a well-known anti-Semitic theme. Soros supports left-wing and human rights organizations that have been highly critical of Israel and its treatment of Palestinians. The Israel office of the Anti-Defamation League denounced the cartoon on Twitter, writing: "The caricature posted by Yair Netanyahu includes explicit anti-Semitic elements. One cannot belittle the danger inherent in an anti-Semitic discourse." In further Facebook posts following criticism for posting the cartoon, Yair Netanyahu, who is a university student, condemned the Israeli left for being two-faced in trying to silence him. A family spokesman said Yair Netanyahu would not be making any other comment. The prime minister refused to ask questions from reporters about the post on Sunday morning at the start of his weekly cabinet meeting. Last month, the son made another headline-grabbing post after a protester was killed during a white nationalist rally in the U.S. state of Virginia. It appeared to suggest that hard-left organizations now pose more of a danger than neo-Nazi groups, which he wrote are a dying breed. In July, Netanyahu junior found himself in a bizarre social media row over dog poo. A neighbor of the family said on Facebook that Yair, who lives with his parents, responded with an obscene gesture and walked away after she had asked him to clean up the mess left by the dog he was walking in a park. The post went viral. A family spokesman said at the time that the woman had behaved aggressively and "Yair does not know if Kaiya (the dog) did defecate as (she) alleges". Some critics in Israel suggested Netanyahu's online activities were meant to deflect attention from his parent's legal troubles. On Friday, Israel's attorney-general said he was considering indicting Sara Netanyahu on suspicion of using state funds for personal dining and catering services amounting to some $100,000. Benjamin Netanyahu, who has served as prime minister for 11 years, spread over four terms, is being investigated by police in two corruption cases. (Additional reporting by Jeffrey Heller; Editing by Keith Weir)
Longtime Apple (AAPL) pundit Gene Munster says Apples new iPhone should have three key features to stand out from the competition when its announced this Tuesday, Sept. 12.

Apple needs to show a different form factor that gets people excited, summed up Munster, a longtime Apple pundit and managing director of the venture capital firm Loup Ventures.

Munster contended just three new features are crucial for the new iPhone, including a larger 5.8-inch OLED screen, which he said is preferred by two-thirds of all smartphone owners; wireless charging that ditches the plug and unplug hassles we all face and 3-D mapping technology like facial recognition, which developers could tap into to create software experiences that overlay information on top of images and video from the real world (read: augmented reality).

We can also probably expect a faster processor, glass case, facial recognition, and wireless charging. But offering up an iPhone with more AR features is critical, according to Munster.

AR-enabled devices will eventually replace phones, he predicted. You dont need a touchscreen to access information. In that respect, the opportunity is limitless.

One artists rendering showing how the iPhone 8 (center) may look, based on previous news leaks.

Much is at stake for the Cupertino, California-based tech company with this particular launch. This year marks the 10th anniversary of Apples popular device, and expectations are riding particularly high for an all-new design.

If Apple delivers, Munster predicted, the companys overall iPhone unit sales could increase 10% over the next 12 months. And even if it doesnt, he contended theres so much pent-up demand now for a new Apple device, the next iPhone could still drive up overall iPhone sales by 5% during the same period.

Brian White, the global head of technology and software for Drexel Hamilton, agrees with Munster. White, who visited China earlier this year and met with a number of Apple competitors, smartphone component companies and cellphone carriers, contended that reports on the new iPhones purported features had already done an excellent job of teeing up excitement for the device.

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I do feel like this device has sold itself already, White said. When people hear its going to get a 5.8-inch OLED screen, for example, thats very exciting.

A tougher smartphone market

Over the last 12 months alone, competition in the smartphone market has become more heated. The market share for smartphones in the world running Apples iOS dipped 3.5% from fourth-quarter 2016 to first-quarter 2017, according to IDC, while Androids market share climbed 3.6% during the same period.

Chalk up some of that market share give-and-take to the introduction of attractive, high-end Android phones, and declining average selling prices. Android creator Andy Rubin launched The Essential Phone last month  a sleek, powerful device priced at $699 to start, which is hundreds of dollars less than what the new iPhone could reportedly cost. Meanwhile, Apples largest smartphone competitor, Samsung, plans on launching its own Galaxy Note 8 on Sept. 15, which my colleague Dan Howley recently reviewed and liked despite its high price. Both devices sport cutting-edge features and blistering speeds.

Android and its many partners have come forth with new experiences and hardware, and now its Apples turn to either keep pace or slightly ahead, contended Ramon Llamas, research manager for IDC. And because there are many areas for Apple to address by itself whilst Android can look to many companies, the pressure is on Apple to stay on the leading edge.

Of course, theres only one way to know whether Apple actually delivers: wait, and see.



JP Mangalindan is a senior correspondent for Yahoo Finance covering the intersection of tech and business. Email story tips and musings to jpm@oath.com. Follow him on Twitter or Facebook.

More from JP:
Christian Siriano's Spring 2018 collection was a total dream.

The designer unveiled his latest collection during New York Fashion Week with hues that totally scream spring -- shades of lime, magenta, and cobalt blue. If you're familiar with Siriano's work, you know that voluminous pieces -- think billowy sleeves and immaculate ball gowns -- are his true love. For Siriano, it's go big or go home. And he definitely went big.

Siriano continued his message of inclusivity at his latest unveiling.

Coca Rocha, a Siriano muse, opened the show in a show in a floral brocade cut-out top and matching cropped trousers. She was followed by male model Austin Kairis in a puff-sleeved blazer and cropped trousers in the same bold pattern.

In the middle of the show, trans model Avie Acosta hit the runway in a dreamy black chiffon gown.

The industry's top curvy models also strutted down the runway, looking flawless, no doubt, in Siriano's pieces.

Former "Saturday Night Live" cast member Leslie Jones, the show's designated hype woman, sat front row and cheered on as models like Marquita Pring, Candice Huffine and Jocelyn Corona walked by. Jones hoot and hollered as every model hit the runway -- and the audience was totally there for it.

Our favorites? A voluminous black ball gown with a sky-high slit that has Reese Witherspoon's name written all over it. One of the last pieces to hit the runway was a magenta-hued gown with an ornate neckline that was truly made for Lady Gaga.

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The makeup perfectly tied all the pieces in the collection together. Siriano was inspired by a psychedelic garden, evoking a bold simplicity within a bright color palette. Head artist Polly Osmond used e.l.f. products to create stunning makeup looks anchored by a petal pink lip, fresh skin and eyes with bold, wispy lashes. The cosmetics brand made its NYFW debut with Siriano's show.

For the complete collection, click on the slideshow above.
ANAHEIM, Calif.  Former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano sued the Trump administration on Friday to block it from taking work authorization and deportation protections away from hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants.

The lawsuit, which she filed in her capacity as president of the University of California system along with the regents, is in part personal to Napolitano  she created the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which Trump is now phasing out, in 2012. But she said on Friday that her bigger interest lies with the young people whose futures are now being put in doubt and doing all we can to support and protect those young people.

There are roughly 4,000 undocumented immigrants who attend schools in the University of California system, and Napolitano said on a call with reporters that a large proportion of them have DACA protections  so-called Dreamers. The states university system also employs undocumented teachers, healthcare workers and other staff.

The lawsuit alleges that Trumps decision to rescind the program violates the Administrative Procedure Act and constitutional due process, including that of students at University of California schools and the system itself.

The administrations approach in rescinding DACA was the opposite of reasoned decision-making and thus is unlawful, Napolitano said. It did not assess the costs of rescinding DACA to the hundreds of thousands of Dreamers or to the schools and communities in which they live, study and work.

Former Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano gives her final speech in that office at the National Press Club in Washington on Aug. 27, 2013. (Photo: Larry Downing / Reuters)

The lawsuit comes on the heels of a complaint by 15 states and the District of Columbia and a challenge by a former recipient of the program. All are aiming to prevent Trump from ending DACA protections.

Napolitanos lawsuit alleges that the Trump administration illegally neglected to follow rules outlined in the Administrative Procedure Act, which would have required more notice and a public comment period before making such a far-reaching change. Napolitano said that the situation was distinct from the creation of DACA, which did not go through a public comment period, because the program involved case-by-case determinations about prosecutorial discretion, while Trumps decision will hit recipients en masse.

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[Rescinding DACA] doesnt involve discretion at all, Napolitano said. It says that for this whole category of cases the administration will not exercise discretion and will not defer deportations. So it deals with this population and a whole category, not individuals.

She said that DACA is also distinct from the Deferred Action for Parents of Americans and Lawful Permanent Residents program, or DAPA, which was blocked in the courts because of a lawsuit that alleged, in part, that the Obama administration violated the Administrative Procedure Act in creating it.

Fridays lawsuit also argues that the Trump administration violated the due process rights of DACA recipients, which are protected by the Fifth Amendment, by executive fiat.

Those arguments also form part of the two other legal challenges to the termination of DACA filed in New York shortly after the Trump administration announced it would phase out the signature immigration reform of the Obama years.

One of those cases was originally filed in Brooklyn last year by DACA recipient Martin Jonathan Batalla Vidal. He had challenged the revocation of his three-year work authorization after the programs expansion was blocked by a federal judge in Texas, along with a farther-reaching program to shield undocumented parents of U.S. citizens from deportation. Lawyers in the Batalla Vidal case requested to amend their lawsuit to challenge the termination of DACA within hours of the Trump administrations announcement on Tuesday.

A coalition of 15 states and the District of Columbia, led by New York, filed a second lawsuit on Wednesday aimed at keeping DACA alive.

Both of the New York lawsuits allege that Trumps decision to end DACA was motivated by an intent to discriminate against Mexicans, citing the vitriolic statements aimed at Mexican immigrants that he made repeatedly on the campaign trail. Napolitanos lawsuit does not include that claim.

Democratic California Attorney General Xavier Becerra plans to file a fourth lawsuit in federal court in his home state disputing the decision to end DACA.

The president has broad authority to undue the executive actions of previous administrations. But similar legal challenges largely blocked Trumps efforts to restrict virtually all visits from several Muslim-majority countries earlier this year.

Whether or not the lawsuits are ultimately successful, they open the possibility that one or more federal judges could issue an injunction that would halt the termination of DACA while the cases wind their way through the legal system.

Trump has said he wants to work with Congress on a legislative solution for Dreamers in the six month window before many begin to lose their work permits and protections. Napolitano said she plans to continue to press members of Congress to solve the bill through law, even as she fights to maintain DACA in court.

I believe that in this case the court should act, Napolitano said, or in the alternative Congress should act and settle this matter for once and for all.

Also on HuffPost

April 2015

At an event hosted by Texas Patriots PAC: Everythings coming across the border: the illegals, the cars, the whole thing. Its like a big mess. Blah. Its like vomit.

June 2015

At a speech announcing his campaign: "When Mexico sends its people, theyre not sending their best. Theyre not sending you. Theyre not sending you. Theyre sending people that have lots of problems, and theyre bringing those problems with us. Theyre bringing drugs. Theyre bringing crime. Theyre rapists. And some, I assume, are good people."

August 2015

On NBC's "Meet the Press": Were going to keep the families together, we have to keep the families together, but they have to go."

September 2015

On CBS's "60 Minutes": Were rounding em up in a very humane way, in a very nice way. And theyre going to be happy because they want to be legalized. And, by the way, I know it doesnt sound nice. But not everything is nice.

November 2015

On MSNBC's "Morning Joe": You are going to have a deportation force, and you are going to do it humanely."

February 2016

At a GOP primary debate: We have at least 11 million people in this country that came in illegally. They will go out. They will come back  some will come back, the best, through a process.

March 2016

At a press conference when asked if he would consider allowing undocumented immigrants to stay: "We either have a country or we dont. We either have a country or we dont. We have borders or we dont have borders. And at this moment, the answer is absolutely not.

April 2016

At an event hosted by NBC's "Today Show": Theyre going to go, and were going to create a path where we can get them into this country legally, OK? But it has to be done legally. ... Theyre going to go, and then come back and come back legally.

July 2016

At the Republican National Convention: "Tonight, I want every American whose demands for immigration security have been denied  and every politician who has denied them  to listen very closely to the words I am about to say. On January 21st of 2017, the day after I take the oath of office, Americans will finally wake up in a country where the laws of the United States are enforced."

September 2016

At a rally: Anyone who has entered the United States illegally is subject to deportation. That is what it means to have laws and to have a country. Otherwise we dont have a country.

September 2016

On "The Dr. Oz Show": Well, under my plan the undocumented or, as you would say, illegal immigrant wouldnt be in the country. They only come in the country legally.

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This article originally appeared on HuffPost.
The Texas police officer who rose to internet fame after having a tea party with a toddler he helped deliver has died, officials said.

Tarrant County Deputy Constable Mark Diebold died Thursday, loved ones said. He was 48.

Though the official cause of death is unknown, those who knew him wrote on social media that he had suffered a heart attack and was in the ICU before he passed away.

Diebold, who leaves behind a wife and two daughters, had worked in law enforcement since 1994 and in the constables office since 2008.

He made headlines across the country after photos of himself and little Evelyn Hall enjoying an adorable tea party went viral earlier this year.

Read: 5-Year-Old Girl Who Loves Police Celebrates Birthday With Her Favorite Officer

Diebold helped deliver the girl in a gas station parking lot on July 18, 2016, after her mother went into labor while on the way to the hospital.

Evelyn and Diebold marked the one-year anniversary of the momentous occasion with an outdoor bash at a table set for two.

Diebold was game for the photo shoot, appearing delighted to toast with the tot he helped bring into this world and raise a pinky as he took an imaginary sip of tea.

You did way more than help with Evelyn's delivery... you brought a light into our life as well as countless of others, Evelyns mother, Destiny Hall, wrote on Facebook in tribute to Diebold.

He was family to us and an angel to our family, she later said in a video posted to Facebook. He is the worlds finest man and well miss him so much.

Read: Police Officer Has Adorable Tea Party with Little Girl He Saved From Choking

He was muscular and tattooed really, a kick-butt officer, but he had the biggest heart, the biggest smile and impacted our life in a huge way  Ill miss him so much and am just devastated to hear of his loss, she continued, choking back sobs as she spoke of her dear friend.

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The Hall and Diebold families became close after the birth of Evelyn, who along with her family affectionately called the officer Uncle Mark.

He blessed so many people and if you ever got a chance to know him, youd know exactly what Im talking about, Hall said Thursday.

Cyndi Williams, who photographed Diebolds tea party with Evelyn, agreed, writing: The world lost one of the most genuine men I've ever been blessed to know... I am honored to have called you my friend. Today, you are truly an angel to us all.

Watch: Marine Drill Instructor Dad Enjoys Tea Party with 4-Year-Old Daughter

Related Articles:
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-11 04:56:54|Editor: yan

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BAGHDAD, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- The Iraqi authorities detained some 1,400 foreign wives and children of suspected Islamic State (IS) fighters at a camp near the newly-freed city of Mosul in northern Iraq, a government official said on Sunday.

"The security forces are interrogating the detainees in a detention camp in Hammam al-Alil, some 50 km south of Mosul, to determine the identities of their countries as many of them no longer had their original documents," Jasim al-Attiyah, undersecretary of the Minister of Displacement and Migration, told Xinhua.

A security source in Mosul told Xinhua "the nationalities of the detainees vary from Russia, Turkey to other countries of Europe and Asia."

"They are wives and children of Daesh (IS) militants who are either killed in the battles in Tal Afar with Iraqi forces or surrendered to the Iraqi forces and the Kurdish Peshmerga forces," the source said on condition of anonymity.

On Aug. 31, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi declared full liberation of the city of Tal Afar and surrounding areas from the extremist IS militants.
Cartagena (Colombia) (AFP) - Pope Francis got a cut on his brow and blood on his white cape Sunday when he bumped into the window of his Popemobile while waving to admirers in Colombia.

Francis, 80, was standing up in the specially designed vehicle during a procession through the Caribbean city of Cartagena when the vehicle braked sharply.

Television pictures showed him colliding with the glass of the vehicle's covered platform, and then being assisted by his bodyguard.

He was seen later with a bruise on his cheek and a small dressing on his brow, but still smiling.

"I got bashed," he joked to reporters.

Vatican spokesman Greg Burke told journalists: "The pope is alright. Ice was put on it and he was treated. He will continue the schedule for his visit with no changes."

Francis was in Cartagena on the last day of a four-city Colombian tour. He was due to fly back to Rome later Sunday.
Cartagena (Colombia) (AFP) - Pope Francis prayed Sunday for a peaceful end to Venezuela's "grave crisis" which has left scores dead, as he wrapped up a tour to support peace in neighboring Colombia.

The Argentine pope, 80, spoke during a prayer service in Cartagena, one of Colombia's top tourist draws but also one of its poorest cities, on the last day of his tour of the country.

"I assure all of you of my prayers for each of the countries of Latin America, and in a special way for neighboring Venezuela," Francis said.

"I appeal for the rejection of all violence in political life and for a solution to the current grave crisis, which affects everyone, particularly the poorest and most disadvantaged of society."

- 'Pope should intervene' -

Venezuela's crisis has caused food and medicine shortages and calls for President Nicolas Maduro to quit.

Clashes with security forces at anti-government protests left 125 people dead from April to July.

The Vatican tried to mediate in negotiations last year between Venezuela's government and opposition.

The talks broke down with the sides accusing each other of bad faith.

Thousands of Venezuelans have fled to Colombia to escape the crisis.

"We could ask the pope to intervene directly for dialogue," said Venezuelan housewife Nancy Pugliese, 35, who attended Francis's visit in Cartagena.

"We need all the spiritual support we can get to free Venezuela... The pope should tell President Maduro directly to listen to the people."

- Venezuelans vote -

On Sunday, Venezuela's center right-led opposition was holding a vote to choose candidates for regional governorship elections scheduled for October.

The opposition MUD coalition and international powers have accused Maduro of stifling democracy by taking over power from state institutions.

Francis met in Bogota on Thursday with Venezuelan bishops, who warned him that priests and nuns had faced threats in their country.

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They said in a statement that they "informed him about the worsening of the crisis and the radicalization of the government's stance."

The statement said Francis "expressed his concern for the worsening of the humanitarian crisis."

- Praying for the poor -

Francis was due to fly back to Rome on Sunday evening after a four-city tour of Colombia.

During his visit, he pleaded for lasting peace in Colombia as it moves toward the end of a half-century civil war.

In Cartagena, he visited the impoverished district of San Francisco, where he blessed the foundations of a new homeless shelter.

"We have a lot of faith in Francis's visit to this forgotten district," said Willy Martinez, a 43-year-old bricklayer.

"Here, there are lots of people who only eat once a day. The worst thing is the corruption -- that is worse than the bullets of the guerrillas or the paramilitaries."

Francis prayed in the name of local holy figures, including Saint Peter Claver, the patron saint of slaves, who lived in this colonial port city during the slave trade.

They "invite us to work to promote the dignity of all our brothers and sisters, particularly the poor and the excluded of society," he said.

"Those who are abandoned, immigrants and those who suffer violence and human trafficking."

- Pope gets 'bashed' -

Earlier, Francis got a cut on his brow and blood on his white cape when he bumped into the window of his Popemobile.

He was standing up in the specially designed vehicle, waving to admirers, when it braked sharply and he collided with the glass.

He was seen later with a bruise on his cheek and a small dressing on his brow, but still smiling.

"I got bashed," he joked to reporters.
Burmese Muslims fleeing the military government arrive in Dhaka, Banglades - AP

Rohingya militants, whose August 25 raids in Burma's Rakhine State sparked an army crackdown that has seen nearly 300,000 of the Muslim minority flee to Bangladesh, on Sunday declared an immediate unilateral one-month ceasefire.

Bedraggled and exhausted Rohingya refugees have arrived in huge numbers in Bangladeshs Coxs Bazar area for over two weeks, while tens of thousands more are believed to be on the move inside Rakhine, many in desperate conditions after more than a fortnight without shelter, food and water.

A further 27,000 ethnic Rakhine Buddhists as well as Hindus have also been displaced by violence that has unfurled across the northern part of the state.

"The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) hereby declares a temporary cessation of offensive military operations," it said in a statement on its Twitter handle @ARSA_Official, adding it was to allow for humanitarian aid to reach the battered region.

The group urged "all humanitarian actors" to resume aid delivery to "all victims of humanitarian crisis irrespective of ethnic or religious background" during the ceasefire period which runs until October 9.

It called on Burma, also known as Myanmar, to "reciprocate this humanitarian pause" in fighting.

About | Myanmars Rohingya people

There was no immediate response from Burma's military.

Rohingya refugees allege "clearance operations" by the army in its offensives against the ARSA resulted in mass killings and the burning of hundreds of villages, sending them across the border. International aid programmes in Rakhine have been severely curtailed, as the fighting engulfed parts of the state.

On Saturday the UN said a total of 290,000 had crossed into Bangladesh after days-long treks or by boat, joining already overcrowded camps of Rohingya who have fled Myanmar over decades of troubles.

The UN has appealed for urgent donations of $77 million to provide for the influx of Rohingya which has put a "massive strain" on existing camps.

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Bangladesh already hosts around 400,000 Rohingya from previous crises.

The World Food Programme is doling out rice sacks to hungry families as desperate new arrivals, many with no belongings, food or water, crowd relief teams trying to manage the huge influx of people.

Better-known locally as Harakah al-Yaqin (Faith Movement), ARSA launched coordinated raids using hundreds of militants on August 25 on around 30 police posts and state offices in northern Rakhine state.

The kickback by security forces prompted the Rohingya exodus.

Rohingya Muslims driven from Burma, in pictures

Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh say ethnic Rakhine Buddhists joined security forces in the indiscriminate killing of villagers.

In an area split by claim and counterclaim, ethnic Rakhine villagers accuse militants of murdering their civilians while the government says fleeing Rohingya set fire to their own homes to forment fear and anti-state anger.

ARSAs Twitter page is often the first to publish statements or direct readers to videos.

Sundays statement was signed by Ata Ullah, who purportedly commands the militants from jungle bases straddling the Bangladesh-Burma border.

ARSA appears to have significantly grown in the last year despite remaining hopelessly outgunned against one of Asias largest militaries.

According to statements and photos released by Burmas army, the militants use primitive weapons, including gunpowder rifles, homemade guns and bombs as well as clubs and swords.

Burma's army says it has killed nearly 400 militants so far, while some Rohingya refugees have complained they were forced to fight by ARSA.

The first ARSA attacks in October last year were less ambitious, but the subsequent military response by a security force notorious for its scorched earth response to insurgency sent 90,000 Rohingya fleeing across the border.

That means over a third of the estimated 1.1 million Rohingya in Rakhine state have fled in less than a year.

Burma does not want its Rohingya population. The government does not recognise them among its official ethnic minority groups and they are instead pejoratively labelled Bengalis  illegal immigrants from Bangaldesh.

The treatment of the Rohingya has overshadowed Burmas emergence from military rule, with de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi singled out for her failure to use her moral weight in defence of the minority.
By Stephen Kalin JEDDAH (Reuters) - Arab countries and Qatar should enter into direct talks to solve a diplomatic dispute, Russia's foreign minister said on a trip to Saudi Arabia on Sunday, urging all parties to restore regional unity. Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt severed ties with Qatar on June 5, accusing it of supporting terrorist groups - a charge it denies. "We have confirmed our position (that we are) in favor of settling the disagreements by means of negotiations, by directly expressing concerns and achieving solutions which would take into account the concerns and the interests of all parties," the minister, Sergei Lavrov, told a news conference in Jeddah. "We are interested in all those mediatory efforts that are currently being made producing results and the unity of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) being restored," he added. Kuwait and the United States have been mediating to reach a breakthrough in the three-month long crisis that has put the whole region on edge, and prompted Turkey to send troops to the wealthy Gulf state in a sign of support. Last week, Saudi Arabia suspended any dialogue with Qatar, accusing it of "distorting facts", just after a report of a phone call between the leaders of both countries suggested a breakthrough in the Gulf dispute. Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir told the news conference that Qatar needed to show seriousness in finding a solution to the crisis. "We want clarity in the Qatari position, we want seriousness in finding a solution to this crisis that leads to the implementation of principles which all countries support: no supporting terrorism, no welcoming unwanted guests, no spreading hate, no intervention in others' affairs," Jubeir said. The two ministers also discussed the planned de-escalation zones in Syria and unification of the Syrian opposition. "The kingdom supports the creation of de-escalation zones and looks forward to starting a political process that will end the Syrian crisis," Jubeir said. President Bashar al-Assad's negotiators have not met directly with the opposition because there is no unified delegation from the High Negotiations Committee (HNC) and two other groups, known as the Cairo and Moscow platforms, all claim to represent the opposition. (Additional reporting by Ahmed Tolba in Cairo and Maria Kiselyova in Moscow, Writing by Sylvia Westall and Aziz El Yaakoubi; Editing by Elaine Hardcastle)
Beirut (AFP) - At least 34 civilians were killed on Sunday when Russian warplanes targeted ferries carrying them across the Euphrates River near Syria's eastern city of Deir Ezzor, a monitor said.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor initially reported 21 deaths in Russian air strikes but later raised the toll to 34, saying that "more bodies have been found in the river".

Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said nine children were among those killed fleeing fighting and that "dozens" of people were wounded in the strikes.

He said the raids targeted "more than 40 ferries" that had left Al-Boulil town southwest of Deir Ezzor city for the eastern shore of the river.

The Observatory relies on a network of sources inside Syria, and says it determines whose planes carry out raids according to type, location, flight patterns and munitions used.

Moscow intervened in Syria in September 2015 in support of its ally President Bashar al-Assad.

Sunday's reported raids came as Syrian troops pressed an offensive against Islamic State group jihadists across Deir Ezzor province with Russian air cover.

At the same time, an alliance of US-backed Syrian Kurdish and Arab fighters is also on the move against IS in Deir Ezzor.

The Syrian Democratic Forces on Saturday announced they had begun clearing IS jihadists from areas east of the Euphrates, which cuts diagonally across the province.

On Sunday, the Observatory said fighters from the SDF's Deir Ezzor Military Council (DEMC) had made a sweeping advance, capturing territory just kilometres (miles) from the provincial capital Deir Ezzor.
Another week, another revelation of a massive breach with potentially far-reaching consequences. Well, two of those this week, actually. First, Symantec revealed that hackersprobably based in Russia, although the security firm didn't go so far as to name nameshad hacked more than 20 power companies in North America and Europe, and in a handful of cases, had direct access to their control systems. And then Equifax confessed it had been the target of a breach that stole 143 million Americans' data, one of the worst data spills ever, and one that raises questions about data centralization, particularly for Social Security Numbers.

Megabreaches aside, Facebook admitted that a Russian troll farm had spent $100,000 on influence ads during last year's election. Google patched a flaw in Android that would allow a nasty "toast overlay" attack to take control of devices. WIRED dug into the long-running series of scams and theft plaguing new currencies in the cryptocoin economy. And we spoke to the Democratic National Committee's chief technology officer about how he hopes to prevent the next attack aimed at disemboweling the party.

And theres more. As always, weve rounded up all the news we didnt break or cover in depth this week. Click on the headlines to read the full stories.

Researchers Uncover Serious Holes in Germany's Voting Software

After hackers believed to be Russian meddled in both the US and French elections, Germany is likely next on the target list. And this week the Chaos Computer Club, a German collective of hackers and security researchers, exposed the results of their unsolicited audit of the country's voting infrastructure. They found that a program called PC-Wahl, used for recording, counting, displaying, and analyzing votes in German elections from the local level to the national government. The hackers found they could corrupt the updates from the server controlling that software to re-tabulate votes at will, with potentially disastrous consequences for the country's October parliamentary election. The CCC says that VOTE-IT, the company behind the software, privately fixed the security flaws the group exposed while publicly refusing to acknowledge the vulnerabilities.

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Ultrasonic Voice Commands Can Hijack Siri and Amazon Echos

These days, it's not just politicians who can use "dog-whistles" to send messages intended only for a very particular audience. So can hackers. Researchers at the University of Zhejiang have shown that they can send ultrasonic signals to voice assistants like your iPhone's Siri, Amazon's Echo, Google Now, and even the voice command systems of an Audi car that are inaudible to humans, but nonetheless picked up and obeyed by those systems. Their technique, which they call DolphinAttack, can be achieved with just a few dollars of equipment like an ultrasonic transducer and a battery, as well as a smartphone, and could allow hackers to silently "speak" to nearby devices and cause them to visit malware-infected websites, make calls that stream audio for surveillance purposes, or other mischief. And since the attack takes advantage of physical properties of the microphone that cause it to pick up commands from ultrasonic waves, there's no easy fix for the problem.

Critical Bug in Open-Source Framework Could Endanger Corporate Data

A bug announced this week in the Apache Struts web application software could allow attackers to take over servers running applications built with the framework, enabling the intruders to steal or manipulate sensitive data. The bug is now patched, but is significant because many organizations and Fortune 100 companies run and rely on affected applications. The vulnerability specifically impacts an Apache Struts plugin called REST that has been around since 2008. Vulnerable systems are everywhere, from public-facing platforms for banking and reservations to back-end software within a company, and researchers say exploiting the bug is simple using a web browser. They hadn't seen evidence that the bug was exploited before their announcement, but stressed how important it is for organizations to patch and monitor their systems.

Resumes of Military and Intelligence Personnel Discovered in Unsecured S3 Bucket

Roughly 9,400 sensitive resumes, many from US veterans, were found accessible and exposed in a recruiting firm's Amazon Web Services server, according to Chris Vickery and other researchers at the UpGuard security firm. The resumes date back to 2008 and were from applicants applying to work for the private security group TigerSwan, which contracted with the third party TalentPen until February. Some of the applicants claimed in their resumes to have US government top secret clearance, and many detailed sensitive military and intelligence work. The documents also naturally included personal information like email addresses, phone numbers, home addresses, and even passport numbers and partial social security numbers. Some of the submissions were from Iraqi and Afghan nationals who worked with US organizations. "While criminals could use the deep knowledge of work experience and personal details ... the value of this database to foreign intelligence agencies if they were to access it is not insignificant," UpGuard noted.

Widespread Protests Criticizing Togolese Government Prompt Telecommunications Blackouts

Beginning on Tuesday, internet users in Togo began reporting slow or inaccessible internet and wireless connections, and lost access to communication platforms like WhatsApp, Facebook, and even SMS text messaging over cell networks. The country was experiencing widespread blackouts by Thursday, and some residents traveled to Togo's borders looking for connectivity leaking in from neighboring countries. The West African NGO Internet Without Borders and the internet infrastructure company Dyn both confirmed local reports. The blackouts are in response to extensive protests demanding Togolese President Faure Gnassingbe's resignation. Governments in countries like Gabon and Cameroon have used similar repression tactics to attempt to quiet dissent.
Washington (AFP) - The rapid-fire formation of four unusually potent Atlantic hurricanes, including Harvey and Irma, has stoked scientific debate over what role global warming is playing in this phenomenon.

First came Harvey, which unleashed massive floods in Texas, then three devastating hurricanes roared across the Atlantic simultaneously -- Irma, Katia and Jose.

"Currently we have three Atlantic hurricanes with 90-plus mile per hour winds -- only the fourth time on record in Atlantic this has occurred," Philip Klotzbach, a research scientist at Colorado State University, said on Twitter.

The last time three hurricanes were active at once was 2010, when hurricanes Igor, Julia and Karl were classified as hurricanes, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

Katia weakend to a tropical depression on Saturday.

Hurricane Irma, now taking aim at Florida, has stunned experts with its sheer size and strength, churning across the ocean with sustained Category 5 winds of 183 miles per hour (295 kilometers per hour) for more than 33 hours, making it the longest-lasting, top-intensity cyclone ever recorded.

Meanwhile Jose, a Category 4 on the Saffir Simpson scale of 1 to 5, is fast on the heels of Irma, pummeling the Caribbean for the second time in the span of a few days.

Many have wondered what is contributing to the power and frequency of these extreme storms.

"Atlantic hurricane seasons over the years have been shaped by many complex factors," said Jim Kossin, a NOAA hurricane scientist at the University of Wisconsin.

"Those include large scale ocean currents, air pollution -- which tends to cool the ocean down -- and climate change."

- Active cycle since 1995 -

For Gabriel Vecchi, professor of geosciences at Princeton University's Environmental Institute, the surge in cyclones is evidence of an "active era" for storms in the Atlantic since the mid 1990s, even if not every year saw strong storms.

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A period of relative calm for hurricanes, stretching from 2013 to 2016, can be explained by the presence of the equatorial Pacific warming trend, El Nino, which produces wind shear that tends to discourage the formation of hurricanes.

There was also little hurricane activity in the 1960s, '70s and '80s.

"There is still a lot of debate in the scientific community," over what causes this shift between calm and tumultuous times for storms, Vecchi said.

Some think a surge in industrial pollution after World War II may have produced more pollutant particles that blocked the Sun's energy and exerted a cooling effect on the oceans.

"The pollution reduced a lot of hurricane activity," he told AFP.

Pollution began to wane in the 1980s due to regulations such as the Clean Air Act, allowing more of the Sun's rays to penetrate the ocean and provide warming fuel for storms.

Vecchi said the "big debate" among scientists is over which plays a larger role -- variations in ocean currents or pollution cuts. There is evidence for both, but there isn't enough data to answer a key question.

"We don't know how long the cycle may last," Vecchi said.

"We have a lack of historical perspective."

- Warming's role -

The burning of fossil fuels, which spew greenhouse gases into the atmosphere and warm the Earth, can also be linked to a rise in extreme storms in recent years.

Warmer ocean temperatures yield more moisture, more rainfall, and greater intensity storms.

"It is not a coincidence that we're seeing more devastating hurricanes," climatologist Michael Mann of Penn State University told AFP in an email.

"Over the past few years, as global sea surface temperatures have been the warmest on record, we've seen the strongest hurricanes -- as measured by peak sustained winds -- globally, in both Southern and Northern Hemisphere, in both Pacific and now, with Irma, the open Atlantic," he added.

"The impacts of climate change are no longer subtle. We're seeing them play out in real time, and the past two weeks have been a sadly vivid example."

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As of noon Saturday, Patrick Air Force Base and Cape Canaveral Air Force Station were completely evacuated in anticipation of Hurricane Irma, according to an Air Force news release.

Despite the record-breaking storms rapid trajectory towards the Florida coast earlier this week, SpaceX and the U.S. Air Force still decided to move ahead with the planned launch of a Falcon 9 rocket carrying the mysterious X-37B spaceplane back into orbit. The unmanned space plane is a reusable space craft, and the Air Force has been generally tight-lipped on what exactly its doing up there in the sky, but this was the Falcon 9s first launch carrying an X-37B.

Following the launch, the Falcon 9 rocket landed safely down at Cape Canaveral, and was recovered and secured by SpaceX personnel.

Alexis Ramos stands in the ocean at Luquillo Beach prior to the passing of Hurricane Irma on September 6, 2017 in San Juan, Puerto Rico. The category 5 storm has since moved into Florida.

Immediately following the launch of the Falcon 9, SpaceX and their Air Force partners began securing the launch pads and facilities of Cape Canaveral, which sits near the middle of the Florida coast. According to a 45th Space Wing press release regarding Hurricane Irma prep, Wing personnel assigned to hurricane response teams  which is about 215 people  and their crisis action teams will be riding out the storm in designated safe buildings. They will be tasked with assessing the damage of the storm and making an educated decision about when it will be safe to resume work at Cape Canaveral. We have a professional team with the right knowledge and expertise to execute what is necessary to ensure the safety of our people, our bases and our assets, the release reads.

The Air Force said it will also have several hurricane ride-out teams remaining around the region. They are tasked with keeping the bases and all their assets secure, as well as assisting with reconnaissance around the area following the storm. The 45th Space Wing says they plan on keeping lines of communication open throughout Hurricane Irma and following it as recovery begins.

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You can follow storm updates from Cape Canaveral and Patrick Air Force Base via its Facebook account, or by texting follow 45SWAlert to 40404.

As of Saturday afternoon, it was predicted that the storm will make its way from the Florida Keys up the coast towards Tampa. Winds could be higher than 100 mph could rip through regularly populated areas of Floridas west coast, with flooding of up to fifteen feet on dry land.

Photos via Getty Images / Jose Jimenez, SpaceX

Written by Grace Lisa Scott

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Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-11 05:31:58|Editor: yan

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by Valentini Anagnostopoulou, Maria Spiliopoulou

THESSALONIKI, Greece, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Representatives of 25 national news agencies from China, the Balkans, Central and Southern Europe and Russia reaffirmed on Sunday their commitment to join efforts to strengthen ties between the countries along the Belt and Road during a forum hosted in the northern city port of Thessaloniki.

The "New Silk Road" forum, organized by the Greek national Athens -- Macedonian News Agency (AMNA) under the auspices of Greek President Prokopis Pavlopoulos, was held in the context of the 82nd Thessaloniki International Fair (TIF), Greece's most prestigious annual trade fair, where China is this year's honored country.

High-ranking Greek government officials and prominent journalists participated in the conference which focused on coordinating the cooperation of news agencies in order to boost their commercial, cultural and trade ties, to promote growth and increase investments along the "New Silk Road".

In this context, all parts pledged to promote common business synergies, scientific and technological innovations and regional economic cooperation.

In his opening speech, AMNA President Michalis Psilos referred to the new challenges news agencies face today. As he stressed, social networks cannot replace real media, which have the responsibility to provide unbiased information to the public.

"Restoring a relationship of trust between the media and the society is the biggest challenge for the news agencies, as well as for modern media," Psilos said.

Psilos also underlined the strategic role Greece holds in the New Silk Road. "It is an economic revolution of global scope... This strategy gives Greece the room and the potential to upgrade its own role in the modern world as a member of the European Union," he added.

Digital Policy, Telecommunications and Media Minister Nikos Pappas, from his part, encouraged the news agencies' representatives to "spread the good news that Greek economy is turning a new page".

Xinhua News Agency Vice President Zhang Sutang voiced hopes that the forum will inject new momentum to the all-round cooperation among the countries along the Belt and Road.

"News media are entrusted with the mission to convey information, boost understanding and enhance cooperation, play a significant part in connecting peoples, and undertake a unique function in bolstering economic and trade cooperation among countries along the route," he noted.

In this direction, Zhang presented to the Forum's participants three proposals: first, to further enhance exchange of personnel and upgrade storytelling of the Silk Road, second, to create common values and build a sharing platform and, third, to adapt to the media development and expand the space for cooperation.

The forum concluded with the "Declaration of Thessaloniki", a shared statement with which the representatives of national news agencies outlined a nine-point action plan of international cooperation and expressed their intention to play a leading role in enhancing communication between the New Silk Road countries.

Until TIF closes on Sept. 17 exhibitors and visitors from 17 countries will explore opportunities for cooperation in several sectors, with China holding a leading role in this discourse this year.

The Chinese pavilion, which was inaugurated on Saturday by Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, covers 6,000 square meters, with the participation of more than 100 major Chinese companies.

Approximately 250,000 visitors are expected to visit the booths of some 1,500 exhibitors until next weekend, making it the most successful exhibition of the past decade, according to organizers.
Srisaket Sor Rungvisai, of Thailand, celebrates after knocking out Roman Gonzalez of Nicaragua, during the fourth round of their WBC super flyweight championship boxing match Saturday, Sept. 9, 2017, in Carson, Calif. (AP)

WBC super flyweight champion Srisaket Sor Rungvisai wanted to prove that his controversial victory over former pound-for-pound king Roman Chocolatito Gonzalez six months ago was no fluke. Not only did he do that, he made a statement that effectively closed the chapter on Chocolatito as a pound-for-pound talent with a 4th round knockout in front of a sold out crowd of 7,418 at the StubHub Center.

If were going to be completely honest, the Chocolatito that weve come to know over the years as an unstoppable super flyweight never showed up. Instead, it was Sor Rungvisai starting off with the same level of confidence that carried him to the upset back in March. As for Chocolatito, he looked as if he had aged terribly since the last fight. He was slower, less accurate and overall a shell of his former self.

Sor Rungvisai dominated the exchanges from the outset and used that early success to set up what would eventually be the sequence that would end the fight. Unconcerned with what Chocolatito sent in return, Sor Rungvisai plowed forward with combinations and power shots. The aggressiveness sapped whatever fight was left in Chocolatito.

A counter right hand dropped Gonzalez in the fourth round. Even though Chocolatito rose to his feet, it was obvious that he wasnt in the fight at this, or any point. Another right hook from Sor Rungvisai sealed the deal as Chocolatito slumped to the canvas with no chance of rising to his feet at the 1:18 mark as Sor Rungvisai firmly established himself as the top super flyweight on the planet. Chocolatito immediately went to a local hospital after the fight.

"This is a chapter of boxing history," Max Kellerman on Sor Rungvisai's KO of Chocolatito. #SuperFly pic.twitter.com/HzTwDrDqk6  HBOboxing (@HBOboxing) September 10, 2017

After starting his career 46-0, Chocolatito has now lost two straight fights. While its too soon to suggest that his career is over, one has to wonder if Chocolatito can alter his style at this stage of his career. After Floyd Mayweather retired, Chocolatito was recognized by many as the No. 1 pound-for-pound fighter in the world thanks to a ruthless style that overpowered his opponents with bell-to-bell aggression. Even though he is only 30 years old, the manner in which he fights has taken a toll on his body over the years.

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As for Sor Rungvisai  who improved to 44-4-1 with his 40th knockout of his career  the sky is the limit. He hasnt lost since dropping a technical decision to Carlos Cuadras in 2014 and has proven his worth as a super flyweight. Juan Francisco Estrada, who defeated Carlos Cuadras earlier in the night, is the mandatory opponent for Sor Rungvisai.

With a stacked 115 pound division, there will surely be some exciting fights down the line for the Thai fighter who has had one heck of a 2017.

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By John Davison BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syrian government forces and U.S.-backed militias converged on Islamic State in separate offensives against the militants in the eastern Syrian province of Deir al-Zor on Sunday. The U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces alliance of mostly Kurdish and Arab militias (SDF) said it had reached Deir al-Zor's industrial zone, just a few miles to the east of the city after launching operations in the area in recent days. The Syrian army and its allies, backed by Iran and by Russian air cover, meanwhile advanced from the west to seize full control of the Deir al-Zor-Damascus highway, a Hezbollah-run media unit reported. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said at least 17 civilians had been killed by Russian air strikes in Deir al-Zor on Sunday. The attacks squeezed Islamic State in its last major Syria stronghold in areas near the border with Iraq. The group has come under pressure since losing its de facto capital Mosul in Iraq this year and is surrounded by the SDF in Raqqa, its former Syria bastion. The jihadist group still holds much of Deir al-Zor province and half the city, as well as a pocket of territory near Homs and Hama further west, however, and is mounting counter-attacks. Sunday's advances mean that U.S.-backed forces and the Syrian government side, boosted by Russian military support, are separated only by about 15 km (10 miles) of ground and the Euphrates River in Deir al-Zor. Much of northeast Syria to the east of the Euphrates is held by the SDF, which is dominated by the Kurdish YPG militia. The Syrian government and its allies are increasingly capturing the remaining areas Islamic State holds to its west. Government troops linked up with forces already in Deir al-Zor at the Panorama entrance to the city, bringing the whole road under their control for the first time in years, the Hezbollah media unit reported. The Syrian army and its Iran-backed allies, which include Lebanese Hezbollah, this week broke a three-year siege by the jihadists of a government-held enclave in Deir al-Zor and an adjacent air base. Syrian state TV broadcast footage of Syrian officers who had been holed up in Deir al-Zor emotionally greeting their superiors after being surrounded by IS since 2014. The United Nations estimates that some 93,000 people were living in "extremely difficult" conditions in government-held parts of Deir al-Zor, supplied by air drops to the air base. Syrian government forces and their allies have been able to turn their attention to the fight against Islamic State in eastern Syria after recapturing many areas in the west from rebels. SDF REACHES INDUSTRIAL ZONE The SDF on Saturday announced an operation to capture northern and eastern parts of Deir al-Zor province and staged attacks from the northern countryside and southern Hasaka, which is under YPG control. The SDF, backed by U.S.-led air strikes and special forces on the ground, has captured most of Raqqa, upstream along the Euphrates, from Islamic State. Islamic State has lost nearly half of its territory across both Iraq and Syria, but still has 6,000-8,000 fighters left in Syria, the U.S.-led coalition has said. The forces leading the SDF's operation in Deir al-Zor say they do not expect clashes with Syrian government forces, but will respond if they come under fire. Syria's crowded battleground has shown the risks of escalation between world powers militarily involved in the six-year-old Syrian conflict. In June a U.S. warplane shot down a Syrian army jet near Raqqa in and the SDF accused the Syrian government of bombing its positions, raising tension between Washington and Moscow. The Cold War foes have also engaged over Syria, however, including setting up communication channels for flight safety in Syrian airspace. Both countries say the priority in Syria is to defeat Islamic State. Rounds of Syria talks between world powers have increasingly focused on Islamic State. Negotiations where Syria's opposition has repeatedly called for the removal of President Bashar al-Assad have failed to bring an end to the conflict. (Reporting by John Davison; Editing by Keith Weir and Angus MacSwan)
BEIRUT (Reuters) - The Syrian government has denied a U.N. report accusing it of a sarin attack in April that killed scores of people, state media said on Friday. Damascus sent the United Nations a letter "asserting that Syria has not and will not use toxic gases against its people because it does not have them in the first place", state news agency SANA said. U.N. war crimes investigators said this week that Syrian forces have used chemical weapons more than two dozen times during the six-year conflict. The U.N. Commission of Inquiry on Syria said a government warplane dropped sarin on Khan Sheikhoun in insurgent-held Idlib province in April, killing more than 80 civilians. The attack prompted a U.S. missile strike on a Syrian government air base. A fact-finding mission of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) previously identified the attack as containing sarin, an odorless nerve agent. But that conclusion did not assign blame. The Syrian government has said before that air strikes in the town of Khan Sheikhoun hit a weapons depot belonging to rebel factions. The U.N. investigators dismissed this. President Bashar al-Assad's government has repeatedly denied using chemical weapons in the war and says it only targets militants. In 2013, hundreds of civilians died in a sarin gas attack in the suburbs of the capital Damascus, in an attack that Western states blamed on Assad's government. Damascus blamed rebels. In the wake of the atrocity, the United States and Russia brokered a deal under which Syria joined the international Chemical Weapons Convention. Syria declared it had 1,300 tonnes of chemical weapons or industrial chemical stocks, surrendering it to the international community for destruction. U.N.-OPCW investigators have said that the government continued to use chlorine, which is widely available and hard to trace. Chlorine is not a banned substance, but the use of any chemical is banned under the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention. A series of U.N.-OPCW investigations found that various parties in the war have used chlorine, sulfur mustard gas and sarin. (Reporting by Ellen Francis; Editing by Alison Williams)
Ayanna Williams from Houston, Texas, has entered the Guinness World Records for having the longest fingernails in the world. Williams has been growing her nails for more than two decades. When Guinness measured her nails earlier this year, the combined total length was found to be 18 feet, 10.9 inches (576.4 centimeters).

Williams works as a nail technician and gives manicures to clients. It is not an easy task to take care of her precious assets as it takes around 20 hours and two bottles of nail polish for her to paint her nails. To keep her nails clean, she uses anti-bacterial soap and a nail brush. Another interesting fact is that her longest individual nail is longer than the shortest man ever, Chandra Bahadur Dangi, according to the Guinness World Records website.

However, Williams also has to follow some precautionary measures to ensure her nails do not break; she avoids washing dishes and also sleeps with her nails resting on a pillow. When she was asked whether she would cut her nails in the future, she replied: "Theyre a part of me so theyre here to stay!" The Guinness World Record website said.

There have been other bizarre records also; here are some of them.

1) Longest eyelashes

You Jianxia from China entered the Guinness World Record for having the longest eyelash. They are 4.88 inches long and were measured in Changzhou, Jiangsu, China, on June 28, 2016, according to The Guinness World Records website.

Jianxia first noticed the lashes on her left eyelid growing in 2013 when she had gone for an 18-month nature retreat.

2) Tallest high top fade

Benny Harlem from Los Angeles, California, has the tallest high top fade, which measures 20.5 inches. It apparently takes him more than two hours to style his hair, the Telegraph reported.

3) Bikini-clad Australian women set record

In September 2007, more than 1,000 women wore bikinis on a beach in Sydney, Australia, for a group photograph to enter into the Guinness World Records, Reuters reported. One of the representatives of the committee said: "This was certainly one of the more spectacular world records that Ive been invited to adjudicate on."

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4) Longest kiss

The longest kiss lasted for 58 hours, 35 minutes, and 58 seconds, which was achieved by a Thai couple named Ekkachai Tiranarat and Laksana Tiranarat at an event organized by "Ripley's Believe It or Not!" It was in February 2013. They won a cash prize, two diamond rings and a Guinness World Records title.

5) Largest Underwater Wedding

In this wedding which took place underwater in 2011, 303 divers attended the marriage ceremony of Ewa Staronska and Pawel Burkowski from Poland. The event was organized at the Koparki Diving Base, Jaworzno, Poland, according to the Guinness World Records website.

6) Highest collection of crocodile-related items

In September 2015, Andrew Gray entered the world records for collecting 6,739 crocodile-related items at his home in Northamptonshire, England, the BBC reported.

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Lome (AFP) - Togo opposition leaders on Sunday said they were not hopeful of political change, as parliament prepared to discuss potential constitutional reform after days of huge anti-government protests.

Hundreds of thousands of demonstrators took to the streets this week calling for presidential term limits, denouncing President Faure Gnassingbe and his family's half-century in power.

Gnassingbe took over as leader in 2005 after the death of his father, Gnassingbe Eyadema, who had come to power in 1967 after a military coup.

Togo's opposition has long called for constitutional reform and in an apparent concession, the government has proposed a new bill to parliament, which has been recalled for Tuesday.

But Eric Dupuy, spokesman for the CAP 2015 opposition grouping, described the bill as a "delaying tactic".

"We don't expect anything from it. We still don't know the details of the bill. At this stage it's difficult to talk about it," he told AFP.

Faure Gnassingbe, who currently holds the rotating presidency of the West African regional bloc ECOWAS, has won three elections in 2005, 2010 and 2015.

But the opposition has disputed the results and hundreds have been killed in post-poll protests.

The demonstrations this past week were largely peaceful, although police fired teargas at protesters who had mounted barricades in some areas of the capital Lome and more than 80 people were arrested.

Dupuy said Sunday human rights groups had told them all of those detained had been released overnight, but there was no official confirmation from the authorities.

Mobile internet services remained disrupted, according to an AFP correspondent in Lome, who said the atmosphere was calm although there were few people on the streets Sunday morning.

The opposition wants a return to the provision for a maximum of two, five-year presidential terms as well as the introduction of a two-round voting system.

The United Nations has urged the opposition to work with the government to enact reforms.

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- United opposition -

Togo's civil service minister Gilbert Barawa has said it was unclear whether lawmakers, who are not officially due back until October, will have time to discuss the bill at Tuesday's extraordinary session.

Gilles Yabi, a political analyst specialising in West Africa, said it was difficult to assess whether the government was serious about implementing any reforms, as it had not done so in the past.

Togo contrasts other West African nations which have imposed presidential term limits. Attempts to ignore pressure to do so have seen leaders forced out of office, as in Burkina Faso and the Gambia.

Yabi said it was unlikely in the current climate that Gnassingbe, who has traditionally had the support of the army and security services, would bow to pressure and step down.

But he said the level of opposition support and the size of demonstrations, particularly in cities outside the capital, was unprecedented, as was the emergence of opposition leader Tikpi Atchadam.

"We have witnessed the emergence of a leader who has broken free of the traditional constraints of Togolese opposition, which until recently was unheard of," he said.

"The fact that his political support base is not in Lome has changed something. It's limited the government's margin for manoeuvre, which has always known how to play off north and south."

Atchadam, who heads the Panafrican National Party (PNP), has made a point of leading the protests with veteran opposition leader Jean-Pierre Fabre, of the National Alliance for Change (ANC).

"By staying united, the opposition may be able to put more pressure on the regime," added Yabi.
Donald Trump suffered a heavy blow when he failed in July to pass a bill that would have toppled Obamacare: Getty Images

Donald Trump has quietly shut down funds to a $63m (48m) Obamacare project  just weeks after he failed to pass a bill to derail the affordable care programme entirely, it has been claimed.

The outreach system provides workers known as Navigators who are trained to help individuals and small businesses get access to health insurance packages which they can afford.

The White House last month said it would slash the budget for the service by $23 million  or 41 per cent  but it was revealed that money handed out in the form of grants already dried up this week.

Managers of non-profits who run the project across the US said they have been closing centres and making staff redundant after complaining their funds ran out in recent days.

Critics of Mr Trump say the move to allegedly stop injecting cash into the programme, which his administration has not confirmed, is designed to sabotage Obamacare.

It came just weeks after the US president suffered a heavy blow when senators failed to pass a bill that would have toppled the program  a plan he touted as one of his key pledges.

Owners of care groups complained that the funds to finance the Navigator outreach programme dried up on September 1, forcing them to scale back or shut down their projects, Vox reported.

Shelli Quenga, who runs the Palmetto Project, in South Carolina, said: "We know nothing right now. I laid off two people today and cut everybody else back to part-time for the remainder of the month. We have to pull from our own money at this point."

Donna Friedsam, director of Covering Wisconsin, also complained after their budget dried up.

She said: I have delivered 10 layoff notices to staff members. We dont have a funding flow anymore.

The care group owners said The White House had not announced when funding earmarked for next year will be released  but believe it could be as late as September 30.

A Health and Human Services spokesperson declined to comment to CNBC on when the information on the grants would be released, only saying "that information is forthcoming".

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President Obama introduced the Affordable Care Act  known as Obamacare  in 2010 in a move designed to help some 15 per cent in the US who did not have the means to sign up for health insurance.

His successor Mr Trump branded it a disaster and pledged to scrap the programme, which costs hundreds of millions a year, so his administration can replace it with their own system.
When he took office, President Donald Trump was convinced that peace Middle East would be easy. Now, seven months into the job, he appears to have realised that ending the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians may be more difficult than he initially though.

After his forthright assertions about his ability to solve the worlds most intractable conflict ("frankly maybe not as difficult as people have thought over the years," he said in May) the president said Thursday that he was now more pessimistic about the prospect of peace in the region.

Read more: Israel Condemned For Threatening Future of Christianity in the Holy Land

I think we have a chance of doing it. I think the Palestinians would like to see it happen. I think the Israelis would like to see it happen. So I think there is a chance that there could be peace. But again, I say that a little bit reluctantly. We're going to give it our best, he told reporters at the White House.

GettyImages-488226322

Getty/Tom Pennington

Early on the president put peace between Israel and the Palestinians at the heart of his foreign policy agenda and a visit to the Middle East was his first after taking office.

Trumps son in law Jared Kushner, the White Houses point man on the region, concluded a two-day tour of the region at the end of last month, meeting with officials in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Jordan, Jerusalem, Israel, and Ramallah in the West Bank.

Before his inauguration Trump said if Kushner couldnt produce peace in the Middle East then nobody can.

But Kushners trip was not exactly an unmitigated success. He was snubbed by the Egyptian President Abdul Fatah el-Sisi, who would be an indispensable guarantor of any possible peace deal, after the State Department announced it would be withdrawing $95.7 million in military and economic aid.

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In the West Bank city of Ramallah, Kushner was met with protests mocking the Trump administration and the 38-year-old seemed to make little progress with the leader of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas. Following their June meeting with Kusher and Middle East envoy Jonathan Greenblatt, Palestinian officials told the Israeli press the pair sounded like Netanyahu's advisers and not like fair arbiters."

For both the president and his son, Middle East peace may continue to be elusive.

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UPDATED | The Trump administration has no clear plans to offer aid to Mexico following a massive 8.1-magnitude earthquake that has killed at least 58 people and injured hundreds, despite the Mexican government's explicit offer to provide support to Texas following Hurricane Harvey.

A spokesperson for the National Security Council tells Newsweek the U.S. government has offered its condolences and is coordinating closely with Mexican authorities, adding, "We will continue to monitor the situation and take all appropriate steps." But no specifics were provided on what those steps may be.

With that said, State Department spokeswoman Nicole Thompson tells Newsweek the Mexican government has yet to request any international assistance, also noting the department is not aware of any U.S. citizen casualties from the quake.

Meanwhile, President Donald Trumpwho routinely tweets on an array of subjectshas yet to mention the earthquake on Twitter.

Thursday's earthquake was the strongest to hit Mexico in a century and was felt as far as Mexico City.

The earthquake did significant damage to parts of the country closer to the epicenter, particularly in the southern states of Chiapas and Oaxaca, The New York Times reports.

In an address to the nation shortly after the quake, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto stated, "We are assessing the damage, which will probably take hours, if not days. But the population is safe over all. There should not be a major sense of panic."

As Texas faced the effects of Hurricane Harvey, Trump attacked Mexico on Twitter over his desire to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, once again making the unsubstantiated claim that Mexico would pay for the wall.

The Mexican government responded to the president's social media assault by reiterating it would not pay for Trump's desired wall, but also offered to help Texas in the wake of the hurricane.

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At the time, Mexicos Ministry of Foreign Affairs released a statement that said, "The Mexican government takes this opportunity to express its full solidarity with the people and government of the United States as a result of the damages caused by Hurricane Harvey in Texas, and expresses that it has offered to provide help and cooperation to the U.S. government in order to deal with the impact of this natural disasteras good neighbors should always do in trying times."

While Secretary of State Rex Tillerson thanked Mexico for the generous offer to help Harvey victims, President Donald Trump has yet to acknowledge it.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott ultimately accepted Mexico's offer to help and Mexican Red Cross volunteers have already crossed the border to provide assistance, Reuters reports.

Mexico is reportedly preparing 25 trailers to send over containing rice, beans, coffee, chocolate, 300 beds, nine generators, mobile kitchens and telecommunications equipment. It's also planning to send over personnel, including paramedics and doctors.

On Tuesday, September 5, Carlos Sada, Mexicos deputy foreign minister for North America, told reporters in Mexico, "Mexico is ready to help those affected by Harvey. Its a demonstration of our neighborliness, a show of solidarity."

Mexico and the U.S. have both assisted each other in the past during and after disasters. In 1998, for example, the Clinton administration provided assistance to Mexico as it battled forest fires. Years later, in 2005, the Mexican military provided aid to Hurricane Katrina victims in Louisiana and Mississippi over the course of a three-week operation.

In short, there is a precedent for the U.S. and Mexico to help one another, but Trump is seemingly averse to this fact.

At the start of his presidential campaign, Trump referred to Mexican immigrants as "rapists" and "drug dealers." Since that time, he's repeatedly insulted Mexico and demonized its people.

Trump has continuously promised to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, but has so far failed to deliver. Meanwhile, many have questioned whether building such a wall, which could cost around $70 billion according to one estimate, represents an effective, productive approach to immigration policy.

Along these lines, it's hard not to wonder how the Trump administration will respond to the earthquake in Mexico, if at all. Despite Trump's aggressive stance toward America's southern neighbor, it has continued to be amicable and diplomatic.

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By Sarah N. Lynch WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump called Hurricane Irma "some big monster" as it battered the Florida coast, saying he wants to go to the state very soon and praising emergency officials for their efforts to protect people. "The bad news is that this is some big monster," Trump told reporters at the White House, saying damage from the storm would be very costly. "Right now, we are worried about lives, not cost," Trump said after returning from Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland where he monitored the storm and met with his Cabinet. The path of the storm, tracking the west coast of Florida, meant it might be less destructive than it would otherwise have been, Trump said, noting the next five or six hours would be critical. "I hope there aren't too many people in the path," he said. "You don't want to be in that path." Trump said the U.S. Coast Guard had been heroic and that the Federal Emergency Management Agency was doing a good job to help coordinate the response with states. He added, however: "I think the hard part is now beginning." Trump has offered the full resources of the federal government to Florida and the affected states, Vice President Mike Pence told reporters during a visit to FEMA's Washington headquarters on Sunday. "Wherever Hurricane Irma goes, we'll be there first," Pence said. "We'll be there with resources and support, both to save lives and to help to recover and rebuild these states and these communities." On Sunday, Trump also issued a disaster declaration for Puerto Rico, and expanded federal funds available to the U.S. Virgin Islands in the aftermath of Irma, the White House said. Trump owns a resort in Palm Beach, Florida, where he has often traveled during his presidency, as well as three golf courses in the state. He told reporters he hoped to travel to the state soon. "We're going to Florida very soon," Trump said. (Reporting by Roberta Rampton, Doina Chiacu, Sarah N. Lynch and Steve Holland; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe and Lisa Von Ahn)
Source: Xinhua| 2017-09-11 06:22:05|Editor: Liangyu

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MEXICO CITY, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- The number of victims from a strong earthquake measuring 8.2 on the Richter scale in Mexico Thursday night has climbed to 90, authorities confirmed on Sunday.

During an evaluation meeting, Oaxaca state governor Alejandro Murat confirmed that 71 people died in southern state of Oaxaca, where the worst impact was felt.

Sunday afternoon, Murat toured the Isthmus of Tehuantepec region, which connects Mexico to Central America and which sustained the most damage.

He told reporters that the search and rescue in the state would continue until there were no reports of missing persons.

Another 15 people were killed in neighboring Chiapas state and four others in Tabasco, Mexico's civil defence chief Luis Felipe said on Saturday.

More than 800,000 people have been displaced after their homes were partially or totally destroyed.

Some 324 public schools have suffered structural damage, including 42 that were totally destroyed.

Oaxaca's head of Civil protection, Armando Bohorquez, said six people remain missing, including four who were reportedly staying at a hotel that collapsed in the town of Matias Romero.

Bohorquez requested the federal government declare 282 towns natural disaster zones to facilitate relief efforts.

The powerful earthquake struck off Mexico's southern coast late Thursday night, with its epicenter 96 km southwest of the town of Pijijiapan in Chiapas state, at a depth of 33 km.

The seismic waves swayed buildings as far away as Mexico City, where a citywide quake alarm sounded, waking residents and sending them into the streets minutes before midnight.

The quake affected at least 50 million people in 12 states. The worst-hit city is Juchitan in Oaxaca, where at least 36 bodies were pulled from ruins. Oaxaca is one of the three states near the quake epicenter off the coast.

According to the Mexican authorities, this was the most intense earthquake the country has suffered in the last 100 years.
A two-headed rattlesnake was found by an on-duty electrical worker in Jonesboro, Arkansas, on Wednesday. Rodney Kelso, an electrical worker, claimed to have found the snake while inspecting a home.

According to CBS affiliate KFSM, Kelso found the two-headed timber snake off Arkansas Highway 284. The snake, which measured out to be 11 inches, was with two other snakes that had normal appearances. Kelso put on a pair of protective gloves and guided the rattlesnake into a box.

"Fifty years on the ridge and never have seen such," Kelso told Arkansas Online Friday.

The two-headed snake is under the care of Forrest L. Wood Crowley's Ridge Nature Center, according to Fox affiliate WBHQ. Caretakers plan to test whether the snake will be able to eat out of both mouths. The nature facility will eventually put the snake on display for visitors to see.

"It does happen from time to time in nature," Cody Walker, an education program specialist at the nature center, told Arkansas Online Friday. "Usually they die from complications."

Two-headed snakes are rare, but they have been spotted before. Reptiles like turtles, snakes and lizards can be born with two heads. In 2002, National Geographic reported that two-headed animals have their own personality and motives for doing things, just as any other creature would. It can, however, make decision-making more challenging for the creature.

"The two heads have to decide they're both hungry at the same time, and then they have to agree to pursue the same prey," National Geographic reported. "Then they might fight over which head gets to swallow the prey."

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According to National Geographic, "since snakes operate a good deal by smell, if one head catches the scent of prey on the other's head, it will attack and try to swallow its second head."

A second head isn't considered to be a genetic mutation. It would be classified as an error in fetal development, which is more closely aligned to how conjoined twins (also known as Siamese twins) can occur with humans.

Conjoined twins, while rare, can occur once every 200,000 births. The survival rate for conjoined twins ranges from 5 percent and 25 percent. They are originally formed as identical twins, which will make them the same gender. The twinning process can occur by a woman releasing two eggs instead of one or she'll produce only one egg that eventually split into two after fertilization is completed.

Rattlesnakes are venomous creatures. The reptile tends to be large in size, too. The snake is known for its distinctive rattle, which often causes predators to turn the other away.

They're often found in North America and South America, but Live Science reported that the greatest population of rattlesnakes resides in the southwestern U.S. Arizona, in particular, houses the most species of rattlesnakes. Approximately 13 types of rattlesnakes live in the state.

Rattlesnake

Photo: Getty Images

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UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The United States on Friday told the U.N. Security Council that it intends to call a meeting on Monday to vote on a draft resolution establishing additional sanctions on North Korea for its missile and nuclear program, the U.S. Mission to the United Nations said in a statement. The United States wants the Security Council to impose an oil embargo on North Korea, ban its exports of textiles and the hiring of North Korean laborers abroad, and to subject leader Kim Jong Un to an asset freeze and travel ban, according to a draft resolution seen by Reuters on Wednesday. It was not immediately clear how North Korean ally China and Russia would vote, but a senior U.S. official on Friday night expressed skepticism that either nation would accept anything more stringent than a ban on imports of North Korean textiles. Chinese officials have privately expressed fears that imposing an oil embargo could risk triggering massive instability in its neighbor. A Security Council resolution needs nine votes in favor and no vetoes by permanent members Britain, the United States, France, Russia or China to pass. Tension on the Korean peninsula has escalated as the North has stepped up the development of weapons, testing a string of missiles this year, including one flying over Japan, and conducting its sixth nuclear test on Sunday. South Korea braced for a possible further missile test by North Korea when it marks its founding anniversary on Saturday. Experts believe the isolated regime is close to its goal of developing a powerful nuclear weapon capable of reaching the United States, something President Donald Trump has vowed to prevent. (Reporting by Michelle Nichols; Writing by Eric Beech; Editing by Eric Walsh and Sandra Maler)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S.-led coalition fighting Islamic State said on Friday its surveillance aircraft had moved away from an Islamic State convoy which has been trying to reach territory in east Syria. The Islamic State convoy has split in two, with 11 buses remaining in the open desert after others turned back into government-held areas. The Syrian government and Lebanon's Hezbollah group offered the convoy of originally about 300 lightly armed Islamic State fighters and about 300 family members safe passage in return for the militant group surrendering an enclave on the Syria-Lebanon border. However, the coalition has blocked the convoy from entering Islamic State territory in east Syria, near the border with Iraq, by cratering roads and destroying bridges. "To ensure safe de-confliction of efforts to defeat ISIS, coalition surveillance aircraft departed the adjacent airspace at the request of Russian officials during their assault on Dawyr Az Zawyr," the coalition said in the Friday statement, using an acronym for Islamic State. The coalition said Syrian pro-regime forces had "advanced past" the convoy. "The regime's advance past the convoy underlines continued Syrian responsibility for the buses and terrorists," Brigadier General Jon Braga, director of operations for the coalition said. (Reporting by Idrees Ali; Editing by James Dalgleish)
LONDON (Reuters) - Two men arrested on suspicion of belonging to a banned far-right group and planning terrorist acts have been released without charge, British police said on Sunday. The men were among five, including some serving soldiers, arrested on Sept. 5 as part of a pre-planned, intelligence-led operation. They were detained on suspicion of being involved in the commission, preparation and instigation of acts of terrorism and of being members of neo-Nazi organization the National Action group. "Two men arrested by officers from West Midlands Police Counter Terrorism Unit on suspicion of terrorism offences have been released from custody ... without charge following enquiries," West Midlands Police said in a statement. "Three other men ... continue to remain in police custody. Detectives have been granted extra time to question the men." (Reporting by Kylie MacLellan; Editing by Elaine Hardcastle)
Berlin (AFP) - Britain's former UKIP party leader Nigel Farage on Friday said Germans should lead a revolt against Brussels as he joined a campaign rally of the anti-immigration and eurosceptic AfD party.

Farage said he was amazed Brexit had barely figured in debates between Chancellor Angela Merkel and her centre-left challenger Martin Schulz, the former European Parliament president, whom he labelled "a pro-EU fanatic", ahead of September 24 elections.

"It's all too embarrassing to admit that their beloved European project is now about to be exited by one of the big countries," said Farage, whose UK Independence Party was the driving force that led to Britain's shock vote to leave the European Union in 2019.

Farage insisted he was at the Alternative for Germany (AfD) event at the "personal invitation" of his fellow European Parliament member, the AfD's Beatrix von Storch, the granddaughter of Hitler's finance minister Lutz von Krosigk.

Farage said he wanted "to get a proper debate going in the biggest, richest, most important and powerful country in Europe about not just the shape of Brexit but perhaps even the shape of the European project to come".

He said Germany, as the biggest EU economy, should "say to Brussels: look, the reason the Brits left is because you're behaving so badly, you're taking away so much of people's freedom, liberty and democracy".

But Farage charged that Germany "hasn't had the debate" about Europe and "about breaking the closed shop" of EU bureaucrats.

"We managed to break it in the United Kingdom. At the moment Germany is at a point where it is very, very to tough to break through," he said, adding however that "I predict, in Germany, it will probably start in Bavaria."

- 'Opposition voice' -

Von Storch -- whose party opposes "the United States of Europe" and wants Germany to introduce Swiss-style referendums -- hailed Farage for "showing that doing the impossible is possible".

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The AfD, which rejects immigration and Islam, is on course to become the first hard-right nationalist party to enter the country's parliament in the post-World War II era, now polling around five to 10 percent.

Its leaders have sparked outrage by saying German border guards should open fire on illegal immigrants "if necessary", labelling Berlin's Holocaust memorial a "monument of shame" and suggesting a Turkish-origin German politician be "disposed of in Anatolia".

At the event Friday at the Spandau Citadel, a 16th century military fortress surrounded by a moat, the AfD displayed a campaign poster that said "For a Christian Occident".

Farage said that the AfD "have had their problems, as new political parties do" but added that "we're on the verge of something very interesting happening", that Germany "is about to get a voice of opposition in the Bundestag".
US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, pictured, are set to come into contact with Russian-backed Syrian government forces in the crowded war to drive out Isis: Reuters

US-backed forces and Syrian government troops, supported by Russia and Iran, look set to come into contact as they each make separate advances against Isis in Syria.

The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) launched an offensive against Isis along the border with Iraq on Saturday, bringing them into a race with government forces marching in the same direction against the extremists.

The duelling battles for Deir Ezzor highlight the importance of the oil-rich eastern province, which has become the latest focus of the international war against tIsis, raising concerns of an eventual clash between the two sides.

The US-trained Deir Ezzor Military Council said it was calling its operation Jazeera Storm, after the familiar name for northeast Syria. The Military Council is a part of the predominantly-Kurdish SDF which enjoys broad U.S. military support. The SDF are the US's primary ally in the fight against Isis in Syria.

The race to reach the Iraqi border will shape future regional dynamics, determining whether the United States or Russia and Iran will have more influence in the strategic area once the extremist group is defeated.

Iran has been one of President Bashar al-Assad's strongest backers since the crisis began in March 2011 and has sent thousands of Iranian-backed fighters and advisers to fight against insurgent groups trying to remove him from power.

The US-backed fighters are up against a huge challenge to reach Deir Ezzor, especially while they are still fighting to liberate Raqqa from Isis. Three months into the battle, they have liberated around 60 per cent of the city, and much more difficult urban fighting still lies ahead.

This week, Syrian troops and their Iranian-backed allies reached Deir Ezzor, breaking a nearly three-year-old Isis siege on government-held parts of the city in a major breakthrough in their offensive against Isis. In a victory statement, the Syrian military said Deir el-Zour will be used as a launching pad to liberate the remaining Isis-held areas along the border with Iraq.

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The Syrian conflict began with a popular uprising against Assad in 2011, which was initially viewed by the western world as heralding a positive new dawn for democracy in the Middle East.

The subsequent chaos has drawn in the US, Russia and regional powers with peace talks failing to resolve a war.

The first step is to free the eastern bank of the Euphrates and the areas Isis still holds, Ahmed Abu Kholeh, head of the Deir Ezzor Military Council, told Reuters after the announcement of their offensive.

Were not specifying a timeframe but we hope it will be a quick operation, he said at the town of al-Shadadi in Hasaka province, adding that he did not know where the battle would move on to once that objective has been achieved.

He said SDF fighters did not expect clashes with Syrian government forces, but if fired upon we will respond.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group reported that SDF forces had advanced against Isis in Deir Ezzor's northwestern countryside, seizing several hilltops and a village.

Meanwhile, Syrian government forces and their allies reached Deir Ezzor military airport on the other side of the Euphrates, where troops had been holed up since 2014, surrounded by Isis, the commander in the pro-Assad alliance said.

The alliance includes Iran-backed militias and the powerful Lebanese Shia group Hezbollah.

The advance came days after the army and its allies broke the siege of the main part of the city, which had been separated from the airport by Isis attacks a few months before.

Syrian troops have now recaptured an oilfield southwest of Deir Ezzor and seized part of a main highway running downstream to the city of al-Mayadeen, to which many Isis militants have retreated, the British-based Observatory said.

Isis fighters in Syria still control much of Deir Ezzor province and half the city, as well some territory further west near Homs and Hama, where government forces recaptured several villages on Saturday, pro-Damascus media reported.

But the group has lost most of its caliphate which from 2014 stretched across swathes of Syria and Iraq, including oil-rich Deir Ezzor.

The SDF is still battling to eliminate Isis from the final areas it controls in Raqqa, northwest of Deir Ezzor.

Talks between Russia, Iran and opposition backer Turkey in the Kazakh capital Astana are set to take place next week, possibly followed by a separate track at the United Nations in Geneva in October or November.

Assads government has participated in previous rounds from a position of power as Damascus clawed back much territory, including the main urban centres in the west of the country and increasingly in eastern desert held by the jihasists.

Syrias non-Islamist opposition holds some pockets of territory in western Syria, and the SDF, which is dominated by the Kurdish YPG militia, controls much of Syrias northeast.

In June, after the SDF shot down a Syrian government fighter plane, the Syrian army called this a flagrant attack" and "an attempt to undermine the efforts of the army as the only effective force capable with its allies ... in fighting terrorism across its territory.

This comes at a time when the Syrian army and its allies were making clear advances in fighting the Daesh (Isis) terrorist group, it added.

Additional reporting by Reuters
(OLATHE, Kan.)  The widow of an Indian national who was fatally shot at a suburban Kansas City bar in an alleged hate crime was facing deportation until a Kansas congressman and others stepped in to help her get a one-year visa.

Sunayana Dumala lost her U.S. resident status after the death of her husband, Srinivas Kuchibhotla, in a Feb. 22 shooting at Austins Bar & Grill in Olathe, Kansas. Witnesses said the gunman shouted racial slurs before opening fire. Kuchibhotlas friend and another man who intervened were wounded.

Republican U.S. Rep. Kevin Yoder said he was apoplectic when he heard Dumala, who lives in Olathe, faced deportation and was worried she could not return to the U.S. after she traveled to India for her husbands funeral, The Kansas City Star reported . The visa allows her to continue working at an area marketing agency.

We are not going to deport the widow of the victim of a hate crime, Yoder said, adding that he would continue working to help her secure permanent residency.

Dumala, also a native of India, has lived in the U.S. for 10 years. She married Kuchibhotla, a technical engineer, in 2012, and they applied for a green card on his work visa. His death means her efforts to get a green card must start over.

On the fateful night of Feb. 22, I not only lost my husband but also my immigration status, Dumala wrote in an email to The Star. She went on to say, Im very fortunate that many people came to my rescue to get me back on a temporary status  and are continuing to work on a permanent fix.

Adam W. Purinton, 52, of Olathe, is charged with first-degree murder and federal hate crimes in Kuchibhotlas death. Authorities arrested him hours after the shooting at a restaurant some 70 miles (110 kilometers) away in Clinton, Missouri.

Yoder is the lead sponsor of a bill that would speed up permanent-residency status for well-educated immigrants from India, China and other highly populated nations. Because of a 7 percent cap, highly-educated immigrants from smaller nations obtain their green cards within months. But hundreds of thousands from large countries such as India and China wait, sometimes for decades, for permanent status and citizenship after establishing careers in the U.S.

Yoder said he hopes the Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act will raise awareness for immigration changes, particularly in light of President Donald Trumps recent decision to ask Congress to pass a law to replace the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.
Astana (Kazakhstan) (AFP) - Wild tigers could be returning to Kazakhstan after a groundbreaking reintroduction plan was signed off Friday.

Seven decades since poaching and habitat destruction wiped out indigenous stocks of the giant cats, it is hoped they will once again roam free -- but experts said it will take years.

The Central Asian country's agreement with the World Wildlife Fund requires it to gradually integrate Amur tigers, closely related to the extinct Caspian tiger, that disappeared from its southeastern Ili-Balkhash region in the mid-20th century.

The fund is providing $10 million (8.3 million euros) for the project that will see Kazakhstan become the first country to reintroduce a population of large cats back into a territory following an extinction.

WWF's Russian representative Igor Chestin hailed the signing as a "event of global significance" but warned reintroducing tigers into the country will take "years".

"It will be years before tigers appear on this territory because the territory needs to be specially prepared," Chestin said at a press conference in the Kazakh capital Astana.

Kazakh Agriculture Minister Askar Myrzakhmetov said work on a specially protected natural area for the tigers would start at the beginning of next year.

"In fact, we are talking about restoring a whole ecosystem, where this species is set to be reintroduced," Myrzakhmetov said at the press conference.

According to a scientific article on the introduction, co-authored by the WWF's Chestin, Caspian tigers inhabited a range taking in 13 modern-day countries with Turkey and China at its extremes just prior to the turn of the century.

The Soviet Union sped up the animal's extinction with mass irrigation and agricultural development that cut into the partly wooded habitat it inhabited along with its prey, mainly boar and deer.

Bounty hunting was also rife in the early Soviet period.

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The Caspian tiger is generally thought to have become extinct globally in the mid to late 20th century.

Numbers of wild tigers as a whole have dwindled precipitously over the last century, plunging from 100,000 to fewer than 4,000 across a dozen countries today.

In 2016 tigers were declared "functionally extinct" by the WWF in Cambodia, with the last big cat seen on a camera trap there in 2007.
Doing chores may not be easy when you have 20-inch long fingernails, but this Texas woman has somehow found a way.

Read: Woman With 95-Inch Hips is Determined to Break World Record Despite Health Warnings

Ayanna Williams, of Houston, who holds the 2018 Guinness World Records for the worlds longest fingernails, is demonstrating how she does everyday activities around the home.

It takes me longer to do anything that it would take a normal human being to do anything because of the length of my nails, Williams admitted.

To do something as simple as taking a sip of water, she carefully threads her thumb through the handle of the mug, and just as carefully removes it as she puts down the cup.

Williams explained her thumbnail is the longest, measuring 26 inches, and all her other nails are between 20 and 26 inches long.

I dont know why, she said, but I know theyre a part of me, so right now theyre here to stay.

Williams said it first started when she had grown her nails out about 3 inches long. She liked how they looked, so she continued growing them for the next two decades.

Read: 1,200 People Help Topple World Record for Biggest Game of Mattress Dominoes

When I was little I was like, 'One day I want to try that,' her niece Cedricia McCoy said.

But she changed her mind as she grew up and realized the work that goes into keeping the nails long and healthy.

Williams, who is a manicurist, says it can take as long as a week to paint her own nails.

Im a perfectionist, so it takes some time, she said.

Watch: 117-Year-Old Jamaican Woman Says It Took 'Hard Work' to Become Oldest Person in the World

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President Trump and first lady Melania Trump head to Camp David for the weekend. (Photo: Getty Images)

First lady Melania Trump loves her stilettos, and shes not going to stop wearing them, no matter what the haters say.

FLOTUS strode across the South Lawn of the White House to Marine One in a form-fitting army-green dress with a ruffle running diagonally from her shoulder down to her knee-grazing hemline. Her hair was styled in her usual polished blowout, and she wore an enormous pair of sunnies.

Of course, she completed her chic look with a pair of leopard-print stilettos.

Photo: Getty Images

Towering high heels have been a favorite of Melanias even before she was first lady, but since her husband won the presidency, her sartorial choices have been scrutinized on a daily basis.

Shes taken some heat for wearing stilettos  not once, but twice!  during travel to Hurricane Harvey relief efforts in the Houston area, as well as for wearing a $2,300 Italian dress in President Trumps American-Made Labor Day post on Twitter.

The couple are heading to Camp David for a Cabinet meeting and updates on Hurricane Irma, according to his spokeswoman.

On her last trip to the compound that the president labeled rustic, FLOTUS wore Manolo Blahnik heels and a Missoni dress (also in dark green), and in a casual twist, she wore flats and a shirtdress for her first visit.

This will be a working weekend, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders told reporters on Friday. Saturdays Cabinet meeting will include updates as Irma bears down on Florida, she added.

The first lady tweeted that she looks forward to hosting Cabinet members and their spouses.

Look fwd to hosting members of the cabinet & their spouses at #CampDavid this weekend. Much work to be done as we monitor #Hurricane Irma.  Melania Trump (@FLOTUS) September 8, 2017

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Some 200 secular protestors demonstrated in Arad Saturday night against what they view as the city growing more religious, after an incident in which burning tires were allegedly thrown by Gur Hasidim at a home where secular people live.

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Confrontations at the demonstration turned violent when Gur followers arrived at the protest and police were called to the scene.

The protest turned violent Saturday night (Photo: Ilana Curiel)

One of the Haredi protestors then spat at a female cop and others confronted the officers. Gur followers from all over Israel have made their way to Arad to paticipate.

Footage of the Arad demonstration (:  -)

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Two secular protestors and two Haredi ones were arrested.

The heart of the conflict between the factions was discord between the city's secular residents and members of the Gur Hasidic dynasty.

This particular flame-up was brought about after Moshe, an Arad resident, hung a sign saying "Alter and Litzman, Arad is not for sale."

The sign sparking outrage from Gur followers, bearing the likeness of their leader Rabbi Yaakov Aryeh Alter

The former is a reference to current Gur leader Yaakov Aryeh Alter, whereas the latter mentions Yaakov Litzman, a Gur follower and current minister of health.

The Gur followers were outraged by their leader's name and photo appearing on the sign, sparking the alleged tire attack.

The Arad resident who hung the controversial sign recounted the event. "Burning tires were thrown at my wife," he said. "We put them out, and they started coming in droves. We hung the sign because they're putting up signs against the mayor, so we paid them back in kind. We'll take down ours when they take down theirs."

He went on to say the perpetrators of the attack have not yet been arrested, only called in to testify. "I believe it will be handled," he remarked. "They're an extremist group. If their rabbi was arrested the whole thing would crumble, as they only do what he tells them to."

This event is part of a larger conflict in Arad, with the Hasidim claiming the secular people in the city are restricting their lifestyles while the municipality isn't providing the community with the public funds they deserve.

Police were alerted to the protest when it turned violent (Photo: Suleiman al-Amur)

The secular segment of the city's populace, on the other hand, claim members of the ultra-Orthodox sect wish to take over public buildings and fear they intend to change the city's character.

Arad Mayor Nisan Ben-Hamo arrived at the protest. "Once again the Gur thuggery crosses the line," he said. "They came to the home of a resident of the city who put up a sign, as they themselves have done with their own political messages. They congregated there and started attacking both police and residents. This is crossing a red line. This is the face of the sect. This madness has to stop. A minority in this city cannot dictate its agenda. It doesn't make sense. We're all simply stunned."

MK Yaakov Litzman, the minister of health and a follower of the Gur sect, later arrived in the city, though not to the protest, and spoke with the deputy commander of the police's Negev division.

Saturday's clashes were preceded by the hanging of pashkevilim against the city's mayor, and a complaint he'd made against the Gur sect's rabbi, as well as struggles regarding budgeting and use of public buildings.

In addition, the municipality fought against signs hung by Gur followers in Arad, with the latter pressing charges against the authority.

The municipality noted this was a result of continued thuggery effectively indorsed by the sect's leaders. "These acts include illegal entries into building buildings, kindergartens, operating sirens without permits, hanging signs all over the city and disturbing neighbors."
A Facebook caricature posted Saturday by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's son, Yair, against his fathers opponents, which was slammed for its apparent anti-Semitic overtones, has been used by Neo-Nazi website The Daily Stormer as proof of anti-Jewish stereotypes, with the paper lauding Yair as a total bro.

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"Next hes going to call for gassings," the anti-Semitic site wrote in its article entitled "Netanyahus Son Posts Awesome Meme Blaming the Jews for Bringing Down His Jew Father".

Netanyahu was asked about this incident at the start of Sunday's cabinet meeting, but declined to comment. The shared post was deleted from Yair' facebook page a day later.

Neo-Nazi website The Daily Stormer's headline

"This is one of those things that is just so fun, you feel really glad that it happened. Like, the type of thing that makes you remember how thankful you are for having been born," the article's writer enthused, before going on to list several traditional racial slurs attributed to Jews, who are "naturally parasites" and "blood suckers."

The article is accompanied by a picture of a vampire in action to illustrate the point.

Yair Netanyahu (Photo: Yuval Hen)

The caricature shared by Netanyahu on his Facebook page, titled "The food chain", depicts Hungarian-Jewish billionaire George Soros followed by a lizard-man and another figure that appears to resemble Nazi caricatures of old.

Farther down the food chain is former prime minister Ehud Barak dangling a bill before two of the Petah Tikva protest's organizers Eldad Yaniv and Meni Naftali.

Naftali is also a witness in the different prime minister's residence cases and features in the cartoon with a tray of food dangling over his head in an apparent allusion to the prime minister's accusations that he was responsible for offences involving the purchase of lavish meals at the prime minister's residence currently being attributed to his wife Sara Netanyahu.

Ehud Barak tweeted in response: Is that what the child hears at home? What is it, genetics or a mental illness? Does not matter. In any case it is very worthwhile that we hire for him a psychiatrist, and not a security guard and a driver."

In response, Yair wrote Saturday on Facebook: "I hope Ehud did not tweet about me from his place in Boston (between one dubious deal and the next) while drunk with whiskey (as I remember him being). It's time for geriatric care, Ehud."

Alt-right activist and former leader of the Ku Klux Klan David Duke tweeted about the affair, writing "Netanyahu's son posts a meme suggesting Soros is controlling the world."
Dozens of Syrian civilians have written letters of gratitude to Israel and the IDF for establishing field hospitals on its northern border which provided, and continue to provide, medical care to numerous victims wounded in the country's ongoing violent civil war.

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One 27-year-old Syrian woman, identifiable as G. made her way to the Israeli side of the border on the Golan Heights seeking medical care for her son who had been wounded in the fighting.

After the IDF treated her son, G. wrote a letter of appreciation to Israel lamenting the tragic situation in Syria and expressing her yearning for peace and the prevention of further bloodshed.

Photo: IDF Spokesperson's Unit

Syria was the most beautiful country of all Arab countries. We thought that Israel was our enemy, but we realized that its good to us. I want to thank the hospitals in Israel and the Israeli army for all its help to the  Syrian children, she wrote

While Israeli field hospitals have existed for years, an operation was launched in June 2016 by the 210th division of the Northern Command dubbed "Operation Good Neighbor aimed at providing relief to the civilians lacking any alternative, whose medical services and infrastructure have been almost entirely obliterated by the carnage.

Photo: AP

Also bemoaning the conflict in Syria which has wrenched the country asunder, was M., a 30-year-old married man with children.

Beginning his missive by describing the horrendous situation in Syria, M. explained how Israel seemed to be the only place in which medical care could be offered to the civilians caught in the crossfire of the fighting.

Letter of gratitude

After seven years of revolution in which we have lost lives and blood, there was no where for the wounded Syrians to go and receive treatment, his letter began. I am grateful to the State of Israel for the help it provided to all the wounded people of Syria.

M. also emphasized that his previous beliefs that Israel was an enemy had been dispelled by his first-hand experience.

After years of thinking that Israel was the enemy that needs to be gotten rid of, (after thinking) that we need to return the Syrian territories (Golan Heights) I am grateful to you for your treatment and especially to the Israeli army for its humanitarianism.

Photo: IDF Spokesperson's Unit

For S., 26, who had to have his right hand amputated, Israels efforts had convinced him that peace had to be made between the two countries.

We, the nation of Syria, want peace with the State of Israel because it provided us with many services during this troubled period. To all Syrians who say Israel is the enemy, I say that you are liars. Peace to Syria and to Israel, he wrote. Echoing such sentiments, D. described Israel as our friend.

Since 2011, around half a million Syrians have been killed in the civil war. Another 2 million have been wounded and some 6 million have been made homeless.
The IDFs former deputy chief of staff, Maj.-Gen. Yair Golan told a security conference in Washington DC Friday Israel will not be able to fight against Iran without US assistance, according to reports on the website DefenseNews.

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In order to achieve victory over Iran in any possible future military showdown, American help would be essential, he reportedly said during his speech at the Washington Institute.





Maj.-Gen. Yair Golan (Photo: Yair Sagi)

We cannot fight Iran alone, Golan was reported as saying in the online publication. They can affect us; we can affect them. Its all about attrition. But if you want to gain something which is deeper, we cannot do it alone. This is a fact of life. Its better to admit that.

Paying lip service to ISISs threatening determination to carry out attacks, Golan insisted that a lid could be kept on the terror organization, adding that it was still Iran that posed the greatest danger.

For decades, weve dealt with ISIS-style terrorism. I dont say its not a problem. But we managed to live with that.  They are primitive and with relatively limited capabilities. Yes, they have their determination and they are dangerous, Golan was quoted as saying.

But when looking at the Iranian threat, its much more dangerous compared to the ISIS threat.

Iran, he continued, are a higher form of civilization. They have nice, academic infrastructure, impressive industry, good scientists and many talented young people. They are very similar to us, and because they are similar to us they are much, much more dangerous. And we cant cope with them alone.

Photo: Motti Kimchi

Golans trip to Washington as a visiting fellow for military research comes at the behest of Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman as the IDF general outlines for his American counterparts Israel national security policy.

According to the DefenseNews, Golan also told his listeners that Israel had to ready itself to lock horns with Iran.

We cannot allow ourselves not to prepare for direct confrontation with Iran, he said. We dont have expeditionary forces. There is no Marine Corps in Israel  this is beyond our capabilities. So what should we have? Thats a big question. Thats the classified part.
Hamas is strengthening its ties with the Shiite axis led by Iran and is attempting to establish a foothold in Lebanon under Tehran's auspices, Shin Bet Director Nadav Argaman told government ministers in a briefing Sunday.

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Argaman noted that although Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014 brought on "the quietest period in the (Gaza) Strip in three decades," this was a "deceptive calm."

"Hamas is in dire straits strategically, has difficulty presenting diplomatic achievements or providing effective solutions to the crises in the Gaza Strip ," the Shin Bet director said. "The civilian-economic difficulties in the Gaza Strip are worsening, including the reconstruction of the strip, poor public infrastructure (water, electricity), a rise in unemployment and a salary crisis."

Nadav Argaman (Photo: Motti Kimchi)

He explained Hamas was investing considerable resources in preparing for the next confrontation, even at the expense of the citizenry's welfare.

On another front, Argaman noted the Shin Bet was able to thwart 70 terror attacks in July and August, with about 200 attacks foiled in total by the agency since the beginning of the year.

"Despite the relative calm, the security situation in the West Bank is fragile, and it is characterized by high sensitivity to events of a religious nature and frequent reoccurrence of terror attacks," said the Shin Bet chief. "The examination of the scope of terrorism attests to a high threat level from the 'institutionalized' terrorist organizations as well as independent attackers."

According to Argaman, Hamas plays a major role in those attacks. "Hamas, under the direction of the movement's headquarters in the Gaza Strip and abroad, continues to lead the effort to launch terror attacks in Judea and Samaria, with the aim of undermining stability in these areas," he said. "In practice, in the past year, Hamas has employed dozens of inter-regional coordinators to promote relentless attacks against Israel's home front, originating from Judea and Samaria."

Ahead of the upcoming High Holy Days, Argaman cautioned that "During this period, which is highly sensitive every year, both terror organizations and individuals are expected to increase their efforts to carry out terrorist attacks. The Shin Bet, together with its partners in the IDF and Israel Police, is making preperations to allow the citizens of Israel a safe holiday period."
IAF aircraft reportedly broke the sound barrier while flying over Sidon in Lebanon on Sunday morning, causing panic in the city below, according to Lebanese media.

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The sonic boom reportedly caused by the Israeli sorties caused glass in buildings below to shatter, while a woman passed out in Sidon's market.

Lebanese media showed images of a store in Sidon's Old City where part of the ceiling collapsed as a result of the alleged Israeli jets flying overhead.

X

Lebanese security officials told a Hezbollah-affiliated radio station the Israeli sorties were part of a large-scale training exercise the IDF is currently holding in northern Israel meant to prepare for a future war with the Shiite terror organization.

Damage from the sonic boom allegedly caused by Israeli jets

The IDF declined to comment on the reports.

Over the weekend, Lebanon filed an official complaint with the UN Security Council over Israel's alleged violation of its air space when it reportedly conducted an airstrike against a Syrian government installation on Thursday.

Lebanese foreign minister Adnan Mansour said on Friday that the alleged Israeli attack on Syrian territory from his country's airspace is "a precedent that we cannot keep silent about."

Yoav Zitun contributed to this report.
A Jewish family was beaten, held hostage and robbed in their home near Paris because of their religion, French authorities and anti-hate groups said Sunday.

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The three attackers burst into the house in the Paris suburb of Livry-Gargan late Thursday, cut the electricity and confined members of the family until one managed to escape and alert police, said anti-Semitism watchdog BNVCA.

It said the assailants told the three victims: "You are Jews, you have money. We take money from Jews to give to the poor."

Photo: Reuters

French Interior Minister Gerard Collomb promised a major effort to arrest those responsible "for this cowardly act (which) appears directly linked to the victims' religion".

The BNVCA condemned the attackin which the assailants made off with jewelry, cash and credit cardsas a "fresh assault that is clearly anti-Semitic".

It said the family members were threatened with death, insulted and "violently beaten".

Francis Kalifat, president of the CRIF umbrella grouping of French Jewish organizations, said "this horrible act is proof that Jews in France are particularly threatened in the street... and even in their homes."

French Jews, the largest community outside of the United States and Israel, have been leaving France at a steady pace since around 2005.

Some 5,000 departures in 2016 add to the record 7,900 who left in 2015 and 7,231 in 2014. In total, 40,000 French Jews have emigrated since 2006.

The community was shocked in 2006 by the kidnapping and brutal anti-Semitic killing of a young Jewish man, Ilan Halimi, in the Paris suburbs, which was followed by a shooting in a Jewish school in the southwest city of Toulouse in 2012.

Experts and members of the Jewish community in France say that the terror attacks in recent yearsincluding one at a Kosher supermarketare not the only reason people are leaving.

Family, religious and economic reasons have also played a role in the decision to emigrate.
Murder victims brother kidnapped

Police identified the victim as Clint Beharry, who was snatched from his home at Pleasantville Terrace, Blitz Village, Pleasantville.

Beharrys brother Rennie, 29, and another man were gunned down in 2010 at Born Free Recreation Club, a bar which the family ran at the same address.

A video of the shooting, now viral on social media, shows a gunman storming the house dressed in clothing resembling tactical uniforms, which appeared to have the Police Service logo and the word POLICE on it. However, the gunman had on white footwear. On his heels was another gunman, similarly dressed but wearing black footwear.

One of the gunmen pushed Beharry out of the premises. The other had a microwave box in his hand. Beharrys hands were tied behind his back and they walked out. A third gunman, dressed in plain clothes, was also seen leaving the compound.

Police were yet to establish a motive for the kidnapping, which occurred shortly after 11 am, and could not say if the kidnapping was linked to his brothers murder.

Rennie was shot and killed on November 18, 2010, following a game of whappie at the recreation club.

Kwasi Preddy, 25, of Pharaoh Avenue, Ste Madeleine, was also killed. A man was subsequently charged with the murders and appeared in the San Fernando Magistrates Court.

Two years later, the main witness Colin Monkey Baptiste, of Papourie Road, Duncan Village, San Fernando was shot in the head and upper body near a barbecue outlet at SS Erin Road, Duncan Village.

Investigators from the Southern Division among them Insp Gajadhar and Sgt Pacheco visited the scene. The Anti -Kidnapping Squad was also notified.
Cop takes action on CoP for insurance claims

Corporal Nicole Cummings sent a pre action protocol letter to Office of the CoP, last Monday, through her attorney Darryl Worrell.

Cummings claims centre around her being shot and hospitalised in the line of duty, placed on a hit list by criminals which forced her to relocate from her home, injuries sustained as a police motor cyclist, as well as being injured off duty.

The corporal, currently assigned to the St James Police Academy, alleges personnel failed to submit her national insurance benefit claims on time to the National Insurance Board in accordance with the National Insurance (Benefits) Regulations 7(4) as Amended by Act 9 of 2004. Worrell said he was instructed to serve a pre action protocol letter because of the Office of the CoPs continued failure to submit timely applications to NIB for compensation on Cummings behalf.

This will be the fourth time woman corporal Cummings was seriously injured and did not receive compensation from the NIB nor the Protective Services Compensation Committee, and she now feels she has no other recourse but to take legal action to recover compensation to which she is entitled, added Worrell.

He said Cummings has paid national insurance for many years, even before she joined the service almost 18 years ago, but she has repeatedly lost out on compensation because the Office of CoP allegedly misplaced documents or submitted applications long after deadlines.

She is not asking for anything special, all she is asking for is the compensation she is entitled to from the NIB, the protection she has been paying for over the years, said Worrell. Cummings was injured in an accident in 2004 as a police motor-cyclist, in 2005 she was shot by another officer at Four Roads Police Station in 2005, she also underwent lung surgery in 2015 and on September 24, 2016 she was injured in a vehicular accident.

Following each incident she was hospitalised and was unable to work for several months. Despite these injuries, Cummings is passionate about policing and is determined to continue contributing to TT via the Police Service, said Worrell. Worrell said her first claim was thrown out by the NIB for late submission whilst the second claim is presently before the National Insurance Appeal Tribunal since 2006.

The current claim is already late and she wants to prevent a repeat of her past experience. Therefore, she is now forced to take legal action to recover lost compensation from the previous three cases and to ensure action is taken to submit the current application. He said although sick leave claims must be submitted within 90 days of the injury, its a year now and despite Cummings submission to the Office of the CoP within a week of the incident, and made numerous visits to police administration, the current claim has not yet been submitted to the NIB.

She has visited police administration many times, and has even broken down in tears in presence of seniors officers at the human resource branch but they continually misplace her file, said Worrell.

This experience is too much for my client who genuinely loves her job and has received recognition and commendations over the years for her performance.

So you can understand that taking this legal step was a very difficult decision for her, he added.

Worrell hopes Cummings can receive the compensation to which she is entitled.
Padarath: Trinis having hurricane parties

That was the observation of Princes Town MP Barry Shiva Padarath, who has instead advised his countrymen to obey the instructions of Florida Governor Rick Scott and seek safety at numerous shelters.

On the hurricane parties, Padarath observed this may be the God is a Trini mentality which seemed to be prevalent among Trinidadians resident in Florida.

I do believe that the culture of God is a Trini has taken root in some parts of the diaspora here in Florida. Trinidadians resident here are advertising hurricane parties and limes on social media. This hurricane is not something to have fun with it as it could cost you your life and that of your family, Padarath said in a message on Facebook.

Governor Scott and the authorities here must be commended for a very hands on approach and an excellent communications strategy.

Their mantra to those in south Florida has been do not wait an hour do not wait till tonight, get out now, he stated.

Padarath, who is on vacation in Broward County, however noted most Trinidadians evacuated, and at 4 pm a curfew was put into effect.

Irma slammed into Cuba overnight as a dangerous Category 5 storm before being downgraded to a Category 3 yesterday morning. The storm is expected to make landfall somewhere between Fort Myers and Tampa. Padarath said many Trinidadian families had expressed deep concern and uncertainty of what their lives will be like after the hurricane seeing that they have had to leave everything behind. The situation here is very grim. Broward country where the majority of Trinidadians reside will be severely affected and has been evacuated, Padarath stated. I am amazed though at the level of preparation and the cooperation of the people here in Florida with instructions from the authorities. I myself have family in Florida and was meant to be here for a few days only. However flights out of Florida is now virtually impossible.

Florida will take a direct hit, it is a first time hurricane experience for me but certainly it has been an eye opening experience, he said.

Padarath observed TT did not possess the level of preparedness which was being seen in Florida and issued a call on Government to review the building codes for Trinidad and Tobago as well as a national drill for the essential services. Trinidadian Rollins Basanta, who lives in a condo at Palm Beach, said he and his wife, together with about 15 other persons, had decided to remain at home.

Basanta said they had stocked up in canned food, water, candles and gas for their generators.

We are prepared, we have boarded up and are just preparing to ride out this storm, he said.

In the Bahamas, Bennett Johnson, who has Trini roots, told Sunday Newsday Nassau suffered less damage compared to other parts of the island. Unofficial reports state, he added, that 22 persons are feared dead.

I cannot say how accurate that count is but in other parts of the island, houses are destroyed and some under floodwaters. It is not as serious here but here the winds are strong and debris are flying around, Johnson said.
PoS Mayor, IDB work on flood plan

Studies have been done on Port of Spain and I am diligently reviewing them and working on proposing strategies which would target flooding once and for all, Martinez said yesterday. Martinez had dispatched City Corporation officials to assess the severity of flooding in downtown Port of Spain, after a heavy downpour. The heavy rain began around lunchtime and continued until 4 pm, disrupting vendors who usually sell at the exits of City Gate, as floodwaters entered the transportation hub. South Quay and surrounding streets also flooded. There has been tremendous rainfall in such a short space of time and we are working towards fixing the flooding situation in Port-of-Spain, said Martinez.

Marios Pizzas City Gate branch profited from the downpour as they had an increase in sales from those stranded there. The water is right inside City Gate but it is not affecting Marios negatively. We are getting a lot more sales from people who are waiting for the water to subside, said the manager.

Weather forecasts yesterday reported on early morning and afternoon showers disrupting hot and sunny conditions, with the likelihood of heavy showers or thunder showers towards late afternoon in western Trinidad.
UNC blanked three times

The votes the UNC lost were votes to adjourn debate on a motion to approve Senate amendments to the Bail (Access to Bail) Amendment Bill; begin debate on a motion to approve Senate amendments to the Criminal( Plea Discussion and Plea Agreement Bill) 2017 and a motion to adjourn the House to September 15.

The votes were tied on all three occasions as Government and the Opposition each had 17 MPs in the House. On each occasion, Speaker Bridgid Annisette- George used the casting vote available to her under the Houses Standing Orders and voted with the Government. Missing on the Governments side were Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley, Public Administration and Communications Minister Maxie Cuffie, Social Development Minister Cherrie Ann Crichlow-Cockburn, Port-of-Spain South MP Marlene McDonald and La Brea MP Nicole Olivierre.

Rowley is in California having a medical check-up. Cuffie was hospitalised on Tuesday after experiencing a medical episode. Annisette-George granted leave from the sitting to Cuffie, McDonald, Olivierre and Crichlow- Cockburn. She also granted leave to Princes Town MP Barry Padarath, the only UNC MP who was absent. Padarath is in Florida and is stranded there as the state braced for Hurriance Irma.

Prior to the vote to adjourn debate on the motion to approve Senate amendments to the Bail Bill, Opposition Chief Whip David Lee complained the Opposition had come prepared to debate this motion and the motion on the Plea Bargaining Bill.

Oropouche East MP Dr Roodal Moonilal questioned Annisette- George on whether the status quo was maintained when she voted with Government to adjourn this debate. Annisette- George warned him his comments could be considered contemptuous.

Moonilal questioned the Speaker a second time when she supported Government on debating the motion for the Plea Bargaining Bill.

When the Opposition objected to the Houses adjournment and called for a third vote, Acting Prime Minister Colm Imbert remarked, Mad people. Speaking with reporters after the sitting, Attorney General Faris Al-Rawi and Leader of Government Business Camille Robinson- Regis expressed concern about the Oppositions behaviour.

Recalling the amendments to both bills were supported by all senators, Al-Rawi said,  It is striking that the Opposition would come here today and completely abuse the system of agreement. He said when the notice of the sitting was sent out, Cuffie was healthy and well. With Parliament due to prorogue on September 21, Al-Rawi said the Oppositions actions was designed to, defeat the Governments passage of law. Robinson-Regis said neither bill required a special majority for passage and it was normal for the House to be asked to approve Senate amendments to any bill.

Under normal circumstances, these go without incident, she stated. Robinson-Regis said she received a letter from Lee only on Thursday evening and it did not articulate the concerns which Persad-Bissessar raised during the sitting.

Persad-Bissessar insisted the Opposition did not take advantage of the equal numbers in the House to frustrate the passage of both bills. She said it was shameful for Government to use Cuffies illness as an excuse for its unpreparedness to debate the motions. She said this gives further credence to polls issued on Thursday which criticise the performance of Rowley and the Government.

Reiterating the Opposition has serious concerns about both bills, Persad-Bissessar said if the Government convinces the Opposition next Friday that the amendments will assist in dealing with crime in TT, the Opposition would vote for them.

She said Annisette-George, saved the Government today. While saying she could not criticise the Speaker without being sanctioned, Persad-Bissessar said the protocol is that a presiding officer uses a casting vote to break a tie and maintain the status quo.

Persad-Bissessar reiterated, They (Government) were brought back from the brink of defeat by the actions of the Speaker.
The Japan Tourism Agency is considering asking municipalities to designate periods during which minpaku (private lodging services) must be shut in their regions.

Municipalities would be free to set their own minpaku business holidays, according to the agency's draft guidelines on the new type of lodging.

The agency plans to finalize the guidelines, seen Friday, by the end of March. The guidelines will encourage municipalities to set their own rules under ordinances designed to localize the suitability of minpaku services.

The draft guidelines gave examples of places and periods suitable for closure, such as areas near schools and nurseries on weekdays, and mountain settlements during the viewing season for autumn leaves and other periods of heavy traffic.
The Japanese foreign minister has asked ministers in Qatar to slash the number of North Korean nationals working in that Middle Eastern nation.

Taro Kono is currently on a tour of the Middle East. On Saturday he met with Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Nasser al-Thani and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani.

Kono is concerned about the amount of money that is being sent home from Qatar by North Korean workers. The foreign currency is apparently being used to finance Pyongyang's nuclear and missile development programs.

Kono asked the Qatari ministers to cooperate and to put more pressure on North Korea. The ministers said they will consider the request.

Kono also mentioned the latest phone call between the leaders of Qatar and Saudi Arabia. It was the first conversation held between high-level officials since the two countries cut off diplomatic ties.

Kono said it is important to resolve the matter diplomatically. He also said that Japan is prepared to offer the countries support.
Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has said the comments by Minister of Women Affairs, Aisha Jumai Alhassan, concerning President Muhammadu Buhari, couldnt have been said any better.

Atiku declared that the All Progressives Congress (APC) is a coalition and that appointees have the right to keep their allegiance with whosoever they please.

Atiku, recently elevated to the Waziri of Adamawa, disclosed that even other Ministers in the cabinet have different views and opinions as regard the 2019 presidential election.

Paul Ibe, his media adviser, on Saturday insisted that what Mama Taraba said is, the truth.

Alhassan recently declared her support for Abubakar to emerge as Nigerias next president.

And again, Baba Buhari did not tell us that he is going to run in 2019, she said.

Let me tell you today that if Baba said he is going to contest in 2019, I swear to Allah, I will go before him and kneel and tell him that Baba I am grateful for the opportunity you gave me to serve your government as a minister.

But Baba just like you know I will support only Atiku because he is my godfather. If Atiku said he is going to contest.

In a chat in Abuja, Ibe said, Theres really nothing to say. Its like stating the obvious.

The Minister couldnt have said it any better, likewise we cant help say it any better.

In fact, she spoke the minds of many Nigerians and dont forget that everyone has a right of association.

Even then president is aware of the Ministers support for former VP Atiku; they (APC) know.

So it should not surprise anybody because it is not a secret that the Minister has been behind us.

Let me tell you, in the federal cabinet, other ministers have their views; they have people they support.

People forget APC is coalition and when people from different background unite, you cannot expect stakeholders to forget their root.

What the Minister did was an act of courage and we thank and commend her. We advise those who share similar opinion to also speak out.
In an interview with Okey Bakassi on Channels TVs The Other News, Nollywood actress Monalisa Chinda told Nigerian women to stop provoking their men into punches and slaps. Surprisingly, this resulted in applause from some misguided members of the audience.

The question was based around the recent controversial statements made by Dr Lola Akande, Lagos State Commissioner for Women Affairs and Poverty Alleviation.

It appears that the fight against domestic violence in Nigeria has a long way to go.

Watch the interview below:
The Federal Government has said it would not tele-guide the court on the need to re-arrest the leader of Indigenous people of Biafra, IPOB, Nnamdi Kanu for allegedly flouting his bail conditions.

Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed made the declaration while addressing Broadcast Media Editors in Abuja on Friday.

Mohammed said though, government reserves the right to lodge complaint but the power to revoke Kanus bail is the sole responsibility of the court.

According to Mohammed, The matter is purely a judicial matter. Once a matter is in the court, it is for the court to say these condition I set for you, you have respected them or not.

We would not tele-guide the court on what to do or what not to do. As a government, we have a right to go to court and lodge a complaint that you gave a condition and the accused has obeyed or disobeyed the terms of the bail, then the decision will be left to court to decide. This is simple judicial overture which has no political overtone.

The Minister also warned against the over politicization of Nigerias exit from recession.

To naysayers, I will say: This issue should not be politicised. An issue that affects the welfare of our citizens should not be toyed with. Let us all appreciate what this Administration has done in returning our economy to the path of positive growth and then support and encourage it to do more.

Trying to downplay what has been achieved is bad politics. I know this good news of our emergence from recession has hit the naysayers very hard. But they should recover quickly and embrace the good news. Sorry, but it can neither be denied nor wished away, he said.
Women Affairs and Social Development minister, Jummai Alhassan has been urged to resign her appointment following the controversial comment she made recently.

Women Affairs and Social Development minister, Jummai Alhassan

Governor Ibikunle Amosun of Ogun state has berated Women Affairs and Social Development minister Jummai Alhassan over her comments on 2019 presidential election candidacy and asked her to resign.

She had confirmed a BBC report where she expressed preference to former Vice President Atiku Abubakar against her boss, President Muhammadu Buhari, for the 2019 presidential ticket of APC.

Amosun, who spoke at a book launch in Abeokuta, on Saturday said although Alhassan was entitled to her opinion, but he expected her to have tendered her resignation immediately after the comments.

The governor said that Alhassan was entitled to her opinion but that he would have saluted her if she had honourably resigned her appointment because no one could blow both hot and cold at the same time.

I would have saluted her if she had resigned but falling short of resigning has taken everything away from what she had said. Well, I am not Mr President and I know that at the appropriate time he will review things.

For somebody to have come out and say such thing means she might be working against the government and she will not want that government to succeed.

That is my own believe although I may be wrong but if I am in her shoes she should have done that and resigned.

Amosun expressed doubt if the Minister desired the success of the Buhari  led administration since she had declared support for Atiku ahead of the 2019 presidential election.

He declared that nobody had the right to stop Buhari from contesting for the presidential election in 2019 except he himself decides against on health ground.

On this 2019, the only thing that can probably prevent Mr. president from contesting is on health ground, he said.

Amosun who commended Buhari for the great positive changes he had effected in Nigeria, said he was the appropriate person the nation needed when he took over the reins of power.

If not for this administration of President Muhammad Buhari, only God knows where Nigeria would have been now.

Again I am saying it, the only thing that can stop Mr President is on health ground but as we can see today, Mr President is back rejuvenating and very soon it would be clear for everybody to see that Mr president is so well now.

 I commend the President for his performance on the three cardinal programmes of his administration because he has performed better in the areas of security, economy and the fight against corruption, he said.
Thales, French aerospace industry leader, has opened a new industrial competence center in Casablanca, with capabilities spanning all aspects of 3D metal printing.

Spanning over a surface area of 1000 square meters, this plant was achieved for a total cost estimated at 20 million and equipped with cutting-edge technologies to produce satellites parts, said Thales, the electronic firm active in the aerospace, defense, security and land transportation sectors.

With an existing aerospace ecosystem of subcontractors, Morocco has everything needed to become Thales global center of expertise in 3D printing. The use of a secure digital platform provides the industrial Competence Center with the latest innovations in terms of connected industry and smart plants, and will improve the competitiveness of the solutions offered to our customers, Pierre Prigent, Thales Country Director in Morocco, was quoted as saying in a statement.

Thales is bringing state-of-the-art technology and a high added value profession to Morocco: it is a genuine source of pride for us to deliver this leap forward to the countrys industrial sector. This new project is proof that Morocco is achieving a diametric shift in its industrial sector, which is driving the creation of highly specialized jobs in the country, said Moulay Hafid Elalamy, Minister of Industry, Investment, Commerce and Digital Economy.

This industrial Competence Center will add impetus to Moroccos Industrial Acceleration Plan, which attaches particular importance to developing innovative ecosystems and creating high-tech industrial competence centers.

The plant will eventually employ around twenty engineers and technicians and is currently equipped with two so-called selective laser melting technology machines. This technique, which involves fusing metal alloy powders using a high-intensity laser, is used to manufacture metal parts of unrivalled complexity, which cannot be manufactured using current technologies.

Thales has a long-standing partnership with Morocco. The company opened its local office in Rabat in 2006 and is active in defense, aerospace, transportation and security. It has 45 employees.

In April 2013, Thales and Rabat International University signed a partnership agreement in aerospace, space and cybersecurity to support technological innovation through training and research.
The Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) executive director Jennifer Musisi has been put on spot for consistently missing council meetings at a time when councillors are discussing critical issues.



Musisi last attended KCCA council on July 13 when it discussed Lord Mayor Erias Lukwagos salary arrears. This particular sitting was snubbed by Lukwago protesting Musisi's affidavit in court saying KCCA would not pay the mayor's salary arrears amounting to Shs 560 million.



Though the council had resolved that KCCA legal directorate should not file a defence in the case filed by Lukwago, Musisi went ahead to take oath in an affidavit stating that Lukwago "is not presently entitled to any payment whatsoever."



The council meeting turned heated when councillors castigated the legal directorate for failure to implement their resolutions.

Jennifer Musisi (L) is accused of missing council meetings

Since July 13, Lukwago has convened four council meetings discussing critical issues such as the drowning of a vendor, Olivia Basemera in Nakivubo channel and how Godwin Katugume, a former bodyguard of the executive director ended up becoming supervisor of the KCCA law enforcement team.



Others are suspension and interdiction of Katugume and Robert Kituma Rusoke, the KCCA chief law enforcement officer and how Nateete market land titles disappeared from KCCA ending up in the hands of individuals who are threatening to evict vendors from the market.



On August 10, Musisi communicated to Lukwago that she could not attend council meetings because of personal safety concerns. Musisi noted that she had been advised to restrict her movements while her security is being reviewed.



This council was convened to discuss the drowning of Olivia Basemera in Nakivubo channel on August 4. The council resolved that Godwin Katugume, supervisor of the KCCA law enforcement team and Robert Kituma Rusoke, the KCCA chief law enforcement officer be suspended and interdicted.



But on August 11, Musisi penned a letter to Kampala minister Beti Kamya implicating the political wing led by the lord mayor, division mayors and councillors for inciting vendors to attack KCCA law enforcement officers.



She argued that the actions of the politicians have resulted into attacks by the vendors and members of the public against KCCA law enforcement officers leading to physical injuries and loss of equipment.



The next council was held on August 17 and Musisi communicated to Lukwago that she had taken a day off her annual leave. Councillors were furious arguing that Musisi who feared for her personal security was seen on TV screens officiating activities such as receiving KCCA carnival sponsorship money from sponsors on behalf of the institution.



When asked why Musisi was officiating KCCA activities between August 17 and August 22 when she was supposed to be on leave, the authority's spokesperson Peter Kaujju said she cancelled her leave because there was duty which made her return to office.



"She was away on her leave but because of business that needed her, she had to cancel her leave and come back to officethere was duty which called and she had to come back to office," Kaujju said.



Council resumed on August 27 when Musisi was out of office. On August 17, Musisi had communicated to minister Kamya that she would be travelling to Washington DC from August 23 to August 30 to attend a seminar on leadership and management in international development at the International Law Institute.



Council convened again on September 6 but Musisi was out of the country. In her August 17 letter, she had also communicated that she would be proceeding to attend World Bank Urbanisation and Poverty Reduction Research Conference on September 8 in Washington DC.

She further said she had been invited to attend inaugural council of the International Growth Council at London School of Economics and Political Science. The event is scheduled for September 17. She will then travel to Canada for meetings with strategic KCCA partners.



During the September 6 council, Rubaga South councillor Nakabugo Faridah raised the issue of Musisi's long absence from council meetings.



Responding to Nakabugo's submissions, the acting executive director Sam Sserunkuma told council that Musisi had travelled out of the country. "The executive director is away for a specific period. She clearly indicates the date when she is away and assigns me duties of her office as acting executive director...."



Kaujju says council should take executive director's office not as Musisi's personal property. He says in all council meetings, Musisi has delegated office authority.



From September 18 to 28, Musisi will take days off her annual leave and will be back in office on October 2 according to the August 17 letter.



Council resumes on Thursday next week.
In June 2017, Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) and Russian energy behemoth Rosneft signed several cooperation, investment and production sharing agreements regarding hydrocarbon exploration, production, infrastructure, logistics and trading. Rosneft also obtained access to Kurdistans oil pipeline to Turkey with a capacity of 700,000 bbl/day, and is planning to extend this to over 1 million bbl/day, although no timeline has been given.

Earlier in 2017, Rosnefts Swiss-based trading arm Rosneft Trading S.A. agreed to buy crude oil from Iraqi Kurdistan until 2019. The crude is to be delivered to Rosnefts refineries in Germany. Rosneft committed to paying KRG for oil supplies in advance. According to sources quoted by Bloomberg, the first advance payment was U.S. $1 billion.

The deal meets the commercial interests of both sides. Rosneft expanded its global portfolio and secured crude supplies for its German, and potentially new Indian, refineries. In August 2017, Rosneft finalised the takeover of Indian refiner Essar Oil. On the other hand, KRG obtained much-wanted funds to finance its costly endeavours.

However, as the layers of the deal begin to peel off, it has become increasingly clear that the agreement was primarily a demonstration of political legitimacy from the KRG, and a manifestation of Russian regional influence.

KRG politics have been in a political deadlock since 2013. In 2015 the regional parliament in Erbil was suspended, triggering an unprecedented political scenario. Since then, President Barzani has been ruling the KRG informally. After more than a decade in power, Barzani has secured key positions in the KRG government, now controlled by loyal figures. The structure of these informal networks is key to understanding governance in the KRG, along with the drivers of the Rosneft deal.

Rosneft: The Power Player

Russias energy industry is the principle driving force of the countrys economy and hence a primary strategic sector over which the state exerts a high degree of control. State monopolies or state-backed companies dominate the industry, which can be used to pursue the governments political goals. This was first showcased by the gas wars with Moldova, Ukraine and Belarus in the 2000s.

Rosneft, the countrys largest oil producer, is majority owned by the state and is run by Igor Sechin who is considered one of the countrys most powerful players and an ardent Putin ally. This makes the company a reliable agent that the Kremlin can utilise for political purposes, both at home and abroad. In exchange, Rosneft receives state support and privileges which allow Igor Sechin to pursue his ambition to convert Rosneft into a global oil producer. Related: Can Putin Bring Peace To The Korean Peninsula?

In a comment to the Financial Times, Sechin criticised international sanctions for transferring political responsibility on to the corporate level and denied Rosneft being part of international politics. However, Rosnefts foreign operations tell a different story.

The Kremlin frequently uses Rosneft to promote its foreign policy agenda. The latest examples include the sale of 20 percent of Rosnefts subsidiary Verkhnechyonskneftegaz (VChNG) to Beijing Gas in June 2017 and the takeover of Indias Essar Oil in August 2017. These deals were in line with the governments pivot to the East, declared after western democracies imposed sanctions against Russia over its involvement in the Ukrainian crisis and the annexation of Crimea. The Kremlin started looking for alternative markets and investors among wealthy and powerful Asian nations. Therefore, closer commercial ties with Eastern players have been a priority of the Kremlins foreign policy agenda.

Last year, Russia - via Rosneft - overtook Saudi Arabia as the biggest crude oil supplier to China, Russia's sought after strategic partner and the key to the Kremlin's so-called Eastern pivot'. Now it is rumoured that Rosneft might even sell a stake to a Chinese energy conglomerate CEFC.

Despite the Wests continued criticism of Russias heavy-handed and dubious role in Syria, the Kremlin shows no signs of limiting its role in the Middle East. The Kremlin aspires to cement its role as an important player in the region whose strategic interests must be recognised, albeit it now uses commercial tools instead of the military. Rosnefts recent foreign deals seem to pursue this ambition. For example, in July 2017, it started buying oil from Libya.

Rosnefts new deal with KRG has all the signs of falling within the same context.

KRG Power Players in the Rosneft Deal

Three main figures arise in the KRG in relation to the Rosneft deal, which ultimately are directly linked to President Barzani.

The first of these figures is the current KRG Prime Minister, Nechirvan Barzani  the brother of Masoud Barzani. Nechirvan has taken part in this deal as the senior representative of the KRG authority.

Since 2013, Nechirvan has been involved in major energy deals between the KRG and other entities and states. This was the case in the 2013 deal with the Turkish government when he signed a deal with the then Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdo?an. This deal was carried out under obscure parameters, as it was never disclosed to the public, and international audit firms were not permitted to analyse it.

Nechirvan, who is also the president of the KDP, is likely to be playing the role of a middle- between international energy clients and President Barzani, who is seeking to maintain a low public profile given his lack of political legitimacy.

Another key figure that took part in the Rosneft-KRG deals was Dr Ashti Hawrami, the current KRG Minister of Natural Resources. Hawrami is believed to be an essential actor in deciding access to KRG oil fields, as he has strong influence over most stakeholders in the KRG. According to Shadow Governance Sources, Hawramis modus operandi makes him indispensable to any IOC operating in the KRG, and therefore maintains high levels of influence in the KRG energy sector.

The last key KRG energy sector power player  who was also involved in the Rosneft deal - is Qubad Talabani, son of the former president of the second largest political party in the KRG, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), Jalal Talabani. According to Shadow Governance sources, the Talabani family controls the oil fields of Sulaimaniyah, which makes them key actors in the energy sector. Moreover, Qubad Talabani - since 2014  has been the Deputy Prime Minister, and he is also believed to play a key role in KRG-U.S. political and economic relations.

The participation of Qubad Talabani in the Rosneft-KRG deal has been a game-changer in the political power relations of the KRG. As the PUK was leading the political opposition in the KRG, alongside the Gorran movement (a scission of the PUK) against the KDP, the Talabanis backing of the Rosneft deal jeopardises this political alliance and establishes a new PUK-KDP coalition.

In this context, the power players that surround the Rosneft-KRG deal highlights:

(1) that the deal is highly personalised;

(2) that the political dynamics and power relations in the KRG are evolving; and,

(3) that the rule and political recognition of President Barzani is being reinforced. This deal with Rosneft will inevitably help legitimise his current (unofficial) position as President of the KRG.

Main Political Outcomes: Russian Energy Endeavours in Iraqi Kurdistan

While the KRG-Rosneft oil deal primarily highlights the dynamics of the KRG's domestic power struggle, from the Russian perspective, it promotes the Kremlins foreign agenda.

Rosneft is not the only Russian company involved in exploring KRGs energy resources. Gazpromneft, another state-owned energy giant, started producing oil in Iraqi Kurdistan back in 2012 and currently operates in three blocks, i.e. Garmian, Shakal and Halabja. It also holds a license for developing Badra oilfield in Eastern Iraq which is controlled by government forces. Related: Expert Commentary: Oil Market Tighter After Hurricane Harvey

In January 2017, Gazpromneft declared that it would increase oil production in Iraqi Kurdistan despite the ongoing military conflict that is only 50 km away from one of its production sites. Gazpromnefts CEO Alexandr Dyukov then said that the company did not see any risks that could affect its operations in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Interestingly, in 2016, Gazpromneft was more cautious about its intentions vis-a-vis Iraqi Kurdistan. It then claimed that due to remaining geological uncertainties at Halabja, Shakal and Garmian blocks - as well as the overall situation in the region - Gazpromneft did not rule out the possibility of reconsidering its geological exploration programme in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Both Rosneft and Gazpormneft explain their decisions to enter and remain in Kurdistans oil industry due to significant undiscovered oil reserves. The KRG Ministry of Natural Resources estimated that Iraqi Kurdistan held 45 million barrels of oil reserves with one of the lowest production costs per barrel in the world. However, there is conflicting evidence regarding Iraqi Kurdistans resource potential.

Representatives of oil companies and energy experts in the field interviewed by the Wall Street Journal complained about additional, unexpected costs arising from the difficulties in producing oil in Kurdistan. In many cases, additional extraction techniques such as horizontal drilling were required. Moreover, the extracted crude turned out to be heavy, less valuable and with toxic gases in it. ExxonMobil and Chevron  both exploring Kurdish oil reserves since 2012 - have so far failed to develop any oilfields. In February 2016, Turkish Genel Energy admitted that the oilfield it had been developing contained twice less oil than it had expected.

In addition, the KRG proved to be a somewhat unreliable business partner and is known to have delayed compensation payments to companies. According to some estimates, in 2016, KRG owed Genel Energy, Gulf Keystone Petroleum and Norwegian DNO approximately U.S.$1.7 billion for produced oil.

Therefore, regardless of the official statements, risks associated with operations in a debt-ridden politically unstable administration, with an open military conflict in the vicinity, seem to override the potential benefits. The exception being if Rosneft entered the deal knowing that it was primarily pursuing geopolitical goals, and was offered significant privileges.

While Rosneft refused to disclose which oilfields it was looking to develop under the five PSA agreements, it is rumoured that some of the sites are located in disputed territories including Bai Hassan field near Kirkuk and Sinjar block near the Syrian border.

Rosnefts deal with KRG creates a strategic stronghold for the Kremlin giving it certain bargaining chips over the central Iraqi government and Turkey without too much official involvement in KRG affairs.

Consequences of Political Leverage

On the other side, the deal between Rosneft and KRG has been announced by the Kurdish government and its loyal media outlets as a factor that marks a new era in this region.

This deal has been presented as evidence that the KRG is again political and economically stable, and that the political crisis triggered by the presence of ISIS in KRG territory is now part of the past. Therefore, the KRG is trying to portray a more stable image to attract foreign investors, especially in its energy sector. Therefore, Rosneft is being presented as the first client, of many others, to invest in the KRG.

While this discourse is embraced by KRG officials, the reality and consequences of this deal are quite different.

Economically, this deal could be understood as one of provisional aid being provided to the KRG  which is generally financially strapped. In the short term, the U.S. $3 billion promised by Russia seem to strengthen this weakened economy. Yet, it remains unclear how this investment can shape the financial future of the KRG. Moreover, this deal has also brought together KDP and PUK political elites, which might work to reinforce the informal power that President Barzani currently holds.

In the long-run, this deal is likely to increase the already high levels of institutional opacity and corruption present in the KRG. The only body that could supervise this type of deal in the KRG was the regional parliament, which has been suspended since 2015.

Although this emerging environment is favouring the informal networks of President Barzani, and the de facto political actors that are driving energy sector deals, international investors should be aware of the high levels of political exposure.

The high levels of personalisation of these deals should also raise concerns for political and economic analysts. The fragility of this deal stems from the fact that it relies on the informal connections between the deal makers. Should there be any changes to the status quo, the deal would be vulnerable to subsequent questioning in terms of its legitimacy.

While the KRG is portraying its deal with Rosneft as a great success that will attract future investment, the outcomes are much less certain. The KRGs political impasse is likely to remain as the deal with Rosneft actually adds to its informal governability. Russia, on the other hand, is betting on the deal to promote its long-term policies in the Middle East, rather than expecting a return on its investment. Therefore, the deal is more of a political gamble rather than an economic one.

By Shadow Governance Intel for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
Cybersecurity firm Symantec reports that dedicated hackers have been able to control operational software at American and European oil and gas companies, according to a new report by CNBC.

The hackers tactics include a variant of malicious software we are all familiar with: phish-friendly emails with a malevolent true purpose. So far, companies in the United States, Turkey, and Switzerland have already been targeted by the email campaigns, Symantec said.

Dragonfly is likely the main culprit behind these attacks. The report said a foreign government is hiring the hacker groups services to target energy hotspots as part of underground geopolitical warfare. The attacks began in late 2015, but have become more frequent, especially during April of this year, Symantec researcher Eric Chien told an interviewer on Wednesday.

A June alert by the U.S. government warned energy companies of an onslaught of new phishing emails designed to gain access to sensitive credentials from mid- to upper-level management teams.

The sophistication of the attacks  and their successes in the U.S. and allied countries  suggests that motivation is the only step left between a large-scale attack against the national power grid, Chien said. But his colleagues disagree.

The attacks remain "far from the level of being able to turn off the lights, so there's no alarmism needed," Robert M. Lee, founder of U.S. critical infrastructure security firm Dragos Inc., said in response to the report. The connection between the recent attacks and DragonFly was also loose, he added. Related: North Korean Sanctions May Hurt Chinas Oil Giants

But even the Dragos wiz can agree that just because the threats identified by Symantec may not necessarily be as dangerous as described, does not mean a real cyberthreat from a foreign government is not real. Dragos itself published a report on risks to the American grid from a Russian cyber-weapon called CrashOverride in June. Dragos threat intelligence director Sergio Caltagirone said the report reflected months of research completed after a Slovak anti-virus firm shared their analysis on the virus with their American counterpart.

Adversaries are getting smarter, they are growing in their ability to learn industrial processes and codify and scale that knowledge, and defenders must also adapt, the report said.

To date, American preparedness has shielded the country from a major cyberattack. Legislative awareness of the dangers of our brave new digital world continues to increase day-by-day.

Reliability is reinforced with regular training and events such as the North American grids GridEX, where grid operators train for events from hurricanes, to terrorist incidents, to cyber-attacks and how they will respond to such outages, the Dragos report reads. Related: What Happens If The OPEC Deal Expires?

Still, authorities and citizens must remain vigilant. In the internet age, assaults against electric grids are unlikely to diminish any time soon.

A separate study by Deloitte in June said the energy sector was he second-most prone industry to cyberattacks last year. Almost three-quarters of U.S. oil and gas companies went through at least one cyber incident in 2016, the consulting firm said.

In May, another investigation found that oil and gas companies operating in Texas, and especially those concentrated around Houston, are exposed to major cybersecurity threats as the sheer size of operations and the growing digitalization of the energy industry make it difficult to protect sensitive data.

Study after study finds that key energy assets are especially vulnerable to digital attackers, but only a handful of players in the private sector are really ready to defend themselves. Though hurricane season puts fossil fuel companies on high alert for natural disaster-related catastrophes, it is time the big players take a serious look at the storm that may be brewing within their own computer systems.

By Zainab Calcuttawala for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
The mathematical (and other) thoughts of a (now retired) math teacher,
QUEENSBURY  A three-time felon from Queensbury who was involved in a drug-related shooting a decade ago has been sentenced to 6 years in state prison for selling narcotics.

Brent C. King, 30, pleaded guilty to third-degree criminal sale of a controlled substance, a felony, for a crack cocaine sale last year in Queensbury.

Warren County Judge John Hall sentenced him to 6 years in state prison, to be followed by 3 years on parole.

King has at least three prior felonies, including one for conspiracy in a 2007 shooting at the former John Burke Apartment apartments in Queensbury. A resident of the complex was seriously hurt when shot by an acquaintance of King.
GLENS FALLS  On Fridays during the school year, the Rev. Joseph Manerowski always adjusted his homily, the message he gave to every Mass during his 10 years as pastor at St. Marys Roman Catholic Church.

I loved the kids, he said of the students from St. Marys/St. Alphonsus, who came across Warren Street for morning Mass on the last day of the school week. Its a joy to see them, either in class or at Mass. When they were there for Mass, instead of giving a homily, I would let them do it. I would ask them questions, and 100 hands would go up.

Manerowski retired Sept. 1 after 23 years as a priest. He said he plans to take it easy in retirement and will continue to live locally.

Prior to his seven years at the Immaculate Conception Church in Hoosick Falls, he also served at St. Peters Catholic Church in Delhi and St. John the Evangelist in Schenectady.

Manerowski said the school is very important to the future of his church and other churches.

Thats part of the mission of the Catholic church, he said. Education in the faith, as well as the academics, are important.

He said that, beyond working with children, he enjoyed several other aspects of his tenure as a priest.

I enjoy the Mass, especially giving the Eucharist, he said of the sacrament of Communion. You encounter a large group of people and you are able to give Communion and give people the meaning of the gospel.

Then there were the times members of the parish came to him directly.

Meeting with people one-on-one is the primary aspect of the priesthood, he said.

His tenure was not without its difficulties, the toughest being when the diocese chose to close nearby St. Alphonsus Roman Catholic Church rather than merging the parishes and offering Mass at both sites.

That was difficult because we had a large group of people meeting with the clergy to figure out how to proceed, and we were all hoping for a merger of the parishes, he said. The bishop decided to close it, and people were left high and dry. They really scattered to other churches.

That meant St. Marys had to assume control of another cemetery and take over the parish records. It also meant moving the statue of St. Alphonsus to St. Marys.

It was difficult, but we got through it, he said.

Then there was the decision to renovate the church, a project that totaled more than $900,000.

It was tough making decisions on everything from the floor to the color of the walls, he said, noting he appreciated the First Baptist Church allowing St. Marys to hold the Mass there during construction. The renovations turned out to be joyful.

When asked what he has seen as positive movement within the church, Manerowski talked about the role of laypeople.

They have a positive desire to be involved in a larger part of the church, he said. Thats a good thing. Lets face it, its their church.

Before becoming a priest, Manerowski had an unusual background for a priest  he was a married school guidance counselor with three children. He had been aiming at a career as a school principal, but after his marriage was annulled, he opted for the priesthood.

People took some time getting used to that, he said, noting that previously married men becoming priests is not that uncommon.

The new pastor will be the Rev. Thomas Morette, who is at All Saints on the Hudson, which has churches in Mechanicville and Stillwater.

Morette, who was ordained in 2005 and has been in his current post since 2012, has also served at Holy Trinity in Johnstown, St. Josephs in Broadalbin and St. Francis in Northville. He was an associate pastor at St. Henrys in Averill Park and St. Michael the Archangel in Troy.

He has been in the church nearly three decades, having been ordained a deacon in 1988.

Manerowski, who is 75, said leaving is difficult, especially after the outpouring of support from parishioners at receptions after each of his four Masses on his final weekend.

I was overwhelmed, he said. It is hard, because you become part of peoples lives. It really is an emotional trip.
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GREENWICH  In the last decade, George Bell has spent more time than he cares to count dealing with trucks jammed under the Battenkill Railroad bridge on Bridge Street or backing out trucks whose drivers realized they were not going to get under the 11-foot, 6-inch bridge.

Ive spent 45 minutes backing a truck up and backing up traffic at the same time, said Bell, chief of the Cambridge and Greenwich police departments. We have had times it took 4, 5, 6, 7 hours to clear an accident. We had one where the trailer had huge rolls of paper, and we had to get the DPW to move them one at a time and get them on another truck.

Needless to say, Bell is happy the railroad has made the decision to raise the bridge to about 14 feet, which puts it above the 13-foot, 6-inch average height for tractor-trailers.

I am tickled pink, said Bell, whose department regularly posts pictures of trucks stuck under the bridge. We spend an enormous amount of time there.

Winn Construction of Waterford is doing the work, which should be completed by October.

Railroad officials said an accident last year caused more damage than previous accidents and that the railroad had been spending a lot of time checking the bridge after each accident.

The change will likely mean more tractor-trailers taking Route 372 between Cambridge and Greenwich and could cause more traffic in downtown Greenwich as trucks travel between Route 22 and the Northway.

He has an additional concern.

Route 372 is not the ideal road for tractor-trailers during the winter, he said. We could wind up with more accidents there.
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Call 281-422-8302 or email sunnews@baytownsun.com to wish someone a happy birthday. We will print your birthday wish on Page 2 of The Sun.

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WHITEHALL  A northbound tractor-trailer filled with 9,000 gallons of No. 6 heating oil rolled over on Route 4 in Whitehall after a southbound vehicle crossed into the tractor-trailer's lane late Saturday afternoon, according to Brian Brooks Sr., Whitehall Volunteer Fire Company Deputy Chief of Special Services.

"The southbound passenger car swerved into the lane of the northbound tractor-trailer and it spun out of control," Brooks said. "The tractor-trailer veered off to the right into a field right before rolling over. The driver jumped from the tractor-trailer just before it caught on fire."

According to Brooks, the call about the accident at 9474 State Route 4 came in at 4:52 p.m.

The driver of the Chevrolet Malibu sedan, later identified as Peter D. Michelsen, 22, of Winithrop, Maine, was trapped in the vehicle; and the tractor-trailer was fully involved in flames when firefighters arrived on scene.

Responders had to remove the driver from the vehicle with the jaws of life.

"Our medics assisted while the driver was trapped and until extracated," Brooks said.

The tractor-trailer driver Roger Edwards, 43, of Danville, Quebec, was transported to Glens Falls Hospital, according to the Washington County Sheriff's Department.

"He had a back and leg injury," Brooks said.

The driver of the passenger vehicle was taken by LifeNet helicopter to Albany Medical Center with facial trauma and a possible compound fracture of the left leg, Brooks said.

The the trailer partially burned through the exterior of the tanker and part of the insulation, but the inner tank remained in tact, due to the actions of the responding fire agencies, according to Washington County Department of Public Safety.

Whitehall Volunteer Fire Company received mutual aid from Queensbury Central Volunteer Fire Company and Fort Ann Volunteer Fire Company. Skenesborough Emergency Rescue squad, Washington County Sheriffs Department and New York State Police were also on scene. The State Police are investigating and will be releasing more information about the passengers.

Route 4 remained closed about three miles south of the village of Whitehall at 10:30 p.m. on Saturday.
Announcing itself with roaring 130 mph winds, Hurricane Irma plowed into the mostly emptied-out Florida Keys early Sunday for the start of what could be a slow, ruinous march up the state's west coast toward the Tampa-St. Petersburg area.

Here's a look at the latest updates from around the web including photos, social media posts, news briefs and more.

Group rescues manatees stranded in Florida bay

MANATEE RESCUE! A Sarasota County man tries to save a manatee after the waters recede from #HurricaneIrma.

(Credit: Marcelo Clavijo) pic.twitter.com/RrdH2mvd6G  John-Carlos Estrada (@JohnCarlos_WINK) September 10, 2017

Two manatees were stranded after Hurricane Irma sucked the water out of Sarasota Bay, in Florida's Manatee County.

Several people posted photos of the mammals on Facebook Sunday, hoping rescue workers or wildlife officials would respond. Michael Sechler posted that the animals were far too massive to be lifted, so they gave them water.

Marcelo Clavijo posted that a group of people eventually loaded the manatees onto tarps and dragged them to deeper water.

A big, wide beastbut not quite as monstrous as feared

Hurricane Irma set all sorts of records for brute strength before crashing into Florida, flattening islands in the Caribbean and swamping the Florida Keys.

It finally hit the mainland as a big wide beast, but not quite as monstrous as once feared. The once-Category 5 storm lost some of its power on the northern Cuba coast.

It's still raking Florida with devastating storm surges, winds and rain. Its top sustained winds are now 110 mph (177 kph) and the center of the storm is about 15 miles (25 kilometers) inland from Fort Myers.

Report from the storm: 'Send cold beer'

It's been difficult to determine the extent of damage Hurricane Irma caused in the Florida Keys, where communication has been difficult and authorities are warning boaters and drivers to stay away.

But The Associated Press has been texting with John Huston, who has been riding out the storm in his house on Key Largo, on the Atlantic side of the island, just south of John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park.

Every few minutes during the height of the storm, he sent another dispatch.

He described whiteout conditions, with howling winds that sucked dry the gulf side of the narrow island, where the tide is usually 8 feet deep. He kept his humor though, texting to "send cold beer" at one point. Now he sees furniture floating down the street with small boats.

He says the storm surge was at least 6 feet deep on his island, 76 miles from Irma's eye. He can see now that structures survived, but the storm left a big mess at ground level.

Irma makes landfall on Marco Island

Hurricane Irma has made landfall on Marco Island, Florida, as a Category 3 hurricane.

The National Hurricane Center in Miami said Irma's powerful eye roared ashore at Marco Island just south of Naples with 115-mph (185-kph) winds, for a second U.S. landfall at 3:35 p.m. Sunday.

Category 3 storms have winds from 111 to 129 mph, but 130-mph (21-kph) wind gust was recently reported by the Marco Island Police Department.

Irma's second U.S. landfall was tied for the 21st strongest landfall in the U.S. based on central pressure. Irma's first U.S. landfall in the Florida Keys was tied for 7th.

Second tower crane collapses

Miami City Manager Daniel Alfonso says a second tower crane has collapsed into a building under construction in the city's downtown area. Alfonso told The Associated Press that the crane collapsed in a large development with multiple towers being built by Grand Paraiso.

Another crane collapsed earlier Sunday onto a high-rise building that's under construction in a bayfront area filled with hotels and high-rise condo and office buildings, near AmericanAirlines Arena. Officials said no one was injured as the result of either crane's collapse.

High winds are impeding Miami authorities' ability to reach the cranes, and authorities are urging people to avoid the areas.

Alfonso says the approximately two-dozen other cranes in the city are still upright and built to withstand significant wind gusts.

The tower cranes working on construction sites throughout the city were a concern ahead of Irma. Moving the massive equipment, weighing up to 30,000 pounds (13,600 kilograms), is a slow process that would have taken about two weeks, according to city officials.

Georgia declares state of emergency

Georgia's governor has declared an emergency for the entire state as Hurricane Irma's approach triggers widespread severe-weather threats, including the first-ever tropical storm warning for Atlanta.

Gov. Nathan Deal's new emergency declaration came Sunday as Irma churned near Florida. The National Hurricane Center predicted the storm's center to cross Monday into southwest Georgia, where a hurricane warning was issued for communities including Albany and Valdosta.

Portions of western Alabama and coastal South Carolina were also under tropical-storm warnings.

The National Weather Service confirmed it had never before issued a tropical-storm warning for Atlanta, where wind gusts could reach 55 mph (88 kph). Meanwhile Savannah and the rest of coastal Georgia were under evacuation orders for the second time since Hurricane Matthew brushed the region last October.

Irma headed for the southwest Florida coast

The National Hurricane Center says Category 4 Hurricane Irma is now "headed for the southwest Florida coast" as winds continue to pick up speed in all of South Florida.

Irma continues to be armed with 130 mph winds as its large eye passes north of the Keys.

Storm surge is forecast for 10 to 15 feet in southwestern Florida.

Hurricane-force winds are continuing throughout southern Florida, including the Keys. The hurricane center warns that winds affecting upper floors of high-rise building will be much stronger than at ground level.

The hurricane center also emphasizes that Irma will bring life-threatening wind to much of Florida regardless of the exact track of its center.

Winds topple crane in Miami

I heard a loud crack, and then like a boom, witness to construction crane incident in downtown Miami says https://t.co/0BdJ0oaWTX pic.twitter.com/IlOQkDBpZv  CNN (@CNN) September 10, 2017

The National Weather Service says that a crane has collapsed in Miami as strong wind from Hurricane Irma blows in.

It's one of two-dozen in the city.

The weather service's Miami office said in a Tweet that one of its employees witnessed the crane boom and counterweight collapse in downtown Miami. The employee captured video of the collapse.

It wasn't immediately clear if the collapse caused damage or injuries.

The cranes have been a concern.

Construction sites across Irma's potential path in Florida were locked down to remove or secure building materials, tools and debris that could be flung by Irma's winds.

But the horizontal arms of the tall tower cranes remained loose despite the potential danger of collapse. According to city officials, it would have taken about two weeks to move the cranes and there wasn't enough time.

Couple rescued while riding out storm in sailboat

Florida sheriff's deputies rescued a couple who tried to ride out Hurricane Irma on a small sailboat.

Christine Weiss of the Martin County Sheriff's Office said a passer-by noticed the couple was in trouble Sunday. It happened just off Jensen Beach, which is on the Atlantic Coast north of Palm Beach.

Video shows a Martin County patrol boat manned by deputies John Howell and James Holloran and Detective Mathew Fritchie pulling up next to the sailboat.

The task of helping the couple onto their boat was precarious as both boats bobbed in choppy water. Deputies then took them to shore.

The names of the couple were not released. They were not injured.

Irma to hit Florida Keys Sunday

Forecasters expect winds of more than 110 mph (177 kph) from Hurricane Irma to smack the Florida Keys around daybreak Sunday.

Irma was lingering over the northern Cuba coast on Saturday. Its forward speed has slowed to 9 mph (15 kph) and it has yet to make the expected big northward turn toward Florida yet. Its maximum sustained winds were 125 mph (205 kph).

The U.S. National Hurricane Center's latest forecast  which still can change a bit and has a margin of error of dozens of miles  projects Irma's potent eye to make three landfalls into Florida.

First, there's a projected Sunday morning hit in the Lower Keys. Then later, after moving over water, Irma is expected to come ashore around Cape Coral or Fort Myers. From there it is predicted to steam inland go over the highly populated Tampa Bay region.

After Tampa, Irma is projected to briefly go back out to the Gulf of Mexico and then hit north of Homosassa Springs for a third landfall. In the following days, Irma is forecast to head through Florida and Georgia into Tennessee.

Hurricane Jose moving into areas just hit by Irma, 1:50 p.m.:

French ministers have decided to step up security on the Caribbean islands of St. Martin and St. Barts that were hit hard by Hurricane Irma and are now facing the approach of Hurricane Jose.

On Friday, looting and gunshots were reported on St. Martin, and a curfew was imposed there and in St. Barts until Wednesday.

According to a statement Saturday, French Interior Minister Gerard Collomb is sending two extra gendarme squadrons and some 150 soldiers. They will be there to strengthen checkpoints, reassure the public and prevent further looting and chaos.

Georgia, South Carolina brace for impact

Georgia is bracing for potentially far-flung impacts from Hurricane Irma, which could swamp the coast with storm surge and topple trees and power lines in Atlanta.

The National Hurricane Center placed the entire Georgia coast under a hurricane watch Saturday as residents packed their cars and trickled onto the highways in six counties under a mandatory evacuation. A hurricane watch was also issued for the South Carolina coast from the Georgia line to Edisto Beach, about 40 miles (65 kilometers) southwest of Charleston.

Evacuations as of 12:20 p.m. ET:

Gov. Rick Scott says the entire west coast of Florida will likely see dangerous affects from storm surge as Hurricane Irma comes ashore Sunday. About 6.3 million of the state's approximately 21 million residents have been asked to evacuate.

During a Saturday news conference, he told those in evacuation zones: "You need to leave  not tonight, not in an hour, right now"

Scott said that the storm surge is expected to be up to 15 feet (4.5 meters) in some areas along the west coast of Florida. In the Tampa Bay area, Scott said the storm surge could be between 5 feet (1.5 meters) and 8 feet (2 meters).

Scott said: "This is the most catastrophic storm the state has ever seen."

Irma weakens to Category 3, 11:25 a.m. ET:

Hurricane Irma has weakened to a Category 3 storm with 125 mph winds, but it's expected to regain its strength before slamming into Florida.

The storm has been pounding Cuba, and forecasters say it will get stronger once it moves away.

Irma is expected to hit the Florida Keys Sunday morning and then Tampa. The National Hurricane Center warned in a Saturday advisory that the storm will bring "life-threatening wind" to much of the state regardless of its exact path. Forecasters also predict storm surges of up to 15 feet in southwestern Florida and rainfall up to 25 inches in the Keys.

Disney World closes

As of Friday afternoon, Disney World in Orlando announced that it would be closing Sunday and Monday. Resort hotels will remain open. The park has closed only five times since 1971  four for storms and once after 9/11.

Warnings, videos and other social updates:
Periodically, the Gallup poll folks ask Americans how much confidence they have in a variety of institutions in American society.

They are given four choices to describe their confidence level: a great deal, quite a lot, some or very little.

All but one institution has been taking a beating.

This year, 41 percent of those asked had a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in religious institutions.

Big business was at 21 percent.

Congress was just 12 percent, but that was up from 9 percent last year.

Public schools were at 36 percent.

Newspapers 27 percent.

Police 57 percent.

But year after year, confidence in the military remains strong. This year it was at 72 percent.

The military cant do anything wrong, unless you take a close look at how it handles sexual assaults, then you should stop waving the American flag.

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, who was once our congresswoman, has made this one of her signature issues. She should be applauded, because few in Congress ever want to stand up to the most popular kid in class, especially one wearing a chestful of medals.

Gillibrand, who also serves on the Senate Armed Services Committee, has been fighting the good fight for several years. She has drawn attention to the issue, gotten some reforms passed, but not been able to make a significant difference.

Reports of sexual assault went up in the most recent statistics.

This past week, Sen. Gillibrand released her third annual report on the subject, concluding that military sexual assaults remain as pervasive as ever.

While the rest of American society has moved forward and adopted respectful workplace standards, many military leaders uniforms dont seem to believe sexual harassment is a significant problem.

Sen. Gillibrands office reviewed a years worth of sexual assault case files at four of the largest military bases in the country. It took the military a year to even get the data to them. Even then, the records were often heavily redacted and sometimes incomplete.

Thats called dragging your feet and covering your butt.

The report reviewed 238 sexual assault cases at the four bases in 2015.

Of those 238 cases, only 23 percent went to trial and just 13 percent (31 cases) resulted in a conviction of sexual assault. In 15 of those 31 cases, the accused confessed.

And despite the Pentagons own data that revealed 6 of 10 victims experience some form of retaliation, there were no examples of disciplinary action against anyone accused of retaliating against an accuser.

Gillibrand called that shocking.

The report also found that the higher the rank of the person accused, the more they were likely to be believed than their accuser.

Id called it what it is  criminal.

If we truly believe and respect those that wear the uniform, why arent we screaming about this ongoing abuse?

Sen. Gillibrand has called for the professionalism and modernization of the military justice system to allow independent military prosecutors to aggressively adjudicate and hold sexual predators who harm our military readiness accountable.

Currently, it is military commanders who decide whether sexual assaults and other serious crimes should be prosecuted.

Gillibrand previously had support from Republican senators such as Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Rand Paul of Kentucky, but not Sen. John McCain of Arizona and too many of his colleagues who refuse to stand up to the generals and do the right thing.

Sen. Gillibrands report includes shockingly graphic accounts of attacks that were often never prosecuted.

Until the military addresses this issue, my confidence is lacking.
The recent push by the Tri-County United Way, Nemer Ford and The Post-Star to donate backpacks filled with school supplies to local elementary school students opened the eyes of the organizers to an issue with local charitable efforts: In an area where an enviable number of organizations are doing admirable work, coordination and cooperation is lacking.

The groups spent $10,000 to fill 200 backpacks and handed them out at four elementary schools in Glens Falls and Queensbury. But as they carried out the project, organizers noticed that several other groups in the local area run similar programs to help families with back-to-school supplies.

That numerous groups want to help kids succeed in school is a great thing. But coordinating the programs to determine who has been included, and more importantly, who hasnt been, would be even better.

The point is not to try to prevent someone from getting two backpacks but to make sure that all areas are being covered so some kids dont go without.

The Tri-County United Way is taking up the challenge of coordinating charitable efforts and will start this fall by reaching out to school districts in the area to ask what they need and where they are now getting help.

When it comes to school supplies, some teachers reach into their own pockets to help kids buy the notebooks, pens and pencils, calculators and other stuff  and the backpacks to carry it all  that students need.

Some sort of clearinghouse to keep track of where those needs are being met and where they arent would be invaluable. As wonderful as it is to hear of such devotion, we cant expect teachers to both lead the classes and buy students their pens and paper.

Cooperation and centralization can and should go beyond the various efforts to hand out school supplies. Were fortunate in this area to have a broad spectrum of charitable and civic organizations that do a tremendous amount of good work. But each operates mostly on its own, with lots of time devoted to fulfilling individual missions but little given to cooperating and collaborating.

Exacerbating the lack of communication among groups doing charitable work is the way the local population is broken up into dozens of small, self-contained towns and villages.

People in tiny communities often cling to their local institutions  as we saw in Thurman with the rescue squad, for example  even when the community is incapable of providing the necessary support. Regionalization is the obvious solution.

Theres no reason why any community needs to lose its local food bank or backpack program. But it does make sense, within the area of Warren, Washington and northern Saratoga counties covered by the Tri-County United Way, for organizations providing services to families to work together to avoid duplication and make sure no one gets overlooked.

Duane Vaughn, director of the Tri-County United Way, pointed out that charitable efforts are undertaken by an array of organizations, not only traditional charities such as soup kitchens.

Schools, churches, clubs such as Rotary, community nonprofits like the YMCA, trusts set up by individuals and educational groups like the PTA all take part in the effort to reach out to families that need the help.

What these organizations have in common is they all depend on the good will and support of the community at large for donations. Everyone who donates to local causes hopes their time and money is put to its best and highest use, and improving cooperation among the areas many service agencies will ensure that happens.

From school supplies to winter coats to meals to rides to doctors offices and much more, local groups do great work, helping people who need it. But the work could be done more efficiently and more comprehensively with some coordination of effort. We urge everyone engaged in providing these services to cooperate with the push by the United Way to make them even better.
A building permit and approval from the Yellowstone Historic Preservation Board now in hand, construction crews are now at work transforming the almost century-old Labor Temple on the Billings South Side into a $3.2 million events center, low-income apartments and office space.

Eric Basye, executive director of Community Leadership & Development Inc., which owns the building and is using several grants to complete the renovation, said workers last week dug up an old 250-gallon petroleum tank in what will be the parking lot for the building at 24 S. 29th St. The dirt surrounding the tank is being analyzed for contaminants and results are expected soon.

As might be expected in an older building, asbestos had to be abated as well.

It took project officials time and compromise to gain the approval of the historic preservation board. Lora Mattox, the city/county historic preservation officer, said that while the project  which includes 16 efficiency and one-bedroom apartments  isnt the most ideal for a historic district, its a building in really poor condition and it could have been slated for demolition.

Collaborative Design Architects designed the project. Fisher Construction is completing the renovation.

Cigars, candy and labor

What came to be known as the Labor Temple began in 1919 as the Otis-Kiichli Candy Company Building in 1919. Historic records indicate the company didnt last long at that location, since city directories show a string of baking companies occupying the building throughout the 1920s and 1930s.

A large, fading exterior sign reads, Otis-Kiichli Candy Co. A second sign below that one proclaims, Chocolates, Made in Salt Lake, sold from Alaska to Australia.

The Yellowstone County Trades and Labor Assembly purchased the building, and by 1949, 25 labor unions and four auxiliaries affiliated with the American Federation of Labor utilized the Labor Temple. The Labor Temple closed its doors around the turn of the 21st century.

Compromises agreed to by the board and by CLDI during the boards June 20 meeting included a more muted color for the apartment exterior; a building cap to, as Mattox said, tie the new and the old together; windows more in line with their historic antecedents; and an exterior stairway that will be covered in brick rather a less-expensive option.

It is on the border of the Old Town Historic District and along First Avenue South, which is highly traveled, Mattox said. It wont be quite in character with the historic district, but it wont deter from the district as a whole.

Basye said to date CLDI, a faith-based development nonprofit and outreach ministry, has $2.5 million of the $3.2 million construction cost in hand, including a $1.1 million grant from the Gianforte Family Foundation. He expects to have the remaining $700,000 or so raised by the time the renovation is completed early next summer.

In addition to the event space and the 16 apartments, the new facility will include office space for CLDI and about 5,000 square feet of office space that can be leased out  perhaps to like-minded ministries, or to businesses that want a home in a South Side neighborhood that has already seen some recent signs of new life, including the nearby St. Vincent de Paul building at 3005 First Ave. South, the former Crane Building.

Were going to need some paying customers, Basye said, to help offset some of the (construction) cost.

The ceilings are high throughout the building and will have an open feel to them. Even the small apartments will feature ceilings 10 feet high.

The events center will include an adjacent kitchen and will be available for community or family events.

Renovating a century-old building is a challenge, said Fisher Constructions Lyle Albrecht, the construction superintendent, but its going to be fun. Its going to be getting a little crazy here starting next week.

For the time being, an eight-man crew has been sufficient, but those ranks will swell as the project takes off in earnest  so long as there arent many more hiccups, Basye said.

Lyles goal, Basye joked, is to bring me good news every week.

That made Albrecht smile.

We think were about done with the bad news, he told Basye.
In the summer of 2001, I was on the rooftop of a skyscraper in lower Manhattan, and we all paused  even the jaded New Yorker  awestruck by the view of the World Trade Centers Twin Towers, gleaming and tall, from a vantage point few could experience.

I wasnt a journalist then. I lived in Rhode Island, and I sold industrial barcode labels. I was on the roof doing a site survey with two co-workers and a prospective customer.

A few weeks later, Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001, sometime between 9:03 and 9:59 a.m. I walked into my field office outside Cincinnati, Ohio. A large, silent group was clustered around a single TV. My flight had landed normally, but I had learned of the two planes hitting the Towers from Howard Stern on the rental cars radio, and like so many others, I was scared.

I said hello and went to join everyone at the TV. But they were now staring at me, their faces collectively draining of color, their mouths forming Os  like a flash mob version of Edvard Munchs painting The Scream. One of the women started crying. We thought you flew out of Boston, she said, pulling me into a bear hug. We thought you were dead.

Parts of that day, and the ones that follow, are a blur. Other parts are indelibly inked in my memory.

Come sit with me, darlin, my favorite co-worker, the Southerner Jamie, had drawled, patting a seat next to him on the half-empty plane leaving Providence, Rhode Island, early that sunny morning. He knew I was a nervous flier. As I slid into a seat I wasnt assigned, I joked that if we crashed, I would screw up the manifest.

Call it survivors guilt, or the hazards of a vivid imagination, but I still think about the four planes that were lost that day and am haunted by what those passengers must have experienced in their final terrifying hour.

Stranded in Ohio, I desperately wanted to hear my kids voices. They had been shielded from the news, so when my son, who was nearly 4, said hello, I tried to keep the sob out of my voice and make it sound like a routine call from the road.

That night at the hotel, the New Yorker  the same one who had been on the roof with me  was pacing, increasingly agitated, as he answered phone call after phone call from his wife, each with news of another neighbor who worked on the upper floors of the World Trade Center and couldnt be reached.

Alone in my hotel room, I heard the cadence of someone running the stairs  hard-soft-hard-soft-hard-soft  seemingly for hours. He was an American Airlines pilot, he told me. He couldnt sleep but couldnt bear to watch TV.

On Friday, Jamie and I, the New Yorker and another rep from Connecticut left Ohio in a minivan. With light traffic and the airspace still closed, it was eerily quiet. As we approached New York City, we could see beams of light through the haze, signs of the recovery efforts in lower Manhattan. The air grew pungent, a rancid stench of smoldering flesh, fuel, metal and paper, mixed with mold.

Exhausted and punchy, we stopped at a diner before we dropped off the New Yorker.

Where are yall from? Jamie genially asked our servers. The men  both brown-skinned and perhaps of Middle Eastern descent  stiffened, their faces turning stony. Oh  no, no, no, Jamie said quickly, realizing it might seem he was insinuating they were terrorists. I thought you might be Lebanese  and my wife is Lebanese  and there was a big-ole discussion we could have had around that. They relaxed but didnt smile.

My son will turn 20 soon. His memories of Sept. 11 arent firsthand, theyre family stories and things hes read or streamed on YouTube. As the terrorist attack becomes distant history, I wonder how it will be remembered.

I see Twin Towers, as clearly as I did that day on the roof.

In one tower, I see the faces of my kids, and Im reminded of the days that followed the attack, when we knew war was coming, but united to face evil and collectively became more caring.

In the second, I see the faces of the diner waitstaff, and Im reminded of the days that followed, when we became suspicious of others and laid a path to divisiveness.

If a tower falls, let it be the second.
The shooting death of a man in Burlington, Iowa, Sunday, is being investigated by Burlington Police and the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation.

Burlington police and a Burlington Ambulance crew responded to the area of North 5th and Iowa streets shortly before 6 a.m. for a report of a man who had been shot, according to police. A victim was transported by ambulance to Great River Medical Center, where he later was pronounced dead.
A catered dinner set for Sept. 16 will benefit a drop-in center that seeks to help women learn to live better, safer lives free from addictions and violence.

The third annual End of Summer Soiree, which will include live music and a live and silent auction, will raise money for the work of Angelas Piazza. It will be held at St. Bernards Catholic Church, at 226 Wicks Lane.

Tickets are $45 each or $300 for a table of eight.

Doors open at 6 p.m. and dinner will be served at 7. All proceeds support programming at Angelas Piazza, at 645 Grand Ave, which has served the Billings community for nearly 20 years.

Last year Angelas Piazza served more than 1,200 women, said Assistant Director Amy Aguirre, and she anticipates this years numbers to grow this year.

At Angelas Piazza, Aguirre said, women discover self-confidence, courage and hope through domestic violence programs and programs that encourage spiritual and emotional healing.

Two of the programs, one that focuses on education for victims of domestic violence and another one that lends support, are unique in the Billings area, she said. While the YWCA offers emergency shelter for victims, as well as job-skills assistance, it refers clients to Angelas Piazza for the drop-in center's programs.

The 12-week class focuses on topics such as the cycle of violence, how to identify red flags in a relationship and how the violence affects children in the home. It also includes community resources to help the women move forward.

The support group is an opportunity for women to share whats happening in their lives, Aguirre said. Its women listening to other women, seeing what theyre experiencing and then empowering each other.

Women are charged a minimal one-time $25 fee, but with costs much more for the two programs and for the other work at the center, the fundraiser helps keep Angelas Piazza going, she said.

The roast beef dinner will be catered by Knights of Columbus chapter 8345. Ron Garritson will provide live music.

Tickets can be purchased at Angelas Piazza. For information, call the center at 255-0611.
Moline artist John Ketner has been chosen from among five applicants to sculpt a replacement for the eroded marble statue that stood atop the Rock Island County Civil War Soldiers' Monument.

The monument is at the northeast corner of the courthouse, fronting 15th Street in downtown Rock Island. But the statue of a Civil War infantryman that originally was on top was taken down and has been in storage since October 2014 when a passerby noticed that it was in danger of falling off the base.

A group that includes the sheriff's office  in charge of county buildings and grounds  and the Quad-City Civil War Roundtable, a study group, and the Rock Island County Historical Society mounted a fund-raising campaign to replace the statue in bronze that is more durable than marble.

This past summer, group members reached the $48,000 mark and bid out the project.

Ketner is a self-taught, self-employed artist who created the Quad-City Police Monument at the Rock Island County Justice Center, a statue of an officer with a child, and the John Baker-Vietnam Monument at Jumer's Casino, Rock Island. Baker was a Medal of Honor recipient from Moline and is shown in uniform.

"We've had a chance to see his (Ketner's) work, and we think he will do a fine job for us," said Capt. Ron Erickson, who has led the project from the sheriff's office.

Ketner founded Lost Arts Studio and specializes in bronze sculpture and custom-made rustic furniture. He doesn't do the actual casting, though; his role will be to sculpt a model. He will begin by shaping a metal and foam armature that he will cover with clay, then use tools to shape in the details.

The model will then be taken to a foundry in Loveland, Colorado, that specializes in art work where a plaster/rubber mold will be created. The clay will be removed and the foundry will cast a copy out of bronze, consisting of "a couple of dozen parts cast separately," Ketner explained.

These parts will then be welded together, a patina added and the piece sealed, ready to return to Rock Island, hopefully by April, he said.

In doing his part of the project, Ketner will have three guides: a photo of the original statue, the eroded original statue in storage that he will measure extensively, and his own research into Civil War uniforms and rifles to make sure he gets the details right.

"That's my main concern," he said of the details. "I want to honor the original sculptor. It's not really my work, but his work."

The original sculptor was Leonard Volk, a one-time Rock Island resident who became a founder of the Chicago Academy of Design.

Work remains; donations still needed

Although Erickson and others feel they are "over the hump" with the statue on order, they are still seeking donations because more work remains.

A priority is to get someone to do an in-depth examination of the monument base to determine whether its cracks are superficial or deep and to fix them, regardless.

"No work has started on that," Erickson said.

Another part of the project is to replicate in bronze or granite  they haven't decided yet  the names of the 354 Rock Island County men who died in the war and whose names are inscribed on the existing base. Many are so eroded that they are no longer legible, and Erickson and others are adamant that this be corrected.

They also want to recondition a rusting copy of the Gettsyburg Address that sits on a crumbling concrete base a few feet from the memorial.

Finally, there will be cost involved in installing the bronze replacement on the marble base.

Money raised so far has come from a variety of sources: $8,000 from the Moline Foundation, $5,000 from the village of Carbon Cliff, $500 from the Rock Island Foundation, outright donations from individuals, "adoptions" of soldiers whose names are on the monument, two gun raffles and a car wash.

The guns were donated by Lewis Machine & Tool, Milan, and Rock River Arms Inc., Colona.

The replacement statue will be formally dedicated during April 2019, the 150th anniversary of the monument's original unveiling.

The statue is being replaced rather than restored because Erickson determined through research early on that replacement would be preferable.

Restoration would look "tacked on," it would mask the work of the artist, and it would not wear any better than the original, because marble is not durable outdoors.

The original statue likely will be displayed somewhere indoors, such as the courthouse or the Rock Island County Historical Society building, Erickson said.
CEDAR RAPIDS  Whether they are resistance rallies or an integral part of representative government, congressional town hall meetings may not reflect majority opinion and are unlikely to change any minds, according to a pair of Iowa political scientists.

On the one hand, I think that elected officials have a duty to meet with their constituents, University of Iowa political scientist Tim Hagle said.

On the other hand, he said, many recent town hall meetings have been little more than shouting matches that limited the elected officials ability to answer questions.

When that happens, most of the benefits of such town hall meetings are lost, Hagle said. Sometimes, a little shouting can be useful to show the depth of feelings, but sustained shouting and a general lack of decorum isnt useful.

Even those members of Congress who are willing to take hard questions and unfavorable feedback may be reluctant to have forums if they turn into shouting matches, he said.

Even if an elected official handles the shouting and such well, it still can make the official look bad, Hagle said. Not holding meetings avoids the drama, which might be seen as the lesser of two bad choices.

Chris Larimer, who teaches political science at University of Northern Iowa, said research shows citizen input in town halls forums is unlikely to change the mind of an elected official. Its just as unlikely that an elected officials answers will change minds.

If a member of Congress is willing to put up with the abuse, it can reinforce the image of an elected official as transparent and available, Larimer said. For Sen. Chuck Grassley, who has a meeting in every county every year, its part of his image.

Those who oppose Grassley probably dont come away from his forum agreeing with him. And those who agree with Grassley, even if they dont go to his meetings, know he was available should they have any questions, and this likely reinforces their positive image of him, Larimer said.

There are a variety of reasons members of Congress dont do forums, Hagle said.

Some just may not be that good at them, he said. Some may be in safe districts where they think they are likely to get re-elected and dont want to provide a forum for an organized resistance.

Other elected officials who might be in a difficult district electorally might not want the bad publicity from a rough town hall meeting, Hagle said.

Hagle cant speak for 1st District Rep. Rod Blum or 4th District Rep. Steve King, both Republicans, but an argument might be made that they could fit into those last two categories.
David Ross hasn't even left the building, and already, the scheming is under way to return Rock Island County to the good ol' days of bloat and dysfunction.

The Rock Island County administrator is in negotiations with Stuart, Florida, for its vacant city administrator post. Late last month, Stuart commissioners approved Ross' nomination by unanimous vote, local media reported. All that's left is for the two sides is to hammer out a compensation package.

Beaches, surf, fruity cocktails with little umbrellas and a robust tax base in a city of just 16,000  things could work out very well for Ross, who has done a yeoman's job herding cats in Rock Island for the past two years.

But Ross' day at the beach might send residents and taxpayers in Rock Island County back to the political tundra if some supervisors have their way. Apparently, several members on Rock Island County Board aren't too hip on a professional budget hawk watching the till they're so accustomed to raiding.

Before Ross, the county's notoriously partisan, wasteful county board ran things on its own. Decades of political gamesmanship, budgets bloated with pork and general dysfunction destabilized Rock Island County, even by Illinois standards.

The county board was more interested in petty squabbles and unabashed cronyism to function with any legitimacy.

It was that precise history that, last year, resulted in the county board voting to reduce its size from 25 members to 15 in 2022. It also propelled the creation of a county administrator position and a national search to fill it. Years of abortive politicking ultimately gave way to Ross' hiring.

And, apparently, a growing number of county board members pine for the old days of government by cronyism and are seizing on Ross' pending departure in an attempt to bring them back.

The backdoor wrangling is hot and heavy among those plugged in to Rock Island County politics, particularly those within its dominant Democratic Party, even though Ross has yet to finalize a deal in Stuart. One high-ranking official recently told us that Ross, a budget czar, should be replaced with an economic development guru. Others have indicated that several members of the county board are uninterested in conducting a search for Ross' replacement altogether.

This bloc, an apparently influential one, longs for the days when it was the board that drafted, approved and oversaw the budget, without so much as general professional guidance.

Neither approach would be wise, should Ross ultimately leave. Those calling for an administrator focused on economic development would sacrifice necessary constant attention to county operations in an effort to look outward. But it's the latter movement that legitimately risks a back-slide into a political system that favored patronage and pork over accountability and transparency.

In Ross' tenure, the county pushed, albeit unsuccessfully, for funding for its jail. It has finally come to grips with just how bad its finances are. At the very least, it wrangled with unsustainable pension costs. The highly political courthouse issue is, finally, moving toward resolution. Given more time, it's probable that Ross would have continued to inject reason into a government that, for years, was downright unreasonable.

Ross' successes can't be measured solely by volume or price tag. In just two years, he began reshaping a dysfunctional government into something that just might work over the long haul. A commitment to the facts has been Ross' biggest strength. His is, by nature, a job steeped in local politics. But he, personally, is no political operative. He's a professional budget hawk and manager, one willing to speak truth to elected officials  his bosses  who have historically been unwilling to hear it.

Should Ross leave for whiter beaches, it's imperative that the county board again conduct a bipartisan national search to replace him. County board members should forsake naming a successor with any ties to a local party or institution. They should, again, seek an outsider who, by professional ethics and freedom from local conflict, can objectively assess the realities of the beleaguered county.

And, above all, county board members should expunge any festering desire to again just do it themselves.
The ever-popular Black Hills State University Geek Speak lecture series returns with the new academic year.

All Geek Speak lectures are free to the public.

Geek Speak lecture series started four years ago as a way to expose students to diversity within disciplines and encourage student-faculty dialog outside the classroom in a more informal setting, said Courtney Huse-Wika, director of the University Honors Program and associate professor of English.

Lectures are held every Thursday at 4 p.m. in Jonas Hall on the BHSU campus. The first semester lecture schedule is as follows:

Sept. 14: I Am The Bone Collector, Now What Do I Do? by Gina Gibson, associate professor of digital communication

Sept. 21: The Joy of SET: Inroads into Combinatorics and Finite Geometry by Dr. Daniel May, assistant professor of mathematics

Sept. 28: "Imagining Mythica: Hit-and-Run Game Design for the Bullheaded, or Building Narrative Engines for an ADD world at the Intersection of Math, Myth, Movies, and Money, or Perseverance and Beginner's Mind: The Eye-opening March from Mythica to Walmart by Karl Lehman, instructor of English

Oct. 5: The Meaning of Everything: The Making of the Oxford English Dictionary by Dr. Andrey Reznikov, professor of English

Oct. 12: Tasting Life Twice: On Life-Writing and Wellbeing by Dr. Denice Turner, assistant professor of education

Oct. 19: Use of Images for Visualization and Visual Literacy in Language Class by Dr. Du-Lu Hsiao, assistant professor of Spanish

Oct. 26: Something Wicked This Way Comes: The History, Myths, and Rituals of Halloween by Dr. Courtney Huse-Wika, director of the Honors Program and associate professor of English

Nov. 2: Veterans Legacies in the Black Hills by Kelly Kirk, instructor of history

Nov. 16: Searching for Riemann: A brief history and some recent insights into one of the most intriguing unsolved million-dollar problem in mathematics by Dr. Parthasarathi Nag, professor of mathematics

Nov. 30: University Honors Capstone Defenses

Dec. 7: University Honors Capstone Defenses

For more information about each lecture go to BHSU.edu/Honors.
After serving his country in Vietnam, Rod Green returned home, stayed in the shadows and didn't talk much about his experience.

"We came home as individuals. It was not a very popular time in our country. You buried everything and didn't talk about it," said Green, who grew up in Sioux Falls and returned there to attend college following service.

"I remember walking onto campus and there were demonstrations going on," he said. "I was never ashamed, but you just didn't talk about it."

But Green is talking now and will make a presentation at 1 p.m. Sunday titled: What are the Things They Carried? at the Piedmont American Legion Post 311, 101 Pine Street, Piedmont.

His presentation is part of the Sturgis Big Read, an initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts. The Sturgis Big Read centers around Tim O'Brien's book, "The Things They Carried."

South Dakota's Rod Green was drafted Nov. 1, 1967 and attended basic trading at Fort Lewis, Wash. Then to Fort Polk, La. for advanced individual training and on to Fort Benning, Ga., for non-commissioned officers course and jump school. Here went back to Fort Lewis for eight weeks and shipped to Vietnam on Nov. 1, 1968.

Green hopes people who attend Sunday's event will come away with a better understanding of what a solider goes through and what military people have to sacrifice.

And he will have some of the things he and others carried while serving in Vietnam including a rucksack, mock hand gernades and C-rations. He will don a reproduction of the uniform he wore as a platoon sergeant serving the 101st Airborne Division with Company A, 1st Battalion, 502nd Parachute Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade.

Eventually, Green did talk about his experiences in Vietnam with his eventual wife, Helen, a nurse who cared for him through a bout with malaria.

"Initially, all she ever knew was that I was in Vietnam and got malaria," he said. "Then, I started talking a little more and she began understanding about my nightmares."

Green returned from Vietnam in 1969. It took more than 20 years before he met up with men he had served with in his platoon.

"It was amazing. I don't think we slept for three days we had so much to talk about," he said. The guys brought our pictures and memories. We started corroborating the stories and found out that depending on what your role, everybody had a little different perspective of what happened."

Then, about eight years ago, Green began speaking to students in Sioux Falls schools about his time in Vietnam. He explains about life was like for an infantry man in the jungle.

He says sharing with students and adults about his service helps him come to grips with what he experienced.

"Certain events will trigger memories. Sometimes they just appear for no reason. I remember when we lived in Rapid City and we were coming home from church. I had stopped at a stoplight and I burst out in tears. For whatever reason on that day at that moment I could see the faces of the enemy soldiers."

Green says his own son, who served in the military in Iraq and Afghanistan, received psychological support when he returned from his tour of duty.

"They also had more support for the families," he said.

Green said he has read O'Brien's book and drew some parallels from their experiences.

"I think we probably were in some same parts of the country," he said. "But some of the stories wouldn't fly in my unit."

After returning from Vietnam, Green joined the South Dakota National Guard where he received a direct commission as a second lieutenant in the field artillery. In October 1976, he was hired as a full-time technician with the Guard.

In 1983, Green remained in the Guard but was converted to active guard/reserve program. He retired from the Army National Guard in April 1999 as a lieutenant colonel. In January 2000, he began a 10-year career as a federal investigator, retiring in December 2009.

O'Brien's "The Things They Carried" is a meditation on war, memory, imagination, and the redemptive power of storytelling. The collection of linked short stories depicts the men of Alpha Company: Jimmy Cross, Henry Dobbins, Rat Kiley, Mitchell Sanders, Norman Bowker, Kiowa, and the character Tim OBrien, who survived his tour in Vietnam to become a father and writer.

In an interview with the Meade County Times-Tribune, O'Brien talked of the things he carried -- and still has all these many years later.

"My uniform, medals, a can opener and photographs are at the Ransom (Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas). I live in Austin and I'm only a mile away, so I can go visit at any time," O'Brien said.

O'Brien will present three programs during his visit to Sturgis later this month, as well as talk at the South Dakota Festival of the Book in Deadwood.

At 9:30 a.m. Sept, 22, O'Brien will visit with Sturgis Brown High School students who are studying his book. At 6 p.m., a public reception in O'Brien's honor will be held in at the Sturgis Community Center. There will be food, beverages, a cash bar with wine and beer, and music.

At 7 p.m, OBrien will present Reflections on The Things They Carried in the Community Center Theater.

On Sept. 23, O'Brien and Ron Capps of the Veterans' Writing Project will speak at 7 p.m. at the Deadwood Mountain Grand. The talk will be preceded by a 5:30 p.m. special screening of "The Vietnam War, a new 10-part, 18-hour documentary film series by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick.

The Vietnam War epic will air nationally on PBS stations beginning Sept. 17.

Ten years in the making, the series brings the war and the chaotic epoch it encompassed viscerally to life. Written by Geoffrey C. Ward, produced by Sarah Botstein, Novick and Burns, it includes rarely seen, digitally re-mastered archival footage from sources around the globe, photographs taken by some of the most celebrated photojournalists of the 20th century, historic television broadcasts, evocative home movies, and revelatory audio recordings from inside the Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon administrations.

The documentary tells the story of the war through the testimony from nearly 100 witnesses, including many Americans who fought in the war and others who opposed it, as well as Vietnamese combatants and civilians from both sides.

The Vietnam War was a decade of agony that took the lives of more than 58,000 Americans, Burns said. Not since the Civil War have we as a country been so torn apart. There wasnt an American alive then who wasnt affected in some way  from those who fought and sacrificed in the war, to families of service members and POWs, to those who protested the war in open conflict with their government and fellow citizens. More than 40 years after it ended, we cant forget Vietnam, and we are still arguing about why it went wrong, who was to blame and whether it was all worth it."

Said Novick: We are all searching for some meaning in this terrible tragedy. Ken and I have tried to shed new light on the war by looking at it from the bottom up, the top down and from all sides. In addition to dozens of Americans who shared their stories, we interviewed many Vietnamese on both the winning and losing sides, and were surprised to learn that the war remains as painful and unresolved for them as it is for us. Within this almost incomprehensibly destructive event, we discovered profound, universal human truths, as well as uncanny resonances with recent events.

Julie Peterson, director of the Sturgis Public Library and co-chair of the NEA Big Read Committee in Sturgis, said she looks forward to seeing the documentary unfold during the Sturgis Big Read programs and discussions.

She said the committee hopes to lead a conversation within the community of Sturgis surrounding the unique cultural and social moment, which was the Vietnam War. Further, and perhaps more importantly, it aims to acknowledge the effects of the war on the veterans, their families, the nation and the Sturgis Community.
The South Dakota Women in Agricultures 2017 rural womens conference will be held Oct. 19-20 at The Lodge at Deadwood.

The annual conference addresses both current agricultural topics as well as self-development programs topics as well as provides networking opportunities, pay it forward projects and creative learning sessions.

There will be a program on genomics in the plant, animal and human health industries.

Jean Koehler and Danci Baker of First Dakota National Bank will present "Legacies are Built Everyday," looking at the daily choices women make and how that affects farm transitions, legacies and estate planning.

Another motivational session: Do Big Things will look at what South Dakota farm and ranch women are doing to promote agriculture and rural communities.

Sarah Tveidt with the South Dakota Soybean Associations Hungry For Truth campaign is the conference keynote speaker. Tveidt will tie together all the conference topics and demonstrate productive ways to have meaningful and accurate conversations about agriculture and food.

The conference is open to women who are involved in the agriculture industry or those who just want to know more about agriculture. Women can register at EventBrite.com.

The conference will kick off with Oct. 19 with an historic tour of Deadwood and Lead followed by a small lunch.

That evening South Dakota Ag Woman of the Year and Young Gun awards will be presented. To submit applications for this award go to SouthDakotaWomeninAg.com.

South Dakota Women in Agriculture is offering scholarships for women ages 18-25 who would like to attend the conference. The scholarship covers the cost of registration and lodging. The application can be found on the South Dakota Women in Ag website.

The deadline to register for the conference is Sept. 30.
WHITE RIVER | After 66 years, a Lakota warrior is coming home.

Philip James Iyotte was born in Mellette County on Nov. 19, 1929, to Joseph and Florence (Menard) Iyotte but was raised by his father and his second wife, Rose (Highpine) Iyotte. As the oldest of 14 children, Phillip was reared in a two-story, five-bedroom home built in White River just north of the Rosebud Indian Reservation by his father, uncles and a brother.

As a young man, Iyotte was given the Lakota name Akicita Isnala Najin, meaning Soldier Who Stands Alone. No one could have known then how prescient that moniker would become.

A Lakota soldier

In 1950, at age 20, Iyotte enlisted in the U.S. Army, destined to serve the same country that had relegated his tribe to a remote reservation in southwest South Dakota. Following boot camp, the young soldier was assigned to the Armys 21st Infantry Regiment of the 24th Infantry Division and soon was deployed to the Korean conflict.

Fragments of an enemy missile seriously injured Iyotte in a battle on Sept. 2, 1950. After being hospitalized for treatment, Iyotte returned to his regiment and the war in just 19 days.

In the heat of combat near Seoul five months later, Iyotte and several of his fellow soldiers were captured by Chinese forces and marched to a prisoner of war encampment. An Army archival photograph from that day of his capture  Feb. 9, 1951  shows the young South Dakota soldier being held at gunpoint by the enemy.

When my uncle was captured, he was west of Seoul, and he and his fellow prisoners were made to walk, Iyottes 40-year-old niece, Dera Iyotte, said from her White River home last week. Two gentlemen, fellow Sioux, named Moses Garneaux and Norman White Buffalo Sr., were in the camp with my uncle.

They had to walk a long ways, and they were not getting proper nutrients, Dera explained. My uncle had been shot in the stomach, developed gangrene, when his friends told him they had found an escape route.

Unable to walk and knowing he would be unable to join the POWs in their dangerous flight to freedom, Iyotte sang them a Lakota honor song before their departure, Dera noted.

Then they shook hands, and the two men took off running, she said. They floated at sea for 18 days before a foreign fishing vessel picked them up, and they returned home. Thats all we know of him, this last story, because they had to leave him. But they made it home to tell my grandfather of their last time together.

Family pride

Deras pride at her relatives selfless service is apparent as she discusses his plight.

He was a warrior before the Army got him, a Lakota horseman, and he prayed and he sang those two men a song, which showed he had the biggest heart in the world, she said with faraway eyes. He was my uncle.

In the ensuing 66 years since the last word of the Lakota warrior filtered down to rural South Dakota, the Iyotte family never gave up hope for the warrior who mysteriously disappeared at the hands of his Chinese captors. They maintained contact with the Army, attended meetings conducted by the Armys Past Conflict Repatriations Branch, also known as the Army Casualty Office, headquartered at Fort Knox, Ky. And they wrote letters and made phone calls to their states congressional delegation asking for assistance in finding their lost sergeant.

Official recognition

Thirty years ago, then-U.S. Sen. Tom Daschle traveled to White River to present the Iyottes with a memorial plaque in honor of Phillip Iyottes service and sacrifice. The plaque, presented because the Army could not declare the missing soldier legally dead, was later installed on the family plot at the Old Two Kettle Cemetery 12 miles north of the servicemans childhood home.

Then, on Sept. 12, 2003, representatives of then-U.S. Sen. Tim Johnson presented the surviving members of the Iyotte family with a series of medals recognizing their lost soldiers service and valor. Among those honors were the Purple Heart with bronze oak leaf cluster, POW Medal, National Defense Service Medal, Korean Service Medal, United Nations Service Medal, and Combat Service Award.

Iyotte died while serving his nation, Sen. Johnson noted in prepared remarks presented that day. Today we come together to honor Sgt. Iyotte, who served his country with valor and distinction and gave his life so others may live freely.

Lone survivor

At the time, Iyotte was survived by four of his 13 siblings. Today, there is but one.

Eva Iyotte, 63, the youngest child of the large family, wasnt even born when her oldest brother disappeared into the Chinese POW camp.

I was born three years after he was captured, Eva said last week. I never knew him, but for the pictures and from my mom and dad. He never got to see me, either.

But Eva grew up revering her lost sibling and, with the passing of her mother and father, eventually adopted the challenge of finding him.

We prayed every morning that he would return because they had him as a POW in Korea, she remembered. We all prayed to hear news of him and that he would come home. Four of my brothers were in the Army and the Marines, and they were all my heroes. But there was one I never met, and hes always been my greatest hero.

Eva laments how her young brother fared; leaving his reservation to fight people he never met, being captured, wounded, and dying a lonely death so far from home.

Each Veterans Day, my grandma would always sing an honor song for him, Eva recalled. In the back of my mind, I always wished he would come home alive. There was this huge hole in my heart. Its a void that drives you, and you want to find out  its your flesh and blood.

As her father lay dying four decades ago, he made Eva promise to continue the pursuit to solve the mystery of her brothers disappearance and, ultimately, to bring him home. She embraced that challenge, attending annual meetings of the Repatriation Branch, providing DNA samples a decade ago to aid in the search, reading journals from those detained in Korean and Chinese POW camps, and commiserating with the families of other soldiers missing in action.

As a young girl, I wondered where Korea was, and when I went to school, I found out, Eva said. I told my dad that he was across the ocean, but one day he would come home.

Homecoming

Last month, when the most recent Repatriation Branch meeting was conducted in Washington, D.C., on Aug. 8, family finances wouldnt let Eva attend. But a telephone call a few days later changed her life.

The man asked if I was sitting down, Eva recalled. He said, 'We wanted to tell you in person that your brother, Sgt. Phillip Iyottes, remains have been positively identified.'

I almost fell over, and I started screaming and hollering, she said. When I think about it, I still cry. I am so happy; its such a miracle. It has been our familys prayer for 66 years, and sometimes all we have is prayer. When they say the family that prays together stays together, its true, because Phillip is coming home, and were going to be together again.

Eva and Dera said they were told that Iyottes remains were identified with the assistance of Chinese officials. The servicemans remains have since been transported to Hawaii and will soon make their way back to South Dakota, they said.

When they do, the Iyottes plan to conduct a memorial service in White River, followed by burial in the family plot north of their home. And on that day, Eva said she will have an intimate talk with the warrior brother she never knew.

I went to my parents grave last Friday and told them Philip is coming home, but I said, 'You already knew that, Eva whispered. When Phillip comes back, I will tell him, 'Hello, brother. Welcome home. I have looked for you for so long.' I will probably cry. And I will get a buffalo robe for him, because he was a true warrior.
Due to decreased fire activity and the establishment of fire lines, an evacuation warning was lifted early Saturday night for residents living near a mixed-fuel wildfire that drew multiple agencies to a ridge roughly two miles northwest of Livingston.

The fire was first reported at about 2:20 p.m. on Saturday and grew to an estimated 200 acres in size as it burned along a ridge between the Fleshman Creek drainage and the O'Rea Creek drainage.

Speaking at about 8 p.m., Greg Coleman, director of the Park County office of emergency management, said that the fire's incident commander, Park County Rural Fire District No. 1 Chief Dann Babcox, was calling the fire controlled but was not calling it contained. "There's still active fire around the perimeter, but they have a perimeter line around it," Coleman said.

Air support was sent home for the night and crews were scheduled to continue monitoring the fire overnight. "They got a good jump on it and I have good hopes for tomorrow," Coleman said.

At one point the fire was reported to be burning on both sides of the ridge.

"It's running the ridge. I don't have an estimate on the size of the fire. It looks pretty significant," Coleman said, speaking at about 5 p.m. "It's not just your normal sub-acre fire."

By 6 p.m. the fire was estimated to be 200 acres in size and temporary road had been put in place for O'Rea Creek Road and Fleshman Creek Road in order to "keep non-residents out of the area," according to a posting to the Park County Sherriff's Office Facebook page.

By about 7 p.m. road blocks were removed and the evacuation warning was lifted.

Earlier in the afternoon the fire had showed movement to the north and northwest, but had yet to progress into nearby forest, according to Coleman.

Reports of the fire first came into dispatch after a storm brought lightning through the area Saturday afternoon. The cause of the fire is unconfirmed, Coleman said. The volume and variety of reports initially led to the belief that there were possibly three fires burning in the area, but it was later determined that people were "probably seeing smoke from the same fire and reporting it from different areas," Coleman said.

Initial reports suggested the fire was making a run east, prompting the usage of a mass-notification system to issue an evacuation order at 3:18 p.m. for the 200 block of O'Rea Creek Road and beyond. "They didn't know the extent of the fire. With an abundance of caution we got people out quick," Coleman said.

The evacuation order was later downgraded to a warning before the warning was also lifted. Though he was unsure if the evacuation downgrade was communicated sooner onsite, Coleman said another mass notification message for the downgrade of the evacuation was sent out an hour after the original evacuation order.

In addition to Park County Rural Fire District No. 1, Livingston Fire and Rescue and other Park County Rural Fire Districts responded to calls for mutual aid. Also assisting in the firefighting effort were the U.S. Forest Service and the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation. Air tankers with retardant, helicopters and smoke jumpers were all utilized to help control the fire.
sacw.net - 10 September 2017

Peopleas Alliance for Democracy and Secularism (PADS)

Press release

Well known Kanada journalist Gouri Lankesh was murdered outside her house in Bangaluru on 5th September. Like the murder of Prof MM Kalburgi in 2015, the killers came on a two wheeler, and without any warning shot her dead at point blank. Spontaneous protests against the murder were held next day in many parts of Karanataka, as well as in many cities outside. Lankesh was a trenchant critic of Hindutva politics and did not mince words in her writings against its majoritarian authoritarianism. Fifteeen defamation cases were filed against her in different courts of Karnataka, but these did not stop her from writing and expressing her opposition to communalism. She was also a tireless campaingner against caste and gender inequalities, and never hesitated in speaking truth to the power. Eventhough she collaborated with the Congress government of the state in trying to get Naxal cadre give up armed struggle, this did not prevent her from criticising the state government whenever she felt it violated its constitutional mandate. Lately, in her writings and addresses she had expressed extreme worry over how Karnataka, especially its coastal areas, were turning into a laboratory for Hindutva. Courage, commitment and honesty defined her work as a jounalist and a public intellectual of Karnataka.

Lankesh came from the rational, secular and progressive tradition of India. After murders of anti-superstition activist Dabholkar, CPI member and trade unionist Govind Panasare, and Prof Kalburgi in the last four years, hers is the fourth one of a staunch secularist opposed to majority communalism being killed in open daylight. It is now clear that a terrorist conspiracy is underway to kill important public itellectuals who are part of secular campaigns. The purpose of this conspiracy is to instill fear, and create a public environment in which ordinary Indians hesitate to express any opposition to the Hidutva politics.

The murder of Gauri Lankesh raises a number issues about which all Indians should be concerned. First, even after four years of the murder of Dr Dabholhar, his killers are at large. The same is true with regard to killers of Dr Panasare and Prof Kalburgi. There is some forensic evidence that all three crimes were committed by the same group. An activist of one Sanatan Sanstha was even arrested, but there has been little progress in these cases. Such a state of affairs not only points towards professional incompetence of investigating agencies, but also raises a doubt that elements inside these agencies may be shielding criminals. After all, public prosecutor Rohini Salian in the Malegaon blast case has publicly said that the NIA was putting pressure to go soft on the accused. It is significant that Col Purohit, an accused in that case recently managed to get bail from the Supreme Court. The degradation of criminal justice system, and systemic bias in favour of one set of criminals will destroy the foundation of rule of law in the country.

Second, all facets of Hindutva politics need to be exposed. Its campaigns of vilification, hatred and violence against selected targets are aimed at destroying any possibility of open public discourse in the society. All these are classic fascist tricks. The kind of trolls its followers send on social media against any one opposed to their poltics will be considered not only uncivilised, but downright barbaric in any decent society. It is widely known that many twitter handles which gloated after the murder of Gouri Lankesh are followed by ministers of the BJP government. The BJP has come out with a statement that following a handle does not amount to giving a character certificate. However, the people of India have a right to ask why these state functionaries follow venom spewing twitter handles. The BJP ministers are actually indulging in dog whistle politics. By following hatred spewing handles they give them their silent approval. On the other hand they also issue public statements condemning vilification campaigns. It is high time people of India see through the duplicitous politics the BJP is playing with them.

Third, Hindutva is a political project, and it is essential that it be defeated politically. Unfotunatley for India, despite nearly seventy years of electoral democracy the political opposition to Hinduvta is extremely weak. Corruption, nepotism and narrow identity politics have delegimised almost all opposition parties. However, the stark choice before the people of India is the limited democracy they have at the moment, or no democracy at all. Democracy can not coexist with violent campaigns against selected citizens. People like Gouri Lankesh, Prof Kalburgi, and Drs Dabholkar and Panasare, who courageously questioned all customs and practices that violate fundamental rights of citizens, are essential for democracy. People of India have to defeat terorrist conspirators behind their muders.

Peoples Alliance of Democracy and Seculasrism demands that the police and investigaing agencies catch the killers of Gauri Lankesh at the earliest. Any organisation behind the criminal conspiracy of murdering Dr Dabholkar, Dr Panasare, Prof Kalburgi and Ms Lankesh be exposed and made to face the law of the land. Only then the diabolical sequence of premeditated attacks on rationalists and secualrists will be brought to an end.
Shirley Contreras lives in Orcutt and writes for the Santa Maria Valley Historical Society. She can be contacted at 623-8193 or at shirleycontreras2@yahoo.com. Her book, The Good Years, a selection of stories shes written for the Santa Maria Times since 1991, is on sale at the Santa Maria Valley Historical Society, 616 S. Broadway.
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The state of Montana could see hundreds of government jobs eliminated, safety in jails and prisons diminished, and even a reduction in the states ability to collect the taxes that keep it operating under plans to cut spending because of lower-than-projected revenue.

Documents submitted by state agencies and released Friday detail the 10 percent budget cuts called for by Gov. Steve Bullocks office in an effort to trim at least $226 million in state spending over the next two years.

The cuts are necessary because of lower-than-expected state revenues due to low income tax collections, which are down about $70 million from what was projected. There has also been a reduction in tax revenue from natural resource extraction, and the state is experiencing high expenses fighting wildfires that have torched more than 1 million acres so far this summer, with several major fires still burning.

Montanas Constitution does not allow the state to operate in the red and gives the governor authority to make mid-year reductions. The state has to have an ending fund balance, or cash in the bank, of $143 million at the end of fiscal year 2019.

The cuts proposed Friday are not final. Two legislative committees will make recommendations on how to cut spending, and starting Sept. 26, Bullock will start an agency-by-agency review. He has the discretion to decide which cuts are made.

Some very tough decisions are going to be made over the coming weeks and months as I work to responsibly balance our budget, Bullock said in an emailed press release Friday. I remain hopeful that the legislature will work with me during this process to identify more responsible solutions to deliver a balanced budget that does not substantially impact education, healthcare, child protective services and public safety.

Unless a special session of the Legislature occurs, the decision on the cuts will fall to Bullock.

This round of cuts comes on top of a 5 percent reduction across most of the state government implemented by the Legislature this spring. That was followed by another $70 million in cuts triggered when revenue came in lower than projected. Those cuts halved the states fire fund, which is now empty, and resulted in 20 people losing jobs, mostly at the Montana Historical Society and the State Library.

The Department of Public Health and Human Services already reduced services to children in foster care, the elderly and disabled and is trying to cut rates Medicaid providers are reimbursed by 3.47 percent.

That department, the biggest in state government, is also the hardest-hit agency under the proposed cuts released Friday. Bullock asked the department to cut $105 million more in spending over the next two years, including in senior and long-term care, child protection services and addictive and mental disorder programs.

While every state agency will be impacted, 85 percent of the states general fund budget is dedicated to the Department of Corrections, the Department of Public Health and Human Services and the primary, secondary and higher education systems.

"To say this has been difficult is a tremendous understatement," health department director Sheila Hogan said in an emailed statement. "We will do the best we can to minimize the impact on Montanans as much as possible, but we remain hopeful the legislature will work with the governor to find more responsible solutions."

Documents released by the state after 5 p.m. on Friday detail more than 110 pages of cuts, with varying degrees of clarity as to which divisions and programs in the health department would be affected. Officials were not available to offer clarification on unclear proposals.

Some health department programs, such as a federal entitlement program that helps infants with disabilities, appears to be cut entirely. Other divisions would see furloughs in staff hours and layoffs, though it wasnt clear exactly how many jobs would be lost.

High-cost dental procedures for 44,774 adult Medicaid patients would no longer be covered. Operating costs at Montana State Hospital would be cut by $2.2 million over two years. Earlier this year, the hospital almost lost its federal funding because of unsafe conditions caused in part by a shortage of staff.

The Department of Corrections will lay off numerous employees, which it said will make conditions worse for inmates, possibly risk public safety and open the state up to several lawsuits. It would cut up to $40 million over two years under its proposal.

"Unfortunately, there are no good options for such significant cuts," director Reginald Michael said in a statement. "We hope that throughout this process we can identify more responsible solutions to this situation, but for now we'll keep making public safety decisions in the best interest of Montanans."

Cuts will mean already overflowing county jails will continue to hold state prisoners. Reducing that burden was a major part of corrections-related discussions during the last session of the Legislature, with some advocacy groups discussing potential lawsuits if county jail populations did not come down.

The cuts are deep enough to even limit the batteries parole and probation staff buy to use in their radios. If batteries die during shifts, that could put their safty at risk. The department would also not be able to replace broken cameras at Montana State Prison for two to three months.

The infirmary in Lewistown would also be closed, leaving 25 inmates without access to nursing home care. Medical costs and equipment would still need to be provided at the Montana State Prison.

The Office of the Public Defender would no longer use contract attorneys, who handle a significant amount of cases. That may cause legal issues by denying people a right to a speedy trial and "disruption to the judicial system," the agency said.

Cuts to the Office of the Commissioner of Higher Education would reduce state financial aid available to Montana College students. Reductions to resources for maintaining federal grant programs could jeopardize a $5.4 million annual Carl D. Perkins Grant. Public service and research agencies attached to Montana State University and the University of Montana will face cuts.

The state university system must identify a total of $44 million in spending reductions. State lawmakers already slashed the Office of the Commissioner of Higher Education's budget in the 2018-2019 state budget passed in April.

Those previous cuts left a $19 million shortfall that resulted in tuition hikes, and Deputy Commissioner Tyler Trevor said tuition may have to go up again. It will be up to the Board of Regents to approve the cuts and tuition hikes, Trevor said.

"They all will have the ability to weather the storm, it's just a matter of the tactics we take," Trevor said of the state's colleges and universities.

At the Department of Justice, 10 percent cuts would mean closing a satellite lab in Billings, as well as scrapping plans to build a morgue there. Both were considered a huge improvement in dealing with an influx of drugs and crime in that region that came with a boom in the Bakken oilfields in Eastern Montana. The department also predicted the change would result in the departure of the state medical examiner because its difficult to recruit that job under current conditions.

The Motor Vehicle Division would leave vacant positions unfilled, resulting in increased wait times for customers.

The plan we submitted represents the worst case scenario, if required to cut the full ten percent of general fund dollars from our budget, Eric Sell, a spokesman for the department, said in a statement. If these cuts go into effect, it will clearly have a negative impact on the services we provide to the people of Montana.

The Office of Public Instruction would cut $5.8 million over two years in local assistance to districts, a move the office said would have "severe" impacts since districts have already budgeted for that amount and can't get money elsewhere.

It would also implement a hiring freeze and put additional restrictions on travel and attending conferences. "The impact of this reduction will significantly alter the way OPI provides services to Montana schools and students," the department wrote in its plan.

The Department of Revenue pointed out by cutting its budget, the state would have less ability to collect revenue and disperse it to state, local and tribal governments. An estimated 116 full-time equivalent positions would be cut over two years, many from the property assessment and business income taxes divisions.

That will "severely impact the security, efficiency and effectiveness of the department's tax administration, thereby negatively impacting the state's general fund, school funding and local government funding," the department wrote.

Montanans can comment on the proposed cuts at http://balancedbudget.mt.gov/.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.
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September 9, 2017

"America must listen to its prisoners before we make a major mistake"

The title of this post is the title of this extended Washington Post op-ed authored by Heather Ann Thompson. Here is how it starts and ends:

Forty-six years ago, on Sept. 9, 1971, almost 1,300 men erupted in one of the 20th centurys most dramatic prison protests. Their goal? To be treated as human beings even as they served their time in one of New York states most notorious penal institutions, the Attica Correctional Facility. These were men being fed on 63 cents a day, treated brutally by prison doctors and forced to labor whether they were sick or well. They finally had reached the breaking point. One year ago, on Sept. 9, 2016, thousands of prisoners, this time men and women from across the United States, marked the anniversary of Attica by engaging in another dramatic series of protests for the very same reasons that Atticas incarcerated had rebelled in 1971. Conditions were terrible. Overcrowding was severe, food was maggot-ridden, and prisoners were still being forced to labor.... On this 46th anniversary of that day when almost 1300 men stood together to tell the nation of the horrors of their confinement at Attica, and this first anniversary of that day when thousands of men and women again stood together, at equally enormous risk, to remind us all that conditions are still brutal in our nations penal institutions, we must listen to what they were trying to tell us: Everyone behind bars remains a human being and, therefore, no crime committed, nor punishment rendered, justifies abuse. And should we forget this basic truth  one that was understood, accepted and stands as the very foundation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the United Nations in 1948  the men and women who endure our nations penal facilities will, inevitably, remind us again. As those who struggled for better conditions and suffered so much in Upstate New York in 1971 oft said, Attica is all of us. Indeed it is.

September 9, 2017 at 03:42 PM | Permalink

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I agree. No one should endure past and current prison conditions. All should have been executed at 14, sparing crime victims and everyone around them the major human catastrophe that each caused for decades.

Crime victims are justified to feel threatened by people like this professor. They should defend their interests by holding her and her institutional sponsors accountable. The Post is owned by Bezos, homosexual rights activist. If crime victims and their families come upon him, just beat his ass, especially if a black loved one was murdered by one of her false victims. There is no talking to deniers like her and Bezos.

Disclosure. The Post Company owned my law school. When I was expelled from chat rooms, a friend and I pointed out California law against such retaliation. We threatened regulatory complaints. Post Counsel made them shut down the chat rooms entirely. Relationship was a little adverse.

Posted by: David Behar | Sep 9, 2017 4:46:32 PM

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Attending in the ceremony were Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Nguyen Xuan Cuong, former President of Vietnam Truong Tan Sang and senior leaders of ministries, departments and representatives of General Consulate of Japan and the Netherlands in Ho Chi Minh City, and leaders of the southern provinces.The shipment marked an important event for Vietnams agricultural sector and affirmed the quality of Vietnamese fresh poultry products in line with international criteria.The Long An international port is the first venue meeting the requirements and international standard on punctuality and preservation for the chicken meat.On the occasion, the Long An international port started a construction project of its wharves No.2 with a length of 210 meters.The wharves No.2 can receive over 50,000 DWT ships after it will be finished and put into operation in the third quarter of 2018.

BY QUOC HUNG- THANH HAI- Translated by Huyen Huong
Doanh made the statement when paying a courtesy visit to Speaker of the National Assembly of Tanzania Job Yustino Ndugai on September 8.The visit reflected the ambassadors enthusiasm to maintain relations with the National Assembly of Tanzania that will greatly contribute to further developing the ties of the two countries legislative bodies for the benefit of their people, Ndugai said.He went on to say that the Tanzanian National Assembly will actively work to deepen the ties between the two countries.Ambassador Doanh, for his part, thanked Tanzania for supporting Vietnam during the struggle for independence in the past as well as the national building today.The long-standing Vietnam-Tanzania relations have seen substantial progress in multiple fields since the visit of Tanzanian President Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete to Vietnam in October, 2014 and that of President Truong Tan Sang to Tanzania in March last year.The Foreign Minister of Tanzania will visit Vietnam in late September this year.

VNS
WEST POINT, Neb.  It is high noon on Thursday at the south end of West Point off Highway 275.

There is lots of traffic moving in and about. The graveled parking lot is overflowing with pickups, cars and livestock trailers.

License plates indicate vehicles from several surrounding counties at the sale barn.

West Point Livestock is a West Point classic. The place for buyers and sellers of livestock goes back to the early 1900s.

In 1982, the livestock sale barn was rebuilt into a clean, modern, air-conditioned center of business activity with regular Thursday sales and special seasonal sales.

The flag waves from the pole next to the West Point Livestock sign. The hot July weather seems to push the crowd indoors, where they are welcomed to the bright, air conditioned lobby by longtime employee Steve Weiler. Men linger in conversation, and sales clerks Melann Wiechmann and Diana Kreikemeier keep track of the proceedings.

The first stop and the most popular place for all is the cafe, which opens at 5 a.m. Monday through Thursday.

"The cafe is a good sideline to the business," said Pam Wordekemper, operator and head cook.

"No fancy stuff. At noon, it is basic hearty meat and potatoes home cooking topped with a slice of cream or fruit pie," Wordekemper said. "This season, it is mostly fruit pies. On sale days, I usually make a special dessert. In this weather we serve a lot of iced tea."

Wordekemper learned her cooking and seasoning skills from her mother, Ione Bleimeister, a well-known restaurant owner and cook.

Wordekemper is known around town for her famous potato salad. Using her mother's recipe, she already has orders for 30 gallons of potato salad for August.

After food, follow the distant rumblings of the auctioneer voice up the stairs through the door to the distinct smell of cattle to the sales ring.

The Norfolk Daily News reports that more than 100 people are sitting on the carpeted bleachers that rise to the top of the barn.

The side bleachers are nearly filled with multiple generations, from toddlers to grandmas. More entertaining than a circus or zoo, they watch and listen to the chant.

Farmers with seed-corn caps and cowboy boots line the bleachers, but interested kids stand watching the action. A teenager closes her cellphone to watch the activities. Babies in arms sleep peacefully.

This is a cow/calf sale. In the auction ring, the hydraulic gates open to admit the cow and her calf.

The frightened cow, protecting her calf, walks back and forth momentarily, looking for an exit. With the auctioneer's cry, "Sold," the hydraulic exit gate opens to the captive cow and calf who make a brisk exit.

Next came a little herd of six calves and their six mama cows.

Once in the auction ring, the digital electronic board states the herd count, average weight, total weight and price.

Group after group moved through the auction ring. Will Epperly of Dunlap, Iowa, was the auctioneer. Several hundred head were sold.

Jim Schaben Jr. and Jon Schaben of Dunlap, Iowa, are owners. They have been since October 2006.

The sale barn was built in 1939, but the new building was built in 1981. It has served multiple generations of livestock producers.

Gradually the crowd clears out. Buyers and sellers exchange checks. It's a good day as action moves outdoors.

Some trailers were going home empty while others were loading livestock and taking off for greener pastures.

"This is an enjoyable place," said Brian Brester, who has managed the sale barn for eight years.
SPIRIT LAKE, Iowa | A report of a disturbance at a Spirit Lake home Friday led to the arrest of two people on a variety of charges.

At approximately 8:36 a.m., Spirit Lake Police were called to 603 20th St. Upon investigation, officers obtained and executed a search warrant at the home. During the search, officers discovered a green, leafy substance they believed to be marijuana. In addition, multiple items of drug paraphernalia were found.

Chad Soat, 42, of Spirit Lake, was arrested and charged with domestic abuse assault in the third or subsequent offense (class D felony); child endangerment (aggravated misdemeanor); possession of marijuana, second offense (serious misdemeanor); and possession of drug paraphernalia (simple misdemeanor).

Mariah Vassar, 23, of Spirit Lake, was also arrested and charged with possession of a controlled substance to wit marijuana, second offense (serious misdemeanor); and possession of drug paraphernalia (simple misdemeanor).

Soat and Vassar were both booked into the Dickinson County Jail.
SHELDON, Iowa | Brandon Ramirez Padilla sat on his mother's outstretched legs 15 years ago, cramped in a truck with dozens of Mexicans as they crossed the border into the U.S., risking their lives in a harrowing 10-hour ride.

"The truck stopped and we were told to get out and run," says Ramirez Padilla, today 19.

He joined his mother and sister, sprinting to refuge in a gas station/convenience store. The trio tried to "blend in" while making believe they were shopping, desperately waiting for a relative from Texas to pull up and cart them away.

Brandon Ramirez Padilla looked back and ahead on Thursday, tracing developments over the past 15 years, a time frame whose calculus includes two baby brothers, four communities, one high school degree and one foggy future, the result of President Trump's announcement last week to phase out DACA, the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, a program President Obama instituted by executive order in 2012.

The Obama administration order offered protection to children like Ramirez Padilla, who came to the U.S. illegally with his parents. DACA allowed such young people the chance to qualify for a two-year renewable period of deferred action from deportation, while also promising eligibility for a work permit. It is estimated that 800,000 young people, called "Dreamers," a name that comes from the Dream Act, are enrolled in the program, a program that does not provide a clear path to citizenship.

Brandon Ramirez Padilla is a "Dreamer." The May 2017 graduate of Sheldon High School served as president of the school's Spanish Club, president of Family Career Community Leaders of America, art director for the fall musicals, a member of National Honor Society and co-editor of the school yearbook. He kept busy while earning a grade-point average of 3.2. An employee of Shopko on Sheldon, he's now a freshman at Northwest Iowa Community College in Sheldon.

Three years ago his parents bought a brick home in Sheldon, their first purchased residence. Possessors of work permits both, Pedro Ramirez and Yeimy Padilla pay property taxes, sales taxes, fuel taxes and income taxes.

They've not returned to Mexico since crossing the border. Doing so, they fear, could result in being unable to come back to Sheldon, where they've built their lives and their future.

"I like our life in the U.S.," says Brandon, a budding artist fluent in Spanish and English. "Sometimes it can be hard due to some racism or ignorance. Luckily, we've had it really good."

His family, he says, worked with an attorney to earn a Cancellation of Removal status that enables its members to remain in the U.S. even if they are pulled over by law enforcement and are unable to show documentation.

"We'd have a right to a trial before we could be removed," he says.

Pedro works as a supervisor in an area meat-packing plant. Yeimy remains at home with their youngest son, 3-year-old Alan Ramirez Padilla, who suffers from Type 1 Diabetes.

"I was encouraged to get into 'Dreamers' to pave the way for my university study," Brandon continues, saying the educational benefit outweighed the risk. "If you are a 'Dreamer' they (the government) know that you and your family are immigrants. We exposed ourselves and our families which makes it easier to pin the whole family down."

U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions said DACA would be terminated come March unless Congress salvages it.

U.S. Rep. Steve King, a Republican from Kiron, Iowa whose district includes Sheldon, supports the program's termination, telling CNN and Fox News that "Dreamers" should live in the shadows.

"They came here to live in the shadows and we're not denying them that opportunity to live in the shadows," King told NBC News. "If they're encountered by law enforcement officials, the law requires that they'd be placed in removal proceedings. That's the law and if you're going to waive the application of law, to groups of people, it is amnesty and amnesty in America, with regard to immigration, is a reward for immigration lawbreakers and is a pardon for immigration lawbreakers coupled with their reward of the objective of their crime."

Fifteen states, including Iowa, are suing the Trump administration to keep it from terminating DACA and, thus, ending protection it affords young people like Brandon Ramirez Padilla.

"My dad speaks perfect English," Brandon continues. "My siblings speak English and my mom continues to learn English. People say 'Why don't you just go back to Mexico?'

"That amounts to throwing all of this away," he adds. "We live here as citizens, paying our taxes and our bills. We make sure everything is paid off and we behave. We do not qualify for (government) assistance, which is fine. My sister, who is 16, and I have jobs and we manage."

While he'd like to be a model citizen, he's not sure that dream is attainable.

"There's a fifty-fifty chance of that, which can be stressful," he says.

The family's most stressful period to date came a few years ago when a judge sought letters in support of Yeimy Padilla, who was threatened with deportation. Brandon and his sister, Paola Ramirez Padilla, 16, wrote to describe their mother's work ethic. Various Sheldon teachers and other relatives joined the effort, lending their support as character references.

"The judge was moved by those letters," Brandon says. "She let our mother stay."

"My life is here," Yeimy Padilla says.

On Wednesday, her oldest son will take his place at a breakfast and forum with legislators at Northwest Iowa Community College. The topic: Constitutional issues.

"I look at my parents as they work so hard," Brandon concludes. "I want to follow their example while setting examples for others. We behave not with citizenship in mind, but because we're trying to do what is right."
IDA GROVE, Iowa | Just weeks removed from an affirmative vote to consolidate the two neighboring districts, voters in the Odebolt-Arthur and Battle Creek-Ida Grove school district will decide Tuesday whether to raise taxes by more than $16 million for building upgrades.

Voters from the Odebolt-Arthur and Battle Creek-Ida Grove districts, which had a whole-grade sharing agreement for eight years, in June decided to fully consolidate into one district.

On Tuesday, voters will weigh in on a bond issue of $16.4 million to improve the high school in Ida Grove and the middle school in Odebolt. Polls will be open from noon to 8 p.m. at a single polling place in each of the four towns comprising the district.

Under Iowa law, school referendums calling for an increase in property taxes must receive a "supermajority" of at least 60 percent to pass.

Superintendent Terry Kenealy said a committee for two years has looked into needed improvements, and added that the final plans would extend the building lives by 40 to 50 years.

One key piece will add a performance arts auditorium on the east side of the high school in Ida Grove, at an estimated cost of $3.8 million. Another $6.5 million would pay to modernize the gymnasium, update classrooms and improve accessibility.

For the school in Odebolt, an estimated $5.9 million would go toward upgrade classrooms and stage curtains, repairing the gym ceiling and addressing accessibility issues by adding an elevator and other pieces.

"Last winter the school districts hired an architect to work with the committee and the board members on this process to assist in the details and costing," Kenealy said.

An initial project estimate by an architect came back at $31 million, but was rejected as too expensive, the superintendent said.

Kenealy, who is in his third year as superintendent for both districts, said the referendum, if approved, would raise property taxes by $2.70 per $1,000 of assessed property valuation. That's the highest increase permitted for a one-measure bond issue vote in Iowa.

The superintendent said some upcoming budget cuts, realized as a result of the consolidation, will reduce that property tax impact over the next few years.

A few seats on the school boards for each district also will be on Tuesday's ballot. The district covers parts of eastern Ida County and western Sac County.

Before passage in June, the proposed consolidation of the Odebolt-Arthur and Battle Creek-Ida Grove school districts went down to defeat twice, in 2011 and 2016.

In the most recent election, 540 voters in Battle Creek-Ida Grove said yes to the reorganization and 70 voted against it. In Odebolt-Arthur, there were 418 affirmative votes and 163 no votes.
JACKSON, Wyo.  The U.S. Forest Service has approved a plan to install a 172-foot-long steel bridge to span the Yellowstone River in a northwest Wyoming wilderness area.

The new bridge in the Teton Wilderness in the Bridger-Teton National Forest would replace another known locally as the Hawks Rest bridge, which is 57 years old and considered unsafe.

"We have a bridge out there that could fail at any time," Blackrock District Ranger Todd Stiles said. "That's what I've been told by my experts. At some point you've got to pull the trigger to fix the thing or you've got to condemn it."

But critics say the new bridge will degrade the character of the Teton Wilderness.

"I wish the Forest Service would use some imagination and creativity and listened to constructive suggestions that are made," conservationist Phil Hocker told the Jackson Hole News & Guide. "That hasn't happened. They could get a bridge that would make the Hawks Rest bridge more appropriate in that astonishing, amazing, none-other-like-it setting."

The Hawks Rest bridge predates the 1964 Wilderness Act by four years and is considered a critical link across a wide and often deep river that is along the most-used trail in the Teton Wilderness.

A number of people who commented on the proposal asked for a packable bridge that could be transported by mules to avoid having to use a helicopter in designated wilderness. Others suggested forgoing a bridge, arguing it was a human feature incongruent with its protected surroundings.

Stiles stood behind the single-span feature, which will not require abutments that protrude out of the bed of the Yellowstone River. Packable bridges the Bridger-Teton researched would have required at least two in-river abutments. Some designs, like suspension bridges, would have required bringing in a drill to do soil tests and skilled maintenance for proper upkeep, he said.

"We think very strongly that our decision to produce a single-span-style bridge best protects the natural character," Stiles said.

Stiles said he hopes the bridge can be installed late next year.
YANKTON, S.D. | An infestation of zebra mussels at Lewis and Clark Lake is causing maintenance headaches at Gavins Point Dam.

The invasive species, first found in Lewis and Clark Lake behind the dam in fall 2014, attaches to grates over the two water intakes for the system that cools the dam's power-generating turbines. Those grates frequently become covered and clogged with mussels, and maintenance workers must now clean the 24 coolers every year, rather than the previous three-year cycle in which eight coolers were cleaned each year. The increased cleaning has led to a significant increase in maintenance costs, power plant superintendent Mike Welch said.

"We have zebra mussels 3-4 inches deep on the intake grates," he said.

The turbines themselves are not affected by the mussels, Welch said, but they must be shut down periodically when the coolers must be cleaned, cutting down on hydroelectric power production.

The pesky zebra mussels, which are about the size of a thumbnail, were found this summer in Lake Yankton, which sits north of the Missouri River below the dam. They've also been found in McCook Lake near North Sioux City and in the Iowa Great Lakes region at Okoboji. The zebra mussel, often transported on boats and in water that has not been drained from boats, competes with native fish and mussels, clogs pipes, cuts swimmers' feet and will pile up on rocks, docks, swimming platforms and anything else in the water.

Karla Zeutenhorst, a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers park ranger at Gavins Point, said the zebra mussel was first spotted on the dam's spillway gates. Mussels also have been found inside and outside the power plant. The mussels have not caused any damage to the plant, she said.

The mussel spreads rapidly, with a female capable of laying up to 1 million eggs a year, so they can multiply quickly.

Zeutenhorst said the corps is evaluating potential options to combat the zebra mussel at the power plant. One possible solution is placing an ultraviolet lighting system where the raw water enters the power plant. The ultraviolet light is believed to kill zebra mussel larvae, though Welch said results at other dams with similar problems haven't been conclusive.

Another option is replacing the two iron water intakes with copper, which adult zebra mussels won't attach to. Again, that's not a guaranteed fix. Welch said mussels have been found attached to copper pipes inside the coolers.

For now, workers will continue the costly cleaning of mussels from the intake grates and coolers. Welch said boaters need to follow recommendations of various state natural resources agencies to rinse boats and drain their wet wells so that the pest isn't transported to other bodies of water not yet infested.
BUDAPEST -- Congress has returned to Washington after another unearned vacation and faces at least two immediate challenges, in addition to the familiar ritual of raising the debt ceiling.

President Trump has called the indecipherable U.S. tax code "self-destructive." He has also decided to end the Obama-era program that allows "undocumented" immigrants who came to America as children to gain work permits. Congress would be given six months to replace it.

For advice on taxes and immigration, the president and Congress might learn something from Hungary.

On Jan. 1, 2017, the government of Prime Minister Viktor Orban lowered the corporate tax rate from 19 percent to 9 percent, the lowest rate among the 28 member states of the European Union. By comparison, the United States' top marginal tax rate is 38.92 percent, just behind Puerto Rico and the United Arab Emirates.

In an interview, Zoltan Kovacs, secretary of state for Public Diplomacy and Relations in Orban's Second Cabinet, tells me the country's 15 percent flat tax and lower corporate taxes have -- surprise -- increased government receipts because more people are being hired and they generate additional tax revenue.

In the last seven years, Kovacs says, 700,000 new jobs have been created in Hungary, only 150,000 of which are government jobs. The government jobs are mostly for people who had relied in the past on social welfare programs. Even here, he says, they know the meaning of the word "workfare." The unemployment rate in Hungary is 4.5 percent, according to Kovacs, down from 11.4 percent in 2010 when the current government took power. Economic growth ranges between 3.5 percent and 4 percent, he says.

While American debt keeps rising, Hungary's debt is falling. In 2010 it was 85 percent of GDP. Today it is 74 percent. True, Hungary has a high value added tax of 27 percent, but Kovacs says that is "temporary" (is there any such thing as a temporary tax?) and the government's goal is to reduce it as revenue continues to increase.

Hungary has some of the toughest immigration policies in the European Union. Since 2015, says Kovacs, "400,000 immigrants have passed through" the country. Asked how many stayed, he replies "none," adding, "They (immigrants) all wanted to go to Western Europe, Germany, Scandinavian countries." Why? Because, he says, they have welfare programs in those countries and Hungary deliberately does not.

The charges for this policy are familiar to Americans: "We are racists, we hate those people who come in," when in fact, Kovacs says, it is about maintaining Hungary's culture and way of life.

What about the religious component when it comes to migrants from Muslim countries?

"We do not underestimate that element," he responds. "Islam is mostly fundamentalist. Europe is mostly secular, but even for those who don't believe in God, or go to church. The very culture of Europe is Christianity."

Kovacs suggests the massive flow of mostly Muslim immigrants is "undermining the very foundations of the European countries." He says even secularism is a threat to those foundations, "but when you bring in a completely different culture -- and it's not superiority vs. inferiority -- it's simply about the difference. If you see the experience in other societies, Islam is not integrating. They exist in parallel societies and live by their own rules. We don't like what we see in France, The Netherlands and Germany."

He might have added that if a nation loses its culture, it loses the nation. The failure of especially Muslim immigrants to assimilate in ways that will preserve their host's culture is critical. Otherwise, it is not immigration, but invasion, which appears to be happening in Europe, a continent that has a lot of experience over many centuries when it comes to that practice.

Hungary has provided a good example when it comes to tax reform and immigration policy. The U.S. could learn from it.
WASHINGTON -- It has become axiomatic that when Donald Trump says or does something over the top or below the belt, beware the unseen.

His cunning use of distraction turns red herrings green with envy.

The template works like this: Trump says something outrageous that drives Washington's Bubble Belt wild. The media leap to outrage while bookers haul in "experts" to intone the obvious in exchange for makeup and a limo.

Next, the same talking heads, commentators and columnists lament the time wasted on such trivia as, say, first lady Melania Trump's wearing stiletto heels to visit victims of Hurricane Harvey. Critics and the media itself lament that Important Issues are being ignored whilst attention is turned on, oh, whether Ivanka and Jared are being snubbed by the DC in-crowd, such as it is. The point is taken, but one should note that nothing is ever being ignored by everyone. Or, rather, everything of import is being monitored and commented upon by someone.

But then, broadcast and cable producers know -- and President Trump knows deeply -- that most Americans don't really care that much about what they insist they care about. A few headlines will get most through the morning. Twitter and Facebook keep the curious plied with updates, and by day's end, who really wants to plunge into tax reform?

It is true, nonetheless, that when Trump needs time to fidget with something that actually matters, he tosses a dead fish into the Dasani tank and waits for the media herdlings to begin their march toward the trough.

Temporarily spared the spotlight, Trump fluffs the thatched nest atop his head and invites his brain to hatch some very bad ideas. Thus, we seem to be on the brink of a nuclear confrontation with North Korea. Remember when we used to worry about Trump having his finger on the nuclear launch button? Square that. When the other antagonist is North Korean Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un, the nightmare can't be dismissed as the twisted hankie of the persistently worried.

Never have two less-qualified "leaders" been so endowed with such devastating power without the requisite impulse control upon which living civilizations depend. Not to mention that these two nuke-hecklers are unmercifully coiffed to resemble cartoon characters so that we, the soberly sane, are left to ponder our face-melting demise as a clown showdown between two renegade circus performers. The horror movie "It," featuring a diabolical clown, couldn't pay for better timing.

Meanwhile, one seeks cooler comfort in the memory of the Cuban missile crisis between Russian Premier Nikita Khrushchev and President John Kennedy. At least these men were capable of finding an alternative to worst-case scenarios. There seems to be no such inclination on North Korea's part or, frankly, on Trump's. Unless our reality star-in-chief holds his sagacity in reserve for special occasions such as this, there's little reason to assume or hope that he'll diplomatically temper his counterpart's apparent need to demonstrate his manhood.

In July, Trump was typically eloquent in describing his approach to thwarting disaster:

"We'll handle North Korea. We'll be able to handle North Korea. It will be handled. We handle everything."

Whew, that.

As further insult to reason, this isn't even a conflict over something at least historically rational such as the now nearly charming contest between communism and Americanism. No battle of wits, the U.S.-North Korea stare-down is more accurately a battle of nitwits who seem to think that threatening nuclear holocaust and mutual destruction is a contest to see who has bigger hands.

No one would suggest that Trump is responsible for all the nail-biting these past few months or that Kim's missile and nuclear tests aren't deadly serious. But Trump surely has exacerbated matters with his "fire and fury" rhetoric. The goading language of ultimatum, more than a bluffing tactic, is an inflammatory agent so that the possible moves inexorably toward the inevitable. U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, the president's toughest-talking Cabinet member, recently said: "We have kicked the can down the road long enough. There is no more road left."

Perhaps, Kim might argue the same. Meanwhile, a can-kicking strategy (i.e., containment and diplomacy) seems a not-irrational substitute for mutual annihilation. Have we reached a point of no return? Will the president of the United States fire Kim, or will he invent some new distraction (staffers: watch your backs) while he becomes a stealth, wartime leader?

Stay tuned. But first: What will Melania wear to the presidential bunker?
Off-the-shelf drones armed with an improvised explosive device and radioactive material comprise an increasingly likely terrorist threat intelligence officials are keeping an eye on worldwide.



The weapon would be physically and sociologically "poisonous," Friedrich Grommes, a senior German intelligence official told McClatchy's Tim Johnson on the sidelines of the September 6-7 Intelligence and National Security Summit in Washington.

"Even if only a few people are affected," Grommes pointed out, a dirty bomb delivered from the air "serves completely the idea of terrorism."



Grommes is the international terrorism and international organized crime desk chief at Germany's Federal Intelligence Service (Bundesnachrichtendienst or simply the BND).



Public education may be one key to unlocking a counter-panic mechanism. "Depending on the situation," the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission reports, a radiological dispersal device (RDD) explosion "could create fear and panic, contaminate property, and require potentially costly cleanup. Making prompt, accurate information available to the public may prevent the panic sought by terrorists."



The technology "hasn't quite crossed the Atlantic," Chris Rousseau, director of the Integrated Terrorism Assessment Centre at the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, said at the summit. "It hasn't actually left the battlefield," Rousseau said, but "the question is at what point somebody's going to get the idea to use that here."



Drones will "increasingly" be relied on by non-state actors as a cheap and readily available weapons platform, Max Abrahms, counterterrorism theorist at the Council on Foreign Relations told Global Security in an email.



"It's just a matter of time before they're equipped with bombs and deployed against civilian targets in the West. UAV's have gotten so much cheaper that they'll increasingly be used by groups and individuals to sow destruction," Abrahms said.



ISIS has been eager to boast that its remotely piloted aircraft make up an "air force."



In Iraq this year, ISIS-controlled UAVs attacked a group of civilians with an IED, a lull period ensued as emergency crews and first responders arrived on the scene, then a suicide car bomber launched a follow up attack in coordination with the IED strike, Bridget Johnson, terrorism fellow at the Haym Salomon Center, reported after examining ISIS propaganda clips.
Electoral Commissioner, Faimalomatumua Mathew Lemisio, has briefed the visiting Commonwealth Secretary General, Patricia Scotland, on the work of the Electoral office.

They include moves to streamline the electoral process and build voter awareness. The Commonwealth operates a number of programmes in electoral support, which Samoa has also accessed.

A senior member of the electoral office was part of the Commonwealth Observer Group mission to Papua New Guinea, in June-July this year.

Assistant Electoral Commissioner, Fetogi Vaai, was among the 12-member group, which was chaired by former New Zealand Governor-General, Sir Anand Satyanand.

Their report was presented last week by SG Scotland to Papua New Guineas Prime Minister, Peter ONeil, on the margins of the 48th Pacific Islands Forum in Apia.
In the last weekend before the Grand Circuit Handicapping Challenge goes into overdrive with daily stakes races in the Midwest, Dennis OHara was the top handicapper for the September 8-9 stanza with a total of 98 points, 21 points ahead of Matt Rose, who took the runner-up position.

Rusty Nash finished in the show position with 62 points, which was good enough for him to take the lead in the overall contest.

On Friday evening, it was a Kindergarten Classic extravaganza at the Meadowlands, as eight tilts of two-year-old racing, plus a leg of the Ms Versatility, was contested. When the night was over, Rose and OHara had four winners each, but Rose prevailed with a net profit of $17.90. Finishing second was Anne Stepien, who, despite only having two winners, selected KJs Bekah, who paid $10.60 and $5.60 for her second-place finish. OHaras four winners was good enough to take fourth place.

Saturday night, the action moved to Mohawk Racetrack and Scioto Downs and, once again, OHara tabbed four winners, but this time he was not to be denied, as he grabbed the top spot with a net profit of $10.70, which was helped by sweeping the Scioto Stakes. Nash, with five winners for the night, had to settle for the place position.

In the year-to-date contest, Nash has moved in front with a grand total of 874.7 points through forty-nine contest legs. Megan Maccario, the leader for the past five weeks, drops back to second place with 849.23 points. Matt Rose (822.38 pts) remains in third. The big mover of the week, Dennis OHara (761.18 pts), jumped three spots into fourth.

Next Up: The busiest segment of the grand circuit handicapping contest will begin this coming Wednesday with the Nadia Lobell at Hoosier Park. Friday will see the Meadowlands host the fourth preliminary leg of the Kindergarten Classic for juveniles of both gaits and sexes, followed by Saturdays quartet of stakes at Mohawk, which includes the Canadian Trotting Classic and Maple Leaf Trot. Sundays stakes will coincide with opening day of the Delaware County Fair, where the Standardbred for two-year-old colts and fillies will be contested.

The following week, the Delaware County Fair continues, including the Little Brown Jug, and Harrahs Philadelphia will host the Simpson for three-year-old filly pacers and trotters. Hoosier Park and Mohawk Racetrack will continue with their stakes program leading to the Red Mile Grand Circuit meet in two weeks.

(HANA Harness)
Corey Callahan completed a sweep of the Canadian Trotting Classic eliminations on the Saturday, September 9 card at Mohawk Racetrack alongside eliminations for the Elegantimage and divisions of the Simcoe, winning with Bills Man and Dover Dan for trainer John Butenschoen.

Bills Man rolled wide to take the first $40,000 elimination for the Canadian Trotting Classic in 1:53.2.

Sitting fourth as Victor Gio It trotted a quarter in :27.3, driver Corey Callahan pulled Bills Man first over after a :56.4 half, gaining on the leader moving into the turn. What The Hill, sitting in the pocket, edged off the rail coming to three-quarters, forcing Bill's Man wide in 1:25.2 as the two pursued Victor Gio It with Dancer Hall moving up the rail into fourth.

Drifting in the stretch, Dancer Hall shot up the rail as Victor Gio It dropped out of contention. What The Hill attempted to challenge the new leader between horses while Bills Man rallied down the center of the track, soon overtaking Dancer Hall with What The Hill finishing third and Lindy The Great picking up fourth.

A three-year-old colt by Credit Winner out of the Yankee Glide mare Silver Springs, Bills Man, racing for owners William Wiswell and M and L of Delaware LLC, won his third race in 14 starts this season and his fifth in 26 overall, amassing $319,427 in earnings. Trained by John Butenschoen and driven by Corey Callahan, he returned $7.20 to win.

"I knew I had David [Miller and What The Hill] beat, but then I saw [Doug] Mcnair [and Dancer Hill] there," Corey Callahan said, "but my horse had plenty of trot and we just wanted to get through there error free and move onto next week.

"I didn't really want [David Miller] coming out of there. I was pretty much almost there, and when he came out I really had to check [Bills Man] for a second. I think if I could've just steamrolled there first up he could've won really easily."

Corey Callahan claimed the second Canadian Trotting Classic elimination, completing his sweep for trainer John Butenschoen, winning with Dover Dan in 1:52.3.

Controlling the tempo, Dover Dan set fractions of :27.4 and :56.1 before being challenged by pocket-sitter Long Tom turning into the stretch. International Moni, tracking Long Tom around the turn, angled three wide while Seven And Seven progressed up the inside in fourth.

The trio blitzed Dover Dan from both flanks approaching the line, with Dover Dan maintaining a slight edge over Long Tom in second, International Moni in third, and Seven And Seven fourth. Southwind Cobra, inheriting fifth following a break around the turn by Dunbar Hall, completed the finalists.

Winning his fourth race in 14 starts and his eighth race in 25 overall, Dover Dan, a three-year-old colt by Andover Hall from the Royal Troubador mare C R Kay Suzie, has earned $352,047 for owners William Wiswell, Jean Goehlen, and Eugene Schick. He paid $14.40 to win.

"He has always been better for me when I leave with him a little bit and kind of get him interested," Corey Callahan said. "I told John [Butenschoen] before the race 'Scotty [Zeron] usually ducks [International Moni] off, so I was going to push off and hopefully follow [Tim] Tetrick [and Long Tom], but [Tetrick] was content to follow me. I kept the fractions honest and everything worked out.

Corey Callahan will opt to drive Bills Man in the Canadian Trotting Classic final.

"I picked off of Dover Dan last week and [Tim] Tetrick picked it up and won the Pennsylvania [Sires Stakes] final, but I think [Bills Man] is the fastest of the two even though [Dover Dan] went a bigger heat tonight. Pure speed wise, I think [Bills Man] is quicker."

Ariana G glided going first over, gaining the lead in the stretch and going on to a 1:53.2 win by three lengths over Magic Presto in the first elimination for the Elegantimage.

Floating away fifth moving to the turn, Ariana G tipped wide to pursue pacesetter Sweet Of My Heart following a :27.1 opening quarter. Advancing to third after a :56.3 half, Ariana G matched strides with the tempo setter circling the final turn, clearing the front at three-quarters in 1:25.4 and cruising down the lane while Magic Presto, riding her cover, took second. On A Sunny Day held third to the inside of Lady Grey, who took fourth, and Sweet Of My Heart rounded out the finalists in fifth.

Owned by Marvin Katz and Al Libfeld, Ariana G, a three-year-old filly by Muscle Hill out of the Cantab Hall mare Cantab It All, won her eighth race in 10 starts this season and her 17th race in 21 overall, compiling $1,449,272 in earnings. Trained by Jimmy Takter and driven by Yannick Gingras, she paid $2.10 to win.

"Last week she was very good, but I think tonight she was vicious," Yannick Gingras said. "She came down on Jody [Jamieson and Sweet Of My Heart] and, at the top of the stretch, I just asked her a little bit and she turned another gear.

"I changed my mind twice in the first eighth of the mile of this race; when Trevor [Henry and Magic Presto] wasn't leaving, I figured I'd take control of the race, and then, when I got closer, I saw Jody's filly was a little aggressive and David [Miller and Mrstery Bear] was there too, so I changed my mind and decided I'd race her from mid-pack. She's just so easy to drive - I can change my mind and there's no set plan with her."

Dream Together flew down the center of the track to catch Feed Your Head in the second Elegantimage, winning in 1:53.3.

Feed Your Head was left unchallenged through fractions of :27.2, :57.2, and 1:25.4 before being braced by Dream Together's uncovered rush through the stretch. The two were clear of Winter Sweet Frost, who took third after 6-5 favourite Thats All Moni broke into the stretch. Dream Together passed Feed Your Head coming into the final sixteenth, strolling away while Winter Sweet Frost, Glitzey Gal, and Dream Baby Dream, who broke before the start, rounded out the top five.

Competing for owner Determination Inc. and trainer Luc Blais, Dream Together, a three-year-old filly by Muscle Hill out of the Andover Hall mare Danae, won her sixth race in 15 starts, earning $230,934. Driven by Daniel Dube, she paid $8.30 to win.

"Last time at the Meadowlands [in the Hambletonian Oaks], I left early and moved first over and she raced real good," Daniel Dube said. "Now, she finally got a better trip and she raced good."

Art Scene swept to the lead moving into the final turn, sprinting away by open lengths to take the $162,838 Simcoe Three-Year-Old Pace in 1:49.4.

Penzance Hanover and Classic Pro battled on the front through a :26.2 quarter before Classic Pro took the lead entering the backstretch. Art Scene, sitting fourth, rushed uncovered passing three-eighths to slide to the front following a :55 half.

Circling the far turn, Art Scene separated from the pack as Classic Pro chased lengths behind in second, pressured by Rebellious from first over while Art Scene passed three-quarters in 1:22.1. Through the stretch, Art Scene strolled as Ocean Colony and Hurricane Brush fanned wide off cover to rally for second and third respectively while Nascar Seelster weaved through horses to get fourth.

By American Ideal from the Artsplace mare Lover Of Art, Art Scene, owned by Brittany Farms and In The Gym Partners, won his third race in 14 starts, earning $256,636. Trained by Tony Alagna and driven by Scott Zeron, he paid $4.40 to win.

"He has raced really well in his last two races over at Yonkers but [he] was impressive," Scott Zeron said. "I drove him at Tioga [Downs for the Empire Breeders Classic]; he was good in the elimination, and in the final he was just a bit disappointing, then he bounced back great at Yonkers and tonight as well.

"We really had to be patient with him. Tony [Alagna] did a great job with him all throughout the year - we really thought he'd be a top colt at the beginning, but it took us awhile to get to the point we're at right now, but it's exciting to have a horse finishing off the year and peaking right now - there's still a lot left."

Bettors Up catapulted off cover, drawing away by open lengths to take the $163,872 Simcoe Three-Year-Old Filly Pace in 1:50.

Stonebridge Sundae sent for the front from the inside, setting a :26 quarter before sitting the pocket to Obvious Blue Chip moving into the backstretch. Even-money favourite Idyllic Beach tipped first over through a :54.2 half, advancing towards Obvious Blue Chip and coming a neck from the lead at three-quarters in 1:22.3.

Carried into contention second over, Bettors Up fanned wide into the stretch, sweeping by Idyllic Beach to take the lead coming into the final eighth. Dudesalady tracked her move to take second as Stonebridge Sundae slid into the mix moving into third approaching the line, both passing Idyllic Beach, who settled for fourth.

Winning her 10th race in 23 starts, Bettors Up, by Bettors Delight out of the Western Hanover mare Fresh Idea, has earned $631,964 for owners Brad Grant, Teresa Davidson, and Michelle Mceneny. Trained by Scott Mceneny and driven by Doug Mcnair, she paid $12.60.

"I didn't want to be first up like the race before," Doug Mcnair said. "I floated and found a good spot and had live cover - in the last turn, I still thought I was in a good spot; she felt good. That's the best she's been since the Fan Hanover, I'd say."

"She does good over in the states, too, but there's a lot more shipping going on over there," Scott Mceneny said. "She raced on Sunday in the [Pennsylvania Sires Stakes] consolation cause of a bad trip the week before, but she was coming here one way or the other."

In the first $97,200 Gold division, driver Trevor Henry sent Shadow Moon directly to the front from post seven, and the pair led the field through fractions of :27.1, :56.4 and 1:24.4. In the stretch it appeared that fan favourite Declan Seelster would collar Shadow Moon, but the pacesetter dug in for a neck victory in 1:53. Declan Seelster and Avalon Hanover, both trained by Dave Menary of Cambridge, ON, finished second and third.

I said to Trevor, He all right, because he almost got beat there, and Trevor said, Well he kind of waits for them. He watches for them, he turns his head and watches for them. He has a Murphy blind on the outside and he likes to take them on when they come, said trainer Dr. Ian Moore of Shadow Moons narrow victory. Hes like that when Im out jogging, if somebody comes along in a hurry, hell take them on jogging.

The win was Shadow Moons second in Gold Series action and his fifth of the season.

Hes just gotten better and better over time. Hes only a little guy, hes not real big, but he has the desire and grit to go, Dr. Ian Moore said. Hes about the same size as State Treasurer was as a two-year-old, hes got the same kind of attitude as him, so hopefully that will carry him a long way.

Dr. Moore shares ownership of Shadow Moon with R G McGroup of Bathurst, NB, Serge Savard of St-Bruno, QC and Gordon McComb of Fall River, NS. The partners offered up $60,000 for the youngster at last falls Harrisburg Yearling Sale and have recouped $195,337 to date.

Shadow Moon will start next in the Metro Pace Eliminations at Mohawk Saturday, September 16.

Were very happy and we are going to try the Metro, said Dr. Moore. That was six races tonight, so hopefully theres a couple more in him.

Its hard to keep them going at that level for that long, Ive always found anyways. When I think about it, Ive only had one horse that was as good at the end of November as he was the first of May, and that was Shadow Play, added the horseman, who trained sire Shadow Play through his $1.5 million racing career.

In the latter $96,400 Gold split, Jonathan Drury sent Jimmy Freight to the front from post four and faced immediate pressure from favourite Western Passage and driver Yannick Gingras. Drury drove on and Jimmy Freight paced through fractions of :27.1, :55.2 and 1:24.1 on his way to a one-and-a-half length win in 1:52.3. Simple Kinda Man closed hard to be second and Sharp Action Money was third, giving sire Sportswriter a sweep of the top three.

[Gingras'] horse got running out pretty good in the first turn there and didnt really want to clear, so I figured I might as well keep going. I was able to get a little breather in the third-quarter and I think that helped a lot, Drury said. Hes a real handy little fella, you can get out of there quick with him and he just settles right down as soon as you clear and you can do whatever you want.

The win bumped Jimmy Freights lifetime earnings to $118,526 and his Gold Series point tally to 112, 13 points behind Shadow Moon and 37 ahead of Declan Seelster.

To view Saturday's harness racing results, click on the following link: Saturday Results - Mohawk Racetrack.

(With files from the Ontario Sires Stakes)
Milan Cecil believes that the best way to prevent history from repeating itself is using it to fight against the future.

Surveying the events in Europe and America, Cecil believes that we're at a turning point. The good news: We can use history to make better choices than we did years ago, and he should know. Cecil has lived through the communist days of his native Slovakia; he saw communism fall in the Velvet Revolution; and now he's seeing his grandchildren's generation not know what it was like to say or write the wrong thing to someone you thought was a friend, only to be visited by the police for interrogation.

"So many things are happening in Europe and the States that indicate that history might easily repeat itself," Cecil said while in Billings last week.

Cecil was in town with history teacher Jana Kerekretyova, who is an instructor at C.S. Lewis preparatory school in Bratislava. Together with local history professor Jenifer Parks, they're building a really innovative program with Rocky Mountain College. Cecil is a longtime friend of community leader Bill Simmons who is helping to build the cultural exchange.

In a pilot program they hope to start in 2018, students at Rocky will take a course on 20th-Century central European history. It will focus on the rise of fascism, then communism, then collapse and finally looking toward the post-Modern era. The idea is to learn in Billings, travel to Slovakia where students will meet with folks who lived through those eras, then travel to where history happened.

"We're in a special moment in history," Cecil said. "These people who lived through the history are still alive."

"Looking at today in history, there are patterns and they can repeat themselves," said Kerekretyova. "There were authoritarian regimes that affected the way everyone lives and it was largely not for the better. But it was a process. It didn't happen in an instant. It was over time and we can ask, 'What were the processes that led to that?'"

For Cecil, it's not just about teaching history, it's about a deeper responsibility to the next generation.

"I deeply believe what the German poet (Johann von) Goethe said that your responsibility to your children is to give them deep roots and strong wings," Cecil said.

Combining Goethe's philosophy with fellow countryman Vaclav Havel's philosophy that the most powerful weapon any society can use is the truth, they hope to build a historical and cultural exchange that gives local students a perspective about their own American republic.

Cecil tells the story of how his country slowly adapted to the regimes which controlled almost every aspect of daily life, including trying to coerce beliefs. Cecil grew up and continued to practice as a Christian, becoming what he described as a "second-class" citizen even though he was a computer programmer and his wife was an architect.

At least several times a year, he was brought in for interrogation about his religious beliefs, something viewed as Western and against communism.

"For the first -- I don't know -- three or five times, it was terrifying," Cecil said, "But then, you get used to it. It's kind of like having a gun stuck to your head. When it's pointed at you for 30 seconds, it's terrifying; when it's pointed at you for 42 years, you kind of get used to it."

He could withstand the interrogations by himself; however, the treatment of his children bothered him.

He remembers one of his daughter's first day of school. The students were all asked to sing a song, and his daughter, Katarina, sang a hymn.

The teacher recoiled. Where, she wondered, had Katarina learned such a thing? Surely, it must have been from a grandmother, the teacher said. But, Katarina, Cecil's daughter, being young and oblivious to the danger, told the teacher she had learned it at Sunday school.

"My kids did not have the right to choose for themselves. They would be stigmatized and that was unfair," Cecil said. "But then I remembered Goethe. I knew that I had to give them their heritage -- their roots."

For people who take religious freedom as a catchphrase, a guy like Cecil is a reminder of just how amazing a country like America still is, even with its present unrest and friction. There's no making it great again. It is still and has been for a long time. A person like Cecil is a reminder of that.

Cecil remembers gathering with other Slovaks in the town square of Bratislava during those heady days of the Velvet Revolution in November 1989. He watched as the communist system in Czechoslovakia crumbled. It was an epiphany.

"I was crying in Bratislava's main square," Cecil said. "Not because I got freedom from the secret police, but because my kids got the chance to be in a different world."

As a journalist who has spent more than two decades playing around with worlds like "freedom" and "liberty" on opinion pages, I suppose that's the best definition I've heard of freedom.
Billy Graham Rapid Response Team Chaplains Make Plans to Deploy Following Devastation from Hurricane Irma

Contact: Erik Ogren, 704-401-2117, eogren@bgea.org; Lisa Moseley, 704-401-2116, lmoseley@bgea.org



CHARLOTTE, N.C., Sept. 9, 2017 /Standard Newswire/ -- Crisis-trained chaplains with the Billy Graham Rapid Response Team will deploy to the Southeastern U.S. in the wake of destruction left by Hurricane Irma, which has been regarded as one of the largest recorded storms in history. Early assessments estimate coastal communities in Florida will experience catastrophic damage similar to what has already been seen across the Caribbean.



Hurricane Irma has vacillated over the past few days, losing and gaining strength. However, in a state that is home to more than 20 million Americans, Florida Gov. Rick Scott said, "All Floridians should prepare to evacuate." Coastal regions of Georgia and South Carolina are also under mandatory evacuation.



"The destructive power of Hurricane Irma, especially on the immediate heels of Hurricane Harvey, reminds us of how fragile our lives really are," said Jack Munday, international director of the Billy Graham Rapid Response Team. "I ask you to join us in praying for all of those who are in the path of this storm, many of whom will spend months or years  perhaps even the rest of their lives  trying to work through the physical and emotional suffering they will endure. We'll be there to offer the hope and comfort of Jesus Christ as they begin to find their 'new normal.'"



The Billy Graham Rapid Response Team will continue to monitor Hurricane Irma as it churns toward Florida. In preparation, they have been in communication with all of the crisis-trained chaplains living in Florida, and have identified more than 100 chaplainsliving outside of the projected hurricane pathwho are on standby to deploy once the storm has passed, water has receded and areas are declared safe to enter.



With significant ministry resources already committed in Texas following Hurricane Harvey, a Billy Graham Rapid Response Team Mobile Ministry Center based out of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association's Canadian office in Calgary, Canada, is en route to North Carolina. The team will be staged for deployment alongside Samaritan's Purse, the Christian disaster relief organization also headed by Franklin Graham. Together the two ministries will address the physical, emotional and spiritual needs of those who have been affected.



With all eyes now on Irma, there are no plans to reduce the presence of chaplains in Texas where over 100 chaplains are currently ministering to those affected by Hurricane Harvey.



For more information on the ministry, including videos, photos, news articles and an interactive map of former and current deployments, visit www.billygraham.org/rrt. Updates can also be found at www.facebook.com/RRTChaplains.



About the Billy Graham Rapid Response Team:

The Billy Graham Rapid Response Team was developed by Franklin Graham and the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association following the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. It has since grown into an international network of chaplains in the U.S., U.K., Canada and Australia who are specifically trained to deal with crisis situations. They have deployed to more than 260 disaster sites, including shootings, floods, hurricanes, wildfires and tornadoes.
Droning bagpipes, soaring wooden posts and steaming meat pies. The Kelso Highlander Festival brought all the classic Scottish attractions to Tam OShanter Park Saturday, but that is not the reason Jim MacLean has been attending Celtic festivals for 45 years.

The Beaverton resident said festivals provide the opportunity to pass on Scottish traditions and history to younger generations.

Heritage is where you come from and where your beliefs come from, said MacLean, the Pacific Northwest representative for Clan MacLean. I enjoy sharing information and history about Scotland.

Tim Wilker agreed that his heritage is a source of pride. The Astoria resident said membership in Clan Ross America helps him form a modern-day community.

When you belong to a clan, its like belonging to a family, he said. You feel good because you know youre among friends.

Gerald Molitor drove left Randle around 5 a.m. Saturday morning in order to represent his Craig ancestors.

The Craigs were named for the rocks or craegs that they lived amongst in northern Scotland, Molitor said.

Also dedicated to his Scottish heritage, the 79-year-old expressed concern about lack of interest from younger generations.

The problem is most of us here are old folks, Molitor said. Young people just dont want to pick up the reins.  This is my last year and I have no one to pass it to.

Molitor has traveled to the Kelso Highlander Festival for the last five years, but he brought his great-granddaughter Madison for the first time this year.

Madison, 9, liked the bagpipes and highland games, but she shrugged at the idea of continuing her great-grandfathers interest in ancestry.

Joe Dolan, of Oak Harbor, said Scottish heritage is also a part of American heritage.

Many clansmen and women at the festival pointed to influential Scots who contributed to color photography, automobiles and the Declaration of Independence.

If we forget our history, we have no heritage. We have no identity, Diane Dolan said. If you know a little about your past, it anchors you down and gives you something to relate to.

Diane Dolan said her ancestry is Dutch and Cherokee, but she felt at home in the lowlands Maxwell clan.

Were border reivers, she said with a smile.

Were misunderstood, her husband insisted.

As the morning warmed up, the wail of celtic music mingled with growls from kilted competitors in the highland games as they flung sheaths, cabers and metal balls.

The Fort Vancouver Pipe Band tuned their bagpipes in a tight circle in preparation for the midday procession of dignitaries and clans.

Victoria MacKenzie said she picked up the bagpipe at age 62 to be social and continue on her familys traditions. The band practices every week in a carpentry warehouse by train tracks to avoid disturbing neighbors.

Tim McLaren, also a member of the Fort Vancouver Pipe Band, said that bagpipes are musically simple but physically demanding.

Its only nine notes, he said No sharps, no flats, no rests.

And yet, the piper said it takes strength and endurance to keep the music going  much like his Scottish ancestry.

McLaren said cultural festivals are popular because the United States has a relatively short history as a nation.

People look for roots and roots in the United States are shallow so you need to go back (to Scotland), he said.  Were more into this kind of thing than Scots are because they live it every day and we only live it for a weekend.

No matter how short the weekend, it was clear that the Scots enthusiasts on Saturday took advantage of the pleasant weather and wore their kilts with pride.

The Kelso Highlander Festival will continue on Sunday with the Team Heavyweight Games, a Kirkin of the Tartan worship service and music from Men of Worth and the Wicked Tinkers.
I hate to say this about my own Senator but I dont know how else to put it: Sen. Daines, you are a coward. You refuse to meet your constituents and we have lots of questions for you. We are tired of your canned replies to our emails. We are tired of your rigged, so-called town telehalls where the callers and questions are screened.

We want to ask you why you fly around on a government plane to tell us that the forests are on fire because of lawsuits and a lack of logging? Senator, it is about drought and heat, attributable to climate change which you deny.

With the horrible congestion in our national parks, we want to know why you want to gut the Antiquities Act, which would prevent future national monuments from being created. We want to know why you are so hostile to protecting public lands, with a lifetime 1 percent conservation voting record. We want to know why, with 99 percent of millions of comments to keep our national monuments intact, you want to cut them. We want to know why you refuse to support legislation to protect Paradise Valley.

We want to know why with federal deficits soaring, you want to cut taxes on billionaires and fund Trumps wall, which folks along the border say will not work. We want to know your specifics on a health care plan, not that you just want to repeal and replace Obamacare. Meet with us.

Orville Bach

Bozeman
The last temptation is the greatest treason: To do the right deed for the wrong reason.  T.S. Eliot

WASHINGTON  We have every reason to assume the worst when it comes to President Trumps motivation in rescinding DACA  the program allowing undocumented immigrants to live and work openly if they came to the United States as children. Trumps public justification is that President Obamas creation of DACA by executive action was unconstitutional. A usurpation of Congress. A process violation.

Yet Trump didnt give a fig for constitutional niceties in his initial order to keep people from certain Muslim-majority countries out of the U.S. Now, to potentially send Hispanics out of the country, he has discovered an appreciation for process and precedent. There is a theme here, and it is not respect for the rule of law. Trump does not deserve the benefit of the doubt when it comes to issues of race and ethnicity. Recently, and with increasing frequency, he has displayed malevolent prejudice for political reasons. His action on DACA is another installment in this disturbing series.

But, apart from Trumps motivations, was his action on DACA the right deed? Not, certainly, by the measure of its outcome. Trump has removed reasonable protections from a sympathetic group. It would be a grave injustice to send the Dreamers home to countries where many have hardly visited.

A democracy, however, considers more than outcomes, or else the American system of government would be the Chinese system of government. And the constitutional case concerning DACA is not obvious.

The legal matter at issue: Does the executive branch have enough discretion and authority to interpret immigration laws in the manner set out by Obama  essentially as a new pseudo-program that grants benefits to a group that Congress did not mark out for benefits? The courts have granted broad discretion to immigration officials in determining who to deport and who not to deport. The fact that the law is not applied equally in every case does not invalidate the just application of the law in any case. But the further question is: Can that discretion be applied to an entire class of undocumented people who are then granted a package of benefits (including work permits, advance parole to travel in and out of the country and, eventually, Social Security and Medicare)?

For most of his presidency, Obama maintained that creating such a program by executive action would be improper overreach. In 2012, out of frustration with congressional inaction, he changed course and created DACA. At the time, Obama frankly admitted that this was a substitute for legislation  a measure taken in the absence of any immigration action from Congress.

There is little question that the president can prioritize immigration enforcement in a variety of ways  say, to focus on deporting convicted felons rather than Dreamers. This is the manner in which the law was generally enforced before DACA, and in which it could still be enforced without DACA.

At some point, however, the systematic organization of this discretion into a new legal status, bringing a series of public benefits, becomes the equivalent of legislating. And the courts might focus particular scrutiny on forms of executive action that Congress could have legislated but didnt. Given the more conservative composition of the Supreme Court, it is likely that DACA would have been struck down.

Whatever the merits of the constitutional case on DACA, the Dreamers should now be protected by law. For the last few decades, Congress has pliantly surrendered a number of roles  particularly on social policy and national security  to the courts and the president. A shortage of institutional ambition is a problem that Americas founders did not even contemplate. This is an opportunity for Congress to reclaim its proper constitutional role.

This is also a debate  given that few Republicans actually want to deport the Dreamers, and most Democrats seem to prioritize their welfare  on which compromise is particularly ripe. The obvious deal: stronger border enforcement (though not the surpassingly silly wall) for a new version of DACA.

If Republicans cant accept such a deal, they have no heart and a severely limited political future in an increasingly diverse country. If Democrats cant accept such a deal, their rhetoric on the Dreamers is empty. On this issue, compromise is now the evidence of compassion.
WASHINGTON  Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has often been the silent man in the Trump foreign policy team. But out of the spotlight, he appears to be crafting a broad strategy aimed at working with China to resolve the North Korea crisis and with Russia to stabilize Syria and Ukraine.

The Tillerson approach focuses on personal diplomacy, in direct contacts with Chinese and Russian leaders, and through private channels to North Korea. His core strategic assumption is that if the U.S. can subtly manage its relations with Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin  and allow those leaders to take credit for successes  complex regional problems can be solved effectively.

Tillerson appears unfazed by criticism that he has been a poor communicator and by recent talk of discord with President Trump. His attitude isnt exactly take this job and shove it, but as a former Exxon Mobil chief executive, he doesnt need to make money or Washington friends  and he clearly thinks he has more urgent obligations than dealing with the press.

Tillerson appears to have preserved a working relationship with Trump despite pointedly separating himself from the presidents controversial comments after the Charlottesville unrest. Although Trump didnt initially like Tillersons statement, its said he was ultimately comfortable with it.

The North Korea crisis is the best example of Tillersons diplomacy. For all the bombast of Trumps tweets, the core of U.S. policy has been an effort to work jointly with China to reverse the North Korean nuclear buildup through negotiations. Tillerson has signaled that the U.S. is ready for direct talks with Kim Jong Uns regime  perhaps soon, if Kim shows restraint. Tillerson wants China standing behind Kim at the negotiating table, with its hands figuratively at Kims throat.

Despite Pyongyangs hyper-belligerent rhetoric, its representatives have conveyed interest in negotiations, querying details of U.S. positions. But Kims actions have been erratic and confusing: When it appeared that the North Koreans wanted credit for not launching missiles toward Guam, Tillerson offered such a public statement. Bizarrely, North Korea followed with three more weapons tests, in a reckless rebuff.

Some analysts see North Koreas race to test missiles and bombs as an effort to prepare the strongest possible bargaining position before negotiations. Tillerson seems to be betting that China can force such talks by imposing an oil embargo against Pyongyang. U.S. officials hope Xi will make this move unilaterally, demonstrating strong leadership publicly, rather than waiting for America to insert the embargo proposal in a new U.N. Security Council resolution.

Tillerson signaled his seriousness about Korea talks during a March visit to the Demilitarized Zone. He pointed to a table at a U.N. office there and remarked maybe well use this again, if negotiations begin.

The Sino-American strategic dialogue about North Korea has been far more extensive than either country acknowledges. Theyve discussed joint efforts to stabilize the Korean Peninsula, including Chinese actions to secure nuclear weapons, if the regime collapses.

The big idea driving Tillersons China policy is that the fundamentals of the relationship have changed as China has grown more powerful and assertive. The message to Beijing is that Xis actions in defusing the North Korea crisis will shape U.S.-China relations for the next half-century.

Tillerson continues to work the Russia file, even amid new Russia sanctions. Hes known Putin since 1999 and views him as a predictable, if sometimes bullying, leader. Even with the relationship in the dumps, Tillerson believes hes making some quiet progress on Ukraine and Syria.

On Ukraine, Tillerson supports Russias proposal to send U.N. peacekeepers to police what Putin claims are Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenkos assaults on Russian-backed forces in eastern Ukraine. The addition of U.N. monitors would help implement the Minsk agreement, even if Putin gets the credit and Poroshenko the blame.

On Syria, Tillerson has warned Putin that the real danger to Russian interests is increasing Iranian power there, especially as Bashar Assads regime regains control of Deir el-Zour in eastern Syria. To counter the Iranians, Tillerson supports a quick move by the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces to capture the Lower Euphrates Valley.

Trumps boisterous, sometimes belligerent manner and Tillersons reticence are an unlikely combination, and many observers have doubted the relationship can last. But Tillerson seems to roll with the punches  and tweets. When Trump makes a disruptive comment, Tillerson seems to treat it as part of the policy landscape  and to ponder how to use it to advantage.

Tillerson may be the least-public chief diplomat in modern American history, but thats apparently by choice. By Washington standards, hes strangely uninterested in taking the credit.
WASHINGTON  How do they come up with this stuff?

According to press reports, the Trump administration is considering withdrawing from the U.S.-South Korea Free Trade Agreement, which was implemented in 2012 and lowered most tariffs between the two countries. Now South Korea and the United States are caught up in the most serious military threat from North Korea since the Korean War. The last thing we ought to do is sow conflict and distrust between the two allies. Yet, this is what Trump has done.

Not surprisingly, theres been plenty of pushback. The South Koreans were clearly angered, and so were many Americans.

Trumps Korean Trade Folly was the headline on a Wall Street Journal editorial. In a press release, the Republican chairmen and Democratic ranking members of Congress two trade committees  the Senate Finance Committee and the House Ways and Means Committee  warned against abandoning the pact. North Koreas latest nuclear test underscores yet again the vital importance of the strong alliance between the United States and South Korea. ... We must not withdraw from the agreement.

An advisory group  consisting of business, labor and nonprofit members  echoed the message: We must not allow bilateral disputes to signal any friction or weakness in our mutual support.

The Trump administration complains that South Korea doesnt buy enough U.S. exports, adding to Americas chronic trade deficits. In 2016, the United States had a $27.7 billion trade deficit in goods (cars, computer chips, cellphones) with South Korea. However, this figure is misleading, as economist Jeffrey Schott of the Peterson Institute, a think tank, points out. He notes that the United States runs about a $10 billion surplus in services (transportation, tourism and legal services), reducing the overall trade deficit with South Korea to $17.6 billion in 2016.

Moreover, as Schott also notes, the deficit with South Korea is a tiny part of the overall U.S. trade deficit, even if only goods are counted. In 2016, that deficit was $737 billion; South Koreas share ($27.7 billion) was less than 4 percent. The shares of China, the European Union and Japan were much larger. These numbers suggest that Trump went after South Korea because it was the easiest target. He could fulfill his campaign promise to be tough on trade on the cheap.

Think again. If the United States ended the free trade agreement, American exports would probably suffer, even if there were no explicit retaliation, which there might be. Take cars. Before the agreement, the U.S. tariff on South Korean imports was 2.5 percent, while the South Korean tariff on U.S. imports was 8 percent. Although both tariffs would be restored, the 8 percent South Korean tariff would probably reduce U.S. sales more than the 2.5 percent tariff would cut South Korean sales.

Similarly, American pork exports, which have boomed from deep tariff reductions, would probably lose market share to producers from other countries that enjoyed free trade agreements. Both China and the European Union have free trade deals with South Korea. All this implies that a Trump rejection of the free trade agreement would be bad economic policy as well as a geopolitical disaster.

The best that could happen now is that the Trump administration would admit as much. It would announce that its indefinitely postponing trade negotiations with South Korea and focusing its undivided attention on the nuclear threats to South Korea, Japan and the United States. These are momentous issues; the trade disputes, by contrast, are small sideshows.
About me I'm Avi Green

From Jerusalem, Israel

I was born in Pennsylvania in 1974, and moved to Israel in 1983. I also enjoyed reading a lot of comics when I was young, the first being Fantastic Four. I maintain a strong belief in the public's right to knowledge and accuracy in facts. I like to think of myself as a conservative-style version of Clark Kent. I don't expect to be perfect at the job, but I do my best. My profile

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Malaysian relief for Rohingyas sent to C' Bazar

UNB, Chittagong :

The district administration on Sunday has started sending Malaysian relief goods for Rohingyas to Cox' Bazar.

On completion of customs formalities, several trucks loaded with relief items, including rice, powdered milk, dried date, biscuit, cloths, drinking water and soaps, started for Cox's Bazar this morning, said Md Zillur Rahman

Chowdhury, deputy commissioner of Chittagong.

The relief materials will be handed over to deputy commissioner of Cox's Bazar and then the district administration will distribute those among Rohingya refugees, he said, adding that the goods, hopefully, will reach Cox's Bazar by this afternoon. A plane, A-400m, carrying the 12 tonnes of relief materials and seven Malaysian crew arrived in Shah Amanat International Airport in Chittagong on Saturday evening.

Wing commander Riaz Uddin, manager of the airport, told UNB that they handed over the relief to the Chittagong deputy commissioner at the airport.
North Korea`s `reckless behaviour` requires global response: NATO chief

Estonia\'s Prime Minister Juri Ratas listens to the speech by NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg during a visit to the NATO battle group soldiers at Tapa Army Base, in Estonia.

Reuters, London :

North Korea's "reckless behavior" is a global threat and requires a global response, the head of the NATO military alliance said on Sunday.

NATO is not directly involved in the crisis, which saw Pyongyang carry out its sixth and most powerful nuclear test a week ago, but has repeatedly called on North Korea to abandon its nuclear and ballistic missile programs.

"The reckless behavior of North Korea is a global threat and requires a global response and that of course also includes NATO," NATO head Jens Stoltenberg said in an interview with BBC television.

Stoltenberg declined to say whether the U.S. territory of Guam, threatened by North Korea, was covered by NATO's Article 5, which says an attack on one member is an attack on all. "We are now totally focused on how can we contribute to a peaceful solution of the conflict," he said.

British defense minister Michael Fallon also told the BBC military conflict should be avoided at all costs.

Newsweek adds: With North Korea's nuclear ambition, Islamist extremism and Russia's military dreams of recapturing Soviet prestige in world politics, the world is at its most dangerous point in a generation, NATO's top diplomat has warned.

Jens Stoltenberg, a former prime minister of Norway and now NATO's secretary general, told The Guardian he has not known a more precarious time in his 30-year career.

"It is more unpredictable, and it's more difficult because we have so many challenges at the same time," he said in an exclusive interview. "We have proliferation of weapons of mass destruction in North Korea, we have terrorists, instability, and we have a more assertive Russia," Stoltenberg said on the sidelines of his visit to Estonia. "It is a more dangerous world."

Estonia and its fellow Baltics, Latvia and Lithuania, are some of the NATO members most concerned by Russia's annexation of Crimea from Ukraine in 2014. The event triggered a fallout in relations between Russia and the West from which there has yet to be recovery.

NATO has formed four multinational battalions to the region and a mission of fewer than a dozen jets to keep an eye out for any potential Russian incursions. Russia has accused the alliance of carrying out aggressive action and will this month participate in simulated warfare in bordering Belarus.

Russia has long claimed that the drill, which it occurs once every four years, will only involve 13,000 troops. But a handful of NATO allies have expressed serious doubt that this will be the case, especially since Moscow has a track record of expanding the scope of such drills through chicanery.

"Russia has said it is below 13,000. They briefed that on the NATO-Russia council a few weeks ago," Stoltenberg said. "That was useful, but at the same time, we have seen when Russia says that an exercise has less than 13,000 troops that's not always the case.


Merkel suggests Iran-style nuclear talks to end North Korea crisis

Reuters, Berlin :

German Chancellor Angela Merkel told a newspaper she would be prepared to become involved in a diplomatic initiative to end the North Korean nuclear and missiles program, and suggested the Iran nuclear talks could be a model.

South Korea on Saturday braced for a possible further missile test by North Korea as it marked its founding anniversary, just days after its sixth and largest nuclear test rattled global financial markets and further escalated tensions in the region.

"If our participation in talks is desired, I will immediately say yes," Merkel told Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung in an interview to be published on Sunday.

She pointed to negotiations that led to a landmark nuclear agreement between Iran and world powers in 2015. Back then, Germany and the five countries on the United Nations Security Council with veto power took part in talks that led to Iran agreeing to curb its nuclear work in return for the lifting of most sanctions.
Here we go again. Earlier this year, Trump said he was going to deliver the best health care that covered more people with more benefits at a cheaper cost. And that didnt happen because it couldnt. Now he wants to lower taxes on corporations and small businesses so they can raise wages for their employees and create better jobs. I hope Montana voters arent buying this because it is just more snake oil.

Yes, our corporate tax rate is 35 percent, but this is a meaningless number because literally no company pays taxes at that rate. The real tax rate is the effective tax rate and the Congressional Research Service says our effective tax rate is 27.1 percent which is similar to the other 30 largest countries. So the argument that we need to lower the tax rate to make our companies more competitive is an argument not supported by the facts. And this change only effects about 1.5 million businesses because most businesses are LLCs and they pay taxes at the individual income tax rate.

The stock market is at record levels, corporate profits are at record levels and all of these companies are sitting on piles of cash. They could be paying better wages, creating better jobs and investing in new plants with that money but they arent. A tax cut for them will just mean more money for dividends and stock buy backs and bigger federal deficits for us. Montanans should tell our Congressman we want change that actually reaches us not just corporations and their stockholders.

Art Foeste

Billings
2000-acre camp in Ukhia: Minister

Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan on Sunday said the government is going to construct a camp on some 2,000 acres of land at Kutupalong of Ukhia upazila in Cox's Bazar to rehabilitate the Rohingyas fleeing persecution in Myanmar.

"There'll be seven blocks in the camp and an officer will be assigned for each block. The Rohingya refugees won't be allowed to go outside the camp," he said.

Mentioning that the government will provide the refugees with refugee cards, the minister said, "The unregistered refugees won't be allowed to get any relief and assistance. And they can't board vehicles inside the Bangladesh territory." While talking to reporters after a meeting with top officials of the law and enforcement agencies at the Secretariat on the ongoing Rohingya crisis, he said around 3 lakh Rohingya people have so far crossed the border from Myanmar to Bangladesh since August 25 last.

Asaduzzaman said police and Ansar members will be deployed in the areas surrounding the camp for ensuring overall security.

Besides, Directors General of the Passports and Immigration Department, Border Guard Bangladesh and National Identity Registration Wing (NID) will monitor the registration process, he said.

The minister said International Organization for Migration (IOM) and United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees will provide assistance in the registration work.
12 more wounded Rohingyas admitted to CMCH

Staff Reporter :

Twelve more bullet wounded Rohingyas fleeing the military crackdown in Myanmar's Rakhine state were admitted to Chittagong Medical College Hospital between Saturday night and Sunday morning for treatment.

The injured have been identified as Sirajunnesa, 28, Md Shaker, 27, Hossain Ali, 45, Mohammad Abdullah, 20, Md Abu Taher, 19, Abul Kalam, 35, Mosammat Adija, 11, Md Hamid Hossain, 40, Fatema, 15, Bashirullah, 28, Karimullah, 46, and Mansur Rahman, 25.



They were shifted to the CMCH from Rohingya refugee camp hospital in Teknaf of Cox's Bazar, said Sub-Inspector Zahirul Islam, In Charge of CMCH Police Outpost.

Of them, Sirajunnesa sustained bullet injuries in her both legs, while Hossain Ali in his left knee, and Shaker and Abdullah suffered injuries in their chests, SI Zahirul added.

Besides, another Rohingya man - Shamsul Alam, 35 - who sustained injuries in a road accident in Teknaf, was admitted to the hospital, said Alauddin, Assistant Sub-Inspector of CMCH police outpost.

A new wave of Rohingya refugees arrived in Bangladesh following military crackdown in Rakhine state.

A total of 89 Rohingyas have been admitted to CMCH. So far two of the patients have died.
Refugee management a big challenge

PM visits Cox's Bazar Tuesday: Home Ministry forms monitoring cell: 4 check posts set up to stop spreading of Rohingyas: Systematic relief distribution a must: Quader seeks Indian help to tackle crisis: Total number of Myanmar national crosses 7 lakh, says Shahriar

Mismanagement in relief distribution in Ukhia refugee camp by various agencies. Photo was taken on Sunday.

Sagar Biswas :

Proper refugee management appears to be a big challenge to the Bangladesh government when resettlement of around 300,000 most vulnerable Rohingya refugees, who arrived here in the last fifteen days being driven away by the Myanmar army, is the only solution for the moment.

To tackle the crisis, the Ministry of Home Affairs has formed a special cell to monitor the extent of influx of Rohingya refugees as Myanmar military unleashed a reign of terror in the Muslim dominated northwestern Rakhine state.

The Home Ministry in a circular on Sunday said the cell has been formed under the supervision of its Public Safety Division. The cell will monitor overall law and order situation in Bandarban and Cox's Bazar districts.

Besides, it will coordinate activities of different departments and organizations. The cell will collect different information about the Rohingyas, including their number, the circular added.

Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan said on Sunday said, "The government will rehabilitate Rohingya refugees over a 2,000 acre land at Ukhiya upazila in Cox's Bazar. If necessary, we will allocate more land in the area."

Against this backdrop, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will visit Cox's Bazar on Tuesday to see for herself the condition of Rohingyas refugees. Deputy Press Secretary of the Prime Minister Asif Kabir yesterday said the PM will visit the Kutupalang camp in Ukhiya.

Meanwhile, the government has decided to conduct relief activities among the Rohingyas only from Cox's Bazar's Balukhali camp in a bid to synchronize the rehabilitation programme and stop fast spreading of refugees in different parts of the country.

Officials said construction work of a temporary shelter is going on at Balukhali where over 200,000 refugees will be given shelter and relief.

Additional District Magistrate of Cox's Bazar Kahlid Mahmud said, "We hope the Rohingyas who are staying scatteredly will go to the designated camp. At present, different organizations are distributing relief materials in different areas, which have created a chaotic situation. So, we're trying to distribute relief materials only at Balukhali camp in a systematic way."

Cox's Bazar District Administration officials said four security check posts have been set up to resist spreading of Rohingya refugees outside Cox's Bazar. Three check posts have already been started operating at Chittagong-Cox's Bazar Link Road, Mithachhari of Teknaf Road and Ukhiya Bazar.

The fourth check post at Marine Drive will be opened today [Monday]. Members of police, Ansar and other agencies are working in the check posts in a coordinated way, the officials said.

With a view to bringing a system in the relief distribution, the Cox's Bazar District Administration has urged the interested persons to deposit their money in the Sonali Bank account title: Assistance to the Myanmar Citizens Illegally Migrated [Rohingya]. Besides, the relief materials could be given to "Disaster and Relief section" of the district administration for proper distribution.

Minister for Relief and Disaster Management Mofazzal Hossain Chowdhury Maya said, "Decision has been taken to construct a camp on about 2000 acres of land under Forest Department at Balukhali area to shelter the Rohingya refugees on a temporary basis. All the Rohingyas, those arrived here since 2016, will be rehabilitated in this place."

Referring the nonstop arrival of Rohingyas, State Minister for Foreign Affairs Shahriar Alam in a facebook status on Sunday said the total number of Rohingya refugees staying in Bangladesh is now over 700, 000. Of them, 300,000 have entered in the last fifteen days.

"The Hasina-led government is trying its best to provide humanitarian aid to the Rohingyas. At the same time, the government has also been trying to send them back to Myanmar. But it did not proceed due to unwillingness of Myanmar government," Shahriar Alam also said.

Against this backdrop, Road Transport and Bridges Minster and also General Secretary of ruling Awami League, Obaidul Quader on Sunday hoped that India would remain with Bangladesh on the burning issue of Rohingyas.

"A huge number of Rohingyas are entering Bangladesh but we will not be able to afford them stay for long in our country. Our neighbouring country India should remain with Bangladesh to resolve the crisis. India was beside Bangladesh during the War of Independence in 1971 and we hope it would remain with Bangladesh during the present crisis," Obaidul Quader said.

Echoing the same, Industries Minister Amir Hossain Amu yesterday said, "The government is working to rehabilitate the Rohingyas. We are getting assistance from different foreign countries and we are distributing them among the refugees. The government is also trying to create global opinion for them."


Dhaka seeks global help

Diplomats pledge to ensure support to end Rohingya crisis

Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali briefs on Rohingya issue at a meeting with foreign diplomats held at the State Guest House Padma in Dhaka on Sunday.

Bangladesh on Sunday sought support from international community to resolve the ongoing Rohingya crisis that began in the face of 'ethnic cleansing' in Myanmar.

Foreign Minister A H Mahmood Ali came up with the call at a briefing with the diplomats held in the State Guest House Padma in Dhaka.

During the meeting, foreign diplomats assured Bangladesh of their support over the Rohingya issue and to resolve the ongoing Rohingya crisis.

They also praised Bangladesh's generosity in responding to the humanitarian crisis to save the Rohingya people who fled from persecution in Myanmar since August 25, sources in the foreign office said.

"We applaud the government of Bangladesh's generosity in responding to the humanitarian crisis and appreciate their continued efforts to ensure assistance for the affected Rohingya population," Joel Reifman, deputy Chief of US Embassy in Dhaka told reporters after the meeting.The US envoy believes that a full implementation of Annan Commission report on Rohingyas would end the current impasse.

The United Nations (UN) yesterday appealed for aid to deal with the humanitarian crisis unfolding in Bangladesh after the number of Muslim Rohingya fleeing Myanmar rose near to 300,000 in just two weeks after violence erupted there.

Mahmood Ali briefed the foreign diplomats about how Bangladesh is affected by the mass Rohingya exodus and highlighted Bangladesh's efforts to respond to this humanitarian crisis.

"We made it clear to the international community that Myanmar government should take responsibility of Rohingya problem and solve it. We sought global support in this regard," Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali told reporters after the meeting with foreign diplomats.

He said at least 3000 people have been killed and more than 10,000 houses were burnt in the security operations in Rakhine State since August 25, following the reported terror attack on police posts and an army base forcing thousands of Muslim Rohingyas to cross into Bangladesh to escape violence in their country.

State Minister for Foreign Affairs M Shahriar Alam and Foreign Secretary M Shahidul Haque accompanied the Minister at the briefing.

The Foreign Ministry earlier summoned the Myanmar envoy in Dhaka and expressed concerns over the issue.

Dhaka also urged immediate steps to take back the Rohingya refugees, who have already taken shelter at makeshift camps in Bangladesh's Cox's Bazar district.

The refugees described horrifying stories of gang-rape, murder and tortures by Myanmar security forces.

The Myanmar authorities flatly denied the allegations.

Ambassadors, high commissioners and Mission chiefs of European and North American and Arabian countries and high officials of international organisations in Bangladesh participated in the briefing.

The Foreign Ministry is scheduled to hold another briefing with the diplomats of South Asia and Southeast Asian countries in Dhaka today (Monday).
Condition dreadful

Camps, open spaces, hills overcrowded: Diarrhoea may break out: Kids, elderly people, women are vulnerable: UN appeals for aid to deal with humanitarian tasks

Staff Reporter :

As hundreds fresh Rohingyas streaming in every day, Kutupalong, Lada and Nayapara camps and all open spaces of Teknaf upazila in Cox's Bazar district are now becoming overcrowded.

Apart from camps and open spaces, the Rohingya refugees are also crowding at under construction buildings, market places and corridors of different government and private offices and mosques. The Teknaf is seeing the worst Rohingya refugee crisis.

Local people say unsanitary conditions and overcrowding prevail at camps and other open spaces. Moreover, over flown toilets, lack of clothes, muddy and filthy earth also making the whole area unlivable, they said.

Diarrhea may break out among the refugees huddled camps as thousands of others found their way to makeshift camps in Kutupalong, Nayapara and Leda along the border areas.

They wait on the Myanmar border to take fishing boats to Teknaf in Bangladesh. The vast majority are women, including mothers with newborn babies, families with children. They arrive in poor condition, exhausted, hungry and desperate for shelter.

An expecting mother has to endure various difficulties during her pregnancy even if one remains at her undisturbed home. This suffering becomes far more painful where there is persecution.

Hasina Begum, 24, who fled her village seeking safety in Bangladesh, had never thought she would have to deliver a premature baby being caught in a sudden attack launched by Myanmar security forces on their village in North Maungdaw og Rakhine State.

A number of newborn babies were born either on the way to Bangladesh or in their villages before leaving for Bangladesh. Many babies are born after their mothers arrived in Bangladesh.

Huge smokes were seen in at least four places in Myanmar side close to the border from 9:00am on Sunday.

"Our village Shilkhali and adjacent villages are burning. Its North of Maungdaw township," Mohammed Tayeb, 20, said at Nayapara village of Teknaf.

Makeshift camps and open spaces have grown so rapidly as they are running out of space, the local said, adding severe shortages in facilities and staffing are creating dreadful conditions for the hundreds of refugees every day

Different agencies and local administration are failing to cope with the dramatic increase in the number of Rohingya people arriving on the island.

Sakhawat Hossain along with his seven family members entered Bangladesh through Badr Mokam point of Shahpori Island is now staying at an open space of Teknaf upazila.

"We can't describe our condition in words. We adult people can tolerate anything but our kids. There is nothing for our kids, not even milk. Our women and young girls are facing the worst situation, as there is no toilet here," he said.

Thousands of displaced people in Rakhine have been stranded or left without food for weeks. Many are still trying to cross mountains, dense bush and rice fields to reach Bangladesh.

In Ukhiya upazila, the newly arrived Rohingyas were seen desperate to find shelter at the hill.

Occupying over 400 acres of hilly land they cut hills or cleared forestland to put up tents or makeshift shelters.

The United Nations has appealed for aid to deal with a humanitarian crisis unfolding in southern Bangladesh after the number of Muslim Rohingya fleeing Myanmar neared 300,000, just two weeks after violence erupted there.

The wave of hungry and traumatized refugees is "showing no signs of stopping", overwhelming agencies in the Cox's Bazar region already helping hundreds of thousands displaced by previous spasms of conflict in Myanmar's Rakhine state, the U.N. said.

"It is vital that aid agencies working in Cox's Bazar have the resources they need to provide emergency assistance to incredibly vulnerable people who have been forced to flee their homes and have arrived in Bangladesh with nothing," the U.N. Resident Coordinator in Bangladesh Robert Watkins said.

Rights monitors and fleeing Rohingya say the army and Rakhine Buddhist vigilantes have mounted a campaign of arson aimed at driving out the Muslim population.

About a dozen Muslim villages were burned down on Friday and Saturday in the ethnically mixed Rathedaung region of Rakhine, two sources monitoring the situation said. "Slowly, one after another, villages are being burnt down - I believe that Rohingyas are already wiped out completely from Rathedaung," said one of the sources, Chris Lewa of the Rohingya monitoring group the Arakan Project. Three Rohingya were killed by landmines on Saturday as they tried to cross from Myanmar, a Bangladeshi border guard said, and an official with a non-government organization said two more were injured on Sunday.

In Cox's Bazar, about 40 Rohingya, mainly women and children, arrived early on Sunday after a four-day trek and then a border crossing by fishing boat.

"The sea was very rough but we made it here somehow," said 25-year-old Rashidullah, one of the group that was looking for temporary shelter on the beach in an area where there is no room left in refugee camps.

The International Crisis Group said in a report that the strife in Rakhine is causing more than a humanitarian crisis.

"It is also driving up the risks that the country's five-year-old transition from military rule will stumble, that Rohingya communities will be radicalised, and that regional stability will be weakened," it said.
No step to modernise UN Park

A Correspondent :

The project on Modernization of United Nation (UN) Park in Chittagong was not approved by the Pre-ecnec meeting due to objection by City Corporation (CCC).

The Ministry of Housing and Works submitted the project on Modernization of UN Park in Chittagong to Pre-ecnec meeting for approval. But, CCC officer present at the Pre-ecnec meeting objected to the proposal. As a result, the Pre-ecnec meeting did not approve the project on Modernization of UN Park in Chittagong on September 7, according to sources.

Although the mayor of CCC A J M Nasir Uddin had minimized the difference of opinion with the Housing Minister Engineer Mosharraf Hossain MP over the dispute of ownership of United Nation (UN) Park in Chittagong, the CCC sent official to the Pre-ecnec meeting to submit objection to the project submitted by the Ministry of Housing.

The CCC also claimed that it is the owner of the UN Park in Chittagong in connection with the maintenance. In the mean time, Engineer Mosharraf Hossain MP expressed concern over the role of mayor of CCC Nasir Uddin. He said he talked to mayor Nasir Uddin and he agreed with me for modernization of the UN park in Chittagong. But, unfortunately, violating his commitment he sent official to the Pre-ecnec meeting to submit objection.

"However, we have also filed case against CCC for the ownership of the UN Park in Chittagong. The Ministry of Housing and Works is the owner of the park while CCC is liable for only the management and maintenance of the park. But, presently CCC is claiming the ownership which is a violation of law and rule. So, the Ministry of Housing is filing the case to restore the ownership of UN Park."

On the other hand, mayor Nasir Uddin said, "We will renovate the swimming pool of UN Park. After making the swimming pool usable it will be opened for all to practice swimming."

He said the asset should be maintained properly. The former mayor of CCC who made the swimming pool at UN Park did not construct it properly. He also did not maintain the park as well as swimming pool properly," Nasir alleged.

"Now, we have taken decision to maintain the UN Park and the swimming pool properly," he added. It may be mentioned that Housing and Works Minister Engineer Mosharraf Hossain MP and Mayor of CCC Nasir Uddin were face to face over the controlling of UN Park in Chittagong. Later, they minimized and overcame the dispute by discussion.

On December 24, in 2016, after resolving the crisis between them, Mosharraf Hossain MP told the journalist during his visit at Jamburi Park at Agrabad in the port city, "Mayor of CCC A J M Nasir Uddin could realize his fault and we have resolved the problem by discussion. So, there is no difference of opinion over the dispute on United Nation (UN) Park."

He further said at that time, the relationship between them was very good. "The Ministry of Housing will build a modern park there and we will give the charge of maintenance of the new park to CCC. But, later, CCC submitted the objection over the dispute of ownership of the UN Park causing the reject of the project.

Sources said, CCC was going to lease the United Nation Park to a private company as part of commercialization of the park in May in the last year. The CCC completed the tender process at that time.

Sources said, CCC has called tender for management of the UN Park on February 9 in 2016. Two companies participated at the tender while one of these, Elite Park Limited offered to deposit Tk two crore and two lakh at once as security money and taka two lak and 2250 is rent per month. Considering the highest payment, CCC was going to award the tender to Elite Park Limited, sources added.

But, the ministry denied the proposal in this regard.




Deshbandhu to launch food and beverage

Industries Minister Amir Hossain Amu, addressing the launching ceremony of the commercial production of Deshbandhu Food and Beverage Limited, a sister concern of Deshbandhu Group at Palash, Narsingdi on Sunday. Golam Mostafa, Chairman of the group preside

Economic Reporter :

Industries Minister Amir Hossain Amu inaugurated the commercial production of Deshbandhu Food and Beverage, a sister concern of Deshbandhu Group at Palash, Narsingdi on Sunday.

Golam Mostafa, Chairman of the group presided over the launching programme while Kamrul Ashraf Khan, MP of the area was present as special guest. Anowarul Ashraf Khan, former MP, ex secretary of education ministry NI Khan and Golam Rahman, Managing Director of the group were also present among others.

The minister said, "There are many wealthy people in Bangladesh but they do not come forward to invest labor oriented industry where many people have chance for job."

"The wealthy people should invest for building industry help develop country", he added.

Deshbandhu makes an example to invest in many sectors. This group contributes in developing the country through creating employment, he added.

To create employments is a charity work. This is the way to close to Almighty Allah, he opined.

Golam Mostafa said, "This group has reached at this stage by 30 years. The government should help to create many industries for the country's development and to connect gas and electricity at them."

The company will be marketing the soft drinks in the name of Guru, Deshbandhu Cola, Deshbandhu Lemon, Deshbandhu Cloudy, Deshbandhu Zira Pani, Deshbandhu Mango Driks. Besides these, Chips, Biscuit, Ata, Suji and Floor will be marketed.


Amanda Nunes of Brazil, celebrates after defeating Valentina Shevchenko of Kyrgyzstan, during their mixed martial arts bout at UFC 215 in Edmonton, Alberta on Saturday.
Conjoined twins leave DMCH after separation

Health and Family Welfare Minister Md Nasim was present at the farewell ceremony of 10-month old two conjoined babies separated successfully at the DMCH on Sunday.

Staff Reporter :

Conjoined twins Tofa and Tahura left Dhaka Medical College Hospital on Sunday after being separated through a successful complicated surgical operation.

Health and Family Welfare Minister Mohammad Nasim and the doctors were present at a farewell ceremony of the 10-month old conjoined babies at DMCH.

Mohammad Nasim said, the government is considering a job for the babies' father Raju Mian.

"We pray for healthy life of Tofa and Tahura.

They will get proper treatment in future also. I will look after their family and a job will be provided to their father," the Minister said.

Shahida Begum, wife of Raju Mian, gave birth the twins on September 29 last year in their village home.

The doctors said that the conjoined twins are identical twins joined in the mother's womb. It is an extremely rare phenomenon. Two babies joined at the pelvis are even rarer. Doctors say such cases are called pygopagus conjoined twins.

A team of 24-member of doctors helped by several nurses and support staff, operated on the twins at DMCH on August 2 and August 3.

Shahida Begum said, "We will go back to our village home at Sundargonj in Gaibandha district."

Professor Shahnur Islam, Superintendent of Tofa-Tahura treatment, gave them new cloths, Shahida said.

Health Services Division Secretary Sirajul Haq Khan, Health Education and Family Welfare Division Secretary Sirajul Islam, Directorate General of Health Services Director General Professor Dr Abul Kalam Azad and DMCH Director Brigadier General AKM Nasir Uddin, among others, were present in the function.
Abducted child rescued from Narayanganj, 3 held

Three members of abductorsa gang were arrested by Lalbagh police from Narayanganj on Saturday night.

Staff Reporter :

Two and a half year old Hasib was rescued from a slum in Narayanganj on Sunday morning , a day after he was abducted from Mitford Hospital in the capital.

Police also detained the alleged kidnapper and two others from the spot. They are Anwar Hossain, CNG-run auto-rickshaw driver, his wife Wahida Begum, 30, and adopted son Shahin Rahman, 22, Police said.

A Team of Police rescued Hasib from a slum in Narayanganj city around 5:00am, said Mohammed Ibrahim Khan,

Deputy Commissioner of Lalbagh Division under Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) in a press briefing at DMP Media Centre on Sunday afternoon.

The victim along with his sister 11-year old Lamia was abducted from Mitford Hospital in the capital, But Lamia was found later in front of the hospital's morgue on Saturday, the police official said.

Hasib's mother Hasina Begum filed a kidnapping case with the Lalbagh Police Station on the day, the DC said.

In the case, she mentioned that she received an unknown phone call from the alleged kidnappers who demanded Tk two lakh from her.

Hasina used to travel by Anwar Hossain's auto-rickshaw, police said.
Natural disasters, such as floods, tornadoes and earthquakes, destroy wealth but may spur economic production. These effects vary with the situation, especially the scale of the disaster. The destruction of wealth is a constant, but the degree to which production is spurred varies with size.

In practical terms, millions of households along the Texas Gulf Coast are poorer than they were two weeks ago. In some cases, their net worth has been wiped out. But over the next months and years, a tremendous amount of productive resources will go to replacing what Hurricane Harvey destroyed.

What is in question is the degree to which such rebuilding will be a net addition to local or national output. To think about this, consider other disasters of widely varying proportions.

In 1992, an F5 tornado hit my hometown of Chandler, Minn., population then about 350, as well as a swathe of farms over several miles. There was one death and a few injuries. A third of the houses in town were destroyed plus business property and farmsteads. Damages probably totaled $10 million to $20 million.

In 1997, flooding of the Red River caused extensive damage over its entire length, with the worst in Grand Forks and surrounding area. There were no deaths, but damages, including those in Canada, were estimated at $3.5 billion.

In 2005, Hurricane Katrina damaged a very large area, but especially New Orleans. Attributed deaths vary but may have been more than 1,800. Damages are estimated at $108 billion. This was the most expensive natural disaster in U.S. history, though perhaps Harvey will surpass it.

In all three cases, wealth was destroyed. Useful houses, businesses and other property providing service on one day were gone or useless a day or two later. The net worth of households fell.

For society as a whole, these were losses regardless of whether owners got any payments from insurance companies or government. Such indemnities transfer money from one person or entity to another, but dont change the total income or net worth of society overall. They do, however, play a big role in how the specific localities damaged come through in the long run.

In a famous essay, the mid-1800s French economist Frederic Bastiat noted that when a window was broken, some would observe well, too bad for the owner, but his loss is the window repairmans gain. There is more business. Bastiat argued this was a fallacy. Yes, the glazier got more income. But whatever the window owner paid for repairs was money not available to buy something else. So some other shop owner or tradesman lost money. The owner had a window just as before, but did not have the new shirt or frying pan that might have been purchased. Society as a whole lost a window and there was no net increase in economic activity, Bastiat argued.

He was right, but is his example of one homeowner and one tradesperson true all the way up to a massive rebuilding project that South Texas is now facing?

My town of Chandler certainly lost wealth. And there certainly was economic activity afterward. Front-loader and backhoe owners, concrete plants, block layers, carpenters and electricians were booked solid for more than a year. Businesses in larger nearby towns sold appliances, furniture and furnishings. Farm contractors had multiple crews replacing livestock and machinery facilities. Workers had to eat and sleep somewhere, so restaurants and motels for 20 miles around had more business.

Of all common natural disasters, tornadoes have the highest level of insurance coverage. So money flowed in to pay for much of the rebuilding. And there was federal money, especially for public infrastructure. These inflows of money were not enough to compensate everyone for their assets destroyed, but the amount of cash circulating was much above normal. And Bastiat was right in that the increased spending on replacing necessities did depress spending of other types.

But on even regional or state levels, the impact was infinitesimal. The increased demand did not drive up the price of clothes dryers or concrete block. Businesses had good sales, but not enough to drive up their market value. Everyone understood this was temporary.

The 1997 Red River floods were bigger, but effects followed a similar pattern. There was a flurry of rebuilding. Thousands of new appliances, furnaces and electrical service panels were replaced along with acres of drywall. Dumpster services added boxes from hundreds of miles away. All local building trades were fully engaged and contractors came from extended distances in the Dakotas and Minnesota.

Here the affected area was large enough that there were increases in the prices of some high-demand items, at least temporarily. No appliance vendor put washers on sale and building materials dealers did not discount drywall. The proportion of losses covered by insurance was lower than for a tornado and the relative level of federal money higher.

Overall, the local economy was strong. Stores and other business with premises flooded out had temporary lost sales. Some went broke. But most resumed operations in remarkably short order.

Overall, many balance sheets showed lower net worth, but current income was good. There probably was some measurable impact on North Dakotas GDP, but nothing at the national level. Bastiat was wrong at the level of Grand Forks but still right for the nation.

Katrina, though about 50 times bigger, followed a similar pattern. Though in this case, the scale was large enough that some observers saw national effects on some categories of goods.

Insurance claims were high enough that financial market observers noted increased bond selling by insurance companies as they converted reserves to cash to pay claims. Insurers profits took a hit that year. So in that sense, Bastiat again was right  the net loss of Katrina rippled beyond the increased economic activity of the recovery.

Harvey may well get into the same range as Katrina. When one gets to $100 billion dollars, cant that affect the national economy?

Bastiats generation argued increased government spending could never boost economic output because such public spending would be offset by decreased private outlays.

Federal disaster spending, particularly that not offset by less spending elsewhere or by higher taxes, could increase total national output. Bastiat would be wrong.

Democrats historically buy this while Republicans usually are skeptical. But now President Donald Trump and some Republicans in Congress are calling for an infrastructure spending bill at annual levels about the same as what Harvey will cost  the carrot being promised increased economic activity  putting Americans to work.

After the 2016 election, the GOP lost concern over deficits, so expect relief and recovery for Harvey to go on the national tab. Yet there is not a lot of slack in the national economy, at least by traditional measures.

How this will play out is unclear. But we are running an interesting experiment, albeit a hard lesson to learn. Lets hope we do not have yet another one too soon, but Irma looks dangerous.
\'Bangladesh Sammilita Bouddha Samaj\' formed a human chain at Gulshan-2 in the city on Sunday before submitting memorandum to Myanmar Embassy in protest against repression on Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar.
JMB activists Naim, Anwar put on remand

Court Correspondent :

The Chief Metropolitan Magistrate (CMM) Court of Dhaka on Sunday placed two suspected militants on two days' remand. They were arrested in Dhaka on Friday night.

Magistrate Mazharul Haque granted the remand after Investigation Officer (IO) Mohammad Ali, Sub-Inspector of Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) unit of police, sought 10-days' remand to interrogate Naim Ahmed alias Anas and Anwar Hossain.

Police arrested the two operatives of the militant

organization Neo-Jamaatul Mujahide'en Bangladesh (JMB) with 30 detonators from the city's Khilkhet area.

During the preliminary interrogation, the suspects confessed their link with the Neo-JMB, said the IO adding: Naim and Anwar got themselves involved in militant activities in 2015. Anwar is the owner of a motor garage and he has close link with JMB activists Sarwar Jahan Manik, Ripon, Noman and Al Bani, while Naim was reportedly an employee of a private IT company. Later, a case was lodged in connection with the incident.


Genocide in Myanmar must be confronted for a right solution

That Bangladesh has become isolated internationally is clear from the fact that on the inhuman crisis faced by Bangladesh with the surge of Rohingya refugees all the three countries considered by our government their closest friends have been supporting openly the Myanmar government. No sympathy and no help has been offered for the acute problems created for Bangladesh. The government is trying to get India's support. Bangladesh government is seeking India's cooperation.







We need to have friendship with India, but friendship between states is a matter of leadership on both sides and not a one-way traffic.





These three countries Russia, China and India cared nothing about genocide being committed against the Rohingya Muslims on ethnic ground and for forcing them to take refuse in Bangladesh despite knowing we have too many problems of our own.





Nobel laureates like Desmond Tutu, Dr Muhammad Yunus and Malala Yousafzai have sternly condemned Myanmar and appealed for help. But Myanmar is not an easy country for listening to appeals. They must help organise world pressure and isolate Myanmar regime. Desmond Tutu condemned specifically fellow Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi over her silence.







We expected Dr Yunus's role to be more activist in kind.







We are accepting the Rohingya refugees for our sense of humanity and to save their lives. But Myanmar is causing a human crisis of an immense proportion for Bangladesh so ill equipped to bear. Most Rohingya refugees are living under open sky in rain soaked condition. Some of them are starving though local people are doing whatever little they can do. Most important they should be provided with adequate police protection against criminals.







More aid must come immediately from the international community for the Red Cross and other humanitarian organisations to offer the destitutes the aid they so desperately need.







But we shall do everything possible for the victims of mass killing and rape. Such exodus of Rohingya Muslims to Bangladesh is an act that is tantamount to enmity towards Bangladesh.





According to an official estimate nearly three lakhs Rohingya Muslims fled their country for fear of life. No civilised country can treat a section of its own people as stateless and commit carnage on them.







It is clear that Bangladesh government is still reluctant to act decisively seemingly against the policy interest of India in Myanmar. Indian Prime Minister Mr Narendra Modi went to Myanmar and sympathised with the military. But not a word, he uttered about taking back the refugees or raised the issue of genocide committed against Rohingya people. Mr Narendra Modi could not hide his racist prejudice.





The good thing is: the Indian press and civil society members were highly critical of their Prime Minister's shameless conduct in the face of gross human rights violations.





Our government could not be diplomatically awakened for protesting internationally and gathering forceful support of the international community. The reason cannot be all about incompetence.





No immediate step was taken either to register the refugees for facilitating international help.





Indonesia is very active in international diplomacy though not directly affected. Malaysia also has taken the matter seriously. Our government is waiting as if for a clear indication from somewhere.





Most generous and helpful response for the refugees came from Turkey. The First Lady with the Foreign Minister visited the refugee shelters in Bangladesh and offered them help and sympathy.





Strong support and sympathy are coming from the Western countries which have been considered enemies by our government since the inception of Bangladesh. The people of Bangladesh are pro-West and pro-democracy.







Our government is unable to see the gravity of the humanitarian crisis as they are too eager to find conspiracy against the government. Even fear has also been expressed about weapons might be coming in. This is unkind. Addiction to power has grown into a nervousness of its own.





Myanmar has certainly victimised the Muslims and made it a religious issue. The Muslim countries have every justification to take the issue as such. So the Muslim countries have a grater obligation to be in the forefront for a solution. Muslim countries are neither helpless or powerless. We must show solidarity.







Our request to the government of Saudi Arabia is if you want to help the Rohingya Muslims do that with full vigour to be effective. Provocation is no help. When lives of thousands of Rohingya are on the line.







The suggestion of our government to a safe zone under the United Nations for the Rohingya people is another indication of nothingness. The safe zone arrangement worked nowhere.





Rohingyas must be registered as citizens for their statehood to make them safe in their country. There are some 135 ethnic groups in Myanmar. The Muslim Rohingya are denied citizenship in violation of international law and are being subjected to carnage from time to time.







The world has seen how reckless violators of human rights Myanmar government is. The army there has long ceased to be a military force only to become a brute force. The Myanmar military has become a sick institution for long. They felt free to commit abuses. Instead of facing the insurgents, the military is attacking the unarmed cultivators. Though not practical yet, Bangladesh offered cooperation to fight the insurgents jointly. Again our government is proving vacuous.







The people of Bangladesh along with the Rohingya Muslims are grateful for the strong response coming from the world community. We expect the friends of humanity to come forward with a working solution for making it possible for the Rohingya people to get statehood and not suffer insane persecution as stateless any more at the pleasure of the Myanmar's military.




Both `trade and diplomacy` with Myanmar to continue together: Qamrul

Food Minister Qamrul Islam on Sunday informed Parliament that the government is going to import rice from Myanmar considering cheap price saying trade and diplomatic effort would continue together with the neighbouring country.

He raised the argument for rice import from Myanmar replying to a supplementary question from JSD lawmaker Nazmul Haque Prodhan.

The Food Minister said, Ive gone on visit to Myanmar as the Prime Minister said that trade and diplomatic effort will continue together.

Nazmul Haque in his question said that the country has been experiencing serious crisis due to ongoing influx of Rohingyas to Bangladesh, but the Food Minister went to Myanmar to import rice from there. Does the minister get special discount? he asked.

Qamrul said Bangladesh government has signed a deal with Myanmar to import three lakhs metric tons of rice. But, 1.20 lakh metric tons of rice will be imported in first phase, he added.

The cost of rice import from Myanmar will be lower than that from Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia. It takes only three days to bring rice from Myanmar, while it takes 15-20 days from other countries like Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia.

He claimed the price of rice to be imported from Myanmar has not been finalised yet.

In reply to another question, the Food Minister said the rice prices have been static at present in the country and remain under the purchasing capacity of the common people.




Eyes on the storms

The United States was captivated by two storms during the week  one that had come and gone, another that hadnt arrived yet. The death toll from Harvey, which ravaged Houston and the surrounding Texas area at the end of August with more than 4 feet of rain, climbed to at least 70 as residents began the long process of recovering. Businesses slowly reopened as the high water levels receded, and Congress worked on a multi-billion-dollar emergency disaster aid package.

Meanwhile, Irma became the most potent Atlantic Ocean hurricane ever. A powerful Category 5 storm with winds that reached 185 mph, Irma was expected to rip into heavily populated South Florida by early Sunday, prompting the governor to declare an emergency and officials to impose mandatory evacuation orders for parts of the Miami metro area and the Florida Keys. Forecasters said Irma could punish the entire Atlantic coast of Florida and rage on into Georgia and the Carolinas.

Trump makes debt-limit deal

President Donald Trump briskly overruled congressional Republicans and his own treasury secretary Wednesday to cut a deal with Democrats to keep the government operating and raise Americas debt limit. The immediate goal was ensuring money for hurricane relief, but in the process the president brazenly rolled his own partys leaders.

Trump sided with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, as they pushed for the three-month debt-limit extension deal, brushing aside the urgings of GOP leaders and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin for a much longer extension.

Natural disasters

Natural disasters have nearly quadrupled in number since 1970 and the United States has experienced the most disasters since 1995, followed by China and India, the United Nations chief said Tuesday. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told reporters that in recent days the world has seen the dramatic aggravation of climate change with unprecedented events caused by storms and flooding from Texas to Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Sierra Leone. Before the current floods, he said, preliminary reports registered 2,087 deaths this year from natural disasters. With the latest floods, that number will at least double.

President ends dreamer program

President Donald Trump has begun dismantling Barack Obamas program protecting hundreds of thousands of young immigrants who were brought into the country illegally as children. He declared on Tuesday that he loves the dreamers who could face deportation but insisted its up to Congress, not him, to address their plight. Trump didnt specify what he wanted done, essentially sending a six-month time bomb to his fellow Republicans in Congress who have no consensus on how to defuse it.

For all of those (DACA) that are concerned about your status during the 6 month period, you have nothing to worry about - No action!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 7, 2017

Amazon looking for new prime location

Amazon, bursting out of its Seattle headquarters, is hunting for a second home. Must haves: A prime location, close to transit, with plenty of space to grow. The company said Thursday it will spend more than $5 billion to build another headquarters in North America to house as many as 50,000 employees.

North Korea

Following U.S. warnings to North Korea of a massive military response, South Korea fired missiles into the sea to simulate an attack on the Norths main nuclear test site on Monday, a day after North Korea detonated its largest-ever nuclear test explosion. South Koreas Defense Ministry also said Monday that North Korea appeared to be planning a future missile launch, possibly of an ICBM, to show off its claimed ability to target the United States with nuclear weapons, though it was unclear when that might happen.

Trump Jr. denies collusion with Russia

President Donald Trump's eldest son cast his meeting with a Russian lawyer last year as simply an opportunity to learn about Hillary Clinton's "fitness, character or qualifications," insisting to Senate investigators behind closed doors that he did not collude with Russia to hurt her campaign against his father.

Donald Trump Jr.'s description of the June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower in New York, delivered in a statement Thursday at the outset of a Senate panel's staff interview, provided his most detailed account yet of an encounter that has drawn close scrutiny from Congress and special counsel Robert Mueller.

Equifax breach exposes 143 million people to identity theft

Credit monitoring company Equifax has been hit by a high-tech heist that exposed the Social Security numbers and other sensitive information about 143 million Americans. Now the unwitting victims have to worry about the threat of having their identities stolen.

The Atlanta-based company, one of three major U.S. credit bureaus, said Thursday that "criminals" exploited a U.S. website application to access files between mid-May and July of this year.

The theft obtained consumers' names, Social Security numbers, birth dates, addresses and, in some cases, driver's license numbers. The purloined data can be enough for crooks to hijack the identities of people whose credentials were stolen through no fault of their own, potentially wreaking havoc on their lives. Equifax said its core credit-reporting databases don't appear to have been breached.

Russian Facebook ads

Hundreds of fake Facebook accounts, probably run from Russia, spent about $100,000 on ads aimed at stirring up divisive issues such as gun control and race relations during the 2016 U.S. presidential election, the social network said Wednesday.

Although the number of ads is relatively small, the disclosure provides a more detailed peek into what investigators believe was a targeted effort by Russians to influence U.S. politics during the campaign, this time through social media.

Super streaming

Star Wars and the Marvel comic-book movies will join Disneys upcoming streaming service, potentially giving it broader appeal beyond families with young children. The Disney service will be the only place to stream those movies on demand in the U.S. as part of a monthly subscription.

Royal baby No. 3

Prince William and his wife, the Duchess of Cambridge, will soon welcome a third child to the royal nursery. Kensington Palace officials announced Monday that the former Kate Middleton is pregnant. As with her other two pregnancies, she is suffering from hyperemesis gravidarum, or acute morning sickness, which caused her to miss 4-year-old Prince George's first day of school on Thursday.

New York Fashion Week begins

The first day of Fashion Week on Thursday brought glitz, glamour and a slew of celebrities at Tom Ford's '90s-themed show, and a prestigious award for designer Thom Browne. Raf Simons, the new star of American fashion since his debut collection in February for Calvin Klein, followed it up with his take on traditional Americana, with cowboy looks, quilts and pompoms. Simons also looked to Hollywood movies  and to Andy Warhol  for inspiration. Heidi Klum was at Fashion Week, not as a judge or model but as a budding designer.

CMA nominations

Miranda Lambert led the pack with five nominations for Country Music Association awards on Monday, with Little Big Town and Keith Urban earning four nods each.

Lambert was nominated for song and single of the year for "Tin Man," and also earned nods for album, female vocalist and best video of the year. Nominations for the 51st annual awards were announced on "Good Morning America." The ceremony is scheduled for Nov. 8 in Nashville.

Model policy

Two of the worlds biggest luxury goods conglomerates will stop working with unhealthily thin fashion models, as part of a joint charter signed Wednesday that aims to protect their health. The pact adopted by LVMH and Kering, which own brands like Dior, Gucci and Louis Vuitton, incorporates a new French law that requires models to provide medical certificates proving they are healthy before they can work.
Tara Parker Routzong(TROY, Ala.) -- A 9-year-old Alabama boy didn't want a Florida evacuee to worry about lunch ahead of Hurricane Irma, so he paid for his meal with the help of his proud mother.



Tara Parker Routzong told ABC News her son Landon noticed Friday that the car in front of them at their local Chick-fil-A had a Florida license plate, and the two figured the driver was an evacuee.



"I didnt want them to waste their money on food because theyre trying to escape the hurricane," Landon Routzong, 9, said. "I felt like I should help out."



The Troy, Alabama, restaurant is on the evacuation route from Florida, Chick-fil-A director of operations Savannah Smith told ABC News.



The Chick-fil-A on Highway 231 has seen an increase in customers since local evacuation advisories were issued earlier this week, she added. Smith said the restaurant had wanted to "do something for everyone that came in our store" but weren't able to.



"So he asked if he could pay for the meal and of course I agreed," Routzong said of her son.



After Routzong told Smith, who's worked for the restaurant since 2013, of their plan, Smith informed them that since the evacuee was in the car ahead of them, they'd have to reach the window before he did to execute their kind deed.



Routzong then told her son: "Here's my debit card. Run!" And he did.



"He went up to the window and asked the gentleman in the car if he minded if he paid his meal," the mother recalled. "The man said yes and thanked him and shook his hand."



Routzong added that the unidentified man also pulled over and thanked her, confirming he was indeed an evacuee. Afterward, both her and her son were "almost in tears."



The mother later posted the heartwarming moment on Facebook, where it quickly went viral, with more than 1,000 reactions.



"I was really proud of him for doing that," she said of her normally shy son.

Copyright  2017, ABC Radio. All rights reserved.
Weeds have been a problem since crops were first cultivated. Farmers, on the front lines of the age-old battle, know all too well that weeds are a relentless foe. At Agweek, weve committed much of our time and resources reporting on weeds and weed management to improve agronomic practices across our region.

But a new weed, Palmer amaranth, is invading the Upper Midwest region. Most agriculturalists here probably dont fully realize how dangerous and destructive it is  and how little time they have to prepare for its arrival. Because of its threat to our region, we had two cover stories on Palmer amaranth over the past few months, one in late May and one in late August following a trip to Nebraska to see the weed for ourselves.

Farmers in much of the country already are dealing with Palmer amaranth, which weed scientists have voted Americas No. 1 weed enemy. Weeds arent partial to a certain type of farmer, and, like Palmer amaranth is doing, they spread.

Native to the southwest U.S., the weed is spreading east and north. Its now established in parts of the Corn Belt and has been found in southern Minnesota and parts of South Dakota. Experts say it almost certainly will spread to the rest of the Upper Midwest, too.

Weed scientists dislike the term super weed, and were reluctant to use it. But Palmer amaranth possesses a combination of characteristics that make it particularly potent. Heres a partial list:

Each Palmer amaranth plant can produce as many 1 million seeds. Whats more, the seeds are so small that farmers can spread them unknowingly.

Seeds can lie dormant in the soil for years, waiting to germinate until growing conditions are favorable.

The seeds are extremely competitive with other crops, including corn and soybeans. Yield losses of up to 91 percent in corn and 79 percent in soybeans have been reported.

It can grow up to 3 inches per day and becomes harder to control the bigger it gets. It can reach more than 10 feet high, towering above mature corn.

It closely resembles pigweed and waterhemp, especially when small. So farmers may misidentify it and take inadequate steps to control it.

It's prone to developing herbicide resistance. Each weed produces so many seeds and new plants that at least a few are likely to survive herbicide application  and those survivors, in turn, are more resistant to herbicide.

Reading about Palmer amaranth gives agriculturalists an idea of how dangerous it is. But the threat cannot be fully understood until they see the weed in person.

A group of North Dakota agriculturalists, primarily extension officials, recently visited Nebraska to learn more about the weed. The trip was funded by the North Dakota Soybean Council. Jonathan Knutson, Agweeks 27-year veteran reporter, and Nick Nelson, Agweek photojournalist, attended.

The group saw fields infested with Palmer amaranth, fields in which the weed was first seen only a few years ago. Farmers had made a determined effort to control with chemicals. The group learned first-hand that early detection and a broad-based approach are needed to keep the weed in check.

We cant overstress the importance of not relying on herbicides to deal with Palmer amaranth. If youre counting on industry to develop a new chemical that single-handedly licks the weed, youre making a tragic mistake, experts say.

Theres a tendency, even among agriculturalists, to think, Ho-hum. Just another weed when they hear about Palmer amaranth. But the threat is real. Its huge. And its immediate.

Our recommendation? Learn as much as you can about this terrible weed. Best educate and prepare yourself for a long, difficult and must-win battle against it.
North Dakota welcomed President Donald Trump as he continued his tour around the nation to move the ball forward on comprehensive tax reform. The president drove home how our current tax code, which has not significantly changed since 1986, puts our nation at a competitive disadvantage, harming our workers and driving investment overseas. Overhauling our tax system will grow and strengthen our economy, create good jobs, increase wages for workers, and provide relief to individuals and families.

There are few who deny that the tax code places an enormous burden on families and businesses. Collectively, Americans spent nearly 9 billion hours complying with the Internal Revenue Service last year, costing our economy $409 billion. These costs are due to the complexity of the tax code, which creates uncertainty and makes long-term planning difficult, whether you are balancing the household budget, preparing for retirement or investing in your business.

On top of this, we operate under the highest marginal corporate income tax rate in the industrialized world at 35 percent, which rises as high as 45 percent when including state taxes. At the same time, our pass-through businesses, which includes most of our farmers and ranchers, face combined federal and state marginal rates of up to 48.6 percent under the individual tax code. In comparison, the average corporate rate among OECD nations is 24 percent, going as low as 9 percent. Additionally, companies are now holding approximately $2.6 trillion in overseas earnings, money that should be invested here at home. Despite these high rates, our nation has remained an economic powerhouse due to the innovation and hard work of our citizens. Reforming our tax code will make our nation more competitive and help grow the economy, creating more economic opportunities in North Dakota and across the nation.

That is why it is vital that we advance comprehensive tax reform that simplifies the IRS code and reduces rates. That will put more money in the pockets of individuals and families, empower private investment, drive domestic job creation and increase wages through higher demand for labor and lower business costs. All the while, we can ensure stable government revenues through a broader tax base, a growing economy and a more efficient tax system. That means we will continue to be able to fund our priorities and get our debt and deficit under control. Thats why we are working to get tax reform done for the American people, for the benefit of both current and future generations.
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MURPHYSBORO  Each year, from 30,000 to 40,000 people are estimated to pour into the streets of downtown Murphysboro for its annual Apple Festival.

It's hard to get a handle on exactly how big that crowd is, but as Apple Festival Committee Chairman Shawn Sterns said, Jackson County Sheriff Robert Burns told him the crowds, as viewed from last year's Grand Parade, looked a bit larger, three people deep in places.

Sterns is hoping for even larger crowds at this year's event, which begins at 5:15 p.m. Wednesday and will include traditional Apple Toss and goes through the end of Saturday.

New this year will be the Big Muddy Apple Obstacle Run, which had 130 entrants as of last week, and Saturday morning's free Captain and Me Fun Run for children in fifth-grade and lower. That children's run is about a mile long and begins at 7:30 a.m. Saturday, half an hour before the Appletime 5K Walk/Run begins at 8 a.m.

This year, festival goers can also receive alerts about the Murphysboro Apple Festival, by texting the words "AppleFestival" ` no space  to 33222. Texts are only going to be sent through September and alert the receiver to advance ride tickets sales or when weather could lead to a temporary closing, Sterns said.

This year's festival will also be the first under the organization's operation as a non-profit, having received its 501(c)3 notification this year, Sterns said.

Another major highlight of the Apple Festival is always the Appletime Grand Parade, which starts at 11 a.m. Saturday.

Leading this year's parade as Grand Marshal is Lawanda Fager, a longtime Murphysboro resident and longtime 4-H volunteer.

When we thought about our theme  Do You Remember When?  we thought of Lawanda Fager," said Debbie Glodo, a parade committee co-chair, "of all that she has done in the community and in the many lives that she has touched and the many Apple Festivals that she has been apart of.
CARTERVILLE  When the late James and Rosemary Dee Childress became high school sweethearts in Carterville in the 1940s, they did not know their relationship would be so successful it would enable them to make a $1.5 million bequest to the John A. Logan Foundation.

But that is exactly what happened.

According to a news release from John A. Logan College the couples attorney, Robert Howerton said the couple left the money behind to benefit students through scholarship opportunities.

Howerton, who presented a check to the JALC Foundation Thursday morning, said the couple knew what it was like to start out with nothing.

"But they worked hard, and became very successful. These are people young people can look up to and model their lives after," Howerton said.

The couple married in 1943 just before James left for the South Pacific with the U.S. Navy to fight in World War II. After returning from the war and completing his high school degree, he and Dee lived in a small, second floor apartment, the release said.

After James graduated from Southern Illinois University Carbondale in 1951, he became a successful businessman.

By the end of his career he had owned numerous corporations and businesses in the steel industry, banking, construction and sales, as well as motels and nursing homes throughout Southern Illinois and Southeast Missouri.

I am simply fulfilling their instructions by making this contribution, and I am very pleased to do so," Howerton said.

According to Staci Shafer, executive director of the John A. Logan College Foundation, this gift from the Carterville couple, who lived to see their 71st anniversary, will impact the lives of generations to come.

Their enormous generosity will impact so many lives for a very, very long time. Im overwhelmed by their generosity and the difference they will make in the lives of others with this contribution, Shafer said.

Howerton said he was proud to be able to deliver the check. He also said the money couldnt have come from two finer people.

What an incredible donation from an incredible couple, said JALC College President Ron House.

The legacy they leave behind is one of hard work and selflessness, a determination to help others even after their lives had ended. I believe many students who, like James and Dee, are also determined to be successful, will benefit from this enormous generosity, House said.

Shafer said the couple had been loyal supporters of the Foundation and mentioned a number of times that after their death they would take care of the Foundation in their will. Still, she said, the size of this donation shocked her.

The money will establish a new endowment, the James and Rosemary Samuel Childress, John A. Logan Endowment which carries the stipulation that it provide scholarships for students interested in business.

Dee passed away on July 6, 2015. James passed away on May 21, 2016. Both were 90.
ENFIELD  As the dust settles in the controversial battle to issue the first high volume horizontal hydraulic fracturing permit in Illinois, people in Enfield, where the first operational well will begin production, are waiting to see what drilling will bring to their community.

The permit was issued Aug. 31 by the Illinois Department of Natural Resources to Kansas based Woolsey Operating Company,

Enfield, population 625, is a village in White county which, like many other Southern Illinois towns, saw its fortunes rise and fall along with the coal industry.

According to Enfield Village President Tom Harbour, this predisposes residents to be open to new oil and gas exploration in the region.

I would say people here at 99 percent in favor of the project. Do they have concerns? Yes. But they have also read up on fracking, including some of the studies out there. And those studies seem to be split in their opinion about the process, Harbour said.

Hydraulic Fracturing, or fracking, is a technique used to enhance the flow of gas from shale formations that are difficult to access due to depth and rock composition.

The process involves the high-pressure injection of 'fracking fluid' into a well to create cracks in deep-rock formations through which natural gas, petroleum, and brine can be extracted.

Advocates of fracking say it supplies needed energy resources and brings with it jobs and economic benefits. Detractors say the practice brings with it social, environmental and human health problems.

When regulators from the IDNR Department of Oil and Gas Resource Management approved Woolseys application to perform operations on the Woodrow #1H-310408-193 well, they did so over the objections of many.

In July, more than 10,000 public comments from citizens against fracking in Illinois were delivered to Governor Bruce Rauner's office in the capital by Food and Water Watch, the Illinois Green Party, the Environmental Defense Fund and Southern Illinoisans against Fracturing our Environment (SAFE) during the public comment period in the application process.

But residents in Enfield are taking a wait and see attitude.

Harbor said that he worked for 33 years at the Pattiki mine in Carmi, which suspended operation in Nov. 2016, and that experience influenced his views about the Woosley project.

I think the operations are a lot safer than people who came here to protest indicated. At Pattiki we dug at 880 feet. Fracking is done at a depth of about 5,600 feet, so we worked at a much shallower depth and I havent heard a complaint about the water around here in 33 years, Harbor said.

Harbor, said Enfield gets its water from the Rend Lake Conservancy District and has two water towers that service approximately 250 customers.

I plan on driving past the drill site at least once a day to check on things. And the farmers in the surrounding countryside will also keep an eye on whats happening out there. If something gets out of line, we will know about it, Harbour said.

The bottom line, Harbour said, is that Woolseys presence in town will help the economy.

Woolsey may not be a huge employer to begin with, but they will bring people who eat here, live here, recreate here, and buy their fuel here and we look forward to that, Harbour said.

Mark Sooter, vice president of business development for Woolsey Operating Company Energy said the company is excited about the permit approval.

This is a really positive moment for us. We have been working toward this for six years so it is a culmination of some really hard work on the part of a lot of people, Sooter said.

Sooter said that the operation of the well in Enfield is definitely part of an exploratory stage.

We will use this well to evaluate production techniques, volume and financial cost. We will keep a close eye on how much it is producing, and the price of oil. If we decide to go forward we have mapped out a good sized area to drill other wells, Sooter said.

According to Sooter, Woolsey hopes to conclude construction of the well by the end of 2017, and is aiming for operations to begin sometime during the first quarter of 2018.

When asked about Woolseys intentions to employ local people, Sooter said current Woolsey energy employees will manage the drilling and completion process.

But then, as we move forward, we will contract with local service companies for the major portion of the work. We want to hire local people as much as possible. If there are not enough local service companies, then we will have to look outside the region, but the intention is there to use local folks, Sooter said.

People around here really want Woolsey to succeed, Harbour said.

But the battle for the well at Enfield may not yet be settled.

Rich Whitney, Vice-Chairman of the Illinois Green Party and SAFE committee member in a previous report said opponent groups are exploring appealing the IDNR's decision in court through the methods made available to them by the Illinois Administrative Procedures Act.

I am tempted to paraphrase our President by saying all options are in the table, Whitney said.
It is too early to know how many animals were affected by the severe weather spawned by Hurricane Harvey. But it is likely that millions of pets and livestock animals were impacted by this disaster. Now Irma is brewing in the Caribbean.

According to the American Veterinary Medical Associations pet ownership calculator, more than 30 percent of metro Houstons two million households owned at least one dog or cat before Harvey struck. Houston also has a significant stray dog and cat problem. Cattle are big business in Texas, so their numbers are more accurate. The 54 impacted counties had about 1.2 million beef cattle and roughly 5,000 dairy cattle, along with beloved backyard horses, goats, chickens and pigs.

As part of Colorado State Universitys Veterinary Extension Team, I help citizens and communities in Colorado protect and care for animals. Pets and livestock pose different challenges, but the key issue is that communities need to plan ahead and create partnerships between disaster professionals, agricultural extension agents, veterinary health experts and animal welfare groups.

The goal is to create animal evacuation teams that are prepared to rescue animals safely, and to have trained volunteers and procedures in place for setting up temporary animal rescue shelters. Deploying well-meaning but untrained volunteers who are not connected with larger rescue operations can hinder response and endanger humans and animals.

Household pets and service animals

The policy of rescuing pets dates back to Hurricane Katrina in 2005. In New Orleans, emergency response teams were too overwhelmed by the challenge of rescuing people to save their pets as well. It is estimated that nearly 600,000 animals died or were stranded. Equally troubling, more than half of the people who did not evacuate stayed because they were not able to take their pets. By remaining in place, they put themselves and first responders at greater risk.

In 2006 Congress passed the Pets Evacuation and Transportation Standards (PETS) Act, which amended the Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act to ensure that state and local emergency preparedness plans addressed the needs of people with household pets and service animals after major disasters. Over the past decade, implementation of the PETS Act at the local level has shown that when emergency operations planning includes animals, human lives are saved, and most pets can be successfully reunited with their owners post-disaster.

Challenges still arise as disasters play out. When temporary animal shelters close, many pets that were never claimed or whose owners can no longer care for them are left in need of homes. The problem is worsened by post-disaster housing shortages in which fewer landlords are willing to accept families with pets.

Additionally, while the PETS Act specifically focuses on household pets and service animals, this definition does not cover many species that people think of as pets, such as snakes or tropical birds. Shelters may not be able to accommodate farm and exotic animals that their owners view as pets.

Moreover, the law does not explicitly recognize emotional support animals  a relatively recent designation for animals that provide therapeutic benefits to their owners through companionship, rather than performing tasks like service animals. People with support animals may be surprised that their animals are not welcomed in a shelter as a service animal would be.

Community disaster animal planning includes identifying types of animals in the community and trying to find appropriate facilities to provide for them. This could mean designating a vacant warehouse as a household pet shelter and a fairground for horses, goats, chickens, sheep and cattle. Plans should also include providing trained staff and appropriate food supplies for each type of shelter.

Rescues on the range

Emergency management prioritizes human safety above saving property, including livestock. But for livestock owners, their animals represent not only a livelihood but a way of life. Farmers and ranchers know how to prepare for unexpected emergencies and disasters because their businesses depend on the land and the weather. And they are prepared to be isolated because they operate in rural areas.

Texas ranchers started moving cattle to higher ground while Harvey was brewing in the Gulf of Mexico in case the storm headed their way. Cattle producers stockpiled large supplies of feed and fresh water near their animals, and had generators and gasoline supplies at hand to keep their operations functioning.

Dairy producers have different strategies because cows dont stop making milk during disasters. Owners need to shelter their animals in place and ensure that milk is picked up and delivered to processing plants. Milk pickup at Texas dairy farms was uninterrupted during the first week of Harvey, although it was not always on schedule because drivers had to find open travel routes and deliver milk to alternative processing plants.

Farmers and ranchers form strong support networks before disasters, and Texas is especially well-organized. The Texas Animal Health Commission has a well-trained and organized Animal Response Team that includes representatives of federal and state agencies, Texas A&M Universitys AgriLife Extension Service, industry organizations and other stakeholder groups. The team began meeting before Harvey hit to coordinate emergency operations and response efforts.

The Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association is also working with state agencies to coordinate relief and support efforts for ranchers. Post-storm tasks include capturing loose animals, evacuating them from hazardous areas, identifying their owners, disposing of carcasses and consulting on animal health and public health concerns.

Once responders have organized fresh feed and clean water and gathered cattle in holding facilities, they will evaluate them for injuries and slowly reintroduce the starving animals to a normal feeding regimen. In the coming weeks, ranchers will carefully monitor their animals health, clean debris from flooded pastures and repair miles of damaged fences.

Make your own plans

One antidote to the concern and fear that we feel when watching disasters like Harvey unfold or tracking current predictions for Hurricane Irma is developing a plan for your own family and animals in case of an emergency in your area. Information is available from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, other federal agencies, and state and local emergency offices.

In the wake of a 2012 drought that resulted in severe forest fires and floods, CSU Extension helped many Colorado counties develop disaster plans for animals. We produced a documentary that illustrates the process in two Colorado counties, and a companion toolkit to guide communities through the process.

If you have time, join a community volunteer group and train to be a responder. Your communitys resilience depends on active involvement. As a Larimer County, Colorado animal response team member told me, The better prepared an animal owner is, the better we can assist them.
COLUMBIA  The South Carolina State Museum will showcase art collected by the South Carolina Arts Commission in Eclipsing 50: The State Art Collection 1967 - 2017, a new exhibit which features work collected between 1967 and 2017. The exhibit, which opens Sept. 15, will highlight the breadth and depth of work produced by artists in our state.

Established in 1967 as one of the Commissions first programs, the State Art Collection now includes 493 works in a variety of styles and media from 287 artists. This exhibition includes over 80 pieces from the collection and centers on the spirit of dynamism and leaps of artistic faith revealed in this unique cultural document of South Carolinas changing art landscape. Spanning work from the last five decades, Eclipsing 50 delves into the idea of artistic exploration and looks at S.C. artists who challenged themselves to reach boldly beyond their respective eras in the universal pursuit of artistic expression.

Eclipsing 50 includes a lead relief entitled 0 Through 9 by Jasper Johns from 1970. Johns grew up in S.C. and briefly attended the University of South Carolina before moving to New York in the late 1940s. He is generally considered one of the most significant American artists of the second half of the 20th century and his depictions of flags, targets and numbers are now iconic. His experimentation with materials and techniques, as in this piece, continue to serve as inspiration for many artists well into the 21st century.

Another artist featured in the exhibit is Linda McCune who has been working on the mixed media sculpture Ede No. 2 from the Slew Series, since 1981. The piece is a very personal narrative about her life experiences, specifically connected to her desire to have a family. There is a sculptural element for each decade of the artists life, so she is continually adding to the piece. The version guests will see in Eclipsing 50 will include a new, recently completed component, bringing the total number to six. This new piece records the expansion of the family with the marriages of McCunes two daughters and the birth of her grandsons.

This exhibit marks the third showing of the State Art Collection at the South Carolina State Museum. The first was a retrospective held in 1988-89 as the inaugural art exhibition in the Lipscomb Gallery for the opening of the museum. The second was held in 1996-97, Signs of Contemporary Art: Selections from the State Art Collection. The Museum is now pleased to partner again with the South Carolina Arts Commission and join in the celebration of the Commissions 50th anniversary this year.

Reflecting on 50 years of collecting and with the historic eclipse on everyones mind this fall, it struck me that an art collection is a living, fluctuating entity, moving through time, said Lori Kornegay, State Museum curator of art. New works are added and time passes, so the layers of meaning shift and expand as ones context and points of reference change through the years. The power of art is that it can eclipse the moment of its making and it takes you out of your day-to-day life, helping you see and experience things in a new way.

Eclipsing 50 is free with museum general admission or museum membership. The exhibit opens in conjunction with the South Carolina Arts Commissions Statewide Arts Conference, No Time Like the Future, being held at the museum Sept. 14-15. For more information on the conference visit SouthCarolinaArts.com.
HARTSVILLE  Three students from Orangeburg County have been accepted to the South Carolina Governors School for Science & Mathematics in Hartsville. They join students from across South Carolina to form the class of 2019.

GSSM students moved onto campus in mid-August, and classes started Aug. 14. This year, the GSSM welcomes 276 students representing 128 high schools and 35 counties.

Doyle Hayden, son of Kristi Sease and Hal Hayden of Lodge, transferred to GSSM from Branchville High School.

Lani McGuire, son of Jennique Williams of Sumter, transferred to GSSM from Orangeburg-Wilkinson High School.

Carnya D. Sutton, daughter of Sandra Sellers and Carlos Sutton of Elloree, transferred to GSSM from Lake Marion High School.

For nearly 30 years, GSSM has been one of the nation's top ranked residential high schools, serving the state's highest achieving juniors and seniors. The school offers unique, college-level courses and a hands-on curriculum with a special focus on science, technology, engineering, math and research, along with concentrations in economics and entrepreneurship, as well as a full array of humanities courses.

One of 12 specialized science and math programs in the country, the GSSM has been nationally recognized for its overall excellence, strong mix of intellectual challenges and dedicated teachers, along with its rigorous mentored scientific and economic research program.

For more information on how to apply for GSSMs class of 2020, visit www.scgssm.org/admissions/residential-admissions.
Hurricane Irma is chasing Florida residents into Orangeburg County as they look for a safe place to get off the busy road and ride out the storm.

Francine Kapp and her family traveled up from Fort Lauderdale.

Weve been in traffic the whole way -- 95 is just awful, Kapp said.

The family stayed overnight in Brunswick, Georgia because of the driving conditions.

We almost wanted to just stay there, but they evacuated us and weve been in traffic the whole way here, Kapp said. This looks like it might be safe here because we were going on to North Carolina.

On Saturday afternoon, the family was trying to decide whether to keep on driving. Forecasts had changed, showing Hurricane Irma shifting west.

Tomorrow it could hit Tampa and then go off to Alabama, Kapp said.

The family is traveling with two young girls ages 3 and 6.

Everybodys tired, were packed in there, Kapp said. Driving miles with little ones in the car is hard.

The family decided it was time to leave Florida after hearing about the size of Irma.

They started saying it was twice the size of Hurricane Andrew, Kapp said. It was like, Hey, you dont have any shot. Its covering the whole state.

It looked devastating, she added.

A few of their friends decided to stay, so they plan on calling often to keep updated.

Jacob Stump and his family also made a stop in Orangeburg. They left Brooksville, Florida at 8 a.m. Friday.

He said the storm could hit right in the middle of where I live.

Even on the way here, we were looking up the weather, Stump said. Its gotten even worse since then.

His family encountered heavy traffic as well. With just a few stops along the way, they had only reached Orangeburg Saturday afternoon.

Stump said the family was not sure where they would end up because before they left, his mother had looked up hotel bookings and saw no vacancies.

After a stop at the Wendys off the interstate, Stumps father saw a nearby hotel and decided to check for available rooms.

The family had to wait about an hour in the parking lot but soon enough, they had a room to stay in.

Were just glad to have finally found a spot, Stump said.

He is thinking about his friends back home who felt they could weather the storm.

Stump said they were stubborn and told him, Were used to the storms.

Jake A. Herbert, who is no stranger to heavy storms, said he and his family evacuated Fripp Island as early as they could.

We always do, Herbert said. We did this last year in Matthew.

Fripp Island residents were told to evacuate so Herbert said, We dont know what were going back to.

He noted that their home still has damage from last years Hurricane Matthew.

When they first mentioned it, we boarded up the house, he said.

They plan on staying in Orangeburg until they say we can go back.

We carried everything wed need to live off at least for a month, Herbert said.

Herbert is also taking special precautions to cover his cars.
Rusty Irick was moved by a story of survival in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey's devastation in Texas.

Irick, owner of Lil Zo's Carwash and Automotive Detailing at 2428 Russell St. in Orangeburg, said he could not sit idly by and not do something to help those whose lives had been turned upside down by the storm.

As a result, he collected five tons of drinking water for the Texas hurricane victims after posting a message on Facebook outlining his mission and calling for others to support it.

"I just had it on my heart to be of some sort of assistance. So I thought, 'How can we help?' I kind of figured the simplest way was to maybe just get people to contribute some water. So I put up a Facebook post asking people to help," Irick said.

What started with his initial purchase of 20 cases of water morphed into the donation of tons of water that his small office could no longer hold. Some of the water had to be stored at D&B Fried Fish and Barbecue, the restaurant next door to Irick's business.

"We got like five tons of water. I had to move it out of my office because we had so much water in here that the floor started separating. I just asked the neighbor guy to use his restaurant because we ran out of room," Irick said.

What really moved Irick was the story of a 3-year-old hurricane survivor who was found clinging to her mother's lifeless body in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey.

"That was touching. Her mother had drowned trying to save her daughter. So I just started reaching out to people. I just had a guy pull up on Tuesday with 80 cases of water," the businessman said.

He said he soon had to figure out how he was going to get the water transported to its destination. He was able to pair the donations he collected with another relief effort that was being spearheaded by the Columbia radio station Hot 103.9.

"A lady that was very instrumental in helping us generate the water came over and referred a name to us. I called the young lady, who is a radio personality for Hot 103.9. She said they had some things going on and that she would be able to get a truck here, said Irick, noting that he was pleased he found a way to conveniently transport the massive amount of drinking water to where it was needed most.

"What started off to me as something so minute and miniscule became a gigantic deal, he said.

He said as Hurricane Irma threatens to make its own potential path of destruction in the Southeast, helping others should be first and foremost on everyone's minds.

"I would say, 'Do something.' Doing nothing is not an option. I didn't go to an agency. I just felt like, 'OK, I'm a willing vessel. What can I do? What can I say? How can we help?' I knew two people personally who lost homes last year in the flood, Irick said, referencing the October 2016 floods that devastated parts of Orangeburg.

It could have been us; it still can be us," he said. "If we find ourselves in that predicament, we would definitely want an outpouring of help."
Monuments honor treason

Enjoyed reading Gus Speth's editorial page column in The T&D on Sept. 3.

It is truly interesting to note that, while this nation has a plethora of monuments to what Bobby Lee himself, aftet thw war, stated was a treasonous cause, Germany has no monuments to its World War II figures, not even to a non-Nazi like Erwin Rommel, who probably is deserving.

When someone takes an oath of allegiance to the United States, as did almost every Confederate general, then takes up arms against the United States, that is treason, plain and simple.

Thus, heritage argument duly considered, we're honoring and glorifying treason by those monuments very existence, as well by having their names on streets, highways, buildings, etc., a significant amount of which came about long after the time cited in Speth's editorial.

No one is saying erase history. Simply admit what was and that it's not deserving of the ostentatious displays that exist.

Frank H. Staley, Life Member: VFW & American Legion, Upper Marlboro, Maryland

History lesson on R.E. Lee

Since the Charlottesville incident was about Robert E. Lee, here's a little history.

Robert E. Lee was married to George Washington's granddaughter. He worked with Grant during the Mexican-American war and became a decorated war hero defending this country He believed slavery was a great evil and his wife broke the law by teaching slaves to read and write.

In addition, Lee was also very torn about the prospect of the South leaving the Union. George Washington was a huge influence on him. He believed that ultimately states rights trumped the federal government and chose to lead the Southern army.

His estate, Arlington, near Washington, was his home. While he was away fighting the war, the federal government demanded that Lee himself pay his taxes in person. He sent his wife but the money was not accepted from a woman. When he could not pay the taxes, the government began burying dead Union soldiers on his land. The government is still burying people there today. It is now called Arlington National Cemetery. Do they want to tear that up too?

After the Civil War, he worked with Andrew Johnson's program of Reconstruction. He became very popular with the Northern states and the barracks at West Point were named in his honor in 1962. He was a great man who served this country his entire life in some form. His memorial is now being called a blight.

People keep yelling, "You can't change history." Sadly you can. This is no better than book burnings. ISIS tried rewriting history by destroying historical artifacts. Is that really who we want to emulate?

As they tear down this "blight," keep these few historical facts in your mind. No military veteran and highly decorated war hero should ever be treated as such. This is not Iraq and that is not a statue of Saddam.

W. Ashby Rhame, MAJ MI USAR Ret, Rembert

A call to action

On behalf of the board of commissioners of the S.C. Human Affairs Commission, I extend our concern to those involved in the recent and tragic incident in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Motivational speaker Les Brown said, If you dont stand up for something, you may fall for anything. Heather Heyer stood up and will not be forgotten for her courage. The state police who died were working to protect all people and we will not forget them.

The Human Affairs Commission urges the citizens of this state to work together when any people face intolerance or discrimination. We all must continue to spread the word about the importance of advancing diversity and inclusion and to respond to hate with a love and a celebration of our differences. This should be our call to action. This should be our plea to every community in this state.

Our agency was created to promote harmony and goodwill among the diverse people of the state, in part by promoting community relations councils and by eliminating and preventing unlawful discrimination in employment, housing, and public accommodations. We will continue to promote civility with citizens across this state to bring about respect and dignity for all people.

Raymond Buxton II, commissioner
The Emirates Red Crescent (ERC) has signed an agreement for upgradation of the sewage network in the governorate of Aden in Yemen, at a total cost of Dh3 million ($816,616).



The signing was held in the presence of Yemeni Prime Minister Ahmed Obaid bin Daghr. It provides for raising the network's operational capacity by replacing the dilapidated drainage pipes and joints, reported state news agency Wam.



Bin Daghr lauded the UAE's humanitarian efforts in Yemen and referred to the vital role played by the ERC in the liberated governorates of Yemen.



Mohammed Saeed Al Ketbi, the director of the ERC office in Aden, said the assistance was part of the UAE's approach to help the brotherly Yemenis overcome the difficulties caused by the Houthi coup, it added.
Global insurance broker Pacific Prime has announced it has partnered with Orient Insurance, Allianz Worldwide Care to help deliver a new international insurance solution for individuals in Dubai.

The plans provide people with exceptional international health coverage coupled with Allianz Worldwide Cares reputation as one of the best insurers in the world, said a statement.

The Dubai Healthcare Plan provides up to $10,500,000 in maximum plan benefits, access to private hospital rooms, and an extensive list of core plan benefits that include intensive care, medical evacuation and surgical fees.

In addition to solid outpatient and inpatient coverage, Dubai residents will also benefit from a range of dental and maternity options along with the fact that the plan is fully compliant in Dubai, said the statement.

David Hayes, global director of sales and renewals at Pacific Prime, said the company is excited to be working with Allianz. Were delighted to continue delivering on our relationship with long-term partner, Allianz Worldwide Care, to help launch their Dubai-based plan for individuals. Whats more, we fully believe that their high level of service and experience in the region will translate to plans that people in Dubai can rely on. - TradeArabia News Service
Senior officials from France's Total will meet industrialists from major Iranian companies this week to discuss cooperation in the implementation of the 11th phase of South Pars Gas Field, an official said.



"A meeting between representatives of Total and Iranian manufacturers of oil industry equipment will be held on Wednesday," head of Society of Iranian Petroleum Industries Equipment Manufacturers Reza Khayyamian told reporters on Saturday, according to a Fars News Agency report.



He underlined that companies which can provide products compatible with the standards of the project will join the project.



The deal for developing phase 11 of the supergiant South Pars Gas Field was signed in July between the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) and a consortium of Total and China's CNPC.



A top NIOC official said the contract will be implemented in two phases: The first phase is worth $2.4 billion, resulting in the production of two billion cubic feet of gas from phase 11. The value of the second phase is also $2.4 billion.



Total will operate the SP11 project with a 50.1 percent interest, while Iranian Petropars company will have a share of 19.9 percent and the Chinese CNPC 30 percent.
Chinese companies can take advantage of attractive investment opportunities in Oman, said a top-level official at the Special economic Zone Authority Duqm (Sezad).



Oman ensures the success of Chinese investments, which are built on the close friendship, cooperation and mutual interest between the two countries, Yahaya bin said Al Jabri, chairman of Sezad, was quoted as saying in a Times of Oman report.



While addressing a gathering at the China-Arab States Expo 2017, he said that there are lucrative business opportunities for the Chinese private sector, either operating alone or in partnership with the Omani private sector.



Al Jabri added that the investment projects that will be completed in Duqm will not only be lucrative for promoters, but also will contribute to the efforts made by the sultanate to diversify the national economy, reduce reliance on oil revenues, impart technology and technical expertise, create job opportunities for Omani youths and increase productivity in various economic sectors, especially industry.



The sultanates delegation to China-Arab States Expo 2017 was led by Al Jabri and included representatives from public firms.



Omans participation was for promoting investment opportunities in the country, especially in Duqm special economic zone.



A large number of Chinese private and government officials and representatives of Arab, Asian and African countries participated in the China-Arab States Expo 2017, added the report.
Uber, a leading ride-hailing technology company, has entered into a strategic partnership with ArabiaWeather, a leading provider of weather products, services and solutions.



Through this partnership, the two companies will leverage each others' technologies to provide people with a reliable weather forecast and an Uber ride when they need it the most and at the push of a button, and especially during severe weather conditions.



The partnership allows visitors of ArabiaWeather's platforms in Jordan and Saudi Arabia to easily sign-up for an Uber account when checking local weather conditions in their area. As part of the partnership, Uber created a promo code to offer first time users who sign-up through ArabiaWeather platforms and at the push of a button, 50 per cent off their first two rides. In Saudi Arabia, the promo code will be AwKSA (up to SR20 off each ride), and in Jordan promo code AwJordan will apply (up to JD2 off each ride).



"We are very pleased to be partnering with a pioneering company such as Uber, which has demonstrated true leadership in the sharing economy and the realm of innovative technologies. There is a natural synergy between the services that we each provide due to a strong positive correlation between weather and people's behavior in choosing their preferred mode of transportation. Both of our companies are aiming to provide the public with the tools they need to seamlessly plan, prepare and conduct their lives," said Mohammed Al Shaker, ArabiaWeather founder and CEO.



Commenting on the partnership, Anthony Khoury, Uber Middle East general manager, said: "We are delighted to partner with ArabiaWeather. Uber is in over 25 cities around the region, and this partnership is aligned with our continuous efforts to provide the largest number of people with safe, reliable and affordable transportation when and where they want it, whether that is on a hot summer day, or a rainy night out in town. As a technology company, we are always excited to work with tech-innovators like ourselves, and with regional players and startups like ArabiaWeather who deliver daily weather conditions to millions around the region."



As part of the partnership, Uber will be part of the weather company's communication channels, which is in-line with Uber's efforts to reach the largest number of people in Jordan and Saudi Arabia.



Utilising ArabiaWeather's unique technology, hyper-local and weather-targeting features, tailored communication will be offered to deliver to the right people and at the right time, for them to be able to request a reliable and affordable ride when they need it the most, the statement said. - TradeArabia News Service
Schneider Electric, a global leader in energy management and automation, recently announced the list of the 12 teams to compete in the final round of Go Green in the City, its international student case study competition focusing on innovative energy solutions for smart cities.



Team Cyclops, which included Kanza Naeem Malik and Zohaib Salahuddin from the University of Engineering and Technology, Lahore-Pakistan, was chosen from the Gulf and Pakistan region, said a statement from the company.



As part of the 2017 challenge, the team developed Jashn, a digital web-based concept that monitors power wastage arising from house-hold appliances and alerts users of the excess consumption.



The proposed solution comes in response to the mounting technical inefficiencies in household and commercial devices that are adversely affecting the countrys power supply.



The team was mentored by Lijo Abraham, who is the senior project manager at Schneider Electric.



Hanan Darwish, president  Gulf Countries and Pakistan, Schneider Electric, said: Through the Go Green in the City competition, we aim to broaden the minds of the students and sharpen their skills, by giving them the chance to understand Schneider Electrics operations and IoT- enabled platforms such as EcoStruxure.



This helps them recognize existing challenges in the market and find ways to develop sustainable solutions. Being a global company, we take pride in fostering the growth of young minds across the world and providing a platform that creates future innovators, he said.



Abraham commented: I strongly believe that collaborations between companies and institutions is key to driving innovation and producing future technocrats and business leaders.



As a mentor, I helped the team evolve their initial idea and ensured that the team was presenting the solutions effectively, and succinctly, he said.



The finalists will now prepare for the last challenge of the competition: presenting their final case study to a panel of Schneider Electric executive jury. Each team will continue to be mentored by a Schneider Electric volunteer, who will offer advice and support. Their role is to help the participants develop their solutions, focusing on user needs and the projects impacts, feasibility, and return on investment, said a statement.



Sevda Esenturk, vice president of HR - Gulf Countries and Pakistan, Schneider Electric, said: As the years progress, we are extremely happy to see that more students from the region are participating in this challenge.



We are committed to promoting the communities it operates in and providing opportunities for its growth. The teams Cyclops project is a great way to combat the growing power inefficiencies and clearly exhibits the capabilities of the regions new generation, Esenturk said.



Launched in 2011, Go Green in the City offers engineering and business students (starting from the second year) an opportunity to present their innovative energy management ideas for the smart cities of the future.



As in previous years, participants are asked to propose an energy management solution to meet the challenges of smart cities in five fields: residential, universities, business, hospitals or water management. Each two- person team must include at least one woman.



Interest in Go Green in the City has grown considerably since the competition launch. This year, Schneider Electric received more than 19,000 applications, 20% increase on 2016. In addition, 180 countries are represented, 24 for the first time.



The number of participating universities has increased by 25 per cent to 2,900, while 58 per cent of competitors are women. Go Green in the City has also attracted wider interest on social networks, with a 51 per cent increase in unique visitors to the competition website (more than 130,000), a 123 per cent increase in the number of likes on Facebook (more than 29,000) and 32 per cent more followers on Twitter (1,950), it stated.  TradeArabia News Service
Bahri, a global leader in transportation and logistics, has reached a new milestone by accepting delivery of Rimthan, a 300,000-dwt carrier built by Hyundai Samho Heavy Industries (HSHI) in South Korea.



The addition of Rimthan to its fast-growing fleet of multipurpose vessels, reinforces Bahris position as the worlds largest owner and operator of very large crude-oil carriers (VLCCs) with a 40-strong fleet, said a statement.



The new vessel, built to the latest environmental and fuel-efficient technical specifications, was handed over to Bahri during a delivery ceremony held at HSHIs Mokpo shipyard in South Jeolla Province, South Korea, it said.



Senior Bahri and HSHI officials who attended the ceremony included Saleh Al Debasi, Bahri board member; Dr Abdulmalik Al Hogail, Bahri board member; M K Yoon, president and CEO of HSHI; Hisham Al Nughaimish, acting president of Bahri Oil, among others, it added.



Rimthan is the fourth VLCC to join the Bahri fleet this year, following the delivery of Amjad, Maharah, and, more recently, Aslaf, said a statement.



Al Debasi said: We are very proud to have become the first and largest transportation and logistics company in the world to have a 40-strong VLCC fleet.



Rimthan is the fourth VLCC that our company has received from HHI Group this year with another six vessels on order and to be delivered over the next year and a half, he said.



We are committed proud to be one of the first companies to contributing to the realisation of the transportation and logistics goals set forth in Saudi Vision 2030, and our ongoing fleet expansion will allow us to increase our market share in crude oil transportation while boosting our ability to provide our customers with world-class transportation solutions and value-added customer service and strengthening the Kingdoms standing as a key player in the global shipping and logistics industry, he added.



Ali Al-Harbi, acting CEO, Bahri, said: The addition of Rimthan is yet another step toward strengthening our leadership in the global oil transportation industry.



Our partnership with HHI Group has been instrumental in enhancing our fleet competitiveness, operational efficiency and flexibility, helping us to achieve a high level of customer satisfaction, and with six more VLCCs currently on order, we look forward to further building on our alliance with HHI Group as we continue our pursuit of global excellence, he said.



Yoon said: HHI Group and Bahri have a long-standing relationship that dates several years and involves multiple collaborations. As key national companies, we are fully committed to playing a significant role in achieving our countries vision and global agenda.



Bahri provides us with the opportunity to contribute to the success of Saudi Arabia, he said.



As the worlds largest shipbuilding company, we are proud of this association, and we look forward to further strengthening ties with Bahri and supporting the growing demand for intercontinental and intra-regional transportation fuelled by a rise in global trade and investments, he added.





Bahri Oil, one of the companys six business units, will be responsible for the commercial operation of Rimthan.



Bahri is set to further expand its oil tanker fleet with the addition of Shaden, its 41st VLCC, towards the end of October, it stated.  TradeArabia News Service
Dubai-based Emirates has suspended all flights to Fort Lauderdale and Orlando as Hurricane Irma makes its way to Florida.



Fort Lauderdale Flights have been cancelled till September 10 and Orlando flights from September 9 to 11, the airline said in an advisory on its website.



"We are monitoring the situation closely, and aim to give customers as much notice as possible if there are any further changes to our operations," the carrier said.



Affected flyers have been advised to get in touch with their travel agents or respective Emirates call centres for assistance, ticket rebooking and cancellation, as well as to check the status of their flight. - TradeArabia News Service
Carlson Rezidor Hotel Group has announced the entrance of its lifestyle select brand, Radisson Red, into Latin America.



Radisson Red Campinas has opened just outside of Sao Paulo, Brazil in partnership with Atlantica Hotels International.



Red is a lifestyle select concept enhanced by art, music and fashion with a fresh design and commitment to local flavour. We are delighted to partner with Atlantica to bring this dynamic brand to Brazil, a growing and vibrant locale. The Red concept provides owners with a flexible footprint and a model that is both efficient to construct and operate, said Ken Greene, president, Americas, Carlson Rezidor Hotel Group.



Radisson Red Campinas offers 185 guest studios, an Events + Games studio, 24/7 fitness center and a restaurant that features locally sourced and sustainable foods as well as an array of beverages.



Radisson Red brings something completely new to the Brazilian market with a bold look and friendly service that puts the guest in control, all delivered at a truly great price, said Eduardo Giestas, president and CEO, Atlantica Hotels International who also operates the Radisson Blu, Radisson, Park Inn by Radisson and now Radisson Red brands in Brazil.



Radisson Red Campinas joins Radisson Red Brussels and Radisson Red Minneapolis and Radisson Red Cape Town will open on September 12. In addition, properties in key cities including Glasgow, Miami and Portland are well underway. - TradeArabia News Service
Dubai Culture & Arts Authority (Dubai Culture) has announced the appointment of Cyril Zammit as expert to the Office of the vice chairman of the Board of Directors.



With his extensive experience in the design sector, Zammit will be responsible for providing the authority with industry insights that go toward further strengthening Dubais cultural and creative fabric.



Latifa bin Demaithan, executive office manager, vice chairman of the Board of Directors at Dubai Culture, said: In just six years, Zammit has played a leading role in enhancing Dubais creative scene, particularly by launching Design Days Dubai in 2012 and Dubai Design Week in 2015. He continues to strengthen the cultural and design agenda through his involvement with the designers and consultancy work. We are delighted to be bringing him on board as we are confident that his insights will further our aim to reinforce Dubai as a global capital for design and the creative industries as a whole.



Zammit provided Dubai Design Week with a distinctive identity, original content and international connections, and established Design Days Dubai as the only fair in the Middle East and South Asia focused entirely on collectible and limited edition designs. He works closely with renowned galleries, designers and professionals from the design industry to support the ongoing vision of the city, and brings a birds-eye view of Dubais design sector to the Authority.



Demaithan added: With his extensive regional and international experience, Zammit has the ideal profile to support Dubai Cultures local and global ambitions for the Emirates design sector. As we continue to reinforce Dubai as a world-leading destination for culture, we prioritise working with the worlds top talents, and we are excited about this promising new addition to our team.



Zammit said: I am honoured to have been appointed as an expert to Dubai Culture  an authority that supports Dubais thriving design scene and its creative community. It is a privilege to be part of this field, which is undergoing a phase of rapid development and progress at home while also reinforcing its position on the global scene. My aim is to support Dubai Cultures wide range of initiatives with a new outlook and fresh perspectives; collectively we can expand Dubais exciting design potential and share it with the world.



Zammit has worked for prestigious events and companies. While part of the HSBC Private Bank (Switerland) team he initiated and managed the sponsorship of Design Miami/ and Design Miami/Basel. He also oversaw the sponsorship of Art Basel, Art Basel Miami Beach and the UBS Verbier Festival Youth Orchestra at UBS Wealth Management (Switzerland). Additionally, Mr. Zammit was part of major cultural events including the Montreux Jazz Festival. He also has a wealth of regional knowledge from his role as senior sponsorship and funding manager for the Tourism Development & Investment Company (TDIC) in Abu Dhabi.



Dubai Culture aims to enhance Dubais cultural scene and draw attention to the emirates rich heritage with a variety of initiatives that take place throughout the year. The authoritys mandate is to build bridges of constructive dialogue between different civilisations and cultures through enriching initiatives that benefit the emirates citizens, residents and visitors. - TradeArabia News Service


DENVER  A law protecting the medical marijuana industry from interference from the federal government has been extended through December.

Marijuana Business Daily reported Friday that the law, known as the Rohrabacher-Blumenauer amendment, was extended under the provisions of an aid package for victims of Hurricane Harvey approved by Congress.

The law bars the U.S. Justice Department from using federal funds to interfere with state medical marijuana programs or prosecuting medical marijuana businesses following state laws. It must be renewed yearly and had been set to expire Sept. 30.

The law's future was in doubt when it was blocked from receiving a vote in the House this week. However, it was extended without a direct vote as part of the extension of government funding that was part of the aid deal.
Thanks to a $5,000 grant from the MDU Resources Foundation, locally known as Knife River, the caregivers of those with an Alzheimers or dementia diagnosis who receive direct services from Wyoming Dementia Care will continue to have access to the completely free support services.

According to board chairman David Wheeler, M.D., Ph.D., the generosity of the MDU Resources Foundation will make a significant difference in Wyoming Dementia Cares ability to reach out and help caregivers. This award from the MDU Resources Foundation will help us continue to support caregivers in an immediate and truly meaningful way.

We are so thankful for support from MDU Resources and Knife River. The caregivers we work with are heros among us, and it is an honor to serve them. said Dani Guerttman, executive director of Wyoming Dementia Care. All the donations we receive stay local in our community to help people in Natrona and Converse counties who face a dementia diagnosis. Our mission is to provide all services at no cost to caregivers.

Wyoming Dementia Cares mission is to help families and the caregivers of those with Alzheimers disease and dementia-related illnesses. Wyoming Dementia Care provides free direct services, support, and access to community resources helping caregivers meet the challenges of caring for their loved ones.

Services include one-on-one counseling, five monthly support groups with on-site respite care, in-home respite care through a voucher program, care planning, disease education, Music & Memory Individualized iPods, a monthly dementia-focused art class, community outreach and dementia training for health care providers. Our goal is to provide a continuum of care from the first diagnosis of a dementia-related illness, including Alzheimers, through the end of life. The free services Wyoming Dementia Care offers to achieve that goal are built around providing education and direct support for local caregivers.
Monday support meetings

Alcoholics Anonymous: 6:30 a.m., 917 N. Beech; 8:30 a.m., 500 S. Wolcott; 10 a.m., 328 E. A St.; noon, 500 S. Wolcott; 2 p.m, 917 N. Beech; 5:30 p.m., 328 E. A; 6 p.m., 500 S. Wolcott, Ste. 200; 6 p.m., 456 S. Walnut; 7 p.m., 917 N. Beech; 8 p.m., 328 E. A. Douglas: 7:30 p.m., 628 E. Richards (upstairs in back). Unless otherwise noted, all meetings are open. Casper info: 266-9578; Douglas info: (307) 351-1688.

Al-Anon: Noon, 701 S. Wolcott, St. Marks Church, main entrance, left to library.

Narcotics Anonymous: Noon, 500 S. Wolcott, 12-24 Club; 7 p.m., 302 E. 2nd, Methodist Church; 8 p.m., 4700 S. Poplar (church basement). Web site: http://www.urmrna.org.

Teen Addiction Anonymous: 3:30-4:30 p.m., Boys & Girls Club Teen Center. Info: 258-7439.

Adult Children of Alcoholics: 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m., 12-24 Club, 500 S. Wolcott St., Suite 200.

TOPS Weight Loss: 5:30 p.m., Weight Loss Support Group TOPS #246, Wyoming Oil & Gas Building, 2211 King Blvd. Use NE door entry. Info: 265-1486.

Toastmaster Clubs seeking members

Toastmasters is a step by step program designed to learn how to prepare and deliver presentations (both planned and impromptu) and improve communication and learn leadership skills. Many individuals have advanced in their careers using skills learned in Toastmasters. Students are always welcome. Toastmasters is a National/International Organization aimed at self-improvement and you can review their web site at toastmasters.org. There are three clubs in Casper:

Morning Tour Toastmasters meets weekly Mondays, 6:30 a.m. to 7:40 a.m. at Perkins Restaurant. For information, contact Jens at 267-6406 or Mary Ann at 234-0158.

Toastmasters is devoted to providing the opportunity for men and women to develop communication and leadership skills in a mutually supportive learning environment.

Jersey Mikes helps Harvey victims

More than 1,300 Jersey Mikes Subs locations across the country, including 3095 Talon Dr., in Casper, are partnering with the Houston Food Bank and Corpus Christi Food Bank to help Texas residents impacted by Hurricane Harvey.

This two-part program provides needed donations to the two local food banks:

1. From Monday through Sunday, Sept. 17, participating Jersey Mikes locations will donate $1 for every regular sized #7 Turkey Breast and Provolone sub sold.

2. Through a grassroots program in September, Jersey Mikes will hand out special cards in local communities nationwide offering a free sub for a $2 donation to the food banks. Cards can be redeemed in participating restaurants from Friday, Sept. 15, through Friday, Dec. 1.

Low vision support

Casper Low Vision Support Group will resume meeting at 10 a.m., at the Casper Senior Center.

We will discuss the challenges faced this summer by those with low vision and how they were handled.

The last 15 minutes of the meeting will be a demonstration of Script Talk or if you like, we will download the Be My Eyes app on your phone.

Reminder that the convention for the Wyoming Council of the Blind is September 23 here in Casper. Contact Muriel McNeely at 234-5688 with questions.

If you need a ride to the meeting, call Howard at 234-5867.

DAR meets

Fort Caspar Chapter, Daughters of the American Revolution will meet at 10 a.m., at the Shepherd of the Hills Community Room, corner of Wyoming Boulevard and South Poplar Street.

The program will be entitled A Fair to Remember, and will highlight the many ways members may participate in and support the Mission State of DAR.

The program will include complimentary coffee and pastries, and a short business meeting will follow. Also meeting afterwards will be the newly formed state chapter of Daughters of 1812. Both organizations are lineage service organizations open to women 18 years and older.

For more information, contact Susan at 577-7146.

Mark Young speaks at Patriot Day

Former Casper fire chief and current deputy state fire marshal Mark Young is the guest speaker at this years Patriot Day ceremony at 11 a.m., in the Tom Walsh chapel at the Wyoming State Veterans Cemetery.

The purpose of the ceremony, sponsored by the Natrona County United Veterans Council, is to pay tribute to all police officers, firemen and first responders who gave their lives in the line of duty this past year. All are welcome to show their pride for these brave men and women.

Chief Kenny King of the Casper Fire Department will serve as master of ceremonies. King and Casper police lieutenant Shane Chaney will honor the fallen and the Casper Pipe & Drums will perform.

Bible study at PoP

Join us Mondays, beginning September 11, 2017 through October 23, 2017 for Womens Bible Study at Prince of Peace Lutheran Church, 2300 E. 15th St. There will be two classes offered, 3:15 to 5:15 p.m. and 6:30 to 8:30 pm. Workbooks are $13. To sign up, please contact the church at 234-6475 or email pop@casperpoplc.org. Prince of Peace is located at 2300 East 15th Street.

Join Beth Moore, Kay Arthur, and Priscilla Shirer in a womens Bible study recorded live at the Orlando Deeper Still conference.

Kay Arthur teaches from basically, the entire book of Hebrews! Hebrews is both an example of Gods faithfulness and a challenge to believers to be faithful in difficult times.

Priscilla Shirer teaches from Ephesians 3:20-21 on Gods abundance. A fundamental basis for every believer is the absolute reality that God can do whatever He chooses to do. Gods ability empowers our faithfulness.

Beth Moore teaches on the topic of discernment. In these difficult days it is absolutely essential that we learn to trust the Holy Spirit to enable us to determine what is true and what is false.

Tween Cooking Club: Fruit Smoothies

The Natrona County Librarys Tween Cooking Club will meet at 4 p.m. Students in grades 4 to 6 will make fruit smoothies. All supplies provided at no cost. New members always welcome. Call 577-READ x5 for more information.

First Steps Genealogy Series: Where to Start

The Natrona County Library and Natrona County Genealogical Society will host a First Steps Genealogy Series this fall at the library. Each class will be taught by Annie Vercimak with the Natrona County Genealogical Society. The first class titled, Where to Start, will be held at 6 p.m. Attendees will learn about a variety of genealogy resources, how to start with what they know, complete pedigree charts and family group sheets, and organize papers and processes. Limited number of spots available. Registration required. Registrants must attend the entire series. Call 577-READ ext. 2 or email reference@natronacountylibrary.org for more information.

Photographers meet

The September meeting of the Casper Photography Club will be at 7:15 p.m., at The Wyoming Oil and Gas Commission Bldg. The program will be presented by Sam Sherman on ranch photography. Refreshments will be provided by Rob Corbin and Jess Burgardt. Christmas show pictures must be submitted at this meeting so get your Christmas 15 labeled and ready to go. For those participating in the Nic show, pictures are due at the October meeting.
The McMurry Foundation recently awarded $10,000 to Wyoming CARES, a 501 (c)(3) statewide charitable agency. Funds received from The McMurry Foundation will be used to provide financial assistance and services to residents of Natrona County.

Through Wyoming CARES, funds raised in Wyoming stay in Wyoming for residents of Wyoming. Targeting those who fall through the cracks of available assistance, within guidelines, Wyoming CARES can assist in many areas of need, both medical and non-medical. Residents of all levels of income are invited to request assistance in times of catastrophic need.

Established in 1998 with a mission to have a significant and beneficial impact on Wyoming communities, The McMurry Foundations board of directors, George Bryce, Susie McMurry and director, Trudi McMurry, are guided by the values of excellence and compassion with emphasis on education, religion, children, advocacy for children, health and human services, the arts and humanities and a favorable business environment. The foundation also invests in innovative ventures, as well as established community programs that have the potential to make a lasting difference.

For details about Wyoming CARES, contact the state office at 237-7035 and 1-866-996-6564.
At least one Casper resident isnt afraid of mixing church and state.

Dale Zimmerle attended the Casper City Councils Tuesday night meeting and asked members to consider opening meetings with prayer now that the city has terminated their contract with former city attorney Bill Luben.

Luben, whose departure was described as a mutual decision by council members, ended his long tenure at Casper City Hall last week.

Assistant City Attorney Will Chambers is currently serving as interim city attorney until a permanent replacement is found.

Zimmerle, who has brought up this issue before, recalled that Luben had cautioned the council that praying at meetings might open the city up to lawsuits.

These kind of cases end up in federal court as a civil rights violation, Luben told council in February. If we lose we end up paying attorneys fees.

However, Zimmerle told council members that other councils across the United States are including prayer in their meetings and said he failed to understand why Casper could not follow their example.

Zimmerle also thanked Councilman Dallas Laird for the billboard he placed downtown that states God is not dead.

After the meeting ended, Laird stated that he absolutely supports Zimmerles idea, as long as no one who attended the meetings was forced or pressured into praying.

Laird acknowledged that some residents might have issues with mixing religion into a city council meeting, but the councilman said nothing will ever please everyone.

It says In God We Trust on money, he added.

Mayor Kenyne Humphrey said Friday she was flexible on the issue of public prayer and would be willing to support what council members and community residents believe is best.

Humphrey said she will discuss the matter further with council members at an upcoming work session and will seek legal advice from the acting city attorney.

Humphrey, who has been on council for over a decade, said she cannot recall a meeting ever being opened with a prayer.

However, the mayor said the council has held moments of silent reflection when significant community figures passed away.
As the nation marks the 16th anniversary of 9/11 on Monday, local veterans and the public will come together in Casper to remember fallen first responders.

Former Casper fire chief and current deputy state fire marshal Mark Young is the guest speaker at this years Patriot Day ceremony at 11 a.m. Monday in the Tom Walsh chapel at the Wyoming State Veterans Cemetery.

The purpose of the ceremony, sponsored by the Natrona County United Veterans Council, is to pay tribute to all police officers, firemen and first responders who gave their lives in the line of duty this past year.

Patriot Day was enacted by the U.S. House of Representatives in October 2001 and is recognized as the official day of remembrance for Sept. 11, 2001, the catastrophic terrorist attacks on the United States.

On that day, three jet planes were hijacked and crashed into the New York World Trade Center and the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, causing the deaths of 2,977 people. The fourth plane (United Airlines Flight 93) was directed at Washington DC, but its passengers bravely attempted to take back control and it crashed into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

Weve been doing this locally six years now, and its always been about honoring the police officers, firefighters and first responders, said Gary Cohee of the sponsoring group. All are welcome to show their pride for these brave men and women.

Chief Kenny King of the Casper Fire Department will serve as master of ceremonies. King and Casper Police Lieutenant Shane Chaney will honor the fallen by reading the names of all who have died nationally in the line of the duty during the past year. Cohee said the names are provided by national databases that police and fire are able to access.

Cohee has been involved with the veterans group for seven years, and said is official title is Cecils go-fer. Cecil Barnes is the venerable president of the group and has been for a lengthy period of time.
CHEYENNE  More than five months after a Cheyenne man was sentenced to 18-20 years in prison for killing 13-month-old Silas Ojeda last October, the boys face has appeared on the wall of a building at a busy intersection in town.

Linda Guerrero, the wife of Silas Ojedas grandfather, and other family and friends planned a mural on the old Salvation Army building.

The boys body hasnt been found, and the Laramie County Sheriffs Department is still actively investigating the case, said Department Spokeswoman Capt. Linda Gesell.

We will never close this case until we try to find the body and interview the mother, she said.

The mural is meant to memorialize Silas and raise awareness about child abuse.

Since (the incident) happened, it opened my eyes that people do that to their kids, Guerrero said. This is about raising awareness  people dont know about child abuse . It could happen to anybody.

Local artist Eddie Fernandez was recently working on the mural.

A striking black-and-white portrait of the boy peered over the side of the building down the roadway. Teddy bears flank the image.

I have the ribbon started over there, Fernandez said, pointing to a blue area in the corner of the building. That is going to wrap around, and were working on a slogan for it.

Cheyenne Stitch owner Steve Sears owns the building. He said it was an easy choice to say yes when asked to help the cause.

Anything that I could ever do to prevent child abuse or a tragedy like that, Ill do anything I can, he said.

Logan Rogers, the boyfriend of Silass mother, Rhiannon Ojeda, was sentenced in March to 18-20 years in prison after pleading guilty to manslaughter.

In his court confession, Rogers said he had been using methamphetamines around the time Silas died. Rogers said he was making the child a bottle when the boy fell off the counter and had a concussion.

Rogers said the boy had a seizure in the bath, and he attempted to do CPR but was unsuccessful. He confirmed in court that the boys mother was home at the time. She has yet to speak with law enforcement and was never charged in connection with the incident.

Rogers gave the Laramie County Sheriffs Department several leads about where Silas body could be during the months of investigation.

One was a dumpster at Laramie County Community College, where Rogers said he dumped the boys body after wrapping him in a white blanket.

Cadaver dogs also identified the drivers side door of Rhiannon Ojedas car and the dumpster at LCCC as having contact with human remains.

When nothing was returned, the search then turned to a landfill in Ault, Colorado, where Cheyenne dumps most of its municipal trash.

Crews sifted through 3.3 million pounds of garbage through 10 days and found nothing.
It was pure joy galloping across the Mongolian grassland through cold rain and wind, a freedom unlike any other Rick Helson had experienced, a freedom worth the bowel issues to come.

Helson, a public defender from Sweetwater County, had traveled thousands of miles to try his hand at the self-proclaimed toughest horse race in the world. The events premise is simple and insane: draw a handful of riders from around the world, supply them with a fleet of semi-wild horses and give them 10 days to race 600 miles across the Mongolian steppe.

The horses just ran and ran, that was an incredible feeling, Helson recalled Wednesday, safely back in his Rock Springs office. They just have heart like you havent seen.

Helson had few expectations when he arrived for the race, modeled after a postal route created by Genghis Khan in the year 1224. Competitors even ride the same small, sturdy breed of horses that carried Khan to victories across the continent.

Im just old enough to know that its not going to be like I expect, the 59-year-old said with a chuckle.

The idea to take on the race came to Helson a few years ago after a friend sent him a link to a National Geographic story about the event. This year, he decided to apply to the race, which is organized annually by a British company called the Adventurists. When he was accepted, he went to work preparing for the adventure.

Completing the race, Helson knew, would take a combination of training, grit and, most importantly, luck.

He tackled the first requirement with vigor. For months, he worked with a personal trainer to get in shape and lose weight. He took riding lessons on his grey Quarter Horse mare, the first horse he learned to ride just seven years ago. He learned about endurance riding, a sport far different than the ranch work with which he was more familiar.

Then, at the beginning of August, he left for Mongolia.

After arriving at base camp, Helson and the other riders spent three days practicing navigation and learning to ride the horses. The classes were meant to prepare the riders as best as possible, though the events website warns potential participants that the chances of being seriously injured or dying as a result of taking part are high.

But there were no guarantees, he said.

His first horse in the race seemed determined to prove that true. While many of the horses he rode preferred to run at full speed at all times, the first one simply refused to move quickly. At one point, the horse simply stopped and then proceeded to roll over with Helson still on board.

Other riders throughout the race faced similar acts of equine defiance, the competitions blog shows. One got kicked in the face. Others had to dismount and walk their horses for miles when the animals refused to be ridden. Multiple competitors lost their horses  and gear  altogether when their steeds took off riderless. One rider went without stirrups for nearly 25 miles.

Unfortunately, Helsons luck did not hold and race organizers pulled him from the competition halfway through the second day due to dehydration and hypothermia. He had picked up a bacteria during his time in country and it was creating chaos in his bowels.

I was very disappointed, but I was just rational enough to recognize that it was for the best, he said. I knew going into it that it was one of the possibilities.

Organizers did allow him to ride again on the ninth day of the competition. Along with a few others who were disqualified from the race, he rode about 75 miles while accompanying competing riders during their final miles. While the group was competitive, everybody wanted to help each other out, he said.

Wed rather see them finish than not, Helson said.

After a celebratory night of bonfires and vodka, Helson and the others started their journeys home.

In the end, it certainly was worth it, Helson said. But its unlikely hell attempt the Mongol Derby again.

There are so many other things to do out there, he said.
Wyomingites need better access to the people elected to represent them.

In the age of Facebook Live and other tools that bring audiences face-to-face with whats going on across town, across the state, across the country or across the world, people who live here should be able to observe their lawmakers doing the states business without having to be in the same room at the same time.

Holding meetings during the interim session in smaller towns across the state  Thermopolis, Buffalo, etc.  is in one way a good start. It gives people who live in more rural areas a better opportunity to see their lawmakers in action than they would have if the meetings were held in Cheyenne.

But in a broader sense, the move is counterintuitive. Because lawmakers arent broadcasting the legislative goings-on, moving the gatherings to smaller towns actually decreases access for the bulk of Wyomings population  not a desirable outcome.

Fortunately, theres an easy solution, and its one that comes at minimal cost. The Wyoming Legislature should invest in some basic equipment  wed suggest a smartphone microphone and a tripod, for a total that barely reaches into three figures  and suddenly be equipped to connect with the rest of its constituents. Like many Wyomingites, we take pride and pleasure in our states open spaces and the opportunities for solitude they provide, but in this instance, it would be better to have the opportunity to come together to make decisions for the good of the state.

Though it wouldnt cost much to broadcast and share the sessions, and it wouldnt be difficult to do, the reward could be very high. People would be better empowered to improve their participation in government. Even if they werent able to watch a session live, recording it would allow them to catch up later at a time more convenient for them.

Improving access is particularly essential because of the magnitude of the decisions Wyoming must make in the coming years, many of them involving money. For example, the state must address its $530 million funding gap for public education  but recent polling suggests lawmakers arent as tuned in to the opinions of their constituents as they might have thought they were. Theyve long rejected raising taxes or creating new ones, sighing that voters just wont support it. However, a survey recently suggested that three-quarters of Wyoming voters would be up for paying more in taxes to support public schools, while more than half would be OK with raising the sales tax.

That fundamental gap  potentially just one of many  indicates that legislators need more contact with their constituents, not less.

The choices our legislators make during the session that starts in January will resonate for decades. This is a pivotal point, one that deserves as much input and dialogue as possible.

More and better public access to legislative decision-making activities is a worthy goal that is within easy reach, and its time for our state government to make it a priority.
As the construction industry steadily adds jobs to keep up with economic activity, finding skilled laborers is posing a challenge.

A new report by the Associated General Contractors of America shows the majority of firms are having a hard time filling hourly craft positions such as carpenters, electricians, laborers and painters.

Most firms believe labor shortages will remain difficult, or get even worse, during the next 12 months, the report says. If the kind of workforce shortages the industry is experiencing persist, there will be significant short-term and long-term implications for the broader U.S. economy.

Short-term, the report says, firms will hesitate to bid on construction projects for fear of not having the workforce to meet contractual obligations.

Long-term, construction companies will turn to new technology such as drones, robotics and GPS-guided equipment to compensate, thus eliminating these jobs for future generations.

Locally, the worker shortage is starting to worry industry leaders.

It is a growing issue and concern in Tucson said David Godlewski, president of the Southern Arizona Home Builders Association. Weve started to hear from builders who are having home starts delayed because the trades dont have enough workers.

SAHBA has been working closely with groups that train students in construction careers and lobbying for more funding of trade programs.

Weve also been working to get an understanding of the H2B guest-worker program and promoting immigration reform, Godlewski said. We are worried that if demand for home building sees a big uptick, there may be significant challenges getting the homes built.

In July, homebuilders opened 277 single-family residential permits in Pima County. That was a 16.9 percent jump from 2016 and the highest permit volume since 2008, year-to-date.

The AGC report said 74 percent of Arizona construction firms plan to expand and add hourly craft personnel in the next 12 months and 75 percent said they are having a hard time filling hourly craft positions.

More than half  55 percent  expect it will continue to be hard to hire hourly craft workers and 35 percent believe it will become harder to hire, the report shows.

Ramon Gaanderse, executive director of the Arizona Transportation Builders Association, which represents civil and highway construction firms, said they are also feeling the effects of a worker shortage.

He said chain restaurants offer young workers good pay, benefits and the luxury of working indoors.

We offer work outside, in the heat, Gaanderse said. Many of todays young people are not willing to put in that kind of effort.

And, since the majority of current skilled laborers are older, the problem is expected to get worse in the next decade as they retire.

Were having to go elsewhere to find the skilled labor, Gaanderse said. We go to North Dakota to entice construction workers with Tucsons warm weather.

He said the association is targeting schools in Southern Arizona that have some construction-related curriculum in place and invite those students to an annual fair to give them hands-on experience.

Were introducing the industry to the next generation and getting these kids to understand the technology, Gaanderse said.

He, too, fears automation may eliminate these jobs in the future.

I still think thats a ways away, he said, but its definitely being spoken of and being tested.

The AGC report urged advocacy for programs that teach these skills both in high schools and junior colleges.

The bottom line is construction firms will figure out a way to cope with labor shortages, the report says. If federal, state and local officials enact measures to expand construction-focused career and technical education opportunities, and make it easier for all firms to establish construction training programs, then the solution will come from an influx on new, highly-paid workers.
We've collected a few front pages from newspapers.com to give you a look at some Sept. 10 papers in history. With a subscription to newspapers.com you can search the Arizona Daily Star and many other newspapers using keywords or dates, and download articles or pages.
Killer Schmid Fights For Life After Stabbing

By KEN BURTON

Star Staff Writer

Triple-killer Charles H. schmid Jr., stabbed and slashed between 14 and 20 times in a Thursday attack at his Arizona State Prison dormitory, remained in critical condition at Maricopa County Hospital yesterday.

"I don't think you would be overstating the case if you say he's fighting for his life," said Arthur Paxton, an assistant to the hospital administrator. "Any time a patient is in critical condition, he is fighting for his life."

The 32-year-old Schmid was attacked Thursday afternoon, according to prison superintendent Harold Cardwell, in one of the eight-man trusty dormitories located outside the prison wall, but inside the prison chain-link fence.

Schmid was stabbed in one eye, in one lung, was severely slashed in the abdomen and intestines and sustained a severed ureter and numerous other, lesser wounds, all in the face, chest and front torso.

Cardwell said three knives, two of them homemade and fashioned from a putty knife and a piece of steel, were confiscated immediately after the attack.
Tucson student Maya Baker from The Gregory School is among the top 300 competitors in the Broadcom MASTERS  a science, technology, engineering and math competition for middle school students.

The Broadcom MASTERS program, founded and produced by the Society for Science & the Public, seeks to inspire young scientists, engineers and innovators who will solve the challenges of the future.

The Top 300 Broadcom MASTERS were selected from a pool of 2,499 applicants from 49 states and four territories.

They were evaluated by a panel of scientists, engineers and educators. The students were judged on the creativity and originality of their science fair project, their ability to engage in analysis of data and their understanding of STEM principles as they relate to the real world.

Pima Democrats hold school-supply drive

The Pima County Democratic Party is collecting school supplies to donate to public school teachers.

The party is asking for pencils, dry-erase markers, pens, White-Out, notebook paper, notebooks, copy paper, index cards, calculators and rulers, along with hygiene products like tissue boxes and hand sanitizer.

The party will have three collection sites:

Pima County Democratic Party headquarters, 4639 E. First St., from 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday.

400 N. Bonita Ave., on Monday, Sept. 11 and 18, from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.

5447 E. Fifth St., #100, upon arrangement. Contact Luci Messing, lucibmessing@cox.net, to arrange drop off.

Waldorf School offers talks on its philosophy

The Tucson Waldorf School, which serves grades pre-K through eight, is hosting a discussion series to answer questions about the Waldorf philosophy and the Tucson Waldorf School.

The series will address questions about the private school and its processes, such as why it teaches reading differently, how rhythm supports children and what students would get out of a Waldorf education.

The event will be hosted by third-grade teacher John Keeney on Wednesday, Sept. 13, from 6 to 7:30 p.m., and again on Wednesday, Sept. 27, at the Tucson Waldorf School, 3605 E. River Road.

The discussions are open to the public, though an RSVP is required. To RSVP, contact Enrollment@TucsonWaldorf.org
By all accounts, and there were many, the road from genocide to independence was a long, arduous and seemingly impossible journey for the Yoeme people.

But the proud and defiant Yoeme, commonly known as Yaqui, overcame insurmountable obstacles from the nightmarish years in their native Sonora, Mexico, to their exodus to Tucson and nearby communities, to the day on Sept. 18, 1978, when the U.S. government recognized the Pascua Yaqui of Arizona as a federally recognized tribe.

In celebration the Pascua Yaqui Nation will sponsor History Nights, three lecture presentations on Yoeme culture and history in Tucson, Sept. 17, Sept. 18 and Sept. 21, all open to the public.

Federal recognition came after years of efforts led by Anselmo Valencia Tori, the tribes elder and former chairman, who died in 1998. The official recognition gave the Pascua Yaqui similar status to other Native American tribes.

But the Yoeme did not need official tribal recognition to legitimize their presence and cultural contributions.

Our contribution has been the ability to carry on our culture, said Amalia Reyes, supervisor of the Dr. Fernando Escalante Community Library and Resource Center on the Pascua Yaqui reservation southwest of Tucson.

The most recognizable cultural feature is the Yaqui deer dancer, which is incorporated into the tribes logo and central to the annual Lenten ceremony of dancers  Fariseos, Chapayekas, Matachinis  the re-enactment of the Passion of Christ in song and dance. The Easter-time ceremonies, hundreds of years old, mix Spanish Christian teachings and ancient Yaqui traditions.

Yaqui history and culture stretches to southern Sonora where the Yoeme inhabited various communities along and near the Yaqui River where Ciudad Obregon exists today, about 300 miles south of Tucson as the crow flies. While southern Sonora was the center of Yaqui life and culture, in precolonial days they had traveled beyond the Yaqui River to other areas, including Southern Arizona.

When the Spanish colonizers, soldiers and priests arrived to the Yaqui River in the early 16th century, the eradication of the Yoeme began. The newcomers cherished the fertile land and, later, the silver discovered in the area.

The Yaquis fiercely resisted. Those who werent slaughtered were shipped away to other parts of Mexico to work as slaves. Others fled. After Mexican Independence in 1810, the Yaquis, along with other indigenous people, Mayo and Opata, fought Mexican attempts to steal their ancestral lands, and against enslavement and elimination. Eventually war, famine, disease and deprivation physically vanquished the Yaquis. But the Yoeme say they never surrendered.

As the 1800s came to an end, the Yoeme, from the young to the old, began leaving in larger numbers. They walked to Southern Arizona for safe haven and established communities in Tucson, Marana and Guadalupe. In Tucson, the Yoeme settled largely north of town, near todays intersection of West Grant and North Oracle roads, today called Old Pascua Pueblo. Pascua, Spanish for Easter, was officially named on Easter Sunday, 1921.

Other Yaquis made their homes in Barrio Libre in South Tucson and in Marana. And many Yaquis who live on their ancestral homelands continue to resist encroachment of their lands and the stealing of their water rights by the Sonoran government and land barons.

While the Yaqui found refuge in Arizona, they encountered hardship, poverty and discrimination. But they persisted. In 1964, with the help of Congressman Morris K. Udall, the Yaqui received 200 acres which has become New Pascua Pueblo and where the tribal offices, homes and the Yaqui-owned Casino del Sol are located.

The Yaqui community has contributed greatly to Tucsons culture and history. Yaqui elders who were laborers have seen their children and grandchildren attend college and join the professional ranks. And the Yaqui tribe is a big employer in the Tucson area through its Casino del Sol.

The History Nights presentations will remind us of their role in our history and share with us the Yoeme story.

Said Reyes: Our contribution is the tenacious belief in ourselves.
At peak periods, thousands of vehicles, pedestrians and cyclists make their way hourly through the East Speedway-North Campbell Avenue intersection, at the northeast corner of the University of Arizona campus

As with many intersections in the city, drivers who have to turn left have a shot during the through traffic cycle  if theres a break in oncoming vehicles  and another with a dedicated arrow after that cycle ends. Thats known as permitted/protected phasing.

Some local officials, including Tucson Police Department Assistant Chief Kevin Hall, say that setup can be dangerous for both motorists and pedestrians, who might not be noticed by drivers scoping an opportunity to turn. There have been six pedestrian-involved collisions, five bicycle-involved collisions and 79 traffic incidents  none fatal  at or near the intersection since mid-2012, according to city GIS data available online.

The vast majority of intersection crashes at red lights are due to permissive left turns, Hall said.

So, if not the current setup, then what?

The university-area intersection will play host to one alternative  a protected left  likely beginning early next year. A protected left simply means drivers are able to make that turn only when they have a green arrow. There are some such intersections in city limits, but few  if any  at a traditional arterial intersection, according to a transportation official. The switch will cost around $25,000, which doesnt include the staff time necessary for the before-and-after studies.

Starting this fall, the Tucson Department of Transportation will begin gathering before data to be able to evaluate the changes impact on collisions, traffic flow, volumes and other metrics.

While conceding that the protected left could reduce the potential for some collisions, Andy McGovern, TDOTs traffic engineering administrator, said he expects to see an increase in traffic delay, as well as a possible increase in red-light running and some kinds of minor accidents, like fender-benders.

On TDOTs website, protected lefts are criticized as very inefficient and a cause of capacity reduction and increased congestion. As it stands, the average driver spends 50 seconds at the intersection during peak periods, according to McGovern.

But Councilman Steve Kozachik, who has been pushing for the pilot project, said that what he described as minimal additional delays are worth the increased safety offered by protected lefts. If the study results are positive, hes hoping protected lefts become standard operating procedure for Tucson arterial intersections with high traffic and pedestrian volumes.

As to the additional delays, he said they would likely be measured in seconds, not minutes.

People can take a few more seconds to get home safely, and youre certainly going to take a lot longer if you end up T-boning somebody, he said.

TDOT, on the other hand, says its hoping to move toward a modified approach to the permitted/protected phasing in which left-turners have a flashing yellow light when the through traffic has a green light to encourage additional caution. In fact, McGovern said his department is drafting a policy to convert intersections with left turn arrows to flashing yellow arrows, and a number are already in place.

Close to the UA campus, several of those signals actually switch to a protected left when there are more pedestrians during the day and back to a flashing yellow in the evening, something McGovern described as one of the citys first forays into adaptive traffic-signal control.

Kozachik takes a dim view of the flashing yellows and part-time protected lefts, arguing that a full-time protected left is simpler.

But in a town like Tucson without the freeway network of Phoenix, where protected lefts are fairly common, McGovern said efficient flow is more important because many motorists get from one end of the city to the other on arterials.

Well find out during the course of next year if those delays acceptable to the motoring public, he said of the upcoming Speedway-Campbell pilot project.

DOWN THE ROAD

Starting Tuesday, the Pima County Department of Transportation will begin microseal treatment of West Ruthrauff/Wetmore Road from North La Cholla Boulevard to North Fairview Avenue. Preliminary work will last through Monday, Sept. 18, with shifts lasting from 5 a.m. to 6 p.m. The treatment will start Oct. 9 and last through Oct. 18. During the work, lane restrictions and reduced speeds will be in effect. Sheriffs deputies, flaggers and a pilot car will be on hand.
When the new AzMERIT scores were released last week, Eileen Sigmund, president of the Arizona Charter Schools Association, couldnt help but brag.

Her organization fired off a press release noting that charter-school students scored better than the state average in virtually every grade level and subject area for the third straight year.

She noted that of the 100 top Local Education Authorities  meaning school districts or groups of charter schools operated by the same entity  97 of the top performers in the English Language Arts portion of the test are charters, as are 93 of the top performers in math.

Sigmund, in an interview, ascribed charters schools successes to the special sauce charter teachers bring to the classroom.

But district-school advocates say comparing charter LEAs to public-school districts is like comparing apples to lemons, and although there are many exceptional charter schools, there are also many at the low end of the spectrum.

Joe Thomas, president of the Arizona Education Association, said the biggest myth about charter schools is that there is a special sauce.

Anybody who is in a classroom knows charter schools arent doing anything different, Thomas said. Their teachers arent teaching in an amazingly different style  theyre not engaging students any differently than district schools. You just have a different caliber of student going to some charters.

Scores for Pima County schools in Fiscal Year 2017.



Scores by county in Fiscal Year 2017.

In fact, charter schools make up an oversized portion of the bottom rung on the testing scale as well.

Of the 100 LEAs that scored worst on the AzMERIT test in math and English, 69 and 68 are charter entities, respectively.

Tucson Unified School District Superintendent Gabriel Trujillo, who started his career in charter schools, said he wasnt surprised that charters made up a large chunk of both the top and bottom performers. What would have surprised him is if charters accounted for a large chunk of the middle-of-the-road scores.

Thats because charters tend to target two types of students, he said. Some charters engage in creaming  or taking the cream of the crop from traditional public schools. Others focus on serving students who didnt succeed at a traditional district school.

Sigmund noted that while charter-school students are a self-selected group that naturally gravitates toward the various types of charter schools, charters cannot cream by requiring that students have high test scores or grades to enter.

The law requires our charter schools in Arizona to accept all those who come to their schoolhouse doors.  It is the same requirements for district and charter public schools for admittance, she said.

Still, Trujillo said comparing a district like TUSD, which has nearly 90 schools, to a charter school LEA, often with just one school, doesnt make any sense.

You could compare individual schools. That would be more appropriate to me, he said.

Charter schools account for 39 percent of Pima County schools with publicly released AzMERIT test scores.

Of the 50 schools in Pima County that performed best on AzMERIT, charters account for 24 percent in the math category, and 30 percent of the top performers in English language arts.

But of the 50 lowest performing schools in Pima County, charters account for nearly half in both subject areas.

Sigmund noted that many of those lowest-performing schools, both on the district and charter side, are alternative schools that are specifically set up to serve students who otherwise probably wouldnt graduate high school.

She said roughly 70 percent of alternative schools are charters and were set up by leaders in the community who saw a need for schools that serve students who would otherwise have dropped out of traditional district schools.

Looking at the lowest 25 performing schools in Pima County, she noted that 15 are alternative district or charter schools, while five are traditional district schools, and five are traditional charters.

The difference between those five charters and five public schools is that if the charters dont improve, theyll likely be closed, Sigmund said. Thats because unlike district schools, charters have an accountability hammer hanging over them in the Arizona State Board of Charter Schools, which is charged with shutting down failing charters.

And while school district governing boards often close or consolidate schools when student enrollment drops, Sigmund said that in her long career in education, shes never seen a single district school shut down for having poor academic performance.

Trujillo said that despite the large number of charter schools occupying the bottom end of the AzMERIT spectrum, theres no avoiding the fact that overall, charter school students outperformed district school students in almost every grade in almost every subject.

He noted that charter schools have some unique advantages that district schools dont, including their self-selecting nature, which means students and parents who seek out charter schools are often more education-focused than their district-attending peers.

You have a group of kids who choose to be at a school, who compete to be at a school, you have parents who have the resources to make sure they go to those schools, youre naturally going to have higher scores.  Now, thats not to say TUSD or Sunnyside is off the hook. We still have abysmal scores, he said.
The election was supposed to have resolved all this.

Pima County voters turned Sheriff Chris Nanos, a Democrat, out of office in part due to a scandal over misuse of seized racketeering money.

Republican Mark Napier took over as sheriff, and the page was turned, right?

Wrong.

Turmoil continues to well up in the Sheriffs Department because the scandal isnt all the way over  and its a useful weapon against the man whose supporters used it to win him the election. Kind of a reverse Pottery Barn rule: You win a fractured department, you own it.

This story, of course, goes back to the controversy over the departments misuse of seized money. My colleague Caitlin Schmidt broke the story back in November 2015, revealing that a niece of then-Chief Deputy Chris Radtke was running cafes at the departments headquarters and the jail rent-free and with equipment purchased by Pima County.

The FBI investigated as a result of Schmidts reporting, and Radtke ended up charged with eight felonies and convicted of one misdemeanor, for theft.

Chief of staff Brad Gagnepain, who was also being investigated, died of suicide in June 2016. Then-Sheriff Nanos lost the November 2016 election in part because of the controversy swirling around the departments misuse of RICO funds, which went back more than a decade.

The story might have ended on May 4, when Radtke was sentenced to probation. But instead, that day, the signs of dissatisfaction were in the courtroom. Some deputies in the audience groaned when the judge accepted the plea agreement, and Sgt. Kevin Kubitskey confronted the federal prosecutor on the case after the sentencing, saying justice hadnt been done.

The steady undertow of grumbling turned into a riptide of rebellion Aug. 31, when KGUN Channel 9s Valerie Cavazos reported that a lieutenant had secretly recorded Napier in a private discussion about the case. The lieutenant, Joseph Cameron, used the recordings to make the case that now its Napier who isnt doing enough about the RICO scandal.

Most questionable to me from the recordings was Napiers comment about the RICO scandal that, A lot of people here did not follow the rules. Im positive of that. All of my chiefs didnt follow the rules. Many captains didnt follow the rules. That is absolute crystal clear.

But I was curious about Cameron, his motives and his thinking, so we agreed to meet for lunch last week at Bob Dobbs.

Cameron was a supporter of the incumbent, Nanos, in last years election, and in 2012 supported incumbent Clarence Dupnik in his winning race against Napier. But Cameron told me his only reason for publicly criticizing Napier was his concern that culpable officials, still high in the department, will never face consequences.

Even Napiers decision in June to ask the Arizona Attorney Generals Office to conduct a second criminal investigation doesnt necessarily satisfy Cameron.

Ive been telling Napier that I dont think he went far enough, Cameron said. Its a matter of public trust, restoring confidence in the agency.

Were taught since the academy, when we see wrongdoing, we need to report it or were just as guilty, he said.

Cameron also pointed to passages in the recordings in which Napier seemed to diminish the significance of the AGs investigation.

But Cameron, a tough cop who leads with his chin when he talks, is not the best messenger for these accusations.

Its not just that he was a political opponent of Napier in 2016, but that he may have an enmity that he says goes back 21 years. And Napier took Cameron off the patrol duty that he loves and put him in charge of the records division. A desk job  not a treat for a street cop.

Perhaps most importantly, in a detail not mentioned on KGUN, Cameron is the former Joe Harvey, a deputy whom Dupnik wanted to fire so badly, for alleged excessive use of force, that Dupnik went to the Arizona Supreme Court to get him canned. But the high court ruled in favor of the merit commission that gave him his job back, and Harvey returned to work.

But first he changed his name, from Joe Harvey to Joe Cameron, because he didnt want to be judged or targeted due to his former name and notoriety. Then he won two promotions, first to sergeant, then to lieutenant.

Attorney Steve Portell, who represents local police unions, has been digging into the RICO scandal and acknowledged his client Camerons flaws as a whistleblower.

But he said Camerons not alone in his unhappiness with Napier.

What Joe Cameron is saying is consistent with what other law enforcement officers have been saying has been going on for a long time, he said. Thats disturbing  to hear this much overlap. You can always discount one or two people.

He added, People who have come forward have been uniformly retaliated against.

Retaliation is something Portell will have to show in court.

In the meantime, Napier is defending his handling of the RICO scandal by saying its right to wait until the AG comes back with the results of its probe  the second investigation of these same facts  before considering administrative consequences for those who broke rules.

I have no reservation about the FBI investigation at all. Ive spoken with them. I believe the investigation was thorough, complete, Napier said. Quite obviously, if the AG were to come back and criminally charge five of my commanders, the administrative part is pretty clear, isnt it?

Everybody wants knee-jerk reactions and emotional response, but Im not going to do that.

That seems defensible  for now. Well know Napier better by how he responds to the AGs investigation.

If he takes decisive action against anyone shown to have approved the misuse of seized money, even Cameron may be satisfied.

If not, you can expect Napiers opponents to drape the RICO scandal over him as if he caused it in the first place.

The next election is only three years away.
Vishnu Reddy, the third and last child in his family, grew up in a remote village with spotty electricity and dark night skies.

The nearest town was Chennai in India, where he was born in 1978. This was where he first began gazing up at the stars.

Almost two decades later, when Reddy was working as a copy editor in a New Delhi newsroom, he jumped at the chance to cover a lecture by Tom Gehrels, an internationally recognized planetary scientist and astronomer, one of the first members of the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory at the University of Arizona and founder of the Spacewatch Program, which surveys the sky for near-Earth asteroids.

After the lecture, Reddy and Gehrels took a cab together so Reddy could interview him. Why should Indians care about asteroids? Reddy asked. Theres all kinds of problems in this world: poverty, food, shelter.

India is surrounded by water on three sides. An impact from an asteroid could cause a tsunami. People could die. Small asteroids are especially dangerous because there are many more of them, Gehrels said.

Can amateur astronomers do anything? Reddy asked. Gehrels told him there are many people in the U.S. with small telescopes who discover and track asteroids that are eventually named.

Im going to do this, Reddy said.

Youre a very enthusiastic young man, he remembered Gehrels saying, but I dont believe you.

I got ticked off, Reddy said. So he returned to the newsroom, filed his story and began researching everything he could about asteroids for the next three years.

Reddy is now an assistant professor at the UA and sits two doors down from Gehrels old office in the Kuiper Space Sciences Building, where he characterizes near-Earth asteroids for impact hazards and mitigation.

He was recently in the news for coordinating a national-scale drill to mitigate an asteroid threat, and, this past spring finished a project with five UA seniors to build two telescopes for much less than buying them would cost.

The telescopes are now housed in the sixth floor of the Kuiper Building and are used to characterize Earths satellites, asteroids and space junk.

Early influences

Reddys parents were doctors. They lived in a small village by choice, to help the sick and poor. We were never poor but we were never rich, he said. I found satisfaction in what I had.

He remembered one morning when he was 4 years old playing in the dirt of his front yard when he saw a rocket launch. He lived near a space agencys launchpad.

Its like what people would have seen in Florida in the 60s, he said.

He found space fascinating. But then my path went in another direction.

My dad did not see that (astronomy) was viable financially to survive, Reddy said.

Reddy started studying filmmaking. When he brought home his first telescope as a teenager, his dad said, Why are you looking at the stars? Hed rather him watch movies to prepare for his future.

Despite the tension, his family did what they could to support him. His sister bought him his first pair of binoculars to observe the asteroid Vesta in the night sky. He made drawings, which he still has, to track its motion through the sky.

Reddy eventually began working in Bollywood, but he was frustrated by the unsteady nature of the work.

He went back to school and got a masters degree in journalism while also working in a newsroom in New Delhi.

He lived in a 10-by-10-foot studio apartment with a roommate who was also interested in astronomy.

It was during this time that he had his life-changing interview with Gehrels.

A spark

Reddy got serious about his dreams to be an astronomer, but he was still a journalist.

On a typical day, Reddy would wake up at 10:30 a.m. in the urban slum where he lived, then head to the newsroom. He didnt have to be at work until 4 p.m., but hed get in early to start researching asteroids.

At 4 p.m. hed start work, deciding which stories to run and editing copy throughout the day. After midnight, his shift would end and hed return to his meticulous research on the only computer in the newsroom with internet access.

During this time, Reddy accumulated six binders of research on asteroids and contacted planetary scientists and amateur astronomers around the world.

Hed catch naps when he could find them, like in elevators. Im an opportunistic sleeper, he said simply. Its just a matter of practice.

A telescope

He sought access to a telescope so he could start discovering his own asteroids. He contacted the big institutional observatories in India.

They were all freaked out because they thought I was doing an investigative piece, Reddy said.

Eventually, Greg Paris, an amateur astronomer in San Clemente, California, tipped Reddy off about a company called Meade that sold telescopes at a discounted price, but still thousands of dollars.

At the time, Reddy was making $30 a month, Which is low even for Indian standards, he said.

Paris offered to buy it for him with the stipulation that Reddy would pay him back when he could.

I didnt even know the guy, Reddy said. Eventually, a philanthropist gave him the money.

But getting the telescope to India took three years, and the import duties drained him of the money he needed to buy the cameras for the telescope.

In the meantime, astronomers had discovered all of the asteroids that could be discovered with this 12-inch telescope, Reddy said. So I was kind of depressed.

Then he met Roy Tucker.

Tucker is an American amateur astronomer whom Reddy contacted and is now an electrical engineer at Imaging Technology Laboratory, a research group of Steward Observatory. Tucker offered to be online to discuss asteroid hunting in real-time. Reddy was the only one who took him up.

I quickly learned that Vishnu had an even greater interest in asteroids than I did, Tucker said. It was obsessiveness channeled into a productive line.

Reddy told him the trouble he was having with getting a telescope, and Tucker agreed to host him in Tucson for a couple of weeks to teach Reddy to find asteroids with amateur equipment in a place with darker skies than New Delhi.

You need money to go to the U.S., Reddy said. So I sold everything I had in my tiny apartment and landed in front of the U.S. Embassy.

Going to America

There were two lines at the embassy for passports. One guy was rejecting everyones application, so I jumped into the other line.

He asked why he was going to the U.S., and Reddy said honestly, Im going to discover an asteroid.

He was granted a passport and landed in Michigan, where he stayed with a host. Then, he took a bus from Michigan to Tucson. It took like six days, Reddy said. I was 24 years old; I saw the real U.S. and met some really crazy people on the bus.

In Tucson, Tucker helped him put his binders of knowledge on asteroids to work.

Astronomers find asteroids by taking photos of the sky multiple times. The stars in the sky should be fixed in place. Astronomers will quickly flip between images, and if they see a point of light moving with respect to the fixed stars, they know its an asteroid.

One evening while he was napping on Tuckers couch, he was shaken awake.

You found an asteroid! Reddy said Tucker told him. He and Tucker have been friends ever since. To this day, they meet Friday nights for pizza and bad sci-fi movies.

Reddy submitted two potential asteroids to the Minor Planet Center, a hub for observational data on asteroids and comets, and one was a new discovery.

He looked at an email they had sent, full of numbers and symbols that he didnt know how to decipher. Tucker pointed at a number in parentheses and said, thats your asteroid. I was expecting a certificate or something, Reddy said. He named the asteroid 78118 Bharat, which is India in Hindi.

During the rest of his asteroid tour of the U.S., he reconnected with Gehrels and met with idols he discovered through his middle-of-the-night research in India.

Back to school

When he returned to India, Reddy started studying for the GRE and applied to the University of North Dakota. They offered a program to transition nonscience majors into science doctoral students. He started in 2004 and earned his doctorate in space studies five years later.

He was a top student, said Paul Hardersen, Reddys masters thesis advisor at North Dakota and now a senior scientist at the Planetary Science Institute in Tucson. Hes very self-motivated and knows what he wants to do and actually does it.

Hes realistic and compassionate and well-rounded, he continued. He doesnt think hes the best thing since sliced bread, he just works hard, which is different for science.

Reddy worked on space missions out of Europe for a few years, where he met his wife, Lucille, also an astronomer.

He eventually made it back to Tucson where he worked at the Planetary Science Institute.

He was hired as an assistant professor in the UAs Lunar and Planetary Laboratory in 2016 and taught his first undergraduate class last spring semester.

Reflecting on where he is now, Reddy said, I am getting paid everyday to do my hobby. Thats what you want to feel.

Toward the future

Reddy, 39, still has his career ahead of him. And although hes changed his career path many times, the one thing that has held it all together was his determination.

So when he took on the telescope-building project last academic year, it was no different.

Hes invested in doing it right and making sure it gets done, said Sameep Arora, one of the seniors on the project, now an intern at American Airlines.

The seniors, under the guidance of Reddy, built two 24-inch telescopes to track satellites and space junk in Earth orbit for a fraction of the price it would have cost to buy them. The students gained valuable experience while fulfilling graduation requirements.

Setbacks in the project, such as parts not coming in on time, were dealt with by Reddy.

There was some frustration, but he would use it as a drive to move the problem forward, Arora said.

Reddy also made time to relax with his students, tell jokes, stories, and give personal insights on life, Arora said.

He does the same thing in his general education classes, which he loves to teach, a trait he thinks he inherited from his parents, who found satisfaction in helping people.

His own piece of advice: I told my students that its OK to not know what you want to do now. But once you do, go out and do it.
An assistant professor of communication at the UA has been stripped of her doctoral degree by Ohio State University  a rare and potentially career-damaging occurrence in higher education.

The OSU Board of Trustees voted Aug. 25 to revoke the advanced degree of Jodi Whitaker, an assistant professor of communication at the University of Arizona. Whitaker received her doctoral degree in communication from the Ohio school in December 2013.

OSU took the action after a study that Whitaker co-authored was called into question by other researchers and ultimately retracted. The university, though, would not say why her degree was revoked, citing student-privacy laws.

Whitaker, who has degrees from Texas A&M and the University of Michigan, joined the UA faculty in 2014 and now teaches a class on the effects of mass media. In fiscal year 2017, her salary was $70,355, according to the UA salary database. As a result of having her doctorate revoked, Whitaker will no longer be allowed to list her Ph.D. from OSU on her curriculum vitae.

The UA is aware of the studys retraction and the revocation of Whitakers degree. However, UA spokesman Chris Sigurdson said her employment status cannot be discussed because it is a personnel issue.

Whitaker did not respond to a request for comment.

]OSU officials told Retraction Watch, a blog that reports on scientific issues such as paper retractions, integrity and fraud, that degree revocations happen about once every two years at OSU, but that is including all levels of degrees, not just doctorates.

The exact reason for the revocation of Whitakers degree was not disclosed by the school. Jeff Grabmeier, senior director of research communication at OSU, said in an email that information is private under the federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA).

In 2015, two researchers who peer reviewed the study approached OSU with concerns the data in the paper Whitaker co-authored with Brad Bushman, her doctoral committee chairman, as a graduate student at OSU were manipulated to support the hypothesis that first-person shooter video games improve real-life shooting accuracy.

The paper was titled Boom, Headshot!: Effect of Video Game Play and Controller Type on Firing Aim and Accuracy.

Bushman is also a professor of communication and psychology and Margaret Hall and Robert Randall Rinehart Chair of Mass Communication at OSU.

The peer review

The paper was submitted to the academic journal Communication Research , where it was peer reviewed. The article was published online in 2012 and in print in 2014.

The process of peer review allows for researchers who are experts in the same field to review the work done by colleagues, give feedback and make recommendations before publication.

Once a research article is published, other researchers can review it again, cite it and use it for their research. Pre- and post-peer reviews are important steps in the scientific process that ensure integrity in research and provide incentive for researchers to avoid errors or fabrication.

Malte Elson, postdoctoral researcher at Ruhr University in Germany, and Patrick Markey, psychology professor at Villanova University, reviewed Whitakers paper after it was published.

We discovered two different data files between which the codes for variables were altered, Markey said in an email to The Lantern, OSUs student paper.

When Markey and Elson approached OSU about their concerns, Whitaker and Bushman said they could not find the raw data to confirm which data file was the correct one.

A Committee of Initial Inquiry at Ohio State University recommended retracting this article after being alerted to irregularities in some variables of the data set by Drs. Markey and Elson in January 2015, according to a retraction notice issued by the editors of Communication Research.

Retractions of published studies are also rare in higher education, but are becoming more common.

Last year, 1,000 out of 1.8 million papers published were retracted, according to Ivan Oransky, co-founder of Retraction Watch and distinguished writer in residence at New York Universitys Carter Journalism Institute, where he teaches medical journalism. He is also the vice president of the Association of Health Care Journalists. That being said, in the year 2000 there were 30 or 40 (retractions) out of a million.

Retractions also play a healthy role in keeping bad research out of circulation and contribute to integrity in science.

But, No surgery is minor surgery, Oransky said, stressing it is a big deal for the author of a published study to have it retracted.

One cleared, one not

Bushman was cleared of data manipulation by OSU.

The university determined that there was no evidence that Bushman participated in, or was aware of, inappropriate data manipulation, Ben Johnson, an OSU spokesman, told the Columbus Dispatch. Therefore, the university found that the allegations brought against Bushman did not have sufficient substance to warrant an investigation and they were dismissed.

Whitaker, however, was not cleared by the school.

Elson and Markey said in a statement to Retraction Watch that their goal of challenging the paper was to correct the scientific record.

We are deeply saddened to hear that this might lead to the end of a fellow scientists (Whitakers) career, they said. There were two authors on the problematic Boom, Headshot! study. That the female, junior researcher is found culpable for those problems while the male, senior researcher is not, seems questionable.

Bushmans research has consistently shown that violent media including video games can lead to aggression, even violence.

Elsons and Markeys respective research has consistently shown the opposite. In fact, Markeys new book, co-authored by Christopher Ferguson, Moral Combat: Why the War on Violent Video Games Is Wrong, argues that violent video games can have positive effects on individuals and society.

Bushman claimed Elson and Markey were engaging in a smear campaign, but ultimately agreed to the retraction of his and Whitakers paper.

Bushman had one other paper retracted in 2016 from the journal Gifted Child Quarterly. He has also had to issue data corrections on papers from 2010 and 2007, according to Retraction Watch.

Bushman did not respond to requests for comment.
At Tucson Medical Center, staff, volunteers and physicians have articulated our values of community, dedication, integrity and compassion. In our value statement, we state that we respect diversity and individuality  and that we will have the courage to uphold our values. We developed these values to honor our tradition and nourish our dreams.

This week I reflected on our values as I watched the news about the administrations directive to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program in six months, and I thought about the dreams that were dampened with that singular action. The program, initiated in 2013 by executive order, is to be discontinued by executive order in 2019, jeopardizing the future of hundreds of thousands of young people throughout our country, including tens of thousands in Arizona.

Instead of embracing these young people and encouraging them to be successful workers and productive members of our communities, their future is unclear at best  frightening at worst. Right when we should be shining a light on their successes, we seem to be poised to send them back into the darkness.

These dreamers are sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers. They are our friends and neighbors, our colleagues and collaborators, our students and teachers, our friends and families.

Individuals who have received deportation deferrals under DACA are workers and students building for a better future. Time and again, they demonstrate that they are serious about contributing to their families and their communities so they can earn the right to stay in this country. They have embraced the opportunity presented and invested in themselves so they can, in turn, make their communities stronger.

As a health-care leader, one of my greatest concerns is having a robust, compassionate and qualified workforce. We take for granted that medical care is available around the clock. But we already have a national shortage of more than 8,200 primary-care physicians. The numbers grow exponentially when you add in other specialties and when you consider needs in the fields like nursing, technology specialists and engineers that are the backbone of health care.

They are not taking jobs from Americans  they are filling critical, hard-to-fill positions in businesses across the country. In health care, we already know those professionals with DACA status are more likely to work in high-need areas, such as rural communities. In Tucson, we need young professionals who are committed to our community. It is shortsighted to say no to the skills, passion and commitment of the dreamers.

At a recent event, I heard Mayor Jonathan Rothschild explain to a group of Tucson health-care professionals who had relocated recently to Tucson that in our city we dont just accept diversity  we seek it out. At TMC, we seek out diversity  we celebrate diversity  because it makes us better, because we build on opportunity to become stronger. TMC is an organization that respects, honors and celebrates diversity, and we support laws that are reflective of our collective values.
Patrick Onchwari is an immigrant from a small village in Kenya. I am a retired math teacher with a devastating terminal neurological disease called amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrigs disease. It has left me paralyzed, dependent on breathing machines, and is now stealing my ability to speak and swallow. Patrick is my full-time caregiver, but he is so much more than that. He is my angel.

This is a story about an unlikely but beautiful friendship, with reasons for why Im grateful that immigrants like Patrick choose to come here.

Patrick was a little boy with a dream to come to America. His family was rich, which meant they had land to grow their food and lots of children to help plant, harvest and fetch water from the river. His house in Kenya had no running water, no electricity and dirt floors. Their tiny home had two bedrooms, one for the parents and one for the seven children.

They learned the importance of a good work ethic and how to run fast because it was necessary for survival. His backyard had giraffes, elephants and baboons, but it was the hyenas that posed the biggest threat to young children and the family chickens.

Patrick and his family had few material goods, but his mother made sure the children made the many kilometer walk to school each day to get an education and learn the Bible. His mom was a strict disciplinarian who did not spare the rod, but also showered her children with love. Patrick credits his mom and her belief in him for his successful journey to America.

Sadly, Patricks mother became ill and the family was unable to afford treatment in the city for what turned out to be cancer. Patrick took on the job as her caregiver. For the next six years he lovingly took care of her until her death in 2006. I think that his mom knew how responsible, trustworthy and capable he was when she asked Patrick to always protect and look out for his siblings.

It was on her burial day that he vowed to find a way to get to America so he could better provide for the family.

It was not easy. He applied for a green card through the visa lottery for three years in a row and was lucky enough to be selected. Next was the mad scramble to obtain a birth certificate (the children were born at home so date of birth was only a guess), pay for a physical and background check, and pass an interview at the American embassy.

This process of thorough vetting took two years until he earned his visa. The next hurdle was scraping together money for an expensive plane ticket. He worked like never before, taking on any odd job available, selling vegetables and his prize goats. Patrick says the happiest day of his life was when he landed on U.S. soil, kneeled down, kissed the ground and said thank you, God. He had a bag of clothing, $200 dollars in his pocket, limited command of English and didnt know a soul.

It was exciting but also scarier than coming face to face with an angry hyena.

He figured out how to apply for a job and worked double shifts doing laundry and cleaning at a local hotel. Patrick quickly realized the minimum-wage jobs would not be enough to support him and his family back home. His true calling was caregiving, so he took classes to become a Certified Nursing Assistant and began doing work he truly loves  and that is how we met.

Weve been together for almost two years now. Caring for an advanced ALS patient is grueling and difficult but Patrick makes it look easy. We also have fun together and have become fast friends. He teaches me Swahili and I taught him to swim. He keeps me clean, fed and comfortable, and I teach him American ways.

One thing I cant explain to him is the negativity surrounding immigration now, which is felt even by those going through the process legally. When he sees angry men with torches marching through the streets spewing unthinkable hate, I just shake my head and try to explain that most of us are good.

It is my strong belief that this country is better and richer in many ways because of our diversity. I know that my life is. Patrick is special but I dont think his story is unique. I believe there are so many more immigrants like him looking for an opportunity to work hard, contribute and make a difference.

This is what makes our country great.

It is unlikely that my battle with ALS will last much longer, but its my goal to stick around long enough to attend Patricks naturalization ceremony. His mother would be so proud  najivunia  and so will I!
The Stars Opinion staff has some groovy news  and we need your help.

Weve launched a podcast.

Thursday afternoons, cartoonist David Fitzsimmons, editorial writer Luis Carrasco and I get together around a conference room table near the Star cafeteria and spend about a half hour chatting. With microphones. Luis puts it all together and a podcast is born.

The goal is to open up the Stars Opinion pages and share how and why we do what we do  and to also share what you have to say.

So far weve talked about immigration, President Trumps visit to Phoenix, the Tucson City Council Ward 3 Democratic primary, Trumps decision to end Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), the Tucson Unified School District superintendent search and selection, Pima County Supervisor Ally Millers ill-advised remarks about her white pride, and more.

We confab about what weve editorialized about that week in our Star editorials and columns.

Im not going to pretend we dont go off on tangents  we talked at some length recently about Fitzs quest to make the perfect pot of refried beans.

Fitz talks about his favorite cartoon of the week, and how he created it.

In a recent episode, Fitz explained how he comes up with ideas for his cartoons. Its something Ive often wondered, because Im definitely a word, not a visual, opinion person.

It turns out he makes lots of lists and looks for connections. Some hit like lightning bolts, others morph. Some fizzle.

Fitz also shares an email or voicemail hes received that week  we call it his air-quotes fan-mail.

Luis handles letters to the editor submissions and many guest-opinion pieces submitted to the Star. These contributions are at the heart of the Opinion pages. Even if people are writing about national or international issues, its a local conversation.

The music we use is local, too. Its a new, unreleased song by The Marshmallow Overcoat called Wait For Her.

Luis interviews letter writers and guest-opinion authors for the podcast. Its great to hear a letter to the editor read by the person who penned it, and to hear them share what moved them to write.

Have a letter writer youd like to hear from? Let us know.

Luis, Fitz and I also share things were interested in each week. Sometimes its another podcast, or a book or a board game. Or beans.

So heres where wed like your help. Our podcast needs a name. Weve been calling it the Arizona Daily Star Opinion Page Podcast  descriptive, yes, but it makes me think of those plain label groceries, with no photo or design. Just a can with PINTO BEANS in black lettering on a white label. PODCAST.

We have a couple names were kicking around, but wed like to hear from you. Ideas? Send them my way at sgassen@tucson.com.

In the meantime, check out our latest podcast below.

01:00  The rescission of the DACA program and plenty of questions: What does this mean? Was the program legal? Will Congress act? and Was this racist?

20:00  Not one, but two Fitz "fan" letters of the week.

21:45  Hot topics on letters to the editor

22:55  Sunday's editorial on AzMERIT scores and the challenges of public education.

28:36  What is a guest opinion and how are they chosen for print?

31:05  Bean update: Last week Fitz was making refried beans for the first time. How did that work out?

32:02  Our groovy recommendations for the week:

Guess what? Luis is a Star Wars nerd, too. He recommends Star Wars: Jedi Challenges.

Fitz is working on a book.
This is a story about a winery in Washington state, but also about its connection to 9/11, which will be remembered Monday on the 16th anniversary of one of the most tragic days in American history.

Mercer's charitable branch is connected to its Eagle & Plow Cabernet Sauvignon, a wine that sources grapes from its 1-acre Block 911 vineyard in the Horse Heaven Hills appellation of the state.

According to the website, the story begins on Sept. 11, 2001, when Mercer Estates' vineyard manager John Derrick lost a best friend - Richard Guadagno, who was among the passengers who fought and died on United Flight 93, when it went down in a Pennsylvania field near Shanksville.

Rob Mercer, owner of Mercer Estates, served as a captain in the U.S. Marine Corps in the 1990s. After the attacks on 9/11, he reenlisted to serve in Iraq, losing many days with his young family.

When Mercer returned from service, he and Derrick decided to plant a special vineyard, called Block 93, in the most ideal location on the Mercer farm. Per the website, "not only would it serve as a memorial for fallen heroes, but as a means to give back to programs that would benefit those who have served and suffered. 911 vines were hand-planted in Block 93 of the Cavalie Vineyard. The fruit from these vines is used, exclusively, to produce its Eagle & Plow, Block 93 Cabernet Sauvignon. All of the revenue generated by this wine is donated to charities that serve American servicemen and women, their families, and the survivors of tragic events, with a portion directed to Friends of Flight 93," the charitable partner of the Flight 93 Memorial. Indeed, Derrick will be speaking at an event there on Sept. 24.

"The 2012 inaugural vintage of Eagle & Plow, Block 93 Cabernet Sauvignon was a heartwarming success. We donated wine to several charities for use in their . And, in a few short months, we sold the remainder of the vintage which allowed us to donate just shy of $12,000 to charities such as Children of Fallen Patriots Foundation, Camp Patriot, Friends of Flight 93 and the New England Center for Homeless Veterans.fund raising efforts."

Overlooking the vineyards at Mercer Estates in eastern Washington state.

Here's a link to the wine and a fact sheet about it. Here's a link to the Flight 93 website, where Vice President Mike Pence will visit on Monday, and another link to a story that PennLive wrote on the memorial in 2015.

Derrick was asked in an email for his take on why he decided on this idea to maintain an ongoing legacy, and what sets the grape in this block apart from the others on the large property. Here's what he said.

Derrick: "The reason I proposed the idea for block 93 [at least planting the vines part - Rob was all about the rest and I am very proud of what has been created] was that I wanted to have something where the story would have to be told about what happened to flight 93 on 9/11. The idea actually came to me because our plants per acre density at the time was 908. . . . I really cherry-picked the location as I felt it was the very best part of the vineyard [it was too small and different enough to not want to just put in a bigger block] so when we were all done planting we still had this one-acre spot. Block 93 has a true south slope, providing excellent drainage and protection from a cold event that can sometimes blow in at the end of harvest from the north. These vines will be producing the highest-quality fruit long after I am gone and with each bottle purchased a chance to tell the story about the brave and heroic folks of flight 93."

The 2014 vintage is available. It retails for $100, and can be purchased at this link. Mercer wines are available in Pennsylvania in the Fine Wines & Good Spirits stores and by direct shipment.

There's far more to Mercer wines, which producer six lines of dry premium red and white wines with grapes sourced from six vineyards in eastern Washington.

The remainder of this post is a series of answers to questions sent to Brenda Mercer, who handles the public relations and charitable giving side of the operation.

Q, I don't think my readers know much about Washington wine in general and certainly don't know about Horse Heaven Hills. What elements there contribute to make it such a great place to grow grapes?

A, The state of Washington lies at the same latitude as Bordeaux France - so a similar climate. Albeit on the east side of the state much less damp. The Horse Heaven Hills in particular is a sandy loamy soil. This gives our viticulturalists a lot of control over the vines as far as irrigation. We also have a large diurnal swing - giving the vines a lot of heat units during the day, but still having cooler nights, which allows for nice sugar levels.

Q, So I understand correctly that the Mercers served strictly as a supplier for more than 30 years before deciding to make wine? What prompted that move from supplier to producer how much was the learning curve reduced by already being involved in the business for so long before the tasting room opened?

A, The Mercers originally had a winery called Mercer Ranch Winery. It was started by Don and Linda Mercer. This was in the early '80s. I think the winery lasted 6-7 years. There was a lot of learning that happened during this period, mainly that we could grow beautiful wine grapes in the Horse Heaven Hills. This original vineyard was purchased by a group of wineries who still make remarkable wines from this original vineyard. We started Mercer Estates Winery in 2006 in hopes of sharing the HHH terroir and story on a national level. Now we are selling Mercer Wines in 48 states and a handful of countries.

Q, Are there still vines yielding grapes from the original planting? And how much how the makeup of the vineyard and the grapes grown changed since 1972?

A, Yes this vineyard was purchased by a group of winemakers [Quilceda Creek & Woodward Canyon are a couple of the partners that bought the original Mercer Ranch Vineyard, since renamed Champoux Vineyard]. I believe Block 1 is still producing wines; some winemakers label these wines as "old vines."

4, Tell me about this success you've had with Malbec. It feels around here like a "less traditional" grape that a lot of wine drinkers are not only familiar with but favor. How much are you growing? How much have you played with it in the cellar?

We are growing a lot of Malbec. We feel we grow an outstanding Malbec grape with our terroir, wind, heat units. . . . We produce 3 different styles of Malbec for all three tiers of wines we produce. We are growing quite a bit of Malbec for ourselves and another large producer.

Q, How much is word getting out beyond the state's borders of the quality of not only Mercer's wines but the state's industry overall, and are there still hurdles to raising your profile?

A, We feel like Washington is starting to gain some traction in the wine world. You are seeing great scores come out of this state. There are definitely still some huge hurdles to overcome or work through. But, I notice more and more Washington wines around the country. The biggest hurdle is probably proving that these wines are a true value.

Q, Where did you come up with the Ode to Brothers name for the Rhone blend? So distinctive!

A, I am so glad you asked about the Ode to Brothers. The name is a tribute to Rob and Will Mercer's father and uncles (Bud, Rick and Don Mercer), who had the foresight back in the '50s and '60s to blaze a new trail and bring irrigation and agriculture out to the Horse Heaven Hills.
Nestled around 80 km from Hanoi, the Van Long lagoon and wetland reserve has awed visitors with tranquil, pristine charms and notable biological diversity.

After crossing the Gian Khuat Bridge on National Highway 1, one will enter Gia Vien District in the northern province of Ninh Binh.

They cannot miss Van Long Dyke, which spans more than 30km and meanders through quiet villages and immense paddy fields.

Thanks to the 52-year-old embankment, Van Long became an expansive marshland which has been named the northern deltas largest wetland reserve.

The area takes pride in thousands of floral and fauna species, including the Delacour's langur, a critically endangered species of lutung indigenous to northern Vietnam.

Lotuses in a lagoon in the Van Long complex. Photo: Tuoi Tre

The primate has predominantly black hair, with white markings on the face and distinctive creamy-white fur over the rump and the outer thighs which give them the colloquial name of vooc quan dui (shorts-donning langur) or vooc mong trang (white-buttock langur).

The complex also boasts stunning rocky outcrops and resplendent grottos.

Tran Thuy Linh, a celebrated artist and Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper contributor, visited Van Long as a storm swept through several northern provinces, including Ninh Binh, in mid-July.

Though the downpours and rising water levels kept them from exploring the grottos, Linh and her group found it a blessing in disguise as they had memorable experiences taking a leisurely boat ride to a lotus lagoon spanning some hectares in area and admiring submerged plants beneath the 250-million-year-old karst mountains.

The area, which is inaccessible by boat in normal weather conditions due to mud and shallow water, is dotted with the Delacour's langurs.

The picturesque landscape in the Van Long complex. Photo: Tuoi Tre

The teeny boat then made its way through canyons teeming with flowering plants in the sedge family.

Mountains glistening in the mist and clouds stood aloft in the distance, giving the beholders a surreal, overwhelming feeling and fitting the complexs name, Van Long (which literally translates as a dragon in the clouds).

The torrential rain, however, prevented Linh and her group from visiting a century-old pagoda and a slab of rock bearing hieroglyphic characters which have baffled scientists so far.

As observed by Linh, Van Long stays gorgeous throughout the year, offering vacationers a clutch of delights whatever season they arrive in.

In autumn, the area is a haven for a type of huge algae and also brims with birds of different kinds.

The small boat that carries the Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper contributor to a lotus lagoon. Photo: Tuoi Tre

Van Long is also known as the bay without waves as visitors on a boat marvel at a flat, still surface that resembles a huge, flawless looking glass.

Other delights

Over recent years, Ninh Binh has emerged as a beloved tourist destination with a host of alluring scenic spots, including the UNESCO-recognized Trang An Landscape Complex, which boasts limestone karst peaks permeated with valleys, many of them partly submerged and surrounded by steep, almost vertical cliffs.

Inundated basins surrounded by karst mountains which locals dub thung are also a notable topographic feature.

Nestled not far from Tam Coc, part of the Trang An complex, Thung Nang is considered one of the localitys most spectacular spots where stalactites of various shapes mirror themselves on the crystal-clear water.

The picturesque, tranquil landscape in the Van Long complex. Photo: Tuoi Tre

The area is home to Thoong Nang Temple, where ba Chua thuong ngan, one of the countrys noted goddesses, is worshipped, and Voi Temple, which is built from centuries-old bricks with ornate carving details.

One cannot miss Thung Nham, or Thung Chim, which provides shelter for a wide range of birds and waterfowl, including storks, herons, teals, as well as endangered ones.

Thung Nham is also famous for scores of pristine caves with illuminating stalactites, with an example being But (the folklore Buddha) Cave, where a Buddha-shaped rock slab is seated in the center.

One must trek and ascend 439 rocky steps in order to reach Vai Gioi Grotto, another cavernous wonder in Thung Nham.

The 5,000m grotto boasts three layers dotted with astounding stalactites and stalagmites.

The way to get to the Van Long complex. Photo: Tuoi Tre

It was where people in the old times made offerings to God to pray for auspicious weather and bumper crops.

Other draws are paradise-like An Tiem Grotto, also known as Tuyet Tinh Coc (Breakup Ravine), which is part of Hoa Lu, Vietnams ancient capital under the Dinh Dynasty (968-980), and a pagoda where Duong Van Nga, a notorious contemporary queen, stayed during her final years.

Meanwhile Mia Mountain and Mia Cave offer visitors stunning panoramas of ripening paddy fields at their prime time and imposing limestone mountains in the distance.

A resplendent spectacle. Photo: Tuoi Tre

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Walk with Me is the title of a new documentary film on Buddhist Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh set to hit U.S. cinemas next week.

The movie is expected to take viewers on a cinematic journey into the world of a monastic community that practices the art of mindfulness.

British directors Marc J. Francis and Max Pugh spent three years shooting the film in Plum Village, a Buddhist meditation center in Dordogne, southern France, which was co-founded by Thich Nhat Hanh.

English actor Bennedict Cumberbatch lends his voice to the films narration.

The place is home to a community of Buddhist monks and Zen practitioners in France.

The documentary captures the monastic lives of monks and nuns in Plum Village, as well as Buddhist Zen Master Hanhs wisdom on mindfulness as illustrated in his writings from the younger years.

British directors Marc J. Francis and Max Pugh interview a monk at Plum Village Monastery in southern France. Photo: Facebook/Walk With Me

The film ix executed in a calm and rhythmic pace that masterfully depicts the essence of Zen, according to Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper critic Anh Nguyen.

Director Alejandro G. Inarritu, who won two Academy Awards for The Revenant and Birdman, described the documentary as silent and pure, containing images and sound that translate the forgotten conciseness, [putting it] right there on the screen, during his exclusive interview with Variety.

I loved how [the filmmakers] capture and convey, cinematically, the sometimes inexplicable state of being awakened, Inarritu was quoted as saying. It gives a hint of that quiet voice so underrated today and ironically so needed in this time of fear and ignorance.

The Mexican film director described Thich Nhat Hanh as one of the deepest and wisest people in the world.

Plum Village monks and directors of Walk with Me appear onstage at the films world premiere at the South by Southwest Festival (SXSW) Film Festival in Austin, Texas, the U.S. Photo: Facebook/Walk With Me

Walk with Me made its world premiere on March 15 at the South by Southwest Festival (SXSW) Film Festival in Austin, Texas, and has had limited U.S. screenings since August.

Thich Nhat Hanh, born in central Vietnams Hue City, is among the pioneering Buddhist leaders in the popularization of the religion on Western soil.

Hanh is also a novelist, poet, religion researcher and social activist with over 100 published books in both Vietnamese and English.

He returned to Vietnam last month to seek rest after recovering from brain hemorrhage in 2014.

The international trailer of Walk with Me. Clip: YouTube

The theatrical poster of Walk with Me. Photo: Gathr Films

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Have a nice Sunday!

Society

-- In recent years, state agencies in Ho Chi Minh City have simplified administrative procedures, including fine payment and passport home delivery, thanks to postal services and the Internet to save citizens and expats time and cut costs.

-- A representative of Can Tho International Airport in the namesake Mekong Delta city has confirmed they had ceased allowing part-time employees from tour operators to get access to a tourist information counter placed in the restricted area for security reasons, until the firms send official staffers in.

-- An official in Tan Chau Town in the Mekong Delta city of An Giang said on Saturday they had evacuated six households to safety after a section of the Hau River, one of the regions major waterways, collapsed on Thursday afternoon. Local residents have faced the threat of increasingly serious land subsidence along local rivers over recent months.

Business

-- Vietnams first batch of clean chicken meat was exported to Japan on Saturday, opening up opportunities in the fastidious market.

-- The Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam has disclosed they had invited 11 foreign contractors and consultants to join a project meant to expand the overloaded Tan Son Nhat International Airport in Ho Chi Minh City.

-- A large number of clients showed interest in outbound tours at the International Travel Expo HCMC 2017, which wrapped up on Saturday in District 7.

Lifestyle

-- More than 1,000 youths participated in a gala on Sunday morning (September 10) in District 2 which wraps up a program jointly initiated by Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper and dairy firm Vinamilk to encourage the healthy lifestyle of walking and jogging.

-- A documentary which is made by two British directors and features revered Vietnamese Zen master and monk Thich Nhat Hanh, who had lived in France for years and is spending time in Vietnam to recuperate from his illness, will hit the screen across the U.S. starting Tuesday.
The administration of Hanoi is seeking government approval for its development of six projects crossing the Red River and Duong River, costing a combined VND57 trillion (US$2.51 billion).

The first one is the Tu Lien Bridge, which runs three kilometers across the Red River and connects Hanois Tay Ho and Dong Anh Districts.

The bridge is part of a nine-kilometer extension of the Hanoi  Thai Nguyen Expressway.

The second project includes the construction of the Thuong Cat Bridge and its access roads, which stretch 5.2 kilometers from an intersection with Belt Road 3 in Bac Tu Liem District to the Bac Thang Long industrial zone in Dong Anh.

Tran Hung Dao River Tunnel is the third project, running 3.1 kilometers from the border of Hoan Kiem and Hai Ba Trung Districts to Long Bien District on the other side of the Red River.

In the fourth project, the second phase of the existing Vinh Tuy Bridge will be constructed, fully linking Vinh Tuy Ward in Hai Ba Trung District to Co Linh Street in Long Bien District.

The Duong Bridge, measuring 1.4 kilometers in length, will be built across the Duong River, connecting Long Biens Duc Giang Ward with Yen Vien Town in Gia Lam District.

The final project will see the construction of the 5.4-kilometer Giang Bien Bridge and its access roads, running through Long Bien and Gia Lam Districts.

According to Hanois administration, the proposed bridges and river tunnels would establish an inter-connection among its belt roads, and speed up the urbanization of its districts situated to the north of the Red River.

Hanoi has also requested government permission to employ special mechanisms in calling for private investments in these projects.

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The massive deforestation was discovered on September 1, when a local forest protection unit patrolled the area in An Lao District, Binh Dinh.

According to An Laos chairman Pham Van Nam, the forest land in question was in the process of healing after a period of being used as farming soil.

On Saturday, a delegation of Binh Dinh authorities, including police and agricultural officials, arrived at the site for investigation.

Initial reports showed the damage to have covered 43.7 hectares of natural forest under the management of An Laos An Hung Commune.

Trees measuring between ten and 60 centimeters in cross-section diameter were cleared with machines, with some trunks still lying around at the site.

This is deforestation on an unprecedented scale in Binh Dinh, said Phan Trong Ho, director of the provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Development. Evidence suggests this is an organized act, as those involved had even cleared a path leading to the swath of forest and used modern chainsaws to cut the trees in a very short time.

Ho said the Peoples Committee of Binh Dinh had requested a police investigation into the crime, as well as conducted a damage evaluation to bring the case to court.

Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc the same day demanded the provincial administration to submit official reports on the case.

A Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper reporter was present at the scene inspection on Saturday morning to capture photos of the illegally cleared forest.

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Season three of Bosch starring Titus Welliver returns to SBS later this month.

Updated: The 10 part series kicks off with a double episode premiere at 8:30pm on Thursday, 28 September (it will be 9:35pm a week later as single eps).

This premiered in the US in April.

LAPD homicide detective Harry Bosch (Titus Welliver) investigated his mothers murder for years, but was unable to bring the killer to justice in the end. The ugly truth behind the case has only left him more tense and restless. Boschs teenage daughter, Maddie (Madison Lintz, The Walking Dead), has come to live with him and ushered into his personal life the everyday responsibilities of being a single father.

Now, between the murder of a homeless veteran, the slaying of another man tied to several unsolved homicides, and a high-profile murder trial involving a Hollywood director, Bosch has taken on his most formidable cases to date.

Episode One: The Smog Cutter (8.35pm)

The ugly truth behind his mothers murder has left LAPD homicide detective Harry Bosch as tense and restless as ever. A homeless veteran is murdered. Bosch works a high-profile trial involving a Hollywood director. The Veronica Allen proceeding nears resolution. Bosch keeps tabs on a long time criminal whos eluded justice.

Episode Two: The Four Last Things (9.35pm)

A suspected killer whom Bosch has pursued for several years turns up dead in an apparent suicide. Edgar discovers that Harry has a complicated history with the dead man. When the case is later ruled a homicide, Detective Jimmy Robertson develops troubling theories about the culprit.

Thursday, 28 September on SBS.
Help India!

By Raqib Hameed Naik, TwoCircles.net

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Srinagar: On Tuesday, September 5, the whole nation was mourning the death of journalist Gauri Lankesh who was shot by some unidentified men at her house in Bangalore. About 3,000 km away north in Pulwama district of Jammu and Kashmir, a freelance photojournalist-Kamran Yousuf-was being huddled to Delhi by National Investigation Agency (NIA).

A day before he was asked to report at the local police station from where he was taken to Srinagar, where NIA formally arrested him.

Till now, the premier investigating agency hasnt issued any press release, a procedure that it usually follows in other cases. The newspapers are abuzz with claims and counterclaims attributed to sources, who say that he was arrested for stone pelting and uploading provocative videos on social networking websites.

Yousuf, a resident of village Tahab, five km from Pulwama town in South Kashmir used to cover the frequent protests by locals, encounters between militants and security forces and funerals of militants who died in the encounters.

As far as I know, he was not involved in any kind of subversive activity. He was very enthusiastic about his work. He would be first among us to reach and cover the protests, said Mohammad Iqbal Wani, a journalist who works for a national news channel.

A quick look at his profile on Facebook makes it quite clear that his photographs were frequently published by Valley-based Greater Kashmir newspaper along with his byline.

A day after his arrest when Greater Kashmir hit the stands, nowhere in its 20-page newspaper found the mention of one of its photo journalist who was arrested a day earlier. It did carry a small news titled NIA arrests 2 for stone pelting and didnt mention the names of those arrested.

The newspaper till date hasnt issued any statement on his arrest, while one of the newspaper insiders confirmed that the arrested journalist was a contributor to the newspaper.

He was not a staffer but was contributing photos from South Kashmir, the source added.

On Wednesday, September 6th, the Kashmir Editors Guild (KEG), the body containing editors of all major local dailies and weeklies as its members issued a press statement condemning the murder of Gauri Lankesh but surprisingly it didnt even mention Yousufs arrest. The KEG is headed by Chief Editor of Greater Kashmir Fayaz Ahmad Kaloo.

On the same day in Srinagars press colony, a handful of Journalist appeared with flexes and placards saying, Kamran Yousuf is a journalist, not a stone pelter and asked for his release, but the crowd was evidently very thin as compared to the protest held against the ban imposed on newspaper Kashmir Reader last year.

They (the senior journalist) only come on streets when it reaches their doors, otherwise the small time journalists dont matter for them, said a journalist who wished not to be named.

The complete silence of the newspaper and the editor body has evoked sharp criticism from the Journalist in Jammu and Kashmir.

Jammu based Journalist, Syed Junaid Hashmi said, Greater Kashmir and the whole journalist fraternity should have come forward for this young journalist, who was doing good in his work and seek answers from the state government and NIA as to why he was arrested.

Bilal Bashir Bhat, editor of news portal OnlyKashmir.in while showing his sympathy for the arrested journalist said, Undoubtedly his arrest has exposed the organisation he worked for.

An organisation who cant defend their employees, how can we expect them to address the concerns of common people, he added.

Aseem Mohiuddin, editor of the magazine The Legitimate attributed the problem to the fact that most of the journalists working in Kashmir for local news organisations are never hired through a proper recruitment method.

Almost 90% of the staff working in various news organisations in Kashmir are never given any offer/appointment letter. Most of them are appointed through phone calls. So practically there is no proof that a person either worked for them or not. It is high time to institutionalise the media industry in Kashmir, he added.

Senior Journalist Yusuf Jameel and president of Kashmir Correspondents Club had called a meeting of its members on Friday, September 8 to discuss the arrest of a photojournalist, but was delayed after the protests erupted in various parts of Kashmir post-Friday prayers.

He said, Personally I feel that if there are allegations against him they should be probed in a free and fair manner and no one should be harassed unnecessarily.

Meanwhile, on Friday, September 8 a joint meeting of the Kashmir TV Journalists Guild, Kashmir Journalist Core, Kashmir Video Journalists Association and Kashmir Press Photographers Association asked NIA to come clear on the charges pressed on the arrested photojournalist.

The NIA Court on Wednesday, September 6 has remanded Yousuf to 10-days police custody. The agency told the court that they were required to be confronted with the other accused in the case.

The arrest comes after NIA announced that it has identified 117 Kashmiris who it believes have been spreading unrest in the Valley. As part of its investigation, the group had identified 6,386 phone numbers and 79 WhatsApp groups who allegedly manage the stone-pelting incidents.

Importantly, the NIA is probing the terror funding case against Kashmiri separatists and has arrested many separatist leaders and workers in this regard.
Help India!

By Aabha J for TwoCircles.net

Late on September 5, noted journalist and human rights activist, Gauri Lankesh was shot dead at her residence by unidentified assailants in Bengaluru. Lankesh was the editor of her weekly tabloid, Gauri Lankesh Patrike which stood strongly against the right wing communal politics and also ferociously critiqued the Hindutva politics in Bengaluru. Her strong writings, both in English and Kannada, against casteism and communalism have brought her under attack by the right-wing forces. It is known that in the year 2016, Lankesh was harassed for alleging two BJP MPs for corruption charges and was put behind bars under the charges of defamation. Because the charges against her were deemed baseless, she was granted bail within a day.

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Gauri was always aware of being under the radar of the Sangh for her stand but nothing desist her from writing. Her murder has brought an alarming concern amongst activist circles to discuss the need for securing freedom of speech as a fundamental right of every citizen to dissent and also the growing efforts of the state to gag the freedom of the press. Her assassination is yet another indication of the vulnerabilities of the social and political activists who challenge fundamentalism and obscurantism.

Violating the democratic spirit, repeated efforts have been made by the state and its associates to attack political citizens who strongly challenge its authority. On the 18th of July, veteran journalist Paranjoy Guha Thakurta stepped down as the editor of well reputed Left-leaning journal, Economic and Political Weekly after publishing an article on the misappropriation of funds by Adani titled, Modi Governments Rs. 500 Crore Bonanza to Adani Group Company. The resignation came after the journal was slapped with defamation and the board was pressured to take down the article on the industrial conglomerate and its nexus with the state. NDTV India, a rather liberal and corporatized news channel was also to be blacked-out for a day by the Information and the Broadcasting Ministry for allegedly revealing strategically sensitive information while reporting about the controversial Pathankot anti-terrorism oppression in January.

The larger discourse pointed at the sweeping powers held by the government to penalize news agencies by taking harsh punitive measures against them. Because of the corporate backing of the media house and its popularity, the news channel received a lot of solidarity on social media by some liberal voices which prompted the I&B Ministry to withdraw the black-out. The freedom of the press, in the history of independent India, has seen such an attack only once before during the Emergency in the reign of Indira Gandhi.

Unfortunately, many local journalists who do not have the agency and are writing in more conflicted regions like Kashmir and Chhattisgarh are haggard and encounter a constant looming danger. The journalists in these areas have faced constant death threats, intimidation and experienced censorship of the most brutal forms.

In an article on the English web-portal Wire, Being a Journalist in Kashmir is fraught with risk and danger the writer and journalist cites constant intimidation and hostility faced by the journalists of the Valley. In the article, he presents various incidents and anecdotes of the roughing up of journalists by the state and military forces.

Struck down like dominos

An early morning in the month of August 2013, founder and conveyor of Andhshraddha Nirmolan Samiti was slumped to the ground after two unidentified assailants shot Narendra Dabholkar point blank while he was on one of his early morning walks. Dabholkar resisted the fundamentalist ideologues of the Sangh and was lauded for his work to uproot superstitious practices and rituals that engulfed the rationality of a thinking mind. A year and a half later, well known communist leader and a rationalist, Com. Govind Pansare was also shot dead in a similar fashion by unknown assailants near his residence in Kolhapur. Pansare has been an influential public figure who was also a writer of a best-selling Marathi novel, Shivaji Kon Hota (Who was Shivaji?). His interpretation of the glorified ruler Shivaji, in his book, had antagonized the conservatives in Maharashtra.

The left-leaning stance of the political leader and his staunch critique of the fundamentalist right wing facets of the RSS had brought him rigid opposition from the Hindutva forces especially the Sanathan Sanstha which was very much in discussion after the killing of Dhabolkar. Pansare received continuous death threats from the militant right wing organization before he was plunged to death with bullets. Soon within a few months, Vice Chancellor of Kannada University, Kalburgi was similarly shot dead after having irked the Hindu fundamentalist forces for his persistent critique of the communal politics.

Human rights activists, rationalists, political leaders, varsity chancellors have been shot down by the fundamentalist Hindutva groups after having drawn ire for their public anti-right, anti-communal and anti-caste dispositions. The public figures, who were assassinated by diabolical right-wingers, have been vociferously resisting communal politics and have also been in constant conflict with the authoritarian state. The assassination of Lankesh has drawn attention back to the assassination of Dabholkar, Pansare and Kalburgi and can be seen as a continuation of the Hindutva assault on anyone who believes in opposing the reactionary state. The common thread amongst the four has been their fearless public confrontation with the Hindutva reactionary forces. The killings of these public dissenters must be seen as a strong signal sent to those who have a scathing criticism against fundamentalism.

Universities: The battlegrounds to defend our freedom of speech

On the 9th of February in 2016, a few students of the esteemed Jawaharlal Nehru University organized an event to protest the hanging of 2001 Parliament terror attack accused Afzal Guru. The event was organized by students titled, The judicial killing of Afzal Guru and Maqbool Bhatt and in solidarity with the Kashmiri peoples right to self-determination. The event was interrupted by ABVP a student wing of the RSS and foot soldiers of the BJP on campuses. An attempt was made by the students of the ABVP to frame a few students for organizing the event.

The students were accused of raising anti-India slogans. Apparently, academic discussions of extreme human rights violations and the fundamental right to self-determination were perceived as anti-Indian. The JNU row led to the incarceration of three students including the then SU president, Kanhiya Kumar, ex-DSU (now BASO) members Umar Khalid and Anirban Bhattacharya who were then slapped with sedition charges. Repeated efforts are being made to demonize the students of the university as abuses are hurled at the students by the Sanghi media for their political will to challenge the atrocities of the state.

After the JNU row, consistent efforts are being made to confine the spaces of dissent in varsities and educational institutions. The Ramjas college literary society, on the 21st of February organized an event titled, Cultures of Protest. The colleges student union dominated by the ABVP, once again insinuated the event for inviting Umar Khalid as one of the speakers. The event organized had to be withdrawn due to the violence instigated by the ABVP. The following day, students of the Left organizations organized a protest rally in condemnation of the violence unleashed by the ABVP. Even at the site of a peaceful protest march, the students from the Left were roughed up and beaten up with lathis by the police that assisted the march without any due provocation. Besides these, many talks and seminars organized by progressive students are more often than not disrupted by the ABVP goons on campus.

Saving the spaces of Dissent

Journalists, writers, human rights activists, students, political leaders, are increasingly penalized for their radical discord with fundamentalism. A hostile and violent reaction to dissent is enjoying states structural support and ones insinuating violence are exercising complete impunity. The constricting spaces of dissent and growing chocking of voices has only ever weakened a democracy. The fascists today have come to power through the means of democracy but the only way to challenge the fascist trends is by confronting them head on with rage, humour, anger, with songs of dissent and words powerful enough to overthrow tyranny. In these difficult times of violence and a growing arch of silence, I resort to the words of Faiz

Bol ki lab azad hain tere

Bol zaban ab tak teri hai

Tera sutvan jism hai tera

Bol ki jaan ab tak teri ha

The author is a second-year MA student studying Dalit and Tribal Studies and Action in Tata Institute of Social Sciences.
Help India!

By Saba Syed Hafeez for TwoCircles.net

Recently, many parts of Bihar and Bengal were hit hard with a severe flood including the Seemanchal region. Kishanganj, where our INSAN School and INSAN College are located, and its surrounding areas have suffered some of the worst of it. This was an unprecedented flood even for an area prone to occasional flooding. The last big one in 1968 was said to be caused due to heavy rain and the overflow of water from the Jalpaiguri embankment in northern Bengal. However, even then, the water in most of Kishanganj city had entered about 2-3 feet. Since it was common that homes were built on higher foundations (chabotrah), most residents in the township escaped the flooding inside their homes.

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It was late Saturday night of August 12 when people in Kishanganj and its surrounding areas started noticing the water entering their homes. Within hours it had risen considerably. Although a warning was given earlier, people were completely caught off guard with the speed and volume of this flash flood. Terrified, people rushed to higher ground late at night to save themselves and whatever they could grab.

In the next few hours, most of the city was waist or chest-high under water, some parts even up to 9 feet. Our own INSANs Shiksha Nagar campus was submerged 4-5 feet. Since most of the people in the town have double story homes, they were able to rush to upper floors. Everything that was left on the first floors is completely destroyed. INSANs Shiksha Nagar is a modest hut style campus, a reflection of its Gandhian founder, late Syed Bhai (Dr Syed Hasan). It only has one three story building and students and staff were able to evacuate to higher ground just in time, in the middle of the night, including the young ones in their sleep. We cant thank Allah enough for all the lives saved.

However, those in the rural area and poor neighbourhoods took the brunt of the destruction and a large number of lives have been lost. They are still suffering from their homes destroyed, food and water contaminated, animals perished, and many poor who earn daily wages are out of work. Hence, there is an urgent need to assist in this post flood phase to prevent the outbreak of any epidemic and provide the basic necessities to those in need. Local organizations and administrations are inundated with the overwhelming demand and also need help from outside sources.

For a few weeks, the surrounding areas were cut off from each other and from the rest of the country since many rail tracks, roads, and bridges were swept away or collapsed. All traffic connecting mainland India to its northeast region were at a standstill. Electricity and phone communications went down a few hours after the flood and remained dark for days. All these had added and still are further obstacles to rescue and relief efforts.

As the water receded, the residents began realizing the sad devastation they have never before experienced in their lifetime. Besides economical destruction, many lives have been lost, drowned or swept away in the water current and their corpses found buried in mud and bushes, the pictures of which are too graphic to share here.

Bihar Flood at a Glance*

More than 1.7 crore people affected in 18 districts and 8394 villages

514 lives lost

8.5 lakhs rescued

1358 Relief Camps through Various NGOs and Govt Agencies

4.2 lakhs homeless being sheltered

5.5 lakhs being fed in relief kitchens

* Source: Bihar Disaster Management (http://disastermgmt.bih.nic. in/) as of September 5, 2017

Can these floodings be prevented, or human and economical loss be minimized? These are the questions we need to give serious thought to as we embrace more extreme weather patterns not just in India but throughout the world. As I write, other parts of India, Southeast Asia, and the American states of Texas and Louisiana are also facing floods; Hurricane Irma has crashed Caribbean Islands at places more than 100 miles per hour. Florida is about to be hit next. Our thoughts and prayers go out for them as well.

Floods come and go. The actual timing of flood activity ranges from a few hours to a few days. In Kishanganj city, the initial nightmare ordeal lasted for about 14 -16 hours as people horrifically experienced the constant rising of water from about 9-10 PM till midday the next day. However long, it leaves a severe, devastating mark.

Now people are slowly trying to piece together whatever has been left. The relief work has finally started gaining momentum as affected areas are becoming more accessible. Many makeshift alternative dirt roads are being built to divert some flow of traffic and army engineers are repairing the ruined rail tracks. Yet the urgent need of emergency supplies of food, water, medicine, and clothes in many remote areas and poor localities are still needed.

After rescue and emergency relief, there is still a long road ahead of rebuilding the lives and community of those afflicted. Many people, especially the poor, have no roof to go back to and are living in shelters.

Similarly, many institutions are also coping with the aftermath of the flood. At INSAN, we are also assessing the damage. The majority of our classrooms, educational materials, computers, library, labs, offices, and hostels were underwater for a few days, leaving behind massive damage; several walls even gave way to the flash flood.

We appeal to everyone one, government, NGOs, and individuals, to join in this post flood relief and rebuilding. In this sacred month of Dhul Hijjah, may Allah reward everyone for the good deeds.

The following are some of the national and local organization you can lend a hand to:

State/National

Bihar Red Cross Branch

Oxfam India

Imarat Sharia

Sahayata Trust

Marazul Maarif

Kishanganj

Tauheed Educational Trust, Maulana Matiur Rahman Email: [email protected] com, Ph: 91- 98202 60173

Human Chain, Mudassir Alam, Email: [email protected], Ph: 91- 82929 50298

All India Taleemi wa Milli Foundation, Maulana Asrarul haque Qasmi, Ph; 91-98188 93994

To Assist in Rebuilding at INSAN

INSAN Group of Institutions, Shefa Syed Hafeez, Email: [email protected]gmail.com, Ph: 91-99315 96300

In US

Indian Muslim Relief Charity

Mumbai, Assam, Bengal, Gujrat, UP Flood Reliefs

Those of you who would like to help in the Mumbai or other flood relief efforts, please contact State Red Cross or one of the above organizations.

These tragedies also bring out the best of humankind. These situations require collaborative efforts from everyone regardless of creed or politics. Our hats go off to everyone who has lent their support to fellow humans in these difficult times. May The Almighty bless them for their dedication and zeal! In the midst of all this, it is beautiful to see people helping people, from far and near, regardless of region, religion, or politics.

The author is an INSAN alumni and engaged in hunger, homelessness, and educational causes in USA.
Michael Eugene spent the first part of his career in Cleveland advising superintendents when to close schools because of snowstorms. In Los Angeles, it was earthquakes.

In Florida, its hurricanes. And in recent days, Eugene has been helping to prepare his district for what is forecast to be the most devastating hurricane to hit the state in a generation.

Eugene, the chief operations officer at the Orange County school district in central Florida, leads a group of chief officersfrom facilities, instruction, and technologywho track hurricanes as they develop in the Atlantic Ocean or Gulf of Mexico and make the recommendation to the superintendent on whetherand whenthe district should close. The team also makes the recommendation for when superintendent should reopen schools.

Over the last several days, as Hurricane Irma gained speed and strength and barreled its way through the Caribbean, Eugenes team jumped into high gear, taking on full-time storm watch and preparation.

They followed weather models four times a day, getting more forensic and technical models from the National Weather Service than the general public sees in the press, he said. They huddled at 4 p.m. each day to pore over hurricane maps to understand Irmas possible paths and impacts on the school district. They talked daily with the countys office of emergency management and joined conference calls with meteorologists who explained the details behind the various weather models.

Figuring out Irmas likely path and behavior has been very challenging. Early models showed the hurricane possibly hitting South Florida and veering west, while another showed Irma veering east.

With the size of a storm like this, inside of it is a hurricane, but just outside of it is tropical storm force windsand those are two very different impacts for us, he said.

Making Sure Theres Fuel in Tanks; Money Queued Up for Payroll

In addition to the policy group, more than 20 departments, who are part of an incident management team that includes emergency management and transportation, are involved in planning for a storm like this. This group puts together the plan on how to prepare for and carry out the preparedness and recovery.

But the team doesnt just make recommendations about how and when to close: They make sure that teachers can get paid if there is prolonged closure.

So, before Florida Gov. Rick Scott decided late Thursday to shut down all K-12 schools, colleges, and universities in the state, Eugene and his team were juggling a range of preparations:



Lining up emergency contracting and spending authority from Superintendent Barbara Jenkins, so they can move quickly to spend large sums of money in the wake of the storm.

Creating a special emergency fund for disaster-related spending.

Ensuring all fuel tanks were at 100 percent, so if theres a gas shortage or other supply chain problem after the storm, the district can function and its buses can run.

Making sure staff will get paid if schools close for an extended period.

Ensuring that food services, which supplies food to evacuees at shelters, has enough supplies for at least five days. Food services also set up a nutrition access program so that if schools are closed for an extended period, the district can set up food trucks at specific locations to give students access to meals.

Raising spending limits for some departments, such as maintenance staff, in case they need to go out and spend large sums of money.

The preventative-based approach helps us prepare in advance so we are not making those decisions in the midst of a crisis, Eugene said in an interview Friday night. That allows you to be more level-headed. It allows to you to be more strategic.

Each department has a specific readiness strategy on the steps its taking to get ready and what it will need to do to get back up and running, he said.

That kind of coordination improves our effectiveness. It improves our efficiency and our consistency, he said.

When some school districts in south Florida made the decision as early as Tuesday to close Thursday and Friday, Orange County did not.

Eugene and his team were still following weather models that showed that the storm was not likely to impact Orange County until Monday with tropical storm force windsmeaning that they could complete the school week and close on Monday.

Some parents were anxious about that decision, Superintendent Jenkins said.

But she knew that her staff was using data, hard facts, and what the weather experts were saying to inform their recommendations to her.

Readying for What Comes After the Storm

Now that the district has shut down for Hurricane Irma, the teams work continues. They were back in the district Saturday, to go over the most recent projections about the fast-moving and rapidly-changing weather system, and think about the earliest day they will be able to reopen. (They decided to stay closed on Tuesday.)

One of the first things they must calculate: Are there enough teachersincluding possible substitutesavailable? Looking at how many teachers in the district submitted requests for leave next week will be one key factor.

Other things the team will evaluate before deciding whether to recommend that Superintendent Jenkins reopen schools:



Are the buildings and buses in a good and safe condition?

Beyond having enough teachers, are there bus drivers available? Have cafeteria workers returned in order to run food services?

Are students able to come to school?

Eugene, who has been with Orange County since 2009, says all the departments have to work in tandem. If the internet goes down, the IT department may need facilities and finance to get up and running again.

The way we think here in Orange County is that none of us is doing it on our own; we all do it as one family, he said.

Members of department readiness teams train during the year to test their preparedness, run through hypotheticals, and come up with tactical response plans, he said.

Eugene says he thinks all Florida districts that face the constant threats of hurricanes have some level of disaster preparedness and emergency response systems in placethe same way districts in the Midwest have structures to deal with snowstorms and California districts focus on earthquakes. The Miami-Dade school district runs disaster response scenarios with its staff.

Having dealt with all three, Eugene thinks hurricanes are more nerve-wracking.

A hurricane places greater stress on staff because of the anticipation of its arrival and because one would think its predictablethat you can see a hurricane coming three to five days away, he said.

The unanticipated part of a hurricane is whether it turns, and thats a very common conversation, and its a very important [reason] for why we focus on those models, he continued. Its the potential for that storm to turn and youre not affected at all. Whereas, an earthquake is an earthquake. When it hits, you are not told about it, and so there isnt the stress of the anticipation. But it definitely hits with a level of certainty.

Photo caption: Chief officers with the Orange County, Fla., school system meeting this week to discuss preparations for Hurricane Irma. Standing left to right: Jesus Jara, deputy superintendent, Michael Eugene, chief operations officer, and Scott Howat, chief communications officer. (Photo courtesy of the Orange County school district.)
The UK has an increasing income inequality issue and large companies are at the forefront of that problem. There are several aspects that they are failing workers, firstly, most don't offer a living wage outside of London, let alone in London. Secondly, their focus is statistical rather than personal. Finally, the standard practice is to offer those at the bottom of the ladder a per hour wage, this can contribute negatively to both the business and the employee.

The latter seems like a farfetched idea but the per hour wage is archaic and doesn't always suit the needs of the modern economy.

We live in an economic environment which requires high productivity and efficiency, but employers continue to exploit workers.

The retail industry

The sector that is guiltiest of exploiting workers and largely paying their staff significantly less than they work for is the Retail Industry. Sainsburys have just given their staff a pay rise of 4%, which granted is high. But when that amounts to an increase to 8 per hour (8.85 in London), it's clear that they still aren't paying their staff a real living wage. Other retailers are doing the same but much like Sainsburys, this doesn't increase employees' wages to a real living wage. However, even offering a per hourly rate in certain areas of businesses is counter-productive.

For example, time sensitive work. If you are doing a job and you have set amounts of workload to do within a period. Individuals who are more productive and finish earlier, who are then given the option of going home (sometimes forced to despite objections), are penalised through an hourly wage because they will lose money.

Whereas, individuals who are less productive are rewarded for taking longer. In these circumstances a per hour wage is counter-productive. Even in roles that have no time constraints, the security of an annual wage would increase morale among the workforce.

If you look at from a worker's perspective, annual wage rewards employees and encourages them to be productive.

However, this is only the case if the employer is paying its staff a real living wage and most in the retail and service sector, use zero-hour contracts to exploit workers and save on costs. They also analyse sales figures harshly as statistical and every worker is number but that view on sales in sectors that rely heavily on customer interaction will cause sales to drop in the long-term.
This week four serving army officers have been arrested on alleged terrorism offences, the individuals were arrested in Brecon, Ipswich and at a RAF base in Akrotiri, Cyprus. The latter is a base of British operations against ISIL territories in Syria. Three of the four serve with the Royal Anglian Regiment, who are based mainly Woolwich and Cyprus and have also been deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan. The individuals in question have also been confirmed as members of National Action.

National Action are an illegal, secretive neo-Nazi group and the four individuals were arrested over "being concerned in the commission, preparation and instigation of acts of terrorism".

This has scarcely been reported and largely ignored, does the UK have a rising far-right problem?

History of media support of fascism

The media have not helped in stoking anti-foreign resentment and groups such as leave.EU continue to promote an agenda that is a close resemblance of fascism, with founder Arron Banks setting up the far-right media outlet, Westmonster, to promote his white supremacy ideals as a valid ideology. British media institutions have a history of supporting fascism, notably the Daily Mail, who have kept quiet on the matter of the four arrests.

In the early 20th century, The Daily Mail were known as a fascist newspaper throughout Europe and on the appointment of G. Ward Price as Chief Correspondent in 1926 saw Benito Mussolini write a letter to Price congratulating him on his appointment and stating that he was "sure" that the widely popular newspaper would continue to be a sincere friend to fascist Italy.

Furthermore, in 1933, the year Hitler implemented the Jewish boycott state managed harassment, beatings and the removal of Jews by the Nazis, Harold Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Rothermere, praised the Nazi regime claiming they were being 'misrepresented' and claimed the bloodthirsty tyranny was exaggerated. A year later, the Nazis began brutally murdering political critics, this has come to be known as "the night of the long knives". The same year as Hitler began systemically censoring Germany, the Daily Mail began openly supporting and praising the Blackshirts, the British Union of Fascists.
This week has been a reminder that our freedoms are to be enjoyed but not exploited. This week in the UK has seen a significant increase in far-right activity, including Nigel Farage going over to Germany to speak at an event held by the far-right Alternative fur Deutschland (AfD) party. Meanwhile in the UK, Theresa May was accused of attempting to rig parliament and Jacob Rees-Mogg is favourited to become next Conservative leader, both are dangerous and highlight the growing far-right in the UK.

Meanwhile the Americas have been hit by 3 hurricanes this week, Irma (category 5), Katia (category 1) and Jose.

The damage is on an unprecedented scale and Irma is due to hit Florida today and will be worst to hit them in history.

Rise of the far-right

There is still a deep and worryingly denial that the far-right are gaining momentum in the UK and the calls on them by supposed liberals to allow them space to speak because of freedom of speech underlines the moral quandary for many people. Free speech is key for any liberal democracy but allowing hate speech is also against the law, the question every individual must ask themselves "what if it was a Muslim preaching this?" because an ISIL supporting hate preacher would say the similar things to those on the far-right.

Nigel Farage addressed an event held by the far-right party AfD, the founder is the grand-daughter of Hitler's finance minister, a Nazi.

The group are anti-immigration and hold views that are like those of the Nazi party, however, they dress up their ideals so that they don't get labelled a fascist party. But they are fascist and Nigel Farage told them to "speak the unspeakable", which means they should be fascist and proud of this.

Meanwhile 5 men were arrested on charges to belonging to the UK neo-Nazi terrorist organisation, National Action.

The men in question are serving officers in the army, one of which was arrested in Cyprus in a base that is used as an operations centre for combatting ISIL territories in Syria. The news of this has scarcely been reported by the UK media, with the Guardian being one of the few to report it. The likes of the Daily Mail, The Sun, Express etc.

have not mentioned the story, but that's hardly surprising when they have a fascist history.

Theresa May has been accused of rigging Parliament to defy the result of the general election and give Tory MPs majority control over all legislation. Andrea Leadsom tables a motion that would give the Conservatives a majority on every standing committee that are the powerhouse to all prospective laws. This would give them the power to dominate every bill until 2022 despite losing their majority in the House of Commons. This would give them the power to control legislation without the DUP. This is a step towards the strip down of democracy and the rights of the people

Jacob Rees-Mogg and the fascist Traditional Britain Group

Jacob Rees-Mogg is touted to take over as Conservative party leader after Theresa May and this poses a threat to society.

He is a traditional conservative and promotes the reinstatement of traditional conservative values on society. He has categorically stated that he is against abortion and same-sex marriage, but perhaps the less reported but more deeply worrying aspect is that he was the speaker at the annual dinner held by the Traditional Britain Group in 2013. He was warned by Searchlight, an anti-fascist publication, of their Politics but ignored it and only chose to distance himself after he was found out.

The group defines what it believes in on their website and they say, "we believe in the obligation of labour and the rolling back of the welfare state." Basically, NHS privatisation, no help for the working poor, disabled etc.

plus, the strip down of workers' rights. Furthermore, they say, "we are opposed to communism, to socialism, to liberalism and to anarchism." Finally, they believe in the forced repatriation of black people to their 'homelands', individuals that would include people like Stormzy, Akala, Mo Farah etc. because this isn't 'their country. Jacob Rees-Mogg has no care for society, environmental protections or ordinary people, he is a danger and supports fascist ideology.

Hurricane Irma, Katia and Jose

The Atlantic has taken a bettering this week with hurricane Irma set to hit Florida today in what will be the worst in their history. Entire nations have been almost destroyed including British territory Anguilla, which has had 95 percent of its infrastructure destroyed.

The three powerful storms that have caused havoc, Irma, which is category 5, underline our growing need to combat climate change. These storms are a direct result in consumption and the damage caused by humans on this planet.
Hurricane Irma already has a successor, Hurricane Jose. The Carribean and Florida are in direct line for Jose and Mexico is preparing for Hurricane Katia to make landfall.

Jose is expected to wreak havoc on the Carribean

The devastation caused by Hurricane Irma has not even begun to be cleared and the islands are still reeling from the impact so the news that a second hurricane is about to hit is disastrous for her people. The UK has already been criticised for not doing enough for the Carribean and now more trouble is on its way.

Scientists attribute climate change and warmer seas to changing weather patterns

According to Al Jazeera, scientists are attributing these and other world weather patterns as likely effects of Global warming. In a recent interview with Al Jazeera's Hashem Ahelbarra, three scientists explained how climate change is warming the seas which then 'feed' hurricanes.

Climate change is no surprise yet too many governments remain apathetic

David Attenborough has been warning about the weather patterns being affected by human behaviour for decades and urging politicians to take action, which is largely falling on deaf ears.

In 2016 during a interview with the UK Independent, he expressed huge concern about political apathy and suggested that political and religious divides are negligible in the face of climate change and its long term impact on all human beings, flora and fauna, worldwide. Evidence of this may already be seen in water levels in dams and rivers around the world.

In the USA the Colorado River is low enough to cause huge concern to the state of Arizona and the state is taking steps to try and ensure conservation.

Excessive rains or drought worldwide must surely stimulate action from governments?

Sierra Leone lost 1000 lives in recent mudslides. India, Nepal and Bangladesh have also experienced torrential rain.

Hong Kong has issued Typhoon 10 grade warnings for the first time in years. South Africa's Cape Town is in dire straits as the winter Cape storms either missed the tip of Africa or were insufficient to fill dams and reservoirs for the city. The evidence is there.

Climate change is serious. Trump's insistence that the USA withdraw from the Paris Agreement is significant in its casual disregard for urgently required measures to curb pollution. Long term planning and application of regulatory measures are no longer suggestions, indeed they are mandatory if humans are to survive.
With the growing number of Cryptocurrencies in the cryptocurrency market, only a handful of crypto currencies are of great importance in this market. Coinmarketcap.com tracks several crypto currencies in this market. There are thousands of cryptocurrencies in the crypto market. Coinmarketcap tracks the market activity of 864 cryptos on this market. New currencies that are being tracked by the website are Hive, Delta, Aventus, Monetha, and Masternodecoin. The website is now following eight new cryptocurrencies since the last seven days. With the growing number of digital coins, investors and users need to identify cryptos that are important and those that are not.

What makes a cryptocurrency vital?

A cryptocurrency is essential if it is being accepted as a mode of payment by the most merchant. Retailers are taking only a handful of cryptos. The list of the main cryptos being accepted by merchants is Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Litecoin. A buyer of any of this cryptos can thus exchange the crypto with a good or service of their choice in a website that accepts these crypto currencies. It is also important to check whether or not the cryptocurrency you are about to buy is taken on most exchange sites, especially large exchange sites such as Bithumb, OKCoin, and Bitfinex. Bithumb allows trading of 8 cryptocurrencies on its site, Bitfinex accepts 35 while OKCoin accepts only 5.

Another aspect that can make a cryptocurrency vital is if it is a popular crypto currency. Examples of popular crypto currencies are Bitcoin, Bitcoin cash, Ethereum, Ripple, Litecoin and Ethereum Classic. These are the currencies that have the highest market capitalization in the cryptocurrency market. Bitcoin alone commands 47 percent of these markets market capitalization while Ethereum commands 18 per cent of market capitalization.

Importance of government regulation

Examples of governments that have legalized cryptocurrencies include Japan and Russia. Most countries have only legalized Bitcoin but not other coins. China, on the other hand, is against crypto currencies such as non-mineable cryptocurrencies that are offered through Initial Coin Offering (ICO).

A document from a Chinese regulator stated that ICO offerings are an unauthorized fundraising tool that can be used for financial scams. Regulators have also called for the inspection of 60 IOC platforms according to CNBC. There were also rumors of plans to shut down local Chinese cryptocurrency exchange sites.

Such stringent regulation will thus reduce market confidence and acceptance of non-mineable crypto currencies.
Though the 2020 presidential election is still three years away, it's not too early to speculate about who will be running for the Democrats to challenge Donald Trump. After mocking an article that listed Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden as the top contenders for the Democratic Party, Kellyanne Conway was instantly hit with backlash for her efforts.

Conway on 2020

It all started in June 2015 on the floor of the famous Trump Tower in New York City. Donald Trump, with his family by his side, caused a media frenzy when he announced that he would be running for president, and would do so in the Republican primary.

At the time, not many took Trump's candidacy seriously, with the consensus being that the former host of "The Apprentice" was just trying to find a way to keep ratings high for his reality show. However, as time moved forward, Trump gained in the polls and found ways to embarrass his Republican opponents on the debate stage. By the time the summer of 2016 rolled around, the billionaire real estate mogul was on stage at the Republican National Convention to accept the party's nomination for president. Fast forward just a few months later to Election Day and Trump pulled off the shocking upset over Hillary Clinton to become the new commander in chief. Since then, Trump has caused an even wider political divide in the country, with the Democratic Party scrambling to put together a potential challenge to the GOP in 2020.

During a September 9 tweet, Kellyanne Conway highlighted a recent article that listed Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders as the top challengers.

Then we'll be sure to have special seating for them. #TrumpPence2020 https://t.co/iSqkB6Cl06  Kellyanne Conway (@KellyannePolls) September 10, 2017

Taking to her Twitter account on Saturday night, Presidential Counsel Kellyanne Conway re-tweeted an article from the Washington Post that ranked the top 15 potential candidates to represent the Democratic Party against Donald Trump in 2020.

In the top two spots were Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and former Vice President Joe Biden, who would be 79 and 78 years old at their inauguration if they were to be elected.

WaPo's top two contenders for Dem 2020 presidential race will be 79 and 78 years old on inauguration day 2021. https://t.co/qzX6VYXAtZ  Byron York (@ByronYork) September 10, 2017

Attached to the article was a smear from Kellyanne Conway who took a shot at the ages of the two possible challengers.

"Then we'll be sure to have special seating for them," Conway tweeted, while using the "#TrumpPence2020" hashtag.

Twitter reacts

Not long after Kellyanne Conway sent out her tweet, critics of the administration were quick to fire back with their reaction. "Your ticket should be safely in jail before that date," one tweet read.

Your ticket should be safely in jail before that date.  Lorraine Hjalte (@LorraineHjalte) September 10, 2017

Focus on the people who have been and are being devastated by the storms and thank the Universe for your time-limited special seating in DC.  Dr. Joe Schippa (@DrJoeSchippa) September 10, 2017

"Wow!!! Why are you attacking our leaders? Wasn't you who said we should focus on Florida right now?

Sad," another Twitter user said in reference to the upcoming Hurricane Irma. "Focus on the people who have been and are being devastated by the storms and thank the Universe for your time-limited special seating in DC," an additional tweet noted.

The actual chairs used for that seating would make better leaders than Trump/Pence.  Sadie Omalley (@OMalley_HG) September 10, 2017

And how old will Trump be? What kind of special chair will he be in? I'm pretty sure treason calls for an electric one.  Patty S (@mylittlevictory) September 10, 2017

@AARP please take note of WH mocking older Americans - apparently new WH platform is that you lose your societal value at a certain age...   Ashley Lynn (@_ashlynn_b) September 10, 2017

"And how old will Trump be?

What kind of special chair will he be in? I'm pretty sure treason calls for an electric one," a Twitter user mockingly added. The backlash continued as the drama surrounding the 2020 election looks to be just started.
President Donald Trump's announcement to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program has both conservatives and liberals divided. The program was first introduced by former President Barack Obama to help ensure documentation for children who illegally immigrated to the United States with their families. Those who oppose the Trump administration's latest decision claim the reversal is unfair to the roughly 800,000 immigrants who are affected by DACA, many who identify as American. Nearly 900 of those people are currently serving in the U.S.

Military or have signed contracts, according to the Pentagon.

DACA and the military

So what happens to the hundreds of immigrants who are active or future military members? If Congress doesn't get its act together in the next six months, it is still unclear what may happen to them.

A spokesperson for the Pentagon says that there are currently less than 900 individuals in the military or that have signed contracts to serve. He pointed out that the individuals are part of the Military Accessions Vital to the National Interest (MAVNI) Pilot Program. According to the Pentagon, the Department of Defense is in contact with the Department of Homeland Security to assess any impact the policy change may have on DACA recipients.

The Pentagon says that it is up to DHS to handle issues related to immigration, naturalization or citizenship.

USA Today reported that Sarah Huckabee Sanders said, "We have confidence that Congress is going to step up and do their job ...This is something that needs to be fixed legislatively, and we have confidence that theyre going to do that."

A reassuring Trump?

Trump took to Twitter on Thursday to try to reassure the thousands of DACA recipients and tell them 'not to worry.'

For all of those (DACA) that are concerned about your status during the 6 month period, you have nothing to worry about - No action!  Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 7, 2017

The vague tweet contradicts the Trump administration's recent series of talking points advising DACA recipients to self-deport.

Homeland Security push DACA to prepare to relocate

"The Department of Homeland Security urges DACA recipients to use the time remaining on their work authorizations to prepare for and arrange their departure from the United States - including proactively seeking travel documentation - or apply for other immigration benefits for which they may be eligible, a document released by the White House reads.

The announcement from the White House also coincides with Trump's decision to no longer allow transgender individuals to serve in the military. Trump cited "tremendous" medical costs for transgender people and that it is a financial burden the U.S. military cannot take on.
It was just last week when the White House announced that Donald Trump was taking steps to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (Daca) program, while giving Congress a limited window of six months to make changes. In response, the president was hit with heavy backlash, which resulted in former Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura to speak out in length.

Ventura slams Trump

Donald Trump's candidacy for president took many by surprise, especially once his started to gain in popularity during the Republican primary. Trump ran as a conservative, but his views didn't always line up with Republican tradition, which didn't sit well with higher ups in the party.

With the former host of "The Apprentice" causing a divide in the GOP, many thought that Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton would be able to ride in and win the presidential election last November, but Trump was able to weather the storm and walk out the winner instead. During this time, former Minnesota governor and Jack of all trades Jesse Ventura applauded Trump, not for his political views, but rather for how he helped shake up the GOP. Despite this, Ventura gave his support to Jill Stein of the Green Party, continuing his tradition of not voting for one of the two major political parties. In the months that Trump has been in office, Ventura has remained mostly silent, but went off on the president in a September 8 Facebook post regarding DACA.

DACA, which allows children brought to the United States illegally by their parents to stay in the country if they are get an education, obtain a work visa, or serve in the military. For Jesse Ventura, who spends part of each year in Mexico, the former governor expressed his opposition to Trump's move. "Now that Trump has indicated he wants to cut DACA, I have to say, its asinine to cut," Ventura wrote.

"DACA recipients grew up in America. They are registered with our government. Theyve been submitted to extensive background checks, and they are paying income taxes," the retired Navy SEAL added.

President Trump said DACA recipients "have nothing to worry about." That's not exactly true https://t.co/XaeCsFwD4R  TIME (@TIME) September 8, 2017

"How does Trumps wife feel about this?" Jesse Ventura went on to ask.

"These are children who were born here and have lived here their entire lives," he continued, before adding, "I find this action so bizarre, as it is coming from a person who married an immigrant."

Politics as usual

Jesse Ventura then went on to accuse Donald Trump of using DACA as a "bargaining chip" to get his much talked about border wall approved and completed. "I see this as a total political move," Ventura observed, while predicting "it will have to be attached to the immigration bill to get the wall built...And now the DACA program will be a bargaining chip to get that wall built." Ventura concluded by proposing the president focus more on dealing with the problems regarding climate than a border wall. Ventura will be hosting a new show on RT America titled "The World According to Jesse," starting this Friday night.
Intended as a discussion group, the blog has evolved to be more of a reading list of current issues affecting our county, its government and people. All reasonable comments and submissions welcomed. Email us at: bill.pysson@gmail.com REMEMBER: To view our sister blog for education issues: www.district100watchdog.blogspot.com
HCM CITY  Leather and footwear exports in the first eight months topped US$9.64 billion, a year-on-year increase of 12.2 per cent, according to the Ministry of Industry and Trade.

They went to 100 countries, with the US, EU, Japan, China, and South Korea being the main buyers, it said.

Foreign companies accounted for more than 81 per cent of the figure.

The Viet Nam Leather, Footwear and Handbag Association (Lefaso) said local companies lack the resources to expand production or market, while foreign-invested firms have for many years invested to expand to capitalise on free trade agreements that Viet Nam had signed or was set to sign, it said.

So the latters exports keep increasing, it added.

ASEAN market

Though intra-ASEAN exports enjoy zero tariffs, leather and footwear exports to member countries remain modest compared to the sectors potential.

The exports were worth less than $400 million last year, going mainly to Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, and the Philippines.

According to trade experts, footwear companies do not treat ASEAN as a key export market.

But according to Lefaso, ASEAN is a hard market to crack since many other members are also strong players, especially Thailand and Indonesia.

Besides, many put up technical barriers to protect their domestic production, the ministry said.

Experts said that this year the world economy is expected to be better than in 2016, and China would continue to reduce investment incentives for textile and footwear to focus on high-tech sectors, meaning orders for shoes and bags would continue to move from China to Viet Nam.

Nguyen uc Thuan, Lefaso chairman, said production and export of leather and footwear have been good this year.

The association forecasts exports to be worth $17.8-18 billion this year, an increase of 10 per cent over last year, he said.  VNS
HA NOI  Viet Nams benchmark VN-Index reached a 10-year high last week on the back of a few blue chips. However, the gain was unstable and the index could face a short-term drop in the coming sessions.

On Friday, the VN-Index on the HCM Stock Exchange gained 0.56 per cent to close at 801.20 points after a seven-day rally. The rally helped the benchmark index record a weekly gain of 1.6 per cent and exceed the 800 points recorded in 2007.

On the Ha Noi Stock Exchange, the HNX-Index was down 0.66 per cent to finish the past trading week at 103.92 points. The northern market index put a dent in its three-day upward run of 0.8 per cent, and concluded the week up only 0.1 per cent from the previous week.

An average of nearly 192 million shares was traded in each session last week, worth VN3.95 trillion (US$175.4 million). The trading figures were down 28 per cent in volume and 13.5 per cent in value compared to the previous trading weeks numbers.

The stock market gain was achieved due several large-cap stocks that performed quite well in all four trading days of the week after the market returned from a national holiday.

Those gainers included brewer Sabeco (SAB), FLC Faros Construction (ROS), food and beverage producer Masan Group (MSN) and PetroVietnam Gas (GAS).

SAB surged 10.7 per cent, ROS rose 5.6 per cent, MSN soared 10.4 per cent and GAS increased by 6 per cent during the week.

However, the rest of the market was quite sluggish on high investor caution. Sectors that were expected to boost the market such as banks, brokerages and insurance-finance firms underperformed.

Though the VN-Index kept hitting new highs, the trading condition was dominated by declining stocks rather than gaining ones, generating investor hestitation to buy new local assets.

Foreign investors finished as net sellers last week. They posted VN74 billion in net sell value on the two local exchanges  contrary to the net buy value of VN237.7 billion.

According to analysts, the gain of the stock market last week was not stable and the market could face a short-term declining period to accumulate and prepare for further increases.

The stock market was driven up by only a few blue chips, while a number of mid-cap stocks had fallen to make gains and returned to their low price levels, Nguyen Ngoc Lan, head of brokerage at Agribank Securities Company, said.

That shows the market needs some time to settle down and accumulate at the current level to increase more strongly in the future, she said. In the few coming weeks, large-cap stocks will take turns to lift the market up and lure investors back to the market.

Bao Viet Securities Company (BVSC) was even more pessimistic about the markets short-term prospects. Investors will increase their selling this week and focus to gain profits from mid-cap and small-cap stocks while large-cap stocks will continue performing in negative directions, it said.

According to BIDV Securities Company (BSC), poor investor confidence resulted in low trading liquidity last week and therefore, the brokerage firm expected the VN-Index would fall in the coming week.  VNS
HA NOI  Importing used cars with nine seats and less will become harder if a proposal to raise used car tariffs is approved by the Government. In fact, the proposed import tax rate is double its current level and would make used cars more expensive than new ones.

The draft was recently issued by the Ministry of Finance to gather ideas from other sectors.

Deputy Head of the Tax Policy Department, Nguyen Thi Thanh Hang, said it was meant to minimise the import of used cars and contribute to developing the domestic automobile industry.

He also said the tax rate on most imported used cars with nine seats and less was currently lower than that to which Viet Nam is committed with the World Trade Organisation (WTO). Therefore, the ministry has proposed an increase to the highest level acceptable.

The draft shows that for vehicles of 2,500cc or more, SUVs, sport cars and passenger cars (excluding vans), they will have a mixed tax rate calculation.The taxable price of used cars multiplies by 200 per cent or 150 per cent plus $10,000. As for other vehicles, the taxable price multiplies by the import tax rate on the new automobile of the same type, plus $15,000.

For vehicles of 10-15 seats with an engine displacement or less than 2,500cc, the taxable price is multiplied by the import tax rate on the new automobile of the same type, plus $10,000. Tax on cars above 2,500cc is multiplied by the new automobile tax rate of the same type, plus $15,000.

Tien Phong (Vanguard) newspaper quoted an auto shop owner saying the finance ministry proposal would encourage consumers to buy new cars, especially given that prices of locally assembled and imported cars were strongly discounted.

The new draft will also help stop the import of old cars, out-of-date cars from foreign countries, which would turn Viet Nam into a car dumping ground.

Nguyen Van Thanh, the director of Customs at inh Vu Port in the northern Hai Phong City, said the office had recently required a buyer to re-export a luxury car, which was claimed old but was new.

Thanh said the four-seater car Bentley Bentayga, which was imported from the US, was produced in 2016 with an engine displacement of 5,950cc. The car, worth VN4.93 billion, was claimed to have run more than 10,000km and been in use for six months. However, the kilometres log did not match the cars technical condition.

According to statistic from the finance ministry, the number of used cars with nine seats and less has dropped in recent years due to continuously increasing import tax. In 2013, Viet Nam imported 3,777 units, but the figure was down to 1,441 in 2016. The volume of used trucks has rapidly increased because those imported from China are cheap.

Director of Thien Phuc An Company Nguyen Tuan told the Tien Phong newspaper that the used cars imported to Viet Nam were mainly luxury cars with high engine displacement from 3,000cc up. However, as of July 1, 2016, when the special consumption tax was raised on high engine displacement cars, most businesses stopped importing this type of vehicle.

With the finance ministry proposal, the price of used cars will certainly rise and the gate for the used car business will become even narrower, said Tuan.

He calculated that on a used Camry imported from the US with an engine displacement of 2,500cc and taxable price at $20,000 the importer would have to pay $19,000 in tax following the current import tariff. Under the draft proposal, the vehicles import tax will rise to $31,000 per unit, plus the special consumption tax worth 50 per cent of the car value, value-added tax of 10 per cent and profit of auto dealers.

If the price of a used car will be VN100-200 million higher than of a similar but new type, no one will buy it, said Tuan.  VNS
LONG AN  The first batch of Vietnamese chicken was exported to Japan on Saturday, marking a milestone in the countrys efforts to open the discerning Japanese market.

The 30 tonnes of chicken wings, thighs and breasts were shipped by the Koyu & Unitek Co, a joint venture between Australia and Japan in southern ong Nai Province and part of a bigger global value chain.

The shipment left from the Long An International Seaport in the southern province of Long An and is expected to arrive in Tokyo in 10 days.

On June 22, Japanese authorities approved the import of poultry products made by the Koyu & Unitek Co from Viet Nam. According to Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Nguyen Xuan Cuong, that was a very important event for the agriculture sector and farmers.

Agriculture and farming are essential to Viet Nam, its agriculture sector and farmers, he said. The first shipment proves Vietnamese food products are clean, good and reasonably priced because Japan is quite a strict market with high requirements on product quality.

Cuong also hopes Viet Nam will be able to export other poultry products to Japanese market, such as eggs, pork, and even beef and milk, in its bid to expand the agriculture sector and its involvement in the global supply chain.

Koyu & Unitek has signed a long-term contract to supply Japan with about 300 tonnes of chicken products per month, said Director General of the firm James Hieu.

According to Hieu, Japan imports over 900,000 tonnes of poultry products annually. In fact, Koyu & Unitek falls short of its Japanese partners real demand, which exceeds 2,000 tonnes per month.

The firm plans to increase capacity in the future by enhancing cooperation with poultry farmers and expanding processing facilities.

Koyu & Unitek Co is a member of a supply chain that involves three others units that operate in the animal breeding and feed industry. Those companies are Bel Ga JSC, a joint venture of the Belgian Belgabroed Group and the Netherlands-based De Heus, Hung Nhon Group and De Heus.

The production chain has helped Viet Nam produce clean poultry products that meet requirements from the Japanese market.

The Long An International Seaport signed a strategic co-operation agreement with the Netherlands-based De Heus to provide logistics and storage services for chicken products that are transported between Viet Nam and Japan.  VNS
HCM City  The central province of Binh Thuan is preparing to receive sludge from the Vinh Tan Thermal Power Centre to reclaim land that has seen serious erosion.

The information was announced at a media briefing organised by the Binh Thuans Party Committees Propaganda Department on September 7.

The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment has approved the use of one million cubic metres of sludge from the Vinh Tan 1 Thermal Power Plant to reclaim land from the sea to build Vinh Tan General Port in Binh Thuan, Vo Thanh Huy, deputy head of the office of the provincial Peoples Committee said at the meeting.

The ministry has also asked the Vinh Tan 1 Thermal Power Plant to report on what has changed from the initial approved environmental effect assessment report, he added.

In the future, all sludge from the Vinh Tan Thermal Power Centre will be used to reclaim land in an area which has seen serious erosion, including the coast from Vinh Tien hamlet to Vinh Hung hamlet in Vinh Tan commune, wards 13 and 14 in Lien Huong town, Tuy Phong district.

Vinh Tien and Vinh Hung hamlets are only 2km away from the Vinh Tan Thermal Power Centre.

Its very convenient to transport the sludge and it is expected that this area will need 2 million cubic metres of sluge to protect its coast, Huy added.

The coast in wards 13 and 14 in Lien Huong town are 15 km away from the Vinh Tan Thermal Power Centre. The coast has seen erosion of 1.2 km and 20  30 m in width and it will need around 8,000 cubic metres of sludge.

The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment and relevant authorities are researching and considering our suggestion, Huy added. -- VNS
HCM CITY  The HCM City Department of Transport will soon submit to the Peoples Committee proposals to increase the bus transport subsidy for students and improve the quality of bus services to get more students to use public transport.

Tran Quang Lam, the departments deputy director, speaking at a meeting with the Department of Education and Training on Wednesday, said officials would also consider operating electric vehicles currently used to serve tourists to pick up students to reassure parents about safety.

The goal is to have 15-20 per cent of the citys school students going by bus by 2020, he said.

His department is currently doing a survey on adding routes and bus stops for students convenience, he said.

Incentives would be offered to bus companies to upgrade the quality of their vehicles, he added.

Tran Chi Trung, head of the city Management and Operation Centre for Public Transport, said only 3 per cent of students go by bus to school now.

Schools in 16 districts have signed agreements with bus operators to pick up and drop their students, 67 per cent of them being in outlying districts like Can Gio, Cu Chi, Hoc Mon, Binh Chanh, and Nha Be, he said.

Despite great effort, the centre has failed to convince more students to use buses, he admitted.

He also admitted that the subsidies provided to bus operators are inadequate.

Nguyen Van Cai, deputy principal of Quang Trung High School in Cu Chi District, said more than 80 per cent of his students used to travel by bus since their tickets were fully subsidised by the city.

The citys current subsidies for bus travel were reduced to VN2,830 (US$0.24) per trip and VN3,537 in Can Gio.

As a result, the number of students travelling by bus has been reducing every year, falling to a mere 17 in 2016-17.

Ngo Quyen High School in District 7 has seen a similar decrease after the subsidy cut, Le Xuan Nguyen, its deputy principal, said.

An official from Trung Vuong High School in District 1 said buses should not pick up students from just one school since that way they may not run to full capacity.

Instead, they should pick up students from several schools in the same area, he added. VNS
HA NOI  Deputy Prime Minister Vuong inh Hue on Thurdsay called on relevant agencies to use the Governments agriculture policies to push the development of co-operatives in Viet Nam.

The deputy PM suggested the agencies to review and take advantages od credit policy for the agriculture sector, agriculture investment incentives and agriculture insurance to boost the operation of co-operatives. The deputy PM is also head of the National Steering Committee on Innovation and Development of Collective Economic Sector and Co-operatives.

The 24-member committee was established last March under the direction of Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc. The committee is assigned to study and make recommendations to the Prime Minister about policies and strategies to develop collective economic sector institutions and co-operatives. It directs and coordinates ministries and agencies in implementing policies for co-operatives.

Speaking at the meeting on Thurday, Hue said that at a time when Viet Nam is restructuring its economy and wants to strengthen the private sector, further attention must be given to the innovations of co-operatives.

The innovations of co-operatives are in line with restructuring in agricultural production and the formation of new style rural areas, he said.

The new-styled co-operatives regulated by the 2012 Law on Co-operatives help households to generate more value, Hue said.

The old-style co-operatives in Viet Nam did not allow members to run individual businesses. Members contributed capital, land and labour to the co-operatives and their income completely depended on the income of the co-operatives.

The old-style co-operatives, which were always cared for by the State and Party, played an important role during wartime and the era of a centralized planned economy in Viet Nam. But they regularly failed to adapt to the transition to an economy operating under the socialist-oriented market mechanism.

Deputy Minister of Planning and Investment ang Huy ong said that since the Law on Co-operatives took effects in 2013, there are over 19,500 co-operatives in Viet Nam with 6.2 million members.

The number of co-operatives increased by 600, but the number of members dropped by 1.4 million compared to before 2013.

Last year, the average income of a co-operative was VN 3 billion (US$132,000), while the rate in 2012 was VN 2.5 billion.

In 2016, a member of a co-operative had yearly income of VN 31 million ($1,400), VN 10 million more than in 2012.

Vo Kim Cu, chairman of Viet Nam Co-operatives Alliance said that Viet Nams co-operatives faced four major difficulties: access to land, access to credit, the application of scientific development and technology, and finding a market for their products.

As half of all co-operatives in Viet Nam operate in agriculture, co-operatives play an important role in ensuring social welfare, providing jobs, developing rural areas and especially restructuring agriculture production, Cu said.  VNS
HCM CITY  Viet Nam has policies to help expand the cultivation of biotech corn, but the cultivation area for the crop remains modest, according to the Crop Production Department.

Speaking at a seminar on Friday on the economic and environmental impact of biotech crops globally and potential benefits from the adoption of biotech crops in Viet Nam, Tran Xuan inh, the departments deputy director, said the area under corn cultivation in Viet Nam has reached 1.17 million hectares, of which 100,000ha was for genetically modified corn.

Hybrid corn varieties dominate fields in Viet Nam.

Average corn productivity was low at 4.5 tonnes per hectare, he said, adding that with high production costs and low yields, domestic corn is unable to compete with imports.

Currently, domestic corn meets about 40-50 per cent of market demand, with corn import volume increasing significantly in the past years, he said.

Though the Government has policies to encourage farmers to shift low-productivity rice land to corn or soybean, the low profits from corn cultivation have discouraged farmers.

To get even in production, average corn productivity must reach at least 5 tonnes per ha, inh said.

This requires the corn sector to have measures to raise productivity and cut back production costs and raise the income of farmers, he told the seminar held by the International University - Viet Nam National University HCM City.

The sector needs to map out a plan to put GM corn in production at localities, as well as develop links in production and consumption of the product.

The use of modern bio-technologies in agricultural production has significantly helped farmers around the world improve productivity and profitability, delegates said.

Graham Brookes from the UKs PG Economics Ltd, a specialist provider of advisory and consultancy services to agriculture and other natural resource-based industries, said the commercialisation of GM crops has occurred at a rapid rate in the past 20 years.

GM crop technology has had a significant positive impact on global gross farm income, which amounted to US$15.5 billion in 2015. This is equivalent to having added 5.2 per cent to the value of global production of the four main crops of corn, canola, cotton and soybeans.

From 1996 to 2015, gross farm income has increased by $167.7 billion, he said.

These gains have been divided 49 per cent to farmers in developed countries and 51 per cent to farmers in developing countries.

About 72 per cent of the gains have derived from yield and production gains with the remaining 28 per cent coming from cost savings, he said.

The adoption of biotech crops has also contribute to reduce green house gas emissions due to reduced fuel use (less spraying and soil cultivation) and decreased the environment impact with a reduction in herbicide and insecticide use.

Talking about the potential impact from the adoption of corn hybrid seeds with biotech traits in Viet Nam, he said the total economic boost to the rural economy could be $16.9 million per year in the worst scenario, if 20 per cent of the corn crop in Viet Nam used biotech corn.

Biotech corn would help farmers increase output to meet growing demand from the feed sector and improve balance of payments, he said.  VNS
By Nguyen My Ha

To many first-time visitors, Ha Noi seems to be a young city not only because of so many young people out on its streets, but also because of new buildings and supermarkets, shops and restaurants, colleges and libraries. Thousands of new buildings have sprung up in the past 20 to 30 years.

Many people, particularly expatriates, find it hard to look into the 1,000-year-old history to find traces of the many dynasties that had their capitals up and down the Red River.

The architectural landmarks of distant dynasties, such as the Ly and Tran, are few and far between. So when a stone statue of Amitabha, the future Buddha, was declared a National Treasure, people jumped at the chance to see it.

The statue, which is housed at Ngo Xa Pagoda in Nam inh Province, is "said to be the oldest remaining complete stone statue of the Viet people from the Ly Dynasty", said history professor Tran Lam Bien.

We found it in the 1960s when we went to examine a collection of Chuong Son relics, he said. The statue was originally up in the mountains, but people had carried it down to preserve it at the Ngo Xa Pagoda at the foot of the mountain.

The Ly Dynasty started with founder Ly Cong Uan, who later became King Ly Thai To, who moved the royal capital from mountain-trapped Hoa Lu, to the flatland surrounding ai La Citadel, where the Red River meets a busy residential and trading centre.

He named the new citadel Thang Long, the Ascending Dragon, and started a dynasty that lasted for more than 200 years, that was militarily powerful and economically successful. Religion and art also bloomed.

First phase: The original stone Amitabha Statue before it was gold-gilded. Photo courtesy of https://hoidonghuongnamdinhhcm.com

Buddhist religion

Ly Cong Uan grew up in a pagoda. During his life, Ly Thai To, as he was known, was an observant Buddhist. Buddhism flourished under the dynasty.

It was written in the ai Viet Su Ky Toan Thu, the Complete History of Great Viet, that the king ordered thousands of Buddhas be chiselled, thousands painted and tens of thousands of religious banners made.

It is written on a stone stele at Quynh Lam Pagoda in Quang Ninh Province, that a monk, Thuong uc, carved a Buddhist statue 1m80 tall.

Author Nguyen Tien Canh writes in The Arts of Ly Dynasty published in 1973, Buddhist towers and pagodas played a vital role under the Ly Dynasty. Then, pagodas were built everywhere in the country. Where there was man, there was pagoda. At beautiful scenic mountains and landscapes, there would be a pagoda built.

Other Ly kings, Ly Thai Tong and Ly Nhan Tong, both took care of Buddhist and State affairs. Buddhism was actively practised, the teachings were wide-spread. Historian Le Van Huu in the 13th century wrote that, Over half of the population are monks and pagodas can be seen everywhere.

Still standing: Old and rusty, the pagoda was built in the 17th century.  VNS Photo My Ha

Under the Ly Dynasty, a great number of pagodas and towers were built. Regent Queen Y Lan built a total of 100 pagodas in her lifetime.

The countrys most influential Buddhist landmarks were built in the period. They included One Pillar Pagoda, the Celestial Tower in Thang Long (now Ha noi), Phat Tich Pagoda and tower in Bac Ninh Province and Chuong Son Tower in Ha Nam Province.

The glorious epoch of the Ly Dynasty was later followed by the illustrious Tran Dynasty, both pivotal to the Viet civilization.

In the 15th century, the Ming from China invaded ai Viet, as then Viet Nam today was named, and placed it under Chinese rule for 20 years. During this time they destroyed all the important landmarks of the Viet people.

They literally pulled down the towers and pagodas, destroyed statues and pavilions. They also burnt all the books.

Of all the magnificent pagodas and towers, palaces and residence, only five statues of Amitabha, the original treasures of the Ly Dynasty, remain for us to see today.

Ancient motif: The Lotus petal bears a pair of dragons typical of Ly Dynasty.  VNS Photo My Ha

The oldest

And of all these five statues, the one at Ngo Xa Pagoda is the most complete. It was listed as a National Treasure in 2013.

This is the most important statue, the Amitabha, says historian Tran Lam Bien. It is the oldest. Its unique.

This year marks the 900th anniversary of the completion of the Chuong Son Tower and we went to observe the statue, now preserved in the Ngo Xa Pagoda at the foot of Chuong Son Mountains.

Started in the early days of spring 1108, the tower took nine years to complete.

King Ly Nhan Tong visited the Chuong Son mountains in 1107, 1114 and 1117  and each time a dragon is said to have appeared. According to ai Viet Su Ky Toan Thu, or the Complete History of Great Viet Complete, King Ly Nhan Tong ventured to Chuong Son Mountains to inaugurate the Sacred Tower Van Phong Thanh Thien.

During his reign, King Ly Nhan Tong warded off northern invaders and pacified southern neighbours. He reinforced the royal exams to choose talented scholars for royal postings. He banned the killing of buffaloes for meat to maintain farming capacity for rice cultivation. He built nine towers including twin towers with white tops in front of the Dien Huu or One Pillar Pagoda in Ha Noi now.

But today, only the square stone foundation remains of the original Chuong Son Pagoda. One side measures 19m long.

The Amitabha statue was originally placed in a 100-compartment pagoda standing by the tower. The statue was taken downhill from the mountains and now rests in Ngo Xa Pagoda, which was built in the 17th century.

Located at the foot of the mountains and further out of the town centre, Ngo Xa Pagoda is quiet and solemn. It stands in a large yard under age-old trees facing a rice field.

The sitting statue at Ngo Xa rests on a three-level stone pedestal. The lowest level shows water waves, dragons and flowers. The lower half of this level shows water wave after wave, above which lively dragons fly in between daisy flower strings. These motifs are quite popular and typical of the decoration in the Ly Dynasty.

The next level features a pair of lions playing with a jade ball on top of an inverted lotus. The lions sport little flowers on their bodies. The lotus petals are carved with chrysanthemum flowers.

The top level features a lotus bed with two layers of petals. Each petal bears a pair of dragons beautifully and lively carved.

All the ornate decorations lead to the most important statue on top. The whole statue and pedestal stand at 2m16.

The statue had a removable headpiece but it was stolen from the pagoda in 2002.

A country-wide police search was announced and all border gates checked. Nearly a year later, the head was found wrapped in a red piece of cloth, left in the communes cemetery.

Now if you visit the pagoda, youll see the statue clad in gold.

Nguyen Van Vinh, 80, a long time guard at the pagoda explained that the gilded coat was to hide the cut at the throat of the statue.

In a paper about Buddhism during the Ly Dynasty, historians Tran Lam Bien and Chu Quang Tru wrote that, Only the statue at Ngo Xa Pagoda best represents the Buddhist human sculpture during the Ly Dynasty.

The same paper also has it that, The 100-compartment pagoda was beautifully carved with wood, but it was all gone.

Pointing to a broken piece with water wave motifs, Nguyen Van Vinh says, This is what is left of the border of the western hall at the 100-compartment pagoda up in the mountain.

He then sighs, It was huge.  VNS
By Hong Van

In the near future, public toilets will be able to use their wastewater to generate power for lighting, thanks to a mini generator made by two university students in the central city of a Nang.

Nguyen Cong Tin, a fresh graduate majoring in Electrical Engineering and Electronics, and Nguyen Thi Thanh, a third-year student majoring in Business Administration, have successfully made a mini generator and urine battery that runs on wastewater.

The project surpassed another five and won Viet Nam Regional Finals of Go Green In The City in late June, a competition aimed at seeking sustainable energy solutions.

a Nang City has several public toilets that dump large amounts of wastewater into the sea. However, these toilets also need power for lighting at night, so we decided to examine the use of this wastewater to create power, said Thanh.

Tin first came up with the idea of a mini generator in early 2017 and invited Thanh, who has special interest in environmental issues to join his project.

With his strength in technical knowledge, Tin is in charge of designing and modelling the product while Thanh researched the economic benefits as well as environmental impact.

There are more than 5,000 public toilets in urban areas, which need an estimated total of 875,000 kWh per year, equivalent to more than US$60,000, according to research by Thanh.

This is costly and contributes to pollution, said Thanh.

For the mini generator, the idea is to put a propeller and motor in a water pipe. The water flow rotates the propeller and generates power. This model can be installed in almost all types of water pipes or faucets, not just public toilets.

Meanwhile, an advantage of the urine battery is that it use urine as the main material to generate power. For toilet that are used frequently, the material will be refilled continuously, said Thanh.

Power generated from these two devices will be stored and reserved for lighting. This is useful and convenient especially in toilets where lighting is yet unavailable, Thanh added.

Success: With the toilet mini generator project, Nguyen Cong Tin (second, left) and Nguyen Thi Thanh (First, left) won the Viet Nam Regional Finalists of Go Green in the City competition.  Photos courtesy of Nguyen Thi Thanh

It took three months for Thanh and Tin to finish the project. By June this year, they released their mini generator and urine battery.

At the beginning we found it hard to clarify the idea. We tried different models, working very hard while still having to focus on study at university, to decide on a mini generator for toilet, said Thanh.

I believe the device will help reduce our dependence on fossil fuel and hydroelectric power as well as encourage the use of eco-friendly batteries, Thanh told Viet Nam News.

By using this device, every one of us can be a green energy maker, Thanh added.

Water flowing at 600-5000 litres per hour in a 27-millimetre-diameter pipe can generate 0.01-1.8W, according to Thanh.

About 60kWh will be generated in each toilet per year, saving more than $14. If a mini generator and urine battery are installed in 5,000 public toilets, about $72,000 will be saved per year.

In June, the two students registered to participate in the "Go Green In The City" competition, a global business case challenge for business and engineering students on green energy solutions for smarter cities launched by Schneider Electric, a company in energy management and automation.

"The Vietnamese finalists are all competitive, the competitors ideas are also interesting and worth being learned. Being winner of Viet Nam Regional Finalist is such a big pleasure for us," said Thanh.

The success of the project at the "Go Green in the City" competition can be attributed to the unique and creative idea, successful demo and potential economic benefits of the product as well as the full knowledge about the product of the two students, Professor Ha ac Binh, dean of Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Electronics of Duy Tan University, who is also instructor of Thanh and Tin for the project, told Viet Nam News.

The orientation to develop this device will be to reduce the cost of product as well as increase the energy generating capacity. Besides, they can also combine with other sources, like generating energy from sewage to increase the amount of energy, said Binh. VNS
Wherever you are, the thing you miss the most is your hometown. For Vietnamese who visit other countries, finding a Vietnamese restaurant is a gift.

After three weeks away from Viet Nam on an exchange programme, I missed my hometown so much. I missed the places, my family, friends and of course the food. I had planned to find a Vietnamese restaurant before I went to Singapore but was lucky to discover Huynh Quangs lovely eatery called Sunny Viet.

I was with two friends from Hong Kong  Jason Lee and Angeline Jia. We were on a trip to Merlion Park to enjoy the festive atmosphere. Everything in Singapore is magnificent and the food good if not slightly expensive, but deep down, I missed Vietnamese food.

We walked to Merlion Park to find a place for dinner. Because the food there is so expensive, Jia suggested we visit Lau Pa Sat (18 Raffles Quay Street) where there are many small, inexpensive restaurants.

Yummy: This tasty chicken pho is a taste of home.

When we entered Lau Pa Sat, I couldnt believe my eyes, Sunny Viet was right in the middle.

Like other restaurants in Lau Pa Sat, Sunny Viet is placed in a cozy wooden booth with four big tables. There are many pictures of pho (chicken or breef noodle soup), smoked duck pho, bun bo Hue (Hue-style beef noodle soup), spring rolls for S$1.5 (US$1.1) each, and others. There were familiar smells of onion, soup, mint leaves, beef and chicken.

I ordered a bowl of chicken pho for S$5 ($3.69) and my two friends chose bun bo Hue which was S$5 ($ 3.69) a bowl. After 15 minutes, Quang, the shops owner, brought out three irresistible dishes. After the first mouthful, I was amazed at the wonderful taste.

Quangs brew was just like the flavour of pho in Ha Noi. The rice noodles were soft and smooth and the soup was featured by sweet broth of chicken bones with a touch of chicken fat. Every piece of the chicken itself was soft, delicious and the taste was exactly like pho back home.

Quang said all of the ingredients were imported from Viet Nam, so that is why everything tasted so good.

My two friends who tried bun bo Hue were also delighted. Ive never tried anything like this before, now I know that Vietnamese food is good, Lee said.

Jia, who has a wide knowledge of food, described how good it really was: First, the noodles were really unique, it was quite thick like spaghetti but made from rice noodle so when I chewed it, the sweet rice melted in my mouth and created a savoury flavour.

Second, the soup was spicy but in a very special way, it was a combination of steamed bones, lemongrass, ginger, garlic, purple onion and chili. I was really impressed with the pigs trotter and the pork pie. Ive never tried this before and it looked weird at first but turned out the flavour was really good, the pork was really delicious mixed with peppers.

Quang opened Sunny Viet seven years ago right after graduating from university. "It all came to me like destiny, through many years living away from Viet Nam, I witnessed not only myself but also many Vietnamese who worked and studied here. We all missed Vietnamese food so much. From that, I came up with an idea of opening a Vietnamese restaurant.

We said goodbye to Quang after buying some spring rolls to enjoy as we watched the Singapore National Day rehearsals. VNS
News / Africa

by Staff reporter

South Africa's ruling African National Congress (ANC) has told President Robert Mugabe to stop "spitting" on Nelson Mandela's grave and fix the mess he created in his own country.ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe made the scathing remarks after Mugabe on two occasions told Zanu PF supporters that Mandela only negotiated for his freedom from jail and not for the economic emancipation of the majority black people.Delivering the OR Tambo memorial lecture in Kwa-Thema in Ekurhuleni on Friday, Mantashe said Mugabe must leave the ANC alone and fix Zimbabwean problems."Zimbabwe should be very grateful to usthe media has reported there are two million Zimbabwean citizens in the country."The crisis in Zimbabwe is not something we have to research, we meet the crisis in the streets of Joburg."It is easy for him to insult me. But he can't spit on Mandela's grave."He can insult me, it's okay. Even ANC members insult me through SMS and WhatsApp, what is different," he said to loud cheers from party supporters.Mantashe wrote to his Zanu PF counterpart Ignatius Chombo registering the ANC's indignation with Mugabe's comments.After the complaint was lodged, Mugabe escalated the tiff by describing Mantashe's comments on the matter as "stupid"."I made these remarks in regards to South Africa and Gwede stupidly reacted," he said on Thursday."Yes, they only fought to remove apartheid, not for freedom and independence as we were doing."Mugabe and Mandela had a frosty relationship, with the South African liberation icon being very critical of the Zimbabwean leader's human rights record.Zimbabweans, estimated to be over a million, have sought refuge in South Africa over the years, escaping the spectacular collapse of the country's economy blamed on Mugabe's bad policies.South Africa last week announced that it will give 200 000 Zimbabweans fresh work and residence permits for another four years so that they can continue eking out a living in that country.Most of the beneficiaries of the Zimbabwean Exemption Permit are economic refugees while other escaped political persecution at home.
by Nguyen Huu Tai

Getting up, Mien looked out of the window. The dim sunbeams piercing the thick clouds did nothing to warm the November morning.

Bitterly cold! Winter hasnt come yet. If the snow keeps coming down like this I wont be able to stand it, she said to herself.

Mum, the year before last in one month there were ten snowstorms, one after another. Worse still, one of them lasted more than two days, said her daughter Dung.

Really?

Mien put on a thick jacket then in her slippers she walked to the door. She opened it. To her surprise, in their bedroom her two grandchildren were still sleeping soundly. They smiled and smiled. Wow, theyre enjoying their dreams, she whispered. Soon theyll be bugging me non-stop, she added.

Going downstairs, she made a cup of coffee, as she used to drink in her hometown. She also wanted to have some fruit juice outside in a cafe, but she dared not, for all its customers were all males. Why should I be the odd man out? she said to herself.

In the kitchen she found a big turkey defrosting on the table.

Yesterday afternoon I told you to get some chickens for Thanksgiving but youve bought this huge, disgusting turkey! Mien reproached her daughter.

Mum, this is American culture, Dung replied. On Thanksgiving, the main course is turkey, of course, along with potatoes and mac and cheese, with pumpkin pie to finish. When in Rome, do as the Romans do. Were holding a great feast for our guests this evening as well, Dung explained to her mother.

Mien had been in the USA for a family reunion for more than a month, much longer than she expected to stay. All she did here was babysit her grandchildren. Her heart ached for her native village, the meandering rural paths, the thatched cottages, the earthen graves of her forefathers and, above all, her friendly neighbours.

She had come because of a letter Dung had sent her. It said, Now that your two daughters are leading a happy life here in Massachusetts with our kids, youre still alone in Vietnam. How can we feel at ease, Mum?

Surprisingly, a few days before Thanksgiving Dung asked her, Mum, do you want to meet Dad together with our stepmother? Let me know soon so we can avoid any awkwardness.

Well, let things take their due course, my dear, she replied after a long silence. Is it necessary for both of us to handle our problems right now? Whats more, I doubt hell be man enough to look me in the face. Ive been here a whole month and havent seen him. If he really wants to see me, why hasnt he come here? she went on.

* * *

How could Mien forget that night when her husband embraced their two daughters and hugged her tightly? She just cried and cried. Stay behind to look after the kids, my darling, he told her in a faltering voice. Ill try to get American citizenship within five years. Then Ill come back here to forge a new marriage certificate so you and our children can settle down there for good.

They all said farewell to him before he left.

Before that Mien, together with her three younger sisters  Lieu, Thuong and Thy, faked their husbands birth certificates so that they became younger and unmarried and could leave more easily. Going to America, one by one they left the four married women behind as single young females, with their seemingly fatherless children in the poverty stricken countryside.

Two, four, then seven years passed by after the wives long wait in vain.

While they toiled tirelessly in the country, the men broke their promises. The four women were deeply upset. Eventually, three of them remarried, each for their own reasons. Why should we wait for these disloyal men in vain when we know they abandoned us for ever? they said. Despite her pain, Mien stayed single. She kept the $100 banknotes sent to her in a safe due to her self-respect rather than for wealth. She eventually changed the cash into taels of gold for her two daughters dowry when they got married later. The main reason for Miens celibacy was that she did not want her daughters to suffer the same fate as her, she was too busy making sure they wouldnt have to rely on her new husband if she remarried.

Several men in her village, divorced or single, came to her but she refused their proposals for marriage, saying My dear, not until my daughters grow up could I think of marrying again.

Unexpectedly, when they become adults they were eligible for US green cards to stay with their dad. Consequently, she was left alone in her hometown. Mum, if you find a good man, marry him as soon as possible. As for us, who are now living very far from you, we cant help you much anymore, said one of them in a letter to her.

The year before last, one of her old friends who had studied in the USSR settled down there and became very rich, but his home life was less rosy. His wife left him with the three children in her custody. He decided to return to Viet Nam to enjoy his old age in peace. He met Mien by chance. He soon asked her for her hand in marriage, and she accepted. Poor them, suddenly in Ukraine there was great political unrest, destroying his business. All his property and money was gone. Immediately, he flew back to Ukraine to support his ex-wife and kids, who were now destitute.

Mien was alone again.

* * *

Keeping the curtain ajar, Mien looked out of the window. In the front courtyard of the building, she saw many cars.

Oh dear, lots of guests have already come in! Perhaps, they are all in the basement ready for the Thanksgiving party, she whispered to herself. Although she had got dressed, she stayed upstairs, too nervous to go down.

After more than 20 years of separation, what will seeing him be like? Are the sweet memories of the past still fresh in his mind? And am I bold enough to stare squarely at his eyes? What will happen when I meet his new wife? Doubts began to flood her mind.

Mum, go downstairs to chat with Dad. Hes been waiting for you, Dung urged her mother.

Slowly, she walked downstairs, Her heart was thumping. Her trembling hands seemed unable to keep her balance. Her teeth gnashed against each other. Why am I so worried! Dont weep, Mien, she whispered to herself. After so many years waiting for this, try to relax, she comforted herself.

Downstairs, a man with his back to the stairs could be seen. Putting her right hand over her breast, she cleared her throat.

Stirred by the noise, he turned round.

Evening, my dear! How are you feeling? he greeted her.

Not too bad. You?

So so, he replied nervously.

Her lips tightened. She tried not to cry. She wanted to hit him in the face and scold him. She also wanted to tell him about the hardships she had suffered at home while he was abroad: extreme poverty, loss of husband and merciless remarks. Whats more, she wanted to tell him that she did not need his money.

As for him, he wanted to console Mien by wiping away her tears or holding her hand tightly, but he did not dare, simply because he was with another woman.

He also wished to mention the troubles he had met with during his stay abroad such as loss of youth, hard work, solitude, harsh winters and racial discrimination. It all happened because of my decisions, he reminded himself.

Fortunately, he met Thu, an overseas Vietnamese, by chance when he drove his car to a garage to have it repaired. Its owners 20-year-old daughter attracted the lonely man of thirty remarkably. She soon fell in love with him too. Both clung to each other passionately in a secret love affair. He completely forgot his wife still living alone in Viet Nam.

Thu was two months pregnant. For a Catholic woman, abortion was prohibited. Therefore, the couple was urged to get married as soon as possible aso a house worth a million dollars would be given to Thu as dowry.

All he could do was to go along with it.

* * *

Actually, he also wanted to return to his home to pay tribute to his ancestors graves and to carry out his old dreams: to go along the Dinh by boat in the late evenings, to catch fish with his large net for his family, to take his two little kids to school, then back home in the afternoons and, last but not least, to lull them to sleep at nights.

He also wanted Miens forgiveness. Yet, he was afraid that the local authorities might discover he had forged the documents and he would be unable to return home again. On the other hand, he could hardly take his old flame to the US for a reunion either because of his new wife. As for Thu, she often told him to return home to Viet Nam to visit Mien and his relatives. If you keep on tormenting yourself like this, the kids and I will be miserable too, she reminded him again and again.

At least he looked after the two children. Ive accepted a lonely life anyway, Mien said to herself.

* * *

Forgive me, my dear, he said to Mien during their encounter.

What for?

Because you still bear a grudge against me, I think.

Oh, no no! Whats the use of hating someone for that long? Anyway, were old now.

Back then...

Let bygones be bygones! Lets think about our childrens future. Come what may, our relationship ended a long time ago, Mien told him.

He felt as if a heavy burden had been lifted from his bony shoulders.

* * *

Did she come here with you? Mien asked him.

Who do you mean by she?

Your young and pretty wife, of course.

Yes, she did. Downstairs. he replied.

Then, let me go downstairs to meet her. I wish to thank her for what she has done for our daughters.

We had to look after them, needless to say, he said.

Of course, I know, I know! Anyhow, take me to her!"

Saying so, Mien stood up abruptly. When her brooch came off, her long sweet-smelling hair flew down over her back.

How beautiful! he whispered to himself.

Well, Ive cooked a pot of chicken gruel with all kinds of spice for you to enjoy. I think youll like it because, frankly speaking, the turkey they have here pales in comparison to a taste of home, she told him.

Translated by Van Minh
REINBECK  Last year, the Reinbeck Art Festival reached its milestone fifth anniversary.

Visitors to the sixth-annual event Sept. 23 can look forward to several changes, including its name. Now officially the Reinbeck Fine Art & Craft Festival, a wider variety of fine art and craft vendors will be represented at the juried gathering.

The event is from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. There is no admission charge.

Twenty-eight vendors are expected, says artist Julie Russell-Steuart, who handles festival marketing. Were pretty much on target, but were hoping to increase our numbers by including craft vendors. Its still a juried show because we want to maintain our good standards. But there has been a strong resurgence in artisan crafts. That is fueling interest in people trying new crafts themselves or buying crafts, she explains.

Artists and artisans will exhibit painting, photography, drawing, ceramics, jewelry, glass, mixed media, digital art, sculpture, watercolor, wood, fiber and resin casting.

Vendors will be clustered more closely together than in previous years and primarily outdoors for easier strolling, although some vendors may be located in City Hall. Vendors will be moved indoors in the event of inclement weather. Organizers also have added food vendors and a dining tent. During the festival, patrons can enter an hourly drawing for a $25 gift certificate for an art purchase.

Midwest Glampers: Never leave home without some style REINBECK  Lydia Robertson's favorite pasttime and outdoor obsession goes by a variety of names.

The Midwest Glampers, a retro RV camper group, will return to show off their interpretation of glamorous camping.

There will be a Show and Shine Car Show at one end of Main Street, art activities for children from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. and a Zendoodle project for ages 10 and up. Kirk Eastman will entertain this year, and several local businesses will host wine tastings.

The festival, under the auspices of the Reinbeck Economic Development Committee, is well-supported by the community. Thats one of the best things about the festival. We have a big group of volunteers who are willing to come out every year to help set up, run the festival and clean up. The support from the community is one of the most successful aspects of the festival, says Russell-Steuart.

Broad Street Brewing Company hosts Becktoberfest the same weekend, with a full schedule events and live music at the brewery. Trevor Schellhorn, owner and brewmaster, is brewing a special beer for the festival. A drawing for a growler of the special brew is planned.

In addition, the public can register to win two $10 gift certificates toward art purchases at the festivals Facebook page, www.facebook.com/ReinbeckArt-Festival. Artist spotlights are at reinbeckartfestival.wordpress.com/.

After the festival, patrons can attend a free bluegrass/sospel concert featuring the Harmans of Shipman, Ill., in Elmwood Park. The event is from 5 to 6:30 p.m. Food will be available. Those attending can bring lawn chairs. The concert is sponsored by Reinbeck United Methodist Church.

Featured artists include: Carol Wilson, Darcy Horn, Vahan and Vickie Bedian, jewelry; Jamie Wilson, Michael Wilson, Jan Stephan, Steve Schroeder, Kay Marquard, mixed media; June Stein, metal; Dave Sorrell, Bob Hertges, Lisa A. McClurg, Doug Cole, ceramics; Sara Sheets, Joe Lacina, wood; Julie Russell-Steuart, printmaking; Lizzy Oman, Marion Boyer, Kenalle Alquwaie, painting; Peggy Royster, digital art; Connie Malven, Susan Cunningham, fiber; Larry Holden, Bryony Forbes, photography; Mark Drury, resin casting; Priscilla Meyermann, silhouettes; Charles Anholt, glass; and Bruce Gordon, drawing.
WATERLOO  When Kristle Davis got to Houston last week she was disheartened  and it wasnt because of the destruction wrought by Hurricane Harvey.

When Davis and her crew of volunteers from Aplington-based charity Kadens Kloset arrived at a large church in the Texas city with a truckload of donations to help hurricane victims, they found they were one truck of hundreds.

To be honest, we just felt a bit unneeded at that moment, said Davis, the founder of Kadens Kloset.

But she was undeterred. She began asking if other nearby cities werent getting as many resources as Houston, which had been the public face of the storm.

Thats when Davis was told about Dickinson, a Houston suburb of about 19,000 and much closer to the Gulf of Mexico.

Upon arriving, Davis couldnt believe what she saw: A town demolished. Homes that cant be salvaged. A man Davis described as being in such shock, he couldnt remember his own name.

They were in desperate need of assistance.

These people had called for help, and rescue didnt come for them, Davis said.

Other volunteer organizations seemed to dismiss complaints and expected residents to drive themselves to meal sites, despite their vehicles floating away in the floodwaters or being destroyed in the storm. Inspectors refused to condemn a womans home despite what Davis said was rampant mold invasion.

In my opinion, and from what we saw, that is because this is an under-resourced community full of minority people, Davis said. She posted a rant to social media about the unnamed organizations, but later thought better of it and deleted it. The upper-class white community seemed to be getting the resources they needed, while the minority communities did not.

Davis and her volunteers landed at an apartment complex in the city and handed out donations they had received from donors in the Cedar Valley.

Some donations were sorely needed  bottles of water, nonperishable foods, first aid items. Others, like blankets, coats and used clothing, were not.

I think, in America, America wants to respond, Davis said. We want to wrap around the communities in a disaster. But we need to think about how to help people in a way that is not detrimental.

So she posted a new list to the Kadens Kloset Facebook page with items that are especially needed  with the caveat that the needs of disaster victims change quickly.

Davis and her volunteers from the Cedar Valley, Kansas and Missouri will take another truckload of donations to Dickinson this week. Donors can drop off supplies at Cedar Falls Construction in Waterloo between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. Monday and Tuesday, and volunteers are needed to pack the truck Tuesday from 4 to 7 p.m. before the crew takes off.

Besides donations, Kadens Kloset will take a pull-behind grill and plans to serve 200 people two meals per day while they are in Texas.

Thankfully our donors have really stepped up  those have really helped, Davis said. I think, in that community, its gonna be huge.
WATERLOO  Cedar Valley Medical Specialists P.C. and Dr. Matthew Kettman have opened their newest family medicine clinic at 110 Plaza Circle in Waterloo beginning Monday.

Kettman, a long-time area general practitioner, recently joined the Cedar Valley Medical group. The clinic will be known as Cedar Valley Family Medicine and will also include family physician Dr. Gregory Harter and advanced registered nurse practitioners (ARNPs), Katie Bries, Maryjane Cose, and Meagan Menken.

Kettman, a native of Gilbertville, graduated from the University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine, completed his residency in Waterloo, and practiced locally for 15 years. The office will be open Mondays through Thursdays from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. and on Fridays from 8 a.m. to noon. For appointments, call 236-7720.

Patriots Day

Grill Out set

WATERLOO  Cedar Valley Hy-Vee stores are hosting their fourth annual Patriots Day Grill Out on Monday. Hy-Vee store directors will be grilling in three locations and providing a free meal to all local police, state troopers, fire rescue and EMTs. The menu includes grilled bratwurst, one-third-pound hamburgers, potato chips, cookies and assorted Coca-Cola beverages and water.

All local service people, on or off duty, as well as support staff are invited to attend any of the following locations and times on Monday: Cedar Falls. noon to 2 p.m. at Hy-Vee at College Square, 6301 University Ave.; Waterloo, noon to 2 p.m. at Waterloo Fire Rescue Station 1, 425 E. Third St.; and Waverly, 5 to 7 p.m., Kids Kingdom Park.

UNI to host diversity events

CEDAR FALLS  The University of Northern Iowa will host three Diversity Colloquiums this fall.

The first is scheduled from 7 to 8:30 p.m. Tuesday in the ScholarSpace in Rod Library. Niria White, a UNI junior majoring in history and a McNair Scholar, will present "African-American Labor History in Waterloo."

The second colloquium is scheduled from 2 to 4 p.m. Oct. 11 in the ScholarSpace. T. Elon Dancy, a professor of education, African & African-American studies, and women's and gender studies at the University of Oklahoma, will present "Strategies for Teaching About Power and Privilege in the University Classroom." This event is sponsored by the College of Education and chief diversity officer.

The final colloquium is scheduled from 7 to 8:30 p.m Nov. 8 in the ScholarSpace. Alan Heisterkamp, director of UNI's Center for Violence Prevention, and Annette Lynch, director and professor in the School of Applied Human Sciences, will present "Education and Collaboration: Key Elements for Cultivating and Sustaining Violence Prevention Efforts."

The colloquiums are free and open to the public and are sponsored by the department of sociology, anthropology and criminology, department of history, college of social and behavioral sciences, McNair Scholars Program, Office of the President and the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning.

Crises exhibit

set at Allen

WATERLOO  Doctors and Nurses as Rescuers in Humanitarian Crises, a traveling exhibit produced by the UNI Center for Holocaust and Genocide Education, will be on display at Allen College this fall.

The exhibit profiles doctors, nurses and small teams who used their medical training and skills to rescue people threatened by humanitarian crisis, usually in the context of armed conflict. From the late 19th century to present, countries on four different continents will be featured.

The exhibit will open with a 7 p.m. Thursday reception by creator Dr. Stephen J Gaies, director of the UNI Center for Holocaust and Genocide Education. It will remain open to the public until mid-November.

A gift in the name of Drs. Melville and Judith Finkelstein of Cedar Falls made the exhibit possible.

Allen College is located at 1990 Heath St. in Waterloo.
WATERLOO -- Few people are heading into Florida this weekend, as the coastal state prepares for the brunt of category 3 Hurricane Irma. But MidAmerican Energy employees and International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Locals 109 and 499 are en route.

MidAmerican Energy announced Friday it is sending 250 employees and contractors to Florida to be in place and prepared to help repair utility infrastructure and restore power after Hurricane Irma is expected to make landfall Saturday night.

Of those 250 employees, 11 are coming from the region, according to Adam Jacobi, public relations representative from MidAmerican Energy.

VIDEO ADDED: Hurricane brings close call for Waterloo couple WATERLOO  Theres an old saying that close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades. Mau

Seven -- a combination of linemen, supervisors and a mechanic -- are from the Waterloo-Cedar Falls area. Another four linemen will be coming from near Charles City and Hampton.

A total of 90 electric line workers and contractors, 16 support staff and 150 contract tree trimmers will be coming from across MidAmericans service territory to lend a hand. They are expected to assist with the cleanup for several weeks.

We are well-prepared and pleased to honor requests for assistance when a natural disaster or severe, widespread weather event occurs, said James Dougherty, vice president of electric delivery for MidAmerican Energy. We take our responsibilities as a provider of essential energy services very seriously and understand the importance of helping restore power safely and effectively in any situation.

IBEW Local 499 business manager Randy Phillips and IBEW Local 109 business manager Tim Wolfe said in a joint statement theyre proud to be a part of helping those impacted by the storm.

These highly skilled professionals will work safely and efficiently to restore energy services and help the area return to normal, and we look forward to their safe return home when their work in the restoration effort is complete, they said.

The crews left Friday. Theyre stopping in Marion, Ill., for safety briefings, before going to Tennessee and then Lake City, Fla., the initial staging area. From there, the crews will assist where theyre needed locally.

In times of need, we always look to mobilize resources to assist where we can, said John Guy, general manager of electric operations for MidAmerican Energy.

Local customer service will not be impacted by the absence of their coworkers, as local crews will have expanded hours and will work to secure additional resources.
WATERLOO  Few people are heading into Florida this weekend, as the coastal state prepares for the brunt of Hurricane Irma. But MidAmerican Energy employees and International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Locals 109 and 499 are en route.

MidAmerican Energy is sending 250 employees and contractors to Florida to help restore power in Irmas wake.

Eleven of those workers are from Northeast Iowa, according to Adam Jacobi, public relations representative from MidAmerican Energy.

Seven  linemen, supervisors and a mechanic  are from the Waterloo-Cedar Falls area. Another four linemen will be coming from near Charles City and Hampton.

MidAmerican will send a total 90 electric line workers and contractors, 16 support staff and 150 contract tree trimmers. They will assist with the cleanup for several weeks.

We are well-prepared and pleased to honor requests for assistance when a natural disaster or severe, widespread weather event occurs, said James Dougherty, vice president of electric delivery for MidAmerican Energy.

IBEW Local 499 business manager Randy Phillips and IBEW Local 109 business manager Tim Wolfe said in a joint statement theyre proud to help those impacted by the storm.

These highly skilled professionals will work safely and efficiently to restore energy services and help the area return to normal, and we look forward to their safe return home when their work in the restoration effort is complete, they said.

Crews left Friday. Theyll stop in Marion, Ill., for safety briefings before going to Tennessee and then Lake City, Fla., the initial staging area. From there, crews will assist where needed.

Local customer service will not be impacted. Local crews will have expanded hours if needed.
Peacock Run set

at UIU Sept. 23

FAYETTE  The annual Upper Iowa University Peacock Adventure Run will return to UIUs Fayette campus Sept. 23.

The three-mile Adventure Run will start at the UIU Recreation Center and contain more than 10 obstacles. Participants can enter 9 a.m., 9:10 a.m. or 9:20 a.m. heats.

Cost is $20 for those who register prior to Friday. A fee of $25 applies to those who register after the deadline. Registration is $10 for UIU students and $15 for UIU employees who register by Friday; registration fees will be $15 for students and $20 for employees after that date. All participants receive a T-shirt and are entered into a drawing to win gift certificates.

Children 12 and younger are invited to participate in a Kids Adventure Run that begins at 8:30 a.m. The half-mile event also will begin at the UIU Rec Center. Cost is $10. All youth participants receive a T-shirt.

To register, go to https://commerce.cashnet.com/uiuem1, click on Rec Center Services and then UIU Adventure Run.

For more information, call LeAnn Cushion at (563) 425-5370.

Tractor ride set

in Castalia Oct. 7

CASTALIA  Classic Tractors 16th Annual Fall Ride will be Oct. 7 starting at Castalia City Park.

Registration is from 7 to 8:15 a.m. at the Castalia City Park. The ride leaves at 8:30 a.m.

The ride heads north on 128th Street to Volney Park, along the Yellow River just off County Road X26 for morning break then to the Luana Tap for lunch, which is $8. The afternoon will include a visit to Krambeers Hide-Away near Luana for afternoon snacks, before returning to Castalia Park. A 20-passenger covered shuttle will accompany the ride. Families are welcome.

Proceeds from the ride fund a North Iowa Community College agricultural scholarship, historic preservation and community betterment projects.

Cost is $20 per tractor/shuttle rider for members and $25 for non-members. Special rates for families. To pre-register call Denny Wilkins (563) 379-0817 or Jan Bear (563) 380-7600.

Open-fire meal

fundraiser slated

BRANDON  Brandons Cowboy Breakfast Fundraiser is set from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. Sept. 17 at the Brandon Area Community Center, 802 Main St.

The menu will include scrambled eggs, pancakes, fried potatoes, sausage gravy, ham, sausage, homemade biscuits, coffee and juice. Cost is $8 for ages 11 and older, and $5 for ages 4-10. Ages 3 and younger are free.

The breakfast will be cooked outside over open fires and is sponsored by the Brandon Area Community Club. All proceeds go to the Community Center Fund.

Forest walk

set Sept. 26

AURORA  Buchanan County Conservation will offer a forest walk at 6 p.m. Sept. 26 at Jakway Forest, two miles south of Aurora.

People can learn about forest management during a walk-through of a premier Iowa woodland. Jakway Forest contains the countys largest system of maintained woodland trails.

There is no registration fee or pre-registration required.

Star party

planned Sept. 22

HAZLETON  A star party is planned for 8 to 9:30 p.m. Sept. 22 at Fontana Nature Center.

People can join Conservation Board volunteer David Voigts and others for close views of the night sky.

Telescopes will be set up for participant use. No registration is required.

Harvest event

set in Decorah

DECORAH  Vesterheim, the national Norwegian-American museum and heritage center, will host Takkefest, a free harvest celebration, on Sept. 23.

There will be a street party from 3 to 8 p.m. on Mill Street next to the museum for live music, dancing, games for all ages, folk art, Nordic-inspired cuisine, Pulpit Rock brews, Scandinavian treats and more.

The museums Main Building will be open with regular admission from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., and there will be folk art demonstrations and special tours. Admission will be free from 5 to 7 p.m. for the gallery opening of the exhibition Rocks and Hard Places: Emigration through the Lens of Knud Knudsen.
PARKERSBURG  Some 100 historic restored barns throughout Iowa will be opened to the public during the Iowa Barn Foundations free self-guided, all-state barn tour from 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Sept. 23 and 24.

Area barns include the Younkers barn in Parkersburg, the Dodd barn near Ackley, the Miller barn in Waverly, the Buckley barn in Elma, the Blazek barn in Lawler, the Hayward round barn in Dysart and the Welter barn in Grundy Counter.

Most barns on the tour have been restored with matching grants from the Iowa Barn Foundation. Other property owners received awards of distinction from the foundation for restorations they undertook themselves.

The Iowa Barn Foundation, an all-volunteer, nonprofit organization founded in 1997, raises money from individuals, foundations and corporations to give matching grants to property owners to restore their barns. The barns must be restored as closely as possible to original.

This is the only group of its kind in the country.

The purpose of the tour is to encourage barn preservation in the state, to teach young people about Iowas agricultural heritage and to renew pride in this heritage.

The tour is free, although donations to support the foundations work are appreciated. For barns on tour go to www.iowabarnfoundation.org.
News / National

by Staff Reporter

The First Lady Grace Mugabe has refuted claims that she leads a faction in the ruling Zanu PF party known by the name G40.Speaking at the Presidential Youth Interface rally in Bindura today, Dr Mugabe said knows that a faction named Lacoste exists, but there is nothing on the group pointing to a G40 faction."I was pissed off yesterday, when Betty Mutero accused me of leading a faction in Zanu PF called G40. She also accused me of poisoning Vice President Mnangagwa, then pave way for Vice President Mphoko to take over power on an acting basis before handing it over to me. I am loyal to my husband, so why this talk when the President is still there?" said Dr Mugabe.Dr Mugabe reiterated that when the President sees it fit and when the time is ripe, he will name his successor, adding that she respects his husbands and all his appointees.She also reprimanded Kazembe Kazembe for pushing for the ouster of Saviour Kasukuwere."Kezembe Kazembe huya pano, iwe wanga wakateya kuita Chairman? Kazembe ndiVice waVaDickson Mafios. Iwe wakabuda paTV uchiti pasi naKasukuwere, anga akutadzirei?" she saked.Mugabe urged Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa to stop all interaction with expelled members of the party and those pushing the factional agenda."Maybe Mnangagwa would have promised to protect those pushing for the Lacoste agenda. Then sometimes he changes his mind and becomes afraid to do so. Ngatirege kumhanya, leadership comes from God," she said.The First Lady took a swipe at 'malicious' claims that Gushungo Dairy ice cream caused the health problems suffered by Cde Mnangagwa recently, saying everyone falls sick at some point."Isu tinorwara but we don't make noise about it. Baba vakamborwara, vaita food poisoning kwaMutare, manga musingazvizivi nekuti hatina kumbozvitaura. Taenda kunobata maoko kwa Amai Edna Madzongwe, baba vakaita diarrhea continuous vakaita madays. Hatina kumboita noise nezvazvo. I suffered food poisoning in 2013 and lost about 5kgs that night because of diarrhea, but I never accused anyone. Ndakatsikwa nemota ini asi ndirimunhu anotya Mwari and I don't want to accuse anyone for mhosva yaasina kuita, kuti hehe driver akasimudza mota ndisati ndapinda," she said.The First Lady also expressed displeasure at some ministers who discriminate against Vice President Phelekezela Mphoko, by always inviting only Vice President Mnangagwa to government functions.
Lets Fix Dinner is the theme for the Northeast Iowa Food Banks strategic plan launched in April of this year. The plan is simple: Be an ingredient, help us provide the serving size and ensure we are in compliance and have the proper infrastructure to close the meal gap. The meal gap is defined as what government programs cant provide for the nearly 47,000 people who are food insecure in Northeast Iowa.

In fiscal 2017, we provided more food to people in need in Northeast Iowa than we ever have before  6.25 million meals or well over 7.2 million pounds. At the same time the number of food insecure people declined to just under 47,000 people. This is good news. You have helped us move to close the meal gap, and fewer people need our services. You have been able to help us provide more food, volunteers and infrastructure, which has enabled us to reach more people.

This work is not without challenges. One, more food is perishable and labor intensive. Much of the product we provide has to be gone through carton by carton. This takes time and volunteers. Groups like EPI, AARP-SCEP program, church groups and businesses, along with individuals, come in and do this. This keeps millions of pounds of food, which is still perfectly good, out of landfills. Secondly, when you have perishable food it has to be moved fast, which means we have to set up new avenues to distribute it because many times food pantries are not open daily and dont have the storage to hold the product. As a result, we continue to operate mobile pantries each month and do special produce drops and distributions at member agencies and other sites.

The food bank is a complex place. There are many moving parts, coordinating food pick ups, ensuring we have enough volunteers, ensuring we have adequate funding and developing new partnerships. It takes a lot to make the food bank operate. Day in and day out, the staff and volunteers make the food bank work. Volunteers spend time during the week out on a truck picking up food or delivering backpacks. A group of volunteers puts on an event to raise money and awareness of childhood hunger each fall. Businesses like John Deere, which weekly sends a group to the food bank to sort food, pack backpacks and help in other ways. And various funding sources help us operate and bring in food to distribute it to the community. All of it makes a difference in what we do.

And due to the generosity of many in our community, we have been able to rise to the challenges and make a difference in the community. But (and you know there had to be a but), one of our biggest challenges comes through something we have very little control over, and that is how much Congress and our president appropriate for the Federal Nutrition Programs. It isnt just school lunch, school breakfast, child and adult care food program and summer feeding it is also SNAP (food stamps), TEFAP (the commodity program, where we get product for people in need) and CSFP to name a few. This is the safety net. For people in need, these programs are vital to assisting them. If their funding is decreased, people will rely on us more than ever. More people will then be food insecure and the meal gap will increase.

The recipe to fix dinner is simple  be an ingredient, provide the serving size and ensure we have the proper utensils. This together, with using our voices, to ensure nutrition programs are adequately funded, will help us make a difference in the lives of nearly 47,000 people in Northeast Iowa. With everyone working together  our donors, volunteers, community groups  and ensuring we are compliant with our regulatory bodies and have the proper infrastructure, we can close the meal gap. You have already done so much to get us this far. Please help us continue to ensure that once we have closed the meal gap it will be continuously closed. On behalf of those we serve, thank you.
Try to follow my reasoning here, but remember it came from thoughts of myself when I was 20.

The summer of 1962 found me working on the Rouge River near Agness, Ore. Thirty miles downriver at Gold Beach, the river empties into the Pacific Ocean. So it made perfect sense to get a job the following summer right on the Atlantic Ocean at Pemaquid Point, Maine. If you are hitchhiking to Maine, youthful logic told me, you might as well go through Pennsylvania and see the battlefield at Gettysburg.

All of this explains how I found myself sleeping in the woods west of Gettysburg. I woke up after dawn on the morning of June 3, 1963. With the sleeping bag rolled up under my arm and my duffle perched on my shoulder, I started down from the hill toward the road. Across a wide and flat plain, the mist was slowing rising. As it did so, it revealed a corresponding series of hills to the east.

As I reached the road, I realized where I was. I had slept on Seminary Ridge, and those hills to the east were Cemetery Ridge. On that very day, 100 years ago less one month, a Confederate general named George Pickett ordered his men to charge the Union forces across that flat land to those eastern hills.

It was not a sound decision. The rebels fired their artillery, and when the northerners stopped firing back they assumed they had quieted the northern guns. But Union forces had stopped for two different reasons: first, they were short of ammunition and, secondly, they wanted to save rounds to repel the anticipated charge of the Confederates.

I still remember to this day looking across that incredibly flat terrain toward where the Yankees had positioned themselves. It is more than a mile across those fields to the base of Cemetery Ridge. Twelve thousand men from the South attempted to traverse that ground. Although they almost reached the Union lines, at the end of the day, more than 50 percent of them were either captured, wounded or dead.

Can anyone question their bravery was any different than young lads from the North? Their blood the same color as their adversary? When the widow was informed of her young husbands death and then received two weeks later the last letter he wrote, her grief was the same regardless of whether she lived in New York or Virginia.

Courage was not a commodity limited to one side. Yes, the rebels cause was bad, and slavery had to end, but I am not certain we can preserve the memory of the courage of that battlefield if now we pretend only the winning army was there.

Removing the symbols of the Confederacy, like the flag, is appropriate. Striking down racism wherever it is found is mandatory. But statutes were not always erected as a monument to slavery. Some simply reflect the South remembering the valor of their fathers, husbands and sons.

I know white extremists have appropriated the Confederate Armys memory as a testament to their perceived notion of racial superiority. But that doesnt mean the rest of us have to follow their lead and engage in a rush of destruction of that chapter of our nations history. Further, to me it implies we are still there, ignoring the progress made by North and South.

When I was young I went seeking two oceans. I think I found a third.

At the outbreak of the Civil War, President James Buchanan, Lincolns predecessor, was floating in a sea of perplexity. On this issue, I am in the raft right next to him. I want to honor their valor, but they fought for the wrong cause.

Columnists are supposed to tell you what to think. This one you will have to sort out for yourself.

I still cant get over, as the sun rose and chased away the mist, how flat that land was between the hills on that July 3rd morning in 1863.
By West Kentucky Star Staff Sep. 09, 2017 | 12:02 AM | PADUCAH, KY

A group of veterans gathered outside Paducah's City Hall on Friday, protesting a decision to exclude the battle flag of the Confederate States of America in the upcoming Veteran's Day parade.WKMS reports the group wants city leaders to follow through on a promised meeting with the Sons of Confederate Veterans to discuss the matter. A previous meeting set for August was postponed since it coincided with the local Emancipation Day celebration, and nothing official has happened since.The Veteran's Day Committee decided in April to only allow participants in the parade to fly the American Flag or a flag for veterans of U.S. armed forces. The City Commission passed a resolution in May that supported the committee's statement of purpose, which would exclude the Sons of Confederate Veterans from the event for the first time in several years.Veteran Michael Swinford told WKMS the resolution is immoral, illegal, improper and impetuous, and said the group is planning to take legal action using local attorneys and the ACLU.Swinford said the Sons of Confederate Veterans have nothing to do with the Ku Klux Klan, Antifa, and other groups, and "We don't hate anyone."The ongoing debate about the parade has been intensified by the violence that broke out August 12 in Charlottesville, Virginia, when white supremacists and counter-protesters clashed in the streets, and one person died.

On the Net:
By The Associated Press Sep. 07, 2017 | 06:29 AM | WASHINGTON, DC

The Senate is nearly doubling the initial Harvey aid package.

Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's midnight move added $7.4 billion in community development block grant funds to a House-passed $7.9 billion measure providing an emergency replenishment for disaster aid coffers.

The additional Senate money is to jump-start rebuilding efforts. The block grant money is more flexible and can cover costs the Federal Emergency Management Agency can't. A vote could come as early as Thursday.

The House passed the Harvey aid package on Wednesday by an overwhelming vote. President Donald Trump agreed to link it to an increase through Dec. 8 in the government's so-called debt limit, as well as a stopgap government-wide funding bill. The aid package is just the first installment. Far more money will be coming later when damage and recovery estimates can be completed.
By The Associated Press

By The Associated Press Sep. 07, 2017 | 08:44 PM | LOUISVILLE, KY

A key health care regulator in Kentucky is being questioned at a federal trial about the circumstances that led to a licensing fight threatening to shut down the state's last abortion clinic.

The regulator, Robert Silverthorn Jr., on Thursday defended the use of emergency regulations that the clinic claims are meant to make it harder to get a license for abortions.

Silverthorn denied communicating with Gov. Matt Bevin's office regarding EMW Women's Surgical Center. Clinic attorney Donald Cox says emails show the matter was discussed at the "highest levels" of state government.

Bevin's administration claims the Louisville clinic lacks proper transfer agreements with a hospital and ambulance service in case of emergencies.

Clinic lawyers say if the state prevails at trial, Kentucky could become the first state without an abortion clinic.
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The First Lady Grace Mugabe has attacked Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa about his alleged faction in the Zanu-PF party and told him to 'stop it.'Speaking at the Presidential Youth Interface rally in Bindura today, Mugabe said she knows that a faction named Lacoste exists.Grace spent over 20 minutes directly attacking Mnangagwa about factionalism and the publicity following his alleged food poisining.Watch video below:
China committed to nuclear security, says IAEA

08 September 2017

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China maintains "strong and sustainable" nuclear security activities, an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) team of experts has concluded. The Vienna-based agency carried out a ten-day International Physical Protection Advisory Service (IPPAS) mission at the Chinese government's request.

The IAEA team visited the Fangjiashan plant (Image: CNNC)

The purpose of the IPPAS mission, as agreed with the Chinese government, included the legislative and regulatory framework for nuclear security, as well as the physical protection of nuclear materials and facilities. The mission also focused on China's implementation of the 2005 Amendment to the Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material. The amendment - ratified by China in 2009 - entered into force last year and provides a strengthened framework for protecting nuclear materials and facilities.

An eight-member team led by Joseph Sandoval of the USA's Sandia National Laboratories today completed the mission. The team visited the Fangjiashan nuclear power plant in China's Zhejiang province to review security arrangements and observe physical protection measures. They also met in Beijing with officials from the China Atomic Energy Authority (CAEA), the National Energy Administration, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Legislative Affairs Office of the State Council, the Ministry of Public Security, the National Nuclear safety Administration, the General Administration of Customs, and other organisations involved in nuclear security.

The team said it had identified a number of good practices, while making recommendations and suggestions for continuous improvement.

Muhammad Khaliq, head of the IAEA's nuclear security of materials and facilities section, said: "A strong commitment to nuclear security is a must for any state that uses nuclear power for electricity generation and that is planning to significantly expand this capacity by constructing new power reactors. China's example in applying IAEA Nuclear Security guidance and using IAEA advisory services demonstrates its strong commitment to nuclear security and its enhancement worldwide."

"We are satisfied with the report of this mission that serves as an independent review of our nuclear security regime," said Shen Lixin, deputy director-general of the CAEA's system engineering department. "I am very proud that the team could identify good practices to be shared with the international community."

IPPAS missions are intended to help IAEA member states strengthen their national nuclear security regime through peer review advice and IAEA guidance. A team of international experts assesses a nation's physical protection systems, compares it with international best practices and recommends improvements. IPPAS missions are conducted both on a nationwide and facility-specific basis.

The mission to China was the 77th IPPAS mission conducted by the IAEA since the program began in 1995. China is the 48th IAEA member state to host an IPPAS mission.

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by World Nuclear News

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News / National

by Staff reporter

First Lady Grace Mugabe alleged yesterday that commander of the defence forces General Constantino Chiwenga had falsely claimed that President Robert Mugabe wanted sacked former Cabinet minister Christopher Mutsvangwa to lead war veterans, when it was his own decision to impose Mutsvangwa for unknown reasons.Speaking at the youth interface rally held in Bindura, Grace also said Mutsvangwa and his colleagues in the Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans Association (ZNLWVA) deserved to be sacked from Zanu PF because they had become a problem.But it was her claim that Chiwenga had handpicked Mutsvangwa to lead the war vets under the pretext that he had been sent by Mugabe which stunned the gathered crowd."I want to tell you the truth about Mutsvangwa. He was not elected. We are constantly being intimidated and threatened by Mutsvangwa that Mnangagwa has the support of the army."Mutsvangwa akanotorwa uko naChiwenga akanzi president ndovarikuda iwewe (Mutsvangwa was brought by Chiwenga and told that the president wants you to lead the war veterans)."President havana kumbobvira vadaro (the president never said that). President is a very democratic person," Grace said."So, Mutsvangwa deserved to go. He deserved to leave this party. Nekuti iny'any'a (he is troublesome). Haana kukwana (He is not normal). Pasi naye (down with him)," she added.Mutsvangwa said he had no time to respond to Grace's accusations."I am a revolutionary. I don't comment on hyperactive nonentities. The man who mattered most, the president, dispensed with frivolities and made quite a refreshing speech today (yesterday) in Bindura when he talked about real challenges that we face in building the modern statecraft," he said."He (Mugabe) also focussed on the collective national sacrifice for the independence of the country ... I played my modest part in that with so many youths of that epochal 1975/6 Samora Machel-Soweto Generation."G40 blabber mouths have been on a screech for too long. I hope after the Bindura interface rally they change tact," the garrulous Mutsvangwa added.Although Chiwenga stands accused of backing Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa in the Zanu PF succession wars, he has publicly distanced himself from the former liberation's movement's ructions.Ruling party insiders say Grace is backing the Generation 40 faction which is fiercely opposed to Mnangagwa succeeding Mugabe.Speaking in June, Chiwenga labelled one of the alleged kingpins of the G40, Higher Education minister Jonathan Moyo as enemy of the State  after the Tsholotsho North legislator appeared to slam the Command Agriculture programme, a government-backed food security initiative which involves the military among other players.Chiwenga issued a lengthy statement in the State-run Herald newspaper, in comments which attracted sharp criticism from opposition political parties.Chiwenga justified what was interpreted as encroachment into civilian matters by saying food security was one of the pillars of national security, adding that an attack on the programme was an attack on the economy."When you attack the economy you become the enemy of the State ... This guy (Moyo) who is vomiting that nonsense, didn't he get support from Command Agriculture."He has some other forces behind him? Hasn't he written books that he is going to destroy Zanu PF from within? We read. We are all educated. We read. He has said that."Everyone must see. He rebelled before. Not once. He rebelled when we were in the struggle, he ran away. When he ran away he did all his nonsense . . ."And in his book, when he was teaching, his commentary on why he went to America  we know. When he left and went independent, was he repentant?"And we know now that the tweeting is coming from Baba Jukwa and company, we know that. But I think he has got to where we wanted him to. Let me leave it at that," Chiwenga thundered then.
Michael Grunwald in Politico:

The first Americans to spend much time in South Florida were the U.S. Army men who chased the Seminole Indians around the peninsula in the 1830s. And they hated it. Today, their letters read like Yelp reviews of an arsenic cafe, denouncing the region as a hideous, loathsome, diabolical, God-abandoned mosquito refuge.

Florida is certainly the poorest country that ever two people quarreled for, one Army surgeon wrote. It was the most dreary and pandemonium-like region I ever visited, nothing but barren wastes. An officer summarized it as swampy, low, excessively hot, sickly and repulsive in all its features. The future president Zachary Taylor, who commanded U.S. troops there for two years, groused that he wouldnt trade a square foot of Michigan or Ohio for a square mile of Florida. The consensus among the soldiers was that the U.S. should just leave the area to the Indians and the mosquitoes; as one general put it, I could not wish them all a worse place. Or as one lieutenant complained: Millions of money has been expended to gain this most barren, swampy, and good-for-nothing peninsula.

Today, Floridas southern thumb has been transformed into a subtropical paradise for millions of residents and tourists, a sprawling megalopolis dangling into the Gulf Stream that could sustain hundreds of billions of dollars in damage if Hurricane Irma makes a direct hit. So its easy to forget that South Florida was once Americas last frontier, generally dismissed as an uninhabitable and undesirable wasteland, almost completely unsettled well after the West was won. How far, far out of the world it seems, Iza Hardy wrote in an 1887 book called Oranges and Alligators: Sketches of South Florida. And Hardy ventured only as far south as Orlando, which is actually central Florida, nearly 250 miles north of Miami. Back then, only about 300 hardy pioneers lived in modern-day South Florida. Miami wasnt even incorporated as a city until 1896. And even then an early visitor declared that if he owned Miami and hell, he would rent out Miami and live in hell.

More here.
News / National

by Staff reporter

MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai and his deputy Thokozani Khupe will meet tomorrow to try and save the labour-backed opposition from splitting - following a nasty fallout caused by disagreements over a coalition with other opposition parties.Tsvangirai has not been seeing eye-to-eye with his long-serving deputy after the MDC president bulldozed his way into signing a coalition deal with a group of opposition parties that include his former secretaries-general - Welshman Ncube and Tendai Biti - whom he had fallen out with in 2005 and 2014, respectively.Khupe, whose grievances have resonated well with influential MDC figures in the southern part of Zimbabwe, has been boycotting meetings called by Tsvangirai to get him to reconsider his decision.She was also conspicuous by her absence at the September 2 rally at White City Stadium where the former prime minister in the inclusive government launched the MDC Alliance  formed on August 5.Tsvangirai's spokesperson Luke Tamborinyoka confirmed tomorrow's meeting."They have always met regularly and they are meeting again but I cannot go into the specifics about the date and venue because like I said, I don't find it to be a media issue."MDC national chairperson Lovemore Moyo, who together with Khupe and organising secretary Abednico Bhebhe, have been fighting in one corner over the manner in which Tsvangirai has handled coalition talks, said there was progress towards coming up with a common position with Tsvangirai."The fact that you are talking about that meeting means we are doing something to ensure that the matter is resolved amicably although I cannot say about the Monday meeting because I am out of town so you could ask Tamborinyoka," Moyo told the Daily News On Sunday.Sources told the Daily News On Sunday that Tsvangirai wanted closure to the long-drawn saga and that it was Khupe who stood to lose the most if they failed to bury their differences.Khupe is the leader of the House in Parliament on the MDC side and was said to be keen to resolve her "issues" with Tsvangirai before opening of the new session on Tuesday."More importantly, she is under pressure because Parliament is reopening and if she doesn't pitch up as she has been doing with party programmes, then she will be supplanted hence it is imperative that she engages the president otherwise she might find it difficult to visit Harvest House."Apart from that, the party's national council meeting is due and could be held any day next week where the cases of (deputy treasurer-general Charlton) Hwende, Bhebhe and others will be discussed and concluded and she knows any resolution can come out of that meeting which makes her presence very important," a source told the Daily News On Sunday.Sources privy to the dispute said both sides had realised that none of them would benefit from a split on the eve of a major election, in which the MDC needs to be at its strongest to fight a well-funded Zanu PF which, apart from enjoying the power of incumbency, has the electoral playing field tilted in its favour.Last week, Moyo allayed fears that the MDC could be on the brink of yet another debilitating split, the third one since its formation in 1999."There will be no split. The disagreements are just something we want to correct. As a leadership, we have raised our concerns. We need to solve these issues and move on. We want to form a government of the people in 2018. I think it's a problem that can be resolved."Our disagreements were on the issues to do with the distribution of seats to Alliance partners and some clauses. We must make sure that we transform the country economically," said Moyo.Tsvangirai was selected to lead the MDC Alliance on August 5 at an event boycotted by Khupe, Moyo and Bhebhe.The trio were targets of party yobs who unleashed an orgy of violence at the party's provincial offices in Bulawayo on August 6.Khupe was injured in the violence which she blamed on Tsvangirai.Party thugs were allegedly incensed that Khupe and her team were holding a separate meeting which they felt was aimed at undermining the Alliance.


Rights Issue - Shares Issued

Perth, Sep 8, 2017 AEST (ABN Newswire) - White Cliff Minerals Ltd ( ASX:WCN ) advises that it has issued for 468,596,860 ordinary shares at an issue price of $0.002 upon completion of the Company's 1-for-2 non-renounceable rights issue. This issue has raised $937,194 in working capital that will be used to further advance the Company's exploration projects both in the Kyrgyz Republic and Australia.



The Company now has 2,348,074,584 ordinary shares on issue.



The Company has previously been advised by the rights issue underwriter, Gleneagle Securities Nominees Pty Ltd, that it has received commitments from its clients to place all the shortfall shares, being 471,142,147 ordinary shares. The allocation of the shortfall shares will occur in accordance with the rights issue timetable and, if fully completed, will raise an additional $942,284 in working capital.





About White Cliff Minerals Ltd





White Cliff Minerals Ltd is a Gold, Copper, Cobalt, Nickel resources and mining company listed in Australia (ASX:WCN). The Company is focused on developing low cost high value mineral deposits that have near term cash flow potential.

Major projects include the Aucu gold deposit that contains 484,000 ounces of gold (3mt at 5.1 g/t) starting at surface and Chanach copper deposit that contains 64,000 tonnes of copper (17.2Mt at 0.37% copper). Both projects have substantial blue sky potential with drilling covering only 5% of the known structures. In Australia the company is developing the Coronation Dam cobaltnickel deposit where a maiden resource will be announced in the late 2018.
Distribution of company announcements to the professional platforms, finance portals and syndication of important corporate news to a wide variety of news aggregators and financial news systems.
ANNA FRANCESCA-FASHION REVOLUTION Hosts Womens Show at the Stewart Hotel

Artist and visionary rebel, designer Anna Francesca hosted editors, fashion influencers and fashions elite at The Stewart Hotel for her latest womens collection from her eponymous line, ANNA FRANCESCA-FASHION REVOLUTION. Bored with the mundane and rules of the world as we know it, Anna envisions her own fantastical realm and it serves as the inspiration for this collection. In this imaginary land, a young girl falls asleep. Dreaming, her mind wanders as she has fallen down a hueco [hole], landing first in a forest where she meanders on an adventure of colors throughout her journey. The collection boasts reds as Annas young girl passes through a desert spotted by sacred Date Palm trees; glow dust as her wanderer ventures through a magical Fairyland filled with flowers and butterflies; and winter white as she makes her way through a wintery, snowy ice land filled with bright stars and ruled by an Ice Queen. The imaginary land, Meyugori Date, its bounty of colors, and Annas young nomad serve as the theme of this collection.

This Smart News Release features multimedia. View the full release here: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170910005056/en/

ANNA FRANCESCA - FASHION REVOLUTION at NYFW 2017 (Photo: Business Wire)

Anna Francesca said, It is a thrill to be back in New York for fashion week and have the opportunity to showcase my latest collection. Being an artist from Panama, I grew up in a world of colors. From a very early age, my passion for the arts and creative expression from painting to sculpture to film and fashion  is the air that I breathe and is what has defined me. I am so excited to be here in New York again and have this opportunity to show my newest collection among the many other talented designers this week.

The show included 41 looks from the collection. For images: http://assignments.gettyimages.com/mm/nicePath/gyipa_public?nav=pr542336365

Show credits:

Makeup by Makeup Forever

Glam, Manicure/Pedicure by Alisha Hicks

Hair by Diane Cole Stevens, Cole Stevens Salon

About ANNA FRANCESCA:

Artist, visionary, rebel with a cause, wants to change the world through her brand "ANNA FRANCESCA - FASHION REVOLUTION". Believing in the power of imagination and following her urge to create she is always looking for a new challenge or a way to express herself. From painting to film, sculpture to fashion, she's been involved with the arts since a very small age teaching herself to sew at the age of 7. She's been in multiple fashion weeks in Panama, NYFW and has been invited twice to the Dominican Republic. Her motto in life is "Me sabe a CAKE" (I dont give a damn) which she made into a huge campaign last year for fashion week recruiting #AFrebels to join her #AFrevolution.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170910005056/en/

For more information:

Paul Wilmot Communications

Alyssa Paugh, 212-206-7447

apaugh@paulwilmot.com
The Delhi Government has ordered a magisterial inquiry into the alleged sexual assault of a five-year-old girl in a Shahdara school, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said on Sunday.

He also said that a protocol would be chalked out for all city schools to ensure the safety of students.

The five-year-old was allegedly raped by a peon on the premises of the private school in Shahdara on Saturday. The accused, Vikas Kumar, was arrested on Saturday night.

The incident comes close on the heels of the gruesome killing of a seven-year-old boy who had his throat slit for allegedly resisting sexual assault by a bus conductor of a Gurgaon school  an incident that sent shock waves across the country.

Kejriwal said such incidents wont be tolerated.

Shameful. Wont be tolerated. Police doing its job. I ordered magisterial enquiry. Will develop protocol for all schools to ensure children safety, he tweeted.

Delhi Revenue Minister Kailash Gahlot also tweeted about the incident and said that the enquiry report will be submitted in three days.

Delhi Govt orders Magisterial Enquiry headed by SDM Vivek Vihar into the rape incident of 5 year old girl of a private school in east Delhis Raghuwarpura near Gandhinagar. Report to be submitted by SDM within 3 days, Gahlot said.

The arrested man, Vikas, had been working in the school for the last three years. Previously, he worked as a security guard there.

He allegedly took the girl inside an empty classroom around noon on Saturday when he was walking in the corridors after handing over lunch boxes to teachers.

The girl later complained of bleeding and pain in her private parts to her mother. She was taken to a hospital where a medical examination confirmed sexual assault.
The Fadnavis government will complete three years in office 31st October 2017. Ahead of this, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis has asked his ministers and bureaucrats to submit Key Result Areas (KRAs) to receive a feedback about the work done by them in the past three years. According to sources, the CM wants his ministers to showcase what different work they have done as compared to the one performed by ministers of erstwhile Democratic Front government. The government already is receiving flak from the opposition for its failure to tackle farmer suicides, drought problems, unemployment and pending irrigation projects. Shiv Sena too is attacking the policies of the government. It becomes a challenge for the government to keep its ally Sena happy which is always on the attacking mode. Thus the road ahead for the government looks tough as it will have to work overtime to complete pending infrastructure projects, maintain transparency and provide good governance.

Former Chief Minister of Maharashtra Prithviraj Chavan said, Already Prakash Mehta, Subhash Desai and other bureaucrats are facing corruption charges. By demanding KRAs from minister the Chief Minister is only trying to keep a check on his ministers. There is a possibility of cabinet reshuffle. Even though three years have passed ever since the Fadnavis government has come to power but projects like Dr Ambedkar memorial, sea link, Mumbai-Nagpur highway, Chhatrapati Shivaji statue is yet to see the light of the day. The government has failed to deliver and it must do self-introspection.

Anil Desai, Shiv Sena Rajya Sabha MP said, The Chief Minister should not demand KRAs from his ministers instead he should remain accountable to the people. Citizens will give a befitting reply to the government soon. The government has failed to resolve the problems faced by agricultural sector. They must provide information about how much amount has been sanctioned for farm loan waiver.

MNS leader Bala Nandgaonkar said, Shiv Sena and BJP should fulfill the promises made to people instead of asking KRAs from its own ministers. The CM should provide information to people about the work done by his government. He always claims that his government is corruption free but many of his ministers like Pankaja Munde, Prakash Mehta, Radheshyam Mopalwar, Vinod Tawde, Rajkumar Badole, Dinesh Waghmare are tainted. He must first initiate action against them instead of demanding KRAs.

BJP MLA Ram Kadam said, It is the right of the government to demand KRAs of its minister. Just because the Chief Minister is asking his ministers to furnish KRAs doesnt mean that he is going ahead with the cabinet reshuffle.
Millions of people, including thousands of Indian-Americans, in Florida braced for Hurricane Irma as it regained its strength as a category 4 storm and moved towards the coastal US state with wind speed of 209 km per hours.

About 120,000 Indian-Americans live in Florida, thousands of them residing in the now-dangerous zones of Miami, Fort Laura deal and even Tampa, according to 2010 census.

Many struggled to cope with Irma, which regained strength as a Category 4 storm as it moved towards Florida.

The deadly storm is expected to hit the US mainland around 7 am (local time). Its outer rain bands lashed the Florida Keys today, the National Weather Service said. A 127 kmph gust was recorded today as Irma drew closer, CNN reported.

Miami and Tampa appeared ghost towns as residents left for safer places following mandatory evacuation notices.

They were preparing to open more shelters and provide accommodation and food as several Indian businesses started contributing to relief efforts.

Sandeep Chakravorty, Indias consul-general in New York, was monitoring the situation through a 24X7-control room set up in Atlanta.

US President Donald Trump reviewed preparedness with his cabinet colleagues at Camp David in Maryland. He asked federal agencies to continue supporting state and local authorities and expedite assistance to areas affected by the hurricane.

This is a storm of enormous destructive power, and I ask everyone in the storms path to pay heed to all instructions from government officials, Trump said.

The US Army has so far deployed more than 7,400 soldiers and US Army Corps of Engineers civilians on the US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and the continental US.

The army has more than 140 aircraft, 650 trucks, 150 boats prepared, and additional resources on standby, the Pentagon said.

The current track of Irma will bring severe and life- threatening impacts to all of the Florida Keys and a large portion of the Florida Peninsula, including Key West, Key Largo, Tampa, Fort Myers, Naples, Sarasota and Miami.
Twenty eight journalists were murdered in India with different motives, as attacks on journalists increase, so does immunity owing to the politician-police nexus letting the culprits off. Exposing wrongdoing is now a very dangerous task. Fifty four attacks and 25 cases of threatening journalists took place in the past 16 months. Though seven journalists were killed this year, reasonable evidence of their journalism being the motive for the murder is available only in one case. The numbers mentioned here is actually the reported one from prominent places; there are many journalists from small towns who get attacked for exposing religious goons. Meanwhile the data reveals a disturbing pattern of impunity. In the 114 incidents of attacks on journalists in 2014, only 32 people were arrested and in relation to the 28 incidents in 2015, 41 people were arrested.

Journalists face countless pressures, such as the daily grind to get stories in by deadline, perfecting the craft, or dealing with sometimes rude, aggressive, even threatening people around. They often cover disturbing events and sometimes feel overworked and overstressed. Journalists are increasingly under fire for their reporting. They are killed, attacked and threatened. Barely three days into 2017 came news of the killing of yet another journalist from Bihar. Probably, the details that followed adhered to the same pattern: a gang of unidentified shooters; motive not known; police suspect a family dispute or a rivalry, anything but a killing caused by the professional work of the defunct. All journalists are constantly negotiating stress from many counter parts. We all expect fair journalism but we dont like the truth spoken about us. This is what the scenario is nowadays. Government is scared of those reporters who criticize establishments and expose ministers. They shelter and protect journalists who are good at boot licking by siding governments bad deeds. But the rationals are the ones who end up sacrificing their lives.

Every year some journalists are silenced but some section of social media tags them to some or the other motive to save the government that they support and very purpose of investigation gets twisted. Take the example of Gauri Lankesh, some section of political supporters called her Kutiya a bitch, some celebrated her death and others demanded same kind of treatment to many other journalists who speak their mind. I agree sometimes the opinion of journalists may differ, they might be harsh in criticizing but they are not taking you on gunpoint. There are many journalists who are hooted, abused, mocked and humiliated by our PMs supporters. They are the followers of right wing organizations, for them the selective subjects and whatever PM doing is like bible, one who speak or disagrees is declared as anti-national.

In 2016, the deaths of six journalists hit the headlines but initial police investigations could indicate professional reasons in only three cases. There were 17 instances in 2016 of threats to journalists  serious cases of death threats, rape threats and intimidation. Neither our government nor the establishment no one ever bothered to attend these issues. Fourth estate of democracy has gone dilapidated and damaged, but still we expect journalism to reach all heights only by flattering some section of people and the rulers.

Whenever a journalist is attacked or killed, the politicians, vigilante groups, police and security forces, lawyers, think tanks, prime time panel to, frazzled Bollywood actors come forward attacking the integrity of journalist, they forget these journalists are not aliens, they too are people belonging to this society, nation and sometimes your own family. Why so much ruthlessness? Why kill someone just because of disagreement?

Political goons, different organizations, rioters, mafias and criminal gangs operate in illegal trades under the protection of local politicians and with the knowledge of local law enforcing agencies. If these entities get exposed or questioned by journalists, they simply attack them. None of the attack is ever investigated or punished. We need to call out the collusion of the political party leaders and politicians supporters who assault journalists, the role of vigilante groups and of heartened student groups who target journalists and methodically chase them and seek to schnozzle them. In the race to feed the beast, some of them are willing to ignore or bypass other beasts. They also know that filing complaints and pursing legal mechanisms to bring culprits to book are time-consuming and dangerous, bringing them more into the spotlight and vulnerable to further targeting. They know the threats and the attacks are a warning that their lives have been spared, this time.

In 2015, nine Indian reporters were among 110 journalists killed around the world a media watchdog group said dubbing India as Asias deadliest country for media personnel. 2016, India has turned out to be the third most dangerous country in the world in terms of violence against journalists. Since 1992, 64 journalists have been killed in India with reporters exposing corruption the most hunted. The high death rate of journalists in the country is only lower than war-torn Iraq and Syria. India is the deadliest nation for reporters in Asia, more than Pakistan or Afghanistan. Its a matter of grave concern that the journalists are attacked and killed in our country.

Its high time these incidents should be stopped by punishing the culprits. Protest needs to be undertaken until government takes some strong steps. This issue has to be raised unless scribes get protection. More importantly, they should be given a Right to Write, Right to Express and Right to unveil Truth.

(Any suggestions, comments or dispute with regards to this article send us on feedback@afternoonvoice.com)
News / National

by Staff reporter

The only feasible way to resolve the current political impasse in Zanu PF is for Mugabe to name who he wants to succeed him, Sapes Trust director Ibbo Mandaza has said.Mandaza said by naming his successor, Mugabe will avert bloodshed and the chaos consuming the ruling party."If he reaches a stage where he no longer can continue because of physical infirmity then yes, he should state his successor. Grace indicated that when he is tired he will do it. I think he is likely to name a successor."We are still far from elections and anything can happen. I think the worst kind of scenario which I do not hope for because it can unleash untold and unpredictable outcomes is that the old man dies before elections."Death is inevitable but it is better if he dies when he has put something in place. The unthinkable that would happen if he dies is a scuffle for power, anarchy and possible bloodshed."He said Zimbabwe's politics is, however, made up of people who are too dependent on the State and cannot live outside it.Mandaza said it is that dependence on the State which makes them endorse a soon-to-be 94-year-old man to contest in elections."Results of Kenya's elections show in my opinion that as long as the state in Africa is what it is made up of people for whom the State has become a livelihood, for whom retention of power is the enemy of politics, it is unlikely that we will have the kind of democratic process that is familiar in bourguor democracies. As we have said elsewhere, in Africa we have the bourgeois State model but without a national bourguor.""We have a people who are dependent on the State and if they are outside of the State, they wilt and die."In the history of Zimbabwe do you remember how many suicide cases there were when a minister has been taken out of government? It has made the practice of the retention of power endemic to African politics."The academic also argued that while there has been pedestrian talk of a third force to take over the reins in Zimbabwe; it is very unlikely to succeed considering that Zanu PF has a tight grip on State institutions.He said the only way the questionable third force can come into control is through elections; which he doubts may happen next year.Mandaza also highlighted that even if elections do take place in 2018, given a readily prepared template, the opposition may not succeed again."The third force is an unlikely way to go but whatever change comes at the moment the ruling party is in control. Who controls the State for the time being is the one who controls what happens next."So I do not think that the third force is an entry point at this time unless through elections of which I also do not see taking place. And even then if elections happen given the template that is there, I do not see the opposition making headway," he said.Mandaza also allayed fears of vote splitting through Nkosana Moyo's new outfit saying that the former Finance minister is not a threat, as the only notable competitors are Zanu PF and the MDC.He however, warned that the coalition between the MDC and other parties should consider looking at regional and international models for reference.The political analyst said in coming up with a formidable coalition the parties may have to consider using a new name than those that exist."The coalition needs modification. If you look at the coalitions in Kenya, it is political parties and individuals coming together under a new banner and I saw Joice Mujuru complaining that the coalition should not carry the name of the MDC, which I think is a valid criticism and point if you are going to follow coalition models of other countries. The various parties subsume their identity around a banner and it is something to look at.""On the other hand people say the MDC is a brand and if it is a coalition around Morgan Tsvangirai then there is nothing wrong in using the MDC as the name of the coalition."However, all that indicates how problematic the coalition is. Coalitions normally emerge after elections," Mandaza said.
The death toll from the massive earthquake that struck Mexico on Thursday night has risen to at least 90 after emergency services in the southern state of Oaxaca said late on Saturday there had been 71 confirmed fatalities in the state alone.

Its 71 (dead). Just for Oaxaca, said Jesus Gonzalez, a spokesperson for the state civil protection authority.

At least 15 people died in the neighbouring state of Chiapas, according to local authorities, while another four deaths have also been confirmed in the state of Tabasco to the north.

The 8.1 magnitude quake that struck off the coast of Chiapas on Thursday was stronger than a devastating 1985 temblor that flattened swathes of Mexico City and killed thousands.

Relief efforts in the south continued through Saturday, with many of the people worst affected still wary of returning indoors to weaken buildings, fearing they could be brought down by ongoing aftershocks.

Elsewhere two died in mudslides unleashed by storm Katia.

In the town of Juchitan, Oaxaca, hundreds of families spent the night camped in the streets, too scared to go back inside for fear of aftershocks.

The Mexican Seismological Service reported 721 aftershocks.

On Saturday, people in Juchitan queued up for food at a shop window as families carried flowers and wreaths, and eventually coffins.

Authorities raised the overall death toll throughout Saturday. In Juchitan, emergency teams with search dogs found the body of a policeman under the rubble of city hall.

Mexicos seismology service measured on Thursdays quake at magnitude 8.2. The US Geological Survey measured it at 8.1  the same magnitude as the 1985 disaster.

The epicentre of Thursdays quake was in the Pacific Ocean, about 100 kilometres off the town of Tonala in Chiapas. AFP reporters in Tonala saw residents salvaging belongings from their ruined houses.

In Tabasco State, two children were among the dead, officials said. One was crushed by a collapsing wall. Another, an infant on a respirator, died after the quake triggered a power outage.

Meanwhile, Katia made landfall in the neighbouring state of Veracruz as a Category One hurricane. It was later downgraded to a tropical storm, before petering out on Saturday.
Hundreds of people on Sunday staged a demonstration outside the Ryan International School demanding a CBI probe into the murder of a seven-year-old school boy and set afire a liquor shop near the school.

Police used batons to quell the protest and detained 20 protestors. Journalists covering the demonstration were also beaten and cameras were damaged.

The protests were held over the gruesome murder of seven-year-old Pradyuman on Friday.

Although the Gurgaon Police have arrested the school bus conductor Ashok Kumar, people are demanding action against the school management.

Protesters demanded that the school should be shut until a CBI probe is ordered into the incident.

The Gurgaon Police had to use mild lathicharge to disperse the agitators. The police detained over 20 protestors found agitating outside the school, Ravinder Kumar, PRO Gurgaon Police said.

Some of the demonstrators threw liquor bottles inside school premises to vent their ire against the school management, police said. The liquor shop is barely 50 metres away from the school.

The protestors alleged that school drivers and conductors often consume alcohol from the liquor shop in their free time.

Pradyuman Thakur was found murdered with his throat slit inside the toilet of Ryan International School on Friday, triggering public outrage. Gurgaon Police arrested the school bus conductor Ashok Kumar in connection with the case.

Kumar was inside the toilet, waiting for any student to come inside with the motive of sexual assault. The deceased was the first student who entered the toilet, the police said.

The Manohar Lal Khattar led Haryana government, meanwhile, has refused to withdraw recognition of the school saying it will affect the future of 1200 school children.

People have demanded that the recognition of the school should be withdrawn. However, parents of the children have requested us that the move would jeopardize the future of 1200 students. Action will also be taken against management and owner of Ryan International School, Ram Bilas Sharma, Haryanas Education Minister, said.

He also promised to hand over the probe to any agency if parents of the child are not satisfied with the Gurgaon Police investigations.
News / National

by Staff reporter

First lady Grace Mugabe on Saturday told a bewildered Vice-President Emmerson Mnangagwa that he risked going the same way as his predecessor Joice Mujuru if he did not rein in his supporters.The visibly-angry Grace accused Mnangagwa of plotting against her husband in front of thousands of Zanu PF supporters at a rally addressed by President Robert Mugabe in Bindura.She took issue with claims by the VP's backers that he was poisoned last month after he allegedly ate ice-cream from the first family's Gushungo Dairies.Mnangagwa has since issued a statement stating that he did not eat the ice-cream, but Mugabe's 52-year-old wife said the poisoning fiasco was just one of many crimes the Midlands political godfather had committed against his boss."VP Mnangagwa fell sick and it was said the president and his wife wanted to kill him," charged Grace, before revealing the dramatic events that happened at the Zanu PF's central committee meeting held in Harare on Friday.The first lady said a Mnangagwa supporter, believed to be Beauty Mutero, accused her of being the leader of the G40 faction, which tried to kill Mugabe's deputy."And listen to what someone said at the central committee meeting yesterday, very illogical reasoning that we wanted to kill VP Mnangagwa so that VP Phelekezela Mphoko would act as president and eventually hand over power to me," she revealed.Grace said the attack on the first family started in 2014 when Zanu PF youth leaders linked to Mnangagwa launched an onslaught against Mugabe and herself."They were doing this to frustrate me so that I tell the president to quit so that Mnangagwa takes over because they were using the VP's name," she said."They said Mugabe was grooming his wife to take over. War veterans were fired for the same reason."It doesn't mean I don't trust the VP, but I don't think it is a good thing for him to keep quite when his supporters are saying this."VP Mnangagwa, if you support the president, why do you associate with people who were fired from the party for attacking him? You are seen with some of the people holding a cup written I am the boss'."Am begging the VP to stop this! I once warned Mujuru and she thought I was joking and where is she now?"Grace asked Mnangagwa why he kept quiet while the name of the first family's business was being dragged in the mud.She said people get sick, but what was wrong was when the VP wanted to manipulate his sickness for political ends.She revealed that Mugabe was once a victim of food poisoning at a rally in Manicaland and fell sick at the funeral of Senate president Edna Madzongwe's husband but no one made a fuss about it."He was sick and thought he was dying. He asked me to call [Defence minister Sydney] Sekeramayi so that he could talk to him before he died. But he recovered and we never said anything," Grace said."I also fell sick after taking food; I lost about five kilogrammes in one night. I was run over by a car but did not even say the driver was sent by someone."She said Zanu PF supporters at some point also wanted to demonstrate against Mnangagwa but she stopped them.Grace said Masvingo and Midlands were the hot spots of factionalism and Masvingo was at the forefront claiming that the VP was poisoned through ice-cream from Gushungo Dairies."Yesterday [Friday] I heard the worst lies from [Zanu PF deputy secretary for legal affairs Paul] Mangwana that Masvingo was united. It is a lie. There are problems in Masvingo and Midlands," she said.Grace sprang to the defence of Zanu PF commissar Saviour Kasukuwere, saying he was not going anywhere, claiming the reason why he was being targeted was that he refused to join Team Lacoste.She also said Higher Education minister Jonathan Moyo was also being prevented from doing his job through false corruption charges.Moyo accused Mnangagwa of cooking up the abuse of office charges where he was accused of stealing over $400 000 from the Zimbabwe Manpower Development Fund last year.The VP sat stone-faced alongside his wife Auxilia as Grace roasted him.
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Robert and Grace Gushungu are closing in on social media, electronic media outlets, members of its ZANU PF party and private individuals with threats of arrests to supress market safety concerns about possible contamination of Gushungu dairy products. The market has responded by shunning Gushungu ice cream following the contamination scare and suspected poisoning of Emmerson Mnangagwa at Gweru youth interface rally on 18/08/2017.Mnangagwa suffered a bout of stomach cramps, vomiting, diarrhoea and nausea suspected to have eaten Gushungu ice cream. The drop in sales of Gushungu ice-cream has forced Gushungu enterprise to scale down on production, total revenue from sales has fallen, the company is unable to cover its production and operational costs, and the general company performance is below breakeven point and now debt ridden. The two weeks period leading to the Gweru youth interface rally the sales of Gushungu ice cream plummeted. $15 000.00 worth of Gushungu ice cream remained unsold due the contamination scare.This underscores how the contamination scare significantly eroded customer confidence in consumption of Gushungu ice cream. This caused retail outlets that sell Gushungu ice-cream to withhold their orders. The retail outlets reduced their orders concerned that their customers could view those outlets less trustworthy in embracing customer safety if they continued to sell Gushungu products that are surrounded by a contamination scare. It is mainly a question of trust from the customers' point of view. The general theory is that a decline in customer trust of a product due to safety concerns or other concerns means a decline in sales of that product. The general consumer psychology and view of a product has an impact on the market performance of that product. Customers are less likely to buy a product on the news headlines associating it with poisoning a consumer.The owner and business entrepreneur of Gushungu enterprise Grace Mugabe gave away over 15 000.00 units of Gushungu ice-cream to ZANU PF attendees at Gweru youth interface rally. Her company endured the cost and loss equivalent to those units. It is expected that an estimated number of 20 000 people attending the Gweru rally tested Gushungu ice-cream with no reports of causalities from poisoning. Gushungu ice cream was of course not contaminated and bewitched this time. The marketing strategy for Gushungu enterprise was to confirm to the public that its product is safe to eat and that its ice cream is not contaminated as the general market is made to believe. The strategy was to regurgitate assurance and confidence of Gushungu dairy products in the market; an attempt to generate improved sales and to rebuild customer loyalty to the Gushungu ice cream. How effective this marketing strategy was effective is yet to be seen in the market.Management at Gushungu enterprise offered a disastrous public relations handling of the contamination scare. The company underestimated the gravity of the contamination threats to its relationship with the markets. Strong ties of Gushungu enterprise with the public and markets is a key factor to its durability and sustainability in the long term. There was a lack of effective communication by the company to acknowledge that its product was associated with contamination and poisoning of a customer. It is not enough to simple deny that its product was not associated with the contamination and poisoning scare. The company failed to address the perceptions of the public whether founded or not.The important action was to respond in the most professional manner proportionate to the perception of the public rather than focussing on what actually happened on the ground. Gushungu enterprises needed to listen to the people, who were making the claims of its ice-cream contamination, address the public concerns and to tune in emotionally to the public mood rather than treating the incident as detached to the company and a means for spreading falsehood by political players.Gushungu enterprise took the problem out of its control and handed it over to a political arena using President Mugabe as its public relations officer. Companies with a political lineage suffer a great deal of economies of scale as their survival is based on political decrees and protection against the rules of market forces. Mugabe simply made a political announcement to say Mnangagwa did not eat Gushungu ice-cream and from his point of view it should be perfectly okay for customers to continue buying Gushungu ice-cream. Mnangagwa on the hand was coerced to make a declaration denying that he ate the ice-cream without mentioning anything else that poisoned him.The involvement by Mugabe was an attempt to give a positive image of Gushungu ice-cream which sat blurry and hazy between business ethics and political contradictions. While pushing to build the image of Gushungu ice-cream Mugabe voluntarily neglected his morally duty to address the safety and wellbeing of his Vice President and the public and to stablish the reasons why and who poisoned Mnangagwa in the first place. Gushungu enterprise had to do more within its own rights as a business entity to handle the crisis by itself rather than allocating the problem to the political domain handled by someone peripheral to its day to day business management.
September 7, 2017

CAIRO  Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry announced Aug. 27 during a press conference in Berlin with his German counterpart Sigmar Gabriel that Egypt had signed a cooperation agreement with Germany to combat and prevent illegal immigration.

During the conference, Shoukry said that Egypt expects Germany to actively support it to overcome the challenges to this effect, adding that he and Gabriel touched upon the German and European Union stances vis-a-vis the issue of the Nile waters.

Gabriel expressed great understanding of the Egyptian position, noting that the Nile is the heart of Egypt and this issue is existential for the country. He stressed that his country is ready to mediate between the Nile Basin countries.

There is an ongoing disagreement between Egypt and Sudan on the one hand and Ethiopia on the other, since the latter has started to build the Renaissance Dam for clean energy generation. Egypt and Sudan are opposed to the technical studies related to the dam, as they believe the dam would affect the rivers water shares of each country.

Meanwhile, the Egyptian Foreign Ministry said in a statement Aug. 28 that Germany will provide Egypt with financial support  without specifying the amount or timing of such aid  to boost its capabilities in securing its borders and combating illegal immigration.

According to the latest statistics published by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees for 2016, more than 3,600 refugees and migrants have died in the Mediterranean Sea while attempting to escape from the Egyptian coast to the shores of Europe.

Nayla Gabr, the head of the National Coordination Committee to Combat and Prevent Illegal Migration in parliament, told Al-Monitor in a phone call that the cooperation agreement between Egypt and Germany included items and terms on how to deal with the refugee crisis and illegal immigration. She said that both sides will later hold a meeting to implement such terms and translate them into actions on the ground.

Gabr added that the committee will allocate part of the German aid toward information and awareness campaigns on illegal immigration and to introduce young people who wish to leave the country to different alternatives. She further stressed that the agreement focused on securing and managing the border as well as finding development solutions through the establishment of technical training centers for Egyptian youth and the creation of a healthy environment for refugees residing in Egypt.

Ayman Shabanah, a political science professor at Cairo University and the deputy director of the Nile Basin Study Center at the university, said that Egypt is a key partner in the issue of illegal immigration and the refugee crisis, as it is a transit country for the displaced coming from countries of armed conflicts, be it Libya or Syria, or even some African countries suffering from recession.

Shabanah told Al-Monitor, Clarifying Egypts vision for the EU countries will contribute to the convergence of views, especially since the operating company working on the [construction of the Renaissance] dam is an Italian company.

He added, Germany has common and direct interests with Egypt, mainly when it comes to working on limiting illegal immigration and alleviating the refugee crisis. Egypt, on the other hand, is working on consolidating its position with the Germans during the negotiations with the Ethiopians, while employing more efforts to limit illegal immigration."

In a similar vein, Rakha Hassan, a member of the Egyptian Council for Foreign Affairs, told Al-Monitor in a telephone interview that Egypt is acting at the international and regional levels to pressure Ethiopia to keep the construction of the Renaissance Dam from affecting Egypts minimum share of the Nile waters. Cairo resorted to Europe in light of the continued disputes with the Nile Basin countries over the Entebbe Agreement, Hassan said.

The Nile Basin countries  which include Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and Tanzania  signed the Entebbe Agreement in 2010 to request an additional share of Nile water. The upstream countries  Egypt and Sudan  are opposing this agreement since it puts an end to their so-called historical shares in the Nile waters of 55.5 billion cubic meters for Egypt and 18.5 billion cubic meters for Sudan.

Mustafa al-Gundi, the head of the parliamentary African Affairs Committee, said, The EU cares about the stability of the situation in Africa, and the absence of confrontation or disruption of relations between Egypt and Ethiopia is in Europes best interest.

Gundi told Al-Monitor that Egypt insists on using diplomatic means to resolve the Renaissance Dam crisis. This is evidenced by the last visit by President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to the African continent, he said.

Sisi had visited four African countries starting Aug. 14, including Tanzania, Rwanda, Gabon and Chad. Gundi noted that Egypt may take several steps to deal with the Renaissance Dam crisis. All options are open and available to protect Egypt's water rights. We will not allow the dam to become a de facto matter without a clear agreement on Egypt's water rights, Gundi said.

He recalled the recent diplomatic measures and procedures that Sisi adopted at the Egyptian Foreign Ministry on June 2. These included the appointment of the acting head of the General Intelligence Service, Maj. Gen. Tarek Sallam, as Egypt's ambassador to Uganda and the appointment of Mohamed Idris, Egypt's former ambassador to Ethiopia and the African Union and assistant foreign minister for African Affairs, as Egypt's envoy to the UN in New York.

The appointment of the No. 2 man in the intelligence services as Egypts ambassador to Uganda reflects the expansion of the role of the intelligence services at the expense of the Foreign Affairs Ministry in dealing with the Nile water issue. Similarly, the appointment of the assistant foreign minister for African Affairs as Egypts envoy to the UN reflects the major importance of the Nile water issue for Egypt in the coming period.

This clearly indicates that preparations are underway to deal more rigorously with the Renaissance Dam crisis, Gundi said.

The Renaissance Dam is one of the biggest challenges facing Sisi since he took office. Indeed, Sisi came to power against a charged political background between Cairo and Addis Ababa following the broadcast of a meeting on June 4, 2013, which included hints of using force against Ethiopia under President Mohammed Morsi. The Egyptian presidency later apologized.

Sisi signed a tripartite joint cooperation agreement in Khartoum on March 23, 2015, between Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia. The three countries held 14 rounds of consultation on resolving disputes over the Renaissance Dam, the latest of which was on May 16.

But all of these rounds failed. Egypt now hopes to pull the Europeans to its side regarding the Renaissance Dam to pressure Ethiopia during the negotiations, in a last attempt before resorting to more escalating options such as protesting before the Security Council.
September 7, 2017

The absence of any progress in the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations appears to have increased the Israeli appetite for grabbing more land and strategic locations. The problem seems most acute in Jerusalem and centers on church property in the holy city.

Jerusalem-based churches issued a strongly worded statement Sept. 4 condemning what they called Israels attempts to change the status quo in the city. The joint statement, signed by the heads of the Greek Orthodox, Catholic, Armenian, Coptic, Lutheran and Anglican churches, reiterated the importance of governments respecting the rights and privileges of churches.

"We now find ourselves united once again in condemning recent further encroachment on the status quo. In such matters as this, the Heads of the Churches are resolute and united in our opposition to any action by any authority or group that undermines those laws, agreements, and regulations that have ordered our life for centuries, the statement read.

Of particular interest to the churches are an Israeli court decision and a draft law, both of which affect church properties.

Hanna Amireh, a member of the PLO Executive Committee in charge of the church portfolio, told Al-Monitor that what is happening to the church properties in Jerusalem is worrisome. For us in the Palestinian leadership, the issue of Jerusalem is an important one in terms of our aspiration for an independent state with Jerusalem as its capital, she said.

The church statement referenced an Aug. 1 decision by the Israeli Central District Court regarding two hotels just inside Jaffa Gate as proof that the status quo is being breached. It reads, The judgement in the 'Jaffa Gate' case against the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem, which we regard as unjust,  restrict[s] the rights of the Churches over our own property, are further assaults on the rights that the status quo has always guaranteed.

The Jaffa Gate legal case, which the church lost and has decided to appeal, involves the questionable sale by a church official, Nikolas Papadimos, without the knowledge or the approval of the patriarch. Israeli media reported on the revelation in the court case of various allegations of bribery amounts by the purchasing side to the church official in the approximately $2 million sale of two hotels at Jaffa Gate and a home in the Old City.

Ateret Cohanim Yeshiva, an Israeli right-wing extremist organization, succeeded in convincing the senior official of the Greek Orthodox Church to sell the strategically located hotels, which provide one of the nearest entrances from West Jerusalem to the Old City of Jerusalem.

Palestinians and the churches are worried that the hotels will be used to house radical Jewish settlers, who will create tensions in the largely Palestinian area inside the walls of Jerusalem.

Amireh said that the Jaffa Gate properties referred to in the church statement are strategic, noting, In the Camp David negotiations in 2000, the issue of Jerusalems Holy Basin was discussed and we refused to give up on it, and that is why the hotels in Jaffa Gate are strategic for us.

Located just inside Jaffa Gate, which is the only entrance that leads to both the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and the Western Wall, the locations have a strategic role in creating the kind of environment that will invite or disinvite visitors belonging to one side of the conflict or the other.

The Holy Basin is the area of Jerusalems Old City that contains the most important religious sites to Jews, Christians and Muslims.

Hanna Issa, a Palestinian Christian historian and head of the Islamic-Christian Commission in Support of Jerusalem and Holy Sites, called the Jaffa Gate case a patriotic case.

"[It] clearly reflects the Israeli attempts to weaken the Palestinian Christian presence in order to make the city more Jewish, Issa said. The issue is very difficult and requires coordinated efforts between the church leaders, Jordan and the PLO.

Amireh feels similarly in regard to the need for coordination. As custodian of Islamic and Christian heritage in Jerusalem, there needs to be strong efforts by Jordan to block the attempts by right-wing Jewish groups to take over Palestinian properties using 'crooked' methods.

According to the Palestinian officials, the Israeli settlement organization had created a fake Western business entity as the purchaser of the property and had found a person within the church to induce to make the deal.

The church sued, arguing that Papadimos had no right to sell church property using a limited power of attorney and that therefore the sale is invalid. The court ruled that since money was exchanged and accepted the deal is valid.

Church leaders are also worried about a draft law being circulated in the Knesset to take over church properties. All church properties are usually sold using long-term leases, although this process is changing. Israeli Knesset member Rachel Azaria said that the aim of the law would be to protect residents living in some of these properties from money-hungry developers.

The land ownership bill I initiated has one goal only: to protect the residents. There is a group of wealthy entrepreneurs that bought the land from the church and thousands of residents in Jerusalem can find themselves homeless, after they purchased their homes fair and square, Azaria told the Jerusalem Post Sept. 5.

Numerous UN Security Council resolutions reject Israeli attempts to change the legal status of the city of East Jerusalem and its character. Resolution 298, passed in September 1971, clearly rejects actions by Israel toward Jerusalem. The resolution confirms in the clearest possible terms that all legislative and administrative actions taken by Israel to change the status of the City of Jerusalem, including expropriation of land and properties, transfer of populations and legislation aimed at the incorporation of the occupied section, are totally invalid and cannot change that status.

While churches enjoy a high degree of independence, it appears that Israel has been able to take advantage of a built-in weakness in the Greek Orthodox Church, which owns a lot of properties but is strapped for cash. Israels actions are completely unchecked these days with a pro-settlement Knesset and government controlling legislation and executive policies, and the peace process has proved to be ineffective in restraining Israels lust to control physically strategic properties in Jerusalem at the very entrance of Jaffa Gate.

A concerted Palestinian-Jordanian effort with a high degree of advocacy of the churches might be able to slow down the process to change the character of Jerusalems Old City since June 1967.
September 7, 2017

The Palestinian Authority (PA) started taking punitive measures against the Gaza Strip in April, notably reducing the salaries of government employees, no longer transferring funds to certain ministries such as the Ministry of Health and Ministry of Education, and cutting the purchase of fuel to operate Gazas sole power plant. The international community remained silent and showed no overt interference to put an end to the repercussions of these measures on the deteriorating living conditions in Gaza.

However, the Palestinian media recently spoke of pressure exerted by European countries on Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to stop these harsh measures against the Gaza Strip.

On Aug. 30, a Palestinian source told Alsaa8 on condition of anonymity that Abbas' reduction of some punitive measures against Gaza was due to pressure exerted by the European Union. On Aug. 26, Palestinian Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah decided, with Abbas' approval, to allow about 6,000 workers in the educational sector of Gaza to return to their jobs after the government forced them into early retirement on July 4.

Meanwhile, on Aug. 29, Hamas-affiliated radio station Al-Aqsa Voice reported that Abbas had asked for a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron, but the latter reportedly refused to meet due to Abbas sanctions against Gaza that have damaged vital sectors such as education, health and infrastructure.

Ramy Abdu, the president of the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor in Gaza, told Al-Monitor, There is no serious European pressure to end Gazas suffering. The EUs action since the beginning of the Gaza siege in 2006 and its talks with the PA have always been calculated so as not to embarrass itself when it comes to the PAs violation of human rights. The EU is the main supporter of the PA, but the latter is playing the Europeans on the subject of sanctions in Gaza from two angles. First, the PA said these were short-term measures, which is not the case. Second, it claimed it only cut off the salaries of employees who are not working, which the EU itself had requested in February. This is why the Europeans are not going above and beyond with their rejection of the sanctions.

On Aug. 28, Al-Resalah newspaper reported that the EU is considering cutting financial aid to the PA if it continues to implement its measures against the Gaza Strip, because they fall under the framework of collective punishment. The EU covers 15% of the PAs budget by providing 450 million euros ($541 million) annually.

In a press statement Aug. 28, Shadi Othman, a spokesman for the Office of the European Union Representative in Jerusalem, denied the alleged EU ultimatum, stressing the strong EU-PA strategic relations and the continuation of the EUs financial commitment to the PA.

Ghassan Khatib, the former minister of labor and planning in the Ramallah government, told Al-Monitor, President Abbas would never risk taking harsh decisions against Gaza without consulting with the international community first  regardless of whether we believe they are positive or negative steps. Abu Mazen [Abbas] had obviously considered the possible international reactions before carrying on with his new policy toward Gaza because he believes that the time has come to bring Gaza back under the Palestinian legitimacy. If Gaza were to remain isolated, the dream of a Palestinian state would never be realized. Abbas wants to convey to the international community that Gaza is still subject to official Palestinian influence.

Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem told Al-Monitor, The international community is called upon to exert strong pressure on Abbas to stop his actions against Gaza because they violate international law, and the situation in Gaza is on the verge of exploding. Most international parties reject these inhumane sanctions, and although Abbas is displeased with these [international] positions, he insists on his non-nationalist positions.

Qassem added, Hamas, on the other hand, is conveying to all the international parties it can communicate with the catastrophic results of Abbas sanctions. Hamas has sought and continues to seek breakthroughs in the region to try to overcome the devastating effects of these measures, as it did with the understandings it reached with Egypt in July.

In his Aug. 30 article on the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs website, Yoni Ben Menachem, a former officer in the Israeli military intelligence service, said that Abbas was under local, regional and international pressure to ease the sanctions he imposed on Gaza's residents. He therefore froze these sanctions on the eve of his departure to Turkey on Aug. 27, as a goodwill gesture toward Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Menachem noted that on Aug. 30, US envoy Jason Greenblatt visited the Gaza border and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres arrived in Gaza. Both men relayed to Abbas their concerns over the deterioration of the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip.

However, no Palestinian official has yet to announce the freezing of all sanctions imposed by the PA against Gaza.

Mohammed Abu Jayyab, the editor-in-chief of local newspaper Al-Eqtesadia, told Al-Monitor, Perhaps Abu Mazen would never take action against Gaza without a European and international consensus. I have learned from prominent sources in the Palestinian Finance Ministry in Ramallah  which oversees most of the measures taken against Gaza  that it provides regular reports to the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the EU. These reports have indicated that the sanctions resulted in a reduction in [the PAs] expenditure, as it [the ministry] seeks international support for such actions.

No one knows the truth behind the European and international pressure on the PA to stop its punitive measures against the Gaza Strip, but it is likely that Abbas may not have the courage to take such sanctions, especially the suspension of salaries and the reduction of expenditures for Gaza, without any implicit or explicit agreement with those international parties.
September 10, 2017

Signs of Saudi Arabia-Iran thaw

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told Al Mayadeen TV on Sept. 6, We are prepared to cooperate with Islamic countries on all issues that are important to the Islamic world.  If the Saudi government is ready to turn the page, Iran is ready for that as well."

Although Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir termed Zarifs gesture as laughable, there are signs that a slow thaw may be in the works, the result of a shifting regional landscape.

The Iran-Saudi Arabia fault line runs deep, as they back different sides in the Syria and Yemen wars. In September 2015, Iranian officials blamed Saudi officials for mismanagement following a stampede during the hajj in Mecca that left over 2,400 dead, including more than 400 Iranians. In January 2016, Iranian crowds ransacked the Saudi Embassy in Tehran following the kingdoms execution of Saudi Shiite cleric Nimr al-Nimr. Riyadh broke ties with Iran soon after.

Despite Jubeirs reaction to Zarif, the trend lines may signal a subtle reset. First, Iran and Saudi Arabia worked out arrangements for Iranian participation in the hajj this year, after Iran banned its citizens from pilgrimage last year. Both governments have downplayed pending visits by Saudi and Iranian officials to inspect diplomatic sites.

More importantly, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman may be seeking to cut his losses on costly involvement in the Syria and Yemen wars. United Nations Syria envoy Staffan de Mistura said Sept. 7 that the Syria war is winding down, and that for the opposition, the message is very clear: If they were planning to win the war, facts are proving that is not the case. So now it's time to win the peace. Saudi Arabia has continued to engage and rally the Syrian opposition to unite in support of UN-brokered discussions of a political transition.

In Yemen, the kingdom is facing increased international scrutiny for airstrikes on civilian targets.

The toll of the war on Yemen, including a cholera outbreak affecting over 500,000 people, more than half of them children, has been a public relations nightmare for Saudi Arabia  with no end in sight and the prospects of a chronic failed state on the Arabian Peninsula. Irans support for Houthi armed groups has served to prolong the conflict, but its intervention is low cost, relative to Saudi Arabias quagmire.

Another sign of shifts in Yemens political winds is the role of former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who has attempted to patch up recent disagreements with his Houthi allies. Many believe Saleh may be playing all sides, including Saudi Arabia, in a bid to retain his decadeslong role as Yemens ultimate power broker.

The tipping point for Saudi Arabia may eventually be buyers remorse on the consequences of isolating Qatar. By shattering Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) unity, Riyadh and its partners have lost their strategic depth, compelling states to cut their own deals with Iran. Not surprisingly, Qatar is first in, as we explained here last month. Oman has always preferred dialogue over confrontation. One wonders if Dubai, which has maintained solid commercial ties with Iran, may eventually influence Abu Dhabi, which has taken the lead on a much tougher line on Iran.

This all came to a head last week during the visit of the emir of Kuwait, Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, to Washington. The emir was quick to anticipate the crisis caused by the rupture with Qatar in June and immediately set about seeking to broker a reconciliation. During Sabahs visit, a call brokered by US President Donald Trump between the Saudi crown prince and Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani appears to have gone badly, ending in further recriminations from both sides.

In retrospect, the US-Saudi-Islamic summit in May may have served as the high-water mark of an approach to regional affairs that was over before it started. Since the summit, the GCC has been facing its worse crisis ever. Meanwhile, Iran is building a network of partnerships  Iraq, Syria, Qatar, Turkey and Hamas, both Sunni and Shiite  which makes it increasingly the center of the action. The Saudi crown prince, who has set an ambitious course of economic and social modernization for his country, understands better than most the costs of declining assets. There are deep reasons for Saudi-Iranian hostility, and no turnaround happens quickly, especially in the Middle East. But the dividends of building bridges, rather than burning them, may be the lessons learned that will inform a reset in both Riyadh, Tehran and other regional capitals.

Turkey weighs US, Russian reaction to next steps in Syria

Mohammed al-Khatieb reports this week on the fighting between the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the Free Syrian Army (FSA) that is backed by Turkey on the outskirts of Aleppo.

The SDF is comprised mostly of fighters drawn from the Syrian Kurdish Peoples Protection Units (YPG) that Turkey claims are linked to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which both Ankara and Washington consider a terrorist organization.

Khatieb writes that the village of Kaljibrin, which is controlled by the FSA and sits 18 miles north of Aleppo, is subject to daily mortar shells and artillery barrage by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which control the nearby village of Ayn Daqnah.

Khatieb explains, The northern Aleppo countryside, near the contact point between the FSA and the SDF, has been the scene of recent mutual bombings, as Turkish military bases shell the SDF-controlled territories along the contact line. And in turn, the SDF retaliates by bombing FSA-controlled areas. As a result, civilian casualties are heavy on both sides. Since its entry into Syrian territory on Aug. 24, 2016, the Turkish army has established several military bases in the north of Aleppo, within the scope of Operation Euphrates Shield. The exact number of these bases is not known, but they are said to include tanks, artillery and communication centers.

The battles between the SDF and thr FSA outside of Aleppo come as Turkey weighs further military action against the YPG in northern Syria, including in Afrin, which is opposed by both the United States and Russia, Semih Idiz writes.

Idiz reports, The YPG announced Aug. 29 that Russian military observers would be deployed to Afrin and al-Shahba region in northwestern Syria to coordinate with Kurdish and local forces with a view to maintaining security.

The Russian move in Afrin and al-Shahba region also comes at a time when the United States issued a demarche to Turkey over multiple attacks by the FSA on US troops in northern Syria in the past few weeks, Idiz continues. Some of these reportedly took place as US Defense Secretary James Mattis was in Ankara for talks. Col. Ryan Dillon, a spokesman for the US-led coalition against IS, said later that they 'reserved the right to defend themselves.' Many took this as a warning not just to the FSA but also to Turkey. Complicating matters is the fact that Ankara is said to be working with Russia for some kind of a trade-off between Afrin and the city of Idlib, which is held in part by the FSA and in part by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, a successor group to Jabhat al-Nusra that is on Washington's and Moscows hit lists.
September 8, 2017

BEIRUT  Palestinian refugees from the Sbeineh refugee camp in Rif Dimashq, Syria, started returning to their homes last week, some four years after the Palestinian camp was devastated by war and then shuttered by the Syrian army.

The Syrian army retook the town of Sbeineh from rebel groups in November 2013 after a fierce military campaign that battered the town and the Palestinian camp of the same name, leaving homes in tatters and infrastructure in ruins. The camp remained closed to civilians since then, with front lines in Daraya and south Damascus that were active until recently just a few miles away.

But on Aug. 27, Palestinian-Syrian community Facebook pages began sharing videos and images of crowds pouring into Sbeineh camp accompanied by Syrian soldiers. There was an air of celebration, the sound of women ululating as they passed beneath the camps concrete gates.

Civilians had been permitted by Minister of State for National Reconciliation Affairs Ali Haidar and military officers to re-enter the camp and assess their properties  the first time civilians had gone inside Sbeineh since 2013.

Rif Dimashq Gov. Alaa Mounir Ibrahim was quoted by state news agency SANA on Aug. 27 as saying that Sbeinehs civilians would be allowed to start returning to their homes on Sept. 1, marking the first day of the Eid al-Adha holiday. However, returns actually began two days earlier. Al-Monitor has heard that family members of martyrs and active servicemen, as well as state employees, will be among the first to move back inside Sbeineh.

The semi-official Facebook page of the National Reconciliation Committee in Sbeineh has claimed that 400-500 families have registered to return to the camp with the governments reconciliation committee already, although this was not possible to independently verify.

With its reopening, Sbeineh has become one of just a handful of displaced Palestinian communities allowed to return to their homes since 2011, following years of fraught negotiations and pleas from former residents. In February, SANA quoted Haidar as saying that Sbeineh families will return in [a] few days, and that later all displaced people will be able to return to their home areas with no exceptions. Khaled Abdul-Majid, the secretary of the pro-regime Palestinian Revolution Factions Alliance in Syria, earlier this year told Al-Monitor that Palestinian figures had lobbied state authorities to accelerate the process and have people immediately return.

Similar statements have been made sporadically by officials and pro-regime Palestinian figures during the four years since Sbeinehs recapture, on the one hand celebrating its return to stability while at the same time citing security reasons and a lack of services on the ground for the delay in rehabilitating residents.

During that time, internally displaced Palestinians were forced to live in areas with high concentrations of Palestinians  some of which, like Qudsaya, northwest of Damascus, were themselves drawn into conflict and later besieged by pro-government forces. Many refugees instead crossed the border into Lebanon and, at one point, the London-based Action Group for Palestinians of Syria and the Palestinian Return Center estimated that some 8% of all Palestinian-Syrian refugees residing in Lebanon hailed from Sbeineh.

Despite the official fanfare inside Syria, not all Palestinian refugees remain hopeful that they will be able to return soon.

I felt real joy to see that the people of Sbeineh returned, said Umm Wael, a Palestinian refugee from Sbeineh in her 60s who now lives in south Lebanons Ain al-Hilweh camp. I always wanted to go back, but then I think, What would I be returning to?

After Aug. 27, Umm Wael telephoned former neighbors inside Syria who had re-entered the camp. They went, checked on their homes and mine, and then left again. My house had been taken over and was badly damaged, and it will take a lot of money to make it right again. Aside from that, rents are very expensive for people there now.

UNRWA, the UN relief agency for Palestinian refugees, plans to resume services following a July 18 mission inside the camp to assess needs and service gaps. However, there are delays.

UNRWA is still waiting for an official communication from the Syrian authorities confirming that our installations are clear of explosive remnants of war, a UN source told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity. Once the Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirms that all UNRWA installations are clear of explosive remnants of war, the agency will start rehabilitating its installations and restore services to the camp.

Even so, Sbeineh will likely form an important case study that speaks of the uncertain future status of Palestinian refugees in Syria. Some Palestinian camps  including northern Aleppos Handarat  have either been completely or almost completely destroyed since 2011, while Yarmouk, once the countrys largest Palestinian community, remains under siege with a messy mix of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham and Islamic State (IS) militants present on the ground.

The Syrian government remains adamant that Yarmouk will see a similar fate to Sbeineh, and Haidar has repeatedly claimed that civilians will be allowed to return to Yarmouk soon with negotiations well underway to evacuate between 100-200 Hayat Tahrir al-Sham fighters and a larger IS contingent.

One of the first Palestinian communities that was displaced and then returned with government permission was Hosseinieh in the southeastern Damascus countryside. Civilians and UNRWA services started trickling back in August 2015.

But former Hosseinieh resident Abu Diab, now living in one of south Lebanons Palestinian camps, said that a return can depend on much more than regime approval.

Houses [in Hosseinieh] are completely destroyed and need to be repaired, maintained or purchased again, he said. The other problem is the economy, because a lot of the jobs in decorating or carpentry or welding and so on are not available, so most people find they have to enlist as conscripts to secure a living for their families.

The risk that security personnel or informants may have written reports about people who have left Syria, containing claims that they have dealt with  enemies of the regime will also stop some Palestinians from returning for now, claimed Abu Diab, who is himself not intending to go back to Hosseinieh just yet.

While the return of civilians to Sbeineh might appear to end one chapter in the story of the post-2011 Palestinian-Syrian catastrophe, low UN resources, widespread destruction of homes and refugees own concerns about their futures will likely mean the camps will not return to their former selves for many years to come.
Opinion / Columnist

Zimbabweans in the UK have taken the first and the golden cup in killing their spouses. In the last four years in the UK alone thirty Zimbabwean women were murdered ruthlessly by their husbands or boyfriends. About 40 percent of all female murder victims (and just six percent of male murder victims) die at the hands of a former or present spouse or lover.The home becomes a dangerous place for women Whereas almost all cases of murders committed by males against their female partners occurred after the female ended the relationship or announced her intention to do so, most of the murders committed by females against their male partners were reactions to severe male domestic violence.In 2011 a Zimbabwean woman in Luton cooked her husband in cooking oil burning all his genitals leaving him for dead. The woman was reacting to sexual and personal abuse.In Corby a town few miles from Leicester a woman who was in a wheel chair drove thirty miles to burn her boyfriend who had jilted her. Unfortunately she killed three innocent children and their mother who had nothing to do with the affair.The handling of domestic issues abroad is so bad that it ends in murder.According to the Metropolitan police, Zimbabwean men involved in murdering their wives have risen and the causes are more of passion than wealth.When love kills Zimbabwean men tops the list.A woman was stabbed in a car park by her husband and the other was stabbed several times in the comfort of her house by her ex-boyfriend. The scenario in most bedrooms abroad resembles a war zone.The white sheets and colourful beds are being turned to blood and the lucky ones come out bruised and some permanently maimed.Nearly all male murderers claim that (a) they committed the murder out of love, and (b) it was a result of loving too much. Wife murder does not express profound love; rather, it is an abusive type of the problematic fusion model of love.There is a great difference between love and jealous most men even those who have not killed yet are so jealous and interpret any movement by the wife to be infidelity. The men have become so insecure and feel so unsafe to the extent that they declare that if they cannot have her no one should.The embarrassing and painful situation is that even adult couples have joined in the race to murder spouses. What has gone wrong with our diaspora society?There is no family which does not know a family which was a victim of diasporic domestic violence. There are reasons always given for such cowardly behaviour by our people in the Land of the queen. The various explanations offered for the murder of wives share two common assumptions: (a) the murder stems from masculine possessiveness; it is the embodiment of the murderer's personality and sexual jealousy and anger are two emotions that trigger it; (B) the murder is the climax of a history of violence that preceded it. Killing for love is never justified, killing for anything is the cruellest human action ever described.Spouse-murder is undoubtedly the most extreme manifestation of male violence, it is not due to a single male quality, such as masculine possessiveness, and is not a "natural" or "inevitable" continuation of domestic violence. It is a phenomenon that is separate to other forms of male violence. Moreover, it is believed that in an important sense, these murders are committed out of love, so that an understanding of which components of love play a role in these murders would increase our understanding of this phenomenon. Because of the shock of the changes in finance , culture and behaviour a sense of insecurity is ushered in the mind of a man and the stupidity blinds his thinking and ends up killing his wife.The wife murderers are not only those who are druggies or those who depended on the wives, some of them are pastor's and some professionals, their actions leaves one wondering what spirit has visited us. What is wrong with us.The murder is not an unintended result of violence that went too far - as most of these murders are well-planned. Furthermore, wife murder cannot be understood in terms of loss of control or local insanity. It is rather a deliberate act which is the result of emotional ripeness that created mental readiness for committing the murder as an act of profound despair that is ready to destroy the other even if this means destroying oneself.Victims always know the result. "There was writing on the wall"It is sad to note that in most cases the victim have been subjected to a prolonged violent treatment. Some have so much into our culture that I cannot embarrass my husband, so they soldier on. Most of those who are killed have been in the abusive relationship for some time. They want to be Zimbabwean woman and try and hope that the man will change. Many women put up a fake picture of what is happening to them in order to have a face. at the end we will all say "There was handwriting on the wall  but I think that even if the writing on the wall wasn't so prominent for the people around, for the family, for friends, the one for whom it was definitely prominent was the victim. The victim ignored and believed that maybe it wasn't what she thought."Although masculine possessiveness as well as jealousy and anger all play a role in the full range of factors that produce a readiness to take the life of a partner, it is more accurate to consider the motive for murder in terms of conditions that are favourable for the development of murderous violence, rather than in terms of one central personality variable. The murders are mostly caused by the man's perception that the woman is his whole world so that he feels that any separation from her entails a loss of his own identity, he feels that there is no other reason for being alive without this woman.The man's traditional perception of masculinity, which dictates that the male has full power, honour, and control, runs counter to his dependency upon his wife, making that reliance appear evidence of his weakness and humiliation, and an affront to masculine honour. Some of these men are lazy and are so used to be fed by these women. When they are thrown out or feel that they will be thrown out, they see the end of their world and they make a fatal decision to kill to avoid humiliation.These men are uncompromising and have a rigid behaviour which can only be controlled if there was pressure or assistance from the extended family. The man's prevailing beliefs about love appear to justify the sacrifice of his wife on the one hand and of persistence on the other. In this case, the ideology behind love provides the legitimacy for terrible crimes. When all the above conditions pertain, the risk of wife murder significantly increases. The specific event that ignites the explosive barrel often revolves around the woman threatening to or actually separating from her partner. Knowing these conditions of risk will enable us to read the writing on the wall, thereby preventing many wife murders.The reasons given by these murderous spouses are often that "I couldn't live, I couldn't function without her.  I believed that I couldn't function if I wasn't with her."In light of the centrality of love in our lives, it is no wonder that cultures all over the world have depicted an ideal form of romantic love towards which all of us are supposedly striving.Zimbabwean men have indeed considered romantic love to be crucial for personal fulfilment and a happy life. However, romantic love is also a major factor in people's misery, as it involves many disappointments and unfulfilled hopes. but love also hurts a lot, can be dangerous, and may lead us to foolish deeds.The biggest problem we have with Zimbabwean is that most do not want to work and view their wives as tools of work. They spent most of their time flirting and themselves harloting around. They then believe that their wives are doing what they are doing. in their idle minds they then plan to kill to show their ultimate power. Most of them commit suicide but many have unfortunately been rescued and they have survived.Needless to say, explaining the men's horrific behaviour as stemming from love is in no way a justification for their actions.Understanding the men's state of mind could prevent future murders; hence, we should examine the real state of mind that leads these men to kill their partners, without worrying about whether our findings are politically correct. The fact that Zimbabweans in Diaspora have no cultural guidance has contributed to these murders. Zimbabwean home grown churches have contributed to the killing of these victims.The church spends time fund raising buying the pastor clothes, cars suits.A woman was killed in 2015 in London because she bought a high quality suit for the pastor and had never bought o sock for the husband.Zimbabwean women in UK have a great madness for hero-worshiping their pastor's to the extent of evoking anger from the husband. Statistics shows that half of the murdered women the problems started from the churches. Pastors have abandoned their roles of promoting family life, they have embarked on the get rich fast.With the loophole and windfall in payment of nurses women became richer than their husband in diaspora, so t6hey start controlling the household thinking. Pastors in their need for money always side with those who are highly paid so that their cars are fuelled and their kitchens are upgraded.There is no spiritual guidance, the closeness of the pastors to the ladies with money has made the men jealous and caused these killings.Whichever way we look at it life abroad has made husband and wife strangers, the wife works 24/7 and the husband thinks she is oiling someone. Sometimes the husband is so tired the wife is not sexually satisfied; she then goes out to fill up the sexual gap. When this is done the cheated husband feels humiliated and lowered and turns to kill the wife.In the name of love, people are ready to use other people; in the name of love, people are ready to be used.In the name of love, women want to leave their male partner, and in the name of love, these men murder them. The woman is the man's whole world and the condition of his existence. If the man's ability to maintain his view of himself as a human being depends on the woman being part of his life, how can he let her go? Thus, love turns the woman into a hostage - a hostage to the man's life - and this puts her own life at risk.The words of many loves songs may beno more than superficial cliches about love, but when these cliches are adopted wholeheartedly with no attention to reality, love becomes a loaded gun.If only women can open up, if you are caught cheating tell someone, a cheated man is unpredictable.The problem with Zimbabwean women in England is they quickly want to behave English. Have friends who are men and go out at will, if your husband is suspecting and you reply in a manner foreign to his culture you have put your leg in a bottle.Vazet2000@yahoo.co.uk
September 9, 2017

Turkeys honey production has steadily increased this century, rising from 61,000 tons of honey annually in 2000 to 106,000 tons. This makes Turkey the second-biggest producer after China.

But this impressive growth is marred by allegations of fake honey that buzz in the sector  revealed both in chemical analysis by the Ministry of Agriculture and suspicious price differences in different brands of honey on supermarket shelves. Good, undiluted honey is relatively expensive around the world, with one of the costliest global honey brands, Manuka Honey from New Zealand, costing around $30 for a 250-gram (8.8-ounce) jar. In Turkey, Anzer honey, whose fans call it the best in the world, can cost as much as 900 Turkish liras a kilo ($120 a pound). The average cost of honey in big market chains is 30-50 liras a kilo (about $4-$6.75 a pound). However, it is also possible to find honey for 10-15 liras a kilo, particularly in open bazaars. According to honey producers and their associations, there is a good chance that these sweet bargains are not real honey at all.

What is fake honey and how is it made? What is the difference between real and fake honey?

Real honey is made by bees that fly from flower to flower, gathering nectar with their long, tube-shaped tongue and storing it in their extra stomach, or "crop." There, the nectar mixes with enzymes that transform its chemical composition and pH. The honey comes from the nectar that bees have collected, regurgitated and dehydrated to enhance its nutritional properties. It is mostly harvested in the fall and most beekeepers leave enough honey in the hives to sustain the bees until spring, when they can fly from flower to flower to make honey again. However, many beekeepers feed sugar or high fructose corn syrup to bees during the winter because it is cheaper.

Some Turkish beekeepers use sugar syrup year-round to feed the bees, including in the spring and summer months, rather than let them collect nectar from flowers. While some beekeepers claim in discussion forums that bees turn sugar syrup into natural honey, this is not the case because the resulting substance lacks nectar, and contains complex sugars that are not present in real honey.

Another method used by dishonest producers simply supplants small doses of honey with huge amounts of glucose, fructose and sugar syrup. The consumers who buy this substance as honey smarten up when the golden liquid that they have bought quickly crystalizes. There is also a lot of fake honey in Turkey produced without any involvement of bees, simply by making a mix of fructose, Selcuk Solmaz, the founder of the FER Bal company known for its organic honey and other bee-related products, told Al-Monitor.

Turkeys flora makes it a good spot for beekeeping and honey. The country has 11,707 plant species, 3,649 of them endemic (not found in other areas), according to an article by Bulent Gozcelioglu, the editor-in-chief of Tubitak Magazine. Yet, chasing profits, some bee-hivers would rather feed their bees with sugar syrup than take hives to flower-rich areas.

Aware that the fake honey is a major problem, Turkeys Ministry of Food and Agriculture keeps a close eye on producers and publishes regular lists on those ignoring food safety, public health and consumer rights. In 2015, the names of 17 fake honey producers were announced. A year later, 12 new companies were added to the list. Ministry sources suspect that some of the companies that are named and shamed reopen under different names.

One way less-than-honest companies mislead the consumer is by using brands that sound like well-known honey types. For example, in 2016, the Agriculture Ministry named and shamed a company that sold fake honey under the name of Enzar Bal. Bal means honey, and the name Enzar is misleadingly close to Anzar, one of the most expensive and well-known types of honey in Turkey. Anzar honey is produced on high plateaus about 35 kilometers (22 miles) south of the Ikizdere district of Rize. Enzar Bal, produced by a company in Van in the east of Turkey, has nothing to do with Anzar. The Agriculture Ministry shows that the fake honey under this name has a high percentage of glucose and complex sugars.

Fake honey-makers also market their products through televised sales, where the presenter appears on-screen with a jar of what looks like honey, says the honey is 100 liras per kilo but that people who can call in before the stock is exhausted can get 5 kilos for the same amount  plus a pair of boots. Some tele-shoppers who took up the offer later placed videos on YouTube complaining that the honey was either fake or came in smaller amounts than promised. Faced with consumer complaints, the Turkish government banned televised sales of honey in 2015.

Companies with solid reputations and international business bitterly complain about the fake honey-makers and express fears that the honey fraud will destroy the reputation of Turkish honey  not to mention their exports. Ozen Altiparmak, the CEO of the Balparmak company, said 85% of honey in the markets is fake. Just because you are getting honey from a village does not mean it is real. The beekeepers in villages are just as inclined to put sugar syrup in front of the bees as some of the companies, he said. This is done because feeding the bees with sugar syrup enables the whole honey-making process to be shorter. Sometimes, they also add paraffin honeycombs to give the sense of authenticity.

Solmaz said the safest bet is to buy honey from major groceries as 99% of the products youll find in the supermarket chains will be reliable because the government controls are very strict. He added, Both the ministry and the markets carry out their own analysis. The consumers should also check whether there is a registration number of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture. He acknowledged that there still would be fakes, noting, Given that there are counterfeit products all around  even fake money  how could you expect that there would be no fake honey?

The Union of Bee Cultivators seeks to persuade both fellow beekeepers and possible buyers that Turkish honey is reputable in general. The association also wants to underline the great variety of Turkish honey products, raw and refined, from lavender honey to acacia honey to pine honey, not to mention bee pollen. Turkey is the worlds largest producer of pine honey with 92% of global production. Pine honey is produced mostly in Turkey's western Mediterranean and southern Aegean regions.

We want to maintain the reputation of Turkish honey, said Ziya Sahin, the chairman of the Turkish Beekeepers Union. We would like the World Beekeeping Congress  which will be held in Istanbul between Sept. 29 and Oct. 4  to be an opportunity to showcase the wide variety of honey produced in Turkey.

Producers say Turkish honey exports could increase if the varous brands of honey in Turkey are better promoted. Semsi Bayraktar, the president of the Union of Chambers of Agriculture of Turkey, said the global honey export market is worth $2.2 billion, but that Turkey has only a 1.1% share.
Alabama's attorney general issued a warning Saturday night to those who might exploit the ongoing bad weather for illegal profit.

Attorney General Steve Marshall stated that Alabama's price gouging law, which was activated by Governor Kay Ivey in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey, remains in effect under the threat of Hurricane Irma.

Ivey declared a State of Emergency ahead of Hurricane Irma on Sept. 8, according to Marshall's statement. That storm is anticipated to affect Alabama by the end of the weekend and into early next week, according to the statement.

In her declaration, Governor Ivey cited her previous emergency proclamations of August 30, 2017, September 1, 2017, and September 6, 2017, including notice that the imposition of unconscionable prices - or "price gouging" - during the State of Emergency is unlawful, the attorney general noted.

Citizens should be cautious of those who would prey upon them through crimes such as price gouging and home repair fraud, Marshall stated. He also warned that anyone who seeks to take advantage of the public will be held accountable.

Marshall explained the law in his statement:

"Alabama's price gouging law comes into effect when the Governor declares a State of Emergency, and it prohibits the "unconscionable pricing" of items for sale or rent. Although what constitutes an unconscionable price is not specifically set forth in state law, a price that is 25 percent or more above the average price charged in the same area within the last 30 days--unless the increase can be attributed to a reasonable cost-- is a prima facie case of unconscionable pricing. The penalty is a fine of up to $1,000 per violation, and those determined to have willfully and continuously violated this law may be prohibited from doing business in Alabama."

Consumers and officials can report any problems of alleged fraud or illegal price gouging to the Attorney General's Office of Consumer Protection by calling toll-free 1-800-392-5658, visiting the Attorney General's website or by writing to 501 Washington Avenue, Montgomery, Alabama, 36130.
Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey on Saturday night authorized activation of the State Emergency Operations Center in Clanton and the Alabama National Guard due to the potential impact of Hurricane Irma and the state's role in supporting additional neighboring state evacuees, according to a statement from the governor.

Ivey made the decision in the wake of the National Weather Service issuing a Tropical Storm Warning for several southeastern Alabama counties and a Tropical Storm Watch for several counties in eastern Alabama.

The governor will meet with emergency coordinators prior to holding a press conference at 1 p.m. Sunday with Alabama Emergency Management Director Brian Hastings, Acting Meteorologist-in-Charge at the National Weather Service in Birmingham and other members of the Emergency Operations Team.

"We have been watching Hurricane Irma very closely since it first formed in the Atlantic and as it continues to track further west," Ivey stated. "On Friday, I issued a State of Emergency and activated our State Emergency Operations Plan, we now feel it necessary to activate the State Emergency Operations Center to a Level One and activate members of the Alabama National Guard."

"I want to ensure that our people are in place to respond immediately to whatever Irma may bring our way," Ivey stated. "We are ready to protect the people of Alabama and those who have recently sought refuge in our state."

A level one activation requires an extensive state response, providing support to local governments where local resources may be overwhelmed, according to the statement. This level of activation ensures the SEOC is fully staffed for 24 hour operations by the command staff and the following sections: operations, planning, logistics and finance/administration.

"We have been tracking the path of Hurricane Irma for several days. As the track started to shift more westward and pose a greater threat to Alabama, we have in turn adjusted the necessary staff and resources to ensure the greatest level of preparedness," Alabama EMA Director Brian Hastings said. "In Alabama, our primary threat continues to be the potential for damaging winds and likely power outages and down trees."

Adjutant General Sheryl E. Gordon also said "The Alabama National Guard continues to monitor Hurricane Irma and the evolving weather situation."

"We are taking all prudent steps to plan and posture forces and resources to support the Governor and the Alabama Emergency Management Agency in advance of the possible storm effects on the State of Alabama," Gordon stated. "Providing defense support to civilian authorities is a core mission for the Alabama National Guard. Our Soldiers and Airman are highly trained, well equipped and ready to respond to assist our fellow citizens in Alabama."

According to the statement the Alabama National Guard is also in direct contact with the National Guards of impacted or potentially impacted states to coordinate response efforts if necessary. "Alabama stands ready to assist the State of Florida and other affected states as the current weather situation develops," according to the statement.

The SEOC will remain activated at level one until the threat for Hurricane Irma diminishes. For the latest information on Alabama preparedness events of resources available to Hurricane Irma evacuees you can visit the governor's website.
With the changing forecast of Hurricane Irma, some Alabama schools are delaying school.

College campuses announcing closures (List will be updated):

Alabama Aviation College in Andalusia

Alabama Aviation College in Ozark

Alabama State University

Auburn University

Enterprise State Community College

Oakwood University

Snead State Community College in Boaz

Troy University

University of Alabama in Huntsville (UAH)

University of Montevallo

Wallace Community College

K-12 school system closures (

List will be updated

):
Boutwell Auditorium is the central drop-off location for hurricane relief efforts in Birmingham, according to Mayor William Bell's office.

Donated supplies, canned goods and bottled water can be dropped off at Boutwell Auditorium beginning Monday, Sept. 11 and continuing throughout the week, each day from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.

There is a special need for school supplies and diapers.

The response so far has been "phenomenal," said April Odom, public affairs director for the mayor's office.

"So far, Birmingham has collected and shipped 12 trailers full of supplies to Texas and Louisiana, with another eight trailers being held for an immediate response for Florida," she said.

"Mayor Bell has spoken to mayors in Southeast Texas, Louisiana and Florida, and we stand ready to help in every way possible."

The public can spread the word about donations by using the #bhmcares hashtag.
Records show that Alabama's school superintendent did not add high-level positions to the bottom line as some board members have alleged.

The records, obtained through a public records request, show staffing for high-level positions is actually lower than that under former state superintendent Tommy Bice.

The issue has been raised amid a move to fire state superintendent Michael Sentance, possibly as soon as the Sept. 14 meeting.

Board member Mary Scott Hunter, R-Huntsville, said the perception about the number of high-level hires Sentance has made is "inaccurate," and added, "There have been a few hires and changes but they've allowed people to retire, or people have left."

Management positions in the upper ranks of the department, called "at-will" positions, are not a part of the state personnel merit system. As such, they constitute the vast majority of high-salaried positions.

Under Bice, there were 40 at-will positions totaling $5.2 million in salaries, including Bice's $271,000 annual pay.

Under Sentance, there are 37 at-will positions totaling $4.9 million in salaries, including Sentance's $219,000 annual pay.

Three of those positions are occupied on an interim basis, as a hiring freeze was put in place department-wide last April after Chief Education Financial Officer Andy Craig warned Sentance the department could be on a path to financial deterioration unless adjustments were made and also laid out recommendations to remedy it.

Craig's recommendations were all related to personnel and came after a series of meetings in March where board members began voicing their concerns.

At the regular board meeting in March, Sentance promoted three employees, enacting raises totaling $76,000 for all three.

Deputy Superintendent Dr. Jeff Langham was promoted from Assistant Superintendent, and his annual pay rose from $153,000 to $169,000.

Assistant Superintendent Dr. Shanthia Washington was promoted from a Director position where she earned $135,000. Her salary is now $153,000.

Assistant Superintendent Dr. Tony Thacker was promoted from a Coordinator position where he earned $113,000. His salary rose to $153,000.

Sentance hired Dr. Jermall Wright at a starting salary of $169,000 to head a newly-created Office of School Improvement which will focus on turning around Alabama's chronically low-performing schools and systems. Wright has been integrally involved in the Montgomery schools intervention.

Those personnel changes came a day after the board vented concerns with Sentance over his proposal to reorganize the department. Sentance then scrapped his initial proposal and incorporated input from board members into the final organizational chart.

Sentance told AL.com he implemented a hiring freeze at the department immediately following Craig's recommendations and has not created any new positions since then.

Craig, whose annual salary is $191,000, told the board in August the department of education could be facing an $8 million budget deficit for the coming year and much of that expense is connected to personnel.

Hunter said budget problems have existed in the department since before Sentance became superintendent in September 2016.

AL.com has requested budget documents from previous years from the department but has not yet received them.

"It is misinformation to blame this on Mr. Sentance. That's just not accurate," Hunter said. "He inherited a problem that is at least six years old."

Board Vice President Stephanie Bell, R-Montgomery, has been vocal about her concerns, asking questions about those hires and defending a hiring freeze the board implemented in June for department hires related to the Montgomery County school district intervention.

In an email to AL.com about the projected deficit, Bell said, "The board's hiring freeze, which has not been lifted, was done as a direct response to information board members received regarding insufficient financial resources available to cover the number of new staff positions Mr. Sentance was approving at the state department and in the Montgomery Public Schools intervention."

Sentance took office in September 2016 and made three hires last November: former Madison City superintendent Dr. Dee Fowler as Chief of Staff at a salary of $206,000, former Tuscaloosa County teacher Chasidy White as Director of Strategic Initiatives at a salary of $113,000, and former Huntsville City deputy superintendent Dr. Barbara Cooper as Director of Teaching and Learning at a salary of $177,000.

Two Deputy Superintendents, Sherrill Parris and Dr. Melinda Maddox, with annual salaries of $191,000 and $169,000, respectively, retired in the months following Bice's March 2016 retirement.

Deputy Superintendent over Career and Technical Education Dr. Philip Cleveland retired in July where he earned $169,000. Director of the Office of Learning Support Linda Felton-Smith, whose salary was $135,000, retired in June.

Both Cleveland and Felton-Smith were still employed when board members began asking questions last spring, though Cleveland had announced his resignation in February after a disagreement with Sentance over the direction of Career and Technical Education.

The document below depicts the salaries and number of at-will employees under Sentance's and under Bice's administrations.

Alabama Department of Education position comparison with salaries by Trisha Powell Crain on Scribd

After the Aug. 23 board work session, Craig told reporters he expected to bring the fiscal year 2018 department budget back to the board for a vote. Though the new fiscal year starts on Oct. 1, there is no mention of the 2018 department budget on either the meeting or work session agendas.

Board member Hunter isn't putting the blame for the projected deficit on Sentance. "I don't think he's ballooned the budget beyond what it was before," she said. "I just think the budget had grown before him, and it suddenly became his problem to fix."

An item labeled "Superintendent's Contract" is on the Sept. 14 meeting agenda. Gov. Kay Ivey, who serves as president of the board of education by virtue of her position, said previously she plans to attend the meeting.

Sentance officially began working as Alabama's superintendent on Sept. 9, 2016.
This morning Hurricane Irma made landfall in the United States, as the storm's 130 mph winds battered Florida and the eye of the storm approached the Florida Keys.

The storm brings with it tornado warnings, flooding and power outages for Florida residents as it churns northward.

Much of Alabama lies in the storm's path.

Gov. Kay Ivey will hold a press conference today at 1 p.m. to discuss the state's preparation for the storm.

Latest projections from the National Hurricane Center show Irma beginning to affect Alabama late today and into early Monday morning, with high winds and heavy rain possible through Tuesday morning.

Ivey will be joined at the press conference by Alabama Emergency Management Director Brian Hastings, Acting Meterologist-in-Charge at the National Weather Service in Birmingham, and other members of the state Emergency Operations Team.

Last night, Ivey activated the Alabama National Guard and put the State Emergency Operations Center on its highest alert. She declared a state of emergency on Sept. 8 ahead of the storm.

Evacuees coming into Alabama escaping Irma can call 211 for information and assistance.

Alabama EMA has a list of shelters for Florida residents feeling the storm, and livestock shelters.

As of Saturday afternoon, about 100 evacuees had registered at one of the largest shelters, the Acadome in Montgomery. According to Birmingham Mayor William Bell's press office, the Bill Harris Arena will open in Birmingham as a shelter once shelters further south (including the Acadome) are 2/3 full.

There is a listing of hotels offering emergency accommodations here.

Beginning Monday, Boutwell Auditorium in Birmingham will be a drop-off location for donated supplies, canned goods and bottled water.

Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall warned yesterday that Alabama's price gouging law remains in effect, prohibiting high prices for goods and services and imposing fines on those who raise prices in order to profit from the storm.
A Fort Payne lawyer has written a new book about one of the most infamous trials in Alabama history.

Robert French Jr. released his book, Beaten, Battered, and Damned: The Drano Murder Trial last month. The book focuses on the trial of Judith Ann Neelley-- who was later convicted with her husband Alvin in the 1982 slaying of 13-year-old Lisa Ann Millican.

According to French's website, the book describes "the dedication of a lawyer embroiled in a horrible case where he despised his client and she hated him."

"I certainly didn't care for her as you will see," French said on the website.

According to court records, in September 1982 Neelley kidnapped Lisa from the Riverbend Mall in Rome, Georgia, and took her to a motel room for her husband Alvin to rape. Over the next several days, Alvin raped Lisa four times, with Neelley assisting as needed by beating Lisa and handcuffing her to the bed to prevent an escape. When the couple was done, Neelley took Lisa to Little River Canyon outside Fort Payne, where Neelley injected Lisa six times with the liquid drain cleaner Drano in a botched attempt to kill her. When that didn't work, Neelley led Lisa to the rim of the gorge and-- over Lisa's pleas to go home-- shot Lisa in the back and shoved her into the canyon.

Records show Neelley claimed her husband forced her to help, but police said there was no evidence her husband was there when Lisa was killed.

A jury recommended Neelley serve a sentence of life imprisonment without parole, but the judge instead imposed a death sentence. In 1999, as then-Alabama Gov. Fob James was leaving office, he commuted Neelley's death sentence to a life sentence.

Over the years, Neelley has been involved in legal battles relating to whether she can ever be eligible for parole. In January, the U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Neelley can proceed with her lawsuit challenging the 2003 law, which aimed at retroactively preventing her parole. The decision reversed U.S. District Court Judge Keith Watkins' earlier ruling that said Neelley's 2014 lawsuit challenging that law -- Act 2003-300 -- was filed too late under the statute of limitations.

"This is a true account of a lawyer's defense of one of America's worst crime sprees. ...the state's evidence was overwhelming. The defense had only the wives and who knew what they would say? Their stories of the cruelty and meanness of Alvin Neelley were international news in their savagery," the book summary states.

Barry Ragsdale has represented Neelley on and off since 1989, and was her lawyer in 1999.

Alvin Neelley was convicted in the death of a woman in Georgia and died while in prison there in 2005.

Beaten, Battered, and Damned: The Drano Murder Trial is available on Amazon.